"It's been like pulling teeth"

Commentary on: Air Force Must Step Up Efforts in Iraq, Afghanistan

I applaud Secretary of Defense Gates' efforts, but the deck is stacked against him. Read Carl Builder's The Masks of War for an in depth discussion as to why the Air Force, and the rest of the services, are change averse and have made the defense secretary consider taking the DAT.

Perhaps these actions are steps toward setting up the next administration to scrap "a leap ahead" and 1-4-2-1, in favor of focusing on the ongoing current wars. Read American Defense Policy by Bolt et al., Shaping U.S. Military Forces by Worley, and Seeing the Elephant: The U.S. Role in Global Security by Binnendijk and Kugler for more background information on this ongoing debate.

In my humble opinion, "a leap ahead" is here to stay due to the military industrial complex's hold on the bottom-up inflationary Pentagon budget, which President Eisenhower warned us about. Who cares about the current "small" wars when we can guarantee a six figure job to every retiring military officer inside the beltway by weaponizing space and fighting for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, they say... I think the families of these troops do.