During this weekend's Republican presidential debates, candidates took aim at the military strategy war-loving President B.S. Obama unveiled late last week:He vows cuts in overt military spending and a stepped-up focus on the Asia-Pacific region as well as increased use of illegal drone strikes that have targeted civilians, reporters, and alleged "militants" in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, and throughout the Horn of Africa.
In a discussion about Obama’s new strategy with William Hartung, director of the Arms and Security Project at the Center for International Policy, it is revealed that Obama is keeping levels equal to the Bush-Cheney administration. Ignoring the only peace candidate, Ron Paul, Hartung examines alternatives presented by Mittens Romney, the GOP front-runner in New Hampshire. "His plan would be sort of laughable, if it wasn’t so obscene," Hartung says."He’s talking about, let’s keep the military budget at 4 percent of gross domestic product, as if it was some sort of entitlement program for the Pentagon... He would spend something like $6.5 trillion over 10 years, which would be about a trillion-and-a-half more than the Obama plan... If he’s not going to raise taxes, it’s going to come straight out of domestic programs, which are already being hit quite substantially." More
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