In Our View: Defense Cuts Make Sense

Although it is anchored in the far-flung northwest corner of the continental United States, Joint Base Lewis-McChord could serve as a microcosm of next year’s budget battles in Congress. Faced with a post-war drawdown and across-the-board budget cuts, the military base near Tacoma is preparing for large personnel reductions. In the process, it will bring to the forefront questions about sequestration cuts, about the military-industrial complex, and about the United States’ military preparedness.

A recently released study from the Army suggests that Joint Base Lewis-McChord, one of Washington’s largest employers, could be facing cuts of as many as 11,000 soldiers in the next round of military reductions. The cuts are driven by sequestration — across-the-board federal reductions that resulted from a 2011 budget agreement in Congress. They also are driven by a post-war drawdown designed to reduce active-duty soldiers across the nation to 420,000, after a wartime high of 562,000.

This, understandably, is disconcerting to people in the South Puget Sound region and across the state. Army officials say the personnel reduction also could lead to about 5,000 layoffs among military contractors and others who do businesses with the base, reducing annual payroll in the region by $1.2 billion and reducing annual sales tax revenue by $17 million. “If this thing were to play out in the worst-case scenario, it would be no less than recession-inducing to the South Puget Sound,” said U.S. Rep. Denny Heck, D-Olympia, whose district includes the base.

That could be devastating, and the scenario points out the difficulty in cutting military budgets. While Joint Base Lewis-McChord is the Army’s third-largest installation — behind Fort Bragg in North Carolina and Fort Hood in Texas — similar discussions are being held throughout the country. The nation’s system of spreading military bases throughout the land has led to dependency upon defense spending in countless locales. Every domestic Army post is facing similar cuts, and every military city is lamenting the negative economic impact that will have.

It is a painful scenario, yet a necessary one.

According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, the United States’ military expenditures of $640 billion in 2013 were equal to the next nine-highest nations combined. Some countries, such as Russia and Saudi Arabia, spent a larger percentage of their Gross Domestic Product on defense, but U.S. expenditures represented more than one-third of the world’s military spending.

Undoubtedly, defense is important to the nation’s well-being. The United States, as the world’s lone superpower, frequently is a target of despots and frequently is called upon to protect nations that are unable to protect themselves. Yet the questions become: How much is too much? What level of defense is required to ensure our safety? How extensive is our role as the world’s police force? And could some of that money be better spent elsewhere?

For Congressional Republicans, this presents a bit of a conundrum. The party long has portrayed itself as the primary defenders of freedom and as the primary supporters of the military. At the same time, Republicans in Congress rightly have carried the torch in defiance of a vastly expanding federal debt. The simple truth is that cuts in defense spending are the most logical avenue for battling the deficit. That might not be the best immediate scenario for the South Puget Sound region or for other areas that rely upon military spending. But it is the best long-term scenario for the nation.