Science Offers Peace-building Mechanism in South China Sea Dispute

March 5, 2017

James Borton & John W. McManus

 

Protecting marine environments and ensuring the ocean’s sustainability is a global issue that is vital for all life, and nowhere is this more important than in the South China Sea.

Extending across tropical and semi-tropical zones, this body of water offers an abundant and complex marine ecosystem.  However, the territorial claims among China, Vietnam, Taiwan, the Philippines, Malaysia, and Brunei in the South China Sea remain a serious threat to the political and ecological security of Southeast Asia. As such, environmental degradation remains at the center of South China Sea scientific policy conversations, and for an increasing number of policy shapers and scientists, there’s an urgent need to address acidification, biodiversity loss, regional impacts of climate change, coral reef destruction, and fishery collapses.

Enter science diplomacy. Defined by the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) as science being used to inform foreign policy decisions, promote international scientific collaborations, and establish scientific cooperation to ease tensions between nations, science diplomacy is a widely accepted method that environmental policy planners use to contribute to conflict resolutions and, for several decades, has been adopted as a diplomatic tool for peace-building by many countries. During the Cold War divide, scientific cooperation was used to build bridges of cooperation and trust.

Science diplomacy is not a completely new approach to international relations, and, at the moment, has raised two important questions in efforts to successfully settle the South China Sea dispute, namely: Should we do it? And will it work?

The answer to both is, “yes.”

Science diplomacy helps directly and indirectly promote confidence-building among the parties involved in the South China Sea dispute, offering a much-needed strategic pause in rising regional tensions. The probability that science diplomacy can successfully manage the South China Sea dispute is quite high because of timing, creditability, and the potential for support from major powers. It offers more advantages than not in terms of economics, politics, social responsibility, and beyond. Most importantly, there’s already a rising tide of cooperation in the exchange of data and information, consensus on the value of marine protected areas, and an increase in joint research expeditions.

There are strong ties among scientists across Southeast Asia and China, partly due to a series of international scientific projects, conferences, and training workshops, such as those associated with the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization’s South China Sea Fisheries Development and Coordination Program from the mid 1970s to the mid-1980s. Informal “Track 2” working groups and associated fieldwork throughout the 1990s and up to the early 2000s included many regional scientists and their projects aimed at promoting peaceful joint resource management in the South China Sea. The UNEP and Global Environment Facility sponsored a South China Sea environmental analysis and management project from 2002 to 2009, and efforts are underway to initiate a follow up project. Other such confidence-building activities are under discussion.

These proposed science collaborative measures are essential in the face of the rampant overfishing and coral reef degradation that has occurred across the South China Sea, in part because the conflicting territorial claims have made ecological analyses and management actions difficult. There are strong indications of impending collapses of fisheries and potential species extinctions. Given the fact that the South China Sea hosts a large proportion of known marine species, including threatened giant clams, sea turtles, and marine mammals, there is no time to waste.

The prospect of a fisheries apocalypse in the South China Sea should weigh heavily on all claimant nations, all of which rely on fish protein to feed a burgeoning population of roughly 1.9 billion people. Challenges around food security and renewable fish resources are fast becoming a hardscrabble reality for more than fishermen. In 2014, the Center for Biological Diversity warned that it could be a scary future indeed, with as many as 30 to 50 percent of all species possibly headed towards extinction by mid-century.

Nevertheless, it’s encouraging that Chinese scientists have been engaged in science diplomacy in polar regimes for the past three years. This includes cooperative fishing regulations research and especially their participation multilateral diplomacy efforts in the central Arctic Ocean. Although Beijing’s role is still limited, they are preparing to play a substantial role in good governance in the Arctic.

Despite the intractable SCS sovereignty issues, and difficulties in securing permissions for environmental field work, even in non-disputed areas, a focus among regional scientists on environmental protection and fishery issues may prove far less difficult than problems in the Arctic.

Science diplomacy seems quite affordable for all claimant countries. In fact, while it is hard to draw an exact comparison of the expenditures a government provides for other ways of solving the South China Sea dispute, science diplomacy would prove very cost effective. Because military and economic initiatives, especially the transformation of reefs into military outposts, unlike scientific ones, are often seen as the actions of one country protecting its sovereignty and is directly related to national defense, any non-state actor’s involvements are inevitably sensitive subjects and considered inappropriate.

The key is to encourage international scientific cooperation. Through joint marine research surveys, the region’s scientists can provide policymakers with the data and information they need to make informed and responsible decisions in the South China Sea.

Science initiatives are more widely accepted as efforts to solve global issues that require contributions from all players in the international relations arena. This not only makes science diplomacy-related initiatives financially possible, but also leads to broader dissemination of results and enhances their impacts on policy decision-making and capacity-building on the regional level.

Most SCS states have adopted marine protected areas to address present and future environmental issues, and there are plans to include areas that fall within disputed waters. Existing MPAs play important roles in the development of the marine economy; they improve the livelihoods of coastal fishing communities and also serve as an excellent directed science policy model. If sovereignty concerns could be set aside in treaties implementing freezes on claims and claim-supportive activities, as has been done in the Antarctic, these and other natural resource management tools could be used far more effectively to secure fisheries and biodiversity, and also to promote sustainable tourism.

Secondly, science diplomacy is a safe and neutral approach to international relations for all governments. While economic or military cooperation requires strong consideration for signs of foreign policy direction, scientific cooperation is much more neutral, even in conflict-torn countries, since they can cooperate with each other in scientific projects “to affirm and to improve human life” without worrying about misleading the international community about their foreign policy orientation or invoking domestic anger because of shaking hands with the “wrong partners.”

Finally, science diplomacy serves essential needs in the lives of human beings. While other types of diplomacy tend to only solve issues at the state level, like sovereignty or territorial integrity, the science research cooperation in the South China Sea aims at a more “down-to-sea” approach, namely ensuring that fishers can fish safely, marine products for human beings are unpolluted, and marine resources are protected correctly.

Looking at science diplomacy from a broader perspective, it provides collateral benefits to resolving the South China Sea dispute. Last year, Fidel V. Ramos, the former president of the Philippines (1992-1998), and a member of the ASEAN Eminent Persons Group stated that environmental cooperation could promise to bring about “mutually beneficial efforts to improve tourism and encourage trade and investment, and to promote exchanges among think tanks and academic institutions on relevant issues.”

Science diplomacy offers a peace-building mechanism for South China Sea scientific advisors to demonstrate their roles as “resource analysts, trend spotters, science communicators, and applied-policy advisors.”

With natural resource politics steering the South China Sea narrative, science diplomacy offers the dual hope of protecting coral cathedrals, marine habitats, and fish species, and it can serve as a peace-building model for similar environmental conflicts elsewhere.

Russia’s Trojan Horse Strategy in Europe

October 21, 2016

Theodoros Papadopoulos

 

Analogies between Greek mythology and contemporary Greek politics come easily these days. If Greece’s financial crisis was akin to the hubris of Daedalus flying too close to the sun before crashing disastrously to Earth, Athens’ current role in abetting Russian interference in European politics surely lends itself to a comparison with the siege of Troy and the wooden horse filled with saboteurs who opened the city gates, allowing it to be overrun by its enemy. Only in the modern setting, the Trojan Horse would be filled not just with Greeks, but with a host of European discontents from Italy to Hungary who seem poised to gift Vladimir Putin the keys to Europe.

The lack of unity in the EU response to Russian support of Bashar al-Assad’s forces in the Syrian civil war is the latest manifestation of discord between Europe’s hawks and doves when dealing with Russia. Although the EU’s 28 foreign ministers did come to an agreement on a statement condemning Russia’s air campaign over Aleppo as “clearly disproportionate” and “the deliberate targeting of hospitals, medical personnel, schools and essential infrastructure” as possible war crimes, the bloc’s bid to enact further sanctions against Russia fell through on October 20. Besides Greece, Cyprus, and Hungary have also voiced opposition to new sanctions, as has Italy, which has broad economic ties with Moscow and was the star participant at this year’s Sankt Petersburg International Economic Forum – Russia’s Davos.

That the EU should be so riven by disagreement at a time when the Kremlin is upping the ante against the West to alarming levels is a cause for serious concern. Not since the depths of the Cold War have relations been so fraught between Moscow and Western capitals that troop movements and nuclear threats are commonplace in Europe’s political landscape, and yet that is exactly the situation we find ourselves in today. Nuclear-capable Iskander-M missiles being moved into the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad, within easy range of Poland and the Baltic states and with further modification, Berlin; NATO battalions and British soldiers being sent to the region as a deterrent; and regular incidences involving Russian fighter jets entering European airspace with RAF jets beings scrambled in response. All evidence of how rapidly relations have deteriorated since Russia’s annexation of Crimea in the early stages of the Ukraine crisis.

An equally worrying development which has flown somewhat under the radar concerns the construction of a Russian- built nuclear power station in the Belarusian district of Ostrovets near the Lithuanian border. Rosatom, the Russian state nuclear energy agency responsible for the power plant’s design and construction, has been accused of being a tool for Russian nuclear diplomacy and a means by which Moscow can exert political pressure abroad, much as it does with its gas and oil pipelines. Only in the case of nuclear energy, the stakes are even higher and in the particular case of the Ostrovets plant there are a number of reasons for extra concern. The list of worries catalogued by the Lithuanian government regarding the project is long, and includes the plant’s location in an area of seismological activity, the lack of an aircraft crash assessment for commercial airliners as well as the failure to perform stress tests of any kind on the facility. Should a Fukushima style event unfold, the Lithuanian capital would lie within the evacuation zone, with cities as far away as Stockholm and Berlin also suffering from the fall-out.

Remarkably, even as Russia adopts such a belligerent stance, Southern EU states such as Greece actively continue to seek out partnerships with Russia, highlighting the success of its two-pronged approach to divide European opinion. A case in point is Athens’ expressed interest in a new pipeline project to transport Russian gas into Europe even after a previous project slated to pass through Italy and Austria was abandoned in the wake of the Ukraine crisis. Yet even more unsettling is the claim made by French president Francois Hollande that Alexis Tsipras personally asked Putin if the Greek government could print Drachmas in Russia should it be forced out of the Eurozone.

However, compared to the close ties fostered between the Kremlin and Hungary’s Viktor Orban or France’s Marine Le Pen, Greece is only a minor offender. And in a US presidential race that has been nothing short of shocking, arguably the most shocking thing of all has been the sight of a potential US president refusing to condemn, or even countenance criticism, of what appears to be direct Russian interference in the election.

While Russia appears to be playing Europe off the field in terms of political strategy, there is some light on the horizon for European interests in the form of a new pipeline interconnector between Bulgaria and Greece. The pipeline will allow gas to flow to Europe from central Asia without passing through Russia. Welcome as this development is, especially if it will result in bringing Greece more firmly back into Europe’s fold and out of Russia’s embrace, it is, all things considered, a small victory in a new Cold War, which on many scores, Russia is winning.

Great Power Competition in the Balkans Heating Up

November 7, 2016

Jasmin Ademovic

 

Hillary Clinton will need to dedicate more time to Bosnia and the Balkans than any president since Bill Clinton. While the prospect of renewed conflict in Bosnia remains relatively low in the short term, the former Yugoslavia republic has become another proxy battle between the West and Russia. Under a Clinton administration, this is likely to intensify, made more complicated by overlapping British, German, and Turkish interests in the Balkans and in relation to Russia.

While Yugoslavia disintegrated between 1990 and 1995, engulfed in two bloody wars in Croatia and Bosnia, Russia was experiencing its own difficulties with the break-up of the USSR and subsequent economic collapse. Russia under Boris Yeltsin largely avoided engaging in Yugoslavia, instead deferring to US and European objectives and leadership.

Putin has done the opposite in recent years, awakening Russian and Serbian dreams of a pan-Slavic link between Russia and its Orthodox Christian cousins in the Balkans. Russian relations with Serbia have generally been limited to political and diplomatic support such as the July 2015 veto of a UN Security Council Resolution that would have classified the July 1995 Srebrenica genocide as genocide and condemned genocide denials. Russia, however, stops short of major investments or extensive military cooperation with Belgrade. Somewhat akin to the Russian-Ukrainian relationship, the pro-West factions within Belgrade are pursuing membership in the European Union as well as possible NATO membership. While Putin might well privately support their EU membership for the opportunity to have a Trojan horse with veto power to block anti-Russian policies, he will fight against NATO membership.

Meanwhile, tensions have increased in Bosnia , where the war-ending Dayton Agreement, which also framed the dysfunctional constitutional order, has been undermined by Milorad Dodik, the ultra-nationalist Serb leader of the Republika Srpska entity, which enjoys partial autonomy within Bosnia-Herzegovina. Despite attempts by the international community and Bosnia’s Constitutional Court to stop him, Dodik went ahead with (and won) his long-threatened referendum on whether January 8th (an Orthodox Serb religious holiday) would also be classified as the National Day of Republika Srpska. It is seen as a precursor to a second referendum in 2018 on independence for the RS from Bosnia. At that point, tensions will be at their highest with a high probability of conflict as the majority Bosnian Muslims would be left with little choice but to defend the territorial integrity of their country, while an ever decreasing minority — Bosnian Croats — are likely to exploit the situation to form their own breakaway entity in the Herzegovina region.

While Serbian Prime Minister Aleksander Vučić has fallen in line with British, German, and American demands in opposing the increasingly confident Dodik and his nationalist rhetoric, including not supporting the referendum, Dodik continues with his ultra-nationalist stance thanks to the support of Vladimir Putin. The Russian president has increased his presence in the RS over recent years, celebrating the Slavic/Orthodox link between Russians and Serbs and using Dodik as an agent of chaos in the Balkans. It forms part of Putin’s strategy: firstly to expand and protect Russia’s sphere of influence and presence, and secondly, to ferment problems for the West, especially the EU. The referendum result undermines the viability and power of the central government in Sarajevo, which then feeds into Dodik’s push for secession. The short-term economic and political instability and the medium-term potential for conflict naturally create problems on the EU’s periphery and undermines the now German-led project to expand the European Union, while at the same time strengthening Russia’s position and bargaining power.

The western Balkans has been left under the supervision of the European Union for the past 10 years, which perhaps explains why there has been limited economic and political progress in the non-EU states of Serbia, Bosnia, Kosovo, and Macedonia. By its very nature, the European Union is not the best conduit for instilling order and advancing necessary reforms — divergent and, at times, diametrically opposed member state objectives and alliances make a forceful common policy difficult to implement.

In Montenegro, the October 16 general election returned the pro-West governing party, the Democratic Party of Socialists, to power with 40% of the vote despite losing their majority. The vote had been a litmus test on whether the country would continue with Western integration. Such steps are likely to continue, with NATO membership, which was already on offer, the most likely route toward neutralizing Russian involvement and influence in Montenegro. This would then increase the pressure for neighboring Serbia and the RS in Bosnia to move further toward Western integration.

A Trump presidency, however, remains a possibility. Such an outcome would complicate the situation further if Trump follows through on adopting a detached and isolationist foreign policy. The US would likely cease to be a major player in the Balkans going forward, leaving the Balkans for Russia, Turkey, Germany, and the United Kingdom to fight over.

Turkey maintains its interest in the Balkans, especially in Bosnia and the Muslim region of Sandzak that straddles both Serbia and Montenegro, on account of its history as the old imperial power. However, the interplay between German and British objectives is of significant interest in relation to their respective Russia policies and to each other. The UK has demonstrated a strong pro-Serbian bias since the 1870s during a string of Orthodox Christian uprisings in Serbia, Bosnia, and Bulgaria against the Ottoman Empire and the ensuing Great Eastern Crisis of 1875–78. This continued throughout the decades, including providing support to the royalist (and Nazi collaborator) Chetniks during World War II before shifting its support to Tito’s Partizans.

For London, the great strategic threat in the Balkans has been Germany, in addition to the traditional threats posed by Russia and Turkey. Before the Serb monarchy was abolished in 1945 Britain and Germany had vied for direct influence over the two Serb dynasties that ruled Serbia and the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. While the Obrenović monarchs looked to Berlin, the Karađorđević line would lean toward London. British support for the 2015 UNSC Resolution over Srebrenica should partially be viewed as a British attempt to reassert influence over Belgrade, at Berlin’s expense.

British support for the Milošević regime’s attempts at maintaining Yugoslavia in the early 90s, with more centralized power in Belgrade — in effect creating a Greater Serbia — was grounded in London’s desire to maintain a strong, unified Yugoslavia, over which it would hold influence. Such a Yugoslavia would act as a bulwark to a then newly unified Germany positioned to be the leading European power that would drive the European Union project. Germany’s historic influence over Slovenia and Croatia would, in turn, be diminished while a large, unified Yugoslavia would neutralize German dominion over the Balkans and act as an additional check on German leadership across the continent.

Germany’s push for the recognition of Slovenian and Croatian independence and European Community’s initiatives to install a peacekeeping force and a no-fly zone over Croatia as the war intensified throughout 1991 was juxtaposed to the British strategy. London initially led from the back by blocking recognition, making it clear that intervention would not occur and instead implementing a containment strategy. Helped by Washington’s willingness to defer to Britain’s judgement, London would eventually take the initiative by leading peace negotiations, gaining French support and pushing through a UN arms embargo, which guaranteed Serbia’s continued military dominance.

The end of the Cold War had threatened British force projection and influence on the world stage. Its geopolitical status was set to become commensurate with its economic status, in turn bringing an end to its role as the leading European power and most reliable American ally. A continent increasingly dominated by Berlin and Paris, pursuing deeper integration, would have left Britain on the fringes of decision making and influence. By adopting the stance they did between 1990–1992, the British were able to neutralize any hope of a common European foreign and security policy and preserve their independence and dominant status within Europe.

In 2017, British foreign policy is likely to adopt a similar strategy in its attempts at maintaining its geopolitical status post-Brexit. Having increased pressure and rhetoric over Russia throughout 2016 they will be looking to a Clinton presidency to cement their leading position as the US’ most useful ally in Europe and geopolitical supremacy. It is a pattern that plays out repeatedly, with the foreign policy establishment unable and unwilling to let go of their position on the world stage. The importance placed on the renewal of Trident was a clear sign of such sentiment.

However, the UK’s Balkan and European foreign policy objectives are dependent upon the supposed threat posed by Putin. Foreign Minister Boris Johnson called for war crimes investigations over Russia’s bombing of Syria, with French President Francois Hollande echoing those words, leading to the cancellation of a Putin-Hollande meeting.

Moreover, British Prime Minister Theresa May has made it clear that London will continue to play a leading role in European Union affairs until Brexit is finalized. While this is partly a bargaining tactic to force European concessions, lest the UK were to create a stalemate on a host of issues, it will predominantly be centered on foreign policy issues — both to stifle a German dominated foreign policy stance and to protect its own position. Part of the strategy will involve continuing David Cameron’s role in maintaining EU sanctions against Russian banks, energy companies, and weapons manufacturers, in addition to leading Kremlin figures, as demonstrated by a failed British and French attempt to implement further sanctions over Russia’s bombing of Aleppo during a recent EU summit. The pre-existing sanctions will, however, remain in place, particularly as NATO prepares to deploy tank and infantry divisions across the Baltics.

Britain does not have the capability to go it alone, especially against Russia, which is partly why it turns to France for support. A secondary aim is to distance France from Germany. In the event of a Clinton presidency, the United Kingdom will see its close ties to Belgrade as a key element in preserving British influence, power and utility to Washington within the context of stifling Russian influence in the Balkans. London holds disproportionate influence and power in NATO and will, therefore, push the Balkan states toward NATO membership and not necessarily EU membership, which would benefit Germany.

London will also understand that Hillary Clinton will seek to preserve Bill’s legacy in the Balkans. The Dayton Agreement and Bosnia’s territorial integrity cannot be threatened. Additionally, the US and Europe cannot afford increased tensions or the outbreak of war in Bosnia over the coming years, requiring them to neutralize the threat Russia and Dodik present. Clinton’s strong and hawkish anti-Putin policy is clear — she will adopt a more confrontational stance in Syria, Ukraine and the Balkans.

Conversely, a Trump presidency would almost certainly strengthen Russian influence in the Balkans, jeopardize Britain’s position as the leading anti-Russian European power and make a joint British and French soft power strategy in the former Yugoslav republics more likely. The present complexities of the situation will be multiplied. A Trump victory would also increase Turkish hopes of reclaiming its imperial influence in the region, particularly in Muslim-majority Bosnia-Herzegovina, Sandzak and Kosovo. A full-scale American withdrawal would leave Bosnian Muslims completely reliant on Turkish support going forward. Russian interests in the Balkans are largely ad hoc and superficial and so the possibility exists, however small, for Ankara to exploit its improved relations with Moscow to bring about an agreement over spheres of influence.

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration has intensified a clandestine war in Somalia over the past year, using Special Operations troops, airstrikes, private contractors and African allies in an escalating campaign against Islamist militants in the anarchic Horn of Africa nation.

 

Hundreds of American troops now rotate through makeshift bases in Somalia, the largest military presence since the United States pulled out of the country after the “Black Hawk Down” battle in 1993.

 

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The Somalia campaign, as it is described by American and African officials and international monitors of the Somali conflict, is partly designed to avoid repeating that debacle, which led to the deaths of 18 American soldiers. But it carries enormous risks — including more American casualties, botched airstrikes that kill civilians and the potential for the United States to be drawn even more deeply into a troubled country that so far has stymied all efforts to fix it.

 

The Somalia campaign is a blueprint for warfare that President Obama has embraced and will pass along to his successor. It is a model the United States now employs across the Middle East and North Africa — from Syria to Libya — despite the president’s stated aversion to American “boots on the ground” in the world’s war zones. This year alone, the United States has carried out airstrikes in seven countries and conducted Special Operations missions in many more.

 

American officials said the White House had quietly broadened the president’s authority for the use of force in Somalia by allowing airstrikes to protect American and African troops as they combat fighters from the Shabab, a Somali-based militant group that has proclaimed allegiance to Al Qaeda.

 

In its public announcements, the Pentagon sometimes characterizes the operations as “self-defense strikes,” though some analysts have said this rationale has become a self-fulfilling prophecy. It is only because American forces are now being deployed on the front lines in Somalia that they face imminent threats from the Shabab.

 

America’s role in Somalia has expanded as the Shabab have become bolder and more cunning. The group has attacked police headquarters, bombed seaside restaurants, killed Somali generals and stormed heavily fortified bases used by African Union troops. In January, Shabab fighters killed more than 100 Kenyan troops and drove off with their trucks and weapons.

  

United States Marines advancing in Mogadishu, Somalia, to quell violence in 1993, about seven months before the “Black Hawk Down” battle.© Corinne Dufka/Reuters United States Marines advancing in Mogadishu, Somalia, to quell violence in 1993, about seven months before the “Black Hawk Down” battle.  The group carried out the 2013 attack at the Westgate mall, which killed more than 60 people and wounded more than 175 in Nairobi, Kenya. More recently it has branched into more sophisticated forms of terrorism, including nearly downing a Somali airliner in February with a bomb hidden in a laptop computer.

 

About 200 to 300 American Special Operations troops work with soldiers from Somalia and other African nations like Kenya and Uganda to carry out more than a half-dozen raids per month, according to senior American military officials. The operations are a combination of ground raids and drone strikes.

 

The Navy’s classified SEAL Team 6 has been heavily involved in many of these operations.

 

Once ground operations are complete, American troops working with Somali forces often interrogate prisoners at temporary screening facilities, including one in Puntland, a state in northern Somalia, before the detainees are transferred to more permanent Somali-run prisons, American military officials said.

 

The Pentagon has acknowledged only a small fraction of these operations. But even the information released publicly shows a marked increase this year. The Pentagon has announced 13 ground raids and airstrikes thus far in 2016 — including three operations in September — up from five in 2015, according to data compiled by New America, a Washington think tank. The strikes have killed about 25 civilians and 200 people suspected of being militants, the group found.

 

The strikes have had a mixed record. In March, an American airstrike killed more than 150 Shabab fighters at what military officials called a “graduation ceremony,” one of the single deadliest American airstrikes in any country in recent years. But an airstrike last month killed more than a dozen Somali government soldiers, who were American allies against the Shabab.

 

Outraged Somali officials said the Americans had been duped by clan rivals and fed bad intelligence, laying bare the complexities of waging a shadow war in Somalia. Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter said the Pentagon was investigating the strike.

 

Some experts point out that with the administration’s expanded self-defense justification for airstrikes, a greater American presence in Somalia would inevitably lead to an escalation of the air campaign.

 

“It is clear that U.S. on-the-ground support to Somali security forces and African Union peacekeepers has been stepped up this year,” said Ken Menkhaus, a Somalia expert at Davidson College. “That increases the likelihood that U.S. advisers will periodically be in positions where Al Shabab is about to launch an attack.”

 

Peter Cook, the Department of Defense spokesman, wrote in an email, “The DoD has a strong partnership with the Somali National Army and AMISOM forces from Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda and Burundi operating in Somalia. They have made steady progress pressuring Al Shabab.”

 

 

 

The ruins of the Jazeera Palace Hotel in Mogadishu last year. The Shabab claimed responsibility for the fatal bombing.© Feisal Omar/Reuters The ruins of the Jazeera Palace Hotel in Mogadishu last year. The Shabab claimed responsibility for the fatal bombing.  The escalation of the war can be seen in the bureaucratic language of the semiannual notifications that Mr. Obama sends to Congress about American conflicts overseas.

 

The Somalia passage in the June 2015 notification is terse, saying American troops “have worked to counter the terrorist threat posed by al-Qa’ida and associated elements of al-Shabaab.”

 

In June, however, the president told Congress that the United States had become engaged in a more expansive mission.

 

Besides hunting members of Al Qaeda and the Shabab, the notification said, American troops are in Somalia “to provide advice and assistance to regional counterterrorism forces, including the Somali National Army and African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) forces.”

 

American airstrikes, it said, were carried out in defense of the African troops and in one instance because Shabab fighters “posed an imminent threat to U.S. and AMISOM forces.”

 

At an old Russian fighter jet base in Baledogle, about 70 miles from the Somali capital, Mogadishu, American Marines and private contractors are working to build up a Somali military unit designed to combat the Shabab throughout the country.

 

Soldiers for the military unit, called Danab, which means lightning in Somali, are recruited by employees of Bancroft Global Development, a Washington-based company that for years has worked with the State Department to train African Union troops and embed with them on military operations inside Somalia.

 

Michael Stock, the company’s founder, said the Danab recruits received initial training at a facility in Mogadishu before they were sent to Baledogle, where they go through months of training by the Marines. Bancroft advisers then accompany the Somali fighters on missions.

 

Mr. Stock said the goal was to create a small Somali military unit capable of battling the Shabab without repeating the mistakes in Afghanistan and Iraq, where the United States spent hundreds of millions of dollars trying to build up large armies.

 

Still, American commanders and their international partners are considering a significant expansion of the training effort to potentially include thousands of Somali troops who would protect the country when African Union forces eventually left the country.

 

Maj. Gen. Kurt L. Sonntag, the commander of the American military’s task force in Djibouti, the only permanent American base in Africa, said the proposed training plan would increase and enhance the Somali national security forces, including the army, national guard and national police.

 

“The specific numbers of forces required is currently being assessed,” General Sonntag said. He added that it must be large enough to protect the Somali people but “affordable and sustainable over time, in terms of Somalia’s national budget.”

 

Independent experts and aid organizations say the Somali Army is still largely untrained, poorly paid and poorly equipped, and years away from coalescing regional militias into a unified army.

 

American policy makers tried to avoid direct involvement in Somalia for years after the Black Hawk Down episode. But in the years after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, Special Operations troops and the Central Intelligence Agency began paying Somali warlords to hunt down Qaeda operatives in the country.

 

In 2006, the United States gave clandestine support to Ethiopian troops invading the country to overthrow an Islamist movement that had taken control of Mogadishu. But the brutal urban warfare tactics of the Ethiopian troops created support for an insurgent movement that called itself Al Shabab, which means “The Youth.”

 

American involvement in Somalia was intermittent for several years afterward, until the Westgate attack refocused Washington’s attention on the threat the Shabab posed beyond Somalia.

 

The Shabab still control thousands of square miles of territory across Somalia. A Somali university student who travels in and out of Shabab areas said the group’s fighters were becoming increasingly suspicious, even paranoid, checking the phones, cameras, computers and documents of anyone passing through their territory, constantly on guard for another American attack. He said Shabab fighters were becoming younger, with a vast majority under 25 and many as young as 10.

 

American law enforcement officials think that the bomb that nearly brought down the commercial jet in February was most likely made by a Yemeni who is believed to have constructed other laptop bombs in Somalia. Pictures from an airport X-ray machine show the explosive packed into the corner of the laptop, next to a nine-volt battery. Several aviation experts said that the bomb was obvious and that airport security officials in Mogadishu might have intentionally allowed it through.

 

The bomb exploded about 15 minutes after takeoff, punching a hole through the fuselage and killing the man suspected of carrying the bomb on board, though the pilot was able to land safely. Aviation experts said that if the bomb had exploded a few minutes later, with the cabin fully pressurized, the fuselage would have most likely blown apart, killing all of the approximately 80 people on board.

The Decline of Democracy in the West

August 16, 2016

Andre Ishii

 

After the implosion of the Soviet Union the day after Christmas in 1991, there was a wide recognition among many analyst-prognosticators of international trends that the flowering of liberal democracy was the global wave of the future. (Liberal democracy characterized by values such as freedom of expression, religion, and speech as well as separation of civilian-run government from the military.)  Roughly three months shy of the decade anniversary after the Soviet collapse, the 9/11 terror attacks dramatically reversed whatever democratic trends there were in the 1990s – admittedly a decade full of civil wars and ethnic cleansings in various regions throughout the planet.  New security strategies and policies were enacted in the West, especially in the United States, telling examples being the consolidation of security agencies into the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), intrusive search practices implemented by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), and the clandestine National Security Agency (NSA) dragnet surveillance program PRISM.

This trend in militarization of domestic policing – and establishing its accompanying security economy – has been analyzed by many in the past 15 years.  The late French social theorist Michel Foucault noted a certain phenomenon he called the ‘boomerang effect’ where various state doctrines and technologies experimented abroad in context of war or colonial administration were oftentimes implemented domestically later and then globalized.  A recent example of this is the use of the Simera, a balloon-based aerial surveillance technology developed by Logos Technologies for the US forces engaging in the wars in Afghanistan and in Iraq, during the 2016 Rio Olympic Games. Meanwhile the French government has renewed the state of emergency after the Nice attack (July 14), extending it for another six months into January 2017, which has pointed out by the Human Rights Watch (HRW) as having some potential for abuse against rule of law and civil liberties if implemented with unaccountability by the national executive.

Needless to point out that this post-9/11 trend of executive expansion hasn’t been contained just among the so-called ‘Western’ states.  The 9/11 terror blasted a shockwave that reverberated throughout the world, altering security and legal structures in many states, both Western and non-Western.  The shock was geopolitically capitalized by the totalitarian government of the People’s Republic of China, which has been resisting liberal democratic principles in the name of ‘civilizational diversity.’  Beijing used the incident as a pretext to crack down on its independence-minded Uighur Muslim populations in its western periphery.  This issue surrounding Islamic extremism in East Turkestan/Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region has taken a new dimension not only with activities of al Qaeda but also with the rise of the terror organization Islamic State (IS).  The current climate has the potential for not only recruitments and inspiring the formation of new terror networks, but also even secessionist Islamist statelets.

Alexander Cooley, director of Columbia University’s Harriman Institute, has extensively noted that Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) – particularly those that work to promote liberal democracy and counter election corruptions – have also come under suppression by various states around the world as extensions of foreign powers (whether those accusations are legit or not will not be made the issue here), in attempt by those states to preserve sovereignty and prevent meddling in its domestic affairs.

While the illiberal regimes attempting to preserve its legitimacy isn’t surprising – and is rather expected – it’s pressing to note that this growth of cracks in the principles of liberal democracy in the West is not limited to post-crisis state policies and legal enactments, but also within the minds of the general national citizenry.

The July 2016 issue of the Journal of Democracy, an internationally-recognized academic quarterly specializing in the analysis of the state of democracy around the globe, ran a sobering article concerning some degrading trends of liberal democratic principles in the West.

According to an analytical piece written by Roberto Foa and Yascha Mounk entitled The Danger of Deconsolidation, basing their analysis on data compiled by The World Values Survey (WVS) between 1995 and 2014, there are several trends to be concerned about if the principle of liberal democracy is to be passed down in the coming decades, noting that citizens have not only become more critical of their politicians, but also that of liberal democratic system itself:

• There is significantly less emphasis given to importance of living in a liberal democratic state, especially by those born after 1980. Devotion that we saw in the past generation to democratic principle is less strong. According to Foa and Mounk, support for freedom of speech has decreased as well. (One comes to mind the internationalization of the “Hate speech laws” in recent decades, whereas the Western states used to see free expression as a human right, according to Jacob Machangama, a lecturer on international human rights at the University of Copenhagen).

• Emphasis on key civil rights and values, as well as idea of using liberal democratic institutions to implement social change (civic engagement), have gone cold, on both sides of the North Atlantic. Although civil protests and boycotts still abound, these have generally declined overall as well.

• Emphasis on importance of free and fair elections has waned in the West, especially among those born after 1980. Foa and Mounk note that this is opposite of what can be observed in other parts of the world such as China, India, and the MENA regions.

• This item is directly linked to our above discussion in the context of post-9/11 political-security trends: Foa and Mounk note that there is a rise in support for illiberal, authoritarian military regime systems, also with those born after 1980. Even those populations with wealth have become increasingly supportive of instituting military rule if the government functions with incompetence. They comment that the “rising support for illiberal politics is driven not only by the disempowered, middle-aged, and the underemployed. Its vocal supporters can also be found among the young, wealthy, and privileged.”

Even a quick view of the US presidential election climate of the past year suggests that there have been a “radicalization” of the strategies, policies and methods used by various candidates to secure victory for the White House.  From the populist camp (from ever-controversial fire-breathing Trump to unabashedly socialist Sanders) to the establishment camp (Clinton, who essentially had fixed victory with the Democratic National Convention), the entire process has been described as the no-holds barred “ugliest election” in modern American history.  This also can be extended to attitudes and actions taken by general public supporters and critics of the various candidates, starting with legitimization of violent anti-Trump protests by an editor at the left-leaning media outlet Vox (who was subsequently suspended).  Meanwhile, violence that we have witnessed at Trump rallies by Trump supporters should be condemned as well.  There also was series of intense protests against Clinton by the pro-Sanders faction after the fixed nature of the Clinton victory at the Democratic National Convention came to light.

We seem to be witnessing a lack of the stability that is usually associated with liberal democracy, at least what has been promoted through civics textbooks.  It is often explained that this trend rises from distrust of traditional and establishment democratic institutions to the politicians who control them, leading to support of non-typical establishment candidates who would hopefully reform the system for the better.  Results of the research by Foa and Mounk suggest that there is something of a deeper undercurrent of cynicism and suspicion against liberal democratic process itself, unable to deliver what various constituents want, brewing underneath the chaos we have been witnessing more recently.

Political systems are complex, especially ones like liberal democracy where the mass population is involved in governance.  It is dependent on varying internal factors of the states implementing it.  Democracy is far from the perfect system it often is portrayed to be, and unfortunately may not necessarily be best for preserving stability for every demographic around the world, especially when the state in question has high tensions with multi-ethnic or multi-religious sub-groups.  It should not be forgotten that it has enabled monsters to grab the levers of national power (think of the rise of Adolph Hitler).

Democracy is messy.  It requires a competent, functioning civil society before polling sites can be opened, a harsh lesson that many of us saw after the 2003 Iraq War.  Meanwhile, liberal democratic principles have in many instances allowed for fuller human individual potential to be unleashed, with free market of ideas and civil institutions available to be adopted by the general public without state coercion in many cases.  If the policies and ideas are debated with rigor according to this free market of ideas, instead of the simple whim of the governing figures or sound bites issued from demagogues (either those of Right or Left), it may potentially prevent short-sighted policies from damaging domestic societies even when implemented with the best of intentions.  If we intend to have liberal democratic principles passed along to coming decades, warnings issued by Foa and Mounk on the rise of illiberalism in the West should not be ignored.

As the world shifts its focus away from military action, the economic realities once again take center stage to present the coming global crisis.

 

Refocus on Deterrence Needed in a Golden Age of Proliferation

February 4, 2016

Greg Lawson

In light of the recent North Korean nuclear detonation and the recent nuclear deal negotiated by the Obama administration and Iran, questions regarding proliferation are as urgent as ever.  As we clearly are entering a “Golden Age of Proliferation,” the right response may prove politically unsatisfying and unpopular.  It is time to get serious about nuclear deterrence strategy again while jettisoning an obsessive focus on non-proliferation.

North Korea, and to a lesser extent Iran, give tremendous evidence that we are entering a new, uncharted time; a dawning of a true “Golden Age of Proliferation.” This concept is clearly not lost in the security field. Paul Bracken has been describing how to confront the “Second Nuclear Age” for some time. Other works have raised this alarm in recent years too, including the well received RAND monograph from the late French thinker Therese Delpech.  Despite this legitimate interest, there is far too little attention being devoted to deterrence.  Rather, there is an obsessive focus on non-proliferation and even pie in the sky notions such as “Global Zero.”  It’s as if with the end of the Cold War, deterrence theory has gone into a near hibernation and what policy does exist runs too often on autopilot.

However, before embarking too far down the path on deterrence, it is imperative to understand why this “Golden Age of Proliferation” is emerging.

In one sense, it is remarkable that proliferation has been as limited over the past decades as it has been.  President Kennedy’s Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara once anticipated eight nuclear power states within a decade.  Clearly that did not happen.  In fact, the pace of proliferation has consistently been slower than most pessimistic analysts forecasted.  However, with nine clear nuclear weapon states today (US, Russia, Great Britain, France, China, India, Pakistan, Israel, North Korea) and one that could move in that direction quickly (Iran), proliferation, despite its slow pace, has nonetheless been real.  It has also shifted from super and major powers like the U.S. and the Soviet Union to include much weaker states, with Pakistan and North Korea being prime examples.

As the world continues to confront fears of global warming, nuclear power will continue to be important. Though it is clearly possible to limit proliferation of material required for weaponization, it is not clear that sufficient precautions will be universally followed.  Thus, the concerns of “breakout” as a nation may, under the guise of a purely civilian nuclear program, step to the threshold of possible weaponization are valid.

Second, one must consider the status that nuclear arms convey on the world stage. While most experts would no doubt argue that the key to nonproliferation is the need to delegitimize the acquisition of nuclear weapons, this is evidently not happening in the case of North Korea.  It is also debatable how this will impact Iran over the medium to longer term.

Third, we know there has been a willing market in trafficking for nuclear materials.  The notorious Pakistan-based Khan network is unlikely to be the last to operate.

Finally, as U.S. power declines in a relative sense on the global stage, one of the keys to limiting proliferation, namely U.S. security guarantees, is also eroding.  This could easily prompt actors facing security dilemmas in their region to re-evaluate the need for a nuclear deterrence.  Though both India and Pakistan are already nuclear weapons states, there is a robust debate about increasing tactical nuclear weapons in Pakistan.  Given this is where the Khan network originated, no one can be sanguine about the implications.

The tipping point has already been reached.

With respect to the most recent North Korean provocation, what sane policymaker really expects regime change to work?  While the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal may call for this, prudent leaders know there are no good solutions.  Backing Kim Jong-un into a corner is more, not less likely, to lead the regime into making radical decisions.  Similar “regime change” rhetoric may well have led to some of Bashar al-Assad’s greater brutalities is Syria.  It is probably not wise to tempt a regime like that in the Hermit Kingdom with which we have even less insight.

The Iran nuclear deal also looms large.  Despite the deal and the recent turnover of uranium to Russia, covert breakout remains a legitimate option for Iran.  Once sanctions are relieved, the difficulties of them being “snapped” back are significant.  Additionally, Iran’s recent ballistic missile tests show they are not giving up on the development of delivery mechanisms.

A military response by either the U.S., or more likely Israel, will do little more than “mow the grass” and delay, rather than eliminate, the fundamental problem. Iran now has the knowledge base it needs to step up to the nuclear threshold.  It should also be recalled that that Iran was seeking nuclear technology long before the 1979 revolution as the Shah of Iran had a desire for them.  Further, as with the North Korean example, a policy of actual regime change is likely to further drive Iran along the path at even more rapid pace.  With both Russian-Western tensions as well as those between the Sunni Arab world and Iran, the amount of damage that could be wreaked is serious.

In two key regions, East Asia and the Middle East, we are entering a time of shifting stability. If the U.S. weakens its position in East Asia in the face of these challenges, the potential for at least Japan, despite being the only nation ever to thus far suffer a nuclear attack, to reverse its present courts and embrace a deterrent capability cannot be discounted.  Further, cascading proliferation in the Middle East is a distinct possibility.  The chances that especially Saudi Arabia and Egypt will sit back in the new strategic environment is hard to fathom, especially as the U.S. shifts its regional security role to more of an offshore balancer.

Nuclear weapons are here to stay. The genie is out and will not go back into the bottle.

 

Assessing Risks to Stability in Africa

This is your source for statistical data for nearly every country in Africa and around the world. In addition to statistics, historical, economic, and political conditions are available.

 

 

The Obamas’ Africa Opportunity

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  President Barack Obama’s trip to Africa this month was focused on the pressing issues of economic growth and investment, democratization, and the next generation of African leaders.

• The itinerary of the Africa trip—Senegal, Tanzania, and South Africa—highlights key priorities and challenges for U.S. policy

• President Barack Obama’s trip to Africa this month is focused on the pressing issues of economic growth and investment, democratization, and the next generation of African leaders.

• Yet a central element for achieving those goals is missing from the list—advancing the health and empowerment of women and girls. The Obamas have an opportunity to make this trip historic by explicitly committing the United States to focus on women and girls as a key pathway to progress for Africa. But will they seize it?

  The president and first lady can speak powerfully to African and global audiences on these issues. On January 30, President Obama issued an unprecedented presidential memorandum on advancing gender equality and empowering women and girls globally, calling it “one of the greatest unmet challenges of our time.” For many who worried that the energy and commitment that former secretary of state Hillary Clinton brought to those issues might dissipate with her departure, this high-level statement was most welcome. Many have also wondered whether Michelle Obama herself might become a champion for global women’s issues in the second Obama term, building on her support for women and girls in the United States.

  The Africa trip provides a timely opportunity to rejuvenate the administration’s commitment to women and girls in Africa and around the world. Growing evidence demonstrates that investments focused on women and girls—maternal health services, voluntary family planning, access to HIV services, education for girls, economic empowerment for women, and preventing and responding to gender-based violence—are not only critical to improving health outcomes, but produce substantial positive returns in poverty reduction, development, and economic growth.