Eric S. Margolis, Khaleej Times, 13 April 2009
A furious debate has raged in the Pentagon over the future and mission of US military forces ever since the collapse of the Soviet Union.
The Pentagon has been deeply divided over whether the US military should be configured to fight conventional wars against Russia and China, or be transformed into an agile force to combat Third World guerillas?
Last week, US Defence Secretary Robert Gates finally put an end to this debate. Gate’s newly announced defence budget makes clear that America’s military future lies in what the Pentagon calls, ‘expeditionary warfare’ or ‘counter-insurgency operations.’ These, it is clear, will take place mostly in the Muslim world.