Not Paranoid--Just Careful

Humor on the IRS scandal (tip to Instapundit). I'd like to note that I posted this before the scandal broke into the news.

Not that I was targeted. I'm not delusional--well, not the grandeur variety, at least.

I am just aware of their tremendous power to punish even when you "win" an argument with them.

Watching Them Search for Us

To sink our carriers, the Chinese have to find them. So the carrier games begin.

Strategypage writes:

As China sends more long-range maritime patrol aircraft out over the West Pacific (to search for American warships, especially carriers), the U.S. is reviving some Cold War era practices it used against Russian maritime patrol aircraft. Mainly this involves sending land-based P-3 maritime patrol aircraft out to keep track of their Chinese counterparts. This task could be done with carrier aircraft, but this would confirm that an American carrier was less than 500 kilometers away.

Cooperation between land-based air power and sea power has always been important, notwithstanding notions that Air-Sea Battle doctrine is a novel way to approach war at sea.

The King of Slaughter, Too

In the Battle for Qusair, which lies on an important supply rout to Homs from Lebanon, Syrian artillery is battering the rebel defenders. With all the talk of Assad's so-called devastating air power, this artillery is the real threat to the rebels.

The battle rages in Qusair:

Saturday's barrage of rockets, mortar rounds and tank shells began after daybreak, said Qusair activist Hadi Abdullah and the pro-opposition Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which is based in Britain. Both said it was the most intense shelling since the regime launched its offensive there a week ago.

They also reported heavy gunfire. The Observatory said at least seven people were killed.

The intense shelling could be heard in Lebanon's border areas and in the Syrian city of Homs, some 25 kilometers (15 miles) away.

A NATO no-fly zone and strikes on Assad's airfields would have no impact on this battle.

One Giant Party-Caused Disaster

Chinese social network sites that help individuals react faster than the government in reacting to natural disasters are unnerving to Chinese Communist Party authorities.

After all, mobilizing people for natural disasters provides practice for mobilizing people for political disasters:

The original Dictator’s Dilemma refers to an authoritarian government’s competing interest in using information communication technology by expanding access to said technology while seeking to control the democratizing influences of this technology. In contrast, the “Dictator’s Disaster Lemma” refers to a repressive regime confronted with effectively networked humanitarian response at the grassroots level, which improves collective action and activism in political contexts as well. But said regime cannot prevent people from helping each other during natural disasters as this could backfire against the regime.

Certainly, the Chinese leadership can be pleased with how their troops can react to peacetime natural disaster. Moving fast and exercising command and control for an unexpected mission is good training for wartime missions, obviously.

The problem for Peking is that effective popular response to natural disasters is good training for policital missions, too. But how does China prevent that help/practice without looking evil?

Taxing Their Judgment?

Soldiers are required to obey only lawful orders from those legally placed above them in their chain of command--and do this under fire, if necessary, even without much of a background in the Uniform Code of Military Justice or international law on warfare.

I think we should be able to expect IRS employees to do the same even if their coffee grows cold while listening to a superior tell them how to treat Tea Party applications.

Dear Gloria

It may be time for a credit intervention for someone intertwined in my life, Gloria Dunn. Dearest Gloria has invested a great deal of confidence in me to provide creditors with an avenue to communicate with Gloria when she allegedly fails to pay her debts.

I'm of course touched by Gloria's faith in me--despite never having met her--and so this post is an effort to pass along yet another urgent message seeking Ms. Dunn. (She's not affiliated with me! Sorry, my daughter has been watching The Incredibles a lot lately.)

Anyway, Gloria Dunn neglected to provide me with email, mailing, or phone information in order to carry out my contact role that she clearly intends for me to fulfill. So in desperation I am taking to the Internet in the hopes that Gloria will get this message so she can finally clear up what I am sure is a terrible misunderstanding with another creditor. The letter did say that they could forward this information to a credit reporting agency, and it pains me to contemplate that.

Dearest Gloria Dunn, this week I received a letter from EOS, CCA notifying you (through my address) of a "notice of collection placement." Apparently, AT & T Mobility believes you owe them $190.50. I didn't look closely at the address in the large stack of mail I had that day and only noticed the last name on the envelope. I wasn't wearing glasses.

Although in fairness I have good reason to believe that Gloria intended for me to open the letter given that I know Ms. Dunn has told another creditor that I am the person who can reach Gloria. So how could I not open a letter to Gloria when she is so obviously counting on me to reach her with important information?

But thank goodness I did open it since I didn't have Gloria Dunn's address to simply forward the letter to her! So Gloria, if you would send me your current contact information (see email at the left) I could directly send mail and phone inquiries your way (and scrub these online references to your name to protect your good credit name, of course). In good conscience and with a sense of duty imposed on me, I cannot let you down in my efforts to pass along information with whatever means are available.

Anyway, Gloria, please use the client reference number 230649668 and the agency account number 6209138 when you call EOS CCA toll free at 1-877-667-6048. The letter says if you don't dispute this within 30 days of May 17 (the date on the letter), they will assume the debt is valid. Since time is of the essence I obviously couldn't wait for you to contact me first.

Oh, and Gloria? The notice says you can pay by credit card if you so choose. Perhaps that's just amusing to me.

Blame

Hey, remember when the argument was made that our presence in Iraq was what caused sectarian violence and that if only we'd leave completely, we'd eliminate the cause of that violence?

Our military has been out of Iraq for a year and a half now. Violence in Iraq is picking up:

Gunmen killed at least seven soldiers in central Iraq on Thursday, officials said, in the latest episode of violence to hit the country in a particularly bloody month. ...

The attacks followed a spike in violence that has left nearly 300 dead over the past 10 days. Alarmed by a nationwide deterioration in the security situation, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has ordered a reshuffle in senior military ranks.

Deadly enemies, sectarian differences, al Qaeda and Iranian efforts to destabilize Iraq, corruption in the security forces, and war in Syria combine to increase Iraqi deaths with nary an American in sight.

The Planes Have to Land Somewhere

The ultimate air superiority is helping rebel forces standing on Assad's air bases.

Should we attack Assad's air power and air fields? This opinion piece argues we should:

The Syrian air force is capable of aerial bombardment, close air support to ground troops, aerial resupply and delivery of chemical weapons. Assad has used all those capabilities over the past two years to fight the rebels and to kill tens of thousands of civilians. But in the past year, the rebels—armed with heavy weapons and possibly with shoulder-fired Stinger missiles—have become more proficient at shooting down helicopters, reportedly as many as 20 so far.

What is keeping Assad in power is his use of fighter planes. If the U.S. wants to break the military stalemate, force Assad into political concessions or aid in his ouster, eliminating his air power should be the first order of business.

I don't think Assad's air power is that critical for his success. His heavy armor and artillery are far more destructive than air attacks. My impression is that Assad isn't flying that many missions. So I went for statistics.

Even with apparent increased tempo (the source for data changed), Assad is carrying out about 4 strike sorties per day.

Consider that when we got down to 4 strike sorties per day in Afghanistan, it was considered low. At peak, it was more than 30 per day and generally 10 or more per day. Against fewer insurgents. With more effectiveness due to accuracy and intelligence. And we have been very restrictive in our use of air power. Our capacity was much greater so the sortie limits were political.

And this Syrian "increase" is suspect. I have no doubt that Iran and Russia are bolstering Syria's maintenance capabilities, but given the lack of pilots, is the sortie rate really up this year when late last year, 20 strike sorties per day seemed possible for Assad?

Remember, Assad's fortunes have seemed to rise lately even as the sortie rate does not match what was achieved when the rebels were forcing Assad to retreat from areas outside his core area. The keys for Assad have been abandoning outer areas in the north and east and the infusion of 60,000 loyal militias on the ground, thus increasing his force-to-space ratio dramatically.

If we want to help the rebels cope with Assad's air power, get them heavy machine guns to hit helicopters and keep aircraft higher (and so more inaccurate). And give them infantry weapons to cope with armor and supplies to sustain attacks on Assad's bases where the air power sorties from. Heck, send them rockets to allow the rebels to hit the airfields from farther away.

I agree that Syria's air defenses aren't as awesome as many critics of air action say to justify withholding air missions. I think the missions are unnecessary and merely Americanize the fight. The rebels want to fight. Help them fight where it counts--on the ground.

Bleed those new militias and nobody will be left to hold the airfields.

I'm Not So Happy About People Having Life or Death Powers

Since the whole crossbow banning idea worked so well, why not ban killer robots?

Sometimes the United Nations distracts us from their worthlessness by displaying their stupidity:

"Moratoria are needed to prevent steps from being taken that may be difficult to reverse later," Heyns said in a 22-page report on "lethal autonomous robotics", due to be discussed at the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva on May 29.

"Their deployment may be unacceptable because no adequate system of legal accountability can be devised and because robots should not have the power of life and death over human beings."

People have been put out of the kill loop for a long time. Pits with stakes, trained attack dogs, mines, IEDs, torpedoes, electrified barriers, guided missiles or bombs. Those are robotic weapons of one type or another where humans aren't in the loop for immediate kill decisions.

People seem only to get upset when we find ways to fight nutballs without risking our own people. Seriously, I'm not terribly happy that a lot of so-called people have the power of life and death over human beings.

I mean, if the jihadi claim that they love death while we love life is true, aren't our killer robots a win-win for both sides? I'm starting to think Mr. Heyns might be a little culturally insensitive, here. Hmm.

Let's just make sure our robots are better than their robots.



Good grief, even the papal ban against crossbows didn't apply to use against non-Christians.

I like the idea of fighting jihadis with robots. I think there is enough grey area in the Koran about dying while fighting robots that uncertainty about going to Paradise will hurt morale.

Really Glad I'm Me

So yesterday I'm running near my home.

A driver goes past me, slows a bit, and then pulls into a driveway ahead of me, behind a couple trees.

As I get closer the driver backs up, blocking the sidewalk. She is not obstructed from backing out.

Odd. But there's plenty of time to get out of my way as I approach.

Then a young woman gets out the car, with one foot apparently still in the car. She was looking at me--with an odd, not terribly happy look on her face--speaking incoherently (or perhaps just unintelligibly) at me.

I don't know her.

I keep running, and since she is still standing I dare to run in front of her car. It was around then that she apparently decided she didn't know me.

She stopped talking and got back in the car. And did not follow me down the road.

I can only assume there is another man in Ann Arbor who is relieved not to have been running down that sidewalk at that moment.

But he'll need to run faster--or at least away from the road.

UPDATE: Hmm. I wonder if I should have asked her if her name is Gloria?

Unrequited Love

During the Bush 43 presidency, many claimed that America's "unilateral" war in Iraq alienated the world and forfeited our moral standing to lead. Not so much.

American power is welcome. Other states may have worried that we were squandering our military power in the Iraq War, but rejecting our leadership and power wasn't a consequence of the war:

Security officials in countries as diverse as Japan and Poland, Vietnam and Romania desperately hope that all this talk about American soft power overtaking American hard power is merely that -- talk. For it is American warships and ground forces deployments that matter most to these countries and their officials. Indeed, despite the disappointing conclusions to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, rarely before has American hard power been so revered in places that actually matter.

The conclusions of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars are not disappointing unless we allow them to be so. We've beaten down enemies and built up allies in both places to the point where our allies can win if we don't abandon them.

I worry enough about the surge of sectarian violence in Iraq--notwithstanding the good news that we "ended" that war--and now I worry that we will walk away from Afghanistan given that the president has foreseen an end to that war coincidentally taking place as we draw down. Good luck there, eh?

Poland, of course, would like it if we had more hard power available to them and are bulking up their armed forces:

The programme aims to spend about a third of the defence budget over the next decade on modernisation – amounting to about 140bn zlotys. That will buy a new missile defence system, new vessels for the navy fleet, upgraded tanks, new military training aircraft, 70 new helicopters, unmanned aerial vehicles and equipment for troops.

Sitting on a big flat plain with no natural defenses will do that. Polish defense spending is still low--but not compared to non-America NATO budgets. And the way Russia's creeping Anschluss with Belorus is going, I don't blame the Poles. I'd like a stronger American Army presence in Europe, but the Bush-era plan to reduce our presence in Europe to two combat brigades will not be reversed by President Obama. I'd still like a REFORPOL program to provide a security blanket for the Poles.

And Iraq and Afghanistan did not wreck our military. Casualties, as tragic as they were, were historically low (foreign militaries are fairly amazed at the low casualty rate) and did not break our ground forces so much as make them combat hardened. As the veterans of these wars spend their careers in the military for another generation, we'll reap benefits if we must fight. I'd hope that we can institutionalize that experience to extend those gains, but I do try to be reality based, so assume nothing of the sort. Still, a generation is good. If our hard power declines, it will be because of choices we are making right now. Remember, you go to war today with the military you wished to have 5-10 years earlier. Clearly, a lot of nations wish we wanted to have a better military a decade from now.

A lot of countries love us. They worry we don't return the love enough.

Playing With Lives

Rebels in Syria (unfortunately aided by a growing jihadi element as the fight has dragged on) have stripped away large chunks of Syria from our enemy Assad's control. The price has been 80,000 lives lost so far. In what world is it moral to give the rebels the choice to endure more casualties to keep fighting or endure the continued survival of Assad?

I'm starting to think that nuance thing is over-rated:

Washington threatened on Wednesday to increase support for Syria's rebels if President Bashar al-Assad refuses to discuss a political end to a civil war that is spreading across borders. ...

The U.S.-Russian proposal for a peace conference has raised suspicion among Arab countries that Washington is watering down support for Assad's opponents, who had long refused to negotiate unless Assad is excluded from any future settlement.

I don't know why we have the basic inability to understand what our enemies understand--that negotiating is a complement to fighting and not an alternative. We think talks should include a halt to fighting. Our enemies always seem to understand that talking is just another means of getting to the end--victory.

That's our problem. We aren't focused on victory, and talking becomes the objective rather than just another means to the objective of victory. That's always been our weakness and it is always the reason I worry when we send in the diplomats.

And John Kerry makes me worry more than usual.

I don't rule out talking as a way to resolve this crisis depending on what our objectives are. But I insist that we view the ultimate removal of Assad and his Baath Party as the ultimate objective regardless of what we decide to pursue in the short term.

Actual Brown Water Combatants

Keep those expensive Littoral Combat Ships (LCS) out of the littorals. You want green and brown water vessels? Send the Cyclones.

Ah, the sweet smell of sanity (via my Jane's email updates):

The US Navy (USN) will forward deploy five more coastal patrol (PC) boats to US 5th Fleet in Bahrain with plans to move its remaining fleet from Virginia to Florida, officials told IHS Jane's on 14 May. Cyclone-class PCs USS Tempest (PC 2), USS Squall (PC 7), and USS Thunderbolt (PC 12) are scheduled to arrive in Manama by the third quarter of 2013[.]

Insanity is expecting LCS to operate close to shore. Patrol craft like the Cyclone class are cheap enough to risk in the littorals if we can't patrol them with drones.

But the Cyclone's are wearing out.

Why not build a new class of this type with the room to mount Griffin missiles to give the little ships a little more range?

Core Syria

Syria is winning the war within Core Syria from the coast to Damascus. The rebels have the recruiting base to overcome the Assad local advantage if they can keep up the war of attrition.

The new Syrian government militias have allowed Assad to go on offense within the smaller region of Core Syria that allows Assad to claim to rule Syria despite rebel conquests of northern and eastern Syria (and increasingly south Syria south of Damascus, it seems). While the loyal militias have been trusted to go on offense, I figured they would be better used to free up whatever regular army forces are available. Stratfor says the latter is being done, too, on top of press reports I've read that say the militias are being used as frontline troops:

External help also enabled Syria to create a new militia, known as the National Defense Force, to offset the losses incurred by the army. With the help of Iranian and Hezbollah advisers, the regime was able to rapidly train and deploy members of this militia. The National Defense Force has brought reliable manpower to the loyalist cause, but equally important, it has helped free up the conventional army to execute difficult offensive operations.

Using militias to free up regulars is the best option. But it also seems as if the militias are being used as frontline infantry, too. I'm curious about whether the Syrian army is crewing infantry fighting vehicles but using NDF militias as the infantry carried in them.

I think the burn rate on the militias will chew them up over the summer. Will the militias currently freeing up regulars be called to the front, too? Will Assad secure his Core Syria and halt offensive operations while the militias are still intact or will he burn through them attacking until they are used up?

And given that Hezbollah and Iran have trained these militias, will Assad want to burn them up to prevent Iran from gaining an independent ground force to influence a rump Core Syria? In many ways, if Assad can rebuild his regular infantry while the militias wage a war of attrition with rebels, the casualties in both forces might be to Assad's long-term advantage. As long as Assad wins the short-term fight for his Core Syria.

Note that Assad's Core Syria seems to extend north to Aleppo--which I think is too much to hold--but does not extend down to the Israeli and Jordanian borders--which I figured were needed to keep Assad's claims to be a "frontline" state against Israel alive.

Regardless of the exact boundaries and fate of the militias, once Assad has his core region secured reasonably well it is a war of attrition with the rebels, and the rebels have more manpower resources than the minority Alawites. If the rebels don't give up, they can eventually crack the Assad military.

The Diversity Riot

Who knew the Nile was a river in Sweden?

Huh. Riots in Swedish immigrant suburbs?

A fourth night of unprecedented riots in Stockholm has seen unrest spread, with a restaurant and up to 40 cars burnt, police told the BBC.

Three police officers were hurt as rioters threw stones and directed laser pointers at emergency services.

The worst of the latest rioting was in the south of the city, not the north-west where it began on Sunday.

Stockholm police spokesman Kjell Lindgren said the rioters were a "mixture of every kind of people".

The violence began in the deprived, largely immigrant suburb of Husby, days after police shot dead an elderly man there who had reportedly threatened to kill them with a machete.

I know what you're thinking. Car burnings. A machete. Attacking firefighters trying to put out fires. Immigrant suburb. Must be Moslem immigrants.

Not so fast! Swedish authorities may not be prepared to lay the blame on Tea Party activists, but they are clear that these rioters were a "mixture" of people. As a police spokesman helpfully explained:

"My colleagues say the people on the streets are a mixture of every kind of people you can think of," he added.

"We have got Swedes, we have got very young people, we have got people aged 30 to 35. You can't define them as a group.

"We don't know why they are doing this. There is no answer to it."

Yeah. Swedish Moslems. Very young Turkish Moslems. Moslems aged 30 to 35 from Pakistan. It really would be difficult to define them as a group. I have no doubt that the police spokesman "can't" define them as a particular group. The mystery may never be solved.

Obviously, not all Moslems--not even a large minority, I dare say--are rioting thugs. But I will make a bold guess that these rioters are Moslems. If the Swedes keep pretending there is no answer to this problem, Malmo will be the first Western city to become Sharia compliant.

I've no problem with welcoming Moslems fleeing the violence, backwardness, and social dysfunction of their homelands. But we should insist they leave those things behind. The West is a refuge from those problems because we are different from them, remember? We can be proud of Western civilization. Defend it.

UPDATE: On the bright side, locals are reacting against the minority rioting:

There are signs that residents in the affected areas are getting fed up with the violence. Many community leaders, dressed in fluorescent jackets, have taken to the streets to try to calm things down.

Good. Rioters are giving all Moslems a bad reputation.

Burning Down the House

An American passport is not a personal force field against America's military if you wage war against America.

Why is this something to get worked up over?

The US government has acknowledged the killing of four American citizens as part of its drone attack program – one person intentionally and three others not specifically targeted but killed in strikes aimed at terrorist suspects.

The information comes in a letter to congressional leaders from Attorney General Eric Holder, reported Wednesday by several news organizations, first by The New York Times.

We are under no obligation to refrain from killing an enemy just because he is an American citizen. And killing an American citizen fighting for the enemy doesn't require them to be an imminent threat to us. War consists of destroying enemy assets--ideally long before they are a threat to our forces.

If an American jihadi is sitting in his living room here in America, attempting to arrest the jihadi rather than striking him with a drone missile is the first choice. Which is why back in the day I was outraged at the Philadelphia police bombing that MOVE rooftop "bunker." The MOVE members were nutballs. But law enforcement methods should have been used for a law enforcement problem.

This is an obvious exception to using air power on domestic jihadis. But we're far from that and I don't think we'd ever get even close to that stage.

Perhaps if our administration wasn't so committed to fitting completely normal wartime drone strikes on enemies into a domestic law enforcement template, this wouldn't be so awkward. The collateral damage to our civil rights could be far worse than that MOVE bombing conflagration.

We remain at war with nutball thugs who will hate us regardless of what we do or don't do. And restricting or repealing the 2001 authorization to use force is part of the insanity.

UPDATE: This post was a scheduled post written before President Obama's "war over" speech. Funny enough this was intended to defend the president's war powers against critics. Silly me.

UPDATE: And imagine my surprise that the president announced a restriction of drone strikes right after a stirring defense of their legality and effectiveness, using an explanation for targeting American citizens that I started this post with:

[When] a U.S. citizen goes abroad to wage war against America – and is actively plotting to kill U.S. citizens; and when neither the United States, nor our partners are in a position to capture him before he carries out a plot – his citizenship should no more serve as a shield than a sniper shooting down on an innocent crowd should be protected from a swat team.

Yet we'll greatly reduce the drone strikes. The recent lull wasn't a pause, it was a trend already in place before the speech. Let's remember this warning from the president:

I must weigh these heartbreaking tragedies [unintended civilian deaths while targeting jihadis] against the alternatives. To do nothing in the face of terrorist networks would invite far more civilian casualties – not just in our cities at home and facilities abroad, but also in the very places –like Sana’a and Kabul and Mogadishu – where terrorists seek a foothold. Let us remember that the terrorists we are after target civilians, and the death toll from their acts of terrorism against Muslims dwarfs any estimate of civilian casualties from drone strikes.

President Obama made an eloquent defense of drone strikes. So he was for them 9right) before he was against them. This will work out swell.

War Over?

The president's "receding tide of war" speech is troubling. It is a troubling mixture of stringing up a "Mission Accomplished" banner, excluding South Korea from our defensive perimeter, and "why do they hate us?" garbage that assumes jihadi grievances somehow make their bloody rage understandable.

The president says the war is over and that drone strikes can be limited to narrow areas and focused even more than they are now.

And the notion that we must address their grievances rather than insist that they restrict their response to ways that do not infringe on our rights or kill us is preposterous.

The president was so close to insight in saying that military force is not the only part of the Long War. I've droned on about helping the Moslem world reject the jihadi impulse. But the president missed it and went back to the "why do they hate us?" guilt that assumes we have done wrong and we must make it right, or who can blame the jihadis for their violent rages.

And when a Code Pink (I can only assume from the shrillness evident) heckler condemns President Obama (who mistakenly engages her and tolerates her interruption--and even salutes her!) for his speech contents as being insufficiently supine, I can only assume that we are in retreat.

Violence isn't the only way to fight the Long War. But it is a vital part of it. And it reminds us that we are at war, does it not? Violence may eventually recede. But it doesn't just happen. It happens because we fight and win. But the war is over, it seems. We shall retreat.

When we retreat, enemies will advance. One side's receding tide of war is always the other side's rising tide that lifts all jihadis. We'll learn that again before this president's term of office ends.

UPDATE: Yes, the protester was purportedly Code Pink's pinkest Medea Benjamin. Luckily, she is part of the president's base so when she figuratively yelled out, "You lie!" she got the gentle treatment rather than the frog march that a Tea Partier would have gotten.

But the cruelest cut was the president's invitation to Ms. Benjamin: "Let Me Finish, Ma'am."

Ma'am! That's gonna leave a mark.

UPDATE: Casualties mount in Iraq even though President Obama "responsibly ended" the war. Our president says the war in Afghanistan will end when we pull most (all?) of our troops from that geographic entity, so of course India wonders what they will do:

As NATO troops solve the logistical challenges of a draw-down from Afghanistan, there is a sense of déjà vu among foreign policymakers in New Delhi. When the Soviet troops left Afghanistan in 1989, and US attention turned elsewhere, Pakistan used the militant infrastructure of the war to support a popular militant uprising in Indian-administered Kashmir while the Afghan mujahideen finished off the communists in Kabul.

Because the funny thing is, when we leave--the war goes on.

So forgive me for not sharing the confidence that the war on terror has gone on long enough and can be summarily ended by presidential decree. It doesn't take two to make war. Indeed, for the side at war, it is pretty ideal if they are the only side at war.

For those concerned with civil liberties (as I've raised over the years), declaring the war over yet institutionalizing in a peacetime setting many of the wartime practices to detect and stop terrorists should be of deep concern. When we are at war, some strengthening of state power occurs but when the war is actually won, those increased state powers are expected to be repealed or reduced. Is TSA being reduced? Border controls lifted? The PATRIOT Act repealed?

But if in peacetime we keep those restrictions because in practice the war is not really over, don't we simply accept a permanent ratcheting up of the security state?

If we're going to have to live like we are at war, we should say we are at war. At least then we have the ability to end war practices when the threat is low enough to declare victory on the figurative corpse of our enemies.

Right now the only question is how bloody the reminder that we are at war will be.

UPDATE: Oh, and silly me, I thought I was defending the president and his ability to wage war in this post. Who knew McCain was just telegraphing the president's intent?

What is Permissible?

Is it not disturbing that our president want new laws to prevent the executive branch from attempts to silence and intimidate media criticism of the administration?

Isn't the president saying that he has no limits on what he will do to press critics unless there is explicit statutory prohibitions? Is he really unable to do what is right to accept the spirit of the First Amendment's press freedom provision?

Shouldn't it be the other way around for our government? Shouldn't the government be unwilling to infringe on freedoms unless explicitly authorized?

About Those High Capacity Magazines

Who knew I was so liberal? Tip to Instapundit.

With an amusing discussion of worries about Peak Seed.

Which we all know was nullified by horizontal fracking.



UPDATE: Obviously, I simply have no objections to the practice, in theory. Further conclusions are purely speculative and beyond the scope of this post.

What Goes Around Comes Around?

Our left saluted the shoe-throwing Iraqi reporter that President Bush faced.

President Obama entered office throwing a shoo at reporters to keep them friendly or quiet. First it was just Fox News. Now it has spread to anyone not part of the JournoListic public relations firms that much of the rest of the media once was.

Will our press start (figuratively) throwing shoes at this president as they realize that their 100% love is valued less than their 100% loyalty?

It might actually become the fourth estate again rather than the public relations arm of the executive branch.

But not without a fight, it seems.

Rip Tide

A man linked to the Boston Marathon bombers may have been about to confess to three brutal murders in Boston, according to ABC news, before the man was shot by FBI agenst during questioning.

To say this story is "odd" is to totally ignore the word "incompetent:"

The man shot dead by an FBI agent in Orlando, Florida early today was "about to sign a statement" admitting to a role, along with Boston Marathon bombing suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev, in an unsolved triple murder in Massachusetts in 2011, two people with direct knowledge of the case told ABC News.

Ibragim Todashev "just went crazy," and pulled a knife during his interview with the FBI, said state and federal law enforcement officials briefed on the latest strange twist in the investigation of the Boston Marathon bombing.

The good news is that the agent's wounds aren't fatal.

But in what world does the FBI interview a suspect in a brutal jihadi-style multiple murder case without searching the suspect for weapons? Or search the man so poorly that the knife remained? Seriously? The man had a knife on him?

I suppose we should just be grateful he didn't have an underwear bomb on him. What the heck. What difference, at this point, does it make? The tide of war is receding, right?

Good News and Bad News

Jay Carney offered some reassurances to the public regarding the reporter investigation scandals:

"If you're asking me whether the president believes that journalists should be prosecuted for doing their jobs, the answer is no," he said.

Unasked was whether the president considers the jobs of journalists as being cheerleaders for the president, as they've largely done for five years.

So take your reassurances at your own risk.

Always Read to the End of the Contract

Spanish shipbuilders have constructed some very advanced submarines for the Spanish navy. They can submerge. Can they surface? Not so much.

This is amazing:

After spending nearly one-third of a $3 billion budget to build four of the world’s most advanced submarines, the project’s engineers have run into a problem: the submarines are so heavy that they would sink to the bottom of the ocean.

But other than that, they're pretty impressive.

I suggest reading up on "buoyancy."

In Defense of Lois Lerner

Lois Lerner of the Internal Revenue Service could go to jail even if she is innocent. Pleading the 5th Amendment isn't necessarily as damning as it appears.

So IRS official Lois Lerner defended her tenure and actions but doesn't want to testify before a House committee:

Lerner's opening statement before the committee was the only information she would provide at the hearing. As advised by her attorney, Lerner invoked her Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate herself by testifying and declined to respond to questions from lawmakers. She added that by refusing to subject herself to questions "some people will assume I have done something wrong. I have not."

Recall that "Scooter" Libby did hard time despite having broken no laws in the Affaire La Plame non-scandal. He was nailed for incorrect statements under oath ("lies") about a non-crime he was not involved in.

How much worse could it be for Ms. Lerner when the IRS already admitted to doing something wrong?

UPDATE: Related thoughts (tip to Instapundit):

The American people have a right to know both how deep and how high the corruption of our government runs. The White House has an interest in minimizing the scandal, and surely that is Obama's objective if he is trying to throw Lerner under the bus. Let's reserve judgment on her and make sure not to let off the hook the man whose re-election the IRS's abuse of power helped to advance.

Well, the 5th amendment was her only way out in the short run, since "What difference, at this point, does it make" whether some IRS employees planned to target Tea Party activists or were just out walking around and spontaneously got worked up over some YoutTube Tea Party video has passed its shelf life in Washington.

And obviously, I meant that pleading the 5th isn't necessarily as damning to Ms. Lerner as it appears.

The Headline Writer Full Employment Act

Oh please, run. Oh please, run. Oh please, run.

Anthony Weiner (Clown--NY) has officially thrown his--er--hat into the ring to run for mayor of New York City:

Disgraced former Rep. Anthony Weiner announced his candidacy Wednesday for mayor of New York City. But he will have a harder time than Rep. Mark Sanford did in staging a comeback.

A harder time, indeed. The headlines write themselves. Good grief, it won't be just the New York Post, either.

I can hardly wait for the official Weiner campaign slogan: "Being your mayor ... excites me!"

And if Donald Trump would be kind enough to run against Weiner, I think I will dump all my Lockheed Martin stock and invest in the Comedy Channel.

Let's Fight Them "Over There"

Jihadis murdered a British soldier and conveniently waited 20 minutes for armed British police to arrive to shoot them.

It's a long war:

Eyewitness Michael Atley, 28, who works for a building maintenance firm nearby, said the two killers were in a blue BMW 3 series which mounted the pavement and knocked the victim over.

They then beheaded him with either a meat cleaver or a machete before both were shot by police officers who were on the scene within moments.

He told the Telegraph: “We heard the gunfire from the police shooting the two people. There were a few shots, then a pause, then some more shots, maybe eight shots in total.

“I spoke to an eyewitness who had seen the whole thing and he said they had run the guy over and then started decapitating him.

“When the police arrived the black guys were waving a pistol and a machete or a meat cleaver in the air and the police opened fire.

Another witness said the police took 20 minutes to arrive. Oh yeah, and the killers yelled "Allahu akbar!" Odd thing that last part. I wonder why they'd do that?

Obviously, with May 22 being the first day of the War of the Roses, informed investigators will no doubt move past that strange exclamation to get right on combing greater London for die hard supporters of Richard of York.

Let's not be shy about killing jihadis wherever we find them. JDAM akbar, and all that. Because they'll kill us wherever they can.

Informaton Ops Fail

This Army information site remains nearly worthless.

That's just sad. It used to be good. So much for full spectrum competence.

Really? I'm Not Prepared to Accept This Much Stupidity

I find it hard to believe that the Benghazi "consulate" was buying back Stinger anti-aircraft missiles from Libyan rebels or that a general was fired for trying to save Americans in danger.

But that is what the rumor mill says will come out:

Stevens’ mission in Benghazi, they will say, was to buy back Stinger missiles from al-Qaeda groups issued to them by the State Department, not by the CIA. Such a mission would usually be a CIA effort, but the intelligence agency had opposed the idea because of the high risk involved in arming “insurgents” with powerful weapons that endanger civilian aircraft.

Hillary Clinton still wanted to proceed because, in part, as one of the diplomats said, she wanted “to overthrow Gaddafi on the cheap.”

Why send Stingers--our top man-carried anti-aircraft missile--when there were so many Russian-made missiles out there? And why send Stingers when we could have bought and shipped in Russian weapons to hide our involvement?

Where would the State Department even get Stingers? It would have to be from our military, I assume. Wouldn't it be easier to buy Russian models from allies?

And one more question on that: why bother arming rebels with any anti-aircraft missiles when we established a no-fly zone (and then expanded it into a regime-change air campaign)? The rebels didn't need anti-aircraft missiles for the limited use of helicopters that could avoid the air patrols.

This makes no sense on many levels. On the other hand, stupid things happen. We'll see. I'm skeptical.

The other rumor is of more interest to me:

Regarding General Ham, military contacts of the diplomats tell them that AFRICOM had Special Ops “assets in place that could have come to the aid of the Benghazi consulate immediately (not in six hours).”

Ham was told by the White House not to send the aid to the trapped men, but Ham decided to disobey and did so anyway, whereupon the White House “called his deputy and had the deputy threaten to relieve Ham of his command.”

I thought that General Ham's retirement in April 2013 was scheduled. Although I'd heard this basic rumor before, I thought it was discredited--or at least not proven correct. Perhaps not. That would be a helluva thing to have happened. We'll see. I can believe higher authorities halted rescue efforts. But I'll need proof to accept linkage between that possible action and Ham's retirement. But it isn't nearly as far-fetched, in my opinion, given the administration efforts to portray the war on terror as over.

Like I said, stupid things happen.

Bitch. Payback: 1 ea.

Get out your tiny violins. The Taliban aren't happy about our drones.

Remember when our jihadi enemies taunted us with the accusation that we only hit them with ineffective cruise missiles strikes and feared to take them on in combat on the ground?

Then we kicked their asses across Afghanistan and Iraq and they no longer accused us of lacking the courage to face them head-on.

Now they aren't even happy with our distant firepower as practiced by our drone operators and the intelligence assets that create the target lists for the drones:

Islamic terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan are openly calling for supporters to help develop methods (electronic or otherwise) to deal with the American UAVs that constantly patrol terrorist sanctuaries in Pakistan (Waziristan) and Afghanistan (the Pakistani border area) and constantly find and kill Islamic terrorist leaders with missiles. This has led to the deaths of hundreds of key terrorist personnel and, despite the heavy use of civilians as human shields, few civilian deaths. The Taliban are increasingly frustrated at their inability to deal with this.

I could wish that this was a clever information operation by our side to craft a message of despair within a call to the faithful for tips on avoiding our fear-inspiring drones. But the simple explanation is that the enemy really is scared witless by the drone campaign.

Why some in the West are eager to put down a sword that allows us to kill enemies more effectively is beyond me.

I know, the expressed fear (as opposed to what I imagine is their guilt that the weapons work so well) is that it is so easy that we will do it everywhere.

But we aren't doing it everywhere, are we? Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, and Somalia are the places our drones hit enemies. All are done in war zones with the cooperation of the host government or where there is no government (Somalia).

We haven't hit jihadis in Iran, Syria, Mali, Kosovo, Egypt, Tunisia, Algeria, or Libya--or Germany for that matter. We really are using this weapon in places we'd use manned planes, conventional missiles, or troops. I don't see an escalation in usage because of their relative safety for our drone crews (the safety of the people providing the intelligence is another matter, no?).

Face it, our enemies prefer to have open season to kill us and hear us express our sorrow that our necks dulled their culturally significant scimitars.

I'm happy that we have an effective weapon in the war on terror that makes our jihadi enemies void their bowels whenever they hear a car backfire or a distant lawn mower engine.

9/10 of Something, At Least

China and Vietnam are fortifying their claims in the South China Sea.

Honestly, everyone with a claim should be fortifying their claims since the decision to eject forces is a lot tougher to make (and get away with) than landing on unoccupied islands and announcing what was always yours is now secure. I'm shocked this hasn't been happening at a faster pace:

Kalayaan Mayor Eugenio Bito-onon yesterday said that Union Bank, a wide body of shallow water located well within the country’s 200-nautical mile exclusive economic zone (EEZ), is now teeming with construction activities not only by the Chinese but also by the Vietnamese.

If countries with claims don't stand on them, China will eventually get to each and every one of them.

Our Marines in Australia could be very busy in a war.

An Important Symbol, Indeed

Democrats have revived the ridiculous notion that House Republicans--who control a third of the relevant institutions in the Benghazi drama--are the reason there was no money for diplomatic security in Benghazi prior to September 11, 2012. One of the reasons this was ridiculous is that it denied the entire notion of prioritizing spending needs.

Hey, look at that that new environmentally sustainable embassy in Burundi!

"In an important symbol of America’s commitment to an enduring friendship with the Republic of Burundi, U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Burundi, Dawn M. Liberi, dedicated the new U.S. Embassy in Bujumbura today," reads the State Department press release.

"Occupying a 10-acre site near the city center in Kigobe, the $133 million multi-building complex provides a state-of-the-art, environmentally-sustainable workplace for embassy personnel."

Sadly, the Benghazi diplomatic facility was not a life-sustaining workplace.

But one must have priorities, mustn't one? Commitment-wise, of course.

Now It Would Be Okay

During our portion of the war in Iraq, I was opposed to dividing Iraq as a strategy to resolve the conflict. Now it might be okay.

While we fought in Iraq, dividing Iraq into nearly autonomous ethnically- or religiously-based sub-states would have rightly been seen as a defeat for America. With al Qaeda still strong, they'd have had a base in western Sunni Arab Iraq. Then, I said that once al Qaeda and other Iranian- and Syrian-supported insurgents and terrorists were defeated, that a separation could take place. Nobody views the dissolution of Czechoslovakia as a defeat for American, NATO, or the EU, after all.

So this might be fine if the factions can't settle their differences within Iraq:

Tribal leaders in Iraq are warning of war unless the country splits into a federation amid a deadly new wave of apparently sectarian violence.

Monday's attacks across Iraqi cities left at least 77 people dead and more than 248 others injured, officials say, pushing the death toll over the past week to well above 200.

On the same day, the pan-Arab newspaper Al-Hayat reported that Sunni protest leaders had called for "armed confrontation or the declaration of an [autonomous] region".

Maliki's response was correct, I think:

Nouri al-Maliki, the Iraqi prime minister, said he was willing to contemplate the establishment of an autonomous region in the Sunni-dominated western provinces, provided it came about through the correct legal procedures, according to the independent Al Sumaria television.

I'd rather have Iraq remain united to provide a better buffer against Iran. It depends on how a federation is defined.

Not that even a legal split would be easy. Friction across the boundaries of the de facto autonomous Kurdish region is tough enough to cope with. Dividing the boundaries, state assets, and state debts between Iraq and the Sunni Arab west would be extremely difficult. Indeed, that path might be more prone to provoking fighting than resolving differences within the existing Iraq.

But talks could reveal that while lowering tensions. And maybe Sunni Arab states would pressure Iraq's Sunni Arabs to tone it down lest Iraq become a mostly Shia state that the Sunni Arab states will worry is more prone to being influenced by Shia Iran.

But if all the problems of separation can be worked out, a federal state might be okay now.

Don't Just Do Something, Stand There!

Ah, gridlock:

The Congressional Budget Office, which only some 90 days ago forecast the deficit this fiscal year would hit $845 billion, has decided that $642 billion is the more likely total. Better still, the deficit is projected to be about 4 percent of GDP this year, down from 7 percent in the previous fiscal year, and reasonably close to a level that can be sustained if the economy grows as it should.

Another year of this and I might be willing to call it a good trend.

The Flexibility They Expected

President Obama did promise Putin we'd be more "flexible" after his reelection. So why wouldn't Putin be happy with Secretary of State Kerry?

Our first Spandex-American Secretary of State is a hit in Moscow, as the New York Times reports. Despite failures to get Russia to reduce support for Assad in Syria, our double-jointed yoga master is eager to work with the Russians:

Kerry is undaunted by the evidence of his failure and is instead concentrating on making friends with Russian Foreign Affairs Minister Sergei Lavrov. The result is, as the Times says, a “change in tone” in the relations between the two countries even if it has not actually advanced American interests.

While there is a case to be made for diplomats keeping the lines of communication open, what recent events have shown is that Kerry is not so much keeping the Russians informed of American positions as he has signaled to them that the U.S. is ready to bow to Moscow’s will. The news that, as the Times makes clear, the Russians are well pleased with Kerry ought to set off alarms in Washington.

The premise of the Times feature is quite clear. While Kerry’s predecessor Hillary Clinton worked hard to butter up the Russians and get them to play ball, Putin and his minions were displeased by her occasional willingness to speak up about human rights violations as well as her assertive statements about Iran and Syria. But in Kerry Moscow has found its perfect American secretary of state: a man willing to both appease them on policy as well as one determined not to offend their sensibilities. As the Times notes, Putin and Lavrov like Kerry a lot more than they did Clinton, let alone her predecessor Condoleezza Rice.

How bad is Kerry? He is a Navy combat veteran and still the Russians believe they can push him around. And sadly, Kerry is quite capable of curling into a fetal position while waiting in Putin's outer office for a pity photo op. This is a "reset" Russia can believe in.

The Palestinians check in with a vote of confidence, too:

The top Palestinian negotiator with Israel on Monday threw his weight behind U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry's bid to revive stalled peace talks, while describing the situation in the West Bank as apartheid worse than that suffered in South Africa.

I can only assume that Iran and North Korea will submit their professions of admiration soon.

Hey, have any of our allies been as happy with our chief diplomat?

UPDATE: Well, the Turks have reason to be happy--for the wrong reason, of course:

A month after comparing the “activists” who died in the 2010 Gaza-flotilla raid to Americans killed in the Boston Marathon bombing, Secretary of State John Kerry reportedly met with Ahmet Dogan, whose son, Furkan Dogan, a Turkish-American dual citizen, was among those killed aboard the MV Mavi Marmara in 2010.

You'll recall the pro-Palestinian ambush at sea in that whole fauxtilla controversy. Sadly, we're in more need of an "American desk" at State than ever.

Syria is Playing With Fire

Syrian forces took a shot at Israeli forces across the hitherto quiet Golan Heights line. Israel could really hurt Assad without shooting at any Syrians at all.

Does Assad believe he has insufficient enemies?

Israel returned fire after one of its military vehicles was hit by shots from Syria, Israel's defence forces say. Media reports say no-one was hurt.

Syria says it destroyed an Israeli vehicle which it says crossed the ceasefire line into territory its forces control.

Syria and Israel have traded fire a number of times in recent weeks.

The Israeli account doesn't include destruction of their vehicle or the unlikely crossing of the ceasefire line.

But if Israel wants to take serious action against Assad, Israel could tear up Hezbollah by driving all the way to Baalbek in the Bekaa Valley.

With a good number of Hezbollah gunmen in Syria and Assad too busy to offer Hezbollah help, such an Israeli offensive would be a severe blow against Assad.

As an aside, I wonder if the Israelis have made contact with the Druze on the Syrian side of the border? The Druze might welcome help from Israel in the face of jihadi Sunnis who look at Druze as they would any other Infidel. The Druze in Israel serve in their military. So there could be avenues of contact, I assume. And that would be another Israeli card to play against Assad if losing his Lebanon rear area isn't enough of a blow.

Mind you, the Israelis have to be careful since a desperate Assad might fire off chemical-tipped missiles. They aren't nukes, but if the weather conditions are right and the warheads can deliver a sufficiently concentrated cloud of gas, Assad could kill a significant number of civilians in a particularly terrorizing manner.

On the other hand, given the legacy of gas chambers, Assad would risk a nuke in retaliation on whatever city he is sitting in.

Taking Off His Dishdash, They Said, Is This Man a Jew?

Stop telling me that jihadis hate us because of what we do.

Hezbollah has constructed quite the elaborate justification for slaughtering Sunni Arabs in Syria for Boy Assad:

Hezbollah's rapidly expanding role in Syria is regarded as part of a strategic decision undertaken by the party, Damascus, and Tehran to safeguard the Assad regime at all costs. To soothe any misgivings among Hezbollah's rank and file, the party's leadership has crafted a narrative that the West and Israel are using militant Sunni jihadists to oust the Assad regime and weaken the "resistance front" of Iran, Syria, and Hezbollah for the benefit of the Jewish state.

It is a rationale that has been absorbed by the Hezbollah combatants. Asked how he felt to be fighting Arab Muslims today, having not fought Israeli troops for nearly seven years, Abu Khalil shook his head.

"No, we are fighting Israelis in Syria," he says. "Only they are wearing a dishdash and carrying the Quran. But it is the same Western and Israeli project that wants to weaken the resistance."

There's a lot of room for dead Moslem Arabs with that thinking that defines Moslem Arabs as just Jews in disguise.

Like in the Iran-Iraq War. Iran justified their furious assaults on Iraq as a means to get at the Israelis. The Iranians killed at least 200,000 Iraqis at the cost of at least 400,000 Iranians during that war under that rationale.

[UPDATE: From this post: "Iran justified continuing the war with offensives against Iraq as Iran's attempt to go through Iraq to get at the real enemy--Israel. When Saddam said that Iran was diverting the Moslem world from dealing with Israel (then fighting in Lebanon) the Ayatollah Khomeini denied that, saying ""We shall get to Lebanon, and to Jerusalem, through Iraq." (from an old unpublished manuscript of mine on the Iran-Iraq War)"]

You have to hand it to the Hezbollah terrorists for being a dedicated lot. After all, they're willing to fight the Jews despite Israel's apparent ability to convince Sunni Arabs to fight Assad.



But Hezbollah knows they can teach their twisted speech to the young believers. They're working hard in Qusair. Working for the clampdown.

Good Thing They Invented That Nuance Thing

The French are in a difficult situation in Mali.

The French did well to blitz north and scatter the jihadi survivors of their offensive.

But the French need the Tuaregs to keep hunting down jihadis.

Yet the Mali government wants to re-control the north--and there is no doubt that the Mali troops will alienate the Tuaregs (again) and reignite the revolt against the central government.

If France wants to largely leave Mali and avoid having northern Mali become a jihadi safe haven in the wake of another Tuareg revolt, the French need to pressure Mali's government to allow some form of autonomy acceptable to most Tuaregs:

A standoff over how to restore Malian government authority to Kidal, the last town in the desert north yet to be brought under central control, is sowing resentment with Paris and could delay planned elections to restore democracy after a coup.

Mali's army has moved troops towards Kidal, a stronghold of the MNLA Tuareg separatists, but missed a self-imposed deadline this week to retake the Saharan town. France, which has its own forces camped outside, does not want Malian troops to march on the town, fearing ethnic bloodshed if it is taken by force.

"Paris blocks army at the gates of Kidal," read a headline in Le Matin, a weekly in Mali's capital Bamako.

Given the poor state of the Mali army, I wouldn't be too quick to assume that the French are protecting the MNLA forces in Kidal.

I wish the French good luck. We need them to navigate this problem successfully.

The Mother of Invention

Our Navy may get to a better place even though the path of budget crunch isn't the most pleasant way to get there.

Our admirals are contemplating a budget future where carriers are no longer the center of our fleet:

The U.S. Navy is facing a cash crisis. Its current fleet is still full of Cold War era ships that are rapidly wearing out. The replacements cost more than the navy can afford, now or in the next decade or so. Looking for ways to manage the inevitable shrinking some navy officials are saying the unthinkable; that the navy rely less on carriers, if only because it cannot afford to replace the ten it has now. The most extreme solution is to build fewer carriers and more destroyers and rely on cruise missiles fired from surface ships and submarines, instead of smart bombs dropped by carrier aircraft. ...

To deal with situations requiring longer (sustained) operations, four or five carriers could be kept in service. Carrier admirals find this appalling, but with the high cost of new ships and shrinking budgets, something has to give.

The Navy is not immune to math, after all. As I've argued over and over, we need to pick a number of ships we need and then build the types of ships we can afford to reach that number.

Heck, modularized auxiliary cruisers might pick up the slack in secondary but still important theaters (in 6th Fleet or around Africa and Latin America) or important but dangerous theaters (western Pacific or Arabian Sea).

If our big deck carriers are no longer forward deployed where they can be the first target in a surprise enemy attack, I won't be bothered one bit. By all means, keep them back. Honestly, if money was no object, I still wouldn't want those big deck carriers as the center-piece of our Navy. When the money was there (or was hoped would soon be there), we never had a real debate on carriers since each side talked past each other on different arguments.

So for me, this is a welcome introduction to reality since until recently the Navy has insisted it could have the numbers it says it needs while keeping a full load of big carriers. Hopefully if money opens up again, it will be for a Navy better balanced to fight for control of the seas and survive while enabling power projection, too.

Remember, it isn't like we can't have naval aviation even for situations that don't call for the big decks in a sustained operation. Which is why I do not think we should cancel the vertical take-off version of the F-35 (the F-35B) despite program cost programs (thank you, Britain!).

Our Navy has a proud tradition of success. Carriers have a number of chapters in that story. But the Navy will continue to build that tradition of success long after big carriers are a part of history rather than deployments. How many people today ask, "Where are the monitors?"

Build a strong Navy. Build the right kind of Navy. And build enough of a Navy.

NOTE: Since Lockheed builds the F-35, I should note that I do have a tiny amount of Lockheed stock. It is so little that it doesn't affect my blogging, but I figure I should mention it.

They Only Miss Us When We're Gone

For years, I've heard that our presence in Afghanistan just promotes war and that the proud Afghan people just want us to leave so they can solve their disputes amongst themselves. Apparently not.

Huh:

Afghanistan is suffering a crisis of confidence – and given what’s on the horizon, it's not so difficult to see why.

Next year is shaping up to be a perfect storm of security, political, and economic transition. And many Afghans, from shopkeepers to members of Parliament, are uncertain that their fragile ship can withstand the tossing waves.

After more than a decade of a massive foreign military presence and an associated aid effort that have showered tens of billions of dollars on one of the world’s poorest countries, the US and other Western powers are preparing, if not to say goodbye, then to substantially scale back.

Let me repeat myself. Huh.

As with so many things in this long war, we're damned if we do and we're damned if we don't.

And recall that I foresaw the crisis of confidence.

And recall that we need to defend the gains of our wars lest things go horribly wrong when we are completely gone too soon:

Suspected Sunni Muslim militants killed four state-backed Sunni fighters in Iraq on Saturday, security sources said, apparently viewing them as collaborators with the Shi'ite-led government of a nation plagued by sectarian hatred.

Sunni-Shi'ite tensions in Iraq have been amplified by the conflict between mostly Sunni rebels and President Bashar al-Assad's Alawite-dominated forces in neighboring Syria.

Just where is the State Department army that was supposed to defend our gains in Iraq?

Keep that in mind as we plan a post-2014 presence in Afghanistan.

I know, I know. Iraq was the "bad" war of "choice." But the impulse to walk away seems to be as strong for the "good" war of "necessity" in Afghanistan.

Self Defense?

If the administration was spying on AP reporters in reaction to a leak that outed an actual source we had inside al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, this is at worst a misdemeanor-level scandal if the snooping went beyond the scope of the problem or if the administration failed to get proper authorization for the snooping.

This certainly sounds investigation-worthy after all, if it accurately reflects the problem the adminsitration faced:

“Penetrating AQAP is incredibly difficult,” Schroeder continued. “This double agent provided a rare opportunity to gain critical, life-saving information. Whoever disclosed the information obtained by the AP had not only put the agent's life and his family's life in danger. He also killed a golden opportunity to save untold more lives that now remain at risk due to al-Ashiri remaining at large.”

But even if this is not a scandal at all, the way the press went after the non-scandal of Affaire de Plame just in case, I'm sure the press will push just as hard to find a scandal here, right?

Don't Assume We Know the Outcome Ahead of Time

If we assume we control the sea, will we be able to fight for it when challenged by the Chinese navy?

Are we watching our Navy lose control of the seas?

Supporting land operations (as necessary as that was for Iraq and Afghanistan), sea-based ballistic missile defense, humanitarian missions, and simple showing the flag missions have crowded out the skill and attitude sets that are necessary to control the seas to carry out all those nice non-sea control missions:

In effect, then, the service has demoted war at sea, the raison d'être for any navy, to secondary status. Both the hardware (weaponry, sensors, and hulls) and the software (training and exercises) for sea control have doubtless suffered as a result. In an era of tight budgetary constraints, reversing two decades of steady decline in surface warfare will be neither easy nor quick. In short, prevailing assumptions about American naval supremacy are coming under strain.

We have sufficient superiority to make sure that this isn't fatal--since we can probably reinforce from global assets to overcome a bloody nose in the opening stage of a naval campaign near China--but if the trends don't change and we don't come to grips that we will need to fight to control the seas, even that best-case scenario won't take place.

Good grief, I was (and remain) horrified that our surface combatants--the core of our fleet--will in twenty years not even have the Harpoon missile that the article notes is outranged by newer Chinese anti-ship missiles.

And I think we all know what I think of carriers in a sea control mission (as opposed to a power projection mission).

But keep in mind that China doesn't have to be superior to us overall to wrest sea control from us in the western Pacific for at least a time because of China's geographic advantage, as those authors in The Diplomat explain:

Whether the Pentagon can afford to mount superior strength in a rival great power's backyard, whether the sea services are investing in the right people and hardware to constitute that strength, and whether American seafarers have the requisite skills to prevail when battle is joined are the only questions worth asking.

That casts U.S.-China competition in a whole new light, doesn't it? A purely fleet-on-fleet engagement is improbable within the China seas or the western reaches of the Pacific Ocean. In those expanses, Beijing has the luxury of throwing the combined weight of Chinese sea power into a sea fight, dispatching not just its surface fleet but missile-toting submarines and swarms of patrol craft. Furthermore, land-based implements of sea power can strike a blow in any fleet action that takes place within their combat radii. PLA Air Force warplanes can join the fray, as can anti-ship missiles fielded by the PLA Second Artillery Corps. Lord Nelson, who knew a thing or two about operating fleets under the shadow of shore-based weaponry, sagely counseled that a ship's a fool to fight a fort. That's doubly true today, when Fortress China can reach scores or hundreds of miles out to sea.

One part of the U.S. Navy, then, could conceivably confront the whole of China's maritime might. The U.S. sea services are dispersed throughout Asia and the world. To estimate the outcome of a fleet action, we thus have to determine how the contingent the U.S. Navy is likely to commit to battle — including its aerial and subsurface components, along with any assets supplied by allies like the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force or South Korean Navy — stacks up to the massed power of the PLA Navy fleet, backed by the array of anti-access weaponry at PLA commanders' disposal.

Yes. I've gone on about that Chinese geographic advantage for years:

I've beat this topic to death over the years. In a long war, we can mass more power than China can. But in a short war that China initiates, they can surge forces out of their ports without worrying about rotating ships in order to get everything out at once to hit our thin blue line in the western Pacific.

And let's make this even worse, shall we? China doesn't even have to defeat our Navy (and supporting Air Force) to inflict a defeat on us. I went on:

More likely than China inflicting a stunning defeat on our forward deployed fleet (though it is certainly possible the Chinese may come up with a silver bullet that we cannot counter, at lest initially) is that Chinese capabilities will induce so much caution in our fleet's movements to engage the Chinese fleet that the Chinese buy time to achieve their objective (say, conquering Taiwan).

We can tell ourselves soothing stories about our crew quality advantages. And they are likely quite superior. But such a qualitative advantage is so difficult to judge that it would be easy for us to disregard measurable quantifiable deficiencies while assuring ourselves that the quality issue balances everything out.

Hey, we assumed just that with the Japanese in 1941, now didn't we? Just remember, China doesn't have to go all the way to the central Pacific to strike our forward deployed strike force. The Chinese just need to leave port.

And Lord knows what the Chinese might achieve if they eject us from the western Pacific for even a short time.

This essay exploring a "Cool War" between America and China addresses this geographic reality with the effects of even a small victory over America based on that geographic advantage:

But to alter the balance of power in a fundamental way, China does not need to reach military parity with the United States -- and once again, Taiwan is the demonstration case. From Beijing's standpoint, the optimal strategy toward Taiwan is to build up China's military capacity and acquire the island without a fight. The idea is that the United States might be prepared to tolerate the abandonment of its historical ally out of necessity, the way Britain ceded control over Hong Kong when it had no choice.

To see why this scenario is so plausible, all that is required is to ask the following question: Would the president of the United States go to war with China over Taiwan absent some high-profile immediate crisis capable of mobilizing domestic support? If the United States were to abandon Taipei, it would have to insist to China, as well as Japan, South Korea, and U.S. citizens, that Taiwan was in a basic sense different from the rest of Asia -- that the United States would protect Asian allies from hegemony despite letting Taiwan go.

Failure to do so credibly would transform capitulation on Taiwan into the end of U.S. military hegemony in Asia. It would represent a reversal of the victories in the Pacific during World War II. It would put much of the world's economic power within China's sphere of control, not only its sphere of influence. To be the regional hegemon in Asia would mean dominating more than half the world's population and more than half its economy. Even without increasing its position in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, or Latin America -- and without achieving military parity -- China could nonetheless be on a par with the United States in terms of global influence.

Again, I've gone on about the global effect of Chinese power that just dominates within 500 miles of China's shore.

And I've argued that the issue of tiny Taiwan's fate isn't just an issue about tiny Taiwan's fate:

For a long time, when China could not get past our fleet to attack Taiwan, it was easy to see the Taiwan problem as Taiwan's problem. But the loss of Taiwan would be a huge blow to our ability to resist Chinese dominance of the seas and countries near China. As we assess China's current and future military capabilities, we can't think of Chinese intent toward Taiwan in isolation.

To fight a war with China, we need to increase our ability to fight close to China and increase the ability of our allies to fight without our surface fleet coming to the rescue for perhaps several months.

Better would be to get China so involved in the interior of Asia--and so divide China's military resources--that China lacks the power to defeat us at sea.

Perhaps even better would be regime change in China. Or even multiple regime changes? And is unrest as unlikely as China's dramatic rising power makes it seem?

Don't assume victory at sea ia our God-given right. And if we can't win at sea when we need to win at sea, what other means are there to win?

Cake Pop Success!

We successfully made cake pops.

Now Lamb and I have to try them after the chocolate shell hardens.

UPDATE: We went out to feed some bread to some geese and their goslings. So that was both fun for Lamb and a chance for the chocolate shell coatings to harden without opening the refrigerator every 40 seconds or so to check.

Quite tasty. Lamb had the push-up style cake pop that I made for her yesterday when I baked the cake for the whole process. I stuck with the traditional dipped variety that we made today.

The only problem was the plastic food sticks that I used. The weight of the cake pop pulled the cake down the stick. But that was a relatively minor problem. We'll see if life in the freezer solves that issue.