Robert Farley

LOCKERBIE. To follow up on Scott’s post over at LGM, this article on the investigation into the Lockerbie bombing is really quite fascinating. Hugh Miles suggests that the verdict and investigation may have been heavily influenced by the United States, to the extent that evidence was stacked against the Libyan defendant. Miles puts forth an […]

WHAT WAS THAT ABOUT AEI NOT BEING HACK-TASTIC? From Defense News: As the “baby boomer” generation nears retirement age, U.S. officials should overhaul Social Security and other entitlement programs to ensure Washington can afford a robust military capable of thwarting future threats, according to an American Enterprise Institute (AEI) panel. Citing Bush administration data, the […]

LIBYA? We approached Libya about hosting AFRICOM? Algeria and Libya separately ruled out hosting the Defense Department’s planned Africa Command, known as AFRICOM, and said they were firmly against any of their neighbors doing so either. U.S. diplomats said they were disappointed by the depth of opposition, given that the Bush administration has bolstered ties […]

WHO’S WINNING IN ANBAR? One can rarely peruse a right wing blog these days without reading about how “we’re winning” in Anbar. The talking point stems from the decision, in September of last year, of a number of tribal elites in Anbar to focus on operations against Al Qaeda, instead of against the United States […]

LAUNDRY. This is really quite exciting: The CIA will declassify hundreds of pages of long-secret records detailing some of the intelligence agency’s worst illegal abuses — the so-called “family jewels” documenting a quarter-century of overseas assassination attempts, domestic spying, kidnapping and infiltration of leftist groups from the 1950s to the 1970s, CIA Director Michael V. […]

BAD NEWS FOR NEW MEXICO, GOOD NEWS FOR LITERALLY EVERYONE ELSE. The Reliable Replacement Warhead program has been zeroed out in the House, replaced in part by a considerable increase in funds for non-proliferation. RRW, a project designed to replace existing U.S. nuclear warheads, is best described as a straight forward, nonsensical boondoggle that would […]

THE OFFENSIVE. I’m as skeptical of the latest offensive effort as of just about all the other offensives that U.S. forces have launched in Iraq, and I’m wondering whether the planning and execution of this operation reveals some frustration in the Army with the surge. The very first thing that a counter-insurgency expert will tell […]

BLACK GOLD… NO, THE OTHER KIND. To follow up on Matt‘s point about liquid coal, take a gander at this recent Defense News article: Coal dug from deep in Kentucky’s rugged mountains generates some $4 billion a year for the state’s economy, helping to lift it to the position of ninth-poorest among the 50 United […]

FAITH-BASED GOVERNMENT. Wouldn’t it be crazy if, like, the Coast Guard gave a couple of ships to this ministry under a Congressional earmark, under the assumption that the ministry would use them for “providing medical assistance” and doing missionary work in the South Seas, and then, like, the ministry just turned around and sold the […]

LEAVING THEM ALONE. Yglesias and Rich Lowry are debating (sort of) whether leaving Sunni militias to fight al-Qaeda on their own is a plausible strategy. I’m very much on Matt’s side on this, in no small part because I think that the Anbar experience over the last year shows that the Sunnis can, if they […]