Center for a New American Security

The last time I saw Andrew Bacevich was a month or so ago, and he chastised me for not responding to this piece he wrote on the New Republic's website. I explained that I had been busy finishing a draft of my dissertation but that I would give it some thought and would respond. I have been thinking a lot about morality and foreign policy since, so Part II of this will be a response to what Prof. Bacevich wrote.

This post, though, is a brief review of Bacevich's new book, Washington Rules: America's Path to Permanent War. Overall, I enjoyed the book -- though not as much as his earlier one, The Limits of Power -- and recommend it. Let me divide up my comments, though, into the good, the bad and the ugly:

The Good:

1. The strongest sections of this book were the beginning and the end, where Bacevich diagnoses what he sees as the central delusion ailing U.S. foreign policy and then provides an alternative. As he sees it, we Americans are bound by a foolish and sacred trinity: "an abiding conviction that the minimum essentials of international peace and order require the United States to maintain a global military presence, the configure its forces for global power projection, and to counter existing or anticipated threats by relying on a policy of global interventionalism."

Bacevich suggests, by way of an alternative, that we should replace this trinity with another: "First, the purpose of the U.S. military is not to combat evil or remake the world, but to defend the United States and its most vital interests. ... Second, the primary duty station of the American soldier is in America. ... Third, consistent with Just War tradition, the United States should employ force only as a last resort and only in self-defense."

Bacevich complains loudly and frequently in Washington Rules that people who suggest things such as this are often denounced with the inevitably pejorative term "isolationist", but if I comb back through the political science literature on what some called "Middle Western Isolationism" or "Midwestern Isolationism" (Billington, 1945; Smuckler, 1953; Rieselbach and Russett, 1960), it's possible to see in Bacevich, a Midwesterner, an inheritor of this tradition -- at least in terms of his preferences for how big the U.S. military should be and where it should be based and employed. If I were him, I would just own the term "isolationist" and let the haters hate. Instead of preemptively denouncing those who would accuse him of isolationism, it might have born more fruit had Bacevich instead asked his readers, in light of what you have seen in Bosnia, Kosovo, Somalia, Iraq and Afghanistan ... why is isolationism so bad?

2. The sections on Allen Dulles and Curtis LeMay make for fun, revisionist history. And again, I mean that word revisionist in a non-pejorative way.

3. I linked to these clownish anti-war demontrators on my Twitter account the other day and bemoaned what passes for the anti-war left in America these days. I spoke too soon. On the one hand, although you're more likely to see Bacevich on Democracy Now! these days than in the pages of the National Review, Bacevich's criticisms of U.S. foreign and defense policy are more rooted in his conservativism than in any common cause with the Left. On the other hand, I still think Andrew Bacevich is the most eloquent anti-war voice in America these days on either the Left or the Right. This book is a very positive contribution to the national conversation about how we maintain and use our military.

The Bad:

1. The sections on counterinsurgency, Iraq and Afghanistan are sloppy. Bacevich sometimes engages with those with whom he disagrees with an impressive degree of seriousness -- combing through David Petraeus's doctoral dissertation, for example, and carefully studying the speeches of Clinton Era officials. Other times he picks out individual voices and holds them up to be emblematic of larger trends. My boss, for example, has written about “global counterinsurgency”, a concept for which few other counterinsurgency theorists have much enthusiasm but Bacevich uses like the bogey man to scare his readers about the future of U.S. policy. In Bacevich’s book, counterinsurgency theorists are like the Borg: we all think the same, and none of us is trying to devise pragmatic operational solutions to disastrous situations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Rather, we are part of some larger project, trying to protect a foolish concept of American power and power projection because we are rewarded with the glittering riches that come with think tank fellowships.

Elsewhere, Bacevich makes assertions without backing them up in facts. He says, for example, that counterinsurgency theorists and military analysts are loathe to acknowledge factors other than U.S. military operations might have led to the drop in violence in Iraq in 2007. But I heard Steve Biddle give a public lecture about the variety of factors he felt led to the drop in violence as early as the summer of 2008, and I have heard and read many other counterinsurgency theorists say and write as much since.

This third fourth of the book was maddening to read because it struck me as disingenuous. Bacevich was not trying to preach to the unconverted or admit that some of those with whom he disagrees might be onto something. He was simply presenting his own simplistic versions of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to counter other, earlier simplistic readings of the wars.

2. For Bacevich, "Washington" is not just the 202 area code or the federal government, but "think tanks ... interest groups ... lawyers, lobbyists, fixers, former officials ... retired military officers ... big banks and other financial institutions, defense contractors and major corporations, television networks ... The New York Times ... the Council on Foreign Relations and Harvard's Kennedy School of Government."

This is all so similar to one of the mistakes John Mearsheimer and Steven Walt made with their book about "The Israel Lobby." Had they confined their field of inquiry to the activities and effects of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, they might have written an interesting and probably dull article. Instead, they constructed a massive conspiracy "lobby" including everyone from think tanks to professors to -- you guess it! -- the New York Times. I do not think casting such a wide net helped their cause, and I do not think it helps that of Bacevich either.

3. I also feel Bacevich has traded in one set of assumptions -- the challenges to which he says he resisted for years -- for another set. I fear Bacevich is on some kind of crusade at this point that is less about engaging with the other side in reasoned debate or considering the political realities facing policy-makers and more about scoring polemical points. "A young man in a hurry is nearly uneducable," he writes. This is certainly true. Equally true is that "better was a poor and wise youth than an old and foolish king who no longer knew how to take advice." I worry Bacevich has not become more open minded through his "education" but rather just as close minded as before -- but on another end of the ideological spectrum.

The Ugly:

1. The thing I dislike most about Bacevich’s writing is when he talks about the personal failings of his antagonists as if they somehow lend extra ammunition to Bacevich’s arguments concerning the policies those antagonists promoted. So Allen Dulles's alleged womanizing is brought up in this book, as was James Forrestal's personal failings in Bacevich's last book. (Although you will note the policies of neither George W. Bush nor Barack Obama get any added credit for the principals being devoted family men and good parents.) For a guy who writes about "the intractability of the human condition," you would think Bacevich would understand that all of the actors in U.S. foreign policy -- "good" and "bad" -- are as sinful and broken as the rest of us. Have a little mercy on them, eh?

Heard this past weekend in a bar in Chattanooga, Tennessee:

Lane Kiffin is the Sarah Palin of college football. He's never stayed anywhere long enough to actually accomplish anything, and aside from a small minority of people for whom he can do no wrong, everyone else in the country thinks he's obnoxious.

This is amazing. Have a great Labor Day weekend, comrades.

(h/t @JamesSanna)

As I wrote last night, I rather liked the president's speech and thought it showed proper respect for the sacrifices made and for President Bush. Others on the internets had different things to say.

1. Andrew Bacevich says "The United States leaves Iraq having learned nothing." I disagree. I think we have learned a lot, tactically, operationally, and strategically, and I think the American people will in the future be more wary of the kind of military adventurism that led to the invasion and occupation of Iraq. Bacevich should take heart in this. But honestly, does anyone out there see a U.S. administration ever embracing the kind of neo-isolationism that Bacevich is apparently demanding? And is it just me, or is he crankier than normal lately?

2. Someone sent this post by Jennifer Rubin at Commentary to my mother, who forwarded it to me, asking, "I thought Obama did a great job in the speech last night, showing great respect for the military and the sacrifices that have been made. Am I wrong?" No, mom, you are not wrong. But Rubin is kind of like the anti-Bacevich: the president could have announced he was re-invading Iraq and marching on Tehran in the spring, and she still would have written a post denouncing him as a weak leader who coddles our enemies. (Interestingly, John Podhoretz liked the speech.)

3. Max Bergmann at the Center for American Progress takes a swipe at CNAS and writes that the president has effectively implemented a 2005 report written by scholars at the Center for American Progress. I'll let others decide which think tanks are the most influential on Iraq policy, recognizing that no one outside the 202 area code really cares. But for those of you unfamiliar with the Center for American Progress, let me just say that it is a great think tank filled with some wonderful scholars whose reports I read with interest. It has a different mission and focus than CNAS, but I have many friends there and value their opinions and analysis. I particularly liked this last report by Caroline Wadhams and Colin Cookman, the latter of whom sends out an invaluable email each morning with news articles and analysis on events in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

4. Fred Kaplan was underwhelmed by the president's speech and wonders where Iraq is headed next. One answer might be found in the rather excellent analysis provided by the man at the Pentagon with day to day responsibility for Iraq. Colin Kahl, an alumnus of the Little Think Tank That Could, is a professor on leave from the security studies department at Georgetown, and he always brings welcome scholarly rigor to his policy analysis.

UPDATE: And on a day when the pathetic Washington Post is ripping off TBD.com's feed to cover the hostage crisis at the Discovery Channel HQ, Anthony Shadid redeems the MSM with one of the best newspaper articles you will ever read in the New York Times.

Not so long ago, I had a conversation with a Pakistani businessman about the prospects for economic growth. The conversation turned to import and export. Now, as someone who has personally had to clear Ms Henley-on-Thames "minimised" 250+kg of shipping through Islamabad airport customs, I have seen a little of the dark dealings it takes to get things done in a place where corruption is part of the background noise.

The businessman, who regularly ships finished products to the UK, was saying that importing and exporting in Pakistan was pretty straight forward. I was saying that it wasn't as there is no clarity in the regulations. We argued back and forth about this until we came to a point we agreed on - well, nearly. The businessman said the customs' payments were reasonable and not prohibitive to business. I said the bribe I had to pay (through some pretty dodgy cunning manoeuvrings) hadn't been as bad as I feared. We both repeated our positions not really thinking about what the other said until it clicked. We both looked at each other for a few seconds and it became clear that we were talking about different ends of the same customs official's twirly moustache.

"Um, you know. The things you have to do here to build your business, your life or whatever... They warp your mentality."

I didn't think it was worth pressing home the point that the businessman had come to consider corruption "normal".

I've seen lots of corruption; bucket loads; all over the place. I still remember feeling slightly thrilled when as an 18-year old landing in Cairo to start an Arabic course, I had to pay my first bribe to get my bags waved away by the narcotics police - not that I had anything illegal in my bags, but only because they were obviously taking about 30 minutes to check each bag in a crowded and sweltering queue in the hope that the better off would self select themselves and offer to pay up to move things along.

Corruption isn't corruption in Pakistan, it's life. As some commentators have already pointed out, it's not a huge surprise that a phenomenon that permeates society is also present in sport.

But just as corruption isn't just corruption, cricket isn't just cricket in Pakistan. It's a metaphor for how the country views itself at its best. The team can be chaotic, unruly, but from the depths of defeat and despair it can tap into some sort of unseen fount of resolve and produce dazzling displays of skill and determination. Equally, from a position of unassailable confidence, it can collapse in less time than it takes to place a bet at your local bookies. At the same time, cricket is the one thing the entire country regardless of religious affiliation, ethnic background or social class can rally around.

Which is what makes the cricket betting scandal so painful for Pakistanis. If cricket is Pakistan, it makes sense that there's an element of corruption involved. But of course, Pakistanis hope beyond the expectations of logic that there isn't. Cricket is Pakistan at its best, and its worst.

As an editorial in Pakistan's most popular newspaper Jang stated the other day:

"The whole nation is ashamed...Corruption has marred the country... and this is going on and on unabated. This latest cricket corruption case shows again the need for revising the whole system."

In the same way the floods have shown up Pakistan's governance problems then the cricket scandal shows up corruption. I don't want to contribute to the sense of beating Pakistan when it's down, but I do feel that responsibly highlighting problems is the first step to solving them. If the cricket fiasco encourages Pakistanis to take matters into their own hands and do something, it will, ultimately, have a positive impact.

Corruption is some times described as a cancer - and I think that's accurate. In a decade of reporting from the Muslim world, across countries and regions, I noticed the all-encompassing presence of corruption. Once it's in your system, it's near impossible to eradicate. Often, the only way to get rid of it, will wreak havoc on the wider body politic, and then there's still no guarantee it's going to stay away.

Corruption is not something to be opposed merely on the grounds of principle or morality. In practical terms it damages a state's ability to enact policy by providing people with ways around laws. It allows the unscrupulous to make enough money to influence the decision making power of the state. It allows those with connections to increase their gains and widen further the gap between rich and poor. There are many other reasons, but perhaps the most damaging in the current climate is the effect it has of alienating the disenfranchised and propelling them to turn to non-state actors to provide security, legal redress or relief.  It shouldn't come as a shock to anyone that ending corruption is a recurrent theme with extremists.

I remember sitting in Cairo's Journalist Union on the eve of the US-led invasion of Iraq with Arab journalist friends. It's hard to imagine now, but despite all our worries about civilian deaths and US intentions towards Iraqi oil, we all took it for granted that the US would establish a competent government in Iraq. At the time, whether you agreed with US policies in the region or not, you didn't doubt its capacity to carry out its aims. The one good thing we thought the US would be able to do in Iraq was to remove corruption as a ubiquitous aspect of life in Arab and Muslim countries. In the end, the US not only failed to stamp out corruption but by its actions encouraged it. It didn't take long before US officials in Iraq were accused of taking part in it.

What usually happens when Pakistan or another Muslim country is in the limelight for deceitful shenanigans is that some Western commenters somewhere will imply (or flat out state) that the problem is cultural. This puts people on the defensive. They object to being portrayed as morally bankrupt down to the last man, woman and child. And I would agree. In a system where getting your kids into school requires bribes and not grades and even obtaining your driving licence is in essence a financial transaction, I am constantly surprised and humbled when I meet stringently honest people like Jahangir Tareen who, for example, pay their taxes even when this requires more effort than just flying under the radar and risks further unwarranted, predatory attention from greedy officials.

But the response of those who are labelled as "culturally corrupt" is often to say "There is even more corruption in the West. They are just better at hiding it." This isn't entirely true. Yes, there is corruption in the West. For example, in the UK not so long ago, Tony Blair while prime minister, ordered the Serious Fraud Office on national security grounds to stop a corruption investigation into an arms deal between a British defence firm and Saudi Arabia. The result was outrage that the executive arm of government had pulled rank over the judicial branch for economic reasons. However, this sort of thing doesn't impact the average person's life several times a day. But what it does do is degrade the checks and balances that keep the cancer out of the system.

And that's what it's about; the system. It's not about culture or DNA, it's about having properly functioning, fair systems that give people faith that even if they are poor, they will be treated like everyone else and have the same (or similar) opportunities to better their lot in life.

...I don't think this speech by the president matters much. But I thought it was excellent. I thought it showed class regarding President Bush, made the right connections between the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and said the right things concerning the nature and composition of U.S. power.

On a related note, I can understand why Republicans do not like this president concerning his preferred domestic policy. But honestly, I can't see how they have much to complain about concerning national security policies.

And on an unrelated but completely apolitical note, let me take this opportunity to remember my friend Joel Cahill. RIP. RLTW. Sua Sponte.

Today's award for Awesomeness in the English Language goes to the Financial Times, which explained cheating in cricket thusly:

The amounts offered to players to divert from the normal course of spirited competition vary from $6000 to more than £300000.

I literally could not wait for Londonstani's take on this corruption scandal surrounding Pakistan's cricket team*, so I'm jumping the gun here. My father was a sports writer and my mom a basketball coach, so I grew up surrounded by sports, and I am ecumenically enthusiastic about them. I can take as much interest in an American football game as I can in a rugby game and as much interest in a cricket match as I can in a baseball game. A few years ago, I watched New Zealand play England in a cricket test match at Lord's Cricket Ground, which is as hallowed a ground as hallowed gets. (For Americans used to baseball, think Yankee Stadium combined with Fenway Park combined with Wrigley Field combined with Cooperstown and you get a sense of the place's importance in the game of cricket.) So the news that Pakistan's cricket team had possibly rigged the proceedings somewhat last weeked -- at Lord's of all places -- threw the world of sport (outside America) into chaos.

I have wondered, on this blog, whether or not the world has been holding back from donating to Pakistan due to allegations of corruption and terrorism. Were the people of Pakistan being collectively punished due to the culture of corruption in Pakistan's government and the government's ties to violent extremists? I have only anecdotal evidence to support this, including the testimony of one friend who refuses to donate to the relief efforts in Pakistan because, in his words, "At least when a Hatian power broker embezzles my donation I know he's not going to try to kill me with it."

I wonder, though, if this cricket scandal -- which trust me, America, is a big deal in the Commonwealth nations -- will just re-inforce the world's view of Pakistan as a place hopelessly corrupt and therefore not the kind of place we should be giving money to, even for humanitarian purposes. As Steve Coll argued in the New Yorker this week**, Pakistan has a serious image problem in the eyes of the West. (And we the United States in the eyes of Pakistan.) The people of Pakistan might very well be paying the price right now for that image.

(For more on corruption and the floods, check out this post by Max Fisher at the Atlantic.com.)

*Londonstani can still count on me to bowl for Team Khan vs. Team Ms Henley-on-Thames in the much-awaited 20/20 match. But why do I have to tell his "cousin" when I plan on bowling a no ball? ... Too soon?

**I actually did not agree with the general thesis of Coll's argument, which is that economic development would reduce violent extremism. This sounds true-ish, but where is the evidence to support causality between violent extremism and economic prosperity? I have not seen it.

It blows my mind that some legislators still think it's a good idea to peg our nation's defense budget to a percentage of the GDP. Call me a traditionalist, but a nation's defense budget should probably be based on a) how the nation sees its current and future threat environments, to include planning for contingencies, b) resources available, and c) how defense spending rates as a priority compared to other government expenditures. We can then have dynamic, fact-supported arguments about a), b) and most especially c).

Further, it makes some sense that our nation has spent a lot of money on national defense while fighting the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. But if I am following the logic of those who want to tie defense spending to the GDP correctly, our defense budget should have shrunk in FY09. And if the world's economy collapses because the Iranians attempt to close the Straits of Hormuz, does that mean we then slash the budgets of the U.S. Navy and Air Force?

As bad as the flood damage is in Pakistan, there is a positive side. My latest article on the afpak channel is about the young Pakistanis with the skills and connections to do what their leaders can't.

"Pakistan is beset by a serious lack of good governance. Analysts such as the scholars at the Pak Institute of Peace Studies have argued for some time that this absence is a driving force behind whatever support extremists in Pakistan can claim. In recent weeks, the Air Blue crash in Islamabad and the government's poor reaction to the floods have drawn more attention to this fracture at the heart of the country. No matter how much aid flows into Pakistan from the outside, Pakistanis themselves must ultimately ensure the formation of governments that serve the people they claim to represent. And surprisingly, possibly the one positive thing to emerge from the floods is growing evidence that young Pakistanis - the educated sons and daughters of well-off families - are willing and able to show that collective action for the public good is not something that is only possible in other countries."

For all its problems there are assets Pakistan has that can serve it well in the future. This includes a tradition of public debate, appreciation for a free press, a healthy culture of dissent against unfettered executive power and a fairly independent civil society. The military in Pakistan is hugely influential but doesn't define the state - possibly because it wasn't instrumental in its inception. The idea of Islam defines the state, but at the same time it remains a vague concept that the people who call the shots don't agree on. That's a problem but also an opportunity for Pakistan. Those who say Islam is all about fighting Kafirs can't completely silence those that say its about raising living standards and providing medical relief.

The question about engagement in Pakistan isn't about whether or not potential partners exist.

UPDATE: I'm not the only optimist. Read Mohsin Hamid's article in the FT.

"Countless individual responses to the floods also inspire hope. Massive collections are under way in Lahore. Virtually everyone I know is donating money, time or goods - or all three - to the relief effort. Societal safety nets, the welfare micro-systems of families and friends that bind Pakistanis together in the absence of a strong and effective state, are doing what they can to help with the unprecedented load.

Hope also comes from the rise of a powerful and independent news media, and from a judiciary that has fought for - and won - remarkable freedom. Pakistan's airwaves and front pages, blogs and cafés are full of the debates of a rambunctious multi-party democracy, one of precious few in the region between India and Europe."

Some Norwegian idiot journalist has embedded with the Taliban and shot this incredible footage of an attack on a U.S. or allied convoy. These guys sound and act a lot like a U.S. small unit, but replace all the quotes from "Anchorman" and "Talladega Nights" with "Allahu Akbar." Oh, and they have much better hair (12:18). In fact, the David Allan Coe-looking dude with the argyle socks is my new favorite Talib. (h/t Intern Steve) Update: Gah, you guys have lost it. (See comments.) I obviously admire the journalism, I just strongly believe there is a thin line between "hardass" and "dumbass" and that this wildman might have crossed the line. I'm not making a political point. Goodness gracious, you guys are touchy. And quick to defend the intelligence of some dude who later got kidnapped by the Taliban. The only other person I know to have done something like this is Nir Rosen, who I like personally and whose work I admire ... and who I regularly accuse of being an idiot for stunts like this.

Gary Schmitt and Cheryl Miller have a really fantastic op-ed in today's Wall Street Journal that is, alas, password-protected on the Journal's website.* The money quote:

Much ink has been spilled over the fraught relations between the military and the Ivy League. But while the good military vs. the bad Ivies makes for good political theater, it isn't the whole story. While ROTC has been banned from many Ivy League campuses since the Vietnam War, the military has also drawn down its ROTC programs in the Northeast and in urban areas. ROTC has become increasingly Southern and rural.

 

In Virginia, for example, there are 7.8 million residents and 11 Army ROTC programs. New York City, home to over eight million people and America's largest university student population, has two Army ROTC programs. The entire Chicago metro area, with its 10 million residents, is covered by a single Army ROTC program, as is Detroit. Alabama, population 4.7 million, has 10.

After my first year at the University of Pennsylvania, the U.S. Army decided our ROTC program should merge with and move down the street to Drexel University, which admittedly made some sense because Drexel had a National Guard Armory on their campus. It is thus one of the quirks of my biography that I was Drexel University's ROTC commander as a college senior despite having never attended Drexel.** But the U.S. Army has made a lot of decisions based solely on monetary cost-benefit calculations that have resulted in ROTC withering on the vine in the urban areas of the Northeast and, as Schmitt and Miller point out, a disproportionately small number of military officers hailing from the large middle-class suburbs of our nation's urban centers in the North.

Schmitt and Miller end their column sharing President Obama's lament that "every town has tons of young people who are serving in Iraq and Afghanistan ... That's not always the case in other parts of the country ... [It's] important for the president to say ... that if we are going into war, then all of us go, not just some."

The U.S. Army, then, needs to be more intentional about recruiting officers outside the American South. It is no coincidence that the only combat arms officer commissioned into the U.S. Army from my class of 2,000+ at Penn was a white southern male. (The other officer commissioned graduated from Penn's top-ranked nursing school.) There is nothing wrong with white southern males, of course (we Scots-Irish are, after all, America's warrior class), but we can hardly claim to accurately represent our nation's awesome cultural, racial, social and ethnic diversity, and there is an argument to be made that a nation's officer corps should do that to some degree. The burden for making that happen falls more heavily on the U.S. Army than it does our nation's university presidents.

*I know it makes a lot of sense for the Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times to charge their customers for the news services they provide. But the op-ed and editorial pages are ostensibly meant to spark public debate, and I fail to see how keeping opinion pieces behind a paywall does that.

**Many thanks, though, to all the cadets of the "Dragon Battalion" for their service. I am a proud alumnus and made a lot of good friends through the program -- who I would not have met had I remained south of Chestnut Street!

UPDATE: @dianawueger pointed me toward this earlier op-ed in the Washington Post that made some of the same points. Depressing fun fact: "the Army's self-imposed target for officer-training programs in the New York City region is roughly 30 new officers per year."

It will surprise very few people to know that Battleship and Risk sit on the communal tables outside our offices here at CNAS. Ganesh Sitaraman, hand pictured, pointed out to everyone this afternoon the way in which, as in real life, Afghanistan is a nightmare: unlike relatively secure areas like the Americas and Australia, Afghanistan's porous borders mean occupying players are subject to attack from FIVE sides. Occupying armies should consider themselves forewarned: Invading is easy; staying is hard.

What constitutes success or failure in counterinsurgency campaigns is controversial and has sparked much informed (and uninformed) discussion in the policy and academic communities. (It has also generated this priceless article in the Onion.) Yesterday, I posted a quote from David Galula's Pacification in Algeria, 1956-1958 and asked the readership to determine whether or not Galula's definition of success can be accurately applied to the United States in Iraq. Here is Galula's definition:

Victory is won and pacification ends when most of the counterinsurgent forces can safely be withdrawn, leaving the population to take care of itself with the help of a normal contingent of police and Army forces.

The debate sparked in the comments thread was a good one, and I promised my own thoughts today. First, though, I need to be up front about some qualifications:

1. My thoughts on whether or not the United States was successful in its counterinsurgency campaign in Iraq does not mean I think the 2003 decision to go to war in Iraq was a wise one. Quite the opposite. I think the 2003 decision to go to war in Iraq was a blunder, and counterinsurgency operations were only necessary, in my view, once the Bush Administration and the U.S. and British militaries had badly mismanaged the war from 2003 to 2006.

2. I am critical of U.S. and British military performance in Iraq from 2003 until 2006 (and beyond). This does not mean that I believe all units performed equally poorly. Some units and commanders performed exceptionally well. So if you were yourself a U.S. officer or troop on the ground between 2003 and 2006 -- and I myself served in Iraq in 2003 and 2004 -- do not take my criticism personally. I do, however, believe that the U.S. military began a difficult and bloody learning process in 2003 that started to show some real fruits by 2006 and that the Bush Administration made a number of wise decisions before and after the midterm elections of 2006 that had a positive effect. The U.S. military deserves credit for learning, and the Bush Administration deserves credit for correcting course.

3. U.S. counterinsurgency operations were not -- I repeat, were NOT -- the only variable which led to the dramatic drop in violence in Iraq in 2007. A bloody civil war in 2006 combined with Moqtada al-Sadr's decision to largely keep his forces on the sidelines and a tribal "awakening" all had an effect on the drop in violence, and it is impossible to determine with relative certainty which variables were most important to the drop in violence. So I am not arguing that the surge in U.S. troops was solely responsible for the drop in violence, and I am also not arguing that counterinsurgency as practiced by the U.S. military in Iraq in 2007 is the only appropriate counterinsurgency strategy or could be replicated with ease elsewhere.

4. I have a very limited view of what success in Iraq looks like. A secular democracy, free from violence, in which individual rights and civil liberties are protected by a robust legal system? That would be nice, sure. But nations wage war in their own interests, and my view -- which is perhaps cynical -- is that in 2006, the United States was looking for a way to a) reduce the levels of violence in Iraq in order to b) build up key Iraqi institutions so that we could c) transition to a security force assistance mission and largely depart the country. (This is almost precisely what we are attempting to do in Afghanistan today, with less success.)

Given and based upon those qualifications, I believe the United States (and its allies, Iraqi and international) were successful in Iraq from 2006 onwards in serving U.S. interests. I believe the desired policy outcome of U.S. decision-makers has largely been realized through a combination of U.S. counterinsurgency efforts, actions taken by the Iraqi government and non-state actors, and wise policy decisions made by the Bush and Obama Administrations between 2006 and 2010.

Today, a series of brutal insurgent attacks tore through Iraq, killing scores in some of the worst violence Iraq has seen since the dark days of 2007. And Iraq's political class remains deadlocked, unable to form a government and frustrating its people. Yesterday, though, the number of U.S. troops in Iraq dipped below 50,000 as the United States credibly transitioned to a smaller security force assistance mission. So while Iraq continues to be wracked by violence and suffers from political instability, U.S. interests have been served in the sense that the conflict in Iraq is now an Iraqi conflict that will be largely settled and fought by Iraqi actors. It's a curious, tragic and selfish definition of victory, I know. But it's victory.

ESV Slide March 9204

Here's a test for the readership: read the following quote, from Galula's Pacification in Algeria, 1956-1958, and debate whether or not Iraq meets the conditions for victory as outlined. Tomorrow I will share my own thoughts.

Victory is won and pacification ends when most of the counterinsurgent forces can safely be withdrawn, leaving the population to take care of itself with the help of a normal contingent of police and Army forces.

(h/t Ganesh)

I like both Anatol Lieven and Tom Ricks and always listen to them both on matters related to Afghanistan, even when I disagree with them. (I currently disagree, for example, with Tom's assessments of both Iraq and Afghanistan.) I first met Tom, actually, in a tent at Bagram in between missions during Operation Anaconda in March 2002, and we now work together at the Little Think Tank That Could. And I always really enjoyed listening to the well-traveled Lieven speak on Afghanistan, Pakistan and Central Asia when I lived in London.

I was disappointed, though, to listen to Lieven's broadside against Ricks here (at the 17:00 mark, to be specific). A more careful graduate student would never criticize a professor at the department from where he hopes to be granted a degree in the near future, but Lieven looks foolish when he brusquely dismisses Tom as a "Washington commentator" (what, because the view of Kabul is clearer from the Strand?) proffering "rubbish ... unqualified garbage" who has never "lived in an Afghan village" and is thus apparently unable to say anything of substance on Afghanistan. Lieven comes out of this looking bad, and not only because, ahem, Tom GREW UP IN AFGHANISTAN and spent 25 years covering the U.S. military at war. Lieven adopts the most condescending tone in this interview. As a public service to this blog's many readers in the United Kingdom, listen to this and realize that when you start speaking this way and using phrases like "obviously" and "of course" (not to mention "Northern Ireland"), we Yanks usually stop listening to whatever you're trying to tell us.

Anyway, even though I manage to disagree with both Tom and Lieven on Afghanistan at the moment, I came out of listening to this interview thinking a little less of a man whose reporting and analysis I normally respect.

By last summer, staff were pointing to Butter Pecan flavored Ensure as popular with the chair-shackled captives. Flavor made no difference going down, one nurse explained, but a captive could taste it if he burped later.

The Miami Herald (and the great Carol Rosenberg, who has stone cold journalisted the heck out of the Guantanamo story)

It's very hard work to run an organization, let alone one that's constantly being spied upon and sued.

Julian Assange, on why his organization does not publish donor information.

What is the over/under on current or former U.S. government officials who read that sentence in today's Wall Street Journal and choked on their coffee? 2,000? 5,000?

It's obviously pretty rich to hear Julian Assange admit that sometimes, secrecy has advantages. Assange wants a standard of transparency where he alone is the arbiter of what remains secret, and I suspect he has a pretty black and white view of things: big governments, bad; plucky leftist internet interests, good. The former have little to no right to secrecy, while the latter have all that they themselves deem necessary. The hypocrisy, here, is on full display.

There has been a lot written about the failure of large organizations, governmental and non-governmental, to adapt to the internet age. But the more I look at internet-age organizations, they more it looks as if they too can't quite figure out how they themselves fit into the world. I was reminded of a friend who spoke with some executives at Google and asked why they posted this or that image of U.S. military installations on Google Earth. "Hey," the answer came back, "information wants to be free."

Okay, my friend asked, then why don't you publish the exact locations of your data centers? His question was met with nervous laughter.

At the moment, the street-view imagery on Google Earth is causing a controversy in Germany, where folks are less enthusiastic about their homes being photographed and put on the internet in high resolution than we Americans have been. Reading about the controversy in the FT over the weekend, I was struck by this quote from Peter Schaar, Germany's data protection chief:

I sometimes get the impression that Google in some areas still acts like the quirky garage start-up that's driven by the sheer enthusiasm of its founders.

This will be cold comfort to governments around the world, but it's becoming more and more apparent that the organizations that should feel most comfortable in the internet age are having as much trouble adjusting to it as everyone else.

Here's a fun project for the readership. This should keep you busy through the weekend. I was reading a book chapter by Stathis Kalyvas (.pdf) and came across his definition of civil war, which will be familiar to those of you who have read this book:

Civil war can be defined as armed combat taking place within the boundaries of a recognized sovereign entity between parties subject to a common authority at the outset of the hostilities.

This got me thinking about Afghanistan and whether or not we can define the conflict in Afghanistan as a civil war. Words like "authority" and "sovereign" seem to me to be in need of exploration (assuming we agree with the definition offered by Kalyvas). Even "outset" is tricky. That in turn got me thinking about Iraq as well. How would we describe the conflict there? Maybe we would say "conflict" is the wrong word and that "political violence" is more appropriate. I don't know myself, but I am interested in the thoughts of the readership.

Update: So I asked a serious social sciency question related to current wars for the readership to mull over the weekend, and I get ... a bunch of inane crap about the mosque they want to build in the old Burlington Coat Factory in Manhattan. Thanks, gang.

I saw this Wall Street Journal article on a Taliban sniper is the most-viewed article on WSJ.com. It's worth pointing out, then, that the myth of the great Afghan marksman is just that: a myth. Marine-turned-journalist C.J. Chivers* wrote a great blog post last spring for the New York Times in which he explained, in great detail, why Afghan marksmen -- Taliban and allied -- are actually quite awful. Worth keeping in mind if you hear people talk about wily Pathan snipers.

*Chivers is a real aficionado of firearms and marksmanship. I just filed a review of his new book on the AK-47, and though I don't want to spoil what I wrote (the review will be published when the book comes out, in the fall), I thought it was fascinating.

My friend Mike Horowitz -- author of this great new book -- has a really funny, well, debate up on Slate with Mark Oppenheimer on high school and college debating. Some of you younger readers may be under the impression that the same jocks who were cool at your high school are the ones who go on to rule the roost here in Washington, but the reality is that within the policy community, a lot of the most impressive people are veterans of the other NFL -- the National Forensic League. As a guy who played football in high school and college (even though I'm not the greatest athlete and probably would have been a lot better at debate), I am highlighting Mike and Mark's debate in part because I spent Tuesday afternoon being impressed with the way Colin Kahl effectively deployed facts and figures in his presentation on Iraq at our big CNAS event. Where did Colin learn how to do that? Well, what did Colin do with all his spare time in high school and college? Yup. So don't despair, nerds: you will someday inherit the earth. (Or at least the 202 area code.)

[Blog alumna Charlie Simpson? Yes, also a debater.]

Update: Oh, snap! And Nagl too! I never knew this, but he's now in one of the common areas talking up his skilz in something called IE.

Update II: This has started a feverish Friday afternoon conversation among the staff at CNAS. The office is roughly divided between those who did debate/mock trial(!)/school newspaper/Model UN and those who played sports along a 1:2 margin. Some, like Nagl (Debate, Track) and Bob Kaplan (School Newspaper, Swimming), did both. I can sense a research project here: what if we sampled people in government at the deputy assistant secretary level and asked about their high school activities. What do you think the result would be?

Update III: Kath Hicks, too, I am now told.

Update IV: Slate's Fred Kaplan reports he went to the NFL nationals in '72, and Dave Barno -- Ranger Dave freaking Barno! -- also confesses he was president of his high school debate team.

Drew Conway was promoted to the faculty of New York University (uh, by the New York Times, at least), for these neat charts he helped make using the Wikileaks data.

Visualisation of Activity in Afghanistan using the Wikileaks data from Mike Dewar on Vimeo.

Think tanks are simply welfare agencies for intellectuals who can’t survive in the marketplace as well as holding pens for political creatures briefly out of office. The Sierra Club should be picketing them over all the innocent trees they’ve killed.

- Ralph Peters

Of course, heh, Business Week reports that Ralph Peters's employer, the New York Post, loses between $15 million to $30 million annually and has to be heavily subsidized by the rest of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. in order to buy the paper and ink for the 500,000 copies of the Post that get printed on a daily basis. Think tanks, by contrast (especially think tanks like CNAS, which do not own their own property and watch their assets take the Metro home every night), have to make payroll each month. So I'm not sure who, exactly, isn't hacking it in the marketplace. Or maybe I'm wrong and Ralph Peters has been successful in his campaign to lock up our commanders in Afghanistan for murdering U.S. troops. (h/t @paulmcleary)

I am in awe of and humbled by the life this man lived.

An article in the Financial Times this morning intimated that perceptions of both government corruption and support for militant groups are causing international donors to keep their pocketbooks closed in supporting victims of the floods in Pakistan. I do not know enough to say one way or another, and the UN humanitarian aid chief, John Holmes, says it's too early to tell. But the statistics so far are interesting. The United States and the United Kingdom have pledged the most aid thus far to Pakistan: $76m and $32m, respectively. But the earthquake in Haiti generated $1b in pledges within 10 days. Pledges by the international community to areas affected by the 2004 tsunami were similarly robust (~$7b). Are the people of Pakistan now suffering because of the corruption of their leaders, real and perceived, and the support, real and perceived, given by the Pakistani military and intelligence services to militant groups?