Sumit Ganguly and Paul Kapur: Mumbai’s Perilous Implications

Energy & EnvironmentRisk & Security

Security officials and cleanup crews are now combing through the carnage in Mumbai, following last week’s terrorist attacks in the city. As the citizens of this vast metropolis seek to restore some semblance of normalcy to their lives, it is important to probe the sources of the violence in Mumbai, and consider the attacks’ implications for regional security in South Asia.

How and why did the Mumbai attacks occur? Information at this stage is still incomplete. Nonetheless, a few points seem clear.

There is considerable evidence that Pakistan-based entities were behind the Mumbai attacks. The sole surviving terrorist is Pakistani. He claims that the attackers trained with the militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba for months inside Pakistan prior to launching their assault. And Indian officials have determined that the terrorists took a boat from Karachi to the Mumbai coast, leaving behind cell phones that had been used to call Pakistan.

None of this directly implicates the Pakistani government in the Mumbai attacks. It does, however, suggest that Pakistan bears some measure of responsibility for recent events; the Pakistani government is either unable or unwilling to prevent its territory from being used to launch terrorist attacks against India.

Jack Devine: Don’t Cut the Intelligence Budget

Risk & Security

On October 29, The New York Times published a major story entitled “Intelligence Agencies Face Austerity.” In the article, Mike McConnell, the Director of National Intelligence, is quoted as stating that spending on intelligence operations in 2007 increased by 9 percent, totaling $47.5 billion. Much of this increased funding understandably has been allocated to Afghanistan, Iraq, and the battle against Al Qaeda. All of these problems, as well as additional new threats including cyber warfare, will continue to dominate the intelligence budget over the coming year. That said, it is hard to predict just how the 2009 budget will play out in the context of the current economic crisis. In fact, there is speculation among some intelligence experts that the intelligence community might be vulnerable to significant cuts in future years.

This pressure needs to be resisted if we are to effectively face intelligence challenges of the future, described in my “Tomorrow’s Spygames” article in the 25th anniversary issue of World Policy Journal.

William D. Hartung: Bush’s Arms Sales Boom Continues

Risk & SecurityTechnology

Since I wrote my piece on the arms trade for the 25th anniversary issue of World Policy Journal, the Bush boom in arms exports has actually accelerated. Major offers that were made between mid-September and early October of this year include a $7 billion agreement to sell a Lockheed Martin missile defense system to the United Arab Emirates; a $15 billion deal for Israel to receive the United States’ latest fighter plane, the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter (another Lockheed Martin product, in partnership with Boeing); and over $6 billion in offers to Taiwan for anti-missile systems, attack helicopters, and anti-ship missiles. The Obama administration will inherit these mega-deals, which are very hard to roll back once an official offer has been made.

These deals come at an ideal time for Lockheed Martin, Boeing, and other arms makers. The economic crisis will force some sort of re-evaluation of the Pentagon’s record budget, which is now at its highest level since World War II. Weapons systems on the chopping block could include Lockheed Martin’s F-22 and F-35 combat aircraft, Boeing’s costly and complicated Future Combat System (FCS) for the Army, and Northrop Grumman’s Virginia-class attack submarine. The big contractors won’t be out on the street begging for change, but they will be scrambling to support themselves in the style to which they have become accustomed during the Bush/Rumsfeld/Cheney years.