Taming The System

摘要

If you are af firm bellever in the war in Afghanistan, Defense Secretary Robert Gates' grim assessment last month of what lies in store for the U.S. might have made you shudder. "If we set ourselves the objective of creating some sort of Central Asian Valhalla over there, we will lose, because nobody in the world has that kind of time, patience and money, to be honest," he said. But if you are a defense contractor who has enjoyed a decade of bottomless Pentagon funding, it was Gates' comments about a struggle much closer to home that are keeping you up at night. "The spigot of defense spending that opened on 9/11 is closing," he said. "With two major campaigns ongoing, the economic crisis and resulting budget pressures will force hard choices on this department."