“Home by Christmas!”

Patrick J. Buchanan reminds us that that was what they were saying sixty years ago — Why Are We Still in Korea? Asking "why, 60 years after the first Korean War, should Americans be the first to die in a second Korean War?" he continues:

Unlike 1950, South Korea is not an impoverished ex-colony of Japan. She is the largest of all the “Asian tigers,” a nation with twice the population and 40 times the economy of the North.

Seoul just hosted the G-20. And there is no Maoist China or Stalinist Soviet Union equipping Pyongyang’s armies. The planes, guns, tanks and ships of the South are far superior in quality.

Why, then, are we still in South Korea? Why is this quarrel our quarrel? Why is this war, should it come, America’s war?

Later, he notes: "We borrow from Europe to defend Europe. We borrow from Japan and China to defend Japan from China. We borrow from the Gulf Arabs to defend the Gulf Arabs." Of course, we also borrow from South Korea to defend South Korea.