CONTENTS
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1. Introduction: The Price of War
2. One Link
3. Spending or Squandering
4. FY 2003: The "War Budget"
5. Budgeting for Peace
6. Get Involved
7. About the Bulletin

INTRODUCTION: THE PRICE OF WAR
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"The budget I submitted is the largest single increase in military spending in a generation. If we're going to fight for freedom, we have to pay the cost to fight for freedom. And it's worth it."
-- President Bush, addressing American troops in Alaska

President Bush has released his proposed budget for Fiscal Year (FY) 2003, and it seems that the "War on Terrorism" is being used to give a blank check to anything related to the military or "defense". This year marks the highest proposed increase in military spending in 20 years. At the same time, Social Security and other programs that focus on improving the quality of life for ordinary American citizens are being plundered or cut. To make matters worse, the long-anticipated budget surplus has fizzled; in its place, a glaring $106 billion deficit has materialized.

Military watchdog groups are furious. And even some conservatives and defense analysts who have steadfastly supported the "war on terrorism" concede that a number of Bush's proposed military expenditures are wasteful and unnecessary. After all, many of the proposed increases come in areas which have little or nothing to do with fighting terrorism.

This week, we explore the controversies underlying the FY 2003 budget and look, in particular, at why it is so vehemently opposed by critics from both the left and the right--from peace activists to military experts.

ONE LINK
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"Shame on Bush for trying to use the flag and September 11 to justify more big government, a return to deficit spending, stealing from the Social Security surplus, permanent tax cuts for the rich and further fattening an already bloated Pentagon."

Read this excellent CNN article to get a quick and dirty summary of the budget and its many failings.
http://www.cnn.com/2002/ALLPOLITICS/02/11/column.billpress/

SPENDING OR SQUANDERING
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Many defense experts, who are not necessarily opposed to the current war effort or war in general, still see the current budget as dangerously overblown. The problem, as they see it, is that there is a lack of focus on dropping or reforming expensive Cold War-era weapons and systems. Instead, these military programs are being included in the current proposed military spending spree, which means that money is being wasted on outdated aspects of defense which have nothing to do with the war on terrorism.

The author of this article outlines some key things to look for to help determine whether or not money is being wasted in the proposed budget.
http://www.businessweek.com:/print/bwdaily/dnflash/jan2002/nf20020131_9382.htm?mainwindow

The proposed Bush budget is stalling efforts to re-evaluate military spending. This means that the increase in funding may be providing only a false sense of security as money is wasted on expensive and ineffective weapons and systems.
http://www.cdi.org/issues/budget/transformation-stalls-pr.cfm

The military budget is being described as "leaving no defense contractor behind". According to the author of this article: "A quick review of the Pentagon's 'Program Acquisition Costs by Weapon System' for FY 2003 indicates that more than one-third of the Pentagon's $68 billion weapons procurement budget for the year will be allocated to big ticket, Cold War era systems that have little or nothing to do with the war on terrorism. In fact, many of these systems were mentioned as candidates for major reductions or cancellation during the Bush campaign and during the early months of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's defense review. "
http://www.commondreams.org/views02/0206-02.htm

Rear Adm. (Ret.) Stephen H. Baker provides 15 examples of Pentagon programs that could/should be cancelled or re-tooled. These recommendations would save at least $147 billion over the next 10 years.
http://www.cdi.org/mrp/transformation.cfm

Defense industries have a vested interest in promoting and supporting a larger military budget, since they stand to profit from it. The current war on terrorism is also increasing the risk of these industries gaining more governmental influence.
http://www.csmonitor.com/2002/0213/p02s03-uspo.html

FY 2003: THE "WAR BUDGET"
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Are you an American who wants to know where your income tax is going? This fantastic page from the War Resisters League uses pie charts to illustrate that the proposed budget sets aside far more money for the military than for human resources such as education and medical care. It is also packed with point-form information on past military spending and includes several action ideas.
http://www.warresisters.org/piechart.htm

FY (Fiscal Year) 2003 Budget at a glance.
http://www.clw.org/milspend/dodbud03.html

Quick facts about the military budget. For example, the $45 billion increase is more than three times the combined defense budgets of all of the "rogue" states that are seen as a threat to America.
http://www.clw.org/milspend/fy03facts.html

A brief summary of the "war budget", which, while increasing military spending, cuts funding many programs. Concludes with a graph of US military spending since 1945.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/business/newsid_1800000/1800954.stm

The federal government is projected to run a $106 billion deficit this year, which is due not only to the war on terrorism but also to Bush's tax cuts for big corporations and the wealthy. This means that money for the current spending spree must be taken out of programs like Social Security.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A23863-2002Jan23.html

Some Republican groups, including Project for a New American Century, are not satisfied with Bush's spending and want to see more money put toward the military. Project for a New American Century's Board of Directors includes Bruce Jackson, who is the Vice President of the world's largest defense corporation, several powerful Republicans, and advocates of the NMD. With groups such as these helping set American fiscal priorities, it is no wonder that more moderate budget scenarios are being ignored.
http://www.commondreams.org/views01/0224-02.htm

NATIONAL MISSILE DEFENSE (NMD)
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The proposed budget includes an increase in funding for a system of National Missile Defense (NMD). This is perhaps one of the most obvious examples of the Bush administration throwing money at extremely expensive and yet generally ineffective military systems.

First, an excellent brief history of missiles and ballistic missile defense (up to and including the Clinton administration).
http://www.cdi.org/hotspots/issuebrief/ch2/index.html

Bush recently pulled out of the ABM treaty, and began to call for an NMD. Bush's proposed shield is even more ambitious (and expensive) than the one proposed by President Clinton, since Bush has promised that it will protect not only America but American allies such as Israel. Sen. Tom Daschle has said, "We fear that the president may be buying a lemon here."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A29775-2001May1?language=printer

The NMD, which is often compared to "hitting a bullet with a bullet", is technologically extremely complex, which means that it is both expensive and vulnerable to malfunction. The proposed missile defense system would be comprised of six separate systems that all must work perfectly if the NMD is to be successful. Testing so far has had mixed to poor results.
http://www.cdi.org/hotspots/issuebrief/ch4/index.html

The main problem with investing in the NMD is that it won't work. A scientific study completed during the Clinton administration has shown that there are several countermeasures that an attacking country could take to render the planned defense system ineffective, all of which require less technology than the missile defense system itself. Three of these countermeasures are specifically discussed..
http://www.commondreams.org/views/051100-101.htm

The Federation of American Scientists, which includes 50 Nobel Laureates, has sent a letter asking Congress not to pursue the NMD.
http://www.guerrillanews.com/government/doc228.html

This Q and A with a member of the Federation of American Scientists helps explain why the group opposes the NMD. Did you know, for example, that this is the eighth proposed NMD, and that all previous attempts have failed?
http://www.guerrillanews.com/government/doc117.html

Incomprehensible amounts of money have already been spent on the NMD since the Reagan era. Get the details.
http://www.cdi.org/hotspots/issuebrief/ch5/index.html

BUDGETING FOR PEACE
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Those of us who advocate peace rather than a military response can take criticism of the proposed budget a step further, and demand that money be used not for waging war and maintaining military involvements in other countries, but rather for social programs, humanitarian aid, and other important long-term human investments.

The war on terrorism is a bad investment. "Like the bankrupt energy giant [Enron], the Bush administration has a predilection for secrecy and deregulation and a penchant for being indiscriminate when it comes to making potentially costly investments -- mainly in the form of new military entanglements -- in unstable partners around the globe."
http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=12403

This entertaining site promotes the idea of diverting some of the money currently spent on the military to social programs such as education. Includes highly entertaining and informative multimedia presentations, forms to send to members of congress, and a neat counter displaying how much money the Pentagon has spent while you were visiting the site.
http://www.moveourmoney.com/Default.htm

The President's proposed budget largely ignores the root causes of terrorism in favor of military spending. The proposed increase in military spending is six times the total amount President Bush plans to spend on international development and humanitarian assistance and more than twice the total that he would spend on all non-military international affairs programs. It is our responsibility to act now to shift these priorities before they become legislation. (This page includes information on writing letters to representatives as well as background information on the budget.)
http://www.fcnl.org/act_lam_current/actnow_lam_index.htm

GET INVOLVED
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We apologize if you have sent us an email and we have not gotten back to you yet. Our response time will be slow until we can get some more volunteers working on this aspect of 9-11Peace.org.