We're not bankrupt because we projected power into the Middle East. We're bankrupt because we've been pissing away trillions of $$$ here at home on welfare programs to buy votes from political constituencies, and to guarantee campaign contributions from crony capitalists, since LBJ was in office.
Small government shouldn't mean stupid government. We didn't have a big government when President Jefferson sent the Marines to clean up Tripoli. (Our first big run-in with Islam and, as we all should know, you either defend yourselves against the followers of the pedophile prophet or they kill you or enslave you.)
President Jefferson sent the Marines to clean up Tripoli as a means to protect American shipping.
If he had done that to protect Danish ships flagged in Bermuda or the Cayman Islands, with crews of Filipinos, carrying cargo from Asia to Europe ... he would have been set on fire on the front lawn of Monticello.