{"id":43140,"date":"2023-07-21T14:58:20","date_gmt":"2023-07-21T22:58:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=43140"},"modified":"2023-07-21T14:58:20","modified_gmt":"2023-07-21T22:58:20","slug":"higher-military-spending-will-save-democracy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2023\/07\/21\/higher-military-spending-will-save-democracy\/","title":{"rendered":"Higher Military Spending Will Save Democracy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Reprinted from Bracing Views<\/a> with the author’s permission.<\/i><\/p>\n

Three days ago, I got a story in my New York Times<\/em> email feed on \u201cA Turning Point in Military Spending.\u201d The article celebrated the greater willingness of NATO members as well as countries like Japan to spend more on military weaponry, which, according to the \u201cliberal\u201d NYT<\/i>, will help to preserve democracy. Interestingly, even as NATO members have started to spend more, the Pentagon is still demanding yet higher budgets, abetted by Congress. I thought if NATO spent more, the USA could finally spend less? <\/p>\n

No matter. Russia\u2019s invasion of Ukraine, as well as the hyping of what used to be called the \u201cYellow Peril,\u201d today read \u201cChina,\u201d is ensuring record military spending in the USA as yearly Pentagon budgets approach $900 billion. That figure does not include the roughly $120 billion or more in aid already provided to Ukraine in its war with Russia. And since the Biden administration\u2019s commitment to Ukraine remains open-ended, you can add scores of billion more to that sum if the war persists into the fall and winter.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s an excerpt from the New York Times<\/em> piece that I found especially humorous in a grim way:<\/p>\n

[Admittedly,] The additional money that countries spend on defense is money they cannot spend on roads, child care, cancer research, refugee resettlement, public parks or clean energy, my colleague Patricia points out. One reason Macron has insisted on raising France\u2019s retirement age despite widespread protests, analysts believe, is a need to leave more money for the military.<\/i><\/p>\n

But the situation [in Europe of spending more on butter than guns] over the past few decades feels unsustainable. Some of the world\u2019s richest countries were able to spend so much on social programs partly because another country – the U.S. – was paying for their defense. Those other countries, sensing a more threatening world, are now once again promising to pull their weight. They still need to demonstrate that they\u2019ll follow through this time.<\/i><\/p>\n

Yes, Europe could continue to invest in better roads, cleaner energy, and the like, but now it\u2019s time to buckle down and build more weapons. Stop freeloading, Europe! Dammit, \u201cpull your weight\u201d! You\u2019ve had better and cheaper health care than Americans, stellar educational systems, child care benefits galore, all sorts of social programs we Americans can only dream of, but that\u2019s because we\u2019ve been paying for it! Captain America\u2019s shield has been protecting you on the cheap! Time to pay up, you Germans, you French, you Italians, and especially you cheap Spaniards.<\/p>\n

\"\"

Look at all those cheap Spaniards. They have good stuff because of Captain America. Freeloaders! (NYT<\/i> Chart, 7\/12\/23)<\/p><\/div>\n

As the NYT<\/i> article says: NATO allies need to \u201cfollow through this time\u201d on strengthening their militaries. Because strong militaries produce democracy. And European \u201cinvestments\u201d in arms will ensure more equitable burden sharing in funding stronger cages and higher barriers to deter a rampaging Russian bear.<\/p>\n

Again, you Americans out there, that doesn\u2019t mean we can spend less on \u201cdefense.\u201d What it means is that the US can \u201cpivot to Asia\u201d and spend more on weaponry to \u201cdeter\u201d China. Because as many neocons say, the real threat is Xi, not Putin.<\/p>\n

We have met the enemy, and he is us. That\u2019s an old saying you won\u2019t see in the \u201cliberal\u201d NYT<\/i>.<\/p>\n

William J. Astore is a retired lieutenant colonel (USAF). He taught history for fifteen years at military and civilian schools. He writes at Bracing Views<\/a>. <\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author’s permission. Three days ago, I got a story in my New York Times email feed on \u201cA Turning Point in Military Spending.\u201d The article celebrated the greater willingness of NATO members as well as countries like Japan to spend more on military weaponry, which, according to the \u201cliberal\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":290,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-43140","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"meta_box":{"disable_donate_message":"","custom_donate_message":"","subtitle":"So says the \"liberal\" New York Times<\/I>"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43140","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/290"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43140"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43140\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":43145,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/43140\/revisions\/43145"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43140"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=43140"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=43140"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=43140"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}