Put on Your Tin Foil Hats. ..

Rainer Hachfeld, Neues Deutschland

Mr. President, are you aware unless you're rich,
you have poor health care?
It makes you scream and want to pull out your hair
Discharged from the hospital soon as you get there
--Mr. President, LL Kool J,

What we got here is...
failure to communicate
--Cool Hand Luke (1967)
____________

A companion to the Pentagon Fire Sale is this small piece from the WaPo on the matter of tactical radio development (What's the Frequency?) It is a fine example of acquisition creep: the radio program which began five years ago with a project budget of $3 Billion, has now grown to $12 Billion. Evolutionary acquisition at its finest, and the troops don't even have the radios yet.

$12 Billion for radios. Put that price next to almost anything else you can imagine this country needs. Approximately $50 Billion for a universal health program which will never be funded for starters, and go from there.

What's The Frequency?

Check out this summary of a new GAO report about the Pentagon's purchase of a new generation of radios.

"The Department of Defense (DOD) has spent an estimated $12 billion on the development and production of tactical radios over the last 5 years--about as much as was spent producing Virginia Class submarines ($10.8 billion) in the same period."

The original estimated cost was supposed to be close to $3 billion.

Why, why, why, you ask. Government Inc. wonders too. The report suggests that the Pentagon rushed the development of the radios, then got caught up in costly delays, and then watched as costs soared.

Of course, it was working, as it should, in the interests of the warfighters, whose lives often depend on instant, excellent communication. But it appears we may have a breakdown in communication on how to design and buy the equipment.

Is anybody ever held accountable for this kind of thing?

Pentagon Fire Sale

"He was found guilty of speaking his mind"
--Hu Jia's mother, on the Chinese human rights activist's
sentencing to 3 1/2 years in a labor camp for subversion

Someday this war's gonna end
--Apocalypse Now (1979)

In the long run, we are all dead
--John Maynard Keynes
_______________

The U.S. Naval Institute's journal Proceedings has become more candid and accessible in recent years. (Note: The "Going Out of Business" sign graced the photo in the hard copy, but had been scrubbed in the online edition. Candor only goes so far.)

One recent article projected bankruptcy for the Pentagon (fiscal, not moral) in the near future based on acquisition figures dating back through the last century and the laws of then-Martin Marietta Aerospace executive Norman R. Augustine (DOD on a Glide Path to Bankruptcy.) Anderson foresaw unsustainable exponential increases in unit costs of military equipment vis-a-vis military budgets.

"Growth rates for unit costs of major systems are greater than those for total defense procurement, total defense spending, and the gross domestic product (GDP). If these historic trends are not addressed, the U.S. military will cease being a significant influence in world events because of shrinking force structure. Past acquisition reforms have been unable to change the trend because they focused on the problem's symptoms (e.g., schedule slippages and cost growth), not its causes."

Using Augustine's growth rates (Augustine's Laws, 1982), which have been borne out in the 30+ years since he developed them, "procuring a single tactical aircraft by 2050 [will] take the entire defense budget."

"If [this] trend continues, the entire defense budget would be required to buy one aircraft carrier early in the 22nd century. Thus, the problem is not just with aircraft. . . .estimates for the Future Combat System, the Army's current largest acquisition program, have increased more than 75 percent over the 2003 baseline estimate."

"Recently defense budget requests have not included the majority of costs of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Most wartime supplemental funding has been for increased operating costs plus replacement of consumable items. At the same time, accelerated use of military equipment is increasing the need for replacement of systems. Thus, recent supplemental funding is not easing the acquisition problem."

It is hard to imagine the defense establish in a state of decline when it is taking in over $400 billion a year, not including supplemental appropriations. However, unless changes are made in the procurement process, the author asserts, "U.S. defense forces will continue to shrink and age, and we rapidly will cease being a dominant military force in the world."

Maybe having empty pockets is the only thing that will stay our hand.