A few miles off the coast of the far northeast corner of the continental United States is a disputed international boundary and a “gray zone” of water over which the United States and a peer nation have competing claims of sovereignty. These waters offer a warning regarding the effectiveness of the military’s current “culture of presence.”
Often viewed as areas of competition short of conflict, such gray zones actually are likely flashpoints, and restricting U.S. operations in these disputed areas to showing presence is an untenable practice. It has fostered a dangerous culture within U.S. naval forces, who increasingly confuse presence with action. Such a culture gives the advantage to belligerent nations and nonstate actors and must be rooted out of strategic visions and policies in favor of a “culture of aggressive nonviolence,” meaning one enabled to seize, burn, and sink with due care for the preservation of life.
ALEXANDRIA – Good Evening, Drifters
Those of you who have followed my work for some time may recall my quixotic quest to get the military to pay attention to the issues with our surge sealift fleet. Well, I have a new one for you: Fisheries. Fishing accounts for 20 percent of the protein in about half the world population’s diet. And, if you’ve not noticed, there are a ton of us.
When the Chinese Fishing Fleet descended on the Galapagos Islands two months ago, clearing out a natural wonder of its fish stocks, it hit me all at once: Fishing is on the fringes of my beat all the time. Many of the clashes between China and its neighbors in the South China Sea have to do with fishing. When, at the end of the Obama Administration, we looked very close to coming to blows with China, it was over Chinese incursions into Scarborough Shoal.