{"id":11799,"date":"2016-02-10T08:37:28","date_gmt":"2016-02-10T14:37:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hcstx.org\/?p=11799"},"modified":"2016-02-10T08:37:28","modified_gmt":"2016-02-10T14:37:28","slug":"what-is-an-existential-threat","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/2016\/02\/10\/what-is-an-existential-threat\/","title":{"rendered":"What is an Existential Threat?"},"content":{"rendered":"

A short, concise 3 minute read that I think nails the MAIN issue regarding U.S. Foreign Policy currently. \u00a0Now I don’t play Politics, but ask yourself; out of all the Presidential hopefuls, which one would you want making a decision like the one described below? If you are like me, your answer is NONE OF THE ABOVE, but unfortunately that is not an option. We have all witnessed these last 8 years what WEAK, NON-COMMITTAL foreign policy leadership looks like. Can the U.S. really weather another 4 to 8 years of another President like that? One look at Russia, China, North Korea and Iran and the answer is a resounding NO! -SF<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\"weather\"<\/p>\n

In the United States the 2016 Presidential Election looms and candidates from all sides are taking to the stage at debates and other venues in an effort to establish their foreign policy credibility.\u00a0 Whether discussing ideas to counter Russian aggression in Europe<\/a>, how to engage China, or whether to destroy, defeat, or minimize<\/a> the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), a term often discussed is existential threat.\u00a0 While an existential threat is generally defined as something that is a threat to existence<\/a>, this is imprecise and deserves further explanation.\u00a0 A more detailed definition could point to a threat being existential if it involves a group with the capability to permanently change another group\u2019s values and the way it governs itself against the latter\u2019s will.<\/p>\n

Two examples where a group permanently changed another group\u2019s values and the way they govern, against their will, occurred during World War 2.\u00a0 In this case, the Allies destroyed the 25-year-old Nazi<\/a> movement in Germany and the 76-year-old Imperialism<\/a> movement in Japan.\u00a0 To make this happen took tremendous military force.<\/a>\u00a0 Not counting the Allied Forces, the United States employed 16,112,566 military members and two nuclear weapons to achieve this end.\u00a0 Today, a truly existential threat to the United States would entail another country being able to permanently take away its freedom and change its democratic form of government, regardless of the preference of the citizenry.<\/p>\n

The groundwork for freedom and democratic government in the United States was laid on July 4th, 1776, when the Continental Congress declared independence from Britain.\u00a0 The signers of the Declaration of Independence<\/a> believed it to be self-evident that “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.\u201d\u00a0 Later, the first amendment<\/a> to the Constitution would establish freedoms of religion, speech, the right of the people to peaceably assemble and to petition the government to address grievances.\u00a0 When looking at the United States and thinking about the term existential threat the question naturally arises:\u00a0 What countries have the capability, in this case an armed force, that could permanently take away the freedom and change the democratic form of government the United States has enjoyed for over 239 years?<\/p>\n

The Russian military<\/a> has 771,000 personnel, 22,000 tanks, 1,337 combat aircraft, and approximately 4,500 deployed and stockpiled nuclear weapons<\/a>.\u00a0 China<\/a> has 2.3 million active military personnel, a further 500,000 estimated in the reserves, and approximately 250 stockpiled nuclear weapons<\/a>.\u00a0 In contrast to these large standing forces, ISIL has approximately 100,000 fighters<\/a> located mostly within Iraq and Syria.\u00a0 Based upon the framework presented here, Russia<\/a> is the only existential threat to the United States, in large part due to their nuclear arsenal.\u00a0 And while China can threaten United States interests worldwide, ISIL’s main capability to strike the United States is through inspiring someone already there to conduct an attack<\/a>.<\/p>\n

After the November, 2016 elections, the new President of the United States will have to deal with one existential threat and many lesser ones. While the President will need to ensure the United States maintains sufficient capability to address these threats, he or she will also need to take into account how this capability is viewed by other countries.\u00a0 To the majority of the world, the United States is the existential threat.\u00a0 This being the case, the next President will need to engage with other countries very carefully, always being aware of this potential undercurrent.\u00a0 It could easily be said that one country\u2019s underwriter of security<\/a> is another\u2019s existential threat.<\/p>\n

Read the Original Article at Real Clear Defense<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A short, concise 3 minute read that I think nails the MAIN issue regarding U.S. Foreign Policy currently. \u00a0Now I don’t play Politics, but ask yourself; out of all the Presidential hopefuls, which one would you want making a decision like the one described below? If you are like me, your answer is NONE OF…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[2280,74,3812,4333,1814,2417,2413,1286,2820,2479,1894,4418,17,65,272,1898],"tags":[2436,4540,1285,4541,2425,1453,4542],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11799"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11799"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11799\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11799"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11799"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thetacticalhermit.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11799"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}