While You Were Sleeping (Or What About China)

Since 9/11 this nation and the Bush administration have been nearly totally focused on the Middle East. One can understand this focus in light of such a horrendous and vicious terrorist attack. Since, and in response to that event we have gone to war in Afghanistan with some success but still not catching the actual culprit responsible for 9/11. We have also gone to war in Iraq without a true coalition and under suspect circumstances and that has turned into a quagmire that our nation’s leader apparently has no clue on how to extract us from. The results of this chaos is that we as a nation and our leaders are so totally focused on the Middle East and have become so isolated from our traditional allies that we no longer have the welfare of our nation nor our roll on the world stage in focus. What I mean by this is that we may not want to believe it but there is a threat out there that is potentially greater than any terrorist threat. Has anyone noticed that China is about as near to a superpower in technological, military, and economic strength as you can get while we have been distracted and marking time.

The United States military has talked of being able to conduct a multi front war for years. This administration has also touted how they have increased military spending and how our military is capable of confronting all threats to our nation on multiple fronts. Well it seems to me that just recently when the chips were down and we were fighting a one front war and experiencing a national natural disaster we didn’t have either the planning or the military strength to deal with it.

I don’t want to seem like Chicken Little and I know the sky is not falling but I also know that it is obvious that we are not prepared. In case our leadership has forgotten the Peoples Republic of China is a communist regime. They are also a nuclear power and have the world’s largest standing army. They are also slicing off bigger and bigger chunks of the world economy and consuming more and more of the world’s oil reserves. What this means to me is that they are at best a serious economic threat that is not being addressed effectively and at worst they are a serious economic and military threat that is not being effectively addressed.

The United States cannot continue to be distracted by misguided foreign and domestic policies. Our nation needs strong Foreign Affairs and Defense Policies along with strong Domestic, Monetary, and Trade policies that take into consideration the true threats to this nation and the other ‘free’ nations of the world. Yes we must focus on and be concerned with terrorism but we must also have a strong foreign affairs policy that is effective in bringing our allies, traditional and new, on board with cohesive defense, monetary and trade policies. The United States can no longer bully itself around the world as this administration would have us do. We are a few 400 million people in a 6 billion people world. If you look at those numbers for purposes of defense or trade they are stacked against us if we intend to be the bully on the block. They are also stacked in our favor if we are trying to profit from being the economic growth catalyst for the world. The key to a truly strong defense of this nation against terrorism and all other threats is not the aggressive invasion of countries in an attempt to install Jeffersonian Democracy but a strong system of allies working in concert sharing intelligence information and law enforcement efforts while forming and improving trade and economic alliances around the world. One would think that a true fiscally conservative administration would understand this concept. Too bad that the one currently in office to quote my children, “don’t have a clue”.

Those are The Sergeant Majors thoughts on that.