DATELINE: Indy, 11 October 2006.
Fighting asymmetrically isn't really that complex. Yes, we dress up with these overarching notions of 4GW and imagine further iterations of similar rising complexity, but by and large, fighting asymetrically often involves simply socializing your problem.
Basically, socializing your problem is about recognizing that the problem you're facing is too large for you to handle, so you blow it up and make it the problem of a whole lot of other people besides yourself.
9/11 is the great example to me, but so is the Big Bang. With 9/11, Osama and al Qaeda socialize their problem to include America proper. Without drawing the Americans in for some real conflict in the Middle East, al Qaeda's chances of effecting fundamentalist revolution there were nil. The "moderate dictators" were simply too good at what they do: buying off as much political support as necessary and sending away as many unredeemables as required (encouraging them to play in some neighbor's yard).
But once Osama gets the Americans in the mix, he's got a board in play--and a chance.
Bush came to the same conclusion after 9/11: I'm going to make this problem the problem of a whole lot of other people besides America. So he issues his axis list, regrettably telegraphing his punches, and makes bold declaration of global war on terrorism. And he decided to invade both Afghanistan and Iraq--the first as pure retribution and the second as the true socialization of the problem (giving Osama right back to the Middle East). Was Bush worried about attracting too much attention? Hell no. "Bring it on," he said.
I think both Osama's and Bush's choices were strong and strategic ones, but I think each set in motion all sorts of other players reaching similar conclusions. When Hezbollah kidnaps that Israeli soldier, the group effectively socialized its problem of being unable to advance its cause within Lebanon. A Lebanon that's progressively connecting to the outside world again and is free of Syrian military occupation is not a Lebanon within which Hezbollah can win rule. But a Lebanon that Israel's decimated? That's a board in play.
Same thing for Iran, waiting on the Bush military strike. Tehran decides to socialize its problem with the asymmetrical attack on Israel. All of a sudden, it's a lot of people's problem--these crazy Americans and their threats.
Same thing for North Korea. If Kim submits to the six-party talks, then he's the problem. But fire off some missiles and test a nuke and all of a sudden it's Condi Rice and America that have explaining to do, declaring we have no attention of invading North Korea. So long as Kim feels like he's being isolated and targeted by the U.S. for regime change, he's got a big problem. But socializing it with the threat of nukes, now the region has a problem.
As I have written many times in the past, we need to help set up regional security schemes (or regimes, to use an International Relations phrase) for both the Middle East and East Asia.
In the latter, I've frequently described using the Kim takedown as a precursor to establishing an East Asia NATO. Why? America can't seriously anticipate a Long War focused on the Gap and all those failed states while holding up the hedge against great power war in East Asia. Simply not enough troops, as we're proving now in Iraq. Also simply not enough friends, which we prove in Africa where the Chinese are everywhere commercially and diplomatically and we're just beginning to set up the embryonic AFRICOM command. By not having an East Asian NATO, we deny ourselves access to our own labor, better put to use elsewhere, and we deny ourselves future logical allies, like body-heavy China.
I know that considering China is a big leap for many long accustomed (and conditioned) to see China only as threat and enemy (apparently, a lot of Glenn Reynolds' readers), but I don't know how you look ahead strategically on either global economics or the Long War and not come to that conclusion. To me, that's just pissing in the wind to imagine we can rely on Europe and Japan--the old West (and the rest of my Old Core), when it's clear that the most incentivized pillars in the Core right now are its newest members (an argument I beat to death in BFA). Our overlap in both strategic interests (we want the same things to happen in the Gap) and capabilities (demographically vibrant, got militaries, and aren't afraid to use them) is stunning in comparison to the lack of the same with Japan and Old Europe (and getting older by the minute, as Steyn constantly reminds).
So when people say, "well, then, how do we move forward?" My reply is simple. We recognize who our new allies are naturally going to be in the future and we begin that co-optation process immediately. We bring them into every situation where we need their help and we insert ourselves--appropriately--into every situation where they need our help. What we don't do is hold onto outdated enemy images or continue adhering to outdated strategic concepts.
In East Asia, would I have a Six-Party forum on North Korea?
No. I'd have an X-party forum on creating an East Asian NATO, within which I'd most deliberately set China up as the mainland mainstay. I'd get them as comfortable as possible strategically, and then I'd talk about North Korea with them within that context.
I wouldn't keep up the Taiwan charade. I wouldn't invite Japan to join my defense guarantee on that.
Frankly, I'd tell the whole region that I'm seeking strategic alliance with Beijing and that I want them in on that most important discussion.
And when Kim got nervous and jumped up and down, I'd look him in the eye and say, "Don't worry, we're going to get around to you soon enough."
And then I'd let Kim's desperation and paranoia set the timetable for the rest of what needed to be done to create an East Asian NATO.
But I would most definitely lock in China at today's prices, and travel through Beijing to get to Pyongyang--at a speed of China's choosing but enabled by my rapid embrace of China as a strategic ally.
Against what?
Against anything we both feel threatens globalization. No need to declare war on everyone and everything in advance. Act first and explain later and stop telegraphing our punches.
In the Middle East, I'd twist as many arms as necessary and make as many promises and compromises as necessary to get some CSCE-like regional security dialogue going, and I'd make sure my entire BRIC quartet was there, plus NATO.
In that dialogue, I'd be forced to make my first compromises with all of Iraq's neighbors, but by giving them what they want in the meantime (regime security), I'd fix the mess I got ourselves into in Iraq first.
The more I'd do this, the more nervous Israel would get, but the more nervous Israel got, the more I'd use that to bring Israel into that mix, socializing the Palestinian problem just like the Iraq one.
I would suffer the slings and arrows of Iran's emergence as the cost for this strategy. But by stabilizing the region on Iraq and Palestine, I make it harder for Tehran to keep the clamps on tight domestically, and that plays into my hands demographically with time.
Then, as I build my tight relationship with China, which I extend to India and Russia, I use that trio to get what I want from Iran over time, making the Iranian problem their problem and solution set.
You can say, "But the Bush administration constantly asks these nations for help on Iran, and we've worked China like crazy on North Korea! And we can't talk with Syria and Iran on Iraq because they're already working directly to sabotage our efforts there!"
As I have said many times with the Bush crew, they lack strategic imagination. They pick up new enemies while not getting rid of outdated ones. They know when to say no but not when to say yes. Worst of all, they want all compromises to be on their terms. They ask for your help when they can't do it alone, but they almost never think they can't do it alone.
"But all of this will take too long. We need answers now."
Sure we do, but messes long-in-the-making require solutions long-in-the-building.
I just don't see us getting what we need in Asia without a regional security scheme that enshrines China as both our strategic ally and main security pillar of the region. Until we give them what they're going to achieve anyway with time, there's no incentive for them to speed up their efforts on our behalf, especially since those efforts would put their trajectory at risk and facilitate our own open attempts to "contain" China's rise.
In short, the Chinese aren't stupid.
Iran's trajectory--believe it or not--is similarly bright and strong in the Middle East. Think of a country that can be both body (resources) and head (that ambitious, young, educated population) in the region better than Iran twenty years from now. We can either be part of making that trajectory happen and work for us, or we can be part of trying to keep it from happening, suffering the regional insecurity that will inevitably result.
Our problem set is no longer containing the Sovs, but we act like we can and should tackle today's problems and the Long War by relying on the same aging cast of allies. North Korea won't be solved by having Japan and South Korea on our side, but by doing whatever it takes to get China to deal with that problem with us and on our behalf. That's the obvious direction our socialization of the problem should go.
Ditto for Iran on Iraq. No one country in the region is going to be able to help us more on settling Iraq than Iran.
Don't want to ally yourself with such a nasty regime? Well, then get the hell out of the Long War, because you're not a realistic strategist who's determined to win but rather a naive tactician who thinks it's cool to take on all-comers at once.
Bush and company are backtracking in both East Asia and the Middle East because they're simply not imaginative enough to see this Long War through in all its strategic implications. Yes, we will make some strange bedfellows in the near term. Such is war. But the real question is whether you want to look good or win.
Me? Like many of my military friends, I don't believe in fair fights. When I enter a fight, I believe in doing whatever it takes to get through it as quickly as possible and as safely as possible. Then I move onto the next challenge.
But this Bush administration has not done that. They came into power all excited to transform the military for future war with China, simply substituting one bogeyman for another. 9/11 pulled this crew into the Long War, but it did not cure them of their Cold War thinking. They added new enemies but no new allies. They got so excited at the prospect of going from A to Z in the Persian Gulf that they forgot all about B through Y as pathways.
Well, now that journey is inescapable.
Want to fix Iraq? Then fix your relationships with Iran and through Iran with Syria.
Want to fix North Korea? Then build strategic alliance with China that can incorporate that solution set.
What we do now with each is boss them around. Hasn't worked up to now and it won't work in the future. Instead, they'll free-ride us to death--quite literally if we let them. And in the end, they'll get what they want regionally at virtually no cost to themselves. Meanwhile, we'll be bankrupted.
Or, we'll get something much smarter on Jan 2009 and let the bidding begin.
And yes, since you ask, I do realize that in penning this post I've basically restated all of my arguments I laid out to the Bush administration at the beginning of their second term (the Esquire Mar 05 piece, called, "Dear Mr. President, Here's How to Make Sense of Your Second Term, Secure Your Legacy, and, oh yeah, Create a Future Worth Living." It was what I believed then and it's still what I believe now. To me, a serious grand strategist isn't somebody with a new answer every week. He gives you the answer you need when you need it. How long you waste before taking his advice is your problem.
And yes, yes, I know how frustrating it can be to read this blog and hear only about the long term, but I will confess, that's my uncorrected vision. In my heart, I'm a grand strategic thinker simply because I have no choice. I am not a political animal. I don't think particularly well on those terms. Because I am such a pure, long-term thinker, I cannot easily divorce my advice from that perspective. When I try, it just seems dishonest and pointless--as in, I really do believe I know better, so why feed you something contradictory for just the short-term when I know it won't get you the long-term you need.
And I know that argument is frustrating for a lot of people right now, because we've got two years left on this administration and it seems more and more--on an almost daily basis--as a continuously unfolding disaster. You can almost feel the price of the inevitable correction go up with each week, making the next president a very important choice.
We're suffering our system right now. If this were a parliamentary system, this government would fall in a few weeks--plain and simple. But that will not happen, and I have zero expectation that Bush will change, or that Rice will suddenly move beyond her talking-point style as SECSTATE. Meanwhile, Rummy's retreated to his office, sending Schoomaker to the Hill, and our Marines and Army are being forced to continue this fight under the worst circumstances.
Truth be told, there's not much use for me in this environment right now. Until Jan 09 this ship is going to be necessarily driven according to very short-term political expediencies (the Rove approach), and that simply will not do. But it's inevitable unless the Dems score such a huge victory and Bush is so thoroughly repudiated that he feels many heads must roll and new strategic approaches employed.
But I am not optimistic the Dems' victory will be big enough to force such change, and I am deeply worried that their leadership isn't up to the challenge of articulating an alternative strategic vision, much less working with the wounded, lame-duck Bush team to make it happen. I fear a muddling-through outcome that will make the next two years awfully unpleasant.
Sad, but a sort of poetic justice WRT to this administration, even as it's supremely unfair to those lives unnecesarily lost in the meantime.
Remember back to 2000, when the word on Bush was "all hat, no cattle." Well, it looks like we should have "blinked" on that one.
Friday, October 13, 2006 at 5:24AM 
