War or Peace: Not Quite the Choice We Face

I saw this morning

A split has emerged among Dems over whether the party should aim to work with Republicans or wage war against them, a division stemming from a belief by many rank-and-file Democrats that the GOP has stopped playing by the old rules. From me & @seungminkim:https://t.co/WTMXKtLYYv

— Matt Viser (@mviser) May 31, 2019

and had a few thoughts:

A) As a scholar of IR, I immediately thought: if a country declares and fights war on another country and that second country chooses not to fight, we tend to call that surrender and defeat.  What happens after surrender?  Mostly very bad stuff.  So, the Dems need to choose war.

B) Um, who radicalized me?  I used to be a fairly moderate democrat.  Oh, that's right, Mitch McConnell.  And John Kelly and Kirstjen Nielsen.

One can argue about the date when this war started.  It could be 2009 when the GOP said they would prefer to deny Obama any wins even if it was good for the country exactly at a time where the US was involved in two wars and the deepest economic hole since the Great Depression.  It could be 2016 when Mitch McConnell refused to let Merrick Garland have a hearing in the Senate, making up a rule that he has recently reputed--that Presidents should not be allowed to have their SCOTUS nominees considered in an election.  One could argue it has been since 2017 as the GOP in Congress refused to do their damn jobs--overseeing the government. They have tolerated both massive corruption and the arson of institutions far and wide.

So, the real question is not war or peace, but how to fight the war.  Whether impeachment now or down the road, whether to hold up USMCA (NAFTA 1.001), whether to close government the next time the opportunity shows up, etc.  Speaking of the last, it turned out that shutting the government down because of Trump's petulance hurts Trump.

Expecting bipartisanship is kind of like being a Special Prosecutor and thinking that the Trump-appointed Attorney General would do the job according to the old rules.  It is naive bordering on stupidity.  Or vice versa.

I don't think Dems should go on Fox, I don't think the Dems should work with Trump, and I am starting to think that the Dems should be starting the impeachment process even though I know it will not lead to Trump losing office.  And, yeah, by the way, kids are dying in cages.

There are one thing the Dems should not do in this war.  They should not try to appeal to the US armed forces to do anything about it.  It is not their job.  It is the job of the courts (until they are packed with Trumpists), and it is job of lawyers and of legislators at all levels.  Because even in wars, there are limits to what one should do, as Trump's pardoning of war criminals reminds us.

Capital Capture: Give Me Info and I Am Yours

As I approach the 7th anniversary of moving to Ottawa, I keep on marveling at my good fortune.  There never was a grand plan to move to Ottawa--it just happened.  Indeed, when I applied for the job at Carleton, I had no expectation of getting it.  Indeed, I didn't get that job (the Barton Chair)--I got the Paterson Chair instead, and it has been a great experience even before my ultimate frisbee team beat a NPSIA-based team last night in the Ottawa ultimate league.

Yesterday was not typical but not atypical.  I went to a briefing organized by the Conference on Defence Associations Institute (a CDSN partner) given by a Canadian officer who had commanded in the Mideast as part of OpImpact.  I learned a great deal including:

• The effort is now a regional one as they have folded the Iraq mission in together with training missions in Lebanon and Jordan.
• The Jordan training includes helping to create Female Engagement Teams--so that the Jordanian military can interact with women better.  Lots of change is going to happens since the speaker indicated that some of the officers of the Jordanian military don't know what to do with the trained women--their new skills are not for secretary jobs but for crowd control, patrolling, etc.
• One Canadian training effort in Lebanon is winter training.  Turns out that a key hunk of the Lebanese border with Syria has long gone unpatrolled because the Lebanese armed forces have had little training in this area.  And yes, there are mountains and snow and skiing in Lebanon.
• The CAF is definitely learning how to do the training and what to expect: "We can't want it more than they do."  Also, this officer was honest about the limitations--we can't say that folks we trained didn't go on to do war crimes.  This is more believable than the previous assurances that this could not happen.  I'd love to see a study that assesses whether western-trained soldiers commit fewer war crimes and whether this varies by the identity of the trainers.  But the methodological problems might just be insurmountable.
• Not much media coverage and much of this is the fault of Canada--that for sometime, the policy was not to show the pictures of faces or give the names of those doing the training.  Fear of security risks were scoffed by those in the room.  A rep of a coalition partner said they had the same policy.  
• That the electromagnetic spectrum is dominated by our opponents.  That is, we do not control the airwaves, and we have to assume that our unclassified networks are penetrated.  Not great.
• Because of how personalist things are (including corruption that provides the grease that allows the military machinery to move in places like Iraq), the performance of any unit depends more on the battalion commander than pretty much anything else.  So, of course, this leads to a key question/observation--who decides who commands and by what criteria?  A big reason why 2014 happened--ISIS getting so close to Baghdad as the Iraqi forces broke--is that promotion was very much about who was loyal to the party in power and not about performance.  

After this, I went to have coffee with someone from inside government who was seeking my take on the world and what Canada is doing.  I actually was not as negative as I often seem to be:

• that when NATO decided to take over the coalition training effort in Iraq, Canada jumped quickly to take the lead, a contrast to how, um, slow, Canada was to agree to lead the NATO effort in Latvia
• that OpImpact, which I had just been briefed on, is actually a pretty coherent effort (contra to the Liberals' starting point, which I had criticized as incoherent, getting me into a twitter fight with Gerry Butts)
• I complimented the Liberals on what an overly cynical person might consider a trap they set for Andrew Scheer and the Conservatives--announcing a new shipbuilding program--this time for the Coast Guard.  How can the Conservatives promise to cut the deficit down to zero if they are wedded to the existing shipbuilding program, this new one, and, oh, yes, a promise to buy new submarines?  Given how all of the parties have to sell out to Vancouver and Halifax on shipbuilding (and maybe Davie in Quebec), I can't see how Scheer can keep the various promises.  It was hard to do even before the new shipbuilding announcement and now much, much harder.
• I did criticize the government for sticking to the planned duration of the Mali mission--that it was for one year, whether or not our replacements are ready.  I think it burns the political capital earned by the mission, it hurts any chance to say that Canada is back in peacekeeping, and so on.  On the other hand, the Conservatives are not going to run on doing more peacekeeping, so this is not a huge vulnerability.  Just seems dumb to me.  Yes, there are tradeoffs and costs, but if the mission is worthwhile for a year, it is worthwhile for 15 months.  This is not a case of extending forever.
• I did criticize the government for keeping a promise that it should have implemented last and not first--disbanding the Liberal caucus in the Senate.  This has made it far harder to get things done including securing the next election (thanks to Stephanie Carvin for educating me about this).  This should have been one of those promises kept later in one's term.  Ooops.

Anyhow, I got into this business because I am deeply curious about damn near everything.  Being in a national capital means learning heaps of stuff through these kinds of meetings.  I do love my job, and I do, yes, love Ottawa.  Some call it a bubble.  I call it home.  

Battle Rhythm

After many conversations, some twitter crowd-sourcing, and yet more discussion, Stéfanie von Hlatky of Queen's University and I have agreed to name our new Canadian Defence and Security Network podcast: Battle Rhythm.  We both picked up this piece of jargon while hanging out with the military.  I learned it in the Pentagon during my fellowship on the Joint Staff, and Stéfanie picked it up while doing fieldwork on her project on gender and NATO.  

What does the term mean?  It refers to the daily routine, which you would think would be sufficient.  For the military types, battle rhythm means having a regular schedule that helps keep everybody synchronized--in rhythm.  

Why did we choose it?  Good question.  I think it speaks to the larger CDSN effort of trying to connect and coordinate the defence and security folks (those who study it, those who do it, those who are involved in it).  We have no expectations of getting everybody to be in sync, but we do hope the podcast forces us to develop our own rhythm--of sharing the research the CDSN is generating, of providing our perspectives on defence and security issues, and of interviewing people on a regular basis, and of responding to our listeners (folks can send questions or comments to

cdsn.rcds@outlook.com).

We will use the podcast to preview events in the CDSN network--not just those organized by CDSN HQ but those of our thirty plus partners and 100+ participants--and share their findings.  So, some of the interviews will be of participants from these events.  Other interviews will be with those in and near government to understand how they think about the stuff they do. One of the key goals of the CDSN is to help foster a more inclusive and diverse next generation of defence scholars, scientists, and policy-makers.  So, we will bring those voices that have not been heard much to a wider audience (assuming the podcast develops a wider audience!).  

We are sure that the podcast will evolve, so that some recurring segments will develop and ones we started may be dropped.  It will take a while to figure out our rhythm.  I hope you can join us for this ride.   

Introducing the Canadian Defence and Security Network

The time has come to roll out the Canadian Defence and Security Network.   We have been working on funding the CDSN for several years, so we are elated and just a wee bit anxious. 

This is what our network looks like now, more or less.

We have built an excellent team of scholars and defence scientists to lead the effort and already have a terrific staff to do much of the heavy lifting and day-to-day management. In addition to that, we have so many partners in a variety of sectors in Canada and beyond who strengthened our application through the commitments they have made.   I am so very grateful for the work done thus far and the work to be done by our leadership team (David Bercuson, JC Boucher, Andrea Charron, Irina Goldenberg, Phil Lagassé, Anessa Kimball, Alex Moens, Alan Okros, Stéphane Roussel, Stéfanie Von Hlatky, and Srdjan Vucetic),* the folks at CDSN HQ (Jeffrey Rice, Melissa Jennings, Alvine Nintai), the people at NPSIA, our dean (Andre Plourde), grants facilitator extraordinaire (Kyla Reid), other folks at Carleton including our VP for Research (Rafik Goubran), and our partners and participants.  I look forward to working with these terrific people along with others who join our efforts.

* Note we have plenty of Francophones on our leadership team that will help compensate for my being linguistically lame.  While my blog here is unilingual, we will try to make sure that much of our stuff will be accessible in both official languages.

Of course, as you are reading this, you are asking yourself: what is the Canadian Defence and Security Network and what is it supposed to do?  

It is a partnership involving academics at both civilian and military universities, units within the Canadian Armed Forces, elements of the Department of National Defence, think tanks, advocacy organizations, a survey firm, and more.  We have a set of common objectives:

• To create a coherent, world-class research network.
• To advance our understanding of defence and security issues.
• To tailor research initiatives to provided evidence-based knowledge to inform policy-making
• To facilitate the transfer of knowledge and data across various divides.
• To improve the defence and security literacy of Canadians (and beyond).
• To build the next generation of experts with an emphasis on equity, diversity and inclusion.

How will we reach those objectives?  The CDSN will focus on five themes to coordinate research efforts--military personnel, defence procurement, operations, civil-military relations, and security--while also providing resources via our headquarters to assist its members and its partners to collaborate and amplify their work.  

To provide an example, one can imagine an event organized by scholars in Kingston or Calgary.  The CDSN Headquarters (based at CSIDS at NPSIA) will help provide contacts to reach out beyond the networks of the organizers, assist if grant-writing is required, will help publicize the event through the CDSN's social media efforts (yes, we have some experience in that stuff) including a blog, twitter account, and podcast, and then after the event, provide a repository for the data generated, the papers and policy briefs that are produced and spread the findings via our website.  

Please note, despite our years of prep work, we are very much a work in progress.  We are officially launching the CDSN on May 24th, and our first major event will be the Kingston Conference on International Security (KCIS) in early June.  While that event has been a great conference involving not just Queens's Centre for International and Defence Policy but also the NATO Defence College and the US Army War College's Strategic Studies Institute and various CAF elements, we hope that the CDSN will help KCIS have a broader reach across Canada, and it will probably provide our first podcast content!  We will also be supporting the Women in International Security-Canada Annual Workshop later in June.

For our first year, we will be focusing mostly on developing our infrastructure and figuring out how to help the various members of the CDSN community.  In years 2-7, we will have thematic workshops on our five areas of research; book workshops for junior scholars; post-docs; surveys of the Canadian public; network analyses; summer training institutes for scholars, military officers and policy officers; an annual conference; defence fellowships for military officers; and capstone events that will bring the best young presenters from events across Canada together to present to defence policy-makers.

Our twitter account is: https://twitter.com/CdsnRcds.  The website will be populated as time goes on, and we will certainly have facebook, instragram and other social media accounts that we will be announcing over the next few months.  Our logos are a work in progress, but this is what we have thus far:

If you are interested in joining our efforts or have questions, shoot us an email at cdsn-rcds@outlook.com.

My Peeviest Pet Peeve is Political

Apparently, Robert Mueller's team has "expressed reticence to him testifying publicly in front of the House Judiciary Committee" because "he does not want to appear political." (via @mkraju)

It's past time for people to step up and do their jobs, even in the face of reticence.

— Amee Vanderpool (@girlsreallyrule) May 21, 2019

When I read that, I wanted to scream.  Why?  Because pretty much everything is political in one way or another and saying something appears to be political is a pretty silly way to think about things.  Let me first address the general peeve and then focus on the specifics of Mueller and the investigation.

One of the fun parts of starting out in political science is thinking about what it covers.  What does it mean for something to be a subject of political science?  What does it mean for something to be political?  I am both too lazy and too busy to reach for my Aristole books (to discuss what a polis is), so I will focus on the basics: whenever people have to decide something.  Yep, that's it.  Deciding what the rules are, deciding how to distribute something, deciding responsibilities--these are all political things. 

So, when folks talk about something becoming political or politicized, it mostly seems beside the point.  One can argue whether something is becoming polarized, which is very different, but something becoming more of a topic for politicians or for elites in the community to decide?  That just means increased salience and relevance.  What people often try to mean with "more political" is that something that was being left alone or being resolved outside of the political arena is now being decided in the political arena--at the city council, the statehouse, the federal (or not so federal) government.  Of course, lots of things become political--being fought over in national politics--because the old way of deciding things was fine for some people and not others.  Here's where Rush really comes in--choosing not to decide is still a choice.  Choosing to keep things out of the political arena is not a neutral choice as it favors those who benefited from the old order, the old way of deciding things. 

I could go on with this, but the basic idea is that the stuff of politics is the stuff of life, of society, of groups.  That we can defer decision to "the market," which again is a choice or we can choose to delegate decision-making to some authority, but that, too, is a political decision. 

Now, onto Mueller.  A guy gets asked by a part of government (Deputy Attorney General, if I remember correctly) to investigate whether crimes were committed during the course of the Presidential campaign including the possibility that one presidential campaign (hint: not the Democrats) conspired (not collusion) with Russia in the run up to the election.  While there are many, many topics covered by political science and the label of politics, none are more POLITICAL than elections.  The national process to choose the next leader is as classic a topic of political science and something of politics than anything else.  Indeed, when folks learn someone is a political scientist, they often focus first on elections.

Indeed, this is very, very POLITICAL combo: elections and foreign interference.  Mueller was essentially asked if the current President had committed crimes, whether he obstructed justice and whether he conspired with the Russian government (indeed, focusing on the Russian government, rather than Russians, is one way that Barr tries to argue that there was no conspiracy). The context is as plain as it gets--should the President be impeached (since the Department of Justice in an incredibly political decision decided the President can't be indicted--something this agency did not decide in 1998 for Bill Clinton)?  While one can try to focus strictly on the legal stuff--does something rise to the level of being indictable, whether laws were broken--impeachment is as political as it gets: should the legislature try to remove the President? 

Mueller saying he does not want to appear in a televised Congressional hearing because he would appear political just incredible.  As in: not believable.  Mueller waded deep into the muck of politics (I actually don't think politics is muck, but let's run with Mueller's mindset for a moment) as soon as he decided to take on the job of investigating the President and the campaign.  He ain't getting out of it now. 

It was inevitable even before Barr lied about the report that Mueller would be testifying in front of Congress.  So, I just have one last thing to say to Mueller, "Hey, Marine, suck it up and DO YOUR JOB!"

Pardons of War Criminals and the Future of Allied Cooperation

The weekend’s news suggests that President Donald Trump’s pardon of a war criminal, former Army officer Michael Behenna, is not going to be a one-off thing but part of a broader trend of pardoning those accused or convicted of war crimes.  While this policy presents challenges to the American armed forces—endangering discipline and cohesion, my focus here is on the impact on present and future allies.  Simply put, this new stance will make it much harder for many countries to join the US in any future military campaign.  Here, I take a quick look at what the allies provide and then focus on how pardoning war criminals is likely to affect future military cooperation.

The ongoing debate about burden-sharing within the North Atlantic Treaty Organization [NATO] might cause one to believe that America’s allies do not contribute much. However, other than the quick and minor military efforts in places like Grenada and Panama, the US does not fight alone.  American allies bore far more of the costs of World War I and World War II than did the US.  Many countries joined in the American efforts to push back the North Koreans and then the Chinese in Korea.  South Koreans, Australians and others joined American troops in Vietnam.  The Cold War effort to deter the Soviet Union required a global effort requiring not just bases in foreign lands but significant military assistance from dozens of countries. 

The Gulf War of 1991 involved hundreds of thousands of non-American troops, where the multinational nature of the alliance—fighting alongside not just British and French troops but also Syrian and many others reduced the risks the Americans faced.  When the Bush Administration shifted its focus from Afghanistan to Iraq in 2003, it meant that there were more allied and partner troops fighting to hold the fort in the former than American troops.  Even in that very unpopular campaign in Iraq, the “coalition of the willing” fought alongside American forces and paid a significant price.

It became much harder for our allies to fight in Iraq and even in Afghanistan after the pictures of American crimes at Abu Ghraib came out.  Our allies, particularly France, Germany and other European countries, had pushed for the creation of the International Criminal Court, established by the 1998 Rome Statute, expending significant political capital because they felt that those who commit war crimes should be held accountable particularly after the horrors of the post-Yugoslav conflict and the genocide in Rwanda. 

In 1998, the US voted against the Statute, concerned that it not be subject to ICC law. This subsequently has been a sore spot in relations with allies. When it was clear in 2002 that the Statute would come into effect due to accomplishment of the necessary number of ratifications,  the Bush Administration pushed to change all of the mandates for UN and NATO missions in which Americans played a role to write exceptions so that the countries hosting American troops would not send suspected war criminals to the ICC [I was on the Bosnia desk of the US Joint Staff at this time, and I got to watch this up close].  This effort antagonized our allies at a key moment—as the preparation for the next Iraq war was underway.  To be clear, under its doctrine of “complementarity,” the ICC only to pursue suspected crimes if a country does not handle its accused war criminals responsibly. 

By pardoning convicted and/or suspected war criminals, Trump shows that the US system of military justice does not live up to international standards, is and will be irresponsible.

Our allies already take concerns with war crimes quite seriously.  In Afghanistan, mentoring Afghan troops was a major part of the training effort, and it meant going out on patrol and into battle alongside Afghan troops.  Some countries were most reluctant to do so, including the otherwise quite aggressive Danish forces who were willing to fight in the most dangerous parts of the country.  Why?  Because they did not want to be present if and when their trainees engaged in war crimes.  They did not want to be complicit. 

For many democracies, it is difficult enough to get mandates from the parliaments to approve these deployments.  Countries governed by coalition governments often have a hard time agreeing on the conditions they will impose upon their troops when they join a cooperative military effort.  If the President continues to pardon war criminals, two things are likely to happen:

1.  Some countries will impose restrictions on their troops, so that the forces they contribute to an allied operation are not be allowed to fight alongside Americans;  
2.  Many countries may find it politically impossible to join American-led campaigns at all.

American forces are currently working with allies in partners in Kosovo, Afghanistan, and Iraq. Trump’s pardons of war criminals will make it more likely that we will get less help in those places.  Getting allies to join the US in a new Iran war was always going to be tough but will become even harder if these pardons continue.

The US military was stretched to the breaking point when it was fighting wars in Afghanistan an Iraq at the same time even with much allied assistance.  Alienating allies via these pardons will make any future war effort unnecessarily more challenging. Yes, the US can fight alone, but it will mean more Americans pay the price in blood, more US tax dollars expended, and far less legitimacy.  This may be a price that Donald Trump is willing to pay, but the American military and the American people should not.

Secession in Westeros: It Ain't Over

Folks have been picking on the last episode for a variety of unrealistic or unearned developments.  Here's my take on the secessionist element below the break.

Game of Thrones: Pool of Life, Way More Life Edition

So, that was a far happier ending than I would have expected, which means, yes, a three way tie.  Explanations and final rulings below:

Pardoning War Criminals is Criminal

Trump has decided to pardon not just one war criminal but perhaps many.  This is awful for many, many reasons.  I have written elsewhere (forthcoming?) about the impact on allies--not good.  Here, I just want to focus on the basics.  That barbarity happens in war, but it is not something you want to encourage.

War does indeed inflame the passions, giving rise to opportunities and pressures to do things that are truly horrible.  It might seem strange to say that it is ok to kill but not that way or not right now or not this person, but we have long had laws of war that defined many behaviors as criminal.  Aside from the morality of this stuff, these laws are also important for operating armed forces.  To have the many soldiers, marines, sailors and aviators do what is expected, they must face the possibility of being punished for behaving in undesirable ways.  That is what is meant by order and discipline being threatened by Trump's pardons--that American troops will not face consequences for disobeying lawful orders, at least in the judicial system, and this will create a permissive environment for those in the armed forces to do bad things.

Yes, some do bad things already--some American troops shot prisoners of war in cold blood even in the Good War while others raped their away across Europe, that massacres happened in Vietnam, and elsewhere.  And, yes, many American servicewomen and men will be restrained by their own moral code and by the disapproval of their peers.  BUT the American president is saying that it is ok to engage in war crimes.  Just like his use of racism and xenophobia in his speeches make it easier for those to come out and be racist and hateful in public and engage in violence against those targeted by the President, Trump's pardoning of war criminals will encourage some troops to engage in horrible acts. 

We should be trying to reduce, not increase, the likelihood that US troops will engage in awful behavior.  Trump, well, that's not what he does.  He makes it possible for people to do bad things.  His cabinet has been given the green light to engage in corruption.  His immigration officials, from John Kelly to Kirstjen Nielsen to whoever's next, have been given the greenlight to abuse immigrants.  Now, the US armed forces are being given the green light to engage in war crimes.

What will the senior military leadership do now?  Will they condone this massive shift in what is expected from their troops?  Will they worry about discipline?  Will they speak out against this?

Yes, this deepens the crisis we have in civilian-military relations in several ways:

1. The US military leadership may have to speak out against the President on this--which is not good.
2. The US military leadership may not speak out on this, in which case they will be seen by many civilians as being complicit.  Not good.
3. It may cause many within the US military who care a great deal about obeying the laws of war to have contempt for their president. Not good.  
4. Those thinking of joining the military might think twice because they may not want to be in a position where they are ordered to commit war crimes, which is now easier to imagine.  Not good.

Once again, Trump does unnecessary damage to American institutions and interests.  Remember that one reason why the US military supports the laws of war is so that their troops are not abused when taken prisoner.  Yes, some have faced such abuses anyway, but reciprocity is a thing.  Eroding these important restrictions on the conduct of war is not in US interests.  It may play well on Fox News, but it will not play well within much of the US military or the armed forces of those we fight alongside.

Trump swore an oath to faithfully execute the laws of the US.  Abusing the pardon power would seem to be a violation of this and would be, yes, an impeachable offense, would it not?

Ira-2: Electric Boogaloo

Oy, so the war drums are beating with Iran the target this time.  How will this be different?
Here's a clue:

Spain pulls frigate from USS Abraham Lincoln Strike Group amid Iran differences |@Reuters https://t.co/rE6KSabN9M

— Lucas Tomlinson (@LucasFoxNews) May 14, 2019

While not all allies jumped aboard the Iraq war bandwagon, Spain showed up last time and then had caveats and left early.  But this points to a key reality when it comes to allies.  They fear two things most--being abandoned and being dragged into a war they don't want to fight.  Japan gets to experience both, but the Spanish are focused on one.  While much of the 2003 support was fairly token--the Bush Administration wanted a long list of countries for their coalition of the willing with few doing real fighting, real burden-bearing.  Spain was one of the few countries that sent enough to attempt to deal with an entire sector.

Anyhow, I expect very, very few countries to join a Trump war in Iran for a few key reasons:

• As problematic as the Iraq war was in terms of legitimacy, folks could rest on a few key things--UN resolutions, past aggression, past genocide, etc.  Iran has done bad things, but they agreed to a nuclear  arms deal that the US, not Iran, is breaking from.  So, who's going to tell their publics that they need to sacrifice blood and treasure for this war?
• As unpopular as Bush was in 2003, US relations with most potential partners were not bad except for the war.  This time, US relations with everyone except Israel and Saudi Arabia are awful.  Trade wars, breaking the Iran deal, etc.  Even relations with the UK are not great.  It is hard to see how May could get a vote through parliament.  Trump is toxic.  And that matters for when leaders try to get votes through their legislatures.  
• As incompetent as Rumseld and his folks were, they did not have that reputation until after they started to screw up the post-war phase.  Everyone knows that this administration can't do anything complicated.  Plus they are pardoning war criminals.  Which makes it even less attractive.
• Oh, and there's the whole Iran thing.  Iran is a much, much tougher opponent than Iraq.  More territory, more people, a regime that has more legitimacy, one that has not been broken by decades of sanctions and lost wars.  So, anyone thinking about this war needs to get clear that it will not be a walk in the park.  

I don't know if the Trump administration is dumb enough to go to war with Iran. I am pretty sure that few other countries will be dumb enough to join them this time.  Just because Trump and Bolton don't possess learning curves does not mean others haven't learned from the past.

Threat Scorecard--Can't Tell Your Threats Without a Program

The desperate effort to make Iran the bogeyman has got me thinking.

Pompeo is proving Wendt right--threats are what we make of them. Iran is really not that big a threat to US interests
UNLESS
US interests become conflated w Saudi/Israeli interests. https://t.co/6FHjQYbk04

— Steve Saideman (@smsaideman) May 13, 2019

What are the threats facing the US?  What are the most worrisome, the ones most likely to do both significant and lasting damage?  Which ones are, dare I say it, existential?  Focusing on international threats (which lets me dodge naming Trump an existential threat to the US and mostly let's me dodge the related threat of white supremacy), here's the list as I see it from my hotel room in Berlin before I give a talk this afternoon on my civ-mil project:

1.  Climate change.  Yeah, I named a dynamic, not a country, as climate change is going to make a big dent on the US in ways that we are only now starting to appreciate.

2.  Russia.  Close call, but a declining and desperate Russia that is willing to subvert US elections (and British and French and etc) is a greater threat than China.  China's damage is potential, Russia's harm is ongoing.  That Russia's future is kind of bleak does not make Russia less threatening--the prospect of loss is far more likely to lead to risk acceptance, gambling, and bad stuff.  Just as Dany.  Ok, ask Daniel and Amos


3.  China has more power, other than numbers of nukes, than Russia, and straddles more important territory--South China Sea.  It has been taking the gloves off of its rise, as seen by its reaction to the Huawei executive being arrested in Canada for extradition to the US.  China has been playing the long game while Russia has been gambling every day.  China is surely going to be more successful and pose risks to the US down the road.  Right now, it is just a trade war and some island disputes.  It will be more than that although I am not so concerned about China in the Arctic.  There are much more immediate problems (Taiwan, Koreas, South China Sea).

4.  Speaking of the Koreas, North Korea is a significant threat.  Unlike Iran, North Korea has nuclear weapons and missiles and is a personalist dictatorship--which means few constraints on the leader.   The frustrating thing about Iran is that Trump seems determined into making Iran like North Korea by dumping the deal.  Of course, North Korea was scarier last year because Trump was amping things up.

5.  ISIS/Al Qaeda/etc.  These organizations can inspire and sometimes organize terrorist attacks.  Uncontested, ISIS did a great deal of damage.

6.  Saudi Arabia.  Yeah, more than Iran.  Why?  Because the Saudis have more influence and allies.  Most folks in the Mideast are worried about Iran and are not its friends, so Iran has to sink resources into Syria.  The Saudis can continue to promote extremism (how many 9/11 attackers were from Iran?  from Saudi Arabia?).  The Saudis have and want to continue to suck the US into wars it should not be fighting.  Yeah, Iran supports terrorism, but so does Saudi Arabia.  I would say that the one way in which Iran is a greater threat is its nuclear weapons program, but the Trump folks seem determined to have the Saudis catch up.

7.  Iran.  Twas a manageable threat with the deal in place.  Yes, Iran supports terrorism, Iran supports Assad, Iran is a pain in the ass.  But not an existential threat to the US.  If the Israelis think Iran is an existential threat, well, that is why they have nuclear weapons.  No country has attacked Israel since 1973--I don't count Hamas or Hezbollah as countries, despite their efforts to become countries.  Note the Israeli Foreign Ministry does list the 1990-91 war as well. 

8.  Syria.  Mostly by creating waves of refugees that undermine our allies.

What other countries threaten the US?  I am sure some folks would like to list Venezuela, but that is stretching the concept of threat.  What harm can Venezuela do to the US?  Exactly.  Cuba? Same thing.  I am sure other places/movements can be mentioned, but do any outrank any of these?  Let me know if you think I am wrong.  I woke up early here in Berlin so I could watch Game of Thrones unspoiled, so I may not be remembering all of the threats.

To be clear, the US is still the most powerful country on the planet, it is far more resilient than its politicians think (hey, we shake off our kids getting killed by spree shooters all the time), it is still far away from adversaries and most crisis zones.  Immigration is not a threat but an opportunity.  Mostly, the greatest threats to the US are Americans--Trump and his coterie, white supremacists, etc.  In a recent episode of Game of Thrones, after defeating the Night King, Tyrion said something to the effect that now we have to deal with us.  That we are the threat to ourselves, and that would be true even if we didn't take into account climate change.  Yes, the US's position of primacy is ending, but that does not mean the US is really threatened.  It just can't impose its will alone as much as it could for about 20 years.

Game of Thrones Pool of Life: Gratuitious Death Edition

Again, not that much damage to our player's characters despite the blood spilled everywhere.  Well, not so much spilled as flung. Spoilers beyond the break.

Berlin Weekend Tourism: Old Stuff, Water Stuff, Scary Stuff

No interviews on weekends, of course, so I had much time to tour Berlin.  Given that this is my third visit here, I had to figure out stuff I had not done before.  The answers: Pergamon Museum, Spree boat ride, Dungeon and walking in between.

Eastside Gallery redux

If there is one must-see when visiting Berlin, it is the Eastside Gallery.  Some authority (Berlin municipal?) decides who gets to put art on the remaining parts of the Berlin Wall on, well, the east side.  The art varies in style and quality and intent, but it is moving and puts much into context.  So, for those who can't get to Berlin, here are some of the wall segments:

Jumping the Dragon

People have had various problems with Game of Thrones since the start.  This season has been particularly controversial because of the various decisions made by the writers.  First, folks were upset that the first two episodes were too slow, too much scene setting.  Then, folks were upset because not enough people died in the Battle of Winterfell.  I was not so fussed... but now I am.

Too Damned Early

I have not written much here about the Democratic competition for the nomination in 2020.  Why?  See the title to the post.  Yes, the American electoral cycle means that the next election campaign starts the day after an election. Yes, we are all curious about who will face Trump with the big mystery being: can the Democrats (who have a bigger base) unify to defeat Trump?

Media folks have to be selective as they have finite resources (thanks to Bryan Curtis of the Press Box podcast for reminding me of this) so they can't focus on all 20+ candidates).  Plus they want clicks and hits and viewers.  So, what are they doing? Two things:

1. Making guesses about viability and focusing on those candidates that might stick around the longest.  How do they know someone is more viable? They either focus on polls, which is somewhat circular since those who get more press do better, lather, rinse, repeat OR they focus on fundraising (more on this below).  Of course, they (and the rest of us) screwed up the last time about who was viable.  So, maybe not a great strategy.  
2. Going for the flavor of the week.  Beto got a week, Buttigieg got a week, Biden is getting maybe two weeks because he is more viable/has more stuff on tape/is more likely to gaffe/whatever.  The media loves narratives, so it is easy to spin up a new narrative with every new candidate.  My own narrative for this tends to be: FFS, can't someone stay in the Senate so that the Dems, if they win the White House in 2020, can actually govern.  

Oh, and as Curtis acknowledged, there seems to be a lot of sexism in who is the flavor of the week.  It should be Kamala Harris for burning Robert Barr to the ground in his appearance last week.  Nope, probably more Biden.

The key is this: we have no idea who is going to do well when the votes are cast.  Once the primaries start, then we will know if Elizabeth Warren's combo of policy papers and Dad jokes is working; whether a former  prosecutor can play well to a base sick of too much prosecution of the base (Harris); whether Bernie plays well to actual democrats who show up; whether Biden's strategy of playing to old people works; etc, etc. 

Re fundraising--yes, money is important, and much of the fundraising is based on expected viability.  So, guess what, the media is gaming the viability thing... until the voters say otherwise.  Once someone does well or poorly in the first few races, the money will desert the losers and run to the winners.   Perhaps the media is doing the women a favor by setting low expectations? Ok, probably not, but the point here is that the money will come later.  The keys right now are:

• can you get enough money to sustain until the bigger money rolls in?  
• Can you hire good staff so that you don't screw up constantly (Biden shows that money does not mean one buys good staff apparently)? 
• with California earlier in the process, can you compete there?  I saw a survey today about Arizona.  Sorry, but fuck Arizona.  What is going in California?  Hint: Harris and Warren are both likely to play well there.
• the damned debate rules--that one needs a certain number of money coming in from enough people to make the big debate stage.  I am not looking forward to the mass debates.  Are you?

The key thing with 20 plus candidates is that one does not need to get 30 or 40% in the first races.  They just need to be one of the tallest oompa loompas.  Then the money and press will focus on those folks and the random white male governors and senators can go home (really, Michael Bennett, what are you thinking?).  What makes one a tall oompa loompa?  Well, for Biden, it means getting the AARP vote and telling the young folks to screw off.  For Harris, it might just mean showing folks who well armed she is to debate Trump by ripping his minions to shreds.  For Warren, it might be being the most reasonable progressive with heaps of policy wonkiness.  For the rest? Damned if I know.

See, I am guilty too, as 20 plus candidates are too much to follow.  I am not making decisions based on viability as I have no idea.  I just write selectively because the press has already selected which folks I know more about.   Oh, I also know about Beto and Pete.  Oy.  No thanks.

Anyhow, my mantra will be that it is too damned early.  And I will focus on one single question--not who will win the nomination, but whether they can win without alienating a hunk of the Democrats.  As Obama said three years ago, Democracy is on the ballot.  Let's keep that in mind rather than insisting on a candidate that is 100% perfect.  This is an awful time for purity tests.