Inevitability of U.S. Military Force

At the beginning of the 21st Century, the United States is the world's only remaining superpower, a position gained in the course of the last 50 years through international engagement, economic tenacity, and the efforts and lives of American soldiers. Our arsenal of strategic tools - political, economic, military - skillfully (or fortuitously) forged a successful conclusion of the Cold War, a period where military force was generally considered the instrument of last resort. However, in the last decade, military forces have been used earlier and earlier in American interventions not considered major theater war, often to the chagrin of the defense establishment. It can be argued that this outcome is a logical one for a nation that has funded the defense tool at roughly fifteen times more than its other instruments of statecraft.1 Moreover, after a decade of uncertainty and vacillation, the U.S. now has a strategic organizing principle - the war on terrorism - that promises to require significant new funds for defense for the foreseeable future. The FY 2002 Department of Defense (DoD) supplemental of $14 billion for the war on terrorism alone is nearly equal to the Department of State's entire FY 2002 request for foreign operations.2