Joe from LowL,
I've served in USA Army Special Forces.
Awlawki was not out of reach of SOCOM, regardless of what you are told by DoD "information operations."
I estimate the marginal cost of capturing him would have been around $20 Million + 0.5 soldier's lives (dead and/ or wounded.)
I estimate the effort to find UBL cost around $2 Billion, give or take $5 Billion.
I estimate the hit raid cost $200 Million, from planning on through execution.
I cannot defend these estimates, but they make my point.
As in most situations, there's a cost-benefit analysis that ultimately informs the decision.
Just how much is the "Rule of Law" worth ?
just a reminder that Prez Obama tripled the number of US forces in Afghanistan from when he entered office.
From ~33,000 to ~68,000 to ~104,000.
After his recent troop cuts, we are down to double the troops there in Jan 2009.
To clarify, neither the NDAA nor Congress put an outright ban on Obama transferring any of the 86 innocent Detainees out of Gitmo.
It just takes a lot of work, work that Ambassador Fried wasn't up to, and neither apparently is his Diplomat-in-Chief.
Congrats, Jones, on a solid piece.
No deep analysis so as to provoke the low information voter into action, but tasty treats to entertain us self-identified FP junkies.
My fave:
"So commanding did the U.S. military become in Kabul and Washington that, over the years, it ate the State Department, gobbled up the incompetent bureaucracy of the U.S. Agency for International Development, and established Provincial Reconstruction Teams (PRTs) in the countryside to carry out maniacal 'development' projects and throw bales of cash at all the wrong 'leaders.'"
Leviathan, thy name is "Interagency."
++++++++
And cute to a fault:
"In the U.S., such details [installing a puppet government of criminal warlords] of our Afghan War, now in its 12th year, are long forgotten ..."
The one most significant fact of the whole Afghan War is that it is an ethnic-based civil war, with the US backing the Hazaras, Tadjiks and Uzbeks, to help them subjugate the Pashtuns. The US military is fighting a racist battle AGAINST the principles in our Declaration of Independence.
But that fact has been classified a military secret. Shhhh!
Most Pashtuns don't like being represented by, governed by, or defended by Taliban knuckle draggers. But that appears to be the only effective means of protecting their families from the invading foreigners (Hazaras, Tadjiks, Uzbeks, Yanks, &tc.)
But you only find that out if you listen to Pashtuns, agruably (if the Durand Line is not sacrosanct) the majority of the population.
Joe,
I would believe an analysis of military outcomes at TomDispatch before I'd believe any of the self-delusion posted at Long War Journal, Foreign Policy or Joint Forces Quarterly.
The reason John Allen is unfit to wind down the Afghan War is because he is too invested personally in somehow proving that it was all worth it. Obana would have replaced him already if it weren't for the Broadwell imbroglio.
If you've fought there, or even if you just went there as a REMF, you cannot see clearly. It's too personal.
Jones is easily duped by "Strategic Communnications" (US military propaganda directed at the US Congress.) She believes, for example, that the US military was serious about negotiating with the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, because they said so.
But she has a willingness to allow resistant facts to disturb her preconcieved notions. "Military"-friendly sources suffer from no such weakness.
"Military" has layers of meanings.
To politicians, it means the Generals and the Contractors. To vets like me, it means folks who serve in the lower ranks.
Those are two completely different entities, and completely different meanings. All they have in common is a deep interest in the suffering and dying of the second group, but for completely different reasons.
And Joe, I've got some bad news:
while we won the invasion of 2001-2002, we lost the occupation and imperial era of 2005-2014.
Anyone can make the judgment: just check to see if the military achieved it's assigned goals/ objectives/ mission.
Use any version: the 2 Administrations have cranked out at least a dozen versions between them, and we've failed to meet any.
Joe/ Lowell:
I think the term “Unlawful Enemy Combatant” comes to us from the brilliant legal scholars from the GW Bush Administration. As far as I can tell, it first appears in the Military Commissions Act of 2006. In my opinion, that particular piece of legislation flouts our Constitution.
As an infantryman, and as the leading American voice on the illegality of the US Government employing Mercenaries, I have studied the Geneva and Hague Conventions, and I don't believe any of them, or any of their Protocols Additional, use the term “Unlawful Enemy Combatant.” I welcome a citation to the contrary.
*****
Since you indicate that you are clear about who we are fighting in our war on terror, perhaps you could state who, succinctly ?
Please be clear if you think that includes women and children, who make up a significant fraction of the folks we kill in drone strikes.
Please clarify whether you believe, as our Government believes, that unidentified people who exhibit a "signature" pattern of associating with suspected terrorists thereby become legitimate targets.
Also, at what point in the future would you say it would be safe to return to the Rule of Law ?
Prez Obama is not about substance; he's simply trying to get another Nobel Prize with that speech.
Recall the number of US forces in Afghanistan when he took office, and compare it to the number today.
Recall how many nations were under drone attack 4 years ago, versus today.
Look up how many nations in Africa had US troops in an active military posture (as opposed to attaches at Embassies) then and now.
Make the same comparison for Asia.
Whatever the rhetoric, this Administration thrives on "all war, all the time."
And let's not get started on "rule of law."
JT,
not everyone here is a military vet. They may not recognize Jody calls sung on the stroll back from the rifle range.
Some served in the AF, some in the Navy, and some never served in the armed forces.
TFor them, the song's next line is, "Same old [stuff] again."
And no mention of war profiteering off the KBR construction of Cam Ranh Bay should omit the name "Lady" Bird Johnson, who personally made a Bundle.
Love to read your thoughts on Shaykh Professor Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri's "Long March" and his upcoming Conference in Kabul, in which he has invited 500 scholars of Islamic Law to ponder whether suicide bombing is un-Islamic.
There is no visible means of him affording either event, leading to interesting commentary in English-language Pakistani press.
Item 5: the US promised to turn Parwan prison over last year, then reneged.
Item 6: with some justification, Taliban says that the real power in Kabul is the US, and the "GIRoA" of Northern Alliance Tadjiks, Uzbeks and Hazaras are simply employees of the USA. They refuse to negotiate with Karzai and want direct talks with Obama and his representatives.
Does it really matter if Obama and Karzai agree to collaborate on peace negotiations between themselves that don't include Taliban ?
And Taliban already have an office in Doha.
Item 9: recall that ISAF policy is to count as a militant any males over 10 years old, if we happen to kill them.
Item 10: I can see it now -- a branch of Harvard in Khost, staffed by active US duty soldiers.
C-130 refers, of course, to the workhorse Hercules turboprop fixed wing cargo aircraft. Not a rotary wing aircraft.
You could improve clarity with an apostrophe, an "s" and a comma after "C-130" in item 4 above.
Would the US government consider an attack on Cannon AFB, or Rome AFB, or Creech AFB, or Edwards AFB, or Holloman,
places where drones are controlled from,
to be an act of terrorism,
or an act of war ?
How about an attack on Las Vegas, or Fargo, or Houston, or Maclean, where many of the pilots and weapons officers live ?
After all, the US Government says that the entire world is our playground battlefield.
In point three,
a significan flasehood is perpetuated.
Lyndie England didn't just decide on her own to humiliate prisoners.
Major General Geoffrey Miller was transferred from Gitmo to Iraq in 2003 specifically to oversee systematic torture.
Lyndie was just following orders.
Everyone I know with a gun has it primarily for self-defense.
Arguing in terms of hunting or target practice at a range misses the point.
Sure, they hunt and practice, but the motivation is fear, not sport.
FWIW, there have been two home invasions in Colorado Springs (pop. ~ 500K) this past week with shots fired.
I one case, a homeowner drove off his attackers, who ended up in the ER.
In the other, the invaders were armed and the victims weren't.
Mr Lowell,
I cannot answer your riposte. I don't understand it.
While the NDAA provisions on detention concern me deeply
(I am the guy who is working to get the 86 or so innocent prisoners at Gitmo outta there,)
my comment above was in reference to the Obama agenda regarding crushing the Iranian economy and causing widespread starvation there.
Re: Point #8.
The 2012 NDAA was enacted into law when it was signed by the US President. The current President has been able to implement his agenda without resorting to the veto.
Why is this particular law ascribed to the Congress, who writes all the draft laws, and so far has enacted none of them by way of veto override ?
Granted, I'm neither as smart or as well-read as most interlocutors here.
But I believe that if President Obama publicly stated that he wanted to build a relationship on mutual respect, if not trust, that he would be answered with a willingness to explore that avenue.
I know the general sense that a Muslim is allowed to lie in dealings with dhimmi, kafir, and thus shouldn't be trusted. So what.
In international politics, nobody and nothing is ever trusted.
If the Prez should take my advice on this matter, he should take steps to ensure he is seen as proceeding in consultation with reasonable Jews, who constitute the majority of Jews. He should just ignore jihadi Jews like Lieberman.
after 10 years of torture and other inhumane treatment,
even a completely innocent Detainee would want to strike back at the USA.
In one sense, such an innocent man should be released immediately, and compensated for his losses. I call that "justice."
But now that we have turned him into a threat, we must deradicalize him before releasing him. I call that being practical.
These 86 men, mostly from Yemen, are political prisoners, in that they continue to be held because members of the US Congress do not want to have to answer to voters if one is released and then strikes at Americans.
Shades of innocence are not a factor. What matters is what Obama can do within the restrictions set by Congress.
The Dat-dazh-deet Deradicalization Program provides a measure of justice, while being careful not to trigger a Congressional veto. On completion, these men get to go home. Until then, they are handled according to Army Regulation 190-8.
I presume that Mr. bin Qumu was not Cleared for Release by the team that reviewed Gitmo Detainees, not if we thought he was a member of al-Qaeda.
I presume he was transferred to Libya because we were pretty sure Ghadaffi would keep close tabs on him (as in, under arrest.) Why else would there be a question of a family visit ?
This prologue is to distinguish him from the 86 or so prisoners at Guantanamo Bay Detention Center who HAVE been Cleared for Release. The reviewing committees under both Bush and Obama have found that more than half of the men still incarcerated there today are functionally innocent. At worst, they may have been low level foot soldiers who never fought US forces.
The various well-intended campaigns to free these men have all fizzled out. I admire and respect the work of Remes, Stafford-Smith, Worthington and other giants, but the results are paltry. It's almost as if Gitmo Czar Fried was doing more to get them out, and we know that ain't so.
I call on these advocates to continue their efforts to get the US legal system to uphold the rule of law.
But in the meantime, I call on them to get behind the Dat-dazh-deet Deradicalization Program, the only realistic hope of these political prisoners ever seeing their homes again before they die.
For the debate to proceed meaningfully, there must be clarity around the terms used.
"Assault weapon" was defined in law by (aggressive) cosmetic characteristics.
"Military weapon" seems to mean that multiple rounds are fired with a single trigger squeeze.
Just as important, we need to confront whether or not we want it to be legal to purchase weapons for self-defense. Right now, gun advocates talk in terms of a "regulated militia" and hunting.
In my limited experience, most handguns, shotguns and even rifles are purchased for defending against home invasion (which is rare,) attempted rape, armed robbery and such.
Unless we can change perceptions about those dangers, people will get all the guns they want, legally or otherwise. Is it smart to outlaw normal bahavior ?
Personally, if my wife carried a handgun, I'd be the person most likely to be shot with it. And yet, I might get her one anyway, because of how afraid she is of being attacked.
Rather than outlawing guns, I'd like to see us work to reduce perceptions of danger posed by these hazards. Then fewer folks would think they needed guns.
While Spy guy above is wrong in the specifics, he is right about how to develop limits: performance-based.
Farmer Steve:
Our societal deference to Generals is scary to me. The folks who percolate to the top in the Army are usually the ones with the least conscience. The core value of our military is: "take care of your boss."
If this invisible government had any connection to advancing our security,
they would have an office in Miram Shah, North Wazi., FATA.
We gotta talk to those who are fighting us, if we want the fight to end anytime in our lifetimes.
But the emissaries that JSOC and CIA send there are all 64-inch long metal cylinders, filled in Phoenix with instrumentation, propellant and warheads.
Not only is this shadow government growing, it is learning.
In today's paper, the latest drone strike was found to have destroyed 9 little girl terrorists. That's a hard sell.
So they got their Vichys in Nangarhar to call it a land mine.
Despite the hoopla to the contrary, the US Army's counterinsurgency doctrine hasn't changed much since the 1920's. And no, a fellow with no knowledge or experience in that area did not rewrite the Army Manual on Counterinsurgency in 2004.
I went through Army SF Phase Training (the "Q" Course) in the mid-1970's. That was not at Fort Benning (USAIS,) but at the JFK Center (Fort Bragg and Camp Mackall.) Back then, SF only had 3 core missions, UW, DA and IDAD. UW is instigating and supporting insurgency; DA is raids, hits and snatches; IDAD is counterinsurgency.
I also later went through Branch Basic and the Advanced Course at USAIS.
Now, the only SF doctrine I ever influenced was in a rewrite of a manual on alpine operations, so I only know a couple times as much as David Petraeus about counterinsurgency doctrine. Still, I gotta point out some basics.
First, the actions of the "Puking Buzzards" (Petraeus' unit in the Iraq invasion) were not counterinsurgency in this important technical sense -- indigenous forces fighting the US Army were not fighting the legitimate government of Iraq. This deeply affects the relationships between all parties, but especially how amenable the local civilians might be to collaboration with the foreign invaders. In educated circles, these folks are called "resistance." Makes a huge difference.
Second, the Soviet Army was not occupying Kabul when Najibullah came to power. He was not installed by the USSR the way Karzai was installed by the USA.
Afghans fighting against the communist government of A'stan could well be portrayed as insurgents, in the battle for the perceptions of the locals who were not invested in the fight.
There are no Afghans today who think that the Taliban are insurgents. Even their sworn enemies acknowledge that they are a legitimate resistance to a colonial invader and the puppet government the colonizers installed.
So, applying counterinsurgency doctrine against a Resistance is a bad misreading of the potential to win over hearts and minds.
Pashtuns who do not belong to the Popalzai tribe can never be persuaded to support the hegemony of the Americans, or their "Northern Alliance / National Front" Vichy government.
Plain and simple, the US Army is in the Pashtun areas of Afghanistan to crush a Resistance we call the Taliban. We force self-respecting Pashtuns to ally with the actual Taliban. Our aim is to force Pashtuns into subjugation under the boot heels of Hazara, Tadjik and Uzbek masters.
There is NO POSSIBILITY of winning over the locals, when the locals are Pashtun.
Finally, the "Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan," the "Afghan National Army" and the "Afghan National Police" are not "Afghan" in the sense of incorporating all Afghans, including the 45% who are Pashtun. These 3 entities are controlled and staffed overwhelmingly by non-Pashtuns, who the Pashtuns consider to be foreigners.
Why, when the national government is on the verge of stepping into an era of fiscal restraint, do some insist that such restraint is the equivalent of falling off a cliff ?
Sequestration is a good thing. It will reduce the ability of the President, any President, to start vanity wars.
Allowing the temporary Bush tax cuts to expire is a good thing.
What free fall ?
So, is Prez Obama repudiating all use of chem weapons against civilians ?
If so, the Pentagon is going to have to totally rewrite major portions of most of their war plans.
Or is this another instance of "do as I say, not as I do ?"
if ITU can take over and restrict the Internet that is built on several corporate-owned backbones (c.f., UUNet,)
then where's the genius who is going to develop the successor architecture based on a mesh (no critical nodes) structure ?
Folks with oceanfront property don't worry.
Based on historical experience, the federal government will rebuild whatever they lose, paid for by the taxpayer, if we still have any taxpayers by then.
of course, Mallorca, Malta, Corsica, Crete and Eastern Thrace would all be green, on that map of European support.
.
What is that green spot midway between Malta and Pelponnesus ? I don't think there's an island there. If that's Atlantis, ...
Pretty good summary of the "issue."
I never was interested enough in the Benghazi "controversy" to find out what it was about; now I see it's just one of his opponents' counterstories to the "Obama killed Bin Laden" myth created by his friends in Hollywood and the MSM.
I don't take anything coming from the Obama "Information Operations" as gospel truth, any more than I'd blindly accept something from Limbaugh or McCain. Everybody has an angle.
Not sure what firefights Tom Ricks might have been in. My impression is that he has traveled to and reported from war zones around the world. But I thought that he reported on those wars from back at the military headquarters (e.g., Camp Victory in Baghdad, Bagram in Afghanistan.) I don't think it was his style to "embed" with combat troops, the way Richard Engel has done.
I think of him as an opinionated analyst on military and political affairs, and an important member of the Petraeus retinue. "Military expert" would be a stretch. Sometimes he has thought-provoking insights; sometimes he's just shilling.
That remark about the Mercenaries killed in Iraq, that looked rehearsed. Yes, it was powerful.
On a related note, has anybody identified the two Mercenaries killed with Ambassador Stevens as such ? Or do polite people still have to call them "contractors ?"
The US has provided Israel over $8 Billion worth of air defense weapons. The entire budget for "Iron Dome" came from the US.
How are ANY missiles getting through, especially "dumb" ballistic) ones ?
may I offer:
"Harman’s elevation to the CIA would FURTHER politicize the agency ..."
Petraeus, Hayden, Goss, Panetta, GHW Bush, Woolsey, Colby, Gates and Tenet were all pretty darn political. But Harman-Kardon, I believe, is a dual Israeli citizen, taking it to a whole 'nother level.
I think Major Broadwell is still in the US Army Reserve. If so, she isn't "ex-mlitary," just no longer on Active Duty.
And we only have the word of Petraeus and Broadwell that the sexual relationship didn't start until after he left the military. Neither is unimpeachable on this.
Earlier reports from Petraeus sycophants emphasized that he only infrequently had one-on-one meetings with Broadwell in his Commanding General's office in Kabul, and on numerous day trips to field locations. Alone. No one else there.
Usually they were not alone for extended periods of time. But sometimes they were. These reports seemed crafted to allow that the sexual relationship may have been initiated in Afghanistan, if not before.
Whatever happened to the reports of prostate cancer and the incident when he passed out during Congressional testimony ? How do these tie in with Mrs. Broadwell ?
So, it is not clear to me that he was not in an adulterous relationship while still subject to the UCMJ. I've read what he has said on the subject, but would like to get the rest of the story.
Bill,
a vessel 16 miles off the coast of Iran, but in the vicinity of Khark Island, may actually be in Iranian airspace.
Also, if it is 16 miles off the coast, but is leaving the area, and had been inside Iran's airspace, I think an argument can be made that attacking it was a defensive move.
I've worked for the Pentagon and the State Department. There's a lot of misinformation that comes out of both.
the linked article at The Daily Star quotes a Pentagon spokesman as saying that the US will defend her "forces."
In a warning to Tehran, the Pentagon spokesman said the United States was prepared to safeguard its forces.
“We have a wide range of options, from diplomatic to military, to protect our military assets and our forces in the region and will do so when necessary,” Little said.
So he tacitly admits that what was at stake was an "asset," but not "forces."
Would shooting down an unmanned drone really be far more serious ? Without loss of human life, how far should the US go to avenge the downing of a piece of equipment ?
That is going to happen sooner or later. I predict it will happen in Pakistan just after their next election, if not sooner.
Maybe 'Rule of Law' Americans can box this President in before that situation arises by having a discussion on whether such an act warrants killing more civilians.
DMOL,
in analyzing polls or any other application of statistics, it is important to weigh "stratification" to see if the numbers really say what you want them to say.
Who outside the major cities is accessible to being polled ?
And, in this case, are these responses from Pashtuns ?
You illustrate why Samuel Clemens despised statistical analysis. The facts speak for themselves, but for most laymen, require an interpreter. And your translation reflects the keen edge on the axe you are grinding.
Joe sez:
"The ... attention focused on the targeted air strikes is completely out of proportion to their ... significance."
Joe does not comprehend their significance. To people around the world, this says that the US does not respect the rule of law. Pretty big deal, in my opinion.
except that everyone affected by this already knew.
Petraeus had her standing in as his escort at official CIA functions.
He had meetings with her in his offices, one-on-one, that were not brief. That's every office he had over the last 4 years.
All of his closest associates knew.
No way his wife didn't know; little chance their children didn't. And maybe she was OK with that; none o' my bizness.
Dr. Cole,
you ask the wrong question because you made such bad assumptions.
The ANA and ANP are NOT Afghan forces, they are "Northern Alliance" forces.
The Karzai government in Kabul is NOT a legit Afghan national government, it is still a puppet installed and propped up by foreign invaders. It joins the Popalzai tribe of Pashtuns with the Northern Alliance. To Pashtuns, it is just another foreign occupation force to replace the NATO foreign occupation force.
As a linguist, tell me what language that troop commander is speaking in the background, that is being translated into English. I assume that it is Dari.
Pashtuns speak a different language.
I found Table 5, on Page 7, the most revealing, explaining what types of federal expenditures were factored into the rankings.
It turns out that "retirement," "disability" and "other direct payments” account for about 53% of expenditures.
"Grants to state and local governments" (including tribal governments) accounts for about 21%.
"Procurement" (federal contracts) is about 15%.
"Salaries and wages" (federal employees) is about 10.5%.
But to me the real story is in which of these columns there is the most variability.
In the column for "retirement and disability," only Alabama, Florida, Maine and Virginia were between 20 – 40% above the mean, and only West Virginia and DC were more than 40% above it. Only Alaska, California and Utah were more than 20% below it. Compared to the rest of the data, that’s very little variability.
In the column for "other direct payments," only Louisiana and Pennsylvania were between 20 – 40% above the mean. The Dakotas were each more than 57% over, and DC came in more than 194% above it. Alaska, Colorado, Hawai’i, Idaho, Nevada, New Hampshire and Wyoming were 20 – 40% below it. Only Utah was more than 40% below it. Little variability.
To me, these are the only columns where it is accurate to call these expenditures wealth transfers from the taxpayers of one state to the taxpayers of another state. There is comparatively lesser variability in the columns analyzed above than those that follow.
The far greater variability in the remaining columns shows where the Congress has decided to favor some states over others.
In the column for grants to state and local governments, Maine, Massachusetts, Montana, Rhode Island, South Dakota and West Virginia were between 20 – 40% above the mean. New Mexico, New York, North Dakota and Vermont were more than 40% above. Wyoming was 109% above, Alaska was 217% above, and DC came in more than 376% above it. Colorado, Florida, Indiana and Virginia all got less than 80% of the mean, per capita. Nevada only got 67% of the mean.
The most variability is in the column for contracts.
Only 10 states are within 20% of the mean, plus or minus. MA, MO and TN are between 20 – 40% above the mean. 3 are between 40 – 100% above, Alabama, Arizona and Hawai’i. 5 states are between 138 – 335% above, AK, CT, NM, MD and VA, in ascending order. DC is at 2,044% above, more that $23,600 per capita in 2004.
FL, GA, KS, LA, MS, NV, NH, NJ, ND, OK, PA, VT and WY are between 20 – 40% below the mean. 17 are more than 40% below, AR, DE, IN, IL, IA, MT, MI, MN, NE, NY, NC, OH, OR, RI, SD, WV and WI. Arkansas is last with only 28%.
The payroll stats are also widely varied.
18 states are within 20% of the mean, plus or minus. CO, GA, MT, OK, SD, WA and WY are between 20 – 40% above the mean. 2 are between 40 – 100% above, NM and ND. 4 states are over 100% above, MD, VA, HI and at 243% above, AK. DC is at 3,433% above.
13 states, AR, DE, FL, IL, MA, NV, NH, NJ, NY, OH, OR, PA and TN, are between 20 – 40% below the mean. 6 states are more than 40% below, including CT, IN, IA, MI and MN. WI is 55% below.
There is an explanation for each outlier. DC, for example, is a company town, and that effect spills into NOVA and MD. Some places get agricultural price supports; other states have military bases; etc.
The data in the report do not support the authors’ conclusions that taxpayers of Blue states are subsidizing taxpayers of Red states through wealth transfers to individuals through the federal government.
The report aggregates different types of data in a way that suggests inaccurate conclusions.
as an anti-progressive, my input may not be embraced, but I have to offer that
something like the impact that sequestration would have on military spending would be good not only for the budget, but would reduce the number of preventive wars and military interventions initiated,
perhaps allowing other peoples to live under governments they consent to.
"Quit framing this in terms of an 'Afghan national government' and Pushtun rebels.
"This is the old rivalry between the Northern Alliance and the Pushtuns. The only thing that's changed is that the USA has declared the Northern Alliance (plus the Popalzai Tribe) as the national government. That doesn't make it legitimate. That does not convey the consent of the governed.
"Almost all 'green-on-blue' and 'green-on-green' attacks are explained as Pushtun vs. Northern Alliance."
How do otherwise well-informed observers get this so wrong ?
I thought we didn't do body counts, lest God find out what we're up to.
And you should mention that ANYONE closer to the actual or suspected location of POW Bowe Bergdahl than the blast radius of a HellFire missile has a good chance of making that non-existent civilian casualty list.
Excellent analysis, but Mr. Strindberg pulls one punch. He finds
“..the privilege of unaccountability and impunity currently enjoyed by the ruling elite in all areas of public life ...”
To be the one thing that MUST be addressed, even if every other aspect of status quo remains unchanged.
But what is that, but the prerogative of being King ?
In a kingdom, all human beings except the royal family are chattel property.
The challenge facing the USA vis-à-vis Bahrain is whether to act in accord with our stated values.
Either we believe that puffery about all men being created equal, or we don’t.
Strindberg is wrong in his conclusion. The leadership challenge demands a US response to a system of government that depends on slavery. Clearly, neither Obama nor Romney are up to the challenge.
Suppose, for the sake of discussion, that there are only two possible ways that the war comes to a close:
--- Either the sensible, rational, well-informed high government officials in the State and Defense Departments and the NSC negotiate a settlement with the leaders of the opposition; or
--- the powerless, ignorant, naive "activists," with their vain protests, like Stafford-Smith and Code Pink, get the American Public to demand the war be ended.
I believe that this blog is read by influential advisors worldwide.
Now would be a good time for the current government of Syria to make effusive apologies and generous reparations to the survivors of Turks killed in recent cross-border squabbling.
"... the small team of planners were not engaged in covert operations and have been housed at the King Abdullah II Special Operations Training Center, north of the capital of Amman, since the early summer."
He states a reason. Maybe that is the reason, maybe not.
He states how long they've been there, kinda. Maybe it's been longer.
Reviewing my post immediately above, one glaring omission jumped out:
doesn't the US plan to use Carrier Strike Groups in the coming battles over the last terrestrial frontiers at the poles ?
As long as we're dependent on manned aircraft, carriers can't economically operate in Arctic or Antarctic theaters. I don't understand why, exactly.
I think that is a contingency mission for the carrier AFTER the Gerald Ford, the PCU (CVN-79)USS John F. Kennedy, due in 2020 or later (Romney hints he would pour billions into accelerating that.)
**** While we currently DO have 11 active nuke carriers,
USS Enterprise is on her Victory Lap, circling the globe on a farewell tour before being decommissioned in December. She isn’t intended for combat operations, only for information operations.
Of the remaining 10, at least 2 or 3 are always in a long term “availability” for overhaul or refueling, and 1 or 2 more are either recovering from deployment, or preparing for one. So, at any given time, there are only 5 – 7 active Carrier Task Forces or Carrier Strike Groups ready for combat. With 1 always on station off Pakistan to provide air support in A’stan, 2 dedicated to provocations in the Strait of Hormuz, 1 in the Eastern Med, 1 in the North or South China Sea, and 1 off each US coast, we appear to be short a couple hulls. Secondary missions elsewhere (S.E.Asia, S. Pacific, S. America, Africa and disaster response) are curtailed. Alternately, we may have taken on too much mission.
The USS Gerald Ford, Enterprise’s replacement, won’t be commissioned until 2015 at the earliest, nor ready for deployment until at least 2016.
**** The President has at his disposal a third “private army.” Despite a prohibition in US law, and a repudiation in the Declaration of Independence, the US now relies on multiple armies of Mercenaries to implement covert foreign policy initiatives. Dr. Cole won’t allow comments on such forces in Syria, but they are also employed in Yemen, Somalia, Honduras, Colombia, trans-Sahel, and who knows where else.
**** While US drone strikes appear to contravene international law, it would be easy for the Pakistani Air Force to shoot them down. See video of the drone shoot-down over Negev last week. They don’t. Ergo, the PAF tacitly permits these missions.
**** If the President’s extrajudicial killings by drones of people he doesn’t like were law enforcement activities, they would clearly be illegal. But he characterizes them as military actions on the global battlefield, where all’s fair. The implication is that we are at war with the entire rest of the world. And maybe even the enemies of the President within our own borders.
Tom and Nick are always great to read at the Dispatch. This is no exception.
I don’t think this article plumbs the depths of the militarization of our foreign policy.
The fertile minds at the Air War College have endowed us with the “Interagency” concept, under which all aspects of foreign policy have to be coordinated with the appropriate Regional Combatant Commander. This (AWC) is the institution that gave us the “Centers of Gravity” and “Revolution in Military Affairs” in the 1970’s that looked like terrorizing civilian populations to me.
When I was last there, “Interagency” was the hot topic at the National Defense U.
In Afghanistan, “Interagency” means that the diplomats at State have to show how their activities will leverage military power in the advancement of military objectives. For USAID, it means that all assistance, stabilization and development efforts must serve as adjuncts to the kinetic operations of the local/ Regional Command. Doesn’t take a clinical sociologist to see how that affects local indigenous populations.
The “Interagency,” more than anything else, explains our failure in A’stan. It conveys that the US is in Afghanistan solely for US benefit. The locals may be ignorant, but they ain’t dumb.
Punjabis make up half the population of Pakistan, and dominate the government, don't they ? They are the wealthiest, best educated and most secular of the Pakistanis.
Khan could have done more to make this protest about Punjabi-Pashtun solidarity, it seems.
The Persian Gulf is so shallow that subs can be seen by satellites. Most of the Gulf is less than 50 meters / 165 feet deep. The deepest point is only about 100 meters below the surface.
Now, once out in the Gulf of Oman, depths drop precipitously to over 5,000 feet, but there's rumors that our latest satellites can even see subs at those depths.
What you posit could still happen, but our Intel agencies would know.
Wasn't "Curveball" groomed by Israeli intelligence ?
Doesn't the US contract out all intelligence on the Middle East to 3 partners, with Israel getting 95% of the work ?
The other two were Syria and Jordan; maybe Syria is losing some of its already small market share.
If a person can question Obama's citizenship, where do they put someone like Senor ?
I live in Colorado Springs.
Most of my neighbors think we are at war against Islam.
They also believe that there is a real prospect of this city coming under Sharia Law , if we don't win this war ("on" / "of") Terror.
Not everyone has the same information as the folks who post here.
"The royal family had taken large swathes of public land for private benefit."
This puzzles me.
I thought that, in Bahrain, everything belonged to the King: all property, all persons.
If land is public, it belongs to the King, and the King can do as he wants with his property.
Isn't that what it means to be King, and to be a Kingdom ?
“While the West sees the fight against Assad as a fight for democracy …”
Interesting thought. Sort of like how the West invaded Iraq to bring Democracy ?
This presupposes that Westerners cannot follow complicated story lines.
“Either the parties can continue the current civil war, and when exhausted eventually …”
Understanding who the parties to this conflict are is key to understanding how long this could go on.
This is not an exclusively Syrian-vs-Syrian fight.
“The West ought to … replace romantic, revolutionary notions with a pragmatic approach …”
Again, understanding who the parties to this conflict are is key to understanding what would be pragmatic.
R-Money never had a chance of winning in November.
Dems could have been making honest criticisms of Obama starting back in 2009, when he made his first really bad errors.
Good to see the faithful finally asking tough questions in time to maybe elicit meaningful responses during the campaign.
My guess, some of the confusion over the total number of US Posts, Camps and Stations in Afghanistan stems from inconsistent classification of the 100+ facilities built for the forces of the Northern Alliance, both in their own territory and in the Pashtoon areas.
The long-term plan calls for turning over the occupation of Pashtoon regions to their NA rivals in the Afghan Civil War, who the US occupation has trained, equipped and rebranded as the "Afghan National Security Forces."
Since each of these Kandak bases has a (vacant) office for the USACE Resident Engineer, they are often classed as US facilities.
-------------------------------
A more granular analysis, by Province, might give a clearer picture.
The heart of the Pashtoon insurgency was never in Qandahar; we picked that particular fight in order to show progress to the folks back home. In parts of Helmand, US Marines for a time outnumbered locals, while CODEL's walked through US funded and operated "markets," with a few locals hired for window dressing. Senators McCain and Lieberman couldn't tell that, when they were mingling with the locals, they were effectively in the middle of a surrounding US military base. General Potemkin would have been proud.
IF there ever was a grand strategy in Afghanistan in the mid-2000's, it was to put off the fight along the Pakistani border until the administration could afford to send another 200,000 troops. The heart of the insurgency was always Paktika, Nangarhar, etc.
In 2009, before Obama declared the US pullout in 2014, the US base at Sharana was slated to grow to become the 3rd largest base in all of Afghanistan. That was going to be the Command and Control Center for the final battle to defeat the Taliban. Ancillary bases in the vicinity were to house a massive logistics support capacity, right down to depot-level maintenance on vehicles and aircraft. And did I mention the largest tank farm in Afghanistan ?
Nick, U wanna track the contraction of US bases there, keep an eye on Paktika. The US Army has already abandoned half the outposts there, including all those within 10 km of the border. That space now belongs to the drone operators out of Rome AFB, Creech AFB, etc.
I get the hagiography thing - Obama is tough on defense because he didn't stop the SEAL's from killing Osama.
While OBL was largely irrelevant to US security by that time, it must not be forgotten that GW Bush ordered SEAL's to stand down when they had OBL in their sights in Tora Bora at the opening of the war, when he was still a factor.
They were ordered to let the PAF airlift al-Qaeda out.
But the one recurrent theme of the Obama defense policy is that he has been afraid of Bush's Generals. He should have cleaned house on taking office, ridding the military and armed services of all those politicians in uniform. But he was afraid of his own shadow.
That's how we ended up with a force and policies unsuited to the challenges we face today.
The smartest thing he could do now is to make the cuts for 2013 that the Sequester is going to inflict anyway, showing that he now has the confidence to command the DoD.
any roll call of warmongering Neocons from that dark era must include Steve Cambone.
There are lots of others you could name, but Cambone is far and away the most influential who is not on your list.
I read that story last night at WaPo, and found it unbelievable that anyone with more than a couple weeks in the Navy would think that even one flattop, let alone 2, could be sent anywhere without notifying numerous offices in DC, particularly the Navy Yard, several weeks in advance.
There's a lot of logistics and administration involved.
a regional combatant commander has a lot of authority, but he cannot simply wish for fuel and subsistence to be brought out to the carrier strike force, and it magically happens.
at any given time, there are usually only 6 or 7 carriers, max, available for deployment. in 2007, we only had 11. by the end of this year we'll only have 10.
these are the most important weapons systems in the navy. the CNO is briefed several times a day on the status of each one. NAVSEA has representatives stationed aboard each one.
this is a sad story, but it exaggerates the central point.
"Teabaggers ?" Really ?
Such infantile name-calling doesn't belong in this respected blog.
As David Park notes above,
your guest columnist resents lower income voters finding a voice in the party of the rich.
If middle and lower income folks become politically active, they will take over the Republican Party from the rich. The rich, Guzzo worries, will thus be left without any means of controlling our political process.
All the stuff about identifying the Tea Party stuff with KKK, racism, &tc. is of a piece with the Liberal /Progressive meme that the only reason a person might not worship President Obama is due to racism.
Further supporting the perception that there's barely any difference between the old school GOP and the Dems.
I offer the thought that holding a man for 10 years at Guantánamo,
not as a combatant under the Law of War and not as a criminal suspect charged with a crime,
with no communications home for most of that time,
to be cruel and unusual.
Even if he has access to plenty of food and a nice soccer pitch.
On another note,
why does the State Department keep messing with the website of the "Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan" (Taliban ?)
What do we fear might happen if the American people can read their version of events ?
Those results, about the top stories concerning only celebrities, those are gleaned from the actions of the folks who vote in our elections.
Boo!
Scary, huh ?
maybe it wasn't a hand-placed bomb.
crater analysis (from photos) hints of a Predator drone strike.
I don't think the rebels, whoever they are, have drones.
Patty,
all the points of tangency of the two circles,
at every elevation of the double helix, form a straight vertical line up the middle. That is the centerline of the elevator shaft.
Above the 57th floor, where the two helixes separate into individual spires, one must walk up.
"For real Christians, that a wealthy society could make sure every individual got health insurance, but did not, would be a scandal."
The early Christian (Catholic) Church, in the 1st Century, was communist. I don't think Jesus was a communist, but sharing with all in the community is how his earliest followers responded to the Good News. they were definitely not a wealthy community.
Free Will is fundamental to Christianity, as I understand it.
People are free to help others or not. Also, people are free to recklessly buy entertainment rather than prudently purchase insurance.
The Progressive Illuminati would take away my freedom to choose whether to pay for someone else's health insurance because they believe that they possess a superior understanding of my responsibilities and obligations. They view government as a mechanism through which to compel me to do the right thing, as they see it.
I don't agree.
___________
___________
"There is a reason for which the Christian Right actively makes fun of the social gospel."
What is that reason, may I ask ?
Is it because Christians are hypocrites ?
"For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God."
Here in the epicenter of the Christian Right,
I don't see my neighbors making fun of the social gospel. They all try to strike some balance in their lives, between going to work and watching "DWTS;" saving for a new RV versus tossing paper money in the collection plate.
I believe that individual members of the Christian Right give a lot more of their income to charitable causes* than other religions, including Humanists.
* - by which I mean actual charitable causes that directly benefit people, as opposed to pseudo-charitable causes that benefit pets, political causes or The Nature Conservancy, and those which result in public recognition for the act of generosity.
The word "charity" derives from the Latin "caritas." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charity_%28virtue%29
In the various Christian communities to which I've belonged,
there is usually a core of about 15% who live to serve others.
Your generalizations seem to accurately describe the rest, to a degree.
__
And the "research" using the ketchup ? It was conducted by adherents of the religion of Humanism, to show that theirs was the superior religion. Guess what ? That's just what their "research" shows.
The contrast with Pakistan, weathering its own constitutional crises, is instructive. Various "players" there also try to steal bases, but there are checks in their system that appear to be working.
Another "democracy" closer to my heart (on this side of the Atlantic) has seen its own share of base stealing.
Because the Constitutional checks and balances between the three branches, and the ameliorative effect of 4th estate, are not working correctly, we get an imputed 4th branch of government, we lose the bill of rights, and we get us an imperial unitary executive.
There is no pitcher to throw a "pick-off."
Speaking as one of the US citizens in the US who is on Obama's "kill list," I would be especially grateful for any further clarification of the points raised by the ACLU.
Editor:
is it possible to add a feature so that posters can edit posts within the first 10 minutes of posting ?
that would improve the readability of some otherwise excellent comments.
Joe from LowL,
I've served in USA Army Special Forces.
Awlawki was not out of reach of SOCOM, regardless of what you are told by DoD "information operations."
I estimate the marginal cost of capturing him would have been around $20 Million + 0.5 soldier's lives (dead and/ or wounded.)
I estimate the effort to find UBL cost around $2 Billion, give or take $5 Billion.
I estimate the hit raid cost $200 Million, from planning on through execution.
I cannot defend these estimates, but they make my point.
As in most situations, there's a cost-benefit analysis that ultimately informs the decision.
Just how much is the "Rule of Law" worth ?
This is rich:
Joe from Lowell offended by pervarications.
Both major parties return to sanity ?
What are the chances even one of them does ?
There are other parties.
Which war are these drone strikes a part of ?
It appears that you never sleep, Dr. Cole.
I count 6 objections, with two numbered "3."
just a reminder that Prez Obama tripled the number of US forces in Afghanistan from when he entered office.
From ~33,000 to ~68,000 to ~104,000.
After his recent troop cuts, we are down to double the troops there in Jan 2009.
And he has never explained why we're there.
To clarify, neither the NDAA nor Congress put an outright ban on Obama transferring any of the 86 innocent Detainees out of Gitmo.
It just takes a lot of work, work that Ambassador Fried wasn't up to, and neither apparently is his Diplomat-in-Chief.
Congrats, Jones, on a solid piece.
No deep analysis so as to provoke the low information voter into action, but tasty treats to entertain us self-identified FP junkies.
My fave:
"So commanding did the U.S. military become in Kabul and Washington that, over the years, it ate the State Department, gobbled up the incompetent bureaucracy of the U.S. Agency for International Development, and established Provincial Reconstruction Teams (PRTs) in the countryside to carry out maniacal 'development' projects and throw bales of cash at all the wrong 'leaders.'"
Leviathan, thy name is "Interagency."
++++++++
And cute to a fault:
"In the U.S., such details [installing a puppet government of criminal warlords] of our Afghan War, now in its 12th year, are long forgotten ..."
The one most significant fact of the whole Afghan War is that it is an ethnic-based civil war, with the US backing the Hazaras, Tadjiks and Uzbeks, to help them subjugate the Pashtuns. The US military is fighting a racist battle AGAINST the principles in our Declaration of Independence.
But that fact has been classified a military secret. Shhhh!
Most Pashtuns don't like being represented by, governed by, or defended by Taliban knuckle draggers. But that appears to be the only effective means of protecting their families from the invading foreigners (Hazaras, Tadjiks, Uzbeks, Yanks, &tc.)
But you only find that out if you listen to Pashtuns, agruably (if the Durand Line is not sacrosanct) the majority of the population.
The overwhelming majority of people killed or maimed in Afghanistan have been Afghan civilians.
Joe,
I would believe an analysis of military outcomes at TomDispatch before I'd believe any of the self-delusion posted at Long War Journal, Foreign Policy or Joint Forces Quarterly.
The reason John Allen is unfit to wind down the Afghan War is because he is too invested personally in somehow proving that it was all worth it. Obana would have replaced him already if it weren't for the Broadwell imbroglio.
If you've fought there, or even if you just went there as a REMF, you cannot see clearly. It's too personal.
Jones is easily duped by "Strategic Communnications" (US military propaganda directed at the US Congress.) She believes, for example, that the US military was serious about negotiating with the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, because they said so.
But she has a willingness to allow resistant facts to disturb her preconcieved notions. "Military"-friendly sources suffer from no such weakness.
"Military" has layers of meanings.
To politicians, it means the Generals and the Contractors. To vets like me, it means folks who serve in the lower ranks.
Those are two completely different entities, and completely different meanings. All they have in common is a deep interest in the suffering and dying of the second group, but for completely different reasons.
And Joe, I've got some bad news:
while we won the invasion of 2001-2002, we lost the occupation and imperial era of 2005-2014.
Anyone can make the judgment: just check to see if the military achieved it's assigned goals/ objectives/ mission.
Use any version: the 2 Administrations have cranked out at least a dozen versions between them, and we've failed to meet any.
Joe/ Lowell:
I think the term “Unlawful Enemy Combatant” comes to us from the brilliant legal scholars from the GW Bush Administration. As far as I can tell, it first appears in the Military Commissions Act of 2006. In my opinion, that particular piece of legislation flouts our Constitution.
As an infantryman, and as the leading American voice on the illegality of the US Government employing Mercenaries, I have studied the Geneva and Hague Conventions, and I don't believe any of them, or any of their Protocols Additional, use the term “Unlawful Enemy Combatant.” I welcome a citation to the contrary.
*****
Since you indicate that you are clear about who we are fighting in our war on terror, perhaps you could state who, succinctly ?
Please be clear if you think that includes women and children, who make up a significant fraction of the folks we kill in drone strikes.
Please clarify whether you believe, as our Government believes, that unidentified people who exhibit a "signature" pattern of associating with suspected terrorists thereby become legitimate targets.
Also, at what point in the future would you say it would be safe to return to the Rule of Law ?
Prez Obama is not about substance; he's simply trying to get another Nobel Prize with that speech.
Recall the number of US forces in Afghanistan when he took office, and compare it to the number today.
Recall how many nations were under drone attack 4 years ago, versus today.
Look up how many nations in Africa had US troops in an active military posture (as opposed to attaches at Embassies) then and now.
Make the same comparison for Asia.
Whatever the rhetoric, this Administration thrives on "all war, all the time."
And let's not get started on "rule of law."
JT,
not everyone here is a military vet. They may not recognize Jody calls sung on the stroll back from the rifle range.
Some served in the AF, some in the Navy, and some never served in the armed forces.
TFor them, the song's next line is, "Same old [stuff] again."
And no mention of war profiteering off the KBR construction of Cam Ranh Bay should omit the name "Lady" Bird Johnson, who personally made a Bundle.
Love to read your thoughts on Shaykh Professor Muhammad Tahir-ul-Qadri's "Long March" and his upcoming Conference in Kabul, in which he has invited 500 scholars of Islamic Law to ponder whether suicide bombing is un-Islamic.
There is no visible means of him affording either event, leading to interesting commentary in English-language Pakistani press.
don't mean to be a downer, but:
Item 5: the US promised to turn Parwan prison over last year, then reneged.
Item 6: with some justification, Taliban says that the real power in Kabul is the US, and the "GIRoA" of Northern Alliance Tadjiks, Uzbeks and Hazaras are simply employees of the USA. They refuse to negotiate with Karzai and want direct talks with Obama and his representatives.
Does it really matter if Obama and Karzai agree to collaborate on peace negotiations between themselves that don't include Taliban ?
And Taliban already have an office in Doha.
Item 9: recall that ISAF policy is to count as a militant any males over 10 years old, if we happen to kill them.
Item 10: I can see it now -- a branch of Harvard in Khost, staffed by active US duty soldiers.
C-130 refers, of course, to the workhorse Hercules turboprop fixed wing cargo aircraft. Not a rotary wing aircraft.
You could improve clarity with an apostrophe, an "s" and a comma after "C-130" in item 4 above.
Would the US government consider an attack on Cannon AFB, or Rome AFB, or Creech AFB, or Edwards AFB, or Holloman,
places where drones are controlled from,
to be an act of terrorism,
or an act of war ?
How about an attack on Las Vegas, or Fargo, or Houston, or Maclean, where many of the pilots and weapons officers live ?
After all, the US Government says that the entire world is our playground battlefield.
The USA needs a "Truth and Justice" Commission of our own.
In point three,
a significan flasehood is perpetuated.
Lyndie England didn't just decide on her own to humiliate prisoners.
Major General Geoffrey Miller was transferred from Gitmo to Iraq in 2003 specifically to oversee systematic torture.
Lyndie was just following orders.
Everyone I know with a gun has it primarily for self-defense.
Arguing in terms of hunting or target practice at a range misses the point.
Sure, they hunt and practice, but the motivation is fear, not sport.
FWIW, there have been two home invasions in Colorado Springs (pop. ~ 500K) this past week with shots fired.
I one case, a homeowner drove off his attackers, who ended up in the ER.
In the other, the invaders were armed and the victims weren't.
Mr Lowell,
I cannot answer your riposte. I don't understand it.
While the NDAA provisions on detention concern me deeply
(I am the guy who is working to get the 86 or so innocent prisoners at Gitmo outta there,)
my comment above was in reference to the Obama agenda regarding crushing the Iranian economy and causing widespread starvation there.
See Cole's Point #8 above.
Re: Point #8.
The 2012 NDAA was enacted into law when it was signed by the US President. The current President has been able to implement his agenda without resorting to the veto.
Why is this particular law ascribed to the Congress, who writes all the draft laws, and so far has enacted none of them by way of veto override ?
Is that estimate of 45,000 killed inclusive of those, if any, killed by the "rebels," which is a mix of Syrians and non-Syrians ?
Granted, I'm neither as smart or as well-read as most interlocutors here.
But I believe that if President Obama publicly stated that he wanted to build a relationship on mutual respect, if not trust, that he would be answered with a willingness to explore that avenue.
I know the general sense that a Muslim is allowed to lie in dealings with dhimmi, kafir, and thus shouldn't be trusted. So what.
In international politics, nobody and nothing is ever trusted.
If the Prez should take my advice on this matter, he should take steps to ensure he is seen as proceeding in consultation with reasonable Jews, who constitute the majority of Jews. He should just ignore jihadi Jews like Lieberman.
If Prez Obama cared about peace in that region,
we would have an Embassy in Tehran.
Mr. Bacon,
after 10 years of torture and other inhumane treatment,
even a completely innocent Detainee would want to strike back at the USA.
In one sense, such an innocent man should be released immediately, and compensated for his losses. I call that "justice."
But now that we have turned him into a threat, we must deradicalize him before releasing him. I call that being practical.
These 86 men, mostly from Yemen, are political prisoners, in that they continue to be held because members of the US Congress do not want to have to answer to voters if one is released and then strikes at Americans.
Shades of innocence are not a factor. What matters is what Obama can do within the restrictions set by Congress.
The Dat-dazh-deet Deradicalization Program provides a measure of justice, while being careful not to trigger a Congressional veto. On completion, these men get to go home. Until then, they are handled according to Army Regulation 190-8.
I presume that Mr. bin Qumu was not Cleared for Release by the team that reviewed Gitmo Detainees, not if we thought he was a member of al-Qaeda.
I presume he was transferred to Libya because we were pretty sure Ghadaffi would keep close tabs on him (as in, under arrest.) Why else would there be a question of a family visit ?
This prologue is to distinguish him from the 86 or so prisoners at Guantanamo Bay Detention Center who HAVE been Cleared for Release. The reviewing committees under both Bush and Obama have found that more than half of the men still incarcerated there today are functionally innocent. At worst, they may have been low level foot soldiers who never fought US forces.
The various well-intended campaigns to free these men have all fizzled out. I admire and respect the work of Remes, Stafford-Smith, Worthington and other giants, but the results are paltry. It's almost as if Gitmo Czar Fried was doing more to get them out, and we know that ain't so.
I call on these advocates to continue their efforts to get the US legal system to uphold the rule of law.
But in the meantime, I call on them to get behind the Dat-dazh-deet Deradicalization Program, the only realistic hope of these political prisoners ever seeing their homes again before they die.
For the debate to proceed meaningfully, there must be clarity around the terms used.
"Assault weapon" was defined in law by (aggressive) cosmetic characteristics.
"Military weapon" seems to mean that multiple rounds are fired with a single trigger squeeze.
Just as important, we need to confront whether or not we want it to be legal to purchase weapons for self-defense. Right now, gun advocates talk in terms of a "regulated militia" and hunting.
In my limited experience, most handguns, shotguns and even rifles are purchased for defending against home invasion (which is rare,) attempted rape, armed robbery and such.
Unless we can change perceptions about those dangers, people will get all the guns they want, legally or otherwise. Is it smart to outlaw normal bahavior ?
Personally, if my wife carried a handgun, I'd be the person most likely to be shot with it. And yet, I might get her one anyway, because of how afraid she is of being attacked.
Rather than outlawing guns, I'd like to see us work to reduce perceptions of danger posed by these hazards. Then fewer folks would think they needed guns.
While Spy guy above is wrong in the specifics, he is right about how to develop limits: performance-based.
Farmer Steve:
Our societal deference to Generals is scary to me. The folks who percolate to the top in the Army are usually the ones with the least conscience. The core value of our military is: "take care of your boss."
If this invisible government had any connection to advancing our security,
they would have an office in Miram Shah, North Wazi., FATA.
We gotta talk to those who are fighting us, if we want the fight to end anytime in our lifetimes.
But the emissaries that JSOC and CIA send there are all 64-inch long metal cylinders, filled in Phoenix with instrumentation, propellant and warheads.
Not only is this shadow government growing, it is learning.
In today's paper, the latest drone strike was found to have destroyed 9 little girl terrorists. That's a hard sell.
So they got their Vichys in Nangarhar to call it a land mine.
Whew. Dodged that accountability bullet.
Despite the hoopla to the contrary, the US Army's counterinsurgency doctrine hasn't changed much since the 1920's. And no, a fellow with no knowledge or experience in that area did not rewrite the Army Manual on Counterinsurgency in 2004.
I went through Army SF Phase Training (the "Q" Course) in the mid-1970's. That was not at Fort Benning (USAIS,) but at the JFK Center (Fort Bragg and Camp Mackall.) Back then, SF only had 3 core missions, UW, DA and IDAD. UW is instigating and supporting insurgency; DA is raids, hits and snatches; IDAD is counterinsurgency.
I also later went through Branch Basic and the Advanced Course at USAIS.
Now, the only SF doctrine I ever influenced was in a rewrite of a manual on alpine operations, so I only know a couple times as much as David Petraeus about counterinsurgency doctrine. Still, I gotta point out some basics.
First, the actions of the "Puking Buzzards" (Petraeus' unit in the Iraq invasion) were not counterinsurgency in this important technical sense -- indigenous forces fighting the US Army were not fighting the legitimate government of Iraq. This deeply affects the relationships between all parties, but especially how amenable the local civilians might be to collaboration with the foreign invaders. In educated circles, these folks are called "resistance." Makes a huge difference.
Second, the Soviet Army was not occupying Kabul when Najibullah came to power. He was not installed by the USSR the way Karzai was installed by the USA.
Afghans fighting against the communist government of A'stan could well be portrayed as insurgents, in the battle for the perceptions of the locals who were not invested in the fight.
There are no Afghans today who think that the Taliban are insurgents. Even their sworn enemies acknowledge that they are a legitimate resistance to a colonial invader and the puppet government the colonizers installed.
So, applying counterinsurgency doctrine against a Resistance is a bad misreading of the potential to win over hearts and minds.
Pashtuns who do not belong to the Popalzai tribe can never be persuaded to support the hegemony of the Americans, or their "Northern Alliance / National Front" Vichy government.
Plain and simple, the US Army is in the Pashtun areas of Afghanistan to crush a Resistance we call the Taliban. We force self-respecting Pashtuns to ally with the actual Taliban. Our aim is to force Pashtuns into subjugation under the boot heels of Hazara, Tadjik and Uzbek masters.
There is NO POSSIBILITY of winning over the locals, when the locals are Pashtun.
Finally, the "Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan," the "Afghan National Army" and the "Afghan National Police" are not "Afghan" in the sense of incorporating all Afghans, including the 45% who are Pashtun. These 3 entities are controlled and staffed overwhelmingly by non-Pashtuns, who the Pashtuns consider to be foreigners.
"If I were Egypt, I’d sue the US and China for the tort of making a tenth of the country or more sink beneath the waves."
In what forum would you sue ?
Why, when the national government is on the verge of stepping into an era of fiscal restraint, do some insist that such restraint is the equivalent of falling off a cliff ?
Sequestration is a good thing. It will reduce the ability of the President, any President, to start vanity wars.
Allowing the temporary Bush tax cuts to expire is a good thing.
What free fall ?
So, is Prez Obama repudiating all use of chem weapons against civilians ?
If so, the Pentagon is going to have to totally rewrite major portions of most of their war plans.
Or is this another instance of "do as I say, not as I do ?"
Information Operations.
Designed to shape public opinion back home.
Propaganda.
If we had a functioning Congress, this would be illegal.
if ITU can take over and restrict the Internet that is built on several corporate-owned backbones (c.f., UUNet,)
then where's the genius who is going to develop the successor architecture based on a mesh (no critical nodes) structure ?
Folks with oceanfront property don't worry.
Based on historical experience, the federal government will rebuild whatever they lose, paid for by the taxpayer, if we still have any taxpayers by then.
of course, Mallorca, Malta, Corsica, Crete and Eastern Thrace would all be green, on that map of European support.
.
What is that green spot midway between Malta and Pelponnesus ? I don't think there's an island there. If that's Atlantis, ...
Pretty good summary of the "issue."
I never was interested enough in the Benghazi "controversy" to find out what it was about; now I see it's just one of his opponents' counterstories to the "Obama killed Bin Laden" myth created by his friends in Hollywood and the MSM.
I don't take anything coming from the Obama "Information Operations" as gospel truth, any more than I'd blindly accept something from Limbaugh or McCain. Everybody has an angle.
Not sure what firefights Tom Ricks might have been in. My impression is that he has traveled to and reported from war zones around the world. But I thought that he reported on those wars from back at the military headquarters (e.g., Camp Victory in Baghdad, Bagram in Afghanistan.) I don't think it was his style to "embed" with combat troops, the way Richard Engel has done.
I think of him as an opinionated analyst on military and political affairs, and an important member of the Petraeus retinue. "Military expert" would be a stretch. Sometimes he has thought-provoking insights; sometimes he's just shilling.
That remark about the Mercenaries killed in Iraq, that looked rehearsed. Yes, it was powerful.
On a related note, has anybody identified the two Mercenaries killed with Ambassador Stevens as such ? Or do polite people still have to call them "contractors ?"
Mike,
are you speaking for Israelis ?
If so, which ones ?
The US has provided Israel over $8 Billion worth of air defense weapons. The entire budget for "Iron Dome" came from the US.
How are ANY missiles getting through, especially "dumb" ballistic) ones ?
may I offer:
"Harman’s elevation to the CIA would FURTHER politicize the agency ..."
Petraeus, Hayden, Goss, Panetta, GHW Bush, Woolsey, Colby, Gates and Tenet were all pretty darn political. But Harman-Kardon, I believe, is a dual Israeli citizen, taking it to a whole 'nother level.
I think Major Broadwell is still in the US Army Reserve. If so, she isn't "ex-mlitary," just no longer on Active Duty.
And we only have the word of Petraeus and Broadwell that the sexual relationship didn't start until after he left the military. Neither is unimpeachable on this.
Earlier reports from Petraeus sycophants emphasized that he only infrequently had one-on-one meetings with Broadwell in his Commanding General's office in Kabul, and on numerous day trips to field locations. Alone. No one else there.
Usually they were not alone for extended periods of time. But sometimes they were. These reports seemed crafted to allow that the sexual relationship may have been initiated in Afghanistan, if not before.
Whatever happened to the reports of prostate cancer and the incident when he passed out during Congressional testimony ? How do these tie in with Mrs. Broadwell ?
So, it is not clear to me that he was not in an adulterous relationship while still subject to the UCMJ. I've read what he has said on the subject, but would like to get the rest of the story.
Bill,
a vessel 16 miles off the coast of Iran, but in the vicinity of Khark Island, may actually be in Iranian airspace.
Also, if it is 16 miles off the coast, but is leaving the area, and had been inside Iran's airspace, I think an argument can be made that attacking it was a defensive move.
I've worked for the Pentagon and the State Department. There's a lot of misinformation that comes out of both.
the linked article at The Daily Star quotes a Pentagon spokesman as saying that the US will defend her "forces."
In a warning to Tehran, the Pentagon spokesman said the United States was prepared to safeguard its forces.
“We have a wide range of options, from diplomatic to military, to protect our military assets and our forces in the region and will do so when necessary,” Little said.
So he tacitly admits that what was at stake was an "asset," but not "forces."
Would shooting down an unmanned drone really be far more serious ? Without loss of human life, how far should the US go to avenge the downing of a piece of equipment ?
That is going to happen sooner or later. I predict it will happen in Pakistan just after their next election, if not sooner.
Maybe 'Rule of Law' Americans can box this President in before that situation arises by having a discussion on whether such an act warrants killing more civilians.
DMOL,
in analyzing polls or any other application of statistics, it is important to weigh "stratification" to see if the numbers really say what you want them to say.
Who outside the major cities is accessible to being polled ?
And, in this case, are these responses from Pashtuns ?
You illustrate why Samuel Clemens despised statistical analysis. The facts speak for themselves, but for most laymen, require an interpreter. And your translation reflects the keen edge on the axe you are grinding.
Joe sez:
"The ... attention focused on the targeted air strikes is completely out of proportion to their ... significance."
Joe does not comprehend their significance. To people around the world, this says that the US does not respect the rule of law. Pretty big deal, in my opinion.
except that everyone affected by this already knew.
Petraeus had her standing in as his escort at official CIA functions.
He had meetings with her in his offices, one-on-one, that were not brief. That's every office he had over the last 4 years.
All of his closest associates knew.
No way his wife didn't know; little chance their children didn't. And maybe she was OK with that; none o' my bizness.
and yet, it remains the foundation of the US strategy:
subjugate the Oashtuns under the Northern Alliance.
Dr. Cole,
you ask the wrong question because you made such bad assumptions.
The ANA and ANP are NOT Afghan forces, they are "Northern Alliance" forces.
The Karzai government in Kabul is NOT a legit Afghan national government, it is still a puppet installed and propped up by foreign invaders. It joins the Popalzai tribe of Pashtuns with the Northern Alliance. To Pashtuns, it is just another foreign occupation force to replace the NATO foreign occupation force.
As a linguist, tell me what language that troop commander is speaking in the background, that is being translated into English. I assume that it is Dari.
Pashtuns speak a different language.
Looking at that Blue / Red map, extracted from the report from the Tax Foundation, I wondered what it meant. So, I read the actual report, which itself is light on details, at only 8 pages.
http://taxfoundation.org/sites/taxfoundation.org/files/docs/sr139.pdf
I found Table 5, on Page 7, the most revealing, explaining what types of federal expenditures were factored into the rankings.
It turns out that "retirement," "disability" and "other direct payments” account for about 53% of expenditures.
"Grants to state and local governments" (including tribal governments) accounts for about 21%.
"Procurement" (federal contracts) is about 15%.
"Salaries and wages" (federal employees) is about 10.5%.
But to me the real story is in which of these columns there is the most variability.
In the column for "retirement and disability," only Alabama, Florida, Maine and Virginia were between 20 – 40% above the mean, and only West Virginia and DC were more than 40% above it. Only Alaska, California and Utah were more than 20% below it. Compared to the rest of the data, that’s very little variability.
In the column for "other direct payments," only Louisiana and Pennsylvania were between 20 – 40% above the mean. The Dakotas were each more than 57% over, and DC came in more than 194% above it. Alaska, Colorado, Hawai’i, Idaho, Nevada, New Hampshire and Wyoming were 20 – 40% below it. Only Utah was more than 40% below it. Little variability.
To me, these are the only columns where it is accurate to call these expenditures wealth transfers from the taxpayers of one state to the taxpayers of another state. There is comparatively lesser variability in the columns analyzed above than those that follow.
The far greater variability in the remaining columns shows where the Congress has decided to favor some states over others.
In the column for grants to state and local governments, Maine, Massachusetts, Montana, Rhode Island, South Dakota and West Virginia were between 20 – 40% above the mean. New Mexico, New York, North Dakota and Vermont were more than 40% above. Wyoming was 109% above, Alaska was 217% above, and DC came in more than 376% above it. Colorado, Florida, Indiana and Virginia all got less than 80% of the mean, per capita. Nevada only got 67% of the mean.
The most variability is in the column for contracts.
Only 10 states are within 20% of the mean, plus or minus. MA, MO and TN are between 20 – 40% above the mean. 3 are between 40 – 100% above, Alabama, Arizona and Hawai’i. 5 states are between 138 – 335% above, AK, CT, NM, MD and VA, in ascending order. DC is at 2,044% above, more that $23,600 per capita in 2004.
FL, GA, KS, LA, MS, NV, NH, NJ, ND, OK, PA, VT and WY are between 20 – 40% below the mean. 17 are more than 40% below, AR, DE, IN, IL, IA, MT, MI, MN, NE, NY, NC, OH, OR, RI, SD, WV and WI. Arkansas is last with only 28%.
The payroll stats are also widely varied.
18 states are within 20% of the mean, plus or minus. CO, GA, MT, OK, SD, WA and WY are between 20 – 40% above the mean. 2 are between 40 – 100% above, NM and ND. 4 states are over 100% above, MD, VA, HI and at 243% above, AK. DC is at 3,433% above.
13 states, AR, DE, FL, IL, MA, NV, NH, NJ, NY, OH, OR, PA and TN, are between 20 – 40% below the mean. 6 states are more than 40% below, including CT, IN, IA, MI and MN. WI is 55% below.
There is an explanation for each outlier. DC, for example, is a company town, and that effect spills into NOVA and MD. Some places get agricultural price supports; other states have military bases; etc.
The data in the report do not support the authors’ conclusions that taxpayers of Blue states are subsidizing taxpayers of Red states through wealth transfers to individuals through the federal government.
The report aggregates different types of data in a way that suggests inaccurate conclusions.
as an anti-progressive, my input may not be embraced, but I have to offer that
something like the impact that sequestration would have on military spending would be good not only for the budget, but would reduce the number of preventive wars and military interventions initiated,
perhaps allowing other peoples to live under governments they consent to.
a voice cries out in the wilderness:
"Quit framing this in terms of an 'Afghan national government' and Pushtun rebels.
"This is the old rivalry between the Northern Alliance and the Pushtuns. The only thing that's changed is that the USA has declared the Northern Alliance (plus the Popalzai Tribe) as the national government. That doesn't make it legitimate. That does not convey the consent of the governed.
"Almost all 'green-on-blue' and 'green-on-green' attacks are explained as Pushtun vs. Northern Alliance."
How do otherwise well-informed observers get this so wrong ?
yes, but what's the upside ?
I thought we didn't do body counts, lest God find out what we're up to.
And you should mention that ANYONE closer to the actual or suspected location of POW Bowe Bergdahl than the blast radius of a HellFire missile has a good chance of making that non-existent civilian casualty list.
or maybe Iran ?
Aren't those the only 2 democracies on the Gulf ?
Excellent analysis, but Mr. Strindberg pulls one punch. He finds
“..the privilege of unaccountability and impunity currently enjoyed by the ruling elite in all areas of public life ...”
To be the one thing that MUST be addressed, even if every other aspect of status quo remains unchanged.
But what is that, but the prerogative of being King ?
In a kingdom, all human beings except the royal family are chattel property.
The challenge facing the USA vis-à-vis Bahrain is whether to act in accord with our stated values.
Either we believe that puffery about all men being created equal, or we don’t.
Strindberg is wrong in his conclusion. The leadership challenge demands a US response to a system of government that depends on slavery. Clearly, neither Obama nor Romney are up to the challenge.
And not one US Congressman or woman aboard ?
Didn't we used to have leaders in this country ?
Leo J. Ryan, we need you.
I'd like to read an analysis comparing Afghan Taliban to Pakistani Taliban.
Suppose, for the sake of discussion, that there are only two possible ways that the war comes to a close:
--- Either the sensible, rational, well-informed high government officials in the State and Defense Departments and the NSC negotiate a settlement with the leaders of the opposition; or
--- the powerless, ignorant, naive "activists," with their vain protests, like Stafford-Smith and Code Pink, get the American Public to demand the war be ended.
If I had to bet, I'd bet on Stafford-Smith.
I believe that this blog is read by influential advisors worldwide.
Now would be a good time for the current government of Syria to make effusive apologies and generous reparations to the survivors of Turks killed in recent cross-border squabbling.
SecDef Panetta acknowledges that US Special Forces have been in Jordan since at least THIS Summer:
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/10/us-usa-jordan-syria-idUSBRE89917720121010
"... the small team of planners were not engaged in covert operations and have been housed at the King Abdullah II Special Operations Training Center, north of the capital of Amman, since the early summer."
He states a reason. Maybe that is the reason, maybe not.
He states how long they've been there, kinda. Maybe it's been longer.
Reviewing my post immediately above, one glaring omission jumped out:
doesn't the US plan to use Carrier Strike Groups in the coming battles over the last terrestrial frontiers at the poles ?
As long as we're dependent on manned aircraft, carriers can't economically operate in Arctic or Antarctic theaters. I don't understand why, exactly.
I think that is a contingency mission for the carrier AFTER the Gerald Ford, the PCU (CVN-79)USS John F. Kennedy, due in 2020 or later (Romney hints he would pour billions into accelerating that.)
Nits to pick with details in the article:
**** While we currently DO have 11 active nuke carriers,
USS Enterprise is on her Victory Lap, circling the globe on a farewell tour before being decommissioned in December. She isn’t intended for combat operations, only for information operations.
Of the remaining 10, at least 2 or 3 are always in a long term “availability” for overhaul or refueling, and 1 or 2 more are either recovering from deployment, or preparing for one. So, at any given time, there are only 5 – 7 active Carrier Task Forces or Carrier Strike Groups ready for combat. With 1 always on station off Pakistan to provide air support in A’stan, 2 dedicated to provocations in the Strait of Hormuz, 1 in the Eastern Med, 1 in the North or South China Sea, and 1 off each US coast, we appear to be short a couple hulls. Secondary missions elsewhere (S.E.Asia, S. Pacific, S. America, Africa and disaster response) are curtailed. Alternately, we may have taken on too much mission.
The USS Gerald Ford, Enterprise’s replacement, won’t be commissioned until 2015 at the earliest, nor ready for deployment until at least 2016.
**** The President has at his disposal a third “private army.” Despite a prohibition in US law, and a repudiation in the Declaration of Independence, the US now relies on multiple armies of Mercenaries to implement covert foreign policy initiatives. Dr. Cole won’t allow comments on such forces in Syria, but they are also employed in Yemen, Somalia, Honduras, Colombia, trans-Sahel, and who knows where else.
**** While US drone strikes appear to contravene international law, it would be easy for the Pakistani Air Force to shoot them down. See video of the drone shoot-down over Negev last week. They don’t. Ergo, the PAF tacitly permits these missions.
**** If the President’s extrajudicial killings by drones of people he doesn’t like were law enforcement activities, they would clearly be illegal. But he characterizes them as military actions on the global battlefield, where all’s fair. The implication is that we are at war with the entire rest of the world. And maybe even the enemies of the President within our own borders.
Tom and Nick are always great to read at the Dispatch. This is no exception.
I don’t think this article plumbs the depths of the militarization of our foreign policy.
The fertile minds at the Air War College have endowed us with the “Interagency” concept, under which all aspects of foreign policy have to be coordinated with the appropriate Regional Combatant Commander. This (AWC) is the institution that gave us the “Centers of Gravity” and “Revolution in Military Affairs” in the 1970’s that looked like terrorizing civilian populations to me.
When I was last there, “Interagency” was the hot topic at the National Defense U.
In Afghanistan, “Interagency” means that the diplomats at State have to show how their activities will leverage military power in the advancement of military objectives. For USAID, it means that all assistance, stabilization and development efforts must serve as adjuncts to the kinetic operations of the local/ Regional Command. Doesn’t take a clinical sociologist to see how that affects local indigenous populations.
The “Interagency,” more than anything else, explains our failure in A’stan. It conveys that the US is in Afghanistan solely for US benefit. The locals may be ignorant, but they ain’t dumb.
Punjabis make up half the population of Pakistan, and dominate the government, don't they ? They are the wealthiest, best educated and most secular of the Pakistanis.
Khan could have done more to make this protest about Punjabi-Pashtun solidarity, it seems.
you even read Urdu ?
For news on Pakistan, I stick to the Nation or Dawn, being American/ monolingual.
NO! That would put soldiers at risk.
The Persian Gulf is so shallow that subs can be seen by satellites. Most of the Gulf is less than 50 meters / 165 feet deep. The deepest point is only about 100 meters below the surface.
Now, once out in the Gulf of Oman, depths drop precipitously to over 5,000 feet, but there's rumors that our latest satellites can even see subs at those depths.
What you posit could still happen, but our Intel agencies would know.
Wasn't "Curveball" groomed by Israeli intelligence ?
Doesn't the US contract out all intelligence on the Middle East to 3 partners, with Israel getting 95% of the work ?
The other two were Syria and Jordan; maybe Syria is losing some of its already small market share.
If a person can question Obama's citizenship, where do they put someone like Senor ?
I live in Colorado Springs.
Most of my neighbors think we are at war against Islam.
They also believe that there is a real prospect of this city coming under Sharia Law , if we don't win this war ("on" / "of") Terror.
Not everyone has the same information as the folks who post here.
So, I'm thinking that Christian religion is not one of your specialties.
"The royal family had taken large swathes of public land for private benefit."
This puzzles me.
I thought that, in Bahrain, everything belonged to the King: all property, all persons.
If land is public, it belongs to the King, and the King can do as he wants with his property.
Isn't that what it means to be King, and to be a Kingdom ?
I viewed the trailer in English.
It looked like something I could make - buffoonish.
But when dubbed into another language, the obvious buffoonery - particularly the overdubs in English - vanishes.
It is not as obvious to someone watching the Arabic language version how badly made this film is.
“While the West sees the fight against Assad as a fight for democracy …”
Interesting thought. Sort of like how the West invaded Iraq to bring Democracy ?
This presupposes that Westerners cannot follow complicated story lines.
“Either the parties can continue the current civil war, and when exhausted eventually …”
Understanding who the parties to this conflict are is key to understanding how long this could go on.
This is not an exclusively Syrian-vs-Syrian fight.
“The West ought to … replace romantic, revolutionary notions with a pragmatic approach …”
Again, understanding who the parties to this conflict are is key to understanding what would be pragmatic.
JT McPhee by TKO
R-Money never had a chance of winning in November.
Dems could have been making honest criticisms of Obama starting back in 2009, when he made his first really bad errors.
Good to see the faithful finally asking tough questions in time to maybe elicit meaningful responses during the campaign.
calm down.
Tweedledee has no chance of pulling off an upset.
Tweedledum will get 4 more years to continue his imitation of GW Bush.
My guess, some of the confusion over the total number of US Posts, Camps and Stations in Afghanistan stems from inconsistent classification of the 100+ facilities built for the forces of the Northern Alliance, both in their own territory and in the Pashtoon areas.
The long-term plan calls for turning over the occupation of Pashtoon regions to their NA rivals in the Afghan Civil War, who the US occupation has trained, equipped and rebranded as the "Afghan National Security Forces."
Since each of these Kandak bases has a (vacant) office for the USACE Resident Engineer, they are often classed as US facilities.
-------------------------------
A more granular analysis, by Province, might give a clearer picture.
The heart of the Pashtoon insurgency was never in Qandahar; we picked that particular fight in order to show progress to the folks back home. In parts of Helmand, US Marines for a time outnumbered locals, while CODEL's walked through US funded and operated "markets," with a few locals hired for window dressing. Senators McCain and Lieberman couldn't tell that, when they were mingling with the locals, they were effectively in the middle of a surrounding US military base. General Potemkin would have been proud.
IF there ever was a grand strategy in Afghanistan in the mid-2000's, it was to put off the fight along the Pakistani border until the administration could afford to send another 200,000 troops. The heart of the insurgency was always Paktika, Nangarhar, etc.
In 2009, before Obama declared the US pullout in 2014, the US base at Sharana was slated to grow to become the 3rd largest base in all of Afghanistan. That was going to be the Command and Control Center for the final battle to defeat the Taliban. Ancillary bases in the vicinity were to house a massive logistics support capacity, right down to depot-level maintenance on vehicles and aircraft. And did I mention the largest tank farm in Afghanistan ?
Nick, U wanna track the contraction of US bases there, keep an eye on Paktika. The US Army has already abandoned half the outposts there, including all those within 10 km of the border. That space now belongs to the drone operators out of Rome AFB, Creech AFB, etc.
I get the hagiography thing - Obama is tough on defense because he didn't stop the SEAL's from killing Osama.
While OBL was largely irrelevant to US security by that time, it must not be forgotten that GW Bush ordered SEAL's to stand down when they had OBL in their sights in Tora Bora at the opening of the war, when he was still a factor.
They were ordered to let the PAF airlift al-Qaeda out.
But the one recurrent theme of the Obama defense policy is that he has been afraid of Bush's Generals. He should have cleaned house on taking office, ridding the military and armed services of all those politicians in uniform. But he was afraid of his own shadow.
That's how we ended up with a force and policies unsuited to the challenges we face today.
The smartest thing he could do now is to make the cuts for 2013 that the Sequester is going to inflict anyway, showing that he now has the confidence to command the DoD.
hey, I'm a conservative, though not a Republican,
I can see no possible way for Romney to win - conservatives don't trust him.
The best thing that could happen to the GOP would be a brokered convention.
any roll call of warmongering Neocons from that dark era must include Steve Cambone.
There are lots of others you could name, but Cambone is far and away the most influential who is not on your list.
I read that story last night at WaPo, and found it unbelievable that anyone with more than a couple weeks in the Navy would think that even one flattop, let alone 2, could be sent anywhere without notifying numerous offices in DC, particularly the Navy Yard, several weeks in advance.
There's a lot of logistics and administration involved.
a regional combatant commander has a lot of authority, but he cannot simply wish for fuel and subsistence to be brought out to the carrier strike force, and it magically happens.
at any given time, there are usually only 6 or 7 carriers, max, available for deployment. in 2007, we only had 11. by the end of this year we'll only have 10.
these are the most important weapons systems in the navy. the CNO is briefed several times a day on the status of each one. NAVSEA has representatives stationed aboard each one.
this is a sad story, but it exaggerates the central point.
"Teabaggers ?" Really ?
Such infantile name-calling doesn't belong in this respected blog.
As David Park notes above,
your guest columnist resents lower income voters finding a voice in the party of the rich.
If middle and lower income folks become politically active, they will take over the Republican Party from the rich. The rich, Guzzo worries, will thus be left without any means of controlling our political process.
All the stuff about identifying the Tea Party stuff with KKK, racism, &tc. is of a piece with the Liberal /Progressive meme that the only reason a person might not worship President Obama is due to racism.
Further supporting the perception that there's barely any difference between the old school GOP and the Dems.
Dead man walking.
The Powerful cannot abide such insubordination.
How would YOU like it if he exposed YOUR crimes and failures ?
No, Kazakhstan is there, labeled as "RUSSIA."
Russia would be that small piece top center sandwiched between Georgia and the Ukraine/ Sea of Azov.
"Only when al-Assad falls will there be hope for a return to relative peace in the region ..."
I've read that the fall of al-Assad will usher in a period of anarchy and civil war. Are you speaking of the "Peace of the Dead ?"
I offer the thought that holding a man for 10 years at Guantánamo,
not as a combatant under the Law of War and not as a criminal suspect charged with a crime,
with no communications home for most of that time,
to be cruel and unusual.
Even if he has access to plenty of food and a nice soccer pitch.
On another note,
why does the State Department keep messing with the website of the "Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan" (Taliban ?)
What do we fear might happen if the American people can read their version of events ?
Those results, about the top stories concerning only celebrities, those are gleaned from the actions of the folks who vote in our elections.
Boo!
Scary, huh ?
maybe it wasn't a hand-placed bomb.
crater analysis (from photos) hints of a Predator drone strike.
I don't think the rebels, whoever they are, have drones.
This is unacceptable.
Perhaps some nation with some moral standing on the issue of torture will speak up.
What nations have that standing ?
Patty,
all the points of tangency of the two circles,
at every elevation of the double helix, form a straight vertical line up the middle. That is the centerline of the elevator shaft.
Above the 57th floor, where the two helixes separate into individual spires, one must walk up.
"For real Christians, that a wealthy society could make sure every individual got health insurance, but did not, would be a scandal."
The early Christian (Catholic) Church, in the 1st Century, was communist. I don't think Jesus was a communist, but sharing with all in the community is how his earliest followers responded to the Good News. they were definitely not a wealthy community.
Free Will is fundamental to Christianity, as I understand it.
People are free to help others or not. Also, people are free to recklessly buy entertainment rather than prudently purchase insurance.
The Progressive Illuminati would take away my freedom to choose whether to pay for someone else's health insurance because they believe that they possess a superior understanding of my responsibilities and obligations. They view government as a mechanism through which to compel me to do the right thing, as they see it.
I don't agree.
___________
___________
"There is a reason for which the Christian Right actively makes fun of the social gospel."
What is that reason, may I ask ?
Is it because Christians are hypocrites ?
"For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God."
Here in the epicenter of the Christian Right,
I don't see my neighbors making fun of the social gospel. They all try to strike some balance in their lives, between going to work and watching "DWTS;" saving for a new RV versus tossing paper money in the collection plate.
I believe that individual members of the Christian Right give a lot more of their income to charitable causes* than other religions, including Humanists.
* - by which I mean actual charitable causes that directly benefit people, as opposed to pseudo-charitable causes that benefit pets, political causes or The Nature Conservancy, and those which result in public recognition for the act of generosity.
The word "charity" derives from the Latin "caritas." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charity_%28virtue%29
In the various Christian communities to which I've belonged,
there is usually a core of about 15% who live to serve others.
Your generalizations seem to accurately describe the rest, to a degree.
__
And the "research" using the ketchup ? It was conducted by adherents of the religion of Humanism, to show that theirs was the superior religion. Guess what ? That's just what their "research" shows.
is there a correlation with acceptance of and access to birth control abortion ?
... or the electricity to run it ?
Please offer a prayer for Bowe Bergdahl tomorrow on his anniversary.
makes sense that Andy Natsios would end up where he did.
The contrast with Pakistan, weathering its own constitutional crises, is instructive. Various "players" there also try to steal bases, but there are checks in their system that appear to be working.
Another "democracy" closer to my heart (on this side of the Atlantic) has seen its own share of base stealing.
Because the Constitutional checks and balances between the three branches, and the ameliorative effect of 4th estate, are not working correctly, we get an imputed 4th branch of government, we lose the bill of rights, and we get us an imperial unitary executive.
There is no pitcher to throw a "pick-off."
Speaking as one of the US citizens in the US who is on Obama's "kill list," I would be especially grateful for any further clarification of the points raised by the ACLU.
Editor:
is it possible to add a feature so that posters can edit posts within the first 10 minutes of posting ?
that would improve the readability of some otherwise excellent comments.