Mitch Berg has an excellent piece on the "the Clinton military" that liberals like to simultaneously crow about then deride. The good attributes of the military are erroneously attributed to Clinton (our high-tech weapons systems and advanced training – much of which were products of the Cold War) while the negatives are errenously attributed to Bush (our inability to fight two theatre-level conflicts simultaneously).
It’s ironic that liberals who whined throughout the 1990’s that it was absurd to maintain an army that could fight to wars simultaneously in an age of "peace" are now many of the same liberals lambasting the Bush administration for not being able to fight two wars simultaneously. The double standard at play here is head-smackingly obvious.
In the end, we have to rebuild our military significantly from the 1990s in which the Clinton Administration tried to transform it from a fighting force to a peacekeeping force. Some of these steps were necessary, such as the rise of the 10th Mountain Division’s rapid fighting capability. Others were not, such as the way the military bureaucracy was turned into a political rather than a military apparatus. It’s a testament to the strength of our military that after 8 years of a presidential administration that both despised and was despised by the military we still have the strongest military on Earth by leaps and bounds.
Berg also deals with the canard that foreign troops can simply take the place of US soldiers. That idea is more a concept of wishful thinking than any realistic assessment of the situation. From Wesley Clark’s assinine idea of letting the Saudis hunt bin Laden to Dean’s equally fallacious notion that "moderate Muslim" soliders (100,000 of them!) should take over for us in Iraq, it’s clear that the only troops that can fight in Iraq are the ones who are in Iraq. (The same ones who are part of what Kerry arrogantly termed "a fraudulent coalition" – one of the most insulting things ever said about people fighting and dying to help us in Iraq.) The fact is that unless we’re willing to put in the time and treasure to rebuild our military we won’t be able to fight two wars simultaneously – and does anyone really think that the Democrats would have the political will to do so?
JDAM.
You’re welcome.
Research into JDAM technology began before Clinton took office in 1993 – they were designed to be a low-cost way of converting "dumb" bombs into smart weapons after the phenomenal success of these weapons in the Gulf War. The only thing Clinton did was sign the check.
From the Navy website:
Background: Operation Desert Storm revealed some shortcomings in air-to-surface weapon capability. Adverse weather conditions limited employment of precision guided munitions. Unguided weapon accuracy was also poor when the weapons were delivered from medium and high altitudes. Research and development of an “adverse weather precision guided munition” began in 1992. The first JDAMs were delivered in 1997 with operational testing conducted in 1998 and 1999. The more than 450 JDAMs dropped during testing had 95 percent system reliability and were accurate to within nine meters. JDAM also performed well in adverse weather testing, including clouds, rain and snow.
http://www.chinfo.navy.mil/navpalib/factfile/weapons/wep-jdam.html
So you’re saying that Clinton deserves no credit for ensuring that a good idea was properly implemented thus giving our military an even greater advantage in Kosovo and Iraq II and saving American lives?
I’m saying that he deserves very little credit for a plan that was made before he took office and went off without him having to do anything for it. The Air Force R&D people and the civilian contractors who designed, tested, and developed the JDAM are the ones who deserve the credit.