Bush to Expand Size of Military
Posted on December 19, 2006
All those cheering the Baker report will be quite disappointed with this development. I think this is a very wise decision to increase the overall size of the military. Bush says he hasn’t decided what we are doing in Iraq, that this is the general overall military that will expand in size. The war on terror will be a long one and we will need a larger military for victory. Iraq is a war, yet it is only a battle in the full war on terror. Anything less than victory there will not help in the long war against terror.
Here is the audio of the Washington Post interview.
Via Washington Post:
President Bush said today that he plans to expand the size of the U.S. military to meet the challenges of a long-term global war against terrorists, a response to warnings that sustained deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan have stretched the armed forces to near the breaking point.
In an interview with The Washington Post, Bush said he has instructed newly sworn-in Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates to report back to him with a plan to increase ground forces. The president gave no estimates about how many troops may be added but indicated that he agreed with suggestions in the Pentagon and on Capitol Hill that the current military is stretched too thin to cope with the demands placed on it.
“I’m inclined to believe that we do need to increase our troops — the Army, the Marines,” Bush said in the Oval Office session. “And I talked about this to Secretary Gates and he is going to spend some time talking to the folks in the building, come back with a recommendation to me about how to proceed forward on this idea.”
The president’s decision comes at a time when he is rethinking his strategy in Iraq and considering, among other options, a short-term surge in troop levels to try to secure violence-torn Baghdad. The Joint Chiefs of Staff are resisting the idea during internal debates in part out of the conviction that it will further strain already-pressed forces.
A substantial military expansion will take years and would not be meaningful in the near term in Iraq. But it would begin to address the growing alarm among commanders about the state of the armed forces. Gen. Peter J. Schoomaker, the Army’s chief of staff, warned Congress last week that the active-duty Army “will break” under the strain of today’s war-zone rotations. Former secretary of state Colin L. Powell, a retired chairman of the Joint Chiefs, said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” on Sunday that “the active Army is about broken.”
The Army has already temporarily increased its size from 482,000 active-duty soldiers in 2001 to 507,000 today and soon to 512,000. But the Army wants to make that 30,000-soldier increase permanent and then grow an additional 7,000 soldiers or more per year. The Army estimates that every 10,000 additional soldiers will cost about $1.2 billion a year.
The incoming chairman of the House Armed Services Committee spoke out forcefully today for increasing the size of the Army and Marines, noting that their leaders describe the services as “stretched and strained.” “We’re going to have to pay attention to this,” Rep. Ike Skelton (D-Mo.) told reporters. Saying the two services are “bleeding,” he added, “I think we have to apply the tourniquet and strengthen the forces. I think that will be a major part of our work.”
In describing his decision today, Bush tied it to the broader struggle against Islamic extremists around the world rather than Iraq specifically. “It is an accurate reflection that this ideological war we’re in is going to last for a while and that we’re going to need a military that’s capable of being able to sustain our efforts and to help us achieve peace,” he said.
Fellow contributor Oak Leaf emails:
Not trying to be a downer on this, I am simply putting on my Staff College “hat.” Increasing the permanent strength of the Army by 30,000 is simply keeping us where we are today with the temporary authorization. Increasing the end strength by 7,000 a year will not have a material effect on world mission capabilities for a decade!!! This is an increase in end strength of 1.4% per year. Sooo, after a decade of growth we will have the addition of one Infantry Division and the various support forces.
Is this a positive thing? Yes, an increase of 1.4% is by definition “positive.” Will it change the operational capability of the US Army in 2007? No. In 2008? No. In 2009? No……………….
If the Administration wants to get serious about military capabilities it should pursue “reversing” the Clinton military cuts with the zeal that democrats are pursuing “reversing” the Bush tax cuts. On Clinton’s
“watch” the Army Guard and Army Reserve went from 616,230 in 1995 to 559,937 in 2000. On Bush’s watch they dropped another 12,888. That right there is 69,181 and that is the Army’s reserve components alone!!!What do I call it? “Feel Good Politics”
Allahpundit has some analysis on this as well.
Dan Riehl breaks out the charts.
The Political Pitbull has more.
Blue Crab Boulevard too.
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3 Responses to “Bush to Expand Size of Military”
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Syndicate Me
For my two cents worth…this is a necessary conclusion. The War on Terror will undoubtedly be a long one as the Middle East is infested with hate-filled religious murderers who have made the fate they mean to us and all freedom loving nations perfectly clear. Iraq is but just one stop along the way.
Im in favor of a larger military. But I have to wonder if that means the existing troops will get a breather or will we end up getting involved in more wars like Iraq and the troops being spread just as thin again?
Rico J Halo,
Good considerations, but this is a war on terror and to think that victory in Iraq would be the end of it would be naive at best. These Islamo-Fascist terrorist are all over the Middle East and until they abandon their bloodthirsty agenda they must be eradicated from the face of the Earth if we are to be able to live in any peace and liberty.