Furiously scratching in the sand, ianparker2@gmail.com wrote:

POV that depends on how important national defense is to you.

It is a truism that generals always fight the last war. The war that
has to be fought is one against terrorism and insurgency. 

Thats the one we are fighting now

The long and
short of it is that globalization and nuclear weapons make war betwen
major powers unlikely. You do not shoot your customers - at least not
literally. 

Both Germany and Italy were large trading partners with the US right
up to WWII.  That is one of several reasons why there was a fairly
strong sentiment among a small but vocal minority against getting into
the war.

There will be no war with China while there are trainers and
Tee shirts around. They are too interested in making money. An all out
war would involve nuclear weapond and be a disaster for both sides.

As it pertains to China, agreed.  But consider that all major
manufacturers of war planes are doing very well selling "old tech"
fighters and tactical bombers all over the earth.  Sad, but true.
These include the F-16, among other platforms.  And, as we have seen
in Venezeula, it sometimes does not take much to turn a friend into an
enemy.  It would be wise to insure that we always have the technical
advantage, wouldn't you think?

There is no threat to ICBMs until there is everything is gloss on the
cake. A bomb for Aurora will cost more than a standard cruise missile.
Best bet in conventional war is simply to swamp the enemy with criuse
missiles and decoys.

Fighting the last war again, eh general?

I also feel something else. A large arsenal contributes to the feeling
that a war agaist (say) Iraq or Iran can be won easily. We are
therefore more likely to have wars and have insurencies to deal with
than if we did not have such an arsenal.

Do you know one of the major reasons Japan attacked the US in '41?

There were many in the US government who felt that maintaining a
large, visible, modern army was not conducive to friendly relations
with the rest of the world.  In December of '41, we had almost no
arsenal at all, and most of what we did have was already 20 years old.
We were sometimes fighting with wooden biplanes against the Zero!

The Japanese figured that although their populace, manufacturing, and
economic size was diminutive compared to the US, the fact that we had
almost nothing to fight with would win the day for them.  But, they
failed to follow up aggressively after their initial victories, and
alowed US manufacturing to kick into high gear.  Once that happened,
the end result was inevitable.  

What we can learn from this is that there will always be someone out
there that wants what the other guy, or country has.  It is perhaps
the most sickening part of human behaviour, but history does teach us
that this has been going on forever.  It would be nice if everyone
could simply just get along with each other, but in all of recorded
history, that has never happened.

EW


If you add up all known religions
and cancel the contradictions, you are left with only one invariant
universal message: God needs *your* money.
  ----Uncle Al