Mike Levin: “this amendment sends the wrong message to every single person in the Defense Department. That message is: Do as I say…”

“this amendment sends the wrong message to every single person in the Defense Department. That message is: Do as I say, not as I do. We are telling the Department of Defense to be more efficient, to adopt better business practices, to do more with less, to go faster in reshaping the military for the threats of the 21st century. We are pushing the DOD to have their inventory maintained more efficiently, to cut acquisition personnel, cut headquarters personnel, cut the number of ships and aircraft and combat troops. But, apparently, the military forces of the future that some colleagues have in mind will cut equipment, people, and supplies, but leave all the empty buildings standing to impress people. This amendment tells our soldiers that despite what we say, our real priority would be to protect our turf back home, instead of protecting the well-being of our future soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines. Every single top uniformed military and civilian military have told us that the reality is that the money we spend maintaining more bases than we need is money that we can't spend buying our troops the things that they do need. You know, it is one thing not to authorize some more BRAC rounds, and it is something altogether different to make even an alignment that is currently possible without BRAC, to make that more difficult. This amendment takes us in exactly the wrong direction. It will make reductions more difficult than they are now.”