http://justoneminute.typepad.com/footnotes/2004/05/us_asks_private.html
May 27, 2004
US asks private sector to ease bullet shortage
Even in the age of unmanned aerial vehicles, satellite-guided bombs and night-vision goggles, the US army cannot fight a war without its most basic necessity: bullets.
And with more troops in Iraq, more intense combat than expected and the need for almost every soldier from frontline infantryman to rearguard logistician to be prepared for an ambush, the army suddenly finds itself in a bullet crunch.
According to a requisition last week by the Army Field Support Command, the service will need 300m to 500m more bullets a year for at least five years, or more than 1.5m a year for combat and training. And because the single army-owned, small-calibre ammunition factory in Lake City, Missouri, can produce only 1.2m bullets annually, the army is suddenly scrambling to get private defence contractors to help fill the gap.
The bullet problem has its roots in a Pentagon effort to restock its depleted war materiel reserve. But it has been exacerbated by the ongoing operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, where rearguard and supply units have been thinly-stretched throughout the countryside, occasionally without active duty combat soldiers to protect them....
XBob, this is exactly what I told you. The single plant that makes 5.56mm that is owned by the military is insufficient for wartime (not the only 5.56mm manufacturer, in the U.S. or otherwise). They are currently contracting with private sources, and I provided you two, one in the U.S., one that is not. This is a cost issue. If they wanted to have all the bullets from U.S. suppliers they could. This has nothing to do with trade to China. Trade with China isn't why the Army owned only one factory making 5.56mm ammunition. That was the case because we hadn't been in any conflict over a month long for three decades. There are plenty of ammunition manufacturers in the U.S., and if the Army wants to build more facilities (of it's own), or buy from those U.S. (or even allied, such as Israel) producers, they can. This is like earlier when you through up a series of unrelated statistics. You're obfuscating.