Stevenson’s army, June 17
– Biden was talked out of calling Xi during spy balloon incident
– US is pushing hard for Saudi-Israeli agreement
– Russian troops are getting better
– Northcom and Space Force are fighting
-Politico explains Biden”s “radical trade agenda”
– Axios notes increased US manufacturing
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
– FP says China is rewriting the Law of the Sea
-Yale prof says we don’t know much about Chinese decision-making
– FT’s always intriguing economist Tim Harford says we should study low tech
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Stevenson’s army, June 16, 2023
Dan Ellsberg, who had a distinguished career in national security before leaking the Pentagon Papers, has died at 92. Fred Kaplan offers an appreciation. [I’ve pasted below a long excerpt from his memoir about advice he gave to Henry Kissinger about having access to government secrets.
Read the indictment of Jack Teixiera, the Discord leaker.
In other news, Hungary has cancelled weapons purchase that some in Congress had blocked.
Sen. Tuberville has been offered a vote on his bill, but he still blocks nominees.
Liz Schrayer, who heads a group that lobbies for more foreign aid [yes, there is one] has an op-ed on countering China. She reports elsewhere that “the House Appropriations Committee proposed dangerous cuts of 31% to America’s footprint in the world,” presumably meaning the GOP cut the allocation for the State/Foreign ops bill.
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Ellsberg to Kissinger, 1968 [from Ellsberg’s memoir, Secrets]
“Henry, there’s something I would like to tell you, for what it’s worth, something I wish I had been told years ago. You’ve been a consultant for a long time, and you’ve dealt a great deal with top secret information. But you’re about to receive a whole slew of special clearances, maybe fifteen or twenty of them, that are higher than top secret.
“I’ve had a number of these myself, and I’ve known other people who have just acquired them, and I have a pretty good sense of what the effects of receiving these clearances are on a person who didn’t previously know they even existed. And the effects of reading the information that they will make available to you.
“First, you’ll be exhilarated by some of this new information, and by having it all — so much! incredible! — suddenly available to you. But second, almost as fast, you will feel like a fool for having studied, written, talked about these subjects, criticized and analyzed decisions made by presidents for years without having known of the existence of all this information, which presidents and others had and you didn’t, and which must have influenced their decisions in ways you couldn’t even guess. In particular, you’ll feel foolish for having literally rubbed shoulders for over a decade with some officials and consultants who did have access to all this information you didn’t know about and didn’t know they had, and you’ll be stunned that they kept that secret from you so well.
“You will feel like a fool, and that will last for about two weeks. Then, after you’ve started reading all this daily intelligence input and become used to using what amounts to whole libraries of hidden information, which is much more closely held than mere top secret data, you will forget there ever was a time when you didn’t have it, and you’ll be aware only of the fact that you have it now and most others don’t….and that all those other people are fools.
“Over a longer period of time — not too long, but a matter of two or three years — you’ll eventually become aware of the limitations of this information. There is a great deal that it doesn’t tell you, it’s often inaccurate, and it can lead you astray just as much as the New York Times can. But that takes a while to learn.
“In the meantime it will have become very hard for you to learn from anybody who doesn’t have these clearances. Because you’ll be thinking as you listen to them: ‘What would this man be telling me if he knew what I know? Would he be giving me the same advice, or would it totally change his predictions and recommendations?’ And that mental exercise is so torturous that after a while you give it up and just stop listening. I’ve seen this with my superiors, my colleagues….and with myself.
“You will deal with a person who doesn’t have those clearances only from the point of view of what you want him to believe and what impression you want him to go away with, since you’ll have to lie carefully to him about what you know. In effect, you will have to manipulate him. You’ll give up trying to assess what he has to say. The danger is, you’ll become something like a moron. You’ll become incapable of learning from most people in the world, no matter how much experience they may have in their particular areas that may be much greater than yours.”
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, June 15
– NYT says US is still paying Russia billions for nuclear fuel.
– NYT also has more on US-Iran talks.
– Canadian quits China bank, claiming CCP interference.
– FT says Putin backs Defense over Wagner.
– SAIS prof Ed Joseph has a Kosovo plan.
– Europeans discuss guarantees for Ukraine.
– Politico’s China Watcher explains problems facing Blinken’s trip.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, June 14
– Germany released its own national security strategy and Politico’s Global Insider has more details.
– Sen. Risch is blocking an arms sale to Hungary because it’s blocking Sweden’s NATO bid.
– WSJ says US is quietly talking to Iran.
– SAIS grad Robin Dickey wants norms for space competition.
– DOD wants to speed up foreign arms sales.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, June 13
– The ever-valuable Politico NatSec Daily explains the administration’s gyrations over the Chinese spy base in Cuba.
– It came up in class: Does Trump’s Judge Cannon have conflict of interest? New Yorker interview explains the law.
– Putin says he’s moving nukes to Belarus.
– NYT says Chinese Coast Guard is more like a navy.
– Politics of military base names.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here, with occasional videos of my choice. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Here’s what to do about US Balkans policy
Chris Hill, America’s Ambassador to Serbia, gave an interview last week to VOA:
What’s wrong with this picture
Here we have an American ambassador to one country casting aspersions on the Prime Minister of a neighboring country. That alone makes me recoil. It is not only unprofessional. It also makes the job of his colleague in Pristina harder. The last time American officials trashed Prime Minister Kurti and even organized his fall from power, he returned after elections with a renewed mandate and an enlarged majority. He has hinted recently he might call a snap election, presumably hoping thereby to show the Americans that he has the unequivocal support of most of Kosovo.
Hill also praises the President of Serbia, the country to which he is accredited, even though Vucic has mobilized troops and sent them to the Kosovo border. There they confronted NATO-led forces, including Americans, who are responsible for Kosovo’s external defense. This is a clear violation of the February normalization agreement between Belgrade and Pristina that the Americans say is legally binding. It prohibits the threat or use of force (Article 3).
Instead of denouncing this violation, Hill mentions that Kosovo Serbs have been playing friendly games with the NATO forces. That’s not surprising. Kosovo Serbs know that NATO today protects them as well as the Albanians south of the Ibar River. It was primarily Serb gangs President Vucic sent from Belgrade who did the dirty work of attacking NATO soldiers. About that, Ambassador Hill says nothing.
Let’s see if Vucic buys
He presses however for the Association of Serb-majority Municipalities inside Kosovo. This proposition was agreed in 2013. The quid pro quo was extension of the rule of law under its constitution to the entire territory of Kosovo. Belgrade, however, has not allowed that extension. It has resisted Pristina’s efforts to get Serbs in northern Kosovo use Kosovo license plates, withdrawn officials from Kosovo institutions in the north, supported and enforced the Serb boycott of elections in northern Kosovo, and maintained clandestine Serbian security forces there, who cooperate with the rioters sent from Belgrade. Not everyone sympathetic to Serb complaints is as blind as the Ambassador to what is going on in the north.
Under current conditions, there is little doubt that creation of the ASMM would formalize Belgrade’s control over northern Kosovo. Nevertheless, I think Pristina should put forward its own proposition for the ASMM. Prime Minister Kurti has mentioned the Serb National Council in Croatia as a possible model. He should spell out that or his own proposition in a written proposal fully consistent with the Kosovo constitution, as the Americans have guaranteed any ASMM has to be. Let’s see if the good Vucic buys. Even if he does, the American guarantee should be in writing with a commitment to monitor implementation on a regular basis.
What now?
Public complaints about current American policy in the Balkans are rife. No one in the State Department is listening. There are, however, lots of government officials at State who are uncomfortable with the blindness towards Serbia’s misdeeds and America’s Kosovo-bashing. It is time for them to get together to submit a dissent channel message that tells Secretary Blinken what he needs to know. His Balkan leadership is making serious mistakes. He should order a speedy reevaluation and course correction.
PS: Even for the State Department, Hill’s comments about Kurti were too much. So Gabe Escobar had to correct them, I think yesterday:
PPS: Vucic shows (recently) how he merits American approval:
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