Soldiers vs Contractors

I guess you could call me liberal ( or libertarian) when it comes to defense spending, as I agree with this NYT editorial:

Very few critics of the military's spending priorities want the United States to relinquish its current dominance in the skies and on the seas. But in a world where no rival military powers are remotely capable of challenging America, that dominance can be preserved without loading every new plane and ship with every conceivable technological marvel, whether or not it is relevant to the military mission at hand.
Much of the astounding 41 percent increase in military spending over the past five years has gone toward hugely expensive air and sea combat systems - and this in an era when America's toughest battles are being fought on land against foes that have no known air force or navy.

Between wars, though, the services which hads the less (though important) to do with victory, got the choicest share of the budget:

The Air Force and the Navy can play only secondary roles in wars like Iraq. Their spending plans are increasingly oriented toward the possibility of future military conflict with China.

I suppose its easier to sell deterrent weapons, that also creates jobs at hope, than to use ground troops in preventative actions:

Once expensive planes, ships and other weapons systems find their way into the budget, they are very hard to stop, even when changes in the global military environment make them no longer smart defense investments. Whether they are really needed or not, they remain profit centers for military contractors and a source of well-paying jobs for the Congressional districts where they are built.