by Daniel Korski | Jun 9, 2008 | Conflict and security, Influence and networks
Simon Jenkins has a good piece in the Sunday Times about the decreasing willingness to contemplate humanitarian intervention. The humanitarian creed, he says:
can no longer override considerations of state sovereignty and the natural caution of diplomats and generals.
While opposing every intervention known to man, Jenkins goes on to lament:
This noble cause has vanished in the wind. Almost before it is put to the test it is gone. The failure to intervene in Darfur and the deference shown to the dictators of Burma and Zimbabwe indicate a pendulum swinging fast in the other direction.
It is not hard to see why the negativity. The West has failed to intervene in Burma and ships are now being forced to return after waiting in vain. The EU military mission in Chad was originally conceived by French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner as a repeat of the U.S safe zone created in the Kurdish areas in Iraq. But instead of a mandate to go into Sudan, it has had to sit on the Chadian side of the border. Problems, of course, plague missions in Iraq and Afghanistan while Kosovo refuses to solve itself.
But Ivo Daalder and Robert Kagan argued against this pessimism in the Washington Post last year.
America has frequently used force on behalf of principles and tangible interests, and that is not likely to change.
The duo behind the League of Democracies, remind readers that the U.S has intervened between 1989 and 2001 with significant military force on eight occasions — once every 18 months. This interventionism, they go on, has been bipartisan — four interventions were launched by Republican administrations, four by Democratic administrations. The implication: interventionism is here to stay. It is as much a part of international politics as state sovereignty.
I have to say I agree with Daalder and Kagan. The West is only temporarily numbed by recent failures, as well as being logistically constrained because of troop overstretch. True, in Europe few governments seem willing to spend the necessary funds on the required military and civilian capability. True, the U.S electorate is in a particularly sour mood, to the extent that more Europeans now support democracy-promotion than Americans.
But this will pass. And once a new U.S president begins a draw-down in Iraq – a policy I expect from both Senators McCain and Obama – and surge in Afghanistan – again something to expect form both – the balance of sentiment will be re-calibrated in favour of intervention.
However, we need a re-definition of interventionism, a Chicago speech for the new post-Iraq millennium. And David Milliband is the man to give it, in my view.
by Richard Gowan | Jun 2, 2008 | Climate and resource scarcity, Conflict and security, North America, Off topic
I was recently hiking in Putnam County, NY, a charming slice of hill country on the Hudson made famous by a musical about a Spelling Bee. I picked up the Putnam County News and Recorder, an old-fashioned newspaper with old-fashioned stories like “Sloop Club Strawberry Festival Serves Up Shortcakes and Sails” and “Heritage Funeral Home Allegations Unproven Says Owner”. But I was struck by the signs of resource scarcity in small (if admittedly liberal, Obama-signs-everywhere) town America. Here are some article openings from the 21 May edition:
The Putnam County Legislature’s Physical Services Committee implicitly acknowledged the financial impact that rising fuel prices are having on the county when, during its May 13 meeting, it heard a presentation on alternate fuels and ways of reducing the ever-escalating costs of heating the county’s buildings.
Water is perhaps our most precious natural resource. All life is dependent on a supply of clean water. And whether you are an average resident changing the oil in your car or a developer constructing several new houses – you have a legal obligation to ensure that your activities do not jeopardize the quality of water in area streams – and ultimately in the Hudson River. That was the gist of a presentation made at a meeting on May 14 at Cold Spring.
Gasoline continues to be a subject of considerable interest in and around the Village of Cold Spring – and not only because consumers are paying more than four dollars to purchase one gallon of regular at area pumps. At the meeting of the Village Board, Trustees passed a resolution requiring Mayor Anthony Phillips to submit expense claims documenting mileage incurred on Village business in order to be reimbursed.
It’s a sort of Olde Worlde Resilience, I guess. And good to see. Although most Putnam residents are probably most concerned about exactly how Olde Worlde their local 1970s-vintage nuclear power station is, especially as it has a “history of problematic performance”. This week it’ll be testing its 156 emergency sirens – a temporary system, it transpires, while a new one is sorted out. Reassuring.
UPDATE: for thoughts on why this post makes me look like a fool, look here.
by Richard Gowan | Jun 1, 2008 | Climate and resource scarcity, Conflict and security, Cooperation and coherence, Europe and Central Asia, Global system, Middle East and North Africa
On Saturday Bernard Kouchner showed why he’s Europe’s Coolest Foreign Minister by swooping into Nasiriya, Iraq, just after a shoot-out to offer reconstruction aid. Part of me thinks “about time” given that (as I pointed in January) French aid to Iraq has been pretty piffling to date. But this gesture provides timely proof of a trend that Daniel and I highlighted in a piece on the ECFR website on Thursday: the emergence of a new consensus in Europe on the need to do more for Iraq.
European diplomats have privately admitted for some time that they could not ignore Iraq forever. But in recent weeks, private talk has given way to public statements. A visit by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to Brussels in April proved a catalyst: the European Commission trumpeted its desire for “an energy security partnership”.
Getting from private to public statements is a step forward. Shifting from rhetoric to real engagement in Iraq will be an even bigger one. What such engagement will look like is uncertain but parts of it are clear. More, better-targeted aid? Yes. Assisting UN mediation? Yes. Support for what Barack Obama calls a “diplomatic surge” across the Middle East? Absolutely. New troops? Not a chance.
Regular readers may faintly recall that I’ve banged on about this whole EU-Iraq thing before, picking up on a February report from the European Parliament that advocated greater engagement. It is actually one of the few issues on which the authors of this blog fundamentally disagree, as evidenced by a somewhat tipsy argument on the topic between Alex and I at Odeon some months ago. Alex thinks (as far as I can recall) that the EU isn’t relevant to Iraq, and shouldn’t try to be. Daniel and I think that it has do more, partially for humanitarian reasons but also to avoid Middle East meltdown and improve post-Bush transatlantic links.
Up until the start of this year, making this case was a rather lonely business (although I should immediately add that there have been people making it far longer than I – Richard Youngs published a great paper on the subject back in 2005, for example). But it is finally getting traction among the commentariat.
Check out Pierre Schori’s piece for ECFR and (as it’s not just people involved with ECFR that believe this stuff) this Guardian online op-ed by Berlin’s Thorsten Benner. And Guido Sternberg of SWP, also in Berlin, has said wise things on the subject for Der Spiegel online. OK, that’s not exactly a flood of commentary in favor of all-out support for Iraq, but it’s a start. I’ll keep you updated as it grows.
UPDATE: our ECFR piece has now received various comments, one of them linking to this interesting online symposium on why Iraq is a European security issue, published late last year. Good stuff.
by David Steven | May 21, 2008 | Climate and resource scarcity, North America, UK
I am at the New America Foundation this morning, where David Miliband is due to ‘discuss the challenge of promoting Western style liberalism, democracy, civil society development in a world that in some corners views the word “democracy” suspiciously.’ The event will be streamed live here.
This is Miliband’s opportunity to connect with a younger audience in Washington. The meeting has been set up by the British Council, as part of its TN2020 network. I moderated the network’s first event in Berlin just before Easter, while Alex and I wrote an essay on climate for the TN2020 book. The intro:
The climate problem is now urgent enough to be a major determinant of the transatlantic relationship. In the wake of Bali, we are promised summits and shindigs galore as the world struggles to agree a global deal to replace Kyoto. This will keep climate at the top of the political and news agenda.
But if a global deal is signed in 2009, the fun will only just have started. Greenhouse gas emissions will need to be slashed by at least half, and probably much more, by 2050. Rich countries will be expected to make deep cuts almost immediately. A colossal and unprecedented economic realignment will therefore be needed. It’s a huge task. So how will Europe and the US fare on this shifting terrain?
The warm-up act is Andrew Sullivan, über-blogger and hawk turned hardcore Obamafan, and absolutely charming in person. He’s talking about the way that – in the new media age – the British and American media audience are merging, with southern England a centre left or centre right ‘blue state’. “I often feel my blog is better understood in London than it is in certain parts of the United States,” he says.
But then Miliband arrives and Sullivan is shuffled off the stage. Introduced by the Washington Note’s Steve Clemons (and our host) as ‘primarily a blogger’, Miliband sits on the table and talks without notes.
He starts with the much-stated, but seldom practised, point that the new diplomacy needs to meld state-to-state relations, economic integration, and the ‘new public diplomacy’ – the mobilisation of non-state audiences.
The great causes in international relations are far from dead, he says, focusing on four challenges. Can we build strong communities across race and religion? Can we take on the conflicts that blight people’s lives? Can we stabilise the global climate? And can we build stronger and more effective international institutions?
Miliband argues that the problems of globalization will be solved by extending globalization. The world needs to tackle its problems through more internationalism not less.
I suggest that the major challenge for globalisation is the combination of rising expectations with limits to strategic resources (food, energy, emissions etc – it’s now a familiar list). What impact will the politics of scarcity have on the international system?
Miliband’s response (with apologies for the paraphrase – hard to type while nodding attentively):
We are living through an unprecedented triple crunch of credit, food and fuel. The common denominator is between food and fuel is carbon dependence. Climate change closes the circle. The key question is whether we can get on a lower carbon trajectory or not. If we don’t, the conflicts that people fear are a real danger.
So, yes, we share an analysis – but I suspect that, collectively, the world is far from having the answers…
by David Steven | May 21, 2008 | Influence and networks
Yesterday’s Brooking’s event on the US and Europe (see this post) included three panels – one on the Presidential election; one on the French EU presidency; and one on Russia.
The Presidential panel combined general rejoicing at the imminent (243 days and counting) departure of George Bush (“somewhat less popular in Europe than Satan”) with caution that expectations may be too high at what will follow.
Gary Schmitt, from the American Enterprise Institute, who advises McCain, thought that Republicans had become much more realistic about the need for transatlantic ties. McCain’s speech at the Munich Conference on Security Policy got a plug (and not just from Gary, but from other speakers too):
The debate in the transatlantic relationship – over who is to lead and who to follow, whether to act in concert or unilaterally, or if the bonds that unite us are stronger than interests that divide us – that debate is over. Our interests, though not always perfectly congruent, are rarely diverging.
The Obama narrative, meanwhile, is ‘deeply attractive’ to Europeans, according to Laurence Freedman, currently promoting his new book, on American and the Middle East – A Choice of Enemies. The Bush administration was forever tarnished in European eyes by Guantanamo Bay, Iraq Abu Ghraib, he said. At a time when Europe is populated by a cast of ‘weak leaders’, a new President will have the opportunity to make a clean break from the past (close Guantanamo) and generate real leadership for the US. (more…)
