Tuesday, July 27, 2010

It's No Secret

WikiLeaks has published lots of classified government documents about our war effort in Afghanistan, with the clear intent of undermining and ending our war there. WikiLeaks is a private entity essentially waging war on the United States.

I've mentioned private warfare before, and this is another challenge to the assumption that a state wages war on another state. Already, we see the problem of waging war on jihadi terrorists. It isn't enough to wage war on al Qaeda since the enemy is too shapeless to fit even into that loose category let alone the strict concept of a state.

Heck, we even have problems confronting the state of Iran even as it supports entities who kill our people in Iraq and Afghanistan since so many in the West argue that "Iran" does not fight us--the Revolutionary Guards (Pasdaran), which is an entity within Iran's government, are fighting us.

So how do we wage war on a private entity that is waging war on us, admittedly without shooting at us, through leaking information that will damage our war effort? No, the information isn't that big a deal. I had "secret" clearance in the Guard, for Pete's sake. But while the information isn't news to those who pay attention, the documents could be demoralizing to those not prepared for that level of detail or who don't place the information in context.

Maybe retired general Stanley McChrystal, who's forgotten more about irregular warfare than most people will ever learn, will start a company to wage war (both violent and non-violent) in the shadows against entities that have their own foreign policy regarding America despite the fact that they are not official members of the international community.

Actually, McChrystal would be a good guy to send to Pakistan as an adviser to help the Pakistanis wage war on their jihadis in the tribal frontier areas.

UPDATE: Well, here's one way to take on Assange.