Right Reasons, Wrong Response? US Action against Islamic State

Photo: Creative Commons via Voice of America

Islamic State (IS, aka ISIL, aka ISIS) is a brutal, deadly organization operating in Syria and Iraq. It is intensifying the refugee crisis in the region, which in itself threatens to destabilize countries like Lebanon and Jordan, which the group also wishes to conquer. This instability and bloodshed alone would be reason enough for the US to take action, but America also has a certain responsibility to help Iraq, as the political situation there that allowed IS to gain a foothold in the country has come about partly through US (in)action. The fact that the Iraqis requested US help leaves little question of the legitimacy of action against Islamic State within Iraq. Conundrums abound, however, and it is easy to see why US President Barack Obama has been so hesitant to get involved.

The US is now involved, however, with the stated aim of leading a broad coalition to "roll back this terrorist threat" and to "degrade and ultimately destroy ISIL through a comprehensive and sustained counterterrorism strategy." Obama also vowed to "hunt down terrorists who threaten our country wherever they are," explicitly allowing airstrikes in Syria as well as Iraq. He announced that 475 additional US troops would be sent to Iraq to advise and train Iraqi forces. The air campaign in Iraq could be expanded and Syrian rebels would also be trained and funded to attack IS.

These actions may be effective in "rolling back" IS--i.e. pushing it back out of Iraq--and "degrading" it, but they are unlikely to "destroy" it anytime soon. Furthermore, even if they did the latter, there is no guarantee that another group would not take its place. Militant groups like IS require support from the populations in which they operate. The flip-side of that coin, however, is that it is nearly impossible to eliminate them as long as they have such support. Furthermore, that support needn't be from anything like a majority of the population as long as there are enough people to hide, supply, and fight for the group. Support for such groups comes for political reasons (such as anger at repression or at a lack of power for a given group). To "destroy" IS, then, requires eliminating as much support for it as possible. Eliminating support for it requires addressing the political issues that have led to that support--in other words: political solutions are needed for political problems. These do not really seem to be part of the "comprehensive and sustained counterterrorism strategy" Obama announced.

Retired British General Rupert Smith points out that armies can be used to assist governments or populations in difficulties, or in order to contain a threat, "without knowing the desired political outcome" or necessarily having a strategy for how the situation ends.¹ Even without a political solution, then, the US would still stand some chance at "rolling back" and "degrading" IS. As pointed out, however, "destroying" it would require a political resolution. A more inclusive government and security service within Iraq may be able to resolve the political issues that fostered support for IS there (if indeed these changes really come about). The situation in Syria, however, is much worse. Smith notes that "destroy" missions that lacked political strategies have tended to slide into being "containment" missions instead. Such a mission may be able to stabilize Iraq and secure its border to Syria while the war there rages on and IS continues to operate and occasionally threaten neighboring countries and even its enemies abroad, like the US. This doesn't sound like the aim Obama set forth.

It is hard to envision destroying IS as long as the civil war in Syria continues. For America to achieve its final objective, then, the war must end. At the risk of gross understatement, this is highly problematic because there are basically only two ways the war could end, and neither is particularly appetizing. The first way is that one group or coalition could win the war and impose its will on the rest of the country. Supporting such an iron-fisted imposition of "peace" would be unpalatable to a democratic country like the United States. The second way the war could end would be with a democratic system of checks and balances that protects minorities and provides assurances to the country's various interest groups. This would require broad support within Syrian society and, crucially, trust among the various groups in that society in the fairness and stability of a democratic government. The civil war and a history of authoritarian rule, however, mean that trust is in seriously short supply in Syria. Creating the conditions for such trust, including a government and institutions worthy of it, would be an enormous undertaking.

The easiest way for the US to end the war in Syria would be to throw all its support behind the Assad regime. It could save face by finding a way to work with Russia and Iran to force Assad out while keeping the rest of his regime in place. After the atrocities the regime has committed, which outstrip those of IS in scale, this would be hard to stomach and would strain the US's relations with Sunni allies like Saudi Arabia and Turkey to the breaking point.

The harder way would be to support a pro-democracy coalition within Syria and give it all the backing it needed to win. This is sort of the current plan, but there is plenty of room to question how "democratic" the US-backed rebels are. The US generally speaks of "moderate" rebels, whatever that means, but conspicuously leaves out any reference to their democratic intentions if they were to take power. If these rebels beat both IS and the Assad regime to take control of Syria, they would be coming to power with numerous backers, many of whom, such as those from the Gulf states, who would not be particularly interested in supporting democracy. In order to influence things in that direction, the rebels would need to be supported by, and rely most heavily on, the West. This would almost certainly mean US troops in Syria and a lengthy, large-scale operation to stabilize the country enough to allow trust to be rebuilt and give all the groups within the Syrian population a stake in the success of a new system. Given the constraints on the US, from its budget tightening to the overwhelming opposition of its population to greater involvement in the region, coupled with the US's poor record in state-building and democracy promotion at gunpoint, this option is inconceivable and success would be far from assured if it were.

In the end, then, Obama's goal to "degrade and ultimately destroy" IS should probably be seen as having a greater emphasis on the "degrade" part. The "ultimately" portion, along with the difficulties of "destroying" IS without extensive involvement in Syria or making unpalatable decisions, suggests this is more of a wish than something that is actually planned at any time in the near future.  As such, the current operation is likely to end up being one of containment, which will be open-ended, only being resolved when someone wins the Syrian civil war. If American-backed rebels win it, tough decisions will still lie ahead. If they don't, even tougher ones may, along with a lot of recriminations. Even the cautious option Obama seems to have selected is fraught with peril and tens of thousands of lives will still likely be lost. Doing something may be better than doing nothing, but it is still not very good.

1. Smith, Rupert. The Utility of Force: The Art of War in the Modern World. Kindle Edition. London: Penguin, 2012, Chapter 7.

When military action is the more "peaceful" option

US President Obama has authorized limited air strikes against the "Islamic State" (IS), an extremist (to put it mildly) group that has taken control of much of northern and western Iraq and eastern Syria. Some in his administration have apparently "toyed" with the idea of a limited troop deployment there to assist the Iraqi army as well, but Obama is a long way from approving this. If IS can be stopped without it, he is right to keep US troops out of harm's way, but it is not clear the Iraqi army is up to the challenge. If it isn't, being hesitant now could lead to heavier (and bloodier) US involvement later.

Many people fear another round of the Iraq War started by Obama's predecessor, George W. Bush. Others might think further back and fear another Vietnam. Afghanistan in the '90s might be a better nightmare scenario, and it is also often cited. If Obama is worried the US will get dragged into an unnecessary war, as it was in Vietnam, he should also keep in mind the old adage "a stitch in time saves nine." It may be much easier to defeat IS now than it will be in a year's time.

Syria provides a cautionary tale: for a while, Assad looked sure to fall. Now Syria is in such a mess (including much of it falling into the hands of IS) that many hope he doesn't, despite all the atrocities he has committed to stay in power. Not backing the moderates more heavily there means Assad is still in power and it has also allowed IS to flourish--the worst of both worlds. Not going to war is not always the option that leads to greater peace and it is not always more prudent. In Libya, there was no real alternative government (though I still believe, as I have argued here, that the limited intervention there was the right thing to do). Iraq is not Libya. It has a (albeit very imperfect) government. Furthermore, it is a government that the US helped bring to fruition. The US therefore carries some responsibility for aiding in its success if it can.

Going back to the Afghanistan analogy, there is a lesson there, too, that speaks in favor of being proactive (though one could hardly call missions against IS "proactive," they are now much closer to "re-active"): The US's failure to be concerned about Afghanistan once the Soviet "threat" there receded came back to haunt it. If IS continues to threaten Iraq, makes progress against the Kurds, or threatens Jordan, hesitation and "prudence," may come to seem very imprudent indeed.

The Difficulties of Deterrence

As my regular readers and friends will know, I am writing a PhD on the use and effectiveness of deterrent policies against terrorism. It's an important subject, because the way a state decides to fight terrorism can protect people from harm, but it can also cost vast sums of money, endanger the lives of soldiers, kill civilians, topple governments, cause global outcries, and quite possibly result in incentives leading to more terrorism, not less. It also might not even protect many people from much harm if the policy is flawed. In other words: it's a matter of life and death.

So what the heck is deterrence, anyway? Deterrence is when I encourage you not to attack me by promising I will attack you back so hard you'll regret it. Sound brutal? Well, let's face it: it's not a happy, "I'm OK you're OK" kind of foreign policy. It has its merits, though. The greatest is that it is inherently defensive in nature, rather than offensive. "I will retaliate if you attack me" is not the same as "I will attack you." So the decision is left to the other party, which is crucial because this distinguishes deterrence from things like preemption and prevention (think of invading Iraq and toppling Saddam so that he can't even think about one day attacking the United States), which seek to control others, rather than simply coerce them.

A second benefit, which further argues for its morality, is that it is also inherently limited, potentially costing less in terms of both blood and treasure, but I will get to this below.

A policy based on threats of violence seems awful to us folks living in countries with the rule of law, where we're taught that violence is never the answer. I agree with that sentiment, by the way. I long considered myself a pacifist and still abhor violence. After all, we have recourse to police, courts, managers, what have you if there's a problem. That's the point of a state, really: to keep its people safe from external threats, and those emanating from its own citizens -- to order society so that it can be run peacefully. Outside of states, though, there is no police force. If a country is attacked and cannot defend itself (yes, this does still happen in today's world!) its only hope is to call another, stronger, country to its rescue. The reason the US has such a big military is that it often is that country and defines its "interests" broadly: Japan not getting freaked out by China and developing nuclear weapons, scaring the whole region into a destabilizing arms race, for example (to prevent this, America promises to protect Japan and mediate disputes in the region, making everyone relax a bit).

OK, so there's my defense of the morality of deterrence. How about the difficulties, as mentioned in the title? Well, there are plenty of them. For one thing, the threat deterrence is based on must be credible. This means I have to have the capability to retaliate and the will to do so. For a country like the US, it is mostly the latter that is problematic. When US troops were attacked in Lebanon and Somalia, the US pulled them out after public outcries. The impression was that the US had no stomach for casualties. In fact, al-Qaeda probably believed this when it launched the 9/11 attacks, hoping that it could encourage the US to pull its troops out of the Middle East. I have recently discovered that Hamas also doubted that Israel would launch a full-scale attack on it when it was launching lots of rockets from Gaza in the run-up to the '08-'09 Gaza War. This was because Israel had been forced out of Lebanon by Hezbollah. Israel was stuck in southern Lebanon and could not crush Hezbollah without re-invading, for which there was no political or diplomatic support, at home or abroad. It eventually had to withdraw.

So deterrence failed to stop rockets coming in from Gaza because Israel's deterrent threat was no longer credible, despite Israel's obvious military capabilities and the large numbers of Hezbollah fighters killed by Israeli forces. This brings me to the most difficult part of maintaining a credible deterrent: preventing getting yourself stuck in quagmires.

Realist theorists are the ones that often stress deterrence. They are also the ones who most advocate only limited intervention to protect core interests and maintain the credibility of a country's deterrent threat. For example: roll into Kuwait to eject Saddam Hussein from the country? Yes. Saddam's presence risked destabilizing the region (Iran and Saudi Arabia were alarmed, and Saudi Arabia asked the US to intervene to protect it), and US inaction would have wholly discredited its deterrent capability and given a green light to would-be invaders everywhere. Invade Iraq when it showed no signs of attacking the US, then overthrow its government and start a new one? No. This is a risky operation likely to be very costly and drawn out, and its effect on deterrent credibility is questionable as it is not in response to any attack. Attack Afghanistan for its role in harboring terrorists? Yes. If the US wished to demonstrate that allowing terrorists to congregate and act in a country is expensive, that's certainly one way to do so. From the perspective of deterrence, setting up a new regime in the country was not strictly necessary and also carried significant risks similar to those in Iraq, which should now be clear.

This brings me back to the second advantage of a deterrent policy: its inherently limited scope and the caution this promotes. Is it nice to leave dictators and regimes like the Taliban in power when we have the capability of removing them? Liberals and neoconservatives (liberals in wolf's clothing) think not. They may sometimes be right: If everything goes well, the people of a country might be freed, and a responsible democracy might set in. Everything doesn't often go right, however, and even if it does, can we be sure it was worth the bloodshed and cost? It should be obvious to anyone right now that the US cannot march against every dictatorship or reviled regime in the world and overthrow it -- it is just too expensive and would bleed the country dry, preventing it from maintaining peace in the rest of the world. Pick your battles. Realism and deterrence policies provide a guide on how to do so.