Report: U.S. Military Readiness Worsens

Strained by the demands of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, there is a significant risk that the U.S. military won't be able to quickly and fully respond to yet another crisis, according to a new report to Congress.

The assessment, done by the nation's top military officer, Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, represents a worsening from a year ago, when that risk was rated as moderate.

The report is classified, but on Monday senior defense officials, speaking on condition on anonymity, confirmed the decline in overall military readiness. And a report that accompanied Pace's review concluded that while the Pentagon is working to improve its warfighting abilities, it "may take several years to reduce risk to acceptable levels."

Pace's report comes as the U.S. is increasing its forces in Iraq to quell escalating violence in Baghdad. And top military officials have consistently acknowledged that the repeated and lengthy deployments are straining the Army, Marine Corps and reserve forces and taking a heavy toll on critical warfighting equipment.

The review grades the military's ability to meet the demands of the nation's military strategy — which would include fighting the wars as well as being able to respond to any potential outbreaks in places such as North Korea, Iran, Lebanon, Cuba or China.

The latest review by Pace covers the military's status during 2006, but the readiness level has seesawed back and forth during the Iraq war. Officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because the risk levels are classified, said the risk for 2005 was moderate, but it was assessed as significant in 2004.

His assessment was submitted to Defense Secretary Robert Gates at the beginning of this year, and therefore does not reflect the latest move to pour 21,500 more troops into Iraq over the next few months.

Gates delivered Pace's assessment to Congress, along with a six-page report on steps the Pentagon is taking to address the problem —including new efforts to increase the size of the Army and Marine Corps, and requests for more money to repair and replace equipment. On Monday, the Pentagon released most of Gates' report, except for a few sections that were classified as secret.

That report concluded that "world events and regional trends add up to increased challenges to our nation's security." And it said the decline in readiness is also affected by whether other federal agencies and other nations are fulfilling their commitments.

There have been long-standing complaints that the State Department has not met its responsibilities in Iraq, particularly in reconstruction and rebuilding efforts, as well as buttressing the political development of the Iraqi government.

In his report, Gates also discussed efforts to repair and replace equipment worn out in combat, beef up recruiting and retention, and make better use of the National Guard and reserve forces. It also details how the Pentagon will use billions of dollars in the proposed budget, including plans to modernize aircraft and weapons, develop better detection and countermeasures for weapons of mass destruction, increase the size of the special operations forces, and boost the nation's missile defense.

[david1737]

Yet another example of how Bush's failure in Iraq has made the world much more dangerous.

[homespunlady]

bluestardad Thankyou for the referenced article. It's not an easy read but is excellent.
I look at the region and ask who's really pulling the strings. Every time it comes up Saudi. Too many connections ther between the ruling elite there and here. Every time oil slips in price the fires of war are stoked by our administration. OPEC (led by the Saudis)had threatened to cut back production unless the price went up. Bin Laden was a windfall for his family's country -Saudi.

[sclaires]

The US Army went down when the draft was ended. They started getting people who could not get a job and figured the military was the way to go. Then they let the military down-size which did not help either. So, now they have a bunch of incompentent people running it. And I mean from the Commander-in-Chief on down. I could see the army going down when I was working for it and it is even more worse off. The Reserves and National Guard might train 2 days a month and 2 weeks a year but they are better then the current army. They are motivated to do the job while a lot of the active duty ones are not. Look at what has been going on at Walter Reed and the VA. There you will see incompentence at it's best.

[olebd]

Excellent post RandalDS - My sediments exactly.

[randalds]

Bush is succeeding in doing something no enemy has been able to do, make our US military impotent. Through stupidity and incompetence he is slowly taking our military apart and destroying it. Not too surprising considering his vice-president (and puppet string puller) never served in the military and that he himself spent Vietnam commanding a bar stool in Texas.

[gunnerv1]

Our Military was not designed to fight in more than two (2) theaters of combat at the same time . So this is a non-news story that someone is just trying to stir the pot with.

[olebd]

And many thanks to all the media for releasing this story for the benefit of our adversaries.

[clestes-2009]

Good going Bush. Thanks to your bumbling, ineffective foreign policy of invading countries that offer no threat to the US, you have managed to make the US MORE vunerable to attacks. Instead of being safer, US citizens are more at risk for attacks.

This is exactly opposite of what you were suppose to be doing. Of course you won't admit that your stupidity has led us to the current state of military overload and strained foreign relations. Oh no, according to you, the US is safer today. Let no clue of the truth enter into your world! Why, that might cause your fantasy to unravel.

Hell, you think the US would be even more safe if we invaded Iran! Let's take our already exhausted military and have them attack a fresh army (News alert here! Iran is not Iraq. Iran's army is in much better shape than Iraq's) and by doing so, unite the Arab world against us and Israel.

You think we are safe now, just wait. Bring on the Iranians you stupid *** and we'll be 10 times safer.

[bluestardad]

President Bush is holding Hostage all the America Troops in the Iraq War Theater by indicating that if Congress Cuts funding for the His Iraq War Plan he will leave the troops over there anyway without supplies and equipment they need, instead of bringing them home. Is that anything other than kidnapping or hostage taking? Supporting the Troops does not mean Supporting the War in Iraq or the Bush Idea of the War in Iraq! There is a difference! It is bad enough that the Bush Administration sent the troops to Iraq on false pretences, ill equipped and ill prepared with no end game plan. The Rovian spin of a Congressional Vote against the Bush Iraq war scenario is a vote against the Troops just validates the Bush Administration resolve to Hold the Military Troops Hostage to his Iraq war plan regardless of the will of America and its elected representatives.

Bush is playing all of us against each other! In one hand he is touting the Red White and Blue war on Terror against everyone who attacked us on 911 and on the other hand he is funding Al Qaeda to destabilize other governments in the Middle East! Here is the stream read it yourself!

http://www.newyorker.com/fact/content/articles/070305fa_fact_hersh

Just copy up to the Hersh on the news stream this web site is adding a n on the end of the paste!

SO DO SOMETHING EXCEPT SIT ON THE COMPUTER AN COMPLAIN! Write Congress Now! //www.visi.com/juan/congress/

[musty2u]

The large military is to keep the outside swizzle-sticks in line. As to inside our borders, I am afraid the liberals are not ging to be happy with my proposals there.