Trump’s budget plan should fund global operations beyond defense
The Trump administration’s budget proposal severely cuts money for diplomacy and development in favor of the military. While on the surface this looks like an attempt to make us safer by strengthening our military, it will cost us our overall national security.
An increase of $54 billion in military spending offset by a 30 percent decrease in funding for the State Department and a 28 percent decrease in USAID — and potentially folding the Agency for International Development into the State Department — sounds like we are focused on keeping America safe. But Andrew Natsios, head of USAID in the George H.W. Bush Administration, called it an “unmitigated disaster” in the long term and warned “we will pay the price for the poorly thought out and ill-considered organization changes that we’re making, and cuts in spending as well.”
Effective national security requires all the cogs of our foreign policy — military, intelligence, diplomacy, economic power, and, yes, foreign aid — to mesh smoothly. If one of these elements is neglected or functions improperly, the amount we must spend to have the other elements make up for it can be prohibitive. Imagine how much we would have saved in military resources had our intelligence been better on the eve of the invasion of Iraq. Or how much we would have saved in national financial, military and human resources if our foreign aid to the mujahedeen who fought the Russians in Afghanistan had been better 30 years ago.
Don’t be fooled by the politician who tells you that more dollars to the Defense Department means that we are getting “peace through strength.” During the height of the Iraq War, we were spending about $1 billion a week on operations there — with no peace no matter how much strength we exhibited.
I have served in Iraq as a soldier and as a diplomat. In my time there, I saw the value of aid. I was well-trained to put big bullets down range — but when that had done its job, I was struck by my inability as a soldier to provide stability for the people. Being good at slinging lead is not enough to make people feel safe and normal. Sometimes “stability” requires you to shoot bad guys — and sometimes it requires you to rebuild a school and make sure that stop lights don’t malfunction.
Foreign aid goes underfunded in the U.S. because we look at it as a “nice to have.” That is, it’s “nice” of us to help starving children from this or that poor country. Americans who see foreign aid through the lens of generosity will always underfund it because they will always find a more compelling case closer to home — such as homeless veterans or the American poor — as a reason why we cannot spend money on foreign aid.
While advocating for the people of the richest country in the world to show generosity to the people of other countries is very becoming, that is not what I am trying to argue here. What most Americans don’t realize is that our foreign aid is already weaponized. We’re not doing touchy-feely work with it. Sure, that is how it’s branded. But we use our foreign aid money to stabilize places where fighting would be expensive, or to influence governments who will — more or less — look after our interests as long as their palms are crossed with a few greenbacks.
I’m asking you to look at it cynically. If a $2 million entrepreneurial women’s apiary training program will provide the stability that would otherwise have to be bought at the cost of $50 million in military hardware and the blood of U.S. troops, then you pay the $2 million and praise your own cleverness — and generosity if you’re of that mind.
We’re never going to be able to be use that angle — or be intelligent enough to know it exists at all — if we do not adequately fund foreign operations other than the military. If we view our national security only through gunsights, we’ll suffer tunnel vision.
Consider the national security successes of foreign aid as well. If the U.S. had not made the investment in building up the war-torn countries of western Europe after World War II, how much would the Cold War have cost if the Soviet sphere of influence had extended all the way to the Kerry coast? The Cold War may have been unwinnable.
The truth is we can’t know for sure, but the cheaper investment in building up democratizing nations and shoring up a faltering middle class worldwide ensures that the values of the people of the world more closely mirror our values and lowers the chance of future, cost-intensive military escapades.
Re: April 21 article, “Texans testify against transgender bathroom bill through the night.”
I’ve watched with great concern as the Texas House’s bathroom bill has worked its way through the Texas Legislature. I’m especially disappointed that the Legislature appears to have made the LGBT community one of its primary targets this session.
For instance, Senate Bill 242 would force teachers to “out” students to their parents. Senate Bill 92 would ban municipalities from enacting anti-LGBT-discrimination ordinances. A shocking 17 bills would let various service providers discriminate under the guise of religious freedom. And, of course, there’s the infamous “bathroom bill,” Senate Bill 6.
Texas is facing a massive budgetary shortfall, skyrocketing maternal mortality rates, a broken Child Protective Services and a faulty school
Feelings about the death penalty in Texas are changing. Harris County had 294 death penalty convictions since 1974, but none in 2015 and 2016. Consider that juries hear vivid descriptions — and often pictures — of murders that may spur feelings of anger and vengeance against the accused. Is that what happened in those 294 trials?
Yet, recently, juries have been just as immersed in those horrors, yet decided on life without parole. They voted against the death penalty!
The Texas House has a bill before it to abolish the death penalty. There is strong evidence that some people Texas executed were innocent. Let us potential jury members call or write to urge our lawmakers to vote to abolish the death penalty in Texas now.