Suchergebnisse

Machine generated contents note: pt. I The Boer War, 1899 -- 1902 -- ch. 1 Casus Belli -- ch. 2 Learning Curve -- Modder River -- Magersfontein -- Colenso -- ch. 3 Mounted Irregulars -- ch. 4 Balance Shifts -- Spion Kop -- Relief of Kimberley -- Paardeburg -- Monte Cristo -- Relief of Ladysmith -- Fall of Bloemfontein -- ch. 5 Baptism of Fire -- Action at Boshof -- ch. 6 Advance on Pretoria -- Relief of Mafeking -- Action at Lindley -- Fall of Johannesburg -- Fall of Pretoria -- Action at Heilbron -- Action at Rhenoster River -- ch. 7 Pursuit of Steyn and de Wet -- Brandwater Basin -- Action at Krugersdorp -- Action at Oliphants Nek -- Action at Vaalbank -- Action at Tygerfontein -- Action at Buffelshoek -- Action at Syferbult -- Second Action at Oliphants Nek -- ch. 8 Guerrilla Warfare -- ch. 9 Lichtenburg -- Defence of Lichtenburg -- ch. 10 Second Squadron -- Action at Zeerust -- South Africa 1900 -- 2 -- pt. II Haldane and the Territorial Force, 1900 -- 14 -- ch. 11 Khaki -- pt. III The Great War, 1914 -- 19 -- ch. 12 Mobilization -- ch. 13 Gallipoli -- Gallipoli -- Landing at Suvla Bay -- Action at Salt Lake -- Action at Ismail Ogu Tepe -- Battle at Scimitar Hill -- Egypt -- Gallipoli 1915 -- ch. 14 Macedonia -- Macedonia -- Action at Kosturino -- Action at Doiran -- Action at Gola Ridge -- Action in the Struma Valley -- Defence of the River Struma -- Action at Kopaci -- Macedonia 1916 -- 17 -- ch. 15 Palestine -- Redeployment -- Egypt 1915 -- 16 -- ch. 16 Palestine -- Gaza -- Third Battle of Gaza -- Charge at Ras Ghannam -- Beersheba -- Action at Bir Abu Khuff -- Action at Wadi Kohle -- Action at Khumeilfe -- Sheria -- ch. 17 Palestine -- Advance on Jerusalem -- Action at El Mughar/Junction Station -- Battle of Nabi Samweil -- Nabi Samweil -- Bietunye -- Biet ur el Foqa -- Biet ur el Tahata -- El Jib -- Action at Kh. Kebabe -- Action at Suffa -- Action at Mosque Sheik ab ed Din -- ch. 18 Palestine -- Reorganization and Repositioning -- The Defence of Jerusalem and Jaffa -- The Capture of Jericho -- Tel Saur -- Raid on Amman -- ch. 19 Palestine -- Second Raid into Trans Jordan -- Action at Umm esh Shert track -- Action at Es Salt -- Shunet Imrin -- Jis en Damiye Crossing -- Umm esh Shert Crossing -- Action at El Huweij -- Withdrawal from Es Salt -- The Damiye Track -- ch. 20 Palestine -- The Affair of Abu Tulul -- Abu Tulul -- Defence of the El Ghoraniye Bridgehead -- Action at Wadi er Rame -- ch. 21 Palestine -- Final Campaign -- Advance across Plain of Sharon -- Nazareth -- El'affule -- Beisan -- Jenin -- Megiddo -- Capture of Haifa -- Charge on the Guns at the Karmelheim -- Damascus -- Beirut -- Horns -- Aleppo -- Palestine 1917 -- 18 -- pt. IV Inter War Years, 1919 -- 39 -- ch. 22 A Peace Fit for Heroes -- pt. V The Second World War, 1939 -- 42 -- The Beginning -- ch. 23 Unhorsed -- Mobilization and Deployment -- Action at Jaffa (Tel Aviv) -- Haifa -- Cyprus -- Sidi Barrani -- Bardia -- Tobruk -- Benghazi -- ch. 24 Abyssinia, Tobruk, Benghazi and Crete -- Abyssinia -- Gondar -- Amba Giogis -- Action at Debarech -- Ras Ayalu -- Wolchefit -- Cyrenaica -- El Agheila -- Siege of Tobruk -- Defence of Benghazi -- El Adem -- El Gubi -- Crete -- Defence of Suda Bay -- Defence of Maleme -- Khelevis -- St John's Hill -- Withdrawal to Sphakia -- Aegean -- Turkey -- ch. 25 Armoured Training -- Palestine -- Karkur -- Egypt -- Cairo -- Sollum -- Gazala -- Tobruk -- El Alamein -- Matruh -- pt. VI The End of the Beginning, 1942 -- 43 -- ch. 26 Battle of Alam el Halfa -- Alam el Halfa -- ch. 27 Battle of El Alamein -- Western Desert -- El Alamein -- Action at Miteiriya Ridge -- Action at Kidney `Ridge' -- Action at Rahman Track -- Action at Tel el Aqqaqir Feature -- Action at Galal Station -- ch. 28 Advance on Tripoli -- Cyrenaica -- Action at El Agheila -- Advance on Tripoli -- Marble Arch -- Sirte -- Misurata -- Bu Ngem Road -- Action at Wadi Zem Zem -- Tripoli -- ch. 29 Battle of Tebaga Gap -- Mareth Line -- Wadi Zigzaou -Matmata Hills -- Djebel Tebaga -- Action at Roman Wall -- Tebaga Gap -- Action at Point 201 -- Action at Wadi Hernel -- Action at Point 209 -- Action at Wadi Mataba -- Action at Chebket en Nouiges -- ch. 30 `From a Scent to a View...' -- Action at Wadi Akarit -- Roumana Gap -- Enfidaville -- Action at Takrouna -- Tunis -- North Africa 1940 -- 43 -- ch. 31 Return Home -- pt. VII The Beginning of the End, 1944 -- ch. 32 D Day -- Normandy Landings -- Le Hamel -- La Riviere -- Meuvaines -- Asnelles sur Mer -- Arromanches -- Ryes -- Buhot -- Sommervieu -- ch. 33 Battle for Normandy -- Bayeux -- Villers Bocage -- Action at Point 103 -- St Pierre -- Cristot -- Le Pare de le Boislonde -- Odon -- Battle of Fontenay le Pesnel -- St Nicholas Farm -- Defence of Rauray -- Chouain -- Action at Hottot -- Caumont -- Action at Bricquessard -- Action at Cahagnes -- Action at Jurques -- Action at la Binge -- Action at Ondefontaine -- Mont Pincon -- Conde sur Noireau -- Action at Noireau Crossing -- Action at Berjou -- Chambois -- ch. 34 Pursuit into Belgium -- Seine 1944 -- Flesselles -- Action at Doullens -- Ghent -- Brussels -- Herschot -- ch. 35 Battle for Gheel -- Albert Canal -- Beringen -- Battle for Gheel -- ch. 36 MARKET GARDEN Salient -- Grave -- Nijmegen -- Dekkenswald -- Groesbeek -- Reichswald Forest -- First British in German Border Crossing -- Beek -- Wyler -- ch. 37 Battle of Geilenkirchen -- Duren -- Paulenburg -- Schinnen -- Crossing R. Wurm -- Breach of Seigfried Line -- Action at Prummen -- Fall of Geilenkirchen -- Action at Wurm -- Action at Beek -- Apweiler -- pt. VIII The End, 1944 -- 45 -- ch. 38 Operation BLACKCOCK -- Schinveld -- Schinnen -- Roer -- Action at Vintelen -- Action at Kievelburg -- Action at Honten -Action at Breberen -- Action at Laffelde -- Action at Selstan -- Action at Hiensburg -- ch. 39 Operations VERITABLE and LEEK -- Nijmegen -- Reichwald Forest -- Rhineland -- Battle for Cleve -- Battle for Goch -- River Niers -- Battle for Weeze -- Action at Hussenoff -- Actions at Issum -- ch. 40 Final Advance -- Rhine -- Rees -- Issleburg -- Dinxperloo -- River Ijssel -- Rurlo -- Lochem -- Enschede -- Henglo -- Cloppenburgh -- Bremen -- North West Europe 1944 -- 45.

The U.S. military presence in Central and West Africa is proving increasingly unwelcome. On Wednesday, the State Department announced that the U.S. would soon begin "an orderly and responsible withdrawal" of its more than 1,000 U.S. service members currently deployed in Niger." A mere 24 hours later, came reports that the Pentagon will withdraw its 75 Army Special Forces personnel as early as next week from neighboring Chad amid uncertainty about whether Washington's status of forces agreement with that sprawling country can continue or be renegotiated.The U.S. has tried to ingratiate itself with military regimes in both countries, hoping to preserve longstanding counterterrorism ties and to maintain military assets, including a $110 million drone base in the Nigerien city of Agadez that acted as the hub for surveilling much of the entire Sahel even in its April 24 announcement, the State Department stressed that Washington "welcomes [the junta's] interest in maintaining a strong bilateral relationship." Yet the growing rejection of the American military in Africa's Sahel region shows that the U.S., blatantly sacrificing democratic principles on the altar of supposed security ties, ultimately wound up with neither.The past four years have seen political upheaval in the Sahel, including two trends that have interacted to produce the current rebukes to Washington: a spate of military coups and a sharp rise in anti-Western — especially anti-French — sentiment. Anti-French sentiment is not new in the Sahel, and legitimate grievances exist there concerning both the colonial past and France's intensive political, economic, and military influence in the present. Yet the past decade has seen anti-French sentiment take new forms and reach a new generation. In particular, many Sahelians were disillusioned by the aftermath of France's Operation Serval in Mali in 2013; an initially successful counter-jihadism mission turned into an interminable regional counterterrorism quagmire, all while many people's daily security degraded in Mali and two of its neighbors, Burkina Faso and Niger.The coups in the Sahel, which spread one after another across the region beginning in 2020, responded to popular outcries over insecurity and removed civilian elites who had long been deferential to France. Niger's 2023 coup, on the heels of takeovers in Mali and Burkina Faso, has replicated a playbook that the Malian and Burkinabe juntas had sketched earlier — drape oneself in the flag, proclaim a renewed vigor and determination against jihadists, kick out the French military and other Western-backed security partners, and increase cooperation with Russia. The U.S. government read the changing signals slowly and poorly, and thought it could simultaneously win the Nigerien junta over and dictate terms — an incoherent and ultimately ineffective approach.The Chadian situation has different dynamics but is clearly trending towards a similar outcome. Chad's coup in 2021 was not to overturn the system but to preserve it — when long-time autocratic president (and loyal friend to Paris and Washington) Idriss Deby was killed in battle, his son Mahamat and a cadre of regime insiders conducted a palace coup to maintain power. France and the U.S. made little pretense of caring about democracy, but rather embraced Mahamat Deby and appeared to accept the (sometimes bloody) "transition" as a fait accompli. Indeed, Washington seemed keen to deepen its relationship with N'Djamena. As with other countries in Africa, Washington tried to pre-emptively scare the Chadian government concerning the Kremlin-linked Wagner Group and alleged Russian ambitions in the region. Ultimately, however, it seems the Chadian authorities are weighing domestic imperatives, and may be distancing themselves from the U.S. as Deby campaigns for presidential elections — which he will almost certainly win — on May 6.One reason U.S. appeals to juntas seem to fall flat is that Washington's approach to counter-jihadism in the region, meanwhile, is shot through with contradictions; at one moment, the U.S. trains African soldiers for flashy urban raids (ignoring actual trends in violence), and at the next, it lectures African militaries, not so convincingly, about respecting human rights. Although militaries in the region have appeared grateful for U.S. hardware and training, they place greater confidence in heavy-handed ground and air operations against suspected jihadists — an approach that often backfires, but that juntas show no signs of relinquishing. Whereas Paris and Washington prize assassinations and raids against high-value targets, Sahelian militaries effectively want body counts. (Neither approach, for the record, has resulted in consistent security gains for ordinary people.)The U.S. has not only misread the juntas, it continues to botch even the withdrawal from Niger. In its last-ditch negotiations with Niger, the U.S. has come across as desperate. In Senate testimony last month, the head of the U.S. Africa Command, or AFRICOM, Marine Corps Gen. Michael Langley warned that Russia is "trying to take over central Africa as well as the Sahel [at an accelerated pace]." On the same day as the State Department's announcement on Niger, Joint Chiefs Vice Chairman Admiral Christopher Grady told the Associated Press, "We certainly want to be there. We want to help them, we want to empower them, we want to do things by, with and through (them)." The cliché of "by, with, and through" is an old one, and it is striking that the military's language remains littered with stock phrases even as the politics surrounding African deployments shift so quickly.The U.S. could send a different signal by not resisting its expulsion so hard, by simply cutting its losses and withdrawing. Calls for the U.S. to act vindictively and cut development aid, meanwhile, would lead Washington down an even worse path. The best thing Washington could do now would be to pull out troops, wait for the political situation in the Sahel to evolve, and then consider what kinds of non-security partnerships might be beneficial for all sides.

Is America experiencing a crisis of confidence? That is the assessment of some world leaders from allied and partner nations in recent months. Former NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen criticized the U.S. at the start of the year, "Recent global events in the Taiwan Strait, in the Middle East, in Ukraine are all results of American hesitance to actually lead."As he addressed Congress earlier this month, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida chided his audience for what he called "an undercurrent of self-doubt among some Americans about what your role in the world should be." One implication of these complaints is that the world would supposedly become more stable and secure if the U.S. simply possessed and demonstrated greater resolve. Given the wreckage created by American hubris during the first part of this century, we know that this is not true. Another implication is that the U.S. should never reconsider or question its "leadership" role, as if the arrangements that were made after 1945 or 1991 are immutable for all time. According to this view, adopting a different strategy, shifting burdens to allies, or reducing commitments are all beyond the pale and a sign of irresolution.The critics are mistaken about all this, and Americans should have the confidence to ignore them.One of the biggest problems with our foreign policy is that U.S. policymakers remain enthusiastic about a "leadership" role that is ill-suited to current realities. American power is in relative decline, but our foreign policy is still defined by the pursuit of dominance in every region. Our political leaders are eager to reaffirm and expand U.S. commitments without any real debate over the risks or the resources that will be needed to make good on those commitments. Consider the last few years. NATO expands as if on autopilot. The president pledges to send U.S. forces to defend Taiwan when we have no treaty obligation to do so. Every commitment to every ally, partner, and client is said to be "ironclad" and therefore beyond serious scrutiny. Is this the behavior of a government that is hesitant and unsure about its international role, or is it the record of one that can't say no to new entanglements? Far from suffering from a crisis of confidence, the U.S. still seems far too sure of itself. The U.S. doesn't need to hear self-serving cheerleading from allies about how "indispensable" it is. It needs sober advice on how it can responsibly unwind the many unnecessary commitments it has accumulated over generations. Instead of cutting back, the U.S. keeps taking on new dependents as if its power and resources were unlimited. The reality of overstretch becomes harder to ignore with each new addition. To the extent that U.S. resolve is being questioned in other capitals, it is the result of spreading around so many promises of support that it becomes difficult to believe them all. Americans absolutely should be questioning our country's role in the world. Besides being an essential part of democratic self-government, a thorough reassessment of our foreign policy is long overdue. One of the reasons why U.S. foreign policy has been so dysfunctional and destructive in so many places is that core assumptions about the U.S. role in the world haven't been challenged and interrogated often enough.The U.S. would avoid a lot of pitfalls if it didn't arrogate to itself the role of dictating terms to other states and policing their behavior. What Prime Minister Kishida calls self-doubt is a hard-earned sense of humility that some Americans have learned from decades of costly and bloody policy failures. U.S. foreign policy has been marred by misguided ideological zeal for so long that we could stand to have a lot more doubting and questioning.A major flaw in our foreign policy debates is that our policymakers often fail to recognize policy failure and insist on plowing ahead with more of the same. The continued U.S. use of broad sanctions is one example of this. Despite considerable evidence over the decades that they achieve none of the government's stated policy goals and cause significant harm to the civilian population of the targeted countries, the U.S. relies on the economic weapon more heavily now than ever before.Waging economic war on recalcitrant states is one of the ways that Washington routinely exercises its "leadership," and in practically every case that exercise of "leadership" has backfired and exacerbated the problem that the sanctions were supposed to ameliorate. The terrible results of the "maximum pressure" campaigns against Venezuela, Iran, and North Korea speak for themselves. If anything should cause people in Washington to doubt U.S. "leadership," it is the repeated failure of sanctions, but nothing like that has happened.Refusing to question the current U.S. role in the world is a path to stagnation and eventually exhaustion. An overcommitted U.S. cannot honor all the promises it makes. If nothing changes, that will set the U.S. up for humiliating climbdowns or dangerous conflicts in the future. It would be far wiser for Washington to begin shifting responsibilities to capable allies now instead of trying to shore up an unsustainable status quo.The U.S. must be able to adapt its foreign policy to present-day realities, and that will necessarily involve reassessing the nature and extent of U.S. involvement in several regions. Clinging to tired dogmas about "leadership" that were created for a different world locks the U.S. into an overly ambitious and dangerous strategy whose costs far exceed the benefits. The U.S. needs to have the confidence to reject a strategy that does such a poor job of advancing and securing American interests.

Last month the Justice Department published a press release announcing that seven Chinese nationals have been charged with "conspiracy to commit computer intrusions and conspiracy to commit wire fraud." This announcement came on the heels of warnings from Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Director Jen Easterly and National Cyber Director Harry Coker that Chinese hackers are making a strategic shift to target critical infrastructure, are likely able to launch cyberattacks that could cripple that infrastructure, and are increasingly exploiting Americans' private information. It's apparent then that a conflict between China and the United States would include disruptive, dangerous cyberwarfare. Indeed, as U.S.-China military-to-military communications restart, cyber needs to become a key part of these conversations to develop bilateral crisis management mechanisms.Unfortunately, cyber crisis management is still in its infancy. The United States and China have engaged in multiple bilateral and multilateral dialogues on cyber-related issues in the past. For example, the 2015 summit between President Obama and Xi Jinping created a series of agreements — tacit and explicit — on cyber espionage, the joint investigation of cybercrimes, and a process that eventually produced the U.S.-China High-Level Joint Dialogue on Cybercrime and Related Issues.However, direct U.S.-China official dialogues have not led to substantial cooperation. President Biden warned Xi during a recent call against China using cyberattacks to target sensitive infrastructure, but no solutions nor potential dialogues appear to have been brought up. There is no dearth of unofficial dialogues, and some have proposed discrete steps that would enhance U.S.-China cyber relations and crisis management mechanisms, such as coming to mutual definitions of cyber terms, strengthening bilateral communications, and promoting restraint in cyber usage. Unfortunately, despite the many attempts at facilitating U.S.-China cyber dialogues and improved relations, no concrete standards or guidelines on cyber usage in a potential conflict have been adopted, nor have U.S.-China cyber relations appeared to improve. Both Washington and Beijing are familiar with the potential harm cyber can do when expertly implemented. Stuxnet, a malicious computer worm known to be created and implemented by the United States and Israel, damaged the centrifuges Iran used for its nuclear-enrichment program. China's cyberespionage campaigns to steal sensitive technologies and designs from American businesses have led to strategic vulnerabilities — like with the theft of designs for the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter's self-diagnostic system in 2009. Concerns about cyber espionage have been a defining feature of U.S.-China technology and business relations since the early 2000s, extending into the rhetoric to ban TikTok. Cyber exploits could cut off power grids, like in Ukraine in 2015 and 2016, cripple wastewater treatment facilities, or render sources of vital information useless — as witnessed in the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine.If a conflict were to break out between the United States and China, wherever and however it might, the reality is that cyber will be a key weapon in a well-rounded arsenal of traditional and emerging weaponry. Fortunately, there may be some space for negotiation. A RAND study — built upon "insights from interviews with leading Chinese and American cyberspace policy experts across [their] governments, militaries, think tanks, and academic communities" — found that China may be more likely to come to a bilateral agreement wherein both the United States and China agree not to cyberattack each other and limit the targeting of critical infrastructure. There is also some precedent which would suggest that the Chinese government thinks that cyberattacking critical infrastructure should be off-the-table. In 2015, China participated in the drafting of and signed a note by the Secretary General as a member of a United Nations group of governmental experts, in which the participants recommended that states not target critical infrastructure with cyber. Further emblematic of this willingness to find common ground on cyberthreats is China's 2015 agreement with Russia to not cyberattack one another. However, the RAND study also found that trust was one of the main impediments to creating such an agreement with the U.S. Neither the U.S. nor Chinese interviewees knew if they could fully trust the other side to adhere to any agreements against this kind of cyberespionage and exploitation. Thus, any agreement like the China-Russia cyber "non-aggression pact" would need to foster transparency and trust between the relevant Chinese and U.S. parties. The agreement would need to be paired with bilateral channels designed to communicate information on cyber events, both mundane and arising from a crisis. Transparent forums between the U.S. and Chinese military, with a focus on cyber elements, is an absolutely vital step to navigate crises effectively and promote a restraint-based foreign policy and defense strategy, especially given the pervasive nature of cyber threats.Luckily, in recent months, Washington and Beijing have re-established military-to-military communications, expressed continued interest in establishing dialogues on the use of artificial intelligence (AI), and have otherwise collaborated in the United Nations on a resolution establishing principles for AI development. While it is not cyber-specific, AI and cyber are conjoined issues. It shows that there may be space for U.S.-China collaboration on emerging technologies, which could lead to more robust dialogues and crisis management mechanisms. These could be vital trust-building exercises that lead to further cooperation on issues related to cybersecurity.Ultimately, there is a path forward for the United States and China to come to an understanding on cyberwarfare in at least some domains. To this end, both sides need to create new bilateral forums to discuss and advance crisis management coordination on these issues of common concern about cyberwarfare.

If there were ever a time when American intelligence officials could empathize with their Russian counterparts, it would be now, in the aftermath of the horrific terrorist attack on Moscow concertgoers a few days ago. The sense of failure and frustration that Russian security officials must be feeling should be all too familiar for Americans whose job it had been to detect and prevent the September 11 attacks by al-Qaida radicals on the United States. A shocked American public wondered why the CIA and FBI had failed to "connect the dots" that could have revealed the plot. Russian President Vladimir Putin had even telephoned President Bush a few days before the attacks to warn that Russian intelligence had detected signs of an incipient terrorist campaign, "something long in preparation," coming out of Afghanistan. In the aftermath of the Moscow attack, much Western media coverage has derided the Russian government for failure to capitalize on a similar American warning of possible attacks on a concert or other public venues. But the 9/11 experience showed that "connecting dots" is far easier in retrospect than in advance, and that translating warnings into effective security measures is often a complicated endeavor. In fact, Putin announced publicly after the American warning that he was putting Russia's security services on heightened alert, despite calling that warning a "provocation." American analysts can also appreciate the enormous political and psychological pressures their Russian counterparts must now be facing. There is a widespread human tendency to try to fit new events into preexisting narratives, as well as to attribute big shocks to big causes. In the case of 9/11, this prompted the White House to strongarm the CIA for evidence linking al-Qaida to Iraq, which had long been a bête noire for key Bush administration officials — not in a conscious effort to cook the books, but out of sincere conviction. Some of them continue to believe there was Iraqi involvement, despite the 9/11 Commission's conclusion that it did not see "evidence indicating that Iraq cooperated with al Qaeda in developing or carrying out any attacks against the United States." Putin has not – at least not yet – explicitly blamed Ukraine for the concert attack. But he has asserted that the Tajik suspects in Russian custody had attempted to flee across the Ukrainian border, where the Ukrainians had allegedly "prepared a window" for the escape. And although he has acknowledged that these suspects are "radical Islamists," he has questioned whether they were acting at Ukraine's behest. Whether this is true – or whether Putin sincerely believes it – remains unclear. Nonetheless, it is obvious that the Kremlin is predisposed to seek evidence linking the attack to Ukraine and its Western supporters, which would help deflect blame for failing to defuse the plot and satisfy the psychological need to link a great evil to one's most immediate adversary. Given Putin's unrivaled dominance of the Russian government apparatus, as well Russia's deep mistrust of Ukraine and the United States, investigators will be sorely tempted to connect the dots in this case in a particularly anti-Ukrainian and anti-American way. America's pre-attack warning and quick post-attack insistence that Ukraine was not involved could be viewed as signs that Washington was trying to mask Kyiv's plot, rather than as evidence that U.S. intelligence had been tracking ISIS involvement from the start. The choice of Tajik triggermen could be seen not only as a false flag operation, but one aimed at poisoning Russian attitudes toward Central Asia immigrants and workers, whose labor has been critical to addressing Russian labor shortages created by the demands of the Ukraine war. One of the Kremlin's many incentives to pin blame on Ukraine might in fact be to minimize the likelihood of public pogroms against Central Asians. It is easy to imagine that Russia's desire for revenge will be enormous in the emotionally supercharged reaction to the concert attacks. The need for retribution was certainly strong in the United States following 9/11, leading Washington first to rebuff Taliban offers to turn over Osama bin Laden and later to supplement its military operation in Afghanistan with an invasion of Iraq. "We wanted revenge," according to one former U.S. official, "and so we made a lot of mistakes that we shouldn't have made." What forms could such revenge take with Russia? The downsides of retributive attacks in Central Asia would loom large for Moscow, already concerned about the potential for losing influence in its border areas to China or the West. The much more tempting target would be Ukraine, where the Russian military could launch massive air strikes on residential areas of Kyiv or other major cities, a step that Putin has largely avoided to this point in the war. Russia's appetite for a compromise settlement, already diminishing in proportion to its growing success in exhausting Ukrainian forces, would almost certainly plummet even further should Russians become convinced that Ukraine masterminded the concert attack. The base emotions, misperceptions, and mistrust fueled by the concert attack underscore just how precarious the U.S.-Russian relationship has become. If officials in Moscow and Washington are unable to manage such a seemingly straightforward matter as the duty to warn each other about the plans of a common terrorist foe, how can we expect them to defuse the dangers that an unintended clash over Ukraine might escalate into direct — even nuclear — combat?

With Oppenheimer expected to dominate this weekend's Academy Awards, Hollywood is sounding the alarm about nuclear weapons. "As artists and advocates, we want to raise our voices to remind people that while Oppenheimer is history, nuclear weapons are not," wrote a group of notable actors and artists in a new open letter. "To protect our families, our communities, and our world, we must demand that global leaders work to make nuclear weapons history — and build a brighter future."The letter's signatories included actors Yvette Nicole Brown, Michael Douglas, Jane Fonda, Tony Goldwyn, Matthew Modine, Viggo Mortensen, and Lily Tomlin. Other notable figures — among them Bill Nye, Graham Nash, and Charles Oppenheimer — also signed the missive.The letter is just one way that Oppenheimer, a new biopic about the man behind the atomic bomb, has reignited Hollywood's interest in nuclear weapons. In an acceptance speech at the BAFTA awards last month, director Christopher Nolan lauded "individuals and organizations who have fought long and hard to reduce the number of nuclear weapons in the world.""I do just want to acknowledge their efforts and point out [that] they show the necessity and potential of efforts for peace," Nolan added.The push comes at a crucial moment for the movement that seeks to eliminate nuclear weapons. Nukes have become an "invisible issue" for most people, according to Joan Rohlfing, a former government adviser and president of the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI). Greater public attention on the issue could push policymakers to start taking nuclear risk seriously again. "Without public awareness, there's not really political momentum for change," Rohlfing told RS.NTI, which spearheaded the open letter from artists, has launched a full-scale PR campaign in Los Angeles to build awareness in the leadup to the Oscars. Among other efforts, the group has put up billboards, backed a new art installation, and commissioned murals around the city.While Americans are probably not calling their members of Congress about nuclear weapons, polls show that average people actually care a lot about them. A 2020 poll found that 73% of Americans see nuclear proliferation as a "major threat" — a level of concern on par with terrorism and the spread of infectious diseases. Another survey from the Chicago Council on Global Affairs found that 66% of Americans believe "no countries should be allowed to have nuclear weapons."Younger people are somewhat less concerned about nukes, but even among that group, Pew Research found that 65% consider nuclear proliferation a leading threat.In Washington, it's a different story. Foundations have steadily slowed or stopped their support for nuclear policy work, and the once-buzzing nuclear strategy programs at think tanks and nonprofits have become an afterthought in the political debate. Despite growing nuclear threats, expertise and political will are now in short supply. "We've seen, even among the policymaking community, a decline in awareness and knowledge and expertise," Rohlfing said.This decline has largely been a story of priorities. When the Cold War ended, a lot of people breathed a sigh of relief. The defining existential risk of the late 20th century seemed to crumble alongside the Berlin Wall. Other issues — terrorism, China's rise, climate change — took center stage, and popular fears of nuclear annihilation began to fade. "It's almost like humanity can only deal with one apocalypse at a time," Nolan said last year.There's just one problem: The threat of nuclear war never went away. In fact, we now face a "generationally high risk" of nuclear use, according to Rohlfing. "We're seeing the guardrails fall away from nuclear weapons," she said, pointing in particular to the slow-moving collapse of U.S.-Russia nuclear accords."We built up a series of arms control agreements to regulate nuclear competition, to stabilize it, to reduce the number of weapons, and to make changes to how they're deployed," Rohlfing said. "All of that has eroded or just been set aside."Nowhere is the risk of nuclear war more palpable than Ukraine. If Ukrainian forces managed to break through Russian defenses and attack Crimea, U.S. officials give a 50-50 shot that Vladimir Putin would resort to a nuclear strike. Putin himself has made a number of veiled nuclear threats since his 2022 invasion, and some of his deputies have been less subtle in their warnings.As U.S.-Russia tensions reach a post-Cold War apex, Washington and Moscow have largely stopped talking about nuclear issues. The State Department's National and Nuclear Risk Reduction Center, once a clearinghouse for more than 1,000 yearly updates from Russia on its nuclear activities, got a grand total of 12 messages from Moscow last year. "Today, the mechanisms of peace aren't moving as swiftly as the machinery of war," wrote W.J. Hennigan of the New York Times.To its credit, the Biden administration has made some effort to right this trend. National security adviser Jake Sullivan announced last June that the U.S. is open to new nuclear talks with Russia and China "without preconditions" — a notable offer given the parlous state of great power relations today.But, in Rohlfing's view, the administration still has a long way to go in order to turn that invitation into real arms control talks. "It's not clear to me, despite what Jake Sullivan said in his speech, that there's been a lot of elbow grease applied to that offer to try and make it real," she said. "We need to see a continued, persistent level of effort."

If he continues to pursue bills that hurt the
electoral chances of his party, Republican Gov. Jeff Landry may find
he sabotages the chances of his own desired bill that probably helps the GOP.

The 2024 First Extraordinary Session of the
Louisiana Legislature focuses on three items: congressional reapportionment,
state Supreme Court reapportionment, and changing the electoral system. Landry
backs doubling the number of majority-minority districts among the six for Congress
to two by a reshuffling to produce a majority black district running from
Shreveport along the Red River then branching off to Lafayette and Baton Rouge;
doing the same for the seven Supreme Court districts by splitting north
Louisiana among three districts and moving lines for the present Sixth District
in the south; and to institute closed primary elections for federal and state offices,
leaving local elections as blanket primaries.

The first wish is a byproduct of federal court
decisions that soon could alter forcibly the present single M/M lineup that
could threaten the seat of Landry ally GOP Rep. Julia Letlow, where Landry's
preferred solution would put into electoral difficulty rival Republican Rep. Garret Graves. The second
faces litigation, but to date jurisprudence finds the current district layout constitutional
and to rule otherwise would take a major shift from that. The third has no
legal actions shaping it.

From the overall Republican perspective, the
reapportionments only would damage the party because it would cost them a seat
almost certainly in Congress, and maybe on the Supreme Court. However, the
party probably would benefit from closed primary elections that might cause a
small number of legislative seats to flip from Democrats and perhaps advantage more
conservative candidates in federal and state contests.

That Landry would support the first two is somewhat
of a headscratcher to a number of Republicans. Regarding congressional
reapportionment, plenty
of options exist to challenge the federal district court's imposition of two
M/M districts, including one the state already is pursuing pursuant to a
similar legal challenge to its legislative districts that has yet to produce a
ruling. Plus, Landry's preferred arrangement is uncomfortably close to one
ruled unconstitutional three decades ago.

As for Supreme Court reapportionment, there's no
legal imperative here. Any district court ruling that would apply malapportionment
as a constitutional standard for judicial elections would break severely from
precedent that undoubtedly would wind up decided by the U.S. Supreme Court
several years from now. Chances are the existing suit,
now four years along, won't go anywhere, but Landry over the past few years has
expressed dismay over the malapportionment, with the highest-populated district
almost twice as large as the lowest, an arrangement that has been petitioned by
five of the seven judges for the state to change that.

GOP legislator doubts registered in the two bills
that have advanced out of differing chambers addressing these. HB 8 dealing
with the Court by Republican state Rep. Mike Johnson passed easily,
but with opposition from some Caddo Parish representatives – the southern part
of the parish gets split from the northern – and from representatives south of
Interstate 10 west of New Orleans, all Republicans.

SB 8 by GOP
state Sen. Glen Womack,
which addresses congressional districts, passed about 2:1
but with almost half of Republicans against, including those from northern Louisiana
and Capitol area districts. HB 17 by
Republican state Rep. Julie Emerson,
dealing with primary elections, passed by about
the same, with all but one Democrat opposed and nine Republicans, including
seven veterans generally viewed as the least conservative of the House GOP,
joining them.

Scuttlebutt
has it that the Senate might be more resistant to HB 17. A couple of the
least conservative GOP senators could be expected to vote against it for
starters and others are hesitant about it, so at this point it may only have a vote
or two to spare. Democrats seem as unwilling as their House counterparts to support
it, and Landry will have limited influence over those in his party who see it
as damaging to their reelection prospects as they consider it a matter of
electoral life or death.

Thus, it could be sunk with a very few defections,
which could come from that north Louisiana/Capitol area contingent upset with
congressional reapportionment. These individuals, a couple of whom won tough campaigns,
while they might consider closed primaries helpful won't fear having to win
through blanket primaries again in having done so before. They might be willing
to play hardball with Landry and if he persists with his reapportionment plans
they could sink what should be his most important priority of the session, and
perhaps of his whole governorship.

It will be a real test of Landry's leadership and
skills to have all three pass in the form he wants, if any pass. At the same time,
regardless of his success he will expend not a small amount of political
capital on the effort, much of it which has no real imperative attached to it
and upsets his natural allies that could detract from their working together
forthwith and beyond. Worst of all, his efforts could come to naught, which
from the party's perspective wouldn't be much of a loss were the
reapportionment bills to founder but would be a major missed opportunity if
changing the electoral system fails. Especially if it's because Landry was so insistent
on relatively unimportant matters that leads him to flub the big kahuna.

I have written about the effort to change the Canadian military's culture here although, to be clear, I am focused and expert (ish) on only one aspect of the culture change effort--changing attitudes and practices of civilian control.  Most of the conversation is about making the military more inclusive, diverse, and equitable, and the CDSN has done much in this area via our personnel research theme.  We have also discussed this much at the Battle Rhythm Podcast.  We know, thanks to Machiavelli, that any reform will face resistance from those who benefited from the old way.  And this is the case today, but there is more to it as I will explain.  The story right now is about a special issue of the Canadian Military Journal and the storm that has been generated in response.  Transforming Military Cultures is one of the nine networks currently funded by the Department of National Defence's Mobilizing Insights on Defence and Security program.  The TMC group organized a special issue of this journal to present a critical perspective on the military and what needs to change.  Yes, they used all kinds of buzz words that greatly annoy the right wing: critical race theory, decolonization, and anti-racism to name a few. * These kinds of analyses can be hard to read and process because they say: the way things have done has been harmful, and we need to change.  This calls out those who have been influential in the military (and their civilian overseers) in the past as complicit--either encouraging or condoning an environment in which those in power could act within impunity and those without power suffered quite significantly.  We know about the purge of LGBTQ2S+ from the military and intelligence services deep into the 1990s, we know about the problem of sexual misconduct from multiple reports by multiple retired supreme court justices, we have some understanding of the challenges Indigenous people have faced in and out of the CAF, and so on.  So, yeah, it calls out mostly white men because white men have generally had power when this bad stuff was happening.  It hurts the feelings of some apparently to be called out for the sins of the past.  Suck it up, snowflakes.Anyhow, this special issue got a heap of attention when a far right propaganda outlet blasted it, essentially siccing its readers on the TMC people who have now faced some significant harassment.  This is typical far right behavior, stuff that Trump does all the time (including providing Obama's address which led to a potential assassin showing up near Obama's house).  Some of the judges and prosecutors involved with Trump's various prosecutions have been swatted--that is when someone files a false report with the cops that indicates there is an emergency that requires the heavily armed special police types to go to a certain address with the caller hoping that the police end up killing the target of their animus.The ruckus this has stirred up has also led opponents of culture change to engage in a writing campaign aimed at CMJ.  Again, opponents to culture change largely but not entirely fit into one basket--those who find the ways of the past--of purged gays and lesbians, of women and men facing little recourse when sexually harassed, of senior officers abusing their authority, of historically excluded groups being relegated to inferior positions--to be the traditions they want maintained.  There is one additional complication--that the far right outlet's take on all of this was included in a Royal Canadian Navy news summary that was widely distributed.  The idea is that those in the navy should be aware of news stories, positive or negative, that are relevant to the navy.  While the far right is quite relevant and the military should be kept abreast of what it is up to, I think including such outlets in a news summary is akin to putting the press releases of Al Qaeda or the Islamic State in a news summary.  Again, the public affairs folks in the CAF should know what is being said about them, but I would not platform far right outlets in regular email summaries.And to be clear, while I want to avoid any false equivalence, I would not include press released by Greenpeace or Amnesty International or the Communist Party in a news summary either.  To be absolutely clear, we live in a time where the violence and the incitement of violence is coming from one side of the spectrum.  Far right terrorism has been far more harmful the past 20 years than far left violence.  So, we need to keep in mind where the threat is coming from, and we need to be clear that platforming the far right without context is very problematic.  I don't think there was ill intent here, but as one of my favorite bluesky follows often says, So, yes, the RCN needs to re-think what it sends around.  And I stand with TMC and others who are fighting the good fight of changing the culture of the military so that almost all Canadians would be welcome to join and to serve with pride and success--all except the far right, white supremacists that is. *A reminder that basic logic suggests that if one is anti-anti-racism, one is pro-racism.

U.S. efforts to cobble together an international coalition to protect the freedom of navigation in the Red Sea against attacks by the Yemeni Houthi militias who demand an immediate ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war are stoking tensions with European allies.On January 8, the U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Charles Brown called his Spanish counterpart Teodoro Lopez Calderon to, according to the official U.S. readout, discuss the "ongoing illegal Houthi attacks on commercial vessels operating in international waters in the Red Sea." Pointedly, Brown "reiterated the U.S. desire to work with all nations who share an interest in upholding the principle of freedom of navigation and ensuring safe passage for global shipping."But according to recent reporting by veteran Spanish journalist Ignacio Cembrero, Washington has been pushing Spain a bit harder. U.S. Navy Secretary Carlos del Toro recently called the Spanish ambassador in Washington Santiago Cabanas to urge his government to join the U.S.-led anti-Houthi coalition, Operation Guardian Prosperity, and, according to Cembrero's reporting, even went so far as issuing a deadline to Madrid to deliver an answer by January 11. So far Madrid has refused to join the U.S.-led coalition and put its soldiers and ships under the command of Pentagon's CENTCOM in the Red Sea. During an announcement of the coalition's formation last month, U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said Spain was among the members without, apparently, consulting with the Spanish government, causing considerable irritation in Madrid.To smooth the friction, President Biden called Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez to emphasize the Houthi threat. If his intention was to nudge Madrid closer to the U.S. position, it clearly failed: Spain refused to join the U.S. and a number of allies in the joint statement they issued on January 3 warning the Houthis about the consequences of their continued attacks on the maritime freedom.The Spanish government's position did not go unnoticed in Sana'a: the Houthi vice minister for foreign affairs Hussein Al-Ezzi expressed appreciation for Madrid's "distancing from American and British lies on the freedom of navigation." Cembrero also reported that one unexpected collateral benefit of the Spanish government's stance was the release by Iran, the Houthis' chief external backer, of a Spanish citizen kept in captivity in Tehran for 15 months.Although the Spanish government never explained the precise motives of its refusal to join "Prosperity Guardian," Madrid, while having unequivocally condemned Hamas's attack on Israel, has also been vocal in denouncing Israel's "indiscriminate killings" in Gaza, which even provoked a diplomatic crisis between Spain and Israel. The protection of the maritime freedom in the Red Sea is indeed a legitimate concern: nearly 12% of the global trade and $1 trillion worth of goods each year passes through it. The disruption of this route forces the shipping companies to divert their itineraries which causes delays and adds costs. Yet the Houthis also made it clear that their attacks will end when Israel's halts its bombing campaign in Gaza. Indeed, there were no Houthi attacks on the international shipping prior to October 7, 2023.In this context, the Spanish government seems to have calculated that joining the anti-Houthi coalition would rather mean fighting the symptoms, and not the root cause of the worsening conflict in the Middle East, namely, Israel's pursuit of maximalist military goals in Gaza and its seeming attempts to expand the war to Lebanon.By any reasonable estimation, taking the fight to the Houthis would not result in a quick, swift military victory. The movement only emerged stronger after the nine years-long war Saudi Arabia and the Arab coalition it led waged against it, with a lavish military, diplomatic and intelligence support from the U.S., UK and other Western nations. The Iran-backed Houthis have also developed considerable home-made drone and missile capabilities, with a proven capacity to hit Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates, Israel and Western military assets in the region. No war on the Houthis would, thus, be limited to some surgical strikes. With a predictable failure of such strikes to "neutralize" the militia, there is a high probability of a mission creep that would lead the coalition to attack targets onshore in Yemen, and that, in turn, could lead to an indirect collision with Iran. The Spanish government's reluctance to assume the risks of being embroiled in a likely pointless war against Houthis and their Iranian backers is understandable, particularly given that Madrid also wants a ceasefire in Gaza.While Spain may have been the most explicit in its reluctance to join the U.S.-led coalition against the Houthis, it is by no means the only U.S. ally harboring reservations. Notably, France, the EU's militarily most capable state, refused to join the White House-led January 3 statement. Italy, although signed that statement, is not committing itself to fighting under the U.S. command. Other NATO allies, like Netherlands, Denmark and Norway, only agreed to send token military personnel. In the end, the whole project looks more like a U.S.–UK undertaking than a real coalition of allies and like-minded partners.Instead of causing division and stoking tensions with its allies over the prospects of a highly questionable (to say the least) military operation, the Biden administration should deploy its leverage to get Israel to agree to an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and abandonment of any temptation to expand the war to Lebanon. If the Houthis continue their attacks in the Red Sea after a ceasefire, then the U.S. and its allies will have full legitimacy to strike back. For now, however, alienating allies like Spain and France by pandering to the most extreme Israeli government in history certainly isn't a price worth paying.

The cutoff of food, water, and fuel imposed on Gaza has created dire conditions for the Palestinians there in just the last six weeks. Soon, they could be starved to death.The trickle of aid that has been allowed in under international pressure is not nearly enough to sustain the civilian population. According to the World Food Program, only 10% of the necessary food is entering the Gaza Strip, and the people there now face an "immediate possibility of starvation." The WFP also warns that the "food infrastructure in Gaza is no longer functional," and what little food is available is being sold at inflated prices and much of it cannot be used because people have no means to cook it. There is a humanitarian catastrophe unfolding before our eyes in Gaza. People are not just starving, they are being starved, and it is happening with the support of our government.Human Rights Watch and legal scholars say Israel is committing war crimes by waging a "war of starvation" against civilians in Gaza. Insofar as Washington continues to assist Israel's military campaign and blockade, it is helping to enable it. The meager amounts of humanitarian aid that the Biden administration boasts about facilitating are a drop in the bucket of what the population needs, and at current rates they cannot stave off large-scale loss of innocent life. The need for a ceasefire and an emergency relief effort is undeniable and Washington's resistance to it is a potential death sentence for thousands of people. Starvation has been used as a weapon with disturbing frequency in several conflicts over the last decade from Syria and Yemen to Tigray and South Sudan. Governments typically use economic warfare and physical blockades to achieve their ends. The current blockade of Gaza involves both by effectively shutting down Gaza's economy and cutting it off from outside supplies. The forced starvation of a civilian population is a form of collective punishment. Israel has an obligation under the Fourth Geneva Convention "of ensuring the food and medical supplies of the population." The Israeli government is obviously not fulfilling that obligation, and instead it has been doing the opposite. It is not surprising that President Biden had nothing serious to say about any of this in his recent op-ed in The Washington Post. The president acknowledged that many innocent Palestinians have been killed in the war, but he said nothing about those responsible for killing them. Biden insists that there must be "no siege or blockade" while both are ongoing. He mentioned no consequences if the Israeli government ignores his list of things that "must" not happen. The Biden administration may have "called for respecting international humanitarian law," but it is not acting to uphold it and it is not holding violators accountable.The president has once again rejected the option of a ceasefire: "As long as Hamas clings to its ideology of destruction, a cease-fire is not peace." This fails to take seriously the devastating consequences that allowing the war to rage on will have for all parties. No one imagines that a ceasefire will resolve the conflict or immediately create conditions for a permanent settlement, but it is imperative for protecting the lives and health of millions of people facing death from starvation, disease, and conflict. As the political scientist Sarah Parkinson explained in Foreign Affairs, "A cease-fire is the only politically reasonable, security-enhancing, and morally defensible policy to advocate, especially if Washington has any hope of remaining a respected player in the Middle East." Opposing a ceasefire in this war is a profound strategic and moral error that will cost the United States dearly in the months and years to come. Biden stresses that the U.S. is aiding Israel in its self-defense, but self-defense does not give a state the unlimited right to do anything it wants. Adil Ahmad Haque wrote an incisive article on self-defense and proportionality in Just Security earlier this month, in which he said this: "Under the law of self-defense, even a legitimate aim must be set aside if it is outweighed by the harmful effects of the force necessary to achieve it. Even if Israel's right to self-defense is engaged, its current exercise of that right is disproportionate."If this war were happening almost anywhere else and if it didn't involve a U.S. client state, it is very likely that our government would insist on the necessity of a ceasefire and U.S. officials would be repeating that there is no military solution. It is only when the U.S. or a U.S.-backed government is fighting that Washington sees no merit in adhering to international law. Unfortunately, this looks like the U.S. is least interested in stopping the wars over which it has considerable influence, and it is most vocal in demanding ceasefires in wars where it has little or no clout. If millions of people were facing an immediate threat of starvation in some other conflict, the U.S. would be appealing to the belligerents to lay down their arms and to do everything possible to facilitate the delivery of life-saving aid. That is exactly what our government should be doing now in this war. Brief pauses in the fighting will not be enough to ensure the safe, consistent delivery of aid.Acting in self-defense doesn't free a government of its obligations under international law, and self-defense isn't a catch-all excuse for violating the law. Some political and military goals can't be reached at an acceptable cost. The harmful effects of waging this war are already too great to justify continuing it, and they will only get worse the longer that this war is allowed to continue.

Us political scientists found ourselves another
teaching tool courtesy of northwest Louisiana election results this past weekend
that, despite this being the runoff balloting, still haven't been decided for one
contest.

Caddo and Bossier Parishes mostly had these for
state and local elections settled last month, if not a couple of months earlier
during qualification, Still, a half-dozen relevant contests remained to be decided.
Almost all of them were.

The one race confined to Bossier saw Democrat
Julius Daby, for many years a fixture on the parish School Board, edge out political
neophyte Democrat Mary Giles to succeed his brother on the Police Jury. Only
415 people voted, under 10 percent of the district electorate, a proportion
only somewhat lower than the 17 percent parish-wide who participated. Clearly without
compelling top-level races at either the state or parish levels Bossier turnout
suffered, and the District 10 runoff drew even fewer because parish governance
seems less important to residents in an urban district within Bossier City.

Yet this outcome proved interesting, for when any
of the Darby clan run for office – four have been elected to posts on the Bossier
City Council, Police Jury, and School Board starting 40 years ago – not only have
they won, but also almost always without a runoff, much less battling to a close
finish. This outcome might signal the beginning of the end of the Darby dynasty
– almost no black elected officials in Bossier City, the parish, or school district
in history has been anything but a Darby – that has dominated black electoral
politics in the parish.

Bossier also had a slice of the Senate District 39
race, which proved almost anti-climactic. Despite his almost three decades in
elective office, including a stint as mayor of Shreveport, the mostly-Caddo
district saw the end of Democrat state Rep. Cedric Glover's
career, going out with a whimper. Perhaps not surprisingly Democrat state Rep. Sam Jenkins triumphed
as during the campaign, and especially in the runoff that Jenkins led into but into
which Glover barely squeaked by a Republican, it had become clear that party
activists were coalescing into Jenkins' corner. More unexpected was the thumping
of nearly 2:1 that Jenkins delivered.

In retrospect, Glover perhaps should have stayed
put, as he could have served another term before limits kicked in. Instead, his
seat now will be held by Democrat Joy
Walters, who in a close three-way contest in the general election first knocked
out a Caddo Parish commissioner, then in the runoff narrowly bested a Caddo Paish
School Board member. This victory was significant in that Walters relied less
on a traditional strategy of shoe leather and making the endorsement rounds
while utilizing more aggressively social and electronic media strategies.

There was no predicted or actual closeness to the
Board of Elementary and Secondary Education District 4 race. Republican Stacey Melerine, aided by the campaigning
nexus of GOP state Rep. (soon to take a state Senate seat) Alan Seabaugh,
handily defeated her Democrat opponent.

The two topline Caddo races were a different
story. Despite leading into the runoff with 46 percent of the vote and the
expectation that enough of the 19 percent of the third place-finishing white
Democrat would push him to victory in the runoff, Republican former Assessor
employee Brett Frazier, who is white, finished 233 votes behind Democrat
college professor Regina Webb, who is black, out of over 40,000 cast and turnout
10 points higher than in Bossier. Remarkably, she spent through the general
election plus a couple of weeks only a few thousand dollars with little in the
way of advertising other than push cards and yard signs, devoting most effort
to canvassing and phone banks, while Frazier spent much more.

Voter
demographics in the parish, that revealed whites with a bare plurality over
blacks, but with a history that whites were twice as likely to cross over to
voter for a black candidate over a white than blacks were to vote for a white
candidate against a black may have helped her pull it out. Yet what probably
helped her more was the high-profile sheriff's race between white Republican
lawyer John Nickelson and black
Democrat former Shreveport police chief and chief administrative officer Henry
Whitehorn.

It generated a lot of heat, sending turnout five
points better than statewide for statewide contests. Nickleson, endorsed by
outgoing GOP Sheriff Steve Prator, grabbed 45 percent of the vote in the general
election while other Republicans picked up 11 percent more. This suggested that
he could hold off Whitehorn in the runoff, who had 35 percent, especially if
the pattern
of blacks disproportionately not turning out in the general election replicated
in the runoff.

Which didn't appear to happen as dramatically in
the runoff. For now, with the results unofficial, Nickelson appears to have
lost out of 43,231 cast by one vote. More in-depth analysis can follow after
results become official on Nov. 27, but a surface look shows that, even as
about 3,000 fewer people voted in the runoff or a drop of 2.4 percent, among
the precincts with at least 70 percent black Democrats registered, turnout
increased around 1.5 percent – voters highly likely to vote for Whitehorn by the
general election trend.

If things stand as is, or if Nickelson flips a
couple of votes, then political scientists can be taken seriously by their
students when they cover material discussing the incentives for people to vote
when they say that a single person's vote could make the difference even in a
large constituency.

U.S. forces launched a third strike against Iran-linked groups on Sunday, the latest in an increasingly destructive series of exchanges that have cast a new light on the continued U.S. troop presence in the Middle East. American aircraft struck a weapons storage facility and command-and-control center used by Iran-backed groups in Syria, according to officials. "Within the last two hours, the U.S. has taken precision defensive strikes against two sites in Syria," an official told ABC News. The two structures were located near the eastern Syrian cities of Mayadin and Abu Kamal, according to statements issued on Sunday by the Department of Defense and U.S. Central Command (CENTOM). "The President has no higher priority than the safety of U.S. personnel, and he directed today's action to make clear that the United States will defend itself, its personnel, and its interests," Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a statement. Up to seven "Iranian proxy fighters" were killed at one of the two locations struck by U.S. warplanes, according to Jennifer Griffin, chief national security correspondent for Fox News, citing a senior defense official. This is the third such strike since October 26, reflecting a continued effort by the U.S. to retaliate against Iran-linked groups that the White House says are responsible for a spate of ongoing rocket and drone attacks against U.S. military personnel in Iraq and Syria. The U.S. sent forces including two carrier strike groups headlined by the USS Gerald R. Ford Carrier and USS Dwight D. Eisenhower, squadrons consisting of F-15E Strike Eagle aircraft and A-10 close-air-support (CAS), and the USS Bataan Amphibious Ready Group to the region following the October 7 Hamas attacks on Israel and subsequent outbreak of war in Gaza. High-ranking officers including a Marine three-star general were reportedly sent to help advise Israeli leadership as it proceeds with its campaign and another 2,000 U.S. personnel were ordered to prepare to deploy last month. Iranian leaders have unsurprisingly taken a strong policy stance in favor of Hamas, though the full extent of their foreknowledge of and support for the October 7 attack remains unclear. Reports citing U.S. intelligence findings suggest that senior Iranian officials were surprised by the attack, undermining or at least heavily complicating claims of direct Iranian involvement. Nevertheless, Tehran has been accused of mobilizing its robust network of regional proxies to launch scores of attacks against American personnel and infrastructure. U.S. assets have been attacked at least 52 times by Iran-linked groups since October 17, according to officials. A total of fifty-six service members have been injured according to numbers provided by the Pentagon, with over two dozen suffering traumatic brain injuries. Washington has responded to these attacks with a mix of warnings by top officials, which have gone wholly unheeded, and retaliatory strikes. The Sunday strikes came shortly on the heels of airstrikes conducted by two F-15 fighter jets against Iran-linked facilities in Syria earlier last week. These two latest rounds of U.S. strikes come just two weeks after a similar spate of operations targeting facilities in eastern Syria that officials say were "used by Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and affiliated groups." The strikes on October 26, which the Pentagon said were not related to "the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas," were partly intended to deter Iran from coordinating further attacks on U.S. personnel. Yet attacks on American troops have not only continued but intensified in recent weeks, with Iran-backed militants reportedly assaulting U.S. bases with drones carrying even larger payloads.Growing risks to American service members and concerns that these continued exchanges could trigger a direct military confrontation between the U.S. and Iran have spurred new perspectives on the costs and benefits of the continued military presence in the Middle East. The 2,500 and 900 troops in Iraq and Syria, respectively, are ostensibly there to prevent the resurgence of the Islamic State, but the rationale behind this presence has come under scrutiny. "If a U.S. ground presence in Iraq and Syria were absolutely necessary to achieve a core U.S. security interest, then perhaps these risks would be tolerable. But this is hardly the case," Defense Priorities (DEFP) fellow Daniel DePetris wrote in a release on November 9. "ISIS lost its territorial caliphate more than four years ago and is now relegated to a low-grade, rural insurgency that local actors can contain. The U.S. military presence is not only unnecessary, but also a dangerous tripwire for a wider war." The continued deployments put service members at constant risk, especially in the context of heightened regional tensions stemming from the Israel-Hamas war, and serve neither clear nor achievable policy aims, argued Justin Logan, the Cato Institute's director of defense and foreign policy studies."Attacks on U.S. troops in Iraq and Syria will no doubt continue—the solution is to remove U.S. forces which remain as targets only because they're within range of these local militias," said a DEFP explainer published earlier this month, suggesting that U.S. troops in stationed within striking distance of local militants be redeployed to better-defended positions in the Middle-East. American troops have reportedly been attacked a staggering four times within less than a day of Sunday's airstrike, sending the clearest signal yet that retaliatory strikes have not had their intended deterring effect. As the Gaza crisis roils on, the dangers confronting U.S. troops — and, with them, calls to reconsider the tools and goals of American power projection in the Middle East—will likely intensify.