The Pentagon says threatened budget cuts will invite aggression, endanger national security and devastate its operations/…/Panetta told senators in a letter this week that after a decade of the threatened cuts, the U.S. would have the smallest ground force since 1940, the smallest number of ships since 1915 and the smallest Air Force ever.But it’s not about the numbers, according to Todd Harrison of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments. Greater firepower and tonnage make today’s naval fleet smaller but more powerful, he said