I’m sure they considered the long-term. What central planners struggle with is the unintended consequences. Probably because that’s impossible to know, except that they will almost certainly suck.
A cynic could make a game out of what kind of fuck-up will come out of the latest intervention in that hellhole. I never would’ve guessed that the Kurdish situation would be next after the offensive to stop ISIS.
Oh, what will we see after that? Put your guess into the pot before the bombs stop flying.
I suspect we could get stuff in there if we needed to.
I would suggest that the Taliban’s rise wasn’t really directly resulting from our intervention in Afghanistan when the soviets were there, but rather from a complex series of events that followed it.
The rise of the fundamentalist islamic groups that formed the Taliban wasn’t due to our intervention, as much as it was due to the fact that the Soviets fucked up Afghanistan and resulted in tons of people growing up in refugee camps where they had wahabiest clerics. It’s not like they did things like 9/11 using the stinger missiles we gave them. I don’t think that fundamentalism would have necessarily been avoided if we had just let the Soviets kill more Afghans without helping.
It may be the case that what happened in Afghanistan was due to our disengagement after the Soviets pulled out, where our interests were mainly in making the Soviets bleed like we bled in Vietnam, and not so much about stabilizing the messy situation that took place afterwards.
Regardless, the fact remains that if you choose to do nothing, then you are ceding the fate of the region to the guys who are willing to do something. And those guys tend to be real bad.
This is perhaps true, but I maintain it’s also true that if you do stuff just to “do something,” you run a very real risk of making things worse. There are some cases–many cases I think–where we simply cannot do anything constructive. Americans hate that, we always want to think we can make a difference. Sometimes we simply cannot. And I think in the vast majority of cases where we have intervened militarily, we have done more harm than good in the long run, or at the very least, we have rarely done anything close to what we said we were going to do.
So, yeah, given the choice between letting bad stuff happen sometimes–and the world is full of bad stuff–and adding to the misery, I would generally opt to let it ride. Of course, there are times when you absolutely need to act, regardless of the chances for success, but those should be few and far between. As much as I like the Kurds, I don’t think this is one of those situations.
Iraqi Kurdish groups by and large are not expansionist and remarkably stable, KDP dates back to 1946 and PUK (a leftist progressive offshoot of KDP) dates back to the '70s. While KDP has had strong links to Iran going all the way back to its inception, it has always managed to maintain functional and strategic independence unlike e.g. Shia Iraqi factions.
I don’t really see how Syrian or Turkish Kurdistan are in any meaningful way different from tens of previous UN peacekeeping missions either.
Stability builds upon stability and Iraqi Kurdistan has offered the only ray of stability in Iraq since the last war. I’m not sure letting a country that made it illegal to refer to Kurds as Kurds and instead referred to them as “Mountain Turks” and later “Eastern Turks” invade other countries to oppress a minority is ever going to have better long term consequences than somehow getting involved, but who really knows.
I’m very sympathetic to this sentiment; in my personal view, there is a clear right and wrong side on at least this issue. My issue, however, is precisely the uncertainty of any potential positive outcome, and the near-certainty of negative outcomes. i just can’t see a scenario where the USA could enforce (not just give lip service about) real protections for the Kurds without causing extreme disruption at best to our relationships with Turkey (a NATO member whether we like it or not) and other nations in the region. It’s not that I think we should be held hostage by these others, or defer policy choices because we don’t want to ruffle feathers, but thinking through the whole thing, it’s a brutal calculus. I fear anything we did substantially would effectively push the Turks out of NATO and provide a huge opening for the Russians to step into the breach. If we were actually principled and actually committed to self-determination (though our relationship with Israel and many other nations in the region would be, um, affected by such a policy), and we were actually prepared to take the consequences of such dramatic action, I’d be pretty proud I suppose.
But we’re not. Anything we’d do would be unlikely to be strong enough to prevent a disaster for the Kurds, while simultaneously would be far too much for the Turks, the Russians, the Iranians, and the Iraqis to accept. And even if we could do something that would, unequivocally, provide security for the Kurds, we are singularly unprepared and unequipped to handle the consequences. Ours is a nation with no foreign (or, really, domestic) policy worthy of the name at this point in time, with a State Department being gutted in ideological purges, a military mired in a variety of crises, and with a total lack of leadership at any level above, it seems, the NCO and junior clerk rank.
Do you really think we could do anything effective that wouldn’t make things worse?
One thing to bear in mind is that a lot of the problems we ran into, in other regions, when we’ve intervened would likely not be the case with the Kurds.
The Kurds seem extremely capable of self governance, and not falling into infighting and disarray (which was the big issue that came about in places like Afghanistan in the 90’s, or Iraq in the 2000’s). Hell, while Iraq was a total basketcase after the invasion, the Kurds pretty much held their shit together.
Everyone in the region doesn’t like them, because there’s this idea that they’re gonna form their own country in that region… and frankly, that probably would be a pretty good idea if it happened. It’d likely be more democratic and stable than a lot of the other nations. But it’d be damn hard for it to happen, since it’d be a war for independence from a bunch of countries simultaneously.
I dunno how that happens… but I do know that I’m not cool with letting folks kill them. Maybe we can’t start an all out war to defend them, but I’m cool with air dropping weapons to them, or even sending in special ops guys to help them.
They put on a good show for our media, but in reality they’re at each others’ throats all the time. The KDP & PUK in Iraq fought each other in the early '90s and are still wary of each other. They’re allied with Turkey against the PKK. And then there’s plenty of Kurds in Turkey and Iran who aren’t nationalists and don’t want independence.
Making a Kurdish state wouldn’t be as easy as drawing a line around where Kurds live. They’re scattered in pockets all the way from the Mediterranean to Afghanistan. Even in areas where they’re in the majority, they don’t necessarily make up the whole population. I’m not convinced that separating them out from the people they’ve lived among for thousands of years is worth it.
Yes?
Your whole argument is based on the presumption that not angering some regional actors will have better consequences than angering them.
Or to put it more accurately, appeasement is the best option.
Appeasement did not work in Pakistan and Pakistan remains the major reason why Afghanistan is the basket case it is now, a situation that seems irretrievable and that delights at showing how inept their military is at committing war crimes against a neighboring nation (aided and abetted by the US for fear of upsetting them).
Appeasement did not work in Saudi Arabia, the state that has been and remains the biggest sponsor of terrorism against western countries.
Appeasement did not work in Russia, who could finish their invasion of Ukraine tomorrow with nary but a few hectoring remarks from the German and US Presidents.
Appeasement did not work in Turkey, where over a decade of advances in human rights (required for EU accession talks) were abandoned almost overnight when it became clear their quid was not resulting in the quo, and where even though the entire world knew they were providing serious support for the most genocidal regime this side of the Khmer Rouge, nothing meaningful was done about it.
I mean, intervention isn’t an obligation, but if it isn’t an obligation the US should probably acknowledge that it is a purely self-interested mercenary geopolitical entity.
@Miguk Any sort of Kurdistan that extended beyond an individual countries borders would need to be federal by nature. For all their constant bickering and infighting, the KDP and PUK have shown a surprising ability to power-share too.
Oh, sounds wonderful. We have to make sure the weapons reach the PUK instead of the PKK. Or else we are FUK.
This is a dumb simplification. If you want to fight back against any of these countries, then stop sending them money, impose sanctions, or declare war. Don’t dump weapons to various resistance groups that might keep them occupied only to become an even worse problem decades later.
We’ve been fucking that up for a century. It’s been so long it’s hard to see cause and effect, who our allies are, and what’s right or wrong. The fundamental problem is foreign countries throwing their weight around to fix regional problems. It doesn’t work in the long run.
I think you misinterpret my point, which may well be my fault. I agree, appeasement is in theory a bad policy. I agree that in theory there are things we could do, if the USA was in a different position with different leadership, and a different history. My point though is that at this particular time there is, in my view, nothing this particular administration–or really, any administration that we could reasonably postulate would be in power given our political situation over the past couple of decades at the very least–could or would do would make things better.
Sure, we can conceive of things the US could do, based solely on its actual physical ability to do stuff, that might actually help the situation. I feel that those sorts of conceptions are at best thought exercises, because it is, I maintain, nearly impossible for the USA at this stage with its current leadership and legacy of policies and actions to take those steps. There is simply nothing we could do that I can conceive of us actually being willing or able to do. Every step that would be useful would require commitment, courage, clarity, and will, commodities which are in direly short supply in Washington.
I agree with the list you provide of failed US non-actions, in the sense that, no, our inaction certainly did not create any successes. I disagree, however, with what seems to me to be a somewhat facile suggestion that the more decisive, more committed, more honorable perhaps approaches you and others have advocated would have either been A, feasible, or B, resulted in a truly better outcome. Stand up to the Russians in the Ukraine? Would have warmed my heart, to be sure, but I figure the chances of really nasty consequences (for Ukrainians as well) would have been higher than the chances of making Putin back down. Pakistan? Yeah, they are definitely not our friends, but what leverage would we really have, short of throwing in totally on the side of the Indians with all that entails vis a vis the region and China, etc? And we’d have to figure out a way to totally extract our web of logistical and intelligence ops running through Pakistan, which I highly doubt we could do without a lot of trauma. Saudi Arabia? Hell, I’ve been arguing forever here that they are definitely not nice people, and that we should ditch them like a hot potato. Again, though, it’s not that simple. We have so much economic and military stuff intertwined with them that a clean break simply isn’t feasible, and could well just free up the Saudis to even more mischief. Not that that alone would deter me, but it adds to the mix.
Turkey is another case where the right thing may well be to kick them to the curb, but that would again mean a hell of a lot of disruption that might in the chaos actually hurt the people we want to help; it would certainly have dire consequences within NATO and our own capabilities in the region.
You have hit the nail on the head. We are a purely self-interested mercenary geopolitical entity. That’s what I’m trying to say, really. I don’t like it, but that’s what we have become. To change that, to do the things you would like us to do, would require that we fundamentally reinvent ourselves. I would love that. I would endorse policies that actually stood for something besides profit for a few. I just don’t think that it’s terribly useful to advocate the US do something that it is in fact not politically, psychologically, or ideologically prepared to do, and has not been for decades. I admit, however, that the constant pretending on the part of Washington to be the defender of the downtrodden, mendacious as those claims are, does leave it open to a myriad of criticisms. In some ways, it would be better to just come clean and say, yeah, we’re bastards too, go suck it. Be more honest at least.
This is a fair point. We won’t be able to do anything here with Trump at the helm. He won’t go up against Russia in a serious way here.
How is it a simplification?
I’m not assuming that there are binary options of:
A) Provide support to States like Saudi Arabia and Pakistan (though aid to Pakistan has gradually been cut over the last few years)
B) Arm and support their domestic opponents.
Further, Iraqi and Syrian Kurds aren’t ‘resistance movements’, they’re independent non-expansionist movements not aimed at toppling domestic regimes. They are aiming for self-determination and as of yet, I’ve not seen anything about full independence.
My point though is that at this particular time there is, in my view, nothing this particular administration–or really, any administration that we could reasonably postulate would be in power given our political situation over the past couple of decades at the very least–could or would do would make things better.
I would agree with you if the premise is “If we continue with the exact same failed policies of regime change without a plan and helping states that support international terrorism”, then fair enough. I’m not sure why there should be an assumption that those legacy policies can never change? US administrations have demonstrated more nous in the past, despite all the controversies.
There is simply nothing we could do that I can conceive of us actually being willing or able to do.
Ah, that’s what I didn’t understand. You’re arguing from a practical point, which I’ll have to concede on. You are correct on that, sadly. It isn’t solely a US thing either, successive British governments have shown themselves to be absolutely ethically and morally bankrupt while the French and German administrations quite clearly strike a balance between what’s “right” (according to liberal Western values) and domestic business interests.
Stand up to the Russians in the Ukraine? Would have warmed my heart, to be sure, but I figure the chances of really nasty consequences (for Ukrainians as well) would have been higher than the chances of making Putin back down.
Stand up? Perhaps not. Provide more economic and military support? Agitate politically for peacekeeping forces (even though it will be vetoed)? I know more troops were sent to Eastern Europe, but it was a drop in the political ocean.
Pakistan: Stop providing military and economic support. Enforce the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. Have started attacking Taliban bases in Pakistan 16 years ago.
Saudi Arabia: Stop providing military and economic support. Start targeting their international finances when it can be connected to terrorism. Freeze the US & allied assets of the royal family involved in sponsoring terrorism. Work with allies on stopping the spread of Saudi propagated Wahhabism.
Turkey: Stop providing military and economic support. Enforce no fly zones in northern Syria.
Pakistan for example, what use was the “web of logistical and intelligence ops” considering the overwhelming evidence that the Taliban only remained an effective fighting force because Pakistan provided such an intensive level of support?
Saudi Arabia isn’t capable of military mischief. The abysmal performance of its military has reverberated domestically and resulted in a generational change in Saudi leadership. It also hasn’t gone unnoticed by its neighbours.
Should there be an assumption that if we have two extreme choices of total US isolation outside of trade // the current policies, that the latter is the more beneficial to both the US and the world?
Again, you make good points, and in many ways I’d love to be able to implement a lot of them. They all do have consequences that, currently, no one in power in the West is willing to embrace I’m afraid. Furthermore, the USA certainly has no foundation of policy that would support any of this. We don’t have policy, we have reactions, Tweets, and vague ideas. Even before Trump, our “policy” in the region was pretty much whatever the ruling cabal could cobble together on any given day, with only a basic through line of support more or less for Israel, hostility more or less to Tehran, and the campaign against ISIS, which itself was never really well thought out with an end-game in mind, but was mostly a reaction, too.
Reasonable people can differ I think on whether, in the abstract, the possible negative consequences of what you propose, however noble, would outweigh the gains. My core position is that, except in pretty extraordinary situations, intervention has to have very clear, reachable goals that in the best estimation of all concerned will create a situation better than the alternatives, I also feel a bit uneasy about outsiders making life and death decisions for people who may or may not share our particular scale of priorities. You and I may well feel standing up to tyranny is worth dire risk, but we’re not living where the tanks and bombs and death squads operate, either. It’s entirely possible that, given these sort of wretched choices, the people in question would rather be alive and under Russian/Turkish/whatever control than honorably dead.
Or not, but it’s their choice. I don’t generally feel justified in forcing the issue based on our, outside, judgement of right and wrong except as I said in extremis.
I would only state that in Yemen, Ukraine, Afghanistan, Syria and Iraq people are already living in fear and terror due to (in 4 cases, at least partly due to US support of regional actors) US action/inaction.
I don’t know how much Yemen is in the news over yonder, but the Saudi actions would not have been possible without 1) US (and EU) hardware & 2) continued provision of US advisors and intelligence.
This is very true, and criminally under-reported here in the US. One of my colleagues and good friends has traveled to Yemen, while spending a year teaching in the UAE. His photos and stories (this was before the shit totally hit the fan) are amazing, and the fact that we are complicit in the utter destruction of that country is heartbreaking and infuriating. One thing I would unequivocally support would be the immediate withdrawal of all US military and tactical intelligence support for the Saudis vis a vis Yemen. Hell, you could even make up something about needing those assets elsewhere to have a fig leaf to cover up the real reason, as long as we could rein in what seems to me to be sheer bloody-mindedness on the part of the Saudis.
If you think your job is hard, at least you’re not doing the State Department’s daily press briefing.
It’s got to be hard to pretend that the YPG isn’t a front for the PKK, or that Turkey is our beloved NATO ally and not a threat to world peace. The divergence between the truth and the things we say to be polite for the sake of diplomacy just keeps growing wider.
Turkey is extending their invasion to Manbij, about 60miles east of Afrin.
While YPG has links to PKK, they are informal at best. Then again, Turkey is a cuntry that believes any citizen questioning the invasion of Syria is a terrorist supporter and imprisons them.