Kyle Brady: Blog » Military

The F-22: A Bureaucratic Failure to Understand War [OpEd]

Kyle Brady — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 07:05:52 +0000

War is unpredictable and largely unforeseeable – most especially in the manner in which it will be fought.

Why, then, does the United States continue to insist that the “future of war” for America will be mostly in the guerrilla style seen with terrorist organizations? Has both the Pentagon and Congress forgotten the lessons of military history? In preparing a country for future self-defense, or aggressive actions, focusing on the struggles of the present inevitably fails to meet the needs of the future, producing technology and methodologies that is hopelessly unsuited to the now-present theatre of war.

The street-by-street method of war currently being used by American military in counter-terrorism efforts is relatively new, and all branches of the military were largely unprepared for it – in terms of both training and equipment. However, modern troops in Iraq, Afghanistan, and other Middle Eastern locales are almost exactly opposite their peers of a decade ago: their training, equipment, and weaponry is designed and tested heavily to cater to their needs in the closed-in, chaotic environments. The retooling of the military, with a heavy focus on the Army, for urban battlefields has taken many years, but resulted in better personnel gear, the reliance on (and improvement of) unmanned drones, and a rethinking of certain military strategies.

However, the Middle East, and other counter-terrorist or black ops conflicts, are not the only battlefields. True, America is currently embroiled in physical conflicts that classify as counter-terrorism, but other threats from various sources could easily erupt into more violent interactions that would be more akin to “classical warfare” – such as North Korea, China, and Russia. These potential conflicts, or even wars, would be much different from the United States’ current military interests.

In terms of sheer manpower, all three of these potential enemies outnumber the American military by significant ratios – fighting such countries in “hand-to-hand” combat would be both pointless and devastating. These conflicts would be fought, and won, in a more traditional manner resembling more the World Wars than Afghanistan: via air and sea power. Despite this simple, and obvious, fact, funding has been continuously cut to “next generation weapons” over the last decade to focus on the lowly footsoldier, rather than devastating and effective weapons that could start, fight, and finish wars without the death or injury of any American military, and the F-22 Raptor is merely the latest and most public example.

Congress, along with President Obama, has stopped the financing of additional F-22 Raptor fighter jets, claiming that the current 187 Raptor jets in the fleet is enough to serve the country. To put that in perspective, that equates to slightly more than three jets per state if they were to be distributed evenly and domestically, or barely enough to canvas each coast with overlapping defensive areas. Basic analysis shows that 187 stealth, nextgen fighters is not as large a force as one might assume, especially given that modern aircraft carriers hold an average of 48 fighter jets, not to mention that most of the airfleet, such as F-16’s, are the aging products of decades past.

This is not to say, however, that air and sea power is being ignored, because they are, most definitively, not. Certain aspects of what could be classified as “future classical warfare” are being heavily invested in, such as space-based laser weaponry, country-wide protection defense systems, and highly efficient/intelligent drone vehicles. But it is the progress of the recent years that presents a worrying trend, not the lack of modern programs: the tendency to eschew advanced weaponry, gear, or otherwise technology for more immediately applicable technology to the current battlefields. Time and time again, empires and countries alike focused on handling their immediate military needs over innovation and the advancement of their future forces, and ultimately met their own demise as a result – Imperialist England and Cold War Russia are simple proof.

Congress, and the rest of American Bureaucracy, are in a unique position to effect the military investments without having the knowledge, foresight, and impartial judgment necessary to make appropriate decisions – similar problems can be found in Congressional oversight of agencies such as the CIA, who are tasked for intelligence appropriation, but are criticized in a public forum for acting, or planning to act, in accordance with their mandate: protecting the United States via operations on foreign soil. The simple ignorance of many Congressmen is astounding, and is only magnified by giving the same individuals the capacity to approve military budgets when they have, on the whole, little to no knowledge of the needs of the military, let alone any knowledge of details outside basic costs.

Admittedly, the combined budget of the United States Air Force, Army, and Navy is quite an astounding figure, rounding out at an estimated $367 billion per year - not including general "Defense Wide" expenditures. This could likely be cut in any number of ways, such as addressing overspending on certain contracts where bidding is inflated on the principle that "the government can afford it". But the place to do so is absolutely not cutting investments in the future, new technology, or any other advancements that could save American lives while retaining, or increasing, the country’s military dominance – the F-22 is just the tip of the government-funded iceberg.

The New Era of Spacecleanup? [Old Content]

Kyle Brady — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 14:44:09 +0000

When you're a little, wideyed kid, you hear about space. You see pictures of the Earth from orbit. You see pictures from, and of, the Moon, and you're enamored. For some, life goes on, but for others space remains a thought in the back of your mind to one day show itself via a career in engineering or physics.

I'm somewhere between the two.

But what they don't tell you as a little kid is how cluttered both Low and High Earth Orbits are becoming. As we've seen, collisions in space are far too real, and the "space trash" problem is apparently becoming worse, as more and more people send up devices, sometimes only for testing purposes, that largely get left when their creators are done with them.

The official story is that the American satellite was a Motorola one, but I'm betting that's, at best, only part of the truth, since any number of government organizations have the option to piggyback on your space hardware. Put this together with the fact that the Russian satellite's collision came as a surprise, when we supposedly track "all objects larger than a football" in orbit...

And I think you have a recipe for a new era of spacecleanup. Maybe "cleanup" isn't the right word, but at a time when satellites are destroying each other and being shot down from Earth, I think our military agencies are going to suddenly care more about the spacetrash orbiting our planet.

The idea of an automated, or semiautomated, orbit debris cleanup system via robots with manuvering capabilities is not new. But the realization that we're fixing our own satellites, and, in all reality, disabling others, is new. If we can manage to fix and destroy satellites from orbit, then wouldn't creating a dumptruck-like manuverable robot be less difficult?

I can imagine this trash collector orbiting Earth, selecting which debris is trash (based on human-maintained lists), and scooping up the true trash. After compacting it, ala Wall-e, it could be sent in a proper trajectory to burn up in the atmosphere.

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Further Information: For some pictures and video check out the coverage on the Inquisitr [1] [2]

Joining the Air Force [Self]

Kyle Brady — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 08:09:40 +0000

I haven't made many "real" posts here recently, because I've been busy deciding what the hell I'm doing with my life. And I have the results:

I'm enlisting with the Air Force.

This may sound drastic, and completely random, but if you're truly interested in the "Why? When? How?" then read the rest of this post... it's long, but full of lots of data- no rambling or ranting.

Why?

As most of you know, I decided to not finish school at the end of May, and went job hunting for a full-time software position here in Silicon Valley. I spent a large portion of two months on the phone talking to both recruiters who I neither understood nor cared to deal with, and actual real people.

Some of those phone conversations turned into phone screens. Some of those turned into in-person interviews. But there was a major problem.

The end result of every interview fell into one of two categories:

They brought me in under one set of requirements, and decided to grill me on a completely different set. For example, if my job description is to work primarily with PHP, how are esoteric data structures in C relevant? These situations obviously ended horribly because they were looking for "God"... or because the economy is so bad that they want someone with Senior-level experience, in a Junior-level position. Take your pick.

The interview went fine, or even fantastically, and then I got a random made-up response as to why I wasn't going to fit. "We're looking for someone more senior" is one I heard alot (even for Junior-level positions where I was overqualified), and I even heard "you're not enough of a gamer" once.

Predictably, after three or four months of this circus act, I became very angry and jaded with the whole "scene".

The clock was running down on my window to find a job, since as soon as the insurance company realized I wasn't a student anymore, that would get pulled. So, not being able to find a job, I went back to school, only being two classes short of an A.S. in Computer Information Systems, which I'm finishing up now.

But, thinking forward, I realized there was a problem. Four, or even nine, months from now, the job situation wasn't going to change. An Associates of Science degree wasn't going to make any difference in how people saw my age, and the economy is only going to get worse. The end result is that after I'd have my degree, I still wouldn't be able to find a job.

I then realized the military would be a good way to circumvent the whole corporate world. Before going to college, I had considered Air Force ROTC, but hadn't committed, since they wouldn't pay for full tuition. So I once again contacted them.

As it turns out, I can be guaranteed a position as a programmer in the Air Force if I pass a test of theirs, after which I'll be sent to a highly specialized AF Tech School for 1-2 years, with the minimum tour of duty being 4 years. I've talked with the same AF recruiter a number of times, and did some digging into the military lifestyle through people I know either in ROTC, ex-military, or currently in a military academy.

And as of the last few days, I've decided to pursue that course of action.

My college experience will put me at the rank of E-3, or "Airman, First Class" (see table), which mostly just means a difference in how much money I earn. All of which is "expendable" (aka "used to pay back loan debt"), since I will have essentially no bills... food, clothing, and housing are all taken care of.

When?

Basically, the timeline for the next few years is going to look like this:

"Graduate" with an A.S. in CIS late May 2009

Deploy to AF Boot Camp in July 2009

1-2 years of AF Tech School

Remaining years working on some very cool military-grade technology

Decide to re-enlist? / Officer Candidate School?

It's pretty cut and dry. But one of the things most people don't realize is that I'll have 30 days of paid vacation every year... compared to 2 weeks of unpaid vacation in the corporate world. So I won't be disappearing like most people imagine.

How?

Essentially, I'll be leaving California. Some of the things I've acquired will be put into local (San Jose) storage, some will be sold, and others will go back East with me. I'll be closing up shop in my apartment, and dividing things into "eventually need/want on base" and "goes home for when I'm on leave" categories.

After Boot Camp and school, I may end up at a base here in California, or maybe elsewhere. But in the long run, after I leave the military (whenever that is), I'll most likely be back in the San Jose area... hence the storage.

Other than that, I'll have to make a few other changes in my life... cut my hair, remove the piercings, and live a little differently, but it'll be worth it.

End Game

The "endgame" to all of this is that I get to have exposure to some very interesting technology, and doing things that actually matter, as opposed to grinding away for a few years in the corporate world trying to move up the ladder enough to not hate my everyday existence.

Whether I become a civilian after four years or twenty, there's one thing I know for sure...

People will never question my talents again.