Defensiebegrotingen en -problematiek, niet NL

[jurrien visser (JuVi op Twitter)]

Hillen: Hoe houden we onze veiligheid 'triple A'

12 januari 2012, 21.00 uur

Minister Hans Hillen heeft vanmiddag in Washington de Atlantic Council toegesproken. De minister pleitte voor het vasthouden aan de hoge ?triple A? veiligheidsstatus van de NAVO, juist in economisch onzekere tijden. De minister brengt deze week een werkbezoek aan de Verenigde Staten en had vandaag een ontmoeting met zijn nieuwe ambtgenoot Leon Panetta.

De minister ging voor de Atlantic Council, een denktank ter bevordering van trans-Atlantische samenwerking, in op zaken die cruciaal zijn voor het huidige hoge veiligheidsniveau in de Westerse wereld. Veiligheid dankzij de NAVO, die op haar beurt essentieel is voor stabiliteit en welvaart.

Hillen: ?Het vraagt politieke wil en leiderschap om onze burgers te overtuigen van het belang van de NAVO en de bijbehorende uitgaven in een tijd van afnemende financiële bronnen. Het risico bestaat dat de keuze voor de welvaart vandaag ten koste gaat van de veiligheid van morgen. Europeanen moeten begrijpen dat hun rijkdom niet alleen samenhangt met een stabiele euro, maar ook met internationale stabiliteit.?

Europese veiligheid

Hillen bepleitte een flexibele organisatie, in staat om adequaat te reageren op de snel veranderende wereld. Een organisatie die de juiste lessen uit eerdere operaties trekt en doeltreffend reageert op wereldwijde machtsverschuivingen. Gezien de onvoorspelbare en zich snel opvolgende veranderingen is een sterke NAVO essentieel voor de Europese veiligheid. Dit betekent volgens de bewindsman niet dat de NAVO-arsenalen met zoveel mogelijk wapens gevuld moeten worden. Het vraagt om een slimme inzet van de beschikbare middelen, conventioneel en nucleair, waarmee op uiteenlopende scenario?s gereageerd kan worden.

Meer samenwerking

Om in de huidige economische crisis de NAVO te handhaven als veiligheidsgarantie is verdere samenwerking van de deelnemers noodzakelijk. Als voorbeeld noemde Hillen de samenwerking tussen Nederland en Amerika die hij 2 dagen eerder met eigen ogen op de Texaanse legerbasis Fort Hood zag. Nederlandse helikopterpiloten maken hier gebruik van Amerikaanse oefenfaciliteiten. Ook noemde hij het gezamenlijk optrekken van F-16-gebruikers bij de mogelijke aanschaf van de JSF. Een samenwerkingsverband dat volgens Hillen zijn vruchten al afwerpt is de gezamenlijke C-17-transportvloot van de NAVO, gestationeerd op het Hongaarse Papa Airbase.

Publieke steun

Hillen merkte op dat verdergaande samenwerking van invloed kan zijn op de nationale soevereiniteit. De betrokken landen moeten hier goed over nadenken, wat de reden is dat de minister deze discussie in Nederland al heeft aangezwengeld. Dit hangt nauw samen met het belang van de publieke steun voor de NAVO. Juist een flexibele en efficiënt optredende organisatie is volgens Hillen cruciaal voor het verwerven van deze steun.

Tijdens de ontmoeting met Panetta eerder vandaag in het Pentagon werd ook gesproken over ontwikkeling van de NAVO en het streven naar meer militaire innovatieve samenwerking, maar ook over de bezuinigingen op Defensie, de missie in Afghanistan, piraterijbestrijding en de JSF. Morgen reist de minister terug naar Nederland.

Verwijzingen

* Toespraak minister Hillen voor Atlantic Council in Washington
* Webpage | 12 januari 2012 | pdf, 4 pagina?s, 67 KB

http://www.nieuwsbank.nl/inp/2012/01/12/T279.htm

[jurrien visser (JuVi op Twitter)]

Laks Europa laat wereldorde aan VS en China

Rob de Wijk − 12/01/12, 23:30

column De trans-Atlantische relatie is de hoeksteen van ons buitenlands en veiligheidsbeleid. Dat willen politici in heel Europa ons doen geloven. Dit uitgangspunt is steeds meer theorie.
De Amerikaanse minister van defensie Robert Gates gaf begin vorig jaar een ongekend harde afscheidsrede in Brussel. Hij vroeg zich af of het Congres nog wel bereid is in de Navo en Europa te investeren als de Europeanen voortdurend in hun eigen defensie zouden blijven snijden. De minister verwachtte dat er een schok door het bondgenootschap zou gaan. Maar er gebeurde niets. Geen debat, nauwelijks berichtgeving.

De Amerikaanse defensieminister moest tot drie maal toe aan het Congres uitleggen hoe hij op de non-reactie van de bondgenoten ging reageren. Toen ik een paar weken geleden in Washington was, bleken ze nog boos.

Generaal Dempsey, de hoogste Amerikaanse militair en de rechterhand van president Obama, sprak in zorgelijke termen over Europa. Zou het oude continent in staat zijn om de politieke en financiële crisis te overleven? Zo niet, dan komt daardoor ook de veiligheid van Amerika in het geding. De reden? Amerika heeft Europa hard nodig als tegenwicht tegen de opkomst van Azië.

Dempsey ging ook in op de komende defensierichtlijn. Die zou, behalve een reductie van het budget, de concentratie van de Amerikaanse defensie-inspanningen in de Pacific eisen. Amerika kijkt nu naar het westen, niet langer naar het oosten.

Die beleidswijziging zat er al aan te komen. Minister van buitenlandse zaken Clinton sprak in een recent artikel in Foreign Policy over 'America's Pacific century'. Azië zou de nieuwe focus van haar beleid worden. Het woord Europa kwam niet één maal uit haar pen.

Sinds een week ligt er dan die nieuwe defensierichtlijn. Obama en Gates' opvolger Panetta stellen daarin dat Europa nog steeds een belangrijke partner is, maar dat de Amerikaanse aanwezigheid zal worden aangepast aan de nieuwe realiteit. Kortom, de Amerikanen willen een rebalancing, een heroriëntatie. Want de opkomst van Azië is bepalend voor de toekomstige welvaart en veiligheid van de gehele westerse wereld. Als Europa zich bij de VS wil aansluiten dan is dat goed, maar Amerika gaat niet langer soebatten.

Ik ben ervan overtuigd dat het merendeel van de Europese burgers en politici 'het zal wel' denkt. Maar het is volstrekt logisch dat Amerika en Europa samen optrekken om hun welvaart, maatschappelijke en politieke stabiliteit die door die nieuwe wereldorde worden bedreigd, te beschermen.

De Europese bondgenoten verkeren echter in een diepe politieke crisis. Voorlopig zijn ze onmachtig om de euro en de Europese Unie te redden. Het uitblijven van elk debat over de gevolgen van het Europese verval in die nieuwe wereldorde is veelzeggend.

Op een dag ontwaakt Europa uit zijn lethargie en wordt de vraag gesteld hoe het toch allemaal zo heeft kunnen komen. Amerika en China bepalen dan zonder Europa de wereldorde. De banden met Amerika zijn zo zwak dat gezamenlijk kunnen optrekken met de Amerikanen onmogelijk is. Europese krijgsmachten zijn lege hulzen.

Grondstoffen en energie gaan vooral naar opkomende, machtig geworden economieën. Europa heeft dan zijn welvaart en veiligheid willens en wetens verkwanseld.

http://www.trouw.nl/tr/nl/6844/Rob-de-Wijk/article/detail/3118581/2012/01/12/Laks-Europa-laat-wereldorde-aan-VS-en-China.dhtml

[jurrien visser (JuVi op Twitter)]

VS trekt duizenden militairen terug uit Europa

ANP − 13/01/12, 03:40

Het Amerikaanse leger trekt tussen de 6000 en 10.000 militairen terug uit bases in Europese landen. Dat heeft Leon Panetta, minister van Defensie in de Verenigde Staten, aangekondigd, zo meldde de persdienst van het ministerie.
Twee in Europa gevestigde gevechtsbrigades keren terug naar de VS. Deze brigades tellen doorgaans tussen de 3000 en 5000 manschappen. Op dit moment zijn ongeveer 40.000 Amerikaanse militairen gelegerd in Europese landen.

Bezuinigingen
Duitsland huisvest drie gevechtsbrigades van de VS, Italië één. De inkrimping van de Amerikaanse troepenmacht in Europa is onderdeel van een grootschalige bezuinigingsoperatie. De militairen worden vergezeld door ongeveer 100.000 familieleden.

De inkrimping van de Amerikaanse troepenmacht in Europa is onderdeel van een grootschalige bezuinigingsoperatie. In de komende tien jaar wil de Amerikaanse regering 487 miljard dollar (380 miljard euro) bezuinigen op de strijdkrachten.

http://www.volkskrant.nl/vk/nl/2668/Buitenland/article/detail/3118884/2012/01/13/VS-trekt-duizenden-militairen-terug-uit-Europa.dhtml

[jurrien visser (JuVi op Twitter)]

Britain signals more defence cuts

• Defence secretary points to new alliances
• Slams Nato members for not pulling their weight
• UK forces to prepare for limited counter terrorist and peacekeeping missions

The defence secretary Philip Hammond popped his head above the water in his first visit to meet his US counterpart, Leon Panetta, and dropped some very important hints about the future shape of Britain's armed forces and what operations they could be engaged in.

His remarks caused few ripples because they were largely ignored. That may well suit some in the Ministry of Defence struggling to fill a multi-billion gap that still exists between its allocated budget and commitments, thanks largely to the Labour government's spending spree.

The defence budget is still facing a crisis. The MoD simply cannot afford the weapons and the numbers of soldiers, sailors, and airforce personnel, and civil servants, it has on its books. The £5bn cuts shadow defence secretary Jim Murphy suggested in an interview in the Guardian last week is a drop in the ocean. Cuts of more like £35bn are needed.

Hammond is sometimes described rather dismissively as an accountant - there are plenty of people in Whitehall who say that is precisely what the MoD needs now, and indeed has done for a very long time. His message, in Washington to the Atlantic Council thinktank on 5 January, was pretty clear: for the forseeable future there won't be any more money to spend on weapons, and more effective collaboration with other countries, some outside Nato, is vital.

He had a go at some Nato countries (principally Germany, though Hammond named no names) for not pulling their weight. "Too many countries are failing to meet their financial responsibilities to Nato, and so failing to maintain appropriate and proportionate capabilities. Too many are opting out of operations or contributing but a fraction of what they should be capable of", said Hammond.

"Across the [Nato] alliance defence expenditure is certain to fall in the short term and, at best, recover slowly in the medium term. More money is not going to be the answer", he emphasised. "Prioritising ruthlessly; specialising aggressively and collaborating unsentimentally", was the answer.

While the government seizes every opportunity to blame its Labour predecessor for the defence budget shambles, it is fighting shy of a debate that might encourage more and more people to question the purpose of the two biggest and most expensive military projects - a new Trident nuclear ballistic missile system and two new aircraft carriers.

Both Trident and the carrier project are scarcely relevant to the kind of operations British forces are going to concentrate on in future. The future of the carriers looks even more uncertain as the US Pentagon, also faced with heavy budgets cuts, threatens to delay production of the ever more expensive F35 Joint Strike Fighter designed to fly from them.

Future operations likely to preoccupy after UK troops pull out of a combat role in Afghanistan at the end of 2014, judging from recent speeches by senior military figures on both sides of the Atlantic, are counter insurgency, counter terrorist, and stabilisation operations in Africa and elsewhere.

The operations would be carried out by pilotless drones, small teams of special forces, cyber warriors, and aircraft equipped with "smart" bombs or missiles of the kind used in Libya.

These kinds of missions were reflected by General Sir Peter Wall, head of the British army, in an interview in this month's issue of Soldier magazine. Asked about what the army might look like in 2002 he replied: "It will make more systematic and strategic use of the military's skills and credibility to grow the capacity and capability of other nations in order to develop both the ability of fragile states to manage threats within their borders and the potential...to conduct wider peace peacekeeping missions".

In other words, helping "fragile states" - in Africa, the Middle East, for example - cope with insurgents or militant groups, and then helping to keep the peace.

Documents recently released at the National Archives show how little has changed. Thirty years ago, the defence secretary Sir John Nott warned his cabinet colleagues of the dangers of Britain "trying to do too much, with the certainty of not doing it well enough". He added: "Now is the time to face radical adjustment, and to settle a stable and realistic long-run course". The chancellor, Sir Geoffrey Howe, commented: "It is unquestionably right to tackle the present massive over-commitment on the defence programme".

It is time to stop re-inventing the wheel.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/global/defence-and-security-blog/2012/jan/09/army-military-defence?newsfeed=true

[jurrien visser (JuVi op Twitter)]

Nu hoor je niemand over die wapendeal, ik zeg vestzak-broekzak principe.....

Precies. Nederland had als eis een aantal nieuw te bouwen fregatten of LPD's kunnen bedingen...

Jammer, gemiste kans.

[Tanker]

Nu hoor je niemand over die wapendeal, ik zeg vestzak-broekzak principe.....

[KapiteinRob]

Blijkbaar onderscheidt weinig Griekenland nog van een ontwikkelingshulp ontvangend land.....

[jurrien visser (JuVi op Twitter)]

Voor de liefhebbers van een Duits stuk in relatie tot Griekese defensie wensen (hieronder 60 Eurofighters) in het licht van bezuinigingen die blijkbaar aan de Griekse defensie organisatie voorbij gaan.


Schöne Waffen für Athen

Fregatten, Panzer und U-Boote: An Griechenlands Militär geht jedes Sparpaket vorbei. Und Deutschland profitiert davon.

http://www.zeit.de/2012/02/Ruestung-Griechenland

[andré herc]

The Harper government may be ready to deliver on its long-standing promise to buy new search-and-rescue planes for the air force.

The procurement plan, stuck in bureaucratic limbo for almost a decade, was approved by the federal cabinet just before Christmas and with a slightly bigger budget of $3.7 billion, according to defence sources.

Initially given the green by Paul Martin's Liberal government in late 2003, the program is meant to replace the aging twin-engine C-115 Buffalos and older model four-engine C-130 Hercules transports.

When the plan was re-announced by the Conservatives almost six years ago, the budget was estimated at $3.1 billion.

voor meer zie link

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/story/2012/01/06/pol-cp-search-planes-contract.html

[andré herc]

Minister van Defensie Pieter De Crem (CD&V) zal in de loop van de komende weken dieper ingaan op de veranderingen die hij de komende jaren wil doorvoeren, zo heeft zijn woordvoerder aangegeven. In het regeerakkoord van de regering-Di Rupo wordt een nieuwe inkrimping van het aantal manschappen voorzien.
Het regeerakkoord voorziet een vermindering van het aantal effectieven tot 32.000 (30.000 militairen en 2.000 burgers) tegen 2015. Onlangs dook het aantal effectieven onder de drempel van 34.000.

"Copy-paste uit regeerakkoord"
Alle ministers en staatssecretarissen moeten het parlement een nota van algemeen beleid overmaken met betrekking tot hun beleidsdomein. In het geval van De Crem ging het echter om een 'copy paste' van de passages over Defensie in het regeerakkoord, zo sneerde kamerlid Wouter De Vriendt (Groen! ) in de krant De Standaard. Hij sprak van "een gebrek aan sérieux en respect voor het parlement".

Meerjarenplan
De woordvoerder van De Crem verzekerde dat de minister optrad "in akkoord met het kabinet" van de premier. Hij gaf wel toe dat een aantal ministers een meer uitgewerkte tekst indienden bij het parlement. Maar De Crem zal in de komende weken zijn visie op de toekomst van het leger en een meerjarenplan voor investeringen presenteren, verzekerde de zegsman. (belga/lb)

http://www.demorgen.be/dm/nl/5036/Binnenland/article/detail/1374325/2012/01/06/De-Crem-presenteert-in-komende-weken-visie-op-toekomst-leger.dhtml

[jurrien visser (JuVi op Twitter)]

Budget Cuts Force Procurement Rethink

Jan 5, 2012
 
By Bill Sweetman, Paul McLeary
Washington, Washington

"We have run out of money, so now we must think," remarked U.S. Air Force Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Philip Breedlove during a presentation on the emerging Air/Sea Battle concept in July. It's becoming a common saying. The military is not in its current predicament by accident. Poor performance—programs years or decades behind schedule, costing too much to acquire and costing far too much to operate—has helped drive almost every military in the world to make pious sounds about "doing more with less" while doing exactly the opposite.

For the first time in a decade, the Pentagon is going to have to budget, rather than just spend. This not only means some programs will have to be removed from the procurement ledger, but new weapons programs will have to cap development—and perhaps more importantly, sustainment costs—significantly.

At the Credit Suisse/Aviation Week 2011 Aerospace and Defense Conference in New York in December, Shay Assad, the Pentagon's director of defense pricing and acquisition policy, tried to assuage some fears defense contractors have vocalized about their potential profits now that the Pentagon is going on a diet. Assad said the Pentagon is making an effort to use the promise of profitability "to motivate contractors to reduce their cost structures." To track this effort the Defense Contract Management Agency is adding more than 350 experts in cost estimating: If costs can be more accurately predicted up front, everyone will enter an agreement with the same realistic expectations.

The Pentagon is also creating Integrated Contractor Analysis Teams, tasked with oversight responsibilities for divisions within the companies with which the Pentagon does the most business. Adding to this is a new tool called the Contractor Business Analysis Repository, which will let contracting officers look into the Defense Department's past dealings with a company, as well as any current relationships other services or offices have with the company.

The fact that these common-sense business practices are coming as a revelation to the Pentagon offers yet another peek into how fragmented and isolated the procurement process has been.

When it comes to funding big-ticket budget items that will have to fit under the $450 billion-1 trillion in defense cuts to be phased in over the next 10 years, the F-35—the most expensive weapon program in history—looms large. "There are some fact-of-life changes that we'll probably have to make based on the ability to procure on the time lines that we'd like to have," Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said during an event in Washington last month. And a decade's worth of schedule delays and rising costs are only part of the problem.

Dempsey acknowledged that, if the eurozone collapses and European allies that planned to buy the airplane lose interest, the JSF program in the U.S. could be affected. "Everything we do is in the context of understanding the economic condition of our nation and understanding that our national power is the sum of military, economic and diplomatic power," Dempsey explained. "We're looking at what we can afford to do." PowerPoint presentations from October 2010 showing JSF production soaring past 200 aircraft a year by the end of 2016 now smack of fantasy.

And what is it that can be afforded? Each branch of the armed services is trying to figure that out, while at the same time taking a hard look at threats in a post-Iraq, post-Afghanistan future. The Army seems to be trying to sprint ahead of the other services by developing a fast, agile, "show-me-what-you-got" template for buying communications, sensors and some unmanned assets.

The Army has been inviting industry down to White Sands Missile Range, N.M., for its biennial Network Integration Exercise (NIE) for several years, where it puts new gear into the hands of the 2nd Brig., 1st Armored Div. and sets them loose in war games against an agile opposition force, to see what's left after several weeks.

Army Vice Chief of Staff Gen. Peter Chiarelli has said the plan is for the service to "buy what it needs, when it needs it, for those who need it. This allows us to buy less more often and incrementally improve network capability over time." In other words, why spend hundreds of millions and years of testing to field tens of thousands of radios, when the Army can spend millions to buy hundreds of radios, which can be swapped out for the next generation when technologies improve in a few years? Chiarelli envisions the tests "as . . . a revolutionary approach that will potentially affect how we provide new capabilities."

The tests are also about integration, experimentation with new technologies not yet in the budget cycle and the acquisition process.

Worldwide, many big programs are in the same fix as U.S. efforts such as the F-35 and the Navy's DDG-1000. The battles between the Eurofighter Typhoon and Dassault Rafale are in no small part due to the fact that their high price tags have slowed the pace of production, service entry and modernization to the point that now an influx of orders and cash from customers such as the United Arab Emirates and India make a huge difference in the program's viability.

The measures being taken in the U.S. and elsewhere—squeezing contractor margins, analyzing their overheads and conducting should-cost reviews—are needed in the short term. But for guidance as to what to do further out, it's worth looking at current and historical examples.

In November 2011, Switzerland picked the JAS 39E/F Gripen as its new fighter over the Typhoon and Rafale, not because it scored highest on any performance index but because it did the job and cost least. This is a vindication for the process that launched Gripen 30 years ago: the recognition that a replacement for the System 37 Viggen family would be unaffordable unless downsized.

The U.K. is showing signs of following the Gripen route with its new Type 26 warships, having been unnerved by the price tag of the Type 45, its newest combatant. One choice to watch is whether the Royal Navy will go whole hog into all-diesel propulsion. New diesels provide almost equal speed to gas turbine or gas-plus-diesel but use less fuel, particularly at slow patrol speeds. Still, it is quite a switch for the navy that invented the gas-turbine warship.

The lesson is that most of the acquisition and operating costs for any system are baked into the basic requirements, at a given technology level. Subsequent initiatives are tinkering at the margins.

Most militaries have difficulty dealing with operating economics. Acquisition and operating budgets—the latter increasingly dominated by personnel costs—come out of separate accounts. It is a rare government that allows, let alone requires, its defense ministry to take credit for lower operating costs in making capital expenditure decisions, something businesses do naturally.

The ultimate horror story, in this regard, is the B-52—still an essential USAF asset. In 1982, Boeing proposed to fit B-52G/H aircraft with four PW2000-series engines, but the proposal was rejected because the Air Force planned to replace all B-52s with 232 B-1Bs and B-2s by the late 1990s. In the mid-1990s, Rolls-Royce offered to lease RB.211-535 engines to USAF.

The service turned this down on the basis of economics, mainly because it had such a large stockpile of TF33 engines that it projected that it would have barely any need to overhaul engines, offsetting the reduction in operating cost (mainly fuel burn) offered by the RB.211. However, in 2003, a Defense Science Board report discovered that the service's calculations were based on fuel costs on the ground and did not include the 17-times-higher cost of fuel offloaded from a tanker aircraft. In fact, a reengining program could have paid for itself many times over.

An indication as to whether the lesson of affordability has sunk in will be the path taken by the U.S. Marine Corps in the development of an amphibious tracked vehicle to substitute for the Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle (EFV), sent to its grave by then-Defense Secretary Robert Gates in 2010. The requirement that defined the EFV's cost and complexity was speed—the ability to travel from ship to shore in 1 hr., deemed necessary to achieve tactical surprise, while allowing ships to stay over the horizon. If the substitute is aimed at the same requirements, the same costs are likely, because it will also need waterjet propulsion and high installed power.

Another test case will be USAF's new bomber—if that program is alive by the end of 2012. The service has been pushed to minimize requirements to get a $500 million unit cost—not exactly cheap, and an indicator of where unconstrained requirements would have taken it.

Affordability may be the new military religion, but so far, like godliness and charity for all, it is preached more than practiced.

http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/story_generic.jsp?channel=dti&id=news/dti/2012/01/01/DT_01_01_2012_p65-404781.xml&headline=null&next=10

[Lex]

Pentagon gaat zich focussen op Azië

WASHINGTON - De Verenigde Staten gaan de militaire strategie voor de komende 10 jaar drastisch aanpassen. De nadruk komt te liggen op het versterken van de militaire positie in Azië, waar de positie van China in de afgelopen jaren steeds sterker is geworden.

Dat heeft president Barack Obama donderdag gezegd in het Pentagon. De president liet weten dat het aantal grondtroepen fors zal worden verminderd,. ,,Ons leger zal kleiner worden'', aldus Obama. ,,Maar de wereld moet weten dat de Verenigde Staten militair superieur blijven met strijdkrachten die behendig en flexibel zijn en die zijn voorbereid op alle onvoorziene omstandigheden en bedreigingen.''

Obama wil af van geldverslindende, langdurige oorlogen, zoals die de afgelopen jaren in Afghanistan en Irak zijn gevoerd. Het nieuwe plan voorziet in forse investeringen in wapens waarmee de Amerikanen goed zijn opgewassen zijn tegen Chinese raketten voor de lange termijn en geavanceerde Chinese radarsystemen.

ANP,
05 januari 12, 17:41

[Lex]

Hierbij bied ik u aan de : US Defense Strategic Guidance. Het omvat 16 pagina's.

[jurrien visser (JuVi op Twitter)]

Shrinking superpower

8:50 am, January 5th, 2012


The U.S. military juggernaut faces another powerful enemy Thursday: budget cuts.

President Barack Obama is set to announce some $450 billion in cuts to the country's defence budget, a move expected to shrink the army and make cuts to numerous weapons programs, possibly including the F35 Joint Strike Fighter.

The cuts come after a congressional "Super Committee" failed to reach a budget-reduction deal in November, a crisis that triggered automatic spending cuts to both defence and domestic programs like Medicare and Medicaid.

Sun News' Brigitte Pellerin has more on this story.

http://www.sunnewsnetwork.ca/sunnews/world/archives/2012/01/20120105-085018.html

[jurrien visser (JuVi op Twitter)]

Britain and US to scale down military capability due to debt crisis

UK defence secretary to say global economic slump is 'greatest strategic threat to future security' of transatlantic allies

Richard Norton-Taylor

guardian.co.uk, Thursday 5 January 2012
Article history

Britain and the US, close allies who are both victims of the debt crisis, will today agree to scale down their military capability and back away from the kind of armed intervention they have enthusiastically supported in recent decades.

That will be the clear message from the first meeting between Philip Hammond, the UK's new defence secretary, and Leon Panetta, his opposite number in the Pentagon, officials say. The Washington meeting will also be the first opportunity for Hammond to confront the US over particular British concerns, notably the availability and soaring cost of the US-made joint strike fighters destined for Britain's new aircraft carrier, HMS Prince of Wales.

As the US plans to withdraw more troops from Europe in what is building up to be a turning point in transatlantic relations, Hammond will also lambast European members of Nato for not pulling their weight.

With Panetta expected to announce sweeping cuts in his defence budget, Hammond will point to similarities in the US and UK economic situations, according to officials. "Without strong economies and stable public finances it is impossible to build and sustain, in the long-term, the military capability required to project power and maintain defence," he is expected to tell the Atlantic Council thinktank.

He will add: "That is why today the debt crisis should be considered the greatest strategic threat to the future security of our nations. The fact is, in this era of austerity ... not even the United States can afford the astronomical resource commitment required to deal with every threat from every source."

On Thursday, Panetta is expected to announce the results of a Pentagon strategic review, recommending that the US abandon its traditional goal of being able to fight, and win, two wars at the same time. The Pentagon has been asked for cuts of $400bn.

British defence officials are worried that pressures on the US budget will further encourage Washington to turn its back on Europe as it concentrates on potential threats in the Pacific.

Libya showed that while the US took a back seat – its aircraft were not involved in the air strikes – the Europeans nevertheless relied on US planes for refuelling and intelligence-gathering operations.

"Libya and Afghanistan have highlighted the significant difficulties we face in ensuring Nato continues to serve the needs of collective security," Hammond will say. "Too many countries are failing to meet their financial responsibilities to Nato, and so failing to maintain appropriate and proportionate capabilities. Too many are opting out of operations, or contributing but a fraction of what they should be capable of.

"This is a European problem, not an American one. And it is a political problem, not a military one."

The defence secretary is not expected to name names, though officials make it clear that he has Germany and Poland (neither of which played a part in the Libyan conflict) in mind, as well as Spain.

The UK is still seeking significant cuts in its defence budget on top of those made in last year's strategic review. Its two single most expensive commitments are replacing the Trident nuclear missile and building two carriers for the navy.

Vital to the carriers are their attack aircraft, supplied via the US joint strike fighter (or F-35) project, with the cost now estimated at £100m each. The project may be delayed or scaled back by the Pentagon, leaving the UK carriers – now being built at uncertain costs – with even more uncertainties.

Hammond will respond to Iran's threat to shut the narrow sea passage leading to the Persian Gulf through which 40% of internationally traded oil flows. He will say: "Disruption to the flow of oil through Straits of Hormuz would threaten regional and global economic growth. Any attempt by Iran to do this would be illegal and unsuccessful."

Last month Tehran threatened to shut the strait and has now said it will take unspecified action if a US aircraft carrier that had left the Gulf returns. Washington said its navy would continue to sail the strait.

Hammond will say that British warships, including minesweepers, will keep playing a "substantial role" in the Gulf.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2012/jan/05/us-and-uk-to-scale-back-military?newsfeed=true