Maggie's Farm

Washington, D.C. Democratic Party HQs

You might read https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/why-we-shouldnt-let-russia-fight-the-islamic-state/2015/10/05/ad77beda-6b6c-11e5-aa5b-f78a98956699_story.html
Opinions, especially inexperienced ones full of cliches, come cheap, but international politics is not a game for isolationists to play head in sand about.

Bird Dog, perhaps you should re-read the post:
First, it posits only several major incidents and ignores others, second it ignores the beneficial impacts even of those it mentions, and third it omits the many other positive impacts of our global presence that avoided catastrophes or created major gains.
To mention just as few:
First and second, the Korean war allowed Japan to redevelop peacefully, Vietnam allowed the rest of Southeast Asia to develop, Cuba embargo and Nicaragua allowed the impedence of militant marching Castroism and Soviet proxies elsewhere in Latin America (aside from bleeding Cuba/Soviets in Angola).
Third, we avoided the fall of Italy and Greece and France to communist regimes in the late 40s, we established peaceful commerce throughout the world that lifted all others and our economies, we provided a model for other countries to follow, at least in their aspirations, of freedom which has given hope and some progress to many millions.. and we lived in secure peace until under Carter we allowed the Ayatollah in Iran determinbed to conquer the MidEast and dominate the world and under Clinton we let our guard down leading to 9/11 and what has followed.
Throughout the decades from WWII, our strength and willingness to employ it has kept us free and prosperous, versus weakness in the past decades sapping our resources and will.

It was our fleet in the Straits of Taiwan that allowed it to withstand the shelling of Quemoi and Matsu by the Bay of Pigs.
mainland China and has kept mainland China from ever again trying to conquer Taiwan.
Exactly, it was inexperienced John Kennedy and his band of theorists (who also overthrew Diem and created chaos in governing S Vietnam, leading to our heavy commitment to pull it from the fire) et. al.whose lack of resolve that weakened and undermined the landings at Bay of Pigs.
It was our creation of NATO and our funding anti-communist forces that pulled Italy, France and Greece back from the brink as the unified communists were against fractured anti-communist and democratic parties.

Pardon the screwed up sentences. I have a new laptop with which I am having a difficulty of moving phrases around in a paragraph.

I agree. It is not through lack of resources (although that plays a key role as the drawdown after the fall of the Berlin Wall has seriously restricted our ability to carry out missions properly) but through lack of will that our more recent poor results have come.