Nationalize the MIC: My Most Radical Policy Design

Wikipedia, accessed 1/22/2018

This post will articulate what is likely the most radical policy I currently support, beyond worker's ownership of the means of production.  I believe the military-industrial complex, the MIC, should be nationalized and made into a set of public corporations committed to the defense of our nation, and not to their personal bottom lines.  The reasoning behind this is two-fold: to cut down on waste and non-strategically relevant or effective pursuits, and to create conditions to enable a more sustainable and lasting peace across nations to permit greater economic development and well-being at local levels.

The United States is a nation that spends more of its federal tax revenue on defense than the next eight countries combined.  This spending is not only on wasted materials, but also on non-strategically relevant forms of hardware, such as the Gerald R. Ford-class supercarriers.  Don't get me wrong, aircraft carriers are great for defending oceans and our borders.  I'm just not certain we need to be buying them in bulk anymore, even if the Ford-class are supposedly cheaper to maintain at sea with fewer crew than the Nimitz-class.  Even then, how effective are the supercarriers anyway?  These are just two public examples of the wasted effort and resources that the United States currently invests in its defense without getting much added security in exchange for it.  Goodness knows how much is actually present when we allow private, for-profit companies to dictate the terms of the arrangements with the American taxpayer footing the bill with tax dollars and revenue that could be spent on more productive uses.
  
Another problem with the MIC is the incentive for the United States to be perpetually at war with other people around the world.  One of the core reasons the United States remains embroiled in conflicts overseas, I believe, is to provide a reason for the private, for-profit defense industry to produce weapon systems and military services.  If we were to remove the incentive for profiteering from war through public (meaning government) choice and policy, we could prevent many conflicts in the future.  We could resolve existing conflicts and heal relationships and ultimately create a safer, more secure set of global conditions that are conducive to peace, trade, and exchanges of cultures, ideas, and knowledge across borders.  With the dispelling of ignorance, hatred, and greed from our own individual societies, we can actually create conditions that are actually better for us as individual humans within our respective social groups.  This would only be temporary if it is not maintained over time, and assuming that no natural or human-made disaster(s) shock us out of that state.

So much for the reasoning of why we should nationalize the MIC.  The next question that's far stickier is how to actually accomplish it politically.  According to the documentary film, Why We Fight, defense contractors exist in every state and Congressional district, making our current Congresspeople effective hostages of the defense industry.  If a Congressperson votes to cut spending on defense, the contractors would close, killing significant parts of local economies throughout the United States.  This is the lynch-pin of why Congress won't cut military spending even if they wanted to (meaning, they don't support it for ideological reasons, or paid campaign contributions to the politicians' re-election campaigns).  The solution to this problem is for the federal government to continue paying the workers in those defense contractors their regular wages, assist in getting them through education and re-training at minimal cost to the workers, and offering opportunities for the many tradespeople and engineers who would be out of jobs to work in other national projects (such as infrastructure upgrades and maintenance), or in the private sector in other industries.  The US government could also provide assistance to local governments to help them make up for budget losses, re-use unnecessary defense plants and the land that they're on to preserve local economies and keep the Congresspeople viable for re-election.  

If Congress writes into the legislation to nationalize the MIC the proposed provisions to help workers transition to different jobs, and preserve the local tax-bases, the Congresspeople may be able to politically escape the clutches of the MIC if they want to.  Without those two key provisions to keep people and places economically and socially stable, the effort to nationalize the MIC should not be done, even if it could be done.

In the unlikely event that the MIC gets nationalized, I would also propose the following design for the new defense sector.  This is only a sketch proposal, and any part of it can be changed or scrapped depending on how effective it actually is.  My only hope is that evidence be used when determining what gets changed and scrapped, as the defense sector is key for the society's well-being.

The design would be involve the following sectors:

1. Research
2. Production
3. Service

Each sector would work to service the others and their respective military branches, all encompassed under the operations of the Department of Defense for cross-pollination and standardization for joint-branch operations.  Each sector would be designed as follows:

• Research: Multiple "companies", specialized according to the branch of military they're serving, all working under the ultimate umbrella of the Department of Defense for cross-pollination and standardization across services for joint-branch operations.  These individual "companies" would compete with each other to produce prototypes and new technology.  The prototypes should be numerous and challenged, with the best traits from each company's design being used to create the later prototypes and future weapons systems.  The goal would be to have competition with cooperation mixed in to produce more robust and effective outcomes from a soup of ideas and designs.
• Production: Production would be maintained in moderation and according to need. In peacetime, a cadre of vetted individuals may be taken and trained in military production and designs, with the intent that they be also able to train other workers how to produce the military hardware quickly, efficiently, and safely should war-time happen.  This nucleus of skilled workers would be on call, as it were, and receive compensation from the government to maintain their skills and training abilities, such that they can be deployed to get factories put on standby back up and running quickly, effectively, efficiently, and safely.
• Services: The internal services that were done by private contractors for a profit would be turned back over to the uniformed personnel of the US military.  The military would then be considered a place where people can get real experience and job training, with easy access made to the civilian economy when they leave.

This is as comprehensive and effective a design for the nationalized defense sector as I can personally conceive.  I hope that not only will I get a chance to experiment to see if this is an effective design for something as significant as the defense industry, but that we may live in a world where there is no profit to be made by creating conflicts where there are none to be had.