Thursday, August 13, 2015

Obama Gets Slammed On Military Cuts By His Own Ex-NATO Chief

Shrinking Military: NATO's ex-commander charges President Obama with drastic force cuts while we're in combat on multiple continents. The president's infamous "bayonets" debate quip won't work this time.
'Our navy is smaller now than at any time since 1917," Republican nominee Mitt Romney pointed out during the third and final 2012 presidential debate. Obama countered that "we also have fewer horses and bayonets, because the nature of our military's changed."
Adm. James Stavridis
The condescension continued: "We have these things called aircraft carriers, where planes land on them ... so the question is not a game of 'Battleship,' where we're counting ships."
The president would be advised not to try such verbal stratagems on retired Adm. James Stavridis, who as Supreme Allied Commander from 2009 to 2013 not only knows that 21st century warfare is no game of "Battleship"; he saw Obama doing what Romney accused him of, up close.
A Toast to U.S. Military Cuts
Appearing Sunday on John Catsimatidis' radio show on AM 970 in New York City, Stavridis pointed out that the U.S. has cut defense by about 30% in the last decade, "and we're still at war . . . actively involved on multiple continents in real combat operations. We should not be drastically reducing our troop levels."
And those "things called aircraft carriers, where planes land on them"? Complaining about Obama withdrawing the sole aircraft carrier on Mideast patrol, Stavridis, the first naval officer to command NATO, pointed out that "we have 11 active nuclear aircraft carriers today in the United States Navy," making it "hard for me to understand why we cannot manage a fleet of that size to maintain an aircraft carrier at all times in regions as dangerous as the Arabian Gulf."
The current dean of Tufts University's Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy also warned that the alliance he once commanded isn't mobilized against the Islamic State. "It's important that NATO take on ISIS," Stavridis stressed.
Having also commanded USEUCOM, America's forces in Europe, Stavridis bemoaned too little opposition to Moscow's aggression in Crimea, warning that Russian forces, while dwarfed by NATO, "can still be extremely disruptive; we have to stand firmly against them to deter them."
Read the rest of This IBD editorial HERE.

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