US Grand Strategy Post-Cold War: Middle East after the Cold War

Us Grand Strategy After the Cold War: Can Realism Explain It? Should Realism Guide It?
Case Study of Middle East Post the Cold War
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Us Grand Strategy After the Cold War: Can Realism Explain It? Should Realism Guide It?
Case Study of Middle East Post the Cold War
Shortcomings of the current foreign policy model of the United States
After the cold war, the United States focused her foreign policy towards influencing the middle east where she had a different objective. The United States involvement in the Persian Gulf has been centered mainly on three strategic reasons ‘1) keeping oil and gas from the region flowing to world markets, to keep the global economy humming; 2) minimizing the danger of anti-American terrorism, and 3) inhibiting the spread of weapons of mass destruction. The two moral interests are 1) promotion of human rights and participatory government, and 2) helping ensure Israel’s survival.’ It has achieved some of these goals, but the others have remained elusive. Realists believe that these goals can be achieved if the United States change her approach to her foreign policies. As the superpower of the world, the US spends a lot of money outside its borders to ensure that its interests are always protected. Its ways have elicited a lot of criticism and countries like North Korea have in the recent past threatened to attack it. However, the US believes that its means always justifies the end and that the world is enjoying the peace it has largely because of its presence and the costly foreign policies. Conversely, there are those who seem to believe that the US’s foreign policy is flawed and hence its increased expenditure in military. Some pundits see it as paranoia while others believe that the US is justified in its operations in the world.
Hypothesis: Increased military spending is as a result of the cost incurred primarily because of the flawed US foreign policy.
Walt, one of the fierce critics of the current American model of foreign policy quotes French ambassador in US 1919 saying, ‘The United States Is lucky. To the north they have a weak neighbor, to the South, they have a weak neighbor, to the east they have fish, and to the west they have fish.’ It is the geographical advantage of the United States that makes it less likely to be attacked by ‘rogue’ states. It has been the military superpower for decades now, and it still spends more than 50 times what Iraq (which it considers a rogue nation and a threat to US security) spends on defense. It is therefore very unlikely that Iraq is a potential threat to US peace and therefore spending billions of dollars in the country is not justifiable. Iraq cannot attack the United States from its location either by land, air, space or water. Any act of aggression against the US has very negligible chance of success. In such cases, the United States can just resort to offshore balancing and let her neighbors maintain a relative level of power in the area. Putting more boots on the ground is both costly to the US, and it fuels anti-Americanism in the country which becomes terrorism.
Anti-Americanism
Anti-Americanism is a product of United States involvement in other regions especially the middle east. Taking sides in the regional conflict earns the United States a new enemy. Rather than avoiding the conflict, and finding non-combative approaches to foster peace, the United States often sends troops and this is always interpreted as an act or a declaration of war. Each troop deployed is interpreted as a threat by the warring parties especially the one perceived as the enemy. The United States often either supports the rebels to ouster a government as in the case with Saddam Hussein government. In such cases, if the US and the rebels are successful and they manage to quash the enemy, the government sympathizers retreat to form terrorist groups to avenge against the United States. CITATION Baz16 \l 1033 (Bazzi, 2016) argues that ‘Hussein left a new legacy in Iraq: a marriage of convenience between former officers of his Baath Party and Sunni militants like those of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).’ In the case where the United States steps in to support a government it also fuels anti-American rhetoric. Washington has been helping Iran over the years. It helped Iran fight the Taliban in Afghanistan which turned the Taliban against the United States. In the process, the anti-American extremism created Sunni extremists and strengthened ISIS. In an unanticipated twist of events, Iran may ‘boosting aid to the Taliban, strengthening its missile program, or kicking out nuclear inspectors; the outcome would also be a defeat for the United States’ CITATION Dom181 \l 1033 (Tierney, 2018). This would be a great loss to the United States considering that she supported the government in many of her wars, but she decided to thank the United States by calling her ‘The Great Satan.’ Whichever side the United States takes in any war in the middle east, it creates a new enemy in the form of a terrorist group.
One thing that might seem incredible is the fact that the US has not in more than half a century declared war on another country. In 1941, the country declared war on Japan and therefore, joined the allied powers in defeating the Axis. After the events of the Second World War, the country never in its history declare war on another country. However, as Keller (2017) says, “American troops are ubiquitous worldwide, engaged in protracted battles with the many-headed hydra of global terror networks.” Keller continues to say that there “are more than 6000 US troops in Iraq, at least 600 in Syria, and 8400 in Afghanistan who continues to bolster local forces in their struggle to beat back the rising tide of ISIS and the remnants of the Taliban in Afghanistan.” What is more shocking is that the actions and the military personnel shown above are as a result of the actions of the sitting presidents. As Keller says, as per the US constitution “the president can take immediate action in the face of an imminent threat like a Pearl Harbor or 9/11, but only Congress can mobilize the US military for a prolonged, bloody conflict.” However, what the US fails to understand is the simple fact that through its actions, it continues to create enemies all over the world. While its actions could be logically supported and even seem to make sense especially when world peace is at stake, one cannot be faulted to say that there are other better and less costly ways of ensuring that ISIS or the fading Taliban never become a global problem.
Increases in the Number of American Deaths
As the US continues to spend more in its military while indicating that it is trying to protect its interests outside its borders, the number of American military personnel killed in hostile action continues to rise. This is another cost that can be abated if the country chooses to depend on offshore balancing and soft power. There is no denying that countries fear to engage the US in a direct war. The US is militarily powerful, and even countries like Russia which are often quarreling with her know that they cannot lure her into direct combat. However, looking back at all the wars the country has participated in as well as the casualties the US suffered, one is convinced that these lives would have been saved had another option other than military action been taken. Since the year 2000, the US has lost more than 7000 soldiers in hostile action, and a majority of these wars could have been avoided had the government considered another option (DeBruyne, 2017). Aside from the deaths of the American troops, the civilians of other countries also suffer greatly. Civilians get killed, maimed, children are left orphans, while others are internally displaced. War always manages to affect the ones directly involved as well as others who are never involved. In the Iraq invasion, for example, Bump (2018) writes that tens of thousands died there including nearly 5000 US service members. A 2013 BBC article reported that the civilian deaths exceed 112,000 with this number including “not only violent deaths from the invasion and subsequent insurgency but avoidable fatalities linked to infrastructure collapse.” Well, all this can be avoided if the US considers another approach in its flawed foreign policy. Military expenditure must not be taking more than 10% of the country’s budget, but three years ago as seen in the image below, military spending was projected to exceed 54%.
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