It’s Us vs. Us in the New Cold War

You probably didn’t notice, because it involves such a small amount, but the Pentagon and the congressional Republican leadership are pushing to add $15 billion to the budget for military weapons. That’s over and above the $39 billion for new weapons already in the Clinton budget. But you can’t have too much of a good thing, and when congressional Republicans demanded that the Pentagon come up with a new wish list, what self-respecting service chief could refuse?

The Navy and Air Force asked for $3 billion each, the Marines another $2 billion. Then the Army got greedy and found $7 billion worth of stuff they just had to have. That ticked off the Navy, which is said to be back at the drawing boards preparing a matching offer. Hey, a billion here, a billion there, who’s counting?

Give them what they want, I say. It’s unseemly to argue about such a piddling sum when national security is at stake. As an addition to the overall $243-billion defense budget, another $15 billion is just peanuts. That’s merely $3 billion more than the federal contribution to the Aid to Families With Dependent Children program, and all that does is provide for 12.8 million children and mothers who should be caring for themselves. Weapons work, children don’t.

Some people think that just because the Cold War is over, we need to spend less on new weapons systems, but that just shows how naive they are. The threat to our national security is even greater now. The Soviet Union provided a stabilizing force because our spy agencies worked so well together. We also had the confidence that the Soviets were using lousy weapons because they made them themselves.

Nowadays, U.S. companies are business partners with the rulers of the former evil empires of Russia and China. Through joint ventures and other technology transfers, including sales of advanced U.S. computers, they can produce much more sophisticated weapons than before. It is therefore essential that U.S. companies provide the Pentagon with better weapons than the ones they now help the Russians and Chinese obtain.

We have enemies popping up everywhere that use top of the line, made in the U.S.A. equipment. When 25,000 U.S. troops were sent to Somalia and 31 were killed, 31% of the enemy weapons they were up against were made in the U.S., including M-113 armored personnel carriers and TOW antitank missiles.

In recent years, the U.S. has supplied arms to more than half of the 50 nations involved in internal or regional wars. For example, Turkey receives 80% of its weapons from the U.S., including F-16 fighter aircraft, Bell Cobra and Sikorsky Black Hawk helicopters. Turkey’s enemy is its own Kurdish minority, but that could change. Remember that the U.S. handsomely outfitted the shah of Iran with the most sophisticated weapons, which are now in the hands of the ayatollah’s wild men. Also, it was U.S. dual-use products and technologies useful for both military and civilian purposes that almost gave Iraq a nuclear weapon.

In their quest to control the international arms market, it is essential that U.S. companies continuously update their product lines, but it is only fair that the Pentagon has first crack at the latest models. This particularly applies to the terrorists out there. Given the global black market in weapons, where U.S. products are the most sought after, it is urgent that we produce better antiterrorist weapons than the ones the terrorists have purchased.

Some might think that in this time of budget constraints, we should focus on programs of international aid and cooperation that might make the world more stable and less hospitable to terrorists. Or pay our dues at the United Nations. But as any dittohead knows, the U.N. is a threat to our sovereignty and diplomacy is for weenies. All we have left is the military card, and we had better be prepared to play it.

A lot is at stake in being the policeman for the world. What would have happened if we had not intervened in the Persian Gulf? Kuwait would not be the beacon of democracy that it is today and Saddam Hussein would still be in power. And the price of gasoline would be at an all-time high. Or if we had failed to stabilize Lebanon with our Navy ships and Marines, the place would be a shambles right now.

Forget diplomacy; carry a big stick and make sure it’s bigger than the one American companies sold to our enemy.

Face it, America: We are in a desperate arms race with ourselves that we cannot afford to lose.