"Thomas Jefferson first suggested that we not have a standing army, and wrote a series of letters in 1787, as the Constitution was being debated, urging James Madison and others to write it into the Constitution.

The idea was, instead of a standing army, for every able-bodied man in the nation to be a member of a local militia, under local control, with a gun in his house. If the nation was invaded, word would come down to the local level and every man in the country would be the army.

Switzerland has such an army, and many have suggested it's one reason why Hitler never tried to invade this neighbor."

P.S. Please don't throw around "national security" as if that handy little term needs no explanation. If you wish to include "national security" in your argument, please say what exactly you mean by it. Security of US citizens from foreign invasion? Security of US business interests in the middle east? Thanks!

note: For the purposes of this debate, the Air Force and Navy are excluded.

It all starts in the name of defense, but you have this large defensive force and no way to put it to use. Then we find out country A needs help from country B. So we step in and help Country A which makes country B and his allies C, D, and E mad. So Country C and D send B aid which turns a small problem between country A and B into a big problem, and now we have to protect our investment with counrty A...

So on and so forth

We run across Counrty H(awaii) who has a great strategic position in the pacific so we decide in the name of defense to liberate these sovereign people and assimulate them

So on and so fourth

I wonder why no one likes the U.S's idea of freedom?

I do agree that the Army should be reduced and more reserved should be readied. In a sense, they reserves are what Jefferson is talking about. But totally disbanding the Active Duty army would place a lot of people out of work and limit our ability to defend our country's ability to defend itself overseas. How many civilians with guns would want to go to Iraq?

If I understand Szechuan's argument correctly, then it's not a question of whether we should have an army or not, but rather 'should we have an offensive army or not'. Mind you, the Swede's do have an army -- it's just not a standing army, it's a militia. And a conscripted one at that.

I fully support the notion of a conscripted militia. There are few more powerful defenses than to have an nearly entire nation's males trained to fight war. And the affect of conscription does great things for national pride as well as endowing individuals with useful skills (navigation, self-defense, leadership).

Having said that, we're in no position to abolish the army now. It will be several decades before we could work ourselves into a position diplomatically that would allow us to remove troops and support from around the world.

Like HELL no. Every Nation needs some form of security one way or another. America is a country ultra developed in terms of infrastructure. If it was free for the taking any country would want to bring their tanks over and take over the capital city.

But, I do support the view that the U.S Army should not be sent thousands of miles from home to do what other Armies should be doing for themselves ( 'Nam, Korea, Iraq to name a few famous examples ) The U.S Army should remain standing, just not on other's soil.

LOL some ppl never seize to amaze me. OK i don't think the question is correct, it should have read, Should we abolish the US government ways and policy's? ok the US army is u and me and our brothers and neighbors fighting to keep freedom, im not saying the wars we have and are in are about our freedom but we do need the US army we do need protection without the Army we would have wars on our very land we dwell on and take for granted the total freedom we really have, now not to say some policy's recently seem to take freedom to a different level, but to me freedom, is all part of being in america period!

There are lots of people in the world that HATE Amercans. Without the miitary we'd belong to some other foriegn nation.

Only an idiot would walk around without any means of protection--from the elements or from others. Abolishing the army is as stupid as getting rid of the police, firefighters, and emergency medical care. It'd be suicide.