Mark D. Jacobsen's Blog, page 13

"The Lords of Harambee" now available as trade paperback

The Lords of Harambee is now available as a trade paperback through Amazon.com.  I received the final proof last week, and am quite happy with the result.  I like my Kindle, but there is nothing like a holding a physical copy of my book in my hands.



In other news, I now have an e-mail list specifically devoted to my writing.  If you would like to sign up, you can do so at Building Peace or just click this link.  Messages will be infrequent; the list is primarily a means of announcing when I have new work available.



Subscribers to the list will receive free digital copies of two of my short stories: Conquering Europa, set on Jupiter's frozen moon, won the 2001 Asimov/Dell Award for Undergraduate Excellence in Science Fiction and Fantasy Writing.  Summit Dreams follows an American POW in Vietnam along his imaginative expedition to climb Mt. Everest.

"The Lords of Harambee" now available as trade paperback

The Lords of Harambee is now available as a trade paperback through Amazon.com.  I received the final proof last week, and am quite happy with the result.  I like my Kindle, but there is nothing like a holding a physical copy of my book in my hands.

In other news, I now have an e-mail list specifically devoted to my writing.  If you would like to sign up, you can do so at Building Peace or just click this link.  Messages will be infrequent; the list is primarily a means of announcing when I have new work available.

Subscribers to the list will receive free digital copies of two of my short stories: Conquering Europa, set on Jupiter's frozen moon, won the 2001 Asimov/Dell Award for Undergraduate Excellence in Science Fiction and Fantasy Writing.  Summit Dreams follows an American POW in Vietnam along his imaginative expedition to climb Mt. Everest.

Garretson on Lessons for the Air Force

A couple years ago, an Air Force colleague suggested I contact a Really Smart Guy named Lt. Col. Peter Garretson for some career mentoring.  Garrison had a successful career as an Air Force pilot, but shifted into jobs where he could put his intellectual gifts to work as a strategist.  I called him up and we had a great conversation about the opportunities out there for Air Force officers who want to get paid to think.

Today I noticed that Lt Col Garretson has an essay up on Small Wars Journal about what lessons the Air Force should (and shouldn't) take away from ten years engaged in the Long War.  This was timely, as I've been thinking a lot about the subject while preparing my SAASS paper.  I really liked his essay and hope it circulates in the Air Force; it runs against the grain of Air Force institutional culture but carries a vital message.

Garretson argues that a military-wide shift to high-end deterrence is underway, but that Security Force Assistance and Partner Capacity Building will be essential to this mission.  The Air Force cannot simply jettison these things and exclusively tailor itself to high-tech, high-end warfare.  The ideas behind this quote are important (although it takes some disentangling):

In fact, for the USAF to equip the nation to defeat anti-access - area denial (A2AD) adversaries, political access and the ability of partner nations to host US air forces for Air Superiority and Strike, and have the Aerial Port of Delivery (APOD) reception capacity for US surface forces via air mobility are the essential components of USAF geopolitical strategy, and it is through low-end engagement that this is secured.

Unfortunately, Garretson argues, the Air Force has some institutional challenges to overcome if it will embrace these missions.  These missions are "too cheap" to draw the full attention of an Air Force oriented around expensive major weapons systems.  They also rely on skilled human beings more than technology, so the Air Force is "culturally disadvantaged" in knowing how to buy and maintain an effective partnering force.  Finally, effectiveness in these missions requires time horizons and a type of planning that is substantially different from the way the Air Force approaches other missions.  Here is another important quote:

A key change in mindset is to realize that the effect airmen are trying to accomplish with airpower is not destruction, but the enhancement of legitimacy and influence of the United States in the international system.  That different mind-set must also be reflected in planning, where instead of a short 24-hr ATO cycle applied against destroying an enemy’s industrial base, it is a multi-decade plan to create lasting, self-sustaining constructive effects.

Tomorrow's Challenge: Building an Agile Air Force

For those who might care, this is my admissions essay for SAASS, which is supposed to explore challenges facing tomorrow's practitioners of air, space, and cyberspace power.
The greatest challenge for air, space, and cyberspace practitioners is building an organization agile enough to meet threats across the spectrum of conflict in a dynamic, fast-changing environment.  The USAF has superior hardware, training, and overall competency in warfighting and should theoretically be able to dominate any and all enemies.  In practice, however, the USAF has had a difficult time adapting to different types of conflicts and translating its tactical dominance into strategic success.  Because it is impossible to predict the exact nature of tomorrow’s conflicts, it is futile to prepare for one hypothetical future; a much better approach is to shape the USAF into an agile learning organization that can rapidly adapt to new threats and missions.  Air Force leaders need the capability to rapidly “reprogram” the institution to meet emerging challenges.  Developing this agility will require reforming the service’s intellectual climate, personnel system, and acquisitions process.
First, an agile Air Force must cultivate an intellectual environment that fosters critical thinking, open-mindedness, and creativity.  Clausewitz famously said that the supreme act of a commander is to “establish ... the kind of war on which they are embarking.”  Unfortunately, the Air Force has traditionally been oriented towards one kind of war and has resisted adapting to others--or even recognizing that they are different.  It lagged years behind the Army and Marines in exploring COIN theory, and there is still a strong institutional bias towards using conventional aircraft to wage strategic air campaigns against states.  A decade into a long war against unconventional foes, the ACSC capstone war game in late 2011 still entailed allocating strike sorties to static, unthinking targets until their percentages reach zero.  The Air Force is heavily invested in AirSea Battle (ASB) for major combat operations against China, but has given less attention to partner capacity building and the management of low-level disputes we are actually seeing in the Pacific.  A scathing 2012 “Dear Boss” letter published on Small Wars Journal, which reflects common sentiments among the Air Force, lambasts senior leadership for selling out the USAF in order to support the joint force in Afghanistan and Iraq.  These examples illustrate how deeply entrenched this institutional culture is, and how slow the organization has been to adopt lessons from ten years of continuous war.  Preparing for great power conflict is vital, and the Air Force must retain its unique canon of airpower doctrine, but it also needs to institutionalize more thoughtfulness about war in its entirety.
Visionary officers must be empowered to make meaningful change across the entire organization.  The traditional channels for “reprogramming” the Air Force are official doctrine and PME, but both develop extremely slowly by today’s standards.  Adaptive, networked enemies who are unconstrained by bureaucracy can easily get inside this OODA loop.  PME lagged several years behind current events in institutionalizing COIN knowledge; by 2011 it was heavy on COIN and Iraq, but almost totally silent on tomorrow’s most likely threats: a highly unstable Pakistan, an ascendant China, war in the Koreas, criminal insurgency in Mexico, and the huge ramifications of debt and budget cuts on the Department of Defense.  Cyberwarfare is still glaringly absent; even the new Chief of Staff recently admitted he doesn’t understand it and is reluctant to commit resources until he does.  Formal channels for institutionalizing such knowledge must be accelerated and supplemented with new real-time channels like blogs and discussion forums.
A second challenge for creating a more agile Air Force is overhauling an industrial-age personnel system.  The current pyramid system rigidly enforces narrow career paths, punishes deviations, and limits the ability of commanders to match talent to requirements.  When urgent new manning requirements arise, personnel who fill them are often gambling with their careers.  A crucial requirement like the CJCS-priority AfPak Hands program has thus gained a reputation as a career-killer.  Perhaps the most significant recent example of institutional reprogramming is the Air Force’s expansion of ISR platforms.  Countless pilots were pulled from their Major Weapons System to become RPA operators or MC-12 pilots, but the rigidity of the personnel system put their futures in question.  This has damaged morale, eroded service culture, and driven personnel out of the force.  The USAF should anticipate further revolutionary changes such as miniaturization, swarming, and expanded roles for robots and cyberwarfare.  To be truly agile the Air Force needs a personnel system that rewards instead of punishes those who usher in such change.  It must attract and retain talent in emerging fields, and create more flexible career paths that allow personnel to deviate from formulaic progressions.  The Air Force should also expand opportunities for higher education and decentralize assignment matching by giving both subordinates and commanders a greater voice in the process.


A third challenge for agility is reforming the DOD’s acquisitions process, which is slow, expensive, and suited primarily for small numbers of high-technology weapons systems.  The Air Force inventory is badly aged, and cutting-edge weapons systems like the F-22, F-35, new tanker, and replacement bomber are essential.  However, an acquisitions system built primarily for such weapons systems has inherent weaknesses. These programs are vulnerable to mismanagement, extravagant cost overruns, and a slow pace of development.  The Air Force has lost much of its moral capital in Congress, has had to pare down future aircraft orders, and now risks losing some of these programs entirely.  The service needs to get its acquisitions processes in order or risk losing the very programs that it needs to survive.  There is also a risk that with this much money and this many jobs at stake, acquisitions programs will drive strategy rather than the other way around.  The Air Force needs sound processes and constant Red Teaming to ensure that rigorous strategic thought and valid assumptions drive acquisitions.  Small fleets can also be uniquely vulnerable to asymmetric attacks.  American airpower owns the skies, but a few low-tech insurgents in Afghanistan destroyed 7% of the Marine Corps' Harrier force in the recent attack at Bastion.  Copycat attacks could be devastating.  The USAF is already bracing itself to face anti-access/area denial weapons, but it should anticipate many other types of asymmetric attack.  Imagine hijacked RPAs, a virus in the F-22 or F-35 flight control software, or even Bastion-style attacks on US soil.  High-tech, low-quantity weapons systems are vital to tomorrow’s Air Force, but to mitigate risk Air Force leaders should simultaneously explore alternative lines of development, such as swarms of low-cost robotic aircraft or cyber weaponry.


This leads to another acquisitions requirement: an agile Air Force needs better processes and streamlined regulations to facilitate the rapid adoption of new technology.  Today Air Force members have better Internet access at Starbucks than they do at work, are issued iPads they aren’t allowed to take online, and must cope with clumsy military imitations of popular social media sites.  If the Air Force still wrestles to adopt technology as prolific as social media and mobile devices, how will it possibly be on the cutting edge of nanotechnology, biotechnology, 3D printing, or augmented reality?  The Air Force needs to anticipate such technologies, lay the legal and regulatory groundwork for their adoption, and experiment with their use.


It is impossible to predict the exact nature of America’s next conflict, but the Air Force should expect to face myriad threats across the spectrum of conflict in a rapidly changing world.  The primary challenge for air, space, and cyber practitioners will be ensuring the Air Force is sufficiently agile to meet these threats.

The Next Industrial Revolution?

I've spent the past week working on my admissions essay to the School of Advanced Air and Space Studies (SAASS), which is supposed to be about challenges facing tomorrow's practitioners of air, space, and cyberspace power.  I am focusing on the challenge of building an organization agile enough to adapt to a wide spectrum of threats in a dynamic, fast-changing world.  Agility is hard for any large organization.  The Air Force has been slow to adapt to revolutionary change, such as learning and institutionalizing COIN, transitioning to enormous ISR and RPA requirements, and adopting Internet and mobile technology.

Let me share a small illustration of how far the DOD, with its cumbersome overregulation, lags behind the rest of the world: I was recently issued an iPad as part of a modernization effort for flight publications.  I am not allowed to install software updates or apps, use the camera, or even connect it to the Internet.  Because going online is strictly forbidden I cannot use it to check e-mail, receive or file flight plans, check the weather or NOTAMS, file post-mission paperwork, or do anything else that a pilot might be expected to do.  All it's good for is reading government-issued publications.  Needless to say, this paperweight has never left its box, and I will continue to use my personal iPad until I'm ordered not to.

What worries me is not my ability to use a government-issued iPad; that is a small gripe.  What worries me is the prospect that the DOD will get farther and farther behind as technological progress accelerates.  We are years behind in embracing mobile technology, which is probably the most ubiquitous technology on the planet.  The biggest revolution in airpower in the last few decades was the transition to remotely-piloted aircraft, a change that has been agonizing for the Air Force.  As I wrote my SAASS essay I tried to envision what future revolutions might be coming.  What changes will we need to adapt to--and quickly--if we are to maintain our edge?

I see a few possibilities in the long run, like nanotechnology/miniaturization, or biological engineering and biological-technological interfaces.  Cyber is already here, but comparatively few people truly grasp its significance; we are in for a rude awakening sooner or later.  But there is one more revolution underway that Air Force leaders should be paying attention to: 3D printing, DIY manufacturing, and the overall concept of the "internet of things."  The implications are innumerable--for the entire global economy.  To cite just one defense-related example, imagine how much it would (or SHOULD) transform our logistics system if we could print aircraft or vehicle parts on demand.  Instead of identifying and prepositioning crucial parts or making provisions to ship them when required, what if we could deploy units with 3D printers and raw materials to generate their own parts?  That is a revolution, and it's one that could easily be overlooked because it's so not sexy... if we can't get iPads right, how will we possibly get logistics reform right?

As I was pondering this technology and its implications, this video and associated article from Wired magazine passed through my inbox.  It's a good primer on the upcoming manufacturing revolution.  The author's book about this revolution will be released tomorrow.

Jordan and Religious Tolerance

A tragedy recently brought me back to Jordan.  A dear Jordanian friend died, orphaning his teenage children.  Even before his final sickness my friend had been poor and in ill health and was concerned about his children's future; he asked me on a couple occasions if I would help look after them in the event that he died.  So as soon as I heard the tragic news, I began making travel plans.

I had a wonderful visit with the kids, who I knew relatively well from my time living in Jordan.  We were able to get out and do some fun things in Jordan, which gave them a much-needed change of atmosphere after the death of their father.  I also met with various people who know and love them, and ensured that financial arrangements are in place for them to live, eat, and continue in school.   Unfortunately, I was also witness to a sad drama and gained new perspective on life without genuine religious freedom.

Jordan sells itself as a pluralistic country that embraces religious tolerance, a view that most Jordanian Muslims genuinely believe.  Religious minorities aren't so quick to agree.  There is no denying that Jordan is a step above most of its neighbors, but religious freedom is far from absolute.  Christians, who are Jordan's largest religious minority, are left alone as long as they don't rock the boat.  However, there are definite red lines that Christians are not supposed to cross.  My Jordanian Christian friends are thus quietist, cautious, and always a little fearful.  They are terrified of the Arab Spring striking Jordan, because they believe that a strong king is the only thing standing between them and persecution at the hands of an Islamist-led government.  In the meantime, they are at least permitted to go about their ordinary lives without too much government interference.

There is one religious community in Jordan, however, that has no peace and lives with overt persecution: converts away from Islam.  A person's formal religious identity is written on his or her national ID card, and changing this religion away from Islam is illegal.  This leads to a host of problems.  A few years ago, the Jordanian friend who died--who was a Muslim convert to Christianity--was brought up on apostasy charges in a shariah court by Muslim relatives who wanted to take custody of his children.  Thankfully the court ruled there wasn't enough evidence to convict him, but it was a dark and stressful year for the family.

Now I am seeing the fallout for my friend's Christian children.  Immediately after his death, Muslim relatives tried to take custody.  They wanted to convert the kids to Islam, force the daughter to cover, and marry her to a Muslim.  The children want no part of this.  For now they are living on their own with help from Christian friends, but even if this continues, their future will be a difficult one.

All will have difficulty marrying.  Most Christian families would be afraid to marry their children to a Muslim-background Christian because of all the legal and social baggage.  For my friend's daughter, it's even worse; she is still legally a Muslim, so it is actually against shariah law for her to marry a non-Muslim.  I know one couple where the wife is a Muslim convert to Christianity.  There was no legal way for her to marry her Christian husband, so they had a religious wedding; now they are fugitives from the law, actively being hunted by furious relatives on the wife's side.  They want to flee the country, but cannot do so because they will flag at any security checkpoint.  There is no way for them to request religious asylum without getting out of the country first.

Religious intolerance is tragic but seems woven into the fabric of human nature.  That is why a strong legal commitment to religious freedom is so vital in government.  Some simple legal changes would dramatically improve the quality-of-life for converts away from Islam, such as the removal of religious identity from national ID cards and the legalization of conversion.  Unfortunately, I don't expect to see these reforms any time soon; Islamists would resist these changes, and the fragile Jordanian government does not want new battles right now.

"The Lords of Harambee" Breaks Out

If you've considered buying my political novel The Lords of Harambee, today would be a good day to do it.

I received a huge boost yesterday when nationally-known blogger Instapundit recommended the book.  In the past twenty-four hours I've sold enough copies to briefly make it onto Amazon.com's list of bestselling political novels (currently #8) and science fiction adventure novels (#14).  After a couple months of struggling to draw any attention to the novel, I'll admit that it's pretty satisfying seeing my name next to Tom Wolfe, Joe Haldeman, Orson Scott Card, and George R.R. Martin.

Self-publishing has been an interesting experiment.  The publishing industry is rapidly changing and I believe that self-publishing will become an increasingly important part of the literary landscape.  However, the market is saturated with lousy self-published novels and there are few gatekeeping mechanisms to help prospective readers separate the wheat from the chaff.  To succeed, a self-published author must (1) write a good book and (2) help readers discover it.  Either that, or write a lousy novel and be a marketing genius.  Or write erotica.  About vampires.

I'll leave it to my readers to determine whether or not my book is any good (free samples are available at the Amazon page).  I obviously believe in it.  The main reason I opted to self-publish is because my book is so far from genre norms that I anticipated trouble getting it published through traditional channels.  As the Instapundit plug noted, one reviewer disparagingly called the novel "Blackhawk Down in space"--which is exactly how I would describe it, except that I hoped it would be a selling point.

In any case, I've discovered that criteria #2--helping readers discover a book--is extremely difficult.  Breaking out is a chicken-and-egg problem.  A self-published book won't be taken seriously without attention from gatekeepers, but the gatekeepers won't pay attention to a self-published book unless it already stands out from the slush.  I've been scratching my head for the past two months trying to figure that one out.

But suddenly, for at least a brief time, the book is highly placed on a couple Amazon bestseller lists.  I would LOVE to keep that momentum going, so I encourage you to take a look at the product page on Amazon.  The book is only available electronically, but Amazon has free Kindle apps for almost every device you can imagine.  I am working on a print edition, which should be available within a few weeks.  If you did read and enjoy the book, tell your friends and consider writing a review on Amazon.com.  Thank you for all your support and encouragement!

A Few Changes

Lately I've been tinkering with my various social media accounts.  Most significantly I am experimenting with Twitter again.  I have decided to rebrand under my real name, so @reach364 has been retired and I am now tweeting as @jacobsenmd.  I never thought much of Twitter, but that's primarily because I saw it as a megaphone for broadcasting information--and I found it rather inefficient for that.  I never broke through to the level of building and sustaining relationships, which is where I keep hearing that Twitter's magic lies.  I am making that effort now.

Second, I've changed the header at Building Peace.  The new header features the great Athenian leader Pericles facing off with a Spartan king across a map of the world.  The new banner captures the scope of my interests better than the previous one, and is designed to illustrate something of what I mean by "building peace."  My use of those words might lead to a presumption of naiveté or idealism, especially in military and policy circles, but I am actually a staunch realist and believe that genuine peacebuilding demands pragmatism and a ruthlessly honest understanding of the world we live in.  That world happens to be the same world of Thucydides, a world captive to the tragic forces unleashed by fear, honor, and interest.

There And Back Again

Me trying to understand my orders from AFPC
My apologies for suddenly disappearing.  I spent the summer deployed to Kuwait, where I had lots of time in crew rest in which to write.  Since returning I have been extremely busy, especially given the massive life disruption because of my unexpected reassignment to AfPak Hands.
I spent the ensuing month reorienting my life around AfPak Hands.  I made contact with some inspiring AfPak Hands like Michele Poole and Fernando Lujan, with whom I was greatly looking forward to working.  I bought a large stack of new books on Afghanistan and Pakistan and subscribed to a new list of blogs like Registan and the Kabul Cable.  I began all the usual chores associated with a new assignment, like figuring out what to do with my house and working out the logistics of where my family should live when I deployed.  Work on my blog ceased; if I was going to spend the next year advising Afghans, blogging about controversial aspects of Islam didn't sound at all like a good idea.
Despite the disruption, I came to be really excited about the program.  So it came as another seismic shock when, several weeks later, I got a second unexpected e-mail telling me that the assignment was cancelled.  I had fully accepted the assignment and was charging full speed ahead, but during some internal deliberations way above my level the Air Force Personnel Center (AFPC) suddenly decided that they didn't want to kill my long-term career by assigning me to AfPak Hands at this particular time.  However, I will still be at the top of the list next year--once I've met some career milestones necessary to progress in the Air Force.
So to put it mildly, the last two months have been insane.  Life is more or less back to normal now, but I'm not sure what the future will hold.  All I know is that I am on a year of borrowed time, during which I need to learn all I can about leadership in the Air Force.  After that, I will be swept off again--either to AfPak Hands (if it's still the priority) or to another foreign affairs-related job.

My Novel is Available

Today I’m thrilled to announce the publication of my novel The Lords of Harambee.  It is available on Amazon for all Kindle platforms for $2.99.  Here is the plot summary:

The hostile world of Harambee was settled by refugees seeking a better life, with a little nudge from the Transsolar Corporation.  Now General Michael Sheridan commands an interstellar peacekeeping operation tasked with bringing order to a world torn apart by poverty, ethnic conflict, and foreign exploitation.  His estranged daughter Claire is an idealistic human rights lawyer who adamantly opposes the mission.  Njeri Omondi and Amazai Nebtomo are Harambean politicians of rival ethnicities, and secret lovers, who are trying to save their homeworld from implosion.  Their worst fears are realized when a coup topples the government and unleashes a horrific campaign of genocide.  These individuals must risk everything, and violate their most cherished principles, to stop the genocide--especially when Sheridan’s peacekeepers are ordered not to intervene.  As they strive to rouse an apathetic interstellar community, they have no idea how many great powers are manipulating the war to their advantage.  Among them is a utopian moon obsessed with achieving the Singularity--a technological leap forward into a posthuman future.

This is a huge event for me.  I spent a decade working on the novel, and have invested more heart and soul in it than any other project I’ve ever undertaken.  It has grown alongside me through my service and education as an officer.  I first conceived the idea while studying the Rwandan genocide as a USAFA cadet, and it has evolved to encompass many of my subsequent studies and interests.  Although fiction, it embodies my deepest reflections on human nature, international relations, and war.

Technically this novel is military science fiction, but it is substantially different from anything I’ve read in the genre and should appeal to anyone interested in history, politics, and war.  The story is set two centuries in the future, but it is really about the constancy of human nature and the eternal nature of war.  One reader told me it read like “Blackhawk Down in space”, which is exactly what I was striving for.

If you enjoy my writing, I invite you to take a look.  You can download a free sample before purchasing.  If you do read and enjoy the book, please spread the word--and be sure to let me know!  You can also help spread the word by liking the book on Facebook.