To channel Frederic Bastiat, the weapons are what is seen, but what is unseen, besides the carnage that those weapons wreak, is the investment that people would make in their own families, homes, and neighborhoods if their tax dollars weren't diverted to destructive ends and means. Preferably the money shouldn't be taken in the first place, but the early American republic at least had a reasonable definition of the Commons that coerced tax money could and should be spent on. Now it's all going to politically connected pressure groups and their minions and politically connected businesses and contractors. It's one big racket, and we ain't in it.