Why does the US spend so much money on defense?

Answer 1

To maintain top of the list in worldwide governments. Funding for the U.S. Department of Defense is 100% essential to the well being of this country. I hope you're not one of those hippies who disagrees. Just think about it for a little bit, and you'll realize the importance of a strong, well funded department of defense. What you should ask is why the American Government spends so much on crap, like, the stimulus bill, health care ("reform") bill and the 700,000,000,000 USD bill to give to failing banks. Think about it, that's an unfathomable amount of money.

Common Sense Update!!

A well funded DoD is essential for the wellbeing of the US but the amount we spend now is ridiculous and trumps all that stuff you're complaining about. The bailout money has been mostly repaid back and was given out in the first place by a republican president, not some hippie dem, FYI.

We out spend the next 26 countries combined. Our budget for DoD is over 900 billion. We need to be well funded but 900 billion is plain excessive, that money is going to R&D for shiny new weapons. Instead of spending so much, slashing that in half and putting it into education, infrastructure, NASA to do what they did for us during the 60-80s and maintaining a massive 450 billion for defense would take the country into a much better direction without sacrificing any of the actual military might of the US. The amount of cash we spend is ridiculous, pure and simple.