Adios

There is more than enough evidence to judge the Castros’ legacy for what it is: the systematic exploitation and oppression of the Cuban people.

Two decades of “Castro-is-dead” rumors are finally at an end. And the race is on to see which world leader can most fulsomely praise Fidel Castro’s legacy, while delicately averting their eyes from his less savory characteristics. Two dul -elected leaders of democracies who should know better, Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau and 44, are leading the way. Mr. Trudeau praised Castro as a “legendary revolutionary and orator” who “made significant improvements to the education and health care of his island nation.” 44 offered his “condolences” to the Cuban people, and blandly suggested that “history will record and judge the enormous impact of this singular figure.” Now, he added, we can “look to the future.”

With all due respect to 44, the 60 years Fidel Castro spent systematically exploiting and oppressing the people of Cuba provide more than enough history to pass judgment on both Fidel and, now more importantly, his brother Raul.

See...

Lee Kwan Yew, Augusto Pinochet, Francisco Franco, Chiang Kai Shek, Park Chung-he: all of these dictators and authoritarians can mock Fidel Castro. They left their countries better off than they found them, and while many of them committed terrible crimes, they can also point to great accomplishments. Fidel has only the crimes.

Fidel leaves a shattered society and a desperately poor country behind him. Cuba is more divided today than it was when he conquered it; it is less able to shape its destiny than it was in 1959, and its future will likely be more closely linked to the United States after his death than before his seizure of power

Adios, failed autocrat

Thankfull

Thankful for being an American. Everything else just seems to fall into place.

Pic - "Almighty God - We totally thank thee for raising up this laughing race of free men, avatars of Thy divine deigns that "Whosoever will" - may. That fun and free choice shall not perish from the earth - we are eternally grateful for l'nom d'guerr "Americans" 

Drones Challange The Law OF Armed Conflict

Over the last eight years, 44’s counterterrorism policy has in large part been defined by drone strikes against a number of terrorist targets around the world.

Indeed, the U.S. drone program is a global enterprise, with bases in at least 10 countries, lethal operations in at least seven countries, and coordination of drone operations with numerous partners and allies.

But even as the Drones Gone Wild program has become a cornerstone of counterterrorism policy, its implementation has raised a number of questions, particularly with regard to the use of drones outside active combat zones or in countries not engaged in war with the United States.

Central to these questions has been the ongoing secrecy surrounding the U.S. lethal drone program, including limited details on casualty figures, a lack of information on the legal framework supporting the program, little insight into policy guidance, and next to no information on how targeted drone strikes fit in with broader strategic objectives.

One of the main challenges with the U.S. drone program is that it has been relatively difficult to assess the basis for and impact of the program itself. Over the last eight years, the administration has released very few documents relating to the legal justification for the lethal drone program, and those that have been released have been primarily only under court order. It wasn’t until the summer of 2016 that the 44th Administration released the first government-provided data on casualties of U.S. “counterterrorism strikes,” as well as a heavily redacted version of the Presidential Policy Guidance (PPG) that governs the use of force and armed drone strikes outside of Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria, countries that are considered “areas of active hostilities.”

While these documents shine some much needed light on the human cost of the U.S. drone program and provide some much-sought insight into the legal rationale underpinning the U.S. drone program, they emphasize the decision-making process without significant clarification of the legal standards for the program. Indeed, the only thing that can be definitively said after these two releases is that the U.S. drone program demonstrates the flexible nature in which the administration has applied law, rules, and regulations.

The use of drones by the United States has challenged the application of the law of armed conflict. For over a decade, the United States has seemed to widely interpret its legal right to target and kill those individuals identified as a member of al-Qaida or its associated forces wherever they are located. However, the ways in which individuals are identified is based on undisclosed criteria and evidence. Moreover, it appears that there has been little means for anyone outside the secretive process to identify or remedy mistakes. This ad hoc application of international legal standards and principles undermines support for the international rule of law.

Current U.S. drone policy is also devoid of public understanding of the processes through which targeting decisions are made, and the domestic and international legal justifications for these decisions. Though detailed and revealing in terms of the procedural process for uses of force against terrorist targets outside the domestic context and outside areas of active hostilities, the PPG release in August did not adequately explain the standards for the use of force outside active war zones, and the terms used within the PPG are seen as vague, inconsistent, and at times contradictory. Moreover, the PPG still neglects to explain the specific legal rules and standards that underpin U.S. drone policy and is particularly vague in terms of the application of international human rights law standards that should apply in such contexts.

Although armed drones are but one tool in the United States’ larger counterterrorism toolkit, they appear to have become the most coveted tool, and their reliability and usage is arguably driving U.S. strategy (rather than being a tactic of a larger strategy). And because it is unclear what oversight and accountability mechanisms are being utilized, it is difficult to gauge success. What remains is a lack of clear understanding of the structures in place to ensure that continued use of targeted strikes against “high-value targets” and associated forces is fulfilling and/or contributing to strategic goals and objectives. These challenges are compounded by continued uncertainty regarding how the administration assesses effectiveness, and the metrics and methodologies used to evaluate impact. Indeed, the opacity of the U.S. lethal drone program has made it impossible to identify the systems in place, if any, to responsibly respond to mistakes, pay reparations if necessary, or ensure that operations are not undermining longer-term strategic goals.

In short, the lack of information on the justifications and rationale behind the Obama Administration’s drone program makes it impossible to conduct any objective analysis of whether the program rests on appropriate standards and if it is accomplishing broader national security and foreign policy aims. Rather, the administration has resorted to a reliance on its own internal evaluations and a “trust us” mentality, which is inherently problematic. The lack of public information about the drone program limits discourse on key U.S. engagements and the use of force in countries around the world.

This discourse is vital to ensuring that U.S. drone use and policy is effective in addressing immediate threats as well as attending to broader strategic interests and foreign policy goals. These interests and goals include upholding U.S. commitments to the laws of war, international human rights law, and international humanitarian law, as well as establishing appropriate standards for the use of drone technology. All of these principles are essential to establishing an appropriate precedent for the use of lethal drones, particularly as other countries develop and seek to acquire similar capabilities.

The next president will inherit a U.S. drone policy that seemingly offers other countries a blank check to adopt and conduct drone operations based on questionable legal justifications and largely secret policy guidance. The 44th Administration’s continued reticence to provide substantive information on the breadth of the U.S. drone program, the legal justification behind it, and the costs and benefits of operations, poses risks within the United States and sets a dangerous precedent internationally.

45 will need to take steps to clearly and publicly establish rules for the U.S. drone program that provides the domestic and international legal framework for the U.S. drone program, including interpretations used by the United States with regard to international humanitarian law and international human rights law.

Congress has a role to play as well. It must place a larger priority on the U.S. drone program, provide more rigorous oversight over the program, and ask questions about its overall efficacy. Without clear and transparent rules, prominent oversight, and legal use, the U.S. drone program will undermine U.S. national security interests and foreign policy objectives, no matter how well-intended.

Mad Dog As Secretary Of Defense

Something kinda cool about command level Teufel Hunden nom d'guerr'd "Mad Dog."

As in General Mad Dog Mattis who may be getting the gig as 45's Defense Secretary...

If you’re going to put a general in there, Mattis is a good choice. He is a rarity in that he is a genuine strategic thinker, pushing himself and others to stretch their minds. This tendency is not always welcomed.

Having Mattis run the Defense Department would put the Marines in their most powerful position ever — they’d have the Secretary of Defense, the Chairman Joint Chief of Staff, and the commandant. If I were the Army I’d hunker down and plan for the future for a few years.

The relationship between SecDef and chairman of the Joint Chiefs would be especially interesting. Joseph Dunford, the CJCS, served under Mattis in Iraq in 2005.

 A Marine Corps Times profile put him in the Corps’ pantheon, calling him “a leader with almost mythical, rock-star status like Chesty Puller and Al Gray.” Check the #Mattisisms hashtag on twitter.

Congrats General Mattis!


Pic - Mad Dog says "Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet."

45's Spy Guy

Mike Pompeo was born in Orange, California, the son of Dorothy (née Mercer) and Wayne Pompeo. He attended the U.S. Military Academy where he majored in Mechanical Engineering, graduating first in his class in 1986 and subsequently serving in the Regular Army as an Armor Branch cavalry officer from 1986 to 1991. He received his J.D. from Harvard Law School, where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. He then worked as a lawyer for Williams & Connolly.

Pompeo has been on the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and Committee on Energy and Commerce, and the following 3 subcommittees: the Subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing and Trade, the Subcommittee on Energy and Power, and the Subcommittee on the CIA. He is also on the House Select Committee on the Events Surrounding the 2012 Terrorist Attack in Benghazi

Pompeo supports the National Security Agency's surveillance programs, characterizing the agency's efforts as "good and important work." In March 2014, Pompeo denounced NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden's inclusion in the South by Southwest conference in Austin, Texas, and called for Snowden's invitation to speak via telecast at the annual Texas event be withdrawn, lest it encourage "lawless behavior" among attendees. In February 2016, Pompeo said Snowden "should be brought back from Russia and given due process, and I think the proper outcome would be that he would be given a death sentence." 

Pompeo has advocated for rolling back post-Snowden surveillance reforms, saying "Congress should pass a law re-establishing collection of all metadata, and combining it with publicly available financial and lifestyle information into a comprehensive, searchable database. Legal and bureaucratic impediments to surveillance should be removed. That includes Presidential Policy Directive-28, which bestows privacy rights on foreigners and imposes burdensome requirements to justify data collection."

On July 21, 2015, Pompeo and Senator Tom Cotton alleged the existence of secret side agreements between Iran and the IAEA on procedures for inspection and verification of Iran's nuclear activities under the Iran nuclear deal. The Obama administration denied any clandestine or secret actions. Administration officials acknowledge the existence of agreements between Iran and the IAEA governing the inspection of sensitive military sites, but deny the characterization that they are “secret side deals,” saying instead that they are standard practice in crafting arms-control pacts and that the Administration had provided the information on them that was at its disposal to Congress.

In a 2013 speech on the House floor, Pompeo said Muslim leaders who fail to denounce acts of terrorism done in the name of Islam are "potentially complicit" in the attacks. The Council on American-Islamic Relations called on Pompeo to revise his remarks, calling them "false and irresponsible".

Pompeo opposes closing Guantánamo Bay detention camp. After a 2013 visit to the prison, Pompeo said, of the prisoners who were on hunger strike, "It looked to me like a lot of them had put on weight."

Pompeo has criticized the 44th administration's decision to end the CIA's secret prisons (so-called "black sites"), and the administration's requirement that all interrogators adhere to anti-torture laws.

On November 18, 2016, the President-elect announced that he would nominate Pompeo to be the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency.

45's NSA

Michael Thomas "Mike" Flynn (born December 1958) is a retired United States Army lieutenant general who served as the director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, commander of the Joint Functional Component Command for Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance, and chair of the Military Intelligence Board from July 24, 2012, to August 2, 2014. Prior to that, he served as Assistant Director of National Intelligence. 

Flynn co-authored a report in January 2010 through the Center for a New American Security entitled Fixing Intel: A Blueprint for Making Intelligence Relevant in Afghanistan, which criticized the intelligence community for lacking an understanding of the human-socio context of the battlefield in Afghanistan.

Flynn's military career was primarily operational, with numerous combat arms, conventional and special operations senior intelligence assignments. He also served as the senior intelligence officer for the Joint Special Operations Command. Flynn is a published author, with articles appearing in Small Wars Journal, Military Review, Joint Forces Quarterly and other military and intelligence publications.

In May 2016, he emerged as one of several leading possibilities to be the vice presidential running mate for Republican nominee. Flynn was not chosen as Trump's running mate; the vice presidential pick was ultimately Indiana Governor Mike Pence. At the 2016 Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio, Flynn delivered what the Los Angeles Times called a "fiery speech".

On November 18, 2016, the Transition announced via press release that President-elect  had named General Flynn his National Security Advisor

Arab League's Brain And Cash Deficit

Oh Arab League!

It's a comedy except it's sooo tragic

If Middle Eastern countries do not start making real progress on fundamental political and economic reforms, further regional turmoil is inevitable. With the rentier systems that governments have maintained for decades now at a breaking point, policymakers must begin the difficult, but not impossible, process of establishing new social contracts. 

That contract in Arab countries started to erode at the turn of the century, when governments with inflated budgets and bloated bureaucracies could no longer provide an adequate supply of basic services such as health care and education, create a sufficient number of jobs, or sustain food and fuel subsidies. But, despite diminished state benefits, most leaders have continued to insist that their countries’ people uphold their end of the contract by not participating meaningfully in public life. 

Arab governments were able to sustain inefficient economies for decades because they were propped up by oil revenues. In recent decades, most Arab countries have benefited in some way from the Middle East’s abundant oil and gas reserves. Hydrocarbon-producing countries used their profits to buy their citizens’ loyalty and establish what were effectively welfare states; and non-oil producers enjoyed the benefits of aid, capital inflows, and remittances sent back by their nationals working in resource-rich countries. 

Because the governments of oil-producing countries used revenues to provide for most of their people’s needs – including jobs, services, and favors – these governments fostered a culture of dependency, rather than encouraging self-reliance and entrepreneurship to expand the private sector. What’s more, because they did not need to tax their citizens to generate revenues, people had little recourse to challenge authoritarianism. The political culture reflected a simple principle: “no taxation, no representation.” 

Now that oil prices are declining and will likely continue to remain low for several years, if not permanently, the Middle East’s rentier systems face a significant challenge. Saudi Arabia, for example, is raising taxes, cutting domestic subsidies, and shifting its foreign-aid paradigm away from grants and toward investments. The kingdom has long provided financial support to Egypt, Jordan, and other countries in the region, so this shift will put pressure on those governments to pursue private-sector growth to improve their own countries’ economic performance. 

But, while the Arab world’s governments have reached the limits of their ability to employ more people, raise public debt, and attract outside grants, members of these countries’ political and economic elite, whom the current rentier system privileges, will likely resist efforts at substantive reform. And we should expect to see further opposition from state bureaucracies, which lack any vision for a transition to an inclusive and sustainable economic model. 

Still, Middle Eastern countries cannot hope to develop prosperous economies without such a transition. After relying on resource rents for decades, these governments must switch not only to new growth models, but also to more representative governance. When Arab societies are asked to accept reduced subsidies, fewer government jobs, and less from the state in general, they will demand a larger share in the decision-making process. 

As it stands, the Arab world is stuck between an unsustainable economic and political status quo and the inclusive, merit-based economic system that less myopic people in the region know must replace it. Too many Arab governments have put themselves in this untenable situation, having given little consideration to building the governance institutions their states need. 

The first wave of Arab uprisings, which began in December 2010 and led to the 2011 Arab Spring, was a response to the breakdown of the old social contracts. In today’s perfect storm of declining oil prices and closed political systems, a new wave of protest could well emerge, particularly where governments have not recognized that the end of rentierism marks the end of the old social contract.  
 
For these governments, economic reform is now a matter of survival. In a more open system, Arab governments will need to privatize many state-controlled companies, and make it far easier for entrepreneurs to register start-ups and launch new businesses. And, ultimately, Arab states’ economic reforms will succeed only if citizens gain a more powerful voice in governance. 

Tunisia is the one country where a new social contract has begun to replace rentierism. The rest of the Arab world faces two alternatives. Its leaders can begin fighting the cancer of an unsustainable status quo, with all the pain and uncertainty that such a struggle entails; or they can wait for the cancer to become a terminal condition, and be devoured by it.