Apr.07.2008
9:42 am
by Chet
The future of conflict
Or a 2-page summary of it at any rate. The Armed Forces Journal International has published my article “The Fight for Friends,” in their April issue. You can read it online at: http://www.afji.com/2008/04/3369506.
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16 Responses to “The future of conflict”
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“the world’s “functioning core.” Under these conditions, nonstate threats to security become manageable. They become seen as what they are — organized crime with an ideological veneer ”
Good work Chet, particuarly I felt compelled to comment on that
paragraph, since you really put your finger on an important point.
The trick is, and to paraphrase the P.T. Barnum cliche, would to be
to “make most of the pepole happy enough, and most of the time,”
and so human naotuer being what it is, the radicals, and every scociety has them from time to time (Yes, EVEN America, in McViegh & Nichols for example) with a lunatic or criminal agenda become marginalised, and alienated.
Every successfull post modern scociety is predicated on that.
This could work for example in Palistine IF the Isreali leadership
had the vision and guts to make some basic binding consessons, and also in Iraq, if only the USA would get the H%$* out, and leave those pepole alone, but intil then, it’s more and more of the same, and probably worse.
MaX
“our refusal to think in terms of grand strategy”
From a Clausewitzian perspective, specific political interests/objective politics runs what passes for US policy today, what Max Weber would have called political or adventure capitalism. Also the character of the state defines the character of its policies. Thus reducing the defense budget is definitely not in the cards. Rather the tendency will be to muddle through until the collapse, much as Spain did in the 17th Century. . .
Dear seydlitz89,
The enormous run-up in the US defense budget is a recent artifact (it was about $360BN in $FY 2008 when Bush took office - depends on exactly what you count). Because there is not a military threat to justify even half the present amount, the DoD budget is going to present a fat target when the pain gets bad enough elsewhere.
I predict its fall is going to be pretty dramatic, at least as rapid as when the Reagan spend-up collapsed in the mid-1980s.
“specific political interests/objective politics runs what passes for US policy today, what Max Weber would have called political or adventure capitalism.”
Good analysis SD and thinking about the “Worldcom, Enron, Martha Stuart, Hollinger, etc,,and most recently the savings and loans,
and sub-prime mortage scenario, the bar has been raised, or
lowered depending on your perspective on the wildest,
and scandelous of adventure capitalisim, where almost anything
goes, until caught, or collaphsed.
So why would politics and that delusional attitude with errosion of morality and concience be any different ?
The nine point five trillion dollar question is, IS America anywhere near the final brink of disaster, if not, or if so, can it recover ?
MaX
Dr. Richards-
I hope you are right, but you are assuming rational behavior at this point, whereas the norm has been delusional behavior in regards to defense policy/spending. Such defense spending cuts as you mention would have to be actual, that is real cuts, not offset by “additional appropriations”.
I would point out that the recent actions in connection with Wall Street financial instability have also been in line with my projection. Nobody is willing to take responsibility (have you read Greenspan’s latest?) and is rather only too willing to let the taxpayers bail them out . . . That based on the assumption that the US Treasury is an endless money hole. . .
If one reads and considers the more important news items, and then the irrational emphasis placed on trivialities, one can only despair.
The GAO recently, reported by CNN as well, stated that 95 programs to acquire weapon systems are $260B over budget and reached $1.6T.
That is only the acquisition costs the 25 year support costs are likely in the $2T range.
Talk about a bow wave of unneeded systems!
MaX-
You’ll find this interesting. . .
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/03/15/nbearr115.xml
“Dr. Richards-”
“I hope you are right, but you are assuming rational behavior at this point, whereas the norm has been delusional behavior in regards to defense policy/spending.”
Well Chet, is definately a “glass half full guy,” and I wish we could
all have his faith. I expect that’s a sign of further developed
wisdom and experience overall.
I often feel guilty for negativity, but that’s something that’s
inbred in my case, since a big part of what I’m trained for
and do for a living, is explain, and warn pepole what’s likely to go wrong with thier plans.
When all is said and done though, I’ve studied, and even witnessed
scenarios worse than what the US is currently undergoing,
the late 60s through and particularly the early 1970s perhaps
and still muddle through.
Now at least this morning General Patreus did not
urge, at least not publicaly, a campain against Iran.
Thanks for the link SD, I had almost forgotten that Britian
wholey supported and is myered in the same quagmire
Of Iraq.
The problem maybe that to bleed leading western interests
white, and to protract and seripticiously extend the war as long as possible is to play perfectly into Bin Laden’s agenda.
There I go again,,,.
M
Chet writes,
“I predict its fall is going to be pretty dramatic, at least as rapid as when the Reagan spend-up collapsed in the mid-1980s.”
The end of the space weaponisation “starwars” fantisy.
Have you noticed that has re-emerged with Stratigic Missle Defence.
I forget what I was reading, or maybe watching, if it was Charles Spinney, or maybe Chalmers Johnson, who witnessed a bar room
exchange between two weapons manufacture’s lobbiest, when Regan’s Star-wars was first annouced.
They’re quoted as being estatic, and saying “we’ve done it, now, we’ve got it made,,.”
Max
Chet, everything you say is right, but I’m afraid that, like most of my fellow respondents, I’m deeply skeptical of the notion that good advice will do us much good. It may be—and I hope that it is so!—that my skepticism is mistaken, and that words such as yours will make a difference. In any case, please do not stop writing and speaking the truth just because so few seem to listen. (Even one as glum as I occasionally yields to the temptation of trying to make sense of the world, of trying to change the mistaken opinions of those around me.)
However, the momentum of the mass delusion, irrationality and dishonesty in our nation’s capital is so great that I cannot honestly say that any amount of good advice will help. Worse, the rot isn’t confined to the centers of political power; as I’ve stated elsewhere, our social framework, our culture, is deeply compromised.
Is there hope? Well, of course there is. In the past, the destruction of civilizations has been followed by the growth of a new order. Perhaps our great-great-grandchildren will live to see it. —Oh, you meant for us?
Well, maybe a small hope: perhaps we’ll be hit by a disaster so great that it completely discredits the ruling elites and their ideologies, without destroying us altogether. In other words, an event so bad that people are willing to listen to reason in its aftermath, but also an event that cannot be used as justification for yet more expansion of the State security apparatus, more pointless wars against the weak, more senseless armaments procurement.
Lest I attract the attention of those in “high places” during these “interesting times”, I feel compelled to state the obvious: I am not expressing a wish that people should die, or that lives be ruined, nor am I announcing my intention to give any or all of the Four Horsemen a boost into the saddle. I am just trying to give you a little hope. You see, there’s a little of the optimist in me, after all.
Maximilian, please tell me where to apply for a job like yours! I’m perfectly qualified!
Dr_V
“Chet, everything you say is right, but I’m afraid that, like most of my fellow respondents,”
Beutifull post, throughout, awesome !
MaX
Link to some highly recommended reading and lesson in
4th Generational warfare.
I’ll start off with one of my favourite Joe Galloway Vietnam analysis quotes;
“you bomb someone’s rice paddy and kill his oxen, you take away his livelyhood,, how’s he supposed to farm without his tractor (oxen) ?”
“you bomb the same guys hooch, and kill his family, you’ve
just made an instant Vietcong.”
Increadably a lesson that America just dosn’t understand.
With all the talk of understanding 4GW, “winning hearts and minds,” being pure lip service and BS.
Follow this link.
Beutifull work by Tom Englehart.
MaX
http://www.lewrockwell.com/engelhardt/engelhardt326.html
In your article you say, “Grand strategy is nothing more than the art of making more friends and allies than enemies.” If that is true then there is perhaps a need for another term pertinent to national (and also international) planning.
To survive in hostile environments requires resiliency, the ability to take a hit and not lose the ability to make a coherent response and to recover. Resiliency is required because not all threatening situations are anticipated, and not all preparations for the anticipated succeed.
The struggle to survive is also aided by total situational awareness, anticipation of hurtful consequences, and ample preparations to meet and overcome threatening events.
Some of the major factors that will threaten humans in many ways including asymmetrical warfare, are global warming, environmental degradation, increasing populations, mass migrations, world-wide epidemics (with the possibility that some may involved designer viruses or microbes), etc. A recent study by Gen. Shalikashvili et al (http://www.csis.org/media/csis/events/080110_grand_strategy.pdf) gives a good account of many of these factors. Unfortunately, neither McCain nor Obama seems to be able to consider more than one factor at a time, and media sources are not aiding the American people in seeing the interlocking nature of such factors and the difficulty of moving one without interacting with the whole complex. Enemies come out of the perception that one has been treated unfairly or with hostility. Friends come out of cooperative activities that benefit the greater community thus formed. We may make enemies as a result of our ignorance, our fear, and our selfishness.
[CR: Not sure I understand your point because I don't see a contradiction between grand strategy and resiliency. Resiliency, by the way, is the theme of the 2008 Boyd Conference on Prince Edward Is.]
“Some of the major factors that will threaten humans in many ways,
>snip< etc”
Not to mention economic issues, particuarly the burgeoning risk to what maybe left of the diwindling fundemental prosperity of a substantial measure of the population.
And yet the US would prefer to squander hundereds of billions
of dollars on the coldwar moored defence estrablishment
with boondogles such as stratigic missle defence.
Homeland security, including invasive and arbitrary survelliance,
and information gathering.
We carry blissfully ignorant and turning a blind eye.
Setting it’s self up in the long run to further compound disaster.
The Phat lady takes the podium in preperation to sing.
M
‘Yes,” indeed “they” (in answer to the question posed in the article linked below) did, a handfull of lunatic fringe retrobates,
thier smarter, leaner, meaner, react and act more quickly and effectively, Read on.
Many here regonised and appreciated this early on.
It’s a pity we don’t have more influence.
M
http://www.consortiumnews.com/2008/091008.html
Did al-Qaeda Succeed?
I guess what worries me in the national debate (or, actually, the lack of it) is that we are good at specifying outcomes (”Make the Middle East into a cluster of democratic nations” for instance), but not very good at figuring out how what will have to go into achieving those outcomes. After I wrote my comment a day or so ago, I realized that if one were to work out all the steps implied in “making more friends and allies than enemies” it would result in a plan that I would like to see followed. The practical problem is to get our national leadership to assess correctly all the major known factors, to understand how they feed into each other, and to make informed decisions on that basis.
I would like to be a fly on the wall in the conference you mentioned [CR: Or, just to raise an alternative, you could attend it]. After reading the 080110 Grand Strategy document cited above, it struck me that we had all this extremely high caliber talent making recommendations that seem to me to make eminent good sense, but our leaders and would-be leaders may be as ignorant of their words as Johnson and Nixon were of recommendations from William R. Corson during the Vietnam conflict.