RE: http://www.military.com/opinio...15202,192939,00.html

Interesting article - one that almost suggests that the Heritage Foundation might be regretting its previous positions/policy recommendations as given to the Bush Administration.

quote:

North Korea continues to be a significant threat to peace and stability, both on and beyond the Korean peninsula. The peaceful reunification of North and South Korea seems as distant as ever, and there are big questions about a successor to North Korea's ailing Kim Jong-Il. The number of North Korean provocations just since the beginning of the year has been staggering.

The peaceful reunification isn't likely to happen - because S. Korea did the math and determined that (using the East-West reunification of Germany as a model) that the costs are absolutely astronomical. The study fundamentally concluded that by comparison (as much as a basket case East Germany was) the Soviets did a superb job of creating infrastructure, educating the people, and handling the affairs of state. The N. Koreans have no infrastructure, the education system a disaster, millions of people starving, and few viable resources to speak of. This is why you don't hear about reunification any more from S. Korea: financially it would break them (and the US hasn't got the money to spend either).

quote:

While walking out of the Six-Party talks aimed at containing North Korea's nuclear ambitions, Pyongyang last month also conducted its second nuclear test in less than three years and reopened a shuttered nuclear facility that could be used to expand its nuclear arsenal.

Makes you wish the Heritage Foundation didn't recommend that the Bush Administration walk away from its treaty obligations with N. Korea doesn't it? The Clinton deal at this point is looking pretty good, because it required that N. Korea keep the cameras monitoring their nuclear facilities on (which they shut off when GWB walked away from the agreement, and then fiegned surprise that they restarted the program).

quote:

Beyond its involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan and its role as the world's most active state sponsor of terrorism, Iran is looking to project power across the region and beyond as it seeks to become the most powerful country in the Middle East and the Muslim world.

And thanks to the Heritage Foundation (and the other neocon cabal) the US turned down the offer of the Iranians to come to the table (hat in hand) to resolve all issues of the past and start renormalizing relations. They got added to the so-called "axis of evil" in a cheap political stunt and in effect were told they were next. So what would you expect them to do? Sit around wringing their hands hoping that Georgie might be nicey-nice to them? The mullahs might be a lot of things - but stupid isn't one of them. They immediately made deals with the Chinese and Russians to make the diplomatic life of the Bush administrationa s difficult as possible. Then we (with the blessing of the Heritage Foundation, amongst others) invaded Iraq, and effectively removed Irans arch-enemy, thereby making them the power broker in the Middle East, angering our allies, and further imperiling our national security, and dragging the rest of the region down with us.

Yet another collassal failure.

quote:

A top Russian Air Force general this spring claimed that Venezuela could host Russian long-range bombers. This follows the visit of Russian bombers and a small flotilla to Venezuela last year. Cuba was mentioned as a possible home to Russian planes as well. Russia is also looking at reestablishing its Cold War naval base in Syria and is discussing basing rights in Libya and Yemen to forward-deploy warships. Russian strategic bombers are operating widely from bases across Russia, and some have conducted flybys near U.S. Navy aircraft carriers.

Claims are useless unless backed up by action. However, a resurgent Russia is one thing that a deplorably short-sighted foreign policy totally failed to take into account: they wouldn't be helpless forever as they have a large, well educated population, and massive untapped natural resources. But the conservatives persisted in sticking a finger in the eye of the Soviets while they were down - and now that they are on the way back up there is reason for concern. The Russians aren't as dumb as most would like to think, and unlike what passes for conservatives today, don't have the long-term memory of a fruit fly. As if they would forget how they had been treated over the years as we encourage NATO expansion right to their borders? Our government was ready to go to all out war when they put missiles, etc, in Cuba. What makes anyone think they wouldn't be deeply suspicious of NATO expansion?

So now they have resources and are using them to further assert themselves. They would be morons if they didn't - and the short-sighted fools running our foreign policy failed to see this coming.

quote:

The biggest challenge to American military preeminence will come from China. Beijing's unprecedented military buildup has included double-digit increases in defense spending for more than a decade. China now has the world's second-largest defense budget, and Admiral Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has observed that Beijing's military modernization is "very much focused on the United States."

And to think that as a by product of the death of "Pay-go" 7 years ago, the previous administration went on a borrowing spree that deeply indebted the United States to a communist dictatorship. And what tangle benefits did we get for all this borrowing? A vastly damaged international reputation, a lousy economy, an army in tatters, the largest government in the history of the nation, more jobs exported overseas than any time in history, a heavily damaged environment, deeply compromised national security (according to multiple NIEs), and a host of new dangers made worse by 8 years of horrifying incompetence!

It makes me wonder who's side these people are/were on...

It is said that a president inherits the military of his predecessor - and for President Obama he gets land forces that are in their lowest state of readiness since Viet Nam, according to the JCS. That doesn't count all the equipement that needs overhaul or replacement (or the astronomical costs).

Yet many complaints come from the very conservatives that created this collection of economic, military, national, and foreign policy disasters that created them - yet the solutions they provide (if provided at all) are unreasonable, dubious, or never worked the previous times attempted. The republicans chose to follow GWB for better or worse, and failed to make any attempt to curb the excesses of that administration no matter how determental to the nation or our national security.

And now the solution for the republicans is to follow crackpots like Limbaugh, Cheney, and Gingrich because they weren't conservative enough?

This nation needs a credible alternative to the democrats to function as our government was designed to function. The methods championed by Cheney, Limbaugh, and Gingrich are certain to ensure that won't happen.

Pity...

Bush, blah blah blah, Cheney, blah blah blah, Rush, blah blah blah, Gingrich, blah blah blah...

C'mon dude. Do we really want to go back more than 50 years or even farther to point at policy mistakes of ALL US administrations? Pretty easy pointing out what we did wrong after the fact.

The author didn't even blame the current administration, he stated facts that are to be considered for the current administration to take into account BEFORE making decisions.

Let's be objective in the blog for Pete's sake.

quote:

Originally posted by yanqui69:
Bush, blah blah blah, Cheney, blah blah blah, Rush, blah blah blah, Gingrich, blah blah blah...

C'mon dude. Do we really want to go back more than 50 years or even farther to point at policy mistakes of ALL US administrations? Pretty easy pointing out what we did wrong after the fact.

The author didn't even blame the current administration, he stated facts that are to be considered for the current administration to take into account BEFORE making decisions.

Let's be objective in the blog for Pete's sake.

You are correct (and I did allude to this) in that this particular article actually (and reasonably) summarizes the major threats on the horizon (or maybe closer).

But without an understanding of how the situation got to where it is today, we are far more likely to compound the problems rather than address them in a way that improves our circumstances. That isn't to post blame so to speak - but to take into account what other countries are going to be looking at (who tend to hold grudges/memories far longer than most Americans would prefer).

Cheers

Apparently, Brookes now writes his own articles, or maybe not. During the reign of the Bushies, the money was obviously there via the Rendon Group, because Brooks could then afford Ghostwriters to rapidly gin up Defense industry puff pieces---like this one. In fact, from Jan-May of 2007, Brooke's bench of writers churned out 20 articles, today Jan-May 2009---a smoking 8. Certainly there should be more to write about, or did our wars end? Is NKorea compliant? Etc.

What Brookes offers up is the same fear mantra all geared to not cutting defense spending. SECDEF Gates is going to try and kill off some needless programs, and hopefully bring some sanity to the kooky ideas of the ideologues who laid waste to to stout DoD principles across the spectrum: Missile Defense shills deploying a non-operational system, ignoring over 60 years of compliance with the Geneva conventions, and most importantly, replacing Strategy with Bushies' brand of "Strategery."


The only thing missing from this high school gossip column was that cats and dogs are sleeping together. G'day!