Geese and Ganders

Donald Trump is furious at the federal courts, particularly the left-leaning Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. He’s telling the world that he will find a way to break up that court into two or three smaller circuits, where, not-so-coincidentally, he will get to appoint enough new judges to turn the resulting appellate circuits into rubber stamps for his policies… or so he believes. We’ve been here before.

“On February 5, 1937, President Franklin Roosevelt announces a controversial plan to expand the Supreme Court to as many as 15 judges, allegedly to make it more efficient. Critics immediately charged that Roosevelt was trying to ‘pack’ the court and thus neutralize Supreme Court justices hostile to his New Deal.

“During the previous two years, the high court had struck down several key pieces of New Deal legislation on the grounds that the laws delegated an unconstitutional amount of authority to the executive branch and the federal government. Flushed with his landslide reelection in 1936, President Roosevelt issued a proposal in February 1937 to provide retirement at full pay for all members of the court over 70. If a justice refused to retire, an ‘assistant’ with full voting rights was to be appointed, thus ensuring Roosevelt a liberal majority. Most Republicans and many Democrats in Congress opposed the so-called ‘court-packing’ plan.” History.com. The Senate, including a number of FDR’s supporters, thought this was a terrible idea and rejected the plan by a vote of 70 to 22.

During the Obama administration, in an effort to contain what too many Republicans felt was an imperious president addicted to over-reaching executive orders, the GOP turned to the self-same federal courts – yup, the same courts that have rejected Trump’s Muslim travel ban and usurped his attempt to cut funding to sanctuary states and cities that did not play ball with his executive orders to detain immigrants accused of violating any laws regardless of seriousness. By all accounts, those anti-Obama GOP efforts were pretty successful.

“Republican officials had great success under President Barack Obama in persuading judges to block or complicate his efforts to expand health care, shield immigrants from deportation and protect transgender students. Now Democratic officials are using the principles established in those cases to frustrate President Trump’s efforts to limit travel from predominantly Muslim countries and to punish so-called sanctuary cities.

“Both sides have shown remarkable dexterity in their understanding of the law, abruptly switching positions on issues like whether states have standing to sue, whether individual federal judges may issue nationwide injunctions and whether a federal threat to withhold funds can amount to a constitutional violation.

“Josh Blackman, a law professor at South Texas College of Law, said Democratic officials should strive for more consistency, even if only as a matter of self-interest. ‘Whatever California can do to resist immigration law,’ Professor Blackman said, ‘Texas can do to resist environmental laws.’…

“[On April 25^th], Judge William H. Orrick of Federal District Court in San Francisco relied on a 2012 Supreme Court decision allowing states to opt out of the Affordable Care Act’s expansion of Medicaid. That ruling, which added major complications to the rollout of the health care law, was popular with conservatives.

“The decision, National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, was best known for sustaining a central provision of the law, its individual mandate. But the court also ruled that Congress may not impose significant new conditions on existing federal funding, a position pressed by states led by Republicans.

“When the case was argued, Justice Antonin Scalia, who died last year, highlighted the political realities of the opposition to the Medicaid expansion. ‘Is there any chance that all 26 states opposing it have Republican governors, and all of the states supporting it have Democratic governors?’ he asked… ‘There’s a correlation, Justice Scalia,’ said Paul D. Clement, a lawyer for the states challenging the law, to laughter.

“On Tuesday [4/25], Judge Orrick said the principle established in 2012 applied to the Trump administration’s threat to withhold federal money from localities that refuse to aid efforts to deport undocumented immigrants… ‘The Supreme Court concluded that the Affordable Care Act’s threat of denying Medicaid funds, which constituted over 10 percent of the state’s overall budget, was unconstitutionally coercive and represented a ‘gun to the head,’ ’ Judge Orrick wrote. ‘The executive order threatens to deny sanctuary jurisdictions all federal grants, hundreds of millions of dollars on which the counties rely. The threat is unconstitutionally coercive.’…

“In cases concerning Mr. Obama’s initiatives on immigration and transgender rights, individual judges in Texas concluded that nationwide injunctions blocking them were warranted… Republicans embraced those rulings. Now they are less certain that individual federal judges should be able to wield such power. ‘Once again, a single district judge — this time in San Francisco — has ignored federal immigration law to set a new immigration policy for the entire country,’ the White House said in a statement released Tuesday [4/25].

“Mr. Trump’s first travel ban was also halted by a nationwide injunction, entered by a judge in Seattle, and his revised travel ban was blocked by nationwide injunctions from judges in Maryland and Hawaii… That last order did not sit well with Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who criticized Judge Derrick K. Watson of Federal District Court in Honolulu — ‘a judge sitting on an island in the Pacific,’ as Mr. Sessions put it — for issuing a ruling that would apply to the whole nation.

“But Judge Watson relied on a 2015 appeals court ruling blocking Mr. Obama’s immigration program that said such nationwide injunctions were required to ensure uniformity. The court affirmed an injunction issued by a single judge in Brownsville, Tex., who said Mr. Obama had exceeded his authority… As a senator, Mr. Sessions cheered that ruling, saying it was ‘an injunction that stopped the Obama administration from proceeding with its lawless immigration system.’” New York Times, April 27^th.

The pendulum will swing back and forth, but the ultimate reality is that judiciary, the congress and the presidency are supposed to be independent of each other and act as checks and balances to each other. The system is doing what it is supposed to do, with or without presidential support. And for those Democrats who may be gloating now…

I’m Peter Dekom, and that “what’s good for the goose is good for the gander” seems to continue to apply.

Beastly Brexit Battle

British P.M. Theresa May has called for an early parliamentary election in the U.K.: June 8^th. This significant and most dramatic vote will come as Britain begins to negotiate its departure from the European Union after last years’ Brexit referendum.  It is May’s effort, perhaps tinged with a touch of British hubris, to consolidate her power and show the European Union that she has the backing of her people to extract a favorable deal with her former partners in the E.U. With parallel anti-E.U. sentiments fueling the rather heated French presidential elections, May might believe that she will fare reasonably well in setting limits on free travel across her international boundary as well as creating a very favorable set of trade agreements with Continental Europe. A soft Brexit, if you will.

But while there are positive signs from E.U. powerhouse, Germany, in favor of a smooth and positive negotiation with Britain creating a new, going-forward relationship with the E.U., there are some fairly angry critics among E.U. nations, including France, that suggest the talks will be anything but easy or harmonious. Many on the Continent believe May’s optimism is sorely misplaced, that she completely fails to understand the complexity of her own need to fill the statutory void left when E.U. law no longer applies, that there are no “automatics” in creating favorable trade agreements, that the status of E.U. residents in the U.K. and U.K. residents in the E.U. is not clear and that the U.K. owes the E.U. a staggering $50 billion in unpaid E.U. obligations that need to be settled before the balance of the exit is handled.

The British “Repeal Bill” is wending its way through Parliament, a complex “cut and paste” statutory proposal to fill that statutory void by lifting “necessary” laws and regulations covered by the E.U. But critics on the left wonder how those “cut and paste” decisions were made and embellished, while those on the right wonder why such a grand “taking” of the very laws they thought they were escaping would even be necessary. It isn’t pretty.

Meanwhile, clearly expecting the June election to solidify Britain’s strength in the negotiations, Ms. May had a preliminary meeting at her official residence with European Commission President, Jean-Claude Juncker and some of his senior staff. While the official U.K. government sources told the British press that the meeting was “constructive” and provided a “useful working dinner,” the German press (notably the prestigious Frankfurter Allgemeine in an April 4^th story) reported quite a different result. 

Juncker purportedly told May, “I leave Downing Street 10 times more skeptical than I was before.” He came away from that dinner thinking it was either complete naivete or political posturing that generated an impression that Ms. May was rather unprepared for the negotiations to follow. “According to the [Frankfurter Allgemeine], EU officials and Mr Juncker were surprised that Ms May did not appear to be fully briefed for the meeting, claiming she had unrealistic expectations about the length and process of negotiations.

“The [U.K.] PM reportedly insisted on discussing other world problems as well as Brexit and refused to accept that the UK owed the EU billions of euros, saying there was no such demand in EU treaties…According to the report, Ms May told EU officials she expected to be elected Prime Minister next month and wanted to ‘make Brexit a success.’

“She was told that would not be possible, because the UK would become worse off in the future as a ‘third country’ - a country outside of the EU and the customs union… Ms May also informed the officials she wanted to clarify the rights of UK citizens in Europe at the EU Council meeting in June – an idea dismissed by Mr Juncker, given the complex nature of associated issues like healthcare.

“She also stated she wanted UK citizens to be treated no differently from other third-country nationals… The PM then said she wanted to deal with Brexit talks in four-day blocks every month, and keep discussions confidential… But Mr Juncker reportedly pulled two piles of paper from his bag: Croatia’s EU entry deal and Canada’s free trade deal, highlighting how complex these talks would be…

“The morning after the meeting, Mr Juncker called German Chancellor Angela Merkel and reportedly said Ms May ‘lived in another galaxy’ and was ‘deluding herself.’... It prompted Ms Merkel to quickly amend a passage in her speech to the EU’s Brexit summit, a speech that would be described as her toughest yet… ‘I have to put it in such clear terms because unfortunately I have the feeling that some in Britain still have illusions,’ she said… ‘But that would be a waste of time.’” Independent.co.uk, May 1^st. E.U. member states have mostly rallied behind the cry of “E.U. first,” and that what Britain may or may not demand is not necessarily what Europe will offer or accept.

But is the U.K. whitewash of what happened at that dinner accurate… or are the Germans telling it as it was? The May 2^nd BBC.com, a British news source, seems to suggest that the Germans are more on the mark. “In Brussels, Politico quotes an EU diplomat saying the dinner went ‘badly, really badly.’ He reportedly went as far as to claim the British government was now ‘living in a different galaxy’ to the EU when it came to Brexit expectations…

“The accounts of the dinner were seized upon by European politicians and opposition parties in the UK… Guy Verhofstadt, the former Belgian prime minister who leads the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe, said it was time to ‘get real.’ He tweeted: ‘Any Brexit deal requires a strong and stable understanding of the complex issues involved.’

“Labour's shadow Brexit secretary Keir Starmer said Mrs. May's stance was ‘wrong, not strong’ while Lib Dem leader Tim Farron said the backlash in the European media was a ‘taste of things to come.’… ‘The reports show a prime minister who seems to have no idea how difficult these negotiations will be,’ he said.

“In his first leader column as Evening Standard editor, former Conservative chancellor George Osborne urged Mrs. May to spell out her intentions more clearly regarding Brexit and other issues… ‘There's nothing wrong with repeating election campaign slogans,’ the article - published on ex-Tory MP Mr Osborne's first day in the editor's chair - stated… ‘The problem comes when the election campaign amounts to no more than a slogan. If you ask for a blank cheque, don't be surprised if later it bounces.’”

The tone set by all of this suggests that the U.K. has a long way to go in order to get even close to the expectations generated by those favoring Brexit… if those goals are even attainable given the rising negativity among the remaining E.U. nations. But then if France elects a leadership determined to rewrite the E.U. charter… or withdraw if it cannot get its way… who knows what will happen or if the E.U. can even survive?

In the wake of the Brexit referendum, even as many companies are reassuring locals that they will keep their London offices, many others are already leaving in droves. Financial giant Goldman Sachs is already relocating over a thousand workers to the Continent – where the necessary financial permits and licenses for E.U. operation will govern – and the U.K. is expecting to lose over 30,000 finance industry workers to Continental Europe in the near term. Without trade agreements in place, the U.K. will be relegated to reliance on the provisions of the World Trade Organization, which is hardly a set of rules that British manufacturers want to see in the exports to Europe.

Many believe that in the long run, British autonomy will bring newfound prosperity to the U.K. Perhaps, but in the shorter term, unless Britain can somehow miraculously pull a soft Brexit out of what looks like a very hard reality, experts suggest that the British pound will erode further and that stagnation, not growth, will be the U.K.’s road for the near term. And no one really can project what lies behind that horizon. Meanwhile, the polarization that generated the Brexit vote in the first place is only growing stronger. Scotland and Ireland are watching… and there may be some nasty realities on those fronts in the coming years as well.

I’m Peter Dekom, and instability in the U.K. and Europe is most certainly not good news, politically or economically, for those of us in the United States.

Trump vs The People Who Elected Him

The Republican Party started out with a powerful foray to protect human rights. In the beginning, Abraham Lincoln was willing to fight a war against a states’ rights faction hell-bent on continuing the abomination called slavery, an inhumanity that the last northern state abolished in 1804. The party also became a powerful force for environmental and conservationist (“conservative”) causes under GOP naturalist President Teddy Roosevelt. It was the party of massive infrastructural investment, the National Defense and the U.S. Interstate Highway Act of 1956, under President Dwight Eisenhower. Ike didn’t privatize that infrastructure so poorer people would pay the richer people who might have otherwise built that Interstate Highway system. He just built the most modern highway system the world had ever seen.

Eisenhower also continued the great Republican human rights tradition, begun under Lincoln, in 1957 (pictured above): “Although skeptical about integrating a former white-only institution, [nine African-American] students arrived at Central High School on September 3, 1957 looking forward to a successful academic year. Instead they were greeted by an angry mob of white students, parents, and citizens determined to stop integration. In addition to facing physical threats, screams, and racial slurs from the crowd, Arkansas Governor Orval M. Faubus intervened, ordering the Arkansas National Guard to keep the nine African American students from entering the school. Faced with no other choice, the ‘Little Rock Nine’ gave up their attempt to attend Central High School which soon became the center of a national debate about civil rights, racial discrimination and States’ rights.   

“On September 20, 1957, Federal Judge Ronald Davies ordered Governor Faubus to remove the National Guard from the Central High School’s entrance and to allow integration to take its course in Little Rock. When Faubus defied the court order, President Dwight Eisenhower dispatched nearly 1,000 paratroopers and federalized the 10,000 Arkansas National Guard troops who were to ensure that the school would be open to the nine students.  On September 23, 1957, the ‘Little Rock Nine’ returned to Central High School where they were enrolled.  Units of the United States Army remained at the school for the rest of the academic year to guarantee their safety.” blackpast.org

Republican Present Richard Nixon was the first modern American president to propose a system of universal healthcare for all Americans (it died in Congress) and became a champion of globalization. He personally lifted the Iron Curtain with the People’s Republic of China and began diplomatic relations with the once-hostile Mao Zedong. But that was then. The new GOP, under seeming populist Donald John Trump, is in the process of disbanding court-ordered supervision (by the U.S. Department of Justice) of big city police departments with clearly-proven records of using excessive force and fostering racial bias.

It has embraced many actions that are clearly anti-consumer, making life more expensive for those who can least afford it, including a huge, older and less-well-off constituency that formed the backbone of Trump’s base. The Federal Communications Commission, with direct support from Congress and the President, has empowered companies with access to their online customers’ personal information to sell that often-private data freely on the open market. The FCC has stated that it will not try and limit mergers and acquisitions among media companies or oppose billing practices and data streaming limitations that will absolutely jack up prices for cable subscribers and Internet users.

For those concerned about their drinking water, Congress and the President have pretty much wiped away restrictions against emitting pollutants into the air and dumping toxic effluents into public waterways… forcing those who can least afford it to use part of their dwindling food budget to purchase bottled water instead of using vastly less expensive tap water. Might even make them sick… and we’ll see how sickness and disability are becoming a luxury only the rich can afford.

Trump and his Republic cronies are deeply committed to the overwhelmingly-disproven trickle-down economic policy – most recently resulting in a near bankruptcy to the last state, Kansas, that attempted to implement it – where, by cutting taxes, the wealthy will theoretically instantly use their newfound excess cash to hire people in droves. I guess they forgot that these folks got rich in the first place (where they didn’t inherit it) by figuring out if there was sufficient business reason to grow and hire other than getting a windfall in lower taxes. Hmmm. Trickle-down, supply-side, incentivize-job-creators economics needs to go away. It never works.

Or the last time we gave a tax break to bring off-shore corporate money into the U.S., during the Reagan years, the result was a flurry of mergers and acquisitions that solidified big corporate power (vs competitive forces that might have benefitted consumers) and resulted in skyrocketing layoffs, the usual result of efficiencies almost always instituted when big companies combine.

With virtually all of the currently proposed tax cut reductions going to the wealthiest Americans under every GOP tax plan under consideration, something has to give on the expenditure side. Under the guise of getting “big federal government” out of our lives, the Trump GOP is focused on cutting programs that are aimed at helping the bottom half of our economy, where the vast pool of Trump supporters mostly dwell. Medicare, Social Security, Medicaid, student loans and grants and, most of all, the Affordable Car Act, are in the crosshairs of axe-wielding conservatives who now control both houses of Congress and the presidency. Robin Hood in the reverse. Let the poor further enrich the wealthy.

And they’re back: GOP healthcare reformers. Even though the Affordable Care Act has finally stabilized and is producing increasingly positive numbers, notwithstanding that opinion polls are consistently showing a public support (60%) for “fix and continue” vs “repeal and replace,” Trump has pledged to use his administrative powers to defund Congressionally-approved support need to sustain the ACA in order to make it to fail (otherwise, it will continue to improve). Then, he suggests, even the Democrats will be forced (he thinks) to buy whatever the GOP is proposing, even though any version of the replacement act will exclude millions who are covered now, raise premiums and deductibles to much higher levels for those who might be able to pay and decimate programs aimed at subsidizing the poor, even the working poor.

The Donald and his Treasury Secretary, Steve Mnuchin, believe that the IRS should go all out to collect delinquent taxes, now approving private collection agencies to badger those owing federal taxes by telephone in addition to the formal written notices that the IRS normally sends out (IRS agents cannot use telephone collection methods). Rich folks with tax issues have lawyers and accountants battling the IRS. Less affluent taxpayers, like the bulk of the Trump base, are stuck with collection agencies and revenue agents to deal with.

“Consumer watchdogs are fearful that some of the nation’s most vulnerable taxpayers will be harassed and that criminals will take advantage of the system by phoning people and impersonating I.R.S. collectors… Twice before, in 1996 and 2006, the I.R.S. has tried to farm out some of its collection duties. Both times, the programs were shut down and deemed failures. The most recent attempt cost millions more than it took in. It also generated thousands of complaints, including one oft-repeated horror story about an older couple who received more than 150 phone calls in less than a month.

“Even so, Congress passed a law in 2015 ordering the I.R.S. to once again outsource some of its delinquent debt. The provision was buried in a $305 billion highway funding bill. The agency hired four companies — CBE Group, ConServe, Performant and Pioneer Credit Recovery — and started giving them cases this month… The companies will work on commission, earning up to 25 percent of the delinquent debt they collect.

“The I.R.S. is owed some $138 billion in severely overdue payments on 14 million accounts, according to agency data, and that huge sum drives lawmakers crazy. Enlisting the private sector’s expertise to solve the problem is an idea that comes up again and again…

“But Nina E. Olson, whose job at the Internal Revenue Service is to be an advocate on behalf of taxpayers, strongly disagrees… ‘Outsourcing the collection of federal tax debt is “a bad idea,’ she wrote in a letter to Congress. ‘It disproportionately impacts low-income and other vulnerable taxpayers, and despite two attempts at making it work, the program has lost money both times, undermining the sole rationale for its existence.’

“In years past, Ms. Olson said, the outside collectors employed by the government used psychological tricks that may have coerced some debtors into payments they could not afford… According to a study by the I.R.S.’s Taxpayer Advocate Service, which Ms. Olson runs, the last time the agency used outside collectors — from 2006 to 2009 — the companies collected a net amount of around $86 million while pursuing $1.6 billion in debt.

“After the remaining debt was returned to the I.R.S. for renewed collection attempts, agents brought in another $139 million — 62 percent more than their private counterparts… With the administrative cost of running the program factored in, the I.R.S. lost $4.4 million, an agency analysis found.” New York Times, April 19^th.

It’s GOP mantra these days to privatize, to empower big companies to make money with few restrictions, to deregulate, to lower taxes for the wealthy and to cut social programs wherever possible. To get support from the volume of votes they need to get elected, which absolutely requires that people vote rather dramatically against their own interests, Trumpists and their GOP support system enlist catchy slogans-as-promises and offer religious and social conservatives the words they want to hear. Given that the vast majority of states are run (legislatively and at the gubernatorial level), both houses of Congress are controlled, the presidency is occupied and even the U.S. Supreme Court is dominated by GOP conservatives, it seems that such alternative facts work!

As day 100 of Trump’s rule came and went, the Donald told Fox News that our very form of constitutional government – with all of its inconvenient “checks and balances” – was a big problem for him and his constituents and in dire need of change: “It’s a very rough system… It’s an archaic system … It’s really a bad thing for the country,” he said. Good to know, our Dear Leader, good to know. Where have we seen governmental leaders challenge constitutional restrictions before? Let me think…

Meanwhile, the headless chickens we call Democrats are mired in their own, directionless, battles. Clinton-Pelosi elite liberals are lined up squarely against Sanders-Warren way-left progressives, and the not-so-loyal-opposition is more focused on defeating Republicans than in creating an agenda that disappointed Trumpists can embrace. 2018 mid-terms are next year; think the Dems will have a common platform by then?

I’m Peter Dekom, and the more I look at what we are becoming, the sadder I get for the legacy my generation is leaving future generations.

On a Wing and a Prayer and Many Billions of Dollars

We live in a world where warfare is increasingly determined by cruise missiles, ICBMs, drones (both in the air and at sea) and deeply submerged attack capacities that can serve as launch platforms. Sure, you cannot control land you cannot occupy, so ground forces and the air and sea power to land and sustain them become critical. Yet our Navy’s fleets are completely built and deployed around massive aircraft carriers, each capable of handling 65-75 aircraft (which can stretch to 90 in some configurations) – from bombers and fighters to rescue helicopters and electronic surveillance and control planes. Submarines patrol around and ahead of the carrier and various frigates, destroyers and other support ships surround the carrier and provide a missile defensive shield for that mobile air fleet.

Nuclear-powered super-carriers are incredibly expensive. Today, a new Gerald Ford Class (post-Nimitz class) carrier costs about $15 billion each (not counting the planes or the $5 billion of underlying research costs to design a new class of carriers). Cost overruns north of 20% are common. And while carriers can last decades (40-50 year expected useful life), with continuous upgrades, they define a kind of warfare that began as an accident back at the beginning of World War II. When the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor took out the bulk of our naval mainstay – battleships – the aircraft carrier fleet heading to the Aleutian Islands picked up most of the slack. Of the eight battleship in harbor, the Oklahoma capsized, the Arizona exploded, the California and the West Virginia were torpedoed and settled into shallow waters with their decks above the surface, and the Nevada ran aground. The Pennsylvania was in dry dock, the Tennessee was hit hard but repaired and the Maryland lightly damaged. Carriers began to redefine naval strategy.

What many have defined as our turning point in the war against Japan, the early June 1942 Battle of Midway, featured two fleets of aircraft carriers – hundreds of miles apart – battling to a decisive victory for the Americans. The notion of enemies behind eyeshot, beyond the horizon, expanded and redefined naval warfare into the present day. Theses mobile airfields have allowed U.S. fleets to sit miles from harm’s way and launch airstrikes into the heart of war zones in the distance. While they are joined by Air Force attack aircraft deployed from Turkey, aircraft from super-carrier U.S.S. George H.W. Bush are assaulting targets in ISIS-held Syria and Iraq.

A task force built around the super-carrier U.S.S. Carl Vinson has now been deployed off the Korean Peninsula, joining with Japanese forces for regional naval exercises. Now hear this: Kim Jong-Un, as you threaten to sink that group and perhaps nuke the United States itself, there is a very big naval force operating in your neighborhood. It sends a very big message.

But are big carriers, even if designed for a very long useful life, becoming large and “too easy targets” carrying an attack capacity that can be more efficiently deployed by smaller and incredibly less expenses ships? If you take out a single U.S. aircraft carrier of this size, think of the cost, the damage that would inflict on our entire Navy.

We have eleven super-carriers (70-110,000 tons, but only 10 in active service because of budget limits) in the U.S. Navy, while most nations that have carriers rely on much smaller ships (30-40,000 tons) with a smaller launch capacity. We are adding two more Ford-class carriers in the near term. Big boats!

With a crew of between 3,000 to well-over 5,000 officers and crew, staffing, and basic supplies are exceptionally costly at every level except, perhaps, fuel. While automation is reducing some of the crew requirements, carriers are hideously expensive to operate and maintain… over $4 billion a year in crew and general costs a year. They are literally small cities with services, shops and workspaces to accommodate their personnel. They spend half their time in port and half their time in active service. Add to this the cost of the aircraft that are carried on board, and depending on how to allocated the development costs, the most modern planes in our carrier fleet cost north of $200 million each (much more depending on the particular version). That would add another $10-$15+ billion per carrier.

Plus these super-carriers cannot operate alone. They are vulnerable to attack from missiles, other aircraft and submarines, so they have to travel in a very protective fleet. “A carrier strike group [1] (CSG) is an operational formation of the United States Navy. It is composed of roughly 7,500 personnel, an aircraft carrier, at least one cruiser, a destroyer squadron of at least two destroyers and/or frigates,[2] and a carrier air wing of 65 to 70 aircraft. A carrier strike group also, on occasion, includes submarines, attached logistics ships and a supply ship. The carrier strike group commander operationally reports to the commander of the numbered fleet who is operationally responsible for the area of waters in which the carrier strike group is operating. So that's another 4000 men and 6-7 warships and a few support ships (fuel for the aircraft, fuel for the CSG ships, and food and parts and expendable armaments).” Quora.com.

We may have had 26 larger carriers at the height of the Cold War, but they were relatively cheap, even corrected for inflation, than the behemoths we field today… with many fewer capabilities. Yet as time progresses, we keep sinking more money into fewer vessels, making each ship that much more precious as an enemy target. Taking out one of those older carriers was not a particularly significant hit… in those days. No longer true. Without looking at the rest of the fleet, taking out a single of the new Ford-class super-carrier destroys over 4000 lives and takes out about $30 billion in hard assets.

As a president with little or no government experience seeks to build out our military capacity, exactly how is he going to deal with a debate among old-line admirals, enamored of big and beautiful, and those younger strategists favoring smaller carriers? “Some naval planners believe smaller carriers could provide much of the same capability at less cost. They envision a vessel of about 40,000 to 60,000 tons that is conventionally powered and would cost around $6 billion. Like a supercarrier, this craft would have catapults and arresting gear to allow it to launch heavier aircraft essential for command, control, communications, computers, intelligence reconnaissance, and surveillance capabilities, such as the E-2D early warning aircraft. With a smaller, but still varied air wing, a light carrier could match the breadth, if not the depth, of supercarrier capabilities.” The Cipher Brief, April 25^th.

Exactly how many planes do we need to deploy in most of our expected military confrontations? And when will drones and even-more-sophisticated missiles challenge those largest carriers for relevancy? Are we ready to make that transition? Are we even willing to consider it? And since we’ve already built or substantially built three Ford-class carriers, is there a phase out? Does China’s April 25^th launch of a brand new 50-plane capable carrier (to be commissioned in 2020) change our strategy?

“Peter Haynes, a Senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, believes the light carrier should augment, rather than replace, the supercarrier. Adding light carriers would increase the major threats to an adversary – ‘not only does he have to worry about where the big carriers are, he has to worry about where the [light carriers] are because they have a long-range capability, and they can be a very flexible and adaptable platform.’

“The drawbacks of a smaller design relate to its use of conventional fuel. Paradoxically, smaller carriers are easier to find. A light carrier would require more tanker ships and this logistical tether hinders its range, and more importantly, its ability to appear and disappear as does a nuclear-powered carrier.

“To predict the aircraft carrier’s future success, we can examine what made it successful in the past. Haynes notes, ‘A Nimitz-class aircraft carrier lasts 12 presidential administrations. Essentially that is 12 different foreign policies, defense policies, and so forth. You have to stay flexible and adaptable.’ Large or small, the aircraft carrier’s place in the Navy’s future fleet structure will likely depend on its ability to deliver its greatest asset, the flexibility of its air wing. If the air wing continues to deliver irreplaceable capabilities such as long-range strike, surveillance and reconnaissance, and electronic warfare that disrupt an adversary’s operations, the carrier’s longevity will likely continue.” The Cipher Brief.

The bottom line is a mix of what is affordable, what is sustainable as artificial intelligence replaces humans in combat, and what our foreign policy priorities are that do or might require military back-up. There is a big picture analysis, a timeline/trend reality and an understanding of who in the military has a vested interest in what… and why. Oddly, while military expertise is essential in the decision-making, it is the big picture determine by a civilian political machine – not biased military players – that needs to understand and make those final determinations.

I’m Peter Dekom, and if someone thinks that just increasing the military budget is the solution without a ground-up detailed review of our expected future, they are woefully naïve and exceptionally unprepared to lead and decide.