Posted on 02/12/2018 2:57:33 PM PST by SeekAndFind
There are many reasons why the U.S. government is in the red. One of the most important is because Washington insists on defending so many of its prosperous and populous allies around the world. They are the international version of Ronald Reagan's famed "welfare queens."
This year Uncle Sam is spending $3.8 trillion. Upward of $1.65 trillion of that will be borrowed, an incredible 40% or more. About $700 billion is going to the military, twice as much in real terms as just a decade ago.
[SNIP]
In the early years the ROK would not have survived without American military support. But by the 1980s the South was pulling away economically from the misnamed Democratic People's Republic of Korea. The latter was a militarized wreck unable to feed its people; in the late 1990s a half million or perhaps more North Koreans starved to death.
Today the ROK economy ranks around number 13 in the world. The South boasts successful hi-tech industries, is known for its construction work and auto production, and is one of the world's top trading nations. South Korea also has twice the North's population as well as an overwhelming diplomatic edge.
In contrast, the DPRK is an economic disaster, again stalked by hunger. Pyongyang has defaulted on its international debts. It has nothing to offer other nations: in fact, the North recently went to Third World states begging for food assistance. Aid agencies are predicting that North Korea will run out of food in just a couple of months. Both China and Russia now have far greater economic ties with Seoul than with their one-time communist ally.
(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...
A sound appraisal for anyone contemplating getting involved in a land war in Asia.
“Why Are U.S. Troops Still In Korea?”
Because it is MUCH MORE EXPENSIVE to fight a war there.
RE: Have you always been mentally incapable of comprehending a succinct military evaluation, or is this a new mental incapacity for you?
I am humble enough to admit that it is a new mental incapacity for me.
RE: You really need to stay away from subjects entirely beyond your grasp
Why should I stay away from it? The reason I am here is to learn. If it is beyond my grasp now, then I need to be educated so that I can grasp it.
You seem to pride yourself in being a mental giant when it comes to military matters. OK, please educate me.
Let me repeat my statement and you show me where I am wrong instead of getting personal. In other words, attack the argument please.
Here’s what I said ( and I’ll even correct a number ):
The article argues that SK is 30 times ( some say 40 times) richer than NK and is more technologically superior. She can easily develop their own weapons to counter NK.
Why is that observation wrong? Educate this ignoramus...
RE: Because it is MUCH MORE EXPENSIVE to fight a war there.
Isn’t the point to SAVE on EXPENSES?
Because they are our ally
Because we NEED strategically placed staging areas
and because asian women are HOT~!
good answer
What’s Korea?
“Can’t we re-negotiate this?”
It’s an armistice, not a peace treaty. We could up & leave, sure.. I’m sure that North Korea would welcome that.
Korea was the Vietnam war before leftists took over America.
Without the presence of the USA’s forces, the SoKors will have to quit pretending that they are more than a screwdriver turn away from being a nuclear power.
Because someone has to call Japan to tell the Generals that the NORKS have come over the border.
And then it will give us an excuse to bomb them up to the stone age.
“One of the most important is because Washington insists on defending so many of its prosperous and populous allies around the world. They are the international version of Ronald Reagan’s famed “welfare queens.”
South Korea, in addition to is own military expenses ($36billion+) pays about 52% ($845 million) of U.S. costs in South Korea, gets no military aid from the U.S. beyond that, spends nearly 3/4 billion annually on U.S. military equipment for its forces, and has a smaller contingent of U.S. forces on its soil than either Japan or Germany, yet, in a strange juxtaposition of threat versus expenses, is far more threatened, militarily, than either Japan or Germany. Add to that the South Korea is paying about $10 billion of the $12 billion costs of moving Camp Humphreys south of the Han River (south of the river that borders the south side of Seoul).
Additionally, THOSE expenses dwarf the contributions to U.S. deficit spending in the bloated, wasteful, corrupt, “economic-redistributing” federal domestic programs.
I’m not how you ‘save on expenses’ when you have to fight a war there. We tried pulling our troops out of South Korea in 1949. 364 days later they were back, fighting a war for 4 years, with something like 40,000 deaths. Seems like the SMARTER, and cheaper, move back then would have been to simply keep them there the whole time.
if you have to ask, then you just don’t get it
$10 short time and $20 overnight.
Good, Now that SK is prosperous and we are 20 trillion in debt maybe they can start paying back some of the aid dollars we have given them.
Now I know there are people who still think of China as some picturesque backwater where people in funny hats pull rickshaws full of tourists through rice paddies filled with mosquitoes carrying malaria and yellow fever. Of course it is worth ignoring.
It seem that it falls upon me to inform you that China is now the preeminent communist power with a first world economy and a manufacturing capacity that rivals any on the planet. North Korea was China's proxy in the fifties, and it still is today. When China wants to rattle things up they pull the strings and North Korea complies.
Now, you just attempted to reply to a post referencing the threat North Korea and China pose to South Korea as if China does not exist.
Your self evaluation I referenced in my first sentence is dead on, and the tone I have taken with your foolish nonsense is fully earned.
“Your self evaluation I referenced in my first sentence is dead on, and the tone I have taken with your foolish nonsense is fully earned.”
Why be such an ass? Just answer politely.
SeekAndFind is genuinely interested.
Ignoring someone else pointing out the vacuousness of this tripe was hardly polite.
There is not a conflict between North Korea and South Korea.
There is a conflict between North Korea as China’s puppet and South Korea. You can not balance the two if you refuse to acknowledge that the Dragon has its thumb on the scales.
Whether South Korea could take out North Korea has always been entirely irrelevant. South Korea cannot stand against North Korea and China.
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