So the money they are spending on defense is really US taxpayers money....

And those are also two countries that have been invaded in the last 20 years, so one could make an argument they need the spending.

Early in the first Gulf war, Iraq took a town just inside Saudi Arabia. Happened while coalition forces were preparing to invade.

Though I guess that's just over 20 years now.

Israel hasn't been invaded in 40 years, Saudi Arabia in 80.

The Iraqis took Khafji early in the 90-91 Gulf War. So that would be 21 years since Saudi Arabia was invaded.

As for Israel, that was a "huh...guess I'm now old" moment when it seemed more recent than it was.

We give them taxpayer dollars which they then give to American defense contractors. From the Milo Minderbinder School of Economics.

We must free ourselves from it.

The chart that is missing is the GDP of these countries. The US is so big because "it can". The outlyer here is China, which hasn't been spending nearly at the pace they could be. Look at the middle chart. Saudia Arabia is #1. Armenia is #10. Where is China?

and to act as a jobs program for people in the defense industry. You can make good money in assisting in the killing of people who have the chutzpah to be born on our oil.

rather than the Defense Budget. No offense.

That's really more descriptive of its function and activities these days.

2 billion for every man/woman and child in the U.S.of A?

I think I'd like to take my first billion in cash and I'll defend myself the best I can after that, OK?

About $2,400 per person (man, woman, child, but unfortunately, not corporations).

we wouldn't need this level of military spending. I'm just not sure how we got to this point.

The people who work in the defense industry spent all of the 1990s for an excuse not to cut defense spending, and in 2001, they got a perfect excuse in the form of the 9/11 attacks. The campaign against communism had been replaced with a campaign against terrorism. Giving up all that money for war preparation and waging war would've represented a multi-billion dollar loss for many defense contractors. They lobbied Congress for years to continue defense spending until the War on Terror made their work easy.

Yeah, when 9/11 happened, Georgie and Dickey just looked at one another and busted out laughing! Who knew that some disgruntled miscreant in an Afghan cave was going to give these two a path of enablement that they couldn't have dreamed of.

It was the last one standing after the 20th century. That's how we got to this point.

Not that anyone really listens to the UN or anything, but if the threat of military action by the US wasn't backing it up, it would probably dissolve as every government would just go back to acting in their own interests. Not that they don't already, but the facade wouldn't even exist.

The US taxpayer is paying for a global military. That's why the US Government can bomb whoever, wherever, and whenever it wants to, and there is nobody that can stop it from doing so.

outspend the rest of the world combined, so that even if everyone gangs up against US
they could be beaten back. Currently US spends only 45.7% of total military expenses.
That is unacceptable, the goal should be >50%, or better yet >60% just to be on a safe
side. And that is not including military spending by non-government entities like Al-Qaeda
and such. How in the world will US ever going to be safe? At some point US will have to
consider occupying the rest of the world and wiping out what they can't occupy - only
then could they live in peace and without fear.

but keep in mind that the planned defense expenditures by countries like China do not match up to real world spending.

Still a minute fraction of our spending (and we hide EVEN MORE spending than is accounted for here, as well) but the numbers presented aren't precise, just something to keep in mind.

American expenditures are obscene, but that fact is worrying.

in the name of fiscal responsibility....

used against us if we rise up.

Apparently their Establishment hasn't quite gotten it through their pointy little heads that they're no longer a global colonial power.