Congress is currently in the middle of the markup process for the 2022 federal budget. As a member of the appropriations committee, I serve on the Defense and Agriculture subcommittees and I’m the ranking member of the Commerce, Justice, and Science committee.
In the coming weeks, I want to discuss with you what I see as my priorities on the three subcommittees I serve on. I want to begin with the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee.
When we talk about our national defense, China is at the very top of our priorities. Frankly, the defense budget the Biden administration sent to Congress doesn’t meet the challenge of protecting ourselves from the Chinese. The budget is weak and sends a message of weakness to the Chinese and our other potential adversaries around the world.
It’s become increasingly clear that President Biden does not understand what our most pressing threats are. From his viewpoint, they change by the week. A few weeks ago, he said the biggest threat facing our nation was “white supremacy.” Then the very next week he said the biggest threat was from “climate change.” But let’s be honest, the biggest threat to our nation is from the Chinese Communist Party.
What exactly are China’s plans? Well, they of course aren’t saying, but their actions are clear. They want to use their military to project their Chinese Communist values outwardly toward the rest of the world.
China’s military has made huge leaps in power, organization, and infrastructure in just the last 20 years. The Department of Defense’s annual report to Congress says that by 2049 “Beijing will seek to develop a military by mid-century that is equal to—or in some cases superior to—the U.S. military.” The budget Joe Biden sent to Congress completely ignores this Chinese plan to meet or surpass us in military power. That is unacceptable from the Commander in Chief.
One of the most telling examples of that increase in projection of power is their Navy. China already has a Navy larger than that of the United States. While our ships are no doubt more technically capable, China is catching up in that sector very quickly. (Mainly by stealing American tech.) And of course, there is a lot of power in just sheer volume of ships and manpower.
They are using this navy to interfere with international shipping lanes in the South China Sea. Their navy is also being used as a saber rattle directed at Taiwan. And their Navy is in no way being used to promote goodwill, open seas, and definitely not democracy.
The Department of Defense says that China is improving its navy, air force and ground-based ballistic missile launch systems in order to deter and prevent any outside help, i.e., the United States, from protecting Taiwan in a conflict. It’s also quickly increasing the size of its nuclear forces, projected to double the number of warheads in the next decade. China’s leader Xi Jinping says the country will construct 100 more nuclear missile silos. They also are developing submarines that could be used to launch nuclear missiles capable of striking our very own shores.
China is also growing ever more powerful in the world of cyber. Cyber experts agree that China has already found backdoors into our most critical electric, water, and internet infrastructure. They could wreak havoc on our nation at the flip of a switch.
China, and also Russia, are far outpacing us in the realm of hypersonic weapons. These weapons are faster than the speed of sound, difficult to defend against, and quickly overpower traditional anti-missile systems. This is unacceptable. America, by the very size of our population is at a manpower disadvantage. Therefore, if we don’t at all times have a technological advantage, then we cannot expect to win a conflict with the likes of China and Russia.
Speaking of Russia, they are also an increasing threat to our national security and to stability throughout Europe. President Putin has grown more and more confident and ambitious during his 20 years in power. Russia has already moved in and taken the Crimea area of Ukraine and has been making threats against other former Soviet countries like Estonia.
In addition to the two big world players of China and Russia, our military also faces the continuing challenges of North Korea, Iran, and the situation in Afghanistan. North Korea’s Kim Jong Un has made it clear he will not be ignored, which will mean our continued watchful eye over the Korean peninsula. If he gets desperate enough, he will likely try anything, and we have to be prepared for that.
Iran is bent on developing nuclear weapons and the Biden administration has attempted to make it easier for that to happen by rejoining the failed nuclear treaty negotiated by the Obama administration. An Iranian regime with a nuclear weapon will threaten to use it against Israel. Our military has to be prepared to confront that possibility.
And in regard to Afghanistan, as our military is pulled out, the Taliban clearly has its eyes set on returning to its pre-2001, ruthless control of the country. Our military must be prepared to keep the Taliban in check. Biden’s defense budget ignores the Afghan situation.
All of these challenges faced by our nation in an unstable world make the flat Biden defense budget untenable. While the left likes to say we spend more money on defense than the next several countries behind us combined, no other country faces the threats we do. While we do have more allies than China or Russia, the brutal fact is that if conflict came, the United States would have to do the vast majority of the heavy lifting.
We must continue to make significant investments in our military. This includes making sure we quickly catch up in the world of hypersonic weapons and that we continue to develop new technology and assets that the Chinese and Russians cannot match.
We must make sure that U.S. Cyber Command has capabilities of both defense and offense that cannot be matched. They must also have the ability to quickly repel a cyber-attack and retaliate in kind.
We also must lead in space. China is making gains in low earth orbit, on the moon and on Mars. Their space program is completely controlled by their military, and as such, military conquest is at forefront of what they do. While NASA is primarily, and should be, focused on exploration, U.S. Space Command, and the U.S. Space Force, must have the recourses to make sure we do not fall behind in space. While we should always promote the idea that space should be a conflict-free zone, we cannot be so naïve to believe that the Chinese Communist Party will follow this same approach.
Biden’s budget is packed with liberal wish list items, while ignoring his most important and pressing requirement under the constitution, to “preserve, protect and defend.” When it comes to military spending, many liberal Democrats like to whistle past the graveyard.
Defending our nation should be a top priority for all of us. As we continue through the 2022 budget process, I will work with my staff, and my Congressional colleagues to make sure these defense priorities are addressed and corrected. If we aren’t willing to defend our nation with the most robust military and best technology, then we could find ourselves without a nation at all.
But I think our military planners at the Pentagon say it best. When discussing the threat from China specifically, they say “What is certain is that the (Chinese Communist Party) has a strategic end state that it is working towards, which if achieved and its accompanying military modernization left unaddressed, will have serious implications for U.S. national interests and the security of the international rules-based order.”
U.S. Rep. Robert Aderholt (AL-04) is a Republican from Haleyville.
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