Why America’s Military Dominance Is Fading

Why America’s Military Dominance Is Fading

06/30/14

Mackenzie Eaglen

State of the Military, United States

In the long run, Congress’ inability to change the status quo is eroding the military’s readiness for the next fight and mortgaging the future for the present.

It is often said Congress hates to cut or cancel weapons systems, usually for reasons relating to jobs and elections back home. But the record shows that Congress is much more likely to curtail new equipment purchases for the military rather than get rid of or retire the old stuff.

This tendency is increasingly problematic for the U.S. military. In many capability sets and domains, the traditional margins of U.S. military technological supremacy are declining across the services. Too often, policy makers think of this as an emerging challenge that can be dealt with in the coming years. But, as has been documented previously and stated by many senior Pentagon officials over the past year, America’s declining military superiority is now a “here-now” problem.

Frank Kendall, undersecretary for acquisition, technology and logistics, recently said, “I’m very concerned about eroding technological superiority and where we’re headed. […] We’ve had 20 years since the end of the Cold War [and] sort of a presumption in the United States that we are technologically superior militarily. I don’t think that that’s a safe assumption. In fact, I think that we’ve gotten complacent about that and we’ve been distracted for the last ten years fighting counterinsurgencies.”

U.S. Pacific Command chief Admiral Sam Locklear reiterated the same point recently, noting “Our historic dominance that most of us in this room have enjoyed is diminishing, no question.”

Now that defense budgets are in their fourth year coming down, this preference to fund the old is increasingly coming at the expense of the new. Paying for yesterday’s equipment is not a static or one-time bill. This is one that only grows as equipment ages and gets more expensive to maintain. These restrictions are starting to hurt investment in innovation and tomorrow’s forces and their battlefield edge. 

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