V-22: The World's Secret Weapon

One word: waste


My heart swells with pride at the thought of the courage and brilliant achievement that went into making that self-licking ice cream cone work at all (click on the pic for the Osprey’s Wikipedia article).  I wouldn’t want to minimize the trickle-down effect from all the research, either.  To a large extent the whole microcomputer revolution was a direct spinoff from my own father’s efforts between 1969 and 1978 to get some onboard processing stuffed into the AIM-7, but at least that bird was arguably useful.  This latest raptor looks to be vulnerable to air defense systems no more sophisticated than a brawny teenager with 5 smooth stones and a pair of used pantyhose.

However, the important point is the sheer expense of the program.

I have a great deal of respect for MISH, but I’m afraid he misfired in Thursday’s open letter to Obama.[1]

With all due respect Mr. President, we were hoping your administration would not carry on the war mongering policies of your predecessor. Instead we see amazingly that you Seek $75.5 Billion More for Wars in 2009. Mr. President, do we really need another $75 billion for wars? Was there nothing in the military budget that could be cut?

With all due respect Mr. President, The United States spends more on its military budget than the next 45 highest spending countries in the world combined; The United States accounts for 48 percent of the world’s total military spending; The United States spends on its military 5.8 times more than China, 10.2 times more than Russia, and 98.6 times more than Iran. Isn’t that enough Mr. President?

With all due respect Mr. President, the downfall of every great nation in history has been unsustainable military expansion. Mr. President, the US can no longer afford to be the world’s policeman. You act as if we can. Mr. President, can you please tell us how we can afford this spending?

In fact, America can well afford to be the world’s policeman, indeed its ruler, for the foreseeable future.  What it can’t do is spend a billion dollars a year for 27 years developing a stunt-platform for the Cirque du Soleil’s next show in Vegas.  Or more to the point, it can’t do that multiplied by hundreds and thousands of other equally non-functional exercises at all sorts of levels of expense.

It’s out of family loyalty and the legacy of almost my entire professional career that I feel compelled to share these thoughts.  On the other hand let me say that as a Canadian I feel a certain comfort that nobody significant is going to pay the least bit of attention to MISH, me or anyone else who has a handle on this.  We can be nearly 100 percent confident that Pax Americana will rot from the inside like an old oak tree or any similar empire in known history.  What’s different is we’re being treated to an ant’s eye view of the process from the inside on this one.[2]

——————–

[1]: "Dear Mr. President, With All Due Respect ….", Mike Shedlock, Global Economic Trend Analaysis, February 26, 2009.

[2]: "The New Pentagon Budget—So New? Obama plans to spend as much on defense as Bush did", by Fred Kaplan, Slate, February 26, 2009.

And yet, there are signs—they can be gleaned from the numbers—that serious changes are in the offing, that some lumbering weapons programs will be slashed, perhaps canceled, though it’s probably also the case that other programs will be boosted or accelerated to compensate.

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3 Comments for this entry

  1. Tobby says:
    February 28, 2009 at 9:50 AM

    The defence budget is the ultimate in earmarked funding projects. The V-22 is a perfect example. Clinton, Cheney, Rumsfeld all tried to kill it, but Congress prevailed. Sure it has some limited uses, but at a huge cost. The Raptor is next up on the chopping block. However, like the V22, the problem is that most of those development costs have been spent, so the per unit cost of each plane drops as more are manufactured.

    Never the less, Mish’s shots at the defense budget are cheap shots (or ignorance). Most of those costs are contractual that can’t be eliminated in a single year. If he bothered to read the budget (short version) he would have seen the projected savings over the next five years.

  2. John M. says:
    February 28, 2009 at 6:23 PM

    Tobby -

    Looks like the F-22 is even worse. Obama’s prospects for controlling these tapeworms devastating the gut of the system appear dim.

    “Lobbyists Line Up to Torpedo Speech Proposals: Health Care, Agribusiness, Mining and Defense Groups Raise War Chests to Sway Legislators and the Public”, by Brody Mullins and Scott Kilman, Wall Street Journal, February 28, 2009.

    Even before Mr. Obama’s speech, the defense industry had stepped up its advertising and lobbying efforts this week in response to the president’s vow to crack down on defense-project cost overruns, and to separate proposals in Congress to cut off certain expensive weapons programs. Mr. Obama’s criticism, industry officials fear, is a foreshadowing of deep cuts to come.

    The Aerospace Industries Association of America has spent $2 million so far on an ad campaign urging that defense spending shouldn’t be slashed to offset shortfalls in other areas.

    Boeing Co. announced Wednesday new players in its Washington team, including a new top lobbyist, David H. Morrison, who hails from powerhouse firm Podesta Group.

    Defense companies have a wind at their back: the jobs they create, and the congressional support that goes with them. That could provide a boost to Lockheed Martin Corp.’s F-22 Raptor, the Air Force’s most advanced fighter, whose production line will have to begin shutting down if more jets aren’t ordered soon.

    Lockheed is mobilizing grass-roots Web efforts and traditional lobbying to keep the plane going, and the Air Force will ask Defense Secretary Robert Gates for more planes. But it’s still not clear whether he will allocate money for more of the $143 million jets, which have been faulted for their high cost and for their origin as a Cold War-era system.

  3. 45north says:
    March 1, 2009 at 3:27 PM

    well I had great hopes for the V22 – it caught my imagination. America is going to need to have effective weapons but I doubt that the V22 is one.

    from the Wikipedia article as a drive shaft connects the nacelles through the wing; one engine can power both proprotors.[22] I wonder if this could be useful for conventional twin engine airplanes?

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