The U.S. Military and Foreign Intervention
U.S. Military Intervention
For the past half-century the United States has, more so than ever, had a heavy and menacing hand in foreign relations. Since the Cold War, military interventions have increased in frequency, but decreased in relevance to national interest, as well as in probability of the U.S. “winning.” Tufts University’s Military Intervention Project argues that these claims are backed by the data: of 393 foreign military interventions since 1776, more than 200 have occurred since 1945, and 114 since 1989. The country has switched, as project founder Monica Duffy Toft assesses, to a “force first” rather than a primarily diplomatic approach.
National defense spending has averaged a whopping 15% of the U.S. federal budget over the past decade, though in 2022 it considerably decreased to 12% or $766 billion. By contrast, only $72 billion was devoted to international affairs, which includes development efforts and humanitarian aid, in the same fiscal year.
Relying on Other Agencies
In 2009, former President Barack Obama issued Executive Order 13526 requiring that government agencies declassify non-exempt historically-relevant records 25 years or older, and prohibiting classification beyond 75 years except in extraordinary circumstances. E.O. 13526 is by far the most liberal policy to ever apply to the declassification of secrets held by the FBI, the CIA, the NSA, and other government agencies that have historically been relied upon for American intervention in foreign affairs.
Some notable pre-Cold War clandestine operations carried out by government agencies include Project FF, which helped overthrow Egyptian king Farouk I; Operations PBFortune and PBSuccess, which aided an end to the Guatemalan Revolution; Operation Mongoose, which carried out a series of U.S.-sponsored terrorist attacks on Fidel Castro’s Cuba; as well as the CIA-supported assassinations of influential political figures Patrice Lumumba and Che Guevara.*
The extent to which these agencies are involved in current foreign interventions is yet declassified, though accusations of involvement in elections across the globe abound.
Current Events
With calls for American intervention in ongoing conflicts like Israel’s war on Gaza, the Russo-Ukrainian War, and disputes in the South China Sea, the United States’ next steps to sponsor or to halt further military intervention abroad is of preeminent importance.
When and how should the U.S. intervene? The United States has been heavily critiqued in the past for intervention at inappropriate times, sacrificing American troops while simultaneously endangering the populations they have been deployed to protect. It has further been known to involve itself in ongoing conflicts without a sound exit-strategy, leaving zones of conflict vulnerable to violent regime changes after the withdrawal of foreign aid.
Michael O’Hanlon of the Brookings Institute delivers this advice: “to focus on [struggles] where the scale of death and suffering is greatest, where intervention is unlikely to create great-power conflicts, and where a mission can be designed that promises many lives saved at low cost to intervening soldiers.” The methodologies of intervention should depend heavily on the context of the areas, and the United States should generally use its capital to support regional efforts rather than direct occupation.
How we apply this framework, and whether it should even be followed, remains a matter of contest.
Additional Reading Materials
On Declassified Documents: The National Security Archive*
*Note: Source linked for its value as a compendium of relevant declassified documents.
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