Thursday, January 05, 2012

Obama unveils new strategy for smaller military

President Barack Obama insisted Thursday that the United States will maintain what he calls the best-equipped military in U.S. history despite deep and looming defense budget cuts, but Pentagon leaders acknowledged the changes carry additional risk.

"Our military will be leaner, but the world must know the United States is going to maintain our military superiority," Obama said in a rare appearance in the Pentagon briefing room.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and a row of top military brass lined the stage behind him, underscoring Pentagon support for cuts that Panetta and others said they know will be criticized as too drastic.

Obama said the strategy is designed to contend with hundreds of billions of dollars in budget cuts and refocus the United States' national security priorities after a decade dominated by the post.-Sept. 11 wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The strategy, devised through a comprehensive review by civilian and military leaders, centered on the military the country needs after the "long wars of the last decade are over," Obama said.
Read the rest here.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Translation: we're going to offload a lot of the military's responsibilities onto overpaid contractors.

The Anti-Gnostic said...

" we're going to offload a lot of the military's responsibilities onto overpaid contractors."

We'll have to, because the government's military is becoming a gay, female, affirmative-action pageant.