How great tragedies on foreign soil will affect American politics, policies, issues

Advertisement

TheFlashToday.com NEWS & SPORTS – FREE & LOCAL

The atrocities in Paris and Mali have made, or should make, foreign policy and national security issues paramount in the upcoming presidential election campaign. These issues will affect American politics, and politics will affect America’s handling of these issues—probably for the worse.

Dr. Malcolm Cross
Dr. Malcolm Cross

Normally the American people trust the Democrats over the Republicans on economic issues, but trust the Republicans over the Democrats on national security.  But that may not be the case this year.  The public may distrust Obama, Hillary, and the Democrats, given Obama’s statement, given just a few hours before the Paris massacre, that ISIS was contained in and confined to the Middle East.  But the Republicans, with the apparently inept handling of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, may lack the reputation for national security competence they once had.  Nobody has yet emerged with credibility on these matters.

Public perceptions of Republican ineptitude may especially limit the range of publicly acceptable responses to ISIS today.  Certainly something must be done—but what?  To combat and physically destroy ISIS in the Middle East and elsewhere may be necessary.  But after our wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Vietnam, the American people may not tolerate another long and seemingly endless war in the Middle East no matter how necessary such a war might be to the destruction of ISIS.  More politically acceptable may be the contribution of American air support,  intelligence and training to a broad coalition of European and Middle East nations which agree to supply the bulk of the “boots on the ground”  to be sent  to combat ISIS.  Of course, it can be argued that the bulk of the manpower used to defeat ISIS should come from Europe and the Middle East, given that there is where ISIS poses the greatest danger.  Yet to let politics limit America’s contributions may prolong whatever war is waged over there, despite our loathing for longer wars.

Also vexing is the issue of Syrian refugees.  As I noted in an article I wrote for my Facebook blog, Crosswise on Politics, the challenge is to protect the refugees without endangering the safety of the American people.  

As of this writing, most Republican governors, and at least one Democratic governor, have announced they will reject Syrian refugees, citing the fear that ISIS may try to infiltrate the refugees seeking asylum in America with terrorists who would wreak havoc here once admitted. The danger to the Republican Party is that it may appear even more unsympathetic to minorities than it currently seems to be, an image being encouraged by Obama and the Democrats, while the Democrats may be endangering themselves by appearing to be insufficiently attentive to the terrorist threat.

In my blog I’ve recommended that refugees be accepted—after a thorough vetting.  Critics claim the vetting for those seeking asylum as refugees is already longer and more rigorous than that required for other foreigners seeking to come to America, and that ISIS could more easily sneak its terrorists into our country as tourists or students than as refugees.  If that’s true, then perhaps we should more vigorously vet everyone from abroad, while also creating detention centers to house refugees and keep them safe until they’re vetted and permitted to live in American society.  But for the time being, Republicans hoping to appease their base supporters by taking an anti-refugee stance and Democrats hoping to fuel minority distrust of Republicans will continue to dominate the dialogue on this issue—and make arriving at a solution which keeps safe everyone more difficult.

In summary, the great tragedy is that which is being inflicted by ISIS on innocent Europeans, Africans, and citizens of the Middle East, where most of those murdered by ISIS and other Islamofascist terrorists are themselves Muslims.  Yet the tragedy is compounded by the way politics shapes and limits our responses to ending the reign of terror ISIS wants to recreate.  If ever there were a time for clear thinking and plain speaking, it is now.  Presidential politics will limit our capabilities for either.  That, too, is a tragedy, which will only make things worse.

Malcolm L. Cross has lived in Stephenville and taught politics and government at Tarleton since 1987.  His political and civic activities include service on the Stephenville City Council (2000-2014) and on the Erath County Republican Executive Committee (1990 to the present).  He was Mayor Pro Tem of Stephenville from 2008 to 2014.  He is a member of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church and the Stephenville Rotary Club, and does volunteer work for the Boy Scouts of America. Views expressed in this column are his and do not reflect those of The Flash as a whole.

Be the first to comment

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.