The Army Is Egypt's Last, Best Hope

Secretary of State Hilary Clinton has upped the ante in the Egyptian Crisis.  She was all over Sunday morning talking heads shows with a clear message for Hosni Mubarak--and the opposition.  While she did not directly call for the aging dictator (with apologies to Joe Biden) to step down, she made it as plain as the pyramids that his days were numbered and the number isn't a big one.

In her statements Ms Clinton ran ahead of President Obama which is a good thing.  The president as is his wont has been too cautious, too ambiguous, too noncommittal, too, in a word, academic in his public statements.  And, get a grip on this, it is the public voice which matters most with the Egyptians in the street.  As has been reported all over the MSM of the English speaking world, the newly empowered Egyptian street has been demanding a loud, unmistakable message from the US.  Are we Americans on the side of the opposition or are we locked in a death embrace with the current regime?

From the statements oozing out of the Oval the answer is not clear.  The Clinton posture is more so, but, arguably not sufficient.  It would be most helpful both to the Egyptians and to American policy interests in the region if Ms Clinton received backup from Secretary of Defense Gates.  The US provides over a billion dollars a year in military assistance to Egypt and, as a result, has very good ties with the senior and mid-level officers of the Egyptian armed forces.  If Gates were to come out with a public statement backing the army as the necessary transitional presence, it would go a long way to assuring the army would do the right thing.

In this case, the right thing consists of impartially maintaining order.  So far all reports indicate that the army has been doing just this.  The forces deployed in Cairo and elsewhere have not taken robust (or any perceptible) action against the demonstrators but, rather, have shown sympathy with the cause of reform/regime change.  This means nothing has happened yet to impair the prestige which the army enjoys with the mass of the Egyptian people.  Quite unlike the massively despised police forces, the army enjoys a high measure of support and is viewed by many on the street as the ultimate guarantor of Egyptian identity and pride.

No observer can conclude that any outcome which does not feature the departure of Mubarak is conceivable.  There is no certainty about what will transpire after Hosni and company depart.  The possibilities include a reasonably fair, honest, and open election occurring on or about the date already scheduled.  They also include the nightmare outcome of chaos, chaos which tosses up the Muslim Brotherhood to power.

The best way of bending events closer to the first rather than the second outcome hinges on the Egyptian army.  As long as the men and officers of the army see that they and their organization are lionized by the mass of the citizenry for playing a fair game, the blandishments of the Muslim Brotherhood--which includes their adherents within the armed forces--will be lessened.  By acting as an impartial honest broker, by maintaining order, by not seeming to favor either the current regime or the radicals of the Muslim Brotherhood, there is a better than even chance that a semblance of a fair presidential election can take place.

The problem with an election, of course, resides in the absence of a high profile non-Islamist candidate.  The former director of the IAEA, Mohamad ElBaradei, comes closest to filling this niche.  The unfortunate reality is he is much better known outside of Egypt than he is within.  Except for the percentage of the Egyptian population which is tied into international affairs, ElBaradei is very much an unknown quantity.  This translates into a strong chance that he could be defeated by a better known personality who is backed by the Muslim Brotherhood.

Again, it would be the army which would have to carry the freight of preventing a takeover by the Brotherhood.  The reality which must be understood by the army at all levels is simply that a Muslim Brotherhood run Egypt would become a danger not only to the region but the world.  As such, the group, as an advocate of armed political Islam, would be a very real danger to Egypt itself.  In its role as ultimate repository of Egyptian sovereignty and identity, the army would have to act to prevent this internal threat--or by failing to do so consign Egypt to the status of pariah.

The US and other Western countries have made one major mistake after another in dealing with Mubarak over the past couple of decades.  Out of a superabundance of concern for the sensitivities and cooperation of the regime, one American administration after another has refused to put any credible pressure on Mubarak to undertake real, albeit gradual reforms.  Rather, in pursuit of compelling but short-term policy interests, the US has made only the softest of noises, the most gentle of nudges.  Not surprisingly, all have been ignored in Cairo.

The best chance of recovering from this unblemished record of error resides with the leverage provided by the high level of US support for the army.  The time has come for the US to cash in on the mass of IOUs piled up over the years.  This requires not only the correct sort of public statements regarding the necessity of regime change but also blunt talk behind the scenes to the senior and mid-level officer corps.  Not only must these men be made aware of the consequences which would ensue should the Muslim Brotherhood come to power either directly or by proxy but also should be reminded that the bastion of national identity and sovereignty has been the army in Muslim majority countries ranging from Turkey to Algeria to, most recently, Tunisia.

Thirty plus years ago the Carter administration wrote the book on how not to deal with internally driven radical regime change.  Among the courses of action not taken by the feckless Carter and his team of foreign policy midgets was insisting that the Iranian army, a creation of American largess, play the role of stability maintainer.  There was no insistence, not even the mildest suggestion, that while the Shah may have to go, the primary responsibility of the armed forces was that of keeping the change within internationally acceptable limits.

The statements by Secretary Clinton a couple of weeks ago as well as today show that at least one member of the current administration is not given to the blindness of the Carter days.  One can only hope she is not alone in this.

Hardball In Egypt And Yemen Goes A Bit More Down The Tube

As expected, the anti-government demonstrators took to the streets in large numbers following Friday prayers.  In an important change the Muslim Brotherhood got off the sideline fence and came down on the side of the demonstrators.  This may mean the leadership cadre has concluded the anti-regime movement has a chance of winning.  Or it may indicate simply an unwillingness for the Brotherhood not to get its fair share of abuse during the protests and concomitant crackdown.

Also without surprise was the decision of the Mubarak regime to order the army into the fray with instructions to support the police.  This may mean a tipping point will shortly arrive.  While the army has been sent on riot control duty twice before during the Mubarak years--once to quell the bread riots and once to suppress a strike by police--it has not fired upon Egyptian civilians during the thirty years of Murbarak's rule nor during the terms of this two predecessors.

The big unknown is simply what will be the response of the senior army commanders--or the snuffies in the streets when--or if--the order to open fire is given.  The entrance of the Muslim Brotherhood into the contest complicates answering this question as the Brotherhood has significant support within both the enlisted men and junior officers of the Egyptian armed forces.  This reality implies that there may be a split between the senior leadership and those down the food chain should the Mubarak dictatorship order the use of live fire on demonstrators for any purpose other than immediate self-defense.

If the high command refuses the order or--as is more likely--the men with guns down on the streets say, "Hell, no!" the days of the Mubarak regime are numbered.  And the number will not be a large one.  The governing ground truth in this is that while the internal security police have a vested interest in the continuation in the status quo, the army below the most exalted levels has no such motivation.

In addition to dispatching the army "in aid of the civil power," the regime has taken other measures.  It is widely known that Egypt has ceased to exist in the world of internet.  It is equally well known that Egypt has blocked mobile phone service.  These moves will cripple the capacity of the anti-government demonstrators to enlist the understanding and support of foreigners.  To a lesser extent it impairs the ability of the demonstrators to organize their efforts.

Beyond the blocking of internet and mobile phone services, the government has mounted a wave of preventative arrests.  Among those either detained or put under house arrests are leading figures of the Muslim Brotherhood and Mohamad ElBaradei.  The former head of the IAEA and current presidential candidate was placed under house arrest only hours after he returned from Vienna with the announced intent of joining with the demonstrations and sharing the fate of the demonstrators.

The arrests and blocking orders are not fatal to the anti-government movement.  In fact the arrests may rebound against the interests of the Mubarak regime by granting status to both the Brotherhood and Mr AlBaradei.

While these events were taking place, the Obama administration continued its imitation of their Carter days predecessors during the fateful days of 1979.  The Secretary of State like the President have made all the usual boilerplate appeals for peace, non-violence, the universal rights of Egyptian citizens, the desirability of reform, of transparency, of democracy, of yadda-yadda.  This can be seen either as a statesmenlike detachment of the US from the internal affairs of a sensitive Arab state or the clueless act of an administration adrift at the policy level.

The demonstrators know the US is involved in the demonstrations as tear gas projectiles clearly marked "Made in the USA" are littering the streets of Cairo, Alexandria, and other cities.  This is the dismal consequence of the years of American military aid.  Unless the US administration undertakes some form of compensatory action, the narrative of a Mubarak-USA linkage will be developed from the fragments of tear gas canisters.  In the estimate of most people, physical evidence trumps distant, diplomatic verbiage.

President Obama has convened his ":foreign policy team" for discussions of the events on the streets of Egypt.  Well, ain't that something?  A question for the "team:"  Is Joe Biden representing your official view when he dissented from characterizing Mubarak as a "dictator?"

As soon as the "team" has decided if Biden was right, it must consider a very alarming situation: Right now the only factor separating the Muslim Brotherhood from power in Egypt is the stance of the Egyptian army.  Specifically, what is the army likely to do if given the order to shoot on demonstrators--Shoot, don't shoot or shoot on the police?  That is the single most important subject for the "team" and president to consider. It is also the issue they must get right or pay the consequences should we get it wrong.

The administration must take a stance on the matter of the army pulling the trigger.  There is every probability that the Egyptian government either has or will shortly test American support for a use of force order.  Even if Mubarak does not order use of force, it is inevitable that should the army open fire, a narrative emphasizing US support for the status quo and therefore responsibility for any army inflicted bloodshed will explode across the Arab world.

Should the opposite happen--should for example, the army in the field oppose the police and take sides with the demonstrators, the administration best consider what, if anything, can be done to prevent the Muslim Brotherhood coming to power, either de facto or de jure.  The emergence of the Brotherhood to power would exceed the impact of the Iranian Islamic Revolution as the Brotherhood has branches or subsidiaries around the world in Muslim and non-Muslim states as well as an outward looking stance infinitely broader than that possessed by the Iranian clerical establishment.

While the Deep Strategic Thinkers of the administration are meeting they might spend a few nanoseconds reviewing the situation in Yemen.  The "Jasmine Revolution" has inspired an offshoot movement in Yemen which has sponsored demonstrations in the capital of Yemen, Saana, the other day.  It is unclear at the moment if the demonstrators want to end the current regime or gain some reforms.  In either event, the demonstrations add one more facet to the deeply fractured and desperately poor country.  The divisions are so profound, the rivals for power so extreme, that any change in the status quo would be in the direction of making Yemen a failed state.

The strong possibility of Yemen going all the way to failed state status is not remote.  And, even though Yemen does not have the international sex appeal of Egypt, it remains a key venue in the Saudi Peninsula.  A failed Yemen would be a perfect launching point for both regional and global terror attacks by al-Qaeda in the Arab Peninsula and others of their ilk.  This is what makes Yemen important to the US--and even more so for states such as Saudi Arabia.

Before leaving for the day, it is only fair that a moment of silence be observed.  The moment of silence is on behalf of President Obama.  It has been terribly wrong for all these pro-reform, anti-status quo demonstrators dotting the Arab world to have raised their ugly heads and cause just now.  Mr Obama would much rather be focusing on his "Sputnik moment" and convincing Americans that they can have growth if and only if We the People "go green" en masse.  The poor clueless guy never expected this and wonders just what the hell he ever did to deserve this.

Hosni Mubarak, The Shah Of 2011?

Over the last couple of days as demonstrators, albeit in diminished numbers, took on the security forces of Egypt, the US has been issuing contradictory statements which are redolent of those made in 1979 in the weeks before the plug was pulled on the Shah of Iran.  Secretary of State Clinton, for example, has tacked between imploring the government of Hosni Mubarak to refrain from suppression and to seize the opportunity to meet the grievances of the demonstrators and averring that the Mubarak regime was "stable"--presumably even without granting ground on the demonstrators demands.

The "stability" of Mubarak's rule is identical to that of the late Shah's.  That is to say, it has the appearance of short term order being (mis)represented by Washington as the reality of long-term stability.  To err on the side of accuracy, it is not so much that the Deep Thinking Global Strategists of the current and prior administrations have simply represented the Egyptian government as stable over the long haul as they have inappropriately invested the regime with capacities it never has possessed.

During the Cold War this confusion of the autocrat's ability to impose and maintain public and political order on a day-to-day basis with the substance of long term stability based upon a perception of existential and functional legitimacy widely shared within the country's population drove most of the glaring errors of US foreign policy.  It was this confusion of the short and long term which joined the US shoulder and hip with the most distasteful dictators in the world.  When night fell as it must on each of these despicable creatures, a roster which includes the Shah, the legacy was one of profound anti-American sentiment which took firm hold not only on the new rulers but the population at large.

The long practice of supporting odious and repressive regimes simply because they assured Washington that the enemies of America were their enemies as well went on a (short) hiatus following the collapse of the Soviet Union.  The rise of violent political Islam brought the Cold War golem out of the tomb and back into the policies of the US government.

Hosni Mubarak made the transition of Dictator Meriting American Support due to his anti-Soviet, anti-Communist stance to the new role of Dictator Meriting American Support because he was resolutely opposed to violent political Islam, at least the sort espoused by the Egyptian based Muslim Brotherhood.  Of course, ole Hosni had reinforced his position by carving a key if sometimes ambiguous role for himself in the Mideast Peace Process.  (You gotta admire professional competence even in the service of a rotten cause--the perpetuation of Rule By Hosni.)

It is necessary to recall that Mubarak came to power courtesy of a subscriber to violent political Islam having gunned down his predecessor Anwar Sadat thirty years ago.  Mubarak moved quickly and effectively to suppress the Muslim Brotherhood and other exponents of violent political Islam.  The jails, torture chambers, and graveyards were filled to capacity by Egyptians who either did or might have supported violent political Islam.  Since then Mubarak and his effective internal security organs have launched waves of repression separated by carefully calculated intervals of tolerance.

Many of the periodic tolerance festivals remind the observer of Mao's Let A Thousand Flowers Bloom campaign which encouraged dissent in order that all dissenters might expose themselves and subsequently be liquidated.  At the same time Mubarak did take measures which allowed followers of political Islam to engage in the allegedly semi-secular political life of Egypt.  This served to tie the Muslim Brotherhood to the government at least to a limited extent and gave the government some relief from public criticism as a result of the Muslim Brotherhood's highly effective social welfare programs.  (And, never forget, it gave additional opportunities for the several secret political police agencies to penetrate the Brotherhood and related entities with greater effect.)

All of this implies that Mubarak is a crafty and calculating political survivor.  His use of robust coercion, official terror as well as his willingness to rule by decree when such is either necessary or merely desirable show Hosni is one determined dude, determined to hold on to power by all means necessary be they fair or foul.  Taken together, these aspects of the Egyptian dictator's character indicate strongly that he is not going to exit the stage easily or gracefully despite his advanced years (he is on the wrong side of eighty) and less than splendid health.

There is no sign that the Egyptian army is likely to emulate its Tunisian equivalent.  Nor have the internal security police shown any suddenly developed sense of tender mercy or squeamishness.  Without defection by either or both of these instruments of state power, the probability of Mubarak acceding to the importuning of people power and getting on a jet plane to Saudi Arabia is very slim to none.

The dissidents are cranking up for another round of monster rallies on Friday following prayer services   These may be a real humdinger.  But, they will not mean the end of Hosni.

The anti-government movement is diffuse, lacking a national stature leader (although ElBaradie is headed back home from Vienna) and confined in the main to those meriting the loose sobriquet, "youth."  On the downside, Mohamad ElBaradei is lacking street cred due to his frequent and prolonged absences from Egypt since announcing his presidential candidacy, which impairs his status as a leader of the demonstrations and the movement of which they are the most dramatic sign.

Another very big unknown is the intention of the Muslim Brotherhood.  The Brotherhood has been on the sidelines.  Perhaps its leadership cadre has been taken by surprise but that seems unlikely.  Far more probable is the assessment that the Brotherhood is being cautious.  The leaders most probably do not expect the demonstrations to have any useful outcome beyond radicalizing an ever larger segment of the politically disaffiliated.  This means the Brotherhood will have a much larger potential recruitment pool in the months to come.

Another, less probable, motive for the Brotherhood's bystander posture is they are waiting for the main chance.  In the event that Mubarak does decide that a trip to Saudi Arabia is in his best interests, the Brotherhood will be in the catbird seat for a takeover bid.  The Brotherhood is very large, quite well organized, highly motivated, sufficiently financed, possesses tendrils nearly everywhere (including the armed forces), and can count on the support of the clerics and faculty of al-Azar university.  In short, it is the only entity in Egypt that can take control of the government.

The ascendancy of the Muslim Brotherhood to the seat of power in Egypt would be a very real nightmare for the Deep Thinkers of Global Strategy in Washington.  The Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt could equal the mullahocracy of Iran as a sinister actor in the region and on the global stage.  From the perspective of either Israel or the US, the Muslim Brotherhood taking control of Egypt is a worst case scenario--on steroids.

There is not much the US government can do to directly influence events in Egypt in the short run.  And, there is not a whole lot more it can do in the longer term.  In a very real sense we chopped off our options when we climbed into bed with Mubarak back in the days following Camp David.  The perceived imperatives of the Cold War and the quest for Mideast peace pushed the US and Mubarak together in a marriage of mutual necessity.  When the Cold War ended, the continued search for the chimera of Arab-Israeli peace precluded ending the marriage.

The coming of Osama bin Laden and with him the challenge of violent political Islam prevented any sane and objective reassessment of the American support for the Egyptian autocrat.  We were stuck with him.  And, stuck with him today we remain.  Our least-worst option is to hope that (and in a low key way, assist) Mubarak remains in power.

Mubarak may be as unpalatable as cyanide but the Muslim Brotherhood would be much, much worse.  And, that, bucko, is all the choice we have.

Yo! Mr O! There Is A Whole World Out There, You Know--Or Do You?

In last night's yawn producing set of stitched together rerun snippets from past speeches, the POTUS spent barely ten percent of his numerous words on foreign policy.  This continues and, arguably expands, his well-established record of undervaluing US foreign relations.

Either the Nice Young Man From Chicago is unaware that foreign governments and opinion molders parse the annual Ain't-My-Administration-Great festival or he knows and cares not at all.  In either event the absence of foreign affairs constituted a species of unilateral disavowal of American status as a Great Power.

The casting aside of foreign relations other than pro forma mention of our getting out of Iraq, our fine troops in Afghanistan, and ritualistic condemnation of the usual adversary, Iran, sends a clear signal to the world that it and its petty problems fly below our president's radar.  His evident disengagement from the affairs of the world indicates to friend, foe, and uncommitted alike that the US has only the most limited interest in pursuing its own national interests.

The denial of the world comes at a moment during which a volatile and critical region of the world--the Arab Mideast and North Africa--seems to be lurching toward a tipping point which has the potential of being world historical in importance.  The "Jasmine Revolution" may or may not prove to be a permanent success for democracy of the bottom up sort.  But, its having occurred, the mere fact that a firmly entrenched authoritarian regime supported by not only the former colonial power, France, but the West generally was overthrown by popular demonstrations and the unwillingness of the armed forces to gun down their fellow citizens has set (literal) fire to similar movements in other countries, most importantly Egypt.

The silence of Mr Obama last night serves to continue his rejection of the assertive support of democracy by the Bush/Cheney administration beyond the point of absurdity into the venue of the counterproductive.  Admittedly the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld/neocon ninnie notion of using armed invasion as a tool to foster democracy was a world class blunder, but that in no way discredited the necessity of promoting democracy by other means, particularly the support of indigenous tendencies or groups.

The administration appears to be possessed by the view that any open support by the US of any pro-democracy effort in any Arab or Muslim majority country will doom the effort to failure.  The Deep Thinkers of the administration took this position openly in the wake of the demonstrations against the mullahocracy and the stolen presidential election.  More recently the same cover was employed implicitly to excuse the hands-off position of the US during the run-up to the "Jasmine Revolution."

This contention is ludicrous on the face.  Interviews and opinion surveys have shown repeatedly that people throughout the world look to the US for support of democracy and the other features customarily associated with that form of government.  The same sources document the severe disappointment felt by people when the government of the US either fails to support democratic aspirations, or, worse, openly supports authoritarian regimes for reasons of state.

The situation which developed rapidly in Egypt yesterday cried out for a statement by the American president.   The demonstrations in Cairo and elsewhere not only were the largest anti-government action in many decades, it also constituted a direct challenge to the US president and the policies of his administration.  The challenge was simply: On which side does the US stand?

The president and his administration have supported the thirty year rule of Hosni Mubarak both publicly and privately in recent weeks and days.  There are reasons of state policy which would appear to compel our linkage with and support for the Mubarak regime.  However, these reasons--the moribund Mideast "peace process" and combating violent political Islam--can be both overstated and, more importantly, overtaken by events.

The US has nailed its flag to the Egyptian mast ever since Cairo kicked the Soviets out and realigned (sort of) with the US.  This in turn led to the Camp David Accords and the "normalization" of diplomatic relations between Egypt and Israel.  The substance of the post-Camp David years has been much less than the promise or the appearance.  The most substantial benefits of the Egyptian realignment were, no surprise here, awarded to Egypt.  The US has tied its aid to Egypt to the aid furnished to Israel with results which have been profitable for the Cairo regime, to put it mildly.

As a "partner" with the US in the "global war on terror," Egypt has proven to be less obstreperous than Pakistan but not by much.  The Egyptian government has done little if any cooperation beyond its own borders while serving as a pointman for the Organization of the Islamic Conference (along with Pakistan) on the various proposals to restrict freedom of speech by means of a UN resolution intended to protect Islam against any perceived attack--including the truth about the religion.

Domestically the Egyptian government has shown itself less than eager to protect the basic rights of its Coptic Christian population against outrages at the hands of the Muslims.  To say that Cairo has sat on its hands as Copts were murdered is only to tell it like it has been--and will be.

Simultaneously the Mubarak regime has shown its willingness to pervert the processes of democratic elections to assure its hold on power.  The recent parliamentary election gave clear indications of having been even more bogus than its predecessors.  The long arm and very heavy hand of the internal security organs have been evermore in evidence such that Egypt of recent months has a strong resemblance to the Iraq of Saddam Hussein.

In short, Egypt has become a heavier liability for American interests and influence in the region.  Bluntly, the costs of linking us to Egypt have far outweighed the benefits by any rational calculus.

The spread of anti-government demonstrations across Egypt in the aftermath of the "Jasmine Revolution" have given the US a perfect opportunity to get on the right side of the political dynamic in Egypt.  The moment is all the more propitious in that so far the Muslim Brotherhood and its offshoots, all advocates of political Islam including the violent sort, have not been at the forefront of events.  Indeed, the Brotherhood shows signs of having been caught by the same surprise as the government.

Had Mr Obama made even brief mention of the anti-government demonstrations, it would have done much to embolden the reformers in the street.  A favorable reference, even if of the most attenuated sort, would have gone far to broadening the base of support for the pro-democracy movement.  It might even have assured that the working class and small merchant segment of society would have been motivated to get off the sidelines and join with the demonstrators.

The "Jasmine Revolution": succeeded in large part because the workers of Tunisia along with the lower middle class linked with the unemployed university graduates to oppose the autocracy.  The same would be the case in Egypt, but only if the cautious came to believe that success and not simply death or torture would be the most probable outcome.  This sea change could have occurred if Mr Obama had only said a few kind and accurate words concerning events in Cairo earlier that day.

Admittedly, the architects of foreign policy like to be slow, cautious, incremental.  Diplomats tend to be conservative, prone to being opposed to boat rocking.  But, in the real world of real people with real hopes, fears, frustrations, and aspirations, fortune often favors the bold.  Events by their very magnitude and pace may preclude the endless rounds of interagency working groups, endless processes of staffing papers, of seeking approval up a never ending chain of command.

This is what happened in Tunisia.  It is what may be happening in Egypt.  It is what could happen in Iran.  The US foreign policy community by virtue of its size, complexity, and attendant inertia is ill-equipped to take proper advantage of fleeting opportunities.  The president is not so limited.  As Richard Nixon demonstrated, it is possible for a president to act quickly and take advantage of a changing international dynamic.

The situations in Tunisia and Egypt as in numerous other countries in the Arab and Muslim world are essential in the definition of what the US stands for as well as what it opposes.  When the US president is silent he concedes the field to the adherents of violent political Islam.  Losing is bad enough. Losing by default is even worse.

So get a grip on this: By his ignoring the world, particularly the unfolding drama in the Mideast, President Obama is losing by default.  Arguably, he is throwing the match.

The State of the Union Address is a perfect opportunity to tell the world just where the US stands, what it stands for, and to what it stands in opposition.  This is necessary for the stability of the world.  Staking a position is what Great Powers are expected to do.  And, whether or not Mr Obama and his ideological soulmates like the idea or repudiate it, the US is a Great Power.

So, Mr Obama, the message is simple: Act like you are the chief executive of a Great Power, in point of fact, the best of the Great Powers.  Anything less is to duck your personal "Sputnik moment."

A Dilemma Always Has Two Horns

Once again the schizoid view of Islam is on display.  Over the past week two diametrically opposing understandings of the relation of Islam the religion and terrorist acts have been advanced by men skilled in the use of the written word for purposes of convincing.

One view, the benevolent one, is offered by Time, Online in the person of Romash Ratnesar.  Mr Ratnesar is an editor-at-large who contributes a weekly column on national security and foreign affairs.  In this piece he takes the view that homegrown terrorism of the violent political Islamic sort is a myth conveniently manufactured and exploited by assorted political and media figures in order to advance an agenda.

In the course of the essay Mr Ratnesar deprecates the assorted homegrown actors as insignificant people who generated plots doomed to fail even had the FBI not used undercover assets to gain control of the plotters and abort their efforts.  In Mr Ratnesar's view the wannabe martyrdom seekers were all pathetic members of the gang that couldn't shoot straight and barely deserved the attention they received.

In the course of marginalizing the homegrowns, Mr Ratnesar blithely discounted the Fort Hood shooter, Major Nidal, as having motivations which were "not strictly ideological" and by asserting that in any event his targets were not exclusively civilians.  This animadversion is breath taking in its scope and baseless nature to say the least.

The opposite viewpoint was adopted by Barry Rubin in the Jerusalem Post.  Rubin is well known as an advocate of Israel and a well-informed attacker of all things relating to political Islam both violent and peaceful.  In this commentary he considers the nature, scope, and probable impact of a fatwa issued recently by Dr Imad Mustafa of Cairo's very prestigious al-Azar university, the leading theological institution of Sunni Islam in the world.

Dr Mustafa, in his fatwa, not only rehearses the traditional understanding of defensive jihad, but defines defensive with such breadth that nearly any act can be construed as an attack upon Islam which invokes defensive jihad as an absolute obligation upon every believer.  But Dr Mustafa goes far beyond defense.

In his fatwa this al-Azar professor invokes a basis for offensive jihad.  One of the acceptable causes of offensive jihad against a non-Muslim majority state is any action by that state which in any way restricts the absolute freedom of Muslims to use and observe every stricture or requirement of the religion--including such cultural additions as the burqa, polygamy, or child brides.  Other causes of offensive jihad include the purging of all religions other than Islam from all the states of the Arabian Peninsula and--most sweeping of all--"to extend God's religion."

Guacamole!  The good professor in this fatwa has made a mighty step back to the future--bringing back the imperatives of the Seventh and Eighth centuries for use in the Twenty-first!

While the Mustafa Fatwa may be utterly irrelevant to the majority of Muslims abroad and here in the US as they pursue the challenges and opportunities of daily life, the fact remains that the most extreme of the advocates of violent political Islam have received the blessings as it were of the most important school of Islamic religious studies in the world.  The Mustafa Fatwa empowers every cleric, every loud mouthed exponent of the Triumph of the Will of Allah (as I see it) to exhort violence against any and all non-Muslims wherever they might live.  It is all that an Osama bin Ladin could have hoped and prayed for--and more.

Stripped to its essentials, the Mustafa Fatwa is a universal declaration of religious war against any and all infidels everywhere.  Compared to this fatwa the call for the First Crusade preached by Pope Urban over a thousand years ago was an invitation to an interfaith love feast.

Professor Mustafa's fatwa must come as an embarrassment to President Obama, the WaPo, and the legions of Islamophiles littering the American and Western European elites.  The Mustafa Fatwa puts the lie to all the assertions these past years that terror acts are the product of an insignificant number of individuals who have hijacked Islam for their own narrow and perverse purposes.  At least in the mind of Professor Mustafa and others of al-Azar university, the concepts of defensive (construed broadly) jihad and, now, offensive jihad reside in the mainstream of Islamic jurisprudence.  Rather than being a perversion of the religion, jihad is an obligation upon each and every believer.  In short, it is the religion.

Still one must be cautious in responding to the broadened challenge represented in the Mustafa Fatwa.  It is not the final word.  It is subject to debate within the community of religious scholars.  It can be repudiated by others even in the al-Azar faculty.  And, it most assuredly can be ignored by believers generally as are most fatwas.

The best basis for policy still remains a careful distinction between Islam qua Islam and political Islam which is an ideology predicated on Islam as a religion.  It is even more critical to distinguish between violent and non-violent political Islam as each requires a different approach to combat successfully.  It is better policy to accept even the conceit advanced by Mr Ratnesar to the effect that homegrown terrorists are few, far between, and relatively inconsequential in their acts.

Policy must focus upon the most pressing threats while never totally ignoring the context which now includes the expansive but well historically rooted Mustafa Fatwa.  The most critical threats are those emanating from overseas, from the FATA or from Yemen.  This implies that a posture of close and careful monitoring of those within the US most susceptible to the messages from abroad must be maintained and even enhanced as new intelligence and new methods allow.

Longer term policy should focus upon ways in which the appeals of jihad might be lessened.  These include the usual suspects of moving to enhance democracy and responsible, responsive government in majority Muslim states and actions oriented toward economic development, particularly the empowerment of women.  But longer term policy must also consider ways in which the splits endemic to Islam can be used to benefit peace, tolerance, and a reduction of the appeal of violent political Islam.  High on this list of it-takes-a-Muslim approaches is that of reinvigorating the unfortunately moribund Sufi school of Islam.

It is also important that policy be based on a more accurate understanding of the ways in which fear, insecurity, and a sense of marginalization have factored into the rise of violent political Islam.  Many of the psychological preconditions for violent political Islam are inherent to certain but not all of the different schools of Islam.  Others are the inevitable consequences of living in authoritarian and repressive environments.  Still others are the results of effective propaganda delivered by clerics with an agenda.

None of these factors exist outside the competence of the relevant agencies of government to comprehend, and act upon.  The problem has come from an unwillingness of these agencies and their superiors to think outside of narrow, ideologically determined lines.  One use for the Mustafa Fatwa and its slap in the face of all Islamophiles is that of thinking the previously unthinkable.  By doing that, and only by doing that can the US move beyond purely military responses or the reflexive view that economic improvement and education cures all of the jihadist syndrome.

The US has been facing the challenge of violent political Islam for thirty plus years now.  It is about time that someone look beyond the horizons of the conventional wisdom.  Professor Mustafa has given a very good motive to do just that.

The Fiction Writers Of The Lebanese Government Start A New Chapter

In recent years Lebanon has been a proving ground for the contention that a country can survive and even do well in the absence of an effective government.  Before that, the often crisis torn place had proved that armed anarchy was a very poor concept.

Now, it would seem the Lebanese are bound on recapitulating the lessons of the period of warring clans, factions, religious confessions, and assorted proxies of foreign powers.  Indeed, it is hard to see how the long suffering people of Lebanon can avoid this dreary future.  The country has been damned by leaders who place the interests of faction, religious confession, or external sponsors ahead of the needs of the population or the interests of the state.

The cause of the impending descent into the abyss is Hezbollah, the long extant Party of God.  Presumably, the deity referred to in the name is Allah, but the record of the group strongly suggests that the actual god of which they are the party is Mars or, perhaps Chaos.  For it is war and chaos which most strongly beckon Hezbollah and result from its acts, policies, and beliefs.

The emergence of Hezbollah as the government of Lebanon rather than as merely the dominant component would have not been possible without the presence of a facilitator.  This critical role has been played by Walid Jumblatt, leader of the Druze minority.  Jumblatt, who initiated a flirtatious relationship with the US and the West generally, has reversed his field, reverting to the traditional Jumblatt family tradition of supporting hard Left and pan-Arab entities.  He demonstrated his new stance dramatically by withdrawing his eleven members from the Hariri government and pledging their support to Hezbollah.

In effect, Walid Jumblatt pulled the plug on Hariri's future.  At the same time he pulled the plug on future cooperation between the Lebanese government and the International Tribunal for Lebanon.  It is this tribunal and the investigation report recently sent to the pre-trial judge for review and action which prompted Hezbollah to make its play for unquestioned authority a few weeks ago.

Jumblatt justified his action by saying his earlier assessment of Hezbollah had been wrong.  Now, he has seen the light and come to realize that it was not a terrorist group operating as a proxy of Iran and Syria but rather a legitimate resistance movement seeking justice for the Palestinians and against Israel.  He also averred that a recent commitment by Hassan Nasrallah, the jefe grande y supreme of Hezbollah, that his group would "respect" the Lebanese constitution, institutions, and traditions which fixed the allocation of offices among the several religious groups had reassured him regarding the group's lofty intentions.

If Jumblatt really believes Nasrallah's assurances, the Druze chieftain has way too much faith in his fellow men.  Hezbollah has made a career out of creative manipulation of perceptions through its extreme economy with the truth.  It is not necessary to be a member of Mossad to know that.

The de jure takeover of the government by Hezbollah will bring it into direct conflict with the US.  At stake are the millions of dollars promised to the government and Lebanese National Forces meant to assure the full implementation of UN Resolution 1701.  Given that Hezbollah has been declared a terrorist entity by the US government, there is no chance that the largess of Uncle Sam will continue--or that it should.  Even if the Obama administration is inclined to keep the cash flowing, the power of appropriation rests with the Republican controlled House which is less prone to flights of international fancy than the Guy in the Oval.

The stopping of the money flow will, of course, have no impact on Hezbollah or its government frontmen.  There is no doubt but Iran will step into the breech with alacrity and generosity.  It is well worth a few hundred million dollars for Tehran to bind Hezbollah closer to the foreign policy requirements of the mullahs.  As the example of Cuba shows clearly, the stopping of American aid simply gives the field over to an adverse power.

The full enforcement of Resolution 1701 was an illusion in the first place.  Hezbollah has been too strongly entrenched in Southern Lebanon for too long.  No matter who rules in Beirut, Hezbollah has the juice once the Litani river is crossed.  When Israel fully withdrew from Southern Lebanon and ended its support for the Christian South Lebanese Army, the resultant vacuum invited Hezbollah.  And, that group has never been noted for being slow on the uptake.

From the perspective of both the US and Israel the least-worst answer for the conundrum called Lebanon was allowing the Syrians to run the show.  While there were some major drawbacks to the Syrian operational dominance, the upside was Syria is a relatively risk-averse state whose army and intelligence services acted to keep the lid on any precipitant actions being mounted from Lebanon.  Quite simply were the Syrians still running the show, there is no chance that Hezbollah would have been allowed to stockpile the formidable arsenal of short and mid-range missiles it currently has in the south of Lebanon.  Or, if the missiles were there, so would be responsible Syrian officers.

The impending Hezbollah putsch will not only destabilize the country, perhaps to the point of another bloody sectarian internal war, but will do the same for the region.  Iran is a mixer and troublemaker.  Hezbollah is of the same stripe.  Syria, being the junior partner in the alliance, has lost the juice it once had to keep Hezbollah on the sanity reservation.  This implies the chance for war on Israel's northern front will grow significantly in the weeks and months following the emergence of Hezbollah to official prominence.

When developments in Lebanon are taken in conjunction with the stasis in the Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, the problem for the Obama administration becomes an order of magnitude greater.  One of the major impacts of the failure of the Obama sponsored peace talks is that the relation between the administration and the Netanyahu ministry are at a record low.  This, in turn, implies that the US cannot deliver on the only subject which would alter Syria's stance vis a vis Iran and Lebanon--the return of the Golan Heights.

The solution to the Lebanese mess has always resided in major part in Damascus.  This should have been obvious to every American administration in the past thirty years.  Whether evident or not, the brute fact remains that no US administration has trusted Syria sufficiently to allow it the free hand in Lebanon which Syria has long believed it is entitled to.  Nor has any administration taken Syria at its word that the Golan Heights was the one and only problem which needed to be solved before Damascus could and would emulate Cairo and sign a comprehensive peace treaty with Israel.

Now it may be a day too late to get on the right track.  But, this will not be known if it isn't attempted.  Sovereignty over the Golan will and must be a part of any overall Mideast peace, and, considering that it is the defining question in the mind of Assad and those around him, it is well worth making the effort.  Even Israeli intransigence need not be considered--Netanyahu knows that Israel must show some signs of seeking real peace with somebody if the international deligitimization campaign is to be arrested.

In short, the only hope for us and Lebanon is for the US to make an offer to Syria which it will not refuse and make a demand on Israel which it cannot refuse.  This way the only losers will be the genuine bad guys--Iran and Hezbollah.

Hey! Vladimir! Better Call Off The Ski Resorts

Irony without equal exists in the world news section of the London Daily Telegraph today.  The lead article is, of course, the suicide bombing at the main Moscow airport.  But, sharing the page is a story from the other day which relates of the plans announced by Vladimir Putin and Dimitri Medvedev for a series of five star ski resorts to be built on the hillsides of the North Caucasus.

The irony resides in the fact that the bombing comes courtesy of the the jihadists of the North Caucasus--the insurgency which has spread from Chechnya to the other segments of the North Caucasus in large measure because the Russian efforts at counterinsurgency have been sufficiently robust to inflame but not to suppress.  The Kremlin may have taken false comfort in the slow motion pace of insurgent activities in the North Caucasus while failing to recall that the the jihadists of the North Caucasus have preferred mediagenic attacks far from home, usually in Moscow.

The suicide bombing meets the test of being a politically shocking media spectacular.  It will grab the full and undivided attention of both Putin and Medvedev.  For Putin in particular the bombing has a very real urgency given that he most probably will seek to return to the presidential post in elections next year.

Putin, it should be remembered, won his political bones in 1999 with his successful ending of the Chenchen war.  Each and every outrage since then has reminded the Russian people and particularly the elites that the insurgency continues.  Each and every outrage is a challenge to Putin's reputation and a threat to his future.

The attack on the international arrivals area of Domodedovo airport has thrown down the gauntlet at a time and in a place which will no doubt convince many in the political elite that Putin has lost his magic, that only a well polished surface remains of a man once thought to be tough and innovative enough to provide a secure and prosperous future for the rebuilding Russia.  Medvedev may be the man issuing enhanced security orders today, but no one in the Russian "know" believes that anyone other than Putin is actually responsible for the situation in the North Caucasus.

If Putin is really serious about returning to the president's office--or even remaining as prime minister--he will have to take a much more hands-on approach to the challenge represented by the advocates of violent political Islam in Chechnya and elsewhere in the North Caucasus.  Gone are the easy going days of appointing a local strongman as capo, or delegating some former KGB general to "clarify the situation and put it to order."  Putin may have to go personally to direct a massive operation aimed not so much at counterinsurgency as at (using the old Russian/Soviet practice) creating a desert and calling it peace.

Next year, 2012, is election time in Russia, and then two years later it is the time of the Winter Olympic Games scheduled to be hosted by Russia in a venue uncomfortably proximate to the heartland of violent political Islam.  This means that for the Kremlin, time is of the essence as attorneys like to put it.  Putin's less than competent, not to say, half-baked, notions of counterinsurgency have frittered away the past several years without either suppressing the leadership or demobilizing support within the population for the goals, if not the total agenda, of the pro-violent political Islam cadre.

From the shortness of time and the probable ill effects upon the elites' perception of Putin's competence, it is not risky to infer that Vladimir of the Bare Chest has few options other than a massive military campaign aimed at the rapid destruction of the jihadists capacity to stage attacks on any but the smallest of small scales. Approaches of greater finesse simply take too much time.

Of course, the use of large military formations, even battalion sized units of special duty troops, carries with it some very real risks.  One risk, of course, is failure.  The local terrain both physical and human favors the insurgents.  The Russian army, even its special duty units, have not demonstrated a high degree of capability so far either in the North Caucasus or Tajikistan.  During the earlier Chechen wars, the Russian military showed the same deficiencies as it had in Afghanistan, including a willingness to kill far more people than genuinely needed to be killed.

Another, larger risk, is that military operations carry with them the strong potential of a negative portrayal in the media of the world.  Media and human rights organizations which feed the media have exhibited both a strong aversion to the reality that people are killed and things broken during wars, including counterinsurgcies. The same crew have demonstrated repeatedly that they have a very tender concern for the fate not only of non-combatants caught in the theater of operations but also insurgents.  Time after time, both media and human rights groups have declared in effect that insurgents are all pure and good but the status quo forces are all evil and malignant.

Russia and Putin need a bad international press like they need another insurgency.  The costs which may be imposed by the US, the EU, and other "concerned" parties may be high.  If that proves to be the case there is a strong probability that the Russian leadership will respond by invoking some of the bad behavior internationally which was once the patented product of the Soviet Union.  This sort of reaction would complicate the diplomatic life of the US and others.

Even with these risks, doing nothing, or nothing more than more of the same, constitutes a greater risk for Mr Putin.  Both he and Mr Medvedev have termed the ongoing insurgency in the North Caucasus the single greatest security threat facing Russia.  The blast at the airport may convince both, or at least Vladimir (the Strong Horse) Putin that the time has come to treat the insurgents appropriately.

If that proves to be the case, it will take more than Allah's will to save the insurgents.

Another Case Where Hanging Tough Pays Off

The Big Two of Successful Defiance Of The International Community, Iran and North Korea, have been joined by another practitioner of cocking a snoot at Great Powers and international organizations, the Ivory Coast.  To err on the side of accuracy it is not the country which is flipping the bird at the assorted powers and both the UN and African Union but rather an aging dictator who maintains he did not lose the election which all the others insist he did.  Laurent Gbagbo has been the Man In Charge for a decade or so and intends to keep on doing so no matter what the AU, UN, or assorted others might say.

The situation in the Ivory Coast with Gbagbo, his army, and his militias holding on to power while confining the properly elected new president, Alassane Ouattara, prisoner in a luxury beachfront hotel and forcibly searching the vehicles of the UN peacekeeping force should be a form of comic relief, theater of the absurd.  It is not.  The standoff in Abidjan is no laughing matter because of its possible even probable impact on the twenty countries in Africa which have elections scheduled for this year.

Africa has never shown itself to be overly hospitable to democracy, at least any form of the often altered beast which would be generally recognizable as an open expression of popular will in the choosing of governmental leaders.  The combination of historical, demographic, social, and economic features which typify much of the continent provide very thin soil for democracy of the sort common in Europe or North America.  Rather the environment has proven nourishing to the ambitions and agendas of autocrats, strongmen, the makers of coups and thieves of elections.

If Gbagbo is allowed to get away with his effort to hold on to power, the probability is that democracy will become even more of an endangered species than it has been.  The US, France, the UK, the EU, and the UN have all imposed sanctions and flexed diplomatic jaw muscles.  The regional organization, ECOWAS, as well as the African Union have also imposed financial and economic sanctions in addition to sending diplomatic missions almost by the score.

So far all the diplomatic palaver and sanctions have had no useful effect.  Even the cutting off of governmental access to governmental funds on deposit with the regional central bank did not claw Gbagbo's grasping fingers from the levers of power,  If anything, all the talk, all the sanctions, all the implied threats, all the offered inducements have done nothing but enhance Gbagbo's intransigence.  In connection with this it might be recalled that Gbagbo did something even Vladimir Putin or Hu Jintao would not contemplate--he refused to accept phone calls from President Obama.

When the UN Security Council sent a message by authorizing an increase in the UN peacekeeping force in the Ivory Coast by two thousand men, Gbagbo demonstrated just how scared he was by ordering his troops to stop and inspect UN vehicles.  In a quick and unmistakable way, the incumbent ex-president showed his contempt for the "international community" as he had some weeks earlier blown off Mr Obama.  With the nerve of a World Series of Poker champion, Gbagbo has called every bluff.

The Western countries, even France whose flag once flew over the Ivory Coast, have washed their collective hands of the situation.  After all, chocolate is nice but it is hardly a strategic material.  The UN has made all the right motions but lacks both the capacity and political will to actually do something.  ECIWAS has shot its wad.

This means the decision making and execution ball is firmly in the African Union's court.  This is as it should be.  The fifty-three member bloc has the most at stake in the Affair Of The Tenacious President.  It also has the capacity to employ effective coercion to achieve its policy goals--should such be defined with a degree of specificity.

Many of the AU's member states are functioning but fragile democracies.  It would seem as a result that the AU should operate without delay using all appropriate means to assure that democracy is not put in further peril by Gbagbo's refusal to accept the verdict of the polls.  Anyone who has followed the developing situation in the Ivory Coast must have long realized that this is a case where only the credible threat of force would serve to reinforce less robust mechanisms of coercive diplomacy.

Unfortunately, the AU is badly divided on how to accomplish a broadly accepted aim--the removal of Gbagbo.  Nigeria has called for the use of military force.  South Africa favors more mediation.  Anglola has beat the drum for new elections.  Other member states have aligned behind one or another of these countries.

If there is a consensus, it is against the use of the "military option."  Although arguments against an AU adventure in regime change are usually couched in terms of humanitarian considerations, the subtext is far more realistic.  Many Africa states are of the view that their military forces are not up to the task.  Others fear the unmentionable: Deployment of the army or any sizable contingent would open the domestic door to coup plotters or self-styled revolutionaries.

There is a great deal of rationality to each of these considerations.  Most AU member states possess armies which are internal security oriented.  Few AU national forces assigned to UN peacekeeping missions have demonstrated the necessary levels of professional competence to mount an invasion which is carefully constrained in lethality and destructiveness.  Taking out a regime which enjoys rightly or not a sizable degree of support without leaving behind a failed state would be very difficult for even the best trained and officered military.

A mission of this degree of difficulty is lightyears beyond the competence of any AU member state's military.  This means the AU does not have the credible capacity to coerce Gbagbo from office.  Importantly, both the AU leadership and Gbagbo know this.

The dreary conclusion of this is simple.  Absent a diplomatic miracle which would tax the devious skills of a Talleyrand, Gbagbo will stay in the presidential palace and his rival will remain penned up in the hotel.  This, in turn, implies that democracy in Africa takes one more bullet in the back of the neck.

Let's hear it one more time for the triumphant march of democracy.  Well, it does sound nice, doesn't it?  If it weren't for reality...

Tunisians Better Have Fun While They Can

The people of Tunisia are having a well merited time of fun, frolic, and freedom--freedom won after fifty years of more or less repressive autocratic regimes.  Unfortunately, the fun police are not only lurking in the wings but actually flowing back home with the intention of blowing the whistle on both fun and freedom in the country.

While the long exiled leader of Tunisia's largest Islamist oriented political party, Rashid Ghannouchi, states that he is no Ayatollah Khomeini and his Renaissance Party (Ennahdha) does not advocate political Islam, violent or otherwise, there are others in the field which are not so inclined.  Faced with competition from the "Left" of Islamism, there is a very real probability that Ghannouchi will trim his party's sails to better catch the prevailing winds.  As Crane Brinton pointed out in his classic treatment of revolutions, there is a built in trajectory to ever more extreme positions in revolutions, or, to use the correct term, offensive insurgencies.

Make no mistake about it, the so-called Jasmine Revolution was an offensive insurgency in that the goal has been the total replacement of the status quo government and its supporting elites.  The goal of the Tunisians in the streets constantly became more totalistic in nature, culminating in the demand that all vestiges of the old ruling party be removed from government and politics.  While this sort of political cleansing is expectable and perhaps beneficial in the longer term, it leaves a vacuum in its immediate wake.

The political movements espousing political Islam were a particular target not only of Ben Ali but his predecessor.  Ben Ali bent every effort to expunging these movements after the election of 1988 in which the Renaissance Party won at least seventeen percent of the votes in an election which resembled one conducted by the old Daley machine in Chicago for its honesty.  Many prominent figures in the movements disappeared into the maws of the internal security machine while even more sought safety in exile.  This did not mean that the movements were destroyed but rather that they were forced underground to wait a more propitious day.

That day has arrived.  It is now safe for the advocates of political Islam to emerge from the shadows, to return from foreign sanctuaries.  It is implicit in the situation extant today that the advocates of political Islam are better organized, more committed to their agendas and goals, better prepared in all respects to compete for power in the post-overthrow environment.  To think that they will be less than absolute in their pursuit of power is to deny reality.

On the surface Tunisia has been more secular, more "Western," more prosperous, than its North African neighbors--or the Arab and Muslim states generally.  Tunisians are better educated, seemingly more tolerant, apparently more oriented to "Western" norms and values than those living elsewhere in the Arab and Muslim states.  The appearances have always been seductively appealing to Western governments, Western elites, Western media.

Importantly, the appearances may be every bit as deceptive as was the facade of Ben Ali's government as an efficiently repressive one.  The ease with which the ancien regime was displaced showed dramatically just how great a gap existed between appearance and reality.  The danger now is the same gulf exists and will be demonstrated just as dramatically between the appearance of "Western" secularism, tolerance, educated sophistication, and the reality of Islamism.

The Tunisians are faced by a challenge far greater than electoral reforms or economic development.  They are faced by a fundamental choice between the message of political Islam and its alternatives including but not limited to one of secularism.

One need not be overly pessimistic to bet that the Tunisians will eventually opt for the Islamist vision of an "Islamic Republic" on the lines of Pakistan.  They will do this because Islam is central to the lives of many, perhaps most, Tunisians, even those with advanced "Western" style education.  The power of the message may rest on Islam qua Islam but gains its real power from the subtext of fear and hate.

In this regard it must never be overlooked that the basic theological content of Islam is fear--fear of displeasing the deity, fear of spending eternity in hell (no religion comes close to Islam in its pornographic treatment of the torments of the damned,) fear of not being a member in good standing of the community, the Ummah.

The religion offer antidotes for the pervasive message of fear.  One of these is explicit in the name of the religion: Islam.  The word means submission, submission to the will of the deity as interpreted by the clerics.  The other counter to pervasive fear is hate.  Muslims are called upon to hate the infidels, to hate the apostates, to hate the omnipresent "others."  The necessity of hate will exist until every last human being has submitted to the will of the deity, the dictates of the Prophet, and the will of the clerics.

Islam holds that not until every last person on Earth has pounded his forehead in the dirt and raised his posterior to the Deity will any Muslim be safe, secure, able to breathe free and easy, able to enjoy certainty.  Until that day Muslims must live in fear and counter that fear by submitting to the authority of the cleric as well as hating all who are branded apostates, infidels, or otherwise being "worthy of death."  It is against this background that the other, plentiful fears of quotidian life must be placed.

Advocates and practitioners of political Islam maintain that by embracing Islam, by following Shariah, by submitting to the will of the deity as put forth by clerics, the great fears of displeasing the deity and of going to hell can be addressed along with the lesser fears of daily life.  The full acceptance of the requirements of Islam will assure that every individual can feel merged with the community, that every individual will live in the dignity and respect of the community of believers, that every person will find economic and social security, that the equality of belief will render nugatory the bogus equality of both democracy and the rule of (man made) law.

The picture of life in a true Islamic republic is paradisaical.  The ideal Islamic republic as portrayed in, say, the writings of assorted Pakistani clerics, is one of equality, security, harmony, justice.  In all essential respects the Islamic republican ideal is akin to the Perfect World described by various Communist theoreticians.  And, again like the Workers' Paradises limned by Communist philosophers, the Paradise-on-Earth descriptions put forth by advocates of political Islam fail the test of application in the real world.

Tunisians would be well-advised to consider carefully just what centuries of Islam have produced.  To what extent has the great human treasury of knowledge been enhanced by contributions from Muslims living in Muslim majority states?  What great technological or scientific discoveries or innovations have been produced by Muslims living in Muslim majority states in recent centuries?  What new, useful, social or political or economic systems have emerged from the minds of Muslims living in Muslim majority countries?  What inventions?  What great works of creative genius?  How many ideas or words have come from Muslim tongues or pens to inspire people around the world regardless of religion?

It might be instructive for a Tunisian contemplating the promises of Islamists to ask whether or not Islam per se--with its emphasis on submission, on not thinking for oneself but rather following the cues of clerical leaders--can produce a creative, dynamic, innovative society?  Is not the groveling submission demanded by Islam generally and political Islam in particular antipodal to the needs of creativity and innovation?

Is it possible, a Tunisian might ask, for a religion or a political movement predicated on religion which has fear and hate as its stock in trade able to produce anything positive?  Is the combination of submission, fear, and hate the perfect mixture to result in killing, destruction, and failure?

These and other similar questions if honestly and objectively answered point in one direction.  The necessity, the absolute imperative, to reject political Islam quickly and finally.  The alternative, following the leaders of political Islam, will result in a future compared to which the recent past under Ben Ali will seem both free and enjoyable.

If Tunisians neglect closely questioning both the Islamists and the religion they purport to represent, the Jasmine Revolution will prove to have been an abject failure.  Worse, it will have been a foreseeable and thus preventable failure.

Why Not Cut Off The UN?

Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the new chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee has thrown down the gauntlet.  Well, actually she has tossed several gloves down, but this particular challenge is aimed directly at the bete noir of conservatives, the United Nations.  The one time minister of foreign affairs in the Republic of Korea, Ban Ki-moon, has vowed to meet the challenge in person.  He will appear in the course of hearings scheduled to start later this month.

Ms Ros-Lehtinen, a Cuban-American representing a district in South Florida, has made her distaste for the UN abundantly clear.  She considers the organization, particularly the Secretariat, to be corrupt, inefficient, lacking in transparency, deficient in honesty, and generally speaking unworthy of the lavish support it receives from the American taxpayer (and his Chinese lenders.)  She has recommended making contributions to the world body purely voluntary as a means of persuading the outfit to clean up its act.

Such a move would cut the UN off at the knees.  Currently the US provides 517 megabucks of the UN's 2.17 gigabuck operating budget.  In addition the US forks over 2.68 billion of the organization's 9.67 billion dollar peacekeeping costs.  That constitutes a whole lot of something for not too terribly much of a return.

Not surprisingly, Secretary General Ban is not in agreement.  While he is more or less willing to admit rather grudgingly that there may have been some problems in the UN during the past, he claims he has made great strides in assuring efficiency, transparency, and an absence of corruption during his tenure to date.  In any event, he seems to say, what alternative is there?

Beyond that cop out defense, Mr Ban appears to think that the only problem the UN has is one of image.  Not unlike the Democratic party following the midterm election, Mr Ban hints at the UN having failed to properly address its "messaging" difficulties.  If only the American public and its (Republican) representatives understood just how well the UN is handling its manifold tasks, there would be no argument over the notion that We the People were getting a very good return on our investment.

Unfortunately the problem is not as simple as Mr Ban believes.  Nor is it simply a matter of UN management. If that had been the case, the 1999 Helms-Biden United Nations Reform Act would have been sufficient to meet American objections and questions.  The problems of UN performance are far more extensive, totally systemic, and in largest measure are the consequence of the organization having been afflicted with a bad case of institutional overreach.

The UN has long strayed from its basic mission, the foundational reason for its creation.  That initial mission was simple to state but very difficult to put into practice.  The purpose of the UN was to preserve international peace by assuring that those countries which broke the peace would suffer severe and immediate punishment by the "international community."  In principle, a state which broke the international peace by unprovoked aggression would face the united effort of member states to restore the status quo ante bellum.

The realities of international politics as expressed in the Security Council made certain that the UN could not address its major mission more than a couple of times--the Korean War and the repulse of Iraq from Kuwait forty years later.  Between the influence of the Cold War on Security Council votes and the many ways in which a state could plausibly present aggressive war as one of a legally defensive nature, the UN failed the hopes of its creators.

In part because of its manifest failure as an instrument of collective security but also as a consequence of the great expansion of its membership during the post-colonial decades, the UN cast about for additional missions.  By feats of (mis)definition, the body concluded that it possessed the authority to intervene in the internal affairs of a member state if that state undertook measures which stimulated a flux of refugees to neighboring countries which threatened instability in those states.  Similarly, the UN determined that it could intervene to address or prevent humanitarian crises contingent upon the collapse of a state or actions by a government which put lives at undue risk.

While the General Assembly, Security Council, and Secretariat were engaged in mission leap, so also were the assorted subsidiary entities operating under the collective UN mantle.  This gave rise to such abominations as the International Panel on Climate Change as well as the aggressive outreach by such bodies as the World Health Organization and the supreme abomination of the Human Rights Council.  Each of these bodies has attempted with more or less success to intrude on affairs formerly seen as the sole bailiwick of sovereign states.

The proliferation of "peacekeeping" missions along with "humanitarian" operations further emphasized the intrusive and expansionist nature of the UN--to say nothing of its increased demands for money.  The result, a consequence not likely to have been intended, was to make the UN appear to have delusions of becoming the very thing denizens of the far, far Right warned against a half century ago--a pretender to world government status.

Leaving aside the philosophical merits of a One World Government, the brute fact remains that the UN is not equipped in any respect to fill that function.  The nature of the Security Council with its Conference of the Victors veto holders as well as the General Assembly with its every country has one vote assure that the UN lacks both the capacity and the perceived legitimacy to operate as even the vaguest sort of super-national government.

What Mr Ban must address--and what Ms Ros-Lehtinen objects to--is the pretense by the UN that it is by right a form of super-national governing body even if not a super-national government per se.  The task for Mr Ban is simply impossible.  There is too wide a perception that the UN has delusions of governmental aspirations for him to counter in a single appearance or even several.

A close reading of the UN record in peacekeeping shows a record which comes far closer to failure than to success.  In the Congo as elsewhere the UN blue helmets have demonstrated a lack of capacity and will to impose or keep the peace which serves to erode the credibility of peacekeeping fatally.  Many of the national contingents assigned to UN duty are poorly trained, poorly equipped, lacking in basic discipline, bereft of effective officers, and overly given to gangster as opposed to military virtues.  That the US should be paying for this is insupportable.

The record in humanitarian operations is not much better.  Haiti is a fine example of how poorly the UN is equipped for major rescue and rehabilitation efforts.  The response to the cyclone in Burma may have been impaired by the local government's intransigence but was still marked by ineptitude at best and flat out blundering at worst.

Mr Ban may be proud of the UN's efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan but there is precious little objective support for this pride.  Domestic political pressures may have forced George W. Bush to relent on his anti-UN stance following the Iraq invasion, but this should not be mistaken as an acknowledgement that the UN was well equipped to do anything meaningful either in Iraq or Afghanistan.  The same applies to Sudan.  American and European diplomacy rather than UN efforts brought about the secession vote in Southern Sudan and have at least limited the Khartoum government's brutal actions in Darfur.

The UN has done nothing to enhance its perceived legitimacy with the ever greater profusion of special tribunals charged with investigation and prosecution of war crimes and crimes against humanity.  So far, the tribunals seems to have specialized in prosecuting former African dictators and the war lords of former Yugoslavia.  It is not surprising that a belief has grown in Africa to the effect that the tribunals are simply one more neo-colonial apparatus intended to keep Africans in their collective place. The indictment of the current Sudanese president has forced the notion to spread from Africa to portions of the Muslim world.  And, this aspect of UN overreach is bound to get worse no matter which course of action the pre-trial judge in the Lebanese matter goes.

With the exception of those Americans who have an agenda such as the environmental activists and their global warming fellow travelers, or those of the hard Left belonging to the "blame America first" school of thought, there is not much support within We the People for the UN.  This translates into a lack of support for feeding the UN's expensive habits.

At a time when budgetary realities are dismal at best, at a time when the US must cut its defense expenditures regardless of the war in progress, the ongoing threat of violent political Islam, the growth of Chinese ambitions and the military means to support those ambitions, there is very little stomach in the US for largess directed to the lame, anti-American bunch which constitutes the ambition heavy, accomplishment light group called the United Nations.  The correlation of forces runs against Mr Ban and runs for those like Ms Ros-Lehtinen who desire an end to American underwriting of the UN.

Tinkering on the margins of the UN will not solve the problem.  The UN as currently constituted is the problem.  The world may benefit from a credible instrument of collective security, but the UN as it exists today is not that instrument.

Pace President Obama, Secretary Clinton, and others of their ilk, get a grip on reality.  The UN as it exists now is not useful.  It is not useful as a means of preventing or punishing international aggression.  It is not useful as a means of protecting human rights.  It is not competent in the protection of the environment.  It is not even a worthy mechanism of American foreign policy.

At best the UN is a charade.  At worst it is a fraud perpetrated upon people eager for a genuine means of keeping the international peace or addressing the very real problems of the global commons.  Today, in large measure because of its nature and character, the UN is as toothless and worthless as was the League of Nations in 1939.  Like the League it has outlived its usefulness.  It has become an institution not unlike a fly in amber, a fossil of a long dead time, entombed.

As the US took the point in developing the concept of the UN during the dark days of a war which seemed without end at the time, we must now take the lead in developing a credible replacement for the UN.  This is a far more demanding process than simply seeking to force changes on the margins by playing games with our financial contribution to the discredited Circus by the Hudson.  It will demand deep and realistic thinking, prolonged and perhaps bitter debate, but the results can be worth the effort.

In any event we cannot simply stand by as the great golem of the UN shambles and lurches along on its course to self-inflicted destruction.  Our future and that of the world in which we live demands more and better of us.

As Robert Kennedy was fond of asking, "If not us, who?  If not now, when?"

Looks Like Lebanon Is Setting Up For A Down The Tube Ride

Pity the Lebanon--and those who live in that unfortunate geographic expression.  No country equals Lebanon's sorry record of recurrent fits of energetic disassembly.  Part of the reason for the Lebanese proclivity is attributable to its religious demographics--split between Sunnis, Shiites, Christians, and smaller sects.  Another part of the package is its relationship with Syria, which has never gotten over the idea that Lebanon is a sort of lost province of something called "Greater Syria."  And, in recent years, great responsibility for Lebanon's fits of falling apart can be assigned to non-Lebanese actors ranging from the PLO in the days following the terrorist group being ejected from Jordan to the tool of Tehran, Hezbollah.

During the period of the French Mandate, the government of Lebanon was distributed among the three major religious confessions on the basis of membership numbers as determined by the snapshot of a census.  The distribution remained unchanged for decades regardless of the demographic changes which occurred.  The result was a dangerous combination of alienation and resentment.  The explosive mix would have detonated in 1957 had it not been for a very well executed American intervention, which served to keep the lid on the pot for another fifteen years.

In the wake of the salutary and short-lived American presence, Lebanon enjoyed a prolonged period of internal peace and economic development.  In the late Sixties Beirut was an island of Western style high life and sophistication in the otherwise dreary Arab Mideast.  It well merited the sobriquet, Paris of the Levant.  The city was glitzy and the nearby countryside beautiful.  It was a safe and fun place for tourists, businessmen, and spies alike.

The Lebanese party came to an end when Jordan got its military and political acts together so as to expel the gunslingers of Fatah and others of the PLO combine.  As these troublemakers and their rabble rousing chairman, Yassar Arafat, were PNG in Syria and Iraq, the only alternative was Lebanon.  Unfortunately, both the army and government of Lebanon were too weak to resist the demands for "Islamic" hospitality which were issued by Fatah and the rest.

In a manner both quick and bloody the trigger pulling thugs of the PLO, who enjoyed the diplomatic and financial support of distant Arab states, established their own state inside a state within Lebanon.  From these enclaves, the Arafat terrorists (and others of those long gone days, the days when terror was secular in goal and motive conducted by groups hiding behind a bewildering welter of alphabet soup initials) launched attacks against Israel and Israelis.  As is their custom the Israelis struck back.

One thing led to another with the result that Lebanon toppled along the edge of the cliff, finally falling into the vast and deep crevice of internal, multi-party war.  The years of war invited outsiders.  Israel invaded.  The US, France, and the UK intervened.  Finally, the Syrians moved in.  Alone among the outsiders, the Syrians remained.

Even though the waves of war and intervention served to eject much of the Fatah/PLO apparatus from Lebanon, and Syria in pursuit of its own interests brought others of the terror networks firmly to heel, this did not mean that Lebanon was cleansed of all who sought to use terror for political purposes.  A new organization, the Party of God or Hezbollah, had formed in the chaos called Lebanon.  It may have started small but it would grow as its leadership brought religion self-consciously into the terror racket.

It does not do disservice to Hezbollah to say it successfully combined the secular nationalism of previous terrorist entities such as Fatah with the violent political Islam which had propelled the Iranian Islamic Revolution.  Protected by the Syrian government whose bidding it did--most of the time--Hezbollah had the time necessary to develop its message, methods, and organization.  With Syrian assistance Hezbollah demonstrated it had the ability and will not only to attack Israeli targets but to provide a reasonable facsimile of effective government in portions of Lebanon.

Israeli hostility, particularly during the debacle of 2006, was second only to Syrian patronage in establishing the political legitimacy and military capacity of Hezbollah in Lebanon.  The relative failure of the Israeli Defense Forces in that campaign validated the decisions made in Tehran and Damascus a year or two earlier to make Hezbollah a full fledged proxy of the new strategic axis connecting Iran and Syria.

The killing of Lebanese former prime minister Saad al-Hariri in 2005 proved to be a fulcrum event.  At the time the massive VBIED killed al-Hariri, it was no doubt believed in both Tehran and Damascus that the assassination would pass unmarked by the larger world.  In this both governments were wrong but neither could be blamed for having assumed that one more noisy killing of an anti-Syrian politician in the blood soaked Levant would raise no eyebrows.

In the event the Lebanese government not only howled, it went to the UN.  Specifically, the government requested that the busy bodies on the Hudson launch an independent international investigation and determine who was culpable.  Almost simultaneously the Bush/Cheney administration in a fit of rushing to premature judgement unilaterally determined that the Syrian government was responsible and recalled its ambassador.

The UN tribunal started off with a credible imitation of Inspector Clouseau and ran off sniffing Syrians under every bed and behind every bomb.  The investigation belatedly got on a less inaccurate track two years ago.  With the grudging cooperation of the Syrian government in which Hezbollah now had a major presence, the investigators apparently focused on the Iranian-Hezbollah linkage with a nod to some peripheral Syrian involvement.

With this the situation in Lebanon took a severe and negative turn.  Reduced to its essentials Hezbollah demanded that the government headed by Hariri's son withdraw its cooperation and support from the tribunal and its investigators.  To his credit Hariri fils declined the demand.  Then Hezbollah sought to bring the government down by withdrawing its ministers from the cabinet.

New elections are scheduled for March.  Hariri has declared his candidacy much to the displeasure of Hezbollah which denounced the action as unacceptable.  Reinforcing their displeasure, Hezbollah has conducted a "drill" preparing it would appear for a coup.  This has done nothing to enhance the tranquility of the Lebanese population.

The sealed report of the investigators is now in the hands of the pre-trial judge who will announce his decision on whether or not to proceed with arrest warrants in the next six to ten weeks.  Assuming the pre-trial judge does not wimp out, there is a high probability that high ranking members of both Hezbollah and the Iranian government, including the Supreme Guardian of the Revolution himself, will find their names on international arrest orders.

In effect this would constitute a declaration of war on both Hezbollah and its Iranian masters.  Certainly the position of Hezbollah that the tribunal is a tool of the American-Israeli conspiracy hints broadly at this conclusion.  At the least Hezbollah will stage the expected coup.  Given the relative weakness of the Lebanese National Forces, there is no probability of a determined resistance to any Hezbollah takeover.

Should the UN tribunal (or at least the pre-trial judge) be so bold as to aver Iranian complicity, particularly that of the Ayatollah Khemenei, Tehran will go ballistic (metaphorically at least.)  As the pre-trial judge is no doubt cognisant of this eventuality it is probable that he will demand more investigation before putting the Supreme Guardian of the Revolution on the Interpol arrest list.  Indeed, a gentle regard for the probable violent reaction of Hezbollah to any accusation of involvement may stay the man's hand completely.

Should the pre-trial judge show the white feather this will mean that Hezbollah has won.  It will take over the government without the messy necessity of a coup and its undoubtedly bloody aftermath.  A demonstration of international cowardice will also give Iran a free pass to engage in further acts of proxy conducted assassination.

Whichever way it goes, the UN tribunal is in a no-win situation.  If the indictments go forward, Lebanon will dissolve into one more internal multi-party war which will not end until either Syria alone or Hezbollah with Syrian support imposes a simulacrum of peace.  If the indictments do not happen, if more investigation is demanded, the result will be a loss of credibility for the UN, a peaceful takeover of Lebanon by Hezbollah, and a boost to Iranian clandestine and proxy efforts.

Whichever way the situation progresses the US will not be able to keep the hands-off policy set forth by Secretary Clinton today.  In either event Israel will be put at greater hazard.  In either event the Mideast "peace process" will be derailed even more than is currently the case.  In either event Iran will become more rather than less intransigent in its dealings with the US and the West generally.

The Lebanon crisis is deep and will get much deeper.  The prospect for the long suffering Lebanese population is poor at best and disastrous at its realistic worst.  And, lost somewhere in the shuffle of political agendas, is the notion of justice.  There will be no justice.  Not for Saad al-Hariri.  Not for his son.  Not for the region.  And, certainly not for the people of Lebanon.

Some More Reasons China Will Defeat The US

There are two contests currently underway in global affairs.  In each the stakes of the game are nothing less than planetary preeminence.  One of the two "games" is between adherents of political Islam, particularly violent political Islam, and the civilized states both great and small.  The other is between the US and the Peoples Republic of China.

Both are dangerous.  Both directly threaten the US and We the People.  Without going unacceptably far out on the limb of doom laden speculation, each--and particularly the second--are existential in the sense that should the US be on the losing side, life will change for Americans, and not for the better.

As was the case in World War II when the US was faced by war on two fronts, war conducted by two qualitatively different enemies, a choice must be made as to which enemy deserves priority.  In 1941 the leadership of the US and UK correctly estimated that Nazi Germany constituted the greater threat and thus merited the greater effort by the Western Allies.  Now, the leadership of the US must make a similar decision.  It must evaluate which threat--violent political Islam or expansionist China--is greater and, thus, must take pride of place in American efforts.

It is not an easy choice to make.  There is no doubt but violent political Islam constitutes a clear and present danger.  There is no arguing against the proposition that should the adherents of this objectionable religion based political philosophy gain greater influence around the world, the consequences for the US and other civilized states would be unpleasant and all too often lethal.  However, the potentials of violent political Islam pale when compared to the threat contained in Chinese expansionism.

Unlike the majority of those who advocate the triumph of political Islam (which are actors of the non-state sort), China is a fully functioning state with all the appurtenances of statehood.  Not only is China a nation-state, it is an authoritarian one, which means it has automatic advantages in long term planning and execution of policy.  China is not only a nation-state with an authoritarian political system, it is a country with both a long history and an equally long record of being quite historically conscious.  Historical consciousness implies that policy is more often than not based on trajectories and world views of very long standing, backed as it were by the power of time.

Given its advantages of organization, economic and technological predicates, population size and cohesiveness, unitary political will, and the very real force of time, China possesses a number of advantages in the Great Game of Nations which are denied to the adherents of political Islam.  In short, China is today's equivalent of Nazi Germany in 1941 while the practitioners of political Islam are the contemporary version of Imperial Japan in 1941--a major annoyance, an enemy which must be defeated in the fullness of time but not a true existential menace.

When considering the match up between China and the US, it is clear that China has a number of very potent advantages.  Some of these have been examined in earlier posts such as Beijing's severely narrow focus on Chinese national and strategic interests, its capacity to assure monolithic political will, or the Trolls' well demonstrated ability to plan and execute foreign policy with an emphasis on the long term.

There are other factors which amp up China's tactical capacities which merit close consideration since without effective tactics even the best strategy will fail.  A second justification for scrutinizing certain tactical matters is that the differing approaches taken by the US and China are illustrative of larger factors which militate against American success in the current contest.

Consider for the moment the notion of "doing good."  The notion of "doing good" is inherent in the concept of "nation-building."  And, as has been demonstrated by our interventionary operations in the post-World War II decades, the slippery critter called "nation-building" has been a centrality.  Actually, the roots of nation-building go back nearly a century when Woodrow Wilson sent the Marines ashore in Mexico in order "to teach the Mexicans to elect good men."

Nation-building is one of those ideas which reads well in academic conferences or policy discussions by ad hoc inter-agency working groups sitting around highly polished fine wood tables in some chancery somewhere.  In the real world, particularly among those benighted folk upon whose backs a nation will be built, the idea is not so well received.

The idea is even less well received when it is presented--as it always is--with overtones of condescension, of the well intentioned expert parachuting in with salvation for the heathen contained in his briefcase or on his flash drive.  The wannabe nation-builder does nothing to enhance the favor with which his efforts at uplift are received when--as inevitably it must be--hectoring replaces mere condescension.

No one likes to be told he is somehow lacking, somehow inferior, somehow in need of guidance, moral uplift, political transformation.  No member of a traditional society and culture enjoys hearing how it is deficient and what he must do to "build" his nation.  The universal crustiness of the human critter assures that the most well intended nation-building will fail unless the "builders" limit their role to that of provider of money and other goodies.

The Americans (and other Westerners as well) have never gotten the message no matter how often it has been delivered by different recipients of our nation-building efforts.  In Afghanistan today as in South Vietnam fifty years ago or Mexico a half century before that, Americans are committed to nation-building complete with the ribbons and bows of hectoring and implicit superiority.  The result is simple: No matter how much "good" we do, the efforts are invariably resented and rejected by the objects of our succor and assistance.

The Chinese are not so high minded.  Perhaps because China was the target of nation-building in bygone days, the Trolls and their agents are willing to simply pass out money and urge that Chinese companies be hired for infrastructure projects.  China does not seek to build nations but rather to secure influence within existing governments and the states these rule.  To this end the Trolls will distribute money, seek to recoup as much of the dole as possible through the awarding of contracts, and in the process gain and retain influence within both the government of the target state and its associated elite(s.)

This is a coldly realistic process of pursuing Chinese national and strategic interests.  The Trolls have no lofty aspirations of uplifting the heathens, of changing the local culture, society, or polity for the "better" or otherwise doing "good" for the local "masses."  Chinese national and strategic interests in no way require the transformation of the recipient country into a simulacrum of China.

This diplomatic philosophy is in sharp opposition with that of the US (and some other Western states.)  It doesn't matter if neocon ninnies or High Minded Progressives are running the White House or congress, the US always demands the recipient become some sort of Western style democratic polity with a society marked by the full panoply of "rights" enjoyed by Americans today and an economy having all the features of a well regulated, "rule of law" approach.

The implications of this sharp set of distinctions are too self-evident to require elucidation.  Or, at least, they should be.

For the Deep Thinking Denizens Inside the Beltway, the distinctions and their impact do not seem so self-evident.  This dynamic comes into sharper focus in another area of difference between the methods of the Trolls and those favored by the US government and its fellow travelers within our domestic elites.

The second illustration of the differences between the Chinese and American ways of 'nation-building" is the role of corruption.  To Americans at the policy level corruption is anathema.  To the Trolls it just another way of acquiring and keeping influence.  To us it is a sin.  To the Chinese it is a fact of life to be used in the pursuit of interest.

In many places around the world graft, corruption, nepotism, and a lack of transparency are a normal and expectable part of life.  When these features of quotidian existence become a problem for the local elite or the citizenry generally, it is usually because the fruits of corruption are not distributed equitably.  It is not the corruption per se but rather its lack of breadth which cause outrage.

The American answer to corruption is to stamp it out with the moral fervor of a health Nazi facing a McDonald's warehouse.  The Chinese response is to build corruption in as a normal cost and try to make sure it is spread around appropriately.  The more spreading the better as such assures more people will be tied in effectively to the Chinese program.

Our approach is more--more laws, more regulations, more courts, more commissions, more oversight, more investigators, more cops.  The Chinese approach is also more--more money and more widespread distribution.

Pop quiz:  Which approach is more likely to produce more positive results with more people in the recipient traditional society?

This brief consideration of two tactical advantages enjoyed by China over the US today illustrates why it is critical for us to stop and take a hard look at the two threats facing the Americans today.  It also helps in understanding why China is the larger, more important threat as well as why the US is not likely to prevail in the contest underway today.

To put it all quite simply, when the deck is stacked against you is it is with respect to the Trolls time is not on your side.  The US does not have the luxury of sitting back and wondering what we should do--if anything.  The real deal is the Obama administration has no viable option other than to remove its collective head from the sand and realize that the Chinese are cruising on by us on the fast track to global preeminence.

Really, Mr Obama is that why you received the Nobel Peace Prize?