Defense Budget

I once heard that our military spending was more than that of all other countries combined. I dont know if I believe that but Im not too concerned with how the precise numbers compare. I do see that we have military spending more than 6X the next country, which happens to be the largest country in the world with the largest army, much larger than our own especially if you count paramilitary. What is the cause behind our MASSIVE military expenditures? I am sure $100billion could easily be taken off that without any decrease in our security. I see that there is talk of government shutdown with all budget disagreement, but thats NOT what I want to talk about. I don't want this to be a party issue. I want to know why we spend such an absurdly high amount and what the supposed reasoning behind it is. Is this really justified and necessary? I wouldnt think so..but I dont really know, thats why I am asking.

I welcome any valuable insight.

Two and a half wars, lots of "black projects" we'll never see or hear of, massive cost overruns (see F-35 Joint Strike Fighter), stuff the military doesn't want (extra C-17 transport planes) or that is not effective in the current threat environment (did you know the F-22 stealth fighter has not been qualified to carry ANY air-to-ground ordnance as of right now?), general waste, kickbacks to the military industrial complex, you name it. Part of the reason China is so strong right now is that it considers its economic stability as a part of its national defense. We don't. Any budget that does not include meaningful cuts to military spending (and I'm not just talking reshuffling funds, I mean REAL cuts) is not worth considering! Even SecDef Robert Gates has said as much.

The current Secretary of Defense seems much more intelligent than past ones. He cut the F-22 Raptor program to save money since it is not useful in today's type of conflicts.

fritzsch wrote: .....What is the cause behind our MASSIVE military expenditures?....

Giving a free pass to anything labeled "national defense".

It costs a lot of money to make war suitable for airing on CNN.

DILYSI Dave wrote: It costs a lot of money to make war suitable for airing on CNN.

What do you mean by this? I dont really know what you are getting at.

I quickly looked up some general information on the F-35, wow that doesnt seem to be carried out terribly well...the software coding went from 85% done down to 50% done in less than a year.

Does anyone know if the money that goes to the reconstruction of afghanistan or iraq counts in the military spending? Or is that considered developmental aid?

All through history, wars involved sending massive numbers of soldiers out to be slaughtered on the battlefield. With instant TV & internet coverage of battles and collateral damage, these days the western world has no tolerance for that much bloodshed of their own peoples or civilians, so we launch tamahawk missiles at $1,000,000 a pop instead or develop and fly robotic airplanes or conduct satellite reconnaissance instead. The result is that far, far few Americans are dying on the battlefield than ever before and fewer civilians are killed, but the cost of war has reached unimaginable levels.

RexSeven wrote: ...or that is not effective in the current threat environment (did you know the F-22 stealth fighter has not been qualified to carry ANY air-to-ground ordnance as of right now?)

Well, yeah. It's an air superiority fighter. It shoots down planes. Is that currently useful? No. Are there some very scary airplanes in the hands of potential baddies? Yes.

Nobody complained when the one-trick pony* F-15A-D racked up a 100+ to 0 air-to-air record. The E is so different as to not really be lumped in with the rest of them.

Why waste money making the F-22 do something it's not going to be any good at? A-10s are stupid cheap, as are F-16s these days. Use those for CAS/strike missions.

*The IAF's F-15's have dropped a few bombs before.

RexSeven wrote: kickbacks to the military industrial complex,

Currently, I make those.. I take umbrage with most of your comments, especially this one. are we perfect, nope.. But, I think you need to explain the source of your comment or retract it.

I can't tell you a lot, but I can tell you that the government is way more cost conscious now than it was in the 70's and 80's. Stories float around the place about people gouging the USAF for a $250 ashtray in the 80's. However, Gates effectively just told us, we won't buy less but we're going to pay less, figure it out...

Here are some interesting thoughts to ponder..

Tell me another country with Stealth bombers, fighters, etc..

Any other country with such a large presence overseas? Look at how many bases we have in Europe and Asia...

Volume of Hardware...

Different branches that use different tools, doing similar things... For example the Army and Navy use the blackhawk and seahawk respectively, but the marines love the Huey?. Volume buying = better pricing.

The government is getting better at using comerically available items on their hardware, but their specifications are still insane, requiring unique products which are $$$$$$$$$$$$$$. All pricing for all parts is available on the interwebs, if you know the part number.

nderwater wrote: , so we launch tamahawk missiles at $1,000,000 a pop instead

They cost $500k. All pricing of every piece of military hardware is available to every citizen, if they know the appropriate part numbers...

For a very concise read of the defense budget, complete with many pretty graphs and charts:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_budget_of_the_United_States

Ok One more post..

I was watching some Kathleen Madigan Standup the other day. She's hilarious. So She says she's in Afghanistan to entertain the troops and this General is giving her a briefing about the war... He talks about the roads, schools, businesses, and infrastructure that they have built....

And Madigan goes... " So when you're done here, can you invade Detroit, cause they need your help"

Lots of truth there.

Kickbacks to the Military Industrial Complex? I also take issue with that.

It's not even worth going into so I'll just leave it at this, the reason the equipment costs so much is NOT because contractors are gouging the military, it's the inane requirements we are forced to try to meet.

Like putting a COTS (Commerical Off The Shelf) circuit breaker in a switchboard design (because it's cheaper), but then having to redesign/retest/recertify all the switchboards because the shock loads are too for the COTS stuff.

So which is cheaper? Using Military spec breakers (more expensive) or making the entire system larger/heavier/more expensive, to use cheaper breakers.

I'll let you guess which is cheaper and I'll also let you guess which the route the gov't is making us take.....

M-777 towed Howitzer, $4 million dollars.

Add projectiles and powder.

Add a vehicle to haul it around.

Add a crew to maintain it.

The price of gas almost doubled this year, add that in.

How many miles per gallon do you figure a Destroyer gets. How about that fat hospital ship with all the people on it that need electricity for warmth, surgical operations and wait, they have to eat also.

Maybe my outlook is too simplistic, I agree that no organization on Earth can't tighten its belt a bit. Since Reagan in the 1980s said he would set an example with his Federal employees, all cost of living increases since then; we've only gotten half. When Bush one tried to save a few coins, he came up with "Do more with less". When someone retires, divide up everything on his desk and divvy it up among the survivors. Try that for 20 yeas and see what your workload is.

While I disagree with some of the recent activities around the world, like not calling it a Global War on Terror but a man made intervention or something (GWOT just rolls off the tongue easier) but because my commander says so, I have to.

I know you didn't intend a poopstorm Fritzsch, but put your hard hat on. These kind of queries usually go badly.

Dan

RexSeven wrote: did you know the F-22 stealth fighter has not been qualified to carry ANY air-to-ground ordnance as of right now?

That's like saying a top fuel dragster should have wider front tires, bigger sway bars, and a shorter wheelbase so it can corner better. The F-22 is the best plane in the world in its intended role.

Let's repeat the F-15 mantra: not a pound for air-to-ground.

killerkane wrote: The current Secretary of Defense seems much more intelligent than past ones. He cut the F-22 Raptor program to save money since it is not useful in today's type of conflicts.

True, but look at what was spent on it before it got cut.
We only seem to like weapon systems that are out of Star Wars, really neat and really expensive.

But there are some good systems out there that make a lot of sense. One smart bomb can be more effective than 100 sorties with dumb bombs.

Greed.

We all really know the answer. All politicians, who actually have the power to make such decisions, are backed by wealthy individuals or corporations. They want to stay in power. Therefore their decisions are made accordingly. They dangle all their political retoric to the media to sway the public to understand their decisions. The public is too busy trying to survive in their crumbling world to rise up against this deception. And so it goes.

While the public wasn't watching, actions have been taken to summarily destroy the middle class, as it's called. Therefore, the power of the few becomes even greater than the power of the many.

90% of the jobs I have applied to are involved with Missile Defense. It kind of makes me glad that we do have a big budget because otherwise I don't know if I would find a job. I am of the opinion everyone likes the idea of budget cutbacks until it effects.

If you want to stay on top, it costs money. If you like the fancy weapons systems, they cost money. Technology costs money. One of the ways the US stays out front is to be the leader in technology. I was fortunate in my previous job to visit many of the tech companies in town that design and build a lot of military projects. It is catagorically wrong to say that these people are taking money and overcharging the government for their design work. You're talking literally thousands of people on single projects. A lot of this is complicated stuff, and making it work is not an easy task.

Many people do not realize that these contracts are done on a bid basis, and usually the lowest bid as long as the company is capable of handling the contract. Also, many contracts now go to women or minority owned companies. It's a major consideration in deciding who gets what. The "good old boy" network is not a player like most people think. The govt. also pays more if you are a women or minority owned company, and if you employ more of either.

Our company was founded by a group of mostly ex NASA guys, and a few military guys. While what we do looks easy on the surface, it has taken 10 years and millions to make it work. Not govt. millions either, but money from the owners. The point is, while making a certain weapon system may look cheap to produce, the amount of money spent getting to that point has to be recouped, and if the govt. buys it, then they have to pay the R&D too.

Now, there is without a doubt a lot of waste in military spending, and there is certainly a need to do reviews on a regular basis to ensure that the money spent is spent in a way that best serves the needs of the people, but having a strong military is the number one job of the govt.

racerdave600 wrote: If you want to stay on top, it costs money. If you like the fancy weapons systems, they cost money. Technology costs money. One of the ways the US stays out front is to be the leader in technology. I was fortunate in my previous job to visit many of the tech companies in town that design and build a lot of military projects. It is catagorically wrong to say that these people are taking money and overcharging the government for their design work. You're talking literally thousands of people on single projects. A lot of this is complicated stuff, and making it work is not an easy task. Many people do not realize that these contracts are done on a bid basis, and usually the lowest bid as long as the company is capable of handling the contract. Also, many contracts now go to women or minority owned companies. It's a major consideration in deciding who gets what. The "good old boy" network is not a player like most people think. The govt. also pays more if you are a women or minority owned company, and if you employ more of either.

^This. Although the whole women/ minority thing pisses me off a little because you feel like you are constantly being passed over because you are a white man in engineering.

Call of duty needs new weaponry. That's where our funding is going.

So... I have no answer as to "Why" that isn't politically charged opine and flounder bait. I would normally fire these off and flounder this thread but I am curious to see what my fellow flounder-artists have to throw first.

The googles tells me these numbers are reasonably close to true :

• The US is roughly 4.5% of the worlds population.
• It spends 46.5% of all military spending in the world.
• The defense budget in 2010 was $737,000,000,000.
• The actual military is 20% of the entire US budget
• The CIA, Homeland Security, military contractors, mercenaries and etc are not figured in this number
• Reasonable news sources cite 33% as a nice total slice of the pie for "Defense".

So... is it the military industrial complex wielding its influence for its own self-fullfilling sake or do we really need to outspend the entire rest of the earth to keep the big bad wolf at bay?

I feel like the US tries to go for too many pie-in-the-sky projects. Yes, it is important to stay on top. But so many projects go millions and millions over budget. Plus we've just made some silly decisions (ACU's are a big WTF moment for the Army). I think if the US would just be smarter, and instead of trying to be 20 years ahead of the world, be two steps ahead (because that's where we end up anyways after a project gets delayed 10 years) and be more realistic about the modern nature of conflict we'd be doing a whole lot better.

Also, enough PMCs. I know it's a PR move and "lessen" the strain on the military, but it's nonsense. There are people who have been in 10+ years and never deployed. Granted we're finally starting to catch them, but still. You joined, pack a bag, you're going.

We have 11 Aircraft Carriers, fully staffed and planed, at any given moment. The rest of the world combined has 9. That takes money.

Giant Purple Snorklewacker wrote: So... is it the military industrial complex wielding its influence for its own self-fullfilling sake or do we really need to outspend the entire rest of the earth to keep the big bad wolf at bay?

To answer this question, read "To Rule the Waves", a history of the Royal Navy. You will see how the rise and fall of the British Empire was directly tied to it's Navy. They also secured freedom of the seas, and thus free trade. That job is now ours. No US Navy = unprotected shipping and freedom of travel on the oceans = collapse of world economy.