Intervention Forever

Intervention Forever

09/19/14

James W. Carden

Public Opinion, Foreign Policy, Military Strategy, United States

Scary thought: A recent survey showed that respondents would essentially be amenable to sending American troops anywhere in the world under nearly any pretext.

This week the Chicago Council on Global Affairs released the results of their biannual survey of American positions (and dispositions) with regard to the conduct of U.S. foreign policy. The report, entitled “Foreign Policy in the Age of Retrenchment,” examines the results of a survey of 2,108 Americans this May. The headline number showed that roughly four in ten (40 percent) surveyed say that the United States should “stay out of world affairs.” That was the highest percentage of respondents to so answer since the Chicago Council began taking the survey in 1974. Indeed, since 2010, the number of respondents who wish America would “stay out” as opposed to those who wish it to “stay active” has been trending progressively higher; support for the former position has increased by ten percentage points over the past four years, while support for the latter position has decreased by the same number.

At a panel discussion marking the release of the CCGA report at the Woodrow Wilson Center on Monday, I got a sense that the headline number was not exactly what the Council was hoping for. It certainly didn’t meet expectations. In an op-ed for The Hill back in June, CCGA advisory board member Dr. Bruce Jentleson had expected the survey to show that 62 percent of those polled would want the United States to “stay active” (the actual number turned out to be 58 percent). So there was a sense of disquiet among the panelists who were at pains to assure the assembled that the public really and truly does want America to remain the globe’s primus inter pares. Wilson Center president and former Congresswoman Jane Harman implied that the number supporting continued American engagement abroad would have certainly been higher had President Obama been more disposed to using the “bully pulpit.” CCGA president and former U.S. Permanent Representative to NATO, Ivo Daalder, said that while the survey reflects the “common sense” of the American people, support among the respondents for “staying active” likely would have been higher had the poll not been taken before ISIL began to dominate the news cycle. 

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