Did I hear ABC correctly?

Mark and Kim Smith wrote:
The Air Force doesn't have enough planes to fly Stryker Force around the
world when it needs to go someplace? Since when did the Air Force have
a shortage of planes?

Since the US has gutted all its Armed Forces by at least 1/3 starting
during the Clinton days, and the US Armed Forces are in more places
doing more missions, how could you not expect the Air Force to be short?

There's been a shortage of many types of planes for years, especially in
the small, specialized areas (so-called “low-density, high-demand”
areas). There's also issues with mission-available rates as planes get
older and require more maintenance hours per flight hour.

In this particluar case, Air Mobility Command (AMC) has had shortages of
its capacity to move enough tons per day for quite a few years,
especially since the number of tons per day seems to continue to increase.

To quote:
"The current requirements document—called MRS-05—was the first to take
into account the need for more airlifters to fill special operations
requirements. However, MRS-05 was completed before the 9/11 terrorist
attacks. It was largely based on diminished airlift requirements then
considered adequate for the post-Cold War world. The document noted that
the airlift fleet even then was insufficient for known requirements, and
it further stated that wartime needs could be met only with “a high
degree of risk.”"

This quote came from: The Squeeze on Air Mobility
(http://www.afa.org/magazine/july2003/0703mobility.asp)

And it's not getting any better, nor is availability and usage for other
areas as well.

Also read "It Means “We Didn’t Buy Enough”"
(http://www.afa.org/magazine/july2003/0703enough.asp) for a good
discussion of current “low-density, high-demand” problems.

On Sat, 03 Jan 2004 16:33:51 -0600, No Spam! wrote:

Since the US has gutted all its Armed Forces by at least 1/3 starting
during the Clinton days,

Wrong. We were in an active draw-down at the same time we were deploying
forces for Desert Shield. That was pre-Clinton.

-Jeff B. (who never liked nor ever voted for Clinton.)
yeff at erols dot com

The Air Force doesn't have enough planes to fly Stryker Force around the
world when it needs to go someplace? Since when did the Air Force have
a shortage of planes?

The Air Force has NEVER had enough transport aircraft to meet the requirements
it was tasked to fill. The two simultaneous war capability advertised during
the Clinton (?) years was so much baloney. Couldn't do it then, can't do it
now. The AF spends a "gajillion" dollars on fighters but not nearly as much on
the support aircraft needed to get the mechanics, supplies, etc. needed to
support those fighters to the same location.

THEN, there's the Army. On one occasion when I was in a C-141B airlift unit,
the Army wanted some heavy equipment moved from point A to point B. However,
when the AF transports arrived to load up, the equipment would no longer fit
(it used to fit though.) What happened? The Army had welded some additional
stuff on the outside of the equipment and it no longer would fit though the
cargo door of the transport.

Ed
"The French couldn't hate us any
more unless we helped 'em out in another war."
--Will Rogers



(Delete text after dot com for e-mail reply.)

No Spam! wrote:
Mark and Kim Smith wrote:
The Air Force doesn't have enough planes to fly Stryker Force around
the world when it needs to go someplace? Since when did the Air
Force have a shortage of planes?

Since the US has gutted all its Armed Forces by at least 1/3 starting
during the Clinton days,

YOu mean "starting in the first Bush Adminsitration." The Bush
Adminstration's 1990/91 Base Force proposal called for a 20-30% cut in force
structure more or less across the board. True, the Clinton administration's
Bottom-Up Review cuts went deeper, but most of the total cuts had already
been planned under Base Force.

This loks liek an itneresting report on the various defense reviews (base
Force, BUR, and first Quadrennial Defense Review).

http://www.rand.org/publications/MR/MR1387/

And I'll point out that the second Bush Adminstration had planned to cut
force levels even further under the second QDR. They were talking about
increased procurement spending (transformation, recapitalization, or
industruial support, depending on your perspective), but not major topline
increases.

--
Tom Schoene Replace "invalid" with "net" to e-mail
"If brave men and women never died, there would be nothing
special about bravery." -- Andy Rooney (attributed)

"Mark and Kim Smith" wrote in message
...


Supposedly this Stryker Force is supposed to be anywhere in the world in 96
hours ( I think that was the time quoted ) and that the Air Force wasn't up
to that.

I don't know what the hell a "Stryker Force" is, but if you are referring to
the Stryker Brigade Combat Team, the goal is 96 hours. As to whether or not
the USAF can manage that, it would largely depend upon the level of
committment it has to other requirements--if DoD says getting the SBCT into
the theater is the top priority, airframes will be made available one way or
another.

The complaints were that their troop transports are too heavy.

Ambiguous. The Stryker combat vehicle pushes (but does not exceed) the
capability of the C-130, but it does not tax that of the larger strategic
airlifters like the C-5 and C-17.

Not to mention they had to add 2 tons of anti RPG protection to each
machine causing their weight problems to increase.

Again, ambiguous. IIRC that is extra applique armor you are referring to--it
could be airlifted in after the initial closure on the aerial port of
debarkation (APOD) if required. But if the method of transport is the C-5 or
C-17, it can travel with it already installed.


All the high tech stuff this Stryker Force has ain't gonna do much good if
you can't get them there. Maybe the Army forgot to talk to the Air Force??

This stuff has been flung back and forth for a couple of years now. Simple
answer is that the SBCT is a hell of a lot lighter (and easier) to transport
than the next heavier asset (a heavy brigade combat team with its M1A2's,
M2A2's, M109A6's, etc.), while it packs substantially more ground maneuver
capability and protection than its next lighter component (the light
infantry brigade combat team). It is a good tool to have in the grand
toolbox of military operations for the US military--they were not quite
ready when the balloon went up for OIF (the first SBCT just became fully
operational this past year), so the Army had to try and get a heavy force
into Northern Iraq by air, resulting in IIRC about the equivalent of one
battalion task force (minus, again IIRC) (which is only one-third of a heavy
BCT) making it into that area by the time the units in the south made the
link up. Had they had a SBCT ready to go we would have seen the entire
brigade in the AO instead.

Brooks

In article ,
says...
The Air Force doesn't have enough planes to fly Stryker Force around the
world when it needs to go someplace? Since when did the Air Force have
a shortage of planes?


Since forever,
the USAF can get it all there in 96 hours if they use all the airlift
asests and have a facility ot the recieving end to handle the traffic.



--
When dealing with propaganda terminology one sometimes always speaks in
variable absolutes. This is not to be mistaken for an unbiased slant.

Kevin Brooks wrote:

"Mark and Kim Smith" wrote in message
...




Supposedly this Stryker Force is supposed to be anywhere in the world in 96


hours ( I think that was the time quoted ) and that the Air Force wasn't up
to that.

I don't know what the hell a "Stryker Force" is, but if you are referring to
the Stryker Brigade Combat Team, the goal is 96 hours. As to whether or not
the USAF can manage that, it would largely depend upon the level of
committment it has to other requirements--if DoD says getting the SBCT into
the theater is the top priority, airframes will be made available one way or
another.



The complaints were that their troop transports are too heavy.



Ambiguous. The Stryker combat vehicle pushes (but does not exceed) the
capability of the C-130, but it does not tax that of the larger strategic
airlifters like the C-5 and C-17.



Not to mention they had to add 2 tons of anti RPG protection to each


machine causing their weight problems to increase.

Again, ambiguous. IIRC that is extra applique armor you are referring to--it
could be airlifted in after the initial closure on the aerial port of
debarkation (APOD) if required. But if the method of transport is the C-5 or
C-17, it can travel with it already installed.




All the high tech stuff this Stryker Force has ain't gonna do much good if


you can't get them there. Maybe the Army forgot to talk to the Air Force??

This stuff has been flung back and forth for a couple of years now. Simple
answer is that the SBCT is a hell of a lot lighter (and easier) to transport
than the next heavier asset (a heavy brigade combat team with its M1A2's,
M2A2's, M109A6's, etc.), while it packs substantially more ground maneuver
capability and protection than its next lighter component (the light
infantry brigade combat team). It is a good tool to have in the grand
toolbox of military operations for the US military--they were not quite
ready when the balloon went up for OIF (the first SBCT just became fully
operational this past year), so the Army had to try and get a heavy force
into Northern Iraq by air, resulting in IIRC about the equivalent of one
battalion task force (minus, again IIRC) (which is only one-third of a heavy
BCT) making it into that area by the time the units in the south made the
link up. Had they had a SBCT ready to go we would have seen the entire
brigade in the AO instead.

Brooks


My apologies if I offended you. I am not familiar with this stuff and I
wasn't taking notes while viewing the show. I'll try to do better next
time. My post was a way for me to seek information so that I could
learn more.

"Mark and Kim Smith" wrote in message
...


Kevin Brooks wrote:

"Mark and Kim Smith" wrote in message
...



Supposedly this Stryker Force is supposed to be anywhere in the world in
96
hours ( I think that was the time quoted ) and that the Air Force wasn't up
to that.

I don't know what the hell a "Stryker Force" is, but if you are referring
to
the Stryker Brigade Combat Team, the goal is 96 hours. As to whether or not
the USAF can manage that, it would largely depend upon the level of
committment it has to other requirements--if DoD says getting the SBCT into
the theater is the top priority, airframes will be made available one way or
another.


The complaints were that their troop transports are too heavy.


Ambiguous. The Stryker combat vehicle pushes (but does not exceed) the
capability of the C-130, but it does not tax that of the larger strategic
airlifters like the C-5 and C-17.


Not to mention they had to add 2 tons of anti RPG protection to each

machine causing their weight problems to increase.

Again, ambiguous. IIRC that is extra applique armor you are referring
to--it
could be airlifted in after the initial closure on the aerial port of
debarkation (APOD) if required. But if the method of transport is the C-5 or
C-17, it can travel with it already installed.



All the high tech stuff this Stryker Force has ain't gonna do much good
if

you can't get them there. Maybe the Army forgot to talk to the Air Force??

This stuff has been flung back and forth for a couple of years now. Simple
answer is that the SBCT is a hell of a lot lighter (and easier) to transport
than the next heavier asset (a heavy brigade combat team with its M1A2's,
M2A2's, M109A6's, etc.), while it packs substantially more ground maneuver
capability and protection than its next lighter component (the light
infantry brigade combat team). It is a good tool to have in the grand
toolbox of military operations for the US military--they were not quite
ready when the balloon went up for OIF (the first SBCT just became fully
operational this past year), so the Army had to try and get a heavy force
into Northern Iraq by air, resulting in IIRC about the equivalent of one
battalion task force (minus, again IIRC) (which is only one-third of a heavy
BCT) making it into that area by the time the units in the south made the
link up. Had they had a SBCT ready to go we would have seen the entire
brigade in the AO instead.

Brooks

My apologies if I offended you. I am not familiar with this stuff and I
wasn't taking notes while viewing the show. I'll try to do better next
time. My post was a way for me to seek information so that I could learn
more.

You did not offend me. I was not aware my response even insinuated that you
had, and upon rereading it again I am still scratchin' my noggin as to how
you got that idea. One piece of advice, though--if you are going to hang
around Usenet, thicken your skin a bit, because if you thought my response
was terse, you ain't seen nothin' yet. And I recommend you post in plain
text--makes it a bit easier on others.

Brooks

Rumsfeld was floating the idea of a military force just large enough
to fight on one front, and use the savings to buy more advandanced
weapons like UAVs. This was pre-911. A damn good thing everybody
wanted their pork and gutted the proposal.

"Thomas Schoene" wrote in message thlink.net...
No Spam! wrote:
Mark and Kim Smith wrote:
The Air Force doesn't have enough planes to fly Stryker Force around
the world when it needs to go someplace? Since when did the Air
Force have a shortage of planes?

Since the US has gutted all its Armed Forces by at least 1/3 starting
during the Clinton days,

YOu mean "starting in the first Bush Adminsitration." The Bush
Adminstration's 1990/91 Base Force proposal called for a 20-30% cut in force
structure more or less across the board. True, the Clinton administration's
Bottom-Up Review cuts went deeper, but most of the total cuts had already
been planned under Base Force.

This loks liek an itneresting report on the various defense reviews (base
Force, BUR, and first Quadrennial Defense Review).

http://www.rand.org/publications/MR/MR1387/

And I'll point out that the second Bush Adminstration had planned to cut
force levels even further under the second QDR. They were talking about
increased procurement spending (transformation, recapitalization, or
industruial support, depending on your perspective), but not major topline
increases.

Yeff wrote:
On Sat, 03 Jan 2004 16:33:51 -0600, No Spam! wrote:

Since the US has gutted all its Armed Forces by at least 1/3 starting
during the Clinton days,

Wrong. We were in an active draw-down at the same time we were deploying
forces for Desert Shield. That was pre-Clinton.

It was not only pre-Clinton but, unless I'm mistaken, it started under Reagan
after Gorby folded his tent and raised the economic white flag. That was when
BRAC started along with force reduction. And I do recall widespread RIFs at the
end of the Gulf War, which daddy Bush can take credit for.

I don't know what the Republicans would have done if Clinton hadn't come along
for two terms and made himself available to be blamed for everything that ever
went wrong in the world. Can you see them blaming one of their own, even when
the evidence supported placing responsibility precisely there? Not very damned
likely, especially when it would have required them to be honest about who did
what to who.

George Z.