Call us crazy, but at Taxpayers for Common Sense we’re big believers in letting the military service chiefs and the service secretaries set military doctrine and decide on the weapon systems to carry out that doctrine.

The Joint Chiefs of Staff set out the missions and potential missions for our military forces. It’s then the job of the individual military services to train and equip the forces to meet those missions. Train and equip. What does each service member need to do to meet the mission? That’s where training comes in. What weapon systems do they need to accomplish their mission? That’s equipping.

But lawmakers, with their ultimate power of the purse, can withhold funding to keep the Pentagon from taking certain actions. And they can appropriate funds for programs the Pentagon either didn’t ask for or wants to retire. Finally, lawmakers can write laws that statutorily require the Pentagon to take or refrain from taking certain actions.

We firmly believe Congress should guard their Constitutionally-conferred power of the purse and we support legislation to strengthen those powers. We have decried the bogus use of so-called “national emergencies” to make an end-run around Congressional appropriations decisions. But we don’t believe lawmakers should be substituting their military strategy for that of the leaders of the military services and the Secretary of Defense.

For that reason, we’re strong advocates of allowing the retirement of so-called “legacy systems” when the military services ask to do so. As new, more capable, equipment comes online, the fiscally responsible option is to retire the older systems. Legacy systems are often expensive to maintain, and training service members to operate them means they will have to be re-trained (at further expense) when they are eventually moved to the new system. Expensive. Duplicative. Time wasting. Not a good use of your federal tax dollars.

The Fiscal Year 2023 budget request from the Biden Administration would retire legacy aircraft and ships, clearing the way for new, more capable systems, and jump-starting the process of training new service members on those systems.

This week the House Armed Services Committee (HASC) began the long process of consideration of legislation that will eventually become the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the legislation that sets Pentagon policy. This is separate from the appropriations bills, which will start to move next week, and which actually cause money to be spent. But the HASC is not without power in these matters. They can statutorily mandate the Pentagon to take or not take certain actions. And the draft version of the Seapower and Projection Forces portion of the NDAA is chock-full of prohibitions on legacy system reductions.

For instance, this year’s Air Force budget request plans to reduce aircraft inventory by 238 (116 active duty, 44 Air Force Reserve, 78 Air National Guard) of a total aircraft inventory of 5,178. On a long list of aircraft type for reductions is one tanker, the KC-135Rs, which the Air Force seeks to reduce from 322 to 308. But the committee draft includes statutory language prohibiting the use of authorized funds to, “reduce the number of KC-135 aircraft designated as primary mission aircraft inventory within the reserve components of the Air Force.” The bill also sets a “floor” on the number of overall tanker aircraft at 466. Interestingly, this is a slightly lower number than the previous statutory requirement of 479, showing a little flexibility on the part of the Congress. We’ll take our minor wins where we can find them.

The draft bill also sets a floor for the number of C-130 aircraft (which comes in many configurations) with a total aircraft inventory of 271 through October 1, 2028. The total aircraft inventory for every flavor of C-130 (ACs, ECs, HCs, LCs, MCs, TCs and WCs) equals 426 in Fiscal Year 2023, a reduction of 20 airframes from FY22. But if you look at just the C-130H and C-130J, you will note the total aircraft inventory reported by the Air Force is, you guessed it, 271 – a reduction of eight airframes from FY22. So, the HASC is telling the Air Force, none too subtly, this low and no lower for the next five years.

But it’s the Navy’s plans that really take it in the head in this draft legislation. The most recent Naval shipbuilding plan, seeks to begin construction of nine ships in FY23. It also plans to “inactivate” 24 ships. (Five Cruisers, nine Littoral Combat Ships, two submarines, four Dock Landing Ships, two oilers, and two Expeditionary Transfer Docks.)

The draft HASC language allows retirement of four of the five cruisers (San Jacinto, Lake Champlain, Bunker Hill, and Mobile Bay) but specifically disallows the Navy from retiring USS Vicksburg. The bill language denies the use of any funds authorized to, “retire, prepare to retire, inactivate, or place in storage more than four guided missile cruisers” and states, “The USS Vicksburg may not be retired, prepared to retire, inactivated, or placed in storage…”).

The bill also blocks the retirement of four Landing Dock Ships. These ships perform transport of troops and cargo. The bill would block retirement of Germantown, Gunston Hall, Tortuga, and Ashland by denying the use of any funds to affect their inactivation. This denial is all tied up in a brewing fight over the Commandant of the Marine Corps’ review of the roles and missions of the USMC in his so-called “Force Design 2030”. This review has spurred a call to the ramparts by former Marine Corps Generals to stop most of the potential changes. This particular fight also reflects potential divisions between the Navy (which actually buys the amphibious ships that bring the Marines to the fight) and the Marine Corps (which supplies the troops, but doesn’t pay for the ships out of its Total Obligational Authority). And those divisions led to language in the draft bill requiring the Navy to “consult” with the Marine Corps, “on major decisions directly concerning Marine Corps Amphibious Structure and Capability.”

People, people, can’t we all just get along? And can’t the Congress refrain from substituting its military strategy for that of the military services at the Pentagon?

The actions of the House Armed Services Committee are just the first shot across the bow (see what we did there?) of a long process to write the Pentagon policy and spending bills. Check back at TCS as we uncover more Congressional actions to stymie Pentagon attempts to retire legacy systems.