Timeline history.

Since the Terror attacks of 9-11, our government has been on a crusade to fight terrorism,

while trying to cut back on the deficit. It can be somewhat difficult to fight a war on terror in

other countries while cutting the spending at the same time. We must find a way to balance

domestic and defense spending while maintaining our preparedness to face terrorism and other

potential threats.

We have been in a constant struggle to find and hold accountable those who are acting

against the safety and best interests of our country. President Bush declared after the attacks that

he would find and bring to justice the perpetrators. During this long drawn out attempt to bring

our attackers to justice, the government has sent troops over to Iraq and Afghanistan to weed out

high ranking members of Al Qaeda. “On May 2nd, 2011, Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was

killed by us special forces during a raid on Abbottabad, Pakistan.” (CNN, 2018) This was a 10-

year battle to bring the leader of this group down, which was very costly.

Though we made great strides in countering terrorism, there is never enough to derail all

forms of terrorism completely. On September 11th, 2012, a terrorist attack on the consulate in

the Libyan city of Benghazi killed four Americans. “Heavily armed Islamic militants launched

an organized attack on the US diplomatic mission, setting fire to buildings before all US

personnel could escape or reinforcements could arrive. And later attacked with mortar rounds a

nearby CIA compound.” (Kaphle, 2014) This was another battle in the ongoing war on terror that

now spanned large regions of the middle east and beyond. This sparked a fight in Congress over

who to blame for the attack, and the GOP set their sights on then Secretary of State, Hillary
Clinton. They spent countless hours trying to get to the bottom of the situation, and in the end,

spent more money on this 2-year investigation then Congress did on the September 11th attacks.

“Democrats accused the House majority of spending nearly 7 million in taxpayer funds for the

select committee on Benghazi.” (Kessler, 2016) This goes to show the multitude of ways budget

can be quickly drained in unexpected ways during the war on terror.

The war on terror, though it is a necessary cause, is nonetheless overwhelmingly

expensive when considering the materials needed to keep troops deployed in so many active war

zones. On January first, 2013, Congress approved a fiscal cliff measure to end a government

shutdown that was the culmination of internal political battles. One of the main points of

contention was a middle-class tax break the Obama Administration was pushing for. They

wished to “Shield millions of middle-class taxpayers from tax increases set to take effect this

month.” (Montgomery, Helder, 2013) While allowing rates to increase on investment profits and

the wages for high earning households. Many were concerned that though this would raise taxes

and bring in a profit, the government was not making sufficient cuts to balance the budget.

Though Obama was praising congressional leaders for pushing through the legislation, he also

states “I think we all recognize this law is just one step in the broader effort to strengthen our

economy and broaden opportunity for everybody.” (Montgomery, Helder, 2013)

In 2015 there was an Islamic state inspired attack in San Bernardino California, this

followed an attack on Paris in November. This just heightened the sense of urgency to increase

security here in the states. It became clear that all of costly our efforts in this war are divided

between protecting our home front and trying to fight the battle in the middle east and across the

world as well. These home-grown, radical inspired attacks are particularly difficult to deal with,

as in many cases they are carried out by individuals who have little to no contact with the
terrorist cells themselves and simply carry out attacks on their own volition. “Authorities believe

they were radicalized by the terrorist organization the Islamic State, but little information on

their motive has been unearthed.” (Atigi, 2016) The amount of funding needed to go into

stopping these types of attacks in addition to traditional terrorist activity may be

incomprehensible. When we take these new threats into consideration as well as the need to

maintain a conventional military presence for other global considerations, the defense cost

continues to balloon.

Another potential threat of war comes again when North Korea, on August 28th, 2017,

fired ballistic missiles over the Sea of Japan. With our military already spread overseas fighting

the war on terror, and trying to maintain our security at home, another potential war breaking out

could be crippling to our economy. While the war in Korea would potentially be in a more

conventional manner than the terrorist wars of the past decade, that would not in any sense

decrease the cost. Japanese Prime minister Shinzo Abe says that his nation faces a serious and

grave threat after North Korea fired a missile over northern Japan. (ABC news, 2017) We have

had mutual defense treaties in place with Japan since the end of World War 2 and would be

obligated to protect our allies in the region.

Fortunately, North and South Korea have recently come together for peace talks. “Friday,

April 27th, 2018, the leaders of North and South Korea have committed themselves to the

complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, and pledged to bring a formal end to the

Korean war, 65 years after hostilities ceased.” (Griffiths, 2018) This is a historic event,

considering the long, drawn-out tensions between the two nations. These peace negotiations are a

step in the right direction to bringing down the nuclear threat level to the world, and in turn, the

United States can refocus their efforts on homeland security as well as countering potential terror
attacks without the fear of another front opening up in southeast Asia. Ideally, the united states

could conceivably reduce their own nuclear armament as a shoe of good faith to the North

Koreans as well as reducing the amount of money spent on defense.

In conclusion, we can see that since the founding of America there have always been

threats to its freedom, perhaps never so many and so varied as what we face today. However, we

must be sure to choose our battles carefully in order to not overextend our budgets either too

heavily on focus to heavily on terrorism or any other national threat. In this way, we can

maintain our agility in facing the many threats that come our way, ideally without sacrificing the

domestic spending needed to improve our country and ensure we are not burdened too heavily by

the taxes necessary to fund these wars.

 Work Cited:

Atagi, C. (2016, December 02). 14 dead in San Bernardino, and we still don't know why one year

later. Retrieved from https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2016/12/01/one-year-

san-bernardino-massacre-leaves-more-questions-than-answers/94762084/

Death of Osama bin Laden Fast Facts. (2018, April 15). Retrieved from

https://www.cnn.com/2013/09/09/world/death-of-osama-bin-laden-fast-facts/index.html

Kaphle, A. (2014, June 17). Timeline: Here's how the Benghazi attacks played out. Retrieved from

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/timeline-how-the-benghazi-attack-

played-out/2014/06/17/a5c34e90-f62c-11e3-a3a5-

42be35962a52_story.html?utm_term=.32af9c1e483b

Kessler, G. (2016, May 17). Have Republicans really spent $7 million on the Benghazi Committee?

Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2016/05/17/have-

republicans-really-spent-7-million-on-the-benghazi-committee/?utm_term=.823896661169

Montgomery, L., & Helderman, R. S. (2013, January 01). Congress approves 'fiscal cliff' measure.

Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/house-members-meet-to-

review-senate-past-cliff-deal/2013/01/01/6e4373cc-5435-11e2-bf3e-

76c0a789346f_story.html?utm_term=.f5b5994b49ab

North and South Korea vow to end the Korean War in historic accord. (n.d.). Retrieved from

https://www-m.cnn.com/2018/04/27/asia/korean-summit-intl/index.html
North Korea fires missile over Japan; attack warnings sounded; launch an 'unprecedented threat'.

(n.d.). Retrieved from http://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2017-08-29/japan-says-north-korea-

launches-missile/8851128