Monthly Archives: May 2017

Benedict XVI Warns of ‘Dangerous Situation’ With Radical Atheism and Radical Islam – National Catholic Register (blog)

Posted: May 2, 2017 at 10:47 pm

In this 2015 file photo, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI meets with seminarians from the Diocese of Faensa-Modigliana, Italy, in the Vatican Gardens. (Diocese of Faenza-Modigliana)

Blogs | May. 1, 2017

Benedict XVI Warns of Dangerous Situation With Radical Atheism and Radical Islam

In a new message addressed to a conference sponsored by Polands president, Benedict warns this contrast creates a dangerous situation for our age.

Pope Emeritus Benedict discussed the joint perils posed by radical Islam and radical atheistic secularism in a message he sent to a conference held April 19 in Warsaw, Poland, on the topic of his thinking about the concept of the state, held to coincide with his 90th birthday. Benedicts comments were delivered to the conference by Archbishop Salvatore Pennacchio, papal nuncio to Poland.

Here is the text of the pope emeritus comments, which were made in Polish and translated for the Register:

I was greatly moved, gratefuland happy to learn that an academic conference on the topic of The Concept of the State From the Perspective of the Teachings of Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger/Pope Benedict XVI (Pojcie Pastwa w perspektywie nauczania Kardynaa Jzefa Ratzingera/Benedykta XVI), attended by the representatives of Polands government and Church and organized under the patronage of the president of the Republic of Poland, was held to coincide with my 90th birthday.

The topic of the conference brings government and Church officials into common dialogue on a topic that is of key significance to the future of our [European] continent. The contrast between the concepts of the radically atheistic state and the creation of the radically theocratic state by Muslim movements creates a dangerous situation for our age, one whose effects we experience each day. These radical ideologies require us to urgently develop a convincing concept of the state that will stand up to the confrontation between these challenges and help to overcome it.

During the agony of the previous half-century, Poland gave the world two great figures Cardinal Stefan Wyszyski and Pope St. John Paul II who not only reflected upon these issues, but also carried within themselves suffering and vivid experiences; thus they continue to give us guidelines for the future.

I give my blessing to all of you and would like to express my sincere gratitude for the work that you do in these circumstances.

Benedict XVI Vatican, April 15, 2017

Translated for the Register by Filip Mazurczak

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Benedict XVI Warns of 'Dangerous Situation' With Radical Atheism and Radical Islam - National Catholic Register (blog)

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Before Michelle, Barack Obama asked another woman to marry him. Then politics got in the way. – Washington Post

Posted: at 10:46 pm

RISING STAR: The Making of Barack Obama

By David J. Garrow.

William Morrow. 1,460 pp. $45.

Of the books that journalists and historians have written on the life of Barack Obama, three stand out so far. In Barack Obama: The Story, David Maraniss shows us who Obama is. In Reading Obama, James T. Kloppenberg explains how Obama thinks. In The Bridge, David Remnick tells us what Obama means.

Now, in a probing new biography, Rising Star, David J. Garrow attempts to do all that, but also something more: He tells us how Obama lived, and explores the calculations he made in the decades leading up to his winning the presidency. Garrow portrays Obama as a man who ruthlessly compartmentalized his existence; who believed early on that he was fated for greatness; and who made emotional sacrifices in the pursuit of a goal that must have seemed unlikely to everyone but him. Every step whether his foray into community organizing, Harvard Law School, even the choice of whom to love was not just about living a life but about fulfilling a destiny.

It is in the personal realm that Garrows account is particularly revealing. He shares for the first time the story of a woman Obama lived with and loved in Chicago, in the years before he met Michelle, and whom he asked to marry him. Sheila Miyoshi Jager, now a professor at Oberlin College, is a recurring presence in Rising Star, and her pained, drawn-out relationship with Obama informs both his will to rise in politics and the trade-offs he deems necessary to do so. Garrow, who received a Pulitzer Prize for his biography of Martin Luther King Jr., concludes this massive new work with a damning verdict on Obamas determination: While the crucible of self-creation had produced an ironclad will, the vessel was hollow at its core.

***

By now the broad contours of the Obama story are well known, not least because Obama has repeated them so often. With Kansas and Kenya in his veins, he carries Indonesia in his memory, Hawaii in his smile, Harvard in his brain and, most of all, Chicago in his soul. It wasnt until I moved to Chicago and became a community organizer that I think I really grew into myself in terms of my identity, he said in an interview about Dreams From My Father, his 1995 memoir. I connected in a very direct way with the African American community in Chicago and was able to walk away with a sense of self-understanding and empowerment.

Note how it was as much about Obama himself as any success he had in his organizing work. Inspired by Harold Washington, the citys first black mayor, Obama began to discuss his political ambitions with a few colleagues and friends during his early time in the city. He wanted to be mayor of Chicago. Or a U.S. senator. Or governor of Illinois. Or perhaps he would enter the ministry. Or, as he confided to very few, such as Jager, he would become president of the United States. Lofty stuff for a 20-something community organizer who struggled to write fiction on the side.

Jager, who in Dreams From My Father was virtually written out, compressed into a single character along with two prior Obama girlfriends, may have evoked something of Obamas distant mother, Stanley Ann Dunham. Like Dunham, Jager studied anthropology, and while Dunham focused on Indonesia, Jager developed a deep expertise in the Korean Peninsula. Jager was of Dutch and Japanese ancestry, fitting the multicultural world Obama was only starting to leave behind. They were a natural fit. Jager soon came to realize, she told Garrow, that Obama had a deep-seated need to be loved and admired.

During his public life, President Barack Obama has often turned to his personal story as a touchstone to relate to the public. Here are four moments that stand out. (Adriana Usero/The Washington Post)

She describes their life together as an isolating experience, an island unto ourselves in which Obama would compartmentalize his work and home life. She did not meet Jeremiah Wright, the pastor with a growing influence on Obama, and they rarely saw his professional colleagues socially. The friends they saw were often graduate students at the University of Chicago, where Sheila was pursuing her doctorate. They traveled together to meet her family as well as his. Soon they began speaking of marriage.

In the winter of 86, when we visited my parents, he asked me to marry him, she told Garrow. Her parents were opposed, less for any racial reasons (Barack came across to them like a white, middle-class kid, a close family friend said) than for concern about Obamas professional prospects, and because her mother thought Sheila, two years Obamas junior, was too young. Not yet, Sheila told Barack. But they stayed together.

In early 1987, when Obama was 25, she sensed a change. He became. . . so very ambitious very suddenly, she told Garrow. I remember very clearly when this transformation happened, and I remember very specifically that by 1987, about a year into our relationship, he already had his sights on becoming president.

The sense of destiny is not unusual among those who become president. (See Clinton, Bill.) But it created complications. Obama believed that he had a calling, Garrow writes, and in his case it was coupled with a heightened awareness that to pursue it he had to fully identify as African American.

[The racial procrastination of Barack Obama]

Maranisss 2012 biography deftly describes Obamas conscious evolution from a multicultural, internationalist self-perception toward a distinctly African American one, and Garrow puts this transition into an explicitly political context. For black politicians in Chicago, he writes, a non-African-American spouse could be a liability. He cites the example of Richard H. Newhouse Jr., a legendary African American state senator in Illinois, who was married to a white woman and endured whispers that he talks black but sleeps white. And Carol Moseley Braun, who during the 1990s served Illinois as the first female African American U.S. senator and whose ex-husband was white, admitted that an interracial marriage really restricts your political options.

Discussions of race and politics suddenly overwhelmed Sheila and Baracks relationship. The marriage discussions dragged on and on, but now they were clouded by Obamas torment over this central issue of his life . . . race and identity, Sheila recalls. The resolution of his black identity was directly linked to his decision to pursue a political career, she said.

In Garrows telling, Obama made emotional judgments on political grounds. A close mutual friend of the couple recalls Obama explaining that the lines are very clearly drawn. ... If I am going out with a white woman, I have no standing here. And friends remember an awkward gathering at a summer house, where Obama and Jager engaged in a loud, messy fight on the subject for an entire afternoon. (Thats wrong! Thats wrong! Thats not a reason, they heard Sheila yell from their guest room, their arguments punctuated by bouts of makeup sex.) Obama cared for her, Garrow writes, yet he felt trapped between the woman he loved and the destiny he knew was his.

Just days before he would depart for Harvard Law School and when the relationship was already coming apart Obama asked her to come with him and get married, mostly, I think, out of a sense of desperation over our eventual parting and not in any real faith in our future, Sheila explained to Garrow. At the time, she was heading to Seoul for dissertation research, and she resented his assumption she would automatically postpone her career for his. More arguments ensued, and each went their way, although not for good.

***

At Harvard, the Obama the world has come to know took clearer form. In his late 20s now and slightly older than most classmates, he had a compulsion to orate in class and summarize other peoples arguments for them. In law school the only thing I would have voted for Obama to do would have been to shut up, one student told Garrow. Classmates created a Obamanometer, ranking how pretentious someones remarks are in class.

[A literary guide to hating Barack Obama]

Such complaints aside, he was generally admired, including by his professors, one of whom wrote a final exam question around comments Obama had made in class. And his elevation to the presidency of the Harvard Law Review, the first time for an African American, signaled the respect the schools elite students had for him even if some liberal classmates later regretted their choice, finding Obama too conciliatory toward conservatives in their midst. Garrow re-creates the drama around the election, with Law Review colleagues debating the candidates legal acumen and leadership skills, as well as the possible history-making aspect of the selection. It is an unexpectedly riveting part of the book. The black editors on the staff began crying and running and hugging when the final choice was made and with the national news coverage that followed, Obamas star was on the rise.

Law school also provided Obama one of his most important intellectual interlocutors: classmate and economist Rob Fisher. They took multiple classes together and co-wrote a never-published book on public policy, titled Transformative Politics or Promises of Democracy: Hopeful Critiques of American Ideology. The manuscript explored the political failures of the left and right and expounded on markets, race and democratic dialogue, showing glimmers of the political philosophy and rhetoric that Obama would come to embrace. A few years later, Fisher helped Obama rethink Dreams From My Father (originally titled Journeys in Black and White), making it less a policy book and more a personal one.

Obama had met Michelle Robinson at the Chicago law firm where she worked and where he was a summer associate after his first year of law school, and the couple quickly became serious. However, Jager, who soon arrived at Harvard on a teaching fellowship, was not entirely out of his life.

Barack and Sheila had continued to see each other irregularly throughout the 1990-91 academic year, notwithstanding the deepening of Baracks relationship with Michelle Robinson, Garrow writes. (I always felt bad about it, Sheila told the author more than two decades later. Once Barack and Michelle were married, his personal ties to Sheila was reduced to the occasional letter (such as after the 9/11 attacks) and phone call (when he reached out to ask whether a biographer had contacted her).

If Garrow is correct in concluding that Obamas romantic choices were influenced by his political ambitions, it is no small irony that Michelle Obama became one of those most skeptical about Obamas political prospects, and most dubious about his will to rise. She constantly discourages his efforts toward elective office and resents the time he spends away from her and their two young daughters. Obama vented to a friend how often Michelle would talk about money. Why dont you go out and get a good job? Youre a lawyer you can make all the money we need, she would tell him, as the couple struggled with student loans and the demands of family and political life. (Garrow sides with Michelle, highlighting how, on the day after Sasha was born, Barack went downtown for a meeting.)

[The self-referential presidency of Barack Obama]

As he considered a U.S. Senate bid, Obamas team commissioned a poll that covered, among other questions, his name. Barry, as he was known from childhood into his early college years, polled better than Barack, but Obama never considered resurrecting the old name. He had made his choice, of identity and image, long ago. Sheila recalls that one of the few times Obama became genuinely angry with her was in Hawaii, when she heard relatives calling him Barry, and she did so as well, just for fun. He became irrationally furious, she said. He told me that under no circumstances was I ever to use that name with him.

There was no going back.

***

Rising Star is exhaustive, but only occasionally exhausting. Garrow zooms his lens out far, for instance when he recounts the evisceration of Chicagos steel industry in the early 1980s, providing useful context for Obamas subsequent work. And he goes deliciously small-bore, too, delving into the culture of the Illinois statehouse, where poker was intense and infidelity was rampant. Theres a lot of people who fed in Springfield, a female lobbyist tells Garrow. What else is there to do? Obama, however, did not. Michelle would kick my butt, he told a colleague there. At times Garrow delivers information simply because he has it; I did not need a detailed readout of all of Obamas course evaluations from his years teaching at the University of Chicagos law school. (Turns out his students liked him.)

The books title seems chosen with a sense of irony. Garrow shows how media organizations invariably described Obama as a rising star, in almost self-fulfilling fashion. Yet, after nine years of research and reporting, Garrow does not appear too impressed by his subject, even if he recognizes Obamas historical importance.

The author is harsh but persuasive in his reading of Dreams From My Father, for instance, calling it not a memoir but a work of historical fiction, one in which the most important composite character was the narrator himself. (Reviewers were impressed by it, but few who knew Obama well seemed to recognize the man in its pages.) He points out that Obamas cocaine use extended into his post-college years, longer than Obama had previously acknowledged. And he suggests Obama deployed religion for political purposes; while campaigning for the U.S. Senate, Garrow notes, Obama began toting around a Bible and exhibited a greater religious faith than close acquaintances had ever previously sensed.

Throughout the book, Obama displays an almost petulant dissatisfaction with each step he took to reach the Oval Office. Community organizing is not ambitious enough, he decides, so he goes to law school. But then he moves into politics because I saw the law as being inadequate to the task of achieving social change, Obama explains. In Springfield, he is again disillusioned by the realization that politics is a business . . . an activity thats designed to advance ones career, accumulate resources and help ones friends, as opposed to a mission.And upon reaching the U.S. Senate, he tells National Journal that he is surprised by the lack of deliberation in the worlds greatest deliberative body. Nothing measures up.

Rising Star concludes with Obama announcing his presidential campaign, and Garrow speeds through the Obama presidency in a clunky and tacky epilogue, in which he recaps the growing media disenchantment with Obama and goes out of his way to cite unfavorable reviews of earlier Obama biographies. (Come on, David. Other books can be good.) In his acknowledgments, Garrow says that Obama granted him eight hours of off-the-record conversations and even read the bulk of the manuscript. His understandable remaining disagreements some strong indeed with multiple characterizations and interpretations contained herein do not lessen my deep thankfulness for his appreciation of the scholarly seriousness with which I have pursued this project, Garrow writes.

That is Obama now: a scholarly project, a figure of history. After the eight years of his presidency, it is odd to consider him in the past tense. Yes, he remains a public figure, as the mini-controversy over his speaking fees shows, and he is not going away, and certainly not with a post-presidential memoir still coming. But now he is fighting for history and legacy, and one of those battles is against another figure whose ascent is even more bizarre, yet perhaps no less personally preordained.

Obama had considered Donald Trump long before either man won the presidency, and brushed off his existence as a misguided national fantasy. Americans have a continuing normative commitment to the ideals of individual freedom and mobility, Obama wrote in the old Harvard book manuscript, now more than 25 years old. The depth of this commitment may be summarily dismissed as the unfounded optimism of the average American I may not be Donald Trump now, but just you wait; if I dont make it, my children will.

Follow Carlos Lozada on Twitter and read his latest reviews, including:

The liberal war over the Obama legacy has already begun

How Clinton and Obama tried to run the world while trying to manage each other

The case for impeaching President Donald J. Trump. (Too soon?)

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Before Michelle, Barack Obama asked another woman to marry him. Then politics got in the way. - Washington Post

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NATO and Partners firmly committed to continue supporting the financial sustainment of the Afghan Security Forces – NATO HQ (press release)

Posted: at 10:43 pm

NATO Allies and Partners, together with representatives of the donors community, reaffirmed their long-term commitment to continue supporting the financial sustainment of the Afghan security forces, at the plenary meeting of the Afghan National Army (ANA) Trust Fund Board, today (Tuesday, 2 May 2017). Participants discussed the Trust Funds achievements in 2016 and 2017, the plans for 2018, the coordination with the donor community in Afghanistan, and the implementation of auditing arrangements. They also discussed the ongoing coordination in Afghanistan between the Afghan authorities and the various funding streams, including the Afghan National Army Trust Fund itself, the Law and Order Trust Fund for the Afghan Police (administered by the United Nations Development Programme, UNDP), the budgetary contributions of the Afghan Government, the bilateral contributions provided, especially the bilateral Afghan Security Forces Fund of the United States, and possible additional adaptations of the ANA Trust Fund aimed at improving joint training and interoperability of the Afghan security forces in key areas, such as medical support, explosive ordnance disposal, and counter-IEDs, amongst others.

The adapted Afghan National Army Trust Fund is NATOs response to the International Communitys commitment in the framework of the 2012 Chicago Summit to continue to support the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan in its efforts to sustain sufficient and capable National Defence and Security Forces.

Together with our Resolute Support Mission to train, advise and assist the Afghan security forces and institutions and the NATO-Afghanistan Enduring Partnership, our Afghan National Army Trust Fund has been an important part of NATOs endeavour to continue supporting the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan in its efforts to achieve a stable and secure Afghanistan, Jens Stoltenberg, NATO Secretary General said. Todays meeting reconfirmed our continued commitment and the donor nations continued commitment to the safety and security of Afghanistan and its people, the NATO Secretary General added.

The Afghan National Army Trust Fund board is composed of national representatives of donor nations and the Trust Fund manager (represented by the United States). NATO Secretary General and a donor nation representative co-chair the Board. Plenary meetings of the Board were held on 1 September 2014, 26 June 2015, and 11 May 2016. Mr.Eklil Ahmad Hakimi, Ministry of Finance of the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan took part in todays meeting.

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Ex-Texas senator leading contender for NATO ambassador: report – The Hill

Posted: at 10:43 pm

Former Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) is reportedly the leading candidate to serve as the U.S. ambassador to NATO.

A senior administration official told CNN that the administration is looking to have Hutchison in the role ahead of NATO meetings in Brussels later this month.

Hutchison previously served in the Senate for nearly 20 years, ending in 2013. During her time, she served on committees including Armed Services, Appropriations and Veterans' Affairs.

Marc Short, the White House director of legislative affairs, previously served as chief of staff for Hutchison.

Earle D. Litzenberger is currently serving as the acting representative.

President Trump voiced strong opinions about NATO during his White House bid. Last month, he said NATO is "no longer obsolete" after repeatedly calling the alliance obsolete on the campaign trail last year.

During a joint press conference in April with NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, Trump said he will continue to work closely with NATO allies, particularly when it comes to fighting terrorism.

The secretary-general and I had a productive discussion on what more NATO can do in the fight against terrorism, Trump said at the press conference. I complained about that a long time ago and they made a change and now they do fight terrorism.

I said it was obsolete, he continued. It is not longer obsolete.

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Ex-Texas senator leading contender for NATO ambassador: report - The Hill

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NATO weighs new counterterrorism post following Trump’s demands – Fox News

Posted: at 10:43 pm

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization is considering appointing a senior official to oversee counterterrorism efforts, a move aimed at meeting one of President Donald Trump's demands that the alliance focus more on terror threats.

The proposal is similar to NATO's recent decision to create a top intelligence post, a move that Mr. Trump has repeatedly praised and that he has cited as evidence the alliance has responded to his criticisms and is no longer obsolete.

While no NATO country has vocally opposed the idea of a senior counterterrorism coordinator, some diplomats are skeptical about the role's impact unless alliance members also agree to expand the organization's counterterror efforts, including funding additional training initiatives.

NATO diplomats have been discussing how they can expand counterterrorism training, including ways to use allied special operations forces to better train antiterror commandos in the Middle East and Africa. Those proposals could include expanding the work or mandate of the NATO Special Operations Headquarters, which develops NATO counterterrorism plans.

No NATO member, including the U.S., has advocated the alliance conducting counterterrorism strikes or taking a direct attack role in the military fight against Islamic State in Syria, Libya or Afghanistan.

But expanding the alliance's use of its scarce resources, such as special-operations forces, is difficult and could weigh on NATO's budget, which some countries oppose expanding.

Bruno Lt, a security expert at the Brussels office of the German Marshall Fund, said the U.S. has indicated it wants NATO to do more to combat terrorism. "NATO allies are going to need to subscribe to Trump's desire for a new NATO that can engage in counterterrorism efforts," Mr. Lt said.

Allied ambassadors are set to formally discuss the counterterrorism post and other proposals at a May 5 meeting, officials said. Diplomats have been debating various proposals as they prepare for the meeting of allied leaders, including Mr. Trump, later this month. Turkish, British and French delegations have circulated papers.

The U.S. however hasn't submitted a paper or made any formal requests to the alliance. While Mr. Trump has said he wants the allies to do more on counterterrorism, neither he nor other U.S. officials have stated any specific desires, according to allied diplomats.

Some NATO allies have said privately that without a formal proposal from the U.S., reaching consensus on new counterterrorism plans is difficult.

Click for more from The Wall Street Journal.

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PICTURE: NATO puts Baltic air defences to the test – Flightglobal – Flightglobal

Posted: at 10:43 pm

NATO staged the two-day "Ramstein Alloy 4" exercise in late April over Lithuania, giving locally deployed air forces the opportunity to practise quick reaction alert procedures and boost interoperability.

During the activity, fighters from the two nations currently providing Baltic Air Policing services for Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania worked together. This involved Lockheed Martin F-16s from the Royal Netherlands Air Force, flown from iauliai air base in Lithuania, and German air force Eurofighter Typhoons deployed to mari, Estonia.

Mark Kwiatkowski/FlightGlobal

Staged three times a year, the Ramstein Alloy series of exercises was launched in 2016 as a replacement for the earlier Baltic Region Training Event, conducted more than 20 times.

Providing airspace security for Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, NATO's Baltic Air Policing detachments are rotated every four months between the allliance's members. Jets held at short readiness are launched in response to military or civilian aircraft that do not properly identify themselves, fail to file proper flightplans, or have lost communication with air traffic controllers.

Separately, a detachment of four UK Royal Air Force-operated Typhoons arrived at Mihail Koglniceanuair base in Romania on 27 April. The aircraft will support Romanian air force RAC MiG-21s in flying air policing missions from the site until 31 August.

A pair of US Air Force Lockheed F-35As flown to Europe for a training detachment at RAF Lakenheath in the UK also touched down at Graf Ignatievo air base in Bulgaria in late April. Lightning IIs also have visited mari during the type's inaugural European deployment.

By Mark Kwiatkowski, iauliai air base, with additional reporting by Craig Hoyle in London

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NATO’s Role in post-Caliphate Stability Operations – The National Interest Online (blog)

Posted: at 10:43 pm

The U.S. missile strike on the air base from which the regime of President Bashar Assad conducted a chemical-weapons attack on Syrian civilians has prompted debate about U.S. strategy in the region. The Trump Administration has said that Assad must go, but that may take considerable time and faces Russian opposition. Given growing Islamic State losses in Iraq, Syria, and Libya, there is a pressing need and a golden opportunity for a strategy to deal with the related problem of suturing the wounds left after the impending defeat of ISIS.

Steps are needed to fill the vacuum left as the caliphate collapses, lest forces on the ground Sunni and Shiite Arabs, Kurds, and Iranian proxies turn on each other to gain control. The U.S. can no more afford to turn its back on this post-ISIS danger than it can take full responsibility for it. The answer is for NATO to act under U.S. leadership. The alternative is either chaos or Iran, backed by Russia, filling the void, with great harm to U.S. and allied interests in either case.

NATO is the only security organization with the skills and breadth to take on this task. The U.S.-led anti-Islamic State coalition of 68 partners is ill equipped to engage in this complex task. A more cohesive organization such as NATO should lead, but in ways that allow continued Arab participation. A creative version of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) coalition could provide the answer.

The post-caliphate political circumstances and potential stabilization missions vary in these three countries. Separate but related missions would need to be designed. Those missions might be guided by three principles.

First, the political circumstances for success need to be created in each country. NATO involvement could help create those circumstances.

In Iraq, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi should recognize that the Sunni area around Mosul requires a degree of political self-rule and cannot be dominated by the Shia and Kurdish forces now leading the charge to liberate the city. Dominating Iraqs Sunnis would lead to yet another violent reaction. A neutral organization like NATO can help create that more benign environment.

In Syria, a transitional safety zone could be created in the area currently controlled by the Islamic State. Many entities ranging from Assads government, to Turkey, to Sunni-led militias, to the Kurds, to residual elements of the Islamic State will all be vying for influence. Without some agreed transitional arrangement a post-caliphate clash could drive more Syrian refugees and terrorists to Europe.

In Libya, a new agreement brokered in Rome between the warring state council and house of representatives could set the stage for a new stabilization effort. The role of Field Marshall Khalifa Haftar in any new government still needs to be settled.

In all three cases, some degree of international legitimacy would be needed for these post-caliphate operations. This could include a request by the internationally recognized sovereign power and/or a UN Security Council Resolution. In the case of Iraq and Libya, the internationally recognized government would probably request a stabilization force and a Security Council Resolution should be possible. Syria may be more problematic given the fact that the Assad government would not request any operation that would weaken its own sovereign claims and that Russia has a veto in the UN Security Council.An arrangementfor post-caliphate Syria between Russia and NATO may be needed to achieve international legitimacy.In extremis, if Russia proves completely intransigent, NATO would have the option to proceed under its own authority, as it did in Kosovo in the late 1990s.

The second principle is that NATO missions would need to be carefully circumscribed and exit strategies designed. NATO engagement in this region cannot be allowed to undermine NATOs primary task today of deterring Russian incursions into the NATO area.

In Iraq, a small NATO force deployed in the Mosul regions plus an enhanced NATO military training program could be enough to give the Sunni population confidence and to provide NATO with needed political leverage in Baghdad.

In Syria, a larger NATO force deployed around Raqqa supported by air operations would have a more difficult mission than in Iraq. It would be tasked with enforcing the transitional safety zone, deterring Syrian military thrusts in that region, defeating any residual Islamic State acts of terrorism, and keeping the peace between Turkish, Kurdish and Sunni militia forces in the zone.

In Libya, a NATO mission could be limited to special operations forces securing the area around Sirte from Islamic State revival, to provision of military training for those loyal to the GNA, and to enhanced naval operations off the Libyan coast to deal more effectively with refugee flows. Large NATO forces would be ineffective absent strong national support for the GNA.

The third principle is that these NATO deployments would need to be flexible and reflect a division of labor commensurate with the national interests and capabilities of the NATO nations involved. Flexibility would be needed to maximize Arab participation in these operations. A division of labor according to national interests is now more possible because of NATOs new framework nation concept. This concept has major European nations taking leadership roles supported and augmented by smaller NATO nations.

In Iraq, for example, the U.S. has perhaps the greatest interest given its long involvement there. So any NATO transition force deployed around Mosul might be U.S. led. European nations might play a leadership role in training the Iraqi military.

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Why NATO Wants Montenegro (Not for Its Military Might) – Bloomberg – Bloomberg

Posted: at 10:43 pm

Late last week, Montenegro's parliament voted to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, adding perhaps the most militarily useless memberto the alliance. The move served no purpose except to maintain the shaky hopes of Georgia and Ukraine that they might be allowed to join, too -- someday.

Montenegro, with 2,080 military personnel, will have the second-smallest military in the alliance after Luxembourg, with its 900-strong defense force. Despite U.S. President Donald Trump's insistence that NATO members spend the agreed-upon 2 percent of economic output on defense, few people in the U.S. or NATO appear worried about Montenegro's inability to meet that target. This year, in line with previous practice, it's spending about 50 million euros ($54.5 million), or about 1.3 of its gross domestic product. It's the smallest military budget of anyNATO member. Albania spends more than twice as much, Luxembourg five times as much.

When Montenegro's admission was first discussed, some analysts made the point that it would complete the NATO "ownership" of the entire coastline of the Adriatic Sea: the rest of it belongs to Italy, Slovenia, Croatia and Albania, NATO members all. But even if Italy were the sole NATO member on the Adriatic, the narrow sea would have been a death trap for any invading force. During World War II, the allies decided against invading in the area, instead providing aid to Marshal Josip Broz Tito's Yugoslavia. The German navy held out inthe Adriatic until the very end of the war.

In addition to Montenegro's utter lack of military importance, it has a population that's lessthan enthusiastic about NATO membership. Polls are unreliable, and public opinion is split roughly down the middle. This is far short of the nearly universal support NATO enjoyed in new eastern European members such as Poland, Hungary and the Czech Republic in the 1990s.

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The country's large Serbian population is wary of the alliance and would rather do business with Russia. Pan-Slavic ideas are popular, helped by Russia's economic expansion in the last 10 years. Even after Russian tourism to Europe shrank following the 2014 Crimea invasion, Russians are still responsible for about 22percent of tourist arrivals in Montenegro. Almost a third of Montenegrin companies and 40 percent of all real estate are owned by Russians, and Russia has provided a thirdof foreign direct investment in the nation. A lot of the money comes from the "patriotic" elite fostered by Russian President Vladimir Putin: loyalist legislators, state company managers, top law enforcers. Travel to Montenegro is visa-free for Russians; the neighbors are, for the most part, friendly; and owning a villa there is less of a risk than, say, across the Adriatic in Italy.

This Russian connection, Moscow's loud warnings against NATO's further expansion, and Montenegro's manageable size make it an ideal prop for a symbolic move. As Karl-Heinz Kamp of Germany's Federal Academy for Security Policy wrote ahead of Montenegro's invitation into NATO:

This sends above all a political message, not least to Russia, that NATO is sticking to its "open door policy" and that it refuses to accept a Russian veto against the right of free choice to form alliances. Montenegro's contribution to NATO may be limited, but that will make it easier to integrate this small country into the Alliance.

Most likely, Moscow realized back in 2015 that it couldn't do anything about Montenegro's NATO accession. It's a natural move for a countryso integrated into the European Union that it uses the euro as its currency despite not being an official euro-zone member. The character of Russian investment in the country doesn't give Moscow any direct political leverage. Montenegrin leaders are grateful for the money, but they don't feel indebted. After all, wealthy Russians choose their country of their own free will, to some extent as a form of protection against problems at home.

The Montenegrin government insists that Russian nationals took part in an anti-NATO coup attempt last year, but even if that's accurate, the amateurish plot looks as though it was hatched by Moscow pan-Slavists, a group that wants to appear closer to Putin's Kremlin than it actually is. The official line is based on the understanding that Russia can't stop Montenegro from joining NATO. The loud protestsregularly heard from the Russian foreign ministry and other quarters close to the Kremlin are a kind of ritual dance. For the Russian regime, as for NATO itself, the real issue isthe possibility of NATO's eventual expansion to post-Soviet countries.

In a recent column for state-owned propaganda outlet RIA Novosti, political scientist Gevorg Mirzayan wrote:

Tough opposition needs to be constantly stressed, even in an apparently unimportant case such as Montenegro's inclusion in NATO. If Moscow stays silent, it will be seen as a change in Russia's position on NATO expansion as such.

In this strange dance, both NATO and Russia know the limits of each other's courage. Russia won't launch a Crimea-style operation in Montenegro, since it wouldn't gain anything geopolitically or militarily, but the fallout might be even more toxic than from meddling in Ukraine. NATO won't ignore the frozen conflicts Russia has organized in Moldova, Georgia and Ukraine; these mini-wars essentially prevent the three countries from joining the alliance without unduly endangering its existing members. It's a standoff in which all both sides can do is signal their positions. With Montenegro's accession, NATO is telling aspiring members to hang tough, for their time may yet come. By stamping its feet in frustration, Moscow is telling the same NATO aspirants and NATO itself that that's a pipe dream.

This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.

To contact the author of this story: Leonid Bershidsky at lbershidsky@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story: Jonathan Landman at jlandman4@bloomberg.net

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NATO cyberwar games shows the U.S. needs more practice – TechTarget

Posted: at 10:43 pm

The U.S. team scored the most improved in this year's NATO Locked Shields cyberwar games, but experts said that result might not be reason to celebrate.

The Locked Shields event is a "live-fire" cyberdefense exercise organized by the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence in which teams are "tasked to maintain the services and networks of a military air base of a fictional country, which, according to the exercise scenario, will experience severe attacks on its electric power grid system, unmanned aerial vehicles, military command and control systems, critical information infrastructure components and other operational infrastructure."

During the cyberwar games, there were more than 2500 possible attacks that could be carried out against more than 3000 virtualized systems meant to simulate military air command and control systems, drone and ground control, a large-scale SCADA system controlling the power grid and programmable logic controllers.

Nathaniel Gleicher, head of cybersecurity strategy at Illumio and former director of cybersecurity policy for the White House, said this type of cyberwar practice is "essential to effective cybersecurity."

"Exercises like this are an important way that security teams can build experience for real threats. The Locked Shields war game is interesting in that it focuses entirely on defense: teams compete to protect their networks, with third parties playing the intruders," Gleicher told SearchSecurity. "This is an especially useful form of wargame -- defense is much more difficult than offense, and any opportunity our teams get to improve their skills in defense is a great opportunity."

John Bambenek, threat research manager at Fidelis Cybersecurity, said it was especially important for the cyberwar games to be "live-fire."

"Defenders learn best in a live-fire environment.When the 'red team' can simulate what adversarial nations are doing, that's even better," Bambenek told SearchSecurity."Tabletop exercises can only take learning so far.Operators need valuable experience, and they need to do so under fire."

The U.S. Army Cyber Brigade was one of 25 countries to compete in the Locked Shields 2017 cyberwar games and finished 12th, which is a marked improvement from the 2016 event where the U.S. was last out of 19 countries participating.

However, Bambenek said "given the threats we face as a nation, we simply can't accept anything less than number one."

"That said, the improvement from last place to the middle of the pack shows an increase in capability. It also shows that they are learning.That's exactly the point of these exercises," Bambenek said and noted that enterprises should take a lesson from the games. "Training, particularly hands-on training, is crucial for the continued improvement and development of defenders.Enterprises should set aside funds to participate in third-party exercises so their team can practice. Always use events within an organization as training.Successful, yet minor, breaches should not resort in blamestorming sessions. Instead, they should be used to help defenders improve."

Gleicher said the U.S. team's results offer an important lesson -- "everyone struggles with defense."

"To be honest, the cards are stacked against defenders from the beginning. The teams are placed in an unfamiliar environment to make life more difficult for them, but the truth is that most defenders are operating in an unfamiliar environment anyway, because most organizations understand surprisingly little about the applications that they are protecting," Gleicher said. "If there's any lesson from this exercise and others like it, it's that we need to substantially increase our ability to understand and control the environments we are protecting."

Learn about the benefits of a cybersecurity training center.

Find out why pen testing should focus on risk not box-ticking.

Get info on how cyberwar games are beneficial to test enterprise security.

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NATO, US Mulling More Troops to Afghanistan amid Worsening Security Situation – Breitbart News

Posted: at 10:43 pm

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Without providing specific figures, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg revealed on Sunday that the military alliance might boost its military presence in the war-devastated country.

Meanwhile, President Donald Trumps Pentagon is considering plans to send as many as 5,000 additional American troops to Afghanistan where the United States has been fighting the Taliban and its al-Qaeda allies for more than 15 years, since October 2001.

Although the United States military argues the U.S. war has hit a stalemate, Bill Roggio from the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies (FDD) recently told lawmakers America is losingthe ongoing conflict, adding that al-Qaeda and the Taliban are growing stronger.

This year, American Gen. John Nicholson, the top commander of U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan, told Congress he was facing a shortfall of a few thousand troops in Afghanistan.

In light of the challenging security conditions in the country, NATO may increase its military footprint, NATO Chief Stoltenberg told German newspaper Welt am Sonntag.

NATO will likely make a decision on the troop increase and whether to lengthen deployment times by June, he added.

Last week, new reports surfaced saying the Pentagon is considering options to send between 3,000 and 5,000 American troops to advise the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces (ANDSF) in their fight against the Taliban, al-Qaeda, and the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) in Afghanistan.

The ANDSF includes police and army units.

On Monday, the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) noted that the ANDSF has suffered a staggering number of fatalities.

Afghan losses have been the greatest of all: more than twice as many ANDSF members were killed in the single year of 2016 than U.S. forces in Afghanistan have lost since 2001, notes SIGAR, a U.S. watchdog agency, adding:

Afghanistan remains in the grip of a deadly war. Casualties suffered by the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces (ANDSF) in the fight against the Taliban and other insurgents continue to be shockingly high: 807 were killed in the first six weeks of this year. Likewise, civilian casualties in 2016 were the highest since the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan began reporting them in 2009.

Moreover, SIGAR points out that security incidents, primarily fueled by battles with the Taliban, have reached record levels, noting that most of the attacks continue to take place along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, home to strongholds held by the Taliban, al-Qaeda, and ISIS.

Security incidents throughout 2016 and continuing into the first quarter of 2017 reached their highest level since UN reporting began in 2007, reports the watchdog agency. Armed clashes between the security forces and the Taliban comprised 63% of all security incidents in Afghanistan during that period and marked a 22% increase from the same period in 20152016.

Citing the United Nations, it adds, During the last year, half of all recorded security incidents continued to occur in the southern, southeastern, and eastern regions [along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border].

The Afghan government controls about 60 percent of Afghanistan, insurgents (primarily the Taliban) 11 percent, and the remaining 29 percent are contested, reveals SIGAR.

President Donald Trump has inherited security chaos in Afghanistan a stronger Taliban that controls more territory than at any time since the war started more than 15 years ago, an ISIS presence in a region already awash in jihadist groups, and historically high production and cultivation of opium and heroin.

The Taliban and likely other terrorist groups in the country use the lucrative profits from the opium business to fund their terrorist activities.

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