US Troops Bring The World Superior Governance and Growth

[Teddy Ballgame]

- Amid the loony lefties and the merely misguided lefties continuing crusade to make the world safer and more inviting for tyranny, terrorism, poverty, repression and totalitarian, anti-Western values by denigrating the US administration, opposing the use of US military forces everywhere and magnifying every atypical incidence of rogue soldiering to discredit the military comes a comprehensive and revealing study of the extraordinarily benifical impact of the long term presence of US troops in countries around the world.

- As The Globe's Neil Reynolds reports below, this study provides abundant evidence that long term commitments of US troops abroad is directly associated with astounding improvements in the governance and economic performance of the host countries.

- Indeed, countries with a high presence of US troops in the last 50 years of the 20th century enjoyed per capita GDP levels of nearly double the world average. In fact, the study indicated that this one factor - the long term presence of significant numbers of US troops - correlated by far the most strongly with the increased GDP levels in the countries concerned compared with any other factor including foreign aid, democracy and even the rule of law (which was determined to be the second most significant factor in these countries' superior levels of economic growth).

- As Reynolds' column and the summary of the study which you can find online under "US troops and economic growth" suggest, it is difficult to ascribe specific weights to the numerous factors which combined to produce the remarkable growth of the fortunate countries that have enjoyed long term US troops commitments such as Germany, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan and Turkey. Freer and more open governance and economies, the rule of law, natural resources, foreign aid, declining corruption, US military salaries and other "in country" spending, enlightened domestic leadership, high quality labour forces and geographic proximity to trading opportunites all play their part.

- However, as one who has travelled and lived in several countires including some that have had the great benefit of US troop concentrations and others that have not, I have at least a tentative theory as to why the long term presence of US troops has such an overwhelmingly strong correlation with superior economic growth.

- In my view, this presence of sizable numbers of US troops for lengthy periods of time - over fifty years in many countries - ensures that most of the other growth factors including stability, the rule of law, more democratic governments and freer economies, declining levels of corruption in government and business, and more enlightened and outward looking domestic leadership are manifested and strengthened.

- Any objective student of post WWII history will acknowledge that the long term commitment of US troops - in some cases initially by occupation, in others by request, and later on by mutually agreed long term alliances in all cases - brought with it not just US military spending and a rooting out of the bad guys but the establishment of stability and the gradual development of western liberal values of governance and wealth creation and sharing.

- Contemplating the economic evidence from this study, US military personnel serving overseas can be very proud of their cumulative positive impact on the prosperity and freedom of the countires in which they have been not merely US mercenaries on military missions but on the ground ambassadors of the western values, attitudes and practices that have improved the world more in the past fifty years than has been the case in any other comparable period in history.

- US troops can also be encouraged that they and their commander in chief are very likely to be seen in the long term as on the right side of history ... not just taking on the terrorists in the terrorists' lairs to keep their own country safe but proactively establishing democratic templates in the Middle East that will ultimately flourish in prosperity, peace and freedom.

- They should also take away from this study the perspective that building better societies takes time and therefore they should steadfastly ignore the left wing weasels, opportunists and useful idiots who preach the bootless gospels of cut and run, moral relativism, pacifism and isolationism.

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

Key to economic growth? U.S. troops

NEIL REYNOLDS

OTTAWA -- In postwar Germany, the Americans invested 10.4 million troop years -- defining a troop year as a single soldier for one year -- in the most successful military occupation of the 20th century. In Japan, they invested 3.9 million troop years. In South Korea, 3.3 million troop years.

In these three countries, the U.S. made long-term security commitments and kept them. They didn't cut and run. And the three countries built workable institutions, developed advanced economies and achieved high rates of economic growth. Could Afghanistan and Iraq do the same? Using sophisticated econometric analysis, two U.S. economists say yes, they could. Indeed, they say the long-term presence of U.S. soldiers essentially ensures superior governance and economic performance.

Garett Jones is an academic economist in Illinois. Tim Kane is a research fellow with the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank in Washington. In March, they published a study titled "U.S. Troops and Economic Growth." They analyze growth rates in 94 countries during the past 50 years of the 20th century -- countries to which the U.S. had deployed troops. (At the bottom of the list, the unfortunate Rwanda -- with a mere three U.S. troop years.) They conclude: "Countries that host large numbers of U.S. troops experience large and persistent increases in their long-term growth rate."

How large are these increases? How persistent? "Countries with a high presence of U.S. troops during 1950-2000," they say, "enjoyed GDP levels, per capita, nearly double the world average." Further: "The difference between having a single U.S. soldier or 1,000 U.S. soldiers is an additional full percentage point of per-capita GDP growth a year." Multiply this by 20 years or 30 years and you can make a real difference.

Between 1960 and 2000, for all 94 countries, the average increase in GDP was 1.86 per cent a year. For the 10 countries with the highest presence of U.S. troops, the average was 3.25 per cent a year. For the next 10 countries, with a more modest presence of U.S. troops (including such countries as Turkey and Morocco), the average was 2.82 per cent a year. For the 50 countries with only a negligible presence of U.S. troops, the average was 1.22 per cent a year.

In 1960, the countries with the most U.S. troops produced per-capita GDP of $4,916 (U.S.); by 2000, they had tripled this number to $16,413. By contrast, the 50 countries with marginal U.S. troop presence had increased per-capita GDP from $2,523 to only $5,505.

Mr. Jones and Mr. Kane measured other factors that might explain the statistical differences -- elements of democracy and the rule of law, corruption, natural resources, national income, the direct economic benefit of U.S. military salaries. They conclude that the only "statistically significant" extraneous factor was the rule of law, which (they determine) always pays off economically -- more strongly than democracy. They also looked at foreign aid.

Between 1950 and 2000, expressed in 2004 dollars, the U.S. gave more than $500-billion in foreign aid. In particular, Mr. Jones and Mr. Kane examined the contribution made to long-term economic growth by the Marshall Plan, the most celebrated foreign aid program in U.S. history. In four postwar years (1949 through 1952), the U.S. gave $90-billion to the countries of Western Europe.

Mr. Jones and Mr. Kane conclude that the Marshall Plan contributed nothing significant to Europe's long-term prosperity. "In a sharp rebuke to conventional wisdom," they write, "foreign aid is economically and statistically insignificant alongside U.S. troop presence." It wasn't foreign aid that rescued Germany, Japan, France and Italy after World War II. It wasn't U.S. foreign aid that sustained South Korea, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand and Turkey during the Cold War. It was, simply, the transformative presence of the American military -- which, according to Messrs. Jones and Kane, "is more important than peace itself for improving pro-growth institutions." How could this be? "Whether in Kosovo or Iraq," they say, "U.S. troops are intimately involved with the civil life of those countries -- training police, resolving disputes, holding elections."

Mr. Kane says: "If the past is prologue, U.S. [military] alliances with Iraq, Afghanistan, Qatar and other Middle Eastern states will reap rewards in peace, democracy and prosperity for these countries, too."

Mr. Jones and Mr. Kane concede an important qualification. The economic advantage provided by U.S. troops occurred only in countries where they were welcomed. Canada now has troops in Afghanistan, perhaps for the long haul. By most accounts, the Afghans want us there.

Extrapolating from the findings of Mr. Jones and Mr. Kane, we now have more reason than ever to regard the mission as foreign aid in its finest sense and in its most effective form.

[Black Dog]

A shame that you didn't take the time during your long and unlamented absence from these forums to familiarize yourself with the rules.

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I won't make any specific comments on "your" theories, but I will draw attention to the conclusions drawn by the study's authours here and note some rather interesting similarities between the two.

[Liam]

I'd probably qualify as a "lefty" to you. I am well aware of the benefits a strong US military presence has on the world. I absolutely support the men and women who serve in uniform. The difference between me and a "righty" when it comes to the military is that I prefer to use military force when it is necessary, and when it is used appropriately our military force is a righteous force and a means of doing good in the world. A "righty" tends to prefer to use military force whether or not it is necessary and that any criticism of the mis-use and abuse of our military by politicians is evidence of cowardice and lack of patriotism.