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| Europe | |
| Street Gangs: the New Urban Insurgency | |
| 2005-11-06 | |
This is a ... problem that must be understood on three distinct levels of analysis: first, the gangs phenomena are generating serious domestic and regional instability and insecurity that ranges from personal violence to insurgent to state failure: second, because of their criminal activities and security challenges, the gangs phenomena are exacerbating civil-military and police-military relations problems and reducing effective and civil-military ability to control the national territory; and, third, gangs are helping transitional criminal organizations, insurgents, warlords, and drug barons erode the legitimacy and effective sovereignty of nation-states . | |
| Posted by:lotp |
| #22 I've read the book and I do not think it is very applicable to the Street Gangs mold. Manwaring focuses on the power of nacro-trafficing and narco-corruption to empower criminal organizations and undermine already week states. This is not what is happening in France. I side more with John Robb's view that France its basically criminal gangs in the ghetto leveraging the rioters to fight back Sarkozy's "tough on crime" campaign. What is happening in France is more akin to Netwar - as described by Aquilla's "Networks and Netwar". The risk of course is that there could be a link-up to Islamofacist organizations. See my analysis at StrategyUnit |
| Posted by: StrategyUnit 2005-11-07 00:00 |
| #21 Zenster - the prefered market for the mobs (maximum profit) is as followed. 1) use and possession of small amts decriminalized 2) Sale criminalized This promises maximum prices with maximum market! The best situation is: Its either totally illegal with death sen. and such or totally legal with drunk driving type controls... Only way to make the market too small to interest gangs. |
| Posted by: 3dc 2005-11-06 23:54 |
| #20 Can you imagine replacing a cig in the mouth of a soccer mom, with a "Fat Boy" as she whips through traffic in her mini-van, with a cellphone glued to head? Besoeker, you may have missed the part about, "with strict regulation - like alcohol and tobacco". Last I checked, Driving Under the Influence was (quite rightly) illegal. In no way do I advocate any alteration of that law. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2005-11-06 23:45 |
| #19 You've identified their lifeblood Zenster, but I'm not ready to see it all legalized. Can you imagine replacing a cig in the mouth of a soccer mom, with a "Fat Boy" as she whips through traffic in her mini-van, with a cellphone glued to head? Or a pack of rednecks on a Harley's toking along? We just ain't ready for that. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2005-11-06 23:22 |
| #18 This will most likely be an extremely unpopular observation hereabouts. The linked article is a comprehensive and detailed argument for the decriminalization (with strict regulation - like alcohol and tobacco) of drugs. If narco-politics is such a major driver of third generation gangs, then let's remove their financial underpinnings. I realize that America's political landscape is still far too Puritanical to accept such an incompatible notion, but it remains a fact that dislocating the huge cash flow enjoyed by such deleterious organizations would go a long way towards pulling their fangs. Please remember how prohibition contributed to the rise of gang activity and violence in America. I can only speculate as to whether decriminalization might erode a significant nexus of revenues for similar criminal organizations. I know this is a can of worms. I also know that decoupling this one significant factor from the incredibly virulent threat of Islamist fanaticism might allow terrorism to be further isolated and dealt with far more successfully. I'll also admit that the article made me think through my advocacy of decapping various rogue governments. While such actions would definitely promote intra-state (internal) conflict, I still maintain that it would help to neuter whatever international (or ethno-religious) destabilization these outlaw nations seek to foment. Food for thought. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2005-11-06 23:13 |
| #17 Yes, I confess... a bit to the right of Ghangus Kahn at times, I'll give you that dankie sus. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2005-11-06 22:13 |
| #16 Thanks for the translation, ex-lib -- that helps a lot. (I hope Besoeker didn't think I was being sarcastic!) Of course, Zenster, doesn't think his views are extreme, he thinks we're just a little slow to catch up. ;-) |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2005-11-06 22:09 |
| #15 Besoeker is arguing that we didn't want to rock the boat too much with the war on illegal drugs here, because it would cause "rioting" (restless gravy train "passengers"). Interesting point, but the US position on illegal drugs is more clear and generally enforced to a greater degree than in France, methinks. Besoeker is kind of a Zenster type, so you can expect some extremist views. |
| Posted by: ex-lib 2005-11-06 21:39 |
| #14 When the gravy train stops, those on board get restless. I've often wondered if that was the motivation for our half-hearted "war on illegal drugs" here in the states. Just shut up, sit back, and eat your candy. Could you expand on that, please, Besoeker? I seem to be a little slow today. Thanks! |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2005-11-06 16:36 |
| #13 Excellent point lotp. When the gravy train stops, those on board get restless. I've often wondered if that was the motivation for our half-hearted "war on illegal drugs" here in the states. Just shut up, sit back, and eat your candy. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2005-11-06 16:14 |
| #12 Excellent summation KBK. Yea, I remember East St. louis AND the Cabrini Green housing projects in Chicago. Very bad juju. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2005-11-06 16:07 |
| #11 Yes, there CAN be such an intersection and no doubt it has occurred for some and will occur for others. But be careful not to oversimplify the facts on the ground in France. The violence (always bubbling at a low level in the banlieus) intensified and got public notice after Sarkozy began cracking down on drug and other crime and the national government announced cutbacks in housing and other subsidies. |
| Posted by: lotp 2005-11-06 15:59 |
| #10 KBK, Great link. I liked this bit: Is it not possible that you would seek a doctrine that would simultaneously explain your predicament, justify your wrath, point the way toward your revenge, and guarantee your salvation, especially if you were imprisoned? Would you not seek a âworthwhileâ direction for the energy, hatred, and violence seething within you, a direction that would enable you to do evil in the name of ultimate good? |
| Posted by: Mctavish Mcpherson 2005-11-06 15:52 |
| #9 That statement about always fighting the last war... This implies to me that Burnett's solution is sort of last war as it doesn't really address the gang/crime angle. |
| Posted by: 3dc 2005-11-06 13:52 |
| #8 insurgentsâ ultimate objective is to depose or control the governments of targeted countries... Good stuff lotp. They've already succeeded in most of urban America. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2005-11-06 12:44 |
| #7 The same issue arises in Iraq, where there's a delicate and slowly shifting balance between the insurgent violence, Iraqi forces, coalition forces and public opinion. Those who see the insurgency in Iraq mainly as an Islamacist uprising forget that Iraq under Saddam was run in many places by gangs that he never tried to suppress, just to exploit and skim money from. In France, I wonder what the public reaction would be to use of force -- and if they have a sufficient armed capability to deal with simultaneous uprisings in many places at once. Could be they do, but that's not what some commenters are saying. Here, such uprisings would threaten to fracture public opinion in serious ways I think. |
| Posted by: lotp 2005-11-06 10:46 |
| #6 Another interesting point is made at Wretchard's also. The yoots have calibrated their agression to the point where it achieves destabilizing political objectives without incurring a military response. In spite of automobiles being destroyed at the rate of 1,000 per night and probably 35,000 YTD, the French are locked in to not even a law enforcement model, but a containment model. That France has given up soverignty over some of its territory is the message that is being nightly reinforced by these yoots. This is a very devastating internal threat to the nation state that it is apparently helpless to respond to. The referencing to LA is quite reasonable. If Caliphornia rejects the four proposals on Tuesday, it's government will be left permanently hostage to the forces that have prevented the French government from making a vigorously effective response to this lawlessness. |
| Posted by: Angolugum Ebbinert6760 2005-11-06 10:31 |
| #5 It's not only M-13 that's well armed: "No one should underestimate the danger that this failure [to address the cités] poses, not only for France but also for the world. The inhabitants of the cités are exceptionally well armed. When the professional robbers among them raid a bank or an armored car delivering cash, they do so with bazookas and rocket launchers, and dress in paramilitary uniforms. From time to time, the police discover whole arsenals of Kalashnikovs in the cités. There is a vigorous informal trade between France and post-communist Eastern Europe: workshops in underground garages in the cités change the serial numbers of stolen luxury cars prior to export to the East, in exchange for sophisticated weaponry." Dalrymple had the situation in the cités absolutely nailed three years ago: The Barbarians at the Gates of Paris Read the whole thing :-). He predicted everything that's happening right now. By creating these dehumanizing ghettoes (similar to the Projects in St. Louis in the 70's), filling them with immigrants, and then abandoning them to criminals, France has created its own destruction. The fact that these immigrants are 30% - 40% unemployed and Muslim, with their associated insecurities and radical worldview, has created the perfect storm. |
| Posted by: KBK 2005-11-06 10:18 |
| #4 That's true in Iraq, btw, too. |
| Posted by: lotp 2005-11-06 09:54 |
| #3 From an article I've read about the french army's experience in Kosovo, the main problem of that area is not an opposing (para)military force, it is an overhelming, omnipresent, politized (and probably islamized too) organized crime. Armed forces are mostly powerless in front of that, and the UN hodge-podge of LE is too. The insurgency potential of organizeed criminal gangs should not be underestimated, it is sometimes hard to tell crooks from terrorists. |
| Posted by: anonymous5089 2005-11-06 09:52 |
| #2 Yup. And Manwaring's take seems prescient, given the quotes from French 'rioters' who've said they decided to rampage when Sarkozy began cutting down on drug trafficking and other crime in their neighborhoods. Same thing with the MS-13 gang, and with other emerging networks of violent thugs who traffick drugs, arms, people .... Last I read, MS-13 have occasionally been caught with body armor, night vision equipment, very high powered rifles .... |
| Posted by: lotp 2005-11-06 09:38 |
| #1 I remember back in the mid to late 1990's reading that Chinese were arming the gangs in LA and wondering WTH. Don't get too cocky with your French jokes, this could spread to our ghettos too. Yes, we are armed and yes we have better leadership, but if planning for these infant-ta-das has been going on for quite some time, then we'll get our turn too. |
| Posted by: 2b 2005-11-06 09:21 |