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Written by Ahmed Adel, Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher
The US has achieved another “milestone” after its national debt surpassed the $35 trillion mark, the US House of Representatives Budget Committee announced on July 29. Yet, despite debt increasing and the economy struggling, the US is still not deterred from achieving its military ambitions.
Committee Chairman Jodey Arrington, R-Ky., called the development a “dubious milestone” and urged for more fiscal and spending responsibility to address the growing national debt.
“Today, we grieve yet another dubious milestone in the fiscal decline of the most powerful and prosperous nation in history. President Reagan’s words 34 trillion dollars ago still hold true today,” Arrington said in a statement, expressing hope that the Republican Party could somehow alleviate the situation if Donald Trump wins the November election.
“I believe Republican leadership in 2025 is our last best hope to restore fiscal responsibility before it’s too late,” he added.
The US national debt has soared in recent years under President Joe Biden and his predecessor, Donald Trump, who had repeatedly promised to reduce it during his 2016 campaign. By the time Trump left office, the debt had grown by $8.4 trillion to $27.7 trillion, with more than half of the borrowings related to COVID-19 measures. The trend has continued under Biden, with the incumbent president now surpassing the $35 trillion mark.
The US is, in fact, the largest debtor nation in world history, and according to the International Monetary Fund, public debt will exceed 123% of GDP this year and reach nearly 134% by 2029. This means that it will be impossible for the US to overcome its debt. The IMF even recently warned the government about the debt level that will be reached if current policies are maintained.
“Under current policies, the general government debt is expected to rise steadily and exceed 140% of GDP by 2032. Similarly, the general government deficit is expected to remain around 2.5% of GDP,” the financial institution said in a statement on June 27.
The IMF added that the US needs to reverse the current rise in its public debt-to-GDP ratio to avoid a growing risk to the country and the global economy.
Responding to the US breaking a new debt record, Maya MacGuineas, president of the nonpartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, said in a statement:
“This news is incredibly sobering – and incredibly unsurprising for anyone who has been following our fiscal trajectory. Just last month, the Congressional Budget Office warned Americans that debt held by the public is on its way to a new record share of the economy in three years. The deficit will be nearly $2 trillion this year and nearly $3 trillion in ten years.”
“We are going to have to get serious about the debt, and soon. Election years cannot be an exception for trying to prevent completely foreseeable dangers – and the debt is one of the major dangers we are facing,” she added.
Nonetheless, despite the growing debt, Moscow is not under any illusions that this will change Washington’s militaristic ambitions.
“Of course, the US, as one of the largest global economies, has a direct impact on the international economic situation,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on July 30. “However, it is unlikely that this whole situation will somehow hinder their militaristic ambitions.”
US global dominance is gradually collapsing due to its weakening economy and the emergence of a multipolar world order in which Russia, China, India, and other countries play a major role. With the emergence of the multipolar world, Washington will soon have to communicate with other powers on an equal footing, especially since, as the failed anti-Russia sanctions have shown, the US can no longer use its economic might to impose its will.
Although US debt is growing and ordinary citizens are suffering from a cost-of-living crisis, Washington’s militaristic ambitions will certainly continue unabated. This is seen in the fact that in May, it was revealed that Congress had approved $175 billion of emergency support for Ukraine since 2022, an astronomical figure considering the US is $35 trillion in debt.
More alarmingly, it appears that the US will continue to waste billions upon billions on a war that Ukraine cannot possibly win. The US announced on July 29 that $1.7 billion in military aid would be sent to Ukraine, including an array of munitions for air defence systems, artillery, mortars and anti-tank and anti-ship missiles.
Nonetheless, if the debt continues to grow, the US may have no choice but to massively scale back its astronomical military spending, which will account for an eyewatering $842.0 billion in 2024. Whether it is a Democrat or a Republican in the White House next year, it is doubtful that the debt will be reduced over the next presidential term.
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with the interest on all that w0rthle$$ paper, it’s much bigger than that!
1 trillion out of 6 trln of the state budget is to pay the interest. trump borrowed 2 trln a year, biden — over 3 (~1 trln for every 100 days). key rate of frs grows to suppress inflation, so interest will grow up even faster and external state debt too. it to pay just 3% interest, ~200 trln debt mean that you need to pay whole state budget for interest only. classic financial pyramid or ponzi scheme.
they’ll pay it off in $bitcoin!… which reminds me…. did russia really mean this “russia approves law allowing use of crypto for global payments as it faces ongoing sanctions”?… and “why” does it continue to play the west’s game(s) like they did with “sputnik”?… and everything else that is the un in order to preserve it’s worthless seat in the unsc?!!!
cryptocurrency will be used to avoid western embargoes. you know that sodomites from dc attacks every banks for transactions with counter-agents from russia. though i also think it’s a financial pyramid too and it’s better to use another ways.
“sputnik” was quite useful. the useless link in the chain was quarantine. there was no q-ne in belorussia or sweden, but their death toll not much higher, because q-ne in russia was formal. real q-ne was in prc and dprk, that’s why their losses were minimal, just several thousand people for giant population, but it was total, wuhan was like one big prison for over 10 million people.
expected in my corrupt amerikunt cesspool where we all worship money
“more alarmingly, it appears that the us will continue to waste billions upon billions on a war that ukraine cannot possibly win.”
remember who you are fighting for, ukrainian slaves. someone paid for yur pointless deaths…
the west economics is based on debt. it is actually not economics at all, it is virtual game , massive ponzi scheme. all the pensioners have their whole life money in funds and these funds are investing in virtual assets which are nothing else as huge bubble inflated for decades and it will eventually burst. everybody know it must burst but people are stupid enough to invest their whole life money for pennies in the rotschilds banks. and they will lose everything.
a total collapse and we can trade with the best of them. slavery of course.
and i don’t agree with how a single penny of it was spent. will i ever pay taxes to the us government again? no.
jewish bible, deuteronomy 15:6. guess who own the fed ?
incorrect headline sf! the us national debt has been pushing above $35trn since 2023, possibly earlier but the whitehouse, the fed and others have found ever new ways to calculate debt so it stays below $35tr. headline should be: ‘us runs out of new ways to cook the books’
the whole west population will never retire as there are not any sound money left in the western banking system. everything was inflated to such absurd point, that money have no value. every financial crisis was curbed with burning all the reserves and making fresh debts so the scale of this financial crisis will be galactic. it looks that the only solution for the central bankers not to end hanging on the street lamps head down is starting ww3
not a big difference. wait for 2 years and we’ll see 40 trln debt, if the us and world will survive.
it’s a good advice to scrap the dollar and go with gold! the disunited states of a never gonna pay back its debt because they can’t
there are no such amounts of gold to cover all trade operations. if to believe that all gold in the us reserves is real, ~9000 tons are just 200-300 billion in dollars, not enough to cover even 1% of internal state debt. world could use platinum, silver, rare earth, but their amounts still not enough. thus gold’s price will rise up as well as price for all goods, if to introduce the golden standard again. the root of trouble is not in dollar itself, but in financial pyramid created by frs.