For our money, one of the better parts of President Obama's speech at West Point this week was his connection between a healthy economy and U.S. national security. To quote: "Our prosperity provides a foundation for our power. It pays for our military. It underwrites our diplomacy." We only wish Mr. Obama understood the link between the larger welfare state he is trying to build at home and the economic weakness that will undermine our military power.

The proof is right before his eyes in the U.S. struggle to get Europe to contribute more forces to Afghanistan. Mr. Obama has called on NATO to buttress the U.S. surge of 30,000 in Afghanistan with 5,000 or more European troops. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is in Brussels today to round up promissory notes. But except for the usual stalwarts—Britain and Poland—the allies are having trouble meeting even this modest goal. Germany and France are reluctant to contribute anything more to defeat the Taliban.

This is by now a familiar story, and a big part of the problem is the relative lack of military spending. Among the Western Europeans, only France and the U.K. spend more than 2% of GDP on defense, supposedly the NATO-mandated minimum. Nearly everyone else is below that. Germany, the continent's largest economy, stands at 1.3%. U.S. defense spending has been above 4% of GDP since 2004, having fallen to 3% after the Cold War ended.

No amount of pleading and shaming has worked on the continentals. NATO launched the "Defense Capabilities Initiative" in 1999, only to abandon it a few years later. Various attempts to stand up European "rapid reaction" forces have floundered.

Most European countries also commit more than half of what little they do spend on defense to soldier salaries and benefits. Equipment and training are shortchanged. Belgium devotes 74% to personnel; the U.S. 30.6%. Europeans lack cargo planes and helicopters to enable troops to get to, and move within, far-off conflict zones. In 2007, the U.S. deployed 14% of its troops in overseas operations, Europe 4%.

Such relative strategic weakness has made the Europeans more dependent on the American security umbrella, even as they resent it. But it also makes Europeans more disposed to avoid confrontation with adversaries like Saddam Hussein or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. As Henry Kissinger has put it, European leaders are no longer able to ask their people to make major sacrifices.

The overlooked culprit here is the rise of the modern welfare state. Since World War II and especially from the 1960s, Europe has built elaborate domestic income-maintenance programs, with government-run health care, pensions and jobless benefits. These are hugely expensive, requiring high taxes and government spending that is a huge proportion of GDP. The nearby table compares the so-called tax wedge across nations, which is one measure of the relative burdens to finance cradle-to-grave entitlements.

One consequence has been slower growth in Europe, relative to the U.S. and China, with less tax revenue to spend on everything. Another result is that welfare spending has crowded out defense spending. The political imperative of health care and pensions always trumps defense spending, save perhaps in a hot war. Europe may never again be able to muster public support for a defense buildup of the kind the U.S. undertook to end the Cold War in the 1980s, or even the smaller surge after 9/11.

The tragic irony of this year is that Democrats are rushing the U.S. down this same primrose entitlement path. With ObamaCare certain to eat up several more percentage points of GDP as it inevitably expands, we will take a giant step toward European social priorities.

For many Democrats, this is precisely the goal. Many Europeans, such as those at the Financial Times, will also welcome America's relative decline. But we doubt the American people fully understand what such a gilded entitlement cage means for our national vitality, or for our ability to defend U.S. interests at home and abroad.

The chart nearby shows the change in the share of U.S. federal spending on defense and domestic programs across recent decades. The upward blips in defense outlays occurred during Vietnam, the Reagan buildup and post-9/11. But the overall trend has been to spend less of the budget on defense. Add the stimulus, ObamaCare, a new entitlement for college and other Democratic plans, and the defense squeeze will only tighten. Higher taxes and borrowing may allow guns and butter to co-exist for a while. But over time, the welfare state will defeat the Pentagon here, as it has in Europe.

President Obama's domestic agenda may well mean that his successors lack the option to deploy 100,000 troops to Afghanistan, or to some other future trouble spot. This is the way superpowers lose their superiority.

The Foreign Office refused to discuss the funding but privately officials confirmed the money was cut amid vain hopes that the Americans would foot the bill instead...

“It was a highly successful mission and the Afghans were getting better every day,” a special forces source said last week. “The paltry sums involved were getting a pretty valuable return.”

Ed Butler, who commanded British troops when they first deployed to Helmand in 2006, said: “It strikes me as pretty counter-intuitive and verging on the ridiculous to cut this funding when the government is stressing the training of Afghan security forces as a way of withdrawing our troops.”

...The Conservatives said it “beggared belief" that the Foreign Office should withdraw funding from what was clearly an important project.

Even the smallest of counter-insurgency programs prove too much of a strain for the British military to sustain.

The next article, U.S. Seeks 10,000 Troops From Its Allies In Afghanistan, shows America’s other allies cannot sustain token troops in Afghanistan, let alone increase force levels.

The United States is scrambling to coax NATO allies to send 10,000 additional troops to Afghanistan as part of President Obama’s strategy for the region. Those countries appear willing to provide fewer than half that number, American and allied officials said Wednesday.

The British government is facing opinion polls showing that around 70 percent of the public favors an early withdrawal...

Germany and France have balked at committing any more forces to a war that has so little public support that they can barely maintain current troop levels...

The Netherlands and Canada have begun discussing plans to pull out. Canadian defense officials told reporters traveling with Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates in Halifax last week that they had no intention of sending troops in the future, and that they remained committed to withdrawing by the end of 2011...

Waning public opinion plays an important role in most NATO members’ reluctance to remain in Afghanistan, but I believe the heart of the matter lies in two important facts: Europe can no longer afford to send troops abroad; and they know the US will pick up the slack.

As sun sets in the west, it also rises in the east. China,Japan Boost Defence Ties illustratesas western power quickly retreats once staunch allies are running for cover and seeking other benefactors.

Japan and China yesterday agreed to conduct their first joint military training exercise as ties warm up between the Asian neighbors, which have long argued over a range of issues and have been suspicious of each other

Top defence officials and military officers from both sides will also meet regularly...(and) The joint exercise will be held next year, according to the Japanese Defence Ministry.

Japan knows the Pax America that kept peace across the Pacific for half a century is coming to an end and China’s rising power is fed from America’s and Europe’s decay. They are smartly moving out from under one shadow to another.  US Navy and Air Force power in the region is atrophying, and China is quickly rising, as seen the article Admiral Says PLA's Strength, Intentions Should Be Displayed.

Beijing should not be shy of displaying the full breadth of its growing military power and intentions to the world, a senior naval officer wrote in comments published yesterday.

In a commentary in the Global Times, a newspaper published by party mouthpiece the People’s Daily, Naval Rear Admiral Yang Yi said Beijing should expand its military power and need not hide this from the world.

“We should confidently and overtly tell the US and other countries that China needs to expand its overseas military power because of the continuation of national interests abroad,” wrote Yang, director of the Strategic Studies Institute under the People’s Liberation Army’s National Defence University

...Yang said Sino-US strategic relations were moving from the level of “common interest” to “ balance of power”.

 “The Taiwan issue has been the most sensitive and explosive problem,” he wrote. “This is a friendly reminder to the US – please be careful, careful, careful, and don’t think Beijing won’t dare to declare war with Washington.”

Anthony Wong Dong, president of the International Military Association, an independent grouping of observers based in Macau, said the article was a candid assessment.

These articles show the West can no longer sustain low-intensity combat operations against an enemy clearly bent on their destruction. At the same time, China is drawing traditional allies from the US orbit and brazenly challenging America as the sole military superpower.

They have the money and leverage to do so. We, on the other hand, have vaults full of IOUs and a congress full of fools.

I don’t like the odds.

The Hill reported on 19 November:

Ranking member Buck McKeon (R-Calif.) raised alarm over a “dramatic decline” in funding for weapons systems — from 35 percent of the overall defense budget in fiscal 2010 to 24 percent in 2020...

“The picture is not a pretty one,” Rep. Ike Skelton (D-Mo.), the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said in his opening statement Wednesday at a hearing on future defense budgets.

The CBO also states the Obama Administration is low-balling its requested Pentagon budget by 6% versus what is required for the Department of Defense's current missions.

A 13% cut vs. GDP over 5 years...while fighting two wars.  Keep in mind, the GDP is stagnant due to the deep recession and this figure also doesn’t factor in potential inflation.

In my last blog entry I highlighted the imminent demise of the Royal Air Force. Over the next 5 years the RAF will slash its force by 25%, essential ending it as a global power projection force.

This morning’s Washington Times heralds the same forces are now at work eroding America’s military might:

...The era of American military dominance, or "Pax Americana," is dwindling as the nation loses its position far atop the global marketplace, a congressional military analyst said Wednesday...

...The new dynamic - in which the U.S. remains a world force, but does not hold the pre-eminent position it attained after World War II - is the result of global financial centers shifting to Asia, said Stephen Daggett, a defense policy and budget specialist for the Congressional Research Service...

..."It seems this administration finds massive amounts of money for bailout and [stimulus spending] but not enough to fund the basic money needed for defensive hardware and personnel," said Rep. Trent Franks, Arizona Republican.

Victor Davis Hansen had a good quote this morning, “...political influence and military power are ultimately predicated on economic strength.”

Our economic strength, like that of Great Britain, is dying as we quickly drowned in a sea of self-induced socialist debt. Only two pillars are keeping us afloat: the fact oil is traded in dollars and the might of the US military protecting the global trade system.

The dollar hangs upon a precipice; it dies overnight if the world turns to another medium for oil trading. Now, our military is about to be cannibalized to feed the socialist beast eating us all alive.

When the US military is gone, depleted in endless wars abroad and cashiered for progressive votes, it will not rise again. We will be naked before our enemies and creditors...one in the same.

The once mighty British Royal Air Force will cut 10,000 personnel, close five bases, and retire the majority of its Harrier and Tornado fighter aircraft. The RAF will reduce its flying programs, ground or mothball major weapons programs such as the Nimrod MR2, Puma helicopter, and Boeing E-3D AWACS.

These cuts are generated by the RAF itself “designed to pre-empt the savage cuts expected as part of the strategic defense review promised by whichever party wins power in next year’s general election.” According to the Times Online “Senior RAF officers believe that whichever party wins the general election it will have to make cuts to defence because of the economic situation.”

The RAF will cease to exist as a strategic force. Why?

Britain is broke. It budget deficit now runs 100 billion pounds, or over 12% of its GDP. The Pound is falling as fast as the dollar. Stand and Poor is threatening to downgrade their debt from AAA to AA. Why does this concern America?

No other European air force ranked with the RAF in its ability to project air power both regionally and globally. The British spend less than 1% of GDP on defense. They have just ceded air defense of Western Europe to the American. Under NATO, Americans are now stuck with the bill.

The UK is the literally “canary in the coal mine.”  Last year, Rep Barney Frank called for almost identical cuts in our military. This level of cuts will come to our shores. Our debt is almost $1.5 trillion, that’s the same 10% ratio as the UK. The national debt just passed $12 TRILLION. Our GDP is only $15 trillion. Translation – we are on the brink of owing more than we are worth. This is called insolvency.

Insolvent nations cannot afford world class militaries. Trading empires without power projection cannot defend their economic interests. Insolvent nations unable to defend their national interests...perish.

America’s deficit and debt are our number one national security issue.

The Pentagon is being limited to zero growth as well as having $60 billion redirected from current budget to initiatives not necessarily in line with the Pentagon’s requirements priorities.

As Defense News reports Some of these initiatives are legitimate:

…the big winners appear to be light intratheater cargo planes, unmanned aerial vehicles, countermine warfare systems.

However, according to Newsweek, about 5% of that $60 billion, or $2.7 billion, is being doled out to key congressional vote-getters like Rep John Murtha, head of the House the Defense Appropriations Committee, and Rep Debbie Wasserman Schultz, a member of the House Appropriations Committee.

I believe if these, and other congressmen, play ball with the White House this fall on critical votes healthcare and cap & trade (regardless of how vocal their constituents tell them to oppose these programs) they may see their precious pork emerge unscathed in the final defense budget.  In my opinion, the defense department will be used as a slush fund to bring congressional votes into line. If you want to know of healthcare reform will pass, then maybe you need to look at the congressional and senate line-item appropriations in the defense budget. The future of the President’s domestic initiative may very well be forged when for defense budget is built. Next step: follow the pork when the Senate gets its hands on the defense budget.

DefenseNews goes on to say:

…Losers may include amphibious craft, heavy armored vehicle and air defense systems, according to defense officials and experts… Asked how program cuts to free up dollars to fill the $60 billion shortfall might be split among the services, Ochmanek said: “Higher-end stuff is typically more expensive.”Defense analysts said that suggests the Navy and Air Force will receive the bulk of the $60 billion (budget cuts).

Aviation Week & Space Technology states:

An early look at the U.S. Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) reveals major force and capability alterations that are being described as “high-g changes in direction, and high-g causes pain,” says a senior U.S. Air Force official.

Moreover, the pared-down, reshaped, multifunctional forces under consideration are expected to cost $50-60 billion over five years above the planning target of no real growth in defense spending through Fiscal 2015…

This is the where the defense budget is heading: no additional spending though 2015, continuing combat operations, billions of extra funds needed to withdrawal forces from Iraq in the next few years (if everything goes as planned), huge modernization bills overdue for the Air Force and Navy, and the whole budget being used as a political sweetener to advance the president’s domestic agenda.

The sad side effect of this pork-barrel politics is transformation of our military from a strategic global power projection force to an expeditionary ground support only good for peacekeeping and counter-insurgency. More specifically, we’re gutting the U.S Air Force into nothing more than a glorified army air corps. 

David Ochmanek, deputy assistant secretary of defense for force transformation and resources, said the Pentagon had identified gaps in its capabilities and had told the services to fill them, while assuming no overall budget growth.

"It's now up to the components to figure out how best to make real those new capabilities and capacities and to find offsets within an assumption of zero real growth," Ochmanek told a group of defense reporters...

The Obama administration has asked Congress for $663.8 billion for the Pentagon for the 2010 fiscal year that begins Oct. 1, including $130 billion in war funding, mainly for the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The Defense Department wants a rocket ship. Defense planners state we have a valid requirement to blast a small force of troops anywhere on planet earth in less than two hours. According to the 17 October edition of Stars and Stripes

Civilian and military officials held a two-day conference at the National Security Space Office (NSSO) to plan development of the Small Unit Space Transport and Insertion — or SUSTAIN — program…the Marines (need) the "capability to transport small, mission-tailored units through space from any point on the globe to a contingency at any other point on the globe" within minutes of an order, the paper reported, sourcing to a Marine document…Private rocket pioneer Burt Rutan says the plan is technologically possible, “…This has never been done," Rutan told USA Today in an e-mail. "However, it is feasible. It would be a relatively expensive way to get the troops on the ground, but it could be done."

I was just wondering if the Defense Department could invent a rocket ship to bring these “civilian and military officials” from the NSSO back to Planet Earth. If the Pentagon is struggling to acquire more terrestrial, conventional weapons systems how can it hope to build a “Buzz Lightyear” system like this?  

For example, the Air Force takes 20 years just to field new fighters like the F-22. It’s failed to acquire a new aerial tanker after a decade of trying. It took both the Marines and Air Force over 20 years to field the V-22 Osprey, the tilt-rotor aircraft. The Marine’s current new version of the venerable H-1 Huey, the UH-1Y, just entered service with severe performance limitations to the irritation of John Young, the Undersecretary of Acquisitions. According to Inside the Pentagon, Young commented on the likelihood that DOD would have to pay roughly $72 million to fix the UH-1Y’s major deficiency even though the problem prevents the aircraft from maneuvering as required. This was just a Huey upgrade program, the ancient and relatively simple helicopter of Vietnam fame. The Marines aren’t the only ones having problems buying helicopters. The Air Force is still unsuccessful in its half-decade old quest to buy a common, off-the-shelf helicopter to replace its 1980-era H-60s. The Army, perhaps the leading authority in military helicopters, just had the $6.2 billion Armed Reconnaissance Helicopter program cancelled by Secretary Young. The Bell ARH-70, designed to replace the 40 year old OH-58 Kiowa scout helicopter, was 40% over-budget and underperformed.

Helicopters and airplanes are not ‘rocket science’ - NASA’s area of expertise. Has anyone in the DoD talked to them lately? Their Orion spacecraft, an Apollo rehash, is delayed again. From 2010 to 2015 American astronauts will hitch rides with our dear and old friends the Russians. NASA is the world’s leader in rockets and they’re having a hard time getting its “retro” rocket into space; and the Pentagon is seriously entertaining the idea of fielding something this cutting edge beyond the atmosphere?  

It’s funny they call this rocket ship “SUSTAIN,” because we’re having a heck of a time just trying to sustain the run-of-the-mill weapons systems we already have. This week the Air Force announced it will cut a massive portion of its frontline fighter force, about 300 fighters including F-15s, F-16s and A-10s, by 2010. The money will be used to sustain other current programs, including manpower. There’s a technical term for this: cannibalization. The Navy announced it is cutting the purchase of one of its much needed half-billion dollar littoral combat ships, citing budget issues. The new Hollow Force is starting to take shape, and this is before the emerging budget crisis really kicks into gear.  

According to the 17 October The Washington Times: 

The spiraling financial crisis and the ballooning costs of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan will force U.S. military planners to make hard choices about defense spending, which has risen at unprecedented levels since 2001, defense officials and experts say…Jeremy Potter, a senior analyst for federal industry with the government contractor consulting group INPUT, said the full impact of the bailout´s cost would not be felt until fiscal 2010, which begins next Oct. 1…A year from now, "defense program managers are going to be scrambling to get their programs funded," he said.

I know, some of you thinking, “Hey, it was just a meeting, it doesn’t mean we’re serious about building a new rocket.” I think even entertaining the concept shows the lack of serious focus within the Pentagon about where we find ourselves:

The services are starting to cannibalize mainstay programs, the Pentagon can’t buy new weapons systems with the money it already has, money for future force modernization is drying up, and the threats to our nation are growing stronger.

There, I just boiled America’s strategic military position down to one sentence. I, the military equivalent to Joe The Plumber, just did what all the brass, consultants, and think tanks in the Beltway can’t or won’t do. Everything the Pentagon does, every penny it spends, should exist within this strategic prism. Building a multi-billion dollar rocket to throw a platoon from one side of the planet to the other is about as far outside this box as one can get. It’s dangerous because it shows our friends and adversaries an unnerving lack of focus within our defense establishment.

Its time to get serious.