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View 788 Tuesday, September 03, 2013

“Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency.”

President Barrack Obama, January 31, 2009

 

Never do any enemy a small injury.

Niccolò Machiavelli

 

“Congress is now the dog that caught the car.”

David Axelrod on President Obama’s Syria decision, August 2013

“From the start of the Syrian uprising, these columns have called for Mr. Obama to mobilize a coalition to support the moderate rebels.

This would depose an enemy of the U.S. and deal a major blow to Iran’s ambition to dominate the region.”

Wall Street Journal Editorial, September 3, 2013

Terrific advice. Of course it requires that we identify a group of moderate rebels, and there seems to be a problem finding any who haven’t headed for the border. The only regions where Christians, Druse, atheists including Baathist socialists, and moderate Muslims are relatively safe are in the areas securely held by Bashar al-Assad’s Alawites. (For what it’s worth, the French, who ruled Syria and Lebanon under a League of Nations mandate after The Great War, considered the Alawites and Druze to be the only warlike people in their mandate.)

Prior to going into Iraq the United States was given to understand that that US troops would be greeted as liberators, and we would ride in triumph to Baghdad where we would install a government made up of moderate Muslims, many of them Iraqi exiles who would accompany our Abrams tanks (although probably riding in open limousines rather than armored vehicles). That didn’t work very well. There was a period after the initial US military victory in which we might have built a government from among Saddam’s generals who had been promised “an honorable role” in the reconstruction of Iraq. The problem was that the exiles couldn’t agree amongst themselves on a government, and the Iraqi people didn’t exactly welcome the returning exiles. And into this mess the State Department send the most incompetent pro-consul to serve in the region since Roman times.

The President asserts that he has the authority to order “punishment” of the Assad regime for its use of Sarin gas in Damascus, and the Secretary of State has made it clear that he has no doubt that the Assad government was responsible for this; thus it is clear what Congress must do. ““I can’t contemplate that the Congress would turn its back on all of that responsibility and the fact that we would have, in fact, granted impunity to a ruthless dictator to continue to gas his people,” Kerry said on “Fox News Sunday.” “Those are the stakes.”

Which has prompted the President’s political advisor David Axelrod to say that “Congress is now the dog that caught the car,” which is a good indication of the White House view of the nature of this issue: it’s political, and the important thing is not to waste a crisis.

What we do not have is any indication of just who we ought to be helping in Syria. Which side would we like to see winning?

Bashar al-Assad is winning at the moment, and he was winning before the use of Sarin. He didn’t need to use war gasses in his capital: if he wanted to exterminate the population in that neighborhood, gunpowder isn’t as efficient as Sarin, but it will do the job. As would bayonets.

The Wall Street Journal has proclaimed the Syrian issue vital to the United States: “A defeat in Congress would signal to Bashar Assad and the world’s other thugs that the U.S. has retired as the enforcer of any kind of world order.”

There are those who do not believe that the U.S. was ever the enforcer of world order – particularly when the nature of that order is obscure. Secretary Kerry is infuriated that 426 children were killed by Sarin. It is a scene of horror but we are used to scenes of horror, in the Middle East and in Africa. There is no world order to be enforced. If there were, the United Nations would be more effective. The world is not universally civilized. The regions of civil order grow and ebb. The British Empire attempted an experiment in world order. They had neither the strength nor the will to continue. There is an honorable heritage of the British Raj, but there are also bitter memories.

We are the friends of liberty everywhere. We are the guardians only of our own. Thomas Jefferson and both Presidents Adams said this at a time when the strength of the United States made it a bold but limited foreign policy. John Quincy Adams, President when the strength of the United States was growing, said “America does not go abroad in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.”

When Congress debates what to do about Syria, it should be very specific in what objectives it authorizes. Congress does not need permission to start a war. It has the constitutional authority to make war on anyone it likes (as did the Crown in England, at least until recently). The President has asserted his right to make war on Syria because there is a threat to US interests, and he has the authority to send in the missiles under the War Powers Act. Congress is not likely to repeal that. The President must make the case that it is vital to the security of the United States that we break things and kill people in Syria. Congress need not make the case for him, but it should not prevent his acting once he determines that it is made.

No battle plan survives contract with the enemy.

Helmuth von Moltke the Elder

Killing children with chemical weapons…

As I understand it, Mr. Obama said:

What message will we send if a dictator can gas hundreds of children to death in plain sight and pay no price? What’s the purpose of the international system that we’ve built if a prohibition on the use of chemical weapons that has been agreed to by the governments of 98 percent of the world’s people and approved overwhelmingly by the Congress of the United States is not enforced?

Make that dozens of children instead of hundreds, and you have Waco. And at Waco there is no uncertainty as to who did the gassing. It is my understanding that Texas has no statute of limitations with respect to manslaughter, murder, and capital murder.

Charles Brumbelow

I had my say about the Waco massacre several times over the years, with a summary in The Grand Inquest of the Nation http://www.jerrypournelle.com/other/inquest.html .  That essay was published in Intellectual Capital http://www.jerrypournelle.com/reports/intellectual/intcap3.html.  The entire Intellectual Capital essay series remains on line.  It was mostly a series of warnings on how we have sown the wind, and alas, most of these essays need no revision.  Now they are no longer prophetic: they are a sort of I told you so.

I also ran across my essay Breaking Things and Killing People http://www.jerrypournelle.com/reports/intellectual/intcap1.html#4 written in Spring of 1998. I was, thankfully, wrong about how quickly the nuclear club would grow – we can thanks the Israelis for much of that – but I had a lot of other things right.

Succinct and on point: http://www.strategypage.com/qnd/syria/articles/20130903.aspx#startofcomments

David Couvillon

Colonel, U.S. Marine Corps Reserve, Retired.; Former Governor of Wasit Province, Iraq; Righter of Wrongs; Wrong most of the time; Distinguished Expert, TV remote control; Chef de Hot Dog Excellance; Avoider of Yard Work

Who should we support?  Or we can break things and kill people.  Who should we kill?

Outrage is not a strategy

Dear Dr. Pournelle,

Michael Yon hits the nail on the head, in my opinion. I honestly believe he’s this generation’s Ernie Pyle.

http://www.michaelyon-online.com/syria-outrage-is-not-a-strategy.htm

Respectfully,

Brian P.

Never do any enemy a small injury. Declare war with a stated war aim, or stay out.  Bombarding ports is a small injury.

View 788 Monday, September 02, 2013

“Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency.”

President Barrack Obama, January 31, 2009

It has been a pleasant day to spend with family and friends. The end of summer. Time to put away my white pants – which I guess I never wore this year. Sable is still happy most of the time, and we had a pleasant walk in the evening just before sundown. And Time Warner made peace with CBS so I don’t have to make a change in cable companies or worry about getting a better antenna…

Fred Pohl, RIP

Fred was one of the first of the legendary writers I met after I started hanging around science fiction conventions in the 1960’s, and one of the first to befriend me when I turned pro. He had an intuitive grasp of science, and no actual education. This was generally more than good enough, and in fact his lack of formal education allowed him a free reign of imagination that many can’t have, but it also led him to make some pretty dreadful scientific mistakes that marred otherwise really great works. It also led him to believe some strange misconceptions about the world of war, and we quarreled over several of those. What we didn’t quarrel about was the writing profession. Fred was scrupulously honest his opinions, and could and did change his views when presented with the right evidence. It just took patience. And I suspect he understood QED better than I did.

When I left office as President of SFWA one of my tasks was to insure that the outfit would be headed by conscientious writers who understood the professional aspects of a writer’s life. That made the decision simple: I talked Fred into running for the office. He accepted on the condition that I would continue to do certain tasks I had undertaken as president, and we worked together splendidly. I always looked forward to seeing Fred at conventions and at the annual get together put on by the Writers of the Future, and I was sad when his health got bad enough that he stopped coming to them; and of course neither of us have gone to many conventions in this millennium, so we have seldom seen each other for a decade and more. But I’ll damned well miss him. He was one of the giants.

http://io9.com/rip-frederik-pohl-the-man-who-transformed-science-fict-1241405614

View 787 Saturday, August 31, 2013

“Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency.”

President Barrack Obama, January 31, 2009

“Build your enemy a golden bridge to retreat across.”

The Art of War

Sun Tzu

Never do any enemy a small injury.

Niccolò Machiavelli

President Obama has announced from the Rose Garden that (1) Bashar al-Assad has used chemical weapons against his own citizens in the civil war in Syrian, (2) this must be punished as it is a monstrous crime against humanity, (3) he has the authority to strike Syria in any way he thinks important since he has deemed that leaving the gas attack unpunished would be a threat against US national security interests, and under the War Powers Resolution of 1973 has the authority to order whatever military action against the Syrian government as he deems proper to deal with this threat to American National Security.

He has not always so interpreted the 1973 Democratic resolution designed to get the US out of Viet Nam just when Saigon had won the civil war, and was now faced with a Russian armed invasion by an armored army from North Viet Nam. The Resolution was carefully crafted to allow the US to anticipate or respond to Soviet actions – particularly a nuclear attack on the US – while keeping us out of future Viet Nam wars. When the North invaded South Viet Nam with 150,000 troops and 3 armored divisions, in 1972 the US assisted in the defense of the South with air and sea support, lots of munitions, logistical efforts, but little ground combat forces, and the invasion from the North was defeated; of the 150,000 sent into South Viet Nam, fewer than 50,000 ever got home. The US/South Viet Nam alliance had won major war at minimal US costs. Then came the 1973 Resolution, and when the North invaded the South in 1975, the US gave its ally no air support, and supplied the Army of the Republic of Viet Nam with 20 rounds and 2 hand grenades per man. The Soviet Union equipped a new armored army that would have been respectably large in World War II. It was sent South in a massive invasion and the US left South Viet Nam to its own devices. Saigon fell, and the era of the boat people was at hand. The War Powers Resolution had done its work.

The present interpretation is different: "A limited engagement such as the one tentatively proposed for Syria, involving no troops on the ground and relying on weapons fired from air and sea, does not appear to fulfill the vague criteria for ‘hostilities’ under the War Powers Resolution," says Christopher McKnight Nichols, a professor at Oregon State University and an expert on the U.S. military history. "Thus the proposed intervention in Syria does not appear to require a deadline for congressional approval or force withdrawal."

Having asserted that a strike against Syria is necessary and proper, and that he has both the physical means and the constitutional authority to order this punitive bombardment, the President announced that he will wait for Congress to come back from the Labor Day holidays and ask for Congressional approval before he sends in the cruise missiles. This will be a bombardment, not an invasion or a punitive expedition.

It is an act of war and by definition of interference in the internal affairs of Syria.

I am no great fan of the United Nations, but President Obama has said in the past that he is.

A/RES/36/103

                                                   91st plenary meeting

                                                   9 December 1981

          36/103.  Declaration on the Inadmissibility of Intervention

                   and Interference in the Internal Affairs of States

               The General Assembly,

Recognizing that full observance of the principles of

non-intervention and non-interference in the internal and external

affairs of sovereign States and peoples, either directly or

indirectly, overtly or covertly, is essential to the fulfilment of

the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations,

1. Approves the Declaration on the Inadmissibility of

Intervention and Interference in the Internal Affairs of States, the

text of which is annexed to the present resolution;

2. Requests the Secretary-General to ensure the widest

disseminaion of this Declaration to States, the specialized agencies

and other organizations in associaton with the United Nations, and

other appropriate bodies.

But, the President says, over 1400 Syrians were killed in the chemical attack including 426 children; that clearly has to be punished, and although the British have decided that they won’t participate, the French (who would not let our air strike against Khadafi fly over French airspace when Reagan bombarded Libya) are all for us.

We live in interesting times.

Since some bombardment of Syria is now considered necessary and proper, the question becomes one of choosing targets. The purpose of the US bombardment is to teach a lesson: you must not use Soman, Sarin, Tabun, VX, or even mustard gas in your civil war. The bombardment is explicitly intended not to effect a regime change; it is punitive only.

Targeting the stockpiles of chemical weapons, assuming that we know where they are, seems a singularly bad idea. Indeed, if Assad can herd his enemies into areas around a war gas dump and there comes a terrible explosion that distributes VX or Soman around the area, who can say that this was not some missile fired from a US warship, or a drone, or from some rocket base in Israel or Jordan. “Our enemies said they would bombard us. Now they have done so.” Of course that requires an explanation of why there was a store or Tabun, but the US still has some stockpiles of really nasty stuff – it turns out that safely getting rid of it is much harder to do than we thought – and having a secure stockpile isn’t an international crime. “We had it secured. But we couldn’t secure it against whatever the United States fired at us.” Or of course the grand plea: “We didn’t have Sarin. The US did. It was their missile that carried it.”

Or, perhaps in keeping with the notion that the US Navy is now serving as the long range bombardment system for al Qaeda, we could crater Syrian runways, blow up their air control towers, and generally cripple as much of their air force as we can find. It might work. But no battle plan survives contact with the enemy. The Syrians are not fools.

Keeping an air force from being a target is tricky but possible. One assumes that the Syrians have learned a lot from the Swedes who successfully kept a modern air force distributed all over the nation. Not just helicopters, either. You do need fuel trucks and possibly pipe lines.

Of course the French will help choose targets. They used to run the place before World War II – and they still have commercial interests in Syria.

If we do find their airplanes and blow them up (expensive aircraft destroyed by even more expensive missiles – modern war is not cheap)  the Syrians will have to buy more modern airplanes from the Russians, which ought to benefit the Russian economy. Perhaps someone in the Middle East will then feel threatened and want to update their air force and come to MacDonnell-Douglas or Boeing, which might have some benefit for the US. And perhaps that is unduly cynical.

I am glad I am not involved in target selection for the coming bombardment of Syria.

Of course it is not entirely clear what the Congress will have to say. The wording of a resolution authorizing the President to punish an unruly nation with a naval and air bombardment will prove interesting. With the President I look forward to the debate.

For whimsical consideration only: would we be better off if the Egyptian military discovered that at one time Syria and Egypt were the “United Arab Republic” (back when the two Hashemite monarchs in Jordan and Iraq formed in retaliation to Nasser’s United Arab Republic the United Arab Kingdoms). The Egyptian President could decide that the union still existed, and send the Mamelukes into Syria to reestablish order and bring Syria into union with Egypt again; to be governed of course by a coalition of the Egyptian and Syrian military. 

View 787 Wednesday, August 28, 2013

“Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency.”

President Barrack Obama, January 31, 2009

“Build your enemy a golden bridge to retreat across.”

The Art of War

Sun Tzu

“Never do any enemy a small injury.”

Niccolo Machiavelli

"President Obama believes there must be accountability for those who would use the world’s most heinous weapons against the world’s most vulnerable people."

John Kerry, Secretary of State

We are abuzz with speculation about what act of war the United States will commit against Syria, apparently without any Congressional resolution or any United Nations consent, in order to teach the Syrians that they must not ignore international law. Apparently this is agreed to by France, but there is parliamentary debate in Britain; and of course Russia disagrees entirely.

The common consensus is that sometime in the next day or so – possibly as early as this evening – the Navy will launch Tomahawk missiles, targeting Syrian airfields. One presumes that the Syrian military authorities will have dispersed their aircraft and fuel assets to other places; craters in runways are easily fixed. Assad would do well to be in a bunker well outside his usual sphere of travel. As to what other targets are “legitimate” when the United States bombards a barbarian port as Great Powers frequently did in the 19^th Century we can only speculate. The United States is serving as the al Qaeda Air Force, but whether we are allowing al Qaeda Syria any consultation in target selection I can’t say. Since President Obama is aware of the reaction to President Clinton’s symbolic bombardments, we can assume that this will be at least symbolically more effective. Craters in runways and perhaps the destruction of a few fire fighting and search and rescue aircraft conveniently left exposed may have to do.

It is of course the very definition of doing your enemy a small injury.

Of course there are those who advocate doing Bashar al-Assad a severe injury. Bomb hell out of them. Blow up his palaces, destroy his home. Reagan scared Khadafy into abject submission and deference. Perhaps it will work with Assad. The problem here is that having frightened Khadafy into being more willing to cooperate, we built him no golden bridge when his country exploded into revolution. The lesson being taught in the 21^st Century is that dictators ought never to let go, because you will be hounded to your death, and your children killed. And if you can get nukes, get at least one, and quickly. It is a lesson easily learned even by a stupid man, and actually few dictators got their position from being stupid – or at least didn’t keep them long. Claudius was elevated to the purple by a drunken sergeant who discovered him hiding behind an arras and was elevated to command by officers convinced that he was elderly and befuddled: they learned better. Most of those elevated to supreme command have to be a lot more bloodthirsty. Claudius learned early that you have to be ruthless – don’t do enemies a small injury – as Messalina discovered.

It does seem certain that we are about to become involved in another war in the Middle East. It will cost ten times as much as is estimated, and will have unintended consequences. It will also have grave implications concerning constitutional government in the United States of America.

The New York Times discusses the legality of bombarding Syria from the safety of the sea:

Bomb Syria, Even if It Is Illegal

By IAN HURD

Published: August 27, 2013 345 Comments

EVANSTON, Ill. — THE latest atrocities in the Syrian civil war, which has killed more than 100,000 people, demand an urgent response to deter further massacres and to punish President Bashar al-Assad. But there is widespread confusion over the legal basis for the use of force in these terrible circumstances. As a legal matter, the Syrian government’s use of chemical weapons does not automatically justify armed intervention by the United States.

There are moral reasons for disregarding the law, and I believe the Obama administration should intervene in Syria. But it should not pretend that there is a legal justification in existing law. Secretary of State John Kerry seemed to do just that on Monday, when he said of the use of chemical weapons, “This international norm cannot be violated without consequences.” His use of the word “norm,” instead of “law,” is telling.

Of course pelting people with missiles has some consequences. It is an act of war and presumably make all the members of your armed forces legitimate targets of retaliation. One supposes that no one is very concerned about that.

Nerve Agents

Jerry,

I looked at some of the victim tapes and they sure were twitching in a familiar way. Admittedly, my personal experience is with demo goats. A bit of neurotoxin in the eye; twitch,twitch; a syrette of atropine in the haunch; artificial respiration by the modified chest pressure/hoof pull method. About five minutes later the star staggers off the stage back to the pen. Survive three shows and you are off to Pelham Range to live a feral life.

Folks around Anniston might be able to tell us how the herd is doing these days.

Since the MSF doctors did not bring anybody back from the brink and there is plenty of atropine available in the area, it looks like somebody came up with old(probably) Russian rockets loaded with GD. Atropine won’t help with that.

As to whodunit, now there is plenty of room for speculation. May not even have been any of the serious participants.

Val Augstkalns

I presume that someone used nerve gas in Syria and killed between 100 and 300 people in an incident that changed nothing about the course of the civil war – except to enlist the United States to serve as al Qaeda air force.

a very short guide to the middle east

http://smallwarsjournal.com/blog/a-short-guide-to-the-middle-east

Jerry,

Just received

What if anything do you know about this? I’m looking for confirmation or discreditation.

http://atlasshrugs2000.typepad.com/atlas_shrugs/2013/01/leaked-emails-prove-obama-backed-plan-to-launch-chemical-weapon-attack-on-syria-and-blame-it-on-assa.html

I know nothing about it nor does anyone else I have asked. It seems enormously unlikely: unlikely that there was such a plot, and even less likely that anyone involved in such double dyed villainy would ever use an e-mail for any part of it. In any event no one I know considers it likely, and few consider it possible.

Senator Cruz of Texas is trying a direct experiment in this Internet age: he is seeking support for withdrawing funding from ObamaCare when the next continuing resolution – there won’t be a budget of course – comes up this fall.

http://www.dontfundobamacare.com/

No intervention in Syria

Dear Dr. Pournelle,

Having read on your site, I was inspired to create a white house petition urging restraint in Syria. 100,000 signatures will force SOME kind of a response, even if it’s nothing more than a pat on the head.

https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/say-no-war-syria/cr4tYvSG

Feel free to sign and pass on if you agree.

Respectfully,

Brian P.