Abstract
This chapter’s first main section tracks developments in the first year of the new Biden administration with respect to U.S. overseas troops. The main story of change is Afghanistan. That is a case, the only such case, of complete withdrawal, even if it did not happen on Trump’s watch. Afghanistan is also a case that, quite tragically, illustrates some of the chain reactions that can indeed manifest once a withdrawal process has begun. After the second main section has presented the main conclusions from my study, the final paragraphs are devoted to a discussion of forces and events that may make the United States retrench in a meaningful way. The United States is a country whose relative power is gradually waning. Even so, my conclusion is that, barring any dramatic, unforeseen, and unforeseeable event of a “black swan” type, the vast and long-standing network of U.S. military bases and forward-deployed troops is likely to persist for a very long time to come.
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Jakobsen, J. (2022). Conclusion: Whither U.S. Overseas Troops?. In: The Geopolitics of U.S. Overseas Troops and Withdrawal. Palgrave Studies in International Relations. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-94488-9_8
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