President Biden has nominated Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Charles Brown to be the next Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, succeeding Army Gen. Mark Milley. He will probably be confirmed quickly.
Brown is an F-16 driver of long experience and has served as an instructor at the Air Force Fighter Weapons School, the Air Force equivalent of the Navy’s “Top Gun.” But, from what his official bio says, he’s never served or led in combat.
Then there’s the question of how a Pentagon accounting error underestimated the aid we’ve sent Ukraine by about $3 billion.
The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (CJCS) is the principal military advisor to the president but is not part of the chain of command. As one former CJCS told me over a decade ago, presidents always want options and the Chairman has to be prepared — in thinking, planning, strategy and tactics — to offer them. At least that was true before Biden came along.
We know both too little and too much about Brown. He was one of the Joint Chiefs at the time of Biden’s Afghanistan withdrawal debacle. He was not sufficiently duty-conscious or courageous to tell Biden that his plan wasn’t working when it obviously wasn’t and demand that it be changed.
From that, and his apparent comfort with the “wokeness” that’s being forced on the armed services — including the Air Force — we have to conclude that Brown will be another Pentagon “yes man” like Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and the rest of the Joint Chiefs. Austin has proved himself to be a nonentity. Austin’s advice and knowledge have had no noticeable effect on what Biden and his real decision-makers — Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan — decide is to be done.
Like Milley before him, Brown will have no greater effect than Austin despite being Biden’s principal military advisor. The nation cannot afford that because of the major threats we will have to face before the 2024 election. Just consider a couple of issues about China and Ukraine.
According to a Wall Street Journal report last week, Microsoft and Western intelligence agencies have revealed that a state-sponsored Chinese group called “Volt Typhoon” is conducting a cyberwar campaign against on everything we could bring to bear in a Chinese attack on Taiwan.
According to a Financial Times report, Volt Typhoon is aiming to interfere in everything from communications to ship and troop movements to logistics in the event China attacks Taiwan. It could be paving the way for preemptive strikes on U.S. forces by China once that balloon goes up.
Last week, the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party released its findings on our lack of preparedness for a Chinese attack on Taiwan. Among these findings are that:
- U.S. critical infrastructure is too vulnerable to CCP cyber-attack;
- U.S. and Taiwanese forces do not currently plan or operate in an integrated manner; and
- The United States needs additional long-range missiles and unmanned vehicles in the Indo-Pacific region and the U.S. defense manufacturing base is not postured to quickly produce the needed numbers.
The House Select Committee’s findings should be the basis for action by the next Chairman of the Joint Chiefs. Brown should bring these finding to Biden with a plan for action to correct the problems and insist that Biden let him go ahead. Will he? It’s not at all likely because, like Austin and Milley, Brown will evidently accept anything coming out of the White House, including its changes of mind regarding Ukraine.
Since the Russian attack on Ukraine commenced in February 2022, I have written here and elsewhere that among Ukraine’s most critical needs is combat aircraft.
In March 2022 Biden blocked Poland from sending Ukraine any MiG-29s, an aircraft type which Ukraine’s pilots have been flying for many years.
Ukrainian President Zelensky has been lobbying hard for such aircraft. Biden, on January 31, answered Zelensky’s plea with a flat “no” on sending Ukraine any F-16s. Biden, last week, suddenly changed his mind and agreed that someone — the U.S. or our many allies that operate the F-16 — could supply Ukraine with F-16s. Zelensky has promised that no F-16s would be used against Russian territory, but when and if the F-16s will be sent, which nation will sent them and when, and where Ukraine’s pilots will be trained on them are all unanswered questions.
And then there’s the question of how a Pentagon accounting error underestimated the aid we’ve sent Ukraine by about $3 billion. Demanding an answer to why that error occurred should be a small task for Brown. Any bets that he’ll demand an answer?
Oleksiy Danilov, Ukraine’s secretary of its National Security and Defense Council, told the BBC that Ukraine’s long-delayed “spring counteroffensive” — now edging into summer — could begin “tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, or in a week.” Or sometime after.
This counteroffensive is not quite an all-or-nothing bet by Zelensky, but nearly so. Patience among Ukraine’s supporters is in short supply, at least outside of the White House. Ukraine needs to force Russian troops out of much of their conquered territory for it to succeed. If it doesn’t, there will be more criticism from everyone including the neo-isolationists in Congress — and former president Trump — to stop giving aid to Ukraine.
In the case of the F-16s, it may be too little too late. Had Biden agreed to sending the Polish MiG-29s last year, Ukrainian pilots might have been able to control the skies and help kick Russian forces out of their country. They might have won the war. We’ll never know.
In short, Charles Brown has a huge job ahead of him. But because Biden is his boss — and his acceptance of everything from the Afghanistan withdrawal to the late decision on combat aircraft for Ukraine — there isn’t any likelihood that he’ll do what should done.