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Mission Creep Dispatch: Robert Kaplan
As part of our special investigation "Mission Creep: US Military Presence Worldwide," we asked a host of military thinkers to contribute their two cents on topics relating to global Pentagon strategy. (You can access the archive here.)
The following dispatch comes from Robert D. Kaplan, a national correspondent for The Atlantic and senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security. His latest book is Hog Pilots, Blue Water Grunts.
In Defense of the Pentagon's Small, Small World
It is important to realize that dozens of deployments simultaneously around the globe need not overstretch a military if those deployments are by and large small. But one big sustained deployment like Iraq can wreck the whole manpower system. It is also important to realize that all of these deployments are closely monitored by Congress. I was in Nepal in the middle of 2005, covering our military mission there, when its activities were halted for the time being by Washington because the king had suspended the political party process, in addition to other anti-democratic infractions. I was in Algeria the same year to witness the first US military mission there after that country had held free elections. Unlike during the Cold War, these missions for the most part are restricted to fledgling democratic countries.
Between risk-prone invasions like Iraq on one hand and isolationism on the other hand, there are these low-cost, low-risk, tediously unspectacular training missions and other small deployments. I have embedded on these missions in Africa, Asia, and Latin America, and have found them generally not bellicose, not utopian, not a distortion of our values, and the epitome of half-measures, full of compromises with the host nation, as well as replete with a recognition on a daily basis of our own limitations.
The problem, ironically, is that while small enough to avoid quagmires, they are big enough to get us into trouble sometimes. I was in Georgia in early 2006, embedded with the US Marine training mission of the Georgian army, and I intimated in print and on television in 2007 that we were dangerously close to interfering with a Russian-Georgian feud, even as our limited mission would not provide the Georgians with the means to affect the outcome. Our training mission was provocative to the Russians, but ineffectual in stopping their aggression.
But the fact that we get ourselves in trouble here and there does not mean the concept of small missions worldwide is wrong. It just means that we have to fully consider all the what-ifs of each one. It is these missions that provide the incentive for our troops to learn foreign languages and study local cultures. To wit, what's the point of a French-language program at Fort Bragg if there are no training missions to former French colonial Africa? These missions, as I've witnessed, also pave the way for more adroit disaster-relief interventions like the one that followed the Indian Ocean tsunami in 2004-2005. And because populations are growing in absolute terms in environmentally and seismically fragile zones, humanitarian intervention will be part of our military future. Keep these missions going, I say, but with strong civilian oversight.
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The problem with accepting the idea of our military being involved in small battles around the world illustrates that fuzzy thinking so often displayed by our policy makers.
We argue the merits of big vs little incursions (aggressions). We argue the "Bush Doctrine." We argue about the "use" of our military power.
Unfortunately the use is not the real problem. WHO MAKES the Decision to go or not is the real problem. If you get a President that has personal motives the decision becomes tainted before the mission is even objectively considered.
Who do you trust to send your son or daughter to some foreign land to fight and die for some "laudable cause"?
Do you realize the extent to which our government with a biased press and a weak Congress can propagandize its citizens? No, what about the idea that nearly 5000 of our sons and daughters are dead BECAUSE the President LIED to get us into Iraq? AND, THERE is NO reaction here in the US.
Do you understand there is a whole industry in the US that has as its whole reason for existence to profit from war?
Do you think that this huge silent industry sits back and waits for war, or does it lobby like all industries for what it wants?
Do you understand that in our Constitutional system we supposedly have checks and balances. Do you also understand that the decisions of your Commander in Chief concerning the rest of the world has none, other than public opinion and the attacked nations ability to respond.
Our Commander in Chief coupled with a willing military is closer to being a King in the "outside" world than we in the US realize.
Our politicians DO NOT make objective decisions about who to attack and why.
If you don't believe me look at all the dictators we have supported because we think it is to our political or our commercial advantage.
Remember supporting Castro against Batista supposedly to get Batista's dictatorship out of Cuba?
Who made that decision? Who failed in their collection of enough evidence of the consequences of a Castro victory? What about Vietnam?
How many of your sons and daughters died there and for what reason? Remember the supposed dangers of the "Domino theory?"
Our fighting World War II was obviously necessary and justified. Irag???
The Bush Doctrine is only marginally rational when the evidence for going to war is accurate, overwhelming, and the danger is imminent, significant and the decision is Bi-partisan and made by objective persons.
That's a BIG order.
Again the problem with debating big or small incursions, where to send the military, to what degree to commit our sons and daughters is the second question.
The first is are the decision makers to be trusted to be making the decision Objectively and for what reasons.
I think it's like this: We need to have a military. Comma. A well-REGULATED military, not a runaway global emergency service that's causing a financial emergency right here in the US, a half-trillion a year added to the debt for 'defense', and if you watch the whole Boeing/tanker story, apparently not really that big a deal, nothing that won't wait for 30 days while the IAW(union) goes on strike to glean more money out of the entire process. My belief is, not only is the military overextended, which is a view forwarded by some fairly chrome-plated military peeps here and there, but it's also gone corrupt, plain and simple. I think it's also kind of forgotten what it's supposed to be, and become a conduit for 'stuff' that may or may not benefit the United States anymore.
But, there's a lot of money wrapped up in the whole thing, and the MJ story talks about there being something like 700+ military bases around the world, and you have to kind of ask, 'why'. I do, anyway, I think there comes a point when you have to give voice to the question, 'empire'?, and consider the attendant concerns involved, there.
Now, for the most part, I think our folks in uniform are a decent lot, used to be one of them, seemed like they were generally OK, but there's some that I've met that I would not care to meet alone in a dark alley, or on Main Street at mid-day for that matter. Now, the military is what it is, they do what they do, but the military is also the face 'we' show the world, and bad memories are hard to erase, and the good ones fade away all-too-soon. Diplomacy vs. thuggery, I guess you could say, and which has a better and longer-lasting impact.
Once upon a time, there lived a man named Smedley Darlington Butler. He joined the Marine Corps, and went on to become a twice-decorated CMOH recipient. The Congressional Medal Of Honor is an award that is typically given posthumously, after you're dead, for doing something especially brave and earning the respect and admiration of your fellows and brothers and sisters in arms. Butler recieved two, and lived to tell the tale, and made General along the way. He also wrote a book, well, a paper, something like that, entitled, 'war is a racket'. No matter what your view of the Iraf saga is, or the military in general, the words of this particular General bear some careful consideration, some soul-searching if you will, as by all accounts Gen. Butler definitely saw and experienced first-hand the kind of times and events that are liable to put said soul to the ultimate litmus test of whether or not you're basically willing to run someone through with a bayonet and keep on doing that kind of thing as a career in order to advance the cause of liberty, or whatever they're calling it this week. Here's a link that contains Butler's quote, and details the misadventures of the rout of the Bonus Army by Patton and McArthur under Herbert Hoover.
http://www.hampsteadchamber.com/A%20Southern%20Primer/hoover.htm
One reason for mentioning the Bonus Army is that these were veterans who were, you guessed it, made a promise of Money From The Government. Problem: Government didn't have it. Disgruntlement ensued, along with Night Of The Living Dead convergence on D.C. of all these veterans.
General-ly, the military is well, it's the military. And, it has its' supporters and its' opponents, but chances are, we'll continue to have one, like it or not. Whether or not it's well-managed, and greed and graft and fraud and largesse and hubris and other pitfalls are avoided, well, that's partly up to Congress, partly up to the People, and partly up to men and women in uniform of Butler's calibre, and their knowledge and ability to do their best to prevent abuse of our military or the squandering of needless lives to promote some people's business interests. That's my view, anyway.
The military reach around the globe is shocking. The NYT's article this week showed that the US now supplies 52% of arms sales to the word to Russia's 21%
The question to ask is why is the US fueling an arms race in the Middle East as more Gulf States order American hardware. Why is it fueling other regional arms races, like in South America. If it is in the US interest, who are we protecting against? All we do is buy some regional hegemony with a state that may or may not be US friends tomorrow.
Is all these pre-emptive arms selling? To buy nations allegiance before others can? And who are the others? Russia? China in the far distant future?
more: horribledictu.com
As an outsider but well within the sphere of influence of the american empire - imperial overstretch is very visible. Embassy staff, usually educated people - has been replaced with christian trailer trash on a mission - overseen by polit-officers.
Disney, Historychannel etc. are delivering ramped up, almost histerical content that shows Americans living in mansions and fighting against evil, interspersed with some "biblical" historiography while the documentary record and numeric evidence
shows the US-empire is already falling apart. Propaganda is the message and the Bushist believe it themselves. Georgia, Tibet, Northafrica - the other Superpowers have the edge. Everywhere the US empire is on the verge of or has been defeated.
Afghanistan will probably fullfill the destiny and be the breaker of empires again.
Peace and blessings unto all.
To think that for one second the US military has altruistic goals in terms of the current operations it's now engaged in around the globe is to fail to see that no military in history has ever mobilized for less than an occupational or resource based agenda if not outright conquest. The "war on terror" is a total pretext (and blatant lie) for global conquest of all materials, resources, and land the US military deems as either strategic or tactical to its own survival. Don't believe anything from an entity that on September the 10th 2001 admitted that it could not account for $2.3 trillion. That money was not blown on lottery tickets friends. It was most likely blown on military technology that has been and will further be tested and used in all the various theaters of operation including the contiguous 48. The US military has read the "handwriting on the wall" and is out for its own survival. All else be damned.
Go further, think deeper & seek the truth at all costs. Learn more at www.subversivearchitect.com.
Yes we need to have a military.
I, personally would like to see our focus on State Militias (Permanent), with a small organizing/deploying/training mechanism (federal military, renewed every two years)
and these small incursions run through the United Nations, allowing for 'volunteers' from the US and state militias (Foreign Legion)
And Congress calling into duty all militias, under the national military, to defend the US in time of war.
Of course, that would be adhearing strictly to the original Constitution and forgoing any attempt at Empire and the War on Terror.
Practicly, though, I have no answer.
While I consider myself unapologetically liberal, I must say that some of you are a little too invested in the idea that everywhere there is an complex issue you might not fully understand, there must be a conspiracy. It's actually pretty simple, but maybe that's because I am also an ex-Infantryman who has participated in some of the operations abroad that Kaplan is talking about.
In a post-cold war world, we have to have our military spread out around the globe for two reasons: ONE: In case of agression that jeapordizes our interests anywhere, we can respond very quickly (within the first 24 hours) with highly mobile, highly subversive small teams that can entrench themselves in the local populace to gather intelligence and prepare any further moves. TWO: The mission of these far-flung bases/operations is NEVER to build empire, simply to make friends, gain trust and support via social/environmental/infrastructure projects that can positively impact local communities. These civil engineering efforts, like building irrigation systems and repairing bridges and such, only help to foster an effective local view of the US and its troops should we need to send combat forces to any region in the future, whether part of the war on terror or any other initiative. Additionally, our involvement in training local, indigenous forces - as in Malaysia, Thailand, Columbia, the Philippines, etc. - allow us to further US interests abroad without risking large numbers of American lives on the ground in countries where guerilla movements, often supported and affiliated with international terrorist organizations, are creating headaches for US-friendly and somewhat Democratic governments.
Overall, I think Kaplan's right on the money - he's saying that WE as the people who elect these representatives have to hold them accountable for quagmires like Iraq which will stall and force undue pressure on this sensitive web of minor, global operations and threaten to undermine US efforts to exert influence and steer allies' civilian populations towards a pro-American viewpoint.
That avoided so many issues at the heart of the matter. You painted a very pretty picture of our past and present international influence. Funny how we respond far for frequently and strongly in areas of some kind of value. Funny also how decades of being a "good neighbor" has us hated and ridiculed around the world. Your infantry experience hardly serves as a qualifier for your knowledge of America's global plans. Kinda sounds like a cute speech I heard by Gordon England.
Good neighborly help?1 Million dead Koreans, 3 Million dead Vietnamese, 1 Million dead Irakis, half a million dead in Southamerica, Rwanda, Darfur.
US usually mingles with dictators, massmurderers.
But hey the rest of the world is rightnow bankrupting the US and turning it into a dysfunctional 3rd world country with the help of your junta and the idiots that voted for them.