How much money should the U.S. actually dedicate towards its military?

As someone in the military, I can definitely tell you some monetary abuse stories, but who on here has any idea how every dollar should be appropriated?

And no, we’re not more susceptible to attack with a downsized military.

When the US and its European allies began bombing parts of Libya to help oust Qaddafi, I remember hearing a commentator say that the first bomb dropped cost more than the annual budgets for PBS and NPR combined. I have no source for that.

I believe we can spend much less on our military and still be quite safe.

I found this pie chart showing the US makes up 43% of the world’s entire military spending. That’s too much.

It’s always too much until we needed to spend it.

we should spend about ten percent of what we currently spend on the military.

@wundayatta Sorry I’m misunderstanding, ten percent less? or just ten percent period?

1) No. The military power we project to the rest of the world has just about nothing to do with ‘preserving freedom,’ and everything to do with preserving power.
2) Also no. In fact, most terrorist attacks against Americans in the last ten years (almost all) have been targeted at men and women in the armed forces serving abroad.

Seems to me that we could spend a quarter of what we currently do, withdraw from our bases around the planet and focus on our own damn problems and everyone else would actually like us a lot more.

Gadzooks, we in the US can cut back 60% or more and still be as safe. Do we actually think the Chinese will come over and repo the nation to get their money back? Who out there is big enough to challenge Uncle Sam? All those who can are not interested (the Russians), have too much invested to lay waste the nation (the Chinese), or are de facto boot lackeys (sorry but that makes it the Aussies, Canadians, and the Brits). We have no need to have bases in dozens of other nations anymore. The reason we still spend the money instead of closing those bases and bringing that money home, is it make for easier backdoor imperialism.

The USA spends $700 billion a year on ‘defence’ far more than any other country in the world and more than the next 20 countries combined. These figures speak for themselves.

1. The threats to our freedoms come from within and not from without.
2. If we had no military presence the threat from terrorism would almost disappear.

@flutherother I’m curious as to your conclusion of answer #2. Can you back this up with some good facts? I’m intrigued by your thinking.

No facts just an opinion.

@flutherother I love the idea of a peaceful world I honestly do. But I’ll put in my two cents and save you from a good old military beating before it happens. If there were no police, say within, the Washington D.C. red district (prostitution central) no presence what so ever, I’m pretty sure pimps would eventually resort to guns and killing for the rights of territory. What I’m getting at is, man makes his own job, if we cannot all agree to disagree that some jobs aren’t appropriate due to the negative virtues of what will most likely arrise from street rules, then there is no governance there, put simply the job becomes barbaric without moral rules. I say moral in regards to rules that involve preventing the slaying of a person. This is just one instance and it deals with sex. Drugs, weapons those are other problems as well. Some argue that sure, these foreign problems aren’t the U.S. problem, I agree with that. But it is very possible that it may become our problem, simply because how could we trade with a country that is not participating in a free market kind of world.

I am very much in favour of having a police force and one of their jobs is to guard against the threat of terrorism. If we want to help the world with its problems the $700 billion spent on the military could be more constructively spent. How much have we spent now in Afghanistan? and what do we have to show for it? What has Afghanistan got to show for it?

@flutherother You’d probably find those answers by asking a soldier himself. I live in San Diego and have had the privilege to ask a soldier what his duties are and if he thinks he’s making a difference over there. I am an artist/musician, I don’t condone war, but I am inspired to live in such a beautiful city where I share most of my space and downtown with military people. They are just regular people earning a living. So one time I asked one of my buddies who joined why he thinks its just to have been there, and he said the people there love them. There are small outspoken pockets in the region who rebel from time to time, but for the most part he said he can tell about 90% welcome the U.S. presence, while they figure out their democratic process further, this is the hope they are given so they can further contribute into the free world market. I do agree they should cut 30 percent of the military though. Put at least 10% of that into the education system and let it grow in 5% increments every 3 years. But of course why would businesses want a smarter America? Surely they would become competitors? Haha

I believe the defense spending could be reduced but I would be concerned if it was reduced dramatically. Maybe 10% reduction without any pain. Terrorism happens in every country. I don’t see this as a result of our military and frankly see it as a deterrent. We could pull out of S.Korea but I’m not sure N.Korea would continue to show restraint. Hell, they’d love to unify Korea under the communist regime and they’ve got the million man army to do it. Russia would love to resurrect the Soviet Union. Iran would love to annex Iraq.

I doubt we would see an affront to the US in the near term but fear the world would become a more dangerous place. We pursued a policy of isolationism in the thirties and it allowed the world to reach critical mass. I suppose we could do it again and see if the results would be different.

@Jaxk As liberal as I’d love to be, having grown up in San Diego helped me talk to a bunch of “conservatives” and these are the issues they talk about. Maybe I’m not a liberal, maybe a moderate. But that’s very true, terrorism isn’t just about the U.S. its about any country who trades with the U.S. haha.

@dreamwolf I meant 10% of what we currently spend. Or, a cut of 90% in defense spending.