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Leaders fail to fight for weapons money

The Air Force won’t get more F-22 Raptors or C-17 Globemaster IIIs, a new combat search-and-rescue helicopter or a next-generation bomber if Congress signs off on the Obama administration’s fiscal 2010 defense budget.

That’s a lot of air power left out of the service’s $160.5 billion portion of the $663.8 billion request — and that’s too bad because, plain and simple, air power is the decisive force in warfare.

It really is that basic, but the White House and the Pentagon don’t get it — and the service’s top leaders aren’t helping.

Secretary Michael Donley and Chief of Staff Gen. Norton Schwartz talk of their “all in” commitment and of being “part of the joint fight.” That approach is a plea for a place among the other service branches. It’s an embarrassment.

Boots on the ground can’t win wars. Neither can ships at sea.

Only long-range, land-based air power, using robust platforms and precision weapons, can achieve victory, whether the conflict is irregular or conventional, urban or rural, small or big.

In today’s rapidly accelerating world, the U.S. can’t afford a repeat of the Pacific war of 1941-45 in which tens of thousands of Allied ground troops had to die to get American bombers within flying range of Japan’s home islands.

Dominant role for Air Force

Donley and Schwartz shouldn’t drop to bended knee, begging to be accepted as partners. They should seek a dominant role for the service.

A great Air Force leader of the past, Gen. Curtis LeMay, who forged the Strategic Air Command and was later chief of staff, probably would wonder why Donley and Schwartz apparently never challenged the postponement of a next-generation bomber.

Though the service really does need 10 squadrons of F-22s, a new CSAR helicopter and a bunch of other stuff, it isn’t an air force without a bomber.

Right now, legislation mandates a new bomber by 2018. Although lawmakers are expected to change the date, as of today, the Air Force is still statutorily required to field a next-generation bomber in nine years. That can’t be accomplished with no money — and there’s no money right now in the budget.

The budget proposal contains a few dollars to support the existing bomber force, led by 76 B-52 Stratofortresses, our most lethal aerial platforms. The unmatched versatility of the B-52 is being reduced, however, by premature retirement of the AGM-129 advanced cruise missile, the weapon highlighted in a notorious mishandling of nuclear materials two years ago.

Although it’s a small thing, the administration is right to include $9.5 million toward a replacement for the decrepit UH-1N Twin Huey helicopter, which has needed to be replaced for a decade.

Small stuff, though, is all there is to feel good about.

As long as the administration dismisses air power as merely one kind of warfare among many, as long as the Pentagon treats the Air Force as part of a team rather than a commanding presence, as long as the service’s own leaders don’t stand up for airmen, the Air Force won’t just feel small. It will be small.

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Robert F. Dorr wrote “Hell Hawks,” a history of an American fighter group. Write to him at Robert.f.dorr@cox.net.