Biden Shrinks The U.S. Military

The President’s $850 billion request for the Pentagon in 2025 is a mere 1% increase over 2024. That’s a cut after inflation, the fourth in a row Mr. Biden has proposed.

Mr. Biden thinks this is an acceptable moment to put American defenses on a diet, and the Administration says it’s merely complying with budget caps negotiated last year with Congress. Yet few priorities escaped the axe.

The larger picture presented by this budget is that the U.S. military is in a state of managed decline. U.S. defense spending falls to a projected 2.4% of the economy in 2034, down from an estimated 3.1% this year, which is half the nearly 6% spent during the 1980s when the U.S. was rearming to win the Cold War.

The U.S. Army will contract, and not because America is relying less on land forces, which are in high demand in Europe and the Middle East. The Army is asking for 442,300 troops, though the Biden Administration requested 485,000 as recently as 2022. The healthier number for the missions required is 500,000. Shrinking the force is no substitute for fixing the underlying problem, which is a struggle to find recruits.

The U.S. Navy will purchase only six ships and retire 10 early, which would shrink the fleet to 287 ships in 2025 from 296 today. Perhaps the most egregious choice is the Administration’s decision to purchase only one Virginia-class attack submarine, instead of a planned two.

U.S. submarine technology is a crown jewel of American military power and a true advantage over a rapidly expanding Chinese naval fleet. The industrial base is struggling to produce two boats a year, and the Administration presents its decision as a concession to this incapacity.