Era of Delay and Decay
The Clinton administration proposed that the B-1 bomber be retired early. The very same B-1 that recently dropped four 2,000-pound bombs on a bunker where Saddam may have been having dinner.
The Clinton administration delayed the Global Hawk, the Predator, the GPS-guided bomb systems and the Long Bow Apache, and wanted to trim the number of aircraft carriers down to eight.
Many of the weapons that the U.S. should be fielding now are still in development because of Clinton delays and under-funding.
The Clinton administration delayed the V-22 Osprey, F-22 Raptor, the Joint Strike Fighter and the Comanche attack helicopter. In addition, the U.S. military is still trying to make up critical shortages in the Milstar space communications program.
The Air Force, Navy and Marines are also scrambling to make up critical shortages in air-refueling tankers, frequently cut out of the Clinton budget requests.
During the Clinton years, the U.S. military had to cut valuable training, live-fire exercises and flight hours in order to meet demanding deployment funding spent in Haiti and Kosovo.
In fact, the U.S. Air Force had to turn to the United Arab Emirates in order to upgrade the F-16 Fighting Falcon. The UAE agreed to purchase advanced versions of the F-16 that the USAF could not afford. The UAE export funded further development of the F-16, which eventually made its way into the U.S. Air Force inventory.
Bill Clinton never helped the U.S. military and often hurt American national security. It is an outright lie to claim that Bill Clinton has any responsibility for the current success in the desert of Iraq. |
