May 19, 2004

The Chemical Question

With the appearance of a few chemical warheads in Iraq, the Left is quick to inform us that this doesn't actually mean that Iraq had WMDs. While this is a factual statement (the shells certainly could have come from Syria or Iran), it does make you wonder just what it would take for the antiwar types to concede that Iraq actually did have WMD. However, since that was, at best, a minor justification for the war for my money, I don't see much profit in discussing that further.

I'm more interested in the potential ramifications of these weapons. It's possible that these shells were merely leftovers, but Blaster points out that Iraq hadn't declared any binary shells in their UNSCOM disclosures. This could mean that this was a weapon they hoped to keep by not revealing it, that they overlooked it (unlikely, but not impossible), or that it's not Iraqi at all (155mm is an unusual caliber for an Iraqi weapon). If this was an Iraqi weapon, however, it seems unlikely that it's the only one, as it's risky to store chemical warheads alongside explosive warhead (chemical shells have been known to leak). (On the other hand, I suspect Iraq's former management was overly concerned about workplace safety, so you can't rule out the possibility this shell was simply carelessly stacked in with many more conventional shells.) If the insurgents have found a reliable source of chemical munitions, however, things could get much more ugly over there.

Chemical artillery shells aren't easy to use as roadside explosives, but they could be deployed in urban areas as marvelous terror weapons. Put a shell loaded with sarin in a crowded area, have someone crack open the chambers and mix the chemicals, and it probably wouldn't be difficult to expose a few thousand people to the agent. Deaths probably wouldn't be too high, as the agent is nonpersistent and wouldn't last long in the heat, but the release would certainly create just the kind of horror and fear terrorists are looking for.

The odds are reasonably good that the terrorists will have to continue to rely on conventional explosives to strike at the Coalition. But the degree of damage they could inflict if they can produce more chemical shells is too great to be ignored. The Coalition needs to turn its attention back to the search for WMDs. Even if the search fails to locate any WMDs, renewed attention on eliminating stockpiles would at least remove them from the terrorists' arsenal for future IED attacks. This is a win-win proposition the Coalition needs to jump immediately.

Posted at 08:11 PM | War | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)





Psychoanalysis and Politics

Keith Burgess-Jackson is trying to explain why people become liberals, trotting out the well-worn thesis that guilt is the determining factor. While I'm sure that there are some liberals that adhere to this description, to try and tar the entire (rather broad) spectrum with such a label is specious. I find it difficult to believe that it all Burgess-Jackson's life he has never come across a liberal who didn't come from a privileged upbringing, but if that is the case, than perhaps he needs to get out and meet a few more liberals, as his sample size is entirely too low.

Indeed, as I read Burgess-Jackson's essay, it appears to be nothing more than a conservative version of a common liberal conceit. Just as many liberals often claim that they are smarter than conservatives, Burgess-Jackson is now claiming that conservatives are wiser than liberals. In both cases, one side is attempting to convince the rest of the world that their side must be correct, because it is backed by smarter/wiser people than the opposition. It's a marvelous rhetorical device, but I'm not convinced that it is a particularly accurate one. In this case, Burgess-Jackson doesn't even offer any evidence to buttress his case beyond his own personal experience. I'm not willing to completely throw out anecdotal evidence, but I think that a claim as broad as Burgess-Jackson's requires a little more than a few self-referential stories.

Were I a betting man, I'd wager that people come to their political philosophies from a number of disparate starting points. Trying to psychoanalyze how people arrived at their position on the political spectrum may be an entertaining parlor game, but it doesn't address anything substantial. Far better to spend the time addressing the arguments the other side makes, not to mention the arguments your side makes. Not as satisfying in the short run, but far more productive.

Posted at 02:26 PM | Philosophy | Comments (3) | TrackBack (0)



May 18, 2004

Phenomonal Stupidity

A Chicago Sun-Times columnist is whining about how the media is treated in the wake of the Abu Ghraib/Nick Berg coverage. Lawrence Haws does a fine job of disposing of her 'argument,' so I won't waste my time or yours repeating him. Instead, I'd like to address one particularly egregious bit of stupidity Ms. Ontiveros expounds.

Can we be attentive long enough to consider that maybe some of the troops we've sent to Iraq have not been adequately trained? And how do we get a better-trained military? Is it through a military draft? Will the reported abuses at Abu Ghraib force that to happen?

We currently have an all-volunteer force, to include the National Guard and Reserve. Once a soldier volunteers, however, he's committed for the length of his enlistment. Therefore there are always some soldiers who don't want to be in their current job despite the fact they're volunteers. Unsurprisingly, these are the soldiers who are most likely to do stupid things like, for example, abuse prisoners. Were we to return to a draft, we would significantly increase the number of soldiers in the Army who didn't want to be doing their job (actually, we wouldn't, but I'll cover that later). Do you think that increasing the number of unhappy soldiers would result in soldiers who pay more attention to their training, or less? If you're Ms. Ontiveros, apparently the answer is that you'd pay more attention. I can only assume that Ms. Ontiveros also believes that people will work harder at jobs they hate than jobs they enjoy. A fascinating outlook on life, but one that has not been upheld in my experience.

Beyond the inherent stupidity of suggesting that draftees would somehow be better-trained than volunteers, Ms. Ontiveros is apparently unaware that the military is meeting its recruiting goals at present. Drafting people would therefore mean we would have to turn away people who want to do the job in exchange for forcing other people to serve. This doesn't seem to make any sense to me, beyond any questions of the morality of the draft. Why would you turn away volunteers to put draftees into service?

The bottom line is simple: there is no reason to institute a draft, and there is certainly no reason to believe that doing so would provide us with a better force than we currently possess. While I can't be certain that Ms. Ontiveros might possess some intelligence in other areas, it is abundantly clear that, when it comes to the military, she is dumber than a box of rocks. Why she would hope anyone might pay attention to her writings is therefore open to question.

Posted at 06:59 PM | Military | Comments (6) | TrackBack (0)





Looking for Help

In the wake of the assassination of Iraq's nominal President, it appears the general consensus is that Iraq is doomed, not only among the pundits, but among the Iraqi people themselves. There's no security, they complain. The U.S. isn't able to protect them, so the transitional government won't be able to, either. Pessimism appears rampant, although it's difficult for me not to wonder how much pessimism is a result of a reporter seeking to confirm his story. But we'll give him the benefit of the doubt here, and assume this is an accurate portrayal of Iraq as it now stands. What do we do now?

Unfortunately, I'm not sure there is a great deal we can do. If we want Iraq to be a relatively free and open society, there's a critical piece of that puzzle that hasn't made itself felt yet: an active citizenry. Democracy (i.e., a republic) requires citizens who understand that government is ultimately their responsibility. It requires a breed of people who are willing to stand up and say 'I'll fix it' rather than sitting on their asses waiting for the government to do something. Without people willing to take responsibility for themselves, democracy doesn't work.

This by no means is to suggest that Iraq is doomed. Some Iraqis have started to take responsibility: look no further than those who decided they weren't going to put up with al-Sadr's Medhi Army and started their own guerilla war against them. That's the kind of attitude that will be required for Iraq to become free. The people have to be willing to stand up and do their part to make it happen, not tolerating the presence of foreign fighters and suicide bombers and everyone else who is willing to destroy Iraq as long as it helps to harm the United States.

Are Iraqis able to do this? I believe that they are. But there's no way to know whether or not they're actually willing to do so. Taking responsibility for yourself is hard, and in Iraq it's risky. Most of the people may prefer to stay on the sidelines. If we can't find a core of Iraqis who are willing to do so, however, I believe that our occupation is likely to end in failure, at least based on our original stated goals.

Posted at 05:43 AM | War | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)



May 17, 2004

Nerve Gas and IEDs

With the report that somebody finally found WMDs in Iraq, I took a few minutes to chat with one of my NCOs about the attack and the agent. He's a 54B, which is Army-speak for an NBC NCO, meaning he's got plenty of experience with Sarin. In fact, he even got to walk into a room filled with Sarin and VX as part of his chemical training, an exciting experience I'm quite happy to have avoided. So I figured his assessment of the attack would probably be of some value.

The odds are pretty good that the insurgents did not realize that this was a chemical round when they set it up as an IED. Binary-type chemical artillery rounds are designed to mix the two chemicals into a nerve agent when they're fired out of the tube. By the time the round reaches its target, it is loaded with an actual chemical agent, which it can then disperse either as an air or ground burst. In either case, the amount of actual explosive in the round is minimal, only enough to rupture the casing so the nerve agent can disperse. Just blowing up the round on the ground, as apparently happened, may allow some of the chemicals to mix, but you're unlikely to get more than a very little nerve agent dispersal when using the round as an IED. This appears to be what happened in this case.

Could a binary-type round be used more successfully as an IED? Maybe, but it would require a great deal of sophistication on the part of the insurgents. They would have to find a way to mix the chemicals without setting off the shell, so the agent was already active when the shell detonated. They would then have to detonate the shell in such a manner that it would disperse the agent without burning much of it off (a big explosion would result in most of the agent burning up, giving little to no secondary effect from the actual explosion). So, while Coalition troops will probably keep their protective masks a little more handy from now on, the risk from these shells remains very low.

A more interesting question, however, is just how many of these shells are still out there. After a year, it seems to be generally assumed that Iraq either never had WMDs or had eliminated them all (either by destroying them or sending them elsewhere) before the war. Clearly at least one chemical warhead remained, and it seems plausible that it came from a stockpile somewhere in Iraq. So how many more of these shells are there, and where are they?

Posted at 11:14 AM | Military | Comments (4) | TrackBack (0)





Ready for War

So the LA Times is telling us that several Army units are far from ready for more war after their experiences in Iraq. Like many reporters working on military stories, however, the Times doesn't appear to really understand what is being reported, and therefore isn't able to give its readers a real sense of whether or not there's a problem and what it is.

Every unit battalion-size or larger in the U.S. Army is required to submit a Unit Status Report (USR) every month. The USR covers a number of issues, which are summed up in a 'C-Rating' from C-1 to C-4. C-1 means the unit is ready for war, C-4 means the unit has massive problems, with C-2 and C-3 representing gradations along that scale. The units in question (the article mentions 1st Armored Division, 4th Infantry Division, and 101st Air Assault Division) are apparently reporting themselves at a level below C-1, which is hardly surprising after a year in the desert. So, technically, the article is correct in reporting that they're not ready for war.

The USR isn't actually that simple, however. First of all, it's a classified document, so there's no way for the Times to look at it and see why the units are reporting at below C-1. Are they short on personnel, equipment, or training? If it's a personnel issue (unlikely, since the Army is hitting its recruiting targets), then it can be fixed relatively easily. If it's a training issue, it will require more time, but it can also be fixed without too much difficulty as long as the time to train is available. But if it's an equipment issue, where the division is short on mission-critical equipment, resolving the problem could be significantly more difficult. Second, commanders can subjectively upgrade or downgrade the USR based on their own experiences and assessment of their unit. Therefore, the division commanders may well have decided to report that they're below C-1 following their time in Iraq simply because they're making a subjective call that the unit needs some time to train and refit before it's ready for combat again. This is a logical assessment, and it may well be true, but that means that the unit is also a lot better off than if it's reporting below C-1 because it's short mission critical equipment.

So are there units far from ready for war? Possibly. Thanks to the classification of the USR (since we don't want to tell the enemy the precise status of our forces), we can't know for sure. But there is insufficient data in the Times article to conclude that any unit is 'far from ready,' as they put it. There's no way to know if this is a case of media bias or sloppy reporting, but when in doubt, I always assume ignorance rather than malice.

Hat tip: The Volokh Conspiracy.

Posted at 10:44 AM | Military | Comments (3) | TrackBack (0)





It Just Keeps Getting Better

Rachel Lucas is back. What else do I need to say?

Posted at 09:06 AM | Blogging | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)



May 16, 2004

Control Freaks Win Another

While I can certainly understand that government officials want to try and put the best possible image of America forward for the world to see, tell our athletes to cool it at the Olympics seems very much the wrong road to go down. Totalitarian states try to control how the outside world views them by micromanaging the actions of its citizens. Free societies should understand that it is that very freedom that is the best possible advertisement available in their favor.

Yes, I'm sure that some atheletes will be jerks in Athens. News flash: some Americans are jerks. (The exact number will probably vary based on your personal experience.) Trying to hide that is a waste of time. The people who are looking for reasons to hate the United States will find them regardless of how we act. So trying to put forth a better image with silly pronouncements forbidding U.S. atheletes from holding an American flag simply demonstrates to the world that we're not really that confident in ourselves, and that we're willing to oppress our own people in order to gain the possibility of better reception from the rest of the world. There's a word for people like that: wimps. Nobody likes wimps. Some people may tolerate them for their sycophancy, but that's about as far as it goes. I see no reason to make America the world's equivalent of the geek who does everyone's homework to be 'popular.'

Hat tips: Garrulitas and Sekimori.

Posted at 03:36 PM | Politics | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)



May 15, 2004

Some Advice on Fighting the War

Here is an email I received yesterday through military channels. It is purported to be from Ralph Peters' new book, but regardless of where it comes from, I think it includes some valuable tips for dealing with radical Islam.

Consider this for the Credo for our country, certainly our Armed Forces, in today's War on Terror. These words do not leave much unsaid. This essay is extracted from Ralph Peters' new book, "When Devils Walk the Earth." It is a must-read.

Chapter III. Fighting Terror: Do's and Don'ts for a Superpower:

1. Be feared!

2. Identify the type of terrorists you face, and know your enemy as well as you possibly can. Although tactics may be similar, strategies for dealing with practical vs. apocalyptic terrorists can differ widely.Practical terrorists may have legitimate grievances that deserve consideration, although their methods cannot be tolerated. Apocalyptic terrorists, no matter their rhetoric, seek your destruction and must be killed to the last man. The apt metaphor is cancer: you cannot hope for success if you only cut out part of the tumor. For the apocalyptic terrorist, evading your efforts can easily be turned into a public triumph. Our bloodiest successes will create far fewer terrorists and sympathizers than our failures.

3. Do not be afraid to be powerful. Cold War-era gambits of proportionate response and dialog may have some utility in dealing with practical terrorists, but they are counter-productive in dealing with apocalyptic terrorists. Our great strengths are wealth and raw power. When we fail to bring those strengths to bear, we contribute to our own defeat. For a superpower to think small, which has been our habit across the last decade, at least, is self-defeating folly. Our responses to terrorist acts should make the world gasp!

4. Speak bluntly. Euphemisms are interpreted as weakness by our enemies and mislead the American people. Speak of killing terrorists and destroying their organizations. Timid speech leads to timid actions. Explain when necessary, but do not apologize. Expressions of regret are never seen as a mark of decency by terrorists or their supporters, but only as a sign that our will is faltering. Blame the terrorists as the root cause whenever operations have unintended negative consequences. Never go on the rhetorical defensive.

5. Concentrate on winning the propaganda war where it is winnable. Focus on keeping or enhancing the support from allies and well-disposed clients, but do not waste an inordinate amount of effort trying to win unwinnable hearts and minds. Convince hostile populations through victory.

6. Do not be drawn into a public dialog with terrorists, especially not with apocalyptic terrorists. You cannot win. You legitimize the terrorists by addressing them even through a third medium, and their extravagant claims will resound more successfully on their own home ground than anything you can say. Ignore absurd accusations, and never let the enemy's claims slow or sidetrack you. The terrorist wants you to react, and your best means of unbalancing him and his plan is to ignore his accusations.

7. Avoid planning creep. Within our vast bureaucratic system, too many voices compete for attention and innumerable agendas, often selfish and personal - intrude on any attempt to act decisively. Focus on the basic mission: the destruction of the terrorists with all the moral, intellectual and practical rigor you can bring to bear. All other issues, from future nation building, to alliance consensus, to humanitarian concerns are secondary.

8. Maintain resolve. Especially in the Middle East and Central Asia, experts and diplomats will always present you with a multitude of good reasons for doing nothing, or for doing too little (or for doing exactly the wrong thing). Fight as hard as you can within the system to prevent diplomats from gaining influence over the strategic campaign. Although their intentions are often good, our diplomats and their obsolete strategic views are the terrorist's unwitting allies and diplomats are extremely jealous of military success and military authority in their region (where their expertise is never as deep or subtle as they believe it to be). Beyond the problem with our diplomats, the broader forces of bureaucratic entropy are an internal threat. The counter-terrorist campaign must be not only resolute, but constantly self-rejuvenating in ideas, techniques, military and inter-agency combinations, and sheer energy. Old hands must be stimulated constantly by new ideas.

9. When in doubt, hit harder than you think necessary. Success will be forgiven. Even the best-intentioned failure will not. When military force is used against terrorist networks, it should be used with such power that it stuns even our allies. We must get over our cowardice in means. While small-scale raids and other knifepoint operations are useful against individual targets, broader operations should be overwhelming. Of course, targeting limitations may inhibit some efforts but whenever possible, maximum force should be used in simultaneous operations at the very beginning of a campaign. Do not hesitate to supplement initial target lists with extensive bombing attacks on nothing if they can increase the initial psychological impact. Demonstrate power whenever you can. Show; don't tell!

10. Whenever legal conditions permit, kill terrorists on the spot (do not give them a chance to surrender, if you can help it). Contrary to academic wisdom, the surest way to make a martyr of a terrorist is to capture, convict and imprison him, leading to endless efforts by sympathizers to stage kidnappings, hijacking and other events intended to liberate the imprisoned terrorist(s). This is war, not law enforcement. (This was written long before Saddam was captured)

11. Never listen to those who warn that ferocity on our part reduces us to the level of the terrorists. That is the argument of the campus, not of the battlefield, and it insults America's service members and the American people. Historically, we have proven, time after time, that we can do a tough, dirty job for our country without any damage to our nation's moral fabric (Hiroshima and Nagasaki did not interfere with American democracy, values or behavior).

12. Spare and protect innocent civilians whenever possible, but do not let the prospect of civilian casualties interfere with ultimate mission accomplishment. This is a fight to protect the American people, and we must do so whatever the cost, or the price in American lives may be devastating. In a choice between them, and us the choice is always us.

13. Do not allow the terrorists to hide behind religion. Apocalyptic terrorists cite religion as a justification for attacking us; in turn, we cannot let them hide behind religious holidays, taboos, strictures or even sacred terrain. We must establish a consistent reputation for relentless pursuit and destruction of those who kill our citizens. Until we do this, our hesitation will continue to strengthen our enemy's ranks and his resolve.

14. Do not allow third parties to broker a peace, a truce, or any pause in operations. One of the most difficult challenges in fighting terrorism on a global scale is the drag produced by nervous allies. We must be single-minded. The best thing we can do for our allies in the long-term is to be so resolute and so strong that they value their alliance with us all the more. We must recognize the innate strength of our position and stop allowing regional leaders with counterproductive local agendas to subdue or dilute our efforts.

15. Don't flinch. If an operation goes awry and friendly casualties are unexpectedly high, immediately bolster morale and the military's image by striking back swiftly in a manner that inflicts the maximum possible number of casualties on the enemy and his supporters. Hit back as graphically as possible, to impress upon the local and regional players that you weren't badly hurt or deterred in the least.

16. Do not worry about alienating already-hostile populations.

17. Whenever possible, humiliate your enemy in the eyes of his own people. Do not try to use reasonable arguments against him. Shame him publicly, in any way you can. Create doubt where you cannot excite support. Most apocalyptic terrorists, especially, come from cultures of male vanity. Disgrace them at every opportunity. Done successfully, this both degrades them in the eyes of their followers and supporters, and provokes the terrorist to respond, increasing his vulnerability.

18. If the terrorists hide, strike what they hold dear, using clandestine means and, whenever possible, foreign agents to provoke them to break cover and react. Do not be squeamish. Your enemy is not. Subtlety is not superpower strength but the raw power to do that, which is necessary, is our great advantage. We forget that, while the world may happily chide or accuse us -or complain of our inhumanity - no one can stop us if we maintain our strength of will. Much of the world will complain no matter what we do. Hatred of America is the default position of failed individuals and failing states around the world, in every civilization, and there is nothing we can do to change their minds. We refuse to understand how much of humanity will find excuses for evil, so long as the evil strikes those who are more successful than the apologists themselves. This is as true of American academics, whose eagerness to declare our military efforts a failure is unflagging, or European clerics, who still cannot forgive America's magnanimity at the end of World War II, as it is of unemployed Egyptians or Pakistanis. The psychologically marginalized are at least as dangerous as the physically deprived.

19. Do not allow the terrorists sanctuary in any country, at any time, under any circumstances. Counter-terrorist operations must, above all, be relentless. This does not necessarily mean that military operations will be constantly underway sometimes it will be surveillance efforts, or deception plans, or operations by other agencies. But the overall effort must never pause for breath. We must be faster, more resolute, more resourceful and, ultimately, even more uncompromising than our enemies.

20. Never declare victory. Announce successes and milestones. But never give the terrorists a chance to embarrass you after a public pronouncement that the war is over.

21. Impress upon the minds of terrorists and potential terrorists everywhere, and upon the populations and governments inclined to support them, that American retaliation will be powerful and uncompromising. You will never deter fanatics, but you can frighten those who might support, harbor or attempt to use terrorists for their own ends. Our basic task in the world today is to restore a sense of American power, capabilities and resolve. We must be hard, or we will be struck wherever we are soft. It is folly for charity to precede victory. First win, then unclench your fist.

22. Do everything possible to make terrorists and their active supporters live in terror themselves. Turn the tide psychologically and practically. While this will not deter hard-core apocalyptic terrorists, it will dissipate their energies as they try to defend themselves and fear will deter many less-committed supporters of terror. Do not be distracted by the baggage of the term assassination. This is a war. The enemy, whether a hijacker or a financier, violates the laws of war by his refusal to wear a uniform and by purposely targeting civilians. He is by definition a war criminal. On our soil, he is either a spy or a saboteur, and not entitled to the protections of the U.S. Constitution. Those who abet terrorists must grow afraid to turn out the lights to go to sleep.

23. Never accept the consensus of the Washington intelligentsia, which looks backward to past failures, not forward to future successes.

24. In dealing with Islamic apocalyptic terrorists, remember that their most cherished symbols are fewer and far more vulnerable than are the West's. Ultimately, no potential target can be regarded as off-limits when the United States is threatened with mass casualties. Worry less about offending foreign sensibilities and more about protecting Americans.

25. Do not look for answers in recent history, which is still unclear and subject to personal emotion. Begin with the study of the classical world, specifically Rome, which is the nearest model to the present-day United States. Mild with subject peoples, to whom they brought the rule of ethical law, the Romans in their rise and at their apogee were implacable with their enemies. The utter destruction of Carthage brought centuries of local peace, while the later empire's attempts to appease barbarians consistently failed!

I dislike the comparison of America with ancient Rome; like most Americans, I have no desire for nor interest in holding an empire. The sooner we can get out of Iraq (with our mission accomplished), the better. But like it or not, this hearkens back to one of Machiavelli's oldest truths: it is better to be feared than loved. And since we're almost certain not to be loved in any case, we'd damned well better make sure that we're feared.

Posted at 09:31 PM | War | Comments (5) | TrackBack (0)





Land of the Free

It's nice to know that there is apparently nothing left that the courts don't think they can control. I'll readily grant you that the last thing it sounds like this woman needs to be doing is having more children, but the idea the courts can or should have any say in the matter is extremely disturbing. If this isn't shot down on appeal, it's difficult to imagine what activities the courts won't think they can regulate from now on.

Posted at 08:22 PM | Philosophy | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)



May 14, 2004

Whose Justice

To a very limited extent, I can sympathize with those who believe that a little too much attention is being paid to the outrages of Abu Ghraib at the expense of other issues. It is certainly clear enough to me that John Kerry and his band of merry men are seizing on the issue not because they want to solve the problem, but because they want to use it as a club to beat President Bush over the head. (To be fair, I suppose they would like to solve the problem, too...but I'm not at all convinced that's Kerry's primary concern.)

That having been said, Lee Harris' essay discussing the war of images is more than a little disturbing.

Meanwhile, back on the home front, those Americans who instinctively believe in supporting our troops in far away lands, and supporting them "right or wrong," will watch with mounting exasperation as the Bush administration tries to appease the unappeasable Iraqi streets by putting Americans on trial in Iraq. At which point those Americans at home will began to ask themselves: Why are we bringing our guys to justice, while their guys, whose crimes are infinitely worst, not only remain at large, but are busily doing whatever they can to kill even more of us? Why are we punishing our own, in a futile attempt to pacify the Arab world, at the very time when we should be sticking together to fight an enemy whose collective will is to destroy us?

Let me try to explain this: we're not punishing our own to appease the Arab world. We're not punishing our own for any public relations purpose. We're going to find out who was involved in these crimes, prosecute them, and (hopefully) put the guilty in jail, but not for any external reason. We're going to do it because it's essential that we do so in order to remain true to ourselves. America is supposed to stand for something better. When I say that, I don't mean that we're simply supposed to be better than Saddam Hussein or the Taliban. I mean that we're supposed to be better than anywhere or anyone else.

Yes, this smacks of American exceptionalism, but so be it. This country is supposed to stand for the highest of ideals: self-government, individual liberty, and equality of opportunity. We certainly don't always measure up to these goals, but when we fail the answer is to pick ourselves up, repair the damage when we can, and learn from our mistake. What we're not supposed to do is comfort ourselves with the idea that we're still better than tinpot dictators.

Does it matter how the rest of the world views our response to Abu Ghraib? Absolutely. But we should be concerned with living up to our own ideals here, not in how the rest of the world will see it. The notion we're going after the criminals from Abu Ghraib for any other reason is insulting and foolish.

Posted at 06:09 PM | War | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)





The Collapse of Western Civilization

With the final episode of Friends behind us, a number of columnists around the country have taken to their word processors in an attempt to explain what it all means. Unsurprisingly, Brent Bozell informs us that Friends demise simply marks another milepost in America's slow trod towards Gomorroh. Most of Bozell's wrath is actually directed toward David E. Kelley, the man who created "Ally McBeal" and "The Practice," among others, each of which Bozell claims helped to lead the United States further towards moral disaster.

A few months ago, Fox pulled the plug on Kelley's high-school shock-drama "Boston Public," a new standard-defying low for Kelley. It premiered in 2000 by sticking its scaly, dirty fingers right in the viewer's eye. A female student facetiously told a male teacher that she masturbated while fantasizing about him. Another surveyed male students about the teachers with whom they'd most like to have sex, then informed at least two of those teachers of the results. A week later, Kelley even referred to a cartoon on a student's Web site in which a teacher was shown (not on camera) taking down his pants, bending over and eating his own excrement.

I'm sure absolutely no one outside of Kelley's cast and immediate family is mourning this show's demise.

Bozell is ostensibly a conservative, but clearly he's a values conservative rather than an economic one, else he'd be aware that shows like "Boston Public" can only succeed if they show things people like to watch. PBS can get away with showing crap to a limited extent, perhaps, but every other station has to draw advertising dollars, and they can only do that by attracting viewers. If, as Bozell claims, nobody was mourning the death of "Boston Public," it would mark an amazing business decision by Fox to run such an unpopular program for so long.

Bozell may be correct that American society is slowly decaying due to moral collapse. But television isn't the cause of such decay. It's just a bellweather.

Posted at 04:01 PM | Philosophy | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)





Blacklist Kudo

I was finally able to get MT-Blacklist up and running on the site this week, thanks in no small part to its developer, Jay Allen. It has already shut down several attempts to spam my comments, and now that it's installed, usage is a cinch. So I wanted to take a minute to publically thank Jay for taking the time to fix the operator headspace and timing problem that lead to my inability to install it myself, and to compliment him on an increasingly valuable utility.

Posted at 10:04 AM | Blogging | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)





Just Following Orders, Revisited

I want to follow up on the issue of unlawful orders and Abu Ghraib, because it is becoming increasingly more clear that the accused will be using the excuse of being ordered to do what they did as an excuse for their behavior.

It will come as no surprise to anyone familiar with military history that a soldier is not obligated to follow all orders he is given. Almost all, yes, but if an order is unlawful then the soldier is not only not obligated to follow it, but he is obligated to disobey it and to report it. In practice, a soldier who believes he has been given an unlawful order should first ask the officer or NCO giving him the order for clarification. If he still believes the order is unlawful, he must so inform whoever gave him the order and refrain from performing it. All soldiers in the Army are required to receive this training annually, and I know that all reservists who mobilized through Fort Carson sat through the classes as part of their training to go to war. I don't know if the 800th MP Brigade came through Carson (though I don't believe it did), but I consider it highly unlikely that whatever post trained them for war didn't provide the same classes prior to their deployment.

There is some room for interpretation of almost any order, but I don't see any way the Abu Ghraib soldiers can pull it off in their case. Had they simply obeyed an order to turn the prisoners over to interrogators they believed might be mistreating the prisoners, they might have an argument. But posing prisoners nude and in various sexual positions doesn't seem to even approach a gray area.

Posted at 08:50 AM | War | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)



May 13, 2004

Priorities

Roger Bate has written a good assessment of some of the problems the world faces in water management, a subject that is near and dear to my heart as we endure our fifth year of drought conditions here in the Front Range. But while I'll probably return to the subject of water use at another time, I'm more interested in focusing on Bate's decision to compare the costs of providing potable water to the world's poor and the costs of implementing the Kyoto Treaty.

As regular readers can doubtless guess, I would certainly prefer to see money spent on a clear problem like potable water than for a dubious 'solution' like Kyoto (though regular readers can probably also guess that I might well prefer not to see tax dollars going to either issue). But I'm not interested in debating that issue at the moment.

As anyone who's ever had to budget their funds is aware, you've always got to make hard decisions about how to use your money (or any resource). Economists refer to this as opportunity cost: if I spend $100 to go see the Red Sox play the Rockies, I can't also take her to the theater that night. Taking my wife to the theater therefore becomes an opportunity cost of going to see the Red Sox (although, fortunately, she loves the Sox as well, so it's not a tough decision). We all have to make these decisions every day, and not only as individuals, but as citizens. Even the U.S. government can't do everything it's asked to by its many citizens, so it has to choose where to focus its efforts. And it is no different for the world at large: decisions have to be made about where to apply our limited resources.

Unfortunately, unlike individuals, governments frequently don't bother to make tradeoffs. Want tax cuts and increased government spending? Well, you'll love today's United States (yes, I do support tax cuts; I just would like to match them with massive cuts in government spending). Thanks to the magic of deficit spending, governments can often avoid difficult choices.

Then there's the 'squeaky wheel' method that governments tend to use when acting. Why does Kyoto get so much more government attention than the dearth of potable water for so many people? Because it gets so much more public attention. I'm too cheap to spring for Nexis, but I'll wager news stories about Kyoto and global warming outnumber stories about water by at least an order of magnitude. And the 'flaw' of any representative system of government is that it will generally only address issues that are generally perceived as problems. (Actually, the real flaw of at least the American system is that the only things government addresses that aren't being pressed in public are those issues being pushed by special interest groups.)

So, rather than carefully considering what issues need to be addressed by the federal government and then working out potential solutions for them, government instead flails about like a child with ADD, doing a little something about whatever is in today's news before shifting its attention to whatever emerges in the next day's headlines. It seems like a lousy way to run a railroad, and it certainly leads to a number of rather dismal decisions by the government (see, for example, the Medicare prescription drug benefit, a deal that will give away 'free' stuff and still appears to have angered most politicians and voters).

Unfortunately, I'm not sure if there's any good way to address the problem. Attempts to curtail lobbying activities run afoul of First Amendment protections of freedom of speech and freedom of assembly (ok, according to the Supreme Court they don't, but I'm confident a future court will overrule that abysmal ruling eventually). As for responding to the electorate, it's hard to see reducing government's incentive to do that as a good thing. So I guess that leaves us with only two choices: raising public awareness of important issues in hopes of gaining sufficient support to goad government into action, or raising enough money to build your own lobbying firm. No wonder voter apathy is so high these days.

Posted at 08:17 PM | Politics | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)



May 12, 2004

Negotiation

<rant>In response to the Arab world's latest declaration of their own inhumanity, Israel should consider offering up a new kind of negotiation. For every day that the Palestinian animals who desecrated the bodies of dead Israeli soldiers refuse to return them, the Israelis should return an equal number of Palestinian body parts from the prisoners the Palestinians are trying to recover. I doubt it would convince the Palestinians to return the remains, but at least it would eliminate their hopes to retrieve prisoners.</rant>

No, I'm not serious. Israel is doing the right thing by simply refusing to negotiate. But I do wonder, between this and the beheading of American Nick Berg, as well as the revelation of abuses at Abu Ghraib, if some people won't decide that it's simply safer not to take prisoners when fighting Arabs. That is a serious violation of the law of war, but it's also a pretty natural human reaction to this sort of atrocity. It might be interesting to keep an eye on how many Palestinians and Iraqis are captured vs. how many are killed over the next few weeks; I suspect this is going to be something commanders will have to look out for.

Posted at 10:16 AM | War | Comments (4) | TrackBack (0)





No Respect

<minor rant>You know, I'm well aware (indeed, painfully aware) that I'm far from being a big-name blogger. But you'd think I could at least get the occasional mention when military bloggers are mentioned. Hell, I've been writing for this site for more than 2 1/2 years; what's it take to get just a smidge of recognition?</minor rant>

Of course, if all I'm doing this for is the recognition, I'm a knucklehead in any case. (This hasn't been ruled out yet.) Just blowing off a little steam. We now return you to your normal blogging.

Posted at 09:41 AM | Blogging | Comments (3) | TrackBack (0)





Comments are Back, And You're Gonna Be In Trouble

I've restored the comments function for the time being. I still haven't been able to get MT-Blacklist working, but I hate not being able to get comments, so I'll just have to delete the spam as it comes in (and ban the IP address, so if you're trying to comment and it won't let you, let me know and I'll unban that IP). So let's get some discussion going.

Posted at 09:31 AM | Blogging | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)





Iraq and Al Qaeda

Dan Darling has posted an extensive review of Iraq/al Qaeda connections that ties together quite a bit of valuable and interesting information. While, as Dan himself is careful to point out, there is no 'smoking gun' that proves collusion between the two groups, there is an impressive array of circumstantial evidence to that effect. As our efforts to defeat Islamic radicalism will have to address how much effort to expend in Iraq vs. against al Qaeda, Dan's analysis is crucial for those seeking to address the question. Regardless of whether or not you agree with Dan's conclusions, I believe he raises some important issues that merit discussion and further investigation.

Posted at 05:44 AM | War | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)



May 11, 2004

On Soldiers

"God and the soldier, we adore,
in time of danger, not before.
The danger gone and all is righted,
God is forgot and the soldier slighted."

Author Unknown

The past few years have brought me a number of mixed feelings about how soldiers are treated. It reminds me in some ways of Bill Cosby describing the people he went to high school with: 'there was no middle of the road for us. We were all on the verge of becoming killers or priests.' In that same vein, after 9/11 it seemed that being a soldier was suddenly akin to making a person some kind of saint. After President Bush asked people to thank a soldier in his State of the Union address, I received quite a few 'thank yous' from people who didn't know me from Adam, but saw that I was wearing a uniform. Even before that strangers purchased meals for me anonymously on several occasions, again, just because they wanted to thank a soldier. While that was certainly a wonderful gesture, I felt odd receiving it, as I'm certainly not one of the soldiers who's overseas actually fighting the war. But people were trying to express their appreciation to soldiers in general, and I just happened to be the first one they saw. The (very mild) flip side of that came when I was in college ROTC, and a student saw me in uniform and asked me why I wanted to kill babies. Another saw me and muttered 'hatemonger' at me over his shoulder as he passed.

Yet in one sense all of those people were identical: they identified soldiers as one unifed group. To the first group (the more common one, I might add), soldiers were good. To the second group, they were scum. Specifics didn't matter: the group identification was all that mattered.

The former group held sway with little dissent until the first pictures from Abu Ghraib were released. Now we're seeing the other side have its day in the sun, as those people who hate the military are quick to inform us that this is the norm for soldiers: they're not heroes, they're scum. (The reaction of these people to Pat Tillman's death was equally instructive.)

The real truth, unsurprisingly, is that soldiers are pretty much like everyone else. We have some great heroes among us, as Blackfive has documented. We have some great villains, as the events at Abu Ghraib have illustrated. And we've got the rest of us, who are reasonably good people trying to do their job with varying degrees of success. Trying to pigeonhole us is as easy as trying to pigeonhole Americans as a group, and about as fruitful.

Posted at 03:17 PM | Military | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)





Time to Go

As Major General Taguba testifies as to BG Karpinski on down bears some responsibility for the abuses. Even if they didn't know about them, that is a significant failing for a commander, particularly given the apparent scope of the abuses. If nothing else, the leadership at Abu Ghraib were massively negligent in the duties, and I suspect the final investigation will show that there most more than simple negligence shown on the part of many of the leaders at the prison. But Rumsfeld still needs to go.

There comes a point in any public servant's term in office when he is no longer able to do what needs to be done to fulfill his duties. Accumulated enemies, favors owed or used, and loss of political capital all add up to ineffectiveness in the long term. (I'm sure there are some exceptions to this rule, but it's correct more often than not.) Rumsfeld has likely reached this point. He is a lightning rod for criticism in the administration, in large part because he's willing to speak his mind when the politic thing might be to avoid certain issues. He has accumulated a large number of enemies in the process of trying to remake the military. And the Abu Ghraib fiasco occurred on his watch, meaning that it might be easier for a new face to deal with fixing the problems. Bottom line, though, is that Rumsfeld leaving office would demonstrate that the Bush administration was actually serious about dealing with the problem.

As any sports fan is probably aware, coaches get fired all the time for things they really have little to no control over. Just ask any former coach of the Arizona Cardinals or Milwaukee Brewers, two franchises with impressive records of futility. Why have those teams been consistently bad for so long? Because they're poorly managed and have bad players, as a rule. Even the best coach can only do so much; if he doesn't have the players, the team will still lose. But you can't fire the whole team. So the coach gets the axe. It's often unfair, but it does sometimes succeed in sending a message that the management is serious about winning. Removing Rumsfeld would be an equally valuable symbol. It would send a message to every military officer and civilian appointee that responsibility doesn't stop at a certain pay grade. That is a message worth sending.

Is it unfair to remove Rumsfeld? Maybe, although his comments about the Geneva Convention, however legally correct, certainly didn't help in setting the correct example for the soldiers under his command. But it's about time the Bush administration started demonstrating that there are consequences for failure. Not one head rolled for 9/11, and not one person has been removed over the various errors we've made in Iraq. When you know your job is secure regardless of how well or how poorly you do it, it's easy to slack off. It's time to remove that complacency.

Posted at 12:43 PM | War | Comments (2) | TrackBack (0)





Just Following Orders

You wouldn't think anyone would try such a defense, but Army Reserve PFC Lynndie England's lawyers are already telling reporters that their client was just obeying the orders of her superiors. On the one hand, if that is true, there is some benefit from them bringing it up, as those superiors clearly merit extremely harsh punishment. But PFC England can't skate free just because she was told to pose for pictures holding a leash attached to naked Iraqi prisoners.

Now I'll admit that, when we review the law of war every year (a mandatory requirement for all soldiers), the subject of taking pictures of naked prisoners has never come up. But this seems to fall into the category of treating captured enemy soldiers with respect and not mistreating them. PFC England's attempts to shift all the blame onto her superiors therefore should succeed only in bringing down those superiors who condoned or even ordered such treatment. Just following orders won't wash.

Yet I do feel a small bit of pit for PFC England. The odds are this is her first time on active duty, other than initial entry training. If she was, in fact, ordered to pose with the prisoners by her superiors, it would have been pretty tough for her to say no. A young woman with little other experience, PFC England may have believed it was wrong but wasn't certain enough to stand up to senior officers and NCOs. I think there's little doubt that would be hard to do. However, in the end, it's no excuse. If you join the Army, you may someday have to make some life or death decisions far more difficult than what was faced by PFC England. While it would have been very hard for her to stand up and say that she wouldn't do it, that was her duty and no amount of extenuating circumstances can erase that simple fact.

I only hope that the intemperate comments of President Bush, Secretary Rumsfeld and many Generals doesn't allow PFC England to escape conviction due to unlawful command influence.

Posted at 05:35 AM | War | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)