Discussion of the American Defense Budget

George Kenney of the "Electric Politics" website recently interviewed me about the $1 trillion US national security budget.  The interview addresses the various relevant numbers, the disappointing coverage of them by defense specialists in the press, and the general approach to defense spending in this country that George aptly characterizes as "mindless drones."  Find the 40 minute interview at http://www.electricpolitics.com/podcast/2012/03/washingtons_warlords.html.

 

I apologize in advance for my sometime slow and plodding oral delivery of the numbers and other information in this excellent interview by George Kenney.  If you want a quicker version of the numbers we discuss,  see the short commentary at http://www.cdi.org/friendlyversion/printversion.cfm?documentID=4717, especially the table at the end.

 

If you want a discussion of the comparison of the US defense budget to other nations' defense related spending, discussed in the interview, see http://www.cdi.org/friendlyversion/printversion.cfm?documentID=4727. 

 

That the Republicans consider the defense budget a lever to argue against the Democrats in an election year is aptly demonstrated by what they are advocating: they assert the numbers discussed above are inadequate and should be increased by hundreds of billions of dollars--in Romney's case by $trillions.  Lest you think the Democrats are the reasonable side of the argument, recall that most of them argue that any reduction from the numbers discussed above would be a "doomsday."  Both parties posture themselves in favor of a level of defense spending that is independent of the nature and size of the threat.  They will be eating their own words in the future, perhaps as soon as January 2013 when a decision to lower defense spending from its current levels appears, at least to me, inevitable--and needed.

_____________________________
Winslow T. Wheeler
Director
Straus Military Reform Project
Center for Defense Information
301 791-2397 (home office)
301 221-3897 (cell)