Civilian Control, 1.5 Degrees, and Your Friendly Neighborhood National Security State
Is America still America under the hood? Links for Friday, May 16
Today we follow up on themes we recently covered:
Civilian control of the military (see here)
Global warming and the lost +1.5°C goal (here)
The onward march of your friendly security state (here)
Each of these finds contain remarkable surprises.
Ceding Civilian Control of the Military
Subverting civilian control of the military is tricky to discuss, since I think many among our friends and neighbors would gladly cede power to the generals if the generals would rid them of a certain troublesome politician.
I touched on this story here:
The thesis above is unproved. So far there’s only one source for it (Lawrence Wilkerson), and events haven’t borne it out. Yes, Netanyahu later invaded Lebanon, but without U.S. support. And yes, Zelensky has fired no more missiles into Russia, but the cause for that is unknown barring further reporting.
Yet the possibility of a rebellious military raises its head again, thanks to this report from Ken Klippenstein (whose site is a must-read, by the way).
The background is this: Pete Hegseth, a man well hated by many, a man who’s considered an “enemy of all we hold dear,” is cleaning house at the Pentagon, firing whichever generals and admirals he pleases.
Is that his right? It should be. After all, he’s the civilian in “civilian control,” no matter his other qualities.
So what are the generals doing? They’re fighting back. Klippenstein:
Hegseth’s belief that the firings will improve the military’s “warfighting capabilities” by rooting out the cabal of Democratic Party ninja operatives is, of course, ridiculous. But this is a classic case of a broken clock being right twice a day. Today’s military brass suck at their jobs. They’re good at agitating for wars (and defending them in jargon-laden testimony to Congress); but ending them? Not so much.
What does “fighting back” look like? Sending people like “retired” General James Marks on CNN to argue that Hegseth should take his cues from the generals and not give them orders. Klippenstein notes:
By saying Hegseth must take his cues from the “service chiefs,” Marks is saying that the military — not its civilian leader — should make the call. And lastly, he’s saying the generals themselves should get to decide if they (or their peers) get to keep their jobs.
Hmm, I wonder what they’d say!
If you wonder why the scare quotes around “retired” in my text above, consider how retired the retired generals were who pushed for invading Iraq on CNN. Active surrogates all.
Passing the +1.5°C Global Warming Target
We recently covered the fact that the global warming baseline was set too high. The pre-industrial age didn’t start in 1850, but in the mid-1700s with steam engines powered by coal, so the baseline shouldn’t be the 1850-1900 average, or anything like it. Pre-industrial is the global temperate around 1700.
Turns out, different climate organizations have different ways of calculating global warming, so it’s interesting and surprising to see Berkeley Earth, an independent non-profit and home to scientists Robert Rohde and Zeke Hausfather, has declared that, for the last two years — 2023 and 2024 — global warming has breached 1.5°C, even measured against the usual baseline.
The last two dots above are the last two years. Full report here:
• Global Temperature Report for 2024
The latest number, in case you’re wondering, is +1.62°C above the too-high baseline number. For the real warming number using Berkeley’s analysis, add 0.2°C to that.
Your Friendly Security State Is Getting Less Friendly
“First they came for…” et cetera. And they’re gearing up fast.
Did you wonder when they’d start to target citizens who hold dangerous opinions, “they” being our robot protectors and “dangerous opinions” being the inverse of Israel support?
It’s started.