more on DO READ Biowar for Dummies]

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: [Dewayne-Net] re: Biowar for Dummies
Date: Thu, 23 Feb 2006 10:54:35 -0800
From: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne () warpspeed com>
Reply-To: dewayne () warpspeed com
To: Dewayne-Net Technology List <dewayne-net () warpspeed com>
References: <007701c638a8$b6484a90$077aa0c0@Dafydd3>

[Note:  This comment comes from reader Dave Hughes.  DLH]
> From: "Dave Hughes" <history () oldcolo com>
> Date: February 23, 2006 10:41:08 AM PST
> To: <dewayne () warpspeed com>
> Subject: Re: [Dewayne-Net] re: Biowar for Dummies
>
> If Ted Kircher had not added the reference  '.and citizens' to his  
> insightful comments re: Biowar ("When will the  U.S. (government  
> and citizens) understand.") I would not bother to compose this  
> post. For it has been the simplistic knee-jerk reaction of citizens  
> from both the left and the right, over what the 'government', has  
> been doing since 9/11 that has preempted deep enough debate on the  
> real long term issues of US national security.
>
> Ted makes three points: that ('military?)  'bullying' won't work,  
> development of a middle class in the third world will, and that we  
> haven't begun to see what 'biowar' and other means can do to us.   
> Up to a point he has it right.
>
> But as Yogi Berra would say its 'De Ja Vue all over again.'
>
> Ted is articulating now what some of us understood clearly, and  
> articulated to and through a Democratic Administration  40 years  
> ago during the Vietnam War, but which advice went over the heads of  
> 'citizens' then, as I am afraid Ted's sophisticated analysis can  
> now. The parallels between 1966 and 2006 are quite exact, right  
> down what both leftist Democrat dove McNamara and rightest  
> Republican neocon Wolfowitz did for their mea culpa after helping  
> lose their wars by leaving to run the World Bank! Which in its  
> clumsy way contributes to 'developing a middle class' in foreign  
> countries.
>
> I invite you to read the major policy speech I wrote for Defense  
> Secretary McNamara in 1966 - as his 'Assistant for  
> Counterinsurgency' where he - based on what a small handful of we  
> uniformed Army officers had studied about the coming nature of our  
> 'future' wars and what we recommended our American, not just  
> military policies for preventing and dealing with them should be  
> based upon. A long term strategic American national security  
> policy, not just a short term tactical military view.  Its  
> distilled in that speech. We soldiers knew Clausewitz was dying, if  
> not dead. And Nuclear deterrence only deterred nuclear war. Neither  
> did much for the coming age of terrorism or guerilla wars.
>
> <http://www.oldcolo.com/McNamara/mcnamara.html>
>
> The e=mc2 for the US prevailing in future wars, particularly those  
> involving the 3d World,  that was embedded in his speech was - and  
> still is, for Western governments -
>
>                             Security is Development
>
> Not 'just' military force (though Kircher is wrong that such wars  
> are 'unwinnable' or that somehow 'military force' is just for  
> bullying. Military force alone cannot 'win' over modern  
> insurgencies, but its absence in the face of violent insurgencies,  
> can sure lose them.  In fact I shook up USAID after that speech  
> when I informed them that pouring ham-handed US Foreign Aid into  
> underdeveloped countries as often as not precipitates civil wars,  
> as often as it does help prevent them.  Nigeria anyone? The battle  
> to create a 'middle class' is often extremely violent. Which simply  
> can't be ignored. Decades of development can be ruined by days of  
> violence. Force has to be met by force. From police to counter- 
> Iranian missle shots.
>
> I'll bet few on this list ever wondered how backward, suppressed  
> (by Japan), South Korea ever emerged to become the economic power  
> it is. One major factor was the massive 'technology transfer' from  
> the US Military through the S Korean military over years of war,   
> that 'modernized' the work force of a small nation. Laid down the  
> prerequisite for investment. And thus a middle class. I know how  
> economically primitive they were before 1950. I was there. 55 years  
> ago.
>
> But we also saw, 40 years ago the 'miniaturization' of technology  
> coming. Stinger missiles any half-instructed peasant could fire,  
> shaped charges designed to kill Soviet tanks, now RPGs fired by  
> teenagers against American soldiers - and civilians - modern  
> explosives, now suicide bomber belts. And of course, satellite  
> linked cam corders, used by Media to tell all, how the US is losing  
> the war, and personal computers, now driving 1,000 Al Quaeda  
> jihaddist web sites. And Biowar agents) We pointed out that  
> advances in technology for waging war favors the rebel more than  
> its government. (sorry Air Force) As Kircher points out, we haven't  
> seen nuthin yet.
>
> BUT where he and I part company - or perhaps he just hasn't thought  
> it through enough, is on how you get from here to there. Rumsfeld  
> refused to listen to quite qualified military professionals, many  
> of whom know a hell of a lot more how to 'nation build' in the  
> midst of violence, and what the winning mix must be between  
> military Civil Affairs, Special Forces, NSA intercepts,  Combat  
> Infantry units, diplomacy, and the Corps of Engineers, than  
> Halliburton or Bremmer ever will. It is on the very difficult issue  
> of 'how' does the US foster, among about 5 of the 6 billion restive  
> people on this planet, with their sectarian, (Sunnis, Shia)  
> territorial (Kurds, Basques), religious (Palestinian, Israel) 'a  
> fat dumb and happy middle class' - while dealing with ever more  
> dangerous  'wars',  insurgent, civil, or cross border ones which  
> inevitably ensue?
>
> Modernization is a much more violent process than Americans will  
> ever admit. Or, unfortunately, have the patience to see through in  
> this age of instant gratification or failure, or instant Sunday  
> Morning Talk Show, or Maillist analysis.
>
> Dave Hughes
> dave () oldcolo com

Weblog at: <http://weblog.warpspeed.com>


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