Democracy Arsenal

February 17, 2011

More On Raymond Davis
Posted by Michael Cohen

So there is a rather interesting article on the Raymond Davis controversy that quotes a number of Congressmen and Senators saying it would be a terrible idea to use US aid to Pakistan as a tool for winning Davis's release.

And generally I agree with this sentiment - but to be sure it's not as if aid is providing much of any leverage with the Pakistani government otherwise. Still, this quote from Lindsay Graham was sort of priceless:

Senator Lindsey Graham, the top Republican on Leahy's subcommittee, strongly warned against any roll back to assistance to Pakistan, citing the need for help in the war in Afghanistan and the hunt for suspected terrorists.

"Our relationship's got to be bigger than this," Graham said.

"This is a friction point, this is a troubling matter, it doesn't play well in Afghanistan. We can't throw this agent over, I don't know all the details, but we cannot define the relationship based on one incident because it is too important at a time when we're making progress in Afghanistan," he said.

This is sort of a prefect encapsulation of the dysfunction at the heart of the US-Pakistan relationship - and the failure of US policymakers to recognize it as such. First of all, we're not really making progress in Afghanistan, but that notwithstanding if we were making progress it wouldn't be because of Pakistan . . it would be despite it. Perhaps Senator Graham has some unique insight into US-Pakistan relations, but it sure does seem as though Pakistan is actively supporting and giving sanctuary to the Afghan Taliban insurgents that are killing US soldiers and have repeatedly rejected US demands/inducements to turn against their nominal allies.

And a good part of the reason for this dysfunction is that we are not only trying to convince the Pakistan to do something they don't want to do but we are overestimating our own leverage and influence with Islamabad (hint: it's marginal at best).

As I wrote a few weeks ago in World Politics Review, there might actually be a better way:

It is small wonder that, despite years of American cajoling and demands that Pakistan break ties with the Afghan Taliban, the Pakistanis refuse to do so. Why should they? There is no incentive for them to take the steps that the U.S. wants them to, especially since they can be fairly confident that the United States will not cut off aid to Pakistan anytime soon. After all, considering how many NATO supply trucks wind their way across the Pakistani border to Afghanistan, the U.S. needs Pakistan just as much as Pakistan needs the U.S. And since the Pakistanis are no doubt aware that at some point in the near future the United States and NATO will leave Afghanistan, they have even less reason to be compliant with U.S. demands.

So what would be a better approach? It begins with recognizing that, to be effective, U.S. policy in Afghanistan must work in concert with and not in opposition to Pakistan's interests. Instead of seeking to marginalize or even eliminate the Taliban in Afghanistan, the United States and NATO should adopt a political strategy that ensures that the Taliban -- and in turn Pakistan -- have a political voice in Afghanistan's future. This is not necessarily an ideal solution, but it's certainly a more realistic one. Adopting such an approach, might also pay dividends for the U.S. in getting Islamabad to devote resources to taking on jihadist groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Haqqani network and, of course, remnants of al-Qaida. Continuing the current strategy will only ensure that U.S. and Pakistani policymakers will remain at loggerheads, and that progress in Afghanistan will remain uncertain.

What the Raymond Davis Incident Says About the US-Pakistan "Strategic Partnership"
Posted by Michael Cohen

For more than a year and a half supporters of the war in Afghanistan have steadily peddled the argument that one of the reasons that the US must stay militarily engaged in the region (and especially in Afghanistan) is to support Pakistan, particularly in its fight against radical extremists. The Obama Administration has even hailed a new strategic partnership with Islamabad. 

But the latest twist in the Raymond Davis saga should throw some mighty cold water on that notion.

For those who haven't followed the Davis story closely he is a US diplomat who was arrested several weeks ago for shooting two Pakistanis, allegedly in self-defense. Here's the problem, Davis is a member of the US embassy's technical and administrative staff, which means that he has fairly absolute diplomatic immunity and should be released from prison.

Yet, this hasn't stopped Pakistan from charging Davis with murder and detaining him and just yesterday the provincial court that has jurisdiction over the case has said it will be holding Davis for another three weeks until the issue of his immunity is resolved.

Let's put aside for a second that this case seems to represent a fairly clear cut violation of international law. Pakistan is one of America's largest foreign aid recipients and one of our supposedly most important allies in the region; just this week the Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee John Kerry traveled to Islamabad to try and resolve the issue - and was rebuffed; and the Obama Administration has steadily escalated the issue even threatening a downgrade in US-Pakistan relations in order to resolve the dispute.

Yet, Pakistan still refuses to release Davis. Indeed the announcement, even after Kerry's visit, that the matter will need another three weeks of consideration is a huge diplomatic slap in the face to the United States and especially this Administration.

Now I understand that the Pakistan government has some issues with anti-US attitudes in the country (clearly through some fault of their own) . . . and I know that Pakistan allows NATO supply trucks to transit the country and it allows US military drones to attack suspected al Qaeda terrorists (as well as those Pakistan Taliban groups that threaten the Pakistani state). But shall we catalog for a moment all the ways in which Pakistan is not just a lousy ally, but is actually undermining US interests.

1) Is home to Osama bin Laden and other top al Qaeda lieutenants (and has been for 9 years) and has made little effort to deal with the issue.

2) Is home to terrorist training camps like one where the Times Square bomber was trained - and also has made little effort to deal with that issue.

3) Is actively supporting an insurgent group in Afghanistan that is killing US soldiers on a regular basis.

4) Provides safe haven to that same insurgency and even after repeated US demands/requests/inducements has offered no indication they are willing end its support for these groups.

5) Has created a diplomatic incident with the United States over the arrest of a protected US diplomat.

Does this sound like the behavior of a country that is interested in a strategic partnership with the United States?

Now granted I understand that it can be a long and drawn-out process of improving relations, but after 9 years shouldn't it be obvious that the United States has made virtually no progress in turning Pakistan into a true strategic ally of the United States. If Islamabad feels little compunction about openly violating international law and US diplomatic demands does anyone really believe they will suddenly turn around and be of assistance against the Taliban or even jihadist groups that threaten America?

Pakistan will support the US only insofar as it bolsters Pakistani national interests - and as we've seen repeatedly the Pakistan government is either too weak to be a strategic partner of the US or is simply not interested. Or even worse, they understand that no matter what they do; no matter how many sharp sticks they put in the eye of the United States there will be little to no consequences because we need Pakistan a lot more than they need us. How many more pieces of evidence do we need before it becomes abundantly clear that Pakistan is not interested in doing anything to help the US that would even slighly undermine Pakistan's own interests? 

If the Davis incident shows us anything it is a reminder of how little leverage we have with Pakistan, what little ability we have to shape Pakistan's behavior and how tenuous US-Pakistani relations remain. At what point will US policymakers wake up to that reality and respond accordingly?

Defending Strategy, Not “Defending Defense”
Posted by Jacob Stokes

BattleshipWashington’s entrenched defense budget hawks are either clueless or willfully ignorant. Following, the release of the fiscal year 2012 budget Monday, the “Defending Defense” trio of The Heritage Foundation, the American Enterprise Institute and the Foreign Policy Initiative released a statement. The first line was “strategy should always guide the defense budget, not vice versa.”

True enough. But looking at the group’s proposals, there’s no strategy involved. Strategy involves identifying threats, establishing what’s needed to combat those threats and then budgeting to ensure those capabilities. The Defending Defense group makes no such efforts. Instead, they use as their yardstick defense spending as a percentage of GDP. GDP tends to continually rise – which is, for them, exactly the point. If the defense budget is pegged to GDP, it keeps rising. 

They’re a wily bunch, though, so they have seized on the quip Secretary of Defense Robert Gates made about the presidential deficit commission’s proposals for cutting defense – Gates called the proposals “math, not strategy” -- to paint any cuts as dangerous to our national security. The reality is that no one is seriously calling for blindly implementing the deficit reduction commission’s proposals. And the other oft-cited proposal, Rep. Barney Frank’s Sustainable Defense Task Force, gave a menu of options that combined would equal $1 trillion in cuts over ten years. Some members support the full menu; others only support only some parts. 

The reality of who’s guilty of “math not strategy” is that Defending Defense has no strategy. In fact, there’s strong strategic rationale for cutting beyond what Secretary Gates has asked for. Even mainstream Washington voices such as the Center for a New American Security have called for proportional cuts to defense as part of a broader deficit reduction plan. CNAS goes even further than Secretary Gates, whose “cuts,” to be clear, are cuts to projected spending, not actual spending.

Continue reading "Defending Strategy, Not “Defending Defense”" »

February 15, 2011

The Blindness of Moral Clarity
Posted by David Shorr



Star trekPlease join me in a thought experiment. I'm going to pinpoint what I consider the central falacy of the ultra-conservative foreign policy argument / critique. See if you agree that this theme -- blind spot, I'd say -- runs through a big proportion of what the hard-right says about the stance the United States should take internationally.

As David Kurtz of Talking Points Memo and Greg Scoblete over at RealClearWorld Compass blog have both noted, the Obama-botched-Egypt meme rests on an inflated notion of US leverage. An impulse that always assumes an American president can make world events come out the way he wants. Actually David's post flags a comment President Obama made in his news conference, pushing back against that idea of American omnipotence.

My hypothesis about administration critics adds one key element: moral clarity (aka 'resolve' or 'certitude'). Sound familiar? The critics love to talk about the president's supposed lack of principles, but let's talk about what self-absorbed self-righteousness gets you in the real world -- i.e. what can really be accomplished through moral clarity. In other words, I don't think the partisan foreign policy divide is about America's international objectives or our moral values; sensible Democrats and Republics largely agree about those. I think it's really a debate about persuasion and pressure versus bluff and bluster.

Here's a useful definition of strategic thinking from an excellent new book, The End of Arrogance by Bruce Jentleson and Steven Weber:

In a complex and rapidly changing environment it does not work well to repeatedly reinforce who we are and what we stand for. We know those things, and we know how they shape what we do, how we act, how we respond. Strategy is ultimately about how we influence what others do.

This is the burden of proof I'd put on the proponents of moral clarity. How will the defense of virtue get others to do what we want, and what's your basis for believing this cause-and-effect relationship? Can loud moral forthrightness ever backfire? Does it ever have unintended consequences?

Don't get me wrong; I don't deny the role of moral principles in international affairs. I'm a big believer in the importance of staking the moral high ground in diplomacy -- it's something on which I've based many of my own policy arguments. But I feel just as strongly that the claim of moral authority must be based on more than an assertion of principle or a belief in the nation's exceptionalism (which I actually share, to an extent). It matters crucially how others respond. As Weber and Jentleson remind us, the question of influence and legerage isn't a question of being true to ourselves but convincing to others. A leader without followers is just someone out for a stroll.

That's what I think the foreign policy debate is really about. Now coming back to that thought experiment, as you've observed national debates about foreign policy, how strong of an undercurrent is this?

America's Budgetary Delusions
Posted by Michael Cohen

Over at AOL I have a new piece up on the dueling Republican and Democratic budget proposals . . . and it ain't pretty

With the Republicans' latest budget proposal -- and to a lesser extent Obama's -- both parties seem intent on furthering the charade that Americans need and want a smaller government, without making any real effort to get us there. It's the least of both worlds, combining pandering and ineffectiveness.

But those inclined to engage in typical Washington bashing should look inward. Americans have no one to blame but themselves for this situation. If they continue to remain blissfully unaware of how their own government operates and oblivious to the contradictions in their expectations for it, is it any wonder that politicians treat them like children?

You can read the whole thing here

Trends in Multilateral Cooperation - Part II
Posted by David Shorr

1 UNGAI had an idea once that the noun United Nations (and its acronym) should always be used in the plural. We should say "the United Nations are," not "the United Nations is."  It's a difficult grammatical discipline, and perhaps impractical. But the point remains: the UN isn't really an entity unto itself, but instead an instrument of the 192 nation-states that comprise its membership. I think a lot of the discussion about the UN merely sets up the world body as a scapegoat and diverts attention from the political tug and pull between member states.

Sometimes I say that the United Nations works best when nations actually unite. In the struggle to address big international challenges like climate change or nuclear proliferation, the power of diplomatic alignment is a sight to behold, yet we see such consensus-building far too rarely. There's a very simple reason the UN has tended to produce lowest-common-denominator outcomes -- the way the UN diplomacy game is played, obstructionists have the upper hand. The UN's traditional diplomatic norm of trying to keep everyone happy has given a handful of countries tremendous blocking power. Often this has meant that New York is a place where urgent international matters disappear into a vortex of deadlock. And the problem is especially bad in UN global conferences, which have followed a consensus rule under which a single nation can prevent a communique or report from being adopted.

With all that as (extremely jaded) background, I think I glimpse very hopeful signs that the dynamic has begun to re-tilt away from obstruction and toward constructive action. Looking back at experts' post-game analysis of last year's key UN conferences on climate change and nonproliferation, they tell a story of dwindling tolerance of the obstructionists.

Let's start with Andrew Light's Cancun read-out over at Climate Progress. According to his narrative, an original hard-line coalition of Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua, Bolivia, and Sudan dissolved over the course of the Cancun conference and left Bolivia standing alone. With Bolivia as the unstinting holdout, Light recounts the heroic leadership of conference chair Mexican Foreign Minister Patricia Espinosa, ultimately rolling right over Bolivia's objections. I'd be interested to hear more from UN experts about the technical grounds for overruling a holdout; or is it simply a matter of common sense? (Also recommended: Michael Levi of CFR arguing in Slate why the Cancun and Copenhagen conferences shouldn't be given short shrift, as well as Levi's outline in WSJ of a diplomatic strategy to outflank China, which I suspect US negotiators used.)

Then there was the every-five-years Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference last spring, cogently explained by Rebecca Johnson of Acronym Institute in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. In that case, Johnson highlights the role of the Egyptian government -- with the help of Russia and others -- in pressing Iran to back down and go along with consensus. Obviously recent events give this story a new cast; I would just add that the Egyptian regime's traditional UN stance has been to join with obstructionists as a way to counter an image of being subservient to Washington.

Recently I was talking with a UN delegate about the question of obstructionism, and this diplomat referred to "the moderate countries." I think the emergence of such an identity among developing and middle income nations could change the dynamic within the UN. The key to breaking deadlocks in the past has been either consensus among the P5 in the Security Council, bridge-building Western middle powers like Canada or the Nordic nations, or entrepreneurial small countries trying to make a mark with one issue. If moderates started to act as a counterweight to the traditional obstructionists, we might see "nations actually unite" a lot more often.

The GOP's Budget Fiasco
Posted by Kelsey Hartigan

The best part about the GOP’s budget day freak-out is that there is concrete proof that conservatives have no alternative vision or plan.  And given the civil war that’s currently playing out on the right, that’s not likely to change anytime soon.

The federal government is currently being funded through a Continuing Resolution, which is set to expire on March 4. So before Congress can get to the 2012 numbers, they have to first pass another CR to keep the government running for the next seven months.  Republicans are hell-bent on slashing the budget, but have yet to articulate an actual strategy for these cuts. 

Last week, Harold Rogers, Chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, heralded his committee’s plan to trim $74 billion from the 2011 budget, proudly proclaiming, “Never before has Congress undertaken a task of this magnitude.”

Unfortunately for the GOP leadership, the tea party immediately denounced this plan and sent the leadership back to the drawing board, insisting that they live up to their pledge to slash $100 billion from the 2011 budget. Without holding a single hearing or seeking any actual analysis, Rogers announced less than 24 hours later that they would “reach a total of $100 billion in cuts compared to the President’s quest immediately—fully meeting the goal outlined in the Republican ‘Pledge to America’ in one fell swoop.” The $100 billion, of course, is merely a symbolic number since it’s based off of the President’s FY11 request, which was never actually passed.  But hey, who has time for details?   

Bruce Bartlett has an excellent post on why the GOP hack-job is reckless and well, ineffective:

The point is not that there are no government programs worthy of cutting, but rather that this is a really stupid way to do it. The vast bulk of government spending, which goes to mandatory programs such as Social Security and Medicare, is completely exempted. And Republicans have effectively exempted the departments of Defense, Homeland Security and Veterans Affairs from cuts. This leaves only 16 percent of the budget from which they will extract their pound of flesh to satisfy voters who demand huge budget cuts but also oppose cutting just about any program except foreign aid.

So to the extent that there is a plan, it’s clearly not one that’s well thought-out. President Obama, meanwhile, has presented a budget, and an overarching strategy, for balancing the current economic climate and need for economic stimulus with the long-term priority of reducing the deficit. Even in areas where the administration could have gone further—the defense budget, for example— conservatives defied logic and decided to fund unwanted, unnecessary defense programs like the JSF alternate engine, which Secretary Gates called yesterday “an unnecessary and extravagant expense.” To top it all off, the F136 funding is “money that looks, feels, and smells very much like an earmark,” and for John Boehner, of all people. 

Politico’s David Rogers included a few side by side comparisons of President Obama’s FY12 budget request and the GOP’s sporadic proposal for the CR, noting:

“Even in areas where both parties have come together in the past, the differences are now measured in billions, not millions. Obama is proposing almost $7.8 billion for the National Science Foundation, for example; House Republican cuts would take the NSF back to about $6.5 billion. And the almost $10 billion gap in foreign aid and State Department funding represents a real retreat by the GOP from the activism of President George W. Bush, let alone Ronald Reagan.

The GOP’s proposed cuts the foreign aid budget have criticized by Republicans and Democrats alike:

“I think it’s short sighted,” said former Rep. Jim Kolbe (R-Ariz.), who oversaw the foreign aid budget for years. “I’m someone who believes it is absolutely vital to get control of our spending, but at a time when we are pulling back militarily, when China is active in Africa, this soft power is vital.”

“Cuts of this magnitude will be devastating to our national security,” Clinton wrote, yet the GOP has also included the National Nuclear Security Administration in its definition of “non-security” spending. Thus non-proliferation programs face reductions alongside those for water projects, and the GOP is backtracking on plans to update the U.S. nuclear stockpile—a major issue for Senate GOP Whip Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) in the recent START treaty debate.

As the budget debate rolls on, it’s clear that the GOP budget fiasco is indicative of the fact that conservatives are split and simply don’t know which direction to take the party, let alone the country.


The Pentagon Always Wins
Posted by Michael Cohen

So there seems to be some argument going around that the Pentagon has engaged in some serious belt-tightening with its latest budget request. Honestly, I don't even have to read Gordon Adams take on this to know that is almost certainly not true, but the man's got the goods:

$78 billion in savings is a myth.  Six billion don’t happen until 2015 and 2015, the mythical budget years, when DOD says the Army and the Marines will start to roll back part of the 92,000 person increase that happened over the last decade.  Four billion comes from stretching out the schedule for the F-35 fighter, which could easily not happen. $12.5 billion comes from pocketing the White House decision to freeze civilian pay for the next three years, credit for a decision the Pentagon did not make.  $41.5 billion comes from “efficiencies” in what are called “defense-wide,” a mystery the Secretary has yet to unravel. And $14 billion is a truly “magic” number. It comes from revising downward DOD’s estimates of future inflation, a hardy, perennial argument between DOD and OMB.

Ezra Klein takes thinks a step further, by pointing out that $78 billion over 10 years really ain't that big of a deal when you consider that "domestic discretionary spending -- that's education, income security, food safety, environmental protection" gets a $400 billion haircut. In all the DoD base budget, not including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, actually increases by 6% in 2011. But then again it's not as if someone has gone out and actually found a trillion dollars in savings from the Pentagon budget over ten years . . . oh wait a minute.

It's hard to believe that during the Truman and Eisenhower years, these presidents calculated defense spending by using the "remainder method" - namely taking tax revenues, subtracting domestic spending and whatever was left over went to the Pentagon. Now we have the exact opposite situation with military expenditures taken up an astounding and indefensible 60% of the discretionary budget. (Imagine how much a greater a health care system, education system and infrastructure we'd have if we reversed these ratios).

The problem, however, isn't even the money and the competely non-serious reduction in defense spending.

The problem is the starting point from which these cuts are made - with an eye toward reducing the deficit rather than actually contemplating what our miltiary priorities should be (and to be clear the numbers being cut from the DoD budget are a mere rounding error in the context of more than $1 trillion deficit).

Instead of asking the questions: what is that we want the US military to do; what military capabalities should we prioritize; how should the US military support the country's larger foreign policy goals etc . . . our defense spending decision-making begins from the starting point that we need a really big military, the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines should get support for most of their pet weapons programs and to cut defense spending when the country is at war would be to put American security at risk.

At no point does it appear that Pentagon officials sat down and said "what do we really need to keep the country safe." Instead, the discussion seems to have been "how do we shave a bit off the budget here and there to make it look like we're being fiscally responsible, but all the while prevent a more serious examination of our bloated defense budget." I don't blame the Pentagon at all for this; every other agency if they had the luxury would do the same - the problem is that no one from the White House or Congress demands that they do it.

To be clear, this doesn't mean that we must have reductions in Pentagon spending (although it's hard to see why not); it means we should think about whether the hundreds of billions we dole out to the Pentagon every year is keeping America secure and is in the nation's best interests. It's a conversation that we haven't even tried to have in more than 30 years. Instead we just pile more defense spending upon more defense spending . . . and demand that every other government agency think more judicously about how it spends the taxpayer's hard-earned dollars.

February 14, 2011

Threading the Elections Needle in Egypt
Posted by Jacob Stokes

As the revolution moves out of Tahrir Square and into the halls of power, it makes sense to look at historical examples for how a military-backed authoritarian government can transition to democracy. Enter this solid piece in the Wall Street Journal today that looks at Indonesia as model for making that move. The piece illustrates an important point that should inform the discussion about the role of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egyptian politics. It shows that broad participation of Islamists parties in the system resulted in a relatively small base of support:

Karen Brooks, who helped oversee Indonesia policy in both the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations, says post-Suharto governments were particularly successful because they co-opted Islamist parties that emerged following the dictator's fall

One of these parties, which has ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, campaigned as being untainted by the corruption of the Suharto years. That party, the Prosperous Justice Party, controls 8% of seats in Indonesia's legislature. Islamist or Islam-inspired parties in total hold 28%.

The article goes on to say, “‘Thirteen years into Indonesia's democratic transformation, the Islamist parties appear to have maxed out their popular support,’ Ms. Brooks says. Their inclusion in Jakarta's political process seemed to have ‘demystified’ their allure, she says.”

The American mainstream is capable of this kind of thinking. Just a few weeks ago, CFR President Richard Haass said that, “You want to make sure that the political space opens, because if the political space opens, the Muslim Brotherhood will have to compete and, based on everything I know about Egypt, it will have an element in the vote, but it will not be a majority.” 

Continue reading "Threading the Elections Needle in Egypt" »

February 11, 2011

Credit Where Credit Is Due, Obama Played This Beautifully
Posted by Michael Cohen

First things first; this is an extraordinary day and while it's a bit trite to salute the people of Egypt . . . I salute the people of Egypt. I think President Obama summed it up best in his remarks today:

The word "tahrir" means "liberation." It is a word that speaks to that something in our souls that cries out for freedom. And forevermore, it will remind us of the Egyptian people: of what they did, of the things that they stood for, and how they changed their country, and in doing so changed the world.

Yup. And now a word about the Obama Administration. At times I've been fairly critical of this president's handling of foreign policy, but credit must be given - this Administration handled this situation about as deftly as possible. This was truly an American diplomatic tour de force.

From the beginning the White House was caught betwixt and between - not wanting to be seen supporting the status quo, particularly when the winds of change seemed to be blowing in the direction of reform and yet at the same time not be seen as throwing a key ally under the bus. 

And while obviously critics can point to individual mistakes (Wisner's wandering off the reservation, Panetta's bizarre comment yesterday in congressional testimony that Mubarak was out the door) on the whole this Administration did a really excellent job - sending public signs that a crackdown would not be acceptable, working the military behind closed doors, trying to ensure a soft landing that wouldn't lead to violence, but still never backing down from the public position that an immediate transition to democracy (and not one in September) was the only acceptable course. (I'll be curious to see the impact of Obama's statement last night on Mubarak and the Egyptian military, but it was absolutely spot-on).

In a sense we helped throw Mubarak under the bus without directly delivering the push (a fact that I'm sure will leave many a non-democratic US ally a tad less secure this evening - which is good).

As Marc Lynch wisely points out the Administration basically followed the lead of the Egyptian people and didn't try to get too far ahead of what was actually happening on the ground.

To this point they didn't overplay their hand or overstate their own influence or demand too much from the government or the protesters. They played it about as well as can be expected, calibrating public and private pressure - and all this while being cognizant of the host of obvious constraints on US actions and words. They seemed to understand something that a lot of the armchair pundits couldn't quite grasp; this wasn't about us and we were, if anything, a bit player in this drama.

And then after all that, President Obama delivered a speech today that was absolutely pitch perfect - one of the best of his presidency (Ben Rhodes take a bow). Most deftly, even though we've supported the Egyptian regime for more than 30 years Obama was able to place the United States, rhetorically, on the same side as those in Tahrir Square - and it actually seems to ring true.

From a diplomatic standpoint this section of Obama's speech was particularly smart:

The military has served patriotically and responsibly as a caretaker to the state, and will now have to ensure a transition that is credible in the eyes of the Egyptian people. That means protecting the rights of Egypt's citizens, lifting the emergency law, revising the constitution and other laws to make this change irreversible, and laying out a clear path to elections that are fair and free. Above all, this transition must bring all of Egypt's voices to the table, for the spirit of peaceful protest and perseverance that the Egyptian people have shown can serve as a powerful wind at the back of this change.

This is exactly the right tone going forward; praising the military but at the same laying out the expectation that their stewardship of the country will be temporary and will lead to a democratic transition. 

Of course, none of us know what will happen in the weeks and months to come, but for at least one day this Administration and his advisors should take a victory lap. 

 

Don't Believe the Hype: The Surge as a Sequel
Posted by Eric Martin

While myth-making and propagandizing can be useful tools in political contests, such embellishments can pervert policy if taken literally. As a general rule, it is best not to believe the hype - even your own.  One recent example of this type of credulity is the conventional wisdom that has coalesced around the "Surge" in Iraq and the supposed benefits that resulted therefrom.

According to the myth, the brilliant visionary, General David Petraeus, shifted US forces in Iraq to a counterinsurgency (COIN) footing based on the COIN manual he wrote and that switch, together with an influx of 20,000 additional troops, led to victory in Iraq.

In reality, hundreds of Iraqis are still dying each month in political violence, though that tragic figure is far lower than the thousands per month that preceded the Surge.  Serious obstacles still remain on the political front as well, with potential for violence to erupt in the future along several existing fault lines.  Further, Petraeus didn't write the COIN manual, in either the literal or figurative sense.  More importantly, though, it was not the influx of additional soldiers, or implementation of COIN doctrine, that played the most important part in leading to a reduction of the violence in Iraq. 

Rather, the causal factors were indigenously conceived: First and foremost, the bulk of the Sunni insurgency made the decision to adandon insurgent activities, pursue political avenues and cooperate with coalition forces in targeting al-Qaeda elements (with such a turnabout commencing prior to the Surge, or Petraeus' arrival on the scene).  In addition, Moqtada al-Sadr, putatitive leader of the largest Shiite insurgent faction, also changed course, ordering his loosely organized militia to stand down. 

In essence, the main combatants comprising the insurgency opted to pursue their interests primarly via the political apparatus, and abandoned attacks on coalition and Iraqi government targets (in addition to the fact that the population transfers reduced sectarian tensions, and general exhaustion from fighting pervaded).  To Petraeus' credit, he was quick to seize on the outreach from insurgent groups and the extra soldiers likely enhanced our capacity to take the fight to al-Qaeda with our new Sunni allies. In summation, he deftly took advantage of the opportunities presented by both the Sunni detente and Sadr's stand down. 

What the Surge taught us, then (or rather, reminded us of), is that insurgencies can be wound down when the vast majority of the combatants join the political process and abandon violence, and that we should seek to encourage and facilitate such developments when doing so is consistent with our overarching interests.

Unfortunately, the Obama administration seems to have bought in to the mythologized version of the Surge, and has attempted to recreate in Afghanistan the successes realized in Iraq by simply adding additional soldiers, and shifting to a COIN-infused approach.

Predictably, the fighting continues: insurgent attacks are occurring at an accelerated pace, with estimates of Taliban numbers remaining constant during the recent escalation.  Despite a coordinated effort by military leaders to put recent events in Afghanistan in a positive light, tangible gains using any observable metric remain elusive. 

Perhaps, then, it is time to pay closer attention to the reality of the Surge, and test available opportunities to wind down the conflict through the political inclusion of the main group comprising the insurgency: the Taliban.

As Michael Cohen noted, a recent report by Alex Strick Van Linschoten and Felix Kuehn explores the possibility that the Taliban and al-Qaeda could be separated as part of a negotiated political settlement with the current Afghan government, and US/NATO forces.  Although admittedly optimistic, the report even includes this tantalizing prospect for military cooperation akin to that enjoyed by US forces working in tandem with Sunni groups in Iraq:

One such vision – recently suggested in private by a senior Taliban political strategist – is that Taliban forces could conduct counterterrorism operations, including joint operations together with U.S. Special Forces, against al-Qaeda and possibly its affiliates along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.

That level of cooperation may never materialize, but something short of that could still be invaluable.  Given that our primary strategic objective in Afghanistan should be to disrupt al-Qaeda and deny that group a base of operations, we should pursue negotiations with the Taliban to test the feasability of at least a separation of the two groups.  Such a settlement might involve including groups whose human rights record we might find noxious, but it is important to note that there are current factions within Karzai's government with equivalent records.  We must engage the players in Afghanistan, regardless of what our ideal outcome would look like.

Unfortunately, our current strategy might be forcing the Taliban to rely more and more on al-Qaeda, sowing mistrust and giving rise to a younger, more radical crop of Taliban leaders who are taking the place of senior commanders killed or captured.  Pursuit of negotiations would require a more consistent approach, without various tactics working at cross-purposes and proving counterproductive to what should be the strategic imperative.

While there is no guarantee that a negotiated settlement with the Taliban would be possible within parameters that satisfy our interests, or that enough Taliban elements would be willing to abandon al-Qaeda at an acceptable price, it is essential that we explore the possibilities further. What the Surge taught us is that the quickest way to wind down an insurgency is to turn the insurgents into allies and political participants, not rely on superstar generals or over-hyped tactical approaches.

Back to the Top of the Slide
Posted by Eric Martin

While it is understandable that there is a reluctance on the part of the Department of Defense to use bodycounts to measure progress in Afghanistan, Joshua Foust took note of a pretty damning announcement regarding insurgent numbers from the Afghan Ministry of Defense:

The strength of Taliban insurgents and other anti-government elements estimated to be between 25,000 to 35,000 in the militancy-hit Afghanistan, Afghan Defense Ministry spokesman Zahir Azimi said on Wednesday.

The reason those numbers should cause concern is that the estimate of Taliban/insurgents strength bears a striking resemblence to estimates in 2009 and, in fact, 2001 at the onset of the conflict.

Though estimates of Taliban strength dipped considerably in the years immediately following the onset of the US military intervention, that the figure has returned to the status quo ante, and remained fairly constant throughout the past few years, despite rather significant fluctuations in US/allied troop levels and shifts in tactical approaches, points to a list of possible conclusions - all of which are unsettling in their own right. As Foust notes:

  • We have no idea who’s out there, or in what numbers;
  • An enormous, expensive build-up in troops has not noticeably diminished the numbers of Taliban (or, in a worst case scenario, created 10,000 more);
  • There was initial success in diminishing the Taliban, but their numbers have grown; or
  • The Taliban are recruiting new people far more quickly than we can reconcile or kill off.

Each of those options militate in favor of pursuing a different strategy.

That Wacky, Wacky Krauthammer
Posted by Michael Cohen

It's been awhile since I've done a post examining the wackiness of Charles Krauthammer but the man's latest missive in the Washington Post has woken me from my slumber.

Krauthammer extols George Bush's Freedom Agenda as well as the virtues of democracy in the Arab World - and helpfully welcomes liberals abroad the neo-con democracy bandwagon:

Today, everyone and his cousin supports the "freedom agenda." Of course, yesterday it was just George W. Bush, Tony Blair and a band of neocons with unusual hypnotic powers who dared challenge the received wisdom of Arab exceptionalism - the notion that Arabs, as opposed to East Asians, Latin Americans, Europeans and Africans, were uniquely allergic to democracy. 

Now it seems everyone, even the left, is enthusiastic for Arab democracy. Fine. Fellow travelers are welcome. But simply being in favor of freedom is not enough. With Egypt in turmoil and in the midst of a perilous transition, we need foreign policy principles to ensure democracy for the long run.

This makes a lot of sense because traditionally liberals have been skeptical of democracy and supportive of authoritarian regimes - while conservatives have never wavered in their commitment to democratic principles. But as I was reading this article I thought to myself "I wonder if Krauthammer will reconcile his call for democracy with the fear of many neo-conservatives that Islamists will come into power if democracy is actually allowed to flower."

Luckily I didn't have to wait long:

As the states of the Arab Middle East throw off decades of dictatorship, their democratic future faces a major threat from the new totalitarianism: Islamism. As in Soviet days, the threat is both internal and external. Iran, a mini-version of the old Soviet Union.

Bingo! And there's more

Just as during the Cold War the United States helped keep European communist parties out of power (to see them ultimately wither away), it will be U.S. policy to oppose the inclusion of totalitarian parties - the Muslim Brotherhood or, for that matter, communists - in any government, whether provisional or elected, in newly liberated Arab states.

Beyond the obvious question as to whether one can have democracy in the Arab world if one tells Islamists they need not apply - it's worth remembering that this tension between democratic aspirations and 'keeping Islamists out' is precisely why Bush's Freedom Agenda failed. The Bush Administration supported free and fair elections in Gaza, was shocked when the Palestinian people embraced an Islamist party (Hamas) and refused to recognize it - which effectively made clear the hypocrisy of our policy: we only wanted democracy in the Arab world if our guys won.

That is, of course, an untenable standard - and back in his Cairo speech of June 2009 I think Barack Obama laid out a more effective one:

America respects the right of all peaceful and law-abiding voices to be heard around the world, even if we disagree with them. And we will welcome all elected, peaceful governments – provided they govern with respect for all their people.

This doesn't preclude the role of Islamists in Arab governments - and doesn't draw the conclusion, as Krauthammer seems to be doing, that any Islamist party is a totalitarian one. After all, you have an Islamist party in charge in Turkey and Islamist parties in Iraq. Indeed, one could argue that Turkey is as 'democratic' under its current leadership than any previous government in the nation's history.

Now in fairness to Krauthammer he makes clear that we probably lack the leverage to keep the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt out of power and that we should be supporting secular, democratic movements. That seems fair; but only up to a point. If we embrace democracy for the Arab world then we must embrace all parties that are willing to play by democratic rules - and that includes the Islamists.  

Our fear of Islamic political movements has led the United States, for years, to support authoritarian and dictatorial regimes - like Hosni Mubarak's - with predictably disastrous results. And contrary to Krauthammer's crowing for the Freedom Agenda, George Bush was guilty of the same crime, particularly in regard to Egypt where he backed away from calls for democracy when the US government decided we needed an un-democratic Mubarak more than an actual democratic process. 

We can't have it both ways - we can't support democracy and then reject political Islam. So long as Islamist groups are willing to abide by the tenets of democracy and participate in free and fair elections we should welcome their inclusion. To do otherwise . . . well it wouldn't be democratic.

February 10, 2011

A Defiant Mubarak and What Obama Should Do Next
Posted by Joel Rubin

Embattled Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak refuses to go.  Protestors in Tahrir Square are in agony. The Obama administration has just been called out. Now what?

According to Mubarak, the issue is no longer a choice between stability and chaos, but instead one of national pride as embodied in the life story of Hosni Mubarak.  To give in to pressure and leave power now would, according to Mubarak, be an insult to all Egyptians.  True, the youth of Egypt are to be listened to, but, according to Mubarak, they do not understand what they really need. To him, they’re children.

Mubarak is raising the stakes, daring the Americans to push him out, appealing to patriotism and staring down the protestors.  While he verbalized certain concessions that the U.S. has been calling for – although he made sure to say those concessions would only follow after restored stability – it’s clear that he has rebuffed President Obama’s call earlier in the day for a “genuine transition to democracy.” Mubarak’s reputation, which could have been rescued, will now likely be in tatters.

While President Obama should continue to stress that there should be no violence, that there should be a respect for universal human rights, and there should be an immediate political transition, the situation is more dire on the ground now than even a week ago.

Therefore, here are the key questions that the White House needs to ask if it hopes to rescue the situation, with whatever remaining leverage it has at its disposal:

1. What is the Army doing?  Will they follow Mubarak? There were rumors earlier in the day that the military would push out Mubarak, call for martial law and make steps to democracy. That scenario appears dashed.  The Administration needs to press all its contacts for real answers.

2. What will the protestors do?  Will more come out tomorrow? The protestors were planning on one million marchers for tomorrow.  Now how many? If they needed anything else to fuel their rage, Mubarak just gave it to them.

3. Is an “orderly transition” to democracy really possible with Suleiman or any other remnant of the Mubarak regime in charge? Mubarak said that he will transfer power to his vice president, Omar Suleiman, and will support changes to the Constitutional amendments, as well as move to end the Emergency Law -- but that has been said before, and Mubarak insisted changes would be made only after stability has been restored, which, after watching the chants from Tahrir, doesn’t seem likely. There’s a credibility problem here.

And here are some recommendations for the White House:

1) Stick to core principles: The White House needs to strongly reiterate its three key points of “no violence,” “respect for human rights,” and “credible transition to democracy”

2) Seek new leverage: The White House needs to explore new routes to sway the behavior of Mubarak and his cohorts.  The stale arguments about levels of whether to explicitly call for Mubarak’s resignation or whether to suspend military aid are clearly not enough to sway him.  The White House should consider fresh ways to show common cause with the protestors.

3) Stay on the offense: President Obama has been strong in his public statements.  Now is not the time to let up, just because Hosni Mubarak said so.  Now is the time to keep the pressure on and seek more concrete and viable changes in Mubarak’s decisions.



Shifting Deck Chairs on the Titanic
Posted by Michael Cohen

I'm a little late in posting this to DA, but I have a new piece up at Foreign Policy making the case that recent signs of military progress in Afghanistan cannot mask the underlying strategic impediments in our current strategy:

Without tangible improvement in creating a capable and effective Afghan security force; without a competent and legitimate central government able to provide good governance to its people; without a choking-off of the supply of arms and fighters from across the border in Pakistan, the tactical gains being made by U.S. troops cannot be sustained and, quite simply, the war in Afghanistan cannot be won.

All the elements of the U.S. strategy in Afghanistan -- political, diplomatic, and military -- must be working if the effort is to be successful, not just the latter. But instead of recognizing these failures and shifting course, there is abiding resistance to any change among policymakers. Proposals to begin the process of political reconciliation with the Taliban are pushed aside because on the ground, after all, the insurgents are back on their heels. So why negotiate?

But this mindset creates a misleading sense of optimism that precludes any serious examination of the current strategy. 

Long overdue in Afghanistan is a sobering recognition by political and military leaders that the current U.S. and NATO strategy is failing, has little chance of success, and must be reformulated immediately. That is the public discussion that needs to be taking place. But none of that will happen so long as the U.S. president and his military commanders ignore the many signs that America is losing the war in Afghanistan -- choosing instead to focus their public rhetoric solely on rosy assessments of military progress.

You can read the whole thing here

February 09, 2011

The Progressive National Military Strategy
Posted by Jacob Stokes

Us-military-seals If President Barack Obama had said in his State of Union address last month that U.S. military policy will “emphasize mutual responsibility and respect” or even hinted at “shifts in relative power,” his political enemies would have wiped the floor with him. But those concepts frame the U.S. National Military Strategy, a document put together by the Joint Chiefs of Staff that was released on Feb. 8. The document is indicative of a profound trend in U.S. foreign policy: that of the military adapting ideas American progressives have long advocated for.

The most of prominent of those ideas is what’s known as a “whole-of-government” approach, or the idea that problems should be solved using a combination of diplomacy, economic incentives, development aid and military power. Conservatives eschew this concept. Figures such as Mitt Romney continue to push for outsourcing all U.S. foreign policy to the Department of Defense and Republicans in Congress are making every effort to eviscerate civilian diplomatic and aid agencies by cutting their funding. 

Compare that to the NMS, which says the relative shift in power politics “requires America’s foreign policy to employ an adaptive blend of diplomacy, development, and defense,” explaining that, “leadership is how we exercise the full spectrum of power to defend our national interests.” That differing concept of how to use the various tools of American power dovetails with the NMS’s more modern conception of the strategic environment, which it says is “characterized more by shifting, interest-driven coalitions based on diplomatic, military, and economic power than by rigid security competition between opposing blocs.” Both the realization of need to integrate the tools of power and the realization of a new strategic environment reflect an understanding that military power alone won’t fix most 21st-century problems.

Continue reading "The Progressive National Military Strategy" »

February 08, 2011

UN Bashing Redux
Posted by David Shorr

Ros-lehtinenIn the category of right wing retreads, guess what's near the top of the agenda for the House Foreign Affairs Committee under its new Republican management. Did you guess witholding the dues our country pays to the big bad anti-American United Nations (subject of a January 25 hearing)? No? Well, it does have an eccentric pet peeve feel to it, to be sure. Not to mention serious tone-deafness about the United States' international image. But some Republicans just loooove to beat up on the UN, can't hardly help themselves.

In all seriousness, though, this is an issue that highlights a genuine contrast of perspectives. Those who support or oppose witholding America's share of the UN budget represent distinct ways of looking at the world body -- and the US international role, for that matter. Look at what Committee Chair Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen said in her opening statement at the recent hearing (in the first para she's quoting her own earlier statement):

‘With significant leadership by the United States, the United Nations was founded on high ideals. The pursuit of international peace and development, and the promotion of basic human rights are core, historic concerns of the American people. At its best, the U.N. can play an important role in promoting U.S. interests and international security, but reality hasn’t matched the ideals.’

Accordingly, U.S. policy on the United Nations should be based on three fundamental questions: Are we advancing American interests? Are we upholding American values? and are we being responsible stewards of American taxpayer dollars?

Translation: has the UN proven itself worthy of our support? Unless the global forum is meeting the United States' expectations, we shouldn't have to pay. The argument combines "what have you done for me lately" with "I'm taking my bat and ball and going home."

Over at the Heritage Foundation's Foundry blog, Brett Schaefer kept the debate going by taking issue with a speech on the subject by Assistant Secretary of State Esther Brimmer. (She spoke at Brookings on February 1 partly to respond to the House hearing.) Here's part of the quote Brett cited:

No longer can our adversaries at the UN change the subject to our arrears when we press them on an important policy matter, as they did for so long. The President’s decision to pay our UN assessments in full means that we have had more political capital to galvanize support from allies, partners, and others for achieving our goals at the United Nations.

Where Ros-Lehtinen and Schaefer see a scandalously wayward culprit due for behavior modification, the Obama administration sees a vital diplomatic arena (e.g. Iran sanctions) where the United States has to be mindful of its reputation. In his post, Schaefer argues that for Brimmer to characterize witheld US dues as hindering diplomatic efforts merely shows a lack of confidence in the administration's own diplomatic effectiveness. In response, I'd say Brett shows a lack of appreciation for how effective American heavy-handedness is in arousing international resentment and resistance.

I should add that over the years, I've found Brett to be a conscientious partner in bipartisan dialogue. I would probably endorse many of the criticisms he makes in his written testimony for the recent hearing in the House. I would never claim that the UN has a stellar record of effectiveness, and to his credit, Brett acknowledges that the UN can claim some important contributions. The question here is one of proportion. For Republicans to devote one of their very first hearings to the UN's deficiencies and threaten to withold our dues hardly keeps things in perspective -- never mind the lack of self-awareness about the effects of American bullying.

The Taliban/Al Qaeda Link & the Facile Reasoning of Afghan War Supporters
Posted by Michael Cohen

Over the past 18 months one of the key rationales that has been used to justify the US military presence in Afghanistan is that if the Taliban are somehow allowed to return to power in Afghanistan they will once again provide a safe haven to al Qaeda. Indeed, President Obama, when he announced a troop surge in December 2009 made this exact argument to justify the increased US military presence in Afghanistan.

However, this has always been something of a dubious argument, both on strategic grounds, but also basic common sense - after spending ten years to get back into power would the Taliban really allow the same organization that caused their demise to set up shop again as if nothing had happened and thus open themselves up to US military attack? 

Now thanks to Kandahar-based researchers Alex Strick Van Linschoten and Felix Kuehn we have a bit more meat on the bones of this argument - a new report that suggests the links between the Taliban and al Qaeda are not permanent and can be exploited for US political and military gain.

  1. The Taliban and al-Qaeda remain distinct groups with different goals, ideologies, and sources of recruits; there was considerable friction between them before September 11, 2001, and today that friction persists.
  2. Elements of current U.S. policy in Afghanistan, especially night raids and attempts to fragment the Taliban, are changing the insurgency, inadvertently creating opportunities for al-Qaeda to achieve its objectives and preventing the achievement of core goals of the United States and the international community.
  3. There is room to engage the Taliban on the issues of renouncing al-Qaeda and providing guarantees against the use of Afghanistan by international terrorists in a way that will achieve core U.S. goals.

I won't try to summarize the entire report, but I recommend taking the time to read it. It provides and important basis for understanding why the foundation of the US mission in Afghanistan - preventing an return to al Qaeda in Afghanistan - is not only wrong, but actually might be self-perpetuating. In other words, by continuing the current strategy we may be strengthening the adversary our war is nominally geared toward weakening.

At the same time, if one wants to understand the intellectual bankruptcy of those who fervently and unthinkingly support continuing the current mission read what Max Boot has to say about this report:

It is worth noting that the authors have collaborated with a leading Taliban figure on his autobiography and have publicly opposed the American-led war effort in Afghanistan. Their “report” reads suspiciously like the Taliban propaganda line.

There is no doubt that the Taliban and al-Qaeda are distinct organizations. But there is also no doubt that they are closely linked — even more so now than they were in 2001, when the Taliban could have remained in power if they had simply handed over Osama bin Laden to the United States. Mullah Omar refused to do that, and he has steadfastly refused to renounce al-Qaeda in the years since, when it would be very much to his advantage to do so. Why would Mullah Omar & Co. suddenly turn on al-Qaeda if they were back in power? Talk about wishful thinking.

A couple of things here. First of all the authors worked on a memoir of a former Taliban, Mullah Zaeef - an important read if you want to get a better understanding of what motivates Taliban fighters. But of course in Max Boot's world seeking to understand the Taliban is akin to supporting them (and of course the none too subtle effort to link Alex and Felix to the Taliban - "collaborated" - is a grubby and obvious effort to invalidate their work. Classy as ever Max). Second, I'm not aware that Alex and Felix have publicly opposed the war in Afghanistan - but so what if they did. Can only those who support the current war effort actually criticize it? By this measure no one should take seriously anything Max Boot has to say because he is a knee-jerk war supporter.

But the worst part here is Boot's simplistic and unsupported reasoning for why this carefully researched report is wrong. He claims there is no doubt the Taliban and al Qaeda are closely linked - but actually provides no evidence, except the bizarre notion that Taliban thinking remains unchanged over the past ten years. He bemoans the fact that Mullah Omar won't trade away the chit of collaboration with al Qaeda - but why would he do such a thing before any serious negotiations with the US and/or the Karzai government?

By this argument America's enemies are not only incapable of strategic and pragmatic behavior, but should unilaterally disarm and rely on the good graces of the United States and its allies. Lastly, is it really impossible to recognize that the Taliban might have reason to turn on al Qaeda if they are returned to power - especially since the limitations on the use of US force that existed pre-9/11 certainly do not exist today and because al Qaeda would provide almost no benefit to the Taliban. At the very least isn't this a potential cleavage that we should be trying to exploit instead confidently declaring that the relationship between two organization with very different orientations and grievance structures is inviolate for all time?

Honestly, it's not a big surprise that war-addled correspondents like Boot would make this sort of argument - what's troubling is that this sort of shallow and facile reasoning actually shapes US policy in Afghanistan.

February 07, 2011

Running Out the Clock in Egypt
Posted by Jacob Stokes

Suleiman As the heady early days of the January 25 movement start to drag into the dull work of figuring out what’s next, the standoff between protestors and the government has turned into a waiting game. The regime wants to wait out the protestors, ceding as few concessions as possible along the way. The protestors, meanwhile, must struggle to keep up the momentum and pressure they’ve accumulated to exact real political change.

Joshua Stacher, writing in Foreign Affairs, makes the argument that the regime – of which the Egyptian military, although a highly respected institution, is still very much a central part – is playing both “the arsonist and firefighter” in this waiting game. That is, the police are seeding chaos in the streets, and creating an opening for the army to bolster its public support by returning stability. 

By employing this two-pronged strategy, Stacher argues, the regime is making life very difficult for the part of the Egyptian citizenry who aren’t the hardcore protestors lying in front of tanks in Tahrir. Stacher explains the growing exasperation of many Egyptians: 

Although some of these citizens may have sympathized with the protesters initially, their mood appears to be shifting. People are tired of being cooped up in their apartments, made anxious as their stockpiles of food and money decrease, and they are ready for a sense of "normalcy" to return. Ironically, the normalcy they pine for resembles the police state so many tried to banish just thirteen days ago. This method of wearing down the non-protesting public seems just as strategic as the violence employed on those airing their grievances in the streets. 

Steve Cook of CFR, who wrote a book on the Egyptian military, predicted this strategy back on Jan. 31:

Continue reading "Running Out the Clock in Egypt" »

New START Enters Into Force
Posted by Kelsey Hartigan

Www.reuters.com Clinton & LavrovNew START formally entered into force this past weekend when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov exchanged instruments of ratification on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference.  U.S. and Russian inspectors will soon exchange data on missiles, launchers, heavy bombers and warheads and in less than 60 days, inspections will resume.  According to my math, this means that by April 6, 2011, inspectors will once again be able to conduct on-site inspections.  My fellow arms control wonks will appreciate the timing:  President Obama gave his historic Prague speech on April 5, 2009 and signed the New START agreement with Russian President Medvedev a year later on April 8, 2010.  When inspections resume this April, the New START process will have come full circle.       

U.S.-Russian inspections ended in December 2009 when the original START agreement expired.  Since that point, the U.S. has only been able to use National Technical Means to monitor Russia’s nuclear arsenal.  National Technical Means, or NTM, is of course, just the polite way of referring to spy satellites.  As Mary Beth Sheridan explained in a piece last summer, however, reconnaissance satellites only go so far.  “For example, a satellite cannot peer into a Russian underground silo and see whether the missile inside is carrying one nuclear bomb or 10, officials say.”

“One of our dirty little secrets is, when the [Berlin] Wall went down, the United States reoriented a lot of intelligence capacity away from the Soviet Union and Russia. To some fair degree . . . the IC [intelligence community] was relying on U.S. inspectors to be on the ground," [Frank] Miller said.

The "boots on the ground" include people such as Phil Smith, a former Air Force crew chief for nuclear-tipped missiles. He has made about 20 inspection visits to Russian nuclear facilities.

"We have 15 years of experience under START, understanding where everything is. We've been through these sites multiple times," he said in an interview.

The U.S. teams typically arrive at Russian bases with only about a day's notice. Many of the inspectors' methods are surprisingly low-tech: They stretch tape measures along missiles and poke flashlights into trailers. The inspections allow each side to count nuclear weapons on a sampling of missiles, bombers or submarine launch tubes and look around one another's maintenance facilities and test ranges.

"If something is atypical . . . I will not be bashful about saying, 'Okay, we need to take a closer look at this one.' That's the kind of dynamic you have on the ground that you wouldn't have with a satellite," Smith said.

For more on New START’s inspection regime, it’s worth revisiting Ken Myers’ testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last June (pdf).  Myers is the head of the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, which is responsible for implementing New START’s inspection and escort provisions.

February 04, 2011

Incentives and Isotopes
Posted by Kelsey Hartigan

Yesterday, NSN and the Center for America Progress co-hosted a forum on principled and pragmatic policy options for dealing with Iran.  Paul Pillar’s write-up in the National Interest offers an overview of his remarks and a reminder of why the current debate over Iran’s enrichment program isn’t getting us too far.

“For all the focus on uranium enrichment, the western side has done little to explore with Iran the possibilities for imparting greater transparency to the Iranian program as a form of safeguards against diversion to military purposes. Our leaders and negotiators have uttered a few things about how someday the west might trust Iran with its own enrichment program, but we have given the Iranians almost no reason to believe any such utterance.

“From Tehran's viewpoint, the overriding message being received is one of pressure and more pressure, of unrelenting animosity, and of lack of acceptance. It is quite understandable for Tehran to conclude that even if it were to end its enrichment program, the state of relations would not fundamentally change and that the principal U.S. goal is, and will remain, regime change. Such a conclusion destroys any Iranian incentive to make concessions on the nuclear program or anything else under discussion. And it increases the Iranian motivation to develop nuclear weapons.

“The fruitless quest for a no-enrichment solution, which has been going on now for some time, lessens the chance of achieving more feasible but still favorable outcomes. And if the saber rattling were ever to lead to the use of military force, among the disastrous consequences for U.S. interests would be to ensure the enmity of future generations of Iranians and to provide the strongest possible incentive for those Iranians to build, or rebuild, a nuclear weapons capability.

Olli Heinonen, former deputy director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, recently floated an interesting proposal— one that could help alleviate the current stalemate on the enrichment question and begin to shift the dynamic Pillar describes above.  Heinonen suggests that the U.S. and its partners, presumably the P-5 +1, work with Iran to build a new research reactor that is designed to use low enriched uranium.

Iran is currently constructing a heavy water reactor, the IR-40, but it's not expected to be operational until sometime around 2013 at the earliest.  As ISIS explains, "If operating optimally, the IR-40 would produce about 9 kilograms of plutonium annually or enough for about two nuclear weapons each year."  If the U.S. and others worked with Iran to modify the reactor design it could ease some of the proliferation concerns and possibly create space for a future fuel swap.

“The offer to help build a new, more secure research reactor to replace the TRR could revive the fuel swap program, in which Iran would agree to send more of its enriched uranium out of the country to be converted into fuel for the new reactor. The outcome would provide Iran with a solid supply of medical isotopes and a new, up-to-date training facility for its scientists. And it would address proliferation concerns by limiting the increase of stocks of enriched uranium and future production of plutonium…

“A modern, more powerful research reactor will require a substantial part of Iran's current stocks of enriched uranium -- ensuring that they are not available for further enrichment for weapons -- and provide a secure, reliable supply of radioisotopes for decades to come. It would only be a first step, however. Iran will still need to address the world's broader concerns about the scope and intentions behind its nuclear program. But successful cooperation on a new reactor might make those conversations a little bit easier.

This would in no way be a silver bullet for dealing with Iran’s nuclear program but such an incentive could help temper the level of distrust that currently exists and provide a stronger platform for future dialogue, perhaps even on matters beyond the nuclear issue.

A Tale of Four Not So Great American "Allies"
Posted by Michael Cohen

I've generally avoided writing anything about the situation in Egypt because it seems there are already enough people who know very little about Egypt publicly saying something - or have a personal agenda in commenting on the crisis.

Still I couldn't help but note an interesting linkage between what's happening with the United States in Egypt and three other countries in the Middle East and South Asia.

First there is Egypt where the day after the President of the United States called on our long-standing ally to begin a peaceful transition toward democracy and respect the will of its people . . . that same ally responded by sending thugs into Tahrir Square to beat up pro-democracy demonstrators. In effect, he spit in the eye of a US president.

In Pakistan, the US remains embroiled in a row with the Pakistani government over the continued detention of a US diplomat, Raymond Davis, who is accused to killing two people who allegedly tried to rob him. Now granted this is a complicated issue, but it's at pace with the frosty relationship between the US and Pakistan, which of course includes the continued refusal by Pakistan to end support for Taliban insurgents battling US forces in Afghanistan - or deal with the jihadist terrorists who want to kill Americans that continue to reside there.

In Afghanistan, the international community (including the US) had to drag our ally Hamid Karzai kicking and screaming to finally agree to seat the Afghan Parliament - and of course he remains an uncertain ally in the fight against the Taliban.

Finally, there's Israel and the Obama Administration's admission of defeat last December that it could ever get the Netanyahu government to freeze settlement building in the West Bank. 

What do these four countries have in common - well besides the fact that they are among the four largest recipients of US foreign aid? Each in their its own unique way is either fundamentally undermining US interests or is thumbing its notes nose at US demands. 

What's the conclusion that we should draw from this bizarre phenomenon?

In the case of Egypt and Israel we've defined our interests in regard to these two countries completely wrong. We've fetishized stability or influence (which granted are important) But we've done so at a cost to US image in the region - and as we are learning right now we haven't really gotten much stability in return. Indeed, when push comes to shove both Israel and Egypt (not to mention Afghanistan and Pakistan) elect to ignore us when they feel the behavior we're urging runs contrary to their perceived interests. And that's all well and good for Israel and Egypt to make those decisions (I for one applaud countries acting in their perceived self-interest!). But why then do we prize these relationships and also provide billions in assistance when both countries feel quite comfortable ignoring us when our interests and their interests diverge? Shouldn't all that aid buy us something in return other than a peace agreement that both countries currently seem to value - and shouldn't we be willing to use it as a lever to encourage policy changes that we support? 

Now I suppose nothing about this is terribly surprising; allies diverge in their interests all the time. But what's odd is that we seem to have flipped around that old maxim about permanent interests and permanent allies - the only thing that maintains permanence in US foreign policy these days is our allies . . . even when our interests change.

That leads to the next point; the way we define our interests is not the way our "allies" define their interests. Not surprisingly Hosni Mubarak doesn't feel like committing political suicide because all of a sudden we become very interested in seeing democracy take root in the Middle East. Israel doesn't feel much like stopping settlement expansion or taking risks for peace simply because the US wants to improve its image in the Arab world. And in Pakistan, they don't have much interest in cracking down on the Afghan Taliban or perhaps ending its support for jihadist terror groups simply because we're trying to extricate ourselves from a war next door. 

None of these are minor disagreements; in some respects they go to the heart of our bilateral relationships - so again at the price of maintaining "stability" or what we think is stability we are allowing our short-term interests in the region to suffer.

The saddest part of this is that we seem to have convinced ourselves that if we just find the right mix of carrots and sticks we can convince each of these countries to act in a way that furthers our interests - and acts against theirs. But do you notice how that never seems to work?

That leads to the last and perhaps most important point - we radically overestimate our ability to affect the behavior of other countries. Even with 100,000 troops on the ground in Afghanistan we can't get Hamid Karzai to stop stealing elections and engaging in corruption; we pile billions upon more billions to Pakistan, we declare a new direction for US-Pakistan relations and nothing changes - OBL remains on the loose & the Pakistanis continue to support the Afghan Taliban. 

Now perhaps it's a failure to wield more sticks - but even here our influence is overstated. In Pakistan and Afghanistan, we can't really use sticks because our foreign policy misjudgments (in particular, fetishizing the war on terror) have created a situation in which we need these countries and their leaders more than they need us. We could use a stick against Israel but domestic politics won't allow it; and as for Egypt - the threat of "Islam" or the impact on the relationship with Israel holds us back (and this pre-dates the current uprising). 

So on the one hand you could say we have terrible allies - and you'd be right. But the better takeaway is that we prize our "friends" (who aren't really our friends) probably a bit more than we do our interests. If we were more clear-headed about what out actual interests are then we might do a better job of not getting involved in such dysfunctional bilateral relationships.

Moreover, one can't help but come away from an examination of US foreign policy over the past few months and conclude that we're not quite as powerful as we would like - and we dramatically overestimate our own ability to shape global affairs. There is a myth of American omnipotence on the world stage and granted we are a powerful and influential nation, but there are real and significant limits to that power - and we don't seem to do a very job of recognizing they exist.  

And to that final point a good part of the reason why we don't recognize the limits of our power is because we define our interests in a limitless manner and then assume that we have the diplomatic, political and military influence to shape those interests. Well, as we are seeing right now across a broad swath of the Middle East and South Asia, we don't. That is perhaps the best takeaway from recent events - the need for a bit more modesty and realism in how we conduct our foreign policy.

February 02, 2011

De-Nile is Not Just a River in Egypt
Posted by Michael Cohen

While the world's eyes are fixated on the pro-democracy demonstrations in Egypt there is, under the radar screen, even more evidence of the strategic dysfunction and delusion that resides at the heart of US policy in Afghanistan. In a press briefing at the Pentagon yesterday, Lt. Gen. David Rodriguez, the number two military commander Afghanistan, said those safe havens in Pakistan . . . not really a big deal.

Rodriguez said Tuesday that the United States and NATO could succeed in the war even if Pakistan refused to shut down a lawless frontier sanctuary that militants use for staging attacks on forces across the border in Afghanistan.

In comments that sought to make a virtue of a now-acknowledged reality, General Rodriguez, the NATO and American commander in charge of the day-to-day fighting in Afghanistan, said that while the United States continued to press Pakistan to root out the militants from their haven in the northwest tribal region of North Waziristan, the United States could still win militarily if the Pakistani Army did not act.

“That’s not a mission-stopper in my mind,” General Rodriguez told reporters at a Pentagon briefing. He did not provide a definition of winning militarily.

As the New York Times notes Rodriguez's view of the Pakistani safe havens is at direct odds with public comments from head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Mike Mullen, the White House, pretty much the entire intelligence community and any serious (or not serious) counter-insurgency analyst. The notion that suddenly the US military can 'work-around' a problem that nearly all analysts, both inside and outside of government, consider to be an existential threat to the success of the US mission seems incomprehensible. Indeed, back in December the US military was pushing the Obama Administration for the extreme step of allowing cross-border raids into Pakistan (a US ally) to go after Taliban insurgents. 

So why is Rodriguez making a comment like this - because to acknowledge that the existence of Pakistani safe havens is a mission stopper would be to acknowledge that the current strategy in Afghanistan isn't working and even more important is unlikely to succeed. 

But instead of doing that the mindset of our political and military leaders seems to be - not surprisingly - how do we work around this problem, rather than reconcile military strategy with it. This is military "can-doism" run horribly amok. But there's no good reason for anyone else to take it seriously.

February 01, 2011

Cairo in Chaos: What’s Next?
Posted by Joel Rubin

As Hosni Mubarak sends mixed signals about his next steps - from an undisclosed location -, what should Americans expect next?  Our best Arab ally for the past 30 years has consistently shown himself to be a cagey autocrat, one not to be counted out prematurely, but this may even be too big for him and he may be gone soon.  Here are some scenarios that could play out as a result of this week’s chaos – and that will have a major impact on American interests in the Middle East.

Gamal, the cronies, and fake democracy are done

It wasn’t by accident that the mob first torched the headquarters of the National Democratic Party (NDP).  The NDP has served as the vehicle for the rise of the elder Mubarak’s son, Gamal, to power.  He has no following amongst ordinary Egyptians and the NDP was his gift power base, where he ran its policy and attempted to build a reputation independent of his father.  The military didn’t want him and now he’s done.  And so are his crony friends, the elite international business class, who have done very well, but who haven’t delivered on lifting nearly half the population of out two-dollar a day poverty.  If they haven’t fled already for fear of their lives, they’re likely on their way.  And as far as another election in this country where the winner garners more than 98% of the vote, well, those days are over.

Chaos begets repression elsewhere in the region

First Tunis, now Cairo.  The uprising in two important Arab capitals has put regional autocrats on notice, and they are likely to respond with more proactive repression, not less.  Don’t be surprised to see Jordan, the Palestinian Authority, Syria, Morocco, and Saudi Arabia clamp down, lest they become the next one to fall.  These regimes may in fact look to the Iranian model – where a harsh clampdown snuffed out the Green Movement –as their ideal scenario.  Of course, this means that more U.S. client states may be beating up their own people, causing our reputation even more harm than the “Made in the U.S.A.” gas canisters in Cairo have.

Continue reading "Cairo in Chaos: What’s Next?" »

Remembrance of a Conversation in Doha
Posted by Michael Wahid Hanna

When I spoke by phone to my fellow blogger Shadi Hamid yesterday, he reminded me of a conversation we had this past summer in Doha. I was passing through on an overnight in Doha on my way to Islamabad and Kabul, and had spent the previous two weeks in Egypt. The conversation naturally focused on the perennial issue of Egypt and reform. At the time, the country’s opposition groups were trying to come together over a common strategy for the upcoming parliamentary elections.

The conversation split along traditional lines with me filling the role of pessimistic skeptic and Shadi assuming his more optimistic take on the chances for reform and change. Much had taken place in the previous year with the establishment of the change campaign following the return of the former IAEA chief Mohammed el-Baradie to Egypt, the galvanizing moment of Khaled Said’s death by torture at the hands of the state, and continued labor unrest. All the signs pointed to the necessity for political change, but Egypt had long resisted any and all indicators for imminent change, whether of a controlled or cataclysmic nature. Egypt, once the proud leader of the Arab world, was a mere shell of its previous incarnation: a defensive regime paralyzed by an obsessive focus on the issue of succession where governance and diplomacy had ceased to be a concern. The political malaise that gripped the country was pronounced.

Continue reading "Remembrance of a Conversation in Doha" »

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