Nation Should Spend Less, Not More, on the Military

This was originally published as a Letter to the Editor on Sept. 13, 2016 in the St. Louis Post Dispatch

Donald Trump wants a dramatic expansion of the military: 65,000 more in the army, 13 more Marine Battalions, 70 more naval ships, 87 more fighter planes. He will pay for these resources with savings derived largely from that old favorite – cutting “waste, fraud and abuse.” The additional cost has been estimated to be around $80 -$90 billion a year.

Does Trump know that the nation is already engaged in a massive arms race? The Navy is planning to replace our 11 aircraft carriers with Gerald Ford class carriers that cost more than $13 billion each, and our 14 Ohio class submarines expected to cost $7 billion each. The Airforce wants 2400 F-35 fighters (total current estimated cost – $370 billion) and up to 100 B-21 ($50 to $100 billion). Does he know that the US spends on the order of $8 billion in Missile Defense systems that have not been shown to work?

Does he realize the amount of military funding that comes from our allies? China spends around $200 billion annually and Russia around $70 billion. Compare that with Saudi Arabia ($85 billion) the United Kingdom ($55 billion), Japan ($55 billion), France ($50 billion), India ($50 billion), South Korea ($48 billion), Germany ($40 billion), Brazil ($ 24 billion), Australia ($23 billion), Italy ($22 billion), Israel ($17 billion). Add these to the roughly $600 billion in the US military budget, and total annual expenditures are more than trillion for the United States and major allies versus $270 billion for Russia and China.

Trump does not seem to understand that we have far more military resources than our potential adversaries. Nor does he offer a believable way to pay for his wish list.