Green Energy
- Obama Waives Anti-terror Requirements For Aid To Pakistan, Keeps The Jizya Flowing
"Pakistan freed of anti-terrorism obligations; U.S. billions flow instead," by Jonathan S. Landay for the McClatchy Newspapers:WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration has refused for the first time to declare that Pakistan is making progress toward...
- Winds Of War: Where’s The Blueprint Against Global Jihad?
“If you don't know where you are going, any road will get you there.” That’s a popular quote of Lewis Carroll and is a handy thought to keep in mind with our struggle with Islamism. Jeffrey Imm at the Counter Terrorism blog said, “The American...
- Winds Of War: Perhaps The Democrats Should Take Power
From The Gathering Storm Before you run to comment section of this blog and fire off a message saying I’m a sandwich short of a full picnic, please read on first. Chalk this post up to frustration. I believe that democrats should regain power for two...
- Strike Three
Nevermind that using sanctions against Japan in 1940-41 'increased' the danger of war, the NYT most recent leaked CIA/intelligence story on increased terrorism dangers as result of Iraq rips it for me. Only by doing nothing could we have increased...
- Winds Of War: He Gets It! Fighting A War We Can’t Win
From The Gathering Storm Afghan President Hamid Karzai said Wednesday that terrorist havens outside Afghanistan "must be destroyed" in order to halt what he called a "murderous campaign" against the Afghan people waged by infiltrators from abroad. What...
Green Energy
America as Jackie Chan
George Friedman argues that by fighting terrorism with allies — and not just Pakistan — who are themselves part of the terrorist nexus, the U.S. has enmeshed itself in an insoluble contradiction. It has denied itself any chance at victory as the price of having to fight terrorism. He asks whether America, by the choice of its allies, has implicitly adopted the strategy of not winning, lest it destabilize its friends.Read the whole thing.
This is the ultimate contradiction in U.S. strategy in Afghanistan and even the so-called war on terror as a whole. … Broadly fighting terrorism requires the cooperation of the Muslim world, as U.S. intelligence and power is inherently limited. …
The United States must either develop the force and intelligence to wage war without any assistance — which is difficult to imagine given the size of the Muslim world and the size of the U.S. military — or it will have to accept half-hearted support and duplicity. Alternatively, it could accept that it will not win in Afghanistan and will not be able simply to eliminate terrorism. These are difficult choices, but the reality of Pakistan drives home that these, in fact, are the choices.
Both sides are fighting in a manner that recalls the Jackie Chan movie in which our hero must fight multiple bad guys while preserving a museum full of priceless Ming vases. The question Friedman never answers completely is whether the choices of accepting “half-hearted support and duplicity” and “that it will not win in Afghanistan and will not be able simply to eliminate terrorism” are equivalent. Whether they amount to the same thing. In other words, whether it is, in the president’s favorite phrase, “a false choice”: heads you win, tails I lose.
The desire not to have to make a choice may account for why the Obama administration wants less — and not more — authority from Congress to prosecute the war it denies exists. The Danger Room describes the administration’s contradictory desire to both expand the war while simultaneously limiting its authority to do so.
- Obama Waives Anti-terror Requirements For Aid To Pakistan, Keeps The Jizya Flowing
"Pakistan freed of anti-terrorism obligations; U.S. billions flow instead," by Jonathan S. Landay for the McClatchy Newspapers:WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration has refused for the first time to declare that Pakistan is making progress toward...
- Winds Of War: Where’s The Blueprint Against Global Jihad?
“If you don't know where you are going, any road will get you there.” That’s a popular quote of Lewis Carroll and is a handy thought to keep in mind with our struggle with Islamism. Jeffrey Imm at the Counter Terrorism blog said, “The American...
- Winds Of War: Perhaps The Democrats Should Take Power
From The Gathering Storm Before you run to comment section of this blog and fire off a message saying I’m a sandwich short of a full picnic, please read on first. Chalk this post up to frustration. I believe that democrats should regain power for two...
- Strike Three
Nevermind that using sanctions against Japan in 1940-41 'increased' the danger of war, the NYT most recent leaked CIA/intelligence story on increased terrorism dangers as result of Iraq rips it for me. Only by doing nothing could we have increased...
- Winds Of War: He Gets It! Fighting A War We Can’t Win
From The Gathering Storm Afghan President Hamid Karzai said Wednesday that terrorist havens outside Afghanistan "must be destroyed" in order to halt what he called a "murderous campaign" against the Afghan people waged by infiltrators from abroad. What...