Budgetary and strategic inertia has impeded the development of a U.S. military best suited to deal with future challenges. Over the past several decades, the military has repeatedly answered the call to arms as American foreign policy privileges the use of force over other instruments of power and influence. The era of near endless war has now stretched into its third decade. In a new paper, Cato scholars Eric Gomez, Christopher A. Preble, Lauren Sander, & Brandon Valeriano argue that Washington should realign national security objectives and motivate allies and partners to become more capable as America’s relative military advantage wanes and the focus inevitably turns to domestic priorities, including public health.

The U.S. government spends billions of dollars every year on goods and services from foreign countries. Most of this spending is for military purposes. In recent years, government procurement has become one of the U.S. military’s most used—and least scrutinized—foreign policy tools for rebuilding states after war, buying military access, and pacifying insurgencies. The problem is that no one knows whether this spending is achieving its intended effects—or producing unwanted consequences. A new paper from Renanah Miles Joyce and Brian Blankenship argues that this strategic spending comes with risks that could erase benefits, create new problems, and complicate achieving desired goals.