The Pentagon’s top intelligence official this week indicated that although Iran has been developing the means to build nuclear weapons, his agency has discerned no sign that Tehran has made a final decision to do so. Lt. General Ronald Burgess, the chief of the Defense Intelligence Agency, told the Voice of America in an interview that “We have not seen indication that the government has made the decision to move ahead with the program. But the fact still remains that we don’t know what we don’t know.” Given Iran’s long …
Former President Dwight D. Eisenhower once said: “Morale is the greatest single factor in successful wars.” So why did President Obama choose last night’s address to further disintegrate what morale is left in the fight in Iraq? Choosing the United States Military Academy in West Point, New York was on first blush a wise decision. These are the young men and women who will put their lives on the line, or may have already, to defend the President’s decisions. This is not the “enemy camp” as MSNBC’s Chris Matthews described …
1. If the President sends 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan, does that count as a “surge?” Simply put, no, because the use of that term implies an Iraq-like strategy of ramping up forces to the maximum of what the generals are requesting. It has been widely reported that General McChrystal’s assessment for additional troops to achieve maximum chance of success was between 60,000 and 80,000 troops. While the President’s decision is better than no new troops at all, it falls short of that assessment. Additionally, the White House plans to …
The end of on-the-air broadcasts of Voice of America couldn’t come at worse time: Russia is providing an utterly skewed and one-sided picture of the war in Georgia domestically, while the Internet has only 15% to 18% penetration, limited primarily to medium and large cities. Russia’s online audience is mostly young(er), urban and educated, which leaves many people in the aging country clueless as to what’s really going on. There are plenty of pro-government sites in the RU.net universe, many TV channels with plenty of Russian “patriotic” fare and entertainment, …
An editorial from major Pakistani English daily The Dawn demonstrates that the era of “peace deals” in Pakistan’s tribal belt and other parts of the North West Frontier Province (NWFP) may be drawing to a close. Strong and decisive action is needed without delay for the situation is spiralling out of control. Baitullah Mehsud captured and then withdrew from Jandola at will, setting houses ablaze and killing pro-government tribal leaders by the dozen. After fresh clashes in Swat that left at least 10 dead on Tuesday, the peace deal struck …
Guns, boots, helmets and…social science? It’s not been used much since the Cold War, but the Department of Defense believes an increase in cultural understanding could play an important role in national security. Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced Minerva as a new approach. Minerva will award $50 million over five years to evolutionary psychologists, demographers, sociologists, historians and anthropologists for security research. Despite significant skepticism within the academic community, namely by a group that calls itself the Network of Concerned Anthropologists, Gates says this is an important first step towards repairing …
The United States is winning the Long War against al-Qaeda. Despite hair on fire headlines, heated presidential political rhetoric, and conventional wisdom that so often points to the contrary, a simple look at the evidence shows that the war against terrorism is actually going better than the chicken-littles would have us all believe. Between 1998 and 2001, a three year period, the US suffered three major terrorist attacks. One against the embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, one against the USS Cole warship, and the 9/11 attacks against the World Trade …
Here’s a preview of what’s happening this week in Washington. [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6YshohNEUM[/youtube] May was a successful month in Iraq, yet progress with the war supplemental has been slowed by the left. House leaders want to tie war funding to domestic spending, including unemployment insurance and pet pork projects. Time is running out for our troops without defeatist language and domestic pork. Heritage’s Brian Riedl says Congress has disregarded its promise to restore fiscal responsibility in Washington. The House is about to follow the Senate in passing a budget resolution conference report …
With congressional Democrats trying to resolve differences on the war supplemental, the Blue Dog Coalition has yet to crack on its demand that any new entitlement spending be offset under pay-as-you-go (PAYGO) rules. Today the Concord Coalition weighed in with a letter from executive director Robert L. Bixby urging the Blue Dogs to set a positive example for fiscal responsibility. “To be blunt, paygo is under assault,” Bixby wrote. “Congress has waived paygo for economic stimulus legislation and a one-year Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) ‘patch.’ These waivers alone have added …
News from Iraq today reminds us that al Qaeda is still capable of inflicting misery on the Iraqi people. But, when pressed, even the Democrat presidential candidates admit the security situation in Iraq has markedly improved. As Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno pointed out earlier this month, while the surge is succeeding it has not yet achieved ultimate success: “For the government of Iraq, the surge has provided a window of opportunity. This window will not remain open forever.” How long that window stays open is up to the American people. …
