ForeignPolicy – The Wrongologist

Who Attacked The Civilians In Moscow?

The Daily Escape:

MLK statue through Cherry blossoms, Tidal Basin, DC – March 2024 photo by National Parks Service

An event in Russia highlights how difficult it is for many to believe what they’re reading and hearing. A terrorist attack took place in the outskirts of Moscow at the Crocus City Hall last Friday. At least 133 people were killed and more than 100 others were injured in the attack just before a performance by a rock band. Assailants who were dressed in camouflage uniforms opened fire and reportedly threw explosive devices inside the venue, which was left in flames with its roof collapsing after the deadly attack.

The Islamic State in Afghanistan known as the Islamic State in Khorasan Province, (ISIS-K) – subsequently claimed responsibility for the attack.

And that’s where the charges and countercharges about who was behind the deed started flying across the internet. Earlier, on March 7, the US Embassy in Russia issued a warning to “avoid large gatherings over the next 48 hours”:

“The Embassy is monitoring reports that extremists have imminent plans to target large gatherings in Moscow, to include concerts, and US citizens should be advised to avoid large gatherings over the next 48 hours.”

Apparently the US Embassy also passed this information on directly to their Russian counterparts. It’s likely that the collapse of US-Russia relations since the start of Ukraine/Russia war makes it very difficult for Russia’s security services to take seriously any intelligence the US might provide about possible attacks.

All of this led to the US State Department saying that ISIS-K was to blame, while the Russians accused Ukraine. Unsurprisingly, Putin is all over the idea that Ukraine is behind the attack: (emphasis by Wrongo)

“They were trying to hide and were moving toward Ukraine….Based on preliminary information, a window for crossing the border was prepared for them by the Ukrainian side.”

Whether or not this is true, it represents a Russian verdict on Ukraine’s guilt.

But think about Putin’s “window”. The idea that escaping terrorists would head for Ukraine is nuts. Russia has 20,000 miles of border. The Russian-Ukrainian portion of it is covered with Russian soldiers and security forces. The Ukrainian side is heavily mined. It’s a site of active combat. It’s almost the last place an escaping terrorist would choose to run to.

Ukrainian officials have denied having anything to do with the attack, and American officials have said there is no evidence of any Ukrainian involvement. From Paul Campos:

“…people often forget that a) Russia occupies vast territories populated predominantly by Muslims, b) Russia has waged a brutal war of terror in order to subjugate some of those territories, and c) Russia has been a target of radical Islamist terror in the past. Consequently, allegations of ISIS-K involvement easily pass the smell test.”

It’s apparent that neither side is remotely interested in a comprehensive investigation. The State Department’s verdict was that Ukraine was innocent and ISIS K was to blame. The Russian FSB’s verdict is that it was hired nobodies from Tajikistan who were sponsored by Ukraine’s GUR (intelligence service) – and thus it was a terrorist act supported by the West. From Timothy Snyder:

“Russia and the Islamic State have long been engaged in conflict. Russia has been bombing Syria since 2015. Russia and the Islamic State compete for territory and resources in Africa. Islamic State attacked the Russian embassy in Kabul. This is the relevant context for the attack outside Moscow.”

Finally CNN begs to differ with the Russians: (parenthesis by Wrongo)

“In March alone, Russian authorities had thwarted several ISIS-related incidents, according to RIA (the state-run RIA-Novosti news agency). On March 3, RIA reported that six ISIS members were killed in a counter-terrorist operation in the Ingush Karabulak; on March 7, it said security services had uncovered and “neutralized” a cell of the banned organization Vilayat Khorasan in the Kaluga region, whose members were planning an attack on a synagogue in Moscow; and on March 20, it said the commander of an ISIS combat group had been detained.”

It is in Putin’s interest to pin the attacks on Ukraine because Russia needs to mobilize more troops to finish the Ukraine job.

OTOH, if Ukraine had anything to do with the murdering of Russian civilians on an industrial scale, the West would shut off their arms & ammo supplies. The US and NATO has zero reason to risk starting a nuclear war by allowing it’s Ukrainian client to murder and maim Russian civilians.

And Ukraine targeting civilians doesn’t fit with their strategy of attacking Russian airfields, refineries, railroads, critical bridges, and FSB offices. If they were going to kill civilians it would be workers in weapons factories or oil industry or railway employees.

Meanwhile during and since the incident, Ukraine attacked two Russian Ropucha Class landing ships, the Black Sea Fleet Communications Center in Sevastopol, and a few more refineries.

Time to wake up America! We need to see beyond the headlines in a complicated story like this terrorist attack in Moscow. This is why people who get their news from social media without better research into the full gamut of possibilities will make bad conclusions about what/who is behind this. It’s probably a good idea for all of us to keep our powder dry and wait for the evidence to tell the story.

To help you wake up, watch and listen to three guys play boogie-woogie on a public piano in St. Pancras station in London. This is an excellent tune to start your day:

Russia. China And Iran, And Other Thoughts

The Daily Escape:

Snow at sunrise, Grand Canyon NP, AZ – February 2024 photo by John Fecteau

Welcome to another Monday Wake Up. Wrongo wants to touch on a few different ideas today. First, a non-trivial topic that Wrongo plans to return to this year. When we look at the geo-political landscape today, the US is confronting a growing alliance between three countries, each of which holds ill-will towards us and towards our western allies. Those three are China, Russia and Iran.

We’re confronting them separately and also in the case of the Ukraine War, jointly. This is an excellent time to harken back to something that Zbigniew Brzezinski wrote in 1997. He had formerly (through 1981) been Carter’s National Security Adviser:

“Potentially the most dangerous scenario would be a grand coalition of China, Russia and perhaps Iran, an ‘anti-hegemonic’ coalition, united not by ideology but by complementary grievances. . . . Averting this contingency . . . will require a display of US geostrategic skill on the western, eastern and southern perimeters of Eurasia simultaneously.”

Today’s geopolitical landscape reflects exactly what Brzezinski feared more than two decades ago. Is the world heading toward what the late Brzezinski referred to as “the most dangerous scenario”? What should America be doing now to head off what we’re seeing from our three rivals? Or is it already too late?

Which presidential candidate will do the better job of blunting this potential power conflict ?

Second, what did the weekend’s South Carolina Republican primary tell us? Trump won by a wide margin. As of this writing, the tally has Trump at 59.8% and Nikki Haley at 39.5%. The media is treating this as a significant triumph. When you win by 20 points, that’s true.

The real story, however, is that Trump underperformed expectations and failed to expand his coalition beyond his base. If you doubt that, take a look at the polling group 538’s polling vs. actual results for Trump across the three Republican primaries:

We’re seeing Trump consistently underperform the polls by 7-8 points. Worse for Trump, Fox News’ John Roberts talked about an alarming exit poll finding that 59% of Haley voters in South Carolina last night (equal to 40% of the electorate) would not vote for Trump in the general election.

From Simon Rosenberg:

“It’s my view that something broke inside the GOP when Dobbs happened. That even for many Republicans, it was just too much, the party had gone too far, had become too ugly and dangerous.”

Trump and the GOP are showing signs of deep institutional weakness. They had disappointing elections in 2018, 2020, 2022 and 2023. They’re replacing the entire leadership team at the RNC due to their ongoing fundraising struggles. Today’s RNC is broke:

In addition, the GOP’s state parties have atrophied in some key battleground states. Trump is burning through cash at unprecedented rates to fund his many lawsuits. Even Nikki Haley out raised him last month.

Wrongo thinks that we’re finally seeing “Trump Fatigue”. Everybody has seen his act and has zero need to ever see it again. The assertion that Trump is strong beyond his die-hard MAGA base seems to at last, be untrue. But what does Wrongo know? When he retired from the F500, he thought he would go into private equity. But he was seduced into online journalism by the promise of very small paychecks and zero job security.

Our third story is for the birds. The Guardian reports that:

“The Eurasian eagle owl named Flaco, which escaped New York City’s Central Park Zoo last year, has died after crashing into a building in Manhattan, officials said late on Friday.”

Here’s Flaco in happier times:

“Flaco was rescued by the zoo in 2010, when he was less than a year old. He was reputed to be the only owl of his kind in the wild in North America, and there were widespread fears he ultimately wouldn’t survive for long outside captivity.”

The Eurasian eagle-owl is one of the larger owl species. Flaco’s wingspan was reported to be about 6 ft. Ornithologist Stephen Ambrose wrote on LinkedIn that there was evidence light glare from city buildings’ windows could blind owls momentarily and increase their risk of crashing into the structures, especially at night.

This raises the evergreen question of how to keep birds safe in US urban areas. Federal officials estimate that one billion birds in the US die annually after accidentally flying into building windows. Wrongo and Ms. Right had this happen to us years ago when a hawk crashed through our lakefront cottage living room’s wall of glass. He was dead when he hit the floor. It doesn’t only happen in high-rise buildings.

Time to wake up, America! There’s glare everywhere, including in the media’s silly discussion about how overwhelming Trump’s electoral chances are vs. Biden. Trump has a very small chance of being elected in 2024. To help you wake up, watch this great video of England’s Prince William singing “Livin’ on a Prayer” with Jon Bon Jovi and Taylor Swift at the Winter Whites Gala charity ball at Kensington Palace. This is fun and worth your time:

The future King of England singing with the current Queen of Americana.

The End Of US Naval Superiority?

The Daily Escape:

Barn in orchard with Mt. Hood in background, OR – January 2024 photo by Mitch Schreiber Photography

What are we to make of the continuing war in the Red Sea? The Iranian-backed Houthis launched more attacks on merchant shipping just hours after the US preemptively struck them in Yemen. There is word from unreliable sources that the Houthis have now banned all US and UK ships from transiting the Red Sea, an escalation. Previously, they focused only on maritime shipping associated with Israel.

From the WaPo:

“Just as global supply chains finally returned to normal….The continuing attacks by the Houthis…have increased global shipping costs, caused cargo carriers or their clients to opt for longer alternate routes from Asia to Europe and the United States and raised alarms about the economic costs of a wider conflict.”

“Almost one-fifth of US freight arrives at East Coast ports after transiting the Red Sea and Suez Canal… Solar panels, electric vehicle batteries, toys and vacuum cleaners are among the goods making that trip. But for now, economists do not anticipate a major impact on the prices that US consumers pay — unless the violence worsens.”

Three months after the start of the Israel/Hamas war, a maritime danger zone has been created that extends hundreds of miles from its original location. Houthi militias have launched dozens of attacks on ships with drones and missiles, cutting container activity in the Suez canal by 90%.

The Western naval forces protecting global trade are now stretched dangerously thin. The attacks are beginning to spread beyond the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden, which leads to the Arabian Sea and the Indian Ocean. That complicates the task facing US military planners.

The economic implications are easy to understand. What may be more difficult is what this implies for America’s preeminent role in defense of the seas. The US simply doesn’t have the armament or manpower to: a) occupy Yemen or b) push the Houthi back far enough from the mouth of the Red Sea to reopen the Suez Canal to western shipping.

We have to consider the implications of an important global logistic choke point being closed as retaliation for the Israel/Hamas war. Also a second choke point, the Panama Canal, has also been forced to limit ships due to their persistent drought.

A second strategic implication is the impact of drone warfare on naval operations. Drones are plentiful and cheap. Large numbers of cheap drones means that warships now must have enough anti-aircraft (AA) systems to stop drones, along with electronic warfare counter-measure systems. Otherwise, they become sitting ducks.

A new fact of war is that cheap drones will overwhelm expensive missiles.

Our navy’s defense against drone attacks on commercial vessels runs headlong into the fact that our ships at sea can only store so many missiles. The US has sent a number of AEGIS destroyers to help protect international shipping, performing the dual role of intercepting Houthi drone and missiles and coming to the aid of distressed commercial ships.

Every missile salvo reduces the amount of time before they have to be resupplied by returning to base. We also know that America’s manufacturing capacity for missiles is far below what is needed to refill stocks, given how many need to be expended against drone swarms in the Red Sea and elsewhere.

Here are a few numbers from Stephen Bryen:

“The [AEGIS] destroyers have a complement of 96 VLS cells, while the [Ticonderoga class] cruisers have 122…However, they need to fit a mixture of weaponry in those cells so they can’t all be used for air defense….In short, each of the AEGIS has around 100 missiles.”

“Neither the US nor the British ships can be reprovisioned at sea, so they have a limited ability to “stay in the fight” if it continues for any length of time.”

So Yemen can launch a hundred drones and missiles at US ships and the destroyer escorts will very quickly exhaust their supply of air defense missiles. In the 1970s the U.S. Navy had ship tenders that could pull alongside a destroyer and resupply it. But today, these new Vertical Launch Systems must be reloaded in port.

In the ME, that means the destroyers will have to sail to Dubai or Europe, and the US aircraft carrier they are accompanying will have to follow because it relies on them for protection from ballistic and cruise missiles. Does America have enough carrier groups to rotate them when missile inventories are exhausted? The answer is no. Unless we are willing to move carrier groups from Asia to the ME. The US currently has 11 aircraft carriers in service, but here’s a map from Stratfor showing the location of our three! active carrier groups (CVNs) as of Jan 11, 2024:

We have three of 11 active, and you can see that CVN 78 (The Gerald Ford) sailed out of the Mediterranean and was replaced by CVN 69 (the Dwight Eisenhower) this week. This is the likely rotation for resupply of on-ship missiles.

Then there’s the issue of the US Navy’s manpower shortages. Forbes says in an article:

“…America’s newest aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald R. Ford (CVN-78), has downsized, cutting the crew aboard by hundreds of sailors….Over the past six months to a year, some 500 to 600 sailors have left the USS Ford and not been replaced.”

“…most likely scenario, according to long-time Navy observers…is that, after the Navy’s massive 20% miss in FY 2023 enlisted sailor recruitment goals, the Navy simply has no sailors to spare.”

This is the US Navy that pretends it can take on either Russia or China or both together!

A profound shift is underway: Our globalized economy relies on ocean freight. Some 80% of trade by volume and 50% by value travels on a fleet of 105,000 container ships, tankers and freight vessels. But today’s superpower rivalry and the decay of global rules may mean that oceans will become a contested zone for the first time since the Cold War. China’s naval build-up means the US Navy’s primacy in the Pacific is being contested for the first time since 1945.

The “law of the sea” is in decline. China increasingly ignores rulings that it objects to. And the West’s use of sanctions has triggered a boom in smuggling: 10% of all tankers are part of a “dark fleet” operating outside mainstream laws and finance, more than twice as many as 18 months ago.

The bottom line is that the US cannot invade Yemen or stop the Yemenis from shooting missiles at commercial vessels or at our own warships. As always, we can bomb a lot, but that’s unlikely to stop the Yemenis. They live in a mountainous country and their missiles are mobile.

The US Navy can’t take them out just by bombing. The Yemenis are tough, experienced fighters. They have endured one of the longest and most brutal bombing campaigns of the last few decades, and they are still here.

The plain fact is that the US and its western allies simply do not have sufficient deterrence to prevail in the Red Sea. The shipping industry has already come to that conclusion:

“In response, some shipping companies have instructed vessels to instead sail around southern Africa, a slower and therefore more expensive route.”

Commercial cargo lines are not going to chance being shot up.

We don’t have sufficient deterrence to keep the Red Sea, and thereby, the Suez Canal, open. We can’t do enough to the Houthis to make them back down. And we won’t be able to stop them with boots on the ground.

What will the US military say is our way out of the box we’ve gotten ourselves into?

Kissinger Has (Finally) Left The Building

The Daily Escape:

Camden, ME – November 2023 photo by Daniel F. Dishner. Note the star: It’s on top of nearby Mt.Battie.

Kissinger may have changed the world, but that isn’t always a good thing. The media are calling his legacy “complicated”. For Wrongo, it isn’t complicated. He may have gotten Nixon to China and negotiated (?) the end of the war in Vietnam, but his time on our foreign policy stage is strewn with death and destruction. Think about the carpet bombing of Cambodia that led to the demonstrations against the war in May 1970 and to the murders at Kent State and Jackson State University. Think about the coup in Chile that overthrew Salvador Allende.

Now, Nixon’s entire Cabinet is dead.

Kissinger’s philosophy was to look at “the big picture”. He was gladdened by how his China diplomacy rattled the Soviets. Most of Wrongo’s current thinking about Kissinger comes from reading Christopher Hitchens’ 2001 book, “The Trial of Henry Kissinger”. Hitchens talks about Kissinger’s role in the destruction of Chilean democracy in favor of the Pinochet dictatorship. And when Pinochet ordered the assassination of dissenter and former U.S. ambassador Orlando Letelier on US soil by blowing up his car in Washington, Kissinger was fine with that.

He was responsible for the prolongation of the Vietnam War through the sabotage of Lyndon Johnson’s 1968 Vietnam peace talks along with the civilian deaths from the US’ bombing in Laos and Cambodia, helping to usher in the Khmer Rouge, while also not doing anything positive to win the Vietnam war. Kissinger then became supportive of the Khmer Rouge. He saw its leader, Pol Pot as a counterweight against North Vietnam. He asked Thailand’s foreign minister to tell the Khmer Rouge: “We will be friends with them. They are murderous thugs, but we won’t let that stand in our way. We are prepared to improve relations with them.”

That was Kissinger’s moral philosophy.

Kissinger was behind the Greek military junta’s invasion of Cyprus in 1974, and the Pakistani army’s crimes against humanity in East Pakistan (now Bangladesh). And we shouldn’t forget the Indonesian invasion and subsequent destruction of East Timor.

Quite the record for a Nobel Peace Prize Laureate.

Late in life. Kissinger continued supporting authoritarians including Putin. Kissinger intervened in Putin’s imperialist war in Ukraine in 2022 to support the idea that the West should bully Zelensky into giving up territory to the Russians. He was also on the board of Theranos helping to facilitate the fraud while lining his pockets.

Wrongo wrote earlier this year about how he started out as a Kissinger fanboy, having read his 1957 book “Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy” while in high school. It criticized the Eisenhower Administration’s “massive retaliation” nuclear doctrine. It proposed the use of tactical nuclear weapons on a regular basis to help win wars. By the time that Wrongo was running a tactical nuclear missile base in the mid-1960s, he was no longer a fan. From Wrongo:

“Wrongo met Kissinger in the mid-1980s at an event hosted by David Rockefeller at his Pocantico Hills estate. HK was walking his dog, a particularly obstreperous Golden Retriever. Wrongo asked “What’s the dog’s name?” Kissinger replied: “Madman”. Could there be a more perfect name for a Kissinger family pet?”

Here are a few headlines announcing Kissinger’s death:

You’ve gotta love the Rolling Stone headline.

Kissinger’s legacy is defined by his role in the US’s resumption of ties with China. He did the groundwork for Nixon’s 1972 visit to China and made more than 100 trips to the country over the years. The WaPo noted that the China state broadcaster labeled Kissinger an “old friend of the Chinese people.”

Let’s close with another possibly apocryphal story about Kissinger by Corey Robin:

Let’s hope that Henry the K is having a really hot time in his new condo.

The Stakes For Biden (And The US) In The Hamas War

The Daily Escape:

First snowfall, Tanglewood, Berkshires, MA – November 1, 2023 photo via Tanglewood Music Festival

For Wrongo, there have been few events that seemed immediately to foreshadow a change in our lives. The first was the assassinations of JFK and MLK. Although they were five years apart, they each signaled turning points. Wrongo felt that way about Hurricane Katrina and 9/11. Both conveyed the thought that our government was helpless against forces it didn’t control or understand.

Then came the election of Donald Trump, and now, the Hamas/Israel war — threats that we couldn’t process with conventional thinking.

In all of these cases, it was clear that something truly catastrophic had occurred, and that we had no idea how America, or the world, would respond.

Now we face the Hamas/Israel war. We’re trying to sort out how to react to what is in front of us every night as the day’s reports from Gaza arrive. It’s hard to watch the discourse around what’s happening in Gaza. The messages from both sides are depressing, since they both look the death and destruction in the face and say it’s caused by the other guy. It’s difficult to see how this ends.

Israel remains under rocket attacks both from Hamas in Gaza and from Hezbollah in Lebanon. We know that Hamas is holding hundreds of hostages in tunnels that are below densely-populated neighborhoods.

The security systems that were designed to protect Israelis were proven wholly inadequate on Oct.7. Netanyahu and the coalition government have been discredited yet remain in power. The people demand justice and that security be provided somehow.

Israel doesn’t want a cease fire, yet that is what Hamas and a growing number of countries are pushing for.

OTOH, what Israel is attempting to do is nearly impossible. How do a million people get moved from the north of Gaza to the South? What makes sense about Israel’s plans to dismantle many of the homes and much of the infrastructure that the northern Gazans depend on, along with some 300 kilometers of tunnels? Why is it a moral war if Israel is willing and able to kill anyone who remains in the area? And when Israel is finished in the north, is there any assurance that they won’t turn to the south where they told the northern Gazans to go?

But as Simon Rosenberg says:

“It’s important to listen to the actual words of Hamas: – Israel must be eliminated, more attacks are coming – Killing of Jews/Americans in Israel is justified – Loss of life in Gaza is acceptable, as we are a “nation of martyrs”

Rosenberg shows this video by Hamas Official Ghazi Hamad in which he says:

“We Will Repeat the October 7 Attack Time and Again Until Israel Is Annihilated; We Are Victims – Everything We Do Is Justified”

And do you really think that Netanyahu will get some kind of deal for hostages done? We need to accept that most of them will be martyrs to the Israeli cause if the war continues. Does anyone believe that Hamas can be made to release the hostages and then surrender to Israel? Even though Hamas initiated this conflict and they could save their own people by taking responsibility, that’s not going to happen.

Where does this leave the US? Biden woke up on Oct. 7 to find himself thrust into the middle of the second major foreign-policy crisis of his term. He embraced Israel, along with what now look like two conflicting imperatives: Support Israel and prevent an escalation of the war.

There’s also a brewing political crisis at home. Polls show that most Americans side with Israel in the conflict and approve of both Israel’s retaliation against Hamas and US support for it. Republicans tend to be more supportive of Israel than Democrats, who have become more sympathetic toward Palestinians over the past several years. But majorities in both Parties are broadly supportive of Israel.

Yet Biden’s unconditional Israel support also brings the risk of regional escalation. Despite his efforts to convince the Israeli government to limit the scope and scale of its military response to Hamas’s attack and consider a “humanitarian pause,” Israel launched its ground invasion anyway.

The offensive will inevitably inflict large-scale Palestinian casualties (especially since Hamas will continue to put civilians between them and the Israelis). It will also lead to a marked escalation in attacks on Israel and US interests across the Middle East that could easily destabilize the region.

Unlike the war in Ukraine, where the US has worked hard to ensure that support of Kyiv doesn’t risk direct military confrontation between them and Russia, the US risks becoming directly involved in the Israel/Hamas war. For better or worse, Biden owns it, if it happens.

While most voters are aligned with Biden’s stance on the war, it poses two political challenges to Biden’s 2024 prospects from the Left and the Right.

From the Right, Biden will be accused of projecting weakness on the global stage. Trump is already making the false case that the two major wars of Biden’s term happened only because Biden’s weakness emboldened our adversaries. Trump will argue that the relative ME calm during his administration was due to his strategy of “peace through strength,” particularly with Russia and Iran. He’ll claim that neither would have dared test the US had he been in office.

Will this be compelling for Republican-leaning swing voters? Remember that Trump’s Abraham Accords – which normalized diplomatic relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco, and Sudan, ignored the Palestinians and helped sow the seeds for the Oct. 7 attack. Also that Trump’s constant threats to NATO were a gift to Putin.

Regardless of what happens next, Biden will always be the president on whose watch these two wars – both of which the US is funding, started.

From the Left, Biden will be accused of enabling Israel’s killing of innocent Palestinians. A CNN poll from earlier this month shows that just 27% of 18-to-34-year-olds view Israel’s military response to the Hamas attacks as “fully justified,” compared to 81% of those 65 or older. Then there’s Muslim and Arab-American voters, around two-thirds of whom backed Biden in 2020. Recent polls show that very few of them plan to vote for Biden again in 2024.

Faced with the Biden vs. Trump choice, these voters (who were an important part of the Democratic coalition in 2020 and 2022) would probably stick with Biden as the lesser evil (or stay home and thereby benefit Trump).

But third-party candidates like Cornel West, who is critical of Israel, could hurt Biden. A USA Today poll shows West already picking up between 4-7% of the vote nationally, primarily from Biden. It would only take 2-3 percentage points for West to be a spoiler in a swing state like Wisconsin, potentially tipping the balance to Trump in a close election.

At the same time, a Middle East crisis that Biden can’t fix could hurt him particularly if the war escalates. Biden will also bear the burden for any terrorist and antisemitic attacks in the US between now and the end of his term.

Can Biden broker a peace when neither side wants one?

For now, Biden is the narrow favorite to win reelection, largely because of Trump’s extraordinary criminality and his unique weaknesses. But if the ME is still dominating our headlines in November 2024, all bets are off.

They Have No Plan Except To Fight Each Other

The Daily Escape:

Nauset Beach, Orleans, MA – October 2023 iPhone photo by Wrongo

It’s already been a long year…and there are still 3 months left! Two issues dominated this week: the Hamas war on Israel and the Republican intramurals in the House.

Let’s start with the Republicans. Semafor reports that Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA) gave up on his quest to become Speaker even though he had been nominated by his caucus as their candidate:

“Scalise withdrew himself from the speaker’s race just one day after colleagues narrowly nominated him for the job, as it became clear he lacked the 217 votes necessary to secure the chair. But there are serious doubts that Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), Scalise’s top rival, can pull together the support necessary for a win — in part due to the bad blood over his contest against Scalise.”

This isn’t a time for Republican arm wrestling. The country and the world need attention. As AB Stoddard says at the Bulwark:

“THE REPUBLICANS WHO CONTROL the House of Representatives cannot respond to a new war waged against Israel. They have rejected new aid to support Ukraine in its defense against the Russian invasion. They have no plan to keep the government from shutting down on November 17 when funding next runs dry.”

Right now, there’s no path forward. While many things in this world are broken, this isn’t a case of American politics being “broken”. If as many pundits say, American politics are broken, we’d have seen things just like this when Democrats controlled the House. But they didn’t. What’s broken is the Republican Party.

A few House Republicans have suggested that their only choice might be to strike a bargain with Democrats. But behind closed doors, there hasn’t been a real effort to hatch a bipartisan deal, writes Semafor’s Kadia Goba: (brackets by Wrongo)

“I don’t think there has been legitimate outreach….Sure, those members talk to the press, but not to Hakeem Jeffries [the Democrats’ Majority Leader] or leadership.”

The potentially disastrous consequences of a broken House of Representatives are real, and some Republicans understand that. GOP Rep. Michael McCaul (R-TX) said the following after Scalise withdrew his name from consideration:

“We are living in a dangerous world, the world’s on fire. Our adversaries are watching what we do — and quite frankly, they like it. I see a lot of threats out there. One of the biggest threats I see is in the [GOP caucus] room, because we can’t unify as a conference and put the speaker in the chair…”

Brian Tyler Cohen, who hosts the podcast No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen, summed up where the GOP is at with his post on Xitter:

“The fact that ALL Republicans would rather fight over Scalise (who attended a neo-Nazi event) or Jordan (who allegedly covered up rampant sexual abuse) rather than simply work with Democrats to elect a Speaker says it all.”

There are two possible paths forward: Either the Republicans unite behind one candidate for Speaker, or they accept that it will take some Democratic votes to elect a bipartisan candidate. “Bipartisan” is a dirty word among many House Republicans. They have broken the House and have zero intent to fix it.

They must be stopped before they break us all.

The murderous rampage by Hamas last weekend against Israeli civilians and Israel’s sharp response will reverberate for years to come. Eric Levitz wrote in New York Magazine:

“This weekend in Israel, a far-right Islamist group perpetrated the largest mass killing of Jews since the Holocaust, murdering entire families, including babies…and slaughtering 260 concertgoers. More than 1,000 Israelis were killed in all, and over 100 others taken hostage.

Israel’s far-right government predictably responded by choking off all food, electricity, and fuel to Gaza’s 2 million residents and then preparing a military assault more untempered by concern for civilian casualties than ever before.”

The Israeli Ministry of Defense just notified the UN that Palestinians living in Gaza City should evacuate to the southern part of the Gaza Strip. But more than 1 million Palestinians live in this area. How is it possible for so many people to move, even if they had months to do it?

If you are a member of the center-left, It is difficult to see any positive influence on this situation. It shouldn’t be a question of whether you’re for Israel or against it. Terrorism directed at civilians is abhorrent regardless of who’s doing it.

And here at home, conservative pundits exploited Hamas’ attack to fearmonger about immigrants in America. Several right-wing media figures have baselessly warned that Hamas or other “sleeper cells” are lying in wait to attack major American cities, calling October 13 “Day of Jihad”. They also used this lie against American Muslims after 9/11.

What’s happening now between Israel and Hamas makes you want to throw up your hands in despair. It’s impossible to think of or see a solution that can satisfy all sides. Despite that, we need to take a break from so much frustration. We need our Saturday Soother. We need to stiffen our spines for what will be yet another week of horror and nonsense.

Here on Cape Cod, the weather is seasonably crisp, so we will be wearing jackets to today’s Wellfleet Oysterfest. Later, we’ll go to the beach to watch the sunset that is coming earlier every day.

To meditate for a few moments on the Hamas/Israel war, grab a comfy chair and listen to John Lennon’s “Imagine” from his 1971 album of the same name. Released during the heart of the Vietnam War, Lennon asks us to envision a world of peace and unity. “Nothing to kill or die for And no religion too”:

Sample Lyric:

Imagine there’s no countries
It isn’t hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace

You may say I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will be as one

Is The Palestinian-Israel Problem Solvable?

The Daily Escape:

Early Autumn, Telluride, CO – October 2023 photo by Steven Carr

We wake up this Monday to yet another conflagration in the Middle East. Israel officially declared war Saturday night after Hamas terrorists launched a surprise barrage of thousands of rockets into southern Israel. It is Israel’s first declaration of war since the Yom Kippur War in 1973. On Sunday, another Iran-backed group, Hezbollah, attacked military targets in northern Israel from its positions in southern Lebanon.

From the WSJ:

“Thousands of rockets were fired into Israel early Saturday to begin what Hamas called ‘Operation Al-Aqsa Storm,’ Mohammed Deif, Hamas’s secretive military chief, said”.

The WSJ also reported that Deif blamed an Israeli “desecration” of the Al Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem, located on the site known as the Noble Sanctuary to Muslims and the Temple Mount to Jews. It is the most sacred site for Jews, among the holiest for Muslims and one of the most fought-over pieces of land in the world.

But there’s more to Deif’s assertion than has been reported in the US press. The New Arab reports that on October 5:

“More than 800 Israeli settlers stormed the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in occupied East Jerusalem on Thursday morning under the protection of Israeli forces.”

We know that the Hamas attacks on Israel began two days later on October 7. From the WaPo:

“The events of the weekend come in the context of 75 years of Israeli occupation of the Palestinians. For Palestinians and supporters across the Middle East who poured into the streets in Tehran, Beirut, Istanbul and Sanaa, Yemen, to celebrate the Hamas attack, the violence was a response to decades of Israeli restrictions, harassment and violence against Palestinians living under Israeli control.”

Even if the Palestinians lose again, which is almost certain, they’ve won. They were able to achieve complete surprise against the Israeli Defense Force (IDF). They overran IDF positions and dragged away IDF soldiers. Video has shown Palestinians driving IDF vehicles. Hundreds of rockets were able to overwhelm Israel’s Iron Dome anti-missile system. The vaunted Israeli intelligence agency apparently didn’t catch wind of an operation that must have taken months to plan, possibly involving hundreds if not thousands of people.

And Netanyahu, whose main claim to fame is that he’s kept Israel safe, is overseeing the country’s worst military debacle in decades. And against Hamas, who has been seen as largely ineffective.

And the one thing that’s already clear is that Israel, (assuming it wins this fight, which is probable), will exact a terrible price from the Palestinians.

Israel is never far from another election. Each of the recent governments they have elected have been coalitions among far-right parties. In one sense the Hamas attack gives the Israeli hardliners a win. And if they get more powerful, the Israelis will grab more land, they will “cleanse” the land they grab, and as a country, become more theocratic.

So yes, Hamas has scored a short term victory. Let’s see how it plays out two years from now.

In paging through comments on the attack on multiple news services, is appears that it’s impossible to simultaneously condemn Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians, while also pointing out that Hamas’ attack on Israel is indefensible. Partisanship prevents a reasoned view.

But the performative knee jerk support by partisans on both sides seems misplaced just now. Two things can be true: The Israeli government and the settlers have been cruel and provocative. They have contributed to the dispossession of the Palestinians; and Hamas is a corrupt anti-democratic institution that does very little for its citizens, and whose attack on Israeli civilians is unjustified and lacks a moral foundation.

Here in America, the Right supports Israel without question. This weekend some were even saying that Biden is funding Hamas, an outright lie. Many Democrats see Israel as a religious-based apartheid power. But few in the US see the Palestinians as freedom fighters.

Time to wake up America! While it may feel good to call the Palestinians simply another group of Islamic terrorists, that provides zero clarity or a solution to the conflict itself. The Palestinians deserve human rights and a say in how they live.

Israel deserves peace and security.

These objectives must shape any discussion of a cease fire. Unfortunately, as elsewhere in the Middle East, air strikes, rocket attacks and the killing of civilians drowns out dialogue.

America is staring down some major shit with short and longer term global consequences. But some treat it as just another day in the neighborhood. This is a good time to remember that when you throw a stone in the pond, the ripples reach all the way to the shore.

Are Drones Replacing Artillery As “The King Of Battle”?

The Daily Escape:

First Snow, Cedar Breaks NM, UT – October 2023 photo by Dawn A. Flesher

America is all a-twitter over whether we are going to continue to fund Ukraine. The basic argument NOT to fund them going forward is how expensive it is, and how the money could be better used at home. Paul Krugman disputes this:

“In the 18 months after the Russian invasion, US aid totaled $77 billion. That may sound like a lot. It is a lot compared with the tiny sums we usually allocate to foreign aid. But total federal outlays are currently running at more than $6 trillion a year, or more than $9 trillion every 18 months, so Ukraine aid accounts for less than 1% of federal spending (and less than 0.3% of GDP. The military portion of that spending is equal to less than 5% of America’s defense budget.”

Wrongo isn’t saying that $77 billion is chump change. But if the MAGA types making the argument to spend it at home instead of in Ukraine would actually agree to increasing social spending with it, they’d have a solid argument. But that’s doubtful. It’s difficult to see them agreeing to spending anywhere near that level to improve the economic distress of America’s middle class and poor.

One thing that thinking about this expense highlights is just how expensive our military hardware has become. Take the F-35 fighter jet, which cost about $80,000,000 each. Air and Cosmos International reports that the maintenance costs for the F-35 are $42,000 per flight hour. And it’s reported that only about 26% of all F-35s are “available” at any point in time, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

It’s maybe an unfair comparison but think about how many drones Ukraine could purchase with one hour’s operating expense of one F-35, or with one of the bombs it carries, which cost about $500,000 each. One hour of F-35 operating expense equals about seven switchblade drones. The smallest Switchblade model fits in a backpack and flies directly into targets to detonate its small warhead. Each F-35 bomb’s cost is equivalent to around 90 drones.

America’s military strategy is based on air superiority, followed by massive bombing sorties and artillery fire. The big lesson in Ukraine is that piloted aircraft have been mostly irrelevant. Russia has many more and newer aircraft, and although they’ve bombed much of Ukraine, they haven’t gained an advantage as a result. Basically they’re using jets to launch missiles from positions beyond the range of Ukraine’s Stinger and Patriot missile systems.

Similarly, Russia’s navy hasn’t been decisive vs. Ukraine. Russia has the advantage at sea, while Ukraine’s ancient fleet is bottled up. But Ukraine is managing to ship (some) grain because the Russian navy is hiding from Ukraine’s cheap naval drones.

Ukraine isn’t breaking through Russia’s lines because its military, like Russia’s military, isn’t fit for the purpose. The artillery-based stalemate on the ground would favor Ukraine if it wasn’t for the in-depth layering of land mines by the Russians in the Ukrainian territory that the Ukies are trying to retake.

The days when Russia could advance into Ukraine under a screen of artillery fire, as they did during the first summer of the war, are over. Ukraine is the one advancing now. From Mark Sumner:

“Over the past several months, Russia tried to make advances at Svatove, quickly capturing a series of villages. That attack fizzled within days, and a week later Ukraine recaptured all the territory it had lost. Something similar happened at Kupyansk, where Russia was reportedly massing over 100,000 troops to drive Ukraine back across the Oskil River. Ukraine is still on the east side of the Oskil, and still in Kupyansk.”

At the moment, Ukraine appears capable of successfully capturing areas it targets and holding them against subsequent Russian assaults.

That’s not to say that the militaries built by the US, NATO, China and Russia are useless. Obviously, they have great value. But it’s clear how capital intensive warfare has become. Ukraine is showing us that there is an evolution in military tactics underway right in front of us.

In Ukraine, drones—both aerial and aquatic—have reached a critical mass. They are demonstrating widespread capabilities that make some traditional weapons systems take on more limited roles. And the immediate future in the Ukraine/Russian war will be drone warfare.

Any military in the world will become somewhat obsolete particularly in a land war, without a robust drone and anti-drone program. All are working feverishly to get there. Except perhaps for Turkey, who’s Bayraktar drones are already exported to both sides in the Russia-Ukraine war.

In Ukraine, drones have redefined the front lines. Before, we generally regarded the front line as the area where the infantry of both sides were engaged. But if soldiers with drones and a smart phone can project force sufficient to stop a tank 4-5 miles away, and then pick up another $1,000± drone and do it again a few minutes later, where’s the real front line?

This and more can be done with precision weapons like HIMARS at even greater ranges. But that requires more expense, more setup, and greater levels of support. There’s a vast logistical train behind a weapon like a mobile HIMARS launcher.

Going back to Napoleonic times, artillery has always been called “the king of battle”, because there’s no real defense against it once it’s firing. But this old artillery officer can tell you that it comes with those pesky logistics problems and much more expense and training.

In contrast, what’s needed to support a DJI quadcopter is in the hands of the operator. Early in the war, drones were performing roles that formerly were played by traditional aircraft. Now they’re also performing the roles of artillery and mortars. They are precision systems that deliver value at not just a lower price, but with fewer burdens of transport, maintenance, and training.

Like Ukraine, Russia has a lot to gain from drones since they bypass the two things that Russia does badly: logistics and training. You don’t need to get a million shells to the front lines if you can get a hundred thousand drones—and better than half of them will hit their target.

Drones can’t replace much more of the military equipment in the field, because the legacy equipment still has a big edge in both range and destructive power. But the cost-benefit ratio of drones is incredibly favorable. As battery technology continues to improve, the destructive power of drones will go up without significant incremental development cost.

What we’re seeing in Ukraine is the 2020s version of the asymmetric warfare that killed us in Vietnam and Afghanistan. Guerilla tactics on their home turf were more valuable than all of our expensive weapons systems.

And Russia is getting their ass kicked by the same kind of asymmetry in Ukraine today.

(Many thanks to Brendan K. for his input to this column)

Henry Kissinger’s Reputation

The Daily Escape:

Sunset, Flaming Gorge Reservoir Recreation Area, UT – August 2023 photo by Doreen Lawrence. The Gorge is the largest reservoir on the Green River.

Welcome to your Monday wakeup call! Wrongo has lived a long life, but he’s still 20 years younger than Henry Kissinger. Kissinger turned 100 in May. When Wrongo was in his late teens, he was protesting against the war in Vietnam. At that point, Kissinger was already a foreign policy advisor to the failed presidential campaigns of Nelson Rockefeller.

He would go on to become Nixon’s national security adviser and Secretary of State, a crucial figure overseeing the conflicts in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos, that many say included war crimes. Kissinger was never indicted, but Anthony Bourdain wrote the following about Kissinger in his 2001 book “A Cook’s Tour”:

“Once you’ve been to Cambodia, you’ll never stop wanting to beat Henry Kissinger to death with your bare hands. You will never again be able to open a newspaper and read about that treacherous, prevaricating, murderous scumbag sitting down for a nice chat with Charlie Rose or attending some black-tie affair for a new glossy magazine without choking. Witness what Henry did in Cambodia—the fruits of his genius for statesmanship—and you will never understand why he’s not sitting in the dock at The Hague next to Milošević. While Henry continues to nibble nori rolls and remaki at A-list parties, Cambodia, the neutral nation he secretly and illegally bombed, invaded, undermined, and then threw to the dogs, is still trying to raise itself up on its one remaining leg.”

But unlike other possible US war criminals like Reagan and Nixon, Kissinger has never needed to rehabilitate his reputation. As Rebecca Gordon says:

“….despite his murderous rap sheet, the media and political establishment has always fawned over him.”

Kissinger is remembered for his initiative to open diplomatic relations between the US and China in 1972, though full normalization of relations with China would not occur until 1979.

Kissinger’s second innovation was inventing the for-profit third act of a public service career. Before him, former foreign policy principals usually wrote a memoir, gave the occasional foreign policy speech, and maybe became head of a nonprofit.

But Kissinger pioneered a for-profit third act in 1982 when he and Brent Scowcroft founded Kissinger Associates (with the help of a loan from the international banking firm of E.M. Warburg, Pincus) to offer advisory services to corporate clients. Kissinger’s prime selling point was that he had access to the corridors of power, not only in Washington, but in Beijing and Moscow.

Wrongo started out being a fanboy, having read Kissinger’s 1957 book “Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy” while in high school. It criticized the Eisenhower Administration’s “massive retaliation” nuclear doctrine. It also caused much controversy at the time by proposing the use of tactical nuclear weapons on a regular basis to win wars. Once Wrongo was running a tactical nuclear missile base in the mid-1960s, he was no longer a fan.

Wrongo met Kissinger in the mid-1980s at an event hosted by David Rockefeller at his Pocantico Hills estate. HK was walking his dog, a particularly obstreperous Golden Retriever. Wrongo asked “What’s the dog’s name?” Kissinger replied: “Madman”. Could there be a more perfect name for a Kissinger family pet?

Kissinger provided advice, both formal and informal, to every president from Eisenhower to Trump (though apparently, not yet to Biden). His fingers are all over the foreign policies of both major Parties. And in all those years, no “serious” American news outlet ever reminded the world of Kissinger’s long history of bloody intervention in other countries.

In fact, as his hundredth birthday approached, he was fawned over in an interview with PBS NewsHour anchor Judy Woodruff. From Rebecca Gordon:

“Fortunately, other institutions have not been so deferential. In preparation for Kissinger’s 100th, the National Security Archive, a center of investigative journalism, assembled a dossier of some of its most important holdings on his legacy.”

A third thing that Kissinger is associated with is the use of the concept of “Realpolitik” in foreign policy. It means conducting diplomatic policies based primarily on considerations of the reality on the ground, rather than strictly following ideology or moral and ethical premises.

Realpolitik has come to mean something quite different in the US: It is associated not with “what is” but with “what ought to be” on the ground. In Kissinger’s realpolitik, actions are good only when they sustain and advance American strategic power. Any concern for human beings that stand in the way, or for the law and the Constitution, are not legitimate.

Alaska! And Russia!

The Daily Escape:

Castle Mountain from Stikine River, Wrangell, AK – September 2023 iPhone photo by Wrongo. Castle Mountain is on the border between Alaska and British Columbia. This is a Nunatak, or a mountain that was higher than its surrounding glaciers, so over the centuries, it wasn’t rounded off by glacial movement.

This is the first day in several when we’ve had internet (or mobile) connectivity. So, here are a few thoughts on our Alaska trip and on the momentous news out of Russia.

First, we’ve had uncharacteristically beautiful weather! It’s usually raining at this time, but its been sunny and relatively warm for the first 10 days of our trip. Over the next few days, once we have better bandwidth, Wrongo will post more photos from the trip.

We have spent all of our time in Southeast Alaska, dropping in and out of fjords where the cruise ships cannot go. We’ve also spent quite a bit of time talking to members of the indigenous Tlingit nation. It is always interesting to learn about one of the many cultures that make up America. Ms. Right and I spent a morning with Joe Williams, a Tlingit ambassador and a former mayor of Ketchikan, Alaska. Attached is a video of Joe giving some highlights of Tlingit history. Joe explained about the Eagle and Raven clans and how the Tlingit gave their children over to uncles and aunts to be raised. The sociology of their tribes and family structure was fascinating.

Second, what the hell is going on in Russia? Wrongo and Ms. Right have gotten to know a retired Marine officer who is traveling with our group. He’s providing commentary for the BBC from our small ship, when we have comms. He says it is way too early to tell how this will fall out, or if there will be a new power alignment in Russia, or if this will make any difference in the Ukraine war.

But as the WSJ’s Peggy Noonan famously said in 2000, “it would be irresponsible not to speculate”, so here goes. It’s clear that Prigozhin became a threat to his buddy Putin simply by leveraging Russia’s assets. As Yale’s Timothy Snyder says:

“Unlike most of its other ventures, Wagner’s war in Ukraine was a losing proposition. Prigozhin leveraged the desperation of Russia’s propaganda for a victory by taking credit for victory at Bakhmut. That minor city was completely destroyed and abandoned by the time Wagner took it, at the cost of tens of thousands of Russian lives.”

Before the aborted coup, Wagner’s primary source of funding was the Russian state. Whether that will continue, given the supposed “deal” between Prigozhin and Putin, remains to be seen.

A couple of other points. Will Prigozhin actually go to Belarus? If he does, will he take some or all of his Wagner forces with him? If they all go to Belarus, who will be paying them? Its difficult to believe that Wagner and Prigozhin will remain inactive for very long. As mercenaries, they survive on extracting money from a benefactor and/or from the places where they operate.

There are several possible “deals” between Putin and Prigozhin that drove his “exile” in Belarus. According to the BBC, Prigozhin agreed to move to Belarus after he negotiated directly with Belarus leader Lukashenko.

Wrongo is most intrigued by the possibility that Wagner could open a second front in the Ukraine war from Belarus, similar to what Russia attempted in February 2022. Back then it looked like this:

With most of Ukraine’s military assets focused on a counteroffensive in the east and south, an attack from the northeast could prove decisive at a point in time when Moscow looks to be weak and vulnerable.

Will this happen? The thing to watch for is how many Wagner assets move to Belarus along with Prigozhin (assuming he moves there). Imagine if part of the “deal” is that Prigozhin is tapped by Belarus to be their army’s commander-in-chief, and they launch a second front during the driest time of the year, rather than in February like last time. Belarus was somewhat neutral in 2022, but since then have become much more tightly aligned militarily with Russia

Russia on the attack may have the resources to open up a second front in Belarus. The question is whether Ukraine can defend itself on one front while attacking Russia on its eastern front.

These are the interesting times we are doomed to live through. Let’s close with a tune from the Aquabats. This was recommended by granddaughter Mallory for our trip to Alaska. Here is “Hot Summer Nights (Won’t Last Forever)” from their 2005 album “Charge!”. Seems appropriate for our trip and for Prigozhin, no?

Sample Lyric:

Dear Elizabeth,
I hope you’re doing well
I think it’s so awesome that you’re out monitoring glacier patterns
In some remote part of Alaska where no one can get a hold of you
I thought I’d try anyway

The Wrongologist

Geopolitics, Power and Political Economy

Category: ForeignPolicy

Who Attacked The Civilians In Moscow?

Russia. China And Iran, And Other Thoughts

The End Of US Naval Superiority?

Kissinger Has (Finally) Left The Building

The Stakes For Biden (And The US) In The Hamas War

Is The Palestinian-Israel Problem Solvable?

Are Drones Replacing Artillery As “The King Of Battle”?

Henry Kissinger’s Reputation

Alaska! And Russia!