The first part of the paper critically analyzes the claim that "The US should return to the 55-mph speed limit to save lives and conserve fuel." According to Lord and Washington (2018), one of the verified methods of reducing road accidents is introducing speed limits at subsequent road points. In as much as such an action is true, it leads to other problems like lateness, particularly of professionals like doctors, where a 55-mph limit could limit their arrival time, leading to deaths. Conversely, other researchers have refuted the lateness claim by stating that it is not worth the risk. Farmer (2017) states that the tame factor is almost insignificant because a 55mph speed limit saves up to 4000 lives per year. Researchers such as Lord and Washington have associated rampant road accidents to over speeding. For instance, according to the researchers, the 55-mph was the initial speed limit, but after its removal, accident numbers increased at an alarming rate. Lord and Washington included data from the Washington Highway Safety System to illustrate the effects of increasing the speed. In the highway exits, when the speeds were increased by 10mph to 65mph, crashes increased by 3% while the possibility of death rose by 24%.
As noted above, the speed limit had been enacted before, but the main reason for that was to conserve fuel because motor vehicles are more likely to use less fuel at a lower speed. The speed limit debate dates back to 1974 when there was a shortage of gasoline, and this forced the US government to adopt the 55mph limit (Farmer, 2017). However, the success of the conservation of fuel that the implementation brought caused the government to relax the law on rural highways, whereby drivers were allowed to exceed the speed by 10 to 20 miles, which caused the prices to skyrocket. In response to that, the Congress the initial speed limit was repealed, and the results have shown a significant drop in the overall consumption. Nevertheless, as Lord and Washington observe, when the calculations are done, the average fuel conserved per vehicle is too little to substantiate the claim, which makes the law uneconomical. Consequently, the 55-mph speed limit should be returned as a means of reducing road accidents and saving lives but not to save lives.
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Figure 1 : Argument map for the 55mph speed limit
Although the United States army is capable of defeating any army in the world, the costs of going into the war in terms of resources and human lives are usually more than what was anticipated. While this is the case, going to war is usually inevitable when the interests of the country, as well as the security of its citizens, are at stake. The Balkans is one of the areas that the US has been recommended not to intervene. The main reason behind this is the Yugoslavian Legacy, which has been obtained unjustly (Merdzanovic, 2017). Additionally, the instability of the Balkan model arouses marginalization fears, mostly because it is deeply rooted in boundaries formation, both internal and external. As the constituent nations fight for sovereignty, deaths become a norm for them, particularly with the help of ethnocentrists who are politically maneuvered (Merdzanovic, 2017). There are several pros and cons associated with the recommendation of America not invading the Balkans. To begin with, intervention at times helps. The United States Army intervened in Bosnia, one of the constituent states in Bosnia, and irrespective of the damages caused, the action brought peace and an end to bloodshed through the Dayton Peace Accord (Hartwell, 2019). Consequently, an intervention could also result in peace in the other states. Furthermore, intervention substantiates the US' place as a superpower. For this reason, an intervention into the Balkans could add to the list of successful peacekeeping missions that the country has had, extending its role as a world leader.
The invasion act rarely benefits the US or the country of intervention. The US suffers the loss of resources and soldiers during such military operations, losses that could have easily been avoided by not being involved. If the Bosnian tragedy is anything to go by, the havoc that the US left in that country should also be a compelling reason enough to follow the recommendation that no more countries should be intervened. There is also the disadvantage of inaction, which also has consequences. At times, the US military's actions during an intervention are judged using a perfect alternative that is impossible to live up to. However, the lack of an intervention meets even harsher criticism considering its military capability. This is the case where the UN, alongside other nations, condemned the US for failing to intervene to stop the war in the Balkans (Merdzanovic, 2017). In the same way, failing to intervene would reduce the credibility of the US. As Merdzanovic states, all of the world's conflicts cannot be solved through diplomacy, which is where the UN fall short. Therefore, countries like the US need to be there to carry out the appropriate intervention. Failing to intervene in the Balkans would thus reduce the credibility of the nation.
The conflicts in Bosnia are not a United States problem, and the country should have refrained from interference. This is because, during the interference, the US caused more harm and further complicated the peacekeeping efforts that were underway. The United Nations agrees with the claim by stating that all members of the UN should settle their disputes in a peaceful manner that does not compromise the security, peace, and justice of neighboring countries and the world at large. What is more, article number two of the UN's Charter accents the need for countries to desist from political interference and unnecessary force against another state, particularly in a way that undermines the country's stability as well as its political stability (Hartwell, 2019). Consequently, Bosnia should have been left to handle its issues as an independent state, and the United States should not have been involved in any way. Nevertheless, the US government made several attempts to help Bosnia through the Vance-Owen plan by providing troops and weapons, but they failed, which led to the Clinton administration to intervene in 1995 (Hartwell, 2019). The intervention, however, led to a full-blown war as the US attempted to drive the Serbs, who had taken nearly half of Bosnia, away. The only positive outcome was the Dayton Accords that ended the bloodshed in the country, but the economy was wrecked to the extent of depending on foreign aid. Additionally, the intervention caused deeper ethnic divisions that have made the country incapable of political cooperation even today (Hartwell, 2019).
The US' involvement raises questions about its hidden opportunistic agenda, thereby obligating the country with the task of reevaluating the intervention. For starters, the nation should form a National Military Strategy that is precise about its interests, to avoid further complications should such an occurrence happen again. The definition should not only include realistic and achievable goals but also revolve around culture, stability, and prosperity maintenance. By so doing, the US will clear some of the doubts about their selfish and opportunistic nature of the intervention. Nonetheless, the United States intervention in Bosnia was uncalled for and unnecessary, considering that the country has a history of a war that dates back to the 20th century, but it somehow manages to resolve such conflicts without any help from other states (Hartwell, 2019).
Figure 2: Argument map for the US intervention in Bosnia
References
Farmer, C. M. (2017). Relationship of Traffic Fatality Rates to Maximum State Speed Limits. Traffic Injury Prevention , 18 (4), 375-380.
Hartwell, L. (2019). Conflict Resolution: Lessons from the Dayton Peace Process. Negotiation Journal , 35 (4), 443-469.
Lord, D., & Washington, S. (Eds.). (2018). Safe Mobility: Challenges, Methodology and Solutions . Emerald Publishing.
Merdzanovic, A. (2017). ‘Imposed Consociationalism’: External Intervention and Power Sharing in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Peacebuilding , 5 (1), 22-35.
