So the US Is Single-Handedly at War Again

In the beginning of summer, the “War on Terror” was over. Our generation’s great wars in Afghanistan and Iraq would soon be a memory. American foreign policy would take an entirely new direction, explained the president. Now, the U.S. is bombing not only Iraq again, but also Syria, without having presented any strategy on how long it will continue or what will happen afterwards. For many Americans, it feels like 2003, though even more confusing.

Misgivings are slowly beginning to rise in the United States: Is this really a good idea?

No one disputes that the Islamic State and their fantasy of a caliphate should be stopped. But are they really a direct threat to the United States, and it is reasonable to try to single-handedly bomb them away? Even if the Islamic State disappears, Iraq and Syria will remain as divided as before, and the United States would rather not spend the next few years trying to create completely new, Western democracies there according to a model acknowledged as unsuccessful.

Bush believed that the United States could get involved in the world, and Obama thought the opposite and tried to reduce the American footprint and withdraw. Neither turned out to be so successful. Now, Obama has adopted a completely new line and launched his own war, while the rest of the world wonders if it really can be legal to bomb Syria without the government’s permission, or if, quite simply, yet another dictator is to be deposed.

It is difficult to get other countries to agree to fight terrorism across borders. If you start in Libya and go east on the map all the way to Pakistan in Southeast Asia, there are eight countries in a row where the United States has gotten involved resisting the Islamists. And how has it gone? Libya, where even Sweden commended itself on making a contribution, is now a completely broken state that is so chaotic that few understand who is at war with whom. And the rest are not exactly stable.

At present there are 1,600 American soldiers in Iraq, and Obama has solemnly promised that there will not be a ground war. However, his own military commanders are already openly saying it may be necessary. And so American soldiers would be back for the third time since 2003 with the nightmarish task of retaking Mosul, one block at a time. Previously, the president’s hallmark had been the opposite — a clinical drone war. However, the myth of the easy war — where one bombs a little bit and then the rest fixes itself — has become increasingly difficult to sell.

In the latest polls more than a third of Americans say that they think Obama seems to be doing a good job with foreign policy, which is not much better than Bush when he was least popular. In Europe, France is the loudest cheerleader, but it is yet unclear what the other allies’ position is on participation.

The internal political row, however, has begun to simmer in Washington, where Congress is divided over sending open support in varying forms to rebels in Syria and trying to get a handle on the “new” old ambition of trying to “root out” terrorism, and what the price will really be this time.