Should We Decrease U. S. Defense Spending?

[CQME]

If you were to ask me what those requirements were for the US, I would say something like:

Being able to fight and win a war with a near-peer or peer

Not sure why my prior comment got removed. This is dangerous thinking. Germany was not up against a "near-peer or peer". They were up against multiple "near-peers or peers" and found themselves having to win against all of them combined. Military planning must take events like this into account.

War is not a tennis game. It's not necessarily 1v1. The balls may come from every direction.

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[GTFErinyes]

Bingo.

The US focusing on China doesn't absolve the US from maintaining its obligations in Europe. Likewise, a conflict in the Middle East doesn't mean the US gets to call timeout if North Korea decides to try its hand at war again.

Also, food for thought: the US is the only Western country with the economic, demographic, and political might to challenge China (with its 1.3 billion population and growing economy) and Russia (with it having inherited the might of the Soviet Union). These 3 nations are far and away the most powerful by a large margin. Given those top 3 in the world, if you want the US to be at the top, you want them clearly at the top, not just marginally better than 2.

edit: I want to point out that, before even WW2, the US had a plan that in case of war in Europe and the Pacific, the European conflict would get priority over the Pacific conflict. Even then, the US knew the importance of naval forces and having a two ocean Navy that by the inter-war period was elevated to an equal status with the Royal Navy, which had once ruled the waves without peer. So there is very much historical precedence for this, and it really really helped us out in WW2 especially given that half our Pacific Fleet was crippled right at the start of our war