IMPENDING BUGGY STUFF

An Old Series Ends, a New One Begins on US Power in the World

Within a few days, Carlos should be ending his work, and immediately a buzzy article will appear in the lengthy strung-out series on Iran's nuclear programs and, more to the point, on whether or not a nuclear-armed terror-state could be reliably deterred and contained the way the Soviet Union was during the cold war. For good or bad, that article will end the Iranian series. In rapid fire, there will begin a new series on the economic and technological base of American global power, comparatively viewed, in a world of turbulent change. Agreed: this swift disruptive change isn't just economic and technological. Obviously not. It's also political, diplomatic, and security in nature; otherwise, what reason could there be for large American military forces on the ground in Afghanistan and Iraq? In the end, though --- for reasons set out at length in that new buggy series to come, with a few comments unfolded here --- a state's relative power on the global scene hinges, mainly, on its economic and technological dynamism, coupled with the size of its population, its domestic stability, and the flexibility and quality of its political institutions . . . always, of course, comparatively viewed with the similar sources of power that exist within other states, especially large, economically vigorous ones. And always understood in long-run perspective --- nowadays meaning several decades at least.

More About Military Power

Obviously, it's a major source of a state's relative power and influence abroad. Wait though! As it happens, the need, the size, and the effectiveness of military instruments in promoting a state's interests abroad --- including, for great and super powers, promoting its leaders' and people's vision of a desirable international order --- vary over long stretches of time, all depending on a host of political judgments: above all, the nature and gravity of the specific threats that a state's leaders perceive and the strategies and tactics they decide on for dealing with them. Consider briefly the American record here. At times, as in the 19th century, the US had a relatively small military budget and a small standing army without any conscription except for the Civil War period. The reason: no major threat from any countries abroad existed after the war of 1812 ended. Similarly, in the 1990s after the cold war, the size of the military shrank, and so did defense spending. Steadily; down, by the end of that decade, to slightly less than 3.0% of GDP. By contrast, defense spending in WWII approached 40% of GDP, and strict rationing was imposed on the American consumer. In the cold war era that followed, this percentage swung sharply up and down. By 1947, it had plunged to 3.5% of GDP --- only to shoot up to almost 12% in the Korean war between 1950 and 1953. Over the next two decades, as cold war threats multiplied and the US escalated its role in Vietnam, the percentage of GDP going to defense averaged about 7.0 to 8.0%. Once we withdrew from Vietnam in 1975, that figure fell to about 4.7% at the end of the Carter era. Enter new threats to the US global role by then: especially the Iranian revolution and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. In the Reagan era, accordingly, defense spending rose swiftly to reach 6.2% of GDP and then, with the cold war's end, began to decline steadily afterwards, reaching about 3.0% by the end of the 1990s. Enter the 9/11 terrorist attacks on US soil. Defense spending began to rose immediately afterwards, reaching about 4.0% of GDP in strict budgetary terms, but --- with hundreds of billions of dollars going into supplementary spending on the Iraqi occupation --- closer probably to 5.5% by 2007. The following graph, taken from this source shows these ups and downs from the start of WWII until the end of 2005, with the peak spending for key years singled out:

Defense Spending as a Percentage of GDP

1945-2005

What Can We Conclude from This Lickety-Split Historical Survey?

A few things, only briefly clarified here. Above all, to reiterate what was said earlier, the importance of military power in the world for a status-quo state varies with perceived threats, along with the success a state’s leadership has extracting human and economic resources for dealing with these threats. For an aggressive state out to conquer its neighbors or far-flung countries --- think of Nazi Germany and Militarized Japan in the run-up to WWII --- the ability to expand aggressively this way pushes military power to the very fore of state spending and priorities. In more concrete terms, the willingness of a democratic country like ours to spend for military purposes hinges on four interacting variables.

Some Clarifying Remarks

The last variable, note quickly, is particularly important in an era of new threats like Islamist terrorism and the political controversies it invariably generates in democratic countries: its nature, its seriousness, and the best ways to counter, militarily and otherwise. The chief reason? To put it tersely, unless a democratic country like the US is attacked by an enemy that's identifiable and there's widespread agreement on the gravity of its threat and how to deal with it --- think of WWII and the struggle to defeat Militarist Japan and Nazi Germany --- that country's leaders will need to fall back more and more on a duo of talents: 1) a flair for public speaking and political persuasion, and 2) clear evidence, as time wears on and casualties mount, that the military has a strategy for ultimate victory within some reasonable time-frame. That time-frame can be flexible. How flexible depends on how effectively the country's government persuades its people that a less than clear-cut security threat is nonetheless serious and patience is needed. The evidence here is graphic. Americans supported WWII's enormous economic and human costs --- remember, more than 3000 American dead in just one day's battle on the beaches of Normandy in June 1944 --- because virtually everybody was convinced that the US couldn't live peacefully in a world with militarized Japan, Nazi Germany, and Fascist Italy, just as the public showed rife confidence in our strategy for ultimate victory. Not so ever since. The battlefield stalemate in Korea led to a surge of war weariness after nearly three years of heavy US losses. Later, in an era of domestic upheaval, the war in Vietnam left Americans badly divided after three or four years of inconclusive fighting as to whether we could win ultimately and, no less important, at reasonable costs. Faced with surging political division and discontent at home, neither Harry Truman nor, later on, Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon ever managed to convince a large majority of Americans that continuing the Korean or Vietnam wars was worth the effort . . . what with victory likely in the near future and achievable at tolerable cost.

Both George W. Bush and Tony Blair have recently learned what Harry Truman, Lyndon Johnson, and Richard Nixon had to learn in earlier decades. Specifically, when faced with a more ambiguous security threat, their peoples may initially support a war abroad --- only, over time, to grow weary and malcontented if a military solution looks more and more elusive. Some of us may regret this. Others will think that this is what democracy entails. Whatever, a President or Prime Minister’s skills in political communication and an ability to persuade domestic critics are part and parcel of what constitutes successful foreign policy in an era of new and diffuse threats and limited warfare . . . regarding which people of good will and differing knowledge will invariably disagree. Look, by way of illustration, at the concrete swing in US public opinion over Iraq.