One day in the future, most (if not all) U.S. forces will be out of Iraq and the massive retooling of the U.S. military will commence.
Equipment needs will be properly addressed, lessons learned from the Iraq War will be taught to new generations of soldiers, and military technology will take several leaps forward. Tomorrow's U.S. military will be deadlier and more efficient than ever before.
Along with manpower, equipment, technological needs, planning the next war will be addressed.
In that planning, I hope that U.S. politicians and military leaders never again plan on using the military in nation building, except if it's part of our country that they're trying to help rebuild, or disaster relief services, such as those provided by the U.S. military to the South Asian region of the world after the disastrous tsunami of December 2004.
Nation building is not for the military.
The U.S. military has two jobs: to kill the enemy, and to break things. That's what their training is for, that's what their equipment is meant to do. That means they go in, do their jobs, and then leave. If they're not doing that, they should be not involved with the situation.
If any future Commander-in-Chief decides to use a military option, he or she must be determined to destroy whatever they're choosing to attack, whether it's a terrorist training camp, or an enemy nation. If they've decided to use our nation's military might to solve a problem, that decision should not be made lightly.
Conquering another nation is prohibitively expensive, in terms of lives lost, material losses, collateral damage, loss of goodwill, and the myriad of other problems that arise when one nation occupies another. We've learned this from the Iraq War.
It's safe to say that America's experiment with invading other nations to effect regime change is effectively over. It's proven to be too costly to consider repeating.
I hope the planners think this out carefully.
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