Military force is the ultimate tool of the state, the one whose use can provide the greatest strategic gains or the greatest losses. Interventions that go beyond the point of maintaining the stability of the system, i.e. following the core objectives of deep engagement. The textbook case of this is the Iraq War of 2003. Gregory Gause underscores this, stating that invasion represented a departure from norms. Washington went from merely wanting to maintain its hegemony to protect oil interests. Stability was previously all important. However, the invasion devalued this very stability throwing the region into chaos through an attempt to reshape the region in America’s image . Of all the conflicts since 1990(the end of the Cold War) the Iraq war represented 67% of all casualties and 64% of all budget costs in a war that only made the region and the United States worse off. The United States may have primacy, but there is no better way to waste it than interventions without a clear aim to further grand strategic objectives
Military force is the ultimate tool of the state, the one whose use can provide the greatest strategic gains or the greatest losses. Interventions that go beyond the point of maintaining the stability of the system, i.e. following the core objectives of deep engagement. The textbook case of this is the Iraq War of 2003. Gregory Gause underscores this, stating that invasion represented a departure from norms. Washington went from merely wanting to maintain its hegemony to protect oil interests. Stability was previously all important. However, the invasion devalued this very stability throwing the region into chaos through an attempt to reshape the region in America’s image . Of all the conflicts since 1990(the end of the Cold War) the Iraq war represented 67% of all casualties and 64% of all budget costs in a war that only made the region and the United States worse off. The United States may have primacy, but there is no better way to waste it than interventions without a clear aim to further grand strategic objectives