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technology produced expensive, scarce and inefficient weapons. Spinney spent the rest of his career refining and expanding this analysis. The report was largely ignored despite a growing reform movement, whose goal was to reduce military budget increases from 7% to 5% after inflation. Two years later, he expounded on his first report, including an analysis on the miscalculation of the burden costs of a majority of the weapon systems and re-titled it "Defense facts of life: The Plans/Reality
Mismatch", which later became simply known as the "Spinney Report".
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25:
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631:"We got out of the Vietnam effectively when the lottery started and middle class kids were getting killed. First thing that happened was that they went to this all volunteer army. And that solved that draft inequality problem, because everybody is a volunteer. And that makes the military much easier to use because:
624:
is a radical hypothesis that would cause Sun Tzu, Clausewitz and George Patton to roll over in their graves. That is, that technology will transform the fog and friction of combat – the uncertainty, fear, chaos, imperfect information which is a natural product of a clash between opposing wills – into
349:
in 1967 as a mechanical engineer. He began working as a Second
Lieutenant engineer in the flight dynamics lab at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio. In 1975 he left military life and eventually re-joined the Pentagon in 1977 as a civilian analyst in the Pentagon's Office of Program Analysis and
204:
who became famous in the early 1980s for what became known as the "Spinney Report", criticizing what he described as the reckless pursuit of costly complex weapon systems by the
Pentagon, with disregard to budgetary consequences. Despite attempts by his superiors to bury the controversial report, it
553:
tank, however, performed well enough in the Gulf War and other combat arenas. This had the effect of questioning the validity of some of the movement's underlying assumptions, leading
Spinney to issue a series of 500 of what he termed "E-mail Blasters" on the Internet publishing his criticisms and
542:
Pentagon's strategists produce budgets that simply cannot be executed because they assume a defense strategy depends only on goals and threats. Strategy, however, is about possibilities, not hopes and dreams. By ignoring costs, U.S. strategists abdicate their responsibility for hard decisions."
497:
With
Senator Grassley threatening to subpoena Spinney to testify in front of the Senate Budget Committee on Defense, the Pentagon agreed to hold a hearing on a Friday afternoon in a remote room, without cameras and with David S. C. Chu at his side for a rebuttal, hoping it would get lost in the
541:
Spinney produced several other reports with titles such as "Shape Up and Fly Right: How to Build a Better Air Force for Less Money" which outlined a reform strategy for the Air Force that would reduce operating costs, or "Teach the
Pentagon to Think Before It Spends", in which he wrote: "The
482:
In 1980 he assembled a three-hour briefing titled "Defense Facts of Life: The Plans-Reality
Mismatch", which sharply criticized defense budgeting, arguing that the defense bureaucracy used unrealistic assumptions to buy into unsustainable programs, and explaining how the pursuit of complex
151:
564:
In 2002, Spinney testified before the
Subcommittee on National Security, Veterans Affairs and International Relations, part of the House Committee on Government Reform on Pentagon accounting and the increasing defense budget before the
608:, whose mission was to reduce the amount of the discretionary budget going to the military by 15% and reallocate that money for education, healthcare, renewable energies, humanitarian aid, and reducing the deficit issues.
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commentary, he called the move to increase the military budget from 2.9% to 4% of the GDP as " tantamount to a declaration of total war on Social
Security and Medicare in the following decade."
350:
Evaluation (better-known by its former name, Systems
Analysis, set up in 1961 to make independent evaluations of Pentagon Policy) under his mentor, the famous fighter pilot Colonel
554:
attacking his critics. These he circulated in the last years of his career to a wide distribution of journalists, military officers, Congressional staff, academics, and others.
494:, and David S. C. Chu, Spinney's immediate superior, who tried to downplay the report saying it was neither factual nor represented the current budget and programs.
932:
Statement, THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY, VETERANS AFFAIRS AND INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS COMMITTEE ON GOVERNMENT REFORM UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
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hearings and allowed the cameras. The Pentagon still hoped that the story would go unnoticed, until a painting of Spinney was printed on the cover of
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News of the report and its content quickly spread around the Air Force offices of the Pentagon and eventually reached Congress. Senator
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Senator Grassley, who later would call Spinney the "conscience of the Pentagon", had the hearing moved to the same room as that of the
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604:, in which he was interviewed on his sloop somewhere in the Caribbean. Spinney also served on the Military Advisers Committee for the
611:
Since his retirement Spinney and his wife have lived on their sailboat, first in the Bahamas and more recently in the Mediterranean.
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The press the report generated breathed new life into the defense budget reform movement, which eventually led to the 1985 military
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AVIATION FROM THE SEA (AFTS)Innovation & Evolving Requirements via Operational Prototyping & Experimentation
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628:"If you want to understand how the Pentagon operates, like everything else in Washington, you follow the money."
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490:(R-Iowa) asked to interview its author, but was met with opposition from the Secretary of Defense
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Budget Committee on Defense hearing, which though scheduled to go unnoticed, made the cover of
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NOW with Bill Moyers, August 01, 2003 Inside the Pentagon: Franklin "Chuck" Spinney
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Many of the systems criticized by the Defense Reform Movement, particularly the
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Original Time article "The winds of Reform" by Walter Isaacson, March 7th, 1983
395:. Contentious material about living people that is unsourced or poorly sourced
261:. Contentious material about living people that is unsourced or poorly sourced
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520:, fighting waste, fraud and abuse inside the Pentagon in many articles in the
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He retired in 2003 and that year received the "Good Government Award" of the
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on various military issues and in 2005, he participated in the documentary
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Shots Across the Bow, Article, Govexec.com, by Jason Vest, March 1, 2006
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Buck Rogers Rides Again, Ken Silverstein, The Nation, October 25, 1999
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magazine, he and Boyd shared an open contempt for authority and their
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Chuck Spinney to Receive POGO's "Good Government Award" May 29, 2003
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external links, and converting useful links where appropriate into
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weekend print media and not be part of the television news cycle.
200:(born May 2, 1945) is an American former military analyst for the
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Project On Government Oversight Website. Retrieved July 1, 2010.
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critique of the military establishment in its spending frenzy.
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you are fucking volunteers, screw you, you signed up for this.
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Since his retirement, he has written several articles for the
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from the article and its talk page, especially if potentially
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you are fucking volunteers, screw you, you signed up for this
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clear, friction-free, predictable, mechanistic interaction."
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NOW with Bill Moyers, November 1, 2002 Interview transcript
345:. The son of an Air Force colonel, Spinney graduated from
635:. You know, the objections don't carry as much water."
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may not follow Knowledge (XXG)'s policies or guidelines
801:. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. p.
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645:Defense Facts of Life: The Plans/Reality Mismatch
917:The Defense Death Spiral, by Franklin C. Spinney
797:Deployed how reservists bear the burden of Iraq
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748:Spinney, Franklin Charles (1 August 2003).
173:Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio, U.S.
149:
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56:about living persons that is unsourced or
927:Fighting the Next War, Inside out Article
893:Learn how and when to remove this message
793:Musheno, Michael; Ross, Susan M. (2008).
459:Learn how and when to remove this message
325:Learn how and when to remove this message
127:Learn how and when to remove this message
606:Business Leaders for Sensible Priorities
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647:, Westview Press; Hardcover April 1985
750:"Bill Moyers interviews Chuck Spinney"
516:. Spinney was hailed as the Pentagon
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16:American military analyst and critic
922:Interview with Franklin C. Spinney
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699:Chuck Spinney's About Me website.
1011:United States Air Force officers
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727:. New York : Verso. p. 19.
680:Good Government Award Home Page.
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205:eventually was exposed during a
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1001:Wright-Patterson Air Force Base
579:Project on Government Oversight
509:magazine the following Monday.
339:Wright-Patterson Air Force Base
721:; Burton-Rose, Daniel (2000).
585:and watchdog group founded by
1:
758:(Interview). Interviewed by
377:biography of a living person
243:biography of a living person
34:biography of a living person
397:must be removed immediately
263:must be removed immediately
198:Franklin C. "Chuck" Spinney
61:must be removed immediately
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708:Retrieved August 12, 2022.
567:September 11, 2001 attacks
477:Emperor's-New-Clothes-like
969:November 6, 2006, at the
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991:Lehigh University alumni
557:In September 2000, in a
215:magazine March 7, 1983.
1006:American whistleblowers
581:("POGO"), an oversight
191:United States Air Force
704:July 30, 2022, at the
391:Please help by adding
257:Please help by adding
48:Please help by adding
685:July 7, 2010, at the
655:; Paperback May 1985
471:Dubbed a maverick by
408:"Franklin C. Spinney"
386:references or sources
274:"Franklin C. Spinney"
252:references or sources
76:"Franklin C. Spinney"
863:improve this article
620:"At the core of the
492:Caspar W. Weinberger
337:Spinney was born at
207:United States Senate
54:Contentious material
875:footnote references
776:(17 January 2005).
358:Intelligence career
143:Franklin C. Spinney
957:2006-10-17 at the
535:The New York Times
375:This section of a
241:This section of a
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782:(Motion picture).
538:and many others.
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779:Why We Fight
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168:May 2, 1946
980:Categories
755:NOW on PBS
667:References
587:Dina Rasor
583:think tank
551:M-1 Abrams
547:F-15 Eagle
419:newspapers
285:newspapers
224:Early life
178:Allegiance
164:1946-05-02
87:newspapers
867:excessive
380:does not
246:does not
39:citations
967:Archived
955:Archived
702:Archived
683:Archived
549:and the
503:McCarthy
202:Pentagon
186:Service/
65:libelous
861:Please
853:use of
433:scholar
382:include
299:scholar
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32:This
820:2016
807:ISBN
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657:ISBN
649:ISBN
507:Time
473:Time
412:news
384:any
343:Ohio
278:news
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158:Born
80:news
41:for
869:or
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