Last updated: September 2, 2013 8:25 pm
The world would miss the American policeman
By Gideon Rachman
The US’s ‘red lines’ underpin global security from the Pacific to eastern Europe
In 1899 Rudyard Kipling, the pre-eminent poet of British imperialism, addressed some stanzas to America. “Take up the white man’s burden,” he urged, “The savage wars of peace/ Fill full the mouth of famine/ And bid the sickness cease.” These days America has a black president and no public intellectual would dare to use the imperialist language of a Kipling. But the idea that the US bears a special burden in policing the world is very much alive. The notion was there in Barack Obama’s call for military action over Syria: “We are the United States,” declared the president – outlining his nation’s special role in creating and defending the post-1945 global order.
But is America still prepared to play the role of world policeman and to wage the “savage wars of peace”? That question will hang over Congress’s debate on intervention in Syria. Mr Obama’s own hesitancy and opinion polls in the US underline that many Americans have grave doubts. They are likely to be reinforced by Britain’s decision to stay out of any military intervention in Syria. Almost 80 years after Kipling’s death, many in the UK have interpreted parliament’s decision as a signal that Britain has finally sloughed off the post-imperial instinct to police the world – even as deputy sheriff to the US.
Since the UK is the world’s fourth- largest military power, and a member of the UN Security Council, such a decision would have global ramifications. But if America were to take a similar path, it would be truly world-shaking. And yet the possibility is clearly there. The US is war-weary after Iraq and Afghanistan and its economy has been weakened by recession. The shale gas revolution has made the country much less reliant on the Middle East. Americans, from Mr Obama down, no longer harbour the illusion that their troops will be greeted with flowers in foreign countries. Instead, as Kipling warned, they have learnt to expect “the blame of those ye better/ The hate of those ye guard.”
As in Britain, a gap seems to have opened up in the US between a foreign policy establishment that still takes it for granted that their nation should police the world – and a more sceptical public. Opinion polls show almost three-quarters of the British public approved of parliament’s decision on Syria. Meanwhile, the congressional debate will take place against a background of opinion polls that show Americans evenly divided on the cruise missile strikes the president is planning.
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GIDEON RACHMAN
These anxieties about Syria are entirely comprehensible. While Mr Obama has triple-underlined his intention that he is contemplating only a limited strike, there are some questions that he cannot really answer. What will happen if Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian leader, is undeterred and uses chemical weapons again? Are we prepared to ignore all other forms of human rights violation in Syria? Does the US have any viable political vision for the future of Syria? Firing a few cruise missiles into Damascus, and hoping that this will somehow improve matters, does not seem like a very sophisticated strategy.
There are broader questions. America has seen itself as the guarantor of global security since 1945, but that has never meant intervening in every conflict or stopping every human rights abuse. The US did not intervene in the
Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s – which, like the Syrian conflict, was waged between two sides that America distrusted and also involved the use of chemical weapons.
Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s – which, like the Syrian conflict, was waged between two sides that America distrusted and also involved the use of chemical weapons.
The notion that the US’s role now involves intervening in particularly bloody civil conflicts – or enforcing a ban on particular weapons – has gained ground only since the 1990s. Its sources lie in the Rwandan genocide, the Bosnian war and the development of a new doctrine on “weapons of mass destruction” as part of a war on terror.
In a speech in 2009 Tony Blair, former UK prime minister, who did a lot to develop this doctrine of liberal interventionism, asked rhetorically: “Should we now revert to a more traditional foreign policy, less bold, more cautious: less idealistic, more pragmatic, more willing to tolerate the intolerable because of fear of the unpredictable consequences that interventions can bring?” The House of Commons has clearly answered that question in the affirmative, repudiating the Blairite legacy.
A Congressional rejection of involvement in Syria would signal that the US, too, is reverting to a more traditional and restricted view of what actions by a foreign power would justify the deployment of American military might. In theory, therefore, refusing to act over Syria need not involve a complete US retirement from the role of global policeman. The trouble is that – as well as encouraging further atrocities by the Assad regime – America’s decision would inevitably be interpreted as sending a much wider message. That is because the belief that America’s “red lines” mean something underpins much of the world’s security architecture – from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf to the Russian-Polish relationship.
For better or worse, Mr Obama drew such a red line over Syria. As he suggested over the weekend, America’s adversaries will draw conclusions if the US fails to act over Syria, and the same would be true of its allies. The governments of Japan, Israel and Poland – to name just a few – will all feel less secure if Congress votes against military action in Syria. The world relies on the American policeman more than it realises.
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Moneynews
US as Global Cop: Speak Softly, Carry Big Debt
Thursday, March 31, 2011 09:59 AM
By: Neal Asbury
Teddy Roosevelt famously proclaimed in 1903 the American creed should be “speak softly and carry a big stick.” These words have been attributed to Roosevelt’s belief that America was in line to become the “world’s policeman.”
The United States reluctantly has embraced this stance and selectively has tried to impose its will on other nations. The results have been mixed, but one thing rings true: these encounters have sapped the American Treasury of trillions of dollars. With our recent incursion into Libya, it’s time to ask ourselves: Considering our current economic morass, can we afford to retain our role as the world’s policeman?
If we look at the start of the 20th century, the U.S. did not relish the thought of getting involved in a faraway war and despite some arms shipments to the U.K. and other European nations, we tried to avoid the conflict. But when we were finally dragged in, we let everyone know: “We’re coming over and we won’t be back ‘til it’s over over there.”
The cost to the U.S. to support World War I was $233 billion in today’s dollars.
While we tried again to avoid direct conflict in World War II, the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor made that impossible. The cost to the U.S. to support WWII was $288 billion in today’s dollars.
After two horrendous world wars, our “world policeman” role was resumed and accelerated with the Korean War costing the U.S. $678 billion and then the Vietnam War costing the U.S. $584 billion.
Now according to figures of the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO), funding for Afghanistan, Iraq and the Global War on Terror could total between $1.56 trillion and $1.88 trillion for FY2001-FY2020 depending on various scenarios. Just to manage the war in Afghanistan costs the U.S. more than $300 million a day.
Our involvement in Libya will cost billions. A single Tomahawk missile costs $1,000,000 and we fired 120 of them during the first few hours of our involvement.
I’m not suggesting that we become isolationist, but can we afford to spend money we do not have on new conflicts that are not clearly defined?
While it’s encouraging that others appear to be stepping up to take on larger roles, if Gadhafi manages to hang on to power, NATO’s enthusiasm will wane and the U.S. will once again be left holding the bag.
Every political pundit across the liberal-to-conservative spectrum agrees that if Gadhafi is not removed, it will be a significant defeat for American policy. Even if Gadhafi goes, what comes next is fraught with numerous nightmarish scenarios. Either way, the financial cost to the U.S. will be staggering.
And then if the Obama doctrine of intervening in foreign lands to protect citizens from their despotic rulers was ever consistently applied, the cost to the U.S. would be a number not yet invented.
If the U.S. is to go to war, why don’t we engage in a war to expand U.S. exports by providing American companies access to foreign markets through the expansion of trade agreements? History has shown that nations that trade peacefully with each other are far less likely to engage in combat since the relationship has inherent advantages for both parties.
The U.S. only has three free trade agreements in the Middle East (Bahrain, Israel and Jordan). We can do better than that, and in May 2003, the U.S. proposed the Middle East Free Trade Area Initiative (MEFTA), a plan of graduated steps for nations in the Middle East to increase trade and investment with the United States leading to the eventual goal of a comprehensive regional free trade agreement.
If the U.S. really wants to demonstrate its support for the people in the Middle East, passing these far reaching trade agreements will bring a flow of much desired U.S. goods to consumers who crave our products. Wouldn’t it be a welcome change to have people in this troubled part of our world appreciate the U.S. instead of always perceiving us as the “bad guys”?
What’s more, how about a war that brings in money instead of watching it flow the other way? The U.S. needs to engage the rest of the world as a trade partner, not a military combatant.
We simply cannot afford to remain the world’s policeman.
We can afford to be the world’s most sought after trading partner, providing a never ending flow of our goods and services instead.
© 2013 Moneynews. All rights reserved.
The United States reluctantly has embraced this stance and selectively has tried to impose its will on other nations. The results have been mixed, but one thing rings true: these encounters have sapped the American Treasury of trillions of dollars. With our recent incursion into Libya, it’s time to ask ourselves: Considering our current economic morass, can we afford to retain our role as the world’s policeman?
If we look at the start of the 20th century, the U.S. did not relish the thought of getting involved in a faraway war and despite some arms shipments to the U.K. and other European nations, we tried to avoid the conflict. But when we were finally dragged in, we let everyone know: “We’re coming over and we won’t be back ‘til it’s over over there.”
The cost to the U.S. to support World War I was $233 billion in today’s dollars.
While we tried again to avoid direct conflict in World War II, the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor made that impossible. The cost to the U.S. to support WWII was $288 billion in today’s dollars.
After two horrendous world wars, our “world policeman” role was resumed and accelerated with the Korean War costing the U.S. $678 billion and then the Vietnam War costing the U.S. $584 billion.
Now according to figures of the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO), funding for Afghanistan, Iraq and the Global War on Terror could total between $1.56 trillion and $1.88 trillion for FY2001-FY2020 depending on various scenarios. Just to manage the war in Afghanistan costs the U.S. more than $300 million a day.
Our involvement in Libya will cost billions. A single Tomahawk missile costs $1,000,000 and we fired 120 of them during the first few hours of our involvement.
I’m not suggesting that we become isolationist, but can we afford to spend money we do not have on new conflicts that are not clearly defined?
While it’s encouraging that others appear to be stepping up to take on larger roles, if Gadhafi manages to hang on to power, NATO’s enthusiasm will wane and the U.S. will once again be left holding the bag.
Every political pundit across the liberal-to-conservative spectrum agrees that if Gadhafi is not removed, it will be a significant defeat for American policy. Even if Gadhafi goes, what comes next is fraught with numerous nightmarish scenarios. Either way, the financial cost to the U.S. will be staggering.
And then if the Obama doctrine of intervening in foreign lands to protect citizens from their despotic rulers was ever consistently applied, the cost to the U.S. would be a number not yet invented.
If the U.S. is to go to war, why don’t we engage in a war to expand U.S. exports by providing American companies access to foreign markets through the expansion of trade agreements? History has shown that nations that trade peacefully with each other are far less likely to engage in combat since the relationship has inherent advantages for both parties.
The U.S. only has three free trade agreements in the Middle East (Bahrain, Israel and Jordan). We can do better than that, and in May 2003, the U.S. proposed the Middle East Free Trade Area Initiative (MEFTA), a plan of graduated steps for nations in the Middle East to increase trade and investment with the United States leading to the eventual goal of a comprehensive regional free trade agreement.
If the U.S. really wants to demonstrate its support for the people in the Middle East, passing these far reaching trade agreements will bring a flow of much desired U.S. goods to consumers who crave our products. Wouldn’t it be a welcome change to have people in this troubled part of our world appreciate the U.S. instead of always perceiving us as the “bad guys”?
What’s more, how about a war that brings in money instead of watching it flow the other way? The U.S. needs to engage the rest of the world as a trade partner, not a military combatant.
We simply cannot afford to remain the world’s policeman.
We can afford to be the world’s most sought after trading partner, providing a never ending flow of our goods and services instead.
© 2013 Moneynews. All rights reserved.
| The White Man's Burden | ||||
| TAKE up the White Man's burden - Send forth the best ye breed - Go bind your sons to exile To serve your captives' need; To wait in heavy harness On fluttered folk and wild - Your new-caught sullen peoples, Half devil and half child.Take up the White Man's burden - In patience to abide To veil the threat of terror And check the show of pride; By open speech and simple, An hundred times made plain, To seek another's profit, And work another's gain. Take up the White Man's burden - The savage wars of peace - Fill full the mouth of famine And bid the sickness cease; And when your goal is nearest The end for others sought, Watch Sloth and heathen Folly Bring all your hopes to nought. Take up the White Man's burden - No tawdry rule of kings, But toil of serf and sweeper - The tale of common things. The ports ye shall not enter, The roads ye shall not tread, Go make them with your living, And mark them with your dead ! Take up the White Man's burden - And reap his old reward, The blame of those ye better, The hate of those ye guard - The cry of hosts ye humour (Ah slowly !) towards the light:- "Why brought ye us from bondage, "Our loved Egyptian night ?" Take up the White Man's burden - Ye dare not stoop to less - Nor call too loud on Freedom To cloak your weariness; By all ye cry or whisper, By all ye leave or do, The silent sullen peoples Shall weigh your Gods and you. Take up the White Man's burden - Have done with childish days - The lightly proffered laurel, The easy, ungrudged praise. Comes now, to search your manhood Through all the thankless years, Cold-edged with dear-bought wisdom, The judgement of your peers. Should the United States be the World's Policeman?
The topic about which I have been asked to speak is a simple question: Should the United States be the world's policeman? Let me start by giving a simple answer: No, we should not.
I know of no one, on the left or the right of the political spectrum, who believes that the United States should assume the role of global cop. Nor, for that matter, do I believe that the rest of the world wants Washington to be the final arbiter of its conflicts and the enforcer of its rules. Turning back a few chapters in our history books, we find some nostalgia for the Pax Britannica of the Nineteenth Century, but such sentiment is primarily confined to the British themselves. To the rest of the world, the Pax Britannica was the Imperium Britannicum, and its sway was consistently resisted by other countries who jealously guarded their own power and independence, including the young United States.
The simple question that I have been asked to address masks a more complicated issue. With the collapse of the Soviet Union, we no longer face an antagonistic superpower whose military and political objective is our destruction. No other country seems able to mount such a threat in the near future. Yet we maintain an extensive diplomatic presence and powerful military forces, at great cost to the U.S. taxpayer, that dwarf those of any other country in the world.
This is because the United States remains a global power with global interests that transcend the life-and-death struggle of the Cold War. So the real question before us is, under what conditions and for which purposes should the United States engage in the limited use of military force for limited objectives?
The question is not whether the United States should ever use military force. Only a pacifist or isolationist would think, for example, that the United States should have consented to Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait and his domination of the Persian Gulf, despite the fact that Iraqi Republican Guards were certainly not going to storm ashore on America's beaches.
No, the only reason we are having this discussion today is because the current Administration has engaged in a muddled, at times dangerous, use of U.S. military power that is greatly at variance with President Bush's wise and prudent actions in the Persian Gulf. I will not today engage in a critique of the Clinton Administration's military efforts in Somalia, Haiti, Bosnia or the Gulf. I have often done so before, and this audience needs no convincing on that score.
Rather, I will address the key factors that I believe should form the basis of a President's decision to use U.S. military forces for limited objectives.
The first and foremost is that American troops should not be ordered into a conflict unless U.S. vital interests are threatened. This is the primary distinction between the role of a great power and that of a policeman: it is the job of a police officer to enforce the laws in situations where the cop, the police chief and the mayor have no direct interest in an outcome. While we all hope for a world in which justice and law govern the actions of states, it would be self-destructive hubris for the United States to put the lives of its soldiers at risk for the sole purpose of good citizenship in the international community.
Of course, defining vital national interests is no simple matter. It calls for statesmanship and is a legitimate matter for political debate. It includes, I believe, ensuring the survival and prosperity of the American people, defending our allies, and combating such global threats as terrorism, the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, or narcotics. But did the United States have a vital national interest in restoring President Aristide to power in Haiti or hunting warlords in Somalia? Of course not.
Second, there should be a clearly stated objective for the use of U.S. armed forces in a conflict.
Third, in keeping with the limited nature of the U.S. military objectives in the post-Cold War world, the commitment of U.S. troops must be of limited duration with a stated and achievable exit strategy. I must say that I was disappointed and angry, but not surprised, when President Clinton announced a few days after the November election that U.S. troops would stay in Bosnia well beyond the one year originally promised to the Congress and the American people. When the deployment of U.S. in Bosnia was debated in Congress in late 1995, I said then that a withdrawal date was not an exit strategy. Despite the outstanding efforts of the forces assigned to the multinational Implementation Force (or IFOR), the conditions for peace in Bosnia did not exist after twelve months, and I have the gravest doubts that they will exist by the time the next deadline for withdrawal comes up in June, 1998.
Fourth, a President who is willing to commit U.S. troops to a conflict must undertake to explain his actions to the American people and obtain political support for his policy. I suspect the failure of the Clinton Administration to seek popular and Congressional support for its peacekeeping operations has been a consequence of its attraction to the fuzzy doctrine of "assertive multilateralism," the purpose of which has been more to strengthen the United Nations than to protect the interests of the United States.
I am not among those who have a reflexively negative reaction to the United Nations. I believe that there are times when international organizations can be used to advance U.S. interests on some issues. But exposing the lives of American soldiers to conflict is and must remain a national decision which should not relegated to an international organization. Nor should such risks be undertaken to advance that organization's interests, as opposed to those of the United States.
Because make no mistake -- the anguish that any President must feel over the loss of American lives in a conflict will not be diminished by the fact that the use of force was authorized by an international organization. Nor will a President escape the judgment of the American people by pointing a finger at New York.
Has there been any change in the Clinton Administration's policies on the use of force since the tragedy of Mogadishu? I believe I am not alone at this gathering in wishing that Bob Dole were now President of the United States. But we only have one president at a time, and I suppose we should consider it a good sign that we hear less about multilateralist interests today than in the early years of the Administration. The decision to deploy troops to Bosnia, for all its faults, was justified on the basis of preserving NATO, an objective which I share. Despite -- or perhaps because of -- her years of service at the United Nations, Madeleine Albright seems to respect the limitations of international organizations on issues of war and peace. And I certainly trust my friend and former colleague Bill Cohen to offer the President sound advice on the use of military force.
Despite our well-founded misgivings about recent uses of limited military force, it is nevertheless true that the United States and our NATO allies have undertaken new commitments in the field of peacekeeping and peacemaking, without of course shedding our traditional responsibilities in the fields of warfighting and deterrence. Unfortunately, these new burdens are being added at a time when defense resources are being cut in all NATO countries.
This raises the issue of whether there might not be new institutional arrangements within the NATO alliance that might facilitate peacekeeping missions by those allies who want to participate, without undercutting our still-necessary mission of deterrence. In the December 10, 1996 edition of the Washington Times, I made a proposal that I believe might be of interest to this body.
I suggested that NATO adopt a new division of labor, under which some members, particularly those with smaller armed forces and/or greater experience with peacekeeping, will increasingly train, equip and organize their forces for peacekeeping missions. While I do not believe any ally should be required to assume such a role, I would think that Canada, the Nordics and perhaps the Benelux countries might be good candidates for specializing in peacekeeping missions on behalf of the alliance. Some of the new members of an enlarged NATO might also choose such a role.
Meanwhile, the United States, along with the United Kingdom, France and perhaps Germany, would agree to assume an even greater relative share of the general defense burden than in the past. A number of other countries, of course, could fit comfortably in either group.
I believe such a division of labor would make the best use of scarce military resources through increased specialization. The countries that emphasize peacekeeping would not have as formidable (or probably expensive) military forces as others, but their troops could expect to deploy more often and actually do more "soldiering." Other NATO members will have to shoulder the cost of maintaining larger, heavier forces and modernizing them with new generations of "smart" weapons.
I also think this arrangement could be made militarily feasible. NATO's new Combined Joint Task Force (CJTF) concept could provide the basis for integrating the new peacekeeping-oriented forces within the Alliance, presumably under a non-American commander. As the division of labor matures, a peacekeeping CJTF might become less ad hoc and more a permanent part of the NATO military structure.
Perhaps most important, this division of labor would address a serious difference of views within the Alliance on peacekeeping missions, the first chapter of which we encountered during the Transatlantic debate with our European Allies participating in the UN peacekeeping mission in Bosnia before the Dayton Accords.
From America's point of view, our primary security interest in Europe is to protect our allies from external aggression, not to cope with ethnic and regional conflicts on Europe's periphery. The Europeans have much more at stake in the latter, in terms of their history, their economies and the importance of forestalling new waves of refugees -- who can flow across the Danube or the Elbe much more easily than the Atlantic.
I do not believe the American people will support an enduring U.S. political and military investment in dealing with such conflicts when U.S. vital interests are not at stake. This is particularly true because the United States also shoulders the burden of protecting, essentially alone, Western security and economic interests outside Europe, from the Persian Gulf to the Taiwan strait.
In this context, I am very pleased that, in his confirmation hearings, the new Secretary of Defense, Bill Cohen, emphasized that this time U.S. forces would definitely be out of Bosnia when the mandate of the new Stabilization Force (SFOR, the successor to IFOR) expires in the summer of 1998. If there is a need for outside military forces after that date, it will be up to the Europeans to handle this problem without the direct participation of the United States.
The response from our European Allies has so far not been very encouraging, as they repeat the "in together, out together" mantra that we have heard so often in the past. But I believe it will take this type of an ultimatum to force the Europeans, who are so proud of their increasing integration and covetous of an ambitious role for their European Security and Defense Identity, to assume a greater real-world responsibility for their own defense.
In closing, I will repeat that we will not be the world's policeman, but there will continue to be a need for the United States and/or our Allies to use military force for limited objectives that, by their nature, will be more complex and difficult than we have faced in the past. The main difference between the role of policeman and responsible world leader is the consideration of vital national interest. There will always be differences over what that interest may be in a given situation, but the decisions will necessarily be those of the President -- and the Congress and the American people will hold him accountable. In those cases where the important test of "U.S. interests" cannot be met, it may still be possible to find ways to facilitate other friendly countries in undertaking peacekeeping missions within the framework of the NATO Alliance.
Thank you.
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