Army At Its Max

Team Infidel

Forum Spin Doctor
New York Daily News
January 7, 2007
Pg. 9

Ex-gens.: Can't bear another 20,000 to Iraq
By Austin Fenner, Daily News Staff Writer
Stretched to the breaking point by the bloody conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, the U.S. Army would be hard-pressed to wage an additional war, two former generals say.
"I'd say we are marginally ready," said retired Marine Gen. Joseph Hoar, former commander in chief of Central Command. "We have enormous power in the Air Force and Navy to respond immediately at a crisis around the world. The commitment of ground forces is more problematic."
The state of the Army became the focus of debate after former Secretary of State Colin Powell charged last month that the Army is "about broken."
President Bush is expected shortly to announce plans to send as many as 20,000 more combat troops to Iraq, putting further stress on the armed forces.
The state of the military goes beyond the ability to wage war in Iraq; it has implications for the country's ability to back up its hard-nosed diplomacy elsewhere, particularly with rogue nations like Iran and North Korea.
If fresh hostilities erupted, the U.S. would offer a "ragged" war campaign relying on air attacks by the Air Force and the Navy, said Winslow Wheeler, a military analyst with Straus Military Reform Project at the Center for Defense Information.
"The result is an ineffective campaign that fails to achieve important objectives. If [ground forces] are forced to participate, they will do so poorly equipped and in a poorly trained state," Wheeler said. "Put simply, it will cost us lives."
The military long has operated under the doctrine that the country should be ready to handle two major wars, but Hoar and other military experts suggested this operating principle has been compromised.
Hoar warned the military doesn't have enough satellite resources, AWAC airplanes and helicopters to deploy for a new war. "We don't have enough infantry divisions to conduct two major land campaigns at the same time."
The Army contends it is ready for any emergency.
"The Army continues to soldier along quite well," said Army spokesman Paul Boyce. "Recruiting is strong. Retention is strong. The will of the American soldier is exceptionally strong and heroic."
Former Army Gen. Jay Garner offered that the size of the Army is "too small" to handle mounting military challenges.
"It's not broken, it's just too small," said Garner, who preceded Paul Bremer as the American administrator in Iraq after the 2003 invasion. "We have a stressed Army. These kids ... are damn good soldiers. We have burned them out. The equipment is overused. They [soldiers] have problems with multiple deployments."
Wheeler said too many U.S. troops are rated as unprepared for combat.
"Every single brigade in the United States that is supposed to be training and getting ready to go to Iraq is not ready," Wheeler said.
 
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