Here are the two top stories in the latest issue of Foreign Affairs:
- The Bundeswehr Backs Away From the Brink — Since the end of the Cold War, NATO members’ defense expenditures, which include arms as well as personnel and facilities, have dropped dramatically. Now, Germany plans to increase its military spending, in large part to repair and maintain the Bundeswehr’s deteriorating equipment.
- The Battle for Okinawa — Growing discontent in Okinawa has the potential to reverberate beyond Japan’s borders. If Washington and Tokyo wish to maintain the bases there, they must be prepared to address the historical and political issues that have led Okinawans to reject them.
By modern standards, we should all be wringing our hands that we are still not rid of the challenges arising from that mess we got involved in back in 1941.
At the moment, I’m reading a fairly new book about the battle in the Ardennes in December 1944 (a.k.a., Battle of the Bulge), and I’m reminded of how Hitler hoped it might give him a chance to fight to a stalemate in the West, so he could concentrate on his main enemy, Russia.
If some modern American leaders had been in charge back then, he might have succeeded. The nation would be in political shock from the disasters of Market Garden and the Hurtgen Forest, that a modern president might have seized upon the Ardennes as an excuse to quit and seek a negotiated settlement.
Then, he could have bragged about having “ended the war in Europe.” Of course, that would have been totally bogus, but not by our standards today…
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Seriously Brad, another WW II analogy? Really? Ronald Reagan was the only modern president who cut and ran when the going got tough (In Lebanon). Everyone else has pretty much stayed the course until a reasonable exit strategy was negotiated. As much grief as Obama gets for his supposed fecklessness he’s still managed to keep troops in Afghanistan AND send troop back to Iraq!
I wasn’t laying this at the feet of Obama. George W. Bush was ready to get out of Iraq, too, by the end of his term. The American public has very little patience with long-term commitments in the world.
I realize irony is a dangerous tool to use on a blog, but my POINT is that even with the clean, GOOD wars that everyone feels great about, entanglements can go on for … more than 70 years now.
It’s just that to most people — the people who don’t care to read Foreign Affairs — these ongoing complications are invisible.
John McCain was excoriated in 2008 when he said that our involvement in Iraq, done right, could well last a century. This seemed obvious to me (when Bush invaded Iraq, I wrote that he had crossed his Rubicon and taken us with him, and there would be no disentangling ourselves for a LONG time), and I was stunned that other people were stunned.
That’s just the way the world is. We’re still struggling with Okinawa, 71 years after every square inch of that island was purchased with the blood of U.S. Marines (and of Japanese, and of civilian families in Okinawa, who were ordered by their government to commit suicide).
Actions AND inaction have consequences, and they go on for a long, long time. A lot of people seem to have trouble taking that in…
“Actions AND inaction have consequences, and they go on for a long, long time.”
And WWII was a very, very big “action”, so I think it’s natural to expect big consequences.
I am cautiously hopeful to hear that Germany is spending more money on its military hardware. For so long, one of the large consequences of WII was the (understandable) hesitancy of Germany to invest in its military, or do anything that even came close to smelling like nationalism. They kind of had a bad experience with it, so that’s understandable.
However, time marches on. At some point, Germany does need to step up and assert itself as a Western power who will stand shoulder to shoulder with other Western democracies, and bear weight in a military manner.
But let’s not let them get carried away. Once they get a thing in their mind, the Germans really…go with it.
As for Okinawa, I have to say that I’m disappointed. The US presence in Japan balances against China. If we left Japan, that would be a huge win for China, and it would be another step towards that part of the world being a “Chinese Lake”.
Oh, and don’t think for a minute that the Chinese have forgotten what the Japanese did to them in WWII. (That’s another one of those WWII consequences that is still simmering out there.)
If we left Japan, that would be a huge win for China, and it would be another step towards that part of the world being a “Chinese Lake”.
-Bryan
Since we would save money by leaving Japan that would be a win for us. Japan would be rid of the controversial American military presence; a win for them. And since as you suggest the Chinese will have their own lake, suggesting a huge win, the what we have is a Win, Win, Win situation. As Stephen Covey says that’s exactly what we should strive for. 🙂
“Since we would save money by leaving Japan that would be a win for us.”
No. You fundamentally misunderstand the entire role of the US Navy. The Navy does not exist to simply sit in our home waters and protect the coast of the United States. Our Navy is designed to operate overseas, to operate forward, to fight “away games”. By being projected forward, the US Navy provides a US voice and presence where we wish to influence events.
“Japan would be rid of the controversial American military presence; a win for them.”
No, it would not be a “win” for Japan. The overwhelming majority of the Japanese people want the US presence to remain there because they aren’t dummies. The military bases in Japan are an integral part of the treaty we have with Japan to defend Japan from a third party’s attack. Are you advocating that we renounce our treaty with Japan, and just let them build up their own Navy?
Everybody should have a Carolina dog at least once– WAR IS BAD
My son has one. They told him at the shelter when he was a pup that he was a German Shepherd. That’s not what he grew up to be…
Is this a German Shepherd? I ask you…
I don’t know what it is, but I can tell you that’s no German Shepherd. I had a GSD for six years. Best dog ever.
It’s a Carolina Dog. Has to be.