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Pilot to Bombardier
Pilot to Bombardier,
are the boulevards burning?
The out-of-Dodge roads? We feel
still heavy with payload,
though smoke whispers
of smoldering — of hamlets
and metropolises aflame.
Pilot to bombardier, I remember
kissing my wife in the hanger,
remember you brushing the bomb
like some mother delivering
her son to his first school day —
gravely aware the guidance
systems of his eyes would come
on-line after the short time
out of your arms, learning.
Pilot to Bombardier (you would never
proffer your child to a burning schoolhouse)
why are we flying, cradling meteoric clusters,
over lands already bursting with war-
heads and small arms fire
and child soldiers and students
of battle and all their constant hopes
that the blast we carry might be
the one to eradicate enemy and enemy
alike? — a shockwave to slow all
air and artillery until they drop
harmless as Mars’ iron tears.
Pilot to Bombardier, we’re losing
altitude. We’re going down. Mayday,
mayday, the earth calls to us.
Saving Congo: Whither the EU?
Madeleine Albright once famously asked then-Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Colin Powell, "What’s the point of having this superb military you’re always talking about if we can’t use it?" Much the same could be demanded of the European Union’s nascent military formations, strong on paper but chimerical when it comes to actual deployment. These formations — officially called "battle groups" in a warlike impulse at odds with their record thus far — risk being nothing more than accessories for an organization that seeks to assume the trappings, if not always the responsibilities, of a global player. That risk becomes greater if the EU chooses not to use its military to ameliorate the latest increase in bloodshed in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
Postcard from…Persepolis
John McCain and his "Bomb, Bomb, Bomb Iran" lost the presidential election. George W. Bush and his view of Iran as an "evil" nation will soon leave the White House. Barack Obama could open a new chapter in U.S.-Iranian relations by visiting Iran. He wouldn’t be alone.
‘2025’ Report: A World of Resource Strife
A new report by the National Intelligence Council (NIC) on the emerging strategic landscape, "Global Trends 2025," has attracted worldwide attention because it forecasts a future environment in which the United States wields less power than it does today and must contend with a constellation of other, newly ambitious great powers. "Although the United States is likely to remain the single most important actor," the report notes, "the United States’ relative strength — even in the military realm — will decline and U.S. leverage will become more constrained." Of all the many revealing findings in the study, this has been the most widely quoted.
Bomb India?
After the attacks in Mumbai last week, should the United States bomb suspected terrorist cells in India? Send the Marines to Kashmir where one of the suspected groups behind the attacks — Lashkar-e-Taiba — originates? Or initiate regime change in Pakistan, which has provided support for several terrorist outfits operating in South Asia?
The Chinese Economy
A recent New York Times editorial gives China broad advice on the economic and financial crises, most of it wrong. Headlined “As Goes China, so Goes…” (an allusion to the old U.S. presidential election bromide, “As goes Maine, so goes the Nation), the editorial distills the essence of the macroeconomists’ conventional wisdom about the proper future direction of the Chinese economy: reduce exports, expand imports, and create a modern consumer economy. The Times implies that China’s government budget surplus, high individual savings rate, and endless consumer and social welfare needs make the task easy, if only Chinese policymakers would catch on. In fact, this transformation would be far more disruptive. Moreover, neither China nor the world can survive the creation of a clone of the 20th-century U.S. economy in the coming era of high-cost energy and low-carbon footprints.
Foreign Policy for Obama Should Be Approached with a Broad Vision
After the Bush administration’s heavy-handed foreign policy, which alienated many U.S. allies, a period of caution under Obama might be welcome. But exercising too much caution, if it translates into maintaining the status quo, would be a profound mistake. The sheer number of grave crises confronting the new president requires a fundamental change in the way that the United States approaches the world.
Change Nuclear Weapons Policy? Yes, We Can.
For nearly 40 years, American presidents have expressed their intention to fulfill the U.S. obligation under the 1968 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT) to pursue "effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament." Still, few presidents have taken that goal seriously, and those who did missed historic opportunities to move closer toward a nuclear weapons-free world.
Not-So-Pearly Gates
Do appointments shape their office or does the office shape the appointment? Imagine what would happen if, improbably, President-elect Barack Obama appointed Dennis Kucinich to head the Pentagon. If he tried to implement any of his excellent plans for demilitarizing the United States, Kucinich would encounter enormous pushback, non-compliance, outright insubordination. To get anything done, even as the head of this powerful institution, Kucinich would have to play by the rules.