Expansive strategic guidance documents written to justify and validate U.S. militarism and the permanent war economy only hamper U.S. military readiness because their authors suggest that the United States pursue global military primacy forever, at all costs – even if most major defense acquisition programs are over cost and behind schedule. This vision is neither strategic nor sustainable as it undergirds an egregious and ever-growing military budget. Even with a near trillion dollar Pentagon base budget, the military leaves servicemembers with equipment that doesn’t work, while padding record-breaking profit margins for military contractors.
The United States’ civilian and uniformed military leaders have created a budgetary time bomb set to explode in the next twenty years. Over the past several years, the military services have committed to a slew of new big-ticket weapon programs now in development. As these programs mature and enter production, national security spending is expected to increase to cover the costs. With weapons growing increasingly more technically complex, the ownership costs to maintain them over the long run could make an already challenging fiscal situation even worse.
The Navy has had two major shipbuilding failures so far this century with another program delivered years late and billions over budget —
Zumwalt -class destroyer and Littoral Combat Ship programs were failures. Billions flushed down the toilet.
Aircraft programs will present the greatest budgetary and schedule challenges in the coming bow wave of military spending. The F-35 program is the most expensive weapon program in history. And when it isn’t regressing, the program continues to lmp forward by inches. Despite nearly 23 years of development, the F-35 still requires years of further design work. The original estimates Air Force leaders used to sell the program show just how much the entire enterprise has slipped. The government expected the F-35’s design to be completed in July 2005. When announcing Lockheed Martin as the winner of the contract, then-Air Force Secretary Jim Roche said each F-35 would cost between $40 and $50 million. The cost of one Air Force F-35A variant in 2025 will be more than $116 million.*
The program has a 30% full mission capable rate, meaning that less than a third of all F-35s can perform all their assigned missions at any given time. That means that less than one in three of the most expensive weapons in history can actually do their job when deployed.
The Army has also dealt with its share of failed acquisition programs since the turn of the century. The service spent at least $8 billion attempting to develop the Future Combat System
The defense industry failed to deliver on its promises for the Future Combat System and Army leaders canceled the program with little to show for the time and resources devoted to the effort. The RAND Corporation criticized the ambitious program for its “overreliance on assumptions.”
The Navy has two new shipbuilding programs in development with the Constellation-class frigate and the Columbia-class ballistic missile submarine. The Air Force is developing the B-21 Raider strategic bomber, the Next Generation Air Dominance fighter jet program, the Sentinel nuclear missile program, and most recently, a stealth aerial refueler tanker aircraft. The Air Force, Marine Corps, and Navy will also continue to sink money into the troubled F-35 program for the foreseeable future. The Army will be buying the V-280 Valor tiltrotor aircraft to replace the Blackhawk helicopter, the XM-30 Mechanized Infantry Combat Vehicle, and the M-10 Booker Combat Vehicle among other land systems. All the services have plans for new satellites, autonomous weapons, communications networks, and investments in cyber capabilities.
Most of these programs are already years behind schedule and over budget, often by billions of dollars.
The increase cost US weapon systems means a smaller force.
2000:2,688 combat aircraft
Today:1,473 combat aircraft many which are the faulty F-35
2000: 318 active ships
Today:238 active ships
The military with the exception of the Marine Corp is having difficulty finding enough bodies to fill the ranks.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/17/us/marines-army-recruits.html
As the other large military branches fall short of their goals despite offering signing bonuses and other incentives, the Marine Corps easily fills its ranks on swagger alone
These are dark days for military recruiting.
The Army, Navy and Air Force have tried almost everything in their power to bring in new people. They’ve relaxed enlistment standards, set up remedial schools for recruits who can’t pass entry tests, and offered signing bonuses worth up to $75,000. Still, this year the three services together fell short by more than 25,000 recruits.
recruiting standards to make its numbers.
The U.S. military estimates that there are 412,000 Americans aged 17-24 who are qualified and willing to join the military. That’s not enough to replace all the troops who are retiring or simply leaving the military.
Another strategy was to stay in touch with those who left before they were eligible, after 20 years, for retirement with a pension. Some believe that returning to the military, even if only for a few more years, was not a bad idea. The military encouraged that by restoring the rank and pay the returnee had when they left. At the moment, all this is less effective because the military, particularly the army, is undergoing a period of mandatory political indoctrination. This discourages males from joining or rejoining the army.
And the US may have to take Germany’s up failed Ukraine promise.
Germany has domestic problems that need attention.
