Army War College: Bush's fiscal policy is an economic WMD...

...and he's given the detonate button to foreign governments.

More from the Army War College publication, indicting President Bush for creating a fiscal disaster that other nations could use as an economic weapon against us:

Foreign direct investment and foreign ownership of American debt total trillions of dollars: Japan and China alone now hold over $870 billion in U.S. Treasury Bonds, and almost 40 percent of the American national debt is now held by foreign bond holders. Were other great powers to use strategically their position as central underwriters of U.S. Government debt, the result could be important coercive leverage on the United States. ...

Through November 2003, the war in Iraq had been costing an average of around $4 billion a month; congressional staff now estimate that recent increases in combat intensity have increased that figure by 50 percent or more, yielding a cost of over $70 billion for the year for Iraq alone. The war in Afghanistan is projected to add another $8.5 billion for 2004. The Congressional Budget Office now estimates that the cost of military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan could total $179 to nearly $400 billion for the years 2005-14, in addition to the $100 billion already spent, and the $26 billion they expect to be spent in the remainder of 2004, for a total projected cost of up to half-a-trillion dollars between 2002 and 2014, and this figure excludes reconstruction aid for either country or the potential cost of any other campaigns fought elsewhere between now and 2014. ...

In principle, an economy the size of America’s could accommodate such costs. ...

Principle and practice can be very different things, however. Since 2001 the government has systematically failed to provide revenues sufficient to cover its costs. The projected U.S. federal budget deficit for FY 2004 exceeds $470 billion; for the 5 years ending in FY 2009, the cumulative projection exceeds $1.4 trillion. Neither figure includes likely spending for contingencies in Iraq, Afghanistan, or elsewhere. These wars are being funded by spending without corresponding taxation. Barring major changes in American fiscal policy, large, sustained expenditures for ongoing preemptive warfare can be expected to create corresponding increases in
federal budget deficits. ...

How would America fund its deficit if overseas lenders stopped buying Treasury Bonds? ...

This represents an ongoing net shift of wealth overseas. ...

Other things being equal, these economic consequences will hasten the loss of American primacy. ...

The preemptive warfare required by energetic counterterrorism along the lines the administration has laid out...degrades American economic performance.