If the answer is invested for long term results then it will appear as a net cost until the returns start flowing in.

But in the long run it doesn’t matter. When a withdrawal precipitates a world war and we know we are in a fight for our lives everything will work out in the long run. At a much higher cost.

Think – the Rhineland Incident – 1936.

The Anglosphere.

Yeah, you mischaracterized what I said. That is objectionable.

“I know you’re not a ‘US out of everywhere type’”.

Correct. Then respond accordingly.

Otherwise, it seems we are in agreement.

Mr. Green: I confess that I am quite confused by your apparent strong objection to my comment. I was of course responding to the lines of yours that I quoted. I placed what I thought were appropriate caveats in my comment to pre-emptively address the objection that I went beyond what you clearly proposed (i.e., I know you’re not a “US out of everywhere type”) because without knowing what you mean by “a quieter and less brusque game” I don’t see why it would “be all to the good.”

I don’t see how one can refer to “the Iraqi tar baby” and then compare Iraq to Germany & Japan. A “tar baby” is something that one wants to get away from completely, and so the implication of that phrasing is certainly that we should completely withdraw all US forces.

I agree with you 100% that American hegemony is good, and without foreseeable end.

What is meant by ‘rich’ when the US is in hock to its eyeballs with
$44 trillion of unfunded SS and medicare liabilities, and growing by $2 trillion annually?

The $45 Trillion Problem

We will no more “leave” Iraq than we have “left” Germany or Korea. That is what McCain’s comment about 100 years meant.

But we are going to reduce our commitment in Iraq whoever the next President is. Iraqis are going to take the lead. And Iraq will drift farther back into the newspaper, as it has been doing. That process will go on. Americans as a practical matter do not care how many foreigners kill each other. As long as our people are not dying it becomes a political non-issue.

Our enemies will not feel themselves to be losers. Merely by tying us down as they have, they have won the war of perceptions. The so-called superpower got stuck in the swamp. That is a win for the bad guys.

More importantly, counterinsurgencies do not have victory parades. They end when your erstwhile enemies come out in the open and make a political deal. Jerry Adams gets photographed in front of 10 Downing St. The bombers get amnesty, they away with it. A deal is made. That is how these kinds of struggles end, when they are “successful”. So, your condition is not going to be met, no matter what happens.

It’s not optional to leave Iraq under any other condition than for our enemies to have felt themselves the loser.

To do anything else guarantees a more vicious world and even more need to use the American military.

The whole reason to ratchet down the Iraq mess is to preserve our power and capability, and lives and treasure, which are being consumed in Iraq. I am in favor of preserving American hegemony. Paul Kennedy has a classic article entitled “Why did the British Empire last so long”, in his book Strategy and Diplomacy 1870–1945. One reason was that the British avoided major conflicts and tried to keep the economic wheels on by doing this quietly on the periphery.

Will it really? Say we withdrew as many military forces as we could from everywhere. (Yes, I know that we’re not really going to do this, despite the hopes of the fevered left.) Even brought all our carriers into port. (It’s a bit amusing to worry about being eclipsed when the ratio of US carriers to the rest of the world is 12 to 0). Would that really be “all to the good” for the world? I expect we’d see vast regions begin to slide into Somali/Afghan anarchy.

As to the US being “replaced”, the only way anyone will be as strong as us is if they’re as rich as us. To be as rich as us, they’ll have to be as free as us. And if they’re as free as us, that’ll be wonderful news.