More on the Drone Revolution

The Christian Science Monitor has an extensive article on the latest developments in drone technology that is worth reading.

"We're not about 20 years, or 10 years, or even five years away – a lot of this could be out in the field in under two years," says Mitchell Zatkin, former director of programmable matter at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, the Pentagon's premier research office.

The drone revolution and its continuing impact is fascinating to any student of military history and technology. As the article points out,

The development of a new generation of military robots, including armed drones, may eventually mark one of the biggest revolutions in warfare in generations. Throughout history, from the crossbow to the cannon to the aircraft carrier, one weapon has supplanted another as nations have strived to create increasingly lethal means of allowing armies to project power from afar.

The impact of the drone revolution on warfare is so dramatic that it creates numerous possibilities and raises many questions. If as expected, we eventually progress from the use of armed drones to true robots, acting according to programming as opposed to being under direct human command, we may have seen nothing yet.

In the not-too-distant future, military officials envision soldiers and robots teaming up in the field, with the troops able to communicate with machines the way they would with a human squad team member. Eventually, says Thompson, the robot-soldier relationship could become even more collaborative, with one human soldier leading many armed robots.

The whole article is extremely interesting reading.

Not So Secret Drone Bases

The Washington Post has a front-page story about a "ring" of supposedly secret drone bases, apparently oblivious to the fact that if they are a featured story in the paper, they are hardly all that secret anymore. These bases, a critical part of our worldwide counterterrorism efforts, have been exposed by our enemy Wikileaks, as part of its release of stolen diplomatic cables.

As I've pointed out before, Wikileaks has already done far more damage to the U.S. than most terrorists can dream of, and this is just the latest example. Al Qaeda doesn't need intelligence operatives in the U.S. conducting espionage to uncover details about U.S. counterterrorism efforts. It has Wikileaks to do it for them. The exposure of these secrets might make for interesting reading, but that damage to U.S. interests is real and significant. The Post covers the situation with Seychelles.

The government of Seychelles agreed to host U.S. drones and to keep their counterterrorism mission secret, using a cover story that they were there for anti-piracy operations. The U.S. told Seychelles that the drones would be unarmed.

During a meeting with Seychelles President James Michel on Sept. 18, 2009, American diplomats said the U.S. government “would seek discrete [sic], specific discussions . . . to gain approval” to arm the Reapers “should the desire to do so ever arise,” according to a cable summarizing the meeting. Michel concurred, but asked U.S. officials to approach him exclusively for permission “and not anyone else” in his government ... Michel’s chief deputy told a U.S. diplomat on a separate occasion that the Seychelles president “was not philosophically against” arming the drones, according to another cable. But the deputy urged the Americans “to be extremely careful in raising the issue with anyone in the Government outside of the President. Such a request would be ‘politically extremely sensitive’ and would have to be handled with ‘the utmost discreet care.’ ”

Here you see that the U.S. made a secret agreement with the president to cut out the rest of his government. In order to conduct these type of operations we need to make agreements with various countries that involve these sorts of back-door dealings, because of domestic political consideration in the states hosting our drones. How much harder will it be to obtain bases now that everyone knows that the U.S. is unable to keep even sensitive diplomatic correspondence secret, and unwilling to take necessary actions to destroy a hostile organization that is stealing and publishing those secrets? If you were the president of some other nation approached by the U.S., would you make a similar agreement, knowing that the U.S. can't keep secrets?

The Libyan Situation

CNN has live updates of the changing situation. The key questions right now are, where is Gaddafi, and will he accept defeat? According to reports his son, a leading spokesman for the regime, was captured Sunday and most resistance in the capital has collapsed. It looks like the rebels have won. But does Gaddafi retain enough military strength and support to continue fighting? Ideally he'll be captured, killed or flee the country and go in to exile.

If we assume that Gaddafi is finished and the rebels will be able to establish a new government, that raises more questions for the U.S. First, when will our involvement end? Will we, as usual, decide that we need to give Libya huge amounts of aid to help rebuild the country? And second, what type of government will emerge? In my opinion our intervention was unnecessary and not in the U.S. interest. However, if a decent friendly or even neutral government takes over, one that removes Libya from the column of nations we need to worry about, the operation will have achieved positive results. Although it isn't hard to do better than Gaddafi, it is unfortunately also possible that the new government will be dominated by Islamists, or be in other ways as bad or worse as the dictator it replaces. Other than just supporting the rebels, I'm not sure what exactly we are doing to try and produce a positive outcome. Right now we are in wait and see mode.

Staying in Iraq

I've been saying for years that we aren't leaving Iraq any time soon, despite our supposed withdrawal date, and a report from the Washington Post appears to confirm that assumption.

U.S. officials welcomed on Wednesday Iraq’s decision to negotiate with Washington on keeping some U.S. troops in the country into next year ... Iraq’s top political leaders agreed late Tuesday that the Iraqi military needs to continue training programs with U.S. forces, marking the first step in a process that still could take months to resolve.

On the one hand the U.S. has good reasons for retaining a military presence in Iraq, which are laid out in the article. But the problems lie in the details.

Significant details that remain unresolved include the length and focus of any training program, how many U.S. troops such training might require and how Iraqi leaders would formally request and approve a new partnership. Mullen and his colleagues also want legal immunity for any troops who stay behind.

One huge detail not mentioned is who is going to pay for the continuing U.S. presence. If Iraq wants and needs U.S. troops to remain in its country beyond the agreed upon withdrawal date, it should provide the financial support for that presence. With our fiscal situation as it is, we should not continue to maintain large foreign deployments, plus the aid programs that go with them, at our expense.

Abdication of Responsibility by Military Leaders

Top U.S. commanders essentially confirmed that the president's announced 10,000 man withdrawal from Afghanistan was done for political reasons. For example,

"The president's decisions are more aggressive and incur more risk that I was originally prepared to accept," Admiral Mullen said. ... Petraeus said, "the ultimate decision was a more aggressive formulation, if you will, in terms of the timeline than what we had recommended." ... Petraeus said he supports the president's decision and will carry it out, but he refused to say he is comfortable with it.

Robert Kagan claims military commanders "know Obama's decision is a disaster."

The entire military leadership believes the president’s decision is a mistake, and especially the decision to withdraw the remainder of the surge forces by September 2012. They will soldier on and do their best, but as the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, put it, in characteristic understatement, they believe the decision will increase the risk to the troops and increase the chance that the mission will not succeed.

Let's assume this is true, and the statements by Mullen and Petraeus indicate that it might be. Kagan writes,

Under our Constitution, military leaders have no choice but to endorse the president’s decision after giving him their best advice. They could resign, of course, but to have the entire senior military leadership resign over a president’s decision contrary to their advice would be a disaster, and not least for the troops on the ground.

Kagan is dead wrong. If our military leaders truly believe that the president's decision is disaster done for political reasons, they have a duty to resign in protest. You can't have it both ways. If you go along with the president, then you automatically sign off on the plan. When you get to the level of a General Petraeus or an Admiral Mullen, you have a duty to resign if you feel that the president is doing the wrong thing and will harm U.S. national interests.

When is the last time a high-ranking officer resigned in protest of a presidential policy decision on military affairs? Today we have military officers who don't want to end their careers, and just go along with things they supposedly feel are terrible decisions. In my opinion that's an abdication of responsibility.

Another Afghanistan Half-Measure

Half-measures have been the American way of war since the conclusion of World War 2., The president's latest move, to withdraw 10,000 troops from Afghanistan is based on little more than political calculations, and bad ones at that. Is there anyone who seriously believes the situation in Afghanistan is so improved that we can reasonably start pulling out troops? Does anyone really think the incredibly corrupt and incompetent Karzai government and Afghan military are ready to start taking over their own war effort any time in the foreseeable future? Is there any question that we will have to keep troops in Afghanistan indefinitely unless we drastically change our strategic objectives?

In my opinion this withdrawal has two main political calculations. First, by starting limited withdrawals, Obama is offering the pretense that our efforts have achieved such success that we need less troops in Afghanistan. In other words, he wants to be able to claim successful prosecution of the war. Second, he wants the American people -- a majority of whom are sick of the Afghanistan War -- to see withdrawals in the hope that they believe he is winding the war down. I'd be willing to bet that very few people, at least among those paying attention, are buying either of those propositions.

The Drone Revolution

When we look back at the past decade from a military history perspective, one of the things that stands out is the rise of unmanned drones as a key weapon of warfare. Today's New York Times has an article called, "War Evolves With Drones, Some Tiny as Bugs," that looks at current research and advances in drone technology. Here are some of the key points.

From blimps to bugs, an explosion in aerial drones is transforming the way America fights and thinks about its wars. ... far less widely known are the sheer size, variety and audaciousness of a rapidly expanding drone universe, along with the dilemmas that come with it.

The Pentagon now has some 7,000 aerial drones, compared with fewer than 50 a decade ago. Within the next decade the Air Force anticipates a decrease in manned aircraft but expects its number of “multirole” aerial drones like the Reaper — the ones that spy as well as strike — to nearly quadruple, to 536. Already the Air Force is training more remote pilots, 350 this year alone, than fighter and bomber pilots combined.

The roles and uses of drones will continue to expand, on land, sea, air and in space. The Times article looks at miniaturization and efforts to copy the flight of insects, but there are numerous other applications and possibilities for drone technology.

One thing is rarely mentioned in the many articles I've read about drones: defense against them. At the moment we are the leading user of drones and at the forefront of drone technology. Our opponents are non-state forces that are relatively low-tech in comparison. But at some point we might face an adversary with a sophisticated drone arsenal of its own, especially as drone technology not only becomes more advanced, but more widespread. With our extensive research efforts in developing drones, I hope we are also devoting some resources to defensive measures against enemy systems.

Why Can't We Win Wars?

With the recent spectacle of the Secretary of Defense refusing to say whether or not we are winning in Afghanistan, and our seeming inability to even define what winning means in wars any more, Mark Steyn's article, "Too Big to Win," is a must-read. It's a long column, but it makes numerous excellent points. Here's one example.

An army has to wage war on behalf of something real. For better or worse, “king and country” is real, and so, mostly for worse, are the tribal loyalties of Africa’s blood-drenched civil wars. But it’s hardly surprising that it’s difficult to win wars waged on behalf of something so chimerical as “the international community.” If you’re making war on behalf of an illusory concept, is it even possible to have war aims? What’s ours? “[We] are in Afghanistan to help the Afghan people,” General Petraeus said in April. Somewhere generations of old-school imperialists are roaring their heads off, not least at the concept of “the Afghan people.” But when you’re the expeditionary force of the parliament of man, what else is there?

The whole article is worth reading.

h/t The Atheist Conservative

War Powers Act Lawsuit

The big political news of the day is that a bi-partisan group of ten congressmen have filed a lawsuit against president Obama over the Libyan intervention, claiming that his actions violate the War Powers Act. In response, the administration claims that the War Powers Act doesn't apply because U.S. involvement isn't serious enough to even warrant being covered.

We are saying the limited nature of this particular mission is not the kind of ‘hostilities’ envisioned by the War Powers Resolution.

Although I'm strongly opposed to the Libyan intervention because I don't think it is in the U.S. interest, I also oppose this lawsuit for the following reasons.

1. The War Powers Act itself is constitutionally dubious at best. As a general rule, I oppose its use.

2. I believe that as Commander in Chief the president should have wide latitude in the use of U.S. forces, even though I am against this particular operation. I'm not in favor of tying the president's hands when it comes to whether or not to employ the military in foreign policy situations.

3. Whether or not the president can commit troops to a foreign intervention without Congressional approval is not something that should be the subject of a lawsuit, or that a federal judge should have any authority to rule on. If Congress wants to block the Libyan operation they can just cut off funding. And if they think the president is actually breaking the law, or violating the Constitution, they can impeach him.

4. Because Congress as a whole is not willing to exercise the above remedies, this action by only 10 of its members amounts to a stunt. It is a typical minority attempt to circumvent the normal functioning of our democracy by looking for a judicial fiat.

Memorial Day Medal of Honor Citation

The past two Memorial Days I've highlighted a Medal of Honor citation, here and here. All MOH citations are available online. They make fascinating reading and point out the amazing courage, will and endurance exhibited by recipients This year's citation comes from World War I, a war that seems largely forgotten except by historians.

Private First Class George Dilboy won his medal posthumously for single-handedly charging and destroying a machine gun position, despite being shot multiple times in the torso, and having his leg nearly severed above the knee by machine gun fire. Here's the full citation.

Rank and organization: Private First Class, U.S. Army, Company H, 103d Infantry, 26th Division. Place and date: Near Belleau, France, 18 July 1918. Entered service at: Keene, N.H. Birth: Greece. G.O. No.: 13, W.D., 1919. Citation: After his platoon had gained its objective along a railroad embankment, Pfc. Dilboy, accompanying his platoon leader to reconnoiter the ground beyond, was suddenly fired upon by an enemy machinegun from 100 yards. From a standing position on the railroad track, fully exposed to view, he opened fire at once, but failing to silence the gun, rushed forward with his bayonet fixed, through a wheat field toward the gun emplacement, falling within 25 yards of the gun with his right leg nearly severed above the knee and with several bullet holes in his body. With undaunted courage he continued to fire into the emplacement from a prone position, killing 2 of the enemy and dispersing the rest of the crew.

George Dilboy is just one of many MOH recipients whose medal had to be awarded after he sacrificed himself to do something beyond the capacity of most people.

Credit Where It Is Due

I've been a harsh critic of President Obama. Anyone reading this blog for any length of time knows that I think he's a weak leader, clueless on foreign policy, and a big government liberal Democrat here at home. But one area where I haven't had much criticism of the president is in his handling of the war against Al Qaeda and its affiliates. In fact, I've noted before that attacks on Obama as soft on terrorism are ridiculous and don't match the evidence.

Although the president has given lip service to the ideas of terrorist rights supporters, and has made some cosmetic changes to our policies, for the most part he has continued the post-9/11 war on terror measures of the Bush administration. Unlike other foreign policy actions, such as Libya, where he foolishly tied the U.S. to a UN resolution, he has not crippled U.S. war efforts against Al Qaeda. He has ignored bleating about international law when it conflicted with American interests regarding targeting terrorists. He even expanded the drone assassination program, despite opposition from his own political base. The killing of Osama bin Laden is a prime example of how the president has taken a hard-edged approach to dealing with foreign terrorists -- as long as they are at large.

Obama ordered a U.S. kill team into Pakistan, violating Pakistani sovereignty. There was no order to capture bin Laden, and bring him back for trial as if he were a criminal. Instead the president ordered his execution without any legal niceties, treating him as the enemy he was. This action was exactly the type of response to terrorist enemies that is in America's interest. It sends a clear message to other terrorist leaders, and those who harbor them. We aren't going to try to arrest you. And the borders of the place you are hiding aren't going to protect you. We are going to kill you, even if it takes ten years to find you. Regardless of what you think of President Obama, he deserves credit for taking decisive action to eliminate one of the greatest enemies of the U.S.

I might also note that this operation was carried out in secret. There were no leaks to compromise it. The administration deserves significant credit for that alone. There has been far too little secrecy lately, and secrecy is critical to effective covert action.

Now What in Libya?

The utter cluelessness and incompetence of Obama in foreign policy is on display for all to see, yet again.

Adm Mike Mullen, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the outcome of military action from the air was "very uncertain" and made it clear that Washington did not see the goal of Operation Odyssey Dawn as removing the Libyan leader from power.

So we're intevening in a foreign civil war against a long-time enemy of the U.S., but we aren't planning on actually doing anything particularly useful. So why are we there?

"The goals are limited. It's not about seeing him go. It's about supporting the United Nations resolution which talked about eliminating his ability to kill his own people."

Is the administration really that stupid? I have to believe that Admiral Mullen must have been fighting the urge to gag when he repeated that nonsense. He's serving complete fools who think it's a good idea to turn the U.S. military into the air and sea equivalent of UN peacekeepers, who sort of intervene in conflicts, but not too much.

Intervening in this civil war was a bad idea, but what makes a positive outcome the most likely? I can think of one thing and one thing only: the quick death of Moammar Gaddafi. The best case scenario is that the death of Gaddafi will cause the quick collapse of the regime and its supporting forces. A new government will form, and the reason for intervention will no longer exist. I realize this is a best case scenario, and that the death of Gaddafi might not end the war. But it's worth a shot. Instead of continuing to bleat our ridiculous mantra about protecting civilians, and pretending that the UN resolution has any real meaning except as an excuse for intervention, we should direct our efforts at killing Gaddafi, his relatives, and any other potential leaders who might take over in his absence.

Setting a Bad Precedent With Libya

I'm opposed to U.S. intervention in Libya because I don't see it as necessary for U.S. interests, or necessary at all. France & Britain, which are gung-ho to act against Gaddafi, can easily turn the tide in favor of the rebels without U.S. assistance. But the UN resolution for intervention also sets a bad precedent that could harm U.S. interests in the future. The justification is based on protecting civilians. If you read the resolution, you will note that the words "to protect civilians" appear repeatedly.

If protecting civilians is a good justification for war, then it justifies any intervention in a foreign conflict. Civilians die in all modern wars. Sometimes they are targeted deliberately, but many times they are killed by accident. And sometimes they are killed because even though they are civilians, they are taking part in hostilities. Any government attempting to put down a rebellion has to kill civilians. Rebels usually don't have their own military, at least not in the initial stages. Armed rebels mingle with and hide amongst unarmed civilians. Even belligerents that care whether or not they kill civilians are going to have to kill some in order to fight at all. It should be obvious, since we have ongoing wars, that counterinsurgency operations require that some numbers of civilians die, no matter what extreme measures are taken to limit casualties.

Anti-American types at home and abroad are constantly condemning the U.S. for killing civilians in Afghanistan and Iraq. At some time in the future, will the U.S. face a U.N. led effort to intervene against us, justified by the supposed need to protect civilians? Is there the slightest doubt that the next time Israel has to launch a major military action there will be calls for international action to protect civilians?

What we are doing by signing on to this foolish UN resolution is handing our enemies a club to beat us with in the future. But as usual, our government never looks at the unintended consequences of its actions when it feels the urge to "do something."

The Last U.S. World War One Veteran is Dead

In the entire world there were two veterans of World War I alive on Saturday, and now there is only one. Frank Buckles enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1917. He died yesterday at the age of 110. I wrote a brief post and linked an article about him a year ago.

Stay Away From Iran

Yet another American has been arrested in an Iranian border area and charged with spying. This time it's a 55 year-old woman who supposedly crossed the border from Armenia without a visa. As an American I hope that she and other Americans detained on what are almost certainly trumped-up charges of espionage are released unharmed. But on a personal level I have very little sympathy for stupid people.

Iran is not just a hostile rogue state, it is an open enemy of the United States. We are currently fighting a low-level war with that country in which Iranian proxies, and Iranian personnel themselves attempt to kill American troops. There is almost certainly a covert war going on beyond the things the public knows of. Iran has made all sorts of wild threats against both the U.S. and Israel, and the latter two countries have publicly speculated about a possible preemptive strike to destroy Iran's nuclear program. In this climate, with the current regime in charge in Tehran, any ordinary American who either goes to Iran, or travels to a border area of a country adjacent to it is a complete fool. Iran is actively looking for American hostages to seize. Americans with an ounce of basic common sense should avoid Iran like the plague.

The Ongoing Wikileaks Saga

As everyone probably knows by now, Julian Assange turned himself in to British authorities as a result of his European arrest warrant and will face sex charges filed in Sweden. This could be either a good or bad development. It's possible the charges will stick, he'll be convicted, thrown in jail and essentially discredited as a sex criminal. On the other hand, there is probably a decent chance that there won't be enough evidence for a conviction, he'll walk free, and use the incident to portray himself as a martyr.

Despite the situation with Assange, Wikileaks says it will continue releasing stolen U.S. diplomatic cables. Assange alone is not the problem, and regardless of what happens to him personally, Wikileaks remains a hostile non-state organization engaged in a direct attack on the United States. Along with the Assange situation, there have been some other positive developments. Visa and Paypal have both suspended business arrangements with Wikileaks, and the Swiss closed Assange's bank account. Those are helpful measures, but they don't go nearly far enough.

As I've argued before, Wikileaks has already inflicted significant damage on the U.S. Instead of waiting around for the next attack, the U.S. should take both overt and covert action to destroy this organization. Attacking its finances is well and good, but the U.S. should directly target the key individuals running Wikileaks. It's past time for some of them to start dying or disappearing. Unfortunately it is unlikely that our current president will act beyond the usual strongly-worded statements, and tentative legal tactics. We can wage an extensive assassination campaign in Afghanistan/Pakistan, but we apparently can't act to destroy an enemy that has carried out a successful assault, and caused far more damage than most of the people we are killing.

Even Hillary Clinton Understands that Wikileaks is an Enemy of the U.S

Here's the Secretary of State,

``This disclosure is not just an attack on America's foreign policy interests,'' Mrs. Clinton said, ``it is an attack on the international community: the alliances and partnerships, the conversations and negotiations that safeguard global security and advance economic prosperity.''

``It puts people's lives in danger, threatens our national security and undermines our efforts to work with other countries to solve shared problems,''

As I've been arguing, Wikileaks is not a journalist organization, it's an enemy entity targeting the United States. Hillary Clinton is claiming that it is also an attack on the mythical "international community." It isn't. The target is clearly the U.S. But the secretary is obviously attempting to build international support for suppression efforts aimed at Wikileaks. With that in mind, casting the attack as an assault on the international system of diplomacy is a reasonable tactic.

But words aren't enough. The Obama administration is big on talking. In fact, it puts great faith in diplomacy, "engagement," and so-called "smart power" or "soft power." The Obama approach to foreign policy -- even more than most -- is directly undermined by leaks which reveal candid assessments, gamesmanship, private conversations and all sorts of other information which diplomats and leaders expected would never see the light of day. Like other leaks, it reinforces the perception that the U.S. government simply can't be trusted to keep secrets secret. When you know someone can't keep a secret, you naturally become much more guarded and wary in your conversations.

Some have attempted to dismiss this leak as much ado about nothing, or at least see the concern as overblown. I'm one of the first to cry "much ado about nothing" in many cases, but this isn't one of them. Anyone who knows how foreign policy and diplomacy operate has to understand the serious damage of these leaks. Hillary Clinton is exactly right when she calls the Wikileak's action an attack. But recognizing an enemy attack is one thing, responding to it effectively and eliminating the possibility of future attacks is another. Let's see if the Obama administration does anything beyond talk.

Wikileaks Launches Another Attack on the U.S.

As everyone probably knows by now, Wikileaks, an organization working with U.S. traitors to reveal classified information, has exposed a vast number of secret U.S. diplomatic documents.  

some 11,000 are classified “secret,” 9,000 are labeled “noforn,” shorthand for material considered too delicate to be shared with any foreign government, and 4,000 are designated both secret and noforn.

Many more cables name diplomats’ confidential sources, from foreign legislators and military officers to human rights activists and journalists, often with a warning to Washington: “Please protect” or “Strictly protect.”

If you read through the NYT article and others, you can see the scope of this information, which reveals all sorts of things that could damage U.S. relations with numerous countries, and render the conduct of U.S. foreign policy far more difficult. What Wikileaks has done is nothing less than a direct assault on the United States. The release of these documents has the potential to be more damaging than many types of terrorist attack. There should be no question that Wikileaks as an organization is a clear enemy of the U.S., and it should be treated as such. Instead of tolerating these attacks and doing little beyond issuing a condemnation, the U.S. government should do everything within its power to destroy Wikileaks, as it would any other non-state entity launching attacks on the U.S. It's time to stop tolerating this enemy that has repeatedly acted with impunity against us.

During the Clinton and Bush years we had a useful program known as extraordinary rendition, which President Obama foolishly shut down -- at least as far as we know. If, like many of Bush's policies, we are still doing something similar, this would be an ideal way to deal with some of the key enemies running Wikileaks. They could simply disappear, with the side benefit that interrogation might yield information regarding which traitors in the U.S. are supplying them with documents. If that isn't possible, there should be a strange rash of fatal accidents and random murders among top level members of Wikileaks. Other options should also be explored, such as legal measures, cyber warfare, disruption of financing and anything else either covert or overt that can be used to destroy the organization. 

UPDATE

Republican Congressman Peter King of New York appears to essentially agree with me -- although naturally he can't be quite as specific about actions we might take.

"I am calling on the attorney general and supporting his efforts to fully prosecute Wikileaks and its founder for violating the Espionage Act. And I'm also calling on Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to declare Wikileaks a foreign terrorist organization," King said on WNIS radio on Sunday evening.

"By doing that, we will be able to seize their funds and go after anyone who provides them help or contributions or assistance whatsoever," he said. "To me, they are a clear and present danger to America."

Obama and North Korea

I'm going to resist the urge, already cropping up among some on the right, to bash President Obama over the current situation with North Korea. In fact, I think that his statements of resolute support for South Korea, combined with the current show of naval force, and diplomatic efforts directed at China comprise a reasonable response at this time. I've written a number of posts about North Korea, (which can be found by clicking the "North Korea" label below), that outline my views on U.S. policy toward that country. I'll quote myself here,

North Korea doesn't need to be "engaged" or talked to; it needs to be contained & deterred. Our diplomacy in that regard should be directed at China, with the intention of making it very clear to the Chinese that we expect them to maintain a certain degree of control over their insane client state. As a rational actor, we expect China to prevent the insanity of North Korea from spilling over its borders. As long as they keep Kim Jong Ill on a short leash, there will be no need for U.S. involvement - a win/win for both the U.S. and China.

If we do talk to North Korea it should be in a language that it understands: clear, unmistakeable threats. As I've written before, we should do everything possible to make the North understand that if it starts a war it will not be a limited conflict, and we will use the full power of the United States against it -- which would include directly targeting and killing the communist leadership and destroying North Korea as a political entity. This should also be conveyed to China in the strongest possible terms.

I have no confidence in the president to carry out a realistic policy of containment with regard to North Korea. But so far he appears to have reacted well to the current crisis. It is not the job of the U.S. to fight South Korea's battles for it, or to take the lead in responding to an attack on South Korean territory. This isn't 1950. South Korea is now a powerful state in its own right. It has to decide how best to respond. Unfortunately, the best time for a response has now passed. In my opinion the South should have delivered a serious message immediately after the attack, not just counterbattery fire, but air strikes against the North Korean artillery that bombarded South Korea. In other words, they should have made it clear that agression would be met by overwhelming force. That's the sort of thing dictators understand. It may be that South Korea's artillery fire inflicted major damage and wiped out the North Korean batteries, in which case the response was appropriate. We don't have enough information to know.

But what to do now becomes much trickier. A punitive strike of some sort on North Korea after the fact will not go over well with China, and will allow North Korea to pose as a victim for those who choose to see it that way. And from the U.S. perspective, we don't need to get dragged into an unnecessary regional war, so it is in our interests that the South doesn't act recklessly. I'm not sure at this point what can be done that hasn't already been done. 

The Wages of Appeasement

If we needed a reminder about the consequences of appeasement, today's latest act of war by North Korea is a good example. When you tolerate numerous acts of hostilities by a rogue state, including allowing it to get away with sinking one of your warships without significant consequence, don't be surprised when its leadership feels confident in firing artillery into your country. At least this time South Korea struck back with its own guns, albeit in a fairly minor way.

For years, U.S. and South Korean policy toward the North has been essentially one of appeasement and wishful thinking. At the same time, both have supported limited economic sanctions, which while doing nothing to negate the North Korean military threat, created even more hostility. Now the threat has increased and is backed by an unknown number of nuclear weapons. Time and time again North Korea has been allowed to get away with hostile acts, to the point where it has to believe it can do pretty much whatever it wants, and that the South and its U.S. ally are too afraid of war to respond with anything more than empty talk and economic sanctions. Its belligerence has paid off before, forcing negotiations and even agreements which brought direct aid to North Korea.

Although appeasement can delay war, it tends to breed more aggression, confirming the aggressor's views of its enemies as weak and irresolute. But at some point the aggressor is going to miscalculate and go too far, and there will be a war. Hopefully it won't happen now, but it's only a matter of time unless there is a drastic change in policy toward North Korea.