Opinion Why US spends so much on the army?

We could do so much with the billion spent on weapons every year. My guess is that the weapon makers throw Tons of cash at the politicians to keep the gravy train rolling.
 
The US military machine is a massive cash cow. Whole cities depend on it for their existence.
 
Panmisiek said:
Why not use fraction of that sum and have 1000's of maintained and ready nukes instead. And use rest of the money for whatever US needs?

Just curious.
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Because our military basically underpins the current world order. Consider for instance the fact that our navy provides the world with an international public good in the form of protecting shipping lanes. Sure other countries also have navies that protect shipping lanes but on a much more regional/domestic scale, not comparable to the international scale the US operates on.
 
nhbbear said:
We could do so much with the billion spent on weapons every year. My guess is that the weapon makers throw Tons of cash at the politicians to keep the gravy train rolling.
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We love to blame corporations(I'm hardly an exception) but here blue collar folks are also to blame to an extent. The military industrial complex also provides many jobs and no representative wants to be the one who has the military hardware factory in his district shut down and lay off a bunch of people because that hardware isn't necessary. So they'll all fight tooth and nail to maintain production even if its not necessary to keep those blue collar manufacturing jobs in his district instead of having them laid off and vote against him.
 
Kafir-kun said:
Because our military basically underpins the current world order. Consider for instance the fact that our navy provides the world with an international public good in the form of protecting shipping lanes. Sure other countries also have navies that protect shipping lanes but on a much more regional/domestic scale, not comparable to the international scale the US operates on.
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Considering some 90% of international trade is still done through maritime transport, it's virtually underwritten and guaranteed by the US Navy; kind of astounding how many people seem to think 'free trade' was a thing in the imperial era of geopolitics and not something the United States established in the aftermath of World War II.

Like I said in the recent NATO thread, people should take a gander at European history from 1345-1945 and then claim America putting it under its collective security blanket wasn't arguably the greatest thing that ever could've happened to the continent. Two wars started in a span of 25 years that ultimately saw at least 85 million fucking people end up dead was quite enough. Those balls needed to be snipped.
 
Kafir-kun said:
Because our military basically underpins the current world order. Consider for instance the fact that our navy provides the world with an international public good in the form of protecting shipping lanes. Sure other countries also have navies that protect shipping lanes but on a much more regional/domestic scale, not comparable to the international scale the US operates on.
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I agree with much of this and wish the US was more honest with the population about what role the military actually plays. For example, in order to secure access to the resources the US has been making war in one form or another in the Middle East sine the 1950's if not much earlier. Why not be honest about why we are there? What about calculating the true cost of gas/oil by factoring in the tax payor dollars spent securing the resources?

Considering how many people live near the poverty line and have very limited access to healthcare, what our country spends on the military is an embarrassment. 25 years ago people used to talk about cutting the military but you hardly hear about that now. I think it was Eisenhower who first warned about the military industrial complex back in the 1950's.

Military spending is one of the biggest problems in the US.
 
HomeCheese said:
I agree with much of this and wish the US was more honest with the population about what role the military actually plays. For example, in order to secure access to the resources the US has been making war in one form or another in the Middle East sine the 1950's if not much earlier. Why not be honest about why we are there? What about calculating the true cost of gas/oil by factoring in the tax payor dollars spent securing the resources?

Considering how many people live near the poverty line and have very limited access to healthcare, what our country spends on the military is an embarrassment. 25 years ago people used to talk about cutting the military but you hardly hear about that now. I think it was Eisenhower who first warned about the military industrial complex back in the 1950's.

Military spending is one of the biggest problems in the US.
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The US is definitely a bad actor in various parts of the globe, but probably one of the more "benevolent" 'empires' there's ever been on the whole tbh. The ills in terms of human cost are obviously going to be exacerbated by default through possession of the most advanced weaponized technology that any world power has ever had at its disposal.

Does anyone honestly believe the tensions and conflict between the likes of Russia and Ukraine/Baltic states, China and Taiwan, China and Japan, China and India, India and Pakistan (British policy), Saudi Arabia and Iran, Turkey and the Kurds, as well as general divide between the Sunnis and Shiites in the Muslim world wouldn't exist independently of any US involvement whatsoever in global affairs?
 
Lead said:
I think warfare in this age is through economic and cyber means. Nukes have neutralized most of the developed countries and forced us to play on those fields now. That does stop countries from constantly testing control at borders so I don't think the military should be completely scaled down but it's fair to say it's pretty excessive where it's at considering what we could do with the money instead.
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I think people underestimate how much is spent on next gen warfare that we don't even know about. Think about this. The stealth bomber went into service in 1997. That was almost a quarter century ago.

th


What technologies does the U.S. have that it just keeps up its sleeve in case ever needed that we don't even know about? That kind of thing cost a shit ton of money. People are just generally behind on what is now truly dangerous. We are still thinking nukes, that's old world stuff. Bioengineering, that is frightening. Forget the nukes, we almost guaranteed have bioengineered viruses in Level 4 Biosafety labs that could wipe out entire countries without any of the nasty problems associated with nuclear fallout.

We could engineer something that makes women not be able to have babies anymore to extinct a particular population like a gene drive through editing of a populations DNA. Look into gene drives if you want to be afraid. We are entering into a level of technology where we either can or will be able to create things so much more scary than nuclear bombs that will never be used.
 
Massive inefficiencies. My dad was a reserve officer and he has so many stories of waste.
Brother is reserves as well, did a tour in Iraq . He has a ton of stories too
 
It makes the richest people in the world even richer. This is why often USA pays huge contracts to buy inefficient weapons systems or navy ships and submarines then scraps them purchases more. It's legal money laundering
 
Seaside said:
I think 2 tjings

1) Russia and US and everyone else with nukes lie about the nunber of missiles they have active and non actice in stockpile.

2) Probably only countries with a known amount or capabilties are North korea, pakistan, france and UK. The Chinese, Russiand etc lie for sure and decieve.

3) You probably have lot more nukes then you think in cruise missiles sitting on air craft carriers or other submarines. And in bases.


Pretty beast. You should be proud if your American. The Ohio class holds the most SLBM ever made of submarine. Its a huge sub.
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Cruise missiles arent launched from aircraft carriers. And we know how many submarines the USA has. It's not really a secret, we have alot. More than enough
 
Thepaintbucket said:
Cause a standing military is paramount to maintaining peace around the world. The costs are high because of government inefficiencies and lobbyist.
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Lol. Done a bang up job maintaining peace
 
NoDak said:
Eh? The US has 14 active SSBNs prowling the oceans virtually undetectable. There are people at the highest levels of government that don't even know where the fuck they are at any given time.

The Trident II's it has on board re-enter the atmosphere at Mach 24 and split up into eight independent re-entry vehicles that each carry a 475 kiloton nuclear warhead. A full deployment from just one of them would let off 192 warheads in less than a minute and strike targets from distances of up to 12,000 km. So 2,688 nukes in 60 seconds or less if they all got busy. And that's just the SLBM leg of triad.
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I wonder if we will ever get to see the privilege of them in use. Maybe under Trump
 
The path forward is vulnerabilities in a nations infrastructure. Destabilize society by knocking out their internal supply chain and power. Next is biologics. A nice foundation of vacc denial has set the playing field for importing some tasty pathogens. Throw in a little designer tailoring and well...
 
NoDak said:
That's one sexy bird, still absolutely incredible.

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On the other hand, look at that piece of shit, lol
F-117_Front_View_1.jpg

The cockroach, got shot down by Serbians with a 1961 soviet missile.
 
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