By Agence France-Presse on Thursday, June 27th, 2013
US Army outlines plans to chop brigades
The US Army will scrap 12 combat brigades as portion of the cheap-cutting plan to slash the dimensions of the force after a decade of war, chief of staff General Ray Odierno said Tuesday.
Calling the move the largest reorganization of the military since World War II, the final outlined how the force would reach a previously announced goal of scaling back the military to 490,000 troops from a peak of 570,000 in the course of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Odierno said the move, which might involve relocating thousands of soldiers and eliminating some civilian jobs, does not hamper the Army’s combat readiness and was not associated with automatic budget cuts referred to as sequestration.
The restructuring “will reduce the whole collection of headquarters, while sustaining as much combat capabilities as possible,” he told reporters.
But if Congress allows the automated budget reductions to continue, the military would face so much more dramatic downsizing, with as much as 100,000 additional troops cut, he said.
In that event, the reductions unveiled Tuesday will be “only the 1st step.”
The 12 combat brigades could be cut over the following four years, with some troops reassigned to other bases. Ten of the brigades are within the Usa and two because of be scrapped are in Germany, which the Pentagon had already announced.
Under the reorganization, the military would bolster its remaining infantry and armor brigades with another battalion. That may mean adding about 600-800 soldiers to a brigade, that is roughly 3,500 troops.
The planned reduction of 80,000 troops in coming years will come mostly through voluntary departures, but some officers may have to be forced to retire, the final said.
Odierno said the army tried to distribute the cuts around the country, because the reductions will affect local economies and a few civilian employees.
The cuts will put the military at concerning the same level because it was before the attacks of Sep 11, 2001.
Republican lawmaker Buck McKeon, chairman of the home Armed Services Committee and an outspoken advocate of military spending, warned that the usa couldn’t risk returning to a smaller ground force.
“America learned the hard way that our pre-9/11 military was too small,” McKeon said in an announcement.
“Now, even before sequestration, we’re reducing the force to that very same size and foolishly expecting history to coach us one more lesson,” he said.
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