Dale Carnegie Yes!: Dr. Strangelove No! Posted by Lorelei Kelly

One way progressives can begin to take back national security is to figure out how to talk about it in ways that most people can understand.  National security, after all, really isn't about rocket science anymore. Today's anti-war movement is very different than the 1980's freeze movement. Far from escalation theory and mutual assured destruction, peace today has got much more in common with regular old domestic tranqulity issues.  In society, we assure security because of the presence of limits on individual use of violence.  Our military itself--in Iraq--understands that carrying out policy at the pointy end of the spear has become self-defeating.  In prosperous cultures, domestic tranquility is assured when rising expectations outpace dashed hopes.  Globalization has made this an international mandate--one for which the United States is unprepared.  Our over-militarized policy apparatus is the wrong set of tools.

America has achieved outrageous success because of a couple hundred years ofleadership that has carried on a mostly balanced discussion about the use of force.   This is why banishing the notion  of pre-emptive war must be an utmost priority for progressives.  Our policy today needs to be more Dale Carnegie and less Dr. Strangelove.  We need to win friends and influence people.  I  cannot think of a more anti-social national security strategy than a policy of pre-emptive violence.  It distorts boundaries at every level of decision making: as a nation we seek submission when cooperation would work just fine.  In Iraq we apply door-kicking, search and destroy tactics instead of stability and support rules.

Derek's piece on mission creep lays out the landscape of our challenge.  We need something like a national twelve-step program to get back to a healthy balance.

In today's conflicts, skills matter at least as much if not more than technology.  Therein lies the military's identity conflict with its Cold War past.  Soldiers, Marines, Sailors and Airmen are carrying out all manner of activities, from calling in coordinates on Al Queda to buildingschools, establishing criminal justice systems and setting up town councils.  They are pretty good at these activities, especially the Army and the Marines, but they are precisely the things they have not wanted to take credit for over the past 15 years.

But should they be the ones doing these tasks?  This policy conversation needs to start soon, led by civilian elected leaders, but inclusive of the military, for they have much to share.   Militaries have a long history of warrior lore and how it relates to society. In this wonderful article,  Danaan Parry  talks of traditional warrior code.  He  identifies values like courage, loyalty and honor. Different cultural interpretations of the warrior are instructive today. Chinese Buddhism tells us that warriors seek self-knowledge.  The Yaqui-an indigenous tribe of Northern Mexico—believe that their warriors embrace the unknown and bring change to the tribe—and therefore represent their society’s collective experience.  A Tibetan warrior is one who is willing to study his own fear. All of these qualities apply to today’s post Cold War American military.

Despite their tremendous physical strength, the American military is quite vulnerable when it comes to protecting themselves in the domestic policy process. (as we saw in the run-up to the Iraq war in 2002, we see it when military education programs are short changed in favor of Cold war leftover weapons platforms) Their professional ethic does  not encourage (nor allow) interference in political decision making and so their fate is often  influenced by the will of those who have no warfare experience but who can engage in the  political process at will, i.e. defense lobbyists and Members of Congress.   The progressive challenge is to de-militarize our foreign policy while holding up the military as a model to be emulated.   to be pro-military, but against militarism. David Rieff has a great piece on this topic in this week' New Republic magazine.

I'm on the road and about to max out my hotel time, so I will get online later and share some website addresses from the reader given to me at the Army War College's Peace and Stability Conference last month. 

Comments

[JohnFH]

It would be a grave mistake for progressives to box themselves out of having the option to engage in the preemptive use of force.

Why does it always seem like progressives want to fight with one hand tied behind their backs? "Hit me first, then, I pwomise, I'll hit back." Sorry to be vaguely insulting about the matter, but believe me, that's how most Americans see it.

John Lewis Gaddis in a little book a couple years back gave many examples of preemptive military action in US history. Not all of them look wise today. Others, however, look like excellent choices.

Democrats hoping to win back the White House and Congress would be wise to study up on the politics and practice of the use of lethal force in US history. Learn from the mistakes to be sure, but plant yourselves firmly in its mainstream. It's not a pretty history - war never is - but our "outrageous success" in the last century and more has been founded on a willingness to spend blood and treasure on wars of choice as much as on wars of necessity.

[Dan Kervick]

One way progressives can begin to take back national security is to figure out how to talk about it in ways that most people can understand. National security, after all, really isn't about rocket science anymore.

Since one of the major national security issues the American people will be asked to face over the next few decades is the militarization of space, perhaps it still is rocket science after all.

[Tommy G]

Not if this talking is anything like the post you reference by Mr. Chollet.

For starters, his:
"In fact, I’ve heard from reliable sources that Army plans for next year call for pulling at least 4 brigades out of Iraq – 15,000 troops"

does not follow from this:
"Our military is reaching its limit in Iraq, and few planners think that we can sustain the tempo of our presence there much longer."

And, as I said, that's taking it at face value. Any guess as to how far back I can google a DTG on "can't sustain presence/tempo much longer", Ms Kelly?

Those reliable sources of his? They wouldn't happen to be every administration official that ever graced a sunday talk show for the last 24 months would they?

In the context that he provided, what your organization calls "mission creep" is more easily explained as "training". In fact, it is far easier to argue that the types of missions that the services have been conducting during the last 2 years in Central Asia have done more to prepare the military for putting back together a destroyed large urban area, than they have depleted it's ability to do so.

This is "talk(ing) about it in ways that most people can understand"?

I seriously don't know what to make of his essay or your follow-up. I'll say iy again They have a certain flow and rhyme to them. They look and taste like FoPo articles - But then you start to try and agree with some - any - part of them, and your head starts to hurt.

I mean, go down-spin and read his closer:

We want the military...to be able to adapt and take on different kinds of missions. But adding more responsibilities ...is not in the military’s interest.

Really? Why? Not why to the first or the second - why? Why to both. What - you want them to, but they can't? Or we need them to, but they shouldn't? It's in their interst, but not ours? Do they even have an interest other than ours? (answer - No)

That, and your cavalier dismissal of the policy of pre-emption, one of the most important and effective policy sea-changes in your lifetime, lead me to think of Inigo famous question of Vizzini.

We need to win friends and influence people

"You keep using that (phrase) -- I do not think it means what you think it means."

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