Originally Posted by Sly

I'm not really all that convinced of this. I am not a China and Russia fearmonger. I don't think a war would happen easily. It would take a lot. But discounting the sheer size of the Chinese military (we can't forget India and North Korea, they are strong Chinese allies with massive militaries as well) doesn't make sense to me. And the willingness of Russians military cannot be discounted either.

Even so. We don't need a war with China or Russia to need a large military. The "war" in Iraq and Afghanistan have proven this. You split up your forces and you have serious, serious problems.

All it would take is a battle of some sort in South America, which is totally possible, and a battle of some sort in Africa/Asia, again totally possible. Now you have troops, supplies, equipment, commanders, and logistics 20,000 miles away from each other.

I'm all for technology. I want more of it. And I want it better. But shrinking our 1.4 million strong military does not make that much sense to me. Which of our allies has a similar military size? Any of them?

Now let's talk about our "non-allies." China, over 2 million. India, over 1 million. Iran, 500,000. North Korea, over 1 million. Russia, over 1 million.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...tary_personnel
Click the down arrow by active military.

Of the top 10, the only other Western ally is Korea, and their size is only a third of ours.