What should the U.S. government do on behalf of the citizens of the U.S. about the Islamic State? President Obama is supposed to explain his plan on Tuesday and Wednesday in meetings with congressional leaders from both parties and a speech on the eve of the anniversary of September 11, 2001. I believe the issue raises a number of very interesting questions for the study of conflict management.
First, what is IS? The Islamic State is a movement that by its name calls itself a government. By its actions IS is trying to rule over western Syria and eastern Iraq. By its actions it poses a threat to Syrians and Iraqis who are non Sunni, as well as a potential threat to Turks and Kurds. Indeed anyone in the general area of their operation and claims of control who does not accept their particular political, religious, and social doctrines is currently in peril of existence. To become the government over a population within a territory and receive recognition from other states is how the system recognizes/determines what states exist in the system. Remember that even the U.S. had to receive recognition from other states after declaring independence from the United Kingdom. Normal procedure to the birth of a state does not include a formal declaration of independence but does historically involve some group of people claiming representation over a larger population and this happens within the framework of a geographic space that is almost guaranteed (we could question this element in the case of Antarctica) to not be without government or population already in place.
The second question is does the U.S. population want IS to become a recognized state? I would say does the U.S. government want to recognize IS, but the U.S. government is supposed to do what "We the People" desire it to do. As a population we can have any number of reasons why or why not to desire our government to recognize IS. Our reasons could be matters of ideology, beliefs about what other governments/populations we support and desire to continue supporting, matters of financial interest, etc. In determining foreign policy, the U.S. government should, I would argue, consider all of these possible reasons for why to support or not support recognition of IS. Currently, I would argue, that we have alliance, financial, and security reasons (before even delving into social, religious, etc. reasons) for expecting our government to oppose IS.
The third question is how to operationalize the decision to support/oppose IS as a state. I would argue, again, that we have chose to oppose IS and our government is responsive to that choice. For my two cents it is at the point of how to oppose that things get interesting. How do you fight IS when IS is fighting against another government that we have opposed? The Assad regime in Syria will be greatly assisted by any and all efforts on our part to destroy IS. Also, non-state actors we oppose in northern and eastern Syria that are connected to other terrorist bases would be positively impacted by our destroying IS. So, I await with some interest the game plan about how to thwart IS without assisting other state and non-state actors in the region that we do not wish to support.
First, what is IS? The Islamic State is a movement that by its name calls itself a government. By its actions IS is trying to rule over western Syria and eastern Iraq. By its actions it poses a threat to Syrians and Iraqis who are non Sunni, as well as a potential threat to Turks and Kurds. Indeed anyone in the general area of their operation and claims of control who does not accept their particular political, religious, and social doctrines is currently in peril of existence. To become the government over a population within a territory and receive recognition from other states is how the system recognizes/determines what states exist in the system. Remember that even the U.S. had to receive recognition from other states after declaring independence from the United Kingdom. Normal procedure to the birth of a state does not include a formal declaration of independence but does historically involve some group of people claiming representation over a larger population and this happens within the framework of a geographic space that is almost guaranteed (we could question this element in the case of Antarctica) to not be without government or population already in place.
The second question is does the U.S. population want IS to become a recognized state? I would say does the U.S. government want to recognize IS, but the U.S. government is supposed to do what "We the People" desire it to do. As a population we can have any number of reasons why or why not to desire our government to recognize IS. Our reasons could be matters of ideology, beliefs about what other governments/populations we support and desire to continue supporting, matters of financial interest, etc. In determining foreign policy, the U.S. government should, I would argue, consider all of these possible reasons for why to support or not support recognition of IS. Currently, I would argue, that we have alliance, financial, and security reasons (before even delving into social, religious, etc. reasons) for expecting our government to oppose IS.
The third question is how to operationalize the decision to support/oppose IS as a state. I would argue, again, that we have chose to oppose IS and our government is responsive to that choice. For my two cents it is at the point of how to oppose that things get interesting. How do you fight IS when IS is fighting against another government that we have opposed? The Assad regime in Syria will be greatly assisted by any and all efforts on our part to destroy IS. Also, non-state actors we oppose in northern and eastern Syria that are connected to other terrorist bases would be positively impacted by our destroying IS. So, I await with some interest the game plan about how to thwart IS without assisting other state and non-state actors in the region that we do not wish to support.
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