<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">
<html>
<head>
<meta content="text/html;charset=ISO-8859-1" http-equiv="Content-Type">
<title></title>
</head>
<body style="" bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000">
<b>This was sent to me this morning.</b>
<div style="margin: 0px;"><b><br class="khtml-block-placeholder">
</b></div>
<div style="margin: 0px;"><b><br class="khtml-block-placeholder">
</b></div>
<div style="margin: 0px;"><b>-Mike</b></div>
<div style="margin: 0px;"><b>-----------------------------------</b></div>
<div style="margin: 0px;"><b><br class="khtml-block-placeholder">
</b></div>
<div style="margin: 0px;"><b>Feral cities - The New Strategic
Environment</b></div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Naval War College Review, Autumn, 2003 by
Richard J. Norton</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Imagine a great metropolis covering hundreds
of square miles. Once a vital component in a national economy, this
sprawling urban environment is now a vast collection of blighted
buildings, an immense petri dish of both ancient and new diseases, a
territory where the rule of law has long been replaced by near anarchy
in which the only security available is that which is attained through
brute power. (1) Such cities have been routinely imagined in
apocalyptic movies and in certain science-fiction genres, where they
are often portrayed as gigantic versions of T. S. Eliot's Rat's Alley.
(2) Yet this city would still be globally connected. It would possess
at least a modicum of commercial linkages, and some of its inhabitants
would have access to the world's most modern communication and
computing technologies. It would, in effect, be a feral city.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Admittedly, the very term "feral city" is
both provocative and controversial. Yet this description has been
chosen advisedly. The feral city may be a phenomenon that never takes
place, yet its emergence should not be dismissed as impossible. The
phrase also suggests, at least faintly, the nature of what may become
one of the more difficult security challenges of the new century.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Over the past decade or so a great deal of
scholarly attention has been paid to the phenomenon of failing states.
(3) Nor has this pursuit been undertaken solely by the academic
community. Government leaders and military commanders as well as
directors of nongovernmental organizations and intergovernmental bodies
have attempted to deal with faltering, failing, and failed states.
Involvement by the United States in such matters has run the gamut from
expressions of concern to cautious humanitarian assistance to
full-fledged military intervention. In contrast, however, there has
been a significant lack of concern for the potential emergence of
failed cities. This is somewhat surprising, as the feral city may prove
as common a feature of the global landscape of the first decade of the
twenty-first century as the faltering, failing, or failed state was in
the last decade of the twentieth. While it may be premature to suggest
that a truly feral city--with the possible exception of Mogadishu--can
be found anywhere on the globe today, indicators point to a day, not so
distant, when such examples will be easily found.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">This article first seeks to define a feral
city. It then describes such a city's attributes and suggests why the
issue is worth international attention. A possible methodology to
identify cities that have the potential to become feral will then be
presented. Finally, the potential impact of feral cities on the U.S.
military, and the U.S. Navy specifically, will be discussed.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">DEFINITION AND ATTRIBUTES</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">The putative "feral city" is (or would be) a
metropolis with a population of more than a million people in a state
the government of which has lost the ability to maintain the rule of
law within the city's boundaries yet remains a functioning actor in the
greater international system. (4)</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">In a feral city social services are all but
nonexistent, and the vast majority of the city's occupants have no
access to even the most basic health or security assistance. There is
no social safety net. Human security is for the most part a matter of
individual initiative. Yet a feral city does not descend into complete,
random chaos. Some elements, be they criminals, armed resistance
groups, clans, tribes, or neighborhood associations, exert various
degrees of control over portions of the city. Intercity, city-state,
and even international commercial transactions occur, but corruption,
avarice, and violence are their hallmarks. A feral city experiences
massive levels of disease and creates enough pollution to qualify as an
international environmental disaster zone. Most feral cities would
suffer from massive urban hypertrophy, covering vast expanses of land.
The city's structures range from once-great buildings symbolic of state
power to the meanest shantytowns and slums. Yet even under these
conditions, these cities continue to grow, and the majority of
occupants do not voluntarily leave. (5)</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Feral cities would exert an almost magnetic
influence on terrorist organizations. Such megalopolises will provide
exceptionally safe havens for armed resistance groups, especially those
having cultural affinity with at least one sizable segment of the
city's population. The efficacy and portability of the most modern
computing and communication systems allow the activities of a worldwide
terrorist, criminal, or predatory and corrupt commercial network to be
coordinated and directed with equipment easily obtained on the open
market and packed into a minivan. The vast size of a feral city, with
its buildings, other structures, and subterranean spaces, would offer
nearly perfect protection from overhead sensors, whether satellites or
unmanned aerial vehicles. The city's population represents for such
entities a ready source of recruits and a built-in intelligence
network. Collecting human intelligence against them in this environment
is likely to be a daunting task. Should the city contain airport or
seaport facilities, such an organization would be able to import and
export a variety of items. The feral city environment will actually
make it easier for an armed resistance group that does not already have
connections with criminal organizations to make them. The linkage
between such groups, once thought to be rather unlikely, is now so
commonplace as to elicit no comment.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">WHAT'S NEW?</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">But is not much of this true of certain
troubled urban areas of today and of the past? It is certainly true
that cities have long bred diseases. Criminal gangs have often held
sway over vast stretches of urban landscape and slums; "projects" and
shantytowns have long been part of the cityscape. Nor is urban
pollution anything new--London was environmentally toxic in the 1960s.
So what is different about "feral cities"?</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">The most notable difference is that where the
police forces of the state have sometimes opted not to enforce the rule
of law in certain urban localities, in a feral city these forces will
not be able to do so. Should the feral city be of special
importance--for example, a major seaport or airport--the state might
find it easier to negotiate power and profit-sharing arrangements with
city power centers to ensure that facilities important to state
survival continue to operate. For a weak state government, the ability
of the feral city to resist the police forces of the state may make
such negotiations the only option. In some countries, especially those
facing massive development challenges, even the military would be
unequal to imposing legal order on a feral city. In other, more
developed states it might be possible to use military force to subdue a
feral city, but the cost would be extremely high, and the operation
would be more likely to leave behind a field of rubble than a reclaimed
and functioning population center.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Other forms of state control and influence in
a feral city would also be weak, and to an unparalleled degree. In a
feral city, the state's writ does not run. In fact, state and
international authorities would be massively ignorant of the true
nature of the power structures, population, and activities within a
feral city.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Yet another difference will be the level and
nature of the security threat posed by a feral city. Traditionally,
problems of urban decay and associated issues, such as crime, have been
seen as domestic issues best dealt with by internal security or police
forces. That will no longer be an option.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">REASONS FOR CONCERN</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Indeed, the majority of threats posed by a
feral city would be viewed as both nontraditional and transnational by
most people currently involved with national security. Chief among the
nontraditional threats are the potential for pandemics and massive
environmental degradation, and the near certainty that feral cities
will serve as major transshipment points for all manner of illicit
commodities.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">As has been noted, city-born pandemics are
not new. Yet the toxic environment of a feral city potentially poses
uniquely severe threats. A new illness or a strain of an existing
disease could easily breed and mutate without detection in a feral
city. Since feral cities would not be hermetically sealed, it is quite
easy to envision a deadly and dangerously virulent epidemic originating
from such places. As of this writing, the SARS outbreak of 2003 seems
to offer an example of a city (Guangdong, China) serving as a pathogen
incubator and point of origin of an intercontinental epidemic. (6) In
the case of SARS, the existence of the disease was rapidly identified,
the origin was speedily traced, and a medical offensive was quickly
mounted. Had such a disease originated in a feral city, it is likely
that this process would have been much more complicated and taken a
great deal more time. As it is, numerous diseases that had been
believed under control have recently mutated into much more
drug-resistant and virulent forms.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Globally, large cities are already placing
significant environmental stress on their local and regional
environments, and nowhere are these problems more pronounced than in
coastal metropolises. A feral city--with minimal or no sanitation
facilities, a complete absence of environmental controls, and a massive
population--would be in effect a toxic-waste dump, poisoning coastal
waters, watersheds, and river systems throughout their hinterlands. (7)</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Major cities containing ports or airfields
are already trying to contend with black-market activity that ranges
from evading legal fees, dues, or taxes to trafficking in illegal and
banned materials. Black marketeers in a feral city would have carte
blanche to ship or receive such materials to or from a global audience.
(8)</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">As serious as these transnational issues are,
another threat is potentially far more dangerous. The anarchic allure
of the feral city for criminal and terrorist groups has already been
discussed. The combination of large profits from criminal activity and
the increasing availability of all families of weapons might make it
possible for relatively small groups to acquire Weapons of mass
destruction. A terrorist group in a feral city with access to world
markets, especially if it can directly ship material by air or sea,
might launch an all but untraceable attack from its urban haven.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">GOING FERAL</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Throughout history, major cities have endured
massive challenges without "going feral." How could it be determined
that a city is at risk of becoming feral? What indicators might give
warning? Is a warning system possible?</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">The answer is yes. This article offers just
such a model, a taxonomy consisting of twelve sets of measurements,
grouped into four main categories. (9) In it, measurements representing
a healthy city are "green," those that would suggest cause for concern
are "yellow," and those that indicate danger, a potentially feral
condition, "red." In the table below, the upper blocks in each category
(column) represent positive or healthy conditions, those at the bottom
unhealthy ones.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">The first category assesses the ability of
the state to govern the city. A city "in the green" has a healthy,
stable government--though not necessarily a democratically elected one.
A democratic city leadership is perhaps the most desirable, but some
cities governed by authoritarian regimes could be at extremely low risk
of becoming feral. City governments "in the green" would be able to
enact effective legislation, direct resources, and control events in
all parts of the city at all times. (10) A yellow indication would
indicate that city government enjoyed such authority only in portions
of the city, producing what might be called "patchwork" governance, or
that it exerted authority only during the day--"diurnal" governance.
State authorities would be unable to govern a "red" city at all, or
would govern in name only. (11) An entity within the city claiming to
be an official representative of the state would simply be another
actor competing for resources and power.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">The second category involves the city's
economy. Cities "in the green" would enjoy a productive mix of foreign
investment, service and manufacturing activities, and a robust tax
base. Cities afforded a "yellow" rating would have ceased to attract
substantial foreign investment, be marked by decaying or heavily
subsidized industrial facilities, and suffer from ever-growing
deficits. Cities "in the red" would have no governmental tax base. Any
industrial activity within their boundaries would be limited to
subsistence-level manufacturing and trade or to illegal trafficking--in
smuggled materials, weapons, drugs, and so on.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">The third category is focused on city
services. Cities with a "green" rating would not only have a complete
array of essential services but would provide public education and
cultural facilities to their populations. These services would be
available to all sectors without distinction or bias. Cities with a
yellow rating would be lacking in providing education and cultural
opportunities but would be able to maintain minimal levels of public
health and sanitation. Trash pickup, ambulance service, and access to
hospitals would all exist. Such a city's water supply would pass
minimum safety standards. In contrast, cities in the "red" zone would
be unable to supply more than intermittent power and water, some not
even that.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Security is the subject of the fourth
category. "Green" cities, while obviously not crime free, would be well
regulated by professional, ethical police forces, able to respond
quickly to a wide spectrum of threats. "Yellow" cities would be marked
by extremely high crime rates, disregard of whole families of "minor
crimes" due to lack of police resources, and criminal elements capable
of serious confrontations. A "yellow" city's police force would have
little regard for individual rights or legal constraints. In a "red"
city, the police force has failed altogether or has become merely
another armed group seeking power and wealth. Citizens must provide for
their own protection, perhaps by hiring independent security personnel
or paying protection to criminal organizations.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">A special, overarching consideration is
corruption. Cities "in the green" are relatively corruption free.
Scandals are rare enough to be newsworthy, and when corruption is
uncovered, self-policing mechanisms effectively deal with it.
Corruption in cities "in the yellow" would be much worse, extending to
every level of the city administration. In yellow cities, "patchwork"
patterns might reflect which portions of the city were able to buy
security and services and which were not. As for "red" cities, it would
be less useful to speak of government corruption than of criminal and
individual opportunism, which would he unconstrained.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">CITY "MOSAICS"</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">The picture of a city that emerges is a
mosaic, and like an artist's mosaic it can be expected to contain more
than one color. Some healthy cities function with remarkable degrees of
corruption. Others, robust and vital in many ways, suffer from
appalling levels of criminal activity. Even a city with multiple "red"
categories is not necessarily feral--yet. It is the overall pattern and
whether that pattern is improving or deteriorating over time that give
the overall diagnosis.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">It is important to remember a diagnostic tool
such as this merely produces a "snapshot" and is therefore of limited
utility unless supported by trend analysis. "Patchwork" and "diurnal"
situations can exist in all the categories; an urban center with an
overall red rating--that is, a feral city--might boast a tiny enclave
where "green" conditions prevail; quite healthy cities experience
cycles of decline and improvement. Another caution concerns the
categories themselves. Although useful indicators of a city's health,
the boundaries are not clearly defined but can be expected to blur.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">The Healthy City: New York. To some it would
seem that New York is an odd example of a "green" city. One hears and
recalls stories of corruption, police brutality, crime, pollution,
neighborhoods that resemble war zones, and the like. Yet by objective
indicators (and certainly in the opinion of the majority of its
citizens) New York is a healthy city and in no risk of "going feral."
Its police force is well regulated, well educated, and responsive. The
city is a hub of national and international investment. It generates
substantial revenues and has a stable tax base. It provides a
remarkable scope of services, including a wide range of educational and
cultural opportunities. Does this favorable evaluation mean that the
rich are not treated differently from the poor, that services and
infrastructure are uniformly well maintained, or that there are no
disparities of economic opportunity or race? Absolutely not. Yet
despite such problems New York remains a viable municipality.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">The Yellow Zone: Mexico City. This sprawling
megalopolis of more than twenty million continues to increase in size
and population every year. It is one of the largest urban
concentrations in the world. As the seat of the Mexican government, it
receives a great deal of state attention. However, Mexico City is now
described as an urban nightmare. (12)</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Mexico City's air is so polluted that it is
routinely rated medically as unfit to breathe. There are square miles
of slums, often without sewage or running water. Law and order is
breaking down at an accelerating rate. Serious crime has doubled over
the past three to four years; it is estimated that 15.5 million
assaults now occur every year in Mexico City. Car-jacking and
taxi-jacking have reached such epidemic proportions that visitors are
now officially warned not to use the cabs. The Mexico City police
department has ninety-one thousand officers--more men than the Canadian
army--but graft and corruption on the force are rampant and on the
rise. According to Mexican senator Adolfo Zinser, police officers
themselves directly contribute to the city's crime statistics: "In the
morning they are a policeman. In the afternoon they're crooks" The
city's judicial system is equally corrupt. Not surprisingly, these
aspects of life in Mexico City have reduced the willingness of foreign
investors to send money or representatives there. (13)</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Johannesburg; On a Knife Edge. As in many
South African cities, police in Johannesburg are waging a desperate war
for control of their city, and it is not clear whether they will win.
Though relatively small in size, with only 2.9 million official
residents, Johannesburg nevertheless experiences more than five
thousand murders a year and at least twice as many rapes. Over the last
several years investors and major industry have fled the city. Many of
the major buildings of the Central Business District have been
abandoned and are now home to squatters. The South African National
Stock Exchange has been removed to Sandton--a safer northern suburb.
Police forces admit they do not control large areas of the city;
official advisories warn against driving on certain thoroughfares. At
night residents are advised to remain in their homes. Tourism has dried
up, and conventions, once an important source of revenue, are now
hosted elsewhere in the country.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">The city also suffers from high rates of air
pollution, primarily from vehicle exhaust but also from the use of open
fires and coal for cooking and heating. Johannesburg's two rivers are
also considered unsafe, primarily because of untreated human waste and
chemicals leaching from piles of mining dross. Mining has also
contaminated much of the soil in the vicinity.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Like those of many states and cities in
Africa, Johannesburg's problems are exacerbated by the AIDS epidemic.
Nationally it is feared the number of infected persons may reach as
high as 20 percent of the population. All sectors of the economy have
been affected adversely by the epidemic, including in Johannesburg. (14)</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Although Mexico City and Johannesburg clearly
qualify for "yellow" and "red" status, respectively, it would be
premature to predict that either of these urban centers will inevitably
become feral. Police corruption has been an aspect of Mexico City life
for decades; further, the recent transition from one political party to
two and a downswing in the state economy may be having a temporarily
adverse influence on the city. In the case of Johannesburg, the South
African government has most definitely not given up on attempts to
revive what was once an industrial and economic showplace. In both
Mexico and South Africa there are dedicated men and women who are
determined to eliminate corruption, clean the environment, and better
the lives of the people. Yet a note of caution is appropriate, for in
neither example is the trend in a positive direction.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Further--and it should come as no
surprise--massive cities in the developing world are at far greater
risk of becoming feral than those in more developed states. Not only
are support networks in such regions much less robust, but as a
potentially feral city grows, it consumes progressively more resources.
(15) Efforts to meet its growing needs often no more than maintain the
status quo or, more often, merely slow the rate of decay of government
control and essential services. All this in turn reduces the resources
that can be applied to other portions of the country, and it may well
increase the speed of urban hypertrophy. However, even such developed
states as Brazil face the threat of feral cities. For example, in March
2003 criminal cartels controlled much of Rio de Janeiro. Rio police
would not enter these areas, and in effect pursued toward them a policy
of containment. (16)</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">FERAL CITIES AND THE U.S. MILITARY</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Feral cities do not represent merely a
sociological or urban-planning issue; they present unique military
challenges. Their very size and densely built-up character make them
natural havens for a variety of hostile nonstate actors, ranging from
small cells of terrorists to large paramilitary forces and militias.
History indicates that should such a group take American hostages,
successful rescue is not likely. (17) Combat operations in such
environments tend to be manpower intensive; limiting noncombatant
casualties can be extraordinarily difficult. An enemy more resolute
than that faced in the 2003 war with Iraq could inflict substantial
casualties on an attacking force. The defense of the Warsaw ghetto in
World War II suggests how effectively a conventional military assault
can be resisted in this environment. Also, in a combat operation in a
feral city the number of casualties from pollutants, toxins, and
disease may well be higher than those caused by the enemy.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">These environmental risks could also affect
ships operating near a feral city. Its miles-long waterfront may offer
as protected and sheltered a setting for antishipping weapons as any
formal coastal defense site. Furthermore, many port cities that today,
with proper security procedures, would be visited for fuel and other
supplies will, if they become feral, no longer be available. This would
hamper diplomatic efforts, reduce the U.S. Navy's ability to show the
flag, and complicate logistics and supply for forward-deployed forces.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Feral cities, as and if they emerge, will be
something new on the international landscape. Cities have descended
into savagery in the past, usually as a result of war or civil
conflict, and armed resistance groups have operated out of urban
centers before. But feral cities, as such, will be a new phenomenon and
will pose security threats on a scale hitherto not encountered. (18) It
is questionable whether the tools, resources, and strategies that would
be required to deal with these threats exist at present. But given the
indications of the imminent emergence of feral cities, it is time to
begin creating the means.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">THE HEALTH OF CITIES</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Government Economy</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Health Enacts effective Robust. Significant</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">("Green") legislation, directs foreign
investment.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">resources, controls Provides goods and</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">events in all portions services. Possesses</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">of the city all the stabnle and adequate</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">time. Not corrupt. tax base.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Marginal Evxercises only Limited/no foreign</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">("Yellow") "patchwork" or investment. Subsi-</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">"diurnal" control. dized or decaying</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Highly corrupt. industries and grow-</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">ing deficits.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Going Feral At best has negoti- Either local
subsi-</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">("Red") ated zones of con- tence industries or</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">trol; at worst does industry based on il-</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">not exist. legal commerce.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Services Security</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Health Complete range of Well regulated by</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">("Green") services, including professional,
ethical</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">educational and cul- police forces. Quick</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">tural, available to all response to wide</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">city residents. spectrum of</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">requirements.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Marginal Can manage mini- Little regard for
le-</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">("Yellow") mal level of public gality/human
rights.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">health, hospital ac- Police often matched/</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">cess, potable water, stymied by criminal</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">trash disposal. "peers."</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Going Feral Intermittent to non- Nonexistent.
Secu-</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">("Red") existent power and rity is attained</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">water. Those who through private</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">can afford ro will means or paying</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">privately contract. protection.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">NOTES</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(1.) I am indebted to my colleague Dr. James
Miskel for the "petri dish" analogy.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(2.) Thomas Stern Eliot, "The Wasteland," in
The New Oxford Book of English Verses: 1250-1950, ed. Helen Gardner
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1972), p. 881.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(3.) See, for example, James F. Miskel and
Richard J. Norton, "Spotting Trouble: Identifying Faltering and Failing
States," Naval War College Review 50, no. 2 (Spring 1997), pp. 79-91.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(4.) Perhaps the most arbitrary component of
this definition is the selection of a million inhabitants as a defining
characteristic of a feral city. An earlier approach to this issue
focused on megacities, cities with more than ten million inhabitants.
However, subsequent research indicated that much smaller cities could
also become feral, and so the population threshold was reduced. For
more information on concepts of urbanization see Stanley D. Brunn, Jack
P. Williams, and Donald J. Zeigler, Cities of the World: World Regional
Urban Development (Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield, 2003), pp.
5-14.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(5.) Such a pattern is already visible today.
See Brunn, Williams, and Zeigler, chap. 1.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(6.) "China Criticized for Dragging Feet on
Outbreak," News in Science, 7 April 2003, p. 1.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(7.) The issue of pollution stemming from
coastal cities is well documented. For example, see chapter two of
United Nations Environmental Program, Global Environmental
Outlook--2000 (London: Earthscan, 2001).</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(8.) The profits involved in such enterprises
can be staggering. For example, the profits from smuggled cigarettes in
1997 were estimated to be as high as sixteen billion dollars a year.
Among the identified major smuggling centers were Naples, Italy; Hong
Kong; and Bogota, Colombia. Raymond Bonner and Christopher Drew,
"Cigarette Makers Are Seen as Aiding Rise in Smuggling," New York
Times, 26 August 1997, C1.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(9.) A similar approach was used in Miskel
and Norton, cited above, for developing a taxonomy for identifying
failing states.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(10.) This is not to imply that such a city
would be 100 percent law-abiding or that incidents of government
failure could not be found. But these conditions would be the exception
and not the rule.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(11.) Not that this would present no
complications. It is likely that states containing a feral city would
not acknowledge a loss of sovereignty over the metropolis, even if this
were patently the case. Such claims could pose a significant obstacle
to collective international action.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(12.) Transcript, PBS Newshour, "Taming
Mexico City," 12 January 1999, available at <a href="http://www.Pbs">www.Pbs</a>
.org/newshour/bb/latin_American/jan-jun99/ mexico [accessed 15 June
2003].</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(13.) Compiled from a variety of sources,
most notably "Taming Mexico City," News Hour with Jim Lehrer,
transcript, 12 January 1999.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(14.) Compiled from a variety of sources,
including BBC reports.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(15.) Brunn, Williams, and Zeigler, p. 37.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(16.) Interview, Dr. Peter Liotta, with the
author, Newport, R.I., 14 April 2003.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(17.) While the recent successful rescue of
Army Private First Class Jessica Lynch during the 2003 Iraq War
demonstrates that success in such operations is not impossible, U.S.
experiences with hostages in Iran, Lebanon, and Somalia would suggest
failure is a more likely outcome.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">(18.) It is predicted that 60 percent of the
world's population will live in an urban environment by the year 2030,
as opposed to 47 percent in 2000. Furthermore, the majority of this
growth will occur in less developed countries, especially in coastal
South Asia. More than fifty-eight cities will boast populations of more
than five million people. Brunn, williams, and Zeigler, pp. 9-11.</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">Dr. Norton holds an undergraduate degree from
Tulane University and a Ph.D. in international relations from the
Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. Before retiring as a commander in
the U.S. Navy he served extensively a t sea in cruisers and destroyers
and in a variety of political-military billets ashore. He is now a
professor of national security affairs in the National Security
Decision Making Department of the Naval War College.</div>
<div
style="margin: 0px; font-family: Helvetica; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; min-height: 14px;"><br>
</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">COPYRIGHT 2003 U.S. Naval War College</div>
<div style="margin: 0px;">COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group</div>
<!-- |**|end egp html banner|**| -->
<span style="color: white;"><br>
__,_._,___</span>
<br>
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="65">--
"Only a zit on the wart on the heinie of progress." Copyright 1992, Frank Rice
Terry W. Colvin, Sierra Vista, Arizona (USA) < fortean1 at mindspring.com >
Alternate: < fortean1 at msn.com >
Home Page: <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/8958/index.html">< http://www.geocities.com/Area51/Stargate/8958/index.html ></a>
Sites: * Fortean Times * Mystic's Haven * TLCB *
U.S. Message Text Formatting (USMTF) Program
------------
Member: Thailand-Laos-Cambodia Brotherhood (TLCB) Mailing List
TLCB Web Site: <a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="http://www.tlc-brotherhood.org">< http://www.tlc-brotherhood.org ></a>
[Southeast Asia/Secret War in Laos veterans, Allies, CIA/NSA,
and "steenkeen" contractors are welcome.]</pre>
</body>
</html>