Is Iraq on the Verge of Collapse?

January 21st, 2010 by The Parallax Brief

Now Britain is out of Iraq, we tend to forget that there is still a bloody, desperate effort underway by the United States and the Iraq government, as it is, to stabilise the country. Just because it seems to have quietened of late, doesn’t mean the problem has gone away.

Tom Ricks, the pulitzer prize winning military correspondent and author, has written on his Foreign Policy magazine blog that he recently received an email from “A friend who doesn’t scare easily”:

“I’m afraid things are coming to a tipping point here. If the Chalibi-Iranian faction succeeds in keeping those 15 pro-Alawi Sunni parties off the ballot all bets are off. I can see a Shiia-on-Shiia civil war (with the Sunnis backing the Alawi faction) or a military coup as real possibilities. At this point, the best thing to happen would be to postpone the election. If they go ahead toward March the way they are heading, all bets are off. I don’t think Washington is fully engaged with Haiti and Afghan distracting them. A lot of bad vibes here.”

A civil war is a frightening prospect, and the idea of Iraq ending up with Chalibi running a pro-Iranian, anti-western fundamentalist dictatorship would be a sickening blow: what would all the treasure and blood spent in Iraq have been for if that was the end game?

It’s also a reminder that the big winner from George and Dick’s Mesopotamian Adventure was Iran. A powerful, stable Iraq is a bulwark to Iranian power in the region, and by weakening its neighbour, and leaving it prostrate so that Iran is free to meddle and manipulate, America has vastly improved Irans strategic position. (Not to mention that the US is now so impoverished and war weary that Iran is much less likely to have to face military interference with its nuclear weapons program.) And really, time is on Iran’s side. It would like a friendly dictatorship next door, but it can just keep meddling, keep the Iraqis killing eachother, keep the brutality simmering, and still be a strategic winner.

But what does the august Mr. Ricks think the architects of Iraq would make of this?

“What will the Doug Feiths and Richard Perles of the world say if he winds up running Iraq as an anti-American, anti-democratic, pro-Iranian leader? I’m sure they’ll find some glib, bullshitty way of blaming it on President Obama.”

It’s funny, because it’s true.

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Post for British Heroes

January 20th, 2010 by The Parallax Brief

BFPOSeveral weeks ago, the Parallax Brief signed an online petition to protest at the closure of British Forces Post Office facilities in mainland Europe. The service provides service personnel stationed in Europe with the same postal rates as residents of the mainland UK. The petition stated that “Withdrawal of this long established tradition will further erode personnel’s ability to communicate with their families in the UK and safe receipt of parcels etc through a secure network”.

But today, the Parallax Brief received an emailed response from Number10.gov.uk, the government’s website:

The Government remains fully committed to providing efficient and effective postal service to our armed forces, especially those serving on operations.

The Ministry of Defence is making some changes to the way BFPO services operate in order to ensure we make best use of military manpower and to ensure the service is delivered in the most efficient way possible. The drawdown of the BFPO personnel supporting the UK military in the NATO headquarters in SHAPE, Brussels, Brunssum, Ramstein, Stavanger, Karup, Rome, Milan, Lisbon, Valencia and Norfolk Virginia should achieve a saving in excess of £1M per annum. The drawdown is scheduled to be completed by September 2010, by which time we aim to have in place alternative arrangements.”

So, that’s a no, then.

The full folly of continually cutting military expenditure, caving in to the RAF and Royal Navy top brass on big ticket items designed to fight the last war, and fighting two brutal, and brutally expensive, counter-insurgency wars is only now becoming clear. In the coming months, probably mainly after the Conservatives win power and pass their promised emergency budget, the savage cuts in headline grabbing military projects such as the new aircraft carriers, the F35 stealth jets, and perhaps even the next generation of Trident subs, will get their fair share of headlines. But in the meantime, important services like the BFPO will likely disappear unnoticed.

That should not be the case.

Given that the US estimates it costs USD1 mn per year to keep a soldier in Afghanistan, surely we can find about the same to give cheap and reliable post to all our personnel in Europe?

And when it says that it “aims” to have in place alternative arrangements, what does that usually mean in government-speak?

It all seems like more shabby treatment for our heroes abroad.

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After the Troop Surge, A Virtual Surge for Afghanistan?`

January 20th, 2010 by The Parallax Brief

The Parallax Brief is skeptical about the West’s ability to win a counter-insurgency war of any kind, and that includes the current one being waged in Afghanistan. But the key understanding of COIN warfare is that winning hearts and minds is as important as winning gun battles, and that national development and wealth generation is crucial if the flow of Taliban recruits is to be stemmed and the country is ever to get off its knees.

Wired.com’s the Danger Room suggests an innovative solution:

“…according to Ashraf Ghani, the country’s former finance minister and a onetime presidential contender, Afghanistan doesn’t need an army of consultants and contractors. It needs you, and your laptop.

Ghani is promoting the idea of a “virtual surge” as a development alternative in Afghanistan. The idea is (more…)

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How Long Before Cameron Takes Up Hacker’s Grand Design?

January 19th, 2010 by The Parallax Brief

The Mirror yesterday reported that the Gordon Brown, as part of his plan to improve social mobility, will increase the army cadet force in schools.

Is the Parallax Brief the only one who gets a sense of where this is heading?

Number 10 Downing Street, 2011

David Cameron: Wait a minute! I’ve got an idea!

Cabinet Secretary: Goooood, Prime Minister

David Cameron: No, I really think I’ve got it. We roll the international development budget into the military budget, as planned; then we don’t buy the upgrade to trident; We use the money to reintroduce conscription. Of course, the conscripts wouldn’t go and fight in wars, that’d be left to the regular army — but they’d travel abroad on international development and basic, low risk peacekeeping missions, leaving the army free to do the real fighting. Not only do I solve my problem with military under-staffing, but I also solve my unemployment problems.

Cabinet Secretary: Prime minister, isn’t conscription a rather… courageous policy?

David Cameron: Courageous? My God! Is it? Ha! Well, in times of full employment it might be, but now it would just give unemployed young people something to do. Give them some training and some skills: a comprehensive education — to make up for their comprehensive education. It might even teach some of them to wash! And I think it’ll be popular with the papers and core voters, as well: instilling some discipline in the teenagers from the sink estates. I can see the Daily Mail headline now: “From ASBO to Army: Cameron’s Grand Design Gives Kids a Chance.” “I’m so proud says mother…”

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The Persian Dilemma

January 14th, 2010 by The Parallax Brief

Sooner rather than later the international community is going to find itself faced with an agonising decision. Iran is developing nuclear weapons. None of us should want to live in a world where the fundamentalist religious autocracy in Iran has nuclear weapons. Even ignoring the horrifying thought that it might use them, or worse, pass them on to one of the terrorist orginasaitons it funds and controls, the geopolitical and strategic consequences are awful. And beyond this, Iran going nuclear would basically spell the end of the non-proliferation treaty as a credible, binding, legal commitment. The number of nuclear-capable countries would multiply in the following decades.

Indeed, dreadful as the consequences of attacking Iran may be, they would surely be the lesser of two evils.

But herein lies the dilemma: The Green movement in Iran is currently fighting heroically against the despotic regime which wants to get these terrible weapons. But the Green movement’s leaders have said clearly that they would be against any US or Israeli air attacks, and such attacks would likely spell the end of the Green movement’s chances of seizing power.

Pulitzer prize winning defence expert Tom Ricks writes in his Foreign Policy magazine blog that these and other Iran-related matters were discussed by some of America’s leading Iran-watchers on Tuesday at the Washington Institute for Near-East Policy. Those who take an interest in foreign policy really ought to read the full report, but below is an extract which encapsulates the dilemma we face when dealing with Iran.

“Iran remains a divided society and government, dangerously deadlocked between hardliners who wish to use the security forces to oppress the democratic opposition, and the Green movement which expanded after the contested June election and has refused to wither despite facing immense coercion. In this explosive domestic environment, there is no room to consider the question of engagement with the United States — save as a political football. Indeed, some experts view any overt intervention to support the Green movement would only feed the Supreme Leader’s paranoia that the movement is externally driven. The diminishing inner circle is ready to call for additional measures of oppression. Meanwhile, the Iranian Revolution Guard Corps, which originally developed around a perceived just cause, is increasingly caught up in perpetuating an ever more illegitimate government.

[…]

Iran’s present regime wants to buy time and divide the international community, keeping the nuclear file out of becoming referred to the United Nations Security Council under Chapter VII of the UN Charter. In the medium term, Iran’s leaders may wish mostly to bust out of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, with a long-term aim of being treated like India-a major power with a nuclear program.”

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Top American General Claims Surge is Working — Time for a Reality Check?

January 12th, 2010 by The Parallax Brief

The Telegraph reports today that the senior NATO officer in Afghanistan, General Stanley McChrystal, believes that the tide in the country is starting to turn against the Taliban.

““We’ve been at this for about seven months now and I believe we’ve made progress,” Gen Stanley McChrystal said in an interview with ABC television.

[...]

The general recounted a recent meeting in the Helmand river valley in the country’s south – a former Taliban stronghold – as an example of progress underway.

“When I sit in an area that the Taliban controlled only seven months ago and now you meet with a shura of elders and they describe with considerable optimism the future, you sense the tide is turning,” he said.

Gen McChrystal issued a dire warning to Mr Obama in September, saying the Afghan mission could fail without more troops. Early in his presidency Mr Obama sent an additional 21,000 troops. It is these that have already begun to make a difference.

Only 8,000 to 9,000 of the second tranche of 30,000 have begun to arrive in Helmand.

Asked if Nato-led forces were shifting the momentum against Taliban insurgents, the general said: “I believe we’re doing it right now.”"

The Parallax Brief wishes he could believe such an upbeat report, and certainly hopes that NATO troops can defeat the Taliban; however, truth be told, he can’t. Indeed, he doesn’t think it’s possible for large, western democracies to win counter-insurgency wars at all.

Of course, we could, if we were willing to jettison our morality and return to the cold hearted brutality of days gone by; and if we could stomach hundreds of our boys coming home in body bags after fighting a war of dubious virtue. But we are willing to do neither, so how is it possible to combat a brutal enemy that is willing to lose 25 of his men for one of ours because he knows that if he can just hang in there long enough, time — or at least demographics, as Israel will soon discover — is on his side.

But, even looking at Afghanistan specifically, it seems strange that such an upbeat outlook has come hot on the heels of perhaps the gloomiest official prognosis yet, delivered on December 23rd during a briefing by Major General Michael Flynn, the top U.S. intelligence officer in the country, a slide from which is pictured below, and curiously unreported by the Telegraph.

According to Wired.com’s Danger Room blog, Gen. Flynn stated during his presentation that:

The Taliban not only has the “momentum” after the most successful year in its campaign against the United States and the Kabul government. “The Afghan insurgency can sustain itself indefinitely,” and, “The Taliban retains [the] required partnerships to sustain support, fuel legitimacy and bolster capacity.”

And if that isn’t enough, Flynn also warns that “time is running out” for the American-led International Security Assistance Force. “Regional instability is rapidly increasing and getting worse,” the report says.

The “loosely organized” Taliban is “growing more cohesive” and “increasingly effective.” The insurgents now have their own “governors” installed in 33 of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces. And the “strength and ability of [that] shadow governance increasing,” according to the presentation. The Taliban’s “organizational capabilities and operational reach are qualitatively and geographically expanding.”

Of course, it could be that the situation has changed dramatically since Gen. Flynn gave his briefing. You decide.

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The Importance of Knowing Dick

December 3rd, 2009 by The Parallax Brief

Former Vice President Richard Cheney has been lambasted since he left office for his strident criticism of the Obama administration. Leading members of an administration are expected maintain decorum and hold back on criticism of their successors for at least a year. Daniel Drezner, the largely conservative foreign policy expert, usually defends Cheney for doing so on the principle that Cheney feels strongly enough about Obama’s policy to speak out. But even Drezner seems to have reached the limit with Cheney’s brazenly self-serving, propagandizing and lies.

So I’m inclined to cut Cheney some slack for his decision to speak out. On the other hand, when we read the Politico interview, Cheney’s actual sins come out:

“Cheney rejected any suggestion that Obama had to decide on a new strategy for Afghanistan because the one employed by the previous administration failed.

Cheney was asked if he thinks the Bush administration bears any responsibility for the disintegration of Afghanistan because of the attention and resources that were diverted to Iraq. “I basically don’t,” he replied without elaborating (emphasis added).”

Seriously? SERIOUSLY? I dare any Cheney supporter to make the argument that Afghanistan was hunky-dory until January 20, 2009, at which point things went to hell in a handbasket.

For the rest of us on the Planet Earth, there’s no way to read that passage and not come to one of two possible conclusions:

—Richard B. Cheney is a liar;

—Richard B. Cheney is so unconnected from reality that it is impossible to trust anything he says.

I don’t mind that Cheney speaks up for what he thinks is right — I mind that he’s a liar.

This matter raises two points — one of which is not that Dick Cheney is a liar, which is incontestable fact.

The first is that the problems Britain and America face now are as a direct consequence of the Bush administration’s decision to divert men and materiel from Afghanistan to Iraq. It’s worth remembering why we are in Afghanistan, because the official line on this matter has shifted so many times that that it has become the most nebulous of concepts. NATO went into Afghanistan because its government was providing shelter to those who perpetrated a horrifying terrorist attack on a NATO member. It wasn’t to nation build, improve women’s rights, or reduce the supply of heroin to the west (noble causes as they are). But, just as the job was almost done, and with Bin Laden and the Taleban and Al Qaeda leadership in within grasping distance, the Bush administration and their supine British partners decided fighting a largely unrelated war against Iraq was more important. The criminals of the century escaped; the Taleban could regroup and start an insurgency campaign against a strategically drifting and materially starved military coalition in the country.

It also, however, highlights the second problem, which is that Obama back home faces an opposition that has completely abandoned the notion of “Loyal Opposition” and will literally do or say anything to attack the President.

That isn’t to say that Obama is faultless. The Parallax Brief sees all kinds of gaps and contradictions in the President’s decision on Afghanistan, but key to understanding how we reached this point is to understand the problems created by what Cheney represents: the Obama administration faces a fantastically expensive (politically, economically, emotionally) COIN war (which are almost invariably lost by advanced western democracies) without a particularly compelling mission against a political backdrop where a hysterical opposition is willing to stoop to outright lies and rabble rousing.

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Afghanistan Stretches American Military Might to Limit, Draws Key Questions into Sharp Focus

November 24th, 2009 by The Parallax Brief

Barack_Obama_meets_with_Stanley_A._McChrystal_in_the_Oval_Office_2009-05-19

News has broken that President Barack Obama is likely to wait until after Thanksgiving to announce his much anticipated Afghanistan decision, but if anyone had any doubts of the hard place in which the President finds himself, a blog entry Wired.com’s The Danger Room should dispel that myth.

“First of all, the situation in Afghanistan is very different than the situation we faced in Iraq in the sense that we do not have the same kind of transportation access to Afghanistan that we did in Iraq, where we were able, over a five-month period or so, to bring in five brigade combat teams,” [Secretary of Defense Roberty Gates] said. “So almost everything of consequence has to go in by air.”

Around 115,000 troops remain in Iraq right now, and a sizeable contingent will need to stick around to support elections — which may be delayed until spring. And there needs to be enough infrastructure [in Afghanistan] to support the influx of troops, along with equipment to protect them from roadside bombs and other key gear.

[...]

Earlier this week, Spencer Ackerman crunched the numbers on possible Army deployments. “If President Obama orders an additional 30,000 to 40,000 troops to Afghanistan, he will be deploying practically every available U.S. Army brigade to war, leaving few units in reserve in case of an unforeseen emergency and further stressing a force that has seen repeated combat deployments since 2002,” he wrote.

And this doesn’t mention the cost — which will run to a minimum of 12 figures (hundreds of billions) for a genuine counterinsurgency plan — no small matter for a country with unemployment over 10% and public debt higher than at any time since WWII.

Is it not, given the scale of the task, now worth considering whether this will be blood and treasure well spent? What was Afghanistan for, anyway? Certainly, the US had every right to go into Afghanistan — and NATO, the charter of which demands that an attack on one of its members is considered an attack on the rest, had to follow — given that the Afghan regime at the time was harbouring the criminals who perpetrated the heinous 9/11 attacks. But once Bush decided that dealing with Saddam Hussein was more important than, you know, catching the people who actually committed the crime, Al-Qaeda and the Taliban were allowed to wriggle out of the bear trap and Tora Bora, regroup and come back into an Afghanistan occupied by a military starved of resources and strategically drifting.

So who, now, are we spending billions to fight, and for what? The criminals have flown the coop.

And It can’t be to deprive terrorists a safe havens, because, as the Parallax Brief has already shown, terrorist attacks are just as likely to be planned in Hamburg or Bradford as Afghanistan (even if Afghanistan was the only country in the world convenient for terrorist training — Sudan, Somalia, anyone?)

The only good reason the Parallax Brief can think of for fighting the war is to show that NATO won’t be beaten. To prove that we can do what the Soviets couldn’t. To not permit the the Taliban to land the psychological blow of beating off the “imperialist aggressor”.

But even this is hard to believe when victory seems to be an opaque, nebulous concept in this war.

Actually defining what constitutes victory, and how withdrawal will be conducted when that victory has been achieved, will be an essential starting point for President Obama and NATO when he makes his decision. Committing every available American combat brigade to war on the idea of “just not losing” and because the generals asked, is not an option — no matter how politically uncomfortable weathering the backlash sure to come from the Hawkish right.

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MoD Should be the First Department to Feel the Cold Steel of Osborne’s Public Sector Hatchet

November 23rd, 2009 by The Parallax Brief

The Times today broke news that the Ministry of Defence procurement spent GPB149 mn on 900 1960s FV430 series Armoured Personal Carriers, pictured left, which can now only be used for training purposes. The upgrade was classed as an “Urgent Operational Requirement three years ago”, designed for operations in Iraq, but the vehicles are now deemed unsuitable for deployment in Afghanistan, and are therefore being used for training purposes, despite the fact 900 is far more than is required for training.

It goes from bad to worse for the MoD procurement department.

The Times reports that a

“…defence insider said yesterday that the ministry had been “caught between two stools” — spending money that was justified for Iraq but now leaving the Government with a legacy of expensive vehicles that were only good for general training. Mines are one of the main threats in Afghanistan and the Bulldog is said to be too low to the ground to allow deployment. “

Yet the decision has wasted a colossal GBP149,000,000, and left a ludicrous number of vehicles sitting idol.

The Parallax Brief would like to remind his reader that there are currently 23,000 civil servants employed by the MoD’s procurement wing, which is around 3 times more than were needed to buy all equipment needed to wage Total War against the Nazis.

If and when the Conservative Party gain power in 2010, and George Osborne struts into the Treasury oozing machismo and ready to slash public spending to get Britain’s finances back in order, the first department to feel the cold steel of his hatchet should be the MoD. Not a penny should be sacrificed from the front line needs — and indeed, the Parallax Brief would increase the defence budget — but the bureaucracy is clearly a bloated, inept morass.

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Spectator Defends Government Spending, Says Civil Servants are Efficient and Necessary

November 16th, 2009 by The Parallax Brief

It’s amazing how much money that so-called fiscal conservatives are willing to lavish on the armed services. The Parallax Brief believes our armed forces are grossly underfunded and overstretched for Britain’s current foreign policy brief, but what always shocks him is the willingness of those who spend the vast majority of their time engaged in a monotonous, aggressive siege of what they see government largesse (that is, all government spending) to not only join him in being against military cutbacks, but to argue that any it’s wrong to even question MoD spending.

Here, for instance, is the Spectator’s Daniel Korski who — and perhaps sit down now, because you might faint when you read what follows — criticised on Sunday on the Spectator’s Coffee House blog Liam Fox for wanting to reduce the size of the MoD’s civilian (civil servant) contingent.

“Liam Fox has made clear that the Conservative Party is planning to slash the number of civilian posts at the Ministry of Defence as a way of balancing the military budget if they win the general election in 2010. “We have 99,000 people in the Army and 85,000 civilians in the MoD. Some things will have to change – and believe me, they will,” Fox has said.

[But]…MoD civilians include “doctors, dentists, nurses, teachers, lecturers, policemen, security guards, Royal Fleet auxiliary sailors, intelligence analysts”. Many of these people would be considered essential frontline servabts if they worked elsewhere in government. Seeing them as bonus-craving, army-destroying time-wasters is wrong.

In fact, if the MoD axed its entire civilian workforce it would save no more than 2.7 billion pounds in pay pensions and other costs. By comparison, armed forces’ costs amount to 8.9 billion pounds.

While the MoD is clearly in need of reform, and the public can be counted to react in a pavlovian way to the juxtaposition of the number of civilian employees and military personnel, this is hardly the zero-sum issue it is made out to be. Nor is it a major strategic concern for UK defence.

The Parallax Brief was still in the process of preparing a stiff brandy to soften the shock of reading a Spectator journalist defending slothful, incompetent civil servants who could never find work in the private sector, when he read Spectator deputy editor James Forsyth on Obama’s Afghanistan dilemma.

“A report in the New York Times today suggests that the administration is now worried about the cost of sending more troops. The paper says that Obama is insisting that every option contains a quick exit strategy as part of an effort to keep costs down. When you consider the likely cost of many of Obama’s domestic priorities, especially health-care, it seems remarkable that he is so concerned about the costs of the Afghan mission.”

Let’s get this straight, then: The Spectator is now for government spending, and civil servants, who are now underpaid and overstretched, and against government carefully analysing costs against benefits?

If the Spectator was genuinely fiscally conservative, then there would be blog entries on the Coffee House supporting the decision to cut back on the MoD’s civilian contingent and Obama’s concerns about the cost of war.

By the Spectator’s own numbers, cutting even 5% of the civil servants working at the MoD would save GBP135,000,000. Given that there are currently 23,000 civil servants working for the MoD’s procurement wing, a staggering three times more than were needed for the job during the second world war, are cutbacks really unwarranted?

Is there any other department of state which can count on the Spectator’s support in this way?

The Parallax Brief suggests that if, say, Andrew Lansley said GBP135 mn could be saved by trimming civil servants and managers working in the NHS, those defending NHS bureaucracy would be ridiculed by the Spectator.

And would Obama be criticised by the Spectator for considering the cost-benefit dynamic of a new extension of education policy?

A question, then: Are James Forsyth, Daniel Korski and the Spectator true fiscal conservatives who genuinely want government spending to be lowered and government to be more efficient, or do they just want spending on services that help poor people to be slashed so rich people can keep most of their money?

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