From Whitewater to Blackwater

In The Nation's web-only article entitled "From Whitewater to Blackwater," Jeremy Scahill and Garrett Ordower report that Ken Starr, dean of the Pepperdine School of Law, is representing Blackwater USA, one of the many private military firms (PMFs) (or private security companies) hired by the U.S. Department of Defense to carry out certain military operations in Iraq without direct governmental supervision. Blackwater is being sued by the families of its employees who were killed in Fallujah in 2004.

The lawsuit raises some interesting questions about the status of combatants who fight without the legal protections afforded to those in uniform. (The Bush Administration calls those who fight without uniforms or the direct ties to a state that such uniforms signify "unlawful combatants"--unless, of course, they work for the United States Government.) Basically, the issue is this: Can a company that lures away from the U.S. armed services some of their most valuable human assets and then turns around and contracts its services to the Department of Defense (with enormous profits guaranteed) benefit from the same protections against wrongful death suits that the military itself benefits from?

Dean Starr's work for Blackwater appears to be limited to "forum shopping"--that is, trying to convince the U.S. Supreme Court that this case belongs in the federal courts rather than in a state court, but nonetheless he's on the wrong side of a very significant issue.

Back from Tucson

My unannounced break from the blog coincided with a trip to Tucson, Arizona for the 2006 ISSS/ISAC Conference. (ISSS is the International Security Studies Section of the International Studies Assocation while ISAC is the International Security and Arms Control Section of the American Political Science Association.)

The conference featured over fifty papers on seventeen panels. Terrorism, homeland security, and nuclear proliferation were among the most common topics addressed. Dan Caldwell and I presented a paper (soon to be published in International Studies Perspectives) entitled "Jus Post Bellum: Just War Theory and the Principles of Just Peace."

As time permits over the next few days, I hope to be able to share a few of the more interesting ideas I gleaned from the conference. I'll also describe my "field trip" to a deactivated Titan II missile silo.

No Hope

"There is no hope. But I could be wrong."

--Pete Seeger

Sixty-One Years

Today is United Nations Day, the sixty-first anniversary of the entry into force of the Charter of the United Nations. It seems an opportune time to quote a bit of poetry.

In 1837, Tennyson penned a poem entitled "Locksley Hall." Paul Kennedy uses the following passage (minus the last two lines I've quoted) as the epigram for his recent book on the UN, The Parliament of Man: The Past, Present, and Future of the United Nations.

For I dipt into the future, far as human eye could see,
Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be;

Saw the heavens fill with commerce, argosies of magic sails,
Pilots of the purple twilight dropping down with costly bales;

Heard the heavens fill with shouting, and there rain'd a ghastly dew
From the nations' airy navies grappling in the central blue;

Far along the world-wide whisper of the south-wind rushing warm,
With the standards of the peoples plunging thro' the thunder-storm;

Till the war-drum throbb'd no longer, and the battle-flags were furl'd
In the Parliament of man, the Federation of the world.

There the common sense of most shall hold a fretful realm in awe,
And the kindly earth shall slumber, lapt in universal law.

Tennyson's vision of a "parliament of man" was certainly idealistic. No less idealistic was the vision of those who framed the UN Charter. But such visions can change the world, even when they are not fully realized.

Kennedy writes (pp. 45-46):

What is incontestable is that the UN's founders had, in some way, created a new world order. The structure of international politics after 1945 was different from that after 1648 and 1815; different even from that after 1919, because it now brought all of the Great Powers into the tent (even the difficult United States) and had given the new international entity a broader remit to address the economic, social, and cultural reasons that it believed drove people toward conflict.

October

For baseball fans, October is the World Series. But it's also the month when the winds turn cold and trees begin to lose their leaves (or so I recall from my days in Virginia and Missouri and Texas).

James Carroll sees in October a reminder of our mortality: "In October, a feeling for the end of things imposes itself on normalcy. Foliage flags the passage of time, a rude interruption of the dominant assumption that life goes on forever." The reminder we get each October, Carroll suggests, could explain why this month has often been a time of reckoning and a time of turning toward peace:

When we humans are in touch with the common fate that awaits us all, the bond among us becomes unbreakable. Not only that each one of us will die, but also that each one knows it. That knowledge, once claimed, is the source of our inevitable compassion, and is the ground of the communion that is our species' natural condition. War, therefore, is not the normal state, but the aberration. On that bond of common fate and common knowledge rests every hope for peace.

Carroll's complete rumination on the meaning of the month is available here.

Blogged Out

The government in Khartoum has expelled the UN's chief envoy in Sudan, Jan Pronk, for comments he made in his blog about the military situation in Darfur. The New York Times has the story here. Chris Borgen and Roger Alford at Opinio Juris both have posts on this development. Professor Alford speculates that "perhaps the UN wanted to give Pronk freedom to speak more candidly by describing the blog as personal reflections," a stance that would protect the UN while "free[ing] the diplomat to pursue a more effective strategy of public condemnation." I tend to think there was less coordination between Pronk and UN headquarters than Professor Alford's speculation suggests, but regardless I agree with both Alford and Borgen that it's surprising (or, in Alford's word, "refreshing") to hear of a top UN diplomat blogging about his work.

Tamil Tigers: The Source

Ideas travel more quickly and efficiently around the world today than at any time in human history. Among those who benefit from the rapid dissemination of information are, of course, terrorist organizations. This, of course, is not news. What may be news to some, however, is the role played by the Tamil Tigers (LTTE), the Sri Lankan rebel movement, in developing many of the technologies and tactics that have been used by terrorists around the world. This CNN report provides some of the details.

The Secret Plan

This would be comical if it didn't involve a war that has (1) taken thousands of lives and (2) turned into the greatest U.S. foreign policy failure of this generation. Senator Conrad Burns of Montana, in a debate with Democratic Senate candidate Jon Tester on Tuesday night, said President Bush has a plan for winning the war in Iraq. But, he said to Tester, "We're not going to tell you . . . because you'll go out there and blow it." According to the Billings Gazette, the audience laughed at Burns.

But don't take the Billings Gazette's word for it. You can see it for yourself here.

It's an embarrassing performance by a third-term senator. And it's precisely why smart Republicans are no longer trying to defend the Bush administration's handling of the war in Iraq.

UN Deadlock Update #2

The week ended with no winner in UN General Assembly voting for the Group of Latin American and Caribbean States seat on the Security Council. After thirty-five rounds of voting (the last thirteen on Thursday), Guatemala and Venezuela remained deadlocked.

According to the Washington Post, "The drawn-out defeat in [Venezuelan President Hugo] Chavez's top 2006 foreign policy goal came despite months of canvassing for votes with foreign trips, subsidized oil sales from Venezuela's large reserves and pledges to spearhead a global anti-U.S. alliance."

Voting is scheduled to resume on Wednesday.

(Vote totals for Thursday's rounds are available here.)

A Brief History of the Middle East

Maps of War offers a ninety-second look at 5,000 years of history in the Middle East. Go here and click on "Play" (if you have Flash) to see which empires have come and gone in the region.

[Thanks to Dan Caldwell for sending this my way.]

Ocean "Dead Zones"

At the Second Intergovernmental Review Meeting (IGR-2) of the Global Programme of Action for the Protection of the Marine Environment from Land-Based Activities in Beijing, scientists reported that there may now be as many as 200 "dead zones" in the world's oceans. "Dead zones" are areas of the ocean environment in which oxygen depletion makes it difficult to sustain the normal diversity of marine life. As a press release from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) puts it,

De-oxygenated zones are areas where algal blooms, triggered by nutrients from sources including fertilizer run off, sewage, animal wastes and atmospheric deposition from the burning of fossil fuels, can remove oxygen from the water.

The low levels of oxygen in the water make it difficult for fish, oysters and other marine creatures to survive as well as important habitats such as sea grass beds.

The Gulf of Mexico, which receives large inputs of nitrogen from agricultural lands in the Mississippi River Valley via the Mississippi, contains one of the best known "dead zones."

Meanwhile, here in Malibu there are concerns that faulty septic systems may be the cause of chronically contaminated ocean water. Los Angeles County officials plan to use DNA testing to determine whether the waste washing into Santa Monica Bay from area streams is human or animal. If human, inspection of septic systems will likely follow in an effort to pinpoint the sources of Malibu's marine pollution.

The Arms Bazaar

Are you in the market for a helicopter loaded with firepower? Take a look at this video ad for two Russian-made helicopters over at Coming Anarchy.

Who's buying? Venezuela, among others. (The Venezuelan air force, which still flies American-made F-16s and C-130s, has been looking for other suppliers since relations with the United States began deteriorating.) The Venezuelans bought 53 helicopters from Russia last summer (along with 24 Su-30 fighter jets) and are reportedly buying another 50 Russian helicopters now.

Just EU and Me, Babe

Over at Opinio Juris, Duncan Hollis notes that for the first time the United States has entered into a treaty (two of them, in fact) with the European Union. There were prior treaties between the United States and the European Community (EC), but those were restricted to economic issues that were within the competence of the EC before it was incorporated into the EU by the 1992 Treaty of Maastricht. The current US-EU agreements deal with extradition and mutual legal assistance.

UN Deadlock Update

The UN General Assembly has taken four more votes today in an effort to fill the remaining seat on the Security Council, bringing the total number of votes to 26. Guatemala continues to lead Venezuela in the voting, but remains far from the necessary two-thirds majority.

In 1979-80, the GA voted 155 times before giving Mexico the necessary two-thirds majority to win a two-year term on the Security Council.

Deadlocked

The UN General Assembly returns this morning to the task of trying to elect a member of the Security Council to represent the Group of Latin American and Caribbean States.

After twenty-two rounds of voting in the General Assembly on Monday and Tuesday, neither Guatemala nor Venezuela was able to win the two-thirds majority necessary to secure a two-year term on the Security Council.

Guatemala, which is being supported by the United States solely in an effort to block the aspirations of Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez, has led consistently in the voting thus far, but many observers believe the GA will be unable to muster enough votes for either party to win in future rounds. In that event, a compromise candidate would have to be put forward by the Latin American and Caribbean Group.

Support for Venezuela's candidacy seems to be based on a combination of promises of support from Venezuela (a state currently awash in petrodollars) and a desire among some states to punish the United States for its overbearing attitude at the UN. Chavez probably lost many potential votes for Venezuela, however, with his undiplomatic speech to the United Nations in September.

The Law of Outer Space

From today's Washington Post:

President Bush has signed a new National Space Policy that rejects future arms-control agreements that might limit U.S. flexibility in space and asserts a right to deny access to space to anyone "hostile to U.S. interests."

The document, the first full revision of overall space policy in 10 years, emphasizes security issues, encourages private enterprise in space, and characterizes the role of U.S. space diplomacy largely in terms of persuading other nations to support U.S. policy.

The new document, released last Friday afternoon in advance of a three-day weekend, contains much that was in the 1996 U.S. National Space Policy (NSP) drafted by the Clinton administration, but there are some differences that, not surprisingly, indicate a subtle move by the Bush administration away from accepted principles of international space law and toward a more unilateral approach. For example, the Clinton administration's 1996 document stated:

The United States considers the space systems of any nation to be national property with the right of passage through and operations in space without interference. Purposeful interference with space systems shall be viewed as an infringement on sovereign rights. (Emphasis added.)

The new NSP states:

The United States considers space systems to have the rights of passage through and operations in space without interference. Consistent with this principle, the United States will view purposeful interference with its space systems as an infringement on its rights.

Under international law, outer space is considered res communis. That is, it is not subject to the control of any state. The 1967 Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies--better known as the Outer Space Treaty--provides the basic legal framework governing activities in space. (And, yes, the United States is a party to the treaty.)

The first three articles of the Outer Space Treaty are worth quoting in their entirety:

Article I

The exploration and use of outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, shall be carried out for the benefit and in the interests of all countries, irrespective of their degree of economic or scientific development, and shall be the province of all mankind.

Outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, shall be free for exploration and use by all States without discrimination of any kind, on a basis of equality and in accordance with international law, and there shall be free access to all areas of celestial bodies.

There shall be freedom of scientific investigation in outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, and States shall facilitate and encourage international co-operation in such investigation.

Article II

Outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, is not subject to national appropriation by claim of sovereignty, by means of use or occupation, or by any other means.

Article III

States Parties to the Treaty shall carry on activities in the exploration and use of outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies, in accordance with international law, including the Charter of the United Nations, in the interest of maintaining international peace and security and promoting international co-operation and understanding.

Technically, the Bush Administration is within the law to "view purposeful interference with its space systems as an infringement on its rights." But this formulation makes the rights sound as if they're grounded in U.S. sovereignty--or at least U.S. military might. In fact, the rights being asserted are multilateral and non-exclusive. Outer space is "free for exploration and use by all States without discrimination of any kind" (in the words of the Outer Space Treaty).

Other states take note of U.S. policy pronouncements like the one embodied in the new NSP. They also notice the changing tone of American policy.

If you're interested in more information, the Center for Defense Information provides an assessment of the new NSP here. Michael Katz-Hyman of the Henry L. Stimson Center provides a very useful side-by-side comparison of the 1996 NSP and the 2006 NSP here. To read the complete text of the NSP itself, go here [.pdf]. Finally, the UN Office for Outer Space Affairs is located on the Internet here.

20,000

I don't know who all the readers of this blog are (although the readership is small enough that it probably wouldn't take long for me to shake hands with everyone), but someone logging in from Wartburg College in Iowa last night was the 20,000th visitor.

Thanks to all of you who stop in from time to time--especially those of you find your way here deliberately.

And if I knew who Visitor #20,000 was, I might have to send him or her some sort of prize--unless he or she turned out to be the person who called me on the phone two weeks ago to berate me for being a "liberal twit." (Really!)

Breathing Earth

Via FP Passport, here's an interesting site that provides a real-time simulation of CO2 emissions, births, and deaths on a world map. It's called, appropriately, Breathing Earth.

The End of the NPT?

There is an excellent article on nuclear weapons proliferation ("Restraints Fray and Risks Grow as Nuclear Club Gains Members") on the front page of today's New York Times. William E. Broad and David J. Sanger provide some of the history of non-proliferation efforts and note that, in addition to the nine existing nuclear weapons states, "as many as 40 more countries have the technical skill, and in some cases the required material, to build a bomb."

Broad and Sanger generally concur with the pessimistic views regarding the future of the nuclear non-proliferation regime that I heard expressed two weeks ago at the ISA-West meeting by Ambassador Thomas Graham, Jr., former general counsel and acting director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, Dr. William C. Potter, director of the Center for Non-Proliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies, and Mary Beth Nitikin of the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, D.C. Broad and Sanger write:

In March 1963, President John F. Kennedy said, "I am haunted by the feeling that by 1970, unless we are successful, there may be 10 nuclear powers instead of 4, and by 1975, 15 or 20." That timetable proved to be inaccurate. But in recent years there has been a sense around the globe that President Kennedy's prediction is about to come true, three decades late.

Unfortunately, the failure of the international community to head off North Korea's nuclear test or to impose costs on Pakistan for the actions of the A. Q. Khan operation has brought us to the point at which the benefits of acquiring nuclear weapons may be perceived as outweighing the costs.

Diplomacy in the Style of Kim

Via The Coming Anarchy, here's the KCNA [Korean Central News Agency] Random Insult Generator for your weekend amusement.