Domestic Politics As Foreign Policy

There’s a pair of posts at Foreign Policy which together make a pretty fair case for the ways in which the Obama Administration’s strategy for waging the War on Terror has not only fallen short but how catastrophic it has been. In the first Micah Zenko reminds us of the heavy commitment of contractors in our overseas conflicts:

Obama has authorized the continuation or re-emergence of two of the most contractor-dependent wars (or “overseas contingency operations” in Pentagon-speak) in U.S. history. As noted previously, there are roughly three contractors (28,626) for every U.S. troops (9,800) in Afghanistan, far above the contractor per uniformed military personnel average of America’s previous wars. In Iraq today, 7,773 contractors support U.S. government operations — and 4,087 U.S. troops. These numbers do not include contractors supporting CIA or other intelligence community activities, either abroad or in the United States.

There is practically no way to know how many contractors have taken part in our foreign adventures or how great their casualties have been but at least 1,500 U. S. contractors have been killed since President Obama took office.

Who cares? At least there aren’t any U. S. boots on the ground.

In the second piece Jack Watling and Namir Shabibi describe the havoc that a combination of bad incentives and the drone war have wrought on Yemen:

Washington and London had sought to increase training and assistance to the bitter end, but without political reform, it had been rendered entirely useless. Today, al Qaeda is in direct control of a large swathe of southern Yemen and is no longer entirely dependent on its tribal allies.

The futility of the Western training program is reflected in the bitter recollection of some British personnel who took part. One lamented the fact that “most of the guys we were mentoring are dead now. There are two who I know are working for Yemeni headquarters in Saudi, but the rest of them are dead.”

“What happened in Yemen,” explained another British official, “was just a lot of money spent, a lot of time wasted, and nothing whatsoever was achieved.”

I’ll repeat my claim. This is what happens when the only yardstick used to measure the effectiveness of foreign policy is its effect on domestic politics. Of course domestic politics will play a role in any decision. But effective decision-making is impossible when domestic political considerations are the only factor that is considered.

3 comments… add one
  • PD Shaw Link

    In a distant future that is closer than you think, a U.S. President appears in Sana’a to apologize for the anti-Islamic bigotry of her predecessor and the mass-civilian casualties he authorized. Then President Chelsea will sign an oil-production-sharing agreement in front of a bronzed drone memorial statue.

  • Andy Link

    I can’t get to the article, but I think those numbers are misleading. They likely include local contractors, contractors for other agencies like the state Department (The state department has a lot of contractors). The term “contractor” includes everything from local boys picking up trash on a fence line all the way up to the Afghan President’s security detail. Governments and local entities often demand we hire locals to do stuff – these are counted as contractors even though it’s really about diplomacy and supporting the local economy and political structure.

  • ... Link

    Who cares? At least there aren’t any U. S. boots on the ground.

    That’s right, it’s all about BRANDING. If only we could get Nike to sponsor the war effort for Syria we could get right to work on rebuilding that country too!

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