US military spending

[LimaUniformNovemberAlpha]

Inspired by a tangent from another thread.

So it seems like everyone with a pet project justifies tax dollars spent on it by citing military spending as precedent.

Yet every time the conversation turns to actually cutting military spending, people act like the USA is the only thing holding Chinese hegemony back.

The whole premise strikes me as unfalsifiable. But that's not the only flaw. There's also the issue of whether or not military might is the best thing to make China think twice about what it does. What of trade boycotts? What if the first world as a whole did a co-ordinated boycott in response to something China did? (Like, let's say, what they're doing to Hong Kong right now?) Would that not make more sense than threatening them with a military we already hesitate to use? How does unused military equipment rotting in a field somewhere make China hesitate to take over the world?

[-Ocelot-]

The USA is the only thing holding Chinese hegemony back.

[Surkiea]

The US should spend more, our enemies are stronger than ever and we need to display our military might that we're still a superpower.

[Communist Crimean Republic]

I have no problem with this, nor do I see any reason to ever have a problem with a majority of the budget being in the military.

[Vivolkha]

Yeah, sure, throw sanctions to the biggest economy in the world because it would not be total economic suicide.

Sanctions will not work with Beijing.

[Kowani]

Reminder that conventional war is pretty much never gonna happen with any of the US’s major enemies, so it really doesn’t need an army that size. You can make a case for the Navy, but the Army? Even without getting into Pentagon waste, that could be fucking downsized.

[Vivolkha]

Yeah, sure, throw sanctions to the biggest economy in the world because it would not be total economic suicide.

Sanctions will not work with Beijing.

Adding to my previous post, the way to go with the PRC is international diplomatic pressure and limiting its influence in international organizations (which is intentionally trying to corrupt, as is Russia to a lesser degree, by weakening human rights protection with several excuses).

[Kowani]

The US should spend more, our enemies are stronger than ever and we need to display our military might that we're still a superpower.

Your enemies are stronger because you gave them strength while maintaining them as ideological and political enemies, all in the name of capitalism.

[Genivaria]

The US would benefit from bringing back the draft and integrating it into the civilian education system.
Our All Volunteer Force is becoming very expensive to maintain, a conscripted force would be much cheaper.

There's also the fact that with the number of technical jobs that are now in high demand both in the military and in the private sector having a large number of conscripts able to go through a military to private sector training pipeline would greatly help our economy.

[Scomagia]

Ideally military spending should be reduced to encourage efficiency. I have no problem with the amount we spend per se but I don't like the amount of waste. When you throw too much money at a government agency or program the tendency is toward using that money instead of being frugal where possible.

[Scomagia]

The US would benefit from bringing back the draft and integrating it into the civilian education system.
Our All Volunteer Force is becoming very expensive to maintain, a conscripted force would be much cheaper.

There's also the fact that with the number of technical jobs that are now in high demand both in the military and in the private sector having a large number of conscripts able to go through a military to private sector training pipeline would greatly help our economy.

Conscripts are arguably more expensive than volunteers. For one thing, volunteers likely have more experience with firearms which makes training to proficiency take less time. Volunteers also want to be in the military, obviously, so time and resources spent on molding them into soldiers is reduced. It's a big hassle to take someone who hasn't held a gun, is physically incompetent (most Americans), and doesn't want to be a soldier and turn them into an efficient soldier.

[LiberNovusAmericae]

The US should spend more, our enemies are stronger than ever and we need to display our military might that we're still a superpower.

Our budget is bigger than our enemies. I see no reason to increase it.

[Kowani]

The US would benefit from bringing back the draft and integrating it into the civilian education system.
Our All Volunteer Force is becoming very expensive to maintain, a conscripted force would be much cheaper.

There's also the fact that with the number of technical jobs that are now in high demand both in the military and in the private sector having a large number of conscripts able to go through a military to private sector training pipeline would greatly help our economy.

Conscripts are arguably more expensive than volunteers. For one thing, volunteers likely have more experience with firearms which makes training to proficiency take less time. Volunteers also want to be in the military, obviously, so time and resources spent on molding them into soldiers is reduced. It's a big hassle to take someone who hasn't held a gun, is physically incompetent (most Americans), and doesn't want to be a soldier and turn them into an efficient soldier.

To back you up, historically speaking, conscript based armies have fared poorly compared to volunteer ones.

[Libertarians]

Current NATO structure of US fitting disproportionately large percentage of the bill for protecting the West made sense after WWII when Europe was wrecked, but makes no sense now. The European Union's GDP is in the same ball park as ours, we should be spending less and they should be spending more.

This is especially true seeing as the US has much greater social problems to get through than Europe. There's zero chance the US can sustain it's current level of spending long-term, so the ball is in Europe's court. I think that view seems to be growing pretty mainstream in both US Political parties, so hopefully the European's realize on that issue Trump is not a fluke.

[Kaztropol]

The US would benefit from bringing back the draft and integrating it into the civilian education system.
Our All Volunteer Force is becoming very expensive to maintain, a conscripted force would be much cheaper.
There's also the fact that with the number of technical jobs that are now in high demand both in the military and in the private sector having a large number of conscripts able to go through a military to private sector training pipeline would greatly help our economy.

A study recently, in 2017 or so, found that of America's 17-24yr olds, some 71% of them would be unfit for any military service, due to lack of education, medical issues, criminal records etc. And of the 29% that would be fit for service, only 17% would qualify for active duty. And only 13% would achieve a satisfactory score on the Armed Forces Qualification Test.

One in 8. more or less.

[Chestaan]

The idea of China as an existential threat is absurd and is purely propaganda used to justify the insanely high levels of military spending.

[Genivaria]

The US would benefit from bringing back the draft and integrating it into the civilian education system.
Our All Volunteer Force is becoming very expensive to maintain, a conscripted force would be much cheaper.
There's also the fact that with the number of technical jobs that are now in high demand both in the military and in the private sector having a large number of conscripts able to go through a military to private sector training pipeline would greatly help our economy.

A study recently, in 2017 or so, found that of America's 17-24yr olds, some 71% of them would be unfit for any military service, due to lack of education, medical issues, criminal records etc. And of the 29% that would be fit for service, only 17% would qualify for active duty. And only 13% would achieve a satisfactory score on the Armed Forces Qualification Test.

One in 8. more or less.

Oh that I'm very much aware of and have posted about before, if anything I agree that our nations obesity epidemic constitutes a national security crisis.
I think we need to completely revitalize our schools PE programs.

[LimaUniformNovemberAlpha]

A study recently, in 2017 or so, found that of America's 17-24yr olds, some 71% of them would be unfit for any military service, due to lack of education, medical issues, criminal records etc. And of the 29% that would be fit for service, only 17% would qualify for active duty. And only 13% would achieve a satisfactory score on the Armed Forces Qualification Test.

One in 8. more or less.

Oh that I'm very much aware of and have posted about before, if anything I agree that our nations obesity epidemic constitutes a national security crisis.
I think we need to completely revitalize our schools PE programs.

Before the draft, or after?

Anyway, I'd rather a "if you're so in favour of this war you serve in it" approach than a draft. It's bad enough governments can impose unjustified wars on people who signed up for a different war. If they can impose unjustified wars on everyone else, they've less incentive to resort to war more sparingly.

[Genivaria]

Oh that I'm very much aware of and have posted about before, if anything I agree that our nations obesity epidemic constitutes a national security crisis.
I think we need to completely revitalize our schools PE programs.

Before the draft, or after?

Anyway, I'd rather a "if you're so in favour of this war you serve in it" approach than a draft. It's bad enough governments can impose unjustified wars on people who signed up for a different war. If they can impose unjustified wars on everyone else, they've less incentive to resort to war more sparingly.

I've always been in favor of making a declaration of war require a national referendum.
It's all about Proportional Response. If the Marines can get a job done within a short period of time then let the President and/or Congress sign off on it, but if we as a nation go to war then WE AS A NATION vote on it first.

[Thermodolia]

The US would benefit from bringing back the draft and integrating it into the civilian education system.
Our All Volunteer Force is becoming very expensive to maintain, a conscripted force would be much cheaper.

There's also the fact that with the number of technical jobs that are now in high demand both in the military and in the private sector having a large number of conscripts able to go through a military to private sector training pipeline would greatly help our economy.

Conscripts are arguably more expensive than volunteers. For one thing, volunteers likely have more experience with firearms which makes training to proficiency take less time. Volunteers also want to be in the military, obviously, so time and resources spent on molding them into soldiers is reduced. It's a big hassle to take someone who hasn't held a gun, is physically incompetent (most Americans), and doesn't want to be a soldier and turn them into an efficient soldier.

Actually those who have experience with guns already are harder to train than those who don’t. Mainly because it’s easier to train those to your way of doing things than to re-train someone who does things different.

[GLDF]

As I've said, first examine where the money goes thoroughly and decide what could use less or more funding. Other NATO states should have to actively get their militaries prepared though.

[Electic]

I don't think conscription is the answer. The current selective service does the job of allocating people in the case of an imminent and absolute danger to the state. I think having our allies take a little bit more of the burden would assist and allow us to scale down our military to something more manageable. The issue is thinking that the U.S. needs to do all the heavy lifting, all the time, is unrealistic and has done us no favors to our post-Cold War reputation.

[Noshirtbigpants]

The US should spend more, our enemies are stronger than ever and we need to display our military might that we're still a superpower.

we are still a superpower

Just are president got issues

[Noshirtbigpants]

I don't think conscription is the answer. The current selective service does the job of allocating people in the case of an imminent and absolute danger to the state. I think having our allies take a little bit more of the burden would assist and allow us to scale down our military to something more manageable. The issue is thinking that the U.S. needs to do all the heavy lifting, all the time, is unrealistic and has done us no favors to our post-Cold War reputation.

Exactly we think our allies need us to help them out all the time. No other country does this much we fight other countries battles and get nothing in return but keeping that ally.

[Blanjiland]

The US would benefit from bringing back the draft and integrating it into the civilian education system.
Our All Volunteer Force is becoming very expensive to maintain, a conscripted force would be much cheaper.

Sorry to burst your bubble, but a draft in the US is never going to happen again unless we face a literal Red Alert C&C scenario. Last time the draft was tried (Vietnam), it nearly caused a civil war and only made the entire situation, both at home and on the field, a hell of a lot worse.