Uncle Sam, A Most Reluctant Cop

Some cables within the WikiLeak dump of diplomatic data, most importantly those coming from the several Gulf states, urge a re-asking of the old questions regarding the role of the US as a sort of global cop.  The position attributed to several Gulf governments actually serves to expand the old stand-by questions which have surrounded the American entry into an already extant conflict (a category which includes both World Wars, Korea and Vietnam.)

Assuming the cables accurately reflect the views of the local interlocutors, there is a consensus among the Gulf states that an Iran equipped with a nuclear capacity is so threatening, so much a danger to peace that the Arab leaders want the US to take military action even before the Iranians actually achieve a deliverable nuclear weapon.  The stated desire is for American preemption.  This, of course, is a course of action qualitatively different from what the US has done traditionally.

The several Arab states are using the US invasion of Iraq as the precedent.  This is unlike other, earlier wars from Korea to (at least arguably) Afghanistan, where the US has acted after the fact.  Historically, the US has entered a war already in progress as in Korea and Vietnam or, with an almost plausible local invitation, sought to restore stability and stave off a threatened war as in Lebanon.  The US has also, as in the case of the Dominican Republic and Grenada, deployed force to protect the lives of US nationals or, in Afghanistan, in retaliation for an armed attack on the US.

The Iraq precedent was another one of those recurrent slippery slope precedents.  There was no direct attack on the US.  There was not, as there had been in 1991, a breach of the international peace.  There were no US lives at risk.  There was certainly no plausible invitation from local political leaders.  In place of these assorted justifications for the use of armed force, there was a stack of UN Resolutions and a heap of less than accurate intelligence.  Judged by past American employments of force, the invasion of Iraq was even more poorly predicated than the war with Spain over a century earlier.  And, that is saying a lot.

The Arab desire for the US to do something robust against the Iranian threat is understandable.  No countries have more at risk than those of the Persian Gulf littoral.  The scale of the Iranian threat is easily measured--compared to it none of the Arab states seem to have a thing against Israel.  It is more than merely interesting that none saw the Israeli nuclear arsenal in being as a threat while all saw the Iranian nuclear arsenal in prospect to be terrifying.

Given this, it is not surprising that there was a monolithic call for the US to take out the Iranian threat regardless of other considerations such as how an attack might be justified to the world generally or the absence of a cause of war even as compelling as that provided by the pile of UN Resolutions directed at the Iraq of Saddam Hussein.  Put at its most basic level, the call by the Arab states was prompted by a genuine and highly compelling national interest.

To the diplomats and leaders of the Gulf states, their countries and the US had a coinciding national interest in nullifying the Iranian nuclear program (and, quite probably the current Iranian regime.)  And, as every person wise to the ways of international politics knows, the only reason that the Gulf states (or any state) has positive relations with the US is that doing so is vital to their national interest.

In this context it might be noted that Secretary of Defense Gates gave a short course in Diplomacy 101 the other day when he opined that other countries do not have relations with the US because they like us or because they trust us or because they believe we can keep secrets safe but only because such relations serve their national interests.  The Arab proposition was predicated upon this concept pure and simple.

The Arab request hints at what attracts some states to seek and maintain good relations with the US.  Even today as We the People drift in a depressant doldrums viewing our present to be poor and our future to be worse, there is a compelling attraction for states to seek and keep good relations with the US.

Put bluntly, other states are most impressed with our military capacities.  They are struck with the potentials resident in that hardest of hard power capabilities--the military's ability to break things and kill people.  It may be disconcerting to those Americans who value our economic power or the soft power appeals of our diplomacy, values, norms, culture, and so on, but in much of the world it is our military alone which gives appeal, which compels the seeking and maintaining of good relations, which defines coinciding national interests.

In short, there are more than a few governments--and not simply Arab autocracies in the Gulf region--which see the pistol on Sheriff Sam's hip and believe their interests (and ours) would be best served by using it against regional bad actors.  Whether we like the notion or not, there are many, important states which want to see us in the role of global cop.

(OK, bucko, the Geek acknowledges that there are also many states which see the US as the Great Global Cash Cow to be milked at will.  These states are also most likely to be most averse to Sheriff Sam ever pulling out the hog leg on his hip.)

Even the Western European countries which are quite willing, even eager, to accuse the US of being an international provocateur are quite happy to lay off the burdens both economic and political of global policing on the US.  This happiness is only going to grow as the assorted states of the European Union facing a collective as well as individual economic challenges downsize their national military capabilities.

In the good cause of deficit reduction, the Coalition government in the UK has taken measures which will shrink their military forces overall to a point that would make a replay of the Falklands Island War impossible.  Other NATO states are lessening their military expenses as well.  The net result will be the rendering of NATO to the status of military nullity at least as regards out of theater operations.  The longer term consequence of this downsizing trend is either shifting the burden to the US or surrendering the global insurgency to the purveyors of political Islam, including the adherents of armed Islamic insurgency.

The evil genii of the global Islamic insurgency will not skulk back to the bottle from which it has emerged over the past thirty or so years.  It is and will continue to be a feature on the global political scene regardless of what we or anybody might wish.  This means, quite simply, that war will not disappear soon from the experience of the human race.

The global insurgency will remain primarily a conflict of asymmetry, of wars almost too small to merit the name, of violence which is small scale but unending, of conflict which saps political will slowly but steadily over the years, the decades, perhaps generations.  It is nonetheless a war which will determine both the nature of the future and the quality of life in the present, each year's successive present.

Insurgency and its counter depend upon both violent and peaceful tactics and methods.  Within that truism the governing reality is that the violent portion is the more important.  It is violence which acts most directly and with greatest intensity upon the political will of the contestant populations.  And, as long as the violence continues, the conditions for that endgame necessity--conflict resolution--will not exist.  The ground truth is simply that the insurgents have to be cowed into submission before there is any possibility of developing a long term detente between differing world views and concomitant civilizations.

In this context it is critical to recall that diplomacy depends upon either the existence of coinciding national interests or a credible capacity for effective coercion.  With respect to coercion, when night falls, all the lesser means of coercion such as sanctions and diplomatic isolation rely upon the credible capacity and political will to employ force in support of policy.

Few governments question seriously the physical capacity of the US to employ force.  Most have a good handle on just how much destruction we can inflict even without using our nuclear weapons.  The quantum level improvements in all the many technologies involved in fighting wars made in recent years render even the observations from the Kuwait War no longer instructive.  The US way of war in both Iraq and Afghanistan has used only a small, even a very small, fraction of the lethality resident in our conventional capacities.  Still, most governments have a reasonably accurate appreciation of what the US could do should it need to.

Indeed, it has been American restraint in how it has fought in both Iraq and Afghanistan which has fed the long standing suspicions in many quarters of the world--including Iran and the purveyors of violent political Islam--that the US lacks the political will to use force in support of policy.  From the time the US withdrew from the Vietnamese War on to the present, there has been a broad sentiment to the effect that the US cannot muster the will to fight a seemingly endless war, to accept the deaths of American service personnel in a "no-win" war, to spend never ending torrents of money in pursuit of what at best constitutes a stalemate of the Korean War sort.

The much maligned unilateralism of George W. Bush went a long way to settling the doubts held by so many leaders around the world.  Unfortunately, the words of the Obama presidency have restored these doubts.  The doubts have been enhanced by some of the administrations actions, such as the apparent willingness of the president and his foreign policy "team" to toss Israel off the sleigh and to the wolves.  This lack of steadfastness disturbed the same Gulf state leaders who pressed the US to take swift and effective military action against Iran.  It might even have prompted the requests as a form of test of American realism and political will.

The sine qua non for success in foreign policy generally and war fighting in particular is consistency and persistence.  Radical shifts in either policy or action calls the reliability and predictability of the US into question in ways which do not further our national interests--or those of our more or less allies.  In a real sense, Great Powers are not allowed to change their minds without penalty.  That penalty is loss of credibility and with credibility goes the most important prize of diplomacy--influence.

For this reason the only rational choice for the Obama administration to make with respect to Afghanistan is to continue what we have been doing with one major addition.  The addition is convincing Pakistan that the governments there have been wrong for sixty years, that Pakistan needs the US more than the US needs Pakistan.

It is for the reasons of consistency and predictability, for the reason of credibility and influence maintenance, that the US must not only draw a line in concrete regarding Iran but must use all means at its disposal to bend that country's regime to our policy requirements.  The same applies to Israel and the Palestinians, choose a policy option which is in keeping with past American requirements and stick with it even if the Palestinians moan, groan, and toss a hissy fit.

While modifications in policy are a requirement of realism, these modifications must be on the margins and carefully explained to all parties.  The requirement for careful explanation also applies to assuring that We the People both understand and support policy including the use of military force should such be necessary.

In that connection this administration in common with all presidencies past and future must understand that We the People are very reluctant global cops.  The American public has never felt at home with the US being a Great Power.  Down deep inside most of us are just fine with Ron Paul's isolationist position.  Down deep inside where it counts, the majority of Americans past, present, and, probably, future see very few compelling reasons for Americans to leave their bones bleaching in the sun of some far away country the name of which most of us cannot pronounce let alone spell.  We see very few compelling reasons to spend vast sums of present and future money on weapons.  Most of us at the time agreed with Ike's "Farewell Address" and its warning against the "military-industrial complex."

We are not imperialists by nature any more.  Our period of seeking empire ended more than a hundred years ago.  Where we have been forced by reasons good or bad to send troops, we have never sought to stay.  (It might be noted that many foreign governments are quite well aware of this and thus are less uncomfortable with American troops being in the neighborhood than is the case with soldiers of other nationalities.)

The irony of the situation resident in the Gulf states request is simply that foreign governments are much more eager to see Sheriff Sam than We the People are willing to pin on the badge.  We Americans, pace many on the Left, are not seeking to be global cops on patrol.  The reality, however, is the world generally is not ready to see us be other than the Good Cop.

Assange Ups The Ante

Julian Assange and his cronies in crime have it in for the US.  Why this is so is for psychiatrists not historians to determine.  Today the desire of the supposed foe of secrecy in government launched his most direct attack on the security of the US and many other countries by releasing a cable which never, but never should have been classified only SECRET and thus available to the nimble fingers of the mentally skewed Bradley Manning.

The latest dispatch from the neitherworld of WikiLeaks details physical facilities identified by US embassies as critical to the security interests of the US.  By any reckoning, this release puts both places and people squarely in the crosshairs of any individual or group wishing to wreak havoc.  As such, it provides direct and substantial "aid and comfort" to enemies of the United States--and other countries as well such as the UK where several facilities are located.  Admittedly any individual with even the minimal Internet skills of the Geek and a fertile imagination could have located the vast majority of the listed facilities without the assistance of WikiLeaks, but a list with the official imprimatur of the State Department makes each and every location more inviting.

This release escalates the damage caused by Assange by a significant extent.  The previous dumps were, at most, embarrassing, with the caveat that longer term repercussions caused by reticence on the part of either American diplomats or their interlocutors may cause ripples of damage far more significant than the short term appearances indicate.  This time WikiLeaks is intentionally and with malicious aforethought seeking material harm to the US and other countries, including civilian casualties.

This malice has been implicit in the earlier releases, but this time there is no mere implication--only direct challenge to the Obama administration.  It is part of the Assange strategy of seeking to terrorize the US government into immunizing him and his organization against reprisals, legal or otherwise.  It is also part and parcel of Assange's remarkable hubris, an arrogance which surpasses the capacity of mere words to describe adequately.

The Assange arrogance is resident in his belief that he alone has the moral authority to determine what constitutes a legitimate state secret.  It is resident as well in his preposterous demand that President Obama resign if it can be shown that he knew of the spy-on-the-UN cable sent over the signature of Secretary of State Clinton.  It is resident as well in his threat to decrypt a "poison pill" of state and corporate secrets currently on hard drives of Assange groupies around the world.

With respect to the threatened "poisoned pill" which purportedly includes unseemly details from Gitmo as well as footage showing an air attack in Afghanistan with civilian fatalities and details from such diverse corporate "bad guys" as Bank of America and BP, the answer is simple, "Publish and be damned!"  No "revelations" such as these will topple the US.  They will not even topple the president.  It is an Assange bark without any real bite behind it.

Assange must know that the computer system to which Specialist Bradley had access was limited to low order material, classified at SECRET and below.  The real hot metal on target stuff is not classified this low down the pole with the apparent unfortunate exception of the critical facilities list.  The probability of any "poison pill" dump having any larger impact on the interests and security of the US than that contained in the critical facilities list is slim to none.

The real issue now that Assange has so blatantly thrown down the gauntlet is whether or not President Obama will show more backbone than a snail and order Cyber Command or some other, blacker, organ of state to go ahead and take WikiLeaks down for good.  The challenge has been made.  Will our commander-in-chief respond quickly, massively, and effectively to it?

The recurrent, distributed denial of service attacks carried out by legions of zombies from Asia, Russia, Africa, and the Central Asian Republics in recent days against WikiLeaks servers provides perfect cover to move in with the killer blow.  It can be done without leaving any Made In the USA fingerprints, if the Clueless Guy in the Oval directs that it be done.

So far Mr Obama has treated the three WikiLeaks dumps with a measure of indifference which surpasses belief.  He has done zilch either to counter the potential negative effects of the dumps, reassure the American and global  public that steps have been taken to preclude any future repeats, or let Assange know he had picked on the wrong country and the wrong president.

Given that Assange, hiding behind his lawyers, has threated to unleash his version of a "thermonuclear bomb" with the promised/threatened "poison pill" of unexpurgated documents, the president must step up and strike back.  Investigations by the Justice Department and explanations or apologies from the State Department do not cut the mustard now.  Only direct and serious words--and actions--from the POTUS will be sufficient.

Come on, Barack, this Assange creature has made it mano a mano, so man up over it and slap the bastard and his buddies where it hurts.

A Tribute To Honesty

Most of We the People like to think honesty is a good thing.  Heck, we may even try to be honest and open in our interpersonal dealings.  Sure, we are jaundiced--with good reason--with respect to the honesty of politicians, advertisers, journalists, and preachers of the frothing mouth persuasion.  In some areas we are even given to joking about the amount of honesty on the part of practitioners.

There is an old saw regarding diplomacy, "A diplomat is an honest person sent to a foreign country to lie on behalf of his own."  This mordant bit of semi-wit is undeserved.  More it is flat out wrong.

Two aspects of a country's foreign relations establishment depend upon blunt candor and utter honesty.  These are diplomacy and intelligence.  While it may be necessary to lie to outsiders in pursuit of the diplomat's or intelligence officer's mission, both must be fully and candidly frank and honest in their reporting from the field.  There is no room for fudging.  No tolerance for heaping sweeteners on underlying sour realities.  The diplomat must tell it like it is regardless of the hopes or fears of the denizens topside.  Any shading, no matter how slight, in deference to what the folks upchannel might want to read is a sin against the national interest.

The WikiLeaks cables demonstrate that our representatives are doing their job correctly.  The reports and accompanying assessments are bluntly honest.  We the People are, therefore, being well served.  The honesty, candor, and quality of the assessments are a very far cry from the sort of diplomatic traffic which passed from overseas to Foggy Bottom thirty and more years ago.  And, that is a very good thing for our country.

Because journalists and even the academic experts quoted in the MSM are apparently unacquainted with history, there has been an unfortunate silence regarding just how superior the leaked documents are in honesty, bluntness, and incisive analysis when compared with the tripe and pablum passing for diplomatic cables during the long dark years following the Republican attacks on the State Department and its personnel during the waning days of the Truman administration.

The shrill cries of "Communist!  Fellow traveler!  Commie dupe!" which echoed in the halls of Congress and through the media of the day served to totally emasculate American diplomats.  Diplomats high and low, accredited to countries great and small, were afraid to put the words of their interlocutors down on paper unless those words were precisely what the most ardent anti-communist in Congress or the press wanted to read.  Likewise, our Foreign Service personnel were scared to death to write an assessment which would not pass muster with the most rabid anti-communist crusaders.

The fear of being hailed before some Senate committee and accused of being the person who "lost" some country or another to the Global Communist Menace assured that the decision makers inside the Beltway--even in the Oval--flew blind, deprived of the necessary eyes on the ground and the counsel of situationally aware professionals.

As a result, American foreign policy for thirty years consisted of aligning the US with each and every authoritarian regime which delivered short term order.  As long as the local heavy promised to oppose Communism in all its many guises and kept a sufficiently strong lid on local discontent, one administration after another regardless of party pretended our "ally" was a staunch bastion of long term stability as well as free enterprise and, well, maybe, some sort of democratic appearances.

This approach--and all the many blunders which came with it--was not so much a policy as it was the default forced upon presidents and secretaries of state by sheer ignorance.  That ignorance resulted from the unwillingness of Foreign Service personnel to be honest, blunt, and candid.  The unwillingness of diplomats to be honest was the direct and completely predictable consequence of the unjustified and quite lethal attacks levied against their predecessors by totally irresponsible and self-seeking politicians riding the great wave of fear--fear of Communism.

The tree of ignorance bore us many poisoned fruits.  In some cases--think Iran--the toxin of these fruit continues to infect the world.  The Iranian object lesson by itself is proof positive of the crucial nature of honest reporting and frank assessments even when such is not welcomed in the rarefied air inside the Beltway.

Fortunately for our country and its interests, the professionals at State left the doldrums of cowardice some years ago as is illustrated convincingly in the WikiLeaks revelations.  Our people abroad are telling it like it is and offering assessments which are trenchant, well founded, and highly useful.  When Secretary of State Clinton argued the cables showed "diplomats doing the work of diplomacy," she spoke a truth of the highest order.

The worst impact of the data dump by Mr Assange's outfit is in its probable chilling effect upon both American diplomats and their foreign interlocutors.  For good and sufficient reason--the fear of future leaks--neither will be as willing to speak or write forthrightly.  While the impact may not be as devastating or long lasting as after the Republican scorched earth campaign of the McCarthy Era of Great Fear, any lowering of the candor quotient will harm our national interests.

The real work of diplomats is no more glitzy or glamorous than is the quotidian tasks of spooks.  It consists of talking to people and reading things.  It requires thinking.  Analysis.  Finally, it demands an ability to write and speak with cogency and effect.  Most of all, the work of diplomats needs intellectual and moral courage.

That is, the diplomat in all times and places must be able to see things as they actually are and not as they might be hoped or feared to be.  Then, the diplomat has to relay the results up the chain of command without any thought as to its impact on one's personal career let alone the opinions of those in Congress or the views of those who constitute the vast beast, the media.

Julian Assange as well as his media enablers at the NYT and other outlets and his source(s) such as the emotional and moral cripple Bradley Manning have conspired to impair the willingness and ability of our diplomatic personnel to do the job we pay them to do.  A job, the cables show clearly, that all hands have been doing with great skill and dedication.

The Alternative Reality Called Pakistan

One collateral benefit from the WikiLeaks diplomatic traffic data dump has been the "real time" confirmation of deep Pakistani involvement with the Taliban in Afghanistan.  While no sentient person well oriented in time and place has ever doubted the umbilical connection between the jihadists and the government, army, and intelligence service of Pakistan, there is something quite comforting in reading the assessments of qualified diplomatic observers.

The Paks were caught with their hands very deep in the cookie jar.  Rather than acting the part of the career criminal caught red handed and acknowledging that the pinch was a fair one, the Pakistani ruling elite in and out of uniform has behaved rather like a first time crook issuing denials that make Richard Nixon's famed "I am not a crook" declaration appear honest in comparison.  Indeed, the movers and shakers of military Pakistan have followed the old, disreputable approach of making counter-accusations.

To be effective, the counter-accusation gambit must be plausible.  It has to have some semblance of believability. The Pakistani effort fails this basic test.  The Paks have taken the road leading to an alternative universe by stating categorically the documents leaked are pure "disinformation" meant to discredit the government and military of Pakistan.  In the alternative reality of Pakistan, these products of the US Foreign Service are a "conspiracy" mounted by hostile forces within the US government.

The Obama administration might be wishing it too could join with Pakistan in the alternative universe given that the players of mood music inside the Beltway have been making reassuring noises about Pakistan's commitment to the joint effort against "extremism," which now seem more off key than ever in the context of the diplomatic cables.  How anybody, even one of those denizens whose brains have been damaged by too much rarefied Washington air, can really, really believe that Pakistan is and has done anything other than support Taliban in Afghanistan while doing the minimum necessary for national survival against the Pakistani equivalent boggles the mind.

Pakistan has defined its national interest in terms of a Forever War with India in which Afghanistan has represented the chimera of strategic depth.  That is why Pakistan created Taliban twenty years ago.  That is why Pakistan not only supported Taliban but gave timely warning to Osama bin Laden regarding incoming cruise missiles.  It is why Pakistan, again acting through the Directorate of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), linked with the Haqqani network.  It is why to this day ISI and the army assist, support, and protect both Taliban and the Haqqani network.

The notion that Afghanistan represents strategic depth is as false as the driving imperative of the Forever War against India.  Both hallucinations are,  however, central to assuring the army's pride of place in Pakistan.  Both are the sole reason the army and ISI can continue to glom onto the sizable share of Pakistan's national resources, which has been the standard for generations now.  Without the fictions of Indian hostility and the centrality of Afghanistan to Pakistan's need for strategic depth, the army and ISI would not have the perceived moral authority to take so much of the public pie that the country as a whole is endangered by the resulting paucity of capacities to deal with very real, very pressing problems.

A key, perhaps the key, source of revenue for the army and ISI is the money paid by the US to ensure cooperation in the "joint" struggle against violent political Islam.  The extortion racket practiced by Islamabad requires keeping the war in Afghanistan perking along while somehow convincing the US that the army is doing all it can do against the areas of the FATA which provide necessary bases and support for Taliban and the Haqqani network as well as the remnants of al-Qaeda.

The release of the cables will (hopefully) make the duplicity so necessary for the extortion to continue a bit more difficult to maintain.  In this context the US government is facing a challenge of corruption far more serious than the attention grabbing graft in Afghanistan.

There is no doubt that the continued existence of cross border sanctuaries in Pakistan's FATA along with the aid and comfort provided by ISI have been and will remain crucial to both Taliban and the Haqqani network. If the FATA were to be closed or interdicted with greater efficiency than is the case presently, the pressure placed upon the trigger pullers of Islam by the US/ISAF forces would prove effective in undercutting both the ability and will of the jihadi to carry on the war.  It would lay the pavement on a genuine road to conflict resolution as well as the more limited goal of hostilities termination.

Since the documents have come out, the Obama administration can do the same.  There is ample basis for the administration to tell Islamabad in essence, "They've got the goods on us now.  Time for you to get damn serious or those highly moral Republicans in Congress will pull the plug on the money machine."

This approach, of course, requires some cooperation from the Republicans.  As the war in Afghanistan not only started under a Republican president but, far more importantly, was fought ineptly with too few resources and too grandiose a set of goals by that president, the GOP has a stake in seeing the war brought to a successful conclusion before 2012.  Doing this is impossible unless the FATA is shut down--with or without the cooperation of the Pakistanis.

Pakistan's genuine national interest including the survival of the government as currently constituted demands both the suppression of their domestic jihadis and the ending of the war in Afghanistan.  The same considerations apply to the continuation of the American money flow.  Unless and until the lads in Islamabad come to realize that here in the real world the cash cow will stop spouting as long as the army sits on its collective butt regarding the FATA, there is no chance of the US achieving even the minimal necessary strategic goal of not losing in Afghanistan.  The same ground truth apples to the domestic violence brought by the Mighty Warriors of the Koran in Pakistan.

The appeals of the alternative universe of disinformation and conspiracy may have some sort of emotional appeal to the Pakistan government, army, and ISI, but are so transparently false that they should be dismissed by the Obama administration with the contempt it merits.  Beyond dismissal, the Obama crew must insist the Pakistanis live in the same world as the rest of us--or face the inevitable and inevitably bad consequences of their tergiversation.

Perhaps as a warm-up exercise, the Obama administration can take on Turkey given that the Islamist leaning AKP regime in Ankara has done the Pakistanis one better alleging that the Israelis are behind the entire WikiLeaks episode.  Surely scotching that ploy and requiring the Turks to choose sides with greater accuracy should not be beyond the capacity of the administration and Secretary of State Clinton.

Rather than just seeing the leak as an embarrassment or a major disaster, the administration should see it as an opportunity to use a bit of honest, coercive diplomacy with respect to two troublesome "allies."  By doing so, the Obama "Team" cannot only retrieve some success from a defeat, but exploit the consequences to suit our policy needs.

Try it, people, you have nothing to lose except defeat.

This Time The Leaks Really Hurt

As a historian dealing with national security affairs the Geek has been long frustrated and angered by the degree of secrecy surrounding diplomatic and military communications and other documents, even those dealing with the most mundane tactical matters.  He has fought many skirmishes with the Minions of Secrecy in order to gain access to materials forty and more years old.

Many, many times when the documents have been released (usually with more than their fair share of thick black lines scattered throughout), the Geek has been surprised that the materials had ever been classified given their content.  Many seem to have been stamped "Burn Before Reading" in order to protect egos, cover over errors of judgement, and otherwise maintain what one White House wallah called, "the mystique of government."

With that as background, the release today of a quarter million documents by the media organs favored by WikiLeaks, to say nothing of the actual WikiLeaks posting, does constitute real damage to the ability of American diplomats to carry out their most basic function.  That task, the foundation of all embassy work, is to speak candidly with representatives of the host government and report back to Foggy Bottom in full, accurate, and blunt candor.  While a degree of public prevarication is a requirement for diplomats, the need for internal honesty of fact and assessment is even more vital.

Diplomats who can not report honestly and frankly are a waste of public money.  Likewise, a host government which cannot speak bluntly with American representatives constitutes a net liability for American interests.  All hands everywhere in the world play the game the same way.  All expect blunt honesty in all internal communications.  All speak with forked tongues--a friendly, bland one for public consumption and an acidic sharp one in private.  And, most importantly, all anticipate that the bluntness will stay all in the family so to speak.

Thanks to the treacherous actions of a weasel named Brandly Manning aided and abetted by a computer system which grants automatic access to any low level person with a Secret clearance, the honesty and frankness without which diplomacy in its many, many forms has been compromised.  Over and above Private Manning is the shadowy Australian Julian Assange whose motives are declared to be pure beyond the ken of mere humans but who may well be a meretricious servant of men deeper in the dark for whom the United States and its actions are anathema.

The duo of Manning and Assange as well as their media facilitators such as the NYT have conspired and acted to cripple severely the capacity of the US to engage effectively in the normal tasks of diplomacy.  They may even have damaged the American ability to formulate and execute foreign policy for years to come.

The only upside in the current affair is that none of the documents carried the highest category of classification.  Bad as the damage done by the glimpse at the real deal of diplomatic doings has been, it would have been orders of magnitude worse had the Top Secret and Sensitive Compartmented Information category been breeched as well.

The way in which damage has been done to US interests does not reside so much in what was actually disclosed, although some of that, such as the Yemeni president saying he has no problem with smuggled whiskey provided it is "good," will have immediate negative ramifications.  The real damage will come when foreign policy makers find some item in the revelations which provides plausible public cover in rejecting an American demarche or an American request for cooperation on a matter of what can be seen as a coinciding national interest.

Most political leaders--and all who deal hands-on with foreign policy--understand how the game is played and will be disinclined to take offense at the contents of the released documents.  Most will take a thank-God-it-didn't-happen-to-us attitude.  But there will be exceptions, some genuine and others artificial.  The exceptions may well hurt.

Also likely to hurt will be the effects of released materials upon the domestic opposition to some foreign governments discussed in the documents.  Opposition groups will go over the trove with an eye for anything, any tiny tidbit which can be exploited to the disadvantage of the man or party in power.  Foreign leaders friendly to the US are the most likely victims of this data mining process.  That will hurt, particularly if they are either forced from office or compelled by the opposition to change pro-US policies.

Another way in which the release will hurt is that it will inhibit honesty both on the part of American diplomatic personnel and foreign interlocutors both inside and outside government.  If secret materials are likely to become a matter of global knowledge, the only rational response is not to talk--at least not honestly and not to write--again or at least not honestly.

This release is no victory for the public's right to know.  Most of the materials are properly classified and awaiting declassification is no unacceptable burden on Americans or foreign nationals.  No genuine need has been served by the dreadful duo of Manning and Assange--except the needs of enemies of the United States and other civilized countries.

Diplomacy By Tribunal

The fallout from the latest WikiLeaks monster dump includes a shot of growth hormone for one of the most disturbing recent trends in the conduct of foreign relations.  That new, dark development is an increasing reliance upon investigations conducted by tribunals operating under some sort of mandate from the UN or a subsidiary organization of the Really Big Folly By The Hudson.

The use of these tribunals, exemplified by the UN created travesty which goes by the name of the Goldstone Panel, is being expanded.  An excellent example of this mission creep is found in the call for a special "study" of the ethics, legality, and general humanitarian propriety of the employment of unmanned lethal systems typified by the US operated Predator and Reaper UAVs.  The long term goal of the "study" called for by the UNs new Special Rapporteur on Extrajudical Executions is the outlawing of these systems by international convention.  In this, the new guy, Christof Heyns, hopes to further the campaign of demonization started by his predecessor, Phillip Alston.

Mr Alston saw the use of Predators and Reapers as being especially vile as they operated at a remove from the immediate combat zone and, worse, did not put the operators at any physical risk.  The fact that the opposition command structure sought immunity from the consequences of its own actions by locating itself within the civilian population in a third country in no way bothered either Mr Alston or Mr Heyns.  Neither worthy were concerned about the cavalier attitude held by the senior leadership of al-Qaeda, Taliban, or other similar groups toward the local non-combatants among whom they sheltered.

Heyns no more than Alston worried in the slightest that the unmanned systems were actually more accurate in their targeting than would be the case with manned platforms.  Apparently, each man was most disturbed by the technological asymmetry favoring advanced countries such as the US and, horrors!, Israel.

The very success of the unmanned platform operations against leaders of groups practicing violent political Islam has built a momentum against the continued use of these systems.  One can be sure that the call for a "study" will be strongly supported by states which facilitate and support the operations of groups pursuing violent political Islam.  It is equally probable that states lacking equivalent technology but harboring deep hostility against the US and other Western countries will do the same.  It is almost as likely that Great Powers such as Russia and China will support the "study" since their efforts in the unmanned systems would be exempt from any proposed restrictions.

In short, the "study" demand is an excellent example of the conduct of diplomacy, the search to advance one's own interests at the expense of the interests of others using a modification of the "tribunal" method.  Since the notion of "arms limitation" has an appeal to people on the Left of the political spectrum and, since the object of the "limitation" is the US or other equally easy to demonize states, the approval for the "study" will be loud within the Left leaning elites of the US and Western Europe.

The same elites will loudly back the demands for investigations of the abuses committed by sectors of the Iraqi security forces set forth in some of the documents in the WikiLeaks dump.  Of necessity, the investigations will focus on the US for alleged sins of omission as well as Iraq for sins of commission.  In the eyes of some, including UK Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, the actions or inactions of both the US and the UK in Iraq merit probing.

The UN and its subsidiary Human Rights Council have already called for investigation.  There is a good chance that Iran will seek to tag its search for a UN investigation of purported US government involvement in the events of 9/11 onto any review of American culpability for alleged war crimes or human rights abuses committed by Iraqi security forces.  Admittedly, there is no logical let alone direct link between the two universes, but that sort of mundane consideration is of little merit in the UN.

The WikiLeaks "revelations" are likely to reinvigorate the search for "justice" by Turkey and its associates regarding the Israeli assault on the Mazi Marmora.  The whatever-we-can-do-for-the-Palestinians crew will barnacle their cause to any inquiry into alleged Iraqi abuses.  The new narrative will emphasize the unity between the US and its actions in Iraq and Israel and its actions vis a vis the West Bank and Gaza.

When night falls, the conclusion will be that the US turns a blind eye to the inhumane and inhuman acts of both its Iraqi and Israeli clients.  The US will be branded as the facilitator of crimes against humanity in both Iraq and the Mideast.  It will take only a very small slide down this very slippery slope to conclude the US not only facilitates and protects but also directly engages in the most vile abuses of human rights.

The goal of the narrative as well as the "studies" and "investigations" and "tribunals" on both the input and output end will be the global reduction of US influence by a consistent message of American indifference to human rights or the ethical conduct of military operations.  Truth is not a consideration.  Neither is that mythical beast, "justice."  All that is important is the diminishing of American influence, American ability or will to play a major role in international politics.

Because "tribunals," "studies," and "investigations" seem to reek of an even handed pursuit of truth, they will gain both support and acceptance within the US and the West generally.  The conclusions, no matter how unjustified or unjustifiable, will be warmly embraced by significant segments of the American and Western European population--the blame-America-first bunch.

It is this built in potential for support and acceptance which gives the new approach in diplomacy its appeal,  It is what makes it so dangerous to the interests of the US and other civilized countries.  The use of mechanisms which represent themselves to be detached, impartial, disinterested, which present themselves as judicial, uses the Western love of justice as a sovereign weapon against the West.

The enemies of civilization be they practitioners of violent political Islam, members of the profoundly alienated, self-hating Left of the West, or simply governments skilled in the pursuit of national interests have developed a new and powerful form of diplomacy.  It is a form which uses the strengths of civilized states against them.  It is a form of diplomacy for which we are poorly prepared to engage.  It is a form of diplomacy which may well lubricate the skids to Western impotence.

WikiLeaks and the MSM have given the users of this new form of diplomacy a new venue in which to operate.  WikiLeaks and the MSM have provided the enemies of civilization with a new set of tools to use against us.

The founder of WikiLeaks said "it is all about the truth."  He is wrong.  It is all about defeating the West and all it stands for.

Julian Assange has done a good job of work for whoever is paying his bills.  The paymasters have chosen well.  They got more than their money's worth.

The Winds Of Hypocrisy And Idiocy Blow Again

The rather disreputable bunch (or individual) at WikiLeaks has captured the attention of entirely too much of the world's mainstream media.  In a case which resembles a sort of "this verse, same as the first," WikiLeaks has provided its favorite media outlets with advance copies of an enormous (391,000+) low level, tactical "Significant Activities" reports.  These are the same sort and level of routine document as constituted the earlier and much smaller batch release.


The SigAct reports provide a blurry look at a complex war from the perspective of a myriad of eyes quite close to the ground.  Their content varies in actual significance.  Similarly, the documents range in quality from highly incisive to pretty much of a let's-pretend-we've-done-something-today sort.  There are more than a few occasions when two or more SigActs cover the same events in the same period of time but with such different perspectives that the result seems to be several different events occurring at widely separated times and places.  Depending on the mindset of the person compiling the SigAct, the verbiage may be so dense in milspeak as to be incomprehensible without a translator.


The reporting of the contents of the mountain of milspeak by the assorted mainstream media is like that which took place a few months ago after WikiLeak's first release.  The best way to characterize the MSM approach is to recollect a brilliant scene from the classic movie Casablanca.


Remember the scene where Claude Raines as the smarmy French police official tells Rick that his bar is being shut down?  "I'm shocked, shocked I tell you to find out gambling is going on here."  At that point a flunky comes in and says, "Your winnings, inspector."  


A more perfect emblematic rendition of hypocrisy cannot be found--unless it is in the media treatment of the current data dump.  Maidenly protests of shock have ensued over several matters found in the great mound of otherwise boringly repetitive, utterly mundane, and, taken overall, quite insignificant activities.  


(Shock the First) More Iraqi civilians may have been killed by either friendly or hostile forces than officially announced to date.


(Shock the Second) American troops did use lethal force when vehicles approaching checkpoints or overtaking convoys did not heed warning signals--including shots--and stop as ordered.


(Even Bigger Shock Number Three) Iraqi security forces abused, even killed, suspected insurgents without the Americans acting immediately and robustly to stop the illegal acts.


The media could not contain their surprise when the documents demonstrated that the oft repeated American accusations of Iranian direct involvement in the arming, training, and directing of insurgent forces were based in fact.  


Each and every one of these highlighted matters constitutes either base hypocrisy or utter idiocy for two simple reasons.  Simple reason number one: The assorted MSM outlets had reporters in theater, assigned to the relevant American and other allied forces throughout the period covered by this dump.  Simple reason number two: We have been down this road before, during the Vietnam War--and the same MSM had reporters covering that war as well.


If any of the Chorus of Shocked And Outraged Maidens had consulted their own morgues, the result would have been both educational and important for accurate framing of the Iraq story.  Leaving aside the one very high profile war crime committed by US personnel, the Mai Lai shootings, the files would have shown reports both spiked and printed of other American acts which could accurately be termed war crimes.  The files would also have disclosed the widespread and very widely covered stories of South Vietnamese security forces abusing captured hostile personnel and those suspected of assisting the hostiles in manifold ways--including murder.  The US and other media also noted the US personnel on scene usually did not stop the abuses.


The morgue search would also have revealed that in the Vietnam War as in wars generally, civilians are killed.  As in the cases cited from Iraq, the killing of civilians can and often has resulted from actions on the part of the civilians which seem to the soldier to be a threat.  Since war is a get-or-get-got activity, it should not surprise anyone oriented in time and place that the soldier will shoot if warnings have no effect.


Because civilians tend to litter the battlefield in unseemly numbers and at most inconvenient locations, it is not shocking that some are killed despite the best intents of the troops.  Nor is it shocking that fatality counts can vary widely over time.  Disparities of count between "official" reports and the SigActs is not evidence of cover up or a policy of understating the lethal effects of American combat operations.


The war in Iraq was an interventionary war after the defeat of the Saddam Hussein regime.  Even though the US was the major actor in theater, the legal and policy fiction that we and other foreign forces were operating in support of the Iraqi government was paramount.  The Iraqi security forces not unlike their South Vietnamese equivalents forty years earlier had a very touchy sense of nationalism.  


The sensitivities of Iraqi personnel--particularly at the command level--inhibited the capacity of the US to act robustly and rapidly to end abusive practices.  The relations between tactical units in the field in Iraq, as had been the case in Vietnam, were always problematic so company and field grade officers rarely felt free to get tough with their Iraqi counterparts.  This meant the most common response was to file a report, kick the problem upstairs, and hope the heavyweights topside would solve it.


More than that the Americans could not do if there was going to be any realistic possibility of shifting combat and security responsibilities to the Iraqi forces.  It is simple for a journalist to sit back and engage in condemnation.  That is not a luxury available to the guy at the spot.


Then it must be recalled that Iraq had a pre-invasion history which was heavy in torture and extajudicial executions.  The history lacked any appreciable dedication to the rule of law or the tempering of "justice" with either mercy or self-interest.  The same history also produced a lengthy record of scores in need of settling while abrading any concern about the judgement of the future.


Given the history of Iraq prior to the invasion as well as the nature of the war being waged between the security forces (including foreign contingents) and the insurgents propelled by faith in violent political Islam, the real shock is how few unnecessary deaths are recorded in the SigActs.  Considering the contexts, both historical and contemporary, the Americans not only fought a clean war but exercised a great deal of influence on the behavior of Iraqi security units.  Had it been otherwise the blood would have gushed rather than merely oozing from the released documents.


Either the NYT or the WaPo (they run together in the Geek's mind) characterized the SigAct reports as providing a "fine grained" view of the war.  That's true as long as it is remembered that in this case the view is an extreme close up, the sort of close up which distorts the image beyond both comprehension and accuracy.  The distortion is made all the greater when a media outlet chooses to ignore the weight of the majority of the reports--mundane, not filled with atrocities real or imagined, but replete with fire missions not fired, aborted air strikes, and all the other consequences of a command structure and operational doctrine which exhibited a sound and accurate understanding of the basic principle of counterinsurgency--You Cannot Kill Your Way To Victory--as well as the corollary--A Dead Civilian Is A Victory For The Enemy.


Arguably, the release of the reports by WikiLeaks has harmed both the US and the fragile polity in Iraq.  But it is incontrovertible that the treatment of the leak by the MSM has done even more damage.  By their framing and inexcusable idiocy, evidenced by willful historical ignorance as well as overlooking the presence of their own reporters during the time and at the places covered by the SigActs, the MSM has done a potentially great harm to the US.


The degree of harm is indicated by the totally expectable demands by the UN for a complete investigation of the American inaction in the presence of Iraqi human rights abuses and possible war crimes.  By setting the stage for an exhibition of America bashing by an organization filled with professional haters of all things and all actions American, the MSM--particularly those located in the US--have hit a new low point in their "buyers remorse" over having sung unquestioning hosannas in support of the invasion of Iraq.


American MSM have not been noted in recent years for having either a sense of shame or a commitment to telling it like it is rather than how they would like it to be.  The full-throated pursuit of a blame-America-first agenda by leading news outlets in the US does journalism no credit.  Nor is it in the better interests of the country or We the People.  


Nor will all the boiler plate special pleadings about the sacred right to know make the treatment of the leak and its contents any less dishonest.  The public does have a right to know, but that right is for the entire story, the whole truth, not carefully selected and framed portions of a complex reality.

Gates Gets It Right--Why Can't Anyone Else?

It is good to know that there is one mature, realistic, and plain speaking person in the Obama administration. Amid all the amateur strategists, self-proclaimed experts in geopolitics, and other assorted talk-without-thinking, speak-without-knowledge folks, Robert Gates stands out as the voice of both accuracy and rationality.

This time the secretary was on CNN responding to the WikiLeaks "revelations," particularly those dealing with the collaboration between the Directorate of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and Taliban. Predictably, he did play down the current closeness between ISI and the insurgents. As a needed balance he did bring the historical dimension of that cooperation into sharp focus. In this he is unique among the flurry of pontification, viewing-with-alarm, and all around hand-wringing which has characterized both politicians and the mainstream media.

Gates said, " we walked out on Pakistan and Afghanistan in 1989 and left them basically holding the bag. And there is always the fear that we will do that again. And I believe that's the reason there's a certain hedge." The Geek can say only, "Amen." (Of course, with his usual modesty the Geek points out that he has made the same point several times in posts over the past three years.)

The unthinking way in which the administrations of both Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush walked away from the morass in Afghanistan not only "left them basically holding the bag" but paved the way for the emergence of Taliban. The senior decision makers of both administrations were warned in a timely manner as to the dangers of handing the Afghan brief over to Islamabad generally and the ISI particularly. But the warnings came from people far down the food chain in the bureaucracies in Langley, Foggy Bottom, and the Pentagon. And, the folks topside had bigger fish to fry as well as a very short term view of the future.

In recent years the short-term vision of the Reagan and H.W. Bush days has been mirrored by the short memories of the W. Bush and Obama administrations. The people breathing the rarefied air around the Oval (as well as journalists and politicians generally) have forgotten the experiences of our earlier activities in both Afghanistan and Pakistan. (This statement presupposes that the minds of today have ever been cluttered by any knowledge of the past, even the very recent and quite critical past.)

When the Americans went to Afghanistan nine plus years ago, their plans were in no way based upon the vast experience collected during the long years of the anti-Soviet proxy war or the years of Pakistani-Taliban collaboration which followed. It is was this willful and easily cured ignorance which both allowed and encouraged the Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld bunch to fail to properly define the goal of the invasion as being purely punitive. Or, to use the less offensive term invented during the Obama administration, "counter-terrorism."

Rather than putting the most narrow focus on the goal of the invasion, the W. Bush administration opted for a hazy and attractive view of somehow building a modern Western style nation-state in the rocky and sterile soil of Afghanistan. At the same time neocon ninnies of the Bush/Cheney days were scared silly by the prospect of somehow angering, alienating, even slightly annoying the military junta which ran Pakistan.

As a result the Americans stood by as the ISI assisted any number of Taliban and al-Qaeda heavyweights to flee the new boots on the ground for the hospitable lands of the FATA--and Pakistan proper. This gross blunder assured that two unpleasant realities would come to pass in the fullness of time. Taliban along with the Haqqani network and other, smaller adherents of armed political Islam would recover their strength; ISI and other components of the Pakistani military and government would continue to provide support and assistance.

When Taliban and the others were ready, they returned to the fight in Afghanistan. The reentry was done with the full support of ISI and understanding of other parts of the Pakistani military and government. There is no doubt but ISI and others depended upon two eventualities coming to pass so as to secure Pakistani goals and reduce any risks to Islamabad.

The first of this was the existence within the US of sufficient war weariness to limit the American will and capacity to counter the new, stronger Taliban. Along with this, the planners of ISI assumed the armed political Islamists of Taliban, et al would be focused sufficiently upon gaining victory in Afghanistan to be willing to refrain from attacks against Pakistan.

In both assumptions ISI was proven wrong. To their consternation, the new, ever-so-peaceful, ever-ready-to-reach-out President Obama was willing to take the risk of sending more troops as well as a competent commander to Afghanistan. And, the LeT was quite willing and able to present an existential challenge to Islamabad in the FATA and elsewhere.

In response to the (unplanned for if not completely unexpected) ramping up of the Islamist political challenge as well as the violence which accompanied it, the government and armed forces of Pakistan had no choice but to wage war against LeT and other groups. The campaigns in Swat and portions of the FATA have been slow motion, fought primarily by the second string of paramilitary forces or the low risk, low effectiveness means of air and artillery strikes and have been conducted in a way assuring minimum losses to the "bad guys," particularly the command echelons.

The Pakistanis have been somewhat more forthcoming in assistance to the US in its conduct of the Predator targeted killing program. The actionable intelligence flow has increased along with the tempo of Predator operations. This has benefited the Pakistanis by eliminating key hostile personnel without any political risk.

If the remarks of Secretary Gates regarding the improvement in Pakistani cooperation are restricted to this area, they are completely correct. At the same time it is critical to note that the collaboration of Islamabad in such matters as impairing the Haqqani network have remained unchanged month to month for years now.

The mention of targeted killings opens the door to the question of just which strategy is the US now following in Afghanistan--counterinsurgency with nation-building or a punitive counter-terrorism approach? At root this constitutes a distinction without a difference. However, since there are some contemporary Great Captains such as Vice-president Joe Biden and the New York Times for which it is critical, a general comment is required.

Both Joe (If-I-Feel-It-I-Say-It) Biden and the NYT are of the view that targeted killing is the hallmark of punitive counter-terrorism but is totally unsuited to counterinsurgency. The V-P and the NYT see the recent higher volume use of both air and ground strikes against identified commanders of Taliban and other groups as being the refutation of the protect the civilians emphasis of General McChrystal.

They are as wrong as a soup sandwich. Organizational disruption is equally important in a genuine counterinsurgent strategy as it is in a pure effort at counter-terrorism. Any success in a counterinsurgent effort requires mobilizing support from the uncommitted majority of the civilian population to the government at the expense of the insurgent. Any success in a counter-insurgent campaign also demands a progressive reduction of the organizational coherence of the insurgents.

In short, successful counterinsurgency requires protecting those who need protection, converting the insurgents who are open to conversion, and killing those insurgents who are immune to any compromise, any power sharing agreement, any alternative less than total victory. For the hard core leadership of Taliban et al, the war is existential in nature. This means they must be killed. Period.

When a commando team on the ground or a UAV delivered Hellfire kills a Taliban heavyweight, it is both a success in counter-terrorism and counterinsurgency. Killing these people is both a necessity and a good thing. Period.

The difference between punitive oriented counter-terrorism and counterinsurgency comes in the other measures taken. Insofar as an emphasis is placed upon all the areas falling under the rubric "nation-building" the outside intervenor as well as the host government is waging a counterinsurgent effort.

The nature of the human terrain in Afghanistan militates against nation-building if such is defined as the creation of a Western style nation-state in Afghanistan. This reality does not allow the US and its partners an easy way out however. The domestic political realities as well as the mindset of American and Western European elites will not allow a simple refocus on the eminently realistic policy of punitively oriented counter-terrorism.

It is necessary for reasons endemic to the politics and values of the West to make a good show of nation-building in Afghanistan even if such provides an endstate far less than wished. There is no way in which most Western elitfes would be satisfied if, when the shooting stops, Afghanistan is a medieval feudal theocracy--even if that is precisely what most Afghans are most comfortable with.

The next time Secretary Gates is on TV it would be nice if he could turn his highly realistic and vastly experienced brain loose on that matter. On the matter of explaining just why there can be no nation-building possible in Afghanistan without a severe redefinition of the term.

The Wikileaks Data Dump Is Flat Out Boring

Reading the Wikileaks Mother Of All Leaks not only provides terminal eye strain, it numbs the brain. It is a tedious slog through a vast swamp of low-level, quotidian reports covering all manner of routine subjects.

The Geek is well prepared for monumental amounts of sheer ennui occasioned by the reading of awesomely repetitive and frightfully mundane materials which are the major product of all wars, particularly those of the "overseas contingency operation" sort. In his various employments, the Geek has spent (subjective) centuries plowing through hundreds of thousands of documents from the Vietnam War as well as other similar conflicts before and after the Great Southeast Asian War Game.

The documents flowing through Wikileaks are of a piece with those of Vietnam, Greece, Malaya, Somalia, portions of the Korean War, the interventions in the Dominican Republic, Panama, El Salvador, and elsewhere. They are inherently without real interest to anyone other than the specialist in the history of fouled up interventions or screwed up attempts at counterinsurgency and its evil cousin, nation-building.

Insofar as the documents have value it is to be found in demonstrating just how long and deeply the Directorate of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) has been involved with Taliban, al-Qaeda, and the Haqqani network. While that involvement is well known to any and all with both an interest in the dynamics of the AfPak region and a proper orientation in time and place, the repetitive mentions of direct ISI partnership with the "radical extremists" of Taliban et al down to the level of operational planning and execution support provides the sort of detail necessary to counter even the most ardent attempts to portray Islamabad as a reliable ally in the war against the adherents of violent political Islam.

As the Geek has noted in numerous posts (as well as elsewhere), the government and military of Pakistan have worked both sides of the street for more than twenty years. Primarily but not exclusively relying upon ISI, Islamabad has sought consistently and effectively to exploit the opportunities presented by Taliban on the one hand and the US fear and loathing of that group on the other to secure and advance Pakistani national interests.

The Pakistani government and, to an even greater extent, its military deserve credit for pursuing national interest at all costs. The firm focus, dedication, and skill shown by the Pakistanis in keeping their eyes on the prize are all outstanding. The Pakistanis deserve congratulations for their effective exploitation of every opportunity presented in Afghanistan as well as their equally high level of ability at practicing extortion against the US.

Indeed, it does not distort reality to assert the Pakistanis have exceeded even the Israelis in the tail-wags-dog areas of foreign policy. Not only have the Pakistani regimes and ISI both created the threat of violent political Islam in Afghanistan and facilitated the survival of al-Qaeda both before and after the US invasion of 2002, they have used the threat they created to extort US military aid and diplomatic support.

No regime has ever surpassed or even equaled the Pakistani for working both sides of the American street. This accomplishment merits respect.

It also has to be ended.

The difficulty comes in that there is no simple, direct, and certain way to depose the fine folks in Islamabad, particularly at the ISI, from their comfortable position in the catbird seat. The dynamic has existed so long (over twenty-five years) and has become so deeply rooted in the relationship between Pakistan and the US, between Pakistan and Afghanistan, that ending it seemingly defies imagination and reality alike.

Pakistan, in and of itself, presents the fundamental conundrum for policy makers.

The Pakistanis are profoundly anti-American. The fear, loathing, and hatred of the US felt and expressed by so many Pakistanis is such that mere civilian aid projects, simple economic development projects even if carefully planned and executed so as to provide immediate, direct, positive results to the Pakistani public, will do nothing to end or even significantly reduce the anti-American sentiments pervading so many in the country. Of course the probability of civilian projects being so perfect must be rated realistically as close to zero.

Also, the Pakistani population has shifted increasingly to the political Islam side of the Muslim opinion spectrum. The shift started during Partition. It accelerated during the several losing wars fought against India. It was intentionally enhanced by General Zia as a means of developing political coherence among the fractured Pakistani population. Finally, the US invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq were used effectively by promoters of both Pakistani nationalism and violent political Islam to give an additional fast boost to radicalization over the past several years.

The population of no country, not Iran, not Saudi Arabia, not Turkey, not even the quasi-country of Palestine, can equal that of Pakistan in embracing the goals, motives, justifications, and methods of violent political Islam. That sorry actuality is most pronounced among the younger elements of the population. And, it must not escape notice, the young provide the wannabe martyrs, the eager trigger-pullers, the guys willing to kill and die.

In Pakistan there are always three public villains: The US, Israel, and India. The relative place on the list may shift from time to time, but overall India occupies the position of Main Enemy, leaving Israel and the US to fight it out for the second spot.

For the government, and, even more, the army, India is always Enemy Number One. It has been that way since Partition. It will stay that way as far into the future as anyone cares to speculate. The English never hated and feared the French, nor the French the Germans with anywhere near the intensity exhibited by the Pakistanis for the Indians. On the other side of the hill, the intensity is nearly equal.

This equation does not bode well for a sudden outbreak of peace, love, and harmony on the sub-continent. The legacy of blood has stood too long for that to be in the tealeaves. Even if the Pakistanis and Indians were to be afflicted with the sort of memory deficiency which characterizes the American public, there have been too many recent events and too many emerging points of friction to provide a basis for genuine conflict resolution.

The focus on India has meant and will continue to mean that Afghanistan serves as a sort of strategic depth for Pakistan. The goal of Islamabad during and after the anti-Soviet war in which the ISI played such a critical role was the establishment of strategic depth. The use of the Islamist Taliban was a brilliant stroke by the ISI and was executed with equal brilliance by Lt General Hamid Gul. The Islamist glue provided Taliban with a coherence unequalled by any of the other contenders for power in post-Soviet Kabul. In violent political struggles, cohesion is the single most important consideration. Taliban had it in spades.

Finally, Pakistan is a member of the nuclear club. It achieved this status despite both American opposition and liberal bribes. Of course, once Pakistan demonstrated its nuclear capability, the regime gained both status internationally and a degree of freedom from coercion it lacked previously.

The US policy regarding Pakistan was governed not by any realistic appraisal of coinciding national interests but rather from a total distaste for the Kremlin leaning governments of India. US policy in Pakistan was a pure artifact of the Cold War. However, the creation of Taliban dominated Afghanistan by ISI just as the Cold War ended made radical shifting of previous US policy difficult.

The emergence of violent political Islam during the Clinton administration locked the US into the long standing stance of accommodating Pakistan. The achievement of a nuclear capability by Pakistan further froze the US into its subordinate role in the bilateral relationship.

As a result Pakistan has had a free hand in simultaneously supporting and aiding Taliban and the Haqqani network while extorting evermore assistance from the US. We have known all of this all along, so the "revelations" of the Wikileaks dump add nothing.

The Pakistanis have proven to be resistant to American hectorings, threats, and blandishments alike. They can take this rejectionist stance because we need them far more than they need us.

Without the minimal cooperation the Pakistanis have provided it would be impossible for us to continue our program of Predator strikes in the FATA. Without the minimal cooperation the ISI has furnished to CIA the flow of actionable intelligence regarding al-Qaeda and Taliban actions and personalities would be lessened, perhaps fatally so. And, without the minimal cooperation of Islamabad it would be impossible to support the forces already deployed in Afghanistan.

Those are representative of the bitter realities upon which members of congress must take a grip as they debate the continuation of the war in Afghanistan and our cooperation with the regime in Islamabad. In short, unless we continue to conform with Pakistani policy dictates, there will be few choices beyond abandoning our efforts in Afghanistan and leaving the place to the locals--and ISI.

We know and have known for years now just what Islamabad is up to in Afghanistan. Islamabad is completely aware that we know. There are no secrets here. This means in turn that there is no room for the US to play bluffs, to wiggle diplomatically, or to coerce credibly.

Back during the Reagan years we let Islamabad get us by the shortest of short hairs. That is where they have us today. Nothing changes that.

Our cone of options has narrowed to two: Go along with Islamabad's tune; get out of the region.

Nothing in the Wikileaks dump changes that. And, in that fact one finds the only matters of interest, the only non-boring matters.