Fighting an insurgency is one of the toughest tasks there is. Doing so as an occupying power is tougher yet. My first SF mission was 20 years ago in the Philippines and a Maoist insurgency called the New People's Army assassinated COL Nick Rowe, a Special Forces icon, while we were there. I had a chance to ask some questions of the current head of Philippine Special Ops Command last year and he said that same group is still their greatest problem. A long war indeed.

The Center for a New American Security has released a report on US efforts in Afghanistan and Pakistan called "Triage: The next twelve months in Afghanistan & Pakistan". The report represents a look at what the concept of Smart Power means when applied to this situation. There is plenty in the report to agree with, but it also showed why CNAS is thought of as the Obama administration's go-to think tank. 

Michèle Flournoy is the Co-Founder of the Center for a New
American Security (CNAS). She served as President of CNAS
until February 9, 2009, when she was confirmed as Undersecretary of
Defense for Policy under Secretary Gates in the Obama administration.

The  authors are Andrew M. Exum, Nathaniel C. Fick, Ahmed A. Humayun, David J. Kilcullen.They begin with some policy recommendations.

In Afghanistan:

Adopt a truly population-centric counterinsurgency strategy that emphasizes protecting the population rather than controlling physical terrain or killing the Taliban and al Qaeda.

They present this as an either-or and that is fundamentally flawed. Any wise policy should be a combination of both balanced due to the particularities of each area. In addition physical terrain control is a major part of how you protect a population. You can't control all of it, but there are always key pieces that must be dominated to even consider safeguarding a populace.

The complete review at BLACKFIVE.

Posted by: Uncle Jimbo at 07:12 PM | Comments (1)
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It's odd, the reflexive argument about nuclear energy from Democrats. We sure as hell can't have it here, but goddamnit, we have no business telling oil-rich Iran they can't make them some nuclear power plants or weapons or whatever the hell they want to do.

I can't believe this douchebag came within a cat's whisker of becoming President of the United States.

“The Bush administration [argument of] no enrichment was ridiculous . . . because it seemed so unreasonable to people,” said Mr Kerry, citing IranÂ’s rights as a signatory of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. “It was bombastic diplomacy. It was wasted energy. It sort of hardened the lines, if you will,” he added. “They have a right to peaceful nuclear power and to enrichment in that purpose.”

They're a signatory of the treaty. So of course the enrichment process, which can produce fuel for electricity (or mass death) will only be used for goodness. It's like discovering you have superhuman powers, and taking the oath that your powers shall only be used for good.

Questioning the openly stated motivations (nuclear weapons) of totalitarian regimes is "bombastic diplomacy".

Also sermons on moral equivalence from John Kerry are "illuminating" and farting loudly in elevators is "making new friends".

Posted by: Dave in Texas at 06:00 PM | Comments (7)
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I finally chewed through the ropes Krakatoa had me tied up with and managed to escape from his little pit of horrors when he was passed out on his sewing room floor. IÂ’m not sure why he went through all that trouble thoughÂ…if he wanted to do an overnight thread post all he really had to do was ask. And what is this obsession he has with lotion and hoses anyway? SheeshÂ…some peopleÂ…

So where were we? Do you dare peer beyond the fold? more...

Posted by: Open Blog at 06:00 PM | Add Comment
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With oil over $70/bbl now, this embryonic, fragile, tentative, speculative, might be, sorta kinda maybe see it if I squint my eyes "recovery" is in grave danger of being smothered in its crib.

Yo O - want to use some of that executive power? You might consider crushing some of these commodity traders right now before this gets out of hand and triggers the next wave of a double dip downturn. Think hard buddy.

YOU. OWN. THIS. ONE.

Posted by: Purple Avenger at 04:14 PM | Add Comment
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Um, only one man in government is above Joe Biden's pay grade.

So, presumably, no other man in government understands this either. Only Barack Obama. Who is super-smart like C-3PO on Ritalin.

No "reasonable challenges" to the entirely made-up figure," he claims. He can't offer any evidence to support his made-up number, but that's okay, because there have been no "reasonable" challenges to it.

Hm. I would think asking for evidence of the number's validity, and the utter failure to provide such, would constitute together a "reasonable" challenge.

Like if you tell me dragons and unicorns exist, and I ask you for evidence, and you cannot offer any. That is, in fact, a "reasonable" challenge.

But not for the Sheriff.

Asked by Jonathan Riskind of the Columbus Dispatch to explain how the White House determined these numbers, Biden said that the Council of Economic Advisers makes its estimates based on measuring what the U.S. employment level would have been without the stimulus, and then comparing it to the nationÂ’s actual employment level.

“I’m sorry I’m not an economist,” Biden said as he was describing the methodology. “My background is in Nerf-Jarts and applesauce."

Actually he said his background is in "foreign policy and the constitution," but I've fixed it for him.

A lot of you guys are gloomy Guses. You believe that Obama's going to continue to skate on all of this just because the media is in his pocket.

Seriously: Think about all of this crap. I know you doubt your fellow Americans -- brothers, I hear ya, I doubt them too -- but at some point it dawns on them that the economy is not improving and Obama's policies are hurting not helping.

And that Joe Biden, our Vice President, hand-picked by Obama as a demonstration of his presidential judgment, is a high-functioning retard.

Posted by: Ace at 01:37 PM | Add Comment
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See Correction Below.

MSNBC anchorbint insists that it's no big deal to call a woman "slutty" because, she suddenly claims, she has also been called that, and yet survived the ordeal.

more...

Posted by: Ace at 12:14 PM | Comments (8)
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Some retard is flinging feces in the comments.

Holocaust-denial warning on this guy.*

It's sort of odd that all the Holocaust deniers are simultaneously Holocaust enthusiasts.

* In fairness, he's "done the research," he says. So he's a genuine scholar.

BTW, what the hell does "crypto blog" mean? I get, say, cryptozionist. But are the nutjobs now just using "crypto" on its own?

Posted by: Ace at 11:23 AM | Comments (24)
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TMZ claims she got her official notice of termination today. The reason given for her firing is that she wasn't getting clearance to do her various appearances on television.

Fox News is reporting it too.

Thanks to AndrewM.

Posted by: Ace at 10:12 AM | Add Comment
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Good question. Obama is selling health care nationalization on the premise that he can actually save the government money by having the government insure most people. The underlying premise to that is that his scary-smart reforms (reforms no president ever before thought of, suggested, or supported) will drastically bring down the price of health care for everyone.

Well -- if so, then these "reforms" are an unmitigated good on their own and ought to be implemented post-haste, on their own. There is no reason to couple them to expanding health care coverage, and very good reasons to decouple the two. For one thing, we can actually see if these "reforms" produce the promised savings and therefore have a better idea of how expensive, on the net, Obamacare will be.

Virginia Postrel quizzes Obamanaut Peter Orszag on this point, but Orszag doesn't really defend his claim that "reform" and nationalization must be done at the same.

He does promise further "dialog," though.

Isn't that wonderful.

Posted by: Ace at 10:09 AM | Add Comment
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Because engaging in combat operations on foreign soil is the same as stealing a car or writing a bad check in the US.

Welcome to Obama's brave new world.

“The administration has decided to change the focus to law enforcement. Here’s the problem. You have foreign fighters who are targeting US troops today – foreign fighters who go to another country to kill Americans. We capture them…and they’re reading them their rights – Mirandizing these foreign fighters,” says Representative Mike Rogers, who recently met with military, intelligence and law enforcement officials on a fact-finding trip to Afghanistan.

War's over kids, nothing to see here. Just send in the cops and it'll all be good.

Read the whole sad story at The Weekly Standard. It's absolutely disgusting.

People used to say, 'no prisoners, just shoot 'em'. That was a bad idea because we might get valuable intel. Clearly, most of these jihadi scum are going to exercise 'their right' to remain silent. Prisoners aren't so attractive anymore, are they?

Posted by: DrewM at 10:07 AM | Comments (1)
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