That's what Andrew Bacevich says once more in this article which castigates such past luminaries as McGeorge Bundy, Walt Rostow and Samuel Huntington. Further, he thinks Ashton Carter is likely to make the same mistakes because he subscribes to the same theory of national security, namely "that a monolith called Communism, controlled by a small group of fanatic
ideologues hidden behind the walls of the Kremlin, posed an existential
threat not simply to America and its allies, but to the very idea of
freedom itself. The claim came with this essential corollary: the only
hope of avoiding such a cataclysmic outcome was for the United States to
vigorously resist the Communist threat wherever it reared its ugly
head." Substitute Terrorism for Communism and you have the raison d'etre of America in the 21st century.
Does he have a point? I think so, as it is this theory that has resulted in our becoming a nation of fear.
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