A major power can afford a military debacle only when it looks like a political victory.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
There's no way that that our military power will not erode if a robust American economic revival is not part of the cards.
Politics has become so expensive that it takes a lot of money even to be defeated.
If you refuse to acknowledge that there is any waste that can be culled from the military budget, you are a big-government conservative, and you cannot lay claim to balancing the budget.
Political battles are won when the rich favor them.
Rebuilding the military is something Putin will pay attention to.
If the large power voluntarily abstains from using its full power or feels the strategic situation to be such that it cannot do so, it in effect loses the advantage of being a big power.
Wealth, religion, military victory have more rhetorical than efficacious worth.
This country cannot afford the deceptive luxury of waging defensive warfare.
The misconception that a victory can be worth its price, has in the nuclear age become a total illusion.
Wars are expensive and dangerous. They're not political winners.