I agree that the BRAC business has gone far enough. During the Vietnam drawdown, the Air Force reduced the number of Air Material Areas, big logistics bases, (Air Logistics Centers since about '74) to five. BRAC reduced that to three, larger ones. Tinker AFB in Oklahoma, is now so crowded that there is little space to put anything else, which if they closed still another ALC, they would need to do. (Warner-Robbins GA, Ogden UT, and OK city OK are the current three). Additionally they've assigned all the AWACS and the Navy E-6s there.
We've mothballed, or sent to museums, 1/3 of the B-1B, fleet, not because we don't need them, but in order to save enough money on flight hour costs to keep thd other sixty some flying. (UPDATE, I've just discovered Congress has overuled that plan, even though it was already underway, with B-1B. See Air Force Association We've only got about 20 B-2s, and less than 100 B-52Hs. The B-52 is undergoing an avionics "mid-life" upgrade. It needs new engines, the ones it has are as old as the airframes, the last of which came off the line in 1964, and have been rebuilt many, many times and they are tired. Boeing has done much of the design work required to replace the 8 relatively fuel hungry (although not as hungry as those on earlier models) with 4 newer and more fuel efficient engines of the sort used on 747s, 767s, etc. Even though it would save money in the long run, politicians don't care much about the long run.
How is it that, with about the same fraction of total GNP going to government, we can now afford only about 1/3 as much of the GNP going to the military than we did in 1962 ? See AFA Percentage of GDP table. The answer..DemoRat giveaway programs. Yes there is pork involved in the military budget, but at least we get planes, ships, or armor, and trained troops to operate them, out of the deal. What do we get for those other vote buying schemes? Incumbent protection is what they get, we get nada.
Defense has been sucking hind teat since the end of the Vietnam war, with only the Reagan years giving some real relief. Those B-1B mentioned above were Reagan era aquistions. Sinc then the only long range heavy bombers we've bough have been the 20 or so B-2s.
In fact they are in the process of expanding the space available by condeming some housing and businesses accross the highway to the North.
Prior to my retirement in 1991 I worked for a large defense contractor, in avionics systems. In the late 1980's I went on several "logistics tours", one to Warner Robbins and one to the ALC at McClelland(Sacramento). Warner Robbins looked fairly busy but McClelland was virtually deserted. It deserved to be closed by BRAC, and Clinton violated the terms of BRAC by trying to keep it open.
At WR we saw federal civilian workers stripping down F-15's and rebuilding them. Since you seem knowledgeable, could you tell me why this work isn't done by the people who built them?