My point of departure for this post is this complaint from Jonathan Kay:
Are we witnessing the end of the “American age”? It depends whom you ask. But one thing is certain: Thanks to the near-bankruptcy of the American welfare state, Washington is losing both the means and desire to project power across the world. Inevitably, nations with deeper pockets — China, most notably — will fill the void.
There are so many things wrong with just those few words it’s hard to know where to start. China’s military is mostly useful for internal use. Our military has the ability to project power without peer in the world today. So much so that it promotes overconfidence in our allies, stealth in our prospective adversaries, and alarm in those sitting on the fence. It should. We spend enough on it.
The most egregiously wrong thing with it is this: if we elected to do so, we could pay the public debt with the stroke of a pen or, more accurately, with electronic credits to accounts held on computers. That, too, would have consequences but it’s possible.
The United States isn’t bankrupt. In practical terms it can’t go bankrupt. It’s just profligate which is a somewhat different proposition.
Dave, I have a question.
Over at OTB, the proprietor (whom I respect and admire greatly) posited that our defense budget was 50% too big. 50%? Wow.
I’m in the corporate world. Every company I have seen (except 1) had expense reduction potential. But 50% expense reduction potential? Holy cow.
How do we project power under those numbers?
I’ve said this here a dozen times. I know what I know, and I know what I don’t know. I don’t know foreign policy and defense. I know business.
Whatup with huge defense reductions etc?
I know that James and I share similar views on this subject. We both think that military spending can be cut substantially, much of the cost-cutting being done by reducing the size of the standing military and reorganizing the balance.
We presently have 76 B-52 bombers, 345 A-10 assault aircraft, just shy of 1,000 F-16 fighters, and a vast number of various kinds of support aircraft. Why? What’s the mission for these aircraft? What enemy will they face? Surely substantial cuts can be made there. We should also scale back the standing Army. We have a half million active service in the Army and another half million in National Guard and Reserves. Those can be cut back substantially, too. I would have removed our forces from Afghanistan years ago, scaled back the Army and Air Force, reunited the Army and Air Force, and cut the number of general officers sharply along with the staffs.
I’d largely leave the Navy and Marine Corps alone.
I think there’s plenty of room for reducing activities and reducing the size of the force without compromising our actual security. It might mean that our allies might actually have to start living up to their treaty obligations but you can’t make an omelet without breaking eggs.
Thanks, Dave.
I just have to process and think about this.
Ain’t my expertise.
As a follow up. When you are talking war, don’t you want just overwhealming power?
By that I mean I don’t want 10 F-16’s, I want 50. I want anyone who wants to screw with us to think very hard and carefully, or we will crush them. Someone has to be the policeman who makes the crooks (who are inherently nuts) think twice.
How do you and James think about that?
You are forgetting all of the money we spend maintaining our nuclear arsenal. Cut it back to what we need. We dont need to have more nukes than other countries. If we have enough to destroy the world 3 times over and someone else has enough to destroy it 10 times, let them bear the costs of the maintenance. We dont need to increase ours also.
50% seems high. Doctrine has been that we should be able to maintain two simultaneous land wars. I think one major war and one minor should be adequate. 25%-30% seems more doable. Gotta pay for DARPA.
Steve
I can’t speak for James. Are we really expecting to fight Russia and China in conventional warfare at the same time? We still have twice as many fighter jets or long range bombers. If it gets to that, it will be nuclear war not conventional warfare.
steve:
DARPA is barely a rounding error. $3 billion out of a budget of about $700 billion.
You speak of “allies” and “treaty obligations.” How about putting ourselves in a position where there are no allies, no foes and no treaty obligations? At least none in Europe and the Mideast. How about becoming a nation again and not an Empire?
Ken Hoop:
Empires are the only states with allies? With enemies and treaty commitments?
I know almost everyone here knows this, but full disclosure: My bread is buttered by the defense department.
Yes, theoretically, one could reduce defense spending to just about any level. Of course that is true for any government program. The problem with arbitrary percentage reductions is that those claims are completely divorced from military capability. So, let’s say we reduce defense spending by 50%. After scrubbing priorities, what would that buy you? I have no idea and I seriously doubt anyone else does either. So I think claims that defense spending could be cut by X% don’t come with much credibility because it’s just an isolated assertion.
As I’ve said before on this subject, it’s more important to identify what one wants the military to do. The ability to maintain high levels of readiness, to deploy and sustain forces around the world on short notice, all while maintaining a qualitative advantage in terms of equipment and training is very expensive. We have structured our commitments around the world to provide the credible ability to assist allies in a timely manner with sufficient forces defend allies and deter enemies.
Still, I think there are still significant savings to be had without altering commitments significantly. I’ll just reiterate the necessity for major structural reform of our national security institutions. For the DoD specifically, there must be major procurement reform, an overhaul of the personnel system, a scrub of roles/missions, and a reexamination of compensation and benefits for the uniformed military and civilians. I don’t know how much that could save, but given what I see everyday and what I’ve seen for the last 20 years, I think it would be a lot.
If we reduce our commitments abroad I think we could see huge savings by moving the bulk of the ground and air forces out of active service and into the reserves. That would be very difficult politically, but everyone needs a fantasy. Our allies would need to understand that we would have to mobilize those reserve forces before we could come to their aid beyond the token ready forces we’d have available at any one time. Mobilization is typically measured in months.
Steve,
The two-war strategy really only exists on paper. Our ability to actually fight and win two major regional wars is completely dependent on the scope and character of those wars. Right now our ground forces have engaged in light infantry-centric ground wars for so long that most units are no longer trained or qualified to fight a high-intensity conventional conflict. The air and naval forces are in much better shape.
Ken,
The US has never been in a position where it has “no allies” “no foes” and “no treaty obligations.” There is simply zero chance that could ever happen. And we should have no allies in Europe? That has never existed in US history and it’s not something that’s achievable or desirable.
Dave
I know we are not fighting Russia or China. That is Armadeddon.
But there are flies all aroud and we swat at them. I’m really not a militarist. But I think there are crazies out there. I think if they think we will not just eliminate them, they will create havok, just because they can.( Heh – like my commenting style)
Seriously, what do you do?
“Right now our ground forces have engaged in light infantry-centric ground wars for so long that most units are no longer trained or qualified to fight a high-intensity conventional conflict. ”
Gian Gentile has been making that claim for years. If we have to fight China and Russia at the same time, our foreign policy has failed. I think the two war scenario is probably something more like Venezuela and Thailand. (Just as examples, not that we are heading to war with them.)
Steve
The US is not bankrupt in the sense that nobody is bankrupt if their creditors keep loaning them additional funds. But this is a situation that depends on the other major currency areas remaining a poorer deal. If that ever changes, there would be a rush for the exits and refinance would become difficult without engaging in drastic choices that would likely lead to hyperinflation.
Our debt exceeds the size of our economy. We are largely spending it on consumption goods, not investments with real positive rates of return that justify the expenditure. That our bankers are temporarily constrained from pulling the rug out from under us is cold comfort.
Andy:
I’m not entirely pulling the numbers I’m talking about out of my rear end. I think that between 2% and 3% of GDP is reasonable, affordable, and, indeed, what we expect from ourselves and our NATO allies. Present GDP is roughly $15 trillion. Consequently, 2% would be $300 billion per year and 3% would be $450 billion per year compared with the roughly $700 billion per year we’re spending now.
The question then become how much real military capability can we buy for 3% of GDP? That’s something I leave to the experts but I find it incredible that we can’t, as is claimed by some hawks, cut a dime from our present military spending without putting our national security at risk.
Dave,
I don’t recall you ever suggesting one could simply and easily reduce defense spending by 50%, so my comment wasn’t aimed at you.
$450 billion should be doable couple of years. The baseline 2013 budget is a bit over $500 billion (it is probably less with the sequester, but I’m not sure) and Afghanistan and what’s left of Iraq add about $90 billion to that. So once Afghanistan is finally over, I’d estimate the budget will be around $525 billion in constant dollars. I think one could get another $75 billion a year through the reforms I mentioned earlier.