A Second Hand Conjecture

Teaching your girlfriend that thing you said you like over at The Conjecturer.

Defense and the War

• The reconciliation deal is of course welcome news. Lance urges proper caution (in particular because the Baath Party is none too pleased with the changes in de-Baathification), as Maliki has proven a marked ability not to hold these together. I wonder what impact that will have on the insurgency, and on the counterinsurgency. If the surge somehow did provide the government the breathing space we say it needed, will that push more pro-war bloggers to push for withdrawal? Or are signs of progress (such as the overwhelming presence of children in our detention centers) as equally indicative of our need to stay for years and years as signs of failure?
• This is certainly distressing, and it makes me doubt further our noble intentions in invading Iraq: “Rather than send the snake eaters to poke around mountain caves and mud-walled compounds, the U.S. military wanted to fight on a grander stage, where it could show off its mobility and firepower.” Well, I’m certainly glad Newt Gingrich convinced The Don Rumsfeld, and eventually Bush himself, that we needed a flashier war to prove how awesome we are. That like, totally worked out.
• Also, notice how even the war supporters in the government are saying the longer the war drags on, the better the jihadists become at methods and tactics? It really is a think tank for terrorism, one we created.
• Oops. National Review forgets what it advocated for years in Iraq, choosing instead to blame Democrats. Sounds about right. Also I lolled reading about how Paul Brinkley is “under investigation” for behaving like John Bolton and wanting a vast array of state-funded enterprises to fake an Iraqi economy. It sometimes moves beyond parody, ya know? Like, when we have 3,000 logistics offers per 2,000 ground troops in the surge…
• The F-35 was mis-designed by Lockheed Martin, turning it almost into a useless paperweight. This is one of the many reasons David Axe quite rightly sees the Air Force as increasingly irrelevant. He also repeats the Obama-slander that an over-reliance on air power creates havoc and kills too many civilians in Afghanistan. But what would he know? He’s only been there.

Around the World

• China barely has an environmental protection officials, which should inspire doubt as to their commitment to said environment… especially for the Olympics. And while I am generally “up” on China, they have serious human rights issues as well—such as the imprisonment and torture of Tiananmen Square dissident (and U.S. resident) Yang Jianli. As they expand their ocean presence, the way in which China chooses to exercise its growing power will to a large degree determine how various other countries—including this one—treat China right back.
• Russia may have finally zeroed in on the killers of Anja Politkovskaya. The culprits? Foreigners, conspiring to “discredit” the Kremlin. I daresay the Kremlin has been far more effective in this regard. I cover this more, including all the zaniness happening along the border with Georgia, over at Registan.net
• Barnett Rubin has an extensive exploration of the new U.S. Counternarcotics Policy for Afghanistan, with a great follow up here. Rubin is required reading for serious studies of Afghanistan.
• Meanwhile, Afghanistanica really beats a dead Chechen horse, twice. No, I’m not kidding, and read both links to see why. He and I share a deep frustration with the incredibly lazy reporting on Afghanistan… though I would extend that to westerners (and bloggers!) covering all of Central Asia.
• Hrm: Bridging two countries with one soul. I like the sound of that. Pics of the new drug trafficking bridge are available here.
• Bangladesh will most likely be the new front of anti-terrorism in the next decade. This is in part because big areas of the country are uncontrolled (rather, controlled by extremist groups like Harkat-ul Jihad al-Islami), and in part because for years there have been rumors of al-Qaeda operatives setting up shop in the central and northern bits of the country. In fact, shortly after the invasion of Afghanistan, a cargo vessel with known ties to al-Qaeda (i.e. it’s been tracked trafficking supplies for them) was seen in Chittagong and later Dhaka. Further, Bangladesh borders the insurgency-ridden Indian state of Assam… which bodes poorly for cross-border movement. There is nothing yet beyond rumor and educated guessing… but I don’t think this bodes well for the security of South Asia.
• What to make of Pervez Musharraf’s aides visiting with Bneazir and Nawaz? Might he behave like a mature adult, hold elections on time, and step down peacefully? Might Pakistan finally get back the democracy it so richly deserves? Might there be the chance Pakistani politics won’t be hopelessly corrupt?
• When the Turkish military complains that secularism is under attack, I immediately begin to wonder how long it will be before yet another coup. Turkey is caught in a nasty bind: its population has radicalized lately, in part because of its woes with EU ascension, in part because (let us be frank) because of our invasion of Iraq. But if the military takes over the government, as seems to be the pattern every three decades or so, they definitely won’t even join the EU, and it would worry an American military nervous they’ll also invade Kurdistan and muck up the very fragile consensus that might be building there. So what to do?
• Thank goodness the Chinese have finally begun to feel okay with having sex. Actually, that’s partially serious: I’m all about people feeling free to make their own choices about sex, without some lame-ass ideology—whether religious or socio-political—telling them not to. Just, ya know… double bag it.

Back at Home

• Alberto Gonzalez tendered his resignation, though he can’t recall doing so or the reasons for taking such an action. Adios, dickhead. Reason makes it a point to remind me what a nightmare pretty much all Attorneys General have been. Yuck.
• A student at my alma mater had his throat slashed on the first day of classes by a crazed older gentleman who then proceeded to stab himself several times in the chest. I think we need to respond with stricter knife control, because otherwise criminals will keep using knives to commit crime.
• Granted it’s Perez Hilton (himself a horrendous beast who makes me reconsider my stance against euthanasia), but his fake story on Castro’s death just left my jaw on the floor.

The should be familiar to anyone who ever took High School French.

Trackback URI | Subscribe to the comments through RSS Feed