The United States needs to cut military spending and shift money to two pressing threats: Pandemics and climate change

ABSTRACT

The Biden administration had an opportunity to redirect the United States’ path away from all but limitless spending on the Defense Department. That path could and should have centered on the most imminent threats to our security: climate change and potentially pandemic infectious diseases. But the Biden budget is one that only a defense contractor could love; it continues spending for unproven weapon systems, unsustainable and unneeded nuclear weapons efforts, and a new Cold War with China.

KEYWORDS:

• Defense spending
• defense budget
• F-35
• submarine-launched cruise missile
• defense contractors
• defense procurement

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Notably, the Department of Defense also accelerates the damage of climate change by being the single largest US user (https://psmag.com/environment/the-military-is-the-largest-single-user-of-fossil-fuels-elizabeth-warren-wants-to-change-that) of fossil fuels. A 2019 analysis by the Brown University Costs of War project found the military has emitted 1.2 billion metric tons of greenhouse gases (https://watson.brown.edu/costsofwar/files/cow/imce/papers/2019/Summary_Pentagon%20Fuel%20Use%2C%20Climate%20Change%2C%20and%20the%20Costs%20of%20War%20%281%29.pdf) since 2001.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mandy Smithberger

Mandy Smithberger is the director of the Center for Defense Information at the Project On Government Oversight, in Washington, DC, where her work focuses on Pentagon reform and the defense budget. You can follow her work @StrausReform.