Foreign Policy Tools

Question 1

Soft Power

Answer 1

Soft Power: entice other states to act in our interests without resorting to threats or bribery, convince without using direct force

• Locus of control is external:
  
  • Makes it hard to manage VS hard power (internal locus of control)
• Ex. Sanctions, Summits, aid…
• What issues does soft power effectively manage:
  
  • Can we use it for security issues like proliferation or china?
• Works best: imposing sanctions against democracies
  
  • Because in authoritarian regime, hits the general public instead of the elites who are in a bubble
  • However, we don’t usually impose sanctions against democracies
• Order of operations of soft power
  
  • Can’t really use military power first, then backtrack to soft power
  • Soft power needs to be used before hard power

Question 2

Soft Power: Legitimacy

Answer 2

• How much legitimacy does the US have
  
  • Does the world think that the US has the true authority to do what it wants to do?
  • Needs resources, efficient diplomats
• How much legitimacy does the US need?Your view depends on your view of FP
  
  • No-cons: don’t care about legitimacy but about primacy

Question 3

Smart Power:

Answer 3

• Balance between soft and hard power
• Aims to use “all the tools in our toolbox”
  
  • Military, legal, economic, social…
• Challenges in implementing smart power
  
  • Learning by analogy: This will work here, so it will probably work again in a similar situation
  • Lots of tools: need to coordinate lots of actors, but hard to make sure they’re all on the same page
  • Assumes soft power and hard power compliment one another
    
    • Not always the case
    • People might doubt your resolve in using hard power because assume soft power will follow

Question 4

Berlin Crises: Context

Answer 4

• Context of Berlin:Geography is tricky: end up ww2 share Germany with access to Berlin
• East is part of Warsaw, West part of NATO
• Berlin is in East Germany but allowed to maintain access
• Eisenhower lets Soviets go in first

Question 5

Berlin Crises:

Answer 5

• The whole thing was a power play – who was the world superpower
• Berlin and Khrushchev tries to push out Eisenhower and JFK from West Berlin
• Air Crisis
• 2 Berlin Ultimatums
• Berlin Wall Crisis –> checkpoint charlie incident and USSR backs down (recalls the tanks)

Question 6

Berlin Ultimatum

Answer 6

Berlin 1958 – Berlin Ultimatum

• Long letter
• If haven’t left in 6 months and formally turn over control, sign peace treaty
• Wait a few weeks to formally respond: didn’t want to appear too edgy
• Start of strategy: move troops towards E. German border
• There is massive immigration into W. Berlin
• Is not democratic
• W. Berlin wanted allies to protect them
• Were very concerned because they are just a city
• Suspends the deadline and it calms for the rest of the Eisenhower admin

Question 7

Berlin Crises: Why did the West care?

Answer 7

• West Berlin has strategic value for US: is symbolic of capitalist ideology
• Is a beacon of democracy and Western views behind the Soviet curtain
• Kennons view of Containment: Berlin was a central strongpoint – one of the few major capitals between communism and democracy block
• Strategic importance of location:
  
  • Could get troops, pales, missiles, protect other cities, reach certain soviet cities
  • Signal to Soviets: if we give in this time, will look like will do the same thing with other capitals fighting more power in the future
    
    • Gives legal precedence
    • Is reputational
• Dulles and Eisenhower: USSR shouldn’t get to change mind – Soviet needed to play by the rules that they established

Question 8

Berlin Crises: New Look

Answer 8

• Used nuclear deterrence: less costly
  
  • Didn’t use convention deterrence: wouldn’t know how to get troops to Berlin
  • Airlift: not efficient because they could be shot down
  • If didn’t airlift, would need to invade
  • Would be outgunned:

Was it a success or a failure?

• Success: there was no war
  
  • Didn’t sign the treaty
• Failure: made concessions, Soviets found a way around the strategy
  
  • Didn’t get rid of soviet threat
  • Did escalate to the point of conflict at one point
  • If it were a success it wouldn’t have repeated itself
• **All depends on time frame you consider: if consider it all one event, propably think failed, if a few, think it was a success

Question 9

Soviet Response to New Look

Answer 9

• Strong diplomatic statements, didn’t just respond quickly, moved troops near it
• Really liked to make America uncomfortable
• Treated JFK like he was a kid
  
  • Strategic negotiation – didn’t get flustered with him
  • Openly accepts USSR security concerns
  • Strategy threatening: enemy troops in territory
    
    • Weakens can have a negative impact on citizens
    • Strategic stronghold: could bomb from there
    • Not necessarily Russia/Ukraine
  • We get it’s a security concern for you, but you need to understand it’s the same for us
  • Is brilliant – he looks sympathetic
• Soviets did not keep their word
• Challenger or target: resolve is an interplay – if both really resolute, coercer and coerced might escalate
• K poses another Ultimatum in Vienna

Question 10

Flexible Response and K’s Response

Answer 10

• Used by JFK
• Used conventional forces and nuclear forces
  
  • Kept troops

Khrushchev: does not take JFK seriously

• Doesn’t think he’s resolute, competent
• Thinks he is too young
• USSR has more at stake than before - takes physical action

Success VS Failure

• Success: The wall was a solution, if not a great one
  
  • Allies maintained access
• Failure: Cold War continues
  
  • Leaves door open for small actions
  • Doesn’t show resolve –> troop movement did
  • JFK didn’t have a reputation for resolve –> failure at bay of pigs

Question 11

Asymmetric Conflict VS Conventional Warfare:

Answer 11

Asymmetric Conflict =

• Strong actor fighting weak actor / not always non-state actor
• Relative power about two states – certain battlefield
• Tactic one side significantly stronger
• Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam, Gulf war, Russo-Finnish war, Russia invading Ukraine
• Why do we care?
  
  • 1. Want to avoid getting into wars we might lose
  • 2. How to win wars – have to get involved because often wearker groups tend to do better in these conflicts

Conventional Warfare = two large armies fighting

• Have long range
• Battlefield tactics change as technology improves – is pretty straightforward

Question 12

Why Wearker Groups do Better in Asymmetric Warfare Arguments

Answer 12

1. Resolve and Interest argument
2. Strategic Argument

Question 13

Resolve and Interest

Answer 13

• Stronger state has less resolve
• It has less to lose (survival isn’t at stake)
  
  • What is at stake: power in that area, cultural identity issue, military reputation damaged
  • Small state might be annexed, colonized, overthrow political leaders, civilians killed and people who fought against (executive so wont – military, intelligence, academics), part of territory annexed
• Strong state doesn’t always start the war, start for dif reasons
• Resolve: willingness to incur costs
• To win war, must break will of the other side and make them leave
  
  • Winning looks different than conventional warfare
• Painful enough

Question 14

Asymmetric Warfare Strategic Argument

Answer 14

• *There is a mismatch: Strong actors can win if get weak states to use direct tactics or decide to use indirect tactics
  
  • Unfortunately, conventional performs poorly against unconventional
  • Are predictable – can use geography, wait until it is strategically viable to attack the strong again
  • Is very inefficient for stronger side
  • Is resource draining, have casualties
  • (-) If strong country uses barbarism, takes a hit in pubic perception
  • When weaker actors get stronger, switch to conventional tactics
  • Only use insurgency because weak – when it is the only option they have
  • Highly problematic

Question 15

Strong VS Weak States Strategies

Answer 15

Attack strong states:

• 1. Direct Attack: attack their military forces – target combatants
     * Loss Exchange Ration – you lose less people, resources
     * Ex. Ww2 – wipe out the enemy
• 2. Barbarism: do naughty things like attacking civilians/go for noncombatents
     * Ex. Bombing civilian targets to break will of the other side

Weak state tactics:

• 3. Indirect, Guerilla Tactics: use insurgent tactics
     * Hit and run
     * Attack/target combatants
• 4. Direct Defense: when come out of the wood work and do strong defenses
     * Pre-emptively take out the capabilities of the other side – attack supply change, war-making ability

Question 16

What can strong states do in Asymmetric Warfare?

Answer 16

• Train armies to fight those tactics
• Problems: use opportunities to your disadvantage
  
  • Standard operating procedures )entire military set up to fight this kind of war)
  • People making decisions are older
  • People training takes time – need to teach them how to think and respond
  • Need new weapons – the gear is too heavy
  • Bound by own public opinion – not supportive of hit and run tactics
    
    • Try to use heart and mind tactics – still an issue because seen as the invador
    • The insurgents have the support of citizens
    • Think the insurgent is the lesser of two evils
• We have learned a lot though – recognize conditions under which insurgency

Question 17

Vietnam War:

Answer 17

• Two major offensives: Rolling Thunder and Line Backer (more successful)
  
  • Looks at when strategic air bombings work against insurgencies
  • Focus on insurgency because in contemporary times we are moving towards insurgent warfare from great power wars
  • Vietnam is a pivotal point where you see a significant mismatch of power
  • How to use it and when you can use it
  • Think will never have extended deterrence work if pull out
    
    • 1. Afraid of being perceived of as weak if didn’t keep fighting in Vietnam
    • 2. Got involved in Vietnam partially because thought it was an easy war to win
    • Vietnam was a Quagmire
• Upsides to Air bombings:
  
  • Less dangerous for soldiers – don’t need to commit troops, cheaper – already have the aircrafts, Vietname fleet can still be used
  • B52s can hold many bombs: very efficient

Question 18

Rolling Thunder

Answer 18

• By Johnson
• Strategic objectives: destroy resolve of the N. Vietnamese
• Strategies: Shelling Model with Gradual Escalation, Douhet Model, Interdiction
• Does our strategy make sense? Rely on multiple bombing – not a lot of options
• Napalm: burn down jungle to see true energy, Douhet uses napalm too
• Backfires and makes the land unstable
• *Military tactics made them immune, vietnam layout is agrarian, wouldn’t work

Question 19

Strategies of Rolling Thunder

Answer 19

1. Shelling model with gradual escalation

• Focuses on civilian vulnerabilities and economic targets
• Ex. Blitz – small targets at beginning, get bigger
• Promise of more pain to come
• If other side gives up early, can get positive outcome for investment
• Downsides: citizens get upset with anti-American sentiments won’t give up
  
  • Doubt credibility
  • Give target population time to figure out strategy, can more population after to underground shelters

2. Douhet Model of Bombing: Attack all at once

• Over-whelming immediate devastation
• Civilian vulnerability and economic targets targeted
• Tries to solve issues by showing they are serious – hit hard and keep going
• Downside: a lot more expensive – may exhaust resources
  
  • Civilians still may keep fighting if feel indignant and don’t like your policy

3. Interdiction: Is pre-emptive

• Focus on military targets and hit then before they can get to battlefield
• Ex. Barracks, road supply lines, etc.
• Hard to distinguish between military and econ targets

Question 20

What Goes wrong in Rolling Thunder?

Answer 20

• 1. They had switched to conventional warfare – shouldn’t focus on guerilla
     * They used guerilla tactics, hard to bomb them
     * America attacking things they didn’t value – didn’t understand their interests well
     * Interdiction relies on idea that have clear targets like barracks – don’t in Guerilla warfare
     
     • Have visible supply chains and targets like railroads
     • Implies have front lines to resupply, what do you hit?
• 2. If primarily agrarian with few/no major cities – what do you hit?
     * Set up for large urban places
• 3. Focuses on women and children which increases resolve of local population

Question 21

Line Backer 2

Answer 21

• Nixon

Pretty Successful - Why?

• A. North Vietnamese changed tactics – our bombing strategy works
  
  • America’s main goal – rolling thunder defeat – linebacker just crippling resources to them give in
  • How do you defining winning/success
  • Launched this offensive – had heightened confidence à didn’t understand and misperception
  • Got greedy (get USSR and Chinese resources), lose territory even though not losing people
  • Want one last push before Americans leave à they get greedy eladers think good idea but counterproductive to strategy
• B. America changes their tactics: we implement too
  
  • There is an interaction affect between A and B
  • Use a lot of interdiction and evolved one (more civilian than economic) – start bombing in south and move north while increasing severity of bombing
  • Clears the territory North
    
    • Pushes people deeper if know they’re coming – civilians can signal to government to stop
    • Signaled to USSR and China serious without making them nervous

Question 22

Alternative Views of America As Hegemon

Answer 22

The “Benevolent” Hegemon

• Because we were geographically isolated post – WW2 so, we were able to fare better off with less casualties, no destruction of homeland
• Stepped up to defend widespread ideals of democracy during cold war because no one else could
• Might feel a bit confused / resentful now that countries no longer need our guidance/unilateral power

The “Imperialistic” hegemon

• US took advantage of power vacuum post-ww2, and actively tried to export power and influence
• Might not cave if others don’t want us to use unilateral power – might do it anyways because they can

Question 23

Why does the US choose to use unilateral force in a post-cold war era when we have other strong allies?

Answer 23

• Utility – just because we have other options, doesn’t mean they will be as effective/efficient
• Reasoning by analogy – it worked in the past, lets try to make it work again
• Question of trust: do we trust others to keep their word and follow through on promises
• Reputation: want to maintain image of power, ability to act alone
  
  • But if use unilateral could develop a bad reputation of tyranny
• Interest: if something is in your vital national interest, might seem important to act unilaterally, don’t care what people think
  
  • Other’s interests may conflict with our own
• Ease: easy to use unilateral force – no need to ask permission, give a reason, form a compromise

Question 24

How do policy-makers decide when to use unilateral force?

Answer 24

• Rational choice model
• Individual world view
  
  • Realist
  • Neo-cons: favor unilateral action
    
    • Want to promote ideals abroad
  • Liberal Institutionalists: Against unilateralism
    
    • Favor multilateral inst. And cooperation because leads to stability, and place a big emphasis on trust and accountability
  • Liberal Realists:

Question 25

Iraq War: Ways to Analyze

Answer 25

2 Ways to analyze:

• 1. Look at initiation: most of discussion
• 2. Large – can use their power to change course
     * How to recognize failure and adjust course

Question 26

Ideology of Bush Doctrine: & Initiation of Iraq War

Answer 26

• Motivations and justifications
• Need to understand these to understand the process of how to get there
• Critical change in the course of Foreign Policy
  
  • Emphasizes hegemony and unilateral power
  • About the voracity and intensity of use of US power
  • Sole focus on use of military power
  • Shift in thinking of America
  • Bush ran on platform of non-interventionism
    
    • Then after 9/11, there is a giant shift to neo-conerservationism and intervention
• A. Part is psychological fear about threat of terrorism
• B. Part is who Bush surrounded himself with
  
  • Management style: lets others run parts of FP – need competent and communicative leaders
  • If people work below and don’t like one another
  • Powell and Rumsfeld fundamentally disagree and hate one another – need to take sides
  • Bush trusts Rumsfeld and VP
  • Realpolitik: neo-conservatism in less than 6 months

Question 27

4 Primary Parts of Bush Doctrine

Answer 27

• Needs to assert primacy in world politics
• Important to use unilateral power
• Spurs action into Afghanistan and Iraq
• Legitimacy – Bush sets up for Obama administration and makes theoretical distinction between preventative and pre-emptive warfare

Question 28

Preventative VS Pre-emptive Warfare

Answer 28

A. Preventative: Could be a first strike against you

• There is potential
• Is used to stave off changes in balance of power
• Ex. Strike against China while we’re still stronger
• Prevent future power shift

B. Pre-emptive: There is an imminent threat of attack

• Attack now to protect selves – threatened
• Bush argued Iraq was pre-emptive but it was really preventative
• Not a sound policy for international community
• Get support if pre-emptive – people disagree if he actually thought it
• Questions when America can protect its interests abroad
• Open up larger conditions of when can use force
• Then more likely to use force
• Increase America’s presence in world by necessity
• Potentially more costly and reputational effect

*Europeans think preventative, Bush thinks pre-emptive

Question 29

Poor Planning Process

Answer 29

• Given the decision to already go in
• Planning process – relatively few forces into Baghdad (middle ground on amount of troops)
• Do well at winning conventional war, not good for postwar planning
• Help to fight counterinsurgency war
• Were very unprepared

Question 30

Why we were unprepared in Iraq War:

Answer 30

• Lacked knowledge of the region
• Before Iraq, not focused on ME, focused on USSR
• Clinton = Arab-Israeli
• 90s Asian (Japan) Economic power and N. Korean issues
• Certain parts of the world more important at dif times
  
  • Shift after 9/11
  • Lage between when think need something and ened it
• “Unknown Unknown”: Rumsfeld was Secretary of Defense
  
  • Can’t know to plan for unknown unknowns so not going to try
  • LOL THIS WAS HIS JOB.
• CIA DoD In-fighting: organizational processes
  
  • Don’t trust CIA – only look at his own intelligence
  • Power struggle – also Rumsfeld
  • Secretary of state and defense unable to put differences aside
• Configuration Biases: pre-determined ideology
  
  • Want seek into argues with pre-existing belief and discount other information
  • Sometimes can use info that disargrees (Ex-com issues) and manipulate it into agreement
• Lack of Planning: thought about war in wrong way – thought military campaign would be short
  
  • Took long rebuilding effort
  • Used wrong planning analogies – thought about Germany, Japan

Question 31

Bush Key Mistakes

Answer 31

• Dismantled army – ended up fighting well-trained people
• Perception of you being an invader
• Feel disenfranchised
• Lack of manpower of US: in key strategic places, could have been a police force for restructuring
• US military troops not trained to be a peace keeper
  
  • Hearts and minds situation
  • Later – not productive, didn’t think about them
  • Looting – let it happen – didn’t have enough man-power

Question 32

Surge: Success

Answer 32

=local populations decide to reject al-Qaeda

Was it successful? Violence decreased a lot

• Short-run, long-run problem: how do you define success
• How long does it need to survive to be successful
• Goal – create:
  
  • Sectarian violence, bring people to talk to one another, lays groundwork for power transition and lets us leave
    
    • By land standards
    • SR more successful than not
    • LR how did Obama do the Surge and after it to continue gains – set artificial timeline
    • Things on ground can change – need to be flexible, counterproductive to goals
    • Don’t want it because if set one, they will stop fighting and once we leave
    • Power vacuum will come in
    • Obama wants it – economic resources, highly unpopular troop morale, election promises

How do we define success? Mission accomplish

• Rumsfeld: conquer Baghdad and take out Hussein, success
• Surge short-run success:
  
  • How 7-8 years later
  • ISIS power vacuum
  • Some say timeline issue, some say nothing could do
  • Another strategic mistake – people entrusted Iraq to give power were not trustworthy
  • =Shiite government (al Maliki) – success with Anbar Awakening
  • He was elected and immediately dimisses certain types of Muslims from governemtn
  • Anbar Awakening bridged divide
  • Played on religious and ethnic divisions
• Should we have known – there is not a perfect choice
• What effect of Surge tells about ability to change course and implement US military