https://www.wsj.com/articles/defense-is-on-the-ballot-in-georgia-11607381546?mod=opinion_lead_pos5
Senator. Sullivan, an Alaska Republican, is chairman of the Senate Armed Services Subcommittee on Readiness and Management Support. He is a colonel in the Marine Corps Reserve.
The stakes in the Georgia U.S. Senate races on Jan. 5, 2021, between Sens. David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler and their respective challengers, Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock, are very high for a host of reasons. One that has not received enough attention is the readiness of our military. The U.S. faces rising threats from China, Russia and Iran, and continued robust funding of our military is clearly at stake in Georgia, which will decide the Senate majority. Nowhere is the divide between Democrats and Republicans more important.
For decades the Democratic Party has staked out a position of diminishing the importance of U.S. military readiness. President Jimmy Carter slashed defense spending in the first three years of his term. This created a hollow force, only to have the Soviets and Iranians take advantage of America’s weakened presence in the Middle East, which forced Mr. Carter to increase spending at the end of his term. President Bill Clinton cut the size of the military by a third, reversing a decade of progress under the Reagan and first Bush administrations.
More recently, Barack Obama and Joe Biden oversaw a 25% reduction in the military budget during their second term. The cuts were more than numbers—they dramatically undermined our military’s combat readiness and the morale of our troops.