Things You Should Be Reading

Three things you should be reading:

Two of them are from Daniel Larison. The first is this denouncement of the broad exception that Israel gets regarding international law and wars of aggression. I would advise Israeli hawks to listen to people like Drezner; we Americans know a thing or two about wars of aggression inspired by hyperbolic fears. I agree with his central assertion whole-heartedly though, and have made it somewhere on my blog before; essentially, that we should not concede to the hawks and neocons that the only argument is about the effectiveness of an invasion or assault. We should also be arguing about whether it's right or wrong to go to war. Old-fashioned notions I know.

Speaking of old-fashioned, perhaps you missed the revelation that former British Prime Minister Margeret Thatcher was secretly opposed to German re-unification. This is what Andrew Sullivan refers to as "staggering news", though as Drezner points out it made perfect sense at the time for British realists to be, if not opposed, then at least leery of German reunification. As Drezner explains, Britain had been opposed to the formation of a single strong continental power for centuries, and none of us had any reason to believe in 1989 (or 1991) that things would turn out as peaceful as they have. Of course now we associate Germany with economic progress and stability, but Margeret Thatcher was thinking of World War II. For my part, I was somewhat relieved to read about a nation's leader behaving in a manner that reflect caution and traditional interests. That sort of thing is passe around here these days.

Lastly, there's Glenn Greenwald on Bagram, the new "black hole" for terrorist detainees the world over:

No wonder they want to close Guantanamo: who wants to be bothered with irritating habeas reviews -- 28 out of 33 have resulted in judicial findings that insufficient evidence exists to justify the detention -- when you can just ship them off to the Black Hole of Bagram and imprison them for as long as you want with no court interference? Apparently, what the Bush administration did that was so terrible, the heinous "shredding of the Constitution" they perpetrated, wasn't about the fact that they imprisoned people indefinitely with no charges -- but that they did it in Cuba rather than somewhere else. Who knew that such grave Constitutional transgressions -- such severe denial of fundamental rights -- could be fixed so easily with a little change of scenery?

If I have written about the Obama administration's gradually worsening record on civil liberties and the "war on terror" (you thought it was over, didn't you?) it's only because of a blogging ennui in general, not because I'm giving the Obama administration a pass. As excited as I was about the Obama candidacy, not for one single instant did I believe that the Obama administration would easily surrender powers claimed by the Bush administration. To believe they would do so requires a willful ignorance of Presidential history. No President has ever surrendedered such power without a fight, and so the fight continues.

Obama in Berlin

It may still be an open contest here, but apparently the Germans would be more than happy to elect Barack Obama for their President. Der Spiegel has more good pictures here.

UPDATE: More on the enthusiastic German response here.

UPDATE II: Obama is even bringing the libertarians around, though I disagree that he offers "neoconservatism with a human face." In fact, I find myself agreeing with this essay by Fareed Zakaria from a few days back, where he characterizes Obama's foreign policy as falling more in the "realist" tradition than anything Wilsonian or progressive. The only appropriate response to the adventurism of the Bush administration is a good, healthy dose of realism, but Obama is no realist in the mold of Henry Kissinger. Rather, I'd say Obama offers realism with a human face; a foreign policy that speaks frankly about the threats that face our nation, but that also respects the dignity and desires of other nations and peoples.

Afghanistan Becoming a "Failed State"

A slew of reports by various think tanks are calling for urgent action in Afghanistan, warning that Afghanistan risks becoming a failed state:

"Make no mistake," a new report begins, "NATO is not winning in Afghanistan." That disturbing warning from the Atlantic Council, a Washington-based think tank, is echoed by two other reports that were also released this week. Afghanistan is at a "crossroads," says the Afghanistan Study Group, led by the Center for the Study of the Presidency, which also cosponsored the original Iraq Study Group. And a paper published by the National Defense University concludes that without quick action, "the prognosis for Afghanistan is grim."

The reports identify many of the same concerns, which are both urgent and alarmingly broad. Not only is the Taliban enjoying a resurgence, but NATO has been unable to boost its troop levels (except for a temporary additional U.S. troop deployment that is pending), and the number of Afghan security forces remains insufficient.

The reports generally agree on what needs to be done:

When it comes to solutions, however, the reports end up being almost equally discouraging. Along with the usual calls to boost troop deployments and aid funding and to create policy "czars" to coordinate reconstruction efforts, the Atlantic Council and the Afghanistan Study Group both say one of the most urgent needs is a high-level United Nations representative. The idea, says the council, is that such a figure could "use his stature, gravitas, an authority to cajole, convince, and even coerce better coordination and integration of the international effort" with that of Afghan President Hamid Karzai's government.

The problem is that after months of wrangling, diplomats finally thought they had such a U.N. superenvoy in place—former British politician Paddy Ashdown, who performed the same role in the Balkans. But at the last minute, Ashdown was in effect vetoed by none other than Karzai himself. While Karzai's aims are not completely clear, the Afghan leader claimed that he was objecting to the enhanced authority that Ashdown was expected to wield—the exact kind of authority that a growing number of think tanks and western diplomats say is needed to cut through the turf battles that have frequently paralyzed reconstruction.

The two reports also share a call for a regional approach, in part to address the security threats pouring across the border from the troubled tribal regions of Pakistan. But they also advocate including Iran in any regional dialogue—something the Bush administration remains vehemently opposed to. Indeed, U.S. officials were quick to criticize U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad this week for something as innocuous as an apparently unauthorized appearance with Iran's foreign minister on a panel in Davos, Switzerland.

A report by Oxfam similarly decries the slow-pace of the rebuilding effort in Afghanistan, but Afghanistan's more pressing concerns are rapidly becoming security against the resurgent Taliban. It would be easy to blame this on the Bush administration for the giant diversion that is Iraq, but the problem is that few of the NATO allies have made the necessary military commitments to Afghanistan. Officials at State vow to get their allies to "step up" and has written a harshly worded letter to Germany and other NATO members, pressing them to commit combat troops to the restless south. Germany seems willing to increase aid, but not increase their military commitment. But that's not going to be enough, not as Canada threatens to leave for want of help in Kandahar and the British are proposing sending inadequately trained troops as a result of pressing troops shortages. And though supporters of the mission in Iraq are calling for more U.S. troops, they're simply nowhere to be found. Whether the mission in Iraq is feasible or not, there's simply no denying that our troops will be their in considerable numbers for some time to come, and possibly long enough to lose Afghanistan. Help is desperately needed in Afghanistan, but it would appear so far that none is on the way.