Well, he didn't exactly say that. But in his speech last Saturday at the Eisenhower Library, Obama Secretary of Defense Robert Gates acknowledged that the United States has such a huge lead in conventional military power that we can afford to do without a few ships here, a few planes there (and many more if we follow Gates's statement to its logical conclusion):
Finally, this Department's approach to requirements must change. Before making claims of requirements not being met or alleged "gaps" - in ships, tactical fighters, personnel, or anything else - we need to evaluate the criteria upon which requirements are based and the wider real world context. For example, should we really be up in arms over a temporary projected shortfall of about 100 Navy and Marine strike fighters relative to the number of carrier wings, when America's military possesses more than 3,200 tactical combat aircraft of all kinds? Does the number of warships we have and are building really put America at risk when the U.S. battle fleet is larger than the next 13 navies combined, 11 of which belong to allies and partners? Is it a dire threat that by 2020 the United States will have only 20 times more advanced stealth fighters than China?
Good questions all. So why are we spending a post-World War II record of over $700 billion per year for military purposes, most of it in the Pentagon's regular budget, not even for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan? For one example of how we can do better, see the Unified Security Budget, the product of a task force assembled annually by the Institute for Policy Studies. The most recent USB report calls for taking over $50 billion from the Pentagon budget and investing it instead in diplomacy, foreign aid, alternative energy, and other non-military programs that will make us a lot safer than throwing more money at weapons systems we don't need (see Gates, above).
And stay tuned for a forthcoming report on how to cut nearly $1 trillion from the Pentagon over the next ten years, assembled by a task force led by the Project for Defense Alternatives and including participation by analysts and staffers from the Cato Institute, the Center for American Progress, the Center for Arms Control and Nonproliferation, the Center for Defense Information, the Institute for Policy Studies, the National Priorities Project, the National Security Network, the New America Foundation (represented by yours truly), Peace Action, and Taxpayers for Common Sense (apologies to any colleagues I may have forgotten in this hastily assembled list -- will make amends in a future post).
(I know I'm hallucinating but imagine our nation after a $200 billion annual reduction in Pentagon spending. I see possible deficit reduction, lower taxes, better schools, roads and bridges, health care and financially sound Social Security and Medicare programs.)
1* United States 548,531,000,000
2 People's Republic of China 63,643,000,000
3* United Kingdom 57,392,000,000
4* France 52,565,000,000
5* Japan 42,751,000,000
6 Russian Federation 38,238,000,000
7* Germany 37,237,000,000
8* Saudi Arabia 33,136,000,000
9* Italy 32,103,000,000
10 India 24,716,000,000
11* South Korea 23,773,000,000
12* Canada 15,940,000,000
13* Brazil 15,477,000,000
14* Australia 15,321,000,000
15* Spain 14,721,000,000
16* Israel 12,135,000,000
17 Turkey 11,663,000,000
18* Netherlands 9,866,000,000
19* Greece 9,706,000,000
( THIS IS RIDICULOUS !!!!!!!! )
When is Congress going to be ALLOWED to ratify that Nuclear Treaty with Russia?
Congress RIGHTS the treaties, says so in the Constitution.
So why is a Harvard Trained Constitutional Lawyer acting like he NEVER READ IT?
Congress does not RIGHT (or even write) treaties under the Constitution, the President does. Try reading Article II, Section 2. Instead of critisizing the President's lack of constitutional knowledge, perhaps you should read it yourself.
and wants to get rid of the waste.
Shouldn't we be gutting Obama Administration Waste first? How many TRILLIONS did Obama give away to Foreign Banks/Nations in the First few Months in office?
500 Billion to Europe alone that just 'Disappeared' untraceable
you just grab rhetoric and numbers out of your behind
http://academic.evergreen.edu/g/grossmaz/interventions.html
went to rebuild AMERICA instead of Brazil/Russia/India/China?
What is Obama's Priorities? Shouldn't the American President put America FIRST?
Where is that legal document needed to legally be president again?
That'll reduce our annual expenditures from the current staggering $700+ billion to a mere pittance of $600+ billion: we might even wind up spending a bit LESS than the rest of the world combined on our military!
Peace dividend, here we come! This should certainly shut up those doves up who keep asking why we can't cut the military budget by more than half. Silly them! Better absolutely, positively, unassailably safe than anything approaching solvent, I say.
We need to force fiscal responsibility on the Pentagon. Make 'em pass an audit.
Getting out of Afghanistan in a quick & timely manner is also essential.
We need to stop believing that there's some overriding need to play the "world's policeman." We have allies, after all.
And for those concerned about what we're going to do with all those displaced military people (we don''t want them to come back to an economy that has no jobs for them), let the military personnel work for the US in the US: patrol our southern borders, fix our bridges, upgrade our interstates, upgrade our electrical grid, help restore rural and inner city schools, help restore urban wastelands and make them into parks and community gardens, set up clinics to help the working class catch up on medical help it can't afford otherwise, help prepare us for a greener economy where we aren't sending so much money to the Middle East for oil from countries who hate us, etc.
Since the Republican party and the right wing wouldn't consent to a Civilian Conservation Corps, let's have a Military Conservation Corps. Only traitors and America haters would object to that.
A win-win situation.