Rathmell: It is high time to get serious about following the indirect approach

Posted By Thomas E. Ricks Wednesday, April 14, 2010 - 10:50 AM Share

Andrew Rathmell, a two tour British veteran of civilian duty in Iraq, said at the UNC-Chapel Hill conference that with the massive costs of direct intervention increasingly apparent, we need to become serious about carrying out the indirect approach, such as better training of foreign militaries and police forces. I think he is right.

The key task in the coming decades, he said, is "helping to police these zones of disorder." If the indirect approach really is the way to go, Rathmell noted, then that has significant implications for foreign policy (like more focus on bolstering weak states) and on the structure of major Western militaries.

Alas, where was the latest QDR on this issue?

US Army Africa/flickr

EXPLORE:IRAQ, MILITARY, U.S. FOREIGN POLICY

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WALKING WOUNDED

5:23 PM ET

April 14, 2010

If you build it, they will get used...

Some attention needs to go towards the availability of arms, and the mainstream business networks that are financing, manufacturing and moving arms about.

The ongoing decade of Bushwar has pumped a new round of state-sponsored purchase of arms that will rattle about this new century of war.

Corruption, demographics and resource shortages guarantee more conflict, but providing security with local forces becomes so much more painful when teenagers on both sides have mines and automatic weapons.

TYRTAIOS

6:26 PM ET

April 14, 2010

Depends what you build

The ball of foreign policy seems to lie more in the court of the Dept of Defense than it does the Dept of State. What is missing here from the equation is that throughout the globe there are authoritarian regimes repressing populations, or sectors of those populations, that seek political freedom and improvement in their standard of living - American values once advanced by our USAID, and Dept of State, by individuals with an understanding of those regions and also armed with the ability to speak the host country language.

We need both soft power and the indirect approach working hand-in-hand, as well as paying attention that we are not just propping-up a totalitarian regime, such as Yemen, for a short term gain.

JJH722

8:01 PM ET

April 14, 2010

good posts--cant help but agree

This really should have been clear to the higher ups years ago. I think the advantages to the indirect approach are clear to the average American, based on the overwhelming rejection of the Iraq war. Unfortunately, all you need to do is look at the prevailing elite sentiment on Iran (and Yemen, for people like Joe Lieberman) to see many have yet to internalize the downright folly of the direct approach. It doesn't take a genius to realize that Al Qaeda's raison d'etre is chaos, and their means of stirring up chaos is to provoke states to make decisions against their best interests. Bin Laden shouted from the rooftops that his interests temporarily (i.e., before he succeeds) aligned with the neoconservatives'. This idea dovetails with Tom's post about Hew Strachan--the reason we've had such a destabilized international environment over the past few years is primarily a result of our state's reaction to terrorist attacks. The "hyperemotionalism" (to gank a phrase from T. Harry Williams) evoked by attacks on our own soil precludes our ability to understand the motivations of terrorists. In turn, we cannot figure out the best ways to stymie their ultimate goals. In contrast, we see things more clearly when we witness attacks on foreign targets. Case in point: our government's relentless efforts to keep terrorist attacks from stirring up the India/Pakistan rivalry. Obviously, a massive nuclear war is perfect for Al Qaeda and bad for both India and Pakistan--yet both countries' keep their nukes on a hair trigger. The story about Nawaz Sharif being talked down from nuclear annihilation by Bill Clinton is especially telling. The same scenario is just as likely today, but MORE likely to be instigated by terrorists. So Tom is definitely right: enhancing other states' capabilities is a much more constructive approach than the alternative option (i.e., fomenting chaos with direct intervention) in that it limits terrorists' ability to communicate, travel, and plan. But it doesn't keep a few terrorists from provoking strong states (like ours), causing these states to act against their own interests and sowing even greater chaos across the globe. In essence, the overbearing direct approach creates an environment in which we are FORCED to undertake the indirect approach. Like the British colonialists before us, we just don't have the $ for indefinite, massive international troop deployments. For all of these reasons, Obama is correct to seek a "world without nuclear weapons"--even if his efforts are doomed to failure. Although a country might have failsafe security and reliable policymakers controlling its nuclear materials (which nuclear states do, generally), these reasonable officials and good policies diminish in importance in the chaotic, uncertain aftermath of sensationalist terrorist attacks. That is, the terrorists become more powerful political actors than the reasonable officials overseeing the weapons, giving them a much greater chance of inciting nuclear conflicts between states. This is what makes your comment about Strachan so interesting: states do ultimately retain more global influence than the globalization zeitgeist accords them, but the fact that there are many situations in which they act inimically to their interests means that responsible and cooperative security policies are more important than ever.

JJH722

8:13 PM ET

April 14, 2010

one more thing

By the way, I fear that the newfound faith in counterinsurgency only serves to bolster the idea that direct intervention is optimal. While counterinsurgency itself was the best option in Iraq from 2007-2008, it was preferable only along a range of extremely negative alternatives. Therefore, it should not be mistaken for global strategy. Given Strachan's focus on strategy and his advice regarding the same (which Tom quoted), I wonder what his take is on these issues. Maybe I just need to look online.

QUANG

12:46 PM ET

April 15, 2010

training foreign militaries a la US

We've tried it with the Cubans and the Vietnamese in the late 50s. Bring them to Lackland AFB to learn English before putting them in airplanes. Send them to Quantico (VNMC, ROK, Piruvian) for The Basic School. Give them orders to advance professional military schools.

Does it work? Well, not for the first two sets.

LITTLEMANTATE

6:08 PM ET

April 15, 2010

"policing zones of disorder"

All one can say to such a phrase, is 'Great Wilberforce's Ghost, Batman!'

Can we as a race get past this 19th-century obsession with making sure every square inch of the globe is accounted for and adequately controlled? Honestly, guys. Rathmell's comments make a person feel tired. By all means, though, let's keep charging windmills.