Steve Clemons

AP

David Ignatius' gripping novels are quickly emerging as the spy industry's narcotic for smart, complex intelligence yarns to read on long flights.  His made-for-movies stories seem to be a hybridized LeCarre with a twist of Michael Crichton as he reveals tectonic fault lines between an overly self-confident, reckless America and a fragmented, in spots radicalized, almost always misunderstood Islamic world.

His latest novel, Bloodmoney: A Novel of Espionage, has recently appeared in paperback and should be required reading for wannabe strategists who want a glimpse of how messy and convulsive the future is probably going to be.  America will remain a big, important power into the foreseeable future, but a myriad of new players pushing back on U.S. institutions and interests heighten the complexity and danger for a declining superpower holding tightly to anachronistic global arrangements.

Ignatius, long-time national security columnist for the Washington Post and author as well of the novel-turned-movie Body of Lies, makes an important policy point via fiction that 'the other guys' -- in this case, vengeance-driven Pakistanis who have legitimate grievances against a drone-lobbing America -- will one day have the technology and systems sophistication to to turn the West's military and economic assets against it.

Bloodmoney probably should have been called Blowback: The Costs and Consequences of American Empire, but that title was already taken by the late Chalmers Johnson who wrote a pre-9/11 treatise arguing that American hubris, its global sprawl of US military bases, and influence-machinery around the world were going to trigger push-back, or blowback as it were, from states no longer wanting to play by U.S. rules in a post-Cold War World -- eventually leading to a cataclysmic event.

One of the cases Johnson starts with in the book was the 1993 murder of CIA employees at a stoplight near the entrance to the Central Intelligence Agency by an aggrieved Pakistani man, Aimal Qazi, who was upset about American policy towards Palestinians. When the terror strikes by al Qaeda hit Washington, New York, and rural Pennsylvania on September 11, 2001, Johnson's Blowback became the most difficult in-print but out of stock book to get. The publisher could not keep the fast-selling, prescient books on the shelves. 

Ignatius' novel starts out on a similar track to this real world event, opening with a US clandestine drone wiping out an innocent family -- mother and father, siblings, and nieces and nephews -- of an unusually smart tribal youth from South Waziristan, Pakistan.  The youth, Omar, was the West's dream kid -- moving via educational opportunity from the backward, tribal pool of an ignorant, terrorist-generating culture, to modernity -- becoming a globally-aware, traveled, and in the Western sense, rational person. (drone photo credit: Reuters)

Ignatius' Omar is a mathematical wunderkind who not only escaped the geographic gravitational forces of his Pashtun tribe but became an academic consulting to the world's spy agencies who wanted to know more about the world he came from.  This fictional fabrication again tracks closely with real life. 

Like some others from Pakistan and Afghanistan who have quietly and deeply buried their grievances with the West -- perhaps because of religion, or the loss of loved ones due to the military operations of the U.S. and its allies -- and bided their time until they were in important military and intelligence operations only to eventually explode killing their duped allies, Omar is committed to achieving a 'calibrated revenge' against those who killed his family. 

I won't reveal more of the plot, but I want to raise a few of the themes and nods that Ignatius weaves into this smart page-turner.

First of all, the West may be deceiving itself that education and roads, modernity writ large, will be a quick fix correcting ancient behavioral norms and codes written deeply into the DNA of tribal groups -- in this case Pashtun tribes but certainly not limited to them.

Ignatius' protagonist killer in the book is a professor possessed by deep impulses to avenge his family's murder. Ignatius' portrait of Omar defies easy typecasting as he sits between primitive and turbo-charged modern worlds; interestingly, Ignatius positions him at the end of the novel to be the one most ready to see a way back to 'balance', or a deal that would end the killing and restore calm.

None of the other personalities in the book -- not the head of Pakistan's ISI, or the operatives of an off-the-books intelligence operation, or the spymasters running the CIA -- could understand that Omar could choose to stop his successful campaign and might strike an arrangement.  Ignatius is telling us that American policymakers still don't understand what could be achieved with the Taliban -- that it's not just a tug of war between a Pashtun uber alles formula or obliterating them.

Secondly, Ignatius has subtly taken sides in the novel, and surprisingly it's with the victimized Pakistani.  Omar, driven by understandable outrage, hit above his weight and achieved an intellectual and technical sophistication besting his adversaries.  The Americans in the novel arrogantly thought it would be impossible for anyone from relatively primitive circumstances in tribal zones in Pakistan  to develop the capacity to challenge the U.S. and Western allies in the way Omar did.  Ignatius reminds the reader that technology and innovation are globally accessible today and that neither the US nor any power have a monopoly on technological or economic innovation. 

In other words, Ignatius warns that weapons technology -- and complex financial instruments and structures -- will not remain the sole preserve of the U.S. and its allies.  What we throw at them may come back and be deployed against us. 

The pattern and link analysis that the Department of Treasury, National Security Agency, CIA, FBI, and other parts of the intelligence industrial complex have used with great effect to target terrorists and influence the behavior of thuggish officials in problematic nations, like Iran, North Korea, and Syria, could conceivably be acquired by our rivals.

While the US is today preparing to further expand its drone force and as of late arm Italian drones, Iran is now trying to develop its own drones.  So too it seems China and Russia.

The question that President Obama, who has admitted direct, routenized involvement in creating the drone 'kill list', should ponder is what will happen as the barriers to entry on drone technology fall enough so that an adversary's drones can be deployed against U.S. and allied forces and interests.

The key message behind David Ignatius's interesting book is that day is probably coming sooner than most think.

I am moderating a chat today as part of a the larger Atlantic Food Summit that will stream live here starting at 1:00 pm EST.

I'll be moderating a panel at 1:30 pm titled "Feeding a World of Nine Billion -- Sustainably" with World Food Program CEO Rick Leach; National Pork Board CEO Chris Novak; Wellesley College professor Robert Paarlberg, Rodale Institute Executive Director Mark Smallwood, and Whole Living Executive Editor Jocelyn Zuckerman.

I'm just back from the Doha Forum where global food security was a key theme of the Qatar Emir's opener. Should be interesting.

Below the fold I have pasted the agenda for today's meeting. Atlantic Senior Editor Corby Kummer, one of the nation's great food commentators will be MCing most of the meeting -- and doing headline interviews with Martha Stewart (1 pm EST) and Mario Batali (2:30 pm EST). 

Schedule follows after link to extended page

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Despite some of my foreign policy differences -- like the whole bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb bomb Iran thing -- with Senator John McCain who once told me he was "the original neoconservative", I have always greatly, truly admired his patriotism and dedication to trying to get the American political system to operate honestly and in a way consistent with what the framers of the Constitution intended.  He has been a major voice in the country on campaign and elections reform, on fiscal matters, on national security, on immigration, and on leadership in every sense.

His body of work actually deserves a library to house it -- but our system doesn't give those who come in second place for the Presidency a National Archives run operation.  Instead, McCain and a bipartisan group of supporters -- including Senators Kelly Ayotte, Sheldon Whitehouse, Lindsey Graham, Mark Udall, Joe Lieberman, Carl Levin as well as CIA Director David Petraeus, and others --- are punctuating the start of a new university-based institute committed to the leadership principles John McCain exhibited and encouraged, particularly in young people.

Under the leadership of former US Ambassador to NATO Kurt Volker who will serve as Executive Director and with a $9 million gift from the McCain institute Foundation (which itself received $9 million in donations from the McCain-Palin campaign surplus), Arizona State University is announcing today the establishment of the McCain Institute for International Leadership.

The McCain Institute press announcement specifies four key pillars of work: 

•    Provide decision recommendations for leaders through open debate and rigorous analysis, by convening experts, publishing policy-relevant research, and holding decision-making training events using cutting-edge technology.
•    Identify and train new national security leaders, both American and foreign, in public service and private enterprise, as well as military spheres.
•    Play a unique role in a crowded intellectual space by serving as Washington's preeminent "decision tank."
•    Promote and preserve the McCain family spirit of character-driven leadership and national service, including hosting the McCain family archives.

Here is the press release (pdf) announcing establishment of the new McCain Institute -- and here a 6-minute video of several of the Senators above as well as Cindy McCain and ASU President Michael Crow sharing why America needs another policy think tank.

A couple of quick thoughts.  First, John McCain is not a cookie cutter conservative and believes in the kind of rough-and-tumble politics where political actors and branches of government responsibly and vigorously compete and knock into each other. This is not the view of most ideologues -- and is an approach to politics that I think is often misunderstood and should be more greatly valued.

After a decision is reached and law is established, McCain believes that the law needs to be upheld.  As a recent example, John McCain opposed the ending of Don't Ask Don't Tell but sent important signals that he would respect and support the law once it was enacted -- and he has done that and impressed me and others with his position.

In my view, McCain has been a vital, rare point of conscience on trying to reverse the corrupt cesspool of advocacy politics today in America. 

I disagree with him on how he wants to throw the Pentagon at so many of America's international problems today -- with little regard for the overall stock of American power and with out working harder to discern what are America's core strategic challenges that are generationally-defining and other conflicts that may draw a moral impulse from us but which may need different tools and approaches.

In this promo video clip, it is interesting to note the decent amount of coverage given to Cindy McCain's work in Africa.  In one of the photo clips, she is shown with Ben Affleck. I'm glad to see Cindy McCain's efforts as part of the Institute's first self-narrative.

There are more than 1,500 think tanks in Washington -- most of them small one-person boutiques but many that are either homes for governments in exile or others that engage in serious policy work but are well-taught to pull their punches and avoid risk.

I'm glad the McCain Institute will be based outside of Washington -- and will also be run by Kurt Volker, a brilliant and steady national security hand who is well-liked and well-respected not just by Republicans, Dems, and Independents -- but by a range of foreign policy types from neocons to liberal internationalists to realists.  Kurt Volker is absolutely the right person to give the McCain Institute instant credibility and gravitas.

We look forward to seeing what the Institute's first contributions will be.

Had a great discussion a few days ago with MSNBC's Chris Matthews and The Washington Post's Eugene Robinson about Mitt Romney's increasingly Cheney-like foreign policy positions.

Chris Matthews discusses Romney foreign policy frame with The Atlantic's Steve Clemons & The Washington Post's Eugene Robinson.

Romney seems like he is trying to cover up his Rockefeller Republican DNA with a mix of Goldwater foreign policy stridency combined with Dick Cheney/John Bolton style pugnacious hard-line attacks on President Obama's global deal-making.

Tonight off to Doha to participate in the Doha Forum.  More soon.

By supporting same-sex unions, Obama is giving his backers something to go to the streets to fight for.

President Obama just made history as the first incumbent president of the United States to endorse same sex marriage, during an interview with ABC News' Robin Roberts.

Admitting that his views had gone through an "evolution," Obama told Roberts:

I have to tell you that over the course of several years as I have talked to friends and family and neighbors when I think about members of my own staff who are in incredibly committed monogamous relationships, same-sex relationships, who are raising kids together, when I think about those soldiers or airmen or marines or sailors who are out there fighting on my behalf and yet feel constrained, even now that Don't Ask Don't Tell is gone, because they are not able to commit themselves in a marriage, at a certain point I've just concluded that for me personally it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same sex couples should be able to get married.

The president's comments come just a day after North Carolina overwhelmingly approved a constitutional amendment defining marriage solely as a union between a man and a woman, shutting down same-sex marriage advocates there. 

Obama's comments also followed Vice President Biden's surprise affirmation of gay marriage on the widely watched Sunday politics show, Meet the Press with David Gregory.  Biden told the anchor that he was "absolutely comfortable" with gay marriage -- which then sent White House mandarins scurrying out to the media and interest groups to walk back Biden's comments, with administration spin-masters suggesting to reporters that the vice president had not actually endorsed gay marriage and had not broken new ground.

President Obama has now shattered any doubt about the administration's commitment to achieving fully equal civil rights for the GLBT (gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender) community.  No shades of gray.  No politically sculpted safe place for the president to endorse same sex civil unions over marriages. No separate but equal. None of that any more.

What the president finally did today is brave. Others around the country have beaten him to the position. At this past year's Human Rights Campaign dinner, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg's full-throated, resounding embrace of and support for gay marriage made President Obama's comments supporting the rights of gays (but not marriage) seem thin and weak-kneed. But Bloomberg is not behind the Oval Office desk -- and does not have to win presidential contests in North Carolina.

The question many in Washington are now asking is "Why did Obama do this?" "What's the political driver here?" "Why now?"

Perhaps Joe Biden's comments on the Sunday show were a fumble that the president decided to pick up in a magnificent display of conscience kicking in. 

Or perhaps more likely, the president in one of his regular private lunch meetings with the vice president encouraged Biden to stir things up by expressing his support for gays and gay marriage. Biden loves the gay community -- and he goes out of his way to affirm gays and lesbians in policy meetings, parties he hosts, and public functions around the nation. Biden presided over the swearing in of gay U.S. Ambassador to New Zealand David Huebner and lavished praise and affection on David's "husband" Duane McWaine. Walking into the room, Biden hugged numerous gay politicos and then walked right over to the legendary iconic gay rights advocate Frank Kameny and said to the room, "Now this is a real hero."

Many political handicappers won't be able to resist criticizing Obama for picking a fight in the culture war terrain that evangelical-strumming, Karl Rove-types have been trying to tease out for years. But President Obama is not prone to emotional leaps of faith and knee jerk shifts in policy. Their polls must show that the nation is ready to have this fight -- that most independents and Democrats think same-sex marriage should be a civil right.

With the enthusiasm of liberals and progressives for the president's reelection seeming somewhat wilted when compared to the Obama juggernaut of 2008, gay marriage now may be one of the big meta-issues of the time that isn't only about gays -- but is part of a package of progressive "wants," such action on climate change, environmental protection, defending a woman's right to make her own choices about birth and abortion, and more.

By supporting gay marriage, Obama is giving his crowd, his base, something to go to the streets to fight for. And to the cynics on the political right who think that Obama loses in a head on culture war, he is saying "Bring it On" -- not only because he thinks that supporting gay marriage is the right thing to do, but because it may now be very smart politics.

photo credit: Reuters

The anniversary of Osama bin Laden's death has spiked public interest in the foreign policy positions of President Obama and Mitt Romney -- particularly with regards to fighting terrorism and the war in Afghanistan.  Over the last couple of days, I have done a number of shows across the networks -- but mostly have the clips from Current TV and MSNBC and want to post here (on next page).

I argue that Barack Obama deserves enormous credit (and political bragging rights) for the decision he made to send the Navy SEAL Team 6 in to get bin Laden.  He would have owned the disaster had things gone badly.  Mitt Romney's views -- or those he held previously criticizing the resources Obama was expending tracking down bin Laden -- are not shameful or unpresidential.  Those views were held by some around the President; some felt the risks were just too high to invade Pakistan's territory and attack the secret bin Laden compound.  President Obama overruled those on his team who conveyed their doubts.

The Bush/Cheney team took its eye off the bin Laden ball and turned attention and resources away from attacking bin Laden and al Qaeda and went after Saddam Hussein and later Iraqi insurgent forces instead.  Al Qaeda metastasized globally during that period - and Obama's national security team which meets every morning with him has been working one by one through the key al Qaeda commanders and plot integrators and attacking them.  The President has been at the helm of this process -- guided essentially by the work and focus of John Brennan, Denis McDonough, and NSC Advisor Tom Donilon.

Finally, Obama is connecting the anniversary of bin Laden's death to a pivot point in America's engagement with Afghanistan.  In other words, America -- completing substantially its strategic goal of decimating al Qaeda -- is now framing the enstate of its presence in Afghanistan. 

The strategic deal signed yesterday by Hamid Karzai and President Obama is binding but unspecific. Lots can go wrong with the vaguely constructed document which essentially promises that the United States will not abandon Afghanistan after combat troops fully end their mission in 2014.  But the President achieved what he wanted which was to fasten Obama's death and the general collapse of the core al Qaeda movement to a strategic shift for the United States.

Presidents find it very hard to end wars -- but Obama seems well on his way to ending America's overextension in Afghanistan as he did in Iraq.

On the following page are some video clips of conversations I have had with Chris Jansing, Eliot Spitzer, Al Sharpton, Chris Matthews, Lawrence O'Donnell, Andrea Mitchell and Rachel Maddow on this arenas of bin Laden-related and US-Afghanistan issues.

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On the one-year anniversary of ordering a Navy SEAL team to kill Osama bin Laden, the president draws the contours of future American involvement in the country.

In a relatively brief 1,540 word speech at Bagram Air Base in a surprise trip to Afghanistan, President Obama has framed the key elements of what America's post-Afghanistan game will look like: moving in 2013 to a full support role for an Afghan security and police force now standing with a personnel of more than 352,000. The full transition of roles and responsibility will be fully complete by the end of 2014.

On Tuesday, Obama signed a binding agreement with Afghan President Hamid Karzai pledging an ongoing responsibility and strategic relationship between the U.S. and Afghanistan after the combat mission of US forces today ended. The so-called 'next' strategic relationship remains subject to speculation -- with caveats that a SOFA, or Status of Forces Agreement, governing the conditions under which U.S. soldiers would be treated still had to be negotiated; that the U.S. Congress would still have to agree annually to a budget that covers the ongoing expenses of this important relationship; and that the number of residual, non-combat troops left inside Afghanistan had not been determined. Most believe that number will be in the 15,000-20,000 range.

Tuesday night (early Wednesday morning, in Afghanistan), the president delivered a powerful message reminding Americans and the world that the invasion of Afghanistan was triggered by al Qaeda's terrorist attacks on New York and Washington, D.C. The killing of bin Laden and the decimation of the top tier of the al Qaeda network -- the president stating, "We devastated al Qaeda's leadership, taking out over 20 of their top 30 leaders" -- has given Obama a key opportunity not only to take credit for being an effective anti-terrorist occupant of the White House but to check-off the box in Afghanistan and to shift U.S. military and economic resources away from what has been a troubling and costly exercise -- one has not been amplifying American power around the world but leading many nations to conclude that the U.S. was military so overstretched and financially beleaguered that it could not support its allies in times of need.

In 2009, a senior White House official told me that if Obama failed to "deliver justice to Osama bin Laden, then John McCain would ultimately win, as we would be in a never-ending global war against terror and bin Laden." The capture or killing of Osama bin Laden was a necessary condition for an exit from Afghanistan.

In his speech Tuesday night, though, Obama also escapes the charge from many on the right and the left that the president wants fully out -- that, yet again, America would leave Afghanistan to rot and become vulnerable to hijacking by radical Islamic forces. By indicating that there would be some sort of minimalist after-life, or next-life of American engagement in the nation, he is saying 'we will not abandon Afghanistan' while at the same time telegraphing that the U.S. would not be responsible for everything that happens in the country.

If the residual force that Obama is helping to frame and set up with the U.S.-Afghanistan Strategic Partnership is in the rumored 15,000-20,000 person range, then that gives the U.S. enough firepower to help deter the overthrow of the government in Kabul and gives the U.S. a significant role over some factors inside Afghanistan -- even though various warlords and forces animated by the Taliban, Iran, Pakistan, and India may also play larger roles throughout the country.

Obama's speech indicated the pathway out of the current conflict -- and Senators John McCain, Lindsey Graham, and Joseph Lieberman who have argued that America should essentially never draw down, or at least not in the near to mid term, may be livid.

By connecting the withdrawal and transition to a new 'end state' to the strategic objective of destroying al Qaeda, Obama goes down in history and helps America's stock value rise on having shown, finally, that America is truly completing something it told its citizens and the rest of the world it would do.

Richard Grenell, recently hired by the Mitt Romney for President campaign to serve as the GOP presidential contender's national security spokesman, has resigned.

His statement:

I have decided to resign from the Romney campaign as the Foreign Policy and National Security Spokesman.

While I welcomed the challenge to confront President Obama's foreign policy failures and weak leadership on the world stage, my ability to speak clearly and forcefully on the issues has been greatly diminished by the hyper-partisan discussion of personal issues that sometimes comes from a presidential campaign.

I want to thank Governor Romney for his belief in me and my abilities and his clear message to me that being openly gay was a non-issue for him and his team.

This is as wrong for the Romney team to do as it was for the Obama team to fire Obama campaign Muslim American outreach director Mazen Asbahi for distant acquaintances from years previous that were stirring up anti-Obama, anti-Islamic agitants in the US. 

Allowing Grenell to resign, and the same is true of Asbahi, just fuels the confidence and status of bigots who undermine big tent, inclusive democracy.

I was just telling Washington Post editor Fred Hiatt this weekend how impressed I was with hyper-conservative Washington Post columnist Jennifer Rubin's statements on Ric Grenell, the GOP, and the party's anti-gay bigotry.  I have almost never agreed with Rubin on her world view but on this, I salute her and think that she was dead on target.

Her kicker line in the essay was important:

It would be a positive thing for the [Republican] party and our country if it was crystal clear there is no place in civil discourse for those fanning the flames of hatred toward gays and egging on fellow conservatives to discriminate against gays in hiring. Unfortunately, not everyone on the right agrees.

When Steve Clemons and Jennifer Rubin actually agree on something, but the GOP gives in to the rants of American Family Association policy director Bryan Fischer and his ilk -- one gets a sense of how really tumorous and distorted certain powerful wings of the Republican Party have become.

The Republican Party needs to re-center itself, recapture the core values it used to believe in, and bring in the likes of Richard Grenell to create a much healthier party.  That is probably a long way off but it needs to happen not only so conservatives can be taken seriously again but because democracy needs sound alternatives.

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Right wing, and anti-gay provocateur Bryan Fischer, Director of Issue Analysis for Government and Public Policy at the American Family Association, wrote in early 2011 that Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich, Sarah Palin and Mike Huckabee were just carrying too much baggage to win the GOP nomination and run for the presidency in 2012.

So, he said a second tier of candidates would probably break through -- listing "Tim Pawlenty, Mitch Daniels, Haley Barbour, John Thune, John Bolton, Mike Pence, and a possible "dark horse" (his term, not mine), Herman Cain."

Ultimately, Fischer said that in the end it would be a hard choice between Herman Cain and Mike Pence. He never gave a thought to Rick Santorum. And as we now know, Mitt Romney is the presumptive nominee -- though Newt Gingrich hasn't tucked it in yet.

About John Bolton, Fischer wrote in January 2011:

John Bolton belongs in the next conservative administration, but not as president. He will be needed in the areas of national security and intelligence, and is a pretty smart fella when it comes to all that. But most of the American people have no idea who he is, and nobody knows where he stands on almost the entire range of domestic issues.

Perhaps Fischer just wasn't tuned in when John Bolton made clear in September 2010 that he 'could live with' gay marriage -- and said this on Don't Ask Don't Tell:

"I don't think there is any good answer to the question why shouldn't gays and lesbians who want to serve their country be allowed to do it."

I have significant differences with John Bolton's international affairs views but I give him great credit for not being the kind of bizarre cookie cutter hard right zealot that Bryan Fischer is. Bolton has not only supported the rights agenda of gay and lesbian Americans, he has been a great boss and mentor to a number of gay people -- including the very capable and doggedly results-focused Richard "Ric" Grenell who served Bolton as spokesman during Bolton's tenure as a recess-appointed Ambassador at the United Nations; his long-time aide in many incarnations Mark Groombridge; and others.

Bolton gets my respect for this -- and I have little patience for those who disparage the competency or qualifications of anyone based on any other issue than merit.

Bryan Fischer's anti-gay bigotry, coughed up of late on Romney for hiring Richard Grenell deserves widespread repudiation and scorn by sensible folks on the right and left. Fischer tweeted yesterday:

Romney picks out & loud gay as a spokesman. If personnel is policy, his message to the pro-family community: drop dead

Fischer didn't say the same about John Bolton who was already quite "out" about his support of gay Americans -- and if Fischer scooted through his roster of Republican possibilities, he'd see that nearly all of them had high level, plugged-in, highly competent gay and lesbian staff.

It's Fischer who is the odd man out in American politics; probably irritated that Mitt Romney punched through Fischer's incorrect political analysis of last year. One hopes that Romney stands strong -- and stand by the competence and capacity of people like Grenell -- and that we spend our time battling each other over issues that really matter to the nation.

There I have many differences with Romney, as well as Obama -- but today, Romney gets a salute from me for hiring Grenell.

Huffpost's Paul Blumenthal has an extensive piece out on Newt Gingrich's campaign debt problems. I loved this graf:

The campaign's most absurd unpaid expenses were more than $1 million to the private jet company Moby Dick Airways, nearly $450,000 to a security firm, and more than $500,000 in travel reimbursements and other payments to individual staffers and consultants.

When life imitates absurd movies. . .well, I just love the notion of Newt, Ahab, and Moby Dick.

Can't find much on the airline, but there is a Moby Dick Airways facebook page and a clip or two out there on Newt/Ahab's debts to Moby.

Last night I joined Rachel Maddow to talk about Mitt Romney's evolving views on Afghanistan.  At various times, Romney has said we needed to get out of the Afghanistan mess, agreeing for the most part at the time of early GOP debates with House Representative and then presidential candidate Michele Bachmann until shifting to a harder-line posture on staying in Afghanistan.

Romney, who has endorsed the general time frame of closing down most of the US mission in Afghanistan at the end of 2014 has been critical of Obama's decision to drawdown the committed surge forces and bringing levels to 68,000.  Obama -- acting like a Commander-in-Chief should listened to the advice of 'the generals' and then made a decision based on larger strategic factors and ordered that the surge troops be drawn out.  Romney has implied that Obama should not only 'listen to the generals' but should do what they tell him. 

Romney might want to go back and read testimony given by former ISAF Commander General David Petraeus about Afghanistan before Congress in which Petraeus said that the recommendations he was making were based on factors inside and related to Afghanistan alone -- but were not taking into account the larger "strategic situation."  Petraeus shied away from giving a strategic assessment of the value of Afghanistan in relation to other matters like America's posture with Iran, with the broader Middle East, with stability dynamics in South Asia -- particularly with Pakistan and India. 

Obama and his national security team lead by Tom Donilon and Denis McDonough have committed to a strategic rebalancing of US forces and long-term commitments. They are working to downsize America's vulnerability to the instability and challenges in the Middle East and South Asia which are sapping American resources and power and deploy to where global economic growth is shifting:  Asia. 

If Mitt Romney re-reads his Citadel speech and checks out the Asia sections, he agrees that Asia needs more attention.

The clip of my discussion with Rachel Maddow follows below:

Rachel Maddow talks to Atlantic editor-at-large Steve Clemons about whether John McCain is pushing Mitt Romney into more hawkish, never leave Afghanistan position

While I have largely dismissed the foreign policy competence and coherence of Mitt Romney's strategic vision in the past, I'm seeing Romney up his game in a few hires he has made. 

First of all, the Romney team has brought on board former Department of State Under Secretary for Global Affairs Paula Dobriansky to play a lead role on shaping his national security and foreign policy agenda and positions.  Dobriansky, who until recently was a senior executive with ThomsonReuters and once was Vice President and Director of the Washington operations for the Council on Foreign Relations, is a formidable and creative public intellectual.  I'm not sure she wrote the piece, but one could sense a different hand -- probably Paula Dobriansky's by my guess -- behind the interesting Mitt Romney Foreign Policy magazine oped, "Bowing to the Kremlin", in which he challenged Obama's caught-on-mic comments to Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on ballistic missile defense.

The essay was tough-minded, internally consistent and coherent, and a real contrast to other Romney foreign policy commentary.

The next big hire that I mentioned to Rachel Maddow last evening was that Ric Grenell, a long time communications expert who served as spokesman for four US Ambassadors to the United Nations, is now Romney's national security spokesman.  Grenell worked for former Senator Jack Danforth at the UN; then John Negroponte; then the affable John Bolton; and finally Zalmay Khalilzad.  During the long battle over John Bolton's Senate confirmation vote which he never received, Grenell was a tireless, tenacious, tough advocate for Bolton with the media.  I was one of those skeptical of John Bolton's UN confirmation, but I give Grenell credit for being fair-minded and serious with me. 

Foreign policy pundits and analysts are now going to have to reconsider Romney on foreign policy and national security and consider his positions more seriously. 

Presidents aren't just people -- they are franchises.  And with Dobriansky and Grenell, Romney has upped the stock value of his foreign policy operation.

The presidential candidacy of Mubarak spy chief Omar Suleiman was hatched more than eight months ago, possibly with the support then of the Muslim Brotherhood.  But then the deal came undone.

photo credit: Reuters

Egypt's Presidential Election Commission has deemed ten candidates unqualified for the upcoming election battle to succeed the toppled Hosni Mubarak.  They include the surprise candidate from the Muslim Brotherhood, Khairat al-Shater; the more radical Islamist Hazem Salah Abu Ismail; and Omar Suleiman, Mubarak's long time spymaster.

Egyptian citizens are massing in Tahrir Square protesting anti-democratic manipulation by the Commission as well as protesting in various pockets of the square this or that candidate on the roster -- or, as it were, not on the roster.

Of those in the current public glare, however, Omar Suleiman is the person I find most fascinating and perhaps consequential. 

First of all, last September I was told by a well connected Arab associate of mine that the military would put Suleiman up to stand for the presidency but would act as if he was separate from them.  I was also told that a secret deal had been made with the Muslim Brotherhood to 'acquiesce' to Suleiman, who despite having served for decades as a powerful head of intelligence in the previous regime was known not to be corrupt.

This was very hard to believe. 

I did not write about what I learned at the time as i could not get anyone from the Muslim Brotherhood or anyone in or close to the military to confirm this fantastical idea.

What I did was share what I learned with some at senior levels of the State Department, White House, Pentagon and CIA -- hoping for some feedback or traded information that might help confirm what I had heard about Suleiman, who had been after all a key ally and supporter of US interests for many years but particularly since 9/11.

In each case, the individual from the Obama administration or diplomatic/national security bureaucracy I spoke to simply thanked me for the information and never came back with anything.  This doesn't imply complicity; perhaps my administration contacts were as incredulous as I was that the military would put forward someone like Suleiman.  I don't know.

What I do know now is that Suleiman did not come out as a candidate at the last minute in some tactical game being played by the Commission and the Army to block and disqualify the Islamist candidates.  Gehad El-Haddad, steering committee member for the Muslim Brotherhood's Renaissance Project, has said "We have a strong understanding that Suleiman came to the scene just (so he could) be removed with Shater and Abu Ismail to afford the decision a higher level of legitimacy."

With due respect to El-Haddad, this was not the case as Suleiman's candidacy had been hatched eight months earlier -- and some of El-Haddad's brothers may have known he was coming down the pike. 

In the final days of the month of January 2012, protestors and revelers massed in Tahir to celebrate the first anniversary of the revolution and to protest the slowness of political reforms.  What was interesting during these events was that many of the regime's lead personalities -- not just the Mubaraks but many Ministers of state and security chiefs -- were targeted and lambasted in the protests as enemies of Egypt and of Islam.  The Muslim Brotherhood organized many of these protests and identified and created the Mubarak-era human targets around which to rally. 

Omar Suleiman, the long time head of intelligence who had participated in many US and European intel confabs to target, render, and occasionally torture Islamists in the wake of 9-11 and who was selected by Mubarak to be his Vice President in the wobbly moments before Mubarak fell from power, was never mentioned or protested against during these January-February 2012 rallies. 

For me, this was circumstantially supportive of the still seemingly bizarre notion that Suleiman would be put forward as a candidate for Egypt's presidency.

I don't know what undid the alleged secret deal between the Muslim Brotherhood and the Army-supported Ruling Council in Egypt, but the entry into the race of the popular Salafist Abu Ismail seems to have triggered the decision for the more 'moderate' Muslim Brotherhood to break its pledge not to enter a candidate and push forward businessman Khairat al-Shater.

Suleiman, who as I wrote some time ago was doing US bidding in both pretending to be a broker promoting reunification talks between the Palestinian Fatah and Hamas parties and yet the principal saboteur of the process, entered the race so that the Ruling Council had their option in -- though Suleiman has publicly disavowed any connection to Egypt's current rulers and the Army.

It's nearly inconceivable that the three candidates whose support comes from the strongest factions of Egyptian society will remain out of the race.  If the ruling stands, violence will likely increase -- or puppet candidates will be put forward with these strong men and their institutions behind them.

But don't count Suleiman out.  He is the phoenix who seems to keep rising out of the ashes of deals gone bad and broken regimes.

George Soros has gone to Berlin to tell the Germans that their policies are leading to the disintegration of not just the Euro, but Europe itself.

Yesterday in a panel on the "Future of Europe" at a conference organized by the Institute for New Economic Thinking, Soros said:

The Euro has really broken down. It has sprung defects, some of which could have been anticipated and some were anticipated. But some actually couldn't. Effectively, heavily indebted countries [in Europe] have ended up in the position of a third world country that is heavily indebted in a foreign currency. And that is only one of the unanticipated results of how things worked out [with the Euro].

Soros went on to say that Europe is simultaneously suffering from a Euro Crisis, a sovereign debt crisis, a balance of payments crisis, a banking crisis, a competitiveness crisis and suffering from other serious structural defects.

Bottom line. Soros thinks Europe is over unless Germany immediately changes course and develops a policy framework that is far more flexible and pragmatic than it is forcing now.

Here is the clip of George Soros on the "Future of Europe" panel:
 

More on the INET meeting in Berlin soon.

What is frightening many in Europe today is that German Finance Minister Schäuble's views are mainstream in Germany, a current account surplus national oasis in a world plagued by debt desertification.

photo credit: Reuters

German Minister of Finance Wolfgang Schäuble in his welcome note to an Institute of New Economic Thinking convening of some of the world's leading economic theorists and practitioners in Berlin this week wrote:

I would also like to point out that it is not just new thinking that we need.  Rather, it is often equally important to recall older ideas and approaches that may have fallen out of the limelight in the meantime.  For example, we in Germany have sharpened our focus on the necessity of pursuing economic and fiscal policies that are consistent with the principles of markets and competition -- what we call Ordnungspolitik.  This approach can make crucial contributions to the concrete design of policies and especially institutions.  In my view, Germany's "debt brake" is an institution that lays the groundwork for reliable long-term policymaking and that by itself can counteract undesriable fiscal and economic developments.

Ordnungspolitik seems to roughly translate into a government debt-averse, laissez-faire approach to economic policy that runs along similar lines to what Republican House Budget Committee Paul Ryan is promoting.

What is frightening many in Europe today is that Schäuble's views are mainstream in Germany, a current account surplus national oasis in a world plagued by debt desertification.

In other words, Germany is not only unwilling to extend a real lifeline to other sinking economies in Europe, it's using this moment in history to promote an ideological austerity that it wants to compel other nations -- when their economies are reeling -- to do the same as the price for German support.

George Soros, anchor speaker among many luminaries at this INET conference, has offered contrarian views to those of Schäuble and published this oped in yesterday's Financial Times, "Europe's Future Not up to Bundesbank."  However, in the side chatter here, most believe that the gap between Germany's economic prescriptions and floundering European siblings won't be bridged.

There is sort of a feeling among many here that the European titanic is sinking and that Germany has control of all the life boats and won't let them out.

In a way, developing 'new economic thinking' is similar to researching and promoting use of renewable energy sources -- vital but it takes a long time and major investment to retrofit a world organized around traditional energy. 

Soros and some others at this conference have been arguing that the very foundation of equilibrium-driven economics is wrong, that markets are instead prone to bubbles and collapse and require constant regulatory involvement. 

But just as the gap between Germany on one side and Spain, Italy, Greece, Portugal, and others on the other is growing -- so too is the gap between market fundamentalists like German Finance Minister Schäuble and 'new economic thinking' market skeptics.

While millions of other-than-German Europeans may sink given Germany's tenaciousness about a debt brake for all and a conservative Ordnungspolitik, also hit hard could be President Obama's reelection aspirations.  Stay tuned.

More »

I just got word that an impressive project designed to help Americans connect with global issues beyond a 'fear-mongering frame' is shuttering itself but will live on through the various reports it produced via the web.

The U.S. in the World Initiative, first launched many years ago by Priscilla Lewis, P.J. Simmons, and Sue Veres -- all then at the Rockefeller Brothers Fund -- was housed in various stages of its development at the Aspen Institute, New America Foundation, and Demos.

Today's toxic political climate and the extreme polarization of views after 9/11 on a number of fronts -- ranging from energy and climate policy to economic questions to national security -- seemed to force politicians and policy-focused organizations to chase people at the extremes rather than to make the case for healthy civic debate, a deliberative process about trade-offs, and decisions based on interests rather than fear.

The U.S. in the World Initiative did a compelling job assembling people from across the political spectrum who were committed to the idea of healthy civic engagement that included respect for minority or divergent views and prepared outlines for those speaking to classrooms, community groups, in the media, or elsewhere in how they might present positions on climate, war and peace, energy, terrorism, and other issues in a way that dialed down the hyperbole, took a big tent approach to the discussion, and yet still conveyed serious data about the respective challenge.

I have thought for years that we needed this kind of initiative on a much more massive scale -- but despite successful swimming against ideological and financing tides for years, to build out USITW just wasn't possible.

Folks may want to check the original U.S. in the World Guide -- which I had a small role in helping to support, and other materials (mostly in pdf format) available throughout the website.

I particularly liked USITW's recent work titled "Managing the Fear Factor."  Two interesting reports that grew out of this project, again in pdf format are "If This Isn't a War on Terrorism, What is it?" and also "Talking Security with Americans, Ten Years after 9/11." 

The first report considers opportunities and challenges associated with eight 'big ideas' that influential communicators might deploy to help change the conversation about terrorism and national security toward less fear-driven directions.  The second is a user-friendly communicators' toolkit based on insights from the Fear Factor project.

The folks that assembled these essays, reports, and toolkits were painstakingly diligent in including commissioned focus group analyses as well as worked with a vast number of communications, psychology, and sociology professionals supplemented by issue specific-experts.

I found this material useful over the years and am glad that it will remain online for some time -- but will certainly miss the U.S. in the World Initiative. 

Clearly the world still needs someone working hard on rationality over unmanaged emotion -- and making the case for healthy civic engagement instead of the regular toxic bickering, policy foodfights and paralysis that we see today.

A few days ago, I shared the key elements of a discussion I had with immediate past International Energy Agency Executive Director Nobuo Tanaka about his concerns about Japan's energy fragility at the moment. 

The bottom line from the talk was that Tanaka, now Global Associate for Energy Security and Sustainability at Japan's Institute of Energy Economics, was that Japan needed to get its nuclear energy production back online, that it could not now afford the allergy that has been shutting down Japan's 54 nuclear energy reactors -- even despite the tragedy at the Fukushima facility after a devastating earthquake and tsunami in the Sendai region.  He also argued that America could help its often taken-for-granted ally by offering sale of its surplus liquefied natural gas (LNG) and could help restore Japanese citizens' trust in their own government and nuclear energy authorities by establishing a peer-level ad hoc commission of US nuclear experts and former U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission commissioners.

I had a number of interesting responses to the piece that I want to share.

The first of this is from Nobuo Tanaka himself who said he agreed with the key tenets of my article but that I actually underestimated (unintentionally) another weak pillar of Japan's energy options -- particularly if a crisis with Iran further escalates. 

Tanaka writes:

Steve.  I read your article carefully again, and I now understand your calculation of total shortage of 800kbd.  Nuclear replacement needed of 500kbd plus Iranian 300kbd*.  This is fine.

But situation can be worse because if Hormuz strait is blocked, Japan will lose 4 million bd rather than 300kbd of Iranian oil.  I said that Saudi Arabia cannot help Japan because they cannot send oil through Hormuz. 

But otherwise this article is strong and correct.

Nobuo TANAKA

Two other informed readers, however, took issue with Nobuo Tanaka's calculations of the 'real costs' of nuclear energy -- and got a bit more expansive about their own critique of the Japanese government and private sector in the wake of the Fukushima disaster.

One reader writes:

I just came back from Japan, and having visited two of the tsunami devastated cities of Kesennuma and Ishinomaki north of Sendai, I am happy to report that recovery is ongoing.
But in terms of Mr. Tanaka's take on Japan's Energy stituation, I am wondering if you did not miss something, namely, if he did not try to:
 

a) Acknowledge that past energy policies (before 3.11) promoting nuclear power generation as the center piece was fool hardy.

b) Recognize the enormity of the damage and suffering that the disaster at Fukushima #1 has caused not just to the immediate people affected, but the entire national psyche.

c) Express some sympathy and even remorse for the suffering of the 100,000 or so people that had to be evacuated with literary "clothes on their backs".

The energy equation of not running 40 or more nuclear reactors at any given time is straight forward--any high school kid can do the calculation, i.e. the Government and the people know that part of the cost.

Perhaps what Mr. Tanaka, METI and TEPCO does not disclose and admit is what the people and the Governors (as politicians) are painfully aware of, namely, that the status and consequence of the complete meltdown of Units 1, 2 and 3 as well as the massive pile of spent fuel of Unit 4 are still unclear.  Hence, it is only sensible and reasonable to wait until the facts are known.

Steve, I need not remind you that Japan is a democracy and the Governors are elected officials who represent the voters, while the bureaucrats such as Mr. Tanaka are not.  Instead of scaring the people of Japan with scenarios of dire consequences if they do not revive METI's failed (some room for argument?) nuclear energy policies, he could listen to their concerns and even urge his former colleagues in METI to map out a different energy path (non-nuclear or greatly reduced nuclear) for Japan--a positive role for METI.

Another reader offers this critique:

Thanks for the article.

I don't have time to reply in detail, but Tanaka's argument for nuclear power is very typical of the kind of scare tactics (``Japanese manufacturing may leave the country'') the nuclear power lobby is using to try and get the nuclear power plants back on.

As Tetsunari Iida of the Institute for Sustainable Energy Policies (and an advisor to numerous local governments as well as the Kan administration) says: ``Go ahead''. He calls the bluff of people like Tanaka in an excellent book refuting the kind of arguments the pro-nuclear lobby is making, showing that the odds of Japanese large firms pulling up stakes and leaving the country because of high fuel prices over the coming months, or even years, are slim because, for most of them, there really is nowhere else to go and few if any have the money to completely start over in a foreign country. Add to that the various political risks and cultural difficulties, Iida-san convincingly argues that the argumentJ apanese firms will pull up stakes is just hot air.

Second, Tanaka probably told you something like "nuclear power costs only five or six yen per kilowatt hour''. That's the official figure, and it's simply not correct. If you add the hidden costs of waste disposal (not included in either METI's or IEA's official calculations but passed along to consumers in each and every monthly utility bill) plus all of the other subsidies needed to build plants, the real cost, according to one study done by an economic professor at Ritsumeikan and now widely endorsed by other economists, is around 15 yen per kilowatt/hour, about the price of wind.

The reaility is nuclear [energy] was a heavily subsidized industry, and this allowed for overproduction and overcapacity, and for hiding the true cost. Everybody benifitted, of course. but now the public and Japan's service and light manufacturing industries, which don't use huge amounts of electricity, want a more objective cost analysis, and an objective series of projections of what the costs are going to be with, or without, nuclear. Instead, they get scare tactics from Keidanren, the steel lobby, the utilities, and people like Tanaka.

As for the mid to long-term future, ask anybody a series of simple questions: Upon what economic statistics and future projections do Japanese government and utility officials make predictions about short, mid, and long-term energy demand? Is there an assumed annual GDP for this year, next year, and the next 10 or 20 years? Do they take into account the fact Japan's population is aging and the number of working age Japanese is dropping with each year? Do they assume the population of 127 million people will remain the same (presumably with massive foreign immigration) over the coming decades? Does fewer Japanese, either in the workplace or in general, mean more total electrictiy consumption or less? For two decades, I've been trying to get answers to the above questions, and nobody seems to really know, including the IEA officials I spoke to.

I don't have time here to write in detail about renewable energy, aging nuclear plants and the varies risks, and increasing costs which will be passed along to consumers, of operating them, etc. I'm sure Tanaka-san believes in his cause. And yes, the short term for some heavy industries (like those that support the IEA) is going to be painful.

But companies like Sharp, Sanyo, Kyocera, and even Toshiba and Mitsubishi see massive potential for non-nuclear energies and are quietly investing in them. The energy future for Japan, in my opinion, is not nearly as dire as Tanaka-san depicts it if everyone outside the nuclear village ignores its warnings and calmly moves forward.

Am I optimstic this will happen? No, to be truthful. However, with a bit of luck, only one or two nuclear plants will come back on in the short-term (those providing power to heavily industrialized areas that are the least energy efficient) and, over the next decade or so, Japan will ease into non-fossil fuel energies. As a nation that imports the vast majority of its energy needs, Japan has far more incentive than most others to become truly self-sufficient, and when Japanese politicians finally realize that Japanese-produced renewable energy allows them to play the ``patriotism'' card (which some like Osaka mayor Toru Hashimoto are already doing) then things are going to get very interesting.

Finally, let me point out I do agree with many of the things Tanaka-san said in the latter part of the piece. I, too, hope some sort of agreement between the U.S. and Japan can be worked out to send LNG from the U.S. to Japan, and I'm following that debate as closely as I can.

These are both highly thoughtful and informed counter-points to Nobuo Tanaka's frame on Japan's dire energy situation -- and like legislators say on the floor of the US Senate, I wanted to offer these for the record.

My sense from my discussion with Tanaka and knowing his take on energy options, that what is driving him now is a risk calculation based on Japan's dependence on external energy inputs, the scale of Japan's dependence, and the possibility that serious disruptions could occur in the near term.  Long term, lots of things could change -- but if serious disruptions occur in the near term, Japan could be facing very bleak times.

However, my own question -- unanswered at the time of this writing -- is that if Japan has a year's worth of strategic oil supplies stockpiled -- which I believe it does, couldn't Japan after an Iranian oil shock use that supply and then in the most dire of situations return the nuclear energy facilities to full operation?

We didn't get this through Wikileaks, but we just acquired an internal Al Jazeera memo to staff indicating a serious downsizing of the DC-based news operations of Al Jazeera English.

Dear All,
 
Today in our Washington DC office we are completing the "next frontier" project to restructure our broadcast model for News contribution from America.

From April 15th, we will no longer be opting-in with presentation from the DC Centre into news bulletins.  Instead we will be taking more live contribution from the field from stories we are covering across the USA.  We will continue to produce Inside Story from DC five days a week.

In addition to the changes in News output, in Programmes we are also moving Empire to New York later this year.  Though Empire does broadcast from locations which are specific to the subject of the show, New York is a natural base given its global make up and its global influence.

This change is part of the wider restructure which began over two years ago in order to enhance one of our core strengths of news gathering and reporting from the field.   We recently started up our bureau in Chicago.  We are soon to formally open our office in Los Angeles.  And we are now fully operational from Miami.  These bureaux add to our existing presence and strength in Washington DC, and New York, and our bureaux across Latin America.   Our commitment to coverage of the Americas remains as strong as ever.  With the US and Mexican elections this year, and with all the other stories from the United States and global stories which relate to the USA it is very important we continue to improve and enhance our coverage from the region.

Very best,

Al

AL ANSTEY |  MANAGING DIRECTOR
AL JAZEERA ENGLISH
www.aljazeera.net/english

We'll have to see what happens -- but this sounds like a pretty big disruption of Al Jazeera's high quality coverage of the American based political scene.  That said, the Al Jazeera English bureaus opening in Chicago, Miami and Los Angeles are reversals of the trend in many major global news operations that are shutting down overseas bureaus.

It's been interesting to watch Al Jazeera gain prominence in Washington over recent years -- with the likes of Hillary Clinton, David Petraeus, Stanley McChrystal, Leon Panetta, Susan Rice and others appearing on Al Jazeera and Al Jazeera English.  President Obama still seems to be maintaining an informal, perhaps unintentional, boycott of the news channel, which still smarts a bit from Obama's decision to grant an exclusive interview to the smaller Al Arabiya during his first year in office.

Many of these high level political interviews might not have been secured if Al Jazeera had not had the robust array of DC-based news products in house at the time.

Many employees of AJ English now fear layoffs will decimate their operation. 

And all this after Al Jazeera just did a deal to move their highly cramped operations to a new building in DC. 

Guess they won't need all that space after all?

photo credit:  Reuters/Alexander Demianchuk

Nobuo Tanaka's hair is on fire.  The immediate past executive director of the International Energy Agency is on a mission attempting to alert officials in the United States, Japan, Europe, China and elsewhere that post-Fukushima Japan may be approaching an energy death spiral.

Tanaka's argument is mathematical at its core.  He argues that if Japan does not find a way to 'turn on' its now shuttered nuclear energy reactors, not only will Japan's already sluggish economic condition be crushed with much larger oil and gas imports from Russia, Southeast Asia and the Middle East -- but because of the costs and risk uncertainty -- Japan's powerful manufacturing base may begin pulling out of the world's third largest economy.  In a morning meeting with me last week, Nobuo Tanaka said that if Japan didn't get its domestic energy production back on line soon, Japan would experience serious 'deindustrialization.'

Tanaka explained that at current levels, Japan consumes about 5 million barrels of oil a day.  Without domestically produced nuclear energy -- for which Japan has stockpiled for decades the world's largest non-weaponized highly processed plutonium reserves -- Japan falls about 10% or half a million barrels of oil short of what it must have. 

Japan has 54 nuclear energy reactors -- only two of which are running at the moment and both of which are scheduled for regular check ups and will shut down either late this month or in early May 2012.  As regular maintenance has required shutting down plant after plant, none of Japan's governors has allowed the nuclear energy plants to be returned to operation.

On top of the post-Fukushima nuclear plant disaster, global tensions with Iran are threatening Japan's dependence on Iranian oil exports, which Japan's share amounts to about 300,000 barrels a day. 

This makes Japan's current potential daily energy deficit about 800,000 barrels per day. 

Tanaka, who after leaving the International Energy Agency is biding his time now as Global Associate for Energy Security and Sustainability at Japan's Institute of Energy Economics, acknowledges that the Saudis have offered Japan, Europe and others who are jittery about the growing tensions with Iran more of its own domestic capacity, which most put at about 2 million barrels a day.  Tanaka says the problem is that that's just not enough to manage global shortfalls if there is a strike on Iran and oil flows are interrupted -- and he believes that the Saudis will favor European needs over Japan's.

On top of the gloom about nuclear energy supply doldrums in Japan, the hard consequences of tensions with Iran, there is a third area of concern Tanaka has:  the weather.  He said that if Japan has a very hot summer -- which some are projecting -- Japan will run another 10% short of supplies on top of the shortages it already projects.

But even all this is not the end of the squeeze.

Japan's other partial energy option is the importation of liquified natural gas (LNG) -- which it imports from Malaysia, Brunei, Qatar, UAE, Indonesia and Australia. Japan needs to further boost imports if it can but prices for LNG are surging.  The combined energy deficit Japan is facing would require a net increase, according to Tanaka, of LNG and oil that would run about $40 billion a year -- wiping out completely Japan's trade surpluses and more.

In meetings hosted by the Center for Strategic and International Studies this past week, Nobuo Tanaka made an appeal for the US to export some of its cheap LNG supply to Japan.  The price of LNG in Japan is currently four times the price in the United States. 

However, House of Representatives Natural Resources Committee Ranking Member Edward Markey has over the last several months been agitating in speeches and correspondence with Energy Secretary for the US to restrict LNG exports -- thus keeping prices low in the United States and leaving key strategic allies like Japan vulnerable to surging global LNG prices and to the geostrategic flirtations from Russia.  Tanaka said that with Russia, about which the US has increasing concerns about its mercantilist global energy behavior, Japan may be forced to build new grid and pipeline infrastructure with Russia given the cold shoulder the US is thus far showing Japan.

Tanaka told me that one high-ranking Chinese official recently approached him asking if and when Japan would turn its nuclear reactors back on -- as Japan's massive energy needs now were disrupting supply patterns and costs and could affect China's energy investment picture if Japan's needs were to become structurally permanent.

To some degree, without the Pulitzer and best-selling energy reality books to his name, Nobuo Tanaka is the Daniel Yergin of Japan and has an encyclopaedic knowledge of the patterns and vectors of energy production and consumption by all the major global energy actors.  His warnings matter -- and yet Japan's political leaders, he believes, have not honestly talked with the Japanese public about the hard choices it faces and a possible economic unraveling that comes with the status quo national nuclear energy allergy.

Tanaka thinks that the U.S. could play a constructive role in helping Japan weather its challenges -- not just in exporting cheaper LNG but it helping bridge the 'trust gap' between Japanese citizens and their government.

The former senior Japan Ministry of Economy Trade & Industry official joked that the only place in the world where an elected legislature may be less popular with its citizens that the US Congress is Japan -- where government incompetence and false statements made during and after the earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear plant disasters have collapsed Japanese trust in their officials.  And trust wasn't high before these incidents.

Tanaka realizes that there is a legitimate debate to be had about the safety and management of Japan's nuclear energy facilities and that standards need to be improved and a national conversation has to take place -- but that a total rejection of nuclear energy will send Japan over a cliff as deindustrialization is triggered by energy shocks.

One solution he thinks is for former US Nuclear Regulatory Commission commissioners and other US-based, respected nuclear energy experts form an ad hoc commission designed to consult with the Japanese nuclear energy industry and political authorities -- and to create what would be a bilateral, or perhaps even an international, peer review structure.  This might allow Japanese citizens to possibly fasten their trust in the international Commission even if doubtful about the solvency of their own business, political, and energy leaders.

It's an interesting proposal -- one that gets to the core issue of trust and lurking uncertainties about nuclear energy in Japan.  Some critics could argue that creating such a US-Japan or international commission would allow Japan to push this needed debate under the rug and cover up dangers lurking in Japan's energy system.

Maybe so -- but it also seems that Nobuo Tanaka could be right that Japan's economic future further unravels if it doesn't figure out some way to get safe nuclear energy back online. 

I've just been on a whirlwind trip in the Middle East and am now in Dubai planning to fly back to Washington tonight.

Don't have much time to write tonight -- but the one impression I can share from talking to a few folks here is that a seemingly brewing storm with Iran is not felt among the regular folks.  Jim Fallows once told me that while he was out doing some work in Seattle at Microsoft and then on various trips to Silicon Valley in California that he experienced an eery distance there from anything that a self-serious Washington was obsessed with. 

I don't want to minimize the dance that the Iranians, Europeans, Americans and Israelis are doing over Iran's nuclear aspirations -- with some involvement from the GCC countries -- but the issue of Iran is not high profile in the Arabic press I was looking at or in the conversations I've had with folks here.

Just a highly subjective snapshot -- but of note to me anyway.

More soon.