Poor, poor Leon Panetta. Our Secretary of Defense has to find a way to cut $45 billion per year out of our $700 billion military budget. That's right, five percent.
At a moment when my students take on ever more debt because of steep tuition hikes which reflect years of education cuts, when our consumption of oil continues to grow because our public transportation is so terrible, when our assistance to poor and homeless people pales in comparison to what other modern societies provide, the Pentagon is forced to shave five percent off its pornographically bloated budget. How sad.
I don't blame Secretary Panetta for the bloated budget. He is a good man who inherited a monster.
Rather, the fault lies at least in part with progressives, who, rather than honestly explaining the dangers of our bloated military, run away from their own ideas and resort to framing and slick messaging to try to make themselves seem hawkish on defense and tough on terrorism.
So, what do progressives need to say? Three things:
First, our bloated military is completely unnecessary. The vast majority of the Pentagon budget is a waste, pure and simple. Why? Because the threats this country faces are not military threats. The United States is protected by our oceanic borders and by nuclear deterrence (which requires very few weapons). The wars this country wages are wars of choice, not necessity. If our military were 75% smaller, it would still be one of the largest in the world, and we would be just as secure.
Second, our bloated military actually makes us less secure. How so? For one thing, our huge military provides political leaders with a constant temptation to get involved in bloody wars (Korea, Vietnam, Iraq) that end up doing no good.
Perhaps even worse, we use our military might to prop up dictators who torture their own people, many of whom come to hate the U.S. and some of whom end up as terrorists. If you look at al-Qaeda's list of demands, you see that ending U.S. military support for the Saudi regime is a top goal. Why do they hate us? It's quite simple. And it has everything to do with our muscular, militarized approach to global affairs.
Third, our military is not bloated because the U.S. faces threats to its security. It is bloated because of the military-industrial-Congressional complex that President Eisenhower warned about more than fifty years ago.
I recently heard a highly-paid, DC-based consultant offer advice to Democrats about how to talk about foreign policy. She was quite an expert at slick framing designed to inoculate Democrats from the charge that they are weak on defense. But the one thing I didn't hear her say is that our bloated military makes us less secure because excessive military force is dangerous.
She can't be blamed for that, because any Democratic office-seeker making that claim would lose votes.
It's up to progressives to give our political leaders some cover by being much louder about the causes and effects of our bloated military budget. In the last few years, progressives have become somewhat more aggressive about these points. But we need to pile it on, year after year, and use research to back up what we are saying. Unless we work harder to change the conversation, we'll never have a chance of making a serious dent in our wasteful, dangerous and bloated military.
Chris Weigant: The Pentagon's First Bake Sale
2. yeah, this is the biggest part of the spending problem that our elected yes-men are afraid to talk about.
3. Defense contractors stock prices are not sacred cows that have to be part of our 401ks.
4. It's not a jobs program to send our kids to die on the other side of the planet for Iraqi oil and Afghan. minerals that are only coming to the USA inside imported crap from China.
R/ PRONESE
I've already called for the elimination of NATO, including all those military outposts all around the world, including the Africa command.
I've already called for the reduction of the nuclear triad to one, where the nuclear submarines and the B1 bombers would be mothballed, and we retain the intercontinental ballistics capability.
I've called for a reduction in our troop capacity to reservists where our deployment of troops will be hampered and therefore no easy wars.
I call on Congress to insist on its Congressional warmaking powers and substantially reduce the Presidents folly for wars. And call on the Congress to stop war spending. NOW, not tomorrow.
The time for unquestioned military spending is over.
We must use our public dollars more wisely.
We no longer have a choice.
P.S. People who profit from war are the worst human beings on earth. Their willingness to profit off of death and destruction, from death and disease and death and weapons is disgusting.
That's why no one likes the sequestration option before congress - and most will be righteously angry if DoD is excused. It's a heckuva conundrum.
But "people jobs" can largely be maintained with a reasoned approach to cutting. In a reasonable world (that is , one without lobbyists ) , one could imagine a scene like in the movie "Dave". The prez and his cabinet sit around , press present , and the prez asks , do we really need eleven carrier groups? Do you want to tell teachers they're fired so we can have eleven carrier groups?
Do we really need the F-22? F-35? Who's air force is better than ours? Do you really want to tell firefighters they're fired so we can have F-22s?
But the boots on the ground? The numbers of helicopters, tanks, etc? We could trim by 50%, mothball most of that equipment, and not see a blip in the effectiveness.
A war of necessity IMHO.
YMMV and does.
R/ PRONESE