Posted on 02/19/2025 3:12:45 PM PST by Miami Rebel
UPDATED Feb 20, 2025, 07:00 AM
Washington - The Trump administration has ordered senior US military leaders to plan for expansive cuts that could slash the defence budget by 8 per cent annually, or some US$290 billion (S$390 billion) within the next five years, US media reported on Feb 19.
Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth told the Pentagon to develop the deep reductions, The Washington Post reported, citing a memo.
The Pentagon’s budget for 2025 is some US$850 billion. Lawmakers across the political spectrum agree that the massive spending is needed to deter threats, especially from China and Russia.
The cuts, if implemented in full, would reduce that figure by tens of billions each year to some US$560 billion by the end of the five years.
The report did not give details of where the cuts would be made in the world’s biggest military, but an earlier Post report said that junior civilian workers, not uniformed personnel, were being targeted.
The news – which comes after Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency reportedly visited the Pentagon last week – was likely to be met with stiff resistance from both the military and Congress.
US President Donald Trump on Feb 19 signalled support for a House of Representatives Bill that would increase the defence budget by US$100 billion – a move at odds with the Hegseth-directed cuts.
....
The Defence Department “must act urgently to revive the warrior ethos, rebuild our military, and reestablish deterrence”, Mr Hegseth wrote in the memo, dated Feb 18, according to the Post.
(Excerpt) Read more at straitstimes.com ...
Just 8%?
I'll cut it by 50% by now.
Stop building the F-35.
And don't build any new aircraft carriers.
We should be making drones instead. They're cheaper.
Get Elon to do it.
You are right, we need to be rebuilding our gutted politicize military.
There is an incredible amount of waste in the Pentagon. They should immediately fire half of the contractors and Pentagon bureaucrats for a start.
DOGE will find a massively bloated military budget. Also, a Trump peace dividend will be realized when he breaks the CCP.
The Russians have their MIC corruption relatively under control. Thieving generals do go to jail when caught in Russia.
In 2024 the Russians spent$101Billion on defense. They completed the largest mobilization since WWII, deployed air defense at least one, probably two generations ahead of ours with the S500. The Russians also deployed the Oreshnik IRBM that is two or three generations ahead of anything we’ve even thought about. Oh yeah, Russia also thumped NATO weapons systems all over the Uke battlefield. We spent nine times what Russia did! NATO spent sixteen times what the Russians did!
Cut the military by 40% today. First cut, ALL planned aircraft carriers.
That is why we better make friends with Russia—one less theater of operations.
The Pentagon was getting fat by getting everyone in the world to hate us.
Oh no. How will be bomb wedding parties on the other side of the planet now?
The us Spends more than 3 times as much as the next closest country on the plant on its military.
Even with these cuts the US would still be spending double.
I do agree you aren’t going to cut a 1/3 by just eliminating DEI.
However, with a national debt of 36 Trillion dollars, or more than 125% of the GDP of the nation, cuts have to be made, and to think the US Military, which is the biggest top line expenditure of discretionary spending every year isn’t going to be cut, you aren’t living in reality.
If you think there isn’t waste and graft in military spending. you are also living in lala land.
Eisenhower didn’t warn about the Military Industrial Complex in his farewell address for nothing.
“In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.”
THIS is what I voted for. I’m a Veteran. I’m a patriot. But the amount of money we spend on defense, and the waste that goes along with it is beyond absurd.
You’re joking.
Russia’s war materiele has been looted for years for scrap by its generals and rank-and-file. Are you forgetting the failed assault on Kyiv? The Russians anticipated a three-day war and set off in a convoy that stretched for miles. Among other reasons for it fizzling was that wheeled vehicles were getting stuck because tires hadn’t been updated or maintained.
As for their “wonder weapons,” a little perspective:
The super state-of-the-art Russian Stealth aircraft, the SU57, is specified as having the radar cross section about the size of a marble, about the same as an F22 Raptor.
When we catch some on radar, the cross section is about the same as a Navy Hornet’s, which isn’t even a Stealth aircraft.
The armored attack helicopter, the Alligator, was supposed to be armored against anti-aircraft cannon fire.
Soldiers shoot them down with small arms fire.
8% out of DOD budget is a minuscule amount. If you do not think there is 3-4 times that in waste fraud and abuse in the DOD budget YOU HAVE NO CLUE WHAT YOUR ARE TALKING ABOUT
THE US is broke. We have no more money to just throw blank checks at DOD so never beens on Social Media can thump their chest and talk all macho about “supporting the Military.”
This may too long a read,
Back when I was in the military
any job that a woman was involved
in, required two people, The woman and
a man to do the work.
Military is not like the civilian world.
you are frequently tasked to do
exceptional things with few resources.
Women make good mothers, shitty democrats,
but not good war fighters.
Don’t give me this shit about piloting
a modern aircraft
a properly trained 12 year old boy
could do that, most the time better.
For the record I’m a retired
Boeing experimental flight test engineer.
https://responsiblestatecraft.org/pentagon-audit-2666415734/
Pentagon can’t account for 60 percent of 4 TRILLION in assets!!!
Wake up and smell the 2025!!
I AM SURE we could cut it in HALF and still get MORE.
And so is Elon.
But I’d settle for a 25 percent cut.
It’s not 8%. It’s 8% compounded. That’s a third of defense spending.
drones have changed warfare forever.
Nearly our entire fighting force is now outdated and nearly useless.
Each littoral combat ship (LCS) costs around $500 million to build, with annual operating costs estimated between $50 million to $70 million. The total lifetime cost for the program could reach $100 billion or more.
Get rid of the LCS, build more Arleigh Burke DDs, end production of large Aircraft Carriers and star designing drone carriers.
Yet President Trump in 2018 was the first president to sign a defense budget over $700mm and in the next two years it grew even more.
The projected budget in five years would be twenty percent BELOW what President Trump himself championed in his first term.
I hated being told every September, to spend our budget before October 1 - need to change that first
No because you manufactured for yourself a zero sum fallacy that assumes a fixed budget every year. Like every other part of the Fed Government DOD’s annually budget every year is created using baseline budgeting
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