Hi, Keith,
Yes, the US administration is being forced
to cut back on some large military expenditure projects, thanks to the ruinous
expenditures on other even more pointless military programs. Sigh.
On the whole, I would rather that the US wasted its money on aircraft carriers
than in invading other countries and killing people there, though.
Did anyone catch the news that Thailand is
launching a satellite, BTW? Via Ariane. Now there’s something to cheer
about.
Cheers,
Lawry
From:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of Keith Hudson
Sent: Friday, July 08, 2005 2:40
PM
To: Ed Weick
Cc: [email protected]
Subject: Re: [Futurework]
Priorities anyone?
Ed,
I'm wary of these sorts of articles where the reader is overwhelmed with
emotive statistics. There's often a lot of clever selectivity. For example, the
article you've posted from the Vancouver Sun
says that global spending on armaments is only 6% below its Cold War peak in
1987/8. What it doesn't say is that both the principal opponents in the Cold
War, Russia and America, are both spending substantially less on defence than
they were then.
The article makes great play on the extra money America is spending on fighting
terrorism (whatever that may mean) but even Bush has pruned back several huge
projects which could easily have restored and exceeded previous Cold War
expenditures -- the new stealth fighter, the successor to the Abrams tank, an
ungraded nuclear submarine, for example. It's also unlikely that America will
ever build a new aircraft carrier -- as France and the UK also. It says that
America spends "almost half" of the rest of the world on military
expenditures. It used to be approaching 70% in real terms and was probably even
higher than that in the 1950s and 60s. Why? Because even America is joining the
rest of the club of developed nation-states and is beginning to feel the pinch
now. This is the reason why Bush and Cheney have recently stopped threatening
Iran, and why the Pentagon has publicly stated that it gave up its
"two-war" capability some years ago. America can't even afford what
it's doing now.
So I suggest that we don't get too pessimistic.
Keith
At 11:42 08/07/2005 -0400, you wrote:
The following two news items say a lot about
our priorities. If the G8 countries were to contribute $50 billion to African
aid by 2015, they would have attained a level of aid equal to 5% of current
global military expenditures or about 10% of current US military expenditures.
But Im not going to bet that it will happen. The military has become a
huge business and the $1.035 trillion figure is undoubtedly low, given the
following:
"But the report said
the figures might be on the low side as countries are increasingly outsourcing
services related to armed conflicts, such as military training and providing
logistics in combat zones, without classifying them as military
expenditures."
Ed
P.S. I hope I have my billions and trillions right. I don't think
I've ever worked with numbers quite so high.
>From this mornings Globe and Mail:
That meets a key Blair objective, though the pledge doesn't mention the British
leader's hope of increasing aid from the current $25-billion (U.S.) to
$50-billion. Also left out of the pledge of support for Africa will be Mr.
Blair's other goal of getting all summit countries to commit to raising foreign
aid to an amount equivalent to 0.7 per cent of each country's economy by 2015.
The United States, which is now giving an amount equal to 0.16 per cent of its
economy, objected to the setting a numerical target.
and From the Vancouver Sun June 8, 2005
Global military spending reaches $1 trillion
The U.S. accounts for almost half of all expenditures
By Mattias Karen
Stockholm, Sweden -- Global military spending in 2004 broke the $1 trillion
US barrier for the first time since the Cold War, boosted by the U.S. war
against terror and the growing defence budgets of India and China, a
European think-tank said Tuesday.
Led by the United States, which accounted for almost half of all military
expenditure, the world spent $1.035 trillion on defence, equal to 2.6 per
cent of global gross domestic product, the Stockholm International Peace
Research Institute said.
Besides its regular defence budget, the U.S. has allocated $238 billion
since 2003 to fight terrorism, according to the report. "These
appropriations are now assuming extraordinary proportions," said SIPRI
researcher Elisabeth Skons, who co-authored the organization's annual
report.
Adjusted for inflation, the figure for global military spending in 2004 is
only six per cent lower than its Cold War peak in 1987-1988, Skons said.
The Cold War was the struggle for power and prestige between the western
powers and the Communist bloc from the end of the Second World War until the
collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.
Total military expenditure grew six per cent in 2004 over the previous year,
in line with an average annual increase since 2002, the institute said.
South Asia, northern Africa and North America made the largest increases. In
Western Europe and Central America, military spending fell.
But the report said the figures might be on the low side as countries are
increasingly outsourcing services related to armed conflicts, such as
military training and providing logistics in combat zones, without
classifying them as military expenditures.
Such outsourcing has more than doubled in the last 15 years, and was
estimated to have reached $100 million during 2004, SIPRI researcher
Caroline Holmqvist said.
The researchers predicted it would double again from current levels by 2010.
"This is a global phenomenon," Holmqvist said, adding it was
difficult to
provide exact figures. "This is an industry that is not largely
regulated."
As a region, South Asia saw the biggest rise in military expenditure,
largely because India boosted its defence budget by 19 per cent in a move
that could provide a "real setback" to the country's attempts at
ending a
decades-long conflict with neighbour Pakistan, Skons said.
"Just a few years ago, it looked like they would be able to reach a
peaceful
settlement," she said. "Now India has increased [military spending]
again."
The report is based on official national budgets in most cases, and
independent studies for countries like China, where, Skons said, "it's
obvious that the official figures are very wrong."
Associated Press and Canadian Press
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