Sunday, May 21, 2006

Intermission

A reader links to long but worthwhile interview by Matthew d' Ancona with Philip Bobbitt, author of The Shield of Achilles . Some excerpts. The highlights are mine.

Matthew d’Ancona: Now let’s look at one of the many intellectual provocations in your introduction, principal amongst which was your pointed decision to talk about the wars on terror in the plural. Now what’s interesting about that is that in America with the neo-conservative movement and in this country with the Prime Minister’s advocacy of the war (singular) on terror, there’s an attempt to do precisely the opposite, which is to argue that there is in fact a historic and lethal convergence going on, which must be impeded, between three things: the proliferations of weapons of mass destruction, the continued existence and ambitions of rogue states, and fundamentalist Islam. And the strategy, such as it is in the West, hugely controversial as it is, is to try and do something about those three factors. Now I take it from your use of the plural “wars” on terrors that you do not accept that analysis, and also that further you are trying to disaggregate the war on terror as it is perceived in popular parlance.

Philip Bobbitt: I think that’s right. What would you do for example with the anthrax attacks? Do we think that a rogue state mailed them, do we think they are an example of proliferation to some other entity, such that something like the NPT might have prevented it, do we think it’s anything to do with Islam? Well it may be linked to the Al Qaeda attacks. It’s always troubled me that the anthrax letters were mailed from Trenton, New Jersey and Boca Raton in Florida, both place where there were dormitories for the 9/11 terrorists. But the general thinking in the law enforcement agencies in the States is that it had nothing to do with Al Qaeda. I don’t know. I want a concept of warfare that doesn’t depend upon my knowing. I don’t mean that you have to give up on what I call the demand side of terrorism and the threats that you’ve mentioned are very real threats, and I am not complacent about them. But I think you have to have also a supply-side strategy, you have to be able to defend yourself when you don’t know who is hitting you or you can get hit again. Matthew has very kindly asked me about the title of this book, which has undergone several changes now and have not decided on the right one yet. At one point I was going to call it A Plague Treatise for the 21st Century; as you know, plague treatises were written 13th/14th centuries by physicians and clerics and they talked about a phenomenon that they by and large didn’t understand. They didn’t have germ theory. I don’t think we really understand the operation of terror in the 21st century. But this much I think we do understand, that we have to build up our immune systems. We cannot simply win this fight by going after our adversaries and attacking them and killing them.

Later we have ..

Matthew d’Ancona And on that note, one of the things that struck me, thinking about your attempt to marry the concept of the market state with the new context is that - I mean, I’m probably one of the last five people in Britain who thinks the Iraq war is a good idea, but to use your analysis, it was not a good outing for this germinating idea of the market state for several reasons. For instance, it encouraged the idea that the market state pedals false information, in the manner of a company to clients. That the Halliburton connection encouraged the notion that there were market elements is rather bigger then the accountable democratic state dimension. The horrors of Abu Ghraib, in which there were these mysterious private contractors engaged in acts of torture, again encouraged the idea that the state is simply contracting out acts that it would normally not have been willing to do in order to avoid accountability. So I wondered if you might say something about how you see the aftermath of Iraq, with reference to your analysis?

Philip Bobbitt You also might have mentioned extraordinary renditions as another example of outsourcing by the states. You’ve put it perfectly. The crucial part of a diplomatic and military campaign for a market state is to unify strategy and law. The nation state separated them. It professionalised both. The military people are often heard to say you wouldn’t want a politician to do brain surgery, Mr President; you don’t want a civilian to do warfare either. Leave it to the pros, we’ll do it, you give us the goal, we’ll achieve it if we can. This kind of separation was characteristic in many, many areas of professionalisation in the 20th century. In the 21st century just the opposite is going to happen, because you’re trying to protect civilians, rather then kill enemy soldiers, as your first objective. You must bring the law into the closest possible coordination with strategy, and what this administration has done, and I support the war in Iraq, what they have done is heartbreaking, because they have steadily removed the greatest source of their power, which was the rule of the law. You may think of Abu Ghraib as a battle and we lost. Guantanamo is a battle that we have lost. It will cost us lives, it will cost us political influence, and above all it may cost us, our strategic objectives. Not simply by ignoring it but by having a studied contempt of the law, and not just international law, which needs desperately to be reformed, but for even our domestic laws. The administration has kicked away what should have been its strongest prop. It baffles me. And it angers me.

Commentary

In Bobbitt's view the entire West was engaged in one continuous war from 1914 to 1989 in which actual fighting was interspersed with attempts to bring law into line with strategy. During that period all the Presidents attempted to build institutions which tried to capture the experience of the preceding conflict. And whether this was reflected in the League of Nations, the UN, NATO, rapproachments to China or arms negotiations of various kinds there was a correspondence between physical warfare and law. Although I do not entirely agree with all Professor Bobbitt's views he is correct, I think, in suggesting that for the first time this has not happened. The War on Terror, which has dealt with the most profound problems of the 21st century, has been curiously sterile institutionally. That's not to say that the last five years have been totally barren; but even when the alliances with India, Central Asian States and the Patriot Act are figured in they still fall short (I think) of a framework within which to meet the future in the style of containment consensus of the post World War 2  years..

It was as if the current administration spent its energy trying to get around the constraints of old institutions -- like the United Nations and what has been called "Transnationalism" -- rather than trying to build better ones. The result is that after five years of epochal conflict the world is left with only the tatterdemalion shadows of 20th century concepts and institutions rather than the solid beginnings of new ones. This is most reflected in the curious instability of American politics, divided between a Democratic Party attached to the concepts of the 1960s and a Republican Party attached to -- at best a new attitude, at worst a few personal figures but to nothing institutionally embodied  -- which may at the next turn of an election lead to wildly oscillating results. The power of law is that it changes the rules; and despite America's great victories in the field the rules have not been changed.

It's not widely appreciated that surveillance, gun control, rules for detention, conditions of interrogation are stricter in Europe than in the United States. British Secretary of Defense John Reid, for example approvingly points to extension of the period in which persons may be detained without charge and suggested the amendment of the Geneva Conventions. The Blair government is seeking legislation to force businesses to hand over their encryption keys to authorities. This after it asked Microsoft to engineer a crypto backdoor into Windows Vista the better to spy on possible threats. And when accusations of running "secret prisons" in Europe were leveled against America, the unasked question is why in Europe and not in America? Because the rules are different in Europe, where for good or ill law has been brought into line with strategy perhaps more than it has been in the United States.

In his introduction to The Shield of Achilles Bobbitt extensively quoted Homer's account of Hephaestus' forging the hero's shield. On it's brazen surface were emblazoned noble cities, wedding feasts, scenes of justice, armies, fallow fields, "estates where harvesters labored, reaping ripe grain", vineyards, cattle and finally the great band of Ocean's River, a fitting rampart to "that great and massive shield". For allegorically the Shield of Achilles is about all the defenses of civilization: culture, faith, arms and commerce. That it should be encompassed by Ocean's River is America's final blessing, but it is only the outermost rampart. Alone the Ocean, unbuttressed by faith, culture and commerce is empty. Bobbitt's curiously unexamined response to d'Ancona reflects his concern about how Western Civilization, though girded by bronze has become curiously hollow, without powers of recovery.

What would you do for example with the anthrax attacks? Do we think that a rogue state mailed them, do we think they are an example of proliferation to some other entity, such that something like the NPT might have prevented it, do we think it’s anything to do with Islam? Well it may be linked to the Al Qaeda attacks. It’s always troubled me that the anthrax letters were mailed from Trenton, New Jersey and Boca Raton in Florida, both place where there were dormitories for the 9/11 terrorists. But the general thinking in the law enforcement agencies in the States is that it had nothing to do with Al Qaeda. I don’t know. I want a concept of warfare that doesn’t depend upon my knowing. I don’t think we really understand the operation of terror in the 21st century. But this much I think we do understand, that we have to build up our immune systems. We cannot simply win this fight by going after our adversaries and attacking them and killing them.

If the Long War of 1914-1989 consisted of fighting interspersed with institution-building there is no reason why the conflicts of the 21st century should not be similar. Those who remember running from their offices in Manhattan or away from Capitol environs on September 11, may if they are honest recall, not without some embarrassment, how far they were prepared to go under the goad of fear to strike at the unknown enemies attacking them then. The years 2001 to 2005 have diminished the first danger and it would be uncharitable to fault an administration responding to the crisis for neglecting what were apparently secondary issues. But they are secondary no longer. The political elite on both sides of the aisle have left the world with none of the defenses on the Shield of Achilles other than armies. Law, institutions, and above of all our thinking have not been adjusted to experience. What then shall we do with our greater power, our sharper sword, our greater reach if another surprise attack comes in the night and we have nothing else but the sword?

35 Comments:

Blogger desert rat said...

A supposedly learmed man says "... We cannot simply win this fight by going after our adversaries and attacking them and killing them. ..."

What proof is there of that?
When or where has it been attempted?
What caused the tactic to fail, if it did?
Why are the successful tactics of the past discarded for theories and unknowns?

WWII was won only after the Allies had killed over 1,000,000 Axis country civilians. To expect less of WWIII or WWIV is wishful thinking.
The idea of an omnipotent US is so engrained that now bloodless Victory is demanded.
Leading to Political "solutions",
that never are.
Welcome to Belfeast, no...I meant Baghdad.

This is so demeaning to the foe, that our Public no longer fears of respects them.
Familiarity breeds contempt.

But with but a few Platoons...
cry havoc &
loose the dogs of war

from sea to shinig sea

5/21/2006 02:30:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Couldn't agree more with 'Rat.
I have no idea what the guy is talking about re:
Gitmo.
Actually, I think I do but just disagree profoundly.
Rush calls it Club Med Gitmo and sells T, shirts, mugs and paraphenalia.
"RELAX FROM THE STRESS OF JIHAD
New Prayer Rugs, Korans, Catered Sharia Friendly Food.
"
THAT is the defeat at Gitmo, imo.
---
"We're so powerful we (don't even have to) win, no matter what!"
I'd call that Hubris of the first order, and a recipe for further misery and defeat.
---
---
Hilarious Howard from Instapundit:
BLITZER:
" So the UN – excuse me for interrupting.
The UN secretary general, Kofi Annan, said this on May 12th.
He said,
“I have insisted very clearly both in private and my contacts with the America administration and publicly that I think it’s important that the United States come to the table and that they should join the European countries and Iran to find a solution.”

He’s the secretary general. (oooh!)
Do you agree with him?
"
---
---
HOWARD:
"Yes.
Well, when I talk about the United Nations processes,
I mean the processes through the Security Council.
I mean, I respect the views of the secretary general but when I talk of the process,
I mean the process which is now underway which involves the potential for further resolutions by the United Nations Security Council
,"
and I think that is the path at this time that ought to be followed.

5/21/2006 03:00:00 PM  
Blogger desert rat said...

Apparently Mr Maloki did not get the "we can't kill 'em" memo

"... Iraq's new prime minister promised Sunday to use "maximum force" if necessary to end the brutal insurgent and sectarian violence wracking the country, ...

... "We are aware of the security challenge and its effects. So we believe that facing this challenge cannot be achieved through the use of force only, despite the fact that we are going to use the maximum force in confronting the terrorists and the killers who are shedding blood," al-Maliki said. ..."


Frpm the <<USA Tofat

The Sunni PM that walked out, paraphrased from the last thread...
"it's gonna get bloody"

5/21/2006 03:16:00 PM  
Blogger Brendan said...

Desert Rat, you make a good point. We are not serious yet. The situation is not understood by Americans as 'serious'. 6,000 people lost on 9/11 and the subsequent conflict is insufficient to mobilize and change our institutions and law in any radical way. The military, the tip of the spear, is certainly adapting in an amazing way. The intensity and remove of the War on Terror does not have our institutions or law on the crucible. Recall that the League and UN were all ex post facto.

This war has a unique character in that WMDs in the hands of non-state actors opens up the real possibility of a very nasty step-function in the casualty rate. We've never seen the likes of it. We want our institutions to adapt before we live with that step-function. I'm going back to my history books to see if there are any shining examples of that.

Alignment of Law and War is a very civilized notion.

5/21/2006 03:24:00 PM  
Blogger Tony said...

It seems we fear threat in our own actions. As if our actions are the only threat, the only cause of hassles, what we do to "make them so mad at us."

It feels like entropy, half the waking people in the country as just tired of hearing about the war. War is a bad thing, period. Just make this bad feeling go away.

It feels like the awareness-field of a slug. We are at war, our troops are face to face with a deadly enemy EVERY DAY. There IS a Reason for this. And yet half our voting population just feel it as an annoyance, an UNNECESSARY annoyance.

Paper Tigers one and all, with nary a thought for what happens when no one takes the pilot's seat. Even the lessons of the 90's are so long ago for half of us, they are lost beneath the sands of time. Couldn't dig those sunken ships of recent history out of the beach if you wanted to.

"Don't Stop Thinking About Tomorrow" didn't mean you were supposed to stop thinking about TODAY!

Q: What if there's a War going on, and we don't show up?

A: 9/11/01.

5/21/2006 03:37:00 PM  
Blogger wretchardthecat said...

I'm not one of those who is raring to go out and picket the Da Vinci Code, but neither will I join those who cheer it on. For in direct proportion to the degree that we destroy the central narratives of our civilization, its demography and its traditions we must rely on the sword. The weaker our civilizational immune system the more it must rely on barriers to protect it. Gitmo prison is compensation for political correctness. Ironical but true, I think. Apart from the River of Ocean and the mighty US Armed Forces there is precious little Western Culture can use to offer resistance. Ask Borders about Freedom of Speech. Our "Shield of Achilles" without its hard outer shell is more the Paper Parasol of Fi-fi.

To the extent that Bobbitt asks whether we can long rely only on the the sword without changing our culture and law I think he has a valid point.

5/21/2006 03:58:00 PM  
Blogger wretchardthecat said...

Cannoneer 4,

I agree about the danger of LawFare. It was precisely to avoid entanglement in those toils, I think, that the current Administration flanked them. But in the meantime the old guard reemphasized every one of those restrictions. Rewrote everyone of them with filigrees and curlicues. 'We will fight according to the old rules'. Bobbitt you will notice, calls international law "in desperate need of reform". Not in desperate need of being ignored, but in desperate need of being changed.

Maybe the last five years were not the time, but one day it will have to be done. Otherwise we will inhabit a schizoid world where our principles, as embodied in culture, are at variance with action.

5/21/2006 04:09:00 PM  
Blogger RWE said...

From my perspective, it is not that international institutions and "the law" - to say nothing of the MSM - were ignored by the Bush Admin but rather that those institutions and concepts moved off on their own and rendered themselves impotent if not downright dangerous.

A "Legal Structure" which sees the ACLU suing to prevent random searches in NY subways while offering nothing coherent as an alternative is not a force to be used but one to be avoided and circumvented.

A "Law" that views industry - indeed Western Society itself - as a cow to be milked endlessly is similarly worse than useless. As long ago as the early 1980's the USAF was forced to terminate even its previously very limited dissemination of aircraft crash investigation findings due to the ceaseless attempts by civilian lawyers to use the data in lawsuits.

A "Law" that focuses on pointless
"angels on the head of a pin" issues such as Gitmo and Abu Grabe while ignoring the very real and basic transgressions of "the enemy" is not to be taken seriously.

To paraphrase Patton’s speech at the opening of the movie of the same name:

"What did you do in the war, Daddy?"

"I shoveled lawsuits in Louisiana, honey."

5/21/2006 04:10:00 PM  
Blogger desert rat said...

ahh... if that were true, about the sword being our sole weapon, but the dollar far surpasses the sword in it's impact.

In India's Call Centers and China's new factories, powered by the newly opened Three Gorges Dam. All fueled by the greenback dollar.

Bolivia and Venezuela are Nationalizing foreign assets, while the US shuts Dubai out of the bidding.

Be careful what is asked for.

We are harassed by the newest generation of Border Bandits and Pirates that harassed both Alexander and British.

The solutions are age old. So are the symptoms of the decline of Empire. How do the two entwine?

In the post modern,
things are soooo acclerated.

5/21/2006 04:24:00 PM  
Blogger John Aristides said...

Bobbitt is correct to an extent. The key to winning in the long run is for the US to use her power and the power of her willing allies to grow and cultivate a global system of ethical rules that, conceptually, are carefully calibrated to stimulate cooperation and avoid an equilibrium point that sits on mass defection. This means that costs and benefits (both material and psychological) will have to be adjusted, tested, and readjusted--a complex organism that demands an active and reactive America, visible and, when needed, felt at all the important levels and nodes of our system space. That is, in fact, what we are doing, pace Bobbitt's anger.

If this new system is not viable--if it turns out to be historically (i.e. contextually) or practicably impossible to actualize (if there is some upper limit on the organizational complexity of the animal homo sapien)--then, yes, our options will be few and immediate--dependent almost entirely on our retention of the noble virtues strength and honor.

However, the situation is unlikely to devolve so much that American will to power becomes the determinant of our survival.

Our primary virtues and values are cooperative ones. They are undeniably, empirically successful rules by which to organize mankind. I'm confident they will win the day.

There is the question of nihilism, of course, and the self-immolation and decadence it entails. But have no fear on this score either. This most insipid of all ideologies is about to be dealt a mortal blow--by an ally hopefully, but if not, by our enemies definitely.

5/21/2006 04:43:00 PM  
Blogger John Aristides said...

The aphorism should be modified: there are no nihilists in a foxhole.

5/21/2006 04:49:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

How many findings, Charters, reifications, United Nations processes, I mean the processes through the Security Council,
I mean, when I talk of the process, I mean the processes which were underway which involved the potential for further resolutions by the United Nations Security Council,
did Wesley and Bill wait for
before they bombed the Crap out of the Christians?

We surrender our country each day to lawyers and gelded legislators wrt our borders and our sovereignty, meanwhile Mexico simply takes care of business on their Southern Border as though they are still truly part of the community of nations that have not yet sacrificed all in the name of PC, and now, even more malignantly, in the name of COMPASSION.

Enough to drive those of us who were brought up in the company real men to drink.

Maybe the New Agers as well as the ACLU and etc, should get more input before we arrive at the final reifications of the meanings of "War," "Enemy," and "Illegal."

5/21/2006 04:53:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

4:49 PM,
I am Airborn, therefore we must have been mortared.
At least I think I am,
therefore...

5/21/2006 04:57:00 PM  
Blogger wretchardthecat said...

Joe Pettit,

I don't want to put words into Bobbitt's mouth but it seems to me that you could interpret the argument that way. Law is our shield; when it goes out of date, change the law but don't be lawless.

Just today two Saudi men, one in a trenchcoat and without ID boarded a school bus in Florida and rode it to school. The bus driver called ahead for the cops. CAIR is calling it racial profiling but the more suspicious are thinking, 'is it a dry run?' Where will law come down on this one? What if the bus driver is sued?

5/21/2006 05:01:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

If we have indeed for some reason become more dependent on factors other than the noble virtues strength and honor, I'll take the Hemlock now, thanks.

5/21/2006 05:06:00 PM  
Blogger vbwyrde said...

Thanks Wretchard, fascinating post as usual. I do find myself philosophically at odds with some of the premises presented, so I will try to illucidate.

First Point:

I for one am not clear as to why Law *should* align with Strategy. To my mind it should be the other way around; Strategy should always align to Law.

The Law is created to uphold morality, and it defines what penalties are accrued to what sins. The idea that the Law should follow Strategy seems to imply that Law is mutable and rests less on a Foundation than does Strategy, which is counter intuitive, and frankly, wrong. The opposite is true. It is Strategy that is mutable as it should always be conditioned on circumstances and necessity, which are themselves certainly mutable. The foundation of Law, which is Morality, is not. Therefore Strategy should be subservient to Law, not the other way around. Or did I miss something? Aha. I missed something: The premise that Morality is the Foundation of Law only has meaning if one believes in some form of Absolute Justice, ie - God who establishes Morality. Otherwise the argument goes that Morality is just as mutable as Law (being man made and therefore flawed and requiring continuous tinkering). Morality, however is not mutable. Law, being mostly (post biblical?) man made is more mutable than Morality, but less mutable than Strategy. When we talk of "aligning Law to Strategy" Law is as an unintended consequence detached from its Morality-Anchor and the Ship of State is thereafter set to drift with the currents and eddies of necessity, as each Captain in turn creates new Strategies which the Law must then be "aligned" to. That is not as it should be. This would be a ship of fools.

Strategy is the means by which one achieves a broad (strategic) goal. It is a plan. If we are unable to deal with the nuances of a sneaky, diabolical and dangerous enemy then we need a Strategy/Plan that answers the question: How do you defeat the kind of Enemy as the Nizari? (read 'The Templars and the Assassins', by James Wasserman)

The Sunni approach to dealing with the Nizari was Strategic. Our approach needs to be Strategic. At this point I do not get the feeling that we have determined exactly what that Strategy really is. Nor should we be able to, as "All warfare is based on deception." - Sun Tzu. If we knew the actual Strategy then we would be in very serious trouble, because so would the Enemy, and that is never a good thing in war.

Second Point:

Our crisis is that we are divided at a time when we need to be united. But of course the enemy knew that in 2000 after observing the election. It was the old Hobbit and the Trolls play. Throw a rock (9/11) from behind a tree and watch the trolls (political factions) start fighting. While we can feel reasonably assured that militarily Al Qaeda can not take down America, it is not so apparent that they can not instigate America to take itself down, and/or Western Europe, and/or Western Civilization.

The raw viceral and largely false rhetorical "political victories" made in the debates over American (Western) leadership are the very weapons that the enemy gleefully delights to see. "Let them draw their swords and kill one another, that in the end we may rule over them all." Divide and Conquer. That is Strategy.

We must define a comprehensive and effective Strategy against this type of foe. We have all the assets of a powerful nation, but as has been pointed out, our division keeps us from being effective, and therefore any Strategy we may have is undermined. Will changing the Law to make it Align with Strategy create Political Unity? Or instead will it create more division as factions battle over the jots and tiddles, their implications, and other arcania?

Hark! I hear the sound of Osama laughing!

My suggestion is this: Align Strategy to the goal and Unite against the Enemy.

How? Education. We have amazing resources for communications at our disposal. Perhaps we may learn to use them more wisely and effectively.

5/21/2006 05:07:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Put CAIR and the ACLU in prison.

5/21/2006 05:08:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

What if we just RESPECT the meaning of "Unlawful Combatants?"

5/21/2006 05:14:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

But habu,
That money depends on "proof" that it was earned:
If you, me, or my wife provided "proof" that we had contributed money under a false name or ID, we would be prosecuted for a FELONY, forthwith.

But fear not for those warm fuzzy illegals you are so concerned about:

Robert Rector informs us that the JUDGES on these matters (won't take but a minute to adjudicate a few million cases, although some are still court from 1986! those judges are to be chosen from a field of
LAWYERS WITH EXPERIENCE AS DEFENSE ATTORNEYS IN IMMIGRATION CASES!!!

5/21/2006 05:36:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

still IN court from 1986

5/21/2006 05:37:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

It of course depends on the meaning of "Insane,"
as well as the meaning of "it."
Best just put on the depends.

5/21/2006 05:47:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

You're just trying to find a Republican you can trust!

5/21/2006 06:01:00 PM  
Blogger Meme chose said...

It will not necessarily be a bad thing if, in response to further attacks which definitely are a bad thing, we become like Israel a more routinely and effectively armed and arms-trained society. Let the academics try continuing to push their waffle with the guns on the table, so to speak. It would also be interesting to see what happens to petty crime in the midst of a generally rearmed citizenry.

5/21/2006 06:02:00 PM  
Blogger Tom Paine said...

Philip Bobbitt: “…we have to build up our immune systems. We cannot simply win this fight by going after our adversaries and attacking them and killing them.”

I can’t be sure that Bobbitt really means what this seems to say, but if he does, it reeks of the “straw-man” argument -- because it implies that “attacking and killing our adversaries” is substantially *all* that we are doing.

That’s obvious nonsense.

It ignores the creation and the massive flows of money, authority, and whole agencies into a Department of Homeland Security. It ignores the almost as massive attempts to realign & re-coordinate the intelligence communities under the new Director of National intelligence. It ignores the Proliferation Security Initiative, and Condi Rice’s still-fledgling attempts to revamp State, and even Rumsfeld’s well-underway changes at Defense.

These (and other things) *are* a very obvious attempt to “build up our immune systems” -- at the same time as attacking and killing our adversaries.

Of course, some will always say that these are the wrong things to do or that we aren’t doing them well enough. Such statements are always made -- and they are usually both right and wrong.

But to imply that the need is simply being overlooked is perceptive myopia of a brightly obvious sort.

There are several other points in that interview that seem to indicate similar failures to notice the obvious. So I shall put Bobbitt on probation until I find out whether I am interpreting him correctly or not.

5/21/2006 06:08:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

A philisophical question which should be answered.
Gibbeting, pressing or the wheel:
Which teaches best by example?

5/21/2006 06:20:00 PM  
Blogger Derek Kite said...

I find Bobbitt's fascination with international law quite quaint.

Law exists only when there is a sword to enforce it. A bunch of lawyers in New York or Brussels or Geneva making up rules without a means of enforcement is meaningless. Essentially the US is the only one with the reach to enforce any law, so really, international law is what the President of the US says it is.

A former foreign affairs minister of Canada essentially said that the world should tell the US how to use it's forces, that international law and multilateral institutions are there to direct the military power of the US, and is quite affronted that the US doesn't go along with it.

I think that the historical view of the policies and actions of the Administration and the US military over the last few years will end up being quite positive.

Derek

5/21/2006 06:50:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Sirius,
I linked it at 7:32 PM in the previous thread.

5/21/2006 06:57:00 PM  
Blogger Brendan said...

The interview with Bobbit seems valuable because of the timing of it. We really should be changing our laws so that we can legally justify and rationalize the extension of our will and power into the world. But, if we imagine a world a few days after several million of our fellow citizens have perished in a nuclear detonation or anthrax attack it becomes pretty clear, from that vantage point, that current institutional change is not useful - the current transformation at Homeland Security and State are almost pointless. The institutions that could exist after that event are outside of public debate - their conception as non-existent as the legal framework needed to align our law and strategy.

When Bobbit talks about alignment of law with strategy it seems naïve if discussed from a purely risk management standpoint - from the standpoint that we must successfully interdict ALL WMD attacks from ALL willing non-state actors. It’s a great concept that seems meaningless in the face of a successful WMD attack. When a million lives are erased at a stroke the magnitude of institutional and legal adaptation are probably at the limits of comprehension. The law as we know it is incapable of delivering enough power to the state or to the people to reasonably identify the non-state actors who could threaten a second attack. The institutions underpinning our economic engine and financial risk management systems would be overwhelmed. How do you institute prescriptive law in this case? The successor to the UN that could have any hope of dealing with non-state actors is a practical impossibility at this time. What kind of institution governs all non-state actors’ access to all points in the global supply chain?

The world didn't change on 9/11. We just got a clue. The real change is when we actually survive a WMD attack. I am hating the Three Conjectures. It is a seriously unnerving contemplation.

5/21/2006 08:10:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

Sirius,
Just go down to Social Security and say you didn't understand that more than one person is not supposed to use the same Social Security Number and a fake ID, and see what happens next!
Better yet, make a claim that YOU contributed a bunch of that income reported on Bill Gates' number, and that you are there to DEMAND your fair share!
If they give you any trouble, just start speaking to them in Pig Latin, and demand they provide and interpreter.
Ignorance of the law IS an excuse if you are one of the animals more equal than others.
---
Your original question still stands:
Why the Hell were they allowed on the bus in the first place?

The Asylum's being run by the riders of the short Bus!

5/21/2006 08:41:00 PM  
Blogger Doug said...

...and the rest of his comment is excellent as well.

5/21/2006 08:43:00 PM  
Blogger RWE said...

In regards to the school bus incident:

Two Saudi men were held without bond Sunday after they were arrested for boarding a school bus full of children, authorities said.

Mana Saleh Almanajam, 23, and Shaker Mohsen Alsidran, 20, were charged with misdemeanor trespassing and were being held at Orient Road Jail after a judge said Saturday she wanted more background information on them.

The two men arrived in the country six months ago on student visas and are enrolled at the English Language Institute at the University of South Florida.

Investigators said they boarded the school bus Friday, sat down and began speaking in Arabic. Their behavior concerned the driver, a substitute, who alerted the school district.

The men were asked why they boarded the bus, and sheriff's spokesman J.D. Callaway said they gave different answers: They wanted to enroll in an easier English language program than the one at USF, they wanted to see a high school, and they thought it would be fun.

5/22/2006 05:18:00 AM  
Blogger Charles said...

The problem is not so much that institutions have not been formed in response to the wot but rather that the global wot calls into question the wisdom of nascent institutions that are forming. ie the eu (that includes turkey) the greater mediterranian basin union and the North American Union. (that includes Mexico)

Alas only the liberals are thinking comprehensively about this stuff. the conservatives have only just begun to catch on to the game.... as the implications of the play have become apparent.

5/22/2006 08:29:00 AM  
Blogger Evanston2 said...

With respect to Mr. Bobbitt, Charles, and even Wretchard, you are missing the overall reality about law: it reflects political power after it is achieved. Put another way, laws don't make change, change makes laws. The problem both in the US and internationally is that the liberals are, in fact, the ones resisting the changes in domestic and international law necessary to fight this "plague."
In that context, Derek Kite's observation that "I find Bobbitt's fascination with international law quite quaint" and Bobalharb's later
comments on law enforcement in Idaho under the 9th Circuit make total sense. Their reactions reflect frustration with liberals, essentially that their attitude toward law is on niceties rather than enforcement. Liberals do not take the threat seriously. Period.
Further, Mr. Bobbitt's criticism of the "market state" is silly when applied to Iraq. We have, in fact, taken a hostile power and converted it into a subcontractor in the GWOT. The Iraqi government is now on "our side" embroiled in a struggle for democracy and human rights in the heart of the Middle East.
Our presence in Afghanistan and the gulf states have successfully encircled the Iranian mullahs. Those who refuse to recognize that this is a bold and successful incursion into enemy territory are fools. We fought Desert Storm/Shield, backed Israel for decades, landed in Lebanon twice, and conducted numerous other operations there since the 1960s due to volatility of governments and oil (yes, it's about oil because the Middle East minus oil equals Africa). Oil-fueled Islam is the threat.
Mr. Bobbit's seeming sophistication in wondering exactly "who" is behind our terror problems is equally silly. The nation will not be shut down by handfuls of non weapons-grade anthrax that killed fewer people than car accidents in the U.S. on a given day. Our principal concern is with oil money purchasing nukes or large ground/naval forces shutting down oil access.
In sum, laws will change once political consensus is reached both domestically and internationally, with the defeat of so-called liberals. And our current "market state" methods are working against the real threat, oil-fueled Islam. Mr. Bobbitt's emphasis on law fails to recognize the most basic realities of the political process in the West, and concentrates on the smallest threats while disparaging our success in dealing with the true Threat.

5/22/2006 11:04:00 AM  
Blogger Red River said...

We still believe in redemption as a univeral ideal.

Some cannot be redeemed and we are only redeemed by accepting this and acting accordingly.

5/22/2006 01:25:00 PM  
Blogger Boghie said...

What are you doing here, Elijah?

"Go out, and stand on the mountain before Yahweh." Behold, Yahweh passed by, and a great and strong wind tore the mountains, and broke in pieces the rocks before Yahweh; but Yahweh was not in the wind. After the wind an earthquake; but Yahweh was not in the earthquake.

After the earthquake a fire passed; but Yahweh was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice. It was so, when Elijah heard it, that he wrapped his face in his mantle, and went out, and stood in the entrance of the cave. Behold, a voice came to him, and said,

"What are you doing here, Elijah?"


We have heard the sturm and drang. Some are thinking there was no war, we have won the war already, or that we cannot win the war.

It still plays on, quieter...

We are working with the civilized nations of the world to combat this evil. To destroy it. This will be a more quiet adjustment than cold war rearmament. It is and will be fiscal. It is and will be societal. It is and will be cultural. And, it will still be martial.

To actually win - and not be forced to fight for centuries or destroy a culture - we have to permit elements of the culture to change for the better. The structure you speak of is the structure you spoke of – the 3rd Conjecture.

I think we are on target.

5/22/2006 07:41:00 PM  

Post a Comment

<< Home


Powered by Blogger