America's Forty Year War

Last week the Free-Market News Network ran a following headline: "Cheney Says War May Last Forty Years." In their own estimations we are in a multi-generational war. Of course this is what the Neo-Con's set out to do in the first place, planning began back in the late 80's early 90's. For those that don't know what I am talking about, go to Project For A New American Century, and read their manifesto.
The insidious part is, not only will the US Army continue to recruit our sons, but also our grandson, and future great-grandson's. Forty years ago today we were fighting in Vietnam, Johnson was in the White House and student demonstrations were beginning to become common and I was four years old. Think about it, in America today, things that happened just ten years ago are considered ancient history and have no bearing on our lives. Can the American people even contemplate what changes our society will have to undergo to sustain a war for forty years? Consider the changes we went through in the last six, or the twelve years of Vietnam.
The prospect of decades of war makes me question some basic assumptions that are drilled into us on a daily basis since this war began. What if the paradigm was different, let me start with a simple one; Strong (big) military makes the country strong. What if we turn that assumption on it's head and we believe that strong/big military is the sign of a weak country. Maybe that is in truth the case that a country such as ours that has no nation that can match us militarily, and uses our military to extract revenge, revenue and resources from other smaller nations, is in fact a weak nation.
What is it that makes a country strong, being able to force our will on any group of people we choose or is it the quality of life the citizens of this nation could enjoy? I believe that the former makes our nation come off as a bully; So which is it?
At what point does war and our military become too costly, currently 49% of our budget goes towards wars, both past and present, and that does not include off budget items allocated for the Iraq and Afghan Wars, which for 2006 were nearly 120 billion dollars, with almost no money allocated for reconstruction costs. In 2004 the US spent about $499 billion on the military and wars, the ENTIRE rest of the world spent $500 billion. More up to date numbers may show that the US is currently spending more than the combined total for the rest of the planet.
What about the human costs, over 3,000 American soldiers have died and more than 150,000 Iraqis. But does anyone collect the numbers of American citizens that have died here at home because there were cuts to human services, medical care for the poor and elderly, absence of funds for heating assistance. I heard on CNN that 58 people died because of the ice storms last week. How many of them where casualties of the military spending sucking the emergency assistance coffers dry? What about the victims of Katrina, how many more could have been saved, and how many more could have returned to their homes by now if it wasn't for this country being bankrupted from wars past and present.
How many of us are prepared for forty more years of the same? At some point we will all crumble under the immense weight of military spending, the cracks are already apparent. How we as a community survives such a collapse is in our hands now. Will we be like the ancient Britons and continue looking towards Rome to save us from our problems, or will we rise to the occasion and take back our lives and country from the overwhelming military burden.