3DN The Pentagon's New Map
The Pentagon's New Map by Thomas P.M. Barnett
- This book's premise is that the Pentagon is stuck in thinking vertically - based on the years of developing the capability of defending against the unthinkable, nuclear war, they are still trying to plan based on a "near peer" opponent. Barnett suggest that better plans could be derived if we start thinking horizontally in terms of military needs in the context of "everything else". His analysis leads him to the proposal that the real threat in the 21st century is "disconnectedness". He proposes a connected core - those people connected into a global system of exchange - and a disconnected gap - those people who are not connected into the global system of exchange because of despotic rulers, exclusionary beliefs, etc.
- Barnett proposes that the role of the US military for the foreseeable future is to keep a lid on the disconnected gap until such time as each of those disconnected communities can be connected.
- My problem with Barnett's theories have to do with the level of capability he assigns to the US military and the view that connectedness alone - the continued march of market economics - will eventually solve the problem. See Better Maps for the limits of the market and Using a Better Map for the fourth option.
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