I'm always on the lookout for innovative ideas in national security. So I was pleased to read the following in a WSJ opinion piece by Christopher Hitchens (h/t TPMB):

Iran is scheduled to suffer from a devastating earthquake in the very near future. Its capital, Tehran, is built on a cobweb of fault-lines: a predicament not improved by the astonishing amount of illegal and uninspected construction that takes place, thanks to corruption and incompetence, within its perimeter...Consider, then, the "public diplomacy" impact of a serious public offer to Iran, made through international media and from the podium (so often usurped by the clownish Mahmoud Ahmadinejad) of the United Nations. The U.S. could propose the following: a commitment to help Iran protect its centers of population and its key installations against an earthquake.

This is soft power at its best. The concept is sometimes denigrated as fuzzy-headed thinking promoted by weak-kneed liberals afraid of bloodshed and military power. And yet, the past five years have made the limits of military power all too clear - even the behemoth that is DoD, with levels of spending that dwarf the rest of the globe, cannot simply throw more resources at a problem and make victory materialize. Soft power helps us return to Clausewitz's dictum that war is a contest of wills - while still recognizing that there is a time and a place for the applications of military power, it posits that there are other ways of gaining strategic leverage.

This particular proposal has several facets that make it particularly appealing:

It harnesses capabilities already present in the US Government. No need for a massive new bureaucracy. No need for a "new Manhattan Project" or similar crash program dedicated to bringing into being an uncertain new capacity. The USGS' Earthquake Hazards Program, in place and running now for twenty-five years, already has the skills, experience, and interagency connections to make this dream a reality. And yes, the fact that it requires exactly zero soldiers, sailors, airmen or marines for long-term implementation is also a plus.

It is site-specific, tailored to a focused need and specific location. While it is true that nothing succeeds like success, it's also true that nothing created excess like success. The apparent success of the "Anbar Strategy" already has planners busily thinking how to implement it elsewhere, often without regard to how unique elements came together to make that strategy workable. By contrast, this idea is specifically focused on a local weakness of Iran's - the incredibly fragile geologic setting that simultaneously makes it such an oil-rich nation and a ticking time bomb of earthquake potential. Even better, it could potentially include the robust community of Iranian geologists, bypassing hard-liners and obstructionists in the Iranian government. For the mullahs to turn down such assistance would be a de facto admission of the weakness of their position.

Turnabout is fair play. I don't know about you, but I grind my teeth every time I hear another offer from Hugo Chavez of discounted heating oil or free eye care. And yet, these appeals are so effective precisely because they specifically target an externally perceived weakness of the nation. Anything Hugo can do, we should be able to do better by an order of magnitude.

This kind of leveraged application of soft power has a proven track record. Every time we've done it in the capacity of disaster response or medical assistance, whether in Pakistan, Indonesia or Latin America, it has paid dividends beyond expectations. Taking a proactive approach of providing assistance before the disaster strikes is simply the next logical step in using soft power to bring about solid results.

Disclosure: The author would like to gratefully acknowledge the assistance of Mindy Kimball in clarifying facts about the geology of Iran and the USGS program mentioned above. All errors of fact are those of the author alone, and her assistance should not be perceived as endorsement of the above opinions.