The attacks in Paris by ISIS terrorists and the downing of a Russian airliner could be game changers, but what will be the game? What changed Friday the 13th was the realization that ISIS was not a localized land grab and a fight between them and other Muslims that did not share their ideology, but their radical movement had gone global.  They were now a threat to homelands from Russia to Turkey to Western Europe to the US.   It was also clear that the failure of intelligence services was profound and the terrorists had figured away to communicate in secret.

The G20 summit taking place in Turkey as this column is being written will be extremely revealing of any definitive change in attitudes of Russia and Turkey, who so far have not given priority to taking action against ISIS.  It is also an opportunity for Pres. Obama to take the lead in organizing action, at least so far as our Arab allies and NATO are concerned. Whatever we do, we should not make threats we cannot back up. We have done too much of that already.

What now?  The fallout will be profound on global realignment and alliances based on convenience or sympathy. Already there have been changes in attitude expressed by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and US Secretary of State John Kerry, who came to an agreement for a road map for a political settlement in Syria.  While all the players have their own national agendas, it is clear that none of their agendas can succeed so long as ISIS remains a force.

The fallout will also impact the US race for president.  The real danger is that the hawks in the Republican party may beat war drums to strike out against ISIS with the same strategy and tactics that we know have failed in the past, massive troops invading and occupying the region. On the other hand, some in the GOP such as Jeb Bush advocate mostly doing more of what  the administration is already doing..

The worst reaction from the West would to condemn and create more fear of all Muslims.  ISIS fighters are motivated by an ideology that rationalizes the killing of innocents. It is a small sect of Islam and the most numbers of the victims of their barbarism have been Muslims. It is also in their ideology that this conflict is a religious war and it is a tool to recruit followers disaffected with their host country the more it appears that it is.   Anti-Islam sentiment is exactly what they hope happens. It is a way to self-fulfill their prophecy and it is a “make my day” approach.  Hawks should not fall into their trap on the battlefield or in politics. Unfortunately right wing media has already begun to gin up more anti-Islam sentiment in the US. Those who advocate only allowing Syrian Christian refugees to enter the US are feeding that perception.

What was especially disturbing about the Paris attacks was the failure of intelligence services. The line I heard in defense of the intelligence operatives was that they did not have the resources and manpower to shadow those they had already identified as radicalized and returnees from ISIS training camps, much less screen the refugees flooding into Europe. So why not fund that ability now, at least.

A version of this appeared in the Sky Hi DailyNews.com November 20,2015

For more, search Charlie Ebdo on this site, for reasons why France was singled out by ISIS

Issues matter

Issues matter

Listening to candidates for president still left standing, those who identify the aspirations of the disaffected owe that for their top tier position in the polls.  Whether that is Dr. Ben Carson or Donald Trump or Bernie Sanders, they inspire large groups of people who agree with their gripes about the economy, banking, jobs, US position in the world, and a corrupt political system. Identifying problems may be a political winner for now, but the devil is in how to fix those problems and candidates know coming clean with the how’s could be a loser.

Issues do matter. How can you evaluate whether the ideas are even plausible or the candidate has knowledge and judgement to make sound policy if we do not even know what their solutions are?  Let us heart a substantive debates on issues instead of gotcha games.  

Without a debate on the issues, simply identifying problems may be a political winner for now, but the devil is in how to fix those problems. Candidates know coming clean might turn off voting groups. That is why you see candidates relying on a remarkable personal history, an appealing personality, personal attacks, or simply ducking answers. Some propose vague concepts, or ask for friendly debate moderators to throw them softball questions. Their lure is a shiny burrito wrapper without the tortilla, beans, rice, and salsa.

Jeb Bush believes voters want more than raging against problems and he has embraced the “fix it” slogan, drawing on position papers and a record in government. His problem is making the fixes sound as sexy and acceptable as the anger mongers’ rages. Hillary Clinton more and more reveals her fixes, too.

 l confess I like to play fantasy debate moderator  so here are some  questions  I could  ask  that would force a debate on issues.  

I would aks those who advocate repealing Obamacare what they would do about the millions who can afford health insurance for the first time.  Let them go bankrupt or throw themselves onto the mercy of charity care again?  Many promise they would come up with a better plan, but do not offer one. Some propose sketchy ideas, but they fail to tell us how much their proposal would cost or how many their plan would cover. If the freedom from federal government control is their goal, and states can do it better, what makes them think states have the will or means to provide anything comparable to the coverage of Obamacare? Or will they rely on a no strings attached gift from the feds and no standards with which to comply?

Those who advocate a militaristic, interventionist foreign policy to bring the US to its greatness again need to tell us how we are to accomplish that without large numbers of boots on the ground or a repeat of failed strategies.  

Those who want to boot a sluggish economy, while opposing government  infrastructure  and education funding or want to change the tax structure, need to tell us how taking away such perks and stimulus would help the middle class.    From those who propose to make higher education free or to bring more income equality, I would ask them how we pay for it.

For more, visit www.mufticforumblog.blogspot.com

Observing Veterans Day with more prospects of wounded warriors

Observance of Veterans Day November 11 should serve as a reminder that there is a human cost to combat. On Memorial Day last May, we honored those who died. On Veterans Day we honor those who came home, including the wounded. There are those who advocate more robust military combat to stop our current threat, ISIS. Are we, the American public, ready to add another war to the list of those generating veterans and seeing  the heartbreaking  images again on TV  of wounded warriors returning home?

The US finds our forces again in Iraq, continuing in Afghanistan, and now making raids into Syria, albeit in a reduced numbers and very limited combat roles. Reality has begun to set in: more US dead and wounded can be expected.

That the American public is “war weary” is a given. Almost no politician on the left and right is advocating an Iraq style invasion and occupation. No wonder. Over six thousand US troops have returned in body bags and caskets since 2003. But the numbers who died are only a small part of the total casualties, thanks to modern battle field medicine saving lives that would in the past have been lost. Those wounded in Afghanistan and Iraq total over 18,000. Some estimate a million. What we have to show for it is war without end, the rise of ISIS and resurgence of the Taliban and post conflict governments that have failed to stop either.

A political firestorm erupted with the announcement that the Obama administration is sending fifty more special forces have been added to the estimated 3500 US troops in northern Iraq and the 10000 forces in Afghanistan.  Politicians are quick to opine whether there are too many or too few or they are jeering at broken promises and blaming premature withdrawal or parsing the definition of boots on the ground and combat, while providing no alternatives that have not failed in the past.

The only hope to limit mission creep is to bring an end to the conflicts that threaten our own security before there is no other Iraq style alternative left. Richard Haas, President of the Council on Foreign Relations on recent Morning Joe (November 2)and Fareed Zakaria’s CNN GPS (November 1)  advocates realistic goals regarding Syria and Iraq, understanding that we neither have allies within Syria we can train nor the will for extensive combat ourselves to defeat ISIS there or to overthrow Assad.  Instead, we need to buy time to get Sunni tribes and Kurds in northern Iraq strong enough to stop the advance of ISIS and to reach a realization among combatants that further violence is futile. At that point a political solution of dividing Syria into ethnic enclaves might work. His approach appears to be the administration strategy.

 The hope is that while every combatant group that has its own agenda, many of Syria’s neighbors also fear an ISIS/Al Qaeda dominated Sunni control of the region. We should be applauding the US diplomatic initiative to seek a political solution in Syria, including Secretary of State John Kerry’s negotiations that involve Iran, Russia, Saudi Arabia, and Kurds and the sending of more US special ops to help what effective allies we have.

For more, see prior  posts of 10/19/15, Why military intervention does not work;  6/14/15, Time to Dust Off Joe Biden’s plan?; 5/9/15, Musings on differences between Memorial Day and Veteran’s Day

A version of this was published in the www.skyhidailynews.com  November 5, 6 ,2015

Fareed Zakaria brings a different view  and makes the parallel between the Obama policy and US mission creep in Viet Nam.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-dangers-of-incrementalism/2015/11/05/22aad1de-83f9-11e5-9afb-0c971f713d0c_story.html

http://journalistsresource.org/studies/government/security-military/us-military-casualty-statistics-costs-war-iraq-afghanistan-post-911

http://www.forbes.com/sites/rebeccaruiz/2013/11/04/report-a-million-veterans-injured-in-iraq-afghanistan-wars/

The inquisition of Hillary Clinton results in unintended consequences for the GOP

The eleven hour long grilling of Hillary Clinton by Republican members of the House Benghazi select committee last week had some unintended consequences for the GOP.   Not only did their attack dog prosecutorial tone fail to rattle her, it gave her an opportunity to demonstrate in a very public way she had the self-control, stamina, and intelligence that a president would need.   The overt attempt by GOP committee members to trip her up with loaded questions, to get her to incriminate herself with her answers, also became additional proof of the partisan nature of the committee and did nothing to restore its credibility.    What did come out of her answer to a GOP committee member’s question is a fact that may in the long term diminish the importance of another issue dogging her, her emails on a private server.

The highly partisan dominated GOP committee began the hearings with a strike against their credibility by a whistle blowing ex staff member and statements by  two members of the House that the committee’s purpose was to hurt her candidacy.  As even committee  chair, Rep. Trey Goudy, admitted afterward, no new facts resulted.  Perhaps he meant no new facts emerged that could bring down her poll numbers.

Goudy had begun his opening case statement against her with trying to link the negatives of Benghazi to Clinton’s private emails.  He failed. What fact did emerge was to her advantage, that the decision making and communications of a Secretary of States’ office were made in staff briefings, one to one conversations, and mostly with old fashioned cables, not by emails.  This may explain why so little evidence of use of the private server has shown any impact on national security.  Only an unfinished investigation by the FBI to see there was “gross negligence” in handling classified and non-classified documents remains.          .

The GOP committee members substantiated the partisan purpose of the hearing with their attitudes and questions that were not fact seeking, but were questions prefaced and constructed to make a public case for their accusations.

 Adding to suspicions of GOP partisanship, the role of other major players had not gotten the same public exposure. Many questions and answers essential to protecting diplomats in the future are buried in written documentation, prior investigations, and hearing transcripts.

 Instead, GOP committee members were preoccupied with posing questions that explored conspiracy theories for the world to see, aimed at pinning blame on Clinton herself.

 Particularly glaring was the committee’s failure to give equal public grilling  of CIA and military  officials. Why were there intelligence failures and why was the military positioned too far away to come to the aid of a besieged ambassador?

There were other unasked pertinent questions deserving  a high profile public airing:  What happened in the State Department that fumbled the Ambassador’s request for more security?  Was underfunding truly an issue requiring prioritization?  Why was the ambassador’s visit not seen as deserving priority?   What measures has the State Department taken to reduce the possibility of a future attack against our diplomats? How and why did post-Gaddafi Libya’s democratically elected governance fail? What lessons learned can be applied to future situations when a dictator is deposed?

A version of this was published in the www.skyhidailynews.com October 29-30, 2015

For more, visit www.mufticforumblog.blogspot.com

Polls taken a few days after the Benghazi hearings confirm the hearings helped Clinton diminish the issue of her private server emails and gave her a bump in favorablility while reducing the favorability of the committee.
In short, the GOP strategy of grilling her backfired on them. http://thehill.com/policy/national-security/258940-after-benghazi-hearing-polling-up-for-clinton-emails