Date: Wed, 15 Oct 1997 22:37:59 -0700 (PDT) From: Annelise Anderson <andrsn@andrsn.stanford.edu> To: "Jordan K. Hubbard" <jkh@time.cdrom.com> Cc: Mike Smith <mike@smith.net.au>, chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: F1.17 (was Re: C2 Trusted FreeBSD?) Message-ID: <Pine.BSF.3.96.971015215719.15151A-100000@andrsn.stanford.edu> In-Reply-To: <13340.876888626@time.cdrom.com>
next in thread | previous in thread | raw e-mail | index | archive | help
On Tue, 14 Oct 1997, Jordan K. Hubbard wrote: > battlefields over the last 4 generations. We also spend more of our > money (whether the average citizen likes it or not) on military > hardware than just about anyone these days, save perhaps India, since > the Soviet Union collapsed. That also tends alter one's perspective, I doubt that any country's military budget (or just the hardware part of it) is larger than that of the United States. Nevertheless, the percentage of Gross Domestic Product spent on defense (function 050 of the federal budget) has dropped from 6.3% in 1987 to about 3.5% in 1997, and declined in real terms (outlays adjusted for inflation) by about 30 percent. The GDP percentage is lower (and going below 3 percent in a few years) than at any time since BEFORE World War II. This is, in effect, a rapid demobilization, with cutbacks across the board--R&D, procurement, personnel, training, etc. The defense budget varies quite a lot (as a percentage of GDP) over time, and there are considerable pressures to reduce defense spending (and spend on other things), so while the defense budget remains pretty big ($250+ billion), it's basically never really out of control; unlike spending on health and retirement, it's not politically untouchable. Federal outlays for social security are greater than those for national defense, as are federal outlays for Medicare + Medicaid. Well, those are just a few facts. I'm just not sure we really know at this point what we might not be capable of doing--the view is generally that we couldn't do today what we did in the Gulf War. My view of being the world's cop is being able just to say "Hey you over there, I wouldn't do that if I were you...." Annelise
Want to link to this message? Use this URL: <https://mail-archive.FreeBSD.org/cgi/mid.cgi?Pine.BSF.3.96.971015215719.15151A-100000>