Friday, October 17, 2014

Mistakes in dealing with ISIS?

Steven Walt lists what he thinks are the major mistakes we are making re ISIS:

Mistake No. 1: Exaggerating the Threat
ISIS is a regional problem, yet many of our leadership talk about their atacking us tomorrow.

Mistake No. 2: Squandering U.S. Leverage
"A recurring problem in the conduct of U.S. foreign policy has been the insistence that no problem can be solved if Uncle Sam isn't leading the charge. The more Washington promises to do for them, the less our local partners will do for themselves."

Mistake No. 3: Failure to Set Clear Priorities
"Is it more important to defeat IS, remove Bashar al-Assad from power in Syria, or keep Iran isolated and halt its nuclear program forever? Because these goals are inherently contradictory"

Mistake No. 4: Assuming Others Share Our Worldview and Our Interests 
"A perennial failure of U.S. diplomacy is the tendency to think our interests and our worldview are unquestionably correct and that only our worst enemies are going to disagree with us."

Mistake No. 5: Overpromising and Underachieving
"Here's one big lesson we might draw from our past follies: Most people don't like being told what to do and how to live by a well-armed and heavy-handed foreign invader, especially when that invader doesn't speak their language, doesn't understand their culture, and when its invasion has killed some of their relatives, disrupted their economy, and destroyed existing political institutions. Under these conditions, some of those angry people will organize resistance, and because it's their country, they are likely to fight both fiercely and effectively, even if they are badly outgunned. A second lesson: An armed force is a crude instrument that can destroy but not build, and it is no substitute for effective governance.

Finally, if our primary concern is U.S. security, Washington ought to direct the billions we are currently spending on bombing IS to making sure its recruits can't return home to cause trouble here."

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