HE’S MAKING A SMART GUY’S COCKTAIL: The Enemy Is Fragility. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s thoughtful new strategy. (Bumped — but with a present.)

Planet Earth, for worse and occasionally better, is a world of neighborhood existence — many neighborhoods at peace, many (most?) neighborhoods uneasy and facing tenuous circumstances, too many neighborhoods experiencing outright anarchy and war.

Blame the level of perception, of easy aggregation, for missing this truth. I’ll illustrate with an anecdote. Six years ago, an obstreperous type saw me at a private reception. From across the room, he bellowed: “Austin Bay! Is there any hope for Africa?”

My reply to the bellower — and the 15 or 20 so others present, who were surprised by the bellowing and puzzled by the question: “Which Africa? There are 6,000 Africas. Some Africas are doing quite well.”

The bellower blinked — an encouraging response. By George, he got it.

More:

The term “failed state” had its day in D.C. Beltway discourse. It translated — roughly — as a region that could not or did not protect humans living within its political boundaries. On the ground, it meant scores, if not hundreds, of neighborhoods convulsed by violence.

This is why the U.S. State Department’s new document “U.S. Strategy to Prevent Conflict and Promote Stability” is worth reading and implementing.

The new strategy identifies fragility as the key strategic issue, not failure. “Failed state” implies static rubble that requires centralized rebuilding.

Fragility frames the problem as a dynamic where small changes — neighborhood by neighborhood — can ultimately produce systemic improvement.

Kicker: “Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is a comprehensive thinker. For that reason alone, superficial media will ignore the new strategy. So download the department’s PDF and read it for yourself.”

A present for you — the link to “United States Strategy to Prevent Conflict and Promote Stability.” Yes, I should have linked to it yesterday. Merry Christmas.

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