[totalZero]

How do you propose that we maintain an all-volunteer military without recruitment?

Returning veterans are going to carry military culture back into civilian life. That's just the reality of the situation after so many years in Iraq and Afghanistan.

China is a real threat to American primacy and this time the battle is economic, but there are major military risks and we can't carry a big stick unless we keep the military in shape.

[kotaKat]

I don't know, fix the current active retention problems ranging from straight up moldy barracks to various issues with access to food and DFAC quality to toxic leadership at every level of the chain of command across the organization?

[avgcorrection]

Isn’t the idea that America needs to retain its “primacy” Jingoism as well? It’s as if you are answering someone being upset (well, or don’t-like-much) about Jingoism with well, how America No. 1 if not with Jingoism?

[totalZero]

Not if you have access to a dictionary, no.

There are a few differences between eminence and extremism. One is measured by its fruits, and the other is detached from its fruits.

[dragonwriter]

> How do you propose that we maintain an all-volunteer military without recruitment?

Did I miss where the poster you are responding to called for maintaining an all-volunteer military, a thing that was created to allow the government to engage in military adventurism that the public would not support with the cadre + universal militia model that the US relied on for its first ~200 years?

[testacct22]

> American primacy

Why talk about this like it's an end in itself? There's an opportunity cost involved

Other NATO countries combined spend less than the US. At what point is it enough?

[bllguo]

Major military risks? Spare me. America is under zero threat of any attack; a child looking at a map could tell you this.

[totalZero]

What happens to the price of a laptop if China invades Taiwan?

[hakfoo]

If that's a fear worth courting WWIII over, shouldn't we have been considering the strategic importance of manufacturing stuff domestically for... IDK, the last forty years?

TBH, I wonder if it would be worth tossing off a few political flashpoints in the name of greater global stability. Hand over Taiwan on a silver platter in exchange for long-term friendship and economic concessions. Could we get to a place where the relationships between major powers is more of "a loose partnership of equals with broad leeway for dissent" rather than "the US surrounded by imminent threats to US hegemony"?

We're going to need China on our side for the next 50-100-200 years. In fact, the China that's currently being villianized is a more valuable partner than some fantasy "one day they wake up and switch to Western democracy" China, because they expand the tools available to respond to the next grand crisis.

[krapp]

Why should I be willing to die for the price of a laptop?

[rainclouds]

Like we make that choice. Drawn in with sex and sent to die for transistors seems Pretty accurate if you look at past utilization for resources.