I spent a career in defense. It’s not how much you spend. It’s how you spend it. I saw fantastic waste. The literal combat ships and Future Combat Systems are great examples. One was due to an admiral’s ego and the other was pure congressional and corporate fraud. It’s like there’s no oversight. Rumsfeld was the last guy who actually tackled the job.
Yes, we’ve bought some bad weapons systems. We’ve invested huge amounts in others like Fleet Carriers I have serious questions about.
Another is we have WAY too many in ranks O5 and up. The number of Generals/Admirals we have is a complete joke given the size of the forces we have. We could easily eliminate 3/4s of those positions and STILL have MORE than we did in WWII when the military was 10-12 times its current size.
Another major source of waste is all the bases we have scattered all over the world. We need to close up a good number of them and bring the troops home.