What are we not doing?

ARTICLE: Twisting Arms Isn't as Easy as Dropping Bombs, By Shankar Vedantam, Washington Post, January 29, 2007; Page A02

Good research that buttresses our common sense appreciation of the limits of "war within the context of war." You want an opponent to submit militarily? Pretty easy for U.S.

But if you want a country to change and simply apply military power alone, you will lose half the time.

The point to take away is not to avoid trying. Failed states don't heal themselves. The question to ask is, What are we not doing now that gets us a "loss" half the time on coercive efforts?

Steve and I say what we're missing is an effective SysAdmin force/function, followed up with connectivity efforts like Development-in-a-Box.

So what this research says to me is that the SysAdmin should prove decisive in roughly half our military interventions, because just shooting the place is not enough.

Thanks to Jean Rogers for sending this.

Comments

[Mike Frager]

"Winning victory is easy, preserving its fruits, difficult."

-Sun Tzu

[J Canepa]

Both concepts of overt military action and “arm twisting” to achieve international objectives may be overstated. Force or the threat of force is only one tool of the State. As to overt military action, history provides leaders with tempting objectives but usually result in long-term defeat. Consider Napoleon and Hitler each of whom pressed their military advantage to control Europe for 15 and 5 years, respectively, only to lose control as suffer a major blowback.

Arm-twisting works better. The US effectively controlled most of Europe for 50 years or so, without any overt military action, but with some arm-twisting.

Persuasion by facts and logic works even better as no one loses face or thereby political power by perceived rational behavior.

One area where persuasion might work now is Venezuela. Somebody should sit down with Chavez and present some facts and logic. Chavez seems bent on opposing the United States and is likely to cross the line by a classic act of war: confiscation of American property. If he thinks about it, this could not be good for Venezuela. Why tempt the Dick Cheney’s to employ force? Venezuela would be better off if it merely partnered with oil companies. If these companies were nationalized and the owners not compensated or given only token compensation, the likely result might be a hot or cold war, which will take a huge toll on Venezuela. Not nationalizing the oil companies, eliminates the war possibility, and will in all probability bring more wealth to Venezuela. If the oil companies were taxed by Venezuela at the same rate that, say Conoco Phillips has been paying, 40+%, Venezuela gets the 40% and has no need of paying any compensation. Likely too that the 40% of a profitable skillfully run oil company will much greater than earned by a State owned company which lacks expertise has little incentive for profit.

Under the present circumstances, this course will be difficult to sell as Chavez on this as he has to suspect US motives. The perception that the US tried to overthrow his government by covert action has to weigh heavily upon his thinking. Couple this with the quick and total rejection of his offer supply the US with oil indefinitely in return for a guaranteed price. Chavez may just think the US is bent on controlling his country. Force or arm-twisting won’t change this perception but facts, logic might. This begins by then US again returning to the posture of a country, which wants peace and order, not domination.