Here we go again. An editorial last week in Bloomberg View argued for steep cuts in national security spending. While much of the editorial supported important reform efforts that will be carried in the National Defense Authorization Act, it never bothered to explain why the spending cuts are necessary.
Indeed, the only rationale offered was the observation that national security spending “has doubled since 2001.” Apparently, we’re to take this as sufficient proof that security spending “urgently needs to be brought under control.” It isn’t.
Defense spending went up after 2001 for a reason. The American public expected a response to the terrorist attacks on 9/11, and an increased defense budget was a necessary part of that response.
Even outside the context of 9/11 and the response it required, the defense budget in 2001 was dangerously low. Americans had been told that the end of the Cold War had ushered in a new era of peace, that history had ended and we could cash the “peace dividends” indefinitely. Post-Cold War national security spending, measured in 2014 dollars, bottomed out in 1998, and by 2001 it had barely moved. 9/11 jolted Americans out of this fantasy, but even if it had never happened, the dangerous realities of geopolitics would have reasserted themselves in another way.
But defense spending is not the only thing that has grown since 2001. From 2001 through 2015, the federal government’s social and economic spending increased far more than national security spending. Using inflation-adjusted dollars, social and economic spending programs soared by 61 percent between 2001 and 2015. During the same period national security spending rose 38 percent. Moreover, national security spending is a small part of total government spending. The Department of Defense went from 16 percent of total federal spending in 2001 to a peak of 21 percent in 2007. This year, it’s back down to 15 percent.
It may also be helpful to consider government spending in terms of the size of the nation’s economy. As a percentage of U.S. gross domestic product (GDP), total national defense spending went from 3 percent of GDP in 1998, to 2.9 percent in 2001, to a high of 4.7 percent in 2010, down to an estimated 3.3 percent in 2015. Meanwhile, spending on the rest of the federal government has grown from 14.7 percent of GDP in 2001 to 17.6 percent of GDP in 2015.
A closer look at the numbers shows us that claims that defense spending is “out of control” and needs to be “reined in” ring hollow and stale. Spending decisions should be driven by reality, not rhetoric.
Our national security budget should be based on a sober assessment of what it will take to meet our national security needs now and in the foreseeable future. That’s not happening now. The Heritage Foundation’s “2015 Index of U.S. Military Strength” assessed today’s military as being only marginally ready to protect our country and our vital interests.
Sorry, Bloomberg View, but to keep America safe going forward, we will need to increase our national security budget, not cut it mindlessly.
Justin T. Johnson is the senior analyst for defense budgeting policy in The Heritage Foundation’s Allison Center for National Security and Foreign Policy.
John Conrad 
John 
ersatzg7 
M.McGannon 
Bill 
Mikehorn 
John King 
sam 
Jamie Harlowe 
We have a major budget deficit and your only answer is to increase spending?
Sounds better than budget austerity. How’s that working for Europe be the way?
Heritage Foundation says all that is needed. Exactly where has spending gone up for domestic programs and if so why? I am in favor of a strong DEFENSE budget and spending is out of control, mainly because of the bloated payment to “defense contractors” and programs like the F-35 which can’t even defeat the F-16. Cut the waste in the programs, quit passing the cost on to the troops, middle/workiing class, start making the corporations and plutocrats pay taxes and the military and the US will have plenty of money. In the meantime the destruction of the middle/working class continues.
This article makes no attempt to say WHY the spending is required other than a reference to “the American public expected a response to the terrorist attacks on 9/11,…” So, what argument are we supposed to make for more spending? The idea that there’s some ‘accounting’ justification for some percentage of federal spending or GDP rings hollow with most Americans, as it should. Describe our role in the world with specific objectives and then build to that requirement. My more than 30 years in the national security apparatus hasn’t given me any notion that the Pentagon needs more money — there’s plenty to meet the objectives laid out in our strategy.
You said, “this article makes no attempt to explain why spending is required other than a reference to the American public expected a response to the 9/11 attacks.”
The last sentence of the second to last paragraph, “the heritage foundations 2015 index of US military strength assessed today’s military as being only marginally ready to protect our country and our vital interest.
Maybe you should get reading glasses, for reading.
It would take a series of articles to point out everything that is wrong with that report…….
They can’t be serious with their ratings. Every service, but the Air Force is rated overall as marginally effective…..come on now, let’s be honest here, the whole things reads like a lobbyist puff piece to increasing spending on major programs, particularly for the nuclear arsenal.
I find it hard to take any report seriously that places North Korea and Terrorism as a bigger threat to the United States than China or Russia…..give me a break you might as well throw the Mexican cartels into the mix as well.
This was my comment to the NY Times yesterday:
President Barack Obama should form a blue ribbon commission to determine the future military mission and resources. The military cuts are a good start. The Pentagon senior leadership has grown too fat to be allowed to do the job alone and I would not consider that leadership’s efforts in our wars a success.
The future military mission? Well we do A LOT of different missions, we fight wars of which there are different types of war, we do humanitarian relief, training and security assistance, etc…and very few wars were predicated to happen, meaning you can’t always plan for the futures eventualities because the future is unknown.
Hopefully you do a better job with your policy analysis, because you offered absolutely no points reasons to counter the Bloomberg article as to why spending should remain the same or be increased.
This happens every single year when the Department of Defense publishes its annual budget request and we hear arguments on both sides that the budget is too large or too small, there are requests for cuts either a % of the total budget or across programs, compromises are made and when the final budget is approved, very little organizational changes have been made. While the DoD budget request is supposed to support the strategy in the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR), no one is addressing the real elephant in the room and hasn’t since the Cold War ended. That Elephant is how should the Department of Defense be organized in the 21 Century?
This leads to a whole series of questions that nobody wants to address, because it may mean organizations are shutdown permanently, which rarely happens in the federal government. We need answers to these tough questions or there will never be true reform within the DoD and the battles over the annual budget will always boil down to a slight of hand bean counting exercise of cutting a percentage of the budget, number of personnel or units of equipment, rather than addressing the real functional needs.
Some questions our senior leadership needs to address include:
• Do we actually need to be structured the same way we have been since the end of World War II?
• Do we really need all the organizations under the DoD umbrella that are often performing the same function?
• Do we need separate services?
• Do we need all the supporting organizations?
• Does the Intel Community need to be structured as it is moving forward.
The toughest challenge for the DoD is to admit that the Cold War has been over for over 20 years, the Korean war ended over 60 years ago and it’s been 70 years since the end of World War II, which means it’s time to reconsider our roles in NATO and our overseas basing requirements and deployments to Europe, South Korea and Japan. To that end we need to evaluate which bases and units need to remain in theater and what can be handed over to the host nations.
Our bases in the Middle East and Africa also need to be reevaluated and while it is in our global interests to promote stability in both regions, it may be time to take a back stage and let our allies lead that charge, while we provide assistance as required.
On the home front, It’s time for a top down review of every organization that falls under the prevue of the DoD. Many people are not aware that the DoD is more than just the service components Army, Air Force, Navy and Marine Corp(which includes active, reserves and national guard) and includes four national intelligence services: the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), the National Security Agency (NSA), the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), and the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), other Defense Agencies including: the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA), the Missile Defense Agency (MDA), Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA), Armed Forces Radiobiology Research Institute (AFRRI), Defense Commissary Agency (DeCA), Defense Contract Audit Agency (DCAA), Defense Contract Management Agency (DCMA), Defense Finance and Accounting Service (DFAS), Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA), Defense Legal Services Agency, Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) , Defense Security Service (DSS), Defense Technical Information Center (DTIC), the Pentagon Force Protection Agency (PFPA) as well as the National Defense University (NDU) and the National War College (NWC) just to name a few.
While all of these organizations are funded within the DoD budget requests, this does not include many military-related items that are outside of the Defense Department budget, such as nuclear weapons research, maintenance, cleanup, and production, which is in the Department of Energy budget, Veterans Affairs, the Treasury Department’s payments in pensions to military retirees and widows and their families, interest on debt incurred in past wars, or State Department financing of foreign arms sales and militarily-related development assistance. Neither does it include defense spending that is not military in nature, such as the Department of Homeland Security, counter-terrorism spending by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and intelligence-gathering spending by NASA.
There won’t be any changes in strategy or budget planning until there is a thorough review of each and every agency, department and units within all the DoD. An outside committee and review panel needs to be convened to conduct these reviews, write up a full report with financial analysis and recommendations on cost saving measures. Basically the DoD needs to be treated like a business, operations are being audited and redundant groups, functions are going to be shut down and there will be reductions in personnel, equipment, facilities and operating expenses, which will reshape the force for the next century, not the past century.
Simply requesting that the budget be cut by 5% or reducing the inventory by 1 aircraft carrier or 20 aircraft or closing 10 bases, is no longer a viable option as it’s not addressing the root cause of why the budget is in its current state.
The review committee will be able to an objective look at functions/organizations within the DoD and provide recommendations. Let’s use R&D as an example; there is the Naval Research Lab (NRL), Army Research Lab (ARL), Air Force Research Lab (AFRL), The Office of Naval Research (ONR), and The Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR). The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and The Department of Energy’s Office of Science and Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) also support DoD related R&D. The first question to answer should be, do we need seven different organizations, all with facilities across the country or would one joint facility be able to perform the same function more efficiently? This will lead to recommendation on how we could eliminate redundant projects between the organizations, and eliminate layers of management. They would need to evaluate how much money is going into these organizations, how many projects are the same and how many projects go from the R&D stage to a practical fielded solution.
In a perfect world a review could take place within a single fiscal year and changes implemented starting the next, but sadly nothing like this will ever happen, because it’s simply too easy to maintain the status quo and I am sure the 2017 budget requests and plans will look the same as 2016.
See the last sentence to the second to last paragraph. You asked for a reason, here ya go partner.
You seem to have a problem dealing with constructive criticism. Several people have commented that the article essentially contributes nothing to the discussion of the amount of US defense spending. Your responses are limited to sarcastically referring to a flippant one liner reference to one source in the article. Would it not have been more productive to actually provide substantial feedback, or even to acknowledge the article’s own lack of substance? This is the first time I’ve been disappointed with War on the Rocks, I’m accustomed to seeing high quality commentary on this site and professional responses in the comments.
The national 9/11 response never saw Americans sacrifice, except for military members. I’ve personally spent years away from my home and family, and I’m on the low end. It’s not unusual for some army veterans to have 5-10 years of combat deployment time. 5-10 years of no wife, no children, no sidewalks, no plumbing. By comparison Vietnam vets usually served 1-2 years in combat. WWII 3-4 years, often less. Bullets and mortars and rockets incoming. We wore out any and all military hardware purchased before 9/11, and most bought after. That needs replacing. That costs money. Lots of money.
Civilians got a massive Bush tax cut and were told to go shopping. Bankers got massive deregulation and nearly broke the economy. How bout we raise income tax a small percentage or two and build some roads, pay some teachers, and buy some weapons? Somewhere less than the tax rate Reagan left office with, which was higher than what Clinton left office with. Nothing big. Nothing like WWII or the 1950s. If we raised income tax 3%, or just gutted loopholes so the revenues increased a comparable amount, we could pay domestic, military, and deficit costs. Maybe make those criminal bankers finally pay for their greed and incompetence.
Military has already paid in hardship and combat and years of life. Maybe the taxpayer can finally chip in their share. They could do with one less shopping trip, one fewer restaraunt meals.
As a few commenters point out, this article offers no real reason why the defense budget should go up! Statistical arguments about percent of GDP and percent increase compared to non-defense are nonsensical. Even Eisenhower said the military should get what it needs and not a penny more. Having worked in Pentagon budgeting for 30 years and seeing all the waste and bad decision-making, they can easily take a 10 percent cut (which happens to be what they are being asked to cut for sequestration).
I find it incredulous that the Pentagon, whose budget is still basically centered on fighting two major regional wars claim they CAN’T fight less than 10,000 insurgents without MORE money! Give me a break. And, as history is proving, they CAN’T do it with MORE money anyway.
I have first hand experience with dealing with lots of Dod and federal labs and I have found Naval Research Lab to be one of the worse. The management like branch head rarely do anything to promote new research ideas or funding and they are completely covered by overhead. Lots of old scientists barely doing technicians work are still hanging on to their cushy jobs when there is no publication in last several year. NRL might shut down soon as it is becoming too big to survive.
Justin T. Johnson is the senior analyst for defense budgeting policy in The Heritage Foundation’s Allison Center for National Security and Foreign Policy.