The truth at any cost lowers all other costs — curated by former US spy Robert David Steele.
Climate change may be an “accelerant of instability” in future conflicts, and the U.S. military needs to plan for possible environmental catastrophes and resource wars, according to the Pentagon’s soon-to-be-released master strategy document. Among other things, the draft QDR suggests the military will have to start planning for operations in which rising sea levels, an …
Continue reading “Journal: The Greening of the Pentagon’s Strategy”
Chuck Spinney is still the best “real” engineer in this town–almost everyone else is staggering after fifty years of government-specification cost-plus engineering. Also, as Chuck explores in the piece on Complexity to Avoid Accountability is Expensive we in the “requirements” business are as much to blame–Service connivance with complexity has killed acquisition from both a …
China Removed As Top Priority For Spies The decision downgrades China from “Priority 1” status, alongside Iran and North Korea, to “Priority 2,” which covers specific events such as the humanitarian crisis after the Haitian earthquake or tensions between India and Pakistan. One new area that has been given a higher intelligence priority under the …
Continue reading “Journal: Intelligence Priority Theater, Weak Strategy”
Superb From Right of Center–VERY Satisfying Competent Collection January 10, 2010 Melvyn Leffler and Jeffrey Legro Of the three books I bought to explore this particular theme, this was the best by far and the only one to earn five stars. Twelve chapters, twelve authors, not a single runt in this litter. The notes are …
Continue reading “Review: To Lead the World–American Strategy after the Bush Doctrine”
BOSTON REVIEW JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2010 ‘The real danger is that al Qaeda and the Neo-Taliban will drag the United States into regional war’ Syed Saleem Shahzad The Obama administration’s troop surge fails to address the real threat in Afghanistan: the insurgents’ efforts to develop a regional strategy in South Asia. Washington’s focus—members of al Qaeda in …
Continue reading “Journal: Al Qaeda Has a Regional Strategy, Does US?”
Overall Strategy Is Needed U.S. can’t prevail with piecemeal approaches By Lawrence J. Korb, Sean Duggan and Laura Conley When President Obama announced his decision to deploy 30,000 additional troops to Afghanistan, he presented a clear argument for why he believes U.S. national security is threatened by violence and extremism in that country and in …
The Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation and Nahdatul Ulama (NU), with support from the governments of Germany and Sweden, co-hosted a workshop in Jakarta on 18-19 November 2009 to raise awareness of the UN Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy among civil society in Southeast Asia and explore the possibilities for greater civil society participation in efforts to …
