I affirm resolved: The United States ought to promote

democracy in the Middle East

I value morality and my standard for when we have
achieved that is utilitarianism or doing the most good
for the most number of people
Before we begin we must define a few terms, Merriam
Webster defines promote as to help (something) happen,
develop, or increase and democracy as a government
in which the supreme power is vested in the people
and exercised by them directly or indirectly through a
system of representation usually involving periodically
held free elections
Contention 1 is Democracy
Middle Eastern democratization has failed in the past due
to a failure to fully commit to democratization by
shifting our focus to democratization we can solve
authoritarianism within the Middle East
Hamid and Mandaville 14
Hamid is a senior fellow at the Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World at the Brookings Institution's
Center for Middle East Policy, Mandaville is a professor of public and international affairs at George Mason
University and a former member of the State Departments policy-planning staff.
(Shadi and Peter, The U.S. Is Giving Up on Middle East Democracyand That's a Mistake, 1-7-14,
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/01/the-us-is-giving-up-on-middle-east-democracy-and-thatsa-mistake/282890/#about-the-authors, 2-24-16)//cv

With the rise of al-Qaeda, increasingly repressive regimes, and weak, even
collapsing states, the Arab Spring is looking more and more like a nightmare for U.S. security interests. Perhaps,

it makes some sense that the Obama administration

would increase security assistance to the Middle East, from 69
percent of the total budget request for 2014 to 80 percent. However, this also entails a
significant reduction in democracy assistance to the
region, which will drop from $459.2 million to $298.3 million. Congress might further deepen these cuts. But
then,

Todays Middle East is

a product, at least in part, of failed democratization, and one of the
reasons it failed was the timid, half-hearted support of the
Obama administration. That the U.S. is fundamentally limited in its ability to influence the internal politics of
to look at this as a security problem risks conflating cause and effect.

Arab states has been a consistent theme within the Obama administration as well as among analysts . No one
denies that there are limits to what the U.S. can (or cant) do; the question, however, is what those limits are. A

growing academic literature points to the significant

impact Western leverage and linkage can have on democratic
transitions. During the third wave of democratization, Steven Levitsky and Lucan Way write, it was an
externally driven shift in the cost of suppression, not changes in domestic conditions, that contributed most

states
vulnerability to Western democratization pressure was
often decisive. Western democratization pressure will be less effective in the Middle East because of
centrally to the demise of authoritarianism in the 1980s and 1990s. They find that

the more existential nature of ideological divides, but it is still important. In a new article in The Washington

the various attempted revolutions of 2011 and 2012

demonstrate the important, even decisive, role of Western nations
Quarterly, we argue that

as well as regional actors, many of whom themselves are dependent on Western security provisions and other

after the uprisings began, the Obama

administration has ended up embracing a narrow,
security-focused approach to the Arab Spring, something that Obama often criticized his
support. Ironically, three years

predecessors for doing. To be sure, many of the regions continuing security problems, particularly in Iraq, are a
result of the Bush administrations disastrous policies. However, it is also worth noting that President Bush
acknowledged the existence of a tyranny-terror linkthe notion that the root causes of extremism and terrorism
can be found in the regions enduring lack of democracy. Those claims are no less relevant today. In the failure of
peaceful politics and democracy, best exemplified by the military coup in Egypt and the ongoing civil war in Syria,
al-Qaeda and other extremist groups have been given a gift. Their narrativethat violence is the only option that
worksis stronger than ever. Facing this mounting challenge, Obama has now further de-prioritized democracy
assistance. Outside of its commendable efforts to strike a deal with Iran and put forward a framework agreement for

the administrations approach to the

region is characterized almost entirely by ad-hoc crisis
management and traditional counterterrorism
approaches. Its one larger-scale reform initiativea half-hearted proposal for a Middle East and North
the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,

Africa Incentive Fundhas yet to see the light of day and likely never will due to the convoluted way it was

the U.S. and its partners now need to

consider a very different approach to Middle East
democracy assistance. Conventional democracy promotion activities tend to focus on the
presented to Congress. We argue that

process and retail aspects of democratic politicsthings like elections, political party training, get-out-the-vote
(GOTV) campaigns, and civil society enhancement . While these are undoubtedly important, they are insufficient to
deliver lasting reforms. Authoritarianism in the Arab world has proven time and time againeven in supposedly
post-revolutionary settings such as Egypt todaythat it can weather the annoyances of elections and civil society.

The uprisings of 2011 and 2012 prove the Middle East

wants democracy but external support from western
countries is key to their transition
Hamid and Mandaville 13
Hamid is a senior fellow at the Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World at the Brookings Institution's Center
for Middle East Policy, Mandaville is a professor of public and international affairs at George Mason University and a
former member of the State Departments policy-planning staff.
(Shadi and Peter, The Washington Quarterly, Bringing the United States Back into the Middle East, Fall 2013,
https://csis.org/files/publication/TWQ_13Winter_Hamid-Mandaville.pdf, 2-24-16)//cv

With the Arab revolts, senior U.S. officials repeatedly argued that this was not about America, emphasizing instead
the indigenous nature of the uprisings. After the fall of Mubarak, President Obama declared, Its not America that
put people into the streets of Tunis and Cairo, 6 while Secretary Clinton remarked, These revolutions are not ours.
They are not by us, for us, or against us.7 There was concern that too much U.S. involvement went against the
very spirit of what was occurring in these countries. That may have been true, but doing less during the Arab
uprisingsthere was, after all, no fundamental reorientation of U.S. policymeant that pre-Arab Spring policies

In the transitional
countriesTunisia, Egypt, Libya, and Yementhe United States pledged
only a limited amount of new aid, despite deteriorating
economies. For the most part, the administration continued business as usual even as it promised to
remained largely intact, particularly in Jordan, Morocco, and the Gulf countries .

back democratic transformations across the region. In Egypt, such pronouncements rang hollow; Washington
watched quietly while the Morsi government grew increasingly inept and authoritarian. And when the military
subsequently deposed the democratically-elected Morsi, the United States expressed only mild criticism, refusing to
call what happened a coup. Secretary of State John Kerry even claimed that Egypts generals were restoring

These early
years of the Arab uprisings tell a story that is largely at
odds with the predominant narrative that external actors
can and should play only a quiet, supporting role. With the
exception of Tunisia, each of the revolutionsin Egypt, Libya, Yemen, and Syria (as
well as the one nearrevolution in Bahrain)has been notable for the important,
even decisive role of international actors. In Egypt, as the crowds
swelled in Tahrir Square, senior U.S. officials exerted pressure on the
military to refrain from using force against protesters. In
Libya, the NATO operation provided a protective umbrella
for the rebel forces, allowing them to defeat Muammar
Qaddafis army. Meanwhile, the uprising in Bahrain was quashed when Saudi and Emirati forces
democracy, a bizarre statement given the violent crackdown on opposition forces.8

arrived to crush the protests led by the countrys majority-Shia population. In Yemen, the removal of president Ali

Abdullah Saleh was facilitated through negotiations involving Saudi Arabia, the United States, and other Gulf
Cooperation Council (GCC) nations. And Russias unfailing support of the Syrian regime has ensured the UNs
inability to take any meaningful action as it slaughters its own citizens. Iran and Hezbollah have helped Assad check
rebel advances on the ground, while aid from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Western nations has been vital in sustaining
the rebellion. It is also worth noting that perceptions of U.S. influence and leverage in the Arab world very much
depend on the preconceptions of whoever happens to be watching . It may be the case that U.S. influence has
diminished in purely objective terms, but that does not mean that all Arabs will or must believe it. If the United
States acts as if it has diminished influence, then it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy . Contrary to declinist

the United States does, in fact, have more

leverage in the Middle East than many U.S. policymakers
assume. For example, former NSC director Steven Simon argues that the United States can do very little to
assumptions,

pressure Egypts generals, but the fact remains that there is simply no replacement for the crucial spare parts and
equipment that the United States provides, not to mention the thickness of military to-military relations built up
over decades. When it comes to the Gulf, the threat of Iran, while often overstated, continues to loom large, but in a
way that affirms U.S. leverage. Instead of viewing the United States as dependent on the Gulf, the reverse is more
accurate, especially now with U.S. domestic energy production rapidly expanding. Meanwhile, in the face of Iranian
aggression, the Gulf States have never been more dependent on U.S. security provisions including advanced
weaponry and efforts at coordinating regional missile defense. As long as the Iranian threat festers, the United
States has an opportunity, one which will almost certainly diminish if Iran gives up its nuclear ambitions and
reconciles with the West. In other words, Iran currently provides an opening for the United States to adopt a more
comprehensive approach of linking what have until now been treated as discrete concernssecurity and reform.

Maintaining democracy is key to peace

Cortright 13,
David Cortright is the director of Policy Studies at the Kroc Institute for Peace Studies at the University of Notre
Dame, Chair of the Board of Directors of the Fourth Freedom Forum, and author of 17 books, Kristen Wall is a
Researcher and Analyst at the Kroc Institute, Conor Seyle is Associate Director of One Earth Future, Governance,
Democracy, and Peace How State Capacity and Regime Type Influence the Prospects of War and
Peace, http://oneearthfuture.org/sites/oneearthfuture.org/files//documents/publications/Cortright-Seyle-WallPaper.pdf

Drawing from the empirical literature,

this paper identifies two underlying pathways through
which state governance systems help to build peace. These are:
State capacity. If states lack the ability to execute their policy goals or to maintain security and
public order in the face of potentially violent groups, armed conflict is more likely. State capacity refers to two
significant aspects: security capacity and social capacity. Security capacity includes the ability to control territory
and resist armed incursion from other states and nonstate actors. Social capacity includes the ability to provide

Research suggests that not all

governance systems are equally effective or capable of
supporting peace. Governance systems are seen
as more credible and legitimate, and are better at supporting peace, when they
are characterized by inclusiveness, representativeness,
social services and public goods. Institutional quality.

transparency, and accountability. In particular, systems allowing citizens to voice

concerns, participate politically, and hold elected leaders accountable are more stable and better able to avoid

Both dimensionsstate capacity and quality

are crucial to the prevention of armed conflict and are the focus of part
one of this paper. Part two of the paper focuses on democracy as the most
common way of structuring state government to
allow for inclusive systems while maintaining state capacity.
armed conflict.

The twoparts summarize important research findings on the features of governance that are most strongly
associated with prospects for peace. Our analysis, based on an extensive review of empirical literature, seeks to

We show
evidence of a direct link between peace and a states
capacity to both exert control over its territory and provide a full range of
social services through effective governance institutions. We apply a governance framework to examine
identify the specific dimensions of governance that are most strongly associated with peace.

three major factors associated with the outbreak of warborder disputes, ethnic conflict, and dependence on
commodity exportsand emphasize the importance of inclusive and representative governance structures for the
prevention of armed conflict.

Liberal democracy is a self-correcting order that will

always prioritize the good of the people that resolves
any potential abuses of rights, fosters cooperation, and
creates productive and positive change
Starr 06
(is a Pulitzer Prize-winning professor of sociology and public affairs at Princeton University) Paul StarrFreedom's
Power: The True Force of Liberalism accessed online 7/9/15
http://www.princeton.edu/~starr/articles/articles07/Starr-Liberalism-Ch1.pdf

In a different way, guarantees of religious toleration and freedom of conscience exemplify the logic of liberalism as
a foundation for a stable polity. Internecine religious conflicts and wars of religion, like revenge feuds, deplete the
powers of states and societies. Religious toleration serves not only to allow people to worship differently but also to
reduce conflict, facilitate economic exchange, and create a wider pool of talent for productive work and the state
itself. By dividing religion from law that is, by excluding religion from any binding social consensusstates
guaranteeing religious freedom allow people of different faiths to cooperate under a political order that does not
threaten to extinguish any of the various theological doctrines they support. Religious toleration has also served as
a paradigm for the states acceptance of pluralism in other cultural and moral controversies. Where divisions over
the meaning of the good life are deep and irreconcilable, the states neutrality among competing perspectives
furthers mutual forbearance, cooperation, and the growth of societal powers. The neutrality of the liberal state,
however, does not apply to all matters of moral judgment. Liberalism not only regards people as worthy of being
treated equally but holds that each individual life has positive value, and the laws and policies of a liberal state
ought to embody that principle, though citizens may well disagree about how to interpret it. As each life has value,
so do the health and well-being of the community: liberal policies in support of public health and a salubrious and
sustainable environment stem from commitments that are moral in their inspiration. And because education
necessarily cultivates character as well as intelligence, a liberal society will properly use its schools to pass on to
the young such moral qualities as integrity, perseverance, empathy, and personal and civic responsibility. But just

as liberalism excludes religion from a binding social consensus, so it accepts a diversity of cultural and moral

The framework of a liberal society is

only a frameworkthat is, it provides space for free
development, allowing for differences and promoting
cooperation. We may justify religious freedom and cultural diversity on the grounds of individual rights
and autonomy or the equal respect due people of different faiths and values. But the potential of
liberty to promote stable cooperation and state power
helps to explain why states that adopted religious
toleration continued to maintain it and why they have
expanded the scope of pluralism. These kinds of effects on societal power are
practices that cause no harm to others.

crucial in accounting for liberalisms historical rise. The liberal hypothesis is not that each and every constraint on
power serves the utilitarian purpose of enlarging societal powers, much less that every rule should be tested solely

liberal constraints on power, when

taken as a whole, have created stronger self-corrective
political mechanisms, a more innovative and productive
economy, broader societal cooperation, and other
formidable advantages. Mechanisms of this kind help to explain why liberal ideas became
on that criterion. Rather, the hypothesis is that

the basis of enduring liberal states.

Contention 2 is Primacy
Democracy promotion is key maintaining primacy
Lennon 9
Fellow in the international security program at CSIS, adjunct professor in Georgetown Universitys Security
Studies program (Alexander T.J., Center for Strategic and International Studies, Views On Democracy Promotion
from the Strategic Community, March 2009,
http://csis.org/files/media/csis/pubs/090310_lennon_democracy_web.pdf, 2-24-16)//cv

democracies are perceived to be better

gov-erned, to make better decisions, and thus to be better
strategic partners for U.S. interests in the world. The basic version of
A second strategic reason cited is that, generally,

this argument, according to one former senior administration adviser explaining U.S. views after September 11, is
only indirectly about democracy: There [was] a sense that time had shown that certain models of government had
worked better than others, and that in general it was true that more open and representative and pluralistic forms
of government, freer forms of government, were more responsive and seemed to be more effective. And so
sometimes praise for democracy and democratic institutions would work their way into the boilerplate, but it wasnt
the central theme. The central theme was gov-ernance matters: we need to care about the way these countries
govern themselves.12 A related idea expressed by a handful of former officials is that democracies make better U.S.

we have better relations with democratic

countries. We work better with them; they share our other
partners: By and large,

values and ambition to democracy, individual rights,

rule of law, pro-tection of minority rights.13 Some subjects put forward a multilateral version of the partnership

the longer term, states that make that

transition become more reliable and more cooperative
participants in a cooperative international system, . . . in
argument, contending that in

an increasingly globalized economy and polity, a part of the international fabric that makes the world work well,
are better for managing global disorder and security, and are drawn to participating in the kind of liberal
international order the United States tries to create. One former senior policymaker concluded: I would simply say
a U.S. grand strategy should certainly be aimed at an international system with the United States in a leading role,
but is rules-based. And those rules should be derived from the consent of the governed . . . and the only way to do
that is to have an international community made up of democratically governed states . . . .14 Finally, a third

having the United States seek to

spread democracy helps it be, and be perceived as, a
benevolent global power or leader. A few simply cited values, a moral interest in
spreading democracy for others, or altruistically that democracy comes
the closest to fulfilling the aspirations of the people who
are being governed.15 But the principal strategic argument, as one former senior policymaker
elaborated, is that for the United States, our credibility as a world
leader depends to some extent on the values that we bring to our
world leadership. And being identified as on the side of
those people that share those [val-ues] is central to our
basic engagement in the international system and who we are as a
strategic reason expressed in interviews is that

people.

Primacy prevents worldwide regional conflicts because

the US acts as a force against possible conflicts and
dampens the possibility of a positive outcome it also
facilitates cooperation between countries that helps to
maintain global peace and unity
Brooks, Wohlforth, and Ikenberry 13
Ikenberry, Brooks, and Wohlforth, Associate Professor of Government at Dartmouth College and the Albert G.
Milbank Professor of Politics and International Affairs at Princeton University and Global Eminence Scholar at Kyung
Hee University in Seoul and the Daniel Webster Professor of Government at Dartmouth College, 13 (John Ikenberry,
Stephen G. Brooks, William C. Wohlforth, January/February 2013, Foreign Affairs, Lean Forward: In Defense of
American Engagement http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/138468/stephen-g-brooks-g-john-ikenberry-andwilliam-c-wohlforth/lean-forward)
Of course, even if it is true that the costs of deep engagement fall far below what advocates of retrenchment claim,
they would not be worth bearing unless they yielded greater benefits. In fact, they do. The most obvious benefit of

strategy is that it reduces the risk of a dangerous conflict. The United

States' security commitments deter states with aspirations to regional
the current

hegemony from contemplating expansion and dissuade U.S. partners from trying to solve security problems on their
own in ways that would end up threatening other states. Skeptics discount this benefit by arguing that U.S. security
guarantees aren't necessary to prevent dangerous rivalries from erupting. They maintain that the high costs of
territorial conquest and the many tools countries can use to signal their benign intentions are enough to prevent
conflict. In other words, major powers could peacefully manage regional multipolarity without the American pacifier.
But that outlook is too sanguine. If Washington got out of East Asia, Japan and South Korea would likely expand their
military capabilities and go nuclear, which could provoke a destabilizing reaction from China. It's worth noting that
during the Cold War, both South Korea and Taiwan tried to obtain nuclear weapons; the only thing that stopped
them was the United States, which used its security commitments to restrain their nuclear temptations. Similarly,

were the United States to leave the Middle East, the countries currently backed
by Washington--notably, Israel, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia--might act in ways
that would intensify the region's security dilemmas. There would even be reason to
worry about Europe. Although it's hard to imagine the return of great-power military competition in a post-American
Europe, it's not difficult to foresee governments there refusing to pay the budgetary costs of higher military outlays
and the political costs of increasing EU defense cooperation. The result might be a continent incapable of securing
itself from threats on its periphery, unable to join foreign interventions on which U.S. leaders might want European
help, and vulnerable to the influence of outside rising powers. Given how easily a U.S. withdrawal from key regions
could lead to dangerous competition, advocates of retrenchment tend to put forth another argument: that such
rivalries wouldn't actually hurt the United States. To be sure, few doubt that the United States could survive the

states in one or both of

these regions to start competing against one another, they would likely boost their military
budgets, arm client states, and perhaps even start regional proxy wars, all of which
return of conflict among powers in Asia or the Middle East--but at what cost? Were

should concern the United States, in part because its lead in military capabilities would narrow. Greater regional
insecurity could also produce cascades of nuclear proliferation as powers such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Japan, South
Korea, and Taiwan built nuclear forces of their own. Those countries' regional competitors might then also seek
nuclear arsenals. Although nuclear deterrence can promote stability between two states with the kinds of nuclear
forces that the Soviet Union and the United States possessed, things get shakier when there are multiple nuclear
rivals with less robust arsenals. As the number of nuclear powers increases, the probability of illicit transfers,

accidents, and unforeseen crises goes up

irrational decisions,
. The case for
abandoning the United States' global role misses the underlying security logic of the current approach. By
reassuring allies and actively managing regional relations, Washington dampens competition in the world s key
areas, thereby preventing the emergence of a hothouse in which countries would grow new military capabilities. For
proof that this strategy is working, one need look no further than the defense budgets of the current great powers:
on average, since 1991 they have kept their military expenditures as A percentage of GDP to historic lows, and they
have not attempted to match the United States' top-end military capabilities. Moreover, all of the world's most
modern militaries are U.S. allies, and the United States' military lead over its potential rivals .is by many measures

grand strategy acts as a hedge

against the emergence regional hegemons. Some supporters of retrenchment argue that
growing. On top of all this, the current

the U.S. military should keep its forces over the horizon and pass the buck to local powers to do the dangerous work
of counterbalancing rising regional powers. Washington, they contend, should deploy forces abroad only when a
truly credible contender for regional hegemony arises, as in the cases of Germany and Japan during World War II
and the Soviet Union during the Cold War. Yet there is already a potential contender for regional hegemony--China-and to balance it, the United States will need to maintain its key alliances in Asia and the military capacity to
intervene there. The implication is that the United States should get out of Afghanistan and Iraq, reduce its military
presence in Europe, and pivot to Asia. Yet that is exactly what the Obama administration is doing. MILITARY
DOMINANCE, ECONOMIC PREEMINENCE Preoccupied with security issues, critics of the current grand strategy miss
one of its most important benefits: sustaining an open global economy and a favorable place for the United States
within it. To be sure, the sheer size of its output would guarantee the United States a major role in the global
economy whatever grand strategy it adopted. Yet the country's military dominance undergirds its economic
leadership. In addition to protecting the world economy from instability, its military commitments and naval
superiority help secure the sea-lanes and other shipping corridors that allow trade to flow freely and cheaply. Were

the United States to pull back from the world, the task of securing the global commons would get much harder.
Washington would have less leverage with which it could convince countries to cooperate on economic matters and
less access to the military bases throughout the world needed to keep the seas open. A global role also lets the
United States structure the world economy in ways that serve its particular economic interests. During the Cold
War, Washington used its overseas security commitments to get allies to embrace the economic policies it
preferred--convincing West Germany in the 1960s, for example, to take costly steps to support the U.S. dollar as a
reserve currency. U.S. defense agreements work the same way today. For example, when negotiating the 2011 freetrade agreement with South Korea, U.S. officials took advantage of Seoul's desire to use the agreement as a means
of tightening its security relations with Washington. As one diplomat explained to us privately, "We asked for
changes in labor and environment clauses, in auto clauses, and the Koreans took it all." Why? Because they feared
a failed agreement would be "a setback to the political and security relationship." More broadly, the United States

the United
States wants from the economic order is more of the same: for instance, it likes the current
structure of the World Trade Organization and the International Monetary Fund
and prefers that free trade continue. Washington wins when U.S.
allies favor this status quo, and one reason they are inclined to
support the existing system is because they value their
military alliances. Japan, to name one example, has shown interest in the Trans-Pacific Partnership,
wields its security leverage to shape the overall structure of the global economy. Much of what

the Obama administration's most important free-trade initiative in the region, less because its economic interests
compel it to do so than because Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda believes that his support will strengthen Japan's
security ties with the United States. The United States' geopolitical dominance also helps keep the U.S. dollar in
place as the world's reserve currency, which confers enormous benefits on the country, such as a greater ability to
borrow money. This is perhaps clearest with Europe: the EU'S dependence on the United States for its security
precludes the EU from having the kind of political leverage to support the euro that the United States has with the
dollar. As with other aspects of the global economy, the United States does not provide its leadership for free: it
extracts disproportionate gains. Shirking that responsibility would place those benefits at risk. CREATING
COOPERATION What goes for the global economy goes for other forms of international cooperation. Here, too,
American leadership benefits many countries but disproportionately helps the United States. In order to counter
transnational threats, such as terrorism, piracy, organized crime, climate change, and pandemics, states have to
work together and take collective action. But cooperation does not come about effortlessly, especially when

United States' military efforts to promote stability and its broader

leadership make it easier for Washington to launch joint initiatives and shape
national interests diverge. The

them in ways that reflect U.S. interests. After all, cooperation is hard to come by in regions where chaos reigns, and

alliances are about security first, but they

also provide the political framework and channels of communication for cooperation on
it flourishes where leaders can anticipate lasting stability. U.S.

nonmilitary issues. NATO, for example, has spawned new institutions, such as the Atlantic Council, a think tank, that
make it easier for Americans and Europeans to talk to one another and do business. Likewise, consultations with
allies in East Asia spill over into other policy issues; for example, when American diplomats travel to Seoul to
manage the military alliance, they also end up discussing the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Thanks to conduits such as
this, the United States can use bargaining chips in one issue area to make progress in others. The benefits of these
communication channels are especially pronounced when it comes to fighting the kinds of threats that require new
forms of cooperation, such as terrorism and pandemics. With its alliance system in place, the United States is in a
stronger position than it would otherwise be to advance cooperation and share burdens. For example, the
intelligence-sharing network within NATO, which was originally designed to gather information on the Soviet Union,
has been adapted to deal with terrorism. Similarly, after a tsunami in the Indian Ocean devastated surrounding
countries in 2004, Washington had a much easier time orchestrating a fast humanitarian response with Australia,
India, and Japan, since their militaries were already comfortable working with one another. The operation did
wonders for the United States' image in the region. The United States' global role also has the more direct effect of
facilitating the bargains among governments that get cooperation going in the first place. As the scholar Joseph Nye
has written, "The American military role in deterring threats to allies, or of assuring access to a crucial resource
such as oil in the Persian Gulf, means that the provision of protective force can be used in bargaining situations.
Sometimes the linkage may be direct; more often it is a factor not mentioned openly but present in the back of
statesmen's minds." THE DEVIL WE KNOW Should America come home? For many prominent scholars of

international relations, the answer is yes--a view that seems even wiser in the wake of the disaster in Iraq and the

There is little evidence that

the United States would save much money switching to a smaller global
posture. Nor is the current strategy self-defeating: it has not provoked
the formation of counterbalancing coalitions or caused the country to spend itself into economic
decline. Nor will it condemn the United States to foolhardy wars in the future. What the strategy does
do is help prevent the outbreak of conflict in the world's most important
regions, keep the global economy humming, and make international cooperation
easier. Charting a different course would threaten all these benefits. This is not to say that the United States'
Great Recession. Yet their arguments simply don't hold up.

current foreign policy can't be adapted to new circumstances and challenges. Washington does not need to retain
every commitment at all costs, and there is nothing wrong with rejiggering its strategy in response to new
opportunities or setbacks. That is what the Nixon administration did by winding down the Vietnam War and
increasing the United States' reliance on regional partners to contain Soviet power, and it is what the Obama
administration has been doing after the Iraq war by pivoting to Asia. These episodes of rebalancing belie the
argument that a powerful and internationally engaged America cannot tailor its policies to a changing world. A
grand strategy of actively managing global security and promoting the liberal economic order has served the United
States exceptionally well for the past six decades, and there is no reason to give it up now. The country's globespanning posture is the devil we know, and a world with a disengaged America is the devil we don't know.

Were American leaders to choose retrenchment,

they would in
essence be running a massive experiment to test how the world would work without an engaged and liberal leading
power. The

results could well be disastrous.