Shouldering the Load for Peace

Max Boot's op-ed in today's Washington Times calls for the world community to take seriously the need to deal with failed states such as Haiti. His strategy calls for both regional and global tactics: Australia should (and has) intervened in East Timor and the Solomon Islands, for example; and NATO and the UN have intervened in hotspots, although their record is spotty at best. Boot's faith in nation states, which form the basis not only for world order but for democratic rule, strikes me as far better placed than his belief that the UN can form a credible fighting force modeled on, he says, the French Foreign Legion. But his understanding that the US alone cannot and should not intervene in every failed nation worldwide is on the spot. Regional intervention, both military and non-military and most often with American logistical and diplomatic support, could be the best route. But even this presupposes that such actions won't become old fashioned wars of aggression under the mantra of the search for global stability. As usual, Boot has raised important problems and solutions that no op-ed can adequately address.