These charts show the “discretionary” part of the federal budget — that is, the part that Congress and the President directly allocate each year (with the funds derived from our income taxes, corporation taxes, excise taxes, estate and gift taxes, and other miscellaneous taxes). These figures exclude expenditures for Social Security, Medicare, and federal highways since these programs are paid from dedicated taxes maintained in separate trust funds. They also exclude interest paid on the national debt since that spending is “mandatory,” not “discretionary.” Funding for Federal Employee Retirement Benefits, Unemployment Benefits, and means-tested entitlements like Veterans Benefits, Medicaid, SSI, and food stamps are also mandated by on-going legislation and so are not included in the discretionary budget.

U.S. Military Spending in the Past 70 Years

Military spending in inflation-adjusted dollars is now greater than at any time since World War II -- even greater than during the peak spending years of the Vietnam War, the Korean War, and the Persian Gulf War (see the chart below — data from Table 6.1).

Military spending has been a major contributor to the annual federal deficit. Compare the chart below with the one above.

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities determined that since 2001, security and military programs (including the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq) are responsible for 37% of federal government deficits.

Arms Sales

The United States is now the largest supplier of weapons to the world. According to a Congressional Research Service report (pdf), in 2008, the U.S. sold $37.8 billion in arms to other countries — nearly 70% of all weapons sales around the world. These weapons, often subsidized by the U.S. government and sold to undemocratic countries and human rights abusers, may lead to future wars. Some of these weapons may end up being used against the U.S. military or against civilians, as they have in the past (for example: Iraq 2004/5, The Philippines 2007, Afghanistan 2009, Israel 2009).

Is Massive Spending on the Military Needed?

Since the demise of the Soviet Union over twenty years ago, the United States has no significant military adversaries. The only countries or groups that express hostility towards the United have small military capabilities.

This contrasts with the period just before World War II when Germany and Japan had massive military forces and the United States had relatively few resources, many of which were destroyed in the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Now, the United States has the most powerful military that has ever existed in the history of the world. We have more than enough firepower to obliterate any enemy. The nuclear weapons in the U.S. arsenal are powerful enough to destroy much of the planet and make our world completely uninhabitable. Moreover, U.S. conventional military force is mighty enough that we can wage two large wars simultaneously far from our shores. The U.S. has over 800 military bases around the world and 11 aircraft carriers circling the planet (and no potential adversary has more than 1). The U.S. spends almost as much on the military as all the rest of the world combined. The U.S. spends vastly more on its military than any possible enemies: roughly 7 times as much as China, 13 times as much as Russia, 73 times as much as Iran, and 44 times as much as the combined spending of the six “rogue” states (Cuba, Iran, Libya, North Korea, Sudan, and Syria).

Despite this massive amount of spending on the military, 47% of Americans are still fearful that our military is somehow inadequate. This may be because most mainstream commentary on the military is provided by pro-military retired generals, many of them on the payroll of military contractors.

President Eisenhower warned us in his farewell speech in 1961 to be wary of the military-industrial complex:



In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes.

[graphic: Todd Boyle, Rosehill Anti War

Rather than building a defense structure that protects us, Congress (especially the House and Senate Committees on Armed Services), the Department of Defense, and military contractors have forged an Iron Triangle that provides money and power for all of them — but at our expense. Military contractors spend enormous amounts lobbying and giving large campaign contributions to Congress and in turn Congress provides them with lucrative, often no-bid, contracts and weak oversight. Military contractors also lobby top DoD administrators and offer them high-paying jobs after they leave the government (revolving door syndrome) and in turn DoD administrators lobby Congress for more weapons and to overlook contractor cost overruns.

Not only is this wasteful and corrupt, but it provides no real benefit. For example, the government wastes money on complete boondoggles like the “Star Wars” missile defense program:



According to the Pentagon, since its inception in 1983, missile defense has cost $150 billion. Twenty years after proponents of the system could no longer justify its purpose by the Cold War, missile defense still does not work. It is the single most expensive weapons program, (after nuclear weapons) and has never yielded a significant result. It is the military equivalent of throwing money, in tens of billions of dollars, down the toilet. The program provides a case study in political corruption. A story by the New York Times, “Insider’s Projects Drained Missile-Defense Millions” revealed that missile defense spending has been driven by insider lobbying with the sole intention of making money, at times even at odds with actual Department of Defense procurement objectives.

Massive military spending, especially if it is corrupt and wasteful, does not provide security. The 9/11 terrorist attacks demonstrated that 19 guys (mostly from Saudi Arabia, an ally) armed with box cutters can attack the United States more effectively than massive armies. Huge expenditures on military personnel and weapons (especially on weapons designed for use in the Cold War) are ineffective in protecting us. It is also clear — asthe U.S. intelligence agencies have warned us — that the Iraq war and the “War on Terrorism” have actually made ussafe.

Real Security

Real security does not come by threatening or bullying, but by respecting and working together with others.

1. The best security is provided by not having enemies, and the best way to achieve this is to treat other countries and their people well. Invading and occupying other countries, supporting dictators, and torturing people who disagree with us are great ways to make lots of long-lasting enemies. As New York Times reporter Stephen Kinzer documented in his book Overthrow: America’s Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq, in the past 110 years, the United States has used military force in dozens of places around the world to gain access to oil and other natural resources, secure cheap labor, stifle dissent, and crush the efforts of opposition political movements. For example, the United States has obstructed independence movements in Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Philippines, and Nicaragua. It has staged covert actions to overthrow democratically-elected governments in Iran in 1953, Guatemala in 1954, and Chile in 1973. And it has invaded the Dominican Republic (most recently in 1965), Grenada in 1983, Panama in 1989, Afghanistan in 2001, and Iraq in 2003. Moreover, the U.S. has supported and helped to arm dozens of dictators including the Shah of Iran (Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlevi), P.W. Botha in apartheid South Africa, Augusto Pinochet in Chile, General Suharto in Indonesia, Francois “Doc” Duvalier and Jean Claude Duvalier (Baby Doc) in Haiti, George Papadopoulos in Greece, Anastasio Somoza, Jr. in Nicaragua, King Fahd bin Abdul of Saudi Arabia, General Pervez Musharraf in Pakistan, and Hosni Mubarek in Egypt.

2. The second best way to provide security is to have large numbers of strong allies around the world and to build trust by negotiating treaties and then adhering to them. Repudiating treaties like the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, ignoring important initiatives like the Kyoto Treaty on climate change, and launching crazy, unilateral military adventures based on lies (ike the Iraq war) are great ways to lose friends and allies. Providing development aid to poor countries — aid that improves health, education, and civil justice — wins friends and reduces grievances.

3. The third best way to provide security is to build strong domestic support. Spending much of our tax money on the military instead of on important domestic needs is a great way to impoverish our country and undercut domestic support for our government and society.

4. The best way to provide security against terrorist organizations is to address their political grievances or to use police and intelligence agencies to stop their leaders. A recent Rand Corporation research study (“How Terrorist Groups End: Lessons for Countering al Qa’ida”) found:

All terrorist groups eventually end. But how do they end? The evidence since 1968 indicates that most groups have ended because (1) they joined the political process (43 percent) or (2) local police and intelligence agencies arrested or killed key members (40 percent). Military force has rarely been the primary reason for the end of terrorist groups...

Don’t we need a strong military to save people from oppressive and genocidal regimes? Actually, as the recent revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt have vividly shown, the most effective and most ethical means to overthrow vicious dictators and undermine horribly repressive regimes is nonviolent action carried out by civic groups within those countries. In addition to the recent revolutions, in the last three decades, nonviolent people-power has toppled the apartheid regime in South Africa, deposed the dictatorships of Slobodan Milosevich in Yugoslavia, Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines, and Augusto Pinochet in Chile, and brought down the former Soviet Union and its communist satellite states (including Poland, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, and Lithuania). Overthrowing those regimes incurred relatively few casualties and wrought relatively little destruction. The nonviolent overthrow of these regimes has mostly left these countries stronger, more civilized, and much more free and democratic.

A 2005 study (2.3 MB pdf) by Freedom House found that in the 67 cases since 1972 in which dictatorial systems fell or new states arose from the disintegration of multinational states, “civic resistance was a key factor in driving 50 of 67 transitions” — over 70%. In 32 of the 67 countries (nearly 48%),

strong, broad-based nonviolent popular fronts or civic coalitions were highly active, and in many cases central to steering the process of change... Now, years after the transition, 24 of the countries (75 percent) where a strong nonviolent civic movement was present are Free and democratic states and 8 (25 percent) are Partly Free states with some space for civic and political life.

the stronger and more cohesive the nonviolent civic coalition operating in societies in the years immediately preceding the transition, the deeper the transformation in the direction of freedom and democracy.

In contrast,. They also found that

Spending on military force, in inflation-adjusted dollars, has grown to a level about 25 times as high as it was in 1940. Much of these expenditures have been used, not to protect our citizens from harm, but to invade and occupy other countries, support dictatorships, topple democratically-elected governments, and otherwise “project power” and secure our “national interests” by controlling the rest of the world. In reality, this has undermined our security and bankrupted our country. We could drastically reduce our military budget by focusing strictly on defense of our territory, which could probably be easily accomplished with $50-100 billion/year. Then we could devote more resources to efforts that would actually make us safer: collaborate with our allies, negotiate with our opponents, provide support to international bodies like the United Nations and the World Court, build up our own economy (especially local, renewal energy), protect the environment, provide aid to impoverished countries, support human rights throughout the world, and provide support to civic movements that use nonviolent action to challenge and undermine repressive regimes.

Six Things You Can Do

1. On Tax Day (Monday, April 18 this year), distribute leaflets to people dropping off their tax returns at your local Post Office. Write your own leaflet, or use ones prepared by FCNL or the War Resisters League.

2. Write to your members of Congress and urge them to cut the military budget. FCNL provides an easy form.

3. Write a letter to the editor of your local newspaper. FCNL provides good guidelines.

4. Make a presentation to a church or civic group based on the materials prepared by the National Priorities Project.

5. Support an organization working for peace.

6. Join the local chapter of a national peace organization like Peace Action or Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF).

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Some other resources:

Budget Background

“Where Do Our Income Taxes Go?” (pdf) — Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL)

“Policy Basics: Where Do Our Federal Tax Dollars Go?” — Center for Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP)

Recent Budget Commentary

"Are We Ready to Cut Defense Spending? What the Polls Say" by Carl Conetta and Charles Knight, Huffington Post, February 8, 2011.

"Too Big To Fail? President Obama has proposed the largest defense budget since World War II" by Fred Kaplan, February 1, 2010.

"Cow Most Sacred: Why Military Spending Remains Untouchable" by Andrew Bacevich, Huffington Post, January 27, 2011.

"Eisenhower's Warning Still Challenges A Nation" by NPR, January 16, 2011.

"A Far From Happy New Year" by William Pfaff, TruthDig, December 28, 2010.

"Conservative Leaders Call on Congress to Consider Defense Spending Cuts" by Mattie Corrao, Americans for Tax Reform, November 30, 2010.

"Waste Land: The Pentagon’s nearly unprecedented, wildly irrational spending binge" by Gregg Easterbrook, The New Republic, November 10, 2010.

"DoD, Wake Up And Cut!" by Gordon Adams, DoDBuzz, November 17, 2010.

"DoD Must Share The Pain" by William D. Hartung, DoDBuzz, October 6, 2010.

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Previous Editions of this Series: 2010 2009 2008

This new article, "The Real U.S. National Security Budget: The Figure No One Wants You to See" from Chris Hellman, National Priorities Project (NPP), adds all the budget items related to national security and finds it totals $1.2 trillion.