Top Billing! NYT – David Kilcullen and Andrew Exum  “Death From Above, Outrage Down Below”

This was very interesting but the argument in the op-ed contains an important logical disconnect.

Exum and Kilcullen are certainly correct that technology, in this case the predator and global hawk drone strikes being used to kill al Qaida and Taliban targets in Pakistan, are no substitute for a coherent strategy. They are also correct that there are, in Exum’s words at Abu Muqawama “second and third order effects”on Pakistan from using predators and their end-goal of enlisting local allies is where the U.S. needs to go to be successful. That said, we should also note that there are also second and third order effects on al Qaida from these strikes – namely that AQ cannot function operationally as a transnational terrorist group in the catastrophic terrorism business. Optimum counter-terrorism objectives are not always going to be congruent with optimum COIN situations and in the Afghapakistan border region, they appear to be in significant conflict.

The logical disconnect in the op-ed is in that to get to that desirable strategic end-state described by Kilcullen and Exum, the U.S. needs to be able to send uniformed people to operate in FATA, which Islamabad adamantly refuses to entertain. Frankly, the Pakistani generals prefer the predators buzzing around to U.S. troops walking around. “Local allies” that are armed, funded and trained by the U.S. military are likely to make short work of the ISI’s radical Islamist militia proteges, which is why Kilcullen wants to get to that policy destination and why Islamabad is unlikely to ever agree except under the greatest duress and in completely bad faith. Our “local allies” are also likely to become a legacy headache for Pakistan once Bin Laden is swinging from a tree in Waziristan and we are long gone.

While Exum and Kilcullen are correct to point out the costs, it is hard for me to say that predators should be taken off the table in Pakistan until COIN can be put on the table. Not sure how we get to that point from here, either but they deserve credit for trying to get the strategic ball rolling in that direction.

Hat tip SWJ Blog.

CTLab –  The Occidental Guerrilla

Review of David Kilcullen’s book, The Accidental Guerrilla.

David Ronfeldt –  Organizational forms compared: my evolving TIMN table vs. other analysts’ tables

Very useful for those looking for org models.

Selil blog –  How to wage cyber warfare: A primer, Part 1, How to wage cyber warfare: Barriers to entry, Part 2,  How to wage cyber warfare: Puzzle pieces, Part 3, How to wage cyber warfare: The technology and structure, Part 4

Professor Liles has a book in progress, I believe.

Neurolearning Blog – Different Brain Networks for Novelty-Induced vs. Voluntary Attention

We are wired to see the new We learn to see the routine.

Kings of War – Hybrid war v postmodern war

Argues that we are looking at war from the wrong angle.

Smartmobs – Publication: Identity in the Age of Cloud Computing 

“The best report on cloud computing ever published”. E-book format.

That’s it.

Top Billing! The Committee of Public Safety – The Machiavellians: Principle I , The Machiavellians: Principle II and The Machiavellians: Principle III

Josephfouche’s neat idea for a series, based on The Machiavellians: Defenders of Freedom by 20th century public intellectual James Burnham.

DNI – “The Epistemology of Strategy” by Maj. Richard Maltz (ret.) Hat tip to Fabius Maximus.

Military revolutions are cognitive revolutions.

NYT  – “Up, Up and Out ” by Paul Kane

Getting rid of the Air Force is laugh test dumb – as if I want ground commanders controlling our arsenal of nuclear weapons, we decided that issue fifty years ago. That said, other parts of this op-ed are very sound.

Foreign Policy – Three juntas and a democracy

Studies in Intelligence – The CIA and the Culture of Failure: U.S. Intelligence from the End of the Cold War

SEED –  This is your brain on Facebook

That’s it!

Very busy week and we are hosting my nephew this weekend, so this may be short:

Top Billing!  James V. DeLong’s  The Coming of the Fourth American Republic ( hat tip to Barnabus and Pundita)

Probably the most provocative analytical political piece of the past month. Reminds me slightly of an internal version of The Shield of Achilles.

Global Guerillas – PAKISTAN AND OPEN SOURCE WARFARE and JOURNAL: An Open Source Counter-insurgency for Pakistan?

John estimates Pakistan’s chances and finds them to be slim. Good back and forth with Dr. Chet Richards on How afraid should we be? in addition.

MountainRunner– Guest Post: How to win the GWOT – or whatever it’s called today

Matt Armstrong turns over his blog to some former NSC staff members, Mark Pfeifle and Jonathan Thompson.

WIRED – Army Looks to Keep Troops Forever Young

I could use some of this anti-aging elixir this morning! 🙂

Scientific American – How Room Designs Affect Your Work and Mood

The neuroscience implies that the average workspace design for offices and schools promotes a feeling of jet lag and depression. LOL! How true.

Proceeedings – “The Overstated Threat” by Commander John Patch, U.S. Navy (Ret.)

The pirates 15 minutes of fame should be over, according to Patch.

The Jamestown Foundation – Ingushetia is Still Burning

In case you feel a need for an update for the troubles of Russo-Transcaucasian backwater.

 The Annual Edge Question 2009 – “What will change everything?… What game-changing scientific ideas and developments do you expect to live to see?”

That’s it!

 Top Billing! Galrahn at Information Dissemination for his comprehensive Somali pirate blogging Observing the Obama Administration Somali Piracy Policy , Somalia is Bigger than Piracy Even as Piracy Dominates the News,  French Conduct Hostage Rescue Off Somalia – Updated , Captain Richard Phillips Rescued , Leveraging Success Going Forward, Somali Pirates Vow Revenge, Kaplan’s Elegant Decline Applied to Piracy  and Time to Plan and Weigh Options

Coming Anarchy:  “Stop calling them pirates”

Global Guerillas: PIRATES

Outside the Beltway (Schuler) – Dealing With Somali Piracy (Updated)

HG’s World –  In the Finest Traditions of the United States Navy

SWJ Blog – Weekend Piracy News, Opinion, Blog Roundup

David Axe – Somali Pirates versus the Tuna Trade

Ok…that’s enough piracy for anyone lacking a peg leg and a parrot. Moving on……

A MENA Burst: Abu Muqawama on The Regionalization of Hizballah and Lounsbury on Reading Race in MENA: Black Imam of Mecca and American reads

A more granular take on Mideast cultural-political issues.

DEBATE: The Army’s Strategic Role  Dr. Steven Metz of SSI vs. Nathan Freier of CSIS

SEED –  The Living Robot

” Researchers have developed a robot capable of learning and interacting with the world using a biological brain.”

The Journal of Democracy – Reading Russia: The Siloviki in Charge

Thomas P.M. Barnett – banning nuclear weapons is a foolish dream and a waste of Obama’s limited political capital in national security affairs

 Tom’s 100 % correct. The folks pushing this, who include conservative Republican elder statesmen who know better, if they succeeded, would breathe new life into great power war ( our last round, WWII, cost 60 million dead) and give a huge edge to dictators who could produce a small arsenal of atomic bombs in secret.

That’s it!

Top Billing! SWJ Blog Gates Budget Plan Reshapes Pentagon’s Priorities and DoD Budget Press Briefing

A round up on the biggest proposed structural shift at the Pentagon since Nixon abolished the draft. It’s going to be a bureaucratic-legislative-political battle royal!

Information Dissemination – Observing the Pentagon Report on China Military Power

Heh. I have a copy of Soviet Military Power 1990 on the shelf.

Fabius Maximus –  Important, even vital, articles from last week

FM draws on liberal economists deeply concerned with Obama’s economic policy of creeping oligarchy.

J. Bradford DeLong – For the First Time in a Decade, an Administration Is Not Making Our Long Run Fiscal Problems Worse

Brad has become, more or less, the blogospheric champion of Obamanomics.

ERMB – The Rise of Entrepreneurialism

Steve DeAngelis uses The Economist as a foil to discuss leveraging cloud computing and modular innovation as it relates to global patterns of entrepreneurship. 

Soob – The “90% of Mexican cartel guns come from the US” Myth

Not surprised a whit. The MSM is more likely to shoot straight ( pun intended) on global warming or abortion than on guns. I’m also not surprised that El Paso is quiet – it is to Mexican narco-cartelistas what Florida once was to La Cosa Nostra.

Choosing the blog over the dead tree: Tom Barnett’s last newspaper column.

Congratulations to blogfriend Dr. Daniel Nexon of The Duck of Minerva for publication of his new book, The Struggle for Power in Early Modern Europe: Religious Conflict, Dynastic Empires, and International Change.

SEED – The Multiverse Problem

Is an obscure theory in the field of theoretical physics about to collide with the political activism of the Religious Right?

That’s it.