Greg Sanders

2013-03-17 Walk to Dizengoff Fountain

After my airport misadventures, I took the train to Tel Aviv Center Station. I sat with a rather nice couple without much English and near a gentlemen who was fluent and piped in at the end. They ended up spotting me bus fare for fear that I wouldn't be able to change money in the station. There did end up being an ATM and I was able to make change easily enough, but I shall have to endeavor to return the favor for visiting tourists and work to pick up more than a smattering of Hebrew for my next visit. In a pinch, I think my initial instinct was right and I could have walked it, but it would have been a schlep with my luggage in tow. Tel Aviv doesn't have a subway or trolley system, but it's got a fair amount of bus support and is quite walkable and bikeable. I was also able to extend my international smart card collection, as both the rail service and the multiple bus companies do have a common card.

I arrived Sunday evening and after getting cleaned up and checking in with a few of Guy's friends and family, I tried to spend the evening in a manner he approved of. Namely, finding good local food (I also did some wandering around on foot; he may have preferred that I biked, but the local bikeshare didn't seem to cater to tourists). I was staying at the Mercure hotel, and the concierge recommended a lovely Italian restaurant near Dizengoff Fountain. My favorite part of the meal was an appetizer special with sardines and cheese in an oily herb sauce. From what I've heard, Tel Aviv is far too cosmopolitan to have a particular local cuisine, but there often seemed to be a local stamp on whatever I ate. Perhaps more important, outdoor seating was commonplace, taking full advantage of the local climate. I'd done café-style dining with Guy before, mostly at a Starbucks a few blocks away from the office and most recently at a po-boy joint, although on both occasions I remember being afflicted by ridiculous winds. Still worth it, but not nearly as common or appealing as in this coastal city.

The restaurant was near Dizengoff Fountain, which was in a small elevated square populated by a group of local musicians. The modernist appearance is fairly typical. As a city, Tel Aviv is not much over a century old, as compared to the multi-millennia history of Jaffa to the South. The relative newness of the city reminded me a bit of Hong Kong; perhaps the common British colonial heritage played a factor there. The rest of the night involved a leisurely, roundabout return to the hotel, uneventful aside from the surprise of seeing bats flying around a local park. I wasn't particularly bothered by insects this trip, so I may owe those flying mammals a debt of gratitude on that score.

 

2013-03-17 Arrival in Tel-Aviv and my experience with security screening

Ben Gurion Airport has a lovely, compact design: there's a central hub with a multistory fountain, an upper level for incoming flights, a lower level for departures, and a massive pair of ramps that flips incoming and outgoing as you enter/exit. Of course, depending on your demographics and/or stamps in your passport form such places as Egypt or Afghanistan, you'll probably be spending an hour waiting in a small partitioned off section of the customs area. As waiting rooms go, that area is pretty drab if not featureless: there's a television and few vending machines. As you'd probably expect, I was a standout and most of the people in that area likely had some sort of Arabic ancestry.

The security interview process for me was about what you'd expect. It took less than fifteen minutes, albeit with of a total wait of about an hour. The questions were varied but nothing that you wouldn't see on a U.S. security clearance plus a more detailed version of the usual customs question. I answered in my usual information dump style and my questioner seemed professional and made the connection to other people traveling for Guy's funeral. They also ended up not stamping my passport without my even requesting it, which will make my life easier should I travel to a few other countries in the future. A friend of mine wasn't so lucky and ended up wasting three hours, two interviews, and getting oddly insistent questions about Guy's cell phone number.

I hadn't actually discussed Israeli airport security much with Guy. That said, his general philosophy often involved using technology to mitigate the costs of conflict. I've got to imagine that were he designing the system, there would probably be some displays with estimated wait times and the like. He'd have made sure that travelers that get detained for an hour at least get accurate information on which baggage carrousel their luggage could be found at. Admittedly, the amount of time I wasted there was largely my fault; once I saw the length of the lost and found lines (picking the wrong one didn't help) I should have searched the rest of the terminal immediately. Lesson learned.

On the whole, I think the interview process does probably result in a greater marginal increase in security than much of the security theater in the U.S. Also, it makes a lot more sense as a first step than strip searches and the like. However, let's be straight for a minute. The idea that we need more selective security is typically a euphemism for just questioning Muslims in greater detail while leaving the rest of the population alone. I'm an international relations professional; if that gets me extra screening I've got no objection, but I'd feel differently if I had to wait an hour every time I traveled because of my ancestry. So while my interview experience (and not my friend's) might be a reasonable example and TSA security theater needs to be toned down, I wouldn't support moving the U.S. towards the Israeli model. That said, I have heard horror stories for foreign friends coming in through U.S. customs, so I don't consider our system an exemplar.

2013-03-17 From Frankfurt to Israel

I had a window seat for only one section of the trip, the journey from Frankfurt, Germany to Tel Aviv. The route traversed the Alps then went through southern central Europe before crossing into the Mediterranean at Greece. Supposedly I some of those pictures actually include Mount Olympus. I'd be able to describe more if I wasn't embarrassingly bad at geography for a international relations major. Next time I travel with a window seat, I think I may try for a small atlas so that I know what passes beneath me. Often on international flight there's a monitor on the seat in front to refer to, but that tends to be flights that are over water and not over land.

The arrival at Tel Aviv surprised me to an extent. I had talked to Guy about Tel Aviv before and Israel in general. However, in part because a lot of his time growing up was in Europe, I wasn't exactly sure what to expect. I knew Tel Aviv was an urbane modern coastal city, but I didn't have a feel for the surrounding countryside. I was surprised how green it was; perhaps that's just a legacy of my visit to Egypt and the typically sparse context of pilgrimage photographs. I shouldn't have been surprised, as the coastal plain of Israel is fertile and humid, hence "land of milk add honey." 

2013-03-17 Transiting through Frankfurt

Landing in a March snowstorm can always be a bit surprising if you aren't paying attention to the weather or the under plane video. I was in the aisle of the absolute last row, due to my last minute ticket purchase. This meant I actually felt a blast of fresh cold air when the flight attendant opened the back door of the plane a few times to consult with the ground crew.

I've been through Frankfurt airport once before that I remember, on a trip to or from Afghanistan for work. Its standout trait was the distance one had to travel to get from one terminal to another. That was true today as well as I schlepped from terminal Z to C which included a train ride that felt like it covered 20% of the distance at most. It feels like a more modern version of Midway's old layout, only more so. I suppose this is what comes of being a Lufthansa hub though the feeling of distance is likely magnified by similar looking corridors rather than grand halls. There's also always something dispiriting about the revelation that one will have to go through security a second time, but that's perhaps inevitable when one's final destination is Tel Aviv.

Cleverly, airport employees actually have Access to bicycles. I wonder if I'll ever see an airport with a bikeshare program or the like. Frankfurt could certainly use it. That said, endearingly T-Mobile does offer 30 minutes of free wifi, a fine trick for weaseling your way into my affections.

As I wait for my next bordering, I'm mostly left with regret that I didn't travel much with Guy. We did all go out to Monterey together, but via separate means. His expertise in Complexity and years in Europe would no doubt leave him with any number of insights into the design and function of a behemoth like Frankfurt terminal. There wasn't a single clear opportunity I missed, but I can't help but feel I've made a profound mistake somewhere in that I am only traveling to my friend's homeland after I can no longer enjoy his company on the journey.

Review: The Revisionists by Thomas Mullen

"You know what a president actually is?" he asked. "An unreliable narrator."
"Really." She sensed a speech coming.
"He's the one who tells us how it is, right? And we fall for it, we read along with his story and let him construct the reality around us. We want to be entertained, soothed. Until one day, we hit that certain chapter, right, an suddenly we see the light and realize, Holy s***, we've been lied to the whole time. Reality ain't like that all. His story was bulls***. But by then, it's too late. We've all been suckered, and we just have to follow along with his little plot."

The Revisionists is a quintessential D.C. novel, from the setting to the fact that whole acts' titles refer to jargon such as 'green badges' in reference to contractors. This fact may be remarkable, given the sci-fi framing of a story about a man sent back in time to ensure that the right calamities happen in order to ensure his future. However, as Moti notes in his review, they don't really clash. I suppose D.C. takes all sorts from all places, so why should the future be any different?

The book tells the story of four characters, the aforementioned time traveler, an Indonesian maid, a lawyer who recently lost her brother in the wars, and a former spook now working for the aforementioned contractors. The first act, before they really become enmeshed in one another's stories, is somewhat slow going, leavened by the sci-fi storyline. Once they start interacting and complicating one another's lives by trying to do the right thing in a compromised way, the story kicks into gear. The characters all face alienation and come to realize that they aren't quite as clever as they think they are, but the book doesn't counsel despair so much as the realization that hard choices are not so easily dodged.

I think a real strength of the book is that it actually grapples with last decade as lived by many middle-class D.C. types. This isn't a war novel so much as a homefront novel, as the lawyer's loss of her brother draws her into becoming a whistleblower and the former intelligence agent recounts the story of how he was drawn into the national security apparatus because he found the world common to many literary novels to be unreal. This is a world of moderates making questionable decisions and leftists that are so far out of the system to be ineffective, with little middle ground. While the prose didn't always have me enraptured, I enjoyed the match between the conflicting viewpoints and think the story managed to be unblinking without being merely cynical.

I liked the ending more than Moti, although we both interpret a key ambiguity of the book in the same way. My only notable critique is that I think the decision to go with a possible tech transfer to North Korea as a key plot element was a mistake. The DPRK model is one with no appeal outside their borders; they offer neither freedom, nor growth, nor an appealing market for sales. I could see going with the PRC in the relevant role or an authoritarian ally of the U.S.  Not every element of the North Korean plotline was bad; one dark chapter told a story coming out of the DPRK that definitely added to the book. But I think their involvement undermined the believability of the villains as it makes them not just evil but also quite foolish.

Source: Moti, thanks Moti!

This blog favors voting for Obama and moving to a primarily criminal-justice/intelligence approach to anti-terrorism efforts

On my Google Reader feed, I’ve recently noted my agreement with voting for the Obama administration even if you have a variety of legitimate critiques against them on foreign policy militancy or war on drugs grounds.

Four quick reasons: the President has respected our status of forces agreement with Iraq and withdrawn from that nation, the President opposes waterboarding and Gov. Romney does not, the President is far less likely to launch and ill-advised strike against Iran, and on domestic policy grounds while Obamacare, which Gov. Romney has promised to gut, needs to go much further it is still the greatest advancement of the U.S. social safety net since the sixties. On top of this, I’d add that I am unaware of any civil rights issue on which the Republican candidate is better than the President.

Nonetheless, this should not to be taken as a statement of support for our drone bombing campaigns in Pakistan and Yemen. Similarly, I’d favor working out a status of forces agreement that could pass muster in the Afghan parliament, and if that means accelerating our withdrawal or reducing the amount we operate outside of bases before that withdrawal, so be it. Obviously, there are many on the left that are more vehement on these issues and I respect that. I’d encourage the American citizens among them them to vote for the President, eyes wide open, but I respect if they wish to criticize U.S. policies and withhold/retarget money/labor from campaigns as a means of applying pressure. The lesser of two evils argument just applies to voting, trying to use it to squash reasonable foreign policy criticisms is illiberal.

Towards that end, here’s a Kevin Drum post on some of the civilian deaths that inspire that criticism. He calls attention to one particular poor practice that is escalating the number of these casualties.

It appears that drone activity has declined in 2012, although that may be an artifact of the time it takes to gather data. Aside from the raw numbers, though, Glenn draws particular attention to this passage from the report:

The US practice of striking one area multiple times, and evidence that it has killed rescuers, makes both community members and humanitarian workers afraid or unwilling to assist injured victims. Some community members shy away from gathering in groups, including important tribal dispute-resolution bodies, out of fear that they may attract the attention of drone operators. Some parents choose to keep their children home, and children injured or traumatized by strikes have dropped out of school. Waziris told our researchers that the strikes have undermined cultural and religious practices related to burial, and made family members afraid to attend funerals.

…There's no question that fighting a counterinsurgency is hard. And it's fundamentally different from fighting a conventional war because it's difficult to separate militants from civilians — something that insurgents explicitly count on. But even if you accept drone strikes as a legitimate part of counterinsurgency, and even if you accept that civilian casualties are an inevitable part of that, "double tap" strikes are simply heinous. They're also far more likely to turn the indigenous population against you, which makes them counterproductive as well as immoral. After all, it's not as if top al-Qaeda leaders are the ones likely to be conducting rescue operations. At best, you might get a few foot soldiers but nothing more.

Again, the whole post is well worth reading and brings more data to bear (go to Greenwalt or the recent drone report for even more). So I support dropping the ‘double tap’ strike immediately and moving away from a war model. Obviously, the criminal justice model failed to prevent 9/11, but the best response there is to improve the model rather than adopt a military one. The initial military approach cost more American lives, let alone hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, than were lost to Al Qaeda. The drone war approach does have far fewer deaths associated with it than the occupation approach, but Osama Bin Laden is dead, al Qaeda is not the force it once was, and it’s time to end our wars. As Drum notes this is hardly a popular position, but it is not going to get more popular unless we talk about it.

Usual caveat, speaking for myself, and not my employer.

What’s an anti-interventionist liberal’s alternative to Paul?

Over at L'Hôte, Freddie argues that the argument over Rep. Ron Paul’s weaknesses has been used as a distraction from the larger critique of American interventions. Robert Farley pushes back some on the specific Indonesian example Freddie raises. While I’m generally anti-occupation I’m not an anti-interventionist, but I think it’s important to keep them part of the discussion.

I’d first like to note a point of disagreement with the post.

Left wing politicians like Bernie Sanders and Dennis Kucinich have embraced discussion of foreign policy and civil liberties, and for their trouble they have been dismissed as unserious by the self-same progressives who now dismiss Ron Paul's ideas…

I do think Rep. Kucinich does tend to be dismissed, but I don't think discussing Sen. Sanders (no relation) is taboo. Ezra Klein interviewed him in August of 2011. Admittedly Klein interviews many politicians, but in May of 2011 he posted video of Sen. Sanders smacking down Sen. Rand Paul. In June of 2011 Klein argued that the moderation of Sen. Sanders proposals, compared to Republican extremism, shows that the national debate is imbalanced. The Senator from Vermont appears to appreciate Klein's work and cited him from the floor of the Senate in June(Source: Fishbowl D.C.). Now that’s just Ezra Klein and is in a domestic context, so perhaps the specific objection is that Sen. Sanders foreign policy views aren’t really discussed.

That objection aside, the question Freddie raises at the end is well worth addressing:

I want those who profess belief in liberalism and egalitarianism to recognize that they are failing those principles every time they ignore our conduct overseas, or ridicule those who criticize it. What I will settle for is an answer to the question: what would they have us do? If you can't find it in you to accept our premises, at least consider what you would do if you did. For those of us who oppose our country's destructive behavior, there is no place to turn that does not result in ridicule…

I think the solution is primary challenges for members of Congress. Matt Yglesias and Freddie have disagreed about this point before but I think the key argument for congressional challenges is that they have a proven track record. The various conservative groups that now make up the Tea Party make regular use of primary challenges and have been rewarded with increasing ideological consistency in Republican Party.

This isn’t to say they haven’t overreached and cost the Republican party seats, it’s a tactic with clear limits. However, I think the experience on the Republican side, see the 1992 election, also indicates that Congressional challenges are far less likely to backfire than Presidential ones. Working on getting state government elected officials is generally a good idea but obviously isn’t that helpful for shifting foreign policy.

I think clear and enforceable red lines are another fairly effective technique. This means picking certain issues where disagreeing with your group means denial of funding or even actively supporting a replacement candidate. Part of the reason there’s such strong pushback against Rep. Paul is that he impressively manages to violate the redlines of almost every member of the liberal coalition. In the 2008 election, I’d say the anti-interventionist made fairly effective use of support for the Iraq war as a redline issue which is part of what got President Obama the nomination. I think that electoral effort deserves part of the credit for the fact that we’re did comply with our treaties and withdrawal the U.S. military (if not contractors) from Iraq.

This is actually an area where a fair amount of popular support is potentially available as both the war in Iraq and in Afghanistan lost popular support well before they lost elite support. Dan Drezner has argued that realism rather than liberal internationalism has more support among the American populace. To be sure, realism is not primarily concerned with preventing U.S. complicity in overseas violence but it is fairly consistently anti-interventionist in a way that does check liberal and neocon hawkery. I’d advise finding one or two policy statements that have support from a strong majority or vehement plurality in a fair number of states or Congressional districts. The anti-war movement probably doesn’t have the clout to raise their own challengers, but such criteria, if publicly applied, could help leverage existing resources by targeting them all at one race.

I think it would also be fair to withhold funding from any candidates, including President Obama, that violate your redlines. While I do have some strong objections to some of President Obama’s actions on civil liberties and foreign policy, I’m still willing to donate to him. However, I think redirecting donations of time or money away from a sitting Presidential candidate, even in a tough race, is a perfectly valid tactic for anti-interventionists. We all have to pick priorities.

Celebrating the end of the Iraq War

Mixed feelings are the common response to the news that the United States has completed the terms of our treaty and withdrawn from Iraq. That is appropriate; there is substantial uncertainty about Iraq's future and there is a level of ongoing violence that belies the term peace.

However, I would argue that celebration is also appropriate. I'm glad that we were able to end ahead of schedule giving the recently deployed a chance to celebrate the holidays at their home. The withdrawal completes a process of de-escalation that first saw troops pulled out of Iraqi cities and then out of the country entirely. As one might expect, this process involved steady declines in the level of violence directly precipitated by the U.S. occupation. While there are still Americans in Iraq who will maintain our relationship with that country and at times be in harm's way, the withdrawal is no illusion; the change has been significant and I suspect any attempts to reverse it would be politically disastrous.

There are those that argue that while this may prove temporarily good news for us, it will come at Iraq's or ultimately our expense. I would counter with my second reason to celebrate: we chose to respect the will of the Iraqi people as expressed through their nascent, troubled, and yet still somewhat democratic institutions. To the right, you can see the parliamentary vote on the Status of Forces Agreement that set our deadline for departure, an agreement that had been negotiated under President Bush. The abstentions are certainly troubling, but I have seen no evidence that they, let alone the Sadrist-dominated no voters, favored a less restrictive agreement. After we returned sovereignty to the Iraqi government they are without question the competent authority under just war theory to determine whether America's involvement should continue. They decided it should not, at least not under conditions acceptable to the U.S. government. Arguments about whether we could achieve a better result by staying longer should only come into play after answering the question about whether we have the authority to stay.

Thus while there are many to mourn, an overabundance of regrets, and a widespread sentiment that the war was a mistake, I would argue that we should celebrate its end. The return home of our troops, the reduction of violence that we're participating in, and the triumph of treaty law in dictating the timeline are all outcomes worth celebrating.

As ever, I speak for myself and not my employer.

Happy Independence Day

I've seen a few comics commenting on the oddity of the date, putting it at the start of the war and noting that it was still a premise and not a realized concept as of July 4th, 1776. I think the former is wrong, as the war had already started by the time of the declaration. The latter misses the point for humorous effect. The success of the Revolutionary war was critical for the U.S., of course. However, it was the principles of the Declaration of Independence, a document that was addressed to a global audience and that has proven a template for subsequent revolutions, that was truly important. While not flawless, I would even say that it would be the founding document most worth of celebration in its original form.

Now, for a song selection inspired by the Capital 4th fireworks tonight. Sadly the Takoma Park ones I'd meant to attend were scuttled by light rain.

Finally, happy second anniversary, Kate.

Back from Afghanistan

I got back yesterday. It's been quite a research trip, but not the sort I can write up as the interviews were for work and were not for attribution. I think I understand some of the fundamentals of Afghanistan a bit better now but had no dramatic revelations. 7 or 8 days in country does not make one a regionalist or an expert in the war.

I'll save any further thoughts until tomorrow, after President's announcement tonight on withdrawal.

4-19-2011 The journey to the valley of the kings and a question of legacy

Our next day began early for we were traveling to the desert. Going to the west, by bridge rather than boat this time, the journey was pleasingly augmented by views of hot air balloons. This is a popular area for ballooning as the sheer number of temples, tombs, and monuments means that you'll should have something to see whichever way the winds take you. That said, apparently the military used to get annoyed at certain balloon paths.

The desert makes quite a contrast after traveling through a mix of farms. The sudden change doesn't feel familiar to me at all, despite having spent some time in America's southwest. It may have something to do with the density of the Nile valley. In either a geographic or population sense, there's not room for settlements to slowly peter out.

I'll save a discussion of the valley of the kings itself for a future post, one that sadly will be bereft of pictures for historical preservation reasons. The sheer amount of history was fairly shocking, there hills at times seemed honeycombed with remnants of ancient Egypt.  We even saw some settlements that were displayed by the government due to the inhabitants penchant for selling artifacts they discovered under their houses. There does seem to be a great number of sites where the government merely attempts to preserve and not study. Some of that is likely a sensible approach; Egypt has millennia of legacy and when rising dam waters aren't a threat there's no great rush.

All this does raise the question of how much of Egypt's legend is a result of  its standing in the ancient world versus the preservative nature of the desert sands. I suspect it varies from era to era, but many of the sites we saw would be notable in most any era. On the other hand, perhaps the continuity between Egypt's Old Kingdom, Middle Kingdom, and New Kingdom were in part a side effect of the desert.  The Roman empire might provide a way to test that hypothesis: is there a correlation between a preservative climate and the survival of Roman engineering? If so, did areas with such a climate maintain more Roman heritage during the dark ages? Under this theory, the desert did not lead to Egypt's greatness; it led to its continuity as one civilization rather than three.

Back to urban life in Luxor 2011-04-18

After crossing the Nile to return from our rural west bank adventures, we had some free time in Luxor city. We decided to take a walk up to the promenade. This was probably a mistake, the walk itself was alright, but involved constantly turning down various carriage drivers. My guide and guide book both agreed to be careful with such rides, as drivers were known to take passengers away from the tourist area and then charge more to give the trip back. Nonetheless, taxis aren't a problem and they may have gotten us past the gauntlet to enjoy a more leisurely walk in the city center. That said, some of our fellow travelers walked the same route without incident, so perhaps it was something in the way we carried ourselves.

On the trip back, we paralleled our route one block away from the main street. This made all the difference in the world, Luxor is dense but it's no Cairo and the side streets on a workday are neither vacant nor bustling. The people we saw weren't looking to sell us things, they were just moving around their neighborhood, running errands, and the like. I don't travel in a search for authenticity, but I do enjoy seeing parts of other countries that aren't there to cater to me or sell me things. Of course, the incentives for vendors are particularly strong in the developing world: the ratio of per capita GDPs between the U.S. and Egypt 47,400 to 6,200. However, as we'd see in more detail in future days, Luxor, ancient capital of upper Egypt, is more than just a tourist town and has a pleasantly different character when you get oft the main strip.

A seamstress shop in West Luxor 2011-04-18

In Egypt I was fairly consistently surprised by the high percentage of men in fields that are balanced or dominated by women in the States. Service industry jobs like clerks, maids, wait staff, and the like were disproportionately likely to be male. I think this can be fairly directly traced to low rates of labor participation by females and the high unemployment rate for men. The chart below is from the Population Council and while the labor participation rate increases for men as they age it stays low for women. I found the study via the viable opposition blog, it has a lot of other good demographic information.

 

The trip’s tour company, does charitable work in Egypt through the Grand Circle foundation and took us to see a seamstress shop that they’d provided with some start up capital and sewing machines. The hire widows, unmarried women, and other females who have insufficient other means of support. The west bank of Luxor is some mix of Rural and Urban Upper Egypt and as the chart above shows, women generally don’t find a lot of opportunities to work.

The woman in charge described how they try to reinforce the economic opportunities with education. The workers are told of the benefits of birth control, delaying one’s first child, and of spacing out children. The workers then tell their families and friends in an attempt to leverage the work in the larger community. They claim fairly dramatic success which would suggest that the high rural birth rate is driven in good part by ignorance of family planning methods rather than directly by cultural or religious pressures. This seems consistent with a Rand study by Mona Khalifa, Julie DaVanzo, and David M. Adamson. In the chart space refers to time between pregnancy and limit refers to restricting overall family size. I’d expect the west bank near Luxor to be one of the more prosperous parts of rural upper Egypt, but even so the need for family planning services is striking.

We picked up a few items in the shop and didn’t get a great deal on them, but I’ll skip the bargaining practicum as this is the sort of thing I’m willing to pay a premium to support.

Death of Bin Laden

President Obama’s statement that he was not a Muslim leader but a mass murder of Muslims is accurate. While there hasn’t an attack on the same scale in the U.S. since 9/11, Al Qaeda affiliates have been directly targeted civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as other predominantly Muslim countries like Indonesia. Prior to 9/11 he plotted the death of hundreds in Kenya. His death provides a measure of justice for New York, for America as a whole, and for the world.

The location of his death seems pivotal. As Peter Baker, Helene Cooper, and Mark Mazzetti report: “When the end came for Bin Laden, he was found not in the remote tribal areas along the Pakistani-Afghan border where he has long been presumed to be sheltered, but in a massive compound about an hour’s drive north from the Pakistani capital of Islamabad. He was hiding in the medium-sized city of Abbottabad, home to a large Pakistani military base and a military academy of the Pakistani Army.”

The war in Afghanistan drove Bin Laden out, but this operation hinged on our intelligence in and relationship with Pakistan and not our occupation of Afghanistan. Even more important, there has been a move towards self-determination in the Middle East that is more consequential to the future of that region than our ongoing military operations, even if you credit operations in Libya with helping to sustain that momentum. I would agree with Yglesias, now is an excellent time to declare victory and change our strategy towards Afghanistan. Specifically bringing our people home in significant numbers before the year is out and working out a status of forces agreement to govern our future relationship.

Anyone who goes by "the great" is an egomaniac 2011-04-18

Ramses the II, or Ramses the Great, was a successful conqueror who guaranteed his place in history by the incredible measures he took to ensure that he could not be forgotten. This is shown all over Egypt, but for the moment it makes a good way to introduce his work in Luxor temple. He built and expanded temples, but he also made sure that he laid claim to older sites and statues by having his name, in hieroglyphic cartouche format, over that of prior rulers. Rejecting the sentiment of "turnabout is fair play" he then commanded that his cartouche be chiseled incredibly deeply into the stone, to ensure that such a rewrite could not happen to him.

Statues of Ramses II guard the entrance to Luxor temple, and he never seems happy to have just one statue of himself when he could build two or four. That said, the pharaoh may defend himself by noting that statues do fall down and their faces all too often are eroded, which is all the more reason to make backups. At least the statues didn't always have the same pose, he would sometimes change his headdress or even his height between statues. This also happened when depicting the gods, and I suppose this reflected different aspects of himself or just was meant to keep things visually interesting.  However, we don't really see any Ramses at leisure, Ramses making a silly face, or the like.

Perhaps the least charming aspect of Egyptian temples is their tendency to depict chains of captured or beheaded foes, the pharaohs beating down enemies with their maces, or a sitting depiction of the pharaohs stepping on various rivals. As a testament to the range of peoples on Egypt's borders, these enemies tend to come in at least two ethnicities shown to the left and right. In this particular display each enemy had a cartouche with the name of the captured city, like a conquest tracking info-graphic out of the game Civilization. If I ever find an image of a bunch of these little guys pulling down the overarching figure of the king, I will snap it up in a second.

Addendum on farmland in Egypt [2011-04-18]

I spoke with our tour guide more today to nail down some uncertainties about land ownership in Egypt. She said more than 60% of the arable land is under government ownership, and that the farmers who work the land pay rent in taxes or in kind. The government does often want to claim the land for other purposes, but it sounds like the farmers successfully resist in a fair number of cases. I just saw today (April, 27) one notable example of successful resistance in the middle of Cairo. What's more, when land is seized it is reimbursed with other land. The replacement will likely be of lower quality, but that sounds like a hedge against lowballing and as a side effect slows the standard developmental transition from being a rural country to an urban one.

On the whole, these policies sound like a hedge against absolute poverty but that may also lock-in farmers. That lock-in could become a problem should urban unemployment decrease. Apparently the new government's agenda includes transitioning land from government to farmer ownership and renewed irrigation projects. Given the level of backlash against some of Mubarak's privatization policies, I'd suspect that any such steps would be pursued rather gingerly. Apparently achieving wheat self-sufficiency is also being discussed as a policy goal. I don't recall reading even liberal economist talking up self-sufficiency as a goal, but it may be a proxy for moving from subsistence farming towards a higher productivity agriculture. As an example, there's a narrow-gage railway in West Luxor for moving sugar cane which suggests that it is, or at least was, a crop that could be sold at market. I suspect that agriculture reform paired with the urban unemployment problem, will be the key tests for the upcoming democratically elected government.

Next: Luxor temple. That involve going out of chronological order, but I figure what readers I have left may be sick of farm talk.

A limited look at land distribution in Egypt 2010-04-18

The farm we visited on the banks of the Nile hadn't existed more than half a century ago. This may seem odd, Egypt is one of the world's oldest civilizations and since the beginning it has been centered around the Nile. However, until the building of the Aswan high dam, the great river's flooding was uncontrolled. When we later visited the dam, I learned that it had increased Egypt's arable land by some 30%.

When the land became safely available, Ahmed's family had claimed a small portion of it. As I understand it, West Luxor has any number of similar claims for 4-5 acres with nebulous ownership status. Denial of electricity in some cases aside, the farmers are allowed to keep their land but it wouldn't officially be there property. From what I've read elsewhere, this is important as it would mean that the land wouldn't be part of the official economy and thus couldn't easily be loaned against or sold. This, in combination with unemployment in the cities, would give farmers a reason to prefer subsistence agriculture to many alternatives.

I don't have a clear sense of whether the middle class farm we visited was representative. We did often drive by fields that were far greater than half a dozen acres. However, I'm told that in many cases the expanses are subdivided into any number of smaller farms. Thus the dam and land policy seems to effective guarantee an opportunity to earn a livelihood for some farmers, weather allowing. 

All that said, as Ahmed was the first to acknowledge, the 30% gain in arable land was not without a price. First off, there's an opportunity cost in losing the economics of scale from larger farms. More important is a legacy I'll discuss when we get to Aswan: building the dam meant that tens of thousands of Nubians were relocated from the banks of what became Lake Nasser. The human toll was supplemented by other environmental impacts such as the denial of rich silt and a raising of the water tables.

Subsistence farming: not just for the Egyptian lower classes 2011-04-18

When I think of reasonably successful farmers, I normally assume that they'd be selling their farm goods at market. However, our host Ahmed was a subsistence farmer in the Egyptian middle class. The 4-5 acres he was cultivating was aimed at feeding his twenty-some person extended family household. As you'd expect, this involved any number of ingenious techniques for making a range of products. For example, on the right is more than a dozen loafs of sun bread. While they do have an oven, the climate gives them the ability to get a fair amount of their baking done by just leaving the dough out. The end product is fine, not the best bread you've ever tasted, but it could work well combined with a good dip. The ingenious part is the baking 'stones' which are a reprocessed version of a common material that merchants are happy to give away with a purchase: egg cartoons.

Avoiding the market involves using a fair number of hand made tools, some of which are passed down through the generations. For one example, see the grindstone the family uses. While the weight is fairly daunting, the end of the video shows that even a child could operate it once you overcome the static friction when it is at rest. From what Ahmed said, not every farm has such a tool, others from the village come by to use it. I suspect that there is some in-kind trading involved as various households allow others in the village to take advantage of their specialty tools.

Manually operated grinding wheel.

Finally, those that read the last entry may be asking: so how did they afford new lights and a washing machine? The answer is that instead of selling food they use surplus labor to produce handcrafted furniture. The techniques involved in creating the wooden furniture were easily demonstrated but effective. Holes were bored with hand crafted tools and attachments made by exploiting the natural expansive properties of wood. The final pieces were great to sit on and quite attractive and I'm guessing could be sold at a much higher margin than agricultural goods. Obviously the family were good savers, reserving money for major purchases like an appliance or a trip to Mecca for Ahmed's mother. I think the key enabling factor is the small size and wide distribution of the farms, which I'll discuss in a future entry.

[Minor update: I've decided to mention Ahmed by name.]

Practical impact of the Egyptian revolution [on a farmer] 2011-04-18

Being in country for only a few weeks, let alone on a tourist trip, is regularly disparaged as a means of gaining in country knowledge. However, while hardly science, it still is a means of augmenting knowledge about a country. In this case, Overseas Adventure Travel includes a few interviews with admittedly a rather biased sample: a farmer in Luxor, a dinner with an Arab family in east Aswan, and a visit with a Nubian family in west Aswan.

Our talk with a middle class farmer was quite illuminating, his English was excellent and based on the answers he gave to our group he seemed both willing to speak honestly about his life and wise enough to see beyond his immediate situation. Like everyone else we've spoken to on the issue, he strongly favored the revolution. There wasn't much in the way of protests in west Luxor, based on what he said, but citizens did gather downtown to watch the news and cheer on the protesters.

The most immediate impact on their lives is that their farm now has electricity. That was a fairly shocking rate of progress until he explained the reason: the Mubarak government hadn't been extending electricity to parts of west Luxor in hopes that the farmers would move, which would free up more land for development. Based on this anecdotal evidence, it seems as if the difference between west and east Luxor may be the result of political battles rather than special traits of the Nile or a lack of bridges. However, that policy has now been reversed and electricity has reached the farm. This seems to be a fairly straightforward case of popular accountability sweeping away low-benefit unpopular policies. I have no idea what development approach would be best for Luxor in the long term, but I do think the high unemployment rate in Egypt shows the limitation of resort oriented development. In the meantime, I'm glad electricity has arrived to this farm and with it not television, but a washing machine (my mother noted that particularly delivery), which should greatly change how the females of the household spend their busy days.

What a difference the Nile makes: East vs. West Luxor 2011-04-18

As much as I enjoyed the trip to the Egyptian Museum, I really started to feel like I was in Egypt on the first day in Luxor. We boating over the Nile, visited with a middle class farmer, and walked the streets to a business that empowers local women, and enjoyed the view from a rooftop restaurant. I'll post on each of those in turn, but first the journey to the west and back. As a bit of context, ancient Egypt's cities were on the east bank of the Nile while the tombs were on the West side. Our guide has told us that this belief resulted from the path of the sun which when it sets in the west travels through the underworld to return to the East. While the Nile runs the length of the country there are only twenty some bridges and between Luxor and Aswan the two sides were often quite distinct from one another at times almost seeming like different countries.

Luxor proper is a city with a tourist district along the water with continuing density, five story plus buildings and the like, further in. By comparison, we spoke to a farmer directly on the west bank of the Nile and he didn't really consider himself a resident of the city. There are towns and some reasonably tall buildings amid the west bank farms, but I'm told that most of them are multi-generational extended family dwellings. [The picture to the left is of a few such buildings in West Luxor]. Population growth is fairly high here, 2-3 children for middle class farmers but 5-6 for poor ones, and from what I'm told that's driving most of the construction. Due to this growth, upper levels of buildings are often left intentionally unfinished, with rebar showing. This allows for adding more floors when finances allow or family size demands expansion. This didn't seem as common in the center of west bank towns, I would guess that this may be a somewhat recent trend.

[Update: I changed the post date to properly position it chronologically.]

I'm still figuring out the character of Cairo 2011-04-17

The streets themselves kept my interest but although I didn't get any sort of big picture feel for Cairo. That may change once I've walked around some, I think navigating and recognizing neighborhoods is key to learning the character of a city. Of course, major planned features like D.C.'s mall, New York's central park, or the lakefront in Chicago give an easy point of reference that speed the process. Rivers like the Nile help, but rivers are a defining feature for so many cities that even with giant papyrus themed towers aren't quite enough to do the trick.

That said, I am shallow enough to be charmed by statues wearing fezzes without know the details of who is being depicted. This particular one also has an interesting pose. There's some sort of stand behind him and it looks like he's rested an overcoat on it. I tend to be a fan of simplifying styles, but there's something about including the right unnecessary detail that can really make a piece for me.

The streets of downtown Cairo [2011-04-17]

Mixed use is the rule, cars and buses share the streets with pedestrians. Our guide pointed out that the mix varies from neighborhood to neighborhood with richer areas like Heliopolis being more automotive and downtown having more buses pedestrians and donkeys. Bicycling doesn't seem aren't here, but I did see rental places in Luxor. The use of donkeys isn't driven by the price of gas, which is highly subsidized, but instead by the price of new cars. This can also be seen in the age of many of the automobiles.

I normally prefer not to drive in cities, and that preference would be quite vehement in Cairo. Instead, on our return, we'll be ticking to the Metro system and we've gotten confirmation that we will be staying downtown rather than off isolated by the pyramids or the airport. I wonder if they have a smart card to add to my collection. Presumably not, I'll have to research that back at the hotel.

Passing through Tahrir Square 2011-04-17

Our trip to the Egyptian Museum took us through Tahrir Square twice, due to confusion about which entrance to use. The boundaries were a bit ambiguous: square is more of a figurative term, it is quite active, and there's multiple entrances. That final attribute and its centrality made it a hard-to-cordon-off gathering place. There were also any number of large buildings bordering the area which provide easy roosts for cameras and snipers.

However, that Sunday, it just seemed to be the  vital center for the city's infrastructure, under construction but not revolutionary. As the news accounts have covered, the big protest day was Friday, which corresponds with Islamic services and, as a result, the main day off in Egypt. The prior week's protest had been preempted by the arrest of Mubarak, and I'm told that later this week the long standing and long hated emergency law was finally lifted. I don't know the status of the remaining political prisoners, since I've actually been catching less Egyptian news here than when I was home, but I suspect this should be a fairly effective sign of progress toward a more stable society.

The main exception to a typical city center square was the building that ha been the former home of Mubarak's National Democratic Party which went up in flames after the revolution started. Last I heard, there hasn't been any attribution of responsibility on that one, although the popular theory is that it was self-inflicted to destroy records. I've got no particular insight on that score, but I am rather curious what will happen to the building. It borders the Nile and is visible from the square, an it is obviously on a prime piece of real estate. I suspect whatever happens with the building, it will be a symbol of the larger fortunes of the party. Supposedly, this party has more of a chance in the upcoming elections as they're to be held in only six months.  With the exception of the Muslim Brotherhood, no other group has existing campaign infrastructure. However, that doesn't accord with what I've heard from some of the locals.

Bargaining Practicum: Cairo [2011-04-16-17]

By the end of my trip to China, I was starting to pick up the ability to walk away. That was a skill I put to use with mixed success in Cairo. On the first day, we were stuck way out of town and our guide mentioned hitting a local mall as something to do within free time. I checked with the travel service at the desk about getting a ride their and back and their price was nowhere close to the $4-5 each way that my guide had mentioned. I got them down from 300 (~$50) Egyptian to 150 Egyptian (~$25) and was offering 100 Egyptian ($17) which was probably still too high but an acceptable markup for something to do. They told me to go talk to the taxis outside, and we failed to reach an agreement.

I'm fairly satisfied with that outcome, although my counter price should have been lower. I think they also may just honestly charge more than my guide thought when it comes to the pickup on the way back. I ended up swimming a bit, prepping my room, and checking out the hotel instead. I also exploited my two paid for meals and skipped getting a lunch. In the Cairo section, I actually overdid it a bit on the free food. By the time I left I was better knew my limits.

I did no other shopping of note in Cairo, sadly my subsequent bargaining experience have been les impressive.

Welcome to Free Egypt [2011-04-16]

The flight was a smooth one and the terminal appears to be quite new. The initial heat, sandstone style, Arabic, and other design elements all announce the location, but otherwise this seems like a standard word class terminal. Many of the people on the tour came over on this flight, which was a rather different experience than my arrival in Hong Kong a day before my tour in China. I suppose it isn't surprising that airports may become one of the more cosmopolitan and universal parts of world culture, although of course only to those who fly which excludes a large portion of the world's population. As I quickly learned, airport hotels are another area of similarity. The Iberotel has an all in one resort quality that reminds me of some time shares I've seen and includes both a Chinese and an Italian restaurant. That said, it does have its charms in the form of large stained glass windowss and some eat room art.

In any event, our next meeting is four hours away, so I may try to do some quick local exploring under the guidance of our guide. She gave the title to this particular post as its her first post-revolutionary tour. I must say, that was fairly exciting to hear. While I did speak to some friend Egyptians and Egyptian-Americans on the plane ride, that was the first time I actually have really heard commentary on the revolution directly from a local. That has a rather different feel than watching it on television or reading updates from twitter.

Underway to Egypt [2011-04-15/16]

As I write this our Egyptian Air flight is passing south of Barrington en route to Cairo. I'd flown up to JFK, which had a nicer terminal than I expected and an unusual system of check-in desks at terminal four that seemed geared handling large numbers of passengers and easy reassignment of airline slots. As expected, I had to leave and re-enter through security which seems unnecessary but I did enjoy riding the air train between the terminals.

I believe I've managed to pack everything I need, about twenty-five pounds worth in my main bag and fifteen in my backpack, a good portion of that being my laptop. I would have liked to have done a more research on Egypt prior to the trip, although my obsessive following of the recent revolution means I know a reasonable amount about the present situation.

Reading the complimentary copy of the Daily News Egypt does bring home Egypt's status as a country that recently went through a revolution. In the day's news: eight of twenty six governors were fired, former President Mubarak remains detained for questioning despite claims of health issues, the treatment of 35 detained protesters is debated and a range of tycoons and former government leaders find their financial dealings investigated or their ability to leave the country denied. Critically though, it's a state more thrilling than frightening, the future is still unclear but disputes are of critical importance but appear to be handled through political and judicial venues. There's still much to be settled, but there's always something cheering about legal consequences for those once above the law.

While it's doubtless provincial to say so, I'm still impressed by international flights. The Spartan outlook of Southwest, my domestic carrier of choice, means that the TV screens, meals, and excellent features like under-seat outlets still strike me as extraordinary. We got a nice bag of freebies including a practical items like a toothbrush and toothpaste and a sleep mask, the ever popular standby of cheap headphones, and, to my surprise, a set of socks. There's also an under seat Ethernet plug but I have no idea if it's active, I'm told by a friend that I have a shot at wifi on my Lufthansa flight home but for  now I'd say Egyptair has treated me rather well. Now I should probably get some sleep, as at this point it's 4:12 am Cairo time.

This time next week, I'll be on a plane to Egypt

My mother had planned a trip with two friends and a tour company well before the revolution. Egypt's future is still uncertain but the State Department has pulled back its travel warnings and the upcoming battles should be organizing and ballot box focused rather than taking place between protestors and police.

I'm quite excited to be going. I lack the words to express the admiration I feel for what the youth of Egypt have already accomplished by nonviolent means. The trip will be focused on Egypt's ancient history, starting in Cairo, going to Luxor, and then traveling down the Nile. It isn't oriented towards current politics and the State Department advises staying away from demonstrations, but during my guided travels and despite my lack of Arabic skills allows I hope to listen and observe and enhance my meager understanding. My regional interest is East Asia and that's not likely to change, but I've long studied attempts at democratization without ever coming much closer than East Germany a decade later.

Thus if any readers have any advice for my travels, please leave them in comments or send an email (gsanders at zort.net). I'll similarly take postcard requests for those so inclined.

Metaphor duel: Zombies versus Robots/Cyborgs

In a clash of professors Charli Carpenter has been making a humorous but genuine critique of Dan Drezner's International Politics and Zombies. She gave a video presentation at the International Studies Association that's well worth watching if you have any interest at all in international relations and or the pop culture topics. If your interest runs deeper, check out their bloggingheads.

Sen. Lugar is right, Libya merits of a declaration of war

His statement, written up by David Jackson in USA Today (passed on by someone I follow in Google Reader) bears quoting in full.

Senator Dick Lugar, the ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, reiterated his call today for "full congressional debate on the objectives and costs" of President Obama's military actions in Libya, "and a declaration of war" to proceed.

"There needs to be a plan about what happens after Gadhafi," Lugar said. "Who will be in charge then, and who pays for this all. President Obama, so far, has only expressed vague hopes.

"Congress has been squabbling for months over a budget to run the federal government for a fiscal year that is almost half over," Lugar said. "We argue over where to cut $100 million here and there from programs many people like. So here comes an open-ended military action with no-end game envisioned.

"With the Arab League already having second thoughts, and Turkey nixing NATO taking over, today there are even more questions. We also have to debate how all this effects the Saudis, Bahrain and Yemen.

"The facts are that our budget is stretched too far and our troops are stretched too far," Lugar said. "The American people require a full understanding and accounting, through a full and open debate in Congress."

I am not as skeptical of Libya as are many in the progressive community. I don't think I would have chosen this level of intervention with the information I have available given the inability of the rebels to hold off Col. Gadhafi's onslaught on their own. That said, I do think the Security Council provides sufficient authorization from an international law perspective. However, there is also the matter of our constitution and while I do think that this situation has arisen because Congress has abdicated its responsibility as Yglesias argues, that doesn't remove the need to publicly go to Congress. I'm unimpressed with the administrations private consultation of Congress, I believe it happened but its still not sufficient. The war powers act should be enforced. The President must either get Congressional authorization or withdraw our support within 60 days or much sooner. I'm not saying Congress should vote no, but they should vote.

Congratulations to the Messenger team for putting our first probe in orbit around Mercury

I had the privilege of attending the public viewing at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab (thanks Kate!) and learned a lot about Messenger as it moved into the next phase of its mission. The design featured a range of ingenious bits of engineering to overcome weight limits, conserve fuel to push it into orbit, and to generally keep costs down due to competition from other NASA programs.

I'm a bit envious, as my field is international relations and for all the gee whiz tech that goes into defense I spend more time reading about cost overruns and projects that try to do too much and fail. Of course the bigger issue is that for anything political, the level of challenge Messenger achieved is just unthinkable. The metaphor they gave tonight was having to shoot an arrow from Miami to Seattle with a margin of error of less than the width of the arrow shaft. In politics, my rule of thumb is that any solution must be robust versus being implemented with some notable flaw;, if your idea requires hitting a bulls-eye at 20 paces, you should probably find a way to expand your target.

That said, tonight the international relations field has an important success and a failure of sorts that may save many lives. More on those after the cut.

A no fly zone for Libya?

I think legitimacy is a key issue here. China and Russia have both gone along with an arms embargo and financial sanctions as well as referral to the international criminal court, but have expressed strong skepticism about going further. That said the Chinese position doesn't seem to be vehement:

Li Baodong, China’s ambassador to the United Nations, emphasized the need for diplomacy to resolve the crisis, and respect for Libya’s territorial integrity, Bloomberg reported.

“We believe that this political crisis should be resolved through peaceful means such as dialogue,” Li told reporters at the U.N. in New York, according to Bloomberg. “We respect the sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity of Libya.”

Li said China would “heed and respect the opinions and positions of Arab countries and African countries.”

That same article by the Ann Simmons also notes that that the Arab League is discussing the possibility of a no fly zone in combination with the African Union. That seems like the most likely way to establish legitimacy. On the whole, multilateral diplomacy seems to be bringing an increasing number of assets to bear. This isn't to downplay the fact that people are being killed but the past ten year experience shows fairly definitively that simply removing a dictator doesn't necessarily get you to a peaceful country. Ultimately, I think the Libyan opposition forces, together with their defected diplomats, should work on making the positive case for their movement and showing that they'll be capable of healing their country. Their military work has been impressive but there's hard political work ahead. While waiting is frustrating, I think there is an opportunity here for the opposition to truly become a transition government.

Smart phones and cameras: new best friends?

Rob Pegoraro makes a solid point and makes me hopeful about a trend to the future:

Trying to cram GPS and Web applications into cameras is not a long-term answer. Instead, the camera should learn to talk to the phone, asking it for its location and tossing photos over to the phone for it to share at will.

But aside from one interesting, Android-linked Samsung model debuted at the Consumer Electronics Show in January - where I took more pictures with a smartphone than my own camera - camera manufacturers don't seem to have figured this out.

I'd be really excited by that combination. I've been meaning to do a better job of geotagging my pictures, but I haven't really gotten around to it yet. That said, you might still want an electronic compass in cameras, if the size was right, as you can't get facing from a separate device. The obvious alternative is phone cameras that are good enough to do the job, but from what I've heard the bottleneck is lenses and not megapixels, so Moore's law won't help on that one. This is consistent with my experience with my Droid camera, it can do the job but even my point and shoot canon gets me much better quality consistently.

Now I just need to find an app to do my tagging for me.

On the international relations front, I think the fast upload camera-phone combo could make a big difference, although that may be an area where smart phone cameras are the best bet unless you're a would be photo journalist.

Armed Humanitarians by Nathan Hodge (Book event)

Hodge takes a skeptical look at the armed humanitarian work of the last decade. I've picked up a copy of his book, but for this write-up I'm just going off the event. He found that much of what we were doing in Afghanistan and Pakistan was similar to the nation building we did in the 1990s. However the money spigot got turned on in a big way which went well beyond the absorption rate of local communities. As an example, we're spending many times building up the Afghan military and police than the Afghan government is taking in as revenue. The military is a can do organization and it stepped in but with the exception of civil affairs and special forces it's not really that skilled at it. The sheer funding is also a problem in its own right, if 5% of convoy spending is misdirected that's enough to fund an insurgency.

On the whole, he thought that we should get leaner and go with a more 1990s approach and lower budgets. He did think we'd have to put in diplomatic and development people in hostile situations, but only at a small scale. A key success story was getting 2-3 people to setup operations in Darfur with the help of satellite technology. Ultimately, he argued that Armed Humanitarianism is an oxymoron which implies to me that we're going to need to substantially curtail our ambitions.

The question I didn't get a chance to ask was, if we need to work at a small scale, what missions are we going to have to give up? From what he said, I'd say Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as hostile occupations in general, obviously aren't on the table. The question I didn't get to ask is where should the line get drawn now? We'll see if the book can answer that one.

Epcot 2011-01-23 Mexico and Norway

Geography is rather peculiar in Epcot's world showcase, but perhaps it's just as well as I'm not sure the Japanese and Chinese exhibitions would be happy next to one another. Our first stop was Mexico, for food by the lake. The prices were in the $8-$10 range and the food was pretty good, but that's not really a surprise for Epcot. Higher end dining is available on the inside of the pyramid as is a boat ride which features Donald Duck a bit too prominently for my tastes. Even so, the inner courtyard has always impressed me although it does feel a bit smaller than the first time I saw it.

I have traveled to Mexico, but only for a few hours, a fact I must remedy some day. For the moment, the range of art and day of the dead related souvenirs reminds me of playing Grim Fandango, which brings back fond memories but makes me feel painfully underexposed to our neighbor to the south. I'm not sure whether it's a permanent exhibit, but I do recommend taking your time and looking around the crafts between the entrance and the courtyard. I didn't buy anything, but there were a few items I considered and the often surreal carvings seemed to be the work of vivid imaginations.

Following Mexico, we went on to Norway which features a mini flume ride that I rode later thanks to Fastpass. The boats were fun, although nothing so exceptional that I think it would make sense to wait in line for a non-trivial amount of time. There was a surprising bit of suspense on the ride though when we ended up having three boats line up behind us before we were shunted down into the drop. There was a succinct exhibit on Viking culture in the classic Scandinavian church that might be easy to overlook. Kate and I were both a bit surprised to learn (relearn?) that Lief Ericson's father was Eric the Red (obviously, Lief's father was an Eric; we'd just forgotten it was that particular one), who was known for founding a settlement on Greenland and giving it that deceptive name.   Their relationship makes perfect sense but does make me think that I know far too small a sampling of historical Norwegians if two of the main ones are related to one another.

Theories of International Politics and Zombies: The Q&A

I greatly recommend buying the book or seeing an event with Dan Drezner in person. Here's a bloggingheads he did with Adam Weinstein that gives a good idea of the in person experience [note the chance to win a book as a prize via zombie trivia]. He had a terrific power point (a contradiction in terms I know) and in general is quite the dynamic speaker. As I said after the event he's easily the funniest of the foreign policy bloggers and while he notes that it's a faint compliment I'd say he's the funnier than my domestic policy bloggers as well. Since the Q&A will vary from event to event, I thought that would be the best way to blog the undead and to ensure a steady mix of new questions. [This is a paraphrase, any lack of humor should be be imputed to my transcription.]

My question: How does the EU fare, rally around the flag or would they fear an infected Polish plumber? EU does not cope well, first response is inevtitably wrong, they only get it right by the fourth and the fith iteration. French would call for an international zombie council [that everyone else would ignore], Germans would keep interest rates high, rest of the Union would ban British beef. He thinks the EU would  adapt, but only at the periphery once Berlusconi was eaten.

Effect of twitter, social networking? Some would argue that it would let humans defeat zombies quickly while others think zombies would just adapt them to their own end. Think that the internet wouldn't solve things but would help.

Zombie outbreak in Abkhazia, what happens? Depends on the theory. Also, World War Z is outstanding for addressing this and has a credible idea of the expansionist Holy Russian empire. Realists would be anti-interventionist.

Does the location of a breakout matter? You can't anticipate all causes, they're heterogeneous. With fast zombies, location matters more but they can walk under water. It would matter most for what great powers if any would be felled.

If zombies can be socialized, couldn't they be weaponized? Would there be a global anti-zombie profileration regime? Secret government lab, private government contractor lab are the most common proposals. Could a rogue state use one as a weapon. Unlikely, the most powerful corporations can't control them, it would probably cause more internal harm rather than external harm.

Could America respond with a zero percent real growth defense budget? The intelligence budget matters more than the defense budget. The question is how quickly can you respond. Also, nuking the zombies would be a catastrophic mistake. Think about it.

What about aliens? Independence day is your classic realist scenario with counter hegemon coalitions forming. Read Alex Whendt and Raymond Duval on sovereignty and the UFO states wouldn't acknowledge them due to existential dread. That doesn't apply to technologically inferior zombies. His next book may be 'After Aliens.'

Drezner suggested that New Zealand was the best place to hide out, someone from the embassy asked what about refugee flows. New Zealand would be better off since they aren't the closest great power, until everyone recognizes from Facebook and twitter. Continually insist that you have serious problems with zombie sheep, bar nuclear ships from coming.

NATO: zombie attack on one, zombie attack on all? Yes, their integrated command structure is part of why they've persisted despite realist prediction. They'd argue they'd be well prepared.

Shouldn't zombies be treated as a disease and not a rational actor? The liberal model does treat zombies as a pathogen. Thinks that zombies canon does show that they can be rational.

What about nuking people to cut off the supply? You're sick. Resolutely oppose that.

How does it change our defense posture? Nukes are no longer the trump card? Well zombies are not the only threat, other nations can still be deterred. America does pretty well when it comes to small arms. Again, World War Z does an excellent job. Navy and Air Force gets screwed.

From a fellow CSISer, have we consider allying with other animals? They traditionally also are strongly anti-zombie. Should we reintroduce wolves? Excellent question! Good idea if only humans are infected but terrible idea under a Resident Evil scenario.

What about the global economy? Collapse of trade wouldn't that cause lots of problems? Yes, trade wouldn't stop, it would slow and be more regulated. Capital can still move as can certain categories of goods. You'd presumably see the development of new regulations to prevent the trade of the undead. Customs form would get a lot more complicated.

Effects of frozen Nazi zombies on German society? There's a great college humor video on whether Nazi zombies are still Nazis. Same answer on how zombie jews would deal with zombie nazis. Regardless, German shame spiral but then aggressive action.

Effects on Mid-East peace? If it happened in the  Middle East, no as the Israelis would take heavy handed preventative measures. If else where, maybe yes as the Israeli military would be a valuable ally.

Zombies seem to be a moving metaphor, are they just our present fear? Yes, zombies provide a way to address the issues that are on

What does it take to get people cooperating? People did cooperate on intel after 9/11. But a bigger crisis does not necessarily increase cooperation. You'd see a rise in religious movement, particularly the really crazy religious movement. Look at the Boxer rebellion in China, through strong meditation you could stop bullets. That sort of thing. Cooperation possible but not guaranteed.

What about Reavers in Firefly? They don't quite make the definition, despite that one turning episode. But doesn't think that going interplanetary versus nations really changes things.

As young professionals, what should we do to best prepare? Book does deal with bureaucratic politics, domestic politics, individual psychology. You're main strength is that you can think outside of standard operating procedures which are not meant to deal with zombies. Watch as many movies as possible, know all the theories, watch what emerges. The more scripts you know, the better you can predict what will happen. Also learn how to shoot.

[Update: Small grammar fixes.]

Theories of International Politics and Zombies: The event

I saw Professor Dan Drezner speaking tonight on his new book: Theories of International Politics and Zombies.

[Update: I initially posted an event summary, but I worry on stepping too much on his material. So instead here's a blogging heads TV to watch. I did get explicit permission to post the Q&A, so that will be up shortly.]

Mubarak may be stepping down.

Too soon to say on the details, but it does sound as if this would still be a transition within the ruling party. Vice President Omar "Egypt is not ready for Democracy" Suleiman is a likely successor. Whoever comes next, there will definitely be some policy shifts and concessions. Whether there's genuine reform will be trickier to guess but the sustained commitment shown by protestors does make me think that there's now an activist core that can be a source of continuing pressure.

If you want to watch what comes next live, Al Jazeera English is probably a good choice.

Beyond the point of no return in Egypt

From what I'm reading from a range of sources, mostly Twitter, it sounds as if the security situation has deteriorated in Egypt with many blaming the former security services for the looting. U.S. citizens are being offered evacuation. From David Kirkpatrick and Alan Cowell's reporting for the NY Times, it sounds like a crackdown order is coming:

But the soldiers refused protesters’ pleas to open fire on the security police. And the police battered the protesters with tear gas, shotguns and rubber bullets. Everywhere in Cairo, soldiers and protesters hugged or snapped pictures together on top of military tanks. With the soldiers’ consent, protesters scrawled graffiti denouncing Mr. Mubarak on many of the tanks. “This is the revolution of all the people,” read a common slogan. “No, no, Mubarak” was another.

By Saturday night, informal brigades of mostly young men armed with bats, kitchen knives and other makeshift weapons had taken control, setting up checkpoints around the city.

Some speculated that the sudden withdrawal of the police from the cities — even some museums and embassies in Cairo were left unguarded — was intended to create chaos that could justify a crackdown.

If enough of the Army cooperates, Mubarak could still get control of the situation. However, it would be a discredited regime that emerged from the rubble. We're now seeing an Egyptian population that is willing to stand up and choose its own destiny. I think John Quiggin is right in that we are seeing the end to the Arab exception [which treats Arabic nations as unready for democracy], although the oil rich emirates can probably buy their people off for some time to come. Yglesias highlights the key point (emphasis Yglesias):

The point applies most obviously in relation to oil. The idea that the US can legitimately use its military power to ensure continued access to oil resources rests, in large measure, on the (not entirely unfounded) assumption that those controlling the resources are a bunch of sheikhs and military adventurers who happened to be in the right place, with guns, at the right time. Without the Arab exception, the idea of oil as a special case, not subject to the ordinary assumption that resources are the property of the people in whose country they are found, will also be hard to sustain.

It is time to say that we will not support a regime that engages in a brutal crackdown and that free and fair elections are the only soft landing available. More important, it's time to call in the chips we have with the military to increase the odds that a crackdown order is not obeyed. The removal of the police forces made this a double or nothing situation; martial law without security services will likely prove reminiscent of the Tiananmen square massacre where police forces were similarly inadequate or unavailable.

[Minor grammar edits and a clarification on the term "Arab exception."]

Review: The King's Speech

The film tells the true story of the Prince Albert and the speech therapist that helped him manage his stammer. That was a rather important process, as the rise of radio and the abdication of his older brother coincided with the rise of Hitler and a moment when Great Britain rather needed an inspiring head of state.

The story does a good job of documenting the burdens of being the public face of a country. Yglesias favorably cited the film as an example of the merits of having a constitutional monarch, presumably because you don't want your head of government to also deal with the difficulties of being head of state. Of course, it's a plight that comes with enormous privileges and as this particular tale shows modern figureheads have more options when it comes to receiving non-sycophantic advice, assuming they can bring themselves to take it.  

But it's mainly worth seeing because it's a terrific story that's well acted. While dramatized, I do think it also stayed very true to demonstrating what the British public heard. Colin Firth gave a very consistent vocal performance that captured eccentricities in the monarch's speech and even at the end did not make him into something he was not. Geoffrey Rush similarly does an excellent job grounding the film, although I think he was helped in that task by playing an exceptional individual who walked a very fine line in using an equality-based treatment of royalty. Helena Bonham Carter is particularly delightful as Prince Albert's wife Elizabeth, who goes a long way towards humanizing him by showing his excellent taste in a spouse.

Wiki-leaks is probably the new normal

In general, the release of confidential information has both benefits and drawbacks. Details of ongoing operations can get people killed, but that hasn't been an issue thus far. Names of people talking with other governments in confidence can potentially be far more damaging and will make people less willing to work with the organization in question, as noted by an Iraqi Shia and a TIbetan in the PRC at the end of this article by Keith Rich Burg and Leila Fadel.

Ultimately, I think wiki-leaks is a fairly inevitable result of information technology in free societies. Julian Assange is not a common sort of figure, but he is hardly unique and I think much of his prickliness and self-righteousness are similarly common features. As the technology to do what he's done becomes more readily available even campaigns of harassment and death threats from some U.S. politicians isn't going to stop this sort of thing. On that note, I will say that I think the assassination talk is overblown to the point of discrediting the U.S., yes people may get hurt but when we aren't talking real time operational details, nuke codes, or the name of field agents, coercive force isn't warranted.

On the whole, Assange is using a crowd sourcing model in an attempt to process the massive amount of information he's received. In practice, this leads to a strategy of not just in whistleblowing but also in using transparency against secretive organizations and governments, in other words heightening the contradictions. Wikileaks has expressed a willingness to redact names, but they aren't willing to let concern about names get prevent them from publishing as ultimately they are information providers and not information processors. Colum Lynch and Peter Finn explore this issue in a Post article:

The State Department has identified what one senior official described as a significant number of activists and journalists whom it believes will be endangered if named. The official said a number of "very sensitive sources" could be arrested or targeted with violence if their names are published.

"These are red-flag lists," the official said.

U.S officials declined to provide specifics on people who were at risk or to characterize those individuals' contacts with American officials. The State Department also refused a WikiLeaks request, made over the weekend, to provide information on the names of individuals whose lives may be "at significant risk of harm."

Kenneth Roth, the executive director of Human Rights Watch, said that he urged WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in writing over the holiday weekend to "redact from the documents the names of any U.S.-supported human rights defenders who might be placed in jeopardy."

At the same time, however, he voiced concern that the State Department was trying to use the "fear of disclosure about human rights defenders as an excuse to pursue WikiLeaks or restrict access to this kind of information."

So, what's the appropriate response for those of us on the research end? I'd say a few principles suggest themselves:

• First off, transparency is important for revealing abuses, I agree with Ta-Nehisi Coates that "I do think the American public is served by knowing that the U.S. forces killed civilians and reporters, and evidently tried to cover it up.  I do not think it serves the American public, or those of us who prefer diplomacy over armed force, to basically allow no anonymity for diplomats." It's important to defend those engaged in conventional whistleblowing although with a few exceptions, such as the details on the successful U.S. effort to squash Spanish investigation of American human rights abuses.
• Even when using publicly available information, I think researchers are obligated to protect the personal information of those who aren't engaged in wrong doing.
• In general, I don't think it's appropriate to use confidential information for the purpose of embarrassing those you disagree with. The amount of documents released should be proportionate to the alleged misconduct.
• As long as you meet the criteria above I think it can be ethical to make use of published formerly confidential sources. But recognize that proper redacting costs money and thus support organizations that either limit data availability to those unlikely to misuse the data or that undertake efforts to scrub documents in the first place.
• Finally, as Yglesias argues, don't put to much weight on secret information. Public government statements are more meaningful than private one and on the whole you can learn more about U.S. relations with dictatorial client states in the Middle East from Marc Lynch than from the diplomatic cables.

What Caprica[‘s pilot got] right and wrong about suicide terrorism

I just started catching up on the second half of the first season of Ron Moore’s Caprica (I just got through episode 10). I won’t get into spoilery details but the sci-fi series is based on the richest world of a multi-planet civilization. The technology is not far advanced from ours and the social climate is typified by decadence escapist virtual reality networks. A key plot driver is a religious terrorist group, called the STO, which in a twist on our reality are monotheists in a polytheistic world. Andrew Sullivan had recently reminded of Robert Pape’s research on suicide terrorism and I thought it might be interesting to see how Caprica matches up. As a quick side note, I classify the STO as clear villains and as a general rule disapprove of any violent tactics target civilians, understanding motives shouldn’t be confused with condoning them.

What Caprica gets right:

• A strategy of weak actors: True enough, the STO are outcasts.
• Targetting democracies: Based on what was shown in Battlestar Gallactica, Caprica is the seat of government for the democratic civilization and thus this definitely holds.
• Suicide attackers “are most often educated, socially integrated, and highly capable people who would expect to have a good future.” This also seems to fit with the small number of bombers shown in the series as well as with their larger network.
• Terrorists are typically recruited through their social network: This isn’t directly from the Pape summaries but I’ve heard it elsewhere and it holds true of the STO network recruiting in Caprica.

What it gets wrong:

• Terrorism is primarily a nationalistic and not a religious phenomenon with the objective “to compel democracies to withdraw military forces from the terrorists’ national homeland.” The STO’s grievances appear primarily to be religious. They hate Capricans, often their own people, for their decadence.
• Notably, as Kate reminds me, Battlestar Galactica actually got this right as Spencer Ackerman covers in a spoilery Slate article from 2006. In that instance, some of the humans used suicide terrorism against Cylon occupiers (the Cylons were even a democracy of a sort, just an evil one).

So why does this matter? In many ways, Caprica works as a dark mirror of our world. Anti-heros abound and we know the civilization only a few decades away from apocalypse. I suspect that in addition to entertaining its meant to provoke hard thoughts about where we’re going as a people. The trouble is that it gets the casual mechanisms wrong, suicide terrorism is not about alienated youths in and of themselves.

To be clear, this research, summarized here in an op-ed and in slightly greater detail on wikipedia just applies to suicide terrorism and not other assassinations and bombings. The dataset they use to reach these conclusion is freely available online. I could find the STO quite plausible as a terror organization, but unless and until the STO gets a notable piece of future-tech working I don’t think they’d have a ready supply of suicide bombers available. I don’t think it’s a decisive problem, suicide terrorism hasn’t been a huge part of the series and if it hadn’t come up in a recent episode I wouldn’t have thought of this at all. Also, in fairness to Caprica, perhaps it is an aberration in the series universe as well, but if it is I don’t recall hearing any evidence to that effect.

Update: After sleeping on it, I wanted to emphasize the last point a bit more. After the two-part pilot, we don’t see that much action from the STO either way. So, conceivably, the big event that got the whole series rolling could have been a fluke. Pape’s research might not apply to the second half of this season based on spoilery exogenous technological advancements.

Information technology as a check on secret assassinations

Good article in the post by R. Jeffrey Smith and Peter Finn on how recent cases show that it’s harder to pull off secret assassinations these days. Notable examples include the Russians and Alexander Litvinenko, the Isrealis and Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, and the U.S. and the kidnapping of a Muslim Cleric in Italy. Obviously, the Predator drone strikes show that overt assassinations are still all the rage but that’s not really a big surprise.

I don’t think this really holds when talking about intra-country assassinations, in those cases suspicions will always be there but no investigation would be allowed. Similarly if the nation of the killing is willing to participate in a cover-up then the secret is likely to stay one.

On the whole, I do think this is a real positive for international relations. I still have mixed feelings about the use of targeting killings in Pakistan, but they seem to be both effective and comparatively low casualty. The implicit support and explicit condemnation from Pakistan seems like a risky situation, but is hardly unheard of and may be more tenable after the Taliban have exposed their own brutality.

However, use of assassination outside of war may take out bad guys with key knowledge or connections but on the whole seems more useful for killing political leaders and dissident threats. On the whole, when people want to hide violent acts from the eyes of the world, it isn’t typically to further world peace.

Can more resources solve Afghanistan's problems?

After attending an off the record briefing, not with an administration official, I heard a way of thinking on Afghanistan that I believe illuminates the new American approach to Afghanistan. To be clear, I have the benefit of others ideas here, but am speaking for myself, credit errors to me and insight to others.

Between the increases earlier this year and the planned 30,000 troop escalation, the Obama administration has dramatically increased the resources going to Afghanistan while making comparatively small adjustments in policy. The approach to rural Afghanistan seems to be shifting from anti-drug efforts to rebuilding the agricultural sector. At the same time, there's talk of working around President Karzai rather than continuing the past policy of flowing all funds through him. Finally while counterinsurgency thinking was not mentioned by name during the speech is being endorsed through population-centric efforts and increasing restraint when it comes to possible civilian casualties.

These changes sound more incremental than revolutionary and no harsh trade-offs were made explicitly. This doesn't mean that more is not going on behind the scenes, but it does seem consistent with the critique of recent Afghan policy that the main problem is that the war was dramatically under resourced. This is certainly accurate, relative to Iraq, when it comes to contract spending and a range of other metrics. On the other hand, critics will note that we are spending more per year than Afghanistan's total GDP, which bespeaks both Afghanistan's remoteness and the expense of military measures in treasure, let alone blood.

So what happens if this view is wrong? If a lack of resources wasn't the main problem or equally likely more resources could well have stabilized the country in the early calm period but are no longer enough. That's where the withdrawal date could come in. There are many caveats to it and strictly speaking we're just supposed to begin the transition to Afghan authority. Even so, I suspect the date will be compelling for our allies and if the situation does not improve may have substantial political support domestically from the President's own party. In essence setting the date puts Afghanistan in the category of a limited war. If the occupation proves unworkable we can dramatically reduce our role even if that means failing to meet key objectives. Looked at another way, there is a level of resources we aren't willing to deploy to "win," the draft is not on the table and the main nation the President is interested in nation building is our own.

It's important to remember that we will see a lag in any results from implementing this new resource level. Sending more people to the country and getting them in action takes time. That said, we can now begin to judge the results of the first troop hike and test the hypothesis that implementation and not strategy is the main problem we face that can be directly controlled from the U.S. end (unlike local corruption).

Next America Repost: Defense-Industry Haikus

In a silly experiment, with help from Matt Zlatnik, I present the following seven haikus inspired by defense-related newsletters. There’s a bit of a contest involved with these with a prize of a Lockheed Martin toiletries kit, see the Next America page for details.

Private security
Cost six billion through ‘09
More in subcontracts

Big 3Q spend bump
The supplement arrived late
Not conspiracy

Cost-plus contracting
Now buys many more services
McCain not pleased

Six hundred million 
Meant for small businesses 
Went to the big boys

Europe does research 
But Americans sell stuff
Thank you big budget!

Big helicopter 
Spend lots on fancy add-ons
Save the President!

Large trade surpluses
Show the U.S. still produces
When it comes to arms

Again, go here for the source newsletters.

This entry also available at CSIS’s Next America Blog.

Help Afghan governance, keep the Afghan police from burning detainees with hot oil

Just read a Foreign Affairs article [by Mark Moyar] on legitimacy in Afghanistan. The broad takeaway was that performance, not elections brings legitimacy. That's probably true to an extent. The strong point of elections is more removing inept leaders than in selecting skilled ones.

That said, this bit gave me pause:

Placing American combat advisers and troops alongside the Afghans will help address the governance problem as well. In provinces where U.S. troops go everywhere with the Afghan National Police, the American presence deters the police from setting up the roadside checkpoints they have customarily used to shake down passers-by. The Americans do not allow the Afghan policemen to beat civilians over the head with rocks or burn detainees with hot oil, which they have been known to do elsewhere.

It's one thing to act to leverage the power of the police and help them accomplish their missions. It's quite another to have our job be to keep them from going completely out of control.

153 billion dollars

That's the amount, in 2008 dollars, we've spent on contracts performed in Iraq, Afghanistan, and their theaters since 2001.  Check the map for the breakdown.  It shouldn't surprise anyone that Iraq has the majority of the spending, Iraq has had many more troops and most of the spending goes to supporting them.  It's important to keep in mind that while private security contractors tend to make the most news, they're direct contracts only account for $6 billion of the $153 billion.  That said, if you want to account for sub-contracting than you can probably double or triple that figure.

Check back over the next week if you're curious who is spending that money and want details on what they're buying.  For those that are impatient, the results are available in this overview newsletter.

Part of my job is to follow and study financial and industrial aspects of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.  On this veterans day I do want to thank those that have served and also to do my part to help people understand this part of the wars.  So, if you've got any I'll do my best to help bridge the civil-military gaps in knowledge.

20th Anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall

My memories of the fall of the wall, and the people walking and then driving to west Berlin and the like, are not that strong.  Oddly enough, I more clearly remember watching on television the coup against Gorbechev, perhaps because I was in [Wales] at the time.  However, I do remember caring about it and doing reports on it and making aluminum foil dioramas.  My pastor had actually gone to Berlin soon thereafter and gotten me a few pieces of the wall, for which I’m still grateful.  My mom actually had visited the divided city, her stories of riding the subway around and seeing the shuttered East Berlin stops and their exposed lightbulbs and single patrolling guard has always stuck with me.

I’ve had a chance to tour the reunited Berlin and loved the experience.  That said, some of the East Berlin construction has got to be the ugliest architecture I’ve ever seen, and that includes Communist construction in the PRC.

All in all, I find the steady consolidation of Europe to be one of the most inspiring stories in human history, made all the more remarkable by its peacefulness after such a destructive past.  While the EU has a stodgy technocratic reputation, its steady peaceful expansion has far outstripped the 20th century expansion of the U.S.  At the same time, I’m quite proud of the role the U.S. played in the reunification of Berlin and Germany as a whole.  We put our faith in the peaceful democratic nature of our two-time enemy and that belief has been redeemed.

Afghanistan's Future: Colombia? Vietnam? Pakistan? Lebanon? Afghanistan's past?

As the administration works to formulate a new strategy for Afghanistan, popular and elite support appears to be dropping off and a string of attacks makes the stakes all too clear.

Dichotomies such as counter-insurgency versus counterterrorism, double down or fold, are useful ways to try to force prioritization rather than allow inertia to set strategy.  However, they preclude options that would vary the approach based on the region.  Another, still overly simple, way to look at Afghanistan is by comparing possible end states.

Colombia: The U.S. has had mixed success is strengthening the government of Colombia and cracking down on cocaine cultivation.  However, mirroring Colombia's achievements would still be a boon to Afghanistan while still being a more realistic end-state than the mountainous and decentralized democracy of Switzerland.  Getting to Colombia in the mid-term would likely require a counterinsurgency approach and a substantial increase in resources and improvements in governance.

Vietnam: Joshua Kurlantzick raises Vietnam as a positive model of an end state. Namely after the withdrawal and the fall of South Vietnam, while the country is still authoritarian, the U.S. enjoys a close relationship with that country and the long-feared domino effect never occurred.   Whether a successor of the current government or the Taliban is in charge, the question of terrorist havens must be addressed.  However, that issues is by no means limited to Afghanistan.

Pakistan: Through the use of Predator drones support by good intel, the U.S. has been quite successful at targeting Al Qaeda leadership without a large scale military presence on the ground.   Austin Long discusses how such an approach could be applied in Afghanistan (via Michael Cohen).  On the one hand, civilian casualties from drone strike do raise tensions, on the other, many of the civilian deaths from airstrikes were a result of missiles and bombs being used to provide support to U.S. combat troops.  The experience in Pakistan shows that these target strikes alone will not defeat the Taliban, but may achieve the narrower objective of crippling Al Qaeda.  Implementing this strategy in the short-term should be manageable, but the sustainability, either in Afghanistan or Pakistan, is an open question.

Lebanon: According to Scott Wilson, one train of thought emerging in the Administration is that we attempt to weaken but not destroy the Taliban.  The analogy would be Hezbollah, which controls a portion of Lebanon and participates in its government as a minority party.  There is a risk that allowing this would destabilize Pakistan, but on the other hand the relationship between Pakistan and the Taliban has often been far friendlier than the relationship between Hezbollah and Israel.  Such an approach could be population-centric in government strongholds while reserving the counter-terrorism for any Al Qaeda activity in the remainder of the country.

Afghanistan's Past: A way to pursue counter-insurgency with less troops would be to exclusively defend the cities.  As Matt Yglesias notes, this approach in some way mirrors the Soviet approach in the latter stages of their occupation, though of course would not seek to emulate many soviet methods.  The Soviet approach may be a subset of the Lebanon approach, the difference would be that a cities approach would pick key population centers nation-wide while a more Lebanon-like approach may abandon some larger population centers in Taliban sympathizing territory while protecting smaller but more sympathetic locales.

Successful pursuit of a strategy in a hostile environment typically requires providing a sufficient level of resources and sacrificing desirable objects that are not necessary for success.  More ambitious approaches require far more resources which will further tax the U.S. economy.  Less ambitious approaches, up to and including withdrawal, will not accomplish everything we would like to see happen in Afghanistan, but may prove the most efficient way to advance U.S. interests and values.  As the Status of Forces agreement in Iraq showed, these choices will be further limited by what the local politicians and population will support, but for such a negotiation to be practical we need to first determine what we are shooting for.

While determining the cost in casualties of any of these strategies is quite difficult, the cost in dollars is easier to estimate.  So, reader, do you think this is a good starting list?  Are there any other end-states to be considered?

This post is also available at ameasureofsecurity.org and Next America.

Ironic that the lunar bombing happens on the day our President gets a Nobel peace prize

I am actually pretty excited about the moon thing.  I hope we do find some good water sources.  The best take I’ve read so far is from Dan Drezner who I don’t always agree with but I think manages to be the funniest top-tier international relations analyst.  Here’s the start:

CHAIR:  Guys?  Guys!!  It's 2 AM and we've got an award to give later today!  What are we gonna do?    We can't use Jimmy Carter again -- he was our emergency winner the last time we were stumped!  If we don't do this right, we'll have less cedibility than the Grammys!!

MEMBER A (clearly drunk):  Hey, why not Neil Patrick Harris?  For bringing peace to.... umm.....  Hollywood awards shows?! 

Neil Patrick Harris does in fact do excellent work.  I’m also left wondering who Kanye West thinks should have gotten the Nobel.

More seriously, I do tend to agree with Ackerman that he’s got to accept it as a commitment to the destination.  Just be real humble in the speech and donate the money somewhere.

There are nearly 200,000 contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan but most aren't toting guns

There are presently more U.S. contractors than troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. James Glanz of the NY Times reported on this parity back in September citing data from March 2009 in a Congressional Research Service report by Moshe Schwartz.

I've seen the latest data and in June of 2009 the trend still held: there were 194,000 contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan and only 190,000 troops. This high ration had first occurred during the U.S. mission in Bosnia where concerns about the size and duration of the U.S. peacekeeping mission made sending large numbers of troops politically costly. Waging two wars at the same time further strained the personnel side of the U.S. military and contractors handling support functions proved easier than a massive increase in recruiting, let alone restoring the draft.

The key word in that last sentence is support. While armed private security contractors spawn many news stories but as of June 2009 only represent 11% of the contractors in Iraq and 7% of the contractors in Afghanistan. Thus the typical face of contracting in Iraq may well be an employee at a base Cinnabon and not a Blackwater security guard.

This post is also available at ameasureofsecurity.org.