Eliminatus said:

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Logos Stick said:

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I'll add this...lots of folks know much more about our spend and capability than I do, but China is a huge threat. They are building up their military big time from what I read.

We must maintain superiority over China.

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Holy *****...I have died or this is some weird parallel dimension or something. I agree with a Logos take here.

China is going all out in every category that is military related or adjacent. Cutting our fat makes absolute sense and I am all for it, but blanket cuts can be very, very dangerous. This is one area we need more of a scalpel than a chainsaw IMO. It'll be slower but there is far less margin to play with here. Mistakes can take years to recover from. Years we may not have.

This one will be a critical one to keep an eye on.

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Agreed. Cutting our capabilities is unwise. Cutting fraud, grift, waste, etc is good though.

aggiedent said:

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Jimmy Carter did something very similar. Funny how conservatives screamed bloody murder (as right they should) as we watched our military readiness and preparedness fall into an abyss.

And along came Ronald Reagan who restored the budget and was hailed by conservatives as a hero.

Damn funny as times and beliefs change.

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I don't think conservatives applaud spending cuts other than to eliminate waste and fraud and bull**** programs like DEI. Most any conservative wants significant military spending but want it done wisely.

Fitch said:

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Big moves ahead, even if only half the target is met. Wonder how to interpret this in the broader context of Ukraine-Russia, China, renegotiating the eurozone defense and trade compacts and, again, China.

According to the Washington Post, U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has signed a memo, ordering senior leaders at the Pentagon and across the U.S. Military to develop plans to cut roughly 40% of the defense budget by 2030, in increments of 8% per year for the next five… pic.twitter.com/DrRUEjHWxE

— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) February 19, 2025

https://www.militarytimes.com/news/pentagon-congress/2025/02/19/white-house-eyes-annual-8-cut-to-defense-budget-through-2030/

"Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered senior military officials to develop a five-year budget plan that would slash defense spending by 8% annually, a dramatic cut which could reshape military end-strength and readiness for decades.
In a memo first obtained by the Washington Post, Hegseth ordered the proposed cuts to be compiled by Feb. 24. Seventeen categories would be exempt from the budget reductions, including military operations at the southern U.S. border, nuclear weapons and missile defense programs, and acquisition of certain drones and munitions."

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Just reading the responses to this post. Even conservatives are upset. This seems a strange step. Of all the crap we could be cutting, let's not mess with the military. This is not the way to keep up with China, Russia, etc.

China is a major threat, but destroy the Three Gorges Dam at the first sign of conflict and see how China has the ability to maintain a conflict.

Fight nasty!

The forthcoming trillion-dollar tax cuts for the uber wealthy must be financed somehow.

The funny thing is I don't recall Trump mentioning cutting our defense budge by 40% in five years during the election. I wonder if that might have changed the outcome.

ts5641 said:

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Eliminatus said:

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Logos Stick said:

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I'll add this...lots of folks know much more about our spend and capability than I do, but China is a huge threat. They are building up their military big time from what I read.

We must maintain superiority over China.

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Holy *****...I have died or this is some weird parallel dimension or something. I agree with a Logos take here.

China is going all out in every category that is military related or adjacent. Cutting our fat makes absolute sense and I am all for it, but blanket cuts can be very, very dangerous. This is one area we need more of a scalpel than a chainsaw IMO. It'll be slower but there is far less margin to play with here. Mistakes can take years to recover from. Years we may not have.

This one will be a critical one to keep an eye on.

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Agreed. Cutting our capabilities is unwise. Cutting fraud, grift, waste, etc is good though.

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This is true of every department. Unfortunately, as this military veteran who works for FEMA learned, Trump is taking a chainsaw to a silk carpet.

Veteran who voted for Trump: I didn't think the leopards would eat MY face

Any cuts in govt they say will take a decade will never happen. Funny how cuts always take 5-20 years but increases happen in months.

This will never happen

Aggie Apotheosis said:

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The forthcoming trillion-dollar tax cuts for the uber wealthy must be financed somehow.

The funny thing is I don't recall Trump mentioning cutting our defense budge by 40% in five years during the election. I wonder if that might have changed the outcome.

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Such a stupid post.

Heineken-Ashi said:

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Aggie Apotheosis said:

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The forthcoming trillion-dollar tax cuts for the uber wealthy must be financed somehow.

The funny thing is I don't recall Trump mentioning cutting our defense budge by 40% in five years during the election. I wonder if that might have changed the outcome.

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If you want to be taken seriously, you should stop lying. This post is straight up MSM talking points. Who pays you to post here? USAID? David Hogg?

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I'm lying? Do you recall Trump saying defense would be cut 40% in five years?


Putin and Xi must be dancing in the streets.

riverrataggie said:

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javajaws said:

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If the Ukraine war has shown us anything its that large expensive objects cannot be replaced easily or done fast enough to win any prolonged war. Our defense and military procurement needs to keep that in mind.

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This is true. But China has a considerable edge on us in manufacturing capacity when it comes to aircraft and ships. We can't do it alone and need our international allies to step up their game.

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Folks who say we can't let China get ahead of us don't realize how far behind our manufacturing base is. In a limited hot war with China we would deplete our inventory of conventional weapons within a month or two and some of our most advanced systems could be depleted in days or weeks.

Anything short of total war where we sink every ship headed to China and turn off all energy storage and power production within China will result in us being overwhelmed by their industrial production capabilities.

With a couple months to retool, DJI could probably produce 1M military drones per month, up from their current production of 200k civilian drones per month. Within a year, 10M drones a month. And this can be duplicated across most industrial domains. Any war of attrition less than total war will not end favorably.

To defeat China risks them going nuclear. Luckily for us our nuclear triad will ensure our offensive capabilities survive. Their only means of hitting CONUS is with ICBMs so we only have to defend a single vector so we likely 'win' a nuclear exchange pretty soundly.

4 said:

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It has always seemed silly to me for an administration to issue orders for longer than their term.

The next administration, especially if they are the opposition party, will just change it.

Give orders to accomplish things during your term, period.

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That's the deal. They must change it and go on record. If it expired, then they get what they want without doing anything. Force them to change it and let the public decide.

ts5641 said:

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Just reading the responses to this post. Even conservatives are upset. This seems a strange step. Of all the crap we could be cutting, let's not mess with the military. This is not the way to keep up with China, Russia, etc.

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To keep up with Russia, we would have to cut our capability significantly.

JFABNRGR said:

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CUT the FWA, which will be like 25-35%, and end up with NO REAL NET loss to Defense Effectiveness.

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What is the fwa?

Fightin_Aggie said:

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JFABNRGR said:

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CUT the FWA, which will be like 25-35%, and end up with NO REAL NET loss to Defense Effectiveness.

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What is the fwa?

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Fixed wing aircraft

Edit: Probably meant fraud, waste, and abuse.

This should be a no brainer. First stop buying expensive items, that have been made redundant by drones.

JFABNRGR said:

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CUT the FWA, which will be like 25-35%, and end up with NO REAL NET loss to Defense Effectiveness.

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Compared to helicopters? Are you crazy?

SwigAg11 said:

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Fightin_Aggie said:

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JFABNRGR said:

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CUT the FWA, which will be like 25-35%, and end up with NO REAL NET loss to Defense Effectiveness.

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What is the fwa?

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Fixed wing aircraft

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Pretty sure he means fraud, waste, and abuse

Silent For Too Long said:

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Unprepared for what? Defending ourselves against plane hijackers? What a total non sequitor.

Are you actually contesting that drones aren't dramatically cheaper and more effective then manned vehicles? Have you been paying attention to any military conflict over the last two decades? Is this a serious question?

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Ummm...

If either Russia or Ukraine had a worthwhile air force, the drones would be much less effective.

Yes drones cheap and useful.

But, they're not replacing everything we have in our miltary in any way.

Are they going to replace our naval fleet?

Our entire air force?

All the vehicles that our troops travel in? (That Russia has run out of)

And yeah...when we got over to Afghanistan we found out that our military had atrophied in the previous 12 years of "peace dividend"

Doh! ><

titan said:

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Ag with kids said:

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Silent For Too Long said:

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Quote:

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United States
In 2025, the US is expected to spend $916 billion on its defense.

China
In 2025, China is expected to spend $296 billion on its defense.

Russia
In 2025, Russia is expected to spend $109 billion on its defense.

India
In 2025, India is expected to spend $83.6 billion on its defense.

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1.) We could cut our budget in half and we would still have by far the number 1 defense budget in the world.

2.) We have the bombs. No country is ever going to want to go toe to toe with our nuclear arsenal. Ever. It would be suicide.

3.) As far as our proxy war state crafting bull ****, drones are ten times more effective for a fraction of the cost.

4.) A significant amount of the budget could we cut if we focus on waste and fraud alone.


I swear some of you are stuck in the 80's. It's completely insane how much money we still spend of defense. We should have cut this back long ago.

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We did after the USSR fell.

Then when 9/11 happened we were woefully unprepared.

As to your bullet point 3), could you give us your expertise on drones?

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This actually is not that good a comparison. The danger and warning of a "draw down" that you are talking about is absolutely real, but 9/11 was more a failure of sufficiently aggressive and blunt covert intelligence operations. AQ leadership should have been wiped out regardless of where or international law. Its not that we need very big military expense to stop Bin Laden before 9/11 if had been that way.

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My point was that when we got to Afghanistan, we found out that our military was not ready - mostly due to the "peace dividend" draw down over 12 years.

Now, I agree that there were intelligence failures too...So you're right there. We should have squashed AQ/BL after the 1993 WTC bombing.

ts5641 said:

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Eliminatus said:

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Logos Stick said:

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I'll add this...lots of folks know much more about our spend and capability than I do, but China is a huge threat. They are building up their military big time from what I read.

We must maintain superiority over China.

---

Holy *****...I have died or this is some weird parallel dimension or something. I agree with a Logos take here.

China is going all out in every category that is military related or adjacent. Cutting our fat makes absolute sense and I am all for it, but blanket cuts can be very, very dangerous. This is one area we need more of a scalpel than a chainsaw IMO. It'll be slower but there is far less margin to play with here. Mistakes can take years to recover from. Years we may not have.

This one will be a critical one to keep an eye on.

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Agreed. Cutting our capabilities is unwise. Cutting fraud, grift, waste, etc is good though.

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Winner winner chicken dinner

aggiehawg said:

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VDH talked about this on Sunday. His assessment was cutting the procurement process, negating overages for the largest military contractors and make them wait for their money by adding documenting necessities before disbursements. Similar to billable hours by attorneys. One hour of engineer's time is one thousand, not inflated to three thousand, etc.

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As the kids say, "This is the way."

Cutting defense and rooting out the waste is a good move even if just for optics. DOGE can't just cut from Al the liberal progressive agencies and agendas. Starting with USAID and DoE then move to defense for some "equality" then tackle entitlements.

This is just like some of the headline articles of the "I voted for Trump and now I lost my gov job". No crap this should be about cutting waste not a left right issue.

ts5641 said:

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Eliminatus said:

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Logos Stick said:

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I'll add this...lots of folks know much more about our spend and capability than I do, but China is a huge threat. They are building up their military big time from what I read.

We must maintain superiority over China.

---

Holy *****...I have died or this is some weird parallel dimension or something. I agree with a Logos take here.

China is going all out in every category that is military related or adjacent. Cutting our fat makes absolute sense and I am all for it, but blanket cuts can be very, very dangerous. This is one area we need more of a scalpel than a chainsaw IMO. It'll be slower but there is far less margin to play with here. Mistakes can take years to recover from. Years we may not have.

This one will be a critical one to keep an eye on.

---

Agreed. Cutting our capabilities is unwise. Cutting fraud, grift, waste, etc is good though.

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There have been plenty of news stories showing how there are things, like tanks, being built, not because they're needed or being used, but simply because they bring jobs to that area. It that's one of the areas that's going to be cut, I couldn't be more for this.

From USAID to The Military, and everything in between, no area of the government should be kept from DOGE doing their thing.

Silent For Too Long said:

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Unprepared for what? Defending ourselves against plane hijackers? What a total non sequitor.

Are you actually contesting that drones aren't dramatically cheaper and more effective then manned vehicles? Have you been paying attention to any military conflict over the last two decades? Is this a serious question?

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Drones have their place, and our use of them (and counter-drone defenses) should be dramatically increased. But drones can't do everything that manned vehicles can. Not yet.

It's not so much that tanks and other items in defense are built to keep jobs, but because if we stop building them, we lose the institutional knowledge and industrial base necessary to build them again when we do need them.

Those little ass drones are WAY too easy to jam. I suspect that making them less jammable will make them suddenly expensive enough that they might as well be Predators. That's why we build those rather than depend on $150 toy drones.

maverick2076 said:

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It's not so much that tanks and other items in defense are built to keep jobs, but because if we stop building them, we lose the institutional knowledge and industrial base necessary to build them again when we do need them.

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I get that, but I'd rather spend money on things that can be used in modern warfare. Tanks, for example, and thanks to Ukraine and their drones have shown, don't really have a place in the modern world.

No Spin Ag said:

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maverick2076 said:

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It's not so much that tanks and other items in defense are built to keep jobs, but because if we stop building them, we lose the institutional knowledge and industrial base necessary to build them again when we do need them.

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I get that, but I'd rather spend money on things that can be used in modern warfare. Tanks, for example, and thanks to Ukraine and their drones have shown, don't really have a place in the modern world.

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Exactly. Tanks have been shown to be obsolete for some time now.

We've spent over a trillion dollars on the F35 program and have basically nothing to show for it. Even if the pieces of **** actually worked they would be completely over whelmed by an army of drones at a tiny fraction of the cost.

One of the greatest lessons of history is the caution against building armaments to fight previous wars.

Ag with kids said:

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ETFan said:

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Decrease military budget drastically while allowing Russia to expand further. Bold move cotton!


Military budget probably needs some trimming. But like I've been saying in the Fed threads, do it smartly?

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Russia really can't.

CHINA, now, CAN.

So, don't do it stupidly...

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Honestly yeah, you do make a better point.

I do love how for weeks all I've seen from the left is "why isn't DOGE going after the DoD!" Which quickly morphed into "Putin puppet is going after the DoD!"

aTmAg said:

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Anybody who says "tax cuts for the uber wealthy" deserve to be ignored.

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Exactly. And anyone who worries we don't have 7% of fat in the pentagon budget we could cut, especially if we stop shipping our existing stockpiles to irrelevant/counter-productive wars all over the planet, isn't really informed about the DoD budget. This is from way back around 2021 but it's still not too far off;

No Spin Ag said:

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maverick2076 said:

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It's not so much that tanks and other items in defense are built to keep jobs, but because if we stop building them, we lose the institutional knowledge and industrial base necessary to build them again when we do need them.

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I get that, but I'd rather spend money on things that can be used in modern warfare. Tanks, for example, and thanks to Ukraine and their drones have shown, don't really have a place in the modern world.

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There is a big difference between sending tanks into battle piecemeal, which is what Russia has done, and sending tanks into battle as part of a coordinated combined arms campaign with requisite EW support and counter-drone efforts, which is what we would (hopefully) do.