{"id":2627,"date":"2008-03-06T16:42:29","date_gmt":"2008-03-06T16:42:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/zenpundit.com\/?p=2627"},"modified":"2008-03-09T16:36:41","modified_gmt":"2008-03-09T16:36:41","slug":"a-barnett-in-a-china-shop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/?p=2627","title":{"rendered":"A Barnett in a China Shop"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tom<\/strong> <\/a>appears to have really rattled somebody’s cage at The White H<\/strong>ouse <\/a>with his profile of CENTCOM<\/strong> <\/a>commander Admiral Fallon<\/strong> in Esquire<\/a><\/em> Magazine<\/strong>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Man Between War and Peace<\/a> by Thomas P.M. Barnett<\/strong><\/p>\n

The money quote\u00a0from the magazine article that probably caused political\u00a0WWIII:<\/p>\n

Last December, when the National Intelligence Estimate downgraded the immediate nuclear threat from Iran, it seemed as if Fallon’s caution was justified. But still, well-placed observers now say that it will come as no surprise if Fallon is relieved of his command before his time is up next spring, maybe as early as this summer, in favor of a commander the White House considers to be more pliable. If that were to happen, it may well mean that the president and vice-president intend to take military action against Iran before the end of this year and don’t want a commander standing in their way. <\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

We will be hearing a lot more about this in the next few days.\u00a0 Before the analysis commences, I’ll add that what Tom wrote for Esquire<\/em><\/strong> was not some shoot-from-the-hip, data-free analysis, op-ed,\u00a0blog post. His\u00a0profile of Admiral Fallon\u00a0was\u00a0\u00a0deeply sourced and the product of a great deal of firsthand experience, careful research and extensive review to vett it prior to publication. Far more so,\u00a0I might add, than\u00a0what Thomas Ricks<\/strong> put up in WaPo<\/em><\/strong> in response.\u00a0 \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n

UPDATE:<\/strong><\/p>\n

I’ve redacted this section as the link was broken and the post has been removed by the author. In the interim, The SWJ BLog<\/strong> <\/a>has put up an extended post that details the Barnett-Fallon-Ricks story in greater detail as well as Tom’s COIN coments (as well as linking here – thanks Dave!).<\/p>\n

SWJ Items of Interest<\/a><\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Barnett was <\/strong>quite critical<\/strong><\/a> of a recent <\/strong>SWJ<\/em> Magazine<\/strong><\/a> article, <\/strong>The Global Counter Insurgency<\/strong><\/a>, by Jonathan Morgenstein & Eric Vickland.<\/strong><\/p>\n

From the article…<\/strong><\/p>\n

Sixty years ago, George Kennan penned his landmark Foreign Affairs article that defined American foreign policy for the next half century. Seminal security policy decisions such as the creation of NATO, the blockade of Cuba and the Berlin airlift were all components of the policy of Containment. Today, a radical Islamic ideology seeks our destruction, yet we lack a unifying doctrine on which to base our foreign policy. Al Qaida and its ideological compatriots represent a worldwide insurgency based on religious extremism. At its core it is a political struggle with political aims and in order to defeat it, we need adapt our means to the nature of the struggle. We are not fighting a war on terrorism. We are fighting a global insurgency against an extremist brand of Islam.<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Read the rest here.<\/a><\/p>\n

Other Blogs Commenting:<\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

Neptunus Lex<\/a>\u00a0 The Agonist<\/a> \u00a0 World and Global Politics Blog<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0 Winterpatriot<\/a>\u00a0 Corrente <\/a>\u00a0 DownWithTyranny<\/a>\u00a0 Tailrank\u00a0<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0 Kevin Drum<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0 Poligazette<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 William Arkin<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0 Thinkprogress<\/a> \u00a0 Newshoggers<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Outside the Beltway<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0 Hullabaloo<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Tom appears to have really rattled somebody’s cage at The White House with his profile of CENTCOM commander Admiral Fallon in Esquire Magazine.\u00a0 The Man Between War and Peace by Thomas P.M. Barnett The money quote\u00a0from the magazine article that probably caused political\u00a0WWIII: Last December, when the National Intelligence Estimate downgraded the immediate nuclear threat […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,22,304,93,499,492,43,39,270,472,18,217,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2627","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-barnett","category-deangelis","category-defense","category-iran","category-islamic-world","category-leadership","category-mideast","category-military","category-national-security","category-public-diplomacy","category-war","category-warriors","category-washington-post"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2627","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2627"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2627\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2627"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2627"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zenpundit.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2627"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}