Category Archives: Afghanistan

Scramble ‘Karzai’ and you get ‘Kraazi’…

Our situation in Afghanistan just took a really dramatic downturn:

KABUL—Afghanistan’s fraying ties with the U.S. hit a new low on Sunday, as President Hamid Karzai said before meeting the new U.S. defense secretary that the Taliban kill Afghan civilians “in the service of America.”

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel is visiting Kabul to discuss ways of ending America’s longest foreign war. On Saturday, Mr. Hagel’s first full day in Afghanistan, Taliban suicide bombers killed at least 18 people outside the Afghan Ministry of Defense in Kabul and in the eastern province of Khost.

In a televised speech Sunday, the Afghan president said the U.S. doesn’t really see the Taliban as an enemy, doesn’t want to leave the country after the coalition’s mandate ends at the end of 2014, and is engaged in negotiations with Taliban leaders behind his back.

“Taliban are every day in talks with America, but in Kabul and Khost they set off bombs to show strength to America,” Mr. Karzai said. “The bombs that went off in Kabul and Khost yesterday were not a show of power to America, but were in service to America… It was in the service of foreigners not withdrawing from Afghanistan.”…

I don’t even know what to say about this (gimme time; I’m thinking), but I thought y’all might…

I like Ryan’s foreign policy ideas for themselves, NOT as a justification for his domestic proposals

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We think of Paul Ryan as an über-libertarian on fiscal issues and as a social conservative. What I didn’t know anything about until this morning was how he stood on the most urgent questions a commander in chief faces — which is pretty critical in the event that Romney is elected, and something happens to him.

One expected the opinion writers of The Wall Street Journal to be hugging themselves with pleasure over Ryan’s fiscal notions. But today, Bret Stephens writes in the Journal about a speech Ryan gave to the Alexander Hamilton Society last year in which he expressed himself on foreign policy. Here’s the speech, and here’s the column. An excerpt from the latter:

Here, in CliffsNotes form, is what the speech tells us about Mr. Ryan. First, that he’s an internationalist of the old school; in another day, he would have sat comfortably in the cabinets of Harry Truman, Jack Kennedy or Ronald Reagan. Also, that he believes in free trade, a strong defense, engagement with our allies—and expectations of them. Also, that he wants America to stay and win in Afghanistan. Furthermore, that he supports the “arduous task of building free societies,” even as he harbored early doubts the Arab Spring was the vehicle for building free societies.

It tells us also that Mr. Ryan has an astute understanding of the fundamental challenge of China. “The key question for American policy makers,” he said, “is whether we are competing with China for leadership of the international system or against them over the fundamental nature of that system.”

Within the speech itself, perhaps the most cogent observation is that the United States doesn’t have the realistic option of fading as a world power the way Britain did, and the way so many on the left and right would like it to do:

Unlike Britain, which handed leadership to a power that shared its fundamental values, today’s most dynamic and growing powers do not embrace the basic principles that should be at the core of the international system.

Now, that’s the sort of thing I agree with. What I don’t agree with is that we have to do all the things Ryan wants to do domestically in order to afford the kind of global position that we can’t afford to surrender. Which takes us into all sorts of other debates that I’m sure we’ll get into before the election…

Anyway, that’s where he loses me. What I didn’t get from the column, and did get from the speech itself, is that for Ryan, the need to maintain U.S. responsibilities in the world is yet another excuse for doing what he wants us to do on the homefront. Of this, I am unconvinced. I agree we have to get our fiscal house in order. I don’t necessarily believe his ideas are the way to do it. Bottom line, we get back to where we started — in his case, his view of America’s role in the world is that of an über-libertarian on fiscal issues…

Stephens is less divided in his admiration. In part, he admires Ryan for setting out clear ideas without any of the softened edges with which presidents must speak, giving little consideration to the fact that House members with no diplomatic responsibility are far freer to speak frankly on such matters.

The truth is, I have generally agreed with the actual actions Mr. Obama has taken as commander in chief (although my views on Afghanistan more closely track Ryan’s). And those speak louder than words, however stirring.

For instance, Stephens likes the way Ryan talks tougher about the Chinese. But it is Barack Obama who has shifted future defense planning toward the Pacific Rim with China in mind, and recently decided to send Marines to Australia in keeping with that strategy.

In any case, this is the beginning of a learning process about Ryan. Although I’m already inclined to agree with Stephens that, in terms of ideas at least, the GOP ticket seems upside-down.

Post: Why should troops die in Afghanistan this year if we’re leaving next year?

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The Washington Post had a thought-provoking editorial this morning. Excerpts:

On Wednesday, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta floated an entirely different plan: an end to most U.S. and NATO combat operations in Afghanistan by the second half of 2013, a year earlier than expected, and a substantial cut in the previously planned size of the Afghan armed forces. So much for “fight.” Though Mr. Panetta didn’t say so, this strategy implies another big U.S. troop reduction in 2013, beyond the pullout of about one-third of troops already planned for this year. U.S. commanders have lobbied to keep the troop strength steady from this coming autumn until the end of 2014 — the current endpoint for the NATO military commitment.

The new timetable may sound good to voters when Mr. Obama touts it on the presidential campaign trail. But how will the Taliban, and its backers in Pakistan, interpret it? Before negotiations even begin, the administration has unilaterally and radically reduced the opposing force the Taliban can expect to face 18 months from now. Will Taliban leader Mohammad Omar have reason to make significant concessions between now and then? More likely, the extremist Islamic movement and an increasingly hostile Pakistani military establishment will conclude that the United States is desperate to get its troops out of Afghanistan, as quickly as possible — whether or not the Afghan government and constitution survive….

But if President Obama has decided to pursue that course, there’s an inevitable next question. If the goal of a stable and democratic Afghanistan is to be subordinated — if timetables are to be accelerated, regardless of conditions — why should U.S. ground troops fight and die this year?

That’s always the question, when timetables are given for withdrawal: If we’re going to withdraw at a certain time regardless of conditions, what’s the point of fighting now?

It’s a brutally tough question whether you come at it from the direction of a hawk or a dove.

“Eisenhower of our generation” visits Columbia

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Some guy who needs a haircut, the general in mufti, and our senior senator./photo by Christy Cox

Gen. David Petraeus, now of the CIA, spoke today in Columbia, at the Riley Institute’s David Wilkins Awards for Excellence in Legislative and Civic Leadership luncheon.

Rep. James Smith and former Blue Cross CEO Ed Sellers were the recipients. It was James (a.k.a. Capt. Smith) who, in his acceptance speech, called Petraeus “the Eisenhower of our generation.” I concur. There’s no general officer in recent years who combines Ike’s strategic vision, diplomatic skill and leadership qualities to the extent that Gen. Petraeus does.

For his part, Petraeus praised not only James and Ed, but the troops he has felt privileged to lead before joining Central Intelligence. He called them “our new greatest generation.”

Those who serve certainly deserve that sobriquet. The difference is that they are only a tiny sliver of an actual generation, unlike the one that overcame the Depression and beat Hitler and Tojo.

Which only underlines how much the rest of us owe to them, each of them, from the commanding general to the lowliest buck private.

Combat ‘sensitivity training’

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Can’t say I was crazy about the headline, which aside from the awkwardly split infinitive seems to presume aberration as the norm (probably unintentionally). But I found the idea intriguing:

Can soldiers be trained to not become war criminals?

Halfway through a 15 month, high-intensity combat deployment in Iraq, soldiers were shown videos of ethically dicey situations they might encounter with civilians. The question researchers wanted to answer was: can soldiers who are already suffering enormous amounts of stress — literally fearing for their lives — be trained to stop and think long enough to prevent unethical behavior?

The answer, happily, is yes. In a study published in the Lancet, researchers concluded that a combination of videos and leader-led discussion groups led to “significantly lower rates of unethical conduct of soldiers and greater willingness to report and address misconduct than in those before training.”

From the paper:

For example, reports of unnecessary damage or destruction of private property decreased from 13·6% before training to 5·0% after training, and willingness to report a unit member for mistreatment of a non-combatant increased from 36·0% to 58·9%. Nearly all participants reported that training made it clear how to respond towards non-combatants.

You wouldn’t think “sensitivity training” or its equivalent would work in the highest stress environment on the planet, but apparently it does. One caveat: soldier’s ethical or unethical behavior was self-reported, so it’s possible that soldiers who had the training were simply reporting less of it because they had been made aware that it was wrong. But isn’t that exactly the mechanism by which ethics training works?

Of course, it sort of militates against the training of U.S. soldiers since the Korean War — training in acquiring targets rapidly and firing immediately and accurately (which makes our soldiers deadlier than any since the introduction of firearms, but leads to a lot of PTSD, since it leads to shooting first and thinking about it later).

But with the kinds of conflicts we face these days, it’s more important than ever to be sure to shoot at the right targets — not only morally, but in terms of eventual effectiveness. One of the greatest pitfalls in places like Iraq and Afghanistan is alienating the civilian populace through mistakes.

So while I’m not entirely convinced that such training works, I hope it does. We need soldiers to shoot straight, but they have to be more sure than ever it’s the bad guys they’re shooting at. For their sakes and the sake of the country as well as for the innocent bystanders.

Full engagement, the only viable, effective and moral stance for the U.S. to take toward the world

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Posting that column last night — the one from 9/23/01 — I realized that I had forgotten to post something else a week earlier.

When I shared with you the hasty column I wrote for the “extra” we put out on 9/11, and the one I turned around immediately and wrote for the next day, I had fully intended also to share a more important piece from several days later — the editorial I wrote for that following Sunday. But the 16th of this month came and went, and I failed to do that.

So I share it now. Being an editorial (an institutional, rather than personal opinion) and being a Sunday piece (when newspapers take a step back from immediate events, and also when they tend to express the views they regard as being of greatest import), it’s different from the other pieces. Less of my voice and style, more formalized. But at the same time, for the purposes of this blog, it also has perhaps greater value as a clear expression of my own views of what the nation should do going forward.

In it, I expressed views I had long held, and still hold, but they were sharpened and set into relief by the events of that week.

Spoiler alert: Basically, this piece is about a couple of things. The first is the need for re-engagement in the world, after a growing isolationism that had worried me all through the 90s. With notable exceptions — our involvement in the Balkans, for instance — we had become more insular, more preoccupied with our own amusements as a fat, happy nation. Up to that point, I had objected on the basis that when you are the world’s richest and most powerful nation (indisputable after the fall of the USSR), it is morally wrong to turn your back on the world, like a rich man behind the walls of his gated community. What 9/11 did was add to that the fact that such disengagement was positively dangerous.

The other main point is something I later learned an interesting term for: DIME, for “Diplomatic,” “Information,” “Military” and “Economic.” Actually, that’s not quite it, either. The DIME term refers to ways of exerting power, and that it certainly part of it, but not all of it. Another piece of the concept I was talking about was what you often hear referred to as “soft power.” Unfortunately, that is often mistakenly expressed as an alternative to “hard power.” But they complement each other. A unipolar power trying to achieve all of its goals through either alone is doomed to fail, ultimately.

No, I have to go back to the earlier, vaguer term: Engagement. On every level you can think of — diplomatic, cultural, mercantile, humanitarian, and yes, military.

Much of this piece, given the moment in which it was written, is occupied with the military part. That’s natural. That’s the hardest to persuade people of in our peaceful times (if you doubt we live in peaceful times, I plan a post after this one to address that). The rest, people just nod about and say, yes, of course we should do those things. (OK, perhaps I’m being a bit sanguine about that. I’ll just say that the people who need convincing on the military part are likely to say that — others are likely to say ‘Hell, no — let them fend for themselves.” And thus we have the two sides of isolationism.) They take more convincing on the tough stuff. (Some of you will object, “Not after 9/11! People’s blood was boiling!” But that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m not talking about passions of the moment. I was talking about long-term policy. I’m talking about what happens after people calm down and say, Never mind; let’s just withdraw.)

Reading it now, I wish the piece had been longer, with far more explication of the other elements, and how they were integrated. The following years, we saw constant argument between two views, neither of which saw the value of the whole concept. On the one hand, you had the Bushian — really, more the Rumsfeldian — notion that all you had to do was topple a tyrant and things would be fine. On the other, there was the myopic view that soft power was the only kind that was moral and effective.

These ideas are as relevant now as ever. Now that we have employed hard power to topple a tyrant in Libya, will we engage fully on other fronts to help Libya have a better future, one in which it has a chance of being a long-term friend, ally and trading partner? Or will we turn our attention away now that the loud noises have stopped going off?

Anyway, I’ve explained it enough. Here it is:

IN THE LONG TERM, U.S. MUST FULLY ENGAGE THE WORLD

State, The (Columbia, SC) – Sunday, September 16, 2001

IF YOU HAD MENTIONED the words “missile defense shield” to the terrorists who took over those planes last Tuesday, they would have laughed so hard they might have missed their targets.

That’s about the only way it might have helped.

Obviously, America is going to have to rethink the way it relates to the rest of the world in the 21st century. Pulling a high-tech defensive blanket over our heads while wishing the rest of the world would go away and leave us alone simply isn’t going to work.

We are going to have to drop our recent tendencies toward isolationism and fully engage the rest of the world on every possible term – military, diplomatic, economic and humanitarian.

Essentially, we have wasted a decade.

After the Berlin Wall fell and the Soviet Union crumbled, there was a vacuum in our increasingly interconnected world, a vacuum only the United States could fill. But we weren’t interested. After half a century of intense engagement in world affairs, we turned inward. Oh, we assembled and led an extraordinary coalition in the Gulf War – then let it fall apart. We tried to help in Somalia, but backed out when we saw the cost. After much shameful procrastination, we did what we should have done in the Balkans, and continue to do so. We tried to promote peace in the Mideast, then sort of gave up. But by and large, we tended our own little garden, and let the rest of the world drift.

We twice elected a man whose reading of the national mood was “It’s the economy, stupid.” Republicans took over Congress and started insisting that America would not be the world’s “policeman.”

Beyond overtures to Mexico and establishing a close, personal relationship with Vladimir Putin, President Bush initially showed little interest in foreign affairs.

Meanwhile, Russia and China worked to expand their own spheres of influence, Europe started looking to its own defenses, and much of the rest of the world seethed over our wealth, power and complacency.

Well, the rest of the world isn’t going to simply leave us alone. We know that now. On Tuesday, we woke up.

In the short term, our new engagement will be dominated by military action, and diplomacy that is closely related to military aims. It won’t just end with the death or apprehension of Osama bin Laden. Secretary of State Colin Powell served notice of what will be required when he said, “When we’re through with that network, we will continue with a global assault against terrorism in general.” That will likely mean a sustained, broad- front military effort unlike anything this nation has seen since 1945. Congress should get behind that.

At the moment, much of the world is with us in this effort. Our diplomacy must be aimed at maintaining that support, which will not be easy in many cases.

Beyond this war, we must continue to maintain the world’s most powerful military, and keep it deployed in forward areas. Our borders will be secure only to the extent that the world is secure. We must engage the help of other advanced nations in this effort. We must invest our defense dollars first and foremost in the basics – in keeping our planes in the air, our ships at sea and our soldiers deployed and well supported.

We must always be prepared to face an advanced foe. Satellite intelligence and, yes, theater missile defenses will play roles. But the greatest threat we currently face is not from advanced nations, but from the kinds of enemies who are so primitive that they don’t even have airplanes; they have to steal ours in order to attack us. For that reason, we must beef up our intelligence capabilities. We need spies in every corner of the world, collecting the kind of low-tech information that espiocrats call “humint” – human intelligence. More of that might have prevented what happened last week, in ways that a missile shield never could.

But we are going to have to do far more than simply project military power. We must help the rest of the world be more free, more affluent and more democratic. Advancing global trade is only the start.

We must cease to regard “nation-building” as a dirty word. If the people of the Mideast didn’t live under oligarchs and brutal tyrants, if they enjoyed the same freedoms and rights and broad prosperity that we do – if, in other words, they had all of those things the sponsors of terror hate and fear most about us – they would understand us more and resent us less. And they would, by and large, cease to be such a threat to us, to Israel and to themselves.

This may sound like an awful lot to contemplate for a nation digging its dead out of the rubble. But it’s the kind of challenge that this nation took on once before, after we had defeated other enemies that had struck us without warning or mercy. Look at Germany and Japan today, and you will see what America can do.

We must have a vision beyond vengeance, beyond the immediate guilty parties. And we must embrace and fulfill that vision, if we are ever again to enjoy the collective peace of mind that was so completely shattered on Sept. 11, 2001.

Our nation’s strength just lost more than 31 men

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I probably shouldn’t have had this awful thought, because the loss of 31 soldiers is 31 individual tragedies that radiate throughout our countries, breaking the hearts of their families and friends, and all those who did or ever would depend upon them.

But the thought I had when I heard of the U.S. helicopter shot down in Afghanistan was, “I hope it wasn’t Special Ops people.” I said that because, having so recently read the account of the raid on Abbottabad, the initial details of the loss sounded like it was consistent with the kind of helicopter operation that SOC people perform all the time in that part of the world. And since our nation increasingly depends on that very small number of super-elite troops — the very same people being involved in taking out bin Laden, the Somali pirates and countless strategically important raids in Afghanistan and Pakistan — the loss of any significant number of them would be like losing a regiment in prior days. That’s the cold calculation that went on in my head along with the personal shock of losing so many fellow Americans, so many fellow humans.

But then my fears were realized:

WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. officials tell The Associated Press that they believe that none of the Navy SEALs who died in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan had participated in the raid that killed Osama bin Laden, although they were from the same unit that carried out the bin Laden mission.

Sources say that more than 20 Navy SEALs were among those lost in the crash in Afghanistan.

The operators from SEAL Team Six were flown by a crew of the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment. That’s according to other AP sources, one current and one former U.S. official. All sources spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military matters.

One source says the team was thought to include 22 SEALs, three Air Force air controllers, seven Afghan Army troops, a dog and his handler, and a civilian interpreter, plus the helicopter crew…

God help their families. And the rest of us as well.

Congressman Joe Wilson, antiwar activist

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Here’s another chapter in what I wrote about back here, in the post headlined “Are we starting to see a geologic shift between left and right on national security?”…

I’ll give you the two items backwards. Friday afternoon, I received this release from Joe Wilson:

(Washington, DC) – Congressman Joe Wilson (SC-02) released the following statement after the House of Representatives voted against authorizing the limited use of the United States Armed Forces in Libya:

“The President’s decision to ignore the Constitution along with the War Powers Resolution has led us to this point. Choosing not to consult with Congress on this conflict was complicated even further by this Administration’s failure to explain and outline a plan of action to the American public.

“NATO is one of America’s closest allies. I do not want to jeopardize the progress it has made in removing Muammar Gaddafi from power. However, the President’s failure to actively engage Congress forces me to vote against committing our Armed Forces on the ground in Libya.”

I hope y’all didn’t get whiplash in that last paragraph. Let’s see, would not want in any way to jeopardize NATO’s mission in Libya (which, last time I checked, was not officially removing Gaddafi, but we can wink and nod at that one), on account of NATO being our great friends and all. BUT… he wants to tie Obama’s hands in supporting that mission, on account of, you know. Obama being Obama.

There are just so many bizarre things going on here. Republicans (especially Republicans of the strong national defense wing, like Joe Wilson) caring about the flippin’ War Powers Resolution. I mean, normally you hear folks in that camp saying the War Powers Resolution is what violates the Constitution. Then… well, I’ll let y’all figure out all the bizarre things about it. Here’s a news story on what Joe’s talking about, by the way.

I wanted to share something else with you. That morning, before the vote, this piece by Kimberley A. Strassel (normal world view: Obama bad, Republicans good) appeared in The Wall Street Journal. It was headlined, “The GOP’s War Powers Opportunism: Republicans abandon principle in a rush to score political points on the president.” I’m going to take a chance here of getting into trouble with the Journal by quoting large chunks of the piece, because it just makes so many good points. Here goes:

But what fun is there in criticizing Democrats on national security when the GOP is offering up a much more embarrassing spectacle? In their rush to score points on the president, what congressional Republicans have actually managed to do is hurt themselves. They’ve highlighted their own divisions and given voters reason to question whether the party is throwing over principle in favor of political opportunism or, more worrisome, a new form of GOP isolationism.

In the space of a few months, Republicans have gone from coherently criticizing Mr. Obama’s timid approach to the Arab awakening, to a few weeks ago incoherently losing 87 members to antiwar Democrat Dennis Kucinich’s resolution to end military engagement in Libya. This caused an open rift in the party, compelling Sen. John McCain to stand up for U.S. victory and sponsor a resolution giving Mr. Obama freedom of action for another year.

House Republicans have very publicly let it be known that they intend to hold a vote on Mr. McCain’s resolution—solely so that they can very publicly vote him down. Not satisfied that this is an ample enough rebuke to those who would win a war, the GOP is now working to pass legislation to defund the president’s Libya mission. That’s right, House Republicans (not House Democrats) intend to kneecap a commander in chief….

… House leaders are of the view that failing to take action against the president is the equivalent of letting him “get away” with his snubs and bad policy and to “win” on this issue. The only real winner of a Libya withdrawal is, of course, a terrorist named Moammar Gadhafi. But try telling that to a GOP that has come full circle to congressional Democrats, circa 2006, who masked their ambitions to undermine President Bush behind lofty arguments of Iraq “oversight.”

Speaking of 2006, some of this is also the consequence of a party with no obvious leader. Mr. Bush kept his caucus (barely) on Iraq only by constantly reminding members of the stakes. Those GOP candidates who would follow Mr. Bush have been mostly craven on Libya and Afghanistan, with Mitt Romney and Michele Bachmann more worried about winning the next public-opinion poll than winning a war. House Speaker John Boehner remains reluctant to openly engage his excitable freshmen. Rather than lead on Libya, his default has been to try to make the best of a fractious GOP—for instance, by offering up a less-bad version of the Kucinich resolution.

To the extent there is political pressure, it comes from the tea party, which has no interest in foreign policy but is instead focused on spending and federal powers. This has helped to drive the growing group of self-described constitutionalists and war-deficit-hawks who are giving rise to a new brand of Republican isolationism.

The prevailing antigovernment feeling has allowed folks like Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul to spin the Libya mission as some sort of affront to the Constitution, since Mr. Obama failed to beg Congress’s approval for Libya, as required by the 1973 War Powers Act. Never mind that conservative scholars will point out that it is the War Powers Act itself that is unconstitutional. That used to be the general GOP view, but with “Obama violated the Constitution” making for such a delicious sound bite among base voters, Republicans are willing to forget the past.

Really, I wanted to quote the whole thing, but restrained myself slightly, giving you only the parts that best address what Joe Wilson and the majority did yesterday.

I urge you to go read it all — and browse the site, and give your custom to the Journal’s advertisers, so they will forgive me for quoting so extensively. It will be worth your while.

By the way, other “conservative” pundits are not getting on the House’s case here. George Will is attacking John McCain for, as Ms. Strassel wrote, daring “to stand up for U.S. victory and sponsor a resolution giving Mr. Obama freedom of action for another year.” Mr. Will’s column is headlined “John McCain’s never-ending war.” Mr. Will seems angry with Sen. McCain for daring to call the latest trend among Republicans “isolationism.” But that (coupled with Obama Derangement Syndrome) is precisely the right word. And it’s not entirely a new thing. We’ve been here before.

Are we starting to see a geologic shift between left and right on national security?

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This is something I’ve been thinking about the last few days, and I haven’t written about it because it’s complicated and I haven’t had time to do something pulling all the threads together. But when I saw this development, I decided I’d better go ahead and throw out the general idea and get the discussion started:

Obama Says War Powers Act Doesn’t Apply to Libya Mission

White House maintains that the president doesn’t need lawmakers’ permission for U.S. role in NATO-led effort.

The White House on Wednesday told skeptical lawmakers that President Obama doesn’t need their permission to continue the nation’s involvement in the NATO-led mission in Libya because U.S. forces are playing only a supporting role there.

Administration lawyers made their case as part of a larger report sent to Congress responding to complaints that the president had yet to provide a sufficient rationale for continuing the Libya campaign, the New York Times reports.

“We are not saying the president can take the country into war on his own,” State Department lawyer Harold Koh told the paper. “We are not saying the War Powers Resolution is unconstitutional or should be scrapped, or that we can refuse to consult Congress. We are saying the limited nature of this particular mission is not the kind of ‘hostilities’ envisioned by the War Powers Resolution.”…

OK, digest that. Here’s the NYT version, and here’s the WashPost. And then consider some of the other things I’ve been noticing lately:

The fact that, in the GOP debate the other night, we heard some Republicans moving more toward the “get out of Afghanistan ASAP” line. Ron Paul, treated as an outcast for saying such things four years ago, got cheered by the Fox News crowd.
The bold way Obama decided to go in and GET bin Laden, without any of that multilateral consult-the-allies (as in, tell the Pakistanis we’re attacking in the heart of their country) touchy-feely stuff. No fooling around.
The way the administration is playing on having stunned the world with the bin Laden thing to get its way elsewhere. That prompted me to write that the difference between Bush and Obama is that Bush was Sonny, while Obama is the far-deadlier (that is, more effective) Michael.
The way Obama is taking advantage of chaos in Yemen to just GO AFTER terrorists there, without asking Congress or the UN, or presenting arguments about the War Powers Act, or anything like that. Read this, and this.

This has been building ever since the election, with a lot of Obama’s antiwar base feeling pretty disoriented (wait — is this who we elected?), and people like me being reassured by his steady pragmatism.

But lately, the process has seemed to be accelerating. Obama still talks a good war-as-last-resort, multilateral, we-don’t-want-to-be-a-bully line for the base… but watch what happens. (And how about the way he threw everybody off-balance on Libya, letting the FRENCH of all people take the lead, while still managing to get in there and go after the bad guys? That enabled him to have it both ways. The allies couldn’t do it without us, but it came across looking like we were a reluctant junior partner, which bought Obama some support for the move among liberals.)

And I find myself wondering, is anyone else noticing? I mean, while the Republicans get more timid about the U.S. role abroad (in some ways) and obsess more and more about domestic issues (because that’s what the Tea Party cares about), Obama is out there going all JFK and LBJ. He’s going Old School. He’s defining Democratic presidential leadership back to where it was before Vietnam.

Are the parties moving toward switching places?

This is a fascinating development. I think it has the potential to completely realign the country politically, and on more than national security.

Anybody else noticing this?

Shooting replaces tough talk

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In case you weren’t worried enough about this whole relationship thing with Pakistan:

Well, this isn’t going to make an alreadytense relationship any better.

A brief firefight between Pakistani ground troops and NATO helicopters erupted early Tuesday morning near the Afghan boarder. Pakistan claims that two of its soldiers were wounded as a result of the clash, and officials are demanding a meeting with NATO leaders to address the situation, Reutersreports.

Pakistan has admitted that the ground troops opened fire first, but maintains that they were in the right because the two helicopters had crossed into Pakistan’s airspace from Afghanistan, the New York Timesreports. Western military officials, meanwhile, have so far declined to say whether the helicopters were indeed over Pakistan…

Sec. Clinton helps point way to what’s next

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Of course, at such an emotion-packed historic moment as this, one encounters a lot of foolishness, from the behavior of those drunken college kids outside the White House last night to people who will actually say (and this I find stunning), OK, we got him, let’s leave Afghanistan…

I thought Hillary Clinton’s remarks this morning addressed that rather nicely:

Here at the State Department, we have worked to forge a worldwide anti-terror network. We have drawn together the effort and energy of friends, partners, and allies on every continent. Our partnerships, including our close cooperation with Pakistan, have helped put unprecedented pressure on al-Qaida and its leadership. Continued cooperation will be just as important in the days ahead, because even as we mark this milestone, we should not forget that the battle to stop al-Qaida and its syndicate of terror will not end with the death of bin Ladin. Indeed, we must take this opportunity to renew our resolve and redouble our efforts.

In Afghanistan, we will continue taking the fight to al-Qaida and their Taliban allies, while working to support the Afghan people as they build a stronger government and begin to take responsibility for their own security. We are implementing the strategy for transition approved by NATO at the summit in Lisbon, and we supporting an Afghan-led political process that seeks to isolate al-Qaida and end the insurgency. Our message to the Taliban remains the same, but today it may have even greater resonance: You cannot wait us out. You cannot defeat us. But you can make the choice to abandon al-Qaida and participate in a peaceful political process….

Indeed, to the extent that the death of bin Laden sends a useful message to the world — to our friends and enemies — is that we will NOT give up. It’s about continuity and persistence. And it’s a powerful message. This is a time for following up the advantage provided by demoralization among the Taliban and al Qaeda at this moment, a moment created by the death of that movement’s chief symbol. Secretary Clinton explains it well.

Some thoughts on Robert Gates’ recent remarks

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I like that headline. Sort of 19th century-sounding in its plainness. Anyway, moving on…

Back on the previous post, Phillip said:

This is somewhat indirectly related to issues raised by #1, but I couldn’t help wondering what you made of Sec’y Gates’ remarkable speech at West Point last week:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/26/world/26gates.html

And I responded in a comment that seems worth a separate post, to wit…

Phillip, I had several thoughts about Gates’ remark (which, for those who missed it, was “In my opinion, any future defense secretary who advises the president to again send a big American land army into Asia or into the Middle East or Africa should ‘have his head examined,’ as General MacArthur so delicately put it.”):

First, my facetious reaction — Asia? Africa? Middle East? So that leaves what? Europe? Australia? South America? Antarctica? Quite a sweeping set of eliminations. Next thing you know, we won’t be able to go war anywhere, and he’ll be out of a job. Golly, I wonder if the world will cooperate with us on that, and make sure, out of sympathy to our preferences, that the next crisis demanding a deployment of U.S. ground troops happens in, say, Sydney. MayBE, but it seems unlikely.
I like Robert Gates (here’s a column I did about him in 2006), have liked him ever since he became CIA director in the 80s (and especially liked him when he delivered us from the disaster of Rumsfeld), so he has my sympathy. And I fully understand why someone who’s had the challenges he’s had as SecDef.
From a pragmatic standpoint, what he says makes all the sense in the world. That’s why the option we’re looking at in Libya is a no-fly zone — you know, the mode we were in in Iraq for 12 years during the “cease-fire” in that war against Saddam that started in 1990 and ended in 2003. It’s manageable, we can do it easily enough (we and the Brits are the only ones with the demonstrated ability to provide this service to the people of Libya and the world). Air superiority is something we know how to assert, and use.
Ground forces are a huge commitment — a commitment that the United States in the 21st century appears politically unwilling to make. If you’re a pragmatist like Gates — and he is, the consummate professional — you consider that when you’re considering whether the goals are achievable. We’ve demonstrated back here on the home front that we’re unable to commit FULLY to a nation-building enterprise the way we did in 1945. It takes such a single-minded dedication on every level — military, economic, diplomatic — and that takes sustained commitment. One is tempted to say that there’s something particular about Americans today that prevents such a consensus — our 50-50, bitter political division, for instance — but really, this is the norm in U.S. history. The anomaly was 1945. It took two world wars for us to bring us to the point that we could make that kind of commitment.

So there you go. I had another bullet in mind, but was interrupted (blast that person from Porlock!), and it hasn’t come back to me yet. Please share your own thoughts…

I’d like to see Obama COMMIT to something

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My friends at The State were right today to praise the fact that President Obama is working with Republicans on a compromise on taxes and unemployment benefits. But they were equally right to be unenthusiastic about the deal itself.

On the one hand, it’s good that we’re not going to see our economy further crippled by untimely tax increases (even if all they are are restorations to pre-Bush levels). And it’s good that the jobless needing those benefits will have them. (At least, that these things will happen if this deal gets through Congress.) On the other, we’re looking at a deal that embodies some of the worst deficit-ballooning values of both parties: tax cuts for the Republicans, more spending for the Democrats.

It’s tragic, and bodes very ill for our country, that this flawed compromise stirs such anger on both partisan extremes: Some Democrats are beside themselves at this “betrayal” by the president. (Which bemuses me — as y’all know, I have trouble understanding how people get so EMOTIONAL about such a dull, gray topic as taxes, whether it’s the rantings of the Tea Partiers who don’t want to pay them, especially if the dough goes to the “undeserving poor,” or the ravings of the liberal class warriors who don’t want “the undeserving rich” to get any breaks. Why not save that passion for something that really matters?) Meanwhile, people on the right — such as Daniel Henninger in the WSJ today — chide Obama for not going far enough on taxes.

In this particular case, I think the folks on the right have a bit of a point (some of them — I have no patience for DeMint demanding the tax cuts and fighting the spending part), but it doesn’t have to do with taxes — it has to do with the president’s overall approach to leadership, and a flaw I see in it. Henninger complains that these tax cut extensions are unlikely to get businesses to go out and invest and create jobs, since the president threatens to eliminate the cuts a year or two down the line.

That actually makes sense (even if it does occur in a column redolent with offensive right-wing attitudes — he sneers at Ma Joad in “The Grapes of Wrath”), and I see in it echoes of the president’s flawed approach in another important arena — Afghanistan.

Here’s the thing: If keeping these tax cuts is the right thing to do to help our economy, then they should be kept in place indefinitely — or “permanently,” as the Republicans say. Of course, there is nothing permanent in government. The next Congress, or the one after that, can raise taxes through the roof if it chooses.

The problem, in other words, isn’t that the cuts won’t be permanent, because nothing is in politics. The problem is that the president is, on the front end, negating whatever beneficial effect might be gained from extending the cuts by coming out and promising that they won’t last.

One of the big reasons why the economy hasn’t improved faster than it has this year is that businesses, small and large, have not known what to expect from the recent election in terms of future tax policy with these tax cuts expiring. People were waiting to see what would happen on taxes before taking investment risks. (Even if the liberal Democrats were to eliminate the cuts, knowing that would be better than the uncertainty.) And even with the election over, the future has remained murky. The best thing about such a deal between the president and the GOP should be that it wipes away those clouds and provides clarity.

But the president negates that by saying yes, we’ll keep the cuts in place, but only for a short time. You may look forward now to a time when there are unspecified increases. And Henninger has a point when he says:

But if an angry, let-me-be-clear Barack Obama just looked into the cameras and said he’s coming to get you in two years, what rational economic choice would you make? Spend the profit or gains 2011 might produce on new workers, or bury any new income in the backyard until the 2012 presidential clouds clear?

Ditto with the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan. What good is it to say we’re going to stay and fight NOW if at the same time you give a future date when you’re going to leave (or, as the president has said, start leaving)? What are they going to do? They’re going to sit tight and wait for you to leave on schedule. (And yes, pragmatic people may take comfort from the fact that the president has allowed himself lots of wiggle-room to stay there — but the harm has been done by the announcement of the intention to leave). Every effort should be taken to make one’s adversaries believe you’re willing to fight them forever (even if you aren’t), if you ever hope to achieve anything by fighting.

The problem in both cases is trying to have one’s cake and eat it, too — making a deal with the Republicans without one’s base getting too mad at you, or maintain our security commitment without (here comes that base thing again) freaking out the anti-war faction too much. What this ignores is that out in the REAL world, as opposed to the one where the parties play partisan tit-for-tat games, real people react in ways that matter to your policy moves: Business people continue to sit rather than creating jobs; the Taliban waits you out while your allies move away from you because they know they have to live there when you’re gone.

What would be great would be if Barack Obama should commit for the duration to something. He should have committed to a single-payer approach to health care from the beginning. Going in with a compromise meant that we got this mish-mash that health care “reform” turned into. He should commit to a plan on the economy, and not undermine it by saying he’s only going to do it for a little while. And most of all, he should commit to Afghanistan, and not try to mollify his base with dangerous deadlines.

What the president does, and even says, matters. He needs to recognize that, pick a direction, and stick with it long enough to have a salutary effect. Whatever their ideology, that’s what leaders do. And we could use some leadership.

The president in Afghanistan: Where would YOU draw the line on security?

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Following our discussion on WikiLeaks, I thought I’d pose this…

Note that President Obama just slipped unannounced into Afghanistan. This, to me, is appropriate and laudable.

But I ask you: Do you think you and I as citizens had a “right” to know in advance that he was going there? And would a Julian Assange, to your thinking, have had the “right” to tell you about it in advance?

And if you think not, then WHERE would you draw the line? I draw it here: It is up to duly constituted authorities to make such decisions about the security of official information, and not up to self-appointed individuals or organizations such as Assange or WikiLeaks. When they presume to take such decisions upon themselves, they should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of national and international law.

Would you draw it somewhere else? And if you would, in what way is that consistent with our being a nation of laws and not of men?

John Wayne, born on the 4th of July, hangs tough

The Koran-burning church, and other foolishness

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By now you’ve heard about it. I tend to look at it from the perspective of Gen. David Petraeus:

KABUL, Afghanistan — The top American commander in Afghanistan has warned that plans by a small Florida church to burn copies of the Koran on Saturday, the anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, could play into the hands of the very extremists at whom the church says it is directing that message.

Burning copies of the Koran, the Muslim holy book, “would undoubtedly be used by extremists in Afghanistan — and around the world — to inflame public opinion and incite violence,” the commander, Gen. David H. Petraeus said in an e-mail message to The Associated Press on Tuesday.

Echoing remarks the general made in an interview with The Wall Street Journal published Tuesday, he said: “It could endanger troops and it could endanger the overall effort. It is precisely the kind of action the Taliban uses and could cause significant problems. Not just here, but everywhere in the world we are engaged with the Islamic community.”…

Somebody needs to find a way to talk some sense to those rockheads down in Florida. Unfortunately, sense is one thing I’m sure they are adamantly determined not to hear. Folks like that are allergic to it, or something. The fact that it’s senseless provocation is what appeals to them. Or maybe I’m wrong. The pastor says he hasn’t changed his mind, but is praying about it. Here’s hoping the Almighty answers him with a big, booming, bone-rattling NO, so that even he can hear it.

One of the really unfortunate things about modern global communications is that when some marginal, fringe doofuses that no one in this country would pay attention to acts out this way, it gets reported to other idiots on the other side of the world, who use it as an excuse to riot and generally raise hell, which makes the idiots over here feel justified, and so the foolishness continues, one generation into the next… (I think the writer of Ecclesiastes would have been a blogger today).

Basically, what we have here is a low-rent version of the allegedly sophisticated “journalists” in Europe who proved how free and enlightened they were (to each other) by specifically commissioning cartoons designed for no other purpose than to be of maximum insult value to conservative Muslims. And thus another unnecessary cycle of violence was launched. (The Enlightened Ones would justify themselves by saying that the violent reactions were unjustified. Of course they were unjustified, you twits. They were also entirely predictable, and your provocation of it was entirely unnecessary.)

I mean, if you just start with what Mamanem taught you before kindergarten, you don’t go around poking fun at the way other folks do church. Sure, if you’re a Baptist, you know what those Methodists do down the street isn’t REAL baptism, but you don’t make fun of them because well-bred people don’t do that. Well, this is like that, only with AK-47s — we have a practical reason not to unnecessarily inflame irrational passions. It’s not just rude, but stupid.

And when it endangers our troops in the field — and Gen. Petraeus is absolutely right to point that out — it is inexcusable.

Why did I write this? I don’t know. I set out thinking this would be a good thing to discuss, but then as I was typing, I thought, “What’s to discuss?” So I threw in the cartoons stuff. I know some of y’all will argue with me about that, but the point is the same, from my perspective.

Soldier? You mean “sailor,” right?

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Don’t suppose we should expect Slate to know anything this basic, but when it said:

Manhunt Is Underway for Captured U.S. Soldier in Afghanistan

Western forces have launched a massive search for two U.S. Navy personnel who went missing Friday….

… it really meant, “U.S. sailor.”

Yeah, OK, technically, the SEALs are kinda like soldiers — supersoldiers, but soldiers. And nowadays even sailors and airmen are being trained in basic infantry tactics so they can do convoy guard duty because of the lack of regular dogfaces in our all-volunteer Army. And obviously, these guys were not on the water at the time of the incident.

But still, there is a difference. It’s pretty bad when a marine is called a soldier, but a sailor? Come on. That’s a distinction that’s existed forever.

Next thing you know, Slate will call its rifle a gun…

Good news is, Petraeus knows how to do the job

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On the one hand, it’s a great shame for someone who by many accounts is a fine officer to lose his job. Insubordination is insubordination, but it’s not a happy day for America when the president has to bust the top guy in a war zone where things haven’t been going well.

On the other hand, at least we know Gen. Petraeus knows how to get the job done if anyone can. He is literally the man who wrote the book on counterinsurgency, and he showed he could put his theories into effective practice by saving the mission in Iraq.

Frankly, I sort of hated to seem him bumped upstairs to MacDill, leaving implementation of his plans to subordinates. As hairy as things are in Afghanistan, it’s good to know it will be run, on the scene, by the guy who knows how to turn things around.

Other thoughts?

Is the M4 a lethal weapon (to the user)?

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Something Burl wrote in a comment reminded me of this story the other day:

WASHINGTON — In the chaos of an early morning assault on a remote U.S. outpost in eastern Afghanistan, Staff Sgt. Erich Phillips’ M4 carbine quit firing as militant forces surrounded the base. The machine gun he grabbed after tossing the rifle aside didn’t work either.

When the battle in the small village of Wanat ended, nine U.S. soldiers lay dead and 27 more were wounded. A detailed study of the attack by a military historian found that weapons failed repeatedly at a “critical moment” during the firefight on July 13, 2008, putting the outnumbered American troops at risk of being overrun by nearly 200 insurgents.

Which raises the question: Eight years into the war against the Taliban in Afghanistan, do U.S. armed forces have the best guns money can buy?…

I’ve sort of wondered for years why this country couldn’t simply produce a weapon as simple, as effective, as cheap, and most of all as RELIABLE as the AK-47.

I read part of the recent book by Larry Kahaner about that remarkable weapon (one of the many books I’ve read “part of” while drinking coffee but not buying anything at Barnes & Noble, my favorite leisuretime activity), and it reads like pretty much an indictment of the free enterprise system. The way it developed was this: A soldier in the Red Army, dissatisfied with what guys like him had to rely on in battle, decided to design a multi-purpose infantry weapon that would get the job done, and always work. So he did, the Soviets mass-produced it, and it became the number-one weapon in the world, the favorite of rebels, terrorists, thugs, and child soldiers everywhere.

It’s cheap; it’s ubiquitous. It puts a LOT of high-impact bullets on a target in a big hurry, so you definitely don’t want to go up against one if you can help it. It’s simple, and easy to maintain. It requires so little skill — and upper-body strength — to operate that it makes a child soldier into a particularly dangerous person.

In other words, it’s pretty horrible. But it’s a way better weapon, in lots of ways, than anything we’ve mass-produced.

We’ve heard about the troubles with the M16 since Vietnam, and the M4 is its descendant. The M16 fires a lower-weight slug at a high velocity, so it rips up whatever it enters — although it doesn’t have much knockdown power. (In Black Hawk Down — the book, not the film — a Delta team member gripes about the M16 because when he shoots somebody who’s shooting at him, he wants to see the guy go down.)

Meanwhile, nothing ever seems to go wrong with Kalashnikovs, no matter what you do to them. The story Burl told matches one I’ve heard before:

A friend (now deceased) who was part of the Army test team for the M-16 told me this anecdote.
He thought the M-16 was delicate and undependable, told the Army so, he was told to shut up and buy stock in Colt.
A few years later, he’s in command of a firebase in Vietnam, and they’re clearing a kill zone. The bulldozer uncovers a dead Viet cong who has buried for a year or so, along with his AK-47. Dave jumped down in the hole, said “now here’s a REAL weapon,” and cocked the muddy, rusty AK, pointed it at the sky and pulled the trigger.
It fired.

So — are our soldiers taking unnecessary risks because of inadequate weapons? I’d be interested in particular to hear from Capt. James Smith and others who have actually taken the M4 into battle (that’s him below getting his ACOG zeroed in on arriving in Afghanistan — at least, I think that’s an M4).

Eight years ago today

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What is there to say on the 8th anniversary of the attacks on America? I suppose I could say the same things I said on the 7th, and add what I said a couple of days before that.

Or I can quote what President Obama said today:

“Let us renew our resolve against those who perpetrated this barbaric act and who plot against us still,” Mr. Obama said. “In defense of our nation, we will never waver.”

And add what he said back in August, to a VFW gathering in Phoenix:

The insurgency in Afghanistan didn’t just happen overnight and we won’t defeat it overnight, but we must never forget: This is not a war of choice; it is a war of necessity. Those who attacked America on 9/11 are plotting to do so again. If left unchecked, the Taliban insurgency will mean an even larger safe haven from which al Qaeda could plot to kill more Americans.

With more than a few out there faltering, I thought it would be good to bring those words to the fore.

Brad Warthen

All The News That Gives You Fits