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Notes -
My apologies. That slipped my mind.
The primary purpose of any army is the defense of its nation, usually from other countries and their armies. I think the US is doing excellent on that front. As I've said, even if recent efforts to project power abroad have been less than effective, the continental USA is at no risk of invasion. Chinese paratroopers aren't going to land in LA no matter how bad the war in Taiwan goes. The US is too far, it is too geographically blessed. There's no power on Earth that can threaten it on its home turf, and that's before we even consider the nukes.
Could the US have been more sensible? Of course. I agree 100%. But the fact that it can hop on one leg while trying to kick itself in the balls and still be the world power means that the pressure to be smart is less than crushing.
I really don't think that even ten billion dollars would make a noticeable difference to the military budget. That's 0.5% of the F-35 program. Of course, that is because procurement is busted and everything is overpriced, but that's still the way it is. The US war machine is not starved for cash, it's suffering from lack of an effective way to convert the ridiculous amount of money it has into useful materiel. I can't blame the Somalians for that.
A thousand cuts? Fatal to small mammals. A whale might not even notice. It could hemorrhage a liter of blood a day and draw every shark in the Pacific and few would have the balls to bite it (cloaca? Idk). The fact remains that even if the USA isn't acting maximally rationally, it's still doing pretty damn well overall. It's fine to grade on a curve when nobody is going to bomb their homes.
What about the Somali fraudsters robbing American taxpayers? The cartel gangsters? The fentanyl from Chinese precursors that the cartel gangsters import? That's what, 70,000 deaths a year? It's not just China's fault (takes two to die of a fent overdose) but they do use fentanyl precursor exports as part of their diplomatic efforts to impose pressure on America. Fentanyl is an instrument of Chinese power, like the PLA is. A more limited instrument, certainly, but an instrument nonetheless.
There's a divide in international relations between people who just talk about hard power and state warfare as 'security' and then the liberals who talk about food security, energy security, economic security, political security, institutional security...
I think the latter have a point even if they usually express it in a limpwristed way. What good is it if Chinese paratroopers can't land in America but Chinese spies can take wealth out of America, steal the F-35 secrets? Does it matter to Chuck and Hank that their factory didn't get bombed by an H-20, their business was just wrecked by some Chinese hackers stealing their IP, passing it on to domestic firms who undercut them? The result is the same, the latter is better even for China since they didn't have to pay much for the bombs and they expanded their stock of national wealth.
Sure, Chuck and Hank aren't getting bayonets pointed at them, they're not made to salute the Chinese flag. Maybe they're not Minnesotans, living under the Somali flag. Chuck and Hank have lost small, not big... but a small loss is still a loss.
The F-35 is also an example of decadence. All these politicians demand production facilities in their state for political reasons. They aren't interested in the national interest, which would demand a few large production plants for economical production and efficiencies of scale. The bloat and waste is seriously harmful to America, China isn't a minnow that can be slapped aside with a few swipes. America needs to be smart to beat a country 4x bigger.
Or from another angle, the Fang Yuan school of conflict strategy prioritizes these asymmetric, cost-efficient and subversive looting campaigns. 'When weak, subvert the social structure and disguises to extract loot without punishment, use loot to become strong, when strong slaughter and loot openly. Repeat as necessary.' It'd be very easy to say 'oh he's not a big deal, even if he beat us in a few fights and steals a little wealth we're still the rulers of the world, we can lose again and again because of how big and strong we are' but then he shows up in Heavenly Court with Unlimited Qi Sea and they all get very quiet and very serious. They made a big error by not squashing him when he was small.
Just because nobody is bombing American homes right now, doesn't mean it won't happen.
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