Public Enemy #1: Runaway Congressional Spending

A friend of mine brought to my attention a review published by Booz Allen Hamilton in 2002 of past military dominance and the implications on the current US military advantage. If you’re just interested in the overview, skip to the last chapter, titled "Implications for the US".

Download military-advantage-in-history.pdf

According to the review, and I agree, military advantage is gained through tactical and operational dominance, weapons and the employment thereof. However, enduring military advantage, the goal of US military strategy, hinges upon institutional advantage: political, economic and military. Therefore, preserving US hegemony is not as simple as maintaining the best tactical use of the best weaponry. We must maintain institutional advantage as well.

What does that mean? Well, it means ensuring that America protects what makes it great: American faith in life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, as well as faith in our constitution, government and military to protect those ideals. Should our ability to protect those ideals erode, American faith will wane in kind and hasten the fall of American leadership. (Other factors, such as lack of strategic vision on part of our leaders will also contribute to American decline, but that’s another topic for another post.)

Booz Allen’s report rightly prescribes military transformation as the tactical and operational requirement for American hegemony, but fails to provide counsel on institutional advantage. The report simply states that, "Tactical or operational advantage must be sustained by a strong economic foundation and a system in which stable governance is maintained."

Is it me or is this understatement of the report and the decade? Granted, when written in 2002, not only was the current economic disruption was not foreseen, we were only just starting to rebound from economic effects of 9/11, but isn’t that what military planning is all about? Preparing for the unexpected? After all, the report does state that "debasement of the currency" was
second among the reasons listed for the Roman collapse, the longest
standing military advantage on record.

Sun Tzu, the ancient chinese military philosopher asserts in his "Art
of War" on which most military strategy is based, that the best general
wins without firing a shot. Knowing that, according to the report,
American institutions; democratic institutions, personal liberties and
market and financial institutions represent not only our greatest
strength, but also our greatest vulnerability, someone other than
Congress, perhaps the Fed, should war plan against economic
vulnerabilities in the same way the DoD plans for military threats.

One may argue that economic defense is not the purview of the military, and perhaps that’s correct. But ignoring the problem isn’t a solution either. Congress clearly lacks the ability to provide proper oversight and policy recommendations pertaining to currency and spending controls from a defensive posture. This abdication of responsibility and failure to properly assign it remains a huge hole in our national defense framework. Some institution, perhaps the Fed in coordination with the DoD must bear this responsibility. Failure to do so could be more catastrophic than a conventional military attack. Just ask the Germans after WWI or the Americans after the revolutionary war.

Moreover, Congress should take to heart and implement those protective economic measures with the same zeal and vigor that they so eagerly pursue DoD recommendations. Perhaps with the backdrop of protecting America, Congress will learn to reign in their spending knowing that if they don’t, their spendthrift ways will ultimately bankrupt the dollar and the American way of life.