America’s Bloated Military Budget
The racket of war is not what it seems to most people.
Only a small ‘inside’ group knows what it’s all about. War is conducted for the benefit of the very few at the expense of the very many. Out of war, a few people make huge fortunes.
The military-industrial complex is perhaps the biggest industry ever developed in history. The monied elite who continue to meet behind closed doors will always push for military actions from local skirmishes to broader large-scale wars — all leading to incalculable suffering around the globe.
According to the Costs of War project at Brown University, as of October 2023, the U.S. federal price tag for its post-9/11 wars is over $8 trillion. The study indicates that military action after 9/11 expanded to more than 80 countries, making it a global ‘endless war’ on terrorism.
The human costs have been profound as well. According to the study, over 940,000 people have died in the post-9/11 wars due to direct war violence. Over 432,000 civilians have been killed as a result of the fighting. An estimated 3.6–3.8 million people have died indirectly in post-9/11 war zones, bringing the total death toll to at least 4.5–4.7 million and counting.
This article is part four of a series. Click here for all my articles regarding ‘The Business of War.’
If you’re all caught up, let’s ponder the enormous federal budget dedicated each year to….
U.S. Military Spending
In fiscal year 2022, the U.S. spent a whopping $877 Billion on its Military Defense budget. That’s more than the next ten countries combined: China: $292 Billion, Russia: $86 Billion, India: $86 Billion, Saudi Arabia: $75 Billion, United Kingdom: $69 Billion, Germany: $56 Billion, France: $54 Billion, Japan: $46 Billion, South Korea: $46 Billion, Ukraine: $44 Billion.
The world’s governments are spending more money than ever on their militaries. But at $877 billion, U.S. military spending is almost 40% of total global military spending and nearly three times more than the second-biggest spender, China.
By comparison, the U.S. federal government allocated just $76.4 billion in discretionary spending for education in 2022. That means the U.S. federal government spends over ten times more on its military than on education.
Congress and the White House add billions of dollars to an already bloated Pentagon budget every year. And the supposed “military defense” measures are nothing more than wasteful pet projects and overpriced contracts handed out to influential companies.
From malfunctioning planes to outdated ships and hazardous nuclear weapons, Congress enriches corrupt contractors while leaving communities across the country starved of much-needed resources.
Instead of U.S. taxpayers’ dollars being applied towards constructive purposes such as universal health care, fighting climate change, hunger, and poverty, or building new roads and bridges — and creating millions of jobs in the process — funding goes to the Pentagon to maintain and increase its arsenal of weapons, including its space weapons.
Despite one in six Americans living in poverty, cost-cutting social programs to the bone, and even slashing PBS funding, Congress has no problem each year maintaining its commitment to the U.S. military monstrosity.
Instead of investing in meaningful progress and addressing the real challenges facing our nation, politicians in Washington keep padding the Pentagon’s pockets — thereby perpetuating a toxic culture of militarism. It’s a never-ending process.
The push for a bloated military budget, clocking in at $886 billion already for 2023, comes hand-in-hand with disheartening news that relief for people experiencing poverty, loan debt forgiveness, and working-class support have been guillotined in recent debt ceiling deals in Congress under the pretense of unaffordability.
One example of military spending deception
In 2020, during the COVID pandemic, Congress passed the $3 trillion Cares Act, which, among other things, gave the Pentagon $1 billion in funds to “prevent, prepare for, and respond to coronavirus.”
But just a few weeks after the Act was passed, the Defense Department began restructuring how it would award the money in a way that was a major deviation from Congress’s original intent.
Instead of building up the country’s supplies of medical equipment, the money was mostly funneled to defense contractors and used for making things such as jet engine parts, body armor, and dress uniforms.
The Pentagon’s misuse of funds showed how difficult it can be for bureaucrats to trace how money is spent and — in the case of Congress — intervene when unapproved changes are made, and funds are redirected to entities that weren’t initially targeted for assistance.
The $1 billion Pentagon fund was allotted under the Defense Production Act (DPA), which allowed President Trump to induce U.S. companies to manufacture products in the nation’s interest.
Trump’s administration was under extreme pressure in the spring of 2020 to use the DPA to address dire shortages in medical-grade masks and other supplies. And in his usual braggadocio fashion, Trump described the law as a “tremendous hammer” and boasted in August 2020 that he had “used the DPA more comprehensively than any president in history.”
Eye-Popping Military Spending
It should be noted that the COVID-related funds that found their way into the Pentagon cofferers and into the pockets of military contractors in 2020 came at a time when U.S. military spending was already at an all-time high.
The U.S. Military defense budget for fiscal year 2020 was a whopping $750 billion. That was up from the $686 billion defense budget for fiscal year 2019.
That amount in 2019 was comparable to a typical year during the Cold War and during the period shortly after 9/11 when the infamous invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq were conducted.
It’s also interesting to note that major defense contractors, such as General Dynamics, Northrop Grumman, and Lockheed Martin, remained financially healthy during the COVID-related disruption and continued paying stock dividends to investors.
At $877 billion for 2022 (up from $750 billion in 2020), the Pentagon’s spending power has never been more enormous. In 2022, the historic boost to the U.S. defense budget was also a boon for defense stocks. Nobody spends money on arms like the U.S. And it continues to show in the bottom lines of the biggest defense contractors.
The Pentagon’s missing money
It should be noted that Pentagon accounting practices are pretty weak. As a result, the Pentagon routinely reports money missing. In 2018, for example, it was reported that $21 trillion went missing from the Pentagon books between 1998 and 2015.
One example is from 2001 (just before 9/11) when then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld testified to Congress that “we cannot track $2.3 trillion in transactions.”
Another example is that for 2015, the Pentagon reported $6.5 trillion in “unsupported journal voucher adjustments,” which is accounting jargon for improperly documented accounting adjustments that are made when different financial ledgers do not match.
According to the ‘official’ storyline, the Pentagon keeps flunking outside audits because funds are shifted between accounts without proper oversight. Some say that the overall documentation of what is happening with the Pentagon’s vast budget is poor — when actually, what is happening amounts to deliberate fraud.
The case of the missing $21 trillion demonstrates how poorly documented internal financial transfers occur such that the same dollar can be transferred repeatedly. And it is undoubtedly true that if another agency were flubbing its internal financial controls to this degree, the American voters wouldn’t tolerate it.
So how are the hundreds of billions given to the Pentagon each year really being spent? What dark programs are being funded that the American public knows nothing about? More on that in an upcoming article.
A recommendation to cut military spending in half
In his memoir, “Soldier Secretary” (released in February 2023), former acting Defense Secretary Chris Miller made a case for the Pentagon’s budget being cut in half. He argued that the U.S. military should be molded into a leaner and nimbler fighting force with prioritized areas of focus.
At the end of his memoir, Miller writes the U.S. must adapt to the threats posed by foreign adversaries like Russia and China by reforming the military, which he calls “too big and bloated and wasteful.”
“Our colossal military establishment was essential for our Cold War victory, but the Cold War has been over for 30 years,” Miller writes. “If we are truly going to end American adventurism and retool our military to face the challenges of the next century, we should cut military spending by 40–50 percent.”
Miller writes that slashing the budget by 40 to 50 percent wouldn’t be as dramatic as it sounds, arguing it would return the U.S. to pre-9/11 spending levels, which he says would make sense since “we are no longer waging wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
