> It's rare that anyone pitches the government as competent outside of military spending
Genuine question - do people see military as competent when it comes to spending?
Genuine question - do people see military as competent when it comes to spending?
This is why the fuels division I was in, we often bought new desk chairs every year and $500 pocket knives and parts we would never need. Literally had to throw parts away to make room for the new parts.
I can't speak to dealing with insurgencies but it's clear to me that a mix of various administrations policies was to blame more than military effectiveness.
I mean was it the military or Paul Bremmer and co who disbanded the Iraqi military and unleashed a lot of chaos?
The first is that other Western countries could pick up the slack instead of having it fall disproportionately on the US. It only got the way it is because the others were mostly bombed out after WWII and that's no longer the case.
The second is that if the US spent less and did less military interventionism, adversarial countries might not feel the need to spend as much either, and then the balance of power stays the same while everyone spends less money on bombs and warships.
The US is the only one who can initiate this because they're the only ones who can reduce military spending without being threatened even if others don't.