From a purely analytical viewpoint, the danger in cutting a vast swathe through the US military industrial complex at this stage is twofold.
On the one hand, half of the US economy is tied up directly or indirectly in the supply of goods to maintain the US military, and cutting a significant portion of that will go down badly in myriad ways.
On the other hand, the US has made a lot of enemies of late, as well as souring the relationships with it’s allies by generally being an international cunt in all the ways we can all describe in detail. What I’m getting at here is that the US may well need the majority of those armed forces to maintain the status quo, as any perceived weakness will be exploited in the new world order Trump has ushered in, and US allies will quite rightly find an excuse to look the other way if at all possible.
Doesn’t matter how you slice the cake, Trump has set the US up for failure on a grand scale, and the global readjustment will be very unpleasant for most, for quite a while.
On the one hand, half of the US economy is tied up directly or indirectly in the supply of goods to maintain the US military, and cutting a significant portion of that will go down badly in myriad ways.
This is nonsense, because cutting the military frees up funds to be spent on things that are actually productive. If you spend a billion dollars on bombs, those bombs blow up and now you have nothing. If you spent it on, say, a grocery store, then that grocery store can generate revenue and not only support itself but provide profits in return. And there are lots of things the government can spend on that are better than that, for example, public transit can boost the economy in a whole area which in turn provides greater tax revenue.
On the other hand, the US has made a lot of enemies of late, as well as souring the relationships with it’s allies by generally being an international cunt in all the ways we can all describe in detail.
Which is all the more reason drastic reductions in the military are necessary. Such an action would demonstrate goodwill to the world.
The US is already spending more than the next 9 countries combined. We could cut the military budget literally in half and still be easily outspending China and Russia combined.
Nobody wants to fuck with the US. Nobody would want to fuck with a country half as powerful of the US. People fight the US because we force them to fight. Virtually every geopolitical “threat” is painstakingly maintained by Washington, because after all, if there weren’t enough threats, there’d be more eyes on military spending. And the primary purpose of military spending is essentially money laundering, funnelling public funds into private hands where it can then make its way back to the politicians.
Do you think Iran is going to be more likely to cause trouble if the US stops fucking with them? Venezuela, Yemen, Cuba, Palestine, China? That’s nonsense. The overwhelming majority of these supposed “threats” are people who want to live their lives in peace but we keep trying to provoke them. The only case you could try to make is Russia, which represents a tiny fraction of US spending either way.
The only thing we would really need European support for is for wars of aggression, like Iran, where they could provide diplomatic cover. What actual scenario are you imagining here? Chinese troops land in California and the EU says “deal with it?” Pure fantasy.
There is exactly one serious, existential threat to the US and that is the domestic threat posed by the far right. Providing QoL improvements is the best way to both keep them out of power by winning political points, and to avoid radicalization by getting people something to feel invested in. Military spending does virtually nothing to protect us from the only real threat we face.
From a purely analytical viewpoint, the danger in cutting a vast swathe through the US military industrial complex at this stage is twofold.
On the one hand, half of the US economy is tied up directly or indirectly in the supply of goods to maintain the US military, and cutting a significant portion of that will go down badly in myriad ways.
On the other hand, the US has made a lot of enemies of late, as well as souring the relationships with it’s allies by generally being an international cunt in all the ways we can all describe in detail. What I’m getting at here is that the US may well need the majority of those armed forces to maintain the status quo, as any perceived weakness will be exploited in the new world order Trump has ushered in, and US allies will quite rightly find an excuse to look the other way if at all possible.
Doesn’t matter how you slice the cake, Trump has set the US up for failure on a grand scale, and the global readjustment will be very unpleasant for most, for quite a while.
This is nonsense, because cutting the military frees up funds to be spent on things that are actually productive. If you spend a billion dollars on bombs, those bombs blow up and now you have nothing. If you spent it on, say, a grocery store, then that grocery store can generate revenue and not only support itself but provide profits in return. And there are lots of things the government can spend on that are better than that, for example, public transit can boost the economy in a whole area which in turn provides greater tax revenue.
Which is all the more reason drastic reductions in the military are necessary. Such an action would demonstrate goodwill to the world.
The US is already spending more than the next 9 countries combined. We could cut the military budget literally in half and still be easily outspending China and Russia combined.
Nobody wants to fuck with the US. Nobody would want to fuck with a country half as powerful of the US. People fight the US because we force them to fight. Virtually every geopolitical “threat” is painstakingly maintained by Washington, because after all, if there weren’t enough threats, there’d be more eyes on military spending. And the primary purpose of military spending is essentially money laundering, funnelling public funds into private hands where it can then make its way back to the politicians.
Do you think Iran is going to be more likely to cause trouble if the US stops fucking with them? Venezuela, Yemen, Cuba, Palestine, China? That’s nonsense. The overwhelming majority of these supposed “threats” are people who want to live their lives in peace but we keep trying to provoke them. The only case you could try to make is Russia, which represents a tiny fraction of US spending either way.
The only thing we would really need European support for is for wars of aggression, like Iran, where they could provide diplomatic cover. What actual scenario are you imagining here? Chinese troops land in California and the EU says “deal with it?” Pure fantasy.
There is exactly one serious, existential threat to the US and that is the domestic threat posed by the far right. Providing QoL improvements is the best way to both keep them out of power by winning political points, and to avoid radicalization by getting people something to feel invested in. Military spending does virtually nothing to protect us from the only real threat we face.