George Bush wants a bigger military.
Cynical as I am about the claims of the "military-industrial complex" of a generation ago, it really does look like the underlying motivation for the past decade or so has been to increase the size of the military in the US.
I was shocked at how militarised the United States society was, in my recent visits. It's a sign of an imperial power. While I agree that in a time of competing military powers, a large force might be needed, in times when the only justification is a war on abstractions that was started by the US, it just looks like organisational empire building to me. [After all, we have had terrorism for centuries; and attempts to deal with it by military force have been singularly unsuccessful. Ask the British about India and Ireland, or the French about Indochine, sometime.]
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"In addition, more troops mean more long-term spending on equipment, training, and future benefits, says Gordon Adams, senior White House official for national security budgeting under President Bill Clinton."
"At more than $500 billion a year, we are already overspending on defense," says Mr. Adams, now a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars."
...
George Bush is insane. Americans are angered because, many military are paid so little as it is, they're on public welfare assistance. I don't know how he's going to get all the recruits. Draft? Some have already suggested that much.
Kerry: Bush Could Renew Draft - CBS News
Kerry told The Des Moines Register, "With George Bush, the plan for Iraq is more of the same and the great potential of a draft." ...
cbsnews.com/stories/2004/10/16/politics/main649757.shtml
AlterNet: The Odd Warfare State
Military families on food stamps? It's not an urban myth. About 25000 families of servicemen and women are eligible, and this may be an underestimate, ...
www.alternet.org/story/18313
U.S. Senator John McCain
In America today, 12000 military personnel must subsist on food stamps. They line up after hours in civilian clothes to receive their monthly allotment of ...
google.com/search?hl=en&q=military+food+stamps
This is too speculative to put on my own blog, so I'll put it in a comment on yours.
What if we send more troops to Iraq, then find a good reason to start a war with Iran? Just seal the border, let Iraq fester, and send all those troops over to invade Iran. Maybe we can do there what we could not do in Iraq.
No, that would be too stupid. But it is hard to understand the rationale for building up the active troop level, if we do not plan to use them.
I don't see how making the military any bigger is going to improve anything if we are unable to use it properly. This is another example, IMO, of the current administrations inability to address an issue properly.
Our country no longer remembers what a real war is. We have lost perspective. Our society, rightly or wrongly, is so reluctant to inflict the necessary harm that war requires and to pay the requisite price. The result is the mess we're in now. Hannibal lost 15,000 men on his march to Rome. Just on the way there. Every time we lose a single man--which is terrible, mind you--it gets treated like it was a major event in warfare.
It's difficult to imagine what someone like Patton would think about our current leadership and our situation.
A hammer is for driving nails. Having more hammers doesn't get the job done if you do not have the resolve to pound the hell out of every nail that stands in your way.
It's not about making anything but the size of the military and its supporting industries better. Using the military is only important as the occasion to increase and entrench it.
Watching President Bush's recent speeches has convinced me that the man has lost touch with reality. I believe that under the stress of his job, and faced with his utter failure in the "war on terror/Iraq/Afghanistan/Al Quaeda/etc/", that he has become delusional. When the new Congress convenes, I hope they will recognize this sad fact, and impeach Cheney (bribery - shouldn't be hard to prove), convict and remove him, then impeach, convict and remove Bush. President Pelosi is not exactly my cup of tea, but better her than the madmen running the show today.
Just like everything else that has come out of the administration, it's mostly gum-flapping. The only way one could realistically expand the military is to reintroduce the draft, which would literally be political suicide for any politician and especially the newly elected democrats.
As CatMan put it, Bush and the rest of the Washington foreign policy elite have either completely lost or are losing touch with reality. We've lost in Iraq, and expanding the adventure is simply not politically feasible at this point.
Does anybody else here think that the "return on investment" of putting the same effort into "soft power" would be much higher?
More diplomacy, more bridge-building (literally and figuratively), lowered trade barriers, support for grass-roots investment and education initiatives and health would in my mind achieve much better results in terms of increasing the security of the US than any increase in military spending could ever hope to!
Return on investment for whom? One of the problems of game theoretic analyses is specifying the interest bearers. The ROI for industrialists in electorates for the Congressmen who support the war is much greater than the ROI they would individually get from diplomacy...
John, sadly enough, I think you're probably right.
However, you would hope that the ROI of those sending their sons and daughters to fight in foreign lands would outweigh that. Or rather, the lack of ROI - if the chosen policy had succeeded in making America safer, or even if it could be seen to acheive that within some forseeable future, I would perhaps have had some understanding for those making "the ultimate sacrifice" or those who have to experience their loved ones making it.
By pursuing this policy, not only are more and more Americans and Iraqis getting killed, but because the strategy is going to fail, those who have lost someone will not even have the consolation of being able to think "but he/she died for a good cause - making my nation and the world safer".
When I think of how these people have been sent to die or get injured with no tangible benifical result to show for it, my feelings are a mix of sympathy for their loved ones, empathy for the injured and outrage at those who pushed this policy.
And I'm not even American.
Bush has been getting too many of those emails saying bigger is better.
Yesterday on Public Radio someone gave an itemized bill for fully equipping a soldier. A considerable sum, and that didn't include the additional costs of deployment.
There are good points in your article. I would like to supplement them with some information:
I am a 2 tour Vietnam Veteran who recently retired after 36 years of working in the Defense Industrial Complex on many of the weapons systems being used by our forces as we speak.
If you are interested in a view of the inside of the Pentagon procurement process from Vietnam to Iraq please check the posting at my blog entitled, Odyssey of Armaments
http://www.rosecoveredglasses.blogspot.com
The Pentagon is a giant, incredibly complex establishment, budgeted in excess of $500B per year. The Rumsfelds, the Administrations and the Congressmen come and go but the real machinery of policy and procurement keeps grinding away, presenting the politicos who arrive with detail and alternatives slanted to perpetuate itself.
How can any newcomer, be he a President, a Congressman or even the new Sec. Def.Mr. Gates, understand such complexity, particularly if heretofore he has not had the clearance to get the full details?
Answer- he cant. Therefore he accepts the alternatives provided by the career establishment that never goes away and he hopes he makes the right choices. Or he is influenced by a lobbyist or two representing companies in his district or special interest groups.
From a practical standpoint, policy and war decisions are made far below the levels of the talking heads who take the heat or the credit for the results.
This situation is unfortunate but it is absolute fact. Take it from one who has been to war and worked in the establishment.
This giant policy making and war machine will eventually come apart and have to be put back together to operate smaller, leaner and on less fuel. But that wont happen until it hits a brick wall at high speed.
We will then have to run a Volkswagen instead of a Caddy and get along somehow. We better start practicing now and get off our high horse. Our golden aura in the world is beginning to dull from arrogance.
Giving lots of money to the military-industrial complex has certainly been a hallmark of the Bush administration, but the big opportunity to expand the military was before the Iraq invasion.
This would be an opportunity for a Democratic-controlled congress to say, "You want a bigger military? Then pay for it. Let's ditch those tax cuts for the rich."