OSC: Russia- Iran Alliance?
Article from the Russian press proposing a strategic alliance between Russia and Iran.
By Juan Cole
Pundit on Possible Russia-Iran Alliance To Counter 'Unfriendly' US Moves. Continue http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article20657.htm
Sunday, August 31, 2008
An Intellectual Genealogy of the Just War-A Survey of Christian Political Thought on the Justification of Warfare
An Intellectual Genealogy of the Just War
A Survey of Christian Political Thought on the Justification of Warfare
by Keith Gomes
An Intellectual Genealogy of the Just War (Full Article PDF)
This paper will briefly outline the development of the just war doctrine, with special emphasis on the developments in Christian thought which ultimately influenced modern international legal documents . Numerous legal documents, such as the Geneva Conventions (1864-1948) contain within them references to just war. More recent attempts to codify the just war include the Report of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty entitled Responsibility to Protect. In examining the development of Christian thought with respect to war, I will illustrate the link between developments within Christian philosophy, the precepts of the Bible, and ultimately, the eventual universalisation of certain elements of Christian morality through the intermediary of natural law.
The need for just war criteria represents the efforts of Western cultures to regulate and restrict violence by establishing rules which specify the situations in which war can be legitimately used as a tool in international statecraft, as well as by setting out rules which govern ethical conduct during combat. However, today these regulations and restrictions are not confined to only Western cultures but, because of developments in international law and the establishment of international organisations such as the UN, this once Western narrative is seen to have universal relevancy, and to a large extent, universal appeal and applicability. While this paper will focus mainly on the rules dealing with the decision to go to war, both sets of rules arise from the same intellectual narrative which recognises recourse to violence not as the preferential modus operandi for dealing with disputes, but the exception. Both sets of rules trace their genealogy to developments in Christian thought, and understanding this genealogy is important, not only for academics, but for military strategists and foreign policy planners alike, since it highlights that these rules are never static because the rationale for these rules is situated in various historical contexts, and interpretations vary depending on the prevailing socio-political atmosphere. This, therefore, always leaves open the possibility that at the very least, the interpretations of these rules can be modified, or at the most, that the rules themselves ought to be more closely scrutinised, given that Christianity itself is constantly evolving and reinventing itself to retain contemporary social, political and ethical applicability.
An Intellectual Genealogy of the Just War (Full Article PDF)
http://smallwarsjournal.com/mag/2008/08/an-intellectual-genealogy-of-t.php
A Survey of Christian Political Thought on the Justification of Warfare
by Keith Gomes
An Intellectual Genealogy of the Just War (Full Article PDF)
This paper will briefly outline the development of the just war doctrine, with special emphasis on the developments in Christian thought which ultimately influenced modern international legal documents . Numerous legal documents, such as the Geneva Conventions (1864-1948) contain within them references to just war. More recent attempts to codify the just war include the Report of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty entitled Responsibility to Protect. In examining the development of Christian thought with respect to war, I will illustrate the link between developments within Christian philosophy, the precepts of the Bible, and ultimately, the eventual universalisation of certain elements of Christian morality through the intermediary of natural law.
The need for just war criteria represents the efforts of Western cultures to regulate and restrict violence by establishing rules which specify the situations in which war can be legitimately used as a tool in international statecraft, as well as by setting out rules which govern ethical conduct during combat. However, today these regulations and restrictions are not confined to only Western cultures but, because of developments in international law and the establishment of international organisations such as the UN, this once Western narrative is seen to have universal relevancy, and to a large extent, universal appeal and applicability. While this paper will focus mainly on the rules dealing with the decision to go to war, both sets of rules arise from the same intellectual narrative which recognises recourse to violence not as the preferential modus operandi for dealing with disputes, but the exception. Both sets of rules trace their genealogy to developments in Christian thought, and understanding this genealogy is important, not only for academics, but for military strategists and foreign policy planners alike, since it highlights that these rules are never static because the rationale for these rules is situated in various historical contexts, and interpretations vary depending on the prevailing socio-political atmosphere. This, therefore, always leaves open the possibility that at the very least, the interpretations of these rules can be modified, or at the most, that the rules themselves ought to be more closely scrutinised, given that Christianity itself is constantly evolving and reinventing itself to retain contemporary social, political and ethical applicability.
An Intellectual Genealogy of the Just War (Full Article PDF)
http://smallwarsjournal.com/mag/2008/08/an-intellectual-genealogy-of-t.php
Public Diplomacy and National Security
Public Diplomacy and National Security
Lessons from the U.S. Experience
by Bruce Gregory
Public Diplomacy and National Security: Lessons from the U.S. Experience (Full PDF Article)
Calls to build greater civilian capacity in national security are well founded, and public diplomacy is high on the list of essential capabilities that must be strengthened. U.S. public diplomacy’s principles and methods are rooted in 20th century models of communication, governance, and armed conflict, which contribute to an inability to learn from recent experience and foster real change. This article defines public diplomacy, describes forces shaping the context of 21st century public diplomacy, and identifies five lessons from recent experience that point the way to change: abandon message influence dominance; drop the war on terror narrative; leverage knowledge, skills, and creativity in civil society; emphasize net-centric actors and actions; rethink government broadcasting and adapt to new media.
Ask most strategists today about national security reform and one answer is assured: strengthen civilian capabilities to meet 21st century challenges and relieve an overburdened military. High on the list of capabilities to be strengthened is what variously is called public diplomacy, strategic communication, and “winning the war of ideas.” The Defense Department’s 2008 National Defense Strategy laments that the U.S. is unable to communicate to the world what it stands for as a society. The State Department calls for new public diplomacy approaches and getting the “war of ideas right” in the battle against today’s terrorist threat. Seven years after 9/11, the nation’s leaders agree. Public diplomacy is crucial to national security and must be improved.
These calls for change sound strikingly familiar. The 2002 U.S. National Security Strategy also urged “effective public diplomacy” – “a different and more comprehensive approach” in “a war of ideas to win the battle against international terrorism.” Lawmakers, cabinet secretaries, and the 9/11 Commission were in early agreement on the same diagnosis, inadequate public diplomacy in an ideological struggle, and the same solution, transform tools designed for a different era and use them more effectively.
Why then has there been no real change? It’s not that U.S. leaders lack for advice. Experts in and out of government wrote more than thirty reports on public diplomacy during the past seven years. Failure to turn report recommendations into business plans and action is part of the answer. But much of the challenge lies in learning from experience.
What is public diplomacy? What can be learned? And how might it change for the better?
Public Diplomacy and National Security: Lessons from the U.S. Experience (Full PDF Article)
http://smallwarsjournal.com/mag/2008/08/public-diplomacy-and-national.php
Lessons from the U.S. Experience
by Bruce Gregory
Public Diplomacy and National Security: Lessons from the U.S. Experience (Full PDF Article)
Calls to build greater civilian capacity in national security are well founded, and public diplomacy is high on the list of essential capabilities that must be strengthened. U.S. public diplomacy’s principles and methods are rooted in 20th century models of communication, governance, and armed conflict, which contribute to an inability to learn from recent experience and foster real change. This article defines public diplomacy, describes forces shaping the context of 21st century public diplomacy, and identifies five lessons from recent experience that point the way to change: abandon message influence dominance; drop the war on terror narrative; leverage knowledge, skills, and creativity in civil society; emphasize net-centric actors and actions; rethink government broadcasting and adapt to new media.
Ask most strategists today about national security reform and one answer is assured: strengthen civilian capabilities to meet 21st century challenges and relieve an overburdened military. High on the list of capabilities to be strengthened is what variously is called public diplomacy, strategic communication, and “winning the war of ideas.” The Defense Department’s 2008 National Defense Strategy laments that the U.S. is unable to communicate to the world what it stands for as a society. The State Department calls for new public diplomacy approaches and getting the “war of ideas right” in the battle against today’s terrorist threat. Seven years after 9/11, the nation’s leaders agree. Public diplomacy is crucial to national security and must be improved.
These calls for change sound strikingly familiar. The 2002 U.S. National Security Strategy also urged “effective public diplomacy” – “a different and more comprehensive approach” in “a war of ideas to win the battle against international terrorism.” Lawmakers, cabinet secretaries, and the 9/11 Commission were in early agreement on the same diagnosis, inadequate public diplomacy in an ideological struggle, and the same solution, transform tools designed for a different era and use them more effectively.
Why then has there been no real change? It’s not that U.S. leaders lack for advice. Experts in and out of government wrote more than thirty reports on public diplomacy during the past seven years. Failure to turn report recommendations into business plans and action is part of the answer. But much of the challenge lies in learning from experience.
What is public diplomacy? What can be learned? And how might it change for the better?
Public Diplomacy and National Security: Lessons from the U.S. Experience (Full PDF Article)
http://smallwarsjournal.com/mag/2008/08/public-diplomacy-and-national.php
Saturday, August 30, 2008
The Disasters that Await a New President
The Disasters that Await a New President
Date 2008/8/30 11:20:00
Paris, August 28, 2006 –- The Bush administration has lived by a strategy of tension, and will go out from office bequeathing the wars it has started, and the ill-will it has created, to its successors, to compromise those who come after.
Guantanamo and the "black sites" abroad will be left, and the probably more than one thousand U.S. military bases abroad, presumably including the 50 bases (currently) that Washington still wants to keep in Iraq after the troops go home, if they go home. And of course the administration's outsourcing arrangements for torture and kidnapping abroad will be left to a new administration.
Whether it is Barack Obama or John McCain who enters the Oval Office in January, he will confront an inheritance of eight years of foreign policy abuses, failures and unresolved dilemmas, and in a climate of international crisis in the Caucasus and clash with Russia, expected by Richard Cheney and others in the Bush administration to promote McCain's election.
If this does elect McCain, it should pose no great problems for him because he is a man of simple commitment to the policy line of his predecessors: of military interventions in the Muslim world to win victory over the terrorists, and political interventions to control troubled European and Caspian-Crimean regions, and deter the new Stalin (or is it Hitler?; Stalin was not at Munich).
This conservative interventionism, in a Manichean politico-intellectual framework of Virtue and Freedom confronting Evil, leaves the Bush administration's successor with continuing conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan, indirectly in Somalia, plus probable domestic crisis in Pakistan before the presidential inauguration arrives. The progress of Islamic integrist and tribal forces linked to the Taliban continues in Pakistan without an apparent solution that would satisfy Washington.
In all of these cases the American intervention is itself the principal continuing cause of conflict – something which in the American policy community is generally inadmissible. In none of these conflicts is America capable of providing a solution. Even in Iraq, which Bush and the neoconservatives now tout as a success, all that has happened is that the U.S. has pitilessly wrecked the country, and now the Iraqis have grown weary of fighting.
The war in Somalia that sets Somalian warlords and an "Islamic Courts" rebel coalition against an unsuccessful Ethiopian military occupation, engineered by the CIA, will be waiting for the new American administration, since any solution involving the Islamists is verboten to Washington.
The Georgian-Ossetian-Abkhazian-Russian drama will have worsened by January, and U.S.-Russian bilateral relations been envenomed (if no worse), as well as trilateral relations among the U.S., Russia, and the hapless and doubly intimidated NATO Europeans, incapable of taking an initiative in their own interest.
The neo-conservative determination that America must dominate at any cost a Hobbesian world driven by greed and self-interest has won the day. The television-rattled public fails to grasp just what this means, and for eight years the Democrats have been frightened into silence by the threat of being outed as unpatriotic.
Senator Joseph Biden, according to the analysts, was made the Democratic vice-presidential nominee because he knows everything about foreign policy. But everything that he knows about foreign policy is just what everybody else in Washington knows and thinks, and would never dream of questioning. There's the problem.
An Obama-Biden administration would lower the rhetoric of the war on terror and enter global negotiations with Iran. It would emphasize the common interest of the U.S. and Iran in the stabilization of Iraq and Afghanistan. It would acknowledge the political and social importance of Hamas and Hizbollah in the real world.
It would start over again with Israel-Palestine negotiations. Those backing the Obama candidacy talk about a "New Marshall Plan" for the Middle East (resembling Condoleezza Rice's proposals last month in Foreign Affairs), offering a "generational" program to lift the Middle East "from misery" and make it democratic, pro-American, and friendly to Israel. Alas, we have heard all that before; the United States is incapable of doing it; and the problem of the Middle East isn't money.
The leaders of such a new administration would negotiate with American allies rather than blackmail and bully them. They would resume good relations with international organizations and make good-faith use of them. They would protect the sovereignty of Georgia and Ukraine. They would be firm with Russia. They would protect western energy sources. They will fight injustice wherever they find it, even if that means more war. They say they will make a better world. The skeptic wishes good luck to them.
© Copyright 2008 by Tribune Media Services International. All Rights Reserved.
This article comes from William PFAFF http://www.williampfaff.com
The URL for this article is: http://www.williampfaff.com/article.php?storyid=338
Date 2008/8/30 11:20:00
Paris, August 28, 2006 –- The Bush administration has lived by a strategy of tension, and will go out from office bequeathing the wars it has started, and the ill-will it has created, to its successors, to compromise those who come after.
Guantanamo and the "black sites" abroad will be left, and the probably more than one thousand U.S. military bases abroad, presumably including the 50 bases (currently) that Washington still wants to keep in Iraq after the troops go home, if they go home. And of course the administration's outsourcing arrangements for torture and kidnapping abroad will be left to a new administration.
Whether it is Barack Obama or John McCain who enters the Oval Office in January, he will confront an inheritance of eight years of foreign policy abuses, failures and unresolved dilemmas, and in a climate of international crisis in the Caucasus and clash with Russia, expected by Richard Cheney and others in the Bush administration to promote McCain's election.
If this does elect McCain, it should pose no great problems for him because he is a man of simple commitment to the policy line of his predecessors: of military interventions in the Muslim world to win victory over the terrorists, and political interventions to control troubled European and Caspian-Crimean regions, and deter the new Stalin (or is it Hitler?; Stalin was not at Munich).
This conservative interventionism, in a Manichean politico-intellectual framework of Virtue and Freedom confronting Evil, leaves the Bush administration's successor with continuing conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan, indirectly in Somalia, plus probable domestic crisis in Pakistan before the presidential inauguration arrives. The progress of Islamic integrist and tribal forces linked to the Taliban continues in Pakistan without an apparent solution that would satisfy Washington.
In all of these cases the American intervention is itself the principal continuing cause of conflict – something which in the American policy community is generally inadmissible. In none of these conflicts is America capable of providing a solution. Even in Iraq, which Bush and the neoconservatives now tout as a success, all that has happened is that the U.S. has pitilessly wrecked the country, and now the Iraqis have grown weary of fighting.
The war in Somalia that sets Somalian warlords and an "Islamic Courts" rebel coalition against an unsuccessful Ethiopian military occupation, engineered by the CIA, will be waiting for the new American administration, since any solution involving the Islamists is verboten to Washington.
The Georgian-Ossetian-Abkhazian-Russian drama will have worsened by January, and U.S.-Russian bilateral relations been envenomed (if no worse), as well as trilateral relations among the U.S., Russia, and the hapless and doubly intimidated NATO Europeans, incapable of taking an initiative in their own interest.
The neo-conservative determination that America must dominate at any cost a Hobbesian world driven by greed and self-interest has won the day. The television-rattled public fails to grasp just what this means, and for eight years the Democrats have been frightened into silence by the threat of being outed as unpatriotic.
Senator Joseph Biden, according to the analysts, was made the Democratic vice-presidential nominee because he knows everything about foreign policy. But everything that he knows about foreign policy is just what everybody else in Washington knows and thinks, and would never dream of questioning. There's the problem.
An Obama-Biden administration would lower the rhetoric of the war on terror and enter global negotiations with Iran. It would emphasize the common interest of the U.S. and Iran in the stabilization of Iraq and Afghanistan. It would acknowledge the political and social importance of Hamas and Hizbollah in the real world.
It would start over again with Israel-Palestine negotiations. Those backing the Obama candidacy talk about a "New Marshall Plan" for the Middle East (resembling Condoleezza Rice's proposals last month in Foreign Affairs), offering a "generational" program to lift the Middle East "from misery" and make it democratic, pro-American, and friendly to Israel. Alas, we have heard all that before; the United States is incapable of doing it; and the problem of the Middle East isn't money.
The leaders of such a new administration would negotiate with American allies rather than blackmail and bully them. They would resume good relations with international organizations and make good-faith use of them. They would protect the sovereignty of Georgia and Ukraine. They would be firm with Russia. They would protect western energy sources. They will fight injustice wherever they find it, even if that means more war. They say they will make a better world. The skeptic wishes good luck to them.
© Copyright 2008 by Tribune Media Services International. All Rights Reserved.
This article comes from William PFAFF http://www.williampfaff.com
The URL for this article is: http://www.williampfaff.com/article.php?storyid=338
e can't afford more troops
http://www.statesman.com/search/content/editorial/stories/08/30/08/30/0830eddorn_edit.html
We can't afford more troops
Edwin Dorn, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS
Saturday, August 30, 2008
As the presidential campaign enters the final stretch, neither John McCain nor Barack Obama is likely to reveal how he plans to deal with the record-setting $490 billion budget deficit that President Bush will leave behind. Once the election is over, however, the winner will need to figure out how to bring his campaign promises into line with fiscal realities. One place to start is the Bush administration's decision to expand the Army and Marine Corps by 92,000 active duty personnel.
McCain and Obama both have endorsed the increase. After the election, the winner should consider three questions: Can we afford a bigger military? Do we need it? What kind of signal are we sending to the rest of the world?
Each soldier and Marine costs about $100,000 per year in pay, housing, health care and other benefits. Adding 65,000 people to the Army and 27,000 to the Marine Corps will add about $9 billion annually to the Defense Department's personnel costs. And that doesn't include the costs of training and equipping those troops.
The personnel buildup comes as the Army is experiencing a huge backlog in its equipment modernization accounts — more than $50 billion, according to Larry Korb of the Center for American Progress. Pentagon experts also are concerned about this imbalance. David Chu, under secretary of Defense for personnel and readiness, recently argued that the Defense Department's growing personnel costs are squeezing out modernization in all of the services.
If enlarging the force were essential, then the United States could go deeper into debt to pay for it. Five years ago, most independent defense experts believed that we needed to enlarge our ground forces to occupy and stabilize Iraq. However, the likelihood of our keeping a large force in Iraq for another three or four years is very low, no matter who wins the election. So by the time the military services reach the ceilings that Congress authorized — 547,000 for the Army and 202,000 for the Marine Corps — those troops won't be needed in Iraq.
We do need to increase the U.S. effort in Afghanistan. There, however, we do not need the huge footprint of an occupying army, but a number of small units capable of advising, equipping and training Afghan security forces. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said as much in his National Defense Strategy.
Of course, the next president will have to think about security issues beyond Iraq and Afghanistan. He must consider the full spectrum of circumstances under which military power may be needed, from humanitarian relief operations to regional conflicts to full-scale war with a global adversary, and he has to consider the likelihood that these crises could happen simultaneously. The next president also will know that our ground forces are not large enough to mount even one sustained major regional conflict — at least, not if we go it alone.
This is where the signal sending comes in. The Defense Department's budget request for fiscal year 2009 is $515 billion, and that does not include tens of billions in "emergency" funding that the department has requested for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Total U.S. defense spending exceeds the combined spending of our likely adversaries and dwarfs the spending of our principal allies.
The message we're sending is clear: We would prefer to go it alone than to work on the hard, complex diplomacy needed to build and sustain alliances. Ironically, the more we spend on military capability, the more we will need to spend, because we lose the ability to bring other resources to bear on international problems.
Is this the trajectory our country should continue to follow? Given recent tensions with Russia and instability in Pakistan, should we not show our allies that their support is essential and that their advice will be taken seriously?
It is not likely that McCain or Obama will back off his campaign commitments. However, the next president will have to dig this nation out of the deep hole that his predecessor has left behind. By scaling back on plans to enlarge the military, the next president can take one small step toward restoring fiscal sanity — without sacrificing security. He also will send an important signal: The United States wants to engage with the rest of the world, not bully it.
Dorn, a professor of public policy, was under secretary of Defense for personnel and readiness during the Clinton administration.
We can't afford more troops
Edwin Dorn, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS
Saturday, August 30, 2008
As the presidential campaign enters the final stretch, neither John McCain nor Barack Obama is likely to reveal how he plans to deal with the record-setting $490 billion budget deficit that President Bush will leave behind. Once the election is over, however, the winner will need to figure out how to bring his campaign promises into line with fiscal realities. One place to start is the Bush administration's decision to expand the Army and Marine Corps by 92,000 active duty personnel.
McCain and Obama both have endorsed the increase. After the election, the winner should consider three questions: Can we afford a bigger military? Do we need it? What kind of signal are we sending to the rest of the world?
Each soldier and Marine costs about $100,000 per year in pay, housing, health care and other benefits. Adding 65,000 people to the Army and 27,000 to the Marine Corps will add about $9 billion annually to the Defense Department's personnel costs. And that doesn't include the costs of training and equipping those troops.
The personnel buildup comes as the Army is experiencing a huge backlog in its equipment modernization accounts — more than $50 billion, according to Larry Korb of the Center for American Progress. Pentagon experts also are concerned about this imbalance. David Chu, under secretary of Defense for personnel and readiness, recently argued that the Defense Department's growing personnel costs are squeezing out modernization in all of the services.
If enlarging the force were essential, then the United States could go deeper into debt to pay for it. Five years ago, most independent defense experts believed that we needed to enlarge our ground forces to occupy and stabilize Iraq. However, the likelihood of our keeping a large force in Iraq for another three or four years is very low, no matter who wins the election. So by the time the military services reach the ceilings that Congress authorized — 547,000 for the Army and 202,000 for the Marine Corps — those troops won't be needed in Iraq.
We do need to increase the U.S. effort in Afghanistan. There, however, we do not need the huge footprint of an occupying army, but a number of small units capable of advising, equipping and training Afghan security forces. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said as much in his National Defense Strategy.
Of course, the next president will have to think about security issues beyond Iraq and Afghanistan. He must consider the full spectrum of circumstances under which military power may be needed, from humanitarian relief operations to regional conflicts to full-scale war with a global adversary, and he has to consider the likelihood that these crises could happen simultaneously. The next president also will know that our ground forces are not large enough to mount even one sustained major regional conflict — at least, not if we go it alone.
This is where the signal sending comes in. The Defense Department's budget request for fiscal year 2009 is $515 billion, and that does not include tens of billions in "emergency" funding that the department has requested for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Total U.S. defense spending exceeds the combined spending of our likely adversaries and dwarfs the spending of our principal allies.
The message we're sending is clear: We would prefer to go it alone than to work on the hard, complex diplomacy needed to build and sustain alliances. Ironically, the more we spend on military capability, the more we will need to spend, because we lose the ability to bring other resources to bear on international problems.
Is this the trajectory our country should continue to follow? Given recent tensions with Russia and instability in Pakistan, should we not show our allies that their support is essential and that their advice will be taken seriously?
It is not likely that McCain or Obama will back off his campaign commitments. However, the next president will have to dig this nation out of the deep hole that his predecessor has left behind. By scaling back on plans to enlarge the military, the next president can take one small step toward restoring fiscal sanity — without sacrificing security. He also will send an important signal: The United States wants to engage with the rest of the world, not bully it.
Dorn, a professor of public policy, was under secretary of Defense for personnel and readiness during the Clinton administration.
Hottentot Morality by Uri Avnery
Uri Avnery
30.8.08
Hottentot Morality
"If he steals my cow, that is bad. If I steal his cow, that is good" - this moral rule was attributed by European racists to the Hottentots, an ancient tribe in Southern Africa.
It's hard not to be reminded of this when the United States and the European countries cry out against Russia's recognition of the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, the two provinces which seceded from the Republic of Sakartvelo, known in the West as Georgia.
Not so long ago, the Western countries recognized the Republic of Kosovo, which seceded from Serbia. The West argued that the population of Kosovo is not Serbian, its culture and language is not Serbian, and that therefore it has a right to independence from Serbia. Especially after Serbia had conducted a grievous campaign of oppression against them. I supported this view with all my heart. Unlike many of my friends, I even supported the military operation that helped the Kosovars to free themselves.
But what's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander, as the saying goes. What's true for Kosovo is no less true for Abkhazia and South Ossetia. The population in these provinces is not Georgian, they have their own languages and ancient civilizations. They were annexed to Georgia almost by whim, and they have no desire to be part of it.
So what is the difference between the two cases? A huge one, indeed: the independence of Kosovo is supported by the Americans and opposed by the Russians. Therefore it's good. The independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia is supported by the Russians and opposed by the Americans. Therefore it's bad. As the Romans said: Quod licet Iovi, non licet bovi, what's allowed to Jupiter is not allowed to an ox.
I do not accept this moral code. I support the independence of all these regions.
In my view, there is one simple principle, and it applies to everybody: every province that wants to secede from any country has a right to do so. In this respect there is, for me, no difference between Kosovars, Abkhazians, Basques, Scots and Palestinians. One rule for all.
THERE WAS a time when this principle could not be implemented. A state of a few hundred thousand people was not viable economically, and could not defend itself militarily.
That was the era of the "nation state", when a strong people imposed itself, its culture and its language, on weaker peoples, in order to create a state big enough to safeguard security, order and a proper standard of living. France imposed itself on Bretons and Corsicans, Spain on Catalans and Basques, England on Welsh, Scots and Irish, and so forth.
That reality has been superseded. Most of the functions of the "nation state" have moved to super-national structures: large federations like the USA, large partnerships like the EU. In those there is room for small countries like Luxemburg beside larger ones like Germany. If Belgium falls apart and a Flemish state comes into being beside a Walloon state, both will be received into the EU, and nobody will be hurt. Yugoslavia has disintegrated, and each of its parts will eventually belong to the European Union.
That has happened to the former Soviet Union, too. Georgia freed itself from Russia. By the same right and the same
logic, Abkhazia can free itself from Georgia.
But then, how can a country avoid disintegration? Very simple: it must convince the smaller peoples which live under its wings that it is worthwhile for them to remain there. If the Scots feel that they enjoy full equality in the United Kingdom, that they have been accorded sufficient autonomy and a fair slice of the common cake, that their culture and traditions are being respected, they may decide to remain there. Such a debate has been going on for decades in the French-speaking Canadian province of Quebec.
The general trend in the world is to enlarge the functions of the big regional organizations, and at the same time allow peoples to secede from their mother countries and establish their own states. That is what happened in the Soviet Union, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Serbia and Georgia. That is bound to happen in many other countries.
Those who want to go in the opposite direction and establish, for example, a bi-national Israeli-Palestinian state, are going against the Zeitgeist - to say the least.
THIS IS the historical background to the recent spat between Georgia and Russia. There are no Righteous Ones here. It is rather funny to hear Vladimir Putin, whose hands are dripping with the blood of Chechen freedom fighters, extolling the right of South Ossetia to secession. It's no less funny to hear Micheil Saakashvili likening the freedom fight of the two separatist regions to the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia.
The fighting reminded me of our own history. In the spring of 1967, I heard a senior Israeli general saying that he prayed every night for the Egyptian leader, Gamal Abd-al- Nasser, to send his troops into the Sinai peninsula. There, he said, we shall annihilate them. Some months later, Nasser marched into the trap. The rest is history.
Now Saakashvili has done precisely the same. The Russians prayed for him to invade South Ossetia. When he walked into this trap, the Russians did to him what we did to the Egyptians. It took the Russians six days, the same as it took us.
Nobody can know what was passing through the mind of Saakashvili. He is an inexperienced person, educated in the United States, a politician who came to power on the strength of his promise to bring the separatist regions back to the homeland. The world is full of such demagogues, who build a career on hatred, super-nationalism and racism. We have more than enough of them here, too.
But even a demagogue does not have to be an idiot. Did he believe that President Bush, who is bankrupt in all fields, would rush to his aid? Did he not know that America has no soldiers to spare? That Bush's warlike speeches are being carried away by the wind? That NATO is a paper tiger? That the Georgian army would melt like butter in the fire of war?
I AM curious about our part in this story.
In the Georgian government there are several ministers who grew up and received their education in Israel. It seems that the Minister of Defense and the Minister for Integration (of the separatist regions) are also Israeli citizens. And most importantly: that the elite units of the Georgian army have been trained by Israeli officers, including the one who was blamed for losing Lebanon War II. The Americans, too, invested much effort in training the Georgians.
I am always amused by the idea that it is possible to train a foreign army. One can, of course, teach technicalities: how to use particular weapons or how to conduct a battalion- scale maneuver. But anyone who has taken part in a real war (as distinct from policing an occupied population) knows that the technical aspects are secondary. What matters is the spirit of the soldiers, their readiness to risk their lives for the cause, their motivation, the human quality of the fighting units and the command echelon.
Such things cannot be imparted by foreigners. Every army is a part of its society, and the quality of the society decides the quality of the army. That is particularly true in a war against an enemy who enjoys a decisive numerical superiority. We experienced that in the 1948 war, when David Ben-Gurion wanted to impose on us officers who were trained in the British army, and we, the combat soldiers, preferred our own commanders, who were trained in our underground army and had never seen a military academy in their lives.
Only professional generals, whose whole outlook is technical, imagine that they could "train" soldiers of another people and another culture - in Afghanistan, Iraq or Georgia.
A well developed trait among our officers is arrogance. In our case, it is generally connected with a reasonable standard of the army. If the Israeli officers infected their Georgian colleagues with this arrogance, convincing them that they could beat the mighty Russian army, they committed a grievous sin against them.
I DO NOT believe that this is the beginning of Cold War II, as has been suggested. But this is certainly a continuation of the Great Game.
This appellation was given to the relentless secret struggle that went on all through the 19th century along Russia's southern border between the two great empires of the time: the British and the Russian. Secret agents and not so secret armies were active in the border regions of India (including today's Pakistan), Afghanistan, Persia and so on. The "North-West Frontier" (of Pakistan), which is starring now in the war against the Taliban, was already legendary then.
Today, the Great Game between the current two great empires - the USA and Russia - is going on all over the place from the Ukraine to Pakistan. It proves that geography is more important than ideology: Communism has come and gone, but the struggle goes on as if nothing has happened.
Georgia is a mere pawn in the chess game. The initiative belongs to the US: it wants to encircle Russia by expanding NATO, an arm of US policy, all along the border. That is a direct threat to the rival empire. Russia, on its part, is trying to extend its control over the resources most vital to the West, oil and gas, as well as their routes of transportation. That can lead to disaster.
WHEN Henry Kissinger was still a wise historian, before he became a foolish statesman, he expounded an important
principle: in order to maintain stability in the world, a system has to be formed that includes all the parties. If one party is left outside, stability is in danger.
He cited as an example the "Holy Alliance" of the great powers that came into being after the Napoleonic wars. The wise statesmen of the time, headed by the Austrian Prince Clemens von Metternich, took care not to leave the defeated French outside, but, on the contrary, gave them an important place in the Concert of Europe.
The present American policy, with its attempt to push Russia out, is a danger to the whole world. (And I have not even mentioned the rising power of China.)
A small country which gets involved in the struggle between the big bullies risks being squashed. That has happened in the past to Poland, and it seems that it has not learned from that experience. One should advise Georgia, and also the Ukraine, not to emulate the Poles but rather the Finns, who since world War II have pursued a wise policy: they guard their independence but endeavor to take the interest of their mighty neighbor into account.
We Israelis can, perhaps, also learn something from all of this: that it is not safe to be a vassal of one great Empire and provoke the rival empire. Russia is returning to our region, and every move we make to further American expansion will surely be countered by a Russian move in favor of Syria and Iran.
So let's not adopt the "Hottentot morality". It is not wise, and certainly not moral.
30.8.08
Hottentot Morality
"If he steals my cow, that is bad. If I steal his cow, that is good" - this moral rule was attributed by European racists to the Hottentots, an ancient tribe in Southern Africa.
It's hard not to be reminded of this when the United States and the European countries cry out against Russia's recognition of the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, the two provinces which seceded from the Republic of Sakartvelo, known in the West as Georgia.
Not so long ago, the Western countries recognized the Republic of Kosovo, which seceded from Serbia. The West argued that the population of Kosovo is not Serbian, its culture and language is not Serbian, and that therefore it has a right to independence from Serbia. Especially after Serbia had conducted a grievous campaign of oppression against them. I supported this view with all my heart. Unlike many of my friends, I even supported the military operation that helped the Kosovars to free themselves.
But what's sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander, as the saying goes. What's true for Kosovo is no less true for Abkhazia and South Ossetia. The population in these provinces is not Georgian, they have their own languages and ancient civilizations. They were annexed to Georgia almost by whim, and they have no desire to be part of it.
So what is the difference between the two cases? A huge one, indeed: the independence of Kosovo is supported by the Americans and opposed by the Russians. Therefore it's good. The independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia is supported by the Russians and opposed by the Americans. Therefore it's bad. As the Romans said: Quod licet Iovi, non licet bovi, what's allowed to Jupiter is not allowed to an ox.
I do not accept this moral code. I support the independence of all these regions.
In my view, there is one simple principle, and it applies to everybody: every province that wants to secede from any country has a right to do so. In this respect there is, for me, no difference between Kosovars, Abkhazians, Basques, Scots and Palestinians. One rule for all.
THERE WAS a time when this principle could not be implemented. A state of a few hundred thousand people was not viable economically, and could not defend itself militarily.
That was the era of the "nation state", when a strong people imposed itself, its culture and its language, on weaker peoples, in order to create a state big enough to safeguard security, order and a proper standard of living. France imposed itself on Bretons and Corsicans, Spain on Catalans and Basques, England on Welsh, Scots and Irish, and so forth.
That reality has been superseded. Most of the functions of the "nation state" have moved to super-national structures: large federations like the USA, large partnerships like the EU. In those there is room for small countries like Luxemburg beside larger ones like Germany. If Belgium falls apart and a Flemish state comes into being beside a Walloon state, both will be received into the EU, and nobody will be hurt. Yugoslavia has disintegrated, and each of its parts will eventually belong to the European Union.
That has happened to the former Soviet Union, too. Georgia freed itself from Russia. By the same right and the same
logic, Abkhazia can free itself from Georgia.
But then, how can a country avoid disintegration? Very simple: it must convince the smaller peoples which live under its wings that it is worthwhile for them to remain there. If the Scots feel that they enjoy full equality in the United Kingdom, that they have been accorded sufficient autonomy and a fair slice of the common cake, that their culture and traditions are being respected, they may decide to remain there. Such a debate has been going on for decades in the French-speaking Canadian province of Quebec.
The general trend in the world is to enlarge the functions of the big regional organizations, and at the same time allow peoples to secede from their mother countries and establish their own states. That is what happened in the Soviet Union, Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, Serbia and Georgia. That is bound to happen in many other countries.
Those who want to go in the opposite direction and establish, for example, a bi-national Israeli-Palestinian state, are going against the Zeitgeist - to say the least.
THIS IS the historical background to the recent spat between Georgia and Russia. There are no Righteous Ones here. It is rather funny to hear Vladimir Putin, whose hands are dripping with the blood of Chechen freedom fighters, extolling the right of South Ossetia to secession. It's no less funny to hear Micheil Saakashvili likening the freedom fight of the two separatist regions to the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia.
The fighting reminded me of our own history. In the spring of 1967, I heard a senior Israeli general saying that he prayed every night for the Egyptian leader, Gamal Abd-al- Nasser, to send his troops into the Sinai peninsula. There, he said, we shall annihilate them. Some months later, Nasser marched into the trap. The rest is history.
Now Saakashvili has done precisely the same. The Russians prayed for him to invade South Ossetia. When he walked into this trap, the Russians did to him what we did to the Egyptians. It took the Russians six days, the same as it took us.
Nobody can know what was passing through the mind of Saakashvili. He is an inexperienced person, educated in the United States, a politician who came to power on the strength of his promise to bring the separatist regions back to the homeland. The world is full of such demagogues, who build a career on hatred, super-nationalism and racism. We have more than enough of them here, too.
But even a demagogue does not have to be an idiot. Did he believe that President Bush, who is bankrupt in all fields, would rush to his aid? Did he not know that America has no soldiers to spare? That Bush's warlike speeches are being carried away by the wind? That NATO is a paper tiger? That the Georgian army would melt like butter in the fire of war?
I AM curious about our part in this story.
In the Georgian government there are several ministers who grew up and received their education in Israel. It seems that the Minister of Defense and the Minister for Integration (of the separatist regions) are also Israeli citizens. And most importantly: that the elite units of the Georgian army have been trained by Israeli officers, including the one who was blamed for losing Lebanon War II. The Americans, too, invested much effort in training the Georgians.
I am always amused by the idea that it is possible to train a foreign army. One can, of course, teach technicalities: how to use particular weapons or how to conduct a battalion- scale maneuver. But anyone who has taken part in a real war (as distinct from policing an occupied population) knows that the technical aspects are secondary. What matters is the spirit of the soldiers, their readiness to risk their lives for the cause, their motivation, the human quality of the fighting units and the command echelon.
Such things cannot be imparted by foreigners. Every army is a part of its society, and the quality of the society decides the quality of the army. That is particularly true in a war against an enemy who enjoys a decisive numerical superiority. We experienced that in the 1948 war, when David Ben-Gurion wanted to impose on us officers who were trained in the British army, and we, the combat soldiers, preferred our own commanders, who were trained in our underground army and had never seen a military academy in their lives.
Only professional generals, whose whole outlook is technical, imagine that they could "train" soldiers of another people and another culture - in Afghanistan, Iraq or Georgia.
A well developed trait among our officers is arrogance. In our case, it is generally connected with a reasonable standard of the army. If the Israeli officers infected their Georgian colleagues with this arrogance, convincing them that they could beat the mighty Russian army, they committed a grievous sin against them.
I DO NOT believe that this is the beginning of Cold War II, as has been suggested. But this is certainly a continuation of the Great Game.
This appellation was given to the relentless secret struggle that went on all through the 19th century along Russia's southern border between the two great empires of the time: the British and the Russian. Secret agents and not so secret armies were active in the border regions of India (including today's Pakistan), Afghanistan, Persia and so on. The "North-West Frontier" (of Pakistan), which is starring now in the war against the Taliban, was already legendary then.
Today, the Great Game between the current two great empires - the USA and Russia - is going on all over the place from the Ukraine to Pakistan. It proves that geography is more important than ideology: Communism has come and gone, but the struggle goes on as if nothing has happened.
Georgia is a mere pawn in the chess game. The initiative belongs to the US: it wants to encircle Russia by expanding NATO, an arm of US policy, all along the border. That is a direct threat to the rival empire. Russia, on its part, is trying to extend its control over the resources most vital to the West, oil and gas, as well as their routes of transportation. That can lead to disaster.
WHEN Henry Kissinger was still a wise historian, before he became a foolish statesman, he expounded an important
principle: in order to maintain stability in the world, a system has to be formed that includes all the parties. If one party is left outside, stability is in danger.
He cited as an example the "Holy Alliance" of the great powers that came into being after the Napoleonic wars. The wise statesmen of the time, headed by the Austrian Prince Clemens von Metternich, took care not to leave the defeated French outside, but, on the contrary, gave them an important place in the Concert of Europe.
The present American policy, with its attempt to push Russia out, is a danger to the whole world. (And I have not even mentioned the rising power of China.)
A small country which gets involved in the struggle between the big bullies risks being squashed. That has happened in the past to Poland, and it seems that it has not learned from that experience. One should advise Georgia, and also the Ukraine, not to emulate the Poles but rather the Finns, who since world War II have pursued a wise policy: they guard their independence but endeavor to take the interest of their mighty neighbor into account.
We Israelis can, perhaps, also learn something from all of this: that it is not safe to be a vassal of one great Empire and provoke the rival empire. Russia is returning to our region, and every move we make to further American expansion will surely be countered by a Russian move in favor of Syria and Iran.
So let's not adopt the "Hottentot morality". It is not wise, and certainly not moral.
The Democrats In Denver
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/08/27/kucinichs-convention-speech-edited/
Kucinich's convention speech edited.
The Hill reports that the Obama campaign has, at times, been "tightening the
reins on campaign speeches and stressing that speakers emphasize a
rags-to-riches theme." Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) had one line redacted
rom his speech, which suggested some conservatives need to serve time in
prison. The original line read: "They're asking for another four years - in
a just world, they'd get 10 to 20."
Chas Freeman wrote:
Norman Birnbaum wrote the following for Spiegel online. It's the sort of forthrightly insightful and witty commentary that is now almost entirely absent from the dumbed-down media in our country. Addressed to a foreign audience, it deserves to be read by those whose politics it is describing.
The Democrats In Denver Norman Birnbaum
I've been at Democratic conventions and regret missing some of the livelier parties at this one. There is very little else to regret. Television has given the essentials. For every Denver blog worth reading, there are ten which are evidence only for their authors' self-important obtuseness and querulousness . Why, however, should unknown citizens not have the same right as our media stars---to make fools of themselves? The major theme of newspaper and television reporting, sedulously repeated by bloggers claiming that they have independent perspectives, was entirely exaggerated. Would the Clintons, defeated in their bid to return to power, take their revenge by somehow sabotaging or stealing Obama's show? Of course not: the Clintons, above all, have no taste for permanent residence in the political wilderness. To give less than full support to Obama would be to risk being blamed for his defeat, should that happen. Should he win, despite their efforts to defeat him, his revenge would be pitiless.. In either case, the Clinton's chances for a return to power of some sort would be very reduced. The Clintons are intelligent. They know that each American election has its own dynamics, and that the outcome of this one does not depend upon their pushing their followers to the voting stations. They also know that those who voted for Senator Clinton in the primaries and are reportedly ready to vote for McCain or abstain will, in their great majority, vote for Obama. The rest are the candidate's to win, or lose, and that is not up to them.
The fact that the Clinton's twinned speeches calling for Obama's election were treated as great events attests only the absence of real events at the Convention. There have been Democratic conventions in which the issues facing the nation were openly, strenuously, sometimes violently debated: racial equality in the late forties and through the sixties, , the war in Vietnam immediately thereafter. One would never gather, in Denver, that the Democratic Party is quite seriously divided on war and peace, on the balance of state and market, on the contending powers of Federal and state government. True, conventions are supposed to unify parties, allow them to temporarily set aside their differences for the sake of winning the Presidency and achieving working majorities in House and Senate.
The difficulty is that they are not solely internal party gatherings. They are also supposed to be occasions on which the parties address the nation, reintroduce themselves to the voters, present new champions as well as honoring departing old Olympians. These functions are often in striking contradiction with one another. Honesty and openess were not salient at Denver, and the tiresomely repeated term "diversity" meant mostly that there are many ways in which to say "Yes."
Controlled and stage managed by the Obama machine with a rigour that would not have been out of place in a People's Republic (every speech was edited, and sometimes parts of these were censored), the convention was utterly devoid of debate. It was a fair, a Kermesse, with a fair showing of rock stars, film actors and actresses, miscellaneous celebrities of every sort (but few or no scientists, perhaps in deference to outreach to the Biblical literalists.) And, of course, there were the rich, buying shares of power or at least proximity to it.
There was, at the end, a very large compensation. Obama introduced himself to a surprised and even fascinated American public in 2004 with a speech at the Democratic Convention in Boston. The candidate (as he was then) for the Senate from Illinois had an unusual appearance, life history, and message: it was time for a new politics which would put the divisions of the past generation behind us. In Denver, with substantial numbers of Democrats and half the nation doubting his capacity to master the challenges of the Presidency, he met his critics head on. In a speech remarkable for joining specific policy prescription and larger vision, sobriety and passion, personal commitment and a call to the citizenry to rise, he took the offensive. For better or for worse, American Presidential contests are not only matters of competing programs and social projects, different cultural and social blocs, clashing political traditions. They are also personal combats. At Denver, Obama threw back at McCain the question of which of the two had a Presidential temperament. It remains to be seen how McCain and the Republicans will answer, but one consequence was instantly clear: the Democrats at Denver were inspired.
How did the speech affect the nation? We will not know, even when the polls give us their answers. There are some fifty thousand historians, political scientists, social psychologists, in our universities. Fifteen thousand political journalists were at the convention. There are thousands of chroniclers and writers, and innumerable veterans of recent politics not at all reticent about sharing the lessons they have learned. We can add the professional advisors and consultants who live not for but from politics---thousands in Washington alone. They have one thing in common: they cannot really predict how and why our citizens will vote. (The historians are still arguing about the elections of 1832,)
Now, on to the twin cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul in Minnesota for the Republican convention. It will look different: :far whiter, and more masculine and older. The conventions will quickly merge, in public memory, with a campaign sure to be bitter and close. The larger world will make itself felt. The Europeans, whether they know it or not, are rendering McCain considerable service----by legitimating Bush's aggressive (and hypocritical) confrontation with Russia. The ultimate result, to be sure, will be a consequence of our own history. If it is as open as our progressivist ethos claims, Obama will win. If we suffer, as our pessimists fear, from what Freud called the repetition compulsion, McCain will enter the White House. The Democratic Convention (and its imminent Republican sequel) will count only as an historical footnote. Serious readers know, however, that frequently footnotes contain the key to the text.
Kucinich's convention speech edited.
The Hill reports that the Obama campaign has, at times, been "tightening the
reins on campaign speeches and stressing that speakers emphasize a
rags-to-riches theme." Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) had one line redacted
rom his speech, which suggested some conservatives need to serve time in
prison. The original line read: "They're asking for another four years - in
a just world, they'd get 10 to 20."
Chas Freeman wrote:
Norman Birnbaum wrote the following for Spiegel online. It's the sort of forthrightly insightful and witty commentary that is now almost entirely absent from the dumbed-down media in our country. Addressed to a foreign audience, it deserves to be read by those whose politics it is describing.
The Democrats In Denver Norman Birnbaum
I've been at Democratic conventions and regret missing some of the livelier parties at this one. There is very little else to regret. Television has given the essentials. For every Denver blog worth reading, there are ten which are evidence only for their authors' self-important obtuseness and querulousness . Why, however, should unknown citizens not have the same right as our media stars---to make fools of themselves? The major theme of newspaper and television reporting, sedulously repeated by bloggers claiming that they have independent perspectives, was entirely exaggerated. Would the Clintons, defeated in their bid to return to power, take their revenge by somehow sabotaging or stealing Obama's show? Of course not: the Clintons, above all, have no taste for permanent residence in the political wilderness. To give less than full support to Obama would be to risk being blamed for his defeat, should that happen. Should he win, despite their efforts to defeat him, his revenge would be pitiless.. In either case, the Clinton's chances for a return to power of some sort would be very reduced. The Clintons are intelligent. They know that each American election has its own dynamics, and that the outcome of this one does not depend upon their pushing their followers to the voting stations. They also know that those who voted for Senator Clinton in the primaries and are reportedly ready to vote for McCain or abstain will, in their great majority, vote for Obama. The rest are the candidate's to win, or lose, and that is not up to them.
The fact that the Clinton's twinned speeches calling for Obama's election were treated as great events attests only the absence of real events at the Convention. There have been Democratic conventions in which the issues facing the nation were openly, strenuously, sometimes violently debated: racial equality in the late forties and through the sixties, , the war in Vietnam immediately thereafter. One would never gather, in Denver, that the Democratic Party is quite seriously divided on war and peace, on the balance of state and market, on the contending powers of Federal and state government. True, conventions are supposed to unify parties, allow them to temporarily set aside their differences for the sake of winning the Presidency and achieving working majorities in House and Senate.
The difficulty is that they are not solely internal party gatherings. They are also supposed to be occasions on which the parties address the nation, reintroduce themselves to the voters, present new champions as well as honoring departing old Olympians. These functions are often in striking contradiction with one another. Honesty and openess were not salient at Denver, and the tiresomely repeated term "diversity" meant mostly that there are many ways in which to say "Yes."
Controlled and stage managed by the Obama machine with a rigour that would not have been out of place in a People's Republic (every speech was edited, and sometimes parts of these were censored), the convention was utterly devoid of debate. It was a fair, a Kermesse, with a fair showing of rock stars, film actors and actresses, miscellaneous celebrities of every sort (but few or no scientists, perhaps in deference to outreach to the Biblical literalists.) And, of course, there were the rich, buying shares of power or at least proximity to it.
There was, at the end, a very large compensation. Obama introduced himself to a surprised and even fascinated American public in 2004 with a speech at the Democratic Convention in Boston. The candidate (as he was then) for the Senate from Illinois had an unusual appearance, life history, and message: it was time for a new politics which would put the divisions of the past generation behind us. In Denver, with substantial numbers of Democrats and half the nation doubting his capacity to master the challenges of the Presidency, he met his critics head on. In a speech remarkable for joining specific policy prescription and larger vision, sobriety and passion, personal commitment and a call to the citizenry to rise, he took the offensive. For better or for worse, American Presidential contests are not only matters of competing programs and social projects, different cultural and social blocs, clashing political traditions. They are also personal combats. At Denver, Obama threw back at McCain the question of which of the two had a Presidential temperament. It remains to be seen how McCain and the Republicans will answer, but one consequence was instantly clear: the Democrats at Denver were inspired.
How did the speech affect the nation? We will not know, even when the polls give us their answers. There are some fifty thousand historians, political scientists, social psychologists, in our universities. Fifteen thousand political journalists were at the convention. There are thousands of chroniclers and writers, and innumerable veterans of recent politics not at all reticent about sharing the lessons they have learned. We can add the professional advisors and consultants who live not for but from politics---thousands in Washington alone. They have one thing in common: they cannot really predict how and why our citizens will vote. (The historians are still arguing about the elections of 1832,)
Now, on to the twin cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul in Minnesota for the Republican convention. It will look different: :far whiter, and more masculine and older. The conventions will quickly merge, in public memory, with a campaign sure to be bitter and close. The larger world will make itself felt. The Europeans, whether they know it or not, are rendering McCain considerable service----by legitimating Bush's aggressive (and hypocritical) confrontation with Russia. The ultimate result, to be sure, will be a consequence of our own history. If it is as open as our progressivist ethos claims, Obama will win. If we suffer, as our pessimists fear, from what Freud called the repetition compulsion, McCain will enter the White House. The Democratic Convention (and its imminent Republican sequel) will count only as an historical footnote. Serious readers know, however, that frequently footnotes contain the key to the text.
Friday, August 29, 2008
And None Dare Call It Treason
And None Dare Call It Treason
by Patrick J. Buchanan
August 22, 2008
http://www.lewrockwell.com/buchanan/buchanan95.html
Who is Randy Scheunemann?
He is the principal foreign policy adviser to John McCain and
potential successor to Henry Kissinger and Zbigniew Brzezinski as
national security adviser to the president of the United States.
But Randy Scheunemann has another identity, another role.
He is a dual loyalist, a foreign agent whose assignment is to get
America committed to spilling the blood of her sons for client
regimes who have made this moral mercenary a rich man.
From January 2007 to March 2008, the McCain campaign paid
Scheunemann $70,000 – pocket change compared to the $290,000 his
Orion Strategies banked in those same 15 months from the Georgian
regime of Mikheil Saakashvili.
What were Mikheil's marching orders to Tbilisi's man in Washington?
Get Georgia a NATO war guarantee. Get America committed to fight
Russia, if necessary, on behalf of Georgia.
Scheunemann came close to succeeding.
Had he done so, U.S. soldiers and Marines from Idaho and West
Virginia would be killing Russians in the Caucasus, and dying to
protect Scheunemann's client, who launched this idiotic war the
night of Aug. 7. That people like Scheunemann hire themselves out to
put American lives on the line for their clients is a classic
corruption of American democracy.
U.S. backing for his campaign to retrieve his lost provinces is what
Saakashvili paid Scheunemann to produce. But why should Americans
fight Russians to force 70,000 South Ossetians back into the custody
of a regime they detest? Why not let the South Ossetians decide
their own future in free elections?
Not only is the folly of the Bush interventionist policy on display
in the Caucasus, so, too, is its manifest incoherence.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates says we have sought for 45 years to
stay out of a shooting war with Russia and we are not going to get
into one now. President Bush assured us there will be no U.S.
military response to the Russian move into Georgia.
That is a recognition of, and a bowing to, reality – namely, that
Russia's control of South Ossetia and Abkhazia and occupation of a
strip of Georgia cannot be a casus belli for the United States. We
may deplore it, but it cannot justify war with Russia.
If that be true, and it transparently is, what are McCain, Barack
Obama, Bush, and German Chancellor Angela Merkel doing committing
the United States and Germany to bringing Georgia into NATO? For
that would commit us to war for a cause we have already conceded, by
our paralysis, does not justify a war.
Not only did Scheunemann's two-man lobbying firm receive $730,000
since 2001 to get Georgia a NATO war guarantee, he was paid by
Romania and Latvia to do the same. And he succeeded.
Latvia, a tiny Baltic republic annexed by Joseph Stalin in June 1940
during his pact with Adolf Hitler, was set free at the end of the
Cold War. Yet hundreds of thousands of Russians had been moved into
Latvia by Stalin, and as Riga served as a base of the Baltic Sea
fleet, many Russian naval officers retired there.
The children and grandchildren of these Russians are Latvian
citizens. They are a cause of constant tension with ethnic Letts and
of strife with Moscow, which has assumed the role of protector of
Russians left behind in the "near abroad" when the Soviet Union
broke apart.
Thanks to the lobbying of Scheunemann and friends, Latvia has been
brought into NATO and given a U.S. war guarantee. If Russia
intervenes to halt some nasty ethnic violence in Riga, the United
States is committed to come in and drive the Russians out.
This is the situation in which the interventionists have placed our
country: committed to go to war for countries and causes that do not
justify war, against a Russia that is re-emerging as a great power
only to find NATO squatting on her doorstep.
Scheunemann's résumé as a War Party apparatchik is lengthy. He
signed the PNAC (Project for the New American Century) letter to
President Clinton urging war on Iraq, four years before 9-11. He
signed the PNAC ultimatum to Bush, nine days after 9-11, threatening
him with political reprisal if he did not go to war against Iraq. He
was executive director of the "Committee for the Liberation of
Iraq," a propaganda front for Ahmad Chalabi and his pack of liars
who deceived us into war.
Now Scheunemann is the neocon agent in place in McCain's camp.
The neocons got their war with Iraq. They are pushing for war on
Iran. And they are now baiting the Russian Bear.
Is this what McCain has on offer? Endless war?
Why would McCain seek foreign policy counsel from the same
discredited crowd that has all but destroyed the presidency of
George Bush?
"Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence ... a free people
ought to be constantly awake," Washington warned in his Farewell
Address. Our Founding Father was warning against the Randy
Scheunemanns among us, agents hired by foreign powers to deceive
Americans into fighting their wars. And none dare call it treason.
Patrick J. Buchanan is co-founder and editor of The American
Conservative
seven books, including Where the Right Went Wrong and A Republic Not
An Empire. His latest book is Churchill, Hitler, and the Unnecessary
War.
by Patrick J. Buchanan
August 22, 2008
http://www.lewrockwell.com/buchanan/buchanan95.html
Who is Randy Scheunemann?
He is the principal foreign policy adviser to John McCain and
potential successor to Henry Kissinger and Zbigniew Brzezinski as
national security adviser to the president of the United States.
But Randy Scheunemann has another identity, another role.
He is a dual loyalist, a foreign agent whose assignment is to get
America committed to spilling the blood of her sons for client
regimes who have made this moral mercenary a rich man.
From January 2007 to March 2008, the McCain campaign paid
Scheunemann $70,000 – pocket change compared to the $290,000 his
Orion Strategies banked in those same 15 months from the Georgian
regime of Mikheil Saakashvili.
What were Mikheil's marching orders to Tbilisi's man in Washington?
Get Georgia a NATO war guarantee. Get America committed to fight
Russia, if necessary, on behalf of Georgia.
Scheunemann came close to succeeding.
Had he done so, U.S. soldiers and Marines from Idaho and West
Virginia would be killing Russians in the Caucasus, and dying to
protect Scheunemann's client, who launched this idiotic war the
night of Aug. 7. That people like Scheunemann hire themselves out to
put American lives on the line for their clients is a classic
corruption of American democracy.
U.S. backing for his campaign to retrieve his lost provinces is what
Saakashvili paid Scheunemann to produce. But why should Americans
fight Russians to force 70,000 South Ossetians back into the custody
of a regime they detest? Why not let the South Ossetians decide
their own future in free elections?
Not only is the folly of the Bush interventionist policy on display
in the Caucasus, so, too, is its manifest incoherence.
Defense Secretary Robert Gates says we have sought for 45 years to
stay out of a shooting war with Russia and we are not going to get
into one now. President Bush assured us there will be no U.S.
military response to the Russian move into Georgia.
That is a recognition of, and a bowing to, reality – namely, that
Russia's control of South Ossetia and Abkhazia and occupation of a
strip of Georgia cannot be a casus belli for the United States. We
may deplore it, but it cannot justify war with Russia.
If that be true, and it transparently is, what are McCain, Barack
Obama, Bush, and German Chancellor Angela Merkel doing committing
the United States and Germany to bringing Georgia into NATO? For
that would commit us to war for a cause we have already conceded, by
our paralysis, does not justify a war.
Not only did Scheunemann's two-man lobbying firm receive $730,000
since 2001 to get Georgia a NATO war guarantee, he was paid by
Romania and Latvia to do the same. And he succeeded.
Latvia, a tiny Baltic republic annexed by Joseph Stalin in June 1940
during his pact with Adolf Hitler, was set free at the end of the
Cold War. Yet hundreds of thousands of Russians had been moved into
Latvia by Stalin, and as Riga served as a base of the Baltic Sea
fleet, many Russian naval officers retired there.
The children and grandchildren of these Russians are Latvian
citizens. They are a cause of constant tension with ethnic Letts and
of strife with Moscow, which has assumed the role of protector of
Russians left behind in the "near abroad" when the Soviet Union
broke apart.
Thanks to the lobbying of Scheunemann and friends, Latvia has been
brought into NATO and given a U.S. war guarantee. If Russia
intervenes to halt some nasty ethnic violence in Riga, the United
States is committed to come in and drive the Russians out.
This is the situation in which the interventionists have placed our
country: committed to go to war for countries and causes that do not
justify war, against a Russia that is re-emerging as a great power
only to find NATO squatting on her doorstep.
Scheunemann's résumé as a War Party apparatchik is lengthy. He
signed the PNAC (Project for the New American Century) letter to
President Clinton urging war on Iraq, four years before 9-11. He
signed the PNAC ultimatum to Bush, nine days after 9-11, threatening
him with political reprisal if he did not go to war against Iraq. He
was executive director of the "Committee for the Liberation of
Iraq," a propaganda front for Ahmad Chalabi and his pack of liars
who deceived us into war.
Now Scheunemann is the neocon agent in place in McCain's camp.
The neocons got their war with Iraq. They are pushing for war on
Iran. And they are now baiting the Russian Bear.
Is this what McCain has on offer? Endless war?
Why would McCain seek foreign policy counsel from the same
discredited crowd that has all but destroyed the presidency of
George Bush?
"Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence ... a free people
ought to be constantly awake," Washington warned in his Farewell
Address. Our Founding Father was warning against the Randy
Scheunemanns among us, agents hired by foreign powers to deceive
Americans into fighting their wars. And none dare call it treason.
Patrick J. Buchanan is co-founder and editor of The American
Conservative
seven books, including Where the Right Went Wrong and A Republic Not
An Empire. His latest book is Churchill, Hitler, and the Unnecessary
War.
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Bush Is Pouring Gas on Afghanistan's Bonfire
AlterNet
Bush Is Pouring Gas on Afghanistan's Bonfire
By Chris Hedges, Truthdig
Posted on August 27, 2008,
http://www.alternet.org/story/96497/
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20080825_hedges_afghanistan_worsening/
The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan grind forward with their terrible human toll, even as the press and many Americans play who gets thrown off the island with Barack Obama. Coalition forces carried out an airstrike that killed up to 95 Afghan civilians in western Afghanistan on Friday, 50 of them children, President Hamid Karzai said. And the mounting bombing raids and widespread detentions of Afghans are rapidly turning Afghanistan into the mirror image of Iraq. But these very real events, which will have devastating consequences over the next few months and years, are largely ignored by us. We prefer to waste our time on the trivia and gossip that swallow up air time and do nothing to advance our understanding of either the campaign or the wars fought in our name.
As the conflict in Afghanistan has intensified, so has the indiscriminate use of airstrikes, including Friday's, which took place in the Azizabad area of Shindand district in Herat province. The airstrike was carried out after Afghan and coalition soldiers were ambushed by insurgents while on a patrol targeting a known Taliban commander in Herat, the U.S. military said. Hundreds of Afghans, shouting anti-U.S. slogans, staged angry street protests on Saturday in Azizabad to protest the killings, and Karzai condemned the airstrike.
The United Nations estimates that 255 of the almost 700 civilian deaths in fighting in Afghanistan this year have been caused by Afghan and international troops. The number of civilians killed in fighting between insurgents and security forces in Afghanistan has soared by two-thirds in the first half of this year.
Ghulam Azrat, the director of the middle school in Azizabad, said he collected 60 bodies after the bombing.
"We put the bodies in the main mosque,'' he told the Associated Press by phone, sometimes pausing to collect himself as he wept. "Most of these dead bodies were children and women. It took all morning to collect them."
Azrat said villagers on Saturday threw stones at Afghan soldiers who arrived and tried to give out food and clothes. He said the soldiers fired into the crowd and wounded eight people, including one child.
"The people were very angry," he said. "They told the soldiers, 'We don't need your food, we don't need your clothes. We want our children. We want our relatives. Can you give [them] to us? You cannot, so go away.' "
We are in trouble in Afghanistan. Sending more soldiers and Marines to fight the Taliban is only dumping gasoline on the bonfire. The Taliban assaults, funded largely by the expanded opium trade, are increasingly sophisticated and well coordinated. And the Taliban is exacting a rising toll on coalition troops. Soldiers and Marines are now dying at a faster rate in Afghanistan than Iraq. In an Aug. 18 attack, only 30 miles from the capital, Kabul, the French army lost 10 and had 21 wounded. The next day, hundreds of militants, aided by six suicide bombers, attacked one of the largest U.S. bases in the country. A week before that, insurgents killed three foreign aid workers and their Afghan driver, prompting international aid missions to talk about withdrawing from a country where they already have very limited access.
Barack Obama, like John McCain, speaks about Afghanistan in words that look as if they were penned by the Bush White House. Obama may call for withdrawing some U.S. troops from Iraq, but he does not want to send them all home. He wants to send them to Afghanistan, or to what he obliquely terms "the right battlefield." Obama said he would deploy an additional 10,000 troops to Afghanistan once he took office.
The seven-year war in Afghanistan has not gone well. An additional 3,200 Marines were deployed there in January. Karzai's puppet government in Kabul controls little territory outside the capital. And our attempt to buy off tribes with money and even weapons has collapsed, with most tribal groups slipping back into the arms of the Taliban insurgents.
Do the cheerleaders for an expanded war in Afghanistan know any history? Have they studied what happened to the Soviets, who lost 15,000 Red Army soldiers between 1979 and 1988, or even the British in the 19th century? Do they remember why we went into Afghanistan? It was, we were told, to hunt down Osama bin Laden, who is now apparently in Pakistan. Has anyone asked what our end goal is in Afghanistan? Is it nation-building? Or is this simply the forever war on terror?
Al-Qaida, which we have also inadvertently resurrected, is alive and well. It still finds plenty of recruits. It still runs training facilities. It still caries out attacks in London, Madrid, Iraq and now Afghanistan, which did not experience suicide bombings until December 2005. Al-Qaida has moved on. But we remain stuck, confused and lashing about wildly like a wounded and lumbering beast.
We do not have the power or the knowledge, nor do we have the right under international law, to occupy Iraq and Afghanistan. We are vainly trying to transplant to these countries a modern system of politics invented in Europe. This system is characterized by, among other things, the division of the Earth into independent secular states based on national citizenship. The belief in a secular civil government is to most Afghans and Iraqis an alien creed. It will never work.
We have blundered into nations we know little about. We are caught between bitter rivalries among competing ethnic and religious groups. We have embarked on an occupation in Iraq and Afghanistan that is as damaging to our souls as it is to our prestige and power and security. And we believe, falsely, that because we have the capacity to wage war we have the right to wage war.
We divert ourselves in our dotage and decline with images and slogans that perpetuate fantasies about our own invulnerability, our own might, our own goodness. We are preoccupied by national trivia games that pass for news, even as the wolf pants at our door. These illusions blind us. We cannot see ourselves as others see us. We do not know who we are.
"We had fed the heart on fantasies," William Butler Yeats wrote, "the heart's grown brutal from the fare."
We are propelled forward not by logic or compassion or understanding but by fear. We have created and live in a world where violence is the primary form of communication. We have become the company we keep. Much of the world--certainly the Muslim world, one-fifth of the world's population, most of whom are not Arab--sees us through the prism of Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine. We are igniting the dispossessed, the majority of humanity who live on less than two dollars a day. And whoever takes the White House next January seems hellbent on fueling our self-immolation.
Chris Hedges' column, now weekly, appears Mondays on Truthdig.
Chris Hedges, a Pulitzer prize-winning reporter, is a Senior Fellow at the Nation Institute. His latest book is Collateral Damage: America's War Against Iraqi Civilians.
© 2008 Truthdig All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/96497/
_______________________________________________
Bush Is Pouring Gas on Afghanistan's Bonfire
By Chris Hedges, Truthdig
Posted on August 27, 2008,
http://www.alternet.org/story/96497/
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20080825_hedges_afghanistan_worsening/
The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan grind forward with their terrible human toll, even as the press and many Americans play who gets thrown off the island with Barack Obama. Coalition forces carried out an airstrike that killed up to 95 Afghan civilians in western Afghanistan on Friday, 50 of them children, President Hamid Karzai said. And the mounting bombing raids and widespread detentions of Afghans are rapidly turning Afghanistan into the mirror image of Iraq. But these very real events, which will have devastating consequences over the next few months and years, are largely ignored by us. We prefer to waste our time on the trivia and gossip that swallow up air time and do nothing to advance our understanding of either the campaign or the wars fought in our name.
As the conflict in Afghanistan has intensified, so has the indiscriminate use of airstrikes, including Friday's, which took place in the Azizabad area of Shindand district in Herat province. The airstrike was carried out after Afghan and coalition soldiers were ambushed by insurgents while on a patrol targeting a known Taliban commander in Herat, the U.S. military said. Hundreds of Afghans, shouting anti-U.S. slogans, staged angry street protests on Saturday in Azizabad to protest the killings, and Karzai condemned the airstrike.
The United Nations estimates that 255 of the almost 700 civilian deaths in fighting in Afghanistan this year have been caused by Afghan and international troops. The number of civilians killed in fighting between insurgents and security forces in Afghanistan has soared by two-thirds in the first half of this year.
Ghulam Azrat, the director of the middle school in Azizabad, said he collected 60 bodies after the bombing.
"We put the bodies in the main mosque,'' he told the Associated Press by phone, sometimes pausing to collect himself as he wept. "Most of these dead bodies were children and women. It took all morning to collect them."
Azrat said villagers on Saturday threw stones at Afghan soldiers who arrived and tried to give out food and clothes. He said the soldiers fired into the crowd and wounded eight people, including one child.
"The people were very angry," he said. "They told the soldiers, 'We don't need your food, we don't need your clothes. We want our children. We want our relatives. Can you give [them] to us? You cannot, so go away.' "
We are in trouble in Afghanistan. Sending more soldiers and Marines to fight the Taliban is only dumping gasoline on the bonfire. The Taliban assaults, funded largely by the expanded opium trade, are increasingly sophisticated and well coordinated. And the Taliban is exacting a rising toll on coalition troops. Soldiers and Marines are now dying at a faster rate in Afghanistan than Iraq. In an Aug. 18 attack, only 30 miles from the capital, Kabul, the French army lost 10 and had 21 wounded. The next day, hundreds of militants, aided by six suicide bombers, attacked one of the largest U.S. bases in the country. A week before that, insurgents killed three foreign aid workers and their Afghan driver, prompting international aid missions to talk about withdrawing from a country where they already have very limited access.
Barack Obama, like John McCain, speaks about Afghanistan in words that look as if they were penned by the Bush White House. Obama may call for withdrawing some U.S. troops from Iraq, but he does not want to send them all home. He wants to send them to Afghanistan, or to what he obliquely terms "the right battlefield." Obama said he would deploy an additional 10,000 troops to Afghanistan once he took office.
The seven-year war in Afghanistan has not gone well. An additional 3,200 Marines were deployed there in January. Karzai's puppet government in Kabul controls little territory outside the capital. And our attempt to buy off tribes with money and even weapons has collapsed, with most tribal groups slipping back into the arms of the Taliban insurgents.
Do the cheerleaders for an expanded war in Afghanistan know any history? Have they studied what happened to the Soviets, who lost 15,000 Red Army soldiers between 1979 and 1988, or even the British in the 19th century? Do they remember why we went into Afghanistan? It was, we were told, to hunt down Osama bin Laden, who is now apparently in Pakistan. Has anyone asked what our end goal is in Afghanistan? Is it nation-building? Or is this simply the forever war on terror?
Al-Qaida, which we have also inadvertently resurrected, is alive and well. It still finds plenty of recruits. It still runs training facilities. It still caries out attacks in London, Madrid, Iraq and now Afghanistan, which did not experience suicide bombings until December 2005. Al-Qaida has moved on. But we remain stuck, confused and lashing about wildly like a wounded and lumbering beast.
We do not have the power or the knowledge, nor do we have the right under international law, to occupy Iraq and Afghanistan. We are vainly trying to transplant to these countries a modern system of politics invented in Europe. This system is characterized by, among other things, the division of the Earth into independent secular states based on national citizenship. The belief in a secular civil government is to most Afghans and Iraqis an alien creed. It will never work.
We have blundered into nations we know little about. We are caught between bitter rivalries among competing ethnic and religious groups. We have embarked on an occupation in Iraq and Afghanistan that is as damaging to our souls as it is to our prestige and power and security. And we believe, falsely, that because we have the capacity to wage war we have the right to wage war.
We divert ourselves in our dotage and decline with images and slogans that perpetuate fantasies about our own invulnerability, our own might, our own goodness. We are preoccupied by national trivia games that pass for news, even as the wolf pants at our door. These illusions blind us. We cannot see ourselves as others see us. We do not know who we are.
"We had fed the heart on fantasies," William Butler Yeats wrote, "the heart's grown brutal from the fare."
We are propelled forward not by logic or compassion or understanding but by fear. We have created and live in a world where violence is the primary form of communication. We have become the company we keep. Much of the world--certainly the Muslim world, one-fifth of the world's population, most of whom are not Arab--sees us through the prism of Iraq, Afghanistan and Palestine. We are igniting the dispossessed, the majority of humanity who live on less than two dollars a day. And whoever takes the White House next January seems hellbent on fueling our self-immolation.
Chris Hedges' column, now weekly, appears Mondays on Truthdig.
Chris Hedges, a Pulitzer prize-winning reporter, is a Senior Fellow at the Nation Institute. His latest book is Collateral Damage: America's War Against Iraqi Civilians.
© 2008 Truthdig All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/96497/
_______________________________________________
Welcome to history by Shlomo Avineri
Welcome to history
Shlomo Avineri
Ha'aretz
August 29, 2008
In 1989, American philosopher Francis Fukuyama saw the breakup of the Soviet Union and the collapse of the Communist regimes in Eastern Europe as "the end of history": After the fall of fascism in World War II, now came the end of the second kind of totalitarian regime. In using a term taken from Hegelian philosophy, Fukuyama argued that history had come to its climax and that the victory of democracy, liberalism and the capitalist market economy meant that humanity had come to its ultimate and universal end: the realization of freedom - personal, political and economic.
There was something intoxicating about this victory cry. Fukuyama's article reverberated enormously and was to a considerable extent responsible for the feeling of near-messianic euphoria that enveloped practical statesmen upon the collapse of the Soviet regime. Even people who had never heard of Hegel and his philosophy of history took delight in the intellectual significance that Fukuyama had afforded to communism's downfall.
However, many people treated this analysis with skepticism; especially its implicit assumption that while it did lead to the opposite of Marxism, it was one-dimensional, linear and deterministic in the same way. If in Marxism all roads led to communism, for Fukuyama all roads are supposed - inevitably, and from within an inner law - to lead to democracy and a market economy. The structure's architecture was impressive, but were the bricks and mortar indeed there?
The doubts were confirmed when it became clear that not all the post-communist countries were doing the same thing: Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary succeeded in the transition to democracy and a market economy, but in Russia there were more complex developments. The Soviet republics in Central Asia developed into classic third-world dictatorships and the complex ethnic disputes in the former Yugoslavia proved that when communism vanishes, classic national conflicts often surface, not a vision of universal, democratic and liberal harmony.
The events of recent weeks in Russia and China, which are ostensibly quite different, only magnify the extent of Fukuyama's mistake. In one there is a brutal war, while in the other there is a stunning sports spectacle. But both of them indicate that what is happening before our eyes is far from the end of history.
On the contrary, to a large extent it is the return of history. The war between Russia and Georgia - whose outcome has been in effect the dismemberment of Georgia - indicates that after the weakness and crumbling during the Boris Yeltsin era, Russia is again becoming a power sending a bullying message to its neighbors. What happened in the Caucasus is reminding many people that Russia has never been a nation state in the usual sense of the term, but has always been an empire - whether in czarist or Soviet guise. And under Vladimir Putin it is again becoming what it had been in the past.
After the suppression of the Chechens - the continuation of a long and brutal war that Russia conducted against them in the 19th century - Moscow is returning to assert its regional hegemony. For the Georgians - and for anyone who knows a bit of history - this policy constitutes a return to what has already happened twice: when (czarist) Russia annexed the Georgian kingdom in 1801 and when (Soviet) Russia annexed the social democratic Georgian republic in 1921 - incidentally, also on the grounds that it was helping the Ossetians.
A return to the signs of Russian neo-imperialism was already on the horizon in recent years: sophisticated repression of the opposition - whether by neutralizing potential opponents through quasi-legal means or mysterious murders of independent journalists - and the concentration of economic resources in the regime's hands. There is also continuing pressure on Ukraine at a time when energy prices are providing an effective tool to use on Europe, accompanied by Putin's bullying rhetoric.
In Beijing we were witness to something else - but not so different. China freed itself long ago from communist ideology, but the Communist Party today constitutes the most palpable manifestation of the Confucian heritage of order, discipline, hierarchy and harmony imposed from above - all according to the Chinese imperialist tradition, with the party instead of mandarins. Industrial capitalism is burgeoning in the shadow of a Confucian regime that embodies multidimensional power - all this amid a total ignoring of human rights and the oppression of national minorities, as in Tibet.
It was impossible not to be impressed by the spectacular performances of the Olympic ceremonies, but the more spectacular they were, the more frightening they were - in their power, their ability to put the masses to work, the iron discipline that seemed it had not been imposed from above but had sprung from the tens of thousands of smiling participants. After all, the Nazi spectacles at the mass rallies at Nuremberg and the Berlin Olympics in 1936 were stunning - and scary, and many good people were amazed by their artistic beauty. Who can deny that Leni Riefenstahl's films, with their amazing pictures and rousing music, could set millions marching, in part because of the inherent aesthetic allure?
After the communist intermezzo, both Russia and China are returning to the bosom of their history. The two histories are different - in one case imperial bullying, in the other Confucian discipline. However, what they have in common is a centralist and hierarchical government and a submissive population. There is power here and perhaps also beauty of a certain sort, but freedom, democracy and liberalism are absent. Welcome to history.
Shlomo Avineri
Ha'aretz
August 29, 2008
In 1989, American philosopher Francis Fukuyama saw the breakup of the Soviet Union and the collapse of the Communist regimes in Eastern Europe as "the end of history": After the fall of fascism in World War II, now came the end of the second kind of totalitarian regime. In using a term taken from Hegelian philosophy, Fukuyama argued that history had come to its climax and that the victory of democracy, liberalism and the capitalist market economy meant that humanity had come to its ultimate and universal end: the realization of freedom - personal, political and economic.
There was something intoxicating about this victory cry. Fukuyama's article reverberated enormously and was to a considerable extent responsible for the feeling of near-messianic euphoria that enveloped practical statesmen upon the collapse of the Soviet regime. Even people who had never heard of Hegel and his philosophy of history took delight in the intellectual significance that Fukuyama had afforded to communism's downfall.
However, many people treated this analysis with skepticism; especially its implicit assumption that while it did lead to the opposite of Marxism, it was one-dimensional, linear and deterministic in the same way. If in Marxism all roads led to communism, for Fukuyama all roads are supposed - inevitably, and from within an inner law - to lead to democracy and a market economy. The structure's architecture was impressive, but were the bricks and mortar indeed there?
The doubts were confirmed when it became clear that not all the post-communist countries were doing the same thing: Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary succeeded in the transition to democracy and a market economy, but in Russia there were more complex developments. The Soviet republics in Central Asia developed into classic third-world dictatorships and the complex ethnic disputes in the former Yugoslavia proved that when communism vanishes, classic national conflicts often surface, not a vision of universal, democratic and liberal harmony.
The events of recent weeks in Russia and China, which are ostensibly quite different, only magnify the extent of Fukuyama's mistake. In one there is a brutal war, while in the other there is a stunning sports spectacle. But both of them indicate that what is happening before our eyes is far from the end of history.
On the contrary, to a large extent it is the return of history. The war between Russia and Georgia - whose outcome has been in effect the dismemberment of Georgia - indicates that after the weakness and crumbling during the Boris Yeltsin era, Russia is again becoming a power sending a bullying message to its neighbors. What happened in the Caucasus is reminding many people that Russia has never been a nation state in the usual sense of the term, but has always been an empire - whether in czarist or Soviet guise. And under Vladimir Putin it is again becoming what it had been in the past.
After the suppression of the Chechens - the continuation of a long and brutal war that Russia conducted against them in the 19th century - Moscow is returning to assert its regional hegemony. For the Georgians - and for anyone who knows a bit of history - this policy constitutes a return to what has already happened twice: when (czarist) Russia annexed the Georgian kingdom in 1801 and when (Soviet) Russia annexed the social democratic Georgian republic in 1921 - incidentally, also on the grounds that it was helping the Ossetians.
A return to the signs of Russian neo-imperialism was already on the horizon in recent years: sophisticated repression of the opposition - whether by neutralizing potential opponents through quasi-legal means or mysterious murders of independent journalists - and the concentration of economic resources in the regime's hands. There is also continuing pressure on Ukraine at a time when energy prices are providing an effective tool to use on Europe, accompanied by Putin's bullying rhetoric.
In Beijing we were witness to something else - but not so different. China freed itself long ago from communist ideology, but the Communist Party today constitutes the most palpable manifestation of the Confucian heritage of order, discipline, hierarchy and harmony imposed from above - all according to the Chinese imperialist tradition, with the party instead of mandarins. Industrial capitalism is burgeoning in the shadow of a Confucian regime that embodies multidimensional power - all this amid a total ignoring of human rights and the oppression of national minorities, as in Tibet.
It was impossible not to be impressed by the spectacular performances of the Olympic ceremonies, but the more spectacular they were, the more frightening they were - in their power, their ability to put the masses to work, the iron discipline that seemed it had not been imposed from above but had sprung from the tens of thousands of smiling participants. After all, the Nazi spectacles at the mass rallies at Nuremberg and the Berlin Olympics in 1936 were stunning - and scary, and many good people were amazed by their artistic beauty. Who can deny that Leni Riefenstahl's films, with their amazing pictures and rousing music, could set millions marching, in part because of the inherent aesthetic allure?
After the communist intermezzo, both Russia and China are returning to the bosom of their history. The two histories are different - in one case imperial bullying, in the other Confucian discipline. However, what they have in common is a centralist and hierarchical government and a submissive population. There is power here and perhaps also beauty of a certain sort, but freedom, democracy and liberalism are absent. Welcome to history.
Mikheil Saakashvili's Achievements
Mikheil Saakashvili's Achievements
William Pfaff
Paris, August 26, 2008 – The overwhelming reaction in American and European comment on the Russian riposte to Georgia's attack on Russsian "peacekeeping" forces in South Ossetia has been that Russia showed too much of its claws. It should now be ostracized or penalized for "overreaction" to an attack on its soldiers.
This response evades acknowledgement that the real damage Georgia's President Mikheil Saakashvili has done has been to the United States and NATO, and to Georgia itself, which for the foreseeable future will now remain a nation of limited sovereignty, and an awkward embarrassment to its western allies.
It will have Russian troops indefinitely stationed on its territory to protect South Ossetia and Abkhazia, henceforth self-declared independent entities under Russian protection (or eventually annexed to Russia at their own request). The Russians, at this point, prefer the first solution, because as they like to emphasize, it follows the precedent of Kosovo's self-proclamation of independence from Serbia in February of this year, under American sponsorship.
The crisis has been a turning point in current international relations because it demonstrated that the United States could not or would not defend Georgia, despite the widespread international impression that Washington, after having trained Georgia's troops and showily displayed the Saakashvili government as its protégé, was in some way implicated in the Georgian attack on South Ossetia, and on the Russian soldiers legally there under international mandate.
Those Russian soldiers had been there for 16 years under an international agreement following a first Georgian attempt to "recover" the linguistically and historically distinct South Ossetia and Abkhazia, both of them autonomous Russian -- and subsequently Soviet -- protectorates or regions since 1810.
Now U.S. Vice President Richard Cheney says he is going to visit Georgia next week, after visits to Azerbaijan and Ukraine -- which no doubt are in need of some bucking-up after this display of Russian fury and of American "diplomatic restraint" (meaning lack of a rational alternative). American naval vessels are in the Black Sea, and one of them, a destroyer, has delivered some humanitarian supplies to a southern Georgian port.
Another U.S. vessel, an unthreatening Coast Guard cutter, is scheduled to make another delivery Wednesday [August 27] to the port of Poti, patrolled by Russian forces and with nearby Russian check-points.
The Russians have darkly declared their suspicion that American vessels have been delivering arms to Georgia at other places along the coast. Even though the Russians destroyed all that was left of the new American military equipment and installations recently given to Georgia, even Saakashvili is unlikely to want to start up the war again. At least just now; unless Cheney is going to bring with him the 82nd Airborne Division and the Sixth Fleet. That of course is what Saakashvili seemed to expect the night when his invasion turned into a debacle. "Where is America?" he cried out, "Where is the Free World?"
He has since received reassurances from presidential candidate John McCain and vice presidential candidate Joe Biden, both fans of the unsuccessful Georgian liberator.
This has been an inane and stupid affair, except for the unfortunates who got killed or maimed, or lost their homes, or have been ethnically cleansed by one side or another during the past days and are now grieving refugees.
The United States left Saakashvili and the Georgians twisting in the wind, after telling them they were going to belong to NATO and help spread democracy in the Caucasus. Ukraine and the Baltic states have been given the lesson that great powers do not go to war against other heavily armed great powers in order to fight the ancient sectarian or linguistic grievances of client countries, even when those are prospective NATO members.
Poland and the Czech Republic had thought it prudent to humor the obsession of Washington and its arms manufacturers with building a missile-defense system ostensibly against the threat of Iran's committing suicide. Now they find that Russia is furious about a project that is no more than an industry-pleasing and money-making boondoggle to Washington politicians.
Israel now finds Syria talking with Moscow arms suppliers. Russian cooperation with the U.S. is now expected to cease on such matters as Iran, Hamas and Hizbollah; counterterrorism, nuclear nonproliferation, and oil and gas supplies to Europe.
Why? As far as one can make out, because a certain number of policy types in the Clinton and Bush II administrations, and in the Pentagon, decided that it could be a cost-free demonstration of American power and intimidation to build NATO right up to Russia's front door. They might even detach some of Russia's historical dependencies and protectorates – just to show who's Number One.
© Copyright 2008 by Tribune Media Services International. All Rights Reserved.
Thiis article comes from William PFAFF
http://www.williampfaff.com
The URL for this article is:
http://www.williampfaff.com/article.php?storyid=337
William Pfaff
Paris, August 26, 2008 – The overwhelming reaction in American and European comment on the Russian riposte to Georgia's attack on Russsian "peacekeeping" forces in South Ossetia has been that Russia showed too much of its claws. It should now be ostracized or penalized for "overreaction" to an attack on its soldiers.
This response evades acknowledgement that the real damage Georgia's President Mikheil Saakashvili has done has been to the United States and NATO, and to Georgia itself, which for the foreseeable future will now remain a nation of limited sovereignty, and an awkward embarrassment to its western allies.
It will have Russian troops indefinitely stationed on its territory to protect South Ossetia and Abkhazia, henceforth self-declared independent entities under Russian protection (or eventually annexed to Russia at their own request). The Russians, at this point, prefer the first solution, because as they like to emphasize, it follows the precedent of Kosovo's self-proclamation of independence from Serbia in February of this year, under American sponsorship.
The crisis has been a turning point in current international relations because it demonstrated that the United States could not or would not defend Georgia, despite the widespread international impression that Washington, after having trained Georgia's troops and showily displayed the Saakashvili government as its protégé, was in some way implicated in the Georgian attack on South Ossetia, and on the Russian soldiers legally there under international mandate.
Those Russian soldiers had been there for 16 years under an international agreement following a first Georgian attempt to "recover" the linguistically and historically distinct South Ossetia and Abkhazia, both of them autonomous Russian -- and subsequently Soviet -- protectorates or regions since 1810.
Now U.S. Vice President Richard Cheney says he is going to visit Georgia next week, after visits to Azerbaijan and Ukraine -- which no doubt are in need of some bucking-up after this display of Russian fury and of American "diplomatic restraint" (meaning lack of a rational alternative). American naval vessels are in the Black Sea, and one of them, a destroyer, has delivered some humanitarian supplies to a southern Georgian port.
Another U.S. vessel, an unthreatening Coast Guard cutter, is scheduled to make another delivery Wednesday [August 27] to the port of Poti, patrolled by Russian forces and with nearby Russian check-points.
The Russians have darkly declared their suspicion that American vessels have been delivering arms to Georgia at other places along the coast. Even though the Russians destroyed all that was left of the new American military equipment and installations recently given to Georgia, even Saakashvili is unlikely to want to start up the war again. At least just now; unless Cheney is going to bring with him the 82nd Airborne Division and the Sixth Fleet. That of course is what Saakashvili seemed to expect the night when his invasion turned into a debacle. "Where is America?" he cried out, "Where is the Free World?"
He has since received reassurances from presidential candidate John McCain and vice presidential candidate Joe Biden, both fans of the unsuccessful Georgian liberator.
This has been an inane and stupid affair, except for the unfortunates who got killed or maimed, or lost their homes, or have been ethnically cleansed by one side or another during the past days and are now grieving refugees.
The United States left Saakashvili and the Georgians twisting in the wind, after telling them they were going to belong to NATO and help spread democracy in the Caucasus. Ukraine and the Baltic states have been given the lesson that great powers do not go to war against other heavily armed great powers in order to fight the ancient sectarian or linguistic grievances of client countries, even when those are prospective NATO members.
Poland and the Czech Republic had thought it prudent to humor the obsession of Washington and its arms manufacturers with building a missile-defense system ostensibly against the threat of Iran's committing suicide. Now they find that Russia is furious about a project that is no more than an industry-pleasing and money-making boondoggle to Washington politicians.
Israel now finds Syria talking with Moscow arms suppliers. Russian cooperation with the U.S. is now expected to cease on such matters as Iran, Hamas and Hizbollah; counterterrorism, nuclear nonproliferation, and oil and gas supplies to Europe.
Why? As far as one can make out, because a certain number of policy types in the Clinton and Bush II administrations, and in the Pentagon, decided that it could be a cost-free demonstration of American power and intimidation to build NATO right up to Russia's front door. They might even detach some of Russia's historical dependencies and protectorates – just to show who's Number One.
© Copyright 2008 by Tribune Media Services International. All Rights Reserved.
Thiis article comes from William PFAFF
http://www.williampfaff.com
The URL for this article is:
http://www.williampfaff.com/article.php?storyid=337
Georgia is the graveyard of America's unipolar world
Georgia is the graveyard of America's unipolar world
Russia's defiance in the Caucasus has brought down the curtain on Bush senior's new world order - not before time
Seumas Milne
Thursday August 28 2008
The Guardian
If there were any doubt that the rules of the international game have changed for good, the events of the past few days should have dispelled it. On Monday, President Bush demanded that Russia's leaders reject their parliament's appeal to recognise the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Within 24 hours, Bush had his response: President Medvedev announced Russia's recognition of the two contested Georgian enclaves.
The Russian message was unmistakable: the outcome of the war triggered by Georgia's attack on South Ossetia on August 7 is non-negotiable - and nothing the titans of the US empire do or say is going to reverse it. After that, the British foreign secretary David Miliband's posturing yesterday in Kiev about building a "coalition against Russian aggression" merely looked foolish.
That this month's events in the Caucasus signal an international turning point is no longer in question. The comparisons with August 1914 are of course ridiculous, and even the speculation about a new cold war overdone. For all the manoeuvres in the Black Sea and nuclear-backed threats, the standoff between Russia and the US is not remotely comparable to the events that led up to the first world war. Nor do the current tensions have anything like the ideological and global dimensions that shaped the 40-year confrontation between the west and the Soviet Union.
But what is clear is that America's unipolar moment has passed - and the new world order heralded by Bush's father in the dying days of the Soviet Union in 1991 is no more. The days when one power was able to bestride the globe like a colossus, enforcing its will in every continent, challenged only by popular movements for national independence and isolated "rogue states", are now over. For nearly two decades, while Russia sunk into "catastroika" and China built an economic powerhouse, the US has exercised unprecedented and unaccountable global power, arrogating to itself and its allies the right to invade and occupy other countries, untroubled by international law or institutions, sucking ever more states into the orbit of its voracious military alliance.
Now, pumped up with petrodollars, Russia has called a halt to this relentless expansion and demonstrated that the US writ doesn't run in every backyard. And although it has been a regional, not a global, challenge, this object lesson in the new limits of American power has already been absorbed from central Asia to Latin America.
In Georgia itself, both Medvedev's recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia's independence and Russia's destruction of Georgian military capacity have been designed to leave no room for doubt that the issue of the enclaves' reintegration has been closed. There are certainly dangers for Russia's own territorial integrity in legitimising breakaway states. But the move will have little practical impact and is presumably partly intended to create bargaining chips for future negotiations.
Miliband's attempt in Ukraine, meanwhile, to deny the obvious parallels with the US-orchestrated recognition of Kosovo's independence earlier this year rang particularly hollow, as did his denunciation of invasions of sovereign states and double standards. Both the west and Russia have abused the charge of "genocide" to try and give themselves legal cover, but Russia is surely on stronger ground over South Ossetia - where its own internationally recognised peacekeepers were directly attacked by the Georgian army - than Nato was in Kosovo in 1999, where most ethnic cleansing took place after the US-led assault began.
There has been much talk among western politicians in recent days about Russia isolating itself from the international community. But unless that simply means North America and Europe, nothing could be further from the truth. While the US and British media have swung into full cold-war mode over the Georgia crisis, the rest of the world has seen it in a very different light. As Kishore Mahbubani, Singapore's former UN ambassador, observed in the Financial Times a few days ago, "most of the world is bemused by western moralising on Georgia". While the western view is that the world "should support the underdog, Georgia, against Russia ... most support Russia against the bullying west. The gap between the western narrative and the rest of the world could not be clearer."
Why that should be so isn't hard to understand. It's not only that the US and its camp followers have trampled on international law and the UN to bring death and destruction to the Middle East, Afghanistan and Pakistan. In the early 1990s, the Pentagon warned that to ensure no global rival emerged, the US would need to "account for the interests of advanced industrial nations to discourage them from challenging our leadership". But when it came to Russia, all that was forgotten in a fog of imperial hubris that has left the US overstretched and unable to prevent the return of a multipolar world.
Of course, that new multipolarity can easily be overstated. Russia is a regional power and there is no imminent prospect of a serious global challenger to the US, which will remain overwhelmingly the most powerful state in the world for years to come. It can also exacerbate the risk of conflict. But only the most solipsistic western mindset can fail to grasp the necessity of a counterbalance in international relations that can restrict the freedom of any one power to impose its will on other countries unilaterally.
One western response, championed by the Times this week, is to damn this growing challenge to US domination on the grounds that it is led by autocratic states in the shape of Russia and China. In reality, western alarm clearly has very little to do with democracy. When Russia collapsed into the US orbit under Boris Yeltsin, his bombardment of the Russian parliament and shamelessly rigged elections were treated with the greatest western understanding.
The real gripe is not with these states' lack of accountability - Russian public opinion is in any case overwhelmingly supportive of its government's actions in Georgia - but their strategic challenge and economic rivalry. For the rest of us, a new assertiveness by Russia and other rising powers doesn't just offer some restraint on the unbridled exercise of global imperial power, it should also increase the pressure for a revival of a rules-based system of international relations. In the circumstances, that might come to seem quite appealing to whoever is elected US president.
s.milne@guardian.co.ukGeorgia is the graveyard of America's unipolar world
Russia's defiance in the Caucasus has brought down the curtain on Bush senior's new world order - not before time
Copyright Guardian Newspapers Limited 2008
Russia's defiance in the Caucasus has brought down the curtain on Bush senior's new world order - not before time
Seumas Milne
Thursday August 28 2008
The Guardian
If there were any doubt that the rules of the international game have changed for good, the events of the past few days should have dispelled it. On Monday, President Bush demanded that Russia's leaders reject their parliament's appeal to recognise the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Within 24 hours, Bush had his response: President Medvedev announced Russia's recognition of the two contested Georgian enclaves.
The Russian message was unmistakable: the outcome of the war triggered by Georgia's attack on South Ossetia on August 7 is non-negotiable - and nothing the titans of the US empire do or say is going to reverse it. After that, the British foreign secretary David Miliband's posturing yesterday in Kiev about building a "coalition against Russian aggression" merely looked foolish.
That this month's events in the Caucasus signal an international turning point is no longer in question. The comparisons with August 1914 are of course ridiculous, and even the speculation about a new cold war overdone. For all the manoeuvres in the Black Sea and nuclear-backed threats, the standoff between Russia and the US is not remotely comparable to the events that led up to the first world war. Nor do the current tensions have anything like the ideological and global dimensions that shaped the 40-year confrontation between the west and the Soviet Union.
But what is clear is that America's unipolar moment has passed - and the new world order heralded by Bush's father in the dying days of the Soviet Union in 1991 is no more. The days when one power was able to bestride the globe like a colossus, enforcing its will in every continent, challenged only by popular movements for national independence and isolated "rogue states", are now over. For nearly two decades, while Russia sunk into "catastroika" and China built an economic powerhouse, the US has exercised unprecedented and unaccountable global power, arrogating to itself and its allies the right to invade and occupy other countries, untroubled by international law or institutions, sucking ever more states into the orbit of its voracious military alliance.
Now, pumped up with petrodollars, Russia has called a halt to this relentless expansion and demonstrated that the US writ doesn't run in every backyard. And although it has been a regional, not a global, challenge, this object lesson in the new limits of American power has already been absorbed from central Asia to Latin America.
In Georgia itself, both Medvedev's recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia's independence and Russia's destruction of Georgian military capacity have been designed to leave no room for doubt that the issue of the enclaves' reintegration has been closed. There are certainly dangers for Russia's own territorial integrity in legitimising breakaway states. But the move will have little practical impact and is presumably partly intended to create bargaining chips for future negotiations.
Miliband's attempt in Ukraine, meanwhile, to deny the obvious parallels with the US-orchestrated recognition of Kosovo's independence earlier this year rang particularly hollow, as did his denunciation of invasions of sovereign states and double standards. Both the west and Russia have abused the charge of "genocide" to try and give themselves legal cover, but Russia is surely on stronger ground over South Ossetia - where its own internationally recognised peacekeepers were directly attacked by the Georgian army - than Nato was in Kosovo in 1999, where most ethnic cleansing took place after the US-led assault began.
There has been much talk among western politicians in recent days about Russia isolating itself from the international community. But unless that simply means North America and Europe, nothing could be further from the truth. While the US and British media have swung into full cold-war mode over the Georgia crisis, the rest of the world has seen it in a very different light. As Kishore Mahbubani, Singapore's former UN ambassador, observed in the Financial Times a few days ago, "most of the world is bemused by western moralising on Georgia". While the western view is that the world "should support the underdog, Georgia, against Russia ... most support Russia against the bullying west. The gap between the western narrative and the rest of the world could not be clearer."
Why that should be so isn't hard to understand. It's not only that the US and its camp followers have trampled on international law and the UN to bring death and destruction to the Middle East, Afghanistan and Pakistan. In the early 1990s, the Pentagon warned that to ensure no global rival emerged, the US would need to "account for the interests of advanced industrial nations to discourage them from challenging our leadership". But when it came to Russia, all that was forgotten in a fog of imperial hubris that has left the US overstretched and unable to prevent the return of a multipolar world.
Of course, that new multipolarity can easily be overstated. Russia is a regional power and there is no imminent prospect of a serious global challenger to the US, which will remain overwhelmingly the most powerful state in the world for years to come. It can also exacerbate the risk of conflict. But only the most solipsistic western mindset can fail to grasp the necessity of a counterbalance in international relations that can restrict the freedom of any one power to impose its will on other countries unilaterally.
One western response, championed by the Times this week, is to damn this growing challenge to US domination on the grounds that it is led by autocratic states in the shape of Russia and China. In reality, western alarm clearly has very little to do with democracy. When Russia collapsed into the US orbit under Boris Yeltsin, his bombardment of the Russian parliament and shamelessly rigged elections were treated with the greatest western understanding.
The real gripe is not with these states' lack of accountability - Russian public opinion is in any case overwhelmingly supportive of its government's actions in Georgia - but their strategic challenge and economic rivalry. For the rest of us, a new assertiveness by Russia and other rising powers doesn't just offer some restraint on the unbridled exercise of global imperial power, it should also increase the pressure for a revival of a rules-based system of international relations. In the circumstances, that might come to seem quite appealing to whoever is elected US president.
s.milne@guardian.co.ukGeorgia is the graveyard of America's unipolar world
Russia's defiance in the Caucasus has brought down the curtain on Bush senior's new world order - not before time
Copyright Guardian Newspapers Limited 2008
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Gulf States Remain wedded to Dollar
International Herald Tribune
Gulf states remain wedded to dollar
By Landon Thomas Jr.
Monday, August 25, 2008
RIYADH: As oil prices soared and the value of the U.S. dollar plunged, a chorus of academics and policy experts took up the cry that Saudi Arabia and neighboring Gulf countries should abandon their currency peg to a depreciating dollar to help combat the social ravages of inflation that were spreading across the region.
The brief, put forth by the likes of Alan Greenspan and the Harvard economist Martin Feldstein, made impeccable theoretical sense: with Gulf economies riding an oil boom, higher interest rates and stronger currencies were needed, not the reverse. Currency traders took heed.
But that argument made only limited headway in Saudi Arabia. And now, with the dollar's modest comeback and oil's retreat, policy makers in the region have been bolstered in their resolve to keep the peg in place and accept the consequences of higher inflation if need be.
"The peg is here to stay, no ifs or buts," said Muhammad Al-Jasser, the vice governor of the central bank who oversees the financial management of Saudi Arabia's soaring dollar reserve base.
Sitting in his spacious office on the top floor of the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency's postmodern headquarters, the academic in Al-Jasser - he has a doctorate in economics from the University of California, Riverside - relishes the to and fro of the debate.
But the policy maker in him takes a different view: the Saudi authorities have long said that a precipitous revaluation would increase investor uncertainty as well as shrink the government's budget surplus and its foreign exchange reserves. Plus, they say, it is not the exchange rate that is causing the price spiral.
"Inflation in our case and in this point of time is not a monetary phenomenon," Al-Jasser said during an interview last month. "It is driven more by government and private sector spending, coupled with the global boom in China and India. Wages are flexible here."
Flexible they may be, but that is cold comfort for millions of immigrant workers who swarm to countries throughout the Gulf - not just Saudi Arabia but the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Kuwait as well - in search of a better life.
Consider Sher Bahader, a cab driver here in the nation's capital, who ticks off the items that have soared in price since inflation hit a 30-year high. Milk, food and, most acutely, rent.
"Too many things are expensive; its very, very difficult," said Bahader, 57, who works seven days a week from 4 in the morning to 11 at night to make enough to send to his five children and wife, who live in a small village in Pakistan-administered Kashmir. "If the oil price is high, that is good for the Saudi Arabian people, but not for the poor man."
The root of the problem is clear. Inflation is high and rising: 10.7 percent in Saudi Arabia as of April, up from 1 percent in 2003; 14 percent in Qatar for the first quarter of 2008; and 12 percent for the United Arab Emirates as of March.
But even as Gulf central bankers and outside prognosticators quarrel over how to respond to the situation, the intellectual divide between Gulf central bankers and outside prognosticators also highlights the gap that often exists between the prescriptions offered by academics and policy outfits in Washington, New York and Cambridge and the grittier realities that face policy makers in their home countries.
Indeed, academics are right when they say that the lower interest rates that dollar-pegged Gulf economies must adhere to have fueled a development boom that has resulted in major supply constraints.
In a part of the world that prizes stability of all kinds, however, it was always unlikely that countries like Abu Dhabi and Saudi Arabia would abruptly revalue and watch their budget surpluses disappear just to appease outside experts - or dyspeptic taxi drivers for that matter.
Especially when memories of oil at $10 a barrel and gaping budget deficits remain vivid.
"The Gulf countries have opted to inflate," said Brad Setser, an international financial analyst at the Council of Foreign Relations who was one of many arguing that the Gulf countries should forgo the dollar link. "If oil revenues are going up 500 percent you can afford to pay your workers more. But that will just add to the inflationary spiral."
It is not just the academics either: the world's credit ratings agencies have recently warned that higher inflation in the coming years could lead to social unrest in the region even as the agencies themselves conclude that the large internal and external surpluses rule out a downgrade.
And on Aug. 11, the International Monetary Fund said that over time, if inflation persisted, Saudi Arabia should consider tying the riyal to a broader basket of currencies, as Kuwait has done.
Because they are paid in riyals and dirhams and then convert them back into dollars to send their wages home, foreign workers, who are estimated to comprise 50 percent or more of the work force in Gulf countries, have felt the punishing brunt of the dollar's slide.
Pay has increased for many imported workers, but it is not enough to compensate for rising food prices and, even more important, the soaring monthly rent, which accounts for 25 percent of the inflation index.
That creates something of a Catch-22 for local governments: to reduce housing costs, they must slake their thirst for inexpensive foreign labor. But that will hinder the region's planners in accomplishing the ambitious development projects intended to provide economic stability and employment opportunities for currently underemployed nationals, whatever the price of oil.
Such a quandary means little to Mahmood Gabar, a 36-year-old taxi driver from Egypt who, carrying only a high school diploma, was drawn to Abu Dhabi 15 years ago by the prospect of robust wages and permanent work. For years he made enough to enjoy a young man's life in the emirates and send more than enough back to his family in Cairo.
But over the past five years, the cost of renting the cramped 7-square-meter, or 72-square-foot, room he shares with two other workers shot up from 800 dirhams a month to 3,000, leaving him little to send home to his wife and newborn daughter.
"I won't stay here anymore," he said, his voice rising in frustration. "I am in the emirates 15 years and I have nothing."
Gulf states remain wedded to dollar
By Landon Thomas Jr.
Monday, August 25, 2008
RIYADH: As oil prices soared and the value of the U.S. dollar plunged, a chorus of academics and policy experts took up the cry that Saudi Arabia and neighboring Gulf countries should abandon their currency peg to a depreciating dollar to help combat the social ravages of inflation that were spreading across the region.
The brief, put forth by the likes of Alan Greenspan and the Harvard economist Martin Feldstein, made impeccable theoretical sense: with Gulf economies riding an oil boom, higher interest rates and stronger currencies were needed, not the reverse. Currency traders took heed.
But that argument made only limited headway in Saudi Arabia. And now, with the dollar's modest comeback and oil's retreat, policy makers in the region have been bolstered in their resolve to keep the peg in place and accept the consequences of higher inflation if need be.
"The peg is here to stay, no ifs or buts," said Muhammad Al-Jasser, the vice governor of the central bank who oversees the financial management of Saudi Arabia's soaring dollar reserve base.
Sitting in his spacious office on the top floor of the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency's postmodern headquarters, the academic in Al-Jasser - he has a doctorate in economics from the University of California, Riverside - relishes the to and fro of the debate.
But the policy maker in him takes a different view: the Saudi authorities have long said that a precipitous revaluation would increase investor uncertainty as well as shrink the government's budget surplus and its foreign exchange reserves. Plus, they say, it is not the exchange rate that is causing the price spiral.
"Inflation in our case and in this point of time is not a monetary phenomenon," Al-Jasser said during an interview last month. "It is driven more by government and private sector spending, coupled with the global boom in China and India. Wages are flexible here."
Flexible they may be, but that is cold comfort for millions of immigrant workers who swarm to countries throughout the Gulf - not just Saudi Arabia but the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Kuwait as well - in search of a better life.
Consider Sher Bahader, a cab driver here in the nation's capital, who ticks off the items that have soared in price since inflation hit a 30-year high. Milk, food and, most acutely, rent.
"Too many things are expensive; its very, very difficult," said Bahader, 57, who works seven days a week from 4 in the morning to 11 at night to make enough to send to his five children and wife, who live in a small village in Pakistan-administered Kashmir. "If the oil price is high, that is good for the Saudi Arabian people, but not for the poor man."
The root of the problem is clear. Inflation is high and rising: 10.7 percent in Saudi Arabia as of April, up from 1 percent in 2003; 14 percent in Qatar for the first quarter of 2008; and 12 percent for the United Arab Emirates as of March.
But even as Gulf central bankers and outside prognosticators quarrel over how to respond to the situation, the intellectual divide between Gulf central bankers and outside prognosticators also highlights the gap that often exists between the prescriptions offered by academics and policy outfits in Washington, New York and Cambridge and the grittier realities that face policy makers in their home countries.
Indeed, academics are right when they say that the lower interest rates that dollar-pegged Gulf economies must adhere to have fueled a development boom that has resulted in major supply constraints.
In a part of the world that prizes stability of all kinds, however, it was always unlikely that countries like Abu Dhabi and Saudi Arabia would abruptly revalue and watch their budget surpluses disappear just to appease outside experts - or dyspeptic taxi drivers for that matter.
Especially when memories of oil at $10 a barrel and gaping budget deficits remain vivid.
"The Gulf countries have opted to inflate," said Brad Setser, an international financial analyst at the Council of Foreign Relations who was one of many arguing that the Gulf countries should forgo the dollar link. "If oil revenues are going up 500 percent you can afford to pay your workers more. But that will just add to the inflationary spiral."
It is not just the academics either: the world's credit ratings agencies have recently warned that higher inflation in the coming years could lead to social unrest in the region even as the agencies themselves conclude that the large internal and external surpluses rule out a downgrade.
And on Aug. 11, the International Monetary Fund said that over time, if inflation persisted, Saudi Arabia should consider tying the riyal to a broader basket of currencies, as Kuwait has done.
Because they are paid in riyals and dirhams and then convert them back into dollars to send their wages home, foreign workers, who are estimated to comprise 50 percent or more of the work force in Gulf countries, have felt the punishing brunt of the dollar's slide.
Pay has increased for many imported workers, but it is not enough to compensate for rising food prices and, even more important, the soaring monthly rent, which accounts for 25 percent of the inflation index.
That creates something of a Catch-22 for local governments: to reduce housing costs, they must slake their thirst for inexpensive foreign labor. But that will hinder the region's planners in accomplishing the ambitious development projects intended to provide economic stability and employment opportunities for currently underemployed nationals, whatever the price of oil.
Such a quandary means little to Mahmood Gabar, a 36-year-old taxi driver from Egypt who, carrying only a high school diploma, was drawn to Abu Dhabi 15 years ago by the prospect of robust wages and permanent work. For years he made enough to enjoy a young man's life in the emirates and send more than enough back to his family in Cairo.
But over the past five years, the cost of renting the cramped 7-square-meter, or 72-square-foot, room he shares with two other workers shot up from 800 dirhams a month to 3,000, leaving him little to send home to his wife and newborn daughter.
"I won't stay here anymore," he said, his voice rising in frustration. "I am in the emirates 15 years and I have nothing."
Crisis of lies and hysteria: The principal lesson of the Russian-Georgian conflict is that Nato must not be expanded further
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/aug/25/georgia.russia
Crisis of lies and hysteria
The principal lesson of the Russian-Georgian conflict is that Nato must not be expanded further
Jonathan Steele
Monday August 25 2008
The Guardian
After a fortnight of conflict on the ground and a flurry of propaganda and debate in European capitals the South Ossetian crisis is winding down. One of the abiding images - a Russian masterstroke - will be the moving concert given by world-renowned Valery Gergiev, a South Ossetian, and the Mariinsky orchestra in the ruins of Tskhinvali, the town the Georgians destroyed.
Another unforgettable memory will be Georgia's flak-jacketed president cowering on the ground as a Russian plane flies over the town of Gori. Bravado turning into humiliation is a metaphor for the whole foolish adventure. Georgian men are hospitable and engaging, but fond of bombast and empty macho gestures. Unlike the Chechens, who have fought Russians for centuries, Georgians prefer poetry and vineyards to the challenge of war.
President Mikheil Saakashvili epitomises the style, made worse in his case by the lies he served up to deceive foreign opinion. He boasted of defeat. Georgia was being swallowed up, Tbilisi was on the verge of occupation, Russia was using weapons of mass destruction.
The biggest lie was his attempt to airbrush the fact that he created the crisis by launching an artillery barrage on the South Ossetian capital, which killed scores of civilians and 15 Russian peacekeepers. It was absurd to think Russia would not retaliate. So the next lie was to claim Russia's leaders had prepared a trap. In fact, they were taken by surprise as much as the Ossetians. Russia's initial response had the hallmarks of hasty improvisation - though, as the crisis unfolded, President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin showed increasing determination to exploit Saakashvili's folly by preventing South Ossetia and Abkhazia from ever being forced back under Georgian rule.
Saakashvili and many of his western backers used ludicrous analogies to hype the crisis - from Poland in 1939 to Hungary in 1956, even though it is clear South Ossetians welcomed Russian aid and now want to break from Georgia once and for all. The more accurate comparison was Kosovo. Suppose Serbia's leaders were suddenly to kill US peacekeepers, fire rockets at civilian houses in Pristina and storm the town, wouldn't the Americans be expected to expel the invaders, even if the UN still recognises Kosovo as legally part of Serbia?
Russia's destruction of Georgia's radar stations, its military and naval bases, and several bridges in order to degrade the country's military capability looks similar to Nato's attacks on Serbian infrastructure in 1999. Instead of confining itself to Kosovo in seeking to protect Albanian civilians from ethnic cleansing, Nato bombed deep into Serbia proper. What Russia did to Georgia was disproportionate, but less so than Nato on Serbia a decade ago.
Nevertheless, Russia should pull back completely now. It should also have restrained South Ossetian militias from running amok against Georgian villages. Nato troops made little effort to stop revenge-seeking Albanians from looting and torching houses in the Serbian enclaves in Kosovo after Yugoslav forces were driven out. Russia's forces should have done better in Ossetia. They had the moral high ground but quickly forfeited it by not changing the patterns of military indiscipline and cruelty shown in Afghanistan and Chechnya as well as towards conscripts in their own ranks.
How and why Saakashvili acted remains unclear. Did he tell the Americans of his plans? If not, he emerges as even more of a hothead than many in Nato feared. If yes, did the Americans approve? Giving him the green light would have been incredibly irresponsible. If the US warned Saakashvili off and he went ahead anyway, he should be condemned as an ally from hell.
Did he think that by playing on ancient anti-Russian prejudice and hysterical cold war analogies he could swap an inevitable loss of territory for accelerated entry into Nato? If that was the gamble, it is paying off in some quarters. One of the grimmest aspects of this crisis was the degree to which John McCain emerged as an undiplomatic hawk. Before the crisis he was on record as calling Putin "a totalitarian dictator" and saying Russia should be expelled from the G8. As Russia came in to defend South Ossetia, he demanded it pay a "serious negative" price.
In Britain David Cameron showed similar wildness. Gordon Brown and David Miliband were little better. Instead of the relative even-handedness of Nicolas Sarkozy and Angela Merkel, New Labour followed the White House line. Could it not bring itself to utter any criticism of Saakashvili? Even as poodles, does this government not see that the next potential US president, Barack Obama, is more nuanced? He called on Georgia, as well as Russia, to show restraint.
That said, there is only a slight chance the US, under any president, will do the sensible thing, which would be to announce Nato expansion has reached its limit and that no invitation to Georgia - or Ukraine - will ever be issued.
The mantra is that Russia cannot have a veto on Nato membership. True, but by the same token no country has a right to join Nato, or the EU. Look at Turkey, which has been a loyal Nato ally for four decades but was not allowed to start EU membership proceedings until 2005 and still has no guarantee they will succeed. Neither Russia nor the applicants decide who enters the club. Its existing members do. Whatever the next US president thinks, and whatever other traditionally anti-Russian countries such as Poland and the Baltic states feel, there are European countries that see the danger of extending the Nato umbrella where the alliance's founders never meant it to go. Nato is not a global institution. It has no business looking for new members in the Caucasus or central Asia.
Nato and Russia are boycotting each other for the moment. But business will soon resume as western leaders see this was a manufactured crisis rather than the start of a new cold war or some cataclysmic shift in international relations. When Nato's foreign ministers met last week, France and Germany made that point. The alliance promised reconstruction aid to Georgia but no support for rushing it into Nato. Earlier this year, France and Germany had the courage to defy Washington and say it was too early to invite Georgia. They were right then, and are even more so now.
j.steele@guardian.co.uk
Copyright Guardian Newspapers Limited 2008
Crisis of lies and hysteria
The principal lesson of the Russian-Georgian conflict is that Nato must not be expanded further
Jonathan Steele
Monday August 25 2008
The Guardian
After a fortnight of conflict on the ground and a flurry of propaganda and debate in European capitals the South Ossetian crisis is winding down. One of the abiding images - a Russian masterstroke - will be the moving concert given by world-renowned Valery Gergiev, a South Ossetian, and the Mariinsky orchestra in the ruins of Tskhinvali, the town the Georgians destroyed.
Another unforgettable memory will be Georgia's flak-jacketed president cowering on the ground as a Russian plane flies over the town of Gori. Bravado turning into humiliation is a metaphor for the whole foolish adventure. Georgian men are hospitable and engaging, but fond of bombast and empty macho gestures. Unlike the Chechens, who have fought Russians for centuries, Georgians prefer poetry and vineyards to the challenge of war.
President Mikheil Saakashvili epitomises the style, made worse in his case by the lies he served up to deceive foreign opinion. He boasted of defeat. Georgia was being swallowed up, Tbilisi was on the verge of occupation, Russia was using weapons of mass destruction.
The biggest lie was his attempt to airbrush the fact that he created the crisis by launching an artillery barrage on the South Ossetian capital, which killed scores of civilians and 15 Russian peacekeepers. It was absurd to think Russia would not retaliate. So the next lie was to claim Russia's leaders had prepared a trap. In fact, they were taken by surprise as much as the Ossetians. Russia's initial response had the hallmarks of hasty improvisation - though, as the crisis unfolded, President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin showed increasing determination to exploit Saakashvili's folly by preventing South Ossetia and Abkhazia from ever being forced back under Georgian rule.
Saakashvili and many of his western backers used ludicrous analogies to hype the crisis - from Poland in 1939 to Hungary in 1956, even though it is clear South Ossetians welcomed Russian aid and now want to break from Georgia once and for all. The more accurate comparison was Kosovo. Suppose Serbia's leaders were suddenly to kill US peacekeepers, fire rockets at civilian houses in Pristina and storm the town, wouldn't the Americans be expected to expel the invaders, even if the UN still recognises Kosovo as legally part of Serbia?
Russia's destruction of Georgia's radar stations, its military and naval bases, and several bridges in order to degrade the country's military capability looks similar to Nato's attacks on Serbian infrastructure in 1999. Instead of confining itself to Kosovo in seeking to protect Albanian civilians from ethnic cleansing, Nato bombed deep into Serbia proper. What Russia did to Georgia was disproportionate, but less so than Nato on Serbia a decade ago.
Nevertheless, Russia should pull back completely now. It should also have restrained South Ossetian militias from running amok against Georgian villages. Nato troops made little effort to stop revenge-seeking Albanians from looting and torching houses in the Serbian enclaves in Kosovo after Yugoslav forces were driven out. Russia's forces should have done better in Ossetia. They had the moral high ground but quickly forfeited it by not changing the patterns of military indiscipline and cruelty shown in Afghanistan and Chechnya as well as towards conscripts in their own ranks.
How and why Saakashvili acted remains unclear. Did he tell the Americans of his plans? If not, he emerges as even more of a hothead than many in Nato feared. If yes, did the Americans approve? Giving him the green light would have been incredibly irresponsible. If the US warned Saakashvili off and he went ahead anyway, he should be condemned as an ally from hell.
Did he think that by playing on ancient anti-Russian prejudice and hysterical cold war analogies he could swap an inevitable loss of territory for accelerated entry into Nato? If that was the gamble, it is paying off in some quarters. One of the grimmest aspects of this crisis was the degree to which John McCain emerged as an undiplomatic hawk. Before the crisis he was on record as calling Putin "a totalitarian dictator" and saying Russia should be expelled from the G8. As Russia came in to defend South Ossetia, he demanded it pay a "serious negative" price.
In Britain David Cameron showed similar wildness. Gordon Brown and David Miliband were little better. Instead of the relative even-handedness of Nicolas Sarkozy and Angela Merkel, New Labour followed the White House line. Could it not bring itself to utter any criticism of Saakashvili? Even as poodles, does this government not see that the next potential US president, Barack Obama, is more nuanced? He called on Georgia, as well as Russia, to show restraint.
That said, there is only a slight chance the US, under any president, will do the sensible thing, which would be to announce Nato expansion has reached its limit and that no invitation to Georgia - or Ukraine - will ever be issued.
The mantra is that Russia cannot have a veto on Nato membership. True, but by the same token no country has a right to join Nato, or the EU. Look at Turkey, which has been a loyal Nato ally for four decades but was not allowed to start EU membership proceedings until 2005 and still has no guarantee they will succeed. Neither Russia nor the applicants decide who enters the club. Its existing members do. Whatever the next US president thinks, and whatever other traditionally anti-Russian countries such as Poland and the Baltic states feel, there are European countries that see the danger of extending the Nato umbrella where the alliance's founders never meant it to go. Nato is not a global institution. It has no business looking for new members in the Caucasus or central Asia.
Nato and Russia are boycotting each other for the moment. But business will soon resume as western leaders see this was a manufactured crisis rather than the start of a new cold war or some cataclysmic shift in international relations. When Nato's foreign ministers met last week, France and Germany made that point. The alliance promised reconstruction aid to Georgia but no support for rushing it into Nato. Earlier this year, France and Germany had the courage to defy Washington and say it was too early to invite Georgia. They were right then, and are even more so now.
j.steele@guardian.co.uk
Copyright Guardian Newspapers Limited 2008
Letting the Iraqis take control
Letting the Iraqis take control
The Bush administration has long refused to set a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq. So why is it doing so now?
Lawrence Korb
guardian.co.uk,
Monday August 25 2008 21:00 BST
When President George Bush and Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki signed a declaration of principles for a long-term relationship between the US and Iraq in late November 2007, the US envisioned that the agreement would enable it to establish an extensive strategic relationship with an Iraq grateful for the blood and treasure the US spilled in liberating and stabilising that country.
The Bush administration believed that this kind of relationship would make a free, democratic, pluralistic, federal and unified Iraq a strong and dependable ally in the American global war on terror. Furthermore, it would ensure that our Iraqi allies would allow the US to maintain a permanent military presence in their country, provide the bases and freedom of action for these combat forces to project American military power throughout the greater Middle East, and serve as a bulwark against Iranian expansion.
In other words, the US would be able to project power regionally, as do US forces in Germany, Japan and South Korea. The administration believed that achieving anything less would be an admission of defeat and would empower our enemies in the war on terror.
The Bush administration was so confident about achieving these results quickly that it agreed not to ask that the UN mandate be extended past December 31 of this year and stated that the negotiations would be wrapped up on July 31. Moreover, the president and his supporters said that, of course, if the Iraqis wanted us to leave, we would, while simultaneously branding those who wanted to set a timetable for withdrawal as defeatists who would undermine the gains made by the surge.
However, on Friday, US and Iraqi negotiators completed a draft accord that demands that the US remove its combat troops from Iraqi cities by June 2009 and from the rest of the country by December 31, 2011. While American officials argue that these timetables for withdrawing American combat forces depend on conditions on the ground, this decision will not be made by the US alone, but in concert with the Iraqis, who do not see it as conditional. While speaking with tribal leaders today, Maliki said that the US and Iraq have reached an agreement on a final date for withdrawal.
Moreover, the draft accord could be rejected by the Presidential Council (which consists of the prime minister, the president, two vice-presidents and the head of the Kurdish regional government), senior Iraqi security officials and the Iraqi parliament. Since most of these officials, including Maliki, and the Iraqi people wanted all American troops out by the end of 2010, it is not a foregone conclusion that all of these groups will accept the 2011 deadline.
How did the Bush administration so misjudge the situation? Why did it agree to a timetable for withdrawal after disparaging those who took such a position as defeatists? Some would argue that the security situation has improved so dramatically in the past 18 months that a timetable has become more realistic. But on the same day that the details of the pact were revealed, General David Petraeus, the commander of US forces in Iraq, said the gains are not durable and that the US role is not anywhere near finished. And, President Bush has said repeatedly that when it comes to withdrawing US troops, he will be guided by the US commanders on the ground in Iraq.
The reason that the Iraqis want a timetable is that there is a broad Iraqi political consensus in favour of a US commitment to withdraw its forces from the country, and, while there does not yet exist a consensus among Iraqis as to what the new Iraq will be, a broad consensus does exist that no genuine, sustainable Iraqi unity can develop while the government continues to be underwritten by a large foreign military presence.
It is important to remember that Maliki opposed the surge of US troops and the US agreement to train and pay the Sunni insurgents, which became known as the Anbar Awakening. In late 2006, as President Bush was deciding on the next steps in Iraq, Maliki urged him to redeploy American forces to the outskirts of Baghdad and allow Iraqi forces to take control of Baghdad. And he has not only refused to incorporate more than a token number of these 100,000 Sunni insurgents, now known as the Sons of Iraq, into the Iraqi Security Forces, but he is also already arresting hundreds of the members of the Awakening movement.
In dealing with Iraq, the Bush administration has consistently demonstrated that it has little understanding of Iraqi history and culture. Just as the Iraqis would not greet any foreign armies as liberators, they are not going to accept a permanent military presence on their soil. These negotiations show that the Iraqis want to take control of their own destiny. We should let them do so. It offers them and us the best, if not the only, chance of gaining something positive from the mess we created.
The Bush administration has long refused to set a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq. So why is it doing so now?
Lawrence Korb
guardian.co.uk,
Monday August 25 2008 21:00 BST
When President George Bush and Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki signed a declaration of principles for a long-term relationship between the US and Iraq in late November 2007, the US envisioned that the agreement would enable it to establish an extensive strategic relationship with an Iraq grateful for the blood and treasure the US spilled in liberating and stabilising that country.
The Bush administration believed that this kind of relationship would make a free, democratic, pluralistic, federal and unified Iraq a strong and dependable ally in the American global war on terror. Furthermore, it would ensure that our Iraqi allies would allow the US to maintain a permanent military presence in their country, provide the bases and freedom of action for these combat forces to project American military power throughout the greater Middle East, and serve as a bulwark against Iranian expansion.
In other words, the US would be able to project power regionally, as do US forces in Germany, Japan and South Korea. The administration believed that achieving anything less would be an admission of defeat and would empower our enemies in the war on terror.
The Bush administration was so confident about achieving these results quickly that it agreed not to ask that the UN mandate be extended past December 31 of this year and stated that the negotiations would be wrapped up on July 31. Moreover, the president and his supporters said that, of course, if the Iraqis wanted us to leave, we would, while simultaneously branding those who wanted to set a timetable for withdrawal as defeatists who would undermine the gains made by the surge.
However, on Friday, US and Iraqi negotiators completed a draft accord that demands that the US remove its combat troops from Iraqi cities by June 2009 and from the rest of the country by December 31, 2011. While American officials argue that these timetables for withdrawing American combat forces depend on conditions on the ground, this decision will not be made by the US alone, but in concert with the Iraqis, who do not see it as conditional. While speaking with tribal leaders today, Maliki said that the US and Iraq have reached an agreement on a final date for withdrawal.
Moreover, the draft accord could be rejected by the Presidential Council (which consists of the prime minister, the president, two vice-presidents and the head of the Kurdish regional government), senior Iraqi security officials and the Iraqi parliament. Since most of these officials, including Maliki, and the Iraqi people wanted all American troops out by the end of 2010, it is not a foregone conclusion that all of these groups will accept the 2011 deadline.
How did the Bush administration so misjudge the situation? Why did it agree to a timetable for withdrawal after disparaging those who took such a position as defeatists? Some would argue that the security situation has improved so dramatically in the past 18 months that a timetable has become more realistic. But on the same day that the details of the pact were revealed, General David Petraeus, the commander of US forces in Iraq, said the gains are not durable and that the US role is not anywhere near finished. And, President Bush has said repeatedly that when it comes to withdrawing US troops, he will be guided by the US commanders on the ground in Iraq.
The reason that the Iraqis want a timetable is that there is a broad Iraqi political consensus in favour of a US commitment to withdraw its forces from the country, and, while there does not yet exist a consensus among Iraqis as to what the new Iraq will be, a broad consensus does exist that no genuine, sustainable Iraqi unity can develop while the government continues to be underwritten by a large foreign military presence.
It is important to remember that Maliki opposed the surge of US troops and the US agreement to train and pay the Sunni insurgents, which became known as the Anbar Awakening. In late 2006, as President Bush was deciding on the next steps in Iraq, Maliki urged him to redeploy American forces to the outskirts of Baghdad and allow Iraqi forces to take control of Baghdad. And he has not only refused to incorporate more than a token number of these 100,000 Sunni insurgents, now known as the Sons of Iraq, into the Iraqi Security Forces, but he is also already arresting hundreds of the members of the Awakening movement.
In dealing with Iraq, the Bush administration has consistently demonstrated that it has little understanding of Iraqi history and culture. Just as the Iraqis would not greet any foreign armies as liberators, they are not going to accept a permanent military presence on their soil. These negotiations show that the Iraqis want to take control of their own destiny. We should let them do so. It offers them and us the best, if not the only, chance of gaining something positive from the mess we created.
Monday, August 25, 2008
A War to Start All Wars: Will Israel Ever Seal the Victory of 1948? Shlomo Ben-Ami
A War to Start All Wars: Will Israel Ever Seal the Victory of 1948?
Shlomo Ben-Ami
Foreign Affairs - August, 2008
The Zionist movement created a state that was admitted to the United Nations and aspires to have orderly relations with the international community. Yet this state continues to behave as if it were the old Yishuv bent on outsmarting a colonial occupier and the local Arab population. And the complex web of settlements it has spread across the West Bank now make negotiating a two-state solution a logistical nightmare.
http://www.foreignaffairs.org/20080901fareviewessay87511/shlomo-ben-ami/a-war-to-start-all-wars.html
Shlomo Ben-Ami
Foreign Affairs - August, 2008
The Zionist movement created a state that was admitted to the United Nations and aspires to have orderly relations with the international community. Yet this state continues to behave as if it were the old Yishuv bent on outsmarting a colonial occupier and the local Arab population. And the complex web of settlements it has spread across the West Bank now make negotiating a two-state solution a logistical nightmare.
http://www.foreignaffairs.org/20080901fareviewessay87511/shlomo-ben-ami/a-war-to-start-all-wars.html
Georgia War Rooted in U.S. Self-Deceit on NATO Analysis by Gareth Porter*
Georgia War Rooted in U.S. Self-Deceit on NATO
Analysis by Gareth Porter*
WASHINGTON, 23 Aug (IPS) - The U.S. policy of absorbing Georgia and Ukraine into NATO, which was enthusiastically embraced by Barack Obama and his running mate Joseph Biden, has undoubtedly been given a major boost by the Russian military operation in Georgia.
In the new narrative of the Russia-Georgia war emerging from op-eds and cable news commentaries, Georgia is portrayed as the innocent victim of Russian aggression fighting for its independence.
However, the political background to that war raises the troubling question of why the George W. Bush administration failed to heed warning signs that its policy of NATO expansion right up to Russia's ethnically troubled border with Georgia was both provocative to Russia and encouraging a Georgian regime known to be bent on using force to recapture the secessionist territories.
There were plenty of signals that Russia would not acquiesce in the alignment of a militarily aggressive Georgia with a U.S.-dominated military alliance. Then Russian President Vladimir Putin made no secret of his view that this represented a move by the United States to infringe on Russia's security in the South Caucasus region. In February 2007 he asked rhetorically, 'Against whom is this expansion intended?'
Contrary to the portrayal of Russian policy as aimed at absorbing South Ossetia and Abkhazia into Russia and regime change in Georgia, Moscow had signaled right up to the eve of the NATO summit its readiness to reach a compromise along the lines of Taiwan's status in U.S.-China relations: formal recognition of the sovereignty over the secessionist territories of South Ossetia and Abkhazia in return for freedom to develop extensive economic and political relations. But it was conditioned on Georgia staying out of NATO.
That compromise was disdained by Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili. After a Mar. 19 speech at the Atlantic Council in Washington, Saakashvili was asked whether Russia had offered a 'Taiwan model' solution in return for Georgia stay out of NATO. 'We have heard many, many suggestions of this sort,' he said, but he insisted, 'You cannot compromise on these issues...'
Russia, meanwhile, had made it clear that it would respond to a move toward NATO membership for Georgia by moving toward official relations with the secessionist regions.
U.S. policymakers had decided long before those developments that the NATO expansion policy would include Georgia and Ukraine. They convinced themselves that they weren't threatening Russia but only contributing to a new European security order that was divorced from the old politics of spheres of interest.
But their view of NATO expansion appears to be marked by self-deception and naiveté. The Bill Clinton administration had abandoned its original notion that Russia would be a 'partner' in post-Cold War European security, and the NATO expansion policy had evolved into a de facto containment strategy.
Robert Hunter, former U.S. ambassador to NATO in the Clinton administration and head of a three-year project for the State Department on reform of the Georgian National Security Council, says the U.S. project of Georgia's membership in NATO 'had to be seen by any serious observer as trying to substitute a Western sphere of influence for Russian' in that violence-prone border region of the Caucasus.
Some officials 'wanted to shore up democracy', said Hunter in an interview, imagining that NATO was 'a kind of glorified Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe' -- a negotiating and conflict prevention body to which the Russian Federation belongs.
But there were also some in the administration who 'genuinely wanted to contain the Russians by surrounding them', he added.
James J. Townsend, director of the International Security Programme at the Atlantic Council and formerly the Pentagon official in charge of European relations, said there was enthusiastic support in both the Defence Department and the State Department soon after Saakashvili took power in 2003 for integration of Georgia into NATO 'as quickly as possible'.
Townsend believes the project to integrate Georgia and Ukraine into NATO gained momentum in part because Washington 'was underestimating just how sensitive this is to Putin'. U.S. policymakers, he said, had observed that in previous rounds of enlargement, despite 'a lot of bluff and bluster by the Russians', there was no Russian troop movement.
Furthermore, policymakers believed they were proving to the Russians that NATO expansion is not a threat to Russian interests, according to Townsend. They did become aware of Russia's growing assertiveness on the issue, Townsend concedes, but policymakers thought they were simply 'making trouble on everything in order to have some leverage'.
In the end, the bureaucracies pushing for NATO expansion were determined to push it through despite Russian opposition. 'I think it was a case of wanting to get Georgia engaged before the window of opportunity closed,' said Townsend.
To do so they had to ignore the risk that the promise of membership in NATO would only encourage Saakashvili, who had already vowed to 'liberate' the South Ossetia and Abkhazia regions, to become even more sanguine about the use of force.
In the same Mar. 19 speech in Washington, Saakashvili minimised the problem of Russian military power in the region. He declared that the Russians 'are not capable of enforcing the Taiwan model in Georgia. Their army in the Caucasus is not strong enough ...to calm down the situation in their own territory. I don't think they are ready for any kind of an adventure in somebody else's territory. And hopefully they know it.'
It was a clear hint that Saakashvili, newly encouraged by Bush's strong support for NATO membership, believed he could face down the Russians.
At the NATO summit, Bush met resistance from Germany and other European allies, who insisted it was 'not the right time' to even begin putting Georgia and Ukraine on the road to membership. But in order to spare embarrassment to Bush, they offered a pledge that Georgia and Ukraine 'will become NATO members'.
Hunter believes that NATO commitment was an even more provocative signal to Putin and Saakashvili than NATO approval of a 'Membership Action Plan' for Georgia would have been.
The Russians responded exactly as they said they would, taking steps toward legal recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. And Saakashvili soon began making moves to prepare for a military assault on one or both regions.
In early July, Rice traveled to Tsibilisi with the explicit intention of trying to rein him in. In her Jul. 10 press conference, she made it clear that Washington was alarmed by his military moves.
'The violence needs to stop,' said Rice. 'And whoever is perpetrating it -- and I've mentioned this to the president -- there should not be violence.'
David L. Phillips, senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, told the Los Angeles Times last week he believes that, despite State Department efforts to restrain the Georgian president, 'Saakashvili's buddies in the White House and the Office of the Vice President kept egging him on'.
But whether more specific encouragement took place or not, the deeper roots of the crisis lay in bureaucratic self-deceit about the objective expanding NATO up to the border of a highly suspicious and proud Russia in the context of an old and volatile ethnic conflict.
*Gareth Porter is an investigative historian and journalist specialising in U.S. national security policy. The paperback edition of his latest book, 'Perils of Dominance: Imbalance of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam', was published in 2006.
(END/2008)http://ipsnorthamerica.net/news.php?idnews=1652
Analysis by Gareth Porter*
WASHINGTON, 23 Aug (IPS) - The U.S. policy of absorbing Georgia and Ukraine into NATO, which was enthusiastically embraced by Barack Obama and his running mate Joseph Biden, has undoubtedly been given a major boost by the Russian military operation in Georgia.
In the new narrative of the Russia-Georgia war emerging from op-eds and cable news commentaries, Georgia is portrayed as the innocent victim of Russian aggression fighting for its independence.
However, the political background to that war raises the troubling question of why the George W. Bush administration failed to heed warning signs that its policy of NATO expansion right up to Russia's ethnically troubled border with Georgia was both provocative to Russia and encouraging a Georgian regime known to be bent on using force to recapture the secessionist territories.
There were plenty of signals that Russia would not acquiesce in the alignment of a militarily aggressive Georgia with a U.S.-dominated military alliance. Then Russian President Vladimir Putin made no secret of his view that this represented a move by the United States to infringe on Russia's security in the South Caucasus region. In February 2007 he asked rhetorically, 'Against whom is this expansion intended?'
Contrary to the portrayal of Russian policy as aimed at absorbing South Ossetia and Abkhazia into Russia and regime change in Georgia, Moscow had signaled right up to the eve of the NATO summit its readiness to reach a compromise along the lines of Taiwan's status in U.S.-China relations: formal recognition of the sovereignty over the secessionist territories of South Ossetia and Abkhazia in return for freedom to develop extensive economic and political relations. But it was conditioned on Georgia staying out of NATO.
That compromise was disdained by Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili. After a Mar. 19 speech at the Atlantic Council in Washington, Saakashvili was asked whether Russia had offered a 'Taiwan model' solution in return for Georgia stay out of NATO. 'We have heard many, many suggestions of this sort,' he said, but he insisted, 'You cannot compromise on these issues...'
Russia, meanwhile, had made it clear that it would respond to a move toward NATO membership for Georgia by moving toward official relations with the secessionist regions.
U.S. policymakers had decided long before those developments that the NATO expansion policy would include Georgia and Ukraine. They convinced themselves that they weren't threatening Russia but only contributing to a new European security order that was divorced from the old politics of spheres of interest.
But their view of NATO expansion appears to be marked by self-deception and naiveté. The Bill Clinton administration had abandoned its original notion that Russia would be a 'partner' in post-Cold War European security, and the NATO expansion policy had evolved into a de facto containment strategy.
Robert Hunter, former U.S. ambassador to NATO in the Clinton administration and head of a three-year project for the State Department on reform of the Georgian National Security Council, says the U.S. project of Georgia's membership in NATO 'had to be seen by any serious observer as trying to substitute a Western sphere of influence for Russian' in that violence-prone border region of the Caucasus.
Some officials 'wanted to shore up democracy', said Hunter in an interview, imagining that NATO was 'a kind of glorified Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe' -- a negotiating and conflict prevention body to which the Russian Federation belongs.
But there were also some in the administration who 'genuinely wanted to contain the Russians by surrounding them', he added.
James J. Townsend, director of the International Security Programme at the Atlantic Council and formerly the Pentagon official in charge of European relations, said there was enthusiastic support in both the Defence Department and the State Department soon after Saakashvili took power in 2003 for integration of Georgia into NATO 'as quickly as possible'.
Townsend believes the project to integrate Georgia and Ukraine into NATO gained momentum in part because Washington 'was underestimating just how sensitive this is to Putin'. U.S. policymakers, he said, had observed that in previous rounds of enlargement, despite 'a lot of bluff and bluster by the Russians', there was no Russian troop movement.
Furthermore, policymakers believed they were proving to the Russians that NATO expansion is not a threat to Russian interests, according to Townsend. They did become aware of Russia's growing assertiveness on the issue, Townsend concedes, but policymakers thought they were simply 'making trouble on everything in order to have some leverage'.
In the end, the bureaucracies pushing for NATO expansion were determined to push it through despite Russian opposition. 'I think it was a case of wanting to get Georgia engaged before the window of opportunity closed,' said Townsend.
To do so they had to ignore the risk that the promise of membership in NATO would only encourage Saakashvili, who had already vowed to 'liberate' the South Ossetia and Abkhazia regions, to become even more sanguine about the use of force.
In the same Mar. 19 speech in Washington, Saakashvili minimised the problem of Russian military power in the region. He declared that the Russians 'are not capable of enforcing the Taiwan model in Georgia. Their army in the Caucasus is not strong enough ...to calm down the situation in their own territory. I don't think they are ready for any kind of an adventure in somebody else's territory. And hopefully they know it.'
It was a clear hint that Saakashvili, newly encouraged by Bush's strong support for NATO membership, believed he could face down the Russians.
At the NATO summit, Bush met resistance from Germany and other European allies, who insisted it was 'not the right time' to even begin putting Georgia and Ukraine on the road to membership. But in order to spare embarrassment to Bush, they offered a pledge that Georgia and Ukraine 'will become NATO members'.
Hunter believes that NATO commitment was an even more provocative signal to Putin and Saakashvili than NATO approval of a 'Membership Action Plan' for Georgia would have been.
The Russians responded exactly as they said they would, taking steps toward legal recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. And Saakashvili soon began making moves to prepare for a military assault on one or both regions.
In early July, Rice traveled to Tsibilisi with the explicit intention of trying to rein him in. In her Jul. 10 press conference, she made it clear that Washington was alarmed by his military moves.
'The violence needs to stop,' said Rice. 'And whoever is perpetrating it -- and I've mentioned this to the president -- there should not be violence.'
David L. Phillips, senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, told the Los Angeles Times last week he believes that, despite State Department efforts to restrain the Georgian president, 'Saakashvili's buddies in the White House and the Office of the Vice President kept egging him on'.
But whether more specific encouragement took place or not, the deeper roots of the crisis lay in bureaucratic self-deceit about the objective expanding NATO up to the border of a highly suspicious and proud Russia in the context of an old and volatile ethnic conflict.
*Gareth Porter is an investigative historian and journalist specialising in U.S. national security policy. The paperback edition of his latest book, 'Perils of Dominance: Imbalance of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam', was published in 2006.
(END/2008)http://ipsnorthamerica.net/news.php?idnews=1652
A Really Bad Couple of Weeks for Pax Americana
A Really Bad Couple of Weeks for Pax Americana
Analysis by Jim Lobe*
WASHINGTON, 23 Aug (IPS) - Whatever hopes the George W. Bush administration may have had for using its post-9/11 'war on terror'' to impose a new Pax Americana on Eurasia, and particularly in the unruly areas between the Caucasus and the Khyber Pass, appear to have gone up in flames -- in some cases, literally -- over the past two weeks.
Not only has Russia reasserted its influence in the most emphatic way possible by invading and occupying substantial parts of Georgia after Washington's favourite Caucasian, President Mikhail Saakashvili, launched an ill-fated offensive against secessionist South Ossetians.
But bloody attacks in Afghanistan, and Pakistan, about 1,000 kms to the east also underlined the seriousness of the Pashtun-dominated Taliban insurgencies in both countries and the threats they pose to their increasingly beleaguered and befuddled U.S.-backed governments.
And while U.S. negotiators appear to have made progress in hammering out details of a bilateral military agreement that will permit U.S. combat forces to remain in Iraq at least for another year and a half, signs that the Shi'a-dominated government of President Nouri al-Maliki may be preparing to move forcefully against the U.S.-backed, predominantly Sunni ''Awakening'' movement has raised the spectre of renewed sectarian civil war.
Meanwhile, any hope of concluding a framework for a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinian Authority by the time Bush leaves office less than five months from now appears to have vanished, while efforts at mobilising greater international diplomatic and economic pressure on Iran to freeze its uranium enrichment programme -- the administration's top priority before the Georgia crisis -- have stalled indefinitely, overwhelmed by the tidal wave of bad news from its neighbourhood.
''The list of foreign policy failures this week is breathtaking,'' noted a statement released Friday by the National Security Network (NSN), a mainstream group of former high-ranking officials critical of the Bush administration's more-aggressive policies. And a prominent New York Times columnist, Paul Krugman, argued that the Russian move on Georgia, in particular, signaled ''the end of the Pax Americana -- the era in which the United States more or less maintained a monopoly on the use of military force.''
Indeed, Russia's intervention in what it used to call its ''near abroad'' was clearly the most spectacular of the fortnight's developments, both because of its unprecedented use of overwhelming military force against a U.S. ally heavily promoted by Washington for membership in NATO and because of the geo-strategic implications of its move for the increasingly-troubled Atlantic alliance and U.S. hopes that Caspian and Central Asian energy resources could be safely transported to the West without transiting either Russia or Iran.
While Russia did not seize control of the Baku-Tbili-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline or approach the area proposed for the Nabucco pipeline further south, its intervention made it abundantly clear that it could have done so if it had wished, a message that is certain to reverberate across gas-hungry Europe. Indeed, investors now may prove considerably less enthusiastic about financing the Nabucco project than before, dealing yet another blow to Washington's regional ambitions.
Russia's move also raised new questions about its willingness to tolerate the continued use by the U.S. and other NATO countries of key air bases and other military facilities in the southern part of the former Soviet Union, notably Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, over which Moscow maintains substantial influence.
As with Georgia, where the U.S. significantly escalated its military presence by sending over Russian protests 200 Special Forces troops in early 2002, Washington first acquired access to these bases under the pretext of its post-9/11 ''global war on terrorism''. But, while clearly important to its subsequent operations on Afghanistan, they were also seen as key building blocks -- or ''lily pads'' -- in the construction of a permanent military infrastructure that could both contain a resurgent Russia or an emergent China and help establish U.S. hegemony over the energy resources of Central Asia and the Caspian region in what its architects hoped would be a ''New American Century.''
As suggested by former Singaporean diplomat Kishore Mahbubani this week, Washington and, to some extent, NATO behind it, ''has intruded into the geopolitical spaces of other dormant countries. They are no longer dormant...''
Indeed, still badly bogged down in Iraq where, despite the much-reduced level of sectarian violence, political reconciliation remains elusive, to say the least, the U.S. and its overly deferential NATO allies now face unprecedented challenges in Afghanistan not entirely unfamiliar to the Soviets 20 years ago.
''The news out of Afghanistan is truly alarming,'' warned Thursday's lead editorial in the New York Times, which noted the killings of 10 French paratroopers near Kabul in an ambush earlier in the week -- the single worst combat death toll for NATO forces in the war there -- as well as the coordinated assault by suicide bombers on one of the biggest U.S. military bases there as indications of an increasingly dire situation. In the last three months, more U.S. soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan than in Iraq.
''Afghanistan badly needs reinforcements. Badly,'' wrote ret. Col. Pat Lang, a former top Middle East and South Asia expert at the Defence Intelligence Agency on his blog this week. ''Afghanistan badly needs a serious infrastructure and economic development programme. Badly.''
Of course, the Taliban's resurgence has in no small part been due to the safe haven it has been provided next door in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) where Pakistan's own Taliban, which also hosts a rejuvenating al Qaeda, has not only tightened its hold on the region in recent months but extended it into the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP).
Last week, it retaliated in spectacular fashion to airborne attacks on its forces by the U.S.-backed military in Bajaur close to the Khyber Pass -- the most important supply route for NATO forces in Afghanistan -- by carrying out suicide bombings at a heavily guarded munitions factory that killed nearly 70 people near Islamabad.
Analysts here are especially worried that, having achieved the resignation last week of U.S.-backed former President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, the new civilian government will likely tear itself apart over the succession and the growing economic crisis and thus prove completely ineffective in dealing with Washington's top priority -- confronting and defeating the Taliban in a major counter-insurgency effort for which the army, long focused on the conventional threat posed by India, has shown no interest at all.
Indeed, the current leadership vacuum in Islamabad has greatly compounded concern here that the army's intelligence service ISI, which Washington believes played a role in last month's deadly Taliban attack on the Indian Embassy in Kabul, could broaden its anti-Indian efforts. This is especially so now that Indian Kashmir is once again hotting up, ensuring a sharp escalation in the two nuclear-armed countries' decades-long rivalry and threatening in yet another way the post-Cold War Pax Americana.
*Jim Lobe's blog on U.S. foreign policy, and particularly the neo-conservative influence in the Bush administration, can be read at http://www.ips.org/blog/jimlobe/.
(END/2008)http://ipsnorthamerica.net/news.php?idnews=1650
Analysis by Jim Lobe*
WASHINGTON, 23 Aug (IPS) - Whatever hopes the George W. Bush administration may have had for using its post-9/11 'war on terror'' to impose a new Pax Americana on Eurasia, and particularly in the unruly areas between the Caucasus and the Khyber Pass, appear to have gone up in flames -- in some cases, literally -- over the past two weeks.
Not only has Russia reasserted its influence in the most emphatic way possible by invading and occupying substantial parts of Georgia after Washington's favourite Caucasian, President Mikhail Saakashvili, launched an ill-fated offensive against secessionist South Ossetians.
But bloody attacks in Afghanistan, and Pakistan, about 1,000 kms to the east also underlined the seriousness of the Pashtun-dominated Taliban insurgencies in both countries and the threats they pose to their increasingly beleaguered and befuddled U.S.-backed governments.
And while U.S. negotiators appear to have made progress in hammering out details of a bilateral military agreement that will permit U.S. combat forces to remain in Iraq at least for another year and a half, signs that the Shi'a-dominated government of President Nouri al-Maliki may be preparing to move forcefully against the U.S.-backed, predominantly Sunni ''Awakening'' movement has raised the spectre of renewed sectarian civil war.
Meanwhile, any hope of concluding a framework for a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinian Authority by the time Bush leaves office less than five months from now appears to have vanished, while efforts at mobilising greater international diplomatic and economic pressure on Iran to freeze its uranium enrichment programme -- the administration's top priority before the Georgia crisis -- have stalled indefinitely, overwhelmed by the tidal wave of bad news from its neighbourhood.
''The list of foreign policy failures this week is breathtaking,'' noted a statement released Friday by the National Security Network (NSN), a mainstream group of former high-ranking officials critical of the Bush administration's more-aggressive policies. And a prominent New York Times columnist, Paul Krugman, argued that the Russian move on Georgia, in particular, signaled ''the end of the Pax Americana -- the era in which the United States more or less maintained a monopoly on the use of military force.''
Indeed, Russia's intervention in what it used to call its ''near abroad'' was clearly the most spectacular of the fortnight's developments, both because of its unprecedented use of overwhelming military force against a U.S. ally heavily promoted by Washington for membership in NATO and because of the geo-strategic implications of its move for the increasingly-troubled Atlantic alliance and U.S. hopes that Caspian and Central Asian energy resources could be safely transported to the West without transiting either Russia or Iran.
While Russia did not seize control of the Baku-Tbili-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline or approach the area proposed for the Nabucco pipeline further south, its intervention made it abundantly clear that it could have done so if it had wished, a message that is certain to reverberate across gas-hungry Europe. Indeed, investors now may prove considerably less enthusiastic about financing the Nabucco project than before, dealing yet another blow to Washington's regional ambitions.
Russia's move also raised new questions about its willingness to tolerate the continued use by the U.S. and other NATO countries of key air bases and other military facilities in the southern part of the former Soviet Union, notably Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, over which Moscow maintains substantial influence.
As with Georgia, where the U.S. significantly escalated its military presence by sending over Russian protests 200 Special Forces troops in early 2002, Washington first acquired access to these bases under the pretext of its post-9/11 ''global war on terrorism''. But, while clearly important to its subsequent operations on Afghanistan, they were also seen as key building blocks -- or ''lily pads'' -- in the construction of a permanent military infrastructure that could both contain a resurgent Russia or an emergent China and help establish U.S. hegemony over the energy resources of Central Asia and the Caspian region in what its architects hoped would be a ''New American Century.''
As suggested by former Singaporean diplomat Kishore Mahbubani this week, Washington and, to some extent, NATO behind it, ''has intruded into the geopolitical spaces of other dormant countries. They are no longer dormant...''
Indeed, still badly bogged down in Iraq where, despite the much-reduced level of sectarian violence, political reconciliation remains elusive, to say the least, the U.S. and its overly deferential NATO allies now face unprecedented challenges in Afghanistan not entirely unfamiliar to the Soviets 20 years ago.
''The news out of Afghanistan is truly alarming,'' warned Thursday's lead editorial in the New York Times, which noted the killings of 10 French paratroopers near Kabul in an ambush earlier in the week -- the single worst combat death toll for NATO forces in the war there -- as well as the coordinated assault by suicide bombers on one of the biggest U.S. military bases there as indications of an increasingly dire situation. In the last three months, more U.S. soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan than in Iraq.
''Afghanistan badly needs reinforcements. Badly,'' wrote ret. Col. Pat Lang, a former top Middle East and South Asia expert at the Defence Intelligence Agency on his blog this week. ''Afghanistan badly needs a serious infrastructure and economic development programme. Badly.''
Of course, the Taliban's resurgence has in no small part been due to the safe haven it has been provided next door in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) where Pakistan's own Taliban, which also hosts a rejuvenating al Qaeda, has not only tightened its hold on the region in recent months but extended it into the North-West Frontier Province (NWFP).
Last week, it retaliated in spectacular fashion to airborne attacks on its forces by the U.S.-backed military in Bajaur close to the Khyber Pass -- the most important supply route for NATO forces in Afghanistan -- by carrying out suicide bombings at a heavily guarded munitions factory that killed nearly 70 people near Islamabad.
Analysts here are especially worried that, having achieved the resignation last week of U.S.-backed former President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, the new civilian government will likely tear itself apart over the succession and the growing economic crisis and thus prove completely ineffective in dealing with Washington's top priority -- confronting and defeating the Taliban in a major counter-insurgency effort for which the army, long focused on the conventional threat posed by India, has shown no interest at all.
Indeed, the current leadership vacuum in Islamabad has greatly compounded concern here that the army's intelligence service ISI, which Washington believes played a role in last month's deadly Taliban attack on the Indian Embassy in Kabul, could broaden its anti-Indian efforts. This is especially so now that Indian Kashmir is once again hotting up, ensuring a sharp escalation in the two nuclear-armed countries' decades-long rivalry and threatening in yet another way the post-Cold War Pax Americana.
*Jim Lobe's blog on U.S. foreign policy, and particularly the neo-conservative influence in the Bush administration, can be read at http://www.ips.org/blog/jimlobe/.
(END/2008)http://ipsnorthamerica.net/news.php?idnews=1650
Totalitarianism: It Can Happen Here
Totalitarianism: It Can Happen Here
by Paul Street / August 23rd, 2008 (13)
Democracy Incorporated: Managed Democracy and the Specter of Inverted Totalitarianism
By Sheldon Wolin
(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008)
ISBN-10: 0691135665
ISBN-13: 978-0691135663
Domesticated Democracy
It is by now commonplace to observe that democracy is in a weakened state in the United States. But could it be that the U.S. is no longer a democracy at all, if it ever truly was? According to Princeton emeritus political scientist Sheldon Wolin’s chilling new volume Democracy, Inc: Managed Democracy and the Specter of Inverted Totalitarianism (2008), the United States is becoming a totalitarian state posing …
(Full article …)
http://www.dissidentvoice.org/2008/08/totalitarianism-it-can-happen-here/
by Paul Street / August 23rd, 2008 (13)
Democracy Incorporated: Managed Democracy and the Specter of Inverted Totalitarianism
By Sheldon Wolin
(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008)
ISBN-10: 0691135665
ISBN-13: 978-0691135663
Domesticated Democracy
It is by now commonplace to observe that democracy is in a weakened state in the United States. But could it be that the U.S. is no longer a democracy at all, if it ever truly was? According to Princeton emeritus political scientist Sheldon Wolin’s chilling new volume Democracy, Inc: Managed Democracy and the Specter of Inverted Totalitarianism (2008), the United States is becoming a totalitarian state posing …
(Full article …)
http://www.dissidentvoice.org/2008/08/totalitarianism-it-can-happen-here/
Russia-Georgia CyberWar Assessment
Russia-Georgia CyberWar Assessment
By Aaron Mannes
The Guardian Online just posted an assessment I co-wrote with my friend Jim Hendler (computer science professor at RPI) about the Georgia-Russia cyberwar.
The first modern cyberwar?
Aaron Mannes and James Hendler
Friday August 22 2008
The Russian-Georgian conflict is being described as the first time cyber-attacks have accompanied an actual war. Last year, the Russian-Estonian spat was described as the first modern cyber-war. These descriptions over dramatise events and are a distraction from the more prosaic, but more serious, danger these illicit cyber-actions represent. The technology used in these cyber-conflicts has only limited strategic impact, but represents a major threat to one of the most successful engines of human freedom and opportunity - the World Wide Web itself.
The strikes against Georgian government websites, along with last April's attacks against Estonian websites, were distributed denial of service attacks (DDoS) where many computers simultaneously send messages to a website, preventing legitimate traffic from reaching the site. These attacks are relatively easy to launch, but taking a website down does not affect real world infrastructure and competent IT professionals can counter or at least mitigate DDoS attacks. The increasing volume and sophistication of these attacks is a subject much discussed among IT professionals, but its impact is to create an inconvenience.
Read the complete article here. http://terrorwonk.blogspot.com/2008/08/aaron-mannes-in-guardian-russia-georgia.html
By Aaron Mannes
The Guardian Online just posted an assessment I co-wrote with my friend Jim Hendler (computer science professor at RPI) about the Georgia-Russia cyberwar.
The first modern cyberwar?
Aaron Mannes and James Hendler
Friday August 22 2008
The Russian-Georgian conflict is being described as the first time cyber-attacks have accompanied an actual war. Last year, the Russian-Estonian spat was described as the first modern cyber-war. These descriptions over dramatise events and are a distraction from the more prosaic, but more serious, danger these illicit cyber-actions represent. The technology used in these cyber-conflicts has only limited strategic impact, but represents a major threat to one of the most successful engines of human freedom and opportunity - the World Wide Web itself.
The strikes against Georgian government websites, along with last April's attacks against Estonian websites, were distributed denial of service attacks (DDoS) where many computers simultaneously send messages to a website, preventing legitimate traffic from reaching the site. These attacks are relatively easy to launch, but taking a website down does not affect real world infrastructure and competent IT professionals can counter or at least mitigate DDoS attacks. The increasing volume and sophistication of these attacks is a subject much discussed among IT professionals, but its impact is to create an inconvenience.
Read the complete article here. http://terrorwonk.blogspot.com/2008/08/aaron-mannes-in-guardian-russia-georgia.html
American Jews and the Palestinians The Long Silence
American Jews and the Palestinians
The Long Silence
By HOWARD LISNOFF
For many years, now decades, I have been silent as a Jew about Israel’s relationship to, and treatment of, the Palestinian people and my place as an American Jew in that equation. Recently, I looked back at the Jews who I have known personally, as friends and acquaintances, and examined how their views about Palestinians and Israel have affected me and deepened my silence.
Following the lightning-fast victory of Israel over Egypt and Syria in the Yom Kippur War of 1973, and the resulting improvement in relations between Egypt and Israel after the Camp David Accords in 1978, Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip appeared solidified. The seeming invincibility of Israel in both the 1967 and 1973 wars led, I believe, to a false perception of invincibility and self-righteousness among many Jews took hold. No longer would Jews be victims, as during the Holocaust, but they would meet any challenge and react with force whenever and wherever a threat appeared. It portrayed Jews as strong as reflected in Israel’s treatment of its neighboring states, and in particular in Israel’s treatment of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The government of Israel was showing the world how rapid and lethal a response could be to attacks, such as suicide bombings, against the people of Israel. Jews would never again be viewed as weak and subject to vicious mass attacks and attempted genocide as symbolized by the Holocaust. The stereotype of Jews as weak would be destroyed forever! The development of a huge stockpile of nuclear weapons is perhaps a reflection of the interplay between these historic and psychological factors. Who is more impervious to an outside threat than a state that possesses the ultimate power of weapons of mass destruction?
Jews in the U.S. were expected to accept their roles as supporters of whatever policy Israel adopted. Those Jews who wavered would be open to the most vicious attacks. Perhaps no one better typifies this phenomenon than Professor Norman G. Finkelstein, who lost his bid for tenure at DePaul University in May 2008, after a campaign of vicious attacks aimed at silencing his scholarly criticism of Israel’s treatment of the Palestinian people and the industry that had grown up, primarily in the U.S., to profit from the horror of the Holocaust. His books, among them The Holocaust Industry (2000) and Beyond Chutzpah (2005) have drawn stinging attacks. Among his most vehement detractors is Professor Alan Dershowitz of Harvard.
The power of the Jewish lobby in the U.S. is partially explained by studying the monetary might behind that influence. The most powerful of these organizations is the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which in the 2004 alone had a $33 million budget with a staff of 140.
James David reports in his article “A Passionate Attachment to Israel,” that the Israel lobby had contributed $41 million to congressional and presidential candidates over the past 54 years (2002). University of San Francisco Professor Stephen Zunes states, in the article “The Strategic Functions of U.S. Aid to Israel,” that “more than $1.5 billion in private U.S. funds…go to Israel annually.”
The emergence of the image of Israel as invincible, and any criticism of Israel by Jews viewed as self-loathing and self-hating, is paralleled by the growth of the religious right in the U.S., which sees Israel as part of the biblical prediction of the final war (Armageddon) fought in the Middle East as reflected in the New Testament Book of Revelation. Indeed, the religious Right and Jews are strange bedfellows! Amid all of the rhetoric of moral support Israel would continue to benefit greatly from the largess of the U.S., receiving one-third of total U.S. foreign aid despite the fact that per capita income among Israelis is among the highest in the world. Such is the payoff for occupying the position as acting as an agent for the projection of raw military might in the Middle East by the U.S.
The antithesis of the Jews who were invincible was the self-hating Jew, again, usually any Jew who dared to criticize Israel’s policies toward the people of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. This phenomenon is remarkable for its sheer chutzpah in that the highest values of Jewish life, both religious and secular, are the tolerance and acceptance of others, the universal value of life, the championing of the downtrodden, the belief in fair play, and the search for peace and justice. These values are at the very root of the Jewish peoples’ struggle for survival and irresistible search for knowledge over many millennia. The most bellicose attacks are reserved for Jews who are scholars, artists and intellectuals.
One footnote to the attempt to paint U.S. Jews as universally supporting Israel, and Israel’s handling of the Palestinian issue, was the incessant propaganda campaigns in the media to portray the Palestinian people and their leadership as both totally undemocratic and hostile to the many attempts brokered by Washington to bring peace to the region. In fact, the most recent attempt to create an autonomous Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, during the Clinton administration, wrongly attributed its failure to the leadership of the Palestinians, when the actual territory of a supposed Palestinian state never materialized as part of the negotiations. The so-called “Two State Solution” never existed on paper. Meanwhile, Jewish settlements in the West Bank grew, as does the wall to block off needed access of the people of the West Bank to Israel. Attacks and counterattacks continue.
Most Jews in the U.S. favor an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. However, when questioned further by pollsters, they say that the prospect for peace between Israel and the Palestinian people is dim. I looked at opinion polls of Jews in the U.S. and Israel and their attitudes toward this issue.
Just prior to the Second Intifada, a poll conducted by the Los Angeles Times among Israelis and American Jews showed a minority (44%) of Israeli Jews support the two-state concept compared to 68% of Jews in the U.S. Polls conducted by the American Jewish Committee from 2001 through 2006 indicated that a relatively consistent 54% of American Jews favored the establishment of a Palestinian state.
I examined the relationships I’ve had with several friends and acquaintances to try to learn if the figures cited above are reflected in the opinions of real people. What I found was very disappointing!
I’ve known Robert for twenty-five years. He was a well-regarded and liberal professor. He had become a favorite of students during the Vietnam War because of his strong antiwar stance. I recall one student I had in class for an undergraduate course who had had Robert in a single course as an undergraduate. The student railed at Robert’s liberalism. Robert and I usually spoke several mornings following our workouts at a local community center. During one session I was shocked to hear Robert referring to Israel as “Eretz Israel,”meaning the biblical land of Palestine referred to in the Old Testament. He had always been critical of my criticism of Israeli policy toward Palestinians, but claiming the biblical homeland as solely Jewish was difficult to accept from a person who was otherwise thoughtful and articulate in discussing foreign affairs, and who had been a staunch antiwar spokesperson.
I’ve known Sheila and Paul since taking a graduate course Paul taught. Our families have socialized for years. They are both Orthodox Jews. Paul never served in the military, a position I had no problem with having been a resister during the Vietnam War. Years after our families had grown, and Sheila and Paul’s oldest son had begun college, I was dumbfounded to find a picture of Paul and his son in a local newspaper. They both wore uniforms of the Israel Defense Forces, and the caption beneath their picture stated that they were involved in a summer program to aid the IDF by performing work on an Israeli military base so that soldiers could be freed from those duties.
Rebecca and Philip have been friends for four years. Philip’s father served in the Israeli army during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. Rebecca holds both an Israeli and U.S. passport, her family having immigrated to Israel after the Holocaust. Recently, while I was visiting with Philip, Rebecca arrived at their house, exiting her car with arms flailing. She could hardly contain her anger. “I just heard a report on National Public Radio. Those monsters are going to allow Al-Jazeera to be broadcast in Vermont. I can’t believe they’ll allow that propaganda on the radio!” What Rebecca was referring to was the decision of one media outlet in one area of Vermont to broadcast Al Jazeera, a news service in the Middle East that has produced a separate English-language counterpart in the U.S.
Philip seethes with anger and animosity toward Palestinians. I cannot bring the subject up when we speak. One wall of their home is covered with pictures and news stories of his father’s exploits during the 1948 war. During the Vietnam War Philip was deferred from the draft because of his employment in the defense industry.
I have known Richard and Diane most of my life. Both of their children have taken part in the March of the Living, a remembrance of the Holocaust and its victims that passes many World War II concentration camps. Both children have traveled in Israel as part of the Birthright Israel program that conducts free tours of Israel for Jews from other countries. Richard is the son of Holocaust survivors. His voice turns to a growl when discussing Palestinians. One of his often-repeated statements is, “You can’t trust an Arab.” It is impossible to engage him in a meaningful debate or discussion about a Palestinian state. I realize that there is a definite psychological impact being a close relative of a Holocaust survivor; however, what I can’t understand is the absence of compassion as a result of the terror that was done to Jews in Nazi Germany.
I also know liberal Jews. They are strongly in favor of the establishment of a Palestinian state; some also favor reparations for Palestinians who left, or were driven from their homes during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. More typical however, of the people I come in contact with is the man who works out in the gym of a community center. One day I overheard him talking to another person in the gym in support of the wall being constructed between Israel and the West Bank. When I interject, “Don’t you think that building a wall is somewhat reminiscent of the wall constructed around the Warsaw Ghetto during World War II?” He yells, “I can’t believe that a Jew would say such a thing! Are you a maniac? Do you want to harm Israel?”
Israel has not fared well in either the General Assembly or the Security Council of the United Nations, although Israel can depend on U.S. support in the latter. More than half of the resolutions dealing with the Arab-Israeli conflict have either criticized or opposed Israel. In the General Assembly, away from the veto power of the U.S., 429 resolutions relating to Israel have been passed, of which 321 condemned Israel (1967-1989). Resolutions passed relating to Israel involve what is called the “Pacific Settlement of Disputes,” and are not enforceable.
Figures showing the number of deaths resulting from the Second Intifada, the uprising against Israeli rule in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, showed 4,269 Palestinians killed between 2000 and 2006, while 1,017 Israelis were killed during the same period (Other estimates indicate that the number of Palestinian deaths have been far higher). These figures reflect the military superiority of the IDF and their backing, both politically and with military hardware, from the U.S.
In examining my own beliefs as a secular Jew I read Judaism in a Secular Age: A Anthology of Secular Humanistic Thought (1995). I wanted to assess the thinking of Jewish scholars, artists and writers over the past several hundred years to attempt to learn about early attitudes toward the establishment of a Jewish state and its relationship to the people of Palestine. What I found was a generally liberal view of live and let live in relationship to Palestinians who had coexisted with Jews in Palestine prior to the founding of Israel. Consistent with the Jewish secular tradition, I found openness to the high value placed on tolerance of the differences of others.
Over the past decade I have had two interactions with one of the most prominent Jewish organizations in the U.S., the Anti-Defamation League. In 2001 I went to the group after a neighbor threatened me by saying, “Hitler should have killed all the Jews,” because of his reaction to letters against war that were published in the local press. In 2007 I again approached the group after the paper The Truth At Last was left on my driveway. The “paper” contained both racist and anti-Semitic articles. In both cases my impression of the group was that their only concern was to collect data on anti-Semitic incidents.
I think writing this piece has been a kind of purging for my years of silence regarding Israeli treatment of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. As Israeli settlements expand in the West Bank and the blockade of the Gaza Strip continues, I can no longer remain silent.
Howard Lisnoff is an educator and freelance writer.
http://www.counterpunch.org/lisnoff08232008.html
The Long Silence
By HOWARD LISNOFF
For many years, now decades, I have been silent as a Jew about Israel’s relationship to, and treatment of, the Palestinian people and my place as an American Jew in that equation. Recently, I looked back at the Jews who I have known personally, as friends and acquaintances, and examined how their views about Palestinians and Israel have affected me and deepened my silence.
Following the lightning-fast victory of Israel over Egypt and Syria in the Yom Kippur War of 1973, and the resulting improvement in relations between Egypt and Israel after the Camp David Accords in 1978, Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip appeared solidified. The seeming invincibility of Israel in both the 1967 and 1973 wars led, I believe, to a false perception of invincibility and self-righteousness among many Jews took hold. No longer would Jews be victims, as during the Holocaust, but they would meet any challenge and react with force whenever and wherever a threat appeared. It portrayed Jews as strong as reflected in Israel’s treatment of its neighboring states, and in particular in Israel’s treatment of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The government of Israel was showing the world how rapid and lethal a response could be to attacks, such as suicide bombings, against the people of Israel. Jews would never again be viewed as weak and subject to vicious mass attacks and attempted genocide as symbolized by the Holocaust. The stereotype of Jews as weak would be destroyed forever! The development of a huge stockpile of nuclear weapons is perhaps a reflection of the interplay between these historic and psychological factors. Who is more impervious to an outside threat than a state that possesses the ultimate power of weapons of mass destruction?
Jews in the U.S. were expected to accept their roles as supporters of whatever policy Israel adopted. Those Jews who wavered would be open to the most vicious attacks. Perhaps no one better typifies this phenomenon than Professor Norman G. Finkelstein, who lost his bid for tenure at DePaul University in May 2008, after a campaign of vicious attacks aimed at silencing his scholarly criticism of Israel’s treatment of the Palestinian people and the industry that had grown up, primarily in the U.S., to profit from the horror of the Holocaust. His books, among them The Holocaust Industry (2000) and Beyond Chutzpah (2005) have drawn stinging attacks. Among his most vehement detractors is Professor Alan Dershowitz of Harvard.
The power of the Jewish lobby in the U.S. is partially explained by studying the monetary might behind that influence. The most powerful of these organizations is the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, which in the 2004 alone had a $33 million budget with a staff of 140.
James David reports in his article “A Passionate Attachment to Israel,” that the Israel lobby had contributed $41 million to congressional and presidential candidates over the past 54 years (2002). University of San Francisco Professor Stephen Zunes states, in the article “The Strategic Functions of U.S. Aid to Israel,” that “more than $1.5 billion in private U.S. funds…go to Israel annually.”
The emergence of the image of Israel as invincible, and any criticism of Israel by Jews viewed as self-loathing and self-hating, is paralleled by the growth of the religious right in the U.S., which sees Israel as part of the biblical prediction of the final war (Armageddon) fought in the Middle East as reflected in the New Testament Book of Revelation. Indeed, the religious Right and Jews are strange bedfellows! Amid all of the rhetoric of moral support Israel would continue to benefit greatly from the largess of the U.S., receiving one-third of total U.S. foreign aid despite the fact that per capita income among Israelis is among the highest in the world. Such is the payoff for occupying the position as acting as an agent for the projection of raw military might in the Middle East by the U.S.
The antithesis of the Jews who were invincible was the self-hating Jew, again, usually any Jew who dared to criticize Israel’s policies toward the people of the West Bank and Gaza Strip. This phenomenon is remarkable for its sheer chutzpah in that the highest values of Jewish life, both religious and secular, are the tolerance and acceptance of others, the universal value of life, the championing of the downtrodden, the belief in fair play, and the search for peace and justice. These values are at the very root of the Jewish peoples’ struggle for survival and irresistible search for knowledge over many millennia. The most bellicose attacks are reserved for Jews who are scholars, artists and intellectuals.
One footnote to the attempt to paint U.S. Jews as universally supporting Israel, and Israel’s handling of the Palestinian issue, was the incessant propaganda campaigns in the media to portray the Palestinian people and their leadership as both totally undemocratic and hostile to the many attempts brokered by Washington to bring peace to the region. In fact, the most recent attempt to create an autonomous Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, during the Clinton administration, wrongly attributed its failure to the leadership of the Palestinians, when the actual territory of a supposed Palestinian state never materialized as part of the negotiations. The so-called “Two State Solution” never existed on paper. Meanwhile, Jewish settlements in the West Bank grew, as does the wall to block off needed access of the people of the West Bank to Israel. Attacks and counterattacks continue.
Most Jews in the U.S. favor an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. However, when questioned further by pollsters, they say that the prospect for peace between Israel and the Palestinian people is dim. I looked at opinion polls of Jews in the U.S. and Israel and their attitudes toward this issue.
Just prior to the Second Intifada, a poll conducted by the Los Angeles Times among Israelis and American Jews showed a minority (44%) of Israeli Jews support the two-state concept compared to 68% of Jews in the U.S. Polls conducted by the American Jewish Committee from 2001 through 2006 indicated that a relatively consistent 54% of American Jews favored the establishment of a Palestinian state.
I examined the relationships I’ve had with several friends and acquaintances to try to learn if the figures cited above are reflected in the opinions of real people. What I found was very disappointing!
I’ve known Robert for twenty-five years. He was a well-regarded and liberal professor. He had become a favorite of students during the Vietnam War because of his strong antiwar stance. I recall one student I had in class for an undergraduate course who had had Robert in a single course as an undergraduate. The student railed at Robert’s liberalism. Robert and I usually spoke several mornings following our workouts at a local community center. During one session I was shocked to hear Robert referring to Israel as “Eretz Israel,”meaning the biblical land of Palestine referred to in the Old Testament. He had always been critical of my criticism of Israeli policy toward Palestinians, but claiming the biblical homeland as solely Jewish was difficult to accept from a person who was otherwise thoughtful and articulate in discussing foreign affairs, and who had been a staunch antiwar spokesperson.
I’ve known Sheila and Paul since taking a graduate course Paul taught. Our families have socialized for years. They are both Orthodox Jews. Paul never served in the military, a position I had no problem with having been a resister during the Vietnam War. Years after our families had grown, and Sheila and Paul’s oldest son had begun college, I was dumbfounded to find a picture of Paul and his son in a local newspaper. They both wore uniforms of the Israel Defense Forces, and the caption beneath their picture stated that they were involved in a summer program to aid the IDF by performing work on an Israeli military base so that soldiers could be freed from those duties.
Rebecca and Philip have been friends for four years. Philip’s father served in the Israeli army during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. Rebecca holds both an Israeli and U.S. passport, her family having immigrated to Israel after the Holocaust. Recently, while I was visiting with Philip, Rebecca arrived at their house, exiting her car with arms flailing. She could hardly contain her anger. “I just heard a report on National Public Radio. Those monsters are going to allow Al-Jazeera to be broadcast in Vermont. I can’t believe they’ll allow that propaganda on the radio!” What Rebecca was referring to was the decision of one media outlet in one area of Vermont to broadcast Al Jazeera, a news service in the Middle East that has produced a separate English-language counterpart in the U.S.
Philip seethes with anger and animosity toward Palestinians. I cannot bring the subject up when we speak. One wall of their home is covered with pictures and news stories of his father’s exploits during the 1948 war. During the Vietnam War Philip was deferred from the draft because of his employment in the defense industry.
I have known Richard and Diane most of my life. Both of their children have taken part in the March of the Living, a remembrance of the Holocaust and its victims that passes many World War II concentration camps. Both children have traveled in Israel as part of the Birthright Israel program that conducts free tours of Israel for Jews from other countries. Richard is the son of Holocaust survivors. His voice turns to a growl when discussing Palestinians. One of his often-repeated statements is, “You can’t trust an Arab.” It is impossible to engage him in a meaningful debate or discussion about a Palestinian state. I realize that there is a definite psychological impact being a close relative of a Holocaust survivor; however, what I can’t understand is the absence of compassion as a result of the terror that was done to Jews in Nazi Germany.
I also know liberal Jews. They are strongly in favor of the establishment of a Palestinian state; some also favor reparations for Palestinians who left, or were driven from their homes during the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. More typical however, of the people I come in contact with is the man who works out in the gym of a community center. One day I overheard him talking to another person in the gym in support of the wall being constructed between Israel and the West Bank. When I interject, “Don’t you think that building a wall is somewhat reminiscent of the wall constructed around the Warsaw Ghetto during World War II?” He yells, “I can’t believe that a Jew would say such a thing! Are you a maniac? Do you want to harm Israel?”
Israel has not fared well in either the General Assembly or the Security Council of the United Nations, although Israel can depend on U.S. support in the latter. More than half of the resolutions dealing with the Arab-Israeli conflict have either criticized or opposed Israel. In the General Assembly, away from the veto power of the U.S., 429 resolutions relating to Israel have been passed, of which 321 condemned Israel (1967-1989). Resolutions passed relating to Israel involve what is called the “Pacific Settlement of Disputes,” and are not enforceable.
Figures showing the number of deaths resulting from the Second Intifada, the uprising against Israeli rule in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, showed 4,269 Palestinians killed between 2000 and 2006, while 1,017 Israelis were killed during the same period (Other estimates indicate that the number of Palestinian deaths have been far higher). These figures reflect the military superiority of the IDF and their backing, both politically and with military hardware, from the U.S.
In examining my own beliefs as a secular Jew I read Judaism in a Secular Age: A Anthology of Secular Humanistic Thought (1995). I wanted to assess the thinking of Jewish scholars, artists and writers over the past several hundred years to attempt to learn about early attitudes toward the establishment of a Jewish state and its relationship to the people of Palestine. What I found was a generally liberal view of live and let live in relationship to Palestinians who had coexisted with Jews in Palestine prior to the founding of Israel. Consistent with the Jewish secular tradition, I found openness to the high value placed on tolerance of the differences of others.
Over the past decade I have had two interactions with one of the most prominent Jewish organizations in the U.S., the Anti-Defamation League. In 2001 I went to the group after a neighbor threatened me by saying, “Hitler should have killed all the Jews,” because of his reaction to letters against war that were published in the local press. In 2007 I again approached the group after the paper The Truth At Last was left on my driveway. The “paper” contained both racist and anti-Semitic articles. In both cases my impression of the group was that their only concern was to collect data on anti-Semitic incidents.
I think writing this piece has been a kind of purging for my years of silence regarding Israeli treatment of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. As Israeli settlements expand in the West Bank and the blockade of the Gaza Strip continues, I can no longer remain silent.
Howard Lisnoff is an educator and freelance writer.
http://www.counterpunch.org/lisnoff08232008.html
Fledgling Settlements Grow by Stealth Israeli Outposts Seal Death of Palestinian State
Fledgling Settlements Grow by Stealth
Israeli Outposts Seal Death of Palestinian State
By JONATHAN COOK
Migron, West Bank
Yehudit Genud hardly feels she is on the frontier of Israel’s settlement project, although the huddle of mobile homes on a wind-swept West Bank hilltop she calls home is controversial even by Israeli standards.
Despite the size and isolation of Migron, a settlement of about 45 religious families on a ridge next to the Palestinian city of Ramallah, Mrs Genud’s job as a social worker in West Jerusalem is a 25-minute drive away on a well-paved road.
Mrs Genud, 28, pregnant with her first child, points out that Migron has parks, children’s playgrounds, a kindergarten, a daycare centre and a synagogue, all paid for by the government -- even if the buildings are enclosed by a razor-wire fence, and her husband, Roni, has to put in overtime as the settlement’s security guard.
From her trailer, she also has panoramic views not only of Ramallah but of the many communities hugging the slopes that gently fall away to the Jordan Valley.
Long-established Palestinian villages are instantly identifiable by their homes’ flat roofs and the prominence of the tall minarets of the local mosques. Interspersed among them, however, are a growing number of much newer, fortified communities of luxury villas topped by distinctive red-tiled roofs.
These are the Jewish settlements that now form an almost complete ring around Palestinian East Jerusalem, cutting it off from the rest of the West Bank and destroying any hope that the city will one day become the capital of a Palestinian state.
“These settlements are supposed to be the nail in the coffin of any future peace agreement with the Palestinians,” said Dror Etkes, a veteran observer of the settlements who works for the Israeli human rights group Yesh Din. “Their purpose is to make a Palestinian state unviable.”
The majority of the half a million settlers in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, according to Mr Etkes, are “economic opportunists”, drawn to life in the occupied territories less by ideological or religious convictions than economic incentives. The homes, municipal services and schools there are heavily subsidised by the government.
In addition, the settlements -- though illegal under international law -- are integrated into Israel through a sophisticated system of roads that make it easy for the settlers to forget they are in occupied territory surrounded by Palestinians.
But Migron, with its supposed links to the Biblical site where King Saul based himself during his fight against the Philistines, attracts a different kind of inhabitant.
“This place is holy to the Jewish people and we have a duty to be here,” Mrs Genud said. “The whole land of Israel belongs to us and we should not be afraid to live wherever we want to. The Arabs must accept that.”
Unlike the 150 or so official settlements dotted across the West Bank, Migron is an example of what the Israeli government refers to as an “illegal outpost”, often an unauthorised outgrowth from one of the main settlements. Today there are more than 100 such outposts, housing several thousand extremist settlers.
Mrs Genud, however, argues that Israel’s refusal to turn Migron into an authorised settlement, as it has done with many other established outposts, reflects pressure from Washington.
Back in 2003, Israel committed itself to dismantling the more recent outposts under the terms of the Road Map, a US-sponsored plan for reviving the peace process and creating a Palestinian state. Two years later the cabinet approved the removal of 24 outposts, although barely any progress has been made on dismantling them. Israel confirmed its pledge again in January when George W Bush, the US president, visited.
Established six years ago by a group from the nearby settlement of Ofra, Migron is now the largest of the outposts. Two residents -- Itai Halevi, the community’s rabbi, and Itai Harel, the son of Israel Harel, a well-known settler leader -- have demonstrated their confidence in Migron’s future by each building permanent homes.
“We are connected to the water grid, we have phone lines from the national company Bezeq, we have been hooked up by the electricity company and have street lighting,” Mrs Genud said. “We also have a kindergarten paid for by the state and a group of soldiers stationed here to protect us. How can we be ‘illegal’?”
Daniella Wiess, a leader of the most extreme wing of the settlers, agreed. Like the inhabitants of Migron, she said the outpost was first suggested by Ariel Sharon when he was housing minister in the 1990s. It was also among the first outposts to be set up after he became prime minister in 2002.
An official report published in 2005 found that more than $4 million was invested in Migron in its first years, with the money channelled through at least six different ministries.
There is good reason for official complicity in such outposts as Migron. “This place is very strategic,” Mrs Genud said. It looks down on Route 60, once the main road serving Palestinians between Jerusalem and Jenin in the northern West Bank.
Today, even those Palestinians who can get a permit to travel the road find regular sections obstructed by checkpoints or closed for the protection of neighbouring settlements.
“We can also see all the Arabs from here and keep an eye on what they are doing,” she said referring to her Palestinian neighbours. “And in addition, we can see the other settlements and check on their safety.”
But despite its significance to the settlement drive, Migron is under threat. Last week, the Israeli government agreed that the outpost must be destroyed, although it was tight-lipped about when. Few are expecting such a reversal to happen soon. The government’s decision was largely foisted upon it by a series of unforeseen events.
In 2006, several West Bank Palestinians, backed by Israeli peace groups, petitioned Israel’s supreme court claiming that Migron had been built on their private land.
Over the past four decades, Israel has declared nearly two-thirds of the West Bank as “state land”, seizing it on a variety of pretexts and transferring much of it to the jurisdiction of settler councils. According to the figures of the Israeli group Peace Now, the settlers are in direct control of more than 40 per cent of the West Bank.
Land belonging to Palestinians who hold the title deeds, however, has been harder to confiscate. As a result, a dubious industry of front companies both inside Israel and in the occupied territories has been spawned to transfer private Palestinian land to the settlers.
One such company appears to be behind the sale of the land on which Migron was built. A police investigation has revealed that one of the Palestinian owners, Abdel Latif Hassan Sumarin, signed over his power of attorney to an Israeli real estate company in 2004, even though he died in the United States in 1961.
During the court hearings, Israel has been dragging its feet. According to its own figures, there are a dozen outposts built entirely or partially on private Palestinian land -- and the true number may be higher still.
The settlers believe that the decision to destroy Migron, if carried out, would set a dangerous precedent. “They are very afraid that this will become simply the first of many settlements to fall,” Mr Etkes said.
Last week, faced with another hearing before the court, the government finally conceded on Migron -- but only after striking a deal with the main settlement lobby group, the Yesha council. Israel promised that the outpost would go, but not before new homes had been built for Migron’s settlers and they had been relocated en masse to a newly created -- and authorised -- settlement. According to reports in the local media, Migron’s families may be moved only a few hundred metres from their current location to an area of the West Bank designated as “state land”.
“The settlers know that preparation of an alternative site could take years,” said Yariv Oppenheimer, the head of Peace Now, fearful that this was simply a delaying tactic.
Others believe that relocating Migron may, in fact, set back the struggle against the settlements. There is already talk of moving the settlers to the jurisdiction of a neighbouring settlement, Adam.
“The danger is that Migron will be destroyed only to be resurrected in ‘legalised’ form by the government as a new settlement close by Adam,” Mr Etkes said.
Such a suspicion is confirmed by the main settler council, Yesha, which issued a statement last week: “We believe it is possible to find a solution for the outposts that will strengthen the settlements.”
Nonetheless, the residents of Migron, backed by hardline settler groups, are talking and acting tough for the time being. In a show of defiance, they moved another mobile home into the outpost last week. For several months the residents have also been erecting a large stone building close by the outpost that will become a winery.
The settlers’ rabbinical council denounced the threatened loss of the outpost, as did settler leader Gershon Masika, who warned of a bloody confrontation to save it.
Mrs Genud is not sure what she will do if the crunch comes and she has to give up her home and life in Migron. “All of this land is Jewish,” she said. “It would be a big mistake if we give up what is rightfully ours.”
Jonathan Cook is a writer and journalist based in Nazareth, Israel. His latest books are “Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle East” (Pluto Press) and “Disappearing Palestine: Israel's Experiments in Human Despair” (Zed Books). His website is www.jkcook.net.
This article originally appeared in The National , published in Abu Dhabi.
http://www.counterpunch.org/cook08252008.html
Israeli Outposts Seal Death of Palestinian State
By JONATHAN COOK
Migron, West Bank
Yehudit Genud hardly feels she is on the frontier of Israel’s settlement project, although the huddle of mobile homes on a wind-swept West Bank hilltop she calls home is controversial even by Israeli standards.
Despite the size and isolation of Migron, a settlement of about 45 religious families on a ridge next to the Palestinian city of Ramallah, Mrs Genud’s job as a social worker in West Jerusalem is a 25-minute drive away on a well-paved road.
Mrs Genud, 28, pregnant with her first child, points out that Migron has parks, children’s playgrounds, a kindergarten, a daycare centre and a synagogue, all paid for by the government -- even if the buildings are enclosed by a razor-wire fence, and her husband, Roni, has to put in overtime as the settlement’s security guard.
From her trailer, she also has panoramic views not only of Ramallah but of the many communities hugging the slopes that gently fall away to the Jordan Valley.
Long-established Palestinian villages are instantly identifiable by their homes’ flat roofs and the prominence of the tall minarets of the local mosques. Interspersed among them, however, are a growing number of much newer, fortified communities of luxury villas topped by distinctive red-tiled roofs.
These are the Jewish settlements that now form an almost complete ring around Palestinian East Jerusalem, cutting it off from the rest of the West Bank and destroying any hope that the city will one day become the capital of a Palestinian state.
“These settlements are supposed to be the nail in the coffin of any future peace agreement with the Palestinians,” said Dror Etkes, a veteran observer of the settlements who works for the Israeli human rights group Yesh Din. “Their purpose is to make a Palestinian state unviable.”
The majority of the half a million settlers in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, according to Mr Etkes, are “economic opportunists”, drawn to life in the occupied territories less by ideological or religious convictions than economic incentives. The homes, municipal services and schools there are heavily subsidised by the government.
In addition, the settlements -- though illegal under international law -- are integrated into Israel through a sophisticated system of roads that make it easy for the settlers to forget they are in occupied territory surrounded by Palestinians.
But Migron, with its supposed links to the Biblical site where King Saul based himself during his fight against the Philistines, attracts a different kind of inhabitant.
“This place is holy to the Jewish people and we have a duty to be here,” Mrs Genud said. “The whole land of Israel belongs to us and we should not be afraid to live wherever we want to. The Arabs must accept that.”
Unlike the 150 or so official settlements dotted across the West Bank, Migron is an example of what the Israeli government refers to as an “illegal outpost”, often an unauthorised outgrowth from one of the main settlements. Today there are more than 100 such outposts, housing several thousand extremist settlers.
Mrs Genud, however, argues that Israel’s refusal to turn Migron into an authorised settlement, as it has done with many other established outposts, reflects pressure from Washington.
Back in 2003, Israel committed itself to dismantling the more recent outposts under the terms of the Road Map, a US-sponsored plan for reviving the peace process and creating a Palestinian state. Two years later the cabinet approved the removal of 24 outposts, although barely any progress has been made on dismantling them. Israel confirmed its pledge again in January when George W Bush, the US president, visited.
Established six years ago by a group from the nearby settlement of Ofra, Migron is now the largest of the outposts. Two residents -- Itai Halevi, the community’s rabbi, and Itai Harel, the son of Israel Harel, a well-known settler leader -- have demonstrated their confidence in Migron’s future by each building permanent homes.
“We are connected to the water grid, we have phone lines from the national company Bezeq, we have been hooked up by the electricity company and have street lighting,” Mrs Genud said. “We also have a kindergarten paid for by the state and a group of soldiers stationed here to protect us. How can we be ‘illegal’?”
Daniella Wiess, a leader of the most extreme wing of the settlers, agreed. Like the inhabitants of Migron, she said the outpost was first suggested by Ariel Sharon when he was housing minister in the 1990s. It was also among the first outposts to be set up after he became prime minister in 2002.
An official report published in 2005 found that more than $4 million was invested in Migron in its first years, with the money channelled through at least six different ministries.
There is good reason for official complicity in such outposts as Migron. “This place is very strategic,” Mrs Genud said. It looks down on Route 60, once the main road serving Palestinians between Jerusalem and Jenin in the northern West Bank.
Today, even those Palestinians who can get a permit to travel the road find regular sections obstructed by checkpoints or closed for the protection of neighbouring settlements.
“We can also see all the Arabs from here and keep an eye on what they are doing,” she said referring to her Palestinian neighbours. “And in addition, we can see the other settlements and check on their safety.”
But despite its significance to the settlement drive, Migron is under threat. Last week, the Israeli government agreed that the outpost must be destroyed, although it was tight-lipped about when. Few are expecting such a reversal to happen soon. The government’s decision was largely foisted upon it by a series of unforeseen events.
In 2006, several West Bank Palestinians, backed by Israeli peace groups, petitioned Israel’s supreme court claiming that Migron had been built on their private land.
Over the past four decades, Israel has declared nearly two-thirds of the West Bank as “state land”, seizing it on a variety of pretexts and transferring much of it to the jurisdiction of settler councils. According to the figures of the Israeli group Peace Now, the settlers are in direct control of more than 40 per cent of the West Bank.
Land belonging to Palestinians who hold the title deeds, however, has been harder to confiscate. As a result, a dubious industry of front companies both inside Israel and in the occupied territories has been spawned to transfer private Palestinian land to the settlers.
One such company appears to be behind the sale of the land on which Migron was built. A police investigation has revealed that one of the Palestinian owners, Abdel Latif Hassan Sumarin, signed over his power of attorney to an Israeli real estate company in 2004, even though he died in the United States in 1961.
During the court hearings, Israel has been dragging its feet. According to its own figures, there are a dozen outposts built entirely or partially on private Palestinian land -- and the true number may be higher still.
The settlers believe that the decision to destroy Migron, if carried out, would set a dangerous precedent. “They are very afraid that this will become simply the first of many settlements to fall,” Mr Etkes said.
Last week, faced with another hearing before the court, the government finally conceded on Migron -- but only after striking a deal with the main settlement lobby group, the Yesha council. Israel promised that the outpost would go, but not before new homes had been built for Migron’s settlers and they had been relocated en masse to a newly created -- and authorised -- settlement. According to reports in the local media, Migron’s families may be moved only a few hundred metres from their current location to an area of the West Bank designated as “state land”.
“The settlers know that preparation of an alternative site could take years,” said Yariv Oppenheimer, the head of Peace Now, fearful that this was simply a delaying tactic.
Others believe that relocating Migron may, in fact, set back the struggle against the settlements. There is already talk of moving the settlers to the jurisdiction of a neighbouring settlement, Adam.
“The danger is that Migron will be destroyed only to be resurrected in ‘legalised’ form by the government as a new settlement close by Adam,” Mr Etkes said.
Such a suspicion is confirmed by the main settler council, Yesha, which issued a statement last week: “We believe it is possible to find a solution for the outposts that will strengthen the settlements.”
Nonetheless, the residents of Migron, backed by hardline settler groups, are talking and acting tough for the time being. In a show of defiance, they moved another mobile home into the outpost last week. For several months the residents have also been erecting a large stone building close by the outpost that will become a winery.
The settlers’ rabbinical council denounced the threatened loss of the outpost, as did settler leader Gershon Masika, who warned of a bloody confrontation to save it.
Mrs Genud is not sure what she will do if the crunch comes and she has to give up her home and life in Migron. “All of this land is Jewish,” she said. “It would be a big mistake if we give up what is rightfully ours.”
Jonathan Cook is a writer and journalist based in Nazareth, Israel. His latest books are “Israel and the Clash of Civilisations: Iraq, Iran and the Plan to Remake the Middle East” (Pluto Press) and “Disappearing Palestine: Israel's Experiments in Human Despair” (Zed Books). His website is www.jkcook.net.
This article originally appeared in The National , published in Abu Dhabi.
http://www.counterpunch.org/cook08252008.html
Sunday, August 24, 2008
Paula R. Newberg: Pakistan, again
Paula R. Newberg: Pakistan, again
Yale Global Online, 21 August 2008
Before the ink was dry on President Pervez Musharraf's resignation letter, and before Pakistanis could celebrate the end of his nine-year rule, remorse filled the air. Washington and New Delhi, both crucial to Pakistan's stability, quickly lamented the end of one-stop diplomacy, prefacing their official statements with "let's wait and see what democracy brings." Their caution has some merit; after all, Islamabad's fractious politics is often the subject of anxious caricature, at home and abroad. But mourning the end of an illegitimate regime betrays a wearied outlook in an insecure environment already dominated by outsiders. With strife threatening Pakistan's borders and its economy limping, the danger is not that India and the US have lost a comfortable relationship with Musharraf, but that nostalgia will blind them to the opportunities that political change might bring.
Self-fulfilling prophecy is a familiar handmaiden to failed policies in this corner of Asia. Although the false promise of military rule has all too frequently disappointed Pakistanis and their patrons, pliant donors have often invested the military with the attributes they want and hope to see. After 2001, Musharraf was expediently billed as the savior who could save the economy, align Pakistan with the West, stop terrorism, and rid the country of tainted politics. This was myth masquerading as fact in a place where everything, including nuclear technology, was for sale.
By sidestepping the critical relationships that bind citizens to their state -- the very politics Musharraf eschewed so contemptuously – Pakistan lost its bearings. Costumed variously as the tone-deaf general who led the state and the chief executive who ran the army, Musharraf led Pakistan through rapid cycles of cross-border enmity, institutional degradation, political corruption and civil strife that inevitably eluded the "reconciliation" he now claims to have sought.
The narrative of the past nine years echoed those of earlier eras: neighborhood wars and domestic inequities gave sanction to army rule, thwarting civilian politicians whose clumsy attempts at statecraft led to the army's return. Sixty years after independence, Pakistan's tribes and sects still crave a credible accommodation with the state over longstanding grievances and inequities, its politicians still search for meaningful participation, and its leaders seek a place in the region and world.
These needs and intentions -- conflicting, overlapping, firm and fretful – define the state more acutely than its often violated constitution. The dominant story is therefore about the unfinished business of citizenship, about who governs whom, and how and why, and what citizens can expected from their state. The troubling arena of domestic politics is also where Pakistan collides with its neighbors, allies, patrons, and the broader interests of global security.
Pakistan has long viewed its eastern and western borders as front lines for its domestic politics, transposing the failures of its electoral politics into campaigns to achieve strategic advantage. Nowhere is this clearer than in the lightly governed, highly corrupted western border region, where global ambitions encounter local necessity. Here, an anti-terror campaign aims to stop the kinds of extremism that make their ways westward – Al Qaeda cells that seek to undermine Afghanistan and Pakistan, and redesign global mores. Where the West sees criminals, however, Pakistan sees its own citizens, renegade and under-represented though they may be -- staunch sectarians exiting the international state system, and equally stalwart secular nationalists trying to enter it, now caught up in retrograde militancy when their own provincial allegiances fail them.
The conditions of borderland battle, however, have set tribes and militants one other and everyone else: the Pakistan army, NATO and the United States on one side, exgtremist sympathizers within the Pakistan military and intelligence establishments on another, and now, separately, local residents who decry militancy, sectarianism and the incapacity of successively weak Pakistan governments to contain, mitigate and dispell these explosive grievances. Filled with victims of violence and hundreds of thousands of displaced persons, the borderlands have spun out of control partly because Pakistan can't decide whom to please – the Americans fighting Al Qaeda, its own army reluctant to fight other Pakistanis, a jumble of insurgents who are nonetheless citizens in name if not deed – and how best to understand its own interests. To Afghanistan and the West, however, split attention is seen as weakness and more likely, deception.
Similar failures dog Pakistan's dealings with India. Although Musharraf is retrospectively credited by New Delhi with stabilizing Indo-Pakistani relations, his own intelligence forces have been implicated in attacks in India, on Indian civilians working in Afghanistan, a bombing in India's Kabul Embassy, and of course, the Kashmir insurgency. Pakistan reads Kashmir's unrest through the lenses of its owninstabilities, seeing in Hindu-Muslim tensions the same incomplete promises of citizenship that color Pakistani society. It's an accurate appraisal, unseen ironies notwithstanding. But when it leads to interference in Kashmir or in India – and surreptitiously justifies using foreign military assistance to seek an elusive parity with India's military rather than fight terror on its western border – this analysis embraces hostility and duplicity.
Pakistan can afford neither, but it needs more than Musharraf's departure to alter its foreign policy fortunes. The impetus for that change, on the periphery of its governance, offers a ray of hope for the future.
It is rare for citizens to speak truth to power and rarer to win, but Pakistan's civil society overturned Musharraf's abuse of civil liberties, dislodged the president and set the tone and content – if not a sure path to success -- for Pakistan's parliament and parties. Other groups have now followed, including villagers who have chased militants from their homes in the Frontier. Politicians from minority provinces are planning to contest for the presidency. Although the weak ruling coalition may not meet the ethical or efficacy standard set by civil society, disagreements among the major political parties are centered on fundamental policy issues – including the role of the judiciary and the constitution -- and not just positions and favor. Their public disputes are among the most transparent political discussions to which voters have been privy in a very long time.
These domestic issues critically affect the state's fortunes. At least one coalition member, the Awami National Party, recognizes the delicate relationships between citizen rights and border security, and came to office with plans to deal with militants sensitively and responsibly. If this pattern can be carried over to more substantial dealing with Afghanistan and India, and if the desire for peace can lead public opinion and the army toward a more liberal stance on Kashmir, then this fragile government might – unexpectedly, counter-intuitively, no doubt inelegantly – provide the region an opportunity to recast its relationships.
For this to happen, Pakistan will finally have to recognize that cross-border belligerence, on its east and west, cannot overcome its own inequality and poor governance. That is a hard lesson to learn, and one that will stick only if India, Afghanistan and the US take up the challenges it implies: to take a long, serious view of Pakistan's governance and the possibilities it might one day offer the region. This means helping Pakistan to democratize Musharraf's personalized command structure and the electoral system he designed to thwart popular politics, working with parliamentarians with whom they may not agree, and ensuring that Pakistan's government can recognize and represent its own interests, even when they may diverge from their allies and neighbors.
The betting in Pakistan is that the coalition won't last long enough to tackle the economy, let alone the broad problems of disaffection and militancy. That may be. But wait and see won't work for long: for everyone's sake, Pakistan's fledgling government needs help now.
Yale Global Online, 21 August 2008
Before the ink was dry on President Pervez Musharraf's resignation letter, and before Pakistanis could celebrate the end of his nine-year rule, remorse filled the air. Washington and New Delhi, both crucial to Pakistan's stability, quickly lamented the end of one-stop diplomacy, prefacing their official statements with "let's wait and see what democracy brings." Their caution has some merit; after all, Islamabad's fractious politics is often the subject of anxious caricature, at home and abroad. But mourning the end of an illegitimate regime betrays a wearied outlook in an insecure environment already dominated by outsiders. With strife threatening Pakistan's borders and its economy limping, the danger is not that India and the US have lost a comfortable relationship with Musharraf, but that nostalgia will blind them to the opportunities that political change might bring.
Self-fulfilling prophecy is a familiar handmaiden to failed policies in this corner of Asia. Although the false promise of military rule has all too frequently disappointed Pakistanis and their patrons, pliant donors have often invested the military with the attributes they want and hope to see. After 2001, Musharraf was expediently billed as the savior who could save the economy, align Pakistan with the West, stop terrorism, and rid the country of tainted politics. This was myth masquerading as fact in a place where everything, including nuclear technology, was for sale.
By sidestepping the critical relationships that bind citizens to their state -- the very politics Musharraf eschewed so contemptuously – Pakistan lost its bearings. Costumed variously as the tone-deaf general who led the state and the chief executive who ran the army, Musharraf led Pakistan through rapid cycles of cross-border enmity, institutional degradation, political corruption and civil strife that inevitably eluded the "reconciliation" he now claims to have sought.
The narrative of the past nine years echoed those of earlier eras: neighborhood wars and domestic inequities gave sanction to army rule, thwarting civilian politicians whose clumsy attempts at statecraft led to the army's return. Sixty years after independence, Pakistan's tribes and sects still crave a credible accommodation with the state over longstanding grievances and inequities, its politicians still search for meaningful participation, and its leaders seek a place in the region and world.
These needs and intentions -- conflicting, overlapping, firm and fretful – define the state more acutely than its often violated constitution. The dominant story is therefore about the unfinished business of citizenship, about who governs whom, and how and why, and what citizens can expected from their state. The troubling arena of domestic politics is also where Pakistan collides with its neighbors, allies, patrons, and the broader interests of global security.
Pakistan has long viewed its eastern and western borders as front lines for its domestic politics, transposing the failures of its electoral politics into campaigns to achieve strategic advantage. Nowhere is this clearer than in the lightly governed, highly corrupted western border region, where global ambitions encounter local necessity. Here, an anti-terror campaign aims to stop the kinds of extremism that make their ways westward – Al Qaeda cells that seek to undermine Afghanistan and Pakistan, and redesign global mores. Where the West sees criminals, however, Pakistan sees its own citizens, renegade and under-represented though they may be -- staunch sectarians exiting the international state system, and equally stalwart secular nationalists trying to enter it, now caught up in retrograde militancy when their own provincial allegiances fail them.
The conditions of borderland battle, however, have set tribes and militants one other and everyone else: the Pakistan army, NATO and the United States on one side, exgtremist sympathizers within the Pakistan military and intelligence establishments on another, and now, separately, local residents who decry militancy, sectarianism and the incapacity of successively weak Pakistan governments to contain, mitigate and dispell these explosive grievances. Filled with victims of violence and hundreds of thousands of displaced persons, the borderlands have spun out of control partly because Pakistan can't decide whom to please – the Americans fighting Al Qaeda, its own army reluctant to fight other Pakistanis, a jumble of insurgents who are nonetheless citizens in name if not deed – and how best to understand its own interests. To Afghanistan and the West, however, split attention is seen as weakness and more likely, deception.
Similar failures dog Pakistan's dealings with India. Although Musharraf is retrospectively credited by New Delhi with stabilizing Indo-Pakistani relations, his own intelligence forces have been implicated in attacks in India, on Indian civilians working in Afghanistan, a bombing in India's Kabul Embassy, and of course, the Kashmir insurgency. Pakistan reads Kashmir's unrest through the lenses of its owninstabilities, seeing in Hindu-Muslim tensions the same incomplete promises of citizenship that color Pakistani society. It's an accurate appraisal, unseen ironies notwithstanding. But when it leads to interference in Kashmir or in India – and surreptitiously justifies using foreign military assistance to seek an elusive parity with India's military rather than fight terror on its western border – this analysis embraces hostility and duplicity.
Pakistan can afford neither, but it needs more than Musharraf's departure to alter its foreign policy fortunes. The impetus for that change, on the periphery of its governance, offers a ray of hope for the future.
It is rare for citizens to speak truth to power and rarer to win, but Pakistan's civil society overturned Musharraf's abuse of civil liberties, dislodged the president and set the tone and content – if not a sure path to success -- for Pakistan's parliament and parties. Other groups have now followed, including villagers who have chased militants from their homes in the Frontier. Politicians from minority provinces are planning to contest for the presidency. Although the weak ruling coalition may not meet the ethical or efficacy standard set by civil society, disagreements among the major political parties are centered on fundamental policy issues – including the role of the judiciary and the constitution -- and not just positions and favor. Their public disputes are among the most transparent political discussions to which voters have been privy in a very long time.
These domestic issues critically affect the state's fortunes. At least one coalition member, the Awami National Party, recognizes the delicate relationships between citizen rights and border security, and came to office with plans to deal with militants sensitively and responsibly. If this pattern can be carried over to more substantial dealing with Afghanistan and India, and if the desire for peace can lead public opinion and the army toward a more liberal stance on Kashmir, then this fragile government might – unexpectedly, counter-intuitively, no doubt inelegantly – provide the region an opportunity to recast its relationships.
For this to happen, Pakistan will finally have to recognize that cross-border belligerence, on its east and west, cannot overcome its own inequality and poor governance. That is a hard lesson to learn, and one that will stick only if India, Afghanistan and the US take up the challenges it implies: to take a long, serious view of Pakistan's governance and the possibilities it might one day offer the region. This means helping Pakistan to democratize Musharraf's personalized command structure and the electoral system he designed to thwart popular politics, working with parliamentarians with whom they may not agree, and ensuring that Pakistan's government can recognize and represent its own interests, even when they may diverge from their allies and neighbors.
The betting in Pakistan is that the coalition won't last long enough to tackle the economy, let alone the broad problems of disaffection and militancy. That may be. But wait and see won't work for long: for everyone's sake, Pakistan's fledgling government needs help now.
A PATH OUT OF THE DESERT A Grand Strategy for America in the Middle East By Kenneth M. Pollack
New York Times book review -- Sunday, 24 August 2008
A PATH OUT OF THE DESERT
A Grand Strategy for America in the Middle East
By Kenneth M. Pollack
(Reviewed by Max Rodenbeck, Middle East correspondent for The Economist)
Back in 2002, I ran into one of the Brookings Institution's top Middle East hands at the inaugural session of the United States-Islamic World Forum, a now annual event that Brookings sponsors jointly with the government of Qatar. "How's it going?" I asked, expecting to hear about clashing misperceptions across the cultural divide. "Good," came the gruff reply. "They're beginning to realize that they are the problem."
Reading this big, ambitious book by Kenneth M. Pollack, who is the head of research at Brookings's Saban Center for Middle East Policy, it is hard not to wish that what he refers to as Washington's "policy community" would more often realize that they are the problem. It would have been nice, for instance, had Pollack himself thought harder before arguing, in scholarly papers and his widely read 2002 book, "The Threatening Storm," that America had "no choice" but to invade Iraq. That ostensibly sober appraisal, coming from a former C.I.A. analyst, Clinton official and self-described liberal, arguably added more gravitas to the shrill cries for war than any other voice.
Pollack has long since confessed to having been wrong about Iraq. "A Path Out of the Desert" includes other mea culpas. "There has been far too little asking the people of the region themselves what they thought and what they wanted," he ruminates at one point, though the book offers slim evidence of his having pursued this advice. While the administration that Pollack served gets some light wrist-Å]slapping, it is the following eight years of Bush policy that he calls "breathtakingly arrogant, ignorant and reckless."
Many of Pollack's other judgments are as sound as is this criticism of the Bush administration. Since most of the post-cold-war world has stabilized, democratized and prospered, it is probably correct to suggest, as he does, that America should commit itself to helping the messy Middle East come up to par.
His proposal of a Grand Strategy to achieve this, which is to say a generation-long effort of a scale and intensity similar to America's engagement with Europe after World War II, is challenging but not irrational, given the world's growing dependency on Middle Eastern oil. And Pollack is right to say that violence and tyranny are not hard-wired into Islam, and to conclude that the threat of Islamist terror has been overblown. He is also right that internal unrest in Middle Eastern states is quite likely to be a strategic threat, and that this danger will not pass until they manage to produce better schools, more opportunities for youth, wider social justice and more inclusive, accountable government. He is correct, too, in describing the region's current regimes as singularly awful, and even in admitting that George Bush showed unwonted acuity when he called for draining the swamps of extremism by promoting reform.
The argument weakens when Pollack tries to prescribe just what America can do to cure the Middle East. Much of his suggested treatment consists of vague outlines and policy homilies. Out of nearly 500 pages, very few describe concrete measures for how to achieve such things as spreading democracy or upgrading education in the face of governments that mistrust reform and peoples that mistrust America. Among other things, he proposes to increase military aid to friendly regimes. This, he says, can create a kind of golden leash that makes governments more compliant to American wishes.
But surely, one can't help gasping, the last thing more guns will bring is political reform. And surely, those Arabs are not so dumb that they don't read this stuff. Elsewhere, he suggests tying aid to Egypt to the lifting of the country's notorious emergency law. Perhaps he is unaware that Congress has already tried conditioning aid on reform, or that the Egyptians, who have grown skilled at circumventing tiresome Western admonishments, have already amended their constitution to incorporate "emergency" strictures under ordinary law. One is left with the impression that should a Democratic administration hire Pollack to try his Grand Strategy, he might soon be reduced to throwing "spaghetti against the wall" to "see if it sticks," as he quotes a rueful Bush official describing that team's effort to reform the Middle East.
Beyond the reform promotion agenda, which is the book's main thrust, Pollack is surprisingly reticent about the most pressing current issues, namely how to get out of Iraq and what to do about Iran (though in recent op-ed essays he has made it clear that he worries about pulling out of Iraq too quickly). In fact, he simply sketches well-known policy options without passing judgment. And, sadly, this thick book's thinness in ideas is not its only flaw.
Pollack raises loud alarms, for instance, over the Middle East's high rates of population growth, urbanization and joblessness. Actually, these are decades-old trends. He fails to note that population growth rates have plunged in recent years. Some scholars even assert that this phase of "demographic transition," in which there is a relatively high ratio of working-age people to young or old dependents, should accelerate the region's economic growth just as it did America's in the late 19th century, and East Asia's more recently.
Pollack commits errors that, despite his years in the corridors of power and some 70 pages of footnotes, betray a lack of genuine intimacy with his subject. It is not true, as he asserts, that education in the Persian Gulf emirates is largely private. Nor is it true, any longer, that virtually the only foreign investment in Arab countries goes toward pumping more oil: real estate, tourism, banking, telecoms and even heavy industry now lure investors, too.
It is an outdated generalization to state that "Arab bureaucracies . . . create interminable delays with customs regulations, inspections and other red tape." Try telling that to Dubai Ports World, a company that runs 45 container terminals in 29 countries, or to the operators of the giant, state-of-the-art transshipment hubs in Egypt and Morocco that are set to dominate Mediterranean trade. It is even more misleading to assert that "the Arab regimes have implicitly or explicitly backed a range of terrorist groups." Pray, which Arab governments does he mean, and which groups is he talking about?
Pollack also shows a shaky grasp of history. We know that the Ottoman Empire declined and fell, but to have endured for five centuries, and for half those as the biggest state in Europe, the Mediterranean and the Middle East, does not make the Ottomans "unsuccessful." Elsewhere he tells us sagely that "over time, the stagnation of the Arab economies has created considerable poverty," as if there were no poor Arabs before, and as if one of the most startling modern examples of mass impoverishment was not the Clinton-era sanctions on Iraq, which destroyed its middle class and set the stage for postwar chaos.
America gets off rather lightly in genÅ]eral, in Pollack's account, compared with the sad Arabs whom we must help to be like us. We are told, for instance, that the United States only grudgingly became involved in the grisly Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s when it nobly undertook to reflag oil tankers in order to protect the flow of oil. No mention here of Donald Rumsfeld's back-slapping with Saddam Hussein or the supply of satellite intelligence to him or the exchange of American weapons to Iran for hostages — all of which helped prolong the slaughter.
Pollack seems oddly unaware of history's motivating forces. To assert that "what triggers revolutions, civil wars and other internal unrest is psychological factors, particularly feelings of extreme despair," is plain silly. The Boston Tea Party could not have been prevented by Prozac. Similarly, he ascribes feelings to broad categories of Middle Easterners, devoid of any context or explanation. They are "angry populations" who suffer "inchoate frustration" and "a pathological hatred of the status quo." We repeatedly hear of "Arab rage at Israel" and "Arab venom for Israel." Nowhere is there a hint that such attitudes might bear some relation to the plight of the Palestinians, the agony of military defeat or the humiliation of life under Israeli occupation.
In fact, the book's most salient distortions stem from Pollack's protectiveness toward Israel. He makes some absurdly cockeyed assertions, like, "America's support for Israel over the years has even been a critical element in winning and securing Arab allies." He offers misleading false alternatives, declaring, for instance, that there is "absolutely no reason to believe that ending American support for Israel would somehow eliminate" the risk of Islamist zealots taking power and cutting oil exports. How about making aid to Israel, and not just to Arabs, conditional, or aiming at mitigating, rather than eliminating, such risks? Pollack makes a peculiarly acrobatic effort to prove that hostility to Israel is not a prime motivating factor behind militant jihadism, repeating this assertion no fewer than four times in two paragraphs. Has he not bothered to listen to Osama bin Laden's addresses to the American people, where he said that what converted him from dreamer to murderous activist was Israeli bombs falling on Beirut in 1982?
Even more disingenuously, Pollack repeats the myth that Al Qaeda has never attacked Israel. One might argue that its bombings of synagogues in Djerba and Istanbul, and against Jewish targets in Casablanca, in which dozens of people died, were anti-Semitic rather than anti-Israeli. But the November 2002 attacks in Kenya were aimed specifically at Israeli tourists. Thirteen people, among them three Israelis, died in a resort hotel, and had the missiles fired simultaneously at an Israeli charter plane with 261 passengers aboard not missed, this would have been Al Qaeda's goriest "success" since the twin towers. This may seem like nit-picking, particularly since Pollack is, after all, on the side of those who believe it is in America's own interest to make peace between Israelis and Arabs, or at least to pretend to try.
What is troubling about Pollack's view, which is fairly representative of his fellow liberal interventionists, who are likely to be in power soon, is its lack of clarity. Can't we just admit that American support for Israel is strategically burdensome and is driven by the passion of several domestic constituencies rather than cold cost-benefit geopolitics? Can't we see that the temptation to intervene in places like the Middle East arises as much because "they" are weak as because "we" are just and noble? No matter what good will America's "policy community" proclaims toward the Middle East, this mix of blinkered indulgence of Israel and disdain for the rest of the region, as well as a predilection for Wilsonian dreams over achievable goals, suggests we will remain in the wilderness for some time to come.
Max Rodenbeck is the Middle East correspondent for The Economist.
A PATH OUT OF THE DESERT
A Grand Strategy for America in the Middle East
By Kenneth M. Pollack
(Reviewed by Max Rodenbeck, Middle East correspondent for The Economist)
Back in 2002, I ran into one of the Brookings Institution's top Middle East hands at the inaugural session of the United States-Islamic World Forum, a now annual event that Brookings sponsors jointly with the government of Qatar. "How's it going?" I asked, expecting to hear about clashing misperceptions across the cultural divide. "Good," came the gruff reply. "They're beginning to realize that they are the problem."
Reading this big, ambitious book by Kenneth M. Pollack, who is the head of research at Brookings's Saban Center for Middle East Policy, it is hard not to wish that what he refers to as Washington's "policy community" would more often realize that they are the problem. It would have been nice, for instance, had Pollack himself thought harder before arguing, in scholarly papers and his widely read 2002 book, "The Threatening Storm," that America had "no choice" but to invade Iraq. That ostensibly sober appraisal, coming from a former C.I.A. analyst, Clinton official and self-described liberal, arguably added more gravitas to the shrill cries for war than any other voice.
Pollack has long since confessed to having been wrong about Iraq. "A Path Out of the Desert" includes other mea culpas. "There has been far too little asking the people of the region themselves what they thought and what they wanted," he ruminates at one point, though the book offers slim evidence of his having pursued this advice. While the administration that Pollack served gets some light wrist-Å]slapping, it is the following eight years of Bush policy that he calls "breathtakingly arrogant, ignorant and reckless."
Many of Pollack's other judgments are as sound as is this criticism of the Bush administration. Since most of the post-cold-war world has stabilized, democratized and prospered, it is probably correct to suggest, as he does, that America should commit itself to helping the messy Middle East come up to par.
His proposal of a Grand Strategy to achieve this, which is to say a generation-long effort of a scale and intensity similar to America's engagement with Europe after World War II, is challenging but not irrational, given the world's growing dependency on Middle Eastern oil. And Pollack is right to say that violence and tyranny are not hard-wired into Islam, and to conclude that the threat of Islamist terror has been overblown. He is also right that internal unrest in Middle Eastern states is quite likely to be a strategic threat, and that this danger will not pass until they manage to produce better schools, more opportunities for youth, wider social justice and more inclusive, accountable government. He is correct, too, in describing the region's current regimes as singularly awful, and even in admitting that George Bush showed unwonted acuity when he called for draining the swamps of extremism by promoting reform.
The argument weakens when Pollack tries to prescribe just what America can do to cure the Middle East. Much of his suggested treatment consists of vague outlines and policy homilies. Out of nearly 500 pages, very few describe concrete measures for how to achieve such things as spreading democracy or upgrading education in the face of governments that mistrust reform and peoples that mistrust America. Among other things, he proposes to increase military aid to friendly regimes. This, he says, can create a kind of golden leash that makes governments more compliant to American wishes.
But surely, one can't help gasping, the last thing more guns will bring is political reform. And surely, those Arabs are not so dumb that they don't read this stuff. Elsewhere, he suggests tying aid to Egypt to the lifting of the country's notorious emergency law. Perhaps he is unaware that Congress has already tried conditioning aid on reform, or that the Egyptians, who have grown skilled at circumventing tiresome Western admonishments, have already amended their constitution to incorporate "emergency" strictures under ordinary law. One is left with the impression that should a Democratic administration hire Pollack to try his Grand Strategy, he might soon be reduced to throwing "spaghetti against the wall" to "see if it sticks," as he quotes a rueful Bush official describing that team's effort to reform the Middle East.
Beyond the reform promotion agenda, which is the book's main thrust, Pollack is surprisingly reticent about the most pressing current issues, namely how to get out of Iraq and what to do about Iran (though in recent op-ed essays he has made it clear that he worries about pulling out of Iraq too quickly). In fact, he simply sketches well-known policy options without passing judgment. And, sadly, this thick book's thinness in ideas is not its only flaw.
Pollack raises loud alarms, for instance, over the Middle East's high rates of population growth, urbanization and joblessness. Actually, these are decades-old trends. He fails to note that population growth rates have plunged in recent years. Some scholars even assert that this phase of "demographic transition," in which there is a relatively high ratio of working-age people to young or old dependents, should accelerate the region's economic growth just as it did America's in the late 19th century, and East Asia's more recently.
Pollack commits errors that, despite his years in the corridors of power and some 70 pages of footnotes, betray a lack of genuine intimacy with his subject. It is not true, as he asserts, that education in the Persian Gulf emirates is largely private. Nor is it true, any longer, that virtually the only foreign investment in Arab countries goes toward pumping more oil: real estate, tourism, banking, telecoms and even heavy industry now lure investors, too.
It is an outdated generalization to state that "Arab bureaucracies . . . create interminable delays with customs regulations, inspections and other red tape." Try telling that to Dubai Ports World, a company that runs 45 container terminals in 29 countries, or to the operators of the giant, state-of-the-art transshipment hubs in Egypt and Morocco that are set to dominate Mediterranean trade. It is even more misleading to assert that "the Arab regimes have implicitly or explicitly backed a range of terrorist groups." Pray, which Arab governments does he mean, and which groups is he talking about?
Pollack also shows a shaky grasp of history. We know that the Ottoman Empire declined and fell, but to have endured for five centuries, and for half those as the biggest state in Europe, the Mediterranean and the Middle East, does not make the Ottomans "unsuccessful." Elsewhere he tells us sagely that "over time, the stagnation of the Arab economies has created considerable poverty," as if there were no poor Arabs before, and as if one of the most startling modern examples of mass impoverishment was not the Clinton-era sanctions on Iraq, which destroyed its middle class and set the stage for postwar chaos.
America gets off rather lightly in genÅ]eral, in Pollack's account, compared with the sad Arabs whom we must help to be like us. We are told, for instance, that the United States only grudgingly became involved in the grisly Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s when it nobly undertook to reflag oil tankers in order to protect the flow of oil. No mention here of Donald Rumsfeld's back-slapping with Saddam Hussein or the supply of satellite intelligence to him or the exchange of American weapons to Iran for hostages — all of which helped prolong the slaughter.
Pollack seems oddly unaware of history's motivating forces. To assert that "what triggers revolutions, civil wars and other internal unrest is psychological factors, particularly feelings of extreme despair," is plain silly. The Boston Tea Party could not have been prevented by Prozac. Similarly, he ascribes feelings to broad categories of Middle Easterners, devoid of any context or explanation. They are "angry populations" who suffer "inchoate frustration" and "a pathological hatred of the status quo." We repeatedly hear of "Arab rage at Israel" and "Arab venom for Israel." Nowhere is there a hint that such attitudes might bear some relation to the plight of the Palestinians, the agony of military defeat or the humiliation of life under Israeli occupation.
In fact, the book's most salient distortions stem from Pollack's protectiveness toward Israel. He makes some absurdly cockeyed assertions, like, "America's support for Israel over the years has even been a critical element in winning and securing Arab allies." He offers misleading false alternatives, declaring, for instance, that there is "absolutely no reason to believe that ending American support for Israel would somehow eliminate" the risk of Islamist zealots taking power and cutting oil exports. How about making aid to Israel, and not just to Arabs, conditional, or aiming at mitigating, rather than eliminating, such risks? Pollack makes a peculiarly acrobatic effort to prove that hostility to Israel is not a prime motivating factor behind militant jihadism, repeating this assertion no fewer than four times in two paragraphs. Has he not bothered to listen to Osama bin Laden's addresses to the American people, where he said that what converted him from dreamer to murderous activist was Israeli bombs falling on Beirut in 1982?
Even more disingenuously, Pollack repeats the myth that Al Qaeda has never attacked Israel. One might argue that its bombings of synagogues in Djerba and Istanbul, and against Jewish targets in Casablanca, in which dozens of people died, were anti-Semitic rather than anti-Israeli. But the November 2002 attacks in Kenya were aimed specifically at Israeli tourists. Thirteen people, among them three Israelis, died in a resort hotel, and had the missiles fired simultaneously at an Israeli charter plane with 261 passengers aboard not missed, this would have been Al Qaeda's goriest "success" since the twin towers. This may seem like nit-picking, particularly since Pollack is, after all, on the side of those who believe it is in America's own interest to make peace between Israelis and Arabs, or at least to pretend to try.
What is troubling about Pollack's view, which is fairly representative of his fellow liberal interventionists, who are likely to be in power soon, is its lack of clarity. Can't we just admit that American support for Israel is strategically burdensome and is driven by the passion of several domestic constituencies rather than cold cost-benefit geopolitics? Can't we see that the temptation to intervene in places like the Middle East arises as much because "they" are weak as because "we" are just and noble? No matter what good will America's "policy community" proclaims toward the Middle East, this mix of blinkered indulgence of Israel and disdain for the rest of the region, as well as a predilection for Wilsonian dreams over achievable goals, suggests we will remain in the wilderness for some time to come.
Max Rodenbeck is the Middle East correspondent for The Economist.
The New America Foundation/American Strategy Program cordially invites you and your colleagues to a Democratic Convention Policy Forum: CAN THE NEXT
The New America Foundation/American Strategy Program
cordially invites you and your colleagues to a Democratic Convention Policy Forum
CAN THE NEXT PRESIDENT MAKE THE
MIDDLE EAST IRRELEVANT?
WEDNESDAY, 27 AUGUST
9:00 am to 11:30 AM (breakfast and beverages)
COLORADO HISTORY MUSEUM
1300 BROADWAY, DOWNTOWN DENVER
RSVP DIRECTLY TO THIS EMAIL OR TO CLEMONS@NEWAMERICA.NET
For media and other program information, contact Steven Clemons at 202-276-1176 cell or Rebecca Abou-Chedid at 202-256-4096
featuring keynote presentations by
THE HON. JOHN KERRY (D-MA)
CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE ON NEAR EAST AFFAIRS,
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS, U.S. SENATE
FORMER DEMOCRATIC CANDIDATE FOR PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES
ANNE-MARIE SLAUGHTER
DEAN, WOODROW WILSON SCHOOL OF PUBLIC AND INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS,
PRINCETON UNIVERSITY
THE HON. JOSCHKA FISCHER
FORMER MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS, FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY
THE HON. GREG CRAIG
SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISOR TO SENATOR BARACK OBAMA
FORMER DIRECTOR, POLICY PLANNING, DEPARTMENT OF STATE
THE HON. MEL LEVINE
SENIOR ADVISOR, OBAMA FOR PRESIDENT
FORMER MEMBER, U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
and ongoing panel commentary from
STEVE COLL
WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT, THE NEW YORKER
FORMER MANAGING EDITOR, WASHINGTON POST
AUTHOR, THE BIN LADENS
PRESIDENT, NEW AMERICA FOUNDATION
DANIEL LEVY
FORMER ISRAEL NEGOTIATOR, TABA AND OSLO ACCORDS
PRINCIPAL DRAFTER/ISRAEL, GENEVA ACCORD
SENIOR FELLOW & DIRECTOR, MIDDLE EAST POLICY INITIATIVE,
NEW AMERICA FOUNDATION and CENTURY FOUNDATION
JAMES ZOGBY
PRESIDENT, ARAB-AMERICAN INSTITUTE
ROBERT MALLEY
FORMER SPECIAL ADVISER TO PRESIDENT CLINTON FOR MIDDLE EAST POLICY
DIRECTOR, MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA PROGRAM,
INTERNATIONAL CRISIS GROUP
moderator
STEVE CLEMONS
Director, American Strategy Program, New America Foundation
Publisher, www.TheWashingtonNote.com
RSVP directly to this email at clemons@newamerica.net
cordially invites you and your colleagues to a Democratic Convention Policy Forum
CAN THE NEXT PRESIDENT MAKE THE
MIDDLE EAST IRRELEVANT?
WEDNESDAY, 27 AUGUST
9:00 am to 11:30 AM (breakfast and beverages)
COLORADO HISTORY MUSEUM
1300 BROADWAY, DOWNTOWN DENVER
RSVP DIRECTLY TO THIS EMAIL OR TO CLEMONS@NEWAMERICA.NET
For media and other program information, contact Steven Clemons at 202-276-1176 cell or Rebecca Abou-Chedid at 202-256-4096
featuring keynote presentations by
THE HON. JOHN KERRY (D-MA)
CHAIRMAN, SUBCOMMITTEE ON NEAR EAST AFFAIRS,
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS, U.S. SENATE
FORMER DEMOCRATIC CANDIDATE FOR PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES
ANNE-MARIE SLAUGHTER
DEAN, WOODROW WILSON SCHOOL OF PUBLIC AND INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS,
PRINCETON UNIVERSITY
THE HON. JOSCHKA FISCHER
FORMER MINISTER OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS, FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY
THE HON. GREG CRAIG
SENIOR NATIONAL SECURITY ADVISOR TO SENATOR BARACK OBAMA
FORMER DIRECTOR, POLICY PLANNING, DEPARTMENT OF STATE
THE HON. MEL LEVINE
SENIOR ADVISOR, OBAMA FOR PRESIDENT
FORMER MEMBER, U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
and ongoing panel commentary from
STEVE COLL
WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT, THE NEW YORKER
FORMER MANAGING EDITOR, WASHINGTON POST
AUTHOR, THE BIN LADENS
PRESIDENT, NEW AMERICA FOUNDATION
DANIEL LEVY
FORMER ISRAEL NEGOTIATOR, TABA AND OSLO ACCORDS
PRINCIPAL DRAFTER/ISRAEL, GENEVA ACCORD
SENIOR FELLOW & DIRECTOR, MIDDLE EAST POLICY INITIATIVE,
NEW AMERICA FOUNDATION and CENTURY FOUNDATION
JAMES ZOGBY
PRESIDENT, ARAB-AMERICAN INSTITUTE
ROBERT MALLEY
FORMER SPECIAL ADVISER TO PRESIDENT CLINTON FOR MIDDLE EAST POLICY
DIRECTOR, MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA PROGRAM,
INTERNATIONAL CRISIS GROUP
moderator
STEVE CLEMONS
Director, American Strategy Program, New America Foundation
Publisher, www.TheWashingtonNote.com
RSVP directly to this email at clemons@newamerica.net
Timely American wisdom
International Herald Tribune
Timely American wisdom
By Rami G. Khouri
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
BEIRUT:
Few observers expect the ongoing Palestinian-Israeli negotiations between the governments of Mahmoud Abbas and Ehud Olmert to achieve any significant breakthrough during the remaining months of President George W. Bush's term. One reason for the low expectations from the negotiations spawned by the Annapolis meeting in the United States last November is the low-key mediating role of the United States itself.
Ample experiences since the 1970s suggest that active external mediation is essential for success, due to low trust among the main protagonists and the need for foreign security guarantees and development aid that typically seal a peace deal in this region.
Whatever happens in coming months, the stage is set for the next American administration to play an active role in Arab-Israeli peace-making - should it decide to do so.
The odds are that it will, for two key reasons: Arab-Israeli peace-making can impact positively and quickly on almost every other American national interest in the Middle East, and American abstinence from peace-making - as during the past eight years - contributes to aggravating multiple local conflicts and radicalizing trends throughout the region.
If the next American administration takes the plunge, it will have a timely, honest and very practical handbook on which to draw for guidance. The U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP) has just published a compact but rich little book entitled "Negotiating Arab-Israeli Peace: American Leadership in the Middle East."
It is the work of respected scholars and former officials who reviewed America's involvement in Arab-Israeli peacemaking during the last three administrations, covering the Bush-Clinton-Bush eras since 1990.
Headed by former ambassador Daniel C. Kurtzer and USIP senior research associate Scott B. Lasensky, and including William Quandt, Steven Spiegel and Shibley Telhami, the group interviewed some 150 officials and activists in the United States and the Middle East to assess their views of Washington's role as a mediator since the end of the Cold War.
They identified "an alarming pattern of mismanaged diplomacy...both strategic and tactical. ... U.S. involvement has been characterized by fits and starts, errors of omission and commission and fundamental weaknesses in policy formulation and execution. Rhetoric all too often has replaced action....Opportunities were squandered, potential breakthroughs missed and meaningful advances stalled unnecessarily."
Noting that Arab-Israeli peace is a strategic American interest and that Washington's direct involvement is indispensable for success, the study gives George H.W. Bush's administration higher marks than the Clinton or George W. Bush teams.
It then offers 10 lessons learned that should be required reading for any American or other external mediator in the Middle East. The most important ones are: U.S. policy should be made in the United States, not in foreign countries (like Israel, it specifically said). The United States should take initiatives and not only respond to openings, and should transcend incrementalism and aim instead for an endgame, not shying away from offering its own proposals.
Washington should play a strong role as monitor of compliance with agreements reached. Broad and bipartisan domestic support is needed, but policy should not be "held captive to the agendas of domestic groups" (where the study pointed out examples of inordinate influence of pro-Israeli groups).
Washington should use its full diplomatic toolbox judiciously (summitry, economic aid, unofficial diplomacy, assurances and understandings), with strategic objectives in mind, and not only to buy time.
The report's gently devastating critique of actual American performance is coupled with a call for U.S. re-engagement, with several recommendations: The next U.S. administration should make Arab-Israeli peace-making a high priority based on a strategy to end the conflict by locking in the gains of the past while balancing bilateral with multilateral efforts, using nontraditional diplomacy, and reassessing the utility of existing mechanisms such as the Quartet.
A final note addresses the "fact of life" that "Israel plays an outsized role in U.S. politics and diplomacy." The challenge is how to use the U.S.-Israeli special relationship to promote peace for all by crafting a "fair and effective U.S. role," rather than diminishing that special relationship.
The report calls on the next administration to use experts who are as familiar with Arab societies as they are with Israel, so as to "restore the U.S. role to its historical purpose of helping the parties to achieve their core requirements."
The USIP should be commended for this study that reflects the best American tradition of honest self-assessment anchored in facts, rather than partisan ideology. The next administration would do well to read it and ponder its recommendations seriously.
Rami G. Khouri is editor-at-large of The Daily Star and director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut.
Timely American wisdom
By Rami G. Khouri
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
BEIRUT:
Few observers expect the ongoing Palestinian-Israeli negotiations between the governments of Mahmoud Abbas and Ehud Olmert to achieve any significant breakthrough during the remaining months of President George W. Bush's term. One reason for the low expectations from the negotiations spawned by the Annapolis meeting in the United States last November is the low-key mediating role of the United States itself.
Ample experiences since the 1970s suggest that active external mediation is essential for success, due to low trust among the main protagonists and the need for foreign security guarantees and development aid that typically seal a peace deal in this region.
Whatever happens in coming months, the stage is set for the next American administration to play an active role in Arab-Israeli peace-making - should it decide to do so.
The odds are that it will, for two key reasons: Arab-Israeli peace-making can impact positively and quickly on almost every other American national interest in the Middle East, and American abstinence from peace-making - as during the past eight years - contributes to aggravating multiple local conflicts and radicalizing trends throughout the region.
If the next American administration takes the plunge, it will have a timely, honest and very practical handbook on which to draw for guidance. The U.S. Institute of Peace (USIP) has just published a compact but rich little book entitled "Negotiating Arab-Israeli Peace: American Leadership in the Middle East."
It is the work of respected scholars and former officials who reviewed America's involvement in Arab-Israeli peacemaking during the last three administrations, covering the Bush-Clinton-Bush eras since 1990.
Headed by former ambassador Daniel C. Kurtzer and USIP senior research associate Scott B. Lasensky, and including William Quandt, Steven Spiegel and Shibley Telhami, the group interviewed some 150 officials and activists in the United States and the Middle East to assess their views of Washington's role as a mediator since the end of the Cold War.
They identified "an alarming pattern of mismanaged diplomacy...both strategic and tactical. ... U.S. involvement has been characterized by fits and starts, errors of omission and commission and fundamental weaknesses in policy formulation and execution. Rhetoric all too often has replaced action....Opportunities were squandered, potential breakthroughs missed and meaningful advances stalled unnecessarily."
Noting that Arab-Israeli peace is a strategic American interest and that Washington's direct involvement is indispensable for success, the study gives George H.W. Bush's administration higher marks than the Clinton or George W. Bush teams.
It then offers 10 lessons learned that should be required reading for any American or other external mediator in the Middle East. The most important ones are: U.S. policy should be made in the United States, not in foreign countries (like Israel, it specifically said). The United States should take initiatives and not only respond to openings, and should transcend incrementalism and aim instead for an endgame, not shying away from offering its own proposals.
Washington should play a strong role as monitor of compliance with agreements reached. Broad and bipartisan domestic support is needed, but policy should not be "held captive to the agendas of domestic groups" (where the study pointed out examples of inordinate influence of pro-Israeli groups).
Washington should use its full diplomatic toolbox judiciously (summitry, economic aid, unofficial diplomacy, assurances and understandings), with strategic objectives in mind, and not only to buy time.
The report's gently devastating critique of actual American performance is coupled with a call for U.S. re-engagement, with several recommendations: The next U.S. administration should make Arab-Israeli peace-making a high priority based on a strategy to end the conflict by locking in the gains of the past while balancing bilateral with multilateral efforts, using nontraditional diplomacy, and reassessing the utility of existing mechanisms such as the Quartet.
A final note addresses the "fact of life" that "Israel plays an outsized role in U.S. politics and diplomacy." The challenge is how to use the U.S.-Israeli special relationship to promote peace for all by crafting a "fair and effective U.S. role," rather than diminishing that special relationship.
The report calls on the next administration to use experts who are as familiar with Arab societies as they are with Israel, so as to "restore the U.S. role to its historical purpose of helping the parties to achieve their core requirements."
The USIP should be commended for this study that reflects the best American tradition of honest self-assessment anchored in facts, rather than partisan ideology. The next administration would do well to read it and ponder its recommendations seriously.
Rami G. Khouri is editor-at-large of The Daily Star and director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
"Naval Blockade" or All Out War Against Iran? - by Michel Chossudovsky - 2008-08-13
"Naval Blockade" or All Out War Against Iran?
- by Michel Chossudovsky - 2008-08-13
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9817
- by Michel Chossudovsky - 2008-08-13
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9817
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9828
Wag the Dog: How to Conceal Massive Economic Collapse
- by Ellen Brown - 2008-08-14
The President's Plunge Protection Team had come to the rescue
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9828
- by Ellen Brown - 2008-08-14
The President's Plunge Protection Team had come to the rescue
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9828
Missile Defense: Washington and Poland just moved the World closer to War
Missile Defense: Washington and Poland just moved the World closer to War - by F. William Engdahl - 2008-08-15 The most dangerous move towards nuclear war the world has seen since the 1962 Cuba Missile crisis.
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9836
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9836
The Eurasian Corridor: Pipeline Geopolitics and the New Cold War
The Eurasian Corridor: Pipeline Geopolitics and the New Cold War
- by Michel Chossudovsky - 2008-08-22
The ongoing crisis in the Caucasus is intimately related to the strategic control over energy pipeline & transportation corridors.
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9907
- by Michel Chossudovsky - 2008-08-22
The ongoing crisis in the Caucasus is intimately related to the strategic control over energy pipeline & transportation corridors.
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=9907
Why the Pentagon Thinks Attacking Iran is a Bad Idea
U.S.News & World Report
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Why the Pentagon Thinks Attacking Iran is a Bad Idea
No one wants a nuclear Iran, but U.S. military leaders worry about the risks and strains of a third war
By Anna Mulrine
Posted August 7, 2008
It was shortly after the bipartisan Iraq Study Group issued its recommendations to Congress in late 2006 that a directive came down from the highest levels of the Pentagon: an order for another war game involving Iran.
Iranian soldiers on parade for President Ahmadinejad.
The study group had proposed that the Bush administration engage in direct diplomatic talks with its nemesis, a nation that Washington says supports terrorism, encourages attacks on U.S. troops in Iraq, and, most ominously, is developing nuclear weapons. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the time, Gen. Peter Pace, asked the Defense Department's top war gamers to construct a scenario to be played out in early 2007. "We postulated that the president of the United States actually took the advice of the Iraq Study Group seriously and tried to engage diplomatically with Iran," says one defense analyst who took part.
Talks stall. There may be few greater symbols, senior officials point out, than the nation's military gaming diplomacy to illustrate the Pentagon's wariness of war with Iran. Such a conflict remains among the options "on the table," as President Bush reiterated in July, if Iran continues its nuclear program. The alternative approach, the European-led multilateral talks with Iran, stalled this month after the deadline expired on yet an-other offer of economic incentives. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad vowed that his country would not surrender its "nuclear rights" in the face of U.S. and European demands to halt uranium enrichment, the process that produces fuel for generating electricity and making nuclear bombs. He has also threatened to shut down the Strait of Hormuz, the strategic waterway through which some 40 percent of the world's oil passes, in the event of any American military attack.
In the wake of these events, the Bush administration expressed its exasperation. "In case he hasn't noticed," White House Press Secretary Dana Perino quipped, "we are trying to talk to them."
The Pentagon has noticed, well aware that the White House is capable of doing more than throwing up its hands in frustration. Military leaders recognize the precarious ambiguity of America's red line with Iran—and that of Israel, which says Iran's nuclear program poses an "existential threat." Mindful of these dynamics and engaged in wars on two fronts, there have been few greater proponents for U.S. diplomatic overtures than the Department of Defense.
Since taking over as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff last year, Adm. Mike Mullen has repeatedly warned—often quite publicly—that military action against Iran, though possible, would be "extremely stressing" for an already overstretched U.S. military. "I'm fighting two wars, and I don't need a third one," Mullen said recently. "There's a real danger of any strike not only causing more instability in the region than there already is," adds a senior military official, "but of actually having the opposite effect of what you want." Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has also weighed in against action, noting recently that it would be "disastrous on a number of levels."
The forthrightness on the part of the top two American defense officials has fed speculation that this is pushback against those within the Bush administration—Vice President Dick Cheney's name often comes up here—who might be inclined to open up a third front for U.S. forces with a strike against Iran. In light of the Iraq experience, "generals are more willing to push back against things they think are stupid, and Gates is more willing to listen," says Andrew Bacevich, professor of international relations at Boston University. "Mullen isn't just saying these things for our benefit—I think it is a real effort to communicate with the civilian leadership."
Or the Pentagon brass is simply stating the obvious, as some senior officials contend, mindful that the final word comes from the White House. "There are lots of opinions about where we're headed with Iran and a lot of healthy discussion" in the administration, says the senior military official. "But to set the debate along the lines of 'to bomb or not to bomb' isn't a fair characterization." Says Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell, "The views the secretary has expressed on this issue are entirely his own, and they are entirely consistent with his colleagues in the administration."
The widely held view within the Pentagon is that any military strike on Iran would be a dangerous, highly complicated undertaking. "There's a lot about Iran that we still just don't understand," says the senior military official. "They are very, very hard to predict." Adds the defense analyst, "A lot of generals are saying, 'Are you sure you really want to do this? Are the gains worth the risk?' "
Shadow games. In scenarios routinely war-gamed by the Pentagon, the recurring answer tends to be no. The risks are considerable, and these shadow games—conceptual exercises intended to test out ideas—often end badly for the U.S. side. "In so many scenarios, it's a nightmare," says Bruce Riedel, a former CIA officer and Middle East fellow with the Brookings Institution who has taken part in war games.
One of the biggest nightmares, a land invasion of Iran, is widely dismissed as a nonstarter. "Unless it's happened in the deepest recesses of the Pentagon, I've never been involved in a war game that seriously considered a land invasion of Iran," says the defense analyst. At the Command and General Staff College in Fort Leavenworth, Kan., Maj. Bruce Terry estimated in his widely circulated master's thesis last year that it would take at least four years to mobilize the more than 1 million U.S. troops required for such an endeavor, followed by U.S. casualties in the tens of thousands for each year of occupation.
The working war scenarios involve surgical strikes by cruise missiles and warplanes on key targets, such as Revolutionary Guard facilities and Iranian nuclear sites, often coupled with covert operations on the ground. These attacks have been war-gamed regularly since 2004, according to another defense adviser, and the results point to some considerable stumbling blocks. "The No. 1 problem we have is: 'Where are the targets?' We still have trouble accurately locating all of the pieces of the nuclear program that we need to take out in order to have a relatively decisive effect," says Bacevich.
That uncertainty extends to assessments of when Iran could have nuclear-bomb capability, something that Iranians assert is not their plan. The consensus U.S. intelligence view points to the 2010 to 2015 timeframe, while Israeli estimates predict it as soon as late 2009. The differences reflect disagreements about the intelligence, as well as about what level of capability should be viewed as the weapons threshold.
What is clear is that Iranian nuclear facilities are buried, dispersed, and protected—and U.S. bombs may not be able to reach deeply enough to destroy them. Some are also in close vicinity to schools, hospitals, and other facilities where there could be civilian casualties that would further inflame anti-Americanism across the Muslim world. By most accounts, bombing might set back Iran by only a few years—at a high cost to the United States.
Such strikes come with the prospect of retaliation in the Strait of Hormuz, though such a move would cut off Iran's own oil exports as well. It is a narrow chokepoint, and an Iranian attempt to obstruct tanker traffic would cause oil to soar far above even recent record prices with dire consequences for western economies. Iran could employ swift boat-swarming tactics and the threat of Chinese-made antiship cruise missiles launched from patrol boats and from small islands off its coast. "The Strait is always the key for war games in the Gulf," says Paul Van Riper, a retired Marine three-star general who unleashed an imaginary salvo of Silkworm-style missiles, overwhelming the sensors on U.S. warships, while playing a "red team" country that closely resembled Iran in a now legendary 2002 war game.
"High stress." There is, too, the issue of mines. "Nobody's underestimating Iran's ability to disrupt access to the strait," adds a senior Navy officer who recalls serving on a U.S. warship accompanying Kuwaiti oil tankers in 1988. "People brush over the tanker wars, but the Navy hasn't forgotten," he says. "It was high stress," and two Navy ships were heavily damaged by mines. Despite antimine technology, the officer recalls that the crew set up a chair and built a shade for it, so that a seaman on deck could scan the water round-the-clock for mines. The Navy practiced repelling swarming Iranian swift boats and mounted machine guns for just such an event on the side of its ships.
Most believe that the U.S. military could, with some effort, quickly reopen the strait and most likely sustain little damage at the hands of the 1970s-era planes and weapons that make up the bulk of the Iranian Air Force. But the greater concern is the asymmetric chaos that Iran could unleash in neighboring countries, says Larry Wilkerson, who was chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell. Wilkerson recalls that in his first briefing after taking that job in 2002, the topic was the attacks Iranian-backed Hezbollah could mount against Israel and elsewhere. "They said Hezbollah is the A-team, and not someone we want to take on, because they were essentially 10 or 15 times the capability of al Qaeda," says Wilkerson.
U.S. troops in Iraq likely would face stepped-up attacks by Iranian-backed militias, and the Karzai government in Afghanistan would collapse, says Riedel. "He couldn't choose between us and the Iranians." A U.S. strike, analysts warn, could also have the undesired effect of bolstering Ahmadinejad—as a nation under attack rallies around even an unpopular leader—and alienating the more progressive, anti-Ahmadinejad factions.
An Israeli strike on Iran—with or without U.S. support—would offer all of these risks and more minuses, say senior defense officials. For this reason, in recent meetings in Israel, Mullen "conveyed his less-than-enthusiastic view of an Israeli attack," says a senior military official. Says Riedel, "From an Iranian perspective, Israel would be flying American-made F-15s and F-16s, dropping bombs made in the USA," he adds. "Within the Pentagon, not only do they see the downsides, they tend to think that if someone's going to do this, they don't want to see it outsourced to another air force."
Still, it is in the best interest of the Bush administration to show that it takes Iran's threat to Israel seriously "in hopes of being able to restrain the Israelis," says Bacevich. The decision by scandal-damaged Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to step down once his party chooses a successor in September creates a new uncertainty. "I don't know whether that keeps an operation from happening. Olmert may want to do this one thing on his way out," says Riedel. "I, for one, am convinced that it's a very real possibility."
That possibility increases each time diplomacy falters. But the Pentagon's diplomatic war game concluded that talking doesn't guarantee resolution, either. There were some useful findings—the benefits of engaging Middle East neighbors, for example. "Regionally, there was very strong interest in limiting Iran's growth and power that we haven't exploited as a country," says the defense analyst.
Yet, just as in real life, direct talks with Iran proved consistently tricky in that exercise. "We could get small concessions and promises to talk again," the analyst adds. "But there were no significant breakthroughs or eurekas that made us say, 'This idea is so wonderful that we need to run down the hall and try it right now.' "
If diplomacy doesn't work, and the military route appears too problem-atic, there is a third possibility: a nuclear-armed Iran. Learning to live with that could be the next challenge Pentagon war gamers—and war planners—will have to face.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Why the Pentagon Thinks Attacking Iran is a Bad Idea
No one wants a nuclear Iran, but U.S. military leaders worry about the risks and strains of a third war
By Anna Mulrine
Posted August 7, 2008
It was shortly after the bipartisan Iraq Study Group issued its recommendations to Congress in late 2006 that a directive came down from the highest levels of the Pentagon: an order for another war game involving Iran.
Iranian soldiers on parade for President Ahmadinejad.
The study group had proposed that the Bush administration engage in direct diplomatic talks with its nemesis, a nation that Washington says supports terrorism, encourages attacks on U.S. troops in Iraq, and, most ominously, is developing nuclear weapons. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the time, Gen. Peter Pace, asked the Defense Department's top war gamers to construct a scenario to be played out in early 2007. "We postulated that the president of the United States actually took the advice of the Iraq Study Group seriously and tried to engage diplomatically with Iran," says one defense analyst who took part.
Talks stall. There may be few greater symbols, senior officials point out, than the nation's military gaming diplomacy to illustrate the Pentagon's wariness of war with Iran. Such a conflict remains among the options "on the table," as President Bush reiterated in July, if Iran continues its nuclear program. The alternative approach, the European-led multilateral talks with Iran, stalled this month after the deadline expired on yet an-other offer of economic incentives. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad vowed that his country would not surrender its "nuclear rights" in the face of U.S. and European demands to halt uranium enrichment, the process that produces fuel for generating electricity and making nuclear bombs. He has also threatened to shut down the Strait of Hormuz, the strategic waterway through which some 40 percent of the world's oil passes, in the event of any American military attack.
In the wake of these events, the Bush administration expressed its exasperation. "In case he hasn't noticed," White House Press Secretary Dana Perino quipped, "we are trying to talk to them."
The Pentagon has noticed, well aware that the White House is capable of doing more than throwing up its hands in frustration. Military leaders recognize the precarious ambiguity of America's red line with Iran—and that of Israel, which says Iran's nuclear program poses an "existential threat." Mindful of these dynamics and engaged in wars on two fronts, there have been few greater proponents for U.S. diplomatic overtures than the Department of Defense.
Since taking over as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff last year, Adm. Mike Mullen has repeatedly warned—often quite publicly—that military action against Iran, though possible, would be "extremely stressing" for an already overstretched U.S. military. "I'm fighting two wars, and I don't need a third one," Mullen said recently. "There's a real danger of any strike not only causing more instability in the region than there already is," adds a senior military official, "but of actually having the opposite effect of what you want." Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has also weighed in against action, noting recently that it would be "disastrous on a number of levels."
The forthrightness on the part of the top two American defense officials has fed speculation that this is pushback against those within the Bush administration—Vice President Dick Cheney's name often comes up here—who might be inclined to open up a third front for U.S. forces with a strike against Iran. In light of the Iraq experience, "generals are more willing to push back against things they think are stupid, and Gates is more willing to listen," says Andrew Bacevich, professor of international relations at Boston University. "Mullen isn't just saying these things for our benefit—I think it is a real effort to communicate with the civilian leadership."
Or the Pentagon brass is simply stating the obvious, as some senior officials contend, mindful that the final word comes from the White House. "There are lots of opinions about where we're headed with Iran and a lot of healthy discussion" in the administration, says the senior military official. "But to set the debate along the lines of 'to bomb or not to bomb' isn't a fair characterization." Says Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell, "The views the secretary has expressed on this issue are entirely his own, and they are entirely consistent with his colleagues in the administration."
The widely held view within the Pentagon is that any military strike on Iran would be a dangerous, highly complicated undertaking. "There's a lot about Iran that we still just don't understand," says the senior military official. "They are very, very hard to predict." Adds the defense analyst, "A lot of generals are saying, 'Are you sure you really want to do this? Are the gains worth the risk?' "
Shadow games. In scenarios routinely war-gamed by the Pentagon, the recurring answer tends to be no. The risks are considerable, and these shadow games—conceptual exercises intended to test out ideas—often end badly for the U.S. side. "In so many scenarios, it's a nightmare," says Bruce Riedel, a former CIA officer and Middle East fellow with the Brookings Institution who has taken part in war games.
One of the biggest nightmares, a land invasion of Iran, is widely dismissed as a nonstarter. "Unless it's happened in the deepest recesses of the Pentagon, I've never been involved in a war game that seriously considered a land invasion of Iran," says the defense analyst. At the Command and General Staff College in Fort Leavenworth, Kan., Maj. Bruce Terry estimated in his widely circulated master's thesis last year that it would take at least four years to mobilize the more than 1 million U.S. troops required for such an endeavor, followed by U.S. casualties in the tens of thousands for each year of occupation.
The working war scenarios involve surgical strikes by cruise missiles and warplanes on key targets, such as Revolutionary Guard facilities and Iranian nuclear sites, often coupled with covert operations on the ground. These attacks have been war-gamed regularly since 2004, according to another defense adviser, and the results point to some considerable stumbling blocks. "The No. 1 problem we have is: 'Where are the targets?' We still have trouble accurately locating all of the pieces of the nuclear program that we need to take out in order to have a relatively decisive effect," says Bacevich.
That uncertainty extends to assessments of when Iran could have nuclear-bomb capability, something that Iranians assert is not their plan. The consensus U.S. intelligence view points to the 2010 to 2015 timeframe, while Israeli estimates predict it as soon as late 2009. The differences reflect disagreements about the intelligence, as well as about what level of capability should be viewed as the weapons threshold.
What is clear is that Iranian nuclear facilities are buried, dispersed, and protected—and U.S. bombs may not be able to reach deeply enough to destroy them. Some are also in close vicinity to schools, hospitals, and other facilities where there could be civilian casualties that would further inflame anti-Americanism across the Muslim world. By most accounts, bombing might set back Iran by only a few years—at a high cost to the United States.
Such strikes come with the prospect of retaliation in the Strait of Hormuz, though such a move would cut off Iran's own oil exports as well. It is a narrow chokepoint, and an Iranian attempt to obstruct tanker traffic would cause oil to soar far above even recent record prices with dire consequences for western economies. Iran could employ swift boat-swarming tactics and the threat of Chinese-made antiship cruise missiles launched from patrol boats and from small islands off its coast. "The Strait is always the key for war games in the Gulf," says Paul Van Riper, a retired Marine three-star general who unleashed an imaginary salvo of Silkworm-style missiles, overwhelming the sensors on U.S. warships, while playing a "red team" country that closely resembled Iran in a now legendary 2002 war game.
"High stress." There is, too, the issue of mines. "Nobody's underestimating Iran's ability to disrupt access to the strait," adds a senior Navy officer who recalls serving on a U.S. warship accompanying Kuwaiti oil tankers in 1988. "People brush over the tanker wars, but the Navy hasn't forgotten," he says. "It was high stress," and two Navy ships were heavily damaged by mines. Despite antimine technology, the officer recalls that the crew set up a chair and built a shade for it, so that a seaman on deck could scan the water round-the-clock for mines. The Navy practiced repelling swarming Iranian swift boats and mounted machine guns for just such an event on the side of its ships.
Most believe that the U.S. military could, with some effort, quickly reopen the strait and most likely sustain little damage at the hands of the 1970s-era planes and weapons that make up the bulk of the Iranian Air Force. But the greater concern is the asymmetric chaos that Iran could unleash in neighboring countries, says Larry Wilkerson, who was chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell. Wilkerson recalls that in his first briefing after taking that job in 2002, the topic was the attacks Iranian-backed Hezbollah could mount against Israel and elsewhere. "They said Hezbollah is the A-team, and not someone we want to take on, because they were essentially 10 or 15 times the capability of al Qaeda," says Wilkerson.
U.S. troops in Iraq likely would face stepped-up attacks by Iranian-backed militias, and the Karzai government in Afghanistan would collapse, says Riedel. "He couldn't choose between us and the Iranians." A U.S. strike, analysts warn, could also have the undesired effect of bolstering Ahmadinejad—as a nation under attack rallies around even an unpopular leader—and alienating the more progressive, anti-Ahmadinejad factions.
An Israeli strike on Iran—with or without U.S. support—would offer all of these risks and more minuses, say senior defense officials. For this reason, in recent meetings in Israel, Mullen "conveyed his less-than-enthusiastic view of an Israeli attack," says a senior military official. Says Riedel, "From an Iranian perspective, Israel would be flying American-made F-15s and F-16s, dropping bombs made in the USA," he adds. "Within the Pentagon, not only do they see the downsides, they tend to think that if someone's going to do this, they don't want to see it outsourced to another air force."
Still, it is in the best interest of the Bush administration to show that it takes Iran's threat to Israel seriously "in hopes of being able to restrain the Israelis," says Bacevich. The decision by scandal-damaged Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert to step down once his party chooses a successor in September creates a new uncertainty. "I don't know whether that keeps an operation from happening. Olmert may want to do this one thing on his way out," says Riedel. "I, for one, am convinced that it's a very real possibility."
That possibility increases each time diplomacy falters. But the Pentagon's diplomatic war game concluded that talking doesn't guarantee resolution, either. There were some useful findings—the benefits of engaging Middle East neighbors, for example. "Regionally, there was very strong interest in limiting Iran's growth and power that we haven't exploited as a country," says the defense analyst.
Yet, just as in real life, direct talks with Iran proved consistently tricky in that exercise. "We could get small concessions and promises to talk again," the analyst adds. "But there were no significant breakthroughs or eurekas that made us say, 'This idea is so wonderful that we need to run down the hall and try it right now.' "
If diplomacy doesn't work, and the military route appears too problem-atic, there is a third possibility: a nuclear-armed Iran. Learning to live with that could be the next challenge Pentagon war gamers—and war planners—will have to face.
Friday, August 22, 2008
Mutually assured destruction in cyberspace
Mutually assured destruction in cyberspace
By Victor Mallet
Published: August 20 2008
The Financial Times
The crisis in Georgia has not only stoked fears of a belligerent Russia. It has also served as a reminder that a new style of warfare – potentially as devastating as those that terrified previous generations – is almost upon us: cyberwar.
Before Russia invaded Georgia, co-ordinated attacks were launched against Georgian government websites, leaving internet servers overloaded and disabled.
This was not the first or the most damaging attack in cyberspace on a sovereign nation by agents suspected of working for another, although it is believed to be the first to coincide with an actual war. Russia was also blamed for a 2007 cyber-assault on Estonia, which asked Nato for help.
However, neither Russian computer interference with its neighbours nor Georgian retaliation should overshadow the greater danger to peace posed by a possible cyberwar pitting China against the west.
As early as 2003, China tested the vulnerability of US military computer networks in a sophisticated operation called "Titan Rain" by the US. In 2007, China hacked into a Pentagon network serving the office of Robert Gates, defence secretary.
China has also launched probing and/or espionage attacks on the UK, Germany, France and Taiwan. "America's vulnerability to cyber-attacks is a critical threat to national security," wrote John Tkacik, senior research fellow at the Asian Studies Center of the Heritage Foundation, in a report this year on the Chinese cyber-threat.
Even allowing for the conservative bent of the Heritage Foundation and possible exaggeration of the China menace, the list of security breaches in Mr Tkacik's paper makes worrying reading for US policymakers. This is particularly so because the US and China have the two biggest populations of internet users – China, with 220m, says it has overtaken the US – and because the US and China will be each other's biggest strategic rival in the future.
Aside from the inflammatory propaganda wars waged by millions of internet users in all international conflicts, the threat to peace from US-China rivalry in cyberspace is significant for two reasons.
First, the US expects to maintain overwhelming military dominance in the Pacific and around the world for at least a generation, but only because of its technological lead and its ability to "see" and control the battlefield electronically from space and from the air. China's recently proved ability to shoot down satellites in orbit and its fast-growing information technology skills erode the US advantage, giving Beijing the chance to wage "asymmetric" warfare using relatively cheap IT capabilities.
Second, planners assume that future wars will involve cyber-attacks to cripple the enemy's entire society by disabling electricity, communications and banking networks.
As luck would have it, Georgia is one of the world's least internet- dependent countries, and the result of this latest cyber-attack was inconvenience not power cuts or financial chaos. That would not necessarily be the case with either China or the US, although opinions are divided about the vulnerability of modern economies to cyberwar.
"I think that the US and China have an ability to shut down each other's societies on the internet today," the far from hawkish Bill Owens, a former vice-chairman of the US joints chiefs of staff who has sought to improve US-China military ties, told the Asia Society in Hong Kong in June. "Cyber-attack by a nation is very different from cyber-attack by a hacker."
The US is now scrambling to counter the cyberwar threat. Admiral Owens, now Asia chief executive of private equity group AEA, is co-chairing a US study into the technological, policymaking, legal and ethical implications of cyber-warfare.
Michael Chertoff, US homeland security secretary, has outlined plans for a "Manhattan project" for IT security involving the sharing of information between government and the private sector. A big and successful attack online, he said, "would have cascading effects across the country and across the world".
It is tempting to dismiss such words as scaremongering. One needs only to recall the false alarm over the supposedly chaos-inducing Y2K bug at the turn of the century, or to point to the immediate physical dangers of nuclear, biological and chemical warfare and the old-fashioned bombs dropped on Georgia.
But the dangers of cyberwar are real, and are made greater by the almost total absence of national policy guidelines or relevant international laws and treaties. There is no agreement, for example, on whether a cyber-attack counts as an act of war, and not even enough experience to know whether a massive attack by one country on another could backfire – for example, by crippling the attacking country itself or one of its allies in another part of the world.
So great are the risks that the nuclear doctrine of mutually assured destruction is already being mentioned as a template for an international understanding, prompting Admiral Owens to recommend an agreement on "no first use of cyber-attack". Such a deal would doubtless take many years of negotiations, but Georgia and Estonia – and doubtless other cyber-conflicts to come – will show it is worth doing.
victor.mallet@ft.com
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008
By Victor Mallet
Published: August 20 2008
The Financial Times
The crisis in Georgia has not only stoked fears of a belligerent Russia. It has also served as a reminder that a new style of warfare – potentially as devastating as those that terrified previous generations – is almost upon us: cyberwar.
Before Russia invaded Georgia, co-ordinated attacks were launched against Georgian government websites, leaving internet servers overloaded and disabled.
This was not the first or the most damaging attack in cyberspace on a sovereign nation by agents suspected of working for another, although it is believed to be the first to coincide with an actual war. Russia was also blamed for a 2007 cyber-assault on Estonia, which asked Nato for help.
However, neither Russian computer interference with its neighbours nor Georgian retaliation should overshadow the greater danger to peace posed by a possible cyberwar pitting China against the west.
As early as 2003, China tested the vulnerability of US military computer networks in a sophisticated operation called "Titan Rain" by the US. In 2007, China hacked into a Pentagon network serving the office of Robert Gates, defence secretary.
China has also launched probing and/or espionage attacks on the UK, Germany, France and Taiwan. "America's vulnerability to cyber-attacks is a critical threat to national security," wrote John Tkacik, senior research fellow at the Asian Studies Center of the Heritage Foundation, in a report this year on the Chinese cyber-threat.
Even allowing for the conservative bent of the Heritage Foundation and possible exaggeration of the China menace, the list of security breaches in Mr Tkacik's paper makes worrying reading for US policymakers. This is particularly so because the US and China have the two biggest populations of internet users – China, with 220m, says it has overtaken the US – and because the US and China will be each other's biggest strategic rival in the future.
Aside from the inflammatory propaganda wars waged by millions of internet users in all international conflicts, the threat to peace from US-China rivalry in cyberspace is significant for two reasons.
First, the US expects to maintain overwhelming military dominance in the Pacific and around the world for at least a generation, but only because of its technological lead and its ability to "see" and control the battlefield electronically from space and from the air. China's recently proved ability to shoot down satellites in orbit and its fast-growing information technology skills erode the US advantage, giving Beijing the chance to wage "asymmetric" warfare using relatively cheap IT capabilities.
Second, planners assume that future wars will involve cyber-attacks to cripple the enemy's entire society by disabling electricity, communications and banking networks.
As luck would have it, Georgia is one of the world's least internet- dependent countries, and the result of this latest cyber-attack was inconvenience not power cuts or financial chaos. That would not necessarily be the case with either China or the US, although opinions are divided about the vulnerability of modern economies to cyberwar.
"I think that the US and China have an ability to shut down each other's societies on the internet today," the far from hawkish Bill Owens, a former vice-chairman of the US joints chiefs of staff who has sought to improve US-China military ties, told the Asia Society in Hong Kong in June. "Cyber-attack by a nation is very different from cyber-attack by a hacker."
The US is now scrambling to counter the cyberwar threat. Admiral Owens, now Asia chief executive of private equity group AEA, is co-chairing a US study into the technological, policymaking, legal and ethical implications of cyber-warfare.
Michael Chertoff, US homeland security secretary, has outlined plans for a "Manhattan project" for IT security involving the sharing of information between government and the private sector. A big and successful attack online, he said, "would have cascading effects across the country and across the world".
It is tempting to dismiss such words as scaremongering. One needs only to recall the false alarm over the supposedly chaos-inducing Y2K bug at the turn of the century, or to point to the immediate physical dangers of nuclear, biological and chemical warfare and the old-fashioned bombs dropped on Georgia.
But the dangers of cyberwar are real, and are made greater by the almost total absence of national policy guidelines or relevant international laws and treaties. There is no agreement, for example, on whether a cyber-attack counts as an act of war, and not even enough experience to know whether a massive attack by one country on another could backfire – for example, by crippling the attacking country itself or one of its allies in another part of the world.
So great are the risks that the nuclear doctrine of mutually assured destruction is already being mentioned as a template for an international understanding, prompting Admiral Owens to recommend an agreement on "no first use of cyber-attack". Such a deal would doubtless take many years of negotiations, but Georgia and Estonia – and doubtless other cyber-conflicts to come – will show it is worth doing.
victor.mallet@ft.com
Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2008
IN HAVANA, WAITING FOR OBAMA OR FOR PUTIN?
IN HAVANA, WAITING FOR OBAMA OR FOR PUTIN?
by Rens Lee
As I left Havana earlier this month, Cuba was eagerly
awaiting the United States' November presidential elections.
The buzz around the capital, reportedly from a highly placed
source, was that Barack Obama has already talked to Raul
Castro by phone. Obama has publicly stated that if elected,
he would immediately ease restrictions on Cuban American
travel and remittances placed by the Bush administration in
2004, but maintain the embargo, which has been in place
since 1961, until there is evidence of Cuban democratization
Indeed, no president could unilaterally lift the U.S.
embargo--the main sticking point in U.S.-Cuban relations--
because U.S. law (the 1996 Helms-Burton Act) mandates
preconditions for this, such as legalization of all
political activity and departure of the Castro brothers from
the political scene, that Cuba finds unacceptable. But a new
president who is open to dialogue with America's enemies
could prevail on a solidly democratic Congress to amend or
abrogate the law and thus un-freeze the U.S.-Cuban
relationship.
The embargo bans most U.S. trade with and all investment in
Cuba. While damaging the country's economy, it has obviously
failed in its intended purpose of getting rid of the Castro
regime. Cuba remains a police state in which the population
is subject to a repressive control and, excepting favored
few, lives at or close to the subsistence level.
(Interestingly, the police are among the best paid
professionals in Cuba, earning almost twice the miserly
average wage of $17 per month). Cuba-watchers debate whether
lifting the embargo and flooding the country with U.S.
tourists and businesspersons would erode the legitimacy of
the current regime or breathe new life into it. Yet there
are very good strategic reasons why America should not
continue its policy of isolating Cuba, even in the absence
of positive signs of democratization on the island.
One reason is that the current U.S. policy makes Cuba a
target of opportunity for a resurgent and increasingly
hostile Russia. Vladimir Putin talks openly about "restoring
our position in Cuba," and hints are surfacing in Moscow
that Russia might reestablish a military and intelligence
presence on the island in response to the planned missile
defense shield in Eastern Europe. Points of cooperation
under consideration include use of Cuba as a refueling stop
for long range bombers and for reconnaissance ships and
aircraft, and also reopening of a gigantic Soviet-era
electronic monitoring and surveillance facility at Lourdes,
near Havana. A state visit to Havana in July by hard-line
Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin (an ex-KGB member of
Putin's inner circle) and head of Russia's Security Council
Nikolai Patrushev could presage a new strategic dialogue
between Moscow and Havana, even though the visit was
officially touted as investment-related.
It is hardly coincidental that the warming of Cuban-Russian
ties and discussion of a renewed military relationship
follows closely on the accession of Raul Castro as de facto
Cuban leader. Moscow has historically regarded Raul's
brother as a bit of a nut case, stemming from Fidel's
erratic behavior during the Cuban missile crisis, when (in
the Soviet's view) Castro was trying to provoke a U.S.-
Soviet nuclear conflict. With Raul--who resembles a Soviet-
style apparatchik--in charge, Russia may feel more
comfortable about deploying strategic or intelligence assets
on the island.
Another point to consider in reevaluating U.S. Cuba policy--
and for doing so in the short term--relates to Cuba's huge
potential energy reserves located deep offshore in the Gulf
of Mexico, which the U.S. Geological Survey says could
contain 4.6 billion barrels of oil and 9.8 trillion cubic
feet of natural gas. With most of the U.S. east and west
coasts closed to offshore drilling and oil prices at well
above $100 a barrel, and international demand for
hydrocarbons projected to increase massively in future
years, U.S. exploration and development of these deposits
becomes a tempting prospect--a justification of rescinding
the embargo or at least creating an exception to it. Other
energy-dependent countries (such as China and India) already
are negotiating exploration rights, but because Cuba is a
sanctioned country, U.S. companies are forced to stand idly
by.
In sum, current strategic and economic realities argue for
dealing with the communist Cuban regime "as is"--i.e. not
insisting on regime change as a precondition for improving
relations. Opening Cuba to commerce and interchange with the
United States could, as many argue, plant the seeds of
democracy and capitalism there and give Americans some
leverage to moderate the regime's police-state
characteristics. But positioning the United States to
participate in what could be a Cuban energy bonanza and
keeping Cuba out of the orbit of America's geopolitical
competitors represent more immediate challenges that should
guide a new U.S.-Havana dialogue.
by Rens Lee
As I left Havana earlier this month, Cuba was eagerly
awaiting the United States' November presidential elections.
The buzz around the capital, reportedly from a highly placed
source, was that Barack Obama has already talked to Raul
Castro by phone. Obama has publicly stated that if elected,
he would immediately ease restrictions on Cuban American
travel and remittances placed by the Bush administration in
2004, but maintain the embargo, which has been in place
since 1961, until there is evidence of Cuban democratization
Indeed, no president could unilaterally lift the U.S.
embargo--the main sticking point in U.S.-Cuban relations--
because U.S. law (the 1996 Helms-Burton Act) mandates
preconditions for this, such as legalization of all
political activity and departure of the Castro brothers from
the political scene, that Cuba finds unacceptable. But a new
president who is open to dialogue with America's enemies
could prevail on a solidly democratic Congress to amend or
abrogate the law and thus un-freeze the U.S.-Cuban
relationship.
The embargo bans most U.S. trade with and all investment in
Cuba. While damaging the country's economy, it has obviously
failed in its intended purpose of getting rid of the Castro
regime. Cuba remains a police state in which the population
is subject to a repressive control and, excepting favored
few, lives at or close to the subsistence level.
(Interestingly, the police are among the best paid
professionals in Cuba, earning almost twice the miserly
average wage of $17 per month). Cuba-watchers debate whether
lifting the embargo and flooding the country with U.S.
tourists and businesspersons would erode the legitimacy of
the current regime or breathe new life into it. Yet there
are very good strategic reasons why America should not
continue its policy of isolating Cuba, even in the absence
of positive signs of democratization on the island.
One reason is that the current U.S. policy makes Cuba a
target of opportunity for a resurgent and increasingly
hostile Russia. Vladimir Putin talks openly about "restoring
our position in Cuba," and hints are surfacing in Moscow
that Russia might reestablish a military and intelligence
presence on the island in response to the planned missile
defense shield in Eastern Europe. Points of cooperation
under consideration include use of Cuba as a refueling stop
for long range bombers and for reconnaissance ships and
aircraft, and also reopening of a gigantic Soviet-era
electronic monitoring and surveillance facility at Lourdes,
near Havana. A state visit to Havana in July by hard-line
Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin (an ex-KGB member of
Putin's inner circle) and head of Russia's Security Council
Nikolai Patrushev could presage a new strategic dialogue
between Moscow and Havana, even though the visit was
officially touted as investment-related.
It is hardly coincidental that the warming of Cuban-Russian
ties and discussion of a renewed military relationship
follows closely on the accession of Raul Castro as de facto
Cuban leader. Moscow has historically regarded Raul's
brother as a bit of a nut case, stemming from Fidel's
erratic behavior during the Cuban missile crisis, when (in
the Soviet's view) Castro was trying to provoke a U.S.-
Soviet nuclear conflict. With Raul--who resembles a Soviet-
style apparatchik--in charge, Russia may feel more
comfortable about deploying strategic or intelligence assets
on the island.
Another point to consider in reevaluating U.S. Cuba policy--
and for doing so in the short term--relates to Cuba's huge
potential energy reserves located deep offshore in the Gulf
of Mexico, which the U.S. Geological Survey says could
contain 4.6 billion barrels of oil and 9.8 trillion cubic
feet of natural gas. With most of the U.S. east and west
coasts closed to offshore drilling and oil prices at well
above $100 a barrel, and international demand for
hydrocarbons projected to increase massively in future
years, U.S. exploration and development of these deposits
becomes a tempting prospect--a justification of rescinding
the embargo or at least creating an exception to it. Other
energy-dependent countries (such as China and India) already
are negotiating exploration rights, but because Cuba is a
sanctioned country, U.S. companies are forced to stand idly
by.
In sum, current strategic and economic realities argue for
dealing with the communist Cuban regime "as is"--i.e. not
insisting on regime change as a precondition for improving
relations. Opening Cuba to commerce and interchange with the
United States could, as many argue, plant the seeds of
democracy and capitalism there and give Americans some
leverage to moderate the regime's police-state
characteristics. But positioning the United States to
participate in what could be a Cuban energy bonanza and
keeping Cuba out of the orbit of America's geopolitical
competitors represent more immediate challenges that should
guide a new U.S.-Havana dialogue.
Ex-Mossad chief: Ahmadinejad is Israel's greatest gift
FP PASSPORT
8/21/08
Ex-Mossad chief: Ahmadinejad is Israel's greatest gift
By Haaretz Service
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's incendiary anti-Israel outbursts have united the international community against his country, thus serving a key Israeli interest, former Mossad chief Ephraim Halevy told an American-sponsored Arab satellite television network on Tuesday.
"Ahmadinejad is our greatest gift," Halevy told the Arab language television network Al-Hurra on Tuesday. "We couldn't carry out a better operation at the Mossad than to put a guy like Ahmadinejad in power in Iran."
Halevy added that the Iranian president's extremist statements "proved to everyone that Iran of today is an Iran that is impossible to live with. [Ahmadinejad] unites the entire world against Iran."
Halevy told Time magazine in an interview published last month that an Israeli attack on Iran "could have an impact on us for the next 100 years" and should only be considered as a last resort.
Halevy, who currently heads the Center for Strategic and Policy Studies at Hebrew University in Jerusalem, added that an Iranian attack on Israel would probably have little impact, because Iranian missiles would largely be intercepted by Israel's advanced anti-missile defense system.
Another former senior Mossad official, who reportedly served during Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's administration, told the American magazine that "Iran's achievement is creating an image of itself as a scary superpower when it's really a paper tiger."
An additional Israeli source told Time that Israel sees the period between the U.S. elections in November and the president's inauguration in January as the "window of opportunity" for a possible attack on Iran. The source explained that any military move against Iran would not be carried out before the elections, because it would negatively impact the presidential candidates, especially Republican candidate John McCain and "No Israel leader wants to be blamed for destroying the Republican chances," Time cited the source as saying.
However, the magazine quoted intelligence sources as saying that an Israeli attack on Iran would likely stall the Islamic republic's nuclear aspirations only by "a year or two."
Launching a long-range strike against a multitude of hidden targets in Iran entails huge risks and uncertain rewards, which makes the cost-benefit analysis weigh against an air strike on Iran, according to some senior Israeli officials who urge caution.
8/21/08
Ex-Mossad chief: Ahmadinejad is Israel's greatest gift
By Haaretz Service
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's incendiary anti-Israel outbursts have united the international community against his country, thus serving a key Israeli interest, former Mossad chief Ephraim Halevy told an American-sponsored Arab satellite television network on Tuesday.
"Ahmadinejad is our greatest gift," Halevy told the Arab language television network Al-Hurra on Tuesday. "We couldn't carry out a better operation at the Mossad than to put a guy like Ahmadinejad in power in Iran."
Halevy added that the Iranian president's extremist statements "proved to everyone that Iran of today is an Iran that is impossible to live with. [Ahmadinejad] unites the entire world against Iran."
Halevy told Time magazine in an interview published last month that an Israeli attack on Iran "could have an impact on us for the next 100 years" and should only be considered as a last resort.
Halevy, who currently heads the Center for Strategic and Policy Studies at Hebrew University in Jerusalem, added that an Iranian attack on Israel would probably have little impact, because Iranian missiles would largely be intercepted by Israel's advanced anti-missile defense system.
Another former senior Mossad official, who reportedly served during Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's administration, told the American magazine that "Iran's achievement is creating an image of itself as a scary superpower when it's really a paper tiger."
An additional Israeli source told Time that Israel sees the period between the U.S. elections in November and the president's inauguration in January as the "window of opportunity" for a possible attack on Iran. The source explained that any military move against Iran would not be carried out before the elections, because it would negatively impact the presidential candidates, especially Republican candidate John McCain and "No Israel leader wants to be blamed for destroying the Republican chances," Time cited the source as saying.
However, the magazine quoted intelligence sources as saying that an Israeli attack on Iran would likely stall the Islamic republic's nuclear aspirations only by "a year or two."
Launching a long-range strike against a multitude of hidden targets in Iran entails huge risks and uncertain rewards, which makes the cost-benefit analysis weigh against an air strike on Iran, according to some senior Israeli officials who urge caution.
Lessons from a "lost decade"
Lessons from a "lost decade"
Aug 21st 2008
From The Economist print edition
Will America follow Japan into a decade of stagnation?
AS FALLING house prices and tightening credit squeeze America's economy, some worry that the country may suffer a decade of stagnation, as Japan did after its bubble burst in the early 1990s. Japan's property bubble was also fuelled by cheap money and financial liberalisation and—just as in America—most people assumed that property prices could not fall nationally. When they did, borrowers defaulted and banks cut their lending. The result was a decade with average growth of less than 1%.
Most dismiss the idea that America could suffer the same fate as Japan, but some of the differences are overstated. For example, some claim that Japan's bubble was much bigger than America's. Yet average house prices nationwide rose by 90% in America between 2000 and 2006, compared with a gain of 51% in Japan between 1985 and early 1991, when Japanese home prices peaked (see left-hand chart). Prices in Japan's biggest cities rose faster, but nationwide figures matter more when gauging the impact on the economy. Japanese home prices have since fallen by just over 40%. American prices are already down by 20%, and many economists reckon they could fall by another 10% or more.
What about commercial property? Again, average prices rose by less in Japan (80%) than in America (90%) over those same periods. Thus Japan's property boom was, if anything, smaller than America's. Japan also had a stockmarket bubble, which burst a year earlier than that in property. This hurt banks, because they counted part of their equity holdings in other firms as capital. But its impact on households was modest, because only 30% of the population held shares, compared with over half of Americans.
Nor were Japanese policymakers any slower than American ones to cut interest rates and loosen fiscal policy after the bubble burst, contrary to popular misconceptions. The Bank of Japan (BoJ) began to lower interest rates in July 1991, soon after property prices began to decline. The discount rate was cut from 6% to 1.75% by the end of 1993. Two years after American house prices started to slide, the Fed funds rate has fallen from 5.25% to 2% (see right-hand chart). A study by America's Federal Reserve concluded that Japanese interest rates fell more sharply in the early 1990s than required by the "Taylor rule", which establishes the appropriate rate using the amount of spare capacity and inflation.
Japan also gave its economy a big fiscal boost. The cyclically adjusted budget deficit (which excludes the automatic impact of slower growth on tax revenues) increased by an annual average of 1.8% of GDP in 1992 and 1993—similar to America's budget boost this year. Japan's monetary and fiscal stimulus did help to lift the economy. After a recession in 1993-94, GDP was growing at an annual rate of around 2.5% by 1995. But deflation also emerged that year, pushing up real interest rates and increasing the real burden of debt. It was from here on that Japan made its biggest policy mistakes. In 1997 the government raised its consumption tax to try to slim its budget deficit. And with interest rates close to zero, the BoJ insisted that there was nothing more it could do. Only much later did it start to print lots of money.
America's inflation rate of above 5% is an advantage. Not only are real interest rates negative, but inflation is also helping to bring the housing market back to fair value with a smaller fall in prices than otherwise. But in another way America is more exposed than Japan was. When its bubble burst in 1991, Japan's households saved 15% of their income. By 2001 saving had fallen to 5%, which helped to prop up consumer spending. America's saving rate of close to zero leaves no such cushion.
The perils of procrastination
John Makin, at the American Enterprise Institute, a think-tank, argues that monetary and fiscal relief were necessary but not sufficient to revive Japan's economy. The missing ingredient was a clean-up of the banking system, on which Japanese firms were more dependent than their American counterparts. Japanese banks hid their bad loans beneath opaque corporate structures, and curtailed new lending to profitable businesses. A vicious circle developed, whereby banks' bad loans depressed growth which then created more bad loans.
In another new report Richard Jerram, at Macquarie Securities, concludes that America "will not come close to repeating the experience of Japan", because its regulatory system, financial markets and political structure will not let it procrastinate for so long. America has a more transparent regulatory structure which presses banks into recognising losses and repairing their balance-sheets—even if regulators were slow to recognise that the banks were shifting risky securitised assets off their balance-sheets in the first place. But Japan's regulators for a long while were in cahoots with banks over hiding their bad loans.
Over the past year, American banks have been quicker than those in Japan in the 1990s to disclose and write off losses and raise new capital. In Japan it took a long while before the political will was there to use taxpayers' money to plug the banking system. A big test for America's Treasury will be how quickly it recognises the need to nationalise Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the teetering mortgage giants.
One advantage over Japan, says Mr Jerram, is that America is spreading the costs of its housing bust across other countries. Foreigners hold a large slice of American mortgage-backed securities. Sovereign-wealth funds have provided new capital for American banks. And America's booming exports have helped to support its economy, thanks to the cheap dollar. In contrast, the yen's sharp appreciation after Japan's bubble burst hurt exports at the same time as domestic demand was being squeezed.
By learning from Japan's mistakes, America can avoid a dismal decade. However, it would be arrogant for those in Washington, DC, to assume that Japan's troubles simply reflected its macroeconomic incompetence. Experience in other countries shows that serious asset-price busts often lead to economic downturns lasting several years. Only a wild optimist would believe that the worst is over in America.
Aug 21st 2008
From The Economist print edition
Will America follow Japan into a decade of stagnation?
AS FALLING house prices and tightening credit squeeze America's economy, some worry that the country may suffer a decade of stagnation, as Japan did after its bubble burst in the early 1990s. Japan's property bubble was also fuelled by cheap money and financial liberalisation and—just as in America—most people assumed that property prices could not fall nationally. When they did, borrowers defaulted and banks cut their lending. The result was a decade with average growth of less than 1%.
Most dismiss the idea that America could suffer the same fate as Japan, but some of the differences are overstated. For example, some claim that Japan's bubble was much bigger than America's. Yet average house prices nationwide rose by 90% in America between 2000 and 2006, compared with a gain of 51% in Japan between 1985 and early 1991, when Japanese home prices peaked (see left-hand chart). Prices in Japan's biggest cities rose faster, but nationwide figures matter more when gauging the impact on the economy. Japanese home prices have since fallen by just over 40%. American prices are already down by 20%, and many economists reckon they could fall by another 10% or more.
What about commercial property? Again, average prices rose by less in Japan (80%) than in America (90%) over those same periods. Thus Japan's property boom was, if anything, smaller than America's. Japan also had a stockmarket bubble, which burst a year earlier than that in property. This hurt banks, because they counted part of their equity holdings in other firms as capital. But its impact on households was modest, because only 30% of the population held shares, compared with over half of Americans.
Nor were Japanese policymakers any slower than American ones to cut interest rates and loosen fiscal policy after the bubble burst, contrary to popular misconceptions. The Bank of Japan (BoJ) began to lower interest rates in July 1991, soon after property prices began to decline. The discount rate was cut from 6% to 1.75% by the end of 1993. Two years after American house prices started to slide, the Fed funds rate has fallen from 5.25% to 2% (see right-hand chart). A study by America's Federal Reserve concluded that Japanese interest rates fell more sharply in the early 1990s than required by the "Taylor rule", which establishes the appropriate rate using the amount of spare capacity and inflation.
Japan also gave its economy a big fiscal boost. The cyclically adjusted budget deficit (which excludes the automatic impact of slower growth on tax revenues) increased by an annual average of 1.8% of GDP in 1992 and 1993—similar to America's budget boost this year. Japan's monetary and fiscal stimulus did help to lift the economy. After a recession in 1993-94, GDP was growing at an annual rate of around 2.5% by 1995. But deflation also emerged that year, pushing up real interest rates and increasing the real burden of debt. It was from here on that Japan made its biggest policy mistakes. In 1997 the government raised its consumption tax to try to slim its budget deficit. And with interest rates close to zero, the BoJ insisted that there was nothing more it could do. Only much later did it start to print lots of money.
America's inflation rate of above 5% is an advantage. Not only are real interest rates negative, but inflation is also helping to bring the housing market back to fair value with a smaller fall in prices than otherwise. But in another way America is more exposed than Japan was. When its bubble burst in 1991, Japan's households saved 15% of their income. By 2001 saving had fallen to 5%, which helped to prop up consumer spending. America's saving rate of close to zero leaves no such cushion.
The perils of procrastination
John Makin, at the American Enterprise Institute, a think-tank, argues that monetary and fiscal relief were necessary but not sufficient to revive Japan's economy. The missing ingredient was a clean-up of the banking system, on which Japanese firms were more dependent than their American counterparts. Japanese banks hid their bad loans beneath opaque corporate structures, and curtailed new lending to profitable businesses. A vicious circle developed, whereby banks' bad loans depressed growth which then created more bad loans.
In another new report Richard Jerram, at Macquarie Securities, concludes that America "will not come close to repeating the experience of Japan", because its regulatory system, financial markets and political structure will not let it procrastinate for so long. America has a more transparent regulatory structure which presses banks into recognising losses and repairing their balance-sheets—even if regulators were slow to recognise that the banks were shifting risky securitised assets off their balance-sheets in the first place. But Japan's regulators for a long while were in cahoots with banks over hiding their bad loans.
Over the past year, American banks have been quicker than those in Japan in the 1990s to disclose and write off losses and raise new capital. In Japan it took a long while before the political will was there to use taxpayers' money to plug the banking system. A big test for America's Treasury will be how quickly it recognises the need to nationalise Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the teetering mortgage giants.
One advantage over Japan, says Mr Jerram, is that America is spreading the costs of its housing bust across other countries. Foreigners hold a large slice of American mortgage-backed securities. Sovereign-wealth funds have provided new capital for American banks. And America's booming exports have helped to support its economy, thanks to the cheap dollar. In contrast, the yen's sharp appreciation after Japan's bubble burst hurt exports at the same time as domestic demand was being squeezed.
By learning from Japan's mistakes, America can avoid a dismal decade. However, it would be arrogant for those in Washington, DC, to assume that Japan's troubles simply reflected its macroeconomic incompetence. Experience in other countries shows that serious asset-price busts often lead to economic downturns lasting several years. Only a wild optimist would believe that the worst is over in America.
Thursday, August 21, 2008
The west is strategically wrong on Georgia
FINANCIAL TIMES
August 20 2008
The west is strategically wrong on Georgia
By Kishore Mahbubani
Sometimes small events can portend great changes. The Georgian fiasco may be one such event. It heralds the end of the post cold-war era. But it does not mark the return of any new cold war. It marks an even bigger return: the return of history.
The post cold-war era began on a note of western triumphalism, symbolised by Francis Fukuyama's book, The End of History. The title was audacious but it captured the western zeitgeist. History had ended with the triumph of western civilisation. The rest of the world had no choice but to capitulate to the advance of the west.
In Georgia, Russia has loudly declared that it will no longer capitulate to the west. After two decades of humiliation Russia has decided to snap back. Before long, other forces will do the same. As a result of its overwhelming power, the west has intruded into the geopolitical spaces of other dormant countries. They are no longer dormant, especially in Asia.
Indeed, most of the world is bemused by western moralising on Georgia. America would not tolerate Russia intruding into its geopolitical sphere in Latin America. Hence Latin Americans see American double standards clearly. So do all the Muslim commentaries that note that the US invaded Iraq illegally, too. Neither India nor China is moved to protest against Russia. It shows how isolated is the western view on Georgia: that the world should support the underdog, Georgia, against Russia. In reality, most support Russia against the bullying west. The gap between the western narrative and the rest of the world could not be greater.
It is therefore critical for the west to learn the right lessons from Georgia. It needs to think strategically about the limited options it has. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, western thinkers assumed the west would never need to make geopolitical compromises. It could dictate terms. Now it must recognise reality. The combined western population in North America, the European Union and Australasia is 700m, about 10 per cent of the world's population. The remaining 90 per cent have gone from being objects of world history to subjects. The Financial Times headline of August 18 2008 proclaimed: "West in united front over Georgia" . It should have read: "Rest of the world faults west on Georgia". Why? A lack of strategic thinking.
Mao Zedong, for all his flaws, was a great strategic thinker. He said China always had to deal with its primary contradiction and compromise with its secondary contradiction. When the Soviet Union became the primary contradiction, Mao settled with the US, even though it involved the humiliation of dealing with a power that then recognised Chiang Kai-shek as the legitimate ruler. The west must emulate Mao's pragmatism and focus on its primary contradiction.
Russia is not even close to becoming the primary contradiction the west faces. The real strategic choice is whether its primary challenge comes from the Islamic world or China. Since September 11 2001, the west has acted as though the Islamic world is the primary challenge. Yet rather than devise a long-term strategy to win over 1.2bn Muslims, the west has jumped into the Islamic world with no strategy. Hence there are looming failures in Afghanistan and Iraq and an even more hostile environment in the Islamic world.
Many European thinkers are acutely aware of the folly of many US policies. But they are reluctant to confront the dangers of outsourcing their security to US power. In security, geography trumps culture. Because of geography, Europe has to worry about Islamic anger. Because of the Atlantic Ocean, the US has less reason to do so.
In the US, leading neo-conservative thinkers see China as their primary contradiction. Yet they also support Israel with a passion, without realising this stance is a geopolitical gift to China. It guarantees the US faces a hostile Islamic universe, distracting it from focusing on China. There is no doubt China was the bigger winner of 9/11. It has stabilised its neighbourhood, while the US has been distracted.
Western thinkers must decide where the real long-term challenge is. If it is the Islamic world, the US should stop intruding into Russia's geopolitical space and work out a long-term engagement with China. If it is China, the US must win over Russia and the Islamic world and resolve the Israel-Palestine issue. This will enable Islamic governments to work more closely with the west in the battle against al-Qaeda.
The biggest paradox facing the west is that it is at last possible to create a safer world order. The number of countries wanting to become "responsible stakeholders" has never been higher. Most, including China and India, want to work with the US and the west. But the absence of a long-term coherent western strategy towards the world and the inability to make geopolitical compromises are the biggest obstacles to a stable world order. Western leaders say the world is becoming a more dangerous place, yet few admit that their flawed thinking is bringing this about. Georgia illustrates the results of a lack of strategic thinking.
The writer, dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy (National University of Singapore), has just published 'The New Asian Hemisphere: the Irresistible Shift of Global Power to the East'
August 20 2008
The west is strategically wrong on Georgia
By Kishore Mahbubani
Sometimes small events can portend great changes. The Georgian fiasco may be one such event. It heralds the end of the post cold-war era. But it does not mark the return of any new cold war. It marks an even bigger return: the return of history.
The post cold-war era began on a note of western triumphalism, symbolised by Francis Fukuyama's book, The End of History. The title was audacious but it captured the western zeitgeist. History had ended with the triumph of western civilisation. The rest of the world had no choice but to capitulate to the advance of the west.
In Georgia, Russia has loudly declared
Indeed, most of the world is bemused by western moralising on Georgia. America would not tolerate Russia intruding into its geopolitical sphere in Latin America. Hence Latin Americans see American double standards clearly. So do all the Muslim commentaries that note that the US invaded Iraq illegally, too. Neither India nor China is moved to protest against Russia. It shows how isolated is the western view on Georgia: that the world should support the underdog, Georgia, against Russia. In reality, most support Russia against the bullying west. The gap between the western narrative and the rest of the world could not be greater.
It is therefore critical for the west to learn the right lessons from Georgia. It needs to think strategically about the limited options it has. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, western thinkers assumed the west would never need to make geopolitical compromises. It could dictate terms. Now it must recognise reality. The combined western population in North America, the European Union and Australasia is 700m, about 10 per cent of the world's population. The remaining 90 per cent have gone from being objects of world history to subjects. The Financial Times headline of August 18 2008 proclaimed: "West in united front over Georgia"
Mao Zedong, for all his flaws, was a great strategic thinker. He said China always had to deal with its primary contradiction and compromise with its secondary contradiction. When the Soviet Union became the primary contradiction, Mao settled with the US, even though it involved the humiliation of dealing with a power that then recognised Chiang Kai-shek as the legitimate ruler. The west must emulate Mao's pragmatism and focus on its primary contradiction.
Russia is not even close to becoming the primary contradiction the west faces. The real strategic choice is whether its primary challenge comes from the Islamic world or China. Since September 11 2001, the west has acted as though the Islamic world is the primary challenge. Yet rather than devise a long-term strategy to win over 1.2bn Muslims, the west has jumped into the Islamic world with no strategy. Hence there are looming failures in Afghanistan and Iraq and an even more hostile environment in the Islamic world.
Many European thinkers are acutely aware of the folly of many US policies. But they are reluctant to confront the dangers of outsourcing their security to US power. In security, geography trumps culture. Because of geography, Europe has to worry about Islamic anger. Because of the Atlantic Ocean, the US has less reason to do so.
In the US, leading neo-conservative thinkers see China as their primary contradiction. Yet they also support Israel with a passion, without realising this stance is a geopolitical gift to China. It guarantees the US faces a hostile Islamic universe, distracting it from focusing on China. There is no doubt China was the bigger winner of 9/11. It has stabilised its neighbourhood, while the US has been distracted.
Western thinkers must decide where the real long-term challenge is. If it is the Islamic world, the US should stop intruding into Russia's geopolitical space and work out a long-term engagement with China. If it is China, the US must win over Russia and the Islamic world and resolve the Israel-Palestine issue. This will enable Islamic governments to work more closely with the west in the battle against al-Qaeda.
The biggest paradox facing the west is that it is at last possible to create a safer world order. The number of countries wanting to become "responsible stakeholders" has never been higher. Most, including China and India, want to work with the US and the west. But the absence of a long-term coherent western strategy towards the world and the inability to make geopolitical compromises are the biggest obstacles to a stable world order. Western leaders say the world is becoming a more dangerous place, yet few admit that their flawed thinking is bringing this about. Georgia illustrates the results of a lack of strategic thinking.
The writer, dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy (National University of Singapore), has just published 'The New Asian Hemisphere: the Irresistible Shift of Global Power to the East'
The World Reacts to Russia
RealClearPolitics
August 21, 2008
The World Reacts to Russia
By Victor Davis Hanson
Everyone is distracted by the Olympics. The squabbling here on the campaign trail consumes the media. Two presidential candidates and a lame-duck president all are weighing in on foreign policy. No wonder Vladimir Putin thought it was a good time to invade Georgia.
Apparently the Russian prime minister knew exactly what he was doing but assumed no one in the West did. And he was right.
Our pundits and politicians are all over the map as Putin is variously portrayed as villain, victim, patriot, tyrant -- and more still.
The neoconservatives: We must make Russia pay a terrible price for subverting a democracy. Our policy of promoting liberal governments among the former Soviet republics, with integration into Europe and relations with NATO, was sound, and it cannot be allowed to be aborted by Putin.
Bottom line: Form a ring of democracies around Russia until it sees the light and likewise evolves into a constitutional state.
The paleoconservatives: Putin is only protecting his rightful national interests in his own backyard, which don't really conflict with ours. You have to admire the old brute for taking care of business. Neocons -- and no doubt Israelis in the background -- provoked that Georgian loudmouthed dandy Saakashvili to stick his head in a noose -- so he deserved the hanging he got.
Bottom line: We should cut a deal with our natural ally Putin to keep out of each other's proper sphere of influence -- and let each deal as it wishes with these miserable little third-party troublemakers.
The realists: Don't poke sticks at the Bear. We should define what our strategic interests in the region are. Maybe we can protect Eastern Europe, the Baltic republics and the Ukraine -- but only if we accept that Georgia just isn't part of the equation. We need to back out of the saloon with drawn pistols, and save as much face as we can.
This is a reminder that we forgot the role of honor and fear in international relations when we encouraged weak former Soviet republics merrily to join the West and gratuitously humiliate Russia.
Bottom line: Don't get caught again issuing promises that we can't keep!
The left wing: Putin's unilateral pre-emption was just like our own in Iraq. His recognition of South Ossetia's independence was no different from our own in breakaway Kosovo. So America is just as bad. Russia's attack is the moral equivalent of America arbitrarily removing the tyrant Saddam. It's all about Big Oil and pipelines anyway -- along with Bush, Cheney, Halliburton et al.
Bottom line: Another long overdue comeuppance for the American Empire.
The liberal mainstream: Both sides are at fault. We understand Georgia's plight, but also sympathize with Russia's dilemma. We should consult the United Nations, involve the European Union and encourage European diplomacy. We can learn from the multilateral NATO teamwork in Afghanistan.
Bottom line: Make sure that international institutions don't confuse an empathetic America with cowboy George Bush.
The Europeans: Prioritize! 1) Don't jeopardize gas supplies from, and trade with, Russia; 2) Avoid any confrontation in any form; 3) Make sure that Bush does not do something stupid to draw us too far in, but at least does something to avoid leaving us too far out.
Bottom line: Luckily, Tbilisi is still a long way from Berlin and Paris!
The rest of America: My lord, Putin is acting just like Brezhnev! But they told us that he just wanted to democratize and reform Russia, integrate with NATO and the EU, and help fight radical Islam! So why did he get angry with Georgia when it just wanted to do the same things he was supposed to be doing? That backstabber wasn't honest with us!
Bottom line: Now what?
The more Russia promises to leave Georgia, the more it seems to stay put. One reason may be that Putin keeps counting on us either to be confused, contradictory or angrier at ourselves than at Russia over his latest aggression. And given our inability to speak with one voice, he seems to be absolutely right.
Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and author, most recently, of "A War Like No Other: How the Athenians and Spartans Fought the Peloponnesian War." You can reach him by e-mailing author@victorhanson.com.
© RealClearPolitics 2008
August 21, 2008
The World Reacts to Russia
By Victor Davis Hanson
Everyone is distracted by the Olympics. The squabbling here on the campaign trail consumes the media. Two presidential candidates and a lame-duck president all are weighing in on foreign policy. No wonder Vladimir Putin thought it was a good time to invade Georgia.
Apparently the Russian prime minister knew exactly what he was doing but assumed no one in the West did. And he was right.
Our pundits and politicians are all over the map as Putin is variously portrayed as villain, victim, patriot, tyrant -- and more still.
The neoconservatives: We must make Russia pay a terrible price for subverting a democracy. Our policy of promoting liberal governments among the former Soviet republics, with integration into Europe and relations with NATO, was sound, and it cannot be allowed to be aborted by Putin.
Bottom line: Form a ring of democracies around Russia until it sees the light and likewise evolves into a constitutional state.
The paleoconservatives: Putin is only protecting his rightful national interests in his own backyard, which don't really conflict with ours. You have to admire the old brute for taking care of business. Neocons -- and no doubt Israelis in the background -- provoked that Georgian loudmouthed dandy Saakashvili to stick his head in a noose -- so he deserved the hanging he got.
Bottom line: We should cut a deal with our natural ally Putin to keep out of each other's proper sphere of influence -- and let each deal as it wishes with these miserable little third-party troublemakers.
The realists: Don't poke sticks at the Bear. We should define what our strategic interests in the region are. Maybe we can protect Eastern Europe, the Baltic republics and the Ukraine -- but only if we accept that Georgia just isn't part of the equation. We need to back out of the saloon with drawn pistols, and save as much face as we can.
This is a reminder that we forgot the role of honor and fear in international relations when we encouraged weak former Soviet republics merrily to join the West and gratuitously humiliate Russia.
Bottom line: Don't get caught again issuing promises that we can't keep!
The left wing: Putin's unilateral pre-emption was just like our own in Iraq. His recognition of South Ossetia's independence was no different from our own in breakaway Kosovo. So America is just as bad. Russia's attack is the moral equivalent of America arbitrarily removing the tyrant Saddam. It's all about Big Oil and pipelines anyway -- along with Bush, Cheney, Halliburton et al.
Bottom line: Another long overdue comeuppance for the American Empire.
The liberal mainstream: Both sides are at fault. We understand Georgia's plight, but also sympathize with Russia's dilemma. We should consult the United Nations, involve the European Union and encourage European diplomacy. We can learn from the multilateral NATO teamwork in Afghanistan.
Bottom line: Make sure that international institutions don't confuse an empathetic America with cowboy George Bush.
The Europeans: Prioritize! 1) Don't jeopardize gas supplies from, and trade with, Russia; 2) Avoid any confrontation in any form; 3) Make sure that Bush does not do something stupid to draw us too far in, but at least does something to avoid leaving us too far out.
Bottom line: Luckily, Tbilisi is still a long way from Berlin and Paris!
The rest of America: My lord, Putin is acting just like Brezhnev! But they told us that he just wanted to democratize and reform Russia, integrate with NATO and the EU, and help fight radical Islam! So why did he get angry with Georgia when it just wanted to do the same things he was supposed to be doing? That backstabber wasn't honest with us!
Bottom line: Now what?
The more Russia promises to leave Georgia, the more it seems to stay put. One reason may be that Putin keeps counting on us either to be confused, contradictory or angrier at ourselves than at Russia over his latest aggression. And given our inability to speak with one voice, he seems to be absolutely right.
Victor Davis Hanson is a classicist and historian at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and author, most recently, of "A War Like No Other: How the Athenians and Spartans Fought the Peloponnesian War." You can reach him by e-mailing author@victorhanson.com.
© RealClearPolitics 2008
Time for U.S. to Embrace Constructive Disengagement from the Mideast
http://www.energytribune.com/articles.cfm?aid=974
Posted on Aug. 20, 2008
By Leon Hadar Time for U.S. to Embrace Constructive Disengagement from the Mideast
Obama
Political observers predict that Barack Obama, who has been critical of the Bush Doctrine of promoting unilateral regime change and spreading democracy in the Middle East, is going to transform U.S. policy there. I'm not holding my breath.
Even under the bestcase scenario, some U.S. troops would probably remain in Iraq and other parts of the Persian Gulf, as a way of demonstrating U.S. resolve to defend the oilproducing countries in the region. Washington would still maintain its strong support for Israel and try to mediate another "peace process."
Indeed, under either a Democratic or a Republican president, one should not be surprised to discover that the major element in the neoconservative agenda – maintaining U.S. military and diplomatic hegemony in the Middle East – will likely remain alive and well, producing the neverending vicious circle: more U.S. military interventions, leading to more antiU.S. terrorism, resulting in more regime changes.
A lack of change in U.S. policy could be due to inertia combined with the influences of entrenched bureaucracies and powerful interest groups. But the most important factor making it likely that U.S. interventionism in the Middle East will continue is the survival of the U.S. Middle East Paradigm MEP, which I described in my book, Sandstorm: Policy Failure in the Middle East. The origins of the MEP go back to end of World War II and the Cold War.
Three factors provided the rationale for ongoing U.S. involvement in the Middle East. The first was what were perceived as the necessities dictated by geostrategy. The assumption was that the Soviet Union sought dominance in the region and had to be contained consequently, the United States replaced Britain and France in the role of protecting the interests of the Western alliance in the Middle East.
The second reason had to do with geoeconomics. Given the larger context of the need to counter Soviet moves, Washington figured it was worth the price to be involved in the Middle East, not only to protect U.S. access to Mideast oil, but also to protect the free access of Western economies to the energy resources in the Persian Gulf. It seemed to make strategic sense during the Cold War to let allies have a "free ride" on U.S. military power.
Third, with the establishment of Israel in 1948, the United States underscored its historic and moral commitment to its survival in the Middle East by helping it maintain its margin of security as it coped with hostile Arab neighbors.
These U.S. policies were very costly, involving alliances with military dictators and medieval despots and covert and overt military intervention. But if one accepted the notion that, based on calculations of national interest, Washington should have been engaged in the Middle East during the Cold War, one was also willing to accept the costs involved – including antiAmericanism that produced oil embargoes, embassies held hostage, and, of course, terrorism.
With the end of the Cold War, however, that factor receded in importance. But U.S. policymakers did not reassess the MEP for U.S. policy. Instead, during the administrations of George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton, Washington took advantage of the Soviet collapse and the lack of competition from other global powers and emerged as the dominant power in the Middle East, including through the containment of Iraq and Iran, the extension of U.S. military power to the Persian Gulf, and the efforts to mediate peace between Israel and Arab states.
But these same policies ignited more antiAmericanism, and led to the Second Intifada and then to 9/11. From this perspective, 9/11 should have been seen as a challenge to U.S. dominance in the Middle East. But again, no effort was made to reassess the MEP in fact, the policy paradigm was the framework within which the U.S. response was fashioned. The neoconservatives simply offered a different strategy to achieve U.S. regional supremacy – through regime change and the direct occupation of Arab countries, instead of through the more diplomatic strategy and indirect military approach embraced by earlier administrations.
The costs of following neoconservatives' advice have become apparent. But most critics of the Bush administration still fail to offer anything other than different policies to achieve U.S. hegemony in the region they prefer to maintain the current MEP instead of replacing the bankrupt policy paradigm.
But U.S. policymakers need to recognize that the main rationale for U.S. intervention in the Middle East – the Soviet threat – has long since disappeared, and that U.S. military intervention in the region only ignites antiAmericanism in the form of international terrorism. Moreover, the U.S. economy is not dependent on Mideast oil 70 percent of U.S. energy supplies do not originate in the Middle East. The United States is actually more dependent on Latin American oil than it is on Saudi and Persian Gulf oil. And the notion that U.S. policy in the Middle East helps give Americans access to cheap and affordable oil makes little sense, if one considers the military and other costs – including two Gulf Wars – that are added to the price the U.S. consumer pays for driving.
Indeed, U.S. military force is quite likely unnecessary to maintain access to Persian Gulf oil, either for the United States, Western Europe, or Japan. The oilproducing states have few resources other than oil, and if they don't sell it to somebody, they will have little wealth to maintain their power and curb domestic challenges. They need to sell oil more than the United States needs to buy it. If political and military influence is required to keep oil flowing to Western Europe and Japan, and increasingly China, the countries that are truly dependent should be the ones to bear the cost.
The time has come, therefore, to bid farewell to the old MEP and try to draw the outlines of a new policy in the Middle East. There is a need for a longterm policy of U.S. "constructive disengagement" from the Middle East that will encourage the Europeans and other global and regional players to take the responsibility of securing their interests in the region.
Posted on Aug. 20, 2008
By Leon Hadar Time for U.S. to Embrace Constructive Disengagement from the Mideast
Obama
Political observers predict that Barack Obama, who has been critical of the Bush Doctrine of promoting unilateral regime change and spreading democracy in the Middle East, is going to transform U.S. policy there. I'm not holding my breath.
Even under the bestcase scenario, some U.S. troops would probably remain in Iraq and other parts of the Persian Gulf, as a way of demonstrating U.S. resolve to defend the oilproducing countries in the region. Washington would still maintain its strong support for Israel and try to mediate another "peace process."
Indeed, under either a Democratic or a Republican president, one should not be surprised to discover that the major element in the neoconservative agenda – maintaining U.S. military and diplomatic hegemony in the Middle East – will likely remain alive and well, producing the neverending vicious circle: more U.S. military interventions, leading to more antiU.S. terrorism, resulting in more regime changes.
A lack of change in U.S. policy could be due to inertia combined with the influences of entrenched bureaucracies and powerful interest groups. But the most important factor making it likely that U.S. interventionism in the Middle East will continue is the survival of the U.S. Middle East Paradigm MEP, which I described in my book, Sandstorm: Policy Failure in the Middle East. The origins of the MEP go back to end of World War II and the Cold War.
Three factors provided the rationale for ongoing U.S. involvement in the Middle East. The first was what were perceived as the necessities dictated by geostrategy. The assumption was that the Soviet Union sought dominance in the region and had to be contained consequently, the United States replaced Britain and France in the role of protecting the interests of the Western alliance in the Middle East.
The second reason had to do with geoeconomics. Given the larger context of the need to counter Soviet moves, Washington figured it was worth the price to be involved in the Middle East, not only to protect U.S. access to Mideast oil, but also to protect the free access of Western economies to the energy resources in the Persian Gulf. It seemed to make strategic sense during the Cold War to let allies have a "free ride" on U.S. military power.
Third, with the establishment of Israel in 1948, the United States underscored its historic and moral commitment to its survival in the Middle East by helping it maintain its margin of security as it coped with hostile Arab neighbors.
These U.S. policies were very costly, involving alliances with military dictators and medieval despots and covert and overt military intervention. But if one accepted the notion that, based on calculations of national interest, Washington should have been engaged in the Middle East during the Cold War, one was also willing to accept the costs involved – including antiAmericanism that produced oil embargoes, embassies held hostage, and, of course, terrorism.
With the end of the Cold War, however, that factor receded in importance. But U.S. policymakers did not reassess the MEP for U.S. policy. Instead, during the administrations of George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton, Washington took advantage of the Soviet collapse and the lack of competition from other global powers and emerged as the dominant power in the Middle East, including through the containment of Iraq and Iran, the extension of U.S. military power to the Persian Gulf, and the efforts to mediate peace between Israel and Arab states.
But these same policies ignited more antiAmericanism, and led to the Second Intifada and then to 9/11. From this perspective, 9/11 should have been seen as a challenge to U.S. dominance in the Middle East. But again, no effort was made to reassess the MEP in fact, the policy paradigm was the framework within which the U.S. response was fashioned. The neoconservatives simply offered a different strategy to achieve U.S. regional supremacy – through regime change and the direct occupation of Arab countries, instead of through the more diplomatic strategy and indirect military approach embraced by earlier administrations.
The costs of following neoconservatives' advice have become apparent. But most critics of the Bush administration still fail to offer anything other than different policies to achieve U.S. hegemony in the region they prefer to maintain the current MEP instead of replacing the bankrupt policy paradigm.
But U.S. policymakers need to recognize that the main rationale for U.S. intervention in the Middle East – the Soviet threat – has long since disappeared, and that U.S. military intervention in the region only ignites antiAmericanism in the form of international terrorism. Moreover, the U.S. economy is not dependent on Mideast oil 70 percent of U.S. energy supplies do not originate in the Middle East. The United States is actually more dependent on Latin American oil than it is on Saudi and Persian Gulf oil. And the notion that U.S. policy in the Middle East helps give Americans access to cheap and affordable oil makes little sense, if one considers the military and other costs – including two Gulf Wars – that are added to the price the U.S. consumer pays for driving.
Indeed, U.S. military force is quite likely unnecessary to maintain access to Persian Gulf oil, either for the United States, Western Europe, or Japan. The oilproducing states have few resources other than oil, and if they don't sell it to somebody, they will have little wealth to maintain their power and curb domestic challenges. They need to sell oil more than the United States needs to buy it. If political and military influence is required to keep oil flowing to Western Europe and Japan, and increasingly China, the countries that are truly dependent should be the ones to bear the cost.
The time has come, therefore, to bid farewell to the old MEP and try to draw the outlines of a new policy in the Middle East. There is a need for a longterm policy of U.S. "constructive disengagement" from the Middle East that will encourage the Europeans and other global and regional players to take the responsibility of securing their interests in the region.
Evil in the US elections
http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/imperium/2008/08/2008818858024416.html
Evil in the US elections
By Marwan Bishara,
Al Jazeera's Senior Political Analyst,
New York
I could only shake my head in bewilderment, as I listened to the interviews Rick Warren, a Baptist pastor, conducted with Barack Obama and John McCain, the US presidential candidates for the Democratic and Republican parties, respectively.
Most absurd during the two-hour special were the exchanges about "evil".
When asked how they would deal with evil if they were elected president - would they ignore it, negotiate with it, contain it, or defeat it - Obama said he would "confront it" while McCain said unflinchingly that he would "defeat it".
After this "civil forum" was broadcast on CNN, the network's so-called "best team on television" commented on the candidates' performance.
This only managed to add insult to injury.
One pundit commended McCain's steadfastness and courage in wanting to defeat, not merely confront, evil if elected president.
For the Republican contender evil is embodied in communism, Islamic fundamentalism and notably Osama Bin Laden, who he promised to hunt down.
Obama was also praised for acknowledging the existence of evil. He thought it present in Darfur but also on the streets of the US as well as in homes where parents abuse their children, and so on.
Evil is the enemy
The last time I checked, there was no legal or strategic interpretation of evil. An open-ended war on evil leads to Armageddon.
It makes absolutely no sense for a future leader of a superpower to speak of dealing with "evil" as commander-in-chief unless this term is used as populist propaganda during election season.
The threat of evil necessitates some sort of definition, otherwise, how can any president evaluate evil and apply the necessary measures to "confront it" or "defeat it"?
Sectarian and tribal wars in Africa and Asia, like religious fundamentalism, are modern phenomena that need to be rationalised first and foremost within our modern world.
In order to be defused or prevented altogether, such conflicts must not be defined or determined by the universal fight between good and evil.
The same applies to street gangs and abusive parents; they require rational explanation and social analyses in order to deter them or best prevent them form carrying out their actions.
In all such cases of violence, there is an urgent need for education, justice, fairness and the rule of law as well as a moral compass, not some religious crusade, to guide us.
But the US media was more than happy to report how the Democratic and Republican candidates were speaking of confronting and defeating evil.
In doing this, US media has pandered to the religious majority in the country.
Religiosity in the US
According to a Pew June 2008 study, 92 per cent of Americans believe in God or a universal spirit, and nearly 80 per cent think miracles occur.
Most Americans believe that angels and demons are active in the world, and one in five Christians speaks or prays in tongues - ecstatic worship or prayer using unintelligible speech.
But while the US has traditionally been religious, it has also been traditionally tolerant.
Since the 1960s, evangelical churches have become politically proactive as faith-based organisations went on to exercise increasing influence over politics in the US and especially within the Republican party.
In recent years, the less strident and more mainstream Christian and evangelical churches like Warren's Saddleback where the two candidates were interviewed, became more active then the southern right-wing churches represented by the likes of Pat Robertson.
The fact that McCain and Obama's first joint appearance (not debate) was coordinated and hosted by an influential religious preacher speaks volumes about the influence of organised religion on politics in the US.
Politics in a bubble
Such theological/political journalism is unthinkable anywhere in Europe or in so-called democracies around the world. Calling one's enemy or their ideology or religion evil is the language normally used by such groups as al-Qaeda, not constitutional democracies.
If religious interviews were done with such fanfare and influence in a Muslim country, democratic or otherwise, western and especially US media would have made mockery of such an imposition of religious fundamentalism on political process.
For most outsiders, the US is in denial over its own "evil doing" around the world. Obama and McCain could see evil in Darfur but would not admit that the invasion and occupation of Iraq on false premises or for oil is no less an evil act.
To his credit, Obama broke out of the delusional discourse of the US as the-city-on-a-hill to underline the need for humility when confronting evil so that the US does not perpetrate its own evils.
But for some people around the world, it may be a bit late for that.
Alas.
Evil in the US elections
By Marwan Bishara,
Al Jazeera's Senior Political Analyst,
New York
I could only shake my head in bewilderment, as I listened to the interviews Rick Warren, a Baptist pastor, conducted with Barack Obama and John McCain, the US presidential candidates for the Democratic and Republican parties, respectively.
Most absurd during the two-hour special were the exchanges about "evil".
When asked how they would deal with evil if they were elected president - would they ignore it, negotiate with it, contain it, or defeat it - Obama said he would "confront it" while McCain said unflinchingly that he would "defeat it".
After this "civil forum" was broadcast on CNN, the network's so-called "best team on television" commented on the candidates' performance.
This only managed to add insult to injury.
One pundit commended McCain's steadfastness and courage in wanting to defeat, not merely confront, evil if elected president.
For the Republican contender evil is embodied in communism, Islamic fundamentalism and notably Osama Bin Laden, who he promised to hunt down.
Obama was also praised for acknowledging the existence of evil. He thought it present in Darfur but also on the streets of the US as well as in homes where parents abuse their children, and so on.
Evil is the enemy
The last time I checked, there was no legal or strategic interpretation of evil. An open-ended war on evil leads to Armageddon.
It makes absolutely no sense for a future leader of a superpower to speak of dealing with "evil" as commander-in-chief unless this term is used as populist propaganda during election season.
The threat of evil necessitates some sort of definition, otherwise, how can any president evaluate evil and apply the necessary measures to "confront it" or "defeat it"?
Sectarian and tribal wars in Africa and Asia, like religious fundamentalism, are modern phenomena that need to be rationalised first and foremost within our modern world.
In order to be defused or prevented altogether, such conflicts must not be defined or determined by the universal fight between good and evil.
The same applies to street gangs and abusive parents; they require rational explanation and social analyses in order to deter them or best prevent them form carrying out their actions.
In all such cases of violence, there is an urgent need for education, justice, fairness and the rule of law as well as a moral compass, not some religious crusade, to guide us.
But the US media was more than happy to report how the Democratic and Republican candidates were speaking of confronting and defeating evil.
In doing this, US media has pandered to the religious majority in the country.
Religiosity in the US
According to a Pew June 2008 study, 92 per cent of Americans believe in God or a universal spirit, and nearly 80 per cent think miracles occur.
Most Americans believe that angels and demons are active in the world, and one in five Christians speaks or prays in tongues - ecstatic worship or prayer using unintelligible speech.
But while the US has traditionally been religious, it has also been traditionally tolerant.
Since the 1960s, evangelical churches have become politically proactive as faith-based organisations went on to exercise increasing influence over politics in the US and especially within the Republican party.
In recent years, the less strident and more mainstream Christian and evangelical churches like Warren's Saddleback where the two candidates were interviewed, became more active then the southern right-wing churches represented by the likes of Pat Robertson.
The fact that McCain and Obama's first joint appearance (not debate) was coordinated and hosted by an influential religious preacher speaks volumes about the influence of organised religion on politics in the US.
Politics in a bubble
Such theological/political journalism is unthinkable anywhere in Europe or in so-called democracies around the world. Calling one's enemy or their ideology or religion evil is the language normally used by such groups as al-Qaeda, not constitutional democracies.
If religious interviews were done with such fanfare and influence in a Muslim country, democratic or otherwise, western and especially US media would have made mockery of such an imposition of religious fundamentalism on political process.
For most outsiders, the US is in denial over its own "evil doing" around the world. Obama and McCain could see evil in Darfur but would not admit that the invasion and occupation of Iraq on false premises or for oil is no less an evil act.
To his credit, Obama broke out of the delusional discourse of the US as the-city-on-a-hill to underline the need for humility when confronting evil so that the US does not perpetrate its own evils.
But for some people around the world, it may be a bit late for that.
Alas.
Bitterlemons-International Middle East Roundtable August 21, 2008, The Regional Dimension of Palestinian Disunity
bitterlemons-international.org
Middle East Roundtable
Edition 33 Volume 6 - August 21, 2008
The regional dimension of Palestinian disunity
• Jordan-Hamas: the untold story - Saad Hattar
Jordan and Hamas both have vested interests in reviving their once strong bonds.
• It's Israel's dilemma - Elias Samo
Syria is sitting tight while watching Israel twist in the wind.
• Ending the divide is a long-term endeavor - Gamal A. G. Soltan
Containing Hamas is still Egypt's strategy, but under increasingly strict terms.
Jordan-Hamas: the untold story
Saad Hattar
Jordan's move to thaw relations with the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) following nine years of estrangement has raised eyebrows as to the timing and the motives behind this tactic.
Internal and external factors dictated the rapprochement amid growing Jordanian dismay at US and Israeli behavior--the kingdom's main strategic allies since the turn of the century. Hence, the timing bears significance considering the last months of President George W. Bush's tenure and Israel's political paralysis. On the other side, the Palestinian Authority led by Mahmoud Abbas looks headed toward failure in light of Hamas' pounding and US-Israeli indifference.
Anxious about the deadlocked Palestinian track, the dwindling prospects for a viable Palestinian state and disenchanted with the lip service paid by the outgoing Republican administration, Jordan has moved fast to rebuild ties with Hamas--an arch enemy of the PA in the West Bank and an offshoot of the powerful Muslim Brotherhood.
Jordan's concerns are strategic. If the prospects for a Palestinian state diminish, it revives the old notion of the Jordan option, positing the kingdom as an alternative state for Palestinians. Jordan is home to 1.9 million Palestinian refugees, 41 percent of the UNRWA-registered refugees in the region and more than 50 percent of Jordan's population.
Jordan is not happy with the performance of Fateh, and Abbas has become a lame duck president pending new elections. There is a growing belief that Khaled Mishaal will become the next president, as Hamas seems bound to win any upcoming elections in the occupied Palestinian territories. But the call for dialogue came from Hamas, which has grown discontent with the increasing boundaries laid down by host countries from Syria to Iran.
The rapprochement with Hamas started two months ago with a preliminary meeting. Subsequently, two rounds of dialogue were held between GID (Jordanian Intelligence Services) Director General Lt. General Mohammad Thahabi and Hamas representatives led by Mohammad Nazzal.
The Beirut-based Nazzal was declared persona non grata in 1999, when the authorities here expelled five Hamas leaders, notably the head of the movement's political bureau Khaled Mishaal. Since then Mishaal has been living between Damascus and Doha. Before 1999, however, the late King Hussein used Hamas as a bargaining chip in the face of nationalist PLO leader Yasser Arafat--who sought to keep Jordan at bay from the West Bank. Since then, the kingdom's strategy shifted and it now considers the creation of a Palestinian state "a higher national interest".
Jordan and Hamas both have vested interests in reviving their once strong bonds--for their own respective benefits. Jordan wants Hamas to acknowledge its 1988 severance of ties with the West Bank (part of the kingdom between 1950 and 1967) halt any meddling in the country's affairs or intertwining politically with the Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan, the most influential party on the local scene.
Parallel to the dialogue with Hamas, the authorities reopened channels here with the Islamic current, ending a decade of cold relations inspired by the tense ties with Hamas. Analysts see this move as a preemptive tactic to contain looming threats to Jordan. Since its inception in 1946, the Brotherhood has functioned as a social safety valve in a traditionally religious state, especially at crucial junctures: the assassination of Jordan's founder King Abdullah I in July 1951; the alleged military putsch in 1957 attributed to leftist parties; the 1967 Arab-Israeli war and the show-down pitting the Jordanian army against PLO factions in 1970.
Hamas seems fed up with the limited maneuvers imposed on it by its regional allies and interlocutors Syria, Iran, Egypt and Qatar. Many Hamas leaders find in Jordan a strategic depth with fewer red lines to cross than is the case in the other countries. Iran has not been happy with the domino-effect detente across the region: indirect negotiations between Syria and Israel, Egypt-brokered calm in Gaza and the German-brokered swap of PoWs between Hizballah and Israel. All these moves have not distracted US attention from the simmering nuclear file, and Hamas has been forced to restrain itself as a result.
Although Jordan labels its dialogue with Hamas as security-oriented, leaks suggest that the kingdom might exploit its revived good offices with Hamas to win the release of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit--believed to be in the custody of Hamas militants since he was captured in Gaza two years ago.
Hence, the rapprochement with Hamas and its local ally the Muslim Brotherhood could serve as a safety valve in case of future pressure on Jordan for some kind of a link-up with what will be left of the West Bank.
On the other side of the compass, King Abdullah II made a breakthrough visit last week to Baghdad, the first by an Arab leader to war-torn Iraq since the US invasion in 2003. Economic and strategic considerations took the king to oil-rich Iraq. The step provoked Jordan's strategic western allies, its peace treaty partner Israel and close partner the PA.
Officially, Jordan insists that those meetings fell within tactics to diversify its options in a fast-changing region, where old allies trade trenches and the prospects of an independent Palestinian state fade away. Nor are they designed to undermine the authority of Abbas, Jordan's traditional ally. Likewise, Jordan has no plans to rescind the peace treaty with Israel or give up its strategic alliance with the US--Jordan's major donor state.
Jordan has reached a stage, however, where it has to reshuffle its cards ahead of possible crucial changes west of the Jordan River. The "lip service" paid by President Bush to the creation of a Palestinian state at the end of 2008 is not taken seriously in political circles here.- Published 21/8/2008 © bitterlemons-international.org
Saad Hattar is deputy editor of Jordan's al-Ghad newspaper
It's Israel's dilemma
Elias Samo
The Israelis want to make peace with the Palestinians, they say. But they are facing a dilemma of a divided people, part of which rejects the existence of Israel and neither part of which has a leader strong enough to make the hard decisions. The Israeli dilemma reminds us of the child who killed his parents and then pleaded with the judge for mercy because he is an orphan.
This raises two interesting points. First, if one were to compare the division of the Palestinians and their lack of a strong leader--which according to Israel are the reasons for the stalled peace process--with the division of the Israelis and the status of their present leadership, there is no contest as to whom to blame. At least the Palestinian leadership, despite all its difficulties and handicaps, has been able to fulfill many of its commitments made in past agreements. By comparison, the Israelis have maintained their intransigence with total disregard for the dignity of Palestinians, no action on freezing settlements or removing illegal ones--in fact expanding them and erecting new ones--while maintaining dehumanizing checkpoints and taking no serious action to release prisoners.
No wonder Gaza has become Hamas-land. In fact, if present Israeli policies continue, Hamas will become stronger; it appears that only a miracle can prevent the West Bank from becoming Hamas-land as well.
Second, the Palestinians are divided and lack leadership, but there was a time when they were not so divided, there was no Hamas-land and there was a charismatic Palestinian leader who symbolized, represented and spoke authoritatively for the Palestinians. He was willing and eager to deal, but what did the Israelis do? They emasculated, contained and ultimately, some believe, neutralized him. The Israelis practiced the old colonial dictum of divide and rule, and it has backfired.
The Israeli policies that brought about Hamas are the same ones that created the dilemma of Hizballah, a confident military establishment that in the summer of 2006 successfully confronted the legendary Israeli military machine. The Israelis are screaming foul, because Hizballah is improving its military capability with the help of Syria and Iran. It is kosher for Israel to improve its military capability, but for Hizballah to do so is sacrilegious. If this is not a double standard, what is? Israel and Hizballah are two military entities that confront each other; they have equal rights to improve their military status. As the Americans say, what is good for the goose is good for the gander.
How does Syria figure in all this? It is sitting tight watching Israel twist in the wind. Israel's dilemmas are Syria's blessings in disguise, for these dilemmas--coupled with the special relations Syria has with both Hamas, whose leadership resides in Damascus, and Hizballah--provide Syria with a major role, almost a veto power, in the Arab-Israel conflict, assuring it that the Golan is part of the package and remains on the front burner, not marginalized and frozen indefinitely.
Mystifying are the Israelis! They helped create these dilemmas and paved the way for their prominence and success and now they are demanding, actually pleading with Syria, to contain and restrain them. Mystifying are the Israelis and the Americans! They worked hard to isolate and marginalize Syria, forcing it to develop closer ties with Iran and are now demanding, actually pleading with Damascus, to sever its ties with Tehran.
In recent years, the Americans along with the Israelis have viewed Syria as an evil spoiler. Why not give it the benefit of the doubt, view it as a serious and constructive peace partner and engage it in a serious peace process? This is now particularly timely since the American crusade for democracy and human rights has vanished, eliminating a major point of contention. Such a move would undoubtedly have a positive impact on resolving Israel's dilemmas.
However, the Israelis are not showing any such willingness. In the recent peace initiative with the Syrians and despite their internal and external dilemmas and setbacks, the Israelis have raised their demands--Hamas, Hizballah and Iran--and lowered their offers, some would say reneged on previous agreements and understandings. This amounts to procrastination if not obstruction, as if the Israelis have the luxury of time. They don't.
The June 1967 war proved that Israel was a giant among midgets. However, Israeli arrogance and mismanagement of that decisive victory--Sharm al-Sheikh should never have been declared more important than peace with the Arabs--coupled with Arab division and uncertainty never gave peace a chance. Had the Israelis seized the many opportunities for peace, and they were there, there would have been no reason for the rise of Hamas, Hizballah and perhaps political Islam, or at least the process would have been delayed. Even nuclear Iran, under conditions of Arab-Israel peace, would not be more "royal than the king".
With the passage of time, the giant began to shrink and some of the midgets have given birth to little giants growing in quantity and quality to haunt Israel. The Israelis have created their own bogey men and they will live or die with them.- Published 21/8/2008 © bitterlemons-international.org
Elias Samo is professor of international relations at American and Syrian universities.
Ending the divide is a long-term endeavor
Gamal A. G. Soltan
The current divide in Palestinian politics is likely to continue for a long time to come. The ideological and political gap between the nationalist Fateh and the Islamist Hamas is too deep. Chances for either faction to compromise with its rival are very slim.
Since Hamas took over the Gaza Strip, Egypt's strategy has been to keep Hamas at arm's length in order to contain it. While persistent in denying Hamas the gains it sought when it took control over Gaza, Egypt is also keen not to fully alienate Hamas. The intermittent opening of the Rafah crossing, mediating the Hamas-Israel negotiations toward the completion of a prisoner exchange deal and mediating relations between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah are some of the ways Egypt contains Hamas.
Mutual mistrust between Hamas and Egypt, however, does not allow Egypt's strategy to fully succeed. Hamas is exploiting the tragedy of besieged civilians in Gaza to embarrass Egypt. The breach of Egypt's borders with Gaza earlier this year was a learning experience for Cairo regarding the limits of the working relations it can develop with Hamas. The latter's reluctance to accept Egypt's efforts to cut a prisoner exchange deal between it and Israel is another indication of the limits of Egypt's Hamas strategy. The recent atrocities committed by Hamas' militia against a pro-Fateh armed clan in Gaza demonstrate Hamas' relentless effort to establish itself as the sole armed power in Gaza.
Thus containing Hamas is still Egypt's strategy, but under increasingly strict terms. Fortifying the border with Gaza and deploying larger numbers of better equipped security forces there have been proven effective in denying Hamas the opportunity to replicate the experience of last January. Applying stricter measures at the Egypt-Gaza border to limit tunnel-smuggling is instrumental toward the same purpose. A display of impatience at Hamas' tactic of avoiding serious talks with the PA and Fateh is another sign of Egypt's changing policy toward Hamas.
There is no reason to believe that Egypt's strict policy can cause major changes in Hamas' strategy in the near future. The Islamist movement's hard-line policy is a function of the resources it can mobilize region-wide. These include assistance provided by Iran and Syria as well as widespread popular support from disenchanted people in diverse Arab countries. Changing the regional environment that has proved to be conducive to the rise of radicalism and Islamism is a long-term strategy pursued by Egypt and like-minded Arab countries.
Divided Palestine in many ways resembles other divided countries in the post-WWII era. Germany, Vietnam, China and Korea have been divided along the ideological lines that split the post-war world. The nationalist-Islamist divide in Palestine is a function of the regional ideological divide between moderates and radicals. This is the Middle East's cold war, in which states that are divided along ideological lines are not likely to restore unity until major systemic changes are brought about. Stabilizing the regional system of states in the Middle East should contribute to the cohesion and stability of the region's failing states, Palestine included.
Efforts to reconcile Palestinian factions should not be abandoned, however. Lasting peace in the Middle East cannot be achieved with two rival Palestinian mini-states in place. It is important to keep Palestinian factions under pressure to reconcile. Efforts in that direction should constrain their mutual enmity. Consolidating the PNA and enhancing its legitimacy as the future Palestinian state is a pivotal piece in the Middle East puzzle. Moderating Hamas is a must-do task. It is important to deny Hamas the legitimacy it is seeking independent of the institutions of the PNA. It is equally important to make Fateh and the PNA the robust center of the Palestinian polity. Demonstrating that moderation pays is central to the success of this approach--something that only Israel and the United States can do.
Bringing change to the regional environment in the Middle East is far beyond the capacity of any single actor. Serious change can be brought about only through the collective and concerted efforts of a number of actors from within and without the region. Here Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, Israel, the US and the European Union are instrumental.
The Middle East peace process is the main factor that could produce the desired effect. A breakthrough in the peace process is not likely in the remaining months of 2008. Only the arrival of a new president to the White House is likely to have a positive effect on our region. Declining US influence in the Middle East in the years that followed the invasion of Iraq has encouraged revisionist forces led by Iran. The rise of Hamas to power and the parallel decline of Fateh should be seen within this context. A new leadership in Washington should allow the US to engage in a major overhaul of its Middle East policy.
The region itself is already warming to the expected change in the US. Peace talks between Syria and Israel, new trends in Syrian foreign policy and limited progress in Lebanon are some of the important indicators in that direction. Recent extensive talks among heads of leading Arab states are geared to address the same concerns. While the Middle East has to wait for the new occupant of the White House, regional actors should nevertheless use the next few months to demonstrate that peace in the Middle East is a viable endeavor.- Published 21/8/2008 © bitterlemons-international.org
Gamal A. G. Soltan is a senior research fellow at Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies in Cairo and a visiting professor of political science at the American University in Cairo.
Bitterlemons-international.org is an internet forum for an array of world perspectives on the Middle East and its specific concerns. It aspires to engender greater understanding about the Middle East region and open a new common space for world thinkers and political leaders to present their viewpoints and initiatives on the region. Editors Ghassan Khatib and Yossi Alpher can be reached at ghassan@bitterlemons-international.org and yossi@bitterlemons-international.org, respectively.
Middle East Roundtable
Edition 33 Volume 6 - August 21, 2008
The regional dimension of Palestinian disunity
• Jordan-Hamas: the untold story - Saad Hattar
Jordan and Hamas both have vested interests in reviving their once strong bonds.
• It's Israel's dilemma - Elias Samo
Syria is sitting tight while watching Israel twist in the wind.
• Ending the divide is a long-term endeavor - Gamal A. G. Soltan
Containing Hamas is still Egypt's strategy, but under increasingly strict terms.
Jordan-Hamas: the untold story
Saad Hattar
Jordan's move to thaw relations with the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) following nine years of estrangement has raised eyebrows as to the timing and the motives behind this tactic.
Internal and external factors dictated the rapprochement amid growing Jordanian dismay at US and Israeli behavior--the kingdom's main strategic allies since the turn of the century. Hence, the timing bears significance considering the last months of President George W. Bush's tenure and Israel's political paralysis. On the other side, the Palestinian Authority led by Mahmoud Abbas looks headed toward failure in light of Hamas' pounding and US-Israeli indifference.
Anxious about the deadlocked Palestinian track, the dwindling prospects for a viable Palestinian state and disenchanted with the lip service paid by the outgoing Republican administration, Jordan has moved fast to rebuild ties with Hamas--an arch enemy of the PA in the West Bank and an offshoot of the powerful Muslim Brotherhood.
Jordan's concerns are strategic. If the prospects for a Palestinian state diminish, it revives the old notion of the Jordan option, positing the kingdom as an alternative state for Palestinians. Jordan is home to 1.9 million Palestinian refugees, 41 percent of the UNRWA-registered refugees in the region and more than 50 percent of Jordan's population.
Jordan is not happy with the performance of Fateh, and Abbas has become a lame duck president pending new elections. There is a growing belief that Khaled Mishaal will become the next president, as Hamas seems bound to win any upcoming elections in the occupied Palestinian territories. But the call for dialogue came from Hamas, which has grown discontent with the increasing boundaries laid down by host countries from Syria to Iran.
The rapprochement with Hamas started two months ago with a preliminary meeting. Subsequently, two rounds of dialogue were held between GID (Jordanian Intelligence Services) Director General Lt. General Mohammad Thahabi and Hamas representatives led by Mohammad Nazzal.
The Beirut-based Nazzal was declared persona non grata in 1999, when the authorities here expelled five Hamas leaders, notably the head of the movement's political bureau Khaled Mishaal. Since then Mishaal has been living between Damascus and Doha. Before 1999, however, the late King Hussein used Hamas as a bargaining chip in the face of nationalist PLO leader Yasser Arafat--who sought to keep Jordan at bay from the West Bank. Since then, the kingdom's strategy shifted and it now considers the creation of a Palestinian state "a higher national interest".
Jordan and Hamas both have vested interests in reviving their once strong bonds--for their own respective benefits. Jordan wants Hamas to acknowledge its 1988 severance of ties with the West Bank (part of the kingdom between 1950 and 1967) halt any meddling in the country's affairs or intertwining politically with the Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan, the most influential party on the local scene.
Parallel to the dialogue with Hamas, the authorities reopened channels here with the Islamic current, ending a decade of cold relations inspired by the tense ties with Hamas. Analysts see this move as a preemptive tactic to contain looming threats to Jordan. Since its inception in 1946, the Brotherhood has functioned as a social safety valve in a traditionally religious state, especially at crucial junctures: the assassination of Jordan's founder King Abdullah I in July 1951; the alleged military putsch in 1957 attributed to leftist parties; the 1967 Arab-Israeli war and the show-down pitting the Jordanian army against PLO factions in 1970.
Hamas seems fed up with the limited maneuvers imposed on it by its regional allies and interlocutors Syria, Iran, Egypt and Qatar. Many Hamas leaders find in Jordan a strategic depth with fewer red lines to cross than is the case in the other countries. Iran has not been happy with the domino-effect detente across the region: indirect negotiations between Syria and Israel, Egypt-brokered calm in Gaza and the German-brokered swap of PoWs between Hizballah and Israel. All these moves have not distracted US attention from the simmering nuclear file, and Hamas has been forced to restrain itself as a result.
Although Jordan labels its dialogue with Hamas as security-oriented, leaks suggest that the kingdom might exploit its revived good offices with Hamas to win the release of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit--believed to be in the custody of Hamas militants since he was captured in Gaza two years ago.
Hence, the rapprochement with Hamas and its local ally the Muslim Brotherhood could serve as a safety valve in case of future pressure on Jordan for some kind of a link-up with what will be left of the West Bank.
On the other side of the compass, King Abdullah II made a breakthrough visit last week to Baghdad, the first by an Arab leader to war-torn Iraq since the US invasion in 2003. Economic and strategic considerations took the king to oil-rich Iraq. The step provoked Jordan's strategic western allies, its peace treaty partner Israel and close partner the PA.
Officially, Jordan insists that those meetings fell within tactics to diversify its options in a fast-changing region, where old allies trade trenches and the prospects of an independent Palestinian state fade away. Nor are they designed to undermine the authority of Abbas, Jordan's traditional ally. Likewise, Jordan has no plans to rescind the peace treaty with Israel or give up its strategic alliance with the US--Jordan's major donor state.
Jordan has reached a stage, however, where it has to reshuffle its cards ahead of possible crucial changes west of the Jordan River. The "lip service" paid by President Bush to the creation of a Palestinian state at the end of 2008 is not taken seriously in political circles here.- Published 21/8/2008 © bitterlemons-international.org
Saad Hattar is deputy editor of Jordan's al-Ghad newspaper
It's Israel's dilemma
Elias Samo
The Israelis want to make peace with the Palestinians, they say. But they are facing a dilemma of a divided people, part of which rejects the existence of Israel and neither part of which has a leader strong enough to make the hard decisions. The Israeli dilemma reminds us of the child who killed his parents and then pleaded with the judge for mercy because he is an orphan.
This raises two interesting points. First, if one were to compare the division of the Palestinians and their lack of a strong leader--which according to Israel are the reasons for the stalled peace process--with the division of the Israelis and the status of their present leadership, there is no contest as to whom to blame. At least the Palestinian leadership, despite all its difficulties and handicaps, has been able to fulfill many of its commitments made in past agreements. By comparison, the Israelis have maintained their intransigence with total disregard for the dignity of Palestinians, no action on freezing settlements or removing illegal ones--in fact expanding them and erecting new ones--while maintaining dehumanizing checkpoints and taking no serious action to release prisoners.
No wonder Gaza has become Hamas-land. In fact, if present Israeli policies continue, Hamas will become stronger; it appears that only a miracle can prevent the West Bank from becoming Hamas-land as well.
Second, the Palestinians are divided and lack leadership, but there was a time when they were not so divided, there was no Hamas-land and there was a charismatic Palestinian leader who symbolized, represented and spoke authoritatively for the Palestinians. He was willing and eager to deal, but what did the Israelis do? They emasculated, contained and ultimately, some believe, neutralized him. The Israelis practiced the old colonial dictum of divide and rule, and it has backfired.
The Israeli policies that brought about Hamas are the same ones that created the dilemma of Hizballah, a confident military establishment that in the summer of 2006 successfully confronted the legendary Israeli military machine. The Israelis are screaming foul, because Hizballah is improving its military capability with the help of Syria and Iran. It is kosher for Israel to improve its military capability, but for Hizballah to do so is sacrilegious. If this is not a double standard, what is? Israel and Hizballah are two military entities that confront each other; they have equal rights to improve their military status. As the Americans say, what is good for the goose is good for the gander.
How does Syria figure in all this? It is sitting tight watching Israel twist in the wind. Israel's dilemmas are Syria's blessings in disguise, for these dilemmas--coupled with the special relations Syria has with both Hamas, whose leadership resides in Damascus, and Hizballah--provide Syria with a major role, almost a veto power, in the Arab-Israel conflict, assuring it that the Golan is part of the package and remains on the front burner, not marginalized and frozen indefinitely.
Mystifying are the Israelis! They helped create these dilemmas and paved the way for their prominence and success and now they are demanding, actually pleading with Syria, to contain and restrain them. Mystifying are the Israelis and the Americans! They worked hard to isolate and marginalize Syria, forcing it to develop closer ties with Iran and are now demanding, actually pleading with Damascus, to sever its ties with Tehran.
In recent years, the Americans along with the Israelis have viewed Syria as an evil spoiler. Why not give it the benefit of the doubt, view it as a serious and constructive peace partner and engage it in a serious peace process? This is now particularly timely since the American crusade for democracy and human rights has vanished, eliminating a major point of contention. Such a move would undoubtedly have a positive impact on resolving Israel's dilemmas.
However, the Israelis are not showing any such willingness. In the recent peace initiative with the Syrians and despite their internal and external dilemmas and setbacks, the Israelis have raised their demands--Hamas, Hizballah and Iran--and lowered their offers, some would say reneged on previous agreements and understandings. This amounts to procrastination if not obstruction, as if the Israelis have the luxury of time. They don't.
The June 1967 war proved that Israel was a giant among midgets. However, Israeli arrogance and mismanagement of that decisive victory--Sharm al-Sheikh should never have been declared more important than peace with the Arabs--coupled with Arab division and uncertainty never gave peace a chance. Had the Israelis seized the many opportunities for peace, and they were there, there would have been no reason for the rise of Hamas, Hizballah and perhaps political Islam, or at least the process would have been delayed. Even nuclear Iran, under conditions of Arab-Israel peace, would not be more "royal than the king".
With the passage of time, the giant began to shrink and some of the midgets have given birth to little giants growing in quantity and quality to haunt Israel. The Israelis have created their own bogey men and they will live or die with them.- Published 21/8/2008 © bitterlemons-international.org
Elias Samo is professor of international relations at American and Syrian universities.
Ending the divide is a long-term endeavor
Gamal A. G. Soltan
The current divide in Palestinian politics is likely to continue for a long time to come. The ideological and political gap between the nationalist Fateh and the Islamist Hamas is too deep. Chances for either faction to compromise with its rival are very slim.
Since Hamas took over the Gaza Strip, Egypt's strategy has been to keep Hamas at arm's length in order to contain it. While persistent in denying Hamas the gains it sought when it took control over Gaza, Egypt is also keen not to fully alienate Hamas. The intermittent opening of the Rafah crossing, mediating the Hamas-Israel negotiations toward the completion of a prisoner exchange deal and mediating relations between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah are some of the ways Egypt contains Hamas.
Mutual mistrust between Hamas and Egypt, however, does not allow Egypt's strategy to fully succeed. Hamas is exploiting the tragedy of besieged civilians in Gaza to embarrass Egypt. The breach of Egypt's borders with Gaza earlier this year was a learning experience for Cairo regarding the limits of the working relations it can develop with Hamas. The latter's reluctance to accept Egypt's efforts to cut a prisoner exchange deal between it and Israel is another indication of the limits of Egypt's Hamas strategy. The recent atrocities committed by Hamas' militia against a pro-Fateh armed clan in Gaza demonstrate Hamas' relentless effort to establish itself as the sole armed power in Gaza.
Thus containing Hamas is still Egypt's strategy, but under increasingly strict terms. Fortifying the border with Gaza and deploying larger numbers of better equipped security forces there have been proven effective in denying Hamas the opportunity to replicate the experience of last January. Applying stricter measures at the Egypt-Gaza border to limit tunnel-smuggling is instrumental toward the same purpose. A display of impatience at Hamas' tactic of avoiding serious talks with the PA and Fateh is another sign of Egypt's changing policy toward Hamas.
There is no reason to believe that Egypt's strict policy can cause major changes in Hamas' strategy in the near future. The Islamist movement's hard-line policy is a function of the resources it can mobilize region-wide. These include assistance provided by Iran and Syria as well as widespread popular support from disenchanted people in diverse Arab countries. Changing the regional environment that has proved to be conducive to the rise of radicalism and Islamism is a long-term strategy pursued by Egypt and like-minded Arab countries.
Divided Palestine in many ways resembles other divided countries in the post-WWII era. Germany, Vietnam, China and Korea have been divided along the ideological lines that split the post-war world. The nationalist-Islamist divide in Palestine is a function of the regional ideological divide between moderates and radicals. This is the Middle East's cold war, in which states that are divided along ideological lines are not likely to restore unity until major systemic changes are brought about. Stabilizing the regional system of states in the Middle East should contribute to the cohesion and stability of the region's failing states, Palestine included.
Efforts to reconcile Palestinian factions should not be abandoned, however. Lasting peace in the Middle East cannot be achieved with two rival Palestinian mini-states in place. It is important to keep Palestinian factions under pressure to reconcile. Efforts in that direction should constrain their mutual enmity. Consolidating the PNA and enhancing its legitimacy as the future Palestinian state is a pivotal piece in the Middle East puzzle. Moderating Hamas is a must-do task. It is important to deny Hamas the legitimacy it is seeking independent of the institutions of the PNA. It is equally important to make Fateh and the PNA the robust center of the Palestinian polity. Demonstrating that moderation pays is central to the success of this approach--something that only Israel and the United States can do.
Bringing change to the regional environment in the Middle East is far beyond the capacity of any single actor. Serious change can be brought about only through the collective and concerted efforts of a number of actors from within and without the region. Here Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, Israel, the US and the European Union are instrumental.
The Middle East peace process is the main factor that could produce the desired effect. A breakthrough in the peace process is not likely in the remaining months of 2008. Only the arrival of a new president to the White House is likely to have a positive effect on our region. Declining US influence in the Middle East in the years that followed the invasion of Iraq has encouraged revisionist forces led by Iran. The rise of Hamas to power and the parallel decline of Fateh should be seen within this context. A new leadership in Washington should allow the US to engage in a major overhaul of its Middle East policy.
The region itself is already warming to the expected change in the US. Peace talks between Syria and Israel, new trends in Syrian foreign policy and limited progress in Lebanon are some of the important indicators in that direction. Recent extensive talks among heads of leading Arab states are geared to address the same concerns. While the Middle East has to wait for the new occupant of the White House, regional actors should nevertheless use the next few months to demonstrate that peace in the Middle East is a viable endeavor.- Published 21/8/2008 © bitterlemons-international.org
Gamal A. G. Soltan is a senior research fellow at Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies in Cairo and a visiting professor of political science at the American University in Cairo.
Bitterlemons-international.org is an internet forum for an array of world perspectives on the Middle East and its specific concerns. It aspires to engender greater understanding about the Middle East region and open a new common space for world thinkers and political leaders to present their viewpoints and initiatives on the region. Editors Ghassan Khatib and Yossi Alpher can be reached at ghassan@bitterlemons-international.org and yossi@bitterlemons-international.org, respectively.
On Chinese, European & American Universities
http://www.redorbit.com/news/education/1526725/on_chinese_european__american_universities/index.html
On Chinese, European & American Universities
Posted on: Tuesday, 19 August 2008
By Kirby, William C
In North America and in Europe, the past three decades have seen an
unprecedented expansion of higher education and, in the most recent
time, efforts at reform and restructuring.1 My own university,
Harvard, has overhauled its undergraduate curriculum in a
comprehensive fashion for the first time in thirty years. European
universities have witnessed even more thoroughgoing changes in the
structure of undergraduate education.
But perhaps nowhere on earth have recent decades seen more revolutionary change in higher education
than in the People's Republic of China. Thirty years ago, Chinese
universities were just reopening after the catastrophe of the Cultural
Revolution. Today they are poised for positions of international
leadership in research and education.
The case of Wuhan University, arguably China's oldest modern university, illustrates the dramatic
changes the Chinese system of higher education has undergone in the
past century. Wuhan and the surrounding province of Hubei have long
been important centers of commerce, scholarship, and political
leadership. It was the great reforming Governor-General Zhang Zhidong,
who founded in 1893 - five years before Peking University began - the
"Self-Strengthening Institute" that would become Wuhan University.
That university would be a witness to central events of China's
twentieth century: it was in Wuhan that the revolution that overthrew
the Qing dynasty in 1912 began; Wuhan hosted one of the two contending
Nationalist governments in 1927, and the retreating government of
Chiang Kaishek in 1938. In the early People's Republic, Wuhan became a
great industrial sector. Today, western Hubei, upriver from Wuhan, is
home to the largest engineering project in world history, the Three
Gorges Dam (and even a "Three Gorges Dam University").
Wuhan University had a strong history of growth before 1949. It was
then nearly destroyed during the Cultural Revolution. Today it is a
great, comprehensive university, with a faculty of nearly 3,500,
teaching a student body of 30,000 undergraduates and 17,000 graduate
students; it confers doctoral degrees in 143 subjects - more than
Harvard University offers.
Wuhan University's renewal and expansion is part of a much larger
story of contemporary higher education in China. For China is
experiencing a revolution in mass higher education that dwarfs that of
the United States in the 1950s and that of Europe in the 1970s. This
is a revolution that began in the final years of the twentieth century
and is still gathering strength.
This is not the first educational revolution in modern China. A little
more than a century ago, China underwent a similar, perhaps even more
seismic shift in educational institutions, when, with the end of the
old examination system, the existing structure of local schools,
academies, and directorates of study - all linked to the civil service
exams - was displaced by a new system of public and private
institutions.
At that time, China developed one of the more dynamic systems of
higher education in the world, with strong, state-run institutions
(Peking University, Jiao Tong University, National Central University,
and at the apogee of research, the Academia Sinica), accompanied by a
creative set of private colleges and universities (Yenching
University, St. John's University, and Peking Union Medical College,
to name but a few). Sadly, all this would be swept away in the late
1950s and 1960s, yet the traditions and memories of excellence
remained, and they have helped to fuel more recent efforts.
Simply in terms of numbers of students educated, the more recent
changes are more dramatic than even the great postwar expansion in the
United States or the growth of mass-enrollment universities in Europe
in the 1970s and 1980s. In 1978, after a decade of mostly closed
universities, Chinese universities enrolled approximately 860,000
students. This number increased very gradually until 1996, with
enrollment then of about one million. In the late 1990s the government
decided to accelerate greatly the pace of expansion, and by the year
2000 as many as six million students were enrolled in Chinese
universities.
In the seven years since then, the overall official numbers - counting
all kinds of institutions - have risen dramatically. According to the
ambitious Eleventh Five-Year Plan of the Ministry of Education,
higher-education enrollment was scheduled to reach twenty-three
million by 2005 and thirty million by 2010. There are at present more
than twentysix million students in institutions of higher learning. By
contrast, the United States had approximately thirteen million
undergraduate and two million graduate and professional students in
2000, with undergraduates projected to rise to perhaps fifteen million
by 2010.
China clearly is moving toward mass higher education. The gross
enrollment ratio of eighteen to twenty-one year olds is presently set
to be at 15 percent, having been in the low single digits for most of
the history of the People's Republic. By 2020, China aims to enroll as
much as 40 percent of young adults in colleges or universities.
A once-small teachers' college in Shantung province, Lin Yi Normal
University had 3,500 students in the year 2000. It now has 35,000.
This growth is clear not only in public universities but in the
rapidly growing number of private universities. Outside the ancient
city of Xi'an, Xi'an International University (Xi'an waishi xueyuan)
did not exist fifteen years ago; today it has 36,000 students. To put
it in another light, that of physical space, the 'square meterage' of
Chinese universities has more than tripled in the past seven years. In
the realm of graduate study, China now turns out, annually, more PhDs
than any other country in the world.
Unlike the American expansion of the 1950s and the European growth of
the 1970s, this growth has elements that are also self- consciously
elitist, with the aim of building a significant number of world-class
universities. These are defined in China as being cradles of
highlevel, creative researchers; frontiers of scientific research;
forces capable of transforming research and innovation into higher
productivity; and bridges for international and cultural exchange. To
that end the Chinese government and many other sources are providing
enormous revenues to the leading institutions. Individual winners of
recent competitions among universities have been each given several
hundred million dollars to expend over the next five years; and
runners-up have received funds equivalent to those given to winners in
recent European competitions.
Beyond this, the leading Chinese universities have tapped private,
philanthropic, and foundation sources for substantial streams of
income. Like leading American state universities, such as the
University of California at Berkeley, or the University of Michigan,
the most prominent Chinese universities know that they will soon be in
a position where only a quarter or less of their budget will come from
the state; the rest will have to be raised elsewhere. However these
budgets are put together, it seems certain that within ten years the
research budgets of China's leading universities will approach those
of leading American and European universities, and that in the realms
of engineering and science, Chinese universities will be among the
world's leaders.
This is a welcome challenge to American universities - a challenge for
both competition and cooperation. Although in the latter part of the
twentieth century, American universities were, as a group, among the
strongest in the world, there is no reason to imagine that this is a
permanent condition. After all, about a century ago -just when China
was abandoning the ancient examination system that as late as the
eighteenth century had helped to make China (at least in the West) an
ideal of educated, enlightened leadership - almost all of the leading
universities in the world were German, based on the great
nineteenth-century reforms of German higher education. Yet, now, at
least according to a recent ranking of universities worldwide by
Shanghai Jiao Tong University - a ranking taken seriously by deans and
presidents the world over - German universities do not dominate.
Indeed, according to the Shanghai rankings, not one of the top fifty
was German.
There is a real silliness to this rankings game. What is ranked often
has little to do with education, as distinct from research. One
criterion, citation indexes, varies in value depending on the
discipline : they are extremely important in economics and much less
useful in history; helpful in chemistry and chemical biology, and
without any merit whatsoever in Celtic. All of the international
rankings also focus on research prizes, such as the Nobel Prize, and
universities glory in having on their faculty Nobel laureates, taking
credit, in these rankings, for these noble scholars, even though the
work that gained them a Nobel Prize may have been given for work done
decades earlier, and at another universify. Even those who try to
measure the quality of undergraduate education often use
student/teacher ratio, which is an inadequate way of assessing
comparatively successful teaching.
But the broader point in this discussion of rankings is that nothing
is permanent in the world of learning. All of us have progressed by
learning from one another. Take again the case of Harvard. Harvard was
founded in 1636, that is, in the late Ming dynasty. It is a measure of
Harvard's parochialism that no one in Cambridge, Massachusetts, knew
that. Harvard was founded in a cultural and economic backwater of a
Europe that was itself 'underdeveloped' in comparison to either the
Ming or early Qing. Harvard became a decent college by copying the
norms of British institutions, but even those could hardly compare
with the sophisticated Confucian learning of the great Donglin Academy
and other institutions of the late Ming and early Qing. It grew to
become a university worthy of the name only in the late nineteenth
century by copying the policies and priorities of the great German
research universities. Today, particularly in an era of mass higher
education, American and European universities share with our Chinese
colleagues many of the same challenges :
* How do we extend the promise of higher education while maintaining quality?
* How do we keep institutions from replicating themselves in academic
appointments, and how do we ensure that they will be open to talent
and ideas from all sources?
* How do we value teaching as well as research in an era in which
almost all of the rewards, professionally, are in research? In fact,
teaching can be beneficial to research : places with good students,
who are empowered to learn and to challenge the best faculty,
consistently outperform stand-alone think tanks and academies of
advanced study.
* How do we promote opportunity, by recruiting and funding the very
best students from all financial, geographic, and ethnic backgrounds;
and how do we ensure greater levels of access and fairness in the
admissions process?
* How do we ensure that colleges and universities have the capacity to
engage in what in China would be called self-criticism: to question
their organization and their curriculum? It is important that in every
generation we review what and how we teach; and that every generation
of faculty have the opportunity to define what it believes students
need to know in our time.
* How do we ensure that - even though our universities will still be
based in a home country, with national responsibilities - we also
fulfill our international responsibilities, training students who will
be citizens of the world?
Finally, beyond these concerns, we need always to ask : Why do we have
higher education at all? Here our debate goes back minimally to those
of the nineteenth century between proponents of the Humboldtian ideal
of Bildung (the education of the whole person) as distinct from Ubung
(more practical training), differences that we might phrase in Chinese
as being between a broad conception of jiaoyu and a narrower,
repetitive one oixunlian.
There is no one right answer for every time and place, but one
American tradition has been a commitment to the idea of liberal
education : educating the whole person, and not just training the
specialist. We want to ensure that our graduates are curious,
reflective, and skeptical learners : people with the capacity for
lifelong learning (as their first job will surely not be their last);
who can develop multiple perspectives on themselves and the world; and
of whom we can say, when they graduate, that they are truly
independent of mind. Over the course of the nineteenth and twentieth
centuries, this ideal, which is of German origin, has become a
distinctive goal of an American undergraduate education.
We at Harvard have just renewed our commitment to this cornerstone of
undergraduate education. In the spring of 2007, the Harvard faculty
approved a new General Education curriculum for Harvard College, after
several years of drafting and seemingly endless discussion. When it
passed with near-unanimity, I reminded my colleagues of that 1924
debate in the Chinese Communist Party about joining the Nationalists
in the first United Front. The minutes of that meeting were recorded
thus : "The resolution passed unanimously, even though many comrades
were opposed." (I was also reminded of a conversation with the
president of a leading Chinese university. When I asked how his
faculty would vote on a set of proposed reforms, he responded:
"Vote?")
Even if decisions are taken in different ways, if activities at
Harvard and at leading Chinese universities are any guide, one
commitment we share is something that is counterintuitive in an age
increasingly dominated by science and technology and by pressures for
ever-earlier and ever-greater specialization. That is, our commitment,
or recommitment, to a general as well as a specialized education, and
to the humanities as part of the core of an undergraduate education.
It is worth noting that European universities appear to be adopting
some of the formal structures of perceived international models, such
as the U.S. baccalaureate. Many of the ideals of what has become known
as the Bologna Process have the promise in time of making higher
education in Europe a continental-wide enterprise, with mobility not
only of students but also of faculty and staff. That will be critical
in competing, and in cooperating, with continentalsized systems of
higher education in the United States and in China.
But while there is some emulation of the current American concept of
the baccalaureate, European universities appear less interested as yet
in the educational values that have defined the B.A. in many American
colleges, which stress a broad undergraduate education in the liberal
arts and sciences. If one looks at the documents of the Bologna,
Prague, Berlin, Bergen, and other meetings, there is enormous
attention paid to research, to funding, and to math, science, and
technology, and precious little to teaching, to citizenship, and to
valuing the broad and deep education of the next generation of
Europe's citizens. The "key competences" for lifelong learning
recommended by the European Parliament in 2006 quite appropriately
include language learning; information and communication technologies;
and math, science, and technology. But where are the humanities? Where
is the multidisciplinary study of other cultures and religions? Where
is education in moral reasoning and philosophy? Where, even, are the
'harder' social sciences?
There will be many further discussions of these issues, because the
quality of education is not one simply to be measured in technical or
vocational courses, nor in incomes earned in euros, dollars, or
renminbi. It is measured in people, and their ultimate contribution to
society.
What is encouraging about Chinese higher education today is the
independent understanding that the general education of China's
students - in the arts and humanities as well as the sciences and
social sciences - will be as important to their, and all of our,
futures, as will be their specialized, professional training. 'General
education' (tongshi jiaoyu) is now the cornerstone of curricular
reform in leading universities throughout the People's Republic, as
well as in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Thus, today, all Peking University
students, even in the Guanghua School of Management, have to take a
selection of courses that may include literature, philosophy, and
history. In addition, a focused liberal arts curriculum has been
established in the new Yuanpei Program, named for Peking University's
famous German-educated chancellor in the early twentieth century, the
philosopher Cai Yuanpei, who was an admirer of Wilhelm von Humboldt.
Chinese educational leaders, at least in the elite institutions,
believe that they need to do this, in part because, in China, as in
the United States, all the pressures are in the opposite direction :
on the part of students, who too singlemindedly pursue their careers,
and on the part of faculty, whose careers and interests are ever more
specialized leading to a situation in which students and faculty
interact on ever narrower ground.
It would be nice, as Henry Rosovsky, one of my predecessors as dean of
Harvard's Faculty of Arts and Sciences once declared, if it were true
that precisely what the faculty wanted to teach was exactly what the
students needed to learn. But that has never been the case, and it is
the job of universities to ensure that our students learn broadly,
from the best faculty, how to think, reflect, and analyze, and that
they become the critical thinkers and problem solvers of the next
generation.
For this, a study of the humanities is essential. China's educational
leaders increasingly share this view. Perhaps this is because they
know, better than anyone else, what life can be like in the absence of
the humanities, and in the absence of a liberal education. For that is
part of the history of China's twentieth century.
What happened in China in the past century is all the more remarkable
because China is the world's longest continuous civilization, with the
longest continuing sets of philosophical and literary traditions. The
study of that tradition defined not only what it meant to be a
scholar, but also what it meant to be powerful. The Qing educational
and examination system brought the most learned men in the realm into
the service of the state - not because they had been trained in
statecraft or tax collection, but because they had deeply studied what
we would today call the 'humanities' : because they had studied,
memorized, chanted, and metaphorically consumed the classics, and they
would, in office, act according to the principles of human behavior
that the Analects, Mencius, and other great works set out.
There has seldom been a higher academic ideal : good people embarking
on the living study of great books in order to do good work in
society. (In the United States we sometimes have trouble imagining a
society where the best people go into government.)
This was the ideal, of course never fully realized in practice, and
the ordeal of studying to be a scholar-official was a tortuous one.
And there were limits to this system : the absence of the study of
mathematics, of science, of practical affairs, did not mean that the
Empire was thereby better governed. Their absence arguably contributed
to the Empire's feeble capacity, in the nineteenth century, to respond
to a militarized, industrialized, and otherwise energized West, in a
series of humiliations that would spell the end of a
two-thousandyear-old imperial tradition. The Qing fell in 1911, but
for our purposes the more important date is 1905, when the ancient
examination system was ended overnight, and not replaced. From that
date - and particularly under Republican and Communist regimes China
would be governed not by a civil service chosen for its proven
capacities in moral reasoning, but largely by exemplars of that most
dominant and successful Western export - the modern, professional
military - in the direct service of another Western export that would
not be particularly sympathetic to humanist discourse - the Leninist
state.
From 1905, for understandable reasons, Chinese education at all levels
would begin to drift strongly toward the study of those subjects that
would bring about a return to fu qiang ('wealth and power') -
primarily mathematics, science, and engineering. Within a decade of
that date, the moral foundation of both Chinese government and
culture, Confucianism, would come under a withering attack, leaving a
void in the realm of human and social values. By 1949, when the
mainland fell to the Communists, less than 10 percent of graduates of
Chinese public universities graduated with degrees in humanistic
disciplines. The Communists then took that number to the vanishing
point.
In the absence of the humanities, there were arguably two dominant
themes in education. One, by no means limited to China, was the belief
that in an age science one could quite literally engineer a bright
future, a new people. This was the dream of Chinese leaders from Sun
Yatsen onward : a government of technocratic expertise, capable of
'reconstructing' China with roads, railroads, and dams - a government
of huge ambition, as seen in the Three Gorges Dam project, first
conceived by Sun Yatsen in the 1920s, and now built by the governments
of Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao. Today, every recent member of the
Standing Committee of the Politburo of the People's Republic of China
- the nine or more men who run the country - has training in
engineering. The term, 'technocracy' has been translated into Chinese
as 'the dictatorship of the engineers.' There is perhaps no more
fitting description of the contemporary government of the People's
Republic. Of all the world's governments in the early twenty-first
century, only China's has the engineering imagination, political will,
and financial resources to complete a project of this scale and to
relocate inhabitants in its way. This and other great infrastructure
projects - highways, subways, airports, and more, on a scale unmatched
anywhere - are the result of an engineering state unleashed and
unchecked.
A second belief of the twentieth century was that 'culture' and the
arts were to be firmly subordinated to the purposes of the
developmental state. Under Chiang Kai-shek's New Life Movement and Mao
Zedong's Cultural Revolution, the humanities were mobilized for the
purposes of the state. As Mao Zedong put it, literature and art were
to be defined as "the artistic crystallization of the political
aspirations of the Communist party." (As the twentieth-century writer
Lu Xun once observed: all art may be propaganda, but not all
propaganda is art.)
Chinese history in the first three-quarters of the twentieth century
shows what dislocation can ensue when a civilization loses its
cultural foundations, its moral compass, on a relentless quest for
wealth and power. In that quest, China imported all sorts of Western
'isms': scientism, militarism, Leninism, chief among them; and it
denigrated nearly every aspect of a civilization that, just a century
earlier, was the most sophisticated and accomplished on Earth.
Today, a more self-confident China is beginning to explore its past
and make that past part of its modern education. There are many signs
of a new cultural pluralism in contemporary China, and of a
willingness to imagine and build institutions of learning that are at
the forefront of science and technology and yet also honor and promote
the humanities. Surely it is a positive sign that statues of Confucius
are replacing statues of Mao - even though their works may still be
equally unread.
Perhaps the most important revolution in Chinese higher education
today will not be its size and scope, but the fact that, even under
the leadership of engineers, leading institutions have come to
understand that an education without the humanities is incomplete.
This is a recognition that in an age still, perhaps necessarily,
consumed with 'wealth and power,' that as countries vie for power and
individuals seek to accumulate wealth, an education that stresses the
values that make for a strong, and even harmonious, human community
are more important than ever.
Just weeks before he was assassinated, President John F. Kennedy
captured the essence of the humanities in a speech at Amherst College.
He spoke about poetry, but his idea applies to all the creative
disciplines:
When power leads man toward arrogance, poetry reminds him of his
limitations. When power narrows the areas of man's concerns, poetry
reminds him of the richness and diversity of his existence. When power
corrupts, poetry cleanses, for art establishes the basic human truths
which must serve as the touchstone of our judgment.
In addressing the challenges facing higher education in China, Europe,
and the United States in this era of reform and renewal, I mean to
speak of our collective human experience. After all, as the Chinese
phrase shu tu tonggui reminds us : "We have myriad paths, but our ends
are one."
1 This essay is based on lectures presented at the University of
Vienna; the Central Party School of the Chinese Communist Party,
Beijing; the University of Hong Kong; National Taiwan University;
Washington University; and the University of California at Berkeley.
This work is supported by the Lee and Tuliet Folger Fund.
William C. Kirby, a Fellow of the American Academy since 2005, is T.
M. Chang Professor of China Studies and Spangler Family Professor of
Business Administration at Harvard University. He directs Harvard's
Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, and served as Dean of the Faculty
of Arts and Sciences from 2002 to 2006. His recent work includes three
edited volumes : "Realms of Freedom in Modern China" (2004), "The
Normalization of U.S. -China Relations" (2005), and "Global
Conjectures: China in Transnational Perspective" (2006).
Copyright MIT Press Summer 2008
(c) 2008 Daedalus. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.
Source: Daedalus
On Chinese, European & American Universities
Posted on: Tuesday, 19 August 2008
By Kirby, William C
In North America and in Europe, the past three decades have seen an
unprecedented expansion of higher education and, in the most recent
time, efforts at reform and restructuring.1 My own university,
Harvard, has overhauled its undergraduate curriculum in a
comprehensive fashion for the first time in thirty years. European
universities have witnessed even more thoroughgoing changes in the
structure of undergraduate education.
But perhaps nowhere on earth have recent decades seen more revolutionary change in higher education
than in the People's Republic of China. Thirty years ago, Chinese
universities were just reopening after the catastrophe of the Cultural
Revolution. Today they are poised for positions of international
leadership in research and education.
The case of Wuhan University, arguably China's oldest modern university, illustrates the dramatic
changes the Chinese system of higher education has undergone in the
past century. Wuhan and the surrounding province of Hubei have long
been important centers of commerce, scholarship, and political
leadership. It was the great reforming Governor-General Zhang Zhidong,
who founded in 1893 - five years before Peking University began - the
"Self-Strengthening Institute" that would become Wuhan University.
That university would be a witness to central events of China's
twentieth century: it was in Wuhan that the revolution that overthrew
the Qing dynasty in 1912 began; Wuhan hosted one of the two contending
Nationalist governments in 1927, and the retreating government of
Chiang Kaishek in 1938. In the early People's Republic, Wuhan became a
great industrial sector. Today, western Hubei, upriver from Wuhan, is
home to the largest engineering project in world history, the Three
Gorges Dam (and even a "Three Gorges Dam University").
Wuhan University had a strong history of growth before 1949. It was
then nearly destroyed during the Cultural Revolution. Today it is a
great, comprehensive university, with a faculty of nearly 3,500,
teaching a student body of 30,000 undergraduates and 17,000 graduate
students; it confers doctoral degrees in 143 subjects - more than
Harvard University offers.
Wuhan University's renewal and expansion is part of a much larger
story of contemporary higher education in China. For China is
experiencing a revolution in mass higher education that dwarfs that of
the United States in the 1950s and that of Europe in the 1970s. This
is a revolution that began in the final years of the twentieth century
and is still gathering strength.
This is not the first educational revolution in modern China. A little
more than a century ago, China underwent a similar, perhaps even more
seismic shift in educational institutions, when, with the end of the
old examination system, the existing structure of local schools,
academies, and directorates of study - all linked to the civil service
exams - was displaced by a new system of public and private
institutions.
At that time, China developed one of the more dynamic systems of
higher education in the world, with strong, state-run institutions
(Peking University, Jiao Tong University, National Central University,
and at the apogee of research, the Academia Sinica), accompanied by a
creative set of private colleges and universities (Yenching
University, St. John's University, and Peking Union Medical College,
to name but a few). Sadly, all this would be swept away in the late
1950s and 1960s, yet the traditions and memories of excellence
remained, and they have helped to fuel more recent efforts.
Simply in terms of numbers of students educated, the more recent
changes are more dramatic than even the great postwar expansion in the
United States or the growth of mass-enrollment universities in Europe
in the 1970s and 1980s. In 1978, after a decade of mostly closed
universities, Chinese universities enrolled approximately 860,000
students. This number increased very gradually until 1996, with
enrollment then of about one million. In the late 1990s the government
decided to accelerate greatly the pace of expansion, and by the year
2000 as many as six million students were enrolled in Chinese
universities.
In the seven years since then, the overall official numbers - counting
all kinds of institutions - have risen dramatically. According to the
ambitious Eleventh Five-Year Plan of the Ministry of Education,
higher-education enrollment was scheduled to reach twenty-three
million by 2005 and thirty million by 2010. There are at present more
than twentysix million students in institutions of higher learning. By
contrast, the United States had approximately thirteen million
undergraduate and two million graduate and professional students in
2000, with undergraduates projected to rise to perhaps fifteen million
by 2010.
China clearly is moving toward mass higher education. The gross
enrollment ratio of eighteen to twenty-one year olds is presently set
to be at 15 percent, having been in the low single digits for most of
the history of the People's Republic. By 2020, China aims to enroll as
much as 40 percent of young adults in colleges or universities.
A once-small teachers' college in Shantung province, Lin Yi Normal
University had 3,500 students in the year 2000. It now has 35,000.
This growth is clear not only in public universities but in the
rapidly growing number of private universities. Outside the ancient
city of Xi'an, Xi'an International University (Xi'an waishi xueyuan)
did not exist fifteen years ago; today it has 36,000 students. To put
it in another light, that of physical space, the 'square meterage' of
Chinese universities has more than tripled in the past seven years. In
the realm of graduate study, China now turns out, annually, more PhDs
than any other country in the world.
Unlike the American expansion of the 1950s and the European growth of
the 1970s, this growth has elements that are also self- consciously
elitist, with the aim of building a significant number of world-class
universities. These are defined in China as being cradles of
highlevel, creative researchers; frontiers of scientific research;
forces capable of transforming research and innovation into higher
productivity; and bridges for international and cultural exchange. To
that end the Chinese government and many other sources are providing
enormous revenues to the leading institutions. Individual winners of
recent competitions among universities have been each given several
hundred million dollars to expend over the next five years; and
runners-up have received funds equivalent to those given to winners in
recent European competitions.
Beyond this, the leading Chinese universities have tapped private,
philanthropic, and foundation sources for substantial streams of
income. Like leading American state universities, such as the
University of California at Berkeley, or the University of Michigan,
the most prominent Chinese universities know that they will soon be in
a position where only a quarter or less of their budget will come from
the state; the rest will have to be raised elsewhere. However these
budgets are put together, it seems certain that within ten years the
research budgets of China's leading universities will approach those
of leading American and European universities, and that in the realms
of engineering and science, Chinese universities will be among the
world's leaders.
This is a welcome challenge to American universities - a challenge for
both competition and cooperation. Although in the latter part of the
twentieth century, American universities were, as a group, among the
strongest in the world, there is no reason to imagine that this is a
permanent condition. After all, about a century ago -just when China
was abandoning the ancient examination system that as late as the
eighteenth century had helped to make China (at least in the West) an
ideal of educated, enlightened leadership - almost all of the leading
universities in the world were German, based on the great
nineteenth-century reforms of German higher education. Yet, now, at
least according to a recent ranking of universities worldwide by
Shanghai Jiao Tong University - a ranking taken seriously by deans and
presidents the world over - German universities do not dominate.
Indeed, according to the Shanghai rankings, not one of the top fifty
was German.
There is a real silliness to this rankings game. What is ranked often
has little to do with education, as distinct from research. One
criterion, citation indexes, varies in value depending on the
discipline : they are extremely important in economics and much less
useful in history; helpful in chemistry and chemical biology, and
without any merit whatsoever in Celtic. All of the international
rankings also focus on research prizes, such as the Nobel Prize, and
universities glory in having on their faculty Nobel laureates, taking
credit, in these rankings, for these noble scholars, even though the
work that gained them a Nobel Prize may have been given for work done
decades earlier, and at another universify. Even those who try to
measure the quality of undergraduate education often use
student/teacher ratio, which is an inadequate way of assessing
comparatively successful teaching.
But the broader point in this discussion of rankings is that nothing
is permanent in the world of learning. All of us have progressed by
learning from one another. Take again the case of Harvard. Harvard was
founded in 1636, that is, in the late Ming dynasty. It is a measure of
Harvard's parochialism that no one in Cambridge, Massachusetts, knew
that. Harvard was founded in a cultural and economic backwater of a
Europe that was itself 'underdeveloped' in comparison to either the
Ming or early Qing. Harvard became a decent college by copying the
norms of British institutions, but even those could hardly compare
with the sophisticated Confucian learning of the great Donglin Academy
and other institutions of the late Ming and early Qing. It grew to
become a university worthy of the name only in the late nineteenth
century by copying the policies and priorities of the great German
research universities. Today, particularly in an era of mass higher
education, American and European universities share with our Chinese
colleagues many of the same challenges :
* How do we extend the promise of higher education while maintaining quality?
* How do we keep institutions from replicating themselves in academic
appointments, and how do we ensure that they will be open to talent
and ideas from all sources?
* How do we value teaching as well as research in an era in which
almost all of the rewards, professionally, are in research? In fact,
teaching can be beneficial to research : places with good students,
who are empowered to learn and to challenge the best faculty,
consistently outperform stand-alone think tanks and academies of
advanced study.
* How do we promote opportunity, by recruiting and funding the very
best students from all financial, geographic, and ethnic backgrounds;
and how do we ensure greater levels of access and fairness in the
admissions process?
* How do we ensure that colleges and universities have the capacity to
engage in what in China would be called self-criticism: to question
their organization and their curriculum? It is important that in every
generation we review what and how we teach; and that every generation
of faculty have the opportunity to define what it believes students
need to know in our time.
* How do we ensure that - even though our universities will still be
based in a home country, with national responsibilities - we also
fulfill our international responsibilities, training students who will
be citizens of the world?
Finally, beyond these concerns, we need always to ask : Why do we have
higher education at all? Here our debate goes back minimally to those
of the nineteenth century between proponents of the Humboldtian ideal
of Bildung (the education of the whole person) as distinct from Ubung
(more practical training), differences that we might phrase in Chinese
as being between a broad conception of jiaoyu and a narrower,
repetitive one oixunlian.
There is no one right answer for every time and place, but one
American tradition has been a commitment to the idea of liberal
education : educating the whole person, and not just training the
specialist. We want to ensure that our graduates are curious,
reflective, and skeptical learners : people with the capacity for
lifelong learning (as their first job will surely not be their last);
who can develop multiple perspectives on themselves and the world; and
of whom we can say, when they graduate, that they are truly
independent of mind. Over the course of the nineteenth and twentieth
centuries, this ideal, which is of German origin, has become a
distinctive goal of an American undergraduate education.
We at Harvard have just renewed our commitment to this cornerstone of
undergraduate education. In the spring of 2007, the Harvard faculty
approved a new General Education curriculum for Harvard College, after
several years of drafting and seemingly endless discussion. When it
passed with near-unanimity, I reminded my colleagues of that 1924
debate in the Chinese Communist Party about joining the Nationalists
in the first United Front. The minutes of that meeting were recorded
thus : "The resolution passed unanimously, even though many comrades
were opposed." (I was also reminded of a conversation with the
president of a leading Chinese university. When I asked how his
faculty would vote on a set of proposed reforms, he responded:
"Vote?")
Even if decisions are taken in different ways, if activities at
Harvard and at leading Chinese universities are any guide, one
commitment we share is something that is counterintuitive in an age
increasingly dominated by science and technology and by pressures for
ever-earlier and ever-greater specialization. That is, our commitment,
or recommitment, to a general as well as a specialized education, and
to the humanities as part of the core of an undergraduate education.
It is worth noting that European universities appear to be adopting
some of the formal structures of perceived international models, such
as the U.S. baccalaureate. Many of the ideals of what has become known
as the Bologna Process have the promise in time of making higher
education in Europe a continental-wide enterprise, with mobility not
only of students but also of faculty and staff. That will be critical
in competing, and in cooperating, with continentalsized systems of
higher education in the United States and in China.
But while there is some emulation of the current American concept of
the baccalaureate, European universities appear less interested as yet
in the educational values that have defined the B.A. in many American
colleges, which stress a broad undergraduate education in the liberal
arts and sciences. If one looks at the documents of the Bologna,
Prague, Berlin, Bergen, and other meetings, there is enormous
attention paid to research, to funding, and to math, science, and
technology, and precious little to teaching, to citizenship, and to
valuing the broad and deep education of the next generation of
Europe's citizens. The "key competences" for lifelong learning
recommended by the European Parliament in 2006 quite appropriately
include language learning; information and communication technologies;
and math, science, and technology. But where are the humanities? Where
is the multidisciplinary study of other cultures and religions? Where
is education in moral reasoning and philosophy? Where, even, are the
'harder' social sciences?
There will be many further discussions of these issues, because the
quality of education is not one simply to be measured in technical or
vocational courses, nor in incomes earned in euros, dollars, or
renminbi. It is measured in people, and their ultimate contribution to
society.
What is encouraging about Chinese higher education today is the
independent understanding that the general education of China's
students - in the arts and humanities as well as the sciences and
social sciences - will be as important to their, and all of our,
futures, as will be their specialized, professional training. 'General
education' (tongshi jiaoyu) is now the cornerstone of curricular
reform in leading universities throughout the People's Republic, as
well as in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Thus, today, all Peking University
students, even in the Guanghua School of Management, have to take a
selection of courses that may include literature, philosophy, and
history. In addition, a focused liberal arts curriculum has been
established in the new Yuanpei Program, named for Peking University's
famous German-educated chancellor in the early twentieth century, the
philosopher Cai Yuanpei, who was an admirer of Wilhelm von Humboldt.
Chinese educational leaders, at least in the elite institutions,
believe that they need to do this, in part because, in China, as in
the United States, all the pressures are in the opposite direction :
on the part of students, who too singlemindedly pursue their careers,
and on the part of faculty, whose careers and interests are ever more
specialized leading to a situation in which students and faculty
interact on ever narrower ground.
It would be nice, as Henry Rosovsky, one of my predecessors as dean of
Harvard's Faculty of Arts and Sciences once declared, if it were true
that precisely what the faculty wanted to teach was exactly what the
students needed to learn. But that has never been the case, and it is
the job of universities to ensure that our students learn broadly,
from the best faculty, how to think, reflect, and analyze, and that
they become the critical thinkers and problem solvers of the next
generation.
For this, a study of the humanities is essential. China's educational
leaders increasingly share this view. Perhaps this is because they
know, better than anyone else, what life can be like in the absence of
the humanities, and in the absence of a liberal education. For that is
part of the history of China's twentieth century.
What happened in China in the past century is all the more remarkable
because China is the world's longest continuous civilization, with the
longest continuing sets of philosophical and literary traditions. The
study of that tradition defined not only what it meant to be a
scholar, but also what it meant to be powerful. The Qing educational
and examination system brought the most learned men in the realm into
the service of the state - not because they had been trained in
statecraft or tax collection, but because they had deeply studied what
we would today call the 'humanities' : because they had studied,
memorized, chanted, and metaphorically consumed the classics, and they
would, in office, act according to the principles of human behavior
that the Analects, Mencius, and other great works set out.
There has seldom been a higher academic ideal : good people embarking
on the living study of great books in order to do good work in
society. (In the United States we sometimes have trouble imagining a
society where the best people go into government.)
This was the ideal, of course never fully realized in practice, and
the ordeal of studying to be a scholar-official was a tortuous one.
And there were limits to this system : the absence of the study of
mathematics, of science, of practical affairs, did not mean that the
Empire was thereby better governed. Their absence arguably contributed
to the Empire's feeble capacity, in the nineteenth century, to respond
to a militarized, industrialized, and otherwise energized West, in a
series of humiliations that would spell the end of a
two-thousandyear-old imperial tradition. The Qing fell in 1911, but
for our purposes the more important date is 1905, when the ancient
examination system was ended overnight, and not replaced. From that
date - and particularly under Republican and Communist regimes China
would be governed not by a civil service chosen for its proven
capacities in moral reasoning, but largely by exemplars of that most
dominant and successful Western export - the modern, professional
military - in the direct service of another Western export that would
not be particularly sympathetic to humanist discourse - the Leninist
state.
From 1905, for understandable reasons, Chinese education at all levels
would begin to drift strongly toward the study of those subjects that
would bring about a return to fu qiang ('wealth and power') -
primarily mathematics, science, and engineering. Within a decade of
that date, the moral foundation of both Chinese government and
culture, Confucianism, would come under a withering attack, leaving a
void in the realm of human and social values. By 1949, when the
mainland fell to the Communists, less than 10 percent of graduates of
Chinese public universities graduated with degrees in humanistic
disciplines. The Communists then took that number to the vanishing
point.
In the absence of the humanities, there were arguably two dominant
themes in education. One, by no means limited to China, was the belief
that in an age science one could quite literally engineer a bright
future, a new people. This was the dream of Chinese leaders from Sun
Yatsen onward : a government of technocratic expertise, capable of
'reconstructing' China with roads, railroads, and dams - a government
of huge ambition, as seen in the Three Gorges Dam project, first
conceived by Sun Yatsen in the 1920s, and now built by the governments
of Jiang Zemin and Hu Jintao. Today, every recent member of the
Standing Committee of the Politburo of the People's Republic of China
- the nine or more men who run the country - has training in
engineering. The term, 'technocracy' has been translated into Chinese
as 'the dictatorship of the engineers.' There is perhaps no more
fitting description of the contemporary government of the People's
Republic. Of all the world's governments in the early twenty-first
century, only China's has the engineering imagination, political will,
and financial resources to complete a project of this scale and to
relocate inhabitants in its way. This and other great infrastructure
projects - highways, subways, airports, and more, on a scale unmatched
anywhere - are the result of an engineering state unleashed and
unchecked.
A second belief of the twentieth century was that 'culture' and the
arts were to be firmly subordinated to the purposes of the
developmental state. Under Chiang Kai-shek's New Life Movement and Mao
Zedong's Cultural Revolution, the humanities were mobilized for the
purposes of the state. As Mao Zedong put it, literature and art were
to be defined as "the artistic crystallization of the political
aspirations of the Communist party." (As the twentieth-century writer
Lu Xun once observed: all art may be propaganda, but not all
propaganda is art.)
Chinese history in the first three-quarters of the twentieth century
shows what dislocation can ensue when a civilization loses its
cultural foundations, its moral compass, on a relentless quest for
wealth and power. In that quest, China imported all sorts of Western
'isms': scientism, militarism, Leninism, chief among them; and it
denigrated nearly every aspect of a civilization that, just a century
earlier, was the most sophisticated and accomplished on Earth.
Today, a more self-confident China is beginning to explore its past
and make that past part of its modern education. There are many signs
of a new cultural pluralism in contemporary China, and of a
willingness to imagine and build institutions of learning that are at
the forefront of science and technology and yet also honor and promote
the humanities. Surely it is a positive sign that statues of Confucius
are replacing statues of Mao - even though their works may still be
equally unread.
Perhaps the most important revolution in Chinese higher education
today will not be its size and scope, but the fact that, even under
the leadership of engineers, leading institutions have come to
understand that an education without the humanities is incomplete.
This is a recognition that in an age still, perhaps necessarily,
consumed with 'wealth and power,' that as countries vie for power and
individuals seek to accumulate wealth, an education that stresses the
values that make for a strong, and even harmonious, human community
are more important than ever.
Just weeks before he was assassinated, President John F. Kennedy
captured the essence of the humanities in a speech at Amherst College.
He spoke about poetry, but his idea applies to all the creative
disciplines:
When power leads man toward arrogance, poetry reminds him of his
limitations. When power narrows the areas of man's concerns, poetry
reminds him of the richness and diversity of his existence. When power
corrupts, poetry cleanses, for art establishes the basic human truths
which must serve as the touchstone of our judgment.
In addressing the challenges facing higher education in China, Europe,
and the United States in this era of reform and renewal, I mean to
speak of our collective human experience. After all, as the Chinese
phrase shu tu tonggui reminds us : "We have myriad paths, but our ends
are one."
1 This essay is based on lectures presented at the University of
Vienna; the Central Party School of the Chinese Communist Party,
Beijing; the University of Hong Kong; National Taiwan University;
Washington University; and the University of California at Berkeley.
This work is supported by the Lee and Tuliet Folger Fund.
William C. Kirby, a Fellow of the American Academy since 2005, is T.
M. Chang Professor of China Studies and Spangler Family Professor of
Business Administration at Harvard University. He directs Harvard's
Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, and served as Dean of the Faculty
of Arts and Sciences from 2002 to 2006. His recent work includes three
edited volumes : "Realms of Freedom in Modern China" (2004), "The
Normalization of U.S. -China Relations" (2005), and "Global
Conjectures: China in Transnational Perspective" (2006).
Copyright MIT Press Summer 2008
(c) 2008 Daedalus. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.
Source: Daedalus
America botches Georgia
International Herald Tribune
America botches Georgia
By H.D.S. Greenway
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/08/19/opinion/edgreenway.php
In years to come, the short, sharp Russo-Georgian war may be remembered as the nadir of American post-Cold War power and influence - the moment in the closing months of George W. Bush's hapless administration when all the damage that he has done to America's position in the world came into focus.
The United States encouraged Georgia into thinking it was under American protection, built up and trained its armed forces with a little help from the Israelis, established one of the biggest embassies in the region to make it a center of American influence in the Caucasus, and, despite private warnings, issued public statements of undying support. And now America's client is wiping blood from its nose. The wreckage of Georgia's towns and countryside, however, is not as complete as the ruin of Bush's policies.
Having misread America's mixed signals, it is President Mikheil Saakashvili of Georgia who deserves much of the blame. He wanted to restore the breakaway enclaves of South Ossetia and Abkhazia to Georgian control. He badly overplayed his hand. Perhaps he really thought that the patronage of the United States would enable him to get away with rattling the bear's cage. Saakashvili played his America card and found it to be a deuce.
As for Russia, it wanted to reassert itself in the region, and Saakashvili gave it the opportunity. The United States has to stand with Saakashvili now, but when this is over, and when the Russians have withdrawn, he should be spanked.
South Ossetia and Abkhazia clearly do not want to be part of Georgia. The Russians were willing to let stand the ambiguous status of both enclaves - nominally part of Georgia but not under Georgian control. But Saakashvili thought he saw his chance while the world was watching the Olympic Games and sent his troops to upset the delicate status quo.
There are many such ambiguous territorial situations around the world. China claims Taiwan as an integral part of its territory, but is willing to allow de facto independence as long as Taiwan doesn't declare de jure independence.
Kosovo used to be another useful ambiguity. Legally an integral part of Serbia with historical and emotional ties going back half a millennium, the region has an Albanian majority who, like the Abkhazians and Ossetians, didn't want to be part of the country they found themselves in at Cold War's end.
The Russians were furious when Europe and the United States backed Kosovar independence, and last week's military assault into Georgia was partly a payback. But Georgia's military grab for South Ossetia, which has its own language and culture, was too much for Russia to take. One can imagine the American and NATO reaction if Serbia tried to invade Kosovo.
The United States needs Russia's support on a host of issues: containing Iran, combating terrorism, nuclear proliferation, the Middle East. Despite Russia's warnings, however, the United States has steadfastly ignored Russia's interests. Expanding NATO eastward is one example, "a solution for which there was no problem," as the saying goes.
Taking former bits of the Soviet Union into NATO is a needless provocation - especially Georgia's entry, which the Bush administration backs. For say what you will about NATO no longer being an anti-Russian alliance, no one in Russia believes it. And no one in Georgia or Ukraine believes it either.
The missile defense shield in Poland and the Czech Republic is another example of sticking it in Russia's eye. Given the administration's attitude toward Moscow's interests, it was only a matter of time before Russia pushed back.
And so you have disillusioned Georgians wringing their hands and wondering if they put too much faith in America. Other countries in the region will draw their own conclusions as America looks both weak and feckless.
Russia feels about the Caucasus as the United States views Central America - its own backyard, an area not to be trifled with. Georgia has become Russia's Cuba, and in the brutish way of the old Soviet era, Russia is determined to teach Georgia and the West a lesson.
U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates says Moscow's actions have forced a profound rethinking of America's relations with Russia. Pity there isn't a profound rethinking of America and Georgia's actions as well.
America botches Georgia
By H.D.S. Greenway
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/08/19/opinion/edgreenway.php
In years to come, the short, sharp Russo-Georgian war may be remembered as the nadir of American post-Cold War power and influence - the moment in the closing months of George W. Bush's hapless administration when all the damage that he has done to America's position in the world came into focus.
The United States encouraged Georgia into thinking it was under American protection, built up and trained its armed forces with a little help from the Israelis, established one of the biggest embassies in the region to make it a center of American influence in the Caucasus, and, despite private warnings, issued public statements of undying support. And now America's client is wiping blood from its nose. The wreckage of Georgia's towns and countryside, however, is not as complete as the ruin of Bush's policies.
Having misread America's mixed signals, it is President Mikheil Saakashvili of Georgia who deserves much of the blame. He wanted to restore the breakaway enclaves of South Ossetia and Abkhazia to Georgian control. He badly overplayed his hand. Perhaps he really thought that the patronage of the United States would enable him to get away with rattling the bear's cage. Saakashvili played his America card and found it to be a deuce.
As for Russia, it wanted to reassert itself in the region, and Saakashvili gave it the opportunity. The United States has to stand with Saakashvili now, but when this is over, and when the Russians have withdrawn, he should be spanked.
South Ossetia and Abkhazia clearly do not want to be part of Georgia. The Russians were willing to let stand the ambiguous status of both enclaves - nominally part of Georgia but not under Georgian control. But Saakashvili thought he saw his chance while the world was watching the Olympic Games and sent his troops to upset the delicate status quo.
There are many such ambiguous territorial situations around the world. China claims Taiwan as an integral part of its territory, but is willing to allow de facto independence as long as Taiwan doesn't declare de jure independence.
Kosovo used to be another useful ambiguity. Legally an integral part of Serbia with historical and emotional ties going back half a millennium, the region has an Albanian majority who, like the Abkhazians and Ossetians, didn't want to be part of the country they found themselves in at Cold War's end.
The Russians were furious when Europe and the United States backed Kosovar independence, and last week's military assault into Georgia was partly a payback. But Georgia's military grab for South Ossetia, which has its own language and culture, was too much for Russia to take. One can imagine the American and NATO reaction if Serbia tried to invade Kosovo.
The United States needs Russia's support on a host of issues: containing Iran, combating terrorism, nuclear proliferation, the Middle East. Despite Russia's warnings, however, the United States has steadfastly ignored Russia's interests. Expanding NATO eastward is one example, "a solution for which there was no problem," as the saying goes.
Taking former bits of the Soviet Union into NATO is a needless provocation - especially Georgia's entry, which the Bush administration backs. For say what you will about NATO no longer being an anti-Russian alliance, no one in Russia believes it. And no one in Georgia or Ukraine believes it either.
The missile defense shield in Poland and the Czech Republic is another example of sticking it in Russia's eye. Given the administration's attitude toward Moscow's interests, it was only a matter of time before Russia pushed back.
And so you have disillusioned Georgians wringing their hands and wondering if they put too much faith in America. Other countries in the region will draw their own conclusions as America looks both weak and feckless.
Russia feels about the Caucasus as the United States views Central America - its own backyard, an area not to be trifled with. Georgia has become Russia's Cuba, and in the brutish way of the old Soviet era, Russia is determined to teach Georgia and the West a lesson.
U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates says Moscow's actions have forced a profound rethinking of America's relations with Russia. Pity there isn't a profound rethinking of America and Georgia's actions as well.
Russia Never Wanted a War By MIKHAIL GORBACHEV
For those who missed this....
The New York Times
August 20, 2008
Op-Ed Contributor
Russia Never Wanted a War
By MIKHAIL GORBACHEV
Moscow
THE acute phase of the crisis provoked by the Georgian forces' assault on Tskhinvali, the capital of South Ossetia, is now behind us. But how can one erase from memory the horrifying scenes of the nighttime rocket attack on a peaceful town, the razing of entire city blocks, the deaths of people taking cover in basements, the destruction of ancient monuments and ancestral graves?
Russia did not want this crisis. The Russian leadership is in a strong enough position domestically; it did not need a little victorious war. Russia was dragged into the fray by the recklessness of the Georgian president, Mikheil Saakashvili. He would not have dared to attack without outside support. Once he did, Russia could not afford inaction.
The decision by the Russian president, Dmitri Medvedev, to now cease hostilities was the right move by a responsible leader. The Russian president acted calmly, confidently and firmly. Anyone who expected confusion in Moscow was disappointed.
The planners of this campaign clearly wanted to make sure that, whatever the outcome, Russia would be blamed for worsening the situation. The West then mounted a propaganda attack against Russia, with the American news media leading the way.
The news coverage has been far from fair and balanced, especially during the first days of the crisis. Tskhinvali was in smoking ruins and thousands of people were fleeing — before any Russian troops arrived. Yet Russia was already being accused of aggression; news reports were often an embarrassing recitation of the Georgian leader's deceptive statements.
It is still not quite clear whether the West was aware of Mr. Saakashvili's plans to invade South Ossetia, and this is a serious matter. What is clear is that Western assistance in training Georgian troops and shipping large supplies of arms had been pushing the region toward war rather than peace.
If this military misadventure was a surprise for the Georgian leader's foreign patrons, so much the worse. It looks like a classic wag-the-dog story.
Mr. Saakashvili had been lavished with praise for being a staunch American ally and a real democrat — and for helping out in Iraq. Now America's friend has wrought disorder, and all of us — the Europeans and, most important, the region's innocent civilians — must pick up the pieces.
Those who rush to judgment on what's happening in the Caucasus, or those who seek influence there, should first have at least some idea of this region's complexities. The Ossetians live both in Georgia and in Russia. The region is a patchwork of ethnic groups living in close proximity. Therefore, all talk of "this is our land," "we are liberating our land," is meaningless. We must think about the people who live on the land.
The problems of the Caucasus region cannot be solved by force. That has been tried more than once in the past two decades, and it has always boomeranged.
What is needed is a legally binding agreement not to use force. Mr. Saakashvili has repeatedly refused to sign such an agreement, for reasons that have now become abundantly clear.
The West would be wise to help achieve such an agreement now. If, instead, it chooses to blame Russia and re-arm Georgia, as American officials are suggesting, a new crisis will be inevitable. In that case, expect the worst.
In recent days, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and President Bush have been promising to isolate Russia. Some American politicians have threatened to expel it from the Group of 8 industrialized nations, to abolish the NATO-Russia Council and to keep Russia out of the World Trade Organization.
These are empty threats. For some time now, Russians have been wondering: If our opinion counts for nothing in those institutions, do we really need them? Just to sit at the nicely set dinner table and listen to lectures?
Indeed, Russia has long been told to simply accept the facts. Here's the independence of Kosovo for you. Here's the abrogation of the Antiballistic Missile Treaty, and the American decision to place missile defenses in neighboring countries. Here's the unending expansion of NATO. All of these moves have been set against the backdrop of sweet talk about partnership. Why would anyone put up with such a charade?
There is much talk now in the United States about rethinking relations with Russia. One thing that should definitely be rethought: the habit of talking to Russia in a condescending way, without regard for its positions and interests.
Our two countries could develop a serious agenda for genuine, rather than token, cooperation. Many Americans, as well as Russians, understand the need for this. But is the same true of the political leaders?
A bipartisan commission led by Senator Chuck Hagel and former Senator Gary Hart has recently been established at Harvard to report on American-Russian relations to Congress and the next president. It includes serious people, and, judging by the commission's early statements, its members understand the importance of Russia and the importance of constructive bilateral relations.
But the members of this commission should be careful. Their mandate is to present "policy recommendations for a new administration to advance America's national interests in relations with Russia." If that alone is the goal, then I doubt that much good will come out of it. If, however, the commission is ready to also consider the interests of the other side and of common security, it may actually help rebuild trust between Russia and the United States and allow them to start doing useful work together.
Mikhail Gorbachev is the former president of the Soviet Union. This article was translated by Pavel Palazhchenko from the Russian.
The New York Times
August 20, 2008
Op-Ed Contributor
Russia Never Wanted a War
By MIKHAIL GORBACHEV
Moscow
THE acute phase of the crisis provoked by the Georgian forces' assault on Tskhinvali, the capital of South Ossetia, is now behind us. But how can one erase from memory the horrifying scenes of the nighttime rocket attack on a peaceful town, the razing of entire city blocks, the deaths of people taking cover in basements, the destruction of ancient monuments and ancestral graves?
Russia did not want this crisis. The Russian leadership is in a strong enough position domestically; it did not need a little victorious war. Russia was dragged into the fray by the recklessness of the Georgian president, Mikheil Saakashvili. He would not have dared to attack without outside support. Once he did, Russia could not afford inaction.
The decision by the Russian president, Dmitri Medvedev, to now cease hostilities was the right move by a responsible leader. The Russian president acted calmly, confidently and firmly. Anyone who expected confusion in Moscow was disappointed.
The planners of this campaign clearly wanted to make sure that, whatever the outcome, Russia would be blamed for worsening the situation. The West then mounted a propaganda attack against Russia, with the American news media leading the way.
The news coverage has been far from fair and balanced, especially during the first days of the crisis. Tskhinvali was in smoking ruins and thousands of people were fleeing — before any Russian troops arrived. Yet Russia was already being accused of aggression; news reports were often an embarrassing recitation of the Georgian leader's deceptive statements.
It is still not quite clear whether the West was aware of Mr. Saakashvili's plans to invade South Ossetia, and this is a serious matter. What is clear is that Western assistance in training Georgian troops and shipping large supplies of arms had been pushing the region toward war rather than peace.
If this military misadventure was a surprise for the Georgian leader's foreign patrons, so much the worse. It looks like a classic wag-the-dog story.
Mr. Saakashvili had been lavished with praise for being a staunch American ally and a real democrat — and for helping out in Iraq. Now America's friend has wrought disorder, and all of us — the Europeans and, most important, the region's innocent civilians — must pick up the pieces.
Those who rush to judgment on what's happening in the Caucasus, or those who seek influence there, should first have at least some idea of this region's complexities. The Ossetians live both in Georgia and in Russia. The region is a patchwork of ethnic groups living in close proximity. Therefore, all talk of "this is our land," "we are liberating our land," is meaningless. We must think about the people who live on the land.
The problems of the Caucasus region cannot be solved by force. That has been tried more than once in the past two decades, and it has always boomeranged.
What is needed is a legally binding agreement not to use force. Mr. Saakashvili has repeatedly refused to sign such an agreement, for reasons that have now become abundantly clear.
The West would be wise to help achieve such an agreement now. If, instead, it chooses to blame Russia and re-arm Georgia, as American officials are suggesting, a new crisis will be inevitable. In that case, expect the worst.
In recent days, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and President Bush have been promising to isolate Russia. Some American politicians have threatened to expel it from the Group of 8 industrialized nations, to abolish the NATO-Russia Council and to keep Russia out of the World Trade Organization.
These are empty threats. For some time now, Russians have been wondering: If our opinion counts for nothing in those institutions, do we really need them? Just to sit at the nicely set dinner table and listen to lectures?
Indeed, Russia has long been told to simply accept the facts. Here's the independence of Kosovo for you. Here's the abrogation of the Antiballistic Missile Treaty, and the American decision to place missile defenses in neighboring countries. Here's the unending expansion of NATO. All of these moves have been set against the backdrop of sweet talk about partnership. Why would anyone put up with such a charade?
There is much talk now in the United States about rethinking relations with Russia. One thing that should definitely be rethought: the habit of talking to Russia in a condescending way, without regard for its positions and interests.
Our two countries could develop a serious agenda for genuine, rather than token, cooperation. Many Americans, as well as Russians, understand the need for this. But is the same true of the political leaders?
A bipartisan commission led by Senator Chuck Hagel and former Senator Gary Hart has recently been established at Harvard to report on American-Russian relations to Congress and the next president. It includes serious people, and, judging by the commission's early statements, its members understand the importance of Russia and the importance of constructive bilateral relations.
But the members of this commission should be careful. Their mandate is to present "policy recommendations for a new administration to advance America's national interests in relations with Russia." If that alone is the goal, then I doubt that much good will come out of it. If, however, the commission is ready to also consider the interests of the other side and of common security, it may actually help rebuild trust between Russia and the United States and allow them to start doing useful work together.
Mikhail Gorbachev is the former president of the Soviet Union. This article was translated by Pavel Palazhchenko from the Russian.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
Who Is Responsible for U.S. Russian Policy?
Who Is Responsible for U.S. Russian Policy?
William Pfaff
Paris, August 19, 2008 – A convincing account of the origin and development of the war between Russia and Georgia has now been provided by The New York Times, clarifying what it charitably describes as the "miscalculation, missed signals, and overreaching" responsible for the war.
The one thing it does not clarify is who is ultimately responsible for an American policy towards Russia that since the collapse of the Soviet Union has been aggressive, militarily overbearing, and threatening to the integrity of Russia, to absolutely no useful purpose. The conventional Western comment says the NATO governments have underestimated "Russia's determination to dominate its traditional sphere of influence."
This is wrong. Russia has been amazingly tolerant of successful western efforts to annex its "traditional sphere of influence," if that term means the Warsaw Pact, which until 1991 was the Communist counterpart to NATO, lending troops to enforce the so-called Brezhnev Doctrine, which held that membership in the Warsaw Pact and in the "Socialist bloc" was irreversible.
Mikhail Gorbachev reversed it. He withdrew troops from Afghanistan.
NATO was redefined by the first President George Bush, as he recounts in his memoirs, as "a political instrument of European stability" rather than a force of military confrontation. On those terms Gorbachev agreed to the unification of Germany within NATO. Warsaw Pact states were invited to go their own way, and they did -- into NATO.
President Bill Clinton told Boris Yeltsin that the expansion of NATO would stop with the East European states annexed to the Soviet bloc by the Russian Army during and just after the second world war. Thus Hungary, the Czech Republic and Poland, particular victims of the cold war U.S.S.R. were among the first admitted to NATO.
In 2004, the second Bush administration, including Condoleezza Rice, a Soviet scholar who should have known better, brutally broke those agreement by causing the admission to NATO of Bulgaria, Romania, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia (among others), the latter three integral if unwilling parts of the Soviet Union during the second world war. Neither Clinton nor the first President Bush, who made these promises, protested.
Next came the American-sponsored "color revolutions" in Georgia and Ukraine, installing pro-American governments, followed by the Bush administration's efforts to get NATO to give them a formal Military Action Plan for membership, an initiative fortunately blocked by Germany and France. And in February of this year, Kosovo, Serbian since the 12th century, was – illegally -- declared by the U.S. and the EU to be an independent nation.
This was the turning point for Russia. Now the United States and the EU had not only unilaterally dismembered Serbia but were attempting to make two states historically part of Russia into western satellites. Georgia and Ukraine had not simply been part of the Soviet Union, but before that of Czarist Russia.
Ukraine is at the core of Russian history. Its capital, Kiev, was at the center of the Rus principality in the Middle Ages, from which modern Russia descends, and has always been known as "the mother of Russian cities."
Georgia has a complex and tormented Caucasian history of conflict with neighboring powers but in the 18th century its monarch voluntarily became a vassal of the Czar in exchange for protection. Georgia has been integrally part of Russian history since. Stalin himself, and his powerful secret police chief Lavrentiy Beria (who is thought to have murdered Stalin to halt the last great Stalinist purge) were both Georgians, as were other leading Bolsheviks.
One can understand that a hysterical and demagogic Georgian nationalist like Mikhail Saakashvili might think he could wipe out long-standing ethnic dissidence in his country by attacking Russian peacekeepers legally stationed in those enclaves to protect the dissidents. But who in Washington is promoting this strategy of hostile military and political encirclement of Russia? What conceivable interest of the West does this serve?
It is a senseless policy, apparently meant to intimidate Russia, but why? For the sake of perpetuating international tension so as to strengthen the forces that with Cheney and Bush have been promoting constitutionally unaccountable executive rule in the United States?
This is a very serious matter, being treated in the American press as if the United States has not been playing with dynamite. Russia is a powerful and nuclear-armed nation with legitimate national interests. Russia is no longer the messianic and ideological state with world ambitions the Soviet Union was. Those adjectives describe the United States today, as well as the policy towards Russia conducted under both Bush and Clinton administrations.
The most sensible advice I have seen has come from Europeans, directed towards other Europeans. It is to break away from this American policy of senseless and aggressive confrontation with Russia, and follow the successful Sarkozy mediation in Georgia with an effort to establish European terms for resolving this crisis, ignoring the United States.
Saakashvili is not likely to prove an obstacle. His people may soon rid themselves of the author of this fiasco, which humiliated his own country, NATO, and the United States as well. Perhaps a friend will preempt an indignant citizenry by offering Saakashvili a bottle of Scotch and a loaded pistol, and locking the office door. Bush and Rice too will soon be off the stage -- although who knows what will follow.
The European initiative makes sense. Forget Washington and approach Russia with a proposal for a new and constructive relationship with Europe, with arbitration and resolution of its problems with Poland, Ukraine and Georgia in the same way that similar issues have been handled inside Europe. It would take a very brave Europe to do this, but the U.S. on its present course may leave it with little choice.
©Copyright 2008 by Tribune Media Services International. All Rights Reserved.
William Pfaff
Paris, August 19, 2008 – A convincing account of the origin and development of the war between Russia and Georgia has now been provided by The New York Times, clarifying what it charitably describes as the "miscalculation, missed signals, and overreaching" responsible for the war.
The one thing it does not clarify is who is ultimately responsible for an American policy towards Russia that since the collapse of the Soviet Union has been aggressive, militarily overbearing, and threatening to the integrity of Russia, to absolutely no useful purpose. The conventional Western comment says the NATO governments have underestimated "Russia's determination to dominate its traditional sphere of influence."
This is wrong. Russia has been amazingly tolerant of successful western efforts to annex its "traditional sphere of influence," if that term means the Warsaw Pact, which until 1991 was the Communist counterpart to NATO, lending troops to enforce the so-called Brezhnev Doctrine, which held that membership in the Warsaw Pact and in the "Socialist bloc" was irreversible.
Mikhail Gorbachev reversed it. He withdrew troops from Afghanistan.
NATO was redefined by the first President George Bush, as he recounts in his memoirs, as "a political instrument of European stability" rather than a force of military confrontation. On those terms Gorbachev agreed to the unification of Germany within NATO. Warsaw Pact states were invited to go their own way, and they did -- into NATO.
President Bill Clinton told Boris Yeltsin that the expansion of NATO would stop with the East European states annexed to the Soviet bloc by the Russian Army during and just after the second world war. Thus Hungary, the Czech Republic and Poland, particular victims of the cold war U.S.S.R. were among the first admitted to NATO.
In 2004, the second Bush administration, including Condoleezza Rice, a Soviet scholar who should have known better, brutally broke those agreement by causing the admission to NATO of Bulgaria, Romania, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia (among others), the latter three integral if unwilling parts of the Soviet Union during the second world war. Neither Clinton nor the first President Bush, who made these promises, protested.
Next came the American-sponsored "color revolutions" in Georgia and Ukraine, installing pro-American governments, followed by the Bush administration's efforts to get NATO to give them a formal Military Action Plan for membership, an initiative fortunately blocked by Germany and France. And in February of this year, Kosovo, Serbian since the 12th century, was – illegally -- declared by the U.S. and the EU to be an independent nation.
This was the turning point for Russia. Now the United States and the EU had not only unilaterally dismembered Serbia but were attempting to make two states historically part of Russia into western satellites. Georgia and Ukraine had not simply been part of the Soviet Union, but before that of Czarist Russia.
Ukraine is at the core of Russian history. Its capital, Kiev, was at the center of the Rus principality in the Middle Ages, from which modern Russia descends, and has always been known as "the mother of Russian cities."
Georgia has a complex and tormented Caucasian history of conflict with neighboring powers but in the 18th century its monarch voluntarily became a vassal of the Czar in exchange for protection. Georgia has been integrally part of Russian history since. Stalin himself, and his powerful secret police chief Lavrentiy Beria (who is thought to have murdered Stalin to halt the last great Stalinist purge) were both Georgians, as were other leading Bolsheviks.
One can understand that a hysterical and demagogic Georgian nationalist like Mikhail Saakashvili might think he could wipe out long-standing ethnic dissidence in his country by attacking Russian peacekeepers legally stationed in those enclaves to protect the dissidents. But who in Washington is promoting this strategy of hostile military and political encirclement of Russia? What conceivable interest of the West does this serve?
It is a senseless policy, apparently meant to intimidate Russia, but why? For the sake of perpetuating international tension so as to strengthen the forces that with Cheney and Bush have been promoting constitutionally unaccountable executive rule in the United States?
This is a very serious matter, being treated in the American press as if the United States has not been playing with dynamite. Russia is a powerful and nuclear-armed nation with legitimate national interests. Russia is no longer the messianic and ideological state with world ambitions the Soviet Union was. Those adjectives describe the United States today, as well as the policy towards Russia conducted under both Bush and Clinton administrations.
The most sensible advice I have seen has come from Europeans, directed towards other Europeans. It is to break away from this American policy of senseless and aggressive confrontation with Russia, and follow the successful Sarkozy mediation in Georgia with an effort to establish European terms for resolving this crisis, ignoring the United States.
Saakashvili is not likely to prove an obstacle. His people may soon rid themselves of the author of this fiasco, which humiliated his own country, NATO, and the United States as well. Perhaps a friend will preempt an indignant citizenry by offering Saakashvili a bottle of Scotch and a loaded pistol, and locking the office door. Bush and Rice too will soon be off the stage -- although who knows what will follow.
The European initiative makes sense. Forget Washington and approach Russia with a proposal for a new and constructive relationship with Europe, with arbitration and resolution of its problems with Poland, Ukraine and Georgia in the same way that similar issues have been handled inside Europe. It would take a very brave Europe to do this, but the U.S. on its present course may leave it with little choice.
©Copyright 2008 by Tribune Media Services International. All Rights Reserved.
Monday, August 18, 2008
Russia's Georgia Campaign
For those interested, some very realistic -- sometimes gruesome -- war photography from Arkady Babchenko, a Russian war correspondent who accompanied Russian forces from Vladikavkaz to Gori and participated as a journalist in the battle for the Georgian village of Zemo Nikozi, is to be found at: http://www.navoine.ru/forum/viewtopic.php?p=551#551
Dr. Doom
A diffent approach than Andrew Bacevich on Bill Moyers, but Dr. Roubani arrives at more or less the same conclusions.
August 17, 2008
Dr. Doom
By STEPHEN MIHM
On Sept. 7, 2006, Nouriel Roubini, an economics professor at New York University, stood before an audience of economists at the International Monetary Fund and announced that a crisis was brewing. In the coming months and years, he warned, the United States was likely to face a once-in-a-lifetime housing bust, an oil shock, sharply declining consumer confidence and, ultimately, a deep recession. He laid out a bleak sequence of events: homeowners defaulting on mortgages, trillions of dollars of mortgage-backed securities unraveling worldwide and the global financial system shuddering to a halt. These developments, he went on, could cripple or destroy hedge funds, investment banks and other major financial institutions like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
The audience seemed skeptical, even dismissive. As Roubini stepped down from the lectern after his talk, the moderator of the event quipped, “I think perhaps we will need a stiff drink after that.” People laughed — and not without reason. At the time, unemployment and inflation remained low, and the economy, while weak, was still growing, despite rising oil prices and a softening housing market. And then there was the espouser of doom himself: Roubini was known to be a perpetual pessimist, what economists call a “permabear.” When the economist Anirvan Banerji delivered his response to Roubini’s talk, he noted that Roubini’s predictions did not make use of mathematical models and dismissed his hunches as those of a career naysayer.
But Roubini was soon vindicated. In the year that followed, subprime lenders began entering bankruptcy, hedge funds began going under and the stock market plunged. There was declining employment, a deteriorating dollar, ever-increasing evidence of a huge housing bust and a growing air of panic in financial markets as the credit crisis deepened. By late summer, the Federal Reserve was rushing to the rescue, making the first of many unorthodox interventions in the economy, including cutting the lending rate by 50 basis points and buying up tens of billions of dollars in mortgage-backed securities. When Roubini returned to the I.M.F. last September, he delivered a second talk, predicting a growing crisis of solvency that would infect every sector of the financial system. This time, no one laughed. “He sounded like a madman in 2006,” recalls the I.M.F. economist Prakash Loungani, who invited Roubini on both occasions. “He was a prophet when he returned in 2007.”
Over the past year, whenever optimists have declared the worst of the economic crisis behind us, Roubini has countered with steadfast pessimism. In February, when the conventional wisdom held that the venerable investment firms of Wall Street would weather the crisis, Roubini warned that one or more of them would go “belly up” — and six weeks later, Bear Stearns collapsed. Following the Fed’s further extraordinary actions in the spring — including making lines of credit available to selected investment banks and brokerage houses — many economists made note of the ensuing economic rally and proclaimed the credit crisis over and a recession averted. Roubini, who dismissed the rally as nothing more than a “delusional complacency” encouraged by a “bunch of self-serving spinmasters,” stuck to his script of “nightmare” events: waves of corporate bankrupticies, collapses in markets like commercial real estate and municipal bonds and, most alarming, the possible bankruptcy of a large regional or national bank that would trigger a panic by depositors. Not all of these developments have come to pass (and perhaps never will), but the demise last month of the California bank IndyMac — one of the largest such failures in U.S. history — drew only more attention to Roubini’s seeming prescience.
As a result, Roubini, a respected but formerly obscure academic, has become a major figure in the public debate about the economy: the seer who saw it coming. He has been summoned to speak before Congress, the Council on Foreign Relations and the World Economic Forum at Davos. He is now a sought-after adviser, spending much of his time shuttling between meetings with central bank governors and finance ministers in Europe and Asia. Though he continues to issue colorful doomsday prophecies of a decidedly nonmainstream sort — especially on his popular and polemical blog, where he offers visions of “equity market slaughter” and the “Coming Systemic Bust of the U.S. Banking System” — the mainstream economic establishment appears to be moving closer, however fitfully, to his way of seeing things. “I have in the last few months become more pessimistic than the consensus,” the former Treasury secretary Lawrence Summers told me earlier this year. “Certainly, Nouriel’s writings have been a contributor to that.”
On a cold and dreary day last winter, I met Roubini over lunch in the TriBeCa neighborhood of New York City. “I’m not a pessimist by nature,” he insisted. “I’m not someone who sees things in a bleak way.” Just looking at him, I found the assertion hard to credit. With a dour manner and an aura of gloom about him, Roubini gives the impression of being permanently pained, as if the burden of what he knows is almost too much for him to bear. He rarely smiles, and when he does, his face, topped by an unruly mop of brown hair, contorts into something more closely resembling a grimace.
When I pressed him on his claim that he wasn’t pessimistic, he paused for a moment and then relented a little. “I have more concerns about potential risks and vulnerabilities than most people,” he said, with glum understatement. But these concerns, he argued, make him more of a realist than a pessimist and put him in the role of the cleareyed outsider — unsettling complacency and puncturing pieties.
Roubini, who is 50, has been an outsider his entire life. He was born in Istanbul, the child of Iranian Jews, and his family moved to Tehran when he was 2, then to Tel Aviv and finally to Italy, where he grew up and attended college. He moved to the United States to pursue his doctorate in international economics at Harvard. Along the way he became fluent in Farsi, Hebrew, Italian and English. His accent, an inimitable polyglot growl, radiates a weariness that comes with being what he calls a “global nomad.”
As a graduate student at Harvard, Roubini was an unusual talent, according to his adviser, the Columbia economist Jeffrey Sachs. He was as comfortable in the world of arcane mathematics as he was studying political and economic institutions. “It’s a mix of skills that rarely comes packaged in one person,” Sachs told me. After completing his Ph.D. in 1988, Roubini joined the economics department at Yale, where he first met and began sharing ideas with Robert Shiller, the economist now known for his prescient warnings about the 1990s tech bubble.
The ’90s were an eventful time for an international economist like Roubini. Throughout the decade, one emerging economy after another was beset by crisis, beginning with Mexico’s in 1994. Panics swept Asia, including Thailand, Indonesia and Korea, in 1997 and 1998. The economies of Brazil and Russia imploded in 1998. Argentina’s followed in 2000. Roubini began studying these countries and soon identified what he saw as their common weaknesses. On the eve of the crises that befell them, he noticed, most had huge current-account deficits (meaning, basically, that they spent far more than they made), and they typically financed these deficits by borrowing from abroad in ways that exposed them to the national equivalent of bank runs. Most of these countries also had poorly regulated banking systems plagued by excessive borrowing and reckless lending. Corporate governance was often weak, with cronyism in abundance.
Roubini’s work was distinguished not only by his conclusions but also by his approach. By making extensive use of transnational comparisons and historical analogies, he was employing a subjective, nontechnical framework, the sort embraced by popular economists like the Times Op-Ed columnist Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz in order to reach a nonacademic audience. Roubini takes pains to note that he remains a rigorous scholarly economist — “When I weigh evidence,” he told me, “I’m drawing on 20 years of accumulated experience using models” — but his approach is not the contemporary scholarly ideal in which an economist builds a model in order to constrain his subjective impressions and abide by a discrete set of data. As Shiller told me, “Nouriel has a different way of seeing things than most economists: he gets into everything.”
Roubini likens his style to that of a policy maker like Alan Greenspan, the former Fed chairman who was said (perhaps apocryphally) to pore over vast quantities of technical economic data while sitting in the bathtub, looking to sniff out where the economy was headed. Roubini also cites, as a more ideologically congenial example, the sweeping, cosmopolitan approach of the legendary economist John Maynard Keynes, whom Roubini, with only slight exaggeration, calls “the most brilliant economist who never wrote down an equation.” The book that Roubini ultimately wrote (with the economist Brad Setser) on the emerging market crises, “Bailouts or Bail-Ins?” contains not a single equation in its 400-plus pages.
After analyzing the markets that collapsed in the ’90s, Roubini set out to determine which country’s economy would be the next to succumb to the same pressures. His surprising answer: the United States’. “The United States,” Roubini remembers thinking, “looked like the biggest emerging market of all.” Of course, the United States wasn’t an emerging market; it was (and still is) the largest economy in the world. But Roubini was unnerved by what he saw in the U.S. economy, in particular its 2004 current-account deficit of $600 billion. He began writing extensively about the dangers of that deficit and then branched out, researching the various effects of the credit boom — including the biggest housing bubble in the nation’s history — that began after the Federal Reserve cut rates to close to zero in 2003. Roubini became convinced that the housing bubble was going to pop.
By late 2004 he had started to write about a “nightmare hard landing scenario for the United States.” He predicted that foreign investors would stop financing the fiscal and current-account deficit and abandon the dollar, wreaking havoc on the economy. He said that these problems, which he called the “twin financial train wrecks,” might manifest themselves in 2005 or, at the latest, 2006. “You have been warned here first,” he wrote ominously on his blog. But by the end of 2006, the train wrecks hadn’t occurred.
Recessions are signal events in any modern economy. And yet remarkably, the profession of economics is quite bad at predicting them. A recent study looked at “consensus forecasts” (the predictions of large groups of economists) that were made in advance of 60 different national recessions that hit around the world in the ’90s: in 97 percent of the cases, the study found, the economists failed to predict the coming contraction a year in advance. On those rare occasions when economists did successfully predict recessions, they significantly underestimated the severity of the downturns. Worse, many of the economists failed to anticipate recessions that occurred as soon as two months later.
The dismal science, it seems, is an optimistic profession. Many economists, Roubini among them, argue that some of the optimism is built into the very machinery, the mathematics, of modern economic theory. Econometric models typically rely on the assumption that the near future is likely to be similar to the recent past, and thus it is rare that the models anticipate breaks in the economy. And if the models can’t foresee a relatively minor break like a recession, they have even more trouble modeling and predicting a major rupture like a full-blown financial crisis. Only a handful of 20th-century economists have even bothered to study financial panics. (The most notable example is probably the late economist Hyman Minksy, of whom Roubini is an avid reader.) “These are things most economists barely understand,” Roubini told me. “We’re in uncharted territory where standard economic theory isn’t helpful.”
True though this may be, Roubini’s critics do not agree that his approach is any more accurate. Anirvan Banerji, the economist who challenged Roubini’s first I.M.F. talk, points out that Roubini has been peddling pessimism for years; Banerji contends that Roubini’s apparent foresight is nothing more than an unhappy coincidence of events. “Even a stopped clock is right twice a day,” he told me. “The justification for his bearish call has evolved over the years,” Banerji went on, ticking off the different reasons that Roubini has used to justify his predictions of recessions and crises: rising trade deficits, exploding current-account deficits, Hurricane Katrina, soaring oil prices. All of Roubini’s predictions, Banerji observed, have been based on analogies with past experience. “This forecasting by analogy is a tempting thing to do,” he said. “But you have to pick the right analogy. The danger of this more subjective approach is that instead of letting the objective facts shape your views, you will choose the facts that confirm your existing views.”
Kenneth Rogoff, an economist at Harvard who has known Roubini for decades, told me that he sees great value in Roubini’s willingness to entertain possible situations that are far outside the consensus view of most economists. “If you’re sitting around at the European Central Bank,” he said, “and you’re asking what’s the worst thing that could happen, the first thing people will say is, ‘Let’s see what Nouriel says.’ ” But Rogoff cautioned against equating that skill with forecasting. Roubini, in other words, might be the kind of economist you want to consult about the possibility of the collapse of the municipal-bond market, but he is not necessarily the kind you ask to predict, say, the rise in global demand for paper clips.
His defenders contend that Roubini is not unduly pessimistic. Jeffrey Sachs, his former adviser, told me that “if the underlying conditions call for optimism, Nouriel would be optimistic.” And to be sure, Roubini is capable of being optimistic — or at least of steering clear of absolute worst-case prognostications. He agrees, for example, with the conventional economic wisdom that oil will drop below $100 a barrel in the coming months as global demand weakens. “I’m not comfortable saying that we’re going to end up in the Great Depression,” he told me. “I’m a reasonable person.”
What economic developments does Roubini see on the horizon? And what does he think we should do about them? The first step, he told me in a recent conversation, is to acknowledge the extent of the problem. “We are in a recession, and denying it is nonsense,” he said. When Jim Nussle, the White House budget director, announced last month that the nation had “avoided a recession,” Roubini was incredulous. For months, he has been predicting that the United States will suffer through an 18-month recession that will eventually rank as the “worst since the Great Depression.” Though he is confident that the economy will enter a technical recovery toward the end of next year, he says that job losses, corporate bankruptcies and other drags on growth will continue to take a toll for years.
Roubini has counseled various policy makers, including Federal Reserve governors and senior Treasury Department officials, to mount an aggressive response to the crisis. He applauded when the Federal Reserve cut interest rates to 2 percent from 5.25 percent beginning last summer. He also supported the Fed’s willingness to engineer a takeover of Bear Stearns. Roubini argues that the Fed’s actions averted catastrophe, though he says he believes that future bailouts should focus on mortgage owners, not investors. Accordingly, he sees the choice facing the United States as stark but simple: either the government backs up a trillion-plus dollars’ worth of high-risk mortgages (in exchange for the lenders’ agreement to reduce monthly mortgage payments), or the banks and other institutions holding those mortgages — or the complex securities derived from them — go under. “You either nationalize the banks or you nationalize the mortgages,” he said. “Otherwise, they’re all toast.”
For months Roubini has been arguing that the true cost of the housing crisis will not be a mere $300 billion — the amount allowed for by the housing legislation sponsored by Representative Barney Frank and Senator Christopher Dodd — but something between a trillion and a trillion and a half dollars. But most important, in Roubini’s opinion, is to realize that the problem is deeper than the housing crisis. “Reckless people have deluded themselves that this was a subprime crisis,” he told me. “But we have problems with credit-card debt, student-loan debt, auto loans, commercial real estate loans, home-equity loans, corporate debt and loans that financed leveraged buyouts.” All of these forms of debt, he argues, suffer from some or all of the same traits that first surfaced in the housing market: shoddy underwriting, securitization, negligence on the part of the credit-rating agencies and lax government oversight. “We have a subprime financial system,” he said, “not a subprime mortgage market.”
Roubini argues that most of the losses from this bad debt have yet to be written off, and the toll from bad commercial real estate loans alone may help send hundreds of local banks into the arms of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. “A good third of the regional banks won’t make it,” he predicted. In turn, these bailouts will add hundreds of billions of dollars to an already gargantuan federal debt, and someone, somewhere, is going to have to finance that debt, along with all the other debt accumulated by consumers and corporations. “Our biggest financiers are China, Russia and the gulf states,” Roubini noted. “These are rivals, not allies.”
The United States, Roubini went on, will likely muddle through the crisis but will emerge from it a different nation, with a different place in the world. “Once you run current-account deficits, you depend on the kindness of strangers,” he said, pausing to let out a resigned sigh. “This might be the beginning of the end of the American empire.”
August 17, 2008
Dr. Doom
By STEPHEN MIHM
On Sept. 7, 2006, Nouriel Roubini, an economics professor at New York University, stood before an audience of economists at the International Monetary Fund and announced that a crisis was brewing. In the coming months and years, he warned, the United States was likely to face a once-in-a-lifetime housing bust, an oil shock, sharply declining consumer confidence and, ultimately, a deep recession. He laid out a bleak sequence of events: homeowners defaulting on mortgages, trillions of dollars of mortgage-backed securities unraveling worldwide and the global financial system shuddering to a halt. These developments, he went on, could cripple or destroy hedge funds, investment banks and other major financial institutions like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
The audience seemed skeptical, even dismissive. As Roubini stepped down from the lectern after his talk, the moderator of the event quipped, “I think perhaps we will need a stiff drink after that.” People laughed — and not without reason. At the time, unemployment and inflation remained low, and the economy, while weak, was still growing, despite rising oil prices and a softening housing market. And then there was the espouser of doom himself: Roubini was known to be a perpetual pessimist, what economists call a “permabear.” When the economist Anirvan Banerji delivered his response to Roubini’s talk, he noted that Roubini’s predictions did not make use of mathematical models and dismissed his hunches as those of a career naysayer.
But Roubini was soon vindicated. In the year that followed, subprime lenders began entering bankruptcy, hedge funds began going under and the stock market plunged. There was declining employment, a deteriorating dollar, ever-increasing evidence of a huge housing bust and a growing air of panic in financial markets as the credit crisis deepened. By late summer, the Federal Reserve was rushing to the rescue, making the first of many unorthodox interventions in the economy, including cutting the lending rate by 50 basis points and buying up tens of billions of dollars in mortgage-backed securities. When Roubini returned to the I.M.F. last September, he delivered a second talk, predicting a growing crisis of solvency that would infect every sector of the financial system. This time, no one laughed. “He sounded like a madman in 2006,” recalls the I.M.F. economist Prakash Loungani, who invited Roubini on both occasions. “He was a prophet when he returned in 2007.”
Over the past year, whenever optimists have declared the worst of the economic crisis behind us, Roubini has countered with steadfast pessimism. In February, when the conventional wisdom held that the venerable investment firms of Wall Street would weather the crisis, Roubini warned that one or more of them would go “belly up” — and six weeks later, Bear Stearns collapsed. Following the Fed’s further extraordinary actions in the spring — including making lines of credit available to selected investment banks and brokerage houses — many economists made note of the ensuing economic rally and proclaimed the credit crisis over and a recession averted. Roubini, who dismissed the rally as nothing more than a “delusional complacency” encouraged by a “bunch of self-serving spinmasters,” stuck to his script of “nightmare” events: waves of corporate bankrupticies, collapses in markets like commercial real estate and municipal bonds and, most alarming, the possible bankruptcy of a large regional or national bank that would trigger a panic by depositors. Not all of these developments have come to pass (and perhaps never will), but the demise last month of the California bank IndyMac — one of the largest such failures in U.S. history — drew only more attention to Roubini’s seeming prescience.
As a result, Roubini, a respected but formerly obscure academic, has become a major figure in the public debate about the economy: the seer who saw it coming. He has been summoned to speak before Congress, the Council on Foreign Relations and the World Economic Forum at Davos. He is now a sought-after adviser, spending much of his time shuttling between meetings with central bank governors and finance ministers in Europe and Asia. Though he continues to issue colorful doomsday prophecies of a decidedly nonmainstream sort — especially on his popular and polemical blog, where he offers visions of “equity market slaughter” and the “Coming Systemic Bust of the U.S. Banking System” — the mainstream economic establishment appears to be moving closer, however fitfully, to his way of seeing things. “I have in the last few months become more pessimistic than the consensus,” the former Treasury secretary Lawrence Summers told me earlier this year. “Certainly, Nouriel’s writings have been a contributor to that.”
On a cold and dreary day last winter, I met Roubini over lunch in the TriBeCa neighborhood of New York City. “I’m not a pessimist by nature,” he insisted. “I’m not someone who sees things in a bleak way.” Just looking at him, I found the assertion hard to credit. With a dour manner and an aura of gloom about him, Roubini gives the impression of being permanently pained, as if the burden of what he knows is almost too much for him to bear. He rarely smiles, and when he does, his face, topped by an unruly mop of brown hair, contorts into something more closely resembling a grimace.
When I pressed him on his claim that he wasn’t pessimistic, he paused for a moment and then relented a little. “I have more concerns about potential risks and vulnerabilities than most people,” he said, with glum understatement. But these concerns, he argued, make him more of a realist than a pessimist and put him in the role of the cleareyed outsider — unsettling complacency and puncturing pieties.
Roubini, who is 50, has been an outsider his entire life. He was born in Istanbul, the child of Iranian Jews, and his family moved to Tehran when he was 2, then to Tel Aviv and finally to Italy, where he grew up and attended college. He moved to the United States to pursue his doctorate in international economics at Harvard. Along the way he became fluent in Farsi, Hebrew, Italian and English. His accent, an inimitable polyglot growl, radiates a weariness that comes with being what he calls a “global nomad.”
As a graduate student at Harvard, Roubini was an unusual talent, according to his adviser, the Columbia economist Jeffrey Sachs. He was as comfortable in the world of arcane mathematics as he was studying political and economic institutions. “It’s a mix of skills that rarely comes packaged in one person,” Sachs told me. After completing his Ph.D. in 1988, Roubini joined the economics department at Yale, where he first met and began sharing ideas with Robert Shiller, the economist now known for his prescient warnings about the 1990s tech bubble.
The ’90s were an eventful time for an international economist like Roubini. Throughout the decade, one emerging economy after another was beset by crisis, beginning with Mexico’s in 1994. Panics swept Asia, including Thailand, Indonesia and Korea, in 1997 and 1998. The economies of Brazil and Russia imploded in 1998. Argentina’s followed in 2000. Roubini began studying these countries and soon identified what he saw as their common weaknesses. On the eve of the crises that befell them, he noticed, most had huge current-account deficits (meaning, basically, that they spent far more than they made), and they typically financed these deficits by borrowing from abroad in ways that exposed them to the national equivalent of bank runs. Most of these countries also had poorly regulated banking systems plagued by excessive borrowing and reckless lending. Corporate governance was often weak, with cronyism in abundance.
Roubini’s work was distinguished not only by his conclusions but also by his approach. By making extensive use of transnational comparisons and historical analogies, he was employing a subjective, nontechnical framework, the sort embraced by popular economists like the Times Op-Ed columnist Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz in order to reach a nonacademic audience. Roubini takes pains to note that he remains a rigorous scholarly economist — “When I weigh evidence,” he told me, “I’m drawing on 20 years of accumulated experience using models” — but his approach is not the contemporary scholarly ideal in which an economist builds a model in order to constrain his subjective impressions and abide by a discrete set of data. As Shiller told me, “Nouriel has a different way of seeing things than most economists: he gets into everything.”
Roubini likens his style to that of a policy maker like Alan Greenspan, the former Fed chairman who was said (perhaps apocryphally) to pore over vast quantities of technical economic data while sitting in the bathtub, looking to sniff out where the economy was headed. Roubini also cites, as a more ideologically congenial example, the sweeping, cosmopolitan approach of the legendary economist John Maynard Keynes, whom Roubini, with only slight exaggeration, calls “the most brilliant economist who never wrote down an equation.” The book that Roubini ultimately wrote (with the economist Brad Setser) on the emerging market crises, “Bailouts or Bail-Ins?” contains not a single equation in its 400-plus pages.
After analyzing the markets that collapsed in the ’90s, Roubini set out to determine which country’s economy would be the next to succumb to the same pressures. His surprising answer: the United States’. “The United States,” Roubini remembers thinking, “looked like the biggest emerging market of all.” Of course, the United States wasn’t an emerging market; it was (and still is) the largest economy in the world. But Roubini was unnerved by what he saw in the U.S. economy, in particular its 2004 current-account deficit of $600 billion. He began writing extensively about the dangers of that deficit and then branched out, researching the various effects of the credit boom — including the biggest housing bubble in the nation’s history — that began after the Federal Reserve cut rates to close to zero in 2003. Roubini became convinced that the housing bubble was going to pop.
By late 2004 he had started to write about a “nightmare hard landing scenario for the United States.” He predicted that foreign investors would stop financing the fiscal and current-account deficit and abandon the dollar, wreaking havoc on the economy. He said that these problems, which he called the “twin financial train wrecks,” might manifest themselves in 2005 or, at the latest, 2006. “You have been warned here first,” he wrote ominously on his blog. But by the end of 2006, the train wrecks hadn’t occurred.
Recessions are signal events in any modern economy. And yet remarkably, the profession of economics is quite bad at predicting them. A recent study looked at “consensus forecasts” (the predictions of large groups of economists) that were made in advance of 60 different national recessions that hit around the world in the ’90s: in 97 percent of the cases, the study found, the economists failed to predict the coming contraction a year in advance. On those rare occasions when economists did successfully predict recessions, they significantly underestimated the severity of the downturns. Worse, many of the economists failed to anticipate recessions that occurred as soon as two months later.
The dismal science, it seems, is an optimistic profession. Many economists, Roubini among them, argue that some of the optimism is built into the very machinery, the mathematics, of modern economic theory. Econometric models typically rely on the assumption that the near future is likely to be similar to the recent past, and thus it is rare that the models anticipate breaks in the economy. And if the models can’t foresee a relatively minor break like a recession, they have even more trouble modeling and predicting a major rupture like a full-blown financial crisis. Only a handful of 20th-century economists have even bothered to study financial panics. (The most notable example is probably the late economist Hyman Minksy, of whom Roubini is an avid reader.) “These are things most economists barely understand,” Roubini told me. “We’re in uncharted territory where standard economic theory isn’t helpful.”
True though this may be, Roubini’s critics do not agree that his approach is any more accurate. Anirvan Banerji, the economist who challenged Roubini’s first I.M.F. talk, points out that Roubini has been peddling pessimism for years; Banerji contends that Roubini’s apparent foresight is nothing more than an unhappy coincidence of events. “Even a stopped clock is right twice a day,” he told me. “The justification for his bearish call has evolved over the years,” Banerji went on, ticking off the different reasons that Roubini has used to justify his predictions of recessions and crises: rising trade deficits, exploding current-account deficits, Hurricane Katrina, soaring oil prices. All of Roubini’s predictions, Banerji observed, have been based on analogies with past experience. “This forecasting by analogy is a tempting thing to do,” he said. “But you have to pick the right analogy. The danger of this more subjective approach is that instead of letting the objective facts shape your views, you will choose the facts that confirm your existing views.”
Kenneth Rogoff, an economist at Harvard who has known Roubini for decades, told me that he sees great value in Roubini’s willingness to entertain possible situations that are far outside the consensus view of most economists. “If you’re sitting around at the European Central Bank,” he said, “and you’re asking what’s the worst thing that could happen, the first thing people will say is, ‘Let’s see what Nouriel says.’ ” But Rogoff cautioned against equating that skill with forecasting. Roubini, in other words, might be the kind of economist you want to consult about the possibility of the collapse of the municipal-bond market, but he is not necessarily the kind you ask to predict, say, the rise in global demand for paper clips.
His defenders contend that Roubini is not unduly pessimistic. Jeffrey Sachs, his former adviser, told me that “if the underlying conditions call for optimism, Nouriel would be optimistic.” And to be sure, Roubini is capable of being optimistic — or at least of steering clear of absolute worst-case prognostications. He agrees, for example, with the conventional economic wisdom that oil will drop below $100 a barrel in the coming months as global demand weakens. “I’m not comfortable saying that we’re going to end up in the Great Depression,” he told me. “I’m a reasonable person.”
What economic developments does Roubini see on the horizon? And what does he think we should do about them? The first step, he told me in a recent conversation, is to acknowledge the extent of the problem. “We are in a recession, and denying it is nonsense,” he said. When Jim Nussle, the White House budget director, announced last month that the nation had “avoided a recession,” Roubini was incredulous. For months, he has been predicting that the United States will suffer through an 18-month recession that will eventually rank as the “worst since the Great Depression.” Though he is confident that the economy will enter a technical recovery toward the end of next year, he says that job losses, corporate bankruptcies and other drags on growth will continue to take a toll for years.
Roubini has counseled various policy makers, including Federal Reserve governors and senior Treasury Department officials, to mount an aggressive response to the crisis. He applauded when the Federal Reserve cut interest rates to 2 percent from 5.25 percent beginning last summer. He also supported the Fed’s willingness to engineer a takeover of Bear Stearns. Roubini argues that the Fed’s actions averted catastrophe, though he says he believes that future bailouts should focus on mortgage owners, not investors. Accordingly, he sees the choice facing the United States as stark but simple: either the government backs up a trillion-plus dollars’ worth of high-risk mortgages (in exchange for the lenders’ agreement to reduce monthly mortgage payments), or the banks and other institutions holding those mortgages — or the complex securities derived from them — go under. “You either nationalize the banks or you nationalize the mortgages,” he said. “Otherwise, they’re all toast.”
For months Roubini has been arguing that the true cost of the housing crisis will not be a mere $300 billion — the amount allowed for by the housing legislation sponsored by Representative Barney Frank and Senator Christopher Dodd — but something between a trillion and a trillion and a half dollars. But most important, in Roubini’s opinion, is to realize that the problem is deeper than the housing crisis. “Reckless people have deluded themselves that this was a subprime crisis,” he told me. “But we have problems with credit-card debt, student-loan debt, auto loans, commercial real estate loans, home-equity loans, corporate debt and loans that financed leveraged buyouts.” All of these forms of debt, he argues, suffer from some or all of the same traits that first surfaced in the housing market: shoddy underwriting, securitization, negligence on the part of the credit-rating agencies and lax government oversight. “We have a subprime financial system,” he said, “not a subprime mortgage market.”
Roubini argues that most of the losses from this bad debt have yet to be written off, and the toll from bad commercial real estate loans alone may help send hundreds of local banks into the arms of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. “A good third of the regional banks won’t make it,” he predicted. In turn, these bailouts will add hundreds of billions of dollars to an already gargantuan federal debt, and someone, somewhere, is going to have to finance that debt, along with all the other debt accumulated by consumers and corporations. “Our biggest financiers are China, Russia and the gulf states,” Roubini noted. “These are rivals, not allies.”
The United States, Roubini went on, will likely muddle through the crisis but will emerge from it a different nation, with a different place in the world. “Once you run current-account deficits, you depend on the kindness of strangers,” he said, pausing to let out a resigned sigh. “This might be the beginning of the end of the American empire.”
Saturday, August 16, 2008
The Georgia Crisis: A Blow to NATO
Friday, Aug. 15, 2008
The Georgia Crisis: A Blow to NATO
By Tony Karon
Washington hawks insist that the remedy to Russia's military humiliation of Georgia is to expedite the smaller country's incorporation into NATO. After all, Moscow might think twice about attacking any nation able to trigger the Atlantic Alliance's Article 5, which obliges all member states to respond militarily to an attack on any one of them. President Bush, in fact, toured Europe last spring to stump aggressively for Georgia and Ukraine to be granted Membership Action Plans, the first step toward joining the Alliance. But despite Bush's high-profile campaigning, the proposal was rebuffed at NATO's April summit by 10 member states, led by key U.S. allies Germany and France. That rejection, said Republican presidential nominee Senator John McCain, "might have been viewed as a green light by Russia for its attacks on Georgia," and he urged European NATO members to "revisit the decision."
But many of the Europeans draw the opposite conclusion. They see last week's events in Georgia as vindicating their caution over granting Georgia NATO membership. Indeed, many in Europe see the Bush Administration's military support for Georgia and its trumpeting of Tbilisi's cause in NATO as having emboldened President Mikheil Saakashvili to launch his reckless attack on South Ossetia.
If Russia's brutal response to Georgia's provocation had, in fact, obliged NATO to intervene, the Atlantic Alliance itself might have faced a terminal crisis. Most of its member states have no enthusiasm for confronting a resurgent Russia in the Caucasus, traditionally a Russian sphere of influence. The Alliance, for one thing, is having enough trouble maintaining 71,000 troops in Afghanistan, where they are managing only to tread water against mounting odds. Other arguments against confrontation: much of Western Europe is wholly dependent on Russian energy supplies, and European negotiators believe there is little chance of a diplomatic solution to the Iran nuclear standoff without committed support from Moscow.
So, regardless of the appeals of Senator McCain — and his Democratic opponent, Senator Barack Obama — the events of the past week have more likely placed Georgia's NATO membership in the deep freeze for the foreseeable future, even if the Alliance remains rhetorically committed to the idea in principle. If so, Moscow can count what has transpired as a major victory: it has prevented the advance of a rival military alliance into Russia's backyard.
Russia's very purpose in its "punishment" of Georgia has been to warn neighbors inclined to challenge Moscow from under a Western security umbrella that if a storm is provoked, that umbrella offers precious little protection. The conflict was never simply about Georgia and its restive minority regions; it was always about NATO, as well as the regional balance of power between Russia and the U.S.
Putin has used the opportunity presented by Saakashvili to show Russia's neighbors that Washington's tough talk could not be matched by any meaningful response to the Kremlin's military campaign. Bush may now be trying to play catch-up with his tough talk, but reversing the impact of the Russian offensive will require a lot more than stitching up a bloodied Georgia and casting Russia out of the G-8 or boycotting the 2014 Winter Olympics. (Thursday's announcement of a deal between the U.S. and Poland to station missile interceptors on Russia's doorstep over increasingly bellicose objections from Moscow may have been timed to signal resolve in the face of Russian aggression, but that plan was in the works long before the Georgia showdown and is unlikely to have any effect on the Georgia situation.)
When NATO holds its last summit of the Bush presidency in December, the symbolic language may remain soothingly supportive of membership for Georgia, but don't expect to see it granted a Membership Action Plan. Indeed, the events of the past week have called into question the very purpose of NATO and its relationship with Russia.
While many Western critics declared the Russian actions of the past week a reversion to Cold War tactics, Moscow sees NATO itself as a Cold War relic. The Russians complain that following the demise of the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Treaty Organization, the U.S. reneged on promises to create a new global security order and instead moved to expand its own Cold War military alliance — NATO — into Moscow's own sphere of influence.
NATO's very purpose had been to contain the Soviet Union in the wake of World War II. The Red Army had just broken the back of Hitler's Wehrmacht and put Moscow in control of the Baltic states (annexed at the outset of the war), Poland, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria and Romania. Having watched Central Europe transformed by Soviet military power into a patchwork of authoritarian vassal states, Western Europe was only too willing to join an all-for-one military alliance with the U.S. and Canada to even up the odds in the event of further Soviet expansionism. Nor was it surprising that decades later, those Europeans who had actually lived under the Soviet heel would race to join the same alliance at the first opportunity. The anti-Moscow military alliance not only remained intact in the decade after the Cold War but also advanced toward Russia's shrinking borders. Russians saw all of that as strategic encirclement with hostile intent.
Last month, General Norton Schwartz, nominated as chief of the U.S. Air Force, said at his confirmation hearing that the U.S. needed to send a warning to Moscow in the wake of Russian media reports claiming that Moscow was weighing the deployment of nuclear-capable bombers in Cuba in response to U.S. missile-defense installations in Poland and the Czech Republic. The Russians should be told that moving bombers to Cuba "crosses a red line for the United States of America," he said. Let's just say that the Russian military brass have long felt the same way about Ukraine and Georgia being militarily integrated into a rival alliance.
Russia could do little to stem NATO's advance during the economic and social collapse presided over by Boris Yeltsin. But Putin's Russia, flush with petrodollars, has re-emerged as a geopolitical player at the same time that U.S. influence has been waning. With the bloodletting in Georgia, the Russians are telling Europe that the current security architecture is dysfunctional — a message Moscow sent earlier in the year through a vague proposal to replace NATO with a pan-European security structure in which Russia would be an equal partner.
In Washington and in many former Soviet satellite states, the response to the Georgia debacle will be to continue NATO's eastward expansion and stiffen its resolve to contain a resurgent Russia. But in Western Europe, there will be growing doubts over the value of a security system built upon a structure designed to isolate and contain Russia. The problem, of course, is that NATO operates strictly by consensus, and in the absence of such consensus, paralysis may set in. Indeed, it may yet emerge that Putin's campaign in the Caucasus has succeeded not only in keeping Georgia out of NATO but in dealing a body blow to the Alliance itself.
* http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1832988,00.html
The Georgia Crisis: A Blow to NATO
By Tony Karon
Washington hawks insist that the remedy to Russia's military humiliation of Georgia is to expedite the smaller country's incorporation into NATO. After all, Moscow might think twice about attacking any nation able to trigger the Atlantic Alliance's Article 5, which obliges all member states to respond militarily to an attack on any one of them. President Bush, in fact, toured Europe last spring to stump aggressively for Georgia and Ukraine to be granted Membership Action Plans, the first step toward joining the Alliance. But despite Bush's high-profile campaigning, the proposal was rebuffed at NATO's April summit by 10 member states, led by key U.S. allies Germany and France. That rejection, said Republican presidential nominee Senator John McCain, "might have been viewed as a green light by Russia for its attacks on Georgia," and he urged European NATO members to "revisit the decision."
But many of the Europeans draw the opposite conclusion. They see last week's events in Georgia as vindicating their caution over granting Georgia NATO membership. Indeed, many in Europe see the Bush Administration's military support for Georgia and its trumpeting of Tbilisi's cause in NATO as having emboldened President Mikheil Saakashvili to launch his reckless attack on South Ossetia.
If Russia's brutal response to Georgia's provocation had, in fact, obliged NATO to intervene, the Atlantic Alliance itself might have faced a terminal crisis. Most of its member states have no enthusiasm for confronting a resurgent Russia in the Caucasus, traditionally a Russian sphere of influence. The Alliance, for one thing, is having enough trouble maintaining 71,000 troops in Afghanistan, where they are managing only to tread water against mounting odds. Other arguments against confrontation: much of Western Europe is wholly dependent on Russian energy supplies, and European negotiators believe there is little chance of a diplomatic solution to the Iran nuclear standoff without committed support from Moscow.
So, regardless of the appeals of Senator McCain — and his Democratic opponent, Senator Barack Obama — the events of the past week have more likely placed Georgia's NATO membership in the deep freeze for the foreseeable future, even if the Alliance remains rhetorically committed to the idea in principle. If so, Moscow can count what has transpired as a major victory: it has prevented the advance of a rival military alliance into Russia's backyard.
Russia's very purpose in its "punishment" of Georgia has been to warn neighbors inclined to challenge Moscow from under a Western security umbrella that if a storm is provoked, that umbrella offers precious little protection. The conflict was never simply about Georgia and its restive minority regions; it was always about NATO, as well as the regional balance of power between Russia and the U.S.
Putin has used the opportunity presented by Saakashvili to show Russia's neighbors that Washington's tough talk could not be matched by any meaningful response to the Kremlin's military campaign. Bush may now be trying to play catch-up with his tough talk, but reversing the impact of the Russian offensive will require a lot more than stitching up a bloodied Georgia and casting Russia out of the G-8 or boycotting the 2014 Winter Olympics. (Thursday's announcement of a deal between the U.S. and Poland to station missile interceptors on Russia's doorstep over increasingly bellicose objections from Moscow may have been timed to signal resolve in the face of Russian aggression, but that plan was in the works long before the Georgia showdown and is unlikely to have any effect on the Georgia situation.)
When NATO holds its last summit of the Bush presidency in December, the symbolic language may remain soothingly supportive of membership for Georgia, but don't expect to see it granted a Membership Action Plan. Indeed, the events of the past week have called into question the very purpose of NATO and its relationship with Russia.
While many Western critics declared the Russian actions of the past week a reversion to Cold War tactics, Moscow sees NATO itself as a Cold War relic. The Russians complain that following the demise of the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Treaty Organization, the U.S. reneged on promises to create a new global security order and instead moved to expand its own Cold War military alliance — NATO — into Moscow's own sphere of influence.
NATO's very purpose had been to contain the Soviet Union in the wake of World War II. The Red Army had just broken the back of Hitler's Wehrmacht and put Moscow in control of the Baltic states (annexed at the outset of the war), Poland, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria and Romania. Having watched Central Europe transformed by Soviet military power into a patchwork of authoritarian vassal states, Western Europe was only too willing to join an all-for-one military alliance with the U.S. and Canada to even up the odds in the event of further Soviet expansionism. Nor was it surprising that decades later, those Europeans who had actually lived under the Soviet heel would race to join the same alliance at the first opportunity. The anti-Moscow military alliance not only remained intact in the decade after the Cold War but also advanced toward Russia's shrinking borders. Russians saw all of that as strategic encirclement with hostile intent.
Last month, General Norton Schwartz, nominated as chief of the U.S. Air Force, said at his confirmation hearing that the U.S. needed to send a warning to Moscow in the wake of Russian media reports claiming that Moscow was weighing the deployment of nuclear-capable bombers in Cuba in response to U.S. missile-defense installations in Poland and the Czech Republic. The Russians should be told that moving bombers to Cuba "crosses a red line for the United States of America," he said. Let's just say that the Russian military brass have long felt the same way about Ukraine and Georgia being militarily integrated into a rival alliance.
Russia could do little to stem NATO's advance during the economic and social collapse presided over by Boris Yeltsin. But Putin's Russia, flush with petrodollars, has re-emerged as a geopolitical player at the same time that U.S. influence has been waning. With the bloodletting in Georgia, the Russians are telling Europe that the current security architecture is dysfunctional — a message Moscow sent earlier in the year through a vague proposal to replace NATO with a pan-European security structure in which Russia would be an equal partner.
In Washington and in many former Soviet satellite states, the response to the Georgia debacle will be to continue NATO's eastward expansion and stiffen its resolve to contain a resurgent Russia. But in Western Europe, there will be growing doubts over the value of a security system built upon a structure designed to isolate and contain Russia. The problem, of course, is that NATO operates strictly by consensus, and in the absence of such consensus, paralysis may set in. Indeed, it may yet emerge that Putin's campaign in the Caucasus has succeeded not only in keeping Georgia out of NATO but in dealing a body blow to the Alliance itself.
* http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1832988,00.html
Crisis in the Caucasus
Crisis in the Caucasus
by Ivan Eland
Despite significant U.S. and Georgian culpability in the crisis in Georgia, most U.S. politicians and media painted Russia as the diabolical "evildoer." As if the Russian military incursions into Georgia, Abkhazia, and South Ossetia – the latter two are autonomous regions of the former that do not want to be part of that country – happened out of the blue, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice implied that Russia was attempting to bring back the Cold War.
Because Georgia is a U.S. friend, however, U.S. politicians, in a huff to heap blame on the resurgent Russian bear, forgot to mention that Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili recklessly first invaded South Ossetia to try to reclaim one of the two regions, which both have had long-standing autonomy and populations who want it to stay that way. He did this in part because the U.S. had helped build up his military, leading him to overestimate U.S. backing in any crisis.
Russia had given ample warnings to Saakashvili that if he attempted to grab such lands, he would meet resistance. In addition, the initial Georgian invasion killed Russian soldiers and apparently many civilians. The United States would never tolerate the killing of its military personnel in such a manner.
But despite their tough pre-election public posturing, some U.S. politicians acknowledge privately that the U.S. friend Saakashvili might be a loose cannon. That they take for granted that the United States should be reflexively supporting him anyway vis-à-vis Russia is troubling. Why should the United States stand behind Saakashvili's aggressive provocation of Russia – a country with thousands of nuclear warheads?
The answer is that contrary to Secretary Rice's implication, Russia is not bringing back the Cold War. In fact, it never ended. After the Soviet Union fell, the United States deliberately took advantage of a weakened Russia to incorporate its former allies and even some former Soviet republics into the NATO alliance. The U.S. even sought and won access to military bases in former Soviet republics in Central Asia. At the time, Russia could do nothing about this perceived hostile alliance moving right up to its current borders. More recently, a stronger Russia – reacting to NATO's flirtation with Ukraine and Georgia for eventual alliance membership and plans for installing U.S. missile defense installations in Poland and the Czech Republic – tightened its relationship with the breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Another factor provoking this Russian reaction was the West's recognition of Kosovo – the secessionist province of Serbia, which is a staunch Russian ally – as an independent state. If the U.S. supported self-determination, as enshrined in the U.S. Declaration of Independence, for Kosovo, then why not for Georgia's breakaway regions?
Thus, the post-1991 "Cold War Lite" policy that the U.S. has adopted has made Russia feel surrounded, isolated, and threatened, as many opponents of NATO expansion predicted in the 1990s would eventually happen. After all, the U.S. is in Russia's face – that is, in its traditional sphere of influence – and not vice versa. The opponents also correctly predicted if Russia rose again – which they deemed a distinct possibility – the disgruntled bear would put its foot down. That just happened.
This crisis has dragged up larger questions, however. If the U.S. continues to pledge a costly defense of an ever expanding list of NATO allies (currently at 25), at some point, one or more of these small, weak nations in Russia's "near abroad" will embroil the U.S. needlessly in a Cold War-style confrontation with a nuclear-armed power. In this case, if the rash Georgia had already become a NATO member, pressure would have mounted to send U.S. combat troops instead of humanitarian aid to that nation.
Ever more to the point, why is Georgia so important to the United States? The answer is that it is not. Although Russia is unfortunately moving back to autocracy and Georgia is an imperfect democracy, Georgia is a small, weak country not even remotely close to the United States, its sphere of influence, or anything important to the United States.
Some would say that oil pipelines running from the Caspian Sea oil basin through Georgia to Turkey and the Mediterranean matter, but even this argument has been vastly overstated. Caspian Sea oil accounts for only less than four percent of the world's proven oil reserves. But even in the worst case, if Russia would get control of the Georgian portions of these pipelines – in addition to controlling its own pipelines carrying Caspian Sea oil – the Russian economy remains oil-based and in dire need of lucrative revenues from oil transport. Thus, although the Russians might raise the price of transporting Caspian Sea oil through these pipelines, Russia would be unlikely to halt the long-term flow of the petroleum to the world market.
In short, U.S. friend Georgia is hardly on the unambiguous right side of this dispute, was recklessly aggressive (in part because of U.S. military aid and friendship), and is not strategic to the United States. As bad as this crisis is, it could have been worse if Georgia had already been admitted to NATO. This crisis should be a wake-up call that admitting Georgia, Ukraine, or other non-strategic nations in the Russian sphere of influence into NATO could needlessly make Russia even more hostile and start a new, dangerous, and unnecessary Cold War.
http://www.antiwar.com/eland/?articleid=13311
by Ivan Eland
Despite significant U.S. and Georgian culpability in the crisis in Georgia, most U.S. politicians and media painted Russia as the diabolical "evildoer." As if the Russian military incursions into Georgia, Abkhazia, and South Ossetia – the latter two are autonomous regions of the former that do not want to be part of that country – happened out of the blue, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice implied that Russia was attempting to bring back the Cold War.
Because Georgia is a U.S. friend, however, U.S. politicians, in a huff to heap blame on the resurgent Russian bear, forgot to mention that Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili recklessly first invaded South Ossetia to try to reclaim one of the two regions, which both have had long-standing autonomy and populations who want it to stay that way. He did this in part because the U.S. had helped build up his military, leading him to overestimate U.S. backing in any crisis.
Russia had given ample warnings to Saakashvili that if he attempted to grab such lands, he would meet resistance. In addition, the initial Georgian invasion killed Russian soldiers and apparently many civilians. The United States would never tolerate the killing of its military personnel in such a manner.
But despite their tough pre-election public posturing, some U.S. politicians acknowledge privately that the U.S. friend Saakashvili might be a loose cannon. That they take for granted that the United States should be reflexively supporting him anyway vis-à-vis Russia is troubling. Why should the United States stand behind Saakashvili's aggressive provocation of Russia – a country with thousands of nuclear warheads?
The answer is that contrary to Secretary Rice's implication, Russia is not bringing back the Cold War. In fact, it never ended. After the Soviet Union fell, the United States deliberately took advantage of a weakened Russia to incorporate its former allies and even some former Soviet republics into the NATO alliance. The U.S. even sought and won access to military bases in former Soviet republics in Central Asia. At the time, Russia could do nothing about this perceived hostile alliance moving right up to its current borders. More recently, a stronger Russia – reacting to NATO's flirtation with Ukraine and Georgia for eventual alliance membership and plans for installing U.S. missile defense installations in Poland and the Czech Republic – tightened its relationship with the breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
Another factor provoking this Russian reaction was the West's recognition of Kosovo – the secessionist province of Serbia, which is a staunch Russian ally – as an independent state. If the U.S. supported self-determination, as enshrined in the U.S. Declaration of Independence, for Kosovo, then why not for Georgia's breakaway regions?
Thus, the post-1991 "Cold War Lite" policy that the U.S. has adopted has made Russia feel surrounded, isolated, and threatened, as many opponents of NATO expansion predicted in the 1990s would eventually happen. After all, the U.S. is in Russia's face – that is, in its traditional sphere of influence – and not vice versa. The opponents also correctly predicted if Russia rose again – which they deemed a distinct possibility – the disgruntled bear would put its foot down. That just happened.
This crisis has dragged up larger questions, however. If the U.S. continues to pledge a costly defense of an ever expanding list of NATO allies (currently at 25), at some point, one or more of these small, weak nations in Russia's "near abroad" will embroil the U.S. needlessly in a Cold War-style confrontation with a nuclear-armed power. In this case, if the rash Georgia had already become a NATO member, pressure would have mounted to send U.S. combat troops instead of humanitarian aid to that nation.
Ever more to the point, why is Georgia so important to the United States? The answer is that it is not. Although Russia is unfortunately moving back to autocracy and Georgia is an imperfect democracy, Georgia is a small, weak country not even remotely close to the United States, its sphere of influence, or anything important to the United States.
Some would say that oil pipelines running from the Caspian Sea oil basin through Georgia to Turkey and the Mediterranean matter, but even this argument has been vastly overstated. Caspian Sea oil accounts for only less than four percent of the world's proven oil reserves. But even in the worst case, if Russia would get control of the Georgian portions of these pipelines – in addition to controlling its own pipelines carrying Caspian Sea oil – the Russian economy remains oil-based and in dire need of lucrative revenues from oil transport. Thus, although the Russians might raise the price of transporting Caspian Sea oil through these pipelines, Russia would be unlikely to halt the long-term flow of the petroleum to the world market.
In short, U.S. friend Georgia is hardly on the unambiguous right side of this dispute, was recklessly aggressive (in part because of U.S. military aid and friendship), and is not strategic to the United States. As bad as this crisis is, it could have been worse if Georgia had already been admitted to NATO. This crisis should be a wake-up call that admitting Georgia, Ukraine, or other non-strategic nations in the Russian sphere of influence into NATO could needlessly make Russia even more hostile and start a new, dangerous, and unnecessary Cold War.
http://www.antiwar.com/eland/?articleid=13311
Andrew Bacevich on Bill Moyers' program
Here is Andrew Bacevich on Bill Moyers' program. Those who found his articles on the limits of American power compelling will find this a well-spent hour. Or you can read the transcript below the video. http://www.pbs.org/moyers
Friday, August 15, 2008
Iran gambles over Georgia's crisis
Iran gambles over Georgia's crisis
Iran, itself under threat of military action by the United States and or Israel, has remained conspicuously silent over Russia's offensive in Georgia. Tehran shares Moscow's fears over the expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the US's plans for anti-missile systems in Eastern Europe. But the Irananians may have blundered by not criticizing Moscow, and the "Iran Six" diplomacy over Iran's nuclear program is now in jeopardy. - Kaveh L Afrasiabi (Aug 15, '08)
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/JH16Ak01.html
Iran, itself under threat of military action by the United States and or Israel, has remained conspicuously silent over Russia's offensive in Georgia. Tehran shares Moscow's fears over the expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the US's plans for anti-missile systems in Eastern Europe. But the Irananians may have blundered by not criticizing Moscow, and the "Iran Six" diplomacy over Iran's nuclear program is now in jeopardy. - Kaveh L Afrasiabi (Aug 15, '08)
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/JH16Ak01.html
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Anthony Saich on the Future of China
Anthony Saich on the Future of China
The 2008 Summer Olympic Games are showcasing the "New China" to the world. The last thirty years have seen tremendous changes in China – economically, socially and politically. Anthony Saich is Daewoo professor of international affairs at Harvard Kennedy School and director of the Ash Institute for Democratic Governance and Innovation. He has been engaged with Chinese culture and politics for more than 30 years, and serves as the Changjiang Scholar at Tsinghua University.
Q: The Chinese government has spent more than $40 billion preparing to host the Olympic Games. Why are these Games such an important event for China?
Saich: The Chinese leadership sees holding the Olympics as a clear symbol that China has emerged as a global player of significant importance and they tried very hard to win the right to host the games. I think they see it as a sign of the country having emerged as a powerful economic force and, increasingly, as a player of cultural influence. China's leaders feel that these games will cement the achievements they feel they've made over the last thirty years.
If you look back historically at Japan, Mexico, and South Korea, they saw hosting the Olympic Games as a very significant milestone in their development as modern countries and as an expression of what they saw as their domestic achievements towards a global audience. So I think the Chinese have been very happy to use the games to promote internationally and domestically what they feel are their achievements. They've linked it to a sense of patriotism and a sense of pride amongst many Chinese nationals who I think feel justifiably proud to be hosting the games on this occasion.
Q: China's environmental and political challenges will receive added scrutiny due to the intense media coverage during the Games. How are the country and the government dealing with these challenges?
Saich: Environmentally, there are short-term and long-term challenges. Obviously, what the leadership is most focused on at the moment is just the short-term challenge of making sure that Beijing is not so polluted that it adversely affects the stamina events. They've closed down a number of factories, they've stopped a lot of the building work around Beijing; and they're trying to restrict traffic flows where a lot of the pollution comes from. But I think many people are questioning whether this is too little, too late.
I think the more important set of environmental issues, though, beyond the Olympics, is what the relationship will be between China's spectacular economic growth and its future development. Environmental pollution affects not just China but plays into global warming and acidic rain in neighboring countries.
China actually has a very good set of environmental legislation. The problem really is with conflicting incentives between the national government and local governments that encourage many local governments to maintain their polluting industries. So on one level, simply implementing the laws they have on the books would be a tremendous help with cleaning up the environment. Secondly, despite international perception, many Chinese enterprises are now adopting cutting-edge, environmentally-sound technologies. Certainly China's citizens are aware of the increasing cost of environmental degradation and pollution, so this has become a very live issue in China.
Politically, I don't think what's taking place around the Olympics is going to affect the long-term trajectory of development in China. The Olympics has become defined as an event which summarizes national pride and the overriding concern is with questions of security.
The Chinese definition of security in that context is broader than would perhaps be acceptable to us. It goes beyond the question of just physical security for the games to entail security in the sense of making sure that China's reputation is not tarnished. The Chinese leadership doesn't want to have people demonstrating, or foreign journalists looking at some of the dark sides of reforms, some of the inequities, some of the brutalities that are being committed by local governments. Once something becomes defined in terms of security, the security forces take over and they have their own logic of action. I think the visceral reaction is to shut down anything that might be a problem.
That obviously brings China into conflict with some of the Western norms around reporting and what reporters would expect to be able to cover and expect to be able to see while they're in China. I don't think it should have surprised China – people have been warning China for a long time that holding the games would mean that not only attention focused on the sport but also attention focused on China itself, with investigative reporters wanting to provide coverage worldwide. I think they've found this quite difficult to cope with.
Q: You have witnessed China's amazing economic growth and cultural change over the past thirty years. What has surprised you most about it?
Saich: I think just quite simply that the changes have kept coming. When I first went to China as a student it was towards the end of the Cultural Revolution. It was an unbelievably drab city; everybody wore blue. Many of the clichés were true: the restaurants closed at six in the evening; there was nowhere to go and get a drink; there was nowhere to really let your hair down and have fun except in the foreign diplomatic compounds. I think if anybody had asked me whether in 30 years time you would see this progress, I would have suggested that they were insane.
Just the mere fact that that reform has kept going I think is astonishing. China is really going through multiple changes that we in the west have taken perhaps a century or more to digest: from being an overwhelming rural country to now a predominately urbanized country. They're de-industrializing their old Soviet style industry while at the same time trying to build up a biopharmacy base and trying to get into high tech areas. They're also dealing with the challenges of shifting from a very young to a very aging population. So I think what surprises me most is the capacity of both the citizenry and the political apparatus to absorb the phenomenal range and pace of changes.
Q: We've been hearing about a new sense of national pride among young people in China. And though university students today may admire the bravery of their counterparts who protested for democracy in 1989, Chinese students now are not necessarily sympathetic to that struggle. Can you tell us something about this?
Saich: I think for any young person in China – and by that I'm talking people, say 35 and under – they've really seen nothing but progress in China in terms of economic advancements and personal freedoms that they can enjoy and the kind of cultural diversity that exists in China.
In terms of students in university, we have to remember they are the elite of the system. They really are the people that benefited most strongly from reforms. So much of what happened during the Cultural Revolution, or even as late as the student-led protests in 1989, seems like prehistory to them. I think many young people have a strong sense of pride in what China has achieved and are often somewhat perplexed by the criticism from the international community around questions related to China's political system.
It's a very complex set of issues, though. I think what is happening is that whereas perhaps in the 1980s many were attracted to a caricature of western democracy and liberalism, many of the young people today – because of the tremendous growth and progress within the Chinese economy – are much more interested in looking back at their own indigenous traditions and what might be a Chinese form of political reform rather than solely relying on the West.
But, I think there's another important aspect underlying this, and that's the question of what was it that Chinese people were being promised markets would bring? A lot of people in the 1980s were arguing that if you had free markets you would get, eventually, more accountability; you'd have a rational economy; you'd have all people being lifted up; you'd have greater transparency, and so forth. And I think for many who've become disillusioned with western models of development, rightly or wrongly, they would argue that no, that's not what the markets and the influence of western thought brought us. It's actually brought us huge inequalities; it's brought us market failures in areas such as health. It's actually increased the levels of corruption. And I think that has led to a process with a number of intellectuals turning away from looking at models in the West to reexamine and explore some of their own historical legacies. Now, the lessons they've drawn may or may not be correct, but I don't think that's the most important issue. That's often the way that they've interpreted these issues: that increasing marketization, increasing interaction with the West didn't produce the utopia that some people had promised them during the reform period.
Q: What are the biggest challenges that lie ahead for China as it continues to grow and develop as a world power?
Saich: There are practical issues and there are systemic issues. If we look at some of the practical challenges first, there is the question of effective urbanization. When China plans to move from 300 to 500 million people off the land and into new and urban environments by 2020, that's just a stunning challenge: to meet the demands in terms of physical infrastructure, social infrastructure, schools, healthcare, and so forth.
However, if it's conducted successfully it will resolve some of the big challenges that China's currently facing in terms of the inequalities that have arisen as part of the reform program. Many of those inequalities relate to the difference between life in the urban centers and life for those left behind in the countryside. And secondly, we've already mentioned the enormous environmental challenges that China faces. If it keeps growing at eight, nine, 10 percent, consuming increasing amounts of oil, requiring increasing amounts of raw products and natural resources without environmental destruction and without consumer price rise increases, it could be destabilizing.
But last and not least, I think the overall challenge for China is modernizing its state structure and finding a political infrastructure that matches its modern society and reformed economy. China needs to produce political solutions that can deal with the challenges of accountability and the interests of a rising middle class that seeks greater representation and will want to represent their views perhaps a bit more forcefully as China continues through its reform process.
Related to that is the challenge of providing an effective moral guidance for the kind of society China wants to be in the future. I think the leadership has seen hosting the Olympic Games as part of that process so far as trying to build national pride and trying to produce unity of purpose amongst the Chinese people to galvanizes them in order to keep moving forward on the reform path.
Interviewed by Doug Gavel and Molly Lanzarotta on August 5, 2008.
The 2008 Summer Olympic Games are showcasing the "New China" to the world. The last thirty years have seen tremendous changes in China – economically, socially and politically. Anthony Saich is Daewoo professor of international affairs at Harvard Kennedy School and director of the Ash Institute for Democratic Governance and Innovation. He has been engaged with Chinese culture and politics for more than 30 years, and serves as the Changjiang Scholar at Tsinghua University.
Q: The Chinese government has spent more than $40 billion preparing to host the Olympic Games. Why are these Games such an important event for China?
Saich: The Chinese leadership sees holding the Olympics as a clear symbol that China has emerged as a global player of significant importance and they tried very hard to win the right to host the games. I think they see it as a sign of the country having emerged as a powerful economic force and, increasingly, as a player of cultural influence. China's leaders feel that these games will cement the achievements they feel they've made over the last thirty years.
If you look back historically at Japan, Mexico, and South Korea, they saw hosting the Olympic Games as a very significant milestone in their development as modern countries and as an expression of what they saw as their domestic achievements towards a global audience. So I think the Chinese have been very happy to use the games to promote internationally and domestically what they feel are their achievements. They've linked it to a sense of patriotism and a sense of pride amongst many Chinese nationals who I think feel justifiably proud to be hosting the games on this occasion.
Q: China's environmental and political challenges will receive added scrutiny due to the intense media coverage during the Games. How are the country and the government dealing with these challenges?
Saich: Environmentally, there are short-term and long-term challenges. Obviously, what the leadership is most focused on at the moment is just the short-term challenge of making sure that Beijing is not so polluted that it adversely affects the stamina events. They've closed down a number of factories, they've stopped a lot of the building work around Beijing; and they're trying to restrict traffic flows where a lot of the pollution comes from. But I think many people are questioning whether this is too little, too late.
I think the more important set of environmental issues, though, beyond the Olympics, is what the relationship will be between China's spectacular economic growth and its future development. Environmental pollution affects not just China but plays into global warming and acidic rain in neighboring countries.
China actually has a very good set of environmental legislation. The problem really is with conflicting incentives between the national government and local governments that encourage many local governments to maintain their polluting industries. So on one level, simply implementing the laws they have on the books would be a tremendous help with cleaning up the environment. Secondly, despite international perception, many Chinese enterprises are now adopting cutting-edge, environmentally-sound technologies. Certainly China's citizens are aware of the increasing cost of environmental degradation and pollution, so this has become a very live issue in China.
Politically, I don't think what's taking place around the Olympics is going to affect the long-term trajectory of development in China. The Olympics has become defined as an event which summarizes national pride and the overriding concern is with questions of security.
The Chinese definition of security in that context is broader than would perhaps be acceptable to us. It goes beyond the question of just physical security for the games to entail security in the sense of making sure that China's reputation is not tarnished. The Chinese leadership doesn't want to have people demonstrating, or foreign journalists looking at some of the dark sides of reforms, some of the inequities, some of the brutalities that are being committed by local governments. Once something becomes defined in terms of security, the security forces take over and they have their own logic of action. I think the visceral reaction is to shut down anything that might be a problem.
That obviously brings China into conflict with some of the Western norms around reporting and what reporters would expect to be able to cover and expect to be able to see while they're in China. I don't think it should have surprised China – people have been warning China for a long time that holding the games would mean that not only attention focused on the sport but also attention focused on China itself, with investigative reporters wanting to provide coverage worldwide. I think they've found this quite difficult to cope with.
Q: You have witnessed China's amazing economic growth and cultural change over the past thirty years. What has surprised you most about it?
Saich: I think just quite simply that the changes have kept coming. When I first went to China as a student it was towards the end of the Cultural Revolution. It was an unbelievably drab city; everybody wore blue. Many of the clichés were true: the restaurants closed at six in the evening; there was nowhere to go and get a drink; there was nowhere to really let your hair down and have fun except in the foreign diplomatic compounds. I think if anybody had asked me whether in 30 years time you would see this progress, I would have suggested that they were insane.
Just the mere fact that that reform has kept going I think is astonishing. China is really going through multiple changes that we in the west have taken perhaps a century or more to digest: from being an overwhelming rural country to now a predominately urbanized country. They're de-industrializing their old Soviet style industry while at the same time trying to build up a biopharmacy base and trying to get into high tech areas. They're also dealing with the challenges of shifting from a very young to a very aging population. So I think what surprises me most is the capacity of both the citizenry and the political apparatus to absorb the phenomenal range and pace of changes.
Q: We've been hearing about a new sense of national pride among young people in China. And though university students today may admire the bravery of their counterparts who protested for democracy in 1989, Chinese students now are not necessarily sympathetic to that struggle. Can you tell us something about this?
Saich: I think for any young person in China – and by that I'm talking people, say 35 and under – they've really seen nothing but progress in China in terms of economic advancements and personal freedoms that they can enjoy and the kind of cultural diversity that exists in China.
In terms of students in university, we have to remember they are the elite of the system. They really are the people that benefited most strongly from reforms. So much of what happened during the Cultural Revolution, or even as late as the student-led protests in 1989, seems like prehistory to them. I think many young people have a strong sense of pride in what China has achieved and are often somewhat perplexed by the criticism from the international community around questions related to China's political system.
It's a very complex set of issues, though. I think what is happening is that whereas perhaps in the 1980s many were attracted to a caricature of western democracy and liberalism, many of the young people today – because of the tremendous growth and progress within the Chinese economy – are much more interested in looking back at their own indigenous traditions and what might be a Chinese form of political reform rather than solely relying on the West.
But, I think there's another important aspect underlying this, and that's the question of what was it that Chinese people were being promised markets would bring? A lot of people in the 1980s were arguing that if you had free markets you would get, eventually, more accountability; you'd have a rational economy; you'd have all people being lifted up; you'd have greater transparency, and so forth. And I think for many who've become disillusioned with western models of development, rightly or wrongly, they would argue that no, that's not what the markets and the influence of western thought brought us. It's actually brought us huge inequalities; it's brought us market failures in areas such as health. It's actually increased the levels of corruption. And I think that has led to a process with a number of intellectuals turning away from looking at models in the West to reexamine and explore some of their own historical legacies. Now, the lessons they've drawn may or may not be correct, but I don't think that's the most important issue. That's often the way that they've interpreted these issues: that increasing marketization, increasing interaction with the West didn't produce the utopia that some people had promised them during the reform period.
Q: What are the biggest challenges that lie ahead for China as it continues to grow and develop as a world power?
Saich: There are practical issues and there are systemic issues. If we look at some of the practical challenges first, there is the question of effective urbanization. When China plans to move from 300 to 500 million people off the land and into new and urban environments by 2020, that's just a stunning challenge: to meet the demands in terms of physical infrastructure, social infrastructure, schools, healthcare, and so forth.
However, if it's conducted successfully it will resolve some of the big challenges that China's currently facing in terms of the inequalities that have arisen as part of the reform program. Many of those inequalities relate to the difference between life in the urban centers and life for those left behind in the countryside. And secondly, we've already mentioned the enormous environmental challenges that China faces. If it keeps growing at eight, nine, 10 percent, consuming increasing amounts of oil, requiring increasing amounts of raw products and natural resources without environmental destruction and without consumer price rise increases, it could be destabilizing.
But last and not least, I think the overall challenge for China is modernizing its state structure and finding a political infrastructure that matches its modern society and reformed economy. China needs to produce political solutions that can deal with the challenges of accountability and the interests of a rising middle class that seeks greater representation and will want to represent their views perhaps a bit more forcefully as China continues through its reform process.
Related to that is the challenge of providing an effective moral guidance for the kind of society China wants to be in the future. I think the leadership has seen hosting the Olympic Games as part of that process so far as trying to build national pride and trying to produce unity of purpose amongst the Chinese people to galvanizes them in order to keep moving forward on the reform path.
Interviewed by Doug Gavel and Molly Lanzarotta on August 5, 2008.
Putin's war enablers: Bush and Cheney
http://www.salon.com/opinion/feature/2008/08/14/bush_putin/index.html
Putin's war enablers: Bush and Cheney
Russia's escalating war on Georgia reveals the consequences of the Bush administration's long assault on the international rule of law.
By Juan Cole
Aug. 14, 2008 | The run-up to the current chaos in the Caucasus should look quite familiar: Russia acted unilaterally rather than going through the U.N. Security Council. It used massive force against a small, weak adversary. It called for regime change in a country that had defied Moscow. It championed a separatist movement as a way of asserting dominance in a region it coveted.
Indeed, despite George W. Bush and Dick Cheney's howls of outrage at Russian aggression in Georgia and the disputed province of South Ossetia, the Bush administration set a deep precedent for Moscow's actions -- with its own systematic assault on international law over the past seven years. Now, the administration's condemnations of Russia ring hollow.
Bush said on Monday, responding to reports that Russia might attack the Georgian capital, "It now appears that an effort may be under way to depose [Georgia's] duly elected government. Russia has invaded a sovereign neighboring state and threatens a democratic government elected by its people. Such an action is unacceptable in the 21st century." By Wednesday, with more Russian troops on the move and a negotiated cease-fire quickly unraveling, Bush stepped up the rhetoric, announcing a sizable humanitarian-aid mission to Georgia and dispatching Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to the region.
While U.S. leaders have tended to back Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, there are two sides to every dispute, and in the ethnically diverse Caucasus it may be more like a hundred sides. Abkhazia and Ossetia are claimed by Georgia, but they have their own distinctive languages, cultures and national aspirations. Both fought for independence in the early 1990s, without success, though neither was Georgia able to assert its full sovereignty over them, accepting Russian mediation and peacekeeping troops.
The separatist leaders of South Ossetia and Abkhazia now speak of Saakashvili in terms reminiscent of the way separatists in Darfur speak of Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir. Sergei Bagapsh of Abkhazia and Eduard Kokoity of South Ossetia have come out against conducting any further talks with Georgia, calling instead for Saakashvili to be tried for war crimes. Kokoity told Interfax, "There can be no talks with the organizers of genocide." The Russian press is full of talk of putting Saakashvili on trial for ordering attacks on Ossetian civilians.
All sides have committed massacres and behaved abominably. There are no clean hands involved, notwithstanding the strong support for Georgia visible in the press of most NATO member countries. (Georgia has been jockeying to join NATO, something Moscow stridently opposes.) Still, not everyone in NATO agrees that Saakashvili is a hero. While traveling with the negotiating team of President Nicolas Sarkozy, one French official observed that "Saakashvili was crazy enough to go in the middle of the night and bomb a city" in South Ossetia. The consequence of Russia's riposte, he said, is "a Georgia attacked, pulverized, through its own fault."
An emboldened Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin sarcastically likened Russia's actions to Bush's foreign policy. Pointing to the invasion of Iraq and the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, Putin said, "Of course, Saddam Hussein ought to have been hanged for destroying several Shiite villages ... And the incumbent Georgian leaders who razed 10 Ossetian villages at once, who ran over elderly people and children with tanks, who burned civilians alive in their sheds -- these leaders must be taken under protection."
In the run-up to the Iraq war, Bush officials repeated ad nauseam the mantra that Saddam Hussein had killed his own people. Thus, they helped create a case for unilateral "humanitarian intervention" of the sort Putin says Russia is now pursuing. Washington had failed to get a U.N. Security Council resolution authorizing a war on Iraq, and Iraq had not attacked the United States, so no principle of self-defense was at stake. But since all governments (even the United States under Abraham Lincoln) repress separatist movements, often ruthlessly, Bush was turning actions such as Saakashvili's attack on South Ossetia into a more legitimate cause for an outside power (especially one bordering it) to wage war against Georgia.
Indeed, Putin's invoking Bush's Iraq adventure points directly to the way in which Bush has enabled other world powers to act impulsively. With his doctrine of preemptive warfare, Bush single-handedly tore down the architecture of post-World War II international law erected by the founders of the United Nations to ensure that rogue states did not go about launching wars of aggression the way Hitler had. While safeguarding minorities at risk is a praiseworthy goal, the U.N. Charter states that the Security Council must approve a war launched for this purpose or any other, excepting self-defense. No individual nation is authorized to wage aggressive war on a vigilante basis, as Bush did in Iraq or Russia is now doing in the Caucasus.
Eight years ago, the United States would have been in a position to condemn Russia for its unilateral war without necessarily seeming hypocritical. After all, even the Korean War had been sanctioned by the United Nations, and President Dwight Eisenhower had condemned the 1956 tripartite attack on Egypt by Britain, France and Israel for violating the U.N. Charter.
Bush's recent argument, that a democratically elected government should not be overthrown (no matter what its behavior, apparently), was intended to sidestep comparisons between his own unilateral wars of aggression and ones such as the current Russian intervention. He was implying that his invasion of Iraq toppled a government that lacked the legitimacy enjoyed by Saakashvili's.
In fact, Bush's foreign policy includes a long list of actions intended to undermine elected governments.
Whether the United States was actively involved in the attempted coup in 2002 against Hugo Chavez, the democratically elected president of Venezuela, or merely cheered it on, it is clear that Venezuelan popular sovereignty meant nothing to Bush if it resulted in a government unfriendly to and critical of Washington.
An even more egregious example came with the destabilization and overthrow of the Hamas government, which won control of the Palestine Authority in January 2006. Bush insisted on allowing the participation in elections of Hamas, a fundamentalist party with a covert paramilitary that has struck at Israeli targets, including civilians. When the party unexpectedly won, however, Bush refused to recognize the legitimacy of the new government, denying it funds and sympathizing with the Israeli attempt to overthrow it. Israeli security forces kidnapped elected Hamas representatives and cabinet ministers, and harmed civilians by blocking medical aid and food that might go to people via the Hamas government.
In 2007, Bush and the Israelis supported a takeover in the West Bank by forces of the Palestine Liberation Organization, lead by Palestine Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. Similar attempts were made in Gaza, but they failed, leaving the elected Hamas government in charge of the small territory. Palestinian popular sovereignty, and Hamas' victory in what were widely judged to have been relatively free and fair elections, were disregarded by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Bush.
Bush and Cheney also repeatedly sided with military dictator Pervez Musharraf against elected civilian politicians in Pakistan. Even when the Pakistani Parliament, elected in open polls last February, initiated impeachment proceedings against Musharraf earlier this week, the Bush administration came out against the idea of Musharraf's going into exile if convicted, urging that he be allowed to stay "honorably" in Pakistan if he stepped down.
Bush's exceptionalism, whereby he implicitly maintained that no international laws or institutions would be allowed to constrain U.S. actions taken in the name of national security, grew out of the sole superpower status of the United States after fall of the Soviet Union. A unipolar world is, however, an exceedingly rare circumstance in modern world history, and it was unlikely to last very long. China may soon have the economic and technological clout to go toe to toe with the United States; and Russia, fueled by the energy boom, is recovering from its economic disaster of the 1990s.
The collapse of the Soviet economy produced tremendous misery and downward mobility. Uncertainty made couples unwilling to risk having children. In one of the great demographic reversals in history, the Russian Federation's population fell by 10 million in the years after 1991. Russian need for U.S. foreign aid and goodwill led Moscow to acquiesce for a time in the expansion of U.S. influence into Eastern Europe and Central Asia.
Russia is now reemerging and flexing its muscles. The run-up in the price of oil and gas has filled Moscow's coffers, since it is one of the great producers of natural gas in the world (prices of natural gas tend to track with those of petroleum). Russia has reasserted its influence in countries such as Uzbekistan, which had briefly licensed a base to U.S. forces but then kicked them out, and in Turkmenistan, which recently agreed to pipe its natural gas through Moscow. Russian President Dmitri Medvedev and Prime Minister Putin are increasingly acting like Gulf emirs, flush with petrodollars and assured of political leverage because of their control over energy resources.
In a unipolar world, the Bush doctrine of preemptive war allowed Washington to assert itself without fear of contradiction. The Bush doctrine, however, was never meant to be emulated by others and was therefore implicitly predicated on the notion that all challengers would be weaker than the United States throughout the 21st century. Bush and Cheney are now getting a glimpse of a multipolar world in which other powers can adopt their modus operandi with impunity. Bush's rhetoric may have sounded like that of President Woodrow Wilson, but his policy has often been to support the overthrow or hobbling of elected governments that he does not like -- and that has not gone unnoticed by countries that also count themselves great powers and would not mind following suit.
The problem with international law for a superpower is that it is a constraint on overweening ambition. Its virtue is that it constrains the aggressive ambitions of others. Bush gutted it because he thought the United States would not need it anytime soon. But Russia is now demonstrating that the Bush doctrine can just as easily be the Putin doctrine. And that leaves America less secure in a world of vigilante powers that spout rhetoric about high ideals to justify their unchecked military interventions. It is the world that Bush has helped build.
-- By Juan Cole
Putin's war enablers: Bush and Cheney
Russia's escalating war on Georgia reveals the consequences of the Bush administration's long assault on the international rule of law.
By Juan Cole
Aug. 14, 2008 | The run-up to the current chaos in the Caucasus should look quite familiar: Russia acted unilaterally rather than going through the U.N. Security Council. It used massive force against a small, weak adversary. It called for regime change in a country that had defied Moscow. It championed a separatist movement as a way of asserting dominance in a region it coveted.
Indeed, despite George W. Bush and Dick Cheney's howls of outrage at Russian aggression in Georgia and the disputed province of South Ossetia, the Bush administration set a deep precedent for Moscow's actions -- with its own systematic assault on international law over the past seven years. Now, the administration's condemnations of Russia ring hollow.
Bush said on Monday, responding to reports that Russia might attack the Georgian capital, "It now appears that an effort may be under way to depose [Georgia's] duly elected government. Russia has invaded a sovereign neighboring state and threatens a democratic government elected by its people. Such an action is unacceptable in the 21st century." By Wednesday, with more Russian troops on the move and a negotiated cease-fire quickly unraveling, Bush stepped up the rhetoric, announcing a sizable humanitarian-aid mission to Georgia and dispatching Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to the region.
While U.S. leaders have tended to back Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, there are two sides to every dispute, and in the ethnically diverse Caucasus it may be more like a hundred sides. Abkhazia and Ossetia are claimed by Georgia, but they have their own distinctive languages, cultures and national aspirations. Both fought for independence in the early 1990s, without success, though neither was Georgia able to assert its full sovereignty over them, accepting Russian mediation and peacekeeping troops.
The separatist leaders of South Ossetia and Abkhazia now speak of Saakashvili in terms reminiscent of the way separatists in Darfur speak of Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir. Sergei Bagapsh of Abkhazia and Eduard Kokoity of South Ossetia have come out against conducting any further talks with Georgia, calling instead for Saakashvili to be tried for war crimes. Kokoity told Interfax, "There can be no talks with the organizers of genocide." The Russian press is full of talk of putting Saakashvili on trial for ordering attacks on Ossetian civilians.
All sides have committed massacres and behaved abominably. There are no clean hands involved, notwithstanding the strong support for Georgia visible in the press of most NATO member countries. (Georgia has been jockeying to join NATO, something Moscow stridently opposes.) Still, not everyone in NATO agrees that Saakashvili is a hero. While traveling with the negotiating team of President Nicolas Sarkozy, one French official observed that "Saakashvili was crazy enough to go in the middle of the night and bomb a city" in South Ossetia. The consequence of Russia's riposte, he said, is "a Georgia attacked, pulverized, through its own fault."
An emboldened Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin sarcastically likened Russia's actions to Bush's foreign policy. Pointing to the invasion of Iraq and the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, Putin said, "Of course, Saddam Hussein ought to have been hanged for destroying several Shiite villages ... And the incumbent Georgian leaders who razed 10 Ossetian villages at once, who ran over elderly people and children with tanks, who burned civilians alive in their sheds -- these leaders must be taken under protection."
In the run-up to the Iraq war, Bush officials repeated ad nauseam the mantra that Saddam Hussein had killed his own people. Thus, they helped create a case for unilateral "humanitarian intervention" of the sort Putin says Russia is now pursuing. Washington had failed to get a U.N. Security Council resolution authorizing a war on Iraq, and Iraq had not attacked the United States, so no principle of self-defense was at stake. But since all governments (even the United States under Abraham Lincoln) repress separatist movements, often ruthlessly, Bush was turning actions such as Saakashvili's attack on South Ossetia into a more legitimate cause for an outside power (especially one bordering it) to wage war against Georgia.
Indeed, Putin's invoking Bush's Iraq adventure points directly to the way in which Bush has enabled other world powers to act impulsively. With his doctrine of preemptive warfare, Bush single-handedly tore down the architecture of post-World War II international law erected by the founders of the United Nations to ensure that rogue states did not go about launching wars of aggression the way Hitler had. While safeguarding minorities at risk is a praiseworthy goal, the U.N. Charter states that the Security Council must approve a war launched for this purpose or any other, excepting self-defense. No individual nation is authorized to wage aggressive war on a vigilante basis, as Bush did in Iraq or Russia is now doing in the Caucasus.
Eight years ago, the United States would have been in a position to condemn Russia for its unilateral war without necessarily seeming hypocritical. After all, even the Korean War had been sanctioned by the United Nations, and President Dwight Eisenhower had condemned the 1956 tripartite attack on Egypt by Britain, France and Israel for violating the U.N. Charter.
Bush's recent argument, that a democratically elected government should not be overthrown (no matter what its behavior, apparently), was intended to sidestep comparisons between his own unilateral wars of aggression and ones such as the current Russian intervention. He was implying that his invasion of Iraq toppled a government that lacked the legitimacy enjoyed by Saakashvili's.
In fact, Bush's foreign policy includes a long list of actions intended to undermine elected governments.
Whether the United States was actively involved in the attempted coup in 2002 against Hugo Chavez, the democratically elected president of Venezuela, or merely cheered it on, it is clear that Venezuelan popular sovereignty meant nothing to Bush if it resulted in a government unfriendly to and critical of Washington.
An even more egregious example came with the destabilization and overthrow of the Hamas government, which won control of the Palestine Authority in January 2006. Bush insisted on allowing the participation in elections of Hamas, a fundamentalist party with a covert paramilitary that has struck at Israeli targets, including civilians. When the party unexpectedly won, however, Bush refused to recognize the legitimacy of the new government, denying it funds and sympathizing with the Israeli attempt to overthrow it. Israeli security forces kidnapped elected Hamas representatives and cabinet ministers, and harmed civilians by blocking medical aid and food that might go to people via the Hamas government.
In 2007, Bush and the Israelis supported a takeover in the West Bank by forces of the Palestine Liberation Organization, lead by Palestine Authority President Mahmoud Abbas. Similar attempts were made in Gaza, but they failed, leaving the elected Hamas government in charge of the small territory. Palestinian popular sovereignty, and Hamas' victory in what were widely judged to have been relatively free and fair elections, were disregarded by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Bush.
Bush and Cheney also repeatedly sided with military dictator Pervez Musharraf against elected civilian politicians in Pakistan. Even when the Pakistani Parliament, elected in open polls last February, initiated impeachment proceedings against Musharraf earlier this week, the Bush administration came out against the idea of Musharraf's going into exile if convicted, urging that he be allowed to stay "honorably" in Pakistan if he stepped down.
Bush's exceptionalism, whereby he implicitly maintained that no international laws or institutions would be allowed to constrain U.S. actions taken in the name of national security, grew out of the sole superpower status of the United States after fall of the Soviet Union. A unipolar world is, however, an exceedingly rare circumstance in modern world history, and it was unlikely to last very long. China may soon have the economic and technological clout to go toe to toe with the United States; and Russia, fueled by the energy boom, is recovering from its economic disaster of the 1990s.
The collapse of the Soviet economy produced tremendous misery and downward mobility. Uncertainty made couples unwilling to risk having children. In one of the great demographic reversals in history, the Russian Federation's population fell by 10 million in the years after 1991. Russian need for U.S. foreign aid and goodwill led Moscow to acquiesce for a time in the expansion of U.S. influence into Eastern Europe and Central Asia.
Russia is now reemerging and flexing its muscles. The run-up in the price of oil and gas has filled Moscow's coffers, since it is one of the great producers of natural gas in the world (prices of natural gas tend to track with those of petroleum). Russia has reasserted its influence in countries such as Uzbekistan, which had briefly licensed a base to U.S. forces but then kicked them out, and in Turkmenistan, which recently agreed to pipe its natural gas through Moscow. Russian President Dmitri Medvedev and Prime Minister Putin are increasingly acting like Gulf emirs, flush with petrodollars and assured of political leverage because of their control over energy resources.
In a unipolar world, the Bush doctrine of preemptive war allowed Washington to assert itself without fear of contradiction. The Bush doctrine, however, was never meant to be emulated by others and was therefore implicitly predicated on the notion that all challengers would be weaker than the United States throughout the 21st century. Bush and Cheney are now getting a glimpse of a multipolar world in which other powers can adopt their modus operandi with impunity. Bush's rhetoric may have sounded like that of President Woodrow Wilson, but his policy has often been to support the overthrow or hobbling of elected governments that he does not like -- and that has not gone unnoticed by countries that also count themselves great powers and would not mind following suit.
The problem with international law for a superpower is that it is a constraint on overweening ambition. Its virtue is that it constrains the aggressive ambitions of others. Bush gutted it because he thought the United States would not need it anytime soon. But Russia is now demonstrating that the Bush doctrine can just as easily be the Putin doctrine. And that leaves America less secure in a world of vigilante powers that spout rhetoric about high ideals to justify their unchecked military interventions. It is the world that Bush has helped build.
-- By Juan Cole
Those Who Dislike US Iraq Subsidies Should Look at the Israel Dole
Those Who Dislike US Iraq Subsidies Should Look at the Israel Dole
by Stephen Glain
The National 08/12/08
This week, Congress indulged in some populist Arab-bashing when it was revealed that high oil prices could earn the Iraq government a budget surplus of US$50 billion (Dh183.6bn) this year. How scandalous, declared US lawmakers, that American taxpayers should be subsidising Iraq's post-war reconstruction when the Iraqis are perfectly capable of financing it themselves.It's a fair point, on its own. But it overlooks the central role subsidies have played in the annals of Middle East occupation and empire. The Ottomans funded a complex web of subsidies for their clients in the Middle East, an arrangement that preserved economic and political stability for generations until the sultanate collapsed nearly a century ago. The Roman emperor Heraclius, bankrupt from war with Persia, withheld his annual payout to Christian tribal leaders in Syria, who responded by allying themselves with the Muslim armies in driving out the rum.
But the treasure divvied out in the Middle East by imperial powers over the millennia is dwarfed by the mother of all Middle East subsidies: the Israel dole, a golden calf of American military aid, humanitarian assistance, and low-interest loans that are forgiven before the checks even clear. Washington has tossed an estimated $85bn at the Jewish state since the 1978 Camp David peace accords in annual allotments that average between $3bn to three or even four times that much, a handout that enables Israel to subsidise its own micro-empire on Palestinian land.
It's a peculiar kind of philanthropy; Israel, the largest Levantine economy as measured by per-capita income - $22,600, the world's 25th highest - is also the world's largest recipient of American aid.Once a socialist slug, Israel has revived its economy into a free-market thoroughbred. The country's industrial base, particularly its defence and security sectors, is world class. The Israeli military commands a qualitative advantage in symmetrical warfare that its neighbours could never hope to challenge. (Israeli armies, contrary to the "David vs Goliath" conceit, have never once been outnumbered on the battlefield, owing to their robust deployment, or "lift" capability.) Israel's capital markets are liquid and efficient, its roads, ports and highways first rate.
Despite this, both Washington and Tel Aviv insist on treating Israel like a fragile, mendicant state. American legislators who celebrate Friedrich Hayek, the 20th century libertarian economist, grope for any opportunity to distort Israel's economy and politics with free money. Washington's minimum annual dollop of $3bn - handed over in one lump sum in the first month of the fiscal year rather than in four quarterly instalments the way the balance of US aid is allocated - is only the most direct form of assistance.
Tucked inside obscure bits of legislation and memoranda of understanding are earmarks that guarantee Israel preferential trade status akin to Canada and Mexico while allowing it defence technologies denied to close US allies.Every year or so, Washington will unveil a package of new weaponry to preserve Israel's quantitative military edge. (It has its own acronym - QME - an indelible seal of permanence in imperial Washington.) Last January, for example, when the White House announced an arms deal for its Gulf allies worth $20bn over 10 years, it tossed in an extra $30bn for the Israeli Defense Force.
There have been calls for restraint. In the early 1990s, George HW Bush struggled to delay loan guarantees to Israel as a hindrance to the peace process in the face of a recalcitrant Congress. Ephraim Sneh, a retired general and prominent leader of Israel's Labor Party, has argued plaintively that excessive US aid creates an unhealthy dependence and slows his country's defence sector. Washington, meanwhile, continues to woo Israel and its supporters with an aid giveaway that most American taxpayers know little about. Powerful US players have a stake in this scheme; farmers sell a fortune in produce to Washington, which gives it to Egypt in return for its peaceful relations with Israel.
Defence contractors have made billions of dollars from US military sales to Israel while enjoying an effective veto power over its aerospace companies as potential competitors. When Israel wanted to develop its own fighter jet in the 1980s, America's own highly subsidised defence contractors manoeuvred to kill it - proof that there are constituencies in Washington more powerful and pernicious than the pro-Israel lobby.
There was nothing necessarily wrong about US lawmakers piling on the Iraqis for hoarding some of their windfall oil profits at a time when the bill for Iraqi reconstruction is nearly $50bn. (Some legislators even demanded American taxpayers be refunded from the Iraqi treasury - a nice election-year touch.) If anything, it was a reminder of how easy it is for imperial powers in the Middle East to ensnare themselves in their own web of subsidies, be they unintended or self-inflicted.
by Stephen Glain
The National 08/12/08
This week, Congress indulged in some populist Arab-bashing when it was revealed that high oil prices could earn the Iraq government a budget surplus of US$50 billion (Dh183.6bn) this year. How scandalous, declared US lawmakers, that American taxpayers should be subsidising Iraq's post-war reconstruction when the Iraqis are perfectly capable of financing it themselves.It's a fair point, on its own. But it overlooks the central role subsidies have played in the annals of Middle East occupation and empire. The Ottomans funded a complex web of subsidies for their clients in the Middle East, an arrangement that preserved economic and political stability for generations until the sultanate collapsed nearly a century ago. The Roman emperor Heraclius, bankrupt from war with Persia, withheld his annual payout to Christian tribal leaders in Syria, who responded by allying themselves with the Muslim armies in driving out the rum.
But the treasure divvied out in the Middle East by imperial powers over the millennia is dwarfed by the mother of all Middle East subsidies: the Israel dole, a golden calf of American military aid, humanitarian assistance, and low-interest loans that are forgiven before the checks even clear. Washington has tossed an estimated $85bn at the Jewish state since the 1978 Camp David peace accords in annual allotments that average between $3bn to three or even four times that much, a handout that enables Israel to subsidise its own micro-empire on Palestinian land.
It's a peculiar kind of philanthropy; Israel, the largest Levantine economy as measured by per-capita income - $22,600, the world's 25th highest - is also the world's largest recipient of American aid.Once a socialist slug, Israel has revived its economy into a free-market thoroughbred. The country's industrial base, particularly its defence and security sectors, is world class. The Israeli military commands a qualitative advantage in symmetrical warfare that its neighbours could never hope to challenge. (Israeli armies, contrary to the "David vs Goliath" conceit, have never once been outnumbered on the battlefield, owing to their robust deployment, or "lift" capability.) Israel's capital markets are liquid and efficient, its roads, ports and highways first rate.
Despite this, both Washington and Tel Aviv insist on treating Israel like a fragile, mendicant state. American legislators who celebrate Friedrich Hayek, the 20th century libertarian economist, grope for any opportunity to distort Israel's economy and politics with free money. Washington's minimum annual dollop of $3bn - handed over in one lump sum in the first month of the fiscal year rather than in four quarterly instalments the way the balance of US aid is allocated - is only the most direct form of assistance.
Tucked inside obscure bits of legislation and memoranda of understanding are earmarks that guarantee Israel preferential trade status akin to Canada and Mexico while allowing it defence technologies denied to close US allies.Every year or so, Washington will unveil a package of new weaponry to preserve Israel's quantitative military edge. (It has its own acronym - QME - an indelible seal of permanence in imperial Washington.) Last January, for example, when the White House announced an arms deal for its Gulf allies worth $20bn over 10 years, it tossed in an extra $30bn for the Israeli Defense Force.
There have been calls for restraint. In the early 1990s, George HW Bush struggled to delay loan guarantees to Israel as a hindrance to the peace process in the face of a recalcitrant Congress. Ephraim Sneh, a retired general and prominent leader of Israel's Labor Party, has argued plaintively that excessive US aid creates an unhealthy dependence and slows his country's defence sector. Washington, meanwhile, continues to woo Israel and its supporters with an aid giveaway that most American taxpayers know little about. Powerful US players have a stake in this scheme; farmers sell a fortune in produce to Washington, which gives it to Egypt in return for its peaceful relations with Israel.
Defence contractors have made billions of dollars from US military sales to Israel while enjoying an effective veto power over its aerospace companies as potential competitors. When Israel wanted to develop its own fighter jet in the 1980s, America's own highly subsidised defence contractors manoeuvred to kill it - proof that there are constituencies in Washington more powerful and pernicious than the pro-Israel lobby.
There was nothing necessarily wrong about US lawmakers piling on the Iraqis for hoarding some of their windfall oil profits at a time when the bill for Iraqi reconstruction is nearly $50bn. (Some legislators even demanded American taxpayers be refunded from the Iraqi treasury - a nice election-year touch.) If anything, it was a reminder of how easy it is for imperial powers in the Middle East to ensnare themselves in their own web of subsidies, be they unintended or self-inflicted.
Is Perpetual War Our Future? Learning the Wrong Lessons from the Bush Era
From TomDispatch.com, the second installment drawn from Andrew Bacevich's new book.
Is Perpetual War Our Future?
Learning the Wrong Lessons from the Bush Era
By Andrew Bacevich
To appreciate the full extent of the military crisis into which the United States has been plunged requires understanding what the Iraq War and, to a lesser extent, the Afghan War have to teach. These two conflicts, along with the attacks of September 11, 2001, will form the centerpiece of George W. Bush's legacy. Their lessons ought to constitute the basis of a new, more realistic military policy.
In some respects, the effort to divine those lessons is well under way, spurred by critics of President Bush's policies on the left and the right as well as by reform-minded members of the officer corps. Broadly speaking, this effort has thus far yielded three distinct conclusions. Whether taken singly or together, they invert the post-Cold War military illusions that provided the foundation for the president's Global War on Terror. In exchange for these received illusions, they propound new ones, which are equally misguided. Thus far, that is, the lessons drawn from America's post-9/11 military experience are the wrong ones.
According to the first lesson, the armed services -- and above all the Army -- need to recognize that the challenges posed by Iraq and Afghanistan define not only the military's present but also its future, the "next war," as enthusiasts like to say. Rooting out insurgents, nation-building, training and advising "host nation" forces, population security and control, winning hearts and minds -- these promise to be ongoing priorities, preoccupying U.S. troops for decades to come, all across the Islamic world.
Rather than brief interventions ending in decisive victory, sustained presence will be the norm. Large-scale conventional conflict like 1991's Operation Desert Storm becomes the least likely contingency. The future will be one of small wars, expected to be frequent, protracted, perhaps perpetual.
Although advanced technology will retain an important place in such conflicts, it will not be decisive. Wherever possible, the warrior will rely on "nonkinetic" methods, functioning as diplomat, mediator, and relief worker. No doubt American soldiers will engage in combat, but, drawing on the latest findings of social science, they will also demonstrate cultural sensitivity, not to speak of mastering local languages and customs. As Secretary of Defense Robert Gates put it in October 2007, "Reviving public services, rebuilding infrastructure and promoting good governance" had now become soldiers' business. "All these so-called nontraditional capabilities have moved into the mainstream of military thinking, planning, and strategy -- where they must stay."
This prospect implies a rigorous integration of military action with political purpose. Hard power and soft power will merge. The soldier on the ground will serve as both cop and social worker. This prospect also implies shedding the sort of utopian expectations that produced so much confident talk of "transformation," "shock-and-awe," and "networkcentric warfare" -- all of which had tended to segregate war and politics into separate compartments.
Local conditions will dictate technique, dooming the Pentagon's effort to devise a single preconceived, technologically determined template applicable across the entire spectrum of conflict. When it comes to low-intensity wars, the armed services will embrace a style owing less to the traditions of the Civil War, World War II, or even Gulf War I than to the nearly forgotten American experiences in the Philippines after 1898 and in Central America during the 1920s. Instead of looking for inspiration at the campaigns of U. S. Grant, George Patton, or H. Norman Schwarzkopf, officers will study postwar British and French involvement in places like Palestine and Malaya, Indochina and Algeria.
In sum, an officer corps bloodied in Iraq and Afghanistan has seen the future and it points to many more Iraqs and Afghanistans. Whereas the architects of full spectrum dominance had expected the unprecedented lethality, range, accuracy, and responsiveness of high-tech striking power to perpetuate military dominion, the veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan know better. They remain committed to global dominance while believing that its pursuit will require not only advanced weaponry but also the ability to put boots on the ground and keep them there. This, in turn, implies a plentiful supply of soldiers and loads of patience on the home front.
Were the Civilians of the Defense Department Responsible?
Viewed from another perspective, however, the post-9/11 wars teach an altogether different lesson. According to this alternative view, echoing a similar complaint during the Vietnam era, the shortcomings of U.S. policy in Iraq and Afghanistan have little to do with the actual performance of American forces in the field and everything to do with the meddling of bumbling civilians back in Washington. In its simplest form, fault lies not with the troops themselves, nor with their commanders, but with the likes of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, and Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith, who prevented the troops from doing their jobs.
The charges leveled by Major General John Batiste, who served in Rumsfeld's Pentagon but subsequently retired in disgust and became one of the defense secretary's loudest military critics, are representative of this view. "Rumsfeld's dismal strategic decisions resulted in the unnecessary deaths of American servicemen and women," Batiste declared in September 2006. The former general held Rumsfeld personally "responsible for America and her allies going to war with the wrong plan." But that was just for starters. Rumsfeld also "violated fundamental principles of war, dismissed deliberate military planning, ignored the hard work to build the peace after the fall of Saddam Hussein, set the conditions for Abu Ghraib and other atrocities that further ignited the insurgency, disbanded Iraqi security force institutions when we needed them most, [and] constrained our commanders with an overly restrictive de-Ba'athification policy."
Nor was the problem limited to Rumsfeld himself. It included his chief lieutenants. According to Batiste, Rumsfeld surrounded himself "with like-minded and compliant subordinates who [did] not grasp the importance of the principles of war, the complexities of Iraq, or the human dimension of warfare." The overall effect was tantamount to murder: Rumsfeld "tied the hands of commanders while our troops were in contact with the enemy."
Here lies the second preliminary lesson drawn from Iraq and Afghanistan, one that appeals to disgruntled military officers like Batiste, but also to Democrats eager to blame the Bush administration for any and all sins and to neoconservatives looking to absolve themselves of responsibility for botched wars that they had once cavalierly promoted. The corrective to civilian arrogance and misjudgment is obvious: It requires tilting the civil-military balance back in favor of the generals, untying the hands of senior commanders.
>From this perspective, the most important lesson to take away from Iraq and Afghanistan is the imperative to empower military professionals. The Petraeus moment of 2007, when all of official Washington from President Bush to the lowest-ranking congressional staffer waited with bated breath for General David Petraeus to formulate basic policy for Iraq, offers a preview of how this lesson might play itself out.
Is a Draft the Answer?
There is also a third perspective, which blames the failures of Iraq and Afghanistan on a problematic relationship between soldiers and society. According to this view, the All-Volunteer Force itself is the problem. As the military historian Adrian Lewis observed, "The most significant transformation in the American conduct of war since World War II and the invention of the atomic bomb was not technological, but cultural, social, and political -- the removal of the American people from the conduct of war." Only after 9/11, with the Bush administration waging war on multiple fronts, have the implications of this transformation become fully evident.
A reliance on volunteer-professionals places a de facto cap on the army's overall size. The pool of willing recruits is necessarily limited. Given a choice, most young Americans will opt for opportunities other than military service, with protracted war diminishing rather than enhancing any collective propensity to volunteer. It is virtually inconceivable that any presidential call to the colors, however impassioned, any PR campaign, however cleverly designed, or any package of pay and bonuses, however generous, could reverse this disinclination.
Furthermore, to the extent that an army composed of regulars is no longer a people's army, the people have little say in its use. In effect, the professional military has become an extension of the imperial presidency. The troops fight when and where the commander in chief determines.
Finally, a reliance on professional soldiers eviscerates the concept of civic duty, relieving citizens at large of any obligation to contribute to the nation's defense. Ending the draft during the waning days of the Vietnam War did nothing to heal the divisions created by that conflict; instead, it ratified the separation of army from society. Like mowing lawns and bussing tables, fighting and perhaps dying to sustain the American way of life became something that Americans pay others to do.
So the third lesson of the Iraq War focuses on the need to repair the relationship between army and society. One way to do this is to junk the All-Volunteer Force altogether. Rather than rely on professionals, perhaps it makes sense to revive the tradition of the citizen-soldier.
Proposals to restore this hallowed tradition invariably conjure up images of reinstituting some form of conscription. In place of a system based on the principle of individual choice, those unhappy with the AVF advocate a system based on the principle of state compulsion.
The advantages offered by such a system are hardly trivial. To the extent that Iraq and Afghanistan have exposed the operational, political, and moral problems produced by relying on a small professional force, a draft seems to offer one obvious way to alleviate those problems.
For those who worry that the existing army is overextended, conscription provides a mechanism for expansion. Triple the size of the army -- in essence restoring the structure that existed during much of the Cold War -- and the personnel shortages that constrain the prosecution of ground campaigns will disappear. Sustaining the military commitment to Iraq for ten or twenty years, or even a century as Senator John McCain and many neoconservatives are willing to contemplate, then becomes a viable proposition.
War planners will no longer find themselves obliged to give short shrift to Contingency A (Afghanistan) in order to support Contingency B (Iraq). The concept of "surge" will take on a whole new meaning with the Pentagon able to dispatch not a measly 30,000 reinforcements to Iraq or another few thousand to Afghanistan, but 100,000 or more additional troops wherever they might be needed. Was the problem with Operation Iraqi Freedom too few "boots on the ground" for occupation and reconstruction? Reconstitute the draft, and that problem goes away.
Creating a mass army might even permit the United States to resuscitate the Weinberger-Powell Doctrine with its emphasis on "overwhelming force."
For those distressed by the absence of a politically meaningful antiwar movement despite the Iraq War's manifest unpopularity, the appeal of conscription differs somewhat. Some political activists look to an Iraq-era draft to do what the Vietnam-era draft did: animate large-scale protest, alter the political dynamic, and eventually shut down any conflict that lacks widespread popular support. The prospect of involuntary service will pry the kids out of the shopping malls and send them into the streets. It will prod the parents of draft-eligible offspring to see politics as something other than a mechanism for doling out entitlements. As a consequence, members of Congress keen to retain their seats will define their wartime responsibilities as something more than simply rubber-stamping spending bills proposed by the White House. In this way, a draft could reinvigorate American democracy, restore the governmental system of checks and balances, and constrain the warmongers inhabiting the executive branch.
For those moved by moral considerations, a draft promises to ensure a more equitable distribution of sacrifice in war time. No longer will rural Americans, people of color, recent immigrants, and members of the working class fill the ranks of the armed forces in disproportionate numbers. With conscription, the children of the political elite and of the well-to-do will once again bear their fair share of the load. Those reaping the benefits of the American way of life will contribute to its defense, helping to garrison the more distant precincts of empire. Perhaps even the editorial staffs of the Weekly Standard, National Review, and the New Republic might have the opportunity to serve, a salutary prospect given the propensity of those magazines to argue on behalf of military intervention.
Reconfigure the armed services to fight "small wars"; empower the generals; reconnect soldiering to citizenship -- on the surface each of these has a certain appeal. But upon closer examination, each also has large defects. They are the wrong lessons to take from Iraq and Afghanistan.
Drawing the Right Lessons from the Bush Era
If gearing up to fight "small wars," deferring to the brass, and scrapping the All-Volunteer Force are the wrong lessons to be drawn from our recent military experience, then what are the right ones?
The events of the recent past offer several lessons that illuminate these questions. The first concerns the nature of war. Iraq and Afghanistan remind us that war is not subject to reinvention, whatever George W. Bush and Pentagon proponents of the so-called Revolution in Military Affairs may contend.
War's essential nature is fixed, permanent, intractable, and irrepressible. War's constant companions are uncertainty and risk. "War is the realm of chance," wrote the military theorist Carl von Clausewitz nearly two centuries ago. "No other human activity gives it greater scope: no other has such incessant and varied dealings with this intruder…" -- a judgment that the invention of the computer, the Internet, and precision-guided munitions has done nothing to overturn.
So the first lesson to be taken away from the Bush administration's two military adventures is simply this: War remains today what it has always been -- elusive, untamed, costly, difficult to control, fraught with surprise, and sure to give rise to unexpected consequences. Only the truly demented will imagine otherwise.
The second lesson of Iraq and Afghanistan derives from the first. As has been the case throughout history, the utility of armed force remains finite. Even in the information age, to the extent that force "works," it does so with respect to a limited range of contingencies.
Although die-hard supporters of the Global War on Terror will insist otherwise, events in Iraq and Afghanistan have demonstrated definitively that further reliance on coercive methods will not enable the United States to achieve its objectives. Whether the actual aim is to democratize the Islamic world or subdue it, the military "option" is not the answer.
The Bush Doctrine itself provides the basis for a third lesson. For centuries, the Western moral tradition has categorically rejected the concept of preventive war. The events of 9/11 convinced some that this tradition no longer applied: old constraints had to give way. Yet our actual experience with preventive war suggests that, even setting moral considerations aside, to launch a war today to eliminate a danger that might pose a threat at some future date is just plain stupid. It doesn't work.
History has repeatedly demonstrated the irrationality of preventive war. If the world needed a further demonstration, President Bush provided it. Iraq shows us why the Bush Doctrine was a bad idea in the first place and why its abrogation has become essential. For principled guidance in determining when the use of force is appropriate, the country should conform to the Just War tradition -- not only because that tradition is consistent with our professed moral values, but also because its provisions provide an eminently useful guide for sound statecraft.
Finally, there is a fourth lesson, relating to the formulation of strategy. The results of U.S. policy in Iraq and Afghanistan suggest that in the upper echelons of the government and among the senior ranks of the officer corps, this has become a lost art.
Since the end of the Cold War, the tendency among civilians -- with President Bush a prime example -- has been to confuse strategy with ideology. The president's freedom agenda, which supposedly provided a blueprint for how to prosecute the Global War on Terror, expressed grandiose aspirations without serious effort to assess the means required to achieve them. Meanwhile, ever since the Vietnam War ended, the tendency among military officers has been to confuse strategy with operations.
Here we come face-to-face with the essential dilemma with which the United States has unsuccessfully wrestled since the Soviets deprived us of a stabilizing adversary. The political elite that ought to bear the chief responsibility for crafting grand strategy instead nurses fantasies of either achieving permanent global hegemony or remaking the world in America's image. Meanwhile, the military elite that could puncture those fantasies and help restore a modicum of realism to U.S. policy fixates on campaigns and battles, with generalship largely a business of organizing and coordinating matériel.
The four lessons of Iraq and Afghanistan boil down to this: Events have exposed as illusory American pretensions to having mastered war. Even today, war is hardly more subject to human control than the tides or the weather. Simply trying harder -- investing ever larger sums in even more advanced technology, devising novel techniques, or even improving the quality of American generalship -- will not enable the United States to evade that reality.
As measured by results achieved, the performance of the military since the end of the Cold War and especially since 9/11 has been unimpressive. This indifferent record of success leads some observers to argue that we need a bigger army or a different army.
But the problem lies less with the army that we have -- a very fine one, which every citizen should wish to preserve -- than with the requirements that we have imposed on our soldiers. Rather than expanding or reconfiguring that army, we need to treat it with the respect that it deserves. That means protecting it from further abuse of the sort that it has endured since 2001.
America doesn't need a bigger army. It needs a smaller -- that is, more modest -- foreign policy, one that assigns soldiers missions that are consistent with their capabilities. Modesty implies giving up on the illusions of grandeur to which the end of the Cold War and then 9/11 gave rise. It also means reining in the imperial presidents who expect the army to make good on those illusions. When it comes to supporting the troops, here lies the essence of a citizen's obligation.
Andrew Bacevich, professor of history and international relations at Boston University, retired from the U.S. Army with the rank of colonel. This piece is adapted from his new book, The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (Metropolitan Books, 2008). He is also the author of The New American Militarism, among other books. His writing has appeared in Foreign Affairs, the Atlantic Monthly, the Nation, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and the Wall Street Journal. A TomDispatch interview with him can be read by clicking here, and then here. For part one of Bacevich's two-part series for TomDispatch, "Illusions of Victory," click here
From the book The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism by Andrew Bacevich, Copyright © 2008 by Andrew Bacevich. Reprinted by arrangement with Metropolitan Books, an Imprint of Henry Holt and Company, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Is Perpetual War Our Future?
Learning the Wrong Lessons from the Bush Era
By Andrew Bacevich
To appreciate the full extent of the military crisis into which the United States has been plunged requires understanding what the Iraq War and, to a lesser extent, the Afghan War have to teach. These two conflicts, along with the attacks of September 11, 2001, will form the centerpiece of George W. Bush's legacy. Their lessons ought to constitute the basis of a new, more realistic military policy.
In some respects, the effort to divine those lessons is well under way, spurred by critics of President Bush's policies on the left and the right as well as by reform-minded members of the officer corps. Broadly speaking, this effort has thus far yielded three distinct conclusions. Whether taken singly or together, they invert the post-Cold War military illusions that provided the foundation for the president's Global War on Terror. In exchange for these received illusions, they propound new ones, which are equally misguided. Thus far, that is, the lessons drawn from America's post-9/11 military experience are the wrong ones.
According to the first lesson, the armed services -- and above all the Army -- need to recognize that the challenges posed by Iraq and Afghanistan define not only the military's present but also its future, the "next war," as enthusiasts like to say. Rooting out insurgents, nation-building, training and advising "host nation" forces, population security and control, winning hearts and minds -- these promise to be ongoing priorities, preoccupying U.S. troops for decades to come, all across the Islamic world.
Rather than brief interventions ending in decisive victory, sustained presence will be the norm. Large-scale conventional conflict like 1991's Operation Desert Storm becomes the least likely contingency. The future will be one of small wars, expected to be frequent, protracted, perhaps perpetual.
Although advanced technology will retain an important place in such conflicts, it will not be decisive. Wherever possible, the warrior will rely on "nonkinetic" methods, functioning as diplomat, mediator, and relief worker. No doubt American soldiers will engage in combat, but, drawing on the latest findings of social science, they will also demonstrate cultural sensitivity, not to speak of mastering local languages and customs. As Secretary of Defense Robert Gates put it in October 2007, "Reviving public services, rebuilding infrastructure and promoting good governance" had now become soldiers' business. "All these so-called nontraditional capabilities have moved into the mainstream of military thinking, planning, and strategy -- where they must stay."
This prospect implies a rigorous integration of military action with political purpose. Hard power and soft power will merge. The soldier on the ground will serve as both cop and social worker. This prospect also implies shedding the sort of utopian expectations that produced so much confident talk of "transformation," "shock-and-awe," and "networkcentric warfare" -- all of which had tended to segregate war and politics into separate compartments.
Local conditions will dictate technique, dooming the Pentagon's effort to devise a single preconceived, technologically determined template applicable across the entire spectrum of conflict. When it comes to low-intensity wars, the armed services will embrace a style owing less to the traditions of the Civil War, World War II, or even Gulf War I than to the nearly forgotten American experiences in the Philippines after 1898 and in Central America during the 1920s. Instead of looking for inspiration at the campaigns of U. S. Grant, George Patton, or H. Norman Schwarzkopf, officers will study postwar British and French involvement in places like Palestine and Malaya, Indochina and Algeria.
In sum, an officer corps bloodied in Iraq and Afghanistan has seen the future and it points to many more Iraqs and Afghanistans. Whereas the architects of full spectrum dominance had expected the unprecedented lethality, range, accuracy, and responsiveness of high-tech striking power to perpetuate military dominion, the veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan know better. They remain committed to global dominance while believing that its pursuit will require not only advanced weaponry but also the ability to put boots on the ground and keep them there. This, in turn, implies a plentiful supply of soldiers and loads of patience on the home front.
Were the Civilians of the Defense Department Responsible?
Viewed from another perspective, however, the post-9/11 wars teach an altogether different lesson. According to this alternative view, echoing a similar complaint during the Vietnam era, the shortcomings of U.S. policy in Iraq and Afghanistan have little to do with the actual performance of American forces in the field and everything to do with the meddling of bumbling civilians back in Washington. In its simplest form, fault lies not with the troops themselves, nor with their commanders, but with the likes of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, and Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith, who prevented the troops from doing their jobs.
The charges leveled by Major General John Batiste, who served in Rumsfeld's Pentagon but subsequently retired in disgust and became one of the defense secretary's loudest military critics, are representative of this view. "Rumsfeld's dismal strategic decisions resulted in the unnecessary deaths of American servicemen and women," Batiste declared in September 2006. The former general held Rumsfeld personally "responsible for America and her allies going to war with the wrong plan." But that was just for starters. Rumsfeld also "violated fundamental principles of war, dismissed deliberate military planning, ignored the hard work to build the peace after the fall of Saddam Hussein, set the conditions for Abu Ghraib and other atrocities that further ignited the insurgency, disbanded Iraqi security force institutions when we needed them most, [and] constrained our commanders with an overly restrictive de-Ba'athification policy."
Nor was the problem limited to Rumsfeld himself. It included his chief lieutenants. According to Batiste, Rumsfeld surrounded himself "with like-minded and compliant subordinates who [did] not grasp the importance of the principles of war, the complexities of Iraq, or the human dimension of warfare." The overall effect was tantamount to murder: Rumsfeld "tied the hands of commanders while our troops were in contact with the enemy."
Here lies the second preliminary lesson drawn from Iraq and Afghanistan, one that appeals to disgruntled military officers like Batiste, but also to Democrats eager to blame the Bush administration for any and all sins and to neoconservatives looking to absolve themselves of responsibility for botched wars that they had once cavalierly promoted. The corrective to civilian arrogance and misjudgment is obvious: It requires tilting the civil-military balance back in favor of the generals, untying the hands of senior commanders.
>From this perspective, the most important lesson to take away from Iraq and Afghanistan is the imperative to empower military professionals. The Petraeus moment of 2007, when all of official Washington from President Bush to the lowest-ranking congressional staffer waited with bated breath for General David Petraeus to formulate basic policy for Iraq, offers a preview of how this lesson might play itself out.
Is a Draft the Answer?
There is also a third perspective, which blames the failures of Iraq and Afghanistan on a problematic relationship between soldiers and society. According to this view, the All-Volunteer Force itself is the problem. As the military historian Adrian Lewis observed, "The most significant transformation in the American conduct of war since World War II and the invention of the atomic bomb was not technological, but cultural, social, and political -- the removal of the American people from the conduct of war." Only after 9/11, with the Bush administration waging war on multiple fronts, have the implications of this transformation become fully evident.
A reliance on volunteer-professionals places a de facto cap on the army's overall size. The pool of willing recruits is necessarily limited. Given a choice, most young Americans will opt for opportunities other than military service, with protracted war diminishing rather than enhancing any collective propensity to volunteer. It is virtually inconceivable that any presidential call to the colors, however impassioned, any PR campaign, however cleverly designed, or any package of pay and bonuses, however generous, could reverse this disinclination.
Furthermore, to the extent that an army composed of regulars is no longer a people's army, the people have little say in its use. In effect, the professional military has become an extension of the imperial presidency. The troops fight when and where the commander in chief determines.
Finally, a reliance on professional soldiers eviscerates the concept of civic duty, relieving citizens at large of any obligation to contribute to the nation's defense. Ending the draft during the waning days of the Vietnam War did nothing to heal the divisions created by that conflict; instead, it ratified the separation of army from society. Like mowing lawns and bussing tables, fighting and perhaps dying to sustain the American way of life became something that Americans pay others to do.
So the third lesson of the Iraq War focuses on the need to repair the relationship between army and society. One way to do this is to junk the All-Volunteer Force altogether. Rather than rely on professionals, perhaps it makes sense to revive the tradition of the citizen-soldier.
Proposals to restore this hallowed tradition invariably conjure up images of reinstituting some form of conscription. In place of a system based on the principle of individual choice, those unhappy with the AVF advocate a system based on the principle of state compulsion.
The advantages offered by such a system are hardly trivial. To the extent that Iraq and Afghanistan have exposed the operational, political, and moral problems produced by relying on a small professional force, a draft seems to offer one obvious way to alleviate those problems.
For those who worry that the existing army is overextended, conscription provides a mechanism for expansion. Triple the size of the army -- in essence restoring the structure that existed during much of the Cold War -- and the personnel shortages that constrain the prosecution of ground campaigns will disappear. Sustaining the military commitment to Iraq for ten or twenty years, or even a century as Senator John McCain and many neoconservatives are willing to contemplate, then becomes a viable proposition.
War planners will no longer find themselves obliged to give short shrift to Contingency A (Afghanistan) in order to support Contingency B (Iraq). The concept of "surge" will take on a whole new meaning with the Pentagon able to dispatch not a measly 30,000 reinforcements to Iraq or another few thousand to Afghanistan, but 100,000 or more additional troops wherever they might be needed. Was the problem with Operation Iraqi Freedom too few "boots on the ground" for occupation and reconstruction? Reconstitute the draft, and that problem goes away.
Creating a mass army might even permit the United States to resuscitate the Weinberger-Powell Doctrine with its emphasis on "overwhelming force."
For those distressed by the absence of a politically meaningful antiwar movement despite the Iraq War's manifest unpopularity, the appeal of conscription differs somewhat. Some political activists look to an Iraq-era draft to do what the Vietnam-era draft did: animate large-scale protest, alter the political dynamic, and eventually shut down any conflict that lacks widespread popular support. The prospect of involuntary service will pry the kids out of the shopping malls and send them into the streets. It will prod the parents of draft-eligible offspring to see politics as something other than a mechanism for doling out entitlements. As a consequence, members of Congress keen to retain their seats will define their wartime responsibilities as something more than simply rubber-stamping spending bills proposed by the White House. In this way, a draft could reinvigorate American democracy, restore the governmental system of checks and balances, and constrain the warmongers inhabiting the executive branch.
For those moved by moral considerations, a draft promises to ensure a more equitable distribution of sacrifice in war time. No longer will rural Americans, people of color, recent immigrants, and members of the working class fill the ranks of the armed forces in disproportionate numbers. With conscription, the children of the political elite and of the well-to-do will once again bear their fair share of the load. Those reaping the benefits of the American way of life will contribute to its defense, helping to garrison the more distant precincts of empire. Perhaps even the editorial staffs of the Weekly Standard, National Review, and the New Republic might have the opportunity to serve, a salutary prospect given the propensity of those magazines to argue on behalf of military intervention.
Reconfigure the armed services to fight "small wars"; empower the generals; reconnect soldiering to citizenship -- on the surface each of these has a certain appeal. But upon closer examination, each also has large defects. They are the wrong lessons to take from Iraq and Afghanistan.
Drawing the Right Lessons from the Bush Era
If gearing up to fight "small wars," deferring to the brass, and scrapping the All-Volunteer Force are the wrong lessons to be drawn from our recent military experience, then what are the right ones?
The events of the recent past offer several lessons that illuminate these questions. The first concerns the nature of war. Iraq and Afghanistan remind us that war is not subject to reinvention, whatever George W. Bush and Pentagon proponents of the so-called Revolution in Military Affairs may contend.
War's essential nature is fixed, permanent, intractable, and irrepressible. War's constant companions are uncertainty and risk. "War is the realm of chance," wrote the military theorist Carl von Clausewitz nearly two centuries ago. "No other human activity gives it greater scope: no other has such incessant and varied dealings with this intruder…" -- a judgment that the invention of the computer, the Internet, and precision-guided munitions has done nothing to overturn.
So the first lesson to be taken away from the Bush administration's two military adventures is simply this: War remains today what it has always been -- elusive, untamed, costly, difficult to control, fraught with surprise, and sure to give rise to unexpected consequences. Only the truly demented will imagine otherwise.
The second lesson of Iraq and Afghanistan derives from the first. As has been the case throughout history, the utility of armed force remains finite. Even in the information age, to the extent that force "works," it does so with respect to a limited range of contingencies.
Although die-hard supporters of the Global War on Terror will insist otherwise, events in Iraq and Afghanistan have demonstrated definitively that further reliance on coercive methods will not enable the United States to achieve its objectives. Whether the actual aim is to democratize the Islamic world or subdue it, the military "option" is not the answer.
The Bush Doctrine itself provides the basis for a third lesson. For centuries, the Western moral tradition has categorically rejected the concept of preventive war. The events of 9/11 convinced some that this tradition no longer applied: old constraints had to give way. Yet our actual experience with preventive war suggests that, even setting moral considerations aside, to launch a war today to eliminate a danger that might pose a threat at some future date is just plain stupid. It doesn't work.
History has repeatedly demonstrated the irrationality of preventive war. If the world needed a further demonstration, President Bush provided it. Iraq shows us why the Bush Doctrine was a bad idea in the first place and why its abrogation has become essential. For principled guidance in determining when the use of force is appropriate, the country should conform to the Just War tradition -- not only because that tradition is consistent with our professed moral values, but also because its provisions provide an eminently useful guide for sound statecraft.
Finally, there is a fourth lesson, relating to the formulation of strategy. The results of U.S. policy in Iraq and Afghanistan suggest that in the upper echelons of the government and among the senior ranks of the officer corps, this has become a lost art.
Since the end of the Cold War, the tendency among civilians -- with President Bush a prime example -- has been to confuse strategy with ideology. The president's freedom agenda, which supposedly provided a blueprint for how to prosecute the Global War on Terror, expressed grandiose aspirations without serious effort to assess the means required to achieve them. Meanwhile, ever since the Vietnam War ended, the tendency among military officers has been to confuse strategy with operations.
Here we come face-to-face with the essential dilemma with which the United States has unsuccessfully wrestled since the Soviets deprived us of a stabilizing adversary. The political elite that ought to bear the chief responsibility for crafting grand strategy instead nurses fantasies of either achieving permanent global hegemony or remaking the world in America's image. Meanwhile, the military elite that could puncture those fantasies and help restore a modicum of realism to U.S. policy fixates on campaigns and battles, with generalship largely a business of organizing and coordinating matériel.
The four lessons of Iraq and Afghanistan boil down to this: Events have exposed as illusory American pretensions to having mastered war. Even today, war is hardly more subject to human control than the tides or the weather. Simply trying harder -- investing ever larger sums in even more advanced technology, devising novel techniques, or even improving the quality of American generalship -- will not enable the United States to evade that reality.
As measured by results achieved, the performance of the military since the end of the Cold War and especially since 9/11 has been unimpressive. This indifferent record of success leads some observers to argue that we need a bigger army or a different army.
But the problem lies less with the army that we have -- a very fine one, which every citizen should wish to preserve -- than with the requirements that we have imposed on our soldiers. Rather than expanding or reconfiguring that army, we need to treat it with the respect that it deserves. That means protecting it from further abuse of the sort that it has endured since 2001.
America doesn't need a bigger army. It needs a smaller -- that is, more modest -- foreign policy, one that assigns soldiers missions that are consistent with their capabilities. Modesty implies giving up on the illusions of grandeur to which the end of the Cold War and then 9/11 gave rise. It also means reining in the imperial presidents who expect the army to make good on those illusions. When it comes to supporting the troops, here lies the essence of a citizen's obligation.
Andrew Bacevich, professor of history and international relations at Boston University, retired from the U.S. Army with the rank of colonel. This piece is adapted from his new book, The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism (Metropolitan Books, 2008). He is also the author of The New American Militarism, among other books. His writing has appeared in Foreign Affairs, the Atlantic Monthly, the Nation, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and the Wall Street Journal. A TomDispatch interview with him can be read by clicking here, and then here. For part one of Bacevich's two-part series for TomDispatch, "Illusions of Victory," click here
From the book The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism by Andrew Bacevich, Copyright © 2008 by Andrew Bacevich. Reprinted by arrangement with Metropolitan Books, an Imprint of Henry Holt and Company, LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Georgia War a Neocon Election Ploy?
Georgia War a Neocon Election Ploy?
October comes early? Sen. John McCain and Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili.
By Robert Scheer
Is it possible that this time the October surprise was tried in August, and that the garbage issue of brave little Georgia struggling for its survival from the grasp of the Russian bear was stoked to influence the U.S. presidential election?
Before you dismiss that possibility, consider the role of one Randy Scheunemann, for four years a paid lobbyist for the Georgian government who ended his official lobbying connection only in March, months after he became Republican presidential candidate John McCain’s senior foreign policy adviser.
Previously, Scheunemann was best known as one of the neoconservatives who engineered the war in Iraq when he was a director of the Project for a New American Century. It was Scheunemann who, after working on the McCain 2000 presidential campaign, headed the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, which championed the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
There are telltale signs that he played a similar role in the recent Georgia flare-up. How else to explain the folly of his close friend and former employer, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, in ordering an invasion of the breakaway region of South Ossetia, an invasion that clearly was expected to produce a Russian counterreaction? It is inconceivable that Saakashvili would have triggered this dangerous escalation without some assurance from influential Americans he trusted, like Scheunemann, that the United States would have his back. Scheunemann long guided McCain in these matters, even before he was officially running foreign policy for McCain’s presidential campaign.
In 2005, while registered as a paid lobbyist for Georgia, Scheunemann worked with McCain to draft a congressional resolution pushing for Georgia’s membership in NATO. A year later, while still on the Georgian payroll, Scheunemann accompanied McCain on a trip to that country, where they met with Saakashvili and supported his bellicose views toward Russia’s Vladimir Putin.
Scheunemann is at the center of the neoconservative cabal that has come to dominate the Republican candidate’s foreign policy stance in a replay of the run-up to the war against Iraq. These folks are always looking for a foreign enemy on which to base a new Cold War, and with the collapse of Saddam Hussein’s regime, it was Putin’s Russia that came increasingly to fit the bill.
Yes, it sounds diabolical, but that may be the most accurate way to assess the designs of the McCain campaign in matters of war and peace. There is every indication that the candidate’s demonization of Russian leader Putin is an even grander plan than the previous use of Saddam to fuel American militarism with the fearsome enemy that it desperately needs.
McCain gets to look tough with a new Cold War to fight while Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, scrambling to make sense of a more measured foreign policy posture, will seem weak in comparison. Meanwhile, the dire consequences of the Bush legacy that McCain has inherited, from the disaster of Iraq to the economic meltdown, conveniently will be ignored. But the military-industrial complex, which has helped bankroll the neoconservatives, will be provided with an excuse for ramping up a military budget that is already bigger than that of the rest of the world combined.
What is at work here is a neoconservative, self-fulfilling prophecy in which Russia is turned into an enemy that expands its largely reduced military, and Putin is cast as the new Josef Stalin bogeyman, evoking images of the old Soviet Union. McCain has condemned a “revanchist Russia” that should once again be contained. Although Putin has been the enormously popular elected leader of post-Communist Russia, it is assumed that imperialism is always lurking, not only in his DNA but in that of the Russian people.
How convenient to forget that Stalin was a Georgian, and indeed if Russian troops had occupied the threatened Georgian town of Gori they would have found a museum still honoring the local boy, who made good by seizing control of the Russian revolution. Indeed five Russian bombs were allegedly dropped on Gori’s Stalin Square on Tuesday.
It should also be mentioned that the post-Communist Georgians have imperial designs on South Ossetia and Abkhazia. What a stark contradiction that the United States, which championed Kosovo’s independence from Serbia, now is ignoring Georgia’s invasion of its ethnically rebellious provinces.
For McCain to so fervently embrace Scheunemann’s neoconservative line of demonizing Russia in the interest of appearing tough during an election campaign is a reminder that a senator can be old and yet wildly irresponsible.
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20080812_georgia_war_a_neocon_election_ploy/
October comes early? Sen. John McCain and Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili.
By Robert Scheer
Is it possible that this time the October surprise was tried in August, and that the garbage issue of brave little Georgia struggling for its survival from the grasp of the Russian bear was stoked to influence the U.S. presidential election?
Before you dismiss that possibility, consider the role of one Randy Scheunemann, for four years a paid lobbyist for the Georgian government who ended his official lobbying connection only in March, months after he became Republican presidential candidate John McCain’s senior foreign policy adviser.
Previously, Scheunemann was best known as one of the neoconservatives who engineered the war in Iraq when he was a director of the Project for a New American Century. It was Scheunemann who, after working on the McCain 2000 presidential campaign, headed the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, which championed the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
There are telltale signs that he played a similar role in the recent Georgia flare-up. How else to explain the folly of his close friend and former employer, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, in ordering an invasion of the breakaway region of South Ossetia, an invasion that clearly was expected to produce a Russian counterreaction? It is inconceivable that Saakashvili would have triggered this dangerous escalation without some assurance from influential Americans he trusted, like Scheunemann, that the United States would have his back. Scheunemann long guided McCain in these matters, even before he was officially running foreign policy for McCain’s presidential campaign.
In 2005, while registered as a paid lobbyist for Georgia, Scheunemann worked with McCain to draft a congressional resolution pushing for Georgia’s membership in NATO. A year later, while still on the Georgian payroll, Scheunemann accompanied McCain on a trip to that country, where they met with Saakashvili and supported his bellicose views toward Russia’s Vladimir Putin.
Scheunemann is at the center of the neoconservative cabal that has come to dominate the Republican candidate’s foreign policy stance in a replay of the run-up to the war against Iraq. These folks are always looking for a foreign enemy on which to base a new Cold War, and with the collapse of Saddam Hussein’s regime, it was Putin’s Russia that came increasingly to fit the bill.
Yes, it sounds diabolical, but that may be the most accurate way to assess the designs of the McCain campaign in matters of war and peace. There is every indication that the candidate’s demonization of Russian leader Putin is an even grander plan than the previous use of Saddam to fuel American militarism with the fearsome enemy that it desperately needs.
McCain gets to look tough with a new Cold War to fight while Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, scrambling to make sense of a more measured foreign policy posture, will seem weak in comparison. Meanwhile, the dire consequences of the Bush legacy that McCain has inherited, from the disaster of Iraq to the economic meltdown, conveniently will be ignored. But the military-industrial complex, which has helped bankroll the neoconservatives, will be provided with an excuse for ramping up a military budget that is already bigger than that of the rest of the world combined.
What is at work here is a neoconservative, self-fulfilling prophecy in which Russia is turned into an enemy that expands its largely reduced military, and Putin is cast as the new Josef Stalin bogeyman, evoking images of the old Soviet Union. McCain has condemned a “revanchist Russia” that should once again be contained. Although Putin has been the enormously popular elected leader of post-Communist Russia, it is assumed that imperialism is always lurking, not only in his DNA but in that of the Russian people.
How convenient to forget that Stalin was a Georgian, and indeed if Russian troops had occupied the threatened Georgian town of Gori they would have found a museum still honoring the local boy, who made good by seizing control of the Russian revolution. Indeed five Russian bombs were allegedly dropped on Gori’s Stalin Square on Tuesday.
It should also be mentioned that the post-Communist Georgians have imperial designs on South Ossetia and Abkhazia. What a stark contradiction that the United States, which championed Kosovo’s independence from Serbia, now is ignoring Georgia’s invasion of its ethnically rebellious provinces.
For McCain to so fervently embrace Scheunemann’s neoconservative line of demonizing Russia in the interest of appearing tough during an election campaign is a reminder that a senator can be old and yet wildly irresponsible.
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20080812_georgia_war_a_neocon_election_ploy/
Neo-Con Hypocrisy on Georgia and Iraq
Neo-Con Hypocrisy on Georgia and Iraq
by Jacob G. Hornberger
Amidst the death and destruction in Georgia, the neo-conservative reaction here in the United States is a sight to behold.
Aggression, the neo-cons are screaming. The Russians are waging an unprovoked war of aggression, they’re exclaiming. This is unacceptable, they’re declaring. Something must be done, they’re saying.
Oh?
Where were all those terms when the U.S. government attacked Iraq, a country that had never attacked the United States or even threatened to do so? If there was ever a case in which an illegal and immoral war of aggression was waged against another country, it was Iraq.
Yet, what did the neo-cons say about the Iraq invasion and occupation? Oh, it’s not a war of aggression, they said, but rather a war of liberation, of freedom, of democracy-spreading — well, at least once those infamous WMDs failed to materialize.
But all of a sudden Russia attacks Georgia in response to Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili’s sending of troops into South Ossetia, and all of a sudden the neo-cons experience a gigantic moral awakening in which they see nothing but unlawful, immoral, and arrogant belligerence and aggression.
You see — in the neo-con mind, when the U.S. government attacks countries, that is automatically considered good. When the Russian government attacks countries, that is automatically considered bad.
But let’s give credit where credit is due: Not only did the neo-cons’ poking of hornets’ nests in the Middle East give rise to 9/11 and the war on terrorism, the clever neo-con use of NATO has now helped to poke the Russian hornet’s nest, giving the neo-cons another excuse — “the resurgence of the communist threat” — to take away even more of our freedoms.
Let’s not forget what the purpose of NATO was — to protect Europe from the Soviet communists (who were the former partner of the U.S. government in World War II and to whose control U.S. officials had delivered Czechoslovakia, Poland, and the Baltics).
When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1989, the obvious step would have been to dismantle NATO, given that its mission was now moot. That’s not what U.S. officials did, however. Instead, they kept NATO in existence and then began using it to take a series of provocative actions against Russia, such as proposing the installation of missiles in Eastern Europe.
U.S. officials also sought to have Georgia, which is a former Soviet republic, join NATO, which would have meant more U.S. missiles on Russia’s border.
Now, the neo-cons are claiming that the Russians are behaving ridiculously in objecting to such actions. They are suggesting that it is Russia’s duty to simply obey the U.S. Empire and comply with its directives. After all, they say, the intentions of the U.S. government are entirely peaceful, defensive, and non-threatening. Everyone knows, they say, that the U.S. government doesn’t attack and wage wars of aggression and occupy other countries or engage in regime-change operations through such actions as assassinations, coups, and bribery. The U.S. government is the embodiment of good, they say. Just trust us and obey us, they say to the Russians.
Now, imagine this: Suppose Russia were to enter into an alliance with Mexico, Cuba, and Grenada in which Russia planned to construct military bases and install missiles in those three countries. Ask yourself: Would not the neo-cons go ballistic? Would they not be calling for invading all three countries and implementing regime change?
Of course they would. They would never allow “the communists” to gain a “foothold” in the Western Hemisphere. After all, who has forgotten the violent regime-change operations in Guatemala, Chile, Cuba, Grenada, Nicaragua, and elsewhere during the Cold War?
Fortunately, the neo-cons are not calling for U.S. military intervention to protect the Georgians from Russian aggression. That’s limited to Third World regimes that lack the military to defend themselves, such as when Iraq invaded Kuwait. But Americans ought to be thanking their lucky stars that commitment to principle has never been a strong suit within the neo-con community. Better that the neo-cons limit their punitive actions against Russia to canceling its membership in the G8 than risking war with Russia as part of the U.S. government’s self-appointed role as the world’s international policeman.
Mr. Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation.
http://www.fff.org/blog/jghblog2008-08-13.asp
by Jacob G. Hornberger
Amidst the death and destruction in Georgia, the neo-conservative reaction here in the United States is a sight to behold.
Aggression, the neo-cons are screaming. The Russians are waging an unprovoked war of aggression, they’re exclaiming. This is unacceptable, they’re declaring. Something must be done, they’re saying.
Oh?
Where were all those terms when the U.S. government attacked Iraq, a country that had never attacked the United States or even threatened to do so? If there was ever a case in which an illegal and immoral war of aggression was waged against another country, it was Iraq.
Yet, what did the neo-cons say about the Iraq invasion and occupation? Oh, it’s not a war of aggression, they said, but rather a war of liberation, of freedom, of democracy-spreading — well, at least once those infamous WMDs failed to materialize.
But all of a sudden Russia attacks Georgia in response to Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili’s sending of troops into South Ossetia, and all of a sudden the neo-cons experience a gigantic moral awakening in which they see nothing but unlawful, immoral, and arrogant belligerence and aggression.
You see — in the neo-con mind, when the U.S. government attacks countries, that is automatically considered good. When the Russian government attacks countries, that is automatically considered bad.
But let’s give credit where credit is due: Not only did the neo-cons’ poking of hornets’ nests in the Middle East give rise to 9/11 and the war on terrorism, the clever neo-con use of NATO has now helped to poke the Russian hornet’s nest, giving the neo-cons another excuse — “the resurgence of the communist threat” — to take away even more of our freedoms.
Let’s not forget what the purpose of NATO was — to protect Europe from the Soviet communists (who were the former partner of the U.S. government in World War II and to whose control U.S. officials had delivered Czechoslovakia, Poland, and the Baltics).
When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1989, the obvious step would have been to dismantle NATO, given that its mission was now moot. That’s not what U.S. officials did, however. Instead, they kept NATO in existence and then began using it to take a series of provocative actions against Russia, such as proposing the installation of missiles in Eastern Europe.
U.S. officials also sought to have Georgia, which is a former Soviet republic, join NATO, which would have meant more U.S. missiles on Russia’s border.
Now, the neo-cons are claiming that the Russians are behaving ridiculously in objecting to such actions. They are suggesting that it is Russia’s duty to simply obey the U.S. Empire and comply with its directives. After all, they say, the intentions of the U.S. government are entirely peaceful, defensive, and non-threatening. Everyone knows, they say, that the U.S. government doesn’t attack and wage wars of aggression and occupy other countries or engage in regime-change operations through such actions as assassinations, coups, and bribery. The U.S. government is the embodiment of good, they say. Just trust us and obey us, they say to the Russians.
Now, imagine this: Suppose Russia were to enter into an alliance with Mexico, Cuba, and Grenada in which Russia planned to construct military bases and install missiles in those three countries. Ask yourself: Would not the neo-cons go ballistic? Would they not be calling for invading all three countries and implementing regime change?
Of course they would. They would never allow “the communists” to gain a “foothold” in the Western Hemisphere. After all, who has forgotten the violent regime-change operations in Guatemala, Chile, Cuba, Grenada, Nicaragua, and elsewhere during the Cold War?
Fortunately, the neo-cons are not calling for U.S. military intervention to protect the Georgians from Russian aggression. That’s limited to Third World regimes that lack the military to defend themselves, such as when Iraq invaded Kuwait. But Americans ought to be thanking their lucky stars that commitment to principle has never been a strong suit within the neo-con community. Better that the neo-cons limit their punitive actions against Russia to canceling its membership in the G8 than risking war with Russia as part of the U.S. government’s self-appointed role as the world’s international policeman.
Mr. Hornberger is founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation.
http://www.fff.org/blog/jghblog2008-08-13.asp
The Lobby Like No Other Wants a War Like No Other
The Lobby Like No Other
Wants a War Like No Other
by Michael Scheuer
Having watched John McCain and Barack Obama resolutely pledge their allegiance – and their countrymen's lives and treasure – to the defense of Israel via AIPAC, the media, and personal meetings with Israeli leaders, it is worth asking what could possibly drive these men to so ardently commit America to participation in other people's religious wars. This question is particularly important today as the Bush administration and the Israel-firsters continue to push for an unprovoked U.S. attack on Iran.
Let me say that I harbor no resentment over the actions of Israel's leaders. For more than 60 years, they have knowingly made their country a pariah in the Arab and Islamic worlds, just as the Palestinians have made themselves pariahs in much of the West. This is, of course, the right of both parties, but neither seems to want to face the consequences of their decisions. With demographic realities and increasingly radical, well-armed Arabs making them panicky about Israel's security, Israel's leaders naturally to try to lock down as much U.S. support as possible. Having consciously – if unwisely – put all their eggs in the U.S. basket since the 1973 War, Israel's leaders must do everything possible to protect their relationship with Washington.
The U.S. invasion of Iraq, it seems, was not enough for the Israel-firsters. Now, according to Sen. Joseph Lieberman, a U.S.-launched war on Iran is needed because "the threat that the U.S. and Israel face from the Islamic Republic of Iran is today greater than ever." Though based on the fantasy that Ahmedinejad's tin-pot regime is a threat to the world's only superpower, this is a perfectly commonsense position for Israel and its U.S.-citizen backers in AIPAC to champion. In their view, U.S. wars with Muslims are the ultimate good for Israel. Recall, if you will, the perfectly accurate April 2008, words of Benjamin Netanyahu, likely Israel's next prime minister: "We [Israel] are benefiting from one thing, and that is the attack on the twin towers and the Pentagon, and the American struggle in Iraq." These wars, Netanyahu said, have "swung American public opinion in our favor." How much more must Netanyahu and AIPAC believe that a U.S. war with Iran would add to this "swing" in Israel's favor?
My own anger falls not on Israel, then, or on Palestine, for that matter; as I have written elsewhere, America would do just fine and would be better off without either or both. It falls rather on the lobbying efforts of AIPAC, that organization's blatant purchasing of fealty from U.S. politicians in both parties, and the media's obsequious parroting of specious canards about "Israel's right to exist" and "the duty of Americans to support an island of democracy in the Middle East."
While few would question the right of AIPAC leaders to lobby U.S. politicians, legally bribe them with campaign contributions, or limit their right to speak as they please in public, not matter how scurrilous or libelous their words, I sometimes wonder if Americans have focused on what AIPAC lobbies for and what its acolytes in politics and the media support.
It is a commonplace to say that lobbying is a pervasive activity in U.S. politics at all levels of government, especially at the federal level. People lobby for tax advantages for business or tax breaks for individuals; for the right to own guns or laws to ban them; for subsidies for agriculture or vouchers for private schools; for universal health care or smaller government. Across this diverse array of lobbyists there are two common threads: (A) None are working to push the United States to participate in other peoples' wars; and (B) All are arguing for things that will – from their perspective – improve America, whether by making it richer, better protected, more competently educated, healthier, freer, etc. The anti-gun lobby, for example, is no less confident than the NRA and its affiliates that they are working for the best interests of Americans. One or the other is wrong, but their activities are shaped by their perception of what is best for America.
It is this last point that separates the lobbyists working for and with AIPAC – most of whom are U.S. citizens – from almost all other U.S.-based lobbyists. AIPAC does not lobby, bribe, and libel to make Americans and America better off. It lobbies solely, forthrightly, and cynically to make Israel richer, better protected, and able to do as it pleases in its relations with Muslim states. AIPAC makes no pretense of doing things meant to benefit America; rather, its members take pride in seeking a goal that runs directly counter to the economic welfare and physical security of almost all other U.S citizens by seeking to keep them involved in a religious war in which no U.S. national interest is at stake.
Now, there are a few other similar anti-American lobbies – those for Armenia, Lebanon, Greece, etc. – but AIPAC is clearly primus inter pares in this dastardly group. And given that every AIPAC success is a net loss for U.S. security and the U.S. Treasury, it seems odd that our so-called political leaders take orders and funds from this fundamentally anti-U.S. organization. Odd or not, however, that is the reality. Senators Obama and McCain have become AIPAC poster boys, each strengthening his support for Israel over the course of the current presidential campaign. Obama's position, in fact, has changed so drastically in a pro-Israel direction that the Illinois senator appears to have no mind of his own on this issue. He has simply and obsequiously adopted the Democrats' traditional abject subservience to their small but powerful pro-Israel constituency.
McCain is an Israel-firster of the deepest hue. Coached by Joe Lieberman – who argues there is a U.S. duty to ensure God's promise to Abraham about Israel is kept – McCain is now considering Republican Congressman Eric Cantor for his running mate. Rep. Cantor, needless to say, is eager to spend American blood and treasure to secure Israel. Speaking in Israel, Cantor pushed the same false assertion that is the staple of U.S. leaders in both parties. "What befalls Jerusalem," Cantor said, "threatens the security of the United States and its allies worldwide. That's because Jerusalem and Israel are Ground Zero in the global battle between tyranny and democracy, radicalism and moderation, terrorism and freedom."
This, of course, is nonsense of a high order, and Lieberman and Cantor know it. Both men are committed to Israel as a religious idea, not because it has anything to do with U.S. security. According to Lieberman, "The rabbis say in the Talmud that a lot of rabbinic law is to put a fence around the Torah so you don't get near to violating it. Well, McCain has a series of very clear-headed policies toward terrorism and Islamic extremism [that put] extra layers behind his support for Israel." He also told a conference of Christians United for Israel that he was pleased they recognized it was America's duty to defend Israel, blithely lying to them that "President Washington and the Founding Fathers" would support America fighting Israel's wars. Cantor, playing to both the Israel-firsters and their U.S. evangelical allies, also has made clear where his primary loyalty lies:
"Jerusalem is not merely the capital of Israel but the spiritual capital of Jews and Christians everywhere. It's the site of the First and Second Temples, which housed the Holy of Holies, and it's the direction in which we Jews face when we pray. This glorious City of David is bound to the Jewish people by an undeniable 3,000-year historical link."
My own view is that if God promised Palestine to the Israelis, God is perfectly capable of keeping that promise, and America is no way committed to expend the lives of its soldier-children in a war over conflicting interpretations of God's word. The Israelis and the Muslims should be perfectly free to fight over whether Yahweh and Abraham or Allah and Mohammed are right, and Americans should be perfectly free to draw the correct conclusion, that the United States does not have a dog in this fight. In addition, there is a genuine constitutional question of church-state separation on this issue. Why should American taxpayers have their earnings and children's lives spent to defend a theocracy in Israel or, for that matter, to protect an Islamic theocracy in Saudi Arabia.? (Imagine the howls of protest and torrents of church-state separation rhetoric from the media and both parties if a congressman introduced a bill calling for the U.S. to designate that an amount equivalent to what's spent to protect Israel and Saudi Arabia be sent to the Vatican – a nation-state like Israel and Saudi Arabia – to improve its defenses against the now well-articulated threat from al-Qaeda and other Islamists.)
Objectively, three realities are clear: (1) U.S. survival is not at stake in the Israeli-Muslim war; (2) the taxes of Americans should not be spent to defend theocratic states; and (3) holy books are insane tools to use as guides for U.S. foreign policy. In America, however, these realities lie unspoken because of the lobbying efforts of AIPAC and the pro-Israel mantras of the politicians it purchases with campaign contributions and promises of media exposure, including McCain and Obama. By their consistent anti-American actions, AIPAC and the U.S. politicians who do its bidding have fully validated the words of the real George Washington – not the figment of Washington painted by Joe Lieberman. "Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence," President Washington wrote in 1796, "the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake, since history and experience prove that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of republican government."
http://www.antiwar.com/scheuer/?articleid=13295
Wants a War Like No Other
by Michael Scheuer
Having watched John McCain and Barack Obama resolutely pledge their allegiance – and their countrymen's lives and treasure – to the defense of Israel via AIPAC, the media, and personal meetings with Israeli leaders, it is worth asking what could possibly drive these men to so ardently commit America to participation in other people's religious wars. This question is particularly important today as the Bush administration and the Israel-firsters continue to push for an unprovoked U.S. attack on Iran.
Let me say that I harbor no resentment over the actions of Israel's leaders. For more than 60 years, they have knowingly made their country a pariah in the Arab and Islamic worlds, just as the Palestinians have made themselves pariahs in much of the West. This is, of course, the right of both parties, but neither seems to want to face the consequences of their decisions. With demographic realities and increasingly radical, well-armed Arabs making them panicky about Israel's security, Israel's leaders naturally to try to lock down as much U.S. support as possible. Having consciously – if unwisely – put all their eggs in the U.S. basket since the 1973 War, Israel's leaders must do everything possible to protect their relationship with Washington.
The U.S. invasion of Iraq, it seems, was not enough for the Israel-firsters. Now, according to Sen. Joseph Lieberman, a U.S.-launched war on Iran is needed because "the threat that the U.S. and Israel face from the Islamic Republic of Iran is today greater than ever." Though based on the fantasy that Ahmedinejad's tin-pot regime is a threat to the world's only superpower, this is a perfectly commonsense position for Israel and its U.S.-citizen backers in AIPAC to champion. In their view, U.S. wars with Muslims are the ultimate good for Israel. Recall, if you will, the perfectly accurate April 2008, words of Benjamin Netanyahu, likely Israel's next prime minister: "We [Israel] are benefiting from one thing, and that is the attack on the twin towers and the Pentagon, and the American struggle in Iraq." These wars, Netanyahu said, have "swung American public opinion in our favor." How much more must Netanyahu and AIPAC believe that a U.S. war with Iran would add to this "swing" in Israel's favor?
My own anger falls not on Israel, then, or on Palestine, for that matter; as I have written elsewhere, America would do just fine and would be better off without either or both. It falls rather on the lobbying efforts of AIPAC, that organization's blatant purchasing of fealty from U.S. politicians in both parties, and the media's obsequious parroting of specious canards about "Israel's right to exist" and "the duty of Americans to support an island of democracy in the Middle East."
While few would question the right of AIPAC leaders to lobby U.S. politicians, legally bribe them with campaign contributions, or limit their right to speak as they please in public, not matter how scurrilous or libelous their words, I sometimes wonder if Americans have focused on what AIPAC lobbies for and what its acolytes in politics and the media support.
It is a commonplace to say that lobbying is a pervasive activity in U.S. politics at all levels of government, especially at the federal level. People lobby for tax advantages for business or tax breaks for individuals; for the right to own guns or laws to ban them; for subsidies for agriculture or vouchers for private schools; for universal health care or smaller government. Across this diverse array of lobbyists there are two common threads: (A) None are working to push the United States to participate in other peoples' wars; and (B) All are arguing for things that will – from their perspective – improve America, whether by making it richer, better protected, more competently educated, healthier, freer, etc. The anti-gun lobby, for example, is no less confident than the NRA and its affiliates that they are working for the best interests of Americans. One or the other is wrong, but their activities are shaped by their perception of what is best for America.
It is this last point that separates the lobbyists working for and with AIPAC – most of whom are U.S. citizens – from almost all other U.S.-based lobbyists. AIPAC does not lobby, bribe, and libel to make Americans and America better off. It lobbies solely, forthrightly, and cynically to make Israel richer, better protected, and able to do as it pleases in its relations with Muslim states. AIPAC makes no pretense of doing things meant to benefit America; rather, its members take pride in seeking a goal that runs directly counter to the economic welfare and physical security of almost all other U.S citizens by seeking to keep them involved in a religious war in which no U.S. national interest is at stake.
Now, there are a few other similar anti-American lobbies – those for Armenia, Lebanon, Greece, etc. – but AIPAC is clearly primus inter pares in this dastardly group. And given that every AIPAC success is a net loss for U.S. security and the U.S. Treasury, it seems odd that our so-called political leaders take orders and funds from this fundamentally anti-U.S. organization. Odd or not, however, that is the reality. Senators Obama and McCain have become AIPAC poster boys, each strengthening his support for Israel over the course of the current presidential campaign. Obama's position, in fact, has changed so drastically in a pro-Israel direction that the Illinois senator appears to have no mind of his own on this issue. He has simply and obsequiously adopted the Democrats' traditional abject subservience to their small but powerful pro-Israel constituency.
McCain is an Israel-firster of the deepest hue. Coached by Joe Lieberman – who argues there is a U.S. duty to ensure God's promise to Abraham about Israel is kept – McCain is now considering Republican Congressman Eric Cantor for his running mate. Rep. Cantor, needless to say, is eager to spend American blood and treasure to secure Israel. Speaking in Israel, Cantor pushed the same false assertion that is the staple of U.S. leaders in both parties. "What befalls Jerusalem," Cantor said, "threatens the security of the United States and its allies worldwide. That's because Jerusalem and Israel are Ground Zero in the global battle between tyranny and democracy, radicalism and moderation, terrorism and freedom."
This, of course, is nonsense of a high order, and Lieberman and Cantor know it. Both men are committed to Israel as a religious idea, not because it has anything to do with U.S. security. According to Lieberman, "The rabbis say in the Talmud that a lot of rabbinic law is to put a fence around the Torah so you don't get near to violating it. Well, McCain has a series of very clear-headed policies toward terrorism and Islamic extremism [that put] extra layers behind his support for Israel." He also told a conference of Christians United for Israel that he was pleased they recognized it was America's duty to defend Israel, blithely lying to them that "President Washington and the Founding Fathers" would support America fighting Israel's wars. Cantor, playing to both the Israel-firsters and their U.S. evangelical allies, also has made clear where his primary loyalty lies:
"Jerusalem is not merely the capital of Israel but the spiritual capital of Jews and Christians everywhere. It's the site of the First and Second Temples, which housed the Holy of Holies, and it's the direction in which we Jews face when we pray. This glorious City of David is bound to the Jewish people by an undeniable 3,000-year historical link."
My own view is that if God promised Palestine to the Israelis, God is perfectly capable of keeping that promise, and America is no way committed to expend the lives of its soldier-children in a war over conflicting interpretations of God's word. The Israelis and the Muslims should be perfectly free to fight over whether Yahweh and Abraham or Allah and Mohammed are right, and Americans should be perfectly free to draw the correct conclusion, that the United States does not have a dog in this fight. In addition, there is a genuine constitutional question of church-state separation on this issue. Why should American taxpayers have their earnings and children's lives spent to defend a theocracy in Israel or, for that matter, to protect an Islamic theocracy in Saudi Arabia.? (Imagine the howls of protest and torrents of church-state separation rhetoric from the media and both parties if a congressman introduced a bill calling for the U.S. to designate that an amount equivalent to what's spent to protect Israel and Saudi Arabia be sent to the Vatican – a nation-state like Israel and Saudi Arabia – to improve its defenses against the now well-articulated threat from al-Qaeda and other Islamists.)
Objectively, three realities are clear: (1) U.S. survival is not at stake in the Israeli-Muslim war; (2) the taxes of Americans should not be spent to defend theocratic states; and (3) holy books are insane tools to use as guides for U.S. foreign policy. In America, however, these realities lie unspoken because of the lobbying efforts of AIPAC and the pro-Israel mantras of the politicians it purchases with campaign contributions and promises of media exposure, including McCain and Obama. By their consistent anti-American actions, AIPAC and the U.S. politicians who do its bidding have fully validated the words of the real George Washington – not the figment of Washington painted by Joe Lieberman. "Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence," President Washington wrote in 1796, "the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake, since history and experience prove that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of republican government."
http://www.antiwar.com/scheuer/?articleid=13295
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Why Georgia Does Not Belong in NATO
Why Georgia Does Not Belong in NATO
William Pfaff
Paris, August 12, 2008
British Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery was the man who said the first three rules of warfare are "Do not invade Russia," repeated three times.
A footnote to that rule would note that while the disputed Georgian districts of South Ossitetia and Abkhazia are not parts of Russia today, they were yesterday, and probably will again be tomorrow, or the day after tomorrow. Most of their present populations carry Russian passports, and there are Russian troops in both provinces.
The fourth rule of war might be, "Do not let anyone trick you into invading Russia." Apologists for Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili have claimed that the Russians prepared their riposte to the Georgian attack on South Ossetia before it happened last Friday, but misled Saakashvili into thinking an attempt to seize the disputed territory would go unopposed. However The New York Times quotes "a senior American official" as saying, "It doesn't look as if this was premeditated. Until the night before the fighting, Russia seemed to be playing a constructive role."
The Russian version of the betrayal theme is that Saakashvili "was forced to start this war by [U.S. Vice President] Dick Cheney to support the campaign of John McCain. The only possibility for John McCain to win is to have some kind of war." That is the view of Sergei Markov, Director of the Institute of Political Studies in Moscow, and undoubtedly it is an opinion widely held in Russia.
It is at least logical. If true it would mean that Cheney should be charged with malfeasance in public office. (But that has been proposed before.) Cheney's actual statement after the Russian counterattack was perfectly presidential. He said the Russian attack "must not go unanswered," and if continued would have serious consequences for Russian-American relations. This said everything and nothing at the same time.
The fifth rule ought also to be precautionary, "Don't let your friends in Washington democracy-promoting institutes or Neo-Conservative think-tanks, or who are important American newspaper columnists or television talking heads, convince you that if you attack Russia the United States and NATO will rescue you."
Thus a sixth rule of conduct is one of political realism, and explains rule five. It was expressed by Henry Kissinger in the words, "Great powers do not commit suicide for allies." (Least of all small and unimportant allies.)
Nowhere in what I have read of the comment on this small but important war has it been explained [ital] why [unital] neither Georgia nor Ukraine should belong to NATO. They carry with them ready-made wars that NATO neither can nor should be expected to deal with. They are both ethnically and culturally divided nations whose histories are of struggle between or among their component parts.
In Georgia it is between the linguistically distinct enclaves that in the past were Russian and wish again to be Russian, and the majority of Georgians who want to be part of the West, but are also determined to dominate their rebellious territories.
If they would peacefully renounce those territories, an ethnically and culturally united Georgia would have every right to demand NATO membership. But as things are now (or were, until the last few days), Mikheil Saakashvili wants his country inside NATO to protect him from the consequences of forcing those dissident territories to remain under Georgian domination. NATO has no business doing such a thing, and as Russia supports the rebel enclaves, NATO membership for Georgia has war with Russia built into it. As we have just seen.
In Ukraine, the problem is between a culturally and historically Orthodox and Russian-speaking Ukraine, and a westernized and Uniate Catholic Ukraine, whose ties are to Poland and Lithuania. Westernized Ukraine is trying to use NATO to help it dominate Russian Ukraine. This again has war built into it, and NATO must stay away from a conflict that is an unresolved and possibly irresolvable internal Ukrainian problem.
NATO is extremely lucky that Germany and France blocked it earlier this year from offering membership to Georgia. Had they not done so, NATO today would either have threatened Russia with war this week, or its Article Five guarantee to come to the military aid of any of its members under attack would have been discredited.
Thus the seventh rule, also one of political realism, is "Don't give guarantees or make threats you cannot carry out." John McCain said "Russia should immediately and unconditionally cease its military operations and withdraw all forces from sovereign Georgia territory." That is ultimatum talk. But if McCain were president today, just what would he have done if Russia defied him?
Barack Obama said, "Now is the time for Georgia and Russia to show restraint, and to avoid an escalation to full-scale war." This was called "weak" by the McCain camp, but it was presidential talk. It said what the two sides should do, without committing the United States to do anything, whatever happened. It maintained a free hand for the United States.
© Copyright 2008 by Tribune Media Services International. All Rights Reserved.
________________________________________
William Pfaff
Paris, August 12, 2008
British Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery was the man who said the first three rules of warfare are "Do not invade Russia," repeated three times.
A footnote to that rule would note that while the disputed Georgian districts of South Ossitetia and Abkhazia are not parts of Russia today, they were yesterday, and probably will again be tomorrow, or the day after tomorrow. Most of their present populations carry Russian passports, and there are Russian troops in both provinces.
The fourth rule of war might be, "Do not let anyone trick you into invading Russia." Apologists for Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili have claimed that the Russians prepared their riposte to the Georgian attack on South Ossetia before it happened last Friday, but misled Saakashvili into thinking an attempt to seize the disputed territory would go unopposed. However The New York Times quotes "a senior American official" as saying, "It doesn't look as if this was premeditated. Until the night before the fighting, Russia seemed to be playing a constructive role."
The Russian version of the betrayal theme is that Saakashvili "was forced to start this war by [U.S. Vice President] Dick Cheney to support the campaign of John McCain. The only possibility for John McCain to win is to have some kind of war." That is the view of Sergei Markov, Director of the Institute of Political Studies in Moscow, and undoubtedly it is an opinion widely held in Russia.
It is at least logical. If true it would mean that Cheney should be charged with malfeasance in public office. (But that has been proposed before.) Cheney's actual statement after the Russian counterattack was perfectly presidential. He said the Russian attack "must not go unanswered," and if continued would have serious consequences for Russian-American relations. This said everything and nothing at the same time.
The fifth rule ought also to be precautionary, "Don't let your friends in Washington democracy-promoting institutes or Neo-Conservative think-tanks, or who are important American newspaper columnists or television talking heads, convince you that if you attack Russia the United States and NATO will rescue you."
Thus a sixth rule of conduct is one of political realism, and explains rule five. It was expressed by Henry Kissinger in the words, "Great powers do not commit suicide for allies." (Least of all small and unimportant allies.)
Nowhere in what I have read of the comment on this small but important war has it been explained [ital] why [unital] neither Georgia nor Ukraine should belong to NATO. They carry with them ready-made wars that NATO neither can nor should be expected to deal with. They are both ethnically and culturally divided nations whose histories are of struggle between or among their component parts.
In Georgia it is between the linguistically distinct enclaves that in the past were Russian and wish again to be Russian, and the majority of Georgians who want to be part of the West, but are also determined to dominate their rebellious territories.
If they would peacefully renounce those territories, an ethnically and culturally united Georgia would have every right to demand NATO membership. But as things are now (or were, until the last few days), Mikheil Saakashvili wants his country inside NATO to protect him from the consequences of forcing those dissident territories to remain under Georgian domination. NATO has no business doing such a thing, and as Russia supports the rebel enclaves, NATO membership for Georgia has war with Russia built into it. As we have just seen.
In Ukraine, the problem is between a culturally and historically Orthodox and Russian-speaking Ukraine, and a westernized and Uniate Catholic Ukraine, whose ties are to Poland and Lithuania. Westernized Ukraine is trying to use NATO to help it dominate Russian Ukraine. This again has war built into it, and NATO must stay away from a conflict that is an unresolved and possibly irresolvable internal Ukrainian problem.
NATO is extremely lucky that Germany and France blocked it earlier this year from offering membership to Georgia. Had they not done so, NATO today would either have threatened Russia with war this week, or its Article Five guarantee to come to the military aid of any of its members under attack would have been discredited.
Thus the seventh rule, also one of political realism, is "Don't give guarantees or make threats you cannot carry out." John McCain said "Russia should immediately and unconditionally cease its military operations and withdraw all forces from sovereign Georgia territory." That is ultimatum talk. But if McCain were president today, just what would he have done if Russia defied him?
Barack Obama said, "Now is the time for Georgia and Russia to show restraint, and to avoid an escalation to full-scale war." This was called "weak" by the McCain camp, but it was presidential talk. It said what the two sides should do, without committing the United States to do anything, whatever happened. It maintained a free hand for the United States.
© Copyright 2008 by Tribune Media Services International. All Rights Reserved.
________________________________________
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Nation Building 101
AMERICAN SPECTATOR
8/11/08
Nation Building 101
Erin Wildermuth
A younger, humbler George W. Bush once said, "I don't think our troops
should be used for what's called nation building."
How times change. A strategy document released recently by U.S.
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, with the tacit approval of the
president, might as well have been titled "Three cheers for nation
building." The authors avoided using the precise phrase but its
carefully worded substitutes are hard to miss.
"Our commitment to democratic values must be matched by our deeds,"
the document exhorts. Extremist groups thrive in "ungoverned,
under-governed and mis-governed areas," it warns. Thus America must
"help foster security and aid local authorities in building effective
systems of representational government."
(Goooooo nation building!)
According to James Dobbins, author of the RAND Corporation's nation
building studies, U.S. intervention had increased from roughly one
country every ten years during the Cold War to one every two years
during the Clinton administration. Bush invaded three countries in his
first three years in office. That's a pretty steep trend line.
This desire to forcibly "fix" failed states is hardly unique to the
U.S. Nation building statistics are on the rise. Europe and the United
Nations have led nation building efforts. Crikey, even Australia has
had a go at it.
The strategy document includes such pseudo pragmatic language as
"military success alone is insufficient to achieve victory," when
referring to Iraq and Afghanistan. "We must not forget our
hard-learned lessons." But what are those lessons?
According to a 2003 report by the Carnegie Endowment for International
Peace, of 16 attempted US nation-building missions over the past
century only four have been successful.
Political scientist James L. Payne maintains that American and
British-led nation building initiatives have been successful in
building democracy 14 times out of 51 attempts.
NO MATTER WHOSE data set one examines, the odds are not in our favor.
They get worse upon closer examination
Payne explains that in cases where nation-building was successful it
has been due not to the superior planning of foreign powers but to a
society's pre-existing propensity toward non-violence. Violent
societies tend to return to violence while those countries that
already have a politically non-violent culture can thrive on
democracy.
It's difficult for any foreign nation to come in and "build" anything
if there isn't a solid foundation in the first place. The things that
DoD recommends -- more "economic development, institution building,
and the rule of law" -- are all to the good but they won't take root
in hostile soil.
America used to understand this and in fact proved resistant to most
calls for nation building. Humanitarian activists use the U.S.'s
refusal to pacify and build up Rwanda, Somalia, Darfur, and other
nations to allege racism. America is said to be just fine with little
black babies dying, but moved to action by the suffering of little
European tots.
But America is not callously racist, simply prudent and
self-interested. Our state apparatus was constructed to care about
national security -- American babies and none other. The new American
policy in favor of nation building was not a flowering of
humanitarianism but, rather, grew out of serious national security
concerns.
So many U.S. troops are in the Middle East because we deem failed
states in that region a national security threat. Al-Qaeda, to a
certain extent, has justified those fears.
Many American hawks have come to believe that bringing democracy and
liberalism to these nations is the only way to keep Americans safe
from future 9/11 style attacks.
BUT ARE THESE new nation building efforts really fostering increased
American security?
Probably not. The odds of successful nation building are stacked
heavily against us, and the effort has unintentionally cultivated a
new and improved hatred for America abroad. The results are not
exactly what President Bush was hoping for when he promised to change
"hearts and minds."
Between 2002 and 2007, public opinion of America declined in 26 of the
33 countries polled by the Pew Global Attitudes Survey. According to
the pollsters, "The U.S. image remains abysmal in most Muslim
countries in the Middle East and Asia."
As a country with a vast set of tools available to mitigate major
threats to our national security, it is puzzling that the U.S. would
embrace nation building now. It's expensive, it darkens our already
black image with other peoples, and it usually ends in bitter, bloody
failure.
Maybe our leaders should embrace strategies that leave more room for error.
Erin Wildermuth, a recent summer intern at The American Spectator, is
a freelance writer in London.
8/11/08
Nation Building 101
Erin Wildermuth
A younger, humbler George W. Bush once said, "I don't think our troops
should be used for what's called nation building."
How times change. A strategy document released recently by U.S.
Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, with the tacit approval of the
president, might as well have been titled "Three cheers for nation
building." The authors avoided using the precise phrase but its
carefully worded substitutes are hard to miss.
"Our commitment to democratic values must be matched by our deeds,"
the document exhorts. Extremist groups thrive in "ungoverned,
under-governed and mis-governed areas," it warns. Thus America must
"help foster security and aid local authorities in building effective
systems of representational government."
(Goooooo nation building!)
According to James Dobbins, author of the RAND Corporation's nation
building studies, U.S. intervention had increased from roughly one
country every ten years during the Cold War to one every two years
during the Clinton administration. Bush invaded three countries in his
first three years in office. That's a pretty steep trend line.
This desire to forcibly "fix" failed states is hardly unique to the
U.S. Nation building statistics are on the rise. Europe and the United
Nations have led nation building efforts. Crikey, even Australia has
had a go at it.
The strategy document includes such pseudo pragmatic language as
"military success alone is insufficient to achieve victory," when
referring to Iraq and Afghanistan. "We must not forget our
hard-learned lessons." But what are those lessons?
According to a 2003 report by the Carnegie Endowment for International
Peace, of 16 attempted US nation-building missions over the past
century only four have been successful.
Political scientist James L. Payne maintains that American and
British-led nation building initiatives have been successful in
building democracy 14 times out of 51 attempts.
NO MATTER WHOSE data set one examines, the odds are not in our favor.
They get worse upon closer examination
Payne explains that in cases where nation-building was successful it
has been due not to the superior planning of foreign powers but to a
society's pre-existing propensity toward non-violence. Violent
societies tend to return to violence while those countries that
already have a politically non-violent culture can thrive on
democracy.
It's difficult for any foreign nation to come in and "build" anything
if there isn't a solid foundation in the first place. The things that
DoD recommends -- more "economic development, institution building,
and the rule of law" -- are all to the good but they won't take root
in hostile soil.
America used to understand this and in fact proved resistant to most
calls for nation building. Humanitarian activists use the U.S.'s
refusal to pacify and build up Rwanda, Somalia, Darfur, and other
nations to allege racism. America is said to be just fine with little
black babies dying, but moved to action by the suffering of little
European tots.
But America is not callously racist, simply prudent and
self-interested. Our state apparatus was constructed to care about
national security -- American babies and none other. The new American
policy in favor of nation building was not a flowering of
humanitarianism but, rather, grew out of serious national security
concerns.
So many U.S. troops are in the Middle East because we deem failed
states in that region a national security threat. Al-Qaeda, to a
certain extent, has justified those fears.
Many American hawks have come to believe that bringing democracy and
liberalism to these nations is the only way to keep Americans safe
from future 9/11 style attacks.
BUT ARE THESE new nation building efforts really fostering increased
American security?
Probably not. The odds of successful nation building are stacked
heavily against us, and the effort has unintentionally cultivated a
new and improved hatred for America abroad. The results are not
exactly what President Bush was hoping for when he promised to change
"hearts and minds."
Between 2002 and 2007, public opinion of America declined in 26 of the
33 countries polled by the Pew Global Attitudes Survey. According to
the pollsters, "The U.S. image remains abysmal in most Muslim
countries in the Middle East and Asia."
As a country with a vast set of tools available to mitigate major
threats to our national security, it is puzzling that the U.S. would
embrace nation building now. It's expensive, it darkens our already
black image with other peoples, and it usually ends in bitter, bloody
failure.
Maybe our leaders should embrace strategies that leave more room for error.
Erin Wildermuth, a recent summer intern at The American Spectator, is
a freelance writer in London.
Oil in troubled mountains
Oil in troubled mountains
The Caucasus conflict underlines the exposed position of oil pipelines from the Caspian Sea that avoid Russia by threading their way through Georgia. Moscow's military moves, supposedly over South Ossetia, indicate its intention to maintain control of these energy links to the West. - Robert M Cutler (Aug 12, '08)
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/JH13Ag04.html
The Caucasus conflict underlines the exposed position of oil pipelines from the Caspian Sea that avoid Russia by threading their way through Georgia. Moscow's military moves, supposedly over South Ossetia, indicate its intention to maintain control of these energy links to the West. - Robert M Cutler (Aug 12, '08)
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/JH13Ag04.html
Russia marks its red lines
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/JH13Ag05.html
Russia marks its red lines
The Georgian attack on South Ossetia and the Russian response is the first battle in a new proxy war between United States and Israeli interests against Russia. But Georgia and ally Washington appear to have miscalculated very badly. Russia has made it clear it has no intention of ceding its support for South Ossetia or allowing a missile defense system into a neighboring country. - F William Engdahl (Aug 12, '08)
Russia marks its red lines
The Georgian attack on South Ossetia and the Russian response is the first battle in a new proxy war between United States and Israeli interests against Russia. But Georgia and ally Washington appear to have miscalculated very badly. Russia has made it clear it has no intention of ceding its support for South Ossetia or allowing a missile defense system into a neighboring country. - F William Engdahl (Aug 12, '08)
The end of the post-Cold War Era
The end of the post-Cold War era
The United States is carefully cultivating an opinion in Western capitals that Russia is "bullying" Georgia. This will strengthen Washington's case for inducting Georgia into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which will in turn facilitate the deployment of the US missile defense system onto Russia's border. If Moscow remains passive, the Caucasus could become its "bleeding wound". - M K Bhadrakumar (Aug 12, '08)
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/JH13Ag02.html
The United States is carefully cultivating an opinion in Western capitals that Russia is "bullying" Georgia. This will strengthen Washington's case for inducting Georgia into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, which will in turn facilitate the deployment of the US missile defense system onto Russia's border. If Moscow remains passive, the Caucasus could become its "bleeding wound". - M K Bhadrakumar (Aug 12, '08)
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/JH13Ag02.html