Winning the Peace: Final Chapter

The title is supposed to make you think about the goal of war not being the enemy laying down arms but in the end-state that we desire. In other words, what should peace look and feel like to you? I have posted, some have said ad nauseam, Winning the Peace OPs before but my previous focus was on operationalizing the DOD’s Foreign Area Officers (FAOs). Those arguments for improving and revolutionizing the tactics, techniques, and procedures of FAOs are still in play, but now I want to discuss winning the peace through energy independence.

Cannot an argument be made that the house of war is at particular risk only if and when the house of peace is financially prosperous? If that is the case then shouldn’t our federal government’s strategy be to starve the Islamic supremacists of petro-dollars? Delightful side effects might be even greater instability in Muslim nations if their rulers were to find themselves unable to maintain social tranquility by means of free bread and circuses for the masses.

Could we not win the peace by becoming the world’s greatest exporter of energy? What do we have to lose? Energy independence should be our strategic goal and would also inhibit Russia’s ability to export mischief. If our nation’s leaders could actually think outside of the box and play hardball too, then we could probably also slap China back into line at the same time. Win – Win – Win.

Finally, I suppose that from time to time the price of oil would drop to a level to make fracking impractical. That ebb and flow would probably have the impact of denying petro-sheiks and therefore Islamic supremacists as well with sufficient funds to threaten the house of war. Our energy policy should promote oil, gas, coal, solar, wind, nukes, all of the above, and etc.

Frack them until they beg for mercy!