The deficit/debt as national security "threats"

James Galbraith in the LA Times, by way of WPR's Media Roundup.

He takes on the notion that the deficit is now a national security threat, a notion the Obama administration raised in its new National Security Strategy.

Was World War II, for example, won with balanced budgets? No. Deficits ran about 25% of GDP every year of the war, and the national debt had reached 121% of GDP by 1946. Was the United States weakened by this? Hardly. America had never been stronger than it was in 1946. And afterward, the economy didn't implode. The debt-to-GDP ratio merely declined, year after year, until it reached a low of about 33% of GDP in 1980.

Was America stronger in 1980 than in 1946? No again. That year we elected Ronald Reagan, who campaigned on a promise to restore the United States to a position of strength. To that end, he promptly cut taxes and boosted military spending, actions that pushed the deficit back up to about 50% of GDP even as the economy recovered.

It's true that nowadays China, Japan and other countries hold large piles of Treasury bonds. But why? Only because they run trade surpluses with the whole world and have chosen to stockpile those earnings in dollars. This is a sign of confidence in us. And reducing budget deficits wouldn't change anything about that, unless those Asian trade surpluses were also reversed. But the folks at Brookings weren't calling for a trade war with Asia, just about the only step (however unwise for other reasons) that might plausibly cut the surpluses.

Do China's debt holdings give China leverage over us? Not at all. Realistically, China can do nothing with its Treasuries except roll them over. China is not going to dump U.S. bonds in order to buy those of Spain or Greece. And paying interest on them is not, for us, a burden, since the money is never spent and probably never will be.

Speaking of interest, it's also obvious that the capital markets don't take the deficit scare-talk seriously; otherwise, they wouldn't be lending to Uncle Sam for 30 years at just over 4%. And the dollar wouldn't be rising, as investors seek safety from the European crisis in Treasury bonds — a sure sign that the world's wealthy don't find U.S. deficits all that worrisome.

The danger?  The old bugaboo by which Social Security and Medicare are whacked to pay for increased military spending.

I like the contrarian attitude here.

The terrific strains caused by a rising car culture in emerging economies

NYT story on rising traffic fatalities in India, where, like China, the car culture explodes.

It is a little-known truth that when you travel in the Gap or in New Core pillars even, the biggest danger you face is not illness or bad water-food or terrorism.  The most likely route to death is a car accident.

This totally corresponds to all the travel I've done in my life (almost forty countries in all, about 2/3rds New Core/Gap): the illnesses and the security stuff were nothing to the routine dangers of automobile travel.

And yeah, I think of that as we contemplate our travels around Ethiopia in coming weeks (thanks for that third donated otoscope, though!).

But India's got it bad:

India overtook China to top the world in road fatalities in 2006 and has continued to pull steadily ahead, despite a heavily agrarian population, fewer people than China and far fewer cars than many Western countries.

See, the Chinese can't be #1 in everything!

But it's not just a size-matters argument, because a lot of New Core/emerging economies are seeing car fatalities level off or even decline as they upgrade fleets and roads and technology, but not India:

While road deaths in many other big emerging markets have declined or stabilized in recent years, even as vehicle sales jumped, in India, fatalities are skyrocketing — up 40 percent in five years to more than 118,000 in 2008, the last figure available.

The World Health Org says India's government is slow to wake up to the issue, but even hearing that is kind of amazing to me:  the notion that rising India needs to focus more government attention on such prosaic things when, of course, it could be waging resource wars across the planet, right?

Ah, the details of globalization's advance.

Certain biases don't help:  new car drivers seems to despise motorcyclists, pedestrians, etc. (not exactly an Asia-specific bias, I might add); helmet laws for motorcyclists are only for men, as women are apparently expendable; etc.  But if you've spent any time being driven or driving in places like China and India, you're probably like me and have to squint a lot so as to not flinch constantly at all the close calls with those not wearing wrap-around steel. 

So as the BRIC continue to balloon their domestic car fleets, expect these tensions to rise, triggering greater government responses.

The world stands at the bottom of a very steep curve.  About a century to get the first billion cars; maybe 1/4 that to get the second!

Arms spending is up! Among the rich and rising great powers--quelle surprise!

I'm too sexy for my hurt

A Guardian story by way of WPR's Media Roundup.

SIPRI, the arms-spending-tracking think tank out of Stockholm, says global defense spending is up almost 50% over the past decade, so a more dangerous world right?

Except when you examine the details, it's all so underwhelming.

Global defense spending peaked in the late 1980s and then dropped dramatically over the 1990s, picking back up around the turn of the century and eventually equally the late 1980s total in the latter years of the last decade. That means we spent two decades getting back to the late Cold War total. 

How did we do this as a planet?  Well, the bulk of that additional spending was by the U.S. (more than half). The rest was almost all by rising powers like India, China, Turkey, etc.--nothing out of the historical norm there.

So you look at the top spenders and unless you can sustain the fantasy of America taking on its banker (China), this is simply a cash of the rich getting richer.

Meanwhile, the 65-year moratorium on great-power non-war holds as steady as ever, despite our collective navigation of the worst financial crisis in modern globalization's history.  State-on-state war remains historically low, and our primary problems remain terrorists and civil strife.

SIPRI's report admits as much:

Only six of the biggest armed conflicts last year concerned territority, with 11 fought over the nature and makeup of a national government, according to Sipri's report. It said that only three of the 30 big conflicts over the past decade were between states.

My, what a dangerous world.  Rich, largely uninvolved rising great powers are bulking up their militaries, while rich-but-aging Western powers are spending precious coin on COIN.  All that tells me is that we need to get the free-riders to pay for their ride.

This thing is toking off!

WSJ story on pot store boom across Montana, of all places, replete with an uptick in violence surrounding the stores (fire bombs tossed in windows).  One town saw a rise in ER patients using.

DC and 15 states have passed med marijuana bills, but the cities have been left to deal with them, leading to a lot of confusion.

Montana cop on new pot store:  "Before the doors even open, the parking lot has 300 kids throwing Frisbees and playing Hacky-Sack."

Been there and done that.

There are people who really need and absolutely benefit, and then there's the groundswell anticipating decriminalization.

This will not go smoothly, but it is coming.

Chart of the day: Crime drop defies multiple predictions for rise

Back in 2004, when I was at the Naval War College, a major metro police chief from New England visited me to talk about Core-Gap dynamics in the seam between the inner city and the suburbs, a topic that still gets presented to me from those quarters.  His prediction struck me as entirely sensible:  all the 3-strikes and tougher sentencing of the 1990s was finally coming home to roost in that America was on the verge of starting to expel more ex-cons than new criminals being sentenced (something like 600k ex-cons hitting the street each year while 500k go in).  Naturally, the prediction was that all of these ex-cons would step right back into the Gap-like conditions of their old neighborhoods and lapse back into criminal behavior.

Then you add in the financial/economic woes since mid-2008, and that seems like a recipe for a big spike in crime, yes?

But instead we get substantial drops in lots of major metros across 2009, with the biggest declines happening in the biggest cities (over one million population).

The credit?  Better policing techniques across the board, plus some staffing help due to the stimulus package.

As a rule, we are told that it takes years for a crime drop to register in the minds of the public.

Then there's concern about chronic long-term unemployment + the end of the stimulus money.

So not all sunny, even as we celebrate this counterintuitive trend.

The Sri Lankan option: details

map here

Little poor Sri Lanka is suddenly a global model of successful COIN.  Everybody seems to forget how long it took (it stretches back to 1983) and instead want to know how the decisive punches were landed.

Louise Arbour, head of the International Crisis Group, sums up the model thusly:

1. Full operational freedom for the Army to pursue scorched-earth tactics;
2. Little concern for noncombatant deaths (pretty much a requirement for #1); and 
3. Dismissing international and media protests regarding #1 and #2.

Judging by Israel's latest mistakes in mishandling the protest flotilla (pen knives and deck chairs = a dozen-plus dead?), Tel Aviv is absorbing the message alright.

Face recognition: the global ID card

Pic here.  FT article.

Google, like Facebook and just about everybody else on the web right now, is suffering privacy issues, hence it has "put the launch of controversial facial recognition technology under review."

But no one expects, argues the article, that Google will back off from the technology, as all sorts of powerful face recognition techs are just hitting the market.

Hell, my new--and tiny--handheld Canon HD digital camcorder/camera does a fascinating job of spotting and tracking faces live as I film or shoot, so if that low-level capacity has reached everybody's personal cameras, you just know that far more profound technologies are being massed by major players.

Most of us have bumped into this technology in travel or across our work days, and there's long been the simple stuff for identifying faces of friends in programs like Apple's iPhoto.  The iPhone's got that bit where you record a snippet of a song and then search the web for its title, so no surprise that companies are rolling out similar technology that allows you to do the same with faces off your phone.

One telecom exec: 

There isn't a single mobile company that isn't interested in this. There are some 800m camera-equipped phones sold each year, but most people don't really use the cameras.  Mobile phone companies are looking for ways to enhance the camera experience.

The fear is easy to imagine:  the ability to snap a photo of somebody, find out who they are, and then be able to pull info up on them instantly, increasing the capacity of stalkers everywhere. Naturally, an Israeli start-up firm, Face.com, is at the forefront of the technology, having already scanned 9bn photos, yielding 52m identities.  Face.com admits it is still defining the safeguards on such a system.

But some smart words from an exec of a Swedish tech firm:

Now people are scared when they see [facial recognition products], but three or our years from now it won't be like that. At the moment, it is hard to control privacy on social networks, but it won't always be that way.  We will see a lot of legal cases over this, and a lot more control given to the user.

I believe he's right, and that this is the normal catch-up phenomenon on rules.

Larger point:  this will be a powerful security tool in a world where violence has largely migrated down to the level of individuals.

US Coast Guard: "Technology has outrun the current regulations"

WSJ piece that says oil rig blowout in Gulf "has prompted scrutiny of the U.S. Coast Guard's ability to carry out even its limited role in preventing disaster on rigs."

CG naturally replies that it's short on resources.

Title quote comes from Lt. Cmdr. Michael Odom, who--career-wise--is just the right age to offer that judgment (been in long enough to spot the rule-set gap, and with enough of a career ahead of him to take it seriously).

The facts:  USCG regs for the massive moving regs date back to 1978, when they were smaller and operated mostly just offshore.

Even when the USCG does get involved, it's mostly paperwork, because the regulation of the rigs lies with the Interior Dept's Minerals Management Service.

Most experts argue to revisit this regulatory split in light of the recent disaster.

But here's the hitch, just like with ships, most of the rigs are under foreign flags, meaning the nation of registry is responsible for oversight.

The Transocean rig that went to the bottom was registered under the Republic of Marshall Islands, which in turn hired a private contractor to do any inspections--a common industry practice for such states.

When the USCG shows up to any rig, the difference in review shows:  foreign rigs get the hours-long treatment but US-registered rigs get the days-long review.

Underlying tone:  2007 independent assessment by fmr USCG Vice Admiral found that, once the USCG got sucked into the Department of Homeland Security, safety maintenance work went out the window in favor of c-terrorism.

The requirement to "fight through" a cyberattack = reasonable planning

Keith Alexander is confirmed as the first head of U.S. Cyber Command, a sub-unified command under Strategic Command.

What caught my eye was his previous sensible testimony (see the other WAPO story) on the subject of war during conditions of cyber attack:

In his written responses, Alexander said that clandestine, offensive actions in cyberspace -- such as dismantling a Web site used by jihadists overseas -- are "traditional military activities" and should not be considered covert operations.

In the event of a cyber attack, the military must still be able to carry out conventional operations.

"Even with the clear understanding that we could experience damage to our infrastructure, we must be prepared to 'fight through' in the worst case scenario," he said.

I know, I know.  The right virus and everything goes back to the Dark Ages and we're all completely helpless.

But indulging in nightmare scenarios isn't planning, it's escapism. As always, the military has to plan on functioning even as comms are degraded.  There's nothing new in that.

Cybersecurity: Be afraid! But how much afraid?

Evgeny Morozov piece in the weekend WSJ a bit back, and recent Bloomberg BusinessWeek story on Richard Clarke's latest tome.  Morozov rails against the "cyber warmongers," in whose ranks one must definitely include Clarke, for reasoning both valid and hyperbolic.

I like Morozov in general:  he is snarky in a good way, solid in his reasoning, and he likes to poke holes in the usual conventional wisdom.  Here, let's say, Morozov is less than impressed with the usual "wargames" that prove, as they are designed to, that the US is COMPLETELY naked and unprepared for an electronic Pearl Harbor.  

It's one of those inescapable predictions that must inevitably someday be right--right?  The question is, How bad will it be? Will it constitute a whole new monster or just another degree of failure/collapse that's marginally bigger than the usual stuff we inflict upon ourselves with great regularity due to accidents, poor practices and bad design?

Morozov targets Clarke right off, who claims in his new book that "the cyberwar has already begun."  That's a prediction you have to love, because no matter what happens, the man has got to be proven right by events, because, what the hell!  By his logic, there's no such thing as a cyberpeace.  So McConnell (former NSA head) says we'll automatically lose any cyberwar that happens (Really?  Then who automatically wins?  Oh, THEY do, of course.) and Panetta (CIA) goes bravely on the record to say that the next Pearl Harbor will be a cyber Pearl Harbor (of course it will, because we said so and we get to determine these things in advance--just like 9/11!).

Morozov says spending on cybersecurity is higher than ever ($55B between now and 2015), but so is our angst.  He wonders out loud if the biggest scare-mongers on the subject tend to benefit from it, by selling books, and winning cybersecurity contracts from the USG (like McConnell's new employer, Booz Allen, or Clarke's new firm, Good Harbor Consulting).  

This is why I don't make enough money consulting, let me tell you.  I really need to focus on scaring people more.

Clarke defends his record by saying that the U.S. has created a very large and very expensive cybersecurity command, so that proves it's a huge problem that the government is trying to take seriously.  Both his firm and Booz denies any connections between what their poster boys say and what the company earns, but you know the visibility and the connections and the message and the product all go together.

As Morozov says, we don't want "to hold our policy-making hostage to the rhetorical ploys of better-informed government contractors."

Best-bit award goes to Obama's current cybersec czar, Howard Schmidt, who said that "there is no cyberwar," and that the term is "a terrible metaphor" and a "terrible concept."  I think he's right, but I think those can easily become words to regret.  

The web, Morozov points out, is a wild place still--a real frontier will few lawmen. We've democratized the connectivity and so too the criminality and malicious behavior--big surprise.  

Here's where Morozov gets to the logic I usually employ in Q&A when I get this question:  "Why don't you emphasize cyberwar more in your brief?":

Why have such tactics—known in military parlance as "computer network attacks"—not been used more widely? As revolutionary as it is, the Internet does not make centuries-old laws of war obsolete or irrelevant. Military conventions, for example, require that attacks distinguish between civilian and military targets. In decentralized and interconnected cyberspace, this requirement is not so easy to satisfy: A cyberattack on a cellphone tower used by the adversary may affect civilian targets along with military ones. When in 2008 the U.S. military decided to dismantle a Saudi Internet forum—initially set up by the CIA to glean intelligence but increasingly used by the jihadists to plan on attacks in Iraq—it inadvertently caused disruption to more than 300 servers in Saudi Arabia, Germany and Texas. A weapon of surgical precision the Internet certainly isn't, and damage to civilians is hard to avoid. Military commanders do not want to be tried for war crimes, even if those crimes are committed online.

I also tend to add: even if you, the weaker guy, shut down my nets for a bit and get some surprise attack accomplished, at the end of the day, I will still be there with my superior conventional military force, and I am likely to be able to make clear my unhappiness regarding whatever trick you just pulled.  Fait accompli or no, you will now have me as a more committed enemy, and when I decide to strike back, the cybertricks won't be enough to protect you.

So Morozov says, quite sensibly:  "We probably want very strong protection against cyberterror, moderate protection against cybercrime, and little to no protection against juvenile cyber-hooliganism."  

Why?  Perfect security would come with huge social, political and economic costs--all of which, I would add, would eventually translate to military weakness.

Best point:  "Recasting basic government problems in terms of a global cyber struggle won't make us any more secure."

So no, Mr. President, please don't turn cyberattacks into "weapons of mass disruption" because you'll be "diverting national attention from more burning problems while promoting extremely costly solutions."

Better to focus on promoting Internet freedom, Morozov says.  He has a book coming out on the Internet and democracy, so he's hawking too, but in a non-hypeish way I instinctively admire.

And yet, Clarke's four big fixes aren't so bad either:

1. Get serious about industrial espionage
2. Create information quarantines (if it's super-secret, keep it totally disconnected from the Web!)
3. Build, don't buy, security (if your security needs are unique, so too should be your solutions) and 
4. get started on cyber-arms control treaties (like one on nobody attacks each other's banks).

Pretty decent, actually.

My take remains the same: nets always race ahead of security, and since we're still--despite the Great Global Recession!--in a period of globalization's stunningly rapid expansion (what else do you call Asian investment everywhere across the Gap while the West's money pours into Asia?), it'll be that way for a long time to come. So, expect a lot of cyber stuff to happen.  Get used to it.  It'll be a natural part of our world.

But yeah, we'll get smarter and more resilient over time.  Just because the criminals and baddies are able to exploit these new techs and nets faster and better than the rest of us right now doesn't signal their supremacy for all time--nor their omnipotence now.  Frontiers get settled, rules catch up, life goes on.

So cybersecurity is real and important and we need to spend on it.  It just ain't the sum total of our existence or even of the fights and conflicts that define our age.  It's like the Web, part of damn near everything but hardly the hard core of anything--except pornography.