re: "Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad Charged with Murder not Terrorism"

Howie at The Jawa Report ("Sand people, get it?") had a Carlos Bledsoe update.

Money quote(s):

"Personally I ask why he was not declared an enemy of the state under the laws of war and shot as an irregular partisan under Geneva"


7/12

re: "Canada Bans Veil from Citizenship Oath Ceremony"

Rusty Shackleford, Ph.D at The Jawa Report ("Sand people, get it?") reports a common-sense data point from The Great White North.

Money quote(s):

"(B)efore we get the usual "stop all Muslim immigration", let me ask you what we should do with the thousands of Muslims who fought alongside us in Iraq and Afghanistan who's families are threatened in their home countries?

Should we just hang them out to dry? Or might it not be a good idea to help them immigrate to the US, where they might be able to continue to help us?

As one Iraq vet once told me about a Muslim who he helped immigrate to the US, "He risked his life for me. What have you ever done?""

12/12

re: "Israel about to denuke Iran?"

Uncle Jimbo at Blackfive ("the paratrooper of love") asked a question about which the clock is ticking.

Money quote(s):

"I find Netanyahu's unveiled threat to be quite refreshing given the usual nature of diplomacy as formalized lying in formal wear or the ever popular nibbling of petit fours and sipping of mint tea by the hotel pool. This was the equivalent of a shotgun blast from the front porch telling would-be thugs this ain't the house you want to be messing with. The fact that Israel has a history of following up warning shots with decapitating strikes makes this all the more believable." (Bold typeface added for emphasis. - CAA.)

UJ likes to describe diplomacy thusly; at certain rarified levels it has an uncomfortable ring of truth to it. For my part, the only time CAA has worn formal attire in the line-of-duty as a diplomat was to attend a USO-sponsored event while accompanying my ambassador.

"The public statements by Netanyahu are obviously aimed at both the Iranians and the "international community" as a last chance to avoid the logical and likely action to come. Iran has picked this fight and I think soon it may learn something others in the area have, Israel doesn't play."

The preliminaries, presumably aimed at forestalling the need for truly escalatory measures, may already be underway. Or all those lab explosions and inconveniently deceased Iranian nuclear scientists may just be coincidence.

(And I have a bridge to sell.)

11/3

re: "Attrition Through Enforcement Immigration Policy Works in Alabama"

Daniel Horowitz at RedState ("the most widely read right of center blog on Capitol Hill") believes attrition through self-deportation works.

Money quote(s):

"Proponents of illegal immigration and open borders are constantly propagating a straw-man argument for amnesty that offers false policy choices. They contend that “we cannot possibly send back the illegals without physically deporting every one of them, and therefore, we are forced to grant them amnesty, in addition to a ‘pathway to citizenship.’ Those with some sense of sanity have always realized that the source of the problem is our incentivizing of illegal behavior, and that a concerted effort to enforce the laws would drain the illegal population through “attrition by enforcement.” "

If you reward (or "incentivize") something, you get more of it. That's basic psychology and basic economics. If you dis-incentivize something, you get less of it than you would have otherwise. Maybe not none of it, but less of it.

"(P)eople vote with their feet. They did the same thing in Arizona. Even though SB 1070 was never implemented, roughly 100,000 illegals left the state. The bottom line is that when they are not collecting $4.2 billion in refundable tax handouts, receiving some form of welfare on behalf of their American-born children, or obtaining employment, they will leave."

In part, this is the beauty of the federal system. Individual states act as laboratories of a sort to try out all sorts of things and other states can learn (or not) from their experiences.

"Texas, which has experienced an economic boom, is the only state with a growing population of illegals. 200,000 more illegals have invaded the Lone Star State from 2007-2009. Now, if only we could actually remove the magnet without destroying our economy, we would solve the illegal problem without mass deportation or amnesty – or even worse, a pathway to citizenship. In other words, treating illegals as illegal actually works."

10/4

re: "Ten Years After"

Francis W. Porretto at Eternity Road aims to influence your opinions.

Money quote(s):

"I've received a fair amount of email this past week, inquiring about whether I planned to write something on the tenth anniversary of Black Tuesday: September 11, 2001, when Islam openly declared war on the United States. Yes, I said Islam, not "terrorists," "extremists," or "fundamentalists." We have it on the authority of a head of state -- Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey -- that there is no "moderate Islam;" there is only Islam. Any number of imams, mullahs, ayatollahs and so forth have said the same -- and have proceeded to justify the atrocities of Black Tuesday as a response to the "humiliation" Muslims have endured at America's hands.

What humiliation? Daring to rise and progress out of the seventh century. Proclaiming a doctrine of individual rights beyond what their scriptures allow. Treating persons of all races, sexes, and faiths as possessing a perfect right to be as they are and believe as they do. Letting women read, drive, and go about in attractive clothing, unaccompanied by a male chaperone.
We "humiliate" Muslims and Islam by being Americans: believers in freedom, a secular state, and an objective rule of law and justice." (Bold typeface added for emphasis. - CAA.)

There're what, a billion muslims in the world? That's almost as many muslims as there are Catholics! Surely all of them aren't at war with the United States?

"If you're a person of wholesome values and rational mind, you were as outraged about Black Tuesday as I was -- and you remain so, as I do. If we differ at all, it's in what would constitute the appropriate responses, short and long-term, and the enduring stance America ought to take toward the perpetrators, their enablers, their apologists, and their co-religionists.

Needless to say, even among men of good will, that's a wide spectrum of opinion. What I'm here to do, today and every day, on this and every subject of public import, is to pull your opinions toward mine. Anyone who writes op-ed is trying to do the same. " (Bold type added for emphasis. - CAA.)

I know it's supposed to be a bad thing to hold onto anger all this time, but frankly I've come to doubt whether the veracity itself of that bit of modern-day folk wisdom. Anger isn't always a bad thing, it seems to me. It can help keep you focused on whatever, presumably important, thing that has angered you. After all, if the thing is still making you angry, maybe the fault isn't you after all.

Not to rule that out, you understand. Let's not rule anything out, let's keep an open mind to all the possibilities and then start to rule them out, based on facts and observations.

Regarding the bolded portion of the excerpt above, I have no quibble with Mr. Porretto's wording except the final three (including one compound-) words: "and their co-religionists." And I'll tell you why:

My issue, my anger, my "eternal hostility" remains with "the perpetrators, their enablers, (and) their apologists." And while I certainly don't limit that hostility to "their co-religionists," nor do I intend to categorically sweep them into the "eternal hostility" category unless, by their perpetration, their enablement, and their apologetics, they place themselves therein.

Frankly, those who are in essence accessories, before and after the facts of 9/11, constitute a sufficiently broad category within both the non-Muslim and Muslim worlds as to provide no end of enemies.

But, as we are in a war, not a criminal court, the object is not conviction of the guilty (including the accessories) but their defeat. So let not your heart be troubled.

"We are at war with Islam, and have been since Iranian "students" stormed the American Embassy in Tehran, took 52 Americans hostage, and kept them for 444 days.

Don't bother to argue with me about this. Either we are or we aren't. If we aren't, the evidence for the proposition demands a better explanation than any I've heard. Worse, there's no objective evidence that we aren't, and no Islamic apologist has dared to present any.

But we're not fighting that war. We're acting, in large measure, as if some other force were responsible for the crimes and atrocities committed in Islam's name. We're acting, in other words, as if Islam and Muslims generally are the victims rather than the cause and the perpetrators."

A couple of points:

First, while certain Islamic actors (including entire governments) have been at war with the U.S., indeed with Western civilization, for at least since the Tehran embassy takeover, we have not ourselves been at war back. At least not until 9/11 when the war which had been being waged against us abroad for all these years came crashing into the home front. No pun intended.

Second, the first (and last) victims of the Sharia-based ideology of militant, fundamentalist (and occasionally socialist) Islam are always muslims themselves. Muslims who disagree, muslims to aren't fundamentalist, aren't militant, aren't murderous enough; they are always the ultimate victims of our Islamist enemies.

This is not to minimize our role as an obstacle to a Sharia-controlled world where muslims may be terrorized and murdered without hindrance, since there won't be anyone else left to terrorize and murder; we're the Great Satan, after all. And with that greatness comes great responsibility.

"In part, it's because of the barrage of propagandization we've received about Islam, about American "imperialism," and about our duty to "tolerate" this totalitarian creed. Like it or not, people's attitudes and unconscious assumptions are shaped by the Legacy Media even today. They see, hear, or read a "news report" and accept it as undiluted, unpolluted fact. They read a bit of op-ed from some eloquent columnist with whom they agree on less weighty matters, and they accept his rendition rather than performing their own. They hear persons whom they admire, and whose good opinion they crave, declaim in this or that fashion, and they accept it and parrot it back to him for no better reason than their need for his approval.

And in part, it's because we've become uncomfortable with the concept of evil. We simply dislike the idea that there are persons in the world whose ultimate aim is our subjugation or destruction. And since it's an abstraction, not represented by any individual we have close at hand, we scowl and shrug it away.

Got a hot flash for you, sports fans: There is evil in the world. Now and then it's codified into a creed and set down between book covers. The Communist Manifesto. Mein Kampf. The Koran. Those who embrace such a creed are embracing evil.

Yes, it's a Christian's part to hate the sin but forgive the sinner and pray for his repentance. But it's a free man's part to fight the evildoer with all his power -- especially when at the end of the contest, one of you will be dead, and the other free to go on as he's done.

We are at war with Islam. We've been at war with Islam for forty-one years." (Emphasis in original text. - CAA.)

See my remarks above. Islamic terrorists (including entire governments) have been at war with us for each of those forty-one years, but for much of that time we brushed aside the insults, the murders, the treachery, and the attacks against our military, our diplomats, and our civilians, as mere nuisances to be ignored or somehow bought off. Actual warfare, at least since the Jefferson administration, against Islamic terrorists, bandits, and pirates (but I repeat myself) has been quite rare, and more the occasional skirmish indicental to various rescue or other reactive and defensive missions.

"Try reading this concise report on Muslims' behavior in Western countries to which they've been admitted. Try rationalizing its evidence against any other conclusion than that Islam is an aggressive program of totalitarian conquest of the world, with a few theological trimmings as protective coloration.

Try imagining how "tolerance" for such a creed could eventuate any other way than in mass slaughter of the "tolerant" and the subjugation of the survivors."

Those with eyes to see need only observe developments in the erstwhile "Arab Spring" nations for a sneak-preview of what may be in store, Ralph Peters notwithstanding, for Western Europe.

9/11/11

re: "Heresy In Old Blighty"

Rand Simberg at Tranterrestrial Musings mourned the passing of one of "the Rights of Englishmen."

Money quote(s):

"The right to self defense is a fundamental Anglospheric human right, going back to the Magna Carta. It is only in the last few decades that it has been abandoned in the place of its birth. It is shameful."

And so it goes. There are reasons why this is so, just as there are reasons why "the Rights of Englishmen" linger still in places where no one thinks of themselves as English (and hasn't for generations).

8/10

re: "The Multi-Layered Betrayal of Britain"

Paul Weston at Gates of Vienna ("At the siege of Vienna in 1683 Islam seemed poised to overrun Christian Europe.We are in a new phase of a very old war.") breaks this down by generational cohort.

Money quote(s):

"Poor old Britain is in a terrible state. Whilst the recent obscenity of a Labour government is mostly to blame for this, they were not alone in the cultural and racial war which has been waged against the British people over the last half-century. Such has been the all-encompassing assault on who we once were that it is now hard to find any social group which has not been betrayed."

Read the whole thing.

7/12

re: "Senator Mark Pryor (D-AR) backs Purple Heart for soldier murdered in Arkansas jihad attack"

Robert at Jihad Watch ("dedicated to bringing public attention to the role that jihad theology and ideology plays in the modern world, and to correcting popular misconceptions about the role of jihad and religion in modern-day conflicts") spotted a superb example of constituent service by one of our congressional representatives.

Money quote(s):

"Carlos Bledsoe, also known as Abdulhakim Muhammad, is serving a life sentence without the chance for parole after pleading guilty and admitting his motivation for the shootings stemmed from the United States’ presence in the Middle East. Bledsoe converted to Islam, became radicalized in Nashville, TN and travelled to Yemen in 2007 where he was arrested by Yemeni authorities in 2008. Following his deportation from Yemen in 2009, he attacked the Little Rock recruiting center, killing Long and wounding Ezeagwula." (Bold typeface added for emphasis. - CAA.)

Bledsoe (a.k.a. "Abdulhakim Mujahid Muhammad'") traveled to Yemen where he spent two years learning to become a "mujahid." The year (give-or-take) spent in jail wouldn't have been all that likely to isolate him from even more radicalizing influences. The argument that Bledsoe's murderous actions had no "international terrorism" character holds little water thereby.

12/9

re: "The Big Lizards Immigration Reform"

Dafydd at Big Lizards ("this fershlugginer web site") has a whole raft of suggestions for immigration reform.

Money quote(s):

"The primary goal of reform is henceforth to select immigrants solely on the basis of two criteria: assimilability (A) and benefit to the United States (B), not by any other criteria (such as race, country of origin, class within the country of origin, having relatives already living legally in the United States, or any other criteria currently used."

Some of his ideas are fairly common-sensical but he goes way off-beam with the stuff about indentured servitude. There are enough problems with modern-day slavery without adding this to the mix.

10/4

re: "Remembering: On The Tenth Anniversary Of 9/11."

John Bernard, 1st Sgt. USMC (ret.), at Big Peace prepared some remarks for this year's 9/11 remembrance.

Money quote(s):

"Ten years ago, today, 19 Al Qaeda affiliated hijackers stole 4 jets and flew them into the World Trade Center Buildings, the Pentagon, along route 95 and attempted to crash a fourth into some as yet unknown target. That fourth plane never reached it’s “reassigned” destination. In all, 2998 people perished at the hands of those 19 zealots of a seventh century, demonically inspired ideology.

I refuse to call them terrorists.

Terrorist is but one of many misnomers that has been associated with a segment of the world population that believe the actions of that day were righteous. Make no mistake about it; the nineteen men that committed that atrocity on American soil that we remember today were but the tip of the sword."

Soldiers of Allah (S.O.A.), just like Major Hasan.

"Since that day, hundreds of thousands of United States Service members, have been compelled, by this government, into harm’s way to hold responsible those who plotted those attacks. Tens of thousands have been wounded, some with life changing effect. Nearly five thousand have died doing the same.

Their combined sacrifices are a direct result of the actions of that day and yet, they are neither remembered nor their brothers, invited. We compound this injustice by perpetuating an insidious act of political cowardice by not naming the enemy who inspired those attacks, cheered the attackers and with whom we are still, presumably, locked in battle."

9/11

re: "Harbinger"

Jeff G. at Protein Wisdom ("because not just anybody can summarize the news.") examined the London rioters.

Money quote(s):

"Products of the long march.

Europe wants to walk it back, and the riots are in part a product of that desperation. Too many in the US, alternately, seems to think this way lies Utopia — and our government is more than happy to join them in their fantasies by continually kicking the can down the road, pretending that necessary reforms can always be put off indefinitely.

Worse still? The people in the US haven’t had their guns taken way just yet…"

The looming impeachment of AG Holder may delay that last part a bit more.

8/10

re: "Hama Doesn’t Forget"

Rand Simberg at Transterrestrial Musings asked a couple of fundamental questions.

Money quote(s):

"Are we going to do anything to people who kill Americans? Apparently not. The Bush administration never did — it would be pretty foolish to expect this gang to."

There are a lot of folks, individuals and organizations, out there in the great abroad who've made a sideline (or worse) in killing my fellow citizens.

And, if truth be told, the case can be made that we (the U.S.) have actively rewarded that behavior set as often as we've punished it.

"Iran is at war with us. Are we at war with Iran? In fact, they’ve been at war with us for over three decades, but we continue, administration in, administration out, to pretend otherwise."

Iran, like a lot of places, is a special case.

Persians, as people, generally are a relatively likeable lot. Iran, on the other hand, deserves at least a five-page essay just to scratch the surface.

The mullacracy that runs the joint can best be understood as a cabal of messianistic death-worshippers whose morals compare disadvantageously with The Sopranos and who are hag-ridden by both a civilizational inferiority complex and delusions of imperial grandeur.

U.S. policy regarding Iran evidences a major strain of wishful thinking and has for decades.

7/12

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: "al-Awlaki and Citizenship"

Peter Spiro at Opinio Juris ("a forum for informed discussion and lively debate about international law and international relations") discusses AAA and what to do about his like in the future.

Money quote(s):

"Al-Awlaki obviously was obviously hostile to the United States; in an older world, in which our adversaries were also states, he would have lost his US citizenship as a member of the armed forces of another state. But the only way to lose your citizenship today is to walk into a US consulate and formally renounce it, a step al-Awlaki wasn’t in a position to undertake.

One response would be to adopt a Lieberman-type terrorist expatriation measure. I don’t think that would do a lot of good, other than generate yet another layer of litigation, this one over whether particular conduct evinced an intent to relinquish citizenship (constitutionally required, as per Afroyim v. Rusk). So that leaves us with some citizens who don’t really seem like citizens, which means that the citizen/non-citizen differential for rights purposes will get smaller still."

The laws regarding expatriation and expatriating acts are still on the books; this business about only those who voluntarily relinquish citizenship is a function of judicial interpretation, which can be overturned. And should be.

10/5

re: "Sandcrawler PSA: Jawa Report Official 9/11 Tenth Anniversary Editorial Post"

Howie at The Jawa Report remembered another infamous date.

Money quote(s):

"(T)o all my countrymen who lost their lives 10 years ago, we remember you and we made damned sure that payback was a motherf*cker."

9/11

re: "Obamanomics For Dummies"

Robert J. Avrech at Seraphic Secret ("Emmy Award winning screenwriter. Religious Zionist. Republican. Movie fanatic. Gun owner. Helplessly and hopelessly in love with my wife since age nine.") noted the economic state-of-play in the Eurozone.

Money quote(s):

"Greece, Spain, Italy, Portugal, France and Ireland are economic basket cases. All are quasi-socialist nanny states whose fiscal policies are Ponzi schemes, the con job for which Bernard Madoff was sent to jail."

Naturally, the solution is more of the same. Reminiscent of the old "The problem with socialism/communism is that it's never really been done/tried right."

"Get enough people working for and dependant on the government and inevitably they will vote for the party upon whom their livelihoods depend.

Entitlements are nothing less than a fiscal narcotic. Once started, the body yearns for a fix and will do most anything to keep the supply coming."

With nearly half of the U.S. exempt from any federal income tax liability, the U.S. economy is reaching a tipping point.

Unfortunately, what some see as the last warning signs before plunging over a cliff, others see as an opportunity.


8/10

re: "Defense Secretary Panetta Makes the Mother of All Kinsley Gaffes (Update: Correcting the WaPo)"

A "kinsley gaffe" is defined as "when a politician accidentally says the truth."

Aaron Worthing at Patterico's Pontifications ("Harangues that Just Make Sense") provided an example:

"Panetta has a history standing up and telling the truth that liberals deny. For instance, after the death of bin Laden, it was Panetta who admitted that waterboarding gave us information that led to bin Laden. And in a weird way, I really respect that."

Is waterboarding torture? Is the torture of unlawful combatants (i.e., those not eligible for POW status under the Geneva Conventions) even illegal? Is it illegal under under those treaties to which the U.S. is party, under U.S. federal law, or under some broader interpretation of "international law"?

I wouldn't much appreciate being waterboarded myself, but am under no illusions that I would be subjected to anything so mild-mannered and gentle were I, or any of my military, diplomatic, or other civilian colleagues fall into the hands of our AQ enemies.

7/11

re: "The British Ambassador To Tehran Experiences a 1979 Flashback"

TSB at The Skeptical Bureaucrat ("Giving my fellow Americans the view from my cubicle") provides some professional insight into Amb. Chilcott's remarks.

Money quote(s):

"(T)he embassy staff assumed they would have sufficient warning of a 'serious' mob attack, as opposed to a 'normal' rock-and-bottle throwing demonstration, and that they could send the non-essential staff and dependents home where they would be safely out of the way. Stop me if you've heard this one before."

This is, IIRC, known to students of behavioral conditioning as "operant conditioning." Career intelligence officers know if for something somewhat different, but the goal is similar: condition your target to expect certain situations and conditions to play out a certain way. It's a form of intelligence deception, and the Iranians are good at it.

"Going to the windows is a very bad practice. I hope British embassies have technical means for seeing what's happening outside without needing to expose staff to bullets and flying glass."

U.S. foreign service staff know better than to run to windows when they hear scary noises outside; not to say someone won't do it anyway, but they've been trained not to do so.

Historically, the majority of casualties in an embassy attack have come from flying glass, particularly when blast effects shatter a window. However the majority of fatalities have come from catastrophic structural collapse.

"I am guessing that the residential compound was less well protected against mob attack than was the embassy office building. Bottom line: the non-essential staff and dependents were "rounded up" - i.e., captured and held hostage - unlike the staff who were locked down in the embassy. That's enough to make a reasonable man ask whether foreign missions in unstable places shouldn't protect their residential compounds to the exact same degree they do their office buildings."

Clearly, they've read our playbook and know that Western embassies put the emphasis of their security measures at their working facilities rather than their residences. And have adjusted their offensive strategies against them accordingly. We can expect to see this happen again.

12/5

re: "The top ten unicorns of China policy"

Daniel Blumenthal at Shadow Government ("Notes From The Loyal Opposition") examined some China-specific cognitive biases.

Money quote(s):

"Much of China policy is also underpinned by belief in the fantastical: in this case, soothing but logically inconsistent ideas. But unlike unicorns, our China policy excursions into the realm of make believe could be dangerous. Crafting a better China policy requires us to identify what is imaginary in our thinking about China."

CAA is not a "China hand." CAA barely speaks "take-out menu Chinese."

(CAA has, however, noticed a phenomenon where, even in non-English, non-Chinese speaking countries, restaurant orders are relayed, using English menu designations, e.g., "Number Seven!")

Rebounding from that tangent, any U.S. intelligence (especially counterintelligence) professional can't fail to notice, and learn a few things about, China.

So take a look at Mr. Blumenthal's "ten unicorns." What do you think?

10/3

re: "The Unfinished Business of September 11"

Richard Fernandez at Belmont Club set out a learning objective.

Money quote(s):

"The story of September 11 must for all time become the story of how a certain date became unspeakable to al-Qaeda and its followers; a tale of how this day of all others, became the blackest day in the history of Islam. It should forever be a date that can never be mentioned without arousing a deep sense of shame throughout the Middle East so that in generations hence, people should still come up to strangers unbidden and say, “I’m sorry for September 11. “ Until then it is unfinished business."

To put it in other terms, this is a "teaching moment" for two civilizations.

One of them, ours, hasn't quite gotten the message across to the other one yet. Which is very unfortunate for both civilizations.

9/10

re: "Why we honor some with half-staff flags and not others."

Chuck at From My Position.... On The Way! ("Life and Observations from the Pointy End of the Spear") posted an explanation for those who don't already know.

Money quote(s):

"We fly the flag at half-staff every memorial day, from sunrise to noon, to honor those who've fallen. To honor ALL of those who've fallen. "

8/10

re: "Almost the Ultimate Carter Moment in Damascus."

Moe Lane (Diary) at RedState ("the most widely read right of center blog on Capitol Hill") cautioned administration appointees:

"(I)f Syrian ‘loyalists’ follow up today’s attack against the US Embassy in Damascus…

…by actually seizing the embassy? If that happens, start updating your resumes. And don’t bother with sending them along to Democratic House Members (and any Democratic Senator up for re-election in 2012): we’ll be throwing them out of office, too."

Recent history only provides one example of the "if" side of this statement, but the "then" segment justifies 100 percent confidence in the political consequences.

7/11

re: "Tehran's embassies: Targets of popular rage since 1829"

Uri Friedman at PASSPORT ("A Blog By The Editors of FOREIGN POLICY") put the Iranian attack on the British embassy in its proper historical context.

Money quote(s):

"The storming of the British embassy in Tehran on Tuesday capped a week of diplomatic wrangling over the United Kingdom's decision to slap new sanctions on Iran in response to its nuclear program."

Just in case anyone actually believes this was the unsanctioned action of a "spontaneous mob," here's a link to some information that bears on that subject.

(Of course, if you equate, as I do, the term "spontaneous mob" to "state-sponsored assault team," then only the "unsanctioned" part of the above should be any bother.)

"(E)mbassy storming is a recurring phenomenon in Tehran, though Iran certainly isn't the only country to experience such attacks. The most infamous incident, of course, involves young Islamic revolutionaries seizing the U.S. embassy in 1979 and taking 63 Americans hostage for 444 days to demand that the United States hand over the recently ousted Shah. But there are other examples."

In addition to some post-Revolutionary examples, there's also this:

"Tehran also witnessed what may be the earliest instance of an embassy assault (if an earlier example comes to mind, please share it with us). In January 1829, Alexander Griboyedov, a famous Russian playwright tasked with imposing a humiliating peace treaty on the Persians, was murdered along with nearly his entire staff when a furious mob stormed the Russian embassy in Tehran following a series of disputes between Griboyedov and the Shah."

In addition to Britain closing its Tehran embassy and order Iran's diplomats out of London, France's mission will also be going on some sort of Ordered Departure.

11/29

re: "Are These the Labour Pains of a New Renaissance?"

Seneca III had an essay posted at Gates of Vienna ("At the siege of Vienna in 1683 Islam seemed poised to overrun Christian Europe.We are in a new phase of a very old war.").

Money quote(s):

"(T)the giant Ponzi scheme that is European monetary union is on the verge of a well-deserved and long overdue collapse. It was always going to fail, of course, because it is a false construct designed not for the financial and fiscal benefit of the ordinary men and women of the Union but in order to enable the ushering in of a continent-wide socialist police state by means of subterfuge and stealth.

And, as is always thus with false constructs, it never did need to be destroyed from without, for the seeds of its destruction were sown in its very foundations by those political pornographers who created it. These legislative and executive elites, drunk on the dopamine of power, wallowing in hubris as they looted the coffers for their personal benefit — they exalted in the mutual masturbation of their own egos as the little people were left to go about their meaningless lives ignored or at best humoured, of no consequence to the peddlers of this embryonic New World Order.

Fatefully for the deconstructionists, they forgot about or refused to acknowledge the inherent power and utter ruthlessness of the desperate, of the people of whom for so long they had been so contemptuous, and who are now in the process of casting off their chains."

The "European Project" began with the most noble of aims, the prevention of future intra-European conflagrations such as the two world wars of the 20th century.

It can be argued that it's been successful, but it must also be admitted that it did not operate in a vacuum.

Little things like NATO, the United States, "containment," the Marshall Plan, nuclear weapons, and two generations of U.S. soldiery standing watch along the intra-German frontier (that sort of thing) had more than a little to do with it.

"(T)he great Global Warming scam (a revealed belief system built on nameless fear and used to justify and enable the transfer of the fruit of our labours into the pockets of Multinational Industrialists, third world kleptocrats and offshore bankers) is now in its third incarnation, and stumbling as more and more of its premises are exposed as creative wishful thinking rather than the rational analysis of a few and often contradictory physical facts."

For the millions who now get their news primarily from the internet rather than through the traditional major media outlets (primarily TV networks and daily newspapers), this will not come as a surprise. Still, like any ancient religion, the beliefs die out only when the believers (eventually) do.

I still cringe when I hear otherwise genuinely bright people talk about AGW, &tc., as if were "settled science." It's embarrassing. I'm embarrassed for them.

"(T)he collective atrocity that is Multiculturalism, asylum-seeking, and immigration — those seemingly innocuous categorisations of the deliberate, iniquitous process of our ethnic cleansing — is more and more being seen for what it is, and more and more of us have lost our fear of saying so in public and on public forums. For the vanguard and principal protagonist, Islam, events are moving in such a fashion that under cover of the coming storm it is quite likely a non-Westphalian solution will come to pass. They would be wise to leave now, whilst they still can."

Seneca III is clearly expecting another greater European war, and his "non-Westphalian solution" phrase puts me in mind of the differing viewpoints on the "Eurabia myth" discussion, as regards Ralph Peters, Mark Steyn, and Tom Kratman.

In other words, somewhere that Western Civilization would really rather not ever go again.

Not to say it won't or can't, given that Western Civilization remains stubbornly composed of hundreds of millions of individuals (perhaps even a billion or more) daily making their choices and decisions, on a planet where billions more of folks follow their own lights about things.

It's an ugly place where signposts are marked "internment," "ethnic cleansing," "displaced persons," "internal refugees," and ultimately "concentration camps" and "genocide."

So it would be well worth the effort to find some other alternate courses of action (so long as they aren't categorizable as either "surrender" or "civilizational suicide").

11/3

re: "Proscriptions"

Dr. Jerry Pournelle at Chaos Manor ("This is my personal journal and day book. Subjects include civilization and technology, strategy, climate, energy policy, space access, and other issues that interest me.") exhibits one of the qualities of good citizens; asking good and just questions about what our government does in their name.

Money quote(s):

"the justification for the missile attacks on two American citizens in Yemen is that this was an act of war against those who have publicly declared themselves to be enemies of the United States. They considered themselves at war with us, and we with them. This is war.

We can accept this, but questions remain.

First, this wasn’t an act of war against someone engaged in actions against the United States. At the time they were travelling from one town to another, and whether they were armed or not is not relevant. It was a missile strike without warning on specific and named individuals, and one presumes there is a list of others who merit the same deadly attention, all of them persons who are at war with the United States. Let us assume all those persons on that list deserve to be there; that they have in fact engaged in war against the United States, and hitting them with missiles, or a sniper’s bullet, is no more than they deserve.

Questions still remain.

The first question is, how do you get on that list? It surely isn’t automatic. Just because the press reports that you have publicly declared yourself an enemy of the United States doesn’t necessarily make it true. Newspapers have been known to get such things wrong. But assuming that we have good intelligence reports, how do you get on the list? Is this a power that lies with the President alone, or must he have the acquiescence of someone else? Who? We are well beyond the law or the constitution here. We have to presume that this is a war power and resides in the President and that he can delegate that power.

To whom is he responsible, and how must he convey this command?" (Bold typeface added for emphasis. - CAA.)

Good questions, all of them.

The U.S. is, at long last, at least somewhat at war with those who've been waging war with us for decades. That war is not, as sometimes happens, limited to distinct and discrete geographical theaters of war or campaigns or areas of operations but is, instead, waged globally and multi-dimensionally.

Still, for all that, to deliberately select and eliminate, whether by drone-launched missile or poison blow-dart, a particular person (regardless of their citizenship or nationality) begs the question of targeteering.

"Another question: if either of these American citizens had returned to the United States and come to Kennedy International where they presented their US passports at the entry booth, could they have been arrested? On what charge? Were there outstanding warrants? In the case of Samir Khan it is not clear what he could be charged with. He ran a blog, an Internet magazine – I do not know of any other involvement other than that he associated with Al Awaki who associated on line with Major Hassan. Perhaps either or both could be charged with conspiracy and with levying war against the US, but I don’t think that has been done. So: we establish that they could be killed out of hand while travelling from one place to another, neither carrying arms or engaged in any act of war, while in a foreign country: but could they have been shot down by a US Marshall while still in the part of the airport that is not yet in the United States? On international territory? Or after they stepped into the United States?

They can be killed but not arrested: it would take convening a grand jury or a warrant from a magistrate before they could be arrested at Kennedy?

I do not here seek to make life difficult for our military; but I do seek to ask questions. If American citizens can be put on a proscription list and those on that list can be killed on sight by launching high explosives as them, is it proper to ask the procedures required to get on that list?" (Bold typeface added for emphasis. - CAA.)

We do not, at present (nor since 1865 or thereabouts) routinely have U.S. military or law enforcement personnel execute "shoot on sight" orders against American citizens within our own borders.

(Historians of the Indian Wars may care to dispute the definitions implicit in that statement.)

So the idea that had either Triple-A or Mr. Khan appeared at an international air terminal (or other port of entry) they would be engaged with lethal force strikes us (and should) as quite alien. But as it is necessary to consider the eventual consequences of what Dr. Pournelle terms (with historical accuracy) as a "proscription list." It is further necessary to understand how such a thing functions.

"Perhaps the questions are frivolous? Perhaps as one reader says “It’s war and all’s fair in love and war.” Of course that statement is not true. And I do not seek to condemn Mr. Obama for ordering the strike. I do question whether we have sufficiently thought this through. Surely before American citizens can be put on a proscription list there must be some conditions: an act of war, a determination by the President, and surely there needs to be a declaration of war. We assume that the War on Terror establishes a state of war (although I believe Mr. Obama rejected that during the campaign; perhaps he has changed his mind, as he has changed his mind regarding Guantanamo, and trials of the inmates of Guantanamo by military tribunals (note that here there is to be a trial: the President does not seem to assert the right simply to order the execution of those held in Guantanamo without those military tribunals). Would it be good to write down the procedures for establishing the proscription list?

Well, enough. Had Mr. Clinton acted positively when Delta had Bin Laden in their sights, it might be that 911 would not have happened. Mr. Obama did not shirk the responsibility. We give him credit for that. But I do think it is worth discussing how we regularize the procedure for getting on the proscription list, and specify how one might appeal to get off it – perhaps by coming home to the United States and engaging a lawyer?" (Bold typeface added for emphasis. - CAA.)

10/3

re: "After 9/11 anniversary: the return of US diplomacy"

Nicholas Burns at the Christian Science Monitor wrote a great piece on the future of U.S. diplomacy.

Money quote(s):

"During these last 10 years, the US has fought two major land wars simultaneously. It has conducted an aggressive, controversial, and dangerous military campaign against terrorist groups from Iraq to the Afghan/Pakistan border to Somalia and Yemen. And America has transformed the way it defends itself from the terrorist threat at home and overseas.

The US has relied on the military to hit back when attacked or even threatened, to place first priority on building up defenses, and to sometimes shoot first and ask questions later. Much of this made sense in the months immediately following the shocking new threat that appeared with such sudden and terrible force in New York and Washington on September 11, 2001."

Students of strategy, grand or otherwise, already know that both military force and diplomacy are only two of the dimensions in which state (and non-state) actors operate.

DIME, anyone?

"(U)nlike the years following 9/11, the most difficult challenges ahead will require greater reliance on a combination of diplomacy and traditional statecraft and all that comes with it. That includes negotiating with odious regimes, threatening and cajoling them – but more often overcoming them through the strength of our political alliances – to get our way in the world.

This return of diplomacy to center stage in American foreign policy will take many different forms.

First, diplomacy is ascendant in the costly, ill-defined, and inconclusive wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that will end not on the battlefield but at the negotiating table. President Obama’s decision to remove combat forces in Iraq and ask the State Department to lead at the end of this year is sensible and long overdue. The US will also need to negotiate its way out of Afghanistan in the next few years as a conventional military victory there is unattainable."

Note the "conventional" qualifier on "military victory" in that last sentence. Still an arguable proposition, not quite a foregone conclusion, and there's lots of room for discussion as to what "conventional" warfare actually involves.

"This renewed commitment to diplomacy is critical for America’s national strategy. It is the most practical and effective way to coalesce with allies and friends as well as to confront foes in the decade ahead. That is why leaders in Washington should make the same commitment to rebuild the State Department as they did with the Pentagon, CIA, and Homeland Security in the years following 9/11. Congress fully funded those three pillars of national security but starved the fourth and equally important pillar – diplomats and USAID professionals."

Strangely, the fourth pillar tends to be the least expensive of them all; which is ironically one reason it's so politically easy to call for cuts in diplomacy and (because they're not actually the same thing) foreign aid budgets.

Let me walk you through that thought: not only are the dollar amounts smaller, but since they tend not to be spent in any congressmen's districts, employing more than a handful of their constituents, there's no immediate political price to be paid by any individual congress person.

It's not that U.S. diplomats and USAID staff don't vote, even when assigned overseas, but they're so relatively few, so difusely dispersed throughout the U.S., that no single politician has more than a handful in their district.

Not only that, but those deployed abroad have to cast absentee ballots, which (along with military overseas ballots) tend to get tossed out on technicalities or only counted long after the election results are actually announced.

"After 9/11, President Bush essentially put the military on the front lines of America’s international engagement all over the world, with the diplomats in reserve. The military became in the minds of politicians and in the public imagination the default choice for dealing with international problems."

And Pres. Bush was, fairly obviously, correct to have done so, disagree though you may with how he prioritized those military campaigns or implemented them.

Of course, even with the military in the forefront, there was action in most of the other dimensions of national policy, if only in support of those military efforts.

"America will face in the next few years the most dangerous and complex set of international challenges in recent memory. As it returns to diplomacy, political leaders at home must also resist the pernicious allure of isolationism so evident on the extreme right and left of the political spectrum. Americans must instead renew their global leadership role as the country moves further away from the tragedy of 9/11 and encounters the more complex times ahead."

Isolationism is a sucker's game, even for relatively insular Americans, and the voters know it. The real question is to what degree U.S. will be engaged internationally and in what arenas.

_____

Who is the writer?

"Nicholas Burns is professor of the practice of diplomacy and international politics, and director of the Future of Diplomacy Project at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. He served as under secretary of State for political affairs from 2005 to 2008. Previously, he was US ambassador to NATO."

Also:

"Burns served in the United States Foreign Service for twenty-seven years until his retirement in April 2008. He was Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs from 2005 to 2008; the State Department’s third-ranking official when he led negotiations on the U.S. – India Civil Nuclear Agreement; a long-term military assistance agreement with Israel; and was the lead U.S. negotiator on Iran’s nuclear program. He was U.S. Ambassador to NATO (2001–2005) and to Greece (1997–2001) and State Department Spokesman (1995–1997). He worked for five years (1990–1995) on the National Security Council at the White House where he was Senior Director for Russia, Ukraine and Eurasia Affairs and Special Assistant to President Clinton and Director for Soviet Affairs in the Administration of President George H.W. Bush. Burns also served in the American Consulate General in Jerusalem (1985–1987) where he coordinated U.S. economic assistance to the Palestinian people in the West Bank and before that, at the American embassies in Egypt and Mauritania.

Professor Burns has received twelve honorary degrees, the Secretary of State’s Distinguished Service Award, the Woodrow Wilson Award for Public Service from the Johns Hopkins University, and the Boston College Alumni Achievement Award. He has a BA in History from Boston College (1978), an MA in International Relations from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (1980), and earned the Certificat Pratique de Langue Francaise at the University of Paris-Sorbonne (1977). He was a visiting Scholar at the Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars in summer 2008."

_____

As the Foglio's might say, he's a "schmat" guy.

9/9

re: "If We Let the Government Take Our Guns, We’ll Have to Run and Hide Like Londoners"

AWR Hawkins at Big Government relayed a (true) story that reminded me that America is where "the Rights of Englishmen" are still preserved.

Money quote(s):

"Fast forward to 2011 and look at the riots taking place in London, England: the city of unarmed people where crime was long ago vanished via the confiscation and destruction of handguns.

Now that the criminals are confident the citizenry is thoroughly unarmed, they’re going into homes and businesses whenever they wish, taking whatever they want once they go in, and walking (or running) away with a smile on their face.

(Oops! I guess someone forgot to tell the criminals that guns were the cause of criminality.)

Just consider an episode from London’s acclaimed restaurant – The Ledbury – from a few nights ago. Patrons talked of being attacked by rioters with “weapons,” who rushed into the restaurant and demanded customers “hand over wedding rings, cell phones and wallets.”

What “weapons” did the rioters use? Baseball bats of course. (That’s right – an entire restaurant full of people was controlled by kids with clubs.)

To be fair, the patrons said the restaurant staff fought back, with “rolling pins, fry baskets” and other “kitchen tools.”

Thomas Jefferson, Founding Father and third President of the United States, once wrote of how denying a person their natural rights is akin to denying them part of their humanity. "

Just to fill in a blank, the right of self-defense is one of those "natural rights" to which former-Pres. Jefferson was referring.

"It is embarrassing to read of the abasement these Londoners have faced as a result of being disarmed. In fact, it is, as Jefferson would say, an insult to their humanity.

Where I live, if a gang of rioters comes busting through the restaurant doors swinging baseball bats at patrons, I doubt I’ll be alone in pulling my .45 and taking care of business. And the very act of doing that, though not hoped for, will prove a reminder that my life is too valuable a thing to be sacrificed on the altar of progressive policies and academic rhetoric."

As a matter of fashion, CAA doesn't (generally) bear arms when not in uniform. But it's not like it's something he's unprepared to do, at need. Speaking of fashion, one's holster and gunbelt (or shoulder rig) should match one's shoes, watchband, and belt. Just sayin.'

8/10

re: "BREAKING: Government Backed Protesters Storm US Embassy Grounds In Damascus . UPDATE: US Says Embassy Grounds Cleared Of Attackers"

DrewM. at Ace of Spades HQ remarked on a purely-spontaneous-mob attack.

Money quote(s):

"I have to admit, I wasn't thrilled when Obama decided to send an ambassador to Syria after Bush had left the post vacant for a few years in protest of the Assad regimes behavior. Honestly though, I like the cut of Ambassador Ford's jib.

Ford took an unauthorized visit to the town of Hamma and then went on facebook (yes, sounds lame but that's where the anti-government activist types are) to call out the regime."

Credit where credit is due, even from consistent critics of the administration.

Damascus is one of those places (I'm sure you can think of at least one other, they tend to be police/counterintelligence states) where "spontaneous mobs" don't just assemble out of nowhere and overwhelm the ubiquitous host nation security forces that surround Western diplomatic missions.

Some years ago, OBO bureau (Overseas Buildings Operations) got tired of having to wait months to get replacement forced entry/ballistic (FE/BR) glazings for the mission's exterior doors and windows out to Damascus every time the Assad regime would be annoyed or bored enough to bus in a "spontaneous mob" to trash the place.

(The FE/BR glazings are quite robust and well up to prevent any "spontaneous mob" members from breaching through them into our buildings, but they can get pretty messed up in the attempts, which rather interferes with the whole transparency thing you expect from an actual window. Marvels of American technological know-how that they are, you can't exactly run down to the Tent Depot and walk out with a replacement. They have to be custom-built at one of a handful of manufacturing companies in the U.S.)

So rather than have to wait months for a set of replacements every time Assad's "spontaneous mob" would visit, OBO got approval (and funding) to simply procure, and store in Syria, a set of replacement window glazings. That way they just had to install them as soon as it was safe to do so and re-order the damaged part, so the next time there was a "spontaneous mob" attack, they'd be ready.

So far as I know, Damascus is the only place we've ever had to do that.

(An expensive hobby (for us), these "spontaneous mob" attacks seem to be.)



7/11

WP - "Who lost Iraq?"

The ever-brilliant Charles Krauthammer asked this indelicate question on the Washington Post's "Opinion" page.

Money quote(s):

"(A) war that was won. The surge had succeeded. Al-Qaeda in Iraq had been routed, driven to humiliating defeat by an Anbar Awakening of Sunnis fighting side-by-side with the infidel Americans. Even more remarkably, the Shiite militias had been taken down, with U.S. backing, by the forces of Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. They crushed the Sadr militias from Basra to Sadr City.

Al-Qaeda decimated. A Shiite prime minister taking a decisively nationalist line. Iraqi Sunnis ready to integrate into a new national government. U.S. casualties at their lowest ebb in the entire war. Elections approaching. Obama was left with but a single task: Negotiate a new status-of-forces agreement (SOFA) to reinforce these gains and create a strategic partnership with the Arab world’s only democracy.

He blew it. Negotiations, such as they were, finally collapsed last month. There is no agreement, no partnership. As of Dec. 31, the U.S. military presence in Iraq will be liquidated."

Some see this is a feature, not a bug.

For myself, I recall my words from way back in 2004, after returning from Iraq myself: All I wanted is for us not to lose.

"Everyone involved, Iraqi and American, knew that the 2008 SOFA calling for full U.S. withdrawal was meant to be renegotiated. And all major parties but one (the Sadr faction) had an interest in some residual stabilizing U.S. force, like the postwar deployments in Japan, Germany and Korea."

&

"U.S. commanders recommended nearly 20,000 troops, considerably fewer than our 28,500 in Korea, 40,000 in Japan and 54,000 in Germany. The president rejected those proposals, choosing instead a level of 3,000 to 5,000 troops.

A deployment so risibly small would have to expend all its energies simply protecting itself — the fate of our tragic, missionless 1982 Lebanon deployment — with no real capability to train the Iraqis, build their U.S.-equipped air force, mediate ethnic disputes (as we have successfully done, for example, between local Arabs and Kurds), operate surveillance and special-ops bases, and establish the kind of close military-to-military relations that undergird our strongest alliances."

The very quintessential self-licking ice cream cone. Somewhat like what our diplomatic missions in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan either already are or are on their way to becoming, at least in terms of most of their human resources footprint.

11/3


_____

Hat tip to Neo-Neocon ("leaving the fold and becoming that dread thing: a neocon").