Our military is encountering a budget problem at a time when we need to be at our best and continue to show our strength to hostile forces across the world.
Thanks to the unexpected explosion of conflicts in the Middle East due to the war between Israel and Hamas, the United States Department of Defense has been caught off guard. The expenses needed by our military to maintain its increased presence in the Middle East were not accounted for in President Joe Biden’s fiscal year defense budget. Since October, the Pentagon has calculated the total cost thus far to have been $1.6 billion.
Even before the October 7 attack, Biden’s annual budget was already slated to underfund the military. An analysis by the Heritage Foundation identified several miscalculations by the president. The army’s budget did not account for a spiked inflation rate, causing land vehicle upgrade programs and recruitment programs to struggle to complete their tasks. The Navy’s budget accounted for the creation of a fifth shipyard but not its constant maintenance and upgrade costs.
The military has been in a decline in many aspects for the past few years. This year’s military budget is only 3.1% of America’s GDP, one of its lowest percentages since World War II. Due to its decreasing budget, maintenance has also taken a hit. For example, far more ships get retired than are procured each year.
This is on top of the lowest recruitment levels since the Vietnam War’s drafts ceased, which are caused primarily by increasing health problems that make people ineligible for military service and the implementation of radical DEI policies that have driven away people who historically have been recruited from red districts across the country.
What do all these problems mean for our military situation overseas? The first is that we will have much lower-quality military equipment than we otherwise could have. This would result in increased maintenance issues and being forced to combat enemies with outdated hardware that does not work as well. The United States would look like an incompetent and aging global authority that is incapable of defending its allies and conquering its enemies.
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The second problem is that we will have a much smaller total military force. A combination of fewer operational vessels and decreasing manpower forces us to stretch ourselves even thinner to protect all our positions across the world. For similar reasons as before, our enemies will feel encouraged to put more and more pressure on us until we are forced to pull out of more positions, leaving our allies to fend for themselves against a growing axis.
Our government needs to properly fund our military so that we will be properly equipped to continue touting ourselves to the world as its arbiter of freedom and its strongest defender. Otherwise, our weaknesses will be further exploited by our opponents at the cost of our friends overseas.
Parker Miller is a 2024 Washington Examiner Winter Fellow.