What Progressives Have in Common with the Military

By Lorelei Kelly, In These Times. Posted January 30, 2007.

When Army Col. Ike Wilson returned home in March 2004 from a 12 month deployment in Iraq, one thought remained with him: "Why such a deliberate plan to fight the war, but none to win the peace to follow?"

Wilson, a West Point professor with years of military planning experience, knew that placing this question at the the center of national security policy discussions was the only way to truly learn from Iraq and Afghanistan. He soon founded the Beyond War Project as a hub to educate both the military and the public about a new vision for war, peace and America's role in the world. Thus far, he's signed up participants ranging from Cornell University's Peace Studies Program to the U.S. Air Force.

Wilson's approach typifies today's professional military education, which includes a breadth of topics that might surprise those more familiar with the liberal arts. In contrast to linear Cold War themes like strategic nuclear deterrence, military schools emphasize humanities subjects such as language, international cooperation and world culture. Such lessons arrived in these academic settings in the early part of the decade--though it took the terror attacks of 9/11 and two offensive U.S. military actions before elected leaders really paid attention to the dramatic shift from Cold War thinking.

Today, nearly every general that testifies before Congress claims that the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan do not have purely military solutions. This sea change means that many members of the military and progressives are philosophically much closer than either believes and they are both hurt by the lack of meaningful interaction. Understanding and aligning with the military around shared concerns could be a crucial new strategy for the left.

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I taught peace studies at Stanford University in California before moving to Washington in 1997 to work on Capitol Hill for Rep. Elizabeth Furse (D-Ore.). In 1995, Congress suffered a semi-lobotomy. The new conservative majority--under the guidance of Newt Gingrich's Contract With America--cut many specialist staff and dismantled bipartisan educational organizations such as the Arms Control and Foreign Policy Caucus. My job was to establish an informal study group to educate staff on new national security issues.

As I set out to find important security initiatives to bring to Capitol Hill, I learned that most of the creative new government programs were in the military. I enrolled in classes--free to Hill staff--offered by the Air Command and Staff College and the National Defense University. I spent days at the Army War College, where the challenges of peace were on every conference agenda. While learning about topics ranging from peacekeeping to AIDS prevention, I came to know numerous military professionals eager to share knowledge about international problem solving--most based on recent experience.

Montgomery McFate is an anthropologist who advises the military on the value of cultural knowledge. She points out how warfighting now sits at the intersection of traditional military activity and what is known as "human security."

"Technology is not the key to victory in Iraq or Afghanistan, where so much of our effort is focused on building infrastructure, increasing their ability to build a government, establishing the rule of law and promoting civil society," says McFate. "U.S. forces need to understand the human terrain in which they are operating."

In both Iraq and Afghanistan, good government is our exit strategy. And if there is a good news story about Iraq, it is that U.S. soldiers have already applied lessons learned from the peace operations in the '90s. In Haiti, the Balkans and even in Somalia, the importance of culturally sensitive conflict resolution was learned.

Good government is also a preventive strategy. As a whole, post-9/11 security threats are broad and inclusive, and require a variety of approaches--military, political, social and economic. Because so much of the institutional memory of post-Cold War security policy resides in the Defense Department, whoever figures out a way to engage and to learn from our military's experiences will have a wealth of policy ideas for moving forward.

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Successful "branding" by conservatives has made liberals seem weak on national security. It has also created a lowest common denominator political discourse--especially the defense budget. The vast majority of members vote for defense bills that continue to fund a Cold War national security apparatus. The absence of a loyal opposition and real debate about national security has led us to where we are today: The U.S. military finds itself in a situation that it would have never gotten into on its own.

November's vote provides a timely opening to begin this conversation. With a new Democratic majority in Congress and the departure of Donald Rumsfeld, liberals must see past their anger over Iraq and grab the opportunity to learn from an unaccustomed source. Building relationships with military professionals will pay huge policy dividends when the time comes to pursue fundamental change on national security priorities.

The cost of the war has now passed half a trillion dollars--on top of a $400 billion plus defense budget. A more rational budget will soon become imperative, and progressives can be in the vanguard instead of on the margin by including real military needs in their list of spending priorities before diverting the conversation back to domestic issues. They can also consistently de-link defense spending from war spending--after Iraq, the Army will need to be rebuilt after its experience in Iraq. The rise of a cohort of military advocates from the left would mark an important change: Confident progressive voices joining the debate over the appropriate mission of American armed forces.

See more stories tagged with: iraq, peace, military

Lorelei Kelly is the director of the Real Security Initiative at the White House Project. She also blogs at TheHuffingtonPost.com.

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