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This is an thoughtful posting:
The weekend was spent in Manchester, via Oxford. On Sunday morning a friend and I visited the Imperial War Museum North, which forms part of the dramatic redevelopment of the quaysides around the ship canal on the Salford/Trafford border.
I was brought up on school trips to the Imperial War Museum in Kennington. The huge naval guns at the entrance, the trench experience, the endless tanks, artillery pieces and bombers’ cockpits you can climb over, the uniforms, guns and bayonettes in cases. Regardless of your attitude towards war, you can’t deny it is a fascinating collection.
So we expected something similar in Manchester, but were surprised. There are very few physical exhibits: one T34 tank, a field gun, a fire engine, and for reasons I still don’t understand, a Trabant car. The cases are sparsely filled. The emphasis is not on weapons or uniforms or battles, but on the effect of war on people – refugees, children, prisoners, asylum-seekers, and peace protestors. So there were more letters and diaries than rifles and grenades. There was even a case filled with cultural items which reflect Britons’ obsession with WWII: Warlord comics, action man, and Dad’s Army.
There are frequent films projected on the vast walls – we saw one about children in war, and one about the ’causes of war’ (it’s all about oil and money).
This is not a place for a military historian or one who wants to see the development of the machine gun, but perhaps that’s not what people want anymore. Does the new type of musuem reflect changing social attitudes, or is it trying to mould them?
At least the architecture of the building, designed by Daniel Libeskind, is stunning, and you can buy Airfix models in the giftshop (very tempting!).
“Stunning” means, from the outside, looking like this:
Normally, I do not dislike buildings of this sort. For modern art something along these (curvey) lines is very appropriate. But put it like this, if the people who fought and died in the wars being propagandised about inside this edifice were asked what they thought of it, what do you think they would say? Or is it that I now associate such buildings with harmless trivialities, that therefore it really does not matter what they look like, and that therefore the architect might as well have some fun – but this is a museum about war?
By the way, to add some other design-related facts, the genius who did the recent redesign of Samizdata.net, and who designed this and this, and also, not surprisingly, this, also did this.
India has closed the deal for the purchase of the ‘Admiral Gorschkov’, a Cold War era Russian aircraft carrier. It is expected this ship will come into service with the Indian Navy around 2008, just in time for the retirement of the INS Viraat, their current aircraft carrier.
It is quite interesting that there is a continuing armaments relationship between the Russians and India, despite the seismic geopolitical changes of the last decade. An untutored alien landing for the first time on Earth would make no sense of it. The roles of the US and the USSR in that region should be reversed, Russia should be partnered with the alternating military dictatorship and semi-democratic kleptocracies of Pakistan and the US with India, the oldest liberal democratic state in Asia.
Relations between nations have layers within layers and oft-times deep and conflicting historical roots, I am aware of some of the public history of the region, but cannot help wondering if there is a bit more to it, an unspoken geopolitical undertext.
India has centuries of liberal European traditions behind it. It is also not likely to change very much even under severe pressure. Generations would come and go before the paperwork for change was properly submitted, checked, authorized and filed. In a Cold War world the risk of India actually going Red was rather slim and thus of less worry than perennially unstable Pakistan.
Pakistan borders China and is within spitting distance of Russia across a ultra thin panhandle of Afghanistan. The region is wild and uncontrolled and right in the hotspot is the contested Kashmir Province. Given the location and the consistant interest in access to the oil and southern oceans shown from Tsarist through Soviet days, Northern Pakistan was absolutely ripe for fun and games with the KGB. It seems obvious checkmating this move was of far more Realpolitik value than telling the Indians how much we admired their history.
With the end of the Evil Empire, much of Geopolitics changed, but the full extent of the re-alignment of interests in this part of the world did not really click into place until September 11th, 2001. Islamic fundamentalists were already a clear and present danger to the Russians. Nutcases don’t even have to board an airliner to get to Moscow. They can drive there. After 9/11 they were also top priority to the US.
Over the last century or so, the Russians have ticked off a lot of people on their borders and they know it. They’ve done a far better job at this than the US… so it is somewhat in their interest for the US to take the brunt of whatever direct ire is caused by sorting out the problems. Otherwise they would have to deal with it, and given their level of success in Afghanistan and Chechnya, I would not have much hope for solutions from that direction.
From the Russian viewpoint, it is ideal if the US stabilizes Pakistan and acts as the lightning rod for fundamentalist ire; meanwhile they help arm India so that in the worst case, a fundamentalist takeover of Pakistan, India can keep Pakistan occupied and looking away from Russian territory.
The Russians see the regional problems up front and personal; they are damned pretty much whatever they do and aren’t very good at building stable liberal democracies. They haven’t even worked the bugs out of their own yet. The US is somewhat less at risk from the downsides of action in the region since it is far, far away and bordered by oceans and democracies. Not that such is a total protection. It just means the crazies have to expend more energy and more resources to carry out their attacks. To put it bluntly, the US stands to lose a smaller number of cities to the fundies than would Russia.
So there is method to this madness. You just have to sit a moment in everyone’s chair and ask ‘what’s in it for me?’
The Threatening Storm: The Case for Invading Iraq
Kenneth M. Pollack
Random House, 2002
The author, a (presumably ex-) CIA operative, has written this book, published in the Autumn of 2002, as an advocate of “regime change” in Iraq, listing the various alternative options, five in all: Containment, Deterrence, Covert Action, The Afghan Approach” and (the preferred one) Invasion (p. xxix and Part III, pp. 211-386).
Iraq’s History and Relations with the US to Gulf War I
Part I (pp. 1-108) Iraq and the United States, following a 30 page Introduction, gives a concise summary of Iraq’s history and relations with US, with greater concentration after the fall of the Shah turned Iran from a Western bulwark to Islamic menace. From someone regarded with repugnance, Saddam became the “man we can do business with”, which meant tolerating some ghastly atrocities in the chemical warfare line against rebel Kurds and Iran, which Saddam had rashly taken on after its armed forces had been purged by the mullahs and sabotaged by departing US and dissident technicians. If the US rescued Iraq by supplying weapons, others – China, Russia (still the USSR), France, Germany and Britain – followed suit, many selling the ingredients for the nuclear, chemical and biological programs that have subsequently given so much trouble (p. 19). Officially Saddam could claim a victory and emerged from the 1980-88 war with a large well-armed army, but with 200,000 dead, terribly in debt and his economy badly degraded. His decision to attack and occupy Kuwait for its wealth, in gold, goods and oil, was fortified by his mistaken belief that his army could defeat an American riposte, and not unassisted by misguided pacific overtures and reports by the US ambassador, Susan Glaspie – and what has happened to her, I wonder? → Continue reading: The case for invading Iraq put (before it actually happened)
I rarely add a new blog to my list of daily visits, but Belmont Club makes the cut.
What does Belmont Club bring to the blog party, you ask? Adamantine analysis of the military situation in Iraq, for one thing, as well as a very interesting look at the pending takeover of the European left by radical Islamists.
As for the Iraqi situation, Mr. Wretchard thinks that the Baathists and Islamists are getting their asses handed to them,
and backs it up with trenchant strategic analysis.
→ Continue reading: First-rate analysis
John Keegan writes about his meeting with Donald Rumsfeld. Aparently, he does not think the situation is that bad:
Mr Rumsfeld read me a series of reports, from the American regional commands, summarising progress achieved: terrorists apprehended, weapons recovered, explosives destroyed. The totals were impressive. Despite daily reports of American casualties, he was dismissive of the danger to coalition forces. Within the context of the total security situation, he sees the level of violence as bearable and believes that the trend of terrorist activity is downward.
Economically, the outlook is strongly positive. Electricity supply actually exceeds pre-war levels, with an output of 4,400 megawatts per day in October, as against 3,300 in January. Oil production is returning to pre-war levels, at nearly 2,200 million barrels per day in October, as against 2,500 million barrels before the war.
Socially, the country has returned to normal. More than 3.6 million children are in primary school and 1.5 million in secondary school. University registrations have increased from 63,000 before the war to 97,000. Healthcare is at pre-war levels and is improving rapidly, because of greatly increased spending, estimated to be at 26 times pre-war levels. Doctors’ salaries are eight times higher and vaccination and drug distribution programmes have also been greatly increased.
Mr Keegan was frequently asked why there is so much less trouble in the British than the American area of occupation. He conceded that America, the Great Satan is target of greater hatred and Britain as the ‘lesser’ Satan does not attract the same degree of hostility. Further he acknowledged that the southern Shia area, where the British are operating, has always been anti-Saddam and therefore their task is easier compared with the American policing of the Sunni area. Also, Basra has a long history of dealing with Britain going back to the days of the East India Company. However, he insisted that there is a fundamental difference between the British and the American approach.
While the Americans, for reasons connected with their own past, seek to solve the Iraqi problem by encouraging the development of democracy, the British, with their long experience of colonial campaigning and their recent exposure to Irish terrorism, take a more pragmatic attitude.
They recognise that Iraq is still a tribal society and that the key to pacification lies in identifying tribal leaders and other big men, in recognising social divisions that can be exploited, and in using a mixture of stick and carrot to restore and maintain order.
The conclusion is unexpected and I expected will be resisted by those who think the United States’ exceptional history and status is as a result of the country’s banishment of European political practices, especially its opposition to imperialism.
Forcibly, America is becoming an imperial if not an imperialist country. The attitude was exemplified by an encounter I had with a tall, lean, crew-cut young man I met in Washington. Our conversation went as follows: “Marine?” I asked. “Yes,” he answered. “Have you been in Iraq?” “Afghanistan. Just got back.” The exchange was straight out of Kipling. There is a lot more of that to come.
There seems to be a fundamental misunderstanding of the British Empire by the Americans and by most marxist and statist continentals, namely that it was driven economically, not politically, and maintained defensively for the most part. The British merchants explored the world for new markets and the British state defended territories where trade with Britain took hold. British imperialism was not the sort the Romans would recognise. We do not need to look that far back, comparisons with Austro-Hungarian Empire or the Soviet Empire would highlight the different nature of the beast. So being imperial may not be so bad, provided you stop short of being imperialist.
Today is Remembrance Sunday and I am watching the Cenotaph ceremony in London. The military band just finished playing Rule Britannia and I remembered, time and again, what an amazing and powerful piece of music it is. Arrogance, defiance and a vow of no submission. It is not a piece of imperialist propaganda, as our transatlantic brethren are prone to conclude about anything British that smacks of national pride, but a cry that represents the desire to defend hundreds years of history and common heritage. It vows that Britons shall never be slaves. Not the country, not her rulers but Britons. And it rings true on this day, when we remember those whose lives were sacrificed to preserve the values that united Britain and her society against her enemies during the First World War and against the totalitarian evil sweeping the world during the Second World War.
Yesterday I was arguing hotly (off-line) against the very meaning of the Remebrance Day. It made me angry to think of so many individuals and their aspirations so cruelly and so pointlessly extinguished. Pointlessly, because the war was the result of the European states doing their ‘worst’ on the international scene. The state’s only legitimate role is to protect its citizens, but the First World War was sparked off by political horse-trading and petty international diplomacy that had nothing to do with the lives of those who were called upon to die on the European states’ playground. The British state let its people and soldiers down, by a strategy that counted lives by a heap. Today’s ceremonies are a far cry from the undignified deaths of the millions on the battlefields, in the trenches, they do not remember the mud, the corpses, the fear, pain and despair.
And it makes me angry to see the politicians taking on their most pious and sanctimonious expression for such occassions, men who have never known and would never understand that kind of sacrifice but are in a position to send others to it. Their expression contrasts with that of the veterans, whose eyes look beyond the memorials to their memories. And I suppose that is why I join the two minute silence and remember that those who died did not die for nothing. Their memory may have been hijacked and the truth tainted but that makes it all the more important to keep that memory alive.
True:
In this handout picture made available Tuesday Oct. 28, 2003 by the Israel-based Cornershot Co. in Tel Aviv, Israel, a rifle is seen composed of two parts; the front, that can swivel from side to side, containing a pistol with a color camera mounted on top, and the back section which consists of the stock, trigger and a monitor. According to a report by the Israeli daily ‘Maariv’ newspaper, the pistol, produced by the Florida-based Cornershot Holdings, is being tested by the Israeli military and has already been bought by a number of special forces around the world. The unique weapon allows a soldier to remain behind cover, with only the barrel of the rifle exposed in the direction of the hostile fire. (AP Photo/HO, Cornershot)
If you’ve already seen and heard about this days ago, apologies from me and only me. If not but you’re glad to see and hear of it now, you also have Chris O’Donnell to thank.
Update from the editor: As it happens, this innovative Israeli weapon is just a more sophisticated development of an idea implemented by the Germans in World War II… a version of the MP44 with a ‘shoot-around-corners’ attachment using a mirror.
Another bracing dose of perspective from Victor Davis Hanson:
[A]fter September 11 we will either accept defeat and stay within our borders to fight a defensive war of hosing down fires, bulldozing rubble, arresting terrorist cells, and hoping to appease or buy off our enemies abroad — or we will eventually have to confront Syria, Lebanon’s Bekka Valley, Saudi Arabia, and Iran with a clear request to change and come over to civilization, or join the Taliban and Saddam Hussein.
[B]y any historical measure, what strikes students of this war so far in its first two years is the amazing degree to which the United States has hurt its enemies without incurring enormous casualties and costs.
As always with VDH, it pays to read the whole thing.
The Kinder, Gentler Military: Can America’s Gender-Neutral Fighting Force Still Win Wars?
Stephanie Gutmann
Scribner, 2000
First published in 2000, nothing could better illustrate the subordination of the military to the civil power than this account, by a woman journalist, of the submission of the male-oriented former to the feminist-dominated latter. Since it is modern political dogma that men and women are equal, the recruitment of women into the fighting forces becomes obligatory. This book is a description of how this is done, and what happens afterwards. As yet, the result has barely been tested in battle conditions, so the problems are being confronted in peacetime.
There is ample evidence that if physical equality was the criterion, few women would qualify – after training intensively, a batch of women, in it for the experiment (not recruits), reached the standard of the weakest males (p. 251). At the same time as trying to pretend that females could be the equivalent of males in tough fighting with enemies out to kill them, they were presumed so vulnerable that they needed protection from all forms of harassment by their comrades, which meant that the sexes couldn’t really interact – and when harassment changed into acceptable behaviour, that was just as bad – the pregnancy rate soared.
There is a long account and analysis of the notorious “Tailhook” party in 1991, post-Gulf (pp. 156-188) “when we had finally gotten over Vietnam” which led to numerous dismissals of top airforce brass and a greatly lowered morale of the rest, resulting in a haemorrhaging of disgusted qualified pilots, at a cost of $lm each for training. This was ostensibly about harassment, though most of the women present could either take care of themselves, expected what they got or went there to get it. Even during a rowdy “gauntlet”, when someone shouted “I’ve lost my pager”, everything stopped until it was found. The woman who led the complaints benefited to the tune of $5+m – and left the service. After Tailhook, everything was about gender, … [it was] the worst event for the Navy since Pearl Harbor.”
Of course, the whole burden of the book is that the US armed forces are not being treated by Congress and the media as a fighting force whose efficiency is paramount, but as a section of society which can be moulded into something with quite a different agenda from fighting and killing, though what that is is difficult to define – that men and women are basically equal and if it doesn’t always work out that way, it’s the men’s fault.
The book ends with a series of recommendations, granted that the forces should remain open to women:
- Eliminate recruiting quotas for women;
- Have separate-sex “boot camp” training;
- Have high and equal standards there;
- Restore “openness” and be frank about the problems, not just put them down to “sexism”;
- Exonerate the personnel victimised after Tailhook (“Witchook”);
- Separate the social service personnel from the fighting forces;
- Copy the practice of Marines, who seem to have fought through the “gender” nonsense largely unscathed.
Interesting legal development – a group of Gulf War veterans are suing the banks and chemical companies that facilitated Hussein’s procurement or manufacture of chemical weapons to which the troops were exposed during the first phase of the Gulf War.
“Sixteen veterans from the Persian Gulf War filed suit Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Brooklyn, N.Y., against 11 chemical companies and 33 banks from throughout the world that allegedly helped Iraq construct and support its extensive chemical warfare program.
The banks named in the suit include Deutsche Bank AG of Germany, Lloyds Bank of the United Kingdom, Credit Lyonnais of France, State Bank of India, Banca Roma of Italy, National Bank of Pakistan, Arab Bank of Jordan, Bank of Tokyo and Kuwait Commercial bank. The companies that the suit claims have sold chemicals or materials to Iraq are headquartered in France, Switzerland, Germany, Great Britain and the United States – ABB Lummus Global Inc. in Delaware.”
The companies all do business in New York, where the suit was filed, so there is no issue of extraterritorial jurisdiction (the fatal flaw to date of that pet tranzi project, international courts).
The lawsuit will have to clear some very difficult legal hurdles before any recovery can be had. If these hurdles are cleared and the veterans receive damages, then the end result could be extreme reluctance on the part of any private business to sell anything, or provide any services, with a military application to any government. After all, liability for the damages, or even collateral or unintended damages, caused by weapons sold to a government, would probably shut down or impede the sale of weapons by the private sector to governments. Attempts to force governments to indemnify their suppliers would be, interesting, to say the least. Depending on exactly how the case goes off, it could clear the way for lawsuits against gun manufacturers for shootings and other crimes. Second order effects could will include the nationalization of defense industries and weapons manufacturers to bring them under the umbrella of sovereign immunity, or other special treatment for these firms.
If the firms were violating the law when they made the sales, then I can see holding them liable for the foreseeable effects of their illegal activity. If the sales were legal when made, then I begin to have a problem with this lawsuit, on both jurisprudential and policy grounds. The jurisprudence of imposing liability for actions that were legal when done is very troubling, of course. The policy implications, a few of which are noted above, are also troubling, although the notion of governments being pariahs in the marketplace for things that hurt people has a certain very definite attraction.
One doesn’t have to look far to find all manner of carping about the current occupation of Iraq. Much of the carping lacks any broader perspective, and this lack of perspective leaves one at a loss as to how seriously to take, for example, anonymous reports of Iraqi citizens being abused by US soldiers. Setting aside the morally obtuse, who think we should have just left the Iraqis to the continued ministrations of Saddam and the Baathists, those critiques worth listening to at all generally boil down to a complaint about the competence of the occupying forces.
I think that we are seeing is an entirely predictable result of the fact that the American, and to a somewhat lesser degree the British, military forces are designed and operated as war-fighting forces. This is in sharp contrast to most other military forces in the world, which serve as a combination of welfare jobs programs and, in effect, domestic occupation forces. The US army, at least, does not prepare much for occupation work, perhaps because they find their time fully occupied preparing for their primary function of kicking the living crap out of the opposition force. Personally, I wouldn’t have it any other way.
War-fighting and occupation are famously incompatible with each other – one demands the rapid application of lethal force, the other the modulated escalation of minimum necessary force, etc. A war-fighting army cannot transition, on the fly, from war-fighting to occupation, at least not with the speed and efficacy now demanded of the US and British forces in Iraq.
See what conclusion you derive from the following assumptions:
- The West, as a matter of self-defense, will need to occasionally go in and change the regime of a foreign nation. Unless you retreat into pacifist fantasizing, I think that 9/11, not to mention WWII, demonstrates that, from time to time, militarily expedited regime change of hostile nations will occasionally be a necessity for the continued survival of even the most libertarian country.
- The occupation forces need to be operating at near pitch-perfect levels within a few days of the Dear Leader statues coming down. It is apparently now the case that, once the old regime is out the door, the victorious forces must have the place running at least as good as before, in jig time.
- The war-fighting forces cannot operate as an occupation force at satisfactory levels. The current conventional wisdom seems to be that successful post-war occupation requires administrators and enforcers that speak the language and are conversant with local customs spread throughout the country within a manner of weeks, if not days, and no heavy-handed policing or otherwise excessive uses of force allowed.
The only conclusion that I can draw is that the US, and possibly other Western nations, need to diversify their armed forces to include specialist occupation and civil administration units. Since many of the complaints about the occupation have to do with the lack of intimate familiarity with the Iraqi situation, we will need to have units training up to take over and run specific foreign nations years before hostilities actually break out.
Imagine the diplomatic possibilities! Will the French be offended because we don’t deem them enough of a threat to spin up a French occupation army group? Or will they be offended because we are planning to run France, for a bit, anyway?
The logic of sky-high expectations seems inescapable to me – self-defense requires regime change, which requires expert military occupiers and nation builders, which in turn requires detailed advance training in the language and customs of the nation to be uplifted.
The strategic and diplomatic consequences of going this route are, of course, disastrous. Even worse are the potential domestic effects – having a prefab military junta sitting around with nothing but time on its hands does not bode well for the domestic tranquility, does it?
Of course, in my view, this is all unnecessary if realistic expectations are maintained. Occupation is a tough business, one that will satisfy virtually no one no matter how well it is done. The Iraqis have complained, for example, that we don’t shoot looters on sight, and undoubtedly many of the ongoing problems with electricity and the oil industry have to do with the coalition trying to rule with a relatively light hand. But for every step we take toward greater enforcement and protection (more troops, more aggressive patrolling, shoot on sight policies, etc.), howls of protest will go up from both within and without Iraq.
The key, I think, is to keep your eye on progress towards the long-term goal and to maintain some minimal perspective on events. Sadly, in today’s partisan world of 24 hour news cycles, long-term thinking and perspective always run a poor second to political cheap shots and sensationalist video clips.
Our Man in Basra has sent us a few quotes from locals before his next dispatch about Basra society.
Words from the streets of Basra:
For over 30 years we suffered under Saddam. No Arab, no Muslim country came to help us. Then America and Britain made political decision to get rid of Saddam. Now we should help the British.
From local Sheikh.
You should be more like the Americans and kill more Ba’athists.
After US killed Uday and Quasay and first time I heard anyone say we should be more like the Americans!
I am very happy that Uday and Quasay were killed but it is a pity they were not captured so they could be put on trial and tortured and then killed. Being killed like this was good for them.
The people here really hate Saddam and all his family and friends. It’s about the one thing everyone agrees on. When the news was confirmed that the evil sons were dead, the whole place was like 4th July in South L.A. In fact it was like watching TV footage of the nights Baghdad was bombed, there was tracer arching up into the sky from every direction you looked. Quite pretty to watch it sailing overhead, but a little worrying to see how many places all around us have automatic weapons to fire off, as well as all kinds of flares. And no shortage of ammo either. On the other hand these people must like us really, because we don’t get all that fired at us, and there’s a lot more civilians with guns here than there are soldiers. But basically, Saddam’s sons dead – party time. The only down notes I heard from anyone was “let’s get the rest”, and “pity they didn’t suffer more”. A lot of people wanted them put on trial but I don’t think a few years in prison and early parole for good behaviour was ever an option. Incidentally, one 12 year old boy sleeping on a roof seems to have been killed by falling fire, though we can’t be certain that was the reason – we had a few near misses. This prompts the thought that one of the first things Iraq really needs is some decent fireworks for celebrations. And don’t worry too much about the safety regs, just make them loud.
You British built Basra, you built the sewers, you taught us how to dress, how to eat, how to run the oil industry. We do not know the Americans, we think they are against the Muslims because of what they do, but we know you. Why do you not do now what you did in 1920 and 1941 and control this place and get rid of the bad men? Then Basra will be very rich for everyone.
By bad men this man meant Ba’athists, anti-CF, sheikhs, criminals and religious fundamentalists. There are quite a lot of anglophiles in Basra from the last time my Regiment was here in WW2 but of course you have to allow for them telling you what they think you want to hear…
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Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
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