Tuesday, May 18, 2004

Posted here Tuesday, May 18, 2004 at 4:52:24 PM     How can children grow up to be organized entities, growing little persons, in an entropic age? ********

Posted here Tuesday, May 18, 2004 at 4:30:11 PM     Some thoughts, overheard, "democrats like sex, Republicans like war and money." Does this give us any clues? I think of the great urges in humans, to procreate, which makes too many, and the result threatens the status quo, and war, which fights to protect and take, through killing. The two are of necessity in balance. Eros and Thanatos, said Freud. Let's add that maltreatment, with beer, sex and violence, is Joe six pack vs the professional elite who want results but don't want to know the methods (as Rumsfeld said, words have no impact but pictures, which should have been repressed, do). So there are complex cultural issues involved with the role of the guards.     ********

Posted here Tuesday, May 18, 2004 at 12:40:08 PM     If the war in Iraq had had world support and been going well, the prison problems would not have happened. Undertaking very controversial actions usually releases people at the crunch points to act unconscionably, because there is no consensual guidance. And I am not just talking about the few at the bottom. The reason the public anguish over the prisons is so high, my clinical sense tells me is because people were already deeply disgusted and or distraught. The prison pictures gave an opportunity for the expression of feeling which predated the pictures, a year and a half's worth of buildup of anguish. The deeper question is, the nature of American culture and why we have a greedy elite, a mild mannered middle and an angry uneducated and scared bottom.  And why at all levels there are some really decent people.. A reservist getting on a place for Iraq was overheard talking to his buddy "where is this place anyway?" "How the hell should I know, I think its near Mexico." Last night I talked with two families, the kind that spend retirement traveling the country in RVs,  who each had a nephew wounded in Iraq. Their view was that these young men were soured on what they saw long before they were injured, and reported how ugly the war was, the ugly behavior of fellow soldiers, the destruction, the poverty, and the lack of meaningful leadership. We are out of our depth. the country has dumbed down, hollowed out, gone shallow, or maybe just hasn't kept up with the changes other populations are going through. Our ignorance makes us bad soldiers, bad leaders, bad strategists. Last night I also attended our local school board meting, as they are trying to cut ten percent from an unbalanced budget. ********

Posted here Tuesday, May 18, 2004 at 12:20:47 PM     From a post at www.Billmon.org including comments. Geneva Coventions - Summary The four Geneva Conventions are meant to lessen the horrors of war. The United States is among more than 150 signatories, signed into domestic Federal Law, but White House lawyers and human-rights groups disagree on the words' exact meaning. Some basic areas of dispute: PRISONERS OF WAR Geneva III defines the rights of POWs, including not only captured armed forces, militias and resistance groups but civilian support staff. POWs can refuse to answer questions beyond name, rank and serial number and are guaranteed basic levels of humane treatment. Two 1977 protocols, not U.S.-signed, extend coverage to insurgents as long as they obey the laws of war. CIVILIANS' RIGHTS Geneva IV covers the treatment of anyone who has no active part in a conflict. It forbids "physical or moral coercion... to obtain information" and bans not only acts of brutality but (like Geneva III) "outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment" under any circumstances. UNLAWFUL COMBATANTS The Pentagon insists suspected Al Qaeda followers have no rights under Geneva III. "Should any doubt arise," Geneva III says, all belligerents are covered until "a competent tribunal" finds otherwise. No such tribunal has been announced. ********

Posted here Tuesday, May 18, 2004 at 10:00:05 AM     Its hard to be president http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/18/business/18reserve.html A photo from his talk at Timken leads the White House Web site's "Building America's Economy Photo Essay." It shows Bush standing in front of a glorious red, white and blue "Jobs and Growth" banner. As he said at the time, the "greatest strength of the American economy is found right here, right in this room, found in the pride and skill of the American work force." Last week, Timken announced that the folks right there in that room are getting fired. Timken, the world's largest industrial bearings maker, whose chairman is a major donor and fundraiser for the Republican Party, plans to shut down three factories in Canton and eliminate 1,300 jobs. But a lot harder when you are wrong and should know it. Wrong here means an accurate read of the economy s being on a slope, not in a wave. ********

Posted here Tuesday, May 18, 2004 at 9:54:09 AM     On oil reserves http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/18/business/18reserve.html Calls to Ease Gasoline Prices by Taking Oil From Reserve By EDMUND L. ANDREWS Published: May 18, 2004 ASHINGTON, May 17 - Congressional Democrats stepped up pressure Monday on the Bush administration to ease gasoline prices by releasing oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, but administration officials plan to keep adding to the reserve until some time next year. I would suspect that the idea is to release reserves in large quantitites in late summer and early fall to affect the election, not now when prices might come down and be going up again by october. ********

Posted here Tuesday, May 18, 2004 at 9:22:43 AM     Here is the proposed commentary on Stratfor. Please note copyright.     THE STRATFOR WEEKLY 17 May 2004   Iraq: New Strategies   By George Friedman   That said, extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures. We normally try to figure out what is going to happen, what other people are going to do -- whether they know it or not -- and explain the actions of others. At times, people confuse Stratfor's analysis for our political position. This time -- this once -- we will write for ourselves -- or more precisely, for myself, since at Stratfor our views on the war range even wider than those among the general public.   DC: this is strange. It would be good to see a longer discussion of “range”. But the logic is strange, if by general public is means in agregate, then it includes everybody, but if it means averages then of course it smooths out the very opinons that “range” refers to, seeming to claim that Stratfor has a broader range than the public.     The Mission   The United States' invasion of Iraq was not a great idea. Its only virtue was that it was the best available idea among a series of even worse ideas.   DC: this is the key assertion. Was there really no better idea? What will be the logic in the next paragraphs?   In the spring of 2003, the United States had no way to engage or defeat al Qaeda.   DC: wasn’t the search strategy in Afghanistan and attemtps in Pakistan making some progress? The attack on Iraq actually distracted the US from that effort and as we know some of the most talented and trained military were pulled from Afghanistan to Iraq.   The only way to achieve that was to force Saudi Arabia -- and lesser enabling countries such as Iran and Syria -- to change their policies on al Qaeda and crack down on its financial and logistical systems. In order to do that, the United States needed two things. First, it had to demonstrate its will and competence in waging war –   DC: was it not doing that in Afghanistan? If that had been done well, humane, reconstruction,, wouldn’t that have been a better approach, that would have gained legitimacy? At the same time to provide increasing support for Blix and the UN  inspectors. (we need to remember that only the presence of US troops, arriving in large numbers in Turkey for example – that got Saddham to allow the inspectors to return.)     something seriously doubted by many in the Islamic world and elsewhere. Second, it had to be in a position to threaten follow- on actions in the region.   DC: why? If we had called for a larger number of multi-lateral discussions and problem solving…   There were many drawbacks to the invasion, ranging from the need to occupy a large and complex country to the difficulty of gathering intelligence. Unlike many, we expected extended resistance in Iraq, although we did not expect the complexity of the guerrilla war that emerged. Moreover, we understood that the invasion would generate hostility toward the United States within the Islamic world, but we felt this would be compensated by dramatic shifts in the behavior of governments in the region. All of this has happened.   DC: not clear what “this” refers to. The troubles, or the apparently positive “shifts of behavior of the gvoernments… “what?   The essential point is that the invasion of Iraq was not and never should have been thought of as an end in itself. Iraq's only importance was its geographic location: It is the most strategically located country between the Mediterranean and the Hindu Kush. The United States needed it as a base of operations and a lever against the Saudis and others, but it had no interest -- or should have had no interest -- in the internal governance of Iraq.   DC: this is core piece of the logic, and rather different than anything in the public debate.   This is the critical point on which the mission became complex, and the worst conceivable thing in a military operation took place: mission creep.   DC: but wasn’t the crep bult in to the pub;ic statement s by the presdident and others about our goals in Iraq? If Stratfor is right on the reasons, they were not the public reasons. This means confusion, including by the troops.   Rather than focus on the follow-on operations that had to be undertaken against al Qaeda, the Bush administration created a new goal: the occupation and administration of Iraq by the United States, with most of the burden falling on the U.S. military.   DC: wouldn’t it have been legally mandated by international law that an occupying power must secure the society? The looting was the first sign that we had no plan and lost control.   More important, the United States also dismantled the Iraqi government bureaucracy and military under the principle that de-Baathification had to be accomplished. Over time, this evolved to a new mission: the creation of democracy in Iraq.   DC: the is a very strong assertion. Is it really true that the invaion began only with the remove saddham goal? How could the Bath party have been left in palce and still achieve what Statfor says was the real purpose: to create a foothol in iraq for future american operations?   Under the best of circumstances, this was not something the United States had the resources to achieve. Iraq is a complex and multi-layered society with many competing interests. The idea that the United States would be able to effectively preside over this society, shepherding it to democracy, was difficult to conceive even in the best of circumstances. Under the circumstances that began to emerge only days after the fall of Baghdad, it was an unachievable goal and an impossible mission.   DC: let’s see where this goes…       The creation of a viable democracy in the midst of a civil war, even if Iraqi society were amenable to copying American institutions, was an impossibility. The one thing that should have been learned in Vietnam was that the evolution of political institutions in the midst of a sustained guerrilla war is impossible.   DC: ok, agree.   The administration pursued this goal for a single reason: From the beginning, it consistently underestimated the Iraqis' capability to resist the United States. It underestimated the tenacity, courage and cleverness of the Sunni guerrillas. It underestimated the political sophistication of the Shiite leadership. It underestimated the forms of military and political resistance that would limit what the United States could achieve. In my view, the underestimation of the enemy in Iraq is the greatest failure of this administration, and the one for which the media rarely hold it accountable.   This miscalculation drew the U.S. Army into the two types of warfare for which it is least suited.   First, it drew the Army into the cities, where the work of reconstruction -- physical and political -- had to be carried out. Having dismantled Iraqi military and police institutions, the Army found itself in the role of policing the cities. This would have been difficult enough had there not been a guerrilla war. With a guerrilla war -- much of it concentrated in heavily urbanized areas and the roads connecting cities -- the Army found itself trapped in low-intensity urban warfare in which its technical advantages dissolved and the political consequences of successful counterattacks outweighed the value of defeating the guerrillas. Destroying three blocks of Baghdad to take out a guerrilla squad made military sense, but no political sense. The Army could neither act effectively nor withdraw.   Second, the Army was lured into counterinsurgency warfare. No subject has been studied more extensively by the U.S. Army, and no subject remains as opaque. The guerrilla seeks to embed himself among the general population. Distinguishing him is virtually impossible, particularly for a 20-year-old soldier or Marine who speaks not a word of the language nor understands the social cues that might guide him. In this circumstance, the soldier is simply a target, a casualty waiting to happen.   The usual solution is to raise an indigenous force to fight the guerrillas. The problem is that the most eager recruits for this force are the guerrillas themselves: They not only get great intelligence, but weapons, ammunition and three square meals a day. Sometimes, pre-existing militias are used, via a political arrangement. But these militias have very different agendas than those of the occupying force, and frequently maneuver the occupier into doing their job for them.   DC: all of which is to say, going into Iraq was a bad idea, which of course he said at the top of the article. But he asserts that there was a way to do it. Leave the bath party in control and let the civil war play out.   Strategies   The United States must begin by recognizing that it cannot possibly pacify Iraq with the force available or, for that matter, with a larger military force. It can continue to patrol, it can continue to question people, it can continue to take casualties. However, it can never permanently defeat the guerrilla forces in the Sunni triangle using this strategy. It certainly cannot displace the power and authority of the Shiite leadership in the south. Urban warfare and counterinsurgency in the Iraqi environment cannot be successful.   DC: OK.   This means the goal of reshaping Iraqi society is beyond the reach of the United States. Iraq is what it is. The United States, having performed the service of removing Saddam Hussein from power, cannot reshape a society that has millennia of layers. The attempt to do so will generate resistance -- while that resistance can be endured, it cannot be suppressed.   DC: OK. Although taking out Saddham required lots of destruction and disruption. Would it have been possible to simply let the Iraqis self organize to take on that mess? Seems impossible, including the politics of it, with the US disrupting the society and being blamed for the chaos that would result?   The United States must recall its original mission, which was to occupy Iraq in order to prosecute the war against al Qaeda.   DC: how can you occupy without taking responsibility?   If that mission is remembered, and the mission creep of reshaping Iraq forgotten, some obvious strategic solutions re-emerge. The first, and most important, is that the United States has no national interest in the nature of Iraqi government or society. DC: this seems to be a path that would never have gotten public support and congressional authorization. It also leaves out the WMD argument. Without that, what could have been the argument?   Wolfowitz (senate Defense committee) this morning. says the tolerance for occupation turns out to be less and the security issue more severe.     Except for not supporting al Qaeda, Iraq's government does not matter. Since the Iraqi Shia have an inherent aversion to Wahabbi al Qaeda, the political path on that is fairly clear.   The United States now cannot withdraw from Iraq. We can wonder about the wisdom of the invasion, but a withdrawal under pressure would be used by al Qaeda and radical Islamists as demonstration of their core point: that the United States is inherently weak and, like the Soviet Union, ripe for defeat. Having gone in, withdrawal in the near term is not an option.   DC: and yet it sounds like increasingly getting out is the emerging consensus – this week - .   That does not mean U.S. forces must be positioned in and near urban areas. There is a major repositioning under way to reduce the size of the U.S. presence in the cities, but there is, nevertheless, a more fundamental shift to be made. The United States undertook responsibility for security in Iraq after its invasion. It cannot carry out this mission. Therefore, it has to abandon the mission. Some might argue this would leave a vacuum. We would argue there already is a vacuum, filled only with American and coalition targets. It is not a question of creating anarchy; anarchy already exists. It is a question of whether the United States wishes to lose soldiers in an anarchic situation.   DC: yes, but how then can we remain in the remote areas if the Iraqi’s take back sovereignty?   The geography of Iraq provides a solution. The bulk of Iraq's population lives in the Tigris and Euphrates valleys. To the south and west of the Euphrates River, there is a vast and relatively uninhabited region of Iraq -- not very hospitable, but with less shooting than on the other side. The western half of Iraq borders Saudi Arabia and Syria, two of the countries about which the United States harbors the most concern. A withdrawal from the river basins would allow the United States to carry out its primary mission -- maintaining regional pressure -- without engaging in an impossible war. Moreover, in the Kurdish regions of the northeast, where U.S. Special Forces have operated for a very long time, U.S. forces could be based -- and supplied -- in order to maintain a presence on the Iranian border.   Iraq should then be encouraged to develop a Shiite-dominated government, the best guarantor against al Qaeda and the greatest incentive for the Iranians not to destabilize the situation. The fate of the Sunnis will rest in the deal they can negotiate with the Shia and Kurds -- and, as they say, that is their problem.   The United States could supply the forces in western and southern Iraq from Kuwait, without the fear that convoy routes would be cut in urban areas. In the relatively uninhabited regions, distinguishing guerrillas from rocks would be somewhat easier than distinguishing them from innocent bystanders. The force could, if it chose, execute a broad crescent around Iraq, touching all the borders but not the populations.   The Iraqi government might demand at some point that the United States withdraw, but they would have no way to impose their demand,   DC: so there would not be any honored sovereignty?   as they would if U.S. forces could continue to be picked off with improvised explosive devices and sniper fire. The geographical move would help to insulate U.S. forces from even this demand, assuming political arrangements could not be made. Certainly the land is inhospitable, and serious engineering and logistical efforts would be required to accommodate basing for large numbers of troops. However, large numbers of troops might not be necessary -- and the engineering and logistical problems certainly will not make headlines around the world.   Cutting Losses   Certainly, as a psychological matter, there is a retreat. The United States would be cutting losses. But it has no choice.   DC: So we would end up looking weaker but with a militarily defensible foothold? If we did, why bother?   It will not be able to defeat the insurgencies it faces without heavy casualties and creating chaos in Iraqi society. Moreover, a victory in this war would not provide the United States with anything that is in its national interest. Unless you are an ideologue -- which I am not -- who believes bringing American- style democracy to the world is a holy mission, it follows that the nature of the Iraqi government -- or chaos -- does not affect me.   DC: what of the possibility that it merge with Iran as a fundamentalist government with large oil revenues?   What does affect me is al Qaeda. Al Qaeda is trying to kill me. Countries such as Saudi Arabia permitted al Qaeda to flourish. The presence of a couple of U.S. armored divisions along the kingdom's northern border has been a very sobering thought. That pressure cannot be removed. Whatever chaos there is in Saudi Arabia, that is the key to breaking al Qaeda -- not Baghdad.   DC: if we don’t are about what government, why not have struck a deal with Saddham for a base and leave him in place? I ask not because I think this is a good idea, but because I don’t fully know why it might not have been far less destructive and costly and distracting?   The key to al Qaeda is in Riyadh and in Islamabad. DC: this seems right. I have for a long time said that the key issue is Pakistan, and a foothold in the ME *may* be a necessity. But if that is the source, wouldn’t some combination of economic fairness and multilateral approaches have been better? I do not believe that the state department/ defense department was smart enough to move a strategy of first Iraq, then Islamabad and Riyadh. And it leaves to the side the issues of oil, and Israel   The invasion of Iraq was a stepping-stone toward policy change in Riyadh, and it worked.   DC: I’ve no idea what “it worked” means. What changes in Riyadh?   The pressure must be maintained and now extended to Islamabad. However, the war was never about Baghdad,   DC: We were told it was about WMD, and about Saddham and regime change.   And certainly never about Al Fallujah and An Najaf.   DC: and isn’t it exactly that it was just these that smart knowledgeable people said would be the problem if we ran this war?   Muqtada al-Sadr's relationship to Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani and the makeup of the elders in Al Fallujah are matters of utter and absolute indifference to the United States. Getting drawn into those fights is in fact the quagmire -- a word we use carefully and deliberately.   But in the desert west and south of the Euphrates, the United States can carry out the real mission for which it came. And if the arc of responsibility extends along the Turkish frontier to Kurdistan, that is a manageable mission creep. The United States should not get out of Iraq. It must get out of Baghdad,   DC: this is the strategy. Would not the outcome in Baghdad be increased demands for the US to get out?   Al Fallujah, An Najaf and the other sinkholes into which the administration's policies have thrown U.S. soldiers.   Again, this differs from our normal analysis in offering policy prescriptions. This is, of course, a very high-level sketch of a solution to an extraordinarily complex situation. Nevertheless, sometimes the solution to complex situations is to simplify them.   DC: I do believe that the solution will be simple but it also might be stupid. Opening up the discussion can only help, and create the conditions for getting past this conundrum. His thinking suggests that the real issue was getting the capacity to keep a US military force in the ME for larger unspecified strategic reasons. He does specify al Queda as *the goal*. Could it really be as limited as that?   (c) 2004 Strategic Forecasting, Inc. All rights reserved.   http://www.stratfor.com   ********