# New Pentagon policy directive puts "nation building" front & center. Is this a wise? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 16, 2005, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-pentagon-policy-directive-puts-nation-building-front-center-is-this-a-wise/335948 "2005-12-16T18:23:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2005, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-pentagon-policy-directive-puts-nation-building-front-center-is-this-a-wise/335948/1 "2005-12-16T18:23:25Z")
Is this simply an acceptance of the realities of waging regime changing war, or is it morphing the military into places we really shouldn’t be taking it? A lot of the Iraqi hostility toward us seems to stem from the fact that we let the country go to hell in a hand basket in a ham handed occupation that has allowed disorder to flourish. If we had a policy like this in place prior to the Iraq invasion would it still have morphed into such a mess? [Will the Pentagon ever value nation-building as much as war-fighting](http://www.slate.com/id/2131376/?nav=navoa) > [@](#): > > A Pentagon directive issued this week might herald the most dramatic upheaval of the U.S. armed forces in 20 years—or it might dissolve upon first contact with reality, like so many reform plans and nostrums before it. We’ll know in the next few months, or maybe weeks, whether the order gets taken seriously or waved off as empty rhetoric. ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2005, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-pentagon-policy-directive-puts-nation-building-front-center-is-this-a-wise/335948/2 "2005-12-16T19:09:09Z")
It is a mutation that we don’t want. It is also a refutation of Bush’s own claims (at one time) that we would never ever be a bunch of “nation builders”. ---
**Author:** ![zagloba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/977dab/32.png) [@zagloba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zagloba)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2005, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-pentagon-policy-directive-puts-nation-building-front-center-is-this-a-wise/335948/3 "2005-12-16T20:07:34Z")
**SteveG1** , surely you can’t be suggesting that Bush is a\* flip-flopper\*? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2005, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-pentagon-policy-directive-puts-nation-building-front-center-is-this-a-wise/335948/4 "2005-12-16T21:11:54Z")
I think the Pentagon is grossly overreacting to this situation. To say, as the Secretary England’s new directive does, that “Stability operations are a core U.S. military mission” – well, it represents a fundamental redefinition of the Defense Department’s mission. They’re as much as saying that from now on a **normal** American military operation will be one that involves post-combat occupation, or even restructuring of the enemy state’s society. In bureauspeak, England is saying, “We’re an empire now and we’re going to remain one and we’re going to act like one.” ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2005, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-pentagon-policy-directive-puts-nation-building-front-center-is-this-a-wise/335948/5 "2005-12-16T21:20:02Z")
> [@zagloba](#): > > **SteveG1** , surely you can’t be suggesting that Bush is a\* flip-flopper\*? Sheesh. Am I becoming so predictable? The horror. The horror. ---
**Author:** ![DougC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7feea3/32.png) [@DougC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DougC)\ **Post date:** [December 16, 2005, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/new-pentagon-policy-directive-puts-nation-building-front-center-is-this-a-wise/335948/6 "2005-12-16T23:02:48Z")
- - - The problem with using the military for nation-building is that in reality, the military is created for nation-_un_-building. ~