Budget Battles: Defending Defense spending

The congressional budget resolution assumes that military spending will grow by $21 billion from fiscal 2000 to 2001-a 7.2 percent nominal increase, or a real increase of about 4.7 percent.

But put aside the numbers and percentages, which are far too inflammatory and too easily manipulated to be of any real use. The question that should be asked in any budget debate is not "how much" but "why that much?" At least as far as military spending is concerned, that has not yet happened this year.

As with any other federal agency or department, the Defense Department's budget should be expanded or cut based on the perceived need. If everyone in America already had basic reading skills, no one would seriously advocate that the Education Department spend more on remedial programs. Similarly, if an effective cure and vaccine for AIDS were developed, the need for additional federal spending by NIH on increased research of this disease would hardly be a question.

The same has to be true of the Pentagon. In the face of the administration and congressional desire to add significantly to this year's DoD budget, no one seems to be asking about the military threat-the Defense Department's equivalent to the question that should be posed to Education about basic reading skills and to NIH about AIDS-that requires an increase in defense spending in 2001. That makes the large increase included in the budget resolution highly questionable.

Thanks to the military's past achievements, the strength of the U.S. economy and the economic and political failures of many potential opponents, the current military threat to Americans appears to be significantly lower now than at any time in recent (and perhaps even not so recent) memory.

But so far this year, new millennium budget analysis seems to have been pushed aside in favor of Cold War-like rhetoric that says that any increase in Pentagon dollars is necessary, valuable, and worthwhile-regardless of the actual need. The same person who can see too many Bunsen burners in a lab or ovens in a school cafeteria as being a wasteful federal expense somehow does not see surplus tanks to be similarly unnecessary.

This is not to say that more defense spending is absolutely unwarranted; there may indeed be a number of reasons that the Pentagon's dollars should be increased-or at least reallocated from other military functions. For example:

• In the current economic environment, when overall unemployment is very low and the Pentagon is competing against private sector jobs that pay better, don't involve basic training, and don't require employees to make a multiyear commitment, the military will have to increase the compensation it pays to fill its ranks. Without a draft to produce a steady supply of new recruits, or a workforce that needs the "employer of last resort" role the armed forces have so often played, the Defense Department will have to pay more and offer better living situations to get the people it needs.
• The reduction in the number of people in uniform and the closing of overseas bases the Pentagon has been implementing since the mid-1980s should mean that, if it has not been done already, additional emphasis should be put on increasing transportation capabilities so that troops and materials can get to where they need to be when they need to be there.
• The fact that the current threat may be low does not mean that it will always be that way. This indicates that (again if it is not already happening) more may need to be devoted to intelligence gathering.
• For similar reasons, more may need to be spent on research and development and less on procuring weapons for current use. The old excuse of keeping procurement higher than is justified by current conditions so the assembly lines can be ready is no longer as valid in an era when industry is working with greater speed, productivity and agility than ever before. In addition, the low unemployment rate means that it will be inflationary to keep workers manufacturing things that have no productive value-like unneeded military hardware-because other employers will then have to increase wages to attract the fewer number of people in the job pool.

Question Of The Week

Last Week's Question. What has to happen legislatively for Congress and the president to be able to spend as much on discretionary spending in fiscal 2001 as was assumed in the recently adopted budget resolution conference report? Other than gimmicks, like declaring spending an emergency, the answer is simple-the cap on budget authority and outlays must be raised. But, as many readers pointed out in their response, the cap must be raised by changing the Budget Enforcement Act, so it must be done in legislation passed by Congress and signed into law by the president. Simply assuming in a budget resolution (which is a "concurrent resolution" that does not amend a statute and is not signed by the president) that the cap will be raised does not actually raise the cap. Congratulations to Michael Jones of the Department of Interior, this week's winner of the much sought-after "I Won A Budget Battle" T-shirt, who was selected at random from the many correct responses.

This Week's Question. If you have never played before, haven't won yet, or haven't won recently, here's your best chance yet to win your very own "I Won A Budget Battle" T-shirt. A brief item in last week's column about how the District of Columbia was trying to get the federal government to reimburse it for the police overtime it incurred during the World Bank meetings in Washington prompted a few readers to offer their own opinion on the subject. So this week everyone gets a chance to vote. The question: Should the federal government reimburse D.C. for its World Bank costs? Send your response-a simple "Yes" or "No" will be enough but comments are also welcome-to scollender@nationaljournal.com by 5 p.m. EDT on Saturday, May 6. The winner will be selected at random from the group with the most number of votes.