Originally posted by normbenign
President's appeal to issues their constituencies are moved by. Ronald Reagan appealed to Americans who thought Carter to be weak and irresolute, and who had wrecked the military.
To satisfy campaign rhetoric, Reagan demanded big increases in military spending, without really being specific. Given that in 1980, if there was a threat it was the Soviet ...[text shortened]... der every President since. Whether this is conspiratorial, or just momentum, I can't answer.
The Cold War conventional forces were for the purpose of defending continental Europe and coastal Asia from Communist invasion. Communists are good at large scale conventional land warfare.
