Globalization's Next Wave of Integration

Thanks to the recent global financial crisis, we've heard much talk about the coming "de-globalization," defined by some as the reversal of the now decades-long push to further integrate trade among national economies by disintegrating production and spreading its means across the planet to the cheapest sources. In the past, all forms of growing supply chain connectivity could be justified on price, buttressed by just-in-time delivery capacity. But the market woes of the last year-and-a-half supposedly threw all that logic into question.

Continue reading this week's New Rules column at WPR.

The capacity/casualty shift from Iraq to Afghanistan

WORLD NEWS: "US claims Iraq milestone after month with no fatalities," by Michael Hastings, Financial Times, 2-3 January 2010.

THE YEAR IN BRIEFING: "#3| Afghanistan: A Looming Quagmire?" by Adam Ferguson, Time, 28 December 2009-4 January 2010.

Essential truth I've been stating going back to before PNM: when casualties get really low, the "controversy" over overseas interventions disappears. Few call them occupations, much less wars. Instead, they become "stationing"--as in, we've keep troops stationed in Germany and Japan.

Naturally, all our fears and hopes shift to Afghanistan, where the MSM unimaginatively retreads all the "quagmire" arguments from Vietnam-cum-Somalia-cum-Iraq.

When will the "quagmire" in Afghanistan end? When the casualties get low enough that the "war" drops below the media's--and the public's--radar relative to other things we fear more.

What do you call a war without enough U.S. casualties? You can it a contingency operation--or normal business for the U.S. military stretching back two solid decades.

The shrinking pool of insiders in Iran

WORLD NEWS: "Turmoil in Iran: Political 'leprosy' takes toll on regime; The opposition is led by politicians who were 'insiders' just six months ago," by Najmeh Bozorgmehr, Financial Times, 2-3 January 2009.

FRONT PAGE: "Opposition chief in Iran ready for martyrdom," by Najmeh Bozorgmehr, Financial Times, 2-3 January 2010.

This substantial migration from the ranks of insiders to outsiders is amazing--a big sign of profound change on the horizon. The only way the Supreme Leader keeps some semblance of control is to concentrate it and--essentially--hand it over to the Revolutionary Guard tightly arrayed around him, meaning he continues his "absolute control" over less and less of the population, only to see the bulk of his power "translated" by others as they see fit for their personal survival and enrichment. The puppeteering has truly begun.

Meanwhile, big leaders on the opposition side are moving toward public statements of martyrdom willingly embraced. Strong and courageous stuff.

The usual political dynamics on attempted healthcare reform

IN THE ARENA: "Village idiots: The left is attacking health care reform as a sellout--and helping right-wing populists in the process," by Joe Klein, Time, 11 January 2010.

The subheader says it all: we all know we need something better, but better to sabotage any good-faith effort in that direction, so we can continue complaining and decrying the lack of political leadership.

McCain is being particularly courageous in this regard--quite the maverick!

Me? I'll take a sloppy compromise here and continued future efforts to smooth it out over yet another do-nothing session of Congress--the true legacy of Boomer politicians.

But, then again, I like that half a loaf.

King of the weeds: The Islamist threat still rules

DECADE OF DISRUPTION: "Islamist threat remains top concern," by Daniel Domboy, Financial Times, 28 December 2009.

Wow! That does describe a decade "from hell."

I mean, working in the DoD back in 2000, I remember most experts rating radical Islam somewhere in the upper half of threats, with nuclear proliferation typically numero two after "rising" China.

Now, a decade later, we still have our freak-out artists on China and nukes (two more states--bringing us to ten and guaranteeing "40 or so nuclear powers any day now!"), and radical Islam, thanks to 9/11 and Iraq and Afghanistan, has moved into the top spot.

Talk about the victory of the lesser-includeds.

If you had come to me in 2000 and said, ten years from now our biggest fears would be terrorists with nukes, I would have bought that future in a heartbeat as the best possible leftovers we could hope for.

But, of course, we live in the most dangerous era known to man!!!!!!! Because SOMEBODY could blow a NUKE off someday!

Then it would be . . . like . . . THE DAY AFTER! (just with virtually the entire planet and world population completely untouched, but other than that, EXACTLY LIKE "THE DAY AFTER"!!!!!!!!!!!).

Scary times, indeed. Unprecedented really, unless you count the last strangely quiet years (I threw in that "strangely" just to cover my rear-end).

FT predicts on trade "wars" and bombing Iran

COMMENT: "Heatwaves, a guerrilla trade war and victory for Brazil: Welcome to 2010," FT Writers, Financial Times, 31 December 2009.

We are told to expect plenty of guerrilla-like actions (meaning sneaky and full of misdirection) in trade protectionism instead of a full-scale war! Why use the term "guerrilla"? It's just the natural downgrading from "war"--thus as near-equally stupid and inappropriate a term.

But look at it this way: with so little actual warfare in this world, the semantic inflation represents a national security experts full-employment act-equivalent--that and 24-hr cable news.

As for Israel bombing Iran?

No. Israel, the US and European powers will become increasingly alarmed in 2010 by signs that Iran is close to developing a nuke. Iran will make significant progress, for example, in developing its enrichment programme, defying world opinion. But Israel knows a strike on Iran's nuclear facilities remains a big risk, not least because Tehran now has the ability to counter with effective ballistic missile attacks on Israeli cities. This time next year, the question on world leaders' minds will no longer be when Iran gets bombed, but when Iran gets the bomb. James Blitz

You heard it here first, folks--about five years ago.

Anticipating the intell data flood on terror suspects

WORLD NEWS: "Airliner bomb plot: Inquiry to focus on turf wars; Fears that agency rivalry led to failure; CIA clashed with intelligence chief," by Harvey Morris, Financial Times, 31 December 2009.

FRONT PAGE: "Pressure rises on CIA after bomb plot: Information sharing practices questioned; Schiphol airport to use body scanners," by Anna Fifield, Pilita Clark and Michael Steen, Financial Times, 31 December 2009.

Unfortunately, the opposite of being unable to share data is actually flooding everyone with--thereupon--useless amounts of ass-covering data.

Better to simply spread the use of the scanners, even though I never seem to spot any info on the medical repercussions (are there any?).

The fig leaf of theocracy in Iran

EDITORIAL: "Iran protests turn into open rebellion: Sanctions should carefully target Iranians' oppressors," Financial Times, 31 December 2009.

MIDDLE EAST AND AFRICA: "Iran's turmoil: Growing signs of desperation; The latest bout of increasingly fierce repression suggests that the Islamist regime has begun to fear for its future," The Economist, 2 January 2010.

Nice call-out text in the editorial:

The theocrats are revealed as a fig leaf cloaking an emerging military dictatorship.

Thus I stick with my 2003 prediction in Pentagon's New Map that Iran's mullahs suffer(ed) an actual loss of rule by 2010.

The FT opines: "A showdown looks inevitable," meaning a showdown between the reform movement and the consolidating military dictatorship known as the Revolutionary Guard.

The regime has always feared for its future, but up to last year those fears were decidedly centered on regime-change efforts by the US. Now the regime fears its own people more--a glorious revolution-in-the-making, if ever there was one.

And the more the regime fancifully blames it on Western powers, the more their own deep fears are revealed.

I do most definitely believe that history will judge this historic shift as part and parcel of the Big Bang effort/vision launched by Bush-Cheney. After not screwing up relations with China, I think, decades from now, B-C will be accorded a great deal of credit for making the call, which, as I have argued for years now, was not a "diversion" whatsoever--but rather a focusing closer to the ideological center of gravity in this Long War, meaning the Gulf.

The Yemen campaign to date

THE FLIGHT 253 BOMB ATTEMPT: "U.S. Looks to Intensify Yemen Campaign," by Peter Spiegel, Jay Solomon and Margaret Coker, Wall Street Journal, 30 December 2009.

For the record:

• Oct 2000 AQ bombs USS Cole in Port of Aden


• Nov 2002 drone hit on former AQ head


• Feb 2006 prison breakout of 23 AQ


• Sept 2006 AQ-linked suicide bombers hit two oil installation


• July 2007 AQ-linked bomber attack Spanish tourists


• Sept 2008 AQ-linked attack on US embassy


• Aug 2009 AQ claims attempt on Saudi deputy interior minister (first underwear bomb)


• Dec 2009 Yemen gov-launched attacks on AQ strongholds, with US assistance


• Dec 2009 attempted attack on US-bound jetliner.

Back when I used to count up US military operations, I'm sure some of these would have registered and others not. But the underlying reality would be the same: periodic episodic ops are the norm inside this Gap country. Basic frontier policing. Nobody likes to do it and it's a complete pain.

But the U.S. military, in various forms, participates here and there, building local capacity wherever possible.

Every so often events conspired to push the country above the white-noise line--like Detroit, and then suddenly the public and media and politicians care most demonstrably.

But most of the time the subject remains rather esoteric--talked about across the community regularly but rarely brought up publicly.

That is the essence of the Gap's security environment and the U.S. military's role there these past two decades.

Cash is king in COIN

TERRORISM THREAT: "Al-Qaeda exploits failures of weak state: Political, social and economic reform is vital in the fight to halt militants," by Andrew England, Financial Times, 4 January 2010.

The word on how AQ moves in on failed-state localities:

They come with bags of cash for the tribes and we have heard they come with teachers for schools, so they understand the importance of the economy. They are not promising jihad; they are promising economic assistance.

Granted, it's designed to be a bait-and-switch ultimately, but it just goes to show that we only symmetricize when we "attack" the situation similarly.

A border clash I can live with

WORLD NEWS: "China's progress provokes border envy in India: Delhi minister fears north-east's neglect; Beijing steps us territorial claims," by James Lamont, Financial Times, 4 January 2010.

Poor people seemingly trapped on the Indian side of the border see neighbors suddenly being treated to all sorts of infrastructure improvement on the Chinese side ("What is the mistake we made by being Indians [rather than Chinese]?")

You mean you can just choose?

A great-power competition I can live with, as China has now played this sort of green-eyed role for India for roughly three decades.

More than four-fold increase: pirate attacks on oil tankers

WORLD NEWS: "Pirate Attacks Raise Risks for Oil Tankers," by Spencer Swartz, Wall Street Journal, 2-3 January 2010.

Chart says 9 attacks in 2006, 25 in 2007, 30 in 2008 and 42 in 2009. Most occur at the starting point around the Persian Gulf/Arabian Sea and--obviously--off the coast of Somalia.

Did the attacks have any impact on oil prices?

Not really. I mean, nothing in comparison to the global economic downswing.

Christians can now claim Allah as their own in Malaysia

WORLD NEWS: "'Allah' Ruling May Challenge Malaysia," by James Hookway and Celine Fernandez, Wall Street Journal, 2-3 January 2010.

ARTICLE: Churches Attacked Amid Furor in Malaysia, By SETH MYDANS, New York Times, January 10, 2010

ARTICLE: Malaysia: Attacks in 'Allah' Dispute, AP, January 8, 2010

Malaysian High Court ruling says Roman Catholics there can use the word Allah to describe God in the local languages and pubs (i.e., Bibles). The ruling overturned a recent government ban.

A small step toward a freer and more openly competitive religious landscape in Asia, with--as I've noted for years--Malaysia playing a decided "lead goose" role.

Yes, the scary prosecutions will pop up here and there (like a woman getting caned for ordering a beer in a hotel bar), but this is a good sign of progress.

Clearly, the ruling won't be the last word in this highly contentious subject.

Tom around the web

+ Tom Engelhardt linked Is Obama's Afghanistan Strategy Ripping Off America? in a piece on Atlantic Free Press that got picked up by a lot of liberal news sites. The short version: America is in decline and China will kick our butts.

+ HG's WORLD linked The Naughties Were Plenty Nice.
+ So did zenpundit.

+ The Future of Integral recommended PNM, BFA, GP, the NDU on CSPAN video and the Middlebury Brief.

+ conneally tweeted the TED video
+ So did diffeomacx.
+ Guesswork Theory linked it.
+ So did Kevin K.

+ artlung tweeted How a childish nation reacts in times of stress.
+ 50kft_K tweeted Stunningly excellent piece of analysis on Iran sanctions.
+ A Postmodern Orthodoxy wrote a lot about PNM.
+ Enter Stage Right listed GP as one of their best books of 2009.
+ Judah Grunstein referred to Tom re: China.
+ Live active cultures linked Imagine that: home-grown mass murders in America!

'Lesser-included' no more

ARTICLE: Slow Start for Military Corps in Afghanistan, By ERIC SCHMITT, New York Times, January 5, 2010

The gist of the challenge:

But General McChrystal said through a spokesman that the effort had been "understaffed," and that he had also asked the branches of the military for their top performers. "We have to be willing to break traditional career models; we've literally got to break systems to do this," General McChrystal said.

Push now coming to shove for the SysAdmin effort in Afghanistan and the military's overall evolution in this direction. Inevitably, sufficient levels of political pain force the issue.

If we want to integrate Afghanistan, we should look to India

ARTICLE: With thumbs-up from Afghans, India explores more areas of aid, By Shubhajit Roy, Indian Express, Jan 05, 2010

The first half:

Buoyed by results of two independent surveys in Afghanistan voting India as the preferred country, ahead of even multilateral agencies like UN and NATO, to carry out reconstruction in the country, India is exploring ways to increase its assistance in various areas to that country.

India, which has a $ 1.3 billion development assistance programme for Afghanistan in place already, may venture into areas of cooperation like agriculture and irrigation apart from existing areas like power, IT, medicine, infrastructure and human resource development.

In a recent Gallup poll, when asked about the roles the Afghans thought that various groups or countries were playing in resolving the situation in Afghanistan, 59 per cent favoured India's role. UN and NATO were mentioned by 57 per cent and 51 per cent Afghans respectively.

In another public opinion survey conducted by the International Republican Institute (IRI), India topped the list of the countries seen as having "good relations with Afghanistan" -- with 24 per cent of respondents naming India, followed by the US (19 per cent), Iran (17 per cent) and Tajikistan (12 per cent). Pakistan, interestingly, was mentioned by only 5 per cent Afghans covered in the IRI survey. In the Gallup poll, about 33 per cent of Afghans surveyed saw Pakistan as supporting the Taliban leadership.

It's interesting, but you never hear anything about India in any American nation-building plan (which is all NATO, NATO, NATO), and yet, by most accounts on the ground, your average Afghan looks to India as the land of opportunity. So if you're going to connect Afghanis to the larger world, why wouldn't any and all cooperation with India on economic development be front and center?

India is the giant force pulling southern Asia into the global economy, not the U.S..

Old story of mine: our natural allies in frontier integration are New Core pillars, not Old Core allies.

Bombing Iranian nuke program won't work

ARTICLE: Iran Shielding Its Nuclear Efforts in Maze of Tunnels, By WILLIAM J. BROAD, New York Times, January 5, 2010

Some details on the long-known Iranian effort to distribute their enrichment/nuclear facilities deep under ground.

The opening:

Last September, when Iran's uranium enrichment plant buried inside a mountain near the holy city of Qum was revealed, the episode cast light on a wider pattern: Over the past decade, Iran has quietly hidden an increasingly large part of its atomic complex in networks of tunnels and bunkers across the country.

In doing so, American government and private experts say, Iran has achieved a double purpose. Not only has it shielded its infrastructure from military attack in warrens of dense rock, but it has further obscured the scale and nature of its notoriously opaque nuclear effort. The discovery of the Qum plant only heightened fears about other undeclared sites.

Now, with the passing of President Obama's year-end deadline for diplomatic progress, that cloak of invisibility has emerged as something of a stealth weapon, complicating the West's military and geopolitical calculus.

Iran's refers to this tactic as a "passive defense." Passive-aggressive would be more apt, but you get the idea.

The complications here are significant and recognized:

Indeed, Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates has repeatedly discounted the possibility of a military strike, saying that it would only slow Iran's nuclear ambitions by one to three years while driving the program further underground.

Some analysts say that Israel, which has taken the hardest line on Iran, may be especially hampered, given its less formidable military and intelligence abilities.

Ahmadinejad, by the way, started as a transportation engineer and then founded the Iranian Tunneling Association, so not exactly some fly-by-night effort easily bombed into submission:

There are hundreds, perhaps thousands, of big tunnels in Iran, according to American government and private experts, and the lines separating their uses can be fuzzy. Companies owned by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps of Iran, for example, build civilian as well as military tunnels.

As the piece points out, America has been working the technology of a deep tunneling bomb for quite some time. But that's not the issue here. The issue is the vastness of the tunneling effort, and the reality that if we went that route, we'd have to bomb at great length and even then we'd have little sense of what damage we did and what was spared.

More good arguments against bombing Iran

POST: Iran and the Goldilocks Principle: Why Kuperman is Completely Wrong and the Leveretts are Only Partly Right and There are no Tunnel Bombs, By Juan Cole, Informed Comment, January 07, 2010

Very intelligent piece by Cole that's worth reading from top to (way below) bottom. Good points throughout, but I liked this one best:

The logical problem is, how can you both acknowledge the depth and legitimacy of the Green Reform movement and at the same time urge President Obama to pursue engagement with Ahmadinejad's government? Me, I don't see the problem here. We didn't close the Polish embassy during the Solidarity movement. You deal with the government in power on bilateral issues as long as it is there. If it falls, then you deal with the new government. It is not as if we are offering the regime weapons or materiel that could be used against the protesters. We're just jawboning them.

It has such a sensible, duh-like logic to it ("Big deal! So we talk to them!"), and yet Cole is but one voice among so many experts arguing otherwise that it seems remarkable and daring for him to make his case so starkly. There are, of course, others who speak such common sense, eschewing all manner of hyperbole, and they are like strange islands of quietude in this rancorous debate. Hard-liners seem to be saying that any interaction somehow spits in the face of the opposition. I just see such efforts doing much to deny the regime the excuse of the external enemy at a time when it needs it most.

Cole's take on the NYT tunneling piece was different from mine: he worries that a case is being made for strikes with such breathless reporting. Me? I just spot more logic against the notion that bombs will get us some definitive outcome, whether they're actually operating equipment under ground or simply stockpiling them to protect them from airstrikes (Cole's argument).

I am especially glad that Cole found the Kuperman piece as supremely bad as I did. I almost didn't blog it I felt it was such a bad piece of analysis, but then I felt compelled--on that basis--to say something. Cole really nails it nicely.

Damned if you do...

ARTICLE: U.S. was more focused on al-Qaeda's plans abroad than for homeland, report on airline bomb plot finds, By Karen DeYoung and Michael A. Fletcher, Washington Post, January 8, 2010

Of course, if the group had actually killed Americans in Yemen, then the report would have condemned the CIA for focusing too much on incredible attempts at bringing terror to the U.S. when the group's history suggests that localized strikes were all it could manage.

But now, of course, we know these clever bastards can give explosive elements to somebody who stuffs them in his underwear and then boards a plane (amazing logistics, yes?). Apparently inconceivable before (at least the Yemen part), we are now deluged with all-or-nothing-calls on Yemen--as in, take down the place or don't bother doing anything at all.

As the analysis grows more pointless, the debate dumbs itself down.

We now officially enter the silly season on this one.

Terrorism mythbuster

OP-ED: 5 myths about keeping America safe from terrorism, By Stephen Flynn, Washington Post, January 3, 2010

The guts:

1. Terrorism is the gravest threat facing the American people.

Americans are at far greater risk of being killed in accidents or by viruses than by acts of terrorism . . .

2. When it comes to preventing terrorism, the only real defense is a good offense.

... Strengthening our national ability to withstand and rapidly recover from terrorism will make the United States a less appealing target. In combating terrorism, as in sports, success requires both a capable offense and a strong defense.

3. Getting better control over America's borders is essential to making us safer.

Our borders will never serve as a meaningful line of defense against terrorism ...

4. Investing in new technology is key to better security.

Not necessarily. Technology can be helpful, but too often it ends up being part of the problem ... and they are no substitute for well-trained professionals who are empowered and rewarded for exercising good judgment.

5. Average citizens aren't an effective bulwark against terrorist attacks.

... This misconception is particularly reckless because it ends up sidelining the greatest asset we have for managing the terrorism threat: the average people who are best positioned to detect and respond to terrorist activities. We have only to look to the attempted Christmas Day attack to validate this truth. Once again it was the government that fell short, not ordinary people.

Myth-busting pieces are a favorite of mine, and Flynn did a very nice job with this one.