MacArthur, Eisenhower, and the Lost Lessons of Building Partnership Capacity
Benjamin Runkle
Arguably the clearest short-term legacy of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, one that transcends the partisan nature of most contemporary foreign policy debates, is the American public’s fatigue with large land wars and its desire to counter threats to U.S. national security without large-scale military deployments. President Obama’s 2015 National Security Strategy, for example, pledged to “focus on building the capacity of others to prevent the causes and consequences of conflict to include countering extreme and dangerous ideologies.†Despite running as the virtual antithesis of every one of his predecessor’s policies, President Trump’s 2017 National Security Strategy commits to helping “our partners develop and responsibly employ the capacity to degrade and maintain persistent pressure against terrorists,†while the Administration’s National Defense Strategy adds: “When we pool resources and share responsibility for our common defense, our security burden becomes lighter.†Indeed, support for the wide array of activities falling under the rubric of “Building Partnership Capacity†(BPC) has become a central pillar of U.S. national security and foreign policy, as evidenced by the activation and deployment of the Army’s Security Force Assistance Brigades.[1]
https://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/macarthur-eisenhower-and-lost-lessons-building-partnership-capacity
