This seems to be the elephant in the room nobody is talking about.
Our military and spending is insane compared to the rest of the world, especially considering we haven’t been in an official war since WW2… just “conflicts”.
It’s a huge fixed cost that has no real return every year. We have armies of tanks, jets, carriers missiles, nuclear power that we are just trying to keep from rusting every year. I’m not saying we don’t need it, but we definitely don’t need so much of it and increase it every year.
This pretty much summarizes our stance in the world power
Edit x2: We have undisputed Air dominance, Naval dominance, Nuclear dominance, global presence, budget, design, schooling/training and technology. :wow
The loss of four civilian aircraft valued at $385 million.
The destruction of major buildings in the World Trade Center with a replacement cost of from $3 billion to $4.5 billion.
Damage to a portion of the Pentagon: up to $1 billion.
Cleanup costs: $1.3 billion.
Property and infrastructure damage: $10 billion to $13 billion.
Federal emergency funds (heightened airport security, sky marshals, government takeover of airport security, retrofitting aircraft with anti-terrorist devices, cost of operations in Afghanistan): $40 billion.
Direct job losses amounted to 83,000, with $17 billion in lost wages.
The amount of damaged or unrecoverable property hit $21.8 billion.
Losses to the city of New York (lost jobs, lost taxes, damage to infrastructure, cleaning): $95 billion.
Your point? Our nuclear bombs and aircraft carriers can’t stop guerrilla warfare and suicidal terrorists. We are well equipped to traditional warfare. Taking civilian planes, sending anthrax, shoebombings and school shootings aren’t stopped by an Abraham’s tank.
So again I ask, what’s your point? You’re the one brought up 9/11 in an argument in regards to overspending of our military.
If you’re going to go by the “what if’s” thats a useless debate, since “what if we didn’t stick our noses all over the world with our military and 9/11 never happened because we didn’t piss of the Middle East”
I’m saying that it’s easy to name a few small attacks that “we didn’t stop” because it’s impossible to list all of the attacks that didn’t happen because we did stop them before they happened.
And how did the nuclear subs, nuclear bombs, aircraft carriers, stealth helicopters, missles, bombers, jet fighters and whatever else you want to name in the military stop other terrorist or guerrilla attacks?
Please indulge me.
Also while on the matter, explain to me how do the countries that spend 1/10th and less on their military deal with the threats that they stop if they have so much less military power?
“Don’t look at the stuff that happened, but pay attention to stuff you can’t see and doesn’t exist”
LOVE IT, go on :rofl
Edit: So please explain to me how our military spending is going to stop the next underwear bomber. And if it can’t now, what if we double the budget would we be able to stop one then?
I’m not sure if you understand how terrorist attacks work, they don’t attack military in traditional combat, they go after civilians, hence why the military hasn’t stopped those events. Hence why we haven’t won the “war on terror” and if anything made them more pissed off ensuring future attacks. But heeeeey, we got a lot of tanks!
im not all for rediculous spending but i think what he said brought up great points… no need for the kk style post vlad, dont make me get all pjb on your ass and talk about drug testing people who collect benefits.
We are the most powerful nation state in the human history that is unrivaled in it’s dominance.
Thats why small states like to “threaten” us and throw “firecrackers” at us in terms of terror attacks, because there is no means to go against us other then being a pest.
We are literally at a point where nobody will dare conquest us in direct combat. It’s suicidal. Our geographical location combined with our military power means nobody will ever make landfall on our soil in a direct military attack. And even if they did, citizens would welcome it as we would finally have a legitimate excuse to own 88 rifles for every 100 people :lol
We have nuclear subs all over the world, invisible, underwater that can lunch a mutli head nuclear strike on any state or location that dares to go against our citizens. We have drones randomly flying in enemy territories while we are sipping on coffee in a base in NY. We can go into any country at any point in time, undetected, execute a mission and run back out.
It’s rather incredible, and it’s good to be on this side of the fense, but it’s still quite extreme especially considering the state of the economy.
To be fair, I don’t even think cuts in military spending would particularly help, just maybe make it more efficient and cut excess spending like being involved in conflicts overseas.
In relation to our total GDP, what is the percentage spent on military?
China?
N. Korea?
Iran?
Israel?
The average is 2%ish, where the US is at 4.7%. Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Israel and a few othe countries spend more than us in relation to total GDP which I think we can all agree is the most important number as it kinda levels the field a bit because of course a country with less GDP will be spending less on military, but maybe at a different proportion (% of GDP).
I wouldn’t have expected Mexico, Italy, Greece, Germany, etc… To have spent more than us considering they all make/spend less than us for GDP.
This is a case of “If not us, then who?” and nothing more. This nation has taken on the role of “World Police” and there isn’t another nation on the planet that can or would want to take on this role. We have in essence succeeded in World conquest, but it’s at a great cost. The “What if” scenarios scare me because no one else can take our place if we pull out of everywhere. Peaople will never get along 100%. We play an important role in keeping people in line (as well as a fair share of plundering and coercison (sp?)) and keeping people safe.
We may not be the most loved, but I do not want to see what would happen if someone else takes over our role… or doesn’t at all…
In a nutshell - Back to Mafdark - “Fall of global markets: incalculable.”
There was a good documentary on this exact issue on Netflix called The World Without “US”. It makes some valid points about the status of the world in general and what ifs, though I’m sure it has its bias.
