The General leaned back in his chair and gave a weary sigh. "Seems to me that our armed services are foundering more than a bit. You don’t have to be an old warhorse like me to see. Things just haven’t been the same since the Air Force lost most of their strategic assets, and the Navy lost the Marines to the Confederated States and got itself mostly confined to one ocean and the Lakes. Our own branch has fared better, but not well. We’re an awfully long way from the superpower we were at the close of the last century. Could be that the country has taken to the closer-to-home view, maybe a bit too much. We’re still bigger and more powerful than England was when the sun never set on her empire."