It is common for people who oppose an activist foreign policy based around military intervention into other countries' affairs to be denounced as the sort of people who allowed Hitler to come to power. They see a potential rearmament of the Rhineland territory in every despot's rise to power, saber-rattling or armed skirmish. This is all part of the unhealthy obsession with World War II and comparing every current political situation to something from World War II that dominates politics in America, but that is a large topic in and of itself.
One thing should be abundantly clear to every rational American, and that is that at this point in American history, there is no foreign power than can stand toe-to-toe against the full strength of the United States military in all-out war. Even China, with its numbers, would fall under the technology-driven onslaught of the United States if it fully committed itself to a modern war fought with the sort of commitment and ruthless that was given in World War II and previous major American wars. It might be a painful first few years, but after a few years of putting the military on a war footing, no country could absorb the losses to its military and trade.
The other big objection is that such a policy would leave America's allies out to dry. This is a red herring because under a policy of minimal or non-intervention, the United States would avoid military alliances in the first place, thus it would only be leaving trade partners to deal with their own issues in most cases.
America's policy of providing substantial military protection to Europe, Japan and Korea has not helped those countries develop a means to protect themselves in a mature fashion. Of these, Japan is only now beginning to realize the danger of relying on American military protection in the face of an increasingly aggressive China. Ironically, many of the same people who clamor about leaving allies stuck to fend for themselves, will lament the fact that some of these same allies who have received substantial American military protection have cultures that are almost completely atrophied in the area of defending their nation.
Now, if America has an ally that is under serious attack, in most cases it would be fairly trivial for the United States to remove the threat to that ally, even with a non-interventionist foreign policy. Israel is a perfect example that those who support an interventionist foreign policy cite. If, God forbid that the IDF were defeated in battle by its neighbors, it would only take a few days for the United States to land an invasion force on Israeli soil to repel the attack. With permission to land and refuel American transport aircraft in European airports, it would be possible for the Air Force to transport thousands of elite Army Airborne soldiers to Israel within twelve hours of hostilities' onset, and the IDF showing signs of folding. A few days later, Israel's neighbors would be dealing with more than just a few thousand soldiers sent as first responders.
There is one last danger that a intervenionist foreign policy presents. It makes it so much easier for America's enemies to rally their people to fight the "imperial Americans." To borrow from the example of Israel again, many of Israel's enemies are able to maintain internal cohesion in no small part because they can focus their peoples' energies on foreign targets of anger such as the United States. America's foreign policy of sticking its nose where it doesn't belong is a lightning rod for such anger.
The difference between "progress" and a hampster wheel is the latter at least burns calories
Good article.
I should point out however that Japan's Constitution limits their military spending to I believe just 5%. This was forced upon them when we conquered them in WWII. It worked out quite well in their instance but that is due to their culture. Now that their culture has largely changed towards a more western philosophy I don't see a problem with letting them take care of themselves and us backing off.
Now I have stated numerous times that I think we should still maintain a handful of bases around the world to use as staging grounds. As we intentionally limited Japan's ability to defend itself it seems to me that we have an obligation to see them thru to a point where, due to their increased spending, they are able to defend themselves. Unfortunately this could easily take 15 years. During which time it could make an excellent Asian staging ground for our military.
Oh, on the China threat... Even with their tremendous numbers they don't have the blue water fleet to bring troops over here and their missles are currently only capable of hitting the west coast. Worrisome to be sure, but hardly able to take on the American juggernaut who could lob 500-1000 nukes upon their country and still maintain worldwide nuclear dominance. The Chinese subs are the only real threat to the American military and their aren't enough of those to stop us.
The Japan Self-Defense Forces already have all of the professional framework in place to become a full military within a few years. All that would be required would be for it to receive the proper level of funding from the government, and to recruit at least 50,000-100,000 new recruits every year for the next few years. They have, according to Wikipedia, 239,000 military personnel. If they were to push that up to about 500,000-600,000 personnel by 2012-2013, with proper infrastructure and equipment spending, Japan's military would be able to assume full responsibility for the defense of Japan.
Remember... they already use aircraft and warships similar to ours. This is not some rinky dinky European military we're talking about.
If the IDF were soundly defeated, there wouldn't be much of Israel left for American troops to land on.
I don't think that should be determinative one way or the other with regard to US foreign policy, but the ability to get a few thousand troops somewhere in a few days isn't something which prevents conquest from occurring.
If the US embraced a non-interventionist foreign policy, we'd have to basically be willing to say "you guys figure it out" about most of our current military allies. Some would do okay, and some wouldn't. I wouldn't put money on Taiwan winning a fight with mainland China, for instance. The next time a tin-pot dictator in the middle east invaded a mostly friendly oil-country (like Kuwait), we'd basically just sit it out.
I used to think that non-intervention was an excellent idea, but I've come to the opinion that being the hegemonic military power (which for instance prevents piracy on the high seas) is better than the consequence of either having some other country be the hegemon, or of there not being a hegemon in the first place. I somehow think that trade wouldn't be improved by having countries provide letters of marque to their privateers...
Besides, some of our allies are militarily or demographically weak compared to those allies' enemies - Israel, Taiwan, etc. It's in our interest to help those countries who want the US to be stronger, and to not help those countries who want the US to be weaker.
A policy of non-interventionism still allows a country to choose to go to war to defend what it perceives as its interests. In the case of Israel, Israel is a powerful bulwark against aggressive Islam, a force that would ultimately seek to attack American interests. America doesn't need to actively take Israel's side... it can just let Israel do its own thing and go to war if Israel is ever seriously facing an existential threat.
I would submit that if the United States maintained its current military might while keeping its forces back in a normally peaceful posture, with a policy of using them to maximum efficiency when committed, that the presence of thousands of American troops landing in Israel would terrify the Arabs. It would mean that America is in the process of, or has declared war on them, and that they are now about to face a superpower that doesn't pussyfoot around when dealing with its enemies.
America has generally been non-interventionist, not isolationist. We stood by the British with the Monroe Doctrine in the 19th century that said that we would consider any attempt to gain new colonies in the Americas to be an armed threat against the United States. Never coming to the aid of those we trade with, or who we are bound by common culture and values, is not non-interventionism, it is isolationism. The difference, in my opinion, is that non-interventionism makes intervention the exception to be used in extraordinary cases, not the rule, and isolationism is an ideological refusal to intervene.