Why You Can't Just Bomb the Hell Out of ISIS

What is the difference between terrorists and the U.S. Armed Forces?

To most Americans, this sounds like a ridiculous question. Anyone who can't tell the difference between terrorists and military forces must be, to use the modern term, challenged. But the terrorists and the military both kill people, and both kill innocent civilians. The principal difference is that the American military tries not to, while terrorists specifically target civilians. If America engages in military operations without regard to civilian casualties, though, the line becomes blurred. Our enemies always try to portray us as the real terrorists, or at least, as no better than they are. Up to now, the U.S. has managed to maintain a broad global consensus among nations cooperating to fight terrorism by acting responsibly. If our commitment to protecting innocents waivers, we risk losing that consensus.

Our military maintains a detailed procedure for deciding when, where and how to use military force, protecting civilians as much as is practical while still achieving important and necessary military objectives. The procedure is complex, but it comes down to some basic principles. When innocents are at risk, which is almost always the case these days, the importance of the objective and likelihood of success must be weighed against the risk to noncombatants. We would not create a high risk of harm to an elementary school full of children to kill a small number of low-level terrorists.  The fact is, we would not recklessly risk the destruction of a school full of children no matter how important the target. The document is very dense, but you can read the procedure yourself if you want to plow through it at this link. Or, if you haven't got the patience for that, you can rent the superb 2015 British thriller Eye in the Sky, which portrays the procedure being applied in a hypothetical attack against terrorists in Kenya.

When our new President tweeted that he was going to "Bomb the hell out of ISIS", he was speaking out of ignorance. He had no idea what he meant by this and I'm sure he doesn't care what it means. Now, after removing the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Director of National Intelligence from the National Security Council, which advises the President on military operations, Trump has put his hot-headed know-nothing attack dog Steve Bannon on the NSC instead.

President Trump's impulses are clear. Those who are waiting for a kinder, gentler Trump to emerge will be disappointed. Those who care about nurturing and preserving the politically fragile global effort to combat terrorism, painstakingly crafted by all U.S. Presidents over the last forty years, must resist Trump fiercely and tenaciously, and do it now, before the American-led anti-terror consensus collapses in a hail of civilian body parts.