A majority of Americans want the United States to lead on the global stage with a strong military, and a supermajority want to increase national defense spending, according to the latest Reagan National Defense Survey.
Despite Americans electing a president who ran on an “America First” agenda that focused on domestic issues ranging from the U.S. economy to securing the southern U.S. border, 57% of those surveyed said they wanted to see the U.S. more engaged and taking the lead on international events this year, compared with 42% a year ago.
Nearly 80% of Americans surveyed supported increased government spending on the U.S. military, a slight increase from last year. Increasing military spending ranked high above some of the other U.S. foreign policy priorities, such as promoting freedom abroad (61%) and providing foreign aid (43%).
“The Reagan National Defense Survey demonstrates yet again that Americans are not pacifists, and we are not isolationists. We want a federal government that serves American interests and protects our country,” Bradley Bowman, a member of the survey’s advisory board and the senior director of the Center on Military and Political Power for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told VOA Friday.
The Ronald Reagan Institute has surveyed U.S. public opinion on national security for the past six years, and the latest poll, released Thursday, included a bipartisan sample of about 2,500 Americans who were surveyed two days after the November presidential election.
Most respondents said they supported continued U.S. security support for Ukraine and allowing Ukraine to fire U.S. weapons inside Russia, with nearly 60% believing the Russia-Ukraine conflict will end with Ukraine negotiating for peace, even if that means giving up some of its sovereign territory.
Ukraine support differed widely among voters for the Democratic presidential candidate, Vice President Kamala Harris, and Republican candidate, President-elect Donald Trump, with 74% of Harris voters in support of sending aid compared with 42% of Trump voters.
A supermajority (80%) sees Russia as an adversary.
On Israel, 54% of those surveyed supported continuing U.S. aid, but Americans were split 45% to 45% on whether Israel has a right to continue military action or Israel’s military action in Gaza has gone on long enough and needs to transition to a ceasefire.
About half of those surveyed think the United States would prevail in a conflict with China, with nearly the same number finding China to be the greatest threat to the United States.
If China invaded Taiwan, nearly three-quarters of those surveyed said the U.S. should officially recognize Taiwan as an independent nation, with two-thirds agreeing that the U.S. should respond with economic sanctions against China and more than half supporting sending more military equipment to Taiwan (56%) and moving more military assets such as aircraft carriers into the region (58%).
Most Americans surveyed believe the U.S. military should be large enough to win two simultaneous wars.
