If Threats Are Rising Why Is The Obama Administration Down-Sizing The Military?

Micahel O'Hanlon, WSJ: Obama’s Military Policy: Down-Size While Threats Rise

A deliberate strategy shift to a smaller standing army risks leaving the U.S. unable to fight when necessary.

The Obama administration’s official policy on U.S. military ground forces is that they should no longer be sized for possible “large-scale prolonged stability operations.” The policy was stated in the administration’s 2012 Defense Strategic Guidance, and dutifully reasserted last year in the Pentagon’s signature planning document known as the Quadrennial Defense Review.

“Stabilization operations” can include the range of missions spanning counterinsurgency, state-building, large-scale counterterrorism, and large-scale relief activities conducted in anarchic conditions. Though constraints like sequestration have limited the money available for the U.S. military, the Obama policy calling for a smaller standing ground army reflects a deliberate strategy shift and not just a response to cost-cutting, since some other parts of the military are not being reduced.

WNU Editor: I am old enough to remember when the U.S. had a policy of being able to fight two major wars at once .... now .... it looks like they may have a problem on handling just one.