German Troops in Oslo, 1940
Posted on 11/05/2007 7:54:26 AM PST by Kurt_Hectic
Norway's Chief of Defense Sverre Diesen said Monday that if the current loss of spending power continued, Norway's national defense would be history in 25 years.
Diesen presented Minister of Defense Anne-Grete Strøm-Erichsen with FS 07 - the study of the next 20 years of Norway's Defense - on Monday.
"If the loss of spending power continues the Defense will be so weakened in 25 years time that only limited units such as the Coast Guard and the Russian border guard will be fully functional - an independent, national Defense will be history," Diesen wrote.
The Defense chief also warned that the effects of ebbing purchasing power would be felt well before this dismal scenario was complete.
The report came with a range of proposals certain to spark political debate from all sides.
FS 07 recommended that military bases be cut back and focused on key bases, with the army and air force operating from northern Norway and the navy from Bergen.
The military report also suggested an eventual merging of the army and National Guard.
The study recommended that a separate military communications satellite be introduced to replace land stations, and that the expensive MTB (military torpedo boat) program be scrapped.
Diesen said that he had the clearest conscience in the world about the scrapping of the costly MTB program before it was even complete.
He pointed out that three successive defense studies had advised against the acquisition of MTBs and made it clear that any loss of face involved should be shouldered by parliamentary politicians that pushed the purchase through in 2003.
Diesen said that the local communities affected by the proposed cuts to bases would likely protest, but that delays would only make things worse. The Defense Chief said he was satisfied with the finding of the government's Defense policy committee.
"When an all-party committee has reached the same conclusion as we have on difficult political issues we take that as security that we have been roughly on target with our recommendations," Diesen said.
Diesen said that he could see no "fundamental deviation on important points" between the two studies.
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Not good.
Amazing they learned nothing from WW2.
You’re right! I am!!!!!!
Mad Vlad
Let's see if they'll swap.
What caused this “loss of spending power?” Is he talking about budget cuts, depreciation of the currency, .... what?
I knew it! :-)
Just put a turban on the guy on the left..
The socialists have always managed to make the government cut the budgets, using the “cheese slicer” principle: one slice at a time, gradually reducing the size of the units.
the situation now is that there is no more cheese to slice, if they cut more now, they have to deactivate the units. And that is what’s happening. An interesting stealth MTB, “SKJOLD”, was supposed to consist of 6 units, but now they are axing them. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skjold_class_patrol_boat
In addition, the new 5 NANSEN-class fregattes seems to have to run on a skeleton-budget, coupled with the fact that it is unsure whether they will be rigged with SPY-1 and AEAGIS.
As for the purchase of 48 JSFs as a replacement of 58 (more or less operative) F-16s: that might be in the blue if the socialists get their will.
I fear for the situation: Russian bombers are on missions in the North-sea almost every day, and the Russians are preparing to exploit the Barents Sea for oil: A huge part of that area is covered by the Norwegian economic area around Svalbard, which is disputed by the russians, together with the disputed area between the territorial lines in the sea outside Norwegian main-land and russian main-land. How will Norway be able to enforce national sovereignty?
Nuetrality is nice - Blessed are the peacemakers. BUT, they need to defend their nuetrality. Liberals want us to believe that one simply needs to “do good” and stop mucking-around in other nations’ affairs will keep a nationa safe. WRONG. There have been predatory nations and empires since the start of time who do not respect a nations’ “good deeds” or neutrality. Nuetrality and non-interference did not protect the Tibetans in 1951, the Laotians in the 1960’s, the Finns and Belgians in both World Wars, The Lebanese now, etc, etc... The Swiss are actively nuetral, but nearly every young man in the country takes some military training, and belongs to a unit to which he will be called in emergency.
They will be taking the French approach. Waving white flags and studying Russian so they can understand the commands of their new masters. Those that fail to study history are doomed to repeat it.
Thank you for the explanation. Leftists are the same the world over. Carter and the Clintons cut and starved our military in a similar way.
They may have been heaving their buttocks Heavenward in the masjid..
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