# What would happen if we brought all the troops home? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [September 24, 2009, 3:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334 "2009-09-24T03:41:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Shakester](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shakester/32/437_2.png) [@Shakester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shakester)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 6:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/21 "2009-09-24T06:48:15Z")
> [@Enuma\_Elish](#): > > Thank God the USA ignored British arrogence and saved your pommy ass. I’m not English, have no English ancestry that I’m aware of, and I don’t own a donkey. I _do_ believe in giving credit where it’s due, which is why I credit the Brits with saving themselves in 1940 with very little help from the USA. As someone else has already stated, the Nazis lost their chance at invading Britain in late 1940, because the RAF fought off the Luftwaffe, and not even Hitler was crazy enough to think that they could invade Britain without air superiority. Over a year before Pearl Harbour, Britain won a strategically vital victory over the Nazi war machine. Britain was safe from invasion after 1940. The Nazis wouldn’t have attacked Russia if they were still planning on trying to invade England, and everybody knew it. ---
**Author:** ![Enuma\_Elish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5e9695/32.png) [@Enuma\_Elish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enuma_Elish)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 6:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/22 "2009-09-24T06:51:05Z")
> [@Shakester](#): > > Oh please, don’t start claiming that the rest of the world doesn’t maintain their own defence forces. > > Pick whatever US ally annoys you the most and then go and look up what percentage of their national budget goes into military spending, then come back here and give us a cite if you find the amount unsatisfactory. Show us some facts and figures, don’t just _assume_ that the US pays for everything. > > I’m willing to bet you can’t find a single US ally that _doesn’t_ spend a large percentage of its national budget on its own defence force. The rest of the world pays less on their defense forces because they know they can always fall back on the good old USA. No-one assumes we pay for everything or even a majority. Or even a large minority. 1% is too much. I just don’t think we should pay anything for ungrateful snotty ‘allies’ who use the money saved on their own home defense to try and defeat us economically. Defend yourself and let us bring our boys home. ---
**Author:** ![Enuma\_Elish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5e9695/32.png) [@Enuma\_Elish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enuma_Elish)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 7:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/23 "2009-09-24T07:00:33Z")
> [@bannerrefugee](#): > > One habit of many Americans which I find very annoying is the concept of American Exceptionalism. > > Notice that Wack-a mole seems to think without US military power the rest of the world is likely to fall into some kind of barbarism. OK, you don’t thing the world would fall apart. Fair enough. What do you think would happen? ---
**Author:** ![Shakester](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shakester/32/437_2.png) [@Shakester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shakester)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 7:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/24 "2009-09-24T07:02:02Z")
> [@Enuma\_Elish](#): > > Since no mention of who was responsible for victory in WW2 was made in the OP. > And since you are the one who brought that subject up… I propose that you are the one who is ignorant and arrogent, not to mention a thread-shitter. I can, at least, spell “arrogant”. Personally, I found the assumptions behind your OP to be highly offensive to the various nations that are (and always have been) allied with the USA. “the world, as much as they purport to hate the US, has become very complacent with the idea that they don’t have to try to make things better because the USA will always be there if things go amiss.” How is that not a flat-out insult to, well, everywhere except the USA? Do you seriously believe that no country besides the US ever does anything to help maintain stability and peace? Is that what you’re claiming? And then calling _me_ arrogant? ---
**Author:** ![Enuma\_Elish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5e9695/32.png) [@Enuma\_Elish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enuma_Elish)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 7:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/25 "2009-09-24T07:06:25Z")
> [@Shakester](#): > > I’m not English, have no English ancestry that I’m aware of, and I don’t own a donkey. I _do_ believe in giving credit where it’s due, which is why I credit the Brits with saving themselves in 1940 with very little help from the USA. > > As someone else has already stated, the Nazis lost their chance at invading Britain in late 1940, because the RAF fought off the Luftwaffe, and not even Hitler was crazy enough to think that they could invade Britain without air superiority. Over a year before Pearl Harbour, Britain won a strategically vital victory over the Nazi war machine. > > Britain was safe from invasion after 1940. The Nazis wouldn’t have attacked Russia if they were still planning on trying to invade England, and everybody knew it. If you want to start another thread on why the British owe or don’t owe the US for WW2, please do. If not, address the OP or shut up. ---
**Author:** ![Enuma\_Elish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5e9695/32.png) [@Enuma\_Elish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enuma_Elish)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 7:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/26 "2009-09-24T07:07:53Z")
> [@Shakester](#): > > I can, at least, spell “arrogant”. Personally, I found the assumptions behind your OP to be highly offensive to the various nations that are (and always have been) allied with the USA. > > “the world, as much as they purport to hate the US, has become very complacent with the idea that they don’t have to try to make things better because the USA will always be there if things go amiss.” > > How is that not a flat-out insult to, well, everywhere except the USA? Do you seriously believe that no country besides the US ever does anything to help maintain stability and peace? Is that what you’re claiming? And then calling _me_ arrogant? You don’t know my assumptions. You can’t read my mind. You started the name-calling. No-one but you said that other countries do nothing. So address the OP or shut up. ---
**Author:** ![Shakester](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shakester/32/437_2.png) [@Shakester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shakester)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 7:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/27 "2009-09-24T07:26:51Z")
> [@Enuma\_Elish](#): > > You don’t know my assumptions. You can’t read my mind. You started the name-calling. No-one but you said that other countries do nothing. So address the OP or shut up. OK - specifically in regard to your OP: “Do you seriously believe that no country besides the US ever does anything to help maintain stability and peace? Is that what you’re claiming?” A simple yes or no will suffice, if you don’t wish to elaborate. Your assumption seems to be that the US does all the work, pays all the bills, and that no other nation makes a substantial contribution to its own national defence, or to international peacekeeping. Is that correct? I can’t read your mind, so here’s your chance to tell me whether or not I’ve understood correctly what you were saying in your OP. And I’m pretty sure I didn’t call anyone any rude names. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 7:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/28 "2009-09-24T07:36:12Z")
> [@Shakester](#): > > Oh please, don’t start claiming that the rest of the world doesn’t maintain their own defence forces. > > Pick whatever US ally annoys you the most and then go and look up what percentage of their national budget goes into military spending, then come back here and give us a cite if you find the amount unsatisfactory. Show us some facts and figures, don’t just _assume_ that the US pays for everything. > > I’m willing to bet you can’t find a single US ally that _doesn’t_ spend a large percentage of its national budget on its own defence force. Are you kidding me? The US spends more than [twice as much](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_expenditures) (in actual dollars) as the entire European Union which is in second place! In 2006 the EU [just beat](http://politicalcalculations.blogspot.com/2007/11/2006-gdp-ppp-eu-vs-us-smackdown.html) the US in GDP. Pay more attention. The US FAR outstrips anyone else in the world in military spending. No one else is remotely close. ---
**Author:** ![Enuma\_Elish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5e9695/32.png) [@Enuma\_Elish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enuma_Elish)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 8:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/29 "2009-09-24T08:02:59Z")
> [@Shakester](#): > > OK - specifically in regard to your OP: “Do you seriously believe that no country besides the US ever does anything to help maintain stability and peace? Is that what you’re claiming?” > > A simple yes or no will suffice, if you don’t wish to elaborate. > > Your assumption seems to be that the US does all the work, pays all the bills, and that no other nation makes a substantial contribution to its own national defence, or to international peacekeeping. Is that correct? > > I can’t read your mind, so here’s your chance to tell me whether or not I’ve understood correctly what you were saying in your OP. > > And I’m pretty sure I didn’t call anyone any rude names. As I’ve already said. I make no such assumption that the US does everything, or even a majority to maintain stability or peace. You shoved that idea into this thread. I just want to know what people think would happen if the US brought all non-embassy military personnel home. ---
**Author:** ![bannerrefugee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c68b51/32.png) [@bannerrefugee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bannerrefugee)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 8:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/30 "2009-09-24T08:06:30Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Err…I resent that. > > I am NOT into the American exceptionalism schtick. Faaar from it. And yet it’s right there your post. ---
**Author:** ![bannerrefugee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c68b51/32.png) [@bannerrefugee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bannerrefugee)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 8:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/31 "2009-09-24T08:08:56Z")
> [@Enuma\_Elish](#): > > OK, you don’t thing the world would fall apart. Fair enough. What do you think would happen? I implied that I don’t think things would change that much. I don’t think anyone here can be terribly specific. ---
**Author:** ![Shakester](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shakester/32/437_2.png) [@Shakester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shakester)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 8:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/32 "2009-09-24T08:12:02Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Are you kidding me? > > Pay more attention. The US FAR outstrips anyone else in the world in military spending. No one else is remotely close. I think you’re the one kidding me. You answered a question I didn’t ask as if it was the one I did. You’re not a politician, by any chance? I didn’t say the US didn’t spend a monstrous amount of money on the military. I didn’t claim that the US didn’t spend far more than anywhere else. What I _asked_ was if you could find a single US ally that doesn’t spend a large percentage of its national budget on its own defence force. I’m still waiting for your answer on that one. The fact that the US spends more is a) something I never denied, and b) not the question I asked. What I find obnoxious here is the fact that many Americans _assume_ that their allies are not doing any of the work and/or paying any of the bills. You know what? Our people are fighting and occasionally dying beside their American allies. British, Australian, and Canadian troops, for instance, are getting shot at in various hellholes in support of their US allies right now. You want to claim that no-one else is doing anything? You want to claim that US allies are getting a free ride at the expense of the USA? Try telling that to the families of the non-American troops who have died in Afghanistan or Iraq. The fact that _more_ Americans die than US-allied troops isn’t really the point: it’s _your_ war, why are _we_ even there? Because we support our American allies, is the answer. A little gratitude wouldn’t be out of place, and the assumption that your allies are getting a free ride at your expense is incredibly offensive. You’re insulting people who are fighting alongside you for _your_ cause. You want to claim that the non-US troops that are putting their lives on the line in support of US forces in Afghanistan and Iraq are getting armed and outfitted by US taxpayers? Bullshit: not only are those troops supplied and funded by their own country’s taxpayers, they’re often supplied with billions of dollars of US-made military hardware, bought and paid for at the expense of their own taxpayers. We’re putting money _into_ your economy at a much higher rate than we’re costing you money. If you have _any_ evidence of the US supplying military hardware to the national troops of of any major US ally _for free_, let’s see it. I’ll save you the effort: there isn’t any. US taxpayers might well be funding the outfitting of Iraqi security forces, for instance, but the Brits, Australians, and Canadians in those places are paying their own way. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 8:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/33 "2009-09-24T08:16:37Z")
> [@bannerrefugee](#): > > And yet it’s right there your post. How so? Methinks you have a weird definition of American “exceptionalism” that bears no semblance to reality. ---
**Author:** ![Jerseyman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/bbce88/32.png) [@Jerseyman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jerseyman)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 8:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/34 "2009-09-24T08:22:29Z")
Rather intriguingly, I see that that is the expenditure for next year. Somebody been doing a little time-travel? The list of percentage GDP is ever stranger because there the USA is beaten by 26 other countries, most of which are Arab and African nations nobody would want to visit for fun - but also including Singapore and Greece. Considering that most of the EU’s expenditure comes about because neither France nor Britain can quite understand that they have not been imperial world powers for nearly fifty years and actually Japan is high up there which isn’t supposed to even have official military forces. I am sure that if the USA reduced its military expenditure to something like Russia’s and transferred the surplus to health care (its economy would collapse) but apart from that, most of the Middle East and South America would breathe a sigh of relief and feel safe to cut theirs. American complaints about military expenditure are on a par with Julius Caesar saying it’s unfair that the Greeks and Gauls don’t match Roman expenses. ---
**Author:** ![bannerrefugee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c68b51/32.png) [@bannerrefugee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bannerrefugee)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 8:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/35 "2009-09-24T08:28:15Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > How so? > > Methinks you have a weird definition of American “exceptionalism” that bears no semblance to reality. The Wiki article is pretty good if you want to read up on it. I would say your post pretty much conforms completely to that definition. ---
**Author:** ![Shakester](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shakester/32/437_2.png) [@Shakester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shakester)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 8:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/36 "2009-09-24T08:33:45Z")
> [@Enuma\_Elish](#): > > As I’ve already said. I make no such assumption that the US does everything, or even a majority to maintain stability or peace. You shoved that idea into this thread. And yet, right there in the OP: _I ask this because I have come to believe that the world, as much as they purport to hate the US, has become very complacent with the idea that they don’t have to try to make things better because the USA will always be there if things go amiss._ That certainly seems to me to imply that you think the rest of the world “doesn’t try to make things better because the USA will always be there if things go amiss.” Plenty of countries, including all of the major US allies, are definitely not complacent, and are all spending plenty of their own money on national defence and international peacekeeping. So hopefully we can agree by now that your belief was mistaken. I certainly hope so, anyway. That being the case, what would happen if the US packed up everything military and went home? There’d be some regional instability, for sure. Maybe even a few invasions. It’s hard to predict, even hypothetically, but while I think there would be an increase in general badness, I don’t think it’d be the apocalypse. For instance, I think if North Korea invaded SK, the Chinese would stomp them down. North Korea is useful to China as-is, but the Chinese wouldn’t allow them to get too powerful in the region. China might take Taiwan, too, but I doubt they’d make it a bloodbath. I’d say it’s bound to happen one day, anyway. And so on. Some adjustment, both nothing globally catastrophic. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 8:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/37 "2009-09-24T08:38:02Z")
> [@Shakester](#): > > I think you’re the one kidding me. You answered a question I didn’t ask as if it was the one I did. You’re not a politician, by any chance? > > I didn’t say the US didn’t spend a monstrous amount of money on the military. I didn’t claim that the US didn’t spend far more than anywhere else. > > What I _asked_ was if you could find a single US ally that doesn’t spend a large percentage of its national budget on its own defence force. I’m still waiting for your answer on that one. The fact that the US spends more is a) something I never denied, and b) not the question I asked. Huh? Re-read my post. I consider the European Union a US ally. I compared them to the US because: A) They are second to the US in defense spending B) They have a GDP even a bit higher than the US Granted they are a combination of countries but so what? They act in a concerted effort. They provide for a common defense. I provided the cites you asked for. Have seen none from you in rebuttal. Do your own work. Want to show me that other countries spend ungodly amounts of their income on their military then YOU provide a cite like I have. And please keep it to the industrialized world (doubtless there is some third world dictator who spends vast sums compared to GDP on military to keep the peasants in line with no regard to them starving). > [@](#): > > What I find obnoxious here is the fact that many Americans _assume_ that their allies are not doing any of the work and/or paying any of the bills. You know what? Our people are fighting and occasionally dying beside their American allies. British, Australian, and Canadian troops, for instance, are getting shot at in various hellholes in support of their US allies right now. You want to claim that no-one else is doing anything? You want to claim that US allies are getting a free ride at the expense of the USA? Allies are losing their kids in our wars. Look around this board and you will see I am no fan of those wars. I do not want either of our sons and daughters in there. That said, even in Desert Storm I which was the most “combined” military for this stuff since WWII the US troops vastly outnumbered foreign troops. Yes other countries sent troops and I am not unaware or unappreciative of that. Despite all that the US had very nearly [double the troops](http://www.desert-storm.com/War/nations.html) in that war than all other countries combined (go ahead, add them up, I did). That includes Kuwaitis who we were liberating and Saudi Arabians who we stationed out of. Great Britain sent 43,000 troops. The US had 540,000 troops there. Time to get off your high horse. The facts are against you. ---
**Author:** ![Whack-a-Mole](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/whack-a-mole/32/141_2.png) [@Whack-a-Mole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Whack-a-Mole)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 8:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/38 "2009-09-24T08:41:27Z")
> [@bannerrefugee](#): > > The Wiki article is pretty good if you want to read up on it. I would say your post pretty much conforms completely to that definition. Quite aware of what it is. You need reading comprehension. I’m done with your drive-by’s till you have something substantive to say. Been on this Board a long time, my posting history if free for you (or anyone) to see and none of it supports your accusation. ---
**Author:** ![bannerrefugee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c68b51/32.png) [@bannerrefugee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bannerrefugee)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 9:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/39 "2009-09-24T09:31:01Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > Quite aware of what it is. You need reading comprehension. Thanks for the insult. ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2009, 10:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334/40 "2009-09-24T10:26:30Z")
> [@Shakester](#): > > I agree. Which was my point: the US didn’t do it alone, and ignoring things like the Battle of Britain, or the crucial effect that breaking the Enigma codes had on winning the Battle of the Atlantic (and WW2 in general) is ignorant and arrogant. If it weren’t for Churchill and the British firewall it would have been a markedly different war. The United States was not a world power at the beginning like GB and the American populace was still gun shy after WWI. If England had fallen and Germany gained control of the infrastructure early on then we would likely have sued for peace and not developed the war machine as well as the atomic bomb. We went from a sleepy country to one capable of making one B-24 bomber an hour. Churchill was the catalyst that put it all together. If the US had not entered the war England would have eventually fallen. The V-1 buzz bomb alone represented a weapon that was much cheaper to build than a conventional bomber and could have been launched continuously without German casualties. Germany also had developed a jet bomber toward the end of the war that was capable of evading British RADAR. > [@Shakester](#): > > In the Hollywood version, it was American sailors who captured Kriegsmarine Enigma machines and codebooks. In real life, it was British sailors that did it, and it was British codebreakers and scientists, with important early help from Poles, who actually broke the codes. The allies, including the US Navy, were _losing_ the Battle of the Atlantic until British codebreakers rescued them. While the British developed the code breakers they also shared the technology. A high-speed version of the bombe was designed and built in my home town by the National Cash Register Company. It’s truly amazing how many decisions/technological breakthroughs went into wining the war. As far as the op question is concerned, If the United States pulled troops back and assuming a vacuum needs to be filled it will be a tremendous financial burden. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-happen-if-we-brought-all-the-troops-home/511334.md?page=3)