Why Donald Trump is the U.S. Army’s Once in A Lifetime Opportunity
Dan Goure
Security,
The stars may be aligning in favor of the U.S. Army.
The stars may be aligning in favor of the U.S. Army. There is a recognition in all quarters – Congress, the military, the American people and even President-elect Trump’s nominees for national security cabinet posts – that the United States faces a range of serious security threats, foremost among them Russia. This leads, naturally, to the need for a U.S. military capable of fighting and prevailing in high-end, high-tech conventional conflicts. There is growing concern among these same stakeholders that the U.S. military is in danger of being outpaced technologically by some of these adversaries. There is a realization that the Army is the service that has suffered the most due to fifteen years of war and declining defense budgets. There is a growing appetite in Congress for an increase in defense spending with a particular focus on the Army. Finally, the Army has a series of “shovel ready” modernization programs that could be jump-started once resources are available.
No military service has been more challenged by circumstances and crises, some self-inflicted, than the Army. Over the past two decades, the Army has experienced serial failure of all its major modernization programs, a massive influx of procurement funding that went to capabilities largely useful for only one type of conflict, relatively rapid and large scale fluctuations in end strength, organizational changes that may actually have reduced combat power and the general drift in U.S. defense strategy. The result is an Army that is in danger of becoming obsolete, having given up a number of capabilities central to modern, high end warfare, is too small to meet current demands not to mention the requirements for major conflicts and lacks focus.
Chief of Staff of the Army, General Mark Milley recognizes these problems. He has identified Russia as the leading near-term military challenge confronting the United States. General Milley has pressed to bring U.S. heavy forces back to Europe. He has been clear about the urgent need to address critical capability gaps. Just yesterday, the Chief identified his modernization priorities as air defense, aviation, long-range fires, ground vehicles for light forces and cyber/electronic warfare. In most of these areas, the U.S. Army was once a leader, but gave up its capabilities as defense budgets declined and new threats required different forces.
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