It's Time to Tax Europe: The US has been footing the bill for Europe's defense for too long and Europe knows it

One of my favorite jokes starts like this: "Who has the second largest air force in the world?" Everyone knows the US has the largest air force in the world, but not many people know who has the second-largest. Unsurprisingly, China, the UK, Russia, and Israel are the most guessed countries. The right answer, though, is actually the US. I can almost hear your muttered confusion, "but didn't he say the US has the biggest air force in the world?" Yes, I did. The second largest air force in the world belongs to the US Navy.

A little research demonstrates that, while true, this statistic is actually misleading, since the planes (by which such an assertion is measured) aren't divided by division of the US military. Nevertheless, such an anecdote offers a valuable allegory about our stratospheric levels of defense spending. Statistics which are assuredly NOT misleading (which is why I'll provide a link to them here) show that US spends more on national defense than China, Russia, France, the UK, and the next ten countries on the list combined... with plenty of room to spare.

In terms of the world's total military expenditures, the United States constitutes an intimidating 43%. But the undeniable truth is that while all of this money comes from American taxpayers, much of it goes into defending people who contribute absolutely nothing, or if not nothing, then far less than their fair share. Am I suggesting that democratic dreamers in Afghanistan reimburse the US for ousting the Taliban? No. But since the end of World War II and the establishment of NATO, the US has borne the brunt of the cost of military endeavors in the interest of all, or almost all of western Europe.

In the light of the recent global economic slowdown, as issues of who pays are becoming more important, NATO's involvement in Libya serves as a perfect example of just how these budget crises are going to influence matters of international military intervention. Libya is place that nobody in the US wants to be involved right now. The left is habitually wary of American military intervention and the right is upset about increases to the budget deficit.

Despite neither the left nor the right really wanting to be there, we're launching hundreds if not thousands of cruise missiles into the country in an attempt to support a "rag-tag" gang of Libyan rebels who had less than a snowball's chance in hell of beating Qaddafi's forces without western military intervention and now have something approaching a snowball's chance in hell of beating Qaddafi's forces without European or American troops on the ground. It's a war that can't be won unless Qaddafi is killed, and even if he is, the resistance to the new government would be formidable.

Even our justifications for being there are lackluster at best. Qaddafi is undeniably an oppressive ruler, but the justification of and explicit mandate for the NATO mission there is the protection of Libyan civilians. Evidently Libyan civilians are more important than Ivorian civilians, many of whom were lost when Laurent Gbagbo refused to cede power after losing to Alassane Outtara in national elections. Libya civilians are, presumably, more important than Congolese civilians, of whom over 5 million have been killed in the last 15 years. Of course, it seems ironic and hypocritical at best that as the US funds the mission to protect civilians in Libya it has ordered the assassination of one of its own. I want to know if Qaddafi will intervene to protect the US from killing Anwar al-Awlaki.

The real reason that the US is involved with Libya is because our European allies were growing mighty uncomfortable with the idea of prolonged conflict in North Africa and were unable to deal with it themselves. The futility of the situation in Libya is the real demonstration of how close the system is to its breaking point. The US has long been the one spending the money to fund the defense of our allies in western Europe, and during the Cold War, this paid valuable dividends. But with the Sovient Union gone, and an amorphous international network of terror our new boggart-like enemy, protecting our allies in Europe is dropping rapidly from our list of international priorities. The fact that we're in Libya at all is a testament to the fact that it is still there, but the question is how long it will last.

The Europeans now need American protection more than the US needs to give it, and as the US reaps fewer rewards from its continued investment in European defense, Europeans are going to be asked to foot more of the bill. My half-joking, half-serious, light-hearted, and not-remotely-thought-through proposal is that the US tax Europe for its defense. Blowing up terror cells in Yemen or Pakistan is just as much a benefit to the Europeans as it is the Americans, so why not ask them to contribute to the cause. The terror attacks in London and Madrid are the types of things the US is working to prevent with the war in Afghanistan, yet as of two years ago, the US supplied two-thirds of the troops in Afghanistan.

The sad truth is that the reality of the situation is that the US simply cannot afford to be the world's policeman. International intervention is too costly to be politically viable in the US except in the most extreme of circumstances (i.e., following September 11th). The alternative for Europe looks bad. Counting on the benevolence of the American taxpayer is a strategy that has run its course. Europe either needs to invest in its own defense with the US or without it, but continuing non-investment will surely have deadly consequences.