The Pentagon doesn’t need $886bn. I oppose this bloated defense budget | Bernie Sanders
The Pentagon doesn’t need $886bn. I oppose this bloated defense budget | Bernie Sanders
As a nation, the time is long overdue for fundamental changes to our national priorities
My friend works for L3 Harris and has been working on useless government contracts for years. The bloat is real.
The assholes at ID.ME are pushing their way into the government ID system and I hate them because they just want to market bullshit restaurants coupons to me and my vet friends.
I hate predatory government contracts that happen because shit bag politicians allow it.
49There is absolutely no argument that can be made in good faith to continue the bloated military budget. We grossly overspend. Of course the US should strive to have a strong military and national defense, but so much of the budget is used to line the pockets of political "donors"
45It's called the "Military Industrial Legislative" Iron Triangle. It works like this: Military retirees go into cushy industrial lobbying positions then lobby to the congressperson to build weapons and "create jobs", this is an easy win for the congressperson and helps with reelection. The congressperson then passes laws that give huge military contracts to the industry.
I think it's the abrams tank where each of the 50 states makes at least one part for the tank and then it is assembled somewhere else. It's not just a complex any more, it's much worse than that.
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I honestly don't think that most people understand how incredibly bloated the US military budget is. Even if you accept the premise that we have to have the biggest military in the world, so much money is spent on overseas military bases that don't meaningfully contribute to our national defense. We have >750 military bases around the world so that we can intimidate other countries into doing what we want, which is both wasteful and evil. Learn more at Al Jazeera
26sooooo yes you’re not wrong, but i’d argue (as not an american mind you) that also it’s a little more complicated than just national defence
overseas military bases aren’t just for intimidating other countries into doing what the US wants: they also contribute significantly to global stability… having THE world super power kinda everywhere means it’s probably much less likely that some random country is going to start shit… sure, the US gets to pick and choose to benefit itself, but it certainly contributes
and that’s not just good for the world: AS the worlds leading superpower, the US benefits enormously from global stability: from cheap trade, financing, more global budget being spent on STEM/R&D (which because of trade and financing the US almost always capitalises on somehow!)
17I would argue that having only one nation in charge of policing the world's stability is incredibly unstable. Its like having a table with only one leg. If that leg suddenly fails the whole thing topples over. The whole world would benefit more from a more distributed system than relying entirely on one nation.
Of course that also means they'd have to start getting their own hands dirty, and risking the lives of their own citizens for world stability, which doesn't seem particularly likely at this point.
12Personally, I do not think that we should be the police of the world, and I don't want to spend my tax dollars on it.
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We have >750 military bases around the world so that we can intimidate other countries into doing what we want, which is both wasteful and evil.
The US military is the most efficient global logistical operation ever. Open up flghtradar sometime and just look at how many military planes are moving tons of equipment and resources every hour of every day. You don't achieve a global logistics network without those bases. To claim it's just for intimidation and wasted is laughably naive.
12We don't need a global logistics network.
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The existence of those bases means we can negotiate with soft power where instead we might need to make a show of force. Intimidation, aka diplomacy, is superior to actual fights.
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I honestly thought it was already over $1T annually.
However, I still remained pretty worried about shipbuilding capacity, at least until the situation over Taiwan can be resolved. If there ever is a large conflict that causes loss in any significant amount in ships it will be very, very difficult to replace. The current shipyards have orders beyond what they can produce, but even more significantly there is a severe shortage in labor that can even build ships.
Also the comparisons he makes I strongly feel are quite poor. There is a large difference in the budgets of various countries in defense spending. Its really hard to argue that the US and France should spend in similar amounts due to size, population, and commitments. And the cost for manufacturing and paying salaries in the US is quite different than what China can do. So the US will always have to spend the more, though we do still in other measures such as a per capita basis its not as extreme as its made out to be.
13Remember on September 10th, 2001 when Donald Rumsfeld publicly announced the Pentagon couldn't account for $2.3 trillion in transaction?
Or again in 2015 (2016?) when that number grew to $6.5 trillion with just the army alone? Yeah, no one does.
10Bernie!!✊
7Well, if the US doesn't need to protect their allies in Europe, Pacific, South China Sea, support Ukraine against invasion, prepare for invasion against Taiwan....Yeah, then it doesn't need that money. But we live in this world.
6Yes, but also no, imo. We absolutely need to accomplish those objectives.
But ..... Do we need to have a system that requires us to buy Tomahawk missiles at whatever cost Raytheon decides to charge? All the weapons we use are supplied by a single company, and the military does not own the IP for their weapons, even the ones initially invented by military research bases (e.g., sidewinder).
Our system of military contractors has, imo, failed us utterly while making a handful of companies incredibly rich
3Oh I definitely agree on that part. Even the F35 is a super bloated project. The US use to have multiple competitors for each weapon categories but industry consolidation (monopoly) made everything worse.
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Bernie Sanders, lol, wouldn't have the first clue as to what the Pentagon needs and what it doesn't
4This is a particularly low effort comment, provides no value, and is therefore unwelcome here. It’s also demonstrably nonsense, as others have shown you.
Please consider engaging intelligently, and in good faith.
45L take, this guy has been on more committees than most (if not all) of the current Senators. He understands well. If you have ever written him a letter and asked him direct questions you would know. Dude is a literal power house that nobody has heard of because he does his job unlike many other “popular” ones.
34I don't know about where you are, but Bernie support in my group of friends and otherwise is still pretty strong and I live on the other side of the country. I don't know if "nobody has heard of" him, but I know that people in power frequently try to subvert and de-fang him because he doesn't accept the status quo and seems to be open to changing the system.
6
You're disagreeing with that then:
much of this additional military spending will go to line the pockets of hugely profitable defense contractors – it is corporate welfare by a different name. Almost half of the Pentagon budget goes to private contractors, some of whom are exploiting their monopoly positions and the trust granted them by the United States to line their pockets. Repeated investigations by the DOD inspector general, the GAO and CBS News have uncovered numerous instances of contractors massively overcharging DOD, helping boost these companies’ profits to nearly 40% – and sometimes as high as 4,451% – while costing US taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars. TransDigm, Lockheed Martin, Boeing and Raytheon are among the offenders, dramatically overcharging the taxpayer while reaping enormous profits, seeing their stock prices soar and handing out massive executive compensation packages. Last year, Lockheed Martin received $46bn in unclassified federal contracts, returned $11bn to shareholders through dividends and stock buybacks, and paid its CEO $25m a year. TransDigm, the company behind the 4,451% markup, touted $3.1bn in profits on $5.4bn of net sales, almost boasting to investors about just how fully it was fleecing the taxpayer. The fact that a share of the profits from these lucrative contracts will flow back to the congressional backers of higher defense budgets in the form of campaign contributions – America’s unique system of legalized bribery – makes the whole situation even more unconscionable.
21Remember when liberals weren’t huge warmongers?
Me neither.
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"If you want peace, prepare for war. Si vis pacem, para bellum." - Vegetius
Big bureaucracies do tend to have waste, but spending less reduces both useful spending and wasteful spending equally. Cutting a budget does not achieve virtue. US military spending keeps the world at peace
2Do you have any sources to back up your claim that useful and wasteful spending decreases equally?
If that is the case, it sounds like the issue is with management which can also be replaced.
The military is unbelievably wasteful and I have a very hard time buying your argument. You're framing makes it sound like he's proposing getting rid of the budget all together.
Also, I didn't realize the world was at peace...
13spending less reduces both useful spending and wasteful spending equally.
I also would like a source or 2 supporting "equally" wasteful, although that's a good point that both types of spending are likely to be reduced.
3
This is suspiciously similar to Trump's anti-military rhetoric. And at this of all times, when that very same military is engaged in defending a sovereign nation from being conquered by an infamously brutal dictator.
Just whose side are you on, Mr Sanders?
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