In the January/February issue of The Atlantic Monthly, journalist James Fallows called out the U.S. populace’s distant affection for the armed forces, citing a litany of instances in which superficially sincere public support is gratuitous at best. “Citizens notice when crime is going up, or school quality is going down, or the water is unsafe to drink, or when other public functions are not working as they should. Not enough citizens are made to notice when things go wrong, or right, with the military,” Fallows wrote.
He cited the “Chickenhawk Nation,” eager to go to war as long as someone else is doing the fighting, and the “Chickenhawk Economy,” referring to the willingness to throw money “stupidly” at military programs on the front end with little consideration to how cost-effective they actually would be. Fallows specifically cites the F-35 program: “The all-in costs of this airplane are now estimated to be as much as $1.5 trillion – or a low-end estimate of the entire Iraq War.” And he cites “Chickenhawk Politics,” referring to corporate and political environments rife with persons who never served and never had children who served in the military.
The entire article, which also takes aim at spiraling cost overruns in the F-35 program, is available here: http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2014/12/the-tragedy-of-the-american-military/383516/
