Seems that the GWOT wasn't lost, it just went missing for a few days but has now been found again. According to Larry Johnson:

The counter terrorism community is abuzz over the President's comments yesterday at a principals meeting of the Homeland Security Council. Bush reportedly said he was not in favor of the new term, Global Struggle Against Violent Extremism (GSAVE). In fact, he said, "no one checked with me". That comment brought an uncomfortable silence to the assembled group of pooh bahs. The President insisted it was still a war as far as he is concerned.

Johnson, as a counter-terrorism guy, understandably sees this episode as illustrative of the broader confusion that reigns within the Bush Admin's competing bureaucracies regarding counter-terrorism. But the confusion goes to the heart of a profound tension between policy and politics that the Bush Admin has created for itself. To mobilize a considerable part of the American public, Bush and his team oversold an idea that was questionable at the outset but has by now certainly outlived its usefulness. The Administration now has to engage in a sleight-of-hand -- it must shift goalposts and policies to ones that are far more realistic, promising and sustainable internationally, while maintaining the unquestioning loyalty of a critical domestic constituency whose support is premised on that core idea.

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Cross-posted at Liberals Against Terrorism

So argues the Armchair Generalist today, citing a straight-talking Marine, Lt. Gen. Wallace Gregson, commander of Marine Forces Pacific (MARFORPAC). The good General doesn't think much of the "war on terror" as a conceptual basis for determining what the US military should be doing -- and not doing.

The pernicious effects of talking about a "global war on terror" has been a long-standing personal hobby-horse -- both regarding military operations and the US' broader grand strategy for foreign policy. Until President Bush recently chose to reinvigorate the bogus GWOT-9/11-Iraq linkage for tactical political purposes, we'd seen a gradual and welcome shift in the Administration's global strategy via a steady but rather surrepticious substitution of "extremism" for "terrorism" in public remarks, combined with an increased emphasis on democracy promotion and "soft power" tools. I'm pleased to see some US military leaders address the matter explicitly and hope that the President's tactical reversion to GWOT-speak won't impinge on the improved thinking that Gregson's remarks suggest.

The AG links to Eric Umansky, who quotes from a recent Naval War College address by Gregson, as reported in Inside Defense. Gregson's argument fits nicely within the framework of a "marginalization" strategy I've previously advocated as a replacement for a GWOT strategy. Gregson is arguing that the our strategic objective shouldn't be to wipe out terrorists but rather to reduce their effectiveness -- to marginalize extremists from the "vast majority" of the local populations in the societies in which they operate.

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For some time, praktike and I have been observing a change in the way the Bush Administration is approaching the Global War on Terrorism, and I promised him I'd try to put some thoughts down in writing. Last week, Jim Hoagland confirmed our observations, flagging a shift underway to a Global War on Extremism, with some reassignment of bureaucratic roles. Then yesterday, Ivo Daalder of Brookings (with whom I am in agreement far more often than not) posted some observations about the changes in Bush's second term foreign policy. He basically concluded that Bush has lost interest in the war on terrorism and has reverted to his pre-9/11 policy priorities and worldview.

Praktike's reaction to Daalder's post was mixed. Among the points prak raises, he hits on the topic I promised to write about:

I also think Daalder is missing the Bush administration's shift away from a "global war on terrorism" to a "global war on extremism," which we've been tracking here. In truth, this change in emphasis from a primarily military to a primarily ideological struggle is what Democrats and counterterrorism experts have been talking about for some time. If done properly (always iffy with the Bush administration), it will be a good thing,..

I agree wholeheartedly. Here's a lengthy very-sketchy-first-draft-essay on why I agree with prak, together with some implications from the view of strategic doctrine.

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Like praktike, I am somewhat disappointed with Ivo Daalder's opening contribution to Josh Marshall's new policy blogging venture. Criticism of the Bush Administration's specific moves on dealing with terrorism are certainly merited. Where Bush's actions (or non-actions) notably diverge from his political rhetoric, he should be especially fair game for his electoral cynicism and fear-mongering.

But Daalder's critique of Bush as "all hat" on terror is pushing us in a direction we don't really want to go. Or rather, it's inadvertently hanging on to a set of Bush-defined narrow policies when Bush has himself begun to shift towards a strategic approach far more in keeping with policies liberals have long advocated. We should get out in front of that process.

The "Global War on Terrorism" as a flawed strategy

From the outset, the "Global War on Terrorism" was widely derided as a strategic concept by scholars and experienced policymakers both in the US and internationally, and within both the foreign policy and military establishments. As emphasized in the report of the 9/11 Commission and the Defense Advisory Board's recommendations on Public Diplomacy, the GWOT is a distinctly unhelpful way of thinking about the complex phenomena of politico-religious extremism which manifest themselves, in part, through terrorist acts aimed at the US or at US friends and interests. A GWOT provides little strategic guidance for defining objectives or for framing policy options, choosing actions, and assessing the effectiveness of those actions (e.g. Rumsfeld's "metrics" problem).

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{update Feb 7 2005} by nadezhda

This article generated an interesting discusson when I posted it a week ago. It identifies a common -- and to my mind highly objectionable -- strain in the policies of the Bush Adminstiration both in foreign policy and in domestic politics.

For those of you interested in the topic, I've taken up the same theme, the inseparability of basic princples of democratic governance both at home and abroad -- in a new post at Liberals Against Terrorism. It's a response to David Adesnik of OxBlog regarding the promotion of Elliott Abrams to a deputy National Security Adviser position on the National Security Council, with the government's portfolio for democracy promotion and Middle East policy, including Iran.

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originally posted Jan 27 2005 by nadezhda

I had not expected to be writing anything lengthy tonight, but praktike has produced two excellent pieces at LaT (No on Gonzales and Clarification) that I view as being part of a single piece, and I felt compelled to spell out how I see them fitting together.
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Shortish Norman Podhoretz:

Yes, folks. World War IV is in trouble and barely hanging by a thread. The anti-World War IV-forces are feeling their oats and seem to think they have WWIV beating a hasty retreat and only moments away from being put to flight. The only way to save WWIV from an ignimonious fate is to call out the troops in its defense. Certain signs might lead one to think Bush may be starting to go wobbly. Oh, where is Maggie and her handbag when you need them. Tony Blair's fundamental wetness and unreliability as a stalwart ally is starting to show through. But never fear, a new handbag wielder seems to be on the job, just as soon as she gets confirmed to her new State Dep't duties.

James Wolcott seems to have triggered this marshalling of forces with an all too casual flinging of the gauntlet (as is his wont, I'm afraid). Said our Jimmy:

It's going to break Norman Podhoretz's peach-pit heart, but it will soon become time to recognize the inevitable and blow the whistle on the World War IV he and the neocons have been so determined to wage.

And back came Norman firing his exhortation to the faithful defenders of poor, misunderstood WWIV. [ed., Well, if we're to get the timing absolutely right, seems Norman's broadside had been in the works for some time and it was now publication date regardless of whether Jimmy had published his cutting remarks , but let's not let a few minor details get in the way of a sweeping narrative.]

If the initial response of the faithful to Norman's call to arms is any indication, the partisans of WWIV can rest easier, knowing that renewed support is on its way. And in any event, Norman (after a rather lengthy analysis of every sliver of a "foreign policy school" across the US political spectrum) concludes that, amazingly enough, maybe Condi isn't going to need that handbag after all.

...I think (to say it one last time) that the amazing leader this President has amazingly turned out to be will—like the comparably amazing Harry Truman before him when he took on the Communist world—have the wind at his back as he continues the struggle against Islamist radicalism and its vicious terrorist armory: a struggle whose objective is the spread of liberty and whose success will bring greater security and greater prosperity not only to the people of this country, and not only to the people of the greater Middle East, but also to the people of Europe and beyond, in spite of the sorry fact that so many of them do not wish to know it yet.

The fight's not out of our Jimmy yet, however. Back he comes today with this next fling of ye olde gauntlet:

Pessimism, schmessifism. It doesn't matter if the glass is half-empty or half full if the glass is filled with blood needlessly shed.

And today [Roger] Simon is all caffeinated about another urgent summons from Norman Podhoretz to gird our loins and show the fortitude to wage World War IV. Ledeen, Chalabi, Podhoretz--these are your comrades, Mr. Simon, and you're welcome to them.

Defenders of WWIV, be prepared not just for some minor skirmishes. Your opponents seem to be gearing for a full-fledged offensive.

[posted on nadya's basket]

Praktike has had several discussions going concerning the issues of detainees, torture and extradition over at Liberals Against Terrorism. This lengthy post was written as a comment to Torture Is a National Security Issue. It's really sort of part 1 of a multi-part essay, which has been floating around in my head and, hopefully, one of these days I'll manage to extract it. Hence it sufers from some overly broad sweeping-everything-up-in-it generalizations, but here goes.

The various justifications for abuse of detainees, whether technically torture and whether in Iraq or Guantanmo, ultimately rely on a "torture as self-defense" argument. Whether the rationalizers attempt to justify the behavior itself, or explain it away as just part of the unavoidable ugliness of war, the arguments come down to the imperative to save innocent lives and reduce injury to our troops. This is, in the final analysis, the same sort of position taken by the unilateralist (or Jacksonian) right on a variety of foreign policy issues. They want to be able to use any means (including pre-emption or any type of weapon invented or to be invented) to prevent the possibility of direct harm to American persons and property. And the "rightness" of their position is defined in terms of the right to protect oneself.

This world view has little or no appreciation of the probability that certain tactics are likely to be self-defeating. The unilateralists can't/won't think through the next step or two to see what other probable consequences will result from their action. Inextricably linked to this attitude is the reluctance to deny ourselves any arrow in the quiver, even though its presence may damage the utility of the rest of our arsenal or change the "correlation of forces" to our detriment -- it might come in handy some day when we need to defend ourselves. It is an overly constricted understanding of "interests" to be pursued and protected. And when actual military force is used, it is a fatally narrow understanding of "victory," by ignoring the ultimate objective which is to win the peace. In the terms of William Lind and Fourth Generation Warfare, we ignore the "moral level" of conflict at our peril, because by doing so we make it easy for others to deny us the fruits of victory.

So whether it's invading Iraq, or changing the nuclear equation via missile defense or developing "small" nuclear weapons, or threatening rogue states who are on the road to acquiring nuclear weapons, or blowing up the Cancun meetings with a major high-subsidy Agriculture bill the week before, or refusing to apply international law to Guantanamo detainees, the justification is always protecting Americans from the possibility of harm by outsiders. We hear little or no recognition that the protection is at best temporary, and that the likelihood of greater harm may have been substantially increased.

Yet aggressive acts of "self-defense" inevitably have longer-term impacts because they change, often for the worse, a complex set of relations that, together, provide a global security environment (or in the case of trade or finance, a global economic system). Lost in the chest-beating about saving innocents and self-defense is (1) the need to focus on improving the security environment itself and (2) the broader damage to the security environment that will result from the "self-defense" action.

In the case of Iraq, the unlilateralists will sincerely say that their policy wasn't intended to produce Salafis terrorizing the population and aid providers with bombings, kidnappings and beheadings. These are "unintended consequences," and certainly not their responsibility, but the responsibility of evil perpetrators.

"Unintended" results they certainly are, but the results certainly shouldn't be put into the category of "unanticipated consequences." Nor should we treat as unanticipated consequences the fact that Iraq is turning into the preferred battleground for Pakistani jihadis. Or that Osama bin Laden is being converted into the revered spokesman for a global ideological movement. Or that we are overseeing the collapse of the Iraqi public health system. Or that the level of repression in neighboring authoritarian states is on the rise. Or that Iran's mullahs are accelerating nuclearization and cracking down on reformers. Or that the US has forfeited enormous public credibility in international institutions. Or that the US is seen by most of the world as, at best, a hypocritical bully.

These are all "collateral damage" of the self-inflicted kind -- consequences that can be, and were, anticipated. The military studies what types and amounts of collateral damage are likely to result from certain ways of using force. There are always trade-offs, and "effectiveness" in obtaining military objectives involves an implicit cost/benefit analysis.

The unilateralists don't seem to understand that you have to ask the same sort of questions whenever you use power aggressively, whether against a prisoner or against a country:

• What are the likely reactions of the people you act against directly.
• What are the likely responses of people who have close relations with those who have been harmed by your action.
• How will it affect your reputation -- which, by the way, is an invaluable asset that takes a long time to earn and little time to lose.
• Will others watching from afar change their assessment of how you might behave in the future and modify their own behavior in ways that aren't necessarily beneficial to you.
• Will others who have been willing to work with you before change their mind and withdraw support you've counted on.
• Will others who previously saw you as unfriendly now see you as a danger and decide to erect protections against ways you might threaten them in the future or actively work to undermine relationships or assets of value to you.

And with regard to each of these "other people" groups, you have to try to understand them -- their reasoning, motivation, values, fears, histories of how they've behaved in the past, etc. Even if they are "evil enemies," you have to try to understand them to identify possible responses and assess probabilities.

Now these are simple home truths we all know from everyday life. I could usefully apply that list of questions to deciding how to launch a controversial business initiative within a corporation. It's called politics. But somehow "politics" has become lost in these debates in which the unilateralists defend their actions by appealing to the overriding legal and moral right of self-defense. Or ignore or dismiss the harm to others in comparison to potential harm to themselves.

As soon as the US border is crossed, they insist we are in a Hobbesian state, denying the interconnectedness of people, nations, commerce and culture. They measure the acceptability of institutions by how effective they are at leveraging US power to get what the US wants, not by how effective those institutions are at contributing to a a more secure and prosperous environment within which the US and its citizens live and operate. Their attacks on the UN, among other international institutions, for "ineffectiveness" is disingenuousness of the worst sort, because their only measure of "effectiveness" is how well it helps the US get what it wants in specific situations, not how well it accomplishes the collective objectives for which its members created it. By their own actions and attitudes the unilateralists help break the interconnectedness, strengthen adversaries on the "moral level," and produce the very Hobbesian conditions they fear. A series of self-fulfilling prophecy.

The contrast with the internationalist branch of the US conservative tradition is striking. One may disagree with the priorities of the presidency of Bush the Elder, but not the commitment to an interconnected world where the long-term consequences of US actions were considered carefully. They were not naive "one Worlders," nor did they see it as necessarily desirable that the UN take on some sort of independent global governance function. But they did see the world as a system of people and nations that formed an interconnected political community.

Not surprisingly, that consummate politician, James Baker, entitled his memoirs as Secretary of State "The Politics of Diplomacy." I quote liberally from its preface, because I find it an eloquent rebuttal to the unilateralist worldview that has dominated our foreign policy for the past four years.

Politics (in its larger sense -- as opposed to specific electoral campaigns) and policy are inextricably linked. It's only through politics that we can transform philosophy into policy. This is particularly true in geopolitics, where the difference between success and failure is often measured by the ability (or lack thereof) to understand how political constraints inevitably shape the outcome of any negotiation Indeed, I would argue, with a nod to Clausewitz, that diplomacy is the continuation of politics -- whether in revolution, war or peace.

We sometimes overlook the fact that most foreign leaders are themselves politicians, frequently elected or members of some ruling party. These senior foreign officials view their problems, and opportunities, through political eyes. To persuade them, it is often helpful to put oneself in their shoes -- to determine how to help them explain, justify, or even rationalize positions to their colleagues and publics. [...]

The political skill extends beyond one-on-one relations to the task of building coalitions. Effective U.S. leadership often depends on the ability to persuade others to join with us so we can extend our influence; to build a coalition, a diplomat needs to appreciate what objectives, arguments, and trade-offs are important to would-be partners. To be successful over time, the politician-diplomat also needs to win the confidence of others. That means words must be matched by deeds and promises must be kept.
[...]
Ultimately, good politicians, like successful diplomats, appreciate power -- its uses and limits. An effective leader recognizes how success can enhance power, and he or she also knows how to husband that precious asset until the timing is right. Power comes in many forms -- economic and military might, group expectations and pressure, and most lastingly, through ideas. And an American political diplomat should always remember that power divorced from the purposes valued by our democracy will ultimately prove empty.

I speculate that, if George W Bush were not the son of George HW Bush, James Baker would find Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo the exercise of power divorced from our most valued purposes.

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[UPDATE 4:45PM EST 12-4-04] I wrote the foregoing about Baker's approach to geopolitics before I'd caught his op-ed in the NYT on Thursday about restarting the Israeli-Palestinian negotiation process. It's a blueprint for taking the political approach --finding the win-win solutions and marginalizing those whose only desire is to destroy any chance of progress.

In his discussion of Baker in Slate, Fred Kaplan reminds us of Baker's position during the run up to the Iraq War, which was to not pay attention to the Cheneys and Rumsfelds who were willing to go it alone without even a gesture to the international community. Bush listened to that advice at least for a time.

Clearly, simple continuing unstinting support for Ariel Sharon isn't going to cut it in the coming period. My concern about the ability of Bush to pursue a political approach is that it seems, in this White House, that anything to do with Israel-Palestine requires the direct engagement of the President. We've not seen the President setting the direction and parameters and then giving a Baker or a Kissinger the authority to go do the deal. The President should come in to close the deal, but there are too many other foreign policy irons in the fire for the Israeli-Palestinian process to be dependent on the President's constant personal attention. And never fear, that particular mare's nest will require constant attention and then some just to keep it from blowing up in everyone's face.

This is a draft I wrote for praktike's TerrorWiki on the need for a different view of the terrorism threat and a new strategy to combat it. As a wiki contribution, the draft will go through innumerable changes offered by innumerable editors. So I thought it best to capture my original thoughts here. Not that the final product of the wiki collaboration won't be superior -- I have every expectation it will in both substance and style. But this version's the way, today, I'm thinking about the long and arduous challenges that face America and its future leaders.

Terrorism is fast becoming one of the defining features of the world we live in. Although Americans naturally associate terrorism with the events of 9/11 and Al Qaeda, terrorism is rapidly evolving into a much wider and longer-term threat.

• Terrorism has become the preferred weapon of international groups who would destroy the existing order, represented by America and other wealthy Western countries. It is increasingly used as the tactic of choice in local civil wars, sectarian or ethnic conflict, or revolts against vulnerable political and social institutions. Like the communists, fascists and preachers of third-world liberation before them, the terrorists offer nothing in place of what they destroy but chaos or a harsh, exclusionary utopia.
  
  
• Terrorism is made increasingly dangerous by the ability of terrorist entrepreneurs to tap into a metastasizing international support network -- people, expertise, financing, weapons, training -- all too often connected to international crime.
  
  
• Terrorism sustains its energy, like a hurricane over open warm waters, with the failings and corruption of weak or despotic states. On the moral level, it is fueled by repressive regimes and the angers and resentments those states breed. On the physical level, it finds refuge and bases of operation in countrysides and cities. It taps into the capacities of government officials and agencies with tragic results, whether by petty bribery of Russian airport security or the close connections of the mujahadeen with Pakistani intelligence.
  
  
• Terrorism flourishes in a global environment of interconnectedness, of open physical and virtual borders, of the explosion of information instantaneously available, of literacy and education reaching a larger and larger number of people. Yet the environment that amplifies the reach and destructive power of terrorists is the same environment that offers the potential of the 21st century as an era of greater personal freedom, growth and prosperity -- both for Americans and for an expanding portion of peoples around the world.

America needs a clear, comprehensive strategy for combating terrorism that leverages our strengths, protects American interests and promotes global security and prosperity. Our strategy must be realistic, sustainable and adaptable as the nature of the enemy and threat continue to evolve. America's strategy must also fit within a broad, coherent US foreign policy that is true to American values, institutions and the rule of law, and that honestly confronts the lessons of the past three years.
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You may have wondered why in my prior post I insisted that the most urgent agenda item for the Democrats is to articulate a strong, clear, disciplined alternative vision to the Bush Admin in foreign policy. I would enlarge that claim to include like-thinkiing Republicans (both traditional internationalists and traditional conservatives).

I draw your attention to the post-election checklist for the foreign policies of Bush II. Prepared by one of the more enthusiastic supporters of the neo-conservative vision and agenda, and appearing in Friday's National Review Online, it merits careful study. The list, part of an article by Frank Graffney, is published in its entirety below. Since the purpose of its original publication was undoubtedly to maximize its broad dissemination, we will assist Mr Gaffney in his distribution efforts.

The important thing now, of course, is not simply to acknowledge past achievements [sic], but to build upon them. This will require, among other things:

• The reduction in detail of Fallujah and other safe havens utilized by freedom's enemies in Iraq � a necessary precondition not only to holding elections there next year, but to the establishment of institutions essential to a functioning and stable democracy;
• Regime change � one way or another � in Iran and North Korea, the only hope for preventing these remaining "Axis of Evil" states from fully realizing their terrorist and nuclear ambitions;
• Providing the substantially increased resources needed to re-equip a transforming military and rebuild human-intelligence capabilities (minus, if at all possible, the sorts of intelligence "reforms" contemplated pre-election that would make matters worse on this and other scores) while we fight World War IV;
• Providing, to the fullest extent possible, for the protection of our homeland � including the adoption of sensible policies on securing our borders and contending with illegal aliens, and by deploying effective missile defenses at sea and in space, as well as ashore;
• Keeping faith with Israel, whose destruction remains a priority for the same people who want to destroy us (and for the same reasons � i.e., our shared, "moral values") � especially in the face of Yasser Arafat's demise and the inevitable, post-election pressure to "solve" the Mideast problem by forcing the Israelis to abandon defensible boundaries;
• Contending with the underlying dynamic that made France and Germany so problematic in the first term: namely, their willingness to make common cause with our enemies for profit, and their desire to employ a united Europe and its new constitution � as well as other international institutions and mechanisms � to thwart the expansion and application of American power where deemed necessary by Washington;
• Adapting appropriate strategies for contending with China's increasingly fascistic trade and military policies, Vladimir Putin's accelerating authoritarianism at home and aggressiveness toward the former Soviet republics, the worldwide spread of Islamofascism, and the emergence of a number of aggressively anti-American regimes in Latin America.

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Ah, cotton subsidies:

The Bush administration yesterday formally appealed a World Trade Organization ruling that subsidies paid to U.S. cotton farmers violate global trade rules.

Now, I'm generally in favor of conservation-oriented subsidies. We have to preserve our prime agricultural soils. But programs like Step 2 are bad news, primarily because they make it harder for developing countries to compete.

And helping cotton growers in the developing world ought to be a vital component of a comprehensive war on terrorism. Nearly half of the Pakistani labor force works in agricultural industries, and cotton is the country's top agricultural commodity. While Pakistan has basically eradicated opium poppy production by launching a vigorous crop substitution program in the Northwest Frontier Provinces, Afghanistan's opium production has exploded, particularly in Helmand province, a stronghold of the Taliban. Al Qaeda is said to be hip-deep in the heroin business. Drug money goes to buy AK-47s and explosives that kill Americans.

I'm by no means certain that cotton is an economically viable alternative to poppies. It requires more intensive irrigation and better soil conditions, and the price it fetches may not be high enough at present to meet a family's needs. But despite these problems, Afghanistan still exports cotton somehow. It's clear that cotton works in some areas of the country. Wouldn't we like to give those Afghanistan's farmers who are at the margin every possible incentive to switch?

Why is the Bush administration undermining the War on Terror?

Obviously, we’re there and all of the criticisms of it have been beaten to death at this point. Like the French and Germans in WWI, critics and proponents of the Iraq war have been chewing up the same ground for several years to no good end. I’m not interested in having the debate so much as I am concerned with thinking about why we are having that debate and where different kinds of people sort themselves out.   more »