Quote:
Originally Posted by piercehawkeye45
How are we kicking a dead horse? I'm assuming that was an analogy and not just worthless rambling?
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We need to use our common sense in developing our policies - whether inside the country, or our foreign policy.
Let history be your guide here. We were weak before WWI, and we lost a lot of soldiers because we were unprepared, and our soldiers were horribly under trained when they arrived at the front.
After the "War to end all wars", we naturally let our military disband largely, and stopped looking like a first class military nation. Other nations, like the UK, did the same thing.
Shortly thereafter, Hitler came to power, and Germany started rebuilding it's military. We were weak, the UK was weak. Poland was terribly weak, and the French had actually gone back to using HORSES for some of their army transport! Russia with Stalin, had just killed off most of their top military leaders, because Stalin feared them. They were woeful at that time.
With that weakness all around of course Hitler felt encouraged to bully and bluster, and finally, go to war with them!
We couldn't believe it! Neither could most of the people in the UK. They were kicking the dead peace horse, waiting for it to run again and carry us all to a lasting peace.
But that horse was really dead.
Thinking that we'll have little need for a strong foreign policy, and the ability to project military strength today, is just lunacy. There is a LOT of instability in the Middle East. North Korea is a chronic hot spot, as is the recent squabbles with China and Japan over some islands that lie between them.
And then there's Al Qaeda and their several associated groups, that are quite active in Mali, Sinai, Syria, Libya, Tunisia, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, etc.
With the UK so very weak - NO aircraft carriers for now, and the French being headed by a Socialist, We need to be alert, and not knocking down the number of ships in our Navy.