Rough notes on the empire death watch

David Seaton's News Links

As I said in the previous post I am loafing a bit this week with no deadlines to meet. However, being a firm believer in the old boxer's adage, "train hard, fight easy", I am engaged, little beaver fashion, in my reading so that hopefully by next week I'll have something useful to say about the horrible mess in the Middle East for my Spanish readers.

Meanwhile, I thought I'd share with you some partially digested material I've been looking at today.

On the eve of more possible conflict, the first thing to do would be to look to the state of forces to be employed. In military affairs, wise men say that amateurs speak of strategy but professionals talk about logistics. If that were the gauge, here is a clipping from the Washington Times, from an extremely professional article by Retired Maj. Gen. Robert H. Scales, former commander of the US Army War College that is anything but encouraging.

If you haven't heard the news, I'm afraid your Army is broken, a victim of too many missions for too few soldiers for too long. Today we have deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan all of our fighting brigades, both active and reserve. Every brigade save one in Korea has spent time in combat. Twenty have two tours there, nine have three and two have four. Some of these brigades' one-year deployments were extended by several months. To demonstrate the gravity of the problem, let's do the math. After the surge the nation will need to keep 33 brigades, each consisting of about 3,000 soldiers, in the field. Past experience tells us that three brigades are needed to keep one continuously in the fight (one recovering and one training up to support each deployed brigade). The Army could in theory maintain itself in combat indefinitely using such a scheme. From a human perspective, a three-for-one schedule would allow each soldier two years back for every year in combat. That is tough but sustainable. So, that means we need a total of 99 brigades to support 33 in the fight. Sorry to say, we only have about half that number available to the Army and Marine Corps.(...) Today, anecdotal evidence of collapse is all around. Past history makes some of us sensitive to anecdotes and distrustful of Pentagon statistics. The Army's collapse after Vietnam was presaged by a desertion of mid-grade officers (captains) and non-commissioned officers. Many were killed or wounded. Most left because they and their families were tired and didn't want to serve in units unprepared for war. If we lose our sergeants and captains, the Army breaks again. It's just that simple. That's why these soldiers are still the canaries in the readiness coal-mine. And, again, if you look closely, you will see that these canaries are fleeing their cages in frightening numbers. The lesson from this sad story is simple: When you fight a long war with a long-service professional Army, the force you begin with will not get any larger or better over the duration of the conflict. For that reason, today's conditions are pretty much irreversible. There's not much that money, goodwill or professed support for the troops can do. Another strange consequence is that the current political catfight over withdrawal dates is made moot by the above facts. We're running out of soldiers faster than we're running out of warfighting missions. The troops will be coming home soon. There simply are too few to sustain the surge for very much longer. READ IT ALL

After looking at the state of the forces, the next thing would be to look at the state of the alliances. America's diplomatic efforts led by Doctor Rice have been pointed toward creating an anti-Iran front among "moderate" Arab governments. Tony Karon of Time Magazine commented on the results in TomDispatch.

In reality, the Bush administration seems increasingly at odds with the consensus among the Arab moderates it claims to be leading. Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah, in particular, appears to have sent a signal of this in cancelling -- with little explanation -– a special state dinner that was to be hosted by President Bush on April 17th. Then, at Wednesday's Arab League Summit in Riyadh, the King followed up by demanding an end to the crippling financial siege of the Palestinian Authority imposed by the U.S. and denouncing the American military presence in Iraq as an "illegitimate foreign occupation." This is strong stuff from the Saudis. READ IT ALL

Strong stuff indeed, especially when you consider that the United States has been the sole guarantor of the the Saudi royal family survival since 1945... Some might consider the phrase, "illegitimate foreign occupation" coming from the King of Saudi Arabia as truly the "writing on the wall"... "You're dead son. get yourself buried".

As to European opinion, there is this snippet from Der Spiegel.

Forty-eight percent of Germans think the United States is more dangerous than Iran, a new survey shows, with only 31 percent believing the opposite.(...)(in) a Forsa opinion poll commissioned by Stern magazine. Young Germans in particular -- 57 percent of 18-to-29-year-olds, to be precise -- said they considered the United States more dangerous than the religious regime in Iran. READ IT ALL

In view of this state of European public opinion, I am not at all sure that the United States could have free use of its European bases in Germany, Italy or Spain or even the fly over use of their airspace in case of an American air attack on Iran.

Meanwhile, what is the word from America's most important ally, Israel? Here is an interesting clipping from Debka.

In his briefing to the Israeli cabinet Sunday, April 1, Maj. Gen. Amos Yadlin, AMAN chief, reported that Iran, Syria, Hizballah and Hamas expect the United States to attack Iran in the summer and they are preparing to retaliate by going to war with Israel. In Yadlin’s view, a proliferation of players and the many imponderables could ignite a conflict, which none of the parties wants – as happened in the Six Day War of 1967.(...) His comments came one day after Iran’s chief of staff, Gen. Hassan Fayrouz Abadi, urged the Arabs to hurry up and join Iran in a defense treaty because, he claimed, Israel threatened a war offensive in summer, two months hence. According to the Iranian general, Israel was bent on a “suicide assault” against a number of Arab states to save the Americans from having to pull their troops out of Iraq (sic).(...) Iran, Syria, Hizballah and Hamas may be presumed to be acting on some piece of intelligence that point to a forthcoming US attack some time between April and early September 2007. Therefore, the Middle East faces at least five months of incendiary military instability during which everyone will be braced for the axe to fall.(...) A coordinated Iranian-Syrian-Hizballah-Hamas attack would lay Israel open to four war fronts and the common weapon to them all: missiles - anti-tank, short-range surface, medium range ballistic and surface-to-air.(...) Hamas threatens to launch the third Palestinian uprising (intifada) against Israel within three months unless the international blockade is lifted and funds are released to the Palestinian Authority. The cabinet was informed that the IDF would start operating behind Gazan lines against the massive Palestinian military build-up. READ IT ALL

What about South Asia and the rest of the Muslim world?

There is a wonderful saying in Spanish, "eramos pocos y parió la abuela", which translates literally, "there were only a few of us and grandmother had a baby". It usually translates weakly into English as, "that was the last straw", which gives none of the surreal nuances of intense exasperation in the Spanish original. As to the reactions to a US/Israeli attack on Iran in Pakistan and its possible effect on the war in Afghanistan, you would do well to read this United Press International article by Arnaud de Borchgrave, said to have unsurpassed access to western intelligence services.

The U.S. intelligence community recently acquired a Pakistani insider's look at what makes Musharraf tick these days. As much as he wanted U.S. victory in Iraq, he has long since concluded the United States has lost the hand to Iran. To recoup America's loss before he leaves the White House in January 2009, Musharraf believes Bush will strike Iran's nuclear facilities from air and sea. And this, in turn, will unite Sunnis and Shiites in Pakistan against all things American -- and provoke a gigantic upheaval throughout the Middle East. With the whole world turning against Israel and the United States, he could not afford to continue his policy of "constructive ambiguity" toward the Bush administration.(...) What ISI reports to him from the European capitals that sent troops to Afghanistan under the NATO flag, and from numerous ISI operatives in 34 Afghan provinces on the other side of the Hindu Kush mountain range, is that NATO is losing ground to a resurgent and rejuvenated Taliban. ISI's conclusion: the NATO consensus on Afghanistan will not long survive a U.S. defeat in Iraq and/or U.S. hostilities against Iran.(...) Creeping Talibanization is now a reality across the length and breadth of one of the world's eight nuclear-weapons powers. Two of Pakistan's four provinces are already under anti-U.S., pro-Taliban governments. Musharraf has convinced himself that unless he could obtain another five years in power -- he took over in a military coup in 1999 -- Pakistan's nuclear arsenal would be at risk of falling under the control of Islamist extremists. READ IT ALL

Truly, eramos pocos y parió la abuela. DS

Iran.... My true confession: yes, we have no bananas

David Seaton's News Links

It's "Semana Santa" in Spain, Easter week. Thursday though Monday (Monday too in Barcelona) are holidays. Many people take the week off and travel and Good Friday is a total, everything shut down holiday, like Christmas, even Friday night... This means there are no newspapers published on Saturday. As my column appears on Saturdays, that means I don't have to write this week. Whew! What a relief.

If I did have to write, I would have to write about Iran and the Middle East and it is so confusing at the moment.

What my antenna are picking up, though, is that we are entering the most dangerous period that I can remember since the Cuban Missile Crisis. However that crisis was so stark, so clear, the players so few, the stakes so obvious, that the whole world sat on the edge of their seats, fingers crossed, "a pissin' and a prayin'"... a child could understand it.

But to analyze the situation in the Middle East at this moment is like standing at an open window trying analyze the flying contents of a pail of garbage that someone is dumping out of a higher window... it's all so mixed up, the coffee grounds with the banana peels.. and all moving so fast... better wait till it all hits the pavement and then pick through the mess at leisure... if that's to your taste.

I will give it a try in the next few days and am collecting material to that effect, but I confess to enjoying the lack of deadlines like a well fed pussycat curled up in the sunshine. DS

Tipping point: Coming to grips with failure in the Middle East

David Seaton's News Links

Today, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan said, "If I were an average Iraqi, obviously I would make the same comparison, that they had a dictator who was brutal but they had their streets, they could go out, their kids could go to school and come back home without a mother or father worrying: 'Am I going to see my child again?' The society needs security and a secure environment for it to get on. Without security, not much can be done - not recovery or reconstruction." There is a moment when failure becomes 'official', a moment when Paul Krugman asks, "How do you ask a man to be the last to die for a bully’s ego?" This moment is called the "tipping point", when people start running for the doors. Many Americans have trouble realizing how bad things really are at this moment; the American managerial class, mostly lives cocooned in the comfortable banality of the suburbs, . But in the Middle East, where rich and poor... they are all of them staring death and chaos straight in the face, every day... for them, all this is all very real. At bottom I think both Americans and the people of the Middle East thought the USA was much more powerful than it really is. All of us still lived with the image of the omnipotent America of the 1950s and 1960 in our heads and together we are having to face the truth. Only facing that truth is a much more serious business in the Middle East than in an American suburb. DS

Mideast allies near a state of panic - Los Angeles Times
Abstract: Instead of flaunting stronger ties and steadfast American influence, the president's journey found friends both old and new near a state of panic. Mideast leaders expressed soaring concern over upheavals across the region that the United States helped ignite through its invasion of Iraq and push for democracy — and fear that the Bush administration may make things worse. President Bush's summit in Jordan with the Iraqi prime minister proved an awkward encounter that deepened doubts about the relationship. Vice President Dick Cheney's stop in Riyadh, the Saudi capital, yielded a blunt warning from the kingdom's leaders. And Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's swing through the West Bank and Israel, intended to build Arab support by showing a new U.S. push for peace, found little to work with. In all, visits designed to show the American team in charge ended instead in diplomatic embarrassment and disappointment, with U.S. leaders rebuked and lectured by Arab counterparts. The trips demonstrated that U.S. allies in the region were struggling to understand what to make of the difficult relationship, and to figure whether, with a new Democratic majority taking over Congress, Bush even had control over his nation's Mideast policy. Arabs are "trying to figure out what the Americans are going to do, and trying develop their own plans," said Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.), one of his party's point men on Iraq. "They're trying to figure out their Plan B." The allies' predicament was described by Jordan's King Abdullah II last week, before Bush arrived in Amman, the capital. Abdullah, one of America's steadiest friends in the region, warned that the Mideast faced the threat of three simultaneous civil wars — in Iraq, Lebanon and the Palestinian territories. And he made clear that the burden of dealing with it rested largely with the United States. "Something dramatic" needed to come out of Bush's meetings with Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki to defuse the three-way threat, Abdullah said, because "I don't think we're in a position where we can come back and visit the problem in early 2007."(...) Expressing deeper unhappiness with the United States, leaders from Jordan, Egypt and Persian Gulf countries told Rice during her trip to an economic development conference in Jordan on Friday that the U.S. had a responsibility to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which they and many analysts viewed as the key to regional stability. Amr Moussa, secretary-general of the Arab League, urged greater U.S. action, warning that the Middle East was becoming "an abyss…. The region is facing real failure." READ IT ALL

Israel: dangerous when cornered

David Seaton's News Links

Briefly described, the neocon plan for the Middle East theorized that the invasion of Iraq and its regime change, accompanied by much "shock and awe", would bring about regime change in Iran and Syria. The new regimes thus produced would forthwith sign peace treaties with Israel and this would leave the Palestinians isolated and thus forced to accept whatever conditions Israel willed. This strategy was expressed as, "the road to Jerusalem leads through Baghdad". Poof! That strategy lies in ruins. Turned inside out like a stocking. The United States is now in the death grip of the Middle East and is struggling to extricate itself. Now it appears that "the road to Baghdad lead through Jerusalem", in other words: for the USA to leave Iraq with even a shred of dignity intact it needs the cooperation of Iran, Syria and the various factions of Iraq who share a common hatred for the "Zionist entity" and will need to humble Israel in order to justify their concessions before their peoples. Therefore, any cooperation, peace plan, or peace conference will come at the expense of Israel, which will have to concede much, much, more than what Ariel Sharon termed, "painful concessions". To top it off, after their military, diplomatic and propaganda failure against Hezbollah last summer, the Israeli's military prestige is in tatters and their enemies emboldened. The Israeli rightwing will do anything and activate any resource to slow down or derail this momentum which is totally to their detriment. In my opinion many of the strange things that are occurring and may occur in the near future, in the Middle East and elsewhere, can be explained by the Israeli right's need to save what they can from the collapse of the neocon 'dream'. This article from the Financial Times lays out the elements without connecting the dots. DS
The assassination in Lebanon should not derail dialogue - Financial Times
Abstract: The assassination of Lebanese industry minister Pierre Gemayel last Tuesday sent shockwaves through the Middle East. It seemed to run counter to the growing momentum for diplomacy and co-operation that had seen Syrian ministers in Baghdad, the Iraqi president preparing to go to Tehran and calls in London and Washington for a change of course toward more constructive engagement with Syria and Iran. However, the killing necessitates a balanced policy of moving ahead with the United Nations special tribunal on assassinations in Lebanon while also reducing conflict and instability through constructive and multilateral dialogue.(...) At the international level, the murder disrupts the momentum in London and Washington for a fundamental change of approach in the Middle East. Regardless of who actually perpetrated it, much public commentary has laid the blame at the doorstep of Damascus. Syria has condemned the killing, denies any responsibility and protests that the act, carried out on the day that the UN Security Council was meeting to finalise the tribunal agreement, could not have been timed more effectively to hurt its interests. Nevertheless, the assassination revived international wariness of the Syrian regime and helped rush the tribunal agreement through the Security Council.(...) Despite the latest events, the logic of reaching out to Tehran and Damascus still holds. The two are major forces in the region and there is much to be gained from robust and responsible dialogue between them and the international community. With the removal of Saddam Hussein and the Taliban, Iran has made gains in the region, helped by the rise in oil prices. Iran will be an important participant in the future of Iraq and in the stability or otherwise of the Middle East. Despite sharp differences over its nuclear programme, Iran shares with other countries an interest in a stable Iraq. It seeks assurances that it will not be attacked or overthrown, that it will not be considered a pariah state and that its role in the region will be recognised. In exchange, it should be open to co-operation in Iraq, security in the gulf, as well as co-operation in stabilising Lebanon.(...) The killing in Lebanon reminds us all that there are dangerous and violent elements at play. But there is no alternative to engaging governments and encouraging states to become partners rather than pariahs in the international community, thus having a stake in playing by its rules. READ IT ALL

Gemayel assassination: Cui bono? - Guardian

David Seaton's News Links
Quite a few analysts observe that the clearest beneficiaries of Gemayel's assassination are the Israelis. This doesn't mean they did it. There are rabid antisemites who blame the Jews for everything from global warming to the fat content in ice cream. However, it is evident that Gemayel's murder does make US rapprochement with Syria and Iran more difficult and that is certainly a major objective of Israeli foreign policy. There is now a dynamic for a great, global, Middle Eastern peace settlement that would not be totally controlled by the United States: derailing that could be an important goal for many players. DS

Abstract: The assassination of a member of a prominent Maronite family, coupled with media attacks on Syria and opposition groups, is expected to weaken the Aoun-Hizbullah alliance, potentially swaying Christian Maronites from the opposition. In the post-assassination climate, the March 14 alliance has already extended the life and boosted the confidence of the government. The opposition forces realise that their plans are now on hold, and they could end up accepting a negotiated solution that would have been unthinkable a few days ago. Alternatively, they may decide to sit back and ride the backwash of the assassination, waiting to regain the initiative when emotions have cooled down. No matter who was behind the assassination of Gemayel, it is the Lebanese opposition and Syria's allies that have been hardest hit politically by this gruesome act. READ IT ALL

Bush Prepares Switch on Iraq and Downgrading of US Ties with Jordan and Israel - Debka

David Seaton's News Links
Is Debka reliable? It certainly gives a reliable idea of what the Israeli right and the Israeli Defense Force are worrying about at any given moment. What is the situation? First, Iraq has broken the US military's reputation as "irresistible" and the summer war against Hezbollah has done the same for the IDF. Iran holds the keys and the winning cards in Iraq and Lebanon. Israel has always been considered both an strategic asset and a liability, but after their "andropausal moment" in Lebanon, more liability than asset. James Baker is back and the great "realist" consiglieri is a Texas oil person (PC for "awl may-hen"). I have never believed that the invasion of Iraq was about oil ("awl"), obviously what the oil business ("awlbidness") really wants above all is stability. The people with the oil have to sell it, they can't eat it. Iraq was a neocon project to cow the Middle East and give time to consolidate "Greater Israel"... They blew it. This issue is going to play havoc with the new Democratic Congress and drive a wedge between their anti-war base and their big Jewish donors. DS

Abstract: Monday, Nov. 13, former US secretary of state James Baker and ex-Congressman Lee Hamilton will present their recommendations on Iraq to President Bush in the Oval Office. Their audience will include an array of top administration officials: Vice President Dick Cheney, national security adviser Stephen Hadley, secretary of state Condoleezza Rice, Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte and CIA Director Gen. Mike Hayden, as well as U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Peter Pace. Incoming defense secretary Robert Gates will attend as a member of the bipartisan committee.(...) The timing and composition of the conference indicate that the larger decisions are already in the bag with regard to the new US policy on Iraq and a fresh approach to the radical side of the Middle East led by Iran and Syria, mainly at the expense of Jordan and Israel. Monday’s White House conference will be concerned mostly with tying up the last ends and deciding who performs which part of the revised strategy. DEBKAfile’s Washington sources report that Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert, who is due Monday will be one of the first foreign White House visitors to hear an update on the new policy. He will find he is required to listen rather than speak. Bush will use the occasion to inform him where America’s Iraq policy leaves Israel and the Palestinian dispute. Most of all, the US president will be looking ahead to Wednesday, Nov, 15, when he stops over in Moscow for unscheduled talks with Vladimir Putin. Air Force One was originally supposed to refuel in Moscow and continue without delay to Hanoi for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit later this week. And the Russian president would not normally have come to the airport to greet him. But the US president has decided to seize on the chance of persuading Putin to jump aboard the new American format on Iraq, Iran and the Middle East, on none of which the two leaders saw eye to eye before. The first sign of Bush-Putin collaboration is in the air. DEBKAfile’s Moscow sources report that Iran’s senior nuclear negotiator, national security adviser Ali Larijani spent two days of talks in Moscow on Nov. 10 and 11, during which Putin asked him if Tehran was willing to adapt its nuclear program after Washington agrees to direct negotiations. Once president Bush decided, after his election defeat, to subsume his Middle East policy to the bipartisan model, he lost no time in realigning its elements. He took now time out for briefing America’s regional allies and dependants - whether Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki, Iraq’s Kurdish leaders, Abdullah King of Jordan or Ehud Olmert – to name a few. No senior Israeli official was abreast of the seismic changes in Washington’s attitude before the prime minister embarked for the United States. His first stop is Los Angeles to address the North American Jewish Federations Conference. Since he is accompanied by seven cabinet ministers, he can call a mini-cabinet session to update them on his talks with Bush. After those talks, Olmert will follow the best diplomatic traditions of US-Israeli relations, declaring that Israel has no better friend who is more committed to its security that the President of the United States and affirming full assent between the two governments on the issues of Iran and the Palestinians. He will gloss over the reality: the New US Middle East Policy will add another negative layer to Israel’s situation and further aggravate the fallout of its Lebanon War reverses. In fact, Jordan and Israel will be the first two countries in the direct line of fire from the reversal of the Bush administration’s Iraq strategy (which DEBKA disclosed was on the cards anyway ahead of the midterm election) Unlike Israel, King Abdullah - who gambled and lost on Bush standing foursquare behind his plans for Iraq – has at least two alternatives: He can make common cause with Syrian president Bashar Asad and join the anti-Israel Eastern Front with Iran, Hizballah and the radical Palestinian organizations operating out of Damascus or - He can turn south instead of north and accept the protection of the Saudi Arabian-Egyptian alliance. Israel, in contrast, will find itself high and dry in the Middle East. After being downgraded by the Lebanon War’s outcome, the Olmert government will be obliged to accept the crack of the American whip - at least until it can build a new security option that is not dependent on Washington’s new Middle East strategy. A clear-eyed evaluation of this prospect was ventured Friday, Nov. 10, by the new deputy defense minister Ephraim Sneh, who urged Israel in a Jerusalem Post interview to prepare to thwart Iran’s drive for a nuclear capability “at all costs”. READ ALL