Wired recently published this article entitled ” How Special Ops Copied al-Qaida to Kill it”. It outlines the work of General Stanley McChrystal and his efforts to defeat a Al Quaida, based on the realization that, “to defeat a networked enemy we had to become a network ourselves.” The general set up a highly efficient […]
As C.S. Lewis states in The Abolition of Man, once you step outside of the Tao, by which he means the world of objective value, you and your civilization fall ultimately down a slippery slope into the abyss of value indeterminacy and the rule of a Nietzschean will to power. According to Lewis, “A dogmatic […]
No need to be naive: we all know that in quasi-military operations against drug lords, their not-necessarily-so-innocent significant others and their completely innocent children are bound to get killed sometimes. The same goes for operations against terrorists operating, say, out of Pakistan’s Northwest Territories: However precise the weaponry, it’s hard to kill a significant leader […]
Whether due to the hunt for Gaddafi, or in anticipation of Obama’s new plan to create jobs, Afghanistan has taken a backseat to other news developments vying for Americans’ attention. The Washington Post’s David Ignatius has an intriguing article, consequently, that some may have missed. Ignatius discusses a classified CIA analytical piece on the state of […]
In yet more news of the reach of the “non-existent” A.Q. Khan network, the IAEA has confirmed in a recent report that North Korea used the black market network to acquire “material needed to establish a uranium enrichment facility at its Yongbyon nuclear complex.” In preparation for the upcoming meetings of the IAEA Board of […]
The Voice of Russia published this piece today on U.S. perceptions of Muslims. The article cites a recent study conducted by the Brooking Institution and The Public Religion Research Institute, which states that 30% of Americans believe that Muslims in the United States would like to establish Sharia law. The article clumsily states that: According […]
Keeping up with policy and international developments can be exhausting. Do certain tools make it easier or better for you? Do you believe that Twitter, for example, exposes you to different opinions and news that you wouldn’t normally read? Without a doubt, Twitter and other social media outlets have provided intangible assistance to the wave […]
Is Turkey’s grandstanding vis-a-vis the Palestine issue hypocritical in light of its own continually deleterious approach to another stateless group – the Kurds? What conditions support the notion that there should or should not be a dichotomy between Turkey’s approach to the two groups – Kurds and Palestinians? With this, how does the apparent contrast […]
Ok. Now we’re into it. Administration top dogs have thrown ATF Director Ken Melson and US Attorney for Arizona Dennis Burke under the truck.In firefighting, they call it a ‘controlled burn,’ torching a perimeter of just enough man-made flame to meet and beat the advance of a wildfire impervious to less-drastic solutions.
Good luck, gentlemen.
The House Oversight Committee’s investigation into the DOJ/ATF gun-running operation known as Fast and Furious is roaring through the halls of Congress, and despite DOJ’s efforts to spin the story every which way but up, Representative Darrell Issa (R-Calif) and Senator Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) are on a trail insiders whisper may lead investigators all the way to the top.
News broke recently from various outlets that Israel has been providing training and non-lethal supplies for Jewish settlers in Palestine to defend themselves from an expected onslaught of unrest during the days surrounding Palestine’s bid to seek official recognition from the UN in September. Palestine’s attempt at recognition, while doomed at the outset because of […]
With revolts against the al-Assad government raging on, the U.S. and Israeli governments are focused on what might happen to Syria’s suspected cache of mustard gas, VX, Sarin, and long-range missiles. The Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday that both countries are keeping a close eye on the status of the nasty stuff for fear […]
On the occasion of yesterday’s “International Day Against Nuclear Tests”, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon reiterated the need for the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) to enter into force. The UN established an International Day against Nuclear Tests in 2009 on the 20th anniversary of the closure of the Semipalatinsk nuclear test site in Kazakhstan. […]
When eminent scholar Walter Russell Mead tackles a subject he does not do it on the cheap. One of his latest long articles attempts to discern the current trajectory of Turkey’s foreign policy and he takes his readers through quite a ride. Mead, an American history, smoothly goes through modern Turkish history and then ties […]
Finding an address to the conflict involving Israel and Palestine, to ensure lasting peace in the Near East, has been nearly impossible. A continual lack of support for Israel, though, has driven us to ask for some sort of punitive measures to ensure that Palestine does not further endanger peace in the region. The Arabs’ lack […]
The ever-unhelpful Senator Inhofe has been repeating his silly mantra that Iran will be in a position to deliver weapons of mass destruction against the United States by 2015. My friend Greg Thielman takes him to task in a recent blog, pointing out that the emphasis of Iranian missile development has been on medium-range rockets […]