As our economy collapsed, I listened to the sensible words of Ron Paul decrying our vast outlays of American cash to play policeman (dictator?) for the world. It was often mentioned that we have over 700 military bases, and I wondered just where these bases where located. Finding them, I discovered, was a typical wade-through-tons-of-government-documents-project that I didn’t have the stomach for.
But Greg Johnson has come to the rescue at Military Spending Info. He has created several maps, showing the American Empire in orange. I confess that the list of countries we occupy … err, protect … includes places I’ve never even heard of: Qatar? Gabon?
He also created a pie chart, which he updates routinely, showing the percentage of world-wide military spending by country. Guess who wins?
Now I know this is radical thinking, but it seems to me that if we supported our own national defense, and we let other countries do the same, we might not be trillions of dollars in debt. Do countries like Australia and England really need us to protect them, or could we treat them like big boys and girls who take responsibility for themselves?
