Buitenlands beleid: It’s the economy, stupid!

Tomas Valasek denkt dat de Verenigde Staten zijn overzeese militaire capaciteit flink zal afbouwen in de komende jaren. Dat betekent dat Europese landen de haast automatische bezuinigingen op Defensie moeten stopzetten en zelfs extra geld ervoor moeten reserveren.

For decades, European countries cut defence budgets with little worry. The United States kept enough troops on the continent to deter all potential enemies, almost irrespective of how small European militaries became. But the US contingent has been steadily shrinking, and the pace of this downsizing now seems certain to accelerate because of the economic crisis. The Europeans should be worried – yet they will probably respond by hastening their own defence cuts.

The July 31st agreement under which US Congress increased the ceiling for national debt cuts defence spending by $350 billion over the next ten years, White House calculations say. However, the deal also calls for a joint committee of six Democrats and six Republicans to find ways to decrease the deficit by another $1.5 trillion. The lion’s share of those reductions is certain to come in the form of expenditure cuts (as opposed to tax increases). And these further cuts – even if spread across government departments – will include significant reductions in the Pentagon budget, beyond the $350 billion that it is already scheduled to lose. Military spending now consumes more than 20 per cent of the total federal budget (for comparison, in the UK the figure is 6 per cent). Assuming that the joint committee makes roughly proportional cuts among government departments, the Pentagon will lose another $250 billion; this would put total reductions in military spending at $600 billion over ten years.