Too Ruthless to Win Posted by David Shorr

With no apologies whatsoever to John Podhoretz.

What if our democracy has become so frantic about destroying our enemies that it can no longer keep track of who its enemies are, why we are fighting them, or what it would mean to win?

What if we assign so much value to our own people that we lose any sense of common humanity? Will the people of other countries believe us when we tell them our quarrel is with their leaders and not with them? Will we have fewer or more enemies if we dismiss all other concerns than the indiscriminate pursuit of our foes? Will other nations come to our aid if we brush aside their wishes and priorities?

What if our enemies refuse to learn the lessons we are so insistent on teaching them? What if, instead of being awed by our power and righteousness, they choose to continue the fight? Is there a point at which the costs exceed the conceivable gains? Don’t we expect our leaders to calculate the chances for and obstacles to success? How many enemies must we fight, for how long?

What if not every enemy can be defeated militarily? How do we know that political steps will never give a better outcome, that they will never reduce the enemy’s will to fight or their support and sustenance?

What if our soldiers are cut loose from "voluntary limits" in combat? What if limits are essential to keeping the conduct of war from becoming completely senseless? What if they are a fundamental part of the warrior’s honor? What if they are critical to the ability of young men and women to make sense of a searing experience? What will be the long-term effects on their psyche? What if we start measuring our own behavior against those of our enemies? What will we permit ourselves (our troops) to do because our enemies are worse?

Could somebody please remind me again what it means to win?

Comments

[J.S.]

Ultimately winning is when zero dictators exist and human rights are respected everywhere- but that's a very long-term strategy. Winning in the short-term is protecting America and its allies and containing and pushing back totalitarian regimes.

J.S.

http://voicesofreason.info

[David Shorr]

I'm all in favor of strategic clarity, but setting our sights too far into the future risks glossing over dilemmas and trade-offs in the nearer term.

You may not advocate a regime-change oriented policy, but a strategic focus on dictators nudges things in that direction. How do we simultaneously contain and push back? Aside from respect for human rights internally, will we also have concerns about others' external policies (beyond any aggression, that is), and how do we resolve the tensions therein? Was it worth striking a deal with Gaddafi to halt his nuclear program? Does the protection of ourselves and our allies leave room for any other strategic interests worthy of using force?

Are we sure we'll always be able to retaliate decisively without invading? And with a blanket policy against occupation, how would order be maintained and reconstruction carried out when regimes are removed? I feel strongly that regime change not only needs to be done less, but threatened less. Should it ever be necessary, though, I'm not sure we'll be able to hang back this far.

[Dvaid Billington]

David - Your cautions are certainly in order but I'm sure you would agree that decisions we take in the nearer term need to be related to a coherent set of longer-term aims. The real problem is with how we have defined such aims.

US policy in recent years has tended to set goals in terms that are probably too open-ended. It is very hard not to do this, however, if one is accustomed to thinking about foreign policy in the manner of private institutions that roll through time, looking behind a few years and ahead a few years, adjusting to needs that present themselves to be managed on behalf of goals that are essentially the same year after year. The actual work of foreign relations will always require translating aims into practice on a daily basis, but insofar as it is possible to do so, I wonder if we don't need to look farther ahead and set (and achieve) goals that have some closure in an approximate but not indefinite timeframe.

Some of our national goals will still be indefinite and that is okay. But not all of them have to be this way. A sense of purpose and accomplishment depends critically on having and achieving goals that are not so open-ended.

[David Billington]

Sorry, my first name is David, not Dvaid. The listed blog contributors don't often have the time to respond in the comments section, so thank you for doing so here.

[David Shorr]

J.S. is to be commended for being truly strategic. If anything, the deficit in the policy debate has been not enough big picture or long-term vision.

My reaction to J.S. was to point out what happens if you're too strategic. I think the questions I put in the comment are still at a higher order than day-to-day policy decisions; they have to do with the in-the-meantime of dealing with today's world while building tomorrow's. Within the foundation we've started emphasizing that this is a transitional moment. Interdependence is here, but the jury is out on whether the world community will come together for the High-level Panel's "new consensus" (again this idea of a crossroad jibes with Richard Haass).

[David Billington]

David - Thank you for pointing out the intermediate level of efforts to which you refer; I'm sorry that to make my point I did not include this level. I should have done so.

While we wait for the High-Level Panel's recommendations to be implemented, I hope new forms of multilateral action are explored that do not require as much unanimity. Please let us know here of any announcements from your foundation of new findings concerning your work in this area.

May I ask what you consider the longest useful timeframe for long-range thinking about international relations (excluding the environment)? Do you think it could be useful to begin to think about the middle decades of this century in terms of military and economic realities that the United States may face by then insofar as these can be anticipated?

[David Shorr]

The question regarding the transitional moment is whether consensus coalesces. I've been describing it as the "global law-abiding majority." Will the major, medium, and regional powers and most of the rest be in a united front? The simplest way to boil it down is to ask whether China makes the strategic decision to be a stakeholder rather than a balancer, regional hegemon, or a panderer to the non-aligned. That will take decades to know. 25 years? 50? I dunno, something like that.

[Will]

'How do we know that political steps will never give a better outcome, that they will never reduce the enemy’s will to fight or their support and sustenance?'

This could be phrased better.

It's not so much that clever soft power affects the enemy, although it does, it's that soft power is the most effective way of demonstrating that your policy is legitimate, universalist and can differentiate between disparate groups. Furthermore, it's really the only way to bolster moderates and dampen the claims of extremists who are always looking for grievances to justify recruitment drives.

It's a hard truth, but whether people in the West want to admit it or not, the simple caricatures of good and evil we hear about are crude. Where there are disaffected people, who exist outside the global market, and see a plausible disconnect between the rhetoric of the international system, and the fairness they actually perceive, it’s obvious that they will become sympathetic to belligerence which speaks to their frustrations. Add in a few charismatic clerics, some collateral damage, and some stupid inflammatory rhetoric on local TV, you have created a life-long monster.

[Lane Brody]

Winning can be defined as imposing your will upon the enemy. This is problematic vis a vis an insurgency. It is extremely problematic vis a vis struggles of ideology.

War is not clean or pretty. The nations that fought the last "good war" gave us Dresden and the deliberate fire-bombing of other large cities. Compared to WWII and the whole sale slaughter of civilians much of what we see today is an attempt to fight a clean war.

The enemy today often seeks to avoid this type of war by both targeting civilians and seeking to invite attack on civilians by various means. To desire a non military approach that somehow avoids these type of people might be understandable but it's unrealistic. The US was not in Afganistan or Iraq prior to 9/11 and Israel had not been in Lebanon for 6 years prior to 8 of it's soldiers being killed and 2 kidnapped.

It's rather surreal to continue watching the majority of the west fail to simply read the memo stating the Islamic Facists have declared war. In a very real long term generational sense either we win this struggle or our posterity lives as slaves. Freedom is not nor has ever been free.

[David Shorr]

The debate isn't over the existence of an ideological adversary, but whether ALL terrorists really are utopians with no agenda short of restoring the caliphate.

In other words, I got the memo, but I don't accept it at face value. In fact, lumping everyone into this category misses a critical opportunity to divide and conquer and frankly boosts the adversary's romantic hearts-and-minds appeal. I don't want to add to the enemy's myth and mystique by describing them as a massive historical force -- I want to grind them down. Are we sure this struggle has to take at least a generation to prevail?

My reference to "political steps" is not generally about soft power, but negotiating peace terms for particular confliicts that may reduce terrorists will to fight. If you assume they're all ideological and have no practical goals, then you reject this posibility. But as I say, I don't think all these forces are totally utopian.

I harbor no illusions that every conflict can be resolved without violence. I'm just rejecting Podhoretz's categorical contention that all conflicts can be won at an acceptable price and that political solutions will never work.

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