Quote Originally Posted by whsieh View Post
In terms of ground warfare, I find it far more plausible in the next 10-15 years that US land forces have to deal with stabilizing a collapsed Pakistani or North Korean state, while attempting to secure both regimes' nuclear weapons, than any sort of conflict that would require high-end "conventional" operations.

I mean, who exactly are we going to fight a conventional ground war with massed armor formations with? Worst case scenarios in the Taiwan Strait would lead to air and naval combat, along with maybe a modest (and light) expeditionary force of Marines and the most mobile Army forces to defend the island. Does anyone actually think we are going to invade China? Or that the Russians will roll into Poland?

But in addition to North Korea and Pakistan, there are all sorts of ramshackle states the United States may find itself having to deal with at some point. Whatever happens in Iraq, Afghanistan is still a live issue, along with chunks of Africa. Whether or not it's wise to intervene in an individual failed state depends on each individual circumstance, but I can think of cases where important US interests will lead to some kind of intervention.

WH
Good post. Our enemies aren't stupid, they've all seen what happens when a state challenges us conventionally, as in Iraq (twice). Nuclear weapons have also changed the rules of the game, as Martin Van Creveld pointed out. We should be regarding small wars and non-state adversaries as the main challenge of the next century.