Opinion: Can the U.S. military respond effectively to all threats to freedom?

The world is getting more dangerous, seemingly by the day. It would behoove the United States to stand ready.

But for that to happen, candidates for the highest offices in the land need to begin addressing this as a priority.

A newly released report by the National Defense Strategy Commission, which was created by Congress to assess the nation’s defense strategy, begins with this warning:

“The United States confronts the most serious and the most challenging threats since the end of World War II. The United States could in short order be drawn into a war across multiple theaters with peer and near-peer adversaries, and it could lose.”

That ominous concern is being repeated by various other experts. In an essay published by Foreign Affairs in April, Andrea Kendall-Taylor, senior fellow and director of the Transatlantic Security Program at the Center for a New American Security, and Richard Fontaine, CEO of the Center for a New American Security, put it this way:

“Too many Western observers have been quick to dismiss the implications of coordination among China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia.” These nations have their differences with one another, “yet their shared aim of weakening the United States and its leadership role provides a strong adhesive.”

In the midst of all this, another source of tension has emerged. Vietnam is busy building islands to challenge China’s claims in the South China Sea, according to The Washington Post. This may not affect the United States directly, but apple carts, once overturned, can spill in many directions.

The problem is the United States has a military designed to fight only one war at a time effectively. It ought to instead adopt a strategy allowing it to confront multiple conflicts.

Mackenzie Eaglen, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute in Washington, wrote recently, “A consensus is building in Washington that a three-theater force is necessary.”

This was, she reminds readers, a strategy championed by the late Arizona Sen. John McCain. It’s also the current opinion of Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Mass., who also acknowledges this would require considerably more military spending. We would add that it would require more effective recruitment of personnel, as well.

With global tensions rising, and with U.S. allies and U.S. resources already involved in hot conflicts in Europe and the Middle East, the question of military readiness ought to be front and center in this year’s presidential race.

With that in mind, we offer two factors to consider.

The first is that any talk of reducing America’s commitment to NATO could send a signal to the nation’s enemies that the alliance’s commitment to mutual defense is waning or uncertain. That might embolden certain belligerent leaders to take action.

As Defense News and Military Times editorial fellow Cristina Stassis wrote recently, the United States cannot ignore its strong trade ties with Europe, involving 40% of global trade. “America’s military strength is a key deterrent,” she wrote, and America’s nuclear arsenal is “a key part of how NATO deters adversaries.”

The second factor concerns the U.S. economy. The national debt recently topped $35 trillion, and it continues to grow at an alarming rate. The annual budget deficit is approaching $2 trillion. Interest alone on debt is roughly equivalent to the nation’s yearly military budget.

The more entangled the nation is with debt, the harder it is to react to emergencies such as recession and war.

In March, the Senate unanimously passed a resolution that called the national debt “a threat to the national security of the United States.”

It went further, saying the Senate “realizes that deficits are unsustainable, irresponsible, and dangerous,” and that it “commits to restoring regular order in the appropriations process” and to “preventing the looming fiscal crisis faced by the United States.”

This came more than a decade after former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Michael Mullen called the debt “the most significant threat to our national security.”

But resolutions do nothing more than state a position or make a declaration.

With the world growing ever more dangerous, inaction and vacillation are inexcusable. Americans need to hold their candidates accountable for how they intend to continue America’s role as a bulwark for freedom.