Category: NATO

This Is Unbelievably Sensible, and Will Never Be Implimented

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The Stimson Center has issued a report saying that maintaining deployed nuclear weapons on NATO basis is stupid and dangerous:

The U.S. government is strengthening its nuclear-deterrent posture to reassure allies in Europe, and is moving forward on a number of programs to modernize its arsenal. But last-minute questions are being raised about whether Washington should rethink the use of B61 tactical warheads in Europe, for both strategic and budgetary reasons. On Aug. 1, the National Nuclear Security Administration revealed that it has initiated a B61 refurbishment program, authorizing the start of production engineering, with production to follow from 2020-25. The effort will extend the lives of about 480 B61 warheads, some of which will be based in Europe.

But why, argues nuclear disarmament expert Barry Blechman, cofounder of the Stimson Center. In a new report, he says it is unlikely NATO allies would ever use a nuclear weapon. Predicted advances in Russian and Chinese air defenses are expected to keep tactical fighters at bay. And security for the warheads is costly and problematic. For example, during the recent failed military coup in Turkey, B61s were left at a base without electricity and whose commander was arrested. Blechman says the U.S. should stop buying B61s for use on tactical fighters and remove them altogether from Europe.

The bombs are don’t serve any tactical purpose these days, if they ever did, as as the failed Turkish coup demonstrates, when Incirlik airbase was literally left in the dark after power was cut, they create a real risk of the loss of a nuclear weapon.

The modernization program is  a waste of money that makes us less safe.

Well, this is Reassuring

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Did you know that there is a bunker at Incirlik air base that contains dozens of nuclear weapons?

With the attempted coup and other recent developments in Turkey, this fills me with a sense of dread:

The U.S. and NATO face serious questions about the wisdom of stationing nuclear weapons in Turkey after commanders at Incirlik air base, which houses potentially as many as 50 B61 thermonuclear weapons, were implicated in the attempted overthrow of President Recep Erdogan.

………

Incirlik is located outside of Adana in southern Turkey, just 100 nm from the so-called Islamic State terrorist group’s headquarters in Aleppo, Syria. Since Turkey agreed to allow counter-Islamic State air operations from the base one year ago, it has become an epicenter for attacking ground targets within Syria.

Now, as Erdogan “purges” his military and police ranks of opposition elements, and as the commander of Incirlik is arrested and replaced, how does America reconcile the fact that a longstanding NATO ally lost control of its military with U.S.-owned nuclear weapons in the mix?

“I can’t remember another time when a base where the U.S. has nuclear weapons was directly involved in a coup, and also where the host government cut off the ability to operate in and out of the base,” says Hans Kristensen of the Federation of American Scientists. “The physical protection of the weapons is not the issue because they have their own security unit and backup power, but it’s a precarious situation that requires the U.S. to rethink why it has nuclear weapons in Turkey. The situation is so unique, and it’s evolving so rapidly that this is just not a place you want to have nuclear weapons deployed.”

As an FYI, the B-61 is a “dial bomb”, and it’s yield can vary from 0.3 to 360 kilotons.

And it’s in a country that just had a violent attempted coup which is run by a paranoid megalomaniac who has been given carte blanch by the attempted coup.

Pleasant dreams.

General Strangelove Breedlove Revealed

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I have wondered if former SACEUR (military leader of NATO) Phillip Breedlove is completely nuts.

Well, it appears that someone hacked his email and removed all doubt as to his insanity:

Retired U.S. Air Force Gen. Philip Breedlove, until recently the supreme commander of NATO forces in Europe, plotted in private to overcome President Barack Obama’s reluctance to escalate military tensions with Russia over the war in Ukraine in 2014, according to apparently hacked emails from Breedlove’s Gmail account that were posted on a new website called DC Leaks.

Obama defied political pressure from hawks in Congress and the military to provide lethal assistance to the Ukrainian government, fearing that doing so would increase the bloodshed and provide Russian President Vladimir Putin with the justification for deeper incursions into the country.

Breedlove, during briefings to Congress, notably contradicted the Obama administration regarding the situation in Ukraine, leading to news stories about conflict between the general and Obama.

But the leaked emails provide an even more dramatic picture of the intense back-channel lobbying for the Obama administration to begin a proxy war with Russia in Ukraine.

In a series of messages in 2014, Breedlove sought meetings with former Secretary of State Colin Powell, asking for advice on how to pressure the Obama administration to take a more aggressive posture toward Russia.

………

Breedlove attempted to influence the administration through several channels, emailing academics and retired military officials, including former NATO supreme commander Wesley Clark, for assistance in building his case for supplying military assistance to Ukrainian forces battling Russian-backed separatists.

………

Phillip Karber, an academic who corresponded regularly with Breedlove — providing him with advice and intelligence on the Ukrainian crisis — verified the authenticity of several of the emails in the leaked cache. He also told The Intercept that Breedlove confirmed to him that the general’s Gmail account was hacked and that the incident had been reported to the government.

………

In the European press, Breedlove has been portrayed as a hawkish figure known for leaning on allied nations to ditch diplomacy and to adopt a more confrontational role again Russian-backed separatists in Ukraine. Breedlove, testifying before Congress earlier in February of this year, called Russia “a long-term existential threat to the United States and to our European allies.”

Der Spiegel reported that Breedlove “stunned” German leaders with a surprise announcement in 2015 claiming that pro-Russian separatists had “upped the ante” in eastern Ukraine with “well over a thousand combat vehicles, Russian combat forces, some of the most sophisticated air defense, battalions of artillery” sent to Donbass, a center of the conflict.

Breedlove’s numbers were “significantly higher” than the figures known to NATO intelligence agencies and seemed exaggerated to German officials. The announcement appeared to be a provocation designed to disrupt mediation efforts led by Chancellor Angela Merkel.

………

The emails, however, depict a desperate search by Breedlove to build his case for escalating the conflict, contacting colleagues and friends for intelligence to illustrate the Russian threat. Karber, who visited Ukrainian politicians and officials in Kiev on several occasions, sent frequent messages to Breedlove — “per your request,” he noted — regarding information he had received about separatist military forces and Russian troop movements. In several updates, Breedlove received military data sourced from Twitter and social media.

Not just a dangerously bellicose general officer, but an insubordinate one as well.

He wanted war with Russia, and he was using tweets in an attempt coerce the President of the United States to go along with his folly.

That is completely nuts.

But Where is the Money in That?

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It is obvious that Russia has been much more aggressive in its dealings with the west lately, and the west has responded by calls for rearmament and massive military exercises near Russia’s border.

Russia has responded by moving military resources to the borders of Poland and the Baltic states.

Turn of events has the father of Glasnost, Mikhail Gorbachev, saying that the US war on Russia never ended.

Well here is a revolutionary proposal, how about trying diplomacy?

From a military standpoint, Western planners’ biggest headache is the defense of the Baltic states, located at the edge of NATO territory and hopelessly outnumbered by Russian troops. Indeed, the need to deter Russia will top the agenda when alliance leaders meet next month in Warsaw. But as they contemplate what military means might stop a swift, Crimea-type land grab, they should also review what they know about Moscow’s beliefs and motivations — and choose a path that might defuse, rather than elevate, regional tensions.

NATO’s fears are not unfounded. In Ukraine, Moscow achieved surprising success with unorthodox tactics that included the use of “voluntary battalions” and unidentified troops. President Putin has made it clear that Russia sees itself as the protective power for all Russians. Theoretically, this also includes the large Russian minorities in Estonia and Latvia.

Thus, the alliance is currently doing what can be expected from a collective defensive organization: it is ramping up defenses. In addition to the decisions at the last summit in Wales, Washington is sending a continually rotating brigade (about 5,000 men) to Eastern Europe. Furthermore, NATO is planning to station a multinational battalion in each of the Baltic States and Poland (altogether about 4,000 men). Romania recently reported the completion of a part of the European ballistic missile defense system. NATO is thus on track to better defend its easternmost allies.

But alliance leaders need a better approach, for even the planned measures are inadequate to mount a military defense. A recent RAND study found that available troops could hold off a Russian attack for a maximum of three days. For serious resistance, about 35,000 soldiers would be needed — and this imbalance is about to get worse. Rushing ahead of the anticipated Warsaw decisions, Russian Minister of Defense Sergey Shoygu recently announced the stationing of three new divisions (up to 30,000 men) on Russia’s western and southern borders.

………

In fact, Russia has accepted the expansion of NATO, however reluctantly. Moscow is also clear-eyed about the ultimate consequences of an attack on an alliance member: war, and possibly with nuclear weapons. What Russia does not accept is further expansion into the post-Soviet space. To Moscow, therefore, NATO’s activism looks like hysteria and a pretext for an offensive rearmament.

 ………

To prevent such a scenario and, in the absence of a fundamentally new approach, the Warsaw meeting should lead NATO back to a Cold War strategy that mixes deterrence and cooperation. What became known in the 1960s as the Harmel Doctrine – that is, the combination of stronger defense and the offer of dialogue with the Soviets – was ultimately implemented in NATO’s dual-track decision of 1979. Today, NATO needs a new dual-track strategy adapted to 21st-century needs.

………

The proponents of deterrence are right: The Kremlin must be shown the limits. But deterrence alone is simply not enough. In order to better gauge Russia’s intentions and prevent a costly decade of mutual rearmament, the alliance must re-discover diplomacy — starting in Warsaw.

With the end the Cold War, the policy of the US and the NATO alliance the past 25 years its policy has been to try to reduce Russia to a 3rd world vassal state, now that Russia has the inclination, and the wherewithal, to resist this, we are back into an arms race.

The only people who win are the the defense contractors.

And Hillary Clinton Acolytes Continue to Ruin the World

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The US is intensifying the pressure on Cyprus to accept a secret NATO plan to keep Turkish forces on the island.

Victoria Nuland, the State Department official in charge of regime change in Russia and Ukraine, met for talks last week with the President of Cyprus, Nicos Anastasiades, and with Turkish Cypriot figures. The State Department and US Embassy in Nicosia have kept silent on what was said. A well-informed Cypriot source reports Nuland “was in Cyprus to pre-empt any likelihood of future deepening in relations with Russia. Anastasiades may not want to, but he may have no other option.” A second Cypriot political source said: “[Nuland] will try to blackmail him. I’m not sure how he will react.”

Andros Kyprianou, head of AKEL, the Cyprus Communist Party running strongly against Anastasiades’s party in next month’s parliamentary election, issued an unusual warning against the Nuland plan. “For us”, Kyprianou (right) said, there is only one acceptable outcome to negotiations between the Greek and Turkish communities for the reunification of the island. This is a “solution that ends the occupation and colonization, restoring the sovereignty, independence, territorial integrity and unity of the Republic, based on UN resolutions, the High Level Agreements, International and European Law. The solution is to demilitarize Cyprus and excludes any guarantee and intervention rights in the internal affairs of the country by foreign forces.”

………

US military commanders and political leaders have never advocated Turkish withdrawal from the island, or compliance with the UN resolutions. Instead, they have recommended incorporating both parts of Cyprus into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). The political and military commands in Ankara have been reluctant to accept a NATO solution for Cyprus because they object to what they regard as “dilution” of their army on the island. The Nuland plan is the latest attempt to give Ankara what it wants, and override Greek Cypriot objections. Nuland has also told Anastasiades she wants to accelerate agreement on the terms of settlement before the US presidential election in November.

Anastasiades has already declared himself in favour of joining NATO by signing the preliminary Partnership for Peace programme, but AKEL has been able to block it. For the time being, Cyprus is not a NATO member, and cannot accept another NATO base on its territory. “How can Nuland now push through a Turkish base on the island”, a well-known Cypriot strategist asks – “that isn’t a Turkish base and isn’t a NATO base either, but meets Ankara’s demand for a military ‘guarantee’, and will be accepted by Anastasiades?”

………

For weeks now in Moscow, there have been public hints that Nuland has resuscitated the scheme for withdrawing Turkish forces under the Turkish flag, then returning them under a NATO flag. In Nicosia in December, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov warned that such a scheme would be unacceptable to Russia. “The sides should reach agreements that would provide these security guarantees on a fundamentally new basis,” Lavrov said, “which will be acceptable to both Cypriot communities…This role should be primarily played by the UN Security Council.” For more details, read this.

In February, Lavrov’s spokesman at the ministry in Moscow attacked statements by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan for his “calls on the Cypriot Turks to take a tough, uncompromising stance in the ongoing intercommunal talks in Cyprus, including on territorial delimitation, a very sensitive issue. This is in stark contrast to Ankara’s statements on its commitment to facilitating a peaceful settlement on the island in the near future. It is obvious that by addressing such calls to one of the parties to the inter-Cypriot dialogue, Turkey’s leaders are rudely interfering in the negotiation process with a view of promoting their own interests.”

 This Neocon bullsh%$ is getting really old.

H/t Naked Capitalism.

This is Not a Surprise

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There now appear to be some strong statistical indications of ballot manipulation in the latest Turkish elections:

A statistical study of the voting patterns in Turkey’s November 1 general election found strong evidence that is “consistent with widespread voting manipulation”.

That was the conclusion of a paper released by assistant professor Erik Meyersson at Stockholm School of Economics entitled “Digit Tests and the Peculiar Election Dynamics of Turkey’s November Elections”, and released on November 4.

The result of the elections came as a shock as the Justice and Development Party (AKP) of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s defied the almost universal polling consensus and won some 9 percentage points more than expected – just enough to rule alone, but not quite a constitutional majority.

Some have speculated that faced with external and internal instability Turks have turned to a strong leader to see them through uncertain times in what might be called a “Sultan complex”. However, drilling down into the voting statistics Meyersson concludes that Sunday’s result was not so much an AKP victory as a defeat for the ultra-nationalist Nationalist Action Party (MHP).

“As in last elections, much of the change in voting seems to have occurred among nationalist as well as Kurdish voters, with this election seeing a difference of priority among them. Whereas June’s election was HDP’s to win, this one appears to have been to a large extent the nationalist MHP’s to lose,” Meyersson said in his paper.

Meyersson concentrated on the differences between June’s election and this one, where that time AKP was the recipient of the shock and had its majority grip on power broken after HDP entered parliament for the first time.

“Plotting the difference in vote share between November and June, the AKP’s gain appears to come predominantly at the expense of MHP. In some other cases, the vote swing seems to be driven by voters in Kurdish provinces leaving the other main opposition party pro-Kurdish and left-leaning Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) for AKP,” says Meyersson.

………
The main statistical test the paper explores is the use of the so-called Benford’s Law that is a widespread statistical technique for spotting cheating in polls and has a big body of academic literature behind it.

The way it works is simple: in a fair vote the last number of the final tally for each polling station should be randomly distributed. As humans are very bad at generating random numbers if the vote count has been tampered with then this randomness is destroyed and a discernable pattern emerges.
………
Meyersson’s study finds a very similar thing seems to have happened last weekend. The analysis was complicated by the fact that some ballots only produced 300-350 ballot papers, which is too small a number to be a good statistical sample. To get round this problem Meyersson decided to use the June vote as the basis of the comparison for the randomness of the last number – but that also assumes the summer’s vote was free and fair.

Those caveats aside, the results are striking. As the chart below of the frequency of each of the appearance of the numbers from 0-9 in the last place of the final tally clearly show there are too few zeros in the AKP party vote counts and too many for MHP.  The same is true for HDP, but the number of zeros at the end of the tally for Republican People’s Party (CHP) were the same in both elections and conforms to the Benford distribution above.
………
Meyersson’s study finds a very similar thing seems to have happened last weekend. The analysis was complicated by the fact that some ballots only produced 300-350 ballot papers, which is too small a number to be a good statistical sample. To get round this problem Meyersson decided to use the June vote as the basis of the comparison for the randomness of the last number – but that also assumes the summer’s vote was free and fair.

Those caveats aside, the results are striking. As the chart below of the frequency of each of the appearance of the numbers from 0-9 in the last place of the final tally clearly show there are too few zeros in the AKP party vote counts and too many for MHP.  The same is true for HDP, but the number of zeros at the end of the tally for Republican People’s Party (CHP) were the same in both elections and conforms to the Benford distribution above.

This explains a lot.

It also means that Erdogan is likely to use even more extreme measures to remain in power the next time around.

I rather expect that we won’t see him leave office absent some sort of coup activity.

Not a pleasant thought for a NATO ally.

This is Interesting………

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The US and Germany have , apparently because Turkey has been using the operations against ISIS to bomb the crap out of the Kurds, in effect aiding ISIS:

The U.S. announced Sunday that Patriot anti-air and missile batteries and 400 troops deployed to Turkey will be withdrawn following a similar move by NATO ally Germany seen as a protest against Turkish airstrikes on the Kurds.

The Pentagon put out a joint statement by Washington and NATO ally Turkey saying that the Patriot batteries, which were sent to Turkey in 2013 to protect against the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, would return to the U.S. by October.

Turkey asked for the deployment of the Patriots following the shoot down in 2012 of a Turkish fighter by Syrian air defenses.

………

The Turkish airstrikes have come under increasing criticism in Europe, where the agreement on use of Incirlik is seen by some as a move by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to gain cover for the airstrikes and bolster his support in maneuvering for new elections to regain a parliamentary majority.

Turkey has said that the airstrikes against the PKK were in response to terror attacks in Turkey that have killed civilians, police and troops.

………

The U.S. is concerned that Turkey also might move against the Kurdish YPG (People’s Protection Units), the military wing of the Kurdish PYD (Democratic Union Party), which is allied with the PKK.

YPG fighters have proven to be among the most effective of local forces in the fight against ISIS. The YPG earlier this year successfully defended the Syrian border town of Kobane against ISIS with the help of U.S. airstrikes. The YPG later took the border towns of Tal Abyad and Hasakah to the east while advancing to within 50 miles of Raqaa, considered the ISIS capital in Syria.

I think that maybe Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s policy of supporting Sunni Islamic extremists and rolling back civil rights has finally outweighed his support for Wall Street friendly economics.

I guess that actively supporting ISIS has kind of crossed the line.

This Business Will get out of Control. It Will get out of Control and we’ll be Lucky to Live Through It.

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The military dick waving in Europe is getting out of control.

First, the US engages in show of force in the Atlantic Resolve exercise, and Russia responded with its own maneuvers, first with 40,000 troops, and a few days later another 40,000:

Russia said Thursday it had doubled the number of troops taking part in mass drills ordered by President Vladimir Putin this week to 80,000 in a major show of strength amid tensions with the West over Ukraine.

 Putin on Monday ordered drills for more than 40,000 troops in regions spanning the country, from the Arctic to the far east to the volatile southern Caucasus, and ordered nuclear bomber jets to be deployed in Crimea a year after its annexation by Moscow.

 Russia’s chief of the general staff, Valery Gerasimov, said Thursday that the “number of troops taking part in the exercises has gone up to 80,000, and the number of aircraft has increased to 220,” quoted by RIA Novosti state news agency.

 Troops in the western and central regions and military aircraft were scrambled for exercises, Gerasimov said.

 The drills are the latest in a succession of large-scale military maneuvers that Moscow has ordered as relations with the West have plunged to a post-Cold War low over the crisis in Ukraine.

Note that Atlantic Resolve deployed something on the order of 3000 troops, and on short notice, the Russians deployed nearly 30 times that, and included a much wider variety of forces.

BTW, western military analysts were very impressed with the speed and competence of the Russian deployment:

“It’s helped us further develop our understanding of freedom of movement in Eastern Europe,” said Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, the Army’s most senior commander in Europe, in an interview with Defense News and Army Times reporters and editors.

 ………

 “[Russian President Vladimir] Putin exercises freedom of movement all the time” within Russia, Hodges said, and the US plans to demonstrate how it converges people and vehicles, a “tremendous opportunity” to practice and reassure allies in the face of Russian aggression. To pull it off, the Army is navigating diplomatic requirements and assessing infrastructure among Eastern European allies.

 “This is what the US Army does, we can move a lot of capability a long distance,” Hodges said. “I’ve been watching the Russian exercises … what I cared about is they can get 30,000 people and 1,000 tanks in a place really fast. Damn, that was impressive.”

 The remarks coincide with the one-year anniversary of Russia’s annexation of Crimea, condemned by Kiev and the West as an illegal land grab but heralded by many Russians as correcting a historic injustice.

 Aside from the Russian military’s ability to converge quickly, Hodges noted Russia’s modernized jamming and signal direction-finding capabilities, stressing the importance of US troops using secure communications.

And our military is determined to continue to engage in dick swinging against country with the 2nd largest nuclear arsenal in the world.

As I stated earlier today, this is not the sort of stuff that should only be done when there are specific orders authorizing the action by civilian authorities.

I will add that if this was a decision by civilian authorities, that person needs to be fired.

H/t Information Dissemination.

It is Ironic that this News Comes Out Just Before Tết

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The US is looking to expand its supply of arms to the Ukraine:

With Russian-backed separatists pressing their attacks in Ukraine, NATO’s military commander, Gen. Philip M. Breedlove, now supports providing defensive weapons and equipment to Kiev’s beleaguered forces, and an array of administration and military officials appear to be edging toward that position, American officials said Sunday.

President Obama has made no decisions on providing such lethal assistance. But after a series of striking reversals that Ukraine’s forces have suffered in recent weeks, the Obama administration is taking a fresh look at the question of military aid.

Secretary of State John Kerry, who plans to visit Kiev on Thursday, is open to new discussions about providing lethal assistance, as is Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, officials said. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, who is leaving his post soon, backs sending defensive weapons to the Ukrainian forces.

It appears that the only person with any sanity left in the Obama administration is Susan Rice:

In recent months, Susan E. Rice, Mr. Obama’s national security adviser, has resisted proposals to provide lethal assistance, several officials said. But one official who is familiar with her views insisted that Ms. Rice was now prepared to reconsider the issue.

It’s interesting that the person that Barack Obama has been determined to keep on his staff, John Seymour McCain III, in a fit of infantile pique blocked her nomination to Secretary of State is stopping this, for now at least.

In some ways, it’s a good thing.

He could be listening to the slavering war monger that is Samantha Powers on this.

BTW, the usual crop of DC psychopaths has weighed in:

Fueling the broader debate over policy is an independent report to be issued Monday by eight former senior American officials, who urge the United States to send $3 billion in defensive arms and equipment to Ukraine, including anti-armor missiles, reconnaissance drones, armored Humvees and radars that can determine the location of enemy rocket and artillery fire.

Michèle A. Flournoy, a former senior Pentagon official who is a leading candidate to serve as defense secretary if Hillary Rodham Clinton is elected president, joined in preparing the report. Others include James G. Stavridis, a retired admiral who served as the top NATO military commander, and Ivo Daalder, the ambassador to NATO during Mr. Obama’s first term.

“The West needs to bolster deterrence in Ukraine by raising the risks and costs to Russia of any renewed major offensive,” the report says. “That requires providing direct military assistance — in far larger amounts than provided to date and including lethal defensive arms.”

They don’t get it.

Russia sees this as an existential issue, and they see US actions, from the expansion of NATO to the multiple coups engineered in the Ukraine and other former Soviet republics under the guise of “color revolutions” as a part of a war that has continued to be waged against Russia since the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Truth is, I agree with the Russian view on this.

Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, we have seen this sort of insanity become a fixture of US foreign policy.

The US believes that it can enforce its preferred solution anywhere in the world, even when it does not serve any meaningful interest of America.

There is also the small fact that the Ukrainian military really does not exist as a particularly functional entity.

It has had to be backed up by Fascist militias, and its attempts to use conscription have been met with protests, an orgy of draft dodging, and the mass purchase sinecures as priests.

And these idiots in the Pentagon and White House are determined to go to war with Russia because their latest color revolution did not go exactly as planned.

Bug Hunt Accomplished…

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So Qaddafi is dead:

Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, the former Libyan strongman who fled into hiding after an armed uprising toppled his regime two months ago, met a violent and vengeful death Thursday in the hands of rebel fighters who stormed his final stronghold in his Mediterranean hometown Surt. At least one of his sons was also killed.

Al Jazeera television showed footage of Colonel Qaddafi, alive but bloody, as he was dragged around by armed men in Surt. The television also broadcast a separate clip of his half-naked torso, with eyes staring vacantly and an apparent gunshot wound to the head, as jubilant fighters fired automatic weapons in the air. A third video, posted on Youtube, showed excited fighters hovering around his lifeless-looking body, posing for photographs and yanking his limp head up and down by the hair.

Conflicting accounts quickly emerged about whether Colonel Qaddafi was executed by his captors, died from gunshot wounds sustained in a firefight, was mortally wounded in a NATO air strike on his escaping convoy or bled to death in an ambulance. But the images broadcast by Al Jazeera punctuated an emphatic and gruesome ending to his four decades as a ruthless and bombastic autocrat who had basked in his reputation as the self-styled king of kings of Africa.

So all that remains for NATO’s little colonial enterprise is the looting by multinational oil companies and ………… What else is there in Libya?

Tourism maybe? 

And, of course, money to gotten by looting privatizing state industry, the healthcare system, and education.

It Looks Like Gaddafi is Out

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Or will be in a matter of hours.

I was listening to NPR, and they were hoping that the rebels would not go medieval on former Gaddafi loyalists, but that is a pipe dream.

They have no credibility, because they were installed largely as the result of direct military action by NATO, which requires the widespread application of violence against any potential opposition.

Additionally, because they are effectively clients of big oil and finance NATO, they will have to aggressively implement “free market reforms”, which means the end of their publicly financed healthcare and education systems, as well as signing sweetheart deals with big oil, which will not be supported by the general populace.

It’s good that Gaddafi is gone, but because he was removed through what was essentially a colonial intervention, the new regime will for the foreseeable future be a colonial administration, which may in the long run prove worse for the average Libyan.

Sanity in the Ukraine

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Ukraine is formally withdrawing its application to join NATO. It’s parliament passed a law making joining the organization illegal.

Ukraine’s aspirations, much like Georgia’s were clearly motivated more by hostility towards Russia than about the real needs of the Ukrainian people, and this should serve to reduce tensions in the region.

Of course, what can be made through legislation can be unmade through legislation, but at the very least, it should reduce the drama from the Black Sea region for a while.

Elections Have Consequences, Lib-Dems in UK Coalition Edition

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I’m pretty sure that one of the conditions for the Liberal Democrats to enter into a coalition with the Tories was that a hard date be set for a withdrawal from Afghanistan, and the recent statement by the Defens(c)e Minister would appear to confirm this:

Senior British officials, including new Foreign Secretary William Hague arrived in Afghanistan May 22 with a warning that Britain wants to withdraw its troops as soon as possible.

Hague, Defence Secretary Liam Fox and International Development Secretary Andrew Mitchell are set to meet President Hamid Karzai in their first visit to the country since a new coalition government took power in London this month.

…………

In an interview with The Times newspaper before arriving in Kabul, Fox made clear the visit would focus on speeding up the withdrawal of British troops from Afghanistan, and that no new troops would be deployed.

“We need to accept we are at the limit of numbers now and I would like the forces to come back as soon as possible,” he was quoted as saying.

“We have to reset expectations and timelines.

“National security is the focus now. We are not a global policeman. We are not in Afghanistan for the sake of the education policy in a broken 13th-century country. We are there so the people of Britain and our global interests are not threatened,” Fox said.

Another contributing factor is that the Afghanistan adventure is phenomenally unpopular in Britain, so a continued trip down the path in the Hindu Kush is politically suicidal, notwithstanding any “special relationship”.

How About Training the Troops to Shoot Accurately at Range?

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Click for full size

The EM-2, the first modern Bullpup

And going with a Bullpup, which would allow for a longer barrel in a shorter weapon would not hurt either.

A monograph by Major Thomas P. Ehrhart (PDF) is raising a bit of a stir in the blogosphere, and mostly this is used as a stopping off point for the suggestion that the 5.56mm round be replaced with something bigger and heavier.

I think that looking at the abstract gives a good picture of the problem:

Operations in Afghanistan frequently require United States ground forces to engage and destroy the enemy at ranges beyond 300 meters. While the infantryman is ideally suited for combat in Afghanistan, his current weapons, doctrine, and marksmanship training do not provide a precise, lethal fire capability to 500 meters and are therefore inappropriate. Comments from returning soldiers reveal that about fifty percent of engagements occur past 300 meters. Current equipment, training, and doctrine are optimized for engagements under 300 meters and on level terrain. This monograph reviews the small arms capability of the infantry squad from World War I to present. It then discusses current shortfalls with cartridge lethality, weapons and optics configurations, the squad designated marksman concept and finally the rifle qualification course. Potential solutions in each of these areas are discussed.

(emphasis mine)

So, the current standard weapon, the M4 is inadequate beyond 300m, and somewhat marginal at lesser distances, but the M-16 serves ably in this role:

In the table of organization for a light infantry company only the six –M240B 7.62-mm machineguns, two– 60-mm mortars and nine designated marksman armed with either 7.62-mm M14 rifles or accurized 5.56-mm M16A4’s rifles are able to effectively engage the enemy. These weapons systems represent 19 percent of the company’s firepower. This means that 81 percent of the company has little effect on the fight. This is unacceptable.

There are two reasons for this, the M4 has a 14½ inch barrel, and as velocity of the round drops, so does stopping power. The M16, with its 20 inch barrel can effectively engage at the longer distances.

The second problem is that the US Army is does not place sufficient emphasis on marksmanship:

The U.S entered World War I with a small professional Army trained in marksmanship. It filled its ranks with volunteers and conscripts and traditional marksmanship training took too much time. Between World War I and the end of the Vietnam War, the U.S. Army was a conscript Army that relied on suppressive fire, not marksmanship, and trained accordingly. The problem is suppressive fire does not do well with a light, barely lethal bullet at the distances of engagements in Afghanistan.

Note again that the bullet is “barely lethal” when fired from a 14½ inch barrel.

Most of the other western armies have moved to Bullpup, and additionally use a gas driven piston to operate the bolt, as opposed to the gas tube system used on the AR-15 family of weapons, which is sensitive to the accumulation of grime and combustion residues.

While changing the weapon and training is a non-trivial course, it is far more straightforward than a adopting a new round, particularly when there would still be issues with accuracy under the current doctrine, particularly when it is likely that our NATO allies would be disinclined to make the change in a timely manner: It took nearly a decade for the 5.56 to be adopted as NATO standard, and a decade after that for it to become the standard round for infantry weapons.

H/t Defense Tech.

Dutch Ruling Coalition Collapses Over Afghanistan Commitment

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The Labor Party has pulled out of government over a proposal to extend the tour of Dutch forces in the region, leaving Christian Democratic Alliance head, and Prim Minister Jan Peter Balkenende no choice but to dissolve government.

What is interesting here is that the troops were supposed to return in 2008, but have remained deployed because no replacements could be found amongst other NATO members, and Labor pulled out as a result.

This means that elections will be held a year ahead of time, probably in May, and that the main issue is likely to be the deployment of Dutch troops to Afghanistan, and given the nature of the electorate in Holland, and Europe generally, I think that the parties who favor immediate withdrawal are likely to gain the upper hand.

This may have political significance to other nations deploying troops to the campaign.

Sanity Hits Missile Defense Plans

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Click Pictures for full size images
Tehran to DC


Masshad to Washington, DC


Masshad to San Francisco


Masshad to Rome


Masshad to Madrid


Masshad to Istambul


Masshad to Athens


Masshad to Chicago

Obama has canceled plans for missile defense installations in Poland and the Czech Republic. Basically, they determined that the threat is not there, and the Russians find it provocative, so they are dropping it.

The Russian response is positive, if somewhat muted, probably because they have been aware that the signals that Obama has sent on this issue for some time, and do now want to stir the pot.

Notably, they mention cost a number of times in their official statement.

I think that this is a combination of a number of things:

  • Recognition that there were no real benefits to the system beyond playing to the right wing in Eastern Europe, and to upset the Russians, because it was thought that a hostile Russia would play well for Republicans in domestic politics.
  • The fact that there are technologies that allow for non-permanent installations to serve the same purpose, most notably THAAD and a potentially larger derivative, and various flavor of interceptors based on the Navy Standard, which won’t have the effect of leaving Turkey, Italy and Spain, as shown in my analysis from earlier this year.

In the case of a diplomatic crisis, you can have a THAAD or a ground based Standard interceptor battery in place in less than 72 hours in northeast Europe, and have an Aegis destroyer off deployed near Cyprus, or possibly in the Black sea, in order to protect the southern tier of NATO in less time than that.

This is a remarkably sensible and sane decision, and it appears that SecDef Gates is fully behind this, so I expect Republicans to start screaming “Munich
if they haven’t already.

I think that we will see more support from the Russians on a number of issues as a result.

Sanity Brakes Out in Missile Defense

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We now have a report that the US will abandon plans to station missile interceptors in Eastern Europe

Washington will scrap plans to put anti-missile bases in Poland and the Czech Republic and is looking at alternatives including Israel and Turkey, a Polish newspaper reported Aug. 27, citing U.S. officials.

The U.S. plan, intended for defense against attacks from Iran, has met with fierce objections from Russia, which regarded the eastern European bases as a threat to its own security.

…

This is good news. Not only was Eastern Europe a piss poor location for missile defense, because it leaves allies on the southern tier of NATO unprotected, but it is located so as to be a direct threat, and a means of surveillance of, all of the European territory of Russia.

I continue to maintain that the real goal of the missile system was to create hostility, which would, in the perception of the Dick Cheneys of the world, bolster the Republican Party.

There is a Context in Georgia

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But I am not sure what it is, so the report of a tank battalion mutinies in Georgia is concerning, but I do not know what it means.

I still believe that the Russians have thoroughly penetrated the Georgian state security apparatus, so I don’t see this as being part of a Russian backed coup. It would have been more extensive and better organized if it had.

It is likely, however, that the Russians were aware of what was going on before the Georgians, and certainly they view the events with no small amount of schadenfreude, but I think that whatever happened here had a lot more to do with what is going on in Georgia than with Russia.

That being said, I have yet to see anyone, anywhere give more specifics than, there was a mutiny, and the Georgians accused the Russians.

Perhaps there is something to be found on Georgian or Russian language sites, but I can’t read either tongue.

My guess would be that there are elements in the Georgian military not happy with the NATO exercises, but that is only a very uninformed guess.

Russia: Turkey Seeks To Buy Air Defense System – Defense News

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About 7 months ago, I noted that Turkey was looking to buy Russian SAM Systems.

We have another report , and this adds the S-400 (NATO Code Name SA-21 Growler) to the list.

It is arguably the most capable SAM system in the world with a range in excess of 400 km, and a sophisticated control system that may allow for some anti-stealth capabilities through sensor fusion and data processing, along a significant anti-missile capabilities, which might very well provide coverage from something fired from Iran.

What is interesting here is that the story is not that the manufacturer is saying that Turkey wants the system, not that a contract has been inked, and the system has yet to be exported, and I am not sure that if I were Russian authorities, I would want a NATO ally, who would be very likely to pass along data on this system to the US, to get their mitts on this.

NATO Meeting Finds Compromise at Meeting

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So NATO agrees to resume limited ties with Russia while also allowing for better ties with Georgia and the Ukraine without any road map to NATA membership.

Obviously, it makes sense to resume ties with Russia. They are geographically and historically very important in dealing with Iran and Afghanistan.

As to kicking NATO membership down the road for the two former Soviet Republics, that’s just stupid, but the best that could be had with Bush and His Evil Minions™ still in power.

NATO does not need expansion, and the idea that a nut job like Georgia’s Mikheil Saakashvili, or a man who seems to be actively in the running for nut job like Ukraine’s Viktor Yushchenko to have the ability to mandate actions on the part of three nuclear powers is absurd.

One of the great diplomatic missteps of the 1990s was the expansion of NATO.

Just imagine how bad it would have been if Georgia had been a NATO member when it launched its assault on civilians. Do governments in the rest of Europe want to be held hostage by someone like Mikheil Saakashvili?

Do the militaries in the rest of Europe want to have to share data with a country whose military was so completely penetrated by Russian intelligence?

The expansion of NATO has been driven by 3 things:

  1. The US desire for new markets for defense equipment.
  2. The desire by some players to treat Russia as a conquered nation, and to use NATO rub their face in their current status.
  3. The European goal of continental union.
  4. Dick Cheney and His Evil Minions™ want to recreate the bad old Russian bear, because it gets Republicans elected, so they keep poking Russia with a number of sticks, of which NATO expansion is one.

I will note that the rapid expansion of the EU, which is, after a civilian institution hasn’t gone well either.

One need only look look at Bulgaria, a virtual Mafia state whose accession to the EU was driven by pan European triumphalism, to a lesser degree places like the Baltic republics, which are engaging in genteel ethnic cleansing, and that whole “twins” thing in Poland.

Both the EU and NATO have over expanded because of this, and the possibility of adding Ukraine and Georgia gives me the willies.

If the road to a unified Europe is inevitable, and I think that it is near inevitable, then expansion can take part at a measured pace.

The greatest threat to a real European super-State policy is the EE’s collapse from overambitious expansion.