Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, March 9, 1991                   TAG: 9103110273
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A/11   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: FRANK F. ELLIS III
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

WHERE ELSE HAVE FEDERAL DOLLARS BROUGHT AS MUCH AS IN DEFENSE?

There is a strong argument made by many knowledgeable people that nuclear weapons have largely been responsible for preventing World War III. If true, the cost has been very low indeed.

He also stated: "Yet with the Cold War over, our military establishment remains intact." Is the Cold War really over? We all had great hope last year while the Soviet Union seemed to be moving in the direction of democracy, but now it appears hard-line communists are regaining the upper hand. What type of government will emerge, and what will be its attitude toward the democracies?

All wars of aggression have been initiated by totalitarian governments; democracies have only fought to defend themselves. A democracy in Russia would make the world a much safer place; a true "new world order."

The Iraqi aggression has shown us again, though, that regardless of what transpires in Russia, we do live in a very dangerous world. The tremendous success of our military seems to prove that our defense dollars have not been wasted. In fact, is there any other area in which the federal government has bought so much with our tax dollars? We have checkmated the communists and their efforts to dominate the world.

When Mr. Hopkins was serving in Korea around 1950, defense was about 57 percent of the total federal budget. By 1960, it had declined to about 50 percent. During President Reagan's term, while he was rebuilding the military, the defense budget was around 25 percent of total federal spending.

With the so-called 1990 Deficit Reduction Bill - and what a cruel joke that is - the share of defense spending will drop to about 18 percent of the total budget. If we were still spending the same percent on defense today as in 1950, defense would amount to about $798 billion rather than $298 billion, as it is. We are getting a mighty big bang for our bucks today.

These facts and figures would seem to decry Mr. Hopkins' great concern about the danger to the nation from the military-industrial complex. President Eisenhower warned us about this at the end of his presidency. Since then, our portion of gross national product spent on defense has declined by 50 percent and more.

We must continue to demand efficiency in the Defense Department, and without doubt there are improvements to be made. It is apparent, though, that as the percent of the budget spent on defense has declined, the federal deficits have grown. In fact, the last year the federal budget was balanced was in 1958, when defense spending was more than 50 percent of the total.

This makes it a rather hollow argument that defense spending is mainly responsible for the obscene federal deficits. It could even be argued that if all branches of the federal government controlled their costs as well as the Defense Department, we would enjoy much lower taxes with a budget surplus.

The American taxpayers deserve the right to have their freedoms protected by a strong military. Perhaps we could even begin to look elsewhere for federal waste and reductions. We all should instruct our congressmen and senators to begin to use our hard-earned tax dollars in a wiser manner, and demand that they balance the budget by cutting spending across the board. How much lower do we dare reduce defense spending?