I think he means pre-World War III levels.
Now is NOT the time to be gutting military spending. Alter the composition, ok but that would also require a change in mission.
I could see greater reliance on a reserve military. I can see a need for 8 to 10 Active combat brigades and twice that number for Reserve brigades. This would be to ease the rotation and refit necessary to sustain the fighting force. I would also like to see at least one combat or support brigade per 3 to 10 million population centers in the US as part of the National Guard. That would then mean a total of about 30 combat and or support brigade sized NG units throughout the US.
This would be a substantial increase over current force structure and would require changes to the way the US conducts a number of activities. One example would be how the nations pays for Pell grants and student loans. I would like to see that some type of service be connected to such grants / loans.
We will end up about as unprepared for any worldwide conflagration as the FDR regime was in December 7, 1941.
We had war thrust upon us, and we were woefully unready, with the “peacetime” armed services underfunded, and unequipped for much more than horse-mounted cavalry charges with drawn sabers.
The only thing we had going for us that made half-way sense was the ramping up of the industrial base to supply England, beleaguered and going through its darkest days, as the Battle for Britain was raging, and after they had fled Europe at Dunkirk. The US was shipping war material and foodstuffs to England as fast as we could organize the convoys in 1939, 1940, and 1941.
But FDR was also demanding payment in silver from the Bank of England, and shipping it back on the return convoy. England really felt that austerity during and after the war, and when it was over, England was very nearly as bad off as Germany.