By law, the Pentagon must produce an annual "Overseas Cost Summary" (OCS) putting a price on the military's activities abroad, from bases to embassies and beyond. This means calculating all the costs of military construction, regular facility repairs and maintenance, plus the costs of maintaining one million US military and Defence Department personnel and their families abroad - the pay cheques, housing, schools, vehicles, equipment and the transportation of personnel and materials overseas and back, and far, far more.

US military spending in question: The OCS, for the 2012 fiscal year ending September 30, documented $22.1bn in spending, although, at Congress' direction, this doesn't include any of the more than $118bn spent that year on the wars in Afghanistan and elsewhere around the globe.

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