'Here's the rest of the story'

by David Grand
September 9, 2004

I hope Paul Harvey won't mind me borrowing his signature line for this column. But I could think of no better way of addressing the blistering-near slanderous-attacks made against John Kerry by Dick Cheney and Zell Miller at the convention; namely, that he's "soft" on defense and would be a "dangerous" commander in chief because of his opposition to many key weapons that the military now relies on in winning the war on terrorists.

Now, while I can partially excuse Zell Miller (who although a year younger than me is obviously farther "over the hill") for his caustic rhetoric in accusing Kerry of everything other than starting the Vietnam War, and who made Patrick Buchanan's fire-breathing speech at the Republican convention in 1992 seem as low-keyed as an after-lunch speaker at the Chamber of Commerce, there's no excusing Dick  Cheney for his out and out hypocrisy in throwing brickbats at Kerry's house when his is made entirely of glass, which the "spitballs" that Zell said would be Kerry's way of defending the country could easily penetrate.

The simple truth of the matter is, that while Kerry voted against only a handful of weapons over his long years in the Senate (due mainly to the fact that they were not voted on individually but in large legislative measures that he opposed on deficit-reduction grounds), Cheney presided over the biggest cutbacks in defense programs in modern history as defense secretary under the first George Bush. And his cuts were so sweeping that today the military is struggling to dig its way out of that hole.

As Loren Thompson, who teaches at Georgetown University's security studies program said in the op-ed page of another paper, "While the tenor of the times seemed to call for a drawdown in Cold War forces, subsequent developments have made some of  Cheney 's decisions look poorly conceived and wasteful." To support his position, he offers the following examples:

• In the case of the Air Force, he recommended terminating both of its top-of-the- line F-15 fighter and its lower cost F-16 fighter; cutting the number of A-10 ground attack planes from 435 in 1990 to 159 in 1993; delaying development of the next-generation F/A-22 fighter; reducing the next generation C-17 cargo planes from 220 to 120 airframes; and after proposing in 1990 a reduction in the B-2 bomber program from 132 planes to 75 (which he said was the minimum acceptable number) then recommending in 1992 to cease production at 20 planes.
• The Army felt the sharp edge of the ax, losing its only tank program (Abrams), its only infantry vehicle (Bradely), its only heavy attack helicopter (Apache), and a third of its active-duty divisions, which led to greater reliance on Reserves for combat support, as evidenced in Iraq.      
• The Navy also didn't escape unscathed, losing both of its submarine programs (Trident and Seawolf), its F-14 fighter and next-generation A-12 bomber. But the Marine Corps being scrappier than the other services prevented Cheney from cutting its highest-priority aviation program, the V-22 Osprey tilt rotor, by going to Congress. However, he responded by refusing to spend the money Congress appropriated until fellow Republicans told him he was hurting the party.

Thompson concludes by saying, "there were so many weapon cuts under Cheney that by election year 1992 the Pentagon could claim credit for terminating over 100 weapons programs, albeit nobody knew then that B-2 bombers would play a central role in the Balkans air war and in the bombing of Iraq, that the Abrams tanks would be critical to securing Baghdad or that the military would need a system like the Osprey in Afghanistan." In sum, "Cheney was the biggest, unilateral disarmer over the last four decades, and darned proud of it."  Good day, as Paul Harvey would say.