A constant question in the war on terror has been, “Why do they hate us?” Americans don’t understand why al-Qaeda would want to attack our country. We don’t understand why the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria would threaten us and kill our citizens. We wonder what we could have done to provoke this hostility, and then we shrug our shoulders and arm ourselves again.
The truth of the matter is the United States has been bombing Iraq for 25 long years.
If that number shocks you, it’s because no one remembers Bill Clinton’s bombing campaign, code named “Operation Desert Fox.” These attacks linked the bombing legacies of Presidents Bush Senior and Junior, making Ronald Reagan the last U.S. president who did not bomb Iraq during his term. Reagan, for the record, backed Iraq’s invasion of Iran by arm ing Iraq with training and biological weapons that would later be used against the Kurds.
There’s a very real question, however, that Obama needs to address. Can the United States destroy ISIS using the same weapons that created it?
ISIS would not be sweeping through Iraq at this moment unless the United States hadn’t done two things: destabilize the region by toppling its government and foster terroristic ideologies by killing Iraqi civilians. These things gave ISIS the opportunity and impetus to conquer.
If the United States decides to use air power against ISIS, we will soon find ourselves unable to accomplish our objectives without civilian casualties. With every Iraqi noncombatant killed in air strikes, we will be pouring gas on the ideological flame that created ISIS in the first place.
ISIS must be stopped. If it is stopped by American air power, however, we will continue the cycle of terrorism and instability in the Middle East that we have been largely responsible for since the ‘80s.
For this reason, efforts to drive back ISIS must consist of a united coalition of nations. The world must be concerned first and foremost with the defense of innocent lives. We can’t continue our policy of killing civilians to get to terrorists, destroying infrastructure and instilling widespread fear and helplessness to defeat our enemies.
Obama may well determine the future of Iraq and its neighbors. By deviating from the “easy solution” of widespread airstrikes, he can give Iraq a chance to finally begin regrowth.
This path will be more difficult for us. It will be longer and more costly, both in terms of finances and the lives of American soldiers.
But it may finally give us a chance to show that we do care about the fate of Iraq.
Nathan James is a senior majoring in psychology. His column runs weekly.
