Worldwide Military Expenditures

The Swedish think tank SIPRI released their annual report on worldwide military spending yesterday, and the results are to be expected. The United States still vastly outspends everybody else in the world, and China's budget is growing. While it is no longer true that the US still spends more than everybody else in the world combined, most of the other countries in the top ten are NATO allies, so it's more or less a misnomer.

If you take all of the countries that are widely accepted to be the United States' "rivals" such as China, Russia, Iran, Syria, etc., the numbers don't even come close to matching the US, and that's if you use the high end estimates for both Russia and China.

The report also concluded that worldwide military expenditures have risen about 45% in the last decade. Why is this? I found this quote in the report very troubling: "The introduction of the idea of 'the war on terrorism' has encouraged several countries to see their problems from a very militarized perspective, and is used to justify high military spending." That line is by Sam-Perlo Freeman, who authored SIPRI's study. I think that reason for more spending is largely true, but is it necessary?

Boosting defense spending isn't likely to curb terrorism, especially if we spend it on things that are not even applicable to the fight against terrorism, such as the F-22, which has never been used in a single sortie in either Afghanistan or Iraq. Streamlined intelligence and coordinated police efforts have been proven to be more effective ways to combat terrorism rather than huge military budgets. The US was spending hundreds of billions of dollars on defense, and that did not stop 9/11 from happening, and it has not stopped the emergence of China.

So what is the right amount of defense spending? Well, that would depend on what you see is the proper role of the United States in the world. If you think that the US should engage in small proxy wars on nearly every continent, then you need a high level of military spending. On the other hand, if you think that the US would be safer if it kept its nose out of other country's civil wars and internal conflicts, then a massive reduction in spending is possible. Projecting massive military power around the world is likely to result in us being less safe. If we want to stay safe, then preventive wars, offshore balancing, and power projection are not the answers. Restraint is a better path towards a long lasting peace.