By Jen DiMascio

Presidential contender former Gov. Mike Huckabee (R-Ark.) wants to move quickly on existing planned growth in the military’s ground forces and increase investment in defense.

Huckabee laid out his defense and foreign policy goals in a wide-ranging article in Foreign Affairs magazine Dec. 15.

In the article, he pledges to implement President Bush’s plan to grow the Army and Marine Corps by 92,000 within five years even faster.

“We can and must do this in two to three years,” Huckabee said in the article.

Before leaving as the Army’s Chief of Staff, Gen. Peter Schoomaker said the service could reasonably add 6,000 to 7,000 soldiers per year; the cost of doing so would be about $1.2 billion per 10,000 soldiers.

But Defense Secretary Robert Gates in October said he supports accelerating the service’s plans as fast as possible.

Huckabee also upped the ante on the Republican position of tying defense spending to at least four percent of the gross domestic product. According to Huckabee, the nation should spend 6 percent of GDP on defense.

Huckabee, the governor of a state that contributes to work on a number of missile systems, also said he supports the administration’s plans to install a radar in the Czech Republic and missile interceptors in Poland to protect Europe against Iranian missiles.

From there, Huckabee departs from the standard GOP agenda echoing calls made by congressional Democrats to increase emphasis on Afghanistan critiquing the administration’s policies in both Iraq and Iran.

He said the president entered Iraq with too few forces. “Our current active armed forces simply are not large enough. We have relied far too heavily on the National Guard and the Reserves and worn them out.”

In addition, the lesson of Iraq can be extended to Iran, he said.

“Since we overthrew Saddam, we have learned that we invaded an imaginary country, because we relied at the time on information that was out of date and on longtime exiles who exaggerated the good condition of Iraq’s infrastructure, the strength of its middle class, and the secular nature of its society,” Huckabee wrote. “We would have received better information if we had had our own ambassador in Baghdad. Before we put boots on the ground elsewhere, we had better have wingtips there first.”

While urging caution and diplomacy with Iran, the candidate suggested it would launch attacks into Pakistan to pursue al Qaeda.

“Rather than wait for the next strike, I prefer to cut to the chase by going after al Qaeda’s safe havens in Pakistan,” he wrote.

Most of the Republican frontrunners laid out major defense and foreign policy statements months ago. But since Huckabee’s performance in a Nov. 28 YouTube debate, his campaign has picked up steam and he has joined the ranks of serious contenders, along with their occasional scorn.

Huckabee’s comments about the Bush administration’s “arrogant bunker mentality” instantly drew heat about the article from fellow candidate former Gov. Mitt Romney (R-Mass.), who urged him to apologize.

Huckabee refusted to apologize, saying in a statement, “I am disappointed by Governor Romney’s attempt to label me as a ‘Democrat’ because of my tough approach to foreign policy,” said Huckabee. “Perhaps he should read the article in its entirety before making such ill-informed comments.”

In an interview with CNN‘s Wolf Blizer on Dec.16, he said he talks to a number of people about foreign policy, including Frank Gaffney, president of the Center for Security Policy and Richard Haass, the president of the Council on Foreign Relations, as well as “a number of military people” who are still on active duty.