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I notice a lot of comments on this thread that seem to make base closings sound like a bad thing. I respectfully disagree. It's great when government shrinks. I only wish the non-military part of the government was run so well.

With fewer bases we'll spend less money and need fewer troops for force-protection. That will leave the military with more money and troops for actual missions overseas.

I'm sorry if some of you have sentimental attachment to bases that are closed -- that must be tough. But overall, for the common good, I think this is great news. I'm only sorry that the shut-down process is so slow and expensive.

You don't close almost every training base for pilots in the United States Air Force! That isn't about sentimental value -- the AF took huge hits in the last three rounds of closure and a lot of them needed closed.

Hanscom AFB and LA AFS need closed for the AF -- no active runways. We had too many bases and some should have closed. They closed two Air Force depots and now Tinker AFB is so overcrowded that they have to have a huge building program going on in order to be able to do depot maintenance on our planes. Sometimes they cut too fast and go too far and instead of saving money it saves none!

Obviously you have no idea about the military and some of their bases and what they have on them and what they do! It isn't about sentimental value -- it is about mission essential!

With fewer bases we'll spend less money and need fewer troops for force-protection. That will leave the military with more money and troops for actual missions overseas.

The government never realized a lot of the savings from the first round of closures. Some of the bases that they expected to become regional airports are still vacant - George AFB in California and England AFB in LA are two that I can think of.

The closures left the military with critical shortages in the medical fields.

Placing all of a single mission at one base is poor stategy. Not only do you have to worry about man-made problems like an attack, you have to consider what would happen if the only logistics facility had a tornado, flood, or hurricane that shut it down.

Now that we're shutting down a lot of our overseas bases the military needs bases in the US to put the people. Cutting troop strengths is no longer a good option because the military mission continues to grow. The cutbacks in the late 80's and early 90's have left the military with too few people. Some stateside units spend at least six months a year overseas. They rotate to Bosnia for three months and then come home just long enough to fix the broken equipment before going to Saudi to provide air cover.