A Matter of Size and Mission

How big a military is needed in these troubled times? How many thousands more troops are needed beyond the figures set forth by Congress and the Army? Are we going to need a million troops to handle the various threats that are on the horizon (and those we haven't even anticipated despite war planning and gaming any multitude of scenarios)? Are we going to need to ramp up troops significantly beyond this? Since we're in a long war, the odds are that we're going to need to significantly ramp up troops, but not only because of the situation in Iraq or the Middle East.

President Bush said today that he plans to expand the size of the U.S. military to meet the challenges of a long-term global war against terrorists, a response to warnings that sustained deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan have stretched the armed forces to near the breaking point.

In an interview with The Washington Post, Bush said he has instructed newly sworn-in Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates to report back to him with a plan to increase ground forces. The president gave no estimates about how many troops may be added but indicated that he agreed with suggestions in the Pentagon and on Capitol Hill that the current military is stretched too thin to cope with the demands placed on it.

"I'm inclined to believe that we do need to increase our troops -- the Army, the Marines," Bush said in the Oval Office session. "And I talked about this to Secretary Gates and he is going to spend some time talking to the folks in the building, come back with a recommendation to me about how to proceed forward on this idea."

The president's decision comes at a time when he is rethinking his strategy in Iraq and considering, among other options, a short-term surge in troop levels to try to secure violence-torn Baghdad. The Joint Chiefs of Staff are resisting the idea during internal debates in part out of the conviction that it will further strain already-pressed forces.

(snip)

The Army has already temporarily increased its size from 482,000 active-duty soldiers in 2001 to 507,000 today and soon to 512,000. But the Army wants to make that 30,000-soldier increase permanent and then grow an additional 7,000 soldiers or more per year. The Army estimates that every 10,000 additional soldiers will cost about $1.2 billion a year.

And yet, the size of the military is besides the point here. It's what do we as a nation expect our military to do and what missions must it be prepared to handle?

Our military is the best the world has ever seen at breaking stuff and doing it with overwhelming force, precision, and totality if need be. We can place a bomb on target anywhere in the world within minutes of a decision to do so. Billions have been spent to develop the technology and train the soldiers, sailors, and Marines to break stuff and do so efficiently.

The US military has shrunk steadily ever since the end of the Vietnam War. Indeed, it has shrunk ever since the last huge war of consequence - World War II. The spending charts bear that out. Congress has limited the increase in the size of the military even though spending has increased significantly over the past few years. The manpower available for various missions remains limited. It is this reason that you hear about the same units being sent back to the theater of operations time and time again.

However, this is where things get interesting. Do we need a larger military force to handle the breaking stuff aspect of warfighting and defending the nation, or do we need a force capable of doing the nation-building peacemaking that comes after conflicts?

It is likely a combination of the above, but leaning towards more forces available to do the nation-building.

Here's my reasoning. If you have a sizable force that handles the nation-building, it frees up those forces that are responsible for breaking stuff. Special forces are great at breaking stuff, but are too valuable and specialized to be tasked to nation building for months on end. Military police are of limited use in breaking stuff, but become quite valuable at the end of a conflict to restore law and order. Engineering units are needed in both breaking stuff and in rebuilding stuff. You need the right mix of troops for the missions.

Complicating matters further, you have differing missions. You need major forces for potential conflicts in North Korea or Iran or Syria or China, but special forces and nimble forces for dealing with failed state regimes like Sudan, Somalia, and other places that are or have the potential to become terrorist incubators. Those missions require different and competing interests that cannot be addressed with the current budget.

California Yankee wonders what took so long for this decision to be made and thought that Rumsfeld should have made the call years ago.

Now, it appears that even Democrats would be willing to consider the increase the physical size of the military where they may have been reluctant to do so previously, as noted here in the WaPo story:

The incoming chairman of the House Armed Services Committee spoke out forcefully today for increasing the size of the Army and Marines, noting that their leaders describe the services as "stretched and strained." "We're going to have to pay attention to this," Rep. Ike Skelton (D-Mo.) told reporters. Saying the two services are "bleeding," he added, "I think we have to apply the tourniquet and strengthen the forces. I think that will be a major part of our work."

Others commenting: Blue Crab Boulevard, Stop the ACLU, Hot Air, Unpartisan, Macranger, Redstate, and Political Pit Bull.

UPDATE:
Oliver Willis thinks it isn't the size of the military that is the problem, but rather that it's been tasked to Iraq. Reasonable minds can differ as to Iraq, but Willis does ignore the fact that the military is in Iraq and hoping that the military breaks or forces a withdrawal of the battlefield crawling with insurgents and jihadis doesn't make much sense either.

The Left Coaster has some questions for Bush.

Dan Riehl weighs in. Instapundit has a link-o-rific post from earlier in the week, citing Austin Bay and notes some of the issues I raise above (albeit far more effectively).

Greyhawk notes that another Iraqi province has been handed over to the Iraqi military to handle security; a good thing no matter where you stand on the situation in Iraq.

UPDATE 12/20/2006:
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