Rep. Lynn Woolsey, D-Calif., introduced legislation that would trim $60 billion in waste from the Pentagon budget and transfer it to programs that will make our nation more secure -- schools, health care, job training and more.

Yes, it's ironic to argue that cutting the Pentagon budget is essential for national security. But it's true.

It's time we recognize that throwing more money at the Pentagon does not insure our national security; in fact, the opposite is evident. And before you accuse me of being unpatriotic, you should know questioning military spending is absolutely patriotic. With our nation at war and with all the problems we face at home, not questioning the Pentagon is unpatriotic.

To understand just how patriotic it is, ask our brave troops in the field what they need to fight the war on global terrorists. Our forces, fighting and dying in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere want better body armor, better boots, sunglasses, reliable rifles and handguns, more powerful small arms ammunition, reliable communication equipment, and more help in the number of forces on the ground. So what are they getting from the Congress and President Bush?

They are not getting more troops. The military services plan to cut servicemen, not add them. Why? The Pentagon has decided that to pay for all the gold-plated weapons it wants to buy, it has to eliminate people, ignoring the fact that it is people and their ideas that fight wars -- not weapons. The result has been a failure to reorganize our military force structure.

We have failed to discard the outmoded "force on force" military philosophy driving today's military thinking, planning and spending. So we end up with fighter jets at $320 million a copy, $3 billion submarines, $13.5 billion aircraft carriers. Try to connect the dots between these weapons and what is needed to fight guerrillas, terrorists and fringe religious fanatics.

Don't spend too long trying to connect the dots. They don't connect. It's plain irrational, and it's all driven by the confluence of power among members of Congress, the president, and powerful defense contractors and their lobbyists. That's the group President Dwight D. Eisenhower aptly labeled the military-industrial complex so many years ago. It's the military industrial complex that drives senseless Pentagon spending.

When one looks at the federal budget and our financial well-being today it seems we have forgotten that there is more to national security than just military spending. The public debt is now over $8.2 trillion and is forecast to go to $12 trillion in the next few years. About 25 percent of this debt is held by foreign entities like China, Japan, England, Germany and others. That's bad for national security.

The 2007 deficit is forecast to be $423 billion. That's bad for national security. The interest on the debt next year will be $257 billion -- more than the combined budgets of the Homeland Security agency, the Department of Education and the Environmental Protection Agency. That's bad for national security.

To feed the military industrial complex, we are under-funding education for our children, under-funding health care for millions of Americans, under-funding environmental needs and much more.

In turn, this is threatening the quality of life for most Americans and adversely affecting our ability to compete globally. That's bad for national security.

Passage of Woolsey's bill, called the Common Sense Budget Act, would also eventually level the slippery slope the military industrial complex has put this nation on. And that's really good for national security.

Jack Shanahan, a retired Navy vice admiral, lives in Ormond Beach. He heads the Military Advisory Committee of Business Leaders for Sensible Priorities.

© 2006 The New York Times

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