Last year Rep. Rob Wittman (R‑Virginia) introduced an amendment to address, of all things, the military’s procurement of anchors and mooring chains. Currently, these items can only be purchased from member countries of the National Technology and Industrial Base comprising the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, and Canada. Rep. Wittman’s amendment would have allowed them to also be purchased from major non-NATO allies, including shipbuilding powerhouse South Korea.

Today there is just one U.S. manufacturer, Lister Chain and Forge, that produces anchors and mooring chains for the military. As Rep. Wittman pointed out, however, the anchor swivels used by Lister are produced in South Korea. So why not allow the military to purchase anchors and mooring chains from South Korea (or other countries) if key parts of the item are produced overseas anyway? Limiting their purchase to a single U.S. firm virtually guarantees the military is not getting the best price and frittering away defense dollars.

Indeed, this hamstringing of the military’s ability to efficiently procure what it needs, Rep. Wittman added, sets the precedent for the United States “being in a noncompetitive mode to look at where we can be able to gain resources to do the things we need to do to rebuild our fleet.” Every dollar unnecessarily spent is a dollar no longer available for modernizing the U.S. Navy or meeting other military needs.

And that’s true of much more than just anchors and mooring chains. As I discuss in a policy analysis released today, the Department of Defense and related national security entities are subject to a raft of laws requiring the use of products that are domestically sourced.

The Berry Amendment, for example, means limited choice and higher prices for items such as flatware and running shoes used by U.S. servicemembers. The Military Cargo Preference Act and Jones Act raise the cost of shipping to domestic and overseas military bases. The Byrnes-Tollefson Amendment prohibits the construction of military vessels in foreign shipyards. That, by the way, helps explain why a Coast Guard icebreaker is currently being built in a Mississippi shipyard that has never before constructed such a vessel instead of one in Finland, a vastly experienced builder of icebreakers—and future NATO member—that could almost certainly deliver such a vessel in less time and considerably lower cost.

The paper, however, is not a call to award defense contracts on cost considerations alone. Even at a significant discount, it’s probably not a good idea to obtain aircraft carriers from state-owned firms in countries regarded as potential adversaries. But neither should the United States view foreign sourcing per se as inherently risky or undesirable. More nuanced thinking is needed, and the trade-offs between the advantages of domestic sourcing and obtaining the greater bang for the defense buck carefully weighed.

Expanding the military’s ability to obtain foreign goods and services, however, is about more than saving money. Having access to suppliers from across the globe brings provides numerous national security benefits. As former Rep. Mac Thornberry, a former chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, wrote shortly before departing office in 2020:

When crises emerge, whether they be pandemics or conflicts, the United States cannot continue to rely on a limited number of companies concentrated in one geographic region. We need geographic diversity. A broader network of trusted suppliers would also provide more competition for defense purchases, benefiting the taxpayers. It would bring in additional sources of innovation, accelerating our development of new technologies and applications to compete with China and other peer competitors.

Foreign countries—and U.S. allies in particular—are a resource to be harnessed. Laws that restrict access to their products and services should be greeted with default skepticism and, as applied to defense purchases, scrutinized to determine whether they serve more to bolster the country’s security or the profit margins of well-connected domestic firms. In numerous instances, the evidence suggests the latter.

In evaluating the slate of protectionist laws imposed on the U.S. military and broader defense apparatus it’s worth bearing in mind Henry George’s observation that “What protection teaches us, is to do to ourselves in time of peace what enemies seek to do to us in time of war.” The United States, including in the defense realm, is too often doing exactly this. In its zeal to guard against foreign overreliance, the United States frequently deprives itself of access to goods and services that could stretch its defense dollars and strengthen the country’s national security. Greater balance must be brought to such considerations. It’s long past time to re-examine, reform, and—at least in some cases—repeal these laws that collectively amount to a self-imposed blockade.