US Foreign Bases

Open Email to:
Rep. Ed Royce, Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. 
Sen. Robert Menendez, Chairman of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations.

Dear Rep. Royce and Sen. Menendez,
I originally wrote a piece concerning Huckabee's view on releasing prisoners in Afghanistan and associated comments by various retired military personnel.
One of our Political Advisers replied to my writing as follows:
"I have a different take on Afghanistan and for that matter Iraq.  I would like the US to have bases in both of these countries, put in the most strategic and defendable locations possible.  I don't think we should be shy, I think we should take what we need.  These bases would operate much like Guantanamo Bay Naval Base in Cuba.  We would not be there to build schools, roads, infrastructure etc..  The bases should be self sufficient and have whatever is necessary to defend and attack when necessary.  The 'Mission" of these bases would be to gather intelligence from the area, disrupt Muslim groups, and project US power.
I don't care what kind of Government they have, but if we get any bad behavior from them our response should be rapid and overwhelming.  These bases would have the potential offer many live training classes for our troops."

To which I replied as follows:
"I can go for that, because it fits in with my program that we need surveillance, via satellites, spies, etc..
However I have to be opposed to your suggestion because it can't work that way. By the time Congress, the military and the White House muck it up, it would be a nationbuilding operation, to which I'm strongly opposed.
I think we have to leave surveillance to all mechanisms other than US ground military forces.
If you have some suggestions on how to make it really work as you would like, I would like to hear them. However, in the real world of US politics I really don't see how it could work that way."

His last comment was then as follows:
"An example is currently and has been working for nearly all my life, Guantanamo Bay Naval Base, Cuba.  I am very comfortable with our presence there and am glad that the Castros know we are there.  I would beef up the bases, declare a 10-15 mile no man zone (ala N-S Korean border) around those bases and anyone penetrating that border is shot first and asked questions later.  So a base could cover 160-250 square miles.  As far as I am concerned any mineral or surface wealth created on the base belongs to the US.  In the case of Iraq, I would acquire the oil fields necessary to fund that base.
Any threatening behavior should be met with overwhelming force quickly.  I would neither apologize for or discourage the judicial use of force required to keep those bases safe.  These bases will have to be covered with an iron dome missile defense system and any site from which a discharge of firearm or missile occurs will be targeted to complete destruction.
We aren't going to ever be 'friends' with the Muslims, but we can get their respect.  Strength is the only thing that will get their respect and with that I would be happy, happy, happy.  The citizens of said country can go about their merry way, I really don't care what they do as long as it doesn't threaten the security and interest of America.  
Do I think we have the guts or IQ to pulled this off in Washington?  No way.  So we go around spending for stupid and securing everyone but our citizens, and punks like Putin take of chunks of territory at will.  Our foreign policy hasn't been right for a long-long time, and because of it we are going to pay big time.  The biggest enemies of freedom and liberty aren't abroad, they are in our midst, they walk the sacred halls of the capitol and the white house.  May God help us."