Wednesday, April 02, 2003

Civilization, a pyramid scheme? Ronald Wright writes: Earth is full of dead cities. Civilizations, like individuals, are born, flourish and die. Except ours. Ours, we believe, is different, the beneficiary of all the rest. The sunny afternoon in which we thrive will stretch ahead forever. In this belief, we carry on our lives against the evidence of time. Civilization (I use the word in the anthropological sense to mean complex, populous societies) is, in round figures, a 10,000-year experiment that began with the invention of farming in key areas - the Near East, Southeast Asia, Mesoamerica and Peru. Farming led to towns and cities, to specialists and priesthoods, to the rule of many by few. With this came wonderful things: most of art, literature, music, science. Civilization also displaced other ways of life, often forcibly. There are now no viable alternatives, no blank spaces on the map. There is no going back without disaster. As we climbed the ladder of progress, we kicked out the rungs below. Ten thousand years may seem long enough to declare an irreversible success. But it is less than 1 per cent of our career on Earth. Even our modern subspecies, Homo sapiens, has existed 10 times longer than civilization. The settled way of life we regard as normal today is not the life by which, and for which, we evolved. So why were there no civilizations anywhere until 10,000 years ago, when they spring up independently on nearly every continent? (04/02/03) What is an Indicator of Sustainablity? Maureen Hart writes: An indicator is something that helps you understand where you are, which way you are going and how far you are from where you want to be. A good indicator alerts you to a problem before it gets too bad and helps you recognize what needs to be done to fix the problem. Indicators of a sustainable community point to areas where the links between the economy, environment and society are weak. They allow you to see where the problem areas are and help show the way to fix those problems. Indicators of sustainability are different from traditional indicators of economic, social, and environmental progress. Traditional indicators -- such as stockholder profits, asthma rates, and water quality -- measure changes in one part of a community as if they were entirely independent of the other parts. Sustainability indicators reflect the reality that the three different segments are very tightly interconnected. (04/02/03) What We Don't Know Can Hurt Us! New York Times -- Maureen Dowd writes: We're shocked that the enemy forces don't observe the rules of war. We're shocked that it's hard to tell civilians from combatants, and friends from foes. Adversaries use guerrilla tactics; they are irregulars; they take advantage of the hostile local weather and terrain; they refuse to stay in uniform. Golly, as our secretary of war likes to say, it's unfair. Some of their soldiers are mere children. We know we have overwhelming, superior power, yet we can't use it all. We're stunned to discover that the local population treats our well-armed high-tech troops like invaders. Why is all this a surprise again? I know our hawks avoided serving in Vietnam, but didn't they, like, read about it? "The U.S. was planning on walking in here like it was easy and all," a young marine named Jimmy Paiz told ABC News this weekend with a rueful smile. "It's not that easy to conquer a country, is it?" (04/02/03) IRAQOMETER "While we hoped that popular revolt would topple Saddam, we did not wish to see the breakup of the Iraqi state. Extending the war into Iraq would have incurred incalculable human and political costs. We would have been forced to occupy Baghdad and, in effect, rule Iraq. The coalition would instantly have collapsed, the Arabs deserting in anger and other allies pulling out as well. Unilaterally exceeding the U.N.'s mandate would have destroyed the precedent of international response to aggression we hoped to establish. Had we gone the invasion route, the U.S. could still be an occupying power in a bitterly hostile land."  -- From Why We Didn't Remove Saddam by George Bush [Sr.] and Brent Scowcroft, Time Magazine, 1998. (04/02/03) Three Scenarios for the Iraq War This is an email I received this evening from a former career diplomat who served as U.S. ambassador to a Muslim country: "Your lastest posting raises the question of what is going to happen. You write that we still have to come up with a strategy to protect our troops and complete the mission. Yogi Berra said never to make predictions, especially about the future. But I have had a pretty good track record over the years in predicting the future. (That's the sin of pride, and not a Nostradamus complex.) So, looking into my crystal ball, I do not believe that we will be able to complete the mission on OUR terms, which were to eliminate weapons of mass destruction, overthrow Saddam, and liberate the Iraqi people. ... The war obviously is not going to end the way that Rumsfeld, Cheney, Perle, Kristol, etc. all predicted. I see three scenarios." (04/02/03) Offence and Defence The New Yorker -- Seymour M. Hersh writes: As the ground campaign against Saddam Hussein faltered last week, with attenuated supply lines and a lack of immediate reinforcements, there was anger in the Pentagon. Several senior war planners complained to me in interviews that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and his inner circle of civilian advisers, who had been chiefly responsible for persuading President Bush to lead the country into war, had insisted on micromanaging the war’s operational details. Rumsfeld’s team took over crucial aspects of the day-to-day logistical planning—traditionally, an area in which the uniformed military excels—and Rumsfeld repeatedly overruled the senior Pentagon planners on the Joint Staff, the operating arm of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. “He thought he knew better,” one senior planner said. “He was the decision-maker at every turn. On at least six occasions, the planner told me, when Rumsfeld and his deputies were presented with operational plans—the Iraqi assault was designated Plan 1003—he insisted that the number of ground troops be sharply reduced. Rumsfeld’s faith in precision bombing and his insistence on streamlined military operations has had profound consequences for the ability of the armed forces to fight effectively overseas. “They’ve got no resources,” a former high-level intelligence official said. “He was so focussed on proving his point—that the Iraqis were going to fall apart.” (04/02/03) 5:34:16 AM

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