Syria under Bashir Assad (closed end 2014)

[Bill Moore]

Dayuhan,

I agree with your overall assessment, so where does that leave us when we state our means to project national power include diplomacy, information, military and economic power? What other credible tools do we have in the toolbox beyond the military?

A lot of folks tend to believe if we just threw more money at State and AID a lot of our issues would magically disappear. I see little evidence of that being true. On the other hand, I think we're over militarizing a number of issues, so we're between the proverbial rock and a hard place.

[Dayuhan]

I agree with your overall assessment, so where does that leave us when we state our means to project national power include diplomacy, information, military and economic power? What other credible tools do we have in the toolbox beyond the military?

The tools are pretty much what they've always been, we just have to be more realistic about what we can expect to accomplish with them, particularly when it comes to meddling in the internal affairs of other countries. The illusion that we can settle another countrys internal disputes or persuade people to accept a government they detest just by spreading aid money around may be attractive, but it's illusory. The idea that we can persuade or compel bitter enemies to sit down and accept "inclusive government" because we want them to is attractive, but illusory. The idea that we can compel governments of other countries to govern as we think they should is attractive, but illusory, as is the idea that we know best how other countries should be governed.

There's a tendency among disengaged observers to overrate American influence and assume that the US has more ability to control others than it actually does. The world is a much more multipolar place than it once was, and whatever another country needs, be it arms, technology, or credit, the US is not the only place to get it. That limits the carrots, just as domestic politics limits the sticks: using threats to force others to do our will is always an appealing prospect to those fond of bluster, but there's no assurance at all that it will work, especially when the electorate is in no mood to back the threats up.

It's easy to claim that, for example, the Saudis depend on the US for their survival, but saying it doesn't make it so. They don't depend on us for their survival, and they have as much leverage over us as we have over them, as they rather pointedly made clear recently by pushing a $3 billion arms deal with France, a deal that the US defense industry would have much rather seen on US shores. File that under mild reprimands, but the point is that we don't just dictate any more, if we ever did.

I think we're over militarizing a number of issues, so we're between the proverbial rock and a hard place.

That's true, and I think it often comes down to taking on goals that we have no realistic or practical means to accomplish ("nation building", among others), then dumping them on the military for want of other options. Hopefully we've learned a thing or two about that.