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October 19, 2003
On effectivenesss of 11 Sep Response
On the effectiveness of US response to 11 September, efforts and spending.
Frankly this question gets into areas where I have no real expertise, such as military and security affaires. I further, not being in the United States, do not really have a sense of activities there, other than what I read in the papers.
On overseas issues, I can only note the following, it strikes me that after an initially well-balanced response with the Afghan campaign and reaching out to various regional governments to upgrade intelligence work and the like, we have seen an unbalanced fixation on a certain kind security and specifically using military might in the place of more useful instruments, such as covert action in conjunction with local governments.
While the statement often thrown carelessly about, that the US can not make those who undertake suicide missions to blow up buildings like it, that is a mis-framing of the issue. The issue is risk management and influence, to use economic thought, on the marginal potential consumer of extremism.
It strikes me that on one hand those already sold on violence as a solution are, generally but always, not subject to influence and compromise. It is correct to note their minds can not be changed.
What is not correct is to confuse that group – whatever the percentage of the population, let’s say 30 percent to include the fellow travelers who will support but not act – with the clear majorities that, however much they may detest US foreign policy, admire the US and are subject to convincing, given the right combination of carrots and sticks. But there must be carrots, by which I mean not the purely negative “carrot” of not getting killed (really the stick) but support for real changes that help their lives.
Now in this area it must be admitted that the US has relatively limited space for action. Certainly much support for the al-Qaeda types derives from the sclerotic nature of the political economies of the Middle East – where corrupt faux-secular elites or oligarchies strangle societies and economies for their own narrow benefit. At the same time, as matters of convenience, and at times sold on the idea these faux-secular elites necessity for fighting Islamism, the US supports them. Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, Tunisia, Yemen come to mind – the Gulf is a somewhat different case but if we leave aside the secular adjective, it is similar.
Recent policy, however, seems to opt for the easily sold but in my mind, long term inefficient military option – we see in Iraq spending of say 100 billion USD or more on the purely military options – with meager efforts in the economic realm where I believe greater returns are to be found.
The example of Israel’s long struggle with the Palestinians and the current madness rather illustrates this. Sharon is presently walking down the same path he walked, to a bloody failure, in the late 1970s and 1980s, attempting to solve a political issue through pure application of force, while simply trying to install quisling leaders to administer the conquered population. By the way, The Economist has two excellent articles on this, including a telling map of the security, or rather Annexation Fence:
The Middle East conflict
Israeli frustration versus Syrian impotence
Oct 9th 2003 | CAIRO AND JERUSALEM
http://www.economist.com/World/africa/displayStory.cfm?story_id=2124664
and including a telling map
Israel's security barrier
A safety measure or a land grab?
Oct 9th 2003 | JERUSALEM
http://www.economist.com/background/displaystory.cfm?story_id=2119356
I note the Israeli conflict in this context because I believe the Sharon's ever escalating and ever more futile responses illustrate that security, as other endeavors respond to the economic law of diminishing returns and likely indeed the marginal utility on security spending, if mapped, would likely took somewhat of an upside down U shape, if on the Y axis we plotted 'security' meaning safeness etc. as an increasing positive value (insecurity as a decrease, etc.) and on the X axis we plotted security dollars spent. I mean, in this case the crudest security dollars, military dollars. From a given point, down on the U, increases result in more security, but as we reach the peak, increases deliver progressively less security and eventually actually generate insecurity.
Nothing novel in this observation I may add, theoricians in security issues have observed that at some point a search for security begins to generate feelings of insecurity among previously unconcerned parties, thus generating more opposition and eventually insecurity for the actor seeking "perfect" security.
I would not pretend that this "security utility" graph is either terribly knowable or indeed constant over time, it likely shifts in or out constantly. However, I do believe that the War on Iraq, a useless piece of idiocy, was security seeking that pushed the US well over the top of the inverted U such that present security spending in Iraq actually has negative returns.
Posted by The Lounsbury at October 19, 2003 11:01 AM
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Jan-Dec 2003
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