• A ‘death spiral’ A ‘death spiral’ Four years ago, when the U.S. economy was in surplus and a year before the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, conservative military strategists began advocating that the United States boost defense spending
• A ‘death spiral’
A ‘death spiral’
Four years ago, when the U.S. economy was in surplus and a year before the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, conservative military strategists began advocating that the United States boost defense spending to 4 percent of gross domestic product, up from the previous historic high level of about 3 percent.
The “4 percent solution” would enable the Pentagon to escape what had been called its “death spiral” — downplaying modernization in favor of keeping forces trained and ready and maintaining older weapons systems.
Right now, 4 percent would be cheap. This year’s military budget is $387 billion, about 3.65 percent of where the GDP was when the president proposed it. But that doesn’t count what’s been spent on U.S. operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. All told, the United States is spending 5.1 percent of GDP on the military this year.
This week, President George W. Bush will send Congress a $402 billion military budget for 2005. Again, that is about 3.6 of the current $11.1 trillion GDP. But later in the year, probably after the November elections, the president is expected to ask for another $50 billion for Iraq operations. That would raise military spending to a little over 4 percent of GDP.
By any standard, this is a lot of money — nearly 19 percent of all federal spending. It is equivalent to the combined military budgets of the next 20 biggest-spending nations. It is about the size of the nation’s anticipated budget deficit. It is a bigger share of GDP than at any time since the last days of the Cold War. But it does very little to address the “death spiral” syndrome. It does contain $69 billion for research and development of new weapons and $11 billion for Bush’s national missile defense system. But the war in Iraq has postponed many of the plans to modernize the military. The strain the war has put on the current military force structure, particularly the Army’s, is forcing the United States to concentrate on the present instead of the future.
Four percent of GDP is at once too much money to spend on the military and not enough. It’s too much given the size of the deficit and the nation’s other needs. It’s not enough given the cost of maintaining or enlarging the structure in place while building for the future.
Serious reform is needed in both military procurement and force structure. The missile defense system is too exotic and far too expensive. The force structure is too prepared to fight the last war, not the next one.
The nation needs to get its troops back home and think carefully about where, when and whether we send them the next time.
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
