The Army Times writes about a GAO report on how expensive it will be to keep two additional brigades in Europe. Two Billion Dollars!!!
Oh my god!!! Billions wasted!!! Two Billion over 10 years!!! Wait, up to $2 Billion? And spread over 10 years? For a military that's going to spend something between $5 Trillion and $10 Trillion. What's the big deal?GAO: Brigades in Europe cost billions
By Jim Tice - Staff writerThe GAO report, issued Sept. 13, comes two months in advance of a NATO summit in Lisbon, Portugal, and an assessment of a U.S. Army Europe basing plan proposed by the Pentagon in February as part of the 2010 Quadrennial Defense Review.
Posted : Wednesday Sep 29, 2010 18:24:24 EDT
The QDR proposal calls for four units to stay in Europe for the long term: The 170th and 172nd Infantry Brigade Combat Teams and the 2nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team would remain in Germany; the fourth unit, the 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team, would remain in northern Italy.
The big deal is that many in the US don't want troops stationed over seas and it's much more convenient to say 'we want to save $2 Billion dollars' then it is to say 'we don't want our troops contaminated by foreigners'. Because the second part sounds xenophobic. I don't have a problem with these troops staying there. In fact I think they are needed.
One of the ongoing problems in Iraq and Afghanistan is the inability of our Armed Forces to deal with civilians. Especially foreign ones that don't speak our language. Part of the problem is that many Army and Marine bases are in rural areas. And the 'garrison routine' is as much about filling the average soldier and Marines potential free time as it is about preparing them for war. This effectively limits the amount of free time the average soldier and Marine can spend out among civilians. Then you combine that with fewer permanent overseas duty stations, where they will be exposed to foreign civilians. If you don't know how to deal with civilians in the first place, even US civilians, then don't know how to deal with ones who don't speak English when you're in a foreign country, how are you supposed to deal with them properly when there are people running around trying to kill you?
And there is another upside to stationing a larger group of soldiers in Europe versus the previously planned reduction. You're able to directly train with European allies. This means you are familiar with them when you have to fight along side them like we are in Afghanistan. Likewise they become familiar with you.
I don't see a problem with stationing troops overseas. In the year I spent on Okinawa the biggest problem problem I had wasn't the locals or the island itself. It was other, higher ranking, Marines who where miserable to be there and decided that the experience should be as miserable for everyone else as it was for them.
To me the post below it had written about too close relations of US military and foreign civilian. They both play by the same rules: what's wrong with murder of unpleasant stranger in Afghanistan? Do you want to deal with civilians? OK, you shall have your wish. You get the civil manners, the civil crimes and civil army: shopkeepers with guns and MQ-9.
ReplyDeleteWar army should be an elite of society. It is incompatible with counting percent's parts of the budget and single positions, like optimization of janitors.
The US Military already sees itself as an 'elite society'. They see themselves as a force that fights other forces like themselves on an open battlefield. That might have worked 100 years ago, but over the past 50 years combat and most other military operations happen in populated areas. If not in heavily populated urban areas.
ReplyDeletePart of this has to do with an every expanding world population, increased urbanization and enemies who don't see any advantage to 'fighting fairly' on open ground. You have to learn how to deal with civilian to effectively fight on the battlefields of the 21st Century.
And I'm pretty sure you totally missed the point of my post.
And I think that you are trying to use military force in the wrong places. The less deals with civilians is the better. Do you think differently?
ReplyDeleteOK, one small example. Did you like in Okinawa? However, easy to google that Japanese people are periodically protesting against US military bases. So what's your deal with civilians: pain in their necks?
So you should look around. Even the allied forces is an irritant. There are many models of fighting in urban areas: Palestine, Chechnya, Iraq. And anyway military operations couldn't finish the confrontation, it's resumed time and again.
P.S. The US Military already sees itself as an 'elite society' - it's funny. Superior the 'Ivy League'-educated, Wall Streeters, etc...
On a planet with 6.5 Billion people how are you going to fight wars avoiding civilians. You can't just go out around them. And the enemy doesn't try to. I'm not sure what you don't understand about this? And there is no such thing as 'military victory'. Any kind of lasting, or even temporary victory is political in nature.
ReplyDeleteAs for the locals on Okinawa, I never actually witnessed any protests. And I never had any problems with the locals when I went off base.
You're talking about an unsolvable problem (at this time). Existing solutions (private security companies, blockade, strikes, bases) is below par. Common GI can't solve it moreover.
ReplyDeleteI was talking about military victories which was the foundation of the legal state: East and West Germany and Japan after WW2, Vietnam postwar, etc. Military forces have occupied enemy territory and left by the wayside.
P.S. http://www.google.com/images?q=Okinawa+protests+bases