What I wanted to write about this morning was how history has fairly definitively demonstrated that the privatization of the delivery of public goods and services has failed the ostensible purpose of improving quality at a lower cost.
But then, a quick tour through the latest news about the United States Air Force led to a considerable detour. For, while Secretary of Defense Robert Gates is making speeches about all our military services being more open to civilian critique, some people seem to have gotten the wrong message from his recent efforts.
Gates: Military Needs to Accept Criticism
By Robert Burns
Associated Press Military Writer Friday, June 13, 2008
Scott AFB, Illinois — The entire U.S. military — not just the Air Force — must learn to accept criticism from outside ranks, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said June 10.
Speaking to about 500 airmen at Scott Air Force Base in Illinois just east of St. Louis, Gates said it is well known that the military services make good use of internal reviews of their performance in order to improve and to correct problems.
"However, I have noticed that none of the services easily accept honest criticism from outside their branch, or scrutiny that exposes institutional shortcomings," Gates said. "This is something that must change across the military."
[...]
The brief stop at Scott was Gates’ third visit to a major Air Force base this week. He was at Langley Air Force Base, Virginia, on Monday after announcing his choices for replacing Wynne and Moseley, and earlier Tuesday the defense secretary spoke to several hundred airmen at Peterson Air Force Base, Colorado.
[...]
At Peterson, Gates told airmen in a private question-and-answer session that the top priority of the next Air Force civilian leader will be to restore to excellence the Air Force’s handling of its nuclear bomber, missile and related missions, according to Morrell, who took notes at the session. Reporters were barred.
"Reporters were barred." Which might provide a hint as to what prompted this concluding comment in the report.
Gates is adamant in cautioning against equating his firing decisions with a lack of support for the overall performance of the military, including the Air Force, which he essentially decapitated by ousting its top civilian official and its top uniformed officer on the same day last week.
Or perhaps it just reflects some widely shared sentiments. As the Airforcetimesreports:
The generals’ salute
Air Force leaders bid farewell to 2 of their own
By Charles J. Dunlap Jr.
If Defense Secretary Robert Gates intended to send a wake-up call to the Air Force, he succeeded with a vengeance. I know because I was at a conference of the service’s top generals when it was learned that the Air Force was losing its two most senior leaders as a result of incidents involving nuclear and nuclear-related materials.
[....]
The Wynne/Moseley approach recognized the importance of winning today’s irregular wars but also aggressively responded to the worrisome growth of the regular militaries of the emerging megapowers. Accordingly, they sought high-tech capabilities aimed at off-setting the manpower advantages some potential adversaries might enjoy, as well as their increasingly sophisticated design and manufacturing capabilities. For this, they were mocked as suffering from "next-war-itis."
[....]
Saluting Moseley was truly heart-wrenching. A relentless airpower advocate, he led the air campaign that toppled the Taliban in weeks. His ingenious air operation in Iraq smashed the Republican Guard in a matter of days.
Indeed, had Moseley’s plan not been terminated early by his superiors, it just might have eliminated many of the Sunni officers who later formed the core of the insurgency and also could have destroyed more of the weapons caches that subsequently supplied the explosives for thousands of improvised explosive devices. America’s enemies will not miss him.
While this civilian has already expressed great misgivings with the apparently accepted strategy of using the Air Force to assassinate individuals with hellfire missiles and bombs (which Gates apparently supports since he's called for sending more drones to Iraq), it seems way past time that we reconsider the idea that the possession of a large store of nuclear weapons by one nation deters others from having or using their own, as this reporter seems to suggest:
The generals are especially concerned about the morale of those spending the flower of their youth as the unheralded guardians of the nation’s ultimate insurance against the most horrific possible "Next War."
Nuclear weapons as insurance is a really scary thought.
Meanwhile, there's now a connection between the Mosely and Wynne forced retirements and the on-going saga of the refuelling tankers, which I am too stupid to understand why we need them when we have 750 overseas bases where our planes can land and refuel.
US Air Force row threatens British contracts
David Robertson
The forced resignation of the top two officials in the United States Air Force (USAF) will have a ripple affect across the defence industry, potentially putting thousands of jobs in Britain at risk.
Michael Wynne, the Secretary of the Air Force, and General T. Michael Moseley, the Chief of General Staff, stepped down last week, prompting speculation that key projects could be scrapped.
[....]
The largest USAF procurement project at present is the $40 billion contract to build 179 refuelling tankers, which EADS won this year. The wings will be built at EADS's factory at Broughton in North Wales, which employs about 10,000 people.
However, Boeing has challenged the decision to award the contract to the owner of Airbus. The departure of General Moseley, in particular, could strengthen its hand. General Moseley was regarded as a champion of the tanker project and, without him to force the pace, the Pentagon may choose to recompete the contract to keep Boeing's backers in Congress happy. The Government Accountability Office is due to rule on Boeing's appeal this week.
General Moseley also championed the Combat, Search and Rescue (CSAR-X) helicopter. The $15 billion contract to build the helicopter was given initially to Boeing but the process is being held again, with competition from Sikorsky and Lockheed Martin. Lockheed Martin is thought to be the favourite now, which would be a boost for AgustaWestland, its British partner. However, the departure of General Moseley could also mean this project being delayed.
[....]
No mention of whether the following is of any significance.
June 11, 2008
French banks threaten legal action to cancel EADS bond purchase
Adam Sage, Paris
The insider trading scandal at EADS took a fresh twist today as French banks threatened legal action in a bid to cancel their purchase of €2 billion (£1.6 billion) of stock in Europe's aerospace and defence giant.
The banks instructed a lawyer to launch proceedings over the deal to buy bonds that were convertible into shares from Lagardère, the French media and defence group and a leading shareholder in EADS, in April 2006, shortly before the share price plunged.
[....]
Today's move was a further blow to EADS, creating greater uncertainty for the group as it seeks to overcome rising costs linked to the euro-dollar exchange rate and production delays at Airbus.
It also threatens to block Lagardere's plan to reduce its aerospace investment and focus on media activities.
[....]
Last month, Noël Forgeard, EADS' former joint chief executive, was placed under formal investigation on suspicion of insider trading over the sale of 360,000 shares for a total of €4,342,480.
Thomas Enders, Airbus' chief executive, says he also expects to be investigated after making €711,750 from exercising his stock options.
The announcement of delays to the A380 in June 2006 wiped €5.5 billion from EADS' share price.
[....]
So what will a delay in the tanker contract mean? Putting a good face on it, Northrup Grumman has a web site up for America's New Tanker
But, honestly, this taxpayer does not sleep better knowing that, old or new, there are gigantic gas tanks soaring through the air while the levees and bridges are crumbling under my feet. So, in the interest of fairness and balance, check out http://www.LiunaBuildsAmerica.org