GAO: US Brigades in Europe Cost Billions
US 'Quadrennial Defense Review' Aimed to Stop Drawdown
In perhaps the best example of how long a military drawdown can take, the 2010 Quadrennial Defense Review proposal by the Pentagon is seeking to halt the drawdown from Western Europe and retain four combat brigades in the region.
But according to a new report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), this is going to come at a significant cost, with an additional $2 billion in “extra costs” associated with keeping the four brigades in Europe instead of just two, as was previously planned.
Three of the brigades would be kept in Germany, with another in Italy. The need for combat brigades in a part of the world that hasn’t seen war in over half a century is unclear, but officials cited “a changing security dynamic in Europe.”
Though the additional costs aren’t an enormous portion of the $700+ billion annual US military budget, they do come at a time when US officials have been insisting they are determined to cut unnecessary costs.
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Roger Lafontaine
October 1st, 2010 at 7:18 am
They might as well be throwing those billions into a well and wishing for … what? Certainly not peace, that's the last thing they'd wish for, for more wars I guess.
JLS
October 1st, 2010 at 2:30 pm
"The need for combat brigades in a part of the world that hasn’t seen war in over half a century is unclear, but officials cited “a changing security dynamic in Europe.”"
Vague, ambiguous and used to justify anything they want to do. Kind of like the word "instability" we have to stay there because if we don't there could be "instability"
Personally I could care less if Russia invades Germany or North Korea attacks South Korea or Croatia decides to have a crack at Italy but apparently the blood of American soldiers or the money of American tax payers is cheap enough to spill in defense of other people's countries for all eternity.