Posts Tagged ‘ Pakistan ’

Faisal Shahzad’s Relationship to the Pakistani Taliban

Tuesday, May 11th, 2010
Jim Arkedis


Jim Arkedis is the director of PPI's National Security Project.

by Jim Arkedis

It was the Pakistani Taliban! Yes, yes, of course. They sat in their evil lair and activated one of their top sleeper agents to infiltrate American territory with a devilish plan to thwack hundreds of unsuspecting victims. And they monitored it all from their giant TV screens in real time, having tapped into NYPD’s closed-circuit television. Should visual monitoring fail, robo-operative Faisal Shahzad would simply activate the GPS tracking system linked to the Pakistani Taliban’s satellite via the computer chip inserted behind his ear.

Or not.

As Eric Holder and Hillary Clinton all took to the Sunday shows yesterday to proclaim Faisal Shahzad’s “connection” to the Pakistani Taliban, it struck me that such rhetoric often conveys, falsely, the sense of an ironclad connection between the operative and his terrorist mentors.

Secretary Clinton deserves credit for her answer on 60 Minutes yesterday, when she said, “There are connections. Exactly what they are, how deep they are, how long they’ve lasted, whether this was an operation encouraged or directed … those are questions still in the process of being sorted out.”

She’s right, of course. But my worry is that people stop paying attention after that first sentence.

I think I have a pretty good idea of Faisal Shahzad’s relationship to the Pakistani Taliban. My inkling is based on not a single piece of intelligence reporting as it pertains to this case, but rather my experience investigating the bombings in Madrid (2004) and London (2005). Both those operations featured “home-grown” operatives — locals who were “clean” (i.e., had all the proper paperwork to access the target country) and who had explicit or nebulous associations with al Qaeda in Afghanistan or Pakistan. The Madrid bomber’s connection to AQ has always been slightly murkier, but the London bombers were known to have traveled to Pakistan on prior occasions.

The Metamorphosis

Based on London and Madrid, here’s an attempted reconstruction of how Faisal Shahzad went from being a nice young father in the Connecticut ‘burbs to an attempted mass murderer:

First, the part we don’t exactly know: What made him travel to Pakistan with the intent to hook up with the Taliban? While a lot of bad stuff had happened to Shahzad over the course of the previous months — quitting his job and losing his house among them — we don’t know what mechanism drove him from “depressed” to “seeking revenge.” It could have been a chat room; it could have been secret meetings at a mosque; it could have been one influential mentor, as was the case with the first London cell in the north of England (the cell met regularly with an Islamic extremist in the backroom of a bookstore before traveling to Pakistan).

However, we do know that it was one of these (or something like it). Faisal went from having a bad run in life to actively seeking revenge. We know that someone — whom we’ll call his “mentor” — got him to translate his frustration into action and was well-connected enough to link up Shahzad with Taliban elements in Pakistan.

Next, as he’d done several times, Shahzad traveled to Pakistan. Most of his previous trips were likely family-related. This one might have been, as well. But at some point, Shahzad’s mentor told his contacts in the Pakistani Taliban that he had an American passport-holding recruit who was open to learning more. What’s more, Shahzad’s mentor must have been highly trusted in Pakistan because Taliban elements view U.S.-based operative as spies. That the mentor could vouch for Shahzad’s legitimacy would have been critical.

The mentor would have given Shahzad contact information in Pakistan, but it would have likely been up to Shahzad to initiate contact with Pakistani Taliban.

Upon traveling to Pakistan, Shahzad obviously decided that he was interested in learning more. He got in touch with his mentor’s network, and agreed to spend a certain period of time — as few as a couple weeks, but up to several months — in the Pakistani wilderness with Taliban members. Travel records indicate that Faisal went to Karachi and then Peshawar, the Taliban hotbed where Shahzad likely jumped off the grid.

During his time in the Taliban camp, Faisal would have gone through Terrorism 101. He’d have been given physical training, religious indoctrination (which is critical to sustaining his commitment), bomb-making classes and likely small-arms instruction. If there was a group of students, they would have bonded and shored up their commitment to jihad in small group sessions where they solidified their hatred of America.

A Freelance Terrorist

Faisal would have received all of this training, but would likely not have been given a specific plan of attack. This is the changing model of terrorism today. No longer do al Qaeda masterminds sit deep in caves and dream up logistically complex plots akin to 9/11. Instead, it’s more likely that the Taliban would have provided him training, possibly some cash, and given Shahzad the autonomy to imagine and execute his own plot. That’s right — the Pakistani Taliban likely would have taught him, paid him, and told him, “Good luck with whatever you end up doing. Just do something.”

In today’s world of increasing counterterrorism capabilities, this model stands a significantly higher degree of success. By not weighing Faisal down with the who’s, what’s and when’s of an operation, logistics are simplified dramatically, thus decreasing the chances of intercepted communications or arrested operatives that could scuttle the whole shebang. Cost drops, too. And since the Taliban has been isolated, they wouldn’t have on-the-spot access to scout a potential attack site, and are therefore almost forced to cede control to local operatives.

Of course many of these operatives, Shahzad and the Underwear Bomber included, aren’t “professional terrorists” with years and years of extensive training and indoctrination. But the Pakistani Taliban now seems willing to give up operational control and experience in order to increase the chances of a successful attack, even if that attack is significantly smaller than before. And since politicians are ready to use terrorism to score political points, a small attack could potentially carry as great a weight as another 9/11.

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The Times Square Bomb and Public Education

Monday, May 3rd, 2010
Jim Arkedis


Jim Arkedis is the director of PPI's National Security Project.

by Jim Arkedis

This weekend’s bomb plot in Times Square was the third significant terrorist try in the U.S. since August. After Najibullah Zazi’s arrest that month and the failed underwear bomber on Christmas Day, it was also the third to fail. (Note that I’m leaving out the Ft. Hood incident, which I don’t classify as terrorism.)

Whether or not the Pakistani Taliban’s claims of responsibility prove true, the plot’s simplistic nature and the bomb’s failure to detonate are the latest anecdotal evidence that the terrorist threat has shifted. Out — for now — is the rarer, mass-causality, 9/11-style plot, while “in” is the more frequent but smaller-impact variety.

While it’s good news that the possibility of thousands of deaths in a single attack has decreased, there’s a sobering reality about this morphing modus operandi: Sooner or later, one of these small-fry, rig-it-up-in-my-garage plots is bound to work. While the recent cases aren’t connected to the same ultimate terrorist authority, their frequency and near-success indicate that similar attempts will keep coming, perhaps as often as three or four per year.
Amateurs may throw these plots together, but they stand a great chance of success even in an era of improving cooperation between police and intelligence services. A U.S. counterterrorism official points out something in today’s WaPo that I’ve believed for a long time: “‘Unsophisticated’ can still cause a lot of pain and misery… These events are so hard to detect in advance. If there were a foolproof way of finding people before they acted, whether it’s the [snipers] in D.C. or someone who puts a bomb in his car . . . it has to be understood how very difficult this business is.”

That’s where the White House has come up a bit short. While President Obama’s initial statements praising the NYPD and vows “to do what’s necessary to protect the American people” are important, they create the public expectation that the government actually can provide complete security, 100 percent of the time.

Instead, the White House should marry tough-minded rhetoric with an explanation of the evolving threat. It’s a delicate dance to be sure – it’s unnatural for any president to acknowledge chinks in America’s armor. Fortunately, complex explanations play to President Obama’s rhetorical skills, and its possible to envision a speech that strikes the right tone of strength, vigilance, caution and honesty about where we stand against an evolving threat.

The stark likelihood of an eventual success dictates the White House shouldn’t miss the opportunity to engage the public on this critical national security issue.

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The Cold War Is Over, But the Nukes Are Still Here

Monday, April 12th, 2010
Jim Arkedis


Jim Arkedis is the director of PPI's National Security Project.

by Jim Arkedis

President Obama sure is spending a lot of time worrying about nuclear weapons this week. Today’s Nuclear Security Summit – a meeting of over 40 world leaders in Washington, D.C. – caps seven days of highly publicized events on nuclear security.

The attention lavished on atomic weapons feels almost anachronistic, invoking a Cold War-era standoff that now seems so distant. Twenty-five years ago, I was a third grader at St. Joan of Arc in Chagrin Falls, Ohio. Once a month, Ms. Elliot would trot my class into the hallway where we’d kneel down and clasp our hands behind our necks. This wasn’t some strange Catholic school ritual – we were “protecting” ourselves from a Soviet nuclear attack.

While I realize now that this defensive maneuver wouldn’t have kept me safe from a direct hit on the jungle gym, the looming threat of a mushroom cloud over the American Midwest felt real.

It doesn’t today. The end of the Cold War, years of American military dominance and improving, if occasionally frustrating, relations with Moscow have effectively banished the threat of mutually assured destruction. Beyond Russia, it’s nearly impossible to imagine China, perhaps the United States’ “near-peer” military competitor but also its financial Siamese twin, launching its nuclear weapons.

But nuclear security must be important – just glance at Obama’s schedule. Before signing the New START accord with Russian President Dmitri Medvedev last Thursday, his administration released its Nuclear Posture Review, an important document that redefines the way America will use the 1550 deployed warheads New START permits. And today the president is convening the summit of world leaders in Washington, D.C.

It’s not only this week. These events are part of a yearlong effort that began last April when President Obama spoke about his vision of a world without nuclear weapons.

It’s a long-term goal to be sure — Obama has been clear that America would retain its arsenal as long as others did. But it’s hardly a liberal fantasy — conservative icons like former Secretaries of State Henry Kissinger and George Shultz have joined forces with mainstream Democrats like former Senator Sam Nunn and Defense Secretary Bill Perry to promote a nuclear-free world.

They’re following the legacy of Ronald Reagan, who nearly signed on to sweeping nuclear restrictions with Mikhail Gorbachev in Iceland in 1986, and George H.W. Bush, who signed the START treaty in 1991.

So with no Cold War threat, what’s the urgency? Why is the president wasting time negotiating with countries that wouldn’t dare attack us anyway?

Here’s why — it’s not state-sponsored atomic destruction that’s the threat. It’s the al-Qaeda operative with a nuclear suitcase. That sounds crazy, right? Then again, we never could have imagined that three airliners could bring down the Twin Towers and slam into the Pentagon. President Obama realizes that a nuclear arsenal in the hands of nation-states still poses a threat, albeit from stateless ones.

How, then, does a stuffy gathering of world leaders at a conference center in Washington, D.C. keep the bomb away from a small-fry terrorist? First, curbing nuclear proliferation depends on the large nuclear powers — U.S., Russia, China, U.K. and France — showing a serious and sustained effort towards nuclear disarmament that convinces the smaller nuclear powers — India, Pakistan and Israel — and nuclear weapons aspirants — North Korea and Iran — to feel comfortable without them. That dialogue needs to start on a big stage, particularly for American allies India and Pakistan, who may want to do the right thing but happen to be mortal enemies.

What’s more, it’s the North Koreas, Irans and Pakistans of the world that stand the greatest chance of selling nuclear technology to the black market’s highest bidder. Getting those countries to swear off nuclear weapons planning is critical. Just ask A.Q. Khan — he might be a hero as the father of the Pakistani A-bomb, but he has also sold nuclear secrets to Iran and North Korea in the 1980s and 1990s for tens of millions of dollars.

We need nation-states to control their nuclear scientists, and getting everyone on the same page — as Obama’s doing — is the first step to achieving that goal.

We are long-removed from cowering in the hallway of my Catholic school in Ohio, but that doesn’t mean the nuclear threat died with the Cold War. It has simply changed. That’s why the Obama administration is spending so much time yanking America’s nuclear security policy into the 21st century.

Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/travlr/

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The Five Most Ridiculous Conservative Statements About Obama’s Nuclear Policy

Friday, April 9th, 2010
Jim Arkedis


Jim Arkedis is the director of PPI's National Security Project.

by Jim Arkedis

The other day, I wrote a column about how the president’s focus on nuclear weapons was a solid opportunity to finally achieve some bipartisanship. I won’t rehash those arguments here, but I encourage you to read the piece. Much of the conservative intelligentsia actually agrees with me, and some have noted that any objections to the president’s moves are simply rooted in politics because there is “no substantive disagreement with what Obama has done.” But that hasn’t stopped some from favoring politics over good governance and — as Kevin Sullivan at RCW points out – start a new “silly season.”

So here, friends, are the five most ridiculous conservative lines about this week’s focus on nuclear security:

5. “[T]he real threat today is proliferation and terrorism. This treaty, of course, doesn’t have anything to do with that.” – Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ)

Au contraire — the New START has EVERYTHING to do with proliferation and terrorism. The key to convincing the Irans, North Koreas and Pakistans of the world that building and/or selling nuclear weapons isn’t necessary is to have demonstrable proof that the big nuclear nations are serious about arms control themselves. So we have to start (no pun intended) with the idea that the U.S. and Russia are making a real commitment to limit their own arsenals over time. Don’t expect Tehran and Pyongyang to bite on this immediately, but this is a decades-long project and New START is a good step in this direction.

4. “[W]e don’t need the treaty, we are willing to do these things unilaterally and the Russians will probably do it unilaterally themselves.” — Doug Feith, former Bush Undersecretary of Defense for Policy

Okay, fair enough…maybe both sides would do things unilaterally. But when I bought my house, I felt a lot better knowing the terms of the deal were actually written down. Feith spent a good chunk of his career negotiating arms control treaties for a living, so it’s curious why he’d slap down his former profession. Also, see #5 again.

3. “A friendly reality check for exuberant Democrats on the first day of the Nuclear-Zero Pax Obama — this treaty is almost certainly dead on arrival.” – Michael Goldfarb, Weekly Standard

Actually, Michael, I don’t think it is. Here’s Sen. Richard Lugar (IN), the ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee: ”I remain hopeful that it will be signed and that there will be time assigned on the floor for debate and a vote this year.” And here’s Henry Kissinger and George Shultz supporting it, too. Ratification will be a tough fight — two-thirds of the Senate is needed — but it’s hardly DOA.

2. “Does anyone think that the Obama administration will use force — much less nuclear force — against Iran? Mahmoud Ahmadinejad certainly doesn’t, to judge by his reaction to the Nuclear Posture Review.” — Max Boot, Commentary

Actually, I think Ahmadinejad does. Iran’s pursuit of a nuclear weapons program over the last decade is the act of a country that’s convinced America would use force against it. After all, we’ve only invaded both of their next-door neighbors. Obama’s nuclear policy only isolates Iran more. Boot says that Robert Gates’ assertion that all options are on the table against Iran is not true. But actions speak louder than words. Judging by Iran’s actions, they still seem pretty convinced of America’s willingness to use force, Ahmadinejad’s bluster notwithstanding.

1. “(Our response is then restricted to bullets, bombs, and other conventional munitions.)” – Charles Krauthammer, Washington Post

Boasting more nonsense than a Phish show, Krauthammer’s piece imagines a scenario where hundreds of Americans are dead due to a nerve gas attack in Boston. Then he claims that the new Nuclear Posture Review ties the U.S. president’s hands because America couldn’t respond with a nuclear strike, and would have to — sigh – respond with just bullets, bombs and the like. Yeah, that’s right – apparently, the only good deterrent is a nuclear one. Really, why would anyone be scared of a conventional military that spends more on bullets, ICBMs and other conventional weapons than the rest of the world combined?

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Obama’s Donations Reflect His National Security and Foreign Policy Priorities

Friday, March 12th, 2010
Jim Arkedis


Jim Arkedis is the director of PPI's National Security Project.

by Jim Arkedis

President Obama gave away his $1.4 million Nobel Peace Prize award yesterday, and where national security is concerned, he literally put his money where his mouth is.

The largest donation—$250,000—was given to Fisher House, an organization that builds “comfort homes” on the grounds of major U.S. military installations that allow service members’ families “to be close to a loved one at the most stressful times—during the hospitalization for an unexpected illness, disease, or injury.”  It shouldn’t come as much of a surprise that President Obama would choose a charity like Fisher House, given the First Lady’s focus on the cause since the beginning of her husband’s presidency.  And with America’s military facing unprecedented strains, every drop in the bucket helps.

The president also gave $100,000 to AfriCare, which promotes health, food security, and access to water in Africa.  This donation mirrors Obama’s long-standing efforts to alleviate poverty in Africa, which dates back to his days in the Senate when he offered the 2007 Global Poverty Act that aims to cut the number of people living on a dollar a day in half by 2015.

Finally, Obama dropped 100 large on the Central Asia Institute, whose story is chronicled in the book “Three Cups of Tea.”  I wasn’t a huge fan of the book’s style, per se, but the CAI’s work is remarkable in and of itself, and it certainly deserves every penny for carrying out such an important mission of educating girls in Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The donations are very embodiment of the notion that American national security policy is about more than the blunt instrument of military force (an idea most recently forwarded by Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Admiral Mullen).  When force is used, it should be done in a careful and judicious manner that accounts for the extended effects on our fighting men and women.

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Another Top Taliban Bites The Dust… For Now

Thursday, February 18th, 2010
Jim Arkedis


Jim Arkedis is the director of PPI's National Security Project.

by Jim Arkedis

The English language online version of Der Spiegel is reporting that Mullah Abdul Salam — a big-fish Taliban commander who has been responsible for recent attacks against German forces stationed in northern Afghanistan — has been arrested by Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI). Salam has been described by both Der Spiegel and the LA Times as the “shadow governor” of province of Kunduz. While Salam doesn’t appear to be the critical lynch-pin that Mullah Baradar was, the LAT explains:

In Kunduz, a once-quiet corner of Afghanistan, Salam presided over a major buildup of Taliban forces over the last 18 months. The insurgents took over entire districts, repeatedly attacked Afghan security posts, harried NATO troops in the province — who were mainly Germans — and menaced a NATO supply line running through Kunduz.

One of the worst civilian-casualty episodes of the war occurred in August after suspected Taliban fighters hijacked a fuel truck. The Germans, fearing the vehicle would be used for an attack on their main base in Kunduz, called in an airstrike that killed dozens of insurgents — and also dozens of civilians.

Late last year, a series of raids, carried out mainly by U.S. special forces, drove the insurgents underground in Kunduz, but their presence remained a threat.

What in the dickens is going on here? As is eloquently detailed in Steve Coll’s Ghost Wars, the ISI essentially started and supported the Taliban throughout the ’90s, and has an institutional culture that has been loathe to crack down on its own project.

Why now? Why has the ISI suddenly decided to wrap-up two significant Taliban commanders in two days, a batting average that makes them look like Ted Williams compared to their standard impersonation of the 1987 Cleveland Indians’ Otis Nixon (I’ll spare you the click — .059 BA).

Consider this: By arresting these guys, the ISI is amassing credit and power. Sure, you could say that the Americans have finally convinced the Pakistanis that it’s in Islamabad’s interest to side with Washington. In the long-term, it definitely is.  But as the strategic landscape shifts and there may be some sort of negotiation with the Taliban (ill-advised though that may be, in my opinion), the ISI is simply collecting all the big cards in its own hand.

The bottom line is that nothing’s for certain just yet — the ISI could continue to cooperate with the Americans, or simply look the other way during an escape attempt, just like the Yemenis.

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What the Capture of the Taliban’s Commander Means

Tuesday, February 16th, 2010
Jim Arkedis


Jim Arkedis is the director of PPI's National Security Project.

by Jim Arkedis

The capture of Mullah Baradar, the Taliban’s top military commander, is indeed very welcome news. If you want the full scoop on Baradar, read Ron Moreau’s Newsweek profile of him from last August, which depicts Baradar’s role thusly:

Baradar appoints and fires the Taliban’s commanders and governors; presides over its top military council and central ruling Shura in Quetta, the city in southwestern Pakistan where most of the group’s senior leaders are based; and issues the group’s most important policy statements in his own name. It is key that he controls the Taliban’s treasury—hundreds of millions of dollars in narcotics protection money, ransom payments, highway tolls, and “charitable donations,” largely from the Gulf.

[...]

Baradar determines much of the Taliban’s grand strategy as well. In late 2007 he ordered Taliban forces to focus their attacks on disrupting the flow of U.S. and NATO military supplies, and to push closer to the cities, especially Kabul. U.S. military chiefs were dismayed by his success.

[...]

Partly because of Baradar’s strong roots among the Popalzai—Afghanistan’s largest and most influential Pashtun tribe—he could bring a number of tribal leaders onboard in the event of serious peace talks. But for now, Taliban leaders seem convinced that negotiations are merely a ploy to peel off elements of the insurgency, which U.S. commanders have more or less acknowledged. “We see no benefit for the country or Islam in such kind of talks,” Baradar told NEWSWEEK.

Taking Baradar into custody not only removes a critical operational commander from the field of battle, but also has the potential to be a treasure trove of intelligence about ongoing Taliban operations. And though I think that Pakistan’s security services will continue to play both sides, this operation is one piece of notable collaboration between the CIA and Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI).

What should we expect? We should keep in mind a tried and true axiom — we can’t kill or capture our way to victory. As is the pattern after most high-value terrorist/guerilla arrests, Baradar will be almost immediately replaced, likely by a younger and less experienced operative who will maintain a substantial though degraded medium-term operational tempo. These are the kinds of arrests that prove the administration is serious about degrading the Taliban’s capabilities.

But based on this high-value pattern, I expect to see a near-term spike in Taliban attacks as the group attempts to prove its continued viability. It will be interesting to see what sort of effect the arrest has on the ongoing battle at Marja (a Taliban stronghold in the Helmund province), a joint U.S.-Afghan operation that could have been timed to knock the Taliban further on their heels during a period of internal instability.

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Stand with Westphalia

Thursday, February 4th, 2010
Mike Signer


Mike Signer is a senior fellow at the Progressive Policy Institute.

by Mike Signer

The “aught” decade that just ended was bracketed by 9/11, perpetrated by al-Qaeda terrorists who had enjoyed havens in Sudan and Afghanistan, and a thwarted Christmas 2009 airline bombing by a Nigerian terrorist, who learned his craft in Yemen. The years were filled with a running, halting effort to prevent the Taliban from re-taking the Afghanistan government. Throughout the millennial decade, a postmodern theme dominated: terrorists virtually taking over weak states that should have been eliminating them.  Today, as we enter a shiny new decade, we should embrace a cozy and decidedly pre-modern tradition: the system of sovereign states that has served us well since the 17th century.

The world has been governed by an arrangement of sovereign nation-states with fixed boundaries since the Treaty of Westphalia was signed in 1648. But that system faces threats today. In a fascinating article in Foreign Policy, Atlantic staff writer Graeme Wood described today’s worrisome “quasi-states”—ethnic enclaves that have currency and governments, yet are not officially recognized by the United Nations. Wood includes Abkhazia, an entity of 190,000 that separated from Georgia after a war in the early 1990s; Somaliland, a refugee enclave from a Somalian dictator’s brutality in the late 1980s; and Kurdistan, which stamps visas “Republic of Iraq-Kurdistan Region.”

No less worrisome are weak nation-states that are currently facing threats to their sovereignty from terrorist groups within their borders. The attempted airplane bombing by a Nigerian disciple of al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, which has taken root in Yemen, is only the latest reminder.

Like termites eating away at a building’s foundation, a weak commitment to states ultimately threatens to topple the internal and external order provided by the Westphalian system, with America and our allies directly in the path of collapse. The system’s bad actors—groups who refuse to respect states per se—have perversely, if predictably, turned on the greatest state of them all, the United States. And so the system needs to defend itself, with the U.S. at the lead.

The destabilization latent in both quasi-states and weak nation-states is aggravating already dangerous conditions in many of the world’s hotspots. In Lebanon, Hezbollah currently controls two cabinet seats and 11 seats in the 128-member Parliament; the cabinet recently voted to defy a UN order for Hezbollah to disarm. In Gaza, Hamas took official governmental powers through elections in 2006, yet has failed so far to provide decent government services, while clashing with Fatah—previously the best hope for progress and stability—and fighting progress with Israel.

Prior to last year, Pakistan had essentially conceded the northwest Federally Administered Tribal Areas to al-Qaeda and the Taliban; today, violent clashes occur in the region, but the terrorists are far from subdued. Meanwhile, in Yemen, al-Qaeda operatives are moving into formal positions in the government. And in Afghanistan, the Taliban is marching again on Kabul; President Obama’s new strategy aims principally to “degrade” the Taliban, in the hopes that the Afghan state can save itself.

With almost a year to review, discussion is now beginning about what President Obama’s foreign policy doctrine exactly is. As the inevitable fray begins, here’s one big doctrinal idea: let’s dedicate America’s resources, both hard and soft, to nurturing strong states around the world, undergirded by constitutionalism and the rule of law, and pressing those actors who would otherwise create sub-states and quasi-states either to put down their weapons and join states, or suffer the oblivion that recalcitrant terrorist methods deserve.

In the coming decade, the U.S. must focus like a laser on the threat non-state actors pose to the world order.  The fronts spread throughout the world.  We need to pressure warlords in Afghanistan to join the government by making private militias unacceptable and illegal.  We should push Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza to forgo violence, recognize Israel, and become legitimate.  We need continually to support and reform the government in Yemen, while fighting al-Qaeda’s intrusions.  In our own hemisphere, we need to render illegitimate the paramilitary groups who are currently re-arming in Colombia and threatening the government there.

In all of these cases, we should employ all the multilateral instruments at our disposal, working with NATO and the UN and also organizations like the IMF and the World Bank to deploy both carrots (including trade and other economic incentives) and sticks (sanctions and, in the case of aggression or imminent threats, force).

There is also much we can do unilaterally.  The FY 2010 omnibus spending bill passed by Congress shows we’re on the right track in using our “soft power” to help consolidate states.  For instance, the budget increases monies to the Millennium Challenge Corporation, which incentivizes governments to undertake democratic reform, 26%, to $1.105 billion.  And in Yemen, the FY 2010 budget nearly doubles our FY 2010 economic support funds from $21 billion to $40 billion, which should help strengthen the government there.

However, there are flaws that demonstrate the need for a more systemic approach.  In Pakistan, under Congress’s 2010 budget, our military assistance will drop, from $300 million in FY 2009 to $238 million in FY 2010, and economic support barely rising, from $1 billion to $1.04 billion.  These decisions risk undermining a Pakistani government that has recently made promising steps toward finally confronting the non-state actors within its borders.

All in all, disparate strands including Pakistan, Yemen, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Colombia need to be woven into a coherent, international approach, led by the United States. The issue isn’t so much quasi-states like Abkhazia and Somaliland, as interesting and troubling as they are. More urgent are non-state actors seeking to become states that directly threaten our security. And so the past should be prologue: we should stand with Westphalia, now more than ever.

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Pakistan Just Ain’t That Easy

Friday, December 18th, 2009
Jim Arkedis


Jim Arkedis is the director of PPI's National Security Project.

by Jim Arkedis

It seems almost elementary that the governments of Pakistan and the U.S. both have a vested interest in extending Islamabad’s authority over the whole of its country, a point David Ignatius makes today:

Here’s the cold, hard truth: U.S. success in Afghanistan depends on Pakistan gaining sovereignty over the tribal belt. If the insurgents can continue to maintain their havens in North Waziristan and other tribal areas, then President Obama’s surge of troops in Afghanistan will fail. It’s that simple.

Extending the Pakistani government’s writ is certainly a core element to any hope of securing Afghanistan. A safe base of operation across the border in Pakistan would allow al Qaeda’s senior leadership room to incubate in hopes of re-spreading its wings in a larger Taliban-protected region. Points for identifying the problem, but it’s not that simple.

But just a handful of pages away from Ignatius is a reminder of just how difficult that challenge will be:

Pakistan’s Supreme Court nullified on Wednesday a controversial deal that had given President Asif Ali Zardari and thousands of other government officials amnesty from prosecution on corruption charges, a decision likely to further weaken Zardari’s shaky hold on power.

The ruling could open the door to additional legal challenges against Zardari. Although he still has immunity from prosecution under the constitution, opponents plan to contest that by arguing that Zardari is technically ineligible for the presidency. …

But Zardari’s ability to make decisions about the level of Pakistani cooperation with the United States has been compromised by his struggle to simply hold on to his job — a task likely to be made more difficult by the court ruling.

There are essentially three legs of power in the Pakistani government — the military and intelligence services are the largest center of gravity, followed by the courts and then the civilian leadership. Rivalries between all three are intense to say the least, a dissection of which could take up an entire encyclopedic volume. And even though the military isn’t mentioned in the WaPo’s article, it almost goes without saying that the generals would be fine if Zardari fell from power.

The point is that as long as these communities’ main focus is a struggle for power, the White House will never get them to pay primary attention to internal security. And even if you could, each power base has reasons (some better than others) to turn a blind eye to the Taliban lodged in Pakistan’s hinterland.

The situation isn’t hopeless…yet. Despite long-standing suspicions of civilian President Zardari’s corruption (hey, the guy wasn’t called “Mr. 10 Percent” for nothing), he is the legitimately elected leader and was allowed to return to Pakistan — with his late-wife Benazir Bhutto — in an amnesty deal reached with ex-President Pervez Musharraf. Therefore, the U.S. should stand by Pakistan’s nascent democracy and support Zardari, without making him look like an American puppet.

Then the U.S. government should work on aligning the military under Pakistan’s civilian leadership. Congress tried this by conditioning aid on just such a goal in October. Guess what? It didn’t go over so well with Pakistan’s generals. Back to the drawing board.

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Posted in A Progressive Security Strategy, Daily Fix | 1 Comment »

Candor We Can Believe In

Wednesday, November 18th, 2009
Will Marshall


Will Marshall is the president of the Progressive Policy Institute.

by Will Marshall

Let us now praise undiplomatic women.

Two cases in point: Michele Rhee, Washington, D.C.’s blunt public schools Chancellor and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Yesterday, Rhee told a gathering of CEOs that the District suffers from a “complete and utter lack of accountability in this system.” That’s likely to intensify the flak she’s already taking from the teachers’ union, which is apoplectic about her decision to lay off 250 subpar teachers, and from the City Council, which sees her as insufficiently deferential on matters of school reform.

But Rhee was unapologetic. “Collaboration and consensus-building are quite frankly overrated in my mind,” she told the executives. “None of you CEOs run your companies by committee, so why should we run a school district by committee?”

It’s a good question, though such characteristic bluntness probably won’t lengthen her tenure as chancellor. Rhee is adamant about putting the needs of Washington’s public school children, who are overwhelmingly poor and minority, above the interests of adults in the District’s political-educational complex who resist fundamental changes in a system that’s manifestly failing.

On measures of student performance, the District ranks 51st among the states and near the bottom of nation’s biggest metropolitan regions. In weeding out teachers on the basis of job performance rather than seniority, Rhee has hit a very sensitive nerve. She’s saying, in effect, that public education in the District isn’t a jobs program for city residents. Let’s hope she goes on making waves.

Here’s Rhee at yesterday’s event:

Meanwhile, Hillary Clinton created a flap in Pakistan recently when she had the temerity to note that Osama bin Laden and his top al Qaeda henchmen have been living in that country since 2002.

The Pakistani press, ever alert for signs of U.S. encroachment on that nation’s sovereignty, went ballistic. Foreign policy mandarins sagely opined that the U.S. secretary of state had committed a clear breach of diplomatic protocol by embarrassing her hosts.

Well, they should be embarrassed. The presence of America’s terrorist enemies in Pakistan should be a besetting sore point in U.S.-Pakistani relations. It signifies either governmental incompetence or, worse, collusion. And with the Pakistani Army now clearing Taliban havens in South Waziristan, which it formerly regarded as no-go territory, the question of why the nation’s intelligence and security forces can’t locate our enemies only grows more insistent.

Pakistani officials reportedly are pushing back hard on U.S. suggestions that they go into North Waziristan next. It’s the home base for the notoriously thuggish Haqqani network, which is responsible for a wave of kidnapping and terrorist attacks in neighboring Afghanistan.

All this suggests that Pakistan, set to receive about $7 billion in U.S. aid, remains a strangely reluctant partner in the struggle against extremists who threaten Pakistan, Afghanistan and the U.S.

The White House reportedly is upset with Clinton for her occasional outbursts of candor. Let’s hope they don’t fit the muzzle too tightly.

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Posted in Daily Fix, New Schools for the 21st Century | 16 Comments »