Spending Freeze Must Include Defense
Spending Freeze Must Include Defense
Our guest blogger is Lawrence J. Korb, a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress
If President Obama is serious about controlling spending, he can’t exempt the Pentagon. In announcing a three-year spending freeze, he exempted all security-related funding. This exemption applies to the budgets of the Pentagon, Department of Homeland Security, foreign aid and the Department of Veterans Affairs. Because the budgets of these agencies, particularly that of the Pentagon, are responsible for a large and increasing share of the discretionary portion of the federal budget, the president’s spending freeze will have a marginal effect.
Rather than exclude these accounts from the freeze for fear of appearing weak on defense, the president should mandate that the baseline defense budget also be frozen.
Indeed, freezing the base defense budget at its current level of about $532 billion would not hinder the Pentagon’s ability to conduct the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq because they will be funded separately through a $160 billion supplemental. Moreover, freezing defense spending would force the Pentagon to make the hard choices it has avoided over the past decade. In the last ten years, the baseline defense budget nearly doubled from $290 billion in FY2000 to $532 billion, an increase of $242 billion or 83 percent, or more than 8 percent a year. Even if one controls for inflation, the real growth amounts to nearly 50 percent, about 5 percent a year in real terms. By way of contrast, non-defense discretionary spending, which the administration proposes to freeze, has averaged only 5 percent annual growth, or 2 percent real growth during that same period.
Additionally, spending on future weapons systems has outpaced spending on our troops. The Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments has pointed out (pdf) that the operations and support portion of the base defense budget – which includes costs for recruitment, training, military and civilian personnel pay, and operating and maintaining equipment – has increased. Yet it has risen less in real terms than the investment portion of the budget, which includes procurement, research and development, and construction. The operations and support part has increased by 3.5 percent a year in real terms over the past decade, while the growth in investment has exceeded 5 percent.
To keep the baseline budget level at $532 billion, the Pentagon could reduce the FY2011 projected budget level for weapons development and purchases from about $190 billion to $170 billion. This could be done through a number of reductions in baseline defense spending. In particular, the U.S. government could acquire $20 billion in savings by taking some of the following measures, which I recommended in my recent report, Paying for the Troop Escalation in Afghanistan (pdf):
-Cut missile defense, while maintaining funding for its continued research and development. Saves about $6 billion.
-Keep the Virginia-class attack submarine production steady at one per year instead of ramping up to two per year in FY 2011. Saves about $2 billion
-Cancel the Zumwalt-class DDG-1000 at two ships. Saves about $1 billion
-Cancel the MV-22 Osprey and substitute cheaper helicopters while continuing production of the CV-22. Saves about $2 billion
-Cancel the Expeditionary Fighting Vehicle program. Saves about $294 million
-Cut the FY 2011 F-35 purchase to twenty, slow down production of the aircraft, cancel the alternate engine program, and replace the cut planes with drones. Saves about $4 billion
-Cut FY 2011 funding for the Army’s Future Combat Systems by one third. Saves about $763 million
-Continue offensive space-based weapons development at a low rate. Saves about $100 million
-Reduce the U.S. nuclear arsenal to 600 deployed warheads and 400 in reserve. Saves about $13 billion
This would still leave the FY 2011 baseline defense budget $15 billion higher in real terms than it was at the height of the Reagan buildup. And by using a unified approach to national security budgeting—which brings together national security spending from the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security, State, and the U.S. Agency for International Development—additional funds could be transferred from DOD to the Department of Homeland Security so that its budget is not cut.
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Don’t freeze the War Department budget. Cut it!!
January 27th, 2010 at 9:04 pmsounds good to me, mr. korb.
and sure to save a lot more money than taking lunch away from disadvantaged schoolkids.
January 27th, 2010 at 9:12 pmHow about a surtax on the net income of the defense contractors?
January 27th, 2010 at 9:13 pmOur guest blogger should acknowledge that funding wars through supplementals is:
1) not what the President said he would do in the campaign
2) not how the President has chosen to budget for wars now that he is in office.
Clearly, the President has a reason for doing this. Something about a “return to honest budgeting,” I believe.
POTUS has directed that DoD fund the wars in its baseline budget, rather than supplementals. The first budget he released shows that (and explicitly accounts for overseas contingency operations).
The DoD budget request did seek austerity in the procurement and investment accounts. Congress put it back. Don’t blame the President for all of this. The administration made reasonable and rational requests. Congress overrode those.
January 27th, 2010 at 9:15 pmHey you “economic conservative” teabaggers – let’s hear what you have to say to this small government solution…
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dsmorgan says:
Our guest blogger should acknowledge that funding wars through supplementals is
Good catch, dsmorgan. Doing it this way would also involve reversing himself regarding honest budgeting. Then the wingnuts would actually have a strong case to be made about broken promises.
January 27th, 2010 at 9:21 pmDesert Eagle says:
actually have a strong case to be made about broken promises.
LOL! Says one of THE most hard-core obamapologists I’ve ever encountered on the innertubes!
Yawn.. Don’t you ever tire of being a fascist d**chebag? Because everyone tires of your constant p*ssy whining… Zzzzz..
January 27th, 2010 at 9:31 pmThe TREASON of the Bushes lives on with the TREASON-baggers.
The BIGGEST “pos” to EVER be “president”.
REAL Americans KNOW this.
Not “deserter eagle”, of course…
January 27th, 2010 at 9:31 pmDesert Eagle says:
Don’t freeze the War Department budget. Cut it!
You actually think obomber would do such a thing?
How about you turn yourself into the authorities you piece of sh!t seditionist terrorist? “K princess?
January 27th, 2010 at 9:32 pmDesert Eagle says:
You mean the spending freeze the pos said countless times he was against? LOL!
“I was against the spending freeze before I was for it!” pos obama
I was against Obama’s policies before I was for it! pos terrorist troll dung
January 27th, 2010 at 9:32 pmDesert rat shows why the GOP is the party of domestic terrorism. They oppose Democrats no matter what the policy. Party before country, terrorism before Americanism – right desert rat b*stard?
January 27th, 2010 at 9:39 pmForget a freeze. We need defense spending cuts by hundreds of billions of dollars.
http://www.sunstateactivist.org/ssablog
January 27th, 2010 at 9:44 pmjust the bleepn facts says:
Good job holding the line on the desert begale or i like your call better ratazz b*stard
January 27th, 2010 at 9:44 pmjust@13, Just like a troll, huh? Money for old people and the sick? No WAY! Money for the war machine? No problem! These trolls are more than brainless, they are immoral. Money for killing innocents (NO matter what the Repugs AND trolls believe, many of the dead in Iraq are women and children) doesn’t matter to them. They are so brain-washed by the Repugs and Faux News, they don’t know how to think. If you read the posts, it’s all about them isn’t it? Their way of life, their well being. As a volunteer, I find caring for others satifies me. That is the ‘Christian’ thing to do isn’t it?
January 27th, 2010 at 9:46 pmWe now spend just shy of a million dollars a minute, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year on defense spending. Not only is our current defense budget a record, it also is nearly as large as the defense budgets of every other country in the world combined. According to estimates by the Center for Arms Control and Nonproliferation, the United States spent more on defense in 2007, the most recent year for which complete data is available, than the next 14 highest spending countries in the world combined.
http://tammybaldwin.house.gov/issues_ForeignPolicy.html
January 27th, 2010 at 9:48 pmAccording to Noam Chomsky :
Nonpartisan budget and security monitors report in Government Executive that the “administration’s request for $538 billion for the Defense Department in fiscal 2010 and its stated intention to maintain a high level of funding in the coming years put the president on track to spend more on defense, in real dollars, than any other president has in one term of office since World War II. And that’s not counting the additional $130 billion the administration is requesting to fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan next year, with even more war spending slated for future years.”
http://www.chomsky.info/articles/20091105.htm
January 27th, 2010 at 9:57 pmDesert, I have concluded it’s about YOU ain’t it? You are like a child in a crowded room screaming for attention. “Look at me! I’m here!” It’s kind of sad.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:00 pmhttp://www.truthandpolitics.org/military-US-world.php
January 27th, 2010 at 10:01 pmWith Supreme Court ruling equating corporations with persons,corporations soon will begin their big march to buy airtime,politicians,and to create a big lobbyists armies to fight everything Obama says or anything that will stand in their way.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:04 pmHey ,the S. Court call it ‘Freedom Of Speech’..
Obama never committed TREASON against the USA like
Bush and Cheney, the MURDEROUS little PUNKS.
Makes HIM a BETTER MAN that ANY of them.
Or their supporters like “deserter”, an unamerikkkan TRAITOR.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:08 pmThis comment has been voted down. Click to read.
Wow. I called Desert childish and he gets all vote down on us. I guess I was right.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:10 pm@30, Do you honestly think getting rid of illegals will solve our problems? No my pathetic troll friend. Thanks to the Xenophobia by you and Repugs and Dobbs, they are staying away and violence against them is up. I find it sad that trolls and Repugs pick on people who come here for a better life. I am a grandchild of immigrants as is my husband. That is why we are a ‘Melting Pot’.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:15 pmP.D. says:
Wow. I called Desert childish and he gets all vote down on us. I guess I was right.
you are so right
if he had any balls he should give them back to the person he took them from,,,,
well all troll should do that.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:15 pmWe spend as much as the entire planet annually yet are the only industrialised nation that doesn’t provide health care for it’s citizens .
Schools and libraries are to suffer while homeland security and the military are set to accelerate .
It’s like a monstrous protection racket offered the mob .
January 27th, 2010 at 10:15 pm@31, So what? You didn’t vote me down for once? Do you think I am that dumb? You are the most cowardly with the mouse you know. LOL! you are dumb.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:17 pmAll the while the computer is spying on you, your phone is tapped and your cell phone is being used to track movements ….. for your own protection of course .
http://emptywheel.firedoglake.com/2009/12/07/the-spying-industrial-complex/
January 27th, 2010 at 10:18 pmJeez, even the sockpuppets seem to be phoning it in.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:20 pmI was Airforce 4 years, and the waste and corruption is beyond anything that you can imagine…way beyond…
…and I’m sure it is tripled since VN.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:23 pmIf Obama were to even suggest he was going to freeze defense spending, the Republicans would be all over him and the Dems. They have used the “Dems are soft on defense” line many times and it was successful. For Obama and the Dems, a freeze would be political suicide. That does not mean there is no room to create savings in the DOD. There are plenty of cost overruns and fraudulent billing by private contractors in the DOD. An aggressive stance on these two problems would free up a few billion more.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:24 pmThe SOTU speach did give me a bit of hope again…
…but then again, the scum bag repukes are going to do their crap…
…traitors all.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:25 pmRemember how democrats used to be accused of big spending programs for the poor like welfare ? God I miss those days. Now the only socialism offered is too the wall street bankers who stole the retirement savings of middle class investors .
The two parties have become one with their corporate sponsors and democracy is indefinitely detained .
January 27th, 2010 at 10:26 pmBuckie Boy, Wayne said the same thing about when he was in the Air Force, and that was more than 20 years ago.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:27 pmconservative guy says:
Instead of a freeze on defense spending let’s cut out all social welfare programs.
No, just cut the WASTE and FAT out of the BLOATED “defense” budget.
Probably 30%.
Plenty of money, CORPORATE WELFARE, there.
Can take care of Health Care and SS and Medicare.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:28 pmDesert Eagle you deserve cancer.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:28 pmHow can you be soft on defence when you go in front of the Nobel committee and declare to the entire world that the country that out spends the entire planet on it’s military has the right to defend itself .
No one liked that speech more than the neocons .
January 27th, 2010 at 10:29 pm@46, Don’t you think Hillary has more important things to do?
January 27th, 2010 at 10:31 pmDesert Eagle says:
Desert Eagle you deserve cancer.
Classy. TP= hate site. Any questions?
YOU come to spout your HATE.
Better off at “free” “rapepublic”, huh??
Soon Bush and Cheney will DROP DEAD and go to be with their MASTER Satan.
And TRAITOR Ronnie.
YOU will get there, too!
January 27th, 2010 at 10:32 pmSoon YOU, deserter, will BURN for ETERNITY.
With the EVIL TRAITORS Bush the AWOL deserter and Cheney.
And TRAITOR Ronnie Raygun…
Did you take your deserter name from AWOL Bush?
January 27th, 2010 at 10:34 pmIt’s true, Goat Blowers like you Desert Eagle are traitors to the country and truly deserve a slow painful death with cancer.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:35 pmThe two party system is a transparent sham . The military industrial complex could be virtually defeated overnight by a simple ammendment to the constitution striking down the obvious con of corporate personhood .
Sign this petition and pass it on !
http://site.pfaw.org/site/MessageViewer?dlv_id=14741&em_id=12301.0
January 27th, 2010 at 10:35 pmBuckie Boy says:
I was Airforce 4 years, and the waste and corruption is beyond anything that you can imagine…way beyond…
…and I’m sure it is tripled since VN.
I worked on those Virginia class subs, my husband is still employed by a large homeland security entity. His first reaction to the announcement of the spending freeze was “Include Defense”. I feel the same way.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:37 pmProbably 30% WASTER in the DoD.
THERE is the money America needs.
That’s why the rest of the industrialized world covers the healthcare of ALL its citizens.
Canada runs a SURPLUS…
January 27th, 2010 at 10:39 pmP.D. says:
@46, Don’t you think Hillary has more important things to do?
goes to show you how dumb dessert beagle is…..
dont even know theres always one cabinet person who will not be in the chambers LOL what a moron,, just like the rest of the idiot tea baggers
January 27th, 2010 at 10:41 pmRemove corporate interference in our democracy and we the people can actually begin to solve the very pressing needs which we are facing with out obstruction and our representatives will once again be public servants as opposed to pigs at the feeding trough .
Allow Citizens United v FEC to stand and all political activism by “the people” will be an exercise in futility.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:42 pmDesert e @ 61
January 27th, 2010 at 10:44 pmAtleast then he could find an honest job .
It’s hard for a truly insane person like yourself to point fingers at anyone.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:45 pmPilot, Jesus! Thousands dead in Haiti, the Middle East in flames! What the Hell? Don’t the trolls know Dems can walk and chew gum at the same time?
January 27th, 2010 at 10:47 pmDesert Eagle says:
obomber
That’s why you sound familiar. Thanks for tipping us off on one of your past usernames!
.
conservative guy says:
Instead of a freeze on defense spending let’s cut out all social welfare programs.
Translation: “I’m only for small government when it comes to helping people. When it comes to killing people I want government to be as large as possible.”
There’s a name for that kind of gornment: military junta.
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Desert Eagle says:
And get rid of the illegals. Problem solved. Next?
Undocumented immigrants are already deported whenever they’re caught. Reasonable enforcement already exists to do exactly that. Do you have some other, perhaps more aggressive, method in mind for “getting rid of” them that you’d like to share with the class?
January 27th, 2010 at 10:47 pmP.D. says:
Pilot, Jesus! Thousands dead in Haiti, the Middle East in flames! What the Hell? Don’t the trolls know Dems can walk and chew gum at the same time?
smiles well they dont even know that jesus was a democrat
January 27th, 2010 at 10:51 pmNot likely that my husband would be unemployed Mr. Eagle. Mission critical and a good value…because he’s a real patriot, and honest.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:53 pmThis comment has been voted down. Click to read.
OutstandingInMyField, sponsored by big Ag says
and good on both of you….
January 27th, 2010 at 10:56 pmThis comment has been voted down. Click to read.
But you love to kill people with military might rather than help Americans.
You kind of earn some hate with your values.
January 27th, 2010 at 10:59 pmKenneth says:
so you must also be dessert begale….. it was saying the same thing
January 27th, 2010 at 11:02 pmThanks Mr. Pilotshark. My husband and I both never lost sight of the fact that our fellow citizens are our customers, and deserve value for their dollar. He’s lost jobs for his unwillingness to cover up defects in the product.
January 27th, 2010 at 11:02 pmBut I think the republicans heard him when he pointed out how UnAmerican they have been behaving….
January 27th, 2010 at 11:03 pmOutstandingInMyField, sponsored by big Ag says:
you most welcome and tell your hubby that he is indeed a real american.
send him a handshake from me
January 27th, 2010 at 11:04 pmDesert Eagle says:
You mean the spending freeze the pos said countless times he was against? LOL!
“I was against the spending freeze before I was for it!” pos obama
Arrested development: it’s a “conservative thing”.
Grow up…..
January 27th, 2010 at 11:08 pmKenneth say
so guessing your wrong side cult party should take a look at what just happen here in Oregon,,,,
That sends a bigger picture that your side should worry about
January 27th, 2010 at 11:11 pmBasic Engineering 101 – to optimize a process, you look first at the parts that are absorbing the greatest amount of your resources.
For the US Budget, the military actions are definitely one of the places you would look at first. Correcting this hemorrhage would go a long way to bringing the budget closer to a balance.
OTOH – I will cut Obama slack on this in two items:
1) Unlike Bush, Obama was honest enough to put the cost of these military actions back on the books (instead of just imagining they don’t have any costs)
2) I see a great difference between deciding to get into an area as opposed to breaking the region and then walking away as if you were without responsibility. We broke it. We have a moral imperative to provide resources to fix it.
January 27th, 2010 at 11:31 pmPilotshark Sponsored by Beoing says:
Kenneth say
so guessing your wrong side cult party should take a look at what just happen here in Oregon,,,,
Last time I checked Oregon was a Blue State. What a surprise!
Let’s see what the job market and unemployment rate is at the end of the year in Oregon and then discuss it.
January 27th, 2010 at 11:42 pmUnemployment always goes down under a democrat and up under a republican. It’s just a fact.
January 27th, 2010 at 11:43 pmKenneth says:
ncbrickhome says:
Soon YOU, deserter, will BURN for ETERNITY.
With the EVIL TRAITORS Bush the AWOL deserter and Cheney.
And TRAITOR Ronnie Raygun…
Did you take your deserter name from AWOL Bush?
Buckie Boy says:
Desert Eagle you deserve cancer.
The hate reeks! Take note TP.
No “hate”.
Just TRUTH.
Of course, you TRAITORS just HATE the TRUTH, so yes, YOUR hate of your fellow Americans “reekd”.
January 27th, 2010 at 11:48 pmKenneth
Always brings the stupid. Never anything worth the waste of life it takes to read his ignorant tripe. Tell us Kenneth. What do you get out of proudly displaying how stupid and pathetic you are?
January 27th, 2010 at 11:50 pmDesert Eagle says:
“Include Defense”.
Which would mean your husband unemployed.
If people have jobs making OBSOLETE weapons, or just committing FRAUD against the DoD and the USA, then YES,
we don’t need CORPORATE WELFARE “jobs”.
These people can get work doing something USEFUL, and not being a LEECH on the US and Americans.
January 27th, 2010 at 11:51 pm.
~Author unknown, quoted in You Said a Mouthful edited by Ronald D. Fuchs
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January 28th, 2010 at 1:31 amKenneth says:
January 28th, 2010 at 2:57 amLet’s see what the job market and unemployment rate is at the end of the year in Oregon and then discuss it.
‘
LOL! Since when are you concerned about the employment rate anywhere you fascist d**chebag?
Kenneth says:
President Obama. SOTU
I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, …..
Apparantly he didn’t hear the voices of ‘We the People’ from Virginia, New Jersey and Massachusetts?
You mean where progressive stayed home because they were pissed off that Obama swung right? LOL! Yes, indeed! you’re such a mental retard kenneh, just like your namesake.
January 28th, 2010 at 2:58 amKenneth says:
I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, …..
You didn’t even hear any of the other 7137 words in the speech, did you? Why is there even any point in you trying to communicate with human beings?
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Kenneth says:
Let’s see what the job market and unemployment rate is at the end of the year in Oregon and then discuss it.
Keep your username. I’ll be back to talk about it with you. As of today, it stands at 10.8%. We’ll see whether that goes up or down.
January 28th, 2010 at 3:11 amChuck Feney says:
Don’t freeze the War Department budget. Cut it!!
I’ll up that: ‘Don’t freeze the War Department budget. KILL IT!!’ In other words, don’t just cut it, GUT IT!! Invest the proceeds in people, infrastructure, education, health, alternate energy; use the rest to balance the budget and reduce long term debt. Look at it this way: if we’d only spend the same amount as, say Russia and China combined, we’d still be able to save the better part of 800 billion per year, all things considered.
Funny how those who demand government get their hands off, stop reckless spending, leave the economy alone, each and all have a shit fit when the concept of military cuts comes us. God, there are a lot of two-faced dumbasses out there!
January 28th, 2010 at 9:19 amFunny, I thought we elected Obama.
Humph…
I didn’t realize we actually elected McCain.
Anyone recall back on the campaign trail a year and a half ago…
McCain stating he would implement a spending freeze on all “non-defense spending.”
Sad that this is now exactly what Obama is doing.
Further evidence that democrats and republicans are two sides of the same, greasy, corrupt coin.
Vote green and independent next election. For ANY office, not just for the presidential run.
January 28th, 2010 at 9:45 am$532 billion is still more money than the military spending of every other country in the world COMBINED.
January 28th, 2010 at 9:49 amWhile I emphatically agree we spend way, way to much on defense, to place a freeze on the military would be political suicide just like gun control was 20 years ago for Dems. The President can reduce defense spending w/out a freeze and that would be the smart way to go about it.
January 28th, 2010 at 1:01 pmMr. Burns #91 re:
Voting green and independent in next election is a great idea.
That is if you like the Supreme Court’s recent decision and would like to see more of the same.
Personally, I don’t.
January 28th, 2010 at 1:06 pmhttp://digg.com/political_opinion/Think_Progress_Spending_Freeze_Must_Include_Defense
January 28th, 2010 at 6:21 pm