Pres. Obama |
President Obama’s 2014 State of the Union address is remembered today mainly for this bit of rhetorical irony: “America must move off a permanent war footing.” It was the triumph of speechwriting over experience. Obama’s pledge came about three weeks after the fall of Fallujah to the Islamic State. By June, Mosul
would be overrun. Global jihadism now has a cause — Abu Bakr
al-Baghdadi’s sham caliphate — around which to rally.
Obama’s
reaction, as always, has been restrained. The world does much to
disappoint him, but it apparently has nothing to teach him. Every signal
he has recently sent — in his lack of an appropriate symbolic reaction to the Paris attacks, in his limp, equivocal performance beside a more determined British Prime Minister David Cameron — seems to be saying: I am not going to repeat George W. Bush’s overreaction to terrorism, which only feeds extremism.
So, Obama is careful to explain that terrorism is not “an existential threat.”
“Intelligence and military force alone,” he says, “is not going to
solve this problem.” And he urges Europeans to “not simply respond with a
hammer.”
We have come a long way when an American president pompously urges the French to curb their cowboy instincts.
But
the situation in Europe reveals this line of argument — that
overreaction provokes terrorism — to be farcical. The French did not
support the Iraq war. They did not engage in enhanced interrogation.
They have been consistent supporters of the Palestinian cause. They have
tried not to offend. But it didn’t matter. Some offense by Charles
Martel in the 8th century would have been sufficient pretext. Western
countries are not engaged in policy disagreements with violent Islamism.
They are facing, in Cameron’s words, a “fanatical death cult.”
Obama
is correct to distinguish that cult from the faith of Islam. Equating
the two is not only substantively wrong, it is strategically insane. No
president would criticize the religious beliefs of millions of his
fellow citizens — particularly when their good faith is necessary to
isolate violent radicalism. And any fight against terrorism depends on
good relations with Muslim allies who take many of the front-line risks.
Islam is not the same as Islamism. And not even all Islamism is violent
Islamism. Such distinctions are essential to successfully conduct a war
on terrorism.
And
Obama is correct that this war requires a variety of non-military
strategies: diplomacy that somehow corrals Sunni and Shiite powers into
anti-terror alliances; economic development that provides opportunities
for alienated youth; effective ideological campaigns (which are now
badly underfunded) to counter violent extremism. We do need “all the
elements of our national power.”
But even
with these caveats, the task that remains is a global armed conflict of
uncertain duration. It will involve maintaining a technological edge to
monitor the communications of potential terrorists. It will involve
arming, training and guiding (sometimes with American boots on the
ground) proxies to fight battles. It will involve targeted killings with
drones, bombers and special operations forces.
Particularly
with the rise of the Islamic State during the past year — which
occurred in a vacuum of local sovereignty and global attention — the
United States has an enormously complex and difficult task ahead. It
involves building up allies that have previously proved hollow and
fragile; patiently reclaiming territory; preventing infiltration by
jihadist veterans and attacks by homegrown sympathizers; helping
re-establish some semblance of legitimate government in Iraq
(challenging) and in Syria (pretty near impossible).
It
is not sufficient to describe this — or dismiss this — as
“counterterrorism.” Even the effort that Obama currently describes
requires the end of a terrorist regime holding large portions of two
countries in the Middle East. Americans need to be prepared for years of
conflict — and for the strong possibility of terrorist escalations such
as we saw in Paris. Or worse. And American allies need to be led and
encouraged in this effort, not ignored or lectured.
President Obama has variously tried to declare victory against terrorism
(“al-Qaeda’s core leadership has been decimated”) or to claim that the
United States has turned a corner past war. But his wishes do not make
it so. Displaying his own core of leadership — if only to justify his
stated strategy of regime elimination — has never been more needed.
Written By: Michale Gerson
Source: The Washington Post
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