tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446351548038522890.post8535946746422372839..comments2024-03-28T16:15:19.319-04:00Comments on Saideman's Semi-Spew: NATO's Record: Better Than ExpectedSteve Saidemanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09881915512311951902noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446351548038522890.post-25455910227733206352011-10-23T09:26:38.453-04:002011-10-23T09:26:38.453-04:00Oh, there is absolutely selection at work: no Soma...Oh, there is absolutely selection at work: no Somalia, no Congo, no Darfur, no Syria. Still, with heaps of people criticizing NATO (including me), we need to remember that the organization does not entirely suck.<br /><br />And the Kosovo/Libya model is a realistic one for the future--NATO provides the high tech and someone else serves as the grunts. I think that will be an enduring lesson of Afghanistan.Steve Saidemanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09881915512311951902noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8446351548038522890.post-44454096464008584612011-10-22T19:08:14.437-04:002011-10-22T19:08:14.437-04:00I'm just wondering whether this high success r...I'm just wondering whether this high success rate might stem from a selection bias on easy cases. Now, everyone who knows the history of your examples will be quick to point out that these were damn complicated operations which were (are) far from easy. That is probably true. But I'm just saying that NATO did not intervene in a random selection of all conflicts worldwide (which would include both "easy" and "hard" cases with the same probability) but rather intervened in very specific conflicts which could be - compared to other conflicts - defined as rather "easy" cases. <br /><br />I can't come up with concrete criteria for "easy" and "hard" cases, but it seems to me that the two incomplete cases NATO is still involved in (Afghanistan and piracy) are also the hardest operations whereas the other ones were not soooo terribly difficult. They involved to a large part air campaigns and when they didn't the territory wasn't as vast as Afghanistan for example, also they were mostly UN blessed (except Kosovo). Compare that for example with PKOs in the DRC or Darfur, which are, I would argue, a lot more difficult conflicts.<br /><br />I don't really know if that makes any sense, it's just a quick shot. It just seemed to me that when evaluating "success" one must always take into account the difficulty of the task.FelixTheCatnoreply@blogger.com