Richard Fontaine
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suggesting that ultimate success is just around the corner, policymak-
ers should articulate the case for an enduring engagement and then
work to lower the human and Änancial costs associated with it.
Perhaps the most dicult guideline is to rigorously estimate the
long-term costs and beneÄts. Although the need to run a cost-beneÄt
analysis seems patently obvious, recent experience suggests that it is
not. In the run-up to the Iraq war, for example, U.S. leaders mini-
mized the estimated cost o troops and reconstruction aid and wildly
overinÁated their projections o success. During the deliberation over
intervention in Libya, it appears that policymakers ignored the lesson
that would-be nuclear proliferators might draw in watching the United
States topple a leader who had previously turned over his weapons o
mass destruction. Most important is an examination o the speciÄc
case itself, including the history o the people and the forces at play.
Analogies to past wars and unrelated historical experiences, or aspira-
tions to abstract principles—such as needing to be on the right side o
history—add little value.FROM THEORY TO PRACTICE
Applying these guidelines would rule some past and potential inter-
ventions in and others out. Intervention in the Balkans and Rwanda
likely would have passed the test, particularly given the limited objec-
tives (in the Balkans, an end to atrocities without toppling govern-
ments) and the military means required (in Rwanda, reinforcing £
peacekeepers already on the ground or jamming radio broadcasts). The
2001 decision to attack al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan would
have met the mark, too, as would have the anti- campaign in Iraq
and Syria, given that nonmilitary approaches were unable to shut down
the safe havens. The 2003 Iraq war would not have met the test, given
a realistic projection o the costs and beneÄts and the ever-changing
objectives. In Libya, these principles would have led Washington to
either mount a limited operation to stop a massacre in Benghazi and
leave QaddaÄ in power or stay out o the Äght altogether. Instead, the
Obama administration chose to topple the regime and then disengage.
For the ongoing interventions in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria, the
guidelines would rule in favor o a residual, indeÄnite troop presence.
Preventing these countries from regressing into terrorist hubs and,
in the cases o Afghanistan and Iraq, supporting the governments
that keep them from doing so are objectives that merit continued