in more ways than ever. and our networks are getting crowded. but if congress frees up more wireless spectrum... we can empower more people to innovate... putting momentum behind our economy. and we can reduce the deficit... with more than thirty billion dollars paid by america's wireless companies. it's simple -- more spectrum means more freedom. for everyone.

welcome to program pravment. i'm vago muradian. 2011 was a roller coaster year, but 2012 is going to be even worse. iraq, afghanistan, pakistan and iran will loom large as the presidential race promises to make the coming 12 months more politically dysfunctional than ever. what should the pentagon military personnel and defense contractors expect to see in the year ahead? will see questerration become a reality and force the pentagon to cut twice as deeply as it expected to cut, will we finally see a real defense budget or will congress continue to force d.o.d. to live off of continuing resolutions. here to prognosticate are rick mays, lauren thompson of the lexington institute, john barry, formerly of newsweek

after 26 laudable years and tom bowman national pentagon's radio reporter. ;v program. >> glad to be hee. >> -- glad to be here. >> tom, u.s. forces will have withdrawn from the end of the year from iraq, there will be troops based as a regional premise. how will it evolve if iraq comes off the rail? >> it's unlikely you'll see u.s. forces going back into iraq. they may go back as trainers, if prime minister nouri al- maliki and president obama can work out some sort of a deal next year. but at this point there will be some troops working out of the embassy with diplomatic training, operations. even if things start to fall apart there and that's a big if, i don't think you'll see american troops go back into iraq. there's just no appetite for it anymore. >> back when iraq was part of the empire, it was not one province, it was three and that's because it had three

major ethnic groups or factions scattered across its territory. >> and putting them together was the best idea. >> right i think the only way to hold this place together is a dictatorship and i think that's what it'll evolve into. >> the troops would go back with some dire attack on the embassy in which we'd have to send people in to protect ourselves. i think embassies everywhere in the middle east are being subject to attack, i suspect ours will be. >> or if iran would intervene in some domestic -- >> which is a big concern. >> which is a huge concern, yes. >> so how do you best -- are the troops that will be based in kuwait then the best counterbalance at the end of the day? >> the problem you have is that al-maliki may very well be working together with the iranians and that presents a sovereignty issue in terms of going back into the country and explaining what exactly your role is. >> yes. well, al-maliki want want a

civil war. iraqi politics is a zero sum game and it always has been. al-maliki's best hope of preserving peace is [ inaudible ] we don't know. he's a polamalutition. the iraqis like a tough guy. the u.s. will have a trading presence. it's not going to be a peace- keeping force as such in the country. >> as we move our way over to pakistan and afghanistan, i want to hit iran first. obviously the iranians are a big concern in iraq, the iranian nuclear program is a top concern, 2170 that was also over iran was watching the nuclear sites by all accounts. is 2012 going to be the year in which either israel or the united states ends up striking iran's nuclear sites? >> there is a huge concern at the pentagon that once

americans leave iraq that perhaps israel could strike iran sometime as early as next spring. there's a huge concern about that. >> because the u.s. is running all the air defense right now. >> precisely. the u.s. will be out of iraq. if the israelis wanted to, they could fly over iraq on their way to iran, but a senior pentagon officials have repeatedly said to israel it's a bad idea to strike iran. they won't be able to end their nuclear program, they'd be able to set it back and the americans are really worried about the effect it will have on u.s. forces in the region. >> but i've spoken to the senior-most israeli officials who say, look, the only thing -- you know, it's unacceptable. it's totally unacceptable and if we buy two more years or one more years, that's one year less that iran has a nuclear weapon. >> the israelis may act, but lx look at the domestic politics of the united states. we have a president in the white house who was elected because of an unpopular war in which his predecessor decided to invade iraq to get nuclear weapons that were not there. the iranians say they don't

have a nuclear weapons program. i'm not saying -- >> international sectors disagree with that. >> understood. but is this president going to aid with iran and experience the experience of bush? >> the problem is you do see parallels in iraq. we were ready to invade iraq, at least in large part because of fullment of domestic. what you begin to see is the same pressures operating on iran. the republicans like drones and you can tell obama. [ indiscernable 8myññ] what you is a compression of what should be a much longer drawnout debate. the truth of matter is even if iran does have a nuclear weapons program, it is some years from getting any nuclear device, certainly one that could be put fj7/÷into a missil it is much tougher than people

think. so israel is hyping this for its own reasons. i suspect one reason they're hyping it is because the israelis can be on the americas side. >> let's move to afghanistan. i want to go to you, tom, because you were there most recently. how is the dwrawdown going and what are going to be +p;the ke event events? are iraqis going to be able to produce their own security? >> 10,000 troops will be leaving afghanistan this year. they'll be mostly support troops. next year the remainder of the so-called surge troops, about 23,000 will be coming out. that's the number to watch because a lot of those will be comat troops. they talk about the marines there having their numbers in the southwestern part of the country. but the key question also is can the afghans step up to the plate and lead. at this point they really haven't been doing that. i was there in june patrolling

with the marines, and the afghanistan forces were in some ways like boy scouts, kind of along for the ride. the americans organized the patrols. they were the ones who were dealing with villagers, it wasn't the iraqi -- i'm sorry, the afghanistan soldiers, and so i think there's a great worry will the afghans can lead this thing and there have been some commentators, retired army general david barnert who's commander in afghanistan, he's suggesting that the americans have to push the afghans forward in the lead, so that's something to watch. >> one indication of u.s. doubts is the fact that john allen, the nato and u.s. commander in the country is saying once we get back to the presurge level of sceagz, late stay there until 2014,late not keep drawing down. >> what's going to happen with pakistan? pakistan is the absolute key of what happens in afghanistan, that's certainly been the administration's position on it. what happens in pakistan?

>> i agree with bruce ridel of the agency. they are basically calling the shots. i think that's true. the problem is the pakistan ministry has not only exaggerated ideas of the influence pakistan can have over afghanistan, but that it determines to pursue that goal. >> but it's one thing to have that kind of disagreement. it's another thing to bring it to a head. and i really don't see it coming to a head in any fashion in the next year. it's going to probably be longer than that because the afghanistan situation is going to take longer than that to develop to know what afghanistan can really do by itself. >> could guys in congress cut funding for pakistan? >> i don't think they will cut funding. >> i think cooler heads will prevail and realize there are other interests involved there.

china, for example. and it would sort of -- it would sort of be foolish for us to cut off aid. >> coming up

we're back with our roundtable discussion. i want to start with rick mays, the super committee fail today reach a deficit reduction deal. see questerration is now the law of the land. it's supposed to take another $600 out of the pentagon spending. there are people in the pentagon that don't believe that's going to happen. what's going to happen?

are they going to end up losing more money than they think? >> they're going to lose more money than they think. will we see see questerration happen? probably not. there will not be a $1.2 trillion cut across the board. it doesn't mean defense is off the hook. whatever they need to replace that is still going to be $1.2 trillion or larger in cuts because that's the price of getting out of this. that could fall on the defense department. >> i think you're right. there is more of an appetite with defense spending cuts with tea party people, democrats. i think we're likely to see more cuts. the see questerration, that won't go into effect because it's too large a number because i don't think the democrats or the republicans want to see this. >> the reason we're having this discussion right now about see questerration is because we have a stalemate political system. if that's the result -- if what we're facing is the result of this stalemate, why do we think there'll be any result of see

questerration until after the election and even after the election. >> i didn't say before the election because my own thought of how will this work out, how will they actually do it is probably if see questerration happens in a month or two and they undo it way. that's a titanical way of doing it because that's going to consume hundreds of thousands of hours of labor to create -- >> this is how ruddman's sequestration is terrible too. >> what sequestration would mean for the pentagon, just to take one example, according to secretary panetta, all three legs of the nuclear triad, all three components of our nuclear deterrent would be cut in one way or another. the effects are actually devastating. >> as general swarz said on the show last week, it's cutting with a chain saw, not with a scalpel. why does anybody in the pentagon think they're only going to get away with $450 billion of cut?

>> because the people in congress are telling them that's not going to happen, we're going to protect you. it's happening everyday where somebody is announcing, oh, we're going to save you from the nasty obama cuts, and that's going to happen and they believe that. >> it only matter we get president romney or president gingrich and they have republican chambers in congress. if you get a split decision like we did the last time or like we did in the midterms, then we're going to not be able to make that. >> i would say even if you had republicans in charge of everything, that doesn't mean the defense isn't going to be cut any more, it's not going to make up any more than the pentagon is now planning for. >> there's some talk about another $200 billion in cuts beyond what they have now. maybe not a sequestration. >> i think the historic record doesn't really support that. republican control of the senate and the white house is the single most reliable predictor of an increase in weapons spending. >> it's only tied to crisis, though, it's not on a steady state basis. >> we've never had people facing the kind of budget

deficit we do now and that's what changes it. >> exactly, with the party that's become fiscally more dramatically conservative, some of them. let's go to the question of what's going to happen when the administration 4,"husubmits its budget. this year we went without a full defense budget. are we going to start seeing real defense budgets next year and what kind of a budget is going to be submitted to hx congress? >> no. they get away with having these budgets, the many budgets at the very end and now they've just become practice. i really don't see a day coming anywhere in the near future where they'll be back on regular defense authorization and appropriations process, anything that happens before the last second. >> john, more gross dysfunctionallity over the course of the year? >> we'll muddle through, it'll cost a fortune. the reason we're not going to have a major defense budget debate is because the choices are very unpalatable and no one wants to opt for any of choices. >> we know what the white house

is planning because it's reported in global business news. they're going to come back with a $125 billion proposal for 2013 in the base budget and in the subsequent three years they go up an average of about $10 billion a year. that's their plan, not counting sequestration which at the moment they're not willing to contemplate. >> i have one interesting question, is where will the cuts come from as we look down the road. who will be the bill payers for this? most people we talk to at the pentagon think the army will be picking up a lot of the cuts here, maybe reducing forestructure and maybe the marine corps will have to drop a little bit more than they'd hoped to as well. if you're looking at a new defense strategy that looks toward asia, it's clearly the navy and the air force that will be big winners here. >> the other thing they're going to try to do is cutting funds from other competent commands, looking particularly [ [ indiscernable ] ] >> you can't make cuts that are very big without a three or four-year period without the

dramatic cuts in the size of the force, dramatic personnel cuts, so we're beyond the scope of the 1/3 cut in the post-cold war. >> you think that's likely? >> i do. >> there's going to be deep cuts when it comes to the civilian work force. anybody has looked to totally reject to pay, personnel and benefits. that battle is over, isn't it? >> the commander rejected it. you can't do that quickly. if you want to save money next year, you don't save money next year by changing the retirement plan and grandfathering people in the force. they're just stuck there. >> it really is a third rail. it's hard to touch that because the issue, veterans groups and so forth are completely against that and even increasing the health benefits, the copays has been very, very difficult. >> congress has prevented that from going up very much. >> stay tuned

we're back with our

roundtable, rick mays, the congressional editor of the military times newspapers, john barry, formerly of newsweek, roland thompson of the institute and tom berman of npr. roland, i want to start with you, eastbound thoi i think rick would -- even though i think rick would challenge you. but let's go to the presidential campaign. unless everybody missed it, it's a presidential election year this year. who are the top advisers to the republican frontrunners at this point, newt gingrich and mitt romney? >> the situation reminding me a little bit of clinton versus obama a few years ago. the romney defense team is like a who's who of the republican establishment. former pentagon comptroller doug zachhime former missouri m senator jim callant, former navy secretary john layman and you have a much smaller group advising gingrich, just mainly cia director jim woolsly,

national security adviser bud mcí farland, but there is this view that advising newt gingrich on anything is a tough sell because he already thinks he knows. in the case of romney, he has put together what appears to be a bedrock of supporters in the establishment. >> it's hard to believe that all those people are already advising romney. they describe them as a working group he's come up with. it's really a part of the romney push to get as many people as they can to sign up on and endorse him so that he tries to crush his opponent and win the nomination. >> which doesn't seem to be working very well since gingrich is ahead in the polls. >> the argument that gingrich can have against romney's panel is that in the past he doesn't promise anything new whereas gingrich says he promises. >> i don't think gingrich wins with mcí farland, skinner the newest advisory who was a bush

advisory on iraq and afghanistan. >> i don't think any republican wins on defense issues. the people care about jobs, they care about the economy. if they care about anything, they want american troops to come home. clearly they're coming home from iraq, they would like them to all come home from afghanistan according to polls. and the other problem for republicans is it's going to be hard to paint this democratic president as soft on defense as we've seen in the past, obama sent 30,000 more troops to afghanistan, he also sent american forces to help topple gadhafi, so he's going to be -- >> you got bin laden. >> another bing thing, of course, you got bin laden, so it's going to be hard to paint him soft on defense. >> he's above the levels of the highest bush years. >> it's going to be really difficult to paint him that way. >> they're pinging at him all the time. they want something that goes well in iraq, they're looking to something that goes wrong in afghanistan. something to say, see, you pulled the troops nóx and it's all going to go downhill now. >> again, that's not cutting

with voters, i think. y said we're going to pull all >> it does have an effect on the conservative people who are actually voting in the primaries >> what is going to be the republican defense strategy over the next year that we're going to see? >> obama is bad. >> we can already see the influence on romney's team of having people like former navy secretary layman there. romney has already said that he's going to increase ship building by more than 50% if he becomes president. >> that's what leman said. it was a 600-ship navy during the reagan years. >> you wonder where they're going to find the money for all this. >> so at the end of the day, defense doesn't really play as big an issue in this coming year? >> i don't think so. >> not unless there's some big overseas development we're not anticipating. >> i want to go around the table of what you think the top defense issues of the year are going fxd" rick. >> cutting the force. >> cutting, cutting, cutting. >> yes, money, money. money, money, money.

>> money in a different sense but how can a declining economy support a military poft -- global military posture? >> if it's not strong enough, you can't really support them. >> we are way down from where we were 10 years ago. >> i would say afghanistan, do things start falling apart in that country even more. >> what do you think the wildcard thing is going to be this year? >> iran. what happens in iran. >> iran will -- whether there be an underground test by iran. >> something will be discovered they've been working more closely than we even believe with terrorist networks >> should we keep an eye on oil prices? >> yes. >> in iraq and iran definitely. >> last week we saw them trading anywhere from $50 a barrel among the hedgers and speculators all the way up to $150, that shows you the uncertainty we have going forward. >> it's going to be a busy, busy year. thanks, guys, very much. coming up in my

a big danger with having sophisticated military systems is that you run the risk of losing them if you use them. that appears to be the case with the u.s. air force rq-170 sentinel. the remote-operated aircraft lost over iran. the stealthy plane has been used worldwide over years. the u.s. has used manned and unmanned aircraft. the special risks by exposing its teerlts and technology to enemies. since the sentinel appears to come in iran's possession largely intact. it's only a matter of time before others study the sensors and electronics. the air force must learn why the plane lost signal and how it came to be recovered apparently in one piece.

it also must guard against future losses and ensure fail- safe mechanisms to obliterate anything of interest once out of u.s. control. last the technology that makes rq-170 possible is a critical u.s. advantage. as defense budgets decline, america must continue robust investment in even more stanced stanced stealth, sensor and communication technologies to maintain a critical strategical and tactical edge. thanks for watching "this week in defense news." i'm vago muradian. you can watch this program online or e-mail me. i'll be back next week at the same time. until then, have a great week.