If 50% of the defence budgets of the 10 biggest nations was given to philanthropic causes, would we see more or less war and violence in the world?

I was watching the UK Parliament debate the renewal of the trident nuclear submarine program in 2016. This program naturally received overwhelming support and was renewed for decades to come. Whilst this nuclear program is stated to cost around $40 billion, when you actually add up the long term costs and storage of nuclear waste, the real figure over the next 40 years will be around $400 billion.

The Trident Deterrent

• Four Vanguard class submarines (SSBN) which maintain continuous at-sea deterrence (CASD), meaning that one vessel is always on patrol (Operation Relentless).
• The Trident II D5 ballistic missile. The UK has title to 58 missile bodies, which are held in a communal pool at the Strategic Weapons Facility at the Kings Bay Submarine Base in Georgia, USA. Maintenance and in-service support of the missiles is undertaken at Kings Bay at periodic intervals.
• Nuclear warhead. The infrastructure for building and maintaining the UK's nuclear stockpile is located at two government-owned, contractor-operated Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) sites at Aldermaston and Burghfield in Berkshire.

$400 Billion dollars would be enough to end world poverty for around 2-3 years according to Jeffrey Sachs in his book, The End of Poverty. Sachs calculated that the total cost per year would be about $175 billion.

Trident is an example of military might that actually poses more of a threat to the UK than it does to other countries. The chances of a foreign country invading the UK by sea or air is very very small indeed. This is not because the UK don't have enemies, but because it is SO much easier to attack a country using technology than by brute force. War in 2018 is happening every day, under the covers, in the digital world. If you only knew what games went on there, you would know that it is possible for a determined terrorist or country to literally shut the UK down and hurt it where it really matters. An attack on the UK in this digital age might mean crashing the stock exchange, switching off the power, causing an overload / explosion at a nuclear power plant... or a very subtle and effective campaign such as influencing the elections to ensure a preferred candidate wins (Russia, USA!) There are SO many ways for a country to wage war, and in many cases no one would even know for sure who had even done it!

So how much is spent by the whole world on the military?

In total, countries around the world splurged $1.686 trillion on arms in 2016. The United States remained at the top of the military spending league last year with $611 billion. That's 36 percent of the global total and over three times the amount spent by second-placed China. Now let us bear in mind that is the official number, and that the real number is most likely SO far above it that you may not even believe the real number if you heard it. Secret military black projects are part and parcel of running a country like the USA, and they spend trillions of dollars that are never accounted for on top of the public figures.

Therefore, let us imagine that if the top ten countries donated half their military budget, we would be looking at a figure of around $800 Billion. Let's call it a trillion since these figures are two years old. 1 Trillion dollars every year could be used in many ways! As mentioned above, we can end world poverty just for starters! In fact that would just about make a dent, and after ending world poverty we would still have around $600 billion left!

1 Trillion dollar bills laid end to end would reach 96,906,565 Miles! That's greater than the distance from the earth to the sun!

This is so much money that ending war would be easy if we wanted it! I mean, what is war about? Why do we have wars? Who starts them? Who benefits from them? When we start to ask this question we begin to open a can of worms. You see, unfortunately, our governments love war and they do everything they can to ensure they are always at war with someone or other. War is profitable in terms of driving the economy, and also increasing a countries power and reach internationally. The USA are experts in overthrowing countries and replacing their leader with one of their friends!

Scarcity is something that we have created, and our systems have ensured that poverty and war will continue. If we threw even $1 trillion dollars at the world to try to stop war it just wouldn't work! Our systems are so corrupt that it would fail on every level. Most of the money would end up in the wrong hands for starters, and then even if it did reach the intended recipients, they would be bled dry soon enough by tax, and more tax. It's sad to say, but its a simple fact that our system is here to make sure poverty, inequality and war continue. It is through this that they can control and manipulate so that they can be the most powerful.

So would there be more or less violence if we donated half the budgets to good causes? I think there would be more! .. Much more. People would be fighting for this money, a sudden influx of money would shift the balance of power.. and we would end up with people who used to have no voice, suddenly having one.. and from that there may well be more violence. The problem you see is the system! It doesn't matter HOW much money the system gives to anyone, it's very nature is to provide all the conditions for war by enforcing mass inequality, allowing corruption at very level of government and commerce, and by promoting the most selfish and sociopathic people to power. Whilst we live under a global capitalism regime i believe that war and violence will continue no matter how much money we throw at each other.

If we want to end war, violence and poverty we have to change the system itself. We don't need more money, what we need is we need less control and less manipulation. War is not just about money, but is also a by-product of oppression. When governments are no longer oppressing their neighbours, and their own people, we will then start to see a reduction in violence and war. When people are no longer sapped dry of the ability to live and survive, they will no longer have the need to wage war, or be violent. Most people just want to get on with their lives! It our governments that start wars, not the people!

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SOURCES:
https://www.forbes.com/sites/niallmccarthy/2017/04/24/the-top-15-countries-for-military-expenditure-in-2016-infographic/#7fbe740943f3
https://www.nationalpriorities.org/campaigns/us-military-spending-vs-world/
https://www.visionofearth.org/news/how-do-we-define-poverty/
https://fullfact.org/economy/trident-nuclear-cost/