While the world has been preoccupied with underwear bombers and other modern horrors, I went to see the latest incarnation of Sherlock Holmes in the new movie starring Robert Downey, Jr. This is not the first time that the great detective has been reshaped for a new generation, though rarely as dramatically as in this version (anyone remember The 7 Percent Solution). I was nevertheless gratified to recognize elements of the canon in the new film, including the “patriotic V.R.” bullet-hole monogram in his Baker Street flat. While much attention has been given to this new athletic ‘action-man’ portrayal, I also enjoyed the reference to the detective’s intellectual side as he called for “data” that would enable him to attack the ongoing mystery.
Reading the adventures of Sherlock Holmes was my earliest introduction to the disciplined use of reason and logic. These lessons, in addition to other more formal instruction, later proved valuable during a career that included several tours of duty as an analyst either in Washington or overseas, whether the problem was diagnosing local politics or analyzing the international gray/black market trade in missile technology and other sensitive advanced technologies and hardware. For example, it was Holmes who first introduced me to Occam’s razor, though he didn’t so identify it at the time: “How often have I said to you that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth?” Holmes was so fond of this bit of advice that he actually stated it twice in the same adventure, The Sign of the Four, “Eliminate all other factors, and the one which remains must be the truth.”
In A Study in Scarlet, Holmes responds to Watson’s observation, as their cab carries them to the scene of a possible investigation, that Holmes didn’t seem “to give much thought to the matter in hand.” The world’s first consulting detective replied, “No data yet. It is a capital mistake to theorize before you have all the evidence. It biases the judgment.” Watching the recurring appearances by expert talking heads on the television news and commentary programs revealed that far too many of these individuals had forgotten that bit of advice. Speculation runs rampant and the sound bite rules as they ignored Holmes’s further cautionary advice that “It is an error to argue in front of your data. You find yourself insensibly twisting them round to fit your theories.”
As a public service, therefore, I offer some additional bits of Sherlockian wisdom from my own small collection in the hopes that analysts, pundits, experts, and the general reader will benefit.
“…I make a point of never having any prejudices and of following docilely wherever fact may lead me…” The Reigate Squires. [Don’t prejudge where the information will lead you before you have accumulated the information necessary to support a conclusion.]
“One should always look for a possible alternative and provide against it. It is the first rule of criminal investigation.” The Adventure of the Black Peter. [In other words, always look for possible alternative explanations of the available data.]
“When you follow two separate trains of thought, you will find some point of intersection which should approximate the truth.” The Disappearance of Lady Frances Carfax. [Evidence is always subject to multiple interpretations or explanations, but as you accumulate additional evidence the correct interpretation emerges.]
“Who is it that profits by it?” The Naval Treaty. [A rephrasing of the classical cui bono? Answer the question of who benefits or profits most directly from an action, event, or outcome and you always have the starting point for your analysis or investigation, and sometimes, it will also give you the end point.]
And the most famous of all, “Is there any other point to which you would wish to draw my attention?” “To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time.” “The dog did nothing in the night-time.” “That was the curious incident,” remarked Sherlock Holmes. The Silver Blaze. [A reminder never to examine an event or incident in isolation, but to remember that it is but one moment on a time line that strings together a series of events or incidents and to look for how they are connected or fail to be connected. In this instance, it was presumed that a stranger had entered the farm – but if it had been a stranger, why didn’t the dog bark at him? And if the dog didn’t bark at this “intruder” could the “intruder” in fact not have been a stranger to the dog and thus it didn’t bark at him.]
Of course, neither Sherlock Holmes nor Dr. Watson would concede that simply reading the great detective’s adventures would enable anyone to fully absorb his methods and achieve anything like his degree of success. Nevertheless, anyone interested in learning how to be an intelligence analyst (or perhaps even to play at one on television) or anyone wanting to brush some rust of their analytical skills now has some basic concepts with which to start. But both critics and advocates of Holmes’ methods must remember that not even Sherlock Holmes cracked every case nor captured every miscreant or criminal.
Showing posts with label terrorism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label terrorism. Show all posts
Thursday, January 7, 2010
Thursday, September 24, 2009
A Rock and a Hard Choice
Last week the CATO Institute held its conference on the subject of Afghanistan and what the U.S. should do in the ongoing war there. The panel and conference were moderated by Christopher Preble, Director of Foreign Policy Studies at the Cato Institute. Panel members included Malou Innocent, Foreign Policy Analyst at the Cato Institute and co-author of Escaping the 'Graveyard of Empires': A Strategy to Exit Afghanistan; Celeste Ward, Senior Defense Analyst at the RAND Corp.; Patrick M. Cronin, Director of the Institute for National Strategic Studies at the National Defense University; Robert Naiman, National Coordinator, Just Foreign Policy; and Ted Galen Carpenter, Vice President for Defense and Foreign Policy Studies, Cato Institute, and co-author of Escaping the 'Graveyard of Empires'. You can see a podcast of the event at the CATO website. The two most striking points of the conference were the surprising degree of civility and the agreement that we need to do something different in Afghanistan (though without unanimity on what we should do differently) and we needed to start doing this something different soon.
My own thinking on the subject has recently been influenced by Death of a Myth by Bob Snelson on General Custer’s defeat at the Little Bighorn, published in 2005. I was struck by the author’s point that Custer’s battlefield decisions reflected how little he in fact knew or understood (beyond the tactical level) about the Native American peoples against whom he was making war. The army’s objective in this expedition was to attack the Sioux and the Cheyenne until they either moved onto the established U.S. government Indian reservations, or were annihilated. In essence, the U.S. Government had decided to use its military resources to compel these tribes to abandon their traditional way of life and its associated values and mores. Custer knew that the Indians would attempt to evade contact and combat with his force unless they perceived some advantage in fighting or a strong threat to the village and tribe that had to be countered. This understanding appears to be what led Custer to keep dividing his small command in order to cast a wide net that would force the warriors to come out fight.
The conflict between America’s Native peoples fighting to preserve their traditional way of life and an American government determined to see them acculturated or eliminated lasted for decades. It in fact resulted in the destruction of much of the traditional ways of Native Americans while many of the survivors were denied full membership in American society and ended up marginalized in their own homeland.
The United States deployed military forces to Afghanistan in pursuit of Al Qaeda and its Taliban protectors. Having brought down the Taliban regime, the efforts of the U.S. and its Allies moved away from military confrontation with and defeat of residual Taliban and Al Qaeda forces and forces were even removed from Afghanistan and sent to Iraq for the new war there. Our forces and assets remaining in Afghanistan became increasingly focused on social engineering and national building issues with the general ambition of building up a modern western-style nation state – to the detriment of Afghan elements still clinging to the more traditional system based upon clan and tribe. In the view of many Afghans, the U.S. goal is to compel them to abandon their traditions, their religion, and their entire culture.
It is increasingly clear that eight years after U.S. forces arrived in Afghanistan, the American people are unwilling to see the U.S. increase or prolong its commitment of time and resources to further push for any long term reshaping of that country. The Afghans themselves appear at least if not more reluctant to accept the sweeping changes pushed for by the U.S. and its allies, such as the elimination of poppy cultivation and full equality for women, among other things. Against the background of conflict between Al Qaeda/Taliban and the U.S. and its allies, too many Afghans are choosing the former as being less of a threat to traditional values and way of life. We need to decide that our most important objective is to deny Al Qaeda any sanctuary or presence in Afghanistan that would contribute to its terrorist plans and operations. Everything else must be considered a secondary and more long term goal. For the immediate future, the U.S. needs to decide now exactly what resources and forces it can commit and for how long – and adjust its goals accordingly.
My own thinking on the subject has recently been influenced by Death of a Myth by Bob Snelson on General Custer’s defeat at the Little Bighorn, published in 2005. I was struck by the author’s point that Custer’s battlefield decisions reflected how little he in fact knew or understood (beyond the tactical level) about the Native American peoples against whom he was making war. The army’s objective in this expedition was to attack the Sioux and the Cheyenne until they either moved onto the established U.S. government Indian reservations, or were annihilated. In essence, the U.S. Government had decided to use its military resources to compel these tribes to abandon their traditional way of life and its associated values and mores. Custer knew that the Indians would attempt to evade contact and combat with his force unless they perceived some advantage in fighting or a strong threat to the village and tribe that had to be countered. This understanding appears to be what led Custer to keep dividing his small command in order to cast a wide net that would force the warriors to come out fight.
The conflict between America’s Native peoples fighting to preserve their traditional way of life and an American government determined to see them acculturated or eliminated lasted for decades. It in fact resulted in the destruction of much of the traditional ways of Native Americans while many of the survivors were denied full membership in American society and ended up marginalized in their own homeland.
The United States deployed military forces to Afghanistan in pursuit of Al Qaeda and its Taliban protectors. Having brought down the Taliban regime, the efforts of the U.S. and its Allies moved away from military confrontation with and defeat of residual Taliban and Al Qaeda forces and forces were even removed from Afghanistan and sent to Iraq for the new war there. Our forces and assets remaining in Afghanistan became increasingly focused on social engineering and national building issues with the general ambition of building up a modern western-style nation state – to the detriment of Afghan elements still clinging to the more traditional system based upon clan and tribe. In the view of many Afghans, the U.S. goal is to compel them to abandon their traditions, their religion, and their entire culture.
It is increasingly clear that eight years after U.S. forces arrived in Afghanistan, the American people are unwilling to see the U.S. increase or prolong its commitment of time and resources to further push for any long term reshaping of that country. The Afghans themselves appear at least if not more reluctant to accept the sweeping changes pushed for by the U.S. and its allies, such as the elimination of poppy cultivation and full equality for women, among other things. Against the background of conflict between Al Qaeda/Taliban and the U.S. and its allies, too many Afghans are choosing the former as being less of a threat to traditional values and way of life. We need to decide that our most important objective is to deny Al Qaeda any sanctuary or presence in Afghanistan that would contribute to its terrorist plans and operations. Everything else must be considered a secondary and more long term goal. For the immediate future, the U.S. needs to decide now exactly what resources and forces it can commit and for how long – and adjust its goals accordingly.
Thursday, March 5, 2009
A Review - The First Tithe by Israel Eldad
The First Tithe, Israel Eldad, translated and with a Foreword and Notes by Zev Golan. Jabotinsky Institute, Israel, 2008. Originally published in Hebrew as Maaser Rishon, © 1950, 1963, 1975 by the author
Israel Eldad was as a member of the three-man Central Command of the underground Lehi organization and its principal ideologue. The publisher of this English version of his memoirs emphasizes Eldad’s shared experiences with figures such as Menachem Begin and Golda Meir, among others, and with underground organizations such as the Irgun and the Hagana. His story includes escape from Nazi-occupied Europe, imprisonment by the British authorities in Palestine, escape from prison, and life in the underground resistance to that British authority while evading recapture until the end of the British mandate and Israel’s independence. Eldad’s account of these experiences has reportedly never before appeared in English.
What author Israel Eldad has presented here, in Zev Golan’s translation into English from the original Hebrew, is neither history nor autobiography, but rather a memoir in a rather classic sense. While generally chronological, Eldad’s narrative is not bound by clock or calendar or limited by objective reality. Rather Israel Eldad tells the story of his life and his work as he recalls it – and as it occurs to him in the telling. He also writes with few concessions to any readership that does not read Hebrew or which might disagree with his views – an attitude that appears consistent with his lifelong struggle to see realized the vision of an independent Jewish state as conceived by him and the Lehi movement. As a result this narrative often challenges but rarely bores the reader.
Eldad’s story is set within Israel’s struggle for independence. That struggle and the subsequent fight for the survival of the young state were first brought to my attention by the 1967 Six Day War. Still in high school at the time, my friends and I immersed ourselves in the details of the dramatic outcome of that remarkable conflict. This interest lead to more reading and research into the historical background of Israel’s existence; the international conflicts, negotiations, and deals; the wars, its military forces and their weapons, the history of persecution, and the Holocaust, etc. This included such modern popular novels as John Hersey’s The Wall and Leon Uris’ Mila 18 both about the Warsaw Ghetto as well as Leon Uris’ Exodus and James Michener’s The Source. I even uncovered in my local library a copy of the White Paper that collected the original memoirs and documents written by the fighters from the Warsaw Ghetto uprising of 1943.
However, I found this a challenging work to read much less to review. It was difficult, not for any fault in the translation, but because of the author’s intent and his statements that made it clear to me that I was not a member of his intended audience. In fact, the deeper I read into the book the more I came to wonder if I wasn’t in fact a part of his “anti-audience” – a member of that community against which he was trying to warn his intended audience. His viewpoints and ideas were frequently at odds with my other sources and my resulting understanding of the historical and political events being described. The challenge was only increased when I read in the publisher’s press release that Israel Eldad was “one of the founding fathers of Israel” but by his own words in the book he rejected this modern state called Israel. Eldad described Israeli independence as the defeat of his Lehi movement which had called for an independent state – a sovereign kingdom of Israel – that incorporated Jerusalem and Jordan, as well as parts of Egypt, Syria, Iraq, and Lebanon.
I recognized that Eldad’s narrative conflicted at many points with my previous readings – many of which reflected the attitudes of the British who controlled Palestine or which reflected the views of other more mainstream elements within the Zionist movement and the Jewish diaspora, and the Jewish community in the United States. My initial surprise in this regard centered on the realization that I had long known of Eldad’s Lehi organization under the sobriquet of “the Stern gang,” a label that supports the reader’s dismissal of the group as being of little value and no further interest, clearly reflecting the viewpoint of the British authorities. From this point on, I read with the understanding that I had passed through a looking glass that separated what I had previously understood about Israel from this new perspective on the nation, its people, and its history.
Eldad’s account of his life’s work on behalf of Lehi clearly supports the long-familiar concept – “one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter.” As an ideologue and advocate supporting Lehi’s fighters in the struggle against Britain’s presence in Palestine and against any other apparent or potential restraint or obstacle to the realization of their vision for an independent Jewish state, Eldad conceded little to nothing in the vehemence of his arguments. The fighters of the Lehi movement were responsible for an escalating series of dramatic and bloody attacks upon the British authorities and even the UN, and its ambitions for further attacks were even greater. And while it is important to remember that his words reach us from a vastly different world almost half a century past, I must point out the following passage:
“And if the British Parliament and Buckingham Palace and the Foreign Office have not yet been blown sky high, this is not because we do not want to provoke or anger them, or because we are afraid of the results, but only because our boys in London have not yet submitted the practical plans to us, though they are working on them and we are awaiting for their letters, and we are sending explosives from France to England.”
There is within these words an echo of another conflict more familiar to me and which repeatedly came to mind as I read Eldad’s declarations on behalf of his cause. The last words above call to mind a 19th Century Irish song which promised “that there’ll be rifles in England that don’t come from France” declaring that the long struggle for Irish independence would be taken up in England’s own green fields.
However, these words above have to be read as very ancient and very modern. In our 21st Century post 9-11 world they have to be interpreted literally and cannot be set aside as a mere exercise in agit-prop political rhetoric. Today such a statement would be acted upon by the intelligence and security services (at least most of us would hope so). Even when first written these words must have held similar if less urgent interest for the authorities of the day.
Another parallel between the IRA and Lehi in their relations with British authority is found in Eldad’s account of how his movement’s fighters rejected the right of the British to put them on trial, the legality of their rule in Palestine, and thereby the authority of the British to determine what might or might not constitute illegal activity such as bearing arms. Irish rebels have long taken similar positions up to and including those members of the IRA brought to trial in the 1980s. By Eldad’s account, Lehi and the IRA also shared a common fund-raising technique – bank robbery. Despite Eldad’s explicit rejection of such comparisons, the parallels are further demonstrated by the IRA attack on then-Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher at the 1987 Conservative Party conference and the 1979 assassination of Prince Phillip’s uncle Lord Mountbatten. Neither the IRA nor Israel Eldad considered anyone beyond their reach.
According to the publishers, The First Tithe appeared in five editions in the original Hebrew. This first edition to appear in English was released on Israeli Independence Day, May 8, 2008. In addition to translating this work from the original Hebrew, Zev Golan has added endnotes and other explanatory data that make the work more accessible to the non-Israeli reader. While I may regret he expressed decision to drop certain passages that appeared in the Hebrew original because of the difficulty of translating and explaining their references to the Talmud and other source, his efforts to make this work more generally available are to be commended.
Even a single book as dramatic as The First Tithe is unlikely to change the reader’s views or even to result in a deeper understanding of a complex subject. However, a single book can compel the reader to understand that the subject of that work is indeed far more complex and less cut and dried than previously realized. In this, Israel Eldad and Zev Golan have succeeded and I personally have at least advanced to that recognition as a result. If you are interested in a deeper understanding of the situation that confronts us in the Middle East today, you need to read this book.
Israel Eldad was as a member of the three-man Central Command of the underground Lehi organization and its principal ideologue. The publisher of this English version of his memoirs emphasizes Eldad’s shared experiences with figures such as Menachem Begin and Golda Meir, among others, and with underground organizations such as the Irgun and the Hagana. His story includes escape from Nazi-occupied Europe, imprisonment by the British authorities in Palestine, escape from prison, and life in the underground resistance to that British authority while evading recapture until the end of the British mandate and Israel’s independence. Eldad’s account of these experiences has reportedly never before appeared in English.
What author Israel Eldad has presented here, in Zev Golan’s translation into English from the original Hebrew, is neither history nor autobiography, but rather a memoir in a rather classic sense. While generally chronological, Eldad’s narrative is not bound by clock or calendar or limited by objective reality. Rather Israel Eldad tells the story of his life and his work as he recalls it – and as it occurs to him in the telling. He also writes with few concessions to any readership that does not read Hebrew or which might disagree with his views – an attitude that appears consistent with his lifelong struggle to see realized the vision of an independent Jewish state as conceived by him and the Lehi movement. As a result this narrative often challenges but rarely bores the reader.
Eldad’s story is set within Israel’s struggle for independence. That struggle and the subsequent fight for the survival of the young state were first brought to my attention by the 1967 Six Day War. Still in high school at the time, my friends and I immersed ourselves in the details of the dramatic outcome of that remarkable conflict. This interest lead to more reading and research into the historical background of Israel’s existence; the international conflicts, negotiations, and deals; the wars, its military forces and their weapons, the history of persecution, and the Holocaust, etc. This included such modern popular novels as John Hersey’s The Wall and Leon Uris’ Mila 18 both about the Warsaw Ghetto as well as Leon Uris’ Exodus and James Michener’s The Source. I even uncovered in my local library a copy of the White Paper that collected the original memoirs and documents written by the fighters from the Warsaw Ghetto uprising of 1943.
However, I found this a challenging work to read much less to review. It was difficult, not for any fault in the translation, but because of the author’s intent and his statements that made it clear to me that I was not a member of his intended audience. In fact, the deeper I read into the book the more I came to wonder if I wasn’t in fact a part of his “anti-audience” – a member of that community against which he was trying to warn his intended audience. His viewpoints and ideas were frequently at odds with my other sources and my resulting understanding of the historical and political events being described. The challenge was only increased when I read in the publisher’s press release that Israel Eldad was “one of the founding fathers of Israel” but by his own words in the book he rejected this modern state called Israel. Eldad described Israeli independence as the defeat of his Lehi movement which had called for an independent state – a sovereign kingdom of Israel – that incorporated Jerusalem and Jordan, as well as parts of Egypt, Syria, Iraq, and Lebanon.
I recognized that Eldad’s narrative conflicted at many points with my previous readings – many of which reflected the attitudes of the British who controlled Palestine or which reflected the views of other more mainstream elements within the Zionist movement and the Jewish diaspora, and the Jewish community in the United States. My initial surprise in this regard centered on the realization that I had long known of Eldad’s Lehi organization under the sobriquet of “the Stern gang,” a label that supports the reader’s dismissal of the group as being of little value and no further interest, clearly reflecting the viewpoint of the British authorities. From this point on, I read with the understanding that I had passed through a looking glass that separated what I had previously understood about Israel from this new perspective on the nation, its people, and its history.
Eldad’s account of his life’s work on behalf of Lehi clearly supports the long-familiar concept – “one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter.” As an ideologue and advocate supporting Lehi’s fighters in the struggle against Britain’s presence in Palestine and against any other apparent or potential restraint or obstacle to the realization of their vision for an independent Jewish state, Eldad conceded little to nothing in the vehemence of his arguments. The fighters of the Lehi movement were responsible for an escalating series of dramatic and bloody attacks upon the British authorities and even the UN, and its ambitions for further attacks were even greater. And while it is important to remember that his words reach us from a vastly different world almost half a century past, I must point out the following passage:
“And if the British Parliament and Buckingham Palace and the Foreign Office have not yet been blown sky high, this is not because we do not want to provoke or anger them, or because we are afraid of the results, but only because our boys in London have not yet submitted the practical plans to us, though they are working on them and we are awaiting for their letters, and we are sending explosives from France to England.”
There is within these words an echo of another conflict more familiar to me and which repeatedly came to mind as I read Eldad’s declarations on behalf of his cause. The last words above call to mind a 19th Century Irish song which promised “that there’ll be rifles in England that don’t come from France” declaring that the long struggle for Irish independence would be taken up in England’s own green fields.
However, these words above have to be read as very ancient and very modern. In our 21st Century post 9-11 world they have to be interpreted literally and cannot be set aside as a mere exercise in agit-prop political rhetoric. Today such a statement would be acted upon by the intelligence and security services (at least most of us would hope so). Even when first written these words must have held similar if less urgent interest for the authorities of the day.
Another parallel between the IRA and Lehi in their relations with British authority is found in Eldad’s account of how his movement’s fighters rejected the right of the British to put them on trial, the legality of their rule in Palestine, and thereby the authority of the British to determine what might or might not constitute illegal activity such as bearing arms. Irish rebels have long taken similar positions up to and including those members of the IRA brought to trial in the 1980s. By Eldad’s account, Lehi and the IRA also shared a common fund-raising technique – bank robbery. Despite Eldad’s explicit rejection of such comparisons, the parallels are further demonstrated by the IRA attack on then-Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher at the 1987 Conservative Party conference and the 1979 assassination of Prince Phillip’s uncle Lord Mountbatten. Neither the IRA nor Israel Eldad considered anyone beyond their reach.
According to the publishers, The First Tithe appeared in five editions in the original Hebrew. This first edition to appear in English was released on Israeli Independence Day, May 8, 2008. In addition to translating this work from the original Hebrew, Zev Golan has added endnotes and other explanatory data that make the work more accessible to the non-Israeli reader. While I may regret he expressed decision to drop certain passages that appeared in the Hebrew original because of the difficulty of translating and explaining their references to the Talmud and other source, his efforts to make this work more generally available are to be commended.
Even a single book as dramatic as The First Tithe is unlikely to change the reader’s views or even to result in a deeper understanding of a complex subject. However, a single book can compel the reader to understand that the subject of that work is indeed far more complex and less cut and dried than previously realized. In this, Israel Eldad and Zev Golan have succeeded and I personally have at least advanced to that recognition as a result. If you are interested in a deeper understanding of the situation that confronts us in the Middle East today, you need to read this book.
Friday, November 28, 2008
Mumbai Mayhem – in the streets and among the pundits
I’ve already seen a fair amount of speculation bouncing around the internet and over the airwaves about the perpetrators of the latest terror attack in Mumbai (aka Bombay), India. Sherlock Holmes at this point would probably be muttering something about the futility of speculation in the absence of sufficient information – and I would suggest that the majority of these pundits still have insufficient information about a group or organization whose latest (if not first) terrorist operation is still ongoing. Certainly my own stints as an analyst taught me this same kind of caution – which as I expect all analysts know is one of the things that drives your policy-maker/decision-maker customers right up the wall.
All of that said, I personally would dare already to disagree about the sophistication, etc. of this attack, based upon what information we already have available.
In the first instance, the principal weapons used by the terrorists appear to be automatic weapons including AK-47s or at least some variation of the Kalashnikov automatic rifle family. This class of firearm is the entry level weapon for both domestic and international terrorists and can be found just about anywhere around the world. Even my daughter has fired one!
The timing of the operation – apparently dusk or early nightfall – offered the attackers both a somewhat covered approach to their objective(s), especially if they did in fact arrive by boat. It also, in Mumbai, offered them a ‘target-rich’ environment. In such a situation, the presence of a large number of civilians offers numerous advantages to the terrorists:
1) multiple targets – the care of the wounded and the identification of the dead impose a major burden on the responding security forces;
2) potential hostages – the assembled civilians in the targeted streets, hotels, restaurants, etc., included a significant number of foreigners (especially UK, U.S., and even Israeli citizens who we understand already were clearly of greatest interest), but also the significant presence of wealthy and/or prominent Indian citizens;
3) cover and concealment – the presence of a large number of civilians offered the terrorists both a crowd within which to lose themselves and a shield that would impose constraints upon the responding security forces.
The multiple targets raise two somewhat contrary thoughts. The targeting of more than one location resulted in dispersal of the terrorists’ numbers vice concentrating their entire force upon a specific target or targets in close proximity from which the terrorists would be able to support each other against responding security forces. On the other hand, the dispersal of targets and the terrorists spread wider panic and forced the security forces to also spread their responding strength. To my mind, along with the absence of masks or any other concealment of the attackers’ identities, this dispersal also supports that as some pundits have already suggested – this group was fully prepared to die in the execution of this attack having maximized the confusion, panic, and physical damage they could create.
The different attacks were not literally simultaneous, according to the timelines so far appearing from Indian and other media sources, although the coordination is evident. The weapons are pretty much the entry level terrorist arsenal of automatic weapons and grenades, and while I would defer to the Indian soldiers who have discussed this, learning the proper use of these weapons is not that difficult for even the average person (or else armies around the world would look very different than they do.). Even the rubber boats (if in fact part of the operation) are available for recreational use in many places around the world.
The one real surprise is that the terrorists were able to plan this attack and raise and equip the force that carried it out without anyone apparently recognizing that this was coming. The Indian security forces were clearly not prepared to prevent this specific attack or anything like it. That part of the terrorists’ operation was reasonably sophisticated – the rest of their operation reflects tactics that can be learned from any of a number of books readily available in public libraries, online, or even in book stores (I have a number of them on my own shelves). They can also be learned from a number of computer/video combat or shooting games – or even via practice with paintball or similar amusements. There are also a number of online sources for overhead imagery that may have facilitated the planning of the attack – assuming that the terrorists didn’t use the old-fashioned technique of actually walking over the ground and checking out the local streets and alley ways. None of the photos of the terrorists so far shown by the media suggest that any of these individuals would have stood out from the crowd if they had been scouting out the area before the attack.
Pending the receipt of that further information I mentioned above, my money right now is on a the attack being the work of indigenous South Asians (Pakistani and/or Indian Muslims) who have been in contact with Al Qaeda. That contact may have taken any of several forms, but it is entirely possible that no more than one or two members of the responsible group, if that many, has had any direct, personal contact with Al Qaeda or its agents.
All of that said, I personally would dare already to disagree about the sophistication, etc. of this attack, based upon what information we already have available.
In the first instance, the principal weapons used by the terrorists appear to be automatic weapons including AK-47s or at least some variation of the Kalashnikov automatic rifle family. This class of firearm is the entry level weapon for both domestic and international terrorists and can be found just about anywhere around the world. Even my daughter has fired one!
The timing of the operation – apparently dusk or early nightfall – offered the attackers both a somewhat covered approach to their objective(s), especially if they did in fact arrive by boat. It also, in Mumbai, offered them a ‘target-rich’ environment. In such a situation, the presence of a large number of civilians offers numerous advantages to the terrorists:
1) multiple targets – the care of the wounded and the identification of the dead impose a major burden on the responding security forces;
2) potential hostages – the assembled civilians in the targeted streets, hotels, restaurants, etc., included a significant number of foreigners (especially UK, U.S., and even Israeli citizens who we understand already were clearly of greatest interest), but also the significant presence of wealthy and/or prominent Indian citizens;
3) cover and concealment – the presence of a large number of civilians offered the terrorists both a crowd within which to lose themselves and a shield that would impose constraints upon the responding security forces.
The multiple targets raise two somewhat contrary thoughts. The targeting of more than one location resulted in dispersal of the terrorists’ numbers vice concentrating their entire force upon a specific target or targets in close proximity from which the terrorists would be able to support each other against responding security forces. On the other hand, the dispersal of targets and the terrorists spread wider panic and forced the security forces to also spread their responding strength. To my mind, along with the absence of masks or any other concealment of the attackers’ identities, this dispersal also supports that as some pundits have already suggested – this group was fully prepared to die in the execution of this attack having maximized the confusion, panic, and physical damage they could create.
The different attacks were not literally simultaneous, according to the timelines so far appearing from Indian and other media sources, although the coordination is evident. The weapons are pretty much the entry level terrorist arsenal of automatic weapons and grenades, and while I would defer to the Indian soldiers who have discussed this, learning the proper use of these weapons is not that difficult for even the average person (or else armies around the world would look very different than they do.). Even the rubber boats (if in fact part of the operation) are available for recreational use in many places around the world.
The one real surprise is that the terrorists were able to plan this attack and raise and equip the force that carried it out without anyone apparently recognizing that this was coming. The Indian security forces were clearly not prepared to prevent this specific attack or anything like it. That part of the terrorists’ operation was reasonably sophisticated – the rest of their operation reflects tactics that can be learned from any of a number of books readily available in public libraries, online, or even in book stores (I have a number of them on my own shelves). They can also be learned from a number of computer/video combat or shooting games – or even via practice with paintball or similar amusements. There are also a number of online sources for overhead imagery that may have facilitated the planning of the attack – assuming that the terrorists didn’t use the old-fashioned technique of actually walking over the ground and checking out the local streets and alley ways. None of the photos of the terrorists so far shown by the media suggest that any of these individuals would have stood out from the crowd if they had been scouting out the area before the attack.
Pending the receipt of that further information I mentioned above, my money right now is on a the attack being the work of indigenous South Asians (Pakistani and/or Indian Muslims) who have been in contact with Al Qaeda. That contact may have taken any of several forms, but it is entirely possible that no more than one or two members of the responsible group, if that many, has had any direct, personal contact with Al Qaeda or its agents.
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
"For what we are about to receive..."
The above noted fragment comes from a blessing that has been used (with variations) at mealtime for hundreds of years. I imagine that in its original un-ironic sense, this prayer was uttered at many a Thanksgiving table this past week. I remember it from reading the adventures of Horatio Hornblower, Jack Aubrey, and others as a half prayer/half joke uttered by seamen of Britain’s Royal Navy just before the guns of an enemy ship would send several hundred pounds of metal hurtling toward them.
In this ironic sense, it may have also been on the minds of the volunteers the State Department found for those 48 jobs in Iraq that need to be filled during the coming year. In case you hadn’t heard, members of the Foreign Service did step forward and volunteer for these positions. There probably won’t be anywhere near as much attention paid to this news as was paid to the report that the State Department had previously put the Foreign Service on notice that these positions would be filled by ‘directed assignment’ if volunteers were not identified. That means that the Department was threatening to send the ‘press gangs’ through the corridors in order to shanghai the required number of personnel. I am confident that from Secretary Rice down to individual Personnel Officers, the Department’s management is grateful that such extreme measures were not necessary (though we don’t yet know if any of the volunteers might now be able to discuss the merits and of water-boarding as a means of persuasion).
It is probably true that this would have been the first time since the Vietnam War that the Department would have filled positions via directed non-voluntary assignment. However, it is not the first time since the end of that war that the Department reminded Foreign Service employees of such a possibility. All members of the Foreign Service join with a stated commitment that they are available for assignment anywhere, anytime – worldwide availability. In reality, this commitment has not prevented some officers from spending little to no time outside of Washington, DC, or plum assignments in Western Europe. During my own thirty years of service, the Department made repeated efforts to convince personnel that the assignment process was fair and ensured that everyone had their share of both plush and hardship posts. When Henry Kissinger was Secretary of State, such an effort was given the unfortunate name of “GLobal Opportunity Program” and the officers thus selected to leave Europe for the underdeveloped world were christened “GLOP-ees.”
The ongoing conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan have brought to center stage the question of personal safety and security for Foreign Service personnel serving abroad. When I joined the Foreign Service in 1973, the Department had just lost two officers killed by Palestinian terrorists in Sudan. Those deaths brought to over 100 the number of names on a memorial plaque commemorating members of the Foreign Service who died while serving abroad. Those two officers, Cleo Allen Noel, Jr., and George Curtis Moore, are buried in Arlington National Cemetery.
Today there are two plaques in the C Street lobby of the State Department building in Washington http://www.afsa.org/plaquelist.cfm bearing the names of 225 members of the Foreign Service who died while on service abroad. The related guidelines have changed since 1973 so the entries are no longer strictly chronological, but the plaques include the names of 71 individuals who died from 1973 to 2007.
The official U.S. government (USG) position on the protection of its diplomatic/consular personnel and facilities abroad is based upon international law and on the agreements that govern diplomatic and consular activity, which make it clear that their security is the responsibility of their host governments. However, while the USG will rarely say so publicly, the protection provided by host governments has frequently failed in the face of terrorists or of angry crowds of their own citizens.
The Department of State has taken and continues to take steps to protect its employees and its physical plant or facilities, as well as the sensitive information to which it has access. The Department’s Division of Security, or DS, did not exist in 1973 in the robust incarnation that it presents to the world today. The Department also requires all personnel going abroad on assignment to undergo several days of security-related training before they leave. However, DS cannot provide bodyguards for every employee abroad, and the question of issuing personal firearms to American diplomats for self-defense is so surrounded with questions of legal liability, international law, host government laws, and the terrible international public image it would create that the possibility is never even seriously raised.
The Departments of State and Defense (DoD) had repeated discussions over my own 30 years’ service about the possibility of using military personnel to provide security for State facilities and personnel abroad. The response has always been, and I believe continues to be, “No,” other than the ongoing and highly successful Marine Corps’ Embassy Security Guard program. DoD rightly argues that it does not have sufficient personnel for such duties, that most military personnel are trained for combat not for security duties, and that such added duties would draw military personnel from other critical missions and duties.
The facts of the matter are clear. The Foreign Service has always been a career accompanied by real risks and confronted by some very real threats. This is even more so in this 21st Century world. It is up to the individual to recognize this and decide what to do about it, including considering the possibility that this not a career they wish to pursue. For its part, the Department’s management is obligated to discuss the risks and threats frankly and fully with all personnel and potential employees; to take every practical precautionary measure to assure the safety and security of Foreign Service personnel while still allowing them to pursue their duties effectively; and most importantly that means the Department must ensure that every member of the Foreign Service is adequately trained and prepared to confront the threats – both real and potential - with every possible chance of success. Those sailors I mentioned at the beginning of this blog fully recognized that their given (if not chosen) trade entailed serious risks including injury and even death. Their half-jesting prayer was an acknowledgement of the realities of their world and a declaration that they would meet those challenges head on. As even Defense Secretary Gates recently acknowledged, the United States is in greater need than ever of the skills, talents, and dedication of its Foreign Service than ever in its history. What the members of the Foreign Service need from us is the moral, physical, and fiscal means necessary to enable them to effectively work as their service to the nation takes them in harm’s way. “For what we are about to receive….. “
In this ironic sense, it may have also been on the minds of the volunteers the State Department found for those 48 jobs in Iraq that need to be filled during the coming year. In case you hadn’t heard, members of the Foreign Service did step forward and volunteer for these positions. There probably won’t be anywhere near as much attention paid to this news as was paid to the report that the State Department had previously put the Foreign Service on notice that these positions would be filled by ‘directed assignment’ if volunteers were not identified. That means that the Department was threatening to send the ‘press gangs’ through the corridors in order to shanghai the required number of personnel. I am confident that from Secretary Rice down to individual Personnel Officers, the Department’s management is grateful that such extreme measures were not necessary (though we don’t yet know if any of the volunteers might now be able to discuss the merits and of water-boarding as a means of persuasion).
It is probably true that this would have been the first time since the Vietnam War that the Department would have filled positions via directed non-voluntary assignment. However, it is not the first time since the end of that war that the Department reminded Foreign Service employees of such a possibility. All members of the Foreign Service join with a stated commitment that they are available for assignment anywhere, anytime – worldwide availability. In reality, this commitment has not prevented some officers from spending little to no time outside of Washington, DC, or plum assignments in Western Europe. During my own thirty years of service, the Department made repeated efforts to convince personnel that the assignment process was fair and ensured that everyone had their share of both plush and hardship posts. When Henry Kissinger was Secretary of State, such an effort was given the unfortunate name of “GLobal Opportunity Program” and the officers thus selected to leave Europe for the underdeveloped world were christened “GLOP-ees.”
The ongoing conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan have brought to center stage the question of personal safety and security for Foreign Service personnel serving abroad. When I joined the Foreign Service in 1973, the Department had just lost two officers killed by Palestinian terrorists in Sudan. Those deaths brought to over 100 the number of names on a memorial plaque commemorating members of the Foreign Service who died while serving abroad. Those two officers, Cleo Allen Noel, Jr., and George Curtis Moore, are buried in Arlington National Cemetery.
Today there are two plaques in the C Street lobby of the State Department building in Washington http://www.afsa.org/plaquelist.cfm bearing the names of 225 members of the Foreign Service who died while on service abroad. The related guidelines have changed since 1973 so the entries are no longer strictly chronological, but the plaques include the names of 71 individuals who died from 1973 to 2007.
The official U.S. government (USG) position on the protection of its diplomatic/consular personnel and facilities abroad is based upon international law and on the agreements that govern diplomatic and consular activity, which make it clear that their security is the responsibility of their host governments. However, while the USG will rarely say so publicly, the protection provided by host governments has frequently failed in the face of terrorists or of angry crowds of their own citizens.
The Department of State has taken and continues to take steps to protect its employees and its physical plant or facilities, as well as the sensitive information to which it has access. The Department’s Division of Security, or DS, did not exist in 1973 in the robust incarnation that it presents to the world today. The Department also requires all personnel going abroad on assignment to undergo several days of security-related training before they leave. However, DS cannot provide bodyguards for every employee abroad, and the question of issuing personal firearms to American diplomats for self-defense is so surrounded with questions of legal liability, international law, host government laws, and the terrible international public image it would create that the possibility is never even seriously raised.
The Departments of State and Defense (DoD) had repeated discussions over my own 30 years’ service about the possibility of using military personnel to provide security for State facilities and personnel abroad. The response has always been, and I believe continues to be, “No,” other than the ongoing and highly successful Marine Corps’ Embassy Security Guard program. DoD rightly argues that it does not have sufficient personnel for such duties, that most military personnel are trained for combat not for security duties, and that such added duties would draw military personnel from other critical missions and duties.
The facts of the matter are clear. The Foreign Service has always been a career accompanied by real risks and confronted by some very real threats. This is even more so in this 21st Century world. It is up to the individual to recognize this and decide what to do about it, including considering the possibility that this not a career they wish to pursue. For its part, the Department’s management is obligated to discuss the risks and threats frankly and fully with all personnel and potential employees; to take every practical precautionary measure to assure the safety and security of Foreign Service personnel while still allowing them to pursue their duties effectively; and most importantly that means the Department must ensure that every member of the Foreign Service is adequately trained and prepared to confront the threats – both real and potential - with every possible chance of success. Those sailors I mentioned at the beginning of this blog fully recognized that their given (if not chosen) trade entailed serious risks including injury and even death. Their half-jesting prayer was an acknowledgement of the realities of their world and a declaration that they would meet those challenges head on. As even Defense Secretary Gates recently acknowledged, the United States is in greater need than ever of the skills, talents, and dedication of its Foreign Service than ever in its history. What the members of the Foreign Service need from us is the moral, physical, and fiscal means necessary to enable them to effectively work as their service to the nation takes them in harm’s way. “For what we are about to receive….. “
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