Posted on 07/13/2018 7:56:34 PM PDT by Blue House Sue
WASHINGTON -- Austin, Texas, will be the location for the headquarters of the new U.S. Army Futures Command, Army Secretary Mark T. Esper announced today at a Pentagon news conference.
Army Undersecretary Ryan D. McCarthy then explained the details. He said the process started with 150 metropolitan areas, narrowed down to five. Besides Austin, officials considered Boston; Minneapolis-St. Paul; Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina; and Philadelphia
(Excerpt) Read more at defense.gov ...
The same things — quality of life, innovation, civic support, higher education
facilities – that have helped attract countless businesses to Austin also played a
key role in the city landing the U.S. Army’s new Futures Command center.
The facility, which will ultimately employ 500 enlisted and civilian workers, is
expected to be up and running by next summer.
Futures Command’s primary mission will be to conceive the Army of the future.
It’s the Army’s first modernization effort in more than 40 years.
“Army: Quality of life, tech culture helped Austin land Futures Command”
Quality of life attracts talent.
Easier to recruit the qualified civilians to Austin than it is to Fargo.
Right. That’s why President Trump doesn’t go down to Mira Lago or play golf on a regular basis...because people - even the President - don’t have lives outside work.
The University is a big player in this, and it is in Austin.
***************
Correct
Futures Command appears bound for the University of Texas System building at
210 W. Seventh St. in downtown Austin. The UT System Board of Regents voted
Friday to enter into negotiations with the Army for space in the 19-story
UT System building, which was completed in 2017.
Bevo always has had big ideas.
LOL.............
President Trump isn’t military. Do you suppose that the reason the military has many of their bases in garden spots like China Lake, CA, Fort Sill, OK, Fort Polk, LA and Fargo, ND is because the night life there is awesome?
Most of the staff will be civilian.
Now, do you think it is easier to recruit civilian high-tech talent at MIT, Stanford, or Cal-Tech to move to Fargo or to move to Austin?
I don’t think that is a consideration. I will wager now that most of the people at this place won’t be from MIT, Stanford or Cal-Tech anyways.
That's all fine and good, but if the place gets staffed with an abundance of locals, most of whom are strident liberals, there are going to be problems.
One of the goals of the futures command is to work with academia. There are not many universities in remote areas. The planners were also looking for universities who want to work with the military. Not all of them wanted that partnership. The U of TX was one of the universities that did want this. I’m glad it went to TX.
Regarding “bases in garden spots.”
1. Ft. Sill was established by Gen Phil Sheridan in 1869-70 in the “Indian Territory” of Oklahoma, thus on the ‘frontier’ where a military presence was needed, Lawton grew up around it. (I spent time there as a field artilleryman.)
2. Ft. Polk, LA, was established in 1941 as part of the expansion of the US Army prior to WWII, and its remote area was for training purposes for divisional size forces.
3. The Naval Air Weapons Station at China Lake, CA, was established in 1943, because the Navy needed a facility to test its aerial delivered weapons that was far from civilians. It would not have been too popular for the Navy to use downtown LA or Berkeley as their bombing ranges during WWII.
4. Bergstrom AFB use to be located in Austin, TX until it was closed in 1993. It was created in 1942 as Del Valle Army Air Field when land was leased from the city of Austin to build the facility.
Regarding “bases in garden spots.”
1. Ft. Sill was established by Gen Phil Sheridan in 1869-70 in the “Indian Territory” of Oklahoma, thus on the ‘frontier’ where a military presence was needed, Lawton grew up around it. (I spent time there as a field artilleryman.)
2. Ft. Polk, LA, was established in 1941 as part of the expansion of the US Army prior to WWII, and its remote area was for training purposes for divisional size forces.
3. The Naval Air Weapons Station at China Lake, CA, was established in 1943, because the Navy needed a facility to test its aerial delivered weapons that was far from civilians. It would not have been too popular for the Navy to use downtown LA or Berkeley as their bombing ranges during WWII.
4. Bergstrom AFB use to be located in Austin, TX until it was closed in 1993. It was created in 1942 as Del Valle Army Air Field when land was leased from the city of Austin to build the facility.
Maybe future MREs will get Pit BarBQ as a main dish.
“That’s all fine and good, but if the place gets staffed with an abundance of locals, most of whom are strident liberals, there are going to be problems.”
I think they will be hiring staff based on the skills, not politics.
Right, and if you hire skilled and qualified applicants from a local labor pool that generally tends left in their politics, guess what?
There are going to be problems.
My guess is that they will have to import talent from elsewhere to fill the spots at the University of Texas and Austin’s U.S. Army’s Futures Command Headquarters.
Hook ‘Em!
I sincerely hope the Army casts a very wide net for talent, but as always, locals have the edge in such things because they're already there.
Thanks for the history lesson. I strongly suspect that this will quickly evolve into another waste of time/money and is really simply some DoD big wigs setting themselves up in a sweet gig at a sweet place to waste more time and money. I envision this as a kind of “rewards” program for SES types before they retire. This is 2018 and we have some fairly advanced coms now. There is no reason the command couldn’t be placed on an existing, secure base and communicate with industry partners as needed and even travel to their locations as we now have cool and efficient transportation systems now too. I expect this will cost a lot and will work out about the same as the McNamara whiz kids thing did back in the 60s. I think this is a mistake but on the bright side, it does create another 4 star slot and all the staff slots that go with that. This is exactly what is needed as we don’t have enough Generals now.
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