Pivot Toward ‘China Rising’? US Military and Place in the World
And there are personnel considerations. The current leaders of the Pentagon — civilian and military — are engaging in near criminal activity. They are allowing the members of our armed forces to be repetitively sent back to fight in the war in Afghanistan three, four and five or more times because that is easier than fighting the Congress, President and news media to increase the size of the Army; even though they know that somewhere around the third or fourth tour, the chances of a service member returning home in a body bag increase substantially.
The military has always been criticized for preparing its forces to fight the wrong war, or the last war now that that war is over. But it is not the military’s job to predict which wars the nation will fight. That is determined by national defense and national security policy, which is determined by the Secretaries of Defense, State and the White House.
For the foreseeable future the US will continue to be the dominant military security leader in the world. It is the military leadership’s job to train and equip these forces to be fierce, flexible and able to carry out the nation’s security roles worldwide, to react to unforeseen threats and to fight and win under all conditions.
While the phrases “A Pivot to Asia” and “China Rising” are catchy and have a nice ring to them, for now the United States is destined to play a dominant role in world security affairs. That is why today the world’s nations look to the armed forces of the US as their court of last resort. This is the role that destiny has carved out for us. No other nation can fill that role.
Our armed forces must be ready at all times to meet that role, provided the Congress and the White House aren’t successful in their current efforts to dull and destroy our military’s sharp fighting edge.
