If the Department of Defense is the Department of War now, does that mean defense spending is best described as “war” spending?
Recent events seem to suggest the answer’s “yes,” and if Donald Trump, erstwhile anti-war isolationist, has his way, war spending will rise dramatically in the next fiscal year.
As you’ve likely heard, Trump wants Congress to authorize an unprecedented 50% increase in defense outlays which, if agreed, would find America spending $1.5 trillion on war (and things related to it) over just 12 months.
That, from a nation which already (and famously) spends more on the military than the next nine closest countries combined.
To be fair to Trump, defense expenditures as a share of GDP aren’t especially elevated, but that’s because America’s not at war. Yet.
Trump justified the request by calmly exclaiming that America’s “entitled” to a “Dream Military” that’ll keep a country which hasn’t been invaded since 1814 “SAFE and SECURE.”
At this point, there’s little use in trying to reconcile Trump’s campaign rhetoric about “endless wars” and foreign entanglements with a series of increasingly brash military operations including the bombing of Iran’s nuclear program and a nighttime raid to kidnap Nicolas Maduro.
There’s no way to square Trump’s actions with his pretensions to isolationism, and although he’d vociferously dispute every part of this, I’d suggest robbing Venezuela at gun point for their oil isn’t the sort of thing that’s consistent with the Nobel Peace Prize Trump covets.
Nor is it a good look in that regard that Trump summarily relegated Venezuela’s newly-minted Nobel laureate to the sidelines following Maduro’s abduction in favor of his deputy, who’s complicit (and then some) in every, single one of the regime’s long list of crimes, real, imagined and in-between.
Trump’s spending request is also inconsistent with his early-term bid to cut federal spending. This — a 50%, non-wartime increase in military outlays when the country’s running a large deficit — is the stuff libertarian, budget hawk nightmares are made of.
Anyway, Trump’s insistence on a 50% increase in America’s military budget gave defense stocks a boost, although they eventually pared gains. It’s been a rollercoaster 24 hours for defense contractors, which are also grappling with the prospect of buyback and dividend restrictions courtesy of an Executive Order Trump signed mid-week following a social media broadside.
“Effective immediately, [contractors] are not permitted in any way, shape, or form to pay dividends or buy back stock, until such time as they are able to produce a superior product, on time and on budget,” Trump declared. (Note that we’ve stopped asking whether he’s even allowed to decree such things, a telltale sign of democratic backsliding.)
Trump claims he can pay for some, or all, of the new military spending with tariff revenue, even without knowing whether the Supreme Court intends to uphold the levies. It now seems likely that, in the event the court pushes back, Trump will claim the justices aren’t just jeopardizing national security in a roundabout way (i.e., by denying him the power to unilaterally tax trade), but directly, by curtailing his capacity to invest for the country’s defense.
Even if the tariffs stand, associated revenues won’t come anywhere near paying for Trump’s proposed military shopping spree, particularly not if he still wants to hand out $2,000 to more or less everyone in the country in the form of a “tariff dividend.”
The Senate on Thursday voted 52-47 to block Trump from additional military action against Venezuela. If I were them (the Senate, I mean), I’d get to work on stopping him from invading Greenland too, because by every appearance and indication, that’s coming.
As for the spending, I don’t know why he bothers asking. He usurped Congress’s power of the purse on too many occasions to count in 2025. Why not just just tell Congress what they’re going to do under credible threat of unspecified consequences if they don’t acquiesce? Hell, it worked with a gang of hardened Chavistas, why can’t it work with a bunch on spineless Beltway politicos?
“Brewster’s Millions: Department of War edition”
Since everyone who disagrees with Trump is now a terrorist (domestic, narco, Muslim, gender, commie Nazi), I suppose a dramatic increase in war funding makes sense.
Also,”There’s little use in trying to reconcile Trump’s campaign rhetoric.” – fixed that for you.
If he has his way eventually (soon?) the Democratic Party will be on that ‘terrorist’ list too.
Btw is trump media going to announce a defense contractor subsidiary/JV/merger soon?
Powered by clean nuclear fusion.
I had to laugh at the announcement that DJT was merging with a fusion energy company. I would laugh at the catastrophic failure ahead, but in this case, it’s more of a laughing-rather-than-crying situation, because I know full well that company is going to promptly receive massive government grants for “research.”
Mad King Donny is on a roll !
This is getting scarier by the minute. That dramatic increase in military spending will buy a lot of new murderous toys. But it will also pay for a lot of new boots. T has already told the top military brass that they should consider using US cities as training grounds, and that we need to “fight the enemy within”. Who’s that? Anyone who opposes him.
All those new boots will be coming to a city and voting booth near you.
H-Man, this party will come to an end when the rest of the world stops buying our bonds which could explain why he is grabbing the assets of other countries to fund his vision of the new world.
In a midterm year where the king is concerned about impeachment, just get the Fed to buy bonds and stock ETFs too…well for that matter, put some trump coins into central bank reserve too…
A guy who went bankrupt every chance he could and now ‘we the people’ have decided he should head up the huge business that is America. Doesn’t say much for our collective intelligence.
Kudos to H for the perfect graphic to this story. He transformed Trump into the perfect archetype Russian general – except for the tiny hands of course.
Early in the campaign people noted that the scant guardrails that existed in his first term would be gone for a second term. We’re clearly seeing the effect of that right now.
H — you had a strong contention that Michelle Obama would have defeated Trump on election day. Still feel that way?
https://18theses.com/The%20Defense%20Reformation.pdf paypal mafia wants to dislodge the old guard and sell ya something new and make sure there’s more money for it. drones, robots, Moonraker tech, salesforce for killing people, etc.
https://youtu.be/80GFRDJ_Ii4 straight from the Hegseth’s mouth.