America's Dangerous Rush to Shrink Its Military Power

Wall St Journal ^ | dec 27, 2010 | MARK HELPRIN

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“As for Europe and the rest of the free world, the USA basically said “Don’t worry about it, WE’LL look after defense against the communist bloc, or anything else that might come up.””

That’s my point. It was idiotic of the U.S. to do that for 50+ years. Those countries should have been cut loose decades ago.

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"That’s my point. It was idiotic of the U.S. to do that for 50+ years. Those countries should have been cut loose decades ago."

I agree with your point, but it's probably also why western europe has enjoyed it's longest period of peace.

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“I agree with your point, but it’s probably also why western europe has enjoyed it’s longest period of peace. “

True, but if the Western European nations aren’t willing to do what it takes to defend themselves then they don’t deserve freedom. I’m all for helping but we took over too much of the task of protecting Europe.

Europe, Japan, and South Korea have also greatly benefited from the fact that they didn’t have to spend huge amounts of money on their own military, leaving more money to build factories to compete with us.