Here we go again.
The State Department is warning U.S. diplomats they may be forced to serve in Iraq next year and says it will soon start identifying prime candidates for jobs at the Baghdad embassy and outlying provinces, according to a cable obtained Tuesday by The Associated Press.
A similar call-up notice last year caused an […]

I like this comment made in a blog post about the recently released National Intelligence Estimate deflating the Bush administration’s rhetoric advocating bombing Iran:
It reminds me of that quote from Kurt von Hammerstein:
I divide officers into four classes — the clever, the lazy, the stupid and the industrious. Each officer possesses at least two of […]

GovExec.com is reporting that Foreign Service Officers — the folks who work for the State Department at embassies around the world — are upset over a new policy that would force them to serve in Iraq:
Several hundred U.S. diplomats vented anger and frustration Wednesday about the State Department’s decision to force foreign service officers to […]

Captain Bill Putnam, an Army Reserve intelligence officer, suggests in the Small Wars Journal that soccer may be an effective strategy for building national unity in Iraq, a prerequisite for American withdrawal:
Soccer is Iraq’s only true national sport. The passion it generates is twice that of the Super Bowl or the College Football national championship. […]

Here’s the CIA’s new anti-terrorist logo:

I sincerely hope they didn’t hand over millions of dollars to a marketing/design firm to develop that.

I completely agree with Abu Muqawama:
Abu Muqawama has always been a big fan of the late French intellectual Raymond Aron. Aron, writing in his newspaper column for Le Figaro, believed it was the responsibility of the public intellectual to make a careful study of the issues at hand — economics, military strategy, etc. — before […]

[Hotel Tango: Mary]

Great article from The Australian about David Kilcullen, an expert in counterinsurgency and adviser to General Petraeus in Iraq:
. . . [W]hen the invasion of Iraq was being planned, Kilcullen was one of a handful of senior military advisers in the coalition of the willing to voice a dissenting view. “I was one of a […]

My little brother just sent over these pictures he took of the POW/MIA Memorial at Hanscom Air Force Base, Massachusetts.
Lest we forget . . .

The FBI-California Highway Patrol Joint Counter-terrorism Task Force has asked right-wing-nut David Horowitz’s organization, the David Horowitz Freedom Center (pride is a sin, Dave), to provide them with a copy of their video, “What Every American Needs to Know About Jihad,” to train their officers.
You can view the ridiculous video here. Then head over […]