Support the Troops, end the wars

Fighting a war, conflict, whatever you choose to call it, without the political will to win is pointless, demoralizing, and unethical. At the risk of sounding like a warmonger I think that in order to fight we must fight to win. Win in reality, not in sound-bites and photo-ops. That means destruction and death on both sides. We have the military capability, the willingness of volunteers, and sheer American determination to win any war. Without the government behind us there is no reason for our troops to try stabilizing a country that has no sense of itself.

Bring our guys back, or at the least pull back to forward bases like Germany, Kuwait, Italy. Oh, and stop selling our stuff to Iraq. The terrorists just steal what the Iraqis don't give them outright.

CPT Zachary Brooks As you probably expected, I was one of those Ron Paul supporters. I've also mentioned elsewhere on RP my support for a Non-Intervensionist foreign policy as envisioned by the founders. A condition of endless war is highly destructive of liberty.

Then, on the personal side, remembering brothers in arms who have spilled their blood for a piece of dirt now owned my the enemy is....frustrating.
https://www.rallypoint.com/answers/who-do-you-remember-fallen-and-deceased

I'm a libertarian. I am. And what I am about to say is going to SOUND contrary to that.

America maintains a large Military Force so others don't.

It's counter-intuitive.

It sounds stupid.

But if you have every country in the world maintaining a fair size military, the chances of a global conflict happening are more likely than if you have one country maintaining a huge military and the rest maintaining just enough force to guard their borders.

I don't want us to be "world police." The idea disgusts me. I don't think we can be trusted with it. I don't think anyone can be trusted with it.

But, the less standing armies there are, the less chances for war there are.

Us maintaining this huge global presence promotes Global Stability. Global Stability is good for EVERYONE. The fact that it has to be done with a monopoly of force is frankly sad. I wish it could be done another way. Someday I hope it could be done another way.

But... if we weren't present in the middle east, how long before Iran rolled into Saudi? If we weren't present in Japan & SK, how long before NK, decided the DMZ didn't apply to them.

Us drawing down our military doesn't help the world. It makes us feel good, because somewhere along the way game changed from War to Defense to Stability, but nobody bothered to update the Dept's name again... so we're thinking of it in outdated terms.