Military Affairs

The Canadian government has had a great deal of trouble in replacing their obsolete submarine fleet. It came to a head last year when the Canadians purchased four British Upholder class submarines. One of the subs, renamed the HMCS Chicoutimi, suffered from a series of accidents while it was being sailed to Canada from England. One crewman lost his life, and the boat was abandoned and had to be towed back to Britain by American and English vessels.

This has been a very embarrassing episode for the Canadian government and military. The civilian press has questioned the need for a silent service at all, something that appears nothing less than surreal to those of us who pay attention to military affairs. Last time I looked, Canada has more coastline to patrol than any other country in the world. Removing a vital asset such as a submarine fleet from your navy is a sure way to open gaping holes in the national defense.

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Four people have been arrested in Los Angeles and charged with smuggling vital defense secrets to China. The information believed to have been transferred includes details on the Aegis battle-management system, a vital component of U.S. cruisers and destroyers, and on the new Virginia-class attack submarines. Officials said that based on a preliminary assessment, China now will be able to track U.S. submarines. It is also believed that information was provided which would facilitate the development of electromagnetic pulse weapons, which could disrupt electronics over a wide area, as well as information on unmanned aerial vehicles.

U.S. intelligence officials said the case remains under investigation but that it could prove to be among the most damaging spy cases since the 1985 case of John A. Walker Jr., who passed Navy communication codes to Moscow for 22 years.

Here is the (rather brief) New York Times article on this matter. Read it for yourself, and see if you think it properly represents the seriousness of what has apparently happened here.

Do you think that this will receive anywhere near the media attention which has been devoted to the Valerie Plame affair?

(also posted at Photon Courier)

This post at Murdoc Online reports that the Philippines have retired the last of their fighter aircraft. As of October 1st, the Philippines are without any dedicated air defense planes. Some trainer aircraft have been modified to act as makeshift fighters, but I don’t think anyone expects them to do any good if a shooting war starts.

But the prospects of actual combat are very remote, and the reasons for that have much to do with the defense umbrella provided by the United States and Australia. Any foreign power looking to make war on the Philippines would essentially have to get permission from the Anglosphere, and I just don’t see that happening in the foreseeable future.

The stated reason for the decision to junk their fighters was economics. The Philippine government has to concern itself with two serious internal threats: Communist guerrillas in the back country and Islamic terrorists in the South. In both cases the enemy is dispersed, desperate to avoid a direct battle, and difficult to eradicate. Fighter aircraft are of little use in this sort of conflict, and the limited defense budget could be better spent on forces that are better suited to dealing with insurgents.

This decision by the Philippine government isn’t unprecedented. New Zealand decided in 2001 to disband their own air combat wing, and their reasons for doing so are also economic in nature. But, unlike the Philippines, New Zealand doesn’t face any internal threats. They wanted to use the cash to fund social welfare programs.

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The military analysis blog Strategypage.com always has something interesting and topical. Case in point is a discussion of the US military’s recruiting efforts. (Scroll down to the post dated Sept. 1, 2005.)

If you’ve been following the news then you’ve probably gotten the impression that service in Iraq is so unpalatable that it’s almost impossible to get anyone to sign up for military service. SP says that this is not the case, with reenlistment and recruiting rates for combat units exceeding expectations. Iraq is a selling point instead of a liability.

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Despite harsh images coming out of Iraq (and made to look even harsher by a traditional media elite determined to make Iraq another Vietnam), which had recruitment well behind schedule for much of the first half of this year, June saw a reversal in recruitment trends:

The U.S. Army, hard pressed to attract new soldiers amid the Iraq war, exceeded its monthly recruiting goal in June, ending four straight months of shortfalls, the top U.S. military officer said on Wednesday.

But the active-duty Army, three-quarters through fiscal 2005, remained 14 percent — about 7,800 recruits — behind its year-to-date target and was in danger of missing its first annual recruiting goal since 1999, officials said. Its goal for fiscal 2005, ending on Sept. 30, is 80,000 recruits.

“I will tell you that for the month of June, the United States Army active recruiting is over 100 percent of its goal, which is a turnaround from where they’ve been the last several months,” Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told an audience of Pentagon employees.

“So there’s a bit of good news in here. We’ll see how it works out the rest of the year,” Myers added.

Well, it seems to me that if there weren’t so many bans on military recruitment on campuses, perhaps the shortfall wouldn’t be so great. The bans make no sense if you support the troops, even if you opposed the war itself.

Nonetheless, now that school is out, perhaps young men and women looking to serve their country will no longer be blinded by their teachers to the military option. In fact, that may be the greatest factor in explaining the uptick.

It’s worth considering, too, that perhaps, with a war going on, our youngsters are thinking a little more thoroughly about what military service entails, instead of viewing it as simply an obligation-free way to pay for college or get out of the hood. Indeed, this deeper soul-searching makes each new warrior even more valuable, even in later civilian life, because he or she will have decided, more unequivocally than ever, that a life worth having (thanks to help from the government) is a life worth fighting, even dying, for.

(Hat-tip: Alexander K. McClure of PoliPundit.com)

[Cross-posted at Between Worlds]