It appears Rob and I have much in common. From the Which Historic General Are You test (via Curzon at Coming Anarchy):You are...Julius CaesarYou scored 53 Wisdom, 73 Tactics, 59 Guts, and 45 Ruthlessness!Filed as: diversion

Chilling story in the Washington Post this morning on the lack of free speech in Afghanistan four years after the US invasion and toppling of the Taliban regime. What's so disturbing is that it's the type of story I expected to read before we brought down the Taliban.Additionally, Rodger has a post on the seemingly delusional Senator Mitch McConnell who stated that the transition in Iraq has been "rather smooth". Rather smooth? Compared to what? The French Revolution??Filed as: Democracy, Afghanistan, Iraq

From my fellow Quakers over at The Apollo Creed, a must read on the fallacious 'War on Christmas'. Check it out.Filed as: War on Christmas

On the topic of why the secularization of politics is not such a bad thing.Short, eloquent, and to the point.Filed as: secularism and sectarianism

Now certainly we can all agree that many of the most inflamatory, anti-Israeli statements from Iran's newest President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, have been targeted towards a certain segment of his domestic audience and possibly segments of the Arab world. This is quite common for politicians of all types, since their continued power relies in part on their ability to maintain support from relevant actors, and this is done through signaling. However, there is a right and wrong way to signal so that you minimize the amount of negative reactions from other audiences who are obviously...

A friend of mine emailed me a link to Barry Posen's "Exit Strategy: How to Disengage with Iraq in Eighteenth Months", which appears in the next issue of the Boston Review. Posen argues, citing familiar evidence, that the occupation is not going particularly well. The insurgency shows no evidence of diminished strength and the Iraqi government shows no signs of being able to take over crucial administrative responsibilities. At the same time, the US presence makes the problem worse.First, Iraqi politicians will not apply sustained pressure to their security forces to improve themselves so...

As I alluded to in my last post, I've been doing exploratory research for a possible blog piece on the general vapidness of the "network" metaphor in a great many popular writings on terrorism and global change. In the process, I stumbled upon a Belmont Club post containing this gem:However perfectly networked the US military battlespace ever becomes, it is still an instrumentality of a state, an organizational type that took form in the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648.To which I say: No!Academics still debate the precise influence of the Peace of Westphalia (comprised of the Treaty of Münster...

Part of the Duck's ongoing mission is to highlight articles in academic international-relations journals that speak to topics of general concern among the blogging and blog-reading community. In that spirit, I want to call attention to the latest issue of International Security, which includes a provocative article by Alex Montgomery.Alex is a good friend of mine from our days together at the Center for International Security and Cooperation, so caveat emptor. In "Ringing in Proliferation: How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb Network," Montgomery slams current trends in US counterproliferation...