One of the most complex issues related to the “Global War on Terror” that has confronted policy makers, military commanders, legal advisors, and even federal courts has been determining where the “battlefield” in this war starts and ends. This is not surprising. The characterization of the struggle against international terrorism as a “war” by the United States had the effect of forcing the proverbial square peg into the round hole. The law that had evolved up to Sept. 11, 2001 to regulate “war” had simply not addressed a military struggle between the armed forces of a nation-state and operatives of [...]
Marc Lynch gave a comic roundup of yesterday’s Middle East nuclear energy news (the U.S. and Bahrain signed an MoU, and the UAE announced the start of their partnership with France) before wondering, “Seriously, does anyone else find the GCC’s rush to acquire ‘peaceful nuclear energy programs’ and the West’s seeming enthusiasm for the prospect a bit odd?” The long answer is here, a WPR article by yours truly on France’s nuclear diplomacy in the Muslim world, which I think gives a good summary of why, despite some basic security concerns, there’s no real need for alarm just yet. But [...]
Over the course of a well-needed break for the Easter weekend, I actually got around to reading some printed news, which is how I ran across this interview in the Nouvel Observateur with Iraq specialist Pierre-Jean Luizard. In it he expresses some of the broader strategic flaws of the Anbar Awakening which have been ignored due to the tactical success the strategy has had in terms of reducing Sunni violence directed at American forces. Like most criticisms of the Awakening, Luizard’s analysis begins with the vacuum that passes for the Iraqi state. But Luizard suggests that the dynamic has become [...]
