U.S. Military Needs to Step Down

Military Needs to Step Down

General Creighton Abrams said, "There must be within our Army, a sense of purpose. There must be a willingness to march a little farther, to carry a heavier load, to step out into the dark and the unknown for the safety and well-being of others (United States)." U.S. military troops are indeed marching farther and farther, expanding into different nations at this very moment: Afghanistan, Egypt, Indonesia, Columbia, Japan, and 58 other countries. However, this isn't what Abrams had in mind. In total, there are 255,065 U.S. military personnel deployed worldwide (Sivitz). But who assigned the U.S. military the task of serving as an international police force? For years, U.S. political and military strategists have conceived a fraudulent justification for increased military deployment that they call "The Global War on Terrorism." Did someone call them for immediate help? Did someone give them the right to occupy and invade? The answer is a resounding "No." In other words, the U.S. does not have the right to intervene in the matters of other nations. It is true that universally distributed military bases are not only for military occupation, but also for training, storage, and security. However, the public is mostly ignorant of the extent of the economic, diplomatic, and ethical damage that such occupation creates. The U.S. needs to step down from their so-called position as international policemen and withdraw their troops because it is weakening the country domestically, hurting its influence abroad, and is in conflict with international laws and relations.

One may ask where the idea began that the U.S. would assume the role of international police force and economic advisor? Briefly, that role was a result of the events that took place at the end and just after World War II. America had not been invaded, and had an economy that was growing stronger and indeed was one of the only major powers whose homeland was untouched by the ravages of World War II (with the exception of Pearl Harbor). Once the war ended, Josef Stalin, understandably paranoid about the military and civilian causalities during the war, set up a buffer zone across Eastern Europe and, in response to the U.S.'s Marshall Plan to aid Europe, began to funnel money into developing countries that either had been part of Europe's colonial Empire, or were in line for a new governmental system. If one imagines looking at the globe in 1946, the Soviet Union would see Japan as occupied by the United States, a looming presence in the Pacific and Indo-China by the United States, a Europe being propped up by the Marshall Plan and extreme loyalty to the Americans, an American economy still tooled for war, American technology far surpassing any the Soviets had at that moment, and finally a new President (Truman) who was strongly opposed to any Soviet grab for territory (Aid). Thus, with the only really functioning economy, the United States became the major protagonist against Soviet aggression during the aptly termed, "Cold War" (Hopf, 1999).

The Cold War with the Soviet Union was based, really, on a high level of mistrust. After World War II the Americans had nuclear weapons capability, they had not been invaded so were on better footing economically, and the Soviet's need for buffer "protective" zones in Eastern and Southern Europe. Then, of course, there was the nature of the Soviet State -- the aim of spreading world communism, and American President Harry Truman's personal dislike and distrust of Joseph Stalin. It was this role that dominated Foreign Policy, military spending, and even personified regional conflicts in Korea, Vietnam, and finally the Middle East for the next several decades.

However, any discussion of the legitimacy of the U.S. military presence abroad must begin by stating that, from a practical standpoint, sustaining the military troops and bases in foreign lands negatively affects the U.S. Although it significantly reinforces the global authority of the U.S. army, the military's international presence hinders the overall welfare of the U.S. and, contrary to popular belief, fails to stimulate the economic development of the U.S.