In the wake of the Paris massacre, engineered by the Islamic State, ISIS, our current president needs to stop “leading from behind,” as his administration once proudly described its Middle East strategy, and start leading from in front. The idea of “containing” the Islamic State is past. It is time to destroy it.
Meaning Obama’s pin-prick air campaigns will no longer suffice. “Boots on the ground” are now required, but “boots” supported by overwhelming air power.
Which leads inevitably to the counter-argument that today’s foreign military operations, especially in the Middle East, become disastrous quagmires, in which, even if we do defeat the enemy — a big “if” — we subsequently face the expensive and politically contentious business of “nation building,” which we are not good at.
But this fight is different. First, unlike previous quagmires — Iraq, Afghanistan, even Vietnam — this fight is not about meddling in a decades-old domestic civil war (Vietnam), or about fighting a counterinsurgency (Iraq, Afghanistan) in which conventional U.S forces eventually did have to engage in nation building. The goal should be simple and narrow. Eliminate ISIS and leave, but even if circumstance do force us to stay engaged, that is still preferable to indefinitely confronting an ever-more-powerful ISIS.
Second, for once we won’t be engaged alone. France, for obvious reasons, will be steadfast, and has already initiated massive attacks on ISIS in Syria, as has Russia, seeking pay-back for ISIS’s bombing of a Russian passenger plane. And given that the other European nations, Germany especially, face the same threat France does, they have plenty of incentive to join this fight. And the Saudis, Turks, Egyptians, and Kurds all have a national interest in seeing ISIS destroyed.
Also, ISIS, unlike Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan, poses a real threat to America’s national security. As with World War II, in which Nazi Germany, while located an ocean away, still posed a national threat, prompting us to fight a war “over there” to prevent having to fight it “over here,” attacking and destroying ISIS with everything we have is the only way to prevent the inevitable acts of terrorism sure to come our way if we don’t.
Finally, notwithstanding President Obama’s belief that domestic issues should be his highest priority, the presidential oath of office requires every president to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.” And listed in the Preamble to that Constitution are five requirements of the government the president heads. They are: “establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty …” And the most important of the five is “provide for the common defense,” because failing that, the other four requirements can’t be met.
