Vanity much?
See my tagline.
Member since February 27, 2009.
That says it all. Whay not educate yourself instead of posting preposterous assumptions and invalid recommendations?
We don’t. The current standing US military is not in any way large. It’s adequate to its tasks, no more and no less.
So we can make sure the ONLY FREE COUNTRY can stay free from enemies, both foreign and DOMESTIC...
Next question?
You have a moniker of lin biao and you’re asking US?
http://www.google.com/search?&rls=en&q=linbiao&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8
Here’s a question for you, “Why does CHINA has such a large army?”
(2) No nation can assume that it will only face one enemy at a time. Imagine the US finding itself in a war against China, Russia, India, Japan, Indonesia, and Vietnam all at once? It's hard to imagine a situation where that type of alliance would form - but you have to plan for the unimaginable to at least some extent.
(3) The US does buy some military hardware from other nations, but there are massive advantages to building your own and making sure that you retain the capability to build your own. Even if, hypothetically for example, Britain has developed a warship that would fill an American need admirably, by building its own, America, first of all, ensures that it continues to develop skills and technologies that can be used in future ships (which may not be ones they can get elsewhere) and secondly allows for the potential of export sales to other nations (such as my own country of Australia). And even if another friendly nation is building an equivalent vessel, the competition involved in building your own will tend to make both nations better at what they are doing (not to mention the potential sharing of information) - which is better? The UK and the US (and, for that matter, I would include Australia when it comes to some classes of warship) each building their own high quality vessels, each trying to produce something better than the others, and therefore each improving their own production - or just building one class that, though very good, could have been better with a bit of friendly rivalry and more people working on and sharing information with other friendly nations. And this is without considering the fact that more designs means more innovation and somewhere else to go if a flaw develops.
"FYI: I have no first hand experience with a real world military or weapons development. "
Then he says:
"... A military half the current size would be able to defeat any other country..."
So, after conceding he knows nothing about a topic, he proceeds to state his opinion as fact, on that very same topic.
Obviously a liberal.
This General Patton riding one of the few tanks (most of the tanks used were trucks with a "I am a tank" sign on the side) used in the Louisiana Maneuvers in 1941
With the speed to today's warfare this country would be overrun before it could even begin to match it's output during WWII. That's why we have a military today unlike the paltry force we used to have between wars in the past.
These questions have been asked many times over the years but... The U.S. will most likely be "compacting" its unit sizes over the coming years as most new conflicts will be "low intensity", the large units are World War and "Cold War" hold overs built for large battle fields...
The future battles will be fought with Special Operations units and technology; Robotics, UAV, Cyber-warfare, etc.
Buying weapons systems from other countries, not such a good idea... should we ever get on that countries bad side they could withhold equipment or spare parts basically removing that equipment from use or diminishing its effectiveness. Plus our weaponry is cutting edge that everyone else wants to get their hands on. If it came down to it, Would you rather go into battle on a U.S. made warship or a French made ship?
Note: I do not think the smaller military would be able to hold all of Iraq.
The are many variables in holding a country, a smaller unit size would not be good at all, as we saw initially in Iraq. If you can't actively patrol the whole area, insurgents will just fill in behind you as you leave an area, or they will operate out of an area that you are not actively suppressing, and you also have to get into force protection, Air superiority, Supply etc... all that takes a lot of people and equipment.
IBTZ
Becuz.
Why? you ask Why? because they have lots of little tiny helicopters in the White House Gift Shop that are given
to Gordon Brown’s boy’s John and James that’s why.
Welcome to Free Republic.
You do understand evil, I presume? Unless you are a liberal, you do. Liberals don’t believe in Evil. Liberals think that if something or someone is bad, something or someone made it that way.
The United States has learned from harsh experience (which it is in the process of un-learning with its newest Dear Leader in office) that evil only understands and respects one thing: Force.
Strength is all evil understands. You cannot be nice to evil. You cannot reason with evil. You cannot make deals with evil. You cannot negotiate with evil.
Evil views negotiation, civility, reason and forbearance as weakness, and will inevitably try to exploit and take advantage of it.
Our new Jimmy Carter, our “President of Hope and Change” is only one of two things: Someone who WANTS to sell our country down the river to our enemies, or someone who is too stupid to understand the nature of evil. Personally, I think it is both.
Communism is Evil. And as F.A. Hayek so eloquently lays out in his book “The Road to Serfdom”, Socialism is evil because it inevitably leads to totalitarianism.
And just so you know: I have first hand experience with the military, and regard myself as a historian. If you understood history, and you understood the nature of the military, you wouldn’t have to ask these questions.
Just a question: Did you vote for Obama? Or even more to the point: Are you an American? You use “we” in your vanity post, but I have my doubts.
Why does the US military insist on having weapon systems designed specifically for itself instead of purchasing 'off the shelf'? What is wrong with letting another country make a proven weapon system and then buying a manufacturing license like Iraq, Iran, India and other countries do with Russia while we stick to designing superiority weapons like the F22 and the next generation attack submarine? The US is designing a future destroyer. So is Britain. Why not buy destroyers from Britain?
We have (had?) an industrial base and can always build more arms and armor if the need arises.
Just my opinion, but -
If we depend on other countries to supply our weapons what happens when they no longer like us? Administrations change, and we could be left in a bind. Obama wants to eliminate several of our modern systems like the F-22. Russia is building a stealth fighter that in many ways equals it, and is more maneuverable with better thrust vectoring.
Yes, we do have an industrial base, but if we quit designing and building our own systems the infrastructure for weapons manufacturing will disappear. It would take years to rebuild from scratch. In WW II car makers produced tanks and Jeeps. With today’s systems it would take years to convert. The simple technology of nearly 70 years ago allowed aircraft manufactures to produce fighters and bombers quickly and in mass. That could not happen today.
The idea that all future wars will be like Iraq and Afghanistan is a false idea. Our military had been long accused of preparing to fight the last war. That is no longer the case. We have to be trained and equipped to fight both conventional and unconventional wars. Russia and China are both modernizing and expanding their military. While relations are better than during the Cold War, they’re hardly friendly.
It won’t be large very much longer. obama will see to it. He intends to replace it with his “security force”.
The other peoples stuff is designed to blow up our stuff. if we bought it, it would blow it’s self up. Duh..Use logic!
Well written.
First you make a statement and then support that by proving you have no idea what you are talking about.