The Pentagon’s huge annual defense budgets dwarf virtually the whole rest of the planet combined, but with the US deploying growing numbers of troops seemingly everywhere in the world, that money doesn’t go as far as it used to.
So with the Pentagon already grousing about its budget being only the lion’s share of a trillion dollars, the latest escalation into Iraq is inopportune, raising concerns among the military of how they’re supposed to pay for yet another new war.
Several hundred US troops have been deployed to Iraq, and there are no signs of that slowing down any time soon. Meanwhile, the US is still sending more troops to Eastern Europe to escalate their involvement there, is committing to years more in Afghanistan, and still moving on their “Pacific Pivot” to increase their presence there.
A lot of the Pentagon’s concerns center around the placeholder budgets closer to 2021, when a bunch of planned cuts reflect “savings” from not being in major wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, while the reality is that the Pentagon may still be in both, and who knows where else.