Price of Freedom

[Guest Rainman A-10]

Interesting info. It's important for folks to understand what is being funded and how much things cost.

Defense Appropriations Bill

[Guest thefranchise]

20 F-22A @ ~$125 million a pop = $2.5 billion for year 07.

oddly i didnt see the $20million for the Iraq/Afghanistan joint victory celebration party

[Guest JLUCB]

Thanks for this information, Rainman. Sucks though, that the AF will be taking the biggest hit for personnel funding.

[Spinner]

Good info, 4fans. Any idea what Special Update Program is?

[Guest croftfam]

Huh, I see nothing on either website about the procurement or research/testing of the CSAR-X. So much for getting an announcement anytime soon. Red-headed stepchild!

Am I just misunderstanding the data?

[ClearedHot]

Originally posted by JLUCB:

Thanks for this information, Rainman. Sucks though, that the AF will be taking the biggest hit for personnel funding.

A small bit of education. The Air Force is not "taking a hit for personnel funding". As a service we made a decision to trade people for new equipment. We all know systems like the F-22 are very expensive, but so are people. So we have decided to give up roughly 40,000 personnel and use that money to replace worn-out airplanes.

In the 1990's we faced a similar situation and we did the same thing. The only career field the escaped the cut was of course pilots. We banked almost two thousand pilots of a four year period knowing that we would need them someday. We cut everyone else and we cut them all at once. I think the Navigator community got the worst of it. First we cut them, then a few years later we started begging for them to come back and offering bonuses to the same ones we cut.

Other services have tried this strategy and failed for one simple reason, they were too good to their people. In order to make the most of cutting people you have to get rid of them all at once or in a short period of time. The Army cut a lot of people in the early 1990’s but they allowed them to leave slowly and basically through attrition. In other words they let a lot of them reach retirement which increased their end cost. There were some immediate cuts but the process was slow enough that it cost them more money over time. Oddly, the Army had to expand to some degree as a personnel centric force.

Bottomline, when you see the budget as approved from Congress, realize the USAF made a conscious decision to accept cuts in people to recapitalize.

[Guest Rainman A-10]

Originally posted by ClearedHot:

In other words they let a lot of them reach retirement which increased their end cost.

Does my retirement check come out of the USAF budget?

[ClearedHot]

Sort of...

[Guest JLUCB]

CH, thanks for the clarification.