History and were doomed to repeat it

[Gawdzilla Sama]

So the best solution is obvious to increase one's military budget because spending more on the military than the next 20 countries put together is shocking insufficient

So is the first word is many strawman posts.

[Minimalist]

It's actually a better example of what happens when a pipsqueak nation forgets itself and declares war on a superpower.  Lucky for us that Napoleon escaped from Elba.

Opinions do vary about that war.

Indeed.  As I recall it was said at the time that "one's enthusiam for war increased with one's distance from the coast."

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Opinions do vary about that war.

Indeed.  As I recall it was said at the time that "one's enthusiam for war increased with one's distance from the coast."

Right in there with "adventure is someone else a long way away having a hell of a hard time."

[Minimalist]

Uh-huh.

Suave magni maro turbantibus aequora ventis e terra magnum alterius spectare laborem


Pleasant it is, when over a great sea the winds trouble the waters, to gaze from shore upon another's tribulation



Lucretius
De Rerum Natura

[Anomalocaris]

Yes, as I said, mediocre military asks for more money first.  Excellent military improves its effectiveness within the given budget first.

If one restricts one's military in peacetime they're not ready in an emergency. We were 16th in the world, behind Bulgaria, when WWII started. Saved a bunch of money. 

Yes, we supported half a million tons of battleships and the world's second largest fleet on less than Bulgaria's budget.  I had no idea we were so, uh, efficient.

[dyresand]

So the best solution is obvious to increase one's military budget because spending more on the military than the next 20 countries put together is shockingly insufficient.

What people fail to realize and what the general public fail to realize  and generals a smaller more elite military on a tighter budget and with technology we have now
would kick our asses into next Tuesday. The military as we speak is a expensive failure and we can blow shit up but we can win battles but we can never really win wars
with what he have.

[Minimalist]

We have simply failed to grasp the economics of using a half million dollar smart bomb to blow up an old pick up truck with a machine gun.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

If one restricts one's military in peacetime they're not ready in an emergency. We were 16th in the world, behind Bulgaria, when WWII started. Saved a bunch of money. 

Yes, we supported half a million tons of battleships and the world's second largest fleet on less than Bulgaria's budget.  I had no idea we were so, uh, efficient.

And those battleships were WWI vintage, with one exception. And most of the fleet was in mothballs. 

BTW, I was talking about the size of our army compared to Bulgaria's. Nothing was said about a budget.

[Anomalocaris]

Yes, we supported half a million tons of battleships and the world's second largest fleet on less than Bulgaria's budget.  I had no idea we were so, uh, efficient.

And those battleships were WWI vintage, with one exception. And most of the fleet was in mothballs. 

BTW, I was talking about the size of our army compared to Bulgaria's. Nothing was said about a budget.

Yes, and the threat we face from Canada and Mexico was clearly more severe and unpredictable than those faced by a Bulgaria in the Balkanized balkans, requiring a large land army for our survival.

As a matter of fact, the US had more post WWI vintage battleships in its fleet between the wars than anyone else-3-to Britain and Japan's 2 each, and effectively 0 for everyone else until around 1938.

As to the rest of our poor world I vintages battle fleet, what will it ever do against everyone else's world war I vintage battle fleets?

[The Grand Nudger]

Our military has, for more than a decade, stressed smaller and more highly trained units.  They heavily emphasize newer, more efficient tech that fits the battles we fight today over conventional forces of past wars.  Our military, however, does not set the level of funding it receives..nor does it direct the focus -of- that funding.  Military spending is corporate and state level welfare decided by our elected reps.

The army, for example..might say -we want to put funding into some component of the fss...and our government responds with "here, have some more artillery pieces constructed in 48 states".

This isn't to say that there isn't grift or inefficiency, or that our armed forces never toss money down a hole - but questions of appropriate vision (smaller, cheaper, mor lethal, on task) are better directed at the house and congress than directly at our military. They are and have been trying to move towards that goal, unfortunately, that goal is diametrically opposed with the -actual- purpose of our bloated defense spending.