Should We Raise the Military Budget?

        Is $600 billion dollars enough to keep us safe? Defense spending means the money a country puts into it’s military forces and financing wars. U.S. defense spending increased an unreasonable amount during this century. U.S. defense budget pays for salaries and housing, different weapons, development of military equipment, operations, and construction. U.S. defense spending increased during this century thanks to a number of factors, including the development of new weapons and an increase in the scope of war. The U.S. spent about $2.4 billion dollars while fighting on the American Revolution and the U.S. spent almost the same amount on the Mexican-American war. The U.S. civil war was the most expensive war in the nineteenth century. The Union spent almost $60 billion dollars and the confederacy $20 billion dollars. With all of this being said should we raise the U.S. military budget or should we cut?

        If we raise the U.S. military budget would we be safer than before? “As a first step to rebuilding America’s military, Congress should increase the FY 2016 defense budget to $600 billion dollars.” (Salmon, “A proposal for the FY 2016 Defense Budget”). There are two things that benefit a military budget increase. Number one, the security in many places of the world has changed in direction unfavorable for the U.S. In the past years, the different threats to the U.S. have changed, and the U.S. needs to reestablish the defense spendings. Number two, the U.S. military keeps getting weaker due to recent spending decisions. The years of doubts over the defense budget, clumsy budget cuts, and reductions have finally led us to a weaker and smaller military today. If we raise the U.S. military budget would we be safer? Yes we would be safer, at least until the threats to the U.S. don’t change.

        If we cut the U.S. military budget would there still be enough money to keep us safe? “In total, since FY 2010, the defense budget, including overseas contingency operations (OCO) spending, has been cut 25 percent in inflation-adjusted dollars.” (Salmon, “A Proposal for the FY 2016 Defense Budget”). Defense cuts have occurred in three different ways over the last six years. The first cut was for about $20 billion and concentrated the budget cut on modernization programs. The budget was cut again by another $49 billion dollars. The cuts aimed to reduce strength and to save some money, instead of taking away modernization programs. The last cut was done by an organization called the Bipartisan Budget Act (BBA) cut another $38 billion to date. If we cut the budget is there still enough money to keep us safe? Yes there’s more than enough money to keep us safe.