Caitlin Doombos – New York Post Oct 18, 2022
The US military may not be able to win one war — let alone two — as the Pentagon struggles to keep its forces equipped against potential threats from China and Russia, according a new report on American military strength.
Years of underfunding and “poorly defined priorities” has led the military to become “weak relative to the force needed to defend national interests on the global stage,” the conservative Heritage Foundation said in its annual “Index of U.S. Military Strength.”
“[T]he current U.S. military force is at significant risk of not being able to meet the demands of a single major regional conflict,” the report said. “The force would probably not be able to do more and is certainly ill-equipped to handle two nearly simultaneous [major conflicts.]”
At the same time, the possibility of two-front fighting has increased as Russia continues to wage war on Ukraine and China grows increasingly aggressive in the Pacific, according to the report.
“In the aggregate, the United States’ military posture can only be rated as ‘weak,’” the report said.
Across the services, the report rated only the Marine Corps as “strong” in the think tank’s assessment of force capacity, capability and readiness. While the Army achieved a “marginal” rating, the Space Force and Navy were labeled “weak” and the Air Force bottomed out at “very weak.”
“In general, the military services continue to prioritize readiness and have seen some improvement over the past few years, but modernization programs, especially in shipbuilding, continue to suffer as resources are committed to preparing for the future, recovering from 20 years of operations and offsetting the effects of inflation,” the report said.
That spells serious trouble as the US gears up to face a rapidly growing and increasingly aggressive Chinese military, Rep. Mike Gallagher (R-Wis.) said Tuesday.
“The particular problem with that is if you look at our priority theater, the Indo-Pacific, the two priority services are the Navy and the Air Force – and those seem to be the ones that are doing the worst,” the House Armed Services Committee member told reporters.
US Marines fire a Howitzer at Islamic State militants from Fire Base Bell, Iraq, March 18, 2016. Click to enlarge
The Marine Corps was the only service rated as “strong” by the “Index of U.S. Military Strength.”The Heritage Foundation
To strengthen its might, the US must be willing to invest in military hardware – ships, missiles and other weaponry – to supply the force with the equipment needed to prepare for future conflict, according to the report.
“At present, the [Biden] administration’s proposed defense budget for [fiscal year] 2023 falls far short of what the services need to regain readiness and to replace aged equipment,” the report said, “and Congress’s intention to increase the proposed budget by 5[%] accounts for barely half of the current rate of inflation, which is nearing 10[%].”
The armed forces also have capacity problem – not having enough personnel, weapons and other equipment to fight a war. The report rates the Navy worse than its sister services, dropping its capacity rating two notches from “marginal” to “very weak” – the lowest on the scale.
Part of the issue is the Biden administration’s diplomacy-first mindset of “substitut[ing] soft power for hard power,” which Gallagher called “naïve at best.”
“I fear as you look at the geopolitical environment, we are going to find ourselves in a competition with China or Taiwan within the next few years if we continue down this path of naive disarmament,” he said.
Gallagher based his timeline on that of former Navy Indo-Pacific commander Adm. Phil Davidson, who told lawmakers last year that China could try to take control of Taiwan by 2027.
Chinese amphibious assault ship: China is expected to have 460 ships by 2030. Click to enlarge
At the center of the hard-power problem is the Navy’s shrinking fleet size, according to the report. To fight in two wars, the think tank said the Navy would need about 400 ships – a drastic bump from the current 292 ships the service said it had as of last week.
In 2018, Congress passed a law mandating that the Navy reach a target of 355 ships “as soon as possible.”
Instead, the service has cut ships faster than they’ve built them.
But even as vessel numbers have dwindled, Navy operations have not slowed – creating an additional hurdle to growing the fleet, Heritage senior defense researcher Dakota Wood said Tuesday. The US has about half the ships it had during the Cold War, but the number of ships at sea at any given time – about 100 – has not changed since at least the early 1990s.
“You’re working your ships twice as hard, the crews twice as hard, maintenance problems mount, so when it finally gets into the [ship]yard, there’s more work that has to be done than was anticipated,” Wood said.
Meanwhile, the Chinese navy already has 355 ships and plans to add about 65 more by 2026, according to the Pentagon’s annual China military report published in November. By 2030, China is expected to have 460 ships.
“The British Royal Navy … is down to a mere 17 or 18 surface combatants total,” Wood said. “China’s adding almost the equivalent of the British Royal Navy to its own fleet almost every year, certainly every two years.”
A Zircon hypersonic missile. Both Russia and China have operational hypersonic missiles. The U.S. has yet to successfully test one. Click to enlarge
But the Navy alone cannot fight off impending threats from China and Russia – the Heritage report demonstrates that the entiire military must invest more in hard power, Gallagher said.
“The lesson is we have to rebuild our munitions industrial base,” Gallagher said. “The Defense Production Act could be modernized and used for actual defense purposes, not for baby formula.”
A Pentagon spokesman declined to comment on the report’s specifics, saying he had not seen it, but called the US military “the strongest fighting force the world has ever known.”
“Every day around the globe, the men and women of our armed forces safeguard vital US national interests by backstopping diplomacy, confronting aggression, deterring conflict, projecting strength and protecting the American people,” said the spokesman, Air Force Brig Gen. Patrick Ryder.
While this analysis might be true, military reviews are always negative.
The US navy is definitely weak. The USSF is probably better than okay, and the army is so so.
None have faught a peer power since I don’t know when, and when you play weak opponents, you get weak yourself.
Take NATO running the Nazis in UKraine. Just keep in mind that NATO commanders, and more so, NWO politicians, they don’t give a stuff about the lost of their disposable men, because they’ve been working on the premise that Russia will collapse, that Russia will run out of shells or missiles, and these assumptions have failed.
Biden wants 40,000 dead Nazis, so he shows better in the midterms. You can’t make this up.
The main reason why the US military can’t win against Russia, is that Russia will jam the US to a standstill, and I bet China can do the same. Israel says they won’t send air defence systems. Probably because they know Russia will render them useless.
This is why NATO doesn’t have a chance in a big war with Russia. I am sure the neocons are begging for war, but they are being told the hard facts.
Ben Wallace’s US trip is probably about guaging the US position, before the UK carries out a major false flag, such as this daft idea that Russia will detonate a low yield nuke over the Black Sea. Why would Russia do this? Russia doesn’t want or need a 2nd front, but the NWO sect does.
The US military is weak because it has lost every war it started since 9/11 and most wars since 1945; it will resort to terrorist atrocities to achieve some of its objectives; and truth has disappeared completely from its despatches and replaced with black propaganda.
Those are the actions of an inferior force.
Gotta take issue with “years of underfunding “, what asteroid was that on? Cause 13 BILLION for the Ford says otherwise. Cause nothing says “sink your life savings in a boat” (ok, ship), cause nothing can piss money thru a firehose, cause nothing can Blow Bucks Better than uncle Sammy! One could write an opinion novella just on those (two) words, but all the mighty hurls of luchre, the BILLIONS borrowed then blown in the name of “national security”, the loss of TRILLIONS swallowed speak for themselves. “Win” one war? Deep subject
not covered AT ALL. Underfunding??? Not buying that…
They say….”Years of ”””’underfunding”” (oh dear dear dear) and “poorly defined priorities” has led the military to become “weak relative to the force needed to defend national interests on the global stage,”
Ha…l wonder what happened to all those trillions of misappropriated dollars..don’t you?…
perhaps they should ask the ‘rabbi’ (yes that’s right a dual cititzen jewish supremacist) that headed up the Pentagon when 911 rolled out.. (funnily enough but just ‘coincidence’)…..
Dov Zakhiem.. the ‘jew’ who managed to disappear about three trillion (and have it vaguely scrubbed from the unterwebz)… and nair a word since… nor investigation…
probably left on palettes in some ‘warzone’ somewhere….
Yes..that’s right..
The idiot in the White House stands 4-square behind weakening and essentially destroying the US military. It has always been obvious, he kisses Xi’s ass and promises to further weaken our military. And what about Congress? Are they irate when they read this Heritage Foundation report? No way, our Congress is loaded with schmucks that want to see our demise so the country can be taken over by the money gluttons aka banks, MIC, etc. And, with the help of the festering, rotten media loaded with traitors, the process of gutting our military is kept hidden. Democrats and rinos, the creme de la creme of this putrid nation.
fossil fool: yes, they’ve lost, on paper, but they never want to win.
Let’s say the US fights two small wars and crushes them, so how does the 2rd, 4th, & 5th wars go?
Much better to appear to have lost, then set out your internal network with huge grease budgets with your political factions, who usually end up in power.
They did this in Iraq, and Afghanistan. The Talibunnies work for CIA.
If things had gone right for the US, same thing would’ve happened in Syria, but Russia stopped it.
Even if we have revolutions in Germany and France, the factions controlled by the US will rise to the top, unless they go back to chopping off heads.
The “woke” queers, trannies, faries, lesbos and perverts of the US military will be SLAUGHTERED
in a war with the Russian military. With the exception of the USMC, there are very few warriors left.
The weakening of the US military began in earnest with the homosexual Communist Kenyan Obongo
removing the good/great military leaders 10-12 years ago. The result is found in the IDIOT Milley as CJCS.
@ FOSSILE FOOL
USA can only defeat weak or weakened
enemies like as they came only at the
end of worldwar 1+2 into europa . Nam+
Afganistanwas good for learning reality !
USA cannot be victorious over an igual
strong enemy !
But these (lol) weaknesses are nothing that can’t be cured by a Trillion dollar infusion into the Pentagram budget, dontcha know.
Milley + his generals around him
are traitors to Trump . i am no fan
of Trump but they betrayed him .
i am still searching their letter of
disobeying . cannot find enymore.
six generals underwriters with
Milley .
P.S. I don’t really wonder much where those missing Trillions have gone.
After all, TR-3B, TR-3B’s Big Brother(s) and beaucoup space based lasers, micro wave and particle beam weapons don’t come cheap.
I agree with waw’s assessment. But you left one factor out: the negro ape simians the U.S. military is infested with. Ask any any Vietnam vet what these monkeys were like in combat:. Cowards.
Having served in the military myself; the nogs can’t shoot to hit the broad side of a barn at close range.
Lerch, my own father witnessed the WW2 (761st) tankers, the original Black Panthers
who he said were borderline insane with their courage in battle and the German tankers feared them mightily. Then again, he was only an on the scene eye witness who also said the Waffen SS (who shot holes through him) along with the Panzer Corp were the finest soldiers of them all though I’m sure there are a lot of book readers and armchair warriors who would call him a liar because they know much better than he.
the Waffen SS were the best wariors .
the drecks were the simple SS in the
koncentration camps .
Good one, waw! As for the Marine Corps, perhaps one reason they are still considered “strong” is that many of them are graduates of Texas A&M, esp. its campus in Galveston, Texas, which has its own Marine Corps training arm, which creates officers that are not woke. (But, unfortunately, wokeism is starting to affect Aggie-land a bit…so, we’ll see….)
What a steaming load of bull….. as is just about anything from the deranged blowhards at the Heritage Foundation. The only thing they got right on this one is the state of the Jew.S. military, which is weak at best.
Several others already commented above on the biggest load of sh*t in there, “Years of underfunding and “poorly defined priorities” has led the military to become ‘weak relative to the force needed to defend national interests on the global stage,'” ,, Underfunding?!? HAHAHA Yeah, ok. Compared to what? The criminal cartel has blown TRILLIONS on the giant terrorist organization known as the Jewnited States military, hardware, munitions, and obscenely expensive, well, everything. The return on investment has been complete and utter moral and legal bankruptcy.
I would agree with the “poorly defined priorities” part of the assessment though. And merely calling it “poorly defined” is a massive understatement. Let’s just get right to the big one and admit the Jewnited States has been fighting on the wrong side of everything for over 100 years now.Quite simply, the Jew.S military is a force for evil and a f*cking disgrace. The ONLY priorities should be defending the actual borders of the country AND fulfilling their f*cking oaths and slaughtering just about every stinking c*nt in that criminal sewer of DC for treason and crimes against humanity. That whole satanic hive should be turned into a smouldering crater with no notice to all the scum polluting the place.
aahhhhh soooo, another justification to give more money to the MIC and the politicians ba$$$tards. The weaknesses are not due to lack of asset, I offer that the weaknesses are due to morally bankrupt political leaders and arse kissing generals, admirals, colonels etc supporting policies against mother nature, ie same sex policies and the likes. I further venture that these policies were purposely thought out and implemented to weaken the military against all form of enemies.
Umrica is reaping what she sowed.
Maybe this is the point of everything that has been going on since Covid?