Brazil, with the 5th largest country in area size and the 5th largest population, has the 14th largest military and 11th largest military budget. Practicing conscription, this military has not been in conflict with its neighbors since 1870, nor has it been in conflict with any other country since 1945. It has had four coups d’etat and accompanying military dictatorships, the last of which ended in 1985.

United States, with the 4th largest area and the 3rd largest population, has the second largest military and the largest military budget. A volunteer military since the 1970s, this military has been in conflict with or in other countries for 224 of it’s 241 years of independence, including up to the present. It has never had a coup.

North Korea, with the 97th largest area and the 48th largest population, has the 4th largest military and is rumored to spend up to a third of its total income on defense expenses. A conscript military, this country has been in a formal, tightly-held state of war with South Korea since 1950. It has long been ruled by its military through the Kim family.

Comparing between these countries, I’m wondering what sort of role these militaries play in relation to their national populations. Are disproportionately-large militaries and larger military budgets a way to mollify and pacify the public? Are military adventures a way to distract us, as the Argentine military tried to do by invading the Falkland Islands (much to their failure at British hands) while Argentina was under a brutal military dictatorship?

If a military has no conflict abroad or natives to pacify, does that military become restless and more likely to lash out at its civilian government through a coup?

What if we in the U.S. pulled back all of our overseas military installations and detachments, ended the international War on Terror and Drugs, scaled down our military budget from its massive $597B to something like India’s $56B, move more active duty folks to reserve duty, recycled our excess of F-16s and other wasted weaponry, closed some of our excess of domestic bases?

If we did all of that and shifted all of that expenditure to other areas, that might benefit more of our working class, although we’d still have to weather the blowback from the craters we’ve made internationally.

But I fear that our military leaders, if reduced in power, scope and range of conflict, will turn against our civilian government. I fear that a reduced, internationally-neutral military will initiate a coup d’etat in the name of correcting the course of civilian government.

This happens way too much in other countries which have not seen conflict between sovereign countries for an extended time.

And this is ironic for me to say since I live on a military base, lol!