[Finbel]

On the other hand calling it "Department of Defense" seems quite whitewashing of what it actually does.

[happymellon]

It spends the defence budget...

[Finbel]

You see how that's a circular reasoning? The defense budget should by all accounts be called the war budget if we look at how it's spent (Iran).

[westmeal]

Which is used primarily for offense anyway

[Braxton1980]

I'm pretty sure the amount the money spent on offensive actions is significantly less than the defense

[westmeal]

When was America last invaded by a foreign adversary?

[JumpCrisscross]

This resembles anti-vax logic. We haven’t been invaded because our military maintains a strong deterrence and strategic depth.

[Finbel]

I think you're the one applying anti-vax logic here. Imagine beating a guy up for looking at you wrong and then get into a semantic argument with the judge on how you shouldn't be charged with assault because it was actually an act of defense, you see if you hadn't assaulted them they would surely have assaulted you so it's defense.

You're basically saying the US don't need a Department of Defense because the Department of War is doing such a good job.

[fleshmonad]

Yeah, otherwise the USA would have been invaded by Cuba, Iraq, Vietnam, Syria, Afghanistan, Yemen and a hundred more, and they all would have a fight over who can have it. Thank god the US defended themselves against those terrible guys. Especially the WMDs were quite the close call, the Iraqis were minutes away from nuking the land of the mart.

[Braxton1980]

>We haven’t been invaded because our military maintains a strong deterrence and strategic depth.

How do you know that's the reason? There are many countries with very low defense spending that haven't been invaded since WW2.

[happymellon]

Maybe.

I was just saying that the purpose of the Department of Defence is to spend the "defence budget".