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Global Security, Book 1

Sharon McBride (Editor)

Start date: May 1, 2011

Finish date: June 24, 2011

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Jul 01, 2011 Dolly rated it liked it

Shelves: africa, nonfiction, military, 2011, afghanistan

I am reading these books as part of my Professional Military Education program (Air War College). Despite the fact that they have no ISBN numbers, they are so nicely bound and professional-looking that I felt compelled to add them to my "read" list. (Not to mention the hours and hours I spent reading them.)

This is book 1 of 2 for the Global Security block. I am steadily plodding my way through these books, knowing that eventually I will finish this course. I have three years to do it, and althou I am reading these books as part of my Professional Military Education program (Air War College). Despite the fact that they have no ISBN numbers, they are so nicely bound and professional-looking that I felt compelled to add them to my "read" list. (Not to mention the hours and hours I spent reading them.)

This is book 1 of 2 for the Global Security block. I am steadily plodding my way through these books, knowing that eventually I will finish this course. I have three years to do it, and although I originally scoffed at that, I am sure that it will take me close to 2 1/2 years. This compilation of articles and other material focuses on different parts of the world in turn and has fairly up-to-date material. Unfortunately, they just updated the block this month, but since I'm more than half-way through the material, I plan to just finish out with the 2008 version.

interesting quotes:

"convenient democracy" = democracy which is pro-U.S (p. 6)

"Workers with only high school educations are almost twice as likely to support protectionist policies as workers with college educations are. (p. 20)

"For the first time in modern history, globalization was superimposed onto a world with a single superpower. What we have discovered in the past 15 years is that it is a dangerous mixture. The
negative effects of globalization since 1990 are not the result of globalization itself. They are the dark side of American predominance." (p.27)

Three simple axioms of "globilization under unipolarity":
"Axiom 1: Above a certain threshold of power, the rate at which new
global problems are generated will exceed the rate at which old problems are fixed.
Axiom 2: In an increasingly networked world, places that fall between
the networks are very dangerous places—and there will be more
ungoverned zones when there is only one network to join.
Axiom 3: Without a real chance to find useful allies to counter a
superpower, opponents will try to neutralize power, by going
underground, going nuclear, or going “bad.”" (pp. 27-28)

"...in much of the world, including most of Europe, China is perceived more favorably along many dimensions than is the United States. And although other nations generally do not wish to emulate China's political system, its combination of high-speed economic growth and apparent stabilty is a development path that appeals to many." (p. 120)

"...Washington must stop defining Chinese power principally as a military challenge... the United States - and the rest of the world - will have to adapt to the centrality of economic and idea power in China's national strategy." (p. 121)

"...even the great famine of 1996-99, which killed as many as one million people, created no immediate domestic political challenge. Trained under the old system, deprived of opportunities to organize, and ignorant of the outside world, North Korea's starving farmers did not rebel. They just died." (p. 205)

"Associating al Qaeda with every known terrorist organization regardless of the nature of that support, whether declaratory or operational, only strengthens the image and political clout of al Qaeda in the Muslim world." (p. 277)

new words: zoonotic, consensualism, juche, rentier, autarkic, conurbations, meiosis, gallimaufry, panoply ...more

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