Slow pace of modernization a vicious cycle.

• Author: McKinley, Craig R.
• Position: President's Perspective

* Last month, I discussed the national security challenges that will be inherited by the new president upon taking office in January. I stated that they were, indeed, daunting problems --and they are.

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And although the new president is commander-in-chief of the armed forces, an enumerated power provided in the constitution, the choices to be made will be shaped by and presented by the new Pentagon leadership team. I hope both campaigns have begun serious efforts to identify this leadership, one that will truly have to hit the ground running to repackage the fiscal year 2018 budget submission that will certainly be left "on the table" for them.

Whoever this leadership is, from whatever party, it will encounter two distinct but related problems: readiness and modernization. Let's consider some recent comments about readiness first.

Retired Air Force Lt. Gen. David Deptula, dean of the Air Force Association's Mitchell Institute, stated that, "Twenty-five years of continuous combat, coupled with budget instability and lower-than-needed top lines, has made the Air Force the smallest, oldest and the least ready in its history."

Deptula, who played a central role in planning the highly successful Operation Desert Storm air campaign, noted that today's Air Force has one-third fewer personnel and 60 percent fewer combat fighter squadrons. Moreover, the squadrons themselves have 25 percent fewer aircraft.

The Marine Corps has a similar problem. Deputy Commandant for Aviation Lt. Gen. Jon Davis has stated that due to a shortage of combat-ready aircraft, Marine pilots, particularly fighter pilots, are not getting the flight hours they need to be fully trained and ready.

These problems are occurring at a time when our air forces are being heavily used in the fight against the Islamic State, while continuing other missions around the world. In short, we have the old story compounding itself: fewer people, in fewer units, are being asked to do more to meet the current threat, in aircraft that are--in Deptula's words--increasingly "geriatric." In fact, the average age of the Air Force's combat aircraft inventory has more than doubled from 12 to 25 years. How many of us are comfortable driving to work in a car built in 1991?

As for the Navy, Chief of Naval Operations Adm. John Richardson testified before Congress in the spring that the sea service is facing readiness problems as it returns to "great power competition" for the first...