Arms and influence

When you need a strong constitution

IN THE NEWS
A couple of quick thoughts about the Iraqi constitution:

• The last thing we need is to have a Made in America stamp on it. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's "get a move on" visit to Iraq hurt the legitimacy of the final product.
• Let the delegates take their time. After all, it is supposed to be the political pole star for the future Iraq. Sure, there are less lofty reasons than profound philosophical differences behind the delays. The drafting process gives the delegates significant but temporary leverage over the United States. They can drag their feet if it looks like it helps them wrangle more resources from the Bush Administration. However, there are other reasons as well--not least of which is ensuring its acceptance among all of Iraq's major ethnic and sectarian groups.
• Let's be careful not to trumpet the results too loudly. If the tensions among Shiites, Sunnis, and Kurds erupt into a larger conflict, the aggrieved parties will point to deficiencies in the constitution as their cassus belli.

"The lowest point of my life"

IN THE NEWS
Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, an aide to Colin Powell from 2002 to 2005, describes Powell's address to the UN prior to the Iraq invasion as "the lowest point in my life."

The credibility gap

IN THE NEWS
For those of us who feel like the war in Iraq is proceeding like the Vietnam War on amphetamines, here's the latest point of comparison. Some insurgent groups—the millennarian Islamists, like Al Qaeda in Iraq—have been stepping up attacks against both Iraqi and American targets. There are rumors of a Tet Offensive-like escalation, seeking the same result as in 1968: the US public declares it has had enough of the war, leading to a US withdrawal.

I'm always eager to learn from past history, and just as eager to avoid spurious comparisons. In 1968, the National Liberation Front and its North Vietnamese patron believed that the Tet attacks would trigger mass uprisings against the government in Saigon. No such revolt occurred, and in fact, NLF atrocities hardened anti-Communist feelings in the South. Ho Chi Minh and General Giap both embellished their description of the Tet strategy after the fact, claiming that they knew all along that the actual outcome—the American political backlash against the war—was their objective all along. Although the North Vietnamese and NLF planned, at the grand strategic level, to wear down American willingness to stay in the war, they did not expect the Tet Offensive to turn into the pivotal event that it was. It's easy to forget that the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) and the post-Tet remnants of the NLF continued mounting offensives every year, in a strategy to make the war increasingly unpalatable to the US electorate.

In Iraq, there is no neighboring country like North Vietnam moving division-sized units into the war zone. Whatever safe havens might exist across the borders with Syria and Iran, they pale in comparison to the NVA bases across the border in North Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos. There is nothing like the Ho Chi Minh Trail, a massive artery for shuttling retiring troops, replacements, and supplies in and out of the main theater of operations. There is, therefore, every reason for the Iraqi insurgents to be wary of anything like the Tet Offensive. After all, they have the sad fate of the NLF during Tet—mauled beyond recovery by US and South Vietnamese counterattacks—as a cautionary tale.

Nothing of what I've said, however, eliminates the risk that the US public's patience with the Iraq War will snap, as it did with the Vietnam War in 1968. In hindsight, it's clear that the Johnson Administration set itself up for the post-Tet political backlash. Constant talk of "light at the end of the tunnel" led the American public to believe that, even if the evening news carried regular stories of Communist attacks and American casualties, the people running the war knew what they were doing. There was enough trust in the White House and the Pentagon to suspend disbelief. When guerrillas who, according to the US government, were supposed to be dead besieged the Marines at Khe Sanh, and NLF sappers briefly broke into the US embassy grounds in Saigon, trust in Johnson and his subordinates collapsed. (Incidentally, this is the same reaction the Spanish electorate had to the Aznar government's mendacity immediately after the March 11 terrorist attack. What sank Aznar wasn't the Spanish electorate's fear of Al Qaeda, but outrage at the Aznar government's obvious lies.)

The Bush Administration is in a similarly precarious situation today. Even a small offensive could result in the kind of images that end the American public's patience. Iraqi troops running from the enemy, insurgents running amok in the Green Zone, widespread assassinations of military and civilian leaders, all could destroy political support for this costly venture in Iraq. During the Tet Offensive, journalists largely missed that the NVA/NLF attack was a failure, on the terms that the leaders in Hanoi had defined for the operation. It's also possible that the news media today might misjudge an insurgent offensive. However, even an accurate accounting of a prospective assault might fly in the face of how leaders in the White House, the Pentagon, and Congress have been depicting the war.

However, the US political landscape in 2005 is also different than the one that existed in 1968. The news media are, by and large, less skeptical of Bush than they were of Johnson. (Another easily-forgotten aspect of the history of the 1960s was the antagonism between Lyndon Johnson and the press that pre-dated the Tet Offensive.) The opposition from both the Congressional party out of power and potential dissidents within the majority party is also weaker. So far, senators like Chuck Hagel and John McCain have made acerbic comments, but have voted with their party far more often than not.

But who knows what may change in the course of a few days of intense combat in Iraq. 9/11 may have opened a fault line in American politics; so too might an Iraqi version of the Tet Offensive.

Shooting ourselves in the foot

IN THE NEWS

In the car this morning, I listened to an interesting interview with Richard Florida, the author of The Flight of the Creative Class. Florida made his name with an earlier book about how cities can benefit in concrete terms (growth, tax revenue, etc.) by attracting new residents in professional and artistic jobs. His new book takes the same perspective to the international plane, where the United States is competing for "creative capital." Although Florida may have overstated his case somewhat, there is a compelling and important point in what he says: in the name of security, we're sacrificing far more in terms of our national economic well-being.

Since 9/11, the US government has restricted both work and student visas and generally made it harder even to visit the country. Moreover, the US has an "image problem" that may be hard to measure, but certainly has some impact on the willingness of non-nationals to come here, or for US nationals to stay here. The net effect may be small—only a few percent of the highly skilled people we'd like to attract or keep—it's completely unnecessary. You don't have to envision doomsday economic scenarios to be uncomfortable with pointless economic hardship of any degree. There are sectors of the US economy—for example, engineering and IT—where the percentage of foreign workers is quite high. The consequences for these segments, many of which represent the leading edge of US innovation, are much higher than average.

Yes, the US has had even worse periods of anti-immigrant sentiments. And yes, we got through those periods and still became an economic superpower. There are two important differences: (1) the level of knowledge about what life in the United States is like for immigrants and visitors; (2) the greater mobility of capital, including labor. Instead of Ellis Island as their first contact with the United States, people worldwide now have the Internet providing a view of the US long before anyone arrives here. Rather than selling your home and nearly all your possessions, then traveling weeks by ship to reach the American shores, the United States is just a plane ride away.

At our house, we sometimes hire a contractor, Marc, a French citizen working in the United States. His wife has the same status, but their daughter—born and raised here—holds a US passport. Marc is now forced to leave, either to return to France or start over in Australia. Marc does about as working class a job as you can imagine, and he does them extremely well. He has a genuine gift for home remodeling projects, and he works hard. He's far better than anyone else we've hired for similar jobs—and now he's leaving. Sure, he's not the sort of "creative class" job holder that I was describing earlier, but in our little corner of the US economy, nothing is gained by Marc's departure.

Whether we're getting rid of people living here, or dissuading people from coming at all, we're doing it in the name of security. Fewer foreign nationals means fewer potential terrorists, right?

Assuming the formula works as simply as that, perhaps, but it doesn't, for two major reasons. First, the number of foreign terrorists may not be very high in the first place, so current restrictions may be about as sensible as killing a spider with a shotgun. We've had four years without terrorist attack—or, for that matter, any arrests and convictions of any terrorist cells like the one that executed the 9/11 attacks. The spider may have been just a shadow on the wall—or, at least, something a lot smaller and less menacing than we thought. (Believe me, I do worry about future terrorist attacks, but there are not thousands of Al Qaeda operatives prowling our borders. And let's not forget that the spider on the wall might be a domestic terrorist.)

Second, our global economic and physical security depends, to a significant extent, on how well people in other countries understand us, and on how well we understand them. Remember how many Arab newspapers carried stories after 9/11 about how Jews working in the World Trade Center got advance warning of the attack? Clearly, these sorts of fables thrive in the mulch pile of ignorance. The bigger this mulch pile, the fewer people are willing to work with the United States, live in the United States, or suffer the United States gladly. The Internet is a good source of information, but it's far from perfect. It's also no substitute for living and working side-by-side with the locals in a foreign country.

In short, enough already. Since the post-9/11 visa and immigration restrictions haven't netted a single terrorist, and they hurt our national well-being every day, it's time to dump them.

Ice picks and airliners

IN THE NEWS
Well, whaddya know. While I was waiting to get through airline security this morning, a TSA employee was cracking jokes to people in line about the proposed screening guidelines that would allow icepicks and throwing stars on airliners. I guess the passengers aren't the only ones who think this idea is fairly daffy.

The cover-up and the crime

IN THE NEWS
General Richard Myers must have worked in Washington long enough to know that the cover-up can easily be worse than the crime. Nevertheless, according to court papers unsealed last week, Myers claims that the yet-unpublished photos and videos of Abu Ghraib abuses would, if relased, unleash rioting in the Middle East and swell the ranks of Al Qaeda.

He's probably right about the former outcome, but not the latter. I agree with the former Army colonel quoted later in the AP article that insurgent attacks in Iraq will continue regardless. The United States has already helped radicalize some number of new recruits to Al Qaeda in Iraq and similar groups, so the photos aren't going to make matters significantly worse in that regard.

The US government is unlikely to win the proto-terrorists over to its side in any case. However, it can lose a broader population of Iraqis and Afghanis--the very people on whom victory in two counterinsurgency wars. The longer that US officials sit on these pictures and videos, the worse the backlash will become.

By now, everyone has read about the crimes, in gory detail--including several rumored abuses that weren't depicted in the digital photographs released to date. Therefore, the only story that can exist now is the possible cover-up of these abuses.

Good news for ninjas on airliners

IN THE NEWS
I'm still digesting the announcement from Edmund "Kip" Hawley, the new head of the Transportation Security Administration, about proposed changes to screening rules. My first reaction is, It's about time. Many post-9/11 procedures for screening airline passengers were a bit mindless. For example, any suicide bomber can hide an explosive in his belt, in a harness underneath his shirt, or shoved into his pants just as easily as Richard Reid hid a bomb in his shoes. I look forward to the day when I don't have to take my shoes off when passing through airport security.

While I'm glad for proposed changes like these, other elements of Hawley's proposal don't make sense:

The proposal also would allow ice picks, throwing stars and bows and arrows on flights. Allowing those items was suggested after a risk evaluation was conducted about which items posed the most danger.

I'm comfortable that the airlines are somewhat better prepared for another attempted seizure of a plane in flight. I'm not 100% confident, however, that someone couldn't use small, easily-carried weapons to take hostages or seize control of a plane. Sure, suicide bombers are a reasonable concern, but that's not the only scenario I'd be worried about as the head of the TSA. Small, less secure commuter planes, for example, may not be as dangerous as flying bombs as the large airliners seized for the 9/11 attacks. However, I'd rather not face the risk of seeing them used as weapons at all.

Maybe I'm missing something here, but I'd rather not fly with anyone carrying an ice pick, shuriken, or crossbow, thank you.

Words and meanings

IN THE NEWS
The GWOT/GSAVE fiasco has certainly touched a terminological nerve with a lot of people. For example, Tacitus uses the Administration's shift in terminology as a springboard to discuss other words, such as war and insurgent:

Ever since April 2003, another word has also bothered me:  Insurgents. In my mind, the ex-Baathist brigades and Zarqawi-led terrorists don't deserve such a neutral-sounding term.  Since there has already been an election and attempts will likely be made to destabilize the next one, their illegitimacy is not captured when they're described as "guerillas" or "insurgents".  The term also doesn't well describe their behavior.

Tacitus quotes approvingly Stephen Vincent, who preferred the term death squad to describe the "insurgents":

Words matter. Words convey moral clarity. Without moral clarity, we will not succeed in Iraq. That is why the terms the press uses to cover this conflict are so vital.

While I sympathize with Tacitus' search for moral clarity, I actually think it may be inappropriate here. There are words for whom we're fighting, why we're fighting them, and how they fight. Not all of these words should be chosen on moral grounds. In fact, we can do ourselves a grave injustice if we confuse justifiable moral outrage with a cool appraisal of operational realities.

Francis Marion, the "Swamp Fox" of the American Revolution, was a guerrilla. So was Pol Pot. Is only one morally worthy of being called a guerrilla, and the other not? Obviously, the fact that both men employed a guerrilla strategy has no moral significance one way or another. We laud Francis Marion as a military leader in a good cause, and Pol Pot in a bad one. If you don't feel comfortable using the term guerrilla to describe Pol Pot, you might as well invent a new word for firearm to describe the weapon he carried.

Insisting on a different word for guerrilla just confuses the picture, at a time when Americans need as little confusion as possible concerning our own foreign policy. Screaming Thugs! Monsters! Murderers! at pictures of Iraqi insurgents might give you a moment of needed catharsis. However, the US government doesn't need to invent a new "counter-thug" strategy to fight them. It needs to apply well-understood counterinsurgency and counterterrorism methods--the kind that would work just as well against saints as against villains. I find that comforting, since we have generations of past experience from dozens of modern internal wars that we can use.

If you need a dose of moral clarity, just add Islamist to the word guerrilla. Meanwhile, Americans seem more confused over how to defeat the al-Zarqawis of the world than whether they need to be defeated.

Just meet with her already

IN THE NEWS
Since we know that Cindy Sheehan is not a suicide bomber, it should be safe for President Bush to spend at least as much time talking to her as he's spent answering questions about her. Show some of the "common touch" a politician of your level should have, sir, and talk to a mother about why her son had to die.

Another interim appointment

IN THE NEWS
Armchair Generalist has another interesting catch about Bush's interim appointments, this time in the Department of Defense. While you might not think these bits of news are as important as, say, a well-publicized foreign policy speech by the Secretary of State, think again. Appointments are some of the most important decisions in any Administration--particularly this one, in which turnover is rather low.

It's also worth noting how politicized these lower levels of appointments have become in the last two decades. You expect the Cabinet level people to be, by and large, close political allies or friends of the President. Increasingly, the next few levels down the org chart have been swept clean whenever a new Administration takes office.