Overseas Contingency Opbearation

We all remember the president's speech in the woods last March reaching out to the Ursine community to undo the damage George W. Bush did with his cowboy diplomacy.

President Obama reminded us of all the contributions that bears have made to Western civilization and culture, decrying crude stereotypes "before he was president" that portrayed bears as greedy picnic basket stealers:

Source: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/YogiBear

And, of course, our president's determination to save the polar bears from drowning was a concrete demonstration of our new commitment to restore our reputation in the Ursine world.

I'm pleased to announce that this outreach has paid great dividends, with Ursine forces now fighting side-by-side against jihadis with no caveats impeding their contribution:

In Indian Kashmir, an Islamic terrorist leader, and one of his followers was killed by a black bear. Two other terrorists were wounded, but were able to flee to a nearby village. Although the terrorists were armed with assault rifles, the bear attacked quickly, and at night, and the men were unable to use their weapons in the restricted confines of the cave.

Score one for hope and change.

UPDATE: We're proving to be a bad ally for Britain? Ah, screw the Brits, eh? Why would we give them the time of day when we have thug regimes to woo?

Who needs our best ally? We've got some friggin' awesome bears, now.

UPDATE: Yes, yes. No need to remind me that George W. Bush constantly referred to bears as the "carnivores of peace." But it's still his fault we didn't have bear help back then--everyone--and every bear--knows those were just words, and he secretly wanted their skins on the Oval Office floor.

UPDATE: Ursine slaughter porn isn't helping our efforts to cultivate our new bear allies. But consider the source--the Brits. Clearly they're trying to regain their prime alliance spot by alienating the bears.

OK, I promise I'll stop beating this dead bear. Post over.

Building an Alliance

As much as a worry that our foreign policy is for all practical purposes an exercise in alienating friends, I'll give the Obama administration a tip of the hat for working to forge closer US-India relations as Prime Minister Singh comes to Washington on a official state visit:

In the wake of the landmark civil nuclear deal signed during the second Bush administration, Indian and American officials have been working on building a closer defense relationship. The United States has been pressing India for several years to sign a defense logistics support agreement that would make it easier to hold more joint military exercises, work together on regional maritime security and to sell vital equipment to Indian forces.

Also on the agenda during talks between the two leaders will be enhanced counterterrorism cooperation in hopes of preventing a similar attack like the one a year ago in Mumbai.

India is an important ally to cultivate, and I'm glad that India isn't tainted as far as the Obama administration is concerned by being an initiative that President Bush worked to achieve.

T-Triple Al

Al Gore has visions of a future where our world is on fire and the oceans rise to drown us.

His new book on global warming offers us the basic choice, "come with me if you want to live."

Actually, I fully expect Gore to start building an ark pretty soon.

Can You Hear Me Now?

Russia is absorbing Abkhazia's area code:

Georgia's breakaway Abkhazia region, recognized as an independent state by Russia, has cut another of its ties with Georgia by adopting Russia's international dialing code.

I do believe we've got five bars in understanding Moscow's message.

What Allah Knows

Victory in Afghanistan is no long-shot gamble, if we'll just keep our heads about us.

Austin Bay addresses two major points that seem to drive the retreatists on Afghanistan, in his discussion of al Qaeda in general:

Napoleon understood the importance of assessing his opposition's position. He wrote in 1809, "In war one sees his own troubles, not those of the enemy." Focusing on one's own troubles and those of allies thwarts the clear-headed analysis of a diplomatic or military conflict Napoleon insisted was the mark of an effective senior commander.

American media have made a business of touting America's troubles in the War on Terror. Tales of doom, fright and angry despair are audience-grabbers. Would that doom, fear and despair were the sole traits. An "it must be our fault and we made them angry" argument threads the cable TV carnival of doom. In the case of Hasan, this shtick became a discussion of his "alienation" and "isolation."

Ah, the classics of the retreat genre.

One: we're doomed to be defeated by our relentless enemies.

And two: it's our fault they're our enemies.

With that type of analysis, it is easy to see why they believe they are the only ones smart enough to understand that retreating before inevitably victorious and morally superior foes is "reality based" or some such rot.

I know it is fruitless to try to convince our nuanced class that we are the good guys in this fight with Islamo-fascists, but do look at the war from the enemy's side:

Measured by the grand map of the would-be caliphate, al-Qaida has arguably lost significant ground since 2001. Several Sunni and Shia conflicts continue, but the strife Zarqawi sought to fatally ignite failed to shatter Iraq. He did incite defeatists in the U.S., but it was Zarqawi who was defeated in Iraq.

Read the whole thing, as they say.

Or consider that even O'Hanlon doesn't think we are doomed in Afghanistan specifically.

Bay points to the lament of Zarqawi when all the bright kids were crowing that we were doomed to defeat in Iraq. I wrote of this, too, at the height of sectarian violence in Iraq (and I first brought it up in mid-2005), quoting not Napoleon but Kipling:

Man cannot tell but Allah knows
How much the other side is hurt.

Our nuanced class thought we were doomed in Iraq even as our enemies showed desperation in avoiding defeat. We won that war.

And now our nuanced class has focused their big-brained analytical abilities on getting us to run from Afghanistan even though our enemies are hurt.

I just don't see reason to panic about our fortunes in Afghanistan. Let's cut the nuance and focus on a simple thing--victory in Afghanistan.

A Fistful of Dullards

My, my, how times have changed.

Once, the global Left here and abroad blamed cowboy foreign policy under George W. Bush for all our ills.

Do I detect a little bit of regret cropping up among the global Left that they got exactly what they wanted in President Obama? They thought nuance is just what the doctor ordered, but the fools in charge of our foreign policy don't seem to have a clue about promoting American or Western interests in the face of Chinese resistance to hope and change.

You can't satisfy some people, apparently. They don't like Bush. They don't like anti-Bush.

Maybe some day we'll conclude that it isn't our fault when foreigners dislike our actions or inaction.

Death Wish

Hugo Chavez wouldn't be the first thug ruler to think a quick foreign adventure would bolster his domestic rule.

I figured the Dutch would be a prime candidate for such an adventure.

But Chavez might have his sights set on Colombia and is issuing threats:

Should Chavez be taken seriously? Yes, says Maruja Tarre, former international relations professor with a degree from Harvard Kennedy School and now a Caracas-based consultant to multinational firms.

With his revolution losing popularity amid rising inflation, rampant crime, a stagnant economy, and frequent water shortages and power outages, Chavez needs a galvanizing event, she says. A border skirmish, if not a full-fledged war, would solidify his support base ahead of next year's legislative elections and give his Bolivarian Revolution the heroic episode that it lacks.

Would Chavez be stupid enough to engage in a war with Colombia? A border skirmish, Chavez could survive, if he strikes first and hard.

But if Chavez can't end the conflict quickly, Colombia would clean his clock. the idiot savante Chavez has spent his rule crippling his armed forces by imposing his own theories of warfare on their doctrine.

I can't believe Chavez would be dumb enough to provoke a war with Colombia. But you never know.

Gaming Mexico

Stratfor has a pretty interesting discussion of Mexico, with the geography of defending Mexico a fascinating read if you grew up on board games (even just Risk).

The Peace of Retreat

I've figured our president is so totally focused on his domestic agenda that foreign policy and wars are only of interest depending on how he figures they'll hurt or help his domestic agenda.

Iraq? Afghanistan? Is it more trouble to win or lose? On Iraq, he'd have to go out of his way to lose--so complete the victory it shall be.

On Afghanistan, three months of debate and the jury is still out on whether we want to win. Will losing or fighting to win hurt his domestic vision more?

Saying that foreign policy is a distant second in priorities for this administration might seem an odd thing to say for a president who has traveled abroad so much already.

But it makes sense if you think of the trips abroad as efforts to disengage from foes and retreat a bit by giving our foes what they want in order to buy time to pass domestic legislation.

Understand that when you retreat, it takes a while for an enemy to pursue you and fill the vacuum. And that time it takes for the enemy to re-engage will surely be much quieter.

And if you want to, you can argue that the period of quiet while the enemy approaches is actually "peace." It isn't peace, but you can pretend for a while that it is so you can focus on domestic issues.

And if conflict erupts after the domestic agenda is achieved? Oh well. Breaking eggs and making omelets, right?

Heck, never waste a crisis, right? Maybe that will be an excuse for even more far-reaching changes at home or simply refusing to reconsider the passed legislation since don't you know there's a war on?

The Final Check on the Bucket List

This is rather creepy:

The Swiss government, concerned that Switzerland is becoming a destination for "suicide tourism," wants to tighten its decades-old assisted-suicide law, considered to be the most liberal of its kind in the world.

Still, you'd think this would have possibilities for the Swisst tourism industry to launch an ad campaign. How many places can boast that visitors would die to (OK, not "to" but "after" if you want to be picky) visit their country? Seriously, picture a hills (but not you, for long) are alive with the sound of music opening. "Switzerland! You come for a visit but never want to leave!"

On Your Mark! Get Set! Run Away!

If we run from the war formerly known as good in Afghanistan, I think we can trust that the reason will be spun as being caused by Afghanistan government corruption. Hey, it isn't really running away as much as it is cold, steely, nuanced evaluation of our chances--and why fight for a doomed war?

Yes, Afghanistan is corrupt. But lots of places are.

And note that another really corrupt place is Iraq--yet we won that war notwithstanding the very real problem of corruption.

And a number of those high corruption states have functioning governments that manage to suppress the opposition.

But what the heck, if our government is determined to run from Afghanistan, one transparent excuse is as good as another. Corruption it is!

Gosh, I can just feel the nuance radiating from the White House!

There is a God

And He loves me:

New Tim Horton's restaurant expected to arrive on Washtenaw Avenue in Ann Arbor

I've lamented that I have to go out to the township for firearms, strippers, and fresh donuts. But now Tim Hortons will return to the city!

I haven't been this happy since the year they reversed the cancellation of "Sledge Hammer."

Yep, Heading for the Exits

I remain fearful that our president is simply looking for an excuse to retreat from Afghanistan. I'm not the only one.

And the defeat chorus is just warming up to shove the president out:

The California Democratic Party just sent a loud message to President Obama, who is pondering the next U.S. move in Afghanistan: Get out.

The state's Dems have gone on record with a Get Out message before -- like at their confab last summer. But this one is more specific. And bolder. Marin County activist and media critic Norman Solomon passes on that the CDP's 300-member statewide exec boardpassed a resolution Sunday called: "End the U.S. Occupation and Air War in Afghanistan." You can find the resolution here.

Huh. The Left wants to run? Who'd have thought that?

Like I've written for the last 3 or 4 years, I knew the "good war" wouldn't remain good once the Iraq War was over. Now the "war of necessity" (as opposed to the Iraq "war of choice" in their logic) is just an "occupation" and an "air war."

I fear the only thing under debate at the White House is how to avoid being visibly defeated prior to early November 2012.

Masters of Their Domain, Apparently

Spain's birth rate is about half replacement rate.

I guess this news makes that statistic a little more understandable:

In late October, the regional government of Extremadura in southwestern Spain launched a new sexual-education campaign designed to facilitate the "development of healthy habits, self-esteem and safety." Although the publicly funded campaign includes the publication of pamphlets and an online magazine, the highlight is a series of workshops for 14-to-17-year-olds aimed at educating participants on anatomy, body image, safe-sex practices, gender equality and, in the mildly celebratory words of an early press release (since redacted), "sexual self-exploration and erotic self-knowledge." Or, in other words, masturbation.

Kids these days with their video games and entrancing lava lamps! In my day and age all you needed was a color bra advertisement from a junk mail Sears catalog and it was off to the races. What worlds would have opened up with state funding?! Although I admit a state pamphlet might have taken the edge off, instead.

And Spanish teens need a freaking seminar just to identify the relevant body parts? What are they doing? Rubbing their elbows and shrugging their shoulders when nothing happens?

If Spanish kids haven't mastered this, what hope is there of actually bumping up that birth rate?

About That Million-Man Swim

I know it is traditional to mock China's ambitions to invade Taiwan by calling the PLA's plan the million-man swim, but I dare say that with this type of capacity, the Chinese might be able to scrape up the civilian craft to cobble together an invasion even if it doesn't meet our standards:

Sooner than anyone expected, China has surpassed South Korea as the world's largest shipbuilder. Currently, Chinese firms have orders for 54.96 million CGT of ships, compared to 53.63 million CGT. Thus China has 34.7 percent of the world market.

And the Chinese are developing the weapons to spearhead an invasion. Here's another:

China has produced a line of amphibious artillery systems that are mounted in the 20 ton ZBD amphibious tracked armored vehicle. The latest model mounts a 122mm howitzer in the chassis. An earlier one mounted a 122mm gun in a small turret.

And more generally, China's military power is advancing quite nicely:

According to at least one high-ranking official, the United States has systematically underestimated the pace and scope of Chinese military modernization for years. On Oct. 21 in an interview with the Voice of America, the incoming Commander of U.S. Pacific Command (USPACOM), Admiral Robert F. Willard, USN, told reporters that, "In the past decade or so, China has exceeded most of our intelligence estimates of their military capability and capacity, every year. ... They've grown at an unprecedented rate in those capabilities. And, they've developed some asymmetric capabilities that are concerning to the region, some anti-access capabilities and so on."

Indeed.

And we have to stop comforting ourselves that China has a long way to go before becoming a peer competitor. China doesn't need to be a peer competitor to be a threat to us any more than Germany or Japan had to be peers to threaten us in World War II. Heck, Japan had a GDP about a tenth of ours at the start of the war, and they reached out to hammer us in Hawaii. China only needs to reach as far a Guam to hit us enough to buy the time Peking needs to conquer Taiwan.

Whether or not China invades Taiwan is no longer a matter of debating capability to do so--it all comes down to a political decision to risk the casualties and political fallout of invading.

What Exactly is Russia's Final Point?

Russia is saying things that might indicate they could conceivably move to some form of action to stop Iran's nuclear ambitions:

Dmitry Medvedev, Russia's president, said his country agreed that progress on talks with Iran was too slow and that "other options" might have to be pursued. That can be taken as a reference to more sanctions on the Iranian regime. "In case we fail, the other options remain on the table, in order to move the process in a different direction," Mr Medvedev said after meeting Barack Obama, US president, at the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation summit in Singapore.

"As reasonable politicians, we understand that any process should have a final point," said Mr Medvedev. The process of talks exists not for the pleasure of talking but for achieving practical goals."

I'm not encouraged by more Russian words that seem to serve the purpose only of stringing us along, which buys tome for Iran.

And more to the point, while our "final point" is to stop Iran under the mullahs from going nuclear, why do we think Russia's "final point" is the same thing? What if Russia's "final point" is a nuclear-armed rogue Iran that serves as a loose cannon to keep us off balance while Russia seeks to recover some of their lost Soviet glory and lost empire?

Let's Employ the Clue Bat, Shall We?

Our president isn't happy about being accused of "dithering" over the decision about troop strength in Afghanistan:

President Barack Obama made no effort to conceal his irritation when his press corps used the first question of his maiden Far East trip to ask what was taking him so long on Afghanistan.

Jennifer Loven of The Associated Press had asked: “Can you explain to people watching and criticizing your deliberations what piece of information you're still lacking to make that call.”

“With respect to Afghanistan, Jennifer,” the president scolded, “I don't think this is a matter of some datum of information that I'm waiting on. … Critics of the process … tend not to be folks who … are directly involved in what's happening in Afghanistan. Those who are, recognize the gravity of the situation and recognize the importance of us getting this right.”

The cool president’s heated response reflected second-guessing from the press and Pentagon about a process that has spanned eight formal meetings with his war cabinet, totaling about 20 hours.

The White House has been deliberately portraying the process as thorough, emphasizing the opposing views the president has considered, as a way of positing a contrast with President George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq.

Let's address this issue of contrast with the Iraq War debate.

One, there is the difference between a debate before the war begins and a debate dragging out as our troops fight and die in an ongoing war.

And two, there was no "rush to war" in Iraq as the argument deployed by the White House asserts. The national debate lasted about a year from after the fall of Kabul to the invasion of Iraq, and included a Congressional debate and declaration of war and long efforts at the UN that got us a resolution reaffirming post-Desert Storm UN resolutions insisting Iraq prove it no longer had WMD or else. We had a long debate on starting that war, and the so-called "rush to war" was quite possibly the most telegraphed war in history.

Oh, and as a delicious bonus, is the president really saying that people outside the White House can't judge the Afghanistan War because of lack of information or responsibility? If so, I'd like a do-over on the Iraq War debates that commenced in 2002 and continues until today.

The president may not like being accused of dithering, but it is hard to escape the conclusion that he's striving to vote "present" when his title of commander-in-chief of the armed forces says it all--he is the chief commander and everybody else must wait on his commands.

There, just three swings with the clue bat. That wasn't so difficult, was it?

I Regret Nothing!

I find it amazing that former President Carter can defend his actions regarding Iran's taking of hostages 30 years ago:

Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter said Monday he had no regrets about his handling of the Iran hostage crisis more than 30 years ago, saying he didn't attack the country as his advisers proposed because thousands of people would have died.

Islamic militants stormed the U.S. Embassy in Tehran on Nov. 4, 1979, and seized its occupants. Fifty-two Americans were held hostage for 444 days.

And this is just a sad commentary on who we trusted to lead us and defend us:

Carter said one proposed option was a military strike on Iran, but he chose to stick with negotiations to prevent bloodshed and bring the hostages home safely.

"My main advisers insisted that I should attack Iran," he said. "I could have destroyed Iran with my weaponry. But I felt in the process it was likely the hostages' lives would be lost, and I didn't want to kill 20,000 Iranians. So I didn't attack."

Iran resorts to war against us (embassy territory is US territory under internationl law) and the president wanted to stick to diplomacy. Yeah, that worked out well. One of the alumni of that crisis now crows about Iran's nuclear ambitions:

Ahmadinejad said the West would have to come to terms with Iran's nuclear progress, Iran's state broadcaster quoted the president as saying on his website. ...

"Enemies have politicised the nuclear issue using all of their abilities to try to make the Iranian nation surrender, but they have been defeated," Ahmadinejad said.

Back to our other alumni of that crisis, is President Carter seriously saying that the only military option involved 20,000 dead Iranians? (Presumably dead civilian Iranians) Really?

That's just BS. Maybe a full scale invasion of Iran leading to American troops in Tehran, but that was hardly the only option presented to him.

And the hypocricy of his purported concern for innocent Iranian civilians doesn't square with Operation Eagle Claw, which President Carter ordered. We were going to plant a small foce in downtown Tehran to rescue our people. Only an imbecile could believe that this option would not have required the utter destruction of blocks of buildings around the embassy grounds to prevent a large mob of Iranians or mullah security forces from charging in to stop the rescue. Thousands of Iranian civilians would have died if we hadn't aborted the mission under the mission that our president did authorize. So it is a bit farcical for him to play the tortured humanitarian.

And we may yet come to appreciate that even 20,000 dead Iranians in 1980 would have beat the death toll that mullahs with atomic bombs will inflict.

Middle Kingdoms

This analysis describes the differences within China:

This week, President Obama makes his first state visit to China. What kind of country will he find there? We tend to imagine China as a monolith: 1.3 billion people sharing the same language, history, and culture. The truth is far more interesting. China is a mosaic of several distinct regions, each with its own resources, dynamics, and historical character.

Although the article's title of the nine nations of China is not meant to suggest political fragmentation, I don't see why this description of China doesn't provide the basis for such a possible split:

With a state both cruel and failing economically, governing a continent-sized population with a history of fragmentation, I don't know why we need to guess which course the government of China will follow. The continent of China is big enough that it could follow all the possible paths.

A Pacific Century doesn't automatically fall into Peking's lap--even if we try to give it to them.

Perfect Harmony

If our outstretched hand to the likes of Iran demonstrates our administration's insistence that foes are just friends we haven't made yet, our treatment of friends seems to define them as neutrals we haven't alienated yet.

So let the Pacific Century begin with a big dose of nuanced alienation, as we insist we are making China are friend but just serve notice to friends that we can't be counted on:

As a result of misunderstanding the Chinese, America is losing friends in Asia fast. Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, who ended the decades-long reign of the Liberal Democratic party in September, has signaled he wants to reorient Japan's foreign policy toward China. And some policy-makers in New Delhi, noticing Obama's unusually soft approach, are pushing their country away from America as they feel India too now needs to placate the Chinese. Washington, in a real sense, is undermining its own role in Asia.

Why shouldn't President Obama's China trip be a success with this outlook? The Chinese will be happy with a foreign policy of American retreat in perfect harmony with their own ambitions.

Our foreign policy people really just act as if diplomacy is all a giant Coke commercial.