Hagel calls for pay, benefits cuts to military
Like I said when he was selected to be the Secretary of Defense, Hagel was chosen to be a hatchet man. Yeah, everyone was saying how great it’d be to have a former enlisted soldier in the position, but he’s a selfish piece of shit more interested in getting along than doing any real work. This is from military.com, sent to us by ROS;
Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel warned Tuesday that troops and their families will be asked to sacrifice on pay and benefits to preserve readiness in an era of tighter budgets.
Hagel listed politically-charged changes to compensation and personnel policy as one of his top six priorities in reforming the military following the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as the department gears up to meet new challenges.
“This may be the most difficult” to achieve among his six priorities, Hagel said of proposals to trim pay increases, overhaul TRICARE and review retirement benefits while adapting to cuts in personnel.
“Without serious attempts to achieve significant savings in this area, which consumes roughly half of the DoD budget and is increasing every year, we risk becoming an unbalanced force,” Hagel said.
The alternative was to have a military that is “well-compensated, but poorly trained and equipped, with limited readiness and capability,” Hagel said in a keynote address to a Global Security Forum 2013 sponsored by the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
Yeah, well, I don’t see Congress discussing their own pay cuts, or planning to do more with less. Are we talking about Hagel taking a cut in either his pay or his pension from the Senate? I’d believe he is serious about saving money if he turned in his pay check.
Category: Veterans Issues
By “overhauling TRICARE” what he really means is kicking retirees out of it and into Obumblecare.
Well, the money has to go to all those green things. It’s for the future. I think I kind of saw something like this coming.
Why are any of you surprised? Social Security is giving a 1.5% raise, the lowest in some time if you don’t count those two years when there was nothing, and milpers get a mere 1%. Frankly, if I were undecided about re-upping, this would certainly help me decide.
And no, there is no value in highly-skilled, well-trained employees. The civilian mentality, that those employees are worth more and should be kept and only slowly replaced, has crept into the Dept of Dumbassery for a long time. The longer you stay, the more you cost. At some point, you’re too expensive to keep, so every move is made to find a way to replace you with cheaper, less-experienced and far less skilled employees.
This always seems great in the beginning, until the sheisse hits the Phan, and then reality sets in because someone, somewhere in this world, wants to pick a fight, big time. Then they’ll need you.
Shit on us, that’s B. Hussein 0bama & Company’s mission! When have THEY even thought of sacrificing even one tiny iota in perks and luxuries while we’re told to thank them every time they shit on us? Sounds like business as usual in the Great Whorehouse on the Potomac River!!
Well, see, if you remember that story about the ‘hookers for info’ stuff from a couple months ago, then these two admirals getting their knuckles rapped for their involvement won’t surprise you, either. They’re too embarrassing to keep around.
http://www.wane.com/news/national/2-admirals-sanctioned-in-bribery-scheme_38379467
(Actually, they should have been sanctioned over this, so I’m not gritching over it.)
Hagel was picked by obama to dismantle the DoD and he’s doing exactly that. Instead of appearing before Congress to decry the current situation and demand more funding, he is meekly relaying obama’s directives. Hagel has gone from being a grunt in Vietnam to being a waterboy in DC.
Of course, it’s not Hagel who is responsible for any of this. It really wouldn’t have mattered who secretary was. This is happening as part of obamaman’s scheme and Hagel is just wearing the knee pads. If Hagel had not known what was expected of him, he wouldn’t have been selected. Sure, he would have had some semblance of personal integrity and garnered a high degree of respect if he had said, “Get another boy, prez.” But, those things don’t put money in the bank. In my view, it’s all about obamaman. He calls the shots. He makes the appointments. That’s where the anger is best directed but too many people don’t give a shit until the decisions affect them and theirs.
@6: Yeppers
“The alternative was to have a military that is ‘well-compensated, but poorly trained and equipped, with limited readiness and capability,’ Hagel said in a keynote address to a Global Security Forum 2013 sponsored by the Center for Strategic and International Studies.”
And the final product will be a poorly-compensated, poorly-motivated, poorly-trained and equipped military, with readiness and capability nadirs not reached since the Carter Administration.
I’ve had bumps of intuition that have hit me a lot, lately, so here’s one recent hit: payrolls are cut back to 1970 levels.
But how can this be, Obama is the great peacemaker! He’s already ended the war in Iraq and he’s ending the war in Afghanistan. Shouldn’t that be saving us billions?
Talking points have been issued. This from the new Issue of Echoes which is the newsletter for Retirees.
General Odierno –
“We also have some tough choices on the issue of compensation and will need your help in this area. We are extremely grateful for the high quality care and compensation our nation has shown to our servicemen and women. However, military manpower costs remain at historic highs. As we go forward, we must develop compensation packages that reduce future costs but at the same time recognize and reward our Soldiers, retirees and their families for their commitment and sacrifice. However, changes to the rate of increases for pay and entitlements, and modest increases to health care contributions are necessary to allow us to maintain a ready force. We must make choices that preserve the high quality, All-Volunteer Force as the most critical component of a ready Army.”
There are a lot of places they need to look before they get to base pay and basic allowances. I was happy to get it at the time but really all travel money and allowances I got on some of those stateside TDY missions was ridiculous. And I wasn’t even gaming the system the way some people do.
so this chimera “readiness”-isn’t it going to be great when we have these multi-billion dollar F35s “ready” to go to war, and no people to fly or maintain them? I guess people aren’t part of “readiness” in the Nobel Peace Prize era of drone strikes.
This’ll happen right after we cut back on SNAP cards, Sec 8 housing, Obamaphones, welfare in general, and green giveaways, er, green energy programs, right? Heavy dose of sarcasm.
Amazingly, the next budget drama occurs in February. What better time to inflict fear and anxiety than just before Thanksgiving and Christmas?
Be interesting to see who gets Stockholm Syndrome and supports Hagel this time.
$20 Billion in Obamacare fraud in YEAR ONE, says the FBI. Medicare/Medicaid fraud over $120B a year. HHS drops half its fraud investigators and will not pursue Obamacare fraud, at the soonest, until 2017.
Stop 20% of that fraud and use that money to pay for the benefits and personnel the DoD needs.
Rat bastards like Hagel and every frickin’ retired 0-7 and above can ALWAYS be counted on to turn on the troops when their political or private sector career calls for it.
How much of a package does anyone think Chuckie was offered?
Ex-PH2: How much of a package does anyone think Chuckie was offered?
I’m guessing it involved 30 pieces of something or other.
@18 – 30 pieces of turkey butt?
Did we not just experience a hissy fit over furloughing those amazing civilian workers? If that was bad for the economy how is this not?
Why fix waste and redundancy when we can screw over honest folks right?
Well, I can’t find any place else to put this op-ed piece about Veterans’ Day, in my local paper this morning, but somebody thinks we’re worth the effort. http://newssun.suntimes.com/opinions/23575381-474/give-thanks-that-they-have-come-home.html As I see it, the real problem is that military personnel seem to be regarded more and more as a form of temp worker, in general. That’s someone hired to work on a specific task. Wars get cute names now, but they are a form of temp work, aren’t they? So when you think you’re done with your temp workers, you don’t owe them anything any more, and you send them away. WWII lasted 4+ years. Korea, a little over 2 years. They were temp jobs. There was a draft in place, and you went into the military, served your time and then left. The career people were those who maybe had no place else to go. Everyone else was glad to get out and go home, and start a civilian job. They generally did not think of the military as a career. Vietnam changed that, and every military action since then has reflected the change from temp job to career. And those who left took their skills with them each time. Now it’s happening again, but this time by directive. So while you bemoan the loss of highly-trained people to attrition, and the losses of pay and benefits, the people who are deciding to do these things to you still regard the military as a temp job, not a career, even if they themselves are making a career of it and could probably not function very well in my world. And if this upsets you, well, frankly, my dears, they don’t give a damn. We have all worked for the same master, and he’s stupid and mean and doesn’t give a crap about us or about who falls by the wayside. I know that many of you would rather see the good people stay in and the slushbuckets kicked out for good, but until or unless the scheisse hits the Phan, it ain’t gonna happen. Part of a Roman soldier’s… Read more »
All of the afore mentioned plus the addition of political correctness equals disster.
Another nail in the coffin of the Volar military. Another reason I will continue to tell my g’son to not enlist when he comes of age.
Another creation of a military that will become even more hollow then under Peanut Famah Catah.
Remember, bennies, health care and families are un-sexy. Huge no-bid contracts, large projects and other pork are teh sexy!!1!!11
No surprise that SECDEF is trying to plead poverty. The current administration wants to go back to the 90’s. A mass exodus of career servicemembers as pay and other bennies fall. More soldiers on food stamps because pay won’t rise as prices do. Cuts to BAH mean more soldiers either lean or AER or get out if they can’t keep a roof over their heads.
I also suspect that the left is tying to backdoor a draft. That would really lead to a cut in bennies (something they want to pay for more socialist handouts). There are a lot of calls for a draft. Tom Ricks openly said that a draft would be good because then the DOD could hike retirement to 30yrs of service, cut bennies and other “hope and change”.
Write your congressmen! If you say “this will happen” and give into dispair, it WILL happen only harder and faster. The Military times admitted that Congress wants to punt on retirement and bennies because of the bad optics and we need to hammer that home. ASUA et al are our only hope!
@24, Nothing you said surprises me. I said the draft would probably start up again. Starting the countdown.
McArmy. Nice.
^^^ That was sarcasm, by the way.