Rapid Fire June 17, 2013: DoD Comptroller Sizes Up FY13 Sequester Impact

• The US DoD Comptroller published a report [PDF] on the financial impact of sequestration on DoD’s discretionary budget authority in Fiscal Year 2013. That boils down -$20.3B for Personnel, -$9..8B for Operations & Maintenance, -$6B in procurement, and -$820M in RDTE, for a total $37.2B shortfall.

[NDIA] Joint Logistics Panelists Agree to Shed Weight

DoD logistics post-sequester: a self-assessment

Ed. note: we continue our coverage of last week’s NDIA’s National Logistics Forum.

Lt. Gen. Brooks L. Bash, Director for Logistics at the Joint Staff, centered his presentation on the constraints that logistics has and will always impose on warfighting. From that perspective, for the US to pivot to the Pacific only makes things harder with the huge distances involved. New threats to the US supply routes, which by and large have not been challenged since WWII, come in varied shapes from missile profileration to swarms of small ships. From a broader macro perspective, logistical chokepoints such as the straits of Hormuz or Malacca could severely damage the economy if they become hotspots.