This blog opened in November 2007. It is a spin-off from Defense and the National Interest, whose Editors generously published my articles since September 2003. There have been 150,000 “vews” of the FM blog (the counter appears at the bottom of the right-side menu bar). The daily rate has increased by 4x since November, to roughly 1,600/day.
This is just a drop in the great ocean of the Internet, with its millions of blogs — where 150,000 hits is a slow day at sites about Britney. More important are the contributions of the people who posted over 1,500 comments. I have learned a lot from them. It has been, imo, both a valuable and civil discussion. I have banned nobody, and never deleted a comment (except one off-topic essay, deleted with the author’s consent). My thanks to all of you!
This blog’s themes have emerged over time, centered on three beliefs:
- Great challenges lie ahead for America.
- We can meet them; the difficulties that lie ahead are no worse than those behind us.
- We must make better use of our resources — esp. our ability to research, analyze, and plan — rather than rely on the inspired guesses that dominate so many fields today (e.g., national security, peak oil).
During the past five years I have written 264 articles, many fiercely disputed at the time. Quantity means nothing, but does create a track record. Accordingly I revised one oft-quoted section of the “About Fabius Maximus and this blog” page. It now reads as follows:
VI. Qualifications of the Author
A work of intellectual analysis stands on its own logic, supported only by the author’s track record. You can easily assess the latter by using the dropdown calendar to read my old articles. After four or five years the dust settles and forecasts can be evaluated. For example, here are my first four articles. They were controversial at the time, like much of the work you will find at this site.
- Scorecard #1: How well are we doing in Iraq? How well is our opposition doing? (22 September 2003)
- Scorecard #2: How well are we doing in Iraq? Afghanistan? (31 October 2003)
- Scorecard #3: the Coalition’s Progress in Iraq (9 November 2003)
- Scorecard #4: New developments in Iraq (22 November 2003)
Please share your comments by posting below. Be brief! Stay on topic! Or email me at fabmaximus at hotmail dot com (note the spam-protected spelling).
I’d like to send you my congratulations on this Memorial Day. I’m Brazilian, but I have a close friend in Iraq, with which I was able to talk with today.
From my point of view, you’re doing a great service to your country, and I do hope your writings help to make his life easier in the years he’ll still serve with the US Army. I hope your compatriots feel the same.
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Fabius Maximus replies: Thank you. Views about these things from outside the US are esp appreciated here!
Although we always disagree, I dont know anyone in the (right or left) blogosphere who thinks and writes more clearly than you. And more originally.
You once talked about “grand strategy” as something like a civilization’s whole purpose in being. You implied that specific military campaigns are meaningless (or worse) without a clear grand strategy. You also suggested that America’s grand strategy is out of sync with current global realities, and needs to be re-considered. I dont see that topic mentioned as one of your three “themes” above, and hope you will continue to treat it anyway. Maybe your readers could provide some thoughts on what a sane grand strategy might be in the 21st century, bearing in mind such obdurate realities as global warming, peak oil (possibly), China’s emergence as a major economic power, the hollowing out of America’s economy, the hollowing out of the political process in America, the overweening power of large corporations and large media, and so forth.
Congratulations on a successful launch!
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Fabius Maximus replies: Yes, I see that as important — as part of #3, planning. Thank you for the kind words!
Fab —
Let me add my congratulations, also.
As we all hoped when we pushed you out of the DNI nest, the site has become the oomphalos of net activity for exploring not how to employ national power, even soft power, but how to maintain our capacity for independent action and survive on our own terms.
There are two temptations that you expose on a daily basis, and as far as I know, you are unique in doing this: The first is to believe that our problems are insolvable, either because they are too large or because their number makes them too complex. The other is that our salvation lies in some particular ideology, whether counterinsurgency or peak-oil survivalism or surrender of our rights and responsibilities to the government. You make the point that these concepts are not inherently good or bad but that instead of signing up for any canned solution, people should engage their brains and THINK. Hard work, but useful every now and again.
It was obvious that these issues were too broad for DNI, which keeps to its mission of using Boyd’s framework to approach what are primarily military subjects, and that they were too important to stay cloaked within another site. I’m happy to have been proved right.
By my calculations, at your current growth rate everybody on the planet will be visiting the FM blog sometime in the spring of 2013 (with apologies to Norm Augustine).
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Fabius Maximus replies: Thank you for the kind review! Without your advice and assistance, this blog would not be here.
Also, you are exactly the 1,500th comment posted to this site. Once the WordPress advertising program starts up, your prize will be in the mail!
No comment deletions were necessary? *sigh*
This makes me look much more provocative than you. Maybe I should have a look at how you stay out of mainstream and don’t attract morons at the same time…
Congratulations FM, well earned. I don’t know how you do it, but you consistently manage to hit the major issues, both the ‘in your face ones’ and the (more often more important) background ones with unerring accuracy.
Either you never sleep or have half a dozen clones you have made (ah ha, I’ve worked out your secret).
Well done mate.
I think you’re a more balanced writer than Ralph Peters. That’s for sure.
Congrats,man! Only wished someone in the Versailles on the Potomac would just freakin’ read your stuff. Maybe that’d transform the strategic quagmire/landscape that America’s facing. Congrats again!
Was wonderin’, how old exactly are you? A baby-boomer perhaps?