Most of that is USN scare tactics honestly. They're trying to keep their big budget and the Blue Angels are an iconic image that the public relates to.
Or possibly not.
SECNAV put out a directive 3 days ago (
Department of the Navy Response to Sequestration ) saying that they will announce the intent to cancel Blue Angel air shows in April, all of them. Talking with folks who have traditionally been in the loop these shows will be canceled one month at a time, if no budget by the beginning of April then May will be canceled, etc. Naturally, if the budget or a continuing resolution comes through they can be reinitiated. The Blues will continue to train, but at a somewhat reduced level.
Other things addressed in the same directive are the shutting down of Carrier Air Wing Two (CVW-2) and to initiate stand down flying (read this as slowly shut down) 3 additional air wings and reducing readiness levels in 2 more wings by the end of the FY. That makes 6 wings that will either be shut down or reduced to a less ready status, the only one named in the directive was CVW-2. If I had to guess I would say CVW-9 and CVW-11 are on the block, reducing Lemoore to nothing at all and paving the way to shutdown of that facility.
They will also be returning early from deployment several ships, and not deploying many more, including several involved in humanitarian efforts in “Continuing Promise 2013”. The deployment of the USS Harry Truman (CVN-75) is on hold, and may not happen this year at all.
Planned maintenance of several important warships will not be done. This includes refueling the Lincoln (CVN-72) and major yard work for several other ships.
Scheduled introductory flight screening for pilots and Naval Flight Officers has been terminated and will not happen this month. This means they are already, today, slowing down the pipeline for pilot and NFO training.
As of right now Navy recruiting media support is terminated for the month of March, any funds not already obligated are not authorized to be spent.
At the local command level, vs the Navy wide level, reductions in spending have been going on for over a month. For example procurement of a $2000 critical need, single point of failure, part to support a multi 10’s of millions of dollar radar system used to be able to be authorized at the O-2 level and below, now it is requiring authorization at the O-6 level and above. This is only one example, suffice to say local commands have been spinning down spending in preparation of this for at least 2 months now.
Yes, the Navy has a big budget. As the primary power projection arm of US policy it has some of the most expensive items to maintain. But make no mistake, the cuts that have been ramping up have already reduced capability. I know some units that have not purchased spares in 2 or more years, they are running on their existing spares and when those run out there is not currently a budget to procure more. At this point the impact is very, very small, but as time goes on the impact will become larger and larger. In the end the reduced maintenance that aircraft and similar hardware will receive will reduce their overall lifespan, meaning that not only will the readiness be somewhat impacted in the short term (although proper management will make this small at first), but the required replacement of some major items of hardware will be accelerated. It is quite likely that loss to hardware failures will rise.
T!
