Understudies

John Podhoretz ponders whether killing Soleimani is a fundamental change, or only the usual opportunity for a leadership rotation in terrorist circles.  He comes down on the side of change:
It may be true that if you kill one terrorist mastermind, another will rise in his place. But the fact is that masterminds like Soleimani do not grow on trees. If you think of him as the Steve Jobs of state-sponsored terror, then it seems plausible to likely that he will be followed by a less creative type — the Tim Cook of terror, say.
I hope he's right. There's no doubt Soleimani had stiff competition in the eel-brain department, but as an effective leader maybe not.

As Podhoretz argues, deterrence isn't peace, and deterred enemies aren't friends.  By the same token, enemies don't become friends when you cozy up to them and offer appeasement.  Trump seems adept at using the carrot and the stick, which makes his foreign policy more coherent than the usual run of American deep-thinkers.

4 comments:

Grim said...

I won’t say he was irreplaceable. He was the kind of true believer who will go out to the front lines and be with the younger radicals, getting to know them and building trust relationships under fire. For that reason, he was effective like no replacement can be for a long time.

These groups aren’t natural allies, and they swim in a sea of cash and guns and power. Holding them together and making them effective was artful work.

Christopher B said...

Nations have no permanent friends or allies, they only have permanent interests. We have no eternal allies, and we have no perpetual enemies. Our interests are eternal and perpetual, and these interests it is our duty to follow. - Lord Palmerston

Deterrence fits into that rather well, I think.

Trump also has a more coherent foreign policy because he has a more coherent definition of the United States as a nation.

E Hines said...

Deterrence only works on the deter-able. I've cited this from Rafsanjani before:

the use of a nuclear bomb in Israel will leave nothing on the ground, whereas it will only damage the world of Islam.

The men who currently populate the Iranian government don't have a mindset that's deter-able, and it's not only a matter of Israel--it compasses the Great Satan, as well, along with Europe and the West in general. The men of the Iranian government don't think like we do, they don't have the same value set we do, they don't care the cost of what they're after. Except to each of them personally. That's why the current pause: they're only considering the threat to their individual persons, not the threat to their nation.

Soleimani was only one of several who must be individually killed. Only after that coterie has been severely decimated, if not eliminated, can their satrap terrorist organizations be materially reduced. In that sense, I disagree with Podhoretz: there is not yet any fundamental change, not enough of those persons have been killed. Nor is the idea of a leadership rotation in terrorist circles relevant in this context.

Eric Hines

Cassandra said...

I guess I'm confused - what is "incoherent" about, "Hey - I don't want to get America into pointless foreign wars, but that doesn't mean I'm going to roll over and pee on myself when your proxies attack our embassy or you attack our allies".

Trump seems more "coherent" to me in that he at least seems to understand that you don't deal effectively with despots and thugs from a position of weakness. You may or may not be able to deter them if you stand up for your interests but it's for danged sure you won't deter them by appeasing them or rewarding aggression with previously withheld concessions. This isn't complicated.

I learned this from raising two boys :) (only partially joking)