Budget cuts

The future does not bode well as these problems are not going away. Thanks for posting nofodad.
 
I know for our son's UPT base their classes are now backing up. UPT students with class dates are being pushed back to later classes. DS said during the summer, instructors would scream at them that they need to understand that the cost to keep them flying was being diverted from operational squadrons, thus they better get it together!

I am sure that these instructors are now screaming that to new classes because the pipeline is slowing down.

I did chuckle to myself about they only had 8 planes available :eek: because I wondered if it was 8 lines or 8 planes. 8 lines is different because many times only 6 lines will be flown due to maintenance issues, and thus they may have had less than 8 when push came to shove.

Here is a dovetail article for the AF. http://www.military.com/daily-news/2013/11/14/af-pilots-rejecting-bonuses-to-leave-service.html

Fanning did not give figures on the number of pilots who have rejected the bonuses but said "pilots want to fly," and there was less opportunity for doing that with whole squadrons periodically being grounded to save money. Absent help from Congress on funding, "we're going to have to continue these rolling groundings for squadrons," Fanning said.
In addition, airline jobs are opening up as more airline pilots retire, Fanning said at an issues forum sponsored by Defense One.
"It's not just compensation that keeps people in the military, it's the mission," Fanning said. Addressing the growth rate of compensation was a key factor in meeting the requirements of the sequester process under the Budget Control Act.

These pilots are about 32 yrs old and if they fly fighters they are walking away from a 250K bonus. 50% up front, and the remainder being divided up for the next 8 yrs. Remember they also get that nice 845 a month flight pay during many of those yrs. It is a heck of a lot of money being thrown at them.
~~~ Realize all pilots know that when they start with any airline they will be returning to an 02 salary for several yrs., and this is a time that many are married with kids, mtg and 2 car payments, but still are willing to walk instead of an additional 6 figure check.

JMPO, I agree with Fanning, many want to fly, and they are currently looking down the road for the next 9 yrs., and saying I am tired of this BS. I can't see it getting any better if this is the feeling after only dealing with this current fiscal fallout of 8 months.

This is also going to have a larger impact for the AF in the next few yrs., because UPT classes are also being slowed down due to budget issues too, which means less are being brought on line fast enough to replace those that aren't taking the bonus. It takes about 2 yrs to get any pilot MQ from start to finish.
http://www.serviceacademyforums.com/showthread.php?t=34611&page=2
hornetguy said:
The rumors are true. Four from 15-03 and four from 15-04 got bumped to 15-07 and later.

The next rumor I'm hearing is that my class is huge and there's no way we can start with that many (15-05).
To put a time frame with that 15-03 to 07, O3 was to start around now. Our DS is 14-08 and he started April 1st. My guess would be 07 would be March. That is a 5 month wait, at least. We also have a friend's DS at UNT. He was given a Dec. date, than it was Jan., than Feb., and now he is scheduled to start in March. He has been at P'cola since Oct. Went to IFS mid Oct - mid Nov., was expected to start UNT 2 weeks later. He will now be on casual status for 6 months awaiting his class start date. God knows what will happen when we actually see the budget.
 
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Simple enough, the United States spends too much. Interestingly, the Air Force is highlighted in this article, the branch "hurting" the least budget-wise.

Eventually the services are going to shrink, people will be "fired" and the world's largest military will be smaller. That will also force other countries who have had their defensive abilities subsidized by the United States to actually fund their own defenses. Long term, maybe that makes the world less reliant on a strong U.S., and maybe another power fills that void. Or maybe, just maybe, the United States learns how to spend responsibly, so we don't approach a disaster that 8 planes could do nothing to defend against.

Cut 'em. Go ahead and do it. Cut airmen. Cuts soldiers. Cut sailors. Cut Marines. Cut Coast Guardsmen. And while you're doing that, restructure the retirement system for the military.

And of course, this comes with major cuts to other unfunded liabilities.
 
Nobody flame me for saying this, but I have always said the military is bulimic.
~ I am not trying to make light of a true medical issue, just saying if the military was one person, they would be classified as bulimic.

They gorge and all of the sudden they realize they need to purge. This has happened in cycles, and tends to be a 20 yr cycle.

After Vietnam, and through the Carter yrs the military was a hollow force. Reagan pumped in tons of money for the military and that continued until 92.

Gulf I came around and right after we purged again. Can we spell RIF? Late 90's after the purge; under Clinton's 2nd term and Bush's 1st we got amazing pay raises and money was pumped in again to stop the purge...it was when certain yr groups were getting 10%+ pay raises every yr for @3 yrs., unlike the what? 1.9% rate currently. The pilot bonus jumped too.

Here we are again now. The military is being hollowed out, and I am willing to bet in 5 yrs from now we will see the military on the binge aspect just from reading all of these articles.

So if my math is correct, 70's 90's and the 10's are purge yrs, or in other words every 20 yrs. The 80's, 00 and most likely the 20's will be the money being handed over to get them back on track.

I have no problem anyone saying I am wrong, just saying from my perspective it appears to be cyclical.
 
+1 to you Pima. Especially the bulimic part. Our government and military does not seem to be able to walk the line in between too much spending (and the massive waste that comes with too much money too quickly) and spending next to nothing. Of course , this cycle could also be looked at in the case of 2 term Presidents that either are for/against the military and increased spending.

It will be interesting to see how these cuts are felt through the commissioning sources. I think we are already seeing some of it with the AROTC branching this year among other things but it will be very interesting to move from the "land of milk and honey" we have been in for about the last decade.
 
+1 to you Pima. Especially the bulimic part. Our government and military does not seem to be able to walk the line in between too much spending (and the massive waste that comes with too much money too quickly) and spending next to nothing. Of course , this cycle could also be looked at in the case of 2 term Presidents that either are for/against the military and increased spending.

It will be interesting to see how these cuts are felt through the commissioning sources. I think we are already seeing some of it with the AROTC branching this year among other things but it will be very interesting to move from the "land of milk and honey" we have been in for about the last decade.

I don't think you can correlate (much less claim causation) of our military budget with a perceived for/against military when you look at the chart. However, it looks like Pima's perceived correlation might be true looking at the budget over time.

csbachartmon.png
 
I don't think you can correlate (much less claim causation) of our military budget with a perceived for/against military when you look at the chart. However, it looks like Pima's perceived correlation might be true looking at the budget over time.

csbachartmon.png

Looks to me like, with the exception of the Reagan buildup (or build back depending on your point of view) that it correlates more with war and peace to me. No mystery here. Everyone always looks for a peace dividend, unfortunately.
 
Looks to me like, with the exception of the Reagan buildup (or build back depending on your point of view) that it correlates more with war and peace to me. No mystery here. Everyone always looks for a peace dividend, unfortunately.

Concur. :)


So many things wrong in this article. F-35 is not meant to replace the A-10. The A-10 ain't ugly. ;) She's just more the girl next door rather than Mila Kunis. :biggrin:

They don't actually discuss the shortfalls of the A-10 when entering a real adversarial threat with an IADS. It's an amazing platform in theaters with low anti-air threats.

The bipartisan members of congress pushing to keep it all have a bone in the A-10 fight whether it being in their districts (like McCain and Flake) or having a spouse fly it (Ayotte). Makes it hard to have a real good talk about it's capabilities.

And I say all this with my spouse being an A-10 pilot.
 
Would be interesting to graph the proposed budgets from the president for the military v. Congressional and final budgets.
 
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