Alex Mintz - The Politics of Resource Allocation in the U.S. Department of Defense: International Crises and Domestic Constraints

Alex Mintz

First published 1988 by Westview Press

Published 2019 by Routledge
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Mintz, Alex, 1953 -
The politics of resource allocation in the U.S. Department of Defense:
international crises and domestic constraints
(Westview special studies in national security and defense policy)
Bibliography: p.
Includes index.
1. United States. Dept. of DefenseAppropriations and
expendituresHistory. 2. United States. Armed Forces
Appropriations and expendituresHistory. 3. United States
Military policy. 4. BudgetUnited States. I. Title.
UA23.6.M56 1988 355.6'22'0973 83-23281

ISBN 13: 978-0-367-29520-2 (hbk)

THE POLITICS OF RESOURCE ALLOCATION IN THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE: INTERNATIONAL CRISES AND DOMESTIC CONSTRAINTS

Over the past few years, the Reagan Administration has invested massive resources in improving the combat effectiveness of the general purpose force of the United States, in upgrading and strengthening the three "legs" of the U.S. strategic Triad, and in modernizing the Pentagon's command, control and communication (C3) systems.

The major objectives of President Reagan's defense buildup have been addressed (on several occasions) by U.S. Administration officials, including Secretary of Defense Caspar W. Weinberger. In his 1984 annual report to the U.S. Congress, for example, Secretary Weinberger claimed that the basic aim of this program (which is the largest peacetime rearmament project in U.S. history) is to rebuild America's defenses "after a decade of neglecting investment in defense," while developing "modern, combat-ready, flexible and sustainable conventional forces" and modernizing America's strategic nuclear forces "to survive a first strike and still pose a credible threat of effective retaliation" (see U.S. Department of Defense 1983, p. 4).

To meet these and other planning priorities of the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), the Reagan Administration granted the Pentagon more than $1.5 trillion over a five-year period (1982-1986), i.e., more than a quarter trillion dollars per year (ibid., p. 71).

U.S. military expenditures are staggering by almost any standard, and their share of total government spending is likewise vast: Americans pay well over $700 per capita annually for defense (see U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency [ACDA] 1984, p. 49), and military spending accounts for more than a quarter of all U.S. federal expendituresup to as much as 17 percent of net governmental expenditures at the federal, state and local levels and more than 6.5 percent of the Cross National Product in recent years (see U.S. Department of Defense 1983, p. 65). Yearly U.S. allocations of resources to the military exceed the respective GNPs of all but nine nationsemrnent expenditures of ail the oil-rich OPEC nations combined (see ACDA 1984, pp. 16-52).

The very high levels of U.S. defense spending are thought by some analysts (e.g., participants in the Boston Study Croup 1979) to be a product of past circumstances (the cold war atmosphere and U.S. involvement in the Korean War during the early 1950s). Since then, defense spending has climbed by approximately 5.4 percent per year and even in constant prices (after adjustment for inflation) has not dropped substantially. Rather, it tapers off periodically after U.S. involvement in wars, subsequently rising cyclically to previous high spending levels. In fixed prices, military spending levels have preserved a kind of status quo since the end of World War II, although compared with the rapid expansion of the U.S. economy as a whole, they have actually declined.

There are apparently certain thresholds constraining U.S. defense outlays, ranging from a lower limit (in 1982 values) of about $150 billion to an upper boundary of about $220-250 billion (see U.S. Department of Defense 1982, p. 308). The inability of the United States to increase defense expenditures much above this upper limit over protracted periods is essentially a byproduct of several budgetary constraints that preclude an increase in defense expenditures. These constraints include tax revenues, "acceptable" deficit spending levels and pressures for increased allocations to nondefense (civilian) programs. Furthermore, the lack of a long-term broad consensus and ideological commitment to increasing such spendingwhich many consider too vast in any casehas precluded, over the long run, drastic increases. While U.S. defense expenditures indeed reached their upper bounds during various periods in the post-World War II era, they did not remain at these levels following changes in administration and international circumstances.

U.S. inability to cut defense expenditures below the lower limit over protracted periods reflects, on the other hand, the country's continuous involvement in the strategic superpower arms race; involvement in conventional wars; the cost of the U.S. collective security arrangements with its allies in Western Europe, and with Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand, etc; and the continuous rise in the price of weapons systems which the Department of Defense develops and procures. Furthermore, constraints on defense spending cutbacks also result from various nonmilitary (organizational, political, ideological and economic) factors that should have little or no direct relevance to military spending. Some of these factors (e.g., the democratic electoral contest, interest group lobbying and the free enterprise economy) are so inherent in the U.S. political and economic systems that a massive and prolonged cut in U.S. defense spending levels appears unlikelyat least in the foreseeable futureregardless of changes in international security conditions.

Since the end of World War II in 1945, the United States has spent more than $4.0 trillion on defense, and during the last five years alone (1982-1986), DoD expenditures amounted to more than $1.5 trillion (see the U.S. Budget annually). These massive allocations of resources to the defense sector have enabled the DoD to develop a mighty strategic and conventional military force. The former is based on the Triad concept of three distinct but complementary offensive strategic arms: the land-based intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) system, which currently consists of the Titan, Minuteman II and Minuteman III ICBMs; the submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) system, which consists of the Poseidon and Trident systems, and the strategic bomber force composed of B-52 and FB-111 squadrons. Considerable reinforcement of this Triad, which constitutes the heart of the U.S. strategic doctrine, is currently being implemented through modernization of the ICBM system via procurement and deployment of the MX missiles and development of a new, small, single-warhead ICBM; modernization of the SLBM system with the continued development and production of the Trident I system and the development of a new, more powerful and accurate Trident II missile; and modernization of the long-range bomber force by procurement of the new B-1 strategic bomber and research and development of an advanced-technology bomber (Stealth), as well as the development and deployment of air-, sea-, and ground-launched cruise missiles.