7 Deadly Scenarios

by KREPINEVICH, ANDREW

• ISBN13: 9780553384727
• ISBN10: 0553384724
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Trade Paper
• Copyright: 2010-08-31
• Publisher: Bantam

Summary

A global pandemic finds millions swarming across the U.S. border. Major U.S. cities are leveled by black-market nukes. China's growing civil unrest ignites a global showdown. Pakistan's collapse leads to a hunt for its nuclear weapons. What if the worst that could happen actually happens? How would we respond? Are we ready? These are the questions that Andrew Krepinevich asks and answers in this timely and often chilling new book, which describes the changing face of war in the twenty-first century and identifies seven deadly scenarios that threaten our security in the crucial years ahead. As president of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments and consultant to secretaries of defense, the CIA, the Homeland Security Council and the Joint Forces Command, Krepinevich's job is to think the unthinkable and prepare a response in the event our worst nightmares become reality. Basing his analysis on open intelligence sources, an assessment of the latest global and political trends, and his knowledge of contemporary military history, Krepinevich starts each of the seven scenarios in the context of current geopolitical realities and vividly tracks the path to crisis. From the implosion of Pakistan to a worldwide cyberattack, from the consequences of a timed withdrawal from Iraq to the likelihood of a China on the march, Krepinevich reveals the forces, both overt and covert, that are in play; the ambitions of world powers, terrorist groups, and rogue states; and the actions and counteractions both our enemies and our allies can be expected to take. As riveting as a thriller, 7 Deadly Scenarios takes you inside the corridors of power, peers into the world of defense planning, and explores U.S. military and political strategy in the past, present, and likely future. The result is a must-read book that will trigger discussion, thought, and hopefully, action.

Author Biography

Andrew Krepinevich is president of the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments, an independent policy research institute, and a distinguished visiting professor at George Mason University’s School of Public Policy. He has served as a consultant on military affairs for many senior government officials and members of Congress. A West Point graduate, Krepinevich served as a U.S. Army officer for twenty-one years and holds an M.P.A. and a Ph.D. from Harvard University. He has lectured widely before professional and academic audiences at Harvard, Princeton, Yale, the Army and Naval War Colleges, the Air University, Europe’s Marshall Center, and France’s École Militaire, among others. He has testified on numerous occasions before Congress, and his work has appeared in such publications as the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, and Foreign Affairs.



From the Hardcover edition.

Table of Contents

Introduction: A Glimpse of the Future	p. 1
The Collapse of Pakistan	p. 30
War Comes to America	p. 63
Pandemic	p. 91
Armageddon: The Assault on Israel	p. 125
China's "Assassin's Mace"	p. 169
Just Not-on-Time: The War on the Global Economy	p. 210
Who Lost Iraq?	p. 246
Afghanistan: The Graveyard of Empires	p. 284
Conclusion: Lighting the Path Ahead	p. 321
Acknowledgments	p. 355
Index	p. 357
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.

Excerpts

Chapter One


The Collapse of Pakistan

A situation threatening the security of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal and collapse of its command and control could only be brought about by subversion from within the military. Were this to happen, it would signify the Islamists’ penetration of the last bastion of credible power in Pakistan.

Brigadier (Ret.) Arun Sahgal
United Service Institution [1]


Less than three months after assuming office, president Martin Simmons faces perhaps the greatest threat to America’s security since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. As Congress rushes to confirm the remaining members of the president’s national security team, the dramatic events of the past eight weeks, which began with the assassination of Pakistan’s president on February 24, are now coming to a head. Also emerging is a clear picture of the danger posed by Pakistan’s Islamist army faction and its militant Muslim allies, who hope to exploit that country’s growing civil disorder to seize power and create a radical Islamist state.


Assassination


The crisis came suddenly. president rehman dhar was planning a trip to the United States. Islamist [2] officers in Pakistan’s shadowy intelligence service, the Directorate of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), apparently leaked the planning details to a clique of Islamist army colonels. The purpose of Dhar’s trip, as we now know, was to request the deployment of American troops to Pakistan as the lead element of an international military force. The Pakistani president hoped to win U.S. backing and, ultimately, broad international support for his campaign to impose order on several provinces that are the center of a rapidly metastasizing militant Islamist insurrection. The Jihadist [3] sanctuaries located in these frontier areas have long provided support to terror campaigns in Afghanistan and India. More recently, they have extended their reach, claming responsibility for the “Stockholm Massacre” train bombings that killed more than two hundred, and the assassination of moderate Muslim leaders in Egypt and Morocco.

Armed with President Simmons’s support, President Dhar planned to address the United Nations General Assembly to request the world body’s backing for deploying an international peacekeeping force to his country. The purpose was to avoid a possible war with India, whose government had become increasingly anxious following last fall’s increase in Jihadist guerrilla and suicide attacks in Kashmir, which Dhar proved unable to suppress.

Whether Dhar could have succeeded in his mission will never be known. Pakistan’s president never made it to the airport. On February 24, 2013, his heavily armed motorcade was ambushed by renegade Pakistani Army units under the command of the Islamist faction, who were likely supported by Jihadist elements. In less than ten minutes the president and nearly all his forty-seven-man bodyguard were cut down. [4] A video of the massacre taken by the militant Islamists has been shown repeatedly by al-Jazeera and other Muslim media. [5] Reflecting their mastery on the “war of ideas” battlefield, Islamist military leaders and their cleric allies proclaimed the assassination the work of the Indians and Americans. This has produced large anti-American and anti-Indian public protests in Pakistan and parts of the Arab world. More than a million Pakistanis demonstrated both in Lahore and in Rawalpindi. At the same time public opinion polls revealed that these same people voice admiration for the Muslim radicals for ridding them of the pro-Western Dhar. [6]


“The Century’s Greatest Crisis”


The situation in pakistan continued deteriorating into mid-April, as the world’s second-largest Muslim state slipped toward open civil war. The mi

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Excerpted from 7 Deadly Scenarios: A Military Futurist Explores the Changing Face of War in the 21st Century by Andrew Krepinevich
All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.