John Noonan: Sarah Palin takes the lead on defense spending

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President Obama and the Democrat-controlled Congress have been on a fifteen-month spending spree which has thrown trillions of dollars down the rat hole and quadrupled the already-too-high deficit of the Bush administration. Consider this metaphor:

Democrats are like the drunkard who wakes up with a bad hangover after a drinking binge. He goes to the liquor store to buy more booze, but his credit card is declined and his checking account overdrawn. To raise money for the purchase of more booze, the drunk pawns the gun collection he inherited from his father, the expensive electronic security system with its ten video cameras that once protected his house, and all the padlocks that had secured the doors. A couple of shady characters who had entered the pawn shop to sell some choice items they had stolen from another house in the neighborhood take note of who the drunk is and where he lives. His home is now a prime target for these thieves who plan to bust in and steal his remaining valuables. But why should the drunk worry? He now has a little cash in his hand to blow at the liquor store.

Every time the Democrats get power, they spend like the foolish drunk in the above scenario on all things except those essential to our nation's security, which they allow to atrophy. Ronald Reagan had to rebuild America's military forces after Jimmy Carter had cut critical weapons systems and destroyed the morale of our troops. Reagan's policy of peace through strength, one which Sarah Palin advocates three decades later, helped to restore our national security and bring freedom to millions of Eastern Europeans as the Iron Curtain came crashing down and the Soviet Union disintegrated. Likewise, George W. Bush inherited from Bill Clinton a military which was dependent on obsolete weapons and and a broken intelligence infrastructure. Like Reagan a decade before him, Bush had to rebuild our military. Had he not done so, America would not have been able to strike aback after the 9/11 attacks and thus prevent them from reoccurring.

Democrats never learn from history. They are in power again, and once again they are killing off essential military assets. With the help of Vichy Republicans, they have drastically curtailed production of some of our most effective weapons systems while completely eliminating others. Some of the systems we must now rely on are hand-me-downs from the Reagan years. Our military is being asked to fight two wars at a time when our nation is faced with an unprecedented array of threats. Sarah Palin sees history about to repeat itself and makes the case for making our house secure again:

It takes a lot of resources to maintain the best fighting force in the world – especially at a time when we face financial uncertainty and a mountain of debt that threatens all of our futures.

We have a federal government that is spending trillions, and that has nationalized whole sections of our economy: the auto industry, the insurance industry, health care, student loans, the list goes on – all of it at enormous cost to the tax payer. The cost of Obamacare alone is likely to exceed $2.5 trillion dollars.

As a result of all these trillion dollar spending bills, America’s going bust in a hurry. By 2020 we may reach debt levels of $20 trillion – twice the debt that we have today! It reminds me of that joke I read the other day: “Please don’t tell Obama what comes after a trillion!”

Something has to be done urgently to stop the out of control Obama-Reid-Pelosi spending machine, and no government agency should be immune from budget scrutiny. We must make sure, however, that we do nothing to undermine the effectiveness of our military. If we lose wars, if we lose the ability to deter adversaries, if we lose the ability to provide security for ourselves and for our allies, we risk losing all that makes America great! That is a price we cannot afford to pay.

John Noonan is a foreign policy advisor for The Foreign Policy Initiative, a think tank which is focused on the strategic challenges faced by the United States and its allies. He has served as an officer in the Air Force and has extensive hands-on experience with missile systems. In a recent commentary, Noonan explains why Sarah Palin is right about the need for the U.S. to reverse the dangerous course the Democrats are steering with our national security:

I've spoken with a few military leaders who, rather dourly, think America is headed down the same road as the British circa the Suez Crisis, where overextension of a strained British armed forces, massive foreign debt, and the draining weight of a new welfare state swiftly unraveled the mightiest empire in history. In the 50s, the British had America on hand to fill the power vacuum. Today there are no benevolent powers to fill the void should America abdicate its unique role in world affairs, only eager and unstable actors like Russia and China, whose belief in their own territorial destiny borders on religious.

Some argue that our military power is directly reliant on our economic power, but the relationship is more symbiotic. Our economy thrives because of the security provided by the U.S. military. That's never been more true than today, a time when our Armed Forces serve as vanguards of realms like space and cyberspace, without which the modern, globalized economy could not exist. The period of Pax Romana was ushered in on the might of Roman legions who controlled the empire's highways, while the peace and prosperity of the Pax Brittanica was derived from the free and safe sea lanes guarded by the Royal Navy. America's security responsibilities are multi-dimensional and far more complex than those of imperial Rome or Britain. Providing the international community with stability and security is a responsibility that we abandon at our own peril

Democrats have made a lot of noise of late about reducing the military budget in order to demonstrate fiscal discipline, but Palin reminds her readers that defense is the main Constitutional duty of the federal government. There is certainly room for improvement in efficiency and procurement, which is a morass even in the best of times, but reduction of forces is a bad idea for a nation at war. The Navy appears to be their main target, but our Navy remains the protector of trade routes and the basic extension of American power around the globe.

The problem with abandoning America's position as the world's most formidable superpower, Noonan warns, is that doing so will leave a void, one which China stands ready to fill. From our vantage point in Texas, it seems that Democrats have no problem with such an outcome. The question we believe needs to be asked is, what could possibly go wrong?

- JP