The US has been involved with foreign affairs dating back to the American Revolution. With France's response to the recent terrorist attacks, it can only be a matter of time before the US takes action. Not to say they already have. How do you think America will respond to the ISIS attack? What kind of influence will this attack have on US foreign policies? Why or why not should the US be involved with Syrian bombings.
Sources:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/france-bombs-isis-syria_5648ef7be4b06037734982c4
http://www.cnn.com/2015/11/15/middleeast/france-announces-raqqa-airstrikes-on-isis/index.html
http://www.cnn.com/2015/11/15/middleeast/france-announces-raqqa-airstrikes-on-isis/index.html
http://gawker.com/france-expands-bombing-campaign-against-isis-into-syria-1733246001
5 comments:
President Obama's recent comments at the G20 Summit seem to implicate that the U.S is ready to become even more involved in the fight against ISIS then it already has before. Obama stated that the attack on Paris was an "attack on the civilized world" and also stated the U.S was ready to intensify its strategy of air raids this time with the hope that a coalition of nations will join them as well. A short video clip also showed Obama and Vladimir Putin discussing the issue, showing that weight that ISIS possesses as both parties seem to be willing to put prior conflicts aside in order to combat this conflict. The question of whether or not the U.S should or shouldn't be involved in Syria seems to be irrelevant at this point. It is clear that the U.S is not going anywhere, especially if France invokes its NATO powers which would require every member of the coalition to respond since one of their members was attacked. White House Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes confirmed that the United States would back France calling for this action.
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/11/15/republican-lawmakers-urge-france-to-use-nato-powers-to-help-in-fight-against/
I believe that France is taking the wrong path in terms of how to fight Daesh. Yes, the French should take revenge for the people who innocently died on Friday however, what is concerning is that President Hollande might even consider a ground invasion. I have said this before previously but we need to understand why they attack us. One of the biggest reasons why people are so attracted to ISIS is because of coalition bombs that hit innocent people that happen to be family members of people who were otherwise neutral about Western intervention in the Middle East. The problem with killing innocents has gotten so bad that the CIA even calls it "blowback" when drone strikes create more terrorists than destroy them. Point being, we are not careful enough with our bombs and bombs are not always the answer. What would also help in stopping these deadly attacks against us if our governments would stop supporting countries that fund organizations like ISIS. The Saudis, one of our biggest allies in the Middle East are funding an interpretation of Islam called wahhabbism which ISIS is literally based off of. It would also help if many high ranking Saudi officials would stop giving money to ISIS in trying to topple Assad's Shia government. Another example of this would be Turkey, such an important ally to us that we even deny the Armenian genocide for them. We need to stop them from giving money in supporting extremist Sunni groups that fight Assad, examples being Al-Nusra and ISIS. Turkey also needs to stop bombing the Kurds/Peshmerga since they have proven to be one of the best tools in combating ISIS. One last suggestion I would have in the fight against ISIS is to stop xenophobic comments about Iran since they are one of our biggest allies in fighting ISIS and try to actually thaw our relationship with them. Of course Iran has a very backwards society with the implimentation of Sharia law however, it does not take away the fact that they are a very valuable asset in combating a group like ISIS. Many conservatives in Europe, United States, Canada, and Ausralia are calling for amped up action against ISIS but they do not seem to understand that we have already dropped around 10 thousand bombs on key ISIS locations. The only thing we have not done is try a ground invasion, however with Obama's poor decision with sending 50 special operations forces we very well may be headed in that direction. Why should we, as western countries, send in OUR troops, to die in a civil war? The role that France and the United States should play is getting our Muslim country allies to form their own ground coalition against ISIS. Considering many of the countries that surround the conflict area, the Arab ground coalition would add up to be about 5 million ground troops against a force of about roughly 15k ISIS fighters.
I believe that America will offer France any help they ask for as long as it does not include Americans being part of the war that France is now a part of. I believe that under Obama we will not be joining France, in terms of actual man power, in stopping ISIS. I believe the US will keep doing what it has been doing the past few years to fight ISIS and that we will not take any different action against ISIS, we will just support France with whatever they need in terms of weapons. However, I do not think these are the steps the SU should take. I believe in order to stop ISIS and any other terrorist organizations, the world will need to join together in the fight, which is why I believe the US should work with France and fully support them with man power in order to stop these terrorists.
A matter of wether bombing is the right solutions is something else to think about. I have not fully thought about wether bombing is the right thing to do in these situations. It seems logical at first that, we need to destroy these strongholds and bombing is a lot more effective then sending actual people out there. But I don't know if this is the best way to stop terrorism. It would take a very long conversation and argument to be able to decided what that way is, and it is something I have't thought much about, but I believe that if people work together we can find a way to stop terrorism without hurting innocent people, like they do.
I agree with Steven about military retaliation being dangerous - when Western countries continue to attack and bomb countries in the Middle East in the fight against ISIS, ISIS uses the attacks as evidence that the West hates Muslims and can thereby recruit more people. It's a vicious cycle of violence, polarization, radicalization, and blame that doesn't accomplish anything. Two ideologies who refuse to change and deny the validity of the other will never get anywhere.
Of course, I also don't think it's at all acceptable to ignore such a violent terrorist attack, and that something absolutely must be done. I just believe that France and another allied countries engaging in whatever plan of attack we'll see in the near future must be very careful and consider the long-term effects of their actions. Luckily we have some ideas of what not to do, from our experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan.
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