As had been expected for several weeks, Rick Perry has entered the GOP contest. Of this the Geek is both glad and positive. Governor Perry appears to possess the stomach and head necessary for a down and dirty campaign against the Nice Young Man From Chicago which is singularly lacking with other Elephant hopefuls.
The Geek became a fan of Texas politics during the years necessity compelled him to live and work in the Lone Star Empire. The doings at that model of law making decorum called the "Lege" were and are as fascinating as the inner workings of the Cook County (Ill.) Democratic machine. The emergence of Perry showed him to be a man having a strong, visceral understanding of the political soul of most Texans. Over the past year Perry's performance has demonstrated that this gut level talent is not restricted to the denizens of the LSE but extends to many of We the People.
It is important to enter an important caveat here, a warning of relevance to international politics. Other significant leaders who have exhibited a strong, visceral understanding of their people's national politics such as Vladimir Putin have seen that understanding stop abruptly at the border. They have little if any understanding of the political mood or mode of other people in other countries.
Governor Perry stated strongly in Charleston that he was a strong believer in "American exceptionalism," which places him in very sharp contrast with the relativistic Mr Obama. This posture while laudable in itself demands yet another caveat in the arena of global affairs. The "exceptionalism" part of the phrase consists of characteristics, attributes, and values which are under a permanent export ban. American exceptionalism is not only made in America by dint of suffering, war, political struggles, and endless effort, it must forever stay in the land of its fabrication. It is unique to us for it is uniquely us and ours. No bayonet, no tank, no stealth fighter, no UAV, no aid program, no propaganda effort, no executive order or congressional enactment can force its export to other, foreign soils. As a transplant it must fail.
On his campaign website, Mr Perry avers that his service as a C-130 driver as well as his many foreign trips as governor give him insight into the needs of American diplomatic and national security policy. While it is true that the governor flew Herky birds with numerous RONs and TDYs, the result would be an intimate acquaintance with nocturnal resorts of entertainment and recreation but little contact with the dark doings of foreign chanceries or the gavottes in distant corridors of power. (To this truism any person with a peripatetic military experience can attest.) And, as governor Mr Perry's overseas jaunts were in the interest of the economic development of the LSE not the national interests of the US.
In his speech at Charleston, the Texan was more than kind when he characterized whatever passes as foreign policy within the Obama administration as a "muddle." It is, of course, far worse than that. It is even worse than a collection of blunders wrapped in empty, high sounding rhetoric. Rather, it is an ideologically driven exercise in ad hoc reaction coupled with a set of self-defeating visions of how the world ought to be if only it were designed in Left leaning academic salons located near the University of Chicago campus.
At least implicitly (if Rick "No One Crosses Me and Lives" Perry can ever be merely implicit) the Texas Cyclone of Prayer vowed to change this. He evidently intends to assure the US once again walks tall and proud on the international stage. This would be a welcome change after the years of "leading from behind" but carries with it yet another, larger caveat.
This caveat resides in the coterie Perry has assembled to date as his advisers on foreign and national security affairs. Without notable exception, it is comprised of neocon ninnies out of the years of the Bush/Cheney administration. At the head of the list is the execrable Doug Feith, the top architect of the debacle in Iraq. Other members have an equally illustrious record. From their post administration writings and speeches, it is apparent they have neither learned nor forgotten a single iota. None have seen the failings produced by their own ideologically predicated view of the world and the role of the US in that world.
Unless Governor Perry expands his advisory staff, there is a very grave danger that his understanding of the abilities and limits of American power will be as disastrously off the mark as were those of George W. Bush. Neither the US nor the world can live with yet another ideologically predicated misreading of what the US can and cannot do with respect to the internal workings of other countries.
It is important to note that not since George H.W. Bush left office has the US enjoyed the services of a president who was both internationally focused and relatively bereft of ideological blinders. The many years of Clinton, George W. Bush and His Hindmost, Barack Obama--each with either or both a disinterest in foreign affairs or ideological predicates of overwhelming power--have seen the steady decline of the US as a Great Power with influence and potency. Given that the next president will be laboring under serious budgetary constraints, the question of the relations of the US with the rest of the world as well as the American capacity and will to defend and advance its national interests will be under very severe challenge.
More than ever we will need a president who realistically assesses our national interests and tailors our diplomacy and military to protect and advance those interests regardless of extraneous considerations including ideological preferences and prejudices. The next president will face a world which remains what it always has been--a dangerous place replete with countries which oppose us and our interests and actors both state and non-state who wish to do us harm. The world will also contain countries which share values and norms with us and with which we have coinciding national interests.
The next president must do what the present incumbent has failed to do with striking obviousness--parse between the enemies and the allies. He must be able and willing to cozen and stroke the latter while drawing in a credible manner the necessary lines in the sand regarding the former.
As Perry lacks any significant foreign policy experience and whose direct experience with military affairs and war fighting is limited to the perspective offered from the cockpit of a C-130, he will depend heavily on his foreign policy and national security teams. Given his first picks as advisers, there is, unfortunately, little if any reason to be hopeful in this regard.
In the future national interest as well as his own personal political fortune, Governor Perry ought to fire the present advisory staff. It is the only smart and prudential thing to do. He has to put daylight between himself and George W. Bush, and listening to the old gang of neocon ninnies is not the way to offset the inevitable Obama camp attacks seeking to make Perry look like the much disliked (not to say hated) Bush, Jr.
(Full disclosure in blogging statement: The Geek is not angling for a job with the Perry camp as he is constitutionally incapable of working for anyone.)
Showing posts with label US Foreign Relations. Show all posts
Showing posts with label US Foreign Relations. Show all posts
Sunday, August 14, 2011
Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Time For The "Nuclear Option"
The US and assorted other civilized states have been making noises and ugly faces for some years now over the Iranian efforts to attain nuclear weapons. Diplomatic and economic sanctions have been employed. So have more robust measures ranging from the more or less covert such as computer viruses to the rather obvious, the shooting of nuclear researchers.
Th net result has been the continued and accelerating Iranian quest for the bomb.
Years ago, the notion of Iranian science or work in advanced technology would have been seen quite properly as an oxymoron. During the early days of the Iranian Islamic Revolution, science and technology were downgraded severely as a matter of theologically predicated policy. It was only years later, years marked by the stalemated bloodletting of the Iran-Iraq War, that the mullahs and ayatollahs changed their religious tune. Only after the near defeat at the hands of the technologically superior Iraq convinced the Supreme Guardian of the Revolution that the deity did, after all, will Iran to have sufficient and sufficiently advanced weapons to protect the revolution.
Science and technology came back to the front and center of Iranian governmental life in the late Eighties and beyond. Oil money poured into new and reinvigorated institutes and university departments. Chief among these were those entities which dealt with nuclear research and development as well as key support systems of nuclear weapons including but not limited to ballistic and guided missiles.
The Iranians deserve great credit for accomplishing much over the next two decades. In both nuclear and missile development, they were very much on their own. Only South Africa was as internationally isolated during its nuclear development period--and even then the Pretoria regime received some assistance from Israel including supplies of tritium necessary for boosted fission as well as fusion bombs. Other than some early model centrifuges from A.Q Khan's ring in Pakistan, the Iranians pulled themselves up by their own fission bootstraps.
The monolithic Western governmental opposition linked with the earlier conviction that only a nuclear capacity would assure Iranian survival in a future war to enhance greatly the firm belief that the possession of nuclear weapons was an existential matter. The existential foundation of the nuclear option was reinforced by Tehran's observation of how the US treated the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. The Islamabad Bad Boys were handled with gentility and respect by Washington for one simple reason--Pakistan had the bomb.
This meant that should Iran match Pakistan's accomplishment, the result would be elevated status on both the global and regional stages. Not only would the "Mahdi Bomb" assure Iran's survival as an Islamic theocracy, it would propel the country to the status of regional hegemon and global actor of real potency. These were two very fine reasons to bear heavy burdens and make great sacrifices for the years it would take to develop a credible nuclear capacity.
There is no doubt but the many sanctions regimes imposed, particularly those of recent origin focusing on shipping and insurance, have place very heavy loads on the Iranian economy. There is no doubt but the sanctions taken in total have forced the Iranian government and people to make sacrifices over and above those required by the inefficient and repressive nature of the government.
Most importantly, there is no reason to conclude that the sanctions and diplomatic pressures have modified Iranian behavior--other than to make the mullahs and their frontmen more intransigent, more creative in sanction evasion, and more committed to acquiring the bomb no matter what the price.
Not to put too fine a point on the matter, in the battle of political wills between the US led West and Iran, it is the latter which is winning. In this context, the Iranians have introduced a form of game changer--a new generation of improved centrifuges which will reduce greatly the time needed to turn twenty percent enriched uranium into weapons grade stuff. Further, they have acted in a prudential manner, placing the new fast-spinners in deep dug bunkers.
Now ninety plus senators have urged the immediate introduction of a game changer from the American perspective. In a letter to the president, this overwhelming majority of the senate have demanded the imposition of sanctions against the Iranian central bank, the bank created some fifty years ago to act as the interface between the consumers of Iranian oil and the Tehran government. This move, described as the "nuclear option," would, if enforced, prevent the clearing of payments to Iran from all purchasers of oil.
For its part, the government of Iran has stated this move would constitute "an act of war."
While not being an armed action, the isolation of the Iranian Bank Markazi would be the equivalent in effect of the US freezing of all Japanese assets in the summer of 1941. That action, the culmination of a long campaign of escalating economic pressures, prevented Japan from acquiring oil and other strategic materials from the US. This gave the government of Imperial Japan the choice of a humiliating surrender to American political dictates or war.
As you know, the Japanese chose the second alternative. The decision makers believed that the fortunes of war might favor Japan given other constraints operating on the US including the ongoing Great Depression and a preoccupation with Nazi Germany.
It would not be irrational for Tehran to make the same choice today or into the near future. The US is in the throes of a severe economic challenge including possibly the second of a double dip recession. It is still engaged in an unpopular and seemingly inconclusive war in Afghanistan. The current administration is perceived as both irresolute and feckless.
The senators hint at the possibility of legislation compelling the imposition of the ultimate sanction should the president decide not to use the authority he already has to make the move. This make the challenge both direct and definitely non-trivial. As the choice is both clear and stark, it will be difficult for Mr Obama to "lead from behind" or equivocate. And, it is debatable whether or not he has the political capital necessary to stare the senators down.
Were the Iranians to choose war, now is the least-worst time for us to fight it. Looking ahead, there is no doubt but the American military will be significantly weaker a year or two hence. The budget battles assure the Pentagon will take a heavy hit. In this context is is important to recall that people close to the Oval have intimated the president would be happy to see the military budget at or below fifteen percent of total expenditures. This would be a funding level not seen since the years immediately preceding Pearl Harbor.
We forget how unready the US was for World War II. We forget how difficult it was to mobilize our industrial resources and manpower for that war. Perhaps most important, we overlook the fact that playing the sort of catch-up now that we did so well seventy years ago is quite impossible. It is no longer feasible or even possible to undertake the kind of forced draft military build-up today which we did between 1941 and 1944. The radical changes in military technology have been responsible for this ground truth as they are for the companion reality that a draftee based armed force is not possible.
Right now or in the next few months, the US is quite capable of decisively defeating Iran should the latter be so ill-advised as to treat our imposition of the "nuclear option" as a literal act of war. Further, it is a war which would be widely supported by We the People--provided only that it was fought as a retaliatory and punitive action without any follow-on occupation and rebuilding of the place.
President Obama is long overdue in making a defecate or get off the pot decision about Iran and its search for the bomb. We have played the escalating sanction game long enough and have had more than sufficient opportunity to have observed the counterproductive results. Diplomacy of the talk sort has also run its course without beneficial results.
The senatorial letter is forcing a final decision. Either we have to admit that we can live and the world can live with a nuclear capable Iran and all that implies or we have to take the final, decisive act. The president would be best off acting on his current authority so he will look as if he were actually a "decider guy" as George W. used to put it. Better to look as if you are acting of your own volition than to be seen as being frog marched by the senate.
Should Iran respond with war-like acts either directly or through surrogates, by overt military actions or through terrorism, let it be. As George W. memorably put the matter, "Bring it on!"
Th net result has been the continued and accelerating Iranian quest for the bomb.
Years ago, the notion of Iranian science or work in advanced technology would have been seen quite properly as an oxymoron. During the early days of the Iranian Islamic Revolution, science and technology were downgraded severely as a matter of theologically predicated policy. It was only years later, years marked by the stalemated bloodletting of the Iran-Iraq War, that the mullahs and ayatollahs changed their religious tune. Only after the near defeat at the hands of the technologically superior Iraq convinced the Supreme Guardian of the Revolution that the deity did, after all, will Iran to have sufficient and sufficiently advanced weapons to protect the revolution.
Science and technology came back to the front and center of Iranian governmental life in the late Eighties and beyond. Oil money poured into new and reinvigorated institutes and university departments. Chief among these were those entities which dealt with nuclear research and development as well as key support systems of nuclear weapons including but not limited to ballistic and guided missiles.
The Iranians deserve great credit for accomplishing much over the next two decades. In both nuclear and missile development, they were very much on their own. Only South Africa was as internationally isolated during its nuclear development period--and even then the Pretoria regime received some assistance from Israel including supplies of tritium necessary for boosted fission as well as fusion bombs. Other than some early model centrifuges from A.Q Khan's ring in Pakistan, the Iranians pulled themselves up by their own fission bootstraps.
The monolithic Western governmental opposition linked with the earlier conviction that only a nuclear capacity would assure Iranian survival in a future war to enhance greatly the firm belief that the possession of nuclear weapons was an existential matter. The existential foundation of the nuclear option was reinforced by Tehran's observation of how the US treated the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. The Islamabad Bad Boys were handled with gentility and respect by Washington for one simple reason--Pakistan had the bomb.
This meant that should Iran match Pakistan's accomplishment, the result would be elevated status on both the global and regional stages. Not only would the "Mahdi Bomb" assure Iran's survival as an Islamic theocracy, it would propel the country to the status of regional hegemon and global actor of real potency. These were two very fine reasons to bear heavy burdens and make great sacrifices for the years it would take to develop a credible nuclear capacity.
There is no doubt but the many sanctions regimes imposed, particularly those of recent origin focusing on shipping and insurance, have place very heavy loads on the Iranian economy. There is no doubt but the sanctions taken in total have forced the Iranian government and people to make sacrifices over and above those required by the inefficient and repressive nature of the government.
Most importantly, there is no reason to conclude that the sanctions and diplomatic pressures have modified Iranian behavior--other than to make the mullahs and their frontmen more intransigent, more creative in sanction evasion, and more committed to acquiring the bomb no matter what the price.
Not to put too fine a point on the matter, in the battle of political wills between the US led West and Iran, it is the latter which is winning. In this context, the Iranians have introduced a form of game changer--a new generation of improved centrifuges which will reduce greatly the time needed to turn twenty percent enriched uranium into weapons grade stuff. Further, they have acted in a prudential manner, placing the new fast-spinners in deep dug bunkers.
Now ninety plus senators have urged the immediate introduction of a game changer from the American perspective. In a letter to the president, this overwhelming majority of the senate have demanded the imposition of sanctions against the Iranian central bank, the bank created some fifty years ago to act as the interface between the consumers of Iranian oil and the Tehran government. This move, described as the "nuclear option," would, if enforced, prevent the clearing of payments to Iran from all purchasers of oil.
For its part, the government of Iran has stated this move would constitute "an act of war."
While not being an armed action, the isolation of the Iranian Bank Markazi would be the equivalent in effect of the US freezing of all Japanese assets in the summer of 1941. That action, the culmination of a long campaign of escalating economic pressures, prevented Japan from acquiring oil and other strategic materials from the US. This gave the government of Imperial Japan the choice of a humiliating surrender to American political dictates or war.
As you know, the Japanese chose the second alternative. The decision makers believed that the fortunes of war might favor Japan given other constraints operating on the US including the ongoing Great Depression and a preoccupation with Nazi Germany.
It would not be irrational for Tehran to make the same choice today or into the near future. The US is in the throes of a severe economic challenge including possibly the second of a double dip recession. It is still engaged in an unpopular and seemingly inconclusive war in Afghanistan. The current administration is perceived as both irresolute and feckless.
The senators hint at the possibility of legislation compelling the imposition of the ultimate sanction should the president decide not to use the authority he already has to make the move. This make the challenge both direct and definitely non-trivial. As the choice is both clear and stark, it will be difficult for Mr Obama to "lead from behind" or equivocate. And, it is debatable whether or not he has the political capital necessary to stare the senators down.
Were the Iranians to choose war, now is the least-worst time for us to fight it. Looking ahead, there is no doubt but the American military will be significantly weaker a year or two hence. The budget battles assure the Pentagon will take a heavy hit. In this context is is important to recall that people close to the Oval have intimated the president would be happy to see the military budget at or below fifteen percent of total expenditures. This would be a funding level not seen since the years immediately preceding Pearl Harbor.
We forget how unready the US was for World War II. We forget how difficult it was to mobilize our industrial resources and manpower for that war. Perhaps most important, we overlook the fact that playing the sort of catch-up now that we did so well seventy years ago is quite impossible. It is no longer feasible or even possible to undertake the kind of forced draft military build-up today which we did between 1941 and 1944. The radical changes in military technology have been responsible for this ground truth as they are for the companion reality that a draftee based armed force is not possible.
Right now or in the next few months, the US is quite capable of decisively defeating Iran should the latter be so ill-advised as to treat our imposition of the "nuclear option" as a literal act of war. Further, it is a war which would be widely supported by We the People--provided only that it was fought as a retaliatory and punitive action without any follow-on occupation and rebuilding of the place.
President Obama is long overdue in making a defecate or get off the pot decision about Iran and its search for the bomb. We have played the escalating sanction game long enough and have had more than sufficient opportunity to have observed the counterproductive results. Diplomacy of the talk sort has also run its course without beneficial results.
The senatorial letter is forcing a final decision. Either we have to admit that we can live and the world can live with a nuclear capable Iran and all that implies or we have to take the final, decisive act. The president would be best off acting on his current authority so he will look as if he were actually a "decider guy" as George W. used to put it. Better to look as if you are acting of your own volition than to be seen as being frog marched by the senate.
Should Iran respond with war-like acts either directly or through surrogates, by overt military actions or through terrorism, let it be. As George W. memorably put the matter, "Bring it on!"
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
The Otherworldly Realism of T-Paw
Former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty is stuck in the second tier of Republican hopefuls despite a strenuous effort to break to daylight. He has already taken a definite stand on matters economic with strong support from the media and no palpable result in the public polling. Now he is trying to do the same in the area of foreign affairs, putting distance between himself and the neo-isolationists of the GOP on the one hand and the neocons of the George W. Bush days on the other.
T-paw's essay in self-definition came yesterday n a speech delivered to the Council on Foreign Relations. While represented as a tour of the horizon, the candidate focused on the Mideast, Israel, and Obama's failures of policy in the region.
There is little doubt but the Obama approach to affairs in the Mideast specifically and the world generally have been marked by far more failure than success. The primary reason for this is to be found in the world view of the Nice Young Man From Chicago with its blame-America-first core. Being a perfect academic, Mr Obama is given to avoiding action in favor of words whenever possible. Then as a matter of personality, the Clueless Guy in the Oval resembles a Pearson's Puppeteer.
(For those of you who do not read science fiction, the Pearson Puppeteer was an alien species created by the fertile mind of Larry Niven. The species is characterized by a degree of caution which surpasses the merely cowardly. The "leader" of the Puppeteers is called the Hindmost--which rather resembles in concept the idea of "leading from behind" offered recently by a member of the administration in admiring tribute to Obama's presumed statesmanship in the Libyan Affair.)
The characterization of Mr Obama's approach(es) to the "Arab Spring" and the Israeli-Palestinian Question offered by Governor Pawlenty are unexceptional. So also is his emphasis on the importance of Israel to US national interests.
Where T-paw misses the cliched bus is in his fervently expressed belief in the ability of the US to act effectively in the creation of freedom and democracy in the Mideast in the wake of the recent and ongoing tumult. He is of the view that authentic democracy, genuine freedom, real Western style government with full fledged protections of minorities including women and non-Muslims can be created and maintained over time with the assistance and support of the US.
It would be very nice if the Pawlenty vision was accurate. It is not. Whether dealing with the environment of post-authoritarian Egypt or Tunisia, or contemplating how "reforms" might be facilitated by American efforts in kingdoms such as Jordan, Morocco or, most importantly of all, Saudi Arabia, Mr Pawlenty discounts the force and universality of Islam, particularly the form of Islam embraced and promoted by Salifists and Wahhibists.
The well-meaning Pawlenty (or his advisers and speechwriters) ignore the fundamental realities of Islamic thought which focus upon the deity as the source of all legitimate law. Also overlooked is the oft-repeated meme that neither democracy nor liberty as understood in the West is compatible with the dictates of the deity contained in the sacred literature as interpreted by generations of scholars of Islamic jurisprudence. The Pawlenty stance also overlooks the fundamental orientation of Islam on the duties of the believer. Not to put an inaccurately fine point on the matter, Islam elevates duty, duty to the deity over any and all personal rights. In short there is no concept of individual rights which equates in any way with the prevalent definitions of rights and responsibilities in the US or the West generally.
The failure to comprehend accurately the impact of faith and its all-inclusive nature constitutes the rock on which Mr Pawlenty's ideas of constructive engagement with the new forces of the Arab states must founder. While the people oriented toward secular concerns and world view dominated and continue to dominate the media coverage of events in the Arab states, these folk are a minority, even an endangered species. Many of the more secular minded are quite aware of this aspect of the post-authoritarian dynamic as is seen with the repeated calls in Egypt for a delay in the elections so as to allow the secularists to organize well enough to take on the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist political groups.
Mr Pawlenty's call for the next president to motivate the Saudi royal house to take the path of reform is also quite otherworldly. The House of Saud exists today because of the bargain made generations ago to link its fortunes with those of the Wahhibists. There is no way on this Earth that the austere world view of Wahhibism would continence let alone participate in any sort of reform such as mentioned by T-paw. There is no chance that the Wahhibist theology is about to go along with extending any rights to non-Muslims or see the error of Mohammad's ways regarding the status of women.
In his remarks Mr Pawlenty warns against the elections which produce results antithetical to genuine democracy, authentic freedom. He may have had Iran in mind when he said this as there is no better example of a people committing political suicide at the ballot box than that. It will take far more than support for the "reform" movement of 2009 for the verdict of self-destruction by vote to be reversed. The Iranians willingly and to the later regret of some surrendered all vestiges of political autonomy to the dictates of theology. The same may happen in at least some of the Arab states celebrated as having sounded the tocsin of freedom by Mr Pawlenty.
A central point made by the presidential aspirant deserved more emphasis. The reality of political Islam, particularly violent political Islam will be with us for many, many years to come. As long as that reality existss the US will be the major target of its hate and violence. This status will not be removed even if the US were to unilaterally withdraw from every last member state of the Organization of the Islamic Conference--or even if the US were to vote for the dissolution of Israel.
The necessary conclusion is the US must not retreat to some sort of Fortress America. Surrender to violent political Islam is not an option simply because surrender will not work. It will not immunize the US against future attacks, future terror, future war. Nothing short of every last American--all 312 million of us--facing east and banging our foreheads on the floor would grant immunity from the hatred of the groups dedicated to violent political Islam.
The US may have, as Mr Pawlenty suggested, one political party which argues for American decline, withdrawal, disengagement and isolation. He thinks that there is no need for a second. He is right. He would have been even more on target had he said that one such party is one too many.
T-paw's essay in self-definition came yesterday n a speech delivered to the Council on Foreign Relations. While represented as a tour of the horizon, the candidate focused on the Mideast, Israel, and Obama's failures of policy in the region.
There is little doubt but the Obama approach to affairs in the Mideast specifically and the world generally have been marked by far more failure than success. The primary reason for this is to be found in the world view of the Nice Young Man From Chicago with its blame-America-first core. Being a perfect academic, Mr Obama is given to avoiding action in favor of words whenever possible. Then as a matter of personality, the Clueless Guy in the Oval resembles a Pearson's Puppeteer.
(For those of you who do not read science fiction, the Pearson Puppeteer was an alien species created by the fertile mind of Larry Niven. The species is characterized by a degree of caution which surpasses the merely cowardly. The "leader" of the Puppeteers is called the Hindmost--which rather resembles in concept the idea of "leading from behind" offered recently by a member of the administration in admiring tribute to Obama's presumed statesmanship in the Libyan Affair.)
The characterization of Mr Obama's approach(es) to the "Arab Spring" and the Israeli-Palestinian Question offered by Governor Pawlenty are unexceptional. So also is his emphasis on the importance of Israel to US national interests.
Where T-paw misses the cliched bus is in his fervently expressed belief in the ability of the US to act effectively in the creation of freedom and democracy in the Mideast in the wake of the recent and ongoing tumult. He is of the view that authentic democracy, genuine freedom, real Western style government with full fledged protections of minorities including women and non-Muslims can be created and maintained over time with the assistance and support of the US.
It would be very nice if the Pawlenty vision was accurate. It is not. Whether dealing with the environment of post-authoritarian Egypt or Tunisia, or contemplating how "reforms" might be facilitated by American efforts in kingdoms such as Jordan, Morocco or, most importantly of all, Saudi Arabia, Mr Pawlenty discounts the force and universality of Islam, particularly the form of Islam embraced and promoted by Salifists and Wahhibists.
The well-meaning Pawlenty (or his advisers and speechwriters) ignore the fundamental realities of Islamic thought which focus upon the deity as the source of all legitimate law. Also overlooked is the oft-repeated meme that neither democracy nor liberty as understood in the West is compatible with the dictates of the deity contained in the sacred literature as interpreted by generations of scholars of Islamic jurisprudence. The Pawlenty stance also overlooks the fundamental orientation of Islam on the duties of the believer. Not to put an inaccurately fine point on the matter, Islam elevates duty, duty to the deity over any and all personal rights. In short there is no concept of individual rights which equates in any way with the prevalent definitions of rights and responsibilities in the US or the West generally.
The failure to comprehend accurately the impact of faith and its all-inclusive nature constitutes the rock on which Mr Pawlenty's ideas of constructive engagement with the new forces of the Arab states must founder. While the people oriented toward secular concerns and world view dominated and continue to dominate the media coverage of events in the Arab states, these folk are a minority, even an endangered species. Many of the more secular minded are quite aware of this aspect of the post-authoritarian dynamic as is seen with the repeated calls in Egypt for a delay in the elections so as to allow the secularists to organize well enough to take on the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist political groups.
Mr Pawlenty's call for the next president to motivate the Saudi royal house to take the path of reform is also quite otherworldly. The House of Saud exists today because of the bargain made generations ago to link its fortunes with those of the Wahhibists. There is no way on this Earth that the austere world view of Wahhibism would continence let alone participate in any sort of reform such as mentioned by T-paw. There is no chance that the Wahhibist theology is about to go along with extending any rights to non-Muslims or see the error of Mohammad's ways regarding the status of women.
In his remarks Mr Pawlenty warns against the elections which produce results antithetical to genuine democracy, authentic freedom. He may have had Iran in mind when he said this as there is no better example of a people committing political suicide at the ballot box than that. It will take far more than support for the "reform" movement of 2009 for the verdict of self-destruction by vote to be reversed. The Iranians willingly and to the later regret of some surrendered all vestiges of political autonomy to the dictates of theology. The same may happen in at least some of the Arab states celebrated as having sounded the tocsin of freedom by Mr Pawlenty.
A central point made by the presidential aspirant deserved more emphasis. The reality of political Islam, particularly violent political Islam will be with us for many, many years to come. As long as that reality existss the US will be the major target of its hate and violence. This status will not be removed even if the US were to unilaterally withdraw from every last member state of the Organization of the Islamic Conference--or even if the US were to vote for the dissolution of Israel.
The necessary conclusion is the US must not retreat to some sort of Fortress America. Surrender to violent political Islam is not an option simply because surrender will not work. It will not immunize the US against future attacks, future terror, future war. Nothing short of every last American--all 312 million of us--facing east and banging our foreheads on the floor would grant immunity from the hatred of the groups dedicated to violent political Islam.
The US may have, as Mr Pawlenty suggested, one political party which argues for American decline, withdrawal, disengagement and isolation. He thinks that there is no need for a second. He is right. He would have been even more on target had he said that one such party is one too many.
Friday, June 24, 2011
Down With The Nation-State!
The end of the cold war was marked by more than merely the collapse of the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact "empire." The unfreezing of the bipolar icecap which had put a heavy and quite repressive hand on global politics as well as the internal politics of the component parts of the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact subordinates started a series of escalating attacks upon the nation-state generally. After centuries of unquestioned dominance as the basic unit of international relations, the seemingly eternal nation-state was under threat on two fronts.
One axis of attack was both predictable and fully expected by observers of global affairs: the internationalists, particularly those of the Western European and American elite. Some sang the praises of supra-national organizations both regional and global. Others gave one shout-out after another on behalf of transnational business entities. Both groups damned the narrow, parochial focus of the nation-state with its preoccupation concerning national and strategic interests.
With far more joy than sorrow, infinitely greater anticipation than regret, members of the several elites drawn from both the Left and the Right consigned the nation-state to the status of museum curio while anticipating that the new age of globalization and supra-national organizations would mean a better future for all people everywhere. Abandoning the nation-state for new, bigger, better forms of organization would, it was repeated, usher in a world of peace and plenty, of prosperity and environmental purity.
Slightly less than ten years ago, the presumably unilateral George W. Bush did his not inconsiderable bit to further the cause of the supra-nationalist camp. Far from being a robust adherent of the go-it-alone school of international relations, George W. Bush showed himself to be squarely in the middle of the American version of multilateralism.
It would have been politically and diplomatically possible, arguably even preferable, to have declined the offer of assistance given by NATO in the wake of 9/11 and dealt with Afghanistan, Taliban, and al-Qaeda with purely American means. The later seeking of a UN figleaf to cover the policy genitalia of the Bush/Cheney administration with respect to regime change in Iraq did the US no useful service while holding the American effort ultimately hostage to the views, policies, and politics of other countries.
By seeking the support and agreement of supra-national organizations, the Bush/Cheney administration stood solidly in the diplomatic tradition of Harry Truman and LBJ far more than in the footsteps of his father who relied on a US constructed ad hoc coalition when he went to war a decade earlier. By so doing, the allegedly unilateralist George W. acted to lessen the future freedom of the US to act as a fully sovereign nation-state.
George W. Bush shared the common view of the American and Western European elites that the nation-state should be lessened in the exercise of untrammeled sovereignty. Regardless of his sometimes less than temperate rhetoric, this President Bush had a faith in the ability of supra-national institutions to restrain the nation-state from pursuing its national interest regardless of the costs imposed on others. He was also a deep believer in the capacity of transnational business to increase stability and real wealth. In essence, he stood on the Right but leaned to the Left.
Over the past decade the view of the nation-state as being an obstacle to creating solutions to global problems has grown greatly. Whether the problem at hand is one of keeping the peace, protecting the environment, creating greater economic stability, assuring access to food and clean water, providing employment and fairly distributing wealth, or assuring human rights, the default position has been to seek the proper supra-national organization, public, or private.
During the past decade, the UN has constantly sought to extend its reach. Along with its subordinate agencies, the UN has looked for ways by which it can intervene in the domestic affairs of member states. There have always been good intentions in play: protecting refugees, protecting civilians against repressive acts by their governments, assuring human rights. Typified by the convention based on the doctrine termed "responsibility to protect," the UN's reach has far extended beyond its practical grasp.
In the years since the end of the cold war, there has been a proliferation of defensive insurgencies by ethnic and religious communities chaffing under the governance of majorities coming from different groups or beliefs. What has been observed ever since the blood letting in the wreckage of the artificial nation-state once called "Yugoslavia" has been a real world application of the self-determination of nations, a doctrine first given form by Woodrow Wilson nearly a century ago.
From Kosovo to the Northern Caucasus to Darfur and South Sudan, defensive insurgencies (aka separatist movements) have resulted not only in massive loss of life and even more massive refugee streams but military interventions or the calls for such interventions. In all cases the calls have been directed to and answered by supra-national organizations ranging from the UN to NATO to the African Union. There is no indication that the trajectory of defensive insurgency has reached its apogee yet. This means there will be more demands for more international intervention in the future.
In recent months, offensive insurgencies (revolutions) have joined with the defensive sort as a very popular pastime. This has resulted in one more outpouring of demands for outside intervention by the "international community." The demand has been answered in Libya by a combination of three supra-national organizations, the Arab League, the UN and NATO. Similar demands with regard to Bahrain, Yemen, and Syria have yet gone unanswered.
The single greatest reason the latter three states have been given a "pass" and left unmolested by missiles and bombs delivered by aircraft operated by governments responsive to the doctrine of R2P is the existence of two countries which do not share the negative view of the nation-state so prevalent in the West. These two countries are Russia and China. Neither accept the proposition that the nation-state is either evil or obsolete (or both.) Neither go along with the belief that countries have the right to intervene in the internal affairs of another if given the OK by the UN or some other supra-national organization.
But all the foot dragging on well-intended, forceful interventions is not confined to the Boys in the Kremlin or the Trolls of Beijing. Nor are the Boys and the Trolls the only people who reject the negative view of the nation-state. In a delightful irony the views put forth in the Kremlin and the Forbidden City are shared by the common folk, the hoi polloi in both the US and the countries of Western Europe. Blinded by an arrogant certainty in the correctness of their own multilateral, multinational, multicultural beliefs, the political, media, and academic elites of the US and Western Europe do not understand that their view of the nation-state is rejected completely by their own fellow citizens.
As recent elections in Europe have shown, there is a strong rejectionist current running among the European citizenry. "Populist" right wing parties have done very very well at the polls in large part due to their rejection of the primacy of supra-national organizations. While not yet tested in an election in the US, there are strong hints that We the People are not ready to embrace the notion that American sovereignty should be ceded in part to supra-national organizations.
The number of challenges to the nation-state by defensive insurgencies will probably continue to grow in the nest few years. It is also to be expected that there will be an ever increasing call for international intervention not only in the case of defensive insurgencies but also under the doctrine of R2P. At least some of these demands will be answered by one supra-national organization or another. Even if the UN Security Council does not heed the call due to the ever present Russian or Chinese veto, some other entity will pick up the slack.
Even in the event no structured supra-national organization does take responsibility to intervene, one or another of the oft maligned and purportedly obsolete nation-states will do so--if its interests require. From this it is legitimate to infer that the number of nasty little wars of peace imposition will grow in the years to come. Practically speaking this means the number of asymmetric wars will grow apace.
Against the backdrop of asymmetrical wars it becomes conceivable, even desirable, for states to use proxy conflicts as an instrument of policy. This will go beyond the past practice of governments such as the Syrian to use terrorist groups as instruments of state policy.
Not too pretty a scene to contemplate, eh, bucko? Makes you wish for the good old days of the cold war when affairs might have been risky, but the world was remarkably stable. Looking ahead, the only thing which gives grounds for thanks is that the elites have been wrong. Tomorrow more than ever it will be the self-interested nation-state which serves as the bulwark against raging instability and war.
In a world full of candidates for devolution, the only genuine force for stability, peace, and some semblance of prosperity is the self-centered nation-state. It and not the supra-national organization is and remains the last, best hope of human kind.
It is time the elites and their iconic figures such as President Obama and Secretary Clinton get a grip on that defining reality. Otherwise, their delusions of a UN inspired heaven on Earth will be the death of us all.
One axis of attack was both predictable and fully expected by observers of global affairs: the internationalists, particularly those of the Western European and American elite. Some sang the praises of supra-national organizations both regional and global. Others gave one shout-out after another on behalf of transnational business entities. Both groups damned the narrow, parochial focus of the nation-state with its preoccupation concerning national and strategic interests.
With far more joy than sorrow, infinitely greater anticipation than regret, members of the several elites drawn from both the Left and the Right consigned the nation-state to the status of museum curio while anticipating that the new age of globalization and supra-national organizations would mean a better future for all people everywhere. Abandoning the nation-state for new, bigger, better forms of organization would, it was repeated, usher in a world of peace and plenty, of prosperity and environmental purity.
Slightly less than ten years ago, the presumably unilateral George W. Bush did his not inconsiderable bit to further the cause of the supra-nationalist camp. Far from being a robust adherent of the go-it-alone school of international relations, George W. Bush showed himself to be squarely in the middle of the American version of multilateralism.
It would have been politically and diplomatically possible, arguably even preferable, to have declined the offer of assistance given by NATO in the wake of 9/11 and dealt with Afghanistan, Taliban, and al-Qaeda with purely American means. The later seeking of a UN figleaf to cover the policy genitalia of the Bush/Cheney administration with respect to regime change in Iraq did the US no useful service while holding the American effort ultimately hostage to the views, policies, and politics of other countries.
By seeking the support and agreement of supra-national organizations, the Bush/Cheney administration stood solidly in the diplomatic tradition of Harry Truman and LBJ far more than in the footsteps of his father who relied on a US constructed ad hoc coalition when he went to war a decade earlier. By so doing, the allegedly unilateralist George W. acted to lessen the future freedom of the US to act as a fully sovereign nation-state.
George W. Bush shared the common view of the American and Western European elites that the nation-state should be lessened in the exercise of untrammeled sovereignty. Regardless of his sometimes less than temperate rhetoric, this President Bush had a faith in the ability of supra-national institutions to restrain the nation-state from pursuing its national interest regardless of the costs imposed on others. He was also a deep believer in the capacity of transnational business to increase stability and real wealth. In essence, he stood on the Right but leaned to the Left.
Over the past decade the view of the nation-state as being an obstacle to creating solutions to global problems has grown greatly. Whether the problem at hand is one of keeping the peace, protecting the environment, creating greater economic stability, assuring access to food and clean water, providing employment and fairly distributing wealth, or assuring human rights, the default position has been to seek the proper supra-national organization, public, or private.
During the past decade, the UN has constantly sought to extend its reach. Along with its subordinate agencies, the UN has looked for ways by which it can intervene in the domestic affairs of member states. There have always been good intentions in play: protecting refugees, protecting civilians against repressive acts by their governments, assuring human rights. Typified by the convention based on the doctrine termed "responsibility to protect," the UN's reach has far extended beyond its practical grasp.
In the years since the end of the cold war, there has been a proliferation of defensive insurgencies by ethnic and religious communities chaffing under the governance of majorities coming from different groups or beliefs. What has been observed ever since the blood letting in the wreckage of the artificial nation-state once called "Yugoslavia" has been a real world application of the self-determination of nations, a doctrine first given form by Woodrow Wilson nearly a century ago.
From Kosovo to the Northern Caucasus to Darfur and South Sudan, defensive insurgencies (aka separatist movements) have resulted not only in massive loss of life and even more massive refugee streams but military interventions or the calls for such interventions. In all cases the calls have been directed to and answered by supra-national organizations ranging from the UN to NATO to the African Union. There is no indication that the trajectory of defensive insurgency has reached its apogee yet. This means there will be more demands for more international intervention in the future.
In recent months, offensive insurgencies (revolutions) have joined with the defensive sort as a very popular pastime. This has resulted in one more outpouring of demands for outside intervention by the "international community." The demand has been answered in Libya by a combination of three supra-national organizations, the Arab League, the UN and NATO. Similar demands with regard to Bahrain, Yemen, and Syria have yet gone unanswered.
The single greatest reason the latter three states have been given a "pass" and left unmolested by missiles and bombs delivered by aircraft operated by governments responsive to the doctrine of R2P is the existence of two countries which do not share the negative view of the nation-state so prevalent in the West. These two countries are Russia and China. Neither accept the proposition that the nation-state is either evil or obsolete (or both.) Neither go along with the belief that countries have the right to intervene in the internal affairs of another if given the OK by the UN or some other supra-national organization.
But all the foot dragging on well-intended, forceful interventions is not confined to the Boys in the Kremlin or the Trolls of Beijing. Nor are the Boys and the Trolls the only people who reject the negative view of the nation-state. In a delightful irony the views put forth in the Kremlin and the Forbidden City are shared by the common folk, the hoi polloi in both the US and the countries of Western Europe. Blinded by an arrogant certainty in the correctness of their own multilateral, multinational, multicultural beliefs, the political, media, and academic elites of the US and Western Europe do not understand that their view of the nation-state is rejected completely by their own fellow citizens.
As recent elections in Europe have shown, there is a strong rejectionist current running among the European citizenry. "Populist" right wing parties have done very very well at the polls in large part due to their rejection of the primacy of supra-national organizations. While not yet tested in an election in the US, there are strong hints that We the People are not ready to embrace the notion that American sovereignty should be ceded in part to supra-national organizations.
The number of challenges to the nation-state by defensive insurgencies will probably continue to grow in the nest few years. It is also to be expected that there will be an ever increasing call for international intervention not only in the case of defensive insurgencies but also under the doctrine of R2P. At least some of these demands will be answered by one supra-national organization or another. Even if the UN Security Council does not heed the call due to the ever present Russian or Chinese veto, some other entity will pick up the slack.
Even in the event no structured supra-national organization does take responsibility to intervene, one or another of the oft maligned and purportedly obsolete nation-states will do so--if its interests require. From this it is legitimate to infer that the number of nasty little wars of peace imposition will grow in the years to come. Practically speaking this means the number of asymmetric wars will grow apace.
Against the backdrop of asymmetrical wars it becomes conceivable, even desirable, for states to use proxy conflicts as an instrument of policy. This will go beyond the past practice of governments such as the Syrian to use terrorist groups as instruments of state policy.
Not too pretty a scene to contemplate, eh, bucko? Makes you wish for the good old days of the cold war when affairs might have been risky, but the world was remarkably stable. Looking ahead, the only thing which gives grounds for thanks is that the elites have been wrong. Tomorrow more than ever it will be the self-interested nation-state which serves as the bulwark against raging instability and war.
In a world full of candidates for devolution, the only genuine force for stability, peace, and some semblance of prosperity is the self-centered nation-state. It and not the supra-national organization is and remains the last, best hope of human kind.
It is time the elites and their iconic figures such as President Obama and Secretary Clinton get a grip on that defining reality. Otherwise, their delusions of a UN inspired heaven on Earth will be the death of us all.
Sunday, June 19, 2011
The Decline Of A Regional Troublemaker
Hugo Chavez is recovering in a Havana hospital. He was operated upon for an abscess on his pelvic bone. The operation was a success as is attested to by a photo of the Paratrooper Turned Socialist Revolutionary standing next to his semi-senescent spiritual mentor, Fidel Castro, and the not-quite-drooling Raul. There has been no word as to whether or not the Soviet trained Cuban surgeons operated on Hugo's larger and more deadly abscess, the one located in his brain housing group.
Sr Chavez is probably not in too much of a hurry to get back home to Caracas, a city so deadly as to make Juarez appear as peaceful and tranquil as, say, Geneva, Switzerland. Not only are the bullets flying in greater number than antisemitic slurs in a Cairo mosque on Friday but the economy of Venezuela is heading down the tubes at an ever greater approximation of warp speed. Further, the grand ambitions of the one-time sergeant to be the Mr Grande of South America are resting in ruins, crushed by the always victorious treads of the ultimate panjandrum--reality.
The oil powered, bribe based diplomacy of Sr Chavez has been ended by the declining production of his country's aging and poorly maintained production fields and infrastructure. With the ending of the financial inducements has come the ending of Chavez's influence outside of a handful of ideological kinsmen: Ortega, Morales, Correa, and Cristina Fernandez.
While relations with Columbia have improved, this is no fault of Sr Chavez. The Bolivarian dictator, however, does bear responsibility for the deterioration of relations between Brazil and Venezuela. Even Peru's new president, who was widely seen prior to his election as a natural ally of Chavez, has repented of his enthusiasm for the Bolivarian Socialist Revolution. The meltdown of the Peruvian stock market in the immediate wake of his election convinced Ollanta Humala to recast himself instantly as a fan of former Brazilian president Lula de Silva's pro-business philosophy. (Of course the change may prove to be short-lived, rhetorical, and cosmetic.)
Perhaps, most critically, a recent public opinion poll covering eighteen Latin American countries shows Chavez with the second lowest favorable rating. (In the coveted position of most unfavorably viewed, one finds Fidel.) The most recent poll gives Chavez the lowest rating to date of the twelve years he has been running and ruining Venezuela.
Ruining seems almost too kind a word. Venezuela has an official inflation rate of twenty-three percent. Its government debt is rising at a rate compared to which the record of the Obama administration appears to be one of pronounced fiscal restraint. As if those numbers were not bad enough, unemployment runs at a minimum of fifteen percent--double that among youth aged fifteen to twenty-five.
Then there is electricity. Or, more properly, the lack of electricity. Venezuela is a green energy heaven with very significant hydro capacity. Due to the usual suspects--deferred maintenance and inept management--the country now has rolling blackouts and periodic unannounced and unscheduled power outages. The applied ideology of Chavez and his cronies is solely responsible for this lamentable fact.
The same applies to the flight of capital--both financial and human--from Venezuela to neighboring countries, most commonly Panama. The middle class, the techocrats, the skilled managers, the small to middling men of commerce and business have left Venezuela in ever increasing droves for the past several years. Short of building a Berlin Wall around the country, Chavez and his fellow Bolivarians have no means of stopping the crippling losses of money and talent.
Chavez faces reelection in 2012. Having failed in his repeated attempts to change the constitution so as to allow him to become president-for-life, the Little Man On Horseback must seek another term in office courtesy of the much abused Venezuelan citizenry. Of course, the man may seek to short-circuit the demands of constitution and democratic process alike. He has a paramilitary force not unlike the Iranian Bands of Thugs. He has used this capacity previously to silence dissent and prevent opposition to implementation of his policies, opposition which has come from his own "base" and not the "counterrevolutionary elements." There is no doubt but his running buddy, Ahmedinejad, has counselled this approach.
The redoubtable dictator has renewed his call for a purely Latin American counterpart to the OAS which would exclude the US and Canada. This move can be seen as a centerpiece for a nationalistically focused reelection campaign. Chavez will portray himself as the embattled foe of the American run imperialistic neo-colonialism. He will invoke the specters of globalization and the IMF, multinational corporations and the World Bank, Yanqui imperialism and economic exploitation. All the usual villains will be enlisted to aid Chavez.
The US should pay a bit more attention to South America as Ms Clinton has suggested. However, there should be rational limits to our attempts to cozen our way back to influence in the region. We should not, for example, sacrifice our relations with the UK to flatter Ms Fernandez's grand ambition to gain the Falkland Islands. This still leaves a wide scope for new demarches including a retraction from the Era of Globalization and Privatization lingering on from the time of Bill Clinton.
Retracting from the excesses of globalization along with a new, due regard for the status of the original inhabitants of South America would go a very long way to lowering the appeal of the Bolivarian Revolution and, thus, its emblems such as Hugo Chavez. We might even make him wish to return to the hospitality of Fidel's own hospital.
Sr Chavez is probably not in too much of a hurry to get back home to Caracas, a city so deadly as to make Juarez appear as peaceful and tranquil as, say, Geneva, Switzerland. Not only are the bullets flying in greater number than antisemitic slurs in a Cairo mosque on Friday but the economy of Venezuela is heading down the tubes at an ever greater approximation of warp speed. Further, the grand ambitions of the one-time sergeant to be the Mr Grande of South America are resting in ruins, crushed by the always victorious treads of the ultimate panjandrum--reality.
The oil powered, bribe based diplomacy of Sr Chavez has been ended by the declining production of his country's aging and poorly maintained production fields and infrastructure. With the ending of the financial inducements has come the ending of Chavez's influence outside of a handful of ideological kinsmen: Ortega, Morales, Correa, and Cristina Fernandez.
While relations with Columbia have improved, this is no fault of Sr Chavez. The Bolivarian dictator, however, does bear responsibility for the deterioration of relations between Brazil and Venezuela. Even Peru's new president, who was widely seen prior to his election as a natural ally of Chavez, has repented of his enthusiasm for the Bolivarian Socialist Revolution. The meltdown of the Peruvian stock market in the immediate wake of his election convinced Ollanta Humala to recast himself instantly as a fan of former Brazilian president Lula de Silva's pro-business philosophy. (Of course the change may prove to be short-lived, rhetorical, and cosmetic.)
Perhaps, most critically, a recent public opinion poll covering eighteen Latin American countries shows Chavez with the second lowest favorable rating. (In the coveted position of most unfavorably viewed, one finds Fidel.) The most recent poll gives Chavez the lowest rating to date of the twelve years he has been running and ruining Venezuela.
Ruining seems almost too kind a word. Venezuela has an official inflation rate of twenty-three percent. Its government debt is rising at a rate compared to which the record of the Obama administration appears to be one of pronounced fiscal restraint. As if those numbers were not bad enough, unemployment runs at a minimum of fifteen percent--double that among youth aged fifteen to twenty-five.
Then there is electricity. Or, more properly, the lack of electricity. Venezuela is a green energy heaven with very significant hydro capacity. Due to the usual suspects--deferred maintenance and inept management--the country now has rolling blackouts and periodic unannounced and unscheduled power outages. The applied ideology of Chavez and his cronies is solely responsible for this lamentable fact.
The same applies to the flight of capital--both financial and human--from Venezuela to neighboring countries, most commonly Panama. The middle class, the techocrats, the skilled managers, the small to middling men of commerce and business have left Venezuela in ever increasing droves for the past several years. Short of building a Berlin Wall around the country, Chavez and his fellow Bolivarians have no means of stopping the crippling losses of money and talent.
Chavez faces reelection in 2012. Having failed in his repeated attempts to change the constitution so as to allow him to become president-for-life, the Little Man On Horseback must seek another term in office courtesy of the much abused Venezuelan citizenry. Of course, the man may seek to short-circuit the demands of constitution and democratic process alike. He has a paramilitary force not unlike the Iranian Bands of Thugs. He has used this capacity previously to silence dissent and prevent opposition to implementation of his policies, opposition which has come from his own "base" and not the "counterrevolutionary elements." There is no doubt but his running buddy, Ahmedinejad, has counselled this approach.
The redoubtable dictator has renewed his call for a purely Latin American counterpart to the OAS which would exclude the US and Canada. This move can be seen as a centerpiece for a nationalistically focused reelection campaign. Chavez will portray himself as the embattled foe of the American run imperialistic neo-colonialism. He will invoke the specters of globalization and the IMF, multinational corporations and the World Bank, Yanqui imperialism and economic exploitation. All the usual villains will be enlisted to aid Chavez.
The US should pay a bit more attention to South America as Ms Clinton has suggested. However, there should be rational limits to our attempts to cozen our way back to influence in the region. We should not, for example, sacrifice our relations with the UK to flatter Ms Fernandez's grand ambition to gain the Falkland Islands. This still leaves a wide scope for new demarches including a retraction from the Era of Globalization and Privatization lingering on from the time of Bill Clinton.
Retracting from the excesses of globalization along with a new, due regard for the status of the original inhabitants of South America would go a very long way to lowering the appeal of the Bolivarian Revolution and, thus, its emblems such as Hugo Chavez. We might even make him wish to return to the hospitality of Fidel's own hospital.
Saturday, June 18, 2011
If You Like Pakistan, You'll Love The "Arab Summer"
Now that all the hyperbolic prattling about the wave of democracy rushing tsunami like over the sands of Arabia is fading away, perhaps overpowered by the sounds of exploding NATO delivered ordnance in Libya, it is possible to take a less biased look at the most likely course of events for the long hot Arab "summer" which is looming like the smoke of an Arizona wildfire. While the details of the forthcoming "summer" are obscure, the broad outlines are coming more clear by the day.
It is not inaccurate to posit Pakistan as the paradigm soon to apply to the countries of North Africa and the Mideast which were convulsed to a greater or lesser extent by the pseudo-revolutions of recent months. This means that there will be a contest for political supremacy pitting the interests of a microscopic economic and political elite against the rising expectations of the marginalized majority egged on by increasingly extremest members of the Muslim clerical establishment. It means the ultimate arbiter of authority will be the armed forces of those states which already possess a large, well organized, well equipped military. Finally, there will be an overlay of regional and tribal loyalties which can serve as effective king-makers.
In the North African states, most notably Morocco, Tunisia, and Egypt, the trappings and forms of democracy will be followed. This process will not apply to Libya unless and until Gaddafi is removed--and the date for this event is impossible to predict beyond saying there is no reason for optimism. Democratic processes are less important in Mideast centers of protest: Syria, Bahrain, and Yemen. But even in these states there will be eventual genuflections before this prime totem of Western affections.
Despite the observance of democratic forms, the substance of representative democracy will be conspicuous by its absence. There is a simple reason for this prediction. Democracy per se is irrelevant to the majority of those who sought the overthrow the established regimes while the exercise of actual democracy is not in the interests of the major contestants for power: the elite and the adherents of political Islam. Insofar as either contestant favors the appearance of democratic processes, it is only to ensure that some middle ground movement comes to power in order to assure that the inevitable failure to bring prosperity to the many will be blamed on the scapegoat so as to allow the real contest to be waged and won.
Western governments and elites would be best advised to discount any and all blather about democracy in action completely. At best elections and the other accoutrement of vox populi is a charade. At worst it will be a mechanism for hijacking power. Elections, after all, sanctified not only the coming to power of the Nazis in 1933 but assured the creation of the statist theocracy in Iran in 1979. To look at the paradigm of Pakistan, elections matter not, for regardless of what party or individuals win at the polls, the army still runs the show.
The army will run the show as well in Egypt or Tunisia or anywhere else that sees the old regime involuntarily retired. As in Pakistan--and Turkey before--the army is the final custodian of nationhood. It is the ultimate guarantor of internal tranquility as it is the defender of the state's borders. Whether openly or from the shadows of the barracks, the army will do the same in the forthcoming governments of North Africa and the Mideast. No government will be allowed to act in a way which is not approved in advance by the armed forces. At the same time, the armed forces will have both the will and ability to direct the government to undertake specified actions or policies.
The limitations which can be imposed by the military are understood by even the most ardent supporter of political Islam. The Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt has implicitly acknowledged this in various fora. This recognition along with the strategic consideration of assuring Islam and Islamists are not tarred with the brush of economic policy failure is behind the MG's entering into coalition agreements with a secular party.
Taking a longer term view, the primacy of the armed forces will be countered by the adherents of political Islam through a program of education and indoctrination. This path has been blazed by the Pakistanis for the past thirty years with the result that the percentage of adherents of political Islam including that of the violent sort is higher among armed forces personnel, including company and field grade officers, than among the population as a whole. Given both the Pakistani paradigm and the power of current social and economic pressures abroad in the several "Arab Spring" countries, there is no reason to believe that the lengthy time period need be followed.
The armed forces of Egypt and Tunisia are well aware of the limits which the West will apply to the foreign and military policies of their states. They also understand the tools available to the West and the effectiveness of these tools. There will be no false bravado operating as there has been with Pakistan. The states of the "Arab Spring" have learned from Pakistan's mistakes as they have from Islamabad's successes.
The backlash against the super-wealthy currently underway in Egypt will slow and halt. The fact is the country, all the "Arab Spring" countries, need these hated rich folk. Even if it is true that one hundred percent of the wealthy became so as the result of the old regime's corruption, the wealth and skills of the rich business types are needed greatly for the country as a whole. The narrow elite will be constricted and placed on the defensive, but it will not be erased. As it will continue to exist, so also will it continue to seek and retain power.
The economically marginal will remain so regardless of the government and its promises. This reality will be exploited by the most extreme elements within the political Islamists. Practically, the results will be a co-option to the "left" which will be expressed primarily in foreign policy. Terror attacks against the "Zionist entity" will increase as will strident diplomatic and propaganda support for the deligitimatization campaign. Anti-Americanism will also ramp up markedly. The armed forces will try to keep the level of attacks below the threshold triggering a robust Israeli response but will fail ultimately.
The evermore vituperative attacks on the US provided these are not matched with terrorist operations, will motivate the American people and its representatives to disengage from the region pleading financial exigencies. This disengagement will exclude Israel. The result will be the worst of all possible worlds for the US--diminished influence with the governments of the "Arab Summer" while making the commitment to Israel more and more of the "blank check" variety.
With the high probability of Yemen becoming a collapsed state, the US will become more and more involved with the assorted tribes on the ground as a mechanism of self-defense. The US will wage an undeclared war with AQAP using civilian personnel and civilian controlled weapons systems. As a "deniable" set of operations run by CIA, the US will be able to act in a more discrete, small footprint way enlisting tribal assistance, using paramilitary officers and UAVs with a sufficiently low public profile not to excite public or congressional opprobrium. In fact, as the experience in Pakistan has shown, the opposite will be the case--widespread approval in both public and congress.
If the Libyan Affray ends in stalemate or a collapsed state or should the Algerian monolith once more show its underlying cracks, the US would rightly apprehend the use of the new opportunities by AQIM. The only viable American response would be similar to that emerging in Yemen--think of it as FATA 3.0. With a civilian agency in the lead and assets from JSOC available on an "as-needed" basis, the US would have the capacity to inhibit the rise of violent political Islam--or at least its ability to operate abroad.
The experiences of Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan have taught all but the most terminally obtuse American policy and decision makers all the critical lessons regarding "nation-building." We have learned for the umpteeth time that nations cannot be built by foreign intervention. This means that the US has only two choices when confronted by violent political Islam: ignore it and hope it goes away or target it with the most lethal and finely focused tools (both human and technological) that are available.
The inherent dilemmas posed by the uprisings of the "Arab Spring" should have shown American decision and policy makers that there is no one-size-fits-all approach possible. The internal dynamics of each uprising as well as the regional and global contextual differences means that each event must be examined as a one-off proposition. The realities of the game of nations also has demonstrated once again that national ideals, values, and norms must support well defined national interest. To state categorically that national interest is predicated on ideals, norms, and values may make for good sound bites but provides a poor basis for effective policy.
On the upside, we can be thankful for our years of frustrating experience with Pakistan. All that we have come to know and dislike about Pakistani politics and international relations has prepared us for the overriding realities which will exist for years to come as a consequence of a few fun filled and exciting weeks last spring. The folks in Foggy Bottom and at the EOB should be pulling out the archives detailing the last twenty-five or so years of our dealings with Islamabad. The contents will be hard to read, embarrassing even, but when the day is done, one can look up and say with genuine feeling, "Good training. Damn good training."
It is not inaccurate to posit Pakistan as the paradigm soon to apply to the countries of North Africa and the Mideast which were convulsed to a greater or lesser extent by the pseudo-revolutions of recent months. This means that there will be a contest for political supremacy pitting the interests of a microscopic economic and political elite against the rising expectations of the marginalized majority egged on by increasingly extremest members of the Muslim clerical establishment. It means the ultimate arbiter of authority will be the armed forces of those states which already possess a large, well organized, well equipped military. Finally, there will be an overlay of regional and tribal loyalties which can serve as effective king-makers.
In the North African states, most notably Morocco, Tunisia, and Egypt, the trappings and forms of democracy will be followed. This process will not apply to Libya unless and until Gaddafi is removed--and the date for this event is impossible to predict beyond saying there is no reason for optimism. Democratic processes are less important in Mideast centers of protest: Syria, Bahrain, and Yemen. But even in these states there will be eventual genuflections before this prime totem of Western affections.
Despite the observance of democratic forms, the substance of representative democracy will be conspicuous by its absence. There is a simple reason for this prediction. Democracy per se is irrelevant to the majority of those who sought the overthrow the established regimes while the exercise of actual democracy is not in the interests of the major contestants for power: the elite and the adherents of political Islam. Insofar as either contestant favors the appearance of democratic processes, it is only to ensure that some middle ground movement comes to power in order to assure that the inevitable failure to bring prosperity to the many will be blamed on the scapegoat so as to allow the real contest to be waged and won.
Western governments and elites would be best advised to discount any and all blather about democracy in action completely. At best elections and the other accoutrement of vox populi is a charade. At worst it will be a mechanism for hijacking power. Elections, after all, sanctified not only the coming to power of the Nazis in 1933 but assured the creation of the statist theocracy in Iran in 1979. To look at the paradigm of Pakistan, elections matter not, for regardless of what party or individuals win at the polls, the army still runs the show.
The army will run the show as well in Egypt or Tunisia or anywhere else that sees the old regime involuntarily retired. As in Pakistan--and Turkey before--the army is the final custodian of nationhood. It is the ultimate guarantor of internal tranquility as it is the defender of the state's borders. Whether openly or from the shadows of the barracks, the army will do the same in the forthcoming governments of North Africa and the Mideast. No government will be allowed to act in a way which is not approved in advance by the armed forces. At the same time, the armed forces will have both the will and ability to direct the government to undertake specified actions or policies.
The limitations which can be imposed by the military are understood by even the most ardent supporter of political Islam. The Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt has implicitly acknowledged this in various fora. This recognition along with the strategic consideration of assuring Islam and Islamists are not tarred with the brush of economic policy failure is behind the MG's entering into coalition agreements with a secular party.
Taking a longer term view, the primacy of the armed forces will be countered by the adherents of political Islam through a program of education and indoctrination. This path has been blazed by the Pakistanis for the past thirty years with the result that the percentage of adherents of political Islam including that of the violent sort is higher among armed forces personnel, including company and field grade officers, than among the population as a whole. Given both the Pakistani paradigm and the power of current social and economic pressures abroad in the several "Arab Spring" countries, there is no reason to believe that the lengthy time period need be followed.
The armed forces of Egypt and Tunisia are well aware of the limits which the West will apply to the foreign and military policies of their states. They also understand the tools available to the West and the effectiveness of these tools. There will be no false bravado operating as there has been with Pakistan. The states of the "Arab Spring" have learned from Pakistan's mistakes as they have from Islamabad's successes.
The backlash against the super-wealthy currently underway in Egypt will slow and halt. The fact is the country, all the "Arab Spring" countries, need these hated rich folk. Even if it is true that one hundred percent of the wealthy became so as the result of the old regime's corruption, the wealth and skills of the rich business types are needed greatly for the country as a whole. The narrow elite will be constricted and placed on the defensive, but it will not be erased. As it will continue to exist, so also will it continue to seek and retain power.
The economically marginal will remain so regardless of the government and its promises. This reality will be exploited by the most extreme elements within the political Islamists. Practically, the results will be a co-option to the "left" which will be expressed primarily in foreign policy. Terror attacks against the "Zionist entity" will increase as will strident diplomatic and propaganda support for the deligitimatization campaign. Anti-Americanism will also ramp up markedly. The armed forces will try to keep the level of attacks below the threshold triggering a robust Israeli response but will fail ultimately.
The evermore vituperative attacks on the US provided these are not matched with terrorist operations, will motivate the American people and its representatives to disengage from the region pleading financial exigencies. This disengagement will exclude Israel. The result will be the worst of all possible worlds for the US--diminished influence with the governments of the "Arab Summer" while making the commitment to Israel more and more of the "blank check" variety.
With the high probability of Yemen becoming a collapsed state, the US will become more and more involved with the assorted tribes on the ground as a mechanism of self-defense. The US will wage an undeclared war with AQAP using civilian personnel and civilian controlled weapons systems. As a "deniable" set of operations run by CIA, the US will be able to act in a more discrete, small footprint way enlisting tribal assistance, using paramilitary officers and UAVs with a sufficiently low public profile not to excite public or congressional opprobrium. In fact, as the experience in Pakistan has shown, the opposite will be the case--widespread approval in both public and congress.
If the Libyan Affray ends in stalemate or a collapsed state or should the Algerian monolith once more show its underlying cracks, the US would rightly apprehend the use of the new opportunities by AQIM. The only viable American response would be similar to that emerging in Yemen--think of it as FATA 3.0. With a civilian agency in the lead and assets from JSOC available on an "as-needed" basis, the US would have the capacity to inhibit the rise of violent political Islam--or at least its ability to operate abroad.
The experiences of Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan have taught all but the most terminally obtuse American policy and decision makers all the critical lessons regarding "nation-building." We have learned for the umpteeth time that nations cannot be built by foreign intervention. This means that the US has only two choices when confronted by violent political Islam: ignore it and hope it goes away or target it with the most lethal and finely focused tools (both human and technological) that are available.
The inherent dilemmas posed by the uprisings of the "Arab Spring" should have shown American decision and policy makers that there is no one-size-fits-all approach possible. The internal dynamics of each uprising as well as the regional and global contextual differences means that each event must be examined as a one-off proposition. The realities of the game of nations also has demonstrated once again that national ideals, values, and norms must support well defined national interest. To state categorically that national interest is predicated on ideals, norms, and values may make for good sound bites but provides a poor basis for effective policy.
On the upside, we can be thankful for our years of frustrating experience with Pakistan. All that we have come to know and dislike about Pakistani politics and international relations has prepared us for the overriding realities which will exist for years to come as a consequence of a few fun filled and exciting weeks last spring. The folks in Foggy Bottom and at the EOB should be pulling out the archives detailing the last twenty-five or so years of our dealings with Islamabad. The contents will be hard to read, embarrassing even, but when the day is done, one can look up and say with genuine feeling, "Good training. Damn good training."
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Parting Company With Secretary Gates And Admiral Mullen
Robert Gates is well known as a "realist" in the areas of foreign policy and national security. His nearly thirty years in the intelligence racket and serving as Secretary of Defense have convinced him that the realities of international politics require the US to continue its difficult relationship with Pakistan. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mullen, concurred with this view as the two men testified to the Senate Appropriations Committee's subcommittee on defense today.
The subcommittee pushed both Gates and Mullen hard on the question of Pakistan. The senators were exercised not only by the general attitude of Islamabad to the purportedly joint effort against advocates of violent political Islam but more particularly with recent, dramatic actions such as the arrest of Pakistani citizens who provided information to CIA in the run-up to the killing of Osama bin Laden. Those arrested reportedly included an army major who furnished license plate numbers among other items.
When asked about the propriety of providing cooperation and sizable aid to an "ally" who engaged in such actions while conducting a non-stop campaign of tergiversation and mendacity, Secretary Gates dismissed the question in a way which was simultaneously both quite accurate--and significantly misleading. The secretary responded by noting that governments routinely lie to each other, that doing so allowed work to be accomplished. He also pointed out, once more accurately but in a way which is not germane to the Pakistani Question, that even friendly governments spy on one another.
Spying and lying are normal government activities. Only hopeless idealists or those who inhabit the lotus lands of Julian Assange and Anonymous might think (or desire) otherwise. But as generalizing from the particular is an intellectual error so also is particularizing from the general.
And, particularizing from the general is precisely what Dr Gates and Adm Mullen were doing. They did it well but that does not make the effort either useful or honest.
Pakistan is a particular case. It has a unique relation with the US defined by the current context of the war in Afghanistan and the larger conflict between the civilized states and the forces of violent political Islam. This means that Pakistan's relation with the US differs not only from American relations with other countries which do not harbor, protect, and assist some groups motivated by violent political Islam while attacking others. It also means that Pakistan's relation with the US today and in recent years is qualitatively different from the relation between the two countries during the cold war.
Simply put, the relationship between Pakistan and the US is utterly unique. It is one of a kind. Further, it is a relationship without precise historical counterpart. To put that in focus, imagine a situation during World War II where the US provided massive aid and support to a country which simultaneously harbored the Nazi party, supported its actions in third countries, protected it against any US attacks, and mounted half-hearted actions against a Fascist organization within its borders. The mind boggles at the concept.
Yet, that is precisely what is happening in Pakistan today. It has been precisely what has gone on month after month from the day American bombs and boots hit the ground in Afghanistan. The government, army, and intelligence service of Pakistan have aided and protected "good" jihadists while on occasion and with great reluctance attacked the "bad" jihadists.
Throughout the charade, the government, army, and intelligence service have benefited from vast amounts of US aid, most of which has been both military and useful not for counterinsurgent campaigns but rather for conventional operations of the sort which would be required when Pakistan gets its wish for one more rematch with India. To ensure the benefits keep pouring in while maintaining its "strategic" asset of terror, the Pakistanis have lied non-stop. They have lied with creativity. They have lied consistently (while being quite unperturbed when the internal inconsistencies of the lies come to light.) They have lied loudly. They have even lied about their lies.
An alliance, any alliance, no matter how limited in nature, scope, and goals cannot be maintained when one of the allies relies upon a dedication to untruth. The US government has been remarkably patient with the Pakistanis and their addiction to prevarication. However, the raid at Abbottabad made the continuation of this policy of patience politically impossible. No person reasonably well oriented in time and place can possibly accept the proposition that the Pakistani regime at its highest levels was clueless as to where Osama might have been for the past half decade or so.
Nor can any person even cursorily aware of the situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan accept Pakistani protestations that they have made great efforts, suffered mighty sacrifices in the joint cause. The expeditions mounted by the army against the advocates of violent political Islam in Swat and other parts of the FATA were conducted not by the regular army in the main but rather by the poorly trained, poorly equipped, and very poorly officered Frontier Corps. The three thousand fatalities so often pointed to by the Pakistani government and army as proof positive of their efforts are the result not of hard fought combat but the consequence of using second and third rank troops against a far better adversary.
As the Pakistani regular army and air force showed the bravery of being out of range, the unfortunates of the Frontier Corps were murdered by inept commanders and a self-serving bunch topside in order to provide a basis for the ongoing lies. A close look at the several "campaigns" shows the troop movements were carefully choreographed to allow the majority of the jihadists to withdraw in perfect safety to havens in South Waziristan. It needs to be recalled that the Pakistanis continue to refuse to operate in South Waziristan regardless of US requests and pressure.
The Geek has laid out in detail the strategic and political thinking which motivates the government, army, and intelligence service to continue their support of the several groups advocating violent political Islam which Islamabad considers to be "good," that is useful strategic assets in the war with India. In these and other posts the Geek has provided a detailed history of the poor US decision making which facilitated the Pakistani efforts to create and maintain terrorist entities as a strategic weapon as well as the critical role played by Zia and Saudi Arabia in the overall Islamazation of the Pakistani people. It is not necessary to recapitulate all that now.
The past, however, is prologue for the situation today. And, today's bad situation will become only worse unless the US pulls the plug on the current relationship with Pakistan.
Dr Gates, as might be expected, raised the nuclear bogeyman. The prospect of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal and production facilities falling into the possession of advocates of violent political Islam is worrying indeed, but does not on its own constitute good and sufficient reason to continue the toxic relation with Islamabad. If necessary there can be no doubt that the US has the capacity to eliminate the nuisance provided it is willing to accept the diplomatic consequences of collateral damage. The ultimate fate of the Pakistani nuclear program is a grave issue to be sure but not an insurmountable problem as Dr Gates and Adm Mullen know from the contingency plans already on the shelf.
As the US draws down in Afghanistan--a question not of "if"or even "when" but rather of "how fast" and "how many," the need for Pakistani cooperation drops apace. Reduction of the American footprint in Afghanistan is liberating as it allows Washington to focus more on the real heartland of terror threats to the US and other civilized states--the FATA. This reality in turn puts a very real pressure on Islamabad. Who is going to abate the jihadist menace in the area, Washington or Islamabad?
The reduction of the US and other foreign presence in Afghanistan shifts the burden for dealing with advocates of violent political Islam on Kabul and Islamabad. The governments of these two counties will have to determine the degree to which they will exist independent of the threats and domination of the extremists. The question for both Afghanistan and Pakistan is ultimately existential. That should provide a real motivation for both political and military solutions to be developed and implemented. The presence of the US and its foreign allies has given both Pakistan and Afghanistan a free pass to ignore the existential threat represented by the advocates of violent political Islam.
Now, with a withdrawal and a shift in policy toward Pakistan, the free pass will be revoked. If the US also takes the position that it is indifferent to what happens within the borders of either country but is concerned only with the exportation of violent political Islam, the two regimes will have no real option beyond dealing effectively with the various Talibans and related groups.
In an ideal world the US would also tilt more and more toward India including supporting that country's efforts in Afghanistan. India has a real strategic need to establish an effective presence in Kabul and has worked diligently in this direction for the past several years. Considering the number of coinciding interests which exist between the US and India including a well-founded apprehension of Chinese ambitions in the region, the US would be well advised to shift its focus from Afghanistan and Pakistan to India so as to assist and support India in its policy gambits in the region.
The fundamental reality of policy in the subcontinent is simply that no government can do business with a regime based solely on lying. Pakistan's behavior is over the edge when it comes to the way in which governments routinely mislead each other. Dr Gates must be very well aware of this. It is most unfortunate that in his last appearance before this subcommittee he felt obliged to shade the truth to a degree which constitutes an insult to American national interest--and the intelligence of many who heard or read his comments.
As there are limits in permissible lying between governments, there are limits to "realism" in foreign and national security policy. In his assessment of Pakistan, Dr Gates regrettably transcended these limits. It is a very sad note on which to end a most distinguished career.
The subcommittee pushed both Gates and Mullen hard on the question of Pakistan. The senators were exercised not only by the general attitude of Islamabad to the purportedly joint effort against advocates of violent political Islam but more particularly with recent, dramatic actions such as the arrest of Pakistani citizens who provided information to CIA in the run-up to the killing of Osama bin Laden. Those arrested reportedly included an army major who furnished license plate numbers among other items.
When asked about the propriety of providing cooperation and sizable aid to an "ally" who engaged in such actions while conducting a non-stop campaign of tergiversation and mendacity, Secretary Gates dismissed the question in a way which was simultaneously both quite accurate--and significantly misleading. The secretary responded by noting that governments routinely lie to each other, that doing so allowed work to be accomplished. He also pointed out, once more accurately but in a way which is not germane to the Pakistani Question, that even friendly governments spy on one another.
Spying and lying are normal government activities. Only hopeless idealists or those who inhabit the lotus lands of Julian Assange and Anonymous might think (or desire) otherwise. But as generalizing from the particular is an intellectual error so also is particularizing from the general.
And, particularizing from the general is precisely what Dr Gates and Adm Mullen were doing. They did it well but that does not make the effort either useful or honest.
Pakistan is a particular case. It has a unique relation with the US defined by the current context of the war in Afghanistan and the larger conflict between the civilized states and the forces of violent political Islam. This means that Pakistan's relation with the US differs not only from American relations with other countries which do not harbor, protect, and assist some groups motivated by violent political Islam while attacking others. It also means that Pakistan's relation with the US today and in recent years is qualitatively different from the relation between the two countries during the cold war.
Simply put, the relationship between Pakistan and the US is utterly unique. It is one of a kind. Further, it is a relationship without precise historical counterpart. To put that in focus, imagine a situation during World War II where the US provided massive aid and support to a country which simultaneously harbored the Nazi party, supported its actions in third countries, protected it against any US attacks, and mounted half-hearted actions against a Fascist organization within its borders. The mind boggles at the concept.
Yet, that is precisely what is happening in Pakistan today. It has been precisely what has gone on month after month from the day American bombs and boots hit the ground in Afghanistan. The government, army, and intelligence service of Pakistan have aided and protected "good" jihadists while on occasion and with great reluctance attacked the "bad" jihadists.
Throughout the charade, the government, army, and intelligence service have benefited from vast amounts of US aid, most of which has been both military and useful not for counterinsurgent campaigns but rather for conventional operations of the sort which would be required when Pakistan gets its wish for one more rematch with India. To ensure the benefits keep pouring in while maintaining its "strategic" asset of terror, the Pakistanis have lied non-stop. They have lied with creativity. They have lied consistently (while being quite unperturbed when the internal inconsistencies of the lies come to light.) They have lied loudly. They have even lied about their lies.
An alliance, any alliance, no matter how limited in nature, scope, and goals cannot be maintained when one of the allies relies upon a dedication to untruth. The US government has been remarkably patient with the Pakistanis and their addiction to prevarication. However, the raid at Abbottabad made the continuation of this policy of patience politically impossible. No person reasonably well oriented in time and place can possibly accept the proposition that the Pakistani regime at its highest levels was clueless as to where Osama might have been for the past half decade or so.
Nor can any person even cursorily aware of the situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan accept Pakistani protestations that they have made great efforts, suffered mighty sacrifices in the joint cause. The expeditions mounted by the army against the advocates of violent political Islam in Swat and other parts of the FATA were conducted not by the regular army in the main but rather by the poorly trained, poorly equipped, and very poorly officered Frontier Corps. The three thousand fatalities so often pointed to by the Pakistani government and army as proof positive of their efforts are the result not of hard fought combat but the consequence of using second and third rank troops against a far better adversary.
As the Pakistani regular army and air force showed the bravery of being out of range, the unfortunates of the Frontier Corps were murdered by inept commanders and a self-serving bunch topside in order to provide a basis for the ongoing lies. A close look at the several "campaigns" shows the troop movements were carefully choreographed to allow the majority of the jihadists to withdraw in perfect safety to havens in South Waziristan. It needs to be recalled that the Pakistanis continue to refuse to operate in South Waziristan regardless of US requests and pressure.
The Geek has laid out in detail the strategic and political thinking which motivates the government, army, and intelligence service to continue their support of the several groups advocating violent political Islam which Islamabad considers to be "good," that is useful strategic assets in the war with India. In these and other posts the Geek has provided a detailed history of the poor US decision making which facilitated the Pakistani efforts to create and maintain terrorist entities as a strategic weapon as well as the critical role played by Zia and Saudi Arabia in the overall Islamazation of the Pakistani people. It is not necessary to recapitulate all that now.
The past, however, is prologue for the situation today. And, today's bad situation will become only worse unless the US pulls the plug on the current relationship with Pakistan.
Dr Gates, as might be expected, raised the nuclear bogeyman. The prospect of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal and production facilities falling into the possession of advocates of violent political Islam is worrying indeed, but does not on its own constitute good and sufficient reason to continue the toxic relation with Islamabad. If necessary there can be no doubt that the US has the capacity to eliminate the nuisance provided it is willing to accept the diplomatic consequences of collateral damage. The ultimate fate of the Pakistani nuclear program is a grave issue to be sure but not an insurmountable problem as Dr Gates and Adm Mullen know from the contingency plans already on the shelf.
As the US draws down in Afghanistan--a question not of "if"or even "when" but rather of "how fast" and "how many," the need for Pakistani cooperation drops apace. Reduction of the American footprint in Afghanistan is liberating as it allows Washington to focus more on the real heartland of terror threats to the US and other civilized states--the FATA. This reality in turn puts a very real pressure on Islamabad. Who is going to abate the jihadist menace in the area, Washington or Islamabad?
The reduction of the US and other foreign presence in Afghanistan shifts the burden for dealing with advocates of violent political Islam on Kabul and Islamabad. The governments of these two counties will have to determine the degree to which they will exist independent of the threats and domination of the extremists. The question for both Afghanistan and Pakistan is ultimately existential. That should provide a real motivation for both political and military solutions to be developed and implemented. The presence of the US and its foreign allies has given both Pakistan and Afghanistan a free pass to ignore the existential threat represented by the advocates of violent political Islam.
Now, with a withdrawal and a shift in policy toward Pakistan, the free pass will be revoked. If the US also takes the position that it is indifferent to what happens within the borders of either country but is concerned only with the exportation of violent political Islam, the two regimes will have no real option beyond dealing effectively with the various Talibans and related groups.
In an ideal world the US would also tilt more and more toward India including supporting that country's efforts in Afghanistan. India has a real strategic need to establish an effective presence in Kabul and has worked diligently in this direction for the past several years. Considering the number of coinciding interests which exist between the US and India including a well-founded apprehension of Chinese ambitions in the region, the US would be well advised to shift its focus from Afghanistan and Pakistan to India so as to assist and support India in its policy gambits in the region.
The fundamental reality of policy in the subcontinent is simply that no government can do business with a regime based solely on lying. Pakistan's behavior is over the edge when it comes to the way in which governments routinely mislead each other. Dr Gates must be very well aware of this. It is most unfortunate that in his last appearance before this subcommittee he felt obliged to shade the truth to a degree which constitutes an insult to American national interest--and the intelligence of many who heard or read his comments.
As there are limits in permissible lying between governments, there are limits to "realism" in foreign and national security policy. In his assessment of Pakistan, Dr Gates regrettably transcended these limits. It is a very sad note on which to end a most distinguished career.
Sunday, June 12, 2011
Speaking With The (Customary) Forked Tongue
Not that many days ago President Obama was in London. He spoke at some great length and with all apparent warmth and sincerity regarding the special relationship between the US and UK. Long and loud were Mr Obama's praises of the relationship between we former colonials and the Mother Country. He even took pains to distort and warp history so as to present a smooth and attractive face of relations unmarred by differences or disagreements. All in all it was a typical bravura performance by a man for whom words trump actions.
As the mood music played Prime Minister David Cameron and his fellow ministers seemed to take it in. Smiles and gestures of appreciation all over Westminster. The shake and grin of the year went well as did the State Banquet at the royal palace. The president and his "team" undoubtedly boarded Air Force One secure in the belief that they had pulled a successful fast one on the Brits.
Like a pirate ship lowering its false colors and raising the Jolly Roger, the true face of the Obama administration's view of the UK and its "special relationship" came to the fore mere hours later. While the diplomatic protocols demand forewarning, the hoisting of the skull and crossbones at the meeting of the Organization of the American States (OAS) must have sent a chill through Her Majesty's Government nonetheless.
On 7 June 2011 the US joined all the other members of the OAS in approving a draft declaration on "the question of the Malvinas Islands." The draft declaration demands that the UK negotiate the status of the Falkland Islands (Malvinas, if you are pro-Argentinian) with Buenos Aires. With this move the US not only linked itself with such profound anti-American regimes as that of Hugo Chavez but stiff armed the British with great gusto. The US is quite well aware that the UK is not willing in the slightest to negotiate with Argentina or to compromise its long standing sovereignty over the islands.
The US position is not new. Secretary of State Clinton put it forth back in March 2010 against the backdrop of shrill protests coming from Buenos Aires over the impending arrival of an exploratory drilling platform prospecting for oil in the 200 mile exclusive economic zone surrounding the Falklands. At that time Her Majesty's Government made their displeasure known, directly and firmly. It is clear that Mr Obama and his "team" value our alliance with the UK very little regardless of the splendid torrent of oratory poured by the president in the halls of Parliament.
The stance taken by the Obama administration at San Salvador on 7 June serves the US ill. The demand for negotiation supported by the Clueless Man in the Oval not only devalues the link between the US and the UK, it ignores completely the right of self-determination for the people of the Falklands. The residents of those faraway and lonely islands have made it quite clear time after time that they are not only British but they desire to remain under the governance of the UK. There is no desire on the part of the islanders to speak Spanish or live under the sway of the Argentine government.
Any possible questions of sovereignty were settled back in 1982 when the government of Argentina, a military junta, ordered the invasion of the islands after having ended the ongoing and quite desultory negotiations of that distant day. Much to the surprise and dismay of the generals running Argentina, the British did not accept the accomplished feat but chose to fight back.
In the resulting Falklands War the US after a short period of sitting astride the fence came down flatly on the side of the UK. Swimming against the tide prevailing at the OAS, the Reagan administration took the position that Argentinian aggression must not be allowed to stand. The US provided important intelligence to the UK as well as assorted munitions. When night finally fell on the war, Britannia was victorious. Aggression had not been allowed to stand. Most importantly, the Falkland islanders were confirmed in their right to be British.
The Britishness of the islanders is the bedrock of Her Majesty's Government's policy regarding the islands. Put in terms that even the Obama administration might be able to comprehend: The Britishness of the islanders is non-negotiable.
For a very long while the government(s) of Argentina accepted the verdict of war. But over the past few years the Argentinian government has been seized by an every growing yearning to plant their flag on the islands regardless of the desires of the locals. The reason is simple, consisting of three letters: O I L. There is a chance that a significant oil field exists far below the cold and stormy waters surrounding the Falklands. With dollar signs in their eyes and envious of the new Brazilian offshore fields, the fine folks at the top of the Argentinian political and financial trees now covet the Falklands.
Apparently following his default position of appeasement brings friends and influence, Mr Obama and his people have thrown the lot of the US behind the ambitions of the Argentinians. As Mr Obama declared his willingness for We the People to become the best customers of Brazil's new fields, so also must he believe that we should purchase oil from the liberty loving democrats in the country which brought the world Juan Peron and his lovely wife, Evita.
There is no doubt but Ms Clinton or one of her smooth talking subordinates can give a fine sounding justification for this reversal of American policy. They would invoke the magic of "stability" and hint that the democratically elected government might be replaced by one more junta if the civilians do not redeem the lost patrimony of the islands. Conceivably the lads and lassies of Foggy Bottom might question the ancient claim exercised by the UK over the islands and choose to ignore the outcome of the more recent war thus concluding the Argentinian claim to be more valid. Or they might simply say the OAS is the vox populi of the hemisphere and its will is binding upon us--and the UK.
Any such pettifoggery is, beyond question, a crock of caca. The real deal--other than Obama's reflexive need to stick it to the Brits whenever given a chance--is the conclusion that the UK no longer has the military capacity to defend the Falklands successfully. That conclusion has a corollary. Any future passage of arms over the Falklands will necessitate an American participation. Such participation will be far more extensive than was that of twenty-nine years ago.
The sad reality is the UK lacks the resources it deployed back then. It no longer has the aircraft carriers and other naval assets which allowed it to mount an amphibious operation over the monumental distance which separates the UK from the Falklands. Simultaneously, it is true that the Argentinian military is stronger today (at least on paper) then it was. Moreover, it is probable that Buenos Aires could count on the active support of Hugo Chavez and other leaders for whom the West is a nest of capitalist, imperialist exploiters.
In the event the Argentinians get muscular over the Falkland Islands, the US will have to choose sides. If it honors both its values and global interests Washington must align with London and be the outsider at the OAS. If, to the contrary, the administration goes with its ideological predilections and personal prejudices, it must line up with the OAS majority in support of Buenos Aires. In that event the close, long standing, and quite critical relationship between the US and the UK will be as dead as George III.
Mr Obama has been a one man disaster area in US foreign relations. Compared to Obama the days of the Bush/Cheney regime constitute a high point of American diplomacy. In no area has the Obama approach to foreign affairs been more fraught with long term injury than the corner into which the president and his "team" have painted the US over the Falkland Islands.
In essence the Nice Young Man From Chicago has pointed a loaded gun directly at the guts of Uncle Sam's foreign relations. And he has placed the trigger in the hands of the less than rational Argentinian government. Get a grip on it: By the action of 7 June the Obama administration has set the stage for a blunder compared to which the invasion of Iraq seems almost like an act of brilliant strategic statesmanship.
As the mood music played Prime Minister David Cameron and his fellow ministers seemed to take it in. Smiles and gestures of appreciation all over Westminster. The shake and grin of the year went well as did the State Banquet at the royal palace. The president and his "team" undoubtedly boarded Air Force One secure in the belief that they had pulled a successful fast one on the Brits.
Like a pirate ship lowering its false colors and raising the Jolly Roger, the true face of the Obama administration's view of the UK and its "special relationship" came to the fore mere hours later. While the diplomatic protocols demand forewarning, the hoisting of the skull and crossbones at the meeting of the Organization of the American States (OAS) must have sent a chill through Her Majesty's Government nonetheless.
On 7 June 2011 the US joined all the other members of the OAS in approving a draft declaration on "the question of the Malvinas Islands." The draft declaration demands that the UK negotiate the status of the Falkland Islands (Malvinas, if you are pro-Argentinian) with Buenos Aires. With this move the US not only linked itself with such profound anti-American regimes as that of Hugo Chavez but stiff armed the British with great gusto. The US is quite well aware that the UK is not willing in the slightest to negotiate with Argentina or to compromise its long standing sovereignty over the islands.
The US position is not new. Secretary of State Clinton put it forth back in March 2010 against the backdrop of shrill protests coming from Buenos Aires over the impending arrival of an exploratory drilling platform prospecting for oil in the 200 mile exclusive economic zone surrounding the Falklands. At that time Her Majesty's Government made their displeasure known, directly and firmly. It is clear that Mr Obama and his "team" value our alliance with the UK very little regardless of the splendid torrent of oratory poured by the president in the halls of Parliament.
The stance taken by the Obama administration at San Salvador on 7 June serves the US ill. The demand for negotiation supported by the Clueless Man in the Oval not only devalues the link between the US and the UK, it ignores completely the right of self-determination for the people of the Falklands. The residents of those faraway and lonely islands have made it quite clear time after time that they are not only British but they desire to remain under the governance of the UK. There is no desire on the part of the islanders to speak Spanish or live under the sway of the Argentine government.
Any possible questions of sovereignty were settled back in 1982 when the government of Argentina, a military junta, ordered the invasion of the islands after having ended the ongoing and quite desultory negotiations of that distant day. Much to the surprise and dismay of the generals running Argentina, the British did not accept the accomplished feat but chose to fight back.
In the resulting Falklands War the US after a short period of sitting astride the fence came down flatly on the side of the UK. Swimming against the tide prevailing at the OAS, the Reagan administration took the position that Argentinian aggression must not be allowed to stand. The US provided important intelligence to the UK as well as assorted munitions. When night finally fell on the war, Britannia was victorious. Aggression had not been allowed to stand. Most importantly, the Falkland islanders were confirmed in their right to be British.
The Britishness of the islanders is the bedrock of Her Majesty's Government's policy regarding the islands. Put in terms that even the Obama administration might be able to comprehend: The Britishness of the islanders is non-negotiable.
For a very long while the government(s) of Argentina accepted the verdict of war. But over the past few years the Argentinian government has been seized by an every growing yearning to plant their flag on the islands regardless of the desires of the locals. The reason is simple, consisting of three letters: O I L. There is a chance that a significant oil field exists far below the cold and stormy waters surrounding the Falklands. With dollar signs in their eyes and envious of the new Brazilian offshore fields, the fine folks at the top of the Argentinian political and financial trees now covet the Falklands.
Apparently following his default position of appeasement brings friends and influence, Mr Obama and his people have thrown the lot of the US behind the ambitions of the Argentinians. As Mr Obama declared his willingness for We the People to become the best customers of Brazil's new fields, so also must he believe that we should purchase oil from the liberty loving democrats in the country which brought the world Juan Peron and his lovely wife, Evita.
There is no doubt but Ms Clinton or one of her smooth talking subordinates can give a fine sounding justification for this reversal of American policy. They would invoke the magic of "stability" and hint that the democratically elected government might be replaced by one more junta if the civilians do not redeem the lost patrimony of the islands. Conceivably the lads and lassies of Foggy Bottom might question the ancient claim exercised by the UK over the islands and choose to ignore the outcome of the more recent war thus concluding the Argentinian claim to be more valid. Or they might simply say the OAS is the vox populi of the hemisphere and its will is binding upon us--and the UK.
Any such pettifoggery is, beyond question, a crock of caca. The real deal--other than Obama's reflexive need to stick it to the Brits whenever given a chance--is the conclusion that the UK no longer has the military capacity to defend the Falklands successfully. That conclusion has a corollary. Any future passage of arms over the Falklands will necessitate an American participation. Such participation will be far more extensive than was that of twenty-nine years ago.
The sad reality is the UK lacks the resources it deployed back then. It no longer has the aircraft carriers and other naval assets which allowed it to mount an amphibious operation over the monumental distance which separates the UK from the Falklands. Simultaneously, it is true that the Argentinian military is stronger today (at least on paper) then it was. Moreover, it is probable that Buenos Aires could count on the active support of Hugo Chavez and other leaders for whom the West is a nest of capitalist, imperialist exploiters.
In the event the Argentinians get muscular over the Falkland Islands, the US will have to choose sides. If it honors both its values and global interests Washington must align with London and be the outsider at the OAS. If, to the contrary, the administration goes with its ideological predilections and personal prejudices, it must line up with the OAS majority in support of Buenos Aires. In that event the close, long standing, and quite critical relationship between the US and the UK will be as dead as George III.
Mr Obama has been a one man disaster area in US foreign relations. Compared to Obama the days of the Bush/Cheney regime constitute a high point of American diplomacy. In no area has the Obama approach to foreign affairs been more fraught with long term injury than the corner into which the president and his "team" have painted the US over the Falkland Islands.
In essence the Nice Young Man From Chicago has pointed a loaded gun directly at the guts of Uncle Sam's foreign relations. And he has placed the trigger in the hands of the less than rational Argentinian government. Get a grip on it: By the action of 7 June the Obama administration has set the stage for a blunder compared to which the invasion of Iraq seems almost like an act of brilliant strategic statesmanship.
Saturday, June 11, 2011
Gates Doubles Down On NATO
NATO--the US has a hard time living with it but believes it cannot live without it. For better than sixty years now we have been in a relationship with a tedious bunch which was not sought by us. The treaty which ties the US to a couple of dozen other states was and remains a form of shotgun marriage--compelled by force of circumstance and, presumably, preferable to the alternative.
Nearly every secretary of defense has been frustrated by the pervasive unwillingness or inability of the member states to carry their fair share of the alliance's water. Yesterday, Robert Gates, feeling free with his impending departure from the Pentagon, let it all hang out as he reamed the group for its collective failures of political will and military capacity.
His words were not particularly harsh. Neither were they the petulant complaints. His assessments were not even new. Each and every one of the criticisms mentioned in his speech have been said before. Often. What made the Gates Warning substantially different was that it came in public. The words were not murmured behind closed doors, minister to minister. No. These came in public for all to hear. And, that sort of thing is just not done, don't you know.
Stripped to the essentials, the Gates Warning was simple and blunt. As the cold war faded as even a memory, the American people and their representatives were decreasingly willing to spend ever more scarce resources underwriting the defense needs of countries unwilling to shoulder their own responsibilities. Pointedly, Gates noted, the US carried roughly half the aggregate NATO military budget just before the Berlin Wall crumbled soon to followed by the Soviet Union. He added the kicker: Currently the US staggers under three quarters of the total NATO military budget.
This one metric suggests strongly that something is amiss in NATO. In case anyone missed the point, Gates commented that only four countries (the UK, France, Greece and Albania[!]) joined the US in spending more than the target two percent of GDP on defense. The target figure of two percent was not established by some sort of fiat out of Washington but rather by consensus of all NATO members. Nor is it some fossil of the cold war having been established long after the collapse of the Vanguard of the Proletariat.
More than a few of the assembled Dignitaries and Deep Thinkers must have squirmed when Gates not only acknowledged an awareness and appreciation of the budget crises enveloping most of the NATO members but went on to demonstrate how some (very) small countries were "punching well above their weight" by having used their defense money in an intelligent, forward looking, and combat focused way. He singled out the Libyan efforts of Norway and Denmark in this regard. By so doing Gates obviated the cringing and whining response offered by such European apologists as Daniel Korski, a senior fellow at the European Council of Foreign Relations. Or, for that matter, the spokesman for the German Foreign Ministry who protested that Germany was pulling an awesome amount of freight in Afghanistan.
The reality of NATO is as it has been for many, many years. That reality is simply the belief on the part of chancelleries throughout Europe that the US would always be there to pick up whatever burdens were necessary to guarantee European security. The view has been the US has no alternative but to do so as Europe was the frontline of American defense. As a consequence for three generations now the several old members of the alliance have shirked in defense so as to underwrite the extensive programs of social benefits and security which have long been the distinguishing characteristic of post-World War II Europe.
The majority of the old members of NATO have ridden in great comfort on the alliance's gravy train while the made-in-America locomotive pulled the freight. The new, post-cold war members, the former Warsaw Pact states which have joined the alliance, have been quite willing to do the same--while complaining that the US is not doing enough to deter and inhibit the Russians in their efforts to reestablish some form of suzerainty over the Eastern European glacis.
NATO was challenged with the end of the cold war. The collapse of the Soviet Union removed the reason for the alliance's existence. More than ever it became obvious that the organization was an ill-assorted array of bed fellows who had little, if anything, in common beyond apprehension regarding Soviet ambitions in the West. Not even geography tied the group together given that it spread from Turkey to Canada, Norway to Italy and Spain. The very term, "North Atlantic Treaty Organization" had no rigorous meaning. Arguably only one word, "treaty," was factual. All the rest was well-intended diplomatic fiction.
The big question of 1991-2 which was never really asked let alone answered was, "What is NATO's justification now?" The pseudo-answer focused on some critter called "out-of-theater operations." That term is one of those phrases which is every bit as portentous rolling off a diplomat's lips as it is empty of actual substance.
The first "out-of-theater" NATO mission was not particularly "out-of-theater" if one defines NATO's area of responsibility to be Europe. Specifically, it was the confused peace imposition operation in Kosovo. That meant it was an R2P campaign without the term. The US as always carried the majority of the burden despite the very compelling fact that no salient American interest was in play in the ruins of Yugoslavia. Insofar as any state or states had interests in play, those states were all European. NATO was invoked simply because the directly effected states (can we say, "Germany?") were unwilling to act.
The next "out-of-theater" operation was the ongoing mess in Afghanistan. NATO with a rush and a flourish invoked its famous an-attack-on-one-is-an-attack-on-all article for the very first time while the smoke still hung heavy in the air over lower Manhattan. What came out of this demonstration of one for all, all for one solidarity was the unfortunate applicability of the alternative meaning for the abbreviation ISAF. To many Americans who have fought in the place the abbreviation does not mean International Security Assistance Force but I Saw Americans Fighting.
While some NATO contingents such as those from the UK, Canada and, shockingly, France have actually taken the war to the bad guys, others, (can we say, "Germany?") have done everything possible to avoid, evade, and ignore even the most remote chance of actually encountering the enemy. Leaving aside the responsibility which must be assigned to the Bush/Cheney administration in the conduct of the war in Afghanistan and the alienation of allies attendant upon the invasion of Iraq, the residual actuality on the ground in Afghanistan is simply that NATO as an organization has done all too little relative to its capacities.
Now NATO is engaged in yet one more "out-of-theater" operation. This time, unlike the previous efforts, the US has been a major non-participant. Indeed, we would be even less involved if NATO had sufficient assets in critical areas such as overhead surveillance, reconnaissance, targeting, mid-air refueling, and electronic warfare. Secretary Gates as much as said this as he detailed the glaring deficiencies in the NATO effort. He also underscored that the engaged NATO contingents had already run short of critical munitions thus requiring urgent American restocking. This, he stated, was the foreseeable consequence of not properly spending even limited defense money.
In its post-cold war missions, NATO has shown itself to be a coalition of the unwilling and unready. This reality is not mitigated by the excellent performance of some national contingents in each and every of the three "out-of-theater" endeavors. Nor can it be lessened by pointing to budgetary matters. Neither can the situation be expected to improve any. In his optimism, limited as it was, Dr Gates is being entirely too kind, too considerate of ruffled diplomatic and political feathers within the alliance's membership.
(In connection with this it is of more than passing interest that the Obama White House attempted mightily to put blue sky between Secretary Gates' position and its own. An unidentified White House "official" took the stance that the Secretary was either speaking solely for the Pentagon or was expressing his personal frustration with some NATO states. The most the white-feathered crew at the White House was willing to grant was that Gates had raised "legitimate issues." A fine bunch of courageous statesmen and women in and near the Oval, don't you think?)
Dr Gates warned NATO that the day would soon come when post-cold war Americans would cease funding Europe's defense needs. That day may be far closer than the secretary indicated. The dismal record compiled by NATO in its post-cold war actions shows rather conclusively that it has no reason to keep on keeping on.
The concept of "out-of-theater" operations is intellectually bankrupt, ethically suspect, and diplomatically useless. Beyond that, it is a military nullity marked with asymmetry of effort, confusion of command, vagueness and contradiction politically. NATO is a broken tool without any real purpose other than inhibiting Russian ambitions should such exist with respect to Central and Eastern Europe.
The US would be far better served by assembling an ad hoc coalition of states with coinciding national interests when interventions of whatsoever nature might be required. The diplomacy of George H. W. Bush in the run-up to the First Gulf War is paradigmatic in this regard. Ad hoc coalitions might be a bit difficult to put together, but no more so than achieving consensus within the councils of NATO. Should it be necessary for the US to carry the overwhelming majority of the water in a coalition, there is at least the advantage that such groups are short duration (provided the war is fought with an appropriate doctrine and force package.)
The time has come to say to NATO, "Thanks for the memories."
Nearly every secretary of defense has been frustrated by the pervasive unwillingness or inability of the member states to carry their fair share of the alliance's water. Yesterday, Robert Gates, feeling free with his impending departure from the Pentagon, let it all hang out as he reamed the group for its collective failures of political will and military capacity.
His words were not particularly harsh. Neither were they the petulant complaints. His assessments were not even new. Each and every one of the criticisms mentioned in his speech have been said before. Often. What made the Gates Warning substantially different was that it came in public. The words were not murmured behind closed doors, minister to minister. No. These came in public for all to hear. And, that sort of thing is just not done, don't you know.
Stripped to the essentials, the Gates Warning was simple and blunt. As the cold war faded as even a memory, the American people and their representatives were decreasingly willing to spend ever more scarce resources underwriting the defense needs of countries unwilling to shoulder their own responsibilities. Pointedly, Gates noted, the US carried roughly half the aggregate NATO military budget just before the Berlin Wall crumbled soon to followed by the Soviet Union. He added the kicker: Currently the US staggers under three quarters of the total NATO military budget.
This one metric suggests strongly that something is amiss in NATO. In case anyone missed the point, Gates commented that only four countries (the UK, France, Greece and Albania[!]) joined the US in spending more than the target two percent of GDP on defense. The target figure of two percent was not established by some sort of fiat out of Washington but rather by consensus of all NATO members. Nor is it some fossil of the cold war having been established long after the collapse of the Vanguard of the Proletariat.
More than a few of the assembled Dignitaries and Deep Thinkers must have squirmed when Gates not only acknowledged an awareness and appreciation of the budget crises enveloping most of the NATO members but went on to demonstrate how some (very) small countries were "punching well above their weight" by having used their defense money in an intelligent, forward looking, and combat focused way. He singled out the Libyan efforts of Norway and Denmark in this regard. By so doing Gates obviated the cringing and whining response offered by such European apologists as Daniel Korski, a senior fellow at the European Council of Foreign Relations. Or, for that matter, the spokesman for the German Foreign Ministry who protested that Germany was pulling an awesome amount of freight in Afghanistan.
The reality of NATO is as it has been for many, many years. That reality is simply the belief on the part of chancelleries throughout Europe that the US would always be there to pick up whatever burdens were necessary to guarantee European security. The view has been the US has no alternative but to do so as Europe was the frontline of American defense. As a consequence for three generations now the several old members of the alliance have shirked in defense so as to underwrite the extensive programs of social benefits and security which have long been the distinguishing characteristic of post-World War II Europe.
The majority of the old members of NATO have ridden in great comfort on the alliance's gravy train while the made-in-America locomotive pulled the freight. The new, post-cold war members, the former Warsaw Pact states which have joined the alliance, have been quite willing to do the same--while complaining that the US is not doing enough to deter and inhibit the Russians in their efforts to reestablish some form of suzerainty over the Eastern European glacis.
NATO was challenged with the end of the cold war. The collapse of the Soviet Union removed the reason for the alliance's existence. More than ever it became obvious that the organization was an ill-assorted array of bed fellows who had little, if anything, in common beyond apprehension regarding Soviet ambitions in the West. Not even geography tied the group together given that it spread from Turkey to Canada, Norway to Italy and Spain. The very term, "North Atlantic Treaty Organization" had no rigorous meaning. Arguably only one word, "treaty," was factual. All the rest was well-intended diplomatic fiction.
The big question of 1991-2 which was never really asked let alone answered was, "What is NATO's justification now?" The pseudo-answer focused on some critter called "out-of-theater operations." That term is one of those phrases which is every bit as portentous rolling off a diplomat's lips as it is empty of actual substance.
The first "out-of-theater" NATO mission was not particularly "out-of-theater" if one defines NATO's area of responsibility to be Europe. Specifically, it was the confused peace imposition operation in Kosovo. That meant it was an R2P campaign without the term. The US as always carried the majority of the burden despite the very compelling fact that no salient American interest was in play in the ruins of Yugoslavia. Insofar as any state or states had interests in play, those states were all European. NATO was invoked simply because the directly effected states (can we say, "Germany?") were unwilling to act.
The next "out-of-theater" operation was the ongoing mess in Afghanistan. NATO with a rush and a flourish invoked its famous an-attack-on-one-is-an-attack-on-all article for the very first time while the smoke still hung heavy in the air over lower Manhattan. What came out of this demonstration of one for all, all for one solidarity was the unfortunate applicability of the alternative meaning for the abbreviation ISAF. To many Americans who have fought in the place the abbreviation does not mean International Security Assistance Force but I Saw Americans Fighting.
While some NATO contingents such as those from the UK, Canada and, shockingly, France have actually taken the war to the bad guys, others, (can we say, "Germany?") have done everything possible to avoid, evade, and ignore even the most remote chance of actually encountering the enemy. Leaving aside the responsibility which must be assigned to the Bush/Cheney administration in the conduct of the war in Afghanistan and the alienation of allies attendant upon the invasion of Iraq, the residual actuality on the ground in Afghanistan is simply that NATO as an organization has done all too little relative to its capacities.
Now NATO is engaged in yet one more "out-of-theater" operation. This time, unlike the previous efforts, the US has been a major non-participant. Indeed, we would be even less involved if NATO had sufficient assets in critical areas such as overhead surveillance, reconnaissance, targeting, mid-air refueling, and electronic warfare. Secretary Gates as much as said this as he detailed the glaring deficiencies in the NATO effort. He also underscored that the engaged NATO contingents had already run short of critical munitions thus requiring urgent American restocking. This, he stated, was the foreseeable consequence of not properly spending even limited defense money.
In its post-cold war missions, NATO has shown itself to be a coalition of the unwilling and unready. This reality is not mitigated by the excellent performance of some national contingents in each and every of the three "out-of-theater" endeavors. Nor can it be lessened by pointing to budgetary matters. Neither can the situation be expected to improve any. In his optimism, limited as it was, Dr Gates is being entirely too kind, too considerate of ruffled diplomatic and political feathers within the alliance's membership.
(In connection with this it is of more than passing interest that the Obama White House attempted mightily to put blue sky between Secretary Gates' position and its own. An unidentified White House "official" took the stance that the Secretary was either speaking solely for the Pentagon or was expressing his personal frustration with some NATO states. The most the white-feathered crew at the White House was willing to grant was that Gates had raised "legitimate issues." A fine bunch of courageous statesmen and women in and near the Oval, don't you think?)
Dr Gates warned NATO that the day would soon come when post-cold war Americans would cease funding Europe's defense needs. That day may be far closer than the secretary indicated. The dismal record compiled by NATO in its post-cold war actions shows rather conclusively that it has no reason to keep on keeping on.
The concept of "out-of-theater" operations is intellectually bankrupt, ethically suspect, and diplomatically useless. Beyond that, it is a military nullity marked with asymmetry of effort, confusion of command, vagueness and contradiction politically. NATO is a broken tool without any real purpose other than inhibiting Russian ambitions should such exist with respect to Central and Eastern Europe.
The US would be far better served by assembling an ad hoc coalition of states with coinciding national interests when interventions of whatsoever nature might be required. The diplomacy of George H. W. Bush in the run-up to the First Gulf War is paradigmatic in this regard. Ad hoc coalitions might be a bit difficult to put together, but no more so than achieving consensus within the councils of NATO. Should it be necessary for the US to carry the overwhelming majority of the water in a coalition, there is at least the advantage that such groups are short duration (provided the war is fought with an appropriate doctrine and force package.)
The time has come to say to NATO, "Thanks for the memories."
Friday, May 27, 2011
Those Paks Never Give It A Rest
Farahnaz Ispahani, a chief adviser to Pakistani president Zardari, has made a modest proposal to the US. No doubt but with the most straight of faces the man has the unmitigated nerve to propose that We the People move immediately to provide a "Marshall Plan" for Pakistan. (Please note that while the link is to a Pakistani site, the Ispahani proposal was put forth in an op-ed piece on USA Today, but the Geek was too lazy to search for this.)
The way Pakistani politics is structured we can be certain that Ispahani would not have penned the piece had it not been pre-approved by his boss. So it can be taken as a trial balloon launched by the most senior levels of the civilian government(?) of Pakistan. It is official.
Not only official but also a disgusting travesty. Part of the travesty is the man's probably willful failure to comprehend the nature of the original Marshall Plan, the iconic model of self-interested but nonetheless altruistic foreign aid.
First, the Plan was not aimed at any one country but rather was open to all European states including the Soviet Union and those old nations of Middle Europe which had fallen under the sway of the Red Army. It was a mechanism for the sorting out of friends from enemies at least in major part, and in this it was quite successful.
Second, the intent of the Plan was the forcing of European joint decision making. Individual countries might have their own shopping lists, but a priority was placed upon those projects which would benefit the region to the greatest extent. There was a desire on the part of the US to see greater and more rapid European integration on the economic and political levels alike.
Third, it was necessary for the recipients of Plan aid to spend the majority of the money in the US. The real selling point to Congress was the blunt reality that the money would be recycled to the US and thus assist in post-war economic readjustment at home.
None of these factors are present in Pakistan. There is no need to force Pakistan to choose a side--it has already done that in practice if not in rhetoric. There is no need to foster regional integration. The Pakistanis have a concept of integration which extends as far as Afghanistan. It is called operational dominance.
Finally, the Pakistanis would like to spend the money wherever they please. It might, for example, best suit the needs and hopes of Islamabad best if the mulcted money were to be spent with the Trolls of Beijing and not with the Capitalist Infidels of the US.
The president and his man seem to believe that Pakistan deserves largess without end simply because some three thousand Pakistani troops (primarily from the undertrained, poorly equipped and usually unpaid Frontier Corps and not the regular army) have been killed in conflict with the Taliban et al. Should we cruel and heartless infidels not think that is sufficient sacrifice of lives, the presidential adviser throws in the two thousand police who have died purportedly at the hands of the jihadi.
The Marshall Plan was not American atonement for the European lives lost in World War II. It was not the product of a collective feeling of guilt over having failed to prevent the outbreak of the war or of having entered the war only after Pearl Harbor. Rather, it was a piece of calculated self-interest as was the creation of NATO, a carefully considered mechanism of defense against a perceived threat.
Ispahani makes the usual attempt to preempt this approach. He alleges that massive economic aid will provide the necessary basis for internal improvement which will automatically reduce the appeal of violent political Islam.
There is a word for this: Crap!
There no evidence that poverty on its own is correlated positively with violent political Islam. Indeed, there is evidence behind the contention that violent political Islam is far more the province of the better off, better educated members of society--including that of Pakistan. The money which has gone to direct support of Pakistani development projects after surviving the hazards of graft, corruption, kickbacks, and assorted insider deals has not shown any benefit accruing either to the image of the US or the conditions of life affecting the recipient communities.
The record of previous civilian aid programs ranging from the building of dams to the provision of emergency food aid is a dreary and disgusting tale of misappropriation, illegal and improper diversion, and, even when every thing goes correctly, a resulting sense of Pakistani entitlement. (Think back and recall the farmer whose fields and property had survived the floods last year due to an American designed and constructed dam. Was he appreciative? No way! He was bent out of shape because the Americans had not been back to properly maintain and upgrade the dam and its associated irrigation projects.)
President Zardari and his advisers would be better off if they were to contemplate the real causes of violent political Islam which has inflicted so much alleged damage, death, and despair on their country. The real causes are simple.
There is a misplaced sense of victimhood focusing on India and its alleged Satanic supporters, Israel and the US.
Then there is the ultimate impact of the program of "Islamification" instituted by Zia more than twenty years ago. The importation of the austere Saudi form of Islam along with Pakistani modifications has provided more than one generation with the mythology of Islamic superiority, Islamic entitlement, Islamic victimization which has looped together with the preexisting sense of Pakistan having been denied its deserved place of sub-continent supremacy by the machinations of India.
Then, of course, there is the success of ISI through its Wing S in creating and operating groups predicated on violent political Islam as a substitute for more conventional forms of war. As Frankenstein's monster escaped its creator's control so also have the advocates of violent political Islam.
To any objective observer, the problems of Pakistan are those of Pakistani manufacture. They have all been made in Islamabad or Rawalpindi. For decades now the powers that be in Pakistan have rejected an honest search for peace with India, preferring a sort of forever war. They have also turned their backs on conventional war in favor of nuclear poker and very lethal use of terror. It is totally unsurprising that they are now being burned by the inevitable blowback.
The same intellectual bankruptcy seen in the forever war with India and the use of violent political Islam as a proxy is seen in the arguments advanced by Ispahani and his boss. They, like the government and military in general, know only one trick--bluster and extort. This is how they met Secretary Clinton today. This is what rests behind the demand for a new Marshall Plan.
If the Obama administration has any sense at all, any orientation as to time and place, it will make clear that, to quote Maxwell Smart, "The trick is old! The trick is stupid!" And in this case the trick will work no longer. To say that the US has no options in the region other than to continue to pay Pakistan off and hope for the best is to show a level of intellect such as to make a tapeworm seem like a genius.
We have options. It is certain that the administration knows perfectly well what they are. The only question is whether or not it has the political will to take a better course than business as usual. It may be time to tell the lads in Islamabad that they best peddle their goods to a different buyer, say, China.
The way Pakistani politics is structured we can be certain that Ispahani would not have penned the piece had it not been pre-approved by his boss. So it can be taken as a trial balloon launched by the most senior levels of the civilian government(?) of Pakistan. It is official.
Not only official but also a disgusting travesty. Part of the travesty is the man's probably willful failure to comprehend the nature of the original Marshall Plan, the iconic model of self-interested but nonetheless altruistic foreign aid.
First, the Plan was not aimed at any one country but rather was open to all European states including the Soviet Union and those old nations of Middle Europe which had fallen under the sway of the Red Army. It was a mechanism for the sorting out of friends from enemies at least in major part, and in this it was quite successful.
Second, the intent of the Plan was the forcing of European joint decision making. Individual countries might have their own shopping lists, but a priority was placed upon those projects which would benefit the region to the greatest extent. There was a desire on the part of the US to see greater and more rapid European integration on the economic and political levels alike.
Third, it was necessary for the recipients of Plan aid to spend the majority of the money in the US. The real selling point to Congress was the blunt reality that the money would be recycled to the US and thus assist in post-war economic readjustment at home.
None of these factors are present in Pakistan. There is no need to force Pakistan to choose a side--it has already done that in practice if not in rhetoric. There is no need to foster regional integration. The Pakistanis have a concept of integration which extends as far as Afghanistan. It is called operational dominance.
Finally, the Pakistanis would like to spend the money wherever they please. It might, for example, best suit the needs and hopes of Islamabad best if the mulcted money were to be spent with the Trolls of Beijing and not with the Capitalist Infidels of the US.
The president and his man seem to believe that Pakistan deserves largess without end simply because some three thousand Pakistani troops (primarily from the undertrained, poorly equipped and usually unpaid Frontier Corps and not the regular army) have been killed in conflict with the Taliban et al. Should we cruel and heartless infidels not think that is sufficient sacrifice of lives, the presidential adviser throws in the two thousand police who have died purportedly at the hands of the jihadi.
The Marshall Plan was not American atonement for the European lives lost in World War II. It was not the product of a collective feeling of guilt over having failed to prevent the outbreak of the war or of having entered the war only after Pearl Harbor. Rather, it was a piece of calculated self-interest as was the creation of NATO, a carefully considered mechanism of defense against a perceived threat.
Ispahani makes the usual attempt to preempt this approach. He alleges that massive economic aid will provide the necessary basis for internal improvement which will automatically reduce the appeal of violent political Islam.
There is a word for this: Crap!
There no evidence that poverty on its own is correlated positively with violent political Islam. Indeed, there is evidence behind the contention that violent political Islam is far more the province of the better off, better educated members of society--including that of Pakistan. The money which has gone to direct support of Pakistani development projects after surviving the hazards of graft, corruption, kickbacks, and assorted insider deals has not shown any benefit accruing either to the image of the US or the conditions of life affecting the recipient communities.
The record of previous civilian aid programs ranging from the building of dams to the provision of emergency food aid is a dreary and disgusting tale of misappropriation, illegal and improper diversion, and, even when every thing goes correctly, a resulting sense of Pakistani entitlement. (Think back and recall the farmer whose fields and property had survived the floods last year due to an American designed and constructed dam. Was he appreciative? No way! He was bent out of shape because the Americans had not been back to properly maintain and upgrade the dam and its associated irrigation projects.)
President Zardari and his advisers would be better off if they were to contemplate the real causes of violent political Islam which has inflicted so much alleged damage, death, and despair on their country. The real causes are simple.
There is a misplaced sense of victimhood focusing on India and its alleged Satanic supporters, Israel and the US.
Then there is the ultimate impact of the program of "Islamification" instituted by Zia more than twenty years ago. The importation of the austere Saudi form of Islam along with Pakistani modifications has provided more than one generation with the mythology of Islamic superiority, Islamic entitlement, Islamic victimization which has looped together with the preexisting sense of Pakistan having been denied its deserved place of sub-continent supremacy by the machinations of India.
Then, of course, there is the success of ISI through its Wing S in creating and operating groups predicated on violent political Islam as a substitute for more conventional forms of war. As Frankenstein's monster escaped its creator's control so also have the advocates of violent political Islam.
To any objective observer, the problems of Pakistan are those of Pakistani manufacture. They have all been made in Islamabad or Rawalpindi. For decades now the powers that be in Pakistan have rejected an honest search for peace with India, preferring a sort of forever war. They have also turned their backs on conventional war in favor of nuclear poker and very lethal use of terror. It is totally unsurprising that they are now being burned by the inevitable blowback.
The same intellectual bankruptcy seen in the forever war with India and the use of violent political Islam as a proxy is seen in the arguments advanced by Ispahani and his boss. They, like the government and military in general, know only one trick--bluster and extort. This is how they met Secretary Clinton today. This is what rests behind the demand for a new Marshall Plan.
If the Obama administration has any sense at all, any orientation as to time and place, it will make clear that, to quote Maxwell Smart, "The trick is old! The trick is stupid!" And in this case the trick will work no longer. To say that the US has no options in the region other than to continue to pay Pakistan off and hope for the best is to show a level of intellect such as to make a tapeworm seem like a genius.
We have options. It is certain that the administration knows perfectly well what they are. The only question is whether or not it has the political will to take a better course than business as usual. It may be time to tell the lads in Islamabad that they best peddle their goods to a different buyer, say, China.
Monday, May 23, 2011
What A Great Day!
This is one of those days which makes a guy glad to be alive--that is if he is a maven of how much can go wrong in the world all at the same time. So much has gone so terribly out of whack in the past twenty-four or so hours that is hard to decide what most tickles the brain, that is, what deserves the virtual ink.
It is quite tempting to take a few shots at that LST (large slow target) named "Pakistan." It is a hoot and a half to contemplate that less than a couple of dozen Mighty Warriors Of The One True Faith can take over a major naval air installation. That these Glorious Fighters Of The Koran can hold off assorted Pakistani military forces for seventeen hours, destroying a pair of P-3C Orion maritime patrol aircraft, gifts of the American people delivered only last June, in the process.
Not since a similar commando unit hit and held the Pakistani army's headquarters a couple of years ago has the Islamic Republic been so humiliated. It is presumed that the Great Strategists of Islamabad are down on their prayer rugs giving thanks to the deity that the Taliban trigger-pullers did not hit a certain facility only ten klicks over, conveniently adjacent to an airbase where nuclear weapons are stored. For such small favors, the Pakistanis should give great and prolonged thanks.
For the rest of us, the Taliban raid raises the long standing questions regarding the security of Pakistan's arsenal of one hundred or so nukes to new heights. After all, the night squad which cut its way through a pair of barbed wire fences and used low tech ladders to scale a wall were not in the same league as the men of Boat Six of Great Abbottabad Raid fame. If a handful of jihadists with nothing more sophisticated than RPGs, AKs, and a willingness to die could storm the heavily guarded naval airfield, is it impossible for a similar group to do the same at either a nuclear weapons depot or manufacturing facility?
On the upside, such muscular measures might not be needful given the omnipresence of ideological soulmates within the Pakistani military and intelligence services. Or the direct method might be obviated by the Pakistani version of the hoary Mexican approach of "silver or lead." It is not unthinkable, considering the prevalence of corruption in the Islamic Republic, that the promise of silver might trump the threat of lead.
On another continent, the ardent observer of frothing wars and failing states must feel a pleasant glow contemplating the attack over the weekend by Sudanese forces on the contested oil center of Abyei. The Khartoum regime has maintained with a straight face that its attack complete with air strikes and armored units was "retaliation" for the ambush last week of a UN convoy escorted by Sudanese army personnel. To the not yet officially independent state of South Sudan, the occupation of Abyei constituted an act of war.
Abyei was supposed to have voted as to which side it would join--Sudan or South Sudan--at the same time as the overall referendum on Southern independence. This did not occur because Khartoum insisted on including a nomadic tribe of Muslim affiliation among those franchised to vote in the election. This demand was vetoed by the southerners. As a result, the Abyei question has not been settled. Nor is it likely to be settled by means other than the violent.
The UN has done the expected--denounce the attack and demand Khartoum withdraw its forces. Assorted advocates for South Sudan (mainly George Clooney and assorted NGOs) are making predictable noises regarding the US and UK doing something to compel Khartoum to back down. And, to insure the decibel level of rhetoric is high enough, spokesmen for South Sudan are warning darkly that the occupation of Abyei bodes well to restart the war between South and North which ended in 2005 after twenty-two years and hundreds of thousands of lives due to the diplomacy of the US and UK.
Just what the US or UK can do short of using highly kinetic coercive diplomacy to gain Khartoum's adherence to our policy requirements is unclear. What is clear is that neither Washington nor London are in any hurry to send warplanes or troops anywhere beyond current theaters of operation.
The upcoming meeting between President Obama and Prime Minister Cameron has some potential for both sparks and amusement. The two leaders are not in perfect tandem regarding what is being done in Libya to say nothing of what should be done. The British and French are all in favor of more hairy chested efforts than those made to date. In earnest of this intent, both have announced the deployment of helicopter gunships to the country. The British will operate Apaches and the French machines of local manufacture from carriers in the Mediterranean.
Both states (the British more vocally) want the US to come back to Libya in a larger and more noise producing way than has been the case in recent weeks. The redeployment of American A-10 and AC-130 aircraft is much desired by Whitehall. While more muted in their stance, there is little doubt that M. Sarkozy's government would be very happy to see the weight of the US more heavily on the scales in favor of the rebels.
There is no indication that President Obama is in a mood to honor the requests. Certainly, there is no evident pawing of the ground in favor of more and more high profile operations visible at the Pentagon.
This contretemps gives added importance to a little noticed event scheduled to occur during the Obama-Cameron meeting. Reportedly the US and UK will establish a joint national security entity which will coordinate the perceptions and plans of the two countries to allow more effective joint and combined actions globally. Considering the negative view held by Mr Obama regarding the "special relationship" between the UK and US, this is a surprising development. If the reports are confirmed by events, it is a most welcome one as well.
While such a joint body may easily be nothing more than a pro forma exercise in policy futility, there is some chance that it will evolve into a genuine mechanism for meshing together the national security strategies and programs of two natural allies. It might even point in the direction of growing to include several UK descended states--Australia, New Zealand, Canada and India--along with the US and UK into a tightly integrated political/military bloc which would be virtually unchallengeable in years to come.
Now, that sort of "international community" is one which is very pleasant to contemplate. It gives the Geek a warm feeling and, being a sensitive sort of guy, he will end this post on this potentially very high note.
It is quite tempting to take a few shots at that LST (large slow target) named "Pakistan." It is a hoot and a half to contemplate that less than a couple of dozen Mighty Warriors Of The One True Faith can take over a major naval air installation. That these Glorious Fighters Of The Koran can hold off assorted Pakistani military forces for seventeen hours, destroying a pair of P-3C Orion maritime patrol aircraft, gifts of the American people delivered only last June, in the process.
Not since a similar commando unit hit and held the Pakistani army's headquarters a couple of years ago has the Islamic Republic been so humiliated. It is presumed that the Great Strategists of Islamabad are down on their prayer rugs giving thanks to the deity that the Taliban trigger-pullers did not hit a certain facility only ten klicks over, conveniently adjacent to an airbase where nuclear weapons are stored. For such small favors, the Pakistanis should give great and prolonged thanks.
For the rest of us, the Taliban raid raises the long standing questions regarding the security of Pakistan's arsenal of one hundred or so nukes to new heights. After all, the night squad which cut its way through a pair of barbed wire fences and used low tech ladders to scale a wall were not in the same league as the men of Boat Six of Great Abbottabad Raid fame. If a handful of jihadists with nothing more sophisticated than RPGs, AKs, and a willingness to die could storm the heavily guarded naval airfield, is it impossible for a similar group to do the same at either a nuclear weapons depot or manufacturing facility?
On the upside, such muscular measures might not be needful given the omnipresence of ideological soulmates within the Pakistani military and intelligence services. Or the direct method might be obviated by the Pakistani version of the hoary Mexican approach of "silver or lead." It is not unthinkable, considering the prevalence of corruption in the Islamic Republic, that the promise of silver might trump the threat of lead.
On another continent, the ardent observer of frothing wars and failing states must feel a pleasant glow contemplating the attack over the weekend by Sudanese forces on the contested oil center of Abyei. The Khartoum regime has maintained with a straight face that its attack complete with air strikes and armored units was "retaliation" for the ambush last week of a UN convoy escorted by Sudanese army personnel. To the not yet officially independent state of South Sudan, the occupation of Abyei constituted an act of war.
Abyei was supposed to have voted as to which side it would join--Sudan or South Sudan--at the same time as the overall referendum on Southern independence. This did not occur because Khartoum insisted on including a nomadic tribe of Muslim affiliation among those franchised to vote in the election. This demand was vetoed by the southerners. As a result, the Abyei question has not been settled. Nor is it likely to be settled by means other than the violent.
The UN has done the expected--denounce the attack and demand Khartoum withdraw its forces. Assorted advocates for South Sudan (mainly George Clooney and assorted NGOs) are making predictable noises regarding the US and UK doing something to compel Khartoum to back down. And, to insure the decibel level of rhetoric is high enough, spokesmen for South Sudan are warning darkly that the occupation of Abyei bodes well to restart the war between South and North which ended in 2005 after twenty-two years and hundreds of thousands of lives due to the diplomacy of the US and UK.
Just what the US or UK can do short of using highly kinetic coercive diplomacy to gain Khartoum's adherence to our policy requirements is unclear. What is clear is that neither Washington nor London are in any hurry to send warplanes or troops anywhere beyond current theaters of operation.
The upcoming meeting between President Obama and Prime Minister Cameron has some potential for both sparks and amusement. The two leaders are not in perfect tandem regarding what is being done in Libya to say nothing of what should be done. The British and French are all in favor of more hairy chested efforts than those made to date. In earnest of this intent, both have announced the deployment of helicopter gunships to the country. The British will operate Apaches and the French machines of local manufacture from carriers in the Mediterranean.
Both states (the British more vocally) want the US to come back to Libya in a larger and more noise producing way than has been the case in recent weeks. The redeployment of American A-10 and AC-130 aircraft is much desired by Whitehall. While more muted in their stance, there is little doubt that M. Sarkozy's government would be very happy to see the weight of the US more heavily on the scales in favor of the rebels.
There is no indication that President Obama is in a mood to honor the requests. Certainly, there is no evident pawing of the ground in favor of more and more high profile operations visible at the Pentagon.
This contretemps gives added importance to a little noticed event scheduled to occur during the Obama-Cameron meeting. Reportedly the US and UK will establish a joint national security entity which will coordinate the perceptions and plans of the two countries to allow more effective joint and combined actions globally. Considering the negative view held by Mr Obama regarding the "special relationship" between the UK and US, this is a surprising development. If the reports are confirmed by events, it is a most welcome one as well.
While such a joint body may easily be nothing more than a pro forma exercise in policy futility, there is some chance that it will evolve into a genuine mechanism for meshing together the national security strategies and programs of two natural allies. It might even point in the direction of growing to include several UK descended states--Australia, New Zealand, Canada and India--along with the US and UK into a tightly integrated political/military bloc which would be virtually unchallengeable in years to come.
Now, that sort of "international community" is one which is very pleasant to contemplate. It gives the Geek a warm feeling and, being a sensitive sort of guy, he will end this post on this potentially very high note.
Friday, May 20, 2011
And, Always There Is Israel
The most commented upon section of President Obama's "major" address on US policy in the Mideast has been the reference to peace being based upon the pre Six Day War borders with negotiated land swaps to accommodate Israeli "realities on the ground." The formulation in and of itself is not outrageous--necessarily.
But an evaluation of the pre-1967 border requires an appreciation of the oft repeated Israeli demand for "secure and defensible borders." It also demands an understanding of the Israeli insistence upon maintaining a residual force along the Jordan river. Mr Obama's words seem to ignore the first and totally disallow the second. Rather the president appeared to rely upon the Palestinian state being "demilitarized."
The concept of "demilitarization" may be useful, but only if the mechanism by which this status would be assured over time is defined and agreed to by Israeli and Palestinian alike. The record of Egyptian actions in the weeks leading up to the Six Day War, in particular the ejection of the UN truce monitoring unit, shows that even international guarantees of "demilitarization" may not prove reliable.
Prior to the Six Day War, the narrow waist of Israel was less than ten miles in width. High speed aircraft could not turn 180 degrees and stay in Israeli air space. More to the point today, ten miles is well within the range of the crude home made rockets so loved by Hamas. The takeaway is simple: The pre-1967 borders would be neither secure nor defensible now and into the future.
This reality requires that a prudent Israeli government continue a military presence in the valley of the Jordan river. This would be necessary even if some hypothetical future Palestinian government were to be so dedicated to peace that its territory was truly "demilitarized." Without the forward basing of high mobility, high firepower IDF units, it would be easy for hostile forces to be concentrated in Jordan, in positions well suited for a quick bounce into Israel.
Presumably, someone in Obama's foreign policy and national security "team" had the knowledge necessary to advise the president regarding the defensive importance of an IDF presence along the banks of the Jordan. If that were the case, Mr Obama deserves a severe down check for having ignored the reality. If no such counsel was available, then the administration must be down checked for failing to give the president the information he needed.
Even the Netanyahu ministry is not dedicated to keeping the totality of the potential Palestinian territory occupied. Doing so would be too expensive in resources and global status to maintain in perpetuity. At the same time, no Israeli ministry, even the most dovish, would sleep soundly absent forward basing in the Jordan valley. To withdraw completely to the pre-1967 borders would require a level of trust and confidence in both the pacifistic nature of the Palestinian government and its ability to police its territory effectively that does not and cannot exist yet. Nor will such exist for many years, perhaps generations, to come.
Mr Obama called upon the Netanyahu government to be "bold." The government of Israel has shown an ability to be "bold" as in the withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. The "international community" including the US promised Israel that this act of bold statesmanship would not result in violence--and, if it did, the "community" would respond with effective aid to Israel. The record written by blood on the sands of Gaza and Israel alike is one of shabby betrayal by the guarantors of Israeli peace and base hatred on the part of Hamas and other practitioners of violent political Islam.
Considering this history of boldness and its consequences, is there any wonder that Prime Minister Netanyahu and many others both in and out of government in Israel rejected the Obama formulation as soon as it left his lips? Undoubtedly, Mr Obama expected this reaction. He courted it on the eve of Netanyahu's arrival in Washington. He used it to feather his own political nest without risk.
This cynical ploy was made possible by the simple fact that the Fatah dominated Palestinian Authority cut its own throat by signing the reconciliation agreement with Hamas. Mr Obama knew and knows that Israel will not negotiate with the two headed hydra as long as Hamas does not embrace the Quartet requirements. Mr Obama knows as well that the US will not and cannot deal with Hamas even indirectly as long as it remains a "terrorist organization," a status it will not lose unless it does the impossible and surrenders its fundamental identity.
Mr Obama was thus able to present himself as a "friend" of the Palestinian people as well as their myriad of supporters throughout the Arab states. The inevitable rejection of the Obama formulation by the Israelis could be offloaded on Netanyahu. From the perspective of the reelection oriented White House, the result would be win-win. From the ground level view of the Mideast, the appearance would be more of the lose-lose sort.
It is to be expected that Mr Obama and his team will put pressure on the Israelis. The president made an allusion during his speech to the vulnerable point. That solar plexus of diplomacy is the Palestinian threat to take the matter to the UN, to demand that the body do for the Palestinians now what it did for the Zionists sixty plus years ago--create a country. The US has been called upon by Israel to block this move by using its influence on European and other states at the least and its Security Council veto if necessary. This gives the US a very great degree of leverage on Israel.
However much leverage the Obama administration has or believe it possesses, the amount is not sufficient to induce Israel to place itself in a suicidal position. This is precisely where the Jewish state would be if it did not have a military presence along the Jordan river.
Any realistic negotiations for a final comprehensive settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict must start with the pre-Six Day War borders. But it cannot end there. Not only must there be negotiated real estate swaps to protect the Israeli "settlements" or at least those that are largest and closest to Israeli territory, there must be an effective addressing of Israel's very legitimate security concerns regarding the Jordan valley. Until such time as both Muslim Arabs and Israelis have had sufficient time and experience to justify the latter's confidence in the will and ability of the former to maintain peace, the Israelis must be allowed to keep a force of sufficient size and capability to deter or defeat any ground attack originating from beyond Palestinian controlled land.
At best Mr Obama was being disingenuous when he called for the complete ending of the Israeli military occupation of the West Bank territory. At worst he was being dishonestly manipulative for personal political reasons.
In either case the tension between rhetoric and reality resident in yesterday's Foggy Bottom oration calls Mr Obama's intellectual honesty into question. The US is facing a plethora of foreign policy and national security challenges the meeting of which requires the highest possible intellectual and moral courage on the part of the president and his senior advisers. If his performance yesterday is any guide, Mr Obama has set a very low standard. Should that low standard continue to prevail with respect to the other matters on the overfilled plate, the republic is in for some very, very bad times.
Perhaps even bad enough for one to have wished Harold Camping had counted the days correctly.
But an evaluation of the pre-1967 border requires an appreciation of the oft repeated Israeli demand for "secure and defensible borders." It also demands an understanding of the Israeli insistence upon maintaining a residual force along the Jordan river. Mr Obama's words seem to ignore the first and totally disallow the second. Rather the president appeared to rely upon the Palestinian state being "demilitarized."
The concept of "demilitarization" may be useful, but only if the mechanism by which this status would be assured over time is defined and agreed to by Israeli and Palestinian alike. The record of Egyptian actions in the weeks leading up to the Six Day War, in particular the ejection of the UN truce monitoring unit, shows that even international guarantees of "demilitarization" may not prove reliable.
Prior to the Six Day War, the narrow waist of Israel was less than ten miles in width. High speed aircraft could not turn 180 degrees and stay in Israeli air space. More to the point today, ten miles is well within the range of the crude home made rockets so loved by Hamas. The takeaway is simple: The pre-1967 borders would be neither secure nor defensible now and into the future.
This reality requires that a prudent Israeli government continue a military presence in the valley of the Jordan river. This would be necessary even if some hypothetical future Palestinian government were to be so dedicated to peace that its territory was truly "demilitarized." Without the forward basing of high mobility, high firepower IDF units, it would be easy for hostile forces to be concentrated in Jordan, in positions well suited for a quick bounce into Israel.
Presumably, someone in Obama's foreign policy and national security "team" had the knowledge necessary to advise the president regarding the defensive importance of an IDF presence along the banks of the Jordan. If that were the case, Mr Obama deserves a severe down check for having ignored the reality. If no such counsel was available, then the administration must be down checked for failing to give the president the information he needed.
Even the Netanyahu ministry is not dedicated to keeping the totality of the potential Palestinian territory occupied. Doing so would be too expensive in resources and global status to maintain in perpetuity. At the same time, no Israeli ministry, even the most dovish, would sleep soundly absent forward basing in the Jordan valley. To withdraw completely to the pre-1967 borders would require a level of trust and confidence in both the pacifistic nature of the Palestinian government and its ability to police its territory effectively that does not and cannot exist yet. Nor will such exist for many years, perhaps generations, to come.
Mr Obama called upon the Netanyahu government to be "bold." The government of Israel has shown an ability to be "bold" as in the withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. The "international community" including the US promised Israel that this act of bold statesmanship would not result in violence--and, if it did, the "community" would respond with effective aid to Israel. The record written by blood on the sands of Gaza and Israel alike is one of shabby betrayal by the guarantors of Israeli peace and base hatred on the part of Hamas and other practitioners of violent political Islam.
Considering this history of boldness and its consequences, is there any wonder that Prime Minister Netanyahu and many others both in and out of government in Israel rejected the Obama formulation as soon as it left his lips? Undoubtedly, Mr Obama expected this reaction. He courted it on the eve of Netanyahu's arrival in Washington. He used it to feather his own political nest without risk.
This cynical ploy was made possible by the simple fact that the Fatah dominated Palestinian Authority cut its own throat by signing the reconciliation agreement with Hamas. Mr Obama knew and knows that Israel will not negotiate with the two headed hydra as long as Hamas does not embrace the Quartet requirements. Mr Obama knows as well that the US will not and cannot deal with Hamas even indirectly as long as it remains a "terrorist organization," a status it will not lose unless it does the impossible and surrenders its fundamental identity.
Mr Obama was thus able to present himself as a "friend" of the Palestinian people as well as their myriad of supporters throughout the Arab states. The inevitable rejection of the Obama formulation by the Israelis could be offloaded on Netanyahu. From the perspective of the reelection oriented White House, the result would be win-win. From the ground level view of the Mideast, the appearance would be more of the lose-lose sort.
It is to be expected that Mr Obama and his team will put pressure on the Israelis. The president made an allusion during his speech to the vulnerable point. That solar plexus of diplomacy is the Palestinian threat to take the matter to the UN, to demand that the body do for the Palestinians now what it did for the Zionists sixty plus years ago--create a country. The US has been called upon by Israel to block this move by using its influence on European and other states at the least and its Security Council veto if necessary. This gives the US a very great degree of leverage on Israel.
However much leverage the Obama administration has or believe it possesses, the amount is not sufficient to induce Israel to place itself in a suicidal position. This is precisely where the Jewish state would be if it did not have a military presence along the Jordan river.
Any realistic negotiations for a final comprehensive settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict must start with the pre-Six Day War borders. But it cannot end there. Not only must there be negotiated real estate swaps to protect the Israeli "settlements" or at least those that are largest and closest to Israeli territory, there must be an effective addressing of Israel's very legitimate security concerns regarding the Jordan valley. Until such time as both Muslim Arabs and Israelis have had sufficient time and experience to justify the latter's confidence in the will and ability of the former to maintain peace, the Israelis must be allowed to keep a force of sufficient size and capability to deter or defeat any ground attack originating from beyond Palestinian controlled land.
At best Mr Obama was being disingenuous when he called for the complete ending of the Israeli military occupation of the West Bank territory. At worst he was being dishonestly manipulative for personal political reasons.
In either case the tension between rhetoric and reality resident in yesterday's Foggy Bottom oration calls Mr Obama's intellectual honesty into question. The US is facing a plethora of foreign policy and national security challenges the meeting of which requires the highest possible intellectual and moral courage on the part of the president and his senior advisers. If his performance yesterday is any guide, Mr Obama has set a very low standard. Should that low standard continue to prevail with respect to the other matters on the overfilled plate, the republic is in for some very, very bad times.
Perhaps even bad enough for one to have wished Harold Camping had counted the days correctly.
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