slade,

You raise a really interesting issue.
We have been retooling our post cold war military for more flexibility in COIN and small wars situations. Now, will we have to u turn back to a conventional war making posture?

Since the terrorism/failed states problem isn’t going away any time soon, does this situation argue for developing a dedicated expeditionary security/peacekeeping/development corps? (If I remember correctly, wretchard had some terrific threads on this very subject a while back …)