America is suffering from what political scientist Greg Weiner calls “narcissistic polity disorder.”
International developments occur because of — and in spite of — American foreign policy. The whole world is viewed as an American interest. All foreign policy developments must coincide with our worldview because our best interest is at stake. This is, of course, an arrogant worldview and is outright impossible to reinforce.
Our nation does not have the infinite resources and unrelenting willpower to keep alive this lofty ideal, an ideal that crystallized itself in the Cold-War era. Either way, America is all too willing to accept her janitorial role.
With the crisis in Iraq comes the shouts of the interventionists for American presence in the region. Their intent and criticisms of the president are clear, but their endgame is not. Even more muddied than their plan of action is their view of history. The war hawks believe that the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq would have had a different outcome if only the country would have listened to them more intently. Ironically, America is forced to accept the consequences of our campaigns as a result of listening to the hawks for too long.
They attribute the fall of Iraq by the Islamic States of Iraq and Syria to the administration and their fellow citizens who want to diminish America’s standing in the world.
The contradictory nature of their squawking is their belief that this crisis — a crisis brought about predominantly by an American intervention in the Middle East — can be solved by another intervention in the Middle East. There is no validity to their claims that new action would produce a positive outcome.
The roots for the Iraqi crisis can be attributed to history-old conflicts between Sunni and Shiite Muslims and the Kurds. In effect, Iraq is caught up in the flames of a religious civil war. ISIS is a radical Sunni militant organization that rose to power as a result of the incompetence and alienation of the Shiite lead al-Maliki government. If our nation intervenes, which is what is likely to occur, America will be caught up in a conflict that has not and cannot be won.
The Sunni-Shiite conflict is at the center of Middle Eastern strife. The whole region is at war with itself. Nothing, not even an erroneously described group of 300 “military advisers” can assuage the situation. The sad reality is once an American adviser — in actuality, active combatant in the region — is killed in action, the stakes will be insurmountably raised.
This country no longer fights out of necessity: Rather, we fight for credibility, and a battered credibility at that. For too long, our country has taken the brunt of international crises for naught. Intervention in Somalia during the Clinton presidency did not better the country. Intervention from behind in Libya did not leave the country in better standing. And now we are forced into another engagement with a country we should have left a while ago.
The hawks do have a point that an American force in Iraq would have stunted the increase in violence, though the trade-offs would be American lives and the participation in an unwinnable, unsolvable engagement for years.
It is time that the world becomes responsible for itself. America should not have a moral obligation to intervene in every conflict. Going back to the kidnappings by Boko Haram in Nigeria, Sen. John McCain was calling for intervention in a country not vital to America’s interest. Intervention would have been a moral decision, but the costs would have been too high and done too little, making it a feel-good but unrealistic endeavor.
The policy of our foreign affairs should not be narcissistic or even morally obligated.
Maturity and discretion must rule the day. Regional conflicts must be dealt within the region. ISIS, prior to the arrival of our advisers, did not pose a great threat to America, compared to that of other Middle Eastern countries and Eastern Europe, all things considered.
More harm than good will be done as a result of action. And our credibility is not the only thing at risk in the new Iraqi conflict.
[Michael Beato is a UF economics junior. His columns appear on Tuesdays. A version of this column ran on page 7 on 7/1/2014 under the headline "‘Activist’ America should stay out of Iraq — among other things"]
