Criticism of Proposed Defense Budget Cuts Doesn't Add Up

President Obama announced this week that his administration plans to cut defense spending as a way to reduce the deficit.  One of the ways he plans to do this is to cut funding for the US F22 Raptor Fighter, a stealth fighter that costs close to $350 per plane.  True to form, those who believe that US Military Might Makes Right have lambasted the proposal.  The two central arguments are air superiority and jobs.  First, the Pentagon tells us that the planes are critical to maintaining our air superiority, which plays a central role in the "war on terror".  They also maintain that if we eliminate the manufacture of these war planes, we put as many as 95,000 jobs at risk across the country - 25,000 or so would be lost outright, they claim, while another 75,000 jobs held by suppliers would be threatened.

I wanted to look at the jobs issue, first, since jobs are a big concern, right now.  The US economic downturn cost us 600,000 jobs in January alone, after all.  So, here's the math I came up with.  Keep in mind, I am not an economist and not a particular whiz at math.  Still, I wanted to take a crack at it.  

So, I found the national average wage for 2005, the most recent year for which statistics are available.  It's $42,922.28 - let's just say $43K.  Trust me, all the word on the street is that it hasn't changed that much since 2005.  Take the cost of one F22 and divide it by that 43K and you get 8139.5.  That means that the money spent on one single F22 Raptor would pay 8139 and a half people the national average wage for one year.  The Pentagon wants 168 of these babies.  That is the equivalent of 1,367,436 jobs.  Almost one and a half million jobs for a year, or  95,000 jobs for 14 years.  Seems to me we can create a heck of a lot of jobs - or at least offset the loss of a lot of jobs by cutting the F22 Raptor from the budget.

Now, on to the issue of national security and our air superiority.  This is what the Air Force Times says about the F-22:

“The F-22 is extremely good at three things,” squadron commander Pilch said. “No. 1, it’s extremely good at defense, that’s what it was built for. It can defend an island, or a region or a country very, very well, better than anything I know. No. 2, it’s very good at offense. It can strike deep, fast and precisely, better than any other fighter in the inventory. Finally, it is great at situational awareness passing, just an overall awareness of the battlespace and making those around the F-22 better.”

Two lines later, though, is this: "None of this, however, has been tested in real combat."

In "The Quest for Air Dominance:  F-22 Cost vs. Capability" by Thomas W. Hampton, Major, USAF, we learn that our current air superiority is due to the F-15, a fighter plane designed in the 1960s and introduced into combat in the 1970s.  It quickly and easily gained superiority over Iraq in Desert Storm.  That should come as no surprise, given the Iraqi army's reluctance to meet the US challenge on the ground or in the air.  

Newly developed weapons from other countries, including Surface-to-Air Missiles (SAMs), threaten this superiority, however.   Does that mean the only option is a $350 million fighter plane?  Sure, you don't drive a 30 year-old car and expect it to be the best thing on the road, but then again, you don't go out and replace it with a Lamborghini.   Particularly in this economy.

Major Hampton's paper introduces (and quickly quashes) several alternatives.  One of his arguments is that since we've already paid for the research and development of the F-22, switching to alternatives would mean throwing good money after bad.  That is an oversimplification, and it assumes the need to buy that Lamborghini, when really, a new version of the old car might just be enough - for now, anyway.

Since the F-22 has yet to be used in Afghanistan or Iraq, what are the odds it will be required in future conflicts?  It is my hope the new administration is looking at that question right not.  And in the end, wouldn't it really be more cost effective to work very, very hard to prevent those conflicts?  Wouldn't it be best for all concerned to seek diplomatic solutions to the threat of a major conflict between say, Iran and Israel, which would inevitably draw us in, too?

These are tough times.  I'm not planning to purchase a $100 pair of clogs when I can get some at Payless for $10 that will last me until things get better.  The technology of the F-22 isn't going anywhere.  No one is asking the Pentagon to burn the plans.  Just put them in the drawer for a while and buy a few new F-15s (perhaps incorporating some of the new stealth technology of the F-22).  It would also be nice if we Americans could get over our superiority complex for a while, too.