Category: IO Deeds of War

Posted on

Chuck Spinney: The Afgan Misadventure in One Paragraph

03 Economy, 04 Inter-State Conflict, 05 Civil War, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Wild Cards, 10 Security, 11 Society, Budgets & Funding, Corruption, Cultural Intelligence, Government, IO Deeds of War, IO Impotency, Military, Officers Call, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests, Secrecy & Politics of Secrecy, Strategy, Waste (materials, food, etc)
Chuck Spinney

First, the paragraph:

“The enterprise has proved to be a model of how not to go about such things, breaking all the rules of grand strategy: getting in without having any idea of how to get out; almost wilful misdiagnosis of the challenges; changing objectives, and no coherent or consistent plan; mission creep on an heroic scale; disunity of political and military command, also on an heroic scale; diversion of attention and resources [to Iraq] at a critical stage in the adventure; poor choice of local allies, who rapidly became more of a problem than a solution; unwillingness to co-opt the neighbours into the project, and thus address the mission-critical problem of external sanctuary and support; military advice, long on institutional self-interest, but woefully short on serious objective analysis of the problems of pacifying a broken country with largely non-existent institutions of government and security; weak political leadership, notably in subjecting to proper scrutiny militarily heavy approaches, and in explaining to the increasingly, and now decisively, sceptical domestic press and public the benefits of expending so much treasure and blood.”

Sir Sherard Cowper-Coles
British ambassador in Kabul and as special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan

The Afghan misadventure

By Lionel Barber, Financial Times, 22/07/11

Phi Beta Iota:  A full reading of “The Afghan misadventure” by Lionel Barber is highly recommended.  The ends with several lessons not understood in Washington, and a marvelous description of NATO as a “tethered goat.”  He also recommends these three books:

Please respect FT.com's ts&cs and copyright policy which allow you to: share links; copy content for personal use; & redistribute limited extracts. Email ftsales.support@ft.com to buy additional rights or use this link to reference the article – http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/0feac042-b395-11e0-b56c-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz1SxSELLAY

Cables From Kabul: The Inside Story of the West’s Afghanistan Campaign, by Sherard Cowper-Coles, Harper Press, 352 pages

The Wars of Afghanistan: Messianic Terrorism, Tribal Conflicts and the Failures of Great Powers, by Peter Tomsen, PublicAffairs, 912 pages

Dead Men Risen: The Welsh Guards and the Real Story of Britain’s War in Afghanistan, by Toby Harnden, Quercus, 640 pages

Posted on

DefDog: The Clash of Generations by Tom Friedman

03 Economy, 06 Family, 09 Justice, 11 Society, Civil Society, Corruption, Cultural Intelligence, Government, IO Deeds of War
DefDog Recommends....

Interesting perspective—especially the common focus on justice against crony capitalism.

The Clash of Generations

By

Published: July 16, 2011

EXTRACT

Indeed, if there is one sentiment that unites the crises in Europe and America it is a powerful sense of “baby boomers behaving badly” — a powerful sense that the generation that came of age in the last 50 years, my generation, will be remembered most for the incredible bounty and freedom it received from its parents and the incredible debt burden and constraints it left on its kids.

. . . . . . .

I was struck by one big similarity between what I heard in Tahrir Square in Cairo in February and what one hears in Syntagma Square today. It’s the word “justice.” You hear it more than “freedom.” That is because there is a deep sense of theft in both countries, a sense that the way capitalism played out in Egypt and Greece in the last decade was in its most crony-esque, rigged and corrupt deformation, letting some people get fantastically rich simply because of their proximity to power. So there is a hunger not just for freedom, but for justice. Or, as Rothkopf puts it, “not just for accounting, but for accountability.”

Read full article at Friedman's page….

See Also:

Clash of generations: Britain will be rent, not by class warfare, but by an age divide, a new book argues

The Economist, Feb 11th 2010 | from the print edition

David Willetts, The Pinch: How the Baby Boomers Took their Children’s Future—and Why They Should Give it Back (Atlantic Books, 2011)

Posted on

Chuck Spinney: Israel Crosses Line Into Fascism

05 Civil War, 07 Other Atrocities, 08 Immigration, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Justice, 10 Security, 11 Society, Corruption, Cultural Intelligence, Government, IO Deeds of War, IO Impotency
Chuck Spinney

Israel likes to pride itself by claiming it is the only democracy in the Middle East … Uri Avnery, a hero of the 1948 War, a former member of the Knesset, and a prominent peace activist, describes how that claim is becoming a hollow shell.

July 18, 2011

The Israeli Boycott Law

It [Fascism] Can Happen Here

By URI AVNERY, Tel Aviv

Counterpunch

Years ago I said that there are but two miracles in Israel: the Hebrew language and democracy.

Hebrew had been a dead language for many generations, more or less like Latin, when it was still used in the Catholic church. Then, suddenly, concurrent with the emergence of Zionism (but independently) it sprang back to life. This never happened to any other language.

Theodor Herzl laughed at the idea that Jews in Palestine would speak Hebrew. He wanted us to speak German. “Are they going to ask for a railway ticket in Hebrew?” he scoffed.

Well, we now buy airline tickets in Hebrew. We read the Bible in its Hebrew original and enjoy it tremendously. As Abba Eban once said, if King David were to come to life in Jerusalem today, he could understand the language spoken in the street. Though with some difficulty, because our language gets corrupted, like most other languages.

Anyhow, the position of Hebrew is secure. Babies and Nobel Prize laureates speak it.

The fate of the other miracle is far less assured.

* * *

THE FUTURE – indeed, the present – of Israeli democracy is shrouded in doubt.

Read rest of article…

Posted on

Chuck Spinney: Obama Implodes…the Story Continues

02 Diplomacy, 08 Wild Cards, 09 Justice, 11 Society, 12 Water, Corruption, Cultural Intelligence, Government, IO Deeds of War, IO Impotency
Chuck Spinney
President Obama in trouble at home and around the world.  The common denominator in his problems is a failure to follow through on expectations he recklessly excites … while this  mismatch is clear in the mounting alienation of his domestic political base in the United States, it is also evident his plummeting popularity abroad, particularly in the Arab World, as shown in the attached survey by Zogby International for the Arab American Institute Foundation.

ARAB ATTITUDES, 2011
Conducted by Zogby International, Analysis by James Zogby
Arab American Institute Foundation
The full report can be downloaded from this link.

Executive Summary   

  • After improving with the election of Barack Obama in 2008, U.S. favorable ratings across the Arab world have plummeted. In most countries they are lower than at the end of the Bush Administration, and lower than Iran's favorable ratings (except in Saudi Arabia).
  • The continuing occupation of Palestinian lands and U.S. interference in the Arab world are held to be the greatest obstacles to peace and stability in the Middle East.
  • While many Arabs were hopeful that the election of Barack Obama would improve U.S.-Arab relations, that hope has evaporated. Today, President Obama's favorable ratings across the Arab World are 10% or less.
  • Obama's performance ratings are lowest on the two issues to which he has devoted the most energy: Palestine and engagement with the Muslim world.
  • The U.S. role in establishing a no-fly zone over Libya receives a positive rating only in Saudi Arabia and Lebanon, but, as an issue, it is the lowest priority.
  • The killing of bin Laden only worsened attitudes toward the U.S.
  • A plurality says it is too early to tell whether the Arab Spring will have a positive impact on the region. In Egypt, the mood is mixed. Only in the Gulf States are optimism and satisfaction levels high.
Posted on

Michel Bauwens: Israel Uses Facebook to Identify and then Block Incoming Protesters from Europe

08 Wild Cards, 10 Security, 11 Society, Advanced Cyber/IO, Civil Society, Cultural Intelligence, Government, IO Deeds of War
Michel Bauwens

Israel used Facebook to stop European pro-Palestine activists

IntelNews.Org, 12 July 2011

Joseph Fitsanakis

Israeli intelligence services managed to stop dozens of European pro-Palestine activists from flying to Israel, by gathering open-source intelligence about them on social media sites, such as Facebook. According to Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor, intelligence gathered on Facebook formed the basis of a blacklist containing over 300 names of European activists, who had signed up on an open-access Facebook page of a group planning nonviolent actions in Israel this summer.

Israeli intelligence agencies forwarded the names on the lists to European airline carriers, asking them not to allow the activists onboard their flights, as they were not going to be allowed into the country. This action prompted airline carriers to prevent over 200 activists from boarding scheduled flights to Israel. Israeli security officers detained over 310 other activists, who arrived in Israel on several European flights last week. Of those, almost 70 were denied entry to the country, while more detentions are expected to take place later this week, according to Israeli Interior Ministry spokeswoman Sabine Hadad.

During the detention operation, at least two flights into Israel, from Geneva, Switzerland, and Rome, Italy, were diverted to a secluded area of the Ben Gurion International Airport, which is located a few miles southeast of Tel Aviv. Once there, they were boarded by armed Israeli security officers, who detained several activists onboard the airplanes before allowing the remaining passengers to disembark. Witnesses also reported the presence of hundreds of police officers at Ben Gurion during the detention of the activists. Characteristically, only one of a 40-strong pro-Palestinian activist contingency onboard an EasyJet flight from London, UK, was able to enter Israel, while 39 were detained and sent back to the UK.

 

Posted on

DefDog: US Approach to Security Insane?

07 Other Atrocities, 10 Security, 11 Society, Corruption, Counter-Oppression/Counter-Dictatorship Practices, Cultural Intelligence, Government, IO Deeds of War, IO Impotency, Power Behind-the-Scenes/Special Interests, Waste (materials, food, etc)
DefDog Recommends....

Anyone who believes we are winning the War on Terror doesn't understand the goals of AQ.  They wanted us to be afraid and to spend our money, both of which the government is doing in spades…..one really has to ask, then, who is winning?

Is high security backfiring in U.S.?

By Richard Engel, NBC News Chief Foreign Correspondent

NEW YORK – As a foreign correspondent for NBC News, I haven’t spent much time in the United States during the last decade. I return only occasionally to check in with colleagues, visit family, or, this last time, to research a documentary for MSNBC.

The documentary, still in the works, is about the Global War on Terrorism, and what it has done to our military, economy and American society in general. Perhaps because the subject was on my mind, I found a recent travel experience especially meaningful.

Through my work I travel to some of the busiest airports in high-risk areas. Just this year I have been in Egypt, Tunisia, Iran, Bahrain, Libya, France, Italy and many other countries. But I have yet to feel so angry, so embarrassed or so scrutinized as I did going through airport security for a flight from Los Angeles International Airport to New York’s JFK while visiting home.

. . . . .

I’ve watched American troops fight, and sometimes die, to drive the Taliban and al-Qaida from Afghanistan, and to secure free elections in Iraq. They have been fighting for other people to be free. I was horrified to see that despite their sacrifices we’d let ourselves become a nation that appears to be driven by fear.

. . . . .

But at the airport, watching a 7-year-old girl go through a full body scan in public – just so she could fly out of the city of Los Angeles – made me wonder how much we have lost.

Read full article….

Phi Beta Iota:  The Founding Fathers do not approve….

Thomas Jefferson: A Nation’s best defense is an educated citizenry.

Thomas Jefferson: Educate and inform the whole mass of the people… They are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty.

James Madison: Knowledge will forever govern ignorance; and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.

Posted on

Winslow Wheeler: Analysis of House Mood on Defense Cuts

03 Economy, 04 Inter-State Conflict, 07 Other Atrocities, 10 Security, 11 Society, Articles & Chapters, Budgets & Funding, Commercial Intelligence, Corporations, Corruption, DoD, Government, InfoOps (IO), Intelligence (government), IO Deeds of War, Methods & Process, Military, Misinformation & Propaganda, Peace Intelligence, Policy, Politics of Science & Science of Politics, Secrecy & Politics of Secrecy
Winslow Wheeler

Below is an important and interesting analysis of John Isaacs of the Council for a Livable World of the “mood” of the House on defense issues.  I do not agree with all of the characterizations or implications (and I agree with some), but I do believe John (whom I have known professionally with respect for almost four decades) has collected some significant information.  From this and other data, I conclude:

1) No one should be surprised at the House' ambivalence on a defense issue like Libya.  It has been the hallmark of Congress for longer than I can recall to permit presidents to do as they please internationally while sniping from the sidelines and avoiding taking responsibility;

2) Congress pats itself on its own back for pretending to support frugality in the Pentagon by taking easy votes such as against the second engine for the F-35 (which SecDef Gates successfully painted as a pork program) and against a piece of the DOD funding for military bands (see below).  The size of the votes on matters that are actually significant, such as the Barney Frank/Ron Paul and the Mulvaney amendments to cut from $8.5 to $17 billion from the 2012 DOD budget, shows a new high-water mark for budget cutting in the Pentagon not seen in Congress since — by my recollection — in the mid-1980s when the so-called Military Reform Caucus and budget cutters like Chuck Grassley were fully active.

Continue reading “Winslow Wheeler: Analysis of House Mood on Defense Cuts”