Goliath Weapons Systems: Interview with Dan Grazier

When the Pentagon and the defense industry have unlimited budgets, "they essentially stop thinking," said POGO’s Jack Shanahan Military Fellow Dan Grazier in an interview on Reuters War College podcast. Since 9/11, military spending has markedly increased, finally reaching a peak in 2011 at $711 billion. Despite this, military leaders constantly claim that their budgets are constrained.

What’s eating up their budgets? To Grazier, the answer is simple: The military is wasting money on massive and over-budget weapon programs, like the F-35 and B-21.

Grazier worries our massive military projects put the United States in the dangerous position of losing the most important part of warfare—the moral dimension. When we drop high-tech and expensive bombs on underequipped people, he worries many countries view the American military as Goliath. And “quite frankly, very few people have rooted for Goliath over the last 2,500 years that story’s been told.”

The full interview can be found on SoundCloud or iTunes.

Show Notes

Dan Grazier - Guest Expert