Posted on 03/07/2016 8:09:01 AM PST by Kaslin
The Republican presidential debates have become so heated and filled with insults, it almost seems we are watching a pro wrestling match. There is no civility, and I wonder whether the candidates are about to come to blows. But despite what appears to be total disagreement among them, there is one area where they all agree. They all promise that if elected they will "rebuild the military."
What does "rebuild the military" mean? Has the budget been gutted? Have the useless weapons programs like the F-35 finally been shut down? No, the United States still spends more on its military than the next 14 countries combined. And the official military budget is only part of the story. The total spending on the U.S. empire is well over $1 trillion per year. Under the Obama Administration the military budget is still 41 percent more than it was in 2001, and seven percent higher than at the peak of the Cold War.
Russia, which the neocons claim is the greatest threat to the United States, spends about one-tenth what we do on its military. China, the other "greatest threat," has a military budget less than 25 percent of ours.
Last week the Pentagon announced it is sending a small naval force of U.S. warships to the South China Sea because, as Commander of the U.S. Pacific Command Adm. Harry Harris told the House Armed Services Committee, China is militarizing the area. Yes, China is supposedly militarizing the area around China, so the U.S. is justified in sending its own military to the area. Is that a wise use of the U.S. military?
The U.S. military maintains over 900 bases in 130 countries. It is actively involved in at least seven wars right now, including in Iraq, Syria, Pakistan, and elsewhere. U.S. Special Forces are deployed in 134 countries across the globe. Does that sound like a military that has been gutted?
I do not agree with the presidential candidates, but I do agree that the military needs to be rebuilt. I would rebuild it in a very different way, however. I would not rebuild it according to the demands of the military-industrial complex, which cares far more about getting rich than about protecting our country. I would not rebuild the military so that it can overthrow more foreign governments who refuse to do the bidding of Washington's neocons. I would not rebuild the military so that it can better protect our wealthy allies in Europe, NATO, Japan, and South Korea. I would not rebuild the military so that it can better occupy countries overseas and help create conditions for blowback here at home.
No. The best way to really "rebuild" the U.S. military would be to stop abusing the military in the first place. The purpose of the U.S. military is to defend the United States. It is not to make the world safe for oil pipelines, or corrupt Gulf monarchies, or NATO, or Israel. Unlike the neocons who are so eager to send our troops to war, I have actually served in the U.S. military. I understand that to keep our military strong we must constrain our foreign policy. We must adopt a policy of non-intervention and a strong defense of this country. The neocons will weaken our country and our military by promoting more war. We need to "rebuild" the military by restoring as its mission the defense of the United States, not of Washington's overseas empire.
Do we REALLY need to castrate Ron Paul ?
Answer: No, he couldn’t get arrested with a pound of meth in his car : )
If we didn’t rebuild our military, we would all see our taxes drop significantly, right?
Why is 2001 used as the base for 41% increase?
May God help me, I hate RP!
Certainly it needs an overhaul, but is it lack of money or poorly allocated funding? We spend far and away more money than anyone else. Somewhere along the way military spending has become as ineffectual as education. That is NO reflection on our military personnel, except perhaps a few well placed careerists. But somewhere there are a LOT of holes in the bucket where the money is leaking.
He’s a lunatic
For starters, just strip down and eliminate the private armies, para-military and SWAT teams Obama has built in the DHS, EPA, IRS and the BLM.
And don’t forget these other government bureaucracies with their own para-military units:
Department of Agriculture
Railroad Retirement Board
Tennessee Valley Authority
Office of Personnel Management
Consumer Product Safety Commission
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
U.S. Department of Education
Food and Drug Administration
“There is no civility”
It is long past time for decent people to wake up and realize that when dealing with scumbags, civility is nothing but a self-imposed handicap.
Actually, rebuilding the military by restructuring it so that interservice rivalry no long drives procurement decisions would probably be a very good thing. It is probably the biggest thing that could be done to simultaneously improve readiness and keep costs down (if not actually cut them).
In the current environment in my judgement we need more spending on ground-force modernization and less on fifth generation fighter aircraft, but try to get that past the Joint Chiefs. (And even if my judgement from afar is wrong, there are plenty of historical circumstances in which building up the Navy without building up, or maybe even while shrinking, the Army, or vice-versa, would have made sense, and likely there will be in the future, but good luck with that the way DOD is currently structured.)
I can find little to disagree with in his comments. Why the “barf alert?” The military is not underfunded. It is over-extended. Our Perpetual War since 2001 has not benefitted us. And it has damn near bankrupted us. Disagree?
I’ve always felt that Ron Paul is a closet Muslim, since cutting our military back would logically enable Islam to seize more territories. He’s quick to whine about enhance interrogation techniques and detaining terrorists as well, both which highly suggest “Muslim”.
The insults are exclusively flowing out of the mouths of Cruz and the rube.
(after this coming Tuesday, the rube will be out frog grabbin' with the jeb)
Add to all this we have the very slimy scumbag Romney trying to smear Mr Trump.
Over 30 years without any significant up grades. Over 15 years of perpetual war. What could possibly go wrong?
M1 Tank entered service in 1980
Bradly Fighting vehicle entered service in 1981
Apache Helicopter - 1975
F-15 - 1972
F-16 - 1975
B-52 - 1955
A-10 - 1976
B-1B - 1986
B-2 - 1997(only 20 built)
F-25 - 2005 (last one delivered in 2012 only 187 built)
10 Active carriers JFK -1968 thru GHWB - 2009
F-18 - 1984
He has been on the take from the muslims for the last 40 years.
Well, if we are going to rely on the militia again there are some things that need to be done. First, stop calling militias crazy people. Two, authorize fully automatic weapons for private sales just like handguns and long guns are now. Three, allow private manufacture, sale, and possession of rocket propelled grenades and military grade explosives.
The only way the military can be defunded is to allow citizen self defense. I don’t think Ron Paul is that serious, though.
Thank you for the list which proves the point.
I think you meant F-22 instead of F-25.
BTW, I think Ron Paul can be a naive pacifist.
However he is right about the Outcomes of our bloated weapons programs.
We are not getting the weapons and force capabilities that our two major opponents are, in light of what we spend.
Capital cronyism, lobbying and not holding political, military and defense contractors accountable for mistakes guarantees we’ll continue to go broke and not get delivery of the most effective military we must have.
RE: “ F-25 - 2005 (last one delivered in 2012 only 187 built)”
The Welfare State has bankrupted us, NOT military funding and campaigns.
You’re gonna believe a lunatic who insists that Islam only attacks us because we are “over there”? and “provoked them”?????????
The Ron Paul Mob Zombies have gravitated in large measure to Trump as their new standard-bearer savior.
No.
Thank you, I meant F-22. Another thing to remember is the technology used to produce these weapons systems is at least a decade older.
There have been upgrades along the way, but usually it is obsolete by the time it is installed.
I agree with Ron Paul. The Pentagon wastes so much money, and the DoD isn’t really focused on defending the US. To Trump’s credit, he said he doesn’t want the defense contractors picking our weapons systems. He also doesn’t want us to go to war unless we get something out of it. I think the reasons the establishment is going after Trump is because he won’t do any more stupid wars. It is so strange having a patriot run for President.
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