re: "What Lies Beneath"

Richard Fernandez a Belmont Club critiqued the Administration's habit of pre-emption.

Money quote(s):

"Pre-emption was also in evidence in foreign affairs, but this Pearl Harbor was not directed against America’s supposed enemies, but at its allies. Mark Perry at Foreign Policy writes an article strongly implies that the Obama administration is pre-emptively leaking Israeli military cooperation arrangements with Azerbaijan to protect Iran from a potential strike. Perry says officials told him that Israel was acquiring airfields on Iran’s northern border, something that may not have been common knowledge."

&

"Well if the Iranians didn’t know about Azerbaijan, they know now. Lee Smith says that this may be a blatant tip-off. “A number of Israeli journalists, led by Ron Ben-Yishai, one of the country’s esteemed security correspondents, claimed that Mark Perry’s article was clear evidence the White House was leaking critical information about Israel’s strategy in order to pressure Jerusalem to abandon its war plans and wait for the administration’s sanctions to bring the Iranian regime to its knees.” Maybe they’ll have to wait a long time. But for what it is worth, John Bolton believes the administration is alerting Iran, the administration acting as their Chain Home system, so to speak."

Omitted from my selective excerption were the passages that suggest the information about Azerbaijan may not have been correct, and the whys of that.

About half of Wretchard's post had to do with the Supreme Court's then-pending health care reform decision.

4/4

re: "Pearl Harbor Considered"

Victor Davis Hanson at Private Papers looked at the Pearl Harbor attack, on its 70th anniversary.

Money quote(s):

"Why did Japan attack us 70 years ago today, other than the usually cited existential reasons and the fact that they thought they could and get away with it?"

Mostly because they thought they could get away with it.

Herman Wouk, in one of his Winds of War books, had a character (a U.S. naval aviator aboard one of our aircraft carriers, IIRC) explain, pre-Pearl Harbor, that peace (i.e., restraining Japanese aggression) in the Pacific was maintained by three "legs." Those were Russia, Britain, and the U.S.

With Russia and Britain preoccupied fighting Nazi Germany, the peace that had been resting on this three-legged stool was about to fall on its ass.

"(U)ntil August 1945, it was the United States, not Japan, that had a traditional two-front war. We rarely talk of Stalin’s duplicity in this regard: While we were suffering terrible casualties from the Japanese, supplying Russia, conducting bloody campaigns in North Africa, Sicily, Italy, and over the skies of Europe, and being hectored by the Soviets to open a second front in Europe, the Soviets honored their non-aggression pact with Japan, freeing up hundreds of thousands of veteran troops to be used against us on the islands. I never understood why history books focus on Stalin’s exasperation with our supposedly tardy invasion of Normandy, when he was completely unwilling to open a second front against Japan — until it was utterly wrecked in August 1945 and there were easy pickings to be had in the region."

Remember, that to a Leftists, "There are no enemies on the Left." Therefore, niggling details like the Molotov-Ribbontrop Pact, the artificial famines, the show trials, the gulag, and the Venona Papers, aren't to be mentioned.

"One final thought. The growth of Japan in the 1920s and 1930s and the alarm that it caused in the Pacific, its increasingly illiberality and nationalism, the enormous industrial and military progress that it had made in emulating European economies and Western armed forces, the concurrent impressions that a Depression-era America was a sinking rather than a rising power, and a general sense that the Japanese model was superior to the alternatives offersome general parallels to the current comparative status of China and America in the Pacific. Let us hope that we learn the lessons of Pearl Harbor, namely that anything is possible at any time, that deterrence ultimately keeps the peace, and that deterrence is a combination of known superior military strength and a certainty among concerned parties that such overwhelming power will be used in defense, and thereby will assure the aggressor that its attack will prove suicidal." (Bold typeface added for emphasis. - CAA.)

12/15

re: "Preventing Pearl Harbor"

George Smiley at In From the Cold ("Musings on Life, Love, Politics, Military Affairs, the Media, the Intelligence Community and Just About Anything Else that Captures Our Interest") commemorated America's most famous intelligence failure.

(Remember that operations are always successful; if they're not successful, then there was a failure of intelligence.)

Money quote(s):

"(C)ould the attack have been prevented, sparing the lives of 2,000 Americans who died on that fateful December day in 1941. While war clouds had been gathering for years before the Japanese strike, supporters of FDR claim that neither the President, nor his senior advisers, had any direct knowledge of a pending attack on Pearl Harbor, and could not provide definitive warning to Admiral Husband Kimmel and Lieutenant General Walter Short, the senior Navy and Army commanders in Hawaii.

Still, there is plenty of evidence that U.S. intelligence was aware the Japanese fleet was on the move in late 1941, and might carry out a strike against American possessions in the Pacific."

George details for us a lot of that intelligence.

"Pearl Harbor was clearly at the top of Japan's potential target list, but raids on the Philippines, Alaska, Wake Island and Guam couldn't be ruled out. So, U.S. commanders in the Pacific faced the daunting challenge of locating the Japanese fleet, across millions of miles of open seas."

All of these potential targets were eventually attacked, and at least portions invaded and seized (including part of Alaska's Aleutian Islands chain).

"(T)here is one incontrovertible fact: the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor could have been easily prevented, had President Roosevelt followed the advice of his previous Pacific Fleet commander, Admiral J.O. Richardson. During his tenure as CINCPAC, Richardson repeatedly warned of his fleet's vulnerability at Pearl Harbor, and requested that most of his ships return to their home port in San Diego. When FDR refused, Richardson stuck to his guns and paid a high price: he was fired as CINCPAC in early 1941 and replaced by Admiral Kimmel."

There's a price, sometimes, in being prematurely correct.

Richardson's memoir included this passage, from a message to the chief of naval operations:

"(T)he probable cost (human and physical resources) of any war should be compared [with] the probable value of winning the war."

Clearly Adm. Richardson was a strategic thinker and had read his Clausewitz.

"Sadly, only World War II buffs and naval historians are familiar with the courageous stand of J.O. Richardson. At the cost of his own career, Admiral Richardson stood on principle, trying to avert a military disaster that he believed could be averted, by returning the fleet to San Diego and engaging in the preparations needed to ready the Navy for war.

Richardson's integrity and candor offer an important lesson for military leaders--or anyone in a position to advise decision-makers. Even in that rarefied air, it is essential to tell "the boss" what they need to hear--not what they want to hear. Admirlal Richardson did just that, realizing his advice might fall on deaf ears and result in his dismissal. It's regrettable that so many of his peers failed to follow his shining example in the days before Pearl Harbor."

Tell the truth as you see it, interpret the facts you know as best you can, don't shade or flavor unpalatable truths to fit the preconceived notions or prejudices of your superiors, and let those above you, with access to a presumably wider range of sources and methods, decide on the basis of a fuller scope of information.

12/7

re: "Pearl Harbor and 9-11: Imagination, Deception and Audacity"

Austin Bay at Strategy Page explains how old lessons remain relevant.

Money quote(s):

"Imagination, deception and audacity, in combination, are the deadly acme of warfare. Japan’s Pearl Harbor ambush of America’s Pacific Fleet, which occurred 70 years ago this week, displayed these traits. So did al-Qaida’s 9-11 savaging of American cities.

Despite clues and suggestive bits of intelligence, both attacks caught America by surprise and thrust the nation headlong into ongoing global wars that it either tried to avoid or ignore. In other words, both imaginative and deceptive attacks, executed with audacity, leveraged American self-deception and lack of imagination.

Both attacks spawned critical re-examination of intelligence data and grim reflection on the complex process of intelligence assessment and political decision-making."

Self-deception is a somewhat harsher term, if still accurate, than the more neutral terminology surround the concept of cognitive bias. But it'll all get you there. Lots of very bright folks have studied, and continue to study, the best way to leverage our collection and analysis capabilities into an architecture that keeps us safer. Mostly it works, except when it doesn't.

"Operational and tactical intelligence data, however -- in 1941, 2001 and in 2011 -- arrive in fragments. A useful analogy is a pointillism painting or a Jackson Pollock drip painting. In the process of creation, the painting is random dots or disjointed splashes. Over time, a lucid pattern emerges; the viewer can step away from the canvas; what looked like chaos appears as a coherent design.

In the midst of events, the significance of an intercepted coded Imperial Japanese Navy radio transmission indicating a fleet can be missed, especially if it didn’t fit a logically convincing (though preconceived) pattern. American strategists knew an attack on Pearl Harbor by carrier aircraft was possible, and they believed Japan might well expand its war. Their imaginative insight, however, was incomplete. They underestimated Japanese imagination and audacity.

After Dec. 7, 1941, the U.S. built a defense establishment designed to prevent another Pearl Harbor. America spent trillions of dollars spying on potential perpetrators of a surprise attack, building a security establishment to deter or defeat it, and engineering equipment to fulfill those missions.

Though the U.S. and U.S. allies suffered severe surprise attacks -- for example, Korea in 1950 and Tet (Vietnam) in 1968 -- in terms of protecting military capacities from pre-emptive attack, that effort has been successful."

Col. Bay hits a key point here: what used to be called our "second strike" capability has never, since Pearl Harbor, been successfuly attacked.

It's possible that 9/11 was genuinely intended as a decapitating strike against our economic, political, and military leadership. Which is a fascinating conversation unto itself; still, if it were, it failed. Even in (assumed) failure, 9/11 was plenty damaging enough.

"Al-Qaida declared war on the U.S., but American leaders preferred to treat the threat as criminal rather than military. Violent cults waging long-term cultural and theological struggles with the terms of social and technological modernity aren’t new. Their ability to employ massively destructive power at strategic distances is, however.

Al-Qaida used jumbo jets as ICBMs; all it lacked was a nuclear weapon. U.S. strategists had wargamed suicide aircraft attacks, but the conventional wisdom labeled the plot too Hollywood. Like Pearl Harbor, post-911 attack examination revealed that U.S. intelligence agencies had clues and facts, but failed to assimilate the data into a design -- the design of an audacious enemy."

Usually I've seen this argument phrased in terms of hijacked passenger jets being the poor-man's cruise missile, but Mr. Bay is still quite correct in his larger theme.

"A violent organization that announces it has declared war on America is no mere criminal problem."

And that is the lesson I wish more people would take to heart.

12/5

re: "A Day That Shall Live in Infamy"

Emperor Misha at The Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler ("HQ of the Rottweiler Empire. An Affiliate of the VRWC.") shares some trans-generational words of encouragement.*

Money quote(s):

"(A)s I grew up it wasn’t some point in ancient history, which is how our children will see it. To put it into perspective, think back on who you were in 1984. Then think about how you thought about the outbreak of World War I. That, back then, was 70 years ago as well. I can’t recall being taught much about the lessons of the Guns of August back when I was a strapping teen, and I don’t imagine that our kids will be taught much about December 7, 1941 today."

Growing up, CAA still had family members who not only served in the Second World War, but were already in uniform when the U.S. entered it. I still remember some of their stories; about fighting the Japanese, about the surrender in the Philippines, and about the Baatan Death March and the horrific captivity which followed.

Lessons?

(Don't Lose & Never Surrender.)

"Among the things we can learn was that this great nation of ours is a lot more resilient than most people think, and that includes myself in my darker moments.

We were attacked in an act of utmost perfidy, ambushed by an enemy who, although professing to worship honor, had none himself. We were hit hard, hit to the point where many wondered if we’d ever get up again from the initial blow, hit at a point in our history where our military was, compared to other nations already at war for two long years, barely in its infancy."

Resiliency is a word much bandied about in certain, Homeland Security, circles.

This does not, by itself, discredit the concept; far from it. If anything, it's a good sign that the quality, and its necessity, is recognized even today.

(A few words about DHS: While I am sympathetic to the notion that they have an impossible job, I also yield to no one when it comes to skepticism about how their missions are being implemented. Indeed, from a business-case standpoint, I wonder whether some of their self- and/or Congress-assigned missions are things that the federal government is best suited to do or whether they need to be done at all. By anyone. That being said, I suffer from a serious case of cognitive dissonance when I try reconcile the very serious and smart working agents and intelligence analysts whose work I admire which the absolute and apparent public bone-headedness exhibited by their policy-makers.)

"Few at the time thought that the United States would be a force to be reckoned with for years after that if ever, but all of the pessimists were proven wrong. In one year, the United States was strong, getting ready to fight a war on not one but two fronts. In a mere two years, the tide had turned and in a relatively short two more years, the United States would be the strongest military force this world had ever seen."

Ten years later the U.S. would have to re-build that military force, virtually from scratch.

There's a lesson there, for those paying attention to military funding debates.

"The resilience, the determination, the “can do” spirit, the love of country, the willingness to sacrifice and our endless optimism and belief in ourselves and the righteousness of our cause, that has always made us unique as a nation. That is what that poo-poo’ed “American Exceptionalism” is all about, and we’re blessed to have it because without it we wouldn’t be here."

There's also the little matter of being both a continental and a sea power, with an unmatched industrial bases and tremendous natural resources.

But without the human resources, those would not have sufficed.

"The Americans of 1941 didn’t moan and cry that defeat was inevitable, that the fleet was crushed, that our enemies were too strong and on the offensive (and you have to keep in mind that December of 1941 was the high water mark of the Axis Powers) and that the best we could do was to compromise, to drag out the inevitable and hope for the best.

They rolled up their damn sleeves and decided that, come what may, it was time to kick some ass. That victory would be ours no matter what it took, no matter how long it took, and that anything short of total, crushing, unconditional victory was NOT an option. Like the Brits at the time of the Battle of Britain when all seemed lost, we shrugged it off and went to work, confident in our cause and our ultimate victory." (Emphasis in original text. - CAA.)

As at least some of us still do today.

"Some say that we don’t have that spirit anymore. I wonder at times myself. But then again I look at our generation’s youngsters who keep going back into the breach, believing as those grandparents and great-grandparents of theirs, that victory comes only to those who never give up, that this is a fight worth fighting because the alternative to victory is not worth living with.

Yes, we have grown a bit soft as a result of decades of affluence and indifference to our nation’s enemies march through our institutions, but even though this is our darkest hour, we still have what it takes to beat back the forces of darkness and prevail in the end. It’s been done before. Our nation has faced perils larger than ours, yet here we are.

The only way we can lose is if we give up the fight before the fight is over." (Bold type added for emphasis. - CAA.)

It's that next "Greatest Generation" that even TIME magazine believed in for approximately 45 minutes. They haven't given up and if their victories are micturated away, there'll be Hell to pay.

_____

* Encouragement in the original sense of intended to instill courage.

12/7

re: "National Security Part 3: The Role Of Economics"

The Curmudgeon Emeritus at Eternity Road reviewed the economic basis for military strength.

Money quote(s):

"The last thing any commander wants to do is take his men into an unwinnable war, especially a war unwinnable by reason of inadequate material resources"

Unfortunately, wars aren't always fought by two sides which chose to go to war against each other. It only takes on side to start a war. The enemy gets a vote.

"If a commander dislikes to go to war inadequately provisioned, a national command authority -- in the case of the United States, the president -- should dislike to send him there. Yet it's in the nature of nation-states that, as John Jay said most memorably, they'll go to war whenever there's a good chance of profiting thereby."

This pre-supposes that a commander-in-chief is sufficiently knowledgable, or sufficiently well-advised, that he (or she) knows the difference. Or cares.

(Yes, I'm still pissed about the whole "the army you have" crack.)

"Economic strength is both the precondition for military readiness and the requirement for military endurance. To be considered well defended, a nation must have both.

Analysts disagree on the extent to which a nation can endure various degrees of economic militarization. In the early years of the RAND Corporation, studies were submitted to the Pentagon that proposed that the United States could divert as much as 50% of its GDP to military expenditures, if that were necessary to meet some contingency. Needless to say, there was a wide spread of opinion on whether that was true, and if so, on how long the nation could remain in being under so large a military burden."

Full mobilization is something that the U.S. has never, not really, experienced. Nothing like what various European states, such as Britain, Russia, or Germany, experienced during World War II.

"(A)nnual military expenditures come to about $700 billion: 5% of GDP. Given that the armed forces are one of the seventeen enumerated powers of Congress, that doesn't seem disproportionate, especially considering the broadening of the military's missions and responsibilities in recent years."

Ah, but what about the penumbras!

"It must be said that we spend as much as we do on our military because our "allies" spend so little on theirs. Not only are we committed to their defense; we are all too frequently called in to handle crises they have disdained to address.

Yet despite all that spending and the large, capable military it supports, we are not secure."

There's no such thing as being completley secure, at least this side of the Pearly Gates. The writer discusses some of the ways in which he believes Americans perceive themselves to be insecure, which are worth reading, particularly with regards to the problems causing, and resulting from, illegal immigration.

"(N)ational security is affected by our willingness and ability to maintain mobilization bases: facilities from which we could rapidly develop new or previously rejected military capabilities, or greatly expand the ones we have.

Mobilization bases are important because few major wars begin as "bolts from the blue." There are normally clear indications that conflict is brewing well before the first exchange of fire. That would be so even in our present age, in which the interval between a firm decision and the ballistic nuclear bombardment of any point on the globe is no more than thirty minutes."

A firm decision should be made upon a basis of firm information. More than likely somewhat longer than 30 minutes would be required to assemble, to say nothing of developing, actionable intelligence.

"(S)uch mobilization bases cost money. Worse, it's money spent to remain flexibly poised against notional threats: possibilities that might never materialize. They're the first targets of budget-cutters in a time of austerity. Thus, we cannot be sanguine about building and maintaining such bases without maintaining our economic health and vitality. Even then, it would be necessary to keep unpleasant but yet unrealized possibilities in mind when the budget-cutters come to call."

Good advice for the strategic-minded, but the strategic-minded won't be calling the shots when the knives come out for budget cutting.

"America was not altogether ready for World War II. We had reduced our World War I Army to pre-war levels, and had retreated from most aspects of military production. Fortunately, the psychological response of Americans to the attack on Pearl Harbor left us ready and willing to endure a considerable degree of privation for the sake of the forces and materiel the war would require. Above all, America was rich enough, and free enough, to convert half of its productive sector to the making of weapons of war. It is unclear that we could do that today."

I'm a bit more optimistic about our ability to convert great swaths of our productive sector to war production, but I'm less sanguine about what of our productive sector actually remains within our own borders.

December 7, 1941

Remember.