The closing critique links worsening procurement and force-structure problems since the 1990s to confidence in lasting Western military superiority. It challenges the claim that forces can safely shrink because no opponent can match them. The argument accepts that people everywhere are capable of greatness and destruction, then questions the assumption that other societies cannot develop comparable military capability. A separate explanation offered for reductions is the simple reluctance to spend money. Both strands are used to question the optimism behind cutting forces to a bare minimum.
Notable Point · 1:10:14-1:11:49
Assumed military superiority as a reason to cut forces
The criticism of post-Cold War force reductions questions whether confidence in permanent superiority is consistent with other societies' capacity to develop.