How Much Defense Spending Is Enough?

This is a debate that has gone on-and-on and around the mulberry bush ever since the end of World War II. How much should the United States spend on defense and what is it getting for the money that is spent? The “Far Left” cries out for as little as possible, the “hardcore conservatives” for as much as can be imagined. Certainly with the cost of the U.S. military and its hardware the country needs a lot of money to purchase any capability at all.

U.S. military members are volunteers who are relatively well compensated with excellent benefits compared to the conscript, mass armies of the past. This means that an individual soldier with his basic equipment is expensive. Add the cost of providing modern weapons and communications systems as well as the relatively high level of supplies and it costs a lot of money. Since 9/11 with the two deployments to Afghanistan and Iraq the cost of fighting has increased greatly.

Add to all this that many in Congress rely on defense spending and programs to prop up the economy back home and you get an even bigger multiplier. John Murtha (D-PA) is just one of 535 people steering funds homeward; he is just bigger and better at it due to his position and influence. This micromanagement of the budget to include things like breast cancer research only adds to the actual cost. So you end up with events like the local Senator and Congressman leading a rally for more aircraft to be built by Boeing in St. Louis.

Some suggest a floor based on the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) with some minimum percentage. Here at Human Events they lobby for four percent of the GDP. Others just say we spend too much and should just cut it twenty-five or fifty percent like Barney Frank (D-MA).

In theory the defense budget is built upon a validated set of requirements that leads to a properly defined force structure equipped with the necessary weapons. The weapons are developed and procured in a well managed manner. Each service has its unique roles and missions that complement the others. This Cato@Liberty blog post describes the history of defense acquisition reform and why it really won’t save you money to do it again like Obama has done with the recent reform law.

In reality the services work together to get the systems they want coordinated and approved. Then the budget is not necessarily divided up proportional to the actual efforts by the services in the current operations. If that was true the U.S. Army and Marine Corps would have the lion’s share of the budget and people. The Air Force and Navy contribute through air support and reconnaissance but their primary weapon systems are not being used in Iraq and Afghanistan. In fact they find their personnel being used to augment Army and Marine Corps troops in roles such as security, support and economic rebuilding.

In order to get U.S. defense spending at a right amount a reevaluation of the roles and missions of the Armed Forces is necessary and then spending should be adjusted for that. This is what is supposed to happen every four years with the Quadrennial Defense Reviews (QDR) begun under Clinton. These support the preparation of five year budget plans for Congress. Of course in his first budget Obama and Gates only provide one years planning. It will be in the 2011 budget that we will start to really see things happen. The big worry for the Services and the defense contractor community are major across-the-board cuts. It won’t be for about ten months before we know.