Obama to short Navy on jets

Adm. Paul Rohrer:

Hot on the heels of President Obama canceling the Air Force's most advanced strike fighter, the Congressional Research Service (CRS) announced this week that we now face a much greater shortfall in Navy and Marine Corps strike fighters than was previously estimated. Last year, CRS predicted a shortfall of 125 navy fighter jets by 2017. They now predict that the shortfall will more be more than 300 jets.

The American people deserve to understand what those shortages really mean.

On the surface, President Obama's defense budget calls for cutting the Navy's aircraft carrier strike groups from 11 to 10. But a closer inspection reveals that Obama's program delays and budget cuts will do terrible harm to the readiness and capability of our carrier groups.

Although America does have 10 carrier groups, we cannot deploy all 10 at any given time. Both personnel and equipment require shore time for maintenance, rest, and training. Along with the carrier groups that are temporarily rotated out of service, the worsening shortage of fighter aircraft is reducing the number of ready carrier groups even further.

...

A carrier group typically sails with 50 strike fighters on board. If the F-18 inventory shortfall climbs from 125 to 300, as the CRS now predicts, then you have a shortage of six carrier groups worth of jets.

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But he is fully funding ACORN. If an enemy could wipe out 300 Navy jets that would be seen as a dire situation. When an administration is cutting defense in war time while running up huge deficits on domestic programs, they have skewed priorities that need to come to the attention of voters.

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