The Wartime President

Apparently, the President, not content to be involved in conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya, announced that he is dispatching about 100 special forces units to Central Africa to assist with stamping out the rebellion of a group known as the Lord's Resistance Army. Why? MSNBC reports there is speculation that this is political payback.

Why is the U.S. sending its troops to finish off a fractured band of bush fighters in the middle of Africa? Political payback for the quiet sacrifices of Uganda's troops in Somalia could be one reason, experts say.
. . .
But capturing LRA leader Joseph Kony — a ruthless and brutal thug — remains the highest priority for Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, a 25-year-leader who has committed thousands of troops to the African Union force in Somalia to fight militants from al-Shabab, a group with ties from al-Qaida.

I haven't had time to digest all the back story on this particular adventure, so it might be a good move in the grand scheme of things. But it sure does reinforce the O = W narrative, or as Dean put it O > W.


Since this effort is strategically linked to the efforts against al Qaeda, we have to ask, at what point do we wind down the GWOT? While al Qaeda is still operating, they seem to be a spent force politically. Perhaps giving them undue attention is counter-productive as it only enhances their street cred. If so, using proxies like the Ugandans against them seems wise. Of course, this will produce other unintended consequences.

Irony Defined

By this WaPo headline:

Al-Qaeda joins those questioning legality of U.S. killing of citizen Anwar al-Awlaki

No mention by al-Qaeda of illegal hijackings of airliners, killing of thousands of Americans, use of mentally challenged suicide bombers, blowing up mosques to foment violence in Iraq, etc. The list is long and tiresome. Even if one were to question the legality, and I have, hearing it from these scumbags is a little much to bear.

B-Daddy's 9/11 Perspective

I was in the U.S. Navy on September 11, 2001. For our armed forces, the day was truly a watershed event. We were continuing the changes that accrued to the end of the cold war. Base security had become very light, for example, in an effort to save money. At the time, we were still primarily focused on the continuing threat from Russia and the rising threat from China, as well as the possibility of regional conflict with Iran and North Korea. (LCR has a post that sheds light on the same issue.) 9/11 immediately changed that view. The initial efforts to establish greater base security were haphazard, and obviously inadequate. It took years of work and hundreds of millions of dollars to adequately put in place technology commensurate with the threat. Despite, those efforts our armed forces at Fort Hood in Texas suffered from the success an insider attack, for which we were unprepared.

But the military changed, and will ultimately rise to the full challenge of the changed environment, I have no doubt. I am far more concerned about the ways that we have allowed the war on terror to reduce our liberties. It is not a coincidence that the Obama administration carried on many of the same policies of the Bush years. Certainly the threat is real; but it is the predilection of government to establish greater control over we the people in the presence of a threat. This must be resisted; by legal means of course, but resisted none the less. Some of my concerns:

• What is the legal basis for targeting U.S. citizens abroad for assassination? What check exists on Presidential power?
  
• How can we ensure the the privacy rights of those making overseas phone calls? Surely we do not lose our rights just because the call went overseas.
• Why has no action been taken to effectively oversee the FBI's prolific use of national security letters that are essentially a subpoena with little judicial oversight and have been abused?
• Why does boarding an airplane amount to consent to being strip searched?

That's a short list, there are more.

In the meantime, we should also remember that al Qaeda is not an ideological threat to our nation, the way fascism and communism were. They sought to attack us in an effort to incite revolution in the Muslim world. That would be dangerous to us, but not in the same way that communism or fascism were; which found adherents in our own country. Defeating al Qaeda on its home turf appears to have been the correct strategy. But at some point the Arab and Persian masses who hate the West will have to abandon their fantasy that the world will conform to their vision. If their vision is achieved, it will impoverish their societies, because the West will no longer be shipping dollops of cash for the oil wealth of the region. Their autocratic, uneducated and illiterate societies would quickly collapse without Western wealth. One hopes that the "Arab Spring" is a movement towards a greater acknowledgement of the power of freedom, but that is yet to be proved.

Our interventions in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya have certainly changed the landscape in the region. Perhaps it is time to reduce our involvement and allow events to play out, given the huge uncertainties. We could certainly benefit from the reduction in spending. The
is now being played out, but we should remember that it was always a gamble.

Rethinking the Middle East and Iran - Part I

I don't think I can summarize my changing thoughts on the Middle East in one post, so I will have to roll this out over time. A number of things got me started on this. First, I am taking a leadership class and we had a lesson on systems thinking, including how the structures of the human mind are part of the systems in which we live and operate. They used the Cold War example of each side building an ever greater arsenal of nuclear weapons to ensure that the other side did not gain an advantage. The escalation was portrayed as an endless series of reactions to each sides advances. The example was fine, but didn't really explain how the process was broken and de-escalation and arms reduction ever came about. I want to say that I never believed the Soviets to be irrational, I did not believe that they would ever launch a first strike, as long as there was something like parity. However, it was clear to me that they would have taken bolder actions that would have risked war had they believed they were in an advantageous position to do so. So what stopped the process? In my view, it was Reagan's announcement that the U.S. would embark on a Strategic Defense Initiative (Star Wars) coupled with the Soviets own assessment that they could not keep up because their economy was coming apart. As a result, they took some bold moves to reduce their risks. The same cycle of escalation could in turn become a cycle of de-escalation, as one side reduces, the other side matches, and there is verification of that outcome. However, neither side reduced their armaments to zero, because, as the US/USSR stockpiles dropped, the significance of the stockpiles of third parties, such as the Chinese becomes a factor in an equation that could previously be simplified to two variables.

So turning our attention to Iran's potential possession of nuclear weapons, there are those who say that since containment worked with the Soviets, we should do the same with Iran. I had thought that perhaps that was correct, because I see no reasonable way out of the current predicament. But containment worked in a bipolar world. In the U.S., we think that Iran is primarily threatening the west and Israel. But I am not so sure that is entirely correct. I do not blame the Israelis for feeling threatened, because a nuclear attack on Israel might advance the Persian agenda, but I don't believe that is ultimately the Iranian goal.

Historically, the Persians have though little of the Arabs or their predecessor civilizations such as the Babylonians or Assyrians. They see themselves as superior and the rightful leaders of the Middle East by history and geography. With their ancient enemies in Mesopotamia temporarily incapacitated, I believe they sense an historic opportunity. However, the United States presents a problem. The U.S. has a very strong, long term vested interest in the stability of the nation state and the sanctity of borders. It is our means to ensure peace and stability. The full and clear wisdom of this position was brought to our shores on 9/11, an attack launched from a failed state that could not really control its own territory.

As a result, the U.S. will not tolerate Iranian expansionism. Obtaining nuclear weapons, is Iran's way of raising the stakes for U.S. involvement, but also is a way for them to achieve their objectives without firing a shot, because their Arab neighbors to the south, including the Saudis know that they will not be able to militarily withstand the Iranian might. However, Iran also knows that they cannot successfully invade these nations and hope to achieve their ends. So what is their long term strategy?

To understand that, one must understand that state-on-state agression in the region is carried on by quasi-political groups that operate within particular countries but are funded by state actors. Al Qaeda is no exception. We know that al-Qaeda has been infiltrated by the state security services of a number of middle eastern nations. This is not to say that it is under their control, but they have some influence and have provided training, money and arms. But al Qaeda is only one such group. From Michael J. Totten's interview of Lee Smith (author of The Strong Horse):

For instance, Syria’s relationship with Jordan’s branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, the Islamic Action Front, and Jordan’s friendliness toward the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood, means that these two states effectively deter each other—if you use Islamists against me, I will unleash Islamists on you. Al Qaeda, as a transnational outfit, seems to be a group that has been supported, manipulated and penetrated by a whole number of Middle Eastern security services, including but not exclusive of the Saudis, Egyptians, Syrians, Libya, Pakistan, and Iraq before Saddam’s downfall. This is not to say that any of these regimes have Al Qaeda or any of these terror organizations under their thumb; when you have a group of people with weapons, money and a deadly ideology it is difficult to manage them very closely.

Back to Iran. Given Iran's funding of Hezbollah and similar entities, one could envision a combination of threats the Iranians could use to destabilize the regimes of the region with the long term goal of establishing regimes with loyalties to Iran. This could even take the form of threatening to provide nuclear arms to the non-state actors operating in the Gulf states. The leaders of those states would not feel safe against nuclear armed terrorists. Politically, Iran has paralyzed criticism of their actions by couching the need for their nuclear program in anti-zionist rhetoric. This allows them to shame the other Arab states who are not fully engaged against Israel. Western criticism of Iran only plays into its hands among those who see Arab nationalism through the lens of the past glories of the Muslim Caliphate.

I digress for a moment. I recently criticized the Iranians for murdering a nuclear physicist who was himself critical of the regime. Now, I am not as sure. Considering the manner in which covert activity funded by other nations is a way of life in the region, and the extent to which Iran is a threat to its Arab neighbors, this attack might have been a clever move by the Pakistanis, for example. It simultaneously had a negative impact on the Iranian nuke program, or so it would seem, and discredits the Iranian regime as thuggish. Because right now, regime change in Iran, seems to be the only option, and that is a long shot indeed.

My parting shot on Part I. I was thinking what would be the most diabolical, insanely mad ploy that the Iranians could attempt to further their aims in the Middle East in one quick blow. I believe that if and when they obtain nukes, they will covertly use nuclear weapons to destroy the Dome of the Rock in a manner to implicate the Israelis. Such a move would simultaneously weaken the Israeli government, one of the few counterweights to Iran in the region, as well as bring uncontrollable riots into the major Arab cities in the middle east, leaving the ripe for the plucking by Iranian affiliated groups.

The Commander in Chief and Afghanistan

I will be the first to admit to some prejudices about the political nature of war and the need for both a thoughtful strategy and civilian control of the military. I often quote Clausewitz' rhetorical remark about war being politics carried out by other means. However, the President, as Commander in Chief, is playing a dangerous game in Afghanistan. To set the stage let me quote what the President said in March (only six months ago):

So let me be clear: al Qaeda and its allies – the terrorists who planned and supported the 9/11 attacks – are in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Multiple intelligence estimates have warned that al Qaeda is actively planning attacks on the U.S. homeland from its safe-haven in Pakistan. And if the Afghan government falls to the Taliban – or allows al Qaeda to go unchallenged – that country will again be a base for terrorists who want to kill as many of our people as they possibly can.

The President was correct. Meanwhile, the situation on the ground has worsened, but not yet deteriorated, contrary to what the NYT is reporting. General McChrystal is asking for more troops to prevent Afghanistan reaching a tipping point, where the war can not be won without huge expenditure of blood and treasure. Sound familiar? Indeed, it was allowing the situation in Iraq get to a dangerous tipping point, starting with a failure to control the looting after the initial defeat of the Hussein regime that caused that effort to drag on and cost

But the President and his defenders are now whining that he needs time to re-think the strategy. But I ask, what has changed strategically since March, for crying out loud? The only difference is that we underestimated the troop level needed to carry the fight to the enemy. How in the world does that change the geopolitical nature of the threat that Obama so clearly spelled out in March? The fact that the elections appear tainted changes nothing in the assessment. (I mention this because it is the only semi-plausible argument in an entire NY Times article on the President's decision making process. Note the prominence given to Joe Biden's strategic thinking as well.)

The President is supposed to LEAD! By dithering and hand wringing, poll watching and whining that he needs more time, he demoralizes the troops in the field and strengthens the position of the Taliban. Our Islamofascist enemies read the news just as much as we do. They are probably using Obama's lack of decision to rally their troops, telling them that an extra push now could achieve victory. That might be correct.

History is full of examples where insurgencies won by outlasting a larger more well equipped forces, starting with our own American Revolution. In some cases, perhaps, it is not in the long term best interests of the more powerful nation to stay in the fight. Some argue that Vietnam is one such example. I do not necessarily agree, but if Democrats and Republicans alike take the President at his word about the consequences of failure in Afghanistan, then he should have sent more troops yesterday.

Did you guys hear the one about Obama concentrating on al Qaeda instead of the Taliban?

Evidence That We Are Winning...

...against the al-Qaeda brand of Islamofascism, at least.

I have so jumped the shark... Hey, is this mic live?

First, we have Osama bin Laden's annual diatribe timed to be released around 9-11. Some things to note; bin Laden is starting to seem like those 60's radicals "always reliving the day" (think Al Sharpton) because he hasn't really done much since. Also notable, Osama makes no threats of impending attacks, unlike past years. I believe this is because his threats are no longer viewed as credible. He spends considerable time justifying the 9-11 attacks, an odd choice of emphasis, unless, he is no longer relevant and wishes to remind the world of his one great triumph. (Yes I am aware of the Madrid and London attacks, but they were an order of magnitude smaller.) There are no new images of bin Laden either, evidence of technical or security difficulties.

Suspect in 2002 Kenya Hotel Truck Bombing

Next, from the WSJ:

A U.S. official said forces from the Joint Special Operations Command were involved in the attack on Kenyan-born Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan, who is suspected of building the truck bomb that killed 15 people at a Kenyan hotel in 2002, as well as involvement in a simultaneous, botched missile launch at an Israeli airliner.

The operation was far too sophisticated for the Somalis to have carried out, but no official confirmation that it was a U.S. effort. The part I liked best? After the attack, the helicopter circles back to retrieve the body for positive identification.


Finally, closer to home, in Queens:

New York City police and the FBI raided homes in the borough of Queens early on Monday as part of an investigation into suspected terrorism, focusing on one man who has been under surveillance, officials said.

Glad to see law enforcement on the job taking things seriously, even if no one else seems to be. The raid occurred after a known al Qaedas were seen visiting the two apartments, one of which was occupied by five Afghan men. Although there appears to have been no imminent danger, that's the way I like it. Find them before they can even start to carry out their evil plans.

I have criticized the Bush administration for some of the extra-legal methods it chose to use in prosecuting the fight against Islamofascism, but I never doubted the professionalism of those on the front lines of law enforcement and the military, just trying to get the job done.

Implacable

Pictured at left is the implacable face of evil in our time. Although he may not be directly responsible for the recent Mumbai attacks, the attackers were certainly his apostles both in ideology and method. I recently left a facetious comment on a Daily Kos article that if we only treated the captured terrorists better, the Arab world would join us in our fight against the terrorists. I was amazed to be praised for my efforts.

However, these attacks show the real intent of the al-Qaeda terrorists, to kill every non-Muslim (indeed every non-Sunni) until all are dead or converted. Their web sites were filled with venomous hatred calling on Allah (the most merciful?) to kill all the Hindu infidels in the worst possible ways. (H/T Weasel Zippers) There can be no negotiating, no treating them better that will cause the rest of the world to be safe from their attacks.

Fortunately, the President-elect seems to be ignoring the advice of the nutroots crowd in his approach to the war on terror and is reportedly going to retain Robert Gates as Secretary of Defense. Good for him. Regardless of how he campaigned, I applaud every move he makes that helps the defense of this country.