Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hope of its children."
These must be the words of some liberal Democratic Senator running for President in 2008. But no, these are the words of Republican President Dwight D. Eisenhower, the Supreme Allied Commander during World War II, five decades ago.
The United States, the only superpower remaining on earth, currently spends more on military than the next 45 highest spending countries in the world combined. The U.S. accounts for 48% of the world’s total military spending. Where did the peace dividend from winning the Cold War go?
The United States spends on its military 5.8 times more than China, 10.2 times more than Russia, and 98.6 times more than Iran. The Cold War has been over for 20 years, but we are spending like World War III is on the near term horizon. There is no country on earth that can challenge the U.S. militarily.
So, why are we spending like we are preparing for a major conflict?
Oh, I dunno.
ReplyDeletePerhaps we are IN a conflict or two?
Or how about the EMPLOYMENT of 10s of 1000's of people who do R&D and manufacture of military goods?
They, too, feed the hungry--their own children.
Or three...
ReplyDeleteBut the waging of wars without end (or justification) does beg the question of why these wars were begun.
As for the domestic front, you candidly hint at the anwser that S. Melman, Krugman, Chomsky and others have pointed out over the years: The injection of federal money into high-tech military-industrial sectors of the economy is our funtional industrial policy, though as a jobs bill, defense spending is much more inefficent than say alternative energy, mass trasportation, public infrastructure and so on are.