Pentagon Defence Budget 2010

[fludblud]

im surprised this hasnt been posted as this is one of the most dramatic shifts in defence policy in quite a while. (and lets not even talk about the shitstorm this is causing in congress)

following article sums it up quite nicely

WASHINGTON, April. 6 (Xinhua) -- U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates on Monday unveiled a bold budget plan to reshape the U.S. military spending with a shift from conventional wars to unconventional conflicts.

A lot of costly conventional programs face termination, delay or restructuring while some programs suited for unconventional conflicts and irregular wars are set to gain.

The following is a list of the losers and gainers in the new U.S. defense budget plan

Losers:

F-22 fighter jets: Gates said the Defense Department would complete its contract for 183 F-22 fighters and add four more, bringing the total to 187, before stopping the purchases.

VH-71 presidential helicopters: Gates said he plans to terminate the program, which had nearly doubled in cost to over 13billion U.S. dollars and was six years behind schedule.

Transformation Satellite Communication System: Gates plans to cancel the program and buy two more Advanced Extremely High Frequency satellites instead.

CG-X next generation cruiser: Gates plans to scrap the program for now, which was initially planned to be based on the DDG-1000 design.

Aircraft carriers: Gates also envisions to reduce the number of aircraft carriers from 11 to 10 after 2040.

Future Combat Systems (FCS): Gates will restructure the Army's modernization program and cut costs.

Missile defense: Gates will cut annual funding for missile defense.

Combat Search and Rescue X (CSAR-X) helicopter program: Gates plans to cancel the 15-billion-dollar program to build new search and rescue helicopters.

Amphibious ship and sea-basing programs: Programs such as the 11th Landing Platform Dock (LPD) ship and the Mobile Landing Platform (MLP) SHIP will be delayed.

Gainers:

Intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance (ISR): budget to be increased by 2 billion dollars.

Predator unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV): Fielding and sustaining 50 Predator-class UAVs.

Army aviation forces: recruiting and training of additional Army helicopter crews and increase the budget by 500 million dollars.

Special forces: increasing special operation personnel by more than 2,800 and buying more aircraft for the special forces.

F-35 fighters: Gates plans to buy more F-35 fighters in fiscal year 2010, raising the F-35 budget from 6.8 billion U.S. dollars to 11.2 billion dollars.

Littoral Combat Ships (LCS): Gates proposes to increase the purchase of LCS, seen as crucial to counterinsurgency operations in coastal regions and to improve inter-theater lift capacity.

F/A-18 fighter jets: Gates plans to buy 31 more F/A-18 fighter jets in fiscal year 2010.

Joint High Speed Vessel (JHSV): increasing the charter of Joint High Speed Vessel (JHSV) ships from two to four until the Pentagon's own production program begins deliveries in 2011.

Backgrounder: Losers and gainers in new U.S. defense budget plan_English_Xinhua

what are your thoughts on this? i think its a great move, as much as we all want a bf2 esque scenario, a war against china or russia is still VERY unlikely. more boots on the ground and less overpriced superweapons for fighting the taliban is the way to go IMO.

lockheed says the termination of F22s at 187 would cost thousands of jobs but neglects to mention funding for the F35s has been almost doubled. but poor boeing is going to lose the F22 (they make the fuselage), airborne laser, missile defence and pretty much the entire future combat systems, ouch.

[[R-MOD]Bob_Marley]

WRT the VH-71 I never really understood why they didn't just buy the merlin rather than spend 6 years modifying it...

F-35s - good. More useful in America's current conflicts than the F-22 and will still be powerful weapons in conventional war.

F/A-18s - Bad, lawn darts are rubbish, buy more F-35s.

Anyway, looks fairly sensible. Any idea on total budget compared to the last one?

[JKRMAUI]

The F/A18 lawn dart...Lawn Dart is my nickname for my parents dog :P

Does look like they are actually spending money on the stuff that is more effective for our current conflict. Good news I say.

[[R-MOD]Saobh]

Mr. Gates's proposed baseline 2010 Defense Department budget of $534 billion is up 4% from last year.

Pentagon Pushes Weapon Cuts - WSJ.com

Which funnily enough is presented in multiple media outlets as "slashing the budget"

[fludblud]

yeah, here were all the republicans predicting that nobama was going to slash the defence budget, disarm america and surrender to the terrorists and what happens? he raises it by 4%

[Anderson29]

Special forces: increasing special operation personnel by more than 2,800 and buying more aircraft for the special forces.

damn...delta force getting big now....i was wondering why i got an email last month....

[charliegrs]

Originally Posted by [R-MOD]Bob_Marley

WRT the VH-71 I never really understood why they didn't just buy the merlin rather than spend 6 years modifying it...

F-35s - good. More useful in America's current conflicts than the F-22 and will still be powerful weapons in conventional war.

F/A-18s - Bad, lawn darts are rubbish, buy more F-35s.

Anyway, looks fairly sensible. Any idea on total budget compared to the last one?

how in the world could you call the f18 bad? its still mighty superior to the iraqi insurgents airforce and the taliban airforce. and id be willing to bet that it could very well handle itself against the worst that russia or china could throw at us, remember its not just the plane but the highly trained pilots that we have.

also about the merlin, i could be wrong but i think our military really prefers to design and build as much of our own stuff as we can, and try to keep military imports to a minimum. but yeah i agree it would have been a better idea to just go with the merlin.

[JKRMAUI]

Maybe they can get to issuing the Scar to regular troops... Hehe...hehe....

[[R-MOD]Bob_Marley]

Originally Posted by charliegrs

how in the world could you call the f18 bad? its still mighty superior to the iraqi insurgents airforce and the taliban airforce. and id be willing to bet that it could very well handle itself against the worst that russia or china could throw at us, remember its not just the plane but the highly trained pilots that we have.

Because it is. The F-18 is designed off the YF-17, the aircraft that lost the lightwieght fighter trials to the F-16. When the F-16 won, the Navy threw a hissy fit and refused to hold up its end of the bargain and buy the same aircraft as the USAF.

So they bought the inferior airframe. An airframe which crashed. Alot (havent got data for all users, but the Aussies have lost 4, the Spanish 6 and the Canadians 16). To get the thing to work properly cost millions in upgrades and modifications. It was less capable than many of the aircraft it replaced (for example, the A-6 which had significantly longer range and a much heavier payload capability).

And of course the pilots are good. If they wern't there'd be alot more F-18 shaped smoking holes in the ground.

Interesting fact - the original F-18s used to shoot themselves down at high altitude. The cannon was positioned in such a way that the exhaust would go back into the engines and cause flameouts.

[[R-DEV]Jaymz]

If it wasn't for the F-18's incompetence, "Independence Day" would have ended half-way through. Therefore, I love the F-18