To claim that the cuts we will make in the defense will make us stronger is the defense equivalent of the emporer’s new clothes. National Review Online posted an article today about the impact of the nearly $500 billion in cuts.
The article reminds us:
And all this in the name of what, exactly? Fiscal rectitude? In his remarks today, Secretary Panetta was absolutely right to note that debt is a national-security issue. And to be sure, in any bureaucracy as large as the Pentagon, there is room for cuts. But a bank looking to reduce overhead does not often start by firing guards and cutting corners on vaults. Nor should national defense be cannibalized in the name of itself.
Worse still, in a move that is cynical if not outright dishonest, neither the president’s strategy nor his expected FY2013 budget takes into account the additional $500 billion in automatic defense sequestrations and spending caps wired into the infamous “trigger” in last year’s debt deal. As is his wont, the president is punting to Congress on the business of avoiding or undoing these cuts, which Panetta himself knows are unconscionable. But sequestration remains the law of the land, and if nothing is done, Obama’s cuts will become gashes.
Military spending is not responsible for the deficit–entitlement programs are, but it is more politically expedient to cut the military than to deal with the actual problem. I hope our next President has more courage than this one.
