In our new, nuanced age, we don't even wait for the "last war" to be safely put in the past before we prepare to refight it:
Since World War II, all military preparations have been centered on the concept of the force being able to fight two separate major conflicts while still retaining the ability to protect the U.S.
Earlier this month, Joint Chiefs Vice Chairman Marine Gen. James Cartwright told the Senate Armed Services Committee that the QDR would move away from that strategy in favor of “one that is acknowledging of the fact that we are not in that type of conflict” and preparing for future fights similar to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Ochmanek softened that stance, saying officials involved in the four-year defense review are confident that, even with the changes, the military will be able to fight two major wars.
Unwilling to pay for a military to defend our assessed needs? No problem. Define the problem down. All wars will be counter-insurgency fights like Iraq or Afghanistan, this thinking goes.
First of all, does anybody really believe that President Obama or his party allies controlling Congress would fight the next "last wars" (Iraq and Afghanistan COIN campaigns) again any time soon? Hah! I count ourselves lucky we won in Iraq and wonder if our Congress will show the determination we need to win in Afghanistan.
Second, saying we will downgrade our abilities from a "two war" strategy ignores that we don't have a "two war" strategy. We have the ability to fight two wars "nearly simultaneously." That's quite a bit different. (See here for a discussion)
Third, protests that we'll still actually have the ability to fight those two wars will rest on whatever we've spent already that won't erode year after year under new spending and planning guidance. Eventually that residual capability will disappear.
So we'll prepare to fight two future wars we're sure will be the same as the wars we fight now (but which we'll never actually fight in the next 10 years for lack of political will) and reduce our ability eventually to fight two conventional foes even nearly simultaneously.
So with a military reduced again, we'll eventually perhaps have a military capable of really only fighting one campaign. And when we lack the force necessary to even hold in a second campaign while we seek to win in the first, we'll always have to debate whether it is safe to commit our military to the campaign in question since it will leave us without the means to fight a second foe if that foe takes advantage of our commitment of troops to war elsewhere.
Ah, the newest generation of the best and brightest to afflict our national security.
