The Pentagon cannot even make payroll. Over 750,000 civilians, who are maintainers, nurses, trainers, and every other function will be furloughed for no less than 14 days this year, resulting in a 15% loss in pay.
'Fiddling While the Pentagon Burns'
But as yesterday’s press conference with Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Martin Dempsey made clear, it’s essentially a Band-Aid for what amounts to a bleeding artery. The Pentagon must still cut $41 billion this year from its budget; it remains over $20 billion short on readiness and operational funds; it is facing a shortfall of some $7 billion in monies needed for the drawdown in Afghanistan; and it has already used up 80% of its operating funds for the year with six months still to go. In his usual, can-do way, General Dempsey said the military can still make all this work as long as the military could shed excess equipment, dump excess facilities, get acquisition reforms in place, reduce redundancy, and overhaul the military’s compensation structure. Well, good luck on all those fronts. More likely, as we say, when pigs fly. In the meantime, training is being radically reduced, maintenance across the services is being postponed, exercises are being cancelled, and the prospect of even deeper cuts to force structure and modernization plans await if the Budget Control Act’s sequester requirements are not rolled back by this fall.
This madness has to stop.
The Republicans should never, ever have agreed to rape Defense so that it had to "pay" 50% of the Sequestration cuts, while Entitlements (the biggest driver of debt and deficit) are exempt. This is an obscenity.
We are emboldening our enemies throughout the world with this budget fiasco. Our politicians of both parties REFUSE to acknowledge that Federal spending on health care costs (Medicare, Medicaid, ObamaCare) and other Entitlements are on the verge of consuming almost all spending in this country.
We have STOP THIS MADNESS NOW.
Our military has been sacrificed on the political altar for too long. It has been slashed by $487 Billion beginning in 2011, and then another $650 Billion by Sequestration.
Enough!