Pier One should be a retailer, not an Army boondoggle

Let’s look at the infamous Hamas pier one last time.

The pier was announced by President Joe Biden in his State of the Union address in March.

Deputy Commander of US Central Command, Vice Adm. Brad Cooper, told reporters in July that the pier helped deliver 19.4 million pounds of aid to the desperate population in Gaza.

“A temporary pier would enable a massive increase in the amount of humanitarian assistance getting into Gaza every day,” Biden said.

But in the end it was only operational for roughly 20 days at a cost of the $230 million and did little to alleviate the grave humanitarian situation in Gaza as the war between Hamas and Israel, which has claimed thousands of civilian lives, continues.

No need to detail the actual pier any more; we’ve discussed it and it’s failures at length. More to the point – the Pentagon is asking for bids for someone o bring the three Army watercraft involved back to the US.

Retired Marine Corps Col. Mark Cancian, a senior adviser with the CSIS International Security Program, estimated that the contract would go for $300,000 per float-on/float-off vessel, which would be used to transport the three boats. The contract description says it is for “multiple awards up to two vessels or until the Government’s needs are met,” meaning it could come out to roughly $600,000 total if two vessels are required.

A retired warrant officer who served as a chief engineer on Army watercraft told CNN that the boats being brought home by contracted vessels indicates they likely need significant maintenance.

“The only things that would stop [7th Transportation Brigade (Expeditionary)] from sailing are mechanical problems or manning,” the retired engineer said. “Unless the whole unit is deploying somewhere, that means these boats are in rough shape.”

It’s not entirely uncommon for the US military to use float-on/float-off vessels to transport smaller ships across large distances, or if a US military vessel is badly damaged, Cancian said. He added it’s “very plausible” that the boats are not in a state to make the journey back after their work on the pier operation.

“They’d probably make it but, again, it’s a matter of risk,” he said. “They don’t want one to get halfway across and have the engines break down and have it floating around.”

Maintenance of the Army’s vessels was a concern throughout the mission of the temporary pier, which ended in July. A US official previously told CNN that the watercraft involved in the mission have not been maintained “to the level they need to be,” primarily because “they lack the funding to get the repair parts in a timely manner.”   CNN

So we sent them over in vessels not maintained due to lack of funds… they have $600,000 to get them back. Bet they had funding for DEI.  Seems to be a habit – remember when we didn’t have the funding to build a border wall, and how much has been spent on illegals since they got here?

Category: "Your Tax Dollars At Work", Army, Israel