SAR

The December 11 reporting period for the Selected Acquisition Reports are out. Here is the DoD release, and here is the PDF that has the tables.

Here is some additional GAO analysis (PDF) worth reading. Good reading at the end of that GAO report.

Israel and Iran

I listened to the discussion on Iran by Matt Duss and Ben Birnbaum tonight and thought it was interesting, but I am not sure what criteria Israel would use setting a date for a surprise attack by against Iran. Indeed, when someone says it is almost certainly not a specific date (they said April 13), my first instinct was to check the moon phases that night. Both Matt Duss and Ben Birnbaum seem to think the criteria for an Israeli attack hinges on the ongoing diplomacy. I'm not sure I believe that, as I tend to think Israel is making calculations on actions alone - like the effectiveness of oil sanctions against the Iranian economy or their military capability options against Iran we don't know about.

I recently read this very interesting CRS Report titled Israel: Possible Military Strike Against Iran’s Nuclear Facilities (PDF) by Jim Zanotti, Coordinator Specialist in Middle Eastern Affairs, Kenneth Katzman, Specialist in Middle Eastern Affairs, Jeremiah Gertler, Specialist in Military Aviation, and Steven A. Hildreth, Specialist in Missile Defense dated March 27, 2012.

It is a very interesting read, but I think they missed some pretty important details, and I think those details may have been omitted on purpose.

A few thoughts.

The report is missing a realistic discussion of cyber capabilities and what the first 3 hours will look like. Let me be clear, the Command and Control capabilities of Iran (and potentially Syria) will not survive the first 3 hours, and there may not be a single bomb delivered during that period. The cyber smart bomb that Israel has likely prepared and potentially already placed on the networks of the Iranians is going to make Stuxnet look ATARI grade. We have been openly discussing the possibility of Iran being bombed by Israel for years - with that kind of lead time, the Israeli's can open a can of whoop ass in cyberspace unlike anything the world has ever seen. Expect it.

An attack by Israel is likely to originate from Israel, but the question is where will the Israeli Air Force go and refuel after finishing the bombing. It could be anywhere, and the bottom line is wherever that place is, the Iranians will struggle to field any credible capability against that target within 24 hours because of C2 problems Iran will be struggling to deal with, and the Iranian Air Force will find that their pilots lack the courage necessary to conduct an airstrike against any air field protected against the Israeli Air Force. Fortune won't favor the brave, the IDF Air Force is one of the very best in the world and even the United States Air Force would have its hands full trying to fight past the Israeli Air Force trying to bomb an airfield protected by the Israelis.

It is entirely possible that Iran could try to rain down dozens, maybe even hundreds of ballistic missiles down on Israel. I'll put my money on the ballistic missile defense capabilities of Israel against the destructive and accurate targeting of the Iranians in that fight. Iran's capabilities would be modern in the 20th century, but this is the 21st century and Iron Dome has proven that Israel is way ahead of everyone when it comes to defensive systems that shoot bullets to hit bullets. I do not see conventional ballistic missiles being anything other than a terror weapon, and ultimately it will be a weapon more likely to kill civilians than military targets. Also noteworthy, the report analysis concludes Bushehr is an unlikely target. I agree with that analysis, and think that is an important detail that might play in the broader diplomacy both before and after any military action - and I do believe that is a specific detail the Obama administration needs to mention more frequently in public as it goes to the heart of the issue that the nuclear power program is not the issue - the nuclear weapons program is.

Finally, there is a train of thought that if Israel attacks Iran, the first thing Iran is going to do is attack the US or other Arab nations in the region. If there was ever wishful thinking from a neoconservative perspective, that would be it. I guess it is possible that Iran could try to mine the Strait of Hormuz and claim they didn't do it, but the first mine that hits a supertanker heading to China - even China is going to call Iran on their bullshit. Iran is almost certainly going to play the wounded Persian role in public in an attempt to rally the Arab world behind them - specifically Egypt, Syria, and Turkey. Attacking the Arab world is not going to forward that agenda, and the retaliation by the Arab world following an Iranian attack on them could potentially be much more dangerous and damaging to Iran than limited airstrikes by Israel.

I have no idea if Israel is going to bomb Iran this week or this year. If Israel is going to attack, I think they will wait until June because that is when the US will have the MIW equipment being moved from CONUS in the Arabian Gulf, because while most calculations don't matter to Israel - insuring the US has had time to position major equipment to be used in defense is one consideration Israel is likely to account for.

I personally believe the Obama administration sanctions on Iranian oil is a huge deal, and could be a golden bullet over time. The oil sanctions strike at the economy of Iran, and if sanctions start getting painful to the people - that could change events inside Iran quite a bit. It would be a mistake to compare sanctions against North Korea with sanctions against Iran, as those nations really have almost nothing in common at the street level. I think Iranians will support a lot of stubbornness from their leadership in support of the nuclear issue, but given the shakeup we have seen in the Arab world over the last 15 months, the tolerance of the people as a whole when it comes to the national economy likely has limits, and the oil sanctions is the first real biting blow to the Iranian economy that will actually test those limits a bit.

Like I said, sometime after June when the naval equipment arrives. Regardless of where negotiations are at (and they have almost no chance at all of success by themselves), that gives a few months for the sanctions to start adding stress to the economy inside Iran.

Culture in Seapower Fail

Living in Lexington, Kentucky during a Wildcats Final Four appearance involves managing a variety of obligations; in this case, I have failed to complete this week's installment of the Seapower in Culture series.  Hopefully everything will be a go two weeks from yesterday, when I'll take a critical look at seapower in the Civilization series of games, with a particular emphasis on Civilization IV.

Until then, take a look at the latest episode of Foreign Entanglements, where Matt Duss and Ben Birnbaum discuss some indications that an Israeli strike on Iran might not happen this year:

BMD and Theater Stability in Northeast Asia

This is another interesting development in the context of the upcoming North Korean rocket launch. It would appear it isn't just South Korea and Japan preparing to shoot the rocket down if necessary, but Taiwan as well.

A military spokesman yesterday refused to comment on media reports alleging that two advanced anti-missile systems — the Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) and Tien Kung-III “Sky Bow” (TK-III) air defense systems — had been deployed in eastern Taiwan to deal with the possible launch of a North Korean rocket later this month.

Ministry of National Defense spokesperson David Lo (羅紹和) said the military was collecting information about Pyongyang’s anticipated rocket launch and added that the military had requested its anti-missile units monitor and respond to the situation as appropriate.

Something has been on my mind, and it goes back to something discussed on the blog last week by Bryan McGrath. A lot of people were up in arms about the President making the comment that he would be better positioned to negotiate with Russia on nuclear issues after the election - because he won't be running for reelection. In a democracy we elect our leaders to represent us, and we bestow upon them through that election process the trust to make decisions for the people in scenarios like a nuclear agreement with Russia. Some are really bent out of shape that the President would suggest this issue would be easier to manage after an election. I am not one of those people, the exchange itself didn't bother me, what bothered me was what Bryan quoted in the speech given the next day by President Obama in his attempt to address the issue. Specifically:

"I don't think it's any surprise that you can't start that a few months before a presidential and congressional elections in the United States, and at a time when they just completed elections in Russia and they're in the process of a presidential transition where a new president is going to be coming in in a little less than two months.

So it was a very simple point, and one that essentially I repeated when I spoke to you guys yesterday, which is that we're going to spend the next nine, 10 months trying to work through some of the technical aspects of how we get past what is a major point of friction -- one of the primary points of friction between our two countries, which is this whole missile defense issue. And it involves a lot of complicated issues. If we can get our technical teams to clear out the underbrush, then hopefully, in 2013, there's a foundation to actually make some significant progress on this and a lot of other bilateral issues.

So I think everybody understands that -- if they haven't they haven't been listening to my speeches -- I want to reduce our nuclear stockpiles. And one of the barriers to doing that is building trust and cooperation around missile defense issues. And so this is not a matter of hiding the ball, I'm on record. I made a speech about it to a whole bunch of Korean university students yesterday. I want to see us, over time, gradually, systematically, reduce reliance on nuclear weapons."

Bryan McGrath is right, the two issues of Russian nuclear weapons and Ballistic Missile Defense cannot be linked, and the President needs to seek better advice regarding Ballistic Missile Defense if he has somehow confused it with an issue he appears to care a lot about - which is a nuclear free world. I appreciate that President Obama has high goals regarding nuclear weapons, but I am not convinced at all that President Obama appreciates Ballistic Missile Defense and the strategic role it is playing in the 21st century that has absolutely nothing to do with cold war era nuclear exchanges.

Playing out before our eyes in Asia is politics of the highest order with North Korea, and it is almost certain that the President's own National Security Council has warned him by now that under no circumstances can North Korea be allowed to launch the rocket planned for launch sometime during the next 2 weeks. The Obama administrations policy for North Korea has been to break the cycle of North Korean provocations and specifically to get North Korea to stand by agreements made within the six-party talks framework. By every definition the rocket launch will repeat a cycle of breaking agreements within the six-party talks, and if allowed to be successful will signal to regional partners that the US policy for North Korea has failed - again. Given the amount of attention without detail that China is putting into North Korea over the last few weeks, it appears that China is becoming increasingly frustrated with Pyongyang like everyone else.

The US is pulling back food aid to North Korea because the US claims that the food deal agreed to last month included a moratorium on long range missile tests, and the rocket launch is seen as a long range missile test. North Korea sees the suspension of US food aid as us breaking the agreement first. Whether you agree or not that the US should be pulling back food aid, it is very hard to claim the US has broken the cycle of provocation with North Korea, and many experts are suggesting that no matter what happens - North Korea will simply test another nuclear weapon at the end of this current diplomatic dustup - which is the very definition of repeating the cycle of provocation the Obama administration policy for North Korea claims to be aimed to prevent.

All we are learning is that the Obama administration is not having any more success than the Bush administration or the Clinton administration did, and that US diplomacy with North Korea is struggling to be relevant in curbing North Korean provocative behavior under any internationally agreed upon process model. It is unknown what impact shooting down the North Korean rocket may have, although it is noted in several circles that taking aggressive action like this with North Korea is in itself a way for the US to attempt to break the cycle of provocation by North Korea - by being provocative ourselves.

I think the US should allow nations in the region deal with the rocket, and the US should simply sit back and provide support for those nations - any and all support requested, but no more or less.

Bigger Picture

Consider for a moment what it looks like if the North Korean rocket goes over Japanese soil. Would a successful shoot down of a North Korean rocket make it more or less likely that Japan would develop nuclear capabilities? What happens if Japan tries to shoot down the rocket and fails? How many scenarios exist in the upcoming North Korean launch where the outcome leaves the Japanese public asking whether they need nuclear weapons to protect themselves? I imagine the Chinese are studying the various possible answers to that last question with considerable detail.

Ballistic missile defense is playing out in Northeast Asia in front of all of us as a major strategic capability bringing allies together against a common foe. South Korea, Japan, and Taiwan are all fielding US Ballistic Missile Defense technology to - perhaps - be used to shoot down the North Korean rocket. At its core, Ballistic Missile Defense is the strategic capability in play right now that forms the foundation of our regional alliances dealing with the regional threat of North Korea, and most importantly (and something President Obama needs to apparently get a briefing on) strategic Ballistic Missile Defense is acting as an alternative for Japan to developing nuclear weapons to counter North Korean nuclear and ballistic weapons development. As a capability, the diplomatic value of Ballistic Missile Defense at this moment in time may be higher than it has ever been in the capabilities history, because BMD serves as a visible reminder of what it means to be in a working strategic relationship where United States is in full support of a nation.

I believe the scenario playing out leads to an important question and discussion - could China or Russia shoot down the North Korean rocket even if they wanted to? Short of the rocket turning towards the Chinese mainland, I am not certain even if under those conditions China could shoot the North Korean rocket down. As for Russia, they have the capability to shoot the missile down, but whether that capability is deployed, trained, and ready to respond in immediate crisis is certainly questionable - and it is important to note that the naval forces of both nations is currently not capable of deploying for purposes of strategic protection from a ballistic missile attack against a partner, friend, or in support of allies.

Both Russia and China have some of the most sophisticated ballistic missiles in the world, but neither country has a credible defense from ballistic missiles that is fielded within the context of an alliance like the US capabilities are, nor are they globally deployable like the BMD capabilities of the US Navy. BMD is a strategic capability that neither Russia nor China has as an offering to friends as a protection in a time of need. When you consider the enormous advantage legitimate Ballistic Missile Defense gives the United States at the strategic and geopolitical level with our Asian allies today, it strikes me as remarkably foolish that on any level the President could potentially be considering conceding that advantage to any competitor for any purpose in a diplomatic negotiation.

The United States should not take for granted the strategic advantage of Ballistic Missile Defense, nor how Ballistic Missile Defense capability translates throughout our alliances to our friends and allies. With all due respect to the President, the suggestion that Ballistic Missile Defense is in play in negotiations with Russia related to nuclear arsenals is a serious miscalculation on his part.

In 2012 Ballistic Missile Defense has become one of the big puzzle pieces that is keeping several of our allies (like Japan and Saudi Arabia, to name a few big ones) from developing their own nuclear arsenals, and removing that incentive from our allies in an effort to simply reduce Russia's nuclear stockpile is counterproductive towards efforts of curbing development of nuclear weapons, and potentially destabilizing in the specific parts of the world the US defense strategy is specifically committed to maintaining stability.

China and Russia: Nothing to Worry About Here. Just Keep Whistling...

Last summer, Mackenzie Eaglen and I wrote a piece for the Heritage Foundation which we then edited for publication in the Weekly Standard.  Both were the result of a thought experiment, one in which we considered what the world might be like in a time in which the US Navy had been decimated through strategic short-sightedness and a dramatic hit to the economy.  Both of us had in our careers, worked with reputable strategic planning firms that dealt in the world of "alternative futures".  Our article was an excursion into an alternative future--it was not a prediction, though some treated it as such. 

One of the reasons the military (and the commercial world) deal in alternative futures studies is the value that they provide in forecasting potential future events--events which in many cases, had been proceeded by a series of events that portended their arrival.  These "signpost" events are then cataloged and monitored, for if more and more of the signposts line up, the event then grows more likely to occur.

One of the things we speculated on in our work was a condominium of power between Russia and China, and for some reason, it was one of the most criticized portions of the piece (among those seeking to make thoughtful comments).  Shortly after we published the paper, just such a "signpost event" occurred when I linked to a coordination of effort between the Chinese and the Russians with respect to missile defense. 

Well, here's another signpost event (courtesy of a Galrahn Tweet):  China and Russia are going to stage a naval exercise in the Yellow Sea in April.  Russia plans to send 10 ships to participate.  This of course, will occur in a body of water that the Chinese have increasingly indicated they wish we would not visit. 

Have the two nations exercised jointly in the past?  Yes they have.  

Does this mean a condominium of power between the two is imminent, that the two will seek to balance the US and its allies in East Asia?  Maybe not. 

But if that occurs, could reasonable people have looked back and seen this event as one more step forward in that union?  

Or perhaps it is all just "nonsense".

Bryan McGrath