With $750 billion spent last year, America’s defense budget is higher than the next 11 highest-spending countries combined. Here’s why ...
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00:00There is no reason for us to be increasing our military spending and our defense budget
00:05when we are not funding child care, health care,
00:08housing priorities, and the climate crisis here at home.
00:11The budget request for the Department of Defense is $773 billion, an increase of $30.7 billion.
00:35The United States, after World War II, decides that it needs to defeat the Soviet Union through
00:40a buildup of its military forces, and that will entail the United States becoming a permanent
00:47military state. In the West, the strength of democracy is being tested, and with it,
00:52modern civilization's chances for survival. We have been compelled to create a permanent
00:56armaments industry of vast proportions, yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications.
01:12The power of the military-industrial complex is that it is able to generate a set of ideas
01:17and set of institutions, a political economy, that it never intended to generate. It was supposed to
01:23be a product of the Cold War, but now it's permanently with us. Congressional figures
01:29want military bases, defense factories in their districts to create jobs. The military contractors
01:34want them, obviously, to create profits. Even after the Cold War, the United States still feels
01:38that because of its national purpose, its mission, its founding ideals, it is uniquely poised to be
01:46preserving democracy, preventing autocracy, and can do that through its military power.
01:51We are now facing two global powers, China and Russia, each with significant military
01:59capabilities, both who intend to fundamentally change the rules-based current global order.
02:06The reason why people would say we need to continue the current levels of defense spending
02:11is just a pure economic material reason, which is we need to create jobs.
02:21At Lockheed Martin, we understand what's at stake. For moments that matter, past, present,
02:30and future, there is one certainty, Raytheon technologies. Lockheed Martin has been fined
02:37over 600 million dollars for misconduct, and Raytheon has been fined more than 479
02:44million dollars for misconduct.
02:53The Pentagon study revealing 125 billion dollars in potential wasteful spending,
02:59but the question, did anyone pay attention?
03:02I'm going to take a deep breath and try to contain my anger. The F-35 is the most
03:08expensive program in the history of the Department of Defense, and the sustainment
03:12costs are expected to exceed 1.2 trillion dollars over the life of the program.
03:18Billions of dollars eventually will be wasted in the F-35 in planes that can't be built. They're
03:24not very efficient. They're not up to standards. This is why there was a demand for the Pentagon
03:30to face an audit.
03:31This is the big problem of the defense budget, is that the Pentagon hasn't passed an audit
03:39ever. It can't create enough evidence or provide enough of its accounting to have the auditor do
03:50a successful audit. What does it mean when we actually don't know that the Pentagon has
03:55much money or what the Pentagon is doing with the money that taxpayers are giving?