Postponed Sacrifices
Joe Galloway | January 20, 2007

President Bush was asked in an interview this week why our military and their families are bearing all the sacrifices of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. His response was telling.

The American people are sacrificing, too, Bush said. Their peace of mind is disturbed by the images of carnage they see on their televisions.

His response was lame, but it also was infuriating, and his attempt to switch the focus to how well he thinks our economy is doing was no less galling.

The educator-in-chief said that it's been his view all along that the American people need to keep living their lives without making sacrifices while 25,000 of their sons and daughters have been killed or wounded in combat in the last five years.

He was proud that, unlike every wartime president in our history, he hasn't increased taxes to pay for a war. In fact, he, George W. Bush, not only hasn't raised taxes; he's cut them, leaving his war to be financed by going deeper into debt to China and Japan.

There's no need, he said, to revive some form of mandatory national service so the children and grandchildren of all those Americans living their comfortable lives might make both sacrifices and contributions to the defense and well-being of our country.

Our volunteer military is working just fine, Bush said. It can continue to shoulder the entire weight of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the wars that have ground the Army and the Marine Corps beyond the breaking point.

The new secretary of defense, Robert Gates, began his term by recommending that the permanent strength of the Army and the Marines be increased by nearly 100,000 soldiers, something that could be suggested only after his predecessor, Donald H. Rumsfeld, had been fired.

Rumsfeld, with the backing of Vice President Dick Cheney, was the architect of the idea that 21st-century wars could be won and soldiers replaced by high-tech weaponry. That you can do much more with much less.

Anyone in uniform who suggested otherwise was throwing his career away, as was made amply clear in late February 2003, when then-Army Chief of Staff Gen. Eric K. Shinseki, under questioning from Sen. Carl Levin, opined that it would take "several hundred thousand" American troops to pacify and occupy Iraq.

Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz promptly dismissed Shinseki's analysis, which was based on the general's experience as the commander of U.S. forces in Bosnia, as "outlandish." Iraq, Wolfowitz said, would be a lot easier than Afghanistan was because there were no ethnic divisions in Iraq.

A veteran of Vietnam who lost a foot in combat there, Shinseki knew whereof he spoke, which is a lot more than one could say of Wolfowitz, who's never worn a uniform or heard a shot fired in combat. Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz and their bosses in the White House made Shinseki's last few months in office a living hell.

At his retirement ceremony, which none of those gentlemen had the common courtesy to attend, the soft-spoken general sounded a warning that they should have heard: Beware of giving a 12-division mission to a 10-division Army.

That, of course, is precisely what Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld did, and the results, four years later, were entirely predictable. In fact, I predicted them right here in a 2003 column headlined: "How to Break a Great Army."

Our troops and our military are now in deep trouble. Many of our soldiers and Marines are now pulling their third or fourth combat tours.

Those tours are being extended beyond the normal 12 months and the troops' time at home for family and training is being reduced from the promised and badly needed 12 months, all in order to man Bush's "surge" or escalation or augmentation in Iraq. And now Defense Secretary Gates has conceded that more troops are needed in Afghanistan, too.

Under the triumvirate of Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld, little of the trillions spent on defense over the last six years has gone to those who are bearing 95 percent of the burden of the war of necessity in Afghanistan and the war of choice in Iraq. While those wars ground up tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles and helicopters and Humvees by the thousands, without enough money to repair or replace them, new high-tech Air Force planes and Navy ships ate up the Pentagon budget and padded the bottom lines of the big defense contractors/campaign contributors.

Even if the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan ended tomorrow, the damage that's been done to our Army and Marine Corps is incalculable, and from past bitter experience after Vietnam, it's a good bet that repairing that damage will take a decade or more and cost trillions.

That means that long after Bush and his deputies have retired to their gated compounds and a $500 million presidential library, we'll be less able to defend our nation in a new era made far deadlier by their disastrous decisions.

Their war-and-peace decisions, warped by arrogance and ignorance, will haunt all of us, and the postponed sacrifices will come due with a vengeance.
Sound Off...What do you think? Join the discussion.

Copyright 2007 Joe Galloway. All opinions expressed in this article are the author's and do not necessarily reflect those of Military.com.

I'm not aligned with all the positions of the above...
However, the damage done to our military (IMO)
during this neo-con reign of non-vets is the worst
in my lifetime. These chickenhawk clowns have
raped our strength and our understanding of mission
more than Vietnam. If for no other reason, this adventurism
has done more to destory American military power, and
should be rejected, damned and destoryed.

The ideologes who have wasted our righteousness,
and our troops, deserve a Nuremberg Trial of their own.

"Mission Accomplished" my a*s*s.

Our Guard and Reserve readiness is at an all time low. Our equipment readiness is a joke. Bush’s fighting his war on the cheap will be costing us through the next generation. The Chinese see what condition our military is in and are taking advantage by blatantly showing off their new satellite killer technology.
Impeach the fool and begin the necessary repairs, starting with raising taxes, redeploying out of Iraq, and initiating a draft.

Here! Here!

Shinseki made the exact same assessment for what it would take to win in Afghanistan. Massive deployment of heavy infantry and armor with all the logistics we could muster. An invasion of Afghanistan along the lines of what the Soviets did in 1979

Shinseki was wrong in that assessment and Rumsfeld figured if was wrong then why not with Iraq too. Too bad it wasn't baseball, batting 500 would be pretty good.

Apparently you have never seen the quality of Chinese military equipment Vaughn. The best strategy for dealing with a confrontation with China would be to retreat 100 miles. That should be a sufficient distance for all of the Chinese equipment to have their wheels fall of or otherwise malfunction.

Underestimating China and her military capability would be a catastrophic mistake on the order of bush’s estimating what the Iraq war would look like. Let us pray that China remains more interested in trade with the US and doesn’t decide to involve us on a military level. The cost of fighting China would dwarf this debacle in Iraq both in lives and treasure.
http://www.rferl.org/featuresarticle/2005/...C86A121F45.html
Over the past decade, massive Russian arms sales to China have favored the development of bilateral cooperation. According to estimates by the Moscow-based Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies, Russia has been delivering an annual average of $2 billion worth of arms to China since 2000, including fighter aircraft, submarines, and destroyers.

The main aim of these exercises is to ensure the training, to ensure the readiness of the structures in charge of the subdivisions taking part from the armed forces of the Russian Federation and the People's Republic of China, precisely in order to counter the challenges we face today in the Asia-Pacific region, and in the world as a whole."

http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Printable.asp?ID=22807
Unfortunately, it seems that the Chinese were underestimated. Just six years later the Pentagon notes not only the technological improvements by the PLA, but also the number of highly trained Chinese citizens capable of developing, maintaining, and operating the country�s increasingly modern defense capabilities. For instance, the report notes that a growing number of Chinese nationals are being trained abroad in the sciences and engineering, including the nearly 36,000 that were granted student or exchange visas in the United States in 2004. The Defense Department understands the dangers here and has no intention of permitting the PRC to challenge for future technological dominance.
Thus, the Defense Department is hardly guilty of overstating the threat posed by a rising China. One reason for this is that Beijing is not only increasing its military capacity and global influence, but gauging their intentions remains a fretful affair. A noteworthy element in the 2006 report is the Pentagon�s accurate assessment of the PRC�s dangerously unpredictable strategy. Sighting former paramount Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping�s words from the early 1990�s, Rodman noted: �The phrase that strikes me, of course is �hide our capacities and bide our time.� The assistant secretary added, �I think this encapsulates what China�s strategy is. They are very patient.� What many fail to understand, and something the Defense Department understands well, is that just like the al-Qaeda forces we are battling now, the Chinese think beyond the immediate and plan for the long-term.

http://www.aei.org/include/pub_print.asp?p.../pub_detail.asp
The latest Quadrennial Defense Review states that China "has the greatest potential to compete militarily with the United States." The Pentagon seeks to "shape [China's] strategic choices" and to "dissuade any military competitor from developing disruptive or other capabilities that could enable regional hegemony." The Bush administration has taken some concrete action toward these ends. An upgraded alliance with Japan will improve our deterrent posture. The opening of a strategic relationship with India reflects in part an American desire to ensure that China does not gain hegemony over South or Central Asia. An increase in the size of the U.S. Navy's attack submarine fleet in Guam also brings more American capability into the Pacific. A nascent defense relationship with Vietnam may over time provide the American military with what it needs most in Asia--more bases.

http://d-n-i.net/lind/lind_5_18_05.htm
I regard a war with China – hot or cold – as perhaps the greatest strategic blunder the United States could make, beyond those it has already made. The end result would be the same as that from the 20th century wars between Britain and Germany: it reduced both to second-rate powers. In the 21st century, the real victors would be the non-state forces of the Fourth Generation, who would fill the gap created by the reduction of both Chinese and American power.
Given my foreboding – in George W. Bush’s Washington, it seems the rule is that any blunder we can make, we will make – I was struck by the title of Robert D. Kaplan’s article in the June Atlantic Monthly, “How We Would Fight China.” Kaplan has written some excellent material on the breakdown of the state and the rise of non-state elements.
http://www.strategycenter.net/printVersion...ub.asp?pubID=65
2005 will mark in China another year of sustained military investment. On March 4th the Chinese government announced that its defense spending would increase by 12.6 percent in 2005. Save for 2003, all of the last 15 years has seen Chinese defense spending grow by double-digit percentages. China also announced that its overall military spending would amount to $29.9 billion, a low figure that many analysts have long believed bears little relation to reality. In 2004 the Pentagon noted that for 2003, overall Chinese military spending ranged between $50 and $70 billion.[1] If we take the Pentagon�s estimate as a baseline, then for 2004, which saw an "official" Chinese increase of 11.6 percent, spending might have risen from $55.8 to $78.1 billion, Similarly modifying the announced Chinese 2005 budget increase of by 12.6 percent yield actual expenditures between $62.8 and $87.9 billion. Other estimates have long held that Chinese military spending has reached or exceeded $100 billion. By comparison, Japan spends $45 billion on defense, and India about $19 billion.
Over fifteen years these expenditures have led to a qualitative transformation for the Chinese military. As recently as the early 1990s the PLA was mired in defensive doctrines and equipped largely with modified 1950s vintage Soviet technology. Now, China is about to field a modern force capable of offensive operations involving land, air, and sea forces, which exploit multiple new information and precision-strike technologies.
Following is a list of ten such major developments.
1. "Informationalization" And PLA Reform
The most recent PLA White Paper [December 27, 2004] PLA stated: "The PLA, aiming at building an informationalized force and winning an informationalized war, deepens its reform, dedicates itself to innovation, improves its quality and actively pushes forward the RMA [Revolution In Military Affairs] with Chinese characteristics with informationalization at the core."
Successive reductions in the size of the PLA Army have permitted resource shifts to build up the PLA Second Artillery missile forces, the PLA Air Force and the PLA Navy. This shift was formalized in late 2004 when the commanders of these three services were for the first time elevated to the PLA�s Central Military Commission, its most important leadership organ. The PLA Army remains the largest service, and thus still dominates the PLA leadership, but now even the Army realizes that modern war requires greater future leadership be given to these high-technology services.
"Informationalization" means improving the PLA�s ability to use the latest technologies in command, intelligence, training and weapon systems. New automatic command systems linked by fiber-optic Internet, satellite and new high-frequency digital radio systems, allow for more efficient joint-service planning and command, while also enabling a reduction in layers of command. The PLA can also better contest the information battlespace with its new space-based, airborne, naval and ground based surveillance and intelligence gathering systems, and its new anti-satellite, anti-radar, electronic warfare and information warfare systems. Training and education are also becoming more "informationalized" as the PLA rapidly increased the use of advanced computer-driven simulators in all services and encourages greater on-line training and education for officers and non-commissioned officers. And there is increasing "information content" for new PLA weapons as its moves to link new space, airborne and ELINT "sensors" to missile, air, naval and ground-based "shooters" to enable all its services to better use new precision-strike weapons.

Gee Vaughn, I'll just go with the kill ratio of 40 to 1 between the M1A1 Abrams and the Soviet manufactured T72 from the Iraq War.

By the way the Soviet manufactured T72 is markedly superior to the Chinese knockoff of that same tank. Seems the Chinese have not been able to get the auto loader not to frequently load the gunner into the main gun's breach instead of a shell.

Just what are you saying here gunny, do you think is would be a cake walk to take on the Chinese militarily?
That sound just like the bush guys and their thoughts on how Iraq would be a no brainer like a cake walk. It would be a fool’s game to believe a war with China would not cost us an unimaginable amount of treasure and an intolerable number of lives. Even if you’re right about the 40 to 1, and your not, it would cost more than any American would want to deal with. Do you know how many people are in the Chinese militia, or their active military?
http://www.sinodefence.com/army/tank/type98.asp
The Type 98 (also known as ZTZ-98) is the prototype of the Chinese third-generation main battle tank (MBT) programme. In 1993, 617 Factory built four prototypes to be tested between 1995 and 1996. In December 1996, an additional four prototypes were handed over to the PLA for extensive evaluation and tests. The design of the tank was finalised in 1996 and the design certificate was issued in 1998. A small number of the Type 98 took park in the military parade held in Beijing Tiananmen Square on 1 October 1999 to mark the 50th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China. The Type 98 did not enter batch production. Instead, the design team continued to develop the improved Type 99 which entered service with the PLA in 2001.
Crew: 3
Weight: 52t
Engine: 1,200hp liquid cooled diesel
Transmission: Mechanical, planetary
Track: Metallic with RMSh, with rubber-tyred road wheels
Suspension: Torsion bar
Radio: Receive/transmit, telephone, laser communications
Dimension: Length: 11.00m; Height: 2.20m; Width: 3.40m
Ground Pressure: N/A
Cruising Range: 450km, or 600km with external tanks
Speed: Max road 70km/h; max off-road 60km/h; average cross-country 35km/h; max swim N/A
Fording Depths: 5m with snorkel
Main Gun: Indigenous 125mm smoothbore
Rate of Fire: 8 rounds/min (autoloader), 1~2 r/min (manual load)
Elevation/Depression: N/A
Auxiliary Weapon: One coaxial 7.62mm machine gun; one 12.7mm air-defence machine gun
Fire Control: Laser rangefinder input, onboard computer, wind sensor, and control panel



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/People's_..._China#Military
The People's Liberation Army (PLA), with its 2.25 million active troops, is currently the largest military in the world.
They ain’t no light weights gunny. Maybe you’re to close to the bush ideal of how to preside over a military. Without real experience bush was clueless as to what it takes to conduct a war.
http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/china/cmc.htm
The armed forces of the PRC are composed of the PLA, both the active and reserve components, the Chinese People's Armed Police Force and the militia. The active components of the PLA comprise the state's standing army, which mainly undertakes the task of defensive combat, and helps to maintain social order, if necessary, according to law; reservists undergo military training in peacetime according to relevant regulations, and help to maintain social order, if necessary, according to law, and in wartime they shall be incorporated in the forces in active service in pursuance of the state's mobilization order. The Chinese People's Armed Police Force undertakes the tasks for maintenance of security and social order entrusted by the state. The militiamen, under the command of military organs, perform combat service support and defensive operations, and help to maintain social order. The PLA, comprised of the Army, the Navy, the Air Force and the Second Artillery Force, is organized in seven military area commands nationwide.

http://www.china-defense.com/pla/pla_resev..._reseve_01.html
"By insisting on combining capable regular army with powerful reserve forces, the "two fundamental changes" have guided the overall situation of national defense construction. Notable improvement in the quality of the construction of reserve forces has also accompanied the advancing steps of the qualitative construction of the army."

http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/1117/p01s03-woap.html
BEIJING – Shi Jin wears a jean jacket, has razor-cropped hair, and seems gravely earnest. An officer in the People's Liberation Army, he was wooed from a Beijing vocational college three years ago by recruiters who talked up his technical aptitude - and his patriotism.
In the past decade, China has undergone two military high-tech reforms designed to give the country a modern fighting force. To sustain that progress, it must attract many more gung-ho young engineers like Shi, who spends most of his time working on an "informational" revolution that planners hope will one day allow them to "see" a battlefield with the same depth as the US military. "I will not do any direct fighting if there is a war, but I am contributing on the technical side," he says. "We are all needed in the new Army."

Update yourself gunny, the Chinese are not sitting around letting their military age. They are a serious force in the world and it would be tragic for us to be forced into a nuclear confrontation in order to prevent a conventional confrontation. That bush attitude of “we are so great no one can hurt us” has already killed over 3,000 GI’s and injured over 23,000, wouldn’t you agree this is not good. Or is the American ego too important for that?

Well in all honesty Vaughn the Chinese Type 98 main battle tank looks like a Soviet T-72 with an angular turret. Since it's stated the armor in the turret is welded steel the Abrams main gun could deal with it with ease, unless you guys make the USA stop using DU to enhance the penetrating qualities of it's projectile. All the Chinese MBTs have been evaluated except the Type 98 and Type 99 and they all were found to be markedly inferior to any Western MBT. According to the web site you provided a link for the Type 98 & 99 design is heavily influenced by the Russian T-72 and is welded steel armor.

I don't imagine any conflict with the Chinese would be a cakewalk but the United States military has trained for years for such an eventuallity. Hopefully, the United States and China are never facing each other as adversaries.

I wonder if the Chinese ever worked out the problems with their autoloading system; you can tell how veteran a Chinese tanker is by how many limbs he's missing.

Let's all start throwing nukes around. That ought to be fun, eh?

I believe that the discussion of tank viability distracts from the topic. I pretty much agree with our bro Indianhead, on the above article. A cluster fu*k of massive proportions, run by clueless, egotistical suits.