The Changing Nature of Warfare
Dateline: CNA Corporation headquarters, Alexandria VA, 25 May 2004
A tough night of travel puts me in a tired state for Tuesday’s activities. I was supposed to fly out of Providence at 6:15, but thanks to some regional storms, it wasn’t wheels up until 9:15. Thus it was a very late end to the day quickly segueing into a very early start.
Why was I concerned? I had to give a brief at a conference at CNA (sporting the title of this blog) that was held for the benefit of the National Intelligence Council (NIC), which is sort of a supreme court of the intelligence community (these are the wise men and women who put together the all-important National Intelligence Estimates that drive the government’s overall sense of strategic risk and focus its general approach to intelligence collection and processing.
I hadn’t given a brief in a very long time for me (almost a month due to the book tour), plus it was a largely new collection of PowerPoint slides. That’s exciting for me, because new slides make for uncertainty. But lack of sleep dulls the blade in terms of delivery.
So I coffee’d up as much as possible in anticipation of the conference’s first panel, in which I appeared with Kurt Campbell of CSIS and Monty Marshall of the University of Maryland (co-author of the brilliant “Peace and Conflict” series of worldwide conflict analysis). The brief went reasonably well, considering the audience was full of insular-minded military analysts who refuse to see much—if any—connection between what they see as pure war and the everything else that is simply too complex to imagine, much less model.
This was a conference examining war almost strictly within the context of war, with the real world relegated to an afterthought. More disturbing, the wholesale pessimism of this crowd stunned me. For a collection of strategic thinkers, the downcast interpretation of events in Iraq over the past six months simply stunned me. If strategic thinkers can’t see the forest for the trees, then how can we expect the public to do better?
As soon as the panel ended I caught CNN’s car to their studio in DC. Anticipating a F2F with Wolf Blitzer, I was immediately disappointed to learn that I missed him again. Last time he was in DC and I was in San Diego; this time I was in DC and somehow he manages to be in NYC. But feeling confident about remotes thanks to recent experiences, I simply decided beforehand that I was going to perform well no matter what questions were thrown at me. Plus I was warmed up by the presentation and Q&A at the conference that morning.
Blitzer gave me a good series of questions, and—unlike last time—he let me go longer before interrupting. I think the key was that I spoke early in the hour, whereas last time I was right at the end. The pre-interview with the producer alerted me that I needed to be able to address President Bush’s speech last night, so I was ready when that question came about halfway through the 8-minute interview. All in all, a relaxed, solid performance that tells me I’m over the hump on remotes.
That was good, because CNN International wanted to tap me as well for a remote immediately following the Blitzer interview—same floor, different studio, different anchor (London?), but roughly the same interview. The tone was, not surprisingly, more confrontational. Both Blitzer and the CNN International anchor started on the header tease from the Esquire article (basically, “the boys are never coming home and this is a good thing for global peace”), but the latter anchor predictably focused on America’s “arrogance” in seeking to impose its will on the Middle East. I wasn’t afraid of repeating myself, but I managed not to for the most part.
In the car back to CNA, I called both home and to the college to see how people thought I performed on CNN. The answer was, nobody saw it because the last any of them heard, I was to go on with Blitzer at 12:40 vice 12:15, so no VCRs were running on time. Maybe somebody in my family got it, otherwise it’s lost to me personally because CNN doesn’t provide you a complimentary tape of your segment. Last time I was on Blitzer, though, the interview was transcribed and placed on their website, so I’ll be looking for that at least.
When I get back to the conference (just in time for lunch), I’m approached by a participant for an off-line brief that he’s willing to fund in terms of travel if I’m interested in meeting the audience. It was an invitation I had long been waiting for, so I’m hoping we work it out. Til then, enough said.
Why tease that much and no more? Sometimes, when I know that the proposed brief will never happen, I take advantage of the invitation itself because I know that’ll be all there is to exploit. Here, I think it actually will occur, so delayed gratification is in order.
Funny thing is, if this brief happens, probably several others will get cancelled as a result, but I say, you take the bird in the hand over the two in the bush. That’s my rule #1 on briefs: I don’t ask to go anywhere; I only go where I’m invited.
Today, at least, I seemed to stir the pot at this conference to the delight of my client (CNA, or more specifically, my old mentor Hank Gaffney) and the ultimate audience (the NIC, or more specifically my old friend the National Intelligence Officer for Conventional Military Issues, retired Army general John Landry). What I hear is that all the papers (including mine) will eventually be posted on the NIC’s website. This is great, and is highly indicative of how openly the NIC operates. That’s why I consider them the cream of the crop in the intelligence community. So when the paper gets posted, I cross-post it here.
The highlight of my day? A senior analyst from the NIC expressing how much he likes reading my blog, especially my post on “how Esquire made me the man I am today.” I was really surprised by that, but I guess that explains all the visitors from Langley at the site over the past weeks.
The lowlight? Ralph Peters’ consistently bizarre predictions that this century will be the bloodiest ever, that the U.S. will engage in bloody wars beyond our current imagination over the course of our lives, and that Europe will once again become a bloody battleground of high-end warfare (i.e., it’s peace since WWII is a “fad”). Moreover, Islam is a “failed civilization” that we’ll end up fighting for most of the century—a long-term conflict based overwhelmingly on attrition (killing as many as we can as fast as we can). That this guy is taken seriously within my community troubles me deeply. He doesn’t just give Dr. Strangelove a run for his money; he leaves him in the dust.
Here’s today’s catch:
REFERENCES with my commentary:
“Soldiers’ Doubts Build as Duties Shift: For Many, Prolonged Stay and New Threat Have Eroded Early Optimism,” by Daniel Williams, Washington Post, 25 May, p. A11.
“Chinese Newspapers Put Spotlight on Polluters: Factory Shutdowns Follow Reports,” by Edward Cody, WP, 25 May, p. A10.