All the way back in December of 2009, President Obama received the Nobel Peace prize and I noted that conservatives were stunned that the President would advocate for the use of force in defense of this country and in limited times when the humanitarian call for action was too great. And I said way back then, that this was unveiling of the Obama doctrine. And I was right.
President Obama proved last night that he's a man of his word. He does not oppose the use of military force but he understands that military force alone cannot, and we as a country cannot, force political change. We can create conditions where mass violence is minimized, but we cannot through our military might form a brand new government for a country out of whole cloth. And for god sakes, we don't need to save the whole world by ourselves! It's OK to ask friends for some help. One of my favorite quotes during the 2004 Presidential campaign, John Kerry mused regarding Iraq, "Mr. President, it's not leadership if no one is following."
Some conservatives and liberals argue that by imposing the "no-fly zone" implicitly calls for regime change. I disagree. We are not taking part in a civil war. We are merely making it a fair fight. We have removed Gaddaffi's ability to attack from the air (which is imprecise and kills more civilians) and limited his ability to use mass artillery. The Obama Doctrine is essentially limited strategic force with a cooperative massive effort on the diplomatic end to ensure foreign policy goals. Last night, the President essentially said "Gaddaffi must go, but we don't have to kill him for that to happen." After the sobering lesson of Iraq, we've learned that the U.S. Armed Forces are really good at blowing stuff up. They are not good at making a government for a foreign country.
Meanwhile, France and the U.K. are taking the reins, because this is in their backyard and the conflict is a more vital interest to them. We are also supplying our high tech know-how with radar jamming and other advanced rescue capability.
I think it's a pretty sensible policy. We will stop mass murder where and when we can. We are in the business of stopping things from happening not making things happening. The military is responsible for destructive capability and constructive capability will be the purview of our state department and diplomatic efforts in the region, which by definition, includes partners willing to help and help pay for those shared goals.
The era of the superpower died in 1990 and really died on September 11, 2001. With actual threats that are so defuse and varied, no one nation will be able to fight it all by itself. The new era requires cooperation with friends and allies, which happens to be the best for security and fiscally. And if working with our friends is called weakness by some conservatives, than so be it. I'd rather have a stronger America that looks weak than a weak America that pretends to be strong.
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6 months ago
Dave, those must be some high-quality rose-colored glasses you've got.
ReplyDeleteContinuing the war in Iraq & expanding the war in Afghanistan don't count as trying to force political change?? We're not pushing for regime change in Libya b/c we're not assassinating Gaddaffi, just BOMBING inside Libya? Maybe if we'd stuck to a no-fly zone, I could've let that one go - but not now we're taking out "air defense targets" (we know how good we are at identifying those from our success in Iraq taking out things like grocery stores and even schools b/c we misread maps).
and since when do we stop mass murder where and when we can? when's the last time we even heard about Burma? Has there been any discussion of intervening in CAR? and there is no way we are touching China, no matter how many Falun Gong practitioners are tortured.
I'm open to believing Obama is trying to be less evil internationally. but I ain't buying your version of things.
Drawing down the war in Iraq to 50,000 troops to assist the Iraqi government in protecting it's people is a limited mission I can live with.
ReplyDeleteAfghanistan is a tricky situation but I think Obama's pushing hard for an end-game, but I do think we owe them a decent chance at helping them create stability seeing as how Obama inherited the conflict and it had been wavering.
Bombing air defense targets is how you create a no-fly zone. Our troops and our allies deserve to have the mission be as safe as possible as they risk their lives for others. President Clinton killed some civilians during the air bombing campaign during the Bosnia conflict but he saved many more lives by doing so. That's the unfortunate calculus of armed conflict.
As for stopping other acts of violence against people, just because we haven't intervened in every case doesn't make a very good argument to not save people here. It's also important to note the context of the recent Arab uprisings. As countries look to the region in how to suppress this new wave of youth expressing their desire for freedom, they know that the international community will not allow violence and is willing to back it up with more than a U.N. resolution that takes 6 months to craft.
And as far as evil. The use of force is not evil. It's only evil if it's used stupidly. I believe President Bush is a good man who was trying to the right thing in Iraq, but he went about it the wrong way by arguing that it was an imminent threat to our national safety and by having dumb people running the after war diplomacy, effectively screwing the pooch.
America needs to find the balance between pure isolationism and intervening militarily in any conflict that makes our stomach turn (what's happening in Bahrain and Yemen is terrible). But unfortunately, Iraq taught us a valuable lesson that although we'd like to help everyone, we can't be everywhere at once. I think President Obama is just trying to find that balance.
you switched from discussing Obama's motivations to discussing his administration's actions. very different things.
ReplyDeleteAll I'm saying is I believe the no-fly zone (which includes bombing air-defense targets) was the right thing to do. And I support the mission so long as our allies Britain and France take the lead (which they have as of last Wednesday). Some innocent people will die in this mission but I believe the good will outweigh the bad. However messy it is, it is a domestic revolution, not one that we tried to force like Iraq.
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