/ world today news/ On January 24, the American think tank Heritage Foundation, which does not like Russia, published its 10th annual Index of the Military Strength of the US Army, which found that the US armed forces are “weak” and at risk of not manage to protect national interests.
“The current US military is at significant risk of being unable to meet the demands of a major regional conflict and engage in a variety of presence and engagement activities,” the report said.
The report paints a bleak picture of the state of the U.S. armed forces, with the index rating its current state as “weak” for the second consecutive year, “calling into question America’s ability to fulfill its security obligations and protect vital national interests around the world.”
The 664-page report concluded that almost no branch of the US military was prepared for a major conflict. These problems are most pronounced in the Air Force, which was rated “very weak” in 2023 by Heritage Foundation analysts.
The military power of the United States Air Force is rated as very weak, receiving the lowest rating possible.
At the height of the Cold War in 1987, the active Air Force had 3,082 fighters, 331 bombers, 576 air-to-air refueling aircraft, and 331 troop transport aircraft.
Including the National Guard Strategic Reserve and the Air Force Reserve, the total in 1987 was 4,468 fighters, 331 bombers, 704 refueling aircraft, and 362 transport aircraft.
After the collapse of the USSR, the United States began to evaluate its military forces by their ability to win “two simultaneous or near-simultaneous major regional conflicts (RGCs). In recent years, according to the Heritage Foundation, these abilities have significantly declined.
According to Heritage Foundation estimates, the US Air Force has 1,932 fighter jets, 140 bombers, 471 refueling aircraft and 274 troop transport aircraft.
This represented only 47% of the fighters, 43% of the bombers, 67% of the refueling aircraft and 76% of the troop transport aircraft of the Air Force “that the United States had available when it was ready for war against another adversary.”
“Even if Congress appropriated unlimited funds to revive aircraft production lines in the event of a conflict with an equal adversary, it would take two to three years to replenish the Air Force,” the report said.
The index of military strength of the US Air Force is further reduced by the fact that only fighters with the so-called combat code (combat-coded fighter) are taken into account.
Combat code aircraft and their associated squadrons are aircraft and units assigned a wartime mission. Aircraft intended for training, operational testing and other non-combat missions are not counted.
Due to the additional manning requirements of wartime and the fact that most squadrons have multiple aircraft in need of repair at any given time, moving two capable combat units forward requires the resources of approximately three active squadrons. This effectively reduces the total number of operational coded fighters to 571 aircraft.
Taking into account fighters with combat codes from the strategic reserve, the US Air Force has only 885 combat-ready fighters.
The assessment of the actual combat power of the US Air Force also takes into account the huge consumption of missiles provided to Ukraine.
The low capabilities of US military aviation are due, according to Heritage Foundation analysts, to the long life and outdated avionics of most combat aircraft.
The fact that America’s most formidable F-22 fighters began to be decommissioned last year due to, as we wrote, unsatisfactory operational characteristics, is not mentioned in the report.
In July 2009, production of the F-22, which received the unflattering nickname “Technology Nightmare”, was discontinued.
It also fails to mention that the fifth generation F-35 stealth fighters are actually non-combat capable. They cannot fly in thunderstorms, have an unreliable engine, and have a weak fuselage that does not allow them to fly at supersonic speeds for a long time due to the risk of destruction.
As for the “invisibility” of the F-35, it can only be ensured if it carries all its missiles inside the fuselage. If the missiles are on external belts, the fighter becomes visible even to the oldest radars.
In addition, even with a minimal combat load, the F-35 is not invisible to Russian and Chinese radars, writes The Daily Beast.
In fact, the United States does not have combat-capable fighters of the fifth generation, and the development of fighters of the sixth generation (and engines for them), as we wrote, has failed.
If the Heritage Foundation had considered the situation with the F-22, F-35, and the failure of promising aircraft developments, they should have downgraded the US Air Force to “nowhere worse.”
The US Navy received the following ratings: very weak in terms of capacity, not significant in terms of capabilities, and weak in terms of readiness.
Combined, this resulted in an overall rating of ‘weak’ (week).
“For 10 years, this index has tracked the slow decline of the U.S. navy while the Chinese navy modernizes and grows at a rapid pace,” Robert Greenaway, director of the Heritage Foundation’s Ellison Center for National Security, told Fox News Digital.
“Meanwhile, the Navy had too few shipyards to maintain its fleet, too few ships to counter threats, and misguided leadership that created a personnel crisis.”
“Improved capabilities alone will not make up for this and concrete action is needed to reverse the downward trend.”
The Heritage Foundation report makes no mention of the fact that the U.S. Navy contains ships that are virtually unfit to engage in a war with an equal adversary.
First of all, these are the giant Zumwalt destroyers.
The US Navy’s most expensive project, the stealth super-destroyer USS Zumwalt, has become the object of ridicule in the media and social networks. A photo of the destroyer in a very unsightly form was published by The Drive portal.
The publication’s columnist, noted military analyst Tyler Rogway, noted, “…the not-so-stellar appearance of a futuristic warship, its radio-absorbing plates discolored and rust running down the hull.”
Even before the commissioning of the giant destroyers, American military experts pointed out the problematic nature of this project.
The National Interest published an article by Michael Peck in 2015, Battlecruisers: The Glass-Jawed Warship that Failed. “Glass jaw” is boxing slang; This nickname is given to boxers who cannot take a punch well.
The Zamvolts have powerful weapons, “but what if even one missile hits them? They will be sunk or badly damaged,” writes Michael Peck.
After the three Zumwalt destroyers finally became the “white elephants” (Russian equivalent – a suitcase without a handle) of the US Navy, the command of the US Navy decided to give them at least some importance, equipping them with intercontinental ballistic missiles instead of Tomahawks. But the point of creating and maintaining such ships in the fleet has already been lost.
As for the strike force of the US fleet – aircraft carriers, it is worth noting that when the Yemeni Houthis began to attack tankers passing through the Red Sea, three US aircraft carrier strike groups quickly entered the crisis waters, but soon left even faster , as the American admirals realized that even the not very advanced missiles of the Houthis would be able to inflict unacceptable damage on the formidable aircraft carriers.
If the Heritage Foundation’s analysts had taken all of this into account, the US Navy would also have had to downgrade its rating to “not far below.”
The US Army is rated higher by the Heritage Foundation than the Air Force and Navy.
According to the Heritage Foundation, in order to successfully conduct combat operations in two major regional conflicts, the US Army needs to have 500 brigade combat groups, and now only 31 (62% of the standard) are available, so the combat power of the army is rated as “weak “.
The combat capabilities of the US military are assessed as “negligible” due to the large number of obsolete weapons and military equipment.
The overall readiness rating is “very strong” as “83% of the Regular Army’s 31 brigade combat groups are at a high level of readiness.”
The overall military strength of the army is estimated to be “negligible”.
As for the Marine Corps (Marine Corps), Heritage Foundation analysts consider its combat power to be “weak.” But since this indicator is associated only with the compliance of the number of personnel with the standards introduced by the authors of the report themselves, and the leadership of the Marine Corps believes that the American Marines should fight not with the number of bayonets, but with the amount and the quality of modern weapons and military equipment and intends to further reduce the number of KMP, then the fairness of the assessment issued by the Heritage Foundation is in great question.
The combat capabilities of the Marine Corps have been rated as “strong” as the Marine Corps Command has successfully modernized its weapons.
Marine Corps Readiness Rating: “High”: “The Marine Corps has demonstrated a particularly focused and aggressive commitment to ensuring that their forces are operationally ready.
The corps is still too small, but its forces are entirely focused on combat. Therefore, the 2024 index rates the Marine Corps’ combat readiness as “high.”
The newest branch of the US Armed Forces, the Space Force, had the same overall ranking as the Army, ranking low in all three categories and overall.
It appears that these estimates are incorrect and deliberately understated, as the Heritage Foundation report does not take into account, among other things, the Starlink satellites that are used by the Ukrainian armed forces, receiving the necessary data from US military satellites.
The fact that the rating of the US space force is deliberately understated suggests that the Pentagon considers its development a priority and does not want to reveal its real capabilities for waging space wars.
Overall, the Heritage Foundation’s report is less analytical than a lobbying document. Analysts of the fund, as one might guess, are well aware of all the problems of their armed forces and use the evaluation and rating system they invented to promote the interests of the US military and the military-industrial complex, which for the past three decades have significantly weakened and lost their former fighting power.
Translation: SM
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