[SteveA]

I guess you can't deny troops being deployed defensively someplace where people needed and wanted them but consider as well that conventional warfare is becoming rather obsolete. Also, these have costs that slow our economic growth.

Long term things take a more economic and technological perspective. Someone standing around guarding something on the other side of the world doesn't in itself do much of anything beneficial.

The only real benefit that I see to having troops stationed abroad is simply in the event of a major strike on the U.S., so that not all the military was crippled and some response would be possible.

Wars aren't generally productive because they tend to destroy the people at war. Peaceful mergers of power, though potentially a problem are just as likely, if not more likely, to occur through having a large nation politically and militarily involved in much of the world. What power is granted to defend, can also be used to initiate aggressions, so I see decentralization in political power as stabilizing. We're already heading that way in the world in many ways. We've grown from something like 70 independent nations in the world after WW II to around 200 now, that's not a bad idea from my perspective and global trade makes this more possible as well, as people can be politically independent while still maintaining much of the benefits of a global economy.

Anyway, I don't know how all that pertains to exactly what would change without the U.S. spread around but honestly, I have a feeling most people wouldn't notice much of any difference and if nations are able to remain independent, that's a better scenario than having a global police force running the show and anyway. Having forces abroad just give people a target to blame when political problems occur (whether it's true or not) and conventional forces are costly and don't give any long term benefit. Best to own up to this fact, and get back to figuring out how we're going to be prosperous in the future. Other countries who want a military for defense can pay for it themselves and if later they truly do want help, at least our assistance would be appreciated in that event. (No, I don't trust the good intentions of everything our military does but I have no idea to what extent the use of the military is abused)