OPINION:
It is astonishing that nearly six years into the tenure of any
administration the commander-in-chief would acknowledge publicly that
he has no strategy for addressing an evident, serious threat to
American interests.
Last week, marauders from the so-called Islamic State overran Tabqa
air base in Syria, where MANPADS, or man-portable air-defense systems,
are stored. These are the weapons that can bring down commercial
aircraft. Considering the pledge of this group’s leader to take the
war to the United States, they now have the means to do so whether
targeting the takeoff of a U.S. commercial airliner from Dubai, or in
a few weeks after penetrating the Mexican border, from Dallas-Fort
Worth International Airport in Dallas.
Historically, every new administration spends the first year of its
tenure enunciating goals — essentially, to keep the peace and
establish a climate at home and abroad in which American interests can
be advanced — and then developing strategies for achieving them in
specific regions of the world. The process begins with the president
stating his view of what our regional interests are, inviting the
intelligence community and the Cabinet to identify how those interests
are threatened, and then tasking these principals and staff to develop
a range of integrated political, economic and military measures for
defending and advancing American interests throughout the world. By
the end of the first year, the president has evaluated the options
submitted to him and has made decisions among them. He then goes about
implementing them by publishing and explaining them to three
constituencies — the American people, the U.S. Congress and our
allies. While this process involves hard work and disciplined
leadership, it’s not rocket science. Doing it well yields enormous
benefits. It engenders confidence among the American people and
nurtures cohesion and support among our allies. Finally, it puts
adversaries on notice that we are a serious nation that has the will,
the capability, a strategic plan and the resources to prevail against
any challenge they might consider posing.
Since World War II, U.S. presidents have engaged this strategic
process as a proven means for defining and announcing our interests
overseas, assessing how they are threatened, and developing effective
strategies designed to deter, or — if deterrence fails — to prevail in
any conflict well in advance of any such conflict. In the Reagan
administration, I had the privilege of managing that process, and in
the ensuing years, it proved invaluable not only in identifying — and
pre-empting — challenges still over the horizon, but in crisis
management as well. In the remaining years of the current
administration, there is still time for President Obama to lead in the
resolution of the plethora of crises before us — starting with the
threats posed by the Islamic State and concurrently in Ukraine, China
and Iran.
Modern terrorism by Islamist groups has posed a “clear and present
danger” to our country for more than 30 years. In Iraq, we are faced
with an especially challenging form of it. A well-financed, well-armed
and well-trained barbarous force has declared its intention, inter
alia, to conduct operations against the United States on its way to
establishing an Islamic caliphate of global reach and jurisdiction.
Given the plausibility of their executing such a plan, the first
comment our president must make is that this movement of uncivilized
savages puts us all at risk — from Irbil to London, Chicago, Tokyo and
Beijing — and that there is no basis for trying to reason with
brainwashed, ideological, totalitarian, genocidal criminals bent on
pursuit of an imperial strategy. The second is that they must be
destroyed. Mr. Obama’s statement from Estonia on Wednesday was a good,
though belated, beginning.
Developing a political, economic and military strategy for containing
and then destroying the Islamic State is not something that will come
easily for the president, given his proclivities toward engagement and
toothless diplomacy. Yet in some respects, his task has been rendered
less onerous. Politicians in every civilized state — especially
European states that have known this menace was coming for years —
understand that if they don’t join in countering this scourge in Syria
and Iraq, they will face it in their own countries before long. This
week, the president’s task is to forge consensus among his political
counterparts in Western Europe to direct NATO Supreme Allied Commander
Europe Gen. Philip Breedlove and the NATO military committee to work
with the Joint Chiefs of Staff to develop a plan for overcoming this
menace.
Economically, it’s time to lean hard on the Gulf Arabs to shut down
their formal and informal funding of radical Islamists. The diplomacy
needed to get this done ought also to be a little easier than it would
have been even five years ago. Their tenure is at risk, and they are
palpably conscious of it. Separately, our work with European allies
should involve closing their financial institutions to Islamist
transactions.
The U.S. military must work with Kurdish, Kuwaiti, Egyptian, United
Arab Emirates, Saudi, Jordanian and Iraqi forces to forge a strategy,
first to contain and then to destroy the Islamic State’s forces. U.S.
and allied tactical aviation can help limit the enemy’s mobility and
provide fire support during engagements. However, the training and
supervision of ground forces from the aforementioned countries in the
struggle to regain lost territory must fall to experienced U.S.
special operations advisory personnel — several thousand of them.
By their brashness and brutality, the Islamists may have provided an
impetus and a window for the civilized world to come together and
reverse their gains. It will take extraordinary leadership from
Washington to oversee this battle and stay the course. That window may
not remain open for long.
As soon as we have stemmed this tide — a year from now — we must turn
to the agenda that we have for so long avoided — bringing the moderate
Arabs, Kurds and Israel into a sustained conversation on regional
security that leads toward reconciling their differences. To do so
offers a revered place in history for the American president. Yet it
will require a far better understanding of the nature of the challenge
than has thus far been apparent, together with the courage and
commitment to lead such an effort successfully.
Robert McFarlane served as President Reagan’s national-security
adviser. He is currently a senior adviser to the Foundation for
Defense of Democracies.
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