I don’t think Mark Sumner is convincing at all. He declares that “ISIS represents no threat to the United States. None.” That’s a hard sell to the parents of American hostages still held by ISIS. I think what Sumner means is that ISIS doesn’t pose the kind of threat that al-Qaeda posed prior to 9/11. Even that is just argumentative. You can believe it; you can assert it. That doesn’t necessarily make it true.
If you oppose getting more involved in the region and particularly in Syria, you need to talk about the complexity of the issues, not just call everyone hyperventilating cowards. When it comes to closing Gitmo, people are hyperventilating cowards. When it comes to ISIS taking over Erbil and Baghdad and wiping out whole communities of people, that’s a pretty big disaster from a variety of points of view.
The best argument against action is the difficulty of achieving success. Trying to say that there isn’t a pretty big, fairly urgent problem here is totally unconvincing and won’t be taken very seriously by too many people.
Just curious, as on this specific topic I am still trying to resolve in my mind what options exist and which might be effective.
But you say that “The best argment against action is the DIFFICULTY of achieving success.” Would say that is also the best argument against doing anything about climate change issues? Or about inequality? Or working towards single payer in this country?
That isn’t really a rhetorical question. Or are you saying that might be the best argument but it isn’t really a good enough one?
Not exactly. But let’s look at two things.
The first one had a time-limited goal, but nothing bad would have happened if we didn’t meet that goal. People would not have turned about NASA funding and ruined the project.
But the second one depends on sustained political support from the people in order to be successful. If you can’t get that, you really ought to consider not doing anything. Because why ask for your own humiliating defeat?
The difficulty is directly proportional to the extent to which the US becomes labeled the “foreign troops” and becomes the target of the folks we are putatively “helping”.
This is something the “do something” folks find difficult to grasp, especially the ones that want US branding and glory for every US military action.
Landing people on the Moon was just engineering. Nothing compared to dealing with human beings.
I read that post earlier today and mostly agreed with him. Is IS (ISIS, ISIL, Iwhatever) a threat? To someone yes. To us here in the US right now? Not that I can see. Are we now boosting their ranks with our airstrikes? Probably. Will more military action from us boost their recruitment numbers higher? Historically that seems to be how this goes.
We can’t seem to help ourselves when it comes to war. Because the other option is admitting that the US and Europe have created a giant mess in the Middle East, supporting dictators, exploiting people, killing a lot of them, all for resources. Time and again we run in with guns blazing and then act surprised that people don’t like us. Not once in our history in this region (or any other) have our intentions been good, despite our claims to the contrary.
And it looks like we are all set to do it again. Because it’s easier than admitting we have a problem. We are drunk on war.
well, we are drunk on war. But we’re also addicted to oil.
It’s not a great combo for the people of the ME….
Funny. In 1991 we needed the invasion and occupation of another country plus a long list of stories of atrocities (all invented out of thin air, as it turned out) to get the American public to support a war – and even then it was a close vote in Congress.
In 2001 we needed a terrorist attack that killed 3000 people to do it.
In 2014 two beheadings are enough.
As a country we are extremely militaristic – it’s embedding in all of our thinking and actions. Military is the only thing we are good at any more – and it’s where half of our non-Social Security/Medicaid dollars go. And the great trick was that this conversion happened without 99.99% of us being aware that it was happening.
It’s the oil.
Sumner is arguing over against the hysteria that has been whipped up about ISIS using children at the Mexican border to bring in ebola. And about the vague statement that ISIS is a threat to “American interests” without ever saying what “American interests” means.
What exactly does “threat to the United States” mean except an attack on the US homeland? Even the administration has tried to downplay that idea. Intramural pickiness among progressives is now becoming silly when the major issue is war hysteria.
What is the language that people need to use with those in their personal networks who have bought into the hysteria?
Sumner’s major point is about all of the security theater we now endure that will only get worse if hysteria drives political action. (Some cynics argue that that is the purpose of hyping the executions by ISIS in the first place.)
The President has already acted. Those actions are starting to have some effect. The current exercise in hysteria was triggered by his words that were spun to say “I don’t have a strategy”. So now there has to be a crisis when the President rolls out his strategy so that the public will pay attention to what he actually says. I get that.
But at the same time I am working as best I can to take the irrational hysteria out of it. Yesterday I Facebooked a rant about Ted Nugent pooping his pants and suggested that folks like him could be usefully employed as envoys to deliver a Presidential ultimatum to ISIS in Raqaa. I also labeled Nugent as a cultural pollutant. Today I Facebooked Sumner’s statement. Those were not taken as actions of rational intellectual discourse. That I do by posting the Institutute for the Study of War situation reports each day. But sometimes when you are dealing with hysterics, you must shout them down first.
The argument is not against action; it is against showy ineffective and ultimately self-defeating action. Where Sumner is coming from is a strong understanding of Ferguson and how the military and police would love to roll that back a regain their authoritarian freedom of action.
In the propagation of hysteria, the media are aiding ISIS.
Well, if we aren’t going to whip up a frenzy over backyard terrorism and mushroom clouds and Toledo beheadings, then “American interests” need to be kept very, very vague…we don’t even want (or need) to hear what they actually are!
ISIS poses no threat to America – it may threaten Americans in the area or American interests in the region but ISIS “taking over Erbil and Baghdad and wiping out whole communities of” locals doesn’t threaten Richmond or Cleveland or Seattle. It is true that “ISIS represents no threat to the United States. None.”
Now we can argue about whether or not America should be concerned about ISIS taking over Erbil and Baghdad and wiping out whole communities of people, but asserting that ISIS threatens America is laughable. Russia don’t threaten America (they are well-deterred) so I’m not losing sleep over the short-term successes of this militant group. Let them try to govern and then leave them to the hell that they brought upon themselves.
The ratio of the threat of ISIS to people in the US versus the threat of people in the US dying in an auto accident is about 1:infinity. But the propaganda machine is very effective in convincing people otherwise. Just look at this post from progressive Booman.
The problem with standing armies – as some wise men suggested in an important document in June, 1776 – is that they have to find reasons to justify their existence and growth. So they create those reasons. The Pentagon doesn’t have 28,000 people employed in media information departments for nothing.
I didn’t think he was arguing that ISIS isn’t a threat somewhere, and yes, I mostly agree with him. I think he’s reacting to the wet your pants and hide under the bed, let’s go bomb some stuff with no worry about the consequences rhetoric that we’re getting from way too many politicians and pundits.
If Sumner isn’t convincing, how about POTUS:
“I want everybody to understand that we have not seen any immediate intelligence about threats to the homeland from ISIL. That’s not what this is about,” – president Obama, Sunday.
One is a factual statement and the other is an analytical prediction.
“The best argument against action is the difficulty of achieving success.” I would like to know what ‘success’ is in this situation.
Obama is setting the stage for the rest of his presidency. He ended the war on terror and is beginning the war on IS. All actions all over the world will be tied in to the War on IS. It will be the excuse for everything and nothing. The barbarians are at the gates. Even Israel can jump in and give a few punches. He can now put himself on autorobot as far as Middle East policy is concerned. In fact he has thrown in the towel. Let the cards fall where they may. It is impossible that he knows what he’s doing or how he thinks his successor might be able to bring this to an end. What a dismal prospect: at least another three years of hysteria and blood-letting, of devouring the little treasure that the U.S. has left (if any, that is). The beheading of two USAians is for IS what the destruction of the Twin Towers was to Al Qaeda: a brazen provocation. The US reaction was so predictable, so childish, really. Stamp your feet and scream you won’t stand for it! But you will, wait and see.
It would probably be more productive if he made things clearer about Ukraine. Who shot down the Malaysian passenger plane? But he’s not saying because he supposedly doesn’t know. I bet.
Didn’t he say that he did know? It was Russis; if not directly than through its separatist puppets. Just like he “knew” that Assad had used chemical weapons on his own people.
Years from now, researchers will learn the truth about MH17. When it doesn’t matter to more than a relatively small number of people. Because in real time USians can’t handle the truth.
Maybe he knows, maybe he’s not telling what he knows. This guy is as cagey as they come and has turned out to be a first-class bummer. I can’t see how his IS adventure can not turn out to be disastrous. All of this is so disgusting. He has manipulated the U.S. into this mess in a blink of the eye, he’s evern more efficient at his game than Cheney, who had at least to huff and puff to get his way.
Short-term, medium-term, or long-term?
Well, we are not very good at long term thinking, or even medium term. News cycle to news cycle. So I guess we are left wondering what a short term success would look like. That said, success will probably be explained to us as defeating extremism. Which opens up a whole bunch of other questions.
“We killed a bunch of bad folks” and “we’re now safer” is all most USians need as a measure of success. From a marketing perspective it’s great because it can be done again and again. The rubes are short-sighted and gullible enough that they don’t even wonder if there are any long-term goals among the FP experts and the elites that hire them.
It’s not a disaster, it’s an opportunity.
When people see ISIS taking over Erbil, and Baghdad, and wiping out whole communities, and the US limiting itself to largely symbolic actions, they will say, ‘See, America’s beginning to learn its lesson. America is learning not to bigfoot everything. This is their first step away from imperialism. Way to go, America!”
If enough people get killed, and the US still refuses to get drawn in, then they can say “This is the first step away from imperialism, and it’s a big one.”
Because this is all about American imperialism.
I mean, isn’t everything?
That’s where the hyperventilating cowards issue comes in. If the US were able to demonstrate the sincerity of its assertion that it has no imperial intentions but just wants freedom and dignity for everybody in the world, perhaps our actions would be better received by people who are not Saudi sheikhs and Knesset members. But if we can’t even run the infinitesimal risk of closing Guantánamo it looks like the only thing that has changed since Nixon and Kissinger were in charge is that we’ve gotten more fearful.
Another Kabuki “case for war” just like we experienced a dozen years ago and have yet to learn from.
From the NYTimes
And from WAPO
Identified bipartisan FP “experts” included: Michèle Flournoy, Jane Harmon (known for complicity in GWB’s illegal torture and warrantless spying), Richard Haass, Stephen Hadley, and Samuel R. “Sandy” Berger. Well, that makes me feel better. Not. But these are VSP.
Nice contrast to the real people that will end up in refugee camps with little food, water, and sanitation as a result of the VSP “deep discussion.” Wonder if they reviewed the spreadsheet of expected innocent injuries, deaths, displacements? The USG monetary costs are never disclosed and may not ever be calculated in advance because monies for war are always available.
Remaking the Middle East more suited to our liking is the ongoing project. A dozen years into this latest round and there is no end in sight. But we’ve been at war since 1941; so, don’t know anything else.
Well put.
Why not admit that our policy in the ME consists of acting as unpaid goons and shitmagnets for the House of Saud and for Israel? At least we could then go on pulling their chestnuts out of the fire without all of the hot air.
Also oil and the US MIC neither of which the US current constructed economy can function well without and we’re not about to change “our way of life.”
Just like Smedley Butler and United Fruit in the ’20s. DoD is the handmaiden of Exxon-Mobil.
2 hostages is not a “threat to the US”. More die in car crashes in a typical hour.
Thousands of dead soldiers, millions of innocent foreigners dead, hundred of billions spent, and trillions in long-term obligation – which is what we’d get for getting into two civil wars simultaneously – now that is a threat to the United States.
Nonsense. These individual Americans != America.
We don’t say that Italy poses a danger to America, because tourists get pickpocketed in Rome, do we?
Last I reviewed my geography textbooks, Erbil and Baghdad were not in America.
We got stampeded into this clusterfuck IN THE FIRST PLACE because of bullshit like ‘the smoking gun/mushroom cloud’ hysteria.
If we go this route we’re doing exactly what they want, which is exactly what bin Laden did and he won. Yeah, he’s dead, but we’ve done incalculable amounts of damage to ourselves reacting to his provocation.
We have screwed ourselves over 14 ways from sunday because he baited us into it. 99% of the damage to the US from terrorism is self inflicted, an autoimmune disease of democracy. It IS intimately tied into the hysteria over Guantanamo, because it’s part of the same thing.
If it’s such a ‘big urgent problem’ let the Saudis put their butts on the line, instead of striking up another hopeful chorus of ‘Onward Christian Soldiers’.
ISIS is a hella bigger threat to their national interests.
You’re buying into the idea that serious people espouse violence as a solution. Look I all for airstrikes to back up the Kurds and assist the Persians in keeping Iraq from falling to the caliph, but I don’t see the caliphate as a big enough threat to throw us into Syria. They are busy trying to govern and run a conventional state in a region that has mixed feelings about them. If they freak out Islamofascists lovers like Erdogan and the Saudis so much the better.
This is nonsensical, and not like you: ‘He declares that “ISIS represents no threat to the United States. None.” That’s a hard sell to the parents of American hostages still held by ISIS.’
I declare that global warming is caused by human activity, and represents a terrifying threat to America. That’s a hard sell to the Republics. So what?What we are able to sell to the parents of hostages is irrelevant.
On a list of the top 1000 threats to the United States, Boo, where would you place ISIS?
Everyone seems to think that the Saudis can field their military against the Daish without it turning on them. I wonder if we actually want to test this theory.
On the other hand, the areas now under Daish control were previously within the sovereignty of Assad and Saddam Hussein; not sure what gains and losses that represents geopolitically but “not much” springs to mind.
Furthermore, before the US dips a toe in this turgid water, it may be worth examining the role of our NATO ally Turkey in this whole mess; I’m not clear that Erdogan has ceased meddling in this arena and half suspect him of harbouring Ottoman pretensions of a new Caliphate himself. Not to mention the Gulf and Saudi allies which village conventional wisdom now seems to be turning against. Stop, everyone. Look around and take a deep, deep breath.
There are as many opportunities here as threats, to be honest. but none of this goes away until we are weaned off desert oil. Until then it is your oversized pick-up truck which is dictating US foreign policy.
So, why didn’t America bomb the shit out of Pakistan after Daniel Pearl was killed? He is an American and he was a journalist.
Pakistan has nukes and a population of almost 180 million people.
Really makes you wonder why anyone else would want nuclear weapons, doesn’t it?
Yeah, Ghaddafi and Saddam are hanging out some place together bemoaning “if only we had a nuke or two like that fruitcake in North Korea.”
Oh, I think one can see what “American interest” is potentially threatened by the rising IS, although it seems our FP elites don’t really want it to be specifically mentioned. If one leaves aside the purely humanitarian concerns that the IS thugs raise (which all sorts of militarily advanced nations supposedly possess, America is no paragon of morality, ha-ha), then of course we are dealing with our time honored perpetual basis for seeking “stability” in ME nation states—the Gulf oil fields, Saudi or otherwise.
We simply cannot countenance an arguably substantial threat to the Family Oil biznesses masquerading as “nations”. And apparently IS can now be perceived as such a threat to these reactionary states, and thus our “interests” are “threatened”. America’s gas pumps and SUV gastanks are under threat!
Now, Saudi Arabia has a border with the new IS, as far as I can tell, but there’s a whole lotta desert between western Iraq and the Gulf Family biznesses. And there’s a lotta Shi-ites to fight thru to get to the oil fields of Basra. Of course, any hostile mechanized infantry anywhere in the ME is too close for comfort, given the essentiality of Gulf oil to running the modern economy, especially our gas hog one. But of course, it is OUR Imperial Sturmtruppen who are being called on.
Now, KSA (for one) has spent a fortune on its bloated hoard of military hardware, and has supposedly trained up a big load of soldiery. But when a rag tag force of beheaaders led by ex-Saddam generals and driving captured American hardware rears its ugly head, King Abdullah knows his troops and armor and artillery (and their 5,000 royal princely commanders) are beyond useless, and only the Imperial Sturmtruppen will do! Very instructive as to the vitality of the mediaeval monarchy the Shining City on a Hill is shackled to! So I guess our generals have to worry about all THAT mountain of hardware someday falling into IS’s hands. And Imperial Germany lamented that IT was shackled to an Austro-Hungarian corpse, haha!
Anyway, quite an about face for Obama, from watching a fairly consistent descent into ME instability for the past 6 years without too much (military) concern, to a nationally televised evening address about “American interests” and our critically necessary military response to IS. One hopes it’s not (purely) about political concern over the hysteria Repubs and their corporate media have generated.
Jeebus, if only some day global warming could be the subject of a high profile evening prez speech! As if…no “American interest” there!
Anyway, back to the trenches!
At this point I’m suggesting that if we thought of the Daish as one of those comic book monsters that grows stronger when subjected to the hero’s superpowers we would begin to grasp the essential problem they present. But I don’t think we’ve realised that yet.
In the meantime we need to ask, “Whose selling these bastards their petrol and grain?” I think we already know the answer. Their whole economy and the ‘Caliphate’ experiment folds up without fuel and food. Is that so complicated? Yet to describe the border with Turkey as ‘porous’ understates the case:
$778,639,000? Whoopsie. So we’re providing the Quds Brigade with air support in Iraq while our NATO ally is getting their collective palms crossed with Daish silver? And buying their smuggled oil one supposes too? This is our NATO ally, folks, propped up by global investments he secured by being a tough guy.
Heh. Well there seems to be a billion dollars the Seven Sisters will never see disappearing into the Turkish black market, and we need Erdogan to stand up to Putin. Clearly time to send in the taxpayers. Better get ’em revved up.
The Seven Sisters. How quaint. Who had the contracts to drill in eastern Syria and Kurdistan? I vaguely remember the disappointing news after the Iraq-US Status of Forces Agreement was implemented was how little US and UK oil companies got in contracts. So likely the oil is being stolen or extorted from some other country’s companies. Japan? China? Russia? Those would go a ways to explaining why the US allowed ISIS to strengthen itself with its deals with Turkey.
The second wrinkle is that somehow the oil finds its way to a formal or informal market where companies interesting it refining it or arbitraging it make transactions that launder it through storage with oil from elsewhere. Some of those transaction could even be short-term ones by US-owned companies. Now it is not black-market oil; it is just oil and off to any refinery it goes.
The point is that the US does not need to control the wellheads any more. In fact it works better if the US participation is out of sight.
But the US is interested in there being no curtailment of aggregate production like the oil embargo that Arab countries conducted in the 1970s. The Three US Sisters (I think there are three left) need a fluid market and good markups and can stick the wellhead producers with oversupplies. I bet there is even a way to play the current oil market to diminish the economic power of ISIS’s holding of wellheads.
In the last two months I think that Erdogan realized that he was playing a dangerous game that could come back to destabilize Turkey. Even the Saudis are beginning to worry about their creation.
Indeed, but cheap oil which affects all producers. But as you have noted it quickly disappears into the commodity market without much notice. You and I may be pumping it into our own fuel tanks a few weeks later.
“I bet there is even a way to play the current oil market to diminish the economic power of ISIS’s holding of wellheads.” Yes, like stopping it at the Turkish border. Honestly, as an alternative to military action wouldn’t that make a world of sense if some actors really wanted to stop this.
My point is this is a problem with a number of our allies whom have taken advantage of our dependence on them. Not saying the US shouldn’t take some action at some point but it should probably include a reassessment of our aspirations and regional relationships.
Six supermajors then. ‘Big oil’ by another name. So that’s how ‘rebranding’ works, eh?
M&A left and right. And mergers of some smaller ones like Total and Fina and Elf Aquitaine filled in some of the empty spaces with new “sisters”.
Tell you what. Since you think ISIS is threat to America I have a proposition for you. I’ve served my time in the army. So, why don’t you man the fuck up rush on down to the nearest recruiting station and join up so you can go fight ISIS if they are such a threat to you.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/isis-pr-machine
‘Bamboozled’ understates the case, it seems to me:
Next we’ll hear that they’ve hired Lanny Davis.
As I noted here with the release of the Foley video (and got handed some grief for doing so, it had high production/staging values. Those guys may hate our guts and culture, but they love our tech.
Doing something to “fix” a US created problem:
But this time will be different?
Why is the assumption that we’re rushing into a war, this President has done everything to avoid that type of situation in the past. Shouldn’t we wait until he actually announces his policy before we pick it apart?
It’s Obama. He’s worse than fill-in-the-blank.
I think the war hysteria the media and GOP have kicked up has everyone nervous.
My current reading is that the speech is more a way of getting the public to listen to what the President is actually saying by hyping the danger. He got behind the news cycle with a statement that was spun as “we don’t have a strategy”. Now he can say, “we definitely have a strategy”.
The new part IMO likely has to do with what we are going to do in Syria. This is dicey because the side we have previously picked, the Free Syrian Army, has shown itself to be transferring arms to ISIS or incapable of opposing ISIS. And supporting them militarily would put the US interfering in a civil war within a sovereign member of the United Nations. Absence a UN Security Council resolution authorizing US action, that would be a violation of international law slightly more significant than Bush’s sleight of hand two resolutions in the UN Security Council that Bush claimed authorized his invasion of Iraq. Once again asserting that the President has the absolute responsibility of protecting the American people walks Presidential power one step further down the slippery slope that Harry Truman started in the 1940s.
The other clarifying issue will be relationships with Iran with respect to Iraq and Russia with respect to Syria and whether the situation in Israel/Palestine enters into the context of stated decision-making at all.
at this post. This
Getting into ANOTHER Middle Eastern war because a bunch of thugs beheaded two people is about the dumbest thing I can possible imagine. There is no evidence that a US intervention can effect even a medium term change in the middle east.
I am surprised to see Booman sign up for the “Do something chorus”. You have the arguments completely reversed.
Show me the strategy. Tell me what happens if ISIS goes away. Who replaces them?
The advocates for intervention do not have any answers to these questions.
The obsession with the Middle East is absurd. It is not in the US interest to become involved in a war in the Middle East.
I just spent the last hour and fifteen minutes listening to “senior administration officials” explain their policy. I can’t talk about it until 9pm, though.
What I can say is that they are a smart, impressive bunch who are taking on a very, very difficult task. You could call me quite concerned.
to all of the right schools.
So did I.
If they are so smart why didn’t they foresee ISIS in the first place. Or what will replace them.
Also, we’re not doing this because of two beheadings, so stop saying that.
And I am not in the “do something chorus.” I have consistently opposed involving ourselves in the Syrian civil war because it would be taking sides in a sectarian war. The administration is working to find an angle that won’t be based on sectarianism, which is probably the biggest challenge they face.
As for ISIS, they are very bad news. Like Rwanda-level bad news. I do support driving them out of Iraq. I just have no idea what to do about Syria. I’ll have more on that when I can talk about it.
Driving them out of Iraq. To where? And how? American bombs will make great recruitment videos. Inevitably there will collateral damage. There always is.
This country still can’t fully admit that our initial invasion in 2003 spawned this mess. And now we are possibly escalating it yet again. I do hope those serious folks you allude to payed attention over the last 11 years.
crystallized public opinion. The President spoke about them directly.
I do not think you are right about that.
Yemen is in midst of 3 civil wars closing in on capital, but it is model for successful US military intervention?
~Sarah Leah Whitson
I’ve gotten to the point where when he comes on TV it’s like how I saw Bush: can’t stand the sound of his voice. What the fuck is this grand strategy that these “Very Serious Smart People” told you? I await the next thread to see it explained in more detail than this address.
Welcome to the club. Been there since his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech. At a purely physical level, my body recoils from arrogant liars and makes it extremely difficult to listen to them speak.