the best exposition/monologue on the military-industrial remains Matt Damon's bit in Good Will Hunting during one of his job interviews -- just as learned as Ike


(for another example of ignored presidential warnings peep george washington's mindfulness "of the danger of foreign entaglements" in his farewell address...)

___________________
agenda:


[Dark Disco|Frozen Balearic|Gay Biker-House| Boogie-Trance|Heavy Electronica|Soft-Goth]

From what I've heard the "military-industrial complex" is very sick at the moment. The free-spending days post Vietnam to the Regan era have stopped and now these arms manufacturers are having a hard time making ends meet. I'm not trying to be sympathetic or empathetic but I don't think the military-industrial complex is what it used to be or has the merit on a political or economic scale that it once had.

For me, the primary role of a central government is to provide for the common defense. Without a stable, safe nation the other roles of government are a mute point. Have we gone overboard as far as military spending? Maybe, but in terms of how much our nation makes in relation to how much we spend in defense, we are on par with most other nations. You also have to look at our track record as far as defense goes. In our almost 230 years of existance, we have had no major conflicts on our own soil (save the civil war, which was a domestic, not international conflict). We have had Pearl Harbor and 9/11, but I think the events afterward have or are speaking for themselves.

Do we spend too much on our military? Maybe. However, our military has kept the United States and argueably the world safe from major military conflict for the past 50 years, and I would rather be debating its over-funding than its under-funding as we worry about our security.

why worry about the military-industrial complex, when you have the healthcare-industrial complex, and the welfare-industrial complex, and the infastructure-industrial complex, and the corporate-industrial complex, and the news-media-industrial complex....

___________________
SAVE ZIONIST MUSTARD: BUY ZIONIST KETCHUP!


Click here to support the free mustard alliance.

quote:

-- Excerpt from a speech delivered in 1933, by Major General Smedley Butler, USMC. War is just a racket. A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of people. Only a small inside group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few at the expense of the masses. I believe in adequate defense at the coastline and nothing else. If a nation comes over here to fight, then we'll fight. The trouble with America is that when the dollar only earns 6 percent over here, then it gets restless and goes overseas to get 100 percent. Then the flag follows the dollar and the soldiers follow the flag. I wouldn't go to war again as I have done to protect some lousy investment of the bankers. There are only two things we should fight for. One is the defense of our homes and the other is the Bill of Rights. War for any other reason is simply a racket. There isn't a trick in the racketeering bag that the military gang is blind to. It has its "finger men" to point out enemies, its "muscle men" to destroy enemies, its "brain men" to plan war preparations, and a "Big Boss" Super-Nationalistic-Capitalism. It may seem odd for me, a military man to adopt such a comparison. Truthfulness compels me to. I spent thirty- three years and four months in active military service as a member of this country's most agile military force, the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from Second Lieutenant to Major-General. And during that period, I spent most of my time being a high class muscle- man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the Bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I suspected I was just part of a racket at the time. Now I am sure of it. Like all the members of the military profession, I never had a thought of my own until I left the service. My mental faculties remained in suspended animation while I obeyed the orders of higher-ups. This is typical with everyone in the military service. I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912 (where have I heard that name before?). I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested. During those years, I had, as the boys in the back room would say, a swell racket. Looking back on it, I feel that I could have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents. http://www.fas.org/man/smedley.htm

quote:

"Why don't these damned oil companies fly their own flags on their personal property - maybe a flag with a gas pump on it." - Brigadier General Smedley D. Butler (1937)

Military Industrial Complexes


by Karen Kwiatkowski


LINK TV’s "Active Opposition" aired a show last Wednesday discussing the military industrial complex. It featured a panel discussion, opening with Dwight D. Eisenhower’s famous farewell speech of 43 years ago.


In preparation for this panel, I re-read War Is a Racket, by two-time Congressional Medal of Honor recipient Lieutenant General Smedley Butler. Butler’s post-World War I, pre-World War II assessment is far more direct than Ike’s speech. Marines often tend to tell it like it is.

I wonder what Butler or Ike, generals who had served in several brutal wars, would have thought about the latest news from Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad.

Smedley Butler noticed how defense industries carefully nurtured politicians for war. Like good cops, they emphasized the job creation benefits and their own outstanding ability to produce needed armaments and supplies. All you want, and then some, yessiree! If that didn’t do the trick, the bad cop defense industrial establishment worried that without war, vast debts owed them by allies or opponents might never be collected, and domestic economic collapse would follow. Politicians, unchanging from the time of Plato, knew exactly what to do.

Ike was concerned that the average American did not really understand the sycophantic and co-dependent relationship between the defense industries, the military leadership, and the Congress. He noted "This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. …We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications."

Ike advised America to stay vigilant, observant, "alert and knowledgeable." Smedley Butler, more of a realist I suppose, simply advised that when talk of war raged, all of the industrialists and politician be conscripted first, then their children, and lastly, the rest of us. Butler conceived a simple democratic plan that would require a decision for war be approved by a majority of all those who would be sent to fight. Draftable young men would vote yea or nay for the next war. No votes by older folks or politicians and industrialists would be considered. Such a system would ensure that truly defensive wars would be fought, and all other wars rejected.

American soldiers today are quite familiar with the military industrial complex and outsourcing. They see inedible food, an extra burden of providing security, and shocking pay inequities. They see inscrutable accountability mysteries.

Some Iraqis held at Abu Ghraib Prison have met the modern American military industrial complex up close and personal. Contractors from CACI International and Titan Corporation, as well as members of our own military, are under investigation for "mistreating" prisoners.

CACI International and Titan Corporatio represent numbers 63 and 35, respectively, of the Pentagon’s top 100 contractors for 2002. These companies are small fry, as out-sourcing goes.

Rational people may debate whether America’s occupation of Iraq is purely defensive, a Republic behaving imperially, or the blueprint for a new kind of empire. But underlying the debate is a fact – that by its very existence – undermines the Constitution, American traditions of justice, and the laws of armed conflict.

We have today over 15,000 military contractors in Iraq, doing not just the cooking and cleaning, but the fighting, the guarding, the strategizing, and even some of the dying. After the U.S. and the U.K. militaries, this third largest "force" outnumbers the entire remaining coalition of the paid for.

The military industrial complex lobbies Congress on a daily basis, costs the taxpayer billions each year, chips away at the credibility of the United States as a force for justice and good will, exists in a hazy legal wasteland unaccountable to domestic or international law, and serves to embarrass the country periodically with overcharges, technology leaks to other countries, and human rights abuses.

Outsourcing contracts for everything from toilet paper to bullets to guards and interrogators have become the Soylent Green of the military industrial complex, an "artificial nourishment whose actual ingredients are not known by the public." The top 100 CEOs and Vice Presidents cheerfully move from government circles into defense industries, and sometimes back again.

This third-generation spawn of Smedley Butler’s racketeers go where we pay them to go and do what they are told. They can hardly complain later that they were forced into anything, or misled by faulty intelligence, or didn’t know what they were getting into. You see, it’s all in their contracts. This makes them worth far more to Washington than our all-volunteer force of American soldiers, sailors, airmen and marines.

When we consider the American military, we don’t think about contracts or contractors, and we don’t worry about the parasitical military industrial complex. Smedley Butler and Dwight D. Eisenhower thought we should. America at war, circa 2004, proves them to be not only patriots, but prophets as well.

May 3, 2004

Karen Kwiatkowski is a retired USAF lieutenant colonel, who spent her final four and a half years in uniform working at the Pentagon. She now lives with her freedom-loving family in the Shenandoah Valley, and writes a bi-weekly column on defense issues with a libertarian perspective for militaryweek.com.

___________________
If God is the answer, it must have been a very stupid question.

quote:

Smedley Butler noticed how defense industries carefully nurtured politicians for war. Like good cops, they emphasized the job creation benefits and their own outstanding ability to produce needed armaments and supplies. All you want, and then some, yessiree! If that didn’t do the trick, the bad cop defense industrial establishment worried that without war, vast debts owed them by allies or opponents might never be collected, and domestic economic collapse would follow. Politicians, unchanging from the time of Plato, knew exactly what to do. Ike was concerned that the average American did not really understand the sycophantic and co-dependent relationship between the defense industries, the military leadership, and the Congress. He noted "This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. …We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications."

GDP 2003
Data source: 2003 CIA World Factbook

001 World $ 49,000,000,000,000
002 United States $ 10,400,000,000,000 x .0359 = $373,360,000,000
003 China $ 5,700,000,000,000
004 Japan $ 3,550,000,000,000
005 India $ 2,660,000,000,000
006 Germany $ 2,184,000,000,000
007 France $ 1,540,000,000,000
008 United Kingdom $ 1,520,000,000,000 x .0293 = $44,536,000,000
009 Italy $ 1,438,000,000,000
010 Russia $ 1,350,000,000,000
011 Brazil $ 1,340,000,000,000
012 Korea, South $ 931,000,000,000
013 Canada $ 923,000,000,000
014 Mexico $ 900,000,000,000
015 Spain $ 828,000,000,000
016 Indonesia $ 663,000,000,000
017 Australia $ 528,000,000,000
018 Turkey $ 468,000,000,000
019 Iran $ 456,000,000,000
020 Netherlands $ 434,000,000,000
021 South Africa $ 432,000,000,000
022 Thailand $ 429,000,000,000
023 Taiwan $ 406,000,000,000
024 Argentina $ 391,000,000,000
025 Poland $ 368,100,000,000
026 Philippines $ 356,000,000,000
027 Pakistan $ 311,000,000,000
028 Belgium $ 297,600,000,000
029 Colombia $ 268,000,000,000
030 Egypt $ 268,000,000,000
031 Saudi Arabia $ 242,000,000,000
032 Bangladesh $ 239,000,000,000
033 Switzerland $ 231,000,000,000
034 Sweden $ 227,400,000,000
035 Austria $ 226,000,000,000
036 Ukraine $ 218,000,000,000
037 Malaysia $ 210,000,000,000
038 Greece $ 201,100,000,000
039 Hong Kong $ 186,000,000,000
040 Vietnam $ 183,000,000,000
041 Portugal $ 182,000,000,000
042 Algeria $ 167,000,000,000
043 Romania $ 166,000,000,000
044 Czech Republic $ 155,900,000,000
045 Denmark $ 155,500,000,000
046 Chile $ 151,000,000,000
047 Norway $ 143,000,000,000
048 Finland $ 136,200,000,000
049 Hungary $ 134,700,000,000
050 Venezuela $ 132,800,000,000
051 Peru $ 132,000,000,000
052 Israel $ 122,000,000,000
053 Ireland $ 118,500,000,000
054 Morocco $ 115,000,000,000
055 Nigeria $ 113,500,000,000
056 Kazakhstan $ 105,000,000,000
057 Singapore $ 105,000,000,000
058 Belarus $ 85,000,000,000
059 New Zealand $ 78,800,000,000
060 Sri Lanka $ 73,700,000,000
061 Burma $ 70,000,000,000
062 Slovakia $ 66,000,000,000
063 Uzbekistan $ 65,000,000,000
064 Tunisia $ 63,000,000,000
065 Syria $ 59,400,000,000
066 Iraq $ 58,000,000,000
067 Dominican Republic $ 53,000,000,000
068 United Arab Emirates $ 53,000,000,000
069 Sudan $ 52,900,000,000
070 Bulgaria $ 50,600,000,000
071 Ethiopia $ 50,600,000,000
072 Guatemala $ 48,000,000,000
073 Puerto Rico $ 45,700,000,000
074 Ghana $ 42,500,000,000
075 Ecuador $ 41,700,000,000
076 Libya $ 41,000,000,000
077 Croatia $ 38,900,000,000
078 Nepal $ 36,000,000,000
079 Slovenia $ 36,000,000,000
080 Kuwait $ 34,200,000,000
081 Congo, Democratic Republic of the $ 34,000,000,000
082 Costa Rica $ 32,300,000,000
083 Kenya $ 32,000,000,000
084 Uganda $ 31,000,000,000
085 El Salvador $ 30,000,000,000
086 Lithuania $ 29,200,000,000
087 Azerbaijan $ 27,000,000,000
088 Cameroon $ 27,000,000,000
089 Zimbabwe $ 27,000,000,000
090 Uruguay $ 26,500,000,000
091 Turkmenistan $ 26,000,000,000
092 Cuba $ 25,900,000,000
093 Serbia and Montenegro $ 25,300,000,000
094 Paraguay $ 25,000,000,000
095 Cote d'Ivoire $ 24,500,000,000
096 Jordan $ 22,800,000,000
097 Tanzania $ 22,500,000,000
098 Oman $ 22,400,000,000
099 Korea, North $ 22,000,000,000
100 Bolivia $ 21,000,000,000
101 Latvia $ 20,000,000,000
102 Luxembourg $ 20,000,000,000
103 Cambodia $ 19,700,000,000
104 Lebanon $ 19,300,000,000
105 Mozambique $ 19,200,000,000
106 Afghanistan $ 19,000,000,000
107 Honduras $ 17,600,000,000
108 Panama $ 17,300,000,000
109 Qatar $ 17,200,000,000
110 Angola $ 16,900,000,000
111 Senegal $ 16,200,000,000
112 Guinea $ 15,900,000,000
113 Yemen $ 15,700,000,000
114 Estonia $ 15,200,000,000
115 Botswana $ 15,100,000,000
116 Georgia $ 15,000,000,000
117 Albania $ 14,000,000,000
118 Burkina Faso $ 13,600,000,000
119 Kyrgyzstan $ 13,500,000,000
120 Mauritius $ 13,200,000,000
121 Nicaragua $ 12,800,000,000
122 Armenia $ 12,600,000,000
123 Namibia $ 12,600,000,000
124 Madagascar $ 12,600,000,000
125 Haiti $ 12,000,000,000
126 Trinidad and Tobago $ 11,100,000,000
127 Moldova $ 11,000,000,000
128 Chad $ 10,000,000,000
129 Macedonia, The Former Yugoslav Republic of $ 10,000,000,000
130 Jamaica $ 10,000,000,000
131 Laos $ 9,900,000,000
132 Bahrain $ 9,800,000,000
133 Mali $ 9,800,000,000
134 Cyprus $ 9,400,000,000
135 Rwanda $ 9,000,000,000
136 Zambia $ 8,900,000,000
137 Niger $ 8,800,000,000
138 Macau $ 8,600,000,000
139 Tajikistan $ 8,000,000,000
140 Togo $ 8,000,000,000
141 Bosnia and Herzegovina $ 7,300,000,000
142 Benin $ 7,300,000,000
143 Malawi $ 7,200,000,000
144 Gabon $ 7,000,000,000
145 Iceland $ 7,000,000,000
146 Malta $ 7,000,000,000
147 Brunei $ 6,500,000,000
148 Lesotho $ 5,600,000,000
149 Mauritania $ 5,300,000,000
150 Bahamas, The $ 5,200,000,000
151 Mongolia $ 5,000,000,000
152 Swaziland $ 4,800,000,000
153 Central African Republic $ 4,700,000,000
154 Fiji $ 4,700,000,000
155 Martinique $ 4,500,000,000
156 Somalia $ 4,100,000,000
157 Barbados $ 4,000,000,000
158 Burundi $ 3,800,000,000
159 Guadeloupe $ 3,700,000,000
160 Reunion $ 3,600,000,000
161 Liberia $ 3,500,000,000
162 Eritrea $ 3,300,000,000
163 Guam $ 3,200,000,000
164 New Caledonia $ 3,000,000,000
165 Sierra Leone $ 2,800,000,000
166 Bhutan $ 2,700,000,000
167 Guyana $ 2,700,000,000
168 Gambia, The $ 2,600,000,000
169 Congo, Republic of the $ 2,500,000,000
170 Netherlands Antilles $ 2,400,000,000
171 Virgin Islands $ 2,400,000,000
172 Bermuda $ 2,250,000,000
173 Jersey $ 2,200,000,000
174 Aruba $ 1,940,000,000
175 West Bank $ 1,700,000,000
176 Man, Isle of $ 1,600,000,000
177 Suriname $ 1,500,000,000
178 Andorra $ 1,300,000,000
179 French Polynesia $ 1,300,000,000
180 Guernsey $ 1,300,000,000
181 Belize $ 1,280,000,000
182 Cayman Islands $ 1,270,000,000
183 Equatorial Guinea $ 1,270,000,000
184 Maldives $ 1,250,000,000
185 Papua New Guinea $ 1,200,000,000
186 French Guiana $ 1,100,000,000
187 Greenland $ 1,100,000,000
188 Guinea-Bissau $ 1,100,000,000
189 Faroe Islands $ 1,000,000,000
190 Samoa $ 1,000,000,000
191 San Marino $ 940,000,000
192 Northern Mariana Islands $ 900,000,000
193 Monaco $ 870,000,000
194 Saint Lucia $ 866,000,000
195 Liechtenstein $ 825,000,000
196 Solomon Islands $ 800,000,000
197 Cyprus $ 787,000,000
198 Antigua and Barbuda $ 750,000,000
199 Gaza Strip $ 735,000,000
200 Seychelles $ 626,000,000

quote:

War is just a racket. A racket is best described, I believe, as something that is not what it seems to the majority of people. Only a small inside group knows what it is about. It is conducted for the benefit of the very few at the expense of the masses.

http://www.maps.com/reference/geosh...r/2034rank.html

Rank Country Military expenditures - percent of GDP(%)
1 Korea, North 22.90 2003
2 Jordan 20.20 2003
3 Eritrea 11.80 2003
4 Oman 11.40 2003
5 Qatar 10.00 NA
6 Saudi Arabia 10.00 2002
7 Israel 8.70 FY02
8 Maldives 8.60 2003
9 Yemen 7.90 2003
10 Bahrain 7.50 2003
11 Armenia 6.50 FY01
12 Burundi 6.00 2003
13 Macedonia, The Former Yugoslav Republic of 6.00 NA
14 Brunei 5.90 2003
15 Syria 5.90 NA
16 Kuwait 5.80 2003
17 New Caledonia 5.30 FY96
18 Turkey 5.30 2003
19 Ethiopia 5.20 2003
20 Singapore 4.90 NA
21 Lebanon 4.80 NA
22 Morocco 4.80 2003
23 Bosnia and Herzegovina 4.50 NA
24 Djibouti 4.40 2003
25 Greece 4.30 2003
26 Chile 4.00 2003
27 Libya 3.90 NA
28 Tajikistan 3.90 FY01
29 Pakistan 3.90 FY02/03
30 United States 3.90 2001
31 Cyprus 3.80 NA
32 Mauritania 3.70 2003
33 Botswana 3.60 2003
34 Egypt 3.60 2003
35 Algeria 3.50 2003
36 Colombia 3.40 FY01
37 Turkmenistan 3.40 NA
38 Iran 3.30 2003 est.
39 Sri Lanka 3.20 2003
40 United Arab Emirates 3.10 NA
41 Cambodia 3.00 NA
42 Comoros 3.00 2003
43 Rwanda 2.90 2003
44 Australia 2.80 2003
45 Guinea-Bissau 2.80 2003
46 Congo, Republic of the 2.80 2003
47 Benin 2.70 2003
48 Korea, South 2.70 FY03
49 Taiwan 2.70 2003
50 Azerbaijan 2.60 NA
51 Bulgaria 2.60 2003
52 France 2.60 2003
53 Lesotho 2.60 2003
54 Equatorial Guinea 2.50 2003
55 Sudan 2.50 NA
56 Vietnam 2.50 NA
57 Namibia 2.50 2003
58 Romania 2.47 2002
59 Ecuador 2.40 2003
60 United Kingdom 2.40 2003
61 India 2.40 2003
62 Croatia 2.39 2002 est.
63 Portugal 2.30 2003
64 Fiji 2.20 FY02
65 Mozambique 2.20 2003
66 Mongolia 2.20 FY02
67 Burma 2.10 NA
68 Brazil 2.10 2003
69 Uganda 2.10 2003
70 Sweden 2.10 FY01
71 Chad 2.10 2003
72 Czech Republic 2.10 FY01
73 Malaysia 2.03 NA
74 Belize 2.00 2003
75 World 2.00 NA
76 Finland 2.00 FY98/99
77 Gabon 2.00 2003
78 Uzbekistan 2.00 NA
79 Uruguay 2.00 2003
80 Estonia 2.00 2002 est.
81 Angola 1.90 2003
82 Togo 1.90 2003
83 Norway 1.90 2003
84 Lithuania 1.90 FY01
85 Italy 1.90 2003
86 Bhutan 1.90 2003
87 Slovakia 1.89 2002
88 Cuba 1.80 2003
89 Kenya 1.80 2003
90 Seychelles 1.80 2003
91 Swaziland 1.80 2003
92 Thailand 1.80 2003
93 Hungary 1.75 2002 est.
94 Poland 1.71 2002
95 Guinea 1.70 2003
96 South Africa 1.70 2003
97 Zimbabwe 1.70 2003
98 Slovenia 1.70 FY00
99 Bolivia 1.60 2003
100 Nepal 1.60 2003
101 Burkina Faso 1.60 2003
102 Denmark 1.60 2003
103 Netherlands 1.60 2003
104 Cape Verde 1.50 2003
105 Tunisia 1.50 NA
106 Sierra Leone 1.50 2003
107 Senegal 1.50 2003
108 Philippines 1.50 NA
109 Honduras 1.50 2003
110 Germany 1.50 2003
111 Albania 1.49 FY02
112 Belarus 1.40 FY02
113 Papua New Guinea 1.40 FY02
114 Kyrgyzstan 1.40 FY01
115 Congo, Democratic Republic of the 1.40 2003
116 Ukraine 1.40 FY02
117 Cameroon 1.40 2003
118 Argentina 1.30 FY00
119 Belgium 1.30 2003
120 Venezuela 1.30 2003
121 Peru 1.30 2003
122 Mali 1.30 2003
123 Liberia 1.30 2003
124 Indonesia 1.30 NA
125 Bangladesh 1.20 2003
126 Cote d'Ivoire 1.20 2003
127 Spain 1.20 2003
128 Panama 1.20 2003
129 Nicaragua 1.20 2003
130 Madagascar 1.20 2003
131 Latvia 1.20 FY01
132 Canada 1.10 2003
133 El Salvador 1.10 2003
134 Dominican Republic 1.10 1998
135 Niger 1.10 2003
136 Central African Republic 1.10 2003
137 Afghanistan 1.00 2003
138 Switzerland 1.00 FY01
139 Japan 1.00 2003
140 New Zealand 1.00 FY02
141 Ireland 0.90 FY00/01
142 Zambia 0.90 2003
143 Somalia 0.90 2003
144 Paraguay 0.90 2003
145 Nigeria 0.90 2003
146 Mexico 0.90 2003
147 Haiti 0.90 2003
148 Luxembourg 0.90 2003
149 Kazakhstan 0.90 FY02
150 Austria 0.80 FY01/02
151 Sao Tome and Principe 0.80 2003
152 Guatemala 0.80 2003
153 Guyana 0.80 2003
154 Malawi 0.70 2003
155 Suriname 0.70 2003
156 Malta 0.70 2003
157 Ghana 0.60 2003
158 Trinidad and Tobago 0.60 2003
159 Georgia 0.59 NA
160 Laos 0.50 2003
161 Costa Rica 0.40 2003
162 Jamaica 0.40 2003
163 Moldova 0.40 FY02
164 Gambia, The 0.30 2003
165 Mauritius 0.20 2003
166 Tanzania 0.20 2003
167 Bermuda 0.11 NA

also refer to page 22 of:
http://www.fas.org/man/crs/RL32209.pdf

___________________
If God is the answer, it must have been a very stupid question.

Okay, but does this really have anything to do with the thread topic?

The US has the highest GDP of any country in the world so obviously it's expenditures are going to be low in regards to the %age, but even that is irrelevant to this thread.

I don't really understand where you're trying to take this, that's all.

quote:

Originally posted by Izzy http://www.maps.com/reference/geosh...r/2034rank.html Rank Country Military expenditures - percent of GDP(%) 1 Korea, North 22.90 2003 2 Jordan 20.20 2003 3 Eritrea 11.80 2003 4 Oman 11.40 2003 5 Qatar 10.00 NA 6 Saudi Arabia 10.00 2002 7 Israel 8.70 FY02 8 Maldives 8.60 2003 9 Yemen 7.90 2003 10 Bahrain 7.50 2003 11 Armenia 6.50 FY01 12 Burundi 6.00 2003 13 Macedonia, The Former Yugoslav Republic of 6.00 NA 14 Brunei 5.90 2003 15 Syria 5.90 NA 16 Kuwait 5.80 2003 also refer to page 22 of: http://www.fas.org/man/crs/RL32209.pdf

quote:

Originally posted by Trancer-X Okay, but does this really have anything to do with the thread topic? The US has the highest GDP of any country in the world so obviously it's expenditures are going to be low in regards to the %age, but even that is irrelevant to this thread. I don't really understand where you're trying to take this, that's all.

well you opened up with an image of military spending as % of GDP.
I just wanted to put it in reference and say its not that out of the norm in comparision to other contries.

I believe that the goverments first and most important priority is to protect the lives of its citizens. From outside factors such as other countries (hence military), natural disasters (hence national gaurd) to inside dangers (hence police and fire departments).

I dont think there is anything to fear about the American military complex because at the end of the day it can only do what is decided upon by the president and congress (ie, we the people).

___________________
If God is the answer, it must have been a very stupid question.