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Comment by terran57 | Hacker News Reader

“Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.”

- Dwight D. Eisenhower

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This is a fallacy. A strong army can also create peace and stability, which in turn feed many more mouths than the opposite.

At some point you’d have to agree that we also need to invest in creating order, or would you vote to remove the police, court, and the rule of the law (which is done by force).

I think the point is to spend the least necessary to achieve the stability required for the base of Maslow’s hierarchy.

That is certainly a reasonable goal, but it is not found in a straightforward reading of the Eisenhower quote. The words clearly suggest a 1-to-1 trade-off between military spending and intrinsically valuable things.

You have to consider at least the minimal context of the Eisenhower quote, i.e. that it's _Eisenhower_'s quote, who in no uncertain terms could be considered anything close to a pacifist or idealist, he understands that military means are necessary.

I mean I basically agree, but I think that just makes it a confusing/misleading thing to say. Would be better to quote people saying things that conform with their actions and beliefs, rather than things that don't where we have to try to infer what they actually meant.

Lots of military action in modern times is worse than 1-to-1. Huge expense to destroy stability-enabling infrastructure, leaving the world a more dangerous place.

The quote implies that the spending is harmful. However, if Ukraine had spent less on defense over the last 5 years, it’s people would be worse off today, clothed worse, less well fed, under Russian (possibly genocidal) occupation. If they had tripled their spending, perhaps Russia would not have even tried

Eisenhower's point was also about arms races. If Ukraine and Russia had spent less on defence over the last five years, both would be better off and there still wouldn't be an occupation. As it was, his administration still spent an astronomical amount of money on defence (albeit less than Truman's Korean War expenditure) because he recognised that the Soviet Union wouldn't disarm if the US did.

Would the world have been better off if the South American dreadnought race had carried on? Doesn't seem very likely. Even the UK/German naval race at the same time cost a preposterous amount of money on both sides for an inconclusive result, even while we were fighting a hot war.

> The quote implies that the spending is harmful.

I don't think it does. It implies that overspending is harmful, while implicitly acknowledging that some level is spending is necessary for law and order.

Or maybe if they spent less Russia would have defeated them sooner, the war would be over, people could return home, and there would be no more casualties. Or maybe if they spend(really received from US) less then Russia would not have felt threatened and invaded at all. Perhaps if their military spending had ramped up faster then Putin would have decided to invade sooner.

Russia is public ally talking about re-education, and they are shipping thousands of Ukrainians into Russia. Mass graves all over and public statements for years about how the country and its people are illegitimate. Russia never once felt threatened, putin has invaded a new country every 5-10 years his entire reign. Stop justifying it

I wonder what a Ukranian thinks about this right now?

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