contentions contributor Max Boot has an excellent piece in today’s New York Times, applauding the State Department’s decision to send—will they or nill they—50 foreign service officers to Iraq. But Boot thinks more is required: a strategic reconfiguration of State to achieve greater regional and situational specialization and put more boots on the ground globally, the creation of a civilian reserve corps to help buttress humanitarian interventions, and the creation of what he calls a “federal constabulary force” to aid international policing efforts. (He also heartily seconds Lt. Col. John Nagl’s proposal to create an advisory corps within the military, an idea he’s written about enthusiastically on contentions.)