How Many Enemies, How Much Military Spending?

Given a list of 18 potential enemies of the U.S., a majority of the American population rated only North Korea and Iran as adversaries. Other nations, ranging from Venezuela to China, came in far behind.

If the American people are right, what explains today's military budget?

The U.S. traditionally pursued a foreign policy and maintained a force structure appropriate for a republic. Not until World War I did Washington create the expeditionary military of a great power. And only during the latter half of the 20th Century did the American government deploy such a force during formal peacetime.

The justification for doing the latter was the threat of hegemonic communism: the Soviet Union, which kept the Red Army poised along the famed Iron Curtain; the Warsaw Pact, which corralled Eastern and Central European states on behalf of Soviet objectives; Maoist China, which posed an unpredictable threat to the war-weakened nations of East Asia; and a gaggle of Third World countries, which allied themselves with the U.S.S.R.

In the aftermath of the world's most destructive conflict, American military deployments around the globe were seen as necessary to contain the advance of communism. Even many advocates of limited government saw little alternative to maintaining outsized armed forces, a network of foreign bases, and numerous, often undemocratic client states.

Two decades ago this justification for America's anomalous, quasi-imperial system disappeared. The Soviet Union dissolved, the Warsaw Pact disbanded, China adopted the market, and Third World states jettisoned collectivism. Colin Powell famously observed that he was running out of enemies, being left with only North Korea's Kim Il-sung and Cuba's Fidel Castro--nasty characters, but pitiful replacements for Joseph Stalin and Mao Zedong.

Yet the U.S. essentially has maintained its Cold War military. Defense spending dipped in the early 1990s, but real outlays merely dropped from the Reagan build-up back to the Cold War average. Since then military expenditures (the baseline budget excluding costs of Afghanistan and Iraq) have climbed to a peacetime record. America accounts for nearly half of the world's military outlays.

That is, Washington is spending more today on its military now than it did when the U.S. was confronting the Soviet Union, Warsaw Pact, Maoist China, and assorted Third World autocracies.

Whatever could justify such outlays?

It certainly isn't the power of America's enemies. The American people rightly rank North Korea and Iran as adversaries of the U.S. But neither state poses even a minor threat to America.

The so-called Democratic People's Republic of Korea is an economic wreck; a half million or more people starved to death a decade ago. The regime is largely friendless and faces a destabilizing leadership transition. Pyongyang's large military is antiquated; though the North is developing both missile and nuclear technologies, it has no present ability to attack the U.S. and, in any case, would be wiped out by any retaliatory strike.

Moreover, the DPRK is constrained by its neighbors. South Korea enjoys 40 times the economic strength, twice the population, and a vast technological advantage. By some measures, the South's military budget is as large as North Korea's entire GDP. With its more modern, efficient military, Seoul alone could defeat the North.

Iran is a military midget, at least compared to America. Tehran's estimated military outlays run about $8 billion annually--less than two percent of America's level. Iran's military has been untested for two decades, and much of the Iranian security apparatus is directed at domestic repression. U.S. intelligence doesn't believe Iran has an active nuclear weapons program underway, though the regime's nuclear energy efforts might be aimed at creating a "turnkey" weapons capability. In any case, one American carrier group could do far more damage to Iran than the entire Iranian military could do to the U.S.

Moreover, Iran is constrained by its neighbors, including hostile Arab states. Even more significant is Israel, the dominant Middle Eastern military power, with as many as 200 nuclear warheads.

Obviously neither North Korea nor Iran justifies America's military outlays today. Even a better-armed North Korea and Iran would not justify America's military outlays today.

Who else, then? A gaggle of modestly hostile states--Cuba, Laos, Syria, Venezuela, and whoever else--are military nullities. The only real potential adversaries with meaningful military capabilities are Russia and China.

But the former is a declining power, whose geopolitical ambitions vastly exceed its capabilities. Moreover the European Union alone has ten times Russia's economic strength, three times Russia's population, and twice Russia's military budget. China's strength is on the rise, but it remains a relatively poor nation whose military remains far behind that of America. It will take years, even decades, for Beijing to fulfill its potential. One statistic alone captures America's dominance: the U.S. possesses 11 carrier groups, compared to one between China and Russia.

Washington spends as much as it does on the military to enable it to attack other nations, not defend itself. Most of America's outlays on "defense" have nothing to do with defense. The Pentagon really has become the Department of Offense.

The U.S. faces a much more benign security environment than during the Cold War. The world remains dangerous, but not particularly so for the U.S. Terrorism is evil, but does not pose an existential threat. Nuclear terrorism would be far more dangerous, but the production or acquisition of such weapons by non-state actors remains thankfully unlikely.

Moreover, this risk actually is exacerbated by a more imperious and interventionist foreign policy. Far more effective in combating terrorism is improved intelligence, international cooperation, use of special forces, and such non-military tactics as drying up terrorist funding.

The changed international security environment should lead to a change in U.S. force structure and military outlays. America's business should be defense, not offense. Especially at a time of economic crisis and budget stringency, the U.S. should bring its military establishment into alignment with its defense needs.

The American people recognize what Colin Powell told us a few years ago: the U.S. is running out of (serious) enemies. It is time to cut the military budget accordingly.

Comments

[kemjika11]

A decent article, but some obvious oversimplification going on here.

"Iran's military has been untested for two decades, and much of the Iranian security apparatus is directed at domestic repression."--yes, its been untested, but did you see Hezbollah's performance in 2006? Hezbollah defeated Israel, and hezbollah is an Iranian creation. The bottom line is, even if Iran's military hasn't been tested recently, to think its incompetent, or can't perform is very naive.it has shown enough strength to prevent US from even striking their nuclear facilities,which i find impressive considering you call their military budget "midget".
Also, you fail to mention US' lack of leverage in many regions in the middle east.Take Iraq. Despite massive militaryand financial capabilities, the US has very little political clout in iraq, and Iran will surely get the biggest slice of the "iraqi pie", for Iraq will end up getting divied up sooner or later.
Also, you fail to mention that because US has alot of manpower spread over the world, it can't devote it all to one conflict/region, so even if China's military is weak as you said(i strongly disagree with this), China knows US has over 120K troops in Iraq and Afghanistan, so how well do you think US could deal with CHina if a fight erupted in south east asia? my prediction is US will need an ally to totally suppress CHina, and i don't think it could succeed.Many countries are patching up the technology gap..

[MajorKong]

China's military isn't weak, but they can't project power very far.

They would be quite strong in their own neighborhood, but they don't really have the ability to come to our neighborhood.

To put things in perspective, I'll use France as an example. France is tied with China for 2nd place in defense expenditures. The entire French Air Force has 14 air refueling tankers. The Ohio Air National Guard has 18.

[oxi]

Why does Ohio need 18 National Guard tankers?

What the local Indian population gonna cause some trouble?

Is the Michigan Militia threatening to attack?

Is Ohio going to go on a imperialistic attack soon to gain some new territory?

Ohio taxpayers should be ashamed of themselves for buying 18 tankers, I do not recall any threats to the state of Ohio lately, do you?

[Paul Bass]

"and hezbollah is an Iranian creation."
NO Hezbollah was not created by a bunch of antisemitic mullahs to carry on their proxy wars

It was created by a uh.... lets see 10 weeks of bombarding Beirut or 20 years of occupation Lebanon.

the reason we dont attack iran is simple they are on our side!
who were the two biggest enemies of the Iran the ba'ath party and the Taliban.

[greyhound2]

Military spending is what bankrupted the Soviet Union. The military-industrial complex, warned about by Eisenhower in the 50's, has an agenda of its own. It's guns or butter in economic terms. While our educational system is going down the drain, health care is plumeting, we have the most bullets, aircraft carriers, stealth bombers and exotic military hardware than any country on the planet. The problem is that the last picture I saw of Bin Laden, he was riding a horse. You don't need a stealth bomber to kill a man on a horse.

[countfloyd]

One of the problems is that the Pentagon is trying to replace very old and costly to maintain weapon systems with state of the art, which changes frequently as new technology is developed, very expensive aircraft, carriers, tanks, etc. that almost guarantee higher than expected costs and late delivery. The Pentagon needs to scale back the requirements on the much needed replacement of old systems.

[jmpurser]

Personally I think we've managed to expand war profiteering to the point where the war is no longer necessary. Just keep the people good and afraid and the bucks will flow.

[Rog49Thomas]

Empire has its own logic.

[MajorKong]

These things tend to become self perpetuating.

Lest any politician dare to scale back military spending - the well-funded think tanks connected to the defense industry like AEI and Heritage will start screaming that we're being put in danger.

[Troy Powell]

There is a military tactic that is more appropriate given the current geopolitcal landscape and its known as offshore balancing. Unfortunately however threat perception and threat preparation are two different enterprises entirely (albeit mutually enforcing).

One reason for the disconnect between the global politcal environment and our threshold of military preparedness may be due to the fact that information communication's technologies are more advanced now (compared to the immediate post cold war era) and permeate our perception and access of world events. This has no doubt fed into exaggerated world views, political mandates and measurements of "threat"

[popart]

must be good for business....some one must profit from it.....otherwise it makes no sense at all...

[oxi]

Why even bother to ask the average U.S. citizen about enemies? They have no clue what goes on outside of U.S. borders except what they are spoon fed from the mainstream media...

"Moreover the European Union alone has ten times Russia's economic strength, three times Russia's population, and twice Russia's military budget."

And how many times could Russia nuke the EU until they are a pile of dust? Russia is still a major world power!

"One statistic alone captures America's dominance: the U.S. possesses 11 carrier groups, compared to one between China and Russia."

The U.S. has not stood up to a major power since WWII, carriers would be easy targets for far superior Russian anti-ship missiles that the U.S. Aegis system cannot defend against...

[COPerez]

No STATE will use nukes. (Should anyone be insane enough to do so they would be totally isolated from the rest of the world and soundly defeated by conventional military forces from around the world.) Russia is a doddering old fool of a state, barely propped up by now-falling oil prices.

And on a strictly military basis (speaking as an ex-military officer) I can tell you that we tend to play up the capabillities of our major enemies' military hardware and forces. When we were able to get our hands (or our weapons) on Soviet era hardware (the stuff we were constantly scared of: MiG-25, Su-27, T-72, etc.) they all turned out to be junk. You can probably add in any current generation of Russian ASMs.

No, we could cut our military expenditures by 1/3 without affecting our true security and fund single-payer healthcare and STILL have a sizeable "Peace Dividend" to bank for a rainy day.

[Rog49Thomas]

A couple of modest objections to your post.

First, I think that you overlook the many dangerous imagined enemies our country has.
If liberals like you had been in power instead of St. Ronnie in October 1983, Maurice Bishop would be in the White House today.

Second, if we squandered money on the middle class and poor, how on earth could we afford another Iraqistan? Or billion dollar no bid contracts for Dyn Corp, Halliburton, and KBR? Or unnecessary tax cuts for the rich? And as sure as night follows day, cancelling or reducing these prudent government policies would weaken our nation. Wouldn't it?

[MajorKong]

I still have my copy of "Russian Military Power" from the 1980s. If you went back and read it today it really smacks of propaganda.

"OMG! They're 10 feet tall and they're coming to get us any day now!"

[oxi]

"No STATE will use nukes. (Should anyone be insane enough to do so"

I guess the U.S. is the insane nation for using nukes on Japan!!!

Yeah, how many days before Georgia (NATO trained) was defeated?

Like 5 days bud and not this pushover type in Iraq and Afghanistan, it was standing army vs. standing army as well as in the air and sea bud!

Where was NATO and the U.S. to defend? If Russia is such a pushover, why did NATO not rush in to defend their failed state? Russia sent a stern message to NATO and the U.S. to back off and stay out of their region of influence...

[TWKT]

They spend to keep the coporate profits up. We have been to war on an almost continuous basis since 1898. Gen. Smedley Butler was one who realized early why he was always at war. The Nye Committee investigated and found that the American arms industry put pressure on to fo to war in WW 1. It is the elitists that run these companies that want to make more massive amounts of money that keep us at war.