Pentagon Hypes ‘China Threat’ With Eye Towards a Bigger Budget

As Russian spending shrinks, Pentagon needs a new excuse for spending

The US military vastly outspends every other military on the planet, and has capabilities that far outstretch all others, hampered, if at all, by the fact that the US is constantly embroiled in myriad wars around the world.

The news that Russia has fallen out of the top five in military spending, however, makes them an increasingly difficult “threat” to hype up. After all, the US is outspending them at least ten-fold.

China is in second place on the list, and even if they’re far behind the US, that seems to be where the Pentagon is focusing. The idea that China is likely to build its first aircraft carrier this year is presented as an effort to “contest US military superiority” in the region.

All Chinese equipment the Pentagon mentioned in their new report, they only have a small fraction of what the US has. On top of that, the report hypes Chinese hackers, and accuses ethnic Chinese people in general of being willing to “advance China’s interests.”

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.