Quote:
Originally Posted by Seahawk
Rick,
They are a wealthy, modern nation. Let them create the right mix of Army, Air Force and Navy to fend off their enemy. Why don't we have 34k in all of our top, say, ten, trading partners?
Beside, our force there is little more than a trip wire...even our 30 thousand dudes and dudettes will be a skid mark should NK come across. Beside, Shaun could use the textile work  |
We have far more than 34k troops near our top two trading partners, which are our northern and southern neighbors and they pose no threat whatsoever. So. Korea has a pretty large military on its own and I have no doubt they'd prevail against the North, even if they had to fight them without Japan's or our help. But that doesn't mean there are no consequences in it for us. If deterring the North required something like 500k troops, then I'd say we need to review that one. But 34k troops are just a tripwire force. They're a symbol of our commitment should anything happen there and that alone keeps bad things from happening. I think it's a good bang for the buck. Any failure of that deterrent would immediately cost more than 100 yrs. of keeping those troops there.