As operations in Iraq and Afghanistan come to a conclusion, a top military official in Kentucky says Fort Knox and Fort Campbell should brace for changes. In a speech Wednesday to the Bowling Green Noon Rotary Club, Colonel David Thompson said BRAC is coming again to military installations nationwide.
“It’s gonna come with a vengeance in my view," predicted Thompson. "As we come out of this war effort, the infrastructure that we have out there is clearly unsupportable. From a business perspective, you can’t have more structure than you have force. At some point, the math is not going to work.”
In 2005, the military’s Base Realignment and Closure moved an influx of soldiers to Fort Knox and spurred massive growth in the region. Thompson, who heads the Kentucky Commission on Military Affairs, expects another round of BRAC changes by 2017. This time, he said, the results could be more dire. Recently, Fort Knox learned the post would lose its only combat brigade, which Thompson called a harbinger of things to come.
Col. Thompson believes Fort Knox and Fort Campbell are both well positioned in the event of another BRAC. However, he said Kentucky needs to work to increase the value of its two installations to head off major cuts.