Going into the new year, it’s always a good idea to take stock of where things are. For the United States military, the picture looks particularly bleak on many fronts.

This comes at a particularly bad time for America, given the fact China and Russia are building up their military forces and fielding new weapons, like hypersonic missiles.

Let’s face it, the military, particularly those forces needed to fight a war with China, is not up to the level it used to be. Quantity has been an issue for years. We’ve covered the decline — both deliberate choices from Bill Clinton and Barack Obama as well as the errors of omission by George W. Bush — on multiple occasions and have noted the desperate need not just for modernizing our force, but to build it up as well, including in the context of the pandemic that was exacerbated by the Chinese Communist cover-up.

For all the difficulties that come with a neglected infrastructure, the physical buildup, though, is the easy part. Here is one very cold, hard, truth: Wars are not won by tanks, planes, and ships. Wars are won by the Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines, Coast Guardsmen, and now Space Force guardians who use the weapons. And right now, there’s a good question about whether they’re up to the fight.

Then we have the dishonorable debacle caused by Joe Biden’s betrayal of Afghanistan. Let’s make it clear, Donald Trump had no good options between the mistakes of his predecessors and the reality of China’s emergence.

Do we have commanders who focus on winning wars, like the late Richard Marcinko? Do the commanders have the backs of their troops, or do they allow situations like the injustices suffered by Mat Golsteyn and Clint Lorance, who were second-guessed for split-second battlefield decisions? How do you think troops feel when they see the patriots who got Khalid Sheikh Mohammed to spill his guts, thereby aiding in rounding up other terror cells, get dragged into court by terrorists?

Then we’re also dealing with the fact that rather than pursue readiness for real wars, the Biden-Harris regime is more interested in fighting the culture wars. When public schools are pushing Critical Race Theory, which postulates that America was founded on racism, they’re shrinking the pool of potential recruits that has already declined due to the childhood obesity epidemic. After all, who would want to defend an abhorrent aberration like that? Worse, even before CRT was being pushed, there was already an incident where hatred of Trump may have contributed to a case of real espionage. We aren’t even wondering if the left-wing indoctrination would prompt other personnel to divert attention from defending America from real threats like China, Russia, and Iran toward playing domestic political games, like those that targeted Trump.

That last problem is the most important. It will also take the longest time to fix, because of the entrenched interests that will fight to keep the status quo. Not only that, even if the Biden administration is ousted in 2024, the current efforts will push a lot of troops out, even before we think about the vaccine mandates that ignore both therapeutics and natural immunity.

In short, when it comes to our military’s ability to fight and win wars, the desperate message sent by the defenders of Wake Island seems apt: The issue is in doubt.