On the recordFebruary 9, 2012
As an example of the approach to the budget cuts, one of the A-10 units slated for cutting, the 127th Wing from Michigan, just returned from fighting bravely in Afghanistan and as a welcome home: Great job. Sorry, we are going to disband you. The approach to budget cuts the Air Force has decided to take is simply wrong. We have to have budget cuts. We know that. But there is a wide variety of reasons why this makes not the sense it should. I draw the Senate's attention to a study produced by the Pentagon last year that was signed by the Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Reserve Affairs that demonstrated what we already knew: Even when mobilized, Reserve component units are far less expensive than their peer units in the Active component. It has always been a foregone conclusion that the Air National Guard costs are far less than Active component costs when they are on base or in garrison. Personnel are not drawing the salaries their peer units are and so on. But the Pentagon report showed something more interesting. It showed the Guard and Reserve save taxpayers dollars even when mobilized. The Reserve component units are estimated to be about one-third as expensive as similar Active component units, and they can deploy nearly half as often.…
