U.S. Army: 95% of Brigade Combat Teams Unprepared to Fight Immediately

Breitbart National Security ^ | 2/8/17 | Edwin Mora

[markomalley]

Only three of the 58 U.S. Army Brigade Combat Teams (BCTs) are capable of immediately joining the fight in the event of a major conflict, Gen. Daniel Allyn, vice chief of staff of the Army, told lawmakers.

According to the general, about one-third of the 58 BCTs in the Army, the largest U.S. military branch, are deemed ready, but “only three” of those “could be called upon to fight tonight in the event of a crisis.”

The rest would require about 30 days to prepare. That means only about five percent of brigade combat teams are ready to engage in immediate combat in the event of a major conflict.

Gen. Allyn also warned that only one-fourth of the Army’s Combat Aviation Brigades and half our the branch’s Division Headquarters are ready to carry out their duties, noting that due to budget cuts and constraints the soldiers can only do what the country requires of them while assuming “high risk.”

[AndyJackson]

Great book on this subject, released November 2016:

[Maj. Gen. (ret) Robert] Scales on War: The Future of America's Military at Risk

The book has one endorsement of perhaps some particular interest.

“Combining his combat experience with a life-long study of men in direct combat, Bob Scales has written a classic. In this eye-opening and authentic work, he articulates a provocative yet sensible way for our nation to overcome its institutional neglect of the infantry. Let’s apply now the wisdom of our top warrior-scholar who has demonstrated again his penetrating understanding of combat at the point of maximum danger."―Gen. James N. Mattis, USMC (Ret.)

[Jet Jaguar]

I believe you are correct.

[markomalley]

No, even in the darkest days of the Carter years, our first line active component Divisions in Europe, Korea and CONUS were manned, trained and equipped to at least C-2 and every Division maintained a ready brigade for immediate deployment.

In the time since I was in (81-02), the ONLY acceptable reason for a unit to be below C-2 was if significant portions of the unit were already deployed. If a unit was C-3 or C-4 for ANY other reason than that, the commander would be virtually guaranteed to be relieved of duty. MAYBE he'd get one month to fix the situation, no more.

And in the days of unannounced ORI's, God help the commander who faked a SORTS report.

[jospehm20]

That makes sense.

[henkster]

Gen. George C. Marshall drew up plans to fit out an army of 300 divisions. However, manpower demands of the Navy and Air Corps cut into that. Probably more importantly, we decided to not mobilize all of our military manpower, and instead concentrated on keeping people in industry making weapons for us and our allies. And that became our part of the triad for allied victory: British science, American production, and Soviet blood.

[TADSLOS]

Yep. C-3 and below was UNACCEPTABLE unless you were in a RC unit that was only resourced to that level. Even at C-2, commanders had to have a solid action plan to get to C-1 within 30 days.

[PAR35]

It was more than a year after Pearl Harbor before the US Army was really combat ready (El Guettar, March 1943). The Marines did better- they got up to combat standards in about 6 months.

So by those standards 30 days doesn’t look too bad.

[Chode]

with all the leaks the past eight years and this wasn't one of them...

[2ndDivisionVet]

IIRC the Soviets lost more people just at Stalingrad than all the other allies lost everywhere.

[polymuser]

I hope a full compendium of the damages Obama, Clinton, Holder, Lynch, Brennan, Lerner, et all inflicted on us is widely published soon.

[Arkansas Tider]

Thanks to you, I will have USR nightmares tonight. I retired in 2013 and it took 18 months for the nightmares to stop. Next you will bring up QTB’s

[jch10]

Well, it takes women awhile to get ready!

[markomalley]

Thanks to you, I will have USR nightmares tonight. I retired in 2013 and it took 18 months for the nightmares to stop. Next you will bring up QTB’s

I sympathize. I was the SORTS manager for AFCC for a while during the 80s. I had TF1 cards jumping over fences in my sleep.

But it gets worse: I was then the UTC Functional Manager for all of the 6KXXX UTCs. Joy.

[ealgeone]

great we are telling the world this info /s

You don't think foreign intelligence sources don't have an estimate of our readiness?

This is the military bellying up to the bar. They know the money's about to start flowing and each branch wants their share.

[DuncanWaring]

The Soviets and the Germans each lost more at Kursk than the US lost in the entire war, Europe and Pacific.

[henkster]

The average life expectancy of a Russian soldier in Stalingrad was about 24 hours. At a state dinner in Moscow, Admiral Ernest J. King offered a toast to “the heroic fighting spirit of the Red Army.” Stalin replied “It takes a brave man to not be a hero in the Red Army.”

[LucyT]

[Some Fat Guy in L.A.]

Yeah that’s right tell our enemies how unprepared we are for them

Not exactly a secret. Obola practically bragged about it.

[PIF]

Wiki: “The infantry brigade combat team, as of 2014, contains 4,413 soldiers and is organized around three battalions of infantry. Each type of brigade (light infantry, air assault, or airborne) has the same basic organization. Each infantry brigade is capable of air assault operations, whether or not it is officially designated as an air assault brigade. Also, most units typically maneuver in HMMWVs when deployed and operate as “motorized infantry” to facilitate speed of movement.

“The infantry brigade combat team consists of seven battalions: one cavalry (RSTA), one brigade support, one engineer, three infantry and one field artillery.”

So we have only 13,000 odd soldiers capable of fighting ... both Putin and Xi are smiling.

[JDoutrider]

bkmrk