Intelligence Interviewing

Intelligence Interviewing - Approved for Release

The Science of Interpersonal Trust

The Science of Interpersonal Trust - Approved for Release

Randy Borum (2010). The Science of Interpersonal Trust Monograph

Guide to Armed Groups in DR Congo

DRC: Who’s who among armed groups in the east

Source: Integrated Regional Information Networks | UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs

KINSHASA, 15 June 2010 (IRIN) - Armed groups have caused severe suffering in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) over the years. Below are listed some that are active in the Kivu region. This information is gathered from various sources:

Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR)

The FDLR was formed by Rwandan Hutus linked to the 1994 genocide and includes former members of President Juvénal Habyarimana’s army and Interahamwe militia. After they were routed by President Paul Kagame’s troops following the genocide, they regrouped in DRC to plot a return to power in Kigali, forming an armed group that eventually became the FDLR.

Former DRC President Laurent-Désiré Kabila formed an alliance with the FDLR to battle Kigali’s influence in eastern Congo after 1998 and some joined his army. But Kabila’s son Joseph, now DRC president, allowed Rwandan troops to enter Congo in 2009 and hunt the FDLR. UN security sources estimated the number of FDLR at 3,000, down from 6,000 in 2009.

The group has an armed wing, FOCA (Forces Combattantes Abacunguzi) , which is active in South Kivu. FDLR has allied with other groups, such as Michel Rukunda’s Republican Federalist Forces (FRF), a South Kivu militia claiming to defend the interests of the Banyamulenge (Congolese ethnic Tutsis) and some Mai-Mai groups.

Mai-Mai groups

Its fighters, who spray themselves with “magic water to protect themselves from bullets”, are essentially self-defence militias formed on an ad-hoc basis by local leaders who arm young men in villages, often along ethnic lines.

Some of the larger ones are better known, such as the Congolese Resistance Patriots (PARECO) or Alliance of Patriots for a Free and Sovereign Congo (APCLS), which joined the peace process in March 2009, promising to transform into peaceful political parties.

On 2 June, 500 members of the Kifuafua Mai-Mai group returned to their positions in Walikale in North Kivu, claiming that their agreed integration into the army had been delayed for too long. Most Mai-Mai groups are local forces known by the name of their leader. The Yakutumba group, which bears the name of the “major-general” at their helm, kidnapped eight aid workers in South Kivu in April.

National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP)

The CNDP threatened to invade Goma, capital of North Kivu, in November 2008. Later, Rwanda placed its leader Laurent Nkunda under house arrest. Bosco Ntaganda, who is indicted by the International Criminal Court (ICC), replaced Nkunda and agreed to steer the group towards peace. In March 2009, the CNDP became a political party and 3,000-4,000 of its fighters joined the Congolese army. Some 1,000 to 2,000 are resisting integration.

Most observers believe the CNDP retained its chains of command within the army. The group administers much of Masisi district and is involved in a range of activities in North Kivu, from artisanal mining to charcoal trafficking and extortion. It is accused of organizing the transfer of its Rwandan supporters to Masisi, raising friction between Rwandese in DRC and other ethnic groups.

Patriotic Forces for the Liberation of Congo (FPLC)

The group, active in North Kivu, is led by General Gad Ngabo, who crossed into the Congolese district of Rutshuru from Uganda recently. Sources say he is recruiting across ethnic lines, gathering potential to compete with CNDP for control of some North Kivu areas. The group is estimated to number a few hundred fighters.

Allied Democratic Forces/National Army for the Liberation of Uganda (ADF/NALU)

Ugandan rebel leader Jamil Mukulu founded a Muslim militant group in the early 1990s, despite converting back and forth between Islam and Catholicism. Under pressure from the Ugandan army, he recruited officers from former dictator Idi Amin’s regime and amalgamated the NALU, another Ugandan rebel group believed to harbour supporters of former president Milton Obote.

The militia crossed into DRC in the mid-1990s and has remained in the Beni area of North Kivu. Analysts consider the group “dormant” with about 1,300 men. Peace negotiations between ADF/NALU, Uganda and the DRC began in 2009 with UN facilitation, but in April, the Congolese army blamed a deadly attack on a military training centre near Beni on a coalition of ADF/NALU and local Mai-Mai fighters.

Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA)

Joseph Kony founded the “Holy Spirit Mobile Force 2” in northern Uganda in 1987 after a rebel group by the same name was crushed while opposing President Yoweri Museveni’s government. In 1989, Kony renamed the militia the Lord’s Resistance Army, claiming that his objective was the establishment of a Christian-inspired theocracy in Uganda.

The LRA first moved into Southern Sudan in the mid-1990s but the 2005 Sudanese peace agreement and the indictment of Kony by the ICC forced the group to cross into DRC’s Garamba National Park.

In December 2008, Ugandan, Southern Sudanese and Congolese armies launched a joint offensive in Garamba, but failed to wipe out the LRA leadership. The group, which is divided into small groups, move on foot across the Uélés districts of northeastern Congo, the east of the Central African Republic (CAR) and parts of Southern Sudan.

Between December 2007 and April 2010, the group is believed to have killed 1,796 civilians and abducted 2,377 in Congo. It is particularly notorious for forced recruitment of child soldiers, turning boys into killers and girls into porters or sex slaves. It also mutilates lips and ears to terrorize the population.

Front for Patriotic Resistance in Ituri/Popular Front for Justice in Congo (FRPI/FPJC)

FRPI and its splinter group FPJC are active in the southern part of Ituri, where they battle government forces and UN peacekeepers. FRPI’s former commander Germain Katanga is on trial at the ICC with two other Ituri militia leaders for war crimes and crimes against humanity, including the recruitment of child soldiers, mass murder and rape. Analysts describe the group as “residual” yet its humanitarian toll remains high.

In 2009, about 5,000 people fled into the Mokato-Ngazi forest after fighting between the DRC army and FRPI/FPJC militants. When government forces and humanitarian agencies accessed the area three months later, an unknown number had starved to death. Jean-Claude Baraka, an FPJC leader, was recently arrested. But FRPI chief “Colonel Cobra” Matata, who had agreed to integrate the national army, reportedly deserted earlier this month to rejoin his militia in Ituri.

Enyele/Independent Movement of Liberation and Allies (MILIA)

Ethnic tensions dating back to the colonial era flared up last November in northwestern Equateur province. Members of the Lobala group, known as “Enyele” after the name of the village where the violence erupted over fishing rights, first attacked the border town of Dongo and defeated police sent to quash them. Civilians fled across the river to the Republic of Congo, and only 20,000 residents have returned.

Adopting the acronym MILIA, they moved southwards across the jungle and stormed the provincial capital, Mbandaka, on 4 April. They also disrupted supplies as far as the eastern city of Kisangani.

On 5 May, the DRC arrested Ondjani Mangbama, the Enyele leader, but his status remains unclear. The Enyele insurrection began in former Congolese ruler Mobutu Sese Seko’s Equateur home province, now a stronghold of Jean-Pierre Bemba’s MLC opposition party.

Armed forces of the DRC (FARDC)

The FARDC has been accused by human rights groups of involvement in criminal activities, but the government denies the accusations. In 2009, its 213th brigade was cited in the deaths of civilians in Lukweti, North Kivu, during the UN-backed Kimia 2 offensive against the FDLR.


Report can be found online HERE

Failed States 2010

The Fund for Peace and Foreign Policy Magazine have released their 2010 Failed States Index. This is the sixth year of this extraordinary project and it is well worth a look.

These are the 12 Indicators used in the Index:

Social Indicators
I-1. Mounting Demographic Pressures

• I-2. Massive Movement of Refugees or Internally Displaced Persons creating Complex Humanitarian Emergencies
• I-3. Legacy of Vengeance-Seeking Group Grievance or Group Paranoia
• I-4. Chronic and Sustained Human Flight

Economic Indicators

• I-5. Uneven Economic Development along Group Lines
• I-6. Sharp and/or Severe Economic Decline

Political Indicators

• I-7. Criminalization and/or Delegitimization of the State
• I-8. Progressive Deterioration of Public Services
• I-9. Suspension or Arbitrary Application of the Rule of Law and Widespread Violation of Human Rights
• I-10. Security Apparatus Operates as a "State Within a State"
• I-11. Rise of Factionalized Elites
• I-12. Intervention of Other States or External Political Actors

Overall, the Top Ten hasn't shifted much since last year's report. Same crew - just slight movements in position. In fact, the Top Ten list of the most unstable has remained persistently stable since the the project first started. Somalia still leads the list. Chad rises to 2nd place, followed by Sudan, Zimbabwe, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Just to give you a sense of what it means to top that list, Rawanda comes in at #41 and Kyrgzstan at #45 (just a few notches above Israel, by the way).

Four Countries are on the "Watch List":

• Guatemala
• Honduras
• Nigeria
• Iran

Somalia, is #1 with a bullet - - or a bunch of bullets -- now approaching 20 years of civil conflict, it continues to lack any essential infrastructure, to be unable to provide its people with basic services or security, and to be plagued by ubiquitous crime and violence. Piracy, it seems, is the only business that's booming - earning about $89 million is ransom last year alone.

Chad, which comes in at #2 has spillover problems from #3 Sudan, plus it own burden of nearly a quarter million internally displaced persons, and the oppressive anti-rule-of-law leadership of President Idriss Déby. Opposition? No problem - just lock 'em up. Or worse. And, by the way, the food and supplies provided for humanitarian relief? He'll be taking those for his military. Unbelievable.

Sudan stays at the unenviable #3 spot. Another hot spot for factional North-South violence, Sudan is potentially facing a major tipping point in the next six months. In January, the South Sudanese are scheduled to vote on whether to secede from Sudan and establish itself as an independent state. If Sudan is such a mess, you might ask why anyone would care. President Omar al-Bashir, a War Crime Hall of Fame Indictee from International Criminal Court, knows that the South is the center of the country's major resource of any value - oil.

The 2010 Failed States Index ranks 177 states according to 12 social, economic, political, and military indicators based on data from more than 90,000 publicly available sources. A listing of the 60 most vulnerable countries is featured in the July/August 2010 issue of FOREIGN POLICY. For a complete ranking of all countries and methodology, please go to www.fundforpeace.org or www.foreignpolicy.com.

Source: The Fund for Peace & Foreign Policy Magazine

Starting a War in the Aftermath of Disaster

Starting a War in the Aftermath of Disaster

In an increasingly complex global environment, we need to look differently at security threats and solutions. A new study conducted by Travis Nelson from University of Vermont carefully examines the security nexus of natural disaster and armed conflict over the past half century using data from the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Emergency Events Database (EM-DAT). He included those disasters that killed 10,000 or more people.

Previously, research has shown that large scale natural disasters can increase the risk for subsequent civil or intrastate conflict, but may also create opportunity for new cooperation and diplomacy between competitive states. Nelson looks at two questions regarding the relationship between disaster and interstate conflict. The first is to explore the “opportunistic conflict” hypothesis that unaffected rival nation’s will prey upon their competitors when they are stricken with a disaster. The second explore the “internal conflict hypothesis” to see whether disasters change a state’s strategic or otherwise shape their foreign policy toward initiating conflict.

Opportunistic Conflict : While intuitively, one might think that a competitor would seize the opportunity to leverage the other’s devastation and vulnerability by initiating conflict, this isn’t what happens. Interestingly, the study finds “no support for the opportunistic conflict hypothesis and that there is, in fact, not a single case (since 1950) in which interstate conflict was initiated by an opponent state in the aftermath of disaster” (p. 156).

Internal Conflict: The second piece of the study builds on what is already known about how disaster heightens a state’s risk for internal civil conflict. Nelson asks whether it also might heighten the risk that a disaster-stricken state would initiate conflict against a competitor, and if so why and how that happens. The study finds that states do sometimes initiate conflict while they are in the aftermath of a recovering from their own disaster. This seems to happen most often when the disaster first precipitated or heightened civil conflict and when disaster recovery was very badly managed. This means it is the most devastated and vulnerable states that wind up initiating conflict against others.

This study makes a thoughtful contribution to the literature in International Relations. It also reminds us of how complex emergency management and “all hazards” approaches are not just domestic or public health issues, but are integrated with our vital global security and foreign policy interests.

Nelson, T. (2010). When disaster strikes: on the relationship between natural disaster and interstate conflict Global Change, Peace & Security, 22 (2), 155-174 DOI: 10.1080/14781151003770788

The "Urban Legend" of Civilian Casualty Rates in War

Adam Roberts - part of the Oxford Leverhulme Programme on the Changing Character of War - has a very thoughtful aticle in the latest issue of Survival, titled: "Lives and Statistics: Are 90% of War Victims Civilians?".

Roberts takes on the commonly made assertion that in contemporary warfare (since the early 1900s)that 80-90% of war victims/casualties have been civilians. This would suggest a civilian-military death ratio of 9:1. It is easy for such a startling statistic to take on a life of its own - and it has, according to Roberts, having been cited without empirical support in venues as influential as the British Medical Journal.

He traces the origins of the claim back to a set of statements in a couple of influential reports in the early 1990s that were broad inferential estimates based on some questionable assumptions - not verified counts of any kind - and that used a very broad definition of what constitutes a war casualty - including suffering from famine or displacement.

Roberts also traces some of the skepticism of these claims by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), contradictory data from the World Health Organization (WHO), and the intellectual melee that ensued from the Human Security Report, which has argued that in today's wars "actual death tolls are relatively small—and have been decreasing" (p.2) and said the notion that 90% of those killed by fighting in today’s wars are civilians is a "myth". Her goes on to present evidence of civilian and military casualties from particular wars that suggest a much lower ratio.

He concludes with a spirited call for better empirical data from actual wars and a caution that propagating the 9:1 ratio proposition - though intended to focus attention on protecting civilians - may have had at least three deleterious effects:

Firstly, it has not merely reflected, but also perpetuated, a misleadingly homogenised view of contemporary wars, when in reality each of them (and even each party to them) is unique in its character and in its consequences for civilians. Secondly, it has obscured significant achievements in civilian protection resulting from actions by states, international organisations and non-governmental organisations (NGOs). And thirdly, it has diverted attention from substantial issues to disputes about numbers and methodologies (pp. 128-129).

Adam Roberts (2010). Lives and Statistics: Are 90% of War Victims Civilians? Survival, 52 (3), 115-136 : 10.1080/00396338.2010.494880

FP Globalization Junkie Quiz

The FP Globalization Quiz

May/June 2010

Are you a globalization junkie? Then test your knowledge of global trends, economics, and politics with 8 questions about how the world works.

(SGSAC: I very rarely get these all right, but I do love the quizzes)

1. If the United States deported all its illegal immigrants at once, how long would the bus convoy be?

• a) 18 miles b) 180 miles c) 1,800 miles

2. The world's wind-power generation capacity increased how much in 2009?

• a) 11 percent b) 21 percent c) 31 percent

3. Which country had the highest rate of economic growth in 2009?

• a) Afghanistan b) China c) Qatar

4. In 2009, China produced 568 million metric tons of crude steel. How much did the No. 2 country produce?

• a) 88 million metric tons b) 298 million c) 458 million

5. Which country spends the most time on social-networking websites?

• a) Australia b) Japan c) United States

6. Which country had the lowest rate of economic growth in 2009?

• a) Latvia b) Lithuania c) Iceland

7. How much did new-car registrations change last year globally?

• a) 14 percent decrease b) no change c) 7 percent increase

8. By how many percentage points did worldwide unemployment change from 1999 to 2009?

a) up 0.2 points b) up 1.2 points c) up 2.2 points

Answers are HERE.

Droning On About UAVs

Droning On About UAVs

At just about the same time last year, there was a flurry of debate about the use of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) - commonly referred to as "drones" – to target enemy combatants. Now, there is another flurry with the same arguments, and fundamentally the same debate.

While much of the back-and-forth involves arguments about the challenges and potential failures of the UAV program, its advocates have also documented their success in removing otherwise inaccessible bad guys from the battlespace, while keeping U.S. and ISAF troops out of harm’s way and averting nasty exchanges of gunfire. So-even if it’s complicated - their potential value should not be dismissed lightly.

Every anti-drone commentator clearly describes the contours and texture of the elephant part that she or he is currently touching. At the risk of drastically over-simplifying a complex set of issues, drone opponents seem to have three basic points of concern – but the empirical evidence in support of these points is less than completely clear:

1. That drones inflict an unacceptable and disproportionate number of civilian casualties;
2. That targeting specific individuals for these attacks is tantamount to assassination or execution; and
3. That America’s use of attack drones is unpopular and breeds resentment toward the U.S. – perhaps even igniting a surge in homegrown radicalization.

If one accepts the assumption that killing an enemy during war is at least sometimes justified, points 1 and 2 seem somewhat related. When using lethal kinetic force in contemporary combat operations, most state forces seek to maximize the selectivity with which enemy combatants are killed, while avoiding or minimizing harm to the civil population.

Of course, in insurgencies, this is much more easily said than done. Innocents and combatants do not wear different colored hats as they meander about. And, in reality, the dualistic civilian-combatant distinction is often … shall we say… fuzzy. Beyond that, I will leave the legal and ethical parsing and comparisons to others who are much smarter and better informed about these things than I am.

Regarding the notion that drones inflict an unacceptable number of civilian casualties, Christine Fair has observed that no real “data” have been presented about drone-inflicted civilian casualties. The Pakistani Taliban - whose motives might be in question – are the only source of reporting to the local Pakstani press – and the Pakistani press reports are the source for most of the international news outlets. So newspaper reports may be a less-than-optimal data source. She notes, personally, that “high-level Pakistani officials have conceded to me that very few civilians have been killed by drones and their innocence is often debatable.”

Regarding the assertion that America’s use of attack drones is unpopular and breeds resentment toward the U.S. – perhaps even igniting a surge in homegrown radicalization, this again may be difficult to discern – for at least two reasons. First, local sentiment about drone attacks and their effects mostly come from local reporting and “word-of-mouth.” Even if they are unpopular, the reasons (and there may be many) for that unpopularity may or may not have any basis in fact. Second, survey results – some of which are available - depend heavily on how the questions are framed. So if someone asks you if you hate the U.S. drone attack program – you might ask yourself: “relative to what?” Face-to-face firefights between ISAF forces and Pakistani Taliban are certainly no less likely result in collateral casualties, and the Pakistani people already are reported to fear the Pakistani army's tactics. Fair states:

What is clear enough, however, is that the drone strikes, however unpopular they may be, are likely to be more popular than the realistic alternatives: the Taliban's violence or the Pakistani army's operations, which have displaced millions. Mosharraf Zaidi, a Pakistani journalist and commentator, vividly captured the complex reality in his May 11 piece in The News: ‘The relative popularity of drones is almost as emphatic as their absolute unpopularity. Pakistani military operations have a reputation in the region now, for being so brutal, that entire parts of towns are destroyed. Drones that destroy one or two homes at a time, obviously represent less damage, and therefore, an option that is preferable to the military's artillery campaigns.’

We need to understand empirically the challenges associated with UAV attacks not just anecdotally argue about them. In my post last year, I posed the following:

In the current era of "effects-based operations," shouldn't the moral (in the Clausewitizian sense) costs and benefits of drone attacks be explicitly anticipated, measured, and weighed as part of operational planning? USJFCOM defines an “effect” as "the physical and/or behavioral state of a system that results from an action, a set of actions, or another effect. A desired effect represents a condition for achieving an associated strategic or operational objective, while undesired effect could inhibit progress toward the same objective" (I-3).

Charli Carpenter suggested in a recent posting that “It’s Not About the Drones, It's About How We Use Them.” I think neither drone technology nor popularity is the real issue here. The intelligence-driven targeting process and decisions about who should be killed where and how can be debated from ethical and legal perspectives, but the UAV is simply the delivery system of lethal force – it is not the “decider.”

Moreover, if we could get reliable data, we might still conclude that UAV attacks are unpopular among the Pakstani population. But popularity is not the issue – legitimacy is the issue. Popularity doesn’t drive defense policy. I’m sure lots of things in war are unpopular, but if the actions are lawful, then the interest of the state using that force is primarily not to undermine its own legitimacy.

This leads to the second facet of the problem that we need to get a handle on – the perceptions. That the Pakistani Taliban can control the “narrative” of U.S. drone attacks may be at least as big of a problem as any actual effects of those attacks in shaping what people think of America. The “buzz” about UAVs may primarily be an instrument of TTP’s informational power.

Memorial Day Reflection

America has lost 4,391 servicemembers in Iraq and 1,074 in Afghanistan. Today, Vice President Joe Biden, Deputy Defense Secretary William J. Lynn III and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Navy Adm. Mike Mullen convened at Arlington National Cemetery to pay tribute to them and to those who came before them. Mr Biden said:

“Collectively, the generation of soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines who have served and sacrificed for us are the heart and soul...of this nation. And as a nation, we pause today to remember them; they gave their lives fulfilling their oath to this nation and to us. And in doing so, they imparted a responsibility on us to recognize, to respect, to honor and to care for those who risked their lives so that we can live our lives.”

“They lived with integrity; they served nobly; they gave everything. They fought for what they believed in and maybe most importantly, they believed in something bigger than themselves. “They believed ... in all of us and they believed in America. So on this day, this solemn day, let us strive once again to be individuals in a nation worthy of that belief.”

May God Bless America.

The Psychology of Leaking Sensitive Information

The Psychology of Leaking Sensitive Information

Group Inequality, Conflict and Peacebuilding

USIP has released a new Peace Brief summarizing discussions from their event held February 22, 2010: “Will Decreasing Horizontal Inequalities Reduce the Likelihood of Political Violence?.”

Summary

• Political, socioeconomic or cultural inequalities among groups could potentially motivate political violence in societies. Research has shown that political inequalities between groups are most likely to motivate leaders, while socioeconomic inequalities motivate followers.
• Political violence is most likely to occur when there is a confluence of exclusionary governance and economic and social marginalization imposed by one group on another.
• In order to minimize the likelihood of conflict, policies should first address the political inequalities that most often provide a catalyst for the leadership of a violent uprising. Reducing the immediacy of conflict allows for subsequent work to address the socioeconomic inequalities that could eventually mobilize the group members at large.
• Going forward, there should be more research into group dynamics and conflict-triggers, coordinated international assistance to ensure optimal policy sequencing, inclusion of equality as an aspect of humanitarian and development programs and increased training and sensitization to group inequalities.

Details of this event, including the audio and Stewart’s PowerPoint presentation, are available online HERE.

On Patriotism & Prejudice

National Identity and Outgroup Prejudice

Having a strong national identity does not necessarily foster prejudice or derogation of other groups. Antipathy toward other groups depends more on how one’s identity is represented - whether people draw us-them distinctions based on ethnic factors or civic factors, like citizenship, according to a new study published in the British Journal of Social Psychology.

Professor Joke Meeus and colleagues from Katholieke Universiteit in Belgium undertook this study to better understand the nature of what is often called “intergroup discrimination.” Social psychologists have long observed that people construct their identities (sense of self) based – at least in part – on their perceived “membership” in various groups or categories. For example, a person might define him/herself as being both British and Muslim. People who are considered British would comprise one ingroup. People who are considered Muslim might comprise another ingroup. Those who are non-British would be outgroup members, as would those who are non-Muslim.

Two common dynamics that tend to drive ingroup-outgroup (intergroup) relationships are: (1) ingroup favoritism (a tendency to evaluate and behave more favorably toward other ingroup members); and (2) outgroup derogation (a tendency to evaluate and behave more negatively toward other outgroup members. The authors of this study suggest, however that these two dynamics are not always interrelated – and that they may vary independently. They cite prior research from political science showing that the strength of one’s national (ingroup) identity often does not predict the degree of outgroup derogation They believe this may occur because ingroup membership criteria are not always very clear cut. So – notions of what constitutes the British ingroup for some might be bounded by native birth, for others it may be citizenship, still others might more broadly include current residency (to include immigrants). For some people and for some countries, national identity tends to be based more on ethnic factors; that is, ethnicity, not citizenship, drives the ingroup-outgroup distinction.

This study sought to explore the role of these different bases for ingroup/national identity membership in understanding the connections between in-group identification and ethnic prejudice. They conducted this inquiry using the national context of Flanders, Belgium.

They assessed Flemish in-group identification with the following four items:

• ‘I am proud to be Flemish’
• ‘Being Flemish is important to me’
• ‘I feel a bond with Flemish people’
• ‘I feel Flemish’

Then the researchers assessed the basis for (representation of) participants’ national identification, using a series of items measuring an ethnic basis (e.g., ‘Mixing Flemish culture with other cultures should be prevented’) and a civic basis (e.g., ‘Someone who settles permanently in Flanders and who follows all basic rules, should receive all rights as a Flemish citizen’). Finally, the degree of ethnic prejudice was measured by a series of items pertaining to ‘Moroccans who are born in Belgium or who have lived here throughout most of their lives’ (e.g., ‘Their presence is a threat to our own culture and customs’).

The team conducted two studies. The first included 397 Dutch-speaking first year psychology students from a Belgian university, and the second study – a longitudinal one (measuring at two time points, one year apart) to predict prejudice over time– surveyed 443 Dutch-speaking 11th grade secondary school students.

They found the following results:

• People with higher national (ingroup) identification tended to base their identification more on ethnic than on civic factors.
• People with higher national (ingroup) identification tended to have higher levels of ethnic prejudice.
• So –“ the more people identify with their Flemish in-group, the more likely they are to view this in-group in more ethnic terms, which in turn, should lead them to exhibit more ethnic prejudice” (p. 317).
• A similar trend happened when they looked at the relationships over time. Students with a high initial level of national (ingroup) identification, tended over time, to increasingly rely on an ethnic basis for that identity, and that ethnic focus later produced higher levels of ethnic (outgroup) prejudice.

The implication seems to be that prejudice and the basis for national identity seem to be interrelated. People with a strong national identification tend to become more prejudiced than those with a weaker national identification. And, importantly, the greater prejudice seems to be caused by the fact they increasingly regard or represent the ingroup-outgroup differences in ethnic terms.

The flip side is that people who are more prejudiced also seem to base their national identity more on ethnic distinctions – perhaps to justify their outgroup derogation.

One wonders how this might apply in an ethnically complex area, where the sense of collective national identity is still relatively weak. And how this might affect outside efforts to shape or strengthen that identity. And how it might affect outgroup perceptions of those seeking to shape or strengthen others' ingroup identity.


Meeus, J., Duriez, B., Vanbeselaere, N., & Boen, F. (2010). The role of national identity representation in the relation between in-group identification and out-group derogation: Ethnic versus civic representation British Journal of Social Psychology, 49 (2), 305-320 DOI: 10.1348/014466609X451455

Teaching Strategy - Free (and Excellent) Book

Teaching Strategy: Challenge and Response

Edited by Dr. Gabriel Marcella
USAWC Strategic Studies Institute

The thoughtful scholars from SSI have again produced an excellent compendium - this time tackling the topic of how to teach strategy. This is not a "current events" discussion of which strategy we should adopt for our current conflicts, but rather a deeper, more deliberative look at what strategy is, why it is important, how to conceive of it, and how we can effectively impart it to the next generation of military, diplomatic, and political leaders who must deploy it in an increasingly complex and dynamic geopolitical environment.

Some of the material pertains specifically to the military's PME institutions and senior service colleges, but there is a great deal of material here that will interest any serious serious student of strategy.

The the book opens with a statement by the SSI Director (Douglas Lovelace) acknowledging that:

No subject is more essential in the preparation of national security professionals and military leaders than the teaching of strategy, from grand to military strategy. Nor is there one that is more timeless and intellectually demanding.

The US has long been criticized for having a chronic and severe "strategy deficit." I am hopeful that the wisdom from this volume will help to prepare its future leaders for the challenges ahead. The following is brief synopsis provided by SSI and a listing of the book's contents.

Teaching all strategy, from grand to military, is essential in the preparation of national security professionals and military leaders. The experience of the armed forces in recent wars recommends that those involved with the system of military education seriously study the way strategy is taught. The task is even more imperative because the ambiguous conflicts and the complex geopolitical environment of the future are likely to challenge the community of strategists, civilian as well as military, in ways not seen in the past. In this context, developing the appropriate curriculum and effective methods of teaching strategy will be the responsibility of universities, colleges, and institutions of professional military education. The authors of this compendium ask and answer the central question of how to teach strategy. The findings, insights, and recommendations in this volume are those of professionals who are accomplished in the classroom as well as the crucible of strategy.

Table of Contents:

Introduction -Robert H. Dorff

1. The Elements of Strategic Thinking: A Practical Guide - Robert Kennedy
2. The Study of Strategy: A Civilian Academic Perspective - Robert C. Gray
3. Teaching Strategy in the 21st Century - Gabriel Marcella and Stephen O. Fought
4. Teaching Strategy: A Scenic View from Newport - Bradford A. Lee
5. A Vision of Developing the National Security Strategist from the National War College -Cynthia A. Watson
6. How Do Students Learn Strategy? Thoughts on the U.S. Army War College Pedagogy of Strategy - Harry R. Yarger
7. The Teaching of Strategy: Lykke’s Balance, Schelling’s Exploitation, and a Community of Practice in Strategic Thinking -Thomaz Guedes da Costa
8. Making Sense of Chaos: Teaching Strategy Using Case Studies - Volker Franke
9. Teaching Strategy in 3D - Ross Harrison
10. Beyond Ends-Based Rationality: A Quad-Conceptual View of Strategic Reasoning for Professional Military Education - Christopher R. Paparone

You can download the entire book FREE from the SSI site HERE

Understanding & Reintegrating the Neo-Taliban

On Wednesday, April 21, 2010, Marine Corps University concluded their Emerald Express Strategic Symposium - "Afghanistan: The Way Ahead" - with a Panel Discussion on “Defining, Dealing and Defeating the Neo-Taliban and Their Message.”

The panel was moderated by Dr. Amin Tarzi, Director, Middle East Studies at Marine Corps University, with two key speakers: Lieutenant General (Ret) Sir Graeme C.M. Lamb, UK Advisor To General McChrystal For Reintegration, ISAF Headquarters, Kabul and Michael Semple, Research Fellow, Carr Center For Human Rights, Harvard University and author of “Talking to the Taliban” and “Reconciliation in Afghanistan,”

Dr. Tarzi opened the panel with the question of how to define – and what to call – the adversary in Afghanistan. Locally, they are sometimes referred to as “enemies of peace and security.” Tarzi refers to them as “Neo-Taliban” elements.

LTGEN Lamb opened with an 1897 quote from Sir Winston Churchill on the Afghan adversary:

“Their system of ethics, which regards treachery and violence as virtues rather than vices, has produced a code of honor so strange, so inconsistent, that it is incomprehensible to a logical mind. I have been told that if a white man could grasp it fully and were to understand their mental impulses, if he knew when it was their honor to stand by him and when it was their honor to betray him, when they were bound to protect and when to kill him, he might – he might – by judging his times and opportunities, pass safely from one end of the mountains to the other.” The challenge that Winston presents us is, can we?

When Lamb landed on the ground in Afghanistan, he assessed the terrain as concluded that the people there were in the grips of widespread intimidation. In describing the current “Neo-Taliban,” Lamb suggests:
 

Well, they’re not a simple, monolithic entity, as many imagine, but a collective of principally Afghans and a number of foreign fighters operating in Afghanistan and Pakistan, its leadership displaced and somewhat distant, in Pakistan. A diverse and independent, albeit eclectic group of experienced combatant leaders inside Afghanistan – facilitators, messengers, quartermasters, paymasters – their foot soldiers drawn from the numerous tribes and villages and their supporters ranging from aggrieved communities to staunch Taliban heartlands.

Regarding the question of what feeds and sustains this movement with a continuing flow of fighters, Lamb observes that some are “committed forever to global jihad, others to the removal of foreigners from their country, (but) most (are) drawn to fight on a manifesto manipulated by a few, on the (mythical) promise of some new Afghan age.”

The bulk of these fighters – young men who ISAF have previously and still occasionally categorize on a broad canvas of an enemy – the Afghans see as sad and upset brothers. Now, you might suggest they’re pretty upset. But that’s how they see them, many of them – sad and upset brothers. The term upset brother captures, rather nicely, the majority of those we need to convince that the cause for which they fight is a poor one by addressing their complaints head on. And understanding and situational awareness is not good enough.

Semple also commented on some the Taliban’s evolving characteristics – and how the Neo-Taliban might differ from the “Old School” Taliban. One of the key areas of contrast

“is this whole issue of the structural relationship between the Taliban movement and Pakistan. Although when the Taliban movement emerged in ’94, it was rooted inside Afghan politics, its sweeping across Afghanistan was, of course, rooted to the intervention of Pakistan in Afghanistan. So there was this symbiosis. …. {Today}, he says, “just about every single commander network which is fighting the insurgency today has a real presence inside Pakistan. And this is something much bigger than just being Pakistan (or ISI) proxies. …This is something about – the people who are organizing the insurgency have found access to cultural and economic resources, which have got long historical roots, which transcend the border.”

What is the way forward to counter this Neo-Taliban movement? Lamb believes we can either “elect to fight them to an unpredictable and costly finish, or we can take the opportunity of a new course of action.. by opening a dialogue with them and their leaders in order to develop a better and broader understanding between ourselves.” He suggests that the foundation of a successful reintegration process lies in understanding (though not surrendering or capitulating to) the adversary’s view, their interests, and their grievances.

“By understanding this anger better than we have presents us with the opportunity to see individuals and groups seeking a way out of the annual cycle of violence. The challenge is to identify and then put your finger on why would they want to reintegrate and when and where to reintegrate to…. We need to convince them through an active and attractive program, including deradicalization, demobilization, skills, training, education and employment, to move from fighter to free man, with a real choice and opportunity.”

You can read the full transcript of this and other symposium panels or listen to audio files HERE

Conflict Networks: Collapsing the Global into the Local

Recent decades have seen a dual and simultaneous shift in conflict trends. With the end of the Cold War and superpower support, conflicts have become increasingly intrastate and increasingly localized, dependent for their sustenance upon local assistance and national resources. Yet this localization of conflict has coincided with the increasingly international aspect of conflicts, with humanitarian intervention and UN peacekeeping becoming ever more prevalent. The aim of this paper is to provide a framework for understanding these shifting relations between the global and the local. This is accomplished through an analysis of actor-network theory and its rejoinders to reductionist understandings of conflict. Rather than reducing the eruption of violence down to greed, grievance, or ancient hatred, actor-network theory aims to examine conflict networks and their specific composition of local, material, and global actors. Three aspects of these networks are highlighted in particular: the personal networks of local individuals, the material actors, and the conflict network as a system. With these clarified the final section turns to an analysis of some of the primary modalities through which global actors relate and embed themselves within local networks.

You can read the full article HERE

Preventing Conflict in the "Stans" (USIP)

Preventing Conflict in the "Stans"

April 2010 | Peace Brief by Jonas Claes

Summary

On February 16, USIP convened an expert meeting on Central Asia to build a greater understanding of regional stability issues that could affect U.S. development aims. This meeting and the ‘Kyrgyz revolution’ in early April inspired this Peace Brief, which will assess the region-wide factors driving and mitigating the potential for conflict as well as some of the conflict dynamics unique to each country specifically. This brief focuses on Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, the Central Asian countries most prone to conflict.

• Several destabilizing dynamics persist throughout eastern Central Asia, such as weak governance, poor social and economic conditions, ethnic tensions and religious militancy. While these differ in kind and scope in each country, some conflict drivers are transnational in scope, such as energy insecurity and environmental degradation.
• Most factors mitigating or managing conflict-risks--such as foreign capital injections, migrant remittances and Soviet-style repression--are unsustainable and could trigger future violence.
• Given the deep Uzbek suspicion of any foreign, particularly Western, presence in the region, conflict prevention efforts should primarily focus on the Kyrgyz and Tajik side of the Ferghana Valley, a potential hotbed of instability.
• The U.S. government (USG) should coordinate its engagements in Central Asia with regional powers China and Russia; these efforts should be complemented by policy initiatives that tackle the unique challenges facing each country.

You can read the full report HERE

FFI Report on Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan – Organization, Leadership and Worldview

Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan – Organization, Leadership and Worldview

Norwegian Defense Research Establishment (FFI) Report

By: Anne Stenersen

Report Summary

The aim of this report is to get a better understanding of the Taliban movement and its role in the Afghan insurgency post-2001. The approach to this is three-fold: First, the report discusses the nature of the Afghan insurgency as described in existing literature. The second part looks at the organizational characteristics of the largest and most well-known insurgent group in Afghanistan: the Taliban movement (or Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, IEA) led by Mullah Omar. The third and most extensive part of the report analyses the Taliban leadership’s ideology and worldview, based on the official statements of its organization and leaders.

The report argues that the Taliban sees itself as a nationalist-religious movement, which fights mainly to resurrect the Taliban regime of the 1990s and to bring the various ethnic groups of Afghanistan under its rule. The Taliban’s agenda differs from that of its foreign allies (al-Qaida, Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan and others) because its primary concern is fighting for Islam within the context of Afghanistan’s borders, while the foreign groups aim to spread their fight to other countries as well. Still, the Taliban appears to have a closer relationship with its foreign allies than with the other major insurgent leader in Afghanistan, Gulbuddin Hekmatyar. In spite of their common goals (ending foreign occupation of Afghanistan and establishing an Islamic state), their relationship can be described as pragmatic at best. The main fault line in the Taliban’s relationship with its various allies appears to be centered on power and authority, rather than ideological disagreement.

The Taliban spends considerable time and resources on attacking Afghan targets, and on justifying these attacks through their propaganda. The report argues that this is not merely a pragmatic choice due to the relative easiness of attacking Afghan targets. Rather, it is a deliberate strategy on part of the Taliban, because the Taliban leadership’s primary concern is to contest for power locally, not to kill foreigners in itself. This corresponds with existing theories of insurgencies, which describe the insurgency as a conflict primarily between the insurgent movement (the Taliban) and the local government (the Karzai regime). Outside actors such as NATO, the United States, Pakistan or even al-Qaida may play an important, but nevertheless a secondary, role compared to the role played by the Afghan regime.

Lastly, the report discusses the Taliban leadership’s attitudes towards negotiations and power-sharing. For the time being, it looks like any attempt to negotiate with the Taliban leadership directly would serve to strengthen the insurgent movement, rather than weakening it. A more realistic approach is probably to try to weaken the Taliban’s coherence through negotiating with, and offering incentives to, low-level commanders and tribal leaders inside Afghanistan. The insurgent movement consists of a wide variety of actors, which may be seen as proof of its strength – but it could also constitute a weakness if properly and systematically exploited. This effort, however, requires extensive resources, both in terms of manpower and knowledge of the Afghan realities.