The language of national insecurity: prediction, strategy, and geopolitics.

ABSTRACT

Credible predictions (in the sense of forecasting future events) are notoriously difficult to achieve in human affairs. Predictions, once made public, invite counter maneuvers by adversaries. But whether presented in public or not, predictions must take into account the human capacity for strategic action: deception, surprise, and even changing the political or technological context of any conflict. One way to narrow the range of anticipated counter maneuvers in the arena of international politics is by incorporating geopolitical analysis into one's predictions; geopolitics being a field of inquiry that analyzes the relationship between contingent political events and persistent spatial structures. In order to show how strategy and geopolitics interact with prediction, this paper reconsiders a prophecy from the Book of Jonah, the strategy of appeasement at Munich, and a geopolitical prediction of the collapse of the Soviet Union.

INTRODUCTION

In an insecure world, diplomats and senior military officers often must act on incomplete knowledge, relying on hunches to thwart the designs of their adversaries; social scientists, on whose (dispassionate) observations the fate of nations rarely depends, loathe to predict the future. Why should this hesitancy be so? Imagine trying to forecast how high and for how long a child might fly his kite (Tocqueville, 1893/1987, p. 28). To attempt a credible forecast, it would be necessary--at the very least--to gauge the child's skill (a behavioral factor), the length and strength of the string and the quality of the kite (technological factors), the rules--if any--pertaining to kite flying (an institutional factor), and the location from whence the kite is launched in relationship to the prevailing winds (geographic factors.) Given such information, there is a reasonable chance of anticipating an outcome. But what if the dispassionate observer is trying to forecast the winning of a kite flying contest under conditions where slightly different locations provide marginal advantages in catching the wind, or the rules permit sabotage, or the design of the kite varies according to the skills of the child or his prior forecast of the likely wind conditions? Such circumstances only begin to approach the complexities--and hence the insecurities--encountered in the arena of international politics.

JONAH, PROPHECY, AND GEOPOLITICS

At least since the time of Jonah, discerning the future has been a risky business. What most people recall about the story of Jonah is that God commanded Jonah to do something--they usually forget what--but that when Jonah fled rather than do it, a great beast of the ocean swallowed him. So, Jonah is usually remembered because of his unfortunate association with a "whale." Nevertheless, what is crucial to remember is what God commanded Jonah to do, and what He commanded involved prediction, strategic thinking and even geopolitics.

God commanded Jonah to go to Nineveh and prophesy that, because of the wickedness of its inhabitants, the capital city of the Assyrians would be "overthrown" in forty days (presumably by God, or one of His instruments.) At first, rather than deliver the prophecy in Ninevah, Jonah fled to the port city, Joppa, where he booked passage to Tarshish. Jonah undoubtedly recognized that he could deliver the prophecy anywhere; he didn't have to travel to Ninevah to do it. Jonah may have also understood that God hoped when the Ninevites heard that the city would be overthrown, they would repent, thereby saving themselves. In that eventuality, Jonah might be accused of being a false prophet!

But there is also another, even more Machiavellian explanation for Jonah's unwillingness to deliver God's message. Armed with this prophecy, Jonah decided to take geopolitical considerations into account. Jonah, according to later interpretations of his actions, also foresaw that the Assyrians would eventually destroy Israel, provided of course that God did not destroy the Assyrians first. Therefore, Jonah may well have reasoned strategically as follows: Israel would not be destroyed if the Assyrians were destroyed first; the Assyrians would be destroyed if they did not repent; they would continue in their wicked ways if God's prophecy was not delivered; and so Jonah decided not to deliver it (and risk being a false prophet to boot.) Thus, Israel's fate and Jonah's reputation were tied together.

It is not our purpose to recount in detail the story of Jonah, and how it came to pass that he repented his own decision to flee while confined to the belly of the "whale." For our purposes all that needs to be mentioned is that the Ninevites, both the commoners and the king, reportedly believed his prophecy, and then they fasted, donned sackcloth, and sat in ashes. In effect, they also thought strategically and took the following risk. By repenting and abandoning their wicked ways, they attempted to stay God's wrath. And, even if their repentance was merely for show, they reckoned that God might take pity on the city, if only for the sake of their children and cattle. Indeed, their gamble paid off, and the city was saved. Where did all of this leave Jonah? Sitting outside the city, furious that his prophecy did not come true, and praying to have his life taken from him. Note the elements of Jonah's prophecy:

* the outcome--a city will be destroyed;

* its location--the capital of the Assyrians;

* its timing--forty days after the delivery of the prophecy;

* the cause or occasion--because of the unrepentant wickedness of the inhabitants; and

* the prime mover--God.

Although God did not direct Jonah to specify the means by which Ninevah was to be overthrown, He could easily have hinted that a plague would befall the Ninevites or that brimstone would fall from heaven or that some neighboring city would conquer them. So, the method by which the prophecy was to have been fulfilled was left unspecified, no doubt contributing to the inhabitants' fears and anxiety, softening them up for repentance. But for the fact that the prime mover and the ultimate source of the prophecy are one and the same (i.e., God), this prophecy sounds a lot like a prediction.

What are the elements of a credible forecast? The sandwich man who walks around town with signs proclaiming that "The end of the world is upon us" should be asked at the very least what he means by the end of the world, how this catastrophic event will take place, and when and where this process will begin. If such assertions of a divinely instigated apocalypse no longer seem entirely credible, it is partially because the God of the Old Testament has perversely threatened to destroy the world, various nations and cities--the innocent along with the wicked--on a number of occasions; even though, after having saved Noah from the flood, He repented on having delivered on His threat. An omnipotent Being may be motivated by whimsy and need brook no opposition.

In human affairs, however, any forecast must indicate what will occur with a fairly high degree of specificity. Credibility and specificity are closely related. Such predictions (and when I use this word, I do so in the same way that meteorologists use "forecast") should state when, where, and how what will occur will take place--all taking into account human intentions, actions and, above all, opposition (Clausewitz, 1832/1984; Luttwak, 1987).

This is because nations (and other organizational manifestations of the human will toward power, certainty, and security) do everything they can to thwart the designs of adversaries (or, indeed, their enemies). They seek to anticipate the likely course of action their adversaries will take, and then surprise them with an unanticipated counter-maneuver. It is this capacity for surprise, which is closely associated with strategic thought and action, that makes it so hard to come up with credible scenarios (Luttwak, 1987, p. 9). After all, once a prediction is made public, those who have an interest in forestalling an outcome may, like the Ninevites of old, seek to do whatever is in their power to reverse their fortune. So, even the most sagacious of political observers can be surprised by the creativity of adversaries (Clausewitz, 1932/1984; Luttwak, 1987; Handel, 2001; Kagan, 1991, pp. 206-7).

PREDICTION AND CHANGING CONTEXTS

What is strategic thinking and why does it render prediction difficult to achieve? Predictions are strange statements. "Tomorrow morning, before going to work, I will shower and shave" is a prediction of personal behavior based on the force of habit, the social expectations of the work place, and perhaps even a vague sense that only people who meet such expectations are likely to get raises or promotions. Such a statement is a prediction, but it is relatively uninteresting and trivial. Why? Well, for one thing as a prediction this statement is based primarily on sheer repetition of daily events: one of the strongest indications of what will happen in the near term is what occurred just prior. And, for another, this prediction takes into account only my own behavior, over which I have considerable degree of control. Completing my daily ablution does not normally provoke opposition.