Hmm. How many oil wars has China started?

ARTICLE: "U.S. Defense Secretary Issues Veiled Warning to China Not to Bully Neighbors Over Energy," by Eric Schmitt, New York Times, 31 May 2008, p. A8.

China's tendency to claim territorial waters and the resources found therein is hardly beyond the great power pale.

To be fair, Gates praised as much as he warned, but seriously, America is so blithely unaware of its tendency to make statements publicly that make other nations' jaws drop.

Who has made war repeatedly in the oil-rich regions of the world and who has not? The Chinese bribe and sell arms, definitely, but that hardly beats actual wars. Slimy, yes, but please keep some perspective.

Granted, we do so for the best of global reasons (hell, I make a career out of such strategic rationales), keeping an "open door" in the region, from which China benefits greatly (and Chinese players will tell you that privately with little angst).

But then we start lecturing China preemptively over its potential strong-arming of situations.

If we are simply more honest with ourselves and the world about the security role we play, everything would be a lot more transparent. But when we layer the sanctimonious warnings on top, it does get under their skin--as in, "Who the hell are you to be lecturing me?" It simply raises suspicions about our real intentions.

Good example: we tell China it's got too many nuke missiles for mere defense, and then China counts up ours and wonders how we can make such statements while sticking missile defense sites in various places.

Again, our honesty about ourselves and our role in the world is the most important transparency to be had. Every other nation's transparency is a function of our choice.

Saved by SATC

Saw it with Vonne and loved it.

Big discovery, though, was how to finally stretch my knee to stop pain that had plagued for year-plus.

It was my arch all along.

Movie, again, was fab. Skip the reviews if you were a fan of the show. I just loved it.

The hunt for red gold

ARTICLE: "China's Pride: A 24-Karat Olympic Machine; Host Nation Invests in Athletes, Aiming for a Return in Gold," by Juliet Macur, New York Times, 1 June 2008, p. A1.

How crass! China hires other nations' great coaches in a money-fueled attempt to win more gold medals..

America would never ... never mind. That list is too long to contemplate.

Center of story is rowing coach, Igor Grinko.

Wanna guess where thr Chinese found this "hired gun"? This sports mercenary?

Uh, that would be America, which stole him from the Sovs after the Wall came down.

It's a free agent world, baby.

In the future, you'll see much wider competition among states for the best and the brightest--and not just in sports.

Our pervasive paranoia must be welcomed by our great power competitors

ARTICLE: "House measure threatens Thales satellite work," By Douglas Barrie and Amy Butler, Aerospace Daily & Defense Report, 06/02/2008, page 12

Here's my fear: America's national security establishment is so imprinted by our Cold War experience regarding secrecy and classified info and export restrictions, that we're going to bureaucratize ourselves into an uncompetitive situation over the long term--if we haven't already.

Our pervasive paranoia must be welcomed by our great power competitors: it effectively sidelines us in many situations and markets to their advantage.

Thank God most of the federal workforce is aging out. We need to unshackle ourselves. The longer we remain trapped in this mindset, the less secure we really become and the more we lose economically.

Exploit the crisis

OP-ED: Missing the Market Meltdown, By Amory B. Lovins, Newsweek, May 26, 2008

While I think the nukes v. renewable choice will end up being a false dichotomy for many emerging markets (they'll end up choosing both, bypassing big nukes for smaller ones), Amory--as always--makes me optimistic about market responses.

Behavior is changing all over the place in response to higher prices.

If we're smart to not assume some rescuing, 1980s-like collapse of oil prices coming down the road, and the Middle East recognizes it can't waste this windfall (in terms of local job creation) like it did the last one, and emerging markets like China act like they know they can't possibly replicate our resource-intensive rise, then this "oil crisis" ends up being exactly what the world needs now.

"Ah, but doesn't this crisis make your entire vision untenable!!!!!???"

Go to the back of the class with that silly nonsense. Crises are not to be wished away, much less avoided.

They are to embraced for what they are: incentive-laden opportunities.

Grand strategy is not crisis avoidance, but crisis exploitation.

Cry for attention

ARTICLE: Iran Makes the Sciences A Part of Its Revolution By Thomas Erdbrink, Washington Post, June 6, 2008; Page A01

This is example of where Iran really wants recognition less as revolution and more as nation-state.

We need to deny connectivity that validates the revolution (a complete failure) and promote stuff that recognizes the people/nation-state.

Iran the nation-state isn't going away. Iran the revolution isn't going forward.

Leverage what you like and ignore the rest.

The big point here: no claim to alternative science.

Nuclear trigger

ARTICLE: Top Two Air Force Officials Ousted, By Ann Scott Tyson and Josh White, Washington Post, June 6, 2008; Page A01

I think the nukes is trigger (pun intended), but real deal is next-war-itis charge of foot dragging. Don't know Chief but Wynne always impressed me.

Still, signals are signals and Gates sending plenty in time he's got left.

Obama and McCain spar on Iran

No talks between us and Iran prevent the reach for the bomb. On that McCain is correct.

Iran's decision based on our choices to invade Afghanistan and Iraq. Nothing we do now will scratch the nuke itch.

Now we live with the consequences of our choices, including the military tie-down that rules out regime change in Iran with military force.

All that is basically decided, along with our inability to stop Iran's reach, thanks also to Tehran's none-too-surprising support (or lack of serious resistance) from Russia, China and India.

We can deal with that emerging reality or we can finger-point over the past.

The question is, Who do you want to deal with this emerging strategic reality? The cool negotiator or the anger-management guy?

Ah, but what of the "irrationality" factor?

I repeat my question.

Why do we get so wobbly over Iran? We have met this package (nation-state/failed revolutionary power talking trash and sporting new nukes) twice before and finessed it nicely (and frankly, both the USSR and PRC were far more successful).

This "Mao" already has a bevy of "Nixons" knocking at the door over oil and gas.

We learn to accept our lack of leverage here or we're going to be consistently flabbergasted at our lack of success--as in, more of the same old, same old.

Our problem remains the same: we are unable to see the strategic reality for what it is and we're perplexed that our attempts at global gun control aren't working.

So I repeat the question differently: turn the page or reread the same passage over and over again, hoping for a different outcome?

Deal with the devil

POST: Northern Ireland's Top Cop: Negotiate with Al Qaeda, By Kris Alexander, Danger Room, June 04, 2008

An interesting perspective. Revolutionary movements lose their revolution when they make pacts with the enemy--"devil" or no.

This is much temptation to make all foreign policy, all national security, and all grand strategy terror-centric (Bobbitt being the most eloquent).

I myself see no reason to reward their asymmetry with symmetry. To me, that is the essence of going wobbly: recasting this grand horizontal scenario called globalization (i.e., nation states integrating via economics, then security, then politics) to foreclose the enemy's capacity for hit-and-miss vertical scenarios.

Their friction merely reflects our far more powerful force.

So avoid going wobbly, avoid giving into fear, don't play down, and maintain faith in what got us here and gets us there: meeting the demands of a growing middle class. For decades that was an intra-national affair. Now it's an international or global middle class whose emergence drives change and adaptation far beyond the puny terrorists, who remain a useful bogeyman for a networked age but control nothing but our fears and attention spans--when we let them.

The global markets we deserve

ARTICLE: U.N. Chief to Prod Nations On Food Crisis, By Colum Lynch, Washington Post, June 2, 2008; Page A07

If the current food crisis makes it easier for governments to reduce all these market-distorting barriers, then we should get the global markets we deserve.

There are no shortages of food, just a surfeit of market-inhibiting barriers.

NC was cooking!

Into RDU from Indy early this a.m. on Northwest. Drive in rental to Chapel Hill and do 75-min brief that felt solid and yet some brain lapses--just slight--that told me something was wrong.

Crowd of many 50-60 midcareer students from two courses (both logistical). Interesting mix of civilian and mil. Q&A especially good and went 45.

Got Last Lecture and nice command coin and signed a bunch of books.

Getting to be a nice regular gig down here.

Heard from spouse: daughter with sinus infection and I begin to wonder about how bad I felt upon waking this morning, the creeping flashes of stupidity and an oddly sore throat after talking.

Having doc call in some antibiotics on the road as trip continues. I don't like to leave the country without some.

The magic number

The cynic and realist in me has always thought, and responded when asked, that if you get the casualty number below 20, or roughly half the number of the war months, then the question of withdrawal would evaporate.

Seeing the page 6 coverage of 18 deaths in May, that logic seems to be holding nicely.

As I said all along: the only measure is U.S. casualties. Progress or no within Iraq, so long as losses are perceived low, the time line stretches plenty. With reasonable progress, like we're getting, then we're into the very positive dynamic of accumulating time since the last great spasms of civil violence.

In that space we fill up, as much as possible, on economic development, with Enterra working the Kurds in the lead, setting the example for elsewhere.

And so long as our casualties stay low and stability spreads, then time is on our side and it becomes apparent to Iran that they have to start picking sides among the Shia in Iraq, no longer backing all in a hedging strategy.

And then the opportunities emerge, once Bush is gone and Ahmadinejad suffers election defeat.

Nothing overnight, but things progressing nicely, and no matter all the legit negatives you can toss at Petraeus, these are the only wins that matter, and so he gets plenty of credit.

The Sichuan quake System Perturbation rumbles on

ARTICLE: "Parents' Grief Turns to Rage at Chinese Officials," by Andrew Jacobs, New York Times, 28 May 2008, p. A1.

Stunning pic: CCP boss of Mianzhu, kneeling in street, eyes downcast, in front of mothers holding pics of dead kids, pointing at the faces and screaming at him. He is begging them to abandon their protests, and seems to be failing.

Article says angry parents are lashing out over fact that gov buildings and nearby elite schools withstood quake while their kids die in poorly built public schools.

The usual caution about confronting party bosses evaporates ...

This is not just about the quake, but about people getting used to making more demands over perceived injustices. People start living better and then start expecting more. When they work their asses off to get ahead and then see how elites do better for no good reason, then they get mad and the gloves come off. People's sense of the new minimum standard is everything when it comes to reforms and change: they say to themselves, "Nobody should have to endure this" and whammo! The new minimum standard for decency is undeniable.

And with every perceptible rise in that public-defined new minimum standard, the party's arbitrary power weakens and its responsibility to deliver on heightened expectations grows.

Increasingly, the quake creates a fault line between a pre-disaster and post-disaster China.

With all due disrespect to misguided Sharon Stone, China is getting what it deserves ... not with this tragedy but as a result of it: a more demanding public and a more responsive Party.

Arctic resource wars!!!!! Canceled!

ARTICLE: "5 Countries Agree to Talk, Not Compete Over the Arctic," by Andrew C. Revkin, New York Times, 29 May 2008, p. A10..

Damn it all!

They even agreed to use the Law of the Sea Treaty.

Took them a whole day!

Weren't these diplomats informed about the growing academic consensus on future resource wars?

This is where McCain can impress

ARTICLE: McCain Campaign Calls; A Nonprofit Steps In, By Robert O'Harrow Jr., Washington Post, May 31, 2008; Page A01

Supporting a good deal while Obama panders on the ag bill.

Nixon:Bush::Dean:McClellan

POST: Shades of Nixon: Scott McClellan as George W. Bush’s John Dean, zenpundit

Very apt analysis on McClellan by Zenpundit.

The Nixon comparison fits like a glove--sadly--absent the proficiency in grand strategy (hence, a dumb Nixon).

This week's column

U.S. sits pretty in global food trade network

In the global oil industry, there is Saudi Arabia and everybody else. But with the planet experiencing the worst food crisis since the tumultuous 1970s, the question begs, Who is the "Saudi Arabia" of agriculture? Well, it turns out that North America is the OPEC of global grain.

When the professional fear mongers try to scare you with America's "oil addiction," remember this: if the world's got us over a barrel on energy, then we've got the world over a bread basket. Moreover, while global climate change will progressively diminish OPEC's importance as we're forced to improve transportation technologies, it'll only strengthen NAFTA's role as the world's preeminent food exporter.

Read on at Scripps Howard.
Read on at KnoxNews.

SH strikes again: Tom's headline was 'NAFTA - the OPEC of food'

Dodged a bullet on flash flood

Casa Barnett survives with no damage, but it was a close call. Basement sump almost overwhelmed, and back-up never triggered (it runs on water, believe it or not), but when lights flickered and the sump was running non-stop, deep in water, I got scared and hooked up the generator as fall-back.

Our yard has to process a lot of run-off and the flood in the backyard came within a few feet of the foundation. Meanwhile I'm waist deep in the side-yard drainage area trying to unplug the bumblebee drain (no matter, as it was overwhelmed as drainage area spilled into street.

Then, just as it seemed like the basement could go at any minute, the sky breaks, the torrent stops, and yard quickly drains. All those French tile drains, taken to the max, just barely hold.

Many neighbors not so lucky.

By 5pm, all water gone, but roads still flooded all over, I discover, as I take little ones to "Kung Fu Panda."

A break for me from editing the mega history chapter.

Long day's journey into night

It is weird to travel as much as I do, hopping around the country. No matter where I go, there I am. In the very recent timeframe I've found myself staring absent-mindedly at all sorts of monuments--today the Statue of Liberty from the Jersey City side. Earlier this week I got to see the mighty Mississippi several times.

Since the beginning of the year, so far "dominated" by the book, I managed to visit three countries (Jordan, Canada and Netherlands), and a slew of states (FL, NJ, NY, MD, VA, DC. AL, AZ, MN, WI, IL, VT, MA, PA, KS, NV, KY, TN, NC--19 in all and many several times!). Plus the articles for Esquire, Good, and the book review for National Review. Plus two dozen columns.

No wonder I thought of giving up the blog!

But I worked something out with Sean for the duration of the book writing, and I liked it so much I've kept the process since: papers pile up at home when I travel, I grab them and read as I can at home but mostly on the road, I collect the articles, and then I blog en masse when the mood strikes, like the night of 6 June when I'm stranded in Philly's airport after a long meet with a global broker-dealer firm in the NYC area (you want to make markets happen inside the Gap, you need a market-maker).

Tonight I crank 25 to avoid falling asleep. I am beat after the nights in the hospital with Mom (like overnighting in coach) in MN, but that was worth it. But after getting almost enough sleep last night, I'm up at 0500 for flight to Philly, then rental to NYC area, then quick meet with Good exec editor to discuss next piece, then meet with firm followed by lunch (Steve in top form and all set up by Jenn, so my lifting light as PNM opened the door), followed by mad car dash to Philly to miss my flight by inches, followed by 3 hours hanging for next.

So I blog, adding to Sean's Q, feeding the beast, staying awake.

I gotta tell you though, if the deals weren't flowing with Enterra, I'd consider slowing down. My problem is that I don't turn down talks, needing the big $ to pay for all the cheap-to-no-pay mil gigs.

I just wish I didn't have to spend so much time away from my kids. It was a lot easier when I was just an analyst.

Obama does well to read Zakaria

OP-ED: "Obama Needs a Better Reading List," by Thomas Frank, Wall Street Journal, 4 June 2008, p. A19.

BOOK REVIEW: "America Dethroned: The Post-American World," by Parag Khanna, Washington Post National Weekly Edition, 2-8 June 2008, p. 39.

Some decent criticism of Zakaria's book from Frank, but he misses the big point: the "rise of the rest" is not to be fought, a key bit of advice to both Obama and "League of democracies" McCain.

Zakaria says, in effect, the "rest" (or my New Core) rise within the liberal trade order of our making. I make the same basic point in Great Powers, albeit with a lot more vehemence, arguing, as I have for some time, that America naturally allies itself with the rising players. Where Zakaria sees a happy outcome to be encouraged, I see a purposeful one that must be exploited, but we see basically the same world: I just see opportunity where he first spots challenge.

So fair for Khanna to say that "Zakaria leaves policymakers to figure out how to rank challenges and restore U.S. legitimacy," especially since that's my primary purpose in Great Powers!

But also fair to point out (for me, that is), that Fareed and I see a world moving more and not less in our favor, if only America does not turn on it mindlessly--the big danger right now among the Dems.

So it's a great thing for Obama to be reading Zakaria.

Franks offers Galbraith's "Predator State" instead--enough said.