Big news today.

Say hello to DoD Directive 3000.5. Or, for those of you keeping score at home, the SysAdmin Directive.

Tons of important stuff in there and I am not even going to pretend that I’m going to be able to unpack it all for a while.

I will say, however, that this is BIG BIG BIG. Did I mention BIG?

Of course, there are still many questions. Such as, do we really expect our entire force to be trained for stability ops?

Some defense scholars have urged the Pentagon to create constabulary units and other specialized forces to handle stability operations, saying that such troops could be kept abroad longer and provide skills not easily developed in conventional troops. But military commanders have considered the idea impractical, and Pentagon officials involved in drafting the new directive rejected it.

“As we looked at that question,” said Jeffrey “Jeb” Nadaner, the deputy assistant secretary for stability operations, “we felt it was better to have the skills across the force.”

In other words…

…the Pentagon wants all deployed forces trained in nation-building to make a smoother transition from major combat to humanitarian work.
“They need to rapidly be able to jump back and forth,” Mr. Nadaner said.

Not surprising really. This is only one step. And Nadaner is keeping his eyes on the prize:

It is required, [Nadaner says], because a major Bush-administration goal is to prevent al Qaeda and other terrorist groups from setting up shop in so-called ungoverned areas, or failing states, around the world.

I shouldn’t get greedy. Appreciate the moment, get back in the fight tomorrow.

Was just reading some stuff over at the Oil Drum regarding “Energize America,” a Daily Kos brainstorm. Never mind the details for now, let’s look at what these folks are trying to achieve:

By 2020, Energize America will:
-make the nation safer from unstable regions of the world - where most of the global oil supply is located;
-insulate the U.S. economy from energy supply disruptions - both natural and human-made
-…

The list goes on. But these are the ones that are raising my blood-pressure. These folks want to make us safe by firewalling us off from those nasty “unstable regions of the world.” As if we could move to some global version of the suburbs and never have to go shopping at those dirty urban stores where the homeless guys hang around the doors and ask for change as you walk in. Furthermore, these folks want to “insulate” the US economy from the energy supply disruptions these unstable regions create.

In other words, the problem isn’t that the inner city is riddled with crime, the problem is that the only place we can buy our energy is in that crime-riddled inner city. If only we could buy our energy without leaving our beautiful, safe global suburb. Then we could live our whole lives in our happy gated community and never have to deal with those messy parts of the world.

I know that the folks who wrote this weren’t looking at the problem like this. That’s the problem. Globalization is connectivity. Globalization is interdependence. It is losing the ability to be nationally self-sufficient and in direct control of everything your country needs. It is the march of economic development being played out on a global scale. The agricultural revolution led to food surpluses, which led to non-agrarian professions, which created individuals who were dependent upon the rest of their social group for their food. The industrial revolution led to mass production and regions that were dependent upon other regions for their food. Globalization is the next natural step in this process: nations that are dependent upon other nations for their food. This makes the stability of those nations our problem, because we depend upon them. We can solve this problem in one of two ways. We can stop depending upon them (the “do it all yourself” solution), or we can address the problems that are making them unstable (the “to it all together” solution). The latter solution might seem like the safest route, but it carries a cost with it. Doing everything yourself means you make do with less. It means that you trade a higher standard of living for a more certain future. And it means that you sever your responsibility for your larger community.

I don’t think that it is morally acceptable or practical to try to distance ourselves from the Gap. I think that the Gap’s threat to us is why we need to shrink it. “Shrinking the Gap” is a sustainable solution. “Avoiding the Gap” is shoving the problem into the closet, locking the door and hoping the walls hold. Which approach do you think makes sense in the long term?