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Welcome to the Official Website of James Landrith
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Blog, Commentary and Articles -
Foreign Policy, Military and War
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Written by Ivan Eland
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Wednesday, 06 June 2012 |
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Did Anyone Ever Bother to Get the Pakistani Perspective?
June 6, 2012
Ivan Eland
The U.S. targeting of Abu Yahya al-Libi, the number-two man in al-Qaeda, continues the American quest to kill its way out of its terrorist problem using pilotless drones, Special Forces raids, and other secret methods. Gen. David Petraeus, former commander of the U.S. military’s central command and author of its counterinsurgency manual, used to believe that trying to kill your way out of any sort of insurgency was counterproductive. He believed that while you might dispatch a group’s leadership using such martial methods, the end result would be more militants streaming to the insurgent cause. But now, ironically, Petraeus is director of the CIA, the agency in charge of the targeted assassination program in Pakistan. Not only is this assassination effort questionable from a legal standpoint, but it has also caused an anti-American backlash in Pakistan, making a nuclear-armed nation much less stable than it was in 2001. This may very well be the worst spillover effect of the U.S. nation-building debacle in Afghanistan. Of course, proponents of the drone attacks in Pakistan would argue that the United States has a right of self-defense in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. Yet the drone strikes have gone beyond striking the perpetrators of 9/11 (al-Qaeda) and those who harbored them (the Afghan Taliban), as authorized by the congressional resolution in 2001; they have been targeting the Pakistani Taliban, whose goal is to topple the Pakistani government. In fact, the Pakistani Taliban did not even exist on 9/11 and are largely a creation of the backlash and resulting instability associated with the heavy U.S. footprint in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Now the Pakistani Taliban are targeting the U.S. homeland, as demonstrated by the bombing attempt in New York’s Times Square. This fits a historical pattern: the U.S. government has a knack for unnecessarily creating new enemies. Among American policymakers and the public, Pakistan has a reputation for either not being sufficiently concerned with neutralizing al-Qaeda and the Afghan Taliban or even actively aiding them. The Pakistani government is even seen as sluggish in combating a threat to its own rule, the Pakistani Taliban. Few Americans even make an attempt to understand the Pakistani perspective. The angry Pakistani people feel that the American war in Afghanistan is not their war—the 9/11 attacks didn’t emanate from Pakistan and, at the time, no one there harbored the attackers—yet they are incurring severe costs in increased instability because of it. As Imran Khan, a former cricket star and one of the most popular opposition politicians in Pakistan, said about the U.S. war in Afghanistan, “This is not our war, so let’s get out of it.” The Pakistani public feels that the American drone strikes are a violation of Pakistan’s sovereignty and are causing increased Islamist militancy in the country’s western tribal regions and elsewhere. In private, Pakistani government officials would say that in exchange for U.S. aid, they are looking the other way while the U.S. conducts drone attacks on their soil, even in the face of overwhelming Pakistani public outrage, and had been allowing most of the supplies for the United States’ Afghan War to transit through Pakistan until the American killing of 24 Pakistani soldiers with a drone strike made that impossible. In fact, from the Pakistan government’s perspective, it has acquiesced or assisted in the capture or killing of most of 9/11’s perpetrators and al-Qaeda’s leaders on its soil. Neutralizing the Afghan Taliban is another matter. Pakistan has always known that the United States would leave Afghanistan one day; then the only influence Pakistan would have to compete with its archenemy India would be through the Afghan Taliban. So Pakistan has been reluctant to give up support for those fighters. Pakistan would have been a much happier and stabler place if the United States had avoided an extended post-9/11 nation-building war in Afghanistan in favor of selected attempts to go after al-Qaeda leaders. This approach would have also provided more security at a far lower cost to the American public.
 New from Ivan Eland!
NO WAR FOR OIL: U.S. Dependency and the Middle East
The grab for oil resources has been a major factor behind many conflicts and military deployments because of its perception as a strategic commodity. This book debunks the notion that oil is strategic and argues that war for oil is not necessary to secure the flow of petroleum. Learn More »» |
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Blog, Commentary and Articles -
Economics and Financial Services
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Written by James Landrith
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Saturday, 02 June 2012 |
I've accumulated close to 15 years of experience in human resources management through the Marine Corps, hospital staffing and retail industries. Over the years, I've seen a lot of strange, sad and head-shaking things on resumes, applications and spoken in interviews. Listed below are some stand-out annoyances, "don't do's" and basic rules of decorum that seem to be lost on so many of today's job seekers.
The best part of my job is telling someone that they got the job. However, I simply have to shake my head in disbelief at some of the nonsense that is presented to me on a regular basis. If you are looking for a job, please read and heed. I WANT to tell you that the gig is yours. Whether I am able to do this is largely in your hands. This article is solely my own professional opinion and is not meant to infer any endorsement by any of my employers past or present.
- Complete the WHOLE application. Looking for work is serious business and those of us reviewing your applications take it seriously. This information is important and can be the determining factor between your application being selected for an interview over another. If you can't be bothered to take the time to complete the whole application, then I am going to assume that you don't really want the job.
- Employee and family referrals do not guarantee an interview or a job offer. While such referrals can prove invaluable for finding great talent, the fact that you know an "insider" does not entitle you to an interview. Really, it doesn't. Your application will still be weighed against others to determine whether an interview is warranted. Asking the employee the badger us on your behalf will not bode well for your application.
- Dress like you actually want the job. If you show up to an interview in sweat pants or a tank top undershirt then you really don't take it seriously. Please don't bother. If you don't have a suit or at least a nicer shirt than you would wear on the job, then you are not yet ready for the interview. If cost is a consideration, you can easily find affordable and appropriate attire at many thrift shops such as those operated by Goodwill and the Salvation Army.
- Show up early. If you come strolling in 15 minutes late, I'm going to have a hard time believing that you really want the job. Those of us conducting interviews are seldom dedicated solely to the task. We have many other functions beyond hiring. If you don't respect that, then you shouldn't expect us to take you seriously as a candidate.
- Quality over Quantity. How many times you've applied for previous positions isn't at issue and we aren't interested in getting browbeat over it. Really, we shouldn't have to discuss it, but it is becoming a very big sticking point among some millenials in the job market. Angrily telling the hiring or human resources manager that you've applied 5 times before and never got a call is not going to help your job search or impress us with your professionalism and patience. No one owes you a job. If you are not one of the candidates selected for an interview, do not expect a phone call. A job application is not equivalent to a bank loan. You are not owed a phone call to explain the rejection. If it is a no, most companies will respond by email or U.S. Mail. Please remember that there is no magic number for how many times it takes to get an interview. It takes however many times it takes. Some candidates may never get a call from that employer as their skillset is either lacking or not evident on their application or resume. "Going off" on the hiring manager, receptionist or human resources manager is a sure sign that you are not a good fit. Don't do it.
- Treat the gatekeepers like an extension of the hiring manager's staff. This one perplexes me. I have yet to understand why any job seeker would be rude to the people answering the phone. Still, it happens with increasing frequency. I make sure that the receptionists inform me immediately if an applicant has been rude. I am not interested in bringing a rude person into my place of business. There are plenty of qualified people looking for work who are able to communicate like mature, professional adults. You will gain nothing by being rude, but stand to lose a potential interview.
- Don't be pushy. It is okay to ask questions or seek help if you don't understand the application process. We are happy to help! However, calling or showing up repeatedly without an appointment to try to force resumes on us, demand interviews be scheduled, or discuss the "status" of your application borders on harassment. None of these tricks are new. You cannot force your way into a job interview. Most of us are not professional recruiters. For the most part, human resources managers have a ton of other duties to attend and have to budget our time accordingly. When we are ready to review applications and set up interviews, you will be contacted if you are one of the top candidates. Trying to force the issue by being overly aggressive shows me that you don't respect the process, don't value our time, and believe you deserve special treatment over the other applicants. I promise you, this hyper-aggressive approach does not work in 2012.
- Proper capitalization and sentence structure are your friends. Increasingly, I am seeing applications where the candidate used all lower case or all upper case letters. While we don't look for dissertation quality writing, it is a bit disrespectful to the process when you don't take the time to follow some basic rules of grammar, capitalization and sentence structure. If you don't have the time to edit your text before submission, how will you find the time to attend interviews?
- Substance Abuse. Many employers test for drug use during the hiring process. If you know you can't pass a test, why would you bother to apply? This is a gigantic waste of my time and yours.
- Read the whole job description! It is fine to apply for positions that are a step or two above your current position and experience. I frequently hire people who are a rung below on the ladder if they will be a good fit and are ready to be mentored into the role quickly. However, if your application shows that you've held one lower level job since high school and had no career growth, you may not be ready for that Senior Vice President slot you've been eyeing. Applying for positions several levels above your current skillset is no different than spamming a company by applying for every single job they post. Be serious and thoughtful with reagrd to your chosen positions. We can usually see that you applied for 75 jobs in every department.
Please remember that these are only brief guidelines and observations. This is not meant to be an exhaustive list. For further tips and best practices, I recommend the following links:
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Last Updated ( Saturday, 02 June 2012 )
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Blog, Commentary and Articles -
Foreign Policy, Military and War
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Written by Ivan Eland
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Wednesday, 30 May 2012 |
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Hands Off Syria
May 30, 2012
Ivan Eland
The recent massacre by the Syrian government of 108 people, mostly women and children, will inevitably put intense pressure on a reluctant Obama administration to take out President Bashar al-Assad using force. As was obvious when the United States evicted Libya’s Moammar Gadhafi after he threatened to kill lots of his compatriots, hawks thirsting for future American intervention in the world will use this as a bloodless (that is, free of American blood) model to depose dictators from the air. But the administration, which also has been rash in its expansion of the drone war against al-Qaeda and related groups, has wisely avoided intervention in Syria for a variety of good reasons. The main reason is that military action in Syria would not be as easy as it was in Libya. And the use of armed force in Libya seems easier in retrospect than it was—it dragged out for months with no conclusion, with some bitten nails on the part of the administration. Ever since Bill Clinton learned in Somalia in 1993 that inserting substantial U.S. ground forces into developing countries could backfire or lead to a quagmire, the American model has been to find a local force to hold an enemy in position on the ground while using U.S. air power to pummel opposing forces. The model was used successfully in Bosnia and Kosovo in the mid- to late-1990s, to initially take out the Taliban in 2001, and to depose Gadhafi in Libya in 2011. By the time of the Iraq invasion in 2003, the model had worked so well that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld decided that air power was now so dominant in warfare that smaller American ground forces could support U.S. air power against even more formidable military opponents, such Saddam Hussein’s Iraqi forces. Previously, since the invention of the airplane, aircraft had supported ground forces or bombed independently of them. Rumsfeld was probably correct that smaller ground forces, U.S. or local, can support massive U.S. air power against more capable adversaries (as Iraq has shown, however, occupying the country or fighting guerrillas will require many more ground forces). Furthermore, dictators sometimes can be eliminated without U.S. forces on the ground, as long as local forces are capable. The problem in Syria is that the opposition is less capable and more splintered and chaotic than in Libya, and the Syrian military is much stronger. In Libya, Gadhafi deliberately kept his military weak so that it wouldn’t threaten his power. Assad—with the militarily capable Iraq, Turkey, and Israel on his borders—hasn’t had that luxury and therefore has maintained fairly capable armed forces with much better air defenses than Libya possessed. So if American air power failed to take out Assad, which would be a real possibility, pressure could mount quickly to insert U.S. ground forces. This outcome would be risky and potentially disastrous in an election year. That is why Obama has been reluctant to escalate the Syrian situation. What happens after the election is another story. If Obama wins, he won’t face re-election and may be less cautious about trying to remove Assad from power. Mitt Romney—who tries to be all things to all people, and like George W. Bush when he entered office, doesn’t seem to have a coherent worldview—could be easily persuaded by his many neoconservative foreign policy advisers to go after Assad. Romney has already called for arming the opposition. So whichever candidate wins, disaster could ensue in Syria. If U.S. ground forces were used, a repeat of Iraq could occur: a protracted guerrilla insurgency plus a civil war among a population with similar ethno-sectarian fractures—with al-Qaeda as one of the participants. Libya still has the possibility of a civil war breaking out among tribal militias armed to the teeth, but Syria has even more volatile political fissures. Arming the opposition can also lead to the slippery slope of U.S. military intervention. Even the currently cautious Obama administration is providing “non-lethal” aid to the Syrian opposition and looking the other way as Sunni Arab Gulf states provide weapons. Yet non-lethal aid is a misnomer, because although it may not shoot, much of it, such as communication devices, dramatically improves the combat power of the Syrian opposition, thus escalating the killing. Although it is difficult for Americans to watch Assad kill his own people, what comes after Assad might be even worse for the region and the United States. The United States should stay on the sidelines and let regional powers, such as Turkey and Saudi Arabia, take the lead in dealing with the Syrian mess. The United States can no longer afford to be the world’s policeman—either morally or financially.
New from Ivan Eland!
NO WAR FOR OIL: U.S. Dependency and the Middle East
The grab for oil resources has been a major factor behind many conflicts and military deployments because of its perception as a strategic commodity. This book debunks the notion that oil is strategic and argues that war for oil is not necessary to secure the flow of petroleum. Learn More »» |
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Blog, Commentary and Articles -
Rape, Sexual Assault and Abuse
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Written by James Landrith
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Wednesday, 16 May 2012 |
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From Human Rights Watch, US: Sexual Violence, Harassment of Immigrant Farmworkers: The 95-page report, “Cultivating Fear: The Vulnerability of Immigrant Farmworkers in the US to Sexual Violence and Sexual Harassment,” describes rape, stalking, unwanted touching, exhibitionism, or vulgar and obscene language by supervisors, employers, and others in positions of power. Most farmworkers interviewed said they had experienced such treatment or knew others who had. And most said they had not reported these or other workplace abuses, fearing reprisals. Those who had filed sexual harassment claims or reported sexual assault to the police had done so with the encouragement and assistance of survivor advocates or attorneys in the face of difficult challenges.
Read more here: |
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Blog, Commentary and Articles -
Archaelogy, Anthropology and History
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Written by James Landrith
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Wednesday, 16 May 2012 |
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From NOAA, BOEM: Historic, 19th century shipwreck discovered in northern Gulf of Mexico: During a recent Gulf of Mexico expedition, NOAA, BOEM and partners discovered an historic wooden-hulled vessel which is believed to have sunk as long as 200 years ago. Scientists on board the NOAA Ship Okeanos Explorer used underwater robots with lights and high definition cameras to view remnants of the ship laden with anchors, navigational instruments, glass bottles, ceramic plates, cannons, and boxes of muskets.
Very cool. Read the rest here: http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2012/20120516_okeanusexplorer.html |
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Last Updated ( Wednesday, 16 May 2012 )
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