No shock and awe this week. It is, however, shockingly awful what has been allowed to happen to our men and women in the Armed Forces. Our President finally made a decision to send 30,000 troops to supplement our current troop levels in Afghanistan. The decision to send more troops took the President exactly 95 days. I remember a General Patton quote from my training at the Air Force Academy that read, “A good plan now is better than a perfectly executed plan next week.” Why did the President wait so long to respond? In his well written report, General McChrystal clearly requests at least 40,000-80,000 additional troops and states the urgency. Why doesn’t the President trust the opinion of the leaders he appointed to lead the war effort? If he did, 40,000 troops would be en route to Afghanistan. The President’s decision to send 25% less troops than what the commander stated was needed to keep our soldiers safe and achieve the goals set forth in our strategy was yet another example of the ineptitude of those governing our country. To make matters worse, our incumbent, Kevin Brady, endorsed the President’s decision this week during an interview with KTRH 740AM when he said, “I thought he was right on target…he laid out a sound strategy”.
I recently attended an air show at Alliance Field in Fort Worth, Texas. While there I happened to run into several classmates from the Air Force Academy who were at the show performing in their F-15s. The F-15 crews and I took some time to discuss the needs of the Air Force and to talk about the day-to-day lives of those still on Active Duty. While we were talking, they raised my awareness of all the impacts of Congress’ recent decision to cut the F-22 fighter aircraft from the Department of Defense budget. The Air Force took delivery of approximately 25% of the original order of the newest, most advanced fighter aircraft on the planet. The few fighters that were acquired are needed to replace the aging F-15 aircraft (many were built in 1972). The F-15s are aging quickly due to high operations tempo and require frequent maintenance, the funds for which are limited by Congress. More importantly our old technology can be outmatched by new foreign fighters. Currently the United States has approximately 178 F-15 aircraft that are expected to be used beyond 2025, the others will be sent to scrap.
Because the Air Force did not receive the support of our Congress, the fighter pilot community is now being restructured to accommodate for a 75% reduction. The pilots who are not selected to stay in the airframe or retrain in the few F-22s available will be asked to augment the Army or step into other roles in the Air Force. The American taxpayers have paid nearly $2.5 million dollars per pilot for training. To send highly specialized, trained pilots to jobs requiring anything but flying is unacceptable. Our national security is at risk without more fighter jets and pilots to fly them—air superiority is paramount. Air superiority ensures that our ground forces remain safe and that the skies are clear of threats.
If Congress continues to deny the military the support and upgrades it needs, then what is the point of keeping our men and women in harm’s way? Servicemen and women putting their lives on the line and our government is failing to support them fully.
Our federal government needs to respect the opinion of the appointed military leaders and should ensure that necessary upgrades and augmented troop levels as requested are supplied in a timely fashion. Don’t let our military go unassisted.
