Threat Axis

No matter who wins next week – the defense establishment of the United States will be changing drastically over the next four years.

The economic/credit crisis that has turned into a world-wide economic slump – will make sure that the military will only get the bare minimum’s (I hope) to maintain some sort of effective force.

The West privately laughed when the Russians had to park/dock/mothball/ground most of their once feared armed forces when they went through their own collapse post-Yeltsin.  Now the shoe is on the other foot.

Normally in a recession – the Armed Forces is a good place to go.  Steady pay, good benefits would serve as the economic base for a community.  Its industry if you will.  That money would trickle down through the bars, dry cleaners, grocery stores & car dealerships.  But when the Cold War ended – the US made a short sighted decision to close down a large number of those bases.  And all of those communities have suffered and some have even disappeared.  So now if money is put into the military – it won’t have a macro economic benefit.

Iraq and Afghanistan are no longer front page news stories.  Instead – it is how Boeing’s workers are on strike over benefits and outsourcing, GM and Chrysler are talking merger, and every day another bank is seized and taken over by the government.  Wall Street is more like a ride on Space Mountain.  You don’t know which way you are going at any point in time – but you hope it will end soon (or at least still be employed at something above minimum wage).

Ronald Reagan was faced w/ similiar issues when he took office – and the readiness (spending) increase he oversaw improved both the military and jumpstarted the economy.  But our new President won’t have the ability to spend money he doesn’t have like Ronnie did.  So to fund the economic bailout the money will come from the DOD budget.  According to a WSJ OpEd on Tuesday – if the DOD budget is held at 4% of the GDP – that will be LESS than it was during the Carter years.

So – what is going to be the chopping block?

- F-35 – trying to be the jack-of-all, master of none.

- LCS – smaller Asian countries have patrol boats w/ more oomph than these things.

- FIA/BASIC – I am beginning to think NRO wants to outsourced its work to Google Earth/Google Maps.

- RRW – if we have to use them – I want to be damn sure that they are going to work.  If the eggheads don’t know if they will or not – it is time to worry (and seriously think about replacing them).

And you wonder why people used to go hide in the hills saying the End is near.  I wonder if there are still any old 60′s era silo’s left for sale….. its going to be a rough ride.