Good reasoning.Genuine question here, "how did that $2-3T hurt us?" Please show your work.
We haven't had to pay it back, we still borrow money with seemingly reckless abandonment, so did it hurt? And what did we gain economically by crushing the USSR? I think one could argue that a big upfront expenditure potentially saved a portion of that in the long run.
How does that $31T hurt us now? BTW, that 3T is more like 9T in today's money. But, I guess it doesn't matter. How will pissing away any amount of money possibly hurt us?
I'm not in disagreement that breaking the USSR was a good thing. It obviously was. And I do think that outspending them did contribute. But Reaganites are eager to stop there and just claim it was all Reagan and his spending strategy. Thatcher contributed a **** ton towards ending the cold war too, and it wasn't by outspending them.
But my main disagreement with your post is the irresponsible attitude towards debt. Increasing debt was bad. To the extent outspending Soviets led to the end of the cold war, we got a peace dividend out of that. So the net total is important to consider. But we did not put that dividend towards the debt. We spent the **** out of that too. Because people stopped giving a **** about debt. That's a contribution of chamber-o-commerce Republicans.