I don't necessarily agree with its conclusions, but this post from Daniel Goure is worth reading:
The last time there was a major reduction in military forces was in the early 1990s at the end of the Cold War. Then the military was reduced by nearly 40 percent. Since that time, four administrations, Democrat and Republican, have found this posture the one they required and used. In the 1990s, even before September 11 and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the utilization rate for the new force posture increased fourfold compared with what it was during the Cold War. The use rate has gone through the roof. This trend will, if anything, increase, given the Obama Administrationâ??s new focus on building partnership capacity, Africa and assisting failing states.
Goure sees this as a good thing and a reason why the defense budget should not be cut. I don't, but you can certainly see how the U.S. set itself on a completely unsustainable course as it tried to cash in on the peace dividend of the Cold War's end, while simultaneously trying to take advantage of the strategic vacuum left by the Soviet collapse with a bout of mindless interventionism.
As it does with other big ticket items like entitlements, Washington has worked assiduously to hide the costs and trade-offs of the policies it has pursued, rather than address them squarely and responsibly. If you want an activist, Big Government posture abroad, then you should pay for it and be clear where taxpayer dollars are going and why. If you want to spend less, you need to do less.
