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Updated: 2 weeks 6 hours ago

The Global Security Benefits of TPP’s Death

Wed, 18/01/2017 - 18:33

Six U.S. ambassadors published an open letter to the United States Congress on January 17 admonishing the disintegration of the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP). They wrote that “walking away from TPP may be seen by future generations as the moment America chose to cede leadership to others in this part of the world and accept a diminished role.”

But the TPP had many cybersecurity holes. Its death, quickened when Vietnam’s Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc pulled out after Donald Trump’s presidential election, has global benefits.

Since the purpose of the TPP was the free flow and enhancement of trade, commerce took priority over security.

Regarding Internet governance, the TPP allowed for many loopholes in user safety, digital privacy, preservation of intellectual property, and government surveillance.

The TPP recommended a coordinated defense against fraud and identity theft that included electronic authentication, consumer protection law, and unspecified punishment for cyber espionage. However, the TPP undermined those security methods by also suggesting all Parties exchange information about user protection. Exchanging information about user protection undermines that protection because collaborating on malware mitigation adds vulnerabilities by exposing those holes. For example, sharing how a hacker damaged a company weakens that company.

Ross Schulman, senior policy counsel at New America’s Open Technology Institute, told FPA that if the defense against fraud and identity theft was “done while still respecting the privacy of users, and limits the transmission of that information, the two are not incompatible.” However, the TPP report did not specify how the Parties plan to reconcile defense and privacy.

The TPP’s emphasis on sharing raised questions about privacy. Transparency “of technical regulations” could provide more oversight to make sure the Internet is not overly regulated through censoring public content or secretly monitoring private online usage. On the other hand, the TPP Parties hoped to “share best practices,” which could weaken data protection and confidentiality. Also, nothing can “prevent law enforcement authorities from requiring… unencrypted communications,” which invalidates encrypting any messages in the first place.

Paul Tiao, a partner at Hunton & Williams and an expert in cybersecurity law, told FPA that there was merit in companies warning each other about cyber threats because that strengthens security for all. Tiao pointed out that “the fault line concerns sharing information about breaches” because of the reputational, legal, and fiscal implications of disclosing such information. Complicating this further, the TPP did not specify what information should be shared and how much, so each country could have participated to whatever extent it desired.

Sharing these ideas may have created added communications regulations. The TPP members believe intellectual property rights benefit business and vaguely encouraged all Parties to draft regulations to protect those rights. According to Schulman, “the TPP, as many international treaties have done over the years, has gone altogether too far in favor of expanding controls on freedom of communication in the name of intellectual property.”

Accessibility was important to the TPP. The report promised “that no condition is imposed on access to and use of public communications networks and services” except to “protect the technical integrity of public telecommunications networks or services.” That exception would have made an open Internet more confusing to maintain, since the provision gives telecommunications services the capacity to interpret at will what constitutes protection of technical integrity.

Internet Service Providers (ISPs) serve under Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) and has the ability to disable websites. The TPP Parties wanted “a rich and accessible public domain,” but also any restriction done “in good faith” will not make an ISP liable. Jeremy Malcolm, a senior analyst at a nonprofit organization advocating for digital freedoms, Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), points to Title 47 of the US Code for a country-specific example of ISPs’ independent power under the “Good Samaritan” clause. Title 47 places trust in actions done with good intentions, but as Malcolm told the FPA, “Good faith is not a hard test to satisfy.”

The post The Global Security Benefits of TPP’s Death appeared first on Foreign Policy Blogs.

Pro-China Groups Protest Taiwan President’s U.S. Visit

Tue, 17/01/2017 - 12:33

Pro-China groups protest Tsai Ing-wen visit in San Francisco (China News)

On January 12-14, pro-China propaganda groups linked to the Chinese government issued a statement and staged a protest against Taiwan president Tsai Ing-wen’s stopovers in the United States en route to and from official visits to diplomatic allies in Latin America. Tsai stopped in Houston on her outbound journey January 7 and arrived in San Francisco on her return journey January 13, angering China.

A joint statement issued January 12 by pro-China groups in the San Francisco Bay Area parroted Chinese government propaganda in its condemnation of Tsai and her U.S. stopovers: “As overseas Chinese, we firmly believe the peaceful reunification of China is an inevitable and irresistible trend. We advise Tsai Ing-wen to recognize the international situation and give up the unrealistic ‘Taiwan independence’ attempts as early as possible…. We will keep a close eye on her secessionist activities and attempts, and firmly oppose the ‘two Chinas’ and ‘Taiwan independence’.”

On January 14, pro-China demonstrators gathered outside Tsai’s hotel near San Francisco International Airport, waving red Chinese flags and shouting “One China, oppose Taiwan independence.” The protest received little attention in U.S. media but was widely reported in state-run mainland Chinese media as evidence of “overseas Chinese” support for Beijing’s “one-China” policy. While a brief mention at Reuters estimated the crowd at just over a hundred including supporters of Tsai, state-run China Daily claimed that 500 showed up to protest against Tsai’s visit and made no mention of Tsai’s supporters (See also China News, China Overseas Network, China Youth NetworkChina Radio International, Observer Network, Sina News).

Pro-China groups protest Tsai Ing-wen visit in San Francisco (China News)

Pro-China groups leading the protest included “Chinese for Peaceful Unification-Northern California” (北加州中國和平統一促進會 or 北加州中国和平统一促进会, CPU-NC). CPU-NC’s activities in the Bay Area and its links to the Chinese government have been noted previously at Foreign Policy Blogs. Organizing the protest for CPU-NC was Zou Zhiqiang (鄒志强 or 邹志强, aka Fred Tzou), a realtor in Fremont, California. Zou’s presence at the January 14 protest outside Tsai’s hotel was prominently noted in Chinese media. “Domestically, [Tsai] promotes ‘cultural Taiwan independence’, said Zou to China Daily, “Internationally, she is willing to be used by the U.S. and Japan like a chess piece.”

The Committee to Promote the Reunification of China-San Francisco Bay Area (舊金山灣區中國統一促進會 or 旧金山湾区中国统一促进会, CPRC-SF), likewise noted previously at Foreign Policy Blogs, was also among the protest organizers. Like CPU-NC, CPRC-SF has an extensive record of pro-China activities in the Bay Area, contacts with Chinese government officials, and a close working relationship with the Chinese consulate-general in San Francisco (See also U.S.-China Press, Jan. 11, Jan 12).

These groups, as further noted at Foreign Policy Blogs, are only two of more than 30 such groups currently operating in cities and regions across the United States and some 200 operating in 90 countries around the world. All are overseas chapters of the China Council for the Promotion of Peaceful National Reunification in Beijing, a nominally “non-governmental” organization run entirely by Chinese Communist Party officials; and all work closely with China’s embassies and consulates abroad. The chief purpose of these organizations is asserting mainland Chinese territorial claims and undermining international support for Taiwan.

Given its established patterns of behavior, the Chinese consulate-general in San Francisco seems likely to have been involved with its allied groups in orchestrating these protests against the Taiwanese president’s visit to the Bay Area.

The post Pro-China Groups Protest Taiwan President’s U.S. Visit appeared first on Foreign Policy Blogs.

The Day after ISIS in Iraq

Tue, 17/01/2017 - 12:03

(Bulent Kilic/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images)

 “ISIS is like a mushroom. It was able to grow here, in Iraq, because there is a fertile environment. It didn’t just come from nowhere.”

This is what an Iraqi activist told me, with an edge of anger and passion in her voice, when I was in Iraq late last year. She went on to explain that in her opinion ISIS could not be—and should not be—eradicated through bombs and fighting. Instead, Iraq desperately needed to embark on a national program of reconciliation and reform.

To be honest, this jarred. I had heard harrowing stories of the systematic cruelty ISIS meted out to the civilian population. I had seen the destruction it left in its wake, from flattened villages to burning oil fields that coated everything, including the faces of children, in a black film.

But her words were a vital reminder of the deep-seated nature of Iraq’s challenges, that atrocities had been committed by all sides, and the need to acknowledge and address the layers of grievance.

Over the last two weeks, the fierce battle to retake Mosul from ISIS has intensified. Over 140,000 civilians have fled their homes since the latest phase of the military operation began last October. So far the Iraqi army, the Kurdish Peshmerga, their international backers, and assorted militias have avoided mass civilian casualties. But as the army enters the dense residential areas of Mosul, families face impossible choices, as they are trapped between warring parties.

The media and political narrative about Iraq tends to be dominated by ISIS, but Iraq’s challenges do not begin and end with Mosul. Even before the current offensive, three million people had been uprooted from their homes. Across the country, there is a mosaic of displacement. Sectarian conflict and identity politics drive people from their homes just as ISIS does, and the experience of displacement can in turn reinforce sectarianism. There are communities unable to return home because they are perceived to be the ‘wrong’ sect, tribe or religion. There are people in need across the board, and this is why Oxfam is supporting people who have returned to or stayed in their homes, as well as those who have fled violence.

Whenever I travel to war zones, I ask our local staff about mixed marriages. It tends to be a good conversation starter and a good, if highly anecdotal, bellwether of inter-communal relations. One of Oxfam’s engineers told me that he was the result of a mixed Sunni-Shia marriage and his wife was Kurdish, but that mixed marriages were increasingly rare. Perhaps even more revealingly, he told me he could never work for the government, whether it was the Kurdish Regional Government, the central government in Baghdad or local authorities because he would always be considered to be ‘from the other side’.

One of the symptoms of this deep-seated sectarianism is the proliferation of local militia groups along communal lines. As young men return home, they are being enlisted by tribal leaders. I spoke to one such young man who was guarding a water plant that had been destroyed by ISIS and subsequently repaired by Oxfam. When I asked him why he had joined the militia, he shrugged as if it was obvious. “This is what we need to do to protect our home,” he said. One security consultant I met wryly described these young men as “Neighborhood Watch with guns”.

While these militias provide a source of employment, and in some instances a degree of protection, they may also put communities at risk and breed instability in the long term. A couple of women in their early twenties, from the same town, told me that when it came to jobs for young men, the choice boiled down to joining the local militia or the local police force—and the distinction between the two can be blurred.

The Iraqi army, the Kurdish Peshmerga and a range of militias have joined international backers like the U.S. and Britain in a marriage of convenience to counter ISIS. Once their common enemy is pushed back, there is a risk that the various Iraqi forces could clash amongst themselves or another dangerous group could emerge if underlying grievances in this oil-rich country are left to fester.

This is why it is crucial to plan beyond the short-term military strategy and, however difficult, work to create a new environment in which ISIS or its successor cannot mushroom.

Maya Mailer is Head of Humanitarian Policy and Campaigns at Oxfam. She recently returned from Iraq, where Oxfam has been supporting families who have fled ISIS since 2014 including as a result of the recent conflict in Mosul.

This blog was first published on independent.co.uk and reappears here with kind permission. 

The post The Day after ISIS in Iraq appeared first on Foreign Policy Blogs.

Of Drones and Overseas Military Bases: The New Face of the War on Terror

Mon, 16/01/2017 - 18:58

The United States is the country with the most overseas military bases in the world by a large margin. It has bases in 30 countries, followed by the United Kingdom, which has bases in half as many countries. In Germany, the U.S. has no less than 38 military bases, the most controversial being Ramstein Air Base—the U.S.’ largest military base on foreign soil.

In 2013, a team of German journalists broke the story that the U.S. was conducting its “war on terror” from Germany, including drone warfare in parts of Africa. Germans were outraged that their government allowed this to happen on their soil.

It was not until the revelations of a U.S. Air Force drone pilot in 2014 that it was confirmed that the drone war would not be possible without Germany. The German Green Party called on to the government to take action against U.S. drone strikes, “it is shameful that the German government simply closes its eyes to violations of international law on German territory,” said foreign policy spokesperson for the Green Party, Omid Nouripour. As tensions mounted, President Obama was forced to address the issue during a visit to Berlin. “We do not use Germany as a launching point for unmanned drones […] as part of our counterterrorism activities” he said.

The deployment of U.S. troops in Germany has been regulated since the 1950s through NATO Status of Forces Agreement. Under NATO’s SOFA, the German government could petition the closure of a base, or the cessation of activities it considers a violation of international law. However, jurisdiction lies with the U.S. on such matters. Alternatively, the German government could terminate the Status of Forces Agreement altogether, but this would open a huge political debate and create detrimental tensions between the two allies.

In the summer of 2016, thousands of German citizens stood outside of Ramstein Air Base to protest drone strikes conducted from there. Participating in the protest, former German Finance Minister, Oskar Lafontaine, said the German government’s silence on the use of drones was “schizophrenic”—while showing generosity towards refugees, Germany was supporting the U.S. wars by way of this base.

Around the same time, the U.S. Office of National Intelligence released a report stating 473 “counterterrorism strikes” had taken place, killing 2,372-2,581 combatants and 64-116 non-combatants since 2009. The Bureau of Investigative Journalists compiled their own statistics and their conservative estimates point towards 504 total strikes, killing between 2,745 and 4,333 of which between 380 and 801 were civilians. The difference between the two reports is staggering.

Ramstein is not the first base to get this sort of bad publicity—an analogous situation occurred in the Shamsi base in the Pakistani province of Balochistan. After Navy Seals found and shot Bin Laden within Pakistan’s borders, local authorities asked the U.S. to vacate the Shamsi Airfield. Supposedly angered, the Pakistani officials said they would no longer allow the U.S. to conduct operations out of the base, as it breached Pakistan’s sovereignty. Although official stories varied, it was later uncovered that the base had been leased to the United Arab Emirates since 1992, and thereafter, sublet to the U.S. by the UAE in 2001.

All this is to say that the use of bases on foreign soil by the U.S. have not been sans mystery. While the founder of the German Green Party sues his own government for answers on why Germany was being used as the staging ground for drone strikes, the U.S. continues to operate from these outposts without much apprehension.

During his inaugural speech in January 2009, President Obama inspired many with these words: “And so to all other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born: know that America is a friend of each nation and every man, woman, and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and we are ready to lead once more.” As he leaves office, he reminded us in his final address just this month that “we are all created equal, endowed by our creator with certain unalienable rights, among them life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

As we brace for an unsure tenure under a leader we cannot begin to understand, we must remember that we did not hold the outgoing leadership accountable. We did not hold them to account for the hundreds that were killed from spaces that we do not own, in countries we do not give answers to. We did not hold them to account for the mystery that shrouds this war that the Obama administration vowed to end, and yet, in some ways increased. With an unpredictable leader coming into power in the next days, we the people, need to be more vigilant about asking questions and demanding answers.

The post Of Drones and Overseas Military Bases: The New Face of the War on Terror appeared first on Foreign Policy Blogs.

How Trump will Impact the Indian and Chinese Geopolitical Chessboard?

Mon, 16/01/2017 - 13:09

By Prarthana Kashinath

The 21st century will certainly go down in history as the beginning of an epoch that transformed the world from a unipolar to a multipolar global structure, where amongst other poles, China conspicuously sticks out its flag, closely followed by India. Consequently, the most extrusive transatlantic challenge for the predominant United States will be China—with its burgeoning economy, tenacious and ever-expanding military and navy, and territorial claims in and around its border.

Ever since 1972, when Nixon paid its first official visit to China, until 2016 under Obama’s presidency, the U.S. policy towards China has been accommodative. For instance, in 1979, the United States under Carter backed the ‘One-China Policy’, pursuant to which it ended the diplomatic recognition of Taiwan, shut down all its bases there, and recognized the People’s Republic of China as the sole authority in order to enhance its relationship with China.

The U.S. also opened up imports from China on such massive scale, that China’s foreign exchange coffers are now overflowing and has catapulted China as an economic superpower, even surpassing the United States in 2014, as estimated by the International Monetary Fund, in GDP terms.

However, the 2016 United States presidential election with Trump’s victory marks a watershed moment in the Sino-American relations. On many aspects, he is an aberration, considering that he is a novice in politics and diplomacy, but has a brash, native business intelligence. Notwithstanding the narcissistic ,sexist,racist and xenophobic undertones of the election campaign, Trump nevertheless won the electoral college. His election maybe signaled the shattering of the status quo and the banausic Washington establishment.

The United States has expressed discomfiture with China’s rise under Obama. Indeed, his “pivot to Asia” policy was aimed at “rebalancing” China. With Trump taking over the Presidential office, it appears likely that there will be a complete reversal of policy accommodation towards China.

China owes its extensive economic growth to its aggressive manufacturing and export industry. The United States has been a core consumer of cheap Chinese goods. As a consequence, U.S. trade deficit with China has increased manifold, and China has become the holder of  a substantial share of U.S. public debt. Trump has vouched to impose heavy import tariffs to reverse this trend. He has constantly chastised China for currency manipulation and violations of intellectual property rights. Trump holds China responsible for loss of factory and manufacturing jobs in the United States.

With Trump pulling out of the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement, he is all the more pressured to take up and negotiate trade issues bilaterally with all U.S. partners including China. While the world contemplated the extent to which Trump may adhere to his election pitch, he made it real by appointing Peter Navarro—a long-time critic of China—as head of the newly created White House National Trade Council.

Trump recently struck China’s most sensitive emotional chord, by calling into question the One-China policy and establishing direct contact with the Taiwan president, the first of such contacts since 1979. It is hard to know if this move was strategically contrived or just reckless.

If Trump’s China policy is mostly motivated by mercantilism and the need to seek trade concessions, then he has certainly gotten China’s attention by playing the Taiwan card. Trump is also miffed about China not doing enough to assist and bring North Korea to the negotiating table.

In this backdrop, it becomes crucial to assess the impact of Trump on India, particularly while looking at it through the prism of Sino-American relationship. If Trump wants to take his China policy, as underscored in the election campaign, to its logical conclusion, it will serve him best if he capitalizes on and galvanizes strategic ties with India.

Trump has been vocal about his interest in India—from recording advertisement campaigns in Hindi, to appointing Indian-Americans to the top echelons of government. Inter alia, Trump pulling out of the TPP and a possible bonhomie between Putin and Trump also works in India’s favor.

However, on the trade and economic front, what works best in the interest of the United States will be detrimental to India. Like China, India is an outsourcing destination for the U.S. India will also be negatively affected by the U.S. currency and trade war with China, by the potential immigration policy of Trump, and the likely interest rate hikes.

In this broad framework of probable U.S. policy toward China and India, New Delhi stands in an advantageous position. Trump perceives China as hostile, and India as an opportunity. He is likely to undertake measures to neutralize China and distract it from geographical forages in the Asia-Pacific region, thus leveraging India’s geostrategic status and also boosting Indo-U.S. congeniality.

As United States attempts to isolate China, there is also the likelihood that China may reach out to India, to negotiate with the United States in ‘regional’ interest. If that is the case, it will be an opportunity for India and China to break the ice and kick-start a new diplomatic relationship.

This will open the doors for India to commence negotiations with China on several outstanding and far- reaching issues, like membership into the Nuclear Suppliers Group, border issues, United Nations Security Council reforms, Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership Therefore, Trump’s election looks like a win-win for India.

Prarthana Kashinath is an Indian lawyer at the Karnataka High Court.

The post How Trump will Impact the Indian and Chinese Geopolitical Chessboard? appeared first on Foreign Policy Blogs.

Turkey’s Syrian Blowback

Sat, 14/01/2017 - 16:59

With the New Year terrorist attack in Istanbul now being claimed by the Islamic State (IS), it is clear that Turkey has suffered yet more blowback from its earlier tolerance of the Middle East’s most vicious terrorist network. The rampage, suspected to have been carried out by a Central Asian extremist, happened at an upmarket nightclub and killed at least 39 people, including 16 foreign citizens. The Turkish news agency Anadolu has reported that Saudi Arabian, Moroccan, Lebanese and Libyan nationals were among the foreign victims, who were overwhelmingly from Muslim majority countries.

The latest attack highlights a continuing trend towards political instability for Turkey, which saw an attempted military coup last summer and suffers from an ongoing civil war with its Kurdish minority on top of the spread of political violence from Syria and Iraq into its towns and cities.The strike also fits in with the typical pattern of IS attacks in Turkey, which have mostly struck at soft targets in crowded civilian areas. In retaliation the Turkish armed forces said that they had carried out a number of air raids and also shelled IS targets near al-Bab, a Sunni Arab settlement in Syria where the Turkish armed forces and rebel proxies are presently battling the jihadist group.

The current Turkish struggle with IS is a complete reversal from the early years of the Syrian civil war, when Turkey leant heavy support to the armed opposition against Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad. However this policy was something which contributed much to the eventual rise of Islamic State, especially once it seized control of a number of strategic border crossing areas where arms, aid and foreign fighters could reach the Syrian half of its self-declared ‘caliphate’.

Turkey has long denied supporting hardline Islamist factions in Syria but many of the fighters it allowed to cross into Syria quickly joined Islamic fundamentalist groups like IS. At the same time it and other terrorist groups took the opportunity to establish a rear base in Turkey, with networks of sleeper cells, recruiters and safe houses. This gave IS the infrastructure it needed to launch repeated terrorist attacks when it decided that the time had come to turn on its Turkish hosts.

It is important to note that IS directed acts of terrorism in Turkey have long predated Operation Euphrates Shield, Ankara’s military intervention against the group in Syria which only began in August last year. IS carried out a string of devastating attacks in Turkey in 2015 and 2016 at Suruc, Ankara and Istanbul, and has claimed responsibility for bombings and shootings as far back as 2013.

That year, the group threatened Turkey with suicide bombings in Ankara if it didn’t reopen border posts it had shut to cut back on the amount of men and material reaching IS controlled areas of Syria. Despite repeated provocations however, Ankara only intervened military against the group when it became concerned about countering increasing Kurdish power in northern Syria. There were repeated accusations that Turkey preferred to allow the existence of an IS presence along its border with Syria as a way of splitting the territory under the control of Syria’s Kurds into two cantonments and preventing a second Kurdish entity from emerging to join the one in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Indeed it was Turkish inaction in the face of an IS onslaught against the Syrian Kurdish border town of Kobane in 2014-15 which ultimately proved to be the spark that led the military wing of the banned Kurdish PKK movement to return to violence. Following the Suruc massacre of students in a suicide bombing by a Turkish Kurd with links to IS, Ankara’s failure to fully implement an agreed upon peace deal came back to haunt it.

Despite a two year ceasefire between Kurdish militants and the state, good relations were poisoned by events in Syria, which convinced Turkey’s suspicious Kurds that Ankara had never truly intended to allow them the political autonomy they desired. Deep suspicions that President Erdoğan’s political ambitions would lead him to try and undermine the Kurds’ political representatives also helped relight the Kurdish conflict inside Turkey itself. But the contrast between Turkish treatment of hardline Islamist terrorist groups and the mainly secular leftist Kurdish fighters in Syria made conflict in Turkey much more certain.

Nonetheless by the end of 2017 IS itself will probably have been eliminated as a territorial entity, as offensives against it in Syria and Iraq by Turkey, Iran, the West, Russia and the Kurdish, Syrian and Iraqi authorities all combine to take its remaining urban strongholds. But IS has demonstrated an organizational ability to survive without a territorial base during its earlier incarnations, before it had spread from Iraq to other Middle Eastern nations. There are clear signs its cells in Turkey may manage the same during 2017.

The return to war with the Kurds and the military intervention into Syria last year meant that Turkey’s security services suddenly found themselves facing multiplying threats during a period when their effectiveness was in decline. This stemmed from the failed coup of last summer, which saw a huge purge begun of anyone suspected of ties to the Gülenist movement who were blamed for mounting it.

This purge has unsurprisingly weakened Turkey’s military, police and intelligence services. Simultaneously the high profile slaying of the Russian ambassador to Turkey by an off-duty policeman in Ankara indicates that some Turkish units may have been infiltrated at a low level by hardline Islamist sympathizers. Sadly therefore Turkey has probably not seen the last attack by IS militants on its soil this year, as the group’s leaders have called for more such outrages abroad in order to offset the loss of prestige the gradual collapse of its ‘caliphate’ in Syria and Iraq has caused it.

Nonetheless the fact that IS is being driven underground in Syria and Iraq will probably reduce the numbers of international militants keen to act out on the group’s orders, and limit the reach of its local fighters more closely to attacks on Syrian and Iraqi targets. Turkey may yet reach the end of this year in a better position to end the group’s operations against it than it began the year in.

This post originally appeared on the Informed Comment blog and reappears here with kind permission.

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Vietnam Hedging by Dredging in the South China Sea

Thu, 12/01/2017 - 23:37

Sand can be seen spilling from a newly dredged channel in this view of Vietnamese-held Ladd Reef, in the Spratly Island group in the South China Sea. (Reuters)

Satellite images released last month by the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative (AMIT), run by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), reveal antiaircraft and antimissile systems now installed on all seven of China’s artificial islands. Geng Shuang, a spokesman for China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, claims the artificial islands are part of “China’s inherent territories” on which it was normal to deploy “defense facilities,” while strangely confessing “nor do I know whether there are such systems on the ground as is suggested.” 

The deployment of the missile systems follows Xi Jinping’s September 2015 visit to the U.S., during which he assured President Obama that Beijing did not intend to pursue militarization of the Spratly Islands.

While China has drawn most of the international media’s attention in the South China Sea, Vietnam has also been busy conducting dredging work on Ladd Reef in the Spratly Island chain. Ladd Reef, claimed by Beijing and Taipei but controlled by Hanoi, is completely submerged during high tide, though boasts a lighthouse containing housing for a small group of Vietnamese soldiers. Satellite imagery taken late last year by U.S. company Planet Labs shows several vessels in a newly dug channel between a lagoon and the sea, and appears to suggest dredging efforts in advance of extensive construction.

The Spratly Island chain, all of which is claimed by China, Taiwan and Vietnam, comprises some 14 islands, islets and cays and more than 100 reefs. Brunei, Malaysia and the Philippines also claim some of the land features. Vietnam occupies 21 features, comprising 6 islands (Spratly Island, Southwest Cay, Sin Cowe Island, Sand Cay, Namyit Island, Amboyna Cay), and such prominent reefs as West Reef, Pearson Reef, Lansdowne Reef, Grierson Reef, Cornwallis South Reef and Central Reef.

In recent months, Hanoi has been actively fortifying its key holdings in the Spratlys, including the construction of a runway, tunnels and bunkers in an effort to defend its territory against China’s growing aggression. Last November, the AMIT confirmed the progress Hanoi has made on Spratly Island with Vietnam’s sole runway in the South China Sea. The runway will soon benefit from an extension to 4,000 feet—capable of accommodating most of Vietnam’s air force planes except for its Antonov An-26 transport planes, and any future P-3 Orion anti-submarine patrol aircraft (to track China’s submarines) Hanoi may purchase from the U.S.

Hanoi has already taken delivery on five of the six Russian-made Kilo-class submarines worth $2.6 billion it ordered since 2009 for deployment at Cam Ranh Bay. The diesel-electric subs operate with near silence and armed with shorter-range torpedoes and sea-skimming anti-ship missiles with a range of 188 miles.

And back in August, diplomats and military officers told Reuters Vietnam had placed rocket launchers on five bases in the Spratly Islands, pointing them toward Chinese facilities. The rocket launchers are believed to be part of Vietnam’s “Extra” rocket artillery system recently acquired from Israel. The rockets have a range of 150km (93 miles) and carry 150kg (330 pounds) warheads that can attack multiple targets simultaneously.

Vietnam is but one country in the region beefing up its military muscle—spending on arms rose 5.4% from 2014 to 2015 across Asia compared with 1% worldwide, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.

While some South China Sea watchers, such as Greg Poling at CSIS in Washington, hesitate to speculate the activity on Ladd Reef is no more than a channel for supply ships or fishing boats, others are more skeptical. Trevor Hollingsbee, a retired naval intelligence analyst with Britain’s defense ministry, believes the imagery reveals Hanoi’s attempt to “fix any vulnerabilities” and that “in this environment, Vietnam’s strategic mistrust is total […] and they are rapidly improving their defenses.”

In a regular press briefing held last month, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang responded to a question on the satellite images of Ladd Reef, saying “China exerts indisputable sovereignty over the Nansha (Spratly) Islands, Riji Jiao (Ladd Reef) included, and the adjacent waters. China urges relevant countries to respect China’s sovereignty and rights and interests, stop illegal occupation and construction, and refrain from taking any action that may complicate the situation. It is hoped that they can work together with China for peace and stability of the South China Sea.” Later in the briefing, he referred to China’s historical rights and interests in the South China Sea as “assets handed down from our ancestors.”

Whatever the changes on Ladd Reef ultimately prove to be, the U.S. State Department was quick to condemn any action. Anna Richey-Allen, a spokesperson at State, acknowledged the reports and encouraged restraint, saying, “We’ve consistently warned that reclamation and militarisation in contested areas of the South China Sea will risk driving a destabilizing and escalatory trend,” while adding, “We encourage all claimants to take steps to lower tensions and peacefully resolve differences.”

However, for all the criticism from the U.S. and China over Vietnam’s land reclamation efforts, the changes are relatively modest compared to those recently undertaken by China. According to the website of the AMTI, which tracks land reclamation efforts in the South China Sea, Vietnam has added about 120 acres (49 hectares) of land in recent years. The 120 acres which Vietnam has added represents about 3.75% of the 3,200 acres China has added since 2013.

No matter how minor this latest action proves to be, this tit-for-tat land reclamation and militarization of the South China Sea is proving devastating to the fragile marine ecosystem and threatening to spiral out of control. Some littoral states in the region are counting on the U.S. naval presence to preserve peace and prosperity in the East and South China Seas, yet fret over isolationist talk from Washington or the recent inflammatory rhetoric from President-elect Trump surrounding Taiwan, China’s trade practices and the One China policy, and the threatening responses from Beijing.

Hanoi may have drawn comfort from the call between U.S. President-elect Trump and Vietnamese premier Nguyen Xuan Phuc in December, during which Trump “asserted his wish to cooperate with Vietnam to accelerate the relationship between the two countries,” according to Vietnam’s government news website.

Yet much will depend not on the President-elect’s words but on the inaugurated U.S. president’s foreign policy actions once in office. With much of Asia questioning the new U.S. president’s eventual military commitment to the region, the waters of the South China Sea could start heating up again with more militarization of the islands and reefs as Southeast Asian nations like Vietnam hedge their bets.

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The Rocky Road to Stability: Mali 4 Years after the French Intervention

Thu, 12/01/2017 - 23:03

On January 11, 2013, President François Hollande ordered the French military to intervene against terrorist and criminal groups that threatened to overtake the Malian state. With this week marking the fourth anniversary of President Hollande’s decision to send troops to one of France’s former colonies, the moment is opportune to review the evolution of the crisis and to re-assess the current security situation in Africa’s former model democracy.

In 2012, during the latest of a series of insurgencies, members of the Kel Tamasheq (Tuareg) ethnic minority launched an armed uprising in their quest for an independent Azawad state. The National Movement for the Liberation of the Azawad’s (MNLA) offensive of January 2012 inflicted heavy losses on the Malian military and reinforced existing resentments against the government under President Amadou Toumani Touré.

In the midst of the struggles between disenfranchised northern separatists and the central government in Bamako, dissatisfied members of the military ousted Touré’s government in March 2012. The coup leaders, however, failed to translate their discontent into an acceptable political agenda and following a series of sanctions by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) an interim government under Dioncounda Traoré was appointed. In the meantime, the fighting in the north continued and by then had displaced over 350,000 people.

In an environment of political crisis and secessionist aspirations, militant Islamist groups (AQMI, MUJAO, and Anṣār ad-Dīn)— emboldened by the recent fall of Libya’s Muammar Gaddafi and the easy access to weapons, money, and troops—emerged as new and powerful actors on Mali’s territory. Their illegal activities benefitted from and contributed to the general instability of the entire region.

Mali’s armed forces were no match for these well-equipped, well-trained, and well-financed fighters that by the end of 2012 had conquered and now ruled the country’s northern part in the name of a jihadist agenda. The situation culminated in the Anṣār ad-Dīn-led offensive towards the government-controlled south in early January 2013. In response to this bold move, Traoré—fearing the total collapse of what remained of the Malian state—issued a written request for French military assistance.

The Hollande administration responded swiftly and 24 hours later the largest military operation in France’s history since the end of the Algerian War began. The mission cloaked under a multilateral veil and accompanied by the discourse of contemporary liberal interventionism was reminiscent of a past where France decided over the fate of its African backyard (pré carré). French forces, with the support of Chadian and Malian troops, stopped the assault and recaptured Gao, Timbuktu, and Kidal. Operation Serval was hailed as a model of a short, precise, and successful contemporary military operation showcasing the clout of France’s military might.

Operation Serval officially ended on July 15, 2014 and was replaced by the successor Operation Barkhane. The latter was not anymore limited to Mali but also concerned Burkina Faso, Chad, Mauritania, and Niger. The 3,000 troops counter-terrorism force headquartered in the Chadian capital of N’djamena commenced on August 1, 2014 with the aim to lend support to the Group of Five of the Sahel and to prevent the re-emergence of safe-havens for terrorists and criminals in an area spanning from Mauritania in the West to Niger in the East (hence its name, signifying a crescent-shaped dune).

In June of the same year, the United Nations Integrated Stabilization Mission (MINUSMA) was officially deployed, marking the beginning of the previously announced process of post-conflict stabilization under international leadership.

According to the credo of liberal peace building MINUSMA facilitated the presidential elections from which Ibrahim Boubacar Keita emerged as the winner. The elections alone, however, did not suffice to gloss over the many rifts that pervaded Mali’s social fabric. Sporadic fighting resumed soon after the elections were held, following a visit of Prime Minister Moussa Mara to the northern city of Kidal.

Facing an increasing number of asymmetric attacks against its peacekeepers and facilities, MINUSMA—in December 2014—had to review its Rules of Engagement and Mission Concept and trained and equipped its troops against IEDs. By then, the UN operation had become a high-risk mission blurring the lines between peacekeeping and counter-terrorism.

New hopes sparked when the Malian government and an alliance of Tuareg-led rebels (Coordination of Movements of Azawad) signed a peace deal in Bamako in June 2015. Yet, the agreement too did not bring to a halt the continuous violence that afflicted the Malian state and its populations. On the contrary, in 2015 according to Human Rights Watch attacks conducted by “Islamist armed groups increased and spread into central and southern Mali”, increasingly affecting neighboring Burkina Faso and Niger. The Uppsala Conflict Data Program whilst documenting a slight decrease in the total number of deaths compared to the previous year, registered 241 conflict related deaths in 2015 (compared to 287 in 2014). The attacks that shook Bamako and Ouagadougou by the end of 2015 and the beginning of 2016 respectively were cruel reminders of jihadi groups’ ability to cause death and destruction.

In June 2016, the UN Security Council expressedconcern about the volatile security situation, especially the recent expansion of terrorist and other criminal activities into central and southern Mali as well as the intensification of intercommunal violence in the Centre of Mali”. Not only did the violence not cease, new groups such as Al Mourabitoune had emerged as actors and potential spoilers of the peace accord. In response to this situation and an increasing number of asymmetric attacks, the Security Council unanimously adopted UN Resolution 2295. The resolution extended MINUSMA’s mandate until 30 June 2017, increased the missions’s troop levels by almost 2,000 to 15,209 uniformed personnel, and authorized a “more proactive and robust posture”.

With 109 fatalities (up to 31/10/2016) over a period of four years, MINUSMA ranks sixth in terms of fatalities by year in the history of UN peacekeeping operations (average number of deaths per year of deployment). For the period between 2014 and 2016 MINUSMA has accounted for the highest number of fatalities of all ongoing UN mission, making MINUSMA one of the most dangerous UN peacekeeping operations of all times.

Table 1: MINUSMA, fatalities by year and incident.
(based on data provided by United Nations Peacekeeping)
Year Accident Illness Malicious Act Other Total 2013 0 1 4 1 6 2014 4 6 28 1 39 2015 5 10 12 2 29 2016 6 3 26 0 35 Total 15 20 70 4 109

The French intervention and the African-led multilateral stabilization force have saved Mali from a total collapse. At the same time, the country is far from having regained a state of stability. In particular, the northern part of the country continues to be affected by asymmetric threats with shootings, kidnappings, and other attacks happening on a regular basis.

The local elections last November showcased the significant gap between the capital Bamako and its hinterland and the rest of the country. They also showed the high degree of insecurity that characterizes the political and daily life in Mali. While elections were held in an orderly fashion in and around Bamako, “ballot boxes were burned by armed men in Timbuktu and the PRVM-FASAKO party said its candidate for a commune near the central town of Mopti had been kidnapped.” Similar conditions prevail along the inner Niger delta, where “the state does not control anything”, according to one local politician now living in exile in Bamako.

The impact of this permanent state of insecurity on civilians cannot be overemphasized. A national assessment carried out by the World Food Program (WFP) in September 2016 revealed the bleak humanitarian dimension of the conflict. Next to the staggering numbers of 36,690 internally displaced people and 135,954 refugees in neighboring countries, the report shows that almost a quarter of Mali’s population is to be considered as food insecure. Furthermore, the WFP found high degrees of food insecurity in Gao, Timbuktu, or Mopti where between 40 and 70 percent of the population are considered food insecure, suggesting a correlation between the on-going political violence and the degree of human suffering.

The security situation in Mali remains volatile due to a conjunction of several factors. First, the country’s “security and stability in Mali are inextricably linked to that of the Sahel and West Africa regions, as well as the situation in Libya and in the North Africa region”. Its geographic location makes Mali the lynchpin not only to French forces to which Bamako “has served as a logistics hub for French forces who are aiding a regional fight against Islamist insurgents” but also to all other extra-legal groups operating in the wider Sahel region and using the routes connecting sub-Saharan Africa with North Africa.

Second, the slow implementation of the peace and reconciliation agreement further hampered all efforts to restore security in the north of the country. Fractions and alliances are highly unstable and the lines between terrorist groups, separatists, and organized political parties blur.

Yet another potential spoiler worth considering is the cyclical and long-lasting nature of the conflict between northern populations and the central government. Dating back to the colonial era, first uprisings occurred immediately after Mali had gained its independence. Since then periods of stability and upheaval have altercated and by now are deeply engrained in the collective memory of the different groups of Mali’s diverse society.

In its outlook for 2017, the Foreign Policy Magazine predicts that Mali will remain on the list of volatile flashpoints. While substantial progress has been made between 2013 and today, the situation in Mali remains fragile.

Recent news about the permanent insecurity in the north and the ever present threat of jihadist attacks are not only worrisome but also hinder any sort of social and political appeasement, necessary to achieve an inclusive and lasting peace. Such a process takes time and requires strong political commitment and resources. Mali today still deserves the international community’s full attention for the sake of the local populations and in the name of regional stability.

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The Fog of Politics and Denied Justice

Wed, 11/01/2017 - 21:42

People walk to pay their respect to a memorial for the victims of the genocide in the Armenian capital Yerevan (Karen Minasyan/AFP/Getty Images).

At a certain point in the near future there will likely be a moment of clarity that cuts through the fog of partisan politics on the conflicts in Syria and Iraq. To cement this clarity for future generations and prevent them from making the same errors, it would be prudent to subject biased policy perspectives to judicial review, when possible.

Establishing the facts in an objective review would assist in completing an appropriate narrative for our time in history, and could possibly achieve some form of justice for victims of war crimes and genocide.

While acts committed by combatants, militants and terrorists can be established with evidence, the intent of these actions is harder to define. With so much fog over the intent of the players in the Middle East, it must be considered that any actions that contributed to war crimes should be considered in the assessment of these events in world history.

While whether or not an individual in Western societies can be compelled to assist those in immediate danger is a thoroughly discussed issue, it has been determined that not helping another person is not a crime in most legal systems. The lack of a moral application when discussing genocide however leads to possible horrendous situations.

The discovery of concentration camps during the Holocaust was met with inaction to help the victims of that mass genocide, leading to additional deaths due to lack of assistance. While absolving one’s responsibility to a victim group would surely be easier, it is against natural justice to avoid victims of genocide as they are too human to ignore.

To form a holistic legal precedent on mass atrocities committed against communities living in Iraq and Syria, it would be a matter of equity to acknowledge and apply legally binding precedents over third parties that have indirectly contributed to the further genocide of victim groups in the region.

Firstly, if it was established that the third party was aware of the mass atrocity to a greater or lesser degree, and actively worked to alter or fade out information about the acts taking place there for a reason that benefits that set of policymakers, then it should be considered as partly contributing to the acts taking place on the ground. Knowledge of an atrocity is the first step to help prohibit those actions, and it is why knowingly diminishing the brutality of the act should be a crime in itself.

Secondly, if the third party took indirect actions that should have been known to likely prolong the genocide taking place or prevents the rescue or assistance of that known community subject to ethnic cleansing, it should be taken as a partial contribution to the act itself. This should be applied to all victims of the targeted group during the time frame in which those contributory third party activities took place.

Thirdly, if a third party knowing of the genocide that took place puts undue bias and pressure on members of the groups that were subject to acts of genocide, murder, torture, sexual assault, acts against minors, planned extermination and others atrocities in the process of ethnically cleansing those groups that have been targeted, and discriminates in the process of assisting individuals from that group, then they should also be acknowledged and charged to respond in the greater trials on crimes against humanity against the individuals of that community.

Targeted groups and individuals should never been re-targeted by discriminatory policies before or after the resolution of the greater conflict. Ignoring the actions against them is the source of the initial discrimination and is tantamount to taking further actions against their community.

Unfortunately, many of the above third party actions have knowingly been taking place and have been blanketed over due to political games in many countries, even those founded on justice and the rule of law. While all sides accuse the others of not having clean hands, the case for justice against atrocities committed in 2016 and previously may not come to fruition in 2017 without strong public condemnation of the genocides committed in our current generation.

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Taiwan’s President and Pro-China Opposition Leader both Plan U.S. Visits

Fri, 06/01/2017 - 18:00

Taiwanese president Tsai Ing wen, pro-Beijing opposition leader Hung Hsiu-chu (ETLife)

An intensified “David versus Goliath” battle appears to be brewing between democratic Taiwan and authoritarian mainland China. That battle will come to the United States this month, as Taiwan’s president and pro-China opposition leader make competing U.S. visits just in time for Donald J. Trump’s inauguration as the 45th President of the United States.

At issue is the international status of Taiwan, which China regards as a renegade province that must be “reunified” with the mainland by any means necessary including military force. The problem for China is that the overwhelming majority of Taiwan’s 23 million citizens consider the island a free and independent country, and have no interest whatsoever in “reunifying” with a one-party dictatorship. Despite Beijing’s insistence to the contrary, the island’s people increasingly “see themselves as Taiwanese, not as Chinese.”

In early December 2016, Taiwan’s democratically-elected president, Tsai Ing-wen, enraged mainland China’s dictators by making a congratulatory telephone call to U.S. president-elect Trump. Trump further angered Beijing by accepting the call from Tsai and challenging the “one-China policy” that Beijing unilaterally considers “the cornerstone of Sino-U.S. relations.” That Beijing would be so upset by a mere phone call illustrates the weakness of its position in the matter.

Tsai Ing-wen (Radio Free Asia)

Now, Tsai has again irritated China by announcing stopovers in the United States during a January trip to visit allies in Latin America; and the United States has in turn angered China by allowing the stopovers. Tsai plans a stop in Houston on her outbound journey January 7 followed by a stop in San Francisco on her return journey January 13. China’s foreign ministry called on the United States to block Tsai’s U.S. stopovers, “warning that such a visit would embolden independence activists in Taiwan.”

The plot thickens: Coinciding with Tsai’s trip will be a U.S. visit by Hung Hsiu-chu, leader of the opposition Nationalist Party (KMT) favored by Beijing but resoundingly defeated by Tsai’s more pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in Taiwan’s 2016 election. Tsai and Hung will both arrive in San Francisco on January 13, with competing events planned in the San Francisco Bay Area for January 13-15. Hung will then visit Chicago, Houston, and Los Angeles before returning to Taiwan on January 21.

Hung has been noted for her “extreme pro-unification views” and “radical pro-Beijing policy.” In a December 30 speech at a Taipei university, Hung insisted that Taiwan and the mainland are “not two countries” and that “Taiwan’s future lies in China.” In November, Hung led a KMT delegation to Beijing and met with Chinese Communist Party officials including President Xi Jinping. No such meetings have taken place with DPP leaders, whom Beijing considers illegitimate despite their landslide victory in the 2016 election.

While Beijing “has attempted to punish Tsai and the DPP” for their refusal to bow to mainland Chinese demands, it has increasingly relied on the Hung and the KMT “to be its proxy in the fight against Taiwanese independence.” Unfortunately for Beijing and the KMT, Hung’s visit to the United States is likely to be of little consequence beyond pro-Beijing propaganda circles, since Tsai is an elected president and Hung is not.

Hung Hsiu-chu with Chinese president Xi Jinping (Xinhua)

Said Tsai at a year-end press conference on December 31: “Step by step, Beijing is going back to the old path of dividing, coercing, and even threatening and intimidating Taiwan.” Indeed it would appear that China has dropped all pretense of cross-strait “friendship” and now sees the majority of the Taiwanese people and their democratically-elected government as an enemy that must be brought to heel. The clearly-expressed will of Taiwan’s people means nothing to China’s autocratic leaders.

As Reuters reported on December 31, China is “considering strong measures to contain Taiwan.” According to sources close to senior People’s Liberation Army (PLA) officers, “China’s military has become alarmed” at the direction U.S.-Taiwan ties might take under the incoming Trump administration, and is anxious to head off any moves by Taiwan toward formal independence.

“We’re ready. If Taiwan wants to make trouble so can we. Let’s hit them hard,” one unnamed official told Reuters, “We can hold exercises close to Taiwan, and show them the damage we could cause. Taiwan will have to give in then.”

Said a retired PLA officer: “We can just cut them off economically. No more direct flights, no more trade. Nothing. Taiwan would not last long…. There would be no need for war.” None of this sounds much like “brotherly love” between cross-strait “compatriots.”

In a December 25 editorial the state-run Global Times likewise called for “military pressure” and other coercive measures against Taiwan and its elected government. In addition to military air and sea exercises designed to intimidate Taiwan, the editorial recommended in absentia criminal trials for Taiwanese independence leaders under China’s “anti-secession law” enacted in 2005.

Causing further consternation in Beijing is Trump’s suggestion that he might agree to meet face-to-face with Tsai after he takes office as President of the United States. Such a meeting, according to Liu Xiangping, director of the Institute of Taiwan Studies at Nanjing University, would be a “deliberate provocation” that would “harm China’s core interests and the feelings of the Chinese people, and directly endanger the development of Sino-U.S. relations.”

More such frothing-at-the-mouth can surely be expected from China as President Tsai visits the United States and Hung attempts to upstage her. As for the future direction of U.S.-Taiwan ties under the incoming U.S. administration, “We’ll see,” according to America’s unpredictable president-elect.

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Israel’s Impending Demographic Reality

Fri, 06/01/2017 - 17:38

Israel’s first Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, posited that Israel could be Jewish, it could be democratic and it could control Greater Israel (all the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea), but that it could only choose two out of the three; they were not all possible concurrently. When given the chance in the late 1940s, he readily—if not woefully—sacrificed the third in order to create a state that was both Jewish and democratic.

And that state grew and even flourished.

In 1967, Israel preemptively struck the armies amassed at its borders and suddenly found itself in control of Greater Israel. But with the land came a lot of new people. Ben-Gurion’s insightful theorem was once again relevant.

It’s been just shy of fifty years since the Six Day War, and Israel is still coming to grips with the difficult predicament that Ben-Gurion spelled out so long ago.

In 2009, I saw Israeli Ambassador Yoram Ettinger speak about the future of the Jewish State. I had the opportunity to ask him about reports saying that by 2020, Arabs would outnumber Jews between the Jordan and the Mediterranean. He responded by challenging the numbers, claiming that the Palestinian Authority had greatly overestimated the numbers of Palestinians living in the region. It is a position he still holds.

I did not have a chance at a follow-up question, but had I, it would have been this: If the Palestinians numbers are as minimal as you claim, why not offer them citizenship? If the Jews of the region significantly outnumbered the Palestinians, Ettinger could bring about his vision of Israel by annexing the Palestinian Territories and simply accepting a bi-national state. Everyone would have an equal vote and with a safe Jewish majority, Israel could finally achieve a Jewish, democratic state that controls all of Greater Israel.

Of course, Ettinger’s analysis only works if you reject the actual demographic realities of the region.

New numbers released this week show that while Palestinians are still on track to be a majority in the region by 2020, they will actually pull even THIS YEAR.

Including Palestinian citizens of Israel, as well as those living in Gaza, East Jerusalem and the West Bank, the report projects that by the end of 2017, Palestinians will have parity with the Jewish population at 6.58 million.

President Trump will preside over a situation in the Middle East that President Obama and Secretary of State Kerry foresaw but were powerless to act on. President Obama’s abstention at the UN and Secretary Kerry’s recent speech were clearly geared at waking Israel up to a new reality, one that is no longer in waiting but has virtually arrived.

Following the UN vote, Israeli President Reuven Rivlin tweeted:

This is an old argument, but one that has been very powerful for Israel. For decades, Israel has sought peace, at times through great sacrifice, at other times simply going through the motions. But Israel always had the benefit of time on its side; the demographic make-up of the region meant that Israel enjoyed a Jewish majority. While peace was always sought, it never carried an existential demographic imperative. This may just be the year that changes.

President Rivlin was upset with the international community. His threat however was leveled directly at the Palestinians. Even if the PA orchestrated the vote and lobbied for it, they didn’t cast it. Those votes were cast by China, Russia, France, England, Spain, Japan, Ukraine, et al.

Responding with threats to the peace process implies that the Palestinians need a negotiated peace agreement while the Israelis can live without it. But everyday that rolls by makes this current evaluation less and less accurate.

Today the Palestinians yearn for a state. But in a year, or three, it may well be Israel who is anxious to come to the table to fight for two states while the Palestinians are busy advocating for a one-state solution. A new survey found that two-thirds of Palestinians no longer believe that a two-state solution is possible. If Prime Minister Netanyahu thinks it’s hard to build—and hold—a coalition today, wait until he tries as part of the country’s Jewish minority.

As with so many issues, PEOTUS Trump has never made clear his exact goals or plans for this part of the world. Following the UN vote, he tweeted his unwavering support for Israel.

But he has also spoken about his desire to solve the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, referring to it as “the ultimate deal.”

Shortly after declaring that he wanted to solve this complicated conflict though, he chose David Friedman as his Ambassador to Israel. Friedman, Trump’s bankruptcy lawyer, supports Israeli annexation of the West Bank.

And Friedman is in good company. What was once a fringe concept amongst Israelis is now supported by Israeli Education Minister and MK Naftali Bennett, head of The Jewish Home, amongst others. And without an Obama bogeyman to pick fights with, Bibi will be forced to continue pulling to the right to fend off challenges by Bennett, his one-time ally, and others.

Bennett supports annexation of parts of the West Bank and continued settlement expansion. He is open about the fact that he does not support Palestinian statehood. He even met with member’s of Trump’s team, just days after the election, to ask them to explore alternatives to the two-state solution.

Assuming Trump doesn’t decide that he knows what is best for Israel, opting to push back hard against settlement expansion, one could assume that the settlement movement has in him the American President they always wanted. And, at least for now, they control the Israeli government.

A majority of Israelis still support a two-state solution. But Israel is being backed into a corner by the settler movement, who despite being a minority of the country control a big seat at the table. For many, their end game is unclear. While there are plenty of pro-settler Israelis who support the Bennett model, Netanyahu is still on record supporting a two-state solution. But the path toward that outcome is harder to visualize with every new settlement expansion.

The modern Jewish State was born out of radical optimism and a dream: Ben-Gurion and his peers created a state out of nothing more than sweat, grit and brain power. A kindred people came together after thousands of years in the wilderness and they enacted a miracle. They (re)invented a language and created institutions, infrastructure and an economy out of nothing. And they did it not just for the Jews living on the land, but for all the Jews of the world to know that they had a safe haven from persecution.

Israel must grapple with the fact that it is not only responsible to its current citizens, but also to all future generations of Jews, globally. No other nation on earth is faced with such a heavy and complicated task. Israel must thrive today, in part so that it can exist tomorrow should the Jews require refuge in an unpredictable world. That was the vision of the early Zionists, and it is one that lives on today.

A two-state solution means walking away from holy lands specifically mentioned in the bible. A one-state solution means either accepting a Jewish minority in a bi-national state or a Jewish minority ruling over an Arab majority. Ben-Gurion and Israel’s founding fathers saw these three choices and they made their decision.

Short of a radical shift in Israeli or American policy regarding the settlement movement, it would seem that today’s Israel has resoundingly, if accidentally, reversed course. Today’s Jewish State is opting to exist throughout Greater Israel. Now it will simply need to decide between remaining Jewish and remaining democratic.

Follow me on Twitter @jlemonsk.

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Peter Navarro and the Coming China Trade Wars

Thu, 05/01/2017 - 08:39

With the selection of Peter Navarro, a harsh critic of China, as the head of the White House National Trade Council, some economic and geopolitical analysts are alarmed over the potential for a U.S. trade war with China. Navarro, a professor of economics and public policy at the University of California, Irvine, was selected to direct the activities of the newly-created council which will advise President-elect Donald Trump on trade issues. The 67-year-old Navarro was one of the most vocal on Trump’s economic advisory team, despite having four unsuccessful tries for public office in California as a Democrat.

Navarro, who holds a Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University, has written a number of books critical of China, and has directed a documentary called Death By China: How America Lost Its Manufacturing Base, parts of which I watched on YouTube. His last three books were The Coming China Wars, Crouching Tiger: What China’s Militarism Means for the World, and Death by China, which I read a few years back after it was published in 2011. From what I remember, the facts were mostly correct but I was struck by the acerbic tone and one-sided arguments.

President-elect Donald Trump also read one of his books years ago, and commented on the book’s documentary saying “ Death by China’ is right on. This important documentary depicts our problem with China with facts, figures and insight. I urge you to see it.” Trump has also declared he “was impressed by the clarity of his arguments and thoroughness of his research,” and believes Navarro “has presciently documented the harms inflicted by globalism on American workers, and laid out a path forward to restore our middle class.” Indeed, Navarro seems a logical pick for the president-elect, who has threatened to impose punitive tariffs of up to 45% on imported goods from China for unfair trade practices.

Navarro considers Beijing to be a currency manipulator and an unfair trade partner, and claims, “The epiphany for me was when I began to notice in the early 2000s a lot of my fully employed [former] MBA students [at UCI business school] were becoming fully unemployed. And it was like, ‘What’s going on here?’ And as I began to look more deeply into it, all roads led to Beijing.” 

But if we look into that statement more deeply, it seems difficult to reconcile fully employed MBA students losing their jobs with lower-wage manufacturing jobs shifting to China. MBA students typically command higher-level management positions less susceptible to attrition, and many of those MBAs on Wall Street who lost their jobs during that decade cannot complain their jobs in finance relocated to Shanghai.

Trump’s top economic cheerleader also has a ways to go in explaining how the next president will “bring American jobs and factories home” from the planet’s most efficient assassin”, which can “pick off American industries, job by job.” Many of these jobs have not been lost to foreign competitors like China and Mexico, but to automation, according to one study last year by Ball State University’s Center for Business and Economic Research. The study revealed that trade accounted for just 13% of America’s lost factory jobs, with some 88% of lost jobs taken by robots and other homegrown factors. Whether or or not Trump and Navarro can reverse this dependence on robotics and automation will prove to be one of their major challenges.

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Japan Outpaces U.S. in Race to Enlist Russia to Balance China

Thu, 05/01/2017 - 08:25

Russian President Vladimir Putin meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

The last week of 2016 saw the passage of three seemingly unrelated events. These were: 1) Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s historic visit to Pearl Harbor, 2) the U.S. expulsion of Russian diplomats in response to allegations of Russian interference in the recent U.S. Presidential election, and 3) the Chinese aircraft carrier Liaoning’s debut into blue water territory.

The first two events juxtapose the current U.S. administration’s willingness to treat a former enemy as a friend in the form of Japan, while treating a former enemy as a present and future enemy based on unsubstantiated allegations in the form of Russia. When combined with recent Russo-Japanese diplomacy, it is clear that Japan’s strategy to recruit Russia to better balance China (typified by the Liaoning’s maneuvers) at the very least is less likely to fail than comparable U.S. efforts to do the same.

Diplomats Are Not Mere Pawns on the Chessboard

Shinzo Abe made headlines last week with his historic visit to Pearl Harbor, widely seen as reciprocating U.S. President Obama’s visit to Hiroshima earlier last year. While condolences, but not apologies, were expressed by the leaders at both events, the picture is much broader. Abe was the first foreign leader to actually meet and congratulate President-elect Donald Trump in person, even before the latter’s being formally sworn in to office. Abe’s Trump visit reflected Japanese uncertainty with the new incoming U.S. administration’s stated ambivalence with supporting Japan militarily in Asia. With Abe’s Pearl Harbor visit, however, the Prime Minister is trying to start off Japan’s relationship with the new U.S. administration on the best foot possible, despite the uncertainty. This is critical to overall Japanese strategy in balancing China.

In contrast, the current U.S. administration has recently expelled several Russian diplomats in response to allegations of Russian interference in the 2016 Presidential election. This move, coming on the heels of extended sanctions against Russia for its role in Crimea, eastern Ukraine, and Syria, symbolizes the U.S.’ determination to not let Russia out of the “enemy” camp anytime soon, unlike Japan. While diplomatic expulsion may be considered only symbolic by some, it’s critical to have as many avenues of communication remain open, not closed, between Russia and the U.S. currently.

Lest anyone underestimate the role of diplomats in international relations, the recent Russian Ambassador to Turkey’s assassination threatened to derail Russo-Turkish communications regarding the Syrian Crisis. Luckily, this did not occur as Russia, Turkey, and Iran, are all currently brokering a deal to resolve the crisis. Equally luckily, Russia has, as of yet, not reciprocated by expelling U.S. diplomats, most likely a nod to improving ties with the next U.S. administration.

U.S. accusations of Russian interference in elections are apparently not only limited to U.S. territory, however. There are currently U.S. claims that Russia may try to influence upcoming European elections in 2017 as well. While there are several European states where Euroscepticism is taking root, concerning the U.S., upcoming French presidential elections clearly garner more attention. This is because Front National’s Marine Le Pen has threatened not only EU withdrawal (“Frexit”) if elected President, but possible NATO withdrawal as well.

Russia will be a factor in the French presidential election, but not in the way articulated by the U.S.. France, like all EU states, has to make a decision regarding not only its own place within the EU, but also the EU’s place as a whole within global politics. Because Russia trades more with Europe than with the U.S., continued anti-Russian sanctions have had and will continue to have a disproportionate effect on Europe’s economy, not the U.S.’. As a Le Pen victory may be even more possible in the wake of the unforeseen Brexit and Trump victory, Russian election interference accusations by the U.S. are meant to preempt even this remote possibility. France, like all of Europe, will have a major decision to make regarding how far it is willing to let its own economy continue to suffer, as with the failed Mistral carrier deal, in order to tow the geopolitical line with the U.S..

The Student Has Become The Master

Unlike Europe, Japan is clearly making more moves independent of the U.S. in strengthening its own strategy to balance China. Similar to the U.S.’ “Diamond of Democracies” to balance China (Japan, Australia, and India), Japan is developing its own stable of powers to serve this very same purpose. In addition to its historical treaty ally, the U.S., and India, Japan is looking to promulgate better relations with Russia in order to create strategic uncertainty on China’s northern and western borders. Japan is doing this despite U.S. reservations due to U.S.-Russian hostilities.

Although a formal peace treaty between Japan and Russia has, as of yet, not been signed, this has not deterred either party from mutual diplomatic outreach. As with Japan, Russia is also looking for outside powers to better balance China’s rising military capabilities. To date, a major sticking point on the Russian side is uncertainty as to whether Japan would actually allow U.S. forces to create a base on any of the islands turned over to Japan in a potential deal. This mirrors Russian concerns in the Black Sea regarding a possible NATO presence on the Crimean peninsula in the worst case scenario.

If China is indeed the longer-term threat to overall U.S. interests according to some, it is highly illogical of the U.S. to continue to antagonize Russia. Even though Western colonialism left its legacy on China, culminating in the Opium Wars, China has historically been focused on threats from its mainland Eurasian neighbors, with the Mongols and Manchus as examples. Because of this, China decided that if it were to achieve its full economic and military potential, it needed to have peace with its many land neighbors. These diplomatic efforts have enabled China to refocus its economic and military energies towards the maritime domain.

This refocused energy has recently borne fruit as China’s sole operational aircraft carrier, the Liaoning, recently made its maiden voyage into the Western Pacific Ocean on a training mission. This symbolizes China’s desire and ambition to no longer be content with only coastal water defense capabilities (“green water”), but to expand its naval capacity onto the high seas (“blue water”). If the U.S. is serious about containing Chinese naval capabilities to the First Island Chain, of course it will need to have strong military ties to Japan, Taiwan, and the Philippines, all of whom form the strongest part of the chain. However, mainland partners such as Russia will also be critical to this effort because of the historical issues outlined above.

It’s been speculated that the incoming U.S. administration is looking to foster better relations with Russia in order to better balance China over the long haul. However, if this is the case, the U.S. has its work cut out for it as it not only needs to work with Russia in order to address the immediate regional concerns outlined above, but will in all likelihood have to also truly treat Russia as a respected world power with legitimate security interests and concerns going back to the end of the Cold War, if not earlier.

Unfortunately, even if the U.S. starts to do all this now, there is no guarantee that its efforts would eventually be successful as it would need to be clearly demonstrated (to Russia) that overall Russian interests would benefit. Additionally, China has a long history of playing outside powers against one another (“Use Barbarians To Fight Barbarians”). U.S.-Russian hostilities only make this easier. Because of this, Japan’s farsightedness currently places it ahead of the U.S. and its nearsightedness in the race to enlist Russia to help balance China.

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How Hawkish is Gen. James Mattis?

Thu, 05/01/2017 - 08:19

The year-end foreign policy analyses that routinely rank the threats America faces are unique in 2016. An unexpected U.S. President-elect creates a host of unanswerable questions. Each analysis is incomplete unless it mentions the “uncharted waters” in which we find ourselves, or how “we simply don’t know” what President-elect Trump’s unique approach, his lack of political experience, and his penchant for improvisation will yield in the foreign policy arena.

America’s foreign policy leaders are used to mapping out the looming uncertainties America faces. They are less accustomed to an environment where, in many ways, America’s incoming leader is that looming uncertainty.

The standard scrutiny of a president-elect’s nominations is sharper for President-elect Trump. Two of his top nominations in the foreign policy arena—National Security Advisor-designate Gen. Michael Flynn and attorney David Friedman to be Ambassador to Israel—have bred new worries with their controversial views. Flynn has endorsed suspicion of Muslims; Friedman would upend any effort at a two-state solution between Israelis and Palestinians.

In this atmosphere, President-elect Trump’s nomination of retired Marine Gen. James Mattis, formerly Commander of U.S. Central Command, to be secretary of defense, is critical. Secretaries of defense, of course, always are. However, serving a president-elect with no military or political background, Gen. Mattis’ own outlook and temperament will likely be scrutinized at his confirmation hearing, and they are of interest to those anticipating what changes to expect in U.S. military policy.

Mattis is on record criticizing President Obama’s Syria policy. Obama’s reticence to commit ground forces after the turmoil of the Iraq War is interpreted alternately as prudent caution based on U.S. experience in Iraq, or as a lack of American leadership and assertiveness. Mattis believes the latter. Trump has praised him as “a general’s general”, compared him favorably to Gen. Patton, and sees him as the point person for a muscular U.S. foreign policy. Does Gen. Mattis’ own rhetoric fit Trump’s casting call?

Reviewing two of Gen. Mattis’ major public statements over the past two years—testimony before the Senate Armed Services Committee in 2015 and an appearance at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) in April 2016—reveals four key ways in which Mattis’ outlook differs from Trump’s.

1) Mattis talks about strategy. One predominant fear about President-elect Trump is his impulsiveness and unwillingness to discuss strategy. Pressed by NBC’s Matt Lauer during a televised candidate’s forum, Trump refused to articulate any elements of the plan to defeat ISIS he claimed to have formulated. During the campaign, Trump expressed a willingness—to some, an eagerness—to “bomb the hell out of ISIS.”

By contrast, Mattis’s Senate testimony centered on strategy. He addressed the fitness of the U.S. intelligence community to respond to emerging threats, including cyber, at a time when President-elect Trump has been dismissive of intelligence institutions. He identified the national debt as perhaps the biggest security threat facing the U.S., after the debt was absent as a presidential campaign topic. Writing in the New York Times, author Thomas Ricks described Mattis as “far more disciplined than Patten was, and a far more strategic thinker.”

2) Mattis talks about international institutions. Trump made campaign headlines undermining international institutions and alliance relationships. He criticized America’s role in NATO, and accused long-term U.S. allies like South Korea of ‘free-riding’ on America’s protection. Mattis’ rhetoric (again, prior to his nomination) contradicted Trump directly.

Mattis began his 2015 Senate testimony addressing the UN, NATO, and the Bretton Woods institutions as “elements we take for granted.” The post-World War II international order, Mattis argued, “reflected the wisdom of those who recognized no nation lived as an island and we needed new ways to deal with challenges that for better or worse impacted all nations.” This is a clear rebuttal of the “America First” rhetoric of Trump’s campaign. Mattis’ contradiction of Trump’s rhetoric on U.S. allies was equally direct. “I would just say that for a sitting president to see our allies as freeloaders is nuts”, Mattis said at CSIS. This direct pushback suggests Mattis might work to preserve and enhance America’s relationships abroad.

3) Mattis talks about Congress’ foreign policy leadership. Fears that President-elect Trump will be “trigger happy” are founded in the fact that military power has concentrated in the presidency under both Republican and Democratic administrations. Tellingly, Mattis spoke about the need for Congress to reassert its role in crafting and overseeing U.S. foreign policy. In particular, he challenged Congress to expand the range of U.S. options to confront an aggressive Iran. In his Senate testimony, Mattis said: “When the decision is made to employ our forces in combat, Congress should ask if the military is being employed with the proper authority.” As he re-enters the Pentagon, Mattis will be reminded of this view, and his inclusion of Congress in constructing foreign policy as a check on an over-active executive is now timelier than ever.

4) Mattis talks about nuclear proliferation. Trump has also raised alarms with statements that seem to welcome nuclear arms races in Asia and the Middle East. On this point, Mattis’ experience will be key. Again before the Armed Services Committee, Mattis asserted that the nuclear deterrent must be maintained. However—and crucially—he discussed ways to reduce the threat of nuclear weapons use by suggesting whether land-based nuclear missiles are in fact obsolete, and should be dismantled. In any event, he called for clarity in nuclear policy in a way that would help to curb proliferation fears instead of fostering them.

It is too low a bar to praise Mattis simply for not adopting the xenophobic and bellicose rhetoric of his colleagues. However, his outlook towards engaging the Islamic world appears to be based on America’s Cold War-approach to the citizens of communist countries. “I too think Radio Farsi has to be dusted off and we need to get back at it,” Mattis said at CSIS. “The Iranian people need to know right up front every day: we have no problem with you.” It is tough to imagine a more effective antidote to the Trump campaign’s indulgence in rhetoric targeting Islam.

Given his views on the Obama Administration, it is safe to assume Mattis will bring a more hawkish outlook to the Pentagon than his predecessor. However, he is steeped in an experience of foreign affairs and military command that the incoming administration otherwise lacks. That is welcome.

Taking Mattis at his word last April, change seems inevitable. “The bottom line on the American situation, though, I think is quite clear,” Mattis said at CSIS; “The next president is going to inherit a mess. That’s probably the most diplomatic word you can use for it.”

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Japan’s Defense Minister Visits ‘War Crimes Shrine’ Following Pearl Harbor Trip

Fri, 30/12/2016 - 18:06

Tomomi Inada (Katehon, 2016)

Japan’s “hawkish” defense minister Tomomi Inada (稲田朋美) has been called the “Japanese Joan of Arc” by her admirers and “Japan’s Sarah Palin” by her critics. She is considered a likely successor to current prime minister Shinzo Abe. In any case, Inada’s visit on December 29 to Tokyo’s ‘war crimes shrine‘ following her “tour of reconciliation” to Pearl Harbor with Abe has sparked anger among Japan’s neighbors—particularly China and South Korea—that suffered under Japanese occupation during World War II.

The visit is also certain to provide a nice wet lump of red meat for the Chinese government’s anti-Japanese propaganda machine. By extension, China’s anti-Japanese ire will likely be turned for propaganda purposes against Japan’s close ally, the United States; and used by China as a wedge in its efforts to pry South Korea away from the U.S.-Japan orbit. This is obviously highly unhelpful for U.S. efforts in the region.

Built in 1869, the Yasukuni Shrine (靖國神社) honors millions of Japanese soldiers who died in wars since the second half of the nineteenth century. Among those enshrined, however, are more than a thousand who are considered war criminals, including fourteen convicted Class A war criminals secretly enshrined in 1978. A visit by Prime Minister Abe to the shrine in 2013 was condemned by China, South Korea, and the United States, the latter of which had strongly advised Abe against the visit. Abe has since sent offerings but has made no further personal visits to the shrine.

Other officials have made visits, however, including the latest visit by Japan’s defense minister. For its part, the South Korean government denounced as “deplorable” Inada’s visit to the shrine. Said a statement from South Korea’s defense ministry: “We strongly condemn the Japanese defense minister’s visit to Yasukuni, which beautifies Japan’s war of aggression against its neighboring countries and honors war criminals.”

“It is deplorable that Japan’s responsible politicians visit Yasukuni Shrine that glorifies its past colonial invasions and war by housing war criminals,” said a South Korean foreign ministry spokesman, “Unless Japan demonstrates humble introspection and sincere self-reflection on its wartime past, it will not be able to gain the trust of neighboring countries and the international community.”

Tomomi Inada and Shinzo Abe (China Daily, 2016)

China likewise condemned Inada’s visit to the “notorious war-linked Yasukuni Shrine.” A statement from the Chinese foreign ministry said that “China is firmly opposed to the visit to the Yasukuni Shrine by Tomomi Inada, and China will make solemn representations to Japan.” Further outrage from China should be expected in the days to come, likely extended to the United States for its alliance with Japan.

For the moment, Chinese media seem content to depict the Americans as dupes of the wily Japanese. “Perhaps it is the Obama administration and the Americans who should feel insulted most by Japan’s tricks, rather than China and South Korea,” said the state-run Global Times, “The Americans are just a bargaining chip the Abe administration can make use of.”

Inada’s hawkish, far-right views and associations have been widely noted. She has frequently defended Japan’s actions during World War II and denied Japanese war crimes including the Nanjing Massacre and the use of women and girls in occupied countries as sex slaves (“comfort women“). In 2014, Inada and far-right politician Sanae Takaichi appeared in photos with Japanese neo-Nazi leader Kazunari Yamada.

People in China, South Korea, and other Asian nations that suffered under Japanese occupation are rightly outraged at Inada’s actions and statements. Unfortunately, however, this hawk is also a golden goose for anti-Japanese and anti-U.S. propagandists in the Chinese government with their own expansionist agenda, and an albatross around the neck for America’s Asia-Pacific alliance.

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‘Eastward Ho’ for India-led South Asia?

Fri, 30/12/2016 - 17:49

(L-R) Leaders of Nepal, Bhutan, Sri Lanka, India, Bangladesh, Myanmar and Thailand at the BRICS-BIMSTEC Outreach Summit, India.

Trade blocs across the globe have often been just as much, if not more, instruments of geopolitics as they have been about commerce. A gradual but definite swell in cooperation between the South Asian nations east of Pakistan currently is playing witness to the age-old truism.

With South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) currently lying comatose due to the India-Pakistan conflict, India is now citing the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) as an alternative that may potentially isolate Pakistan in South Asia.

India’s increased activities within and with BIMSTEC nations is a clear warning by India to Pakistan over the current deadlock of dialogue between the two countries because of the terror attacks on Indian soil, almost all of which emanate from Pakistan.

After pulling out of the 19th SAARC Summit in Islamabad in November 9-10, 2016, which led to pull outs by all the remaining member nations too, India – along with Bangladesh – did not attend a three-day regional conference held in Islamabad beginning December 19 to  promote innovation for sustainable development and discuss strategy of the Asian and Pacific Centre for Transfer of Technology (APCTT). The conference, significantly, was held under the aegis of the United Nations.

On the other hand, India went out of the way to promote BIMSTEC at the 8th BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) Summit in Goa, India on October 15-16. Dubbed as one of the highlights of the Summit by many in India, the host nation facilitated a BRICS-BIMSTEC Outreach Summit, where the BRICS leaders met the heads of government of the BIMSTEC countries.

The selection of BIMSTEC for engagement with BRICS was both significant and deliberate by India.

While it fits India’s long-term Act East Policy, which aims at strengthening trade and bilateral relations with the South-East Asian nations, with India’s northeast region as the transit base, the October invitation to BIMSTEC to the BRICS summit also suited India’s immediate concerns.

In a major victory for India against Pakistan, BIMSTEC Leaders’ Retreat 2016 Outcome Document reiterated its stand:

“We strongly believe that our fight against terrorism should not only seek to disrupt and eliminate terrorists, terror organisations and networks, but should also identify, hold accountable and take strong measures against States who encourage, support and finance terrorism, provide sanctuary to terrorists and terror groups, and falsely extol their virtues. There should be no glorification of terrorists as martyrs.”

The statement was a near replica of the one released later by the boycotting SAARC member states at the time of pulling out of the Summit in Islamabad in November.

In other words, by trade or by trick, India had managed to get all the South Asian nations—and indeed Thailand and Myanmar—together to send a message to Pakistan to put a lid on terror activities emanating from its soil.

It was as much a diplomatic victory for India as it was an expression of exasperation of the other nations with regards the comatose nature of cooperation in South Asia via SAARC due to the conflict between the two biggest member states of the Association.

The boycott of events and the pointed nature of joint statements is not an ad-hoc development. As stated earlier, it is India taking a lead out of the general exasperation of the South Asian nations – particularly India and Bangladesh—with the issue of Pakistani-originating terror completely bringing to halt any future-looking trade and development issues of the region.

To that effect, India in September 2016 approved $1.04-billion for constructing and upgrading 558 km of roads to link it with Bangladesh, Bhutan, and Nepal and ease the movement of passengers and cargo within the region.

Funded equally by India and the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the primary purpose of the Bangladesh-Bhutan-India-Nepal (BBIN) road initiative is to increase the intra-regional trade by over 60%.

A much more expansive project than BBIN is the  Mekong-Ganga Cooperation (MGC), which though was established way back in 2000 in Laos, is receiving renewed attention. Named after Ganga and Mekong, the two of the largest rivers of the region, the grouping is about building tourism, culture, education and transportation linkages between India, Thailand, Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam.

While MGC might not be moving as well as the promoters would’ve liked it to, there are other examples that actually are.

The Kaladan Multi-Modal Transit Transport Project has been identified for special focus by the BIMSTEC Transport Infrastructure and Logistics Study (BTILS). It will connect the eastern Indian seaport of Kolkata with Myanmar’s Sittwe seaport by sea in the first phase – and then link Sittwe to Paletwa in the same country via Kaladan River route, before connecting Paletwa to the Indian state of Mizoram by road. Originally scheduled to be completed by 2014, it is running behind schedule, but moving well now.

Another one identified by the BTILS is the India–Myanmar–Thailand (IMT) Trilateral Highway, an under-construction highway that will connect Moreh in India with Mae Sot in Thailand via Myanmar. The road had a trial run in November 2015 itself, with Indian vehicles traveling to Naypyidaw in Myanmar via the Imphal-Mandalay-Bagan-Naypyidaw route and back. Myanmarese vehicles had joined the Indian vehicles on the return journey.

With a clear view of expanding the India-ASEAN Free Trade Area trade, India has proposed extending the highway to Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam.

The most interesting one, however, is the Bangladesh, China, India and Myanmar (BCIM) Economic Corridor. The multi-modal (road, rail, water and air linkages) corridor will be the first expressway between India and China and will pass through Myanmar and Bangladesh—covering a total area of about 1.65 million square kilometers.

This is interesting because it brings together two traditional and intense rivals, India and China—and also because China has put all its eggs in the Pakistani basket in the longstanding India-Pakistan conflict, the very reason for which India is looking and leading other nations eastwards.

There remain many miles before all the mentioned projects lay the final brick. But it is amply clear that the terrorism emanating from Pakistan—and indeed the steadfast refusal by the Pakistani government to both stop supporting the terror groups and acknowledging their presence on its soil—has led to a steady rise in activities on the east of South Asia. At the moment, it is indeed ‘Eastward Ho’ for the India-led South Asia.

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Defending Space: Preserving U.S. Superiority in the Skies

Fri, 30/12/2016 - 17:13

(War on the Rocks)

On December 27, 2016, China’s State Council Information Office published a white paper outlining the plans for a new and expanded national space program which aims to become the first country to soft land a probe on the far side of the moon. The white paper states that Change-4 spacecraft will, through the new lunar exploration project, better examine the evolution of the moon and will carry out a low-frequency radio astronomy observation around the landing site.

It also restated China’s ambitions to send a mission to Mars by 2020. According to the white paper, in the next five years, China will continue to enhance the basic capacities of its space industry, and strengthen research into key and cutting-edge technologies.

Since sending its first satellite into orbit in 1970, almost two decades after Soviet Union’s Sputnik 1, China has been consistently funding its space program, with ambitions to both compete in the U.S. dominated global satellite networks and also to boost its military modernization.

China’s recent increased focus on enhancing its military and space capabilities are not without basis. The space environment is more competitive than ever as states are striving to benefit from space-enabled technologies and move their defense capabilities above the earth to gain a clear-eyed look at the conflict-ridden world.

Even though the militarization of space started during the Cold War years, technological developments and (unclassified) tests proved that we are now closer to an actual warfare in space. Over the past few years, China and Russia have been gradually strengthening their space-provided weapon capabilities, specifically focusing on anti-satellite defense strategies and technology.

(War on the Rocks)

For example, Russia recently launched an anti-satellite weapon into the space, the latest in a number of weapons led under Putin’s administration. The test of the PL-19 Nudol missile was carried out on December 16 from a base in central Russia, and was monitored by U.S. intelligence agencies. It was the fifth test of the Nudol missile and the third successful flight of a system Moscow has claimed is for use against enemy missiles, said officials familiar with the reports of the launch.

With modern armies and much of the world’s economy dependent on the information, imagery and communication systems supported by satellites in orbit, it is no surprise that providing assets in space is a high priority for national security and provides a competitive edge in deterrence as part of defense strategies globally.

As a global force, Washington has many reasons to further explore technology options in space for military capabilities as well. Instead of exhaustive deployments, the space domain successfully facilitates the U.S. to overcome the financial and political borders, allowing for greater force projection. As a result, the U.S. military depends critically on its orbital assets for navigation, intelligence exercises, accuracy, communication, early warning and other activities.

While being the leader in space and military technologies provides advantages for the U.S., its heavy reliance on these technologies also entails dangers. The existing U.S. power in space could give challengers incentives to attack its infrastructure in orbit or develop technologies to obscure satellite vision, essential for military communications and location accuracy.

In the infamous 2007 incident, China tested and demolished one of its own satellites, resulting the largest recorded creation of space debris with more than 2,000 pieces. Irrespective of labeling it as a scientific exploration accident, this is a close example of what could become an anti-satellite weapon threatening to destroy U.S. investments in space.

(Vice News)

While historic rivalseven though how we label Russia and China may soon changealso depend on space for their military capabilities, they are less dependent on these assets since neither state has as much investments as the U.S. do on orbit and since their power is initially aimed within their geographic regions, they can successfully rely on earth-based technologies and traditional military capabilities for their short to medium term goals. In the long term, however, it would benefit any opposition to U.S. significantly if they could simply take down its satellites, essentially eyes and ears of the U.S. national defense.

“China’s aspirations are driven by its assessment that space power enables the country’s military modernization and would allow it to challenge U.S. information superiority during a conflict,” states the 2015 Report to Congress of the China-U.S. Economic and Security Review Commission and besides the national security concerns and military aptitudes, it underlines that the humanity depends on space systems for communication, exploration, navigation and a host of other functions essential to modern life.

If the U.S. wants to preserve its superiority, not dominance, in the face of increasing threats to its strength in space, it will need to invest in strategies to deter attacks on its orbital assets. And while working on deterrence strategies, it will also need to take additional steps to plan for a potential war in space, by providing the necessary financial and political support to defense forces and also administrating space programs with both deterrence and readiness in mind, all while keeping a close eye on what others are conducting in orbit.

A good place to start could be improving the space situational awareness programs and investing in technologies which makes managing and operating space systems more resilient. According to a Government Accountability Office report, situational awareness in space remains limited despite halting attempts at improvement. This means more land-based radar and optical telescopes, as well as space-based visible optical telescopes to track the 22,000 currently active and dead satellites, junk, and debris.

If the U.S. took no action at all, China and Russia would no doubt continue to grow their space-provided capabilities and could eventually undermine the American strategic advantage in space. Others would surely follow to catch up and take their place in the renewed space-front.

Striving to maintain American superiority in space does not just protect the U.S., but considering the alternatives, also makes the world a safer place.

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Trump and al-Sisi Set to Launch Strategic Rapprochement

Fri, 30/12/2016 - 15:47

Donald Trump meets with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Sisi. (Dominick Reuter / AFP-Getty Images)

As President-elect Donald Trump prepares to take office next month, concerns about the direction of U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East is already looming in the air. With the Trump administration at risk of triggering tensions with traditional American allies in the region, in particular those in the Persian Gulf, there are also high expectations for a fresh start with the others. Indeed, Egypt’s strongman President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi could emerge as one of the potential winners of the Trump foreign policy.

There is little secret that relations between Obama and al-Sisi have been marked by persistent tensions that affected bilateral relations. The Obama administration’s support for the Arab Spring largely discredited the White House’s credibility among the higher ranks of the Egyptian political establishment and, in particular, within the Egyptian army.

Indeed, the Obama’s foreign policy in the Middle East remained an epitome of “the divide and rule” strategy for many in Egypt. With a direct meddling into domestic affairs, it was viewed as continuation of efforts for causing a controlled havoc across the Arab world that started during the George W. Bush Presidency.

Despite friendlier recent statements from the White House towards Egypt, the relations between Obama and al-Sisi remain complicated. However, the situation might take a dramatic turn after Trump’s inauguration.

The “friendship” between Trump and al-Sisi began even before the Republican candidate won the elections in November. Al-Sisi met Trump in New York in September, and the meeting resulted in the Egyptian President calling Trump “a strong leader”, while Trump responded by calling al-Sisi “a fantastic guy.”

Meanwhile, many in the Middle East treated the news of Trump’s election with deep concerns; al-Sisi welcomed it with enthusiasm. The Egyptian President was the first world leader to congratulate Trump on his victory, highlighting hopes for a “new spirit into US-Egyptian relations.”

Al-Sisi’s support for Trump might come as a surprise to many. Egypt is one of the world’s most populous Muslim nations and Trump still maintains its hardline stance on implementing the ban on Muslim immigrants to the United States. However, the Egyptian President foresees future benefits of the President-elect foreign policy that outweigh its provocative statements.

Despite Trump’s hardline anti-Muslims rhetoric, he emerges as a game-changer to the Obama U.S. foreign policy in the region. For example, Trump’s views on Muslim Brotherhood resembles those of al-Sisi. The organization is currently categorized as a terrorist group in Egypt, and Trump labels it as “radical”.

Similarly to al-Sisi, Trump is also supportive of a Russian-led campaign in Syria and interprets it as a part of greater efforts of a “war on extremism”. Moreover, Trump seems willing to cooperate with the Kremlin in halting the expansion of radical jihadists across the Middle East. This is a crucial point for Cairo which is deeply concerned by the surge of extremists both in its immediate neighborhood and in the Sinai Peninsula.

Both Trump and al-Sisi also share a mutual appreciation for a strongman leadership. Trump has already demonstrated during the meeting in September that he does not intend on lecturing Cairo for its disregard for human rights.

In fact, the bilateral relations under the Trump administration might resemble those when George W. Bush was U.S. President and paid less attention, relatively to Obama, to the issue of “democratization in Egypt.” It is fair to say that Bush and Mubarak still butted heads over issues of human rights; but Trump is likely to be even less concerned.

Cairo is also hoping that Trump’s policy might contribute to opening ways for a thaw in U.S.-Russia relations,. Cairo and Moscow have become close friends over the past several years and their ties have grown even stronger after the Kremlin launched its military campaign in Syria.

Overall, the strategic rapprochement between Egypt and the United States could deliver a long-awaited balance to the Egyptian foreign policy while opening more opportunities for maneuvers between the White House and the Kremlin. Furthermore, the improved relationship will likely elevate Cairo’s stance within the regional balance of power, breaking away from its dependence on the Gulf monarchies—which became extremely burdensome after the Arab Spring.

Cairo’s expectations of the Trump’s policy could shed light on the Egypt’s recent decision to postpone a vote on a UN Security Council resolution against Israeli settlements—a move that caused many in the Arab world to raise eyebrows. Indeed, while many in Egypt are extremely critical of Israeli actions in the West Bank, it was important for al-Sisi to accentuate on the readiness for a fresh start with the incoming Trump administration.

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How the U.S. Sentiment Towards Refugees Shifted

Wed, 28/12/2016 - 15:52

We see images of them all the time: running up from the shoreline after disembarking, walking in large groups across a dusty road, sleeping in clumps in a refugee shelter tent. These are Syrian refugees fleeing a five-year civil war, but look just like images from the 1970s and 1980s when Vietnamese refugees fled a decade-long war.

President Barack Obama announced in September 2015 that the United States would accept 10,000 Syrian refugees over the course of a year. Governors of 31 out of the 52 U.S. states responded to Obama’s resettlement plan by denying Syrian refugees a place in their state.

Nevertheless, the 10,000th refugee successfully reached the U.S. at the end of August 2016. There have been no announcements to increase American assistance. With Donald Trump assuming office on January 20, 2017, it’s unlikely the United States will welcome anyone.

Forty years ago, almost two million Vietnamese refugees resettled in the United States, with no strong reactions to those refugees by local communities. Foreign Policy Association spoke to three Vietnamese-Americans to learn about their journey to the United States and what could have happened to the American sentiment towards refugees from the Vietnam War to the Syrian War. Their statements have been edited for clarity.

Trong Nong, professor at University of Houston

Being the captain of the boat with 22 people is what makes me the most proud in my life. I learned to navigate by using math from school to chart the course. We escaped Vietnam in a fishing boat to Thailand and then we were moved to the Philippines to a refugee processing center. I left Vietnam in February 1980 and arrived in the U.S. by November of that year.

I just saw my life slipping away, since there was no future in the jungle. My family had been forced into a new economic zone and our property and wealth were confiscated. My father was a high-ranking military officer for the South, so he was the enemy of the people. We were put in the jungle and I had to lead my brothers in cultivating the land. My father spent 15 years in a reeducation camp along with all the other officers.

We were lucky to be accepted by the US. A church in North Carolina sponsored me. Others weren’t accepted and had to stay in a refugee camp until they returned to Vietnam. The American policy was to find a sponsor to take in the Vietnamese refugees, not through the government, but through an NGO, usually a church. The refugees had to find churches to take us in, orient us, help us settle, and get us shots. The church that took me in was founded by Vietnamese-Americans in 1975.

I was baptized after I arrived. My family had no religious affiliations, so none of us had any problem converting to Christianity. The people in North Carolina were very friendly. They had fresh memories of the Vietnam War, so they were sympathetic. The Americans who welcomed me probably felt they had a debt to repay because the U.S. just left Vietnam so suddenly. Actually, my supervisor at my first job was a Vietnam War veteran. He understood me.

Since this country is a country of immigrants and refugees, the U.S. should accept Syrians. But there must be a process of doing things, like we had with the sponsoring churches. Having a clear plan would ease the angst in American people. The main difference between the resettlement of Vietnamese and of Syrians is religion. Vietnamese are Buddhist or ancestor worshippers, so we had no problem accepting Christian values. Muslim Syrians might have more trouble.

Tram Ho, internal medicine internist

I was captured when I was ten years old and put in prison because my dad was in the South Vietnam military, so we were singled out and targeted. I was separated from my parents and stayed with my three younger brothers in a cell with close to 70 or 80 other people. We were allowed one hour to breathe fresh air and to shower. There was nothing in the cell except a small toilet and concrete floor. I was in prison for two weeks until my parents paid to get me out.

We were discriminated against and couldn’t advance in society because of the stigma of being the children of the traitor or American ally. My father was put in a reeducation camp after April 30, 1975, like many other military personnel. After he was released, we planned to escape by boat.

I was thirteen when I managed to escape with my father and five siblings. My mother and one sibling stayed behind. After six days and five nights, we made it to Hong Kong and stayed there for six months to fill out paperwork. A Catholic nonprofit organization, USCC, or United States Catholic Conference, sponsored us and I arrived in 1982. We were settled into a halfway house for shelter. There were 50 other people there already, the majority from Vietnam. Two months later, my dad was able to find a job as an auto mechanic and we moved out to our own apartment with two other families.

I had pretty neutral responses from neighbors when I moved to the U.S. I don’t recall whether anybody had negative feelings towards us. We basically stayed home by ourselves and my dad worked two jobs, so we didn’t really interact with Americans anyway. When I started eighth grade, no one teased me or anything, but I also didn’t really talk to anybody because everything was so new. As a teenager, I was uncomfortable and scared.

Refusing refugees is not a new problem and that’s why the wave of the boat people stopped. The Vietnamese refugee wave stopped in early 1985 because the U.S. stopped accepting refugees too. My mom wouldn’t have made it if we weren’t already here. All the camps in Southeast Asia closed and didn’t accept any more Vietnamese escaping.

I feel for the Syrian refugees. Most of them are very nice people running away from hardship and war. But I understand that with the current situation now and the problem of terrorists disguising themselves as refugees, Americans can’t have open arms like they had with the Vietnamese refugees.

Trish Nguyen, senior branch manager at Boat People SOS

My dad worked for an American company and when the communists took over the South, they saw that my family supported the Americans and we were shunned. My dad didn’t work for a political company, so they put him in jail for six months. He was lucky. They kept a log of what our family did and kept tracking us.

We lived in a small town and we were very poor when I was young. We went to the field every day and tried to find something to eat for that day.

My aunt was American and brought my uncle back to the U.S. and we connected 17 years later. They sponsored our family in 1993. The first year when I came to the U.S., I was just trying to survive. I had to start over. I couldn’t go to school because I was working hard to have money for an apartment. My parents never worked and can’t speak English or drive. They live with me and I take care of them. My brother is still in Vietnam and when he asks me to visit, I say I’ll think about it, but I don’t think I’ll ever go back. It’s just bad memories there.

I graduated and am now the branch manager at Boat People SOS Houston. My wish came true and now I can help the people who were once in my situation. BP SOS helps with cases of domestic violence, elderly aid, welfare, human trafficking, et cetera.

There was a language barrier, but I worked hard, studied hard, and learned English. The Americans I met had good hearts, maybe because they had experience already with Chinese immigrants and others. In my opinion, I don’t think the U.S. will close their doors because this country has always welcomed refugees. There’s no reason to reject them. Other governments have never allowed foreigners in the way the U.S. does. God bless America—I can say that.

Kimberly Cooper, Children’s Ministry Coordinator at Trinity Episcopal Church

Trinity Episcopal Church is helping resettle a Syrian family now, actually. They’ve been waiting since 1998. In the early 80s, the church helped a Vietnamese family and again in the 90s. The congregation at the time was very supportive and eager to help. Outside the church, the community is still very comfortable.

I’ve been working in some way with the U.S. refugee program for almost 20 years and I’ve met some of my best friends through that program. I mean, they’ve even babysat my kids. These are Muslims and I trust them.

People are really just confused about the religion of Islam and there is a lot of lumping everyone into one bad corner. I haven’t heard a negative comment, but quite a few people have contacted me genuinely asking me about why I’m comfortable having Muslims here.

A local person running for office in Texas wrote a campaign comment about how it’s not okay to bring more Muslims into the country when the ones that are here aren’t assimilated. And I’m like, what do you mean by assimilation? What do you want to happen? Do you want them to all be white Christians? That’s not really an appropriate request for all Americans.

The post How the U.S. Sentiment Towards Refugees Shifted appeared first on Foreign Policy Blogs.

Despite a Neighborhood on Fire, Jordan Remains Stable

Wed, 28/12/2016 - 11:28

As the media focuses on the many crises in the Middle East, Jordan’s capacity to endure the instability next door is noteworthy. Yet the Hashemite Kingdom faces tough challenges at home and abroad that make its future precarious.

Despite regional turmoil testing Jordan’s borders and population, the Hashemite Kingdom has remained remarkably stable. The resource-deprived country has largely weathered Iraq and Syria’s instability to the north, Israel and Palestine’s tensions to the west, and Egypt’s restive Sinai Peninsula to the south. Under the leadership of King Abdullah al-Thani, Jordan has also endured the domestic dangers of a swelling refugee population as well as growing political and economic volatility.

Security reigns supreme

Central to Jordan’s stability is its exceptionally sophisticated national security enterprise. With a $1.5 billion military budget underwritten by Western aid, the Kingdom boasts some of the most elite special forces and counterterrorism units in the region. All this is bolstered by the Kingdom’s extensive mukhabarat, which identifies foreign and domestic threats by carefully monitoring the country’s regional situation while penetrating the deepest levels of Jordanian society.

Jordan’s security establishment has effectively deterred most of the region’s unrest from spilling over into its borders. The Kingdom plays a pivotal role in preventing foreign jihadists from entering or exiting the Syrian conflict through Jordanian territory, and leverages its military might as part of the U.S.-led coalition against ISIS and its affiliates in Iraq and Syria.

As instability has increased in the Middle East in recent years, U.S. military and police assistance to Jordan has grown accordingly, peaking at $662 million in 2016. The growing threat of ISIS and its affiliates also prompted a Pentagon-funded, $100 million program between Jordan and the U.S. defense contractor Raytheon to improve security along the Kingdom’s northern border.

King Abdullah of Jordan shakes hands with former U.S. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen

Although these measures have strengthened Jordan, they also have coincided with an intensifying threat environment. In June 2016, two terrorist attacks linked to ISIS were carried out near Syrian refugee camps in Baqa’a and al-Rukban, killing five Jordanian intelligence personnel and six Jordanian military members respectively. In December, gunmen presumably affiliated with al-Qaeda or ISIS also killed seven Jordanian policemen and two civilians in the southern city of Karak. The success of these attacks despite Jordan’s comparative advantages suggests that the Kingdom will face an increasingly fragile security situation in the short to medium term. This is more likely as ISIS and its affiliates’ priorities shift from holding territory to performing more traditional terrorist operations.

Containing the refugee crisis

Jordan has shouldered a swelling refugee population. The country plays host to 1.27 million Syrian refugees, which compose nearly 13% of Jordan’s population. Lack of resources and available opportunities in refugee camps have disadvantaged many Syrians, forcing them to find employment in criminal networks, militias fighting in Syria, or terrorist groups. This creates high rates of violence and sexual abuse in refugee camps, and further threatens Jordan’s security from within.

The refugee population also burdens the Kingdom’s already struggling economy. Jordan’s debt-to-GDP ratio is over 90%, and unemployment is around 16% with youth unemployment nearly double that. The refugee influx has further increased youth unemployment by 30% and has grown demand for basic commodities by 40%. The security risks linked to disenfranchised refugees have also shrunk Jordan’s vital revenue streams like tourism and external remittances.

The Kingdom has consequently depended on humanitarian aid from the United States, Gulf countries, and international agencies: the United States alone provided nearly $800 million for refugee assistance in 2015. While the combined aid flows have enabled Jordan to meet existing refugee-related costs to date, it will be increasingly difficult to meet the needs of  the country’s growing refugee numbers.

King Abdullah has continually stressed that job creation and foreign investment in Jordan can benefit the economy and the refugee situation more than direct aid. One promising initiative along these lines is a recent trade arrangement that incentivizes foreign companies to invest in Jordan and export products to Europe tariff-free if those companies derive at least 15% of their labor from Syrian refugees.

Another risk posed by the refugee crisis is that it has facilitated Jordan’s continuing reliance on short-term surges in foreign aid and investment, preventing the Kingdom from engaging in long-term, structural economic reform. As the country edges towards insolvency, Jordan must trim deficit-enabling redundancies in government, gradually wane unsustainable commodity subsidies, and improve ease-of-business measures for small-to-medium sized Jordanian enterprises—which make up 95% of Jordan’s private sector but are typically ignored by the government’s focus on initiatives for large and multinational enterprises.

Preserving power

Although Jordanian’s anxieties about their safety and finances are intensifying, the political system is fairly stable. The royal family is well-regarded, and the monarchy’s position is bolstered by the knowledge that the United States, Britain, and others need Jordan more than ever in a region wracked by various crises. King Abdullah has also maintained a firm grip on power since the 2011 Arab uprisings. Part of this is due to the monarchy’s clientelism; the King has recruited Bedouin leaders into military leadership and offered them monopolies on parts of the tourism trade. This has helped solidify tribal loyalty and maintain security in rural areas outside Amman.

Another source of the monarchy’s stability is the parliament. Most government power resides with the King, yet many Jordanians fault their elected officials for their economic gripes instead. In one recent survey, 87% of polled Jordanians were unable to name single positive achievement of the last parliament. The monarchy can accordingly deflect blame from itself, and even dissolve the parliament and call for elections to satisfy calls for political change—as it did in May 2016.

Yet politics is breeding unpredictability. Young Jordanians’ lack of economic opportunities and dissatisfaction with government has been repeatedly linked to support for Islamism in addition to Salafi-jihadism. Over a thousand Jordanians are estimated to be fighting for ISIS or al-Qaeda’s affiliate Jabhat Fateh al-Sham in Syria. Law enforcement’s strict crackdown on those who simply praise ISIS on social media further breeds an antagonistic relationship with government among Jordan’s disenfranchised youth.

King Abdullah seemed to consider this in the September 2016 parliamentary elections. These elections returned to bloc voting (last used in 1989), where voters could select lists of candidates prepared by political parties instead of having one vote per one candidate. The hope was that empowering political parties will make Jordan’s parliament more technocratic and less of a hostage to patronage and tribal ties.

The September elections also allowed Islamists to run, particularly from the political arm of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood – the Islamist Action Front. Unlike past Brotherhood messaging, the Islamist Action Front pushed a reformist brand instead of the standard, ‘Islam is the solution’ line. It also fielded contenders alongside women, Christian and minority candidates. This perhaps hints at coinciding goals for Jordan’s monarchy and Islamists. For Islamists, liberalizing their message could appeal broadly to a restive population and gain acceptance from Jordan’s leadership. For the monarchy, allowing Islamists in politics could generate legitimacy from disenfranchised refugees and the millions of devout Palestinians living in financial strain, all while tempering the more extreme Islamist ideologies among them.

Jordan will stay stable in 2017, but greater risks are present

Yet the election’s actual results were largely uneventful. Voter turnout was 37% compared to over 50% in 2013. Islamist candidates gained 15% of parliament’s lower house seats, but the legislature is still dominated by individuals with tribal affiliations or loyal to the monarchy.

While the monarchy could view the election results as a sign of stability, high voter apathy may also indicate widespread anti-establishment sentiment and signal greater political risk. Many young Jordanians—which make up 70% of the population—have been mobilizing and openly challenging the Kingdom’s political system. Deployed by a restive youth, these ideas—alongside emergent Islamism—could generate political volatility in the short to medium term.

While Jordan’s outlook remains optimistic, its situation looks increasingly risky for the coming year. As ISIS and its affiliates disperse through the region, the Kingdom’s deteriorating economic climate and testy political environment will produce an atmosphere that breeds insecurity from within the country’s borders. Containing these risks while addressing their causes will continue to be paramount.

This article was originally published by Global Risk Insights and written by  Azhar Unwala, an analyst for government and corporate clients based in Washington, D.C.

The post Despite a Neighborhood on Fire, Jordan Remains Stable appeared first on Foreign Policy Blogs.

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