POLICY BIG IDEAS brookings.edu/policy2020 Focusing on quality over quantity in the US military budget By James N. Miller and Michael O’Hanlon About the Authors Executive Summary The Trump administration, with the bipartisan support of Congress, has achieved large increases in defense spending in recent years. The proposed 2020 James N. Miller national defense budget of some $750 billion (as of this writing in November Former Under Secretary of Defense for Policy - Obama administration 2019, a final 2020 budget has not been passed by Congress) is much larger Senior Fellow - Harvard’s Belfer Center than the Cold War average of some $575 billion or President Obama’s last for Science & International Affairs budget of just over $600 billion. Senior Fellow - Johns Hopkins University’s Applied Physics Laboratory Our view is that after two decades of war, a decade of budgetary irregularities in Washington, and nearly 10 years of gradual decline in the topline, there is no doubt that the Pentagon can make good use of these funds. Former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis’ National Defense Strategy sensibly called on the Department of Defense to reinvigorate its capabilities vis-à-vis China and Russia including addressing dangerous vulnerabilities in cyberspace and outer space, while still managing today’s wars in the Middle East as well as the potential for a Michael O’Hanlon near-term crisis on the Korean Peninsula. That is a daunting set of tasks. Senior Fellow - Foreign Policy Director of Research - Foreign Policy While we do not doubt that the Pentagon can make good use of a $750 billion The Sydney Stein, Jr. Chair national defense budget in 2020, we are very concerned whether it will do so. @MichaelEOHanlon Each of the services continues to clamor for more force structure: more ships for the Navy, more tactical aircraft squadrons for the Air Force, and more troops for the Army. While growth in some key areas such as unmanned systems, cyber and The Brookings Institution is a nonprofit organization devoted to independent space resilience, and precision-guided munitions is warranted, it makes no sense research and policy solutions. Its mission is to conduct high-quality, under a strategy focused on China and Russia to grow the force overall. The independent research and, based on nation’s fiscal plight, with a 2019 federal budget deficit approaching $1 trillion, that research, to provide innovative, practical recommendations for reinforces the expectation, as evidenced in the Trump administration’s own budget policymakers and the public. The projections for 2021 and beyond, that real defense spending will not grow further conclusions and recommendations of any Brookings publication are solely and might well shrink. For that reason as well, tough choices are necessary. those of its author(s), and do not reflect the views of the Institution, its management, or its other scholars. FOCUSING ON QUALITY OVER QUANTITY IN THE US MILITARY BUDGET 2 We argue in this policy brief that the central accounts and war costs), constitutes nearly 40 choice for policymakers and candidates running percent of global military spending. America’s for election in 2020 is clear. The future focus allies and close friends account for another third should be on quality over quantity of military or so of the global total, meaning that the Western capabilities. Increased military spending largely alliance system wields the preponderance of serves three objectives: better modernization for global military resources even in the context of the future, upgraded unit-by-unit readiness for China’s rise and Russia’s revanchism. today, and increased force size and structure. Of these, the last is the least important to the U.S. Individual parts of the defense budget are military for the foreseeable future, and by draining reasonably healthy, too. Military compensation away resources needed elsewhere, increasing compares well with civilian jobs requiring force size is actually counter-productive. comparable skills and experience across the bulk of military specialties. Weapons procurement The U.S. armed forces need to innovate and budgets exceed $100 billion a year; the so-called invest in breakthrough capabilities and to improve “procurement holiday” of the 1990s and early immediate readiness, but they can do so at their 2000s is by now completely over. current overall size. Investing in modernization and readiness rather than growth, paired with more Research and development budgets in 2019 are clever and efficient management of the military, also robust. Funds for training are proportionate can allow today’s U.S. military of roughly 1.3 million to the size of the force, akin to Reagan-era levels active duty troops, just over 900,000 reservists, as well in terms of flight hours, steaming days, and almost 750,000 full-time civilians to do the job. major ground exercises, and other core activities. By giving up most plans for expansion, the military The same is true of maintenance budgets. The services can ensure that modernization and problem with the latter accounts in recent years readiness get the resources they crucially require. has been unpredictability and delay more than inadequate resources. But at the same time, U.S. defense spending is hardly huge or unaffordable. Relative to the size Background: Is U.S. defense spending of the economy, it is down to about 3.5 percent high or low? of GDP, after having reached nearly 5 percent in the late years of George W. Bush and early years First, some broad perspective is in order. Is of Obama. During the Cold War, it varied roughly today’s American military spending high or low? between 5 percent and 10 percent of GDP, by How one answers this question sets the political way of comparison. Also, today’s U.S. military is and budgetary context for more detailed debates modest in size. Its 1.3 million active-duty uniformed over strategy, modernization, and force structure. personnel are far fewer than the Cold War force The current U.S. national defense budget is that exceeded 2 million during its latter decades. certainly large by some measures. It exceeds the It is also smaller than China’s and not much bigger Cold War average for the United States of just than the Indian or North Korean militaries. In short, over $500 billion as expressed in 2020 dollars. it is a reasonably expensive but affordable military The U.S. national defense budget, which does not that relies on sustaining a qualitative edge over include budgets for the Department of Veterans adversaries to maintain its combat punch and to Affairs and the Department of Homeland Security protect U.S. interests across the globe. (but does include Department of Energy nuclear U.S. military spending may well be, as President weapons expenses as well as most intelligence Obama noted in his 2016 State of the Union FOCUSING ON QUALITY OVER QUANTITY IN THE US MILITARY BUDGET 3 address, roughly equal to the next eight highest- aggregate military strength of just some 30,000, spending countries combined.1 But defense and when the United States plus other NATO budgets do not always dictate combat outcomes allies only have about 5,000 troops in the general or ensure effective deterrence. Chinese precision vicinity under normal peacetime conditions.4 missiles, Russian advanced air defenses, advanced submarines, cyberattacks, anti-satellite One might ask why the United States should weapons, and other such capabilities—whether shoulder so much of the burden of deterring operated by Beijing and Moscow or sold to other Russia and China—shouldn’t our allies do more? parties—can cause asymmetric, disproportionate While some of America’s allies have stepped up effects.2 New technologies offer promise for to the plate in terms of defense spending (for America’s armed forces, but also new ways example South Korea at about 2.4 percent in for adversaries to challenge or hurt the United 2018, Australia and the U.K. at 2 percent, and States. As such, it is essential for the Department France at 2.3 percent of their GDP), many have of Defense to have enough resources to pursue not kept their military spending levels as high as a qualitative military advantage over potential they had promised, and they have not always adversaries through a robust and well-directed spent their resources well. So, without a doubt, modernization program. the United States must continue to press allies to spend more for their own defense. However, even So yes, U.S. military spending is large. Indeed, if allied defense budgets rise, the reality is that it is now roughly three times that of China’s, the there is no substitute for the skill and scale of the world’s number-two military power—after having U.S. military. Thus, the United States must take been nearly 10 times as great at the turn of the a lead role in deterring China and Russia from century. That may sound like a comfortable coercion or aggression. advantage. It is not, especially when the correct strategic goal for the United States military is not Finally, one might ask, isn’t the Department of primarily to defeat China or Russia in combat Defense—a federal agency not even able to but to deter China and Russia in the first place audit its own expenses—so wasteful that it can by being able to deny the objectives of any preserve or improve combat power with far fewer aggression and impose unacceptable costs. budgetary resources? While it is true that DoD is inefficient, much of the waste is marbled into As a result of military modernization and reform muscle—difficult to excise without painstaking and efforts this century, China now possesses patient work, lest major combat capabilities be advanced weapons systems including the DF- damaged along the way.