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America's Foriegn Policy Fallacy
t has been twenty-three years since war broke out in Somalia, and although conflicts and participants have shifted, the looming threats and problems remain ever present. As of now extremist groups such as al-Shabaab and al-Qaeda pose the biggest threat. However the UN is attempting resolution to conflict alongside help from the United States. Our country again finds itself in a difficult foreign situation without an easy solution or end in sight. It has been years since the "black hawk down" incident that left eighteen Americans dead so military intervention seems far fetched. (Mark Bowden, 1997) During the Reagan era our government funded the very people we are fighting across the globe. Stemming from soviet conflicts in Afghanistan various terrors groups that include al-Qaeda were given billions worth of weapons and training. (Global Research, 2010) All this being said it is not the complexity of the problems in Somalia that makes it hard for our country to act. It is the inability to come to a consensus within our own government on
what type of country we should be and for the foreseeable future will be. (Ivan Eland, 2014) At the heart of this is our foreign policy and the way we conduct ourselves among other nations.
We continue a trend of arguing amongst ourselves not just about the solution to the problems we face but to the existence of the problems themselves. We are caught in what seems to be an ongoing transitional period of ideological clashing between the left and right. (Ivan Eland, 2014) America is the pubescent teenager of the modern world who can't decide whether or not post a selfie on Instagram. Our government's priorities are becoming more and more selfish so it is easy to comprehend that our foreign affairs are anything but good. We can't seem to decide whether to push our bravado on others or quietly skeem In the corner. This isn't new, this is how we've been since becoming a world power but, it isn't how we have to be. We must follow the lessons from when we were five an implement the rational of elementary school. Yes, as of now our government isn't meeting these lofty requirements.
By: Keegan Pedersen