Combining rigorous academic scholarship with the experience of a senior Pentagon policymaker, Mara E. Karlin explores the key national security issue of our time: how to effectively build partner militaries. Given the complex and complicated global security environment, declining U.S. defense budgets, and an increasingly connected (and often unstable) world, the United States has an ever-deepening interest in strengthening fragile states. Particularly since World War II, it has often chosen to do so by strengthening partner militaries. It will continue to do so, Karlin predicts, given U.S. sensitivity to casualties, a constrained fiscal environment, the nature of modern nationalism, increasing transnational security threats, the proliferation of fragile states, and limits on U.S. public support for military interventions. However, its record of success is thin. While most analyses of these programs focus on training and equipment, Building Militaries in Fragile States argues that this approach is misguided. Instead, given the nature of a fragile state, Karlin homes in on the outsized roles played by two key actors: the U.S. military and unhelpful external actors. With a rich comparative case-study approach that spans Europe, Asia, and the Middle East, Karlin unearths provocative findings that suggest the traditional way of working with foreign militaries needs to be rethought. Benefiting from the practical eye of an experienced national security official, her results-based exploration suggests new and meaningful findings for building partner militaries in fragile states.

Exploring how the U.S. military can move beyond Iraq and Afghanistan.Since the September 11, 2001, attacks, the U.S. military has been fighting incessantly in conflicts around the globe, but with inconclusive results. The legacy of this long involvement in war without end includes a military that is bitter and frustrated. The public is disinterested. The national security apparatus seeks to pivot away from these engagements and to move on to the next threats - notably those emanating from China and Russia. At best there are ad hoc, unstructured debates about Iraq or Afghanistan. Many young Americans question whether it even makes sense to invest in the military. Simply put, there has been no serious, organized stocktaking by the public, politicians, opinion leaders, or the military itself of this inheritance. Despite its lengthy warfighting experience and high-technology weapons, the military is woefully unprepared for future wars because of this conflicted legacy and uncertainty about the future security environment. But the United States cannot simply hit the reset button.If the U.S. military seeks to win in the future, it must acknowledge and reconcile with the inheritance of its long and failed wars. This book seeks to help them do so.