The 2020 Military Strength Index is in — and America's military is far from the top of the charts. In fact, it's rated as "marginal."
Conservative think tank Heritage Foundation started publishing an annual Military Strength Index in 2015. After establishing baseline levels in 2015, the foundation has conducted yearly studies to assess the global operating environment, threats to U.S. vital interests, and U.S. military power.
This year, each branch of the United States Armed Forces received a "marginal" score on a five-tier scale from "very weak" to "very strong."
Each branch was assessed in three areas — capability, capacity, and readiness — as the Heritage Foundation determined these three areas are central to the question of whether or not the U.S. has enough modern military power to conduct military operations effectively and on demand.
The Army received the highest individual score in any area with a "very strong" assessment of its readiness. This was the highest score across every branch and every assessment — every other score was either weak or marginal.
The "capacity" scores of each branch were particularly concerning for index researchers. Every branch, with the exception of the Air Force, received a "weak" score for capacity.
The 2020 Military Strength Index conducted research to determine the minimum requirements for the capacity of each branch which included 50 brigade combat teams for the Army, 400 ships for the Navy, 1,200 fighters for the Air Force, and 36 battalions for the Marines. Each branch is at 70, 73, 79, and 67 percent of these goals respectively.
So what does this mean?
If the U.S. were to be engaged in more than one major regional conflict, the index concluded, it would be very ill-equipped.
“Our bigger message in the index is saying to the nation as a whole, and to Congress as its representatives, that we are not devoting the resources needed for the U.S. to be a credible player in the global world against more than one major competitor,” Dakota Wood, a senior research fellow with Heritage Foundation told Defense News.
"The military services have prioritized readiness and seen improvement over the past couple of years," the index reads. "But modernization programs continue to suffer as resources are redirected toward current operations and sustainment of readiness levels."
Reduced operating numbers have also been "normalized," according to the index. So, while the military believes its reduced size and number of military units is normal, they are truthfully well below the level needed to operate.
In defending the United States's interests both at home and abroad, the index thus concluded, the U.S. military is only "marginal."
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