Month: August 2014

Pope Francis’ Advice for President Obama

by dcortright, posted in Iraq and Iran

In his statement yesterday on the conflict in northern Iraq Pope Francis helped to clarify the moral basis for military action against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), and also defined its limits. President Obama should take some pointers.

In cases where there is unjust aggression, said the Pope, a moral duty exists to stop the aggressor. This is not an endorsement of war but a reiteration of the ‘just cause’ criterion for when limited military force may be permissible. It is a statement of the ‘responsibility to protect’ principle endorsed by human rights groups and adopted by the United Nations and most countries.

When innocent populations face imminent threat of attack, it is morally justified to take action to stop the killing. No nation alone should decide how to respond, the Pope emphasized. The determination of whether aggression has occurred and what should be done to stop it is up to the United Nations. The responsibility to judge and act belongs to the international community, not an individual country. The pontiff also emphasized that the imperative to protect does not mean bombing or making war.

President Obama on the other hand clings to the threadbare argument that U.S. bombing and drone strikes in the region are necessary to protect American military advisers based hundreds of miles away in Baghdad. The administration is claiming open-ended authority to launch military strikes and seems to be planning a protracted military campaign to counter ISIS.

No one objects to preventing extremists from murdering civilians and taking over cities and towns, but President Obama should follow Pope Francis’ advice and bring this issue to the UN Security Council. Let’s work with other nations to develop a comprehensive strategy for countering ISIS and cutting off its sources of recruits, weapons and money.  If further military action is deemed necessary, it should be multilateral not unilateral.

Needed: An International Strategy in Iraq

by dcortright, posted in Iraq and Iran, Multilateral Protective Intervention

I’ve been asked by Jim Wallis and the team at Sojourners for my thoughts on how to respond to the current humanitarian and security crisis in Iraq.

I believe the United States should work through the United Nations to develop a coherent humanitarian, political and military strategy for addressing the needs of persecuted minority communities and countering the security threat posed by the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, ISIS.

Unilateral U.S. military action is unsustainable and unwise over the long run. If further security measures are needed to protect civilians from ISIS, they should be multilateral, not unilateral.

Read my comments here, posted in today’s God’s Politics blog.

Aiding Afghanistan?

by dcortright, posted in Afghanistan/Pakistan

A startling statistic appears in the most recent quarterly report of Congress’ Special Inspector General Afghan Reconstruction (SIGAR). U.S. appropriations for the ‘reconstruction’ of Afghanistan have now exceeded the funds committed by the United States for the Marshall Plan at the end of World War II.

The inflation-adjusted cost of the Marshall Plan for the period 1948-1952 was $103.4 billion. The equivalent figure for funds committed to Afghanistan so far is more than $109 billion. Think of it, more money has been spent in Afghanistan than was provided to 16 countries of Western Europe for reconstruction in the aftermath of World War II!

The Marshall Plan is considered one of the most successful development programs in history. It helped to rebuild war-torn economies and solidified the basis for democratic governance and prosperity in Western Europe.

What about U.S. aid to Afghanistan? What has been accomplished? Here are some quotes from the latest SIGAR report:

  • Audits reveal “poor planning, shoddy construction, mechanical failures, and inadequate oversight.”
  • “It is questionable whether the Afghan government can sustain many non-security reconstruction programs in such sectors as health, education, and economic development.”
  • “U.S.-built schools and health facilities often cannot be staffed or supplied. … some facilities  have fallen into disrepair; others are unsafe, incomplete, or unsuited for their intended purposes.”

A far cry from the Marshall Plan!

The poor results of foreign aid in Afghanistan result in part from the Kabul regime’s lack of governance capacity. The countries of Western Europe had pre-existing institutional structures that could be rebuilt, but Afghanistan has never had an effective system of national governance. State revenues fall far short of government expenditures. According to the IMF, “Afghanistan has one of the lowest domestic revenue collections in the world” (the result of minimal payment of taxes).

Another failure factor is the link to armed conflict. Aid for Europe came after World War II in a period of relative calm, while development efforts in Afghanistan have come in the midst of intensive armed conflict. Foreign aid has been “securitized” and used to advance the military strategy of defeating insurgents. Approximately 60% of U.S. aid has been used to support Afghan security forces.

Militarized aid strategies seldom succeed. Similar attempts to fund indigenous armed forces and win “hearts and minds” through humanitarian programs failed in Vietnam and Iraq.

The bottom line: development aid cannot succeed in the absence of good governance, and it cannot bring victory in wars of dubious purpose.