By J. Dana Stuster

Best Defense office of Arab seasonal affairs 

In the earliest days of the Arab Spring, Algeria appeared poised to join Tunisia in its revolution. Protests swept through the country weeks before the first stirrings in Egypt, Bahrain, Libya or Syria. According to The Economist's tongue-in-cheek attempt to quantify the factors generating the unrest ("the shoe thrower's index"), Algeria seemed less likely to be stable than its revolutionary neighbor and far outpaced Bahrain in factors contributing to potential unrest.

Algeria isn't stable now, but it has managed to avoid reaching a critical mass of domestic upheaval through a measured police response that has been severe without being so brutal that it incites more anger, as well as economic concessions that reduced the cost of staple foods and legal reforms that include the repeal the country's twenty-year-old emergency law. While it remains to be seen whether these concessions will stick in the long-term, they seem to have bought some time for the Algerian government.

The next potential crisis will be the country's legislative elections, scheduled for May. The country is only dubiously democratic; true power resides with a cabal of political and military officials informally know as Le Pouvoir, and there are concerns that, if a truly democratic election is held, the military may intervene to prevent an Islamist landslide in the parliament. The last time the military stepped in was 1992; what followed was a military coup, the institution of the emergency law, and an ugly civil war. The Algerian government is only now walking back the many effects of 1992, and if Le Pouvoir intervenes in May it would be a significant setback for the country, but so too could be a polarizing election.

Speaking at CSIS recently, Algerian Foreign Minister Mourad Medelci expressed his full confidence that the military will support the results of the election and downplayed the significance of a potential Islamist election, pointing out that an Islamist party (condoned by the government) has participated in the parliament since the late 1990s. Listening to Medelci, it is easy to get caught up in his optimism for Algeria. He boasts about his country's progress toward meeting the United Nations' Development Program's Millennium Development Goals and speaks eloquently about the political and economic reforms underway. Speaking to a collection of Arab media, businesspeople, think tank experts, and diplomats, he touted the increasing privatization of the economy, the large college-educated population (the majority of which are women), the proliferation of trade agreements, and the government's attempts to diversify the economy, including a large solar array to reduce Algeria's reliance on oil exports. He tied the new flurry of reforms to Algeria's efforts over the past decade to better incorporate minority groups, though he didn't go into detail on these. He seemed pleased with the new reforms, which include expanded press freedoms, a new quota system for women's representation in the parliament, an increased role for the judiciary in elections to make them more independent from the administration, and an upcoming revision of the constitution.

It all sounds very promising, and if done right, it could be precisely the sort of gradual reform that the United States has encouraged the monarchies in the Gulf to embrace. But even ignoring the questions about how healthy Algeria's economy truly is (only last year, Issandr El Amrani called Bouteflika's economic policy "an unmitigated disaster"), Algeria has only a narrow window of opportunity for this to succeed - Bouteflika's term expires in 2014, but he is physically ailing and there is no clear means of succession if he passes while in office. If Algeria cannot prepare its democratic institutions for this essential transition, it will face a two-front struggle: a crisis within Le Pouvoir, and also the remobilization of the disenfranchised and disheartened public that took to the streets in January 2011. Eurasia Group's James Fallon pointed to Algeria for a potential renewal of upheaval last November, and while the protesters in Algiers had difficulty expressing a set of common grievances, they will no doubt learn from the successes in Egypt and Tunisia.

While Algeria's problems are far from solved and new unrest may arise between now and then, for now, its role in the Arab Spring is restricted to its participation in the Arab League delegation to Syria. Medelci distanced his government from Anwar Malek, the Algerian monitor who resigned from the delegation and called it a "farce." Medelci has pointed out that Malek was representing a non-governmental organization and not the Algerian government, which remains committed to the mission in Syria. Justifying this commitment involved some verbal hurdles. Pressed by Ellen Laipson of the Stimson Center to reconcile Algeria's involvement in the Arab League's involvement in Syria with its policy of non-intervention, Medelci explained that he considers the Arab League mission as less a matter of interference, but an effort to prevent broader interference through providing an option for third-party mediation.

Medelci was nothing if not positive in his assessment. Speaking of its revolutionary neighbors in North Africa, he told the audience, "We hope that these countries now control their destiny and can join us as stronger partners. We need stronger partners, but we are not in a position to be hegemonic. We don't have lessons to teach but we share a revolutionary heritage." This July will mark the fiftieth anniversary of Algeria's independence from France, and while, for now, Algeria's non-interventionist intervention in Syria may be the center of attention, it is shaping up to be a dramatic year domestically as well. Here's hoping it lives up to the foreign minister's optimism.

I see why in 1961 the secret British government codeword to signal an imminent Soviet nuclear attack was "orangeade." It seems such a sad word to go out on.

By Patrick McKinney
Best Defense department of Maghreb affairs

In late October 1956, British and French forces aided Israel's seizure of the Suez Canal from Egypt. In March 2011, an allied force including British and French forces intervened in Libya to establish a no-fly zone and protect rebels from the ruling Gaddafi regime. Half a century apart, these actions in North African defined trans-Atlantic defense. The Suez Crisis heralded an era of American leadership and action, while Libya has shown that, though powerful, America intends to rely on its allies to carry larger burdens, and take responsibility for their own regions. America once drove and financed western security, but due to fiscal shortfalls and a decade of conflict, it no longer intends to guarantee European security.

In 1956, the once-powerful European states were still weakened from the world war and faced forceful colonial independence movements. The French lost Indochina in 1954 and the situation in Algeria continued to deteriorate, while the Suez Canal Zone in Egypt was England's last foothold in the Middle East. After tense negotiations, Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser threatened to nationalize the canal as sovereign Egyptian territory, and in response, Israel, England, and France coordinated an invasion with the pretext of securing the canal for world commerce. They failed to inform the United States of their intent and expected American support or indifference. To their surprise, they received neither.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower forcefully protested the Suez invasion and demanded that foreign forces withdraw from Egypt. Though he had little compassion for Nasser and his regime, Eisenhower intended to support international order and avoid unnecessary international conflicts. He condemned the invasion, saying, "We believe these actions to have been taken in error. For we do not accept the use of force as a wise and proper instrument for the settlement of international disputes." Israel, England, and France were surprised by the American response and false expectations of support. Their forces began withdrawal from the Suez Canal Zone, and returned control to Egypt.

After the conflict, American authority and consent became pre-eminent in the Trans-Atlantic partnership.  Through NATO, America assured European defense from the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact, and American priorities were NATO's priorities. England lost its Middle Eastern influence and decided to influence western and world security through cooperation in its "special relationship" with the United States. Embarrassed and affronted by the perceived betrayal, France took the alternate path and sought to set its own defense priorities. France demanded a restructure of NATO leadership in 1958, and began the withdrawal of its forces from the command in the 1960s. France remained outside of NATO for more than forty years until operations in Afghanistan and officially returned its forces in 2009.

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An Italian astronaut preparing to launch into space from Kazakhstan is already complaining about the food. Wait until he actually gets into orbit: "Che succede? There is only one woman in space?"

At least, its parliament voted to do so. I wonder if Saudi Arabia will retaliate by banning the sale of wine. Oh, wait a minute.

Happy Bastille Day, btw.

Yesterday I was reading the transcript of comments Gen. J. Lawton Collins made at Fort Leavenworth in 1983. "Lighning Joe" Collins was one of the few generals to fight in both the Pacific and the European theaters in World War II, and to my knowledge, the only one successful in both. (Generals Eugene Landrum and Charles Corlett, not so much.) So I was interested to see Collins conclude that the Germans were better fighters:

They were radically different. The German was far more skilled than the Japanese. Most of the Japanese that we fought were not skilled men. Not skilled leaders. The German had a professional army. . . . The Japanese army was very much like ours in a sense. They had a small corps of officers who were professionals. But the bulk of their people were not professionals in the sense of knowing their business and so on. They didn't have the equipment that we had. They didn't know how to handle combined arms-the artillery and the support of the infantry-to the same extent we did. They were gallant soldiers, though. They fought to the end and you had to knock them off-that was all there was to it. And we had to do that right on Guadalcanal. . . . The Japanese were very gallant men. They fought very, very hard, but they were not nearly as skillful as the Germans. But the German didn't have the tenacity of the Japanese."

Tom again: Still, I think the Pacific war, conducted on remote islands where the enemy would fight to the death, probably was the tougher fight, even if the foe wasn't as skillful or as well-equipped.

By Daniel Kliman
Best Defense chief Turkish affairs correspondent

When Turkey's Foreign Minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, spoke at the Council on Foreign Relations one night last week, Iran dominated his remarks. He was emphatically opposed to more robust sanctions, arguing that instead what is needed is "diplomacy, diplomacy, diplomacy." Davutoglu also suggested that a glimmer of hope remains for negotiations with Iran, though he didn't provide any details. In the past, Turkey has served as a mediator between Iran and countries concerned about its nuclear program. Davutoglu played up Turkey's success in this role during his remarks. Could there be a Turkish initiative in the works? Stay tuned.

On Iraq, the FM was bullish. Calling Iraq a "mini-model of the Middle East," Davutoglu cast the recent elections there as a move away from sectarian politics. (Your mileage may vary, of course.)

Earlier this month, Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Erdogan hammered Israel, labeling it "the principal threat to peace in the region today." Davutoglu avoided such language.

Omission can be telling. Davutoglu was silent on Turkey's prospects for EU membership. Combined with his ambitious vision for a transformed Middle East, it was clear that Turkey sees its destiny unfolding to the east and south, in lands once under Ottoman rule.

By Rebecca Frankel
Best Defense chief canine correspondent

Tom's recent posts on the seedy behavior of some naval officers got me thinking about a far more virtuous sailor and the Royal Norwegian Forces' beloved mascot during WWII.

Bamse (which is Norwegian for cuddly bear or teddy bear -- take your pick), was a St. Bernard who belonged to the family of Erling Hafto, captain of Thorodd, a whaling vessel. A gentle giant weighing in at 14 stone (that's 196 lbs!), Bamse officially became a war dog when Captain Hafto's ship was drafted into the service of the Royal Norwegian Navy during the first years of WWII. By 1940, the ship, by that point a minesweeper, regularly docked in a town called Montrose, Scotland where Bamse quickly became a neighborhood fixture where he was oft seen making the rounds "decked out in a white sailor's collar and mariner's cap."

The stories about Bamse are some of the most delightful I've come across -- tales of how he would break up fights between the men by launching his large paws on the agitated sailor's shoulders to subdue him. Or, almost unbelievably, how this large dog would ride the local bus unaccompanied to a nearby pub and retrieve the drunken crew to lead them safely back to their ship.

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Nicolas Sarkozy, president de la France, condemned the assassination of a Hamas commander in Dubai. He said that his country cannot accept such "executions."

Funny, I remember reading in Savage War of Peace how French agents whacked European arms dealers it believed were supplying the Algerian rebels.

I thought the president's acceptance speech today for his Nobel Prize for Peace was surprisingly hawkish, especially about Iran:

... it's also incumbent upon all of us to insist that nations like Iran and North Korea do not game the system. Those who claim to respect international law cannot avert their eyes when those laws are flouted. Those who care for their own security cannot ignore the danger of an arms race in the Middle East or East Asia. Those who seek peace cannot stand idly by as nations arm themselves for nuclear war.

The same principle applies to those who violate international laws by brutalizing their own people. When there is genocide in Darfur, systematic rape in Congo, repression in Burma, there must be consequences. Yes, there will be engagement; yes, there will be diplomacy. But there must be consequences when those things fail. And the closer we stand together, the less likely we will be faced with the choice between armed intervention and complicity in oppression.

He's a contradictory man, this Obama. A couple of weeks ago he went to West Point to announce that he was reluctantly escalating the war in Afghanistan. I read that speech as an explanation and apology to his political supporters. Now he goes to pick up the Peace Prize and paradoxically defends the American use of force in the world. I read this speech as an apology to Martin Luther King, who was invoked six times in the speech, far more anyone else.  

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It was good of the British to find and free their kidnapped countryman, Stephen Farrell of the New York Times, near Kunduz, Afghanistan. A lot of us had known about his disappearance and had worried about it, but had refrained from mentioning it in print.

My condolences to the Times for the loss of Sultan Munadi, its Afghan interpreter (mourned above), and to the British military for the lost of a commando. And to the villagers who lost an unknown number of civilians.

Now a question for the Times and other media outlets: It is fair to ask people not to report the kidnapping of reporters when the kidnapping of other defenseless people, like NGO workers, is routinely reported?

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A veteran Special Forces trainer, one-time Sgt. 1st Class Kelly Stewart, fluent in German and knowledgeable about evasion techniques, is convicted in Vilseck, Germany, of sexual assault and kidnapping, and then sent to a hotel room escorted only by a sleepy member of his unit? And the Army is surprised that he takes off and disappears in the black Audi Q5? (But he eventually saw the light and turned himself in. But apparently not before taking some poison that wound him up in intensive care at Walter Reed. This guy is out to beat the astronaut lady who wore Depends.)

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I about fell off my chair when I read this lead on a story in the National Post of Canada:

The Ottawa university professor accused of killing four people in the 1980 bombing of a Paris synagogue will not be returning to work.

Hassan Diab's lawyer told a court on Monday that his client had expected to resume teaching a sociology class this week at Carleton University.

But in a terse statement released yesterday afternoon, the university said that a full-time faculty member "will immediately replace the current instructor, Hassan Diab."

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Patrick Little, a former British infantry officer, blasts the British military for not adjusting in recent years as the U.S. Army has. This is a bit ironic, given that one of the most influential American military books in recent years, John Nagl's Eating Soup with a Knife, was built on the notion that the British army of the 1950s was a "learning institution," while the American Army of the 1960s was not.

Writing in the RUSI Journal, Little charges that there are "serious systemic shortcomings" that aren't being addressed, most notably a command climate in which "bad news is routinely camouflaged."

The current climate, with themes of deteriorating communication, intolerance of dissent, tolerance of toxicity, poorly designed processes and perceived tolerance of inadequate senior officer performance, is a real obstacles to learning and adapting."

Where, he wonders, are. Nagls and Yinglings of the British military -- or a General Petraeus willing to listen to them and protect them?

He recommends several major reforms, including:

• Seeking foreign perspectives on British strategy, tactics and doctrine, especially from those who have fought alongside the British military.
• "Re-invigorating" professional writing.
• Creating and using "red teams" to critique concepts and policy.
• Educating officers more in sociology, anthropology and international development, with more emphasis on languages
• Introducing 360-degree appraisals

This all makes sense to me. I think he tends to think the U.S. military has changed more than it has, but he is correct in crediting our military has moved in the right direction.

(HT to JB)

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