By 32,000 troops….
Including 3,000 in Special Ops….
The service has had trouble getting people to sign up…
It may also be a throw at Congress for addtional funding….
Some of the spots on the chopping block are not combat related…..
Congress may NOT go along with some of this….
George said the Army is trying “adapt ahead” of emerging threats.
“We are acutely aware of the world and how it’s changing. We have a real sense of urgency to adapt ahead of it…how we operate, how we buy stuff, how we’re training our people,”
The Army is also eyeing cuts where it can if Congress fails to deliver a budget for this year or supplemental funding for Ukraine, Wormuth said.
“We are cash flowing…the training that we’re doing with the Ukrainians to the tune of about $500 million that we’ve spent so far. And we were counting on the supplemental [funding bill] to be able to sort of replenish us for that. If that’s not going to come, that’s a very substantial part” of the operations and maintenance budget of U.S. Army Europe and Africa, she said.
The same goes for U.S. support to Israel for its war on Hamas, including preparatory deployments to the region.
“The price tag for that isn’t as large but again the chief and I do worry,” Wormuth said. “If we don’t get a budget and we don’t get a supplemental, we’re probably going to have to cancel some things.”
That could mean deciding to cut planned military exercises in the coming months.
“Probably by late spring, summer we would have to make some difficult choices about other exercises, for example, that we had planned to participate in,” including several with NATO, she said….
image…NBC News Andrei Pungovschi / Bloomberg via Getty