Thanks for the comment! I don’t what to presume to speak for Robb, but based on the intellectual circles it appears that he runs in from his books read, blogroll, etc. I would guess that he would view Russia-Georgia as somewhat of an anomaly – fires create a few sparks even as they are burning out.

In proclaiming the end of state-vs-state warfare he is carrying on the message of most 4GW advocates. Martin Van Creveld discussed this idea in “The Transformation of War” (highly recommend). One of the basic assumptions behind 4GW is that the state is losing (has lost) its monopoly on violence, i.e. small groups independent of the state can inflict major damage of their own.

Will there continue to be state-vs-state conflicts in the future, possibly, but I would argue that they will be less and less as nations realize they produce diminishing returns. You just don’t get as much bang for your buck these days when it comes to conventional war…politically, nations that try to expand their borders will be shunned by the world.

What you may see is state-vs-state via proxy forces (like Iran using Hamas to indirectly fight their battles).

Here’s a great outline that shows the transformation of war and what it may look like in the future:

http://shloky.com/?p=2005

You’re right on target – stopping terrorism doesn’t just include securing ourselves from the end product, but also doing everything we can to stop young people from choosing that route in the first place.

David Kilcullen has some good thoughts on this in his book, “The Accidental Guerrilla,” specifically regarding Europe, which is currently home to an increasing number of Muslim immigrants.

Rather than isolating them and creating more despair in their lives, Kilcullen argues for well-targeted community engagement, taking away the opportunity for extremist penetration and manipulation.

As for Pakistan I really am not sure what I think yet – sometimes I feel like they are on the same page as the U.S., but more often than not I think we underestimate the level of Taliban support, specifically in the ISI. I haven’t studied Pakistan enough yet to have many intelligent thoughts to offer.

The season premiere of PBS Frontline, “Obama’s War” suggested that the ISI have strong ties with Mullah Omar and Jalaluddin Haqqani and know exactly where they are, but are unwilling to give them up to the U.S. Here’s the link to the episode (highly recommend watching it):

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/obamaswar/view/