Herzliya Dispatch #1:The two state solution is coming, whether you like it or not. Posted by Joel Rubin

If there was one consistent theme that dominated the Herzliya conference today, it was the argument, made time and again by Israeli political and military leaders to a largely cautious audience, that a two state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is in Israel’s interest.

“Israel must be part of the pragmatic camp” in the Middle East said leader of the opposition Tzipi Livni.

“We have to have a real plan to implement the two state solution” said former Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz.

“80% of Israelis support a two state solution…” and “…we must implement both a bottoms-up and top-down approach (to the conflict) now” said Deputy Prime Minister Dan Meridor.

Not surprisingly, these strong pronouncements did not inspire the crowd to jump to its feet.

Of course, there is much more on the agenda here, as Israel’s top political-military leaders, thinkers, strategists, and officials networked with a diverse set of American, European, Asian, and Arab leaders. Discussions about the global economy, climate change, Israel’s public image, and the waning influence of the U.S. dominated. Permeating through almost every discussion was the backdrop of the looming danger posed by Iran, creating a sense of seriousness and concern.

And everyone made sure to make nice about the Obama administration.

The most powerful speaker, for my money, was Tzipi Livni. She delivered a forceful keynote early in the morning, barely looking at her notes and armed with a honed, strategic analysis. Critical of the current Israeli government, yet mindful of the need to be diplomatic, she demonstrated big league skills.

Dan Meridor too looked like a calm, reasonable voice. Sober and intelligent, he spoke of the broader strategic challenges, even bluntly stating the Israel made a mistake by not making more of an effort with Syria.

And the Americans showed their best, with Dan Kurtzer and Elliott Abrams engaging in a vigorous debate about the peace process. Abrams argued that the only year in the last 20 that didn’t have Israeli-Palestinian negotiations was the past one, implying that Obama has failed at peacemaking and that seeking a political deal for a state was the wrong approach. He also argued that the Palestinians should focus instead on creating the trappings of a state now, and wait for a political deal for an actual state later. Kurtzer countered that yes, 20 years of negotiations had failed to produce a state, either on the ground or at the political level, but instead spoke about how it was time to be more aggressive, not less. He also reminded the audience that Abrams’ recommendation of a bottoms-up only approach had been tried many times before, producing neither an improvement on the ground nor an actual state.

Interestingly, an early morning panel with Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations Executive Vice Chairman Malcolm Hoenlein, American Ambassador to Israel Jim Cunningham, Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon, and former U.S. Ambassador Alfred Moses entitled “Still Special: US-Israel Relations?” was nearly unanimous in its declarations that the relationship has never been better. Of course, it only took a few questions to notice that several of the panelists had real concerns, but they were all at great pains to show that relations are in top shape, handing a symbolic victory to President Obama after a tough year.

So overall, the strategic clarity expressed by the Israelis about the need for a Palestinian state – none of whom declared this for sentimental reasons – was striking. Approaches on how to get there differed widely. The rationale was often based on cold calculation related to consolidating relations with the Arabs against Iran. No one seemed particularly optimistic about the prospects of this goal even being achieved. But it was clear that this was a message that met the audience head-on, knocking them off balance.

There may not yet either be peace, or even a clear way to get there, but this day may well have granted Obama a subtle victory, as the broad political recognition in Israel of the importance of a two state solution was made urgently clear.

I can’t wait to hear Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad and Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak discuss this issue together tomorrow night.

 This was first published on the Huffington Post here.

More of the Same From the Pentagon on Contracting Posted by Michael Cohen

So the QDR is finally out . . .and over at attackerman Spencer is doing a nice job of picking out some of the juicier highlights. He seems to like this:

In keeping with the Administration’s goal of reducing the taxpayer’s dependence on contractors, the Department introduced its in-sourcing initiative  in the [fiscal year] 2010 budget. Over the next five years, the Department will reduce the number of support service contractors to their pre-2001 level of 26 percent of the workforce (from the current level of 39 percent) and replace them, if needed, with full-time government employees. These efforts will help us establish a balanced total workforce of military, government civilians and contractor personnel that more appropriately aligns public- and private-sector functions, and results in better value for the taxpayer.

It's hard to get excited about a statement like this, but it's reflective of the Pentagon's continued refusal to deal seriously with the question of how it utilizes contractors. Indeed, the language feels like the exact same thing Gates and others at the Pentagon were saying a year ago on this issue. But then as now; using arbitrary percentages to decide how many service contractors you will utilize is a truly unserious way to address the contractor question. 

It comes at the expense of asking critically important questions about core competencies; about how contractors contribute to mission success; or about how contractors can be more effectively integrated into the total force. Considering that as in Iraq there are today more contractors than troops in Afghanistan, these are precisely the kinds of questions that the Pentagon needs to be asking. But with the QDR only using the word "contractors" 12 times in a 128 page document one gets the pretty clear sense they haven't.

The bottom line is that there is nothing inherently wrong with having 39% of the Pentagon workforce filled by contractors, particularly since these private actors often perform tasks for which DoD lacks a core competency or where a surge force is needed. But this only works if DoD has thought long and hard about how they plan to use this private force and how they will conduct oversight of them.  What continues to be needed is an institutional-wide, top-to-bottom review of how each branch interacts with contractors and highlight areas for greater or lesser reliance on them (in short, the entire Pentagon needs to its own version of the Army's Gansler Report).

In an odd way, the use of arbitrary percentages is reminiscent of how we got into this contractor mess in the first place. Spencer refers to the post 9/11 contractor boom, but the rising use of contractors began well before September 2001. It started when the Clinton Administration decided they needed to shrink the size of government by outsourcing more and more government responsibilities to the private sector, with precious little consideration for what jobs belonged in-house and which ones could be outsourced. So it wasn't government that decreased in the 1990s; it was the number of people in the private sector taking on once public responsibilities that jumped.

More than a year ago, I wrote this about the contractor phenomenon:

A failure to accept the inevitability of contractors as a key element of the military force structure has contributed to inertia and an abdication of responsibility for managing the interaction between government departments and private contractors. A cultural shift is required in which civilian and military leaders take steps to fully integrate private contractors not only into the force structure but also into mission requirements. Without this sort of institutional change, the problems we have experienced in connection with contractors in Iraq and Afghanistan will continue, significantly retarding the military's ability to adjust to the evolving security challenges of the 21st century.

Nothing that I read in this leaked QDR document leads me to believe that the Pentagon has used the QDR process to seriously address these issues.

But We Need Band-Aids Posted by Michael Wahid Hanna

To keep this back and forth going just a bit more, I wanted to respond quickly to Michael Cohen’s post below where he characterizes tribal outreach efforts as band-aids. To which I would reply that we desperately need band-aids. This type of arrangement is not a long-term strategy and nor must it be. Certainly we should not confuse tactical success from engaging tribal militias as some sort of strategic breakthrough.

But I also believe that we overestimate our ability to craft long-term, sustainable solutions to the many ills that plague Afghanistan. In short, I don’t believe that these types of short-term efforts are irreparably damaging the coherent nation-building strategy that would simply take its place. When coupled with the difficult security situation then I think that band-aids are not such a bad idea − we need all the help we can get.

Further, my main point was simply to rebut the presumption that this type of initiative outside the scope of the central government’s control was inherently problematic and doomed to contribute to the unraveling of the country. In some ways, creating even ad hoc structures for the devolution of power might nudge the country toward a more sustainable and decentralized system of governance.  While Shinwari tribal leaders expressed a lack of trust in Kabul they have not indicated a desire to topple that government and that is a real and important distinction. 

Whether or not circumventing the central government represents some form of doctrinal heresy, we should judge this approach on its effectiveness. Again, this is a very small initiative and I cannot speak to the likelihood of its success, but all things considered I don’t think we can eschew such opportunities simply because of long-term concerns about the authority of the central government.

For the record, having a background in human rights law, I can say definitively that I think burning down the houses of Taliban sympathizers is immoral and also counterproductive. But, if we are engaged in some level of sponsorship with tribal militias then we might have the ability to influence their behavior. And let us not forget, if the root of this dispute is commercial in nature, it is conceivable that it will lead to violence in any event. Accordingly, it seems to me that taking advantage of these existing tribal rivalries might be more constructive than if we simply sat it out.

Climate Change as the New Yemen? Posted by Patrick Barry

Judging from Osama Bin Laden's latest ramblings, Al Qaeda is about to get into the climate change debate in a big way. From the New York Times:

“Talk about climate change is not an ideological luxury but a reality,” Mr. bin Laden was quoted as saying in a report on Al Jazeera’s English-language Web site. “All of the industrialized countries, especially the big ones, bear responsibility for the global warming crisis.”

It stands to reason that all future climate change intiatives should be placed under a counterterrorism umbrella. The Kerry-Boxer Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act will now be referred to as the Defeating Al Qaeda Through Energy Jobs and American Power Act.

A New Twist on Population Centric COIN Posted by Michael Cohen

So there has been a lot of back and forth here at DA on word yesterday that the Shimwari, a Pahstun tribe in Afghanistan is making an agreement with the US goverment for $1 million in development funds. Just to summarize, here are the three things that the Shinwari will do:

1) "They've agreed to support the American-backed government."

Clearly that's good news; after all one of the goals of the counter-insurgency effort is to extend the legitimacy of the Kabul government . . . so this sounds good.

2) "Battle insurgents."

Wow, even better. Clearly getting some tribal skin in the game against the Taliban has to be a good thing.

3) "Burn down the home of any Afghan who harbored Taliban guerrillas."

Excuse me?

You know I really wish there was a way to reproduce a spit take on a blog post; because when I read this I nearly shot orange juice out my nose.

While I certainly understand Michael Hanna's point below about the need to occasionally make unsavory deals; it doesn't strike me as a long-term strategy for success or even stability in Afghanistan to be encouraging one tribe to burn down the houses of their neighbors. Second, the $1 million in development assistance is being provided in such a way to purposely circumvent the Afghan government. Again how does this encourage long-term stability in Afghanistan, particularly when you have Shinwari elders saying things like this, "We have absolutely no faith in the Afghan government to do anything for us. We don’t trust them at all." And isn't this a direct contradiction of the earlier assertion that the Shinwari have agreed to support the Karzai government?

Third, if you read the Times story closely, it seems pretty clear that the Shinwaris war on the Taliban has far more to do with commerce (illicit and licit) than it does with any sort of fealty to long-term US goals. So while I guess this might work in the interim; deals like this one feel a bit like a band-aid on a much bigger and more complex set of problems. By supporting the Shinwari in the short-term are we just fostering a host of long-term problems for the Afghan state long after we leave?

Along these lines, Bernard Finel made a smart point the other day:

In our local politics, we fight over every little thing — school locations, bus routes, sidewalks — but somehow we think we can show in Afghanistan, spend billions of dollars, pick winners and losers, and come out smelling like a rose.

Oh and one more thing; isn't burning down houses a war crime? It's sort of strange to me that the immorality of the US joining up with an Afghan tribe that has openly declared it will burn down its rival's house didn't get more attention in this article.

Jindal Jumps Aboard the Keep America Afraid Wagon Posted by Adam Blickstein

The pattern's becoming a bit clear, isn't it? After wading through 8 years failed policies, the GOP is protecting it's ineffective counterterror legacy and penchant to put politics above national security by outsourcing its politics of terror agenda to Scott Brown and his refrain " Americans don't want their taxpayer hiring attorneys for terrorists. We want to use our taxpayer dollars to kill these terrorists." From Hannity last night, Bobby Jindal joins this earsplitting chorus:

Well, absolutely. Two things are concerning me greatly. You know when you talk -- last night you heard him -- I heard him say he wanted to end the war. I didn't hear him say that he wanted to win the war. And those are two very different phrases.You know, when you look at what happened with the underwear -- the so- called underwear bomber. Senator-elect Brown got it right. Americans don't want their taxpayer hiring attorneys for terrorists. We want to use our taxpayer dollars to kill these terrorists.

It just -- it was very, very disturbing, not only rhetoric but the actions. This whole idea that you've got -- how much more evidence do they need? They've got a man, they catch him in the act, trying to blow up the plane, and they want to read him his Miranda rights.They want to arrest him, give an attorney. And by the way, as soon as he found out he could be silent, he did become silent. Who knows what additional information we could have learned if they hadn't done that?

First, it's pretty clear, that like Gov. McDonnell, Jindal has his facts soiled in regard to the interrogation of and intelligence gleaned from the underwear bomber:

Collins said in a statement that the fact that the FBI read Abdulmutallab his Miranda rights “likely foreclosed the collection of additional intelligence information.” But over the weekend, The Associated Press published the most comprehensive account to date of Abdulmutallab’s interrogation and found no evidence that Mirandization inhibited interrogators’ access to valuable information. FBI interrogators, to the contrary, read him his Miranda rights after they were satisfied that he had no further information about any further attacks.

Second, this whole notion that money should go solely to weapons to kill terrorists completely dismisses that a great deal of money, in fact a critical amount of it from a national security perspective, also goes to intelligence gathering and analysis and other areas of our national security apparatus. Jindal subscribes to the "deny, ignore and bomb" it mentality that imperiled American security and lives during the Bush years. In stark contrast, the Obama administration has implemented a counterterrorism strategy that embraces the full spectrum of American power, one which actually keeps America safe.

Jindal also doesn't understand that naming someone an enemy combatant and sending him to a military commission doesn't mean he is denied representative counsel and legal protections. In fact, the opposite is true. As Ken Gude explains:

These conservatives clearly believe that the criminal system impedes intelligence collection because defendants get lawyers in the criminal system who always tell their clients to stop talking to the government. The only problem with this argument is that their recommended solution to this apparent problem—charging detainees in military commissions or holding them without charge in military detention—doesn’t change a defendant’s access to an attorney...Military commissions also have procedures prohibiting self-incrimination and ensuring that statements from the defendant are made voluntarily. There is virtually no difference between military commissions and criminal courts in the provision and availability of defense counsel.

Gude also undercuts Jindal's argument by describing the litany of valuable and actionable intelligence America has obtained from terrorists with lawyers present. This intelligence gathered in the presence of legal counsel has, in fact, kept America safe:

Brent Vinas, an American convert to Islam captured in Pakistan in 2008 and turned over to the FBI, has proven to be one of the U.S. government’s most valuable sources of information about Al Qaeda. From the moment Vinas was in American custody he had all the access to attorneys and other rights afforded criminal suspects, and he still produced what one intelligence official called a “treasure trove” of information about Al Qaeda. In more than 100 interviews with counterterrorism officials, Vinas provided information that led to a Predator drone strike that killed a suspected militant, and his information has allowed counterterrorism officials “to peer deep inside the inner workings of Al Qaeda.”

David Headly—also known as Daood Gilani—was arrested in Chicago and charged in connection with the 2008 Mumbai attack that left more than 150 people dead. Headly pleaded not guilty, but he is cooperating with prosecutors and helped U.S. officials uncover a plan by Lashkar-e-Taibi to unleash a similar attack in Copenhagen, Denmark, targeting the newspaper that printed cartoons of the prophet Mohammed. Meeting with his attorney has not prevented him from providing intelligence information that disrupted at least one terrorist plot.

And, my god, all that information without torture! The bottom line is Gov. Jindal joins Gov. Pawlenty, Gov. McDonnell and other GOP leaders who talk tough on national security, but really don't actually project any confidence that they can keep America safe. False assertions, fearmongering bluster, and placing politics above national security simply does not protect American lives.

What NYC Terror Trial Uproar Changes: Nothing Posted by Patrick Barry

Speculation that the White House is taking up Mayor Bloomberg's request to re-locate the trial of the 9/11 conspirators somewhere outside NYC will probably find supporters of military commissions sharpening their knives.  But why should that be? Leaving aside that the request for a relocation is largely a controversy of inconvenience (H\T Adam Serwer), civilian courts are still the most effective tool for bringing terrorists to justice. Ken Gude, of the Center for American Progress, writes, “The facts are clear: Criminal courts are a far tougher and more reliable forum for prosecuting terrorists than military commissions.”

The record of federal courts for trying terrorists, particularly since 9/11 is formidable.  Former Republican Congressman from Oklahoma Mickey Edwards writes: “[Critics] scowl and declare that our American courts will not, or can not, convict terrorists.  They seem pretty damned certain of that.  Which is weird since nearly 200 terrorists have been convicted in our federal courts in the last nine years (that's 65 times as many as have been convicted by military commissions).” A 2009 report by Human Rights First written by a team of former federal prosecutors found that terror trials in civilian courts had “a conviction rate of 91.121%.” And for those still think the NYC issue somehow stems from the courts effectiveness at prosecuting extremists, a study by NYU’s center on Law and Security, found that NYC courts have a zero acquittal rate for terrorism cases.

Another refrain from opponents of civilian trials is that they will somehow act as a soapbox for Al Qaeda to spread its virulent ideology.  Writing in the New York Times last November, Council on Foreign Relations counterterrorism expert Steven Simon pushed back on this idea: “Historically, the public exposure of state-sponsored mass murder or terrorism through a transparent judicial process has strengthened the forces of good and undercut the extremists. The Nuremberg trials were a classic case. And nothing more effectively alerted the world to the danger of genocide than Israel’s prosecution in 1961 of Adolf Eichmann, the bureaucrat who engineered the Holocaust.”

Support for military commissions might make sense, if the commissions themselves weren't so ineffective and soft. Gude explains, “military commissions have never handled a single case of murder or attempted murder and have doled out shockingly short sentences to terrorists—even to a close associate of Osama bin Laden.”  Moreover, “since their formation in November 2001, military commissions have only had one trial, negotiated one plea bargain, and convicted one defendant after he boycotted the proceedings,” while sustaining multiple supreme court challenges.  Of the three individuals convicted in military commissions, two received sentences less than a year long. 

So why, despite the overwhelming evidence that civilian courts are the best mechanism for bringing terrorists to justice, do people like Lindsey Graham support military commissions?  Might it be do avoid drudging up the GOP's torture problem in an open criminal proceeding? That's what Adam Serwer suspects: “There's also a potentially even more cynical motivation for the bill, however. Graham, a former JAG lawyer, is the Senate's expert on military law. He helped craft the revised military commissions, so he has to know that the prior commissions were ineffective, and that the new ones still might not be constitutional. Republicans have an interest in not revisiting the torture of terror suspects in open court, so preventing a civilian trial for KSM, depending on whether or not the commissions pass constitutional muster, could mean simply putting off any kind of trial indefinitely.”

One More on Tribal Militias Posted by Michael Wahid Hanna

At the risk of engaging in a practice that I have come to abhor, I am going to draw a few parallels between Iraq and Afghanistan, knowing that the situations are not generally comparable. On the issue of tribal engagement, many knowledgeable regional experts have emphasized the fact that Afghan tribal structures are deteriorated in comparison with Iraq's tribal structures and that tribal authority is far from sacrosanct following decades of war.

Be that as it may, I wanted to respond to Patrick Barry’s post below discussing the implications of providing direct support for the Shinwari tribe based on their declared intention to take on the Taliban. Patrick, in response to a post by Josh Foust, is sympathetic to the notion that this type of U.S. sponsorship will undermine the Afghan government since it is premised on a form of factionalism that is inimical to the state structure.

I find this concern puzzling for the simple fact that the U.S. has gotten to this point due to the fact that it has been unable to achieve its security goals in conjunction with the central government and its subsidiary organs. At present, the Afghan security forces lack capacity and they are simply incapable of reversing the deterioration in security. And while Foust is right in pointing out that Shinwari best practices of burning down the houses of enemy sympathizers is probably not something we should be associated with, the mere fact of operating outside of the formal structures of the state is not in and of itself sufficient to doom the current efforts (which are really small-bore in relative terms in any event).

When the Sunni Awakening arose in Anbar province and, particularly, when it was replicated in concerted fashion in other mixed areas of the country, there was a great deal of concern that the United States was undermining the authority of the state by eschewing the concerns of Baghdad and supporting or orchestrating the rise of these Sunni militias. Such efforts largely contradicted some of the central goals of any counterinsurgency, namely, reinforcing the power of the state and garnering civilian support for it. Some criticisms also pointed out that the United States was now engaged with unsavory criminal characters. But these critiques definitely put the cart before the horse, so to speak.

Certainly, American support for the Awakenings was unsustainable over the long-term and their establishment created a whole series of concerns about their relationship to Baghdad and the prospects for future sectarian warfare. But they arose and spread at a time when many people within the military thought that Anbar province had been lost and sectarian civil war had begun to engulf wide swaths of the country. As such, the concerns generated by U.S. sponsorship of the various Awakening groups were, in my mind, a second-order priority to the immediate task of reversing the disastrous momentum that had brought the United States to the brink of defeat in Iraq.

Of course such arrangements are less than ideal––they represent a stark reminder of the limited capabilities of the central state and are fraught with possibilities for blowback. But bearing that in mind, the first order of business has to be the improvement of security. If this can and has to be done through more localized means then so be it. And if the U.S. military pursues such means in the midst of an insurgency then they are very likely to be dealing with and sponsoring those with suspect affiliations and former insurgents with blood on their hands. If the Afghan security forces and local authorities were more capable then a simple solution would have presented itself long ago.

Now the Shinwari might be lousy allies, as Foust indicates in his post, and this whole initiative might come to naught, but it is not as if we have a vast menu of excellent choices to choose from. And we will never even get to the point of contemplating serious negotiations with senior Taliban leaders on a political settlement or issues of improved governance capacity and human security if current trends continue on the same trajectory. As was the case in Iraq, if we have any hope of addressing those political, systemic and institutional concerns, then security will have to come first. 

Foreign and Domestic Posted by Heather Hurlburt

CATO's Justin Logan tweaks me for something I said on Bloggingheads with Dan Drezner two days ago.  He seems to think I said foreign and defense spending are not fungible.  What I meant to say:

1.  The idea that foreign and domestic spending allocation is a one-for-one zero sum game is mistaken.  We need a strong economy at home to form the foundation of our power abroad (as President Obama went on to suggest in his state of the union).  We also need smart spending abroad -- to keep ourselves secure, to block disease and environmental disaster and other threats before they reach our shores, and to encourage economic and social development that, among their other benefits, create consumers and trading partners for our economy.

2.  The idea that it's a useful political trope to lead your argument on any national security issue with "we can't afford it" is also mistaken.  In the public mind -- I'm talking about perception here, and I think this is where the confusion came in -- if it's about our security of course we can afford it.  What kind of defeatist would say we can't afford things that are essential for our security?  If you establish first in your messaging that something -- say, the F-22, or outdated nuclear bombers, or an endless war in Iraq -- is not effective in promoting US security, then you can say, and besides, it's not cost-effective.  

3.  Also, if you believe as I do that the US has security, economic and moral interests in an active, engaged (though mostly civilian-led) foreign policy around the world, then the idea that a dollar spent abroad is better spent at home is not your friend.  Again, it ain't as simple (pace John Kerry) as firehouses there or firehouses here.

Finally, Justin raises the question of whether or not we can afford an "interventionist" foreign policy over the long term.  Now it's my turn to say I don't know what he means.  Usually at CATO that term is not a compliment.  What I laid out in point one above doesn't count to me as "interventionist" -- but starting two wars a decade sure does.  I actually think if we launch two wars every decade we will run out of manpower, morale and morals long before we run out of cash. Justin may think that policies that try to shift US energy production away from fossil fuels and negotiate with China to encourage/help/pressure it to do the same -- just as one example -- count as "interventionist."  I would disagree that they belong in the same worldview as the Iraq war.  I believe we both agree that we can afford the former policies; obviously I believe that kind of "engaged" foreign policy is a necessity.  I also believe we both agree that we can't afford the latter.

By the way, this is the crazy thing about the relationship between liberals and libertarians on national security these days.  We often start from the same critique and reach many of the same policy prescriptions -- but the intervening steps of reasoning look very different.  Justin's colleague Chris Preble looves to tweak me about this.  But at least the libertarians usually have internally-consistent reasoning.  Usually.

Who’s Who of Securing Loose Nukes Posted by Kelsey Hartigan

As I noted last night, President Obama’s comments on securing vulnerable nuclear materials received a standing ovation from both sides of the aisle.  (Though according to ABC’s tweet…there were 37 standing ovations in all…)

Now, even as we prosecute two wars, we're also confronting perhaps the greatest danger to the American people -– the threat of nuclear weapons.  I've embraced the vision of John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan through a strategy that reverses the spread of these weapons and seeks a world without them.  To reduce our stockpiles and launchers, while ensuring our deterrent, the United States and Russia are completing negotiations on the farthest-reaching arms control treaty in nearly two decades.  And at April's Nuclear Security Summit, we will bring 44 nations together here in Washington, D.C. behind a clear goal:  securing all vulnerable nuclear materials around the world in four years, so that they never fall into the hands of terrorists.  (And the crowd goes wild...)

As a follow-up on the President’s plug, the White House announced today whichcountries received invitations to attend. Via Josh Gerstein of Politico:

Israel is among the countries President Barack Obama has invited to Washington to discuss nuclear security issues this spring, the White House confirmed Thursday. However, Iran, the country whose nuclear ambitions are most the focus of international suspicion at the moment, will not be attending.

Arab countries on the 43-nation guest list include Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Egypt, whose foreign minister regularly hounds Israel over its nuclear arsenal during international meetings. All the major nuclear powers are also expected to attend the summit, along with countries like India and Pakistan who built and tested small numbers of weapons in recent years.

Another nation whose nuclear program has triggered widespread concern, North Korea, is also absent from the invite list, although neighboring South Korea will be present.

The full list, as released by the White House to POLITICO Thursday morning, is as follows:

Argentina
Australia
Belgium
Brazil
Canada
Chile
China
Czech Republic
Egypt
Finland
France
Georgia
Germany
India
Indonesia
Israel
Italy
Japan
Jordan
Kazakhstan
Malaysia
Mexico
Morocco
Netherlands
New Zealand
Nigeria
Norway
Pakistan
Philippines
Poland
Russia
Saudi Arabia
Singapore
South Africa
South Korea
Spain
Sweden
Switzerland
Turkey
Ukraine
United Arab Emirates
United Kingdom
Vietnam

I for one, am pretty relieved to see that Russia made the cut...