I wish the Barack Obama Jeffrey Goldberg interviewed for the Atlantic’s April cover story had been in charge of U.S. foreign policy for the last seven years. Obama’s arguments in the article are similar to those Cato’s foreign policy department are always employing in criticizing the Obama administration.
One such argument says that U.S. military leadership promotes free‐riding among allies. Another is that overthrowing Middle‐Eastern dictators by arming their rebel opponents tends to promote chaos destructive to human life and liberal values and that letting in more refugees from those conflicts is a better way to help people there. In the interview, Obama agrees that U.S. entanglement in the Middle’s East’s civil wars drains U.S. power and security. He sensibly applies the same logic to Russia—dismissing the idea that Russia’s meddling in the Syrian civil war strengthens it. He too is critical of Russian aggression beyond its borders but suggests that Putin is propping up friendly neighbors rather than launching an expansionist frenzy. He agrees that Russia is far weaker than the United States but also that, given our relatively limited interest in states like Ukraine on Russia’s borders, there is little sense in trying to bolster those states with aid or bluffs so that they can overcome Russian aggression.
Goldberg’s Obama is especially impressive in arguing that it is stupid to make war in the name of signaling or credibility. He rightly rejects the idea that foreign leaders start wars because Washington failed to fight in very different circumstances. He even “disdains” Washington’s foreign policy establishment for its credibility “fetish” and reflexive hawkishness.
Unfortunately the actual President Obama has sometimes taken the other side of these arguments. He has pushed to do more for allies in Europe, Asia and even the Middle East. In Syria, he is working to overthrow a second Middle‐Eastern dictator by aiding a rebellion. He kept U.S. forces in Iraq and appointed two secretaries of defense that supported the prolonged occupation there. He initially supported NATO membership for Georgia and Ukraine and subsequently backed military aid for the latter, which undermines its willingness to accommodate Russia. He offered NATO’s credibility as one reason to increase troop levels in Afghanistan. He initially gave a credibility rationale for bombing the Assad regime to punish it for using chemical weapons, as Goldberg notes. Obama used credibility to argue for bombing on behalf of Libya’s rebels—not intervening, he said, would send a message to other regional dictators that they could keep power by killing their people.