A Reader has brought up several National Security concerns. World War III?
Al-Qaeda
Are we at the beginning or end of WWIII? I have called this WWIII but the fact is we may have averted it or are averting it. In 2000, Al-Qaeda for all intents and purposes had the first nation in their Caliphate and was looking to expand. We know that OBL personally selected the 9/11 hi-jackers and they were mostly Saudi.
AQ & OBL has been calling for the overthrow of the Saudi government ever since they declined his offer to have AQ save them from Saddam. With this circumstantial evidence, one must consider if OBL thought the 9/11 attacks would result on us attacking Saudi Arabia, planned on it, and was waiting for it.
In Pakistan, Palestine, & Iraq, the populace has turned against AQ. I have even seen Saudis that turned against AQ. Specifically they alleged that AQ was ran by Mossad, allowing them to call it as evil and vile as I call it.
The enemy (Al-Qaeda) is on the run but not defeated. They lost their base of operations (Afghanistan) and are looking for a place to call home. They do have remnants in the border region of Pakistan with Afghanistan. In fact this may even be their strongest point. They are also scattered across Northern Africa and Southeast Asia.
Their best base of recruits is still Saudi Arabia but overcoming that is not an easy question. The government there now is their enemy and probably the most humane, pro-Western we can expect for decades. The populace itself is ripe with the kind of islamist beliefs that breeds terrorists, though this is a function of their mosques, not their government.
9/11 and Iraq are two miscalculations on the part of AQ. OBL underestimated American resolve. As a result he lost Afghanistan which could have been his Iran.
Iraq exposed AQ for its brutalities against muslims and turned them against his movement. Even his attack on the UN in Algeria has resulted in a negative backlash.
By taking on AQ at the point we did, by their mistakes and miscalculations and by the backlash, we may have averted WWIII with what would have been an Al-Qaeda Imperial Power called a Caliphate.
Iran
Iran is the model AQ wishes to emulate and supercede. It is a dangerous islamist government with the same Caliphate goals and 30 years of experience in Terrorism. Its methods is the export of terrorism through surrogates using the Soviet Model of revolution rather than Nazi Model of invasion.
But Iran is the opposite of Saudi Arabia. The Iranian people do not embrace islamism while the government foists it upon them. Its first target and its current target is Iraq. Iraq is a central point in Arabia and the Islamic world and important in the strategic, tactical and religious realms.
The most important shrines to Shi'ism are in Iraq. The most important battles were fought there.
Iran is and will continue to be a dangerous enemy for some time. They do not fear our Military as much as they fear successful democracies on their borders. The Iranian economy, despite high oil prices, has been in shatters for a long time. In the 21st century, they have seen democracies on their borders go from one (Turkey) to three (Iraq, Afghanistan.)
Initially they didn't oppose our invasion into Iraq, because either way, they knew an enemy would be defeated. Until Congress and the US media turned against our own policies, Iran got very quiet because they knew they might be next.
Had there not been an anti-war backlash, diplomacy with Iran would have had a good chance of improving the situation there, particularly in relation to the nuclear development situation.
Iraq
In 2003, as the saber rattling changed to determination, I looked back to 1991. I recalled the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Soldiers that had surrendered to the US in Desert Storm. I recalled that while Afghanistan had no infrastructure that Iraq was rather advanced. I knew the people of Iraq were not prone to islamism. I expected that Iraq would be over and us out much sooner there than in Afghanistan.
But the second time around the Iraqi Police and Army simply disappeared into the populace rather than surrendering.
I had not realized that during the last 20 years of his reign Saddam had allowed the infrastructure there to deteriorate. Our planners had actually done a great job of hitting it in a manner that was easily and quickly repairable. And those repairs were made, but the rest of it was simply in too much of a state of disrepair. (See "A General Speaks Out" by Gen DeLong, deputy commander of CentCom during this entire period.)
With no Iraqi Police and no core to build an Iraqi Army, it has taken longer to build them from scratch.
The US did not even realize initially that it was in fact Al-Qaeda that was fomenting a Civil War by attacking both Shi'a and Sunni. While it did keep an eye on Iranian involvement, they bid their time, initially supporting peace overtly while setting in place their mid term plans to take over their neighbor, using violent revolution and terrorism.
Iraqis have long looked over their border and seen that Iran is internally a failure, but Iraq was not internally a success story either. City by City, Village by Village, Iraq is becoming a success story. Market by market they are seeing economic success. They are pushing out the barbaric Al-Qaeda and the Government of Iraq is taking out Special Groups.
The Government of Iraq is slowly coming of age and making govermental strides as well as security gains. I cannot predict how long it will be before the violence subsides but I have been amazed by the gains made in 2007. The people are returning, the economy is better than it was in 2002. The Iraqi Security Forces are proving themselves and the Infrastructure is above the levels it was in 2002.
China
This is certainly a nation to keep a watchful eye on. They are modernizing their Military Equipment and certainly have a lot of manpower to tap into.
I don't buy into a Mexico-China alliance. Regardless of immigration or La Raza issues, Mexico is a close ally.
The Chinese presence in the Panama Canal is certainly a concern but there is little chance they could march up Central America.
China is the reason we must not abandon equipment and training that is needed in full scale major war, what I call conventional warfare.
China is coming of age economically due to their slow embrace of capitalism. They are the main reason why oil, copper and concrete prices are so high. They've been buying it up to build in China.
China is potentially more dangerous because they think and plan in terms of centuries but they are less prone to the irrational planning of Al-Qaeda or Iran. When the Chinese make a statement, it is well thought out to include consideration of response. But the Chinese are patient and willing to achieve their goals over time without all out war, even if they are building towards the ability to make all out war.
At present, the military threat from China is regional. With their rate of technological advance, the future threat from China could be global. The question would be whether they become a civilized superpower or become a great adversary and I don't think anyone can accurately predict this yet.
Summary: When you're the best, there will always be a kid trying to prove themselves. America is the best and there are many out there trying to prove themselves. We see this in Chavez and Ahdiminijihadist as well as the European Union, France, and China. Not every threat is the same; The EU has no obvious intent of a military confrontation but they are certainly looking at economic rivalry. Since the threats are different, since the nations, cultures and politics are different, they must be dealt with in different manners.
The best strategy in Afghanistan was an Unconventional War and 5th Special Forces Group proved themselves there. The best strategy in 2003 Iraq was a Conventional War and many divisions and CentCom proved themselves there. The best strategy with Saudi Arabia is diplomacy, as it is with the EU and China currently at the very least.
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