That’s what defense industry insider and analyst Loren Thompson says. It’s hard to imagine that given the country’s ugly fiscal situation, annual defense outlays of $700 billion will continue. Thompson peruses the 2010 QDR and finds another reason why defense spending will turn south: lack of an urgent threat sufficient to focus lawmakers and taxpayers.
The QDR speaks in very vague terms of an “uncertain” security environment throwing terrorism, a rising China, globalization and weapons proliferation into the mix. Thompson pulls this quote: “Rising demand for resources, rapid urbanization of littoral regions, the effects of climate change, the emergence of new strains of disease, and profound cultural and demographic tensions in several regions are just some of the trends whose complex interplay may spark or exacerbate future conflicts.”
That’s not going to be enough:
“It sounds like Pentagon policymakers are stretching to find a justification for generating nearly half of all global military outlays, and therefore have thrown in every negative trend they can think of. The end result is a diverse menagerie of disconnected concerns that lacks the urgency or focus necessary to sustain a coherent military posture.”
His conclusion: “We’re headed down, and “Exhibit A” in the case for why less defense spending is likely is our inability to find a threat that really scares the average voter.”
– Greg
{ 15 comments… read them below or add one }
Couldn't agree more. Slash the budget in 1/2 and give the military full control over their procurements and operations with absolutely no political intervention. Without political horse shit driving up the costs of everything, the troops will make the most pragmatic use of resources. We'll have a better run military at 1/2 the cost.
"[G]ive the military full control over their procurements and operations with absolutely no political intervention"
This is a fish without gills, or a vetebrate without a backbone, or campaign contributions without candidates. Military procurement is fundamentally political.
The difference between a business and the military is that the business has a very clear goal: make a profit, which is easy to translate into down the road procurement. In contrast, the military is fundamentally aimless without political direction.
In periods of political indifference, the military has historically simply allocated funds among its fiefdoms based on tradition.
Military transformation comes because it is desired politically, not despite political interference.
I have no problem with slashing the defense budget. As long as the other agencies are slashed too.
NO MORE HOLLOW FORCES!
unlikely….or if anything just the operations budget, not the base budget. For a year now they have talked about possibly decreasing defense speending, but that was only because they were predicting the wars in iraq and afganistan would start winding down and so would the operations budget.
The truth is too many congress people and their constituents rely on a large defense budget so i don't see it really going anywhere significantly.
Also remember, any drastic cut in defense spending would also have to go through a political mine field; one which it will probably not survive. All the other party has to say is "party x is soft on national security" and watch such idea fall down a hole and never be ressurrected again. Remember that proposed spending freeze- obama is refusing to even consider defense spending being frozen
If they cut the budget, it'll be like the mid 1990s where the very first things to go will be spare parts and ammunition so we'll sit around with no money or resources to train.
i would like to put our attention on this time last year. The same thing was being said; there were rumors that the base budget could be cut up to 25%….what happened? well the base budget actually grew
Lastly, i would like to comment on all this budget doom and gloom. As the economy turns around the defecit will start shrinking- remember, during this recession the U.S. Government lost 25% of its revenue, THAT IS A LOT. Add that with a ONE TIME big stimulus and ofcourse you are going to have a massive debt. But the thing is this isnt a structural debt; its temporary.
So to conclude; i see the next 5 years bringing slow and small growth to the baseline budget with cuts coming from the operations budget
Not a structural deficit? That is exactly what it is. Money to be spent on "existing" programs like Medicare and Social Security are the problem.
Another decade of 10% annual increases in the Chinese military budget will wake America up. Of course, the 2020s will be when the bill really comes due for all the crap Obama is doing. Hey thanks for deliberately bankrupting America, Obama — you liberal fascist lying weasel.
America will not be bankrupt in the next decade…sparing some weird unforseen catastrophe. If Japan can support a debt of 200% GDP i'm pretty sure we can support one that is 90% of GDP
Are people really that apathetic about Iranian nukes? Just sayin'
Not apathetic, but what are we supposed to do about it? Open up a third front in the land war in Asia? We've been fighting for nine years and we've run out of money. We can hammer Iran, but that would be tantamount to letting China and Russia run amok.
Both Obama and Bush did their part to wreck the economy, as long there is the FED to print money, the dollar is doomed. Bush was anything but "small goverment", Obama is just more sincere about being a statist.
Ron Paul is the only possible president that has sound economical ideas, but being sound in a crazy world makes you seem crazy.
No, being crazy makes you seem crazy. Ron Paul? Seriously?
"lack of an urgent threat sufficient to focus lawmakers and taxpayers."
Lack of an urgent threat? Are you brain-dead?
How about 1) We're at war in Afghanistan!!! And need to build up the army so our soldiers aren't spending a year at a time or more overseas. 2) We need to fortify our borders to keep out nuclear-armed (or just car-bomb) terrorists.
There are no doubt some places in the defense budget that could be reduced or eliminated, but those are probably the places that will be totally ignored by budget-slashers in Congress.
For all the budget grips about entitlement programs, they come mostly funded with their own tax base. Cuts to income taxes, in contrast, are fundamentally cuts to the general fund budget, a plurality of which is military spending. We are fighting the biggest wars ever conducted without a tax increase; instead we have fought two wars and cut taxes simultaneously.
When it comes to war related spending, there does need to be a money is not an object attitude. But, not all of the DOD is heavily involved in prosecuting that war. For, the Navy (apart from the Marines and a few engineering units) and the Air Force, fighting regional wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is very little different from a peacetime posture. You can count on your fingers the number of Air Force fighters aloft in Iraq on a given day, and the demand in Afghanistan is higher but not that much higher (and is less of a departure from training as usual for Air Force forces than for Army and Marine forces). For the part of the Navy on ships an d submarines, the current wars have almost no impact at this point. The non-war related part of the military shouldn't be conducting business as usual.