The United States must move towards non-military solutions to its foreign policy challenges.
Jackson Diehl’s Dec 7 Washington Post opinion-editorial titled “The sloppy thinking of ‘no military solution’” is a misleading case for military adventurism. It argues that Obama’s leaning toward military non-intervention is “profoundly misguided” and has produced much of the insecurity that exists today. However, this repackaged argument for violence, which led to the invasion of Iraq that Diehl supported, rests on a pervasive myth.
There is no evidence that, after thirteen years of war, military force will bring about peace and security in the region.
There is no evidence that, after thirteen years of war, military force will bring about peace and security in the region. The resurgence of the Taliban in Afghanistan, defeat of Iraqi army by the Islamic State, and persistent instability in Libya prove – without abstract ideology and with facts on the ground – that using the American military to solve political, social, and economic problems is simply ineffective.
The Obama administration has a choice as it begins its final two years: double-down on a misguided, violent paradigm by bombing Syria and Iraq and equipping various armed groups or set the United States on a path toward evidence-based, non-military strategies that get beyond the extremism whack-a-mole it’s playing now.