Hotmail
Murtha wants full speed ahead on submarines
Democrats proving a point
Robert Work, a military analyst with the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, a Washington think tank, said, “This is a very interesting time: between now and the presidential election the Democrats are going to want to show that they provide jobs, that they are strong on defense.”
The Navy agrees that two subs a year are needed “and they only ask for one” because of the uncertainty in the Pentagon budget, said Murtha. “Of course, the Navy is worried where I’ll take the money from (to speed up the pace of sub building) – but we’ll work that out.”
Total shipbuilding outlays will increase. “Absolutely,” Murtha vowed.
With Pentagon outlays running at about $530 billion a year, you might not think it would be hard to add an extra $3 billion a year for another submarine. That’s only about one-half of one percent of the Defense Department’s total annual spending.
|
But Work said the Navy is worried that Murtha’s push for accelerated shipbuilding “will upset their long-term plans.”
A 33-year House veteran, Murtha was Nancy Pelosi’s campaign manager in her leadership battle with Steny Hoyer in 2001; she’s speaker today due more to Murtha than to anyone else.
But, said Work, “No matter how powerful you are, there’s no way to have a guarantee that you’re going to be able to sustain extra (shipbuilding) money over time. The Navy’s plan is based on what they believe is sustainable over a 30-year period.”
Navy chief warns of budget ‘train wreck’
The Navy’s top officer, Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Michael Mullen, acknowledged last week that his budget will soon collide with the mammoth cost of Medicare and Social Security benefits for the retiring Baby Boom generations.
“There is a huge fiscal train wreck out there for us as a country… defense is a piece of it, but it’s only right now 3.8 percent of GDP,” Mullen said in a speech at the Brookings Institution.
But Mullen said the Navy simply must have more ships. “We’re 276 today. That’s too small,” he said.
Military spending now accounts for 20 percent of the budget, far lower than the post-World War II peak in 1954. That’s when military outlays were nearly 70 percent of all federal expenditures.
So how is Congress going to pay for the entitlement programs, the submarines, the destroyers, the Iraq deployment, and all the rest?
How about an increase in taxes to pay for increased military outlays? After his tour of the plant, Murtha sidestepped the question, noting only that “I voted against every tax cut.”
In a recent interview in his Capitol office, Courtney’s answer to the tax question was: “It’s premature to get it into that right now.”
So the United States will be borrowing some of the money to build the subs by selling Treasury bonds to, among other buyers, the Chinese, the very threat against which the subs are being built.
Murtha weighs Chinese threat
Of the seriousness of the potential Chinese menace, Murtha has no doubt.
“I see projections that by the year 2013 they’ll be buying as much oil as we do,” he said. “If that’s accurate, the world supply of oil will not satisfy the United States and China. What is going to be the reaction of China if we are weak militarily?”
He then noted, “the reason Japan attacked the United States in World War II is that we cut off their oil supply. I’m just trying to prepare so that nobody miscalculates that we won’t be able to respond.”
- Discuss Story On Newsvine
-
Rate Story:
View popularLowHigh - Instant Message
MORE FROM POLITICS |
 Politics Section Front |
| Add Politics headlines to your news reader: |
Sponsored links
Resource guide