Minister Pinotti has confused ideas

02/03/17

Read the interview that Minister Pinotti gave yesterday to the newspaper "La Repubblica"?

According to the Minister of Defense there is a Copernican revolution between career reorganization, the White Book and the Italian Pentagon. It seems to me an electoral propaganda, because to shoot like that on a sector justifying the epochal changes to the new international demands seems to me risky.

The evolution, involution, would touch the personnel, the real estate and the organization of the entire structure that would become the chief of state "centric" defense defense.

The Minister said that the old system provided, for generals and admirals, the establishment of commands according to the number of senior managers, now it will be up to the trend to be reversed, or to promote them according to the number of commands. In fact it is not really so, because the rates of progress, every year, are made based on the holidays that are created, based on the leave for age limits of the senior officers.

The armed forces have been slashing resources for about ten years, amalgamating bodies and functions, and encouraging staff to leave and introducing very few pupils into schools, compared to the past. This is to say that successive governments have always paid attention to the dicastery's budget, making linear and compartmental cuts, after months and years of studies, analyzes and simulations.

To say that today it was decided to merge the functions seems more like an offense for the predecessors who, even without the support of the White Paper, have in any case implemented what the Parliament and the government in office were asking. Then now we want to create a single figure at the command of all the armed forces. This new figure will decide everything: the financing, the investments, the promotions of the generals and admirals, in short, will have a "total" power, to the detriment of the individual armed forces.

The Chief of the Armed Forces, what can he do? Ah yes, attend the ceremonies around Italy, since you will not be able to decide on anything anymore, except to maintain the operativeness of your armed force, with the money and the means that the great Chief bestows. Then we do not understand the logic of the extensions to military leaders, Admiral De Giorgi, former head of the Navy, and General Preziosa, former head of the Air Force, had to terminate their mandate peremptorily on the day when they reached the limit of age, according to the Madia Law. Very right, considering the law that says "no to detention in service beyond age limits". Even the Consulta, in the 2016, promoted the Madia Law, initially accused of being unconstitutional at this point. Then, it is not clear what was the "very high motivation" that kept the current military summits above the age limits. There is something wrong with this. Is the law the same for everyone, or not?

Then the Minister speaks of a defense budget below the 2% of GDP, as requested by NATO and its allies, precisely at the 1,8 of the GDP, equal to 23 billion per year. It is a pity that you forget to say that most military investments weigh on the budget of the Ministry of Economic Development and not on the defense. If you do the math, I think, you would far exceed the 2% threshold.

The point is that nobody believes in the “election spots” anymore, especially if everything is not linear within the department.

We do not speculate on the skin of our military of any order and degree, just because they are not unionized. The senior officers, generals and admirals did what the parliament and the government asked for and asked for and did not invent anything, in fact to tell the truth they only executed the political wishes to the letter.

Femaz

(photo: governo.it)