Resolved: The US Federal Government should remove military presence and economic aid from S. Korea

I'll start off on observations/overview, then go top to bottom on the affirmative case, and then go onto negative case.==Overview== Recognize that today's round, the BOP might be shared, but he has to prove that we should withdraw both military presence and economic aid. If you think at the end of the round, the US should keep its military presence but end economic aid or vice-versa, the aff loses. Decamp of the Naval War College outlines that Presence missions are meant to deter aggression, preserve regional balances, deflect arms races, and prevent power vacuums. They also cement alliances and signal that our commitments are backed by action. (http://www.dtic.mil...) The first negative case will hinge on that. Recognize his advocacy is based on the current day. His assumption is that we would withdraw right away if we affirm. ==1NR====C1: South Korea can defend themselves==4 key responses here His first source comes from Global Fire Power. This source is awful for 3 key reasons. First, The bottom of this website says that the numbers provided are for entertainment purposes. Not academic. But even if you want to buy that, the main page of the same website says that it only factors in conventional warfare. This will become more relevant in the 1NC but basically the major threat to South Korea is going to be a Nuclear armed North Korea, not so much the conventional warfare. Third is that these numbers exist in a vacuum. His analysis here doesn't take into account things like leadership, willingness of a local population to fight, or allies of either nation. Recognize that a strong economy doesn't guarantee a strong military. He has to prove that to get offense off of his second warrant. His next source comes from the national interest and there are 2 ways you indict this. The first is that there is no explanation of how or why Russia and China stopped backing North Korea. But even if they have, there other uses for North Korea besides an ally. They would logically still support North Korea as a buffer state against South Korea, a nation that in the affirmative world would be a strong military power. But secondly, his own source concludes that North Korea is a stronger military power, when they write quote: On every measure of national power, save military, South Korea dominates. Finally, just because there is a potential for a strong South Korea doesn't guarantee that South Korea will build up its military at a reasonable pace or at all. ==C2:US Troops Are Terrible==3 responses here Even if you buy that US troops perpetuate human rights abuses, he has no solvency here because under his 3rd contention he says we need to relocate troops to other areas where they are needed more. If troops are committing human rights abuses in South Korea, there is no reason to expect anything different if we just take these same troops and put them elsewhere. Insofar as this is true, he can't gain offense off of both of these arguments His impact is protests, but he doesn't show how these protests have materialized into actual harms in the US-South Korean relationship. His next impact is the environment. Recognize that this is the military infrastructure, so he has to prove that this goes away in the Affirmative world or he gets no offence. Logically, we can infer that it isn't going to go away. Not only does it take time to deconstruct infrastructure, but also money. It makes no sense to assume that the military power South Korea would become in the affirmative world wouldn't just use this infrastructure for their own military. No solvency ==C3: US troops are needed elsewhere==5 responses I'm going to concede that military overstretch is a problem, but he doesn't solve for this. He can't guarantee that these troops will be taken from South Korea and moved to someplace they would be used better. The USFG could just put them on a boat in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean or back on the US mainland Extend my first response to his C2. He can't get offense off of both of these arguments. He tells us US troops are really really bad, but then he also wants us to put those troops in some of the most volatile, anti-American parts of the world. His first example here is Syria. Lots of problems with this. First, we are already involved in the Syrian conflict via airstrikes. Second, what he is advocating for is essentially another forgein intervention in the Middle East. Look the previous Iraq wars as to why that's a bad idea. His next materialization is stopping Russia from expanding their influence. A lot of problems with this. Recognize that this is exactly why we put troops in South Korea in the first place. No uniqueness. Furthermore, there is no solvency here. He doesn't show you that US troops are going to be able to stop Russia from propping up a regime they have supported for over 40 years. Then he says Russia wants to take out ISIS, but this benefits the US because Drop this on fairness. This argument inherently forces me to prove that either A)Military overstretch isn't a problem, something that is impossible to do. Or alternatively I can prove B) US troops are best used in South Korea. The problem with this is that he can literally introduce new examples that I am forced to argue about, but he can also drop examples that I begin to win on. Because of this he creates an offense skew that I can never solve for. Drop this argument for that reason alone. If he is to run this argument, he should stay bound to the examples already presented. ==Negative Case==The Thesis and Sole contention of the Negative Case is that US presence is a nauseously. We must maintain regional stability, and the US presence is key to that. 4 reasons. First The US is sanctioning North Korea as outlined by the Department of the Tresses. This is problematic, because as the American Journal of Political Science outlines, Sanctions increase the risk of conflict by 17%.(https://www.researchgate.net...) This is because, as the article finds, sanctions are most often used in a manner that minimizes cost to the nation that sends the sanction, sending a message of weakness rather than strength. Because of this, North Korea is more likely to act out and start conflict, but their capability to attack the mainland US is lacking. So logically, they are going to simply lash out against US allies such as South Korea and Japan. Second: The US withdrawal has created problems in the past. The National Interest finds that when the US withdrew military presence from the Philippines, it created a military vacuum that China felt they could fill. In response, China seized the Spratly Islands from the Philippines and started a territorial dispute between the two nations. (http://nationalinterest.org...) There is no reason to assume that this won't happen again.Third is militarization. As Yuki Yoshida finds, when one nation militarizes, other nations inherently follow suit in order to not fall behind and maintain the balance of power. (http://www.atlantic-community.org...) If we are to believe the Aff that South Korea will become this great military power absent US forces. Then other nations in the region would simply follow suit and militarize swell, creating instability.Fourth and finally, alliances backed by commitment reduce conflict. Rice University finds that this is quantified at 28%. (http://atop.rice.edu...) This is going to be really important because war between North Korea is really bad, and would likely escalate to a nuclear conflict, killing millions of people. My opposition never addresses economic aid, but if it becomes needed, I reserve the right to defend that later in the round. For these reasons and many more I am proud to negate.