There may or may not be an argument for a troop reduction or withdraw but you don't do it with a Tweet or against the advice of the generals you put in charge.
@NavyCanDo ROFLMAO! Generals are not in charge,and with any luck at all will never be in charge in the US. If they WERE in charge,we would all be wearing uniforms and doing close order drills on high school football fields.
Generals are like a little boy with a hammer that sees everything as a nail. Aggression is the nature of the beast. Unfortunately,most of the flag officers in our military now have only seen battle from a distance. This includes Mattis,who seems to have been VERY careful to avoid infantry assignments until he was a field grade officer who would get staff positions.
You ain't going to like this,but the situation gets even worse once you get away from the US Army and the USMC because only a handful of people in the US Navy or the USAF have ever experienced actual combat,and most of them were enlisted swine,not officers and gentlemen.
If you want to find out what the US Military needs for war-fighting,ask a Sergeant First Class/E-7 with a Combat Arms MOS,not his battalion commander. I can practically guarantee you that number 1 on their lists will be "smarter recruits" because the quality of your common foot soldiers and their ability to take and understand orders is where the rubber meets the road.
What they do NOT need is female commanders,trans-sexuals,bi-sexuals,homosexuals,bestiality fans,etc,etc,etc. They need someone that can lead by example and inspire confidence.
BTW,NavyCanDo,this one should make you feel better. My niece is married to a sailor that enlisted in the Navy right out of high school. He was sent to language school to learn Arabic and related dialects,and is probably on his 3rd enlistment now and was a E-6 the last I heard of him. He was also sent to radio school. Despite being a sailor (technically) he has spent his entire career attached to either USMC units or US Army units. Frankly I am shocked he was even able to get promoted being so far from "the chow line",and my hat is off to the US Navy for keeping him in mind and rewarding him for his hard and dangerous work.
Not really sure what he is doing right now. Last i heard he was being assigned to the Pentegram,so he is probably in some signal intelligence unit and translating messages instead of humping a rucksack with a radio and a M-16.
Frankly,I don't understand why he doesn't apply for a commission as either a Warrant Officer or a commissioned officer. People with his skill sets are in demand,and as far as I can see,will remain in demand for a good number of years.
