NEW YORK -- Senior Army officials are circling the wagons to protect the crown jewel of the service's modernization effort, the Future Combat System, a network of 18 different platforms that service officials say is as essential to ground forces as aircraft carriers are to the Navy. Facing a $32 billion cut across the fiscal year 2007 to 2011 budget, the Office of the Secretary of Defense in October suggested cuts to key elements of the Army's Future Combat System,...
