Serious Potential Budget Issues With Need to Replace Bombers, Boomers & Surface Ships Coming

It won’t happen tomorrow, but the Pentagon may have to start eating its young to pay for two of the most expensive weapons in US history: the Air Force’s Long Range Strike bomber and the Navy’s replacement for the Ohio class nuclear missile submarine.

That’s the estimation of Todd Harrison, the top budget expert at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessment. His conclusions are based on a new detailed report, Analysis of the FY 2015 Budget Request being released as you read this.

link.

In some ways, this feels like the constant worries about Social Security I have heard since I was a teen.  OTOH, the budget situation is not good for doing procurements and, frankly, we've gotten pretty bad at them.  OTGH, we have a serious problem: the ships we are using for our navy with the exception of the new carrier, LCSes, attack subs and the three lonely Zumwalts are very old designs which date back to the Cold War.  All of these need replacing.  Likewise, our nuclear weapons are aging and must be replaced.  This is also true of the bomber to carry them.  Or the Boomer to launch.  Or the ICBM to launch them.  Or the tanks we use for our heavy forces are also legacy items.  

If the world had remained the US as the sole 'hyperpower' then who cares?  However, the world has changed.  China is rising.  It has two stealth aircraft under development.  It has its first carrier.  It too is working on hypersonic, laser and other high tech weapons.  We are about to face a peer.  A peer, even if we are not at war with them nor planning to try, we will need the capability to stand toe-to-toe with if there is a stare down.  Like in the South China Sea.  

Putin did one remarkable thing, for all his asininity: he showed soft power has limits.  Serious limits.  Ones which need to be met with hard power.  If the side does not care about the soft power consequences, the hard power capability is absolutely necessary to stop the bad actor.  And that requires modern, up to date capabilities.  Ones conceived and brought to bare in a timely, cost effective manner. 

We need to replace the legacy systems.  We need them in a timely manner: not 15, 20 years after the program is started.    We need sufficient numbers of them to meet the challenges of the post hyperpower world.  And we need them not to break the bank.  This is all doable.