An interesting argument. James Kitfield's Prodigal Soldiers* also tells the story of how the junior officers of Vietnam rose to be the senior leaders of Desert Storm, and how the former shaped the latter.

While it's almost inconceivable to me that anyone could surpass the United States in military power anytime soon--the economic resources needed to do so are enormous--it's always a possibility. Not in the short term, I think: we're spending more in this year's military budget than the rest of the world combined spends on theirs. I'm not sure who out there can afford $300 billion, let alone has the available land to establish things like National Training Center. Absent some quantum leap in technology that obviates our economic-technological advantage, it's hard to see how we could fail.

You're correct that the major danger comes from within. We could indeed get too complacent. While I was glad Rumsfeld cut Crusader and see no reason to build the F-22, we can't go indefinitely with 1980s technology. Bush talked about "skipping a generation" of weaponry in the 2000 campaign. That strikes me as prudent given our current advantage. But I'm not sure I see a lot of evidence that the next generation is being well funded.

*Disclaimer: My company, Brassey's, published the paperback edition of Kitfield's book but it was a major bestseller in hardcover with its original publisher.

The nature of the War against Terror makes me hope that Victory Disease won't be a problem. I can't conceive of a definitive victory. The best that could happen would be for the problem to decline in importance to a policing or patrolling requirement. Fruitcake terrorists will always be with us. One thing the war of Iraqi liberation showed, though, is that no army in the world can take on America tank for tank or man for man. At some point defeat - or the cost of stalemate - makes the losers realize there's no use competing any more, e.g., the Russians in the Cold War. The performance of Russian weapons systems in the Iraq war is surely making a lot of dictators look askance at their T-72s.

See Bill Whittle's latest, "Victory". No, go on, I'll wait; if you haven't already you need to do so right now. The rest of you, review the last two paragraphs.

Now apply that thought to the military.

If we do in fact succeed in spreading the American Way of Life, other countries will in fact achieve at least military parity with the United States, because they'll be using the same tools.

The hardware will get cheaper, and more efficient, so you'll need less of it. Concrete bombs, anyone?

And, of course, the world might even become a less threatening place, so our military will shrink. Yaay!

I hope for the day when all nations can arm themselves with nukes, and not be considered rogue or imperial, even as I hope for the day that all US citizens can arm themselves with guns, and not be considered thugs or subversives.

I hope for the day that all nations become equals with the US.

We need the competition, or we'll get stale and bloated.

"I hope for the day when all nations can arm themselves with nukes, and not be considered rogue or imperial"
I hope that was a joke. The concept of a nuclear Iran, Palestine, North Korea, Zimbabwe... the mind boggles.

Well, Joel, if you're willing to argue with a guy who misspells his own screen-name....

The point of my post was my hope that someday, all nations can be trusted with nukes at least as much as the present day U.S., because the U.S. model has proven itself to be so successful that everybody has adopted it (or has adopted another model that has proven to work at least as well).

If everyone were as rich and successful as we are now, if everyone had gone through the phases of national introspection and contrition that we have, if every citizen of every nation on Earth (or off it) grew up with our experience and expectation of freedom, why should we not trust them with nukes?

How would a Saddam or Aidid fare in such world? How could such tyrants arise?

For awhile now, I've had this wild idea that the US has, for the last few decades, been going through a kind of national adolesence -- the first nation in the history of the world to do so. We are growing up, throwing off the p/matriachal restraints of gods and kings, taking the responsibilities and reaping the rewards of adulthood.

In this view, our handling of the Middle East -- not just Iraq, but the whole kit and kaboodle -- is a kind of final exam. We want everybody to grow up so that they, too, can earn the right to arm themselves as we have.

Anything else leads us into the hated imperialist role.