Three Ways to Break Up Globalizationís Functioning Core

Dateline: Southwest flight from Chicago to Providence with my family, 3 April.

Three stories in todayís New York Times trouble me. All speak to what I fear are serious missteps by the Bush Administration in national security strategy, ones that may end up dividing the Core rather than strengthening it. I consider each a serious threat to our winning the Global War on Terror.

First up is story on page 1 entitled, ìJapan Joining U.S. In Missile Shield: A Role for TaiwanóNew Network Angers China,î by Norimitsu Onishi.

This one scares me the most, because missile shields in general strike me as 21st century Maginot Linesóincredibly expensive and divisive to build and easily circumvented by those really desiring to do us harm. Plus such firewalls also speak to the mind-set that says, ìLetís stop them at the border,î versus ìLetís figure out how to eliminate the hostility in the first place."

In short, what I dislike about missile defense in general is that it puts so many of our eggs into the basket called ìthe absolute failure of our national security strategy.î Plus, I just donít believe they work, and Iím certain they siphon off loads of resources and brain power put to better use elsewhere.

The danger of approach in Asia is this: we enlist India, Taiwan, and Japan in this ìshieldî that we say is mostly about North Korea but frankly is easily interpreted by Beijing as mostly being about them over the long haul (unless you think North Korea has a long and bright future ahead).

Ask yourself, do we want to be selling or sharing missile defense technology with Taiwan? Is that where we want to go in our relationship with that state and China? Making Taiwan feel more confident that it can pursue ìindependenceî (whatever that means in this obviously symbiotic economic relationship with the mainland) when we know that will piss Beijing off and increase their wariness toward our military in general? Is that really where we want to go with China at this point in history? This country with whom we conduct so much trade and financial flows (we send in foreign direct investment and they buy our Treasury bills like crazy)?

If the real fear is all about North Korea, then letís include China in the scheme, to allay any fears of encirclement or any impression that weíre going an extra step on Taiwanís security (like we should get millions of Chinese on both sides killed over this issue). We already have enough conventional deterrence assets in the region to make China think twice about invading Taiwan, something no serious security analyst thinks they could pull off anytime soonóand weíre talking years upon years.

But hell, letís skip this whole boondoggle completely and simply deal with the real issue at hand: we need to get rid of Kim Jong Il. We should be talking to China and Japan and South Korea about how to make that happen, not plotting some Asian star wars shield that makes Beijing fear us all the more. Simply put, this is the Pentagon doing what it always does: ignoring the present (GWOT and rogues like Kim who should go down sooner as opposed to later) and focusing on a future it prefers (big war with a big enemyóChina). Iím not talking about the regional commanders in the field, or even OSD per se when I say this, but the Pentagon itself, which really does nothing all day but plot future wars they believe are worth fighting, and then developing and buying the force structure mix (aircraft, ships, armor) it thinks will win that fabulous war in some distant future.

Thatís the system, stupid! And nothing really changes across DoD and the U.S. military until that systemóthat definition of war solely within the context of war and not within the context of anything elseóis dismantled and rebuilt for the task at hand: winning the GWOT by shrinking the Gap.

Second story is also on page 1 of New York Times. It is entitled, ìU.S. to Mandate Fingerprinting And Photos of More Foreigners,î by Rachel L. Swarns.

The U.S. had started this sort of stuff with developing countries in the aftermath of 9/11, and now theyíre expanding this very contentious practice (it sure has pissed off the Brazilians, for example) with 27 industrialized states, all of whom are reasonably considered our allies.

Why the push? The reasonable fear is that terrorists will exploit the more lax security systems of allies to gain entry into the U.S.óin effect exploiting a ìseamî in our defenses. So, in an effort to export new security rule sets, we force these additional security burdens on close allies, hoping it will push them to raise the security practices within their own states.

Would it be better to gain a Core-wide consensus on such improved security measures, using this multilateral discussion to further bring such New Core powers as India, China, and Russia into our preferred mix? Yes, but the question is asked quite logically, ìDo we try for that or simply establish the new rule set on our own and demand our fellow Core states implement something similar?î So itís sort of a chicken-or-egg question of how to get the ball rolling in a reasonable time frame.

Naturally, the U.S. tourism industry is a bit freaked, since the bulk of our tourists come from these industrialized states. So far, the reaction from these states is relatively muted, since most apparently believe theyíll get off our list once they implement new, far more secure, high-tech passport control systems.

Hmmmmm. We shall see.

But for now, this comes off as just another American firewall that may buy us some security in the near term while threatening Core unity over the long run.

Third article is about Russiaís response to all those east central European states joining NATO formally (Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Bulgaria, Romania, Slovakia and Slovenia). Written by Steven Lee Myers (a great security reporter), it is entitled, ìAs NATO Finally Arrives on Its Border, Russia Grumblesî (page 3 in print edition).

Trigger for this grumbling is NATO sending a handful of Belgian F-16ís plus their support groups into the Baltic states to fly ìpurely defensiveî sky police-type missions overhead. Against whom? Moscow logically asks. Al Qaedaís secret air force?

With tensions already growing between the Baltic states and Russia over ìborder incursions,î like some Russian jet that recently wandered across, you have to wonder what NATO is looking to achieve now that it can place military assets right on Russiaís border. What are the signals being sent here?

The U.S. and Europe need to ask themselves, ìWhat future role do we hope Russia will play in the Global War on Terrorism?î Understanding NATOís need to make new members feel good about their association with the West, you have to wonder if it really makes sense to piss off a potentially huge ally in the East.