Thursday, November 30, 2006

Are Mobb Deep Neo-Cons?

"You should spread love not war
Cause my shit is poppin
And I'd be god damned if you shot me
You need to spread love not war
Cause you wont feel safe
Comin out your crib, knowin that we got beef
"


(Thanks to Javier for pointing out this important connection.)

Wednesday, November 29, 2006

Hot off the Press

Required reading.
Saw Shimon Peres speak at Yale tonight. He gave a somewhat desultory lecture on how economic development was the key to peace and stability in the Middle East. There was one golden moment of his talk: (referring to Israel's planned expansion of its solar power producing facilities) "I'd rather depend on the sun than on the Saudis. The sun is more democratic."

So much for that.

Monday, November 27, 2006

Today's Yale Daily News column.

Saturday, November 25, 2006

For the Hershites out there

If you want to know what the new Secretary of Defense really has up his sleeve in regards to Iran, what better place to look than this extensive brief co-edited in 2004 by Zbigniew Brzezinski and Mr. Gates himself.

From page 47:

"Given the potential threat that Iran's acquisition of nuclear weapons could pose, the full range of alternatives--including military options--for confronting Tehran must be examined. Yet the use of military force would be extremely problematic, given the dispersal of Iran's program at sites throughout the country and their proximity to urban centers. Since Washington would be blamed for any unilateral Israeli military strike, the United States should make it quite clear to Israel that U.S. interests would be adversely affected by such a move. In addition, any military effort to eliminate Iranian weapon capabilities would run the significant risk of reinforcing Tehran's desire to acquire a nuclear deterrent and of provoking nationalist passions in defense of that very course. It would most likely also generate hostile Iranian initiatives in Iraq and Afghanistan."

Friday, November 24, 2006

To balance the interesting, but somewhat alarmist, Hersh piece in the New Yorker read George Packer's short bit in the journal's latest issue. Packer wrote the standard-bearer book on the war, The Assasin's Gate. It's nice to read such pragmatic commentary on the problems of withdrawal from someone other than Kagan or Kristol. As Packer points out, there are few who look at this question seriously and realistically, with most choosing instead to hide from the harsh realities of the ground behind political and ideological agendas of little relevance.

Packer points out an extremely interesting phenomenon, one of which I have recently become aware but have not yet put into words: the way, over the last year or two, so many liberals and left-leaning Democrats have become policy realists on the Iraq issue, framing the question of withdrawal in terms of American national interests without considering deeply its important humanitarian implications. And, while the neo-cons themselves have never had much regard for questions of humanitarian intervention, Kagan et al now present a case against withdrawal exactly in such terms. Perhaps they do so (similiarly to how they foisted upon us the ex post facto humitarian justification for invasion) in order to sell their interest-based agenda to a broader American base. Regardless, the burden is now squarely upon liberal Democrats who advocate withdrawal to explain, once all-out ethnic and religious slaughter commences in our absence, upon what grounds this withdrawal was justified. One of the most thoughtful left-wing warriors I know (more of a communist than anything) tried to sell me the argument the other day that he'd rather see Iraqis slaughtering each other than young American troops dying in a meaningless war. Is that the thinking behind advocates of withdrawal? If so, the Left has strayed far from its universalistic, humanitarian principles...

Thursday, November 23, 2006

I am thankful for, amongst other things, this useful new website from the folks at the Hudson Institute. Happy Thanksgiving! Enjoy!

Tuesday, November 21, 2006

More on Gaddis, Bush, and Bismarck

In his use of the term “shock and awe” in "Surprise, Security and the American Experience" and in his 2005 piece in Foreign Affairs, it is evident that Gaddis refers to a broader conception of shock and awe than the one envisioned by the military planners and strategists who originally coined the term. In its original coinage, shock and awe was a military concept, referring to a brand of limited, psychological warfare intended to achieve maximum battlefield effectiveness at a minimum cost in lives and materiel and with little damage to civilian infrastructure. Gaddis, however, uses the term to describe how offensive military operations can shock the international system from stasis such that it reconfigures itself favorably to one’s strategic interests. He writes:

It [is] free-market thinking applied to geopolitics: that just as the removal of economic constraints allows the pursuit of self-interest automatically to advance a collective interest, so the breaking up of an old international order would encourage a new one to emerge, more or less spontaneously, based on a universal desire for security, prosperity, and liberty. Shock therapy would produce a safer, saner world.”

For Gaddis, shock and awe is the Grand Strategic principle of the forward-looking statesman who, dissatisfied with the current world order uses his military power and influence to affect radical change therein. The wise statesman, Gaddis adds, will know when to stop administering such “shock therapy” and when to consolidate his gains in the protection and preservation of the changed international order.

It is important, however, that we do not forget the original tactical description of the shock and awe concept. Harlan Ullman, the inventor of the term, describes shock and awe as a means of affecting enemy surrender or paralysis in such a way that excessively costly and destructive military operations become unnecessary. Shock, Ullman writes, is “the momentary reaction to some event leading to paralysis, impotence and a feeling of helplessness…overcoming an enemy so quickly and rendering that enemy incapable so as to make any resistance futile or impossible.” Awe, he continues, is “an effect that translate[s] the initial shock into an enduring quality, so that will and perception would not revert to a pre-existing condition.” Perfect knowledge of the enemy, control of the battlefield environment, use of superior technology, and rapidity and efficiency of execution in battle are the tools that would allow one the ability to affect enemy surrender at such a low cost. The correct use of shock and awe strategy, Ullman concludes, will help one realize one’s post-war political objectives—short of complete military annihilation—by refusing to continue the use of indiscriminate and imprudent military force beyond when it is necessary.

These two different conceptions of the shock and awe idea—the Grand Strategic and the military—work well in tandem: affecting large-scale disruptions in the international order, as described by Gaddis, can be achieved through the accumulation of smaller-scale, rapid, and relatively painless military victories which help guarantee certain key political objectives. In other words, shock and awe applied on the tactical level in successful military operations can be sufficient itself to rattle the international order from the status quo. For example, military victories won quickly and easily can convey the sense to one’s enemies that they too could be quickly and easily overcome in violent confrontation. This may force one’s enemies to alter their conduct or to accept certain political compromises that they may not have been willing to before. Indeed, this seems to have motivated in part the Bush Administration’s decision to invade Iraq in 2003, as the Blitzkrieg operation was hoped to demonstrate to others with what celerity and ease the American military could affect regime change in distant regions of the world.

While Gaddis limits his characterization of Bismarck as shock and awe strategist to a description of how the statesman’s policies conformed to a certain Grand Strategic use of shock and awe, it is useful to consider to what extent Bismarck oversaw the use of shock and awe at the tactical, military level as well. In particular, how much can one can say that the Austro-Prussian War was won through the use of shock and awe-style military tactics in Helmuth von Moltke’s campaign? To what extent did Bismarck use the success of such tactics at the local level to realize a Grand Strategic vision for the restructuring of the European order in the post-war settlement?

Sunday, November 19, 2006

Seymour Hersh on Iran--Round II

Here.

Wednesday, November 15, 2006

A ridiculous, poetic NBA blog written by Flea. Enough said.
Remember how we all hoped that the Islamist front struggling for power in Somalia would turn out, once in power, to be, well, non-Islamist? That it would temper its goals once it were in charge of protecting and rebuilding a shattered state? Nope.

Tuesday, November 14, 2006

Bush and Bismarck

I am in the process of researching/composing a paper on the similarities between Bismarck's Austro-Prussian War of 1866 and Bush's Iraq War of 2003, particularly concerning the use of rapid, psychologically-crippling warfare in each conflict--"shock and awe" tactics. I just stumbled across this quote, which reflects pretty closely the shift that occurred in the Bush Administration after 9/11. It's an obvious point, but hearing it said in regards to the 1866 war makes the historical similarities between Bismarck and Bush of all the more interest: "After 1866, the example of Könnigrätz suggested that Prussia-Germany could extend its influence... against any rival if only it struck fast and hard enough...While other powers tended to view war as a question of 'defense,' the Germans, after 1866, came to relish its offensive potentialities."

John Gaddis turned me on to this comparison in his "Surprise, Security and the American Experience" and also in a 2005 piece in Foreign Affairs.

Sunday, November 12, 2006

A useful interactive graphic from Der Spiegel. Also shows what Europeans are thinking about the elections in the U.S. and the fate of Iraq. I'm not sure if the site has a translation feature, but it's worth looking at.

Friday, November 10, 2006

The Hippo gets coverage at Ivygate.
One of the more touching and revealing news stories about Iraq I've read in a while. I haven't much more to say for now in this space about Rumsfeld's resignation.
New Philosophical Gourmet rankings available here. Yale has moved up considerably, likely due to its hiring craze last spring.

Tuesday, November 07, 2006

whoa.

some public school in maine puts on a ballet of deerhoof's "milk man." the future of post-modern education...

Monday, November 06, 2006

a clausewitzian passage in proust...

"There is one aspect of war," I continued, "which I think Robert was beginning to comprehend: war is human, it is something that is lived like a love or a hatred and could be told like the story of a novel, and consequently, if anyone goes about repeating that strategy is a science, it won't help him in the least to understand war, since war is not a matter of strategy. The enemy has not more knowledge of our plans than we have of the objective pursued by the woman whom we love, and perhaps we do not even know what these plans are ourselves. Did the Germans in their offensive of March 1918 aim at capturing Amiens? We simply do not know. Perhaps they did not know themselves, perhaps it was what happened--their advance in the west towards Amiens--that determined the nature of their plan. And even if war were scientific, it would still be right to paint it as Elstir painted the sea, by reversing the real and the apparent, starting from illusions and beliefs which one then slowly brings into line with the truth, which is the manner in which Dostoiesky tells the story of a life. Quite certainly, however, war is not strategic, it might better be described as a pathological condition, because it admits of accidents which even a skilled physician could not have foreseen, such as the Russian Revolution."

Le Temps retrouvé

Sunday, November 05, 2006

question of the day...


What has proven even more difficult for me today than understanding the normative foundations of Marcuse's eudaemonistic/hedonistic theory of the good has been why the hell this guy is so sad if he just won the New York City Marathon.

- Image from NY Times.

Awaiting tomorrow's verdict...

Whatever happens, I'm sure it will be barbarous.

Saturday, November 04, 2006

Last night I witnessed one of the more amusing things I've seen at Yale in a while. The Harlem Shakes played a show in Ezra Stiles College along with Girl Talk, a Pittsburgh based D.J. whose wildly eclectic dance-beats sample everything from Nirvana to Dipset. About five minutes into the show, the stage was rushed and Girl Talk was thrown into the arms of the crowd, where he hung suspended for the majority of his set. (I thought crowd-surfing was a thing of the 90's, but who am I to judge...) In the last moments of the show, with Girl Talk hanging in the air, stripped to his underwear and screaming into the mic, he managed to articulate a thoughtful message to the crowd of sweaty Yalies: "I'm glad you guys have made it this far. You'll all have a big fucking impact on the world!" With that said, he fell to the ground.

Friday, November 03, 2006


Remember the '90s? Remember how good this band was (is)? I saw them for the first time this summer in East Berlin, in a warehouse full of sweaty, burned-out, 30-something Germans... Short-hair, tight-clothes--as if the era had never passed.

Today's Post from the Hippolytic

The Haggard Case


Well here's today's biggest headline: evangelical leader Ted Haggard is accused of having paid a gay prostitute for sexual service over the course of three years. He also admits to purchase of methamphetamines from a gay escort service in Colorado. In some sense, it seems like old news: big political or religious leader accused of sex scandal, massive cover-up ensues, rocks thrown everywhere, and not much changes (unless the Democratic president is impeached). Perhaps things won't happen again this way--it seems to me the evangelical machine isn't as secretive and hierarchical as the Catholic Church, although it is as rich and cut-throat as mainstream political parties. Regardless, I am dying to see how it will react. Whatever it does, it's in big trouble. It could condemn Haggard with equal force as it condemned Clinton or the Massachusetts priests of the Catholic Church's sex-scandal (remember how Santorum attributed this scandal to Boston's culture of "academic, political, and cultural liberalism"? It seems unlikely to me that it will do so, since it refused to come out so hard in the same way on Foley, de-emphasizing what he actually did and instead focusing on how the Democrats were supposedly using the issue for political purposes. The wider evangelical populace saw the scandal more as a result of Foley's own personal failings, rather than as a greater problem of the Republican party itself (i.e. its refusal to disclose telling information on one of its members.) While these aforementioned sex-scandals differ greatly from the Haggard case (Haggard's doesn't involve rape or pedolphilia) it seems we can learn some lessons from the Right's reaction to these former cases. It seems likely to me that the evangelical machine will offer some kind of limited defense of Haggard--if he actually admits his participation in such activity--while ultimately linking it all, à la Santorum, to some kind of "massive liberal conspiracy" (it's not me that does that Stan!).

But could this be a turning point of sorts? That is, could the evangelical community's realization that one of their leaders has *gasp* homosexual interests turn them on to the idea that perhaps homosexuality is much more human than they had previously imagined? Somehow I doubt it, and, in fact, it could swing the other way: Haggard's apparent use of drugs and prostitution may cement even more deeply the widely held belief in the connection of homosexuality and moral degeneracy. But perhaps the evangelical community will finally see an issue for what it is: a hypocrite in high power who, while fighting against homosexuality as hard as he could, turned out to have homosexual longings himself. Failing to find outlet for these longings in an open, healthy way, he turned to prostitution and methamphetamines. At the very least, it may force some of those who rage so hard against the progress of the gay community in this country to look inside and ask themselves whether this really is the right cause to be fighting for.

Wednesday, November 01, 2006

The 2006 edition of the Yale Philosophy Review is now available online.