President Barack Obama should stay on track with his plan for a 10-year reduction in military spending of about $500 billion. We are winding down two wars, so troop cutbacks are normal. We recently ended a combat role in Iraq, and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta now says we will do the same in Afghanistan by late 2013.
Plowing the money savings back into equipment renovation, as some are suggesting, is wrong-headed. The federal government is struggling to reduce the federal deficit, and the military is an obvious area for savings, as was understood by the legislators who worked out last year’s spending reduction package.
The real problem is that President Obama is treading too lightly with troop reduction. He would be well advised to take a page from the playbook of Republican presidential contender Ron Paul, who says we do not need to station troops around the world.
But President Obama is increasing our overseas deployments. In January, he announced the results of a Defense Strategic Review, calling for more troops in the Far East. “We will be strengthening our presence in the Asia Pacific,” he said, “and budget reductions will not come at the expense of that critical region.”
Why the Far East? Why is it “critical”?
What we are getting ourselves into, no one can predict. Two decades ago we had to dismantle huge bases we had in the Philippines because of local protest. A long-standing insurgency in the Philippines would not welcome Uncle Sam. As GOP presidential candidate Ron Paul points out, bases provide anti-U.S. elements with easy targets close to home.
President Obama has the right idea with military cutbacks. He just doesn’t take the idea seriously enough.
John B. Quigley is a professor of law at Ohio State University. These essays were distributed by McClatchy-Tribune News Service.
