More Weekend Reading: IISS's 2011 Military Balance

Best in class. The International Institute for Strategic Studies' (IISS) The Military Balance is an annual assessment of the military capabilities and defence economics of 170 countries worldwide. Everything you want to know, need to know and  (probably never would have known) are inside the covers of this annual report.  Always good to have on the shelves as a superb reference book.

DR Congo: 48 rapes every hour, US study finds - where is the United Nations?

This is staggering and one of the most hellish statistics I have ever read. The Democratic Republic of the Congo seems to slide deeper and deeper into a hellish state.  The question that comes to mind is where is the United Nations?  This is a perfect example of how and where the UN should be stepping in to re-establish the rule of law and provide protection to those who are being destroyed at a rate like this -- 48 rapes per hour?? 

But when you step back for a moment and look at all the crisis' that have emerged around the world -- and the opportunities for reform and democracy to emerge such as Egypt, Libya, Bahrain, North Korea (a long list that seems to grow longer daily), the UN seems to be missing in action EVERYWHERE.  In years past, they at least gave the appearance and mouthed the words that they wanted to be involved.  But aside from a pointless resolution on Libya, the UN seems to have become more like a high school version of the model UN than the real thing.   And more surprisingly, the White House and President Obama have not tried to engage the UN in these efforts - quite surprising and something we hope to explore more on these pages in the weeks ahead.

Weekend Reading: The Wrong War: Grit, Strategy, and the Way Out of Afghanistan

I found this to be BingWest's very best book to date (and that's saying something if you've read any of his other excellent books). A tough, in the dust and blood walk though the war in Afghanistan to day. At times, the book is rightly painful as West exposes some of the more senseless tactical efforts in the first five years -- of which many failed and too many brave young American lives were taken or mained. Every member of Congress and every general who thinks he knows what is going on on the ground should read this excellent book. I'm betting the Pulitzer Prize Committee will be taking a close look at it, as well.

Weekend Reading: The Frugal Superpower

Being a self-confessed bookaholic, I thought maybe we should highlight and recommend some weekend reading each Wednesday.   In this week's (and our first) recommendation, Michael Mandelbaum offers a robust and in-depth explanations of an enormous national security threat of our own creation: the United States ever expanding out of control federal deficit. His conclusion is both dramatic and frighteningly on point: While a good portion of the world may dislike the seemingly all-powerful United States, they will soon come to regret the creation of a weakened United States due to grotesque fiscal profligacy -- in short, the United States is at risk of becoming a nation no longer capable of projecting soft or hard power globally. 

The book, which was published last year, is particularly timely as Congress and the White House exit a ridiculous squabble over the 2011 budget and begin to battle over the 2012 federal budget -- a debate which the White House seems to not take as seriously as they should.  Mandelbaum provides a good primer of how the global shifts could be significant and severe without the US getting their fiscal house in order.   If you want to get a deeper sense of what we are truly facing, then read this book.

China and Cybersecurity: The Growing Threat Everyone Seems to Ignore...

Adam Segel over at the Council on Foreign Relations has an interesting analysis analysis up on CFR's Website on the growing threat of Chinese cyber attacks. It's getting tough out there, folks -- China Inc, working with Chinese security services and the People's Liberation Army (PLA) are swamping US corporations, the US government -- seemingly everything and anything with a computer attached to it.

At what point does the US officially and publicly begin to complain?

Is China the US's Answer to Both Pakistan and Afghanistan?

Patrick Doherty has an excellent piece in Foreign Policy.com today about the need for the US to engage China to engage Pakistan(Can Fixing Afghanistan Come Via China Fixing Pakistan?). Doherty makes a number of important points that can lead to a path toward reconstructing the US's policy toward Pakistan.  

"...there are two important points of convergence between Beijing's long-term interests and Washington's. First, China is concerned with preventing Islamist terrorism from disrupting its Central Asian energy routes and its restive western region, Xinjiang, which borders Pakistan. China is actively securing natural gas and oil reserves as far as Turkmenistan on the Caspian, rebuilding the old Soviet-era pipelines to feed its western frontier and crossing territory that hosts a majority Muslim population.

Secondly, China has a stake in promoting sustainable, pan-Asian prosperity in the medium-to-long term to fuel its torrid economic growth. China -- and neighboring India -- are undertaking a monumental frenzy of urbanization. A study prepared by McKinsey estimates that approximately 375 million Chinese and 250 million Indians will move from villages to cities over the next 20 years. This growth will require a substantial productivity increase across all economic sectors -- but along the China-India periphery, the question of whether this massive urbanization will be sustainable hinges on higher levels of food production."

I have read the McKinsey Study Doherty quotes and it is absolutley fascinating.  Leadership in Beijing painfully understands the point Dorhety and McKinsey make and are worried about it.  Hopefully, the US State Department and even US Treasury in theUS-China Economic Dialogue meetings this week have raised the point, too.
But it seems to me that if we can engage China to engage Pakistan, it may be a critical move to help the US in Afghanistan.  Moving quickly after the death of Osama Bin Laden and the positive impact it may have on the region and the war, the US should pursue this option vigorously.