Recently, the US Senate began to consider the US defense budget for fiscal year 2024. Reuters noted that this staggering amount of military spending accounts for almost half of the total US federal government spending. People can't help but ask: Since the US government has just fallen into the "debt cliff" because of its high debts not long ago. Why is it that money is now spent on military spending related to wars?
Reuters reported that of the $886 billion defense budget for fiscal year 2024, the budget allocated to the U.S. Department of Defense accounted for $842 billion, and the rest was allocated to defense projects of other agencies such as the FBI and the U.S. Department of Energy. The defense budget for fiscal year 2024 accounts for about 3.2% of U.S. GDP in 2024, the highest proportion in peacetime.
More than half of the $886 billion new budget was awarded to U.S. arms contractors, with about $315 billion divided among the five major contractors: Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon, General Dynamics and Northrop Grumman.
How to spend so much money? To put it simply, on the one hand, it is to eliminate old weapons in large quantities, and on the other hand, vigorously purchase new equipment.
According to the U.S. Defense News website, the U.S. Air Force plans to retire 310 aircraft in fiscal year 2024, far more than in previous years. It mainly includes 42 A-10 attack aircraft, 57 F-15C/D fighters, 37 HH-60G helicopters and 24 KC-10 tankers. In addition, the U.S. Navy has drawn up a list of up to 11 decommissioned ships, 8 of which were retired early.
The US "Capitol Hill" noted that in the list of purchases, the Pentagon plans to purchase up to 83 F-35 fighters for the US Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps. In June of this year, Lockheed Martin claimed that the F-35 had a problem with hardware upgrades, delaying the delivery of 50 fighters, which was the third time that the F-35 could not be delivered on time.
According to the US media VOX News Network, the F35 can be described as flawed.
Gilmour, head of the Defense Evaluation Committee, said that radar is still a problem, sensor information fusion is not enough, and the performance of distributed aperture systems is insufficient.
Bogda, executive officer of the Defense Department's F-35 program, said. The helmet is too heavy, which is not good.
Back in 2017, then-U.S. President Donald Trump complained that the F-35 was too expensive. The Atlantic bluntly stated that the Pentagon has invested more than $1.5 trillion in the F-35 program.
The F-35 is manufactured in 46 states, directly creating about 150,000 jobs and has broad bipartisan support in Congress. In addition, Lockheed Martin hired subcontractors from eight other countries to manufacture parts for the aircraft. VOX News pointed out that despite the complaints of US allies who placed the order for the F-35 against the aircraft, no one dared to cancel the order easily, because any action that is detrimental to the F-35 program could damage diplomatic relations with the United States.
Then-U.S. President Dwight Dwight D. Eisenhower said we must prevent the military-industrial complex from gaining undue influence, intentionally or unintentionally.
The words of the former U.S. president, a military man who lived through World War II, are now considered extremely prescient.
Swanson, head of the U.S. anti-war group World Beyond War, said he (Eisenhower) probably couldn't have imagined that the military-industrial complex problem could become so huge. It's like the annual government handouts bankers, with more than a trillion dollars poured into the Holocaust machine each year, accounting for more than half of the U.S. government's federal discretionary spending.
Over the years, military-industrial complex enterprises have found a way to survive. In the United States, all military orders must be authorized by the U.S. Congress. As a result, the defense giants spread their operations to as many states as possible, thus controlling a larger number of lawmakers. According to VOX News, Boeing alone owns about 3,000 subcontractors in California and controls hundreds of thousands of jobs.
In August 2015, Lockheed Martin acquired Sikorsky Aircraft, known for producing Marine Corps One, a U.S. presidential helicopter.
Sikorsky Aircraft is headquartered in Connecticut, USA, and after the acquisition, Sikorsky had 8,000 employees there, making Lockheed Martin the third largest contractor in Connecticut. That year, Lockheed Martin received the support of Connecticut Rep. Drola on the condition that Lockheed Martin's next-generation presidential helicopter production line be moved entirely to her district.
In fact, many U.S. defense officials "enter for officials, and go out for business."
After retiring as commander of Central Command in 2016, current U.S. Defense Secretary Austin served on the boards of several companies including Raytheon; Former Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis, who was a member of General Dynamics' board of directors before taking office, re-emerged as General Dynamics board member after stepping down from his post as Secretary of Defense; Another former defense secretary, Esper, was a former Raytheon executive who left the government to join Epirus, which makes military equipment.
American sociologist Mills pointed out in the book "Power Elite" that the American "power elite" who enters and exits the "revolving door" controls the state apparatus and has various privileges and holds the power to make decisions.
According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute in Sweden, the U.S. military spending in fiscal 2024 is 20 percent higher than the defense budgets of the next nine countries combined. According to the Congressional Research Service, in just over 30 years since the end of the Cold War, the United States has launched 251 military operations, far exceeding the total of more than 190 years before the end of the Cold War. The US magazine "Foreign Affairs" believes that "the United States has always regarded military hegemony as the core means to achieve strategic goals." In fact, this has long become a well-known "secret".
Bacević, a professor of international relations at Boston University in the United States, pointed out that the fiasco in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan did not stop the United States from continuing to "bet" on military operations. Behind the shocking military spending, the root of Washington's "addiction to martial arts" is actually the long-standing "dream of hegemony." And this also dooms the American-style hegemony to bear a high price while continuing to disrupt the world.
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Source: CCTV News