You want probability and a systematic approach? You can't handle a ..;)
Because some want to attribute probabilities and science to warfare and budget allocations, lets look at some possible figures.
The first assumption balances probabilities for war over the next 20 years in various parts of the world. If the US chose option A with more air and seapower and showed no willingness to deploy ground forces to fight or deter terror, I would submit based on the abandonment of land troops in Lebanon, Somalia, and the cruise missile attacks of Afghanistan, failed no-fly zone over Iraq, and failure to act in Libya
all increase likelihood of a terrorist attack to .95 over the next 20 years versus only .85 if the U.S. continues terror deterrent efforts in places like Afghanistan, etc.
A similar hypothesis is that if we withdrew U.S. ground forces in South Korea, the loss of the tripwire effect would increase probability of war there. One could make a claim that a subsequent rush to Korea would involve greater ground losses than if we had forces there already. But I kept the losses the same but the probability of war higher with no forces there.
Finally, I acknowledge that increased spending on air and seapower would decrease an already extremely low probability of war with China. If a minor nuclear exchange occurred, it would be the same death toll regardless of which option we chose. Of course if no minor nuclear exchange occurred, losses would be far lower in both scenarios.
The last point is a primary one. The very high probability of another terrorist attack and subsequent war over the next 20 years must be balanced against the extremely low probability of war with China or Russia due to economic interdependency and MAD making it a lose-lose proposition. With MAD, even if we had limited conflict with either quasi-superpower, the probability is still pretty good that no nuclear exchange would occur.
Potential U.S. Deaths over next 20 years from warfare and/or terrorist attack
..Middle East
..
Korea
China
Option A: [.95 x 8,000] + [.2 x 12,000] + [.02 x 100,000] = ?
Option A: 7,600 +2,400 + 2,000 = 12,000 dead
Option B: [.85 x 8,000] + [.1 x 12,000] + [.04 x 100,000] =?
Option B: 6,800 + 1,200 + 4,000 = 12,000 dead
Next since COL (R) Warden and other USAF proponents and sellers of AirSea Battle would argue for greater defense budgets for Air and Seapower, lets look at what the above option A (higher air and seapower spending) compares to an option B with the more traditional equal spending between all the services.
For starters, air and seapower procurement is far costlier as are O&S costs than Army procurement and O&S expense. Army Manpower expense is admittedly higher. But because of the disproportionate costs of air and seapower, you can see how the U.S. could easily spend $2.5 trillion more than in a balanced approach over the next 20 years.
Service Defense Budgets over next 20 years in todays dollars
Air Force
..Navy/Marines
..Army
Option A: $5 trillion + $6 trillion +$2.5 trillion = $13.5 trillion
Option B: $3.5 trillion +$4 trillion +$3.5 trillion = $11 trillion
Finally, as the war winds down, it is somewhat startling to see how rapidly some are talking about reducing Army size. The already highly disproportionate deployment rate of Army versus other services is unlikely to improve if Army manpower is seen as a billpayer to increase air and seapower spending.
The below figures are based on one 6 month deployment by the Air Force, Navy, and Marines every 30 months with the Army deploying for 12 months out of every 30 months in Option A (smaller Army, more spent on air and seapower) and for 12 months out of every 40 months in Option B (traditional near equal spending for all services) where the Army stays nearly as large as it currently is. Note that the Army still gets the raw end of the deal either way.
Deployed months over the next 20 years: Air Force (6 mths)
Navy/Marines (6 mths)
Army (12 mths)
Option A:
.48 months
..48 months
.96 months
(Decrease Army and slightly fewer AF/Navy/Marines)
Option B:
..48 months
.48 months
.72 months
(Keep Army ranks higher and slightly fewer AF/Navy/Marines)
Heh.. Funny you say that...
Quote:
Originally Posted by
Bob's World
...worked the halls of the Pentagon vainly attempting to get each of the services to give two flying monkeys of concern over their statutory responsibility to fund all service-common aspects of Special Operations Forces...
Many years ago some of us told a lot of the "We need a SO service..." types to be careful what they wanted, they might get it...:D
Barbwire Bob may have persuaded Nunn and Goldwater but I'm not at all sure he did the Nation any favors...
It's hard to convince someone to give you money when you have your own pot which you don't share at all well and when you imply to the folks you want to give you money that they're lesser, pedestrian beings, isn't it... :wry:
Quote:
I understand the inter-service rivalry. All of the services are insanely biased and self-serving. None of them want to "lose" to a sister service in the grand priority and budget competition.
That's true and it applies to SOCOM-as-service as well. However, it's as much an effect of out pathetically poor budgeting system and a venal Congress as anything. The services are not blameless but Congress creates more problems than it solves -- not least by years of overfunding DoD.
Quote:
The Army (and the Marines, though this actually fits well within their wheelhouse) have latched onto Terrorism, Irregular Warfare, Asymmetric Warfare, Security Force Assistance, and every other bottle of snake oil they could pull of the shelf in an effort to stay in the game at a wartime footing in an era of peace. Frankly, treating peace like war may be good for the Army, but it is not healthy for the rest of the nation, and someone needs to throw the switch and side rail the crazy train.
Nor is it good for the Army or the Marines... :mad:
In their defense, they have not so much latched onto it as been forced to grab it. And truth be told, SOCOM has not helped in that.
Turf protection is a people problem. It isn't beneficial and it's a by-product of poorly crafted laws, a poorly functioning Congress -- and poor leadership. It is in part funded by such massive amounts of money being made available which inculcates greed -- our boom and bust way with money does not help. It also would not be such a problem if it were not tolerated, even encouraged...
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As to Warden? Like all models, there is value in any model that helps one to organize their thoughts...Its a framework for thinking, and that is helpful, and that is enough.
True dat.
...From Left Field - A better definition of "airpower"?
I was talking to some folks around the ofice and it hit me that there is some touble with Warden's defintion of Airpower as:
Quote:
To keep this simple, we will not talk about current service organizations. Thus, ground power is anything essentially tethered directly to the earth, including people, tanks, and artillery; sea power is anything that operates on or under water but does not include aircraft or missiles launched from ships; and airpower is anything guided that flies through the air and space, regardless of who owns it or its launch platform. If we want to avoid parochial arguments that confuse our assessment of the options, we need to stay with these definitions. After reaching conclusions, we can decide which organizations should own and operate the three types of power.
So is an ICBM or other ballistic missile "ground power" since it is not guided and comes from a ground launcher? But then a realtively short ranged guided artillery projectile or SAM would be "airpower"?
Does my ship, which is a seapower platform when it is firing ballistic rounds from its gun become an airpower platform when I load a guided round? If I put a rail gun on my ship that fires unguided rounds hundreds of miles is that rail gun seapower, but the shorter range Harpoon missile that only affects ships is "airpower"? Is a ship that only fires guided weapons an "airpower" platform?
How about a high powered laser? Is that that not airpower because its not guided, but a short range SAM is airpower becasue it is?
Can we come up with a better definition of "airpower" that perhaps uses some aspect of overall precision rather than just "guided"? And the notion that a crucial discriminator of "airpower" has to do with some function of "action at a distance"? Bt not all action at adistance? (ie the target matters?)