Sequestration: Don’t Believe All The Hype

Sequestration: Don’t Believe All The Hype
Sequestration: Don’t Believe All The Hype

Bob Hale regularly demonstrated his better qualities during testimony before Congress, delivering highly complex facts and judgments about the Defense Department’s spending and budgets to the public with a knowing humor delivered with the sort of gravelly voice you’d expect from one of those old country lawyers.  Hale served as DoD comptroller from 2009 to 2014, and, before…

Army Budget Boss: Threats, Uncertainty Reign

Army Budget Boss: Threats, Uncertainty Reign
Army Budget Boss: Threats, Uncertainty Reign

ARLINGTON: No one knows what the 2016 budget is really going to be. In fact, no one can even plan properly for what it might be, the highest-ranking budgeteer in Army uniform made clear this morning. The uncertainty is coming at the Pentagon from two sides at the same time. On the demand side, there’s…

Why America Got The Sequester It Deserves

Generals, admirals, members of Congress, captains of industry, and two Defense Secretaries in a row have been pounding the drums for nearly two years on the dangers of sequestration. So far, it appears hardly anyone is listening outside the Beltway — or even on Capitol Hill. What is appalling is “the lack of engagement by…

Sequestration Cuts Leave Army With Only 2 Brigades Ready To Fight: CSA Odierno

Sequestration Cuts Leave Army With Only 2 Brigades Ready To Fight: CSA Odierno
Sequestration Cuts Leave Army With Only 2 Brigades Ready To Fight: CSA Odierno

UPDATE: Odierno Clarifies. It May Be Three Brigades WASHINGTON: The Army has had to cancel so much training that only two of its 42 combat brigades are ready for combat, Chief of Staff Gen. Ray Odierno told reporters at the Association of the US Army conference here today. It’ll take until June to get a…

AUSA, Biggest Defense Conference, Thrives Despite Shutdown, Sequester & CR

AUSA, Biggest Defense Conference, Thrives Despite Shutdown, Sequester & CR
AUSA, Biggest Defense Conference, Thrives Despite Shutdown, Sequester & CR

[UPDATED 2:15 pm]WASHINGTON: Between sequestration, shutdown, and the Continuing Resolution, it’s been a brutal year for the federal government, especially the Army. Alongside training, maintenance, and morale, most of the service’s conferences have been hammered: “I’m surprised any of us is here,” Army Secretary John McHugh said this morning in his opening remarks to the…

Pentagon Memos Detail Government Shutdown Plans

Pentagon Memos Detail Government Shutdown Plans
Pentagon Memos Detail Government Shutdown Plans

How will the Defense Department handle the all-but-inevitable government shutdown on October 1st? In a few minutes, Pentagon comptroller Robert Hale will lay out the answers for the media — and for hundreds of thousands of anxious civil service employees, many of whom will be watching via webcast. What he’ll be briefing people on is…

Navy To HASC: We’re About To Sign Sub Deals We Can’t Pay For

Navy To HASC: We’re About To Sign Sub Deals We Can’t Pay For
Navy To HASC: We’re About To Sign Sub Deals We Can’t Pay For

CAPITOL HILL: The United States Navy is negotiating to buy 10 nuclear submarines that it probably can’t pay for. But the service is going ahead regardless, counting on the Pentagon and Congress to make up the money as long as the budget cuts known as sequestration continue. The sequester doesn’t mean the Navy can’t afford…

Hagel’s Strategic Review Falls Short; Make Hard Choices Now

Hagel’s Strategic Review Falls Short; Make Hard Choices Now
Hagel’s Strategic Review Falls Short; Make Hard Choices Now

When you add up the defense budget shortfalls for the next few years, it quickly becomes clear Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel’s recent Strategic Choices and Management Review (SCMR) looks to become just what he did not want: actions he will have to implement instead of a menu of options. Pentagon leaders must now consider most if…

Will Sequester Scuttle Navy’s Surface Ship Comeback?

Will Sequester Scuttle Navy’s Surface Ship Comeback?
Will Sequester Scuttle Navy’s Surface Ship Comeback?

CAPITOL HILL: Just when the Navy’s surface fleet had started pulling itself out of a 10-year, $2 billion hole, budget dysfunction may kick it right back in. We’ve written a great deal about the damage done to all four armed services by the automatic budget cuts known as sequestration. But what is happening to the…

Fewer Ships At Sea, Fewer Missions, Less Training: CNO’s Sequestration Damage List

Fewer Ships At Sea, Fewer Missions, Less Training: CNO’s Sequestration Damage List
Fewer Ships At Sea, Fewer Missions, Less Training: CNO’s Sequestration Damage List

PENTAGON: The Navy has 10 fewer ships worldwide compared to just a few months ago. It has no warships at all off South America to help combat the drug trade. And training cutbacks will force many units to specialize in a sub-set of their assigned missions instead of getting ready for the full range of…

Grounded Air Force Jets Take Off Again – But Training Budget Still Up In The Air

Grounded Air Force Jets Take Off Again – But Training Budget Still Up In The Air
Grounded Air Force Jets Take Off Again – But Training Budget Still Up In The Air

Today, the US Air Force announced that squadrons grounded since April, from combat units to the famous Thunderbirds, had the funding to fly again – for now. Congress had given the service permission to move some $423 million from other programs into the training budget, enough to keep planes flying until October 1st, when the…

Hagel, Dempsey Beg Appropriators For Sequestration Wiggle Room

Hagel, Dempsey Beg Appropriators For Sequestration Wiggle Room
Hagel, Dempsey Beg Appropriators For Sequestration Wiggle Room

CAPITOL HILL: Even amidst the furor over sexual assault and NSA leaker Edward Snowden, the budget cuts known as the sequester dominated this morning’s discussion before the Senate Appropriations Committee. Testifying before SAC’s subcommittee on defense, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and Joint Chiefs chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey both pleaded for, in Hagel’s words, “time and flexibility.” The…

HASC Finds $5 Billion Fix For Sequester Damage, But It Won’t Matter

HASC Finds $5 Billion Fix For Sequester Damage, But It Won’t Matter
HASC Finds $5 Billion Fix For Sequester Damage, But It Won’t Matter

CAPITOL HILL: Like water rushing downhill, flowing over or around or through every obstacle in its path, money in Washington will find a way. Today’s example is the newly released House Armed Services Committee’s “mark up” of the 2014 national defense authorization act. Striving to address shortfalls in military readiness created by this year’s hasty…

Sequester Means $1 Billion More Of Cocaine Floods Into US: Coast Guard

Sequester Means $1 Billion More Of Cocaine Floods Into US: Coast Guard
Sequester Means $1 Billion More Of Cocaine Floods Into US: Coast Guard

[Corrected drug submersible range] WASHINGTON: The automatic, across-the-board spending cuts known as sequestration will reduce the Coast Guard and Navy forces available to intercept South American cocaine to record lows, said Rear Adm. Charles Michel, the Coast Guard two-star who commands Joint Interagency Task Force-South (JIATF-South). The result? “The sequestration cuts in aircraft and ships…