| | | | Fareed: The Big Question Raised by MOAB | | The discussion over the hardware following the U.S. use of the Massive Ordnance Air Blast Bomb (MOAB) in Afghanistan completely misses the point, writes Zack Beauchamp Vox.
"The mere use of a large bomb, in and of itself, is not strategically significant. There's no evidence so far that the MOAB was used for any reason other than that it made sense to use it against this specific ISIS target," he writes.
"…We should focus on the deadly nature of the bombing raid itself -- and not the technological wonder." - What comes after the bombs? Fareed says that the use of MOAB is unlikely to represent a dramatic change in the U.S. political or military strategy in Afghanistan or the region. "The bigger issue this raises is that it reminds us that 16 years after 9/11, we are still fighting a war in Afghanistan," he says."This is the longest war in American history."
"You can drop a lot of these bombs, but the reality is that the United States has never gone wrong in these engagements because it lacked firepower. The problem is, what do you then do? How do you stabilize the situation? If you don't get a representative government in Afghanistan that can control its territory, we'll be dropping these bombs for another 16 years.
"Just look at what has happened in Iraq -- we weren't able to create a political dynamic that was stable and successful. Perhaps Donald Trump will come to realize this, because his national security adviser is actually one of the experts on this issue, namely how do you stabilize a place politically?
"Ultimately, the U.S. does the military side of this very well – better than anyone else. It did it well under President Bush, it did it well under President Obama, and it will do it well under President Trump. The question is, what do you do after the bombs?"
| | Should the U.S. Cut South Korea Loose? | | The U.S. military presence in South Korea is unnecessary -- and ultimately may be doing everyone more harm than good, suggests Doug Bandow in Foreign Policy.
"There was a time when U.S. withdrawal from a confrontation with a Soviet ally in Asia would have, analysts believed, signaled weakness a continent away in Europe," he says. "But the Soviets are long gone and the cause for American commitment with them. An inter-Korean war would be tragic and the body count enormous, but absent American involvement the fighting would largely be confined to the peninsula. The continued presence of U.S. forces, by contrast, virtually guarantees the spread of conflict."
"…With a bigger economy, larger population, and significant technological edge, as well as greater international support, Seoul could construct armed forces capable of deterring and defeating the North." - Conflict could break out "at any moment," Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said at a press conference Friday, the South China Morning Post's Catherine Wong reports.
"Once a war really happens, the result will be nothing but loss all round and no one will be a winner," Wang said.
| | Russia's Leaders "Are Bureaucratic Ninjas" | | | Don't be fooled by Russia's call for an investigation into last week's atrocity in Syria, suggests Julia Ioffe in The Atlantic.
"[The] Russians are bureaucratic ninjas -- their strongest rulers, Putin and Stalin, were strong in large part because of their bureaucratic prowess -- and they will find every way to slow down, obfuscate, and slowly bleed of life any initiative," she says.
"The point…is to freeze Trump's unexpectedly hot temper by herding it into a labyrinth of procedure for procedure's sake, where, while it dies a slow and frustrating bureaucratic death, Russia will have the time and breathing room to continue giving Assad cover to reconquer Syria." | | Fareed: "Trump Derangement Syndrome" Is Real | | | At least as far as the Syria strike is concerned, President Trump "appears to have listened carefully to his senior national security professionals, reversed his earlier positions, chosen a calibrated response and acted swiftly," Fareed writes in his latest Washington Post column. "I supported the strike and pointed out -- in print and on air -- that Trump was finally being presidential because the action 'seems to reflect a belated recognition from Trump that he cannot simply put America first -- that the president of the United States must act on behalf of broader interests and ideals.' On the whole, though, I was critical of Trump's larger Syria policy, describing it as 'incoherent.' My Post column was titled, 'One missile strike is not a strategy.' "From the response on the left, you would have thought I had just endorsed Trump for pope." | | France Headed for a Nail-Biter: Polls | | France's presidential race has tightened, with four candidates now within reach of the two-person run-off, Reuters reports following the release of two new polls.
"The latest voter surveys may raise investor concerns about the outside possibility of a second round that pits the far-right candidate Marine Le Pen against hard-left challenger Jean-Luc Melenchon," Sudip Kar-Gupta and Sarah White report.
| | What the World Can Teach America About Taxes | | | "Americans will spend more than six billion hours this year gathering records and filling out forms, just to pay their taxes," writes T.R. Reid in the New York Times. But it doesn't have to be this way – just look at how countries like Japan do it. "What's going on…in many other developed democracies…is that government computers handle the tedious chore of filling out your tax return," Reid writes. "The system is called 'pre-filled forms,' or 'pre-populated returns.' The taxpayer just has to check the numbers. If the agency got something wrong, there's a mechanism for appeal." "Our own Internal Revenue Service could do the same for tens of millions of taxpayers." | | | | | | |
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