In a move that surprised absolutely no one who has been paying attention, the Pentagon announced Tuesday it's shipping another $2 billion in military aid overseas, because nothing says "fiscal responsibility" like overnighting precision-guided missiles to a region currently described by the State Department as "complicated."
The package includes air defense systems, artillery rounds, armored vehicles, and what officials described as "capability enhancements" — a phrase that means exactly nothing but sounds expensive enough to justify a press release. A senior defense official, speaking on condition of anonymity because apparently nobody in this building has a name anymore, said the aid demonstrates "our enduring commitment to our partners."
"Our partners," in this context, refers to whichever government is currently in charge of the country this week. That government may or may not still be in charge by the time the crates arrive. The Pentagon has thoughtfully included a return label.
Critics on both sides of the aisle immediately weighed in. One camp argues we can't afford this while bridges are collapsing and school lunches are being debated as a luxury item. The other camp argues we can't afford *not* to, because if we don't send the missiles, someone else will, and then we'd have to send *different* missiles later at a markup. This is known in defense circles as "the sunk cost fallacy, but with extra steps."
Meanwhile, the defense contractors who manufacture these weapons posted record earnings this quarter, because war — or the threat of it — remains the only American industry that reliably delivers. Shareholders are reportedly "thrilled," which is the closest thing to a moral position anyone in this story has taken.
The White House defended the move, noting that the aid was "already budgeted" — a phrase that functions as a magic spell in Washington, instantly rendering any expenditure both inevitable and unworthy of further discussion. Congress is expected to approve the package with bipartisan support, since opposing it would require reading the bill, and nobody has time for that.
In a related development, the State Department confirmed that the recipient nation's leader has once again pledged to hold democratic elections "soon," a word that has now been under investigation for fraud for the better part of a decade. The leader also expressed "deep gratitude" for American generosity, before immediately using the new weapons to shell a neighboring region that the U.S. has also promised to protect. Officials called this "an internal matter."
Analysts warn that the situation on the ground remains "fluid," which is Pentagon-speak for "we have no idea what's happening, but the checks cleared." One retired general told reporters that the aid is "critical to maintaining stability in the region," a sentence he has now said 47 times in the last 20 years, each time about a different region, each time while wearing the same suit.
The weapons are expected to arrive within weeks, or possibly never, depending on how the logistics go. Either way, the money is gone. The announcement did, however, generate a brief moment of national unity: Americans from all political persuasions came together to agree that $2 billion is a lot of money, right before returning to their separate corners to argue about whether it should have been spent on literally anything else.
The Pentagon says it will provide updates as the situation develops. It will not.
**Opinion:** We've turned foreign policy into a subscription service nobody can cancel, where the price goes up every year and the product never works. At some point "enduring commitment" just means we forgot how to say no. Somewhere, a defense contractor is naming a yacht after this aid package, and honestly, it's the only part of this story that makes sense.