Austin Bay Blog

Zenpundit continues his forum on globalization and warfare. My short essay appears today.

Josh Manchester considers “false strategic presumptions” and Sam Crane looks at Asia. (Direct link to Crane’s article doesn’t work, so go to Zenpundit’s homepage and scroll down. Crane’s article is below mine.)

Norman Podhoretz destroys the “Bush/Blair lied” meme.

Harry Reid and Howard Dean won’t read this, but everyone interviewing them should.

The lede:

Among the many distortions, misrepresentations, and outright falsifications that have emerged from the debate over Iraq, one in particular stands out above all others. This is the charge that George W. Bush misled us into an immoral and/or unnecessary war in Iraq by telling a series of lies that have now been definitively exposed.

What makes this charge so special is the amazing success it has enjoyed in getting itself established as a self-evident truth even though it has been refuted and discredited over and over again by evidence and argument alike. In this it resembles nothing so much as those animated cartoon characters who, after being flattened, blown up, or pushed over a cliff, always spring back to life with their bodies perfectly intact. Perhaps, like those cartoon characters, this allegation simply cannot be killed off, no matter what.

Nevertheless, I want to take one more shot at exposing it for the lie that it itself really is. Although doing so will require going over ground that I and many others have covered before, I hope that revisiting this well-trodden terrain may also serve to refresh memories that have grown dim, to clarify thoughts that have grown confused, and to revive outrage that has grown commensurately dulled.

The main “lie” that George W. Bush is accused of telling us is that Saddam Hussein possessed an arsenal of weapons of mass destruction, or WMD as they have invariably come to be called. From this followed the subsidiary “lie” that Iraq under Saddam’s regime posed a two-edged mortal threat. On the one hand, we were informed, there was a distinct (or even “imminent”) possibility that Saddam himself would use these weapons against us and/or our allies; and on the other hand, there was the still more dangerous possibility that he would supply them to terrorists like those who had already attacked us on 9/11 and to whom he was linked.

This entire scenario of purported deceit has been given a new lease on life by the indictment in late October of I. Lewis (Scooter) Libby, then chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney. Libby stands accused of making false statements to the FBI and of committing perjury in testifying before a grand jury that had been convened to find out who in the Bush administration had “outed” Valerie Plame, a CIA agent married to the retired ambassador Joseph C. Wilson, IV. The supposed purpose of leaking this classified information to the press was to retaliate against Wilson for having “debunked” (in his words) “the lies that led to war.”

I have to include these quotes. I’ve posted some of them previously, but given the current cries of “lie lie lie” I might re-post them several more times:

But the consensus on which Bush relied was not born in his own administration. In fact, it was first fully formed in the Clinton administration. Here is Clinton himself, speaking in 1998:

If Saddam rejects peace and we have to use force, our purpose is clear. We want to seriously diminish the threat posed by Iraq’s weapons-of-mass-destruction program.

Here is his Secretary of State Madeline Albright, also speaking in 1998:

Iraq is a long way from [the USA], but what happens there matters a great deal here. For the risk that the leaders of a rogue state will use nuclear, chemical, or biological weapons against us or our allies is the greatest security threat we face.

Here is Sandy Berger, Clinton’s National Security Adviser, who chimed in at the same time with this flat-out assertion about Saddam:

He will use those weapons of mass destruction again, as he has ten times since 1983.
Finally, Clinton’s Secretary of Defense, William Cohen, was so sure Saddam had stockpiles of WMD that he remained “absolutely convinced” of it even after our failure to find them in the wake of the invasion in March 2003.

Nor did leading Democrats in Congress entertain any doubts on this score. A few months after Clinton and his people made the statements I have just quoted, a group of Democratic Senators, including such liberals as Carl Levin, Tom Daschle, and John Kerry, urged the President

to take necessary actions (including, if appropriate, air and missile strikes on suspect Iraqi sites) to respond effectively to the threat posed by Iraq’s refusal to end its weapons-of-mass-destruction programs.

Nancy Pelosi, the future leader of the Democrats in the House, and then a member of the House Intelligence Committee, added her voice to the chorus:

Saddam Hussein has been engaged in the development of weapons-of-mass-destruction technology, which is a threat to countries in the region, and he has made a mockery of the weapons inspection process.

This Democratic drumbeat continued and even intensified when Bush succeeded Clinton in 2001, and it featured many who would later pretend to have been deceived by the Bush White House. In a letter to the new President, a number of Senators led by Bob Graham declared:

There is no doubt that . . . Saddam Hussein has invigorated his weapons programs. Reports indicate that biological, chemical, and nuclear programs continue apace and may be back to pre-Gulf war status. In addition, Saddam continues to redefine delivery systems and is doubtless using the cover of a licit missile program to develop longer-range missiles that will threaten the United States and our allies.

Senator Carl Levin also reaffirmed for Bush’s benefit what he had told Clinton some years earlier:

Saddam Hussein is a tyrant and a threat to the peace and stability of the region. He has ignored the mandate of the United Nations, and is building weapons of mass destruction and the means of delivering them.
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton agreed, speaking in October 2002:

In the four years since the inspectors left, intelligence reports show that Saddam Hussein has worked to rebuild his chemical- and biological-weapons stock, his missile-delivery capability, and his nuclear program. He has also given aid, comfort, and sanctuary to terrorists, including al-Qaeda members.

Senator Jay Rockefeller, vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, agreed as well:

There is unmistakable evidence that Saddam Hussein is working aggressively to develop nuclear weapons and will likely have nuclear weapons within the next five years. . . . We also should remember we have always underestimated the progress Saddam has made in development of weapons of mass destruction.
Even more striking were the sentiments of Bush’s opponents in his two campaigns for the presidency. Thus Al Gore in September 2002:

We know that [Saddam] has stored secret supplies of biological and chemical weapons throughout his country.

And here is Gore again, in that same year:

Iraq’s search for weapons of mass destruction has proven impossible to deter, and we should assume that it will continue for as long as Saddam is in power.

Now to John Kerry, also speaking in 2002:

I will be voting to give the President of the United States the authority to use force—if necessary—to disarm Saddam Hussein because I believe that a deadly arsenal of weapons of mass destruction in his hands is a real and grave threat to our security.

Perhaps most startling of all, given the rhetoric that they would later employ against Bush after the invasion of Iraq, are statements made by Senators Ted Kennedy and Robert Byrd, also in 2002:

Kennedy: We have known for many years that Saddam Hussein is seeking and developing weapons of mass destruction.

Byrd: The last UN weapons inspectors left Iraq in October of 1998. We are confident that Saddam Hussein retains some stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons, and that he has since embarked on a crash course to build up his chemical- and biological-warfare capabilities. Intelligence reports indicate that he is seeking nuclear weapons.2

Liberal politicians like these were seconded by the mainstream media, in whose columns a very different tune would later be sung. For example, throughout the last two years of the Clinton administration, editorials in the New York Times repeatedly insisted that

without further outside intervention, Iraq should be able to rebuild weapons and missile plants within a year [and] future military attacks may be required to diminish the arsenal again.
The Times was also skeptical of negotiations, pointing out that it was

hard to negotiate with a tyrant who has no intention of honoring his commitments and who sees nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons as his country’s salvation.

So, too, the Washington Post, which greeted the inauguration of George W. Bush in January 2001 with the admonition that

[o]f all the booby traps left behind by the Clinton administration, none is more dangerous—or more urgent—than the situation in Iraq. Over the last year, Mr. Clinton and his team quietly avoided dealing with, or calling attention to, the almost complete unraveling of a decade’s efforts to isolate the regime of Saddam Hussein and prevent it from rebuilding its weapons of mass destruction. That leaves President Bush to confront a dismaying panorama in the Persian Gulf [where] intelligence photos . . . show the reconstruction of factories long suspected of producing chemical and biological weapons.3

Read the entirety of Mr. Podhoretz superb essay.

Mark Safranski (scholar and Zenpundit) has organized a three-day long web forum. The subject is “Globalization and War.” Day One’s commentary features Bruce Kesler and Doug Macdonald.

Doug Macdonald’s lede:

I am going to concentrate my remarks on the question of Globalization and terrorism, as that is the main means of conflict that seems to have emerged since the end of the Cold War, and the acceleration of trends that had been developing for decades that we now call Globalization…

I’ll participate November 10.

Via Strategypage.

UPDATE: The AP reports that the riots are diminishing in intensity — which was the trend I commented on yesterday. Car burnings is one metric. The AP reports incidents of “car-b-ques” dropped significantly last night. This may also be the result of imposing a state of emergency (curfews, etc.). The next three to five days will be critical. If a “second wave” of violence occurs that’s a bad sign, one signaling political support for the rioters and solidifying organization. When will the Left wing commentariat start calling the rioters “the resistance?”

The AP:

France’s storm of rioting lost strength on Wednesday with a drop of nearly half in the number of car burnings, police said. But looters and vandals still defied a state of emergency with attacks on stores, a newspaper warehouse and a subway station.

The extraordinary 12-day state of emergency went into effect Tuesday at midnight, giving special powers to authorities in Paris, its suburbs and more than 30 other cities from the Mediterranean to the German border _ an indication of how widespread arson, riots and other unrest have become in nearly two weeks of violence…

I served in Iraq with the young man who occasionally comments under the nom de plume The Marine. I was extremely impressed with him in Iraq; The Marine and The Aussie (who also posts occasionally) were a powerful one-two punch. He’s one reason I wrote about “the new greatest generation” when I returned last fall.

But to the issue of the moment. The Marine read an essay this morning by the Washington Post’s E.J. Dionne and decided he had to respond– and he’s earned the privilege.

Here’s a link to the Dionne essay. Dionne fulminates over a “Democratic platform” (a Contract with America tactical clone). The Marine also read an article in Washington Monthly on the same subject– and thinks it’s rather good. Read both articles then read The Marine.

E.J. Dionne’s lede:

Democrats are obsessed with visions, messages, programs and narratives.

The party’s leaders, thinkers and consultants have held a slew of meetings and are said to be close to a statement of hopes and principles. They are determined to apply the tactical lessons Newt Gingrich taught when he offered a Contract With America in 1994. There is a collective rush to the nearest thesaurus as Democrats consider a Compact With America and a Covenant With America. A Bargain or even a Concordat can’t be far behind. Personally, I’m still fond of the word Deal (as in “Square,” “New,” and “Fair”), but I guess that word is just too 20th century.

Journalists, of course, are the last people who have any right to poke fun at this Democratic endeavor. Indulging the desire to appear nonpartisan, most news stories regularly balance reports about actual Republican disasters and cratering poll numbers with assertions that voters have no idea what Democrats stand for. In going Big Picture, the Democrats are simply responding to critics and the relentless pressure of the Conventional Wisdom.

Dionne finally says:

the Democrats will never fully expose the Republicans’ contradictions without a clear — forgive me — vision of their own and that’s why this business about Compacts and Covenants could yet be constructive.

Dionne then quotes/invokes FDR.

Maybe it was the phrase “tactical lessons” that ignited The Marine. You decide.
Here’s The Marine’s email on Dionne, which he asked me to post. I scrubbed his language in a spot or two, but I’ve done that for years, as a courtesy to jarheads:

Col. Bay–

After 75 years of New Deal Socialism and 35 years of Great Society Enhanced Socialism, the only self evident truths we as a nation can embrace regarding the DNC’s Wistful Visions from Yesteryear (as expressed by Dionne) are (1st) Government does not enhance individual liberty, it steals and stifles it, choking freedom and squelching democracy AND (2nd) Government wealth redistribution and social programing does not create self sufficiency. It creates a culture of dependency and spiraling impoverishment.

So I say to Mr. Dionne, GO AHEAD, Democrats, run a campaign or two or three on a vision that amounts to Socialism’s Reprise. The result: The Republicans will bury you.

It’s too funny. Liberals actually think “New Deal Nostalgia” is a “Vision.” Speaking of lost in the past, did anyone see the cover of Jimmy Carter’s new Book ~ How badly do we need Ronald Reagan to respond once more for the record “There you go again!!”

And speaking of liberals being silly then reaping the whirlwind, as I watch events unfold in France, I cannot help but feel I am watching in living color the modern version of France’s “reign of terror.” It will be interesting to see if the French can save themselves…The fireworks are impressive if not cautionary on many levels. Modern Multiculturalism & Political Correctness are in every respect the tools of a Socialist/Progressive Design to Devastate the very foundations of Western Classic Liberalism, Democracy, Liberty & Civil Government (See J.S. Mill, J. Locke, J Berkeley, T. Jefferson, T. Paine, J. Madison & A. Hamilton).

A heterogeneous society (especially one premised on Individual Liberty and Democratic Freedom) demands a degree of Acceptance & Assimilation by those who seek its sanctuary. The extent to which a society so devoted promotes the balkanization of its own population, it contributes to its own demise. The truth and beauty of the Melting Pot cannot be denied in favor of some pop culture pseudo social science…

As for the Washington Monthly essay, The Marine writes:

Glastris’s article in the Washington Monthly titled “Bush’s Ownership Society - Why No One’s Buying” actually provides the DNC something EJ Dionne could never hope to offer: logical and prescient advice. This essay offers a very probing and compelling critique of Conservative Policy Successes and Failures over the last 35 years. The essay concludes with serious suggestions and potential openings for the DNC to exploit as they formulate their “Vision Thing?!?!” for the 2006 election season.

I just read Glastris’ article. I think The Marine is right.

Here’s Glastris’ lede:

Conservatives have a knack for taking good ideas—say, patriotism or faith—to the sort of ideologized extreme that brands the ideas as theirs and leads liberals to abandon them. We’re seeing that now with the issue of choice and individual empowerment. Those very concepts used to be associated with liberal causes like abortion and voting rights. But over the last couple of decades, conservative intellectuals have roped them to a larger agenda to revolutionize government.

And they’re perfectly open about it. Talk to scholars at the Cato Institute or the Heritage Foundation or to movement organizers like Grover Norquist, and they’ll walk you through the strategy. Big government and individual freedom, they’ll explain, are opposed to each other; more of one means less of the other. The three big areas of non-defense-related government spending are retirement (mainly Social Security), health care (mainly Medicare and Medicaid), and education (mainly K-12 public schools). For political reasons, it is practically impossible to cut spending in these areas. But it is possible to dismantle the government bureaucracies that administer them in a way that enhances personal freedom and makes possible big cuts down the road: privatize the benefits.

The father of this line of thinking is Milton Friedman. In the 1950s and 1960s, the conservative economist dreamed up the notions of education vouchers and private accounts for Social Security. Republican operatives and think tankers seized on Friedman’s ideas in the 1970s, expanded them into areas like health care, and fleshed out their philosophic and political logic. Vesting individuals with more choice, control, and ownership of their government benefits, they argued, would not only enhance virtues like personal responsibility, but over time, it would also result in the shift of hundreds of billions of tax dollars from the custodial care of government to the corporations that would help manage people’s private accounts. Best of all, from the conservative point of view, it would transform the electorate’s political identity. Instead of government-dependent supporters of the Democratic Party, voters would become self-reliant followers of the GOP.

These ideas are the intellectual fuel of the conservative movement that has swept across the country in recent decades. They were well understood in the Reagan administration, and the Gipper’s speeches are suffused with them. But it has only been in the last few years, with both Congress and the White House in conservative Republican hands, that the ideas have truly debuted.

Now, the reviews are in—and they are not good…

Here’s Glastris’ critique of privatized Social Security accounts:

The more intractable problem with the president’s ownership society is its effort to inject choice and control into benefits people already have. Here, the culprit is not complexity but risk. Behavioral economists have described what’s known as an “endowment effect”: People are psychologically prone to be exceptionally risk-averse with benefits they already have. With his Social-Security private-accounts proposal, the president was in essence offering voters a variety of ways to have less retirement security. The reaction should not have been a surprise. Surveys by the Pew Research Center found that 60 percent of those who opposed private Social-Security accounts said they worried about the risk—to themselves, to others, and to the system as a whole.

He goes on to discuss “libertarian paternalism”:

Libertarian paternalism

Choice, then, can be a powerful tool to advance public ends as long as one ironic truth is recognized: People like having choice but often don’t like to choose.

This concept is at the center of a brewing movement within public-policy circles, one that Cass Sunstein and Richard H. Thaler of the University of Chicago have affectionately, if cheekily, dubbed “libertarian paternalism.” The idea is for government to shape the choices people have so that the natural human tendency to avoid making a decision works to the individuals’ and society’s advantage.

Read the entire article. QUICK UPDATE: I see an early commenter thinks Glastris is a bit disingenuous. I still think The Marine’s point is well-taken. Glastris has looked at conservative successes and failures. Glastris is trying to adapt left-liberal approaches to the 21st century, not serve thrice-baked New Deal.

UPDATE: An Instalanche. The Marine will appreciate it, Glenn.

Apparently the riots slacked-off in some areas. If that’s the case then the increased police presence may have helped. However, the French government has now declared a 12-day long state of emergency. (Link goes to the NY Times, but there are numerous articles available with the same report.)

The lede:

France declared a 12-day state of emergency today in an attempt by the government to curb the worst civil disturbances in the country in nearly four decades.

Skip to next paragraph

The French Riots

Violence in France The government of Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin used a 1955 law drafted during the Algerian War to impose a curfew and other restrictive measures on areas where rioters have sown disorder in the streets for 12 days, burning thousands of cars, targeting businesses, schools and churches with gasoline bombs, and firing ammunition at the police. At least one person has died.

Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy announced after an emergency cabinet meeting this morning that the curfew would take effect at midnight in areas to be determined at a meeting of senior regional officials later in the day.

By mid-afternoon, the officials - prefects of France’s seven military zones - were still trying to hammer out details of the measure, said Franck Louvrier, a spokesman for Mr. Sarkozy. He said it was unclear whether the curfew would apply only to minors or to the entire population of towns like Clichy-sous-Bois, the suburb northeast of Paris where the trouble started on Oct. 27 when two youths jumped over the wall of an electrical substation and died, thinking they were being pursued by the police.

Some details on the law:

The law itself states that emergency measures can be enacted by government decree for up to 12 days on all or part of the territory of France. Beyond a curfew, the law gives the authorities powers to conduct raids without a warrant; to restrict freedom of the press and freedom of assembly; to shut down theaters; to close bars; and to put under house arrest any individual whose activities are deemed dangerous to the maintenance of law and order.

A news broadcaster for the state-run radio station France-Inter said at midday that no restrictions would be applied to the press and the theater, but Mr. Sarkozy’s spokesman declined to confirm this. People arrested under the law can be jailed for two months, fined 3,750 Euros, or both.

At this point the government has to look tough. The state of emergency makes the Patriot Act look rather mild, doesn’t it?

A conspiracy theory worthy of Joe Wilson. Except it’s better than Joe Wilson’s. And it’s about Joe Wilson.

Or nails them. Norm Geras takes down several obfuscators and scam rhetorical artists. His subject: The “Bush/Blair lied” meme and “the war’s been fought incompetently” meme, etc.

The Christian Science Monitor look s at Bernard Goldberg’s latest book.

I’ve written about the NYDCLA (nid-cla) axis– New York, Washington, and Los Angeles insularity. Goldberg’ offers some solutions solutions. Mr. Goldberg might check out pajamasmedia.

On MSNBC this morning. Dowd wants to flack her new book on the necessity of men but Imus wants to talk about Judy Miller, Dowd’s column on Miller, and the NY Times. Imus’ crack: “The wheels are off over there (at the Times) by the way.”

D0wd ignored that line. She said she wants to segue from war (Miller, Iraq, etc) to “gender war.” Sheesh.

Via Instapundit and Gateway Pundit — another “anti-war vet” is exposed as –yup– an exaggerator and a liar.

Polipundit has the details and many links. Here is a direct link to the St Louis Post-Dispatch article that finally damned Massey. Massey did serve with the 3/7 Marines in Operation Iraqi Freedom 1.

The lede:

For more than a year, former Marine Staff Sgt. Jimmy Massey has been telling anybody who will listen about the atrocities that he and other Marines committed in Iraq.

In scores of newspaper, magazine and broadcast stories, at a Canadian immigration hearing and in numerous speeches across the country, Massey has told how he and other Marines recklessly, sometimes intentionally, killed dozens of innocent Iraqi civilians.

Among his claims:

Marines fired on and killed peaceful Iraqi protesters.

Americans shot a 4-year-old Iraqi girl in the head.

A tractor-trailer was filled with the bodies of civilian men, women and children killed by American artillery.

Massey’s claims have gained him celebrity. Last month, Massey’s book, “Kill, Kill, Kill,” was released in France. His allegations have been reported in nationwide publications such as Vanity Fair and USA Today, as well as numerous broadcast reports. Earlier this year, he joined the anti-war bus tour of Cindy Sheehan, and he’s spoken at Cornell and Syracuse universities, among others.

News organizations worldwide published or broadcast Massey’s claims without any corroboration and in most cases without investigation. Outside of the Marines, almost no one has seriously questioned whether Massey, a 12-year veteran who was honorably discharged, was telling the truth.

He wasn’t.

Each of his claims is either demonstrably false or exaggerated - according to his fellow Marines, Massey’s own admissions, and the five journalists who were embedded with Massey’s unit, including a reporter and photographer from the Post-Dispatch and reporters from The Associated Press and The Wall Street Journal.

Read the entire sad report.

And this St Louis Post-Dispatch rumination on why Massey got away with it. Bottom line: lack of fact checking.

In four or five years the same thing will happen with the entire “Bush/Blair lied” meme and Joe Wilson’s “trip to Niger.”

French President Jacques Chirac threatens the rioters with arrest.

A report.

The lede:

French President Jacques Chirac on Sunday promised arrests, trials and punishment for those sowing “violence or fear” across France _ as the urban unrest that has triggered attacks on vehicles, nursery schools and other targets hit central Paris for the first time.

And:

“What we notice is that the bands of youths are, little by little, getting more organized,” arranging attacks through cell phone text messages and learning how to make gasoline bombs…

UPDATE: Steven Den Beste points out a post in the Brussels Journal. Read it.

A few grafs:

What is happening in France has been brewing in Old Europe for years. The BBC speaks of “youths” venting their “anger.” The BBC is wrong. It is not anger that is driving the insurgents to take it out on the secularised welfare states of Old Europe. It is hatred. Hatred caused not by injustice suffered, but stemming from a sense of superiority. The “youths” do not blame the French, they despise them.

Most observers in the mainstream media (MSM) provide an occidentocentric analysis of the facts. They depict the “youths” as outsiders who want to be brought into Western society and have the same rights as the natives of Old Europe. The MSM believe that the “youths” are being treated unjustly because they are not a functioning part of Western society. They claim that, in spite of positive discrimination, subsidies, public services, schools, and all the provisions that have been made for immigrants over the years, access has been denied them.

This is the marxist rhetoric of the West that has been predominant in the media and the chattering classes since the 1960s. But it does not fit the facts of the situation in Europe today. To understand what is going on one cannot look at today’s events from a Western perspective. One has to think like the “youths” in order to understand them. Not imagine oneself in their shoes, but imagine their minds in one’s own head. The important question is: how do these insurgents perceive their relationship with society in France?

Unlike their fathers, who came to France from Muslim countries, accepting that, whilst remaining Muslims themselves, they had come to live in a non-Muslim country, the rioters see France as their country. They were born here. This land is their land. And since they are Muslims, this land, or at least a part of it, is Muslim as well…

The San Antonio Express-News ran this column of mine on September 13, 1995. I do not have a link. The subject is Algeria’s Armed Islamic Group (AIG, the French acronym is GIA). I mentioned France’s experience with Alerigan terrorists in a prior post.

For France “la gloire” — that French sense of national pride and global glory always colored with a dash of Napoleonic military verve– is once more extracting a heavy price.

Conflict with radical environmentalists, like Greenpeace, over French nuclear testing in the South Pacific, is the least worrisome of France’s current intrigues. Unlike neighboring Germany which earlier this year lost a round of “propaganda war” to Greenpeace over North Sea environmental issues, the French ignore what CNN has to say.

The French understand that bullets are more dangerous than soundbites. And globally the French are facing bullets.

French troops are engaged in Bosnia and are a major component of the U.N. Rapid Reaction Force. French political interests in the Balkans are complicated. Many Frenchmen fear a “Muslim” state in Europe; at the same time the majority of the French people reject the Serbs’ “ethnic cleansing.” At the moment the people of France support Bosnian involvement, but Serbia is an old French ally. Pride, and French forces, may disappear if the war widens.

The French Army is deployed in several African could-be hot spots. In most cases the French are regarded as genuine peacekeepers, a force preventing local ideological and tribal rivals from dragging struggling nations into senseless civil war.

The situation in the east African nation of Djibouti, however, is increasingly tense. French forces posted there could be easily drawn into a civil conflict.

Algeria’s civil war, however, is the most dangerous current conflict involving France. Within the last six weeks a half-dozen terror bombings have occurred in France itself. French authorities link the bombings to the militant Algerian Muslim “Armed Islamic Group” (the AIG).

Last week the French government declared war on the terrorist “enemy without a face” and deployed regular French Army units throughout France.

The AIG and other Algerian extremists see France and Europe as part of their own local battlefield. This stems from the legacy of French rule in Algeria. In the late 1950s France was involved in a full-scale guerrilla war against the Algerian National Liberation Front (NLF).

In 1962 President Charles DeGaulle’s government withdrew French forces from Algeria and proclaimed Algerian independence. The victorious NLF, however, imposed a one-party, socialist state. Democratic promises went unfulfilled. The NLF revolutionaries, their power centered on the military, became the new elites. With democracy stymied, religion became a haven for dissent.

The Islamic Salvation Front (ISF), currently Algeria’s main opposition party, won a resounding victory in Algeria’s 1991 elections. The ISF is a curious organization, with several moderate factions. The Algerian Army, however, instead of dealing with the moderates, canceled run-off elections and outlawed the ISF. The army’s position: Better a military dictatorship than an Islamic fundamentalist dictatorship.

Inside Algeria the radical AIG used the Army’s reaction to shunt Islamic moderates aside. The AIG assassinated foreign workers (especially European Christians), journalists and Algerian women wearing “western dress.” The Algerian Army began a “dirty war” with “death squads” attacking the AIG.

The AIG leadership believes France’s support of the Algerian Army-dominated government is an alliance; this means France is a belligerent.

France struggles with its own internal “Islam problem.” About four to five million Muslims, most of them Arab immigrants and a third of them Algerian, live in France. In 1970 France had two dozen mosques. In 1994 there were around 1,000 mosques in France.

The French government confronts many difficult choices. A tough response to terrorists is one thing; a “state of siege” which leads to ethnic carnage between the French and Arab immigrants is a step towards a kind of smoldering civil war, and one that plays into the hands of extreme right-wing politicians. [ED NOTE: These paragraphs were written in 1995– the riots are no surprise, folks.]

Likewise, French strikes at AIG bases in North Africa, in the minds of the AIG leadership, makes the point that the Algerian Army and “western-oriented” Arabs and Berbers are merely another type of “colonialist.” The AIG believes this could be the political issue which would turn the “trapped majority” of the Algerian people against the NLF and the Algerian Army.

France’s new war with political Islamic terrorism promises to be long and ugly — with very little glory.

The rather cursory “Is Paris Burning?” post attracted a number of fascinating comments, from “mais oui” to “mais non” and “possiblement.”

The French riots are not” jihad comes to Europe”– jihad is already in Europe. A year ago a jihadi murdered filmmaker Theo Van Gogh (hey Hollywood, where are the protests?). I know, I’ve been called a Euro-optimist, a counter to Mark Steyn as Euro-pessimist. Mark and I identify the same problems, and he’s been writing about them for years. I’ve thought that Holland and France would fight back– eventually. Well, the fight is on. Political evolution is far preferable to revolution, but evolution on the domestic means arresting Salafist/Islamist radicals and encouraging “Euro-Islam,” (France has been doing the latter.) On the international front evolution means developing democratic alternatives in the politically-dysfunctional Arab Muslim Middle East. And that means helping the Iraqi people defeat Saddmist and theo-fascists in Iraq.

New reports indicate the riots have moved from simple “burn” to calculated fire bombs. Though reports say “youths” are carrying out the attacks, discovering a bomb factory says some type of organizing spine either existed or now exists.

Here’s a new AP report. The French police found a Molotov Cocktail “factory.” Fire bombs are easy to make, so the factory could have been created quickly:

Ten nights of urban unrest that brought thousands of arson attacks on cars, nursery schools and other targets from the Mediterranean to the German border reached Paris where at least 28 cars were burned overnight in the French capital, government officials said Sunday.

Police found a gasoline bomb-making factory in a southern suburb of the city, with more than 100 bottles, gallons of fuel and hoods for hiding rioters’ faces, a senior Justice Ministry official said Sunday.

Six youths, all aged under 18, were arrested in the raid Saturday night on a building in Evry south of Paris where the gasoline bombs were being put together, Jean-Marie Huet, the ministry’s director of criminal affairs and pardons, told The Associated Press.

The discovery, Huet said, shows that gasoline bombs being used by rioters “are not being improvised by kids in their bathrooms.”

Hmmm. Poverty breeds molotovs?

The report suggests the French police are reinforcing the urbs and suburbs:

Some 2,300 police poured into the Paris region to bolster security on a restive Saturday night while firefighters moved out around the city to douse blazing vehicles.

At least 918 vehicles _ including those in Paris _ were burned during the 10th night of violence, said the Interior Ministry’s operational center tracking the violence. There was no word yet on damage in Paris to shops, gymnasiums, nursery schools and other targets which have been attacked around the country.

Police made 186 arrests nationwide overnight.

Shops, gyms, nursery schools, and cars. That’s a broad target list. In Torcy a police station and a youth center suffered attacks. Attacks have also been reported in Cannes and Nice– so tourists, beware.

Poverty exacerbates all problems, but poverty in and of itself does not produce violence. Migrants from France’s former Muslim colonies initially came for jobs, not to assimilate or “become French.” But the migrants stayed. Now France’s “Muslim neighborhoods” are permanent “cultural islands.” The French government’s own duplicitous policy towards Salafist/Islamist terror has backfired. France has fought Islamist terrorism. For 15 years the French government has been supporting the Algerian government’s battle against the Armed Islamic Group (GIA, the French acronym). In the mid-1990s GIA set off several bombs in and around Paris. However, the French government’s rhetoric has been appeasenik and enabling. Ah yes, the source of Muslim outrage is…America! France was following its Cold War strategy of snaking between Washington and Moscow. Remember, Reagan frightened the USSR. In 1983 Reagan was going to cause a nuclear war in Europe. Etcetera.

Appeasement and duplicity have once again failed as policy. Didn’t work for France in the Rhineland and at Munich, either.

UPDATE: A worthwhile article from Newsweek.

Here’s Mark Steyn on the “Eurarabian War” via radioblogger.

I also recommend readers look over the comments on my first French riots post. The level of denial exhibited by French readers is extraordinary…then again, perhaps it isn’t.

Here is some deep background, from the International Herald Tribune, October 17, 2005 — before the latest spate of riots. The subject: the decrepit, squalid living conditions European immigrants (legal and illegal) face.

Key graf:

In Paris, a string of deadly fires this year that killed 48 West African immigrants stunned France by revealing dangerously decrepit buildings, sometimes without running water and with hazardous electrical wiring, in the heart of the City of Light.

After fires in diplapidated housing killed over four-dozen African immigrants, the French government said it would build new homes. (This article dates from October 4 and focuses on African immigrants.)

…In the past five months, fires in crowded and dilapidated Paris buildings have killed almost 50 people, many of them immigrants and children.

…Two fires killed 24 people in derelict houses in Paris at the end of August. Twenty-four people were also killed when a hotel housing immigrants went up in flames in Paris in April.

…After the fires, the government vowed to make land available to build more than 20,000 homes and said it would provide 50 million euros to renovate decrepit buildings.

But opposition parties and anti-racism groups have said the measures will not be enough to solve the housing crisis, pointing out that the recent expulsions and strong government rhetoric on immigration only risked feeding xenophobia.

UPDATE 2: A more detailed history of General Dietrich von Choltitz’ refusal to execute Hitler’s August 1944 order to burn Paris (ie, more detailed than the one in my original “Is Paris Burning?” post.)

Key grafs:

When de Gaulle learned of the plan to bypass the city and delay liberation, he became convinced that the Americans were for some as yet unknown reason plotting to destroy his political future. Whoever expelled the Germans and freed Paris would likely build for himself in the process a power base with which to dominate the entire country in years to come. De Gaulle estimated that the Communists had 25,000 armed men in the city (if this figure was accurate, they outnumbered the Germans); he ordered the cessation of all Resistance-bound arms drops into the area. While Eisenhower brooded in his gloomy headquarters, de Gaulle was in Algiers, busily sending trusted subordinates to the City of Light to do everything in their power to head off any premature insurrection that might well sow the seeds of a civil war. France, drained by four years of Nazi occupation, was in no condition to endure such a calamity.

An intro to von Choltitz:

After three years of distinguished service on the Russian Front, Maj. Gen. Dietrich von Choltitz was brought west by Hitler. Since the July 20, 1944, bomb attempt on his life, the Fuhrer had had little faith in his military commanders’ trustworthiness; yet in Choltitz he believed he had found his man for a monumental task. Choltitz’s family heritage of generations of Prussian militarism left little room for an independent spirit. He had been raised to do as he was told. When he led the German invasion force into Holland in the spring of 1940, he commanded the bomber formations that pulverized Rotterdam before the city had a chance to surrender. During the gory July 1942 siege of the Crimean port of Sevastopol, Choltitz’s 4,800-man regiment was so decimated that he decided to force Russian POWs to carry shells and load the big guns being used against their comrades. While Choltitz suffered only an arm wound, all but 347 of his soldiers died in action. Transferred to Army Group Center a year later, he obediently followed the Fuhrer’s scorched-earth policy, making sure the advancing Russians found nothing but smoldering rubble in the wake of the withdrawing Wehrmacht.

Dietrich von Choltitz was indeed an able city destroyer, but by the time he arrived in Paris as its new military governor, he had had a couple of encounters that changed him radically. He had first met Hitler at a summer 1943 conference on the Russian Front, and though shocked by the Austrian peasant’s table manners during a luncheon, he was captivated by the powerful personality and contagious confidence of the Fuhrer. When he arrived at the Fuhrer’s headquarters in Rastenburg, East Prussia, a year later, however, he was in for a shocking disappointment. Hitler’s health had been wrecked by the incredible pressures of his life, the previous month’s attempted assassination and, some doctors suspected, Parkinson’s disease. After a rambling discourse on his career and the war, Hitler concluded with a shrieking diatribe against the Prussian officer corps. Finally, he told Choltitz he would be Befehlshaber, fortress commander, of Paris and should “stamp out without pity” all civilian acts of disobedience or terrorism.

The Germans prepared for a “scorched earth” retreat from Paris:

Upon arrival at his new command, Choltitz was informed by Generalleutnant Gunther Blumentritt of the dreaded expected orders for a scorched-earth withdrawal should the Germans be unable to hold the city. Soon the 813th Pionierkompanie (Engineer Company) began the strategic placement of explosives. Electric and water facilities were given the greatest priority, but the first structures mined were the centuries-old bridges spanning the Seine. Without these bridges, the broad, meandering loops of the river would be a troublesome obstacle for an advancing army. On August 16, Hitler had ordered the Gestapo and noncombat administrators to evacuate the city. The previous day, eight Germans had been killed in an ambush in an adjoining suburb. There was no doubt that things were about to get hot. But by telling the Wehrmacht Western Front operations chief, Generaloberst Alfred Jodl, that the preparations were not yet completed, Choltitz managed to hold off any blasting.

The drama unfolds:

A tunnel beneath the city was filled with U-boat torpedoes that, if ignited, would produce a titanic explosion and tremendous devastation. On August 17, the busy general received at his headquarters Pierre Charles Tattinger, the mayor of Paris. The mayor was alarmed at all the explosives being deployed throughout the city and asked the German for an explanation. He was shocked by Choltitz’s response: “As an officer, Monsieur Tattinger, you will understand there are certain measures I shall have to take in Paris. It is my duty to slow up as much as possible the advance of the Allies.”

Although he was a collaborator, Tattinger was understandably aghast at this revelation. How could even the Nazis consider such an atrocity? Suddenly, Choltitz was seized by one of his periodic attacks of asthma and went into a fit of uncontrollable coughing. Leading him onto the balcony for some fresh air, Tattinger looked down on the lovely sculptured garden of the Tuileries and had an inspiration. Gesturing at the captivating vista, he made his point. Below them a lovely young girl was riding her bicycle on the Rue de Rivoli; on the manicured grounds of Le Notre, children played by the pond with their sailboats; across the adjacent Seine was the glittering dome of Les Invalides; and beyond that stood the landmark of the City of Light, the Eiffel Tower.

The Frenchman’s appeal was powerful: “Often it is given a general to destroy, rarely to preserve. Imagine that one day it may be given you to stand on this balcony again, as a tourist, to look once more on these monuments to our joys, to our sufferings, and be able to say, ‘One day I could have destroyed this, and I preserved it as a gift to humanity.’ General, is not that worth all a conqueror’s glory?” Choltitz looked silently to his left at the Louvre and to his right at the Place de la Concorde and replied: “You are a good advocate for Paris, Monsieur Tattinger. You have done your duty well. Likewise I, as a German general, must do mine.” Would he?…

Read the entire article.

UPDATE 3: Wretchard at The Belmont Club discusses the French riots and offers several trenchant observations about rioter tactics. Wretchard says attacks on cars indicate the rioters are practicing brinksmanship– not going too far. But there is the report of the attack on the police station and now reports of schools burning. ANother tv report says 30 policemen have been injured in a riot at Grigny.

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Yes, along with French pretensions and a few prevarications. I linked to a StrategyPage analysis the day after the riots in Clichy and other suburbs began, but otherwise haven’t posted on this issue. France is fighting a low-level civil war.

The Weekly Standard carries an excellent article in its latest issue. The lede:

THE FRENCH USE THE EUPHEMISM “quartiers sensibles”–sensitive neighborhoods–for the troubled, predominantly Arab and African working-class suburbs of Paris and other cities that increasingly resemble a ticking bomb at the heart of their society.

One such sensitive neighborhood is Clichy-sous-Bois, nine miles northeast of Paris, where last week’s string of nightly riots began. Two Muslim youths–one black, one Arab–were electrocuted at a power relay station on October 27. The circumstances are sketchy: Were the youths being chased by the police because they were suspects in a break-in? Were they being chased for no reason? Or were they–as Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy claims, and the preliminary report of the prosecutor has now confirmed–never pursued by the police at all?

For the time being, what is certain is that the rumor that innocent youths had died as a result of police harassment spread like wildfire. Local residents called their friends in other neighborhoods and urged them to join the upcoming fight against the state. In fact, the first people attacked by the mob were the firemen who went to the power relay station to rescue the youths. The firemen, greeted by a barrage of stones, could not treat the victims on the spot but retreated to their trucks and drove the youths to a nearby trauma center.

Later, some 400 young men started trashing the town, burning cars, vandalizing a school, a mall, the post office, the fire station, bus shelters. They even tried to enter the town hall but were prevented by police. Fighting broke out

when 300 antiriot forces entered Clichy and were met with Molotov cocktails and stones and even a live gunshot.

Seven cops were injured, and witnesses described the scene as “guerrilla warfare.” Philosopher Jean-François Mattei spoke of “urban barbarity.” In the eight nights of rioting that, at this writing, have ensued, in Clichy-sous-Bois and other Paris suburbs, about 1,224 cars were burned and numerous youths arrested.

Other key grafs:

Communal tensions are equally pervasive, pitting white French (or “Gaulois”) against Arab and Black, Black against Arab, and Muslim against Jew. In light of this, it is no coincidence that France saw a record number of anti-Semitic incidents in 2004 (970, well over 2 a day), most of them committed by young Muslims from the suburbs.

In extreme cases, these neighborhoods might as well be foreign countries, with their own laws and value systems. Thus, good students are treated as pariahs, while outlaws get respect. Matters have reached the point where some young “Gauloises” have testified that, in a kind of inverse assimilation process, they converted to Islam to escape harassment by Muslim thugs.

Some intellectuals speak of the Lebanonization of French society. Others speculate about civil war in ten years if nothing is done. Michel Gurfinkiel, editor of the news magazine Valeurs Actuelles, likens France today to the Weimar republic just before the rise of Nazism.

The article is written by Olivier Guitta. Read the whole thing.

UPDATE: It appears some readers– particularly readers in France– fail to get the historical allusion in the headline. In WWII, as allied columns approached Paris, Hitler was supposed to have asked his general in charge of the city, General Dietrich von Choltitz, if he had begun destroying it. (”Brennt Paris?”) Hitler wanted Paris destroyed as German units retreated. Von Choltitz didn’t carry out the order. So Paris wasn’t burning. Be that as it may, Parisian suburbs are close enough to Paris for folks outside of France to say riots are occuring “in Paris.” During the LA riots of the early 1990s, Los Angeles in toto wasn’t burning, either. Guitta’s article makes it clear most of the riots are in outlying suburbs of Paris. Sheesh.

This editorial from the NY Post (requires registration) is a case in point. The headline reads “The Paris Riots” but scan three sentences and it clairifies with “suburbs of Paris.”

The lede:

Ever since America reacted to 9/11 by declaring — and vigorously prose cuting — a worldwide War on Terror, the usual suspects in the punditocracy have been smugly predicting that sooner or later the “Muslim street” would explode in anger and outrage.
Well, it’s finally happened — not in the Mideast, but in the suburbs of Paris.

France, of course, arrogantly took the lead in opposing virtually every meaningful U.S. initiative in the War on Terror, especially Operation Iraqi Freedom.

I’m certain there are several drams of truth in the UN auditing claims. Still, a bit of this is tit for the far heavier tat– US investigator Paul Volcker’s report on the UN’s truly corrupt Oil For Food program. Yes, the UN auditors would have issued a tough report on the US and its Iraqi contractors anyway. Note the source of the reports: US civilian and military sources. Weasel words flit through the accounting accusations, like work “done poorly.” The US must repay “some” of the overcharge money.As I said, I’m certain hasty work in many cases was done very poorly and shabbily. When gobs of government money get spent that happens. War increases haste, which increases the chance of slipshod. Oil For Food, however, was corrupt to the core– to the core of the UN bureaucracy, with the strings running back to Saddam and tendrils touching Russian and French elites.

However– fair bet the magic incantation “Kellog Brown and Root” will give this story major media legs.

The lede:

An auditing board sponsored by the United Nations recommended on Friday that the United States repay as much as $208 million to the Iraqi government for contracting work in 2003 and 2004 assigned to Kellogg, Brown & Root, the Halliburton subsidiary.

The work was paid for with Iraqi oil proceeds but the board says it was either carried out at inflated prices or done poorly. The board did not, however, give examples of poor work.

Some of the work involved postwar fuel imports carried out by KBR that previous audits have criticized as grossly overpriced. But this is the first time that an international auditing group has suggested that the United States repay some of that money to Iraq.

The International Advisory and Monitoring Board of the Development Fund for Iraq compiled reports from an array of Pentagon, U.S. government and private auditors to carry out its analysis.

This blog’s first post went up on January 7. The site meter went up late on the evening of May 2. The webmaster and I put it up more out of curiosity than anything else. As of yesterday (November 3) site meter had counted 961,000 unique visits, May 3-November 2. That’s an average of –give or take– 5200 a day over the six month period. There are several three and four day periods where posts were few and far between, too. Thank you.

The Washington Times runs my column on the Libby indictment.

The column explores the Clinton/Libby similarities mentioned last Friday when the court handed down the indictment.

From the column: “”If Mr. Libby committed perjury, he did so out of arrogance.”

Arrogance based on this:

Mr. Libby had harnessed the power of Washington’s shadow forces: wheeling and dealing with the K Street clan, handling political hatchets, leaking to reporters and kowtowing to the mighty — or what those of us in flyover country consider the usual dirty day’s work of a sharp Beltway clerk.

Two days ago I posted on the state of Texas’ new intel and law enforcement data fusion center.

A reader sends this enlightening comment:

This fusion center has the potential to really impact local government. I hope it can reach its objective. Presently, the State of Texas provides volumes of “current intelligence” to first responders all across the state. This really takes the form of “raw intelligence.” It includes things that might read like, “on Oct. 31st a police car with full range of equipment normally carried was stolen in Detroit.” If you are the Emergency Medical Service Chief in McAllen, Texas this is not really useful. The problem is, that in its effort to kepp everyone informed messages like this one example have been flowing into e-mail in boxes all across the state. So much so that many fire chiefs, emergency medical service and emergency managers just delete the messages without reading them.

If this fusion center can reduce this flow of “raw intelligence” and provide an analysis of trends it will be a solid step in increasing useful information available at the local level.

The obligatory “oh, by the way” 1. Intelligence isn’t perfect, it won’t necessarily predict the next attack, or it might but the people who receive the intelligence won’t accept it. (History if full of such incidents - Ardennes 1944). Many local first responders haven’t had a basic schooling or understanding on intelligence data analysis what it can and can’t do for them. Well-these were two “oh, by the ways.” Certainly both are worthy of further exploration.