The U.S. military was unprepared for 9/11 a decade ago. Up until the day of the attacks, its focus was on training for conventional wars against enemies such as North Korea or Iraq’s Republican Guard. Nobody knows if or when the next 9/11 might happen, but most likely the U.S. military once again will be caught flat-footed, military analysts predict.
After a traumatic attack on US soil, lawmakers were quick to authorize nearly unlimited funds for the Pentagon to rout terrorists who killed thousands of American citizens – and to keep them from ever doing it again.
Ten years after the United States embarked on a war against terrorism in the rubble of the September 11 attacks, the country finds itself financially exhausted and facing hard strategic choices as it grapples with new budget realities. After spending heavily for a decade on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Pentagon now faces potential cuts of up to nearly $1 trillion over 10 years at a time when it sees rising competition from countries like China and a need to replace its fleet of aging planes and ships.
Planners of the defense budget face an unprecedented challenge in responding to new threats in a post-9/11 era at the same time resources are diminishing, experts said Thursday.
U.S. military procurement coffers were flush with cash in the post-9/11 decade, but the Pentagon missed an opportunity to replace the hardware still being used in the wars spawned by that infamous day.
The Senate’s spending committee today reduced by $26 billion the pending fiscal 2012 defense budget — the first installment of as much as $400 billion in cuts the Pentagon faces through 2024. The Senate Appropriations Committee applied the reduction to a fiscal 2012 base defense budget of $539 billion that’s controlled by its defense panel.
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