Sorry I am going to say it forgive me AMY. BOTU is a correct a little. The military really needs to be trimmed and cut. But it keeps selling it self as NEEDED and Republicans keep falling for it.

I believe in a strong defense but their are things I look at the military and it just screams - WHAT A WASTE!

We do not need the military pretty. Sheesh.

Yes, we don't need a military, because those Somali pirates will just leave our ships alone, with no interruption to our flow of consumer goods. And those Iranians have never threatened to shut off our supply of oil.

How about making the NFL pay for the cost of using the Blue Angels?

Wow, how short memories are.

Guys, this was explained when people got hysterical about Air Force One flying over NYC. The expense! The expense!

But as it turns out, all aircraft - all of them - cost the same sitting or flying. A sitting military jet cannot be shown to be ready.

That word is "cannot".

So the budget is setup to put them all in the air so many hours, every so often, to exercise the systems and prove that they are ready.

You might not have noticed this because you can park your Civic or RAV-4 for a month and have it start up, right? Well, guess what? You don't own an airplane.

If you did, or you studied them, you'd know this.

Yes, flying over the closed dome was stupid. Flying the "missing man" formation over Texas A&M - because students died setting up a bonfire - was also stupid. But neither cost what you think it did, for the above reason.

And although Somali pirates aren't a reason to have F-18s, some people ought to crack a history book once in their lives and notice that you cannot build a military Just In Time To Save The Day™.

Ryan I do not think I said or Amy said we should scrap the entire Military. Daghain said Pretty which that whole Super bowl thing was a Pretty expensive display which could have been replaced with a nice video of two planes flying by.

No, military is needed to prevent piracy. That is a given, The question is do we need 20000 troops in Korea plus family too. What about Iraq or Afghanistan

do we need to have troops there too. Do we need to spent billions (27) on the V-22 Osprey that many military people said they did not want or think works not the best. Do we need to spend billions on a fighter jet new and old when basically every other enemy or potential enemy has technology that is decades behind or barely work at all.

Maybe yes, maybe no. The problem military is the one sacred cow of many conservative people that you just can not cut or change and if you want to you must be a hippy peacenik or scrap the entire thing.

I want sensibility and rationality - Not the Military Industrial Complex that President Eisenhower warned us about that sucks the tax payer dry while saying it is all for are OWN good and Mom and apple pie.

I second what John said. I bet that if we restricted deployment of personnel and facilities to areas where we actually have a security interest, i.e. shipping lanes, pirate havens, and, heaven forbid, our borders, and got rid of defense contracts that are nothing more than payback for campaign contributions and no practical good to national defense, we could save $200B a year. With no compromise to our ability to defend ourselves from foreign threats.

I'd like someone to prove me wrong on that.

2% of the worlds population and 50% of the worlds spending on military & intellegence. 200 million a day in Iraq. When people talk about smaller goverment, it must start here.

Thank you, Raddy. Although I doubt people will read your post and actually take the time to think it through. And cpabroker makes a good point too. We need to start using our military to protect our interests domestically as well as, hell, even more so than, internationally.

Saw this this morning:

America is not at war.
The Marine Corps is at war.
America is at the mall.

Every time I see these huge numbers, I ask myself where they get them. Liars figure, and figures lie.

That $450K will turn out to be the pro-rated cost of the planes and expenses, which was already spent and wouldn't change by a dime if they were parked, and the pilot's salaries. Guess what, they get paid every month, even if they do something else. What we are really talking about is the fuel, which is a considerable expense, but would have been consumed anyway. Why? Because an untrained, rusty pilot is about as useful as a rusty rifle.

If you are going after waste, at least use credible numbers.

Right. We didn't need to buy any planes or train any pilots and ground crew to perform this fly over. The planes would have sat idle, and the military personnel would have drawn their salaries regardless. The only real cost was maybe a few $K in gas. We have a volunteer military. The flyover was seen by hundreds of millions. Is a few thousand dollars too much to spend for a VERY effective recruiting campaign?

The majority of the costs in our budget are mandatory spending including entitlements such as Social security, Medicare and Medicaid. We shouldn't worry about the specks in our eye until someone removes the log.

The irony to me is that the only real job of a government is to protect its citizens rights. And while I agree that we are currently misusing our military, it is one of the few departments that we must have. I'm with Milton Friedman in that I think that we should disband 13 of the 17 governmental departments. Defense is not one of them.

Radwaste commented
And although Somali pirates aren't a reason to have F-18s, some people ought to crack a history book once in their lives and notice that you cannot build a military Just In Time To Save The Day™.

Yes, totally true. Military do need to build and have enough of a reserve, They do need to invest into new technology. I am not saying not to do that. The problem is the military (prodded on old odmirals and congress critters and slimy lobbyists) to keep rebuilding the Maginot Line over and over again and keep saying to us it will work trust us. Until that fateful day it does not work. Because somebody just walked around it.

One good article to think about is by the War Nerd - a sort of arm chair general who brings up a good point about the way the military thinks and spends.
http://www.exile.ru/articles/detail.php?ARTICLE_ID=6779&IBLOCK_ID=35
Read and think about how much a ship costs.

Ryan Commented...
Yes, we don't need a military, because those Somali pirates will just leave our ships alone,

Really the only solution to the problem of the Somali Pirate is the Military. (Thru I will admit is a good solution)

Here is my list of solution - both good and bad
1. Risk it, ship gets captured you pay the ransom. It's a gamble
2. Prepay - I bet many warlords in Somali would be up to a nice protection racket. Pay us and we leave your ships alone
Both above costs are borne by the shipping companies (thru customers in the end).
3. Shipping companies and ships militarize, invest in so good machine guns and mountings, train a couple of sailors. Assign weapons to ship personnel and many pirates will rethink attacking.
4. Securitize. Invest in radar, and night vision technology, beef up the command deck security, The could get onto the ship but if they can not reach the engines or the captain they can not do shit but shoot some people.
5. Shipping companies invest in private military or mercenaries. I bet some nice rent a soldiers or sailors would like a chance to have some action and money.
6. Heck try negotiation. Maybe you can get them to see the error of their ways.
7. Abandon the route. Invest in other transportation technologies.

In the end the solution does not always need to be one way. It can be many or none or just one.

The cry does not always have to be "WE HAVE A PROBLEM, PLEASE HELP US GOVERNMENT"

Remember $400 a gallon gasoline in Afghanistan? Those numbers came from the Pentagon...

http://www.military.com/news/article/gas-costs-400-a-gallon-in-afghanistan.html

Radwaste and MarkD are mostly correct.

The correct answer for how much this flyover cost:

$0

Every aircraft type has an associated flying hour program: the number of fight hours per fiscal year allocated to it.

Those hours are calculated based upon a whole bunch of things which I won't go into here. Suffice to say that the FHP is executed every year.

The flyby time counted towards proficiency requirements for the pilots, which would have been flown in any event.

How do I know? I did it for twenty years.

One more thing: if you're going to complain about military spending, do be sure to recognize it is dwarfed by social spending. People won't complain about that, though, because the checks come to them. Congress won't mention that because those checks buy them votes. And they don't risk anything.

"The problem is the military (prodded on old odmirals and congress critters and slimy lobbyists) to keep rebuilding the Maginot Line over and over again and keep saying to us it will work trust us."

I keep hearing people say stuff like this, but I challenge anyone to come up with any case in the last 30 years where the U.S. military spend major $$$ on a system that just flat didn't work. Not to say that there haven't been any failed projects, but the bulk of those get killed in the prototype phase or earlier. No one is going to promise that there will never be failed projects -- if you never fail, you aren't trying hard enough.

As for fighting the last war, which was the real problem with the Maginot Line, it does happen. But you know what? Those decisions are above the pay grade of both the contractors and the generals. They are ultimately the responsibility of the President. If the military is putting way too much effort into addressing the wrong threats, don't look at the Pentagon. Look at the White House.

Do we need to spend billions on a fighter jet new and old when basically every other enemy or potential enemy has technology that is decades behind or barely work at all.

No we don't, if it were true. A Chinese Stealth Challenge?

Also notice the F-4E-2020 Terminator and the F-4X in the link below: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F-4_Phantom_II_variants.

While Israel hopefully will always be a friendly country, what about Turkey?

Another one to take notice of is the Egyptian Air Force. Take a look at their inventory and current events. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egyptian_Air_Force#Current_inventory

The world is not a safe and peaceful place.

One way to cut defense budget is to get rid of baseline budgeting.

A few thing about military spending.

1 As Rad and a few others have pointed out, you have to test the equipment and hone skills.

2 Spending on the military when the military says they dont want it is NOT military spending. It is political graft disgused as military spending. Talking about it as though it acctully is military spending is a pointless watse of time.

3 Whle the US does spend more on military spending dont forget that some of that military money goes to the UN for 'their' security forces.

4 While it may seem like an gross over investment dont forget that out investment in all that military has resulted in the most peaceful centruy since human history began. True more pople have died in the wars of this century, but that is onle because far more people were alive at the time. I dont know how many people here truly study history but mankind rise to civilization is soaked in the blood of millions of war causlties.

5 Regarding Korea
a) they asked us to help them
b) our presence keeps North Korea in line and it doesnt hurt to remind China of our military might either
c) the reason we allow military memebers to have their famillies to to create a dead man switch

Afterall if North Korea kills a bunch of americas women & children the amercian public would be clamoring to nuke the bastards into powder.

Quite frankly had I been in on Intel planning I'd have pushed to detonae a nuke in korea back when the north was 'testing' their nucler capabilities and blame it as a 'miscalculation' on their part

First off - I do agree Medicare, Pensions and also both big problems. The both together dwarf military. AND they do need to slash and trimmed. Yes the common citizen do really hold onto their quote entitlements quote. But military and defense spending can not ignored too. "But, but but MOM, she has more then me it so not fair, why can't she give up some tooooooooo". If the US is going to get back on its feet and into the black nothing including military has to be considered sacred.

As to the Egyptian Military - looks impressive. But that also might be just looks. You also have to consider more then number of jets you have to look at trained pilots, upkeep, age of airplanes. Besides the future of the country is looking pretty iffy. WHich will effect how effective those planes will be.

One concept we need to be aware of is that the Miltary and defense should not be an over glorified game of Keeping up with the Joneses. On No China has a Stealth Fighter - we need one too. We have already seen what happens to a country that plays this game, Russia.

MORE LATER

I complain about all forms of spending.

Right up until the Strait of Hormuz gets closed, that is.

If you are going to complain about military spending, you need to consider what the national security strategy should be, and how to ensure resources match that strategy in the most efficient way possible.

There is plenty of room for debate on each of those elements.

In contrast, blathering about already programmed spending is pointless, except to demonstrate that Sally Jenkins needs to get a clue, or the WaPo a decent editor.

Right up until the Strait of Hormuz gets closed, that is.

"Hey Skipper",

Don't you mean mean the Suez Canal? (I'll forgive the miss on the geography.)

If the US is going to get back on its feet and into the black nothing including military has to be considered sacred.

While I don't hold the military spending sacred -- I was in the USAF from 85-93. The budget was cut under Bush Sr. Under Clinton they cut it even further. The term "hollow force" comes to mind.

I was in a commander's call in 1991. Our unit commander, a full bird Colonel, got up and said to us (LtC to E-2): [paraphrased] "Thank you for all that you are doing. I know you all have been doing your best. Our budget and personnel have just been cut again. We have been doing more with less. We are now going to have to do less with less. Anyone who can come up with anything to cut, please pass it up the chain. Or just come see me." I ended up walking about seven miles around the base hand-delivering classified documents to various other offices needing them. That was about four hours out of my day and saving about three gallons of gas.

2. Spending on the military when the military says they don't want it is NOT military spending. It is political graft disguised as military spending. Talking about it as though it actually is military spending is a pointless waste of time.

I will agree to a point. The F-117 is a pig (air-to-mud) -- only 59 production models were produced and are being retired. The F-22 program is/was expensive. The issue is that if you think that 187 fighters can do all that the existing fleet of F-15's and F-16's is a pipe dream. I can't find the F-15's inventory (a 1970's A/C), but it appears to be less than 500. Then you have to split the 2000 F-16's, which are never going to be in one theater, between air to mud, recon, wild weasel, and air superiority.

If China produces 500 stealth fighters that are in the ballpark of the the F-22, let alone the F-35, we are hosed.

"One way to cut defense budget is to get rid of baseline budgeting."

In general, that should go for every agency. However, you do have to be careful in contracting and procurement; when the government jerks that around too much, they eventually find that people don't want to do business with them anymore. One of the reasons defense procurements are so expensive is that the contractor has to cover for programs where the government jerks the requirements around and leaves the contractor holding the bag. A lot of people don't realize that Congress can abrogate any contract simply by not appropriating funding; that's a risk you generally don't run in the commercial world, and Congress is not always a rational actor when it comes to this sort of thing. I'll give you an example: the next time the Navy and/or Air Force have a program for a new fighter, they may as well sole source it to Lockheed Martin. Boeing will never bid on a fighter program again after their experiences with the A-12 and F-35 programs, and General Dynamics got so discouraged by their experiences with the F-16 and EELV programs that they got out of aviation entirely.

Oh hell, the main point of the above, which I forgot to add, was: I agree that if there is going to be a broad-based cut, it has to hit every agency. Politically, that's the only way it's going to happen. If you give one agency or department a skate, then the worms are out of the can. I certainly won't claim that the DoD budget is so efficient that there isn't, say, 5% that they can't cut somewhere without doing major harm.

However, I do find it interesting that this thread was supposed to be about the entire federal budget, but has become entirely a discussion of military spending, and only one commenter has even mentioned entitlement spending. If entitlements get to keep partying like it's 1999, then none of the rest of this matters.

Jim P:

"Hey Skipper",

Don't you mean mean the Suez Canal? (I'll forgive the miss on the geography.)

The Strait of Hormuz is the choke point at the southern end of the Persian Gulf, through which 20% of the world's oil passes.

While the US could get by for sometime (IIRC, the strategic petroleum reserve has enough to supply the US daily demand for a month) without oil from the Persian Gulf, most of the rest of the world isn't in that position.

Since the effect on our economy in the event of such a closure (never mind the incredible suffering that would occur elsewhere in the world) would put the collapse of the housing bubble in the shade, the US national security strategy includes maintaining freedom of navigation in the area.

To support that element of the NSS, the US must have certain types and quantities of military force, which require ongoing materiel support and training.

And some of that training includes proficiency flying, some of which just happened to take place at the Superbowl.

Which I am sure you understand.

Sally Jenkins does not, and Amy propagated her ignorance.

BTW, IIRC, the F-117 was completely retired several years ago.

The F-22 is so superior to the F-15 that it is hard to know how many is enough.

Considering the only thing like a peer competitor is China, I think 187 F-22s is enough for the next decade.

Finally, you are also right that entitlement spending dwarfs discretionary spending.

Obama wants to add at least another $2 trillion to that before he leaves office.

But not to worry, at the rate we're going, a default is looking increasingly inevitable.