Defense is one of the few things the Federal government does that are legitimate functions of government.
Why should we cut a legitimate function to preserve illegitimate functions?
We could actually cut the military if we were energy-independent, but not before that.
I have told people before that our environmentalist wackos create a national security threat when they take our natural energy resources off of the table. Keeping our oil imports flowing accounts for a chunk of our military expenditures.
Of course the military is a legitimate expense and function of the Fed Gov.
I am not lumping it in with entitlements at all. I understand it is categorically different. But it is one of the biggest single line items on our budget, and the cost needs to be contained.