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THE LIMITATIONS OF 4GW

As a rule, I dislike writing about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict because it is a problem that under the current dynamic, cannot be resolved but I will make a military theory exception today.

William Lind at DNI has an interesting analysis of the predicament that the HAMAS government of the Palestinian Authority finds itself in during the current crisis with Israel over kidnapped Israeli soldier, Cpl. Gilad Shalit . In ” To Be or Not To Be a State? “, Lind argues that the move by HAMAS, a 4GW entity, to accept the responsibility of state governance was a serious strategic error that played into the hands of Israeli and American officials who had no intention of permitting a HAMAS government to be a success:

“In cooperation with Israel (can Washington now do anything except in cooperation with Israel?), the U.S. imposed a starvation blockade on the Palestinian territories. Instead of British armored cruisers, the blockaders this time are U.S. banking laws, plus Israeli withholding of Palestinian tax receipts. As the government of a quasi-state, Hamas found itself with no money. PA employees went unpaid and PA services, such as they were, largely collapsed. The burden, as always, fell on average Palestinians.

Normally, that captured Israeli would be a Hamas asset. But now that Hamas is a state, it has discovered Cpl. Gilad Shalit is a major liability. Israel is refusing all deals for his return. If Hamas returns him without a deal, it will be humiliated. If it continues to hold him, Israel will up the military pressure; it is already destroying PA targets such as government offices and arresting PA cabinet members. If it kills him, the Israeli public will back whatever revenge strikes the Israeli military wants. Hamas is now far more targetable than it was as a non-state entity, but is no better able to defend itself or Palestine than it was as a Fourth Generation force. 4GW forces are generally unable to defend territory or fixed targets against state armed forces, but they have no reason to do so. Now, as a quasi-state, Hamas must do so or appear to be defeated. “

In my view, the original miscalculation made by HAMAS was the expectation that they could have their cake and eat it as well by enjoying the prestge and power base of PA instrumentalities while being allowed to carry on their terror war with Israel. A free pass of sorts from accountability by virtue of having won a democratic election. This did not happen as both Israel and the United States indicated that a HAMAS-run PA would be responsible for upholding all of the agreements the PA had signed with Israel under Arafat’s Fatah or suffer accordingly. Lind is correct here -HAMAS had become very “targetable”.

A better strategy for HAMAS than clinging to its credo of uncompromising resistance to Israel would have been a full court press P.R. campaign for a ” Hudna” or truce that would let the Islamists save face while pragmatically adhering to past agreements. The “Hudna” idea was floated by a few HAMAS leaders after their victory but was never made the centerpiece for a political victory at the moral level of warfare; indeed, recent threats to attack Israeli schools in retaliation for Israeli attacks in Gaza would seem to indicate that HAMAS does not understand the dynamics of 4GW at all.

Lind did have some bold advice for HAMAS:

“There is, however, another way out for Hamas. It can call and raise Washington’s and Tel Aviv bets. How? By voting to dissolve the Palestinian Authority. Ending the PA would dump the Palestinian territories and their inhabitants’ right back in Israel’s lap. Under international law, as the occupying power, Israel would be responsible for everything in the territories: security, human services, utilities and infrastructure, the economy, the whole megillah (oy!). Israel could try to restore the PA in cooperation with Fatah, but if Fatah joined Israel in doing so, it would destroy what legitimacy it has left. Hamas could meanwhile return to a 4GW war against Israel, unencumbered with the dubious assets of a state, and with lots more targets as Israel attempted to run the Palestinian Territories itself.”

That is probably tactically sound advice but strategically unwise. Statehood seems to be something deeply desired by the vast majority of Palestinians, despite divisions over the form that state should take and its relationship to Israel (for those Palestinians willing to accept less than 100 % of the old Transjordanian Mandate). Unilaterally discorporating the PA, hollow quasi-state it may well be, risks de-legitimizing HAMAS as a Palestinian political movement and, perhaps, might be resisted by Fatah/PLO by force.

Which brings us to the limitations of 4GW itself. It is not, in the the strategic taxonomy of Colonel John Boyd, a constructive force and a nation-state is. HAMAS needed to make the jump from being an anti-Israeli vehicle for destruction to an entity that can construct a positive future for the Palestinian people. Without the state as an end, the means of 4GW would appear to result in little other than societal disintegration.

RECOMMENDED READING

In quick, staccato, bullet point fashion !

Shawn at Asia Logistics Wrap -” Resiliency Lessons from China: A Look at Carrefour“

Steve DeAngelis at ERMB -” Networked Civilization Revisited“
(more on this subject from me later…)

Critt Jarvis at Connecting in Conversation -” Human Complexity“

Chirol at Coming Anarchy -” Empowerment through Technology“

Dr. Andrew Meyer at Madman of Chu -” China, North Korea, and the US “

StrategyUnit on “Culture and Decision Making: Avoiding Mirroring“

Prometheus6 on “All you social networking types better get your connections made while they’re still free“

That’s it !

BOATIN’

Spent much of yesterday on the lake doing what my friends and I like to call The Annual Jack Daniel’s Regatta. The weather was superb, drinks were plentiful, the view perfect and a good time was had by all. My only regret being that I forgot to light up a big, honkin’ cigar.

And now…back to regularly scheduled blogging.

DEANGELIS ON CIVILIZATIONAL RESILIENCE AND COMPLEXITY

Steve DeAngelis at ERMB was kind enough to devote a lengthy post to my thoughts on civilizational resilience and also those of the complexity theorist Dr. Yaneer Bar-Yam.
In bringing his expertise to bear, Steve helpfully clarified many important aspects of civilizational resilience and complexity, including the issue of scalability, before delving into Bar-Yam’s biological model:

“The basic premise is that the complexity of connections increases as one moves from the random actions of individuals to the coordinated movements of great civilizations. Resilience increases as you move up this continuum from individuals (who survive at best around century) to civilizations (which can survive for thousands of years). Safranski asks where globalization fits into this scheme of things. Is globalization an ephemeral stage or a convergence of civilizations into something new?

… I agree with the basic premise that complexity grows as connections increase. I have argued that globalization has created a complexity gap which results when organizations try unsuccessfully to meet emerging challenges with traditional solutions. I started Enterra Solutions to help fill the complexity gap for organizations and Tom Barnett and I promote Development-in-a-Box as a way to fill the complexity gap for nation-states.

…Dynamic civilizations, like the Roman Empire, generally fall as a result of complacency and decadence. Whereas, static civilizations generally decline more gradually as the complexity gap increases and the people end up undereducated, underproductive, and impoverished”

This last point was really quite important.

Steve’s “Complexity Gap“ is a critical concept because it introduces the cognitive aspect of social and political problems that, if left unaddressed, is likely to render otherwise solvable political problems intractable. A phenomena we see in many failing states with a numerically tiny, Western (or Soviet bloc) educated elite and a semi-illiterate, rural majority, population. A reason why the introduction of mass education, particularly for in societies where, traditionally, education has been denied to women, often proves to be transformative on a multiplicity of levels.

On Bar-Yam:

“Although there is a Borg-like quality to Bar-Yam’s description of humanity as “a single organism,” his larger point is that we are all in this world together and many of the complex solutions to emerging challenges are going to require a coordinated effort. Since we all know how difficult (impossible?) it is to get international agreement on anything, we are left wondering how (if?) this coordinated effort will emerge.

If Bar-Yam is correct and we are heading toward a networked “civilization” and greater specialization, some of the topics I’ve blogged in the past will become even more important. For example, the able to create a “Medici Effect” (18 May post) among specializations will critical as will the establishment of “globally-integrated enterprises” (14 June post). The ability to establish and maintain “communities of practice” (27 & 29 June posts) will also be important. Each of these concepts shares a simple idea, when people connect good things can happen.”

Steve is, in my view, quite correct.

A networked civilization by definition will see greater interaction by these specialists across domains , in horizontal thinking fashion, and that such multidisciplinary collaboration ( which is happening with increasing frequency in the sciences) is a sign that such a society is starting to emerge. Not unlike the first shifts away from commons land agriculture and artisanal craftsmanship and toward consolidated landholdings, factories and worker specialization in the 17th-19th centuries. An economic and organizational transition that heralded the start of the Industrial Revolution.

Read Steve’s post in full.

“THE COMPLEXITY ECONOMICS REVOLUTION”

John Hagel, who I wish would post more frequently than he does, reviewing Eric Beinhocker’s The Origin of Wealth, at Edge Perspectives:

“Beinhocker’s book takes on a more ambitious task. As he indicates in his preface,

Second, and related to the first, Eric’s rich discussion of business strategy towards the end of his book suffers from a tendency to focus solely on individual enterprises without exploring significant opportunities to pursue strategies that mobilize large networks or webs of participants. His discussion of strategy tends to assume a dichotomy of firm and market, without acknowledging the rich spectrum of relationships that exist between these two extremes. This is particularly surprising since, earlier in his book, Eric explores with great insight the role of networks in complex adaptive systems. “

Read John Hagel’s post in full.