Handing Back Responsibility

I've written some in this space before about how the military has taken a creeping level of responsibility for diplomatic tasks, particularly in our engagements in Iraq and Afghanistan. Over at the Cable, Josh Rogin reports that a number of retired military leaders think it's time to give some of that responsibility back to the State Department, and to send appropriate amounts of resources and support back with it:

"While our military power can provide the logistics and organizational support to help those in need in times of humanitarian crisis, as demonstrated by our current efforts in Haiti, it can only help create the conditions necessary to allow the other tools of statecraft - our diplomatic, development and humanitarian programs - to effectively address these issues," reads a letter to Congress organized by the U.S. Global Leadership Coalition, a network of more than 400 businesses and non-governmental organizations....

Hagee said the letter is remarkable because it represents the opinions of "50 retired three-and-four-star good-old boys," who have seen first-hand the military's encroachment upon traditional development issues, which was unavoidable but now needs to be addressed.

The combination of this and the State Department policy review in April should make for an interesting, and powerful, discussion about State's role and capacities.