Net strength of US armed forces

[padren]

I am just curious how the US armed forces rank right now strength wise, against where we were before afghanistan and iraq.

 

You are only as strong as the forces you have at your disposal to commit, and from what it looks like we are overtaxed with our current deployments. Sure, if WWIII broke out, we'd pull out of Iraq in a hurry and redeploy, but when smaller conflicts arise and hostile leaders view our current strength, it will be with the question of whether we'd be willing to give up on Iraq to engage at full strength, or engage with whatever we have left over.

 

 

If we needed to deploy armed forces tomorrow to a new conflict - how well could we do it?

[ParanoiA]

I am just curious how the US armed forces rank right now strength wise, against where we were before afghanistan and iraq.

 

You are only as strong as the forces you have at your disposal to commit, and from what it looks like we are overtaxed with our current deployments. Sure, if WWIII broke out, we'd pull out of Iraq in a hurry and redeploy, but when smaller conflicts arise and hostile leaders view our current strength, it will be with the question of whether we'd be willing to give up on Iraq to engage at full strength, or engage with whatever we have left over.

 

 

If we needed to deploy armed forces tomorrow to a new conflict - how well could we do it?

 

I'm not sure, but I would think we're crazy strong still. Iraq isn't going to put a true "tax" on our military. If that was the case, I'd be under the impression that we're one of the crappiest militaries in the world. The only reason we have so many committed in that region is politics.

[ecoli]

Sure, if WWIII broke out, we'd pull out of Iraq in a hurry and redeploy,

 

Depends where it broke out, I guess. I have a feeling that a WWIII would be heavily involved in the middle east.

[Sisyphus]

Certainly we could defeat any military in the world in any conventional conflict. That said, I think you're right that Iraq is tying up most of our resources. If we had to fight a major conflict, we would have to pull out of Iraq in order to do so.

 

That doesn't mean we have a weak military, it just means we have an EXPENSIVE military. Firefights in Iraq with insurgents pretty much always go heavily in our favor, but at what cost? Anyone could easily afford the primary weapons of your typical insurgent, militia member, or Al Qaeda grunt. Homemade bombs are easy. There are parts of the world where AK-47s act as currency (roughly equal a chicken in value). And we're lobbing multimillion dollar missles around, and maintaining multibillion dollar bombers. So we can win any fight easily, but the question is, can we win ten fights?

[john5746]

If we needed to deploy armed forces tomorrow to a new conflict - how well could we do it?

 

If North Korea started spilling over in the South, it would be amazing how quickly the Iraq civil war would become unimportant.

 

I think we are better able to respond to conflicts that can be met with technology versus ground troops.

[swansont]

I think it depends on the conflict. If a new conflict allowed us to use our strengths, we'd do just fine. Iraq hasn't depleted our ability to bomb the crap out of a target.

 

Seems to me that Iraq is taxing our ground troops doing a "show of strength" and police-like duties, but a lot of what's going on is low-tech. Our strength is high-tech; we use technology to make each service member more effective. So the current mission in Iraq, it seems to me, isn't playing to our strengths. We reached the "mission accomplished" stage fairly quickly, because it did.

[aguy2]

I am just curious how the US armed forces rank right now strength wise, against where we were before afghanistan and iraq.

 

You are only as strong as the forces you have at your disposal to commit, and from what it looks like we are overtaxed with our current deployments. Sure, if WWIII broke out, we'd pull out of Iraq in a hurry and redeploy, but when smaller conflicts arise and hostile leaders view our current strength, it will be with the question of whether we'd be willing to give up on Iraq to engage at full strength, or engage with whatever we have left over.

 

 

If we needed to deploy armed forces tomorrow to a new conflict - how well could we do it?

 

Currently we have 20 battle ready brigades; 17 of which are presently fully engaged.

 

They are attempting to suppress approximately 100K combatants, or around 1/1000th of Muslim manpower potentials.

 

Not 'getting' Ben Ladin may be the only positive military legacy this administration has accomplished. I would think it would be easier to negotiate with an aging man in poor health, than a 'mythologized historical figure'.

aguy2(amen)

[Rebiu]

Ground forces are but one piece in the military force pizza. The real measure of US military strength is the US Air and naval power. There is no country of group of countries that could realisticaly defeat the US in a conventional stategic conflict.

[Haezed]

Hello everyone. First post here for me.

 

The big downside of the Iraq war is that we've proven the limits of American power against insurgent tactics. Of course, I would have thought we would already have appreciated those limits but I doubt Bush did too well in history in college.

 

As far as conventional power, today we are sitting pretty but 10 years from now, who knows? It will come down to the technology and we can't take anything for granted. If one country, for example, develops a real "invisibility cloak" for its tanks or planes, that country will be the instant global superpower.

[Rebiu]

Hello everyone. First post here for me.

 

The big downside of the Iraq war is that we've proven the limits of American power against insurgent tactics. Of course, I would have thought we would already have appreciated those limits but I doubt Bush did too well in history in college.

Good points. The world knows we cannot be challenged conventionally and so all real conflict takes place in other ways. The US attitude seems to be to strut our military muscle and then shake our confused heads when it does not work out as we hoped.

 

As far as conventional power, today we are sitting pretty but 10 years from now, who knows? It will come down to the technology and we can't take anything for granted. If one country, for example, develops a real "invisibility cloak" for its tanks or planes, that country will be the instant global superpower.

The future is wide open. However military strength is directly proportional to economic strength. If the US fails to keep its economic edge it will also loose its military advantage. Many feel this would be a disaster. How bad would it be for the US to have significant competitors for world domination again?

[Haezed]

How bad would it be for the US to have significant competitors for world domination again?

 

 

I wouldn't mind if Britain or France gave us a run for our money. I'm not so keen on Iran competing with us for "world domination," as you call it.

[JesuBungle]

I'm all for being taken over by the swiss:-)

[aguy2]

I wouldn't mind if Britain or France gave us a run for our money. I'm not so keen on Iran competing with us for "world domination," as you call it.

 

Britain has general elections before Us. If the British elected a man and a party that for the time being could assume leadership of the 'free world', I would think most Americans would go along with a 'lower profile' in world affairs.

aguy2