Even under the Fiscal 2015 budget, which sharply reduces manpower, force structure, and overall spending, the US military will for the most part still be able to fight two wars at once, the nation’s No. 2 military man said last week. “We believe we’ll be able to execute the defense strategic guidance that we put out in 2012. We will be able to simultaneously defend the homeland, conduct sustained counterterrorism operations, and deter aggression in multiple regions,” Adm. James Winnefeld, Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, told attendees at a Bloomberg budget conference in Washington, D.C. If deterrence fails, “We will be capable of defeating one adversary in a large-scale regional campaign, while at the same time denying the objectives of, or imposing unacceptable costs on, a second aggressor in another region.” All that, however, will be done at far less speed and with little excess margin, he said.
Promotions to the Space Force’s second highest enlisted grade, senior master sergeant, have surged to the highest level in the young service’s history, bolstering the senior NCO corps as officials plan to aggressively expand the force and especially the enlisted corps.