In my 2023 paper, "Uncle Sucker," I lamented the failure of US efforts to shift the burdens of defense back onto the shoulders of US allies and client states. During the Cold War, Congress required presidential administrations to produce a report on "Allied Contributions to the Common Defense." In that report, as former Pentagon official Richard Perle would later admit, US officials would portray allied defense efforts in the most favorable possible light to protect them from political pressure in the United States to lessen the American commitment to their defense. In Perle's words, he was always "thinking of ways to put the best possible gloss on some pretty dismal figures ... we look for statistics that make the allies look good." Although the report was ineffective at shifting defense burdens, it performed the service of making administration officials uncomfortable while they played Robert Shapiro to the allies' OJ.
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Table of Contents
- In my 2023 paper Uncle Sucker I lamented the failure of US efforts to 1
- In that report as former Pentagon official Richard Perle would later admit 2
- US officials would portray allied defense efforts in the most favorable 2
- Although the report was ineffective at shifting defense burdens it 2
- Utah Senator Mike Lee has introduced a couple of new bills that should 2
- That bill reinstates an amped-up version of the Allied Contributions to the 2
- Common Defense report stipulating that such a report should include 2
- Lee also introduced a more general Allied Burden Sharing Report Act 2
- Burdensharing report into the House version of the 2025 NDAA. 2
- With the United States 35 trillion in debt the programs producing the debt 2
- 1.5 trillion on the fire of debt each year the time has come to twist alliesʼ 2
