An end to the Afghan war?

[durak]

I'll try and address as many points as possible.

1. The Constitution does not authorize us to maintain military bases in 130 out of 190 countries. Our presence in many of these countries has unintended consequences, known as "blow back," a well documented theory by our own Central Intelligence Agency. Let us divorce ourselves from the constitutional argument for a moment, and say that our constitution did authorize our military presence in these nations, we can no longer AFFORD to maintain a military presence in all these countries, we are broke. It is a simple matter of economics. The greatest super powers in history were never brought down by armed conflict, they were brought down because they went broke. The Romans and the USSR, both large superpowers of their day, crumbled because they ran out of many, not because they were defeated militarily.

2. The Constitution does not authorize entangling allia-nces's. Once again, our 'support' of Israel both with weapons and monetarily is not authorized by our Constitution. The founders realized the dangers of entangling a-lliance's, and they said "Trade with all, allies with none"(or something to that effect). Additionally, our support of Israel and the meddling of affairs of countries in the Middle East emboldens our enemies and further contributes to the "blow back" principle our CIA warns us about. The bombs we dropped in Iraq and Afghanistan has done more to bolster Al-Qaeda and other extremist group recruiting efforts than they could have ever done without us. Every time we receive bad intelligence and kill innocent civilians over there, it does nothing except to expand the recruitment efforts of extremist groups who preach hate towards America and the West.

3. We have always achieved more in trading with nations than we ever have in bombing them. A military presence around the world is not a necessity to be prosperous. China has a hugely successful economy, and yet they do not have large military bases in countries throughout the world, that is proof enough that a military presence is not necessary for a successful economy. Our foreign policy needs to be reevaluated as it does much to embolden our enemies, and little to keep us safe. Anyone who believes we need such a large military presence in that many countries, in order to protect the contingent 48 states, and 2 satellite states from attack, is sorely mistaken. There exist very few countries with the ability to invade our mainland, and the only two countries who have that ability would never come to that, via M.A.D.D.

We ought to be following the advice and guidance of the founding fathers of our country. We would be much better off if we had done so. 1 trillion dollars per year could be spent at home improving the quality of life of the citizens of this country, rather than being used to maintain an EMPIRE around the world. Or better yet, 1 trillion dollars a year could not be SPENT AT ALL, to pass on a tax savings to the citizens of this country to REALLY stimulate our economy. Many have been brainwashed into believing our military presence is a necessary evil in so many of these countries, and quite the opposite is true. Military sanctions are an ACT OF WAR, and they hurt no one but the innocent civilians of the countries we sanction, but very little to hurt the governments of these countries.

I hope that many of you take a much harder look at American foreign policy, and I encourage many of you to read books written by Ron Paul, Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan, and other principled conservative Republicans who understand what it means to be a true conservative and to have a humble foreign policy.

lol... i hope you feel better... please do not lump ron paul in the same group/sentence as Ronald Reagan.

Why is it that you nutters on the right and left always leave these massive posts that wander all over the place and do nothing to address the point at hand? lol...

I am editing this because after reading your post again, I do not think you are even a ron paul supporter. You are a lefty trying to act like a ron paul supporter. lol...

This statement alone proves your ignorance about the state of world affairs. "China has a hugely successful economy, and yet they do not have large military bases in countries throughout the world, that is proof enough that a military presence is not necessary for a successful economy."

Using Communist China as an example of an economy that we should strive for.... sad, so sad. Having been all over china I can tell you that their economy is build on slave labor, child labor, disregard for environmental factors, and outright disdain for the lives of the people in their economy. WE are the only reason they have not attacked taiwan and put forth plans to take over the rest of their region.

And the Chinese DO have troop all over south america, central america, and africa...

By the way, it was the arms race with russia that sucked up so much money that they could not handle the decline in the price of oil.... I bet you did not even know it was the decline in the price of oil that brought down the soviet union...lol...