Freeze Pentagon Spending?

Last month, in an interesting example of politics making strange bedfellows emerged when the following happened: 

"In July, freshman congressman Mick Mulvaney (R-S.C.), along with Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), introduced an amendment to the House’s 2013 defense appropriations bill freezing defense spending at 2012 levels. Though it merely eliminates a proposed $1.1 billion increase in defense spending, the Mulvaney-Frank amendment was an acknowledgment that the endless military-spending hikes since 9/11 cannot continue. The legislation passed the House 247-167, with 88 Republicans in support, and the Senate will take up the bill this September."

I'm not a Congressional scholar, so I'm not sure how closely Mulvaney's and Frank's positions were correlated on other issues.  But this was an interesting development.  The story was picked up again yesterday in the Washington Examiner with the headline "Serious About Cutting Spending? Start With The Military".  I became aware of it through the tweeting of the redoubtable Chris Preble of The Cato Institute, for whom reducing the defense budget has become the Great White Whale of his libertarian master plan cut the U.S. down to size. 

So--let's unpack this issue, shall we?

I think the first question to be considered is whether cuts to the defense budget (or in this case, a freeze) should be considered at all.  That this unholy alliance between Frank and Mulvaney is the stalking horse for the question is immaterial; the question is an important one, and I find myself believing that all things considered, freezing the defense budget at its 2012 level was worthy of consideration.  Which raises the second question--why should it be considered?

There are a range of answers to this question, and I think where you stand depends on where you sit.  I believe such an idea was worthy of consideration  (note:  I am not saying I advocate this position), but only as part of a larger effort that reduced ALL government spending, including entitlements.  Clearly, this is consistent with my ideology.  For Barney Frank, cutting the defense budget is simply part of his ideological approach.  I mean no disrespect--as I find ideology to be a very positive thing.  But liberal, Massachusetts Congressmen see the defense budget as a great big sow from which countless social program piglets are excluded from suckling.  For Mulvaney, cutting the defense budget arises from a different motivation.  He's a fiscal hawk, he concludes that the 2012 budget was sufficient, and that there was some strategic, psychological advantage to be gained by offering up cuts to the defense budget, as a way of incentivizing Democrats to do likewise in programs dear to them.  For Preble--as I've alluded--cutting the DoD budget is not so much a fiscal question as it is a means to an end.  He wants to spend less on the military and make it smaller so that it is capable of doing fewer things, in fewer places.  This is the business end of his ideology (again folks, I have a great affinity for ideology), one that believes the U.S. mucks around in far too many places, spending its treasure to support rich allies who then pump their own money into ultra-progressive social welfare architectures--freed from the inconvenience of seeing to their own defense.  This is an honorable position--and is at the heart of HIS approach to offshore balancing.  Which leads then, to the next question--why FIRST?  Why consider cutting the defense budget FIRST?

Again--this gets to ideology.  Frank supports it because it is pain free--what's not to like?  He gets a smaller defense budget without having to give on any social spending.  For Mulvaney, there's a bit of a Boy Scout approach at work.  Maybe, just maybe, if we give the liberals an inch on defense spending, they'll be willing to sit down and deal with us on other non-defense discretionary spending and entitlements.  Preble's approach is the mirror image of Frank's--his "big issue" is for the U.S. to mind its knitting, and because he (and others like him) aren't winning the strategic argument about U.S. power and influence around the world, the best way to get his way is to "starve the beast".  Now I realize freezing at 2012 levels is hardly "starving" anything--but it would be a start.

I am sympathetic to Mulvaney's approach, but I think it somewhat telling that it was a very junior member of the GOP caucus who reached across the aisle on this one.  I think his heart was in the right place, but I don't believe there is much evidence to suggest that the TACTIC would ultimately be successful--that is, give something without getting something in return.  Put another way, cutting defense FIRST is a non-starter with me.  Cutting defense alongside other cuts?  Perhaps.  The other problem with Mulvaney's approach is that at the ideological level, I have a sense that HE believes that cutting the defense budget would provide money for two and only two outlets--addressing the debt and deficit, and returning the money to the taxpayers.  I have no confidence that Barney Frank--or the other 150-some Democrats who voted for the freeze--see the savings going to either of those two purposes.  This is exactly the criticism I had of the Report of the Sustainable Defense Task Force two summers ago, another interesting case of strange bedfellows in which Barney Frank teamed up with---you guessed it--Chris Preble (among others) to put forward a plan for a reduced defense budget.  Upon its release, I had a talk with Dr. Preble in which I questioned the wisdom of teaming up with someone who both of us KNEW had very different aims in mind for savings from the defense budget than he (Preble) had. Preble granted me that possibility, but (rightly) asserted that the work was important enough to go forward on.

The U.S. continues to face economic stagnation and mounting debt.  We MUST at some point, realize that what we spend on defense is not the cause of these conditions, even indirectly.  Our long term solvency is threatened by exploding entitlements at the Federal and State level, and monkeying around with the defense budget---while initially satisfying to those who want to "show that we get it"--represents a rounding error in the the totality of the problem.  Seeking to cut the defense budget first, is simply not a serious approach.

Bryan McGrath