Libertarianism and Foreign wars are Incompatible

The argument i present rests on a simple premise but on a lot of complex real world events. All wars expand the size of government...unless you lose and a new government is formed. Most new governments are always smaller then their older counterparts since they have not had time to accumulate a bureaucracy. This is why i mentioned only foreign wars, because there are exceptions to the expansion of war on domestic soil...when you lose the government gets smaller. Wars on foreign soil are far more costly to a war machine then those on home turf. The swiss have shown very well that a strong defense is an effective deterrent against the strongest offense. Our interventionist foreign policy in WWI caused the creation of Hitler in the first place. Wilson intervened on behalf of Briton and France tipping the war in their favor and leading Germany to surrender and be forced into a treaty that would lead them to Hitler. Stalin was mostly worried about killing his own citizens until Hitler came along. And since Hitler was the result of this failed foreign policy of foreign wars its silly to invoke him as a reason for having them. France supported us for their own selfish reasons...more to attack Britain then actually help us. America was long lost as a colony to the British. There wasn't a whole lot of chance that the British would have held onto the colonies. It was too much land, too many people, and they were too angry with Britain. France sped up the process. We then denied them help during the French revolution which saved us from a lot of trouble getting involved with a European country that became universally hated by the other European nations. It also would have started America's involvement in European wars far earlier then was necessary. So yes i certainly see how a foreign policy of intervention gets you caught up in more conflicts then can be dealt with. But its not a defense for such a reckless foreign policy. I would rather not have an efficient government...governments adept at maintaining themselves have also been brutally effective at putting down revolts. A trait of small government is that it is limited in its scope and thus does not concern itself with limiting the civil liberties of its citizens. Enlargement does not mean efficiency. It means the opposite most of the time. The free market is always busy creating more wealth, and the government is always just as busy taking more and more of it away. Often government does not become more efficient it just grows a greater ability to throw money at a problem. Efficiency is doing more with less. Government does more with more. Your words remind of what Thomas Paine said in "Common Sense". (paraphrasing:) The government is at best a necessary evil, and at worst an intolerable one. His definition of intolerable was a small tax on luxury items. Your definition of necessary evil is an expensive and aggressive foreign policy. Foreign wars destroy small government and replace it with big government. Foreign wars to protect freedom at home are a misnomer and are often just a politically convenient way for domestic politicians to grab more power for themselves. War is the health of the state, and any advocate of small government know that a healthy state is a big and intrusive government. We cannot afford our foreign adventures overseas without losing our wealth, our freedoms, and our tenuous control over our government.