A U.S. Military Budget But No Plan Or Strategy To Back It

President Donald Trump delivers remarks aboard the USS Gerald R. Ford. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst

Caitlin Talmadge, NYT: Trump’s Military Budget Minus a Plan

Last week President Trump again called to revitalize the United States military, most notably with a 10 percent increase in the defense budget. Such proposals make for a snappy sound bite and enable the president to bask in the reflected glow of the armed forces, which happen to be more popular than he is. Yet in the absence of a coherent national strategy, arbitrary increases in the defense budget will do little to make America safer, and could make the world more dangerous.

There is no doubt that the United States faces serious security threats. The Defense Department is dealing with genuine readiness and modernization challenges, and reasonable people can disagree about whether targeted budget increases are a necessary remedy. Some experts see rising threats from North Korea and Russia and have called for augmenting the United States’ ground warfare capabilities after long campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq. Others call for increasing funding for the Navy, which is slated to shoulder the cost of a new ballistic missile submarine — the backbone of the nation’s future nuclear force — even though this effort may squeeze out the service’s traditional shipbuilding.

Read more ....

WNU Editor: For the past 20 years there has been no debate/discussion on what should be America's national security priorities .... and the military/intelligence budget that is needed to accommodate these strategic priorities. President Trump is continuing this tradition .... throwing a defence budget number out there but not explaining why we should be spending this money.