The United States needs to rethink its defense strategy for an age of fiscal austerity. The Budget Control Act of 2011 requires the government to reduce spending dramatically over the next decade, and a congressional “super committee” is now seeking to cut expenditures by more than $1 trillion beyond the substantial cuts already enacted this year.
Decisions made by Congress will affect the size, shape and capabilities of the U.S. military and the Department of Defense (DOD) for decades to come. As lawmakers debate their options, they must consider two questions: How much must the U.S. government spend on defense to secure its people and interests, and how much risk is it willing to tolerate? To help answer these questions, this report – the first in the Center for a New American Security’s Responsible Defense series – outlines the ends, ways and means of U.S. defense strategy under a range of budgetary constraints. We acknowledge that these constraints are driving strategy, not the other way around, but accept this as an unavoidable reality in today’s political environment. Therefore, the report seeks to highlight the strategic consequences of these constraints, so that political leaders grasp the risks and trade-offs the cuts portend. We offer four scenarios for defense budget reductions, and identify what we think are the best possible ways to cut military force structure, end strength, procurement and overhead to reach the required levels of savings. We also consider the modified roles and missions, operational approaches and vulnerabilities that might result.
We believe that the United States should continue to pursue the ends of its longstanding global engagement strategy, but should do so using different ways and means than those codified in the Obama administration’s current national security plans. A new version of America’s global engagement strategy remains affordable, even in today’s fiscal environment, and pursuing it will help prevent and deter conflicts in the years ahead.
However, we judge that the U.S. military’s ability to execute America’s global engagement strategy, as it is currently articulated, will be placed at high risk if total national defense cuts exceed $500-550 billion over 10 years.* This judgment could change if policymakers recalibrate America’s global engagement strategy and/or generate savings by reforming military pay and benefits for future service members. Cutting beyond this range without such reform will force the U.S. military to reduce its force structure in ways that will impair its ability to protect vital American interests worldwide, engage key allies and modernize after a decade of grueling ground wars.
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