Eli5: Why is it that whenever we hear about “defense spending” it’s always on offensive things like weapons? Is there not a way to make actual defense the priority instead of offense?

Question

I could be missing the point about military spending, and the five-year-old in my head asking the question does just want forcefields over every country in the end.

In: Technology

Answer 1

It’s marketing. In the case of the US, the thing we call the “Department of Defense” was called the “Department of War” up until 1947. In Britain, the War Office became the Ministry of Defense in 1964.

Thing is, no matter what you call it, all military spending and action is supposed to do the same thing- change someone else’s behavior to achieve a political goal of your country’s. Basic [Clausewitz](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_von_Clausewitz)- war is the extension of politics by other means.

So if you have a stack of nuclear weapons sufficient to inform any country that invasion will be met with annihilation? It does what you wanted it to do- prevents them from invading. If you can park an aircraft carrier off someone’s coast and suggest they change their recent policy decisions? Job done.

Military violence isn’t done to kill people and break stuff, it’s done to persuade. There’s not a clear division between offense and defense when you look at it that way.