Center for a New American Security

I like to think our counterinsurgency reading list is pretty good, too, but this one, from the U.S. Army War College, is really comprehensive. (Thanks, Ross.)

IWnov09

Allow me to re-introduce myself: My name is Andrew Exum, and I have edited and authored the "Abu Muqawama" blog since February 2007. After much deliberation and consultation, I have decided to stop daily blogging. I owe it to the readership to explain both why and also how it will affect this site.

First off, I have steadily grown dissatisfied with blogging as a medium since returning fulltime in December of last year. The best bloggers I know -- the ones I read and enjoy, like Spencer Ackerman, Tom Ricks and Andrew Sullivan -- are either also journalists or started out as journalists. They are much better at offering on-the-spot commentary and analysis on the events of the day. My friend and boss Nate Fick, meanwhile, accurately described me last week as being someone who enjoys taking a more deliberate approach and digging deep down into an issue before offering comment. Blogging forces me into more or less split-second reactions to complicated policy events before I have had the opportunity to research and weigh opposing views. In addition, the AD/HD nature of this medium -- as well as its format -- has harmed both my research abilities as well as my ability to write in the long form. Blogging, like any medium, is one you get better at with practice. As I have become a better blogger, my long-form writing skills have atrophied.

Second, since starting at CNAS and taking up a more public profile, I have grown concerned over the reaction to my blogging and public commentary. A few months ago, Lady Muqawama, after reading one of the comments threads here, asked me, half joking and half serious, "Are you going to be assassinated?" And when I had my phone turned off today for a CNAS offsite event, I turned it back on to a text message from her asking if I had been kidnapped by a disgruntled reader. (Again, only half joking.) I know that sounds ridiculous, but unlike me, my girlfriend and my mother read all the comments on this site, and they also read posts on the internet like this one. Sorry, but this is simply no longer worth it. I may have a certain talent for writing clever 200-word blog posts and offering sound bites on television, but I enjoy neither doing so nor the effects of doing so. In my heart, I would much rather do research, read more books, play more rugby and take on a more active role in my community than be some public figure sprinting from television interview to radio spot, twittering in the cab along the way.

So how will this blog change? First off, let me tell you how it will stay the same. This blog will remain an active website hosted by CNAS, and it will remain a home for Londonstani's awesome field reports from such dangerous places as the Federally Administered Tribal Areas and the ends of the Victoria Line. Second, I aim to use this blog in a different way than I have so far done. I look to friends like Marc Lynch and Reidar Visser and admire the way they use their blogs to highlight ongoing academic and policy research. I aim to do the same, which means you can expect me to post far less often but in a more considered way.

I want to thank the loyal readership for all its support. I treasure the community of people who read this blog, offer non-crazed commentary, and have reached out to become friends and drinking partners. I appreciate your continued support and hope you stay in touch.

A story has been rumbling on in Pakistan for a couple of weeks now that just plain refuses to go away. 

The daily newspaper, the Nation, published an article on Nov 5 claiming US journalist Matthew Rosenberg, South Asia Correspondent for the Wall Street Journal, was spying in Pakistan. Rosenberg left the country and the WSJ responded with an open letter signed by a bunch of US, British and French outlets along with Al Jazeera.

Now, Londonstani finds this "foreign journalists are spies" rumour mongering really distasteful. It looks like the article fulfilled a couple of aims for whoever thought it was a good idea.

1) It embarasses a couple of senior officials, who are named, for potentially providing information on military matters to an American spy

2) It plays to suspicions about America and might sell a few more copies

3) Last but not least, it gets rid of a journalist who might have been printing stories someone somewhere didn't like

Stories like this are common all over the Middle East, and it always surprises Londonstani that people reading this stuff in countries with strong US ties stop and think "hmm.. maybe they're are up to something dodgy", since, it's absolutely no secret that the militaries of these places are briefing US intelligence agencies several times a day. Seriously people, what does everyone think the president, prime minister and head of the army were doing when the CIA director visited Islamabad last week??

So, about this story in particular:

"To the surprise and shock of many, top bosses of Federally Administrated Tribal Area (FATA) Secretariat are allegedly feeding these journalists with secret reports and information regarding Pak Army and militant groups operating there."

How secret are these "secret reports and information" exactly? Is it stuff the Pakistanis would give the American intelligence agencies anyway?

Why would officials meet a journalist anyway? In Londonstani's experience, officials don't meet journalists unless they have some spin they are trying to get out into the open. Were these Pakistani officials trying to press upon US public opinion that their country was serious about going after militants? In this case maybe Shireen Mazari, the editor in chief of the Nation, has actually harmed her country in her unthinking and unblinking one-woman mission to protect Pakistan. She did something similar when she responded to the Seymour Hersh article on Pakistan's nukes by telling everyone that Hersh couldn't be believed as he got the protection levels on Pakistani nuclear weapons totally wrong. They were, in fact, she said, stored in a way that made them much easier to activate.

In a television interview on the brewing controversy, Mazari repeated the pointed out that Rosenberg has broken the law by going up to FATA and NWFP without getting proper clearance.

Now, getting this clearance, is cumbersome and bureaucratic and most journalists go up to Peshawar and the rest of NWFP without it. This doesn't make them spies, as it doesn't make Rosenberg a spy. It should be added that the journalists who went up to Waziristan for Hakimullah's first interview last year were all Pakistani and all sneaked up past checkpoints in violation of the law. If you are going to do some reporting that involves more than shooting the breeze with friends you're likely to end up breaking  rules. That's not the same as spying.

Rosenberg's safety was threatened by this article. Londonstani hopes that anyone reading this who is angered by the treatment that Rosenberg received, also takes a moment to remember what happened to Sami al Hajj, the Sudanese Jazeera cameraman who ended up in Guantanamo for six years without charge after Pakistani forces handed him over to the US.

Finally, the Nation article is just terrible news writing. The title doesn't match the lede, there is no quote to back up the central argument. There are a bunch of unanswered questions; If Pakistani officials were feeding sensitive information to a foreign national, could they be prosecuted? What was Rosenberg doing with this information? (If he was writing articles, then, ummm.. he's just a boring journalist). It's a legal minefield, etc etc.

Anyway, Londonstani thought spies never pose as journalists anyway, that would just be too predictable.

Is there really a difference between the Taliban in Pakistan and the Taliban in Afghanistan? The question divides the Pakistani and American governments as well as analysts and observers, including those that post comments on this blog.

Events in and concerning Pakistan over the past couple of days have brought this question into sharper focus.

Apart from the military operation going on in Waziristan, Pakistan is keen to show that it is going after the men killing Pakistanis by the hundreds every week. Pakistani law enforcement agencies and the army's efforts are vital to assuage the growing despair and anger of a population that literally fears for its life as it goes out to buy food it is finding harder to afford. The latest attacks took place on Thursday, when a suicide bomber and a roadside bomb killed 22 people in Peshawar. So, the state machinery is keen to tell everyone how many militants it has killed and which is has caught - like the alleged mastermind of a string of attacks in the capital.

But is Pakistan choosing to fight the enemy it can't ignore while avoiding a clash with the militants fighting ISAF in Afghanistan? - You know the ones it, along with the US, helped train and kinda hopes will be its anti-Indian proxy in the new Afghanistan? It's no secret that the US thinks so. And reports in the local media suggest that CIA Director Leon Panetta made the point during his visit to Islamabad.

Yesterday, the Washington Times rode into the debate by claiming that Pakistan had relocated Mullah Omar, the leader of the Afghan Taliban, and moved him to Karachi. Yes, the WT isn't known for its extensive reporting network. And it is owned by Moonies, who spend most of their time worrying about how to get everyone married, (which sort of makes them quite ideologically akin to much of the Pakistani population). But you know what Moonie ownership means? Yep, good contacts with the CIA.

The named source in the story is Bruce Riedel, the man who chaired the Whitehouse review of Afghanistan-Pakistan policy earlier this year. It should be noted however that Riedel's actual quote from the article isn't the most definitive:

"Some sources claim the ISI decided to move him further from the battlefield to keep him safe" from U.S. drone attacks, said Mr. Riedel, who headed the Obama administration's review of policy for Afghanistan and Pakistan last spring. "There are huge madrassas in Karachi where Mullah Omar could easily be kept."

Although, the article goes on:

"A second senior intelligence officer who specializes in monitoring al Qaeda said U.S. intelligence had confirmed Mullah Omar's move through both electronic and human sources as well as intelligence from an unnamed allied service."

The article also quotes analyst Mary Habeck, a professor at John Hopkins, saying that the information suggests the Pakistani and Afghan Taliban are one in the same thing. Her position seems to be based on the idea that the Taliban have pretty much left Karachi alone.

But something doesn't sit quite right with Londonstani about all this. The evidence of inter Taliban squabbles as well as the attacks on civilians (which the "official" Taliban maintain are outside their rules of engagement) suggest that their aren't one or two Talibans but lots and lots of Talibans. Maybe it's comforting to see your enemy as  distinct unified force, but is it more realistic to assume that "Taliban" is a convenient umbrella for a bunch of mixed grieviances and motivations?

The New York Times profiles one of the great counterinsurgents of the contemporary era ... and a great friend and mentor to this blogger.

RARELY does the hulking commander of American forces in Iraq meet with Iraqis or go to a news conference without a slight, dark-haired woman standing just a little to one side — as if to give him space, but almost always in his line of sight and within earshot.

 

The woman is Emma Sky, and she is an unlikely figure in the milieu of the generally strait-laced American military. She is British, 41, a civilian and a onetime opponent of the war, but nevertheless a political adviser, as well as confidante on many policy matters to the American commander, Gen. Ray Odierno.

 

She is often compared to Gertrude Bell, a celebrated early-20th-century British adventurer who was an architect of modern Iraq. That may be an overstatement, but Ms. Sky is nevertheless, like Ms. Bell, a woman to be reckoned with.

On the continuing theme of "what Pakistanis think" on various issues, an article in The Nation (a newspaper mostly known for calling out American journalists as spies and forcing them to leave the country) sums up the sheer exasperation quietly expressed by Pakistanis of all walks of life. Titled An Open Letter to Allah, Londonstani thinks it's definitely worth a read:

"....Pakistan is run by the three A's - namely Army, America and Allah...Out of a choice of writing open letters to General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, President Barack Obama or You, I decided I had the best chance of being heard by You because, and I quote from Your Book: 'I comply with the call of the caller when he calls me'"

"As a country we are in such a bind. Depression surrounds us as we fight an enemy that we cannot even see. We fight an enemy that has unclear reasons for doing what they are doing. We are stuck with a leadership who, for the foreseeable future and even if it changes face, will always put themselves first. Their own security, their perks and privileges, their wealth and acquisitions. They constitute a club which we, the ordinary citizens, cannot break."

"Ever since You gave us a beautiful, independent country 62 years ago, this is probably the most desolate winter. The people have no respite from struggling to keep their bodies and souls together. Poverty is rampant and so is hopelessness. Nothing seems to divert attention from the insecurity and uncertainty of our existence. Dear God, even if it is not possible to go back to starting point again, give us the collective wisdom and strength to overcome our problems."

"It feels dreadful when we read of our place among the corrupt nations of the world and see the bulky Cabinet which needs a sound system installed for one end to be audible to the other. From among those we have elected, give us a lean, dedicated bunch of ministers who don't care so much for their perks as they do for doing the right thing. Give them the will to guard and protect their areas of responsibilities. Give us a judiciary that is beyond reproach. Give us a media that is an unbiased watchdog and, most of all, give us a civilian and military bureaucracy that does not overstep the boundaries drawn up for it."

"The flower of our youth is sacrificing their lives on the battlefield every day. Our cities and innocent people are targets of terrorism so frequently and our hospitals full of the wounded. Yet, we remain steadfast because we believe. In the space of just 29 months, we have seen 2,540 innocent people die. Dear God, please arrest this mayhem. Restore calm, peace and prosperity to this land. Give us the confidence that when we step out for our every daily chores, we will return unharmed to our homes."

"...Give us back the promise that was Pakistan. Amen"

The reference to corrupt nations is in relation to Transparency International's latest report which places Pakistan in 42nd place. Last year, Pakistan was ranked 47th, so this is a significant deterioration in just a year. You'd think this was depressing enough for Pakistanis. But to get an idea of what the writer is really despairing over, check out the response of the leaders of whom she speaks:

"Governor Punjab Salmaan Taseer has said that the charges of corruption and misappropriation of funds are an attempt to destabilise the democratic government."

Londonstani really wishes Pakistani newspapers would have the direct quotes needed to back up their headlines. But, yeah, that's what they said the man said.

The article goes on:

Referring to the Transparency International, he expressed his doubts over the statistics given in its report and said, “The agency with its office located in London, is publishing the report as if it is operating in Pakistan. It should quote the statistics after a careful study.”

Yes, sometimes prayer really is your best option.

The trick with bad news in Washington is to release it on Friday afternoon so no one notices. That's the idea behind a new paper I wrote with Richard Fontaine on Yemen. Combined with Yezid's recent paper on SSR in Lebanon, Palestine and Yemen, this should make for some cheery weekend reading.

In the coming decades, Yemen will suffer three negative trends – one economic, one demographic, and one environmental. Economically, Yemen depends heavily on oil production. Yet analysts predict that its petroleum output, already down from 460,000 barrels a day in 2002 to between 300,000 and 350,000 barrels in 2007 and down 12 percent in 2007 alone, will fall to zero by 2017. The government, which receives the vast majority of its revenue from taxes on oil production, has conducted virtually no planning for its post-oil future. Demographically, Yemen’s population – already the poorest on the Arabian Peninsula with an unemployment rate of 40 percent – is expected to double by 2035. An incredible 45 percent of Yemen’s population is under the age of 15. Environmentally, this large population will soon exhaust Yemen’s ground water resources. Given that a full 90 percent of Yemen’s water is used in highly inefficient agricultural projects, this trend portends disaster.

Now go drink heavily.

"After many years during which I saw many things, what I know most surely about morality and the duty of man I owe to sport and learned it in the RUA." -- Albert Camus, Goalkeeper, Racing Universitaire Algerois

Is this story for real?! I never thought Iraqi prisoners could be so freaking awesome. These guys should all be pardoned:

BAGHDAD - It seems that the Brett Favre-Green Bay Packers saga is such a worldwide phenomenon that it's being used by detainees in American military camps.

 

According to a military official, detainees at a Wisconsin National Guard camp in Iraq are using Brett Favre as a manner of getting at the guard troops there.

 

"They know Favre by name," said First Lieutenant Tim Boehnen, who is from New Richmond, Wis. 

 

"One of the big words they know now is shenanigan.  They'll constantly talk about 'Favre shenanigans,' 'He's so good for the Vikings,' and 'The Packers have got to really feel bad about that one.'  "

 

According to Boehnen, it started when troops there started decorating their camp in Packers colors.

 

"We try to allow our troops to have as much fun in the compound as they can while still maintaining our professional manner," explained Boehnen.

 

"We spend a lot of time painting and making our compound our own and representing us.  Obviously, wherever Wisconsinites go, we bring the Packers with us."

 

Once the decoration job happened, detainees became curious.

 

"They obviously then started up the conversations, and started talking about Brett Favre.  They soon learned about Favre going to the Vikings, and things just started going downhill from there."

If two Arab countries can produce this much anger towards each other..

"Riot police in the Egyptian capital, Cairo, quelled a violent demonstration near the Algerian embassy in the early hours of Friday. Egyptian protesters reportedly hurled firebombs at police protecting the embassy and overturned a police van. Egypt's Interior Ministry said 35 people were injured"

..over a game of football

"The clashes stem from Egypt's defeat by Algeria in a World Cup qualifying match on Wednesday, securing Algeria the last African place for next year's finals."

..What would happen if Israel was playing?

OK, ok, so Londonstani knows there's bad blood between Egypt and Algeria... but hey, they've never fought a war - let alone three.

"The statement by Egypt's Football Federation added: "Egyptian fans, officials and players put their lives at risk before and after the game, under threat from weapons, knives, swords and flares".

"We should treat Algeria like any country that has declared war on us," university student Amr Higazi told Agence France Presse."

I mean seriously, this sounds like its turning to a mid sized diplomatic incident between Algeria, Egypt and then Sudan, when all they did was host!?

What. A. Legend.

“I went from Army deserter to colonel,” he said. “I served in two armies, in three wars — in Africa, Europe and Asia.” He said he had met presidents, “had my picture taken with some of them. But I was honored to fight for freedom, and I’d do it again.”

KABUL, Afghanistan — Tainted by a flawed election and allegations of high-level corruption in his regime, President Hamid Karzai was inaugurated Thursday for a second term, saying the Afghan Army should assume full control of the country’s security within five years.

Did any of you see this? FIFA needed both France and Portugal in this summer's World Cup, and both were facing playoff games after failing to qualify in the group stages. It would be a commercial disaster if either the former or the latter (which features the best player in the world at the moment) did not qualify. FIFA even seeded the playoffs based on world rankings rather than what happened in the group stages. What happened in Paris, then, last night? Let's just say that if I were Irish, I would be livid. Watch Thierry Henry's left hand.

Update: Judah was surprised I did not mention that the president of UEFA is Michel Platini. Scandal aside, Platini ... what a genius. Probably this blog's second-favorite French footballer. You already know this blog's all-time favorite. And watch this pass to Denis Irwin as a reminder of better days in Franco-Irish relations.

Many of you responded with a willingness to read and translate portions of this book by this man for me from the Hebrew. A friend volunteered, but rest assured, I will write a thank you note to the rest of you who wrote in volunteering. For now, thanks.

...like when one of our interns writes about Thorium and the nuclear fuel cycle. Another COINdinista, obviously.

Nice outfit, Madam Secretary. Putting Karl and Stan to shame. Look how happy she is, too. That's what style is all about: it should be about projecting your confidence to the world. Hamid Karzai, here I come!

In other, serious, news, do not expect an Afghanistan announcement until next week, Laura reports.

Did she mean for her new blog to be discovered? Well, it's too late now. One of our readers already did.

This may be the first spinoff from Abu Muqawama. Let's hope it's more Frasier to our Cheers than Enos to our Dukes of Hazard.

Oh no, the pride of Mahrouna, Haifa Wehbe, has gotten in trouble for calling those from Upper Egypt "monkeys". Tsk, tsk. I don't think singing this in Aswan is going to make up for the hurt, either.

There's little news coming out from independent sources about the Pakistani army's campaign in Waziristan. The suspicion amongst the international journalists and analysts is that the Pakistani army doesn't have the capacity to take out militants without causing serious collateral damage to civilians, and so the result of the present action will be further militancy in the future.

However, some journalists who have seen the government's efforts during the Waziristan campaign and before that in Swat have come away with a sense that the government has realised that succeeding against militancy is about resettlement and reconstruction as much as it is about blowing stuff up.

David Rose of The Mail, a British daily, spent a good long time in Peshawar, Swat and Dera Ismail Khan. Amid calls from U.S. and British officials for Pakistan to do more, David says that what Pakistan is doing, it is doing well, and ISAF forces on the other side of the Durand Line could learn a thing or two from the Pakistani approach.

David illustrates what the Pakistani state successes by pointing out how it dealt with refugees from the Swat campaign.

"When I last visited Pakistan in June, at the height of the Swat campaign, there were more than two million internally displaced persons (IDPs) living on the scorching plains in camps and relatives’ spare rooms.

But a remarkably efficient army-led transport and reconstruction effort has meant more than 95 per cent of them have been back home for weeks."

David's reporting suggests that the Taliban's ability to alienate practically everyone once in power is proving an asset to the Pakistani state.

"‘The people supported the Taliban because they felt the state was not giving them justice. But now they are finished," says one man from Mingora.

Extrapolating, Londonstani wonders if what David saw in Mingora is applicable to Pakistan as a whole? If we look past all the "slave of the West" talk, does the Taliban gain support when the state seems to have failed to provide the basics? And if the Taliban does manage to rule an area, does the state have a window of opportunity to prove to the population that they are better off without Taliban rule? But, doesn't that mean we could avoid all of this if the government could do a good job actually doing its job (like, you know, governing) in the first place.

Doesn't that make the solution seem tantalisingly close at hand? Help Pakistan govern properly.

Unfortunately, this is harder than it seems. In fact, it's so hard the government seems to be concentrating on letting people down gently instead of building up their hopes. A popular political banner at the moment proclaims, "The worst democracy is better than the best dictatorship." Londonstani is not so sure everyone agrees.

Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index is released today. Somalia just edges out Afghanistan for most corrupt nation on Earth.