Military Spending Pros And Cons

Should the government decrease military spending or should it increase military spending? This is a question that many Americans wrestle with, and politically speaking, is a point of great contention since to many, military might evokes a sense of security. However, when considering this question from a foreign policy standpoint, does current military spending really match the current level of threats faced by the United States, or are too many dollars being allocated for an unnecessary level of military strength? There are certainly cons in making the decision to drastically lower military spending, but they are minimal when compared to the positive ramifications such a decision would have. This paper aims to explore these pros and cons

According to Cambridge Dictionaries Online (2016), defense spending is “money spent by a government to provide its military with weapons, equipment, and soldiers.” Defense spending is what keeps us safe and can include a wide array of expenditures from the acquisition of weaponry to the recruitment of a high school student for military training. Allocating funds for national defense within a country is of great importance because it “is one of the most important objectives of any government because national security is a necessary condition for a government to pursue other policy objectives” (Heo & Bohte, 2012, p. 416). Essentially, in order for citizens to feel safe and secure, it is important that the United States have a national defense budget in case a threat arises. Just like a homeowner takes out an insurance policy and has a security system installed, they hope that these will never have to be utilized, but are available if needed to protect the family. Similarly, the United States has equipped itself with air, naval, ground bases as well as a stockpile of weaponry in the event that we find ourselves offensively or defensively

Of this total, around $500 billion comprises the base budget which “includes funding for the procurement of military equipment and the daily operations costs of U.S. bases” (Gould & Bender, 2015). Basically, home defense measures amount to over eighty-percent of the nation’s defense budget. With these astronomical figures, one may question whether or not these types of expenditures are excessive when considering the infrequency of attacks on U.S. soil. To further break down this nearly $500 billion base budget, roughly $200 billion is allotted for operations/maintenance, $135 billion for military personnel, $90 billion for procurement, and $65 billion for research/development (Gould & Bender, 2015). In a world where people rush to purchase lottery tickets at the hopes of hitting a jackpot worth a few million, these expenditures are incomprehensible and may seem excessive; however, not everyone feels this way. In an article found on the U.S. Department of Defense’s website, the “DoD has done its best to manage through this prolonged period of budget uncertainty, the secretary said, making painful choices and tradeoffs” and that in “today’s security environment we need to be dynamic and we need to be responsive. What we have now is a straitjacket” (Pellerin, 2015). At the end of the day, it is all about who is being asked whether the defense