Zorching is the new surging

At yesterday's Pentagon press briefing, a great deal of time was dedicated to the subject of U.S. naval posture in the USCENTCOM AOR, specifically the Arabian Gulf. A number of journalists pressed Capt. Kirby and Mr. Little about whether the current two-carrier presence (STENNIS and VINSON) is an anomaly, a response to rising tensions in the region, or just coincidental business-as-usual. The spokesmen were slippery. Here's Kirby:

And that presence changes all the time.  It fluctuates based on needs and requirements set by the combatant commander and approved by the Joint Staff and the secretary of defense.  

And as you all know, I mean, to get an aircraft carrier strike group anywhere in the world takes time.  It takes a lot of planning and training.  Months of advance work is done.  It's not – I don't want to leave anybody with the impression that, you know, we're somehow zorching two carriers over there because we're concerned about what happened, you know, today in Iran.  It's just not the case. This is – this is just prudent force posture requirements set by the combatant commander.

I'm going to be frank with you here: I have no idea whether this is true or not. I don't know whether ships' movements in this case are responsive to political developments in the region; if anyone else does, I'd be very interested to see your comments.

What this brief interlude does remind us, though, is that it's still much simpler to go zorching carrier strike groups around the globe than land forces. Or something. So, uh, don't forget that.

DO NOT DARE COUNTENANCE VIOLENT, COERCIVE ACTION AGAINST US!

I'm not going to pretend like I know much of the details behind the alleged Iranian plot to assassinate the Saudi ambassador in Washington. I'm not going to add to the din of people commenting and analyzing and speculating and advocating. All I'm going to say is that this passage from Steve Clemons pretty much sums up a whole lot of what's behind the recent debate about the defense budget, force structure, national security strategy, etc.:

This is a serious situation -- and this kind of assassination is the sort that could lead to an unexpected cascade of events that could draw the US and other powers into a consequential conflagration in the Middle East.

If Iran was indeed willing to attack a Saudi Ambassador and close confidante of the Saudi King on US soil and countenance the death of 100-150 Americans, then the US has reached a point where it must take action. 

The President's National Security Council and intelligence teams led by Thomas Donilon must construct a response that is "more than reactive."  This is time for a significant strategic response to the Iran challenge in the Middle East and globally -- and if the US does not take action, then the Saudis will most likely retaliate in ways that will escalate the stakes and tensions with Iran throughout the Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia.

If Iran was willing to countenance... Let's put this in plain words: Steve Clemons is saying that the United States ought to muster "a significant strategic response" -- presumably involving direct action by intelligence agencies or military force -- to the apparent revelation that a regional power on the other side of the globe might even consider aggressive action against U.S. and allied interests.

No wonder we need a $700 billion defense budget: some of us are planning strike operations at the hint of an anti-American plan.

Mark Kirk gets his feelings hurt, says a spectacularly dumb thing

Russian ambassador to NATO/kooky unreformed nationalist Dmitri Rogozin, who has a habit of saying (and tweeting) somewhat nutty stuff, took a whole bunch of shots at unilateralist Russophobe dinosaurs/U.S. Senators John Kyl and Mark Kirk in his country's press after meeting with the two this week. The story is related by Josh Rogin at The Cable. Here's the money line from Rogozin:

"The meeting [with Kirk and Kyl] is very useful because it shows that the alternative to Barack Obama is a collapse of all the programs of cooperation with Russia. Today, I had the impression that I was transported in a time machine back several decades, and in front of me sat two monsters of the Cold War, who looked at me not through pupils, but targeting sights."

The guy is always good for a few lulz, but Kirk was less amused. He gave Rogin a few snippy quotes that aren't worth recounting, but also dropped what I imagine he thinks is the hammer:

"In a potential missile combat scenario between NATO and Iran, Russia is thoroughly irrelevant. So Russian concerns about what we do and not do about the Iranian threat are interesting but largely irrelevant."

Wow. Russia is thoroughly irrelevant, and its concerns are largely irrelevant. (See if you can't sort that one out for yourself.)

I know it's probably a bit much to expect sophisticated understanding of strategic deterrence theory from a guy who "misremembers" his own military record, but could we at least hope for some common sense?

"In a potential missile combat scenario between NATO and Iran," precisely nobody with nuclear weapons and an early-warning/launch detection system is "irrelevant." Especially not a state with a massive arsenal of nuclear warheads and the delivery systems to get them to American soil, one with a cultivated distrust of American intentions vis-a-vis missile defense.

"In a potential missile combat scenario" in which the sky fills up with ballistic missiles, every damned guy on the planet with a red button is going to go reaching for it until he has a pretty solid sense that none of those missiles is going to land on him. That solid sense is probably going to take just a little while longer to materialize when you've got a bunch of senior "statesmen" running their yaps and posturing in ways that seem almost certainly intended to impede information-sharing and common understanding, to keep the other guy off balance, wondering if -- in spite of official policy statements to the contrary -- our missile defenses really are targeting his weapons.

Russia's "irrelevant" to a scenario that could kindle nuclear war, huh, Senator? More irrelevant than a guy who has to shit-talk his own government to America's biggest foreign creditors just to get on the news? More irrelevant than a guy who spent much of his time in the House impotently railing against the government's irresponsible spending habits while serving as a member of the body that writes America's checks? More irrelevant than a guy whose idea of inspired leadership and aggressive oversight is pathetic obstructionism and delaying tactics in a condominium of ignorance with the U.S. Senate's most trifling and manifestly inconsequential clowns?

Well hell, Rogozin, I might take "irrelevant" as a compliment coming from that guy.

Iran, North Korea and UN Sanctions

Last June, the UN Security Council imposed tougher sanctions on both Iran and North Korea. Following in the footsteps of sanctions imposed on DRC, Liberia, Cote d'Ivoire, Sudan, Somalia/Eritrea, and of course Al Qaida and the Taliban, the Council decided to appoint Panels of Experts for each of the new regimes (it's worth noting that the new sanctions on Libya also feature such a Panel).

Anyway, these Panels, the ones on Iran and North Korea, were a little different from their Africa-focused step-siblings. For one thing, they included a member who hailed from a P5 country (US, UK, France, Russia, China). Then they typically also had representatives from key regional countries or countries involved in high-level diplomatic initiatives. For another, they had more support staff and more resources.

Both Panels just submitted their final reports to the Council. It took 24 hours for the Iran Panel's report to be leaked to the press and 72 hours for the North Korea Panel's report to be leaked. As has been reported by Reuters, the experts have found that North Korea and Iran have shared nuclear missile technology and that they have received assistance, in violation of the sanctions, from China and Russia respectively. The reports also detail the evasive measures that North Korea and Iran have taken to avoid the sanctions.

Now why does this matter? Because China and Russia will be using the excuse that they were leaked, first to block their release, and second to either delay or prevent the sanctions renewal and of course the renewal of expert panels' mandates. China has of course blocked the publication of the North Korea report. This is not the first time this has happened, it took four months for the October report of the Sudan Panel to be released after China blocked it--they found evidence that China violated sanctions by providing ammunition to Sudan, for use in Darfur. Similarly, the May 2010 report on North Korea, wasn't released until November.

I think it's more likely that the panels' mandates will not be renewed. That's bad news because the panels are doing an important job and providing a useful service to countries who want to abide by the sanctions and don't have the intelligence capacity to monitor implementation themselves (and therefore be aware of potential illicit activity in their own jurisdictions). Second, there's also something to be said for putting a report out there that lays out the evidence and helps to hold countries, private companies, and of course international organizations accountable.

Finally, it would be a shame for these sanctions, which were seen as a loss by both Iran and North Korea, to lose some of their teeth or even for them to no longer have assigned monitoring. It's clear that would be a victory for both of them and it would be a shame for that to happen just because these reports are supposedly embarrassing to China and Russia.

Support for the democratic aspirations of all people: why more talk, less action is the right way to go

In last night's State of the Union, President Obama made brief reference to the anti-totalitarian struggle of democracy activists and protestors in Tunisia, and also to recent elections in South Sudan. He failed to mention the burgeoning unrest in Egypt, something for which he was criticized as a sort of front-runner ("notice he mentioned Tunisia after the whole thing was settled, but didn't say anything about Egypt!", blah blah blah). Here's the bit from the transcript:

Recent events have shown us that what sets us apart must not just be our power -– it must also be the purpose behind it.  In south Sudan -– with our assistance -– the people were finally able to vote for independence after years of war.  (Applause.)  Thousands lined up before dawn.  People danced in the streets.  One man who lost four of his brothers at war summed up the scene around him:  “This was a battlefield for most of my life,” he said.  “Now we want to be free.”  (Applause.)

And we saw that same desire to be free in Tunisia, where the will of the people proved more powerful than the writ of a dictator.  And tonight, let us be clear:  The United States of America stands with the people of Tunisia, and supports the democratic aspirations of all people.  (Applause.)

After eight years of the Bush Doctrine ("The best hope for peace in our world is the expansion of freedom in all the world"; "...it is the policy of the United States to seek and support the growth of democratic movements and institutions in every nation and culture, with the ultimate goal of ending tyranny in our world"; "All who live in tyranny and hopelessness can know the United States will not ignore your oppression or excuse your oppressors. When you stand for your liberty, we will stand with you"; etc.), there's been a lot of justifiable anxiousness to see how the Obama administration would shake out on the question of democracy promotion. The signs have been encouraging, at least from my perspective: repeated assurances that America favors liberty and democracy, but a steadfast refusal to let the perfect be the enemy of the good -- to let our inability to shape the world to our will frustrate us into bleating disengagement, or worse, aggressive war.

So how about the president's comments last night? They're the sort of thing that will surely disappoint (and perhaps outrage) folks on both sides of the democracy-promotion argument: realists and isolationists will contend that we ought not concern ourselves with the political struggles of others, while neoconservatives and liberal hawks will complain that the president wasn't concrete enough about the ways that our "support" will manifest itself (as they did during the Green protests in Iran). Unromantic as this parsing may be, the whole thing really comes down to what you think "support" means, and what it ought to mean. I happen to think that selective engagement -- that is to say deeper involvement in instances where we've determined that American influence can be meaningful and have predictable results, with a continuation of nice, flowery words about freedom and liberty and democracy, plus a helping of public-diplomacy and Radio Free _____, in all other instances -- is the right approach. I don't think a blanket expression of guaranteed material support for all pro-democracy movements in authoritarian countries is a great idea, and I'm happy that neither this president nor any other (even George W. Bush) has made any such pledge.

As Elliott Abrams has said, there is genuine continuity in U.S. foreign policy on this question.

Let me just say a few things first about the first question: Should we be promoting democracy? My answer is yes, we have been for decades under presidents of both parties.

But again, there have been some significant differences on what exactly "promoting democracy" ought to constitute. (I feel confident that Abrams and I disagree.) The real continuity is in rhetorical support, in the way American leaders formulate our counry's self-image. I've always loved this speech given to the House of Representatives by John Quincy Adams on July 4, 1821, when he was Secretary of State (a section of it was the epigram to my graduate thesis). This is the kind of "support [for] democratic aspirations" I can get behind:

America, with the same voice which spoke herself into existence as a nation, proclaimed to mankind the inextinguishable rights of human nature, and the only lawful foundations of government. America, in the assembly of nations, since her admission among them, has invariably, though often fruitlessly, held forth to them the hand of honest friendship, of equal freedom, of generous reciprocity. She has uniformly spoken among them, though often to heedless and often to disdainful ears, the language of equal liberty, of equal justice, and of equal rights. [...] Wherever the standard of freedom and Independence has been or shall be unfurled, there will her heart, her benedictions and her prayers be. But she goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.

To repeat a theme I've touched on in past weeks: if our foreign policy serves to destroy or disfigure beyond recognition our own constitutional republic -- even in the service of liberty for others -- then it has failed.

And so I pose a question to Elliot Abrams and Jennifer Rubin and those who criticized the White House and Congress over a "failure to act" during the Iranian elections and the Tunisian revolt and the current Egyptian troubles: what would you have us do? What is it that's expected of us? Hell, let's even forget about the comparatively simple case of Iran, where the government generally opposes U.S. policy aims and the populace seems predisposed to democracy and liberalism; what about in places where our foreign policy and security interests are generally served by an oppressive or even totalitarian government, as in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and in many cases even China? Shadi Hamid gets at the root of the problem in The Atlantic:

The Middle East just got more complicated for the Obama administration. The January 14 popular revolt in Tunisia, the first ever to topple an Arab dictator, has called into question a basic premise of U.S. policy in the Middle East - that repressive regimes, however distasteful, are at least stable. They can also be counted on to support key American interests, which is part of why the U.S. provides them with substantial assistance. Tunisia was considered one of the least likely to fall, but it fell. Across the region, opposition groups, hoping to repeat Tunisia's successes, are emboldened and increasingly active. For the first time, they know what change looks like. More importantly, they now believe it can happen in their own countries. But in the growing battle between Arab autocrats and popular oppositions, the U.S. is finding itself torn between the reliable allies it needs and the democratic reformers it wants.

I've added the emphasis at the end. Hamid continues:

But the problem the U.S. faces currently is the same it faced during the short-lived "Arab spring" of 2005: For now, it is difficult, if not impossible to have both a democratic Middle East and a pro-American one. Because anti-Americanism is so widespread (in part because the U.S. supports reviled autocrats), and because Islamist groups represent the largest oppositions, any freely elected government will want to distance itself from U.S policies.

And here's where we get to the crux of the whole democracy-promotion dilemma: free people do not define their own interests in the same ways, and those interests will not always stand in peaceful harmony with those of other free people around the world. Freedom may be a universal good, but universal freedom certainly will not result in universal peace. One more from Hamid:

The U.S., then, finds itself in the unenviable position of being a status quo power in a region where so many detest the status quo, wish to fight it, and may - or perhaps inevitably will - one day bring it crashing down.

I think this is a vitally important observation, because it helps tie democracy promotion into the broader context of U.S. efforts to shape and manage the international system -- that is, the broader context of U.S. foreign policy. The fact of the matter is that the U.S. is a status quo power on the global stage, and in almost every way: we benefit unequally from the international system as it is presently constituted, and in many respects it's in our interest to maintain it. This isn't universally true, of course: one could say, for example, that widespread global dependence on oil to meet energy needs is a fact of the international system (or a fact which bears on the international system) that is not an optimal condition for the U.S., and so we should work to shape the future in ways that mitigate in our favor.

That's what foreign and security policy is all about, and that's what our "democracy promotion agenda" and approach to human rights should also be focused on: managing change so that the world of the future is as favorable to U.S. interests as possible. When viewed in this light, Hamid's suggestion that we increase criticism of the Mubarak regime and deepen ties with opposition elements is a useful one. "It is better to have leverage with opposition groups before they come to power than afterward," he tells us; this isn't all that different from my desired approach to interstate relations, which (like Kissinger's) concedes those inevitabilities of China's rise that we're powerless to control while appreciating that American interests will be best served by creating and solidifying leverage where possible.

How to kill a perfectly good lunch hour fiddling with an essentially meaningless thought experiment; Or: How this graph mathematically proves withdrawal is a good idea

Step 1: Browse Abu Muqawama

Step 2: Observe new post positing a simple graphical model for Chinese and Iranian engagement in Afghanistan

Step 3: Immediately assume that this model is fundamentally flawed in extremely simple, easily illustrated way

Step 4: Second-guess, equivocate, hedge, rethink, repeat

Step 5: Sink an hour into playing around with your own draft

Step 6: Refresh browser, notice that Ex has appended explanatory update that basically resolves concerns

Step 7: Review Step 3, revise conclusion to reflect that Gulliver's brain is fundamentally flawed in an extremely simple, easily illustrated way

Step 8: Choke yourself

Seeing as I've now spent so much effort demonstrating my high nerd quotient and talent for auto-distraction, I suppose I ought also own up to being a blowhard and a popinjay by sharing the product of my scribblings. (N.b.: the time I spent carefully modifying Ex's graph was meant to have been dedicated to a far more substantial post, one illustrated by yet another semi-original visual aid. That one will have to wait.)

I promise this made sense a few hours ago

So there it is: my redrafting of Ex's graph and some explanatory notes. What the hell does it all mean?

First of all, I think the original depiction suffers from a well-intentioned attempt at parsimony and elegance. The concept being depicted is too complex to be accurately rendered with just two lines. I understand the attempt, and the logic behind it is so simple as to be nearly self-evident: as U.S. engagement in Afghanistan decreases, other states will likely become more involved in the country so as to protect their interests. In the near term, those states that view the U.S. as a competitor will try to bandwagon off American efforts -- taking advantage of the stability dividends of NATO presence in Afghanistan to serve their own economic and geopolitical interests -- while enjoying the relative benefit of reduced U.S. readiness and flexibility attendant to the commitment of a substantial force. As the American footprint shrinks, countries like China and Iran will seek to assert themselves in Afghanistan so as not to suffer an interruption to the largely beneficial status quo.

Ex lays all of this down in two simple assumptions. (There are certainly more implicit in the model, but it's a good beginning.)

Let's start by assuming both China and Iran have an interest in U.S. military assets remaining in Afghanistan at great expense. Let's also assume that neither country, both with interests in Afghanistan, wants more instability.

Ok, so let's double back: Here he's saying that Iran and China want instability in Afghanistan to continue at present levels so as to ensure the U.S. continues to dedicate resources and military assets to it, but that China and Iran have broader interests in Afghanistan such that increased instability would be detrimental to them (outweighing whatever benefit is derived from continued heavy U.S. involvement). Put another way: an increase in Afghan stability would benefit those interests that exist independent of the relationship with the U.S., while harming the specific interest those countries have in continued U.S. involvement in the conflict.

This is all predicated on the idea that the presence of U.S. troops in Afghanistan contributes to stability, and that their departure will likely presage instability (absent other mitigating circumstances), or at the very least that a precipitious withdrawal of all American forces would threaten whatever stability currently exists. The Chinese and Iranians, then, want instability so much as it's required to cement American presence (and thus enhance their own position vis-a-vis the U.S.), but not so much as to threaten their own independent interests.

But what if decisions about U.S. troop levels in Afghanistan were made independent of assessments about the country's stability? What if the timeline for withdrawal was not controlled or impacted significantly by the security situation, and American troops were to be brought home without a care for whether or not the Afghan government could be counted on to secure predictable political outcomes? Because as it happens, that's our reality: NATO has pledged to turn over primary responsibility for the country to its own government by 2014, a benchmark that's helpfully highlighted on the graph. With a withdrawal timeline set, we can't argue that stability impacts force sizing in any meaningful sense. So U.S. troop levels aren't going to increase, and in fact are going to decrease on a generally predictable schedule. As such, we can eliminate that variable from our assessment of Chinese and Iranian interests and say that stability in Afghanistan is an objective "good" for those countries.

This is worth repeating: because China and Iran benefit from Afghan stability in a broad sense, and because the only detrimental effect those countries suffer from Afghan stability is increased U.S. flexibility and readiness, and because U.S. troop levels (and thus flexibility and readiness) are determined by an independent political decision and are thus not connected to Afghan stability… we can ignore U.S. troop numbers and say that all things which increase Afghan stability benefit China and Iran.

Still with me?

If Afghan stability benefits Chinese and Iranian interests – that is, if there’s a directly proportional relationship between the two – and if it’s assumed that stability will decrease after 2014, then China and Iran will seek to engage in behaviors that either counter this decline or mitigate the relationship between Afghanistan and their other interests. (This means that their options are to make Afghanistan less impactful on their other interests or to try to make Afghanistan more stable. This is the same choice the U.S. is facing right now, and we’ve determined that the threat of terrorism makes it impossible to pursue the first option. At least until 2014.) So as U.S. troop levels go down, Chinese and Iranian willingness to take stabilizing actions must increase in order to keep the “Afghan stability” indicator from spiking downwards. This is a decidedly different concept from what the original graph is meant to represent.

Of course, I wrote all that before Ex made his "clarification" (which is really a correction!). So you can see on my chart that I've redlined "Chinese and Iranian interest in a stable Afghanistan" on the original graph and replaced it with "Chinese and Iranian willingness to take actions to ensure stability." The conflation (or at least confusion) of these two variables was a major flaw. I addressed this by adding a new line which you can see across the top of my version: "Chinese/Iranian interest in Afghan stability." Over a limited timescale, this measure should stay relatively flat. The dotted line that scoops upward from "willingness" to "interest" is meant to illustrate the mistake we make if we fail to consider the intended U.S. withdrawal timeline: our adversaries' enduring interest in Afghan stability is only variable if a decrease in stability is met with a flexible U.S. response -- meaning an escalation and the attendant consequences for readiness.

Does this new graph have any broader meaning or explanatory value? Well, it ought to indicate that so long as we're willing to assume that other countries have an interest in Afghan stability, reducing our troop presence is certainly the correct decision. It prevents potential competitors from continuing to bandwagon and coattail, and we reap benefits from improved readiness and increased strategic flexibility. (But we already knew this, right?) It also means that those states that perceive a threat to their interests from uncertainty in Afghanistan should be lining up to get involved in a productive, stabilizing capacity -- both now and after the U.S. heads for the exits. (An predictable and unfortunate side-effect is that the internationalizing of the conflict absent strong U.S./NATO leadership is likely to have negative outcomes for the Afghan people, if not for "stability.") So why isn't that happening? Well, there are a few options: either A) those other countries don't perceive a similar level of threat from instability; B) they feel as though they're sufficiently shielded from the negative effects of instability or that the U.S. will continue to shield them in some way, even without troops on the ground; or C) they simply don't believe the U.S. is really going to leave.

That's what spits out at the end of all this? Fuck, what a waste of time.

What's in it for Russia? (UPDATED TWICE)

Russian defense minister Anatoliy Serdyukov met with Secretary of Defense Robert Gates at the Pentagon last week. Gates devoted more than four hours to his Russian counterpart; suffice it to say that it's unusual for the SECDEF to spend half a working day on a senior leader engagement.

That said, the time seems to have been well spent. Just today, the Russian government announced that President Dmitriy Medvyedev has cancelled a proposed sale of S-300 anti-aircraft systems to Iran, a development that will come as a pleasant surprise to American and Israeli military leaders. The S-300 is "a system that scares every Western air force," according to defense analyst Daniel Goure (via Spencer Ackerman), and Medvyedev's decision flies in the face of recent Russian insistence that the S-300 deal would go ahead.

So why the sudden change of heart? It's difficult to say. Gates' meeting with Serdyukov also apparently emphasized American gratitude for Russian assistance with the Northern Distribution Network, a logistics line that has become increasingly important to the coalition effort in Afghanistan in light of instability and insecurity in Pakistan. Spencer quotes Ariel Cohen and suggests that Russian complicity with U.S. wishes on the S-300 deal may be part of some sort of "quid pro quo" for the ministerial visit. But look at the Serdyukov-Gates chat alongside the NDN developments and recent U.S. interest in Russian helicopters. Just so there's no misunderstanding here, the Russians know exactly what's going on; here's what Serdykov had to say after his meetings with Gates: "“We discussed that our cooperation in the military and technical sphere isn’t developing. We, of course, have an interest in some American technology and, I think, they have an interest in some of ours.” Hint hint.

So, seriously: what's in it for Russia? They've helped with the NDN, they've agreed not to sell S-300s to the Iranians, and they're interested in exchanges of defense technology (to include facilitating U.S. efforts to supply warfighting partners with difficult-to-find Russian airframes). It can't be as simple as us refusing to satisfy Georgian pipe dreams about self-defense, right? Or pushing the "overcharge" button? So really: what is it?

UPDATE: This morning's Playbook has a statement on the S-300 issue from National Security Staff spokesman Mike Hammer:

"The White House strongly welcomes the Executive Order signed by Russian President Medvedev which bans the transfer of advanced weaponry to Iran, including the S-300. We believe President Medvedev has demonstrated leadership on holding Iran accountable to its international obligations from start to finish. We welcome this faithful and robust implementation of UN Security Council resolution 1929, and we remain committed alongside our Russian and other P5+1 partners to finding a negotiated solution to the Iranian nuclear issue."

UPDATE 2: Josh Rogin has an excellent rundown on this issue, though I think the space he gives to David Kramer's bleating is probably excessive. But to the point of this post, Rogin speculates that Russia's decision is an effort to win support for WTO accession:

As for why the Russians finally decided to scuttle the arms deal after years of lobbying by Washington, the official speculated that Moscow now has something it needs -- and that it finally has faith that the U.S. is willing to help. Russia is jockeying for as much U.S. support as possible for their upcoming bid to join the World Trade Organization (WTO), and Moscow is planning to finalize its bid this year.

"Momentum on WTO accession is what they see as they next big negotiations with us. We're right in the middle of that. That's asymmetric because that's more in their interest than ours. I think we have to deliver on that," the official said.

But the Obama administration isn't asking Russia for favors or giving them out in return, the official explained. The idea is to make the U.S.-Russia relationship more valuable to the Russians than their relationship with Iran, and both countries should act in their own interests.

"The objective is not actually to develop a good relationship with Russia. The goal here is to advance our national security and economic interests and to promote universal values," the official said.

The last bit is noteworthy in light of Kramer's criticism, perhaps. Anyway, it's worth reading the whole piece.

Anybody interested in a really, really stupid definition of "victory"?

Because I can show you one, courtesy of Lee Smith, author of The Strong Horse. He and Andrew Exum have been having a little back-and-forth about the fundamental, conceptual underpinnings of Smith's new book -- which, you won't be surprised to learn, I think are catastrophically flawed -- via Abu Muqawama and Michael Totten's blog. Smith's latest riposte came today, in a post entitled "The Trouble With Proxy Wars." Read the whole thing if you want (or don't), but I want to highlight the specific section in which Smith seems to reveal exactly what he thinks about the limits of military force (or rather, the almost completely unlimited nature of what can be achieved by effective use of force, I guess):

Whether or not the American counterinsurgency waged in Iraq’s Sunni regions was successful, Bush did not win Iraq, and Washington has no intention to win Iraq. It’s not me who says so, but rather a broad cross-section of America’s political, military and intelligence classes. Back in July 2008, Andrew himself wrote the following:

The past year and half have demonstrated that despite impressive gains in Iraq and a truly heroic effort by our soldiers and diplomats, a large portion of that country’s security environment is determined by the Iranians, who have leverage with nearly all of Iraq’s political parties and factions. If Iran desires to turn the heat up there or elsewhere in the region, it can.

Even Gen. David Petraeus, the man credited with a successful counterinsurgency campaign in Iraq, acknowledged in his senate testimony in March that "the Iranian regime has embarked on a broad campaign led by the IRGC-Qods Force to influence Iraqi politics and support, through various means, parties loyal to Iran. The Qods Force also maintains its lethal support to Shia Iraqi militia groups, providing them with weapons, funding, and training."

If the Iranians are capable of heating up Iraq, if they are able to embark on a broad campaign including both political and military aspects, then the US did not win in Iraq. The test of victory is simply whether or not you are capable of imposing terms on your adversaries; if you can’t, if rather they shape your strategic decisions -- e.g., if they determine your security environment by funding, arming and training militias -- then you have not won.

Or think of it like this: after VE Day what capacity did the Nazis have to heat things up for US troops in France and Italy and consequently determine US strategy? American society may have changed during the last half century so that we no longer know how to describe victory, but the objective standards for defining victory have not changed, nor have they changed at any time during the course of human history. The Iranians are able to shape our regional strategy because we did not win.

It bears repeating that it is not me who says we did not win, but rather our decision-makers. Of course, they do not explicitly say that we did not win, only that the Iranians can hurt us in Iraq and Afghanistan, which is the same thing.

This is really, really flawed. I could go into all the reasons why, or I could just take Smith's view to its logical historical extension and see how sane the whole thing seems to you. I'll do the latter. And so:

After VE Day, what capacity did the Soviets have to heat things up for US troops in Germany, or to deny them access to central and eastern Europe? What capacity did the Soviets have to deny the US complete dominion over Europe, or unipolarity, or limitless determination of the postwar geopolitical landscape? (Hint: if you said "nearly total," or at least "really, really high," then you're right!)

Postwar Germany is a really bad comparison for Iran for one simple reason: as much as it may disappoint Lee Smith, we haven't been fighting a war against Iran, and we haven't invaded Iranian territory! If "winning" means the exclusive, limitless ability to shape the postwar battlespace in any way we like, then we're very rarely going to "win" anything at all without engaging in total, regional war. It seems that Smith would probably agree with this analysis, and support that policy option. His stated support for aggressive action against Tehran and Damascus certainly doesn't suggest otherwise.

And so we're back where we started, really: Lee Smith is just another guy who thinks of the military instrument as a means to crush in their entirety the enemy's will and means to resist, not so much shaping outcomes as dictating them in toto. Must've been sick the day they taught Clausewitz.

"Joint IED Mitigation Organization" just doesn't have quite the same ring to it

"I don't think you can defeat the IED as a weapon system. It is too easy to use."

So says LTG Michael Oates, director of JIEDDO. Yeah, that JIEDDO: the Joint IED Defeat Organization.

Oates said technological advances have enabled the military to save lives by providing better armor and other forms of protection for troops. But he said the high-tech approach -- despite billions of dollars in research -- has failed to produce an effective way to detect IEDs in the field. About four-fifths of the devices that are found before they explode are detected the old-fashioned way: by troops who notice telltale signs, such as a recently disturbed patch of dirt that might be covering up a bomb.

Despite the insurgents' crude approach, the explosive power of their IEDs is growing. Each bombing in Afghanistan, on average, causes 50 percent more casualties than it did three years ago, Oates said Wednesday at a House committee hearing. U.S. officials say even armored troop-transport vehicles that were designed to protect against roadside bombs are now vulnerable.

IED attacks in Iraq have plummeted, you surely won't be surprised to learn.

Oates credited U.S. countermeasures -- such as interrupting the flow of military-grade explosives and detonators from Iran -- for some of the decrease. Other military officials said a bigger factor was the overall reduction in the intensity of the insurgency; as sectarian fighting faded, people simply stopped planting bombs.

Chicken or egg? Seems to me that while the interdiction of high-end bomb materials from outside the country would certainly have helped stanch the violence, it's far more likely that the stabilization of the security situation in Iraq was accompanied by a decrease in basically all types of violent incidents, including IEDs. After all, the Post article cited above -- and the military officials quoted therein -- emphasizes the fact that IEDs don't need to be built from bits off the Radio Shack shelves or Explosively Formed Penetrators (EFP) from the IRGC.

Political considerations made the adoption of a vehicle like the MRAP an inevitability. MRAPs have also saved a whole bunch of lives, so I don't mean to disparage their utility. But once the current conflicts are done, we're going to be left with a fleet of heavy, highly-armored vehicles well suited for buttoned-up patrolling on hardened roads in urban areas -- hardly the optimal system for the sort of conflicts we're likely to be engaged in over the coming decades. We can unload a few on the Iraqis and the Afghans, sure, but the program is an expensive one and has entailed some trade-offs.

So what's the point? I guess I'd say that we're learning that high technology might not be the answer to the IED problem. While a country like the U.S. certainly doesn't want to cede its technological advantage and should bring to bear whatever scientific and industrial capabilities may help to mitigate casualties and increase operational effectiveness, the conclusion I've drawn from Gunslinger and other combat soldiers and Marines is that the best counter-IED system is the Mk 1, Mod 1 eyeball. We can talk about network analysis and all the things the intel folks are doing to target construction and emplacement networks (or maybe we can't: I have no idea how that stuff works, and the details are mostly classified), too, but I think the conclusion here -- if we hadn't already drawn it -- is that there's not going to be a push-button answer to protecting our troops from IEDs.

Booby traps, mines, and hidden bombs will always be a cheap, unsophisticated, and effective countermeasure against foot patrol-intensive operations, and counterinsurgencies are very often going to be dependent on that sort of method of operation. I'm not saying we ought to give up looking for the magic bullet, but maybe there's a better way to think about how we spend our money and allocate our other resources to this mission.

Welcome to the party, David, even if you're like three years late

Did you know that America's global competitors are focusing on the development of anti-access technologies to counter U.S. power projection and expeditionary capabilities? Oh, you did? Yeah, me too. I heard from Andy Krepinevich like a year ago. And Bob Gates even before that. David Wood just caught on, apparently from "Pentagon strategists." But, I mean, that's cool -- keep getting the word out!

The United States, Pentagon strategists say, is quickly losing its ability to barge in without permission. Potential target countries and even some lukewarm allies are figuring out ingenious ways to blunt American power without trying to meet it head-on, using a combination of high-tech and low-tech jujitsu.

At the same time, U.S. naval and air forces have been shrinking under the weight of ever more expensive hardware. It's no longer the case that the United States can overwhelm clever defenses with sheer numbers.As Defense Secretary Robert Gates summed up the problem this month, countries in places where the United States has strategic interests -- including the Persian Gulf and the Pacific -- are building "sophisticated, new technologies to deny our forces access to the global commons of sea, air, space and cyberspace.''Those innocuous words spell trouble. While the U.S. military and strategy community is focused on Afghanistan and the fight in Marja, others – Iran and China, to name two – are chipping away at America's access to the Taiwan Strait, the South China Sea, the Persian Gulf and the increasingly critical extraterrestrial realms.

On the bright side, Wood links to Krepinevich's new study Why AirSea Battle?, which focuses on DoD's efforts to develop a counter-anti-access operational concept. It's worth a read. While you're at it, you might also take a look at Gunslinger's Document of the Week: The U.S. Navy's Vision for Confonting Irregular Challenges (or as Bernard Finel described it on Twitter, "fascinating document. Shows the power of the COIN/hybrid war junta inside the building." Um, right).

I probably wouldn't highlight this Wood piece on any other day, but I have a case of the redass about an appearance he made on the Diane Rehm Show the other night, in which he said some frankly idiotic things about what's going on in Afghanistan. (My favorite part is where he says that U.S. forces are pursuing "in essence a conventional, industrial-age strategy in Marja, not unlike one you saw in the American Civil War 150 years ago.") I would really encourage you not to listen.

Iranian rebel leader received U.S. backing

Oh, no, wait, that's just what he told Iranian authorities after he'd been captured and likely tortured.

Sunni Muslim rebel leader Abdul Malik Rigi, arrested Tuesday by Iran, said the United States had offered to provide him with a base, cash and weapons, according to Iranian state television, which showed him purportedly making the admissions.

Iranian authorities said Rigi's group, Jundallah, was responsible for several deadly attacks in southeastern Iran and is backed by the United States. They said he was provided with an Afghan passport and had been at a U.S. base in Afghanistan 24 hours before the arrest.

U.S. officials, of course, deny anything of the sort.

While I think this guy would probably tell his government tormentors just about anything they wanted to hear, it's fair to note that there were rumblings during the prior administration that the U.S. ought to support Jundullah. Here's what Bob Baer had to say about that in Time last October, after a suspected Jundullah bomb had killed IRGC leadership alongside a number of other people:

"American intelligence has also had contact with Jundullah. But that contact, as Iran almost certainly knows, was confined to intelligence-gathering on the country," Robert Baer, a former Middle East CIA field officer wrote on the Time.com, IRNA reported early on Saturday.

However, he noted that the US-Jundullah relationship "was never formalized, and contact was sporadic."

The news comes amid US denial of any involvement in a recent terrorist attack in Sistan-Baluchestan province in southeastern Iran, which Jundullah claimed responsibility for.

"I've been told that the Bush Administration at one point considered Jundullah as a piece in a covert-action campaign against Iran, but the idea was quickly dropped because Jundullah was judged uncontrollable and too close to al-Qaeda. There was no way to be certain that Jundullah would not throw the bombs we paid for back at us," said the former CIA agent who is a columnist in the weekly, and very probably an advisor in the Middle East.

Baer also noted that Pakistan's intelligence agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), has had relations with the Jundullah leader, Abdolmalek Rigi.

"Pakistani intelligence has indeed had contact with Jundullah over the years, but there's no good evidence that Pakistan created Jundullah from scratch. And there's certainly no evidence that Pakistan ordered the attack," Baer said in reference to the terrorist attack that took place in Iran on Sunday, October 18, which killed 42 people including the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps commanders.

There are a million good reasons why our association with Jundullah should never have progressed beyond the point where it apparently stopped (according to Baer), so this explanation has a ring of truth. That the Iranian regime would try to associate Rigi with the U.S. is about as surprising as it is compelling, which is to say not at all.

The death of an Ayatollah

Grand Ayatollah Hosein-Ali Montazeri - one of the most credible and eloquent critics of Iran's regime over the last 2 decades - has died. Others who know Iranian politics and society better than I will hopefully provide analysis in the coming days, but as mourners gather in Tehran and riot police stream into Qom, let's hope that the sad loss of a dedicated reformer is a rallying point for the opposition.

Congress is awesome

The Iran Refined Petroleum Sanctions Act passed the House yesterday 412-12. (Here's another article with some good info on this.) Two bastions of sanity on this day (and this is the only time you'll ever hear me say this) were Dennis Kucinich and Ron Paul.

Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, a leading critic of the bill, said it would antagonize the many Iranian people who oppose the Tehran government of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. "We're telling the Iranian people, 'we have feelings of friendship for you. we like you so much, but we're going to cut off your home heating oil.'"

"This will unify the Iranian people against us," said Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas.

The Senate ain't getting to it until next year, so this is pretty pointless for the time being except to jab a sharp stick in the eye of a regime that we're trying to compel to behave a certain way.

Ileana Ros-Lehtinen wants to "hit Iran where it hurts"

In an op-ed for today's Los Angeles Times, the ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee proposes a multi-pronged approach for compelling the Iranian regime to give up the pursuit of nuclear technology.

The regime in Tehran knows only hardball, and nothing less than overwhelming and crippling sanctions could produce a reversal of its threatening programs and policies.

That is why the United States must be prepared to act alone, if necessary, and with every weapon in its political and economic arsenal. The Iran Refined Petroleum Sanctions Act is one such tool. This legislation, which I coauthored, has the support of more than 300 members of the House, and it is urgent that this bill reaches the president's desk before the end of the year. It targets one of Iran's major weaknesses -- namely, its dependency on foreign gasoline and other refined petroleum products. By placing financial sanctions on U.S. and foreign companies providing these crucial resources, Iran's economic lifeline would be severed and its already weak economy would crumble.

But these sanctions must be coupled with action on all fronts. The U.S. must also specifically reject Iran's claim to an inalienable right to produce nuclear fuel.

So let's sum that up for clarity:

1. Block Iran from importing refined petroleum.
2. Inform Iran that it has no right to produce nuclear energy.

Iran can't refine its own oil, and needs to import gasoline from other countries. (As a result, the government must provide massive, nearly-bankrupting gasoline subsidies to offset the outrageously high natural price and stave off domestic discontent.) This is a massive vulnerability for Iran; if circumstances were similar in America, we would consider this a threat to our national security.

So I've got an awesome idea for bending Iran to our will: do everything possible to exploit its fears of isolation and vulnerability. Don't just prevent them from taking advantage of a plentiful resource to secure their energy requirements, but make sure they know you'll never allow them to find alternative solutions! In fact, make sure you tell them that if they try to develop the infrastructure to refine more of their own oil, you'll bomb the hell out of that, too!

This is certain to calm everyone down and reduce tensions in the region. Certain!

Rafsanjani to deliver sermon in Tehran

As many will have already heard, Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani will speak at Tehran University's Friday prayer service in a few hours. Rafsanjani is the chairman of both the Assembly of Experts (putatively empowered with the ability to replace the Supreme Leader) and the influential Expediency Council. He's one of the wealthiest and most well-connected politicians in Iran, and is a staunch supporter of the velayat-e faqih, or Guardianship of the Jurists -- the technical term for the Islamic Republic's theoretical "rule by (religious) judges." Most interestingly, he has only ever been considered a "moderate" or "reformist" in the context of the most recent presidential election, when he sided with Ahmadinejad's leading challenger, Mir Hussein Mousavi.

Today's sermon, Rafsanjani's first appearance at the prayer service in over two months, will be very closely watched. Neither conservatives nor reformists know exactly what to expect from Rafsanjani, who has long been a supporter of the clerical regime but recently emerged as a vocal critic of Ahmadinejad and his backers. Whether he chooses to be conciliatory or to further inflame the passions of pro-Mousavi elements will go a long way towards determining whether or not the matter of last month's elections is closed. Interior Ministry officials are already making noises that some interpret as encouragement to Basij militias to crack down with violence in the case of anti-government disturbances.

In related news, Ahmadinejad spoke in Mashhad yesterday and blamed the whole thing on the West. Shocker. Oh yeah, and when he's returned to the head of government, "with ten times more power and authority than before, [the government] will enter the global scene and will defeat the global arrogance." (That's a little code phrase he likes to use for America.) So be on the lookout for that.

Seriously though, Friday could be a big day in Iran, so keep your eyes open.