Are we spending enough money on defense?

[Brichard]

I must confess that I can't begin to cover what we do/dont' spend on defense. I can also tell you that I thought we were spending too much at one time. We already have enough bombs to blow up the world many times over, so I always wondered why we continued to dump so much money into that with our large deficit.

But... have we gone too far? Somebody I know that has a military background said that we couldn't even launch a Gulf War strike with our current anemic level of troops. I also spoke to another military friend in his 60's, and he said things were really difficult on those in the service. He said the expectations haven't changed, so with fewer people around many are forced to work 15+ hour days.

I've also been warned that while we continue to take away from those resources that many other countries like China continue to bolster their defenses. With the potential of some of our enemies like Bin Ladin getting more and mored destructive weapons, I hope we are not lulled into a false sense of security.

I will say this, I hope much of our study is on actual "defense" mechanisms. I am speaking of counter-defense against proactive strikes.

So... Whaddya think?

[TXmom]

There's a theory that says that every ounce of power in the US is held by a specific circle of people, and Pentagon warlords are among those people. Their survival depends on the US spending hundreds of billions of dollars on our military. For example, aren't President Bush and the Pentagon currently trying to sell the American people on a national missile defense system? Even though it doesn't work and the last test (which cost $100 million dollars) was rigged.

[Lynda/WA]

I don't know much about missle defense so I won't comment on that. I think the military should have more power over how they spend the money they do get. By that I mean that many of the decisions are made by congress. An amazing number of decisions are made in little committees in congress about how military money is spent. Imagine if your boss said I'm going to pay you this much money but I decide how you spend it.I'm going tell you to spend this money to support social programs (small businesses, handicapped, minorities). And when to much is spent, I'll blame it on you. They want programs that will help their home districts or to help canidates of their own party.

Some examples. Many years ago (late 80s) the pentagon wanted to stop buying MREs. MREs are Meals Ready to Eat. Dehydrated and packaged food in a brown bag that can be stored for a long time. High in sodium and about 2,000+ calories. The stuff has a long expiration date and the military had a huge stockpile. Congress said you have to keep buying MREs to support the business. Keep in mind that there is a market for these since boy scouts, campers ect use them. The result was that we got to start eating them in the dining hall in place of real food. No choice.

Another example - base closures. Closures were recommended based on security needs. The final determination was made by congress. Did you notice that California has so many military bases? Not many closures? BTW closures for stateside bases and overseas bases are different. I say they should both be based on military needs not local economy. And the military wants to close more bases. Let them.

There have been weapons/arms programs that the pentagon had wanted to end but congress has over-riden them. The helicopters that go vertical. I think they are the Blackhawks? I don't know much about them but I do know that years ago Cheney wanted to axe the program. He was over-ridden by congress. Guessing that they are made in some congressperson's district!

Even smaller purchases could be made smarter without congress' interference. We were required to buy things from small or minority owned businesses. Frequently that meant more expensive. For example - DH worked as a civilian out on the ranges operating heavy equipment. They leased large piece of equipment for a couple of months to see if it would be more efficient at doing the job. It was so they decided it would be smarter to buy. After much research they found that the one they had on location would be the cheapest. They put in paperwork to buy the piece they were leasing. The contracting office turned it down because the company wasn't a small business or minority owned. They found a minority owned business from out of state. That company ran the paperwork. They bought the equipment from the company DHs shop had found, on paper only. Then sold it to the government for a couple of thousand dollars more. The equipment never left DH's shop but the government added in another middleman for thousands extra. I could tell you dozens of stories like that.

Then in CA DH worked for a contractor on base repairing their grounds equipment. They had been given the contract without having to compete for it since they hired handicaped people. DH was fabbergasted. The first day his boss drove him around to see what they did. The man told him not to wake up any of the workers if they were sleeping since many of them were heavily medicated. These were workers driving equipment like riding lawn mowers on medication! And they'd fall asleep while driving!!!! Nothing like spending money claiming it spent on the military but in reality its being used to support social programs!

Another way that military funds are used to support *disadvantaged* people. When we left AZ the base went contract. All of the civilian workers were given a pink slip. The government had to offer them a job. Many were willing to move anywere in the country. I had 2 mechanics working under me that put in to be eligible for jobs nation wide. At the same time they were trying to find a job one came open at McCord in WA. Those under base closer should get first option at those jobs. When hiring for government civilian jobs, those injured in Vietnam get extra points. Being qualified for the job is a must. No on the job training if anyone qualified applies. I had two injured vietnam vets already doing the job and they never were considered for the job. Instead a black woman was given the job. She wasn't qualified at all. In fact she had never had any experience as a mechanic and needed to go to the same training school that active duty people are sent to. The one I went to when my mechanical experience was putting gas in a car! Can you imagine your local mechanics shop hiring someone with **NO** experience and sending them to school when eligible people WANTED the job! Again military money spent to support social programs. The kicker is she turned around and sued the government! Saying she wasn't given enough training!! Never heard the result of the suit since my friend that was TRYING to train her, after she got out of school, left.

Military money is also used for *experiments*. At my base in California we had to start converting our air conditioning freon to the more enviromentally friendly R134 instead of the old R12 (this was in 94/95). Very few people were doing it but the government wanted to *jumpstart* the market and create a demand making things cheaper for you and I. Another *experiment* was propane vehicles. Again the idea was to create a demand that would result in more supply for you and I as consumers. Not the pentagon choosing but congress spending military money to impact things they want. In this case to create a demand for more enviromentally friendly things.

Another silly thing - if the money isn't spent (ie saved) you lose it. When I lived in Germany they revamped the dorms. The money to remodel was pushed back. The money to paint wan't. The result was that they painted the buildings then went through and remodeled. They went from doors in the center down a hall to doors on the outside for dorms 4 floors high. That meant ripping off the face of dorms painted a couple of months prior! I went to the head enlisted guy in my squadron to question this stupidity. My first lesson in how congress can mess things up!

Gore was supposedly revamping the government purchasing system but I never saw a difference.

When the base in AZ went contract the housing was offered up for use by those in need. They weren't good enough! I found it funny that it was ok for me to live in a house that you could see daylight through a hole in the floor. It wasn't good enough for welfare people though! I think it was HUD that declined the houses?

Brichard - DHs company loves to hire prior military people. The reason is because they are accustomed to working long hours and enduring hardships. The number of people deserting is at an all time high. Porbably because while the number of people dramatically decreased (half?) the number of deployments increase by 300%.
I once put in a 23 hour day when military. I was sent home by a co-worker that put in 26 hours. A couple of hours sleep and we were both back at work for another 16. Nearly my entire tour in Germany was spent working 12 hour shifts for 6 days a week. When pregnant, you are limited by the doctors to 72 hours in a week. That's either 6 twelve hour days or just over 10 hours a day for 7 days. When I was in Germany I was frost bitten working INSIDE my building. We had no heat. We put cans around to catch the rainwater coming through the ceiling. We drilled holes in the soft floor. If we put a vehicle on jacks, they would sink and I wasn't always strong enough to pull the jacks out of the floor. Once I laid down on the floor and my coworker outlined my body with chalk. Looked like a stiff. We joked around about how something was going to kill us in that building! I can remember operating a wrecker one day sitting there crying because I was sooo cold. I had to wear steel toed boots in the snow with no way to warm up! People would ask me and my coworkers how we could get along so well working in the conditions we did. We told them that when you face hell together it creates a bond. We kept a book of matches tacked up on a wall and joked that if things got REALLY cold we would light a match and gather around the match for heat.
I prayed that my next base would have heat. Guess what? I got sent to AZ. Working outside in 120* weather was heat alright! I was IVd for dehydration twice. My building had no walls just wire fencing. The office was a bathroom with the toilet pulled out. If we sat on the desk all 5 of us could fit in the office at one time! That was the only place with A/C unless you went to the neighboring shop. Sometime you have to watch what you ask for!
I wouldn't trade any of it though because the absolute BEST people I have ever met have all been military. It made me a better person. Guess what doesn't break you makes you stronger.

[Mickey]

I'd love to hear more, Donna!

I wouldn't be surprised if there were a circle of power like that. And I'm convinced that we will never know the truth about what is spent and by whom or why--we're only told what they want us to believe--and they'd probably prefer us to get all up in arms about a negative untrue "spin" and take the focus off of what's REALLY going on.

I saw an interesting Nova program once about how our being the first to land on the moon was a total hoax to fake out our enemies--to beat the Russians to it...to get them to believe we had an endless supply of money and technology. Not sure if it's true, but the footage and info was extremely interesting--they showed multiple shadows in "moon" photographs that should not exist with one light source (the sun) and how the moon terrain was remarkably similar to that of a desert area on earth (they overlapped stills from the moon and from earth and they matched perfectly) and how there shouldn't be "tracks" on the dirt on the moon and how the flag shouldn't have been "waving" in the non-existent breeze. Interesting.

Anyway, my point is we will only ever "know" what they want us to believe and I'm sure we'd be shocked at some of the stuff that's actually going on.

Regarding Lynda's comments...I've had State jobs and it was the same thing there--they discovered that the prices they were paying for some things from particular vendors was exorbitant, so they started putting contracts out to bid and that helped a lot. This kind of stuff happens in private companies as well...people want to spend down their budgets or they won't get allotted the same amount or be able to justify an increase for next year. I've had jobs at which I suggested that purchasing equipment elsewhere would be cheaper and was told not to worry about it. I knew someone who put in a request to purchase a can of spray paint to spray paint a file cabinet that was a bit rusty in spots and he ended up with a p.o. to purchase a brand new three-hundred-fifty-dollar oak file cabinet (from a specific furniture store) instead because they needed to spend down the budget. The can of paint would have come under the category of "repairs" which was part of a budget that was already spent down, so they went for the "furniture" category in a different budget that had excess money. So, while it's wrong, wasteful spending and back-scratching is rampant everywhere.

[TXmom]

Here are a couple of books:

The Power Elite - C. Wright Mills
Who Rules America? - Domhoff

Here's the link to the missile defense story:

http://www.salon.com/news/col/cona/2001/07/31/test/index.html

It's the top people who have the power and will ensure
their survival. The common man is of no consequence.

[Lynda/WA]

Donna - Have you read these two books? I went to check them out and they appear to me to have less to do with the military and more with class separation. Is that what you are talking about?

The one book - Who Rules - appears to only have one reference to the President (LBJ specifically). I didn't see anything about anyone else mentioning the military specifically with this book and can't imagine how you can talk about the power of high ranking military officials without mentioning the top dog in it - the President.

And the other book - The Power Elite - says there are three groups that rule. The military, the government and big corporations. I can buy that. But it was also written in 1956! That was before I was even born! Here's a quote about the book [In Mills's work, he identified the military, the government, and big corporations as the power elite, and they all work together to keep it that way. Yet, today, the military is an extension of the government; the media have emerged as a much more powerful force than before; and mass movements, such as civil rights, have defied the "elites". Arguing that the "new" power centers merely replace the old puts you in the pluralist camp--something Mills specifically dismissed.

The book itself is written very well, and his sources and statistics are fine. But they have not survived the test of time, and has largely been proved wrong. This book is the centerpiece for power elite theory, so as a scholarly work it is at the top. It's just that it's, you know, wrong. ]

If he discounts the power of special interest groups (ie enviromentalist, civil rights etc) and the media, I have to question how correct he is about other things. Especially half a century later!

Mickey - I also saw a show about if we really did land on the moon. Maybe even the same one. It was interesting. The next day I saw another show (interview style) that gave explainations for much of this stuff. I wish I could remember more details!

I'm not really sure I understand the point of view of a couple of you. Who specifically do you think holds to much power?

[TXmom]

Well of the two of us who answered this post other than you, which couple don't you understand LOL? I really don't have much more to add, it's just a theory that was presented to me recently. The only thing that I will address is the media aspect. Did you read the story about the missile test? Have you ever read this information in any newspaper? Who owns the newspapers and TV networks? Large corporations perhaps?

[Lynda/WA]

Donna - Yes, I would like your and Mickey's opinions on who specifically is in power. I didn't say you two by name because I was hoping others would give there own opinions. I didn't want it to seem as if this was a conversation limited to those that had already posted (other than Brichard).

Yes, I did read the article. I also went into the sites archives and read other articles by that writer. It seemed to me that he isn't even remotely an unbiased author. In fact he sounded like a socialist to me. He lacted credibility to me which makes me skeptical about his *facts*. Also, it sounded to me like he was describing a demonstration not actual testing. Demonstrations are done for show. to give people an visual idea of what can be done. They aren't proof are tests. Even during training exercises, things aren't always done completely real life for a couple of reasons. To keep things safer (especially with spectators) and to keep costs down. If we similated a chemical warfare attack do you think they actually sprayed chemicals on us? I trained using my gas mask hundreds of times. Just because things weren't 100% real life would it have meant my gas mask didn't work? Police may train with *dummy* ammo. Does that mean the real thing doesn't work, or that it hasn't been tested properly?
I'm not saying I believe this weapons system is fool proof. But I didn't find the author credible and I can see why things were done the way he described. To me that isn't proof of failure.

In the book you mentioned - *The Power Elite*, the military, the government and big corporations are listed as the three groups that work together to keep in control. I disagree. If I had to list three I'd say, government, media, and special interest groups have the most power.

The military is a part of the government not a separate powerful group. The president is its Commander in Chief. Congress has immense control over the military. Even when I was military I didn't realize just how much until I went through a base conversion study and base closure.

Of the 3 branches in government, I'd say the judicial branch has the most power. In theory the three are balanced but I think judges have major power. A supreme court judge has more power than a congress person. And they are nominated for life not voted on for 2-6 years. Of the departments/ agencies within the government, I'd place the EPA as having a great deal of power. Groups like this can establish regulations to make things even more restrictive than laws require. Much greater impact on the typical person than the DOD will ever have. Same with groups like welfare agencies. They can use child protection laws to cover up their own errors. Even in the case of a child's death (happening here now). I am more at risk of having my children taken away from me for spanking them or feeding them macaroni & cheese then of having the military break down my door. I am more at risk of having the EPA fine me for killing a purple spotted frog then of the military doing anything to me. Of the government segments the military impacts me the least.

Special interest groups would include industries and non business groups that want to influence public opinion and policies. All of the groups that have lobbyists and spin doctors. Not all are big corporations. Some are groups that have a goal like enviromentalist groups. I'd put the non corporation groups as having the most power within this segment. Groups like ELF. They can influence the government and public opinion with little risk to themselves.

I wouldn't classify media as a big corp. Yes, many (not all) are owned by corporations. The owning corporation sets the company policy. How those policies are applied is where the real power is. The ones within the media with the real power to influence are the editors, journalists, writers, news anchors, the visible people. A journalist can write a story that slants in one direction or another. Rosie has power. She can promote her beliefs. Katie Curic has power.

I could always tell which side of a debate Oprah was on before she said. You could listen to her guests. She always had articulate, sypathetic speakers to represent her point of view. The other side paled in comparison. Sort of like having a 1st grader debate against a college professor. Which is more likely to win? I see the same thing happening on the editorial page in the newspaper. There the editor is like Oprah.

[Brichard]

Look for defense to get some major attention. Defense spending goes down when there is no common enemy, but look for people to loosen the purse strings.

[Amy]

With my dh being in the military--lets just say that he makes MUCH less than a person who works in the private sector for the same amount of years in the same job. They are not family friendly; some on-base houses are likened to ghetto conditions; long hours, many deployments and time away from families. Im not a good person to ask seeing my dh puts his life on the line (He is a Green Beret), under undesirable conditions to protect everyone else but themselves.

[Brichard]

Originally posted by Amy/CO
With my dh being in the military--lets just say that he makes MUCH less than a person who works in the private sector for the same amount of years in the same job. They are not family friendly; some on-base houses are likened to ghetto conditions; long hours, many deployments and time away from families. Im not a good person to ask seeing my dh puts his life on the line (He is a Green Beret), under undesirable conditions to protect everyone else but themselves.

Thank your husband for me! I am serious. His actions are very appreciated by me.

[Lynda/WA]

I'm with you Amy/CO. When DH got out he first went civil service and doubled in pay. That was to a job that required less skills then when he was Active duty. After we moved he went to the job he has now and earns triple what he did when active duty.

I got out and with moderate lifestyle changes we didn't notice the loss of my active duty income. You could say it was costing me as much to work as I was earning. From what I've seen I was probably paid about the same as military as if I worked on the outside.

For us the biggest differences have been in having control over our future. We don't have to worry about me being sent overseas without the family for a year. We can make plans for the next couple of years and know where we will be living. We don't have to worry about being forced to move. Now that would mean selling the house and losing DH's job. Still wouldn't trade my time in though. Again, the best people I ever met were all military (and their families)!

And yes, Amy I've lived in housing that was uncondemd for military families to live in. When we left the local government refused to accept it for housing for the poor. It was closed up and os currently sitting empty. I didn't think it was THAT bad. That was in AZ. When I lived at Travis AFB I could hear my neighbor snore through the bedroom wall. Others told me they could hear the neighbor chopping vegetables. The housing had been remodeled by a civilian contractor that used the cheapest methods/materials they could legally get away with. You don't have to worry about customer satisfaction with a civilian contract just cost and meeting legal requirements. I slipped down a flight of stairs while pregnant because a contractor used stairway materials that had been taken out of use by the commercial market. The military was forced to replace it at their own cost. You can bet mine was one of the first ones!

I've heard that compared to the during the Vietnam war the military has been cut in half but deployments are up by 300% and that has been in the last 10 years alone.