Big Government Conservatism, Pentagon Edition

I'm always amused when I see self-styled conservatives appropriate the language of liberals when they want to bemoan funding increases "cuts" to the bureaucracy:

The Obama administration has given the Pentagon a $527 billion limit, excluding war costs, for its fiscal 2010 Defense budget, an Office of Management and Budget official said Monday.

If enacted, that would be about $14 billion more than the $513 billion allocated for fiscal 2009 (PL 110-329), including military construction funds, and it would match what the Bush administration estimated last year for the Pentagon in fiscal 2010.

But it sets up a potential conflict between the new administration and the Defense Department’s entrenched bureaucracy, which has remained largely intact through the presidential transition. Some Pentagon officials and congressional conservatives are already trying to portray the OMB number as a cut by comparing it with a $584 billion draft budget request compiled last fall by the Joint Chiefs of Staff for fiscal 2010.

And right on cue, Max Boot:

Yet at the same time that Obama and the Congressional Democrats are throwing money at their constituencies it appears that they are stiffing the most important government department–the Department of Defense. According to news reports, “The Obama administration has asked the military’s Joint Chiefs of Staff to cut the Pentagon’s budget request for the fiscal year 2010 by more than 10 percent — about $55 billion.”

It’s possible that the president will still overrule this directive from the Office of Management and Budget, which is said to be opposed by Secretary of Defense Gates, but if he doesn’t he could be doing terrible damage not only to our armed forces but also to his carefully cultivated image of moderation.

The U.S. could afford to slow the growth of the defense budget and still stay far ahead of potential great power competitors such as China or Russia by simply updating its strategy to reflect the realities of the 21st century. But Boot and company want the U.S. to maintain its antiquated Cold War posture, wage manpower intensive, colonial-style wars in the Middle East, and stare down China - budget be damned.

What ever happened to the party of Eisenhower?

[Hat tip: Noah Shactman]

Update: Robert Kagan musters a stronger argument in the Washington Post. But, again, it underscores the up-is-down nature of the defense debate. Here's Kagan:

A reduction in defense spending this year would unnerve American allies and undercut efforts to gain greater cooperation. There is already a sense around the world, fed by irresponsible pundits here at home, that the United States is in terminal decline. Many fear that the economic crisis will cause the United States to pull back from overseas commitments. The announcement of a defense cutback would be taken by the world as evidence that the American retreat has begun.

This would make it harder to press allies to do more. The Obama administration rightly plans to encourage European allies to increase defense capabilities so they can more equitably share the burden of global commitments. This will be a tough sell if the United States is cutting its own defense budget.

I think it's precisely the opposite. Our current allies are so militarily weak and so unable to contribute to ostensibly "coalition" efforts precisely because America has, for decades now, relieved them of the obligation to fund their own defense. (Indeed, Kagan has celebrated this dynamic and argued for it to continue well into the 21st century.) It is a classic case of dependency - the sort conservatives would typically bemoan but in the alternative universe of the Pentagon budget, seem to forget. (Just imagine the conservative response to the assertion that the way to get people off welfare and back to work was to give them even larger welfare payments.)

Kagan acknowledges that America's defense budget is as high as it is not because we're living in an era of unprecedented national danger, but because of America's overseas commitments. But it would be nice to start the debate not by demanding an ever larger share of my (and everyone else's) paycheck to underwrite those commitments, but with an argument about why those commitments are necessary in the first place, and why allies cannot take a larger share of the burden.