Pentagon Döstädning: A Good Idea
Trump has proposed that the United States, China, and Russia cut their defense budgets by half. If the administration pulls the trigger – death cleaning the Pentagon – most Americans won’t notice and all will benefit.
Swedish death cleaning – döstädning – is about getting one’s house in order, in preparation for handing over what has been accumulated to the next generation. The Pentagon was finished in 1943, apparently as a big place to run the war. Less than two years later it became a big place to “put things” as the US transitioned to full-blown global empire. Forty years ago, the five rings were still grand hallways, the corridor spokes wide and spacious. By the time I left the Pentagon in 2003, most hallways and corridors had been filled with a thousand new warrens and ratholes of offices and cubicles.
Massive savings may be found overnight, and 80% — not just 50% — of the DoD could be eliminated with zero impact on “defensive capability” or “national security.” This is true because of the abysmal level of defensive capability it provides, something we found out real quick on September 11, 2001. The DoD wasn’t defending us then, nor is it providing measurable national security today.
Future generations of Americans deserve a new triad: national security, peace and prosperity. Towards that end, a Pentagon death cleaning is in order. If done correctly, useless things will be eliminated, haphazard collections thrown out, accumulated supplies for forgotten projects donated, and clothes worn in a career that ended thirty years ago discarded. We will identify what we want to preserve, as we discover many hidden things we never wanted in the first place.
DOGE and Secretary of Defense Hegseth are targeting the waste, duplication, and sheer criminality that coats the DoD circulatory system like arterial plaque. Past efforts to root out waste and duplication, like Reagan’s 1984 Grace Commission Report, or even Al Gore’s Reinventing Government study never caught fire in the Congress, and we are left with an annual rage-celebration, courtesy Rand Paul’s increasingly popular Festivus Report. We do have many organizations, like Citizens Against Government Waste, that continue in the spirit of J. Peter Grace. We have a myriad of canaries in the mine who aim to make the Pentagon more efficient, more effective, and more honest.
DOGE, unlike previous efforts, is spearheaded by youthful outsiders who recognize they and their generation are inheriting a precarious mountain of garbage government. Unlike Grace and Gore who believed there was still time to save the
Article from LewRockwell
LewRockwell.com is a libertarian website that publishes articles, essays, and blog posts advocating for minimal government, free markets, and individual liberty. The site was founded by Lew Rockwell, an American libertarian political commentator, activist, and former congressional staffer. The website often features content that is critical of mainstream politics, state intervention, and foreign policy, among other topics. It is a platform frequently used to disseminate Austrian economics, a school of economic thought that is popular among some libertarians.
