A defense budget larger than any in the world and bigger than most major parties combined and the first suggestion this very wordy essay is, THERE IS NOT ENOUGH MONEY?
You positively have to be kidding me.
What is more, I wonder why the publication needs to go to Sweden for an author?
Malcom Kyeyune is a writer based in Sweden and contributing editor of American Affairs.
I question the credibility of the entire enterprise and wonder what their real motives are. It sounds just like another rag promoting the defense industrial complex to be sustained in the current form or bigger. Like our stupid schools, and I do mean stupid schools since that is the bulk of what they produce, stupid children, the answer is not more money.
$15 billion for a carrier? SIXTY TIMES the cost of an LNG carrier? SIXTY, that’s right. TWENTY TIMES the cost of a drill ship; albiet one of the most complex vessels afloat and costs for oilfield products are some of the most inflated in the world. Somebodies have been lulled into just going with the flow on cost instead of making serious comparison about why they should cost so damn much. Carriers should cost no more than 1/3 the current going price.
The littoral combat ships? We once had wonderful frigates that could be stamped out like widgets.
Land military weapons? Trucks are just trucks and howitzers are the same. A WWII soldier could operate a new 155 withing half a day. They are that unchanged.
An M198 howitzer now costs about $575,000 and clocks in at 15,760 lbs., just shy of 8 tons. That means it is $71,000 a ton to make. It is simple machined and fabricated steel, maybe some titanium. Industral machinery, some a whole lot more complex than this howitzer hits somewhere south of $20,000 per ton. Maybe we should let Caterpillar make our howitzers instead of Rock Island Arsenal?
Costs are too high and the defense industrial complex is making far too much money from the taxpayer. If eggs in Mexico are $2 a dozen right now and the best we can do here is around $5 isn’t something wrong? Does anyone suspect that our methods are wrong? And no, our stuff is not more sophisticated than others. Not for the most part.
We are being raped on both cost and quality. Hesgeth, are you listening?
“A defense budget larger than any in the world and bigger than most major parties combined and the first suggestion this very wordy essay is, THERE IS NOT ENOUGH MONEY? “
That’s the irony. Kyeyune is correct that the current budget is far too small to maintain the current size of fleet, current airframes, 750 overseas bases etc.
And we know that because Navy ships in port for maintenance get the minimum, long term repairs are skipped over - because they can’t afford it.
Same with the F35s. Half available at any time because of the colossal cost of maintenance and parts.
If the US military wants to cut costs. It needs to downsize the overseas Imperial committments. And reduce the big ticket high cost weapons.
For carrier cost. You are just not being realistic about the price of these. For example the Stennis is in port doing a reactor change which was budgeted at 3.5 billion just for that one item.
M198 cost. You are right to look at the finished cost per ton. But you have to separate out the cost of the structure vs cost of components (eg gun optics, electronics). If an artillery gun was made out of hot rolled at $500/ton like some industrial machine, that would be one thing. But it is not. Titanium costs ~$7000/ton and the specialty high strength steels cost 10x times hot rolled (or more).
And the finished cost scales right up from the cost of the raw material.