[Southack]

I'm not really thrilled with the article for this thread, but the pictures are nice.

Anyway, what better place than this thread to mention the obvious:

The U.S. has the world's mightiest military due to an amazing combination of technology, training, and integration.

It is the integration that is the least understood. Our soldiers on the ground are digitally linked through HQ to every unit in the skies and in the rear, and thus coordinated into highly effective local tactics that fit in with the overall strategy.

What does all of this mean? It means that simply copying American technology *won't* give pipsqueak nations a competitive force to challenge us. It means that simply adapting our training won't allow another nation to match us.

But what the Iraq war illustrates is something even more amazing: that even with ex-Soviet military advisors, the latest in French and German military equipment, the breaking of all military rules of acceptable behavior, and willing suicide volunteers, that a 600,000 man army is little more than modern roadkill for any sizeable U.S. military force (in this case, 1/6th the size of the defenders).

Or put another way: the rest of the world is failing to match the U.S. in *any* significant category (e.g. technology, training, integration, et al).

And the so-called "great equalizers" are being threatened by our new dominance in ABM interception technology, special forces operations in strategic areas, as well as our electronic eavesdropping capabilities.

Thus, the rest of the world is not only wasting every penny that it spends to try to compete with our own military, but it is also playing into our strong suit by insisting upon military solutions to conflicts with us (a *clever* Iraq would have played a South Africa-style hand, completely disarmed in an open, visible fashion, and simply held on until GWB was no longer in office, for instance).

So North Korea wants a nuclear war with us and old Europe wants an economic trade war with us, the strongest economy in the history of this entire planet?!

B.r.i.n.g. I.t. O.n.

[WOSG]

Or put another way: the rest of the world is failing to match the U.S. in *any* significant category (e.g. technology, training, integration, et al). And the so-called "great equalizers" are being threatened by our new dominance in ABM interception technology, special forces operations in strategic areas, as well as our electronic eavesdropping capabilities.

Well said. We really are #1 superpower and even armies late cold war era technology are no match for us. France's 1 supercarrier is a leaky bucket, Russia has an army not much different from Iraq's of unmotivated conscripts. etc.

No wonder they were scared about this. WE ALL KNOW that if these other selfish powers had this supremacy they would abuse it. BUT WE WONT.

[<1/1,000,000th%]

The U.S. has the world's mightiest military due to an amazing combination of technology, training, and integration.

Not to be too picky, but more fundamentally it results from our much greater freedom to pursue our own interests as individuals that results in the only economy in the world capable of fielding such a military. That and the brave and patriotic souls who understand that "freedom is not free".

[WaterDragon]

That sounds good!