Insurgents Using New Ideas Choke Iraq, No New Ideas Here Though

James Glanz writes in today's New York Times that Iraq Insurgents Starve Capital of Electricity:

Over the past six months, Baghdad has been all but isolated electrically, Iraqi officials say, as insurgents have effectively won their battle to bring down critical high-voltage lines and cut off the capital from the major power plants to the north, south and west.

The battle has been waged in the remotest parts of the open desert, where the great towers that support thousands of miles of exposed lines are frequently felled with explosive charges in increasingly determined and sophisticated attacks, generally at night. Crews that arrive to repair the damage are often attacked and sometimes killed, ensuring that the government falls further and further behind as it attempts to repair the lines.

Mr. Wahid said that last week, seven of the nine lines supplying power directly to Baghdad were down, and that just a trickle of electricity was flowing through the two others. Western officials agreed that most of the lines were down, but gave somewhat higher estimates on the electricity that was still flowing.

And in a measure of the deep disunity and dysfunction of this nation, when the repair crews and security forces are slow to respond, skilled looters often arrive with heavy trucks that pull down more of the towers to steal as much of the valuable aluminum conducting material in the lines as possible. The aluminum is melted into ingots and sold.

While Mr. Glanz goes on to give a solid, workmanlike recitation of the facts and figures of the country's electrical infrastructure and problems with same, he really misses the point that what he's describing is textbook 4th Generation War: as it starves the Malaki government of credibility and bleeds the population's will to resist... whatever it is the bad guys want. I'm still unclear on that part, but I'm sure the people dynamiting the electrical grid have a diamond-sharp agenda.

So, as the bad guys continue to innovate the nation of Iraq out of existence the powers that be in D.C. as well as the wannabes continue to trot out ideas that are either too little, too late (more troops) or just plain blame the victim rationalizations to get the hell out (Visack, Levin, et. al.). None of which are going to help us gain control or regain the initiative in Iraq.

Sure, it is easy to throw stones. Do I have any answers to Iraq? No. I've thought about it a lot and I really don't see any possible "victory" scenario. Just varying shades of failure, shame and regional unrest.

But the one ray of hope that do have is that the tools needed to, a) prevent another Iraq debacle from happening or, b) help inoculate the United States against internal 4th Generation Warfare tactics are becoming apparent.

Radical Transparency is one path. Pulling the curtain back from the wizards at the controls and allowing the wisdom of crowds to identify and close weaknesses. As John Robb puts it:

A newly vigilant and networked public will push for much greater levels of transparency in government and corporate operations, using the Internet to expose, publish, and patch potential security flaws. Over time, this new transparency, and the wider participation it entails, will lead to radical improvements in government and corporate efficiency.

Certainly the current tactics of Chomsky-esque manufacturing of consent and outright propaganda are reaching the point of diminishing returns, just as an over-stimulated public is also rejecting the ever more omnipresent advertising industry. As Robb continues:

Within the context of 21st century warfare, moral cohesion and innovation (particularly given open source opponents) have emerged as paramount concerns. Up until now, nation-states have relied on propaganda to mobilize the public for war and maintain the effort. In parallel, black box decision making has been relied upon to produce ongoing improvements in capabilities/technology. However, in this long war, these methods are more of a liability than an asset. Propaganda has proven to be both ineffective and harmful (see my critique: "Propaganda Wars" for more on this) -- and -- black box decision making has yet to yield any meaningful improvements in capabilities. In my view, an update to our decision making process (to take advantage of vastly superior information flows) through radical transparency would be a far superior means of maintaining our moral cohesion and innovation over the long haul.

Many of the tools required are in our hands. What is needed is some event or catalyst that can force open the black boxes of power and capital and bring a more transparent society. Secrecy (and privacy) may be dead, but that doesn't neccesarily have to be a bad thing.