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February 25, 2010
The Hypocrisy of the Liberal Call for "Unity"
So we read that Hillary Clinton tells us that we are weaker because we have political fights between Republicans and Democrats:
Clinton: Political fights hurt U.S. image: Wants world to see 'unity and strength'
The Washington Times
By Nicholas KralevPresident Obama's diminished political power as a result of fights between the White House and Congress has damaged both his and the country's image abroad, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Wednesday.
Even as she thanked Congress for its bipartisan support for many of the Obama administration's foreign policy goals, Mrs. Clinton said during two Senate committee hearings that recent bickering on domestic issues concerns her and that she hopes "we can figure out a better way to address it."
We hear this line often from Democrats these days. It's a lot of nonsense, and here's why:
It's really the very definition to hear this from the party that for years told us that "Bush Lied, people died!" This from the party whose spokesmen told us that "Bush lied us into war." This from the party that undermined our efforts in the war on terror in general and in Iraq in particular at every turn. This from the party that spent more time complaining about the Patriot Act than about trying to help us defeat the jihadist threat. This from the party whose bloggers regularly referred to our president as "BusHitler," "Chimpy McHitler," and all the rest of it.
And this from the party whose entire leadership attended the opening of Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11
The liberals resort to this tactic all the time when they have trouble getting their agenda enacted.
George Will nailed it when he said that
I don't know quite what his complaint is, but, Terry, with metronomic regularity, we go through these moments in Washington where we complain about the government being broken. These moments have one thing in common: The Left is having trouble enacting its agenda. No one when George W. Bush had trouble reforming Social Security said, "Oh, that's terrible - the government's broken."
There's another reason too; those who call for "unity" think that things alike healthcare are a giant math problem, and if only we can get enough experts in the same room together we can solve it. This is false, because it presumes that everyone agrees on the fundamentals.
But we don't. What you have is one side that thinks that government should guarantee health insurance coverage for everyone, and the other thinks that it's primarily the individual's responsibility.
As a conservative, I am not interested in some compromise that will inevitably result in a slow but sure incremental path toward single-payer, or more and more government involvement. History decisively shows that once a program is put into place it grows and grows and benefits, and thus taxes, go nowhere but up.
Obama and other progressives want to set the overall structure of the healthcare bill and throw Republicans a few bones, letting us tweak a percentage here and there or a small amendment or two. This is unacceptable.
The bottom line is there are going to be political differences and fights because we disagree on the fundamentals. Get used to it. And anyway, my reading of history shows that it is false and silly to think that the disagreements are worse today than they were in the past. The best thing is to try and convince the public you are right, and if you win don't push too much too fast or act arrogant in power. Be responsible to the people and implement your agenda one step at a time.
But for today we'll have to listen to Hillary and the liberals complain. Just don't take them seriously.
Posted by Tom at 9:06 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
February 23, 2010
The "most open and transparent administration in history" sets record for avoiding press conferences
Get this:
Obama tops Bush at ducking reporters
The Washington Times
February 22, 2010
by Joseph CurlPresident Obama, who pledged to establish the most open and transparent administration in history, on Monday surpasses his predecessor's record for avoiding a full-fledged question-and-answer session with White House reporters in a formal press conference.
President George W. Bush's longest stretch between prime-time, nationally televised press conferences was 214 days, from April 4 to Nov. 4, 2004. Mr. Obama tops that record on Monday, going 215 days - stretching back to July 22, according to records kept by CBS Radio's veteran reporter Mark Knoller.
The president has seemingly shunned formal, prime-time sessions since his last disastrous presser, when he said police in Cambridge, Mass., "acted stupidly" by arresting a Harvard professor who broke into a home that turned out to be his own. The off-the-cuff comment took over the news cycle for a week, overshadowing his push for health care reform, and culminated in a White House "Beer Summit," where the president hosted white police officer James Crowley and the black Harvard professor, Henry Louis Gates Jr.
"He does seem a little snakebit on the whole presser thing," said Julie Mason, a longtime White House reporter and board member of the White House Correspondents' Association."At his last big press conference in July, he lost control of the message with his response to the Gates question, and then returns six months later with an unannounced, five-question avail in the briefing room - on a snow day. Was it something we said?"
Earlier this month, the president did field a few questions from reporters in a "mini-presser." He dropped by the White House briefing room unannounced at midday just after Washington's second snowstorm, right when the daily briefing by the press secretary was to occur. The "press availability" lasted only 33 minutes and encompassed questions from just five reporters - plus one after Mr. Obama tried to head for the door.
In contrast, a typical White House press conference is usually announced well in advance and takes place in the far more formal White House East Room. The prime-time sessions - carried live by all TV networks - last at least an hour and include questions from 12 to 15 reporters, sometimes more.
"I don't count that five-question, surprise 'avail,' as a presser," Miss Mason said.
Still, Mr. Obama has held plenty of tightly controlled sessions with reporters. He has given 66 interviews since July 22 - including two that day, according to Mr. Knoller's records. But that doesn't satisfy White House veterans.
"The administration will point you to all the interviews he does, but that is all about control. We are naturally at cross-purposes with him, because he wants to come out with his talking points and the press wants to knock him off those talking points - so the result is he just doesn't come around anymore," Miss Mason said.
Nevertheless, Mr. Obama tops his predecessor in total output. He has given 43 press conferences of various degrees, six of which were solo White House sessions, Mr. Knoller said. During the same period, Mr. Bush gave 24 press conferences, of which four were formal, solo White House sessions.
So since the last one didn't go as he wanted it to he's not giving any more? This Administration has a penchant not only for insisting it control the message but for acting like children when they can't. Remember how they threw those reporters off the campaign airplane? They ones they tossed worked for newspapers whose editorial boards had endorsed McCain: The Dallas Moring News, The New York Post and The Washington Times. This was said to be coincidence, but I doubt it.
Anyway, it is one thing for Obama to go after Fox News. The rest of the media couldn't care less about that. But avoiding full-fledged press briefings... that could be dangerous. Most members of the media may love him, and let him get away with things that would sink a conservative, but they also don't like being "dissed." Obama's honeymoon with the media will be longer than most, but even they have their limits with him. And I think if Obama keeps this up he's going to find that out the hard way.
Posted by Tom at 8:00 AM | Comments (1) | TrackBack
February 22, 2010
Iraq Briefing - 16 February 2010 - A "significant improvement of the day-to-day lives of Iraqis"
Yes I know, you're tempted to skip over this post because Iraq is so... yesterday. Afghanistan is understandably all the rage, and blog posts that are more topical and angry are the ones that generate all the comments.
Does that mean the public has largely conceded that we've won? In part, I think.
There have not been any briefings lately on The Pentagon Channel or DODvClips, and I'm not entirely sure why. Obviously there is not as much fighting in Iraq as there was a year ago, but I wonder if a decision was taken at a higher level to not do as many as they used to. This is pure speculation, of course.
Fortunately our commander in Iraq, General Raymond Odierno, accepted Dr. Kimberly Kagan's invitation to discuss the future of Iraq at a forum she held on February 16.
The entire interview and Q & A is over an hour, and videos and the complete transcript can be found at the Institute for the Study of War website here.
General Odierno was the #2 man in Iraq during the "surge" of 2007-8, and earned a we'll deserved reputation as the "Patton of Counterinsurgency". The analogy is this; Odierno was to Petraeus what Patton was to Eisenhower. Patton executed Ike's strategy, ditto for Odierno.
Kimberly Kagan's husband, Frederick Kagan, has been accurately described as "the intellectual author of the surge." It was him and retired General Jack Keane (who introduces them in the first video) who first convinced President Bush to change course. Kimberly is founder and President of the Institute for the Study of War.
Between the two Kagans they are probably the two smartest military theorists on the planet. Those who follow this blog know that I have quoted both of them often.
Here is the first part of the interview, with the others below the fold:
DR. KAGAN: ... honestly, General Odierno, I can't -- I can't think of a more critical moment to have you here in Washington. We're three weeks before Iraq's second and quite dramatic election for its new Parliament and therefore for its new prime minister and I think it's a critical time to be studying Iraq, to be thinking about Iraq's future and what really lies ahead.
And so my first question to you is, is Iraq on a path to political success?
GENERAL ODIERNO: Well, I think -- I tell everyone that I think success and victory and all those kinds of things we won't know till three to five to 10 years from now, but I think we're still moving along the path that we have an opportunity in Iraq today that we might never get again in our lifetimes.
We have -- we are involved with the government. We have a relationship with the Government of Iraq that gives us an opportunity to develop a democratic Iraq that has a long-term partnership with the United States and I don't know if we'll have that opportunity again.
So I think it's important that we understand we have an opportunity today and that we have to take advantage of that opportunity.
We have gotten through many different steps forward that I think have gone better than expected. The implementation of the Security Agreement in 2009, I think everyone was nervous about it. I was a bit nervous about it as we went through it, but I would argue it's been a success.
...
DR. KAGAN: -- politics?
GENERAL ODIERNO: -- lots of theories and everybody would have their own theory on this, but it's clear that, you know, there are -- there are many countries who have -- who have a lot at stake, depending on how Iraq turns out. Some of them -- I'm not going to name specific names, but some (nations) don't really want the democratic process to succeed because of the pressure it might put on their own government.
We have others who want to have a lot of influence over Iraq for many reasons: for the protection of their own nation, for the fact that they believe that they would like to see a weak government that they can control so they can better protect their borders and in many ways so they can control Iraq's development and they don't become a challenger to them in the future as a state on the rise.
So I think it's a combination of all those things. So you have these different agendas, some coming from Sunni Arab countries, some coming from -- from Persian Shi'a Arab countries who are -- who are trying to drive the elections a certain way, and so what we're seeing in the beginning is this sectarian divide.
What we want is we want it to come back together and be about Iraq, not about these other regional countries. It needs to be about Iraq.
...
QUESTION: Viola Gienger from Bloomberg News. You mentioned earlier on that this is an opportunity for the U.S. to be engaged and an opportunity that we may never get again. You seem to be suggesting do you think we are engaged? Do you think the U.S. is engaged as much as it should be at this point, or is there more to be done?
GENERAL ODIERNO: Yeah, I do. I mean, it's a very yeah, thanks. I mean, it is a very complex issue. I mean, we are very engaged. We have 98,000 soldiers on the ground, sailors, airmen, and Marines. I consider that to be very, very engaged. We are spending billions of dollars in Iraq still today. We have the largest embassy in the world in Iraq. So we are engaged across several different levels.
It's not today that I worry about. It's today. It's tomorrow. It's 2011. It's 2012, '13, '14. As everyone knows, all our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines will come out at the end of 2011. That doesn't mean our commitment needs to end.
It needs to be a long-term commitment. The commitment just changes. It changes from one based on mutual security and cooperation, with us having forces on the ground, to one that's across the wide spectrum of governmental support economic, diplomatic, security, environmental, educational. And it's how we invest in that that will be important.
And I think so our challenge we have now is how we transition from a military-centric operation to a civilian-led operation, and then after 2011, how we continue to support Iraq's progress. And to me, that's what's very important here. And so that's what we have to make sure we stay engaged with.
I've said before, and the story I tell is about six months ago now my wife had asked me if I ever saw "Charlie Wilson's War." I hadn't seen it. And so I watched it one night. And what worries me is the last scene of that movie, even though it's about Afghanistan, not about Iraq, if anybody hasn't seen it. But Charlie Wilson had gotten billions of dollars to fight the insurgency in Afghanistan against the Russians. And at the end, he went to get $2 million in order to start an education program in Afghanistan, and he couldn't get anybody to help him to support that program.
...
DR. KAGAN: We had watched the beginning of a reconciliation process among Shi'a groups, and even Shi'a extremist groups such as the League of the Righteous. What's happened to that reconciliation process?
GENERAL ODIERNO: ...One of the things that I've been most pleased with, which I want to make clear to everyone, is in Iraq, the Iraqi security forces have and still conduct significant operations in southern Iraq against these groups. Just a few days ago there was a significant operation in Maysan Province which piked up several individuals from Kataeb Hezbollah.
There's been operations in Basra. There's been operations in Baghdad. There's been operations in all of the southern provinces, Iraqi security force-led, supported by U.S. forces. So they have shown the security force has shown the dedication to go after all target sets if they are enemies of the government of Iraq. And I think that's an important step as we move forward.
DR. KAGAN: And in the category of enemies of Iraq, is al-Qaeda in Iraq still a threat to the government of Iraq? Is it an insurgent group or is it a terrorist group?
GENERAL ODIERNO: Well, first, I believe the only way al-Qaeda in Iraq can be a threat to the government of Iraq is the government of Iraq lets it be. And I'll now explain that.
Al-Qaeda in Iraq, back in 2004 and 2005 and 2006 and 2007, was a broad-based insurgency that had permeated all of northern Iraq and central Iraq and was conducting significant operations throughout Iraq. Over the last since the beginning of 2007 till today, we've been able to make significant progress against al-Qaeda in Iraq, significantly degrade their capacity. It is a shadow of what it once was.
So what they've done is they've transitioned it from a broad-based insurgency into a covert terrorist organization who focus solely on conducting high-profile attacks against the Iraqi people and against the governmental institutions of Iraq.
What is their goal? Their goal is they want to see the government of Iraq fail. And then they want to have ungoverned territory that can be filled by al-Qaeda and other groups that will allow them to maintain safe havens and sanctuaries. They are a long ways from that ever happening.
So what we see now that's frustrating to all of us there is they pick the softest targets possible to kill as many or wound as many civilians as possible because they want to see an overreaction from the government of Iraq. They want to see a miscalculation from the government of Iraq that could push Iraq back into some sort of sectarian violence or lose faith in its own government. They've been absolutely unsuccessful in doing that.
All of our measurements you know, we measure everything. And again, I don't when things were bad in 2006/2007, I said it then and I'll say it now, is the number of incidents and the type of incidents don't necessarily define what Iraq is, but it is a point that you must consider.
And we have consistently continued to come down in every category, to include high-profile attacks. 2009 was about 60 percent less than 2008. And that's after turning over the security file to the government of Iraq. 2010 is continuing to either sustain itself or go down a little bit from 2009. So their capacity to sustain and do this over a long period of time and across the entirety of Iraq is no longer possible. But they can still do attacks.
If I could just, since we're talking about it, I do want to really talk about security in Iraq itself. It's hard to describe this to anybody who's not there every day. But the basic security of Iraq is significantly different than it ever has been.
When you go into Baghdad, if you go into Basra, if you go into Ramadi, if you go into Mosul, if you go into Kirkuk, if you go into any city in Iraq, you see significant improvement of the day-to-day lives of Iraqis. It's completely different than what it was two to three years ago. It's different than it was six months ago.
...
But the reaction of the Iraqis has been exactly what we'd like to see. They condemn al-Qaeda. They say the best way to fight this is to vote in a democratic process, bring a leadership in to continue to go after these elements. We continue to see that theme across Iraq.
They've rejected al-Qaeda
...
DR. KAGAN: So concretely, what does that mean? I mean what do U.S. soldiers in Iraq do now in order to --
GENERAL ODIERNO: Yeah, well, one of the fallacies I want to make sure is very clear is I go out four times a week to visit battalions and brigades and the one thing we do not do is stay on our FOBs and do nothing. I want to make that very clear. If you went and talked to a battalion colonel, they get very offended when they read that. They're out every single day. They do 14 to 15 operations, but they're doing it with their Iraqi security force partners. They're right there helping them to conduct these operations.
What's different is we do not do anything unilaterally. Everything we do is completely coordinated with the government of Iraq, and you will never see a U.S. soldier conduct an operation without an Iraqi security force with him, in fact, without an Iraqi security force in the lead of the operation. But they're out every single day working with the Iraqi security force partners. So we still play a very significant role.
...
DR. KAGAN: You began the discussion by talking about the opportunity that the United States has in Iraq and, indeed, the opportunity that Iraq has right now. What are the long-term U.S. interests in seeing a stable and -- a stable Iraq with a kind of just, accountable and representative government that you described?
GENERAL ODIERNO: Well, first again, (a democratic Iraq will be) a diplomatic and economic and a security partner in a very volatile part of the world. And Iraq has a significant economic upside, not just from its oil industry but from other industries that we think could spin off from that. And that economic -- their ability to develop that economically inside of Iraq. So with economic development and diplomatic development, making this work could have a significant impact across the entire Middle East.
And secondly and lastly, us having a long term strategic partnership, one that is based on common trust and common goals, one that recognizes each other's own sovereignty, over time would help us in my mind to better secure the United States, because that would give us another partner right in the center of the Middle East that can help us to fight terrorism. I will argue that when we leave there, Iraq will have some of the best characters and forces in the Middle East and they can help us to fight this threat against us from many of these other terrorist groups. So I think that's what we have the potential to gain from this relationship I think is significant.
DR. KAGAN: As we look at that relationship, what kind of engagement is needed by the United States in order to realize this opportunity?
GENERAL ODIERNO: Well, I think think General Keane and yourself mentioned it. It's the Strategic Framework Agreement. Most people don't pay much attention to that. When it was passed in December of '08, everybody paid attention to the SOFA agreement, security agreement. The strategic framework agreement is the basis for this and it's the one agreement that Iraq really looks to. That agreement can, really outlines the long term relationship between the United States and the government of Iraq. They want to have people, the Iraqi people educated in the United States. They want to learn from the United States. They want to learn how to develop their economy. They want to learn about our educational system, our medical capability. So by developing these strong bonds between our two countries at the national level I think will be very important in meeting our long term goals.
...
- to another question
GENERAL ODIERNO:...when I. the reason I come back and try to do some of these things is I worry about those who left Iraq in 2006 and haven't been back. And they think they understand where Iraq is. I talk to every brigade and battalion that comes into Iraq, and the first thing I tell them is, "When did you leave?" I ask them. Some will say, "Two years ago." Some will say, "One year ago." Some will say, "Six months ago." And I say, "If it's three months ago, it's different than it was." Because it's changing so quickly. And so it's important to rotate that expertise out.
...
DR. KAGAN: No. I was going to ask you if there was anything left that you wanted to say before I have the final word, as I always do.
GENERAL ODIERNO: Yeah, okay. I'm very familiar with that, by the way so I just want to close by saying that it's I am one who believes in the young men and women of this country. I've gotten to watch it for seven years up close. I mean, I've been involved in the Army for 34 years almost now. But for the last seven years I've got to watch it up close and personal, the young men and women who are coming out of our society who choose to do what I consider to be the extraordinary, where especially some that have done it two times, three times, four times, five times. And they do it for a lot of different reasons. But there's one, there's about three common reasons that they always have: that they have a bond with the person that stands to their right and left, that they have a love for their unit or their service and third, they have a love of their country and they think they're making a difference. These are great young men and women. They're smart, they're articulate. They've been able to understand the nuances of change and execute them on the run. We have an incredible young leadership coming up. I'm glad that I'm going to retire soon because I'll never be able compete with these young men and women who are coming up and the experiences that they've had.
Posted by Tom at 8:30 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
February 21, 2010
"Reconciliation" and the Fraud that is ObamaCare
The Obama administration's apparent intention to use the "budget reconciliation" process to try to advance its proposed health-care overhaul has shined the spotlight on why it, and the federal government as a whole, should not control what will soon be one-fifth of our economy. Simply put, the president has repeatedly emphasized three problems that must be addressed, while pursuing a course of action that would exacerbate all three.Lack of bipartisanship: As President Obama said last month in his State of the Union address, the government can't pass needed reforms "if we don't also reform how we work with one another." His "health-care summit" is supposedly an attempt to bring Republicans and Democrats together. The president has said, "Well I think that what I want to do is to look at the Republican ideas that are out there." "Bipartisanship" has been a theme of nearly all of his recent health-care remarks.
Now, Politico reports that the president, Speaker Nancy Pelosi, and Sen. Harry Reid plan to try to use the "budget reconciliation" process after next week's bipartisan summit to jam through elements of their proposed health-care overhaul over widespread opposition. Politico quotes one Democratic insider as saying, "They are coming out of the summit guns-a-blazing, and they're committed to reconciliation.""Budget reconciliation" prevents use of the filibuster, a feature of the Senate since the early 19th century. The arcane process is designed to help the Senate pass bills that would balance the budget. President Obama would use it to try to pass portions of a $2.5 trillion health-care overhaul without having to get any Republican (or even all Democratic) votes. This is the new era of bipartisanship?
Political cronyism: Interviewing President Obama before the Super Bowl, Katie Couric asked about "all these special deals that were given to certain senators," which, she said, made the American people "pretty sick to their stomachs." He replied, "They did not help. They frustrate me."
Now, Politico reports that part of why the president wants to use the "budget reconciliation" process is to exempt union workers from the tax on "Cadillac" insurance plans. In other words, Americans would pay a 40-percent tax on health benefits above a certain point -- unless they belong to a union, a core constituent of the Democratic party. This is the remedy for cronyism?
Health costs: The President and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius have been highlighting recent increases in insurance premiums. These increases are almost entirely the result of two things: rising hospital and drug costs, which Obamacare would do essentially nothing about; and the poor economy, which causes some healthier people to take the calculated risk of dropping their insurance for the short-term, leaving a mix of unhealthier people in insurance pools and raising average costs accordingly. President Obama is willing to blame the economy for the fact that he will run up more deficit spending in just two years than President Bush did in eight, but he's reluctant to admit that this same economy affects entities run by somebody other than the government.
In any event, both the Congressional Budget Office and the Medicare Chief Actuary have said that, under Obamacare, insurance premiums would be higher than under current law. So, the solution to high premiums is to pass legislation that would raise them?
In each of these ways, the disconnect between cause and effect, problem and solution, rhetoric and reality, is astounding.
Of course, the biggest disconnect is between the Obama administration and the American people. Americans have made it abundantly clear that they don't want Obamacare. President Obama has made it abundantly clear that he doesn't care.
But House and Senate Democrats are unlikely to continue to turn such a deaf ear toward their constituents.
Healthcare will be the Democrat's Waterloo.
Now, my problem with what the Democrats are doing is not so much with "reconciliation" or any other parliamentary maneuver, so liberal commenters are advised not to get their panties in a wad over how Republicans did this or that when they were in power.
My problems are that
1) They are trying to pass an insane bill that bill make the situation in our country much worse in both the short and long terms,
2) Their real objective is to take over and/or control as much of the economy as possible. In other words, de facto socialism, and
3) The will of the people is so obviously against it.
You might say "if you think it'll be their Waterloo they aren't you glad they're doing it?" Of course not, because they'll wreck tremendous damage on the country in the process that will be difficult to undo.
We've got to find a way to stop this freight train before it's too late.
Posted by Tom at 10:30 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
Afghanistan Briefing - 18 February 2010 - Operation Moshtarak Update
This briefing is by British Army Major General Patrick Carter. MG Carter is the commander of ISAF Regional Command [RC] South, which is comprised of about 45,000 troops from a number of nations.
number of nations.
This and other videos can be seen at DODvClips. The Pentagon Channel also has videos and news stories, so visit it as well.
The transcript is at DefenseLink.
MG Carter updates us on the progress we're making in Operation Moshtarak in his opening remarks:
GEN. CARTER: Thank you very much. And good morning to you all in the Pentagon....And what we've tried -- been trying to do here is to get the Afghan government to assert its authority over a number of places in Helmand which have been ungoverned for some months now. So that was the key objective, about the Afghan government asserting its control and authority over central Helmand and the ungoverned spaces that existed within it....
Now, the second part of setting the political context was about making sure that the Afghan government in Kabul was fully behind this operation. And Governor Mangal about three-and-a-half weeks ago led a delegation consisting of my two security partners -- General Wardak, who runs the regional police that corresponds to RC South; and General Zazai, who commands the 205th Corps of the Afghan National Army.
He led this delegation up to Kabul, where they briefed President Karzai and his national-security committee on how the operation would work.
What they showed to him was that the operation had been planned from the finish back to the start, with, importantly, governance at the tip of the spear. So what Governor Mangal was able to reassure the president about was that they had thought through very carefully the sorts of services that people wanted to have on the ground and how that would represent betterment for the population....
Now, up front, as the commander on the ground, there were two things that I wanted to ensure were put in place before the operation was mounted, the first one of which was to ensure that the political context was properly set, and the second one was to ensure that we had adequate resources to conduct the operation. And I'll talk to the setting of the political context first of all....
Now, a second part of the operational prerequisite that I had for this operation was to ensure that we had adequate resources. And what I'm talking about here is predominantly Afghan national security force resources. And for the operation, six ANA [Afghan National Army] kandaks, or battalion, were -- battalions, were made available, as were two of the special commando kandaks, around a thousand of the ANCOP, or the Afghan gendarmerie -- that's their special police force that's nationally recruited. And we are in the process of training around a thousand new Afghan national policemen, who will be fed into Nad Ali and Marja once the hold phase of the operation starts to bite effectively.
And, of course, what's made all of this possible is the fact that the first two U.S. Marine Corps battalions that President Obama announced as part of his uplift before Christmas became available to us during the course of December and January. And they, in partnership with these Afghan national security forces and an uplift that Gordon Brown announced for British forces, has made it possible for us to put on the ground around 8,000 combined troops, who have provided the sort of force densities that are needed generally to bring the sort of security that's required on the ground.
Now, inserting all of this in a way that guarantees surprise, given that we were quite open about the fact this operation was happening, was a challenge. Now, I know that the scale of aviation assault that happened at the beginning of the Iraq war was a sight to behold. But in terms of detail coordination, I think the aviation insertion that took place last Saturday morning was most impressive, for it brought together not just one nation, but five nations' worth of helicopter pilots and a whole load of Afghans de-busing from the back of these helicopters as well....
And the upshot of this was that complete tactical surprise was achieved. And the insurgence was entirely dislocated in the first 24 hours of the operation....
Although there was much of interest in the briefing, we'll just concentrate on one exchange in the Q & A, because it goes to the heart of counterinsurgency warfare
Q Sir, Bryan Bender with the Boston Globe. To try and follow up on that, obviously your focus -- a lot of your focus now is this operation, but can you give us a broader assessment of your headquarters and the larger region of the south? What does the enemy look like? What does the population look like in terms of their view of the government? Kind of give us a sense of what your challenge is going forward in the next six months to stabilize not just this region but what you just said has been one of the most unstable.GEN. CARTER: Yes. I mean, I think one of the things -- the key things that changed with General McChrystal's population-centric approach is that a mission statement that was very much focused on defeating an insurgency switched firmly to protecting a population.
Now in the south, that means that given even the additional resources we've got, that we have to be very focused on where the population is living.
Central Helmand is therefore important to us because, taking Lashkar Gah as the center, from Lashkar Gah north by about 50 kilometers, and from Lashkar Gah south down to Garmsir, another distance of about a hundred kilometers, within that part of the Helmand Valley around 750,000 people live.
Equally, over in Kandahar, in the urban area lives around 500,000 people, and around it, in its rural environs, all of which are very closely irrigated and therefore significantly populated, another 500,000 people live.
So taking the overall population in the south -- there's around 3 million -- you can see if you focused your attention in population- centric terms on those two population areas, you're picking up around two-thirds of the population.
So from my perspective as an RC South commander, my principal effort goes towards central Helmand and to the population living in and around Kandahar and the urban area.
I'm also very conscious of freedom of movement between those two population centers, because if you can get Afghans to be able to move freely on those roads, you'll begin to get the economy to move and governance to be delivered more broadly across the region.
Now as the population sees it at the moment, it does not feel able to move freely on those roads, and indeed it is regularly fleeced at illegal checkpoints if it tries to move goods and services that it has grown in these agricultural areas, as it were, to market or indeed further afield. And what we have to do is to improve that paradigm and to make that population feel protected.
The challenge, though, is that we need adequate ANSF (Afghanistan National Security Forces) to be able to do that. And the big difficulty for us at the moment is that we need more policemen to do this, and we're therefore working extremely hard to build on the police force, in conjunction with the army, to give ourself [sic] that partnership to be able genuinely to pop -- to protect that population.
I've gone over this a kazillion times on this blog while discussing Iraq and Afghanistan, but once more can't hurt; the key to beating insurgents is to win over the population. This does not mean they have to like the counterinsurgents, rather that they must 1) believe the counterinsurgents must win and that 2) it is their best interests that they win. The first step is protecting the population. If the counterinsurgents cannot protect the people, all the building projects in the world are worthless.
We were able to protect the population in Iraq after the surge of 2007, and after we won them over this led to a process whereby the insurgents had no place to hide.
Now I realize this is a quite simplified version of events, that there were several regional insurgencies in Iraq, each of which was quite different. And there was the Anbar Awakening. But it is a good description of the overall picture and the definition of how to win.
It's so far so good with Operation Moshtarak, and we'll just have to wait and see whether our gains are permanent.
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Operation Moshtarak: Kinetic Operations in Afghanistan Begin Anew
Posted by Tom at 8:30 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 18, 2010
IAEA: Iran is Probably Working on a Nuclear Warhead
Reuters has the story:
In unusually blunt language, an International Atomic Energy Agency report for the first time suggested Iran was actively pursuing nuclear weapons capability, throwing independent weight behind similar Western suspicions.The IAEA seemed to be cautiously going public with concerns arising from a classified agency analysis leaked in part last year which concluded that Iran has already honed explosives expertise relevant to a workable nuclear weapon.
The report also confirmed Iran had produced its first small batch of uranium enriched to a higher purity -- 20 percent.
Both developments will intensify pressure on Iran to prove it is not covertly bent on "weaponizing" enrichment by allowing unfettered access for IAEA inspectors and investigators, something it rejects in protest at U.N. sanctions.
The United States is already leading a push for the U.N. Security Council to impose a fourth round of sanctions on Iran because of suspicions it may be developing nuclear weapons and has received declarations of support from Russia, which has until now been reluctant to expand sanctions.
"We always said that if Iran failed to live up to those international obligations, that there would be consequences," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs told reporters aboard Air Force One as President Barack Obama flew to a political event.
What consequences? Conveniently, Gibbs doesn't say.
Speaking of "consequences" without the threat of military force is useless with this regime. They've proven they're not intimidated by sanctions. Russia and China have said time and again they're not interested in serious sanctions.
There are, of course, two parts to a nuclear bomb; the warhead and the nuclear fuel. It's relatively easy to design "a bomb" if you don't care about size or how it's packaged. In other words, it's one thing to make something that will explode in a static test, quite another to make it so that it can be carried by an airplane or put atop a missile and still explode after going through the stresses of being blasted off, carried to altitude, dropped, etc.
The Warhead
In November of 2009, the Guardian published an explosive report that suggested that Iran was testing warheads:
The UN's nuclear watchdog has asked Iran to explain evidence suggesting that Iranian scientists have experimented with an advanced nuclear warhead design, the Guardian has learned.The very existence of the technology, known as a "two-point implosion" device, is officially secret in both the US and Britain, but according to previously unpublished documentation in a dossier compiled by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Iranian scientists may have tested high-explosive components of the design. The development was today described by nuclear experts as "breathtaking" and has added urgency to the effort to find a diplomatic solution to the Iranian nuclear crisis.
The sophisticated technology, once mastered, allows for the production of smaller and simpler warheads than older models. It reduces the diameter of a warhead and makes it easier to put a nuclear warhead on a missile.
Documentation referring to experiments testing a two-point detonation design are part of the evidence of nuclear weaponisation gathered by the IAEA and presented to Iran for its response.
So today's IAEA report did not come out of the blue.
The Fuel
Back to the Reuters story. Let's refresh ourselves with where Iran is on enriching uranium:
Last week, Iran announced a start to higher-scale enrichment, saying it was frustrated at the collapse of an IAEA-backed plan for big powers to provide it with fuel rods for nuclear medicine made from uranium refined to 20 percent purity.The IAEA report complained that Iran had begun feeding low-enriched uranium (LEU) into centrifuges for higher refinement before inspectors could get to the scene in the Natanz pilot enrichment facility.
...The big powers accused Iran of reneging on an agreement to ship out two-thirds of its LEU reserve to be turned into fuel rods for the medical reactor. This would have prevented Iran retaining enough of the material to fuel a nuclear weapon, if it were refined to about 90 percent purity.
Only France, one party to the U.N. draft deal, and Argentina are known to possess the technology. So analysts ask why Iran would enrich uranium well above its needs, except to lay the groundwork for producing bomb-grade uranium.
The report further said that Iran had increased its LEU stockpile by some 300 kg (660 pounds) to 2.06 tons since November -- enough for one or two nuclear bombs if enriched to 90 percent purity.
The IAEA said over nine-tenths of the LEU stockpile had been earmarked for enrichment up to 20 percent, a significant mark as further enrichment up to 90 percent may need only a few months.
"...only a few months" Let that sink in.
Posted by Tom at 9:15 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
February 17, 2010
Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar Captured!
As we've all seen in the news, the tactical leader of the Taliban was captured in Pakistan a few weeks ago. This is very good news. On Monday the New York Times reported that:
The Taliban's top military commander was captured several days ago in Karachi, Pakistan, in a secret joint operation by Pakistani and American intelligence forces, according to American government officials.
he commander, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, is an Afghan described by American officials as the most significant Taliban figure to be detained since the American-led war in Afghanistan started more than eight years ago. He ranks second in influence only to Mullah Muhammad Omar, the Taliban's founder and a close associate of Osama bin Laden before the Sept. 11 attacks.
Mullah Baradar has been in Pakistani custody for several days, with American and Pakistani intelligence officials both taking part in interrogations, according to the officials.
Another AP story yesterday indicates that he has, in fact, been talking:
Baradar, who also functioned as the link between Mullah Omar and field commanders, has been in detention for more than 10 days and was talking to interrogators, two Pakistani intelligence officials said Tuesday. One said several other suspects were also captured in the raid. He said Baradar had provided "useful information" to them and that Pakistan had shared it with their U.S. counterparts.
All in all this is very good news in that we have neutralized the top Taliban commander just after the launch of Operation Moshtarak, which I covered on Monday. Their propaganda to the contrary, Taliban and other insurgent leaders must not be happy.
Of course, there's more to it than just this. As always with the Obama Administration, the capture and treatment of Baradar illustrates the contradictions inherent in their policies. The New York Times story quoted above goes on to highlight one of them:
The officials said that Pakistan was leading the interrogation of Mullah Baradar, but that Americans were also involved. The conditions of the questioning are unclear. In its first week in office, the Obama administration banned harsh interrogations like waterboarding by Americans, but the Pakistanis have long been known to subject prisoners to brutal questioning.
Liberals complain to high heaven that Bush "tortured" captured "suspects" but we'll see if they complain about the treatment of Baradar, who I guarantee you was not read his Miranda rights and does not have ACLU lawyers by his side.
Did we deliberatly allow the Pakistani's to capture Baradar, or hand him over to them after we caught him, simply to avoid these legal issues of so much concern to the left? How long will this de facto "rendition" last?
In fact, I would imagine it's pretty clear the Pakistanis are using all sorts of unpleasant methods to get information out of Baradar. In the months and years to come they'll dig strategic information out of him, but in the short term they're looking for tactical details that are actionable on the battlefield.
Further, AG Eric Holder, and by implication President Obama, plan on trying Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and his fellows in New York City, even though he too was captured in Pakistan in 2003. Of course, as we all know, bringing KSM to New York City was all about appeasing the left wing of the Democrat party and little else.
Conclusion: It's OK if Obama does it, but it was torture and violation of international law when Bush-Cheney did it.
Who is Abdul Ghani Baradar?
In The Taliban Explained I quoted at length a backgrounder report published by Kimberly Kagan's Institute for the Study of War. Read the whole thing, but here is the relevant section
Although Mullah Mohammad Omar remains the figurehead atop the QST (Quetta Shura Taliban) organization, he no longer directs day-to-day operations. His reputation and admiration among rank-and-file Taliban still make him the spiritual leader of the movement,....The QST's day-to-day operations are handled by Omar's top deputy, Mullah Barader (or "Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar")....
Back to Afghanistan
The NYT story makes clear the implications of the capture:
His capture could cripple the Taliban's military operations, at least in the short term, said Bruce O. Riedel, a former C.I.A. officer who last spring led the Obama administration's Afghanistan and Pakistan policy review.
Readers of this website will know that while I lambasted Obama for dithering in making his decision to "surge" troops into Afghanistan, and that I was unhappy that he only gave McChrystal only 30,000 of the 40,000 troops he requested, and that he put a ridiculous timelimit on success, I am generally pleased with his decision. It's certainly better than the alternates he could have chosen.
I'll have more to say about the capture of Baradar and Operation Moshtarak, but I've got to go so for now here is some commentary that I largely agree with.
The news of his capture in Pakistan is a pretty big deal.Among the reasons:
Next to Mullah Omar, Mullah Baradar was the biggest fish. It won't be easy to replace him with someone as skilled.
He probably has a lot to tell -- and the Pakistanis will not read him his Miranda rights.
It's significant that the ISI, Pakistani intelligence, decided to cooperate with us and capture him. They've been ambivalent at best about the Afghan Taliban (which they separate from the Pakistani Taliban).
Mullah Baradar may know where Osama bin Laden is or at least have information that could help find him. (I'm assuming the Pakistanis don't know already -- not sure that's true. I don't think Osama is living in a cave. I think he's in a quite comfortable villa.
Also interesting that Baradar was captured in Karachi -- a major Pakistani city (which I visited just a few months ago -- and which is a very dangerous place). But this proves once again that it's not just the wild and wooly tribal areas that are infested with terrorists.
The Afghan Taliban's leadership cadre have long operated from within Pakistan. The Taliban's leadership council, called the Quetta Shura, has operated from the Pakistani city of the same name for years, according to Afghan and US officials.Last fall, the Quetta Shura, and Mullah Omar himself, were reported to have been relocated to Karachi.
Baradar's arrest, if confirmed, creates problems for the Pakistani government. Numerous Pakistani government, military, and intelligence officials have repeatedly denied the existence of the Quetta Shura and have disputed claims that it had moved to Karachi.
But Baradar's arrest in Karachi would provide the strongest evidence that the Quetta Shura is now in the Pakistani port city.
The Inter-Services Intelligence agency has long been accused of sheltering the Quetta Shura, as it views the Afghan Taliban as its greatest asset in regaining influence in Afghanistan. The terror group would also serve as strategic depth, or a reserve, against India and Indian influence inside Afghanistan.
Posted by Tom at 8:00 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 16, 2010
Obama's Cynical War on Terror
Ever get the impression that our president doesn't have any idea what he's doing in the War on Terror? Victor Davis Hanson summarizes the situation perfectly:
Is there any logic in the confusion of the Obama administration's actions and statements on fighting the war on terror?On the one hand, we had a two-year campaign (2007-08) of damning the Bush protocols, from renditions and military tribunals to Guantanamo and Predator strikes. Then, the Obama administration unleashed Eric Holder and John Brennan, who in highly partisan fashion attacked the anti-terrorism policies implemented from 2001-08 and reflected the themes voiced by Obama himself in his al-Arabiya interview and Cairo speech, many of which were reified by the Mirandizing of the Christmas Day bomber and the announced civilian trial of KSM in New York.
But all that said, Obama never shut down Guantanamo; has not tried KSM in New York; has kept the wiretaps, intercepts, renditions, and tribunals he once castigated; has escalated the war in Afghanistan; and has kept the status-of-forces agreements that Bush negotiated with the Iraqis -- and Joe Biden now claims that Bush's Iraq agreements were Obama's greatest success!
Most importantly, Obama has vastly increased the Predator assassination missions along the Afghan-Pakistani border. If one were to sort out the politics of all this, one would conclude that Obama's cynical strategy looked something like this:1) Run against Bush as the candidate of the Democratic party's hard-Left, anti-war, pro-ACLU base.
2) When elected, pacify that same base with soaring multicultural-outreach rhetoric of the Cairo sort and grand gestures, such as promising to close Guantanamo, investigate former CIA interrogators, appoint a Muslim-American liaison to the Islamic world, and end waterboarding.
3) Meanwhile, up the fighting in Afghanistan and the Predator assassination missions to prevent another 9/11-style attack.
Bottom line?
a) Obama really does (privately) believe that radical Islamists wish to kill us, and apparently has decided the only effective means of combating them is to copy the Bush strategy but drop the "smoke 'em out" rhetoric and substitute hope-and-change therapeutic banalities as we blow up suspected killers. The more conservatives rail about the KSM trial, the more Obama gains trust with the Left, and the more he can keep quietly killing suspected terrorists in Waziristan. (Dead men need no Miranda rights.)
b) So at home, Obama's calculation is even more cynical: He assumes that left-wing hatred of Bush's war on terror was never principled, but was always about partisan politics, and that left-wingers were far "angrier" about Bush's waterboarding of three admitted terrorists than they ever will be about Obama's assassinating suspected terrorists along the Afghan-Pakistani border.
c) Conservatives are then supposedly put in a bind: They may be angry that Obama demagogued the issue for two years as a candidate, and they may be upset that he so brazenly reversed course and emulated what he had demonized, and they may be mad about the hypocrisy of the hard Left -- but they are also relieved that Obama is fighting terror and killing terrorists, and might even be impressed that he is doing so as a Nobel Peace laureate immune from the criticism that nearly destroyed Bush, and as someone who quietly executes suspected terrorists by remote control but worries publicly about confessed detainees in Bush's gulag.
I think that sums up the present Obama policy, which is far more cynical than confusing. I have no idea whether it is sustainable.
Posted by Tom at 9:34 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
February 15, 2010
What I Wish I'd Said About the Audi "Green Police" Ad
The ad that aired during the Super Bowl
And what I wish I'd said in my first post on it
The New Conformo-radicalism
Groupthink compliance has never felt so right!
by Mark Steyn
A man asks for a plastic bag at the supermarket checkout. Next thing you know, his head's slammed against the counter, and he's being cuffed by the Green Police. "You picked the wrong day to mess with the ecosystem, plastic boy," sneers the enviro-cop, as the perp is led away. Cut to more Green Police going through your trash, until they find . . . a battery! "Take the house!" orders the eco-commando. And we switch to a roadblock on a backed-up interstate, with the Green Police prowling the lines of vehicles to check they're in environmental compliance.If you watched the Super Bowl, you most likely saw this commercial. As my comrade Jonah Goldberg noted, up until this point you might have assumed it was a fun message from a libertarian think-tank warning of the barely veiled totalitarian tendencies of the eco-nanny state. Any time now, you figure, some splendidly contrarian type -- perhaps Clint lui-même in his famous Gran Torino -- will come roaring through flipping the bird at the stormtroopers and blowing out their tires for good measure. But instead the Greenstapo stumble across an Audi A3 TDI. "You're good to go," they tell the driver, and, with the approval of the state enforcers, he meekly pulls out of the stalled traffic and moves off. Tagline: "Green has never felt so right."
So the message from Audi isn't "You are a free man. Don't bend to the statist bullies," but "Resistance is futile. You might as well get with the program."
Strange. Not so long ago, car ads prioritized liberty. Your vehicle opened up new horizons: Gitcha motor running, head out on the highway, looking for adventure. . . . To sell dull automobiles to people who lived in suburban cul de sacs, manufacturers showed them roaring round hairpin bends, deep into forests, splashing through rivers, across the desert plain, invariably coming to rest on the edge of a spectacular promontory on the roof of the world offering a dizzying view of half the planet. Freedom!But now Audi flogs you its vehicles on the basis that it's the most convenient way to submit to arbitrary state authority. Forty years ago, when they first began selling over here, it's doubtful the company would have considered this either a helpful image for a German car manufacturer or a viable pitch to the American male.
But times change. As Jonah Goldberg pointed out, all the men in the Audi ad are the usual befuddled effete new-male eunuchs that infest all the other commercials. The sort of milksop who'll buy the TDI and then, when the Green Police change their regulatory requirements six weeks later, obediently take it back to the shop and pay however many thousand bucks to have it brought it into compliance with whatever the whimsical tyrant's emissions regime requires this month.
Indeed we are trading our liberty for illusory environmental gains.
I've noticed a few things about this entire matter, especially surrounding the topic of global warming climate change.
One, the same people who screamed and hollered that the Patriot Act was the ultimate violation of our civil liberties have no problem regulating the most minute aspect of our lives when it's in the name of environmentalism. They will create the most gargantuan bureaucracies with the most vast powers, and which are largely unaccountable to lawmakers. But mention that maybe we shouldn't treat would-be airplane bombers as common criminals, and you'd think the world was about to end.
Two, if you're against any part of the environmentalist agenda, you must also be against any sort of regulation whatsoever and in favor of air and water pollution. Don't believe me? Here are the two comments left at my blog after my first post on the Green Police ad:
Are you saying there are no environmental problems severe enough to warrant government intervention? There are limits to what voluntary civic action can achieve. Actually I think these low-emission light-bulb campaigns etc are good examples of how calls for voluntarist action so often wind up irritating people, creating a backlash.Shouldn't there be laws on the books preventing companies from dumping hazardous chemicals into water supplies, for example? And if environmental regulations are sometimes necessary, why is it so absurd that the government should enforce them? If a company is caught dumping illegally, shouldn't the CEO be arrested? Call this the "green police" if you want, but I doubt you'd want to live in a society where government didn't intervene to protect drinking water standards.
I know that we disagree about climate change, but seeing as you have ridiculed my country of birth I will at least say this. The UK government has decided that CO2 is a pollutant (as has your own, for that matter). If they want to regulate it, good for them.
Posted by: Mylne Karimov at February 10, 2010 1:27 PM
If you look at the website for the NY "Green Police", their enforcement covers petroleum spills, illegal burning, dumping oil in storm drains, and chemical spills.
Those crazy greens!!!! Next they will have notions about not letting me cut down tree on my own property!!!
To protest this we could have our own tea party. I'll dump oil in the storm drain, and you can crap directly into the river that provides water supplies for your neighbors. That will put an end to this green madness!!!
Posted by: jason at February 10, 2010 1:37 PM
It'll be interesting to see what I get this time.
Posted by Tom at 11:00 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
Operation Moshtarak: Kinetic Operations in Afghanistan Begin Anew
"The War in Afghanistan has truly begun. This will be a long, difficult fight that is set to eclipse anything we've seen in Iraq."
The fight for Afghanistan has begun anew with the launching of Operation Mostarak, or "Together," this past week. For various reasons, our efforts from 2001 to 2005 failed to prevent the resurgence of the Taliban that started in 2006 and by 2009 threatened to grow completely out of control.
A decent and concise summary, I think, of Operation Moshtarak can be found on Wikipedia:
Operation Moshtarak (Dari and Arabic for Together or Joint) is an ISAF pacification offensive in the area that is described as the "poppy-growing belt" of Helmand Province in southern Afghanistan. The combat operations started on February 13, 2010, and focuses on the Nad Ali District and Lashkar Gah district. It involves Afghan and troops of several ISAF-members in addition to the USMC and U.S. Army units.The main target of the offensive was widely considered to be Marja (also Marjah or Marjeh), which had been controlled for years by Taliban militants as well as drug traffickers. Reports indicate that some 2,500 or more Afghan troops participated, rising to more than 15,000 when American, British, and other coalition troops are included.
As such, the offensive has been described as the largest since the fall of the Taliban, whose government was ousted from Kabul and Kandahar in October-December 2001, but proceeded to resist in the following years in an ongoing guerrilla war known as the Taliban insurgency. This became especially clear during the violent campaign in the midst of the Afghan presidential elections in 2009.
ISAF - International Security Assistance Force, the NATO led operation in Afghanistan
The 1st Battalion, 3rd Marines seize a key junction of roads just outside of Marja:
Via the BBC (follow the link to enlarge):
For months the United States has been building up troops in Afghanistan since President Obama's decision to "surge" troops last December 1. Between now and then we have been moving troops and supplies into the country, in particular Helmund Province, the area that has seen the most activity from the Taliban (or Quetta Shura Taliban (QST), as they are most properly called.) No doubt that between Dec 1 and now, these additional troops have not simply been getting settled in their bases but engaged in what the military calls "preparing the ground," which entails things such as getting familiar with the terrain and populace, identifying enemy targets, and even "herding" enemy forces into certain areas by selective targeting and precision strikes.
Via the BBC: British and Afghan forces prepare for battle in Helmand:
CNN has a very good Q & A with Andrew Exum, who served in both Iraq and Afghanistan and was on Gen. Stanley McChrystal's review team of the Afghanistan strategy, and Mark Moyar, professor of national security affairs at the Marine Corps University, on why Marjah and why now:
Q: Many have never even heard of Marjah - why is the area such a big deal?Moyar: Marjah is in Helmand province where they've made a major push in the past year with the Marines. It is the last major enemy holdout, and it is serving as a sanctuary - it is allowing them to stage military attacks, build IEDs. And it is militarily imperative and also psychologically imperative that we remove this sanctuary area, make it harder for the insurgents to operate. It's much harder for them if they don't have that sanctuary area now so they can still move into sanctuaries in other places like Pakistan, but we're going to work on those as well. But this is really a big thorn in our side and one that we're clearly going to address in the near future.
Q: Why haven't coalition forces tried securing Marjah before now?
Exum: Unfortunately, when you look at our force-to-population ratios in Helmand and throughout Afghanistan really, we're not matched up to a degree where we can secure every place all the time. However, the Marines have had a lot of security gains in Helmand province over the past year, and so now it makes sense to go after Marjah at this time because we have had some gains elsewhere through that Helmand River valley.
Q: If indeed this will be a victory for NATO forces, will this be a game-changer for the whole war?
Exum: No, it's not. In Afghanistan, unfortunately, there's no silver bullet. There's no one thing that we're going to do that's going to turn the tide. What you're going to see in Afghanistan is very steady, very unglamorous offensives whereby we're moving in and trying to secure the population, to buy the Afghan government some time and space to build up key institutions. No one thing is going to be a game-changer. There is no silver bullet in Afghanistan. This is the long, hard slog of counterinsurgency, unfortunately. But so far the Marines in Helmand province have done very well over the past year since they've been deployed there.
Moyar: That's right, it is going to be a long process. These types of wars aren't going to be decided by a single battle, and we're going to have to hold this area. Even bigger than going in and clearing it out is going to be what we do afterward, because we have gone in and cleared that area several times before but we haven't had a good follow-on plan, we haven't had robust security forces, and the enemy has come back.
Don't be put off by the implied timeframe. This isn't a high-intensity war like World War II. As I've written about a zillion times, that it takes years if not decades to defeat an insurgency does NOT mean that the same level of troops are required the entire time. High-intensity wars end with a bang, low-intensity wars (insurgencies) end with a whimper; the peter out over the course of several years.
Via Fox News, a U.S. Marine from Bravo Company of the 1st Battalion, 6th Marines runs during a heavy gun battle in the town of Marjah, Afghanistan:
From what I can tell, Operation Mostarak is our first use of these troops in a full-scale offensive operation. As such, it is somewhat equivalent to Operation Phantom Thunder, launched June 16, 2007, the first of a series of operations in Iraq which made use of surge troops there.
Bill Roggio assesses the situation and describes the overall military strategy:
Since 2006, the Taliban have made a dramatic comeback in Afghanistan after being driven from the country in 2002. As security has deteriorated, they have steadily taken control of more and more territory. In response, a new strategic plan for Afghanistan has been formulated by General Stanley McChrystal, Commander of ISAF and US Forces - Afghanistan. On Dec. 3, 2009, this plan was approved by the Obama administration. While there are several important aspects of the strategy, such as political development, economic development, counter narcotics, and the police and justice system, this article will focus on the military aspect. ...The McChrystal military plan covers the short term, the next 12-18 months. The plan's main goal is to halt the progress of the Taliban, to reverse it in key areas, and to regain the initiative.
The first part of the strategy de-emphasizes the counterterrorism strategy and institutes a counterinsurgency strategy. This means reducing efforts on going after Taliban combatants and increasing efforts to provide security to the population. While the insurgency can afford to lose fighters and leaders, it cannot afford to lose control of the population.
For the short term, the US does not consider it necessary to control the entire country but rather to secure a few key areas and population centers. The goal is for the people of Afghanistan to first see an opportunity for a normal, better future, and then to start to experience it.
The key areas that General McChrystal has identified are:
• Helmand province, particularly the Helmand River valley
• Kandahar City and the areas surrounding the city
• The provinces of Paktika, Paktia, and KhostThe second part of the strategy is to develop the Afghan National Security Force into a force that is capable of providing security for the country. Although ANSF development will not be completed in 18 months, it needs to demonstrate both substantial progress and that the long term goal of the ANSF providing for security for the entire country is achievable. A major review will be held in December 2010 to assess progress.
Additional details at The Long War
Also from the BBC: A US soldier returns fire as others run for cover during a firefight with insurgents in the Badula Qulp area, West of Lashkar Gah in Helmand province, southern Afghanistan:
Vice-President Joe Biden and others advocated the counter-terror approach to Afghanistan, which President Obama wisely rejected. General Petraeus' U.S. Army / Marine Corps Counterinsurgency Field Manual 3-24 (released Dec 2006), which laid out the strategy behind the successful surge in Iraq, says flat out that in order to defeat an insurgency troops must maintain a presence in areas under contention, and that "raiding from remote, secure bases does not work." FM 3-24 also speaks to part two of McChrystal's strategy
6-1 Success in counterinsurgency (COIN) operations requires establishing a legitimate government supported by the people and able to address the fundamental causes that insurgents use to gain support. Achieving these goals requires the host nation to defeat insurgents or render them irrelevant, upholding the rule of law, and provide a basic level os essential and security for the populace. Key to all these tasks is developing an effective host-nation (HN) security force.6-29 Training HN (host nation) security forces is a slow and painstaking process. It does not lend itself to a "quick fix".
BBC: British soldiers from the First Battalion The Royal Welsh mobilise for Operation Moshtarak at Camp Bastion:
As to how well Moshtark is working, an ISAF press release says we've achieved our initial objectives:
The initial key objectives of Operation Moshtarak have been achieved in a short space of time and with minimal interference from the Taliban, according to UK military spokesman Major General Gordon Messenger.The "clearing" phase of the operation was launched at 0400hrs local time this morning with a series of simultaneous helicopter assaults and ground offensives undertaken by thousands of Afghan Army forces and ISAF soldiers from nations including the UK, US, Denmark and Estonia.
Major General Messenger said:
"It is still early days but operational commanders are currently pleased with the progress that has been made since the operation was launched this morning.
"There has been some resistance but it has been relatively light and the initial objective of surprising the Taliban with the time and place of the operation appears to have been achieved."
Major General Messenger said the key objectives of this phase of the operation was the built up population areas where troops were inserted via helicopters. Ground elements, linked up with these troops according to plan.
Posted by Tom at 12:00 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
February 12, 2010
As Usual, Joe Biden is Wrong on Iraq
You just can't make this stuff up:
On Larry King Live last night, Vice President Joe Biden said Iraq "could be one of the great achievements of this administration. You're going to see 90,000 American troops come marching home by the end of the summer. You're going to see a stable government in Iraq that is actually moving toward a representative government."The vice president said he'd been to Iraq 17 times and visits the country every three months or so. "I know every one of the major players in all the segments of that society" he said. "It's impressed me. I've been impressed how they have been deciding to use the political process rather than guns to settle their differences."
At the briefing today, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs was asked about Biden calling Iraq one of the great potential achievements of the Obama administration given that Biden had previously advocated that the country should be divided into thirds and split among Kurds, Shiites, and Sunnis, and then-Sen. Obama opposing the surge of US troops that many experts argue helped bring stability that allowed the reconciliation process to continue.
And to think that some people say Sarah Palin and Dan Quayle are dumb.
Unfortunately, there's no reason to be surprised by the latest idiocy coming from Joe Biden. Not only is the man a walking gaff machine, he's been wrong on almost every foreign policy question of the last 30 years.
Obama is the most narcissistic, arrogant, and vain person ever to occupy the White House, but if (heaven forbid!) Biden should somehow become president he'll be a shoo-inn as number two. Can our Vice-President actually believe that his administration is responsible for our (so far) success in Iraq? Frighteningly, the answer appears to be "yes."
It's bad enough that this administration spends so much of its time blaming it's predecessor for everything. But now they're taking credit for something they weren't even responsible for.
A commenter on Newsbusters reminded me of an analogy that I've heard before:
So let's say my wife has major surgery and it's touch-and-go for quite awhile and the doctor tells us that another surgery is needed to back the first one and hopefully to make it successful. We go ahead with his suggestion and the wife starts doing much better quickly. She still needs to stay in the hospital for various reasons but the big hurdles have been accomplished.Another doctor takes over for the first one who's now retired and removes her remaining few stitches and turns to me and says "I guess you are happy I was able to save her life."
Whatever you want to think about the wisdom of invading Iraq, or our original strategy while there, it's indisputable that George W. Bush's surge saved the day. I've blogged on this so extensively that from 2007 to 2008 you could just about call this "the Iraq blog." Check out Iraq II 2007 - 2008 under "Categories" at right, and scroll away. Hope you have awhile.
Since we're having such fun with our Vice President let's revisit some of his greatest hits:
Posted by Tom at 9:00 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
February 10, 2010
"Climate Change" Comes to Leesburg Virginia Part II: Blizzard!
Updates and new photos at bottom
NOAA: Blizzard - def: "Officially, the National Weather Service defines a blizzard as a storm which contains large amounts of snow OR blowing snow, with winds in excess of 35 mph and visibilities of less than 1/4 mile for an extended period of time (at least 3 hours). When these conditions are expected, the National Weather Service will issue a "Blizzard Warning". When these conditions are not expected to occur simultaneously, but one or two of these conditions are expected, a "Winter Storm Warning" or "Heavy Snow Warning" may be issued."
Ok, so what we're getting in northern Virginia is not what those of you in more northern climes get, but it is fairly unusual for us. As it is the worst of the storm is passing to the north, so Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York, and Boston will really get hammered this time.
This was the view from my front door this morning at maybe 7:30. The door faces almost directly east, so normally I'd see the sun coming up. Mind you, I live in a townhouse development and there are times when you can not even see across the street.
And these from my back door
Evening Update
Like many offices in the area, I suppose, mine follows the Federal government as to whether they're open or closed. Given that the Feds have been closed all week and probably tomorrow as well, we are too.
The good news is that with laptops we can vpn in and work from home.
The bad news is that with laptops we can vpn in and work from home.
With modern technology there is no escape.
Although there is no way I am going anywhere tomorrow, I grew stir crazy late in the afternoon and decided to venture out to do some digging. As you can see, the pile in my yard is just about at the height of the front door, which I haven't been able to open since Friday.
Record Snowfall Levels
The Times is reporting today that
As a result of Wednesday's snowfall, all three Washington-area airports now have set records for snowfall in a winter season: Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport reached 54.9 inches as of early afternoon, by which time Washington Dulles International Airport had reached 67 1/2 inches for the winter and Baltimore-Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport had 65.6 inches.
RR airport is in Washington DC, and Dulles to the west out near where I live. I just heard on the radio that Baltimore has had 72 inches.
Thursday
Dug out! I'm not going anywhere today, but it's nice to know I could if I had to.
Here's the view in the opposite direction
Posted by Tom at 11:30 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
The Green Police in Fiction and in Truth
If you haven't seen it yet, here's the "green police" ad by Audio that aired during the Super Bowl
Pretty well done, I think. I see it as satire criticizing the worst tendencies of the environmental movement. Oddly, the makers don't see it that way More on that later, though.
If you do think the idea of an Orwellian "Green Police" to be a total right-wing fantasy, check out this MasterCard commercial that is most definitely not satire:
John Dewey would be proud.
Green Police Not Satire?
I don't have time to do a whole lot of investigating, but the "Green Police" are apparently a concept dreamed up by Audi, and they've set up a Green Police website. Here's what they say about themselves:
Green Police: Who are they? Here is a quick primer.Every day consumers around the globe are faced with a myriad of decisions in their quest to become more environmentally responsible citizens. Paper or plastic? Bottled water or tap water? Gas or electric? Compost bucket or recycling bin? So many questions; yet so many conflicting answers. It can be overwhelming.
Now consumers have help, from the Green Police.
As part of the lead up to their third consecutive Super Bowl ad, Audi has created a fictional Green Police unit that are caricatures of todays green movement. The Green Police are a humorous group of individuals that have joined forces in an effort to collectively help guide consumers to make the right decision when it comes to the environment. They're not here to judge, merely to guide these decisions.
Coincidentally, there are numerous real Green Police units globally that are furthering green practices and environmental issues. For example, Israel's main arm of the Ministry of Environmental Protection. Audi strives to help protect the environment in all aspects of our vehicle manufacturing.Environmental Protection in the area of enforcement and deterrence is called; you guessed it, the Green Police. New York has officers within the states Department of Environmental Conservation that are fondly called the Green Police. The Green Police is also the popular name for Vietnams Environmental Police Department and the UK has a group who dresses in green as part of the Environment Agencys squad to monitor excessive CO2 emissions.
This is just wrong.
Look, I'm all for responsible conservation. I'm also somewhat of a local activist on the matter, specifically enhancing, preserving, and protecting our tree canopy cover. But today's environmental movement goes too far.
Posted by Tom at 11:00 AM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
February 9, 2010
Not the Way for the GOP to Win Back the People
The biggest reason that the GOP politicians lost in 2006 and 2008 was that they had preached fiscal conservatism and ethical government and then spent like drunken sailors and too may of them got tied up in their own scandals. The public turned to the Democrats, who had promised to govern more responsibly.
Once elected in 2008, the troika of Obama-Reid-Pelosi took a sharp turn to the left, especially on fiscal matters. If the Republicans spent money like drunken sailors, the Democrats spent money like they were high on every drug known to man. Repulsed, many in the country didn't know who to turn to.
Thus was born the Tea Party movement. Say what you will about them (and I am a sort-of Tea Party person, having been to the 9-12 one on the Mall in Washington DC), they are absolutely non-partisan and are looking for authenticity in politicians, especially in the area of fiscal responsibility. As someone who speaks to more active Tea Party people somewhat regularly, I can tell you now that they are very mistrustful of the GOP.
The way to win these people over, then, is to practice what we preach. So I was distressed to see this story in the Washington Times today:
Stimulus foes see value in seeking cash
Pet projects irresistible to GOP lawmakers
By Jim McElhattonSen. Christopher S. Bond regularly railed against President Obama's economic stimulus plan as irresponsible spending that would drive up the national debt. But behind the scenes, the Missouri Republican quietly sought more than $50 million from a federal agency for two projects in his state.
Mr. Bond was not alone. More than a dozen Republican lawmakers, while denouncing the stimulus to the media and their constituents, privately sent letters to just one of the federal government's many agencies seeking stimulus money for home-state pork projects.
The letters to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, expose the gulf between lawmakers' public criticism of the overall stimulus package and their private lobbying for projects close to home."It's not illegal to talk out of both sides of your mouth, but it does seem to be a level of dishonesty troubling to the American public," said Melanie Sloan, executive director of the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington.
In a letter to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, Mr. Bond noted that one project applying to the USDA for stimulus money would "create jobs and ultimately spur economic opportunities."
He and other lawmakers make no apologies for privately seeking stimulus money after they voted against it and continue to criticize the plan: "I strongly opposed the stimulus, but the only thing that could make it worse would be if none of it returned to the taxpayers of Missouri," said Mr. Bond, who is retiring.
But watchdog groups say the lawmakers' public talk and private letters don't square, highlighting a side of government spending largely overshadowed by the "earmarking" process. While members of Congress must disclose their earmarks -- or pet projects they slip into broader spending bills -- the private funding requests they make in letters to agencies fall outside of the public's view.
"There is a definite disconnect between the public statements and the private letters," said Thomas A. Schatz, president of the nonpartisan Citizens Against Government Waste. "It does seem inconsistent to say you're against the bill but then you want some little piece of it."
At a televised meeting with the House Republican caucus late last month, Mr. Obama chided GOP lawmakers who, he said, took credit for projects funded by the same stimulus bill they voted against -- adding that some were even attending ribbon-cutting ceremonies.
This is not the plan, folks.
Before Liberals Get Too High And Mighty...
There is a difference between lobbying for stimulus money and just accepting what comes your way., The former is verbotten, the latter acceptable, and I will explain why.
If a locality refuses stimulus money the Democrats will just send it somewhere else. So it's not like by refusing to accept it the money won't get spent. As such, there is a huge incentive to accept whatever comes your way. If you don't, if you refuse to accept it, every liberal newspaper editorial staff, go nuts in denouncing you. Democrat politicians in your locality go nuts denouncing you.
It all becomes a big game of "who can get the biggest piece of the pie." There is a huge perverse incentive to accept federal money no matter what one's principle's, which is exactly the dilemma the liberals want to foist on us.
So those on the left who chide Republicans are the same ones who would denounce them for not taking stimulus money.
I get why Senator Bond said "the only thing that could make it worse would be if none of it returned to the taxpayers of Missouri," because the man does have a point.
Which is why the entire concept of stimulus money and ear-marks must end. And in this it is the Tea Party people who have the best point of all.
Posted by Tom at 9:32 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
February 6, 2010
"Climate Change" Comes to Leesburg Virginia
It's no wonder they've abandoned "global warming" in favor of "climate change." Despite the change in terminology, we're all aware they still mean to scare us with the notion that "our planet has a fever."
Some fever. I live in Loudoun County, northern Virginia, and t =his is our fourth significant snowfall this year. Mind you, this is an area where we're lucky if we only get one where the trucks have to do any plowing. Six inches is a big deal around here. They've already closed schools for Monday and Tuesday. Our local paper says the area got between 24 - 30 inches, depending on where you lived. Other media reports said some areas got 33 inches.
Here's the view that greeted me as I opened my garage door in preparation for hours of shoveling
A record 2 feet or more was predicted for Washington. As of early Saturday, 10 inches of snow was reported at the White House, while parts of Maryland and West Virginia were buried under more than 20 inches. Forecasters expected snowfall rates to increase, up to 2 inches per hours through Saturday morning.
Turns out the snow continued for most of the day, finally tapering off at 4 or 5pm.
I dug a path to to the street and took a photo of my townhouse
The storm, which started in the midwest a few days ago and has been moving east ever since, hit northern Virginia at about 10am yesterday. It's been snowing steadily ever since. The center, and thus heaviest part of the storm, is passing right through our area, so we're getting the worst of it.
This is the fourth snowstorm we've had this year in an area where we usually only get one, and sometimes not even that.
Word from my connections is that our town budgeted enough to cover snow removal through this storm, but one more and we'll have a shortfall. I haven't checked but I'm sure my homeowners association (HOA) is way over budget.
From Weather.com earlier today
* ACCUMULATIONS... TOTAL ACCUMULATIONS OF 18 TO 24 INCHES... WITH SOME LOCATIONS POSSIBLY RECEIVING LOCALLY HIGHER AMOUNTS ACROSS WESTERN MARYLAND AND THE EASTERN WEST VIRGINIA PANHANDLE.THIS EXTREMELY DANGEROUS STORM IS EXPECTED TO PRODUCE RECORD SNOWFALL FOR THE BALTIMORE AND WASHINGTON DC METROPOLITAN AREAS. TRAVEL CONDITIONS TONIGHT ACROSS THE REGION WILL BE EXTREMELY HAZARDOUS AND LIFE-THREATENING. HELP YOUR LOCAL AND STATE GOVERNMENT FIRST RESPONDERS AND TRANSPORTATION AGENCIES BY STAYING OFF THE ROADS.
Virginia Governor McDonnell said that snowfall records are "fast approaching the highest accumulations in the 103 years that these statistics have been kept,"
Before all of you who live in states that get this much snow on a regular basis tell me I'm a wimp... give us a break. We don't live prepared for this stuff.
I keep a bird feeder out back and enjoy watching and identifying the birds. Not being dumb, they know where the food is and flocked my backyard today since they weren't getting anything from the ground. Unless you enlarge this photo you can barely see the male Cardinal at the feeder
Deciding to make the most of it, I also put out a tray with birdfood. Most of the birds that swarmed the feeders where Dark-eyed Juncos, but today we also had male and female Cardinals, a few House Sparrows, European Starlings, and even one Blue Jay, which is like an eagle compared to those other small species. The birds in this photo are all Dark-eyed Juncos
Mocha just about went nuts looking at them just a few feet away
This was in the morning, before I cleared off the deck. We got about another 6 inches from when I took this photo.
After over 3 hours I had the driveway shoveled. I didn't realize how tired I was until I got into the house and sat down at the computer.
From our local paper, here's a picture of our downtown area at about 6pm
Monday Evening Update
Good grief! Another 10 - 20 inches are on the way tomorrow and Wednesday. I don't know where I'm going to put the stuff, as the pile in my yard is over 5 feet now. Stay tuned for another post tomorrow or Wednesday.
Posted by Tom at 9:00 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
February 5, 2010
Obama's Nuclear Free Fantasy World Part II
In Obama's Nuclear Free Fantasy World I wrote that The honest truth is that a "nuclear free world" has always meant a nuclear-free United States, because as I said earlier there is no way the other nuclear armed countries of this world would be so stupid as to follow suit, and yes that includes France."
I didn't know how right I was.
Charles Krauthammer relates this amazing story in a lecture he gave at the Heritage Foundation on Monday:
The depths of Obama's naïve universalism can be seen in his pursuit of this deeply unserious goal, the most dramatic instance of which, as Nicolas Sarkozy will not easily forget, occurred on September 24, one day after Obama's speech to the General Assembly, when he ostentatiously presided over the Security Council, the first time an American President had ever done so.At the time, unknown to the world, Obama had knowledge that the Iranians had built a secret uranium enrichment facility near Qom. France and Britain were urging him to use that dramatic setting to stun the world with that revelation and thus be in a position to call for powerful immediate action. Not only did Obama refuse, but Sarkozy was forced to scrap any mention of Qom in his speech. Obama only revealed the news a day later in Pittsburgh.
Why did he forgo the opportunity? Because, explained White House officials, Obama did not want anything at that Security Council meeting to get in the way of his dream of a nuclear-free world. He did not want to "dilute" his disarmament resolution by "diverting to Iran."
Iran as a diversion? It's the most important security issue on the planet. A diversion from the fantasy of universal nuclear disarmament?
Sarkozy was sitting at that same Council table and could hardly contain himself. With Obama at the chair, Sarkozy pointedly observed: "President Obama has even said 'I dream of a world without [nuclear weapons].' Yet before our very eyes, two countries are currently doing the exact opposite." Sarkozy also informed the President that "we live in a real world, not a virtual world."
What have we come to when the President of France thinks our leader is a wimp?
Former Ambassador to the UN John Bolton explains the problem:
More Mr. Nice Guy
While nukes proliferate, Obama fiddles.
By John Bolton(During his State of the Union Address) the president found time to opine more explicitly than ever before that reducing America's nuclear weapons and delivery systems will temper the global threat of proliferation. Obama boasted that "the United States and Russia are completing negotiations on the farthest-reaching arms control treaty in nearly two decades" and that he is trying to secure "all vulnerable nuclear materials around the world in four years, so that they never fall into the hands of terrorists."
Then came Obama's critical linkage: "These diplomatic efforts have also strengthened our hand in dealing with those nations that insist on violating international agreements in pursuit of nuclear weapons." Obama described the increasing "isolation" of both North Korea and Iran, the two most conspicuous--but far from the only--nuclear proliferators. He also mentioned the increased sanctions imposed on Pyongyang after its second nuclear test in 2009 and the "growing consequences" he says Iran will face because of his policies.
In fact, reducing our nuclear -arsenal will not somehow persuade Iran and North Korea to alter their behavior or encourage others to apply more pressure on them to do so. Obama's remarks reflect a complete misreading of strategic realities.
...The premise underlying (Obama's) assertions may well be found in Obama's smug earlier comment that we should "put aside the schoolyard taunts about who is tough. . . . Let's leave behind the fear and division." By reducing to the level of wayward boys the debates over whether his policies are making us more or less secure, Obama reveals a deep disdain for the decades of strategic thinking that kept America safe during the Cold War and afterwards. Even more pertinent, Obama's indifference and scorn for real threats are chilling auguries of what the next three years may hold.
Obama has now explicitly rejected the idea that U.S. weakness is provocative, arguing instead that weakness will convince Tehran and Pyongyang to do the opposite of what they have been resolutely doing for decades--vigorously pursuing their nuclear and missile programs. Obama's first year amply demonstrates that his approach will do nothing even to retard, let alone stop, Iran and North Korea.
Neither Bush nor Obama administration efforts toward international sanctions have had any measurable impact....
For years I've been saying that there can be no successful negotiating with the revolutionary government of Iran. They are bound and determined to get nuclear weapons because they see them as the key to their goal of achieving regional hegemony. As such, the best solution is regime change, and failing that, military action.
Whether we've been clandestinely engaged in trying to change the government is unknown, but out public actions have certainly not been calibrated to achieving that goal.
I've written at length about this,but long story short we could and should have been overtly supporting a change of government, dissidents, and making a huge issue out of Iran's terrible record on human rights. That Iran is the world's leading state sponsor of terror is also something we should have been screaming to the high heavens, but instead our leaders have been silent.
For the most part George W Bush let the EU3 (France, the UK, and Germany) handle negotiations with Iran. As Bolton explains above, it didn't work. Those who continue to talk about sanctions as the answer aren't reading the papers:
Talk of Iran sanctions hinders diplomacy, says China Friday, February 05, 2010 ReutersChina told other world powers on Thursday that discussing broader sanctions against Iran was counter-productive, striking a blow to a Western push to rein in Tehran's nuclear program. Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi told a conference during a visit to France that Tehran's negotiating position was evolving and he wanted to see more direct talks with Iran.
"To talk about sanctions at the moment will complicate the situation and might stand in the way of finding a diplomatic solution," Yang said.
France is among Western powers seeking to have the UN Security Council approve a fourth batch of sanctions against Iran by the end of March to prod Tehran into freezing uranium enrichment, which can have peaceful or military purposes.
Russia, like China, has extensive trade ties with Iran and both acted to weaken previous rounds of Security Council sanctions.
But a Russian lawmaker said on Thursday that Moscow and Western powers had already moved closer to agreement on the need for farther-reaching punitive measures.
We've been through this so often that I've no faith whatsoever that there is any hope of enforcing the level of sanctions that would stand a chance of getting the mullahs to stop their nuclear program.
And why should China or Russia agree to sanctions? They've got good trade going with Iran which they see no reason to spoil. Iranian nukes wouldn't be pointed at them, and if and everyone knows that Chinese or Russian leaders wouldn't hesitate to erase Iran from the map if necessary. Everyone does doubt U.S. resolve however, and with good reason: Barack Obama is seen as a wimp.
Israel may strike Iran, but they have very limited resources, and the best they can do is set their nuclear program back for awhile. At the rate things are going, Iran will eventually get nuclear weapons, whatever type of world Obama is dreaming of. Can you imagine a situation where their nuclear weapons are more modern than ours? It would be the case. Our most recent warhead is the W88, designed in the 1970s.
Whatever, one can argue that we have better delivery systems. True enough. What seems inarguable, however, is that severely reducing our arsenal will not persuade Iran, North Korea, or any of the other bad actors to give up their programs, and indeed will reduce our options in striking back if that's what it comes down to.
As I said at the beginning, it's a sad day when the President of France things out leader is a wimp.
Posted by Tom at 8:16 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
February 4, 2010
President Obama Calls for Civility
No joke. From the Washington Post:
Obama pleads for civility, cooperation in politicsBy BEN FELLER
The Associated Press
Thursday, January 28, 2010; 11:57 PMTAMPA, Fla. -- Trying to bury a year of polarization, President Barack Obama on Thursday escalated his appeal for politicians and voters alike to settle differences without tearing each other apart. His plea: "Let's start thinking of each other as Americans first."
...Coming one day after his State of the Union address, and one day before meeting with House Republican leaders with whom he continues to battle, Obama's emphasis on civility was a nod to political reality. He needs Republicans more than ever to get his agenda passed, and he is getting saddled with more public blame for the partisanship he promised to change.
Even the AP reporter couldn't report this one with a straight face.
It's a typical Democrat/liberal ploy. Attack, vilify, and slander, then as soon as you suffer a setback demand "civility" from the other side.
The level of hypocrisy is stunning, even for Obama
A call for civility from the party that spent 6 or more years saying "Bush Lied!" at every opportunity, and otherwise savaging him in all manner of ways. This from the party whose senators (John Kerry and Chuck Schumer) have started to use the vulgar term "teabagger" to describe the Tea Party movement. Of course anyone who criticizes Obama too effectively risks being labeled a racist, something we saw quite often during the campaign. And this from the movement of a zillion "Bushitler" and "ChimpyMcHitler" references.
Barack Obama himself is hardly civil, treating anyone who doesn't agree with him as worthy of contempt.
Finally, there was the insane level of attacks on Sarah Palin and her family.
It just like the schoolyard bully; tough and mean when he's on top, but the first to cry foul when he's received a good knock on the head.
But don't Republicans attack and vilify their opponents, you ask? Yes we do. But with rare exceptions we don't then demand civility when the tables are turned.
Also, don't suddenly call for civility when you've been out of power and then win the White House, as Democrats did after Obama won. After years and years of "Bush Lied!" and all the rest of it, I'm in no mood to listen to such hypocrisy.
Look, political discourse is what it is. Yes each side does bad things. But don't be a hypocrite about it and suddenly demand civility from the other side when you suddenly the tables are turned.
Posted by Tom at 9:36 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
Scott Brown Sworn In as 41st Republican Senator
Democrat Plan to Bring Socialism to American on Hold
Scott Brown was sworn in at approximately 5pm today by Vice-President Biden as the new Senator from Massachusetts. His upset victory was a tremendous blow to Democrats, who have lost their filibuster-proof majority in the Senate. Not that they had been able to capitalize on it. Via ABC News, here is the swearing in ceremonyL
And here is Senator Brown taking questions from the press. He handles himself well, I think
Brown's victory demonstrates several things.
Republicans and conservatives from around the country do not insist on ideological purity, but will support a moderate if that's what it takes to win. Brown is a fiscal conservative but moderate on social issues, supposedly the death-knell for Republican candidates. It also shows that there are no safe seats or safe areas for Democrats, and that if Republicans put forth good candidates who play their cards right, we can win anywhere.
Of course, Republicans should not become overconfident. President Clinton staged one of the most impressive comebacks in modern history after 1994. Obama's poll ratings are going down, but he's still floating at 50%, which is not too bad. But then again, his poll ratings were about that in Virginia and New Jersey, and fat lot of good it did the Democrats there.
Finishing up, the liberal's favorite conservative, Newt Gingrich, offers these 9 lessons from Brown's victory that I think are largely correct:
Lesson One: Run Candidates Everywhere The first lesson Republicans should take from last night's victory is the GOP should run candidates everywhere this year and not worry about whether the district used to vote Republican.In the last five days a poll has shown Tim Griffin beating incumbent Democrat Vic Snyder by 17 points in Arkansas's 2nd congressional district. In Cincinnati, former Republican Congressman Steve Chabot is now up 17 points over the Democratic incumbent, Steve Driehaus, who beat Chabot in the 2008 election. In Michigan, former Republican Congressman Tim Walberg is now 7 points ahead of the Democrat Mark Schauer who beat him in 2008.
There are moments when history changes and the American people decide to shake things up. This may be such a moment and it means Republicans should fill in the ticket at every level in every state.
Lesson Two: Being Positive Matters and Congressional Republicans Should Take Note
In the three winning campaigns (Virginia, New Jersey, Massachusetts) the Republican candidate has been issue-oriented and had a positive message. In each case, Republicans drew a principled, issue-oriented difference between themselves and the Democrats.The American people are genuinely frightened about the economy, about terrorism, about the loss of honesty and transparency in their government. The American people want a party which is trying to solve the things they fear, not a party which is trying to use their fear to remain negative. An alternative party can win huge victories in 2010 and 2012; an opposition party will have far fewer victories.
Lesson Three: President Obama Has Had Two Bad Anniversaries and Now is the Moment for Him to Rethink What He Has Been Doing
The anniversary of the President's victory in the 2008 election saw decisive Republican gubernatorial victories in two states he had carried. Wednesday was the anniversary of his inauguration, and it was the date a new Republican senator was sent to Washington to fill the late Sen. Ted Kennedy's seat, which Senator-elect Brown made clear is the "people's seat" .The President now has an excuse to stop, rethink, recalibrate, and learn some painful lessons. No more secret deals. No more Pelosi-Reid machine votes. No more leftwing, Democrats-only strategies. The leftwing leadership in the House and Senate would hate and fight such a change in course. Moderate Democrats (and most Americans) would breathe a sigh of relief.
Lesson Four: Republicans Should Offer To Help Solve America's Jobs, Security, Deficit, and Health Challenges through an Open, Transparent Legislative Process
This is the right moment for House and Senate Republicans to offer to meet with the President and start a new health reform process, as well as America's other challenges. This offer to work together to help the nation would be well received by the American people and would represent a real shift from an opposition party attitude to an alternative governing party attitude.Lesson Five: The Tea Parties and Populism Are Real
The Tea Party movement is going to be a major force in 2010 and 2012. It represents a real uprising of angry and frightened Americans who are fed up with both parties.It's no accident Scott Brown spent so much of his victory speech emphasizing his independence. This was not a Republican victory. Only 12% of Massachusetts is registered Republican. This was a people's victory--a genuine alliance of Republicans, Independents, and moderate Democrats.
Lesson Six: Trucks Beat Lobbyists
The strangest thing about President Obama's ill-advised, last minute visit to Massachusetts on Sunday was his fixation with Scott Brown's truck. FDR, who was a genuine Hudson Valley aristocrat, would have instinctively understood to be on the side of trucks. Bill Clinton might have driven up in a truck.However the elitism of the new leftwing Democratic Party--the party of the Obama-Pelosi-Reid machine--is so ingrown and so out of touch it did not understand what Scott Brown was doing.
Lesson Seven: National Security Matters
Andy McCarthy has a superb article this morning on National Review Online that discusses the role national security played in the election. Every American concerned about our safety in an age of terrorism ought to look at Brown's campaign and take heart that safety is a winning issue, and the left is absurdly on the side of putting terrorists' rights above protecting American lives.If you agree, I also encourage you to sign the Human Events petition protesting the civilian trial of Khalid Sheikh Mohammed.
Lesson Eight: Secular Radicalism is a Losing Theme ...Even in Massachusetts
In one of the strangest moments in Attorney General Coakley's march to defeat, on the Thursday before the election in a radio interview, she said although "you can have religious freedom ... you probably shouldn't work in an emergency room". As the left has grown more secular and more militant in its hostility to religion it has begun to arouse strong opposition. Among Catholics, Evangelicals, Mormons, and Orthodox Jews, Coakley's position represented an anti-religious bigotry which they fear.Defining conscience and religion as legitimate parts of America is an enormous winning position, and Scott Brown's career had a strong component of defending faith and conscience even in Massachusetts.
Lesson Nine: The American People are Sovereign and When Their Leaders Infuriate Them They will Rise Up and Fire The Leaders
As it was with Jefferson, Jackson, Lincoln, the Progressive movement (especially Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson), Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Ronald Reagan -- again and again the American people find a way to overwhelm the establishment.In America the people are sovereign. Last night reminded us it is still true. We remain an exceptional country of freedom and opportunity despite the politicians and bureaucrats and academics and elite news media.
Your friend,
Newt Gingrich
Posted by Tom at 9:00 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
February 2, 2010
Obama v Bush - Budget Deficits
Jim Treacher puts numbers and a graph to a conversation I'm familiar with:
A simple five-step process for understanding the deficit and people's reactions to it
1) Read a story on the Obama administration's pledge to reduce the deficit. Pay special attention to quotes like this:"We wanted to draw a line in the sand and enforce some discipline in the spending process," White House spokesman Dan Pfeiffer said.2) Say: "Wow, they sure are spending a lot. Why didn't they reduce it by not increasing it so much in the first place? I'm no economist or anything, but I'm not so sure I like this whole deal."
3) Listen to Obama defender screech: "HOW COME YOU NEVER COMPLAINED ABOUT BUSH'S SPENDING, WINGNUT???"
4) Show the Obama defender this graph, courtesy of the Congressional Budget Office:
5) Repeat as needed, i.e., every single time it comes up.
Another way to see how much Obama has increased the deficit relative to past presidents is through this national debt road trip video:
Update
Deficit imperils U.S.'s top credit rating
Washington Times
By Patrice HillThe United States is drawing closer to the kind of debt crisis plaguing some European countries, where a financial emergency forces political leaders to make draconian spending cuts and tax increases to maintain the confidence of international investors.
Moody's, a top Wall Street credit agency, brought the U.S. closer to such a point this week by, for the first time, warning that the U.S. could lose its gold-plated AAA credit rating in coming years unless it quickly puts into place plans to curb budget deficits of more than $1 trillion that have the potential to destabilize government finances and the financial markets.
"Unless further measures are taken to reduce the budget deficit further or the economy rebounds more vigorously than expected, the federal financial picture as presented in [President Obama's Feb. 1 budget] will at some point put pressure on the AAA-government bond rating," Moody's said in a report Tuesday.
But hey, don't worry folks, move along, nothing to see here.
Posted by Tom at 8:25 PM | Comments (9) | TrackBack
February 1, 2010
"The Steady Erosion of Women's Rights in Egypt"
In Now They Call Me Infidel, Nonie Darwish tells of growing up in a relatively secular and Westernizing Egypt in the 1950s, only to see the country take a sharp Islamist turn as the decades wore on. The experience led her to flee her native country, and eventually the faith of her birth, for the United States and Christianity.
Sometimes the level of freedom or liberty in a society is not obvious by simply looking around. Economic freedom, to say nothing of freedom of speech and press, cannot be easily discerned by simply walking down the street. But other times there are visible signs that make it painfully obvious where a society or nation ranks. We're all familiar with communist and Nazi propaganda posters and statues. Huge signs of the head of state are a sign of a cult of personality that is a telling sign of totalitarian or authoritarian societies.
These are still around, but in today's world we face a new threat to our liberties; a fundamentalist or radical Islam. One of the first things that happens in a society infected with that disease is the degradation of women's rights, and the most visible sign of that is the wearing of the veil, whether the full burka or the head-covering-only hijab.
Chester, over at Pajamas Media , has documented the degradation of women's rights in Egypt through four photographs sent to him by a friend. They show the graduating class of Cairo University in 1959, 1978, 1995, and 2004.
click on each photo to enlarge
Class of 1959
Class of 1978
Class of 1995
Class of 2004
Commenting on the photos, Mark Steyn says that
Whenever I give a speech on Islam, some or other complacenik always says, "Oh, but they haven't had time to Westernize. Just you wait and see. Give it another 20 years, and the siren song of Westernization will work its magic." This argument isn't merely speculative, it's already been proved wrong by what's happened over the last 20 years. Compare the Cairo University class of 1959 with those of the 21st century, and then see if you can recite your inevitablist theories of social evolution with a straight face. The idea that social progress is like the wheel or the internal combustion engine -- once invented, it can never be uninvented -- is one of the laziest assumptions of the Western Left.
Posted by Tom at 8:45 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
