I'm a little confused about defense appropriations. Strangely enough, it seems that some, if not all, of these programs deserve some scrutiny. And, PLEASE, someone post something about relative domestic spending compared to the F-35 and others.
Well, this was easy enough to find, although I'm scratching my head at some of these suggested procurements for 2008.
• Missile Defense – $8.8 billion: Only politics drives this big, wasteful, pointless project. AEGIS has a promising naval objective and airborne lasers aboard modified 747s bring out the sci-fi lover in me, but the former doesn't really work...
http://www.sciencedaily.com/...
...and the latter assumes we can fly modified passenger planes at 30,000 feet over hostile territory so we can shoot lasers at launching ballistic missiles without being shot down ourselves. Mobile SAMs are widely deployed all over the world and there is just simply no way we could take them all out in a given area.
Oh, and there's the little matter that most of this money is going toward Bush's EUROPEAN missile defense system – you know, the one the Russians despise and are willing to break treaties to prevent. Aside from the idiocy of pissing off the Russians for no good reason, we would spend a large part of $8.8 billion in 2008 to try a nefarious system that isn't even designed to protect our own country. The European countries are big boys. If they want a missile defense system, let them fund one themselves. Even a worse-case scenario with Iran doesn't justify it.
• F-35 Joint Strike Fighter – $6.1 billion: I'm still mad that Congress nuked the next generation F-14 program in favor of the F-18 back in the 80s, but I'll save that for F-18 procurement. Evidently, they have some buyers overseas so OK.
• F-22 Raptor – $4.6 billion: Our Corvette. Nobody will buy it because it's too expensive. And all of the simulations suggest it is damn near unbeatable (although see my F-14 post for taking down a Raptor). Still, the tech-geek in me gives it an OK.
• Future Combat Systems – $3.7 billion: So nebulous and unknown I can't really argue, but I'm guessing a lot of this money is going to unmanned stuff.
• Zumwalt Class Destroyer – $3.5 billion: This project tells us a lot about the state of our military given the multiple wars. Originally, the Navy wanted 32. The number was later reduced to 24, then to 7. Finally, the Senate authorized 2 would be built. Nice ship, lots of bells and whistles, supposedly also fills the purpose of a battleship, but is it needed?
• Gerald Ford Class Carrier – $2.6 billion: The Navy obviously considers this a priority as there was a 118 percent increase in spending from last year. Bigger runway that even C-130s could land on. I would build a couple, and if they work, a couple more. However, why are we naming a next generation carrier after Gerry Ford?
* F/A-18E/F Hornet – $2.6 billion: The problem with the F-18 is it is a small aircraft trying to do too much. I suppose that is the same problem with the F-35, as that is also a small aircraft that will probably try to do too much. The F-18, fully loaded in fighter/bomber capacity, is useless in a fighter mode. Any modern Russian fighter would kill it instantly. So then it's simply a bomber. And the plane it replaced had much bigger bombing potential, much better radar, and a missile that could hit any target 100+ miles away.
The Navy got totally screwed when the advanced F-14 Supercat program was nuked. The F-14 was the only plane in the U.S. arsenal that could carry the Phoenix missile – and the Phoenix missiles could kill many air-to-air, air-to-ground, or air-to-sea targets from 100+ miles away simultaneously. It worked. The U.S. presently has no long-range air-to-air missile systems. The Russians do. They bought F-14s from Iran after the Shah fell to study the awesome radar and Phoenix. I imagine that's why they have it.
Obviously, as it relates to military spending, the war in Iraq is an endless drain. Since this is a military post, I'd like to see some of the Iraq money going toward military upgrades. The Radical Islam thing is not going away, and the paranoia of other wanna be superpowers is also not to be ignored. As much as I hate to say it, we need to keep an eye on this military stuff.