William S, Lind has posted a neutralist foreign policy at Traditional Right. We at The Neutralist award him.

William S. Lind at traditionalRight is always interesting and not someone we could consider a wild-eyed interventionist like say, the neocons.  We have never noticed, and it just may be our fault, an explicitly neutralist foreign policy being expressed at TR.  

This is close enough:

"There is an alternative strategy I think might work, or at least work better than recruiting more enemies.  It has two components.  The first is tight border security, far tighter than anything President Trump is planning, tight enough to keep all varieties of 4GW fighters from entering (we will still face the home-grown variety, who in the long run will be more dangerous).  The second component is invisibility.  Since what we are doing now feeds hydra, stop it.  Stop all overt actions around the world.  Bring the troops, planes, drones, and ships home.  Disappear, and thus take away our enemies’ main recruiting tool.  No longer will Somalis or Yemenis or Libyans or Syrians live with the constant hum of American drones overhead, waiting for the Hellfire missile in the night. There may still be drones, but they will not be American drones.  They will have to fight someone else."

Mr. Lind may not live down the embarrassment, but we hereby name him a Senior Fellow of The Neutralist Institute.

The Official Neutralist Position on the Iran deal and Iran

Let us preface our announcement with the admission that the Neutralist has in no way focused laser like on the negotiations or the agreement.  If the Neutralist policy were in effect, the negotiations would have been irrelevant.  Why worry about Iran anyway as a rogue neighbor that does not effectively control all its own territory has deliverable nukes.

Our official position on the deal is that it is probably sort of okay.  All the People we respect endorse it.   No one we have some confidence in has opposed it.  Many people we do not have a good opinion of have opposed it.  It wins on points.

As we stated above, if a neutralist foreign policy were in place, there would have not have been any need to have negotiations.

What should a neutralist attitude toward Iran be.

As we have noted in prior posts, William S. Lind has spelled it out,

America's grand strategy should seek to connect our country with as many centers of order as possible while isolating us from as many centers and sources of disorder as possible.

So, if Iran is a center of order, we cooperate with them where we can or have to, and as they are on the opposite side of the world, that should not be too often.

Then again, as they are where they are, there should not be too much need to bug them unless they actively bug us.  We have a history with the Persians, but I don't want to get into who started it.  We should not try to continue it unless we have to.

Then again, If Palestinia can build an ordered state, we can cooperate with them, as we could with the Israelis and the Andorrans for that matter.

Notice, cooperate does not mean ally.

Now there is one state that is a bit rogue.  Granted, it made a good effort in the negotiations, but it feels it necessary to bother the Russkies for silly reasons.  We shall let our readers, few as they are, figure that one out.

From William S. Lind-America's strategy is there is no strategyu

William S. Lind blogs at Traditional Right and has been featured at The American Conservative and was known for his On War articles that are now archived.

On April 2nd, Mr. Lind posted THE VIEW FROM OLYMPUS: AN ABSENCE OF STRATEGY.  The author makes the point that in World War II there were some deficiencies in the American war machine, but the strategy was sound and that made all the difference.

Nowadays, there is nothing coherent, as Lind puts it,

As we look at America’s current role in the Mideast’s Thirty Years’ War, the renewed war between Sunnis and Shiites, the most striking impression we get is of absence of strategy. In Iraq and Syria, we are simultaneously opposing both sides, the Sunnis because of ISIS and the Shiites because of Iran. Similarly, in Israel we oppose the Shiites of Hezbollah and the Sunnis of Hamas, despite the fact that our alliance with Israel is temporarily suspended after Mr. Netanyahu tore it up, spat on it and burned it during his election campaign. In Yemen, we are opposing both the Shiite Houthis and Sunni Al Qaeda. Presumably we will now back the Saudis in their intervention against the Houthis. The Saudis intervened against the Houthis once before. It did not go well.

In that one paragraph, Mr. Lind kind of reminds us of the point  Bill Murray makes in the bowling alley about how would you feel if you were doing the same stupid thing day after day.  The working class guy he is hanging with has probably one of the few insights in his life when he chimes in, "That about sums it up for me."

We are doing the same stupid thing over and over and it's not working.  What does Mr. Lind suggest,

We need a strategy. What should it be? The answer is obvious, low-risk, and cheap. Stay out and let Mohammedans fight their own damned Thirty Years’ War. With the exception of France, who came in late, none of the outside Powers who intervened in central Europe’s Thirty Years’ War benefited from doing so.

That is not a bad policy.  He further suggests,

As I have written before, the demographics of the Middle East guarantee war, supply-side war. The region teems with young men with nothing to do and no prospects. So what are they going to do? Fight. Our safe and simple strategy should be to let–nay, encourage–them to fight each other instead of fighting us. 

The Neutralist differs in that we wish all people would come to the conclusion peace is better than war.  Reality is on Lind's side and it would be better they fight each other and not us.

I have a few questions about some of the finer points of the strategy,

That strategy places one clear demand on us at the operational and tactical levels: keep the lowest of low profiles. Local agents are a good idea; we do want to know what is going on. If some locals are planning to attack us despite our non-involvement, our agents can also be used for direct action. If some locals succeed in hitting us, then, briefly, we would go overt, with an annihilating punitive raid. Other than in that case, we would always appear to be five thousand miles away, which, lest we forget, we are. Geography is the starting point of strategy, and our two oceans still give us welcome strategic distance. 

I am okay with intelligence gatherers, but not covert ops.  We would be in their land and that means, without troops or a large footprint, there should be nothing to hit.  Any depredations on our soil are mostly due to a mindless immigration problem.

It's a small quibble.  Mr. Lind is a rare font of sense.  I have even seen him on Cspan.  Well only once.  He is worth seeking out.

William S. Lind and our best policy in the Middle East-It's a Neutralist strategy

I used to read William S. Linds essays on strategy that that appeared at the Free Congress Foundation.  After they abruptly stopped, I read him whenever possible.  It has been mostly at The American Conservative.  He always makes sense, though the Neutralist is sure we can find something to disagree with if we try hard enough.

Not today, however.  Mr. Lind has written a thoroughly neutralist column at TAC.  The title says it all,

Islam’s Civil War

America can win it—by staying out.

Yup, as we've said before, they ain't jumping in their carrier fleets to invade our east coast.  

some have decried Mr. Lind's attitude as gloating.  I hope it is not.  I take no pleasure that Shia and Sunni will fight and kill each other.  May they find peace.  Still, facts are facts, and we, and they are better off without our attempts at managing it.

To read Mr. Lind, go here.  

He is now a fellow of the Neutralist Foundation whether he likes it or not.  If we can, we'll hit him up for dues.