One sentence in Pentagon QDR starts a battle
By Georgie Gale | Monday, February 1st, 2010 | Uncategorized“To mitigate the risk of a terrorist attack, accident, or natural disaster, the U.S. Navy will homeport an East Coast carrier in Mayport, Florida.”
Nothing else. No supporting language. Just one sentence. That one sentence could be a precursor to a disaster worse than the Ford plant closing. Worse than the Franklin paper mill closing. The worst economic blow that Hampton Roads has been dealt in a long time.
Concerns about losing a carrier rose a couple years ago when the politics of Presidential campaigns came into play. During the Presidential election, every hopeful wanted the Florida vote, and made campaign promises about bringing the carrier and all its surrounding benefits to Mayport. Political insiders spread rumors that Jeb was asking big brother for a favor, and it was being seriously considered.
Then last year it was discovered that the 2010 Defense legislation appropriated funds for upgrading a pier and dredging a channel to serve as a temporary docking place for a carrier. We were all told not to worry because this was clearly just for a temporary dock and there were no plans in the near future for a permanent move of a carrier to Mayport, and thus a $650 million loss to the region.
Most recently, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said he was not going to speculate on the matter until the Pentagon’s Quadrennial Defense Review came out. And it just did. And guess what it said… (did you read the first line?)
Let the political battle ensue!
Every elected official and elected hopeful is making their voice heard. And with good reason. The loss of a carrier would an enormous loss to the Hampton Roads region. In addition to the aforementioned $650 million dollars, the region would lose 11,000 jobs. Make that 11,000 income-drawers, consumers and tax-payers.
People worry about having all the carriers docked in one place in case of a terrorist attack. As if they’re ever ALL docked in Norfolk at the same time.
And let’s talk about the cost to the taxpayer for a minute… well, shoot, Congressman Forbes can say it better than I can:
“At a time when the size of China’s Navy surpasses our own and continues to grow – fueled by yearly double-digit defense spending increases – and at a time when we know we have a $1.3 billion shortfall in our public shipyard infrastructure, a looming shortfall of 125 strike fighter aircraft by 2015, and are offering the lowest pay raise for troops in decades, I intend to demand full transparency into the decision-making behind the proposed use of up to a billion of taxpayer dollars on a move regarded as duplicative and even ‘scandalous.’”
Beautiful.
Sen. Jim Webb threw us a crumb of hope with his comment, “…it should be emphasized that although the QDR is a valuable planning tool, it is an internal document and does not have the force of law. Decisions with respect to matters such as homeporting are subject to the authorization and appropriations process of the Congress.” Wait a minute – authorization of Congress? Strike the hope part.
The good news is – can we call it good? – that the Navy has requested no appropriations for 2011 for Mayport construction. Only a minimal amount for planning and design. This is encouraging in the fact that while they’re moving forward on the QDR recommendations, there’s no real immediacy in their actions, and a lengthy political battle is rapidly growing on the horizon.
Here’s hoping our guys are better on the political battlefield than theirs.
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Georgie Gale of Virginia Beach. That's it.
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16 Responses to "One sentence in Pentagon QDR starts a battle"
So now that Congressman Wittman has forsworn earmarks…
What a crisis of leadership in the 2nd District. Where is Congressman Nye on this issue? Probably the same place he has been on the F-22′s to Langley and offshore energy – silent.
Only just a couple weeks ago he did cobble together a commission on this issue to coordinate our regional response – just in advance of the QDR’s report.
Really? As you said Georgie, this move has been in the works for years – and Nye has been our Congressman for more than a year. He’s had time to act.
The district deserves better.
As a former Norfolk native, I urge everyone to consider the strategic value of spreading our Carriers out a bit, rather than clustering them in San Diego and Norfolk.
When the Communist Chinese attack us; and they surely will, we needn’t create Pearl Harbor-like targets for them to make their attack planning any easier.
Norfolk will do just fine without one Carrier and it will help alleviate some of the Base traffic.
We previously had a Mayport/Jacksonville Carrier task group, so the QDR is taking the right approach in proposing reestablishing such strategic basing of our Naval assets.
While I don’t like losing the carrier as it is a big local hit, I support the move to Florida. As a Navy retiree, I understand the need to protect our limited carrier fleet.
Put the question to those outside our area and I’m sure they will agree with the move. In our area and Florida, the politicians will only see the $$$ (to win or lose) and not be able to understand the national military importance.
As a Navy Reserve retiree as well, I am perplexed that in response to 9-11, we started to move DoD personnel back inside the gate in order to provide better security, and now, we seem to be pursuing a policy of disperal of our carrier assets, most of which are at sea on deployment. Frankly, this just reeks of political gamesmanship at a time when the billions of dollars are better spent on assets.
Grover,
Really!!!! Seriously!!! You believe China is going to attack us and we might have a 2nd Pearl Harbor on our hands. I can tell you we would have weeks if not months warning of an attack of that magnitude. We have satelite recon, HUMINT, SIGINT, COMINT, SOSUS nets, etc. Are you really that dumb.
As for a nuclear attack, I guarentee once China has ICBM’s that can reach U.S. soil, we will have them targeted as well. Ever heard of the “Mutually Assured Destruction” MAD doctrine? Basically side A knows side B has enough nukes to totally destroy the other, so they won’t launch on each other (no winner).
You really need to think through before you post!!!!
Why not let the sailors vote on it. Let’s see . . .fun in the sun nearly year round; no state income tax, Professional football, baseball, basket ball teams, Disneyland, Cruise ship lines year round, 30-minute sea details . . . hmm sounds like a slam dunk for the sailor.
Virginia voted for a Democrat President, two Democrat Senators, and a Democrat Congressman for the Second district.
And this is what that brought us!
Just goes to show that the Pentagon doesn’t really like Democrats. Oh, and who seriously cares if a carrier gets moved to Mayport? It will force HR to become less dependant on the federal government for employment opportunities. This is a bad thing? We’re conservatives. Maybe a little less government (even though this is the military) will be the catalyst for us to finally create a new economic engine instead of being satisfied to live off the government teet.
With all the government spending in the federal government, I think there are a few more areas of spending worth cutting before getting around to our national defense
“when the Chinese attack us”.. Guffaw!! The Chinese own our debt, and the only attack we are going to see is their lawyers foreclosing and taking possession of our aircraft carriers, destroyers, property in Washington DC and probably GM and our banks. For that matter they may foreclose on Congress and take possession of Democrats and moderate Republicans. For any country to attack what they own is makes as much sense as running a bulldozer through your house because you want to remodel it.
Let’s be practical.
It is going to happen so HR “leaders” need to start planning what to do about it. And, it will involve more than the one ship, the carrier. It will involve its group as well along with the many personnel and their families.
Bipartisan Hampton Roads Delegation Statement on QDR
01/30/10
Washington, DC – Hampton Roads’ Congressmen Glenn Nye (VA-02), Rob Wittman (VA-01), Randy Forbes (VA-04), and Bobby Scott (VA-03) issued the following statement concerning the 2010 Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR).
“There have been conflicting news reports about the contents of the upcoming QDR, and it would be inappropriate to comment on specific provisions of the document until it is formally released to Congress with the Department of Defense budget request.
“The Navy has never demonstrated a clear strategic rationale for spending up to $1 billion to create a redundant East Coast homeport at a time when other crucial priorities are going unfunded.
“This is the beginning of the process, and the QDR is just one planning document that Congress will evaluate as we develop the Fiscal Year 2011 defense authorization and appropriations bills.
“As members of the bipartisan Hampton Roads delegation, we look forward to working together to thoroughly review all of our critical national security priorities, and making sure we spend our defense dollars wisely and responsibly.”
Nye, Wittman and Forbes are members of the House Armed Services Committee, which is responsible for passing the annual Defense Authorization bill. Scott is a member of the House Budget Committee.
The game ain’t over until the fat lady sings
Jim Webb is hardly rolling over on this.
http://www.navytimes.com/news/2010/02/gns_webb_natter_carrier_florida_020210/
Best I could find on Warner. Party like its 1773
September 18, 2009
Virginia lawmakers act against Mayport move
Senator Warner joined Senator Jim Webb and Congressmen Randy Forbes, Glenn Nye, Bobby Scott, and Rob Wittman in writing to the Senate and House Armed Services Committees, urging them not to authorize an appropriation of $46.3 million to dredge the channel and basin at Florida’s Naval Station Mayport.
The House Armed Services Committee voted overwhelming to remove the funding authorization after an in-depth review by the Committee determined that it was premature to expend $46.3 million to initiate dredging prior to the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR). The Senate version contains the authorization which must be resolved by House and Senate conferees.
In their letter to the chairmen and ranking members of the two committees, the Virginia lawmakers cited poor policy, fiscal irresponsibility, and lack of strategic justification:
“Mindful of our increasingly fiscally constrained budget environment, we believe the QDR’s review is the best approach to assess the military necessity, costs, and benefits associated with all aspects of carrier homeporting or port visits at NS Mayport.”
Specifically, the Virginia lawmakers cited the following reasons for the House position to be accepted in conference:
* spending nearly $50 million of taxpayer funds before the QDR review is completed is poor policy;
* the expense of transforming NS Mayport into a homeport for nuclear-powered aircraft carriers is fiscally irresponsible;
* and the Navy has not justified the strategic or military requirements for deep dredging at NS Mayport nor creating an additional CVN homeport on the East Coast
WVEC TV 13 is reporting the USS Enterprise(CVN-65) will be decommissioned in 2013 (or so) so it would appear that we are in the game to lose two carriers. That is a extremely heavy economic blow to take…
Politically, I have to mention that Bob McD our “Jobs Gov” has a big job on his hands and might be the first to lose two carriers and tens of thousands of military jobs in Hampton Roads.
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