About a year ago I predicted the US was in the first stages of disentangling itself from global tarbabies. Invading Iraq was one of the items I expected as there was no real path out of the Middle East so long as Saddam was there. Northern and Southern Watch would have continued for decades. This is not to say America will not be stuck there for quite a few years to come, only that there is a plausible exit strategy where there once was none.
The BRAC (Base Realignment and Closure) process is due to culminate in a report in mid-March and will include what may well be the greatest re-organization of American overseas basing since the end of WWII. I expect to see the buzz word ‘capabilities based defense’ used as an explanation for greatly decreased numbers of Americans in overseas bases.
The third part is South Korea, and I give you these two items from Jane’s to take as thou wilt:
Seoul’s AEW&C buy will reduce reliance on US.
The relaunch of the E-X airborne early-warning and control (AEW&C) programme by the Republic of Korea (RoK) Ministry of National Defence (MND) on 4 February is intended to reduce the country’s reliance on US Air Force E-3 Sentry Airborne Warning And Control System (AWACS) aircraft (JDW 11 February).
[Jane’s Defence Weekly – first posted to http://jdw.janes.com – 13 February 2004]
South Korea haggles over procurement programme. The Republic of Korea Ministry of National Defence (MND) established its Korea Multirole Helicopter (KMH) Programme Management Office (PMO) last month to lead the country’s largest-ever defence procurement programme, with a value of some $12.5 billion.
[Jane’s Defence Weekly – first posted to http://jdw.janes.com – 13 February 2004]
We will see agreements for unrestricted bases containing pre-positioned supplies in in places convenient to expected trouble spots. There will only be enough local American staff to handle peace-time security, inventory and infrastructure. Perhaps there will be some intelligence, training and Special Forces as well, but the ‘footprint’ will be small. As much as possible will be handled by civilians, on base where absolutely required and otherwise ‘outsourced’ to a back-office in the US.
Naval basing will be an exception. A primarily maritime power still needs home ports for the Fleet that are within reasonable sailing distances of trouble spots.
We are entering an era in which our military will be kept at home and deployed only when and where required. It will take most of this decade to get there.
And they’ve canceled The Commanche helicopter.
The US navy has been working on it’s Sea Base concept for quite a few years now. The original plan consisted of a huge, artificial island that would have an air base capable of handling C-130s or similar aircraft.
Now the idea seems to be a group of very large container type ships that can be reconfigured to serve any number of roles logistics , Command and Control, helo maintenence, barracks etc. and will be networked together, sort of a giant wi fi.
Of course this concept was used in a slightly more basic (or improvised) form by the RN in the Falklands war in 1982. The Task Force was a sort of floating base.
Before that, the US Fleet in the Pacific circa 1944/ 1945 fullfiled a similar function.
It will be interesting to see how this works itself out. I have noted that the USAF is planning to keep a number of bombers based on Guam.
Of course Guam is US territory, as are a number of other Pacific Islands and I don’t see us pulling out of our own territory. The other airbase I see being in use for a very long time to come is Diego Garcia, which is British and pretty much off limits to every one non-military.
There are also (I believe) things going on up in the Aleutians which are on the great circle route underneath anything coming from North Korea.
“We are entering an era in which our military will be kept at home and deployed only when and where required. It will take most of this decade to get there.”
Without wishing to be disrespectful, so what? The crucial words are surely “deployed … when and where required”. I don’t see that it is of any great consequence where the forces are stationed in-between times, if they are still available to be deployed anywhere in the world in large numbers at the behest of politicians in Washington DC.
It makes a very big difference. Fewer people in fewer places to act as targets; and less basing overseas makes it much easier to push for not getting involved in things which aren’t directly in the national interest.
And yes, we will have to deploy troops to places now and then. There are real dangers; I am totally convinced we are going to take at least one nuke hit on an American city this century almost no matter what we do. We will have to be ready to respond with extreme prejudice to stop it at one.
I’d rather zero if we could manage it. But in any case I prefer we go in fast and hard and then get out and come home as quickly as possible.
And even for the worst sort of cynic, which is better? American troops based all over the planet in large numbers or mostly at home with their families instead of places where they are not wanted anyway?
I do hope the US military is making plans to escape basing in Germany ASAP after Iraq.
Move east, if necessary, and that seems rational for the future.
The only things Germany needs protection from are fanatic Muslims and the EU. But, those are Germany’s problems alone.
Cydonia, this shift makes a big difference to the US and to other countries as well.
The US is moving away from the post-WWII model of basing troops overseas. Instead, most bases will become supply depots and staging points with little or no permanent troop presence. This allows a much more flexible strategy about deploying troops when / where needed.
I take it from the tone of your comment you’d rather US troops were never deployed. ??
From the point of view of other countries, this move does two things. First, it removes both the annoyance and also the financial value of having large bases in place. Second, it removes the direct protective presence of US troops, which for the moment may not be seen as valuable to the host country anymore. Third, it means that US policies and actions will not be hostage to allied countries in quite the same way anymore.
One of those “be careful what you ask for” situations, as with Incerlik.
Interesting links about the new Butler Inquiry.
The Butler Inquiry
Well, I’m not sure an Indymedia discussion of the Butler Inquiry in the UK as a great deal of relevance to the overall thrust of my article which is in no particular way dependant on presence or absence of WMD; cutting the Gordian not was still necessary.
That is not to say I do not strongly believe those weapons went somewhere and it wasn’t into a UN inspection team site for destruction. Hand waving doesn’t get rid of them, therefore they are still there… somewhere, with someone.