December 11, 2006
New Season of Sleeper Cell
The second season of Sleeper Cell is currently being released on Showtime.
I don't get Showtime, and was hoping to watch it via iTunes. Haven't found it there yet, but the first episode of the new season is available free via the official website.
Spoiler alert! Don't watch it if you have a desire to watch the first season, which I thought was excellent.
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December 5, 2006
Followup to "Why Newt Is Right"
Well, there seems to be quite a bit of misunderstanding of my last article in TCSDaily. I'll lay the blame for this solely at my own feet, since I'm the one who did all the writing.
The article is titled, "Why Newt Is Right," and if I could have added a subtitle, it would have been, "To worry about a catastrophic attack." It seems instead that many people added their own subtitle, something like, "To restrict free speech."
Arguing in favor of restricting free speech was not my intent. Aside from poor writing on my part, that it was nonetheless taken that way may show just what problems await us as the war continues.
For example, blogger Glenn Greenwald took special umbrage to the piece:
In a TCS Daily column this week entitled "Why Newt is Right," Josh Manchester talked about all the bad things that would happen in the event that a nuclear bomb were detonated in Long Beach, California, and then expressly urged measures for "physically stopping or legally outlawing the ideas behind radicalism"Like I said, this is my fault for writing poorly. When read in context, this sentence was meant to show an alternative strategy to restricting free speech:
An offensive yet superficially benign way to accomplish some of these same goals might be to begin a cultural war against extremism. In addition to physically stopping or legally outlawing the ideas behind radicalism, such a campaign might seek to propagate competing memes, which appeal to the same core demographic that is apt to become extremists.I should have written, "instead of" where I did write "in addition to."
Let me elaborate upon this, since I obviously did a poor job in the article: Rather than merely restricting speech, as many would assume is what I was talking about, why not create competing ideas, and discredit those that appeal so strongly to the core demographic (young men) who are drawn to terrorism? In order to do this, I think many of the same things Newt mentioned would be necessary: technologies to disrupt and track extremist websites. As I tried to say in the piece, to merely restrict such websites is a defensive method.
To take an example: outlawing a website only gives it a sort of cache within the world of rebellious extremists. But a lampooning of extremist ideas in a comedic fashion, in a cultural manner that appeals to the demographic of extremism, would be much more valuable, and probably more successful in the long run.
For the benefits of monitoring terror sites instead of shutting them down, see this backgrounder by the Council on Foreign Relations.
Also, I don't think it's clear that Newt wants to restrict free speech. Instead, he was merely noting that the pursuit of terrorists and stopping attacks is going to require "a serious debate about the first amendment," and that it is better to have this debate now to "develop the appropriate rules of engagement." I don't think it's a straight leap from that to detention camps, and a police state, as the left seems to assume. I can't speak for Newt, but what I was more concerned with is things that we can do now that will serve the purpose of both preventing an attack and preserving the government. To me, this includes civil liberties. In fact, it's not just to me. I used the examples of the nuclear strategists Fred Ikle and Philip Bobbitt in the article. One of Bobbitt's pet peeves is that as of today there is no legal mechanism in place to quickly reconstitute the House of Representatives should a majority of its members be killed or incapacitated in an attack (the Senate does not have this problem, as replacement Senators can be appointed by governors). I'm no legal expert, but I believe that the only way to restaff the House of Representatives is to hold new elections. Even if these are scheduled to take place a few months after an attack, those months are likely to be when crucial decisions need to be made by the House, and when crucial oversight needs to take place as well.
In short, ask yourself: is the United States less or more secure in its freedoms if a plan exists to quickly reconstitute the House of Representatives after a catastrophic attack?
You might say that such measures are how the Nazis rose to power. I'd argue that "stockpiling laws" such as Bobbitt has advocated, is meant to stop such a nightmare scenario from occuring.
This in fact is the entire thrust of Fred Ikle's new book. It's no accident that it's called "Annihilation From Within." Here's an excerpt from the book's website:
Our greatest threat is a cunning tyrant gaining possession of a few weapons of mass destruction. His purpose would not be to destroy landmarks, highjack airplanes, or attack railroad stations. He would annihilate a nation's government from within and assume dictatorial power. The twentieth century offers vivid examples of tyrants who have exploited major national disasters by rallying violent followers and intimidating an entire nation.Frankly, Ikle is advocating a series of measures to prevent this from happening, not a series of measures that would make it more likely. If you need more evidence, I'll go get my copy and quote some more.
To be clear as well, just so I'm not misunderstood, neither Bobbitt nor Ikle argues for restrictions on speech.
Now Newt is a different story. As I tried to argue in the article, he's right to be concerned with the same issues as Bobbitt and Ikle. I think he's right to raise the questions of undermining terrorist communications as well.
If Al Qaeda were a state -- Qaedastan -- where we could clearly locate them, is there any doubt we would have destroyed their command and control infrastructure long ago?
The problem is that Al Qaeda, or jihad, or extremism, or however it can be identified, is not a state. It is more like a virus. It's command and control infrastructure is highly diffuse and a lot of it is located in cyberspace. To stem recruitment, I think we should offer counternarratives and competing memes. Newt thinks we should shut down recruiting websites.
Whichever of us you agree with, the point is that we are both concerned with preventing another attack. Newt is asking for a dialogue about free speech in order to figure out how to stop terrorism from spreading through the internet. To merely demonize him as wishing to restrict speech is to deny the very dialogue that he seeks.
I'm a blogger. I can appreciate the beauty of free speech. In a post a long time ago I once told "the troglodyte FEC bureaucrats and their draconian moronic henchmen in the court system" that "You can have my blog when you pry it out of my cold dead hands."
At the same time, as a blogger, I'm pretty in tune with the power of the internet to organize people and ideas. Jihad can use this power just as well as Josh.
I guess all of this debate swirls from the fact that cyberspace is both speech and a place. It's probably the one true commons in the world today.
Well, I hope that helps somewhat. Again, I wish I could have been clearer in my article.
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November 29, 2006
Damned if you do . . .
It's hard to know what to make of the New York Times. In its latest escapade, the Times has published an article titled, "Bush Adviser's Memo Cites Doubts About Iraqi Leader," which excerpts a classified report from National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley to the President. The memo supposedly questions Iraqi Prime Minister Maliki's ability to control sectarian violence in Iraq and recommends that steps be taken to bolster his position.
The memo was reportedly produced by Hadley after a trip to Iraq and a meeting with Maliki that took place on October 30th.
Stop for a moment and completely disregard the content of the memo. Instead ask yourself: how long has the Times had this information? The memo is exactly one month old. Now ask yourself: why are they releasing this story on the very same day that Bush is set to meet with Maliki?
It is really hard to know what to make of the Times.
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November 22, 2006
. . . But somebody's got to do it
Der Spiegel carries a slideshow of photos of assassinated Lebanese Industry Minister Pierre Gemayal. He is seen in turn with various members of his family, including his wife, when they were married.
The Washington Post reports the details of Gemayal's death.
Gemayel, a 34-year-old father of two and an up-and-coming politician, was killed when his car was ambushed by men from one or two cars that collided with it in the suburban neighborhood of Jdeideh. At least three gunmen opened fire with automatic weapons equipped with silencers, hitting him in the head and chest, officials said. Television footage showed the tinted driver's-side window pocked with at least eight shots and the glass on the passenger's side shattered. The silver sedan's hood was crumpled from the collision.Doctors said Gemayel was dead when he arrived at the hospital, and his bodyguard later succumbed to his wounds.
Commentary
Is this a consolidation or an overextension? Iran announces it is seeking a new set of centrifuges. Syria tells James Baker it'll help in Iraq in exchange for the Golan Heights. Iran invites Iraq and Syria to a conference. Syria and Iraq re-establish diplomatic ties. Syria offs another prominent Lebanese politician.
Are Syria and Iran overplaying their hands? Have the carefully leaked deliberations of the Iraq Study Group been so much theater, meant to force an over-reaction? Victor Davis Hanson wrote in his book The Soul of Battle 
Patton, of course, knew from his initial conversation with Bradley that he would be under orders to go north, not to continue east: "That's too daring for them. My guess is that our offensive will be called off and we will have to go up there and save their hides."
Tony Blankley, writing at RealClearPolitics, says this:
In fact, even those Americans who today can't wait to end our involvement in the "hopeless" war in Iraq will -- when the consequences of our irresponsibility becomes manifest -- join the chorus of outrage.Jules Crittenden writes that "It's a dirty job . . .Expedient Washington politicians, take note: Your public is fickle. They may cheer your decision today to get out of Iraq but vote you out of office tomorrow when they don't like the results . . .
Iran has been our persistent enemy for 27 years -- Syria longer. They may well be glad to give us cover while we retreat, but that would merely be an exercise in slightly delayed gratification, not self-denial, let alone benignity. So long as Iran is ruled by its current radical Shi'a theocracy, she will be vigorously and violently undercutting any potentially positive, peaceful forces in the region -- and is already triggering a prolonged clash with the terrified Sunni nations. Our absence from the region will only make matters far worse.
We need to start undermining by all methods available that dangerous Iranian regime -- as the Iranian people, free to express and implement their own opinions and policies, are our greatest natural allies in the Muslim Middle East.
We have only two choices: Get out and let the ensuing Middle East firestorm enflame the wider world; or, stay and with shrewder policies and growing material strength manage and contain the danger. [emphasis added]
This is the thing about dirty jobs that need to be done. They can only be ignored or left half-done for so long . . .But will any of this happen? What prevents it from happening right now? It is not a lack of resources. It is only a perception that all is lost, held by a large part of the political class. Fortunately, they are wrong. Sadly, they don't know it.This is why the current move to restrain the militias in Baghdad must be stepped up. This is why the calls for more troops there must be heeded. This is why the United States must pursue and destroy militias there ruthlessly and in force.
This is why these regimes need to know that their missteps will cost them, and that their own infrastructure, seats of power and persons are not immune from our threat of force as long as they abet murder, spread instability through the region, and seek weapons of mass destruction.
Belmont Club takes the pessimistic argument: The Rout Continues:
The most comical aspect of this whole rout is the way the diplomats will continue to prepare for the big meeting with Syria and Iran to broker a regional peace, something they believe "only a Superpower" can achieve. Alas, the habits of self-importance die hard. The countries are already making their own arrangements with the new victors, because those countries realize better than Barack Obama that you cannot charge a price for what you have already given away. And what will come of it all won't be peace. It will be war on a scale that will either draw America back into a larger cauldron or send it scurrying away behind whatever line of defense it thinks it has the will to hold. More than 60 years ago, Winston Churchill told the appeasers they had a choice between war and dishonor. They had chosen dishonor, and added that now they would have both war and dishonor.
If Bush lied and people died, then Pierre Gamayel is probably dead today because Nancy Pelosi told the truth last week: Bringing the war to an end is my highest priority as Speaker. James Baker didn't stage that.
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November 20, 2006
I'm not asking you to ask, I'm telling you to listen
Iran judges itself the victor in the Iraq war. It is now inviting Syria and Iraq to Tehran for a conference.
Iran has invited the Iraqi and Syrian presidents to Tehran for a weekend summit with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to hash out ways to cooperate in curbing the runaway violence that has taken Iraq to the verge of civil war and threatens to spread through the region, four key lawmakers told The Associated Press on Monday.Iraqi President Jalal Talabani has accepted the invitation and will fly to the Iranian capital Saturday, a close parliamentary associate said.
The Iranian diplomatic gambit appeared designed to upstage expected moves from Washington to include Syria and Iran in a wider regional effort to clamp off violence in Iraq, where more civilians have been killed in the first 20 days of November than in any other month since the AP began tallying the figures in April 2005.
The Iranian move was also a display of its increasingly muscular role in the Middle East, where it already has established deep influence over Syria and Lebanon.
"All three countries intend to hold a three-way summit among Iraq, Iran and Syria to discuss the security situation and the repercussions for stability of the region," said Ali al-Adeeb, a lawmaker of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's Dawa Party and a close aide to the prime minister.
Commentary
What do victors do next? They consolidate their gains. Belmont Club notes:
It was Mark Steyn who said that however evasively the Democratic party phrased it, the platform upon which they ran would be understood by its true name throughout the Middle East. George Packer, writing in the New Republic, said that now was the time to make arrangements to evacuate the thousands of Iraqis who believed in America; and that those Iraqis were even now making deals with whoever they thought would be in charge -- after the policy with the unstated name was implemented -- in order to survive.What will the conversations be like in Tehran? Hard to say, but one thing is sure: Tehran won't be asking for anything, but dictating terms instead. After the meeting, no one should be surprised at what comes next. Talabani might even change his tune as to how many US troops are needed for how long.But the Iranians can hardly contain their glee. They know what last elections meant; and so do Iraq and Syria. There may be no need to wait for the Baker report. It is being overtaken by events.
Phase One of the "Global War on Terror" is over. It has seen two vicious regimes destroyed in the Middle East. Thousands of Al Qaeda operatives have been killed or captured. A fledgling democracy grips power by its fingernails in Iraq. Iran is emboldened and is now the dominant power in the region. A new regional war looms around the periphery of Israel and another is beginning around the periphery of Somalila. Pakistan has ceded territory to the Taliban in Waziristan. The US military now has hundreds of thousands of battle-hardened veterans.
Writing in the Weekly Standard of his latest trip to Ramadi, Michael Fumento concludes thus:
People always ask how the Iraqis feel about Americans and the war in general. I respond that they just tell you what they think will prove advantageous to them, a combination of complaints and praise for Ameriki (America). Non-embedded American reporters run into the same thing. I asked one of the north Ramadi farmers through the translator if he thinks Ramadi is getting safer. He starts out with a few complaints, such as lack of water from the Euphrates for his fields because of rationing, and then tells me: "But safety is 100 percent better now that the Americans have come along." Baloney. Things got a lot more dangerous when we first came along. They may or may not be safer now than a year ago, but this guy isn't going to tell me. None of them will tell me.There are pluses and minuses. The war is not over, but the first part of it is largely ended. It might be presumptuous to end a chapter now, but the largest use of US force has been in Iraq, and that enterprise is now destined to wither away in one form or another. It's hard to know what comes next: an interlude, or Phase Two. The previous post The Golden Mean argued that those who favor attacking Iran are now largely in the wilderness. It's hard to know if there will even be a Phase Two. But for now, the last page has been turned and it will be time to wait for the sequel in whatever form it takes.Soldiers also give different accounts of the extent of progress in Ramadi. A Cougar driver told me nothing had changed since his last deployment, yet the very fact that he was driving into Ramadi in a convoy of just four trucks indicated otherwise. Another told me Ramadi is now "a thousand times better." Ultimately each was simply another blind man feeling his part of the elephant. With my three embeds in Anbar, I'd like to believe I've felt quite a few parts of the elephant.
Depressed? No. Thinking we won't eventually win? Not at all. Just being realistic. They don't call it a "long war" for nothing.
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The Golden Mean
Pundits and armcharists have struggled for months to articulate a military strategy vis a vis Iran that fits the following constraints: the nuclear program must be stopped; there can be no invasion; and if possible the regime should be removed.
Perhaps Arthur Herman has discovered the solution to this evasive strategic proof . . .
Continue reading "The Golden Mean"
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November 15, 2006
Jihad beats McWorld
A story over the weekend in the Times chronicled the use of hip-hop music by Islamists to spread their messages.
HIP-HOP and rap artists are teaching young Muslims the ideology of radical Islamism through songs about the war in Iraq, the oppression of Muslims and the creation of an Islamic state governed by Sharia, or religious law.
Intelligence agencies have identified music as a “tool for indoctrination”. The phenomenon began with an American group called Soldiers of Allah. The group has since disbanded but its music and lyrics remain popular on the internet. Other groups in Britain, France and the US have been identified as giving cause for concern. Many use the derogatory term “kufur” to describe non-Muslims.[ . . . ]
“The music is very persuasive because it is giving young people ideas, and those ideas are what might motivate someone to become a jihadi. The material is all in English. It’s spreading a radical message to domestic populations that don’t speak Arabic or Urdu.”
Commentary
"American culture conquers all" is a meme that has circulated for years. A friend used to joke that if Britney Spears could have been convinced to do some concerts in Afghanistan, there would have been no need for a US invasion.
Yet stories like these hint at a different set of conclusions: that like any other Western innovation, pop culture can be subverted to serve the virus of radicalism. In this case, the use of hip hop, a form which glorifies the artist and his ego, serves to glamorize jihad.
Rather than meeting radicalism with apple pie and entreaties to freedom vacuously defined as popular music, jeans and McDonald's, it seems that the much-vaunted "war of ideas" that is sometimes heard but rarely elaborated upon will have to actually take place, and hold some substance. Moreover, it seems that any new memes introduced to fight against those of the radicals, will have to be Muslim in origin, even if they use Western forms, as seen here. It is a complex problem and one unlikely to be solved by any government, if it can be solved at all. Creating counternarratives is a task best left to the private sector in the West, and putting such narratives in the form of popular music will take some time -- not in the least because those most likely to do so probably feel that their lives will be endangered.
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November 13, 2006
By a thousand cuts . . .
Travel has kept me from writing about what I'd intended today . . . but not to worry, as Westhawk has instead done so. See his piece on Britain's looming insurgency.
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November 9, 2006
The Thousand Fathers
All of a sudden, everyone's got an Iraq plan. The Small Wars Journal excerpts a subscription-only article from Inside the Pentagon:
A small group of officers assembled by Gen. Peter Pace, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to draw up alternatives to the U.S. military strategy in Iraq is expected to conclude its work in December, according to defense sources. Some observers anticipate the recommendations will call for a dramatic change of course in the Persian Gulf nation and perhaps in the war on terrorism more broadly...It's the secret group to develop a backup plan in case the president doesn't like the public group's plan. Or, the secret group, being close to the top, has maybe already gotten wind of the public group's plan and decided it's awful . . .The Joint Staff review is being carried out in extraordinary secrecy. A spokesman for Pace said this week the group has no formal name but its role is “to assess what’s working and what’s not working” in Iraq and beyond. The spokesman did not respond by press time (Nov. 8) to a number of follow-up questions posed by a reporter.
Pace’s exploration of Iraq alternatives comes as a congressionally mandated study group, co-chaired by former Secretary of State James Baker and former House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Rep. Lee Hamilton (D-IN), is conducting an independent review of the strategy to combat the insurgency and sectarian violence in the war-torn nation.
Some experts speculate the Marine Corps general decided to convene his own panel to develop new alternatives for Iraq in case the Baker-Hamilton “Iraq Study Group” offers recommendations the military or the Bush administration find unacceptable...
Participants include Army Col. H.R. McMaster, who until earlier this year commanded a cavalry regiment that pacified the Iraqi insurgent stronghold of Tall Afar, though violence has since returned to that town. Another team member is Army Col. Peter Mansoor, who directs an Army-Marine Corps counterinsurgency school at Fort Leavenworth, KS. The Marine Corps reportedly has sent Col. Thomas Greenwood, director of the Marine Command and Staff College, and the other services are represented on the study team, as well.
The Joint Staff strategy review kicked off in late September and was originally slated to last 60 days, though it now appears work will continue into December, according to officials familiar with the group who are not authorized to speak for it...
Meanwhile, Ralph Peters mentions the "all hands on deck" concept:
One proposal under discussion within the administration is to "send everything we've got" - to deploy every possible Army and Marine unit, no matter how worn and weary, for six months to "clean things up."Now there's an option for you!
John McCain said yesterday that Moqtada Al-Sadr needs "to be taken out," and that the "Mahdi Army continues to pose a threat."
Heck, even the preacher at the Duke Chapel is getting in on the game. I was out of town one weekend and missed it, but he delivered an eloquent sermon about Iraq on October 29th to what is probably a left-leaning congregation -- and he did it on parents' weekend to boot, just for maximum effect:
A number of people have asked me to preach a sermon about Iraq. Imagine you've let yourself into someone else's home and you find yourself in the kitchen. You reach up and open a cupboard door. Out fall a deluge of tightly stacked items, crashing down on your head and tumbling all over the floor. As well as being in a lot of pain, you may well feel pretty stupid. You may be saying to yourself, "I shouldn't be in this house. I certainly shouldn't have opened the door without checking what was inside." But feeling stupid and full of shame shouldn't stop you doing the one thing you simply must do. And that is, to get on your knees, clean up after yourself, and try to put everything back in the cupboard as best you can.He was kidding. Read the whole thing.That's pretty much all I have to say about Iraq. [laughter]
Commentary
This is the golden window for not only making significant changes, but for also building bipartisan consensus, before the show trials begin in January. If the Democrats are on board with an Iraq plan, even the media will drag themselves kicking and screaming toward slightly better coverage. They know where their bread is buttered.
As to my preacher, I have my differences with his view, but I'll take it. Whatever is necessary to not abandon Iraq.
James Baker is a brilliant diplomat and should not be misunderestimated. The events in the next week will spell salvation or doom in Mesopotamia.
Nancy Pelosi has her own take, recorded for posterity on HotAir. When interviewed by Fox News, "Asked if it was more important to win or leave Iraq, presumptive Speaker, Nancy Pelosi, told Fox this:"
The point is, this isn't a war to win, it's a situation to be solved. And you define winning any way you want, but you must solve the problem.
It will be a very smart move to make some major changes to our strategy in Iraq before January, when this woman becomes the Speaker. At the same time, get as much buy-in from her posse as possible.
McCain's right too: No American voters are going to be upset if al Sadr goes away. In fact, best to kill The Man With One Red Shoe now, because if we do pull out of Iraq, he'll probably be the next dictator of Shiastan.
Bob Owens notes that the new Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates, was an advisor the the first President Bush when he screwed the Shi'ites, leading to the deaths of nearly a hundred thousand of them.
The obvious question is, "Did Bob Gates have a hand in shaping Bush's call for rebellion?"If so, would he also partially responsible for failing to support the rebellion, leading to one of Saddam's greatest genocides? I do not know the answers to these questions, but they must be asked before he is confirmed as the next U.S. Secretary of Defense.
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November 8, 2006
The Best and the Worst
For the most magnanimous take possible on the election, see Bill Whittle:
Remember one thing before you go. The most important election we are ever likely to see in our lives was not this evening's election. Bush's re-election in 2004 was the one we HAD to have, and we got it. Be grateful for that, acknowledge that this loss is no one's fault but our own, congratulate the Democrats on their impressive wins and start figuring out how we can make sure this never EVER happens again. =)For the most pessimistic, see this, from a reader of the Corner, which I quote in full:I wish to tell my friends to be cheerful and especially to be of good will. Disappointments come and go, but moments of courage and integrity in dark hours will be there when the stars grow cold. We have lost the election, so let us maintain our determination, our dignity and our sense of humor, and let us take this moment to reflect upon how our actions have fallen short of our ideals. And then, finally, let's act like the Americans we are, roll up our sleeves and start rebuilding. We who have survived Civil War, the Nazis and the Communists can probably manage to find a way to preserve the Republic in the face of Speaker Pelosi.
America is not only much, much stronger than you imagine; it is stronger than you CAN imagine.
To those who have written me in anger over the years, I say sincere congratulations to you on a big win, and I genuinely hope it will remove some of the bitterness in your hearts and restore some belief in a system that was never broken.
As for me, I pledge to re-enter the fight with more energy, not less, and to continue to try to make the case I think needs to be made. I'll start on that tomorrow.
"Americans can always be counted on to do the right thing...after they have exhausted all other possibilities." -- Winston ChurchillWelcome to the process of exhausting all other possibilities. This is where we separate the men from the boys. Pick a line and stand in it.
Those people who were serious about criticizing Rumsfeld (as opposed to those who were just vindictive or crazy) did so because they wanted our military to be doing more, not less, but does anyone seriously think that a Democratic Congress is going approve expenditures for the extra 50-70,000 troops that his serious critics say would be required to actually win in Iraq?
As a practical matter, I'm not sure how Iraq is possibly salvageable at this point given our current political situation. Zal is apparently on his way out, not wanting to be scapegoated as the man who lost Iraq and the real travesty is that he will be unlikely to receive half the official honors that Bremer and Tenet got despite his far more capable service to our country in Iraq and Afghanistan. Once the Baker Commission comes out, the administration is going to be under overwhelming pressure to implement the suggestions of the "bipartisan" commission and their failure to do so is just going to give the Democrats one more issue to run on to a pliable media and (near as I can determine) general public. Sooner or later, Baker's recommendations will likely be implemented, at which point al-Qaeda will be left in control of Anbar, Salahaddin, and possibly Babil and Diyala as well. They won't have any oil, but they'll have their failed state and that will give them a base from which to strike throughout the rest of the Middle East. Whether or not they are able to work out a manageable detente with Muqtada al-Sadr (who I expect will likely seize the southern part of the country), they won't be able to conquer his territory nor vice versa, meaning that we will still have a failed terrorist state made up of what was central Iraq to deal with. Oh, and a lot of innocent Iraqis are going to die, probably in the tens of thousands. But no one here will care about them, just like no one ever cares about the hundreds of thousands of South Vietnamese and Cambodians who died when we abandoned Vietnam, but the important thing is that we'll all feel that much better. The truly ironic thing is that Iraq is likely to be held up as an example of why "Arabs/Muslims can't handle democracy," because to believe otherwise would be to admit that we should have done more, fought harder, and worked better to save them. And we can't have that. It goes without saying that if this is going to be the result that we never should have gone into Iraq in the first place.
The loss of Iraq is almost certain to coincide with a major push in Afghanistan-Pakistan and having defeated the United States, al-Qaeda is likely to regard the momentum as being with them. My own assessment is that Pakistan is likely to fall (probably in a palace coup) before al-Qaeda and the Taliban make any serious headway in Afghanistan. That may preserve the Karzai government, but it will also turn bin Laden into a nuclear power. The only good news that I can take away from this is that if, not when, this occurs the United States is unlikely to lapse into a "Blame America First" or "Iraq Syndrome." We won't lift a finger to save Somalia (now almost certainly lost) or Iraq, but the fall of Pakistan is likely to awaken the general population from their slumber. If not now, then certainly once the nukes start flying, whether at India or at the United States in Europe. It also now goes without saying that the US will not prevent the emergence of a nuclear Iran or take anything more than token gestures regarding North Korea. One thing I want to be clear on is that this isn't the apocalypse and al-Qaeda is not going to take over the Middle East in 2 years but that they will make a great deal of headway there if the US is emasculated in the interim as a result of domestic politics, particularly if the legislative branch now treats the executive as though it is part of an enemy state.
A word on Europe. As you are no doubt seeing in the media coverage, much of the European punditocracy is now giddy that the US has rejected the evils of Bushitleretardespotheocrat and all his works. While this is likely to make American tourist trips and cocktail parties more enjoyable, it is also nothing short of meaningless because, as we have seen over the last several years, Europe wants to be treated as a great power but does not wish to exert the necessary effort to actually be one. Our cooperation with them on intelligence and law enforcement matters would continue regardless of the event because they must [cooperate] for their own self-preservation, but they will not support sanctions against state sponsors of terrorism or increased troop commitments to Iraq or Afghanistan. In the case of the latter, they simply do not have the troops to send or the logistics to sustain them. . . .
The next 2 years are likely to suck, but I could always be wrong and the Democrats could always develop an uncharacteristic amount of sanity.
Commentary
"You win some and you lose some." "It's not whether you win or lose, but how you play the game." And so forth.
Well, actually, no. When you and your countrymen might die, it is whether you win or lose.
There no doubt are many furtive conversations taking place in both Iraqi kitchens and government councils right now.
"Should we go to Jordan?"
"Should we let the Americans attack Sadr?"
"If I try to tamp down the death squads, but the Americans leave, will the squads come for me?"
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November 2, 2006
The Man With One Red Shoe
Has Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army played a role in the presumed capture of a US Army translator? Is Sadr culpable for this, or has some other faction of his force performed this act? Confederate Yankee offers one explanation:
The fact that al-Taei (or as this article spells it "al-Taayie") did not turn up dead within the first 72 hours of his abduction, and the fact that he is believed to have been captured by the Mahdi Army instead of al Qaeda, leads me to believe that he was abducted not to become a victim of torture and murder, but to become a political pawn for one of the factions of Muqtada al-Sadr's militia.The idea that al-Sadr needs killing, and that this might be accomplished by his own forces working against him, was floated recently by Bill Roggio as well:What remains to be seen, and what we may never know, is whether al-Taei's capture is something that al-Sadr had a hand in, or if a faction within his loosely-organized Mahdi Army Militia conducted the kidnapping independently. If al-Taei's abduction was not conducted with al-Sadr's knowledge or blessing, there is the possibility that the kidnapping is evidence of a rift between factions of the Mahdi Army.
If so (and this is purely speculation), it could be that factions within the Mahdi Army are using the kidnapping to make a run on al-Sadr's control of the militia. The kidnapping places a microscope on al-Sadr (note the renewed calls to have him killed, which stem at least in part from the kidnapping), and depending on internal Iraqi politics, could rattle his standing with both other Mahdi Army factions and with the Iraqi government, which for now, seems to be doing the bidding of al-Sadr (on that, at least, Sullivan was correct).
If al-Sadr starts to lose (more) control of the Madhi Army, his importance to and influence within the Iraqi government may wane, and the possibility that Ralph Peters may eventually get his wish, perhaps courtesy of the apparently fragmenting Mahdi Army itself.
Sadr can no longer claim these are the acts of mere 'rogue elements' of his Mahdi Army. The clashes between Mahdi Army units and Iraqi and U.S. forces are occurring on a near-daily basis, and the sectarian violence is largely driven by Mahdi fighters. Ralph Peters argues it is time for the U.S. to kill Sadr. However, this would give Sadr the status of martyr to the 'occupiers' and could create unnecessary violence. We argue this is a task best left to the Iraqis. Ideally, a 'rogue element' of the Mahdi Army would kill him (or so it would appear). This would be just desserts for Sadr's shallow attempts at obfuscating his militia's role in the fighting. And it would spawn a round of internecine fighting that would do much of the needed dirty work of dismantling the Mahdi Army.
Commentary
The question of whether Sadr is behind the kidnapping, and whether his control of his forces seems to be slipping, is impossible to know. Since the invasion, Sadr has proven to be an adroit player of the Iraqi game. His continued presence after four years of other Iraqi politicians -- or leaders -- who have largely come and gone seems to testify against the idea that he has lost control over his own forces.
So then, taking that as case A, allow case B: Sadr's influence has grown to the point that he is now making use of it. The kidnapping of an American and the subsequent negotiations to maintain his release create a certain legitimacy for Sadr. Perhaps a year ago such an action would have warranted open battle with his forces; perhaps now he has struck because he knows such an outcome is unlikely, and that the Americans, coming to him with hat in hand, asking if he knows anything about a missing translator, will only buttress his own prestige within the Iraqi community.
It may be possible in the coming days to read between the lines of stories on this issue and deduce whether case A or case B is correct.
Regardless, Sadr should have been killed long ago. Many would argue that this is not necessary: only a significant defanging of his forces would have marginalized him. But this is to discount the nature of Shia Islam, which if nothing else, tends toward messianism. In other words, the big boss himself is frequently the source of strength, and not merely the forces with which he surrounds himself. See Ayatollah Khomeini.
The 1980s comedy The Man with One Red Shoe stars Dabney Coleman as a CIA officer who has been duped into thinking that Tom Hanks, a hapless violinist, is a spy. Coleman pursues Hanks left and right throughout the film, always being asked by one of his henchmen, "Sir, why don't we just kill him?" Coleman always has a better answer about how to manipulate him instead. Finally, at his wits' end, Coleman finally says, "Ok." But by then it's too late. Hanks has run off with a female spy.
Perhaps the Iraqi electorate is the female in this twisted analogy, and al-Sadr is the man with one red shoe. Sadly, I think we'll be seeing much more of him, not less.
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October 26, 2006
Steve Acuff Airs a YouTube Video
Steve Acuff, Republican congressional candidate for North Carolina's 4th District, has just aired what I believe is his first YouTube video, in which he denounces CNN for showing an insurgent snuff film, calls for their investigation, and describes their behavior as treasonous.
I've mentioned before that I did a little bit of volunteer work for Steve's congressional campaign over the summer. I didn't help much, just once a week for a couple of hours over the course of a month or so.
So having met the man, let me say that this is the most angry I've ever seen him. Don't get me wrong. He's still got his emotions in check. But the degree to which he's upset about this issue clearly shows.
Also, the film doesn't even mention his opponent. In fact, it's not really even a political commercial, in a certain sense.
I should make it clear that I didn't assist with making this film.
Steve's campaign site is here.
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"Welcome to the party, pal!"
A quick cycle through the headlines of the past two days provides an update on our NATO allies:
Continue reading ""Welcome to the party, pal!""
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October 24, 2006
A Simple Plan
The New Media Journal carries a fictional bit of prognostication by one Raymond S. Kraft. It is the story of a surprise nuclear attack on the United States, performed with aplomb by Iran and North Korea [via Rocket's Brain Trust].
At 0723 Hawaii time on the 67th Anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack three old fishing trawlers, about 100 miles apart, and each about 300 miles off the east coast, launched six small cruise missiles from launch tubes that could be dismantled and stored in the holds under ice, or fish, and set up in less than an hour. The missiles were launched at precisely one minute intervals. As soon as each boat had launched its pair, the skeleton crew began to abandon ship into a fast rubber inflatable. The captain was last off, and just before going overboard started the timer on the scuttling charges. Fifteen minutes later and ten miles away, each crew was going up the nets into a small freighter or tanker of Moroccan or Liberian registry, where each man was issued new identification as ship's crew. The rubber inflatables were shot and sunk, and just about then charges in the bilges of each of the three trawlers blew the hulls out, and they sank with no one on board and no distress signals in less than two minutes.Commentary
The missiles had been built in a joint operation by North Korea and Iran, and tested in Iran, so they would not have to overfly any other country. The small nuclear warheads had only been tested deep underground. The GPS guidance and detonating systems had worked perfectly, after a few corrections. They flew fifty feet above sea level, and 500 feet above ground level on the last leg of the trip, using computers and terrain data modified from open market technology and flight directors, autopilots, adapted from commercial aviation units. They would adjust speed to arrive on target at specific times and altitudes, and detonate upon reaching the programmed GPS coordinates. They were not as adaptable and intelligent as American cruise missiles, but they did not need to be. Not for this mission.
I'm unfamiliar with Mr. Kraft's work, but here he succeeds in rapidly painting a scenario that is entirely plausible. The more interesting questions are those it merely implies.
Continue reading "A Simple Plan"
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October 3, 2006
Good Cop, Bad Cop
Suppose you are a member of Britain's security services and are faced with a dilemma: you can either arrest a terror plotter and lose the opportunity to continue rolling up his network, or know that if you don't, the US will swoop him up and send him to a secret prison (aka, "render" him)? Which is worse?
Such is the scenario reported in the Guardian on Sunday [via the CS Monitor's Terrorism and Security Brief]:
Continue reading "Good Cop, Bad Cop"
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In Which the European Defense Agency Shows It Has Learned Nothing in the Last Five Years
Political discourse about warfare is all too frequently shot through with utopian impulses. This is because warfare involves both the vision of an "end-state" that one's forces work toward, and millions of decisions at all levels that are easily second guessed as time passes.
An article in the London Telegraph reports that the new European Defense Agency has released a paper envisioning the next 20 years of conflict.
The paper, An Initial Long-Term Vision for European Defence Capability and Capacity Needs, paints a Europe in which plunging fertility rates leave the military struggling to recruit young men and women of fighting age, at a time when national budgets will be under unprecedented strain to pay for greying populations.It seems the study does not attempt to really envision future conflicts so much as it attempts to proscribe a series of measures that must be in place in order for the EU to engage in war. In other words, rather than focusing on enemies, it seems to focus on its own requirements. There is a term for this: self-induced friction. The EU Defense Agency is only 2 years old and already is hamstringing itself.At the same time, increasingly cautious voters and politicians may be unwilling to contemplate casualties, or "potentially controversial interventions abroad – in particular interventions in regions from where large numbers of immigrants have come."
Voters will also be insistent on having backing from the United Nations for operations, and on crafting large coalitions of EU member states with a heavy involvement of civilian agencies, and not just fighting units, the paper states. They will also want military operations to be environmentally friendly, where possible.
All of this is similar to the Powell Doctrine in the United States, another set of internally imposed rules meant to make domestic constituents happy and to limit the kinds and types of wars that will have to be fought.
A hard-thinking, proactive enemy -- and there are few other kinds -- no doubt laughs in glee at these efforts, as it merely gives him all the more opportunities to avoid battle with the West and pursue his own agenda with impunity; or, once engaged in battle, to prevail simply by using methods and techniques that the West is institutionally (and thereby mentally) unprepared to counter.
The entire report may be downloaded here.
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October 2, 2006
Could Al Qaeda team with the mob?
There is a scene near the end of the film The Rocketeer in which a deal of some kind goes south and all of a sudden three parties find themselves in a Mexican standoff: cops, the mob, and a bunch of Nazi sympathizers intent of helping Hitler invade America. When the shooting starts, the mob quickly starts fighting the Nazis. At one point a cop and a mobster are crouching next to each other, firing away with submachine guns, when they pause, look at each other, shrug, and then keep firing.
But today, this sentiment -- "hey, mobsters are awful, but at least they love America," -- must be realized as so much wishful thinking. An AP story released over the weekend [via Instapundit] reported that the FBI is keeping close tabs on the possibility of collusion between organized crime and terror-related groups.
Continue reading "Could Al Qaeda team with the mob?"
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September 30, 2006
Combination Warfare
One of the hallmarks of maneuver warfare as it has been conceived in the Marine Corps is the use of combined arms. "Combined arms" refers to the use of various weapons systems in concert, such that each reinforces the weaknesses of the other. The doctrinal definition is this:
Combined arms is the full integration of arms in such a way that to counteract one, the enemy must become more vulnerable to another. We pose the enemy not just with a problem, but with a dilemma -- a no-win situation. [from Marine Corps Doctrinal Publication 1, Warfighting]There's no reason to think that this doctrine couldn't be articulated at the national level as well. Rather than confining it to the realm of military strategy and the use of force, why not include all the elements of national power -- diplomatic, economic, informational, military, etc -- and force them to work in concert toward a common goal? This may be an ideal, but it is one at which the US does not perform so well. The primary reason is the way our foreign policy bureaucracy operates: there is little in the way of the kind of unity of command necessary for an individual decision-maker to muster all elements to work in concert.
But not so in Iran, warns Robert Kaplan:
Continue reading "Combination Warfare"
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September 27, 2006
Michael Yon Names Names
Michael Yon, the retired Green Beret who embedded for months with US forces in Iraq, pulls no punches in this email dispatch he just sent to his mailing list:
Pajamas Media recently reported that there are only 9 embedded reporters in Iraq . Many are blaming this on the media, and while I can never be called an apologist for mainstream media, I can say with certainty that the United States military is censoring.Them's fighting words! Yon has huge credibility on issues like this. It seems he would not easily risk it.It remains unclear if this is a general policy, though there are recent inquiries to the office of the Secretary of Defense. I await response. Or, perhaps, the censorship is merely the policy of ******* who is responsible for operations involving embeds. ******** is said to be the most quoted man in Iraq . I've learned to trust nothing he says. I do know for a fact that ******* has been untruthful with the media. If ******* calls me on this, I'll take the time to prove it.
While sons and daughters, mothers and fathers, sisters, brothers and friends, fight and die in Iraq and Afghanistan, the military apparently is preventing journalists from telling the story. They attempt to deflect accusations of censorship by allowing in just enough reporters to appear transparent.
UPDATE: After noting Belmont Club's post on Yon's email, which notes that it has not been verified as actually coming from Yon, I've removed the name that Yon mentions in the email. It should not have been included in the first place.
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Berlin Production of Idomeneo A Little Strange to Begin With
The AP reports:
German politicians condemned on Tuesday a decision by a Berlin opera house to cancel performances of Mozart's "Idomeneo" over concerns they could enrage Muslims and pose a security risk.At first glance, this seems to fit the familiar pattern of:The Deutsche Oper in west Berlin announced on Monday it was replacing four performances of "Idomeneo" scheduled for November with "The Marriage of Figaro" and "La Traviata."
The decision was taken after Berlin security officials warned that putting on the opera as planned would present an "incalculable security risk" for the establishment.
In the production, directed by Hans Neuenfels, King Idomeneo is shown staggering on stage next to the severed heads of Buddha, Jesus, Poseidon and the Prophet Mohammad, which sit on chairs.
a) Western person or institution makes a public statement with some sort of content about Islam or Mohammed
b) Muslims go nuts.
Yet perhaps there is something else to this story. First off, what the heck is Idomeneo about and why does its performance include as props "the severed heads of Buddha, Jesus, Poseidon and the Prophet Mohammad, which sit on chairs?"
Wikipedia's synopsis of the plot makes no mention of any of the these people, except for Poseidon [Neptune] and no mention of his beheading.
My guess is that this is an instance of some pretty ridiculous modern liberties taken with the script of Idomeneo. More akin to the whole "Piss Christ" controversy years ago than to either the Cartoon Jihad or, for lack of a better term, the Pope Jihad.
This doesn't mean that as free speech it shouldn't be defended. It just means that perhaps it's a little less defensible than the other instances. In the end of course, bad taste is not a crime, or shouldn't be.
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September 26, 2006
The Irrational Tenth Part 2
I've posted a second part to the piece below, The Irrational Tenth, over at Winds of Change. Here it is: The Irrational Tenth, Part Two.
I welcome all comments to either post.
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DVD Rec of the Week
If you like this blog, you'll probably enjoy watching this:
The Battle of Algiers, produced only three years after the end of the French-Algerian War, is an excellent little study in the phases of a counterinsurgency, and quite a learning tool to boot. Moreover, its style is incredibly realistic. When coupled with a reading of Counterinsurgency Warfare: Theory and Practice
The Criterion Collection edition also includes two full discs of special features, most of which looked interesting, though I didn't have time for them.
There's more background about the film at Wikipedia's entry.
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The Irrational Tenth
Belmont Club notes a sort of ongoing conversation taking place in many circles about the war and the size of the force necessary to best prosecute it.
At that time [2003] there was very little appreciation of what was really required to defeat the enemy. The Democrats were arguing for police action through multilateral alliances. Or for large half-million man troop deployments in Iraq. And the Conservatives thought that major combat operations were over in Iraq. But in truth, no one was asking the right questions. As one Marine Colonel (the reference to which I can't find at the moment) argued, more men of the wrong kind would have converted Iraq into a mud-trodden disaster. John Kerry understands this, and calls for more Special Forces to be used. But where to get them?Where to get them indeed. This is the type of conversation in which someone quickly chimes in, "Amateurs talk strategy, professionals talk logistics." And they'd be right in a sense, because figuring out what kinds of forces are necessary when and where is a sort of strategic issue. Figuring out where to find them and then supplying them is more of a logistical problem, since it deals with the whole panoply of issues that entail the forming and manning of a certain kind of force. A commenter on the Small Wars Journal noted:
In the short run you have to raid tactical units for more recruiters, for drill sergeants, for instructors, etc. This means less capable deploying units. We've divested ourselves of a lot of training facilities. It will take lots of time and money to get back to the capacity we had in 1990 with a much smaller number of installations because an expanded Army has to be quartered somewhere and it has to train when not deployed.In short, institutional fear of a lack of national will hampers the ability to make a full-throated cry for increases in size.So without some degree of political guarantee that we won't find another "Peace Dividend" there is really little to no constituency within the institutional Army to expand in anything but the most gradual way.
And this is truly the problem. New forces might be raised, new kinds of fighters might be created, but in the end without the will to use them, they come to naught. Critics can carp to no end about the lack of postwar planning in Iraq, and certainly have a point in many cases. But our national will seems too endeared with the search for a perfect plan for warfare, without acknowledging that such quests are as fruitless as perpetual motion machines. This sentiment is one of the bases of Tony Corn's wide-ranging critique of an over-reliance on Clausewitz in Policy Review:
Last but not least, the third major flaw is “strategism.” At its “best,” strategism is synonymous with “strategy for strategy’s sake,” i.e., a self-referential discourse more interested in theory-building (or is it hair-splitting?) than policy-making. Strategism would be innocuous enough were it not for the fact that, in the media and academia, “realism” today is fast becoming synonymous with “absence of memory, will, and imagination”: in that context, the self-referentiality of the strategic discourse does not exactly improve the quality of the public debate.
In making the case that there is a distinct Western military tradition dating back to the Greeks, Victor Hanson argued in The Wars of the Ancient Greeks
Fair enough. But Corn seems to think that we have gone too far, that our conversations are "strategy for strategy's sake." Indeed, I know a different aphorism, often mentioned by field-grade logisticians with whom I served: "amateurs talk logistics, professionals talk pornography."
What this is meant to express, however earthily, is the idea that it is a sort of raw, fighting spirit which is the essence of war, and given that, all else will fall into place with merely mediocre planning. Leadership, persistence, manipulation, sheer force of will -- these are the missing elements.
T.E. Lawrence knew this. "Nine-tenths of tactics are certain and taught in books: but the irrational tenth is like the kingfisher flashing across the pool, and that is the test of generals. It can only be ensured by instinct, sharpened by thought practicing the stroke so often that at the crisis it is as natural as a reflex."
Belmont Club finishes,
In the end, the single best . . . response to the attack on September 11 was simply to do something, a policy which seems to me infinitely better than doing nothing, if only because action led to learning and that was superior to sitting back and imagining that we had the answers.Yes, the irrational tenth is probably only to be discovered in combat.
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September 25, 2006
Jihad and Thailand's New Leadership
News reports indicate that there were a number of reasons why Thailand's military decided to overthrow Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra last week, but the most interesting among them was a disappointment with his strategy toward the Muslim insurgency in the south. From The Australian:
THE Royal Thai Army will adopt new tactics against a militant Islamic uprising, following the coup that sent Thaksin Shinawatra, the ousted prime minister, into exile in London last week.But at the same time Zachary Abuza, a political science professor at Simmons College in the US, and author of a forthcoming book about the Thai insurgency, offers a more nuanced take:According to sources briefed by the army high command, Mr Thaksin's bungled response to the insurgency in southern Thailand, which has claimed 1700 lives in two years, was a critical factor in the generals' decision to get rid of him.
Military intelligence officers intend to negotiate with separatists and to use psychological warfare to isolate the most violent extremists, in contrast to Mr Thaksin's heavy-handed methods and harsh rhetoric.
[ . . . ]
if the prime minister's absence was the opportunity, sources said, the incentive to act was a sense that the Thai state was losing control over its southern territory, where about four million Muslims live.
A final spur for the coup came when bomb explosions tore through the south's commercial and tourist centre of Hat Yai this month, killing a Canadian visitor and three others, wounding dozens and prompting holidaymakers to flee.
Shocked Thai officials conceded that the terrorism could no longer be contained and might spread north to resorts such as Phuket and Koh Samui, with catastrophic results for the $13billion-a-year tourist industry, still reeling from 2004's Boxing Day tsunami.
[ . . . ]
When Mr Thaksin, a former policeman who made his fortune from telecommunications, came to power in 2001, he broke with the old order. He put police cronies in charge of the southern border and shut down two intelligence clearing centres.
Soon, reports in the media alleged that corruption, smuggling and racketeering were rife.
In January 2004, militants raided an armoury and started a killing spree. They have murdered Buddhist monks, teachers, hospital staff and civil servants - anyone seen as representing the Thai state. The army has seemed powerless to halt the chaos.
"Down there, you stay inside the camp at night," said a soldier who recently returned from a tour of duty. "If you go out, you die."
Mr Thaksin's iron-fisted methods went disastrously wrong. A suicidal mass assault on army and police posts by young Muslims, many armed only with machetes, ended with almost 100 "martyrs" dead. Later, 74 unarmed Muslims died at the hands of the security forces in the village of Tak Bae, most of them suffocated in trucks, and a suspected police death squad abducted Somchai Neelaphaijit, a Muslim lawyer, on a Bangkok street.
Somchai, who had brought torture cases before the National Human Rights Commission, was never seen again.
Then there is the southern insurgency. Will the CDR [Council for Democratic Reform] and interim administration be better equipped to deal with [it]? At the very least, there will be less political interference in counter-insurgent operations and fewer personnel reshuffles and policy initiatives from an impatient “CEO prime minister.” Second, the CDR is likely to implement many of the recommendations of the National Reconciliation Council that Thaksin had blatantly ignored. Though the NRC’s recommendations alone will not quell the insurgency, they will have an important impact in regaining the trust of the Muslim community. Third, Sonthi has expressed a willingness to talk with insurgents, though to date only PULO has offered to talk and the aged leaders in Europe have no control over the insurgents. And many in the military establishment including Sonthi, himself a Muslim, have publicly refused to see the insurgency for what it is, denying it any religious overtones or secessionist goals. Nor is the political situation likely to alter the campaign of the insurgents. If anything they may step up attacks in an attempt to provoke a heavy-handed government response. The Muslim provinces have been under martial law for over two and a half years, with little to show for it but an alienated and angry populace.
Commentary
It seems Thailand has made two strategic errors in the past 15 years, the first of which was the dismantling of intelligence assets in the south.
A 2004 article from The Straits Times notes that
the upsurge in violence is also proving difficult to understand and control because it comes after Bangkok effectively dismantled its intelligence apparatus in the area and scaled down its military presence, thinking it had all but crushed the separatist movement in the late 1990s.Dr. Abuza made the same point in the piece above, noting,The simple, stark fact, as admitted to me by a retired Thai general last week, is that neither the military nor the police now have a clue what is going on in the south.
“There has been a complete failure of intelligence. No one knows who the insurgents are. They don’t have a face.”In the absence of this lack of knowledge, it seems that ousted PM Thaksin made his second error: he responded to the insurgency with heavy-handed tactics, rather than classic counterinsurgency strategy. This only served to make things worse.
How will the generals do? We shall soon see. It was through cunning and realpolitik that Thailand avoided becoming a European colony while every single one of its neighbors did so in the last 300 years.
For the moment though, the south of Thailand, just like Waziristan or Somalia, has become another of the black holes with which we have become all too familiar, which the rest of us stare into with vacuous looks upon our faces, wondering intently what goes on in there, and from which the faintest traces of muezzin calls can be heard.
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David Frum and Containment
David Frum, former speechwriter for the Bush Administration, has made an argument in two separate places that the Bush team is not preparing at all to stop Iran from gaining nuclear weapons, and is instead "acquiescing" to their desires.
Frum first made the case last week in his blog at National Review:
1) Any prudent war planner has to assume that the rulers of Iran will strike back . . .Then he seconded these emotions with a piece in Canada's National Post (via AEI), arguing that the Bush Administration is preparing for a campaign of containment against Iran:
2) Despite the accusations of America's critics, the United States does not bomb other countries out of a clear blue sky . . .
3) Nor has there been diplomacy outside the UN . . .
4) Finally, through Washington there echoes the hushed sound of back doors being opened to quiet negotiations . . .
Iran is going nuclear. Sanctions will not be imposed. The U.S. hesitates to strike. And the Bush administration's new big idea will not work. Brace yourselves.
Commentary
In his post at NRO, Frum mentions that perhaps the real goal is a deal. If this is true, then the Bush administration can't be faulted for its pursuit, no matter how unlikely it seems. For while there is a certain clamoring in the right for action against Iran, there is at the same time little substantive discussion of the fact that such action will be the beginning of what could be a very large war, and while justified and perhaps necessary, it will not be clean and simple by any means. If a favorable outcome -- a non-nuclear Iran -- can be obtained without the use of force, then by all means, let's do it.
But if not, then we are in for a very interesting next few years, as a nuclear Iran is a prospect no sane and serious individual should be willing to entertain lightly.
What might a policy of "containment" look like vs Iran? A glimpse was perhaps provided earlier this year in an article in the Times of London on the Proliferation Security Initiative:
A PROGRAMME of covert action against nuclear and missile traffic to North Korea and Iran is to be intensified after last week’s missile tests by the North Korean regime.From the perspective painted here, the Proliferation Security Initiative seems to be two things: both a good picture of what "containment" against another rogue nuclear power resembles, and a race against the clock to make sure that it does not sell or pass nuclear material to other states or non-states.Intelligence agencies, navies and air forces from at least 13 nations are quietly co-operating in a “secret war” against Pyongyang and Tehran.
It has so far involved interceptions of North Korean ships at sea, US agents prowling the waterfronts in Taiwan, multinational naval and air surveillance missions out of Singapore, investigators poring over the books of dubious banks in the former Portuguese colony of Macau and a fleet of planes and ships eavesdropping on the “hermit kingdom” in the waters north of Japan . . .
The United States and its allies are now preoccupied by what Kim might do with the trump card in his arsenal — his stockpile of plutonium for nuclear bombs.
“The real danger is that the North Koreans could sell their plutonium to another rogue state — read Iran — or to terrorists,” said a western diplomat who has served in Pyongyang. American officials fear Iran is negotiating to buy plutonium from North Korea in a move that would confound the international effort to stop Tehran’s nuclear weapons programme.
The prospect of such a sale is “the next big thing”, said a western diplomat involved with the issue. The White House commissioned an intelligence study on the risk last December but drew no firm conclusions.
Iran is a much larger and more powerful entity than North Korea, and more strategically located to boot. If the picture above is an accurate portrayal of a containment strategy, one must ask how much more difficult such a strategy would be if aimed at Iran.
Furthermore, one must not be too hasty in comparing such strategies to those used against the Soviet Union. A central part of that doctrine, as we all know, was mutually-assured destruction. Attack us and we will destroy you, though we may well be destroyed in the process, to paraphrase.
Is it possible some new doctrine of offensive use of nuclear weapons might apply to situations in which states are likely to sell nuclear materials or pass them to proxies? How might such a doctrine be formulated? If containment is truly to be the policy of the US, then it should have such a strict expression of offensive capability as one of its key platforms.
Such are the dilemmas we'll be facing if Iran becomes a nuclear power.
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September 15, 2006
Interesting New Contracts at Intrade
In the past few days, the online prediction market Intrade has doubled its number of contracts for both US or Israeli strikes against Iran and for the capture or killing of Osama bin Laden. The actual contracts can't be pointed to, so you'll have to go there and poke around a bit to find them.
This probably reflects a desire on the part of the Intrade folks to keep on top of these events, rather than any unusual movements in those markets.
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September 12, 2006
From Every Mountainside
Tom Ricks’ book FIASCO: The American Military Adventure in Iraq has been climbing the charts of late. Ricks lists the work Counterinsurgency Warfare: Theory and Practice by David Galula as being very important to understanding the fight in Iraq today. Galula was a French officer who served in Greece, Algeria, and China, and observed various different insurgencies firsthand. His work is peppered with colorful anecdotes such as the things he learned after being captured by the Chinese Communists. Nevertheless, it very much attempts to develop a theory of counterinsurgency warfare that is extremely relevant today, despite the differences between Communist fighters and those of the Islamic ilk.
Galula believed that the population must be divided into three groups, the favorable minority, who will always favor the side of the counterinsurgent, the insurgent minority, those who are the actual fighters and organizers for the insurgency, and the rest of the population, which lives between the two sides, and can be swayed in either direction. He further made the point that insurgencies are always motivated by a cause, and that counterinsurgencies must have a cause as well if they are to succeed:
The strategic problem of the counterinsurgent may be defined now as follows: “To find the favorable minority, to organize it in order to mobilize the population against the insurgent minority.” Every operation, whether in the military field of in the political, social, economic, and psychological fields, must be geared to that end.To be sure, the better the cause and the situation, the larger will be the active minority favorable to the counterinsurgent and the easier its task. This truism dictates the main goal of the propaganda – to show that the cause the situation of the counterinsurgent are better than the insurgent’s. More important [sic], it underlines the necessity for the counterinsurgent to come out with an acceptable countercause.
All of this struck me very forcefully last week while attending the 5th Annual Defense Forum in Washington, DC, and hearing Tom Ricks give the keynote address. Ricks told the story of Army Colonel H.R. McMaster’s method of addressing the sheiks and imams in his area of operations upon arrival in Iraq in 2005. “McMaster told the Iraqis that when the American military first invaded Iraq, they were like men stumbling around furniture in a dark room. Now, the Iraqi government has turned on the lights for us, and the time for honorable resistance has ended.”
Ricks stated that this level of courtesy, used by McMaster even while implicitly threatening those who opposed him, is both necessary and extremely effective in the Arab world because the core value of that society is honor, or dignity, or respect. Ricks believes that when “Americans speak to the Iraqis about freedom, something is lost in translation.”
To use Galula’s terminology and theory, an independent observer must conclude that democracy is the “countercause” that the US seeks to advocate in the Middle East. But to use Ricks’ anecdote of Colonel McMaster, perhaps this is not the strongest or most effective countercause we might be using. Instead, perhaps we could link the honor that is so important to Arabs to what we define as freedom. Or perhaps we might attempt to dissociate jihad – especially the suicidal variant – from those actions which are perceived to be honorable.
These are tall orders but certainly possible for what has already been called a “long war.” Surely we are up to the task.
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September 7, 2006
Dispatches from the Defense Forum
The Defense Forum of 2006 was an outstanding event and I'd like to thank the US Naval Institute and Marine Corps Association for making it possible for me to attend.
If any Loyal Readers are interested, here are the pieces I wrote from the conference for Pajamas Media:
First Dispatch: about the remarks of Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Giambastiani.
Second Dispatch: about a panel on the progress of the Long War.
The Third Dispatch discusses both the remarks of Tom Ricks, and a panel on the Quadrennial Defense Review.
The final dispatch recounts the final panel, about lessons learned in Iraq and Afghanistan.
There's lots of good stuff in there!
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September 4, 2006
Defense Forum Washington 2006
Tomorrow (Tuesday the 5th), I'll be attending the Defense Forum in Washington, DC, sponsored by the Marine Corps Association and the US Naval Institute, two outstanding professional organizations for the Naval services.
While there, I'll be sending email dispatches throughout the day to Pajamas Media, so look for updates on their homepage.
The schedule of events looks really interesting and I'm especially looking forward to the panels entitled "The Long War: Where Are We Now?" and "Fighting on the Terrorists’ Turf: Lessons Learned in Iraq & Afghanistan and the Gap Between Expectations and Realities".
If there's a chance during the panel discussions, I'll be sure to ask a question or two from the back of the room. If any readers have questions you'd like me to try to address, please send them on to my email account, listed in the sidebar to the right.
I'll be attempting to file my dispatches while using my Motorola RAZR phone in a modem capacity for my laptop. There's a backup if it doesn't work, but it will be pretty cool if it does!
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August 30, 2006
Carolina FreedomNet 2006
I've been invited to be a panelist at the upcoming conference Carolina FreedomNet 2006, which will be held in Greensboro on October 7th. See the link for details. A number of other local Carolina bloggers will be present, and the keynote remarks will be made by Scott Johnson of Power Line. Looks to be great fun and the cost to the public is only $25! That's a steal compared to other conferences I've seen or attended.
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America's Schizophrenic View of Warfare
I've written an article for TCSDaily entitled Bipolar Disorder: America's Schizophrenic View of Warfare. It argues that Americans tend to view total war as positive, and counterinsurgencies as negative, rather than merely seeing them as different kinds of conflict. Go see for yourself!
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August 15, 2006
TCSDaily Article: Unfrozen Caveman Voter
I've written another piece for TCSDaily entitled, "Unfrozen Caveman Voter." Go check it out and ask yourself: are you part of the caveman demographic?
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Discussion Topic: Energy Independence
One of the frequent strategies espoused for the war is that of pursuing independence from the importation of vast sums of foreign oil.
It seems there are many competing agendas among those who favor this move. Many want to end the dependence on fossil fuels in general. That may be well and good, but it doth not make an immediate foreign policy or strategy for war.
Also, many who advocate increasing the use of alternative energy see no way for this to happen but for the government to invest massive sums in such technologies. It seems to me that any sector of the economy in which the government is heavily invested, whether monetarily, from an attention-standpoint, or via regulations, is likely to be inefficient and screwy. Consider public education, health care, pensions, and defense (hey the military is filled with motivated individuals, but it is after all a bureaucracy and as such, filled with nonsense). In other words, it's hard to see how a massive government program to rid our dependence on oil would really serve any immediate strategic aims. I rather think that the government should abolish the energy department altogether and then if there are market alternatives to imported oil, those will begin to shine.
The other agenda for many who insist on an end to imported foreign oil is an old-school isolationism. Rid the US economy of the necessity to have anything to do with oil exporters, and then we can just fence the Middle East in and let them kill each other off. But it seems to me that those who are angry with us now will be no less angry with us if we are more isolated from the world.
Any thoughts? Please discuss.
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July 31, 2006
Kissinger on Iran
Henry Kissinger's op-ed in today's Washington Post requires careful examination.
Let's take a close reading of The Next Steps With Iran:
The world's attention is focused on the fighting in Lebanon and the Gaza Strip, but the context leads inevitably back to Iran. Unfortunately, the diplomacy dealing with that issue is constantly outstripped by events. While explosives are raining on Lebanese and Israeli towns and Israel reclaims portions of Gaza, the proposal to Iran in May by the so-called Six (the United States, Great Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China) for negotiations on its nuclear weapons program still awaits an answer. It's possible that Tehran reads the almost pleading tone of some communications addressed to it as a sign of weakness and irresolution. Or perhaps the violence in Lebanon has produced second thoughts among the mullahs about the risks of courting and triggering crisis.Unless Israel resumes its offensive against Hezbollah, the mullahs have little reason for second thoughts about provoking conflict because the war will have finished in Hezbollah's favor. Hezbollah's centers of gravity are either its support from Iran and Syria, or its masterful use of the international media to rally world opinion against Israel. Whichever it is, if it's not both, the Israelis have yet to find a critical vulnerability to attack either of those two strengths. Attriting Hez forces buys time for a little peace in the future, but it does not solve any problems in the long term. It looks as though Israel is going to widen its ground offensive. We'll see what happens next . . .
However the tea leaves are read, the current Near Eastern upheaval could become a turning point. Iran may come to appreciate the law of unintended consequences.Is this a reference to a defeat for Hezbollah? Perhaps.
For their part, the Six can no longer avoid dealing with the twin challenges that Iran poses. On the one hand, the quest for nuclear weapons represents Iran's reach for modernity via the power symbol of the modern state; at the same time, this claim is put forward by a fervent kind of religious extremism that has kept the Muslim Middle East unmodernized for centuries. This conundrum can be solved without conflict only if Iran adopts a modernism consistent with international order and a view of Islam compatible with peaceful coexistence.Thank goodness Kissinger doesn't say the only other way the conundrum can be solved without conflict: for the world to just accept a nuclear Iran. Finally, someone sane in the diplomatic community!
Heretofore the Six have been vague about their response to an Iranian refusal to negotiate, except for unspecific threats of sanctions through the United Nations Security Council. But if a deadlock between strained forbearance by the Six and taunting invective from the Iranian president leads to de facto acquiescence in the Iranian nuclear program, prospects for multilateral international order will dim everywhere. If the permanent members of the Security Council plus Germany are unable jointly to achieve goals to which they have publicly committed themselves, every country, especially those composing the Six, will face growing threats, be they increased domestic pressure from radical Islamic groups, terrorist acts or the nearly inevitable conflagrations sparked by the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.This is the gut check for the world. As much as an encouragement of iran's nuclear ambitions by other states may serve to promote their interests in checking US power, ultimately, if Iran proliferates, then the international system will be broken, perhaps beyond repair. And the United Nations will become even more of a laughingstock than it is now. Previous posts have discussed the issue of Iranian proliferation from the standpoint of stability in the international system (here and here). Iran may well be the tipping point in nuclear proliferation in the world. Not only would the likelihood of further proliferation by Egypt, Turkey, or Saudi Arabia be increased dramatically, but the case of Iran is unique in that the series of events comprising Iranian proliferation offer a direct challenge to the UN and the system of nonproliferation. Whereas Pakistan and India pursued their programs clandestinely, and successfully so, and Israel is still technically an undeclared nuclear power, Iran's cover was blown in 2003 by an opposition group, thus creating a clear case where the nonproliferation regime must be tested in its ability to dissuade a state from aquiring nuclear weapons. Iraq may have involved horrendous lapses in intelligence, but one thing is certain for the moment: Iraq currently has no nuclear weapons or programs to produce them. If the international security system cannot deter Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons, then its credibility will be completely destroyed, and its legitimacy nil. Kissinger is right: world order will decrease, conflicts will multiply, and what he doesn't explicitly say will also be proved true: the chances of a nuclear exchange or a nuclear crisis will increase dramatically as well. These are not conditions that will appear overnight, but over an intermediate period. The morning after an Iranian weapons test will not mark the end of the current system of international security, but it will mark the beginning of the end. Kissinger next offers a quick primer in Diplomacy 101:The analogy of such a disaster is not Munich, when the democracies yielded the German-speaking part of Czechoslovakia to Hitler, but the response when Mussolini invaded Abyssinia. At Munich, the democracies thought that Hitler's demands were essentially justified by the principle of self-determination; they were repelled mostly by his methods. In the Abyssinian crisis, the nature of the challenge was uncontested. By a vast majority, the League of Nations voted to treat the Italian adventure as aggression and to impose sanctions. But they recoiled before the consequences of their insight and rejected an oil embargo, which Italy would have been unable to overcome. The league never recovered from that debacle. If the six-nation forums dealing with Iran and North Korea suffer comparable failures, the consequence will be a world of unchecked proliferation, not controlled by either governing principles or functioning institutions.
Diplomacy never operates in a vacuum. It persuades not by the eloquence of its practitioners but by assembling a balance of incentives and risks. Clausewitz's famous dictum that war is a continuation of diplomacy by other means defines both the challenge and the limits of diplomacy. War can impose submission; diplomacy needs to evoke consensus. Military success enables the victor in war to prescribe, at least for an interim period. Diplomatic success occurs when the principal parties are substantially satisfied; it creates -- or should strive to create -- common purposes, at least regarding the subject matter of the negotiation; otherwise no agreement lasts very long. The risk of war lies in exceeding objective limits; the bane of diplomacy is to substitute process for purpose. Diplomacy should not be confused with glibness. It is not an oratorical but a conceptual exercise. When it postures for domestic audiences, radical challenges are encouraged rather than overcome.The popular methods of portraying diplomacy include its being on the opposite end of a one-dimensional axis that includes military action on its far end, and of characterizing diplomatic initiatives as merely talk and not action. Such a view is unconstructive. Diplomacy is dealmaking, pure and simple. The tragedy perhaps is that so much of our recent dealmaking has seemed much more like concession-making alone. As Kissinger mentions, diplomacy is not rhetoric; the other side of the negotiating table will not be swayed by the eloquence of domestic speeches. Kissinger next spends two paragraphs comparing the current situation with that of the US and China in the 1970s. He concludes that they are dramatically different:
The challenge of the Iranian negotiation is far more complex. For two years before the opening to China, the two sides had engaged in subtle, reciprocal, symbolic and diplomatic actions to convey their intentions. In the process, they had tacitly achieved a parallel understanding of the international situation, and China opted for seeking to live in a cooperative world.Kissinger sees a window of opportunity for diplomatic action and it looks something like this: allow Israel to teach Hezbollah a significant lesson; quickly come to consensus among the Six; use the Israeli action to encourage realism among the Iranians, an attitude that would abandon their messianic religious idealism heretofore displayed in favor of seeking a deal. It's a tall order and my guess is the window won't be open long.Nothing like that has occurred between Iran and the United States. There is not even an approximation of a comparable world view. Iran has reacted to the American offer to enter negotiations with taunts, and has inflamed tensions in the region. Even if the Hezbollah raids from Lebanon into Israel and the kidnapping of Israeli soldiers were not planned in Tehran, they would not have occurred had their perpetrators thought them inconsistent with Iranian strategy. In short, Iran has not yet made the choice of the world it seeks -- or it has made the wrong choice from the point of view of international stability. The crisis in Lebanon could mark a watershed if it confers a sense of urgency to the diplomacy of the Six and a note of realism to the attitudes in Tehran. [emphasis added]
Up to now Iran has been playing for time. The mullahs apparently seek to accumulate as much nuclear capability as possible so that, even were they to suspend enrichment, they would be in a position to use the threat of resuming their weapons effort as a means to enhance their clout in the region.Kissinger sees comprehensive sanctions as a necessity, and soon. And he encourages a process among the Six that will not necessitate 100% agreement or long pauses.Given the pace of technology, patience can easily turn into evasion. The Six will have to decide how serious they will be in insisting on their convictions. Specifically, the Six will have to be prepared to act decisively before the process of technology makes the objective of stopping uranium enrichment irrelevant. Well before that point is reached, sanctions will have to be agreed on. To be effective, they must be comprehensive; halfhearted, symbolic measures combine the disadvantage of every course of action. Interallied consultations must avoid the hesitation that the League of Nations conveyed over Abyssinia. We must learn from the North Korean negotiations not to engage in a process involving long pauses to settle disagreements within the administration and within the negotiating group, while the other side adds to its nuclear potential. There is equal need, on the part of America's partners, for decisions permitting them to pursue a parallel course.
A suspension of enrichment of uranium should not be the end of the process. A next step should be the elaboration of a global system of nuclear enrichment to take place in designated centers around the world under international control -- as proposed for Iran by Russia. This would ease implications of discrimination against Iran and establish a pattern for the development of nuclear energy without a crisis with each entrant into the nuclear field.This seems like a fantastic idea if it can be accomplished in a verifiably safe fashion.
President Bush has announced America's willingness to participate in the discussions of the Six with Iran to prevent emergence of an Iranian nuclear weapons program. But it will not be possible to draw a line between nuclear negotiations and a comprehensive review of Iran's overall relations to the rest of the world.This is a point that many other commentators have made: while Iran's nuclear program is our paramount concern, there are a number of other issues that need addressing, any one of which would be bad enough on its own.The legacy of the hostage crisis, the decades of isolation and the messianic aspect of the Iranian regime represent huge obstacles to such a diplomacy. If Tehran insists on combining the Persian imperial tradition with contemporary Islamic fervor, then a collision with America -- and, indeed, with its negotiating partners of the Six -- is unavoidable. Iran simply cannot be permitted to fulfill a dream of imperial rule in a region of such importance to the rest of the world.
At the same time, an Iran concentrating on the development of the talents of its people and the resources of its country should have nothing to fear from the United States. Hard as it is to imagine that Iran, under its present president, will participate in an effort that would require it to abandon its terrorist activities or its support for such instruments as Hezbollah, the recognition of this fact should emerge from the process of negotiation rather than being the basis for a refusal to negotiate. Such an approach would imply the redefinition of the objective of regime change, providing an opportunity for a genuine change in direction by Iran, whoever is in power.A good point: give the Iranians enough rope to hang themselves, then say diplomacy won't work. Don't just assume it won't. He may be referring to direct negotiations here.
It is important to express such a policy in precise objectives capable of transparent verification. A geopolitical dialogue is not a substitute for an early solution of the nuclear enrichment crisis. That must be addressed separately, rapidly and firmly. But a great deal depends on whether a strong stand on that issue is understood as the first step in the broader invitation to Iran to return to the wider world.Another good point: a policy of improving relations with the world should have identifiable and verfiable objectives.
In the end, the United States must be prepared to vindicate its efforts to prevent an Iranian nuclear weapons program. For that reason, America has an obligation to explore every honorable alternative.This final statement is where Kissinger shows he understands the game better than most of the denizens of Foggy Bottom ever will: "vindicating" US efforts implies efforts that have failed. And it refers to the use of force. Kissinger understands all too well the big stick that must be carried by the soft-spoken.
Altogether an excellent piece. Given the hyperbolic nature of the coverage of Israel's war with Hezbollah, Iran's nuke program has fallen by the wayside. Kissinger's piece could not have come at a better time. In summary: Iran is the real problem; the clock is ticking quickly; there's an opportunity; get after it. Wise words from an old man.
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July 28, 2006
Discussion Topic: The Future of Iraq
The US is shifting forces around Iraq and the region in order to bolster security in Baghdad. Around 6,000 Iraqis have killed each other in June and July.
Can the US slow the pace of sectarian violence long enough for professional native security organizations to grow?
If the answer is no, then what should US policy be?
If the central government dissolves and the country splits, what should US policy be?
Let me argue first, that the US will be able to staunch the violence to bring the sectarian killings to a lower-level and prevent an open civil war. That the answer to number 2 is to go after the Mahdi Army and al Sadr. And the answer to number three, I'm not sure about, but absolutely certain that complete withdrawal would be the poorest of options because we would have less influence on the outcome of the dissolution.
Please discuss.
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July 27, 2006
The Hamdan Decision and the Privatization of War
I've written a short piece about the Hamdan decision and the privatization of warfare for PajamasMedia's new POLITICS CENTRAL portal. You can find it here.
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July 23, 2006
Discussion Topic: Splitting Syria From Iran, Hez
The AP reports that a major diplomatic task is being undertaken: an attempt to split Syria from its support of Hezbollah, and presumably, from its alliance with Iran, is underway:
With Israel and the United States saying a real cease-fire is not possible until Hezbollah is reined in, Arab heavyweights Egypt and Saudi Arabia were pushing Syria to end its support for the guerrillas, Arab diplomats in Cairo said.Let's all discuss. My stream-of-consciousness thoughts:A loss of Syria's support would deeply weaken Hezbollah, though its other ally,
Iran, gives it a large part of its money and weapons. The two moderate Arab governments were prepared to spend heavily from Egypt's political capital in the region and Saudi Arabia's vast financial reserves to break Damascus from the guerrillas and Iran, the diplomats said.Syria said it will press for a cease-fire to end the fighting — but only in the framework of a broader Middle East peace initiative that would include the return of the Golan Heights. Israel was unlikely to accept such terms but it was the first indication of Syria's willingness to be involved in efforts to defuse the crisis.
-Do the major Arab powers have the wherewithal, whether politcal capital or financial resources, to sway Syria from its support of Hezbollah by themselves? How is such an agreement enforceable?
Seems that if they can pull it off by themselves that would be a serious accomplishment for the US because it would mean no concessions on our part in negotiations. Even with US support in the background, for example, pressuring Israel to do or not do certain things as good-faith measures, it would still be a significant move forward.
-Can the Arab powers appeal to Assad's regime as Arabs? Does that appeal carry more water than the amity he feels with Iran since his ruling caste is Shia?
-If the US enters these negotiations, what will be on the table? The US has had many differences with Syria in the past three years: the harboring of Saddam's lieutenants, the support for the insurgency, the assassination of Hariri and lack of cooperation with the resulting investigation . . . what is the US prepared to offer Syria to entice it away from Iran's umbrella? Is there a Libya-like deal there to be made? Can Qaddafi come in and do a bit of "witnessing" as it were?
-Is it possible to corral Syria away from Iran's influence while not affecting its innate hostility to Israel? My guess is yes, but only if the Arabs make the deal among themselves.
-If Syria drops its support for Hezbollah, would that serve to sunder its security relationship with Iran? What does Iran gain from being "allied" with Syria if Syria no longer supports Hezbollah?
All of this seems like reading a good mafia novel with competing crime families. Assad is weak and inexperienced. Everyone sees him as the weakest link. Does he know it? Is he trying to figure out who is the best candidate to be his protector? Whose wrath will he fear more? Iran or the US?
-Aside from political capital and financial resources, what levers can the Egyptians, Jordanians and Saudis pull to put pressure on the House of Assad?
What do all of you Loyal Readers think?
MORE: I just saw Tigerhawk's post on this same topic and he makes some of the same points I do. So go there for more discussion and his thoughts.
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July 19, 2006
Game, Set, Match: Hezbollah's Demise Has Been Decided
UPDATE FOLLOWS BELOW
My spider senses tell me that the US has decided to give Israel a goodly amount of time to destroy Hezbollah. NPR's All Things Considered today interviewed US Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Nicholas Burns. Since the resignation of Robert Zoellick, a few weeks ago, Burns is the number two man at State. He's always interesting to observe and is one of the heavy hitters behind US policy. Consider: [emphases added, and let me also state for the record for the NPR folks that I duly paid $3.95 for this transcript, rather than listening with realaudio and copying myself]:
ROBERT SIEGEL, host: Secretary of State Rice said today that there should be a cease-fire in Lebanon as soon as possible when conditions are conducive. Does that mean after Israel is satisfied that is has sufficiently disabled Hezbollah?The US is creating a diplomatic dilemma for Hezbollah: in order to stop the Israeli offensive, Hezbollah will have to take actions that inherently admit defeat and discredit it. Returning the Israeli soldiers and removing itself from the south might leave the Arab street sufficiently riled up, but these actions will be strategic disasters. And that's not to even mention the attrition their forces will have suffered at whatever point the fighting stops.Undersecretary BURNS: Well, I think it means that the conditions have to be appropriate for a ceasefire to be effective. What all the leader in St. Petersburg said over the weekend - the G-8 countries and that - is that it’s very important that we go to the heart of the problem. And the heart of the problem is that Hezbollah - in deciding to abduct the Israeli soldiers and in deciding to now inflict a reign of terror on Israeli cities in the north - has actually broken four U.N. Security Council violations. And as you know Robert, this has been a 25 to 30 year struggle over that border. And what we wanted to do is make sure that the border can be safe and secure so that there’s no need for violence on either side. Hezbollah has broken that long- standing prohibition on violence.
SIEGEL: But to pursue this notion of when conditions are conducive - if the Israelis felt that it would take them several more weeks of air strikes in order to degrade Hezbollah, would that be acceptable to Washington? Or do you think that the countdown to a cease-fire is measured in days rather than weeks?
Undersecretary BURNS: I think what has to happen now is that Hezbollah has to return the abducted soldiers, and Hezbollah has to also stop the bombing of Northern Israel. That is a condition that - not only the United States - but all the European countries, Russian, and Japan laid down the other day.
That’s why Secretary Rice said when conditions are appropriate, because a cease-fire in place today would essentially leave Hezbollah in a victorious position, and Hezbollah with a sword hanging over Israel’s head. That is not a condition conducive to peace or stability. And it’s a tragic situation, because Lebanon is very much a victim of what Hezbollah has done.
SIEGEL: Does that mean, then, that Hezbollah would have to return the Israeli soldiers it captured and also completely disarm in the South of Lebanon in order for there to be conditions conducive to a cease fire?
Undersecretary BURNS: Well, I don’t - we have certainly not been that specific about conditions conducive to a cease-fire, nor has anyone else. Kofi Annan has not been that specific.
Everyone knows what happened here. And I think what was remarkable about the St. Petersburg statement issued yesterday morning by the leaders was that they said there was one party responsible for this, and it’s Hezbollah. They all said that. If you look at the public statements of Egypt and of Saudi Arabia, and look at the statements of Kofi Annan himself - it was Hezbollah who started this. And Hezbollah has now put us and put us and put the Israelis in a situation where they have to defend their country.
So our task as diplomats and our task in the United States is to try to use our influence and our energy to right that situation, and it has to begin with Hezbollah.
SIEGEL: Since the president was heard saying that he believes someone ought to tell Syria to tell Hezbollah to cut it out in Southern Lebanon, why aren’t we saying that to Syria? Why aren’t we talking directly to Syria now?
Undersecretary BURNS: Well, we’re certainly talking to the Syrians. I mean, they have an ambassador in Washington, we have an embassy in Damascus. The quality of that relationship is very, very poor.
Syria, of course, is a country that in our view has destabilized Lebanon for the past 30 years. And we certainly don’t want to see Syria now try to regain its position in Lebanon. But the other day in St. Petersburg, the leader said – all of them – that in addition to the extreme miss by Hezbollah starting this conflict, there were others who supported, who bore a equal responsibility, and Syria and Iran are certainly two of them.
Siegel: Equal responsibility?
Undersecretary BURNS: Well certainly, Syria and Iran have to be held accountable for what they’ve done, and it’s our strong advice that they would stop resupplying Hezbollah in the coming days.
SIEGEL: So the long and the short of it is the Israelis should continue until they really deal a grievous blow to Hezbollah. That’s the - that should be the condition that precedes any kind of ceasefire?
Undersecretary BURNS: I wouldn’t put it like that. I would put it in the following way: that Hezbollah has the responsibility now to take the steps to end this crisis. And the obligation rests with Hezbollah to begin to lead the region back towards peace, and that’s where we will be putting our efforts over the next several days and several weeks.
Allow me to paint a best-case scenario: The US or EU brokers backchannel diplomacy between Syria and Israel to the effect that neither will attack the other unprovoked. Israel then is given diplomatic leeway to absolutely destroy Hezbollah, even to the extent of entering the Beka'a Valley, provided it takes place within a reasonable amount of time.
The next step will be: how to ensure that no terrorist force metastasizes on Israel's border once again? Or really, how to ensure that no terrorist force can threaten Israel from the north? A buffer zone isn't really helpful if Hezbollah or anyone else can just get longer-range missiles and use them from Northern Lebanon. Instead, one of two things has to happen:
a) someone responsible has to control Lebanon's borders. It could be the Israelis, though they won't want to; the Lebanese though they'll be questionble in their effectiveness; or the "international community" which probably means the US (though perhaps the French would help, given that they used to own Lebanon).
Or
b) Lebanon's borders must be redrawn and the Beka'a declared an international DMZ of some sort. This is extremely unlikely.
The reason for the necessity of one of these options is because the international system should have no desire for a conflict like the current one to happen again. The only way this is possible is if the next time a terrorist organization supported by Syria launches attacks at Israel, it does so from within Syria. This will then clarify thngs for the rest of the world. Borders, which are among the most sacrosanct of the current system's rules, will have been violated, and that makes consequences easier.
In other words the goal of the international community should not just be the destruction of Hezbollah; it should be a solution such that a similar proxy cannot emerge.
Before you hound me in the comments, please, like I said, it's a best-case scenario . . . Some of the conditions of the best-case will undoubtedly not be met. Finally, this is excepting some event by Iran which escalates the conflict. Then, all bets are off.
UPDATE: Bill Roggio and the other smart guys at the Counterterrorism Blog study the Israeli military call-ups, rather than reading the diplomacy tea leaves like me, and come to a different conclusion:
While there is always the possibility the Israeli government and military officials are conducting a sophisticated information operations campaign, the military is not mobilizing for a large scale invasion of Lebanon. Only three battalions (about 300 troops per battalion) have been mobilized over the past few days. With Israel being a small nation, a large scale call up of troops could not be hidden from public view.Goodness knows there are smarter guys than me at the Counterterrorism Blog. All of this shows the difficulty of reaching a consensus on intelligence issues. At least those of us in the blogosphere try to make predictions . . .
The same post also mentions that "air strikes cannot defeat Hezbollah's forces alone." If their analysis is correct, then a decision will not be reached, and the entire tumult will revert to the status quo ante.
In my mind this would be unfortunate.
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July 16, 2006
NEO Questions
Noncombatant Evacuation Operation in Lebanon: The US will take the lead in evacuating Americans and other allied nation's citizens from Lebanon. In fact, there is already an assessment team on the ground figuring out the logistics of how to do a mass evacuation, especially since the Israelis have taken the Beirut airport out of action. Here's a couple of key issues that will be important:
a) throughput of personnel: If the evacuation is to be handled by helicopters as Spook 86 argues, and those are from the USS Iwo Jima Expeditionary Strike Group, then there are going to be some serious logistical problems to be solved if the NEO is not to drag on for weeks. How many helicopters does the ESG have? An educated guess would be less than 30, mainly CH-46s and CH-53s, with a handful of Navy CH-60s. Figure an average of 20ish people per trip and you start to see the problem. There are an estimated 25,000 Americans in Lebanon, not to mention foreign nationals. Now the second part of the problem is the distance that must be flown. Cyprus has been mentioned as one drop-off point, where follow-on fixed wing transport can be arranged to Europe or back to the States. Nicosia, Cyprus is 150 miles from Beirut, according to Google Earth. This makes for one long flight for just 20 people per bird. Finally, I think they'll have to go to Cyprus. It's the closest relatively safe place with airfields.
I'm no NEO expert. There are probably a variety of techniques to shorten the roundtrip distance needed per flight in order to increase the flow of personnel. But here's two predictions: the US is going to surge more helicopters to the region somehow. And, don't be surprised if the British and especially French navies show up to assist in the evacuation. The NEO will be big.
b) Rules of engagement: The NEO will require a relatively light footprint on the ground; it probably will not be conducted under fire, so there can probably be some bare minimum in the way of processing stations. These areas, however many there are, will need security. I'd expect at least a company of Marine infantry to go ashore to provide security at pickup sites. A larger force could be required, depending on how many pickup sites there are and how dispersed they are.
This leads one to wonder what sorts of rules of engagement they'll be given. If sniped at, what's the response? If the transport helos receive ground fire, will Cobras be on call to respond?
Finally, aside from tactical considerations of ROE and responses, what does it mean strategically if an American helicopter is shot down in Lebanon? That is the biggest risk of the entire operation. Finally, if US ships are close to shore, what's to prevent Hezbollah from using one of its drones to attack the US Navy?
Written by Chester at 11:12 PM | Link | Comments (13) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article
July 13, 2006
The Guns of July Part Two
Assorted thoughts for today about the conflict in the Middle East:
1. All day I thought, you know, there really hasn't been that much activity on the ground yet. Richard Fernandez agrees, writing in a Belmont Club thread:
. . . remember that actual events on the ground are still limited, despite the ominous sounds being generated everywhere. That might be part of the posturing game. Our best bet is to keep watching. We'll know where this goes soon enough.I agree.
2. Strategic Forecasting, in a subscription-only piece (hat-tip to Tigerhawk) has predicted this [emphasis added]:
Given the blockade and what appears to be the shape of the airstrikes, it seems to us at the moment the Israelis are planning to go fairly deep into Lebanon. The logical first step is a move to the Litani River in southern Lebanon. But given the missile attacks on Haifa, they will go farther, not only to attack launcher sites, but to get rid of weapons caches.This means a move deep into the Bekaa Valley, the seat of Hezbollah power and the location of plants and facilities. Such a penetration would leave Israeli forces' left flank open, so a move into Bekaa would likely be accompanied by attacks to the west. It would bring the Israelis close to Beirut again.This is eerily similar to a possible scenario for Israeli action described in an opinion piece in the Jerusalem Post[emphasis added here as well]:This leaves Israel's right flank exposed, and that exposure is to Syria. The Israeli doctrine is that leaving Syrian airpower intact while operating in Lebanon is dangerous. Therefore, Israel must at least be considering using its air force to attack Syrian facilities, unless it gets ironclad assurances the Syrians will not intervene in any way. Conversations are going on between Egypt and Syria, and we suspect this is the subject. But Israel would not necessarily object to the opportunity of eliminating Syrian air power as part of its operation, or if Syria chooses, going even further.
At the same time, Israel does not intend to get bogged down in Lebanon again. It will want to go in, wreak havoc, withdraw. That means it will go deeper and faster, and be more devastating, than if it were planning a long-term occupation. It will go in to liquidate Hezbollah and then leave. True, this is no final solution, but for the Israelis, there are no final solutions.
For some time, the defense establishment has considered the Hizbullah armaments an important enough target to justify preemptive action. Therefore, the removal of the missile threat and the perceived strategic parity that has constrained Israel's reaction to past Hizbullah provocations must be the primary goal of an Israeli invasion of southern Lebanon.Eliminating the Hizbullah missile threat will allow greater freedom of action against Syria and Iran. The "search and destroy" mode of operation required for capturing and/or destroying the missiles hidden in numerous locations necessitates the use of ground forces. But, of course, even their cautious employment under an aerial umbrella might be costly. To a large extent the success of Israeli actions in Lebanon will be measured by the counting of casualties.
Israel may well capitalize on its missile hunt in Lebanon to expand the goal of the operations. Israeli threats to seriously punish Hizbullah probably mean targeting its leadership. A "gloves off" policy to decapitate Hizbullah could paralyze this terrorist organization for several years. This would clearly signal Israel's determination to deal with terrorist threats and with Iranian proxies.
A further expansion of goals concerns Syria - the channel for Iranian support to Hizbullah. Damascus still hosts the headquarters of Hamas and Islamic Jihad, despite promising the Americans a few years ago to close their offices.
Israel may enjoy much freedom of action versus Syria because Syria frustrated the American and French attempts to limit it's influence in Lebanon in their quest to restore Lebanon's independence. Washington, in particular, may relish military pressure on a Bashar Assad regime that allows infiltration of insurgents into Iraq from its territory.
Syrian targets could be attacked by an Israel Air Force that could easily suppress the Syrian air defenses and acquire aerial supremacy. Israel may also decide the time is ripe for attacking the Syrian long-range missile infrastructure, whose threat hovers over most of Israel.
3. Michael Ledeen makes this point in an NRO piece:
After a few days of fighting, I would not be surprised to see some new kind of terrorist attack against Israel, or against an American facility in the region. An escalation to chemical weapons, for example, or even the fulfillment of the longstanding Iranian promise to launch something nuclear at Israel. They meant it when they said it, don’t you know?The kidnapping yesterday put the initiative in the hands of Hezbollah. Israel has regained the initiative in this conflict with its rapid and robust response. It's important at this point to differentiate between acts by Hezbollah that regain the initiative yet again at the operational level and acts which escalate the conflict in an attempt to seize the initiative at the strategic level. If Israel conducts airstrikes in Syria, this is an escalation, a strategic enlargement of the conflict. The same is true of Hezbollah acts that involve overt Syrian or Iranian involvement. On the other hand, an Israeli ground incursion into Lebanon does not seem like such an escalation. The same might be said for rocket attacks by Hezbollah. These would be more confined to the existing campaign space, small though it may be.
4. Today, the Intrade prediction market contracts dealing with Iran were extremely active and had high volume. Here's a breakdown:
a) The contract "USA and/or Israel to execute an overt Air Strike against Iran by 31SEP06" increased from 5.0 to 10.0, an increase of 100% on volume of 631.
b) The contract "USA and/or Israel to execute an overt Air Strike against Iran by 31DEC06" increased from 10.0 to 18.0, an increase of 80%, on volume of 5050.
c) The contract "USA and/or Israel to execute an overt Air Strike against Iran by 31March07" increased from 15.0 to 22.0, an increase of 47%, on volume of 8179.
For the uninitiated, these contracts are settled when the event occurs or when the date expires. When a contract is settled, it is either a "yes" and the value goes to 100, or it is a "no" and the value drops to 0. So the "price" level of the contracts currently don't indicate a huge sentiment that airstrikes are imminent, since the prices are mostly closer to 0. But they are worth watching to see how that sentiment changes in the coming days. At least, they are worth watching if you have any belief whatsoever in the wisdom of crowds.
5. Here's a couple of requests for information for you Loyal Readers:
a) What's the range and payload of Israel's Jericho missiles? What would be the most effective use of them if Israel wanted to strike Iran? How many does it have? I researched this once and I think they have between 200 and 300. But I bet there are readers who know better than any quick Google searches I could do.
b) Have there ever been any reports of chemical weapons being shipped to Hezbollah? How credible are those reports? Can Katusha or Fajr rockets hold a chemical payload without destroying it on detonation?
c) Can rocket attacks be countered with counterbattery fire? My guess is that the Katushas can, but that something like the Fajr missiles depend on how close the counterbattery tubes are to the launch sites. Artillery has a much shorter range than rockets do.
d) What's the latest version of Patriots we've sold to Israel? Do they have PAC3s or just PAC2s? There's an order of magnitude of difference in performance.
6. Tigerhawk's big post today was extremely insightful. This is his conclusion:
Iran cannot afford to let Israel decimate Hezbollah in Lebanon. If Israel measures its response to preserve Hezbollah, a wider war can still be avoided. However, if Israel decides that it can no longer allow Hezbollah to attack it from Lebanon, Iran will have to intervene. The question is how? One method might be to increase the pressure on the United States, the external player with the greatest ability to influence Israel. If Iraq's Shiites rise up during the crisis in Lebanon, we will know who is behind them.This is a very compelling argument. Allow some absolutely unadulterated speculation: If Iran's goal is to set the Middle East ablaze in order to give it as much leverage as possible in upcoming trials concerning its nuke program, then an Iraqi uprising seems like a great way to do so. The question is, can they actually accomplish such an uprising? I haven't followed the latest antics of Moqtada Al-Sadr closely enough to know. Readers may disagree. Keep an eye on Muthanna province though, which was turned over to the Iraqi security forces in toto today. That is deep in the heart of Shi'ite Iraq. If there's to be some sort of uprising, it might be one place to look, and the target might not be American and coalition forces, but the Iraqi government.
Please discuss.
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July 12, 2006
The Guns of July
UPDATES BELOW
The big news of the hour is twofold: first, Carl in Jerusalem has it on good authority that Israel is stepping up its strikes into Lebanon and will declare war tonight against its neighbor. I've never heard of Carl in Jerusalem before but that post is being linked from everywhere. So far, no other secondary confirmation of an open declaration of war, even though Drudge himself is running with the headline "It's War, Israel Says" which points to this piece in which Olmert doesn't say that but calls "the Hezbollah raid an "act of war" by Lebanon and threatened "very, very, very painful" retaliation."
Then there's good ole Debka, which always has something interesting, but which usually must be taken with a shaker of salt. Debka is reporting both that Ali Larijani, the Iranian National Security Advisor, is in Damascus for consultations with Syria, AND that the real reason this whole dustup started is so Iran can force the G8 to focus on Israel during their conference starting today:
Tehran hopes to hijack the agenda before the G-8 summit opening in St. Petersberg, Russia on July 15. Instead of discussing Iran’s nuclear case and the situation in Iraq along the lines set by President George W. Bush, the leaders of the industrial nations will be forced to address the Middle East flare-up.This makes for an interesting little narrative, but it ascribes a great degree of control of events to the Iranians -- a degree that is hard to sustain at any level when human beings are involved. Keep It Simple Stupid is the best defense against conspiracy theories: no plan ever survives contact with the enemy, and conspiracy theories are always the most convoluted of plans.
But even if Iran didn't set in motion the current crisis, there's no reason to believe it doesn't want to profit from it.
If Larijani is in Damascus, my guess is they're trying to keep Israel from declaring war on Syria at all costs. Consider:
-Syria is militarily extremely weak compared to Israel
-Iran is not only weaker than Israel, it has no easy method of threatening Israel, save with missiles of questionable accuracy.
-Israel can strike Syria from the air with impunity.
Now consider: from the Iranian and Syrian standpoint, the best course of action is to vex the Israelis as much as possible via their Hamas and Hezbollah proxies. So long as this happens, Israel does take the headlines, and the attention span at the G8. But as soon as Israel declares war on Syria, or commits an act of war, which might be the same thing, then events start to turn sour for the Iranians:
-Iran will have to declare war on Israel or risk losing face in the region, since it has pledged to defend Syria
-Syria's government would likely fall; what might follow it is anyone's guess; what does follow might not be nearly as close to Iranian interests
-Israel and the US have never fought on the same side at the same time, but Lord (and Yahweh) knows they'll help each other in other ways. If a three-way war breaks out, and Israel requested US permission to use bases in Iraq for strikes against Iran, even for refueling, the US might grant them their wish. Alternatively, it was rumored long ago that Israel had set up a deal with the Kurds to use Kurdish bases for strikes into Iran. The same might be true of Turkey, which has no love for Iran either.
From the Israeli standpoint, it all depends on what they can gain from striking Syria. If they think strikes in Syria will convince the Syrians to pressure Hamas to release Shalit, they might give it a shot. But they are probably just as aware of the consequences as anyone else: Iran might declare war.
So my guess is neither Israel, nor Syria, nor Iran want to get in a war with each other at the moment. But there're always wild cards. At least three groups, Israel, Hamas, Hizbollah, and possibly a fourth, the Lebanese military, are now involved. From that stew, an event might emerge that like it or not would force a widening of the conflict by one side or another, or an entry by Iran or Syria. This is it, in a nutshell: Is Israel willing to risk a widening of the conflict in order to dismantle Hamas and Hezbollah? Is Iran willing to risk the dismantlement of Hamas and Hezbollah in order NOT to widen the conflict?
The New Republic carries a piece entitled, Battle Plans:
The next Middle East war--Israel against genocidal Islamism--has begun. The first stage of the war started two weeks ago, with the Israeli incursion into Gaza in response to the kidnapping of an Israeli soldier and the ongoing shelling of Israeli towns and kibbutzim; now, with Hezbollah's latest attack, the war has spread to southern Lebanon. Ultimately, though, Israel's antagonists won't be Hamas and Hezbollah but their patrons, Iran and Syria. The war will go on for months, perhaps several years. There may be lulls in the fighting, perhaps even temporary agreements and prisoner exchanges. But those periods of calm will be mere respites . . .And we silly Americans thought this was about one captured Israeli soldier. Stupid, stupid . . .The ultimate threat, though, isn't Hezbollah or Hamas but Iran. And as Iran draws closer to nuclear capability--which the Israeli intelligence community believes could happen this year--an Israeli-Iranian showdown becomes increasingly likely. According to a very senior military source with whom I've spoken, Israel is still hoping that an international effort will stop a nuclear Iran; if that fails, then Israel is hoping for an American attack. But if the Bush administration is too weakened to take on Iran, then, as a last resort, Israel will have to act unilaterally. And, added the source, Israel has the operational capability to do so.
For Israelis, that is the worst scenario of all. Except, of course, the scenario of nuclear weapons in the hands of the patron state of Hezbollah and Hamas.
UPDATE, 8:08am EST: Welcome Pajamas Media and Roger Simon readers! Roger says, about this post: "I think he is naive in thinking the Israelis didn't want this confrontation. It may be quite the opposite - at least in its result. You could look at this all as Sharon's trap... and his adversaries walked right into it."
Hmm. Could be. The question is what kind of confrontation did they want? Is this a limited action meant to stop the kidnapping for prisoners rubric that has become standard practice? Or is this something larger? Is it meant to attack Hezbollah in depth? Or is it even larger, meant to hit Syria and Iran too? My guess, as I tried to outline above, is that the Israelis don't want to spark a regional conflict, just hurt Hezbollah very badly.
Here are some interesting things to read:
-The Jerusalem Post reports :
Defense Minister Amir Peretz said on Thursday morning that Israel would not allow Hizbullah to return to its positions on Lebanon's southern border. He also demanded that Lebanese forces secure the border, something they have not done to date, during comments made to the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee.Hmm. Several months.A high-ranking IDF source said that the current operation, dubbed Operation Just Reward, would be "long" and could last up to several months, or "as long as it takes to destroy the Hizbullah's ability to launch attacks against Israel."
Raja @ Lebanese Bloggers, who's been doing a play-by-play of events, also something big is in the works:
Something tells me that everything the Israelis are doing right now is preparation for something much bigger.Finally, this is the most interesting thing I've read in the past 24 hours. An article written in August of 2002 by Mark Silverberg, an author in the Ariel Center for Policy Research is an absolute must-read:
American and Israeli leadership both share a common concern that Bashar al-Assad is "playing with fire". Hezbollah has the ability - even the intention - of sparking an explosion that could lead to a regional war. Nasrallah now possesses 7,000 Katyusha rockets - each targeted at Israel. Some are heavy, long-range missiles that threaten the entire Galilee region to the outskirts of Haifa (and its oil refineries).Read the whole thing. It's an uncanny description of exactly what's happening 4 years later.Hezbollah has completed building a line of forward positions along the Israeli border, complete with video cameras that track the IDF's movements in order to learn the operational routine of its units. Iranian officers in Southern Lebanon check Hezbollah deployments directly under Syrian eyes.
Within the next several months, Hezbollah will also complete construction of its second line of defense deep inside South Lebanon meant to create a barrier against any Israeli armed advance. The effect of such a barrier will permit Hezbollah to shell northern Israel continuously over a period of several months, and, if necessary, to slow an Israeli retaliatory invasion.
The problem for Israel is that young President al-Assad has surrounded himself with people inexperienced in high politics, although he recognizes his country's military and technological inferiority to Israel. Assad Jr. unfortunately, is fascinated by Nasrallah, accepts his patronizing praise and has allowed him to hold at least one Hezbollah paramilitary parade on Syrian soil.
He's playing the dangerous game of brinksmanship without understanding the rules. Slowly, almost invisibly, an important revolution appears to be underway. Hezbollah is gradually consolidating its strength in Syria, and the Iranians, whose Vice-President recently visited Damascus, have "laid down the law" for the confused leadership there.
A Syria that can be manipulated by Hezbollah under Iranian guidance could well miss that crucial moment when Iran and Hezbollah attempt to spark a regional conflagration by means of a military provocation on Israel's northeastern border.
That is a major source of concern to both Israel and the United States Defense Department. A weak and naive Syria will accelerate the power, influence and growth of Hezbollah, just as Arafat now finds it impossible to control Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Tanzim and the al Aksa Martyrs Brigades in the Palestinian territories. The more that Nasrallah is convinced that Assad Jr. is not up to speed; the more he will be convinced that he, in consultation with his Iranian cohorts, holds the key to power. And if he is convinced that there is an American threat to Iran, he will preempt it by striking at the Galilee to provoke an Israeli retaliatory strike.
But that retaliatory strike will be at Hezbollah in Lebanon as well as Syria.
This is not an imaginary scenario. As recently as three weeks ago, American and Israeli UN representatives met privately with their Syrian counterpart to warn him of the danger posed to Syria and the entire region by Hezbollah.
The singular conclusion is that someone has to inject sufficient fear into the Syrians to bring Nasrallah down.
And if the Europeans and Americans can't, the Israelis will. [emphasis added]
UPDATE2 8:38am EST: Welcome Instapundit readers! Please comment. What does everyone else think?
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July 11, 2006
The bastards have done it again
Terrorists have attacked the metro system in Mumbai (aka Bombay), killing an estimated 135.
Is this to be the nature of the world for the foreseeable future? Civilzation perpetually under siege? Innocents regularly dead? If this is not stopped, we will descend to the Dark Ages in a death of a thousand cuts.
The Terrorist, He's WatchingHow will this affect India-Pakistan relations? The role of India in suppressing Iran's nuclear program (if there is one)? The strengthening of US-India ties? Domestic responses within India?The bomb in the bar will explode at thirteen twenty.
Now it's just thirteen sixteen.
There's still time for some to go in,
And some to come out.The terrorist has already crossed the street.
The distance keeps him out of danger,
And what a view -- just like the movies.A woman in a yellow jacket, she's going in.
A man in dark glasses, he's coming out.
Teen-agers in jeans, they're talking.
Thirteen seventeen and four seconds.
The short one, he's lucky, he's getting on a scooter,
But the tall one, he's going in.Thirteen seventeen and forty seconds.
That girl, she's walking along with a green ribbon in her hair.
But then a bus suddenly pulls in front of her.
Thirteen eighteen.
The girl's gone.
Was she that dumb, did she go in or not,
We'll see when they carry them out.Thirteen nineteen.
Somehow, no one's going in.
Another guy, fat, bald, is leaving, though.
Wait a second, looks like he's looking
For something in his pockets and
At thirteen twenty minus ten seconds
He goes back in for his crummy gloves.Thirteen twenty exactly.
The waiting, it's taking forever.
Any second now.
No, not yet.
Yes, now.
The bomb, it explodes.-Wislawa Szymborska
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June 30, 2006
Of Note
Some things to note for weekend thinking:
1. The Guardian reports that:
The intelligence agencies have warned ministers that Iran could launch terrorist attacks against British targets if the row over its controversial nuclear programme escalates, it was disclosed today.That's something to keep in mind. The same article notes:The parliamentary intelligence and security committee - which oversees the work of the agencies - said the possibility of Iranian state-sponsored terrorism was now considered one of the main threats facing the UK.
"There is increasing international tension over Iran's nuclear programme and backing of groups such as Lebanese Hezbollah," the committee said in its annual report.
"There is a possibility of an increased threat to UK interests from Iranian state-sponsored terrorism should the diplomatic situation deteriorate."
The report also revealed that MI5, the security service, was expanding so rapidly in order to meet the threat of terrorism in the UK that it had outgrown its London headquarters building.Wow. That is amazing. MI-5 is the agency that will be infiltrating or surveiling any homegrown terror cells or organizations. Good to see that they are taking things seriously across the pond.Thames House at Westminster is expected to have exhausted its capacity by October. The committee said another building had been found to provide additional accommodation - but its identity was censored out on security grounds.
MI5 staff numbers are now expected to grow by over 50% over the next three years, with over half its resources now devoted to counter-terrorism.
2. That article was via RegimeChangeIran, which is asking for your help. Gary Metz, aka Dr. Zin, is requesting donations for "several campaigns to take this work to the next level." Look for more info there soon. He's also asking for volunteers. Sounds like he has something up his sleeve . . . RegimeChangeIran is a great site, so consider supporting him.
3. Finally, while we're in an altruistic mood, Robert Mayer of Publiuspundit sends this:
I have decided to try the path of Michael Totten sans the Middle East. I will be writing pieces from places like Honduras (one of the darkest corners in Latin America), Catalunya (which voted for large autonomy from Spain), The Netherlands (where the government has collapsed over the Ayaan Hirsi Ali affair), Switzerland (an overlooked and extremely interesting country), and the Czech Republic (home of the original velvet revolution that people talk so much about). Most of my reporting will be from Latin America and eventually Eastern Europe, someday moving on to other regions.His first post is here. Check it out and if you like it hit his tipjar.
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June 29, 2006
The Geneva Convention for a Non-State Entity
Today's Supreme Court ruling seems to me a remarkable point in the development of a kind of quasi-sovereignty for non-state organizations.
Were there to develop an Anti-Qaeda force, a private military to pursue Al Qaeda and win the war on its own terms, then their members would also have the Geneva Conventions apply to them, were they ever to be apprehended or detained by the US, yes? In other words, if the Geneva Convention now applies to a non-state that is a non-signatory in the eyes of the US, does it not then apply to ALL non-states that are non-signatories?
This is quite a large new degree of sovereignty that has been granted to non-state organizations. How will the concept of citizenship evolve with decisions like these?
If protections that normally accrue to states after debate and ratification can now be given over to non-states which have no mechanism for ratification, let alone debate, one can easily imagine a scenario in which non-state organizations form themselves and immediately possess the rights of a state, with no corresponding need to adhere to any laws in their own activities.
If this is the case, then we have the answer to the war: it will be privatized, and its ultimate victories won by uninhibited private military actors, not the hamstrung citizen militaries of nation-states.
Any legal minds out there are welcome to comment.
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June 27, 2006
Open Letter to the President of the New York Times
I just sent this email to Scott Heekin-Canedy, President and General Manager of the New York Times:
To: scotthc@nytimes.comI do not expect a response, but will certainly print any I receive.Subj: Publication of Classified Material
Mr. Heekin-Canedy,
I am outraged that the New York Times chose to publicize an ongoing intelligence operation on its front page on June 23rd, 2006. By the admission of the story itself, the program to track terrorist financing was legal; it was effective; it was limited; it had no history of ongoing abuse; it was independently audited by an outside board; and it was briefed to members of Congress. What else could one want from a classified program? If the t's weren't crossed and the i's weren't dotted, then I challenge the New York Times to mount some constructive criticism that would have made the program better.
While you consider that, I am contacting the largest institutional shareholders in the New York Times Co and asking them to sell their stakes. I am also contacting the three largest buyers of national advertising and asking them to refrain from buying advertising in your publication. Below is a copy of an email I've just sent to Proctor and Gamble, General Motors, and Time-Warner.
Begin copy:
Greetings,On Friday, June 23rd, 2006, the New York Times published on its front page the details of a classified, legal, and effective program to monitor the financial transactions of terrorist networks. The program is legal and had been briefed to members of Congress. It had no known record of ongoing abuse and is audited by an independent board of auditors.
The decision to out such a government program endangers our national security, with such little benefit to the public as to seriously question the judgment of those who decided to publish the story.
As one of the largest national advertisers in the United States, I’d like to recommend that your firm seriously consider not purchasing advertising in the New York Times. Why invest in a media organization that displays such little respect for the security of the United States?
I write on my own behalf, and not for the government. Thanks very much for your consideration.
[End copy]I am extremely disappointed that the Times has chosen to endanger our national security in such a blatant fashion, with such little to gain from that recklessness. And to be based in Manhattan as well! Unbelievable! Do the memories of our enemies' intent to take innocent life run so shallow on 43rd Street?
Despite your protestations of serving the public interest, I think your newspaper's decision is disgraceful.
Sincerely,
Joshua P. Manchester
Captain, US Marine Corps Reserve
UPDATE: Response received from T. Rowe Price:
Dear Captin [sic] Manchester:Pretty standard, but the first paragraph indicates that they did actually read my email, which is better than I could have hoped for.Thank you for your e-mail to T. Rowe Price.
We appreciate your taking the time to contact us regarding our
investment association with the New York Times Company. Please be
assured that your comments have been forwarded to the appropriate party
for consideration.If you have any questions or need additional assistance, please call us
at 1-800-225-5132. Representatives are available Monday through Friday
from 7 a.m. to 12 a.m. ET and Saturday and Sunday from 8:30 a.m. to 5
p.m. ET.Sincerely,
Cameron Coleman
Senior Account Services Representative
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June 26, 2006
Hit Em Where It Hurts
SCROLL DOWN FOR UPDATES
It is sad and unfortunate that the New York Times has chosen to publish the classified details of a legal and effective government program meant to secure the Republic from attack. In fact, it is not just sad, it is enraging. In December, I thought that the outing of the NSA wiretapping techniques was in poor form, but there was a case to be made, and it was made by many, many commentators, that the program was operating in a gray area of the law.
But this latest bit of treason is truly outrageous. The program was legal; it was effective; it was not abused; it had independent auditors; and it was briefed to the members of Congress of both parties who Needed To Know.
I've never written about this on the ole blog here before, but there was a period not long ago when I wrote some things that could have been construed as putting sensitive data in the public realm. Shortly thereafter, I received one email -- one -- from a concerned member of the military. He wasn't a government representative, he was just acting on his own. He made a case that what I had written was not a good idea. I disagreed with him, but I felt disgusted and sickened. I immediately removed the post in question. I emailed the other bloggers who had linked to it and discreetly asked them to remove their links. They complied.
The truth is, I was absolutely horrified that I might have done anything at all to endanger ongoing operations. God forbid I should be the officer who burned an op.
Now this is just a blog, and I had only received one email, but that was enough to make me reconsider. But by its own admission, the President of the United States himself asked the New York Times not to reveal the details of how we spy on terrorist financing. And by its own admission, the New York Times blew him off.
Fortunately for all of you who are as shocked as I am, it turns out that the details of how the New York Times finances its own operations are not secret at all. In fact, The New York Times is owned by a public company, known as The New York Times Company, trading as NYT on the New York Stock Exchange.
I just spent a few fruitful moments on Yahoo Finance and discovered some basic information that may be of interest to many of you readers out there. On the major holdings page, we learn that a significant percentage of the New York Times' stock is held by institutions and mutual funds: 83%, quite a large chunk. Those institutions, especially the mutual funds, are in turn owned by none other than many of you Loyal Readers out there. You might want to find out if you own a little piece of the New York Times in your own 401K or IRA. Take a look at the largest mutual fund holders:
FUND, size of holdingHere's the contact info for some of those funds, if you are an investor:
PRICE (T.ROWE) EQUITY INCOME FUND $196,152,500FIDELITY EQUITY-INCOME II, FUND $133,709,464
PRICE (T.ROWE) MID-CAP VALUE FUND $59,853,088
FIDELITY EQUITY-INCOME FUND $63,835,036
PRICE (T.ROWE) CAPITAL APPRECIATION FUND $53,100,380
VAN KAMPEN SERIES FUND INC.-GLOBAL FRANCHISE FUND $46,467,059
VANGUARD 500 INDEX FUND 1,362,604 $34,487,507
FIDELITY CAPITAL APPRECIATION FUND $37,926,669
FIDELITY PURITAN FUND INC $37,209,406
FIDELITY VALUE FUND $37,118,280
T. Rowe Price: 800-225-5132
Fidelity: 800-FIDELTY [one might ask them what exactly they render "fidelity" to]
Van Kampen: 800-341-2941 (Say "Representative" or press "**0")
If a few dozen investors were to call the these numbers tomorrow and ask if these respectable blue-chip investment firms are going to continue to hold the stock of a company that sells out the security of the United States, my guess is that would register pretty quickly with the management of those firms. Those firms after all, being in the financial services industry, no doubt have a significant presence in Manhattan. And Manhattan after all, is the site of our most ignominious encounter with our sworn enemies -- whom the New York Times has decided to assist.
Now, what else might we find on Yahoo Finance? Returning to the Institutional Holdings page, [here it is again], one can find a list of Institutional investors in NYT as well, though these are probably less responsive to outraged individuals like you and me . . .
Poking around in the New York Times Annual Report does however yield some useful information. On page 2, we learn that 65% of all advertising revenue for the business segment that contains the Gray Lady comes from national advertisers. Hmm. Interesting. A bit further, on page 12, we find this tidbit [emphasis in original]:
Our largest newspaper properties are dependent on national advertising.Later, on page F3, we learn that the same business segment, the News Media Group, earns 95% of the revenue for the entire company. The role of those national advertisers to the viability of the firm is becoming very clear now.A significant portion of advertising revenues for our largest newspaper properties is from national advertising. As a result, events that affect national advertisers, such as structural changes and challenges to their traditional business models, may change the level of our advertising revenues. Increased consolidation among major national and retail advertisers has depressed, and may continue to depress, the level of our advertising revenue.
Googling "largest national advertisers" led me to this new article in AdAge magazine, which is dated -- what are the odds? -- June 26, 2006, and consists of the 51st annual listing of the 100 largest national advertisers in the United States. If you clickthrough you'll get to a lovely PDF with all the info you could need about national advertising in it.
Let's focus on, say, the 3 largest national advertisers in the United States. Here are their Investor Relations contact numbers. Perhaps a few calls suggesting that they refrain from buying advertising in the New York Times might not be a bad idea:
Proctor and Gamble 800-742-6253
General Motors 313-667-1500
Time Warner 866-INFO-TWX
I'll be calling each of these myself during regular business hours tomorrow.
To reiterate the facts, as reported by the New York Times itself: the program was legal; it was effective; it was briefed to Congress; there were independent auditors; there was no evidence of abuse. These are the facts. I know they're true cause I read them in the New York Times.
If you contact any of the above-listed numbers, feel free to leave a comment here about your experience. Or shoot me an email. I'd like to know how it goes.
UPDATE: Ah yes, one final bit of info. According to the contact page on the New York Times Company corporate site, here are some good people to know:
Catherine MathisThose might come in handy.
Vice President
Corporate Communications
(212) 556-1981Paula Schwartz
Assistant Director, Investor Relations and Online Communications
(212) 556-4317
UPDATE2: As recommended by a commenter, here are the contact methods for the 3 investment companies, and 3 national advertisers listed above. This is actually a much better way to go. I realized this after calling Fidelity. THe poor person on the other end of the line doesn't really know how to react when politely asked if Fidelity might be able to sell its NYT holdings.
T. Rowe Price (Click on the Contact Us link and a popup window will appear)
And the Time-Warner email, as noted here, is "ir" at "timewarner.com.
UPDATE3: Here's what I sent to the financial institutions:
Greetings,Your firm is a large institutional investor in the New York Times Co (NYT). On Friday, June 23rd, 2006, the New York Times published on its front page the details of a classified, legal, and effective program to monitor the financial transactions of terrorist networks. The program is legal and had been briefed to members of Congress. It had no known record of ongoing abuse and is audited by an independent board of auditors.
The decision to out such a government program endangers our national security, with such little benefit to the public as to seriously question the judgment of those who decided to publish the story.
I’d like to recommend that your firm seriously reconsider its investment in the New York Times Co. Why invest in a media organization that displays such little respect for the security of the United States?
I write on my own behalf, and not for the government. Thanks very much for your consideration.
Respectfully,
Joshua P. Manchester
Captain, US Marine Corps Reserve
Written by Chester at 9:49 PM | Link | Comments (7) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article
June 23, 2006
The Iraqi Peace Deal
Very late night thoughts of the just-reported Iraqi peace deal (see here):
1. The source: The Times nailed another recent event way in advance: the large-scale security operation in Baghdad. They called that several months ago and were correct that it would occur in the summer. They seem to have good sources inside the parties that would be involved in the negotiations.
2. The negotiations: There's a deal and then there's a deal. How close is this to getting done? Have confidence-building measures already been performed? Could the appointments of the Interior and Defense ministers be a part of that process? Could Zarqawi's death have been part of the process? The two happened on the same day! That has bothered me ever since . . .
3. The terms: The Times article states,
The Government will promise a finite, UN-approved timeline for the withdrawal of all foreign troops from Iraq; a halt to US operations against insurgent strongholds; an end to human rights violations, including those by coalition troops; and compensation for victims of attacks by terrorists or Iraqi and coalition forces.It's never good to believe the first report. This one implies that the US will admit ongoing human rights violations. It also implies that the UN has somehow given sanction already to an existing withdrawal plan. Neither of these seem like concessions the US would be willing to make. FInally, the article states in a later point "A halt to “anti-terrorist operations” by coalition forces in insurgent areas" as being another term. What exactly does that mean? It seems way too broad.
My guess is that the agreement is much more detailed and some of these details are incorrect as reported.
4. Enforcement: The deal involves "seven Sunni insurgent groups". Is that a significant enough portion of the insurgency to really offer a meaningful end to violence? Do we have good documentation of their capabilities (see confidence-building measures above)? And, will they act against the remaining elements of the insurgency, whether Ba'athists, criminals, or Al Qaeda? This would be a must, no?
5. Effects: Wow. I think the degree to which this will be good for Bush will depend on whether Iraqis who've killed Americans are given amnesty and how that works out.
This would be bad for Iran, not only because they'll lose a little more on their bid for influence, but because the US will soon be in a position to right-face the whole force and head east (figuratively).
The Left will still be the Left, but it won't win in November. And if the whole thing goes through more or less as declared by the Times -- which says it has seen the documents -- then Zalmay Khalilzad should get the Nobel Peace Prize.
If the deal goes through as predicted, someone is going to have to sit back and tally the results: what did the insurgents get out of the insurgency? This is a deal after all, not a surrender. Did they get a place at the political table? A share in oil revenue? Something more? Implied security guarantees?
One can ask what the US has gotten for its blood and treasure . . . but I think it is far too early for that.
If Iraqis who've killed Americans are given amnesty, a curious possibility enters the mind: future Sunni politicians who declare their status as veterans of the war against the Americans in their campaigns . . . This is a horrendous historical comparison, but Confederate officers weren't allowed to run for office . . .
But let's hold for more developments . . .
Written by Chester at 2:20 AM | Link | Comments (7) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article
May 8, 2006
General Hayden, Director, Human Intelligence Agency
Two things can be expected from Bush's nomination of General Hayden to be the Director of National Intelligence:
a) During the confirmation hearings, Hayden's role in the NSA wiretapping will be discussed ad infinitum, with lots of posturing by Democrats. Sadly, this will not work in their favor. In the end, they'll either vote for Hayden, angering their own base, or vote against Hayden, showing the country yet again that, "if Al Qaeda makes a phone call to someone in the US" the Democrats don't want to know what is discussed.
b) All of this activity around the NSA wiretapping story will probably cause the larger issue to fade from the spotlight: the CIA is being retooled into an HIA, or Human Intelligence Agency. This is not yet a fait accompli, but it seems that much of the analytical capability of the agency is being transferred over to the Director of National Intelligence, or at least being reproduced there. Whether this is a good thing or not is hard to determine. But it seems to be happening. Perhaps the Bush Administration has decided that rebuilding analysis capabilities in whole or in part is the best way to circumvent the leak-prone CIA: after all, if the place is turned into solely a resource for human intelligence and covert action, its employees will be firmly ensconced around the world, yes? instead of installed in the Beltway's subculture, with Washington Post reporters on speed dial . . .
Written by Chester at 4:04 PM | Link | Comments (3) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article
April 28, 2006
United 93
Mrs. Chester and I just returned from viewing United 93. It was . . . enraging, gut-wrenching, and very emotional.
I usually don't find myself getting worked up too much in movies, but at the end I realized that waves of adrenaline and anger had been coming over me for nearly the entire film. From time to time I found my pulse absolutely racing. I also realized when it was over that I had broken out in, quite literally, a cold sweat. Perhaps there's just something visceral about that day that is burned into many of us.
From time to time there were the briefest of moments when I would remember -- not just mentally, but in my bones -- what a September 10th mentality felt like. You know -- how things were just . . . different.
The film was outstanding and I highly recommend it. It bested my expectations on nearly every level: the acting was good, the story stuck to the facts, and it was apolitical as far as I could tell. Kudos to the director and producer for pulling that off. It was also refreshing not to see any big-name actors in the film. It's supposed to be about regular folks after all, right?
Mrs. Chester reports that she had an emotional response as well. She also liked that the passengers were not portrayed in some sort of gung-ho heroic super-patriotic light, but rather that they just realized that they had to try to do something to save themselves.
I wonder if it will be shown in Europe?
The theater was about 75% full. When the film ended there was a moderate level of applause.
And that's it. Go see it for yourself.
UPDATE: United 93 is apolitical as I mentioned above. But I wonder if it might have some political effects, particularly with regard to Tipping Point politics. I'll make a confession: as I reflect on my thoughts and feelings during the film, I can't help but admitting that when seeing images of the younger hijackers -- not Ziad Jarrah, the pilot, but the muscle -- I am overcome with absolute revulsion. It makes one wonder if our entire enterprise of reforming the Middle East is a fool's errand.
I don't usually think this way. In fact I rarely do (see the link in the above paragraph). Yet this is how I found myself thinking during the movie, and I don't think it was because that was the filmmakers' intended effect. I'll bet I'm not the only one who feels this way after watching. It was a fleeting thought, but there nonetheless.
Perhaps this is just me. I have rather emotional reactions when it comes to the defense of the United States. Many things I can argue or debate with cool distance and even-headed dispassion. Not so with defending America. Politics might be a messy, relativistic labyrinth in general, but one thing I know: this country is the greatest thing since sliced bread, and all who wish it harm be damned.
For better or worse, I predict Tipping Point effects from this film . . .
Written by Chester at 10:41 PM | Link | Comments (10) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article
April 24, 2006
Economic Determinism and Europe's Descent
Charles Boix has written a fascinating recent article in Policy Review, in which he argues that as universal as the desire for freedom may be, the conditions for the spread of democracy are limited. Chiefly, equality of economic conditions is the primary state in which democracy will take root and thrive:
The insight that equality of conditions is a precondition for democracy has a long and often forgotten tradition in the study of politics. It was apparent to most classical political thinkers that democracy could not survive without some equality among its citizens. Aristotle, who spent a substantial amount of time collecting all the constitutions of the Greek cities, concluded that to be successful, a city “ought to be composed, as far as possible, of equals and similars.” By contrast, he noticed, a state could not be well-governed where there were only very rich and very poor people because the former “could only rule despotically” and the latter “know not how to command and must be ruled like slaves.” They would simply lead “to a city, not of free persons but of slaves and masters, the ones consumed by envy, the others by contempt.” Two thousand years later Machiavelli would observe in his Discourses that a republic — that is, a regime where citizens could govern themselves — could only be constituted “where there exists, or can be brought into being, notable equality; and a regime of the opposite type, i.e. a principality, where there is notable inequality. Otherwise what is done will lack proportion and will be of but short duration.”Boix then goes on to offer a variety of empirical evidence to support this point. He takes particular aim at Islam itself, showing that it is no stronger a force against democracy than any other cultural factors in other parts of the world, and that even Islam is subordinate to economics when it comes to the flowering of democracy:
Islam has been much brandished as the cause of authoritarian attitudes and institutions in the Middle East and North Africa. But as Freedom House recently pointed out, if we take into account the large Muslim populations of countries such as India, Indonesia, Bangladesh, and Turkey, the majority of the world’s Muslims live now under democratic regimes. In turn, some scholars have noted that, even if Islam is compatible with free elections, the Arab world is not. Indeed, all Arab states remain undemocratic as of today — and do so by employing substantially repressive policies. The problem with this claim, however, is that it never specifies the ways in which Arab culture and behavior may be at odds with the principle of mutual toleration among winners and losers that makes democracy possible. Moreover, the few surveys we do have seem to show that Middle Eastern populations favor democracy by margins similar to those found in Latin American or Asian publics. The truth is that the politics surrounding the control of natural resources, rather than any religious or cultural factor, is what explains the preponderance of authoritarianism in the Middle East (and much of sub-Saharan Africa as well).Boix's is a great article and his ultimate conclusions are not to be dismissed.
His work though raises vexing questions about what he does not discuss. Namely, how does his economically determinate argument explain the rise of semi-autonomous, undemocratic groups within Europe? According to his economics-based theory of democratization, Europe should be a place where democracy continues to thrive indefinitely, not where it is threatened by some other system. Yet the growth of semi-autonomous immigrant communities in Europe's large cities -- places where the democratically created laws of the host society don't apply or aren't enforced -- is a frequent feature of the news these days (and even a slew of recent books).
How to account for this? Especially when all of these communities have one thing in common -- Islam?
My guess is that this phenomenon speaks less to the anti-democratic tendencies of Muslims than it does to the pusillanimous and faint-hearted efforts of the Europeans in defending and justifying their freedoms. But readers are welcome to differ . . .
Written by Chester at 10:59 PM | Link | Comments (17) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article
April 8, 2006
The US-Iraqi Security Treaty of 2007
Belmont Club points to an article I noticed in Opinionjournal last week, in which Amir Taheri fleshes out his belief that the strategy in many Muslim capitals is to wait out the end of Mr. Bush's presidency, the assumption being that whoever follows will not be so prone to an aggressive foreign policy in the Middle East:
According to this theory, President George W. Bush is an "aberration," a leader out of sync with his nation's character and no more than a brief nightmare for those who oppose the creation of an "American Middle East." Messrs. Abbasi and Ahmadinejad have concluded that there will be no helicopter as long as George W. Bush is in the White House. But they believe that whoever succeeds him, Democrat or Republican, will revive the helicopter image to extricate the U.S. from a complex situation that few Americans appear to understand.Allow a bit of speculation . . .Mr. Ahmadinejad's defiant rhetoric is based on a strategy known in Middle Eastern capitals as "waiting Bush out." "We are sure the U.S. will return to saner policies," says Manuchehr Motakki, Iran's new Foreign Minister.
The Bush administration is probably equally as concerned as Mr. Ahmadinejad that its successor will pursue a, for lack of a better term, more "traditional" foreign policy in the Muslim world. Moreover, the Bush team has proven fairly adept at forcing military actions to conform to domestic political timeframes. I think an oft-overlooked facet of the timing of the invasion of Iraq in 2003 was its relationship to the election cycle. Bush et al. knew that they wanted to get rid of Saddam, and knew that they had to do it in his first term, because there was no way to guarantee that he'd have a second. Letting the inspections drag on then, as an alternative strategy for example, would have been more than just backing down; it would have lessened the chance that the regime would be changed before November of 2004.
Likewise, the Second Battle of Fallujah coincided with the end of the US election in 2004, as Bush could not risk the media's coverage of a dirty, urban battle while he was shoring up his own electoral position at home.
Some might think this is a poor way to plan: manipulative of policy for the purposes of political gain . . . but to think such is to ignore the intricate ties between warfare and politics . . . Clausewitz would understand what the President is up to, as would Lincoln, I think . . .
In any case, assuming Mr. Taheri is correct in his assessment of the "waiting Bush out" strategy he describes, we now encounter a new foreign-policy conundrum for Bush's team. First an inescapable fact: after January 20th, 2009, we'll have a new President, who might have altogether different ideas of how the US should be involved in the Middle East.
So assume that Bush wants his strategy to continue beyond his own tenure. How might he ensure that? One way might be through a security treaty with the new Iraqi government. Such a treaty might detail the nature of continued US intervention for the next decade or so: where bases might be located; how aid should be distributed; how intelligence might be shared between the two; how the two countries' forces could cooperate in a variety of endeavors . . .
It is unlikely that such a step could be taken in 2006 because of political conditions in both countries: the Iraqi government is in no shape to begin deliberating it, as it does not yet exist. And in Washington, things have entered the twilight zone that occurs in the runup to elections: little other than the election itself is on anyone's mind, and passing a major piece of foreign-policy legislation is unlikely (the immigration debate is certainly foreign-policyish, but is also certainly more driven by reelection concerns than anything else). Moreover, after 2007, Bush will probably have missed his chance to attempt such an initiative . . . by 2008, he'll have entered full-scale lame duck status, and most everything will be on autopilot as the politerati totally focus on the presidential election.
Back to Iraqis: one thing's for sure: whoever does end up running the government over there will not run it for long if security is not his highest priority . . .
So there's an interesting confluence of interests: US desires to extend its forward presence in the Mideast for the intermediate term, perhaps 10 years or more; and an Iraqi political need to appear to shore up domestic security, while at the same time addressing the status of the large US presence within the country.
And then there's the timing: the formation of the Iraqi government, and what could be called the continual reformation of the US government, both won't be complete until early 2007 . . .
My guess is that if the Bush team wants to enshrine some sort of aggressive US transformational policy in the Middle East, 2007 will be the year to make it happen, and a treaty, or other similar agreement, might be the means . . .
One interesting side note is that treaties must be approved by the Senate . . . and the number of Senators who are preening for 2008 is as large as ever . . . and the Bush team also has a habit of skillfully employing the tactic of forcing a vote on an issue so that legislators are thereby defined by that vote in an upcoming election (think the DHS bill of 2002 for example) . . . interesting . . .
A principle of grand strategy is to ensure that one's policies live longer than one's own administration -- for if they are the correct course, then they should not be limited in the timeframe of their execution . . .
Written by Chester at 5:06 AM | Link | Comments (16) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article
March 23, 2006
The President's Sergeant Major
A few days ago, the case was made here that the President, if not the Secretary of Defense, needs a "directed telescope" to help him understand ground events in Iraq, and to refute, counter and clarify whatever hash is out in the evening news in the US:
While in Napoleon's time the directed telescope was one of two parts that were reinforcing -- regular reporting being the other -- in our day, there would be three parts: regular reporting, the directed telescope, and the press. The telescopes would be a powerful tool to have in the arsenal of a Defense Secretary or President in need of further independent information on the status of forces or situations. And, in my conception, the telescopes might provide valuable information about the conduct of a given battle or campaign. Such information could be priceless in engaging in the debate with the press described above. They might be composed of a couple of colonels, some independent civilians (West himself, or Robert Kaplan might be good examples, since this is similar to the roles they've fashioned for themselves already, albeit independently), and even a physically fit diplomat or two. Combined with robust archiving, search, image retrieval, and public-speaking capabilities inherent in the combat pundit office (perhaps "office" is the wrong term, as it should be informal, small, and not legislatively created), the National Command Authorities might be much better able to determine the status of all kinds of events, and use that information to refute inaccurate media memes (and be more informed in general as well).
Several new stories serve to clarify this idea a bit. First, Peggy Noonan has an excellent piece in today's Opinionjournal about the distance of elites from the masses, and the resulting cause for error in judgment:
The leaders of the day did not know that terrible violence was coming because of what I think is a classic and structural problem of leadership: It distances. Each of these men was to varying degrees detached from facts on the ground. They were by virtue of their position and accomplishments an elite. They no longer knew what was beating within the hearts of those who lived quite literally on the ground. Nehru, Mountbatten, Jinnah--they well knew that Muslims feared living under the rule of the Hindus, that Hindus feared living under Muslims, that Sikhs feared both. But the leaders did not know the fear that was felt was so deep, so constitutional, so passionate. They did not know it would find its expression in a savagery so wild and widespread.So how to correct for this as much as possible? Keeping the idea of a "directed telescope" in mind, now see this exchange between Hugh Hewitt and Michael Yon, warblogger extraordinaire:Each of these leaders had been removed by his own history from facts on the ground. "Elitism" doesn't always speak of where you went to school or what caste, as it were, you came from. You can wind up one of the elites simply by rising. Simply by being separated for a certain amount of time from those you seek to lead.
People who know most intimately, and through most recent experience, what is happening on the ground, and in the hearts of men, are usually not in the inner councils. They have not fought their way or earned their way in yet. Sometimes they're called in and listened to, at least for a moment, but in the end they tend to be ignored. They're nobodies, after all.
This is a problem with government and governing bodies--with the White House, Downing Street, with State Department specialists, and the Council on Foreign Relations, and West Point, too. It is not so much a matter of fault as it is structural. The minute you rise to govern you become another step removed from the lives of those you govern. Which means you become removed from reality.
Hugh Hewitt: . . . Michael Yon, when you do go back, which part of the country are you headed to? Are you going to embed with another unit like the Infantry division you were with a year ago?Now tie it all together. You can see it, yes? What the President needs is his own Sergeant Major - a directed telescope on the battlefield reporting directly to him. Not his staff, not the White House Spokesman or the Press Pool. The chain goes straight to The Man himself.Michael Yon: Well, I've already contacted Sergeant Major Mellinger, who's the top enlisted man in the theater, meaning he is the top enlisted man in Iraq. And he goes everywhere. I've been out with him twice before, and I call him the University of Iraq, because he seems to know everything that's going on. So I'd like to spend a couple of weeks with him, getting in-briefed again about the new state of the country, because he speaks very bluntly. And then after that, I'll go to probably where the action is. I tend to go to where our troops are seeing the most combat, but then I pop out sometimes, and go to the peaceful areas. But I want to know how our troops are doing.
This is not hard to envision. Grab any of a number of Sergeants Major out there who are now retired. They have made careers of making gut calls in all manner of odd situations. Grab a guy who used to be in Delta Force, or the 1st Marine Division SgtMaj. You could grab an officer if you preferred (ahem: my email address is in the sidebar), but if it was me, I'd have a senior enlisted man, the type who's harder than woodpecker lips. Whoever he is, he must be able to communicate very very very well. Then give him an armored four door humvee, a translator, and a couple of shooters to be a mini-brute squad. That's all he'll want if he's the kind I have in mind. He can always hop on a bird if needs to. Get him some nice equipment too -- a camera, a sat phone, etc.
Then set him loose. Tell him to go to whatever is interesting and report whatever he thinks necessary. Give him no format whatsoever. No timeframes whatsoever. Or, if you know of a particular operation that needs checking up on, send him there.
One more thing he needs: a little letter signed by POTUS that says, "This man may go wherever he wishes. Do not impede him." He can laminate that and put it in his vest and that's all he'll need for access.
The cost of all this is miniscule compared to the added channel of insight that the President would have to the events on the ground. He can then make better decisions, question his subordinates a little more pointedly, but most importantly, be very prepared to refute, clarify, and offer counternarratives to the press.
Written by Chester at 12:23 AM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article
March 17, 2006
Fallujah, media memes, and public debate
Today, Belmont Club has a post mentioning the problems Bing West describes in No True Glory
I knew Wretchard was reading this book, so I decided to read it too and finished it earlier in the week.
The thing that struck me, but which West does not explicitly state, is that media perceptions were the driving factor in two key decisions made by the Bush Administration: first, to order the assault on the city in April of 2004, and second to halt it a few days later.
First, US popular revulsion to the images of the four dead military contractors in Fallujah caused the Administration to seek vengeance solely for its own sake.
For a gleeful mob to hang Americans like pieces of charred meat mocked the rationale that the war had liberated grateful Iraqis. The mutilation was both a stinging rebuke and a challenge. National pride and honor were involved. The president's envoy to Iraq, Ambassador L. Paul Bremer III, went on television in Baghdad to denounce the atrocity, vowing that the "deaths will not go unpunished." The spokesman for the JTF, Army Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, followed up by saying the attack on Fallujah would be "overwhelming." Write an order for the Marines to attack, General Sanchez told his staff, and I don't mean any fucking knock-before-search, touchy-feely stuff.The Marines, namely the 1st Marine Division, then still under General Mattis, and his immediate field commander, LtGen Conway of the First MEF, had intended to slowly take over various portions of the city over months, not invade it in one decisive action. But they had their orders (apparently very poorly written ones, according to West) and they carried them out.
But then media coverage and perceptions of the attack were once again integral in operational decisionmaking. The CPA
had prepared a public affairs plan in support of the offensive, although it didn't address the Arab press.That left Arab media to shape perceptions of the battle with no American influence at all.
On April 4, Fallujah was dominating international headlines because all major news outlets had rushed reporters and video crews there after the administration's vow of an overwhelming response.West's chapter entitled "Faint Echoes of Tet" is priceless. Here's an extended excerpt:
The CPA and all Iraqis were relying on the press to inform them about the military situation. Reports about the fighting came from two major sources -- Western journalists, principally American, and the Arab press. The two dominant Arab satellite networks were Al Arabiya, based in Dubai, and Al Jazeera, based in Qatar. In addition to reaching hundreds of millions of Arabs, their reportage was more trused by Iraqis than was the US-funded channel called Al Iraqiya, based in Baghdad. About 25% of Iraqis -- the more wealthy and influential -- had access to satellite reception, and by a five-to-one margin they preferred Jazeera to Iraqiya . . .West offers what might have been a palliative for this spin.Both networks had learned how not to bite the hands that fed them. Criticism of the autocracies in Egypt, Syria, and elsewhere had resulted in the closure of offices and the withdrawal of advertising revenues. Diatribes about the Israeli occupation of Iraq were the two staples of their coverage that received wide approval among Arab governments . . .
In April the insurgents invited a reporter from Al Jazeera, Ahmed Mansour, and his crew into Fallujah, where they filmed scenes from the hospital. Hour after hour, day after day after day in the first week in April, the airwaves were filled with pictures of the dead, the bleeding, and the maimed. The Arab media were calling the resistance an Initifada, linking the insurgent fighting against the Americans to the Palestinian uprising against the Israelis. The sound bites featured the wails of the mourners, the sobs and screams of mothers, and the frenzied shouts and harried faces of blood bespotted doctors and nurses. No one with a breath of compassion could watch Arab TV and not feel anguish. Most poignant were the pictures Jazeera ran of babies, one after another after another, all calm, frail, and pitiful in the repose of death. Where how or when they died was not attributed. The viewer assumed all the infants wwere killed by the Marines in Fallujah. The baby pictures would bring tears from a rock . . .
A Jazeera and Al Arabiya were unrelenting in broadcasting the plight of the civilians in Fallujah, while the internet amplified the message of Marine callousness and sped protests around the world on a minute-by-minute basis. On the Google search engine, during the month of April, the word Fallujah leaped from 700 to 175,000 stories, many highly critical of the Marines. Quantity had a spurious quality of its own, resulting in an erroneous certitude based on the sheer volume of repetition.
The reports filed by Western journalists embedded with the Marines did not support the allegations of widespread, indiscriminate carnage. Senior US government officials, though, didn't have the time to peruse tactical reporting. Instead, in their offices they turned on cable news, where video clips from Fallujah were shown over and over again. The images, obtained from a pool that included the Jazeera cameramen inside the city affected viewers in Iraq, in Washington, and in Crawford, Texas.
In the face of this press onslaught, the White House, the Pentagon, the CPA, and CentCom were passive. Partially this was a military reflex to avoid any comparison to the 'body count' debacle of Vietnam. none of those at the top of the chains of command, though, requested from the Marine units in daily contact any systematic estimates that distinguished between civilian and enemy casualties. Given the video recorded the the unmanned aerial vehicles and the imagery required of every air strike and AC-130 gun run, records of the damage would have been easy enough to collect and verify had anyone thought of doing so.In the absence of countervailing visual evidence presented by authoritative sources, Al Jazeera shaped the world's understanding of Fallujah without having to counter the scrutiny of informed skeptics. The resulting political pressures constrained military actions both against Fallujah and against Sadr.
The Cluetrain Manifesto, which in the 1990s was so influential at describing the nature of the emerging connected world, made two observations that are relevant here:
1. Hyperlinks subvert hierarchy. In the case of Fallujah, the CNN and other western outlets frequently used footage from Jazeera, subverting to some extent the hierarchy of national boundaries as being determinative of press coverage. The same is true with the Google News aspect that West mentions. And finally, the hierarchy of the chain of command was subverted as well. Presumably the President himself had Fallujah brought into his living room, and its coverage shaped his perceptions of the battle. West implies that he did not seek out other opinions, notably that of the ground commanders, Mattis and Conway.
2. Markets are conversations. Cluetrain asserted that the information technology revolution allowed mass markets to revert to their conversational origins: the haggling, debate, and spirited nature of the traditional market or bazaar, rather than the stilted interaction between monolithic institutions and underdog individual customers that came to characterize relationships in the age of the industrial society.
West's solution to the whole conundrum, as mentioned in the last two paragraphs above, is very interesting. Traditional public relations methodology has attempted to generate enough contrary content such that the good might offer an alternative to the negative for the public to choose what to believe themselves. But what West advocates is something more like a public debate, in which some viewpoints, spin, or memes, are publicly refuted in some meaningful way. The only member of the Bush Administration who does anything like this on any kind of regular basis is the Defense Secretary. Occasionally when asked a leading or insinuating question for example, he responds with another question that attempts to refashion the dialogue. But even he doesn't do this that often. Keeping track of what memes are proliferating, where they come from, how they contradict each other, and finding concrete and believable evidence to refute them is a big job. Few military or policy organizations do this well. Not even corporations excel at this: usually they stumble along with PR as a sort of arm of the Marketing department. How many times has a corporation been accused of something and responded with deft explanations and a robust defense? Only about a tenth of the time or so would be my guess . . .
In fact, the only kind of organization I can think of that has an inherent stake in immediately and strongly responding to charges made by the press -- or by an opponent, with the press as its proxy -- is the political campaign. Attack ad is met by attack ad, and spin meets spin. But even those organizations are in search of the ever-memorable sound bite, not some public consensus on "truth."
Perhaps then, one thing that the Defense Department needs is a rapid response combat punditry team. Since this would essentially be a political function, it should be staffed with appointed civilians, but preferably those who are not too closely tied to the reigning administration, if that's possible. The office would work to refute, debate, clarify and offer counter-narratives in any case deemed necessary. This would be something different from "propaganda" creation, at least as I envision it. Propaganda nowadays is smelled as such by the public immediately and if there ever was value to it, it would certainly be counterproductive today. But to publicly enter into a debate with the memes, or individuals in the press -- to begin a conversation, rather than the traditionally conceived shouting match or corporate institutional-speak-- might be very effective. It would be a difficult job, but it seems to be a necessary one these days. The key would be to be forceful, but not necessarily adversarial. Public debate is about winning people over to one's side after all, and the ultimate coup would be to win the press themselves.
Notably though, one key to good conversation is when each side is willing to admit previous mistakes, or misjudgments. A candid combat pundit would do so. And if the press failed to do so, it would lessen it morally in the eyes of the independent observer. Or, miracle of miracles, perhaps some would admit mischaracterizations from time to time. In that case, would not public debate be more enlightened than it is now?
The blogosphere already performs the function I've described to some degree, but with much more limited effectiveness. Someone based within the DoD would have the authority of office to go with that of the megaphone.
A second technique for offering evidence to counter inaccuracies that enter public discourse would be the use of a small number of "directed telescopes", perhaps working out of the same combat pundit office mentioned above. The directed telescope was an innovation of Napoleon. Each was a pretty senior colonel or general officer, held by Napoleon in exceptionally high esteem, and trusted implicitly. He would use them to survey terrain, deliver important communications, gather intelligence, make judgments of enemy dispositions, and occasionally they would jump in to correct units that were not following Napoleon's intent. Martin Van Creveld describes this technique in Command in War
Climbing through the chain of command, however, such reports tend to become less and less specific; the more numerous the stages through which they pass and the more standardized the form in which they are presented, the greater the danger that they will become so heavily profiled (and possibly sugar-coated or merely distorted by the many summaries) as to become almost meaningless. To guard against this danger, and keep subordinates on their toes, a commander needs to have in addition a kind of directed telescope -- the metaphor is an apt one -- which he can direct, at will, at any part of the enemy's forces, the terrain, or his own army in order to bring in information that is not only less structured than that passed on by the normal channels but also tailored to meet his momentary (and specific) needs. Ideally, the regular reporting system should tell the commander which questions to ask, and the directed telescope should enable him to answer those questions. It was the two systems together, cutting across each other and wielded by Napoleon's masterful hand, which made the evolution in command possible.While in Napoleon's time the directed telescope was one of two parts that were reinforcing -- regular reporting being the other -- in our day, there would be three parts: regular reporting, the directed telescope, and the press. The telescopes would be a powerful tool to have in the arsenal of a Defense Secretary or President in need of further independent information on the status of forces or situations. And, in my conception, the telescopes might provide valuable information about the conduct of a given battle or campaign. Such information could be priceless in engaging in the debate with the press described above. They might be composed of a couple of colonels, some independent civilians (West himself, or Robert Kaplan might be good examples, since this is similar to the roles they've fashioned for themselves already, albeit independently), and even a physically fit diplomat or two. Combined with robust archiving, search, image retrieval, and public-speaking capabilities inherent in the combat pundit office (perhaps "office" is the wrong term, as it should be informal, small, and not legislatively created), the National Command Authorities might be much better able to determine the status of all kinds of events, and use that information to refute inaccurate media memes (and be more informed in general as well).As organized from 1805 on, Napoleon's system for cutting through established channels and for directly gathering the information he needed consisted of two separate parts. The first was a group of between eight and twelve adjutant generals; these were men selected unsystematically from among colonels and generals who caught the emperor's eye, usually carried the rank of brigadier or major general, and were between ages thirty and forty and thus in the full flower of their mental and physical powers. Their duties varied enormously, from reconnoitering entire countries (Savary in 1805) to negotiating a surrender (Rapp in the same year) to spying out enemy headquarters under the cover of a truce (Rapp again, on the eve of Austerlitz) to commanding the cavalry of the artillery reserve in battle (Druot, Lauriston) to governing a province and commanding a garrison far from the main theater of operations. Such responsibilities called for practical savoir faire as well as diplomatic ability, the knowledge and talents of a military commander, and, last, but not least, sheer physical stamina.
PS: Comments are currently closed. Feel free to email me any thoughts or responses you have. I may include them here, but no promises.
UPDATE: I forgot to mention: in case there's any doubt to the role the press played in the Fallujah Battle, remember that when the city was finally assaulted in November of 04, the first objective was seizure of the hospital so that he images mentioned above would not be used so spuriously.
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March 2, 2006
"Strike?"
Jim Geraghty wonders how else the fallout from the port deal will affect our politics: [hat-tip: Instapundit]
Welcome to Post-Tipping Point politics. There is no upside to doing the right thing – which is to emphasize, as one blogger put it, that there is a difference between Dubai and Damascus. There is tremendous political upside to doing the wrong thing, boldly declaring, “I don’t care what the Muslim world thinks, I’m not allowing any Arab country running ports here in America! I don’t care how much President Bush claims these guys are our allies, I don’t trust them, and I’m not going to hand them the keys to the vital entries to our country!”Geraghty points to this New Republic piece, in which Peter Beinart asks,Courting these voters will mean supporting proposals that are supported by wide swaths of the American people, but are largely considered nonstarters in Washington circles: much tougher immigration restrictions, including patrolling the Mexican border; racial profiling of airline passengers instead of confiscating grandma’s tweezers; drastically reducing or eliminating entry visas to residents of Muslim or Arab countries; and taking a much tougher line with Saudi Arabia and coping with the consequences of that stance. Since 9/11, the Bush administration, and most leaders on Capitol Hill in both parties have dismissed those ideas as unrealistic, counterproductive, or not in accordance to American values.
If you listen to Democratic criticism of the port deal, the Jacksonian themes are clear. In the words of California Senator Barbara Boxer, "We have to have American companies running our own ports." But nationalism tinged with xenophobia makes Democrats uncomfortable.For Democrats, stealing the Bush administration's populist, unilateralist thunder would be a remarkable coup. And it would be a remarkable historical irony, since Jacksonianism in Jeffersonian clothes--civil libertarian, anti-globalization, uninterested in transforming the world--inverts the foreign policy of the last Democratic president, Bill Clinton.
Politically, the opportunity is clear. There's just one catch: Is this really what Democrats believe?
*********
I'm convinced this is all a remake of Naked Gun. You remember the scene: in his zealous pursuit of the Queen's would-be assassin, Lt. Frank Drebin finds himself at an Angels game, suddenly taking the place of the umpire behind home plate. A pitch is thrown. The crowd goes silent. Drebin is quiet. The pitcher stares at him. The batter turns and looks at him. Drebin looks back at him. Then he mumbles, "Strike?"
The crowd goes wild. Drebin smiles. He's got em now! He's forgotten all about the assassin for the moment. The next pitch is thrown. It's obviously way outside. Drebin calls another strike. The crowd goes nuts! Drebin does a little dance behind the plate, with two fingers up in the air, repeating, "Two! Two! Two! Strike Two!" On the next pitch, Drebin calls a strike before the ball even hits the catcher's mitt. Then he polishes it off with a moonwalk and a bit of breakdancing.
This is where the Democratic party finds itself. With their friends in the press, they've thrown out all manner of arguments in their zealous quest to wrest power from George W. Bush. Then, all of a sudden, they find themselves in a position to umpire a large commercial transaction. Everyone waits to see what they're going to say.
"Arabs?"
The country goes wild! They reinforce their success and continue on this meme. But as Beinart notes above, are they really ready to deal with the underlying reasoning that leads the nation to cheer at their calls?
We all know how that segment of the movie ends. Drebin is having so much fun that he forgets about the sleeper in his midst. Then, when he's reminded, he starts a riot on the field. Of course, it's Hollywood and in the end he's a hero. But is this the kind of national security that we want? Ask a Democrat what kinds of actions he's prepared to take in the war, and he'll say he'll withdraw troops from Iraq. Then he'll list a litany of things he would have done differently. But does he really have a plan of any substance? In the midst of discrediting the Bush Administration, he sees an opening on Bush's right. Finally! But is he really ready to go there and do the things that those constituencies want done? All of a sudden, the pre-9/11 Democrats have gone on a blind date with 2006 voters. I have a feeling that before it is all over, the Democrats will be as terrified of the voters as they are of Arabs.
This all goes back to my post of yesterday: How will our society answer the question: Is Islam compatible with a free society? The Democrats may be about to side with those who say, No. SInce this violates some of their most fundamental principles, and those of multiculturalism, can they even make this journey? Or are we witnessing a transformation of the Democratic party?
Interestingly enough, Naked Gun opens with Drebin "on vacation" in Beirut, if memory serves, where he takes out Ayatollah Khomeini, Gorbachev, Idi Amin, and Qaddafi all at one time.
[Frank has beaten a horde of America's most-feared world leaders in a conference room and heads for a door]This was supposed to be funny back in 1988: a witless American taking the fight to the enemy: basically what the American people would have loved to see done to any of those world leaders. But it's meant to be a farce!
Muammar al-Qaddafi: Hey, who are you?
Frank: I'm Lt. Frank Drebin! Police Squad! And don't ever let me catch you guys in America!
[the door hits Frank in the face and he loses his balance]
Who knew it was prophetic of the possible electoral machinations of the Democratic party in 2006?
Written by Chester at 10:10 PM | Link | Comments (8) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article
The Key Strategic Question
Is Islam compatible with a free society?
This is the key strategic question of our day.
In October, William Buckley wrote:
The moment has not come, but it is around the corner, when non-Muslims will reasonably demand to have evidence that the Muslim faith can operate within boundaries in which Christians and Jews (and many non-believers) live and work without unconstitutional distraction.[h-t to a Belmont Club commenter]
Buckley is correct that this is a question demanding an answer, but he misjudges the timing of its asking and answering. The truth is that assumed answers to this question have been fundamental in developing our strategies in the war on terror, and that we have yet to answer it definitively.
Is Islam compatible with a free society? A 'yes' answer offers a far different set of strategic imperatives than a 'no' answer.
In his book The Universal Hunger for Liberty
"Surely," the proposition was put forward, by many Islamic voices as well as by the president, "a modern and faithful Islam is consistent with nonrepressive, open, economically vital societies."To say yes to our question, one assumes that there are aspects of being Muslim and faithful to Islam, that can coexist peacefully with liberty, tolerance, and equality. The strategy that follows is one of identifying the groups and sects within Islam that adhere to these notions of their religion, and then encouraging them, favoring them, propagating them, and splitting them off from the elements of Islamic practice that are all too incompatible with the portions of modernity that invigorate men's souls: free inquiry, free association, free commerce, free worship, or even the freedom to be left alone.
To answer no, one states that Islam itself is fundamentally irreconcilable with freedom. This leads to a wholly different set of tactical moves to isolate free societies from Islam. They might include:
-detention of Muslims, or an abrogation of certain of their rights;
-forced deportation of Muslims from free societies;
-rather than transformative invasions, punitive expeditions and punitive strikes;
-extreme racial profiling;
-limits on the practice and study of Islam in its entirety
And even some extreme measures if free societies find the above moves to be failing:
-forced conversion from Islam, or renunciation;
-colonization;
-extermination of Muslims wherever they are found.
These last are especially ghastly measures. But a society that thought Islam incompatible with freedom might in the long term slip towards them.
Since 9/11, the assumption of our government has been that Islam can be compatible with freedom. The Bush administration has been exploiting all manner of divides within the Muslim world, not to conquer it, but to transform it such that a type of Islam compatible with freedom -- and therefore the West and the US, the wellspring and birthplace of modern individual liberty -- will come to the front at the expense of a type of Islam that is irreconcilable. Every institution of government answers our key question with a resounding yes. The Pentagon, in its Quadrennial Defense Review, makes a distinction between "bin Ladenism" and moderate Muslims, our would-be allies. Bush makes speeches in praise of freedom in general and especially in the Muslim world. The defense establishment is addressing what it calls a 'war of ideas':
The U.S. government is also focusing more attention on the intangible but vital dimension of the "war of ideas" between radical Islam and moderate Western and Islamic thought. The Pentagon's September 2004 National Defense Strategy stressed the need to counter ideological support for terrorism to secure permanent gains in the war against terrorism.A yes answer to the question requires Red State Christians in the US to tolerate an Islam that tolerates them. A no answer to the question requires an abandonment of belief in the universality of ideas originating in the west, because it becomes clear that a large portion of humanity -- a fifth perhaps -- follows an incompatible religion. A yes answer forces one to attack totalitarian elements within Islam. A no answer forces a clash of civilizations, a Great Islamic War, as it assumes that all Islam is totalitarian.It stated the importance of negating the image of a U.S. war against Islam, and instead, developing the image of a civil war within Islam, fought between moderate states and radical terrorists. This kind of imagery will feed into the broader debate beginning in the U.S. on how to win such a war of ideas and how to cultivate moderate democratic Islamic states.
A yes answer might lead to the establishment of something like the Congress for Cultural Freedom, as discussed in a recent piece in the Chronicle of Higher Education:
The idea of the congress, however, grew out of a feeling among independent intellectuals on the non-Communist left, as well as American officials, that the West after World War II faced a huge Soviet commitment to propagandizing and imposing Communism, and might lose the battle for European minds to Stalinism.One principle of the CCF's founding document was, "Freedom is based on the toleration of divergent opinions. The principle of toleration does not logically permit the practice of intolerance."So the congress — established at a 1950 Berlin meeting at which the writer Arthur Koestler declared to a crowd of 15,000, "Friends, freedom has seized the offensive!" — launched magazines, held conferences, mounted exhibitions, and generally sought to expose Stalinist falsehoods from its liberal position. At its height, according to Coleman, the CCF "had offices or representatives in 35 countries, employing a total of 280 staff members."
A no answer might disparage the notion that Westerners can say anything of import to those practicing Islam. I'm not sure if Bruce Thornton would answer no to the key question, but he doesn't seem to like the idea of Westerners trying to convince Muslims of anything new about their religion:
If, then, you are in possession of this truth that you are absolutely certain holds the key to universal happiness in this world and the next, why would you be tolerant of alternatives? Why should you tolerate a dangerous lie? Why should you “live and let live,” the credo of the spiritually moribund who stand for everything because they stand for nothing? And why wouldn’t you kill in the name of this vision, when the infidel nations work against God’s will and his beneficent intentions for the human race?A yes answer to our question might force us to reexamine the religious roots of our own conceptions of freedom, in order to figure best a way to help Muslims look for such roots in their faith. This might resemble the efforts of David Gelernter in his recent Bradley Lecture at the American Enterprise Institute, "A Religious Idea Called 'America'"This is precisely what the jihadists tell us, what fourteen centuries of Islamic theology and jurisprudence tell us, what the Koran and Hadith tell us. Yet we smug Westerners, so certain of our own superior knowledge that human life is really about genes or neuroses or politics or nutrition, condescendingly look down on the true believer. Patronizing him like a child, we tell him that he doesn’t know that his own faith has been “hijacked” by “fundamentalists” who manipulate his ignorance, that what he thinks he knows about his faith is a delusion, and that the true explanation is one that we advanced, sophisticated Westerners understand while the believer remains mired in superstition and neurotic fantasy.
The most important story in and for American history is the biblical Exodus; the verse “let my people go” became the subtext of the Puritan emigration to America in the seventeenth century, the American revolution in the eighteenth, and--in significant part by Lincoln’s own efforts--of the Civil War in the nineteenth. It became important, also, to the twentieth century Americanism of Wilson and Truman and Reagan and W. Bush--Americanism as an outward-looking religion with global responsibilities.A yes answer might say that if God gave Biblical antecedents for the freedom of all mankind, He might have put some in the Koran as well . . . A yes answer would try to figure how to play our own religion-based beliefs into a conversation with Islam, as Henry Jaffa seems to argue in the Claremont Review:In the end we do need to know the real character of Americanism. The secular version is a flat, gray rendition--no color and no fizz--of this extraordinary work of religious imagination: the idea that liberty, equality, and democracy belong to all mankind because God wants them to.
We [are], in short, engaged in telling others to accept the forms of our own political institutions, without reference to the principles or convictions that give rise to those institutions.A no answer, on the other hand, might first start with Islam as anathema to free society, then move to other religious creeds, seeing them through a lens of general suspicion.Unless we as a political community can by reasoned discourse re-establish in our own minds the authority of the constitutionalism of the Founding Fathers and of Lincoln, of government devoted to securing the God-given equal rights of every individual human being, we will remain ill equipped to bring the fruits of freedom to others.
Is Islam compatible with a free society? Like a Zen koan, this is the question that vexes us.
Our answer of course, might change. The Bush administration has been answering yes for five years. But, inhabiting a democracy, it is of course reflective of and responsive to public sentiment. Several commentators believe that sentiment may be shifting. A piece by Jim Geraghty on his National Review blog wonders if Americans' answer to the key question is changing:
This strikes me as the fallout of the Tipping Point™ - my sense that in recent weeks, a large chunk of Americans just decided that they no longer have any faith in the good sense or non-hostile nature of the Muslim world. If subsequent polls find similar results, the port deal is dead.Perhaps the people's answer to the question is changing.
And what to make of the Manifesto from a dozen European intellectuals, Muslims or former Muslims many of them? How are they answering the key strategic question?
It is not a clash of civilisations nor an antagonism of West and East that we are witnessing, but a global struggle that confronts democrats and theocrats . . .In Glenn Reynolds' podcast interview with Claire Berlinkski, author of Menace in Europe: Why the Continent's Crisis is America's TooIslamism is a reactionary ideology which kills equality, freedom and secularism wherever it is present. Its success can only lead to a world of domination: man’s domination of woman, the Islamists’ domination of all the others.
, she relates this story: Reynolds: You have this wonderful scene in your book where you talk about this, this Englishman of Bengali descent, and he said that when he traveled to the United States, he saw all these immigrants who were US citizens being welcomed by the INS and told, "Welcome home!" And he said, you know, if I ever got that kind of treatment you know when I returned to England, I'd happily lay down my life for England right there . . .In a dissenting statement to the above-mentioned manifesto, Paul Belien in Brussels Journal quotes Dr. Jos Verhulst:Berlinski: I would have died for England on the spot, that's what he told me. If ever once, someone had said "welcome home" when I showed them my passport at customs and immigration, I would have died for England on the spot.
And now he stands at the dawn of the 21st century: the maligned individual, unsteady on his own feet after executing the inner breach with every form of imposed authority, uncertain, blinking in the brightness of the only god he is willing to recognise – Truth itself, stretching out before him unfathomably deep – full of doubt but aware that he, called to non-submission, must seek the road to the transcendent, carrying as his only property, his most valuable heirloom from his turbulent past, that one gold piece that means the utmost to him, his precious ideal of complete freedom of thought, of speech and of scientific inquiry. That is the unique advance that he received to help him in his long and difficult quest.When I was in Iraq, one Iraqi told me he wished Iraq could be the 51st state in the union. Our experience in both Iraq and Afghanistan seems to indicate that there are many Muslims who would prefer that we answer the key question with a yes, saying to those Muslims who can find Islam compatible with freedom, "Have courage!" and once they've achieved their freedom, "Welcome home!"Meanwhile he is being beleaguered and threatened on all sides; from out of the darkness voices call him to submit and retreat; they shout that the gold in his hands is worthless, while the brightness ahead of him still makes it almost impossible for him to see what lies in store. In short: what this contemporary individual needs most of all is courage, great courage. And the will to be free and to see, which is tantamount to the will to live.
To what fate are we assigning them if we answer no?
UPDATE: Welcome Instapundit readers! Even though I had no direct quote above, this piece, like most that I do, had a lot of influence from Belmont Club, especially Blowback.
UPDATE2: There seems to be some problem posting comments. The server must be a little slow. It took me several tries to post last night. Thanks for your patience.
Written by Chester at 12:26 AM | Link | Comments (43) | TrackBack (5) | Print Article
February 24, 2006
"Solidarity with Denmark, death to fascism."
Ian Schwartz has a 2 mintue and 27 second video available of Christopher Hitchens' speech at the Danish Embassy in DC today, where Hitchens organized a pro-Denmark rally. [Hat-tip: Instapundit]. I've put together a little transcript of Hitchens' remarks:
"Brothers and sisters, I [inaudible] . . . a speech.I imagine that Hitchens and I might disagree on many points. He's more or less a socialist after all. But he's pretty much won my admiration for all time with his spirited defense of the war in Iraq. The piece he wrote in the Weekly Standard back in September alone is absolutely outstanding [see A War to Be Proud Of], and when I see things like Fukuyama backpedaling, I look back on that piece and feel comforted.[Laughter]
It misses the point . . . [inaudible] [laughter]
[Crowd: "Speech! Speech!"]
Brothers and sisters, I just thought I would thank everyone for coming and say how touching it is that people will take a minute from a working day to do something that our government won't do for us, which is quite simply to say that we know who our friends and our allies are, and they should know that we know it. And that we take a stand of democracy against dictatorship. And when the embassies of democracies are burned in the capital cities of dictatorships, we think the State Department should denounce that, and not denounce the cartoons.
[Cheers of support and applause]
And that we're fed up with the invertebrate nature of our State Department.
[Laughter, cheers, applause]
If we had more time, brothers and sisters, I think that we should have gone from here to the embassy of Iraq, to express our support for another country that is facing a campaign of lies and hatred and violence. And we would -- if we did that we would say that we knew blasphemy when we saw it, we knew sacrilege when we saw it: it is sacrilegious to blow up beautiful houses of worship in Samarra. That would be worth filling the streets of the world to protest about.
[Cheers and applause]
We are not for profanity nor for disrespect, though we are, and without any conditions, or any ifs or any buts, for free expression in all times and in all places
[applause]
and our solidarity . . . [inaudible]
[applause]
So, we said we would, I told the Danish embassy that we would disperse at one o'clock. I hope and believe we've made our point, I hope and believe that today's tv will have some more agreeable features, such as your own, to show, instead of the faces of violence and hatred, and fascism, and I think I can just close by saying, solidarity with Denmark, death to fascism.
[Applause as Hitchens steps away]
Today only increases my favor for Hitchens. Three cheers for Denmark!
Written by Chester at 9:52 PM | Link | Comments (7) | TrackBack (1) | Print Article
February 23, 2006
Has war with Iran begun already?
Back in January, I said:
Here's what I expect in the next 12 months.Is it possible that the Iranians have begun their campaign of terror, but with as much deniability as possible? Let's discuss.-There will be airstrikes upon Iranian facilities by either the US or Israel.
-There will be catastrophic, if not cataclysmic, terror attacks in various parts of the Middle East, sponsored by Iran or its proxies; The Gulf States, Jordan, Israel, and Iraq are potential targets.I'm not going to make any definitive statements of causality. Either of the above two events may happen before the other. What happens after those two is anyone's guess. But I think they are both coming, and coming faster than we may all expect.
As far as terrorism and its relationship to a state, Iran presents a different set of circumstances than either Iraq or Afghanistan. Al Qaeda's raid on the eastern seaboard on 9/11 was an act of a transnational terror organization with sanctuary within a state. Afghanistan was a totally willing host to Al Qaeda's parasitic organization. Nevertheless, the Taliban and Al Qaeda were still different organizations, with different goals, intents, and motivations, complementary though they might have been.
In Iraq, terror organizations have yet a different relationship with the state. There they exist as something more akin to a cancer, feeding off the ideological and organizational remnants of the Hussein regime, and attacking the host -- the new Iraqi state, founded in the period of 2004-2005.
But what if terrorism is not just a tactic, or an organization separate from its host state? What if instead, terrorism is part and parcel of the state, and not just a tactic, but key to the national security strategy of a state? What if its institutions are not just cooperative with those of a given state, but nearly completely reliant upon it, even to the point of serving as its proxy?
Something akin to this last scenario describes the relationship of Iran to terrorist outfits, whether Hezbollah, its own internal security organizations, or its Pasdaran officers who have made mischief in all parts of the Muslim world at some point or another. Let us then posit that terrorism in some form is an integral part of Iran's foreign policy.
Allow a slilght digression on the nature of terrorism itself. As much as Al Qaeda or its brethren may wish to inflict massive casualties within the West and the US especially, terrorism is just as much about, well, terrorizing a given audience or constituency. That is to say, even though many forms of it might inflict significant casualties, the ultimate goal is influence. It is meant to change minds. When its perpetrators are known, and terror acts are overt, it might be categorized within that type of operation that the West would know as a "show of force." When its origins are not known, or if it is perhaps not even clear that a certain event has a single human agency behind it, then it seeks other forms of influence -- perhaps to change mindsets or affect policy. In some cases, it might even overlap or be confused with covert action, one of the purposes of which is to affect or change policy without any public knowledge of agency or origin.
The US response to 9/11 -- transformation of two states, and an unremitting pursuit of Al Qaeda in all its forms -- would seem to suggest that overt terrorism does not influence the US in a productive manner. Any organization or state that used terror solely for the purpose of a "show of force" would be looking down the business end of the US military's arsenal with little delay. This is not to suggest that spectacular attacks won't be pursued, just that they might now be most useful only for their destructive power.
But the second kind of terrorism -- deniable, covert, and meant to influence -- might take on a whole new importance. These kinds of attacks might be meant to embarrass the West, harrass it, sow discord among its nations, or alternately (and perhaps not simultaneously) unify the Muslim world against it. What might some of these actions look lilke? Well, perhaps "spontaneous" demonstrations in dozens of countries about something published four months previously in an obscure news organ would fit the bill. Or, perhaps a massive terror attack upon a key Shia shrine, which has thus far not been claimed by Al Qaeda in Iraq, could fit into this category as well.
When considered in the light of the long history of Iran with terror, as both its sponsor and its exporter, one wonders if Iran has begun a new campaign in its quest to achieve nuclear power status with no real objection from the rest of the world. Much of the below has been stated in other venues, but consider each of these points afresh:
-the cartoon controversy did not really begin until after the IAEA had referred Iran to the security council.
-the current chairmanship of the IAEA is held by Denmark.
-some of the worst violence was in Syria, a state where the government controls association, and which is allied with Iran.
And as far as the mosque destruction goes:
-no particular group has claimed responsibility.
-conventional wisdom, correct or not, holds that this act has created one of the highest states of tension in Iraq in some time.
-President Ahmadinejad was quick to blame the US and/or Israel, for the act.
Have these acts been effective in influencing the West? The cartoon controversy might have united the West a bit, but it might have united the Muslim world much more. The mosque destruction is a bit too recent to judge.
One wonders though: how does the US public's reaction to the UAE port deal relate to the cartoon riots? One commentator today (can't find the link) mentioned that it is the reaction of the US public to distrust this transaction when they see that their own government was not forthright enough in supporting Denmark.
One can speculate all night on whether the above two acts are related and how. There are other explanations. Coincidence is one of the easiest.
But all of this raises a larger point: when Americans envision war, we imagine large scale military assaults and operations to neutralize targets, not covert and deniable violence on behalf of influencing public attitudes. Yet this blind spot is exactly what Iran excels at performing, and exactly what vexes Secretary Rumsfeld so much as he laments today in the LA Times:
Our enemies have skillfully adapted to fighting wars in today's media age, but for the most part we -- our government, the media or our society in general -- have not.I believe our war with Iran has begun.Consider that violent extremists have established "media relations committees" and have proved to be highly successful at manipulating opinion elites. They plan and design their headline-grabbing attacks using every means of communication to break the collective will of free people.
Strategypage today has a list of "Ten Signs that the United States is about to Bomb Iran." These are things to look for that will indicate an imminent strike by the US, movements of units and materiel and such that intelligence analysts would examine.
Iran is playing quite a different game than us. It seeks a campaign of influence, of which terrorism and rioting might be key components. Iran's campaign needs no top ten signs to detect it. If the period before it was referred to the Security Council might have been called the "diplomatic phase," it is now in the "influence phase," which might last for a long time, and mean no further escalation is necessary. There may be no start or stop, there may be no formal military action, there may be no overt Iranian involvement, but war with Iran will likely look like a series of events, inexplicable and spontaneous, yet which frustrate our aims.
It is a well-crafted strategy really, as it seeks the seams in our defenses. It undermines our cultural assumptions (wars must be declared at a given point, ended at a given point, and fought by uniformed military forces on "battlefields") and even some of our societal organizational seams (media institutions are not part of the governments that fight wars, but are separate, and beheld to different standards).
For those who think I might be some sort of conspiracy nut, consider: a key part of influence is opportunism. I'm not implying that Iran knew the cartoons would be published, or even was behind the Danish imam who first started circulating them. But when you see an opening you seize it. Iran may have had nothing to do with the destruction of the golden mosque, but this doesn't stop Ahmadinejad from fanning the flames of popular emotion by blaming the US or Israel.
Welcome to warfare in the 21st century. What will be next?
UPDATE: Hat-tip to Instapundit for the Strategypage bit. Also, for this piece by Michael Novak:
Naturally, the West is feeling guilty about the cartoons, and chillingly intimidated by the “Muslim reaction”—more exactly, by the contrived, heavily stimulated, long-contained, and deliberately timed demonstrations of focused political outrage against them—while failing to pay serious attention to the truly huge event that started off this week with a great boom.I guess I'm not the only one . . .That event, I have a hunch, might well be followed by another shocker fairly soon.
For the stakes for Iran—its nuclear future—and for Syria—its safety from within—and for the future of Hamas in Palestine, could scarcely be higher than they are just now. The most organized radical forces are poised to act in great concert. The moment is crucial for their future prospects.
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February 21, 2006
"I want hard bastards. I want MI-5."
(dialogue excerpt from Episode 8)
I've finished watching Season 3 of MI-5 and it did not disappoint. MI-5 is consistently one of the best television shows around. It addresses varied aspects of intelligence work, the clandestine lifestyle, morality and national security, and is not afraid to call a spade a spade when face to face with Islamic terror. It is superb.
If Season 3 has a theme, it is of the trials of love while engaged in serving one's country, a cruel mistress indeed. Also, extended ruminations on death are throughout these ten episodes as well. When is it moral for a country to order an assassination? I found the scenario that the show used to be completely justified, but, well, I'm a Marine. Is the lifestyle of a spy compatible at all with a personal love life? When has an agent gone too far in influencing a target? What should one be prohibited from suggesting?
These larger questions are punctuated with bits of technological whimsy -- I'm no computer geek but I think some of the technology mentioned seems a little far-fetched -- but they at no point detract from the plot, as they are ancillary to the more substantial questions above.
There are also a few digs at the Americans ("Most Americans still think the world on the other side of the oceans is empty save for signs saying 'Here be dragons." -- I took no offense at this, but found it amusing.), interservice rivalry (whew! are things really that bad between 5 and 6?), political usage of the agency, and the role of corporations in influencing policy. But none of these made up the substance of plots, and were really sideshows -- maybe even bones thrown by the writers to their political masters at the BBC.
No, this show is a work of art of the highest quality.
One episode contains a chilling exchange between a suspected terror financier -- who hides beneath three-piece suits, flawless English, and legitimate businesses -- and a female agent sent to investigate his motives:
TARGET: [sipping cognac] "American rubbish."I found this exchange to be very compelling because the message was not only delivered by a silver-tongued businessman, speaking to an attractive woman in a $500-a-night hotel suite, but also because its content is not one of Islam, Allah, paradise or fascism. It is only the most cynical nihilism. What a telling scene. For all of our rightful stereotypes of poor Arabs shouting in the streets and brandishing AK-47s, here is another side of Al Qaeda equally dangerous: megalothymia wed only to violent thrill-seeking. Might this derivation of "Islamic" terror be a growiing constituency of Eurabia in the future? I hope not, but suspect so.AGENT: "You don't like Americans?"
TARGET: "I think no better or worse of them than of anyone else. I did enjoy watching the planes flying into the Twin Towers."
AGENT: "It certainly made the pulse . . . beat a little faster."
TARGET: "Umm."
AGENT: "The people jumping . . . was awful though."
TARGET: "Can't you imagine the excitement of those young men who had taken over the planes? To do something so . . . devastating, so spectacular . . . "
AGENT: "It almost sounds as though you . . . support Al Qaeda."
TARGET: "No . . . I'm not interested in their ideology. They're a business as well as a terrorist organization."
AGENT: "But they could do something here or back in London that would kill everyone."
TARGET: "Why be so frightened of death, Sophie? Couple kissing down in the lobby. Boy who brought us the drinks. Who would really care if they all vanished tomorrow?"
AGENT: "Well, their families, the people that love them . . ."
TARGET: "Compare their trivial lives to those men who rushed to their deaths on that beautiful morning in New York."
AGENT: "Is that what you enjoy then? Death and destroying people?"
TARGET: "Enjoy? No, not really. But if you don't like death and destruction, I suggest you look away for the next thirty years, because it's inevitable. And millions will perish."
AGENT: "You know, you make money from people who deal in death and destruction. I'm not sure I entirely approve of you."
TARGET: "But there is a part of you that agrees with me, I'm sure."
AGENT: "What makes you think that?"
TARGET: "You're clever. You're a bit lonely. I imagine you've never been able to keep a lover, but you pretend that's through choice. One thing puzzles me though. That lost child at the station.
AGENT: "What about it?"
TARGET: "I saw your face. It wasn't the Sophie Newman who screams at cloakroom attendants.
AGENT: "How do you know about that? . . . [recovers her bearing] I've always had a soft spot for children. That other bitch happened to lose a particularly beautiful scarf of mine."
TARGET: "Shall I have her killed?"
AGENT: "What?"
TARGET: "The girl in the cloakroom? Hmm? Come on, Sophie! I thought it was your mission in life not to be bored. Let's see if she's working tonight.
AGENT: "Let's just . . .sit down."
TARGET: "One call to the casino, and one of my men can follow her to her house, kill her, and everybody in it."
AGENT: "Stop it."
TARGET: "Come on, Sophie, you don't find this boring do you? We can listen to her screaming." [Speaks a few sentences in Turkish into his phone] Good. She's working. So how much pain does she deserve for losing your scarf?"
AGENT: "Stop it."
TARGET: [Looks at her, then hangs up phone] "One person. A million people. You or me. It changes nothing in the end. Life is only a dream. And one day, we all wake up from it."
AGENT: "I'd like to believe that when people wake up from it they'll see a kinder face than yours."
TARGET: "Good night, Sophie."
Lest you think that this is the only impression of terrorists that is given, I have to contrast the above depiction of terror's nihilistic side with the portrayal of an influential imam in a London mosque in an episode from Season 2. The imam gives this homily to six would-be suicide bombers in one scene:
"What is it to wear 150 pound American training shoes? To put on jackets with a label from Milan in Italy? What is it to drink alcohol? To go clubbing, and end up fumbling a slut of an English girl in the park at dawn, your mind wrecked with pills? It is nothing but ash in the mouth, the taste of the death of the soul. For the west sells you the illusion of an earthly paradise. This is how the American Jews on Wall Street make their money. But despite all the pressures of the West, gaudy promises in your schools, on the television, the way your British friends behave, you've kept yourselves pure. You've become the West's worst fear: young people they cannot sell to, young people they cannot touch. You know the way to true paradise: through a martyr's death." [ALL, shouting] "Death to America and her allies! Death to the unbelievers! Death to the West!"That episode aired at least a few months before the bus and train bombings in London. Like I said, MI-5 does not shy from asking the difficult questions inherent in strategy, or offending where necessary to ask those questions. If you aren't watching MI-5, why not? I recommend starting with Season 1.
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February 5, 2006
Ductus Exemplo
Today's sermon at church was pretty thought-provoking. The minister took the occasion of Bush's State of the Union address to offer his own interpretation of the "State of the Church," by which he meant, the state of the Christian church in general, not our own church community.
He pointed out that statistics show that 76% of Americans weren't in church today. He noted that long ago, when a new subdivision was created, the developers would choose a place for the church, making sure there was one, but now, churches have trouble expanding or even starting in some communities. Neighborhoods often even oppose church expansions -- which was apparently the case for our church several years ago.
Pastors are portrayed on television and in popular culture as bumbling, and inarticulate. Christians in general are shown as being narrow-minded and judgemental. In years past missionaries would depart the United States for lands abroad, then return to report on their progress. Now, the United States is the 3rd largest mission field in the world, with missionaries coming here to testify, then returning to their own countries to report.
The minister mentioned Thomas Friedman's book, "The World is Flat", which makes the case for the extreme interconnected nature of the world economy today.
He noted that we live in a time of extreme technological advance, with corresponding social upheavals, and political controversies. He said that although Christianity may seem as though it cannot adapt to new circumstances, and it may seem that our nation is not a Christian nation, that Christianity has weathered similar social upheavals before. I thought he was going to draw comparisons to the Reformation or the Renaissance, but instead, he drew our attention to the 1st century AD.
In the 1st century, Pax Romana ruled the world, and Roman engineering, in the form of roads and other public works projects, and shipping and transportation technology, meant rapid change in many parts of the world. Christianity started in this environment and began to spread like wildfire. By the end of the 1st century, the Christian church had spread until it covered most of the known world.
But its spread was not without strife. The Romans at first ignored Christianity, then began to persecute it, and then things got so bad that Romans would kill Christians anytime they discovered them.
How did Christianity spread so quickly in this environment? The pastor's thesis was that Christianity spread because it acted and "looked" differently than the rest of the world. That is to say, his thesis is that Christianity spread by its own example. He pointed us to the book "The Rise of Christianity" by Rodney Stark, in which it is argued that Constantine's conversion to Christianity was not a leading event but a trailing one: only when much of the empire was already Christian did Constantine convert. By that time, Christianity had already infiltrated all realms of empire life. The reason the pastor gave was that during the period between 100 AD and the conversion of Constantine, Rome had many troubles which its government and its elites could not solve. When they failed, Christians stepped in and attempted to take care of the people of the empire, to provide the services that the government could not.
The pastor noted that when Christians today discuss how to influence the United States so that it might become a more devout or devoutly Christian nation, they usually have two solutions: first, they want to somehow convert the media such that celebrities are Christians and set good examples. Second, they want to "vote out the bums" in office and replace them with Christians.
The pastor said that those ideas were all well and good but the real way that Christianity will spread is by the example of its philosophy in everyday life: Christians can change the culture "through the living of our very lives." Christians themselves can affect this change by 1) aspiring to be Christ-like, 2) going on mission trips of some kind, whether locally or abroad, and 3) having social and communal relationships with other Christians, because Christianity does not thrive in a vacuum.
I thought this was a very interesting sermon and I really agreed with his idea that Christianity must survive and thrive on its own merits, not by voting in certain politicians who might enforce it through fiat, or by merely having somehow the right celebrities in place to espouse its tenets. This appealed to me as one who tries to examine all manner of ideas on their own merits.
I did however, have two other reactions to the sermon:
First, if today is an era of rapid technological change and there is a faith that is spreading as quickly as Christianity did in the 1st century AD, I think the more accurate analogy is Islam. Islam is offering itself very clearly as an alternative to the modernizing forces of rapid technological change, social and political upheaval, and "mental war" as I mentioned in a previous post.
Second, if, as the pastor recommended, Christians can advocate their own religion by setting an example through the living of their very lives, how might Muslims be convinced to do the same? And not just Muslims in the US, or the West, but Muslims in the Middle East as well? Is this even possible? Or are they destined to attempt to impose their own enforcement of Islam upon the rest of us, by law when possible, or by protest when not?
Perhaps our own democratic initiatives in Iraq -- a secular country, and a religiously diverse one at that -- are as much about inculcating some sense of this striving to prove the value of one's own religion as a way of life in compeition with other ways of life, as they are about anything else?
I know that all may be a bit off the beaten path from the regular topics here, but it all seems incredibly relevant given the cartoon controversy of late.
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January 19, 2006
Michael Scheuer to Bill O'Reilly: "We have to kill more of the enemy."
Michael Scheuer was on Bill O'Reilly this evening and Johnny Dollar has the transcript:
O'REILLY: [talking about Dick Cheny's interview with Neil Cavuto] OK. Now he comes in, and he's very cool and confident, as he usually is. He doesn't do a lot of media, but when you see him he's cool and confident. And he basically says, look. We could get attacked, but we have done a tremendous amount of damage to Al-Qaeda. This is Dick Cheney saying this to Neil Cavuto. Do you believe that?Scheuer also believes that the recent "truce" offer from bin Laden does not imply weakness, but is part of the ancient Muslim code of warning an enemy prior to an attack.SCHEUER: No, sir. He's whistling past the graveyard, sir. They have a body count of how many people we've killed in Al-Qaeda, but they never have had an idea of how big Al-Qaeda was, or is. So when Mr Cheney says that, it's simply to me a sign of panic. Because if Al-Qaeda attacks us again in the United States, the United States has absolutely nothing to respond against. Unless we're willing to take out a city like Riyad or Cairo. The President and the Vice-President and Mr Clinton before them play a very dangerous game here. Because if we are attacked again, what do we respond against? And to think that somehow we're winning this war is really to fly in the face of reality, sir.
O'REILLY: Is there anything we can do to win it?
SCHEUER: Yes, sir. We certainly have to kill more of the enemy. That's the first step.
O'REILLY: Any way we can?
SCHEUER: Anywhere we can, whenever we can, without a great deal of concern for civilian casualties. As I said, war is war. The people who got killed when they were hosting Zawahiri to dinner were not the friends of the United States.
O'REILLY: All right, Mr Scheuer, always a pleasure to talk with you. Thank you very much for taking the time.
I was surprised to see Scheuer speak in such frank terms about warfare, because of his previous statements about Jewish conspiracies. Given that those were in front of a liberal audience of the policy elite, but that his more bellicose comments today were on Fox, the favored cable news source of redstaters, perhaps . . . he's just trying to please everyone to sell more books.
Either way, his theory of an impending attack is certainly interesting.
SCHEUER: It's always my pleasure, sir. Thank you.
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January 15, 2006
Diplomatic History is Taking Place Even As We Speak
In addition to the much-publicized diplomatic shuffling between the US and the EU, there are other meetings taking place which happen much less frequently, or at all, and which seem to indicate that momentous events behind the scenes, the contents of which we might only speculate upon, are at hand.
Syria's Assad made a surprise visit to Saudi Arabia last week.
Bush met with former Cabinet officials on Jan 5th.
Kobayashi Maru speculates: Why is Kim Jong-il in China Now?
The answer to all three might be Iran, or it might not. What is scary is that the answer could be Iran. In short, while Iraq was largely diplomatically, economically, militarily and otherwise isolated from the rest of the world before 2003, Iran is only slightly so today. While Iraq's contacts with the west were abundant via the Oil-for-Food scandal, those contacts were still scandalous. Iran is linked to the economies of Russia & China, has relationships with North Korea, Pakistan, even France, Germany, and the UK.
The relationships which Iran possess do not sum up to a coalition. But they are there nonetheless, making the Iran nut even harder to crack, and the price for miscalculation ever higher.
A History of the Modern World
The Austrian government was determined to make an end to the South Slav separatism that was gnawing its empire to pieces. It decided to crush the independence of Serbia, the nucleus of South Slav agitation, though not to annex it, since there were now thought to be too many Slavs within the emprie already. The Austrian government consulted the German, to see how far it might go with the support of its ally. The Germans, issuing their famous "blank check," encouraged the Austrians to be firm. The Austrians, thus reassured, dispatched a drastic ultimatum to Serbia, demanding among other things that Austrian officials be permitted to collaborate in investigating and punishing the perpetrators of the assassination. The Serbs counted on Russian support, even to the point of war, judging that Russia could not again yield in a Balkan crisis, for the third time in six years, without losing its influence in the Balkans altogether. The Russians in turn counted on France; and France, terrified at the possibility of being some day caught alone in a war with Germany, and determined to keep Russia as an ally at any cost, in effect gave a blank check to Russia. The Serbs rejected the critical item in the Austrian ultimatum as an infringement on Serbian sovereignty, and Austria thereupon declared war upon Serbia. Russia prepared to defend Serbia and hence to fight Austria. Expecting that Austria would be joined by Germany, Russia rashly mobilized its army ono the German as well as the Austrian frontier. Since the power which first mobilized had all the advantages of a rapid offensive, the German government demanded an end to the Russian mobilization on its border and, receiving no answer, declared war on Russia on August 1, 1914. Convinced that France would in any case enter the war on the side of Russia, Germany also declared war on France on August 3rd.The German decisions were posited on a reckless hope that Great Britain might not enter the war at all . . . The German plan to crush France quickly was such that it could succeed only by crossing Belgium. When the Belgians protested, the Germans invaded anyway, violating the treaty of 1839 which had guaranteed Belgian neutrality. England declared war on Germany on August 4th . . .
As for Russia and Austria, they were both tottering empires. Especially after 1900, the tsarist regime suffered from endemic revolutionism, and the Hapsburg empire from chronic nationalistic agitation. Authorities in both empires became desperate. Like the Serbs, they had little to lose and were therefore reckless. It was Russia that drew France and hence England into war in 1914, and Austria that drew in Germany. Seen in this light, the tragedy of 1914 is that the most backward or politically bankrupt parts of Europe, through the alliance system, dragged the more advanced parts automatically into ruin.
It is not useful to draw analogies among the power relationships, the rising or falling states, or the alliances of 1914 to those that exist today. We live in a new world. But it is useful to consider the enormous complexity of the world then and now, and to realize that complexity offers both opportunities for the art of the deal to thrive, and for miscalculation to lead to utter ruin.
We are blessed to live in the "interesting times" of the old Chinese proverb . . .
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November 3, 2005
"Hideous Schizophrenia": Western Nihilism and Angry Muslims
Cultural diplomacy abroad is all well and good, but what about those who are radicalized in the West?
A recent article in the Christian Science Monitor, 'Cultural diplomacy' is key to winning hearts and minds encourages a return to old methods of cultural diplomacy that were in vogue during the cold war:
Over the years, the United States government has targeted a string of foreign individuals destined for greatness and brought them to America to be steeped in the culture and ways of Americans, and be exposed to the strengths and weaknesses of the American political system. They came on an international visitor program and though they may not have necessarily agreed with the policies of any particular administration, they generally left with warm memories of individual Americans and respect for American institutions . . .One man in particular did not. Bernard Lewis explains in The Crisis of Islam: Holy War and Unholy Terror
: What we confront now is not just a complaint about one or another American policy but rather a rejection and condemnation, at once angry and contemptuous, of all that American is seen to represent in the modern world.Qutb, a major influence to Osama bin Laden, was radicalized in America, by just the sort of cultural diplomacy programs mentioned above. It seems that direct and pervasive exposure to Western culture has some sort of innate radicalizing influence when that exposure occurs in the West.A key figure in the development of these new attitudes was Sayyid Qutb, an Egyptian who became a leading ideologue of Muslim fundamentalism and an active member of the fundamentalist organization known as the Muslim Brotherhood. Born in a village in Upper Egypt in 1906, he studied in Cairo and for some years worked as a teacher and then as an official in the Egyptian Ministry of Education. In that capacity he was sent on a special study mission to the United States, where he stayed from November 1948 to August 1950. His fundamentalist activism and writing began very soon after his return from America to Egypt . . .
Even more revealing was his shocked response to the American way of life -- principally its sinfulness and degeneray and its addiction to what he saw as sexual promiscuity. Sayyid Qutb took as a given the contrast between Eastern spirituality and Western materialism, and described American as a particularly extremem form of the latter.
Why might this be? Is there some larger force at work? In Shows About Nothing: Nihilism in Popular Culture from The Exorcist to Seinfeld
According to Tocqueville, there are two dominant passions in democracy: the love of liberty and the love of equality, the more powerful of which is the latter. When allied to the longing for physical well-being, the passion for equality leads to a remarkable sameness of condition and to uniformity of opinion even as it dissipates the soul by immersing it in the pursuit of consumer goods and petty pleasures . . .This attitude is exactly what Theodore Dalrymple examines among UK Muslims in the latest issue of City Journal [ht: The Belmont Club]:There is, then, a hidden alliance between centralized government and individualism. They are mirror images of one another; each tends to give birth to its opposite. How are we to understand the relationship? According to Tocqueville, "When the inhabitant of a democratic country compares himself individually with all those about him, he feels with pride that he is the equal of any one of them; but when he comes to survey the totality of his fellows and to place himself in contrast with so huge a body, he is instantly overwhelmed by the sense of his own insignificance and weakness. The same equality that renders him independent of each of his fellow citizens, taken severally, exposes him alone and unprotected to the influence of the greater number . . ."
In jettisoning authority -- indeed, the past itself -- Enlightenment progress is supposed to liberate the individual. But progress puts the individual at the service of large, impersonal, historical forces. Tocqueville worried that the modern emphasis on historical progress would engenger in individuals a sense of helplessness and impotence born of the suspicion that the actions and thoughts of an individual are as nothing in comparison with the force of history.
The dissatisfactions of young Muslim men in Britain are manifold. Most will experience at some time slighting or downright insulting remarks about them or their group—the word “Paki” is a term of disdainful abuse—and these experiences tend to grow in severity and significance with constant rehearsal in the mind as it seeks an external explanation for its woes. Minor tribulations thus swell into major injustices, which in turn explain the evident failure of Muslims to rise in their adopted land. The French-Iranian researcher Farhad Khosrokhavar, who interviewed 15 French Muslim prisoners convicted of planning terrorist acts, relates in his book, Suicide Bombers: Allah’s New Martyrs, how some of his interviewees had been converted to the terrorist outlook by a single insulting remark—for example, when one of their sisters was called a “dirty Arab” when she explained how she couldn’t leave home on her own as other girls could. Such is the fragility of the modern ego—not of Muslims alone, but of countless people brought up in our modern culture of ineffable self-importance, in which an insult is understood not as an inevitable human annoyance, but as a wound that outweighs all the rest of one’s experience.Even now, we learn in an AP article about the Paris riots that the rioters live in "neighborhoods where African and Muslim immigrants and their French-born children are trapped by poverty, unemployment, racial discrimination, crime, poor education and housing."A constant and almost unchallenged emphasis on “social justice,” the negation of which is, of course, “discrimination,” can breed only festering embitterment. Where the definition of justice is entitlement by virtue of group existence rather than reward for individual effort, a radical overhaul of society will appear necessary to achieve such justice. Islamism in Britain is thus not the product of Islam alone: it is the product of the meeting of Islam with a now deeply entrenched native mode of thinking about social problems.
And it is here that the “potential space” of Islamism, with its ready-made diagnosis and prescriptions, opens up and fills with the pus of implacable hatred for many in search of a reason for and a solution to their discontents. According to Islamism, the West can never meet the demands of justice, because it is decadent, materialistic, individualistic, heathen, and democratic rather than theocratic. Only a return to the principles and practices of seventh-century Arabia will resolve all personal and political problems at the same time. This notion is fundamentally no more (and no less) bizarre or stupid than the Marxist notion that captivated so many Western intellectuals throughout the 20th century: that the abolition of private property would lead to final and lasting harmony among men. Both conceptions offer a formula that, rigidly followed, would resolve all human problems.
Meanwhile, the British have developed a new citizenship test:
It's not about your familiarity with Shakespeare, your knowledge of the Restoration or your command of the battles that forged the empire.[Here's the official study guide, and here's a BBC estimation of what kinds of questions might be on an actual test. I scored a 7, which gives me a "seat on the district council." Not bad for never having been to the UK.]As far as the British government is concerned, it's about knowing how old you must be to buy a lottery ticket (answer: 16). It's about UK voltage standards (240 volts). It's about what numbers to dial for police (999) and the fire department (112).
As of Tuesday, immigrants applying to become British citizens must pass a 24-question exam that is a mix of practical knowledge, civics and trivia about life in Her Majesty's realm. Unlike applicants for U.S. citizenship, aspiring Brits need not worry about having to bone up on history.
The 45-minute, multiple-choice test costs about $60 to take. Applicants must answer 18 questions correctly to pass; there are no limits on the number of times the test can be taken.
The Home Office says the test will help form a common bond among an increasingly diverse population.
Back to the piece on cultural diplomacy:
President Bush has installed Karen Hughes, his closest media strategist, as undersecretary for public diplomacy at the State Department. She and Secretary Rice have the president's ear. On their desks last month was deposited the intriguing report of an advisory committee on cultural diplomacy made up of distinguished American citizens. They argue that alongside radio and TV broadcasting to foreign countries, and all the other media programs designed to explain and further political policies, cultural diplomacy "reveals the soul of a nation." American art, dance, film, jazz, and literature continue to inspire people the world over despite our political differences. Cultural diplomacy, say the advisory committee members, "demonstrates our values, and our interest in values, and combats the popular notion that Americans are shallow, violent, and godless."Looking at the West as a whole, our soft-power strategy seems to be great books and priceless works of art abroad, and watered-down citizenship at home.
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September 11, 2005
Killing the Heresy of Suicide
Perhaps relevant to the war against the Islamists, and with a hint of substituting law enforcement for the use of force that is a bit unpalatable. But that much is easily overlooked. In this scene from The Man Who Was Thursday, written in 1906, Gabriel Syme is recruited by Scotland Yard:
"I will tell you," said the policeman slowly. "This is the situation. The head of one of our departments, one of the most celebrated detectives in Europe, has long been of the opinion that a purely intellectual conspiracy would soon threaten the very existence of civilization. He is certain that the scientific and artistic worlds are silently bound in a crusade against the Family and the State. He has, therefore, formed a special corps of policemen, policemen who are also philosophers. It is their business to watch the beginnings of this conspiracy, not merely in a criminal but in a controversial sense. I am a democrat myself, and I am fully aware of the value of the ordinary man in matters of ordinary valour or virtue. But it would obviously be undesirable to employ the common policeman in an investigation which is also a heresy hunt."One imagines that when this was published in 1906, the anarchists that the policeman purported to fight were those destined to fall victim to Bolshevism and other stains of the 20th century. The same year saw the publication of Conrad's The Secret Agent. Commenting upon his work after it was turned into a play, in 1929, Chesterton said, "Perhaps it is not worth while to try to kill heresies which so rapidly kill themselves -- and the cult of suicide committed suicide some time ago."Syme's eyes were bright with a sympathetic curiosity.
"What do you do, then?" he said.
"The work of the philosophical policeman," replied the man in blue, "is at once bolder and more subtle than that of the ordinary detective. The ordinary detective goes to pot-houses to arrest thieves; we go to artistic tea-parties to detect pessimists. The ordinary detective discovers from a ledger or a diary that a crime has been committed. We discover from a book of sonnets that a crime will be committed. We have to trace the origin of those dreadul thoughts that drive men on at last to intellectual fanaticism and intellectual crime. We were only just in time to prevent the assassination at Hartlepool, and that was entirely due to the fact that our Mr. Wilks (a smart young fellow) thoroughly understood a triolet."
"Do you mean," asked Syme, " that there is really as much connexion between crime and the modern intellect as all that?"
"You are not sufficiently democratic," answered the policeman, "but you were right when you said just now that our ordinary treatment of the poor criminal was a pretty brutal business. I tell you I am sometimes sick of my trade when I see how perpetually it means merely a war upon the ignorant and the desperate. But this new movement of ours is a very different affair. We deny the snobbish English assumption that the uneducated are the dangerous criminals. We remember the Roman Emperors. We remember the great poisoning princes of the Renaissance. We say that the most dangerous criminal is the educated criminal. We say that the most dangerous criminal now is the entirely lawless modern philosopher. Compared to him, burglars and bigamists are essentially moral men; my heart goes out to them. They accept the essential idea of man; they merely seek it wrongly. Thieves respect property. They merely wish the property become their property that they may more perfectly respect it. But philosophers dislike property as property; they wish to destroy the very idea of personal possession. Bigamists respect marriage, or they would not go through the highly ceremonial and even ritualistic formality of bigamy. But philosophers despise marriage as marriage. Murderers respect human life; they merely wish to attain a greater fullness of human life in themselves by the sacrifice of what seems to be lesser lives. But philosophers hate life itself, their own as much as other people's."
But it has moved outward from Europe and taken refuge elsewhere . . .
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June 22, 2005
Under the Radar
Here's a few under-reported events and stories that have caught my attention:
1. Porter Goss's recent interview with Time has been remarked upon elsewhere, especially his statements about the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden. But it doesn't seem that many people have paid much attention to this exchange:
Q: YOU HAVE BEEN A BIG CRITIC OF CIA HUMAN INTELLIGENCE. WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO FIX IT?I won't speculate on the many new things Goss says are in the offing, but I just want to draw attention to the tone of this response as compared to "we need another five years" from George Tenet. Let's hope Goss isn't blustering.A: We're fixing it with quantity and quality. We're changing methods. We're changing systems. We're changing it from the beginning to the end, from the recruitment--the types of people we are trying to attract--to the way we bring them in, to the experience we give them in training, to the ways we get them on station or in places where they are of use to us. We are focused very much on finding ways to get our eyes and ears out and about on a global basis. And we are doing it in ways that you can't even imagine and I'm not even going to slightly discuss.
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2. A few weeks ago I noticed that during his trip to Asia, Rumsfeld spent a few quiet moments with his South Korean counterpart, and they agreed to the contingency plan in case of the North's collapse (from the Korea Herald via Benador Assoc.):
Code-named OPLAN 5029, it calls for joint military actions to be taken in line with different levels should there be any kind of internal trouble in North Korea, including massive defections, a military coup or a regime change.I noted our policy toward North Korea back in December. See this Korea Times piece:
In an apparent policy turnaround, the United States will seek transformation of the North Korean regime without attempting to change or overthrow it, a top U.S. security policymaker said Tuesday.Could it be that these two things are related? All manner of pressure to transform the regime a la Eastern Europe in the 80s and then a contingency plan for when all hell breaks loose and the party cadres come south with the peasants?
Worth thinking about. Here's some more background.
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3. Finally, Forbes recently carried an interesting piece: an analysis of the war by Oxford Analytica, which is one of those foreign policy analysis outfits kind of like Strategic Forecasting. Check this little bit out:
. . . the Administration is moving toward a new phase in its anti-terror campaign. It is likely to embark on developing a new Presidential Decision Directive.If any of this is accurate, we are in for a round 3 that is as different as rounds 1 and 2 were from each other. Especially interesting is the idea of painting the conflict as a civil war within Islam. Perhaps such efforts would change things in Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, places where we want change but are hamstrung by economic and political ties with parts of the government. Those places in particular seem the ones destined to be affected most by such a campaign.
This document, which would replace the one created in October 2001, will provide interagency strategic guidance to U.S. counterterrorism policy.
The review will probably increase the scope of counterterrorist strategy, involving more instruments of state power than the current military/intelligence-heavy approach.
More focus will fall on terrorist groups such as Hezbollah and Hamas. These are known to be separate from al Qaeda and its affiliates but share some logistical assets.
Regime change in so-called state sponsors of terrorism (Cuba, North Korea, Syria and Iran) is not high on the agenda.In essence, the strategy will aim to make permanent the gains so far accrued in the war against terror by striking at the root causes and residual networks of Islamic terrorism. A growing trend in Islamic terrorism is the decay of global operations by al Qaeda against principally U.S. targets and the proliferation of local affiliate cells that strike mainly at perceived U.S. proxies or civilians in their own country of residence. The U.S. Country Reports on Terrorism 2004 document noted that al Qaeda's leadership threatened about three dozen countries in 2004, encouraging local affiliates to develop their own terrorist campaigns.
Washington is thus focusing rising levels of security assistance on a broad range of threatened nations in an effort to fight terrorists where they are active. State Department-administered counter-terrorism assistance rose from $38 million in 2001 to $133 million recently requested for fiscal year 2006. Since 2001, 20 new countries have begun receiving assistance, which means the number of states receiving training is now 67. Key focus states include Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Indonesia, Philippines, Columbia, Kenya and Malaysia.
In addition to response and post-incident investigation, a large proportion of training focuses on the border security aspects of preventative security. A growing number of U.S.-led initiatives are underway to reduce unregulated cross-border movement, control access to the global air-transport network, and "fence off" areas of weak government control where terrorists can develop bases.
The U.S. government is also focusing more attention on the intangible but vital dimension of the "war of ideas" between radical Islam and moderate Western and Islamic thought. The Pentagon's September 2004 National Defense Strategy stressed the need to counter ideological support for terrorism to secure permanent gains in the war against terrorism.
It stated the importance of negating the image of a U.S. war against Islam, and instead, developing the image of a civil war within Islam, fought between moderate states and radical terrorists. This kind of imagery will feed into the broader debate beginning in the U.S. on how to win such a war of ideas and how to cultivate moderate democratic Islamic states.
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How 'bout them apples?
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June 19, 2005
Time for a Pep Talk: What Bush Should Say on June 28th
Human will, instilled through leadership, is the driving force of all action in war.
- Warfighting Marine Corps Doctrinal Publication One
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Last week, five members of the US Congress "introduced a resolution calling for the beginning of troop withdrawal from Iraq by Oct. 1, 2006." From the Washington Times:
Democratic Reps. Neil Abercrombie of Hawaii and Dennis J. Kucinich of Ohio and Republican Reps. Ron Paul of Texas and Walter B. Jones of North Carolina introduced a resolution yesterday calling for President Bush to announce a withdrawal plan by the end of the year.Time vs Event-based DecisionmakingThe congressmen said, however, that they don't expect to see any action on the resolution, but hope it will start a public conversation resulting in the troops coming home.
"This is a proposal that will be the basis for the beginning of the end of the war in Iraq," Mr. Kucinich said. "This is really about bringing our troops home. It's about saying, 'Come home, you've done your job, come home.'"
Congressman Kucinich's mistake is in attempting to dictate a timetable for what is the most fluid and ever-changing of all human endeavors. Indeed, the very next paragraph of Warfighting quoted above is this:
No degree of technological development or scientific calculation will diminish the human dimension in war. Any doctrine which attempts to reduce warfare to ratios of forces, weapons and equipment neglects the impact of the human will on the conduct of war and is therefore inherently flawed.One might add timetables to this list. Why October 1st, 2006? Why not October 2nd? Or September 1st? Or October 1st, 2005? By what magical timetable, or secret sliderule does Mr. Kucinich calculate the point at which our efforts must be curtailed?
Furthermore, why must those efforts be wed to a date? What is wrong with the already explicit event-based decisionmaking that is in place today? Our leaders have made it abundantly clear that the US drawdown will begin when Iraqi forces are capable of handling their own security in an ever-increasing fashion. Perhaps these few congressmen believe that if we publish a schedule, the enemy will adopt it themselves and retire from the field on cue, as though possessing the same dance card.
Martin Van Creveld had a bit to say about the mechanistic thinking which necessitates timetables in war. He notes the following about the mindsets that prevailed in the German General Staff before World War I:
The scientific spirit of the age, which believed with Lord Kelvin that physics had already reached the limits of its development, also affected command in another way. War itself, long regarded as the province of art, now came to be thought of as a science, and consequently as subject to systematic study and analysis in the same way that physics or chemistry is. Clausewitz's warnings concerning the incalculable moral forces governing war was often overlooked, and his discussion of the correct use of numbers in time and space was regarded as the key to his doctrine.The results of the Germans' thinking are well-known. Their vaunted Schlieffen Plan, which called for 42 days of scripted maneuvering resulting in the destruction of France, led to years of trench warfare instead.
It All Comes Down to This
There are two reasons why such calls are being made on the floor of the House. The first is the nature of Western culture and of Western war. Victor Hanson notes in The Wars of the Ancient Greeks that decisive engagements are one of the eight characteristics unique to Western war-making:
5. CHOICE OF DECISIVE ENGAGEMENT: the preference to meet the enemy head-on, hand-to-hand in shock battle, and to resolve the fighting as quickly and decisively as possible, battle being simly the final military expression of the majority will of the citizenry. The Persians felt a destructive madness had come upon the Greeks at Marathon, and so it had, as they ran head-on into the Persian ranks, a practice frightening to behold for the easterner, as the battles at Plataea, Cunaxa, Granicus, Issus, and Gaugamela attest.Hanson believes that this military goal of decisive battle is influenced by the democratic decisionmaking of assemblies, congresses, and the like: an issue voted upon is thereby decided once and for all.
We witness this same preference two and a half millenia later. When our forces can seek decisive engagement, they are at their most destructive and receive the highest levels of support, and when they are involved in lower-intensity wars which seem to drag on, that same support soon falters.
Here is our conundrum: while we are geared culturally, and militarily for decisive battle, our enemies do not give it so willingly. They instead seek to harrass, disperse, and fight against our softer targets, fleeing when we come in large numbers to kill them, returning when we don't find them all and withdraw. This is classic guerrilla thinking and it is being employed with great skill by Al Qaeda in Iraq. Thus it is not our forces which are targeted, and it is not our military which Al Qaeda seeks to defeat, but instead it is our will they seek to rend, and the political victory of our withdrawal is their goal.
Another corollary to this fundamental aspect of Western warmaking is its resulting mobile nature. A mobile force's objectives are more easily observed by those watching at home, via press reports and the like. And the decisive pursuit of the enemy leads to a mobile force.
In another text, The Soul of Battle, Hanson notes that General Patton understood these aspects of US military power implicitly.
Patton realized that it was very American to keep an army constantly on the move, uprooting its headquarters every few days, entering and leaving new landscapes almost simultaneously, always shooting on the run . . .Today we find ourselves involved in a war of relative physical stasis, against an enemy who will not allow himself to become decisively engaged. Such conditions of war are poison to the American populace's will to fight, and that toxicity is beginning to show. In fact, this is the second reason for the Kucinich bill.More than any other American commander, Patton also understood that the American army fought best when it exploited its inherent mobility as part of a continual allegiance to the indirect approach . . .
. . . Patton proved that the idea of a great democratic march, an ideological trek in which a fiery commander might pour his spirit of vengeance into his citizen soldiers, was not lost, regardless of the sheer magnitude and deadliness of such an undertaking in the murderous new age of mechanized warfare.
A Continuation of Politics by Other Means
Again, why October 1st, 2006? Could it be that such a date is known to be too soon? Nearly every Senator who I've seen on Meet the Press this spring has said we need at least two more years. So October 1st, 2006 is short by some 9 months. If the Democrats were to make October 1st, 2006 their artificial and self-imposed withdrawal date, and were then to propagate this far and wide as a reasonable time for our forces to be home, and were that date to then come and go without such events, you can bet your bottom dollar that there will be commercials in the final month of the midterm election asking why Republicans can't get the troops home on time. Make no mistake about the choice of dates in Mr. Kucinich's bill.
The popular will to continue the war is waning. This must not be allowed to continue.
Consider this report by Fox:
The issue of whether to set a deadline to pull U.S. troops out of Iraq is beginning to creep into the early stages of next year's midterm congressional elections.See the video here, and hear Ford make this statement:Tennessee Democratic Rep. Harold Ford Jr. began running a television ad last week, his first as a U.S. Senate candidate in 2006, a race he entered last month. The advertisement asks the question of whether it is time to start bringing troops home and plays off the public's impatience with U.S. involvement in Iraq.
I am Harold Ford Jr. and I approve this message because this Fourth of July I hope all of us will take a moment to remember those brave Americans fighting to make the world freer and America safer. Let's work hard to bring them home soon and with honor, and make them as proud of us as we are of them."Such statements, which link in the same breath the lack of political will of those like Ford with the resolve necessary to fight honorably is off-putting to say the least -- and these same sentiments, no matter how falsely emotive, or incoherent from the standpoint of victory, are likely to be increasingly prominent if the national will is not bolstered and fast.
What must be doneWe shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender!
President Bush has a major address planned for June 28th, the one year anniversary of the transfer of sovereignty back to the Iraqis. What will he say?
He needs to give the pep talk of his life. He needs to tell the American people that there has been great progress in Iraq and needs to lay that out explicitly. He needs to give concrete examples of the progress of Iraqi forces and note as clearly as possible how our own presence there depends upon their progress. He needs to spell out clearly where the path to victory leads, and he needs to be very, very clear about the catastrophic results of a premature withdrawal.
He then needs to ask people for sacrifice, and for two kinds of sacrifice. First, he needs to ask for people to join the military. He needs to ask those who've thought about it for awhile to come off the bench and get in the game. Make it very clear that their country needs them. Don't mention any kind of economic incentives, etc, because while those are nice, they won't give his remarks the right tenor. Instead, call upon people to serve in the same inspiring language that has always marked such calls.
The second sacrifice needs to be from the rest of the population. What it should be I'm not sure, but there needs to be some kind of program that people can participate in, contribute to, and otherwise get a sense of involvement in the war. It needs to not just be such in spirit, but also in effect, such that it won't just give people a feeling of involvement, but it needs to actually help the war effort. It might be adopt-a-soldier, it might be war bonds, it might be a list of charities that help the war effort (like Spirit of America), or it might be something else entirely. There is a great untapped reservoir of popular patriotism and a similar reservoir of desire to be involved and to play a part in victory. The President must tap that vein and find a way for people in general to have a sense of ownership for the conflict in which we are engaged. A country told to shop or travel rather than told to get their heads in the game will be one that loses the war. The President needs to draw upon his own unwavering confidence in the cause and imbue the nation with it.
This is a tall order. Whatever the President says will be relentlessly dissected and sniffed at by the media. This speech needs to be one for the history books. It needs to be the most rousing, inspiring, rhetorically impressive feat of public-speaking he's ever given. For a President who has the fault of not being known for his speech-making skills, this is a very tall order.
That's why he needs to enlist some help. He needs to announce a bipartisan coalition of representatives of the White House who will travel the country for a month drumming up support for the war. My first choice would be Zell Miller, but the rest must be bipartisan and out of the box. Get John McCain in there. Hillary is on the record on TV as supporting the war. Let her have her shot. Get a couple of actors, get some war heroes, get some old cagey veterans of World War II, get a diverse group and make your points with them standing behind you, and then let them loose on the country. This will do much to cut off at the pass partisan sniping and press criticism, and will serve to shift the focus of such criticism from Bush himself, since he seems to drive his opponents absolutely bonkers.
Finally, make sure to get Zell Miller's speechwriter too, but don't blame the Democrats with another barnburner, just use his rhetorical skills to ask for sacrifice. We will give it in spades.
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From today's Meet the Press:
MR. RUSSERT: We have considerable commitments in Afghanistan and Iraq, deployments. These were the headlines that greeted Americans just last week. "Just over 5,000 new recruits entered Army boot camp in May. ... Early last month, the Army ... lowered its long-stated May goal to 6,700 recruits from 8,050. Compared with the original target, the Army achieved only 62.6 percent of its goal for the month [a shortfall of almost 40 percent]." What will happen if for the next year the recruitment for the volunteer Army falls 40 percent short of the goal?SEN. McCAIN: We're in trouble. We have to understand that we need to do a couple of things. One of them is to increase the incentives for people to join the military. To some degree, this is a marketplace for a pool of young Americans, men and women. So it's very important we do that. We should consider a shorter term enlistment for some 18 months active duty, 18 months Reserve duty in return for $18,000 in educational benefits. But I think we also have to talk a lot more--a lot more--about patriotism, about national service, about the challenges that America faces throughout the world and maybe try to re-ignite some of the patriotism that America felt after September 11.
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May 20, 2005
Strange Coincidences in Madrid
Some very strange coincidences about the 3/11 bombings in Madrid have come to light. El Mundo, the Spanish-language daily, has been investigating the entire incident.
The blogger Barcepundit has been translating some of thethe Spanish articles into English , and here is a good summary article from Frank Gaffney at NRO (hat-tip to Chrenkoff for all of these.)
In an effort to completely blow out my bandwidth for the month, and to clearly depict the strange coincidences and relationships in the investigation, I've created the chart below. See an explanation of each number under the chart.
Continue reading "Strange Coincidences in Madrid"
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March 4, 2005
Our Schemes and Theirs
Two stories have been largely under-reported this week. Or at least under-thought about. Both deserve some special attention.
Earlier this week, The American Thinker posted an article entitled, The Next Domino by Douglas Hanson. [h-t: Regime Change Iran.] Hanson deserves credit for thinking outside the box on possible US action. He formulates something other than "invade or bomb" which is the conventional wisdom, and his article raises many intriguing questions. Hanson's thoughts deserve the full treatment:
With virtually no attention from the mainstream media, the United States has been taking actions calculated to ratchet-up pressure on the mullahs of Iran. A complex plan has been carefully crafted to avoid a direct military attack on Iran, which would inflame nationalism and build support for the mullahs. Once again, the scope, subtlety, and vision of President Bush’s foreign policy confounds his carping critics.This is a very interesting viewpoint on Iran's influence. First, it seems that the Horn of Africa was always viewed as a playground for al Qaeda, not Iran. Was this view wrong? Did the US just not clearly state who its possible detractors there were, referring to them generically as terrorists instead? The Horn of Africa is always a source of interest, so it bears even closer scrutiny in light of this theory. The next point about combined French, German, and US action against Iran is also interesting. The Combined Joint Task Force - Horn of Africa has been in operation for several years now, and its existence is no surprise.The fall of Lebanon’s pro-Syrian government validates GW’s strategy of staying the course in Iraq, to prove to the people of the Middle East that freedom and liberty can flourish in a region where many thought it was impossible to institute democratic reforms. We mustn’t lose sight of the fact that, despite criticism from the so-called realists, the US is implementing change in the region for our own long-term national interests. That is, the more functioning democracies there are in the world, the less the chance of armed conflict and terrorism.
Over the last several months, Iran’s support of Shia terrorists in Iraq and its nuclear ambitions have dominated the discussions of our next steps in the War on Terror. Some commentators, including me, have criticized CENTCOM for its failure to view the war in Southwest Asia from a regional perspective. However, we may have been wrong, or at least too hasty.
Iran has been aggressively moving to export terror and build-up its ability to threaten the world in two places: the Horn of Africa, and the vital Straits of Hormuz, where the Persian Gulf’s oil riches must pass on their way to market. There are now some serious indicators that the Coalition, including both French and German military elements, has been deftly executing a combined political and military operation to roll back Iranian gains from the last 12 years.
The Iranian maneuver to dominate the Central Region and isolate the Arabian Peninsula started in the Horn of Africa in the early 90s. By aligning with warlord Mohammed Farah Aideed’s forces, Iran hoped to gain a foothold in Somalia that could potentially threaten shipping moving through the Red Sea. Following the US strategic retreat from Somalia after the “Blackhawk Down” ambush in 1993, the remaining UN peacekeepers withdrew in 1995 and abandoned the country to the terrorists and their Iranian sponsors. After 9-11, the Coalition was forced to use Djibouti as a base to secure the shipping lanes on the Western side of the Arabian Peninsula, and to interdict the movement of terrorists into and out of the region.Again, very interesting. Wasn't it al Qaeda that was the target in the Horn of Africa? Just who was in the Horn of Africa doing what, and what were their relations to both Iran and al Qaeda? Not questioning the truthfulness of the article, just asking questions. In any case, Iran's influence is in the process of being rolled back in East Africa. But how does this solve the problem of its nuclear program?There are strong indications that the efforts of Combined Joint Task Force – Horn of Africa (CJTF-HOA) are starting to push Iranian operators out of the Horn, if they have not gone already. United States naval and ground forces, French commandos, and Die Deutsche Kriegsmarine (German Navy), through a combined series of special and conventional operations, naval power, and humanitarian assistance projects, have established the conditions for the introduction of up to 7,500 troops from the African Union and the Arab League. This is a watershed event for the Coalition in this area, and shows that the Somali people are anxious to finally rid their country of bandits, terrorists, and Iranian agents, and are looking forward to having the government-in-exile return to Mogadishu.
The Coalition also mounted a synchronized diplomatic and military blitz in neighboring Ethiopia, with elements of the 3d Infantry Regiment (The Old Guard) moving into the country last year to secure territory for military assistance training and for “other operations” in the War on Terror. (For a summary of the $1.2 billion U.S. humanitarian assistance program in the country click here.) In addition, there were several visits by the former and current commanders of CENTCOM, General (retired) Tommy Franks and General John Abizaid, and visits by Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld. This was all done under the radar screen of the major press, but it was not lost on the mullahs. All they had to do was look at the map. The Kriegsmarine had sealed off Somalia from the eastern sea approaches, Ethiopia became increasingly untenable for cross-border terror bases and Iranian training camps, and, more than likely, Coalition special operations forces from Djibouti were taking their toll. In short, the Iranians in the Horn of Africa have been surrounded.
The other prong of CENTCOM’s operations against Iran involves Abu Musa Island. The island had been the object of a long-running dispute between Iran and the UAE because of its oil reserves and its strategic location midway in the narrow channel of the Straits of Hormuz. In 1992, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps took complete control of the island, and proceeded to fortify it and deploy thousands of troops, modern air defense batteries, sophisticated anti-ship missile systems, and, according to former SecDef William Perry, chemical weapons. For over a decade, the Iranians have had the capability of shutting down the shipping lane and paralyzing shipment of over one-fifth of the world’s oil supply.The island is pretty close to the mainland of Iran. Can't much of that power still be projected from the mainland? Those anti-ship missiles for example have pretty good ranges.
However, recent US operations in the Persian Gulf are, at a minimum, presenting a more aggressive military posture to pressure the mullahs, or are signaling a run-up to seizure of Abu Musa itself.Very true. Repacking the ships is key to doing anything with a MEU, both before and after. And while it is completely normal for a MEU to practice amphibious landings before deploying, it seems a little strange for a MEU to practice an amphib landing in the Persian Gulf right now -- it seems more likely that their Battalion Landing Team would be needed on the ground in Iraq. The 15th MEU's website reports that 1st Battalion, 1st Marines, its BLT, is training at Udairi Range in Kuwait. Udairi range is quite literally in the middle of nowhere in the Kuwaiti desert. This too is normal. There is no mention of an amphibious assault rehearsal . . . and much of Kuwait's coastline is made up of Kuwait City, which would probably not welcome such a demonstration. Nevertheless, there are some little-inhabited islands that belong to Kuwait and which have been training areas before . . . in October, 2002, some Marines were attacked while training on one. Hanson's theory is intriguing . . .This past week, Expeditionary Strike Group 5 (ESG-5) completed an amphibious exercise on the coast of Kuwait. Keep in mind that a rehearsal is a phase of any amphibious operation, and allows the afloat Marine Expeditionary Unit (MEU) and the Navy to test the communications links, practice disembarkation, exercise the procedures for naval surface fire support and air support, and, of course, practice the assault itself. The ESG rarely loads at home port in a manner that will completely satisfy every contingency. Therefore, the rehearsal is a chance to unload everything on the beach, and then load according to a specific assault plan. This was done in Gulf War I during a “rehearsal” when an actual amphibious assault on Kuwaiti beaches was still a viable option.
Additional naval forces are also present in the Gulf . Besides ESG-5, the Essex Expeditionary Strike Group is underway, as is the USS Harry Truman Carrier Battle Group. One MEU is the ideal force to seize Abu Musa, but the additional forces would be needed to protect an amphibious group from any interference from nearby Qeshm Island, and to continue to secure the Iraqi oil terminals off the Al-Faw Peninsula. Simply put, the mullahs’ 12 year old gambit to squeeze oil shipments through the Straights of Hormuz could come to an end very quickly.It seems that arraying all of this combat power against the single island of Abu Musa would certainly be an effective show of force against the regime, without actually touching any territory of the Iranian homeland. But it seems that the Iranians can affect oil shipments easily without this one island as well. If Abu Musa is a target, then I see it as only one stop in a larger campaign. But what is the makeup of that campaign?
Rather than risk a popular backlash by the citizens of Iran against the US by conducting a direct air or land campaign against the Iranian homeland, seizure of an island that has been disputed for decades would show the Iranians we were willing to support their fight against the mullahs without putting their lives at risk or destroying their infrastructure. The mullahs launched their gambit as an act of aggression; reversing it would demonstrate strength, but indicate no hostility to the Iranian people.Rolling back Iranian influence in the Horn of Africa is good, and seizing an island would certainly wake up the mullahs. But would these moves really be enough pressure to give a "slight push" to the "freedom-loving people of Iran"? How effective at mobilizing an opposition can US Special Forces or clandestine operatives be in Iran? Is there any organized opposition in Iran that can be trained or coordinated? Starting riots, protests, and other types of demonstrations is the bread and butter (or used to be) of the CIA and possibly even Delta Force . . . seizing one island while simultaneously fomenting riots makes for a partial campaign . . . especially if the Iranian offensive capabilities are concentrated on the island. But it seems that this is still missing some crucial elements. What is to become of the old guard? Are they corrupt? Where will they go? Will they melt away or form an insurgency against a new Iranian government a la Iraq? Will they actually go to Iraq and join the insurgency? This seems improbable, but depends on how centralized the terrorists in Iraq actually are. If they are decentralized enough, it seems that just about anyone can set up shop in a cell there . . .This analysis doesn’t even include any possible covert Special Operations Force activities designed to foment rebellion in what is viewed as an increasingly restive Iranian population. Because of the pressure being applied in the Horn of Africa and the Persian Gulf, it may require only a slight push from the freedom-loving people in Iran to rid themselves of this oppressive regime, following through on the very visible promise to them made by President Bush in his State of the Union Address.
And will we allow a democratic Iran to pursue nukes?
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Next, via sometime Adventures contributor, USMC_Vet over at The Word Unheard, Michael Scheuer, of CIA and various punditry fame, writes in The Jamestown Foundation that Al Qaeda has completed a cycle of warnings that Sunni scholars warned had to take place before the next mass-casualty attack against Americans. Scheuer:
After 9/11, bin Laden received sharp criticisms from Islamist scholars that dealt with the al-Qaeda chief's failure to satisfy several religious requirements pertinent to waging war. The critique focused on three items: (1) insufficient warning; (2) failure to offer Americans a chance to convert to Islam; and (3) inadequate religious authorization to kill so many people. Bin Laden accepted these criticisms and in mid-2002 began a series of speeches and actions to remedy the shortcomings and satisfy his Islamist critics before again attacking in the United States.Scheuer has made all manner of bizarre statements about the war on terror and Al Qaeda. His anti-semitic remarks at the Council of Foreign Relations recently were certainly enough to give one pause. But he's on to something here. It is tempting to dismiss Osama bin Laden as effectively marginalized, or that his statements are rants and ravings of someone who's spent a few too many days on the lam or in a cave. But it is always worthwhile to look for patterns in his statements, appearances, and communication efforts. Scheuer believes that bin Laden has performed the rhetorical tasks necessary to satisfy Sunni clerics who criticized him after September 11th.
Bin Laden devoted most attention to warning Americans that, to prevent another 9/11-type attack, they had to elect leaders who would change U.S. policies toward the Islamic world. He focused especially on the U.S. presence in the Arabian Peninsula, Iraq, and Afghanistan, unqualified support for Israel, as well as support for Muslim tyrannies in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and elsewhere. Animosity toward these policies had long been a staple of bin Laden's statements, but since 2002 he has spoken directly to Americans about what they - not their leaders - must do to avoid another attack.
To remedy the criticism of inadequate religious authorization for mass American casualties, bin Laden received the necessary sanction from a young, radical Saudi Shaykh named Hamid bin al-Fahd. In May 2003, al-Fahd published a fatwa on his website entitled "A Treatise on the Legal Status of Using Weapons of Mass Destruction Against Infidels." (FBIS, May 23 2003) In this lengthy work, al-Fahd affirmatively answered the question of whether it was permissible under the four schools of Sunni Islam for the mujahideen to use nuclear weapons against the United States. Bin al-Fahd concluded that each school did permit the use of such weapons and that the mujahideen would be justified in inflicting millions of casualties in the United States. "Anyone who considers America's aggression against Muslims and their lands during the last decade," al-Fahd maintained, "will conclude that striking her is permissible merely on the rule of treating one as one has been treated. Some brothers have totaled the number of Muslims killed directly or indirectly by their [America's] weapons and come up with the figure of nearly ten million."Going a bit further in looking at bin Laden's Oct 30th statements, The Word Unheard wonders about the significance of bin Laden's dress: USMC_Vet believes he was wearing Iranian attire.
Thus, when bin Laden spoke to Americans in October 2004, he was tying up loose ends leftover from 9/11 and telling Americans again that changing the "policy of the White House ... [is] the ideal way to prevent another Manhattan...." (Al-Jazeera 30 Oct 04) By then he had repeatedly warned Americans that al-Qaeda would attack unless U.S. policies were changed. Strange and even comic sounding to American and Western ears, bin Laden's warnings and invitation to conversion are meant to satisfy Islamic scholars, and Muslims generally, that al-Qaeda has abided by the Prophet Muhammad's instructions of offering a warning to the enemy before launching an attack. Likewise, Shaykh al-Fahd's treatise attempts to overcome the lack of religious grounding for mass casualties for which Islamic scholars criticized the 9/11 attack, and will be used by bin Laden as such after his next attack against the United States.
I also noted that he was dressed in Iranian-style garb rather than his usual 'attire'. I matched that up with the tone and the uncharacteristic lengthy early references to what I deemed more Iranian regional interests than traditional bin Laden interests:What manner of attack might be in the offing? USMC_Vet wonders about news last month that NORAD is now responsible for maritime security, and whether there is a connection:I say to you, Allah knows that it had never occurred to us to strike the towers. But after it became unbearable and we witnessed the oppression and tyranny of the American/Israeli coalition against our people in Palestine and Lebanon, it came to my mind.The sudden emphasis on Lebanon and his attempt to clarify that he always was really angry about Lebanon struck me as an appeasment to Iran for providing him and his minions protection and shelter. Palestine and Lebanon now suddenly rather than Saudi Arabia, Mecca, Medina et al? He went to great lengths to convince listeners of how this had long been his motivation. Why was convincing us of this so important? Iran wanted it and he needed to be percieved as owning it.The events that affected my soul in a direct way started in 1982 when America permitted the Israelis to invade Lebanon and the American Sixth Fleet helped them in that. This bombardment began and many were killed and injured and others were terrorized and displaced.
While correct on the adoption of Iranian interests, I reconsider now that I may have been incorrect on the reasons why he did so. Is it prudent to consider that he wasn't deferring to Iranian interests as a sort of payback for shelter & protection but rather for weaponry assistance (specifically nuclear or radiological refinement and production from materials al Qaeda may have from Russian sources as stated by DCI, Porter Goss)? To dismiss this as a possibility (or probability) is irresponsible and foolhardy . . .
When you finish reading [Scheuer], consider also that it is more than merely possible that Iran has been arming al Qaida rather than simply providing cover and protection, and you will conclude that the time for absolute vigilance is now...for our intelligence assets, our military assets, our law enforcement in key areas and for alert citizens.
Although Keating said the oceans pose “a tough way to get at us,” he added, “We’re working harder to make sure they can’t.”Any readers with more naval experience than me are free to confirm or refute me, but I think that launching a cruise missile of some kind from a ship would be pretty difficult to pull off, unless Al Qaeda has had some serious state help. The ballistics of launching a missile from a moving, rocking ship are difficult, and then to have it actually hit its target with some degree of accuracy make it even more so. Certainly, some Katyusha rockets launched from the deck of a freighter off Long Beach could do some damage, but this seems like small potatoes. AQ is going to be looking for large, spectacular mass-casualty attacks. The option of freighter as a suicide bomb seems much more plausible . . .He said the Northern Command monitors the seas around the clock for threats, conducts frequent exercises and maintains minute-to-minute data on Navy and Coast Guard assets. Emphasis on maritime protection is no surprise in light of government reports that say only a fraction of arriving shipping containers are inspected.
Also, terrorist organizations operate merchant ships from which they could launch missiles at the United States, said Loren Thompson of the Lexington Institute in Arlington, Va., a public-policy research group.
Although a sea-based attack might not be likely, he said, “The biggest lesson of 9-11 is if you ignore a potential danger, it will become a real danger.”
The nation’s surveillance system for tracking ships isn’t well developed or integrated with other capabilities, he said.
“What Northern Command is looking for is an architecture that will bring together all the various agencies and all the various surveillance capabilities that bear upon homeland defense,” Thompson said.
Some folks have rightly warned Americans not to become cocky with all of the good news out of the Middle East recently. Others have warned of spoiling attacks. The timing is perfect for one of these. It raises an interesting question: has Al Qaeda been planning the next attack for months and years like September 11th, or will it be a hasty exercise, meant to stop the momentum of political reform in the Mid-east? The answer will tell us much about the attrited or evolved operational capabilities of our foe.
UPDATE: Welcome Instapundit readers!
What would the psychological effects of a US seizure of Abu Musa island be upon the Iranian regime? Conventional wisdom assumes that Iranians will rally around the government during an attack because of a deep-found distrust of the US and its motives. This might be the case; but the seizure of territory that Iran has claimed for 13 years would certainly give pause to the mullahs themselves because it would refute another bit of conventional wisdom in many parts, both Washington and elsewhere: the US is tied down in Iraq and cannot exercise its power in other quarters for now. Committing one or even two heavily reinforced infantry battalions to the seizure of an island in a different theater destroys this assumption in toto. It raises the question as well: what will the Americans do next? More importantly for us, how would Iran respond?
Written by Chester at 3:50 PM | Link | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0) | Print Article
January 23, 2005
Conservative Critiques of the War, Part II: The Lone Realist
[This is Part II of "Conservative Critiques of the War." See Part I, the Introduction, here.]
Consider this, written in the autumn of 2003, as US forces had completely defeated Saddam's regime:
America has approached the war on terrorism as if from two dreamworlds. The liberal, in which an absurd understanding of cause and effect, the habit of capitulation to foreign influence, a mild and perpetual anti-Americanism, reflex allergies to military spending, and a theological aversion to self-defense all lead to policies that are hard to differentiate from surrender. And the conservative, in which everything must be all right as long as a self-declared conservative is in the White House—no matter how badly the war is run; no matter that a Republican administration in electoral fear leans left and breaks its promise to restore the military; and no matter that because the Secretary of Defense decided that he need not be able to fight two wars at once, an adequate reserve does not exist to deal with, for example, North Korea. And in between these dreamworlds of paralysis and incompetence lies the seam, in French military terminology la soudure , through which al-Qaeda, uninterested in our parochialisms, will make its next attack.Or this:
The unprecedented military and economic potential of even the United States alone, thus far so imperfectly utilized, is the appropriate instrument. Adjusting military spending to the level of the peacetime years of the past half-century would raise outlays from approximately $370 billion to approximately $650 billion. If the United States had the will, it could, excessively, field 20 million men, build 200 aircraft carriers, or almost instantly turn every Arab capital into molten glass, and the Arabs know this.Or this:
The war in Iraq was a war of sufficiency when what was needed was a war of surplus, for the proper objective should have been not merely to drive to Baghdad but to engage and impress the imagination of the Arab and Islamic worlds on the scale of the thousand-year war that is to them, if not to us, still ongoing. Had the United States delivered a coup de main soon after September 11 and, on an appropriate scale, had the president asked Congress on the 12th for a declaration of war and all he needed to wage war, and had this country risen to the occasion as it has done so often, the war on terrorism would now be largely over.And finally, this:
But the country did not rise to the occasion, and our enemies know that we fought them on the cheap. They know that we did not, would not, and will not tolerate the disruption of our normal way of life. They know that they did not seize our full attention. They know that we have hardly stirred. And as long as they have these things to know, they will neither stand down nor shrink back, and, for us, the sorrows that will come will be greater than the sorrows that have been.Although the critiques of the war from the left are well-documented, and even well-"documentaried" if one considers Michael Moore's oeuvre, conservative critiques of our current war receive scant coverage in the mainstream press.
Continue reading "Conservative Critiques of the War, Part II: The Lone Realist"
Written by Chester at 8:17 PM | Link | Comments (0) | TrackBack (1) | Print Article
