Pentagon officials are reportedly struggling to devise a plan to spend the extra $500 billion that Donald Trump wants to give the bloated, fraud-ridden agency in the next fiscal year, vindicating criticism of the funding proposal as immensely wasteful.
The Washington Post reported over the weekend that “White House aides and defense officials have run into logistical challenges surrounding where to put the money, because the amount is so large.”
The extra $500 billion, endorsed by the top Republican on the House Armed Services Committee, would push annual US military spending to a staggering $1.5 trillion after the Trump administration and congressional Republicans enacted unprecedented cuts to federal nutrition assistance and Medicaid last summer.
64 Comments
Gork@sopuli.xyz · 92 pts · 174d
Hmm let's give an extra $500 billion to an agency that has failed all of its financial audits...
TheFogan@programming.dev · 24 pts · 174d
Which, some how the Dodge waste fraud and abuse team, never seemed to get around to investigating... They claimed they would, but I guess were too busy gutting everything that was investigating musks companies before getting bored with it.
anomnom@sh.itjust.works · 8 pts · 174d
Don’t forget the canceling of any services that weren’t exclusively for white men.
givesomefucks@lemmy.world · -28 pts · 174d
What most people don't understand is there can be $0 missing money at the same time...
It's not one big pile of money, every agency has their own pile and much smaller piles.
So say Navy sent 10k to Norfolk and Norfolk used it. That balances to $0 logically.
If that 10k is late being sent between accounts, that's a $20k discrepancy because it hits both ways instead of cancelling out, which isn't logical but that how finances work. Missing 10k debit and 10k credit is still missing 20k even tho it balances out.
But, and I can't stress this enough, saying the DoD is "an agency" just tells everyone who knows about this stuff, that you have no idea what you're talking about. Some agencies fail their annuals, some have never failed a single one.
If you have questions, ask them. But please don't just repeat talking points you don't understand.
SippyCup@lemmy.world · 18 pts · 174d
That is not how accounting works.
givesomefucks@lemmy.world · -15 pts · 174d
No...
That's literally how accounting journals work...
Quick edit:
Like, this is day 1 accounting stuff, it doesn't matter if it's a positive or negative.
-20 and +20 add up to a 40 error.
Just like +20 and +20 does, or -20 and -20 does.
They all add up to the same amount of "missing" money.
Bakkoda@lemmy.world · 27 pts · 174d
What an incredibly detailed and accurate way to dismiss the fact that, despite you clearly defining what accounting errors are, the Pentagon still can't audit itself successfully and therefore shouldn't be given more money.
givesomefucks@lemmy.world · -15 pts · 174d
You...
You think clarification is dismissal?
I'm fine answering questions to help people understand this, but you don't understand any of it and aren't asking questions...
You have an opinion on what the conclusion should be, so you want to debate facts to make your conclusion appear to be the only option.
But all of that would be pointless because you're choosing to remain willfully ignorant of how accounting ledgers actually work.
I just don't have the time for that.
Bakkoda@lemmy.world · 18 pts · 174d
You think that them failing audits is my opinion? I think you missed the point and wrote an accurate yet completely unnecessary post.
TLDR: you made a highly accurate "welllll actually" post that did nothing to counter the OPs statement.
Brainsploosh@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 174d
Since about the 1500s we use double booking in bookkeeping, meaning the accounts look like that so that the balance sheet can balance and show 0 missing money. In most audits you don't "summarise" error accounts, you check the balance accounts, statements and you check for why there's stuff lying in the transaction accounts.
You should probably have stayed on a couple more days of your accounting class.
SippyCup@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 174d
No. It's literally not.
Did you sleep through class? Maybe have a dream where the professor told you to make up missing money?
This type of discrepancy is, wait for it, accounted for. It's the point of bookkeeping. You know that money has been sent or received, you know how much you owe and how much you're owed. A check in the mail isn't going to cause a failed audit. 10,000 checks in the mail won't cause a failed audit. You can look back over thousands of transactions and know, "oh, we normally get that check on the last Friday, it's the last Monday, nothing to worry about yet." Any auditor would also look at the history of payments and not account for money that's not expected yet.
Stop going on the Internet and telling lies.
frisbird@lemmy.ml · 10 pts · 174d
Why would we ask you questions? Do you work the GAO or something? Like what is this BS? DoD has a major accountability problem. Some of it is financial. Most of it is in their indiscriminate killing of civilians.
AlexanderTheDead@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 174d
Poem_for_your_sprog@lemmy.world · 59 pts · 174d
Give all of it to the army corps of engineers and build public transportation networks.
boonhet@sopuli.xyz · 18 pts · 174d
Someone should let them know that when it actually comes to war, railroads can be used to efficiently transport weaponry and vehicles
And the same railroads could be used for civilian transit when there's no war
chaogomu@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 174d
Rails can do that, yes. The thing is, the military is supposed to be used outside the US. Internal military rail networks only really good for putting down internal dissent and attacking neighbors.
No, it's better to give the money to an agency focused on designing a rail network from an economic and transportation basis.
Eat_Your_Paisley@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 174d
The military uses rails to move equipment for training, they also use rail for the vast amount of supplies required at installations and such.
chaogomu@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 174d
I don't care if they use it, I just don't want them in charge of designing it.
Eat_Your_Paisley@lemmy.world · 0 pts · 174d
The US Army Corps of Engineers have been designing, building, and maintaining public infrastructure for a very long time now.
starchylemming@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 174d
what the fuck? a good idea??? get out
MintyFresh@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 174d
Rapid urban troop movers. Must be grade separated.
littlewonder@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 174d
Goddamn it, we've just invented trains again.
agamemnonymous@sh.itjust.works · 3 pts · 174d
No, trains are stupid. We need cars. Well, we need trucks. And we could get a lot more efficiency if we added more trailers to the trucks and made them bigger so we'd need fewer drivers;. And dedicated lanes for the trucks! And since we're giving them their own lane, we could optimize it by changing the material on the wheels and the road to resist rolling friction, maybe steel on steel? And since truckers tend to doze off, we could make grooves in the road so they stay on course...
Goddamn it!
DagwoodIII@piefed.social · 51 pts · 174d
This has been going on for decades.
Reagan wanted a 'six hundred ship' Navy. The actual Navy had no idea what he was talking about.
monkeyslikebananas2@lemmy.world · 9 pts · 174d
Poseidon won’t even know what hit him!
WagnasT@piefed.world · 31 pts · 174d
remember when they had to keep increasing the budget to sustain 2 war zones for decades and then when they pulled out of both Iraq and afganistan they...kept increasing the budget???? Where the fuck is the money going?
karashta@piefed.social · 10 pts · 174d
Into creating things that destroy rather than things that are good and last, because destruction lines the pockets of capitalists better.
frisbird@lemmy.ml · 5 pts · 174d
Failed wunderwaffe projects and grift, but I repeat myself
mcv@lemmy.zip · 24 pts · 174d
I've got an idea. Use it to buy weapons for Ukraine.
frisbird@lemmy.ml · -17 pts · 174d
It would be inline with Trump. He was the first president ever to buy weapons for Ukraine.
bufalo1973@piefed.social · 22 pts · 174d
But there's no money for public health, public education or anything that helps people.
kofe@lemmy.world · 7 pts · 174d
Of course silly, otherwise that would mean money spent on undesirables
sturmblast@lemmy.world · 19 pts · 174d
Here's an idea, give it back
Lucidlethargy@sh.itjust.works · 17 pts · 174d
If returned to tax payers, this would mean a $3,030 payment for every single one of us.
That'd at least pay the rent one month in Trump's economy.
fibojoly@sh.itjust.works · 6 pts · 174d
Maybe a carton of eggs, even?
MrEff@lemmy.world · 13 pts · 174d
The really crazy part is when you look at it as a percentage of the budget and compare it to pre war levels. It isn't what you think. In 2000 the budget was $304 billion, a total of 16.7% of the federal budget. Then 2 wars later of ballooning costs and it grew all the way up to $962 billion (the 2025 approved budget. Not counting the random $500 billion he is trying to add in). But this is now only 13.7% of thr total budget. Somehow the percentage has gone down.
Now, if you know numbers you should know that percentages get messy and are misleading to look at. The real question is what the fuck is going on with the giant ballooning budget that has gotten spending so out of control that this monstrous defense spending is now somehow a lower percentage than pre-war spending??? And the real kicker is that we are ballooning on spending, but none of it is going to actually helping the people paying the taxes! None of it is helping built up infrastructure, invest in education, build communities -nothing that helps build this country.
Trump is blowing through money and we doing even get anything out of it.
BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today · 8 pts · 174d
I just read that at the current rate of spending, by the end of Trump's administration in 2028, Trump will be responsible for 55% of the national debt.
Remember that the next time some MAGA claims it's time to reign in spending...during a Democratic administration.
wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz · 6 pts · 174d
He's paying himself, his family, his cronies, his handlers, his gestapo, and his billionaire donors.
All with taxpayer money that mostly comes from the working class, who are getting screwed over.
crusa187@lemmy.ml · 13 pts · 174d
They should spend it all on passing a financial audit, for once.
Someonelol@lemmy.dbzer0.com · 5 pts · 174d
Accountability on their own activities? Good luck with that. They want surveillance on everyone else but would rather stay in the shadows themselves.
Formfiller@lemmy.world · 13 pts · 174d
I’m sure they’ll give it to Israel somehow
manxu@piefed.social · 12 pts · 174d
That is America's biggest problem right now. Forget affordability, forget inflation. It's the sartorial problem to beat all problems: the pockets of American politicians are not deep and strong enough for all the money they have to line them with. Just think of all the poor sweatshops in Vietnam that have to re-cut, re-fit, and re-sew all the pockets.
Sanctus@anarchist.nexus · 9 pts · 174d
Give it to the poor, build housing and use soldiers for the labour under a contractor? Anything besides blow people up and fraud please.
DandomRude@piefed.social · 9 pts · 174d
LordMayor@piefed.social · 7 pts · 174d
Yeah, I’m sure if friends and family will spin up some new consulting companies, suppliers and middle men to soak up the excess.
chalupapocalypse@lemmy.world · 8 pts · 174d
How much does a Battlestar Galactica cost, we're gonna need one
Knock_Knock_Lemmy_In@lemmy.world · 3 pts · 174d
It's one Battlestar Galactica, Michael. What could it cost?
chalupapocalypse@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 174d
10 cubits?
Sassington@feddit.uk · 1 pts · 174d
So say we all
BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today · 7 pts · 174d
Then give it the fuck back!
3jane@piefed.ca · 7 pts · 174d
Trump wants to buy the Army's loyalty.
You can't have a coup without the army. He's replaced the Joint Chiefs of Staff, with bootlickers probably.
apftwb@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 174d
Just give it to Lockheed and Raytheon as a tip
Gammelfisch@lemmy.world · 6 pts · 174d
Shit, I thought the US military budget was at $960 billion, not $1.5 trillion.
How about universal healthcare and a high speed rail network?
GoofSchmoofer@lemmy.world · 5 pts · 174d
...And yet no one in power right now will push back against it because they don't want to be seen as "weak on defense"
minorkeys@lemmy.world · 4 pts · 174d
Give to Ukraine?
ClownStatue@piefed.social · 3 pts · 174d
Is there an index fund of just defense contractors?
RizzRustbolt@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 174d
Jollyllama@lemmy.world · 2 pts · 174d
I can think of a few military contractors that would live a cool 500b
digitalFatteh@lemmy.ca · 2 pts · 174d
The rate things are going maybe they should plumb it into Baby Oil to lube themselves up for the pedo party protection racket. They all seem quiet apt at following their chiefs orders.
Tetragrade@leminal.space · 1 pts · 174d
You could make so many military datacenters with that. Then they could make their own AI and call it PatriotGPT, it'd be a very strong & powerful use of funds.
wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz · 1 pts · 174d
Ladies and gentlemen and other distinguished guests, the party of fiscal responsibility™
bacon_pdp@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 174d
bold_atlas@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 174d
This is the same military that makes sailors at sea pay for their own food.
Objection@lemmy.ml · 1 pts · 174d
Maybe they should revisit some old projects, like that time they made plans to blow up the moon but never got around to it.
DreamlandLividity@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 174d
This is such a stupid way to frame it. The Pentagon would have no issue to (semi-reasonably) spend extra $50 trillion, if you give them 20 years to do it.
But most military factories are already busy pumping out equipment for Ukraine etc. And US shipyards are atrophied from underinvestment, plus no new ship designs are ready for production despite US Navy needing urgent modernization. So yes, if you tell the Pentagon to spend half a trillion in a year on short notice, that creates logistic issues. This will be true for pretty much any military, no matter how underfunded or overfunded. It does not tell you anything about whether the US military needs the money.
altphoto@lemmy.today · 1 pts · 135d
The GDP is 29 to 31 trillion 2024-2025.
1.5 trillion to fuck up most of the planet including ourselves and reduce the GDP to say 25 billion.... Priceless! Well 31-25....6billion.
Health spending in the US is 4.9trillion -5.3 trillion~$14,570.00 per person on the lower end. This is 7% higher than in 2022.
Yeah that's numbers and they say that this government doesn't care about our well being. They have an idiot leading us. "They" referring to the actual electors, who we are not. We don't vote for the sonobabich who's wasting our money and time trying to cover-up his sexual predation crimes.
daannii@lemmy.world · 1 pts · 174d
Nuclear weapons. Trump already said.