In fiscal year 2015, Pentagon and related spending will total $598 billion, accounting for 54 percent of all federal discretionary spending. That's roughly the size of the next seven largest military budgets around the world, combined.
If civilian production can be shifted to be useful right now against the coronavirus, so should military production. This is an excellent time to invoke the Defense Production Act to redirect the industrial capacity of military contractors.
Rather than restoring the status quo, we have the opportunity to forge a different path that invests in real security for Americans.
The time has come for an end to the United States ill-conceived wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the moment is ripe for a new peace dividend. Today’s threats are mostly non-military in nature: climate change, global economic inequality, and rising nationalism all do not have military solutions.
President Trump released his fourth budget proposal today, and the priorities are crystal clear. Just four agencies rate spending increases in the Trump 2021 budget: the Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Veterans Affairs, and the Treasury Department. From Agriculture to Education, and from Commerce to State, every other federal agency would face cuts under the president’s proposal. Across the board, the Trump budget prioritizes brute force and military solutions over humanitarian and diplomatic ones.
