The United States military should be significantly reduced in size and scope.

Right. First things first. The actual mission statement of the Department of Defense is to "provide the military forces needed to deter war and protect the security of the country [1]," where deterrence and discouraging threats from ever taking place is actually a lot more broad in scope than saying "we're only going to resist invasion and defend against attack," which Pro's overly simplistic DoD purpose seems to imply. Secondly, the current US military posture since year 2000 has called for Full-Spectrum Dominance [2]. Full-Spectrum Dominance is a military doctrine based on the technological idea that a nation has invested significantly (aka money & research) in all elements of armed battlespace (including land, sea, air, space, and information based assets) and is thereby able to conduct military operations in any given scenario with complete wartime impunity, without ever having to worry about effective enemy opposition or prohibitive interference. [3] It is the strategic intention of the Department of Defense that the US military is able to achieve Full-Spectrum Dominance in any possible conflict, with or without allies. [3] I would therefore seriously hope Pro begins to understand then why maintaining current funding of the military is so vitally important to national security strategy, less our official military doctrine becomes Less-Spectrum Dominance.Next. Where in loony-toon land do we get the idea that other government agencies are feeling the effects of serious budget cuts but the military has not??? Here's an in your face look of what $500 billion worth of sequestration cuts over the next 10 years is going to have:The U.S. Air Force now has the oldest fleet of bombers, fighters, tankers, and cargo aircraft in its history.http://www.military.com...The Navy now has the least number of active duty ships since WWI.http://www.history.navy.mil...The Army and Marines are currently undergoing 25% reductions in active duty troop levels each.http://www.defense.gov...And our nuclear deterrent is infected with rats, roaches, sewage, and is inching dangerously close to expiring.http://time.com...http://www.latimes.com...But regardless of whose expert opinion Pro's been referring to, there is not one single defense official in the entire country with actual street cred that has said massive cuts to the DoD was ever a good idea. Former Defense Secretaries Robert Gates and Leon Panetta certainly haven't endorsed any (http://www.reuters.com... http://www.cnn.com...), I don't recall 4-Star General and war hero David Petraeus ever endorsing any cuts (http://www.washingtontimes.com...), The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs (and foremost military adviser to the President) has said he firmly wasn't for it (http://www.executivegov.com...), and now it looks like the super benevolent always right POTUS was never for any "draconian style" cuts like this in the first place (http://thehill.com...). All in all, it is the official position of the Department of Defense that continuing sequester-level cuts like the above examples will "result in a military that is too small to fully meet the requirements of its strategy, thereby significantly increasing national security risks both in the short- and long-term," and that we would be "gambling with our future." [4] There is no doubt that this reality is coming true considering the rise of China, a resurgent Russia, an overstretched US military, a rather weak NATO alliance, and a host other frightening war possibilities that range from North Korean cyber attacks, to Iranian Nukes, ISIS, and the never ending War on Terror. Yet, despite all the warning labels, Pro insists to go against all expert advice and initiate an immediate 33% across the board cut to the DoD (some $170 billion) ontop of ongoing sequester cuts, ongoing wars in 22 different countries (http://www.globalsecurity.org...), and the impending loss of 300,000 American servicemen from active duty service since this whole financial crisis thingy first started... That's not just irresponsible, that's INSANE! And that high of a percentage is enough to scrap any one branch of the military. (http://comptroller.defense.gov...).Finally, I am aware of ZERO defense sponsored studies by the DoD, NSC, or defense intelligence community that has ever concluded that military intervention in Iraq and Afghanistan was a direct cause in a rise of the terrorist threat index against America. Pro's claim that military occupation leads directly to increased terrorism and that a special task force by Donald Rumsfeld of all people (who's favorite quote was "America ain't what's wrong with the world") found that "American policies were actually the problem." are debunked through careful searching of Pro's sources as deliberately exaggerated rhetoric from liberal academia and anti-war websites. The correct orgin for the misleading quotes from Rumsfeld's report is found in the Report of the Defense Science Board Task Force on Strategic Communication 2004 which was an attempt by the Executive Branch to improve on American image and perception problems in the middle east [5] The report acknowledged that among Iraqis who were failing to notice many of the democratic changes taking place, that some middle east societies had found Americans to be "hypocritical" because the perception was that Americans had previously supported authoritarian Arab regimes so long as they were aligned with American interests (anti-communist) (5). It is the official conclusion of the paper however, that poor trust with the Muslim world was "a problem" but not "the problem" to middle east conflict, and none of its seven policy recommendations ever mentioned altering major foreign policy objectives or withdrawing American forces from Iraq and Afghanistan. In fact, -if anything- the paper advocated increasing cross-cultural interaction with the Muslim World in order "to better understand Muslims" and "win heats & minds." [5]Today, the US military has the largest defense commitments of any nation, where -when weighing the facts- the greatest threat to national security actually comes from excessive budget cuts. More American servicemen have been loss under sequestration than the total wartime casualty counts of all previous wars since the Korean War (based on what I know of American casualty figures since 1950). And given the current fiscals strains on the Army, Air Force, Navy, and Marines, and their diminished sizes, it is absolutely irresponsible to cut another dime from the defense establishment. Gutting the defense budget, especially by a ridiculous 33%, could risk loosing an entire branch of the military along with vital defense sector jobs in many local state communities who depend on government contracts for a source of revenue and economic growth. Though admittedly large, the entire defense budget at just 3.8% of GDP is affordable and is completely in line with the spending averages of other countries (6). Our troops are providing the nation with the most vital service in the world and deserve the best equipment and all the excellent support that we can afford. Our freedoms and way of life is never something we can afford to lose. 1)http://www.defense.gov...2)http://www.defense.gov...3)http://en.wikipedia.org...4)http://www.defense.gov...5)http://fas.org... 6)http://en.wikipedia.org...