We need submarines and a new generation of fighter to take on the Al Qaeda Navy and Air Force

A submarine to fight al-Qaida’s navy

By Robert Scheer
truthdig
April 1, 2008

A TRILLION DOLLARS here, a trillion dollars there, and soon you’re
talking real money. But when it comes to reporting on what the Bush
war legacy has cost American taxpayers, the media have been shockingly
indifferent to the highest run-up in military spending since World War
II. Even the devastating defense spending audit released Monday (March
31) by the Government Accountability Office documenting the enormous
waste in every single U.S. advanced weapons system failed to provoke
the outrage it, and five equally scathing previous annual audits,
deserved.

This is not about the waste of taxpayer dollars — already pushing a
trillion — in funding the Iraq war, which, while reprehensible enough,
pales in comparison to the big-ticket military systems purchased in
the wake of 9/11. In the horror of that moment, the floodgates were
lifted and the peace dividend promised with the end of the Cold War
was washed away by a doubling of spending on ultra-complex military
equipment originally designed to defeat a Soviet enemy that no longer
exists, equipment that has no plausible connection with fighting
stateless terrorists. Example: the $81-billion submarine pushed by
Sen. Joseph Lieberman, presumably to fight al-Qaida’s navy.

Ignored Scandal

That’s the huge scandal the media and politicians from both parties
have studiously avoided. But as the GAO’s authoritative audit details,
the costs are astronomical. The explosion of spending on expensive
weaponry after 9/11 had nothing whatsoever to do with the attacks of
that day. The high-tech planes and ships commissioned for trillions of
dollars to defeat an enemy with no navy, air force or army, and using
$3 knives as its weapons arsenal, were gifts to the military-
industrial complex that will go on giving for decades to come.

The Iraq war may end someday, but rest assured that major weapons
systems, once commissioned, have a life-support system unmatched in
any other sector of public spending. Rarely does the plug get pulled
on even the most irrelevant and expensive war toy. Not while both
Democratic and Republican politicians feed at the same trough, and
when so much is at stake in the way of jobs and profit.

Mushrooming Over-Runs

Just how expensive and wasteful this is was marked in the GAO’s audit:
"Since 2000, the Department of Defense (DOD) has roughly doubled its
planned investment in new systems from $790 billion to $1.6 trillion
in 2007, but acquisition outcomes in terms of cost and schedule have
not improved." Pentagon cost over-runs, always a huge problem, have
mushroomed. As the GAO reported, "Total acquisition costs for major
defense programs in the fiscal year 2007 portfolio have increased 26
percent from first estimates, compared with 6 percent in 2000."

I know eyes glaze when government budgets are discussed, but keep in
mind that defense spending accounts for more than half of all the
federal government’s discretionary spending. In short, funding for all
the other stuff we argue about — science research, education, Arabic
translators, insuring uninsured children — is minor compared to the
waste on these military boondoggles that go unexamined.

Grade of Zero

Yet nothing else the federal government does involves such waste
because we are talking about weapons systems shrouded in secrecy and
protected from unwelcome scrutiny by the Teflon coating of "national
defense." Credit the GAO for providing a rare glimpse into the most
egregious waste of taxpayer dollars, concluding in its exhaustive, 205-
page report:

"Of the 72 programs GAO assessed this year, none of them had proceeded
through system development meeting the best-practice standards for
mature technologies, stable design, or mature production processes by
critical junctures of the program, each of which are essential for
achieving planned cost, schedule, and performance outcomes."

That’s a grade of zero for every major weapons system. Let’s take just
one, the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, a program estimated to be worth
$300 billion in sales to its manufacturer, Lockheed Martin, the
nation’s biggest defense contractor and most generous donor to
lobbyists and politicians’ campaigns. The program to build what
Lockheed boasts is "the most complex fighter ever built" is also the
most expensive, with estimated acquisition costs having increased a
whopping $55 billion in just the last three years.

Taxpayer's Tab

Lockheed need not worry about future profits, because the procurement
schedule on this troubled plane has been stretched out to the year
2034. As the GAO says, "currently unproven processes and a lack of
flight testing could mean future changes to design and manufacturing
processes." Hey, no problem, Lockheed will just add that to the
taxpayer tab. Maybe by 2034, the plane will be ready to go take out
Osama bin Laden. Or not.

Copyright © 2007 Truthdig, L.L.C./COPYRIGHT 2008 CREATORS SYNDICATE
INC.

E-mail Robert Scheer at rscheer@xxxxxxxxxxxxx

http://tinyurl.com/3yx7z2

.

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