Sic Semper Tyrannis

Israel attacks Turkish ship.

 "..the situation in Gaza "is very high on Obama's agenda. He gets passionate about it and presses his staff to do more." In Obama's speech in Cairo a year ago, he highlighted Gaza, saying, "Just as it devastates Palestinian families, the continuing humanitarian crisis in Gaza does not serve Israel's security."

In that same speech, Obama appeared to appeal to Palestinians to undertake acts of civil disobedience rather than violence, saying that it was "not violence that won full and equal rights" for African Americans but "a peaceful and determined insistence."

Whether the flotilla was one such act of civil disobedience remains up for debate. Its organizers said it was, but Israeli officials say members of the Israel Defense Forces were met with violence when they boarded the ships.?  Kessler

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So the "principle" involved in this attack on an unarmed ship was what?  We're bad-asses and can stop you from supplying Gaza?

Somehow this kind of cold-blooded disregard for anyone else brings the attack on USS Liberty to mind.

There will be at least one more post on this after I have a chance to check, but this gives you all a chance to comment.  pl 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/31/AR2010053102500.html?sid=ST2010053101699

"NATO general in Afghanistan: Victory will be slow" AP

 "... winter offensive in the southern Afghan town of Marjah has been followed by the re-infiltration of Taliban forces into the area despite a continuing strong U.S. Marine presence.

"We've dramatically changed the state of the insurgency in that region," McChrystal said, but at the same acknowledged that Marjah was still a struggle.

"Progress there is not yet fully established," he said.

A summer offensive planned for the Taliban birthplace of Kandahar will be similarly painstaking, McChrystal said. The plan is to focus on delivering services like electricity and water, he explained."  AP

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Is McChrystal really this delusional?  Does he really think that he can "log-roll" the media, shape US public opinion and thus force Obama to do what he wants him to do?

Apparently, the answer is yes.

The info-ops obsession seems to have reached a level of development in which the monkish general believes that he bestrides the world and can sculpt history to his taste.

The problem with being a senior personage for a long time is that you live with sycophants for so long that after a while you start to believe the nonsense they serve up about how wonderful you are, how powerful, how handsome, etc.  My wife calls this the "great man syndrome."

It sounds as though Stanley is riding hard for a fall...  pl 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/as_afghanistan

"The Head of the Table" - Oliver Wendell Holmes

Maureen has put up a lovely thing for Memorial Day.  This photo is of a United Confederate Veterans (UCV) meeting sometime after 1900.  Yes, the black men in the picture  were members.  pl

http://turcopolier.typepad.com/the_athenaeum/2010/05/the-soldiers-faith-oliver-wendell-holmes.html

"They Don't Mind and We Don't Matter" - Anonymous 11b

 "Sen. James Webb (D-Va.), who voted against the legislation Thursday in the Armed Services Committee, said it was untimely for Congress to take up the issue when the Pentagon review is still in progress.

"I see no reason to preempt the process that our senior Defense Department leaders put into motion, and I am concerned that many members of the military would view such a move as disrespectful to the importance of their roles in this process," Webb said in a statement."  Washpost

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I supported Webb for election over the egrege Allen, but I haven't been keen on him since he crapped all over My Beloved Alma Mater in my presence.  Nevertheless, I think that he is right on this.  So is Gates--------------  Ugh.

Hey!  What an idea!  Talk to the enlisted people.   pl

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/28/AR2010052804063.html

The logistical implications of openly gay soldiers

 The farcical process of authorizing the open military service of gay people is yet to play out, but the outcome of that process is foreordained.  The Gay Movement has powerful friends in government and the media.  In a year or so, the force will begin to be somewhat different and that difference will grow greater as time passes and gay soldiers become more confident of the security of their position.

 Michele Obama says that she cares for military families.  I wonder if she understands what military families are.  The military (especially the ground forces) are not analogous to an industrial corporation's work force.  In industry, the workers are mere units of production and their families are merely an expense to be dealt with as cheaply as possible.  In the military the families are part of the force.  They are the women and kids who used to follow the wagons when the regiment changed post.  The US military is unusual (but not unique) in that it has the long standing cultural pattern of having a large part of the force live on its posts (bases) with their families in married family housing.  Most armies do not do that, but the US Army settled the West, often setting up shop beyond the frontier in places where there were no towns.  Often the towns were later built around the security provided by an Army post.  The Frontier in this sense started very near the eastern seaboard. Carlisle Barracks in central Pennsylvania was a British Army post garrisoned by the "Royal Americans" (now the Royal Green Jackets) and the Black Watch before the new US Army took charge of the place.  The pattern was set early and has persisted. In places like Ft. Bragg, Ft. Hood, Ft. Campbell, Ft. Wainright, Ft Irwin thousands of military families live in the security of communities of their peers.  The family quarters and community provided are part of the "package" as human resource staff would call it in civilian life.  Families wait there while their units are deployed overseas.  Some people prefer to live off post, preferring the real estate investment possibilities but I think that they are in the minority.  To change this social system will be a major and wrenching experience.

Gay soldiers will have to be given the opportunity to live in married family quarters with their partners.  Fair is fair.  Nevertheless DOMA establishes the federal government's policy that gay marriage is not marriage.  For gay partners to be given married family housing, DOMA must be repealed.  If the US Government's future policy is that cohabitation of gay partners married or unmarried is allowed then they, logically, will be entitled to family housing. Most states, and especially the ones with the biggest Army posts do not recognize gay marriage and are unlikely to do so any time soon.  Does that mean that gay soldiers will have to be given priority in assignment of family quarters?  There are only so many units.  Will the House of Representatives who voted yesterday to repeal the DADT law also vote construction money for more housing?  Will those denied housing because of a shortage simply be expected to find a place to live in towns "outside the gate?"  The realtors out there will be pleased.

Giraldi on Zuckerman

 "Well, Mort Zuckerman is certainly entitled to his own opinion and I suppose he can use the magazine he owns to spread Israeli hasbara, but the notion that Israel is some kind of strategic asset for the United States is nonsense, a complete fabrication. Most recently, Chas Freeman has pointed out that Israel is useless for the projection of American power. The US has numerous bases in Arab countries but is not allowed to use any military base in Israel. Washington’s own carrier groups and other forces in place all over the Middle East, including the Red Sea, have capabilities that far exceed those of the Israel Defense Forces. Israel has never been a strategic asset or any asset at all, always a liability. Even the stockpiles of US equipment in Israel are a typical bit of bonus support for Tel Aviv from Congress, placed there for the Israelis to use “in emergencies” while making it appear that they are for American forces. The supplies are, in fact, regularly looted by the Israelis, leaving largely unusable or picked over equipment for US forces if it should ever be needed."  Giraldi

http://original.antiwar.com/giraldi/2010/05/26/the-strategic-ally-myth/

Scarecrows - Richard Sale

By Richard Sale, author of Clinton’s Secret Wars    

     The art of having an opinion consists of our willingness to undergo the labor of ascertaining the reasons why we have it. It means carefully learning data, and then examining facts and assertions to see which are actual truths worth keeping and which are simply erroneous statements whose sole value may consist in their being familiar and personal. The virtue of facts is that they can be verified, while our feelings may only be empty biases that furnish us with pretexts or bogus reasons rather than any insight into reality. 

     To have responsible opinions then means that we are humble enough to subject our views to criticisms that may challenge their veracity or which might imply that our views are perhaps in part mistaken, or worse, complete rubbish. Feelings are fine, but they are not thought. Conscience requires that we impose some check on our subjective leanings and that check must come from those who are better and brighter than we are – those who know more than we do in areas we deem important. This should not enthrone the Expert, but the existence of such people should caution us that when we view the sun as “rising” in the morning, in spite of our unshakeable confidence in what we see, Copernicus was right and we are wrong.

National Journal redux - 26 May 2010

 

http://security.nationaljournal.com/2010/05/is-it-time-to-kill-off-the-dni.php#1588042

Liberman Israel/South Africa Nukes paper.

 AT has provided us this paper by Peter Liberman from 2004.  pl 

Download SouthAfricaNukesLiberman

"Obama to Send 1,200 Guard Troops to Mexico Border" - NY Times

 "Homeland Security officials said that the troops would provide support to law enforcement officers already working along the border by helping observe and monitor traffic between official crossing points, and would help analyze trafficking patterns in hopes of intercepting illegal drug shipments. They performed similar tasks in an earlier deployment along the border from 2006 to 2008, when they also assisted with road and fence construction. The troops have not been involved directly in intercepting border crossers."  Archibold

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I am on record here as favoring a political solution to the problem of illegal immigration to the US from or through Mexico.  What I favor is a separation of residential and economic rights from those of citizenship so that people of both nationalities could live anywhere in the two countries and could own businesses and property anywhere as well.  At the same time people who wanted to acquire citizenship and the vote would have to follow whatever the law was in the country in question.  I know that this is a solution for the angels, not for humans.  President Calderon's egregious and arrogant remarks in the US confirm me in that opinion. 

What we are left with instead is a choice in the US as to whether or not we are serious in trying to control our borders and immigration.  Drug smugglers are another and different matter.  There is no question as to what to do about and to them.  

So, Obama is going to send Guard troops to the border to do intelligence analysis and labor? Construction companies are not available to build fences?  Citizen soldiers of the National Guard will sit on outposts "trail watching" perhaps alone or perhaps with the Border Patrol? Will they be armed?  Will they have the deputized power of arrest?  Posse Comitatus? Somehow I doubt that this would apply to state (or federal) troops augmenting law enforcement if they are properly deputized.

This is a dilemma.  If you do not arm the troops and authorize them to use at least some force then their blood will be on your head when they run into armed border crossers.  If you do authorize them to use force then the Mexicans' blood will be your responsibility.

The border situation was likely to come to this.  Life is largely a series of choices made between bad options.  pl

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/26/us/26border.html

End Game in Afghanistan - F. B. Ali

The players involved in the conflict in Afghanistan have all concluded that neither side can achieve a military victory and that it will end in some other way, probably through a negotiated solution. Since each of them has different goals, this end game is likely to be both confusing and complicated. What is likely to make it even more so is that within each of the parties involved there are factions and interests that have differing ideas on the desired end state and, therefore, the appropriate tactic to achieve it. 

With so many players and sub-players, and so many competing agendas, it would be foolhardy to try and predict how this end game will play out (although it is possible to foresee the near-term moves and their probable fate, as well as some of the major forks likely to appear in the road ahead). The best approach is to look at the parties involved, their goals, and how they are likely to try and achieve them. 

National Journal Blog - 24 May 2010

 
http://security.nationaljournal.com/2010/05/is-it-time-to-kill-off-the-dni.php#1587374

pl

"Israel offered to sell South Africa nuclear weapons" - Guardian

 "Secret South African documents reveal that Israel offered to sell nuclear warheads to the apartheid regime, providing the first official documentary evidence of the state's possession of nuclear weapons.

The "top secret" minutes of meetings between senior officials from the two countries in 1975 show that South Africa's defence minister, PW Botha, asked for the warheads and Shimon Peres, then Israel's defence minister and now its president, responded by offering them "in three sizes". The two men also signed a broad-ranging agreement governing military ties between the two countries that included a clause declaring that "the very existence of this agreement" was to remain secret.

The documents, uncovered by an American academic, Sasha Polakow-Suransky, in research for a book on the close relationship between the two countries, provide evidence that Israel has nuclear weapons despite its policy of "ambiguity" in neither confirming nor denying their existence.

The Israeli authorities tried to stop South Africa's post-apartheid government declassifying the documents at Polakow-Suransky's request and the revelations will be an embarrassment, particularly as this week's nuclear non-proliferation talks in New York focus on the Middle East."  Guardian

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OK.  So, let's stop all the nonsense over whether or not Israel has a nuclear strike force.  And, oh by the way a proliferator in "three sizes."  One for the baby bear, one for the ...  Shimon Peres, man of peace...  Well, the money was going to be good.  pl 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/may/23/israel-south-africa-nuclear-weapons

Afghan News

Some group of "Taliban" have now claimed yesterday's attack on the airfield at Kandahar. Mortar fire, rockets and ground action around the perimeter marked the event.  Evidently this went on for some hours.  A dozen or so people were wounded within the airfield defense line.  Damage evidently was minimal. OK. How many insurgents were killed, wounded or captured?  How many?  Considering the amount of ground and aerial firepower that should be available on the base and the putative existence of counter-mortar radar, it should have been difficult for the attackers to withdraw.  Was it or were there more restrictions on how much coalition forces can shoot at the enemy?

This follows on a recent Taliban declaration of their intention to conduct a Spring offensive.  In that context, there have been attacks in Kabul, and ambitious and successful  ambushes of vehicular convoys.  So far, the opposition is not "fixed" in the military sense of "finding, fixing and finishing" the enemy.  "Fixing" here means that the enemy must be dominated and held in position while the process is brought to end.  That does not seem to be happening.  This is a bad portent for the future.

I keep saying that the preliminary COIN effort at Marja is a predictor of what the likely prospects are for COIN success at Kandahar and elsewhere around the country. Where is the news from Marja?

Time is short.  William Hague, the new British foreign minister urges the US not to withdraw "too soon" from Afghanistan.  That is easy for him to say.  His government is new and not yet scarred.  The horizon seems far away just now.  For President Obama the horizon is close and approaching fast.  We have learned now that Obama recognized during the Afghan policy debate that the generals and admirals were trying to "roll" him for what they wanted.  They wanted a long COIN war in Afghanistan with an open ended commitment to that war.  He called Admiral Mullen and Secretary Gates to his office and summoned them to subordination.  The threat behind that was obvious.  In spite of that he gave them much of what they wanted, but with a caveat driven by his political need to start the end of the war before November, 2012.

That clock is ticking.  The Afghan insurgents can hear it ticking.  The generals do not have the time they would need to make their strategy work.

The West Point commencement speech yesterday was interesting.   It becomes increasingly obvious that Obama is both a social democrat and an internationalist in the classic old mold.  These are heavy political burdens for a candidate to bear these days.  He will not be able to bear an additional burden in Afghanistan in 2012.  pl 

 

   

Shaping the Iran story - Giraldi

 "There have been recent reports that Iran has enabled the travel of al-Qaeda leaders to Afghanistan and Pakistan where they will be able to confront and kill American soldiers.  If you think you have heard the story before, you have, in another context.  In the earlier rendition it was Saddam Hussein who was hand-in-glove with al-Qaeda, helping the group in its nefarious planning to attack the United States and kill Americans.  Saddam, who was in reality only a threat to his own people, was on the receiving end of a barrage of fabricated information claiming that he was secretly developing weapons of mass destruction and clandestinely dealing with the terrorists who were responsible for 9/11.  Or so the story goes.  And now it is Iran’s turn and the story and the storytellers are exactly the same."  Giraldi

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http://original.antiwar.com/giraldi/2010/05/19/shaping-the-story-on-iran/

Stein on Jim Clapper

"According to the two former top DIA officials, Clapper’s major initiative -- to reorganize intelligence analysis by specialists in enemy weapons, rather than specialists in countries and regions -- wreaked havoc at the agency and significantly downgraded its understanding of foreign events.

One of the analysts, Jeffrey White, who was chief of Middle East/Africa military assessments, among other top jobs during a 34-year career at the DIA, said Clapper eventually realized the mistake he made and reversed course.

But in the meantime, according to W. Patrick Lang, DIA’s chief intelligence officer for the Middle East, South Asia and terrorism at the time, veteran country and regional specialists rushed for the doors.

"We lost a tremendous number of analysts, old hands with 25 or 30 years of experience, who said, 'Screw this, I don't want to be a tank expert -- I'll just go fishing,’ ” Lang said in an interview. "

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Jeff White is one of the best analysts and managers of analysts ever seen in Washington.  These comments were not coordinated between us.  pl

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/spy-talk/2010/05/former_dia_analysts_rip_clappe.html#more

Clapper will probably be DNI

 "The news will not come as a surprise to those in the intelligence community. For months, Blair has turf battles while the White House made it clear that it had more confidence in others, such as counterterrorism and homeland security adviser John Brennan, taking the lead both publicly and privately.

Last November, the White House sided with CIA director Leon Panettawhen Blair attempted, against Panetta’s wishes, to pick the chief U.S. intelligence officer in each country, a job that traditionally has gone to the CIA station chief."  ABC News

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- Dennis Blair is a poor briefer.  Many flag officers are not good briefers.  They are briefed.  They do not brief.  President Obama is a brilliant orator and such people often have little patience with those who are not.

-  Blair was unlucky enough to have several events occur on his watch that he had little control over.  His office is largely concerned with policy, budgets, estimates and community wide administrative functions like source registration.  The DNI is not an emperor who commands the activities of the intelligence community on a daily basis. Blair was blamed for things that were not really under his control.  The Ft. Hood and undy bomber incidents are good examples.

- CIA lost a lot of power and function in the re-organization that created the DNI function as head of the community.  Langley has been plotting to regain that power ever  since.  It will be a shame if they succeed in this Byzantine court political goal.  The present setup makes the playing field of the intelligence community more level since the director of the CIA agency is no longer head of the whole community and able to "break ties" in their favor.  An obvious goal in their effort to regain supremacy is the reduction of the DNI to the status of an impotent puppet for them.

Brennan or Hagel would be good choices for a replacement.  Clapper is the most likely.  He is a good briefer and a better apple polisher.  pl

http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2010/05/exclusive-president-obama-to-replace-director-of-national-intelligence-dennis-blair.html

Hotrod speaks on RSTA.

 A couple of notes - The RSTA squadrons are a relatively new "innovation". They've gone through a couple of name changes, e.g. I believe that they were ARSs - Armored Recon Squadrons - at one point, but I believe that RSTA is the current, and correct nomenclature. Reconnaissance, Surveillance, Target Acquisition, which I believe accurately emphasizes the only thing they're really capable of. When GEN Schoomaker, then CoS, wanted to both continue increasing the emphasis on brigades over divisions while simultaneously increasing the pool of available brigades - he ordered a reorg. Basically, divisions shuffled the pieces of their traditional three brigades around to get four. There were definite upsides - e.g. heavy battalions regained the fourth company that had been lost during the post Cold-War Force XXI reorg. All in all, though, you basically ended up with two well equipped and properly organized line battalions, plus a RSTA squadron. The RSTA units, whether light or heavy, ar e marginally appropriately equipped and organized to apply fires, e.g. they have a smattering of mortars and FIST teams (artillery spotters), but IIRC, a "heavy Cav Troop" now has 85 Soldiers. These are NOT elements suitable to sustained combat without reinforcement. The doctrine does acknowledge that, but the nature of the new MTOE (a

Why do people do this? - Blumenthal

 "“We have learned something important since the days that I served in Vietnam,” Mr. Blumenthal said to the group gathered in Norwalk in March 2008. “And you exemplify it. Whatever we think about the war, whatever we call it — Afghanistan or Iraq — we owe our military men and women unconditional support.”

There was one problem: Mr. Blumenthal, a Democrat now running for the United States Senate, never served in Vietnam. He obtained at least five military deferments from 1965 to 1970 and took repeated steps that enabled him to avoid going to war, according to records.

The deferments allowed Mr. Blumenthal to complete his studies at Harvard; pursue a graduate fellowship in England; serve as a special assistant to The Washington Post’s publisher, Katharine Graham; and ultimately take a job in the Nixon White House.

In 1970, with his last deferment in jeopardy, he landed a coveted spot in the Marine Reserve, which virtually guaranteed that he would not be sent to Vietnam. He joined a unit in Washington that conducted drills and other exercises and focused on local projects, like fixing a campground and organizing a Toys for Tots drive."  NY Times

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Who would have know that us folks who were thought of by many as moral derelicts for serving would become iconic images?  Politicians lie in order to be thought of as Vietnam veterans.  Any number of them have done this.  Blumenthal is merely the most recent.  There is an interesting book on this subject.  It is titled "Stolen Valor."

I would think that Blumenthal's political life is ended.   pl

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/18/nyregion/18blumenthal.html?hp

Homage to the 61st Cavalry - Whatever that is

 "The offer came from an insurgent known as Mullah Sadiq, who had been on the U.S. kill-capture list since 2005. Brown assumed that some fighters aligned with Sadiq had taken part in the assault.

Sadiq wanted 50 assault rifles, $20,000 and a promise that U.S. forces would not kill him. In return, he promised to turn against more-radical Taliban insurgents and to begin to work with the Afghan government.

Sadiq's proposition gave Brown a chance, however tentative, to achieve a victory of sorts in his corner of Afghanistan and redeem the loss of his men.

"This has the potential to work," Brown told his commander."  Jaffe

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I was raised in a Regular Army tradition that said that "Whatever sticks out we cut off."  By that standard Brown is a walking dead man.   He received a letter of reprimand.?  That is career death.  The reprimand was for failure to sufficiently prepare an outpost for defense, even though he had urged its closure?  No matter, that is death.  The Army officer pyramidal rank structure with its "up or out" feature insures that.  Things have changed?  Show me.

So, now LTC Brown struggles with understanding of an alien culture and superiors who do not want to adapt to use of that culture and local officials who merely represent the Karzai government.  Well, God help him.  At the same time his superiors do not want to use the local culture as a tool.  No, they want to create a new Afghanistan.  Well, good luck brothers and sisters, good luck.

What the hell is the 61st Cavalry Regiment?  RISTA?  Should they have been expected to have the skills to defend this place?  pl 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/16/AR2010051603492.html

Is the US Army still competent in real combat?

"In recent months, the battle of Wanat has come to symbolize the U.S. military's missteps in Afghanistan. It has provoked Brostrom's father to question why Jonathan died and whether senior Army officers -- including a former colleague and close friend -- made careless mistakes that left the platoon vulnerable. It has triggered three investigations, the latest initiated last week by Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

And it has helped drive a broader reassessment of war strategy among top commanders in Afghanistan, who have begun to pull U.S. troops out of remote villages where some of the heaviest fighting has occurred. Senior military leaders have concluded that they lack the forces to wrest these Taliban strongholds away from the enemy and are instead focusing on more populated and less violent areas."  Jaffe

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Greg Jaffe is a great combat reporter.  I don't know him but wish I did.

He has another story today in the Washington Post about what happened at Outpost Keating and the aftermath of that fight in which eight American soldiers died.  

Those who follow this blog know that I have increasing;y been concerned over the planning and conduct of a number of small Afghanistan battles in which it seem to me that my beloved Army has neither planned nor fought well.  Not the men, not the men, the officers.  Over the last several days I have watched Sebastian Junger push his new book.  He spent a lot of time on another outpost with an understrength platoon of infantry.  At that place the troops were sent up a mountain to secure and build their own little fortlet.  They did that, under fire the while and then lived there for a month at a time with inadequate fire support, no hot food, no way to keep clean and nothing to do except fight all day against Afghans who would surely kill them all if the smallest error occurred.  

Is this my Army?  In my Army (Vietnam), a battalion of infantry would have occupied the area while engineers built a solidly entrenched post, heavily fortified and wired in behind several barbed wire fences with mines laid between fences, fougasse and a lot of pre-planned mortar and artillery fire registered.  Air support?  Don't make me laugh.  They are great when they show up.  Once all that was done, then the platoon would have been given their little post to defend.  Then the post would have been re-supplied or reinforced at night by helicopter.  There would have been clean clothes every few days, hot chow brought in Mermite cans, replacement weapons, etc.

Instead, men are left to rot in their clothes, clinging to each other, essentially abandoned by the Army.

What has caused this loss of competence in officers who are responsible for such failings?

Is it a failure to train for real fighting because von Rumsfeld did not understand ground warfare?  Is it the COIN obsession that distracts officers from the planning tasks that are needed to care for their men.

A price will be paid for these officer failures.  The troops will always forgive necessary deaths.  They do not forgive when their comrades' lives are uselessly thrown away.

This is necessary to practice COINism?  I think not.  pl

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/03/AR2009100303048.html

Who is this?

OK. Confess.  Your sister?  Your cousin?  Miss Croatia of 1998?

View this photo

Turki al-Faisal and US performance. - Kiracofe

 "a catastrophic political failure (for the U.S.A.)" Anna Missed, 1. This is what those of us opposed to the Bush policy were saying in 2002. But Washington wants to listen to "pro-Israel" advice and conduct "pro-Israel" foreign policy. My own view is that it will have to get considerably more catastrophic around the world to get a minimal debate going in the US on the real problem of pro-Israel influence in the US. And it is, perhaps, too late for that anyways. 2. Prince Turki's speech to diplomats in Riyadh seems to be almost screened out of US media. Here is a report in extenso from Agence France Presse: "RIYADH (AFP) – An "inept" United States cannot fix Afghanistan's problems and should simply focus on "chasing the terrorists" there, former Saudi intelligence chief Prince Turki al-Faisal said on Saturday. The ex-ambassador to the United States also challenged Washington to produce results in just-started Middle East peace talks, and accused US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton of undermining efforts to make the region nuclear-free. In a speech in Riyadh before diplomats, Turki said US-led NATO troops had irrevocably alienated the Afghan people and had no hope of rebuilding the country. "What Afghanistan needs now is a shift from nation-building to effectively countering terrorists," Turki told the Arab News conference. US President Barack Obama "should not be misdirected into believing that he can fix Afghanistan's ills by military means."

The Coming Civil War in Iraq.

""After the elections we have seen a new wave of sectarianism which is very dangerous and we have indications that we are heading towards a new peak," Allawi told the Spanish newspaper El Mundo.

"We are just at the beginning, but if the violence continues we are heading towards civil war."

A further 25 people were killed on Friday in a double bomb attack at a football match in northern Iraq.

Allawi's Iraqiya bloc won 91 seats in the election, two more than State of Law, with the Iraqi National Alliance, of which the Sadrists are a part, coming in third with 70 seats.

Meanwhile, former Saudi intelligence chief Prince Turki al-Faisal accused Maliki of trying to hijack the results of the election.

"Adding to the brutal mayhem taking place there, we are watching a deliberate effort on the part of the incumbent prime minister, Mr al-Maliki, to hijack the results of the election and deny the Iraqi people their legitimately elected government," Prince Turki said in Riyadh.

"The consequences of that are more bloodshed and potential civil war," said Prince Turki, who has no official position but is believed to often reflect high-level Saudi thinking."  Yahoo News

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As I said, there will be civil war with foreign Sunni suppoert.  pl

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/iraqpolitics

Elena Kagan, yet another New Yorker.

 My objection to this woman (Kagan) has nothing to do with her gender, religion, sexual preference (if she has one), educational background or politics.  I reckon that she is someone who compromises every issue and "goes along to get along."  She is everyone's pal.  She will not be a "troublemaker."

My problem with her is that she is from the northeastern United States.  In my opinion there are already too many Justices on the Supreme Court who are from east of the Ohio and north of the Potomac.

Nationalists will reject the idea that culture varies widely across the US but, in fact, that is the case.  The elites of the northeast believe that they are uniquely the guardians of enlightenment and "progress," but the cultures of rural America, the Midwest, Southwest, Mountain West, the Pacific Northwest and the South are quite different from that of the Northeast and its cities.  

In the present Supreme Court, Kennedy and Breyer were raised in California. Thomas has deep roots in the South.  The rest are Northeasterners.  Do other Americans not have the right to be judged by people less alien in culture than some of the incumbents?

There should be more regional and cultural balance on the Supreme Court.  pl 

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/16/fashion/16noticed.html

Obama's space program?

Someone explain to this dinosaur why it is a good idea to retire the shuttle fleet.  This is a maneuverable vehicle.  Will whatever they have in mind for a replacement be able to move things around in space or will it just go to a given point and return?  How is it a good idea to put ourselves in a position in which we will have to depend on Russia to get to the space station?  Privatization?  Are there ongoing developmental programs?  pl

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/15/science/space/15shuttle.html?src=me

Afghanistan as Graveyard

 "Although it is just beginning, the U.S.-led effort to pacify the Taliban's spiritual capital appears to be faltering.

Key military operations have been delayed until the fall, and a Taliban assassination campaign is undermining efforts to improve local government in Kandahar.

NATO officials once spoke of demonstrating major progress by mid-August, but U.S. commanders now say the turning point may not be reached until November, and perhaps later.

U.S. officials have stopped describing the plan as a military operation. Instead, they've dubbed it "Cooperation for Kandahar."

"We're not using the term 'operation' or 'major operations' because that often brings to mind in people's psyche the idea of a D-Day," Army Gen. Stanley McChrystal, the commander of U.S.-led international forces in Afghanistan, said Thursday in Washington.

Instead, he emphasized winning over the local population.

U.S. and Afghan officials, however, have made little headway in building a foundation for a respected local government that can win the support of residents."  Dallas News

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This is DOA.  FB Ali had it right when he said that COIN is a boutique art to be practiced by those who have real expertise rather than by infantry colonels who have read a few books and who are swept up in this latest fad.

I said Marja would be decisive because it would show whether or not we are really capable of making COIN work on an industrial strength basis.  I don't see any evidence that we have made any real progress there in implanting government delivered "in a box."  If there is such evidence, tell us about it.

Afghanistan is tediously said to  be the graveyard of empires.  This is trite.  Alexander's empire did quite well in what is now Afghanistan

No, Afghanistan is going to be a graveyard for careers, reputations and naive theorizing.  pl 

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/world/stories/DN-kandahar_14int.ART.State.Edition1.f86f4d.html

Hysterical Zionist Children?

"... this is the new style of pro-Israel advocacy built on victimhood. No wonder so few American kids buy into this. (As for Israeli kids, they would fall over laughing).

Not long ago, I talked to a boy from LA who had taken one of those propaganda trips from Auschwitz to Israel, designed to convey that the alternative to maintaining the occupation is death camps.

He said that it was awful. He was blown away by the horror of what he had seen. But on the bus leaving Auschwitz for Krakow or Warsaw, the adult escorts tried to work the kids up into a frenzy of weeping.

"They seemed to think that us seeing the ovens wasn't enough. They had to milk it and then turn it into a propaganda exercise. And I guess they thought that weeping hysterically was a good place to start. Even a couple of the boys cried," he said. "But I don't cry in public and my friends didn't either. I felt like thinking not crying. So they told me I didn't understand. But I understood. Me and my friends are just not big criers.""  Rosenberg

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Ah, well...  Another self hating Jew heard from...  Seriously, this is an ineresting set of vignettes on the state of American Zionism and the desperation that is emerging in efforts to persuade people that Israel is endangered by anything other than its own attitudes and policies. 

Iran?  Well, maybe.  pl

http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/05/13/zionist_children_losing_their_minds_2/

CRS on the Arizona law.

The Congressional Research Service has published its analysis of Arizona 1070.  I, personally, think that short of the "radical" economic and residential "anschluss" that I have suggested, something like this has to be done.  But, as I have said, I don't think the Mexicans and the rednecks are ready for that.

I have been thinking of buying a pair of boots from "Rocketbuster" that have the Virgin of Guadelupe on them.  They would be made by Mexican artisans in El Paso. I think I would change the light blue color to something else but that's just the Gringo in me.  pl

http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/homesec/R41221.pdf

Kagan no. Sid Thomas, yes. pl

 "“Bankruptcy’s amazing,Kathleen,” she recalled him saying. “It’s about life. It’s about failure — it’s about overcoming failure. It’s about dreams dying.”

Judge Thomas, 56, who sits on the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, is being considered for a seat on theUnited States Supreme Court; he met with President Obama last Thursday. He is, by most accounts, a long shot on the short list, but supporters say he represents the values the president has said he wants: “a keen understanding of how the law affects the daily lives of the American people.”"  NY Times

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Is he a Prod? I don't know.  I hope so.  Obama's narcissistic focus on Ivy, liberal credentials, etc. is pathetic.  I spent the last few days in Oregon earning enough money to pay vet bills by consulting on legal matters.   My lawyer employers responded to questions about Judge Sid Thomas by telling me what a good judge he is, how grounded in the life of the West he is...

What a shame that he has no chance... But perhaps Obama might think otherwise if Kagan fails..   pl 

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/06/us/06thomas.html

COIN is "going down" - again.

 "Scepticism about McChrystal's ambitious aims was implicit in the way the Pentagon report on the war issued Apr. 26 assessed the progress of the campaign in Marja. Now, as Afghan President Hamid Karzai begins a four-day round of consultations with President Barack Obama and other senior U.S. officials here this week, the new report has been given even more pointed expression by an unnamed "senior military official" quoted in a column in the Washington Post Sunday by David Ignatius. 

The senior military officer criticised McChrystal's announcement in February that he had "a government in a box, ready to roll in" for the Marja campaign, for having created "an expectation of rapidity and efficiency that doesn't exist now", according to Ignatius. 

The same military official is also quoted as pointing out that parts of Helmand that were supposed to have been cleared by the offensive in February and March are in fact still under Taliban control and that Afghan government performance in the wake of the offensive had been disappointing, according to Ignatius. 

The outlook at the Pentagon and the White House on the nascent Kandahar offensive is also pessimistic, judging from the comment to Ignatius by an unnamed "senior administration official". The official told Ignatius the operation is "still a work in progress", observing that McChrystal's command was still trying to decide how much of the local government the military could "salvage" and how much "you have to rebuild"'  ipsnews.

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I have already said enough about this.  pl . 

http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=51376

"A Reply to Readers" Richard Sale

 A Reply to Readers: 

Before going further with writing about Big Business, I would like to express appreciation for the comments of readers whose observations are almost always sincere, civil and thoughtful whether agreement is there or not. 

“Charles,” who advocates a strict interpretation of the Constitution, adds that the Founding Fathers thought the smallest federal government to be the best federal government.  I don’t believe this is entirely correct.  With all due respect, even during the country’s first presidency, while the administration gave lip service to a strict interpretation of the Constriction, under the extremely able leadership of Hamilton and the Federalists, it moved quickly to expand federal authority by enacting legislation on tariffs, the currency, taxes and banking. 

Open Thread - 10 May 2010

 I am out of town today and tomorrow.  pl 

Gates should start with himself...

 "Among Gates's apparent targets for major cuts are the private contractors the Pentagon has hired in large numbers over the past decade to take on administrative tasks that the military used to handle. The defense secretary estimated that this portion of the Pentagon budget has grown by as much as $23 billion, a figure that does not include the tens of billions of dollars spent on private firms supporting U.S. troops in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The defense contractors, who populate new office towers throughout Washington's suburbs and have been a major driver of the local economy, are a significant source of budgetary bloat, Gates said. "We ended up with contractors supervising other contractors -- with predictable results," he said in the speech Saturday.

Gates rattled off examples of costly bureaucracy inside the military, as well. A simple request for a dog-handling team in Afghanistan must be reviewed and assessed at multiple high-level headquarters before it can be deployed to the war zone. "Can you believe it takes five four-star headquarters to get a decision on a guy and a dog up to me?" Gates said to reporters Friday.

More than two decades after the end of the Cold War, the military still has more than 40 generals, admirals or senior civilian equivalents working in Europe. "Yet we scold our allies over the bloat in NATO headquarters," he said."  Washpost

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Gates is right.  The armed forces are loaded up with too many generals and admirals.  There is feather bedding everywhere.  The money taps were turned on in Republican days and have been opened even wider in the present administration.  The armed forces are structured now to support a forward leaning aggressive foreign policy in which the expectation is clear that finesse counts for little and massive brute force and large troop commitments are the pattern.  A COIN strategy in Afghanistan that relies on so many soldiers for what the generals would clearly like be an indefinite period is the very emblem of this kind of thinking.

Headquarters have multiplied remarkably in the last 20 years.  Bush '41 once said that he lacked the "vision thing."  Today's armed forces are burdened with far too many flag officers and SESs who are unable to even imagine "the vision thing."  As a result the processes of equipment acquisition and creation of new doctrine have been relegated to huge committees, endless paper and expensive endless experimentation.

Gates' statements about multi-layered civilian contracts would be more impressive if he were not guilty of the same thing.  He has a number of "pet rocks" for which this outrage does not seem to apply.

I can name a few but I will leave it to you gentle readers...  pl 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/08/AR2010050802495.html

"Reasons to be anxious about Afghanistan" Ignatius

 Kandahar, the next big test of the U.S. strategy, will be even harder. The plan is to work with the existing power structure inside the city, even as U.S. troops pound Taliban strongholds to the west and south. But a senior administration official cautions that the Kandahar strategy is "still a work in progress." He explains: "We're still working our way through how much you can salvage [in the local government] and how much you have to rebuild.""  Ignatius

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As I said before, the Marja operation will decide the fate of the US effort in Afghanistan. The Kandahar operation will just conform that outcome.  The COINistas and their general officer acolytes have led President Obama into a box from which there is no good end unless we are willing to persist in the COIN effort for many years and many billions of dollars that we can not afford.

The assumption inherent in the COIN idea is that human behavior is easily modified.  That is an incorrect assumption.  pl 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/07/AR2010050704062.html?hpid=opinionsbox1

What's the Deal on Sestak?

 "In the summer of 2005, Sestak was administratively reassigned from his position as DCNO due to a "poor command climate," effectively ending his naval career.^[9] His removal was one of the first changes made by Admiral Michael Mullen when he took over as the new Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) in July, according to Navy Times."  Wiki

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Arlen Spector floated a TV ad that says that this man was "relieved of duty."  Sestak says that is a lie.  it appears to me to be a lie..  Mullen fired him.  Sestak then retired from the Navy.   That's not the same thing as being thrown out as Spector implies.   What do the Navy people here say?  

I know that I brought this up before but I was not satisfied with the result.  pl 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Sestak

"a disturbing reversal of symbolism"

 "Your local paper might not have covered it, but in the wee hours of Wednesday morning a gang of Israeli settlers attacked the West Bank village of Hawara. "Palestinians reported two torched cars on the village’s central road early yesterday," Haaretz writes. "A small village mosque, used only on the weekend, had the word 'Muhammad' sprayed in Hebrew and a Star of David. Haaretz also found graffiti with the Jewish prayer 'Praise be onto him for not making me a gentile.'" The attackers also took the opportunity to destroy some three hundred olive trees, a major source of local income. "  Salon

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This kind of behavior is on the rise in Israel.  A kind of overweening contempt for the Palestinians has set in.  Attitudes have hardened steadily.  It is now  very difficult to imagine these two populations ever living together amicably.   The concept of peace in the Holy Land seems increasingly to be fantasy.  The whole bloody mess is likely to play itself out as tragedy.   I decided two years ago not to go there again.  pl  

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2010/04/15/star_david_swastika_open2010/index.html

Major Hassan

 I heard Brian Williams talk about this man tonight.  What he said was utter nonsense. He claimed that Hasan's problem had something to do with a fear that he would not be promoted. What nonsense!  The Wiki article about Hasan contains an inconsistency about when he joined the US Army. In fact he joined as an enlisted man after he graduated from high school in Roanoke, Virginia.  He was  stationed at Ft. Erwin, California where he attended after hours  classes in an on post program by a local community college paid for by the government.  Following some years of service as an enlisted man in an MOS that I have not so far determined, he was sent to Virginia Tech as a degree completion student by the Army at public expense and then commissioned as an officer.  Then he applied to the armed forces medical school to which he was accepted and attended as an officer with all pay and allowances.  After being awarded the degree of MD at public expense, he received a fellowship in psychiatry. 

This forsworn traitor should die, and I would be happy to shoot him myself. If his politics were a problem, he should not have accepted a commission in the US Army. There is no higher obligation.  pl

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nidal_Malik_Hasan

Kalmyk president abducted by aliens!

 "Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, the governor of Kalmykia, told a popular Russian television host that the aliens came for him in his apartment on September 18, 1997. According to a report on ABC News, Ilyumzhinov said that the aliens didn’t make themselves known to the rest of the world because they weren’t ready, adding that he communicated with them telepathically because there wasn’t enough oxygen. 

“I believe I talked to them and saw them. I perhaps wouldn’t believe it if it wasn’t for 3 witnesses -- my driver, my minister and my assistant,” who were apparently in the apartment at the time, he reportedly said.

According to a report on Russian news website GZT.ru, State Duma deputy Andrei Lebedev doesn’t believe that the governor was simply shown around the alien spaceship and released. Lebedev wants to find out what else happened to the president -- and he wants Russian president Dmitry Medvedev to interrogate the abductee.

Russian officials fear Ilyumzhinov may have given the aliens “secret information,” according to the Echo of Moscow radio station."  Fox News

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I particularly like the part in which "Russian officials" fear that he may have told the aliens state secrets.  pl 

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/05/06/russian-governor-abducted-aliens/

Kristof on the Catholic Church

 "It may be easy at a New York cocktail party to sniff derisively at a church whose apex is male chauvinist, homophobic and so out of touch that it bars the use of condoms even to curb AIDS. But what about Father Michael Barton, a Catholic priest from Indianapolis? I met Father Michael in the remote village of Nyamlell, 150 miles from any paved road here in southern Sudan. He runs four schools for children who would otherwise go without an education, and his graduates score at the top of statewide examinations.

Father Michael came to southern Sudan in 1978 and chatters fluently in Dinka and other local languages. To keep his schools alive, he persevered through civil war, imprisonment and beatings, and a smorgasbord of disease. “It’s very normal to have malaria,” he said. “Intestinal parasites — that’s just normal.”

Father Michael may be the worst-dressed priest I’ve ever seen — and the noblest."

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This reminds me of the possibly mad English nun who refused my protection and support in a remote village in Vietnam.

She lived in the most abject poverty and vulnerability.  I could have fed her at least, but she would have none of it.

I thank you in advance for your insults.  pl 

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/02/opinion/02kristof.html

""The image on the Shroud is that of a dead man,..."

 ""The image on the Shroud is that of a dead man, but the blood speaks of his life. Each trace of blood speaks of love and life," Benedict said.

The Vatican to date had tiptoed around the issue of just what the Shroud of Turin is, calling it a powerful symbol of Christ's suffering while making no claim to its authenticity.

Benedict's meditation — delivered after he prayed as if in a trance before the shroud — appeared to imply that in the end it doesn't matter what science says about its authenticity.

"The Shroud of Turin offers us the image of how his body lay in the tomb during that time (of death); time that was brief chronologically — about a day and a half — but was immense, infinite in its value and significance," Benedict said.

A Vatican researcher said late last year that faint writing on the linen, which she studied through computer-enhanced images, proves the cloth was used to wrap Jesus' body after his crucifixion."  Yahoo News

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I am puzzled by this.  The Catholic Church has carefully avoided judging the authenticity of the shroud.  The scientific evidence is still mixed since the possibility exists that earlier carbon dating tests were contaminated.

Will Benedict go next to the church in Rome where the "titulus' is housed?  

Is stress unhinging him?  It is puzzling.  pl 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100502/ap_on_re_eu/eu_pope_shroud_of_turin

White Noise - Richard Sale

White Noise 

     Nothing can confer a right to do what is wrong.  Even our precious freedom of speech must, in my opinion at least, be exercised with some humility towards the verified facts, some respect for truthful evidence, some strain of intellectual conscience. Yet lately it seems that we see a horde of public pundits who can say anything they like no matter how false, reckless and unfeeling.

    With the election of America’s first black president we have suddenly become victims – captive listeners – to a debate over the menaces of Big Government attempting to bully our cherished American freedom. Thanks to demagogues like Glenn Beck (and others with fearless brains of steel), we are made to listen to allegations about the growing tyranny of “bureaucrats” and “politicians” and “socialists” – assertions that unfortunately describe nothing real. You would think listening to Beck that the only reliable and trustworthy entity in America life is Big Business upon which rests the future of the entire American experiment – the only refuge from the increasing suffocations of Big Government.

The Facts Matter - NJ Blog 3 May 2010

http://security.nationaljournal.com/2010/05/is-war-brewing-in-the-middle-e.php

 

A Prude in Richmond - Ridiculous

 "Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli is opting for a more modest depiction of the state's seal.

The seal depicts the Roman goddess Virtus wearing a blue tunic draped over one shoulder with her left breast exposed. But on the new lapel pins Cuccinelli recently handed out to his staff, her bosom is covered by an armored breastplate.

Workers in attendance when the new design came up at a staff meeting said Cuccinelli joked that it converts a risque image into a PG one.

But the joke might be on Cuccinelli, said University of Virginia political scientist Larry Sabato. 
“When you ask to be ridiculed, it usually happens. And it will happen here, nationally,” he said. “This is classical art, for goodness' sake.” Cuccinelli has found himself at the center of political controversy numerous times since taking office in January. The conservative Republican was ridiculed on Comedy Central's “The Daily Show” in March after advising state colleges and universities they lack the legal authority to protect gay employees from discrimination."  WP

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What an ass.  pl

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/local-breaking-news/cuccinelli-unveils-modest-vers.html

Sheriffs play their own game.

 For some reason beyond my capacity I can't modify the format in this article to make it fit this space.  Nevertheless, the material in this is germane to our discussion of the diverse functions and powers of the various kinds of American governments and law enforcement.  

It is evident that the different sheriff's departments in Arizona have been enforcing federal law with regard to immigration differently.

The sheriff in Tucson has been rounding up illegals all along.  Others have not.  The sheriff in this article has his men out doing patrols in the desert, and not just to rescue the immigrants from dehydration and death.

This reflects my experience of local law enforcement in Virginia and other states.

Yes, American local law enforcement picks and chooses which federal laws it wishes to place emphasis on.

The new Arizona law is designed to force uniform enforcement of federal immigration law on all Arizona police.  pl 

http://news.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474978210158

Walrus on narcissistic "leaders."

 Col. Lang:

"The idea has been allowed to take hold in the army that general officers are a race apart, not subject to the norms of ordinary life and that nothing should limit their ambition, not even common sense. " It seems quite clear from this and other articles, that the ROE are about covering General officers backsides, and nothing else. What is killing the Army is exactly the same disease that is killing the American economy and has killed American politics, and it is spreading internationally. That disease is the promotion or election of officials, be they Generals, CEO's or Congressmen who have a variant of narcissistic personality disorder. People so affected may be intelligent and hard working, but they cannot empathise with anyone. Normal human emotions, shame, love, fear, embarrasssment, etc. are a mystery to them. Such folk self select for high office because they will do anything to get ahead without the slightest qualm, and that includes lying, cheating, character assassination, backstabbing and outrageous flattery of their seniors. They mimic whatever behaviours they need to exhibit to get ahead, but they don't "own' those behaviours.