Geez, I’m embarased that this has been the first blog post in about a week.  Admittedly, Minneapolis’ school board primary elections are coming up, and profiling six of NINE candidates has kinda eaten up my week, but still.  So many interesting things to flap my digital jaw about.

This week saw the third major suicide bomning in a week in Pakistan, shortly after Musharaf resigned, underlining the lack of a coherent strategy (h/t, Peter Maron) from either the US or Pakistani governments.  This one targeted a very high-profile facility that reportedly also stores nuclear weapons; it would seem that the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan are trying to rattle the civilian government’s cage as they fight it out over who gets to be king of the hill — I mean, president — trying to make the government appear weak and incompetent righ tout of the gate.  It’s distinctly possible that this was coordinated with the ambush of French troops and the assault on the US base in Khost (incidentally, where the right-wing press has been claiming “victory” for the past while) for a kind of all-around media-based hammering at the US and its allies.  However, as this fabulous article in today’s Guardian details, there’s so many different factions that it’s possible the timing of at least one of those two major attacks was only coincidental.

One question not even Carlotta Gall is asking is: why?  Why this lack of strategy, particularly in Pakistan, and what does it bode for the future?

A place to start, though is this post from the Agonist last week, unpacking what is meant by the “destablilization” of Pakistan, a term tossed about so freely on the evening news –

Ongoing conflicts in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas and provinces like Balochistan demonstrate the weakness of the central government in Pakistan; with over 135,000 people displaced because of fighting in the north, one could reasonably say that a low-level war is simmering between the Pakistani army and militants. Recurring waves of violence throughout the country, especially suicide bombings, also weaken the authority and legitimacy of the central government while creating an atmosphere of tension, uncertainty, and danger. Finally, US missile strikes in Pakistan undermine Pakistani sovereignty, fuel anti-Americanism, kill civilians, and often fail to produce measurable results in the “war on terror.”

To fix this, mainstream progressive/Democrat opinion says “more boots on the ground.” As Joshua Foust points out there are a host of problems in doing this while continuing with Business As Usual.  I’m reminded of calls for more troops for Iraq back in 2005 — all that would have gotten us would be to put more skittish young soldiers with itch trigger fingers in-country, with a lot more pissed-off locals as a result!  Before following Obama’s blind charge into the guns of the Taliban, we need to work with the Pakistani army and government, the Afghan government and local leaders, and our coalition partners in Afghanistan to find a new way forward.

Courtesy of Waleed Ibrahim of Reuters, via The Stupidest Man on Earth, comes a behind-the-scenes look at the Iraqi parliament as it tried to get a quorum of lawmakers to vote on the provincial elections law last week.

A Shi’ite lawmaker accused Sunnis of following a ‘foreign Arab agenda’. A Sunni accused the Shi’ites of pursuing a ‘foreign Iranian agenda’. Kurds branded their opponents ‘the remaining Baathists’ — Saddam’s party that ruled through fear.

It was never clear when a parliamentary session would start. Often deputies only managed to keep them going for a few minutes before they broke down. Most of the time lawmakers could not even agree to enter the chamber, meaning no quorum.

In a side note: I’ve always thought that the US media is missing a major opportunity in not covering the Iraqi Parliament.  Kirkuk is an especially provocative issue, but generally, the Parliament generates more high drama than what the media is able to wring from any election season.  Colorful charecters, sweeping rhetoric, intense emotions — the US media would eat that up.  Not only could they save flagging viewer/reader numbers, but the American public would wind up with a better understanding of the country we’re trying to run…

It’s kind of old news, but this is the first concrete evidence I’ve seen in the Western media, and it deserves to be highlighted.  From the AP via YahooNews

So, we’re at it again. Gotta love those “dirty wars”. According to the AP article, the Badr organization and Iraqi Security Forces, with the complicity of the American military and the Prime Minister’s office, are waging a “dirty war” against Sadr’s political operatives, greatly weakening Sadr’s party and fueling splits between local factions of the movement.  As the reporter makes clear, this goes above and beyond the strikes on “special groups” that have been going on since the start of “The Surge.”  Most of the assasinations are carried out by Iraqi forces or Badr militiamen, and most are directed at political organizers and local leaders of the Sadr party.

The elimination of this critical mid-level leadership has not only begun to break the Jaish al-Mehdi’s stranglehold on the provision of social services, such as cooking gas, that form the core of the famed Sadrist “shaddow state,” but also caused splits between local affiliates of the movement, particularly militia cells.  The reporter beleives these groups are trying to position themselves ahead of the (postponed) provincial elections, aiming to get on the side of Badr, ISF, and the “Powers that Be.”  With the last anecdote about neighborhood Imamns (perhaps in Bagdhad?) “chastising” Sadrist MPs for “abandoning” their neighborhoods to the ISF, the reporter seems to be saying that theses assasinations are being felt at the local level, and now the poor Shi’ite vote is up for grabs.

In this case, though, things might be a bit different. Noah Shachtman at Danger Room and Spencer Ackerman at the Washington Independent (is that now called WIndy?) point out why with this question: is Sadr just retrenching and burying himself further into Iraqi society? As Badger and others have repeatedly pointed out, the ISF “offensives” against the JAM in Basra were ended with deals between the militias and the Iraqi Army that allowed the army into the city, but let the militia keep their weapons. This could well be the same – winning back credibility with poor Shi’ites, lost because of the JAM’s gangster-like behavior, while keeping a large, but theoretically disarmed, reserve to fight another day, while the wilder limbs of his organization are pruned by US and Iraqi hit squads.

In today’s NYTimes:

“Officials say the administration contracted out so much work in Iraq that companies like KBR were simply overwhelmed by the scale of the operations. Some of the electrical work, for example, was turned over to subcontractors, some of which hired unskilled Iraqis who were paid only a few dollars a day.

“Government officials responsible for contract oversight, meanwhile, were also unable to keep up, so that unsafe electrical work was not challenged by government auditors.

Buildings at a Marine base in Falujah destroyed last month by an electrical fire

“Several electricians who worked for KBR have said previously in interviews that they repeatedly warned KBR managers and Pentagon and military officials about unsafe electrical work. They said that supervisors had ignored their concerns or, in some cases, lacked the training to understand the problems.”

I mean, this is entirely unsurprising in the context of the history of the either Iraq War, or of contractor involvement with the US military.  This sounds like so many stories I’ve heard about project and contract management, whether it’s of Private Security Contractors or reconstruction projects.  You just think it would have come up by now.  The reporter says electrocution is now the “most urgent non-combat safety hazard,” which suggesting how he heard about this — examining non-combat fatality and injury numbers.  Hopefully the congressional investigations turn into something, or help the families of the electrocuted dead sue KBR.  Some more highlights from the article:

“The 2007 safety survey was ordered by the top official in Iraq for the Defense Contract Management Agency, which oversees contractors, after the October 2006 electrical fire that killed two soldiers near Tikrit. Paul Dickinson, a Pentagon safety specialist who wrote the report, confirmed its findings, but did not elaborate.

“Senior Pentagon officials appear not to have responded to the survey until this May, after Congressional investigators had begun to ask questions. Then they argued that its findings were irrelevant to Sergeant Maseth’s electrocution.”

KBR did some ass-covering of its own, unassisted by its DoD budies:

“Heather Browne, a KBR spokeswoman, would not comment about a company safety study or the reports of electrical fires or shocks, but she said KBR had found no evidence of a link between its work and the electrocutions. She added, “KBR’s commitment to the safety of all employees and those the company serves remains unwavering.”

This is rather surprising: The Guardian, citing no-one, says the US will establish an interests section - a kind of mini-embasy – in Tehran, and is planning the announcement for next month.  Their reporter smells election-year politics, and I concur.  It might go some way to undercuting Obama’s main point that Bush (and by extension, McCain) is nothing but a cowboy.  We shall see.

It was peculiar listening to journalists call the exchange of remains today a “prisoner swap” — 200 dead bodies and 5 lives ones, in exchange for the “remains” of Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser.  Not even their bodies, just bits and pieces.

Undoubtedly a sad day in Israel, and a joyous one in Lebanon.  But what most of the American media is glossing over is the “love fest” (pithy quote from Angry Arab, see the Daily Star article for the specifics) between Walid Jumblatt, formerly (?) of the March 14 bloc, and Hezbollah leader Hassan Nassrallah. 

Remember, Jumblatt was the guy whose home base, the Chouf district was targeted by Hezbollah back in May (although Hezbollah was thoroughly trounced in the fighting).  Such is Lebanese politics — Jumblatt and Sa’ad Hariri’s assasinated father used to be Syria’s biggest clients in the 1980’s and 1990’s!

Al-Jazeera English’s Marwan Bishara reads this as a symptom of Hezbollah’s position of strength comming out of the Doha agreement between Lebanon’s warring factions.  They came out w/ a slim majority in the national unity cabinet.  Bishara goes on to say some rather silly things — that this will stabilize Lebanon, and the region, etc. — but in his first point, he’s probably right.  Hezbollah now holds the upper hand in all arenas of power, and they have a certain amount of popular support. But, as the string of clashes last month between M14 and Hezbollah/Aounist-allied militias in Tripoli show, no-one has given up yet.  Everyone is still armed, and Hariri just might be importing more militia.

The one big unknown (and I’m not sure how to get a sense of this without being there) is how are Sunni and Marionite leaders portraying this to their communities, and will this event become any kind of touchstone for Lebanese politicians?  Hariri & Co. have been appealing to Sunni and Marionite (and Druze) sectarian identity for a while now, and generally trying to foment sectarian hostility.

If I were “over there” I’d be going around , trying to figure out what’s being said at prayers on Friday and Sunday, and wait for the next big political crisis and see where the parties line up (In a country so thoroughly in debt, and riddled w/ economic problems like Lebanon, there’s plenty of fodder.  For example, the unions have been a rather visible member of the “opposition).

Expect Lebanon to provide plenty of drama in the future, even without significant Israeli involvment.

El Toro, my glorious steed. A 1980's Schwin World.

Apparently so, say the Minneapolis police.

Who knew that a car can’t squish me into the curb?

That’s a comforting thought…if only I could trust the passive-aggressive, four-wheeled cows in this cit

Remember the combat outpost attacked a few days ago, and almost overrun?

This one?

It looks like we’ve been pushed out of that district in Nuristan, because US and Afghan troops are pulling out.  Carlotta Gall of the NYTimes (*heart!*) mentions this in the above-linked story:

“The American and Afghan army soldiers had moved into the base at Wanat just days before, after abandoning another base higher up a side valley where they had come under repeated attack from insurgents.”

I’m not exactly clear who is behind this attack, but it shows a lot of sophistication — sneaking up under cover of darkness, striking isolated parts of the base, and especially, clearing out the villagers before the attack.   As Gall points out, this was why no locals were killed in the battle, although parts of the village of Wanat must look a bit like Falujah, or Lashkar Gah a few years ago before the Royal Marines pulled out.  Ghosts of Alexander has a very timely post on the importance of Nuristan in the guerrillas’ strategy, mirroring comments from the recently-deposed governor of Nuristan in Gall’s article that the area was a logistics highway for insurgents.

I’d bet good money that our establishment of this Combat Outpost in Wanat was an attempt to strike at those logistics, and the insurgents recognized this, and put their best people on the job.

So where does that leave “the grand narrative” — i.e. what the heck is going on?

Well, we’re pulling out, and theoretically the elders of Wanat (and presumably the district) are still with us, according to the local police chief.  (incidentally, he was also airlifted out, along with the garrison).  We’ll continue to patrol the area, says the ISAF spokesman quoted by the BBC piece, but we’ll have no permanent presence.  We’ll still be a part of the local political landscape, but we’ll pretty much be on the sidelines.

This could be a good thing, if we soon return in larger numbers (is that really possible here? what other parts of Afghanistan would be stripped of troops?).  This way, we don’t wind up in the same situation as the British “Platoon House” in Lashkar Gah, in Helmand did, where weekly clashes keep us pinned down in the fort, level the village, and we become an intolerable presence to the locals.  We’ll be saving political capital, so to speak.

US commanders are probably taking solace in the elders’ support, if the local ANP chief’s desperate-sounding protestations are a clue.  We might build on this when we come back, they’re thinking.  One problem, though, as Giustozzi points out, is that a) local leadership has been seriously gutted by the last 20 years of fighting, b) village mullahs are just as influential, if not more so, and c) these mullahs are frequently the pillars of support for the Taliban.  I haven’t heard one way or the other who is behind the attack, but it’s a good thing to keep in mind.

(If you’re interested in Afghanistan and haven’t read his book, don’t come back until you have.  He’s kind of this war’s Tom Ricks)

So, we’ll see. We’re on our back foot in Nuristan right now…

Update: Josh Foust, at Registan, has this to add, confirming my suspicions about Salafi village mullahs, and adds some background info about the US presence in Nuristan.

No, not the kind that involves Christian religious officiators dumping water on your head.  This is more of the nautical kind, involving fashionable ladies and bottles of champagne.

Ships are built in two stages: first, the hull is put together on a slipway, then it is launched and towed to a dock to be “fitted out”, where the engines, masts, and superstructure are put on.  It’s formally given its name when its hull is put into the water at a ceremony called the “christening” and a bottle of champagne is smashed on the front of the vessel.  I’m not sure why the do it.  Testing the construction job, maybe?  That seems a bit like slapping your newborn around to see if it’ll survive the middle school bullies…

So I’ve spent the last few weeks building the hull of this blog — plotting out what I’ll cover, how I’ll bulid readership, finding links, picking a pretty (?) format — and now it’s time to put it in the water and start putting the guts in.  Once I’ve worked out the kinks, and it won’t be too embarasing to show to my friends, I’ll “commission” the blog, and start plugging it everywhere I can

Ok, so first, we’ll need our rich lady, and her bottle of champagne.

Oh-oh-okay…This is a little nerve-wracking…When I smash this bottle, I’ve got to start taking responsability for this thing and all the shit — I mean, stuff — that I write here.  Well, here it goes.

The wind-up…

And the pitch!

]]> http://bikesandbullets.wordpress.com/2008/07/10/the-christening/feed/ 0 jamessanna http://bikesandbullets.wordpress.com/2008/07/10/what-a-way-to-begin-a-blog/ http://bikesandbullets.wordpress.com/2008/07/10/what-a-way-to-begin-a-blog/#comments Thu, 10 Jul 2008 16:33:36 +0000 jamessanna http://bikesandbullets.wordpress.com/?p=4 ]]>

Is this really such a good idea?  Every time you mention Israel on the ‘net, you bring out all kinds of trolls.  Thank God for moderated comments.

So this morning, NPR ran a story about a new law gathering steam in the Knesset (the Israeli Parliament) that would strip Israeli citizenship, identity papers, health and unemployment benefits, and wide freedom of movement from the immediate family members of “anyone in Israel” who carries out a terrorist attack or is a member of a terrorist group.  Right-wing parties in Israel have proposed several laws like it over the last several years, claiming these laws would act as a deterrent, but this is (in my memory at least) the first time mainstream politicians (PM Ehud Olmert, and the head of the Likud opposition party) have voiced support for the law, playing up fears of an Israeli Arab ‘fifth column.’

In summary, it’s B.A.U. for the Israeli state.  Bullshit As Usual — Racism, collective punishment and revenge under the guise of a fair judicial response; beating Palestinians into submission as a substitute for long-term solutions.  (This argument gets made over and over again in Left-y blogs, so I won’t bore you)

This is one of those times you say to yourself “we need Israel as an ally like we need a hole in our collective head”.

One interesting question (and I’m pretty sure I know the answer) is what might happen to a future Baruch Goldstein, the Hebron settler who murdered 29 Palestinians and wounded another 150 at the Tomb of the Patriarchs in 1994?  Every now and then, a right-wing settler will shoot a Palestinian or two in the West Bank, and committ other terrorist-like attacks.  Would he or she be stripped of his citizenship, along with their family? This law would *theoretically* put them on par with Mr. Buldozer of Death, whose attack last week gave some more momentum to this law, even if these settlers’ attacks are almost never punished by the Army authorities who govern the West Bank.

Eric Westervelt (the NPR reporter) interviewed the father of the yeshiva gunman for some perspective from the family of an attacker, and came up with this nifty little quote: “What he did is still a shock to us…My son used to act like a very normal person.”

In that quote, there’s something that doesn’t get mentioned all that often in the American media.  Armed resistance a la Hamas or the al-Aqsa Brigaides is not “normal” for the “person on the street,” despite the rhetoric of such armed groups.  Passive or non-violent resistance could be (that’s a topic for another time), but this does not mean that every Palestinian is just itching to put a bullet in the brain of an Israeli at their first chance.  When reacting to – or covering — stories of attacks like these,  that’s something to keep in mind.