Report: Military Spending Tops $1T Mark

[ckramer]

Global military spending in 2004 broke the $1 trillion barrier for the first time since the Cold War, boosted by the U.S. war against terror and the growing defense budgets of India and China, a European think tank said Tuesday.

Led by the United States, which accounted for almost half of all military expenditure, the world spent $1.035 trillion on defense, equal to 2.6 percent of global gross domestic product, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute said.

Besides its regular defense budget, the United States has allocated $238 billion since 2003 to fight terrorism, according to the report. "These appropriations are now assuming extraordinary proportions," said SIPRI researcher Elisabeth Skons, who co-authored the organization's annual report.

Adjusted for inflation, the figure for global military spending in 2004 is only 6 percent lower than its Cold War peak in 1987-1988, Skons said.

link

[ckramer]

1. In other words,

Human being on this earth spent $1.035 trillion last year trying to kill each other.

How terrible! Shame on earthlings.

[MisterP]

2. well, it appears we've solved the Fermi Paradox...

expansionism, Manifest Destiny, and aggression are lethal in the long run for countries and species

[Stockholm]

3. Sipri kick! n/t

[DoYouEverWonder]

4. Global spending on arms tops $1 trillion

By Andrew Buncombe in Washington

09 June 2005

Less than a month before leaders of the world's most powerful nations meet to discuss financial help for Africa, a new report reveals the extraordinary sums spent by those same countries on weapons compared to the relatively modest sums spent on aid.

In 2004 - the sixth successive year in which arms spending increased - the global total spent on munitions topped $1 trillion for the first time since the height of the Cold War. In contrast, the amount spent on aid over the same period was $78.6bn.

Once again, America was by far the greatest spender on arms. In 2004, it spent $455bn, an increase from 2003 of 12 per cent, fuelled largely by the investment in President George Bush's "war on terror". America's foreign aid spending is around 4.1 per cent of its arms bill. Britain, the second largest arms spender, spent $47bn - a tenth of the US total.

The new figures, released by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (Sipri), an independent research institute, emerged the day after Tony Blair and President Bush met in Washington to discuss increasing aid for Africa. The Prime Minister came away with an undertaking from Mr Bush to support a 100 per cent debt relief plan that could be worth more than $20bn to the continent. Mr Bush also announced $674m in new famine relief for the Horn of Africa.

http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/story.jsp?story=645335

Imagine, if we spent half that money helping people instead? Then everyone wouldn't need to be so worried about defending themselves all the time. What a waste of money, people and resources.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

5. Imagine, if we spent half that money helping people instead?

Imagine if we spent that money on settling the problem between Israel and Palestine.

Please note.... a very small percentage of that money is spent by terrorists... unless of course you aren't real particular about whom you consider a terrorist.

[acmejack]

6. The holy profit margin would suffer

There is not nearly as much PROFIT to be made in feeding the poor, healing the sick, you know giving everyone a decent life. The greedy bastards just doesn't give a Fuck about anyone else's poor fortune. As St. Mike of Malloy would say, "Have I mentioned how much I hate these people?"

[Zynx]

7. The amount of resources wasted on war is astounding.

[DoYouEverWonder]

8. Good education programs and access

to cheap and safe methods of birth control would go a long way to making the world a more peaceful place to live. Too bad the powers that be don't really want any of that. They just want more death and destruction in order to try to satisfy their blood lust.

[Voltaire99]

9. This is a crime perpetrated by the GOP and Democratic Party alike

This catastrophic waste shames us.

The next Democratic candidate who goes around claiming he or she will make "America stronger" through military spending will get no vote of mine.