After watching every Republican presidential candidates’s debate/interview/town hall meeting there is one issue on which every remaining candidate agrees: President Obama (who by the way is NOT running for re-election ) is a weak, basically indifferent, Commander-In-Chief whose national defense policies have led this nation to the brink of disaster.
To prove their, basically collective, case the Republican candidates consistently cite the military programs of President Obama and how the armed forces of the U.S. have dwindled in size.
They then go on to point out the threats to this country with ISIS, Iran, North Korea, Russia and China being the major actors. It is emphasized that these countries, or the radical ISIS terrorist movement , are bent, in one way or another, on bringing this country, based on our weak Obama designed military, to some sort of incapability to defend “the Homeland” or project decisive military power overseas. As “proof“ of what is constantly chanted is the fact that our Air Force, Navy and Army have all declined in numbers.
In all honesty, this is absolutely correct. But what is not elaborated upon is any discussion of the capabilities of our armed forces. Yes, our Air Force and Navy have fewer aircraft and ships than at any time since World War II and our Army also falls into the same category in terms of size.
But, which of the Republican candidates, in view of the current and near-term threat environment, would trade the capabilities of today’s U.S. armed forces with those of past years? Also, if the United States is so weak, with which countries would the candidates like to trade capabilities?
Would they swap the capabilities of the U.S. with China, Russia, North Korea, or Iran? Would they trade the ability of the U.S. to project power via 10 nuclear-powered aircraft carriers, with their state of the art aircraft component (with three more carriers under construction!) for that of the one of China or one of Russia?
How about the capabilities of the U.S. Air Force? Is its capability of today, which is slowly being strengthened even more with the introduction of the world-class stealth F-35 Lightening Joint Strike Fighter, inferior to that of any of our potential adversaries?
Can any of the Republican candidates envision a scenario where even a U.S. Army consisting of only 410,000 members is incapable of defending the vital national interests of the U.S.?
Now, if the argument is that such a minimum size Army is incapable of ground combat in Asia, versus the Chinese, or Eastern Europe, against Russia, adding a mere 50,000 to 70,000 additional troops would certainly be insufficient. But what is the likelihood of such combat happening?
If the political/military situation should deteriorate, in either one of these two theaters, to a situation that hostilities seem imminent, would it not be likely that a U.S. ground force of even 500,000 to 700,000 would be woefully inadequate and a likely resumption of the military draft would be necessary to field a force of several million ground troops to be effective?
Also, is it not quite probable that combat in either theater would escalate to what in effect would be World War III and all that situation would entail, including the utilization of the nuclear arsenals of the involved combatants?
Hopefully, the international situation will not deteriorate to the one noted above, but in terms of “making our military strong again” or “rebuilding” it, which is advocated by every Republican presidential candidate, what exactly are they advocating in detail?
How many additional carriers/surface/subsurface combatants should our Navy have? How many more aircraft should our Air Force have? How about additional combat divisions for our Army and Marine Corps? How much will “making our military strong again” or “rebuilding it” cost? What non-defense programs, primarily concerning social and medical expenditures, will have to be radically reduced or eliminated?
When addressing the aforementioned issues, there are lessons from the past as to how to address military gaps. I am referring to the 1950s when during President Eisenhower’s presidency there was much publicity and widespread discussion concerning a serious bomber gap and (then)Senator John F. Kennedy similarly spoke out strongly concerning a missile gap, starting in 1958. Both gaps were in terms of our military strength vis-a-vis the then Soviet Union.
But here is the hard cold fact: both the bomber gap and the missile gap were fallacious, never existed and were fabricated to both strengthen the “military-industrial complex” and appeal to a false sense of insecurity among the American citizenry.
What we have today is the creation of yet another gap which is also fallacious, non-existent and fabricated: the military numbers gap.
On the one hand we have the Republican candidates trumpeting the argument that the U.S. military is the most dedicated, patriotic and professional in history, but is weak in term of numbers, when considering the quantity of ships, planes or personnel.
But, what these candidates refuse to accept is that the U.S. military of today is the most capable in the world in terms of being able to defend not just the Homeland but ,in conjunction with our allies, our overseas national interests.
In summary, as noted above, I pose the following question to the Republican presidential candidates: with which country, possessing larger numbers of ground forces or military hardware, would the Republican presidential hopefuls trade overall U.S. military capabilities?
Let us be direct in terms of gaps: yes, there is one, but it entails a lack of truthfulness and objectivity on behalf of the Republican presidential candidates when addressing current U.S. military capabilities.
Wade J. Williams
Colonel, USA (Ret.)
Peachtree City, Ga.
