Gates Warns Against Calls to Cut Military Spending
Insists Massive Military Will 'Ultimately' Be Needed for Something
Speaking today to graduating seniors at the University of Notre Dame, Secretary of Defense Robert Gates slammed all prospective calls to answer the financial crisis by cutting the record military budget.
Gates conceded that the mounting national debt “could develop into a deep crisis” but insisted that it was vital to maintain spending to ensure that the US military is able to extend its reach globally, and to ensure that the US military is superior to any adversary.
The later claim is particularly ridiculous, of course, because despite Secretary Gates’ constant calls for bigger budgets, the United States already has a nearly ten-fold lead over any nation on earth in the question of military spending, and a near hundred-fold advantage over any nation it is liable to attack.
Gates seemed to try to answer this complete lack of need for such a ridiculously oversized military as well, claiming that the “lessons of history” were that such a force would “ultimately” be needed. Though Secretary Gates may well be right in that any nation spending $700 billion annually simply looking for trouble is liable to find it, this will probably not silence the calls to bring the military down to a sensible size in the near future.
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JLS
May 22nd, 2011 at 10:03 pm
The Defense department makes the American public an offer they can't refuse :
"Just keep giving us the money and no one gets hurt."
Jamal
May 22nd, 2011 at 11:21 pm
War.. what is it goody for.., "Massive Military Will 'Ultimately' Be Needed for Something".., war.., what is it goody for…, more war.., War what is it goody for.., absolutely nothing but war machinery.., send this man back to school.
thedissenter
May 23rd, 2011 at 4:17 am
Well, it's a good thing then that just a short few weeks ago, he was warning against too much military. Oh, that was but a fleeting moment in the memories of few himself not included.
jaczar
May 23rd, 2011 at 7:27 am
Mr. Ditz is absolutely correct, anyone spending 700 billion a year (and that’s only what’s on the books) makes all the enemies he will ever need for forever war, which is the aim of the military.
KIDDING MESEIROUSLY
May 23rd, 2011 at 10:10 am
Gates = AntiAmerican.
KSB26
May 23rd, 2011 at 12:46 pm
"Gates seemed to try to answer this complete lack of need for such a ridiculously oversized military as well, claiming that the lessons of history were that such a force would ultimately be needed."
I was going to make a joke about the idiots in DC not learning a thing from the fall of the USSR. I was wrong. They have learned. In its final days the USSR stopped paying their troops. When the orders came down to fire on their friends and neighbors the soldiers refused.
DC will not make the same mistake. When broke, starving, and out of work Americans start turning on the state, the leadership wants to make sure the average grunt will do his job when he is "ultimately needed."
andy
May 23rd, 2011 at 2:37 pm
Gotta make sure those evil Canadians and Mexicans don't attack us.