Comments on: Gates Starts Huge Acquisition Shift; Congress Wary

By: Charles Phillips

Charles Phillips — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 19:38:29 +0000

The F-22 decision is troubling since our fighter (and bomber, and tanker) fleet is so old. We need to replace aircraft and the F-35 will do that (primarily) in the NEXT Administration. I would be happy to see more F-15E production (the F-15 is still in production for South Korea) just to give us some airframes with reasonable hours.

By: rbrenzelsr

rbrenzelsr — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 15:08:34 +0000

All right, Gates knows the future. There will be no need for 5th generation. He will build "new", "cheap" single purpose aircraft in large quantities (down the road). Our sons and daughters will become cannon fodder in the air, a la WW I and WW II. If they encounter Russian or Chinese 5th Gen's, "Gates" will be a cuss word like Johnson (SecDef after WW II) by 6 weeks and go infantryman, without good anti-tank weapon or training of Korea and Stansfield Turner who de-huminted the CIA under Carter fame.

By: Schlappy

Schlappy — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 14:28:53 +0000

F-22 production will stop at 187? …lol, good luck!!!

By: Recon-Tean

Recon-Tean — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 13:19:25 +0000

I agree B. In a time of war (or peace even) this is unacceptable, and puts our soldiers in needless danger.

By: B

Thu, 09 Apr 2009 12:50:10 +0000

I find it odd that everyone is harping what a great change this is. The only real change is the historical decrease as a portion of GDP. I think this will put US defense spending at around 3.5% of GDP (depending on the final GDP numbers for 10) which is almost at the 45 year low of 3% in 2000.

By: bobbymike

bobbymike — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 20:51:00 +0000

If the federal government was freezing or reducing spending FOR THE ENTIRE FEDERAL BUDGET the importance of making tactical and strategic weapons “choices” would be important and we could debate Gate’s proposal accordingly.

Why does only defense get cut? When the Dems passed the $800 billion of stimulas would it have been hard — if you really were concerned about national security that is — to pass a $750 billion stimulas and give $50 billion to the DOD? The Dems also increased non-defense discretionary spending by 9% (this is in addition to the stimulas money) You would think they don’t take the “Provide for the Common Defense” part of the Constitution seriously.

By: DensityDuck

DensityDuck — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 16:59:24 +0000

TB: Not all contractors are the same flavor…and, as loggie20 says, moving people from Aerospace Corporation to DoD isn’t going to solve any problems.

By: Recon-Team

Recon-Team — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 13:50:28 +0000

Yet TB, if we don’t start development of new vehicles like the FCS series now, we will never get to them. We can’t keep upgrading old designs forever.

By: loggie20

loggie20 — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 13:02:02 +0000

Moving work to civil servants under the watered down NSPS is rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. There is no performance ℗ in DoD.

Congress and their PAC bagmen decide “army” to “raise”, nothing to do with mission nor threats nor whether the stuff works to either.

By: TB

TB — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 02:30:10 +0000

Funny how Murtha blames the DoD for its past problems, but reminds us all that its his job to write the checks. Gates will go down in the history books if he can enact half of what he proposed today. There is an absolute fortune to be lost by the contractors and they make sure Congress doesn’t take these matters lying down.

Moving the acquisition and support forces from contractors to civil servants will be a big help in the long run. Since the war started, the wolves have been watching over the herd and oversight has been a pipe dream.

The spinouts of FCS that Gates wants to keep are the smaller techs that troops are actually using and putting to great use. The FCS fleet was probably too ambitious (like most programs) and would have taken a decade or more to see results.