Why Do We Have Such A Big Military?

[Reality]

Correct. Our worst enemies live here.

Thats right. The internal enemy is in China right now. His insurgent supporters are everywhere.

 

[Orange_Juice]

What size military do you think the U.S.A. should have? What troop levels are would you deem sufficent to defend, keep the sea lanes open and help with our allies. If you want to be the the world's policeman, how many more troops would you want to have?

How much should be spend on R&D? Development helps reduce troop levels. I am sure this is one of the major differences between our country and others is R&D.

I'd chop the military by 1/3 to begin with. My research and development program would be shifted to other things like alternative energy, finding cures for diseases and better peaceful purposes for many other things.

What sea lanes are being threatened now?

 

[Gunny]

I'd chop the military by 1/3 to begin with. My research and development program would be shifted to other things like alternative energy, finding cures for diseases and better peaceful purposes for many other things.

What sea lanes are being threatened now?

Did you steal that response from a Miss Universe contestant, or what?

Our military has already been cut too much and the OpTempo of current deployments reflects just that. Longer tours with less time stateside in between. The military is stretched to the breaking point because of the cuts it's weathered throughout the 80s and 90s.

Your freedom to do research and other goody peaceful purposes is only as strong as your ability to protect it, Jimmy Carter. If you cannot or will not protect it, you will lose it.

 

[Orange_Juice]

Correct. Our worst enemies live here.

Who would that be?

And if the worst enemies live here how does the military fit into defending us if civilians living in the country are our enemies?

 

[Orange_Juice]

Did you steal that response from a Miss Universe contestant, or what?

Our military has already been cut too much and the OpTempo of current deployments reflects just that. Longer tours with less time stateside in between. The military is stretched to the breaking point because of the cuts it's weathered throughout the 80s and 90s.

Your freedom to do research and other goody peaceful purposes is only as strong as your ability to protect it, Jimmy Carter. If you cannot or will not protect it, you will lose it.

Protect it from who? Who is trying to destroy my freedom?

 

[Toro]

Did you steal that response from a Miss Universe contestant, or what?

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lj3iNxZ8Dww]YouTube - Miss Teen USA 2007 - South Carolina answers a question[/ame]

 

[Toro]

What sea lanes are being threatened now?

Why do sea lanes have to be threatened now?

Don't you think its sort of pointless to build up the military as it is being threatened?

 

[BrianH]

Why do sea lanes have to be threatened now?

Don't you think its sort of pointless to build up the military as it is being threatened?

"Uh oh...we've been invaded. Better raise an army now."
"Uh oh...we're in danger. Better raise an army now."

That even sounds crappy.

OJ...our military consists of about 3 million personnel....OUT OF 300,000,000 people. Thats not even close to being a large military in comparison to your population.

 

[Orange_Juice]

Why do sea lanes have to be threatened now?

Don't you think its sort of pointless to build up the military as it is being threatened?

The global economy is dependant on the seas lanes being open. What is happening is the the majority of the world has a stake in keeping them open and much fewer nations would ever dream of closing them. So the world would fight to stop a disappearing threat, even if it did emerge.

You are suffering from a basic law of military history, *generals* fighting the last war. The world is changing away from the need for wasteful military conflict. Trade 'wars,' free trade agreements, industrial espionage and other much less destructive forms of conflict are what our increasingly non-violent world are turning to. Bush has basically accepted the decline of national sovereignity with his open border policy. The world is moving towrads one world, integrated by capitalism, technology and shared liberal values

 

[Orange_Juice]

"Uh oh...we've been invaded. Better raise an army now."
"Uh oh...we're in danger. Better raise an army now."

That even sounds crappy.

OJ...our military consists of about 3 million personnel....OUT OF 300,000,000 people. Thats not even close to being a large military in comparison to your population.

Oh hell, you can feel free to increase the size of the military if you want, just cut the spending down by a third, fine with me. Military helps build better people, its just all the money they spend on big ticket items that must go

 

[Toro]

The global economy is dependant on the seas lanes being open. What is happening is the the majority of the world has a stake in keeping them open and much fewer nations would ever dream of closing them. So the world would fight to stop a disappearing threat, even if it did emerge.

You are suffering from a basic law of military history, *generals* fighting the last war. The world is changing away from the need for wasteful military conflict. Trade 'wars,' free trade agreements, industrial espionage and other much less destructive forms of conflict are what our increasingly non-violent world are turning to. Bush has basically accepted the decline of national sovereignity with his open border policy. The world is moving towrads one world, integrated by capitalism, technology and shared liberal values

I do believe that Thomas Friedman's The World is Flat thesis is generally correct - that the more countries trade with each other, the less likely they are to conduct war.

Idealistically, I love the idea of no war or no army, but I think your supposition is naive. Secure lines of supply are vitally important, and countries will use those lines of supply to exert power. For example, Vladimir Putin understands this, and is restoring Russia's might through Gazprom. This is why Russia is slowly re-taking control of its energy resources, and squeezing multinationals such as Shell and BP to return those assets for a song after spending tens of billions in the country.

Russia controls the distribution and supply of natural gas into Europe, and is using this power to increase Russia's influence over the continent. This was crudely demonstrated when Russia cut off supplies to the Ukraine a few years back in January for - supposedly - nonpayment of bills. Currently, Gazprom is in discussions to buy the entire natural gas distribution in Serbia, slowly increasing Gazprom's influence in Europe.

The fact that we have fewer sovereign enemies now does not mean that will be the case in the future. And the US is the richest most powerful country in the world by far, and really the only country able to exert power around the globe. Thus, you say "the world would fight to stop a disappearing threat," but the world would turn to the US first and foremost because the US is the only country that could do something about it.

 

[chopcrazy]

I'd chop the military by 1/3 to begin with. My research and development program would be shifted to other things like alternative energy, finding cures for diseases and better peaceful purposes for many other things.

What sea lanes are being threatened now?

There are pirates over in Somalia to name one area.

Cutting down roughly 500K troops would put a big dent in being the world's policeman. You do not have a problem with out of control spending and would continue to do so but spend it on other items?

 

[editec]

There are pirates over in Somalia to name one area.

Cutting down roughly 500K troops would put a big dent in being the world's policeman. You do not have a problem with out of control spending and would continue to do so but spend it on other items?

Indeed, the age of piracy has returned.

Canada's Navy to Protect Somalia Food Aid Ships From Pirates​

By Jason McLure

Aug. 7 (Bloomberg) -- Canada's navy will protect World Food Programme aid ships bound for Somalia from pirates operating in the Indian Ocean, who have made 26 attacks on vessels off the country's northern and eastern coastline this year.

``Deteriorating security has made delivery difficult by land and sea,'' Peter Gordon MacKay, Canada's Minister of National Defense, said in an e-mailed statement late yesterday.

Somalia is in its 18th year of a civil war that has forced more than 3 million people into exile and displaced more than 800,000 people within the country. As many as 3.5 million people, or almost half the nation's remaining populace, may need emergency humanitarian aid before the end of the year, according to the World Food Programme.

World Food Programme ships were last year attacked by pirates while bringing food to ports in southern Somalia.

 

[Orange_Juice]

I do believe that Thomas Friedman's The World is Flat thesis is generally correct - that the more countries trade with each other, the less likely they are to conduct war.

Idealistically, I love the idea of no war or no army, but I think your supposition is naive. Secure lines of supply are vitally important, and countries will use those lines of supply to exert power. For example, Vladimir Putin understands this, and is restoring Russia's might through Gazprom. This is why Russia is slowly re-taking control of its energy resources, and squeezing multinationals such as Shell and BP to return those assets for a song after spending tens of billions in the country.

Russia controls the distribution and supply of natural gas into Europe, and is using this power to increase Russia's influence over the continent. This was crudely demonstrated when Russia cut off supplies to the Ukraine a few years back in January for - supposedly - nonpayment of bills. Currently, Gazprom is in discussions to buy the entire natural gas distribution in Serbia, slowly increasing Gazprom's influence in Europe.

The fact that we have fewer sovereign enemies now does not mean that will be the case in the future. And the US is the richest most powerful country in the world by far, and really the only country able to exert power around the globe. Thus, you say "the world would fight to stop a disappearing threat," but the world would turn to the US first and foremost because the US is the only country that could do something about it.

A sovereign nation withholding its own natural resources is not a problem that can be solved by a massive military, unless of course you are suggesting we should go ahead with Barbarossa II. Trade is vital to everyone, more and more everyday, it isn't an American interest, its a world interest.

As to your Big Penis argument, that we are the biggest, most robust and hardest penis in the world and need to poke it around the globe in a masculin manner, I'd say, stick around awhile, the other penises are growing larger. Why should we waste all our resources on the military while China and the EU and others are building infrastructure?

To the other fellows that suggest little Somlia is a reason to spend half a trillion a year on the military I'd tell them to go hide back under their fucking beds

 

[chopcrazy]

To the other fellows that suggest little Somlia is a reason to spend half a trillion a year on the military I'd tell them to go hide back under their fucking beds

Looks like a nerve got struck by answering his question which sea lanes are being threatened.

It is fine to want to be an isolationist but in today's world, it is difficult. Another difference is the USA military is a volunteer army. As such, you have to pay people more to want to be in the military. Where as with countries that people are conscripted, you do not have to pay as much.

 

[Munin]

European Jews are different in the sense that they were a repressed minority group within a greater population. Nobody really cared that Hitler was killing Jews. The French sure cared that they were invaded and certainly defended themselves.

Huh, really: nobody cared? Surely you can't believe that? Many resistance groups in Europe have been hiding and "protecting" Jews during WWII, risking their lives to do it. That s the thing, there weren't enough people who were prepared to risk their lives to save a Jew (death-penalty or slave-laborcamp): their is a difference between that and nobody cared.

 

[Gunny]

Huh, really: nobody cared? Surely you can't believe that? Many resistance groups in Europe have been hiding and "protecting" Jews during WWII, risking their lives to do it. That s the thing, there weren't enough people who were prepared to risk their lives to save a Jew (death-penalty or slave-laborcamp): their is a difference between that and nobody cared.

"Some" cared. But don't overplay it. There wouldn't have even been a need for the establishment of a Jewish state had Jews been accepted. Roosevelt hid the attrocities the Nazis were committing from the American people for that very reason. He didn't want the war to suddenly become about Jews and lose his overwhelming popular support for it.

The comment "nobody cared" as a general comment is accurate. Europe and the US were overwhelmingly antisemitic.

 

[Annie]

"Some" cared. But don't overplay it. There wouldn't have even been a need for the establishment of a Jewish state had Jews been accepted. Roosevelt hid the attrocities the Nazis were committing from the American people for that very reason. He didn't want the war to suddenly become about Jews and lose his overwhelming popular support for it.

The comment "nobody cared" as a general comment is accurate. Europe and the US were overwhelmingly antisemitic.

and still are, contrary to popular rants.