For State Actors, Financial Sanctions Bite

Perhaps it is nothing new. It has long been realized that "finance" is a potent weapon, when "financial power" is consolidated politically.

One of the architects of the US Treasury's efforts to use 'financial sanctions' as policy instruments pens a positive post-mortem:

The results have been promising. Many non-US financial institutions and companies reduced or terminated commercial ties with Iran and early last year the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development raised its risk-rating for Iran. Months later the Iranian oil minister had to acknowledge that Iran was having trouble financing oil projects.

Of these financial measures, the action against the Banco Delta Asia had the most dramatic impact. Macau's subsequent freezing of nearly €19 million in BDA accounts clearly rattled the North Koreans. It became a major sticking point in the six-party talks, with North Korea refusing to return to the table until the money was returned.

The Struggle for the Future of Islam: One Tribe, One Bullet at a Time

I had just been writing about the Pandora's box that threatens to rewrite the long-term struggle inside Islam to one based predominantly on Sunni vs. Shi'a politics (also just writing about COP Falcon in Ramadi).

While we ogle potential changes in the conceptual landscape, we know also know that the daily epiphanies in almost any struggle come down to individuals who will write History with the success or failure of their moral conviction in action.

Accordingly, I point out this post from the guys at the Fourth Rail (where else?), who have this to observe:

The U.S. now estimated 12 of the 21 tribes in Ramadi actively support the government, 6 are neutral and three have sided with al-Qaeda.

Al-Qaeda has fired back with a vicious campaign of suicide attacks, murders and kidnappings of tribal leaders in an attempt to intimidate the Anbar tribes. Last year, a captured document showed al-Qaeda's 'hit list' of Sunni politicians, tribal leaders, clerics and Baathists in Anbar.

If you read the rest of the post, you get a long list of complaints of what al-qaeda hath wrought in al-Anbar.

Coupled with the Mecca Declaration, perhaps some of the animus of 'fighting occupation' might abate. The question is will it be enough or will enough people continue to struggle without their ideological 'cover story', as it were.

It is also a question of timing, perhaps. The Shi'a led unity government might come up with yet another display of unbelievable incompetence, which would provide another "rationale" and provocation to supplant the old one(s)...

The Spanish Connection

Hit and Run:

A top Pakistani intelligence official told ABC News that following a "crunch" by British counterterrorism authorities on Pakistani militant networks in the U.K. after the July 2005 bombings, "dozens of local leaders for groups, such as Jaish e Muhammad ('Army of Muhammad' in Arabic) and Lashkar e Tayyba ('Army of the Pure' in Urdu) moved to Spain," settling in the area around Barcelona.

They have since established a very strong "rear base" in Barcelona to support terrorist activity in Britain, setting up logistics and recruitment networks in the local Pakistani community, the source said

Deconstructing "Jihad"

Andrew Sullivan recently featured a Channel 4 documentary on the eye-popping focus and content of some of the teachings in a mosque in Britain.

LISTEN AND LEARN

I've been slowly working my way through each of the installments and the rebuttal, listening carefully, taking notes.

I find these little glimpses quite a treasure trove. There is much of analytical value. For instance, one can remark the so-called seal of completeness, viz. no one else has the Truth (just lies) and only here can one find the Truth. While that is a common seal in a religious-teaching context, a more moderate approach would not suggest that ALL else is lies, but some others might just have pieces of the truth and it is only through reason and study of al-Islam can one find the whole Truth.

WE ARE ALL ISLAMIC NOW

So, this brings up the question of whether pundits are willing to spend the time to actively engage Islamic thinkers on the topics raised here. Do we all have to become mujtahids, in order to have a dialogue with our moderate Muslim counterparts, with whom we would make common cause against a radical belief system that so many see as ultimately threatening to civil order and peace itself.

TO DO IS TO BE (OR NOT TO BE)?

Moreover, in discussing "jihadi" and radical concepts, does one unwittingly do the work of spreading the jihadi viewpoint/propaganda -- the catch-22 of talking about what one would really like to bury?

Myself, I think, at some point, such messages ought not to be let to fester unattended, unanswered. Their frame of reference tends to seep into the common "understanding" with deleterious effects on how folks come to understand and judge issues.

THE NATIONAL STAGE OR LOCAL THEATER

There might be a question of *who* should address them. National leaders run the risk of legitimizing and publicizing their opponents with a direct "debate". Still, I think one could craft a governmental effort. Nonetheless, much could be accomplished among a few, dedicated intelligentsia and the political punditry machine.

Here is one person who is deconstructing Osama's message, in detail, including concepts like "the myth of grievance", etc.

THE GOALS OF ENGAGEMENT

Everyone has to be concerned about the "Clash of Civilizations", perhaps even more so since the Bush Administrations bungling of the effort in Iraq may have precluded the very, very important "first steps" and started a cycle of blame and recrimination all its own.

Nevertheless, I think a deconstruction of narratives goes a very long way to framing the discussion, the "ideological challenge", in ways simple enough for people without comprehensive learning to say to themselves, "See, I agree with that, and that other stuff is not what I value", or "This is what I think you ought to be teaching, instead." It's a lot more detailed and meaningful than "they hate Freedom and we don't".

Last, I would just observe that it would be facetious, IMO, to engage in such an exercise just as a matter of propaganda. One has to truly listen back, to see what might be learned and to be open to changes oneself.

Hizb'allah's Nasrallah brings strife, death to Lebanon

The leader of Lebanon's Hizb'allah (HA, or Party of God) has brought nothing to Lebanon in the past six months but strife, disorder, and death.

One must ask, how do they get away with it and still maintain the popular support needed to run a significant militia and a network of missiles that defend no one and endanger every Lebanese?

This picture, I thought, says it all about how Nasrallah's organization follows in the steps of the Prophet (pbuh) - is this what Mecca or Medina looked like at the time of the Prophet, I wonder:

A supporter of Hezbollah takes cover behind roadblocks in Beirut
©AFP - Izzat Atta

SOTU on Threat from Terrorism

President Bush's SOTU address pointed the way toward continued un-resolved tension in the U.S. public diplomacy on terrorism.

One unresolved tension is how to deliver a message of ongoing, grave threat, while suggesting that current actions - whatever they amount to - are mitigating that threat.

Replacing the "war on terror" rhetoric with "decisive ideological struggle" doesn't quite seem to convey a full message, especially when the response to that has been military action, legal realignment (in eye-popping ways), and various homeland security initiatives, still in whatever state of implementation, which themselves are non-ideological per se (as I understand it, first responders do not have coordinated frequencies for communications in many locations still).

Notwithstanding, "Freedom" seems to be what the Administration suggests will be the decisive ideological weapon, but is that enough of an engagement, at this time? That's a very hard question to answer; but even if it is presently sufficiently sparse, one hardly has the sense that the US Government has a plan, let alone a phased plan, for how to combat the rhetoric of radical Islam that vies for legitimacy, in various ways at various stages of its own political development. What about other tie-in issues, like anti-americanism, education, and informational assymetries (imposed or natural)?

"Bring the fight to the terrorists" is somehow component, in an undescribed way. Does that mean Gitmo? Aren't people simply divided on how best to accomplish that goal, mostly? What's more, how does such a physical "fight" fit alongside defeating an ideology?

Altogether, SOTU suggests that, from the top down, the Bush Administration still needs to formulate a coherent message and strategy for counterterrorism, one that covers all the complexities of public diplomacy, military action, and law enforcement.

To date, they've done a lot to finally focus and get the message out on the objectives (remaining) for Op Iraqi Freedom. They need to do the same thing for the terrorist threat. Getting a clean conceptual landscape on the issue is a necessary first step, as complex as it is.

Only in that way can one get a sense for whether this criticism is misguided or on-the-mark:

For example, his description of the global counter-terrorist campaign waged audaciously—and so far rather successfully—by the United States government seems to be directed more at Ayman al Zawahiri, who gave his own “State of the Jihad” two days ago, than to millions of U.S. citizens under threat. By painting the campaign as a “decisive ideological struggle” against an “evil”, which, in case we were wondering, “is still at work”, President Bush promotes Al-Qaeda into a status (existential threat) and a role (defining the identity of U.S. foreign policy) which Osama bin Laden ought to appreciate, at a time when his share in the global militancy market has dramatically declined in favor of Hezbollah’s Hassan Nasrallah and Hamas’ Khaled Meshaal. - Alexis Debat, National Interest article

Vicious Intimidation and Elimination of Journalists

The absolutely brutal campaign to de-capitate the eyes and ears of the world, to intimidate professionals into carrying messages sympathetic to 'jihad' or 'insurgency', and to disable intellectual challenge continues.

The journalist dimension of the violence puts in high relief just how much the battle is not military in nature, if anyone needs more evidence.

Meanwhile, how much do the MNF and the Iraqi government rely on the press to 'get the word out'? It's hard to build a communications network that competes with the Mosques ...

item:

MOSUL: Gunmen killed an Iraqi journalist outside his home in the northern city of Mosul, a local police officer said Saturday. Khudhir Yunis, a freelance journalist working for a number of Baghdad-based newspapers, was shot dead overnight in Mosul's southern Sumar neighbourhood, police Major Mohammed Ahmed said. Iraq was in 2006 described as the most dangerous place in the world for journalists, where more than 130 journalists and media workers have been killed since the US-led invasion in March 2003.

Yunis, a member of the Iraqi Journalist Association in Mosul, was the fifth journalist to be killed in the country's third largest city in two months.

The bloodiest attack on Iraq's media in recent months came when gunmen burst into the Baghdad offices of new television network Al-Shaabiya on October 12 [?2006] and killed at least nine staffers, including reporters and the general manager.

More detail from Committe to Protect Journalists.

Is calling them killers enough?

Here is a snippet from Counterterrorism blog (see links on RHS), which has some elements of interest (I've taken-out what I found to be overstatement):

The overwhelmingly negative assessment of the U.S. counter-terrorism strategy laid out by John Negroponte ... was notable for its candor and the end to the happy talk that has often made its way into assessments on the struggle against the jihadist threat. What is amazing is that, five years and billions of dollars after 9-11, we are falling behind in the conflict. We are not even really competing in the field of ideas, and we have done little to mitigate the broader problems.

Part of the problem is that there is still no general consensus on who the enemy is and if a war exists. Until we decide that, little else of import can happen.
link

From this assessment, one gleans that the effort to "raise the costs" on al-qa'ida and to get them on-the-run has had mixed results. The DNI suggests that they continue to plan and to be organized.

The lack of a consensus suggests that leadership has failed to come up with a strategy to confront radical Islam, either in general or one that has produced a consensus approach. This may be suggestive of a failure of imagination (poor conceptualization of the key problems and their solutions), a weak implementation, a genuine lack of consensus/understanding, or the difficulty (complexity) of that task.

The Fallacy of "Emboldening Terrorists"

We want the people of Iraq to live in a free society. It's in our interests. In my judgment, if we were to leave before the job is done, it would only embolden terrorists, it would only embolden the extremists. It would dash the hopes of millions of people who want to live in a free society, just like the 12 million people who voted in the Iraqi election. They want to live in a free society. And we support this government, because the government understands it was elected by the people. And Prime Minister Maliki is working hard to overcome the many obstacles in the way to a peaceful Iraq, and we want to help him. - President Bush, al-Malki visit, 2006 11 30

I would like to argue that this judgement about emboldening the terrorists is partly misdirected, as much as those who wanted so passionately to "send the terrorists a message" after 9/11.

We may not be able to "win" every battle with terrorists. It may be arrogance to suggest that we can. Terrorist methods are powerful.

THE PSYCHOLOGY OF WARFARE

Managing psychology of warfare is important, even key sometimes. However, one has to be careful in elevating it to a strategic goal, rather than a tactic. For sure, to fight the perverse messages of 'global jihad', it is important to at least stand up for those values indicted and greatly jeopardized by the false 'religious' callings of militant jihad.

But, to shape strategic choices because of how they might impact the psychology of terrorists is either to plainly put tactics ahead of strategy (usually a poor choice, a confusion) or to get the wrong balance among strategic imperatives.

SOME PRESSURE CAN ALSO BE STAGED, TIMED OR SCALED, NOT JUST CONTINUOUS, MONOTONE

We might do better to think in terms of putting degrees of pressure on jihadi groups, from any number of angles, and in terms of choices or tactics that allow for our freedom of action, action that is not drawn into a straightjacket because of perceived psychological impacts.

Besides, what could be better than duping an enemy into a false sense of security, than "emboldening" them?

What is important is that, whatever gains they might try to consolidate from a cessation or tactics retreat, stand in continuous jeopardy of being pushed over or pushed back. We ought not to think of 'losing face' over the kinds of smart, tactical shifts that would make a time-phased strategy in certain circumstances smart.

MORE ON THE EFFORT TO CONFRONT RADICAL, MILITANT 'JIHAD'

There is a question about whether to continuously engage in the political debate that militant jihad puts forward, as well as any number of other messages or to attack annointed leaders, lest one confer a kind of legitimacy and free press to their aims.

Ideas are still forming on precisely what the appropriate countermeasures are at each stage of militant jihad, as it is envisioned by its own theorists.

One way is to apply "medicine" (choice countermeasures) in various doses and then to measure how they are working. This is how governments in the Arab world effectively work now, quite arguably - they make statements and wait to see how 'the Street" responds. ('The Street' is nothing more than the long-term educational challenge, the literacy problem/dimension, in some respects.)

WRONG TO WITHDRAW, RIGHT TO REPOSITION

Accordingly, I think that abject calls for withdrawal ought to be met with derision, except as part of a broder plan to reposition the pressure campaign.

It might be possible to fashion a long-term strategy to confront radical Islam by denying it its next steps, by picking an choosing which issues on which to engage insofar as they have direct impact on achieving the next goals of the jihad (I'm thinking of the three phases mentioned below, iman, hijrah, and then jihad).

If one worries that the removal of military pressure in one situation might lead to greater recruitment, one has to re-position against recruitment, suggesting that the 'withdrawal' is a way to trap new recruits, who will be confronted/captured shortly.

In sum, there ought to be a continuous engagement, in my view, a pressure campaign, and it can include periods of repositioning in which certain confrontations are conceded as no longer productive and for which we do not have to worry about 'emboldening' some enemy today, if that is just a set-up for them to be neutralized or marginalized tomorrow.

A Page from Counterterrorism History

The missing metrics. The need to retool the DoD for a long conflict, in terms of incentives, training, and more. New governmental/organizational approaches to deal with the long-term nature and comprehensive character of the problem:

Have we fashioned the right mix of rewards, amnesty, protection and confidence in the US?

Does DoD need to think through new ways to organize, train, equip and focus to deal with the global war on terror?

Are the changes we have and are making too modest and incremental? My impression is that we have not yet made truly bold moves, although we have have made many sensible, logical moves in the right direction, but are they enough?

Today, we lack metrics to know if we are winning or losing the global war on terror. Are we capturing, killing or deterring and dissuading more terrorists every day than the madrassas and the radical clerics are recruiting, training and deploying against us?

Does the US need to fashion a broad, integrated plan to stop the next generation of terrorists? The US is putting relatively little effort into a long-range plan, but we are putting a great deal of effort into trying to stop terrorists. The cost-benefit ratio is against us! Our cost is billions against the terrorists' costs of millions.

Do we need a new organization?

That was Donald Rumsfeld, in October of ... 2003.

The need for bold initiatives and long-term planning was on the CIC's desk back in 2003, not shifts in tactics under the rubric of stay-the-course.

The Grim Visage of the Infernal Invitation of Terrorism ...

From TNR (hat tip, AS), a picture of how clear-hold-build is a strategy that has not been executed too often in favor of shuttling around troops in a whack-a-mole approach.

As one officer remarked to Congress, how can you leave [pull out or drawdown] and then expect the populace to welcome you back when or if you return? It's a relentless effort to get it right consistently, a constant pressure campaign that requires forward motion, a steady struggle to maintain whatever trust and predictability has been built.

But either way, a persistent and tragic theme of our operations in Iraq has been the one-step-forward-two-steps-back sliding of towns and regions in and out of security: Through immense effort American forces will calm a city, then troops there will be drawn down and all their work will be lost; and on, and on, and on. Lawrence has written several persuasive stories for us on Tall Afar, the insurgent Northern Iraq outpost tamed by innovative and amazingly intense military efforts to connect with its population; he also lamented what may happen when these particular now-expert troops are blindly rotated out of the town as was scheduled

What is more alarming is this conclusion, that al-qa'ida is able to consolidate politically gains from the chaos they impose:

By Dafna Linzer and Thomas E. Ricks
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, November 28, 2006; Page A01

The U.S. military is no longer able to defeat a bloody insurgency in western Iraq or counter al-Qaeda's rising popularity there, according to newly disclosed details from a classified Marine Corps intelligence report that set off debate in recent months about the military's mission in Anbar province.

This conclusion is debated in the story by an intelligence official. The TNR picture is also a mosaic truth.

Together, these imply that the uncertainty is still very high.

However, one does start to get the sense that al-qa'ida, alongside the insurgency, have gotten quite good at refining tactics: Random violence and post-verbal evil to tear at the fabric of society (al qa'ida) and fear, greed, and intimidation to consolidate political power (the insurgency).

It was also a good week for Counterinsurgency

THE BATTLESHIP IS TURNING

Counterinsurgency was the coin of the realm at the Cato Institute, in a panel discussion of where the military is on The U.S. Military and Counterinsurgency: What We Have Learned in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The current state of the aggregate knowledge about counterinsurgency matters more in prospect than does the retrospect, and focusing only on retrospect would likely require re-titling the panel, "What we wished we might have inculcated sooner" and, to some extent, "How the costs were mis-estimated by this generations' best and brightest" (somewhere in the room was the ghost of Robert McNamara, it seems).

Now that the Army is closer to sure footing, there is a chance that they can be more rigorous about self-evaluation. One potential issue, not explored, is the impact that thin troop levels may have had on willingness to be self-critical, in certain ways.

The hard question about whether anything much now is too little too late is probably too hard to answer, from afar. The ultimate question about whether the Iraqi populace's increasing anxiety - fears are rising as fast as hopes, it seems to me - hangs in the balance, with new Iraqi governments willingness to cooperate sufficiently on all aspects of counterinsurgency dangling in a way that could tip the scales.

AMERICA'S TOTAL READINESS ON TRIAL

In a crafty piece of writing, The American Way of War: Cultural Barriers to Successful Counterinsurgency, Jeffrey Record of the Air War College (Alabama) fleshes out a nuanced version of why wars of attrition are not hard in general for liberal democracies, but hard in particular for America. Among the points:

"The American way of war is, as British strategist Colin S. Gray observes

• apolitical - not focused on warfare or counterinsurgency as an extension of policy (or ideology).
• impatient
• ahistorical - unwilling to take serious or learn the lessons of the past (unlike Fawaz Gerges who puts a brilliant tenor on unable to understand how history is important and culturally important to non-Americans)
• culturally ignorant
• technology-infatuated - mostly in regard to arms
• firepower-focused - a version of "cowboys with guns", rather than diplomats with a range of tools
• profoundly conventional - the bureaucracy (and its personnel policies)
• sensitive to casualties - (debated during the Q&A)"

THE END OF THE WEINBERGER-POWELL DOCTRINE

The question is roundaboutly raised about what we can conclude so far about "military transformation", based on new data.

In the old world, if one "really read the Weinberger-Powell doctrine, you wouldn't never use force unless our shores were being attacked."

Of course, the newer formulation is that the status-quo is more risky than action. But there is a twist to that: The strategic choice to try to get by with as small an army and effort as you possibly can. It seems to me that any strong empirical conclusions about pre-emptive war, or wars against the status quo, are not possible without reference to that Bush-43 choice.

That choice, in turn, brings up the issue of cost, as Preble points out, or, more precisely cost-benefit. How it came to pass that President Bush (and the U.S. Congress and the US Press) put so little thought into how it might go wrong and end up with costs perhaps outreaching benefits is the key institutional failure, in my humble opinion. When there is little or no margin for error, when it is clear that there is going to be a race for control on the ground by forces seeking their own political autonomy (legitimately or illegitimately), the Rumsfeldian "known-unknowns" have to take a much higher priority than they were given.

MISSION OBJECTIVES UNCLEAR?

Last, mission objectives, like 'set the conditions for democracy to emerge', come into debate as the incompletely specified set that I suspect that they were intended to be all along.

Ricks questions how much specific actions are more "revolutionary" (deep change from the status quo) in character than "stability operations" (which require a reference to 'something politically stable' to be meaningful, i.e. a "thing" that may not exist or, if it does, may be inimical to institutionalization).

And the jury is still out whether throwing a nation into a quasi-Hobsian state-of-nature and then expecting the military to pull a liberal democratic rabbit out of the hat using counterinsurgency methods and largely military staffing can be done.

Given that, is a scaled back objective of a democratic Iraq that is self-sustaining and an ally in the war on terror more reasonable (or a comedown from hubris?)? Perhaps. The only question is, over the mid-term, who is going to guarantee the sanctity of the ballot box? A standing US army in Iraq?

It was a good week for Counterterrorism as a topic

MORE CONTENT, LESS 'GREAT MAN' OF POLITICS / 'GREAT DEFENDER'

The International Center for Terrorism Studies at the Potomac Institute for Policy Studies held a conference that was available via C-span (unfortunately it is not available for replay..arg!).

US Politicians are behind - far behind. This likely has to do with the wrong conceptual footing that was the gambit of the haplessly phrased "War on Terror" that has infected domestic politics since. As with any journey, if your first steps are in the wrong direction, it takes double the time and effort to re-do them.

Whatever the case, one can hardly imagine a US Senator today giving the kind of far-reaching and perspicacious speech given by The Honorable Gustavo Manuel de Aristegui y San Roman (Member of the Spanish Parliament and Spokesman in the Foreign Affairs Parliamentary Commission for the Popular Party). I haven't been able to find a transcript, but all we'd need is a few good Senators with this breadth of comprehension to get back on track.

Such speeches and comprehension start to pave the way for a transition from 'brain storming' about counterterrorism to crystallizing some worthwhile public diplomacy (I mean, almost anything to replace the "We're gonna win the war" rhetoric might be an improvement).

HOW TO GET THE GROOVE BACK

Brookings offered up a redux of the Politics of National Security. Those who are interested in an in-depth look at how politics-as-usual or politics of the unusual are denying the public interest, the common good, and arguably national security itself can peruse a transcript.

Getting smart about tribunals: separating power grab from counterterrorism-inspired judicial processes

I am not a legal scholar and it is often hard for me to be able to follow the discussions about what is happening to the Republic. Maybe others feel the same.

I have these questions, though, that I list just to see if anyone else has the same or can say whether these are off-base. As I find resources or formulate answers, I will add them to the thread.

1. What is the role of Military Justice?
   
   This question came to my mind in the context of Executive authority. Senator L. Graham, on the Senate floor, said that he believes that, in times of war, the Executive ought to have deference in determining who is an enemy combatant, rather than a judge. This history of this principle, as I understood it, is so that the military can shape the battlefield to its advantage.
   
   My question, however, is what is “the battlefield” in international terrorism, except the streets and houses of non-US citizens? Do we really want the military ‘shaping’ this part of our international relations, in general?
   
   We fought international terrorism for a long while before 9-11 (and it seems other nations, like Britain have too). What has changed since then? We have mobilized the Army (for Afghanistan). Well, is that just a circumstance or do we really need new legal principles for that, a mobilization which we do not expect to be frequently recurring?
   
   Last, why is the military the right choice? I can appreciate the difficulties of offering criminal trials, but what is the argument against having a civilian tribunal set-up, rather than a military one?
   
   Lindsey Graham was asking, “Do you believe 9-11 was an act of war or a crime?” (asked of Justice Alito, too).I think most sensitive, non-lawyer folks believe that terrorists acts are “acts of war (or moral depravity) that we intuitively feel should be calmly and steadfastly prosecuted as crimes.” Can the legal system be made to accommodate that tension?
   
   
2. What is a successful trial for international terrorists?
   
   This question came up in watching Mary Jo White, et. al. on C-span yesterday.
   
   How can we possibly NOT think of a trial as an extension of our counterterrorism efforts? Clearly, al-qa’ida types believe that their trial is just the ‘judicial phase’ of their jihad, their public platform even to show the political part of their political-violence.
   
   It seems to me that ‘success’ goes beyond proving ‘guilt’ in a conspiracy, for example. We might define the public interest in paying for a trial, for Justice, to publicly re-enforce a broad-reaching counter-terror strategy, viz. that political violence is the wrong choice for social change, that individual pain or suffering does not justify all things to oneself, that terrorist acts are not moral championship but moral abdication, etc.
   
   
3. Should we look to specific cases to make good judgments about how to handle them or do we need a complete “framework”?
   
   How much are decisions about what to do being and proposed solutions driven by the number of new cases, how much by the similarity of cases, and how much by the uniqueness of cases?
   
   Are we making choices about how to structure due process because we do not have “good cases” or have “poor cases” against certain people who we just do not want to let go (let go at any price)?
   
   Are we ready, as a public, to actually let someone go, because a confession was the result of CIA …er .. “righteousness”, rather than regress the evidentiary rules so much that even hearsay is ‘sufficient’ or worse?
   
   
4. How much do we need harmonize international approaches to prosecuting terrorists?
   
   How much can the World’s Security Net be set-up so that there are some minimum standards of evidence and perception that serving Justice to terrorists is not something that is so wholly dependent on jurisdiction?Rather than take differences as something that ‘must be dealt with at trial’, how much do we need to deal with it at the diplomatic and ex ante security arrangement level?
   
   Should we view our legal system as spoke in the wheel of the legal systems of many cooperating Nations?
   
   What is a good relationship between counterterrorism/enforcement and judicial prosecution? Are we interested in intelligence value, primarily, that is, in being integrated into an capture/interrogation process? Can home countries try terrorists? Does the dependence on proprietary intelligence sources make that an impossibility?
   
   
5. How much and how should ‘fault tolerance’ be included in the design of legal choices?
   
   Are there unique implications for counterterrorism of Type-I and Type-II judicial errors and prosecution ‘failure’? Are these unique implications such ('stakes so high') that they change the character of the Justice we seek?
   
   Can we or should we tolerate certain types of errors more than others?
   
   If so, what are the costs attached to each? Who gets to choose how to balance that equation, to make that choice – the courts or the legislatures or the executive?

Straight talk on "Strategy" Generates Administration Accountability

"Accountability" is in the air in Washington, at least in prospect.

A TEMPLATE FOR ACCOUNTABILITY AND CITIZEN-LED EVALUATION

One way forward is to start insisting in clear thinking. Not just smart-talk about counterterrorism, but also demand that the Administration (especially Scty Rumsfeld and the DoD Press Corps) clearly separate goals from strategy, and that they be fully accountable for the strategy -- for clearly articulating it, responsibly communicating it, and for sharing evaluations of it.

Some tactical choices may prove insufficient to an adopted strategy. This doesn't negate the strategy, per se. However, if there are no or few tactics that can be or have been used to execute the strategy, then the strategy may not be executable or adoptable. Something else is needed.

STRATEGIC EVALUATION

If the results of a strategy turn out to be insufficiently complete or show themselves too costly (measured in time or treasure or both), and if there are indications that other factors that make the effectiveness of a strategy remote or increasingly remote, then the achiveability of the stated goals starts to come into question.

SAMPLES

These are examples of goals (and they can be disputed):

• Neutralize the insurgency (Woodward quotes Rumsfeld)
• An Iraq that can defend and sustain itself and be an ally in the "War on terror" (not my phrase). (Bush in Stephanopolous interview)

These are slogans, mostly useless (boo! ug!):

• Stay the course
• Cut and Run
• Until the job is finished
• Peace with Dignity
• The Only Exit Strategy is Victory

Here is one counter-insurgency strategy: CLEAR-HOLD-BUILD ( clear /limit each area of those with hostile intent and capability; hold ground against backsliding; and build out political, security, and infrastructure until overall objective is achieved).

Within the strategy there could be various tactics:

• Perimiter operations, US only troops
• Police training, Army involvement (US, Iraqi, other national)
• Psy-ops
• Political negotiations/bargaining - even payoffs for information and cooperation
• Support from Scorpion Brigades