Chairman of Joint Chiefs Says Doomsday Cut Would 'Break' Military
Published: September 22, 2011
Washington: The outgoing Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff pulled no punches during his last week on the job, saying today that the across-the-board defense cuts under the so-called "doomsday" scenario will break the military.
For the first time, Adm. Mike Mullen said this afternoon that if the Super Committee set up by the White House is forced to cut any more from national security coffers, the military simply would not survive.
"If you took a trillion dollars out of defense right now, that would break us," Mullen said during a speech to defense industry leaders in Washington today. So far, the Obama administration has committed to cuts of $450 billion over the next 10 years, including $315 billion mandated by the Budget Control Act that Congress passed in July to avert a national default. Add the $500 billion that would be automatically cut should the Super Committee fail to come up with a plan to cut $1.2 trillion and you get close to $1 trillion.
Mullen and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta expressed their concern about deeper cuts to defense spending to the Senate Armed Services Committee earlier today.
Widespread reductions beyond the $450 billion already committed to by the Obama administration over the next decade would cause "catastrophic damage to military and ability to protect this country," Panetta told the panel.
At the morning hearing, Mullen was more subdued in his remarks, noting the threat of going past $315 billion "has forced us to look into the abyss" in terms of what could happen if the doomsday scenario did happen.
Jacob Lew, director of the Office of Budget and Management, echoed that same sentiment in a Sept. 15 letter to House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon.
In the letter, Lew said that if defense funding is cut further, the department "would almost certainly be forced to furlough large numbers of its civilian workers, training would have to be curtailed, the force reduced and purchases of weapons would have to be cut dramatically."
And with a Pentagon trying to rebuild from over 10 years of constant combat, those types of reductions will almost certainly shatter the force, Mullen reiterated during his speech today.
Lawmakers have until this October to submit their recommendations for national security spending cuts to the Super Committee. The bipartisan congressional panel will then have to come up with nearly $1.2 trillion in savings across the government, including DoD.
If the Super Committee cannot hit that $1.2 trillion goal, it will force the White House to trigger an automatic, across-the-board cut to national security spending, which is known as the "doomsday" scenario on the Hill, which some have estimated could hit near between $600 billion and $1 trillion over the next decade.
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Here is another example of some of the "career" officers in the military today. We have always had them~~those whose career was more important than Duty, Honor and Country. How "Moon" Mullen ever got to be an Admiral in the first place is amazing. Political pull, I guess. Much like Wes Clarke, #1 academically at West Point, and pure politics from then on!
But, the people of the United States are just as much to blame for having put an incompetent, arrogant, unknown into the WH (who the hell is he!!! Harvard? Columbia? Occidental? Where are his diplomas? Where is his birth certificate? ) Actually, he TOLD us what he was going to do~~~destroy this wonderful country and make it into a Socialistic hellhole. People voted for him to "prove they were not racists". People voted for him only BECAUSE he is black~~as racist as voting AGAINST him because he is black.
Naturally, he is going to surround himself with the likes of "Moon" Mullen, who can be manipulated and molded into "good little soldiers"! God forgive us for what we have done to You and pushed You out of our country.
About third or fourth Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is a naval officer...there's more or less a rotation among the services, subject to the President's discretion to jump the rotation and name some other general or flag officer to the post, and in my nearly 40-year experience with Defense matters, the worst -- the absolute worst -- CJCSs have been from the Navy...Ship drivers, while critically important to our defense, generally have little appreciation for the different mindsets of ground force and aerial forces officers and the services they represent...the missions they represent. Yes, the winnowing-out of each year group of officers to select the best general & flag officers possible is a tough vetting process...joint and joint & combined assignments and schools are part of the road leading to the high seats of military power...Nonetheless, the Navy remains the most parochial of all the services; and that, I think, accounts for the squishiness of admirals in high joint service positions.
But doesn't the Navy own the Marine Corps? Yes, but Navy purists seldom acquire the Marine ground force attitude of 'mission first' and 'always faithful, always ready.' Most naval officers are much more tolerant of individual 'foibles' (consider the history of 'cabin boys' in naval tradition) than are ground guys, and even air guys (any service)...
My history is with the Army -- mostly in support of the active component but also some with the Army Reserve; although I often lived in and worked in the joint & combined environment. My observation is that almost across the board, the senior Navy officers were slightly to egregiously out of phase with the rest of the command...and never did seem to get the whole mission into complete perspective although many were excellent in their specific jobs.
None of this is a knock against the Navy...we need 'em, we love 'em...but the person who gets to be CJCS needs to be a true generalist (no pun intended) who is sensitive to the needs & missions of the other services...but the services reward loyalty and total buy-into the service-specific culture so it's almost impossible to get the 'ideal' Chairman...We'll continue to get highly qualified, but flawed humans whose loyalties only they know for certain.
Mullen was no worse as CJCS than any other admiral who has ever held the post.
God bless you Stingray and your fellow Seals. But that is a little over the top to say that the only Navy choice for the top job should be a Seal trained Chief. This Marine does not agree. Of course the Navy seldom acquires the Marine Ground Force attitude of mission first, always faithful, always ready as Steve said and as does the Seals. Instead, the Navy has in fact removed the Marines from Ships crew assignments, put Seals on standby to do what Marines used to do (missions do change) for the Navy, and trained its own sailors to guard its gates instead of Marines. Of course one needs to understand that the General Staffs do indeed provide the world view training to its top leaders and indeed it is that kind of training that creates the truly great Generals in the Corps, the Army, and indeed the Air Force. The Navy also provides that training and it has produced some great Admirals, none of which I believe should ever have been CJCS. At least none since WWII and given some of our history that focused on some of the greatest Admirals of WWII, I would question even them as CJCS choices. But correct me if I am wrong. I do not believe that Seal Training is a career path that most Naval Officers choose to become Admiral. And fewer still would indeed be chosen to get that far if they did. That in my view means that seldom would we ever get to see a Navy Seal become the top Naval leader of his time let alone CJCS...No, I actually believe that the most successful and best of the best are chosen because of who they are what they know and their training along with the politics. We have had some truly great CJCS. Mostly Army and Marine as I recall...., not that I wish to digress from the gist of this thread which of course is what this usurper is doing to our military and our country....Semper Fi.
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