America’s “national security” costs about $1 trillion dollars annually

Defense One and the Brennan Center for Justice published a real humdinger of an opinion piece about the growing size and cost of the Intelligence Community, or IC, where former FBI counterterrorism interrogator Michael German asserts:

The U.S. spends nearly $1 trillion on national security programs and agencies annually, more than any other nation in the world. Yet despite this enormous investment, there is not enough evidence to show the public that these programs are keeping Americans any safer – especially in the intelligence community.

Why Size Doesn’t Matter When Judging the Intelligence Community