The Troop Withdrawal

I'm going to have to come right out and say this: I agree with President Bush. Reducing our overseas troop commitments is a good idea. I've wondered for a while now why we still have so many troops in Germany and other Cold War hotspots. They're not hot anymore. Our defense spending is outlandish and much of it is still geared towards massive conventional warfare, something that is simply not as relevant now as it used to be. We need to make cuts and reductions, and this plan was as good as any I've seen.

John Kerry's objections, covered here in the Washington Post, just don't seem very objectionable. His protest on South Korea just doesn't make sense. If we decide we need to deal with North Korea militarily, we'll need far more manpower than the 30,000 troops now stationed there. And if North Korea were to stage an attack on the South, the difference between us having 20,000 or 30,000 troops is nil. In either case they would get steamrolled by the North Korean military. Their purpose there is not to be able to stop an invasion. Our troop strength there is not even close to that level. They're there to up the ante, so that if North Korea invades, a bunch of American kids will get killed, and we will be obligated to go in there and kick some ass.

Likewise I disagree with Kerry's assertion that this plan "does not strengthen our hand in the war on terror" or reduce strain on the military. How can bringing home 70,000 troops from foreign commitments not increase the flexibility of military staffing and troop rotation? It doesn't make any sense.

Our military spending it totally out of control and we need to find ways to get more for our money. That means we need to take a good hard look at where that money is going and not be afraid to make hard cuts where we can. I applaud this decision by the Bush administration.