War Machines: Thirsty Business

Where is the sanity in all this?

Shorter version below, longer version here.

As of September 30, 2005 the US Air Force had 5,986 aircraft in service. (1)

At the beginning of 2006 the US Navy had 285 combat and support ships, and around 4,000 operational aircraft (planes and helicopters). (2)

At the end of 2005, the US Army had a combat vehicle fleet of approximately 28,000 armored vehicles (tracked vehicles such as Abrams tanks and Bradley Fighting Vehicles)(3).

Besides those the Army and the Marine corps have tactical wheeled vehicles such as 140,000 High-Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles.

The US Army has also over 4,000 combat helicopters and several hundred fixed wing aircraft.

Add all those also 187,493 fleet vehicles (4) (passenger cars, busses, light trucks etc) the US Department of Defense (DOD) uses.

The issue is that except for 80 nuclear submarines and aircraft carriers, almost all military fleet (including the ones that will be joining in the next decade) run on oil.

Yes, the US military is completely addicted to oil.

Unsurprisingly, its oil consumption for aircraft, ships, ground vehicles and facilities makes the Pentagon the single largest oil consumer in the world.

By the way, according to the 2006 CIA World Factbook rankings there are only 35 countries (out of 210) in the world that consume more oil per day than the Pentagon.