Congress and DOGE Can Find Spending Cuts at the Department of Defense
The growing distance between the United States and its allies in NATO is an overdue nudge to European nations to start paying for their own defense rather than relying on Uncle Sugar. But it’s also an opportunity for the cash-strapped U.S. government to cut costs on military expenditures as it shifts responsibilities to countries that have huddled under the U.S. umbrella for decades. Given the enormous role that defense spending plays in the federal budget, closing the gap between revenues and spending and reducing debt requires that hard choices be made by the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and Congress about the military.
The Pentagon Welcomes DOGE
“We welcome DOGE to the Pentagon, and I hope to welcome Elon to the Pentagon very soon and his team, working in collaboration with us,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth commented last month to reporters in Germany about scrutiny from Elon Musk and his cost-cutters. “There are waste, redundancies and headcounts in headquarters that need to be addressed.”
Last week, a quick, early review by the DOGE found “some $80 million in funds wasted on programs that do not support [the Department of Defense]’s core mission.”
That’s an encouraging start, but there is a very long way to go. The federal government’s 2025 fiscal year began October 1, 2024, and $334 billion has been spent on national defense to-date on its way to roughly $850 billion, not counting veterans’ benefits and Department of Energy expenditures on nuclear weapons. The Congressional Budget Office projects that this year the federal government will spend $1.9 trillion more than it collects in revenues. With defense as the third largest category of spending after Social Security and Medicare, the military will have to take some cuts if there’s any hope of getting the federal government’s books balanced. Fortunately, there’s room to do just that.
Last month, The Washington Post‘s Dan Lamothe, Alex Horton, and Hannah Natanson reported that a leaked memo revealed “Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth has ordered senior leaders at the Pentagon and throughout the U.S. military to develop plans for cutting 8 percent from the defense budget in each of the next five years.” Exempte
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