# Make the case for a $300 billion defense budget. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 27, 2011, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392 "2011-05-27T03:19:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2011, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/21 "2011-05-28T02:14:03Z")
> [@gonzomax](#): > > We could spend the money in positive projects like developing non fossil energy sources. Green jobs would prepare America for the future. Like nuclear power! Which however you seem to have an extreme phobia to. American hegemony is a good thing for the world, it prevents wars, especially large-scale ones and egregarious violations of human rights. The rogue states of North Korea and Iran remain, the Chinese look with greed towards North Korea to seize even more of the Korean homeland, the Russians are determined to restore their Czarist-Stalinist hegemony over the Caucuses and Eastern Europe. Until China and Russia democratizes the US must remain on the alert. In addition we have a moral duty to the people of Afghanistan, and Libya to stay until the fight is finished. ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2011, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/22 "2011-05-28T02:15:03Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > The argument that the US’s war budget (let’s not mince words by calling it “defense”) is so big because it needs to be is a complete nonstarter. We spend as much on our military as the rest of the world combined. If our high level of spending were actually necessary, then it’d be necessary for all the other countries of the world, too: The only adequate world would be one where _every_ country outspent the rest of the world combined, which is patently absurd. If we go by percentage of GDP, we only spend one or two percent more than for instance. And unlike France we are a serious military superpower. ---
**Author:** ![Simplicio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c37758/32.png) [@Simplicio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simplicio)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2011, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/23 "2011-05-28T02:21:49Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > If we go by percentage of GDP, we only spend one or two percent more than for instance. And unlike France we are a serious military superpower. By percentage of GDP is a silly way to measure it. When we go to war, we go to war against other countries actual armies, not their armies scaled to the size of our economy. Eritrea spends four times as much of their GDP on military spending as the US, but its not like their military is four times more powerful. (Plus, even without that, your post is kinda misleading, France spends 2.5% of their GDP on their military, so “one or two percent more” is almost twice as much as a proportion to GDP). ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2011, 3:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/24 "2011-05-28T03:14:01Z")
[QUOTE=Simplicio] By percentage of GDP is a silly way to measure it. When we go to war, we go to war against other countries actual armies, not their armies scaled to the size of our economy. Eritrea spends four times as much of their GDP on military spending as the US, but its not like their military is four times more powerful. [/QUOTE] Definitely. You go by the mission. The mission of the US military has been to be the dominant military force on the entire planet for the last 2 decades, and to try and achieve at least parity with the Soviets before that. The reason we spend so much both relative to our GDP and in absolute terms is in an attempt to maintain that dominance. Whether you think that’s a good thing or a bad thing is irrelevant…it was the goal. The fact that other countries spend much less is because either they rely on the US defense (or war machine) for protection or there is no point, since spending a lot more still wouldn’t bring them to parity with the US…not unless the US stopped or vastly cut it’s spending. When that happens (and I think we all know it’s going to in our lifetimes) we’ll see what happens…my guess is a bunch of regional military powers who will have rough parity with other regional powers, and will try and dominate their regions and look with disfavor on other powers meddling in what they feel is their spheres of influence. That will probably be a bad thing, but it’s hard to say. What I do think is that as the US spends less on it’s military other powers or superpowers will spend more. Will they spend as much as the US does? Yeah…I think they will, combined. If the EU has to spend up to it’s weight to protect it’s overseas interests, and if China feels that spending more will give them even more regional military dominance, and if India feels the same, then those three powers alone will most likely outspend what America is currently spending to fill the void. And countries like Iran will spend even more because they will see opportunity in a world less dominated by one supreme military superpower, and instead more loosely dominated by regional powers who may be at odds with each other. Japan, Israel, South Korea…all will spend more if they have to rely less on the US being so dominant and offering them the protection of the powerful alliance they have with the US. Guess we’ll see, since I think that especially the younger 'dopers will live to see such a world. Will it be a world of peace and goodness and light without the American military war machine keeping it down, as advocated by Der Trihs and Commissar, or will it be a world of more war and strife, with even large regional powers directly or indirectly butting heads and smaller nations seeing opportunity for themselves because the US defense is no longer so dominant? Time will tell. -XT ---
**Author:** ![Simplicio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c37758/32.png) [@Simplicio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simplicio)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2011, 3:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/25 "2011-05-28T03:46:54Z")
> [@xtisme](#): > > Definitely. You go by the mission. The mission of the US military has been to be the dominant military force on the entire planet for the last 2 decades, and to try and achieve at least parity with the Soviets before that. The reason we spend so much both relative to our GDP and in absolute terms is in an attempt to maintain that dominance. Whether you think that’s a good thing or a bad thing is irrelevant…it was the goal. I think its a decent goal, but I also think we spend more then we have to even to be the dominant military power. If we went from 11 aircraft carriers to 6, 14 ballistic missile submarines to 7, one fifth generation fighter instead of two, etc, etc. We’d still be the dominant military power. We spend six times the amount of the next closest country (and most of the top ten are our allies). If we only spent three times as much, I we’d still be the dominant military power. > [@](#): > > The fact that other countries spend much less is because either they rely on the US defense (or war machine) for protection or there is no point, since spending a lot more still wouldn’t bring them to parity with the US…not unless the US stopped or > vastly cut it’s spending. I think the largest reason is simply because we’re the only ones that can afford it. Our military spending is more then the entire GDPs of all but the 18 or so richest countries. If we spent half as much, we could not only still spend more then most other countries, we could still spend more then most other countries mathematically _could_ spend. Which I think is another strong point for such cuts. In the end, the size of your military power is pretty dependent on the size of your economy. A rich country can increase spending and build a bigger military if changing geopolitical situation requires it, but a poor country can’t. So spending more money on economic infrastructure and the like isn’t only a good idea economically, I think its actually better for our longterm military dominance then another couple submarines wandering aimlessly around the Pacific would be. ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2011, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/26 "2011-05-28T03:58:55Z")
It’s possibly worth noting that the primary reason for the fall of the U.S.S.R. was that the Soviet economy could no longer support their military budget. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2011, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/27 "2011-05-28T04:17:57Z")
[QUOTE=Simplicio] I think its a decent goal, but I also think we spend more then we have to even to be the dominant military power. If we went from 11 aircraft carriers to 6, 14 ballistic missile submarines to 7, one fifth generation fighter instead of two, etc, etc. We’d still be the dominant military power. We spend six times the amount of the next closest country (and most of the top ten are our allies). If we only spent three times as much, I we’d still be the dominant military power. [/QUOTE] We might still be technologically dominant, but our technological dominance would be spread thinner. With fewer carriers you wouldn’t be able to cover as much of the world, since the things do need to be down for maintenance and can only cover so much area. With fewer fighters the loss of any one becomes more critical and again they are spread thinner. Same with the rest…you either cover less or you spread them thinner and thinner. To paraphrase from Lord of the Rings you spread your butter thinner and thinner on your toast until your capabilities are all thin and stretchy…and then when something breaks it’s much more critical. In the end, if we want to maintain such a level of dominance it’s going to cost us. If not, then not…and we’ll have to see what happens. I don’t think it will be good for us OR the world, but it’s going to happen sooner or later. We can’t afford to maintain dominance of this level indefinitely. We can’t have the best technology, the best training, the best equipment AND numerical superiority in the top technological weapons forever…something has to give sometime. > [@](#): > > I think the largest reason is simply because we’re the only ones that can afford it. Our military spending is more then the entire GDPs of all but the 18 or so richest countries. If we spent half as much, we could not only still spend more then most other countries, we could still spend more then most other countries mathematically could spend. But the EU COULD spend more. China COULD spend more. India COULD spend more. Japan COULD spend more. Many countries have the ability to spend more…but there isn’t any reason for them to do so. Why should the EU spend more on it’s military? It would mean tradeoffs that would be uncomfortable for them. China would have to slow it’s progress. India too. Here’s the thing…if they don’t need to, or if it won’t really achieve their goals, why should they? No matter how much China spends they will be years behind us and numerically inferior in the top of the line equipment and overall training. The EU doesn’t have to spend as much as they could or probably should because we are their allies, and we spend what needs to be spent to ensure western military dominance of the planet. Japan is the same thing…we have their back. But if we didn’t then those countries would have to spend more to protect their own interests. Who else is going to protect their interests in a world where the US is just another military power? Unless you feel, like some in this thread, that the world has fundamentally changed and that the need for military strength is no longer needed, SOMEONE has to spend the money for that strength to protect overseas interests. Today, trade and resources are a global affair, and that trade and those resources could be attacked or cut off if no one is there to protect them…or threaten massive retaliation if they are attacked or interdicted. When the US is no longer able to project power overseas, or isn’t able to project it at such a dominant level, then it’s going to occur to some folks out there that there might be some opportunities opening up…and it’s going to occur to the folks who’s interests are threatened that they are going to need to protect those interests. Heck, long before the US military completely wanes I expect many nations to start seriously bumping up their military spending. -XT ---
**Author:** ![Simplicio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c37758/32.png) [@Simplicio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simplicio)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2011, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/28 "2011-05-28T04:40:07Z")
> [@xtisme](#): > > We might still be technologically dominant, but our technological dominance would be spread thinner. With fewer carriers you wouldn’t be able to cover as much of the world, since the things do need to be down for maintenance and can only cover so much area. With fewer fighters the loss of any one becomes more critical and again they are spread thinner. Same with the rest…you either cover less or you spread them thinner and thinner. To paraphrase from Lord of the Rings you spread your butter thinner and thinner on your toast until your capabilities are all thin and stretchy…and then when something breaks it’s much more critical. I don’t really understand what “thinner” means in this context. I guess there would be fewer aircraft carriers per unit of area of the planets surface, but we seem to send aircraft carriers to troubled parts of the world, not just rely on them to be in the neighborhood, so I don’t really think the instantaneous nearness of an aircraft carrier is a big deal. Has there been a situation where the US has needed an aircraft carrier “right there” unexpectedly? > [@](#): > > In the end, if we want to maintain such a level of dominance it’s going to cost us. It will cost us something, I think it could cost us much less. > [@](#): > > But if we didn’t then those countries would have to spend more to protect their own interests. Who else is going to protect their interests in a world where the US is just another military power? Unless you feel, like some in this thread, that the world has fundamentally changed and that the need for military strength is no longer needed, SOMEONE has to spend the money for that strength to protect overseas interests. Today, trade and resources are a global affair, and that trade and those resources could be attacked or cut off if no one is there to protect them…or threaten massive retaliation if they are attacked or interdicted. When the US is no longer able to project power overseas, or isn’t able to project it at such a dominant level, then it’s going to occur to some folks out there that there might be some opportunities opening up…and it’s going to occur to the folks who’s interests are threatened that they are going to need to protect those interests. Heck, long before the US military completely wanes I expect many nations to start seriously bumping up their military spending. > > -XT At what point is this going to occur. If we had one fewer aircraft carriers, would the rest of the world suddenly sense weakness and jump at the chance to build up their militaries. I agree if the US abandoned the global reach of its miitary this might happen, I don’t think it will happen if we simply cut back to five times our nearest rival instead of six times. Plus, even if the rest of the world suddenly goes on a navy building binge, it would take them decades to catch up with even a much reduced US military. And its not like a blue water navy is something you can build on the down-low. If the rest of the world decides to double their military budget, we can just do the same, and they’ll be back in the same situation as before. ---
**Author:** ![Simplicio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c37758/32.png) [@Simplicio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simplicio)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2011, 4:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/29 "2011-05-28T04:54:03Z")
> [@Frank](#): > > It’s possibly worth noting that the primary reason for the fall of the U.S.S.R. was that the Soviet economy could no longer support their military budget. I hear this a lot, but I’m not sure its true. Do you have a cite (preferably one with numbers). In the last ten years of the Soviet Union, its economy almost doubled in size, while Gorbachav tried to reduce the size of the army. I’d expect that total military spending as a percentage of GDP actually shrank pretty rapidly during much of the 80’s, (though I can’t find a source that actually gives Soviet military spending over time) which seems counter to it causing the collapse of the USSR. ---
**Author:** ![Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e36b37/32.png) [@Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airman_Doors_USAF)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2011, 5:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/30 "2011-05-28T05:46:41Z")
> [@Simplicio](#): > > I hear this a lot, but I’m not sure its true. Do you have a cite (preferably one with numbers). In the last ten years of the Soviet Union, its economy almost doubled in size, while Gorbachav tried to reduce the size of the army. I’d expect that total military spending as a percentage of GDP actually shrank pretty rapidly during much of the 80’s, (though I can’t find a source that actually gives Soviet military spending over time) which seems counter to it causing the collapse of the USSR. [ > [@](#): > > By the mid-1980s, the Soviet Union devoted between 15 and 17 percent of its annual gross national product to military spending, according to United States government sources. Until the early 1980s, Soviet defense expenditures rose between 4 and 7 percent per year. Subsequently, they slowed as the yearly growth in Soviet GNP slipped to about 3 percent. In 1987 Gorbachev and other party officials discussed the extension of glasnost’ to military affairs through the publication of a detailed Soviet defense budget. In early 1989, Gorbachev announced a military budget of 77.3 billion rubles, but Western authorities estimated the budget to be about twice that. ]([Russian Military Spending](http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/russia/mo-budget.htm)) They quite literally spent themselves out of existence trying to “keep up”. As a percentage of GDP we were not anywhere close to where they were, and as a result they quite literally threw in the towel. ---
**Author:** ![Simplicio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c37758/32.png) [@Simplicio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Simplicio)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2011, 6:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/31 "2011-05-28T06:03:35Z")
> [@Airman\_Doors\_USAF](#): > > [URL=“[Russian Military Spending](http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/russia/mo-budget.htm)”] > > They quite literally spent themselves out of existence trying to “keep up”. As a percentage of GDP we were not anywhere close to where they were, and as a result they quite literally threw in the towel. My question was about the change in Soviet military spending during their last decade though. In their last ten years, GDP almost doubled while Gorbachav was trying to cut military spending, so I suspect military spending as a fraction of GDP was actually falling pretty quickly. It may have been high in absolute terms, but was it rising or falling? Annoyingly, no one seems to have a table of Soviet military expenditures by year. I realize their official budgets were fake, but I’d think by now someone would’ve put together an estimate of their actual spending by year. (ETA: also, note your cite gives a value of 15-17% of GDP in the mid-eighties, but an average value of 30%, which supports my guess that spending was actually falling rapidly as a share of the economy during the 80’s). ---
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2011, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/32 "2011-05-28T07:35:43Z")
The defense budget isn’t just about national security in a traditional way. The defense budget also supports science and technology. The biggest things that come to mind is collaboration between NASA, armed forces, and the private sectors. I rather enjoy my GPS! (: ---
**Author:** ![Farmer\_Jane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Farmer\_Jane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farmer_Jane)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2011, 7:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/33 "2011-05-28T07:41:49Z")
> [@Simplicio](#): > > I think its a decent goal, but I also think we spend more then we have to even to be the dominant military power. If we went from 11 aircraft carriers to 6, 14 ballistic missile submarines to 7, one fifth generation fighter instead of two, etc, etc. We’d still be the dominant military power. We spend six times the amount of the next closest country (and most of the top ten are our allies). If we only spent three times as much, I we’d still be the dominant military power. > > I think the largest reason is simply because we’re the only ones that can afford it. Our military spending is more then the entire GDPs of all but the 18 or so richest countries. If we spent half as much, we could not only still spend more then most other countries, we could still spend more then most other countries mathematically _could_ spend. > > Which I think is another strong point for such cuts. In the end, the size of your military power is pretty dependent on the size of your economy. A rich country can increase spending and build a bigger military if changing geopolitical situation requires it, but a poor country can’t. So spending more money on economic infrastructure and the like isn’t only a good idea economically, I think its actually better for our longterm military dominance then another couple submarines wandering aimlessly around the Pacific would be. What do you think would happen if we cut military spending? Do we try to balance the budget or give it to another program? And then what happens to those jobs? I mean, if you want to cut spending in regards to unused aircraft or some such, I can understand that. I’m all about making things more _efficient_. But there are 10,000 ways we could improve our military with a budget increase in some areas - so I’d rather see cash shifted around. There’s no reason why the Army should have trouble meeting recruitment standards (and have to lower test score requirements - ugh!) or why the armed forces can’t increase benefits for active and veteran members. i know that’s not part of the DoD budget, but you get what I mean. thoughts? ---
**Author:** ![Try2B\_Comprehensive](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/try2b_comprehensive/32/65_2.png) [@Try2B\_Comprehensive](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Try2B_Comprehensive)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2011, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/34 "2011-05-28T14:43:48Z")
I don’t have the exact figures on Soviet military spending, but see [Exaggeration Of The Threat: Then And Now](http://pubrecord.org/commentary/5161/exaggeration-threat-then/): > [@](#): > > A recently declassified study on Soviet intentions during the Cold War identifies significant failures in U.S. intelligence analysis on Soviet military intentions and demonstrates the constant exaggeration of the Soviet threat. > [@](#): > > In the 1980s, long after Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev signaled reduced growth in Soviet defense spending, the CIA produced a series of National Intelligence Estimates (NIEs) titled “Soviet Capabilities for Strategic Nuclear Conflict,” which concluded that the Soviet Union sought “superior capabilities to fight and win a nuclear war with the United States, and have been working to improve their chances of prevailing in such a conflict.” > [@](#): > > The CIA ignored the Soviet slowdown in the growth of military procurement, exaggerated the capabilities of important strategic systems, and distorted the military and economic power of the Warsaw Pact states. As late as 1986, the CIA reported that the per capita income of East Germany was ahead of West Germany and that the national income per capita was higher in the Soviet Union than in Italy. Several years later, the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact collapsed, and former CIA director Stansfield Turner wrote that the “corporate view” at the CIA “missed by a mile.” > [@](#): > > in 1975, presidential chief of staff Dick Cheney and secretary of defense Donald Rumsfeld introduced a group of neoconservatives, led by Harvard professor Richard Pipes, to the CIA in order to make sure that future NIEs would falsely conclude that the Soviet Union rejected nuclear parity, were bent on fighting and winning a nuclear war, and were radically increasing their military spending. > > The neocons (known as Team B) and the CIA (Team A) then wrongly predicted a series of Soviet weapons developments that never took place, including directed energy weapons, mobile ABM systems, and anti-satellite capabilities. CIA deputy director Gates used this worst-case reasoning in a series of speeches to insinuate himself with CIA director Bill Casey and the Reagan administration. > [@](#): > > The exaggeration of the Soviet threat in the 1980s led to an additional trillion and a half dollars in defense spending against a Soviet Union that was in decline and a Soviet military threat that was disappearing. It is time to recognize the great harm that was done to the intelligence community and the CIA with the politicization of intelligence in the 1980s as well as the militarization of intelligence over the past twenty years. I’m curious what others think of this. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2011, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/35 "2011-05-28T20:02:58Z")
[QUOTE=Simplicio] I don’t really understand what “thinner” means in this context. I guess there would be fewer aircraft carriers per unit of area of the planets surface, but we seem to send aircraft carriers to troubled parts of the world, not just rely on them to be in the neighborhood, so I don’t really think the instantaneous nearness of an aircraft carrier is a big deal. Has there been a situation where the US has needed an aircraft carrier “right there” unexpectedly? [/QUOTE] Well, Korea springs to mind, but the point is that as the carriers are there and everyone knows they are there we haven’t had to use them very often. The thing is, the carriers can only cover so much territory, and they do need to be down for maintenance from time to time…and often maintenance or upgrades can take months or even a year. So, as you have fewer of them that means you have to cover more area with fewer assets…and you have less reserve if something breaks. I’ll put it in terms of a help desk. When you build a help desk that has to be manned 24/7/365 you don’t hire just enough (or slightly less) people to man the thing…you hire more than enough and you rotate them. That accomplishes several things. First, it doesn’t burn out your people (at least no faster than they would get burned out anyway doing that kind of job). Secondly, if someone gets sick or something else that prevents them from working (or quits without notice) then you have other people who you can draw on to take their shift and fill in for the until the person can come back to work or until you can hire someone else to fill in. > [@](#): > > It will cost us something, I think it could cost us much less. Depends on what you mean. Not having dominance might cost us less in military spending, but it might end up costing us more in other things. It depends on the details of what we are talking about. Cut the entire defense budget to $300 billion? That would be a pretty large cut back, depending on how you propose to do it. If it’s a slow cut back over years or decades with the goal of getting the budget to $300 billion then it might not have any effect at all. The military could adapt over a few decades, change it’s hardware and mission, perhaps go to greater automation…and our allies would have time to slowly ramp up their own capabilities if it’s felt there will be gaps or soft spots in our collective military projection and response capabilities. If we are talking about cutting back to that in a year or a few years or immediately then that’s something else entirely. > [@](#): > > At what point is this going to occur. If we had one fewer aircraft carriers, would the rest of the world suddenly sense weakness and jump at the chance to build up their militaries. I agree if the US abandoned the global reach of its miitary this might happen, I don’t think it will happen if we simply cut back to five times our nearest rival instead of six times. It’s hard to predict. Would taking out one carrier (permanently) put our entire global military stance in jeopardy? Probably not…we have carriers down for long periods at times now. It would just mean that the remaining carriers would have to pick up the slack, and when one of the remaining ones goes down it would put even more stress on the situation. Two carriers permanently out of service? Three? Four? Five? At what point would you have to fundamentally change your entire operations stance and basically say that we can’t do the mission anymore…we can’t cover all the places we think we might need to, or if we cover them it will take extra days or weeks to get into that coverage? And at what point are we spread so thin that if something unexpected (or even expected) happens it leaves a huge hole in that coverage that simply can’t be filled? I don’t know. We work our carriers pretty hard at their current strength…and we work the crews pretty hard already as well. Cut one carrier out and they will have to work and be worked a bit harder. Two…three…four. At some point we simply won’t be able to do the mission as defined today. Whether you or others think that mission is worth doing or that we should be doing it is, of course, debatable. If it’s not necessary anymore because the world has become a kinder, gentler place, and nation states are no longer interested in playing power games with their neighbors or in attacking other nations overseas resources or trade, then that’s fine. We won’t really know until the grip of Pax-Americana loosens sufficiently that other nations feel they COULD project power successfully at least locally. > [@](#): > > Plus, even if the rest of the world suddenly goes on a navy building binge, it would take them decades to catch up with even a much reduced US military. And its not like a blue water navy is something you can build on the down-low. If the rest of the world decides to double their military budget, we can just do the same, and they’ll be back in the same situation as before. The navy is only one aspect. If you are China, you don’t NEED a large navy (unless you are thinking of trying a forced entry invasion of Taiwan or something dippy like that). WE need a large navy because that’s what we use for global power project and as the front line in protecting our overseas interests. It’s the big stick that we have and no one else does. But if the US gets out of the game, that doesn’t mean someone else will get into it in the same way. I think that the EU probably would have to build up a real blue water navy capability…but it would be one focused on protecting their interests, not on the same sort of dominance the US has tried to maintain. If you cut the US budget to $300 billion then it’s going to leave gaps in all the branches…and probably going to mean that our R&D and procurement of new weapons systems comes to a halt. Much of that money would go to paying the soldiers and sailors, paying for their benefits, and maintaining the equipment we already have (some percentage of which we couldn’t afford to even continue to maintain)…there wouldn’t be a lot for new stuff. Sure…the fighters, ships and even tanks can last for decades, even centuries in some cases (I think a US carrier is designed to last at least 50 years if not more, and we have B-52 bombers that old or older that are still in service), but today we constantly upgrade their capabilities and systems. And we are always researching new innovations and systems. I guess it depends on how we would cut that budget and over what time frame as to what effect it might or might not have on our and our allies security. I seriously doubt that any of our allies (not including the citizens of our allies countries) would think it’s a good idea for the US to suddenly or even over a few years make such drastic cut backs. Of course a lot of that is because they rely on us to a greater or lesser extent to be the main backbone of Western defense and global military power projection, with them filling in the gaps or providing enhancements. -XT ---
**Author:** ![Gukumatz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/74df32/32.png) [@Gukumatz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gukumatz)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2011, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/36 "2011-05-29T04:28:50Z")
It’s always interesting to me to see the difference in American and western European thinking of military capabilites. Most Americans I’ve talked to sees the US as the “fist in the glove” of NATO, with NATO’s task essentially being to hold steady until they can mobilize and get there, while Europeans tend to see NATO and the US-M as running paralell courses. (For European defence interests, that is.) For what it’s worth, I’m more inclined towards the American way of thinking, though I do see a lot of ground being covered twice. ---
**Author:** ![ralph124c](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8797f3/32.png) [@ralph124c](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ralph124c)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2011, 11:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/37 "2011-05-30T11:36:40Z")
The Russians are attempting to have a blue-water navy on a shoestring-which means their nuclear subs are manned by poorly trained sailors, and accidents aplenty continue. The fact is, you cannot have nuclear subs withot spending the money to have highly trained crews. Given that, do we really need 20+ SSBNs? The Chinese are being wise-they spend their money on useful stuff (dams, highways, power plants)-while we go bankrupt patrolling the world. And when we decide to go on these il-advised military junkets (Afghanistan, Iraq, Somali, Libya)-what do we wind up accomplishing? Usually nothing-except geting a lot of young men killed and maimed for life. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2011, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/38 "2011-05-30T15:41:27Z")
Relative to their GDP the Chinese spend quite a bit on defense (the known figure IIRC is close to $100 billion…and a lot of people think that they spend a lot more than what they admit too). -XT ---
**Author:** ![billfish678](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7bcc69/32.png) [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2011, 3:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/39 "2011-05-30T15:59:15Z")
One aspect of having a military much bigger than any other given countries military. Your pool of the “best of the best” is likely to be both bigger and or better than the other countries “best of the best”. Its not a given but IMO it is likely. In combat its not the just size that matters, its the skill level of the combatants. Bigger is always a plus but better can sure help things along too. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2011, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392/40 "2011-05-30T18:44:01Z")
Quoth **xtisme** : > [@](#): > > But the EU COULD spend more. China COULD spend more. India COULD spend more. Japan COULD spend more. Many countries have the ability to spend more…but there isn’t any reason for them to do so. Why should the EU spend more on it’s military? It would mean tradeoffs that would be uncomfortable for them. China would have to slow it’s progress. India too. If there’s no reason for them to spend more, why isn’t the same true for us? What makes us different from the EU or Japan, that we need to spend so much money and they don’t? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/make-the-case-for-a-300-billion-defense-budget/583392.md?page=3)