In a recent book review essay in the New York Review of Books, military historian Max Hastings cites a passage from Nicholas Stargardt’s “The German War” (Basic Books, 2015) to explain why Germans continued to “close ranks around Hitler” even after it became obvious that their country was going to lose the war.

The argument Stargardt offers and that Hastings finds persuasive is this: If Germans lost the war, they knew that “retribution must follow” and that this retribution “seemed likely to be annihilatory.” Consequently, Stargardt says, faced with the prospect of defeat,

“Neither Nazism nor the war itself could be rejected, because Germans envisaged their own defeat in existential terms. The worse their war went, the more obviously ‘defensive’ it became. Far from leading to collapse, successive crises acted as catalysts of radical transformation … Major disasters like Stalingrad and Hamburg did indeed lead to a catastrophic fall in the regime’s popularity, but they did not in themselves call patriotic commitment into question.”

(This quotation is given in Hastings’ “Why the Germans Closed Ranks around Hitler,” New York Review of Books, October 22, 2015, p. 29.)

Stargardt’s insight may be instructive for analyzing what is happening and is likely to happen in Russia today under Vladimir Putin in three ways. First, it explains why the Kremlin increasingly casts the struggle between Russia and the West now in apocalyptic terms, talking about supposed Western plans to dismember Russia.

Second, it explains why many Russians even those opposed to Putin’s policies will continue to express support for him as the symbol of their statehood. It is not just that Russian liberalism “ends at Ukraine.” Russian liberalism may end at the thought that Russia itself is at stake. (On this, see Aleksandr Shiropayev at kasparov.ru/material.php?id=56B1A86B15E8F).

And third, it explains why despite all the challenges he now faces or more precisely because of those challenges as he and his propagandists define them, Putin may be able to retain support far longer than many expect – and do so by playing this apocalyptic card, as dangerous as that ultimately is for Russia and the world. Indeed, it may even explain some of the outrages his regime commits.

By Luis Durani*

September 11th changed the trajectory of history. The attacks began what appears to be war campaign with no end in sight. While the initial operations against Afghanistan was justified and supported by the international community, the direction of the campaigns afterward was both financially imprudent and unproductive to an extent.

As the Afghan campaign began winding down with the defeat of the Taliban, it was abruptly interrupted with a new front, Iraq. With the US’ attention diverted towards Iraq, the Taliban were defeated but not eliminated. The invasion of Iraq was partly goaded on by Osama Bin Laden. His modus operandi was to engage the US and elicit a response in the form of a long-term campaign . His desire was to bankrupt the US through the War on Terror. With the September 11th attacks costing Al Qaeda approximately half a million dollars , their bet has perhaps resulted in the largest return ever . The current approach in executing the War on Terror is leading to large costs for the US. Al Qaeda’s desire to bankrupt the US has resulted in the biggest short of history.

What Happened

A short position is defined as the “sale of a borrowed security, commodity or currency with the expectation that the asset will fall in value ”. In other words, shorting is wagering that a firm or in this case a country will fall in value over time.

After 9/11, the American security paradigm transformed due to fears of another attack on the US. The Bush administration began implementing new measures to ensure security of the homeland. The drums of war also began to beat. But as the public and administration were caught up in the fog of war and revenge, the intent of the terrorist attacks were lost on many. Bin Laden was fully cognizant his ill-equipped team of terrorist could not stand a chance against the strongest military in history but his desire was that such a provocation would be the catalyst for his grand plan.

Shortly after the initiation of the Iraq War, Bin Laden released a tape outlining the group’s long term strategy, “We are continuing this policy in bleeding America to the point of bankruptcy .” Yet this proclamation was disregarded by many. In 2004, the national debt was at $7 trillion Dollars , today it stands at approximately $19 trillion Dollars and terrorism appears to becoming more widespread.

Although the Taliban were routed, they were not eliminated. The group found safe havens in the tribal regions of Pakistan. Instead of pursuing and eliminating the Taliban and Al Qaeda’s leadership, the United States decided to begin a new front against terrorism in Iraq. This is where the strategy began to go astray. Another conventional war added more to the national debt. These campaigns were not being paid for directly but being accrued to the debt.

Aside from the fact that the war in Iraq turned out to be ill-planned and launched under a false pretense, it was not a cheap affair. The Iraq War has cost the American taxpayers about $2 trillion Dollars but is estimated to rise to approximately $6 trillion Dollars in the next few decades . The Afghan War, which officially ended on December 31st, 2014 (but is still ragin on) has cost the American taxpayers about $1 trillion Dollars . The long term cost of that war will grow in the next few decades as well. Just the two campaigns alone can end up costing American taxpayers around $10 trillion Dollars, leave alone the additional covert wars, battles and drone strikes being carried out under the banner of the War on Terror . With the terrorist attacks of 9/11 costing half a million Dollars, the return on investment for Al Qaeda is about 20 million to 1 (without accounting for inflation). This simple analysis is not accounting for the cost and grief that is endured by the families and friends of those who died in the wars. That is a price that cannot be measured.

Was It Needed

The September 11th attacks brought a new enemy to the forefront, Muslim radicals. There is no doubt that pursuing Al Qaeda in Afghanistan was the correct course. The front in Afghanistan should have been the first and perhaps last conventional engagement in the War on Terror. But the Bush administration pursued a policy of “Transformational Diplomacy “; promoting democratic reform through hard power. Not only did the Iraq War create a major financial burden, it bogged American troops, resources and attention from the actual war of eliminating Al Qaeda in Afghanistan.

The invasion of Iraq created a power vacuum and opened the flood gates for foreign terrorists to enter the country. The extremists took root in a once secular nation, which began to fissure along sectarian lines. The combination of war, foreign extremists who fueled the embers of sectarian violence, and a newly disenfranchised segment of the population (Sunnis) spawned a new terror group; ISIS. Today, ISIS has eclipsed Al Qaeda in terms of threat as well as barbarity. The war in Iraq opened a Pandora’s Box of terrorism and allowed for all these radicals to emerge and establish a network in a place they were essentially nonexistent prior to the invasion. The Iraq War is one of the largest foreign policy mistakes ever in American history and a major factor behind the instabilities that are currently being witnessed across the region .

Aside from the initial conventional war in Afghanistan, all the other campaigns against terrorist targets should have focused more on smart power rather than purely hard power. The United States’ military is second to none but a hard power centric strategy was not ideal. A combination of both soft and hard power would have allowed the US to win hearts and minds as well as eliminate the root of terrorism. The War on Terror should have focused more on building intelligence networks and capabilities, limited engagements throughout the globe with Special Forces and/or drone strikes, as well as building better regional coalitions to defeat local menaces. This approach would have been a less costly affair than the current strategy that is employed where conventional war is used and supplemented by these other tactics. As demonstrated by the false premise behind the Iraq War, underestimation of ISIS’ threat and drone strike statistics , the US’ intelligence capabilities with regard to the War on Terror have not been optimal and in some cases have created more terrorism rather than eliminate it .

Conclusion

Now almost 15 years after 9/11, the world appears to be much more unstable and dangerous than on the onset of this campaign. Since then the US national debt has almost quadrupled with the debt to GDP ratio at 100% . Such levels are unsustainable to say the least. The War on Terror has caused the US to become financially insolvent, is this what Bin Laden’s grand strategy was? Is this why he prodded the US into war in Iraq, knowing two fronts will create a quagmire? The continuous enflaming of sectarian violence by Al Qaeda in Iraq appears to have spilled over into other countries of the region, which are engulfed in civil wars along sectarian lines now. Was it all worth it, can it have been done cheaper and better, no one will ever know; hindsight is 20/20.

About the author:
*Luis Durani is currently employed in the oil and gas industry. He previously worked in the nuclear energy industry. He has a M.A. in international affairs with a focus on Chinese Foreign Policy and the South China Sea, MBA, M.S. in nuclear engineering, B.S. in mechanical engineer and B.A. in political science. He is also author of “Afghanistan: It’s No Nebraska – How to do Deal with a Tribal State.” Follow him for other articles on Instagram: @Luis_Durani

Source:
This article was published by Modern Diplomacy

By Loredana Vuoto

A current proposal by a federal agency has raised concerns that doctors may be punished for believing that there are only two genders, rooted in biological sex.

The proposed rule, issued by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, says that it is aimed at banning discrimination against transgender individuals under the Obama administration’s Affordable Care Act.

Section 1557 of the Affordable Care Act cites decades-old federal laws that prohibit any individual from being denied benefits or discriminated against in any health program or federally funded activity on the basis of race, color, nationality, sex, disability and age.

However, the Office of Civil Rights is now interpreting “sex” to include “gender identity” and “sex stereotypes.”

The consequences of this change could be wide-reaching.

The proposed regulation defines “sex stereotypes,” in part as “expectations that gender can only be constructed within two distinct opposite and disconnected forms (masculinity and femininity), and that gender cannot be constructed outside of this gender construct (individuals who identify as neither, both, or as a combination of male and female genders).”

Gender identity is defined as “an individual’s internal sense of gender, which may be different from an individual’s sex assigned at birth.”

As a result, doctors and medical institutions could be penalized – or even forced out of business – if they are not willing to perform or facilitate sex reassignment surgeries and other “gender transition” treatments for individuals who identify as transsexual.

Critics of the suggested regulation say that it is a radical proposal that could result in severe penalties for doctors who cannot in good conscience comply.

Jonathan Scruggs, legal counsel with Alliance Defending Freedom, called the proposed regulation an “unparalleled overreach by bureaucrats who want to advance a specific agenda.”

“Everyone knows that under Title IX, sex means biological sex,” he told CNA. “HHS has exceeded its authority and is going against the intent of Congress.”

“The government should not be in the business of trying to redefine sex,” Scruggs said. “HHS is supposed to apply the law faithfully, not go beyond the terms of the law.”

Roger Severino, director of the De Vos Center for Religion and Civil Society at The Heritage Foundation, questioned the impact that the rule could have on religious liberty and rights of conscience.

“(W)hat about an individual’s moral convictions and religious freedom?” he asked. “Will they be respected and preserved?”

Apart from religious beliefs, many doctors oppose sex reassignment surgeries for medical reasons. Statistics show that individuals who have these surgeries can face serious psychological consequences and are at a significantly higher risk of suicide.

Once a pioneer in sex reassignment surgery, Johns Hopkins University has since ended the practice, finding that it was actually damaging to those who undergo it.

If finalized, the proposed regulation would be binding on all health insurers that offer plans under the Affordable Care Act, including those participating in health insurance exchange plans.

The regulation would also apply to approximately 133,000 health care facilities, all state Medicaid programs, all private insurers that receive federal funding, as well as almost all physicians in the United States who accept some form of federal reimbursement.

Failure to comply could result in a loss of government funding and other legal penalties.

“The authority for the government to revoke funds for health facilities and doctors that do not comply is vast,” said Severino. “So many health facilities and doctors would be run out of business because their business model is based on government funding.”

“They would be hit very hard,” he stressed. “Practically all of them would suffer millions of dollars in losses if their funding was cut.”

Doctors who refuse to conduct gender reassignment treatments and surgery because of their religious beliefs, personal convictions, or for other medical reasons could risk losing their job.

“If a hospital is threatened with the loss of millions of funds, you would expect them to fire any person who does not comply,” said Severino. “Hospitals will not want to be sued, so the easy way out is to fire anyone who disagrees with the mandate and jeopardizes their funding.”

“But therein lies the conflict,” he continued. “This mandate threatens religious liberty because it forces individuals to choose between violating their conscience or risk losing government benefits or their job.”

Legal experts believe that legal challenges against the proposed regulation could be successful in the courts.

“It is unconstitutional for religious doctors and health facilities to be forced to violate their beliefs,” said Scruggs. “No federal court has ever said that sex includes gender identity or sexual orientation.”

“Individuals who refuse to comply with this mandate will have recourse under the First Amendment and under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act,” he added.

This is not the first time that the Affordable Care Act has stirred up controversy surrounding religious freedom.

In recent years, hundreds of plaintiffs have filed lawsuits against the federal contraception mandate, which was issued under the Affordable Care Act and requires employers to offer health insurance plans covering contraception, sterilization and some drugs that can cause early abortions.

The Supreme Court ruled against that mandate as it applies to closely-held for-profit companies in 2014. Another case involving numerous non-profits that object to the mandate on religious grounds will be heard by the court this year.

“The Obama administration is hostile to religious freedom,” said Severino. “We have seen this with Hobby Lobby and the Little Sisters of the Poor.”

“Now the administration is trying to advance a specific gender ideology that redefines what it means to be a man or a woman,” he said. “This gender ideology will result in discriminating against people who believe that a person’s biology is something to be respected rather than something that should be treated as a disease.”

The place where Jesus was baptized in the Jordan River was officially declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO on Feb. 2.

The baptism site, officially called “Bethany Beyond the Jordan” (Al-Maghtas) (Jordan), is situated on the eastern bank of the River Jordan, nine kilometers north of the Dead Sea.

UNESCO’s announcement ceremony in Paris was attended by a delegation from Jordan, including Archbishop Maroun Lahham of Medaba, the patriarchal vicar for Jordan.

Fides reported that Archbishop Lahham described the site as, “a place where the voice of Christ still resounds” in Jordan and that it was considered “a quiet and safe place in the middle of a Middle East in flames.”

“The Gospels said it 2,000 years ago, popular devotion has always confirmed it, archaeological researches have highlighted it, four popes have visited it, and today the international community will declare it officially … that Jordan is in the Holy Land. The Holy Land also and above all includes Jerusalem, Bethlehem and Nazareth, but Jordan is not the less holy,” Archbishop Lahham said, according to Fides.

UNESCO noted the archaeological site consists of two distinct areas: Tell Al-Kharrar, also known as Jabal Mar-Elias (Elijah’s Hill) and the area of the churches of Saint John the Baptist near the river.

Situated in a pristine natural environment the site is believed to be the location where Jesus of Nazareth was baptized by John the Baptist.

UNESCO noted that the area features Roman and Byzantine remains including churches and chapels, a monastery, caves that have been used by hermits and pools in which baptisms were celebrated, testifying to the religious character of the place. The site is a Christian place of pilgrimage.

President Hassan Rohani scored a major foreign policy success in his 5-day tour of Europe that yielded numerous contracts worth billions of dollars and also underscored Iran’s security symbiosis with Europe. Accompanied by a dozen cabinet ministers and some 120 trade delegation, Rohani toured Rome and the Vatican before arriving in Paris for a two-day official visit that was hailed by the French media as a timely Iran-France rapprochement; without doubt, the stage is now set for other European countries to follow suit, e.g., Sweden has expressed the readiness of its banks to finance economic and industrial projects in Iran.

Having fulfilled its nuclear obligations under the accord known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which entered its implementation phase in mid-January, Iran has now entered the “post-sanctions” era that will hopefully usher in rapid economic development, in light of a recent study (by the Euler Hermes group) that projects a respectable 4% percent growth in 2016. Although hampered by the continuing low oil prices and a slow re-engagement with Iran by the Western financial institutions, the government’s economic projections focus on the expansion of foreign trade and a boon in joint investment with foreign firms as key economic implications of this new era, highlighted by the whopping 600 billion worth of MoUs signed between Iran and China during the one-day Tehran visit of China’s President, Xi Jinping, on January 23rd.

In Italy, Rohani rejuvenated the Iran-Italy ties by inking deals worth $18 billion, including a $5.4 billion contract with the pipeline company Saipem to build a 1,800 Km pipeline and to upgrade the refineries in Shiraz and Tabriz, a $6.2 billion deal with the Italian steel giant Danieli, and a similar $4 billion contract with the infrastructure development firm Condotte. The Italian Prime Minister hailed these as merely the prelude to deeper relations: “We have signed the first accords but we are only at the start of a long road.”

Europe’s warming to Iran, blessed by Pope’s embrace of Rohani in the Vatican, then reached a new milestone during Rohani’s Paris visit that resulted in the following agreements:

• Iran committed to the acquisition of 118 Airbus aircraft, a contract valued at $ 25 billion that will be distributed among the shareholders of the consortium which include the French, German and Spanish.
• PSA Peugeot Citroën agreed to invest 400 million euros over five years in a joint venture with Iran Khodro, its traditional partner in the country, aiming to produce 200,000 cars per year;
• Total will buy up to 200,000 barrels per day of Iran’s crude oil, according to its CEO, Patrick Pouyanné;
• The giant Bouygues Construction, in partnership with the manager of the Paris airports (ADP), received a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for the extension of the Imam Khomeini International airport outside Tehran;
• The construction group VINCI Concessions announced the signing of a MoU on the renovation, expansion and operation of airports in Mashhad and Isfahan;
• SNCF announced the signing of a protocol of cooperation with Iranian Railways (RAI) in four areas including station operations and development of high-speed lines.
• The pharmaceutical group Sanofi signed a MoU with the Iranian Ministry of Health on strengthening existing partnerships with Iranian manufacturers, participation in prevention programs of certain diseases and aids that Iran could lead epidemiological research;
• Suez, the giant water management and waste, signed a framework agreement with the National Water Company (NWWC) in the areas of cooperation in water and its treatment;
• The CMA CGM shipping company signed a MoU with the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines to exchange or rent space ships, operate joint maritime and cooperate on the use of port terminals;
• Richel, a manufacturer of agricultural and horticultural greenhouses, signed a MoU with Iran on the implementation of 50 hectares of high-tech greenhouses;
• The construction group VINCI Concessions signed a MoU with Iran on the renovation, expansion and operation of airports in Mashhad and Isfahan.

The above-mentioned wide-ranging deals simply illustrate the overall appeal of the Iranian market, widely billed as one of the top “emerging markets” in the new post-sanctions milieu. Evan Canada, which unilaterally broke diplomatic ties with Iran, has expressed its openness to restore ties and to lift sanctions on Iran in a “timely fashion” so as to allow Canadian companies join the race to re-enter the Iranian market — “because if other countries move before us, it’s not a way to help our industry,” to paraphrase Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. A big, and pertinent, question is of course whether not the US, which led the multilateral nuclear negotiations with Iran, will follow suit, in light of the existing non-nuclear US sanctions on Iran that continue to shut Iran’s doors to US companies?

Lessons for US’s One-Dimensional Iran Policy: Search for an Economic Diplomacy

In a recent article, American-Iranian Council (AIC ) President Hooshang Amirahmadi has drawn parallels between US’s current Iran policy and US’s post-war Vietnam policy, which squandered opportunities for US business due to late engagement. Unfortunately, history is repeating itself and it requires bold political leadership in Washington to draw the right lessons from both the past errors as well as the present wave of Iran’s re-integration in the global market highlighted by the above-mentioned Asian and European contracts with Iran.

Incremental US steps, such as positive signals by the White House, the U.S. Treasury, and the State Department, can be catalytic in stimulating an expansion of US-Iran trade, in light of the JCPOA’s paving the way to US subsidies overseas to do business with Iran. Eventually, however, the main existing barriers, such as Iran’s inclusion in the State Department’s list, must be removed in order to unblock the US corporate access to Iran.

Fact is that Iran today is a bulwark of anti-terrorism and has much in common with US vis-à-vis the threat of Islamic State (Daesh), Taliban, narco-traffic, and the like. The existing differences between the two countries, such as with respect to Lebanon’s Hizbollah or human rights, do not need to entirely disappear before Tehran and Washington embark on the economic dimension of a “reset.” Hypothetically, the US can continue to exert pressure on Iran on these issues, diplomatically and otherwise, under a revised scenario marked with simultaneous growth in ‘economic interdependence’. An important prerequisite here is a cognitive US re-imaging of Iran, as an anchor of regional stability and a cooperative partner in regional crisis-management, instead of as an enemy pure and simple.

Unfortunately, as illustrated by the new US visa restrictions (adversely affecting businessmen of other nations doing business with Iran), Washington still harbors the illusion of retarding the tsunami of global business interest in post-sanctions Iran. Yet, clearly as Rouhani’s successful trip to Europe has demonstrated, the US is increasingly the lone exception in the West that continues the dysfunctional self-sanctioning – that harms the US’s own economic interests. Hopefully, Europe’s red carpet for Rouhani and the multi-billion dollar deals above-mentioned spur a much-needed re-thinking on US’s part, to jettison its one-dimensional, and ultimately counterproductive, Iran policy that ought to, logically speaking, reap the benefits of US’s impressive leadership role in the arduous nuclear negotiations.

Indeed, the illogic of US’s current Iran policy consists of a dreadful lacunae in terms of a missing economic diplomacy toward Iran.

By Dalan McEndree

In recent days, signs of a possible breakthrough in the year-long stand-off between Russia and Saudi Arabia on crude production strategy have emerged. Saudi Arabia, OPEC’s dominant member, has long insisted OPEC (read Saudi Arabia) would not reduce output to balance supply and demand absent corresponding cuts from non-OPEC members (read Russia), while Russia has consistently insisted harsh climactic conditions prevent Russian producers from reducing output and in any case Russia insists it could withstand low prices as well as any other country.

January 27, however, Russia announced, in a roundabout way, its willingness to cut. According to Bloomberg, the Russian Energy Ministry issued a statement that “Energy Minister Alexander Novak and the heads of Russia’s biggest oil companies discussed the possibility of working with OPEC.” The article also reported that Deputy Prime Minister Yury Trutnev told President Vladimir Putin that:

“There was a series of meetings with other governments last week on the issue of oil prices during the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. Oil exporters are talking about coordination because the current price is “unacceptable” to justify spending on exploration and field development”.

These Russian comments were not the only signs of potential movement in the past week. At a conference in Kuwait City, Iraq’s Oil Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi stated that “Saudi Arabia and Russia, the world’s biggest oil producers, are now more flexible about cooperating to cut output as crude prices have fallen to levels that hydrocarbon-rich nations didn’t foresee.

Many observers, however, have been quick to dismiss the significance of these public statements. John Kilduff, founding partner of Again Capital, and frequent CNBC oil contributor, commented January 29 on CNBC that:

“This whole story line about there being a coordinated production cut plan is just rubbish”).

More generally, as this quote from a recent Bloomberg article shows, observers believe simply both sides are committed to their current (over)production strategy:

“There’s little sign the countries themselves are ready to reach an agreement despite the economic damage wrought by the lowest prices since 2003. Long-standing obstacles remain — Saudi Arabia’s desire to defend market share, Russia’s inability to cut production in winter months — and analysts say talk of a deal probably reflects the hope of producers in pain rather than the expectation of concrete action”.

In fact, skeptical observers dismiss these statements’ implications at their own peril. Both the Saudis and the Russians are serious, as both have powerful motivations to agree on measures to balance the market through production cuts, reduce crude inventories, and increase prices.

The real question, instead, is whether their interests are sufficiently congruent to agree to simultaneous moves to balance the market.

With Their Economic Situation Dire, Are the Russians Desperate?

Over the last several months, as crude prices have renewed their plunge and taken the Ruble with them, Russian economic prospects have deteriorated sharply. Even a cursory review of press reports reveals the intensity of the economic pain.

At the World Economic Forum in Davos last week, Alexei Kudrin, Russia’s respected former Finance Minister, stated—or perhaps warned—”We have two years in reserve [to overcome the economic crisis] when social sentiments will be stable. There are still social protests, they are growing, but they aren’t bursting into something out of control”.

Until recent weeks, the Russian government had some basis to harbor hope that GDP, after contracting ~3.5 percent in 2015, would return to growth within this two year window. As late as Q3 2015, the IMF estimated that in 2016, GDP would grow, if only anemically at below 1 percent.

Recent crude price action, however, has dashed such hopes and instead has raised the prospect of a deeper and longer recession. In a “stress” test it conducted in November, the Russian Central Bank estimated that with Ural crude prices below $40 per barrel between 2016-2018, the Russian economy would contract five percent in 2016, inflation would run at 7-to-9 percent, and that these conditions “would also raise risks to inflation and financial stability.

Central Bank efforts to stabilize the Ruble and contain inflation are one reason the “stress” test results may prove prescient. The plunge in crude prices is preventing the Central Bank from easing monetary policy to stimulate the economy. Friday, January 29, it announced that it would keep its benchmark interest rate at 11 percent, to support the Ruble (which fell as low as ~R82.5/US$ last week before recovering to ~RUB75.5/US$ on January 29) and contain inflation. In its announcement, it noted that its next move could be to raise rather than lower the benchmark rate, were inflationary pressures to increase.

Facing crude prices below $30 per barrel, Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov in a January 16 television interview said Russia now faced a RUB 1.5 trillion budget deficit ($38.6 billion at the time of the interview) and that this would force the government to rework the budget it approved in December, which was based on $50 Ural crude prices. Reworking, according to Siluanov, will entail cutting RUB 500 million in spending (from which the military, national security, and agriculture would be exempted) and finding RUB 1 trillion in additional revenue.

Finding this RUB 1 trillion confronts the Russian government with unpalatable choices. Russia’s sovereign wealth/reserve funds have been proposed as sources—but in September, Siluanov warned that they would be depleted in sixteen months.

The Russian government is also contemplating asset sales (including part of its stake in Rosneft and in VTB, a major bank), but such sales would provide one-time boosts to revenue and in any case would take time to organize. Borrowing is a possibility, since Russia’s sovereign debt is low, but the Russian government can’t access U.S. and European capital markets, closed to it due to U.S. and EU sanctions related to the conflict over Ukraine).

The Russian energy industry is also a target—and potentially a lucrative one, given the structure of Russian taxes on the industry. In 2015’s first three quarters, for example, low crude prices decreased the revenues the Russian government collected in export customs duties from Rosneft, Russia’s largest producer, by RUB 520 billion (RUB 1058 billion to RUB 738 billion), while taxes other than income taxes increased only RUB 80 billion, from RUB 919 billion to RUB 1009 billion).

It is therefore not surprising that in September, the Russian Finance Ministry attempted to increase the mineral extraction tax. Industry opposition and opposition from other Russian ministries—citing the negative impact on investment and output—forced it to back down (Venezuela is an example, admittedly extreme, of what happens when government raids on industry revenues to fund current operations squeezes investment). It proposed instead to slow down the planned decrease in crude export duty rate (from 42 percent to 36 percent. Also under consideration is a windfall profits tax on Russian energy exporters benefitting from the Ruble’s depreciation.

Deteriorating Energy Industry Conditions

The situation of Russian energy producers is also difficult. The Telegraph (UK) in early January quoted Russia’s deputy finance minister, Maxim Oreshkin, as telling TASS earlier this month that low crude prices could lead to “hard and fast closures in coming months.” The article also said noted that in the key Soviet-era fields in western Siberia, the annual rate of depletion is averaging 8 percent to 11 percent, while new projects are being curtailed.

According to the Telegraph, Transneft, the Russian crude and product pipeline monopoly, estimated that Russian crude exports could decrease in 2016 by some 460,000 barrels per day, based on producer applications for pipeline capacity.

In an interview with TASS, the Russian news agency last week, Lukoil Vice President Leonid Fedun commented that Lukoil was unlikely to produce the one hundred million tons it produced in 2015. He also said that it made more economic sense to sell one barrel of oil for $50 than two barrels for $30.

Gazprom, Russia’s natural gas giant, shows signs of stress. In recent weeks, it has instituted a series of cuts in investments. January 11, Reuters reported Gazprom cancelled one tender in December and three tenders in January for work on the construction of the Ukhta-Torzhok pipeline, a domestic key component of pipeline system which will transport natural gas directly to Germany through the Nord Stream II pipeline. According to Reuters, Gazprom Neft (of which Gazprom is the majority shareholder) recently terminated negotiations to acquire a 49 percent stake in Vietnam’s Binh Son Refining and Petrochemical, a subsidiary of Vietnam’s state-owned PetroVietnam.

A January 15 Reuters article quoted “sources close to Gazrpom” as saying that Chinese economic problems and low energy prices have reduced the volume of natural gas Gazprom expects to export to China via the Power of Siberia pipeline—the project on which Gazprom has bet its future—when it is completed. Given the already questionable economics of the Power of Siberia project, reduced volumes will intensify doubts about the project’s financial viability and future (Putin Is Taking A Big Risk With China Gas Deals).

Overleveraged, Rosneft’s Pain is Particularly Acute

The pain for Rosneft, the company which the Russian government hoped would gain the size necessary to compete on equal terms with Western oil majors, is particularly acute. As part of its effort to gain scale, the company in 2013 took on massive debt—$40 billion according to Reuters—to finance its acquisition of Russian competitor TNK-BP for $55 billion.

To help pay down debt, Rosneft, also in 2013, concluded an agreement with Chinese National Petroleum Corporation to supply 400 million metric tons of crude over twenty five years, under which Rosneft was entitled to receive prepayment equal to 30 percent of the contract’s value (Rosneft received RUB 1027 billion in 2015 Q3).

At the end of Q3, Rosneft’s net debt stood at $24 billion. Yet, Alexey Bulgakov, a fixed income analyst at Sberbank CIB estimates that Rosneft may already have accessed the maximum amount of cash it can under the deal, given the decline in price from ~$100-plus per barrel in 2013 to ~$30 per barrel now and the terms of the agreement. And, should crude prices remain at current levels, Rosneft likely cannot generate the cash to cover its investment, interest, and debt repayment obligations.

Russian government officials and energy producers argue that a depreciating Ruble has attenuated the impact of lower crude prices, since each US$ generates more Rubles, which is important given that the bulk of their expenses are in Rubles. This, however, isn’t the only impact of a weak Ruble. It can also cause inflation, and this has been the case in Russia. The following table, from Rosneft’s quarterly Management’s Discussion and Analysis reports, provides the Russian Central Bank data for cumulative inflation over 2015’s first three quarters (table below).

For Rosneft, inflation has contributed to increased costs in all but one expense category compared to 2014’s corresponding quarter (percentage change in red font in column 2 in the table below) and, because revenues declined in 2015, increased the ratio of that cost to revenue compared to the corresponding 2014 period (last two columns).

These two effects caused operating income through Q3 2015 to fall to RUB 455 billion from RUB 539 billion in 2014 (and, of course, in US$ terms, the value of the operating income decreased even more, since the respective average exchange rates were RUB 59.28/US$ and RUB 35.59/US$ in 2015 and 2014). In addition, if not for the 41.3 percent decrease in export customs duty—RUB 520 billion in absolute terms—operating income would have been negative RUB 65 billion through 3Q 2015 (RUB 455 billion minus RUB 520 billion).

Reduced revenues and increased costs in 2015’s first three quarters also reduced the amount of cash Rosneft generated to cover investment, dividends, and net finance expense (which includes interest paid, interest received, and operations with derivative financial instruments). The following table shows that the cash remaining after Rosneft’s spending on net finance expense, investment, and dividends, after adding non-cash depreciation, depletion, and amortization expense back into operating income, declined significantly through three, six, and nine months of 2015 compared to 2014 in Ruble terms and, of course, even more in US$ terms given Ruble depreciation (RUB 59.28/US$ in 2015 versus RUB 35.59/US$ in 2014) (see table above).

Given that average crude prices in Q4 2015 were substantially lower than in Q3 and that they likely will even lower in Q1 2016, Rosneft’s financial operating results should also deteriorate substantially in these quarters. The following table projects Rosneft’s revenues in Rubles in Q4 2015 and Q1 2016 using the Ruble’s Q4 average US$ exchange rate and a guesstimate of the Ruble’s Q1 US$ average exchange rate; an estimate of sales in volume terms, assuming output in 4Q 2015 continued to outpace 2014 levels by 2 percent and stayed constant in Q1 2016; and guesstimates of crude prices, taking into account Ural crude’s discount to Brent, Rosneft’s price competition in Europe with Saudi Arabia, and the impact on Rosneft prices in Europe and Asia from a prepayment agreement with Transneft that lowered its realized price per barrel (in Q1, Q2, and Q3, a reduction of RUB 200, RUB 40, and RUB 180 in Europe and RUB 170, RUB 350, and RUB 190 Rubles in Asia).

In the following table, 4Q costs are estimated using 4Q 2014 figures, multiplied by the percentage increase in costs in Q4 2015 from Q3 2015 (except for taxes and export custom’s duty, which are the average quarterly cost in 2015).

This rough guesstimate of Rosneft’s 4Q 2015 and 1Q 2016 performance suggests that the company will not generate sufficient cash to fund investment, dividends, and interest, and pay down debt.

From the Saudi Point of View

The Saudis and their Gulf Arab allies also have compelling reasons to consider production cuts to balance the global crude market and raise prices. They depend on revenues from crude and crude product exports as much as if not more so than the Russian government to fund government spending. Like the Russian government, they face serious domestic and international challenges—including wars and domestic tensions—that they counted on the export of crude and crude products to fund.

As a result of lost revenues and deteriorating budget numbers, the government are drawing on foreign currency and sovereign wealth resources, seeking to cut spending, including in such politically sensitive areas as subsidies for individuals and businesses, and to defer or cancel important investment projects (the UAE in recent days suspended the tender process for stage two of a project to build a 1,350 mile railroad from Kuwait the Indian Ocean along the Persian Gulf).

To raise revenue, they are introducing new taxes (such as on unoccupied land in Saudi cities) and contemplating asset sales (or which the Saudi plan to sell shares in Saudi Aramco and/or its downstream subsidiaries is a prime example).

OPEC dynamics are another important consideration. Other OPEC members—Venezuela, Algeria, Nigeria, Angola and Libya—repeatedly have called for output to be cut. In response, the Saudis have argued that OPEC cuts would be ineffective in the absence of simultaneous cuts from non-OPEC countries members. Were the Saudis and their Gulf Arab allies to reject a sincere Russian commitment to cut production, their credibility and authority within OPEC would suffer perhaps irreparable damage.

Also, for the Saudis, the plans to sell shares in Saudi Aramco and/or its downstream operations could play an important role. The price investors will be willing to pay for shares in these entities will depend on the value they place on the entities, and this value will depend on their assessment of the entities’ management, strategy, and prospects. If, for example, potential investors believe that management, at the behest of the Saudi government, will sacrifice growth, profits, and dividends to achieve Saudi foreign policy goals through low prices, investors’ interest might be tepid at best.

A Narrow Window of Opportunity for Russia for Coordinated Cuts

The Russians potentially enter any discussions with a weaker hand. The Saudis and their Gulf Arab allies probably can withstand lower prices longer than the Russians. Russia lacks the financial resources the Saudis and their Gulf Arab allies have at their disposal.

Their sovereign wealth funds and foreign currency reserves in absolute and per capita terms exceed Russia’s, the value of their government owned energy assets are greater than the value of the Russian government’s energy assets (which are already partially privatized), and Saudi Arabia and its Gulf Arab allies have access to international capital markets, whereas the Russian government, because of U.S. and EU sanctions, does not.

They also have the means to pressure Russia. The Saudis have spare capacity (according to the IEA have some ‘1.5~2.0 million barrels per day which they can bring on line within three months), while the Russians lack spare capacity. Finally, Russia’s major energy companies report quarterly results, whereas with a few exceptions, Saudi and Gulf Arab energy companies do not. Thus, the Saudis have access to critical Russian microeconomic financial data, whereas the Russians do not have such access to Saudi and Gulf Arab data.

Possibly, if the Russian government believes its hand is weaker, it might consider it advisable to reach agreement expeditiously. After all, the Russian government should take into account that if Russian data during the first quarter shows declines in output and exports, as comments from Russian government and company officials cited above suggest might happen, and Q1 2015 financial reports show intensifying financial pressures on Russian energy companies, Saudis and their Gulf Arab allies might be tempted to decide to maintain pressure on prices and force Russia to absorb the cuts necessary to balance the global crude markets.

Article Source: http://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Russia-Cries-Dyadya-Uncle-Is-Saudi-Arabia-Listening.html

The elections are over and the transition towards a democratic government in Myanmar is currently underway. However, the sailing isn’t as smooth. The NLD and the military are in agreement but are cautious at the same time. Myanmar promises to be a car driven by two drivers.

By Rajiv Bhatia*

Myanmar’s long-term transition from the 50-year old military rule to democracy began in March 2011, with a retired general as the president. As he prepares to demit office, the short-term transition between elections on 8 November 2015 and the end of President Thein Sein’s innings on 30 March 2016, has gained momentum. There are important developments that are unfolding and may impact the shift from the present ‘controlled democracy’ to ‘full-fledged democracy’ in the long run.

The Internal political scene has been dominated by two key issues: the new, emerging equation between the winner in elections–the National League for Democracy (NLD) led by Aung San Suu Kyi and the military leadership; and ethnic reconciliation.

On the first issue, the deal is almost clear. The military and NLD are engaged in devising a mutually acceptable framework for power sharing. To begin with, it will be strictly in accordance with the constitution. This means that Suu Kyi will have a president of her choice (but not her as the constitution doesn’t allow) and may be free to define her relationship as ‘the leader’ of NLD with him. However, there will be no reduction in the military’s political role or powers. Besides, the new ruling party will need to cooperate with the new ‘Opposition’ (in the parliament), comprising a truncated group of USDP members and the military-nominated group of 166 MPs. The latter will be serving defense services officers, led by a major general in the lower and the upper house each.

The Myanmar polity promises to be a car driven by two drivers. It will move forward only through their mutual agreement.

The constitutional reforms that were aimed at increasing the quotient of democracy or re-define relationship between the national government and states/regions would have to wait for an indefinite period. Little progress on this dossier should be expected until sufficient trust develops between NLD and the military.

This trend became clearer with the issue of ethnic reconciliation. A a conference was convened by the outgoing government, in the capital Naypyitaw from 12-16 January 2016, and attended by 700 delegates. The conference, building on the National Ceasefire Agreement (NCA) signed last year, furthered the process of political dialogue for bringing reconciliation and peaceful resolution of problems among diverse ethnic groups, their political and armed wings.

Eight of the armed groups which had signed the NCA attended the conference, but seven of the invited groups (who had not signed the NCA), boycotted the peace conference. A notable feature remained the continuation of serious differences among ethnic groups, the military and NLD. They largely swear by a commitment to Myanmar as a ‘federal union’, but differ about the roadmap for achieving it. While the fear of secession has almost disappeared, the military remains distrustful of delegating more authority to states/regions, a common demand of most ethnic groups. NLD may, thus, find itself between a rock and a hard place.

Suu Kyi has stated that she is ready ‘to take responsibility’ for the peace process, in accordance with ‘the mandate given by the people.’ She can afford to alienate neither the military nor the ethnic minorities. However, if it comes to a choice, she – as a hard-nosed Burman politician and a strong leader by temperament – could favour the military’s viewpoint.

Foreign governments and businesses are anxious to know more about the incoming government’s economic policy. NLD has not been very articulate so far. Policies to liberalise economy, attract foreign investment, and establish special economic zones would continue. Suu Kyi will strive hard to enhance inclusiveness in development by expanding opportunities for agriculture, employment, health, education, skill development and use of IT for youth empowerment. Yet, she may find it difficult to fashion an economic policy essentially different from the policy pursued by outgoing President Thein Sein.

In the domain of foreign policy, however, the new government could face a major challenge. How to balance NLD’s perceived proximity to the West, especially the U.S., with Myanmar’s need for a good relationship with China, is a dilemma. This comes in the wake of Thein Sein’s successful endeavour in the past five years to arrest the expansion of Myanmar-China relations without endangering them, while simultaneously creating new space for cooperation with the U.S., EU, Japan and other countries. Though belatedly, but China has signaled that it would cooperate with Suu Kyi. The country, though, has its concerns. It needs to turn Myanmar more accommodative than it was under Thein Sein. By stressing that Suu KYi’s government would lay ‘more emphasis on its relations with neighbours’, she has indicated her readiness to be an active player in the new great game unfolding in Myanmar.

In fact, the next phase of the game has already begun. Anthony Blinken, deputy secretary of state of the U.S., has recently visited Myanmar to convey a complex but important message from the Obama Administration. He urged that political reforms should continue until ‘an elected civilian government is truly sovereign and all the country’s institutions answer to the people.’ The U.S. expected to work in ‘close partnership’ with the NLD government in pursuit of the identified goals – democracy, development and national reconciliation. Both Myanmar’s military brass and Beijing must have already noted the implications of this message from the U.S.

One should expect that a warmer phase in Myanmar-China relations may begin soon, possibly with a bilateral visit by the president of prime minister of China to Naypyitaw in 2016. But to paint Suu Kyi as ‘the Dragon’s Lady’, as a columnist has done in the New York Times, is unconvincing.. Top leaders and foreign ministers of other key countries interested in Myanmar would not like to lag behind. Eventually the new government may end up following a balanced foreign policy, much like the outgoing president did.

Two developments in April onwards will evoke considerable interest: which countries will send their top VIPs to visit Myanmar and which countries will be visited by Suu Kyi in the early months after the change of government?

India’s Ministry of External Affairs has been keeping a close watch on developments, and will no doubt make its moves at a suitable time.

As an analyst put it, Myanmar is heading towards ‘an unchartered political terrain.’ The expectation is that it will move forward with a blend of caution, calibration and some creativity.

About the author:
*Rajiv Bhatia is Distinguished Fellow, Foreign Policy Studies Programme at Gateway House, former ambassador to Myanmar, and author of ‘India-Myanmar Relations: Changing contours’ (Routledge).

Source:
This feature was written for Gateway House: Indian Council on Global Relations.

The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), which officially opened for business on 16 January 2016 in Beijing with participation of representatives from the 57 member countries, will be able to strongly compete with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank (WB), the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and even the Asian Development Bank (ADB) in the future, the foreign media quote experts and economists.

Some of them say the emergence of a new international institution with the authorized capital stock of $100 billion, which seeks to overcome infrastructure deficit in Asian countries, was triggered by the US authorities, who now express displeasure over the very idea behind the alternative financial center.

As media reports note, the decision to create the AIIB came forth when the United States refused to ratify a series of slight changes to the governance of the International Monetary Fund that would redistribute quotas and increase the representation of China and other Asian countries at the IMF corporate management.

As the result, in October 2013, the Chinese President Xi Jinping and the Premier of the State Council of the People’s Republic of China Li Keqiang announced the AIIB initiative in October 2013. A year later, China together with 21 countries signed a memorandum of understanding, and soon after, on 29 June 2015, representatives from the 57 founding countries signed the establishment agreement.

According to Jin Liqun, President of the AIIB, former Vice Minister of Finance of the PRC, originally the initiative was met with doubts by many, but the attitude changed later on, and currently, China is in the process of gaining credibility and building up mutual trust by collective consultation and making decisions based on democratic approaches.

However, China, while being the organization’s largest shareholder, has no plans to exercise its veto power or expand its vote share, which, as Jin Liqun adds, is a major contrast to the World Bank, in which the United States “has maintained its veto power by amending the articles of agreement.”

“The new lender will set itself apart from other similar institutions,” stresses the AIIB President, adding that transparency, openness, independence and accountability will be the institution’s main principles of work.

The launch of the AIIB already forced some existing international banking institutions to review their activities in the Asia-Pacific region, says Tran Viet Thai, deputy director for the Institute for Foreign Policy and Strategic Studies at the Diplomatic Academy of Vietnam.

“For example, the Asian Development Bank is already in the process of restructuring its infrastructure loans to focus on other lucrative ones. […] Even more than that, I already see competition between AIIB and ADB in Asia, especially in infrastructure projects in the region,” the analyst stressed.

At the same time, he reminded that the organizations such as WB, IMF, EBRD and ADB have been functioning for several decades, and the AIIB will need to go to great lengths to compete with them on the same level.

“I do hope that in the long run, these institutions can share the same international standards, can cooperate with each other to provide the best products for its customers,” the expert said.

In his opinion, the AIIB will encounter no significant hindrances and will find its own niche among other financial organizations.

“The demand for building infrastructure in Asia Pacific region and all over the world is very high. None of the currently existing financial institutions can meet this demand. There is still a lot of room for the bank to play,” Tran Viet Thai noted.

From his point of view, the AIIB will prioritize “build-operate-transfer” and public-private partnership projects, as Chinese construction companies are able to complete practically any jobs, even the most difficult ones.

He also suggested that loan conditions will be defined through talks not only with AIIB representatives, but with the Chinese government as well.

“I hope the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank will be a politics-free institution, but nothing can be separated from politics in the world of today,” Tran Viet Thai added.

At the same time, Nick Haekkerup, Member of Folketing for the Danish Social Democratic Party, expressed his belief that investment will become the key reference factor for the AIIB.

“The opinion of the Foreign Ministry of Denmark is that the way that the setup is made by now ensures that these political intentions will not prevail. […] I think that the number of countries participating by now shows that there is a large commitment to the new bank,” he said.

Nick Haekkerup also said he hopes the AIIB will promote investment and benefit the life in the Asian region, which will also benefit other countries such as Denmark.

“Our companies will then have a better chance of participating in investments. We foresee that this will contribute to economic growth, and our companies will have a better chance of selling their products to people living in Asia,” the Folketing MP described.

In turn, Alicia Garcia Herrero, chief economist for Asia and the Pacific at Natixis Asia, senior research fellow at Bruegel, argued that the AIIB should first of all support the cross-border infrastructure projects.

Such projects would be harder to do at the national level, she explained.

She also suggested that the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank will be competing with the Asia Development Bank and the World Bank, while financial institutions in the Silk Road Economic Belt will be cooperating with the AIIB, rather than ADB, EBRD or WB.

One of the possible priority projects for the AIIB at the early stage is the construction of the railroad from Asia to Europe, said Andrei Ostrovski, Doctor of Economics, professor and vice-principal at the Institute of Far Eastern Studies.

“There are three options: the northern route through Russia, the central through the Caspian Sea and Turkey, and the southern through Iran. In fact, all three of them are viable,” the expert explained, and added that ensuring suitable political conditions will be one of the key requirements to projects.

In his opinion, even though AIIB is primarily economy-oriented, activity of bank members is also stimulated by their intention to develop financial and political relations with Beijing.

“Right now, money is enough in Beijing, including gold and free reserves, fast-developing economy, and renminbi is now actively involved in the financial market: it became an international reserve currency as of the end of the previous year. So if the bank keeps working well, it can just as well compete with the World Bank and the IMF,” Doctor of Economics concluded.

In turn, Mark Harbers, Finance Spokesman, Dutch MP for The People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy, said he hopes the AIIB will seek to diversify relations with other banking institutions.

“Eventually, economic growth is in everybody’s best interest. But of course we should continue to scrutinize and monitor the functioning of the AIIB. It is our job as politicians of the AIIB member states to prevent such external political pressure from affecting decisions,” the politician stressed.

From his point of view, the AIIB leadership must create only a brief list of key objectives and prioritize the projects that could bring the most “bang for their buck,” to keep the organization independent from politics.

“The launch of the AIIB is a positive step in the world economy. Trade benefits everybody and the AIIB could be a great way in getting more infrastructure and a more prosperous life to people in the region,” said the Dutch Finance Spokesman.

Meanwhile, Marc Lanteigne, expert on China, senior research fellow at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs, noted that the number of founding members became much larger than China had expected, which could cause certain challenges in the future.

“You have a combination of European economies, Asian economies, with much different views at times on development assistance and financial aid,” the expert explained.

According to him, several countries, such as the United Kingdom, joined the project because they acknowledge the importance of developing Asian economy on the global level.

“The traditional regime, such as the IMF, the World Bank and even the Asia Development Bank, were really not efficient to really engage or really understand the specific economic conditions in Asia. The results are a bit of frustration on China’s part. Even though China is growing very rapidly economically, has a very strong role in many parts of the world when it comes to development assistance, it was not very well represented in the traditional regime,” said the expert on China, adding that the opening of the BRICS New Development Bank in 2015 was one of the first steps towards the new world order.

He also pointed out that the AIIB is yet to define the issues in Asia that must be dealt with first.

“There is talk about including communications and transportation infrastructure. This is everything from the basics, the road building, the bridge building, but also as a way of improving trade and economic activity within the region. There are all kinds of areas in poverty reduction which are being debated right now, And there are all kinds of discussion about how to develop better economic governance, especially in countries which are still trying to work their way through the very difficult global economic situation. It is a very long laundry list,” Marc Lanteigne stressed.

The Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) is an international financial organization with the objective to foster financial cooperation in Asia-Pacific region.

The bank, which was based upon the 2013 initiative by China, aims to develop infrastructure and production sectors, including energy, transportation, telecommunications, agriculture and other areas.

The stock capital of the AIIB is $100 billion. The top three bank shareholders who have the biggest vote in the bank board of directors are China (26.06%), India (7.5%), and Russia (5.92%).

The bank was co-founded by a total of 57 states, who signed the AIIB Articles of Agreement which serve as its foundation. As a regional bank, the AIIB’s Asian members hold nearly 75% of the capital stock.

The official opening ceremony of the AIIB took place on 16 January 2016 in Beijing, which is also the location of the international bank’s headquarters.

The first annual meeting of the AIIB founding member countries is scheduled to take place in June.

North Korea’s recent nuclear test could pose huge risks to China and a dire threat to its food security.

By Zhang Hongzhou*

ON January 6, 2016, North Korea claimed to have carried out a “successful” hydrogen bomb test, which was the country’s first nuclear test in three years. Pyongyang’s nuclear test triggered condemnation from the international community, including South Korea, Japan, the United States, China and the United Nations.

Even if North Korea’s nuclear development is targeted at the US and its allies, Pyongyang’s nuclear programme brings huge risks to China. Apart from threatening the lives of millions of Chinese residents along the border, disrupting regional stability, potentially triggering a nuclear arms race in Northeast Asia and dragging China into a potential military clash, North Korea’s nuclear project poses a dire threat to China’s food security as its nuclear test sites are located very close to China’s northeast region which is considered the “bread basket” for the country.

Importance of northeast region to China’s food security

China has identified food security as one of its biggest challenges over the next decade. With its population still rising, vast tracts of arable land are already being swallowed up by rapid urbanisation and industrialisation while fresh water resources have become even more scarce. China’s northeast region, which comprises Heilongjiang, Jilin, Liaoning and part of Inner Mongolia, is vital to the country’s efforts to achieve food security.

In 2015, data from China’s Bureau of Statistics indicated that the Northeast Region contributed nearly a quarter of China’s total grain production. In terms of individual crops, the northeast region accounts for 41 percent of the China’s total soybean production, 34 percent of its corn production and 50 percent of its japonica rice. The northeast region is also an important milk and beef producing region for China, accounting for 20 percent of the national output.

As the northeast region has vast and fertile farmland yet with relatively low population density, it enjoys huge grain surplus which is distributed to the country’s major grain consuming regions in the coastal regions, including Shanghai, Beijing and Guangdong. Currently, the northeast region contributes over 60% of China’s inter-provincially traded grain. In addition, the northeast region is the biggest grain storage base for China. For instance, the northeast region holds nearly 80% of the country’s total corn reserve.

Looking into the future, the northeast region is expected to play an even bigger role in safeguarding China’s food security. Between 2003 and 2015, China’s total annual grain production increased by 44%. The northeast region contributed 38% of the grain production growth during the period. Given the favourable natural condition, the northeast region is poised to shoulder more responsibilities in boosting the country’s grain production. In 2010, the Chinese central government issued a document pointing out that the northeast region should be built up as a pillar of national food security. Over the past few years, billions of dollars have been spent by both the central and local governments to boost grain productions in the northeast region.

Food systems vulnerable to nuclear radiation

Given the proximity of China’s northeast region to North Korea’s nuclear test sites, Pyongyang’s nuclear programme presents a real danger for China’s food safety and food security. To be sure, underground nuclear tests are relatively safer and the possibility of nuclear leakage is low. Nonetheless, the food systems are still vulnerable to underground nuclear tests. As Rose Gottemoelle, the US Under-secretary for Arms Control and International Security, recently pointed out, the series of underground nuclear tests by the US on Amchitka Island in Alaska from 1965 to 1971 had substantial impact on the local environment with significant uptake of radioactive particles in the local food systems.

Given North Korea’s backward nuclear technologies, poor infrastructure and weak environmental protection capability, the potential impact of its nuclear test on air, water and soil could be greater and the likelihood of a nuclear disaster certainly cannot be ruled out. This could eventually result in nuclear radiation spreading to China’s northeast, destroying its food systems.

Chinese authorities and nuclear experts have tried to assure the public that it is highly unlikely China’s northeast region will be affected by North Korea’s nuclear tests. For example, some pointed out that mountains along the border could effectively prevent nuclear radiation spreading to China’s northeast. However, the real problem is that due to the deep fear of potential nuclear radiation on food safety, quite often it is the perception rather than reality that shapes people’s decision.

During the Fukushima nuclear disaster, while the Japanese government assured the public that food met the government safety levels, many consumers nonetheless questioned the safety of food supplies and often rejected all food from affected regions.

Ticking time-bomb for China’s food security?

What is worse, in the era of social media, rumours related to nuclear radiation could easily go viral and cause devastating impacts on the country’s food systems. Again, taking the Japan’s Fukushima nuclear disaster as an example, right after the incident there were all kinds of rumours circulating on social media in China.

The most famous case was about salt: some said sea salt was contaminated while others claimed that salt can guard against radiation exposure. As a result, these rumours led to panic-buying of salt across the country. Prices of salt jumped five or ten-fold in many cities of China. Should similar rumours relating to rice produced in the northeast region spread in China following a nuclear incident in North Korea, it would immediately trigger a food crisis in China.

This will have region-wide repercussions, given China’s role as the biggest food producer and top agricultural grain importer in the world. North Korea’s nuclear programme could be a ticking time bomb for China. Thus, apart from undertaking more scientific research on the potential impacts of North Korea’s nuclear tests on the northeast region’s agricultural production and food systems, actions have to be taken on the ground by Beijing to deter North Korea’s nuclear development programme.

Zhang Hongzhou is an Associate Research Fellow with the China Programme at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.

Europe, cultural identity under attack, must regroup and form grand strategy to battle extremism at home and abroad.

By Joergen Oerstroem Moeller*

Europe’s cultural identity is under attack. At stake are values forged over centuries, respect for freedom of thought and every single individual’s rights. This is an existential crisis.

The enemy is not Islam nor the Muslims still migrating into Europe, but a small minority of brutal people who are hijacking Islam. Their intent is not to propagate a new political system. The goal is simple, trite and not religious: destruction of the Western system including democracy, individual freedom and economic globalization. What comes after does not matter. The extremists ensnare young people as recruits, selecting those who vent anger against their societies, political systems and parents. The young people crave respectability – acknowledgement as someone to be reckoned with, to be taken seriously, and the Islamic State delivers. The hardcore, intellectual elite and determined leadership of ISIS and the young recruits share one attribute, and that is hatred of Western societies.

Little can be done about the hardcore except understanding that the battle comes down to eliminating “them or us.”

The young recruits, though, are malleable and offer a window of opportunity for European countries. The targets are Muslim communities in Europe, the large majority of whom perceive their religion as ordinary and far from extreme.

The extremists are few in number and must be separated from the Muslim communities, both outside and inside Europe.

Outside Europe, governments must intensify the search for terrorists, extremists and hardliners. Troops on the ground and massive bombings with civilian casualties are not helpful, despite the support of many Europeans. If overdone, such tactics play into the hands of the terrorists who argue that Europe, the West and Russia are at war with Islam. The argument helps in recruitment.

Instead, a selective military tactic is needed with pinpointed operations, aiming at destroying or crippling ISIS leadership. Efforts to close gaps for refugees and migrants, transfer of money, selling of oil, and communication via mobile devices should be continued and strengthened. Turkey is the pivotal country and fully onboard in the fight against terrorism. But Turkey has broadened its target to fight Kurdish citizens seeking autonomy. That sets limits for how much the West can count on Turkish collaboration in the fight against ISIS and indeed efforts to ease the waves of refugees and migrants crossing into Europe via Turkey.

Europeans and Americans must recognize that agendas in the Middle East and North Africa include conflicting goals originating from more than 2,000 years of history – religious confrontations between Sunni Muslims and Shiites, tribal conflicts, internal and old colonial disagreements, and a revival of old confrontations among the remnants of the Arab, Ottoman, Iranian and Russian empires. As outsiders, the Europeans and Americans could easily be lured into focusing on one conflict that unfolds into massive warfare.

Fortress Europe: The European Commission regularly surveys citizens in the 27 EU members on leading values and issues, and autumn 2015 was the first time an issue not directly related to the economy topped the list (Eurobarometer Reports)

The main battleground for the United States and Europe is at home. Muslim communities should be encouraged and praised for reinforcing the message that versions of Islam as preached by the extremists are wrong and in contradiction with the faith. European nation-states should form much stronger links with Muslim leadership and clergy practicing in Europe who can be allies in the fight against terrorism. This battle is for hearts, souls and minds of the Muslims – and as such should fought and decided inside Muslim communities.

The Europeans can and should form a grand strategy. Otherwise, the outlook for solving the crisis inside the framework of European culture and values is bleak.

Europe can leave no doubt that the continent respects religious freedom, but ultimately the migrants must adapt and adjust to European norms and values as defined in the Lisbon Treaty: Respect for human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, the rule of law and respect for human rights, including the rights of persons belonging to minorities. These values are common to the member states in a society in which pluralism, non-discrimination, tolerance, justice, solidarity and equality between women and men prevail.

Those who choose to live in Europe must adhere to a societal system that is sufficiently malleable and flexible to accommodate variations, but not fundamental differences of values, ethics and norms.

The Muslims living in Europe want to have a decent life, live in peace and care for their families. They came to Europe hoping for better opportunities. Due to a flailing global economy, such expectations have been tough to meet, for immigrants and long-time Europeans, too. Yet there is no escape hatch. Unless the economy improves and a chance for a better life is offered, many will be discouraged and direct frustrations against the societies where they live. The European far-right, including the Front National in France and similar political parties in Britain and the Nordic Countries, exploits analogous feelings among Europeans who feel their identity is under attack, their social welfare threatened and economic future uncertain. Anti-Islamist groups throughout Europe are organizing. The mixture of xenophobia with a touch of racism through Islamophobic acts and angst is all too visible, conveying to migrants that they are not welcome, and challenges integration.

Sweden and Finland plan to send back almost 50 percent of asylum seekers. No one should dispute the right of countries to form a judgment on whether asylum seekers fulfill the criteria according to international treaties, but the reality is that political leaders are increasingly caving in to far-right parties, scaring refugees and immigrants away.

Down on EU? A positive image of the EU lost ground among survey respondents in 24 member states in autumn 2015 – respondents who viewed the EU most positively were found in Romania, Poland, Ireland, Lithuania and Croatia while Germans and British share skepticism (Eurobarometer Reports)

A better life does not necessarily need to be inside Europe. The majority of migrants having settled in Europe may prefer to stay, but some would prefer pursuing the dream in their own homelands. Many would prefer avoiding Europe as attitudes vis-a-vis migrants and refugees harden and spread, with some governments posting advertisements advising migrants not to come and some like Danish government threatening to confiscate belongings.

Europe could step up economic and trade programs to strengthen the development and growth in adjacent regions, including the Middle East, North Africa. EU association agreements exist with almost all countries in this geographical area and would be given more clout. The snag is that such programs cost money, which Europe lacks due to fiscal restraints. Exports would compete with European producers of Mediterranean agricultural products many of whom face fierce market conditions in depressed regions. Politically it’s a tall order for Europeans, already struggling and divided, and requires more redistribution of money from rich to poorer regions inside Europe. The political will among the richer countries may not be there.

Europe must take a hard look at the Schengen Agreement securing border-free travel among the 26 countries. This agreement, crafted in the 1980s, did not foresee the current pressure on Europe’s external borders. Without a genuine strengthening of external border controls – negligible compared to US external border controls – it’s unlikely that inter-European free border passage can be maintained. Indeed, temporary border checks may be allowed for up to two years.

The EU faces tough political questions and must determine how many refugees and migrants can be admitted while stopping the political chaos and fear. The task is immediate, and the consequences could be the long-term future of Europe and its very identity.

*Joergen Oerstroem Moeller is a visiting senior fellow with the ISEAS Yusof Ishak Institute; adjunct professor with the Singapore Management University and Copenhagen Business School; and honorary alumnus with the University of Copenhagen.

By Jim Hightower*

When I crossed paths with a Democratic campaign consultant in Austin last March, I suggested he come to the local International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers hall to hear Bernie Sanders speak. The Vermont senator, I added, was pondering a presidential run.

“You gotta be kiddin’ me,” he snorted. “Bernie Sanders? Let me tell ya,’ his chances are slim and none, and Slim don’t live in Bernie’s precinct. First of all, no one south of Greenwich Village ever heard of him. Second, who’s gonna vote for some old senator from a tiny state of Birkenstock wearers damn near in Canada?”

He was a no-show, but we didn’t have room for him anyway. The hall was designed to seat 200 — but nearly 500 Texans showed up that night to hear the undiluted populist message of this senator “no one ever heard of.”

Austin was one of the stops on a cross-country trip that Bernie was taking to assess whether an unabashedly progressive, movement-building presidential campaign could rally any substantial support. If he ran, he intended to go right at the moneyed elites who’ve thoroughly corrupted our politics and rigged our economy to squeeze the life out of the middle class.

The big question was: Would anyone follow? Sanders wasn’t sure. Even if it might work, he assumed it would be a slow build.

I was to introduce him at the Austin event. As we worked our way from the parking lot, waving to the overflow group gathered outside, shaking hands with people standing in the hallway and stairwell, then squeezing through the jam-packed crowd in the auditorium — I said to him: “Something is happening here.”

Bernie nodded and said in an astonished whisper, “Something is happening.”

That surprisingly big night in Austin was a precursor to what would soon become the “Sanders Sensation,” a people-powered movement that has already shattered the Democratic establishment’s holy myth that corporate centrism and Super PAC money are the only means to victory. By going straight to the people, Bernie is proving that another way can work.

*OtherWords columnist Jim Hightower is a radio commentator, writer, and public speaker. He’s also the editor of the populist newsletter, The Hightower Lowdown, and a member of the Public Citizen board. OtherWords.org

Senator Ted Cruz has won the Iowa Republican caucuses. Over the weekend, Chris Wallace of Fox News challenged Sen. Cruz on his proposal “to sell health insurance across state lines,” citing my argument that federal action to mandate this would be ineffective. The argument in question appeared in an op-ed in The Hill last October, although I have made it previously elsewhere.

In fact, Sen. Cruz’s proposal to sell health insurance across state lines does not appear in his presidential campaign platform. It is in a Senate bill he proposed last March, in anticipation of the Supreme Court’s decision in King v. Burwell. That case was decided last summer in favor of the Obama administration. If it had gone the other way, Obamacare would have collapsed in most of the states (which have federally facilitated health insurance exchanges, i.e. healthcare.gov).

Few politicians in Congress prepared for this possibility. Sen. Cruz and a handful of his colleagues did. However, the Supreme Court got the case wrong, so any pressure on the administration to change Obamacare through legislation evaporated.

So, Sen. Cruz’s bill to sell health insurance across state lines is best understood as a quick response to an opportunity that could have arisen. I cannot imagine this comprises his entire health reform proposal.

On the other hand, Sen. Cruz was on the right side of two recent issues, where most of his colleagues were wrong. Back in April, he was one of only eight senators to vote against the extremely flawed Medicare “doc fix” legislation. Last December, he was one of only 33 senators to vote against the also flawed “taxibus” legislation which deficit-funded Obamacare.

For those following the primary campaign: Sen. Marco Rubio also voted against the Medicare bill; while Senators Rand Paul and Bernie Sanders voted against the “taxibus,” for which Sen. Rubio did not vote. So, the Independent Institute’s policy positions are having a disproportionate influence on the presidential candidates!

This article was published by The Beacon.

Here’s what you need to know about the Syria peace talks: Four of the most powerful militias currently operating in Syria have been excluded from the negotiations. The Islamic State (ISIS), Jabhat al Nusra, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) have all been banned from the talks. What this means is that even if all the delegates agree to a ceasefire, it’s not going to matter. The fighting is going to continue.  Everyone in the Obama administration already knows this, which is why we think the peace talks are a fraud designed to conceal Washington’s real objectives.  (More on this later.)

The meetings that were supposed to begin on Friday, did not actually start until Monday following a series of diplomatic miscues over the weekend. As it happens, the main Syrian opposition groups, most of who operate under the aegis of the High Negotiations Committee, refused to come to Geneva until Russia met their demands concerning humanitarian relief, prisoner release and stopping the bombing of enemy positions. Not surprisingly, the matter wasn’t settled by Moscow caving in to the HNC’s demands, but by Kerry bending-over-backwards to placate the group by making a number of commitments that he’ll never be able to keep. What commitments? According to Reuters:

“In separate comments before heading to Geneva, Assad al-Zoubi, (chief negotiator for the HNC) said U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry gave assurances by phone to the HNC’s leadership, saying Washington supported a U.N.-backed political transition period without Assad, a bone of contention among warring parties.” (Reuters)

Naturally, the media has tried to sweep this story under the rug saying that there was no quid pro quo between the State Department and the opposition, but that seems very unlikely. Here’s more background from Tass news service:

“The Syrian opposition is ready to begin the negotiations in Geneva without any preconditions, Salem al-Muslad, a spokesman for the delegation of the High Negotiations Committee supported by Riyadh that has arrived in Switzerland has told reporters.

According to him, the delegation will demand providing humanitarian access to Syrian cities, releasing prisoners and rendering humanitarian assistance. He noted though that those “were not preconditions.” “These are not our preconditions.” (Syrian opposition ready to begin talks in Geneva without preconditions, Tass)

Let’s get this straight: Demanding “the release of prisoners and humanitarian assistance”, is a “precondition” regardless of what Muslad says. This hair-splitting mishmash is simply designed to confuse the public about concessions Kerry apparently made in private. And, if the Reuters report can be trusted, then Kerry also promised that Assad would not be part of the “transitional government”. That’s a promise Kerry will never be able to keep since Russia, Iran and Hezbollah flatly reject the idea. In fact, the current war is largely a battle between those who support regime change and those who don’t. Moscow doesn’t, and it has deployed its military assets to Syria to defend that principle.

In any event, the actual peace talks did not begin until Monday when members of the HNC arrived in Geneva and held their first two hour-long meeting with UN special envoy Staffan de Mistura. Members from the Syrian government’s delegation, led by Syrian ambassador to the UN, Bashar al-Jaafari, were not present at the meeting nor will they be in the future.  They refuse to be in the same room with members of the anti-regime opposition.  Instead, they plan to be in another part of the building where they’ll get regular updates from couriers shuttling back and forth between their suite and the conference room. The obvious hatred between the members of the rival groups suggests that a breakthrough is improbable at best.

It’s worth noting, that the Saudis created the HNC to lump the many disparate militias operating in Syria under one pretentious-sounding moniker that lends legitimacy to the roving bands of Sunni militants that most people consider terrorists. The whole scam is another shining example of public relations run amok. For example, the HNC does not view Jaish al-Islam and Ahrar al-Sham as extremist groups even though both organizations are committed to overthrowing the existing, secular government and replacing it with an Islamic regime that will enforce Sharia law.  Naturally, the western media goes along with this sham because the HNC’s strategic aims coincide closely with those of the US. But the fact is the HNC is basically a terrorist umbrella organization whose ultimate goal is to topple Assad and replace him with a compliant stooge who’ll do whatever he’s told by his foreign puppetmasters.

On Monday, following his meeting with the HNC delegation, de Mistura issued a statement that reiterated the primary policy objective of the Obama State Department; to stop the blistering Russian-led military offensive and declare an immediate ceasefire to save as many US-backed jihadists as possible. Here’s a blurb on the topic from an article in Al monitor:

“Declaring the official beginning of the Syrian peace talks, de Mistura said it was now up to the 20-member International Syria Support Group (ISSG) to begin parallel discussions on a Syria cease-fire…

“I am reminding International Syria Support Group members of what they actually indicated, that when talks start, they themselves would start helping in ensuring there would be a discussion about an overall cease-fire in the Syrian conflict,” de Mistura said.”  (Syrian opposition finally agrees to join Geneva talks, al Monitor)

So implementing a ceasefire is the UN’s top priority as it is Washington’s. But why would Putin agree to a ceasefire now just when the Russian-led coalition is making great strides on the battlefield,  the war’s momentum has shifted in his favor, and the jihadist militias appear to be on the ropes?

He probably won’t agree to a ceasefire nor will he agree to have Assad be removed by force of arms. But he  might be willing to ease-up on his current military offensive and even allow the US to retain captured territory in eastern Syria  (that could be used for future pipeline corridors)  if he thought that Russia would benefit from the deal.

But what sort of deal would that be and what would it involve?

Oil. It would involve oil and, ultimately, oil prices.

What if the Saudis, acting on behalf of their friends in Washington, offered to cut back production so prices began to rise and Russia’s economy started to rebound? Would that be an offer that Putin would consider?

Maybe, after all, the combination of sanctions and plunging oil prices has pushed the Russian economy into a deep slump. It’s only natural that Putin would want to put an end the pain and get the economy back on track. But what do the Saudi’s want in return, that’s the question.  Check out this clip from an article in Monday’s Wall Street Journal:

“It remains within Saudi Arabia’s ability to foster at least a partial recovery in crude prices on its own. A sharp rally in prices last Thursday morning was based on comments from Russia’s energy minister that the Saudis might get the ball rolling on 5 per cent output cuts. That was quickly refuted and oil gave up much of the gains….

Russian overtures that include political and military concessions might break the logjam and persuade the Saudis to take the lead on production cuts.” (Oil-price poker: why the Saudis refuse to fold ‘em, Wall Street Journal)

There are three points in this excerpt that need clarification.  First, the WSJ confirms what the so called “conspiracy theorists” have been saying from the beginning, that is, that the Saudis have ability to foster a “recovery in crude prices on its own”. In other words, the plunging prices are not simply “market driven”, but the result of deliberate manipulation via oversupply. The Saudis have the power to change this.

Second, the Saudis DID tell Russia’s energy minister that they were considering 5 percent output cuts. And then they lied about it afterwards when they talked with the media. (which sent prices back down.)  Was the quick about-face designed to get the Russians thinking about how much they need the Saudis to lift oil prices?

Of course, it was. They wanted the energy minister to pass-along the message to the Kremlin bigwigs so they’d start to whet their appetites for those juicy oil revenues. The Saudis are trying to weaken Moscow’s resolve and pave the way for a compromise. That’s what’s really going on.

Third, “Russian overtures that include political and military concessions might break the logjam and persuade the Saudis to take the lead on production cuts.”

Ah ha! So the author admits that if Russia agrees to “political and military concessions”, then the Saudis will implement production cuts.   But are the Saudis really acting on their own behalf in this matter or has someone else put them up to it, someone like Uncle Sam, for example?

This same theme popped up in Brookings working paper last year by author F.Gregory Gause 3. Here’s what he said:

“The question remains whether negotiations, or even agreements, on oil questions might lead to enough improvement in the atmospherics of regional relations that security issues like the Syrian civil war … might become amenable to negotiations among Riyadh, Tehran and Moscow”  (Sultans of Swing? The Geopolitics of Falling Oil Prices, F. Gregory Gause, Brookings Institute)

Hmmm?  In other words, if Putin is willing to make concessions on Syria,  then maybe all his oil problems will just go away. Sounds a lot like blackmail, doesn’t it?  Here’s Gause again:

“Washington should be ready to make an effort to expand them (the negotiations) beyond oil issues to include regional crisis spots like Syria. This can only be done through cooperation with Saudi Arabia, which will have to make an oil deal contingent on some geopolitical concessions from Bashar al-Assad’s allies as well.”

So the author is admitting that the only way Washington is going to be able to force Putin into making the “geopolitical concessions”  they want, is by using Saudi oil for leverage.

Is this the strategy behind Geneva, to use the fake “peace talks” to put a gun to Putin’s head and see if he’ll cave in?

It sure looks like it to me.

The love that many self-described leftists have for Bernie Sanders seemingly defies logic and political sense. Or perhaps it should be said that the idol worship fits a long standing pattern that ought to die once and for all. Simply put, many people who call themselves leftists are nothing of the sort. They are merely Democrats who live in hope that their party will be a tiny bit liberalish but not actually make meaningful change. Devoid of any true political leanings they really just long for someone to love. Every four years they follow a candidate down the road to hell while declaring they are on the way to heaven.

A quick perusal of the Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders policy statements shows little difference between the two. Sanders benefits from once having called himself a socialist and from not being Hillary Clinton. The former first lady, senator and secretary of state is disliked by millions of people. The antipathy becomes evident when she runs for president and is visible in all of her dissembling glory.

There has been no real debate about the Democratic Party and its role as a willing part of the political duopoly tag team. Any discussion of alternatives raises the specter of “spoilers” who are blamed for Al Gore’s loss to George W. Bush in 2000. The endless fear mongering about right wingers makes any Democrat look good by comparison despite their dubious history. Discussions about lesser evil only leads to Democrats who market themselves better than Republicans do. They still bail out the banksters, keep black people in jail, commit mass murder and worldwide chaos with drones or sanctions or willing puppet regimes.

Sanders benefits from a protection racket with Vermont’s Democratic Party. He first called himself a socialist, now an independent, when in fact he works with the Democrats to prevent primary challengers and the growth of any third party. If he were truly a leftist the Democrats would have targeted him for defeat long ago. Instead he gets the seal of approval and the campaign cash needed to keep his senate seat.

Sanders talks good game that belies his record. As a presidential candidate he suddenly sponsored legislation to raise the federal minimum wage incrementally to $15 per hour over a five-year period. Republican control of both houses of Congress means that his timid plan is dead upon arrival. More importantly, when Democrats controlled the legislative branch completely in 2009 and 2010 they made no effort to do what they now say they want so badly. Senator Sanders did not deviate from his party’s plan for inaction.

Who is really on the left? Not anyone who clings to the Democrats after being cast aside again and again while still suffering from unrequited love. Leftists are opposed to imperialism in all its forms. They don’t change their minds because a Democrat is occupying, sanctioning and assassinating around the world instead of a Republican.

Leftists demand that the federal government spend however much is necessary to restore the people of Flint, Michigan to health and safety. Leftists are anti-zionist and anti-imperialist. They oppose all neo-liberal “free trade” deals like the Trans Pacific Partnership. They want killer police to go to jail but want to free the masses from it. They want to end gentrification and displacement and they don’t like the scam of charter school privatization of public educationThe sad reality is that most Americans do not want to deviate from the establishment narrative of a wise and beneficent system and progressives are no different. They don’t want to struggle for true change and thus be left out of the establishment whose approval they covet. They want the gigs and the acceptance that come with declaring that the country is just fine but might be better off with a little tinkering here and there.

Leftists ought to be revolutionaries. Perhaps that word is a tall order that many will shrink from claiming but the truth shouldn’t be unspoken because useless people will be uncomfortable. A revolutionary isn’t fooled by the quadrennial circus of the Democrats and Republicans. Revolutionaries aren’t browbeaten into lesser evilism. They say without hesitation that capitalism cannot be reformed and must be jettisoned altogether. They aren’t fooled by propaganda that legitimizes intervening in foreign countries. They want an empty prison system and community control of the police. Revolutionaries don’t exult over Bernie Sanders vis a vis Hillary Clinton because they know that great change comes from mass action and not the ballot box.

Leftists see through the Democratic Party’s corruption and don’t fear being spoilers. They know that the system needs to be spoiled and aren’t afraid to say so. The word Democrat is not synonymous with leftist. Sander fans are Democrats with all of the flaws of the party they still support. The people who yearn to find a good person in a corrupt system have some choices to make, but putting the Sanders lipstick on the Democratic pig should not be among them.

Western government officials, former intelligence officers and pundits have long predicted the fall of the House of Saud. I am one of those. “This cannot last,” was my conclusion after my first visit to the kingdom in 1976. That prediction remains true even if I had a different timeline in mind when I first came to that conclusion. Former CIA operative Robert Baer warned almost 30 years later in a book in 2003 that “the country is run by an increasingly dysfunctional royal family that has been funding militant Islamic movements abroad in an attempt to protect itself from them at home… Today’s Saudi Arabia can’t last much longer—and the social and economic fallout of its demise could be calamitous.”

Operating on the principle of “progress without change” expounded by the government in the 1990s, the ruling Al Sauds have obviously maintained their grip on power longer than many analysts believed possible. They did so on the basis of a social contract that promised cradle-to-grave welfare in exchange for a surrender of political rights; a Faustian pact with the country’s Wahhabi clergy, proponents of an expansionist, puritan, discriminatory, anti-pluralistic interpretation of Islam; and repression.

The dawn of 2016 has brought a new round of doomsday predictions. Saudi Arabia appeared to be caught in a perfect storm. Arab popular protests in 2011 toppled the leaders of Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen; sparked a brutal civil war in Syria and Saudi military interventions in Bahrain and Yemen; and a divergence of interests between the kingdom and the United States, its main protector. The beginning of the end of autocratic rule in the Middle East and North Africa appeared to be on the horizon. Saudi leaders demonstrated however their determination to turn the tide.

Tumbling commodity and energy prices are forcing the Saudi government to reform, diversify, streamline and rationalize the kingdom’s economy. To succeed, the government will have to introduce change, not just progress. The change is already obvious with the cutting of subsidies, the raising of prices for services, the search for alternative sources of revenues and moves towards a greater role for the private sector and for women. Cost cutting is occurring at a time that Saudi Arabia is spending effusively on efforts to counter winds of political change in the region with its stalled military intervention in Yemen, its support for anti-Bashar al Assad rebels in Syria and massive financial injections into a regime in Egypt that has yet to perform.

US officials for much of their country’s relationship with Saudi Arabia have insisted that the two countries do not share common values, that their relationship is based on common interests. Underlying the now cooler relations between Washington and Riyadh is the fact that those interests are diverging. The divergence became evident with the eruption of popular revolts in 2011 and particularly US criticism of the Saudi military intervention in Bahrain to squash a rebellion and hesitant American support for the toppling of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. It is also obvious in the US persistence in reaching a nuclear agreement with Iran that is returning the Islamic republic to the international fold despite deep-felt Saudi objections.

The result of all of this has been with the rise of the Salmans, King Salman and his powerful son, deputy crown prince Mohammed bin Salman a far more assertive foreign and military policy. Make however no mistake, Saudi Arabia’s new assertiveness is not a declaration of independence from the United States. On the contrary, Mohammed Bin Salman made that very clear in a recent Economist interview. It is designed to force the United States to reengage in the Middle East in the belief that it will constitute a return to the status ante quo: US support for the kingdom in the belief that it is the best guarantor for regional stability.

The problem with that assumption is that history is not static, it is a dynamic process of continuous change. Analysts suggest that Saudi Arabia is confronting the perfect storm: economic problems, social challenges, foreign policy crises. Saudi Arabia may be heading into a perfect storm but the two key drivers are likely to be far more existential. Those drivers have been interlinked ever since the 1979 Iranian revolution, the first time that an icon of US power in the region was toppled. One diver is the Al Saud’s increasingly problematic Faustian bargain with Wahhabism, the other is Iran.

Let me start with Iran. Saudi government leaders do not hate Shias so much as that they see them as a tool for countering Iran by motivating Sunnis in the region to fear and resist Iranian influence. Anti-Shiite sectarianism helps Saudi Arabia motivate both Sunni and Shia Muslims to take up arms as part of the kingdom’s struggle with Iran for regional hegemony to defend their respective nations irrespective of sect wherever they are perceived to be under threat. Saudi Arabia has repeatedly accused Iran of fuelling sectarianism by backing Shia militias who have targeted Sunnis in Iraq, Yemen, Lebanon and Syria. The Saudi allegations notwithstanding, a Carnegie Endowment for International Peace concluded that anti-Shia rhetoric was much more common online than anti-Sunni rhetoric.

Fact of the matter is that Saudi Arabia had legitimate concerns in the immediate wake of the Iranian revolution. The fall of the autocratic pro-US regime of the Shah made place for a regime that was revolutionary and keen on exporting its revolution to the Gulf. Iran made no bones about it. The headquarters, for example, of the Islamic Liberation Front of Bahrain was housed in the diwan of Ayatollah Hussein-Ali Montazeri. Revolution not Shi’ism was what Iran hoped to export. It took however less than a year for nationalism to trump revolution in Iran. The process was accelerated by the Saudi-backed Iraqi invasion of Iran and the eight year-long bloody Iran-Iraq war.

The Saudi determination to counter the Iranian revolutionary threat by defeating rather than containing it has ever since shaped Saudi policy towards the Islamic republic and towards Shiites despite occasional thaws in relations. To be sure, Iran repeatedly took the bait with the creation of Hezbollah, political protests during the haj in Mecca, the 1996 bombing of the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia, to name just a few of the incidents.

Nonetheless, much like the Al Saud’s Faustian pact with Wahhabism the kingdom’s handling of relations with revolutionary Iran was certain to ultimately backfire and position the Islamic republic as an existential threat. Rather than embrace its Shiite minority by ensuring that its members had equal opportunity and a stake in society and countering discriminatory statements by the clergy and government institutions, the kingdom grew even more suspicious of Shias who populate the country’s oil-rich Eastern Province. In doing so, they provided Iran with a golden opportunity to forge closer ties to disgruntled Shia communities in the Gulf.

Middle East expert Suzanne Maloney predicted that “the most important variable in the stability of states with significant Shia minorities — such as Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Pakistan‎ will be the overall tenor of these states’ domestic politics, particularly on minority rights issues.” A Kuwaiti Shiite businessman who visited Tehran shortly after the 1979 toppling of the Shah saw the revolution as opening the door to a new era. “We are citizens of Kuwait, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia. We are Shiites, not Iranians. What happened in Iran is good for everyone. It will persuade our governments to treat us as equals,” the businessman said at the time.

The businessman’s words went unheeded. Instead of acknowledging legitimate grievances, the kingdom accused Iran of Interference in its internal affairs and those of its allies. It relied on autocratic minority Sunni leaders to keep a grip on majority Shia populations in Iraq and Bahrain. ‎ Saudi leaders further failed to recognize that Tehran’s perception of itself as Shia Central was no less legitimate than Riyadh’s insistence on being Sunni Central or Israel’s claim that it is the centre of the Jewish world.

As a result, the 2003 US invasion of Iraq that brought the Shiite majority for the first time to power left the Saudis incredulous. “To us, it seems out of this world that you do this. We fought a war together to keep Iran from occupying Iraq after Iraq was driven out of Kuwait (in 1991). Now we are handing the whole country over to Iran without reason,” Saudi Foreign. Minister Prince Saud al Faisal told an American audience in 2005.

Similarly, the perceived Iranian threat to Saudi dominance prompted Saudi Prince Bandar bin Sultan, for decades a key player in the shaping of Saudi security policy and the kingdom’s relations with the United States, to warn Richard Dearlove, the head of the British Secret Intelligence Service, MI6, already more than a decade ago that: “the time is not far off in the Middle East, Richard, when it will be literally ‘God help the Shia’. More than a billion Sunnis have simply had enough of them. As recently as October 2015, Saudi TV Host Abdulellah Al-Dosari celebrated uncontested the death of some 300 Shiite Iranians, including Iranian diplomats, in a stampede during the haj in Mecca. “Praised be to Allah, who relieved Islam and the Muslims from their evil. We pray that Allah will usher them into hell for all eternities.”

Saudi policies, attitudes and perceptions accentuated historic rivalries between Persians and Arabs and Sunnis and Shiites that were never absent but were not primary drivers in contemporary relations. Saudi policy has consistently ignored the fact that some one million Iraqi Shiites died in the Iran-Iraq war defending their country against their Shia brethren.

The Saudi approach created the seeds for intermittent domestic unrest and repeated tit-for-tat attempts to weaken and undermine the legitimacy of the other, set the stage for a global effort to ensure that Muslim communities across the globe empathized with Saudi Wahhabism rather than revolutionary Iranian ideals, and with Saudi support for Saddam Hussein’s bloody eight-year long war against Iran poisoned relations despite occasional attempts by the two states to paper over their differences.

The poisoning was evident in the will of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, whose anti-monarchical views were rooted in the oppression of the imperial regime of the shah that he had toppled. “Muslims should curse tyrants, including the Saudi royal family, these traitors to God’s great shrine, may God’s curses and that of his prophets and angels be upon them,” Khomeini ordained.

The execution of Nimr al Nimr was not simply designed as many analysts maintain to send a message to domestic opposition, nor was it simply intended to send a message to Iran. The message, ‘don’t mess with me,’ has long been loud and clear. The execution was part of a deliberate strategy to delay if not derail implementation of the nuclear agreement and Iran’s return to the international fold. Iranian hardliners played into Saudi hands with the storming of the Saudi embassy. It is the hardliners that Saudi Arabia wants to strengthen in advance of this month’s elections in Iran for parliament and the Assembly of Experts, the council that eventually will elect Iran’s next spiritual leader. If the selection of candidates for both councils for is anything to go by, the Saudi strategy is working.

The strategy makes perfect sense. Saudi regional leadership amounts to exploitation of a window of opportunity rather than reliance on the assets and power needed to sustain it. Saudi Arabia’s interest is to extend its window of opportunity for as long as possible. That window of opportunity exists as long as the obvious regional powers – Iran, Turkey and Egypt – are in various degrees of disrepair. Punitive international sanctions and international isolation long took care of Iran.

And that is what is changing. Iran may not be Arab and maintains a sense of Persian superiority but it has the assets Saud Arabia lacks: a large population base, an industrial base, resources, a battle hardened military, a deep-rooted culture, a history of empire and a geography that makes it a crossroads. Mecca and money will not be able to compete, and certainly not with Wahhabism in control.

Which brings me to the second driver of the perfect storm. The Al Sauds in my mind are inching ever closer to a fundamental change in their deal with the Wahhabis. Reform that enables the kingdom to become a competitive, 21st century knowledge economy is difficult if not impossible as long as it is held back by the strictures of a religious doctrine that looks backwards rather than forwards, whose ideal is the emulation of life as it was at the time of the prophet and his companions.

Saudi Arabia was shell shocked on September 11 2001 when it became evident that the majority of the perpetrators were Saudi nationals. Saudi society was put under the kind of scrutiny the kingdom had never experienced before. The same is happening again today in the wake of the execution of Sheikh Nimr al Nimr. The Saudis expected human rights criticism. The criticism goes in one ear and out the other. What they didn’t expect fuelled by the emergence of the Islamic State was that the focus would be on Wahhabism and Salafism itself.

Wahhabism was Saudi Arabia’s defense against the Islamic revolution that demonstrated that rulers can be toppled, that raised questions about a clergy that slavishly served the needs of an autocratic ruler and that recognized some degree of popular sovereignty. To be sure, Wahhabism has been an expansionary, proselytizing force from its inception. But the success of an Islamic revolution that potentially could inspire not only Shiites but also Sunnis persuaded the Al Sauds flush with oil dollars in the wake of the 1973 oil crisis to kick Wahhabi proselytization into high gear.

It may be hard to conceive of Wahhabism as soft power, but that was the Saudi government’s goal in launching the single largest dedicated public diplomacy campaign in history to establish Wahhabism and Salafism as a major force in the Muslim world that would be able to resist any appeal Iran might have. Estimates of Saudi expenditure on this campaign in the almost four decades since the Iranian revolution range from $75 to $100 billion.

The cost is however beginning to become perhaps too high. Saudi Arabia finds itself being increasingly compared to the Islamic State. Not unfairly. Wahhabism at the beginning of the 20th century and the creation in 1932 of the second Saudi state was what the Islamic State is today. Saudi Arabia is what the Islamic State will become should it survive. Saudi clerics despite their denunciations of IS as a deviation from Islam admit this.

Adel Kalbani, a former imam of the Grand Mosque in Mecca was unequivocal. “Daesh (the Arabic reference to IS) has adopted Salafist thought. It’s not the Muslim Brotherhood’s thought, Qutubism, Sufism of Ash’ari thought. They draw their thoughts from what is written in our own books, from our own principles…. The ideological origin is Salafism. They exploited our own principles that can be found in our own books… We follow the same thought but apply it in a refined way,” Kalbani said. Mohammed Bin Salman summed up the Al Saud’s dilemma when he told The New York Times in November: “The terrorists are telling me that I am not a Muslim. And the world is telling me I am a terrorist.”

One can question the effectiveness of the Saudi soft power effort on multiple levels. True the, Islamic Conference Organization recently backed Saudi Arabia in its conflict with the Islamic republic. But only four countries broke off diplomatic relations with Iran following the storming of the Saudi embassy in Riyadh. All four – Bahrain, Djibouti, Sudan and Somalia – were dependent on the kingdom. None of the other Gulf states did so although some lowered the level of their diplomatic representation in Tehran. To be sure, the move by Sudan had more than symbolic value. It disrupted Iranian logistics in the region.

Similarly, Saudi Arabia recently hastily announced the creation of a 34-nation, Sunni Muslim anti-terrorism military command to be headquartered in Riyadh. The command appeared to be a paper tiger from the moment it was declared in December 2015 by Mohammed Bin Salman. Various Muslim nations, including Malaysia, Pakistan, Lebanon and Indonesia were quick to state that they had not been consulted and had yet to decide whether they would be part of the Saudi initiative. Malaysian Defence Minister Hishammuddin Hussein ruled out any military contribution to the command. So did senior Bangladeshi officials. Pakistan’s parliament had months earlier rejected a Saudi request that it contribute troops to the war in Yemen.

The alliance was likely to further struggle with definitions of what constitutes terrorism given that various of its potential members were likely to take issue with Saudi Arabia’s inclusion in its definition of everything ranging from adherence to atheism to the vaguest contact with any group deemed hostile to the kingdom.

On the level of Muslim communities and at the level of Saudi relations with a host of government agencies in Muslim countries like Malaysia, Indonesia, Bangladesh and Pakistan, the kingdom’s soft power strategy has paid off. It is proving however to be increasingly a pyrrhic victory. Societies particularly in countries with governments that play politics with religion have become more conservative. The result is greater intolerance towards minorities and greater social volatility. The payback is obvious in for example an intelligence chief who recently retired who believes even after the IS attack in Djakarta last month that Shiites not Wahhabis, Salafis or jihadists constitute the greatest domestic threat to Indonesian national security.

Two major political parties in the Dutch parliament recently asked the government whether there was a legal basis for outlawing Wahhabi and Salafi institutions, schools, academies, social services that are funded by Saudi and Kuwaiti institutions. The question arose as a result of graduates of those institutions increasingly refusing to interact with Dutch society and allegations that a minority had joined IS in Syria. The government has yet to respond to the questions. Nonetheless, imagine a scenario in which the government did move to a ban that would likely be challenged in the courts and imagine that the ban would be upheld in the courts. The next step would be the banning of Saudi funding and ultimately the expulsion of the Saudi embassy’s religious attaché. It’s not a development that the Saudi state can afford.

The Al Saud’s risk was also evident late last year when German vice-chancellor Sigmar Gabriel, in a rare attack on Saudi Arabia by a senior Western government official while in office, accused the kingdom of financing extremist mosques and communities in the West that constitute a security risk and warned that it must stop. “We have to make clear to the Saudis that the time of looking away is over. Wahhabi mosques all over the world are financed by Saudi Arabia. Many Islamists who are a threat to public safety come from these communities in Germany,” he said.

Changing international attitudes towards Saudi sectarianism and the fighting of proxy wars against Iran are evident in a quiet conclusion in Western intelligence and policy circles that the crisis in Syria is in part a product of the international community’s indulgence of Saudi propagation of Wahhabism. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director John Brennan unsuccessfully tried in 2011 as peaceful anti-regime protests in Syria descended into violence to persuade Saudi Arabia at a meeting in Washington of Middle Eastern intelligence chiefs to stop supporting militant Sunni Muslim Islamist fighters in Syria. ‎An advisor to the Joint Chiefs of Staff recounted that the Saudis ignored Brennan’s request. They “went back home and increased their efforts with the extremists and asked us for more technical support. And we say OK, and so it turns out that we end up reinforcing the extremists,” the advisor said

In sum, the complex relationship between the Al-Sauds and Wahhabism creates policy dilemmas for the Saudi government on multiple levels, complicates its relationship with the United States and its approach towards the multiple crises in the Middle East and North Africa, including Syria, IS and Yemen. Historian Richard Bulliet argues that Saudi “King Salman faces a difficult choice. Does he do what President Obama, Hillary Clinton, and many Republican presidential hopefuls want him to do, namely, lead a Sunni alliance against the Islamic State? Or does he continue to ignore Syria, attack Shias in Yemen, and allow his subjects to volunteer money and lives to the ISIS caliph’s war against Shi‘ism? The former option risks intensifying unrest, possibly fatal unrest, in the Saudi kingdom. The latter contributes to a growing sense in the West that Saudi Arabia is insensitive to the crimes being carried out around the world in the name of Sunni Islam. Prediction: In five years’ time, Saudi Arabia will either help defeat the Islamic State, or become it.”

The Al Sauds problems are multiplied by the fact that Saudi Arabia’s clergy is tying itself into knots as a result of its sell-out to the regime and its close ideological affinity to more militant strands of Islam. Dissident Saudi scholar Madawi Al-Rasheed argues that the sectarianism that underwrites the anti-Iran campaign strengthens regime stability in the immediate term because it ensures “a divided society that is incapable of developing broad, grassroots solidarities to demand political reform… The divisions are enhanced by the regime’s promotion of an all-encompassing religious nationalism, anchored in Wahhabi teachings, which tend to be intolerant of religious diversity… Dissidence, therefore, centres on narrow regional, tribal and sectarian issues.”

The knots are also evident in approaches towards Syria. A Saudi royal decree banning Saudis from granting moral or material aid to groups including Islamic State and al Qaeda’s official offshoot in Syria, the Al Nusra Front, was countered more than a year later by a statement of more than 50 clerics that called on Sunni Muslims to unite against Russia, Iran, and the regime of Bashar Al Assad. The statement described groups fighting the Assad regime as “holy warriors” in what was widely seen as an endorsement of jihadist groups.

By the same token, Saudi Arabia’s intervention in Yemen in a bid to defeat Houthi rebels, the only group to have challenged Al Qaeda advances in the country but that also threatened to undermine the kingdom’s dominant role in Yemeni politics, has effectively turned the Saudi air force into the jihadists’ air wing as Al Qaeda expands its reach in the country.

Whether Bulliet is right or not in his prediction, Wahhabism is not what’s going to win Saudi Arabia lasting regional hegemony in the Middle East and North Africa. In fact, as long as Wahhabism is a dominant player in the kingdom, Saudi Arabia is even less likely to win its battle for hegemony. At the end of the day, it is a perfect storm. The stakes for Saudi Arabia are existential and the kingdom may well be caught in a Catch-22.

Iran poses an existential threat, not because it’s still projects itself as a revolutionary state, but simply by what it is, the assets it can bring to bear and the intrinsic challenge it poses. But equally existential is the fact that Wahhabism is likely to increasingly become a domestic and external liability for the Al Sauds. Their future is clouded in uncertainty, no more so if and when they lose Wahhabism as the basis for the legitimacy of their absolute rule.

This article was published by RSIS

If a US-led coalition decides to start ground operations in Syria, Saudi Arabia says it’s ready to join the fight.

In an interview televised on al-Arabiya TV, Brigadier General Ahmed Asseri said, “The kingdom is ready to participate in any ground operations that the coalition (against Daesh) may agree to carry out in Syria,”

Asseri, who is also the spokesman for the Saudi-led Arab coalition in Yemen, stated that Saudi Arabia has already been an active member of the U.S.-led coalition against Daesh since 2014, carrying out out more than 190 aerial missions.

He also said that Saudi Arabia believes that the coalition needs to combine both ground and aerial operations to win against Daesh.

Asseri added, “If there was a consensus from the leadership of the coalition, the kingdom is willing to participate in these efforts because we believe that aerial operations are not the ideal solution and there must be a twin mix of aerial and ground operation,” though there was no mention of actually how man troops the kingdom is prepared to send.

U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby said of the general’s comments that the coalition was more than happy to have partners in the fight against Daesh, but had yet to see a proposal from the Saudis.

“I would not want to comment specifically on this until we’ve had a chance to review it,” he said.

Later this month, the US is expected to hold a meeting in Brussels with defense members from countries fighting against Daesh.

Original article

By Jacques deLisle*

When Taiwanese voters went to the polls on January 16, 2016, they did something that has become admirably routine in Taiwan’s robust democracy: mandating a change of the party in power and setting the stage for another peaceful transition of power between opposing political parties—the third since Taiwan began holding fully democratic presidential elections in 1996. This election was, however, different in some key respects: voters chose the first woman president of the ROC or any government in the Chinese-speaking world; cross-Strait relations were not a defining or central issue in the campaign or, apparently, for the electorate; and the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) won both the presidency and a solid majority in the Legislative Yuan—something that the Kuomintang (KMT) had enjoyed for the preceding eight years. The significance of the second of these novel features should not be overstated. Relations with the Mainland were more salient than the surface focus on issues of economic performance, inequality, pensions, housing affordability, and public health and safety may suggest. And cross-Strait questions will loom very large for President Tsai Ing-wen and a DPP-majority government’s prospects for success.

Cross-Strait Issues and the Elections: Still Salient After All These Years

The lack of emphasis on relations with Beijing was, in part, a consequence of the public’s heightened concern with domestic economic and social issues. But it also reflected other changes. Under party chair and presidential candidate Tsai, the DPP had positioned itself effectively nearer the political center on cross-Strait policy, thereby neutralizing an issue on which the KMT had long enjoyed an advantage with voters. Compared to prior DPP stances (including, especially, those adopted by the only previous DPP president, Chen Shui-bian), Tsai’s positions were much more solidly in the mainstream of public opinion and likely to appeal to the median voter: she would maintain the status quo in cross-Strait relations, pursue peaceful and stable development of cross-Strait relations, not openly reject the 1992 Consensus (characterized by the Ma Ying-jeou administration as “one China, respective / differing interpretations”), insist that developments in cross-Strait relations be in accordance with the will of the people of Taiwan and the constitution of the Republic of China, and so on. The KMT’s later-replaced presidential candidate Hong Hsiu-chu helped the DPP (and helped to scuttle her own candidacy) with statements that were seen as significantly more “pro-unification” or “pro-China” than the positions of the incumbent KMT government under President Ma. The most controversial example was her proffering a formula of “one China, same interpretation,” which stood in seemingly obvious—if subsequently denied—contrast to Ma’s “one China, respective / differing interpretations.”

Moreover, concerns in Taiwan about the closer ties with China forged during the preceding eight years by the Ma government had shifted in ways that favored the DPP’s traditionally more skeptical stance. For many years, debates about Taiwan’s Mainland policies had been framed largely in terms of how far and how fast rapprochement should proceed, and whether the economic gains to Taiwan were worth the political risk that Beijing would use its increased leverage to undermine Taiwan’s de facto independence and to press for accommodation on issues of sovereignty under terms acceptable to the PRC. In the run-up to the 2016 electoral cycle, however, the critique had shifted to focus on engagement’s failure to deliver the gains its proponents had promised. Although performing well by dismal contemporary global standards, Taiwan’s economic growth remained anemic when measured against expectations rooted in Taiwan’s past experience and reinforced by the Ma government’s pledges.

More significant politically, many Taiwanese saw the benefits from cross-Strait economic integration as going overwhelmingly to a small elite. Ma-era policies toward the Mainland became entwined with public perceptions of unacceptably high levels of inequality. Especially for younger Taiwanese with little sense of connection to China and much anxiety about their own economic futures, the Ma government’s steps toward further opening to the Mainland were not just inadequate as solutions; they were part of the problem. The most striking example was the reaction to the proposed cross-Strait agreement on trade in services—one of nearly two dozen follow-on agreements to the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement reached in the early days of the Ma administration. Concerns about the agreement and the Ma administration’s push for it spurred the Sunflower Movement and the student-led occupation of the legislature in the spring of 2014, contributed to stunning KMT defeats in local elections in November 2014, and led to the formation of the New Power Party which became (albeit with a mere five of 113 seats) the third largest party in the legislature elected in 2016.

The controversy over the cross-Strait agreement on trade in services also indicated connections between cross-Strait relations and Taiwan’s 2016 electoral politics that extended beyond economic issues. Much of what drove the Sunflower Movement and the 2014 election losses that presaged the KMT’s defeat in 2016 was the way the trade agreement had proceeded through the KMT-controlled legislature. The severely truncated debate and lack of substantive deliberation prompted sharp denunciations of a lack of transparency and democracy, and successful calls for the introduction of new legislation to provide for more detailed and substantive legislative scrutiny of cross-Strait agreements. (The legislation, although still unenacted, is a top DPP priority for 2016.)  At the same time, the Ma administration’s ultimate failure to secure legislative approval despite the KMT’s large parliamentary majority became part of a broader narrative of the ineffectiveness and dysfunction of the Ma administration and KMT-controlled government.

While cross-Strait issues thus played a large (if sometimes underappreciated and somewhat indirect role) in the 2016 elections, they also will remain a crucial concern for the DPP-led government. As Tsai’s and other DPP leaders’ statements during the campaign and in the wake of victory have acknowledged, they face daunting problems, not least in economic policy. And success will be more achievable—or possible at all—if cross-Strait relations go reasonably well. As disappointing as the economic fruits of Ma-era cross-Strait policies have been (especially in the eyes of DPP supporters), Taiwan’s economic fortunes depend a great deal on ties to the Mainland (and, in turn, the increasingly questionable health of the Chinese economy).

More indirectly but no less significantly, stable cross-Strait relations are preconditions to Beijing’s acquiescence in—and, in turn, the overall prospects for—Taiwan’s pursuit of other international economic opportunities that figure prominently in Tsai’s policy agenda (and that were key goals for Ma as well), including free trade agreements with other partners in East and Southeast Asia and possible future membership in the U.S.-led Trans-Pacific Partnership (which includes many members susceptible to pressure from China) and the PRC-led Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership. More broadly and most seriously, a new period of crisis or a deep and lasting chill in cross-Strait relations would create additional distractions undermining the ambitious agenda of domestic economic and social reform offered by Tsai and the DPP, could threaten Taiwan’s security, and might push a hard-pressed DPP government to adopt a political strategy that returns to traditional positions that Beijing and other critics would attack as “pro-independence.”

Domestic Politics, U.S. Relations, and Beijing (1): Tsai’s (Limited) Advantages

In navigating a difficult environment in external relations, President Tsai will enjoy, at least initially, some notable advantages. First, at home, the Tsai government should have some latitude to formulate and adjust cross-Strait policies. The likely correctly perceived link between Tsai’s embrace of a more moderate approach to Mainland policy and the DPP’s electoral success, and the substantial majority that Tsai’s DPP won in the legislature should mean that there will not be much effective pressure from the DPP’s “deep green” base (and the legislators most aligned with it) to move toward a “tougher” Mainland policy. This is all the more likely to be true if the DPP-led legislature adopts reforms to the legislature’s internal procedural rules—which under the KMT’s parliamentary head and Ma Ying-jeou’s bitter intra-party rival Wang Jin-pyng allowed a handful of members to block legislative action.

From the other side of Taiwan’s political spectrum, there seems likely to be little near-term pressure on Tsai to move farther toward more accommodating positions. By accepting much of what was undertaken under Ma, Tsai and the DPP have preempted—even coopted—some traditional “blue” criticisms. And the opposition KMT is, for now, too much in disarray to frame a clear and politically effective alternative position on cross-Strait policy (or other issues). With its once-rising star Eric Chu (Chu Li-luan) having been dragged reluctantly into the presidential race and having led his party to a stunning defeat, the KMT faces internal struggles and, in the immediate aftermath of the 2016 elections, seemed to have little political strategy beyond waiting for Tsai and the DPP to make mistakes or to fail to solve the problems that had made voters so dissatisfied with Ma and the KMT that they turned the incumbent party out of power.

Second, in relations with Taiwan’s indispensable supporter, Tsai starts from a relatively strong position as well. Her 2015 visit to Washington contrasted sharply with her visit four years earlier during her first, unsuccessful run for Taiwan’s presidency. In 2011, the U.S. reception was chilly at best, replete with complaints that she was evasive on questions of policy toward the Mainland, concerns that she could not or would not handle cross-Strait relations well, and clear signals that the U.S. favored Ma’s reelection. Her pre-2016 election trip went far better, with her more clearly articulated and more centrist positions on cross-Strait relations winning much greater acceptance, her quiet meetings with higher-ranking U.S. officials reflecting this more positive reception, and her U.S. audiences drawing additional comfort from the prominent role accorded to Joseph Wu (Wu Jaushieh), who was known and respected in Washington for his handling of the difficult task of serving as Taiwan’s ambassador-equivalent during Chen Shui-bian’s friction-producing presidency, and who had become the DPP’s General Secretary under Tsai and likely appointee to a key national security or foreign policy post in a Tsai government.

Third, Taiwan’s counterparty in cross-Strait relations adopted positions of relative restraint and moderation toward presidential candidate and President-elect Tsai’s approach to cross-Strait issues (something Tsai herself noted publicly). Despite some long-running grumblings that Tsai was a true-believer in Taiwan independence who would be worse than the merely opportunistic former President Chen (whose “pro-independence” moves had drawn Beijing’s ire and triggered recurring crises in Taiwan-Mainland relations), or that Tsai was irredeemably tainted by her role in former President Lee Teng-hui’s “splittist” “two-states thesis” (as Beijing called Lee’s famous July 1999 characterization of the nature of cross-Strait relations), Beijing’s official stance toward the 2016 Taiwan election—and its outcome—generally followed the pattern of 2008 and 2012. That is, China left no doubt that it favored the KMT, but it did not rule out dealing with a DPP-led government that was willing to eschew positions on cross-Strait issues that Beijing deemed unacceptable. Beijing’s post-election view, as expressed in commentary by the official Xinhua News Agency, expressed hope and expectation that cross-Strait relations could and would proceed on their prior course and eschewed alarm over the DPP’s victory.

Domestic Politics, U.S. Relations and Beijing (2): Underlying Weaknesses and Challenges

Yet, on each of these fronts, Tsai and her government may be in a weaker position than these evident strengths suggest. First, insulation from political pressure at home may prove fragile. Although the incoming DPP government has tried hard to manage expectations, slow progress on economic issues could quickly become a problem. If Beijing is dissatisfied with what Tsai appears ready to offer on the terms of cross-Strait engagement, it may choose to turn up the pressure in the relatively near term, perhaps through relatively small but symbolically weighty blows to Taiwan’s international space. For example, China might allow one of Taiwan’s remaining diplomatic partners to switch recognition and formal relations to the PRC. Or Beijing might block Taiwan’s invitation to participate at the World Health Assembly annual meeting in May 2016 (breaking a pattern that has been in place since 2008). Or the PRC might suspend the meetings between the quasi-official bodies—Taiwan’s Straits Exchange Foundation and the Mainland’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait—that were recommenced in 2008 and that have been instrumental to rapprochement during the Ma years, and stall progress toward deeper government-to-government engagement or the establishment of quasi-consular offices on both sides of the Strait.

In these circumstances, Tsai would face pressure to respond. Critical voices would likely grow loud, charging that her approach to cross-Strait relations was not working. The perseverance to endure an early chill from Beijing—which might portend little about the Chinese regime’s longer term strategy—would not come easily. Small but significant U.S. countermeasures to Beijing’s gambits—for example, sending a higher-than-usual-level American official to Taipei—could help to prevent an unnecessary downward spiral, but it would be unlikely to eliminate the risk.

The generally positive reception for Tsai in Washington in mid-2015 should not be over-read. Although more subdued, complaints persisted in some quarters that Tsai had not yet made her cross-Strait policies clear. And there were more widespread—and harder to dismiss—concerns about the uncertainty of what Tsai would do if, or when, Beijing found her non-acceptance of the 1992 Consensus (or other of Tsai’s positions) unacceptable. To a significant extent, the contrast between Tsai’s 2011 and 2015 visits reflected Washington’s recognition of the obvious difference in her electoral prospects. In 2011, the U.S., which was generally happy with President Ma’s handling of cross-Strait relations (and very pleased by the changes from the Chen era), was confident that Ma would prevail over Tsai and maintain policies that were, for Washington, preferable to what Tsai would do in the unlikely event that she were to win. In 2015, however, Washington had to engage Tsai as a presumptive victor in the then-upcoming election. In such circumstances, U.S. officials and others in relevant policy circles had to be concerned about how they might best cultivate means to persuade or influence the policies of a future President Tsai. Simply, Washington has reason to—and does—treat presumptive winners differently from likely losers.

Candidate Tsai’s two visits to Washington occurred in two significantly different contexts of U.S.-China relations. Although tensions in the world’s most important bilateral relationship were evident in 2011, by 2015 the view was more widespread and more emphatic in U.S. China-watching circles that a largely cooperative relationship between Beijing and Washington could not be counted upon. In this context (and with other things—including Taiwan’s Mainland policy—held constant), Taiwan appeared less likely to be a cause of unnecessary friction in U.S.-PRC relations and more likely to be an asset—one of the friends and allies upon which the U.S. relied in its “rebalancing” to Asia (and in response to China).

To be sure, these circumstances offered valuable security benefits to Taiwan that would persist into Tsai’s presidency—and that seemed to be confirmed on the eve of Taiwan’s elections by the first (albeit modest-sized) U.S. offer of arms sales to Taiwan in four years. But, here too, the apparent good news for Tsai and Taiwan should not be exaggerated. If U.S.-China relations remain tension-filled or become more fraught (whether over the South China Sea, cyberespionage, rivalrous international economic agendas, or many other possible issues) or if the U.S. seeks cooperation from what it sees as a generally recalcitrant (and, indeed, increasingly uncooperative) China (on security issues involving North Korea, conflict in West Asia, or other matters), serious questions of U.S. national interests will be more directly and deeply implicated. If that happens, the U.S.’s commitments to supporting Taiwan cannot be expected to trump the other interests the U.S. will have at stake. This is a risk for Taiwan even if Washington does not see Taipei as having caused deterioration in cross-Strait and, in turn, U.S.-China relations. The problem for Taiwan is greater still if influential opinion in the U.S. sees Taiwan as being at fault. Prospects for Taiwan are all the more uncertain because a still-unknown new U.S. president will take office eight months after Tsai does.

Beijing’s apparent forbearance toward the prospect of a DPP win and a Tsai presidency has been ambiguous and seems ambivalent. The hardline view that Tsai is merely tactically hiding a radically pro-independence agenda has not defined Beijing’s approach, but voices expressing that view have not been silenced either. China’s relatively hands-off approach to the last three presidential election cycles in Taiwan does not definitively show Beijing’s progress along a learning curve that the contrast with three preceding rounds might seem to suggest. It is true that China’s approach has evolved: the cross-Strait missile crisis in 1995-96, which helped hand Beijing’s bête noire Lee Teng-hui a victory in 1996 (and stiffened American support for Taiwan); the second Taiwan White Paper that threatened the use of force if Taiwan pursued independence or even delayed indefinitely negotiations over reunification and the finger-wagging warning by Premier Zhu Rongji not to vote for the DPP, which likely helped the DPP’s Chen Shui-bian win in 2000; the strong indications of support for, and high-profile ties to, a reunited pan-Blue ticket in 2004, which gave Chen ammunition in his close-fought and successful reelection battle to argue that electing a KMT government risked undermining Taiwan’s autonomy and de facto independence; and the more temperate signals of support for the KMT coupled with a willingness to engage with any regime (including a DPP one) under certain conditions in the 2008, 2012, and 2016 cycles.

To the extent that this pattern reflects a growing appreciation in Beijing that ham-fisted intervention in Taiwan’s elections tends to backfire, that is still only moderately good news for Taiwan. Such learning does not neatly translate simply into an accommodating approach to post-election cross-Strait relations in 2016. More fundamentally, Beijing’s approach to the last three contests may not tell us very much because China’s Taiwan policymakers—in part benefitting from a much-improved understanding of Taiwan’s domestic politics—saw those elections as ones that Beijing could not hope to influence, with the first two predictably going to its favored candidate and the third going to its less palatable alternative.

In the run-up to the election (including at the November 2015 meeting between Xi Jinping and Ma Ying-jeou) and in the aftermath of the DPP’s impressive win at the polls in January 2016, Beijing has continued to insist that Taiwan’s leader must adhere to the 1992 Consensus and some form of a one-China principle (presumptively in the form of both Taiwan and the Mainland belonging to one China), and must forego Taiwan independence, “splittist” activities, and claims that Taiwan and the Mainland are in any sense two countries. Tsai’s evolving positions go some distance toward what Beijing wants: not specifically rejecting the 1992 Consensus, promising to address cross-Strait relations within the framework of the ROC Constitution (which is, in some sense, a “one China” charter), approaching cross-Strait relations on the basis of a status quo that includes twenty-plus years of cross-Strait negotiations and exchanges (a timeframe that, at least arguably, includes the 1992 Singapore meeting that is the ostensible real-world basis for the “1992 Consensus” terminology coined by Su Chi eight years later), accepting the historical fact of the 1992 meeting and (in a point emphasized in Joseph Wu’s post-election visit to Washington) its spirit of dialogue and setting aside (but reserving) differences while pursuing common ground, and being interested in top-level cross-Strait meetings under appropriate conditions. But there is still a gap, and Tsai appears unlikely to be willing, or able politically, to accept the terms Beijing has, so far, insisted upon as the political basis for stability—or perhaps the avoidance of retrogression—in cross-Strait relations.

The Road Ahead for Cross-Strait Relations: Words and Deeds

The question looms of whether some new or revised formulation can be found in the arcane politics of creating language to handle cross-Strait relations. Will it be possible to craft a terminology that, on the one hand, Beijing can accept as adequate to provide the requisite framework and to preserve the political basis or foundation that Beijing characterizes as indispensable to the peaceful development of cross-Strait relations during the last eight years and that, on the other hand, Tsai and her DPP supporters can tolerate.

Beijing’s approach must take account of some major developments in Taiwan’s politics. Long-term trends—up notably during the Ma years and underpinned by generational turnover—have produced very high levels of “Taiwanese” identity in Taiwan (and correspondingly low identification with Mainland China). At the same time, support for independence (at least under current or reasonably imaginable conditions) is strikingly low, and—as Tsai’s positions underscore—the prospect of pursuing independence has ebbed considerably from the high watermark of the Chen administration’s more assertive moments. This striking and sharpened juxtaposition means that Beijing has very good reason to be confident that its “anti-secession” agenda is in good shape. But it also has very strong reason to fear that its “reunification” agenda faces extremely bleak prospects (at least if the means remain those of “winning hearts and minds” rather than resorting to coercion or force).

A peculiarity of Taiwan’s constitutional and electoral system will give both sides some time to work out what language to offer (in Taiwan’s case) or accept (in Beijing’s). Tsai will not take office until May 20, and her inaugural address likely will be a key occasion (as it certainly was for Chen in 2000 and 2004 and for Ma in 2008) to offer a definitive statement of her formula for engaging the Mainland. The four months between election and taking office surely will be marked by intense efforts and discussions among all three sides of the cross-Strait relationship—Taiwan, the Mainland and the United States—to shape an effective and acceptable locution.

When Tsai takes office, perhaps before then, and well into her term as well, there will be many decision points that may reveal much about the likely trajectory of cross-Strait relations. Early shots across the bow from Beijing—such as poaching one of Taiwan’s few diplomatic partners or quashing Taiwan’s 2016 WHA invitation—are a potential avoidable, and regrettable, example. Another test will come as the Tsai government pursues closer ties with Tokyo—something foreshadowed by Tsai’s October 2015 visit to Japan, former president and later DPP-supporter Lee Teng-hui’s support for closer ties with Japan, and the impending departure of President Ma (who is widely perceived as being relatively “anti-Japanese,” not least because of his long-standing focus on claims of ROC sovereignty in the Senkaku / Diaoyutai islands dispute).

Other salient moments may include any significant policy statements from Tsai and her government concerning the maritime and territorial disputes in the East and South China Seas. Alarmist critics on both sides of the Strait have raised the remote possibility that Tsai might abandon or radically alter the ROC’s long-standing claims—which are the progenitors of the PRC’s claims—in the two contested areas. More plausibly and in a move that the U.S. has favored, Tsai might “clarify” the nature of the ROC’s claims under the 11-dash line (which forms the basis of the PRC’s 9-dash line) in the South China Sea, limiting it to claims based on territorial sovereignty over the landforms inside the line rather than a more capacious and assertive claim of rights based on sovereignty over the waters themselves or other historic rights. Or, in a move that Washington would be less likely to welcome, Tsai might take steps to affirm Ma’s pointed confirmation (through a pre-Chinese New Year’s visit that drew a rebuke from U.S. officials) of the ROC’s claims to Itu Aba / Taiping Island—the largest landform and strongest candidate for full island status in the South China Sea.

Under Tsai, Taiwan will also continue its long-running quest for international space and international economic engagement. Pursuit of opportunities to participate in the International Civil Aviation Organization, the International Maritime Organization, INTERPOL, and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change will be on the new regime’s agenda. So too will be the RCEP, TPP (whenever the second round begins), the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, and bilateral free trade agreements. Each of these will provide an occasion for a more or less accommodating or obstructing response from Beijing.

Prospects for cross-Strait relations, and the new DPP-led government, will depend on how the Mainland and the United States respond to Taiwan’s statements and actions on these and other concrete issues, as well as on the more dramatic focal point of what formula Tsai will present for relations with Beijing, presumably at her historic and closely watched inaugural address. And it is important to recognize that much will also likely turn on still-unforeseen events. This last feature of cross-Strait relations was vividly illustrated on the eve of the 2016 election when a teenage Taiwanese K-pop singer’s waving of the ROC national flag drew (with prompting from a Mainland-resident Taiwanese entertainer) virulent condemnation from Mainland netizens for displaying ostensibly “pro-independence” sentiments, and led, in turn, a hostage video-like self-criticism from the young singer, a flat-footed response from Chinese officials, and much anger and concern in Taiwan about what the incident seemed to reveal about the Mainland’s approach to, and understanding of, its neighbor across the Strait.

About the author:
*Jacques deLisle is director of the Foreign Policy Research Institute’s Asia Program and the Stephen Cozen Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania.

Source:
This article was published by FPRI

By David W. Murray*

The Obama Administration’s latest response to the mounting opiate addiction and overdose crisis will do virtually nothing to change the growth of the epidemic. More compelling, because of the philosophy upon which these actions are predicated, the response cannot in principle change the acceleration, because the policy is misdirected.

According to the plan announced February 2nd, there will be $920 million for “cooperative agreements” with states to expand a certain type of treatment, with $80 million for evaluation and practitioner support, and $90 million additional funds for overdose antidotes.

Yet these responses are directed at the results of the epidemic, not its causes, mitigating the fate of those already trapped in drug use, be it opiate prescriptions or heroin and the extraordinarily lethal drug fentanyl. They do not address the epidemic’s spread, or the source of the pathogens, nor prevent new victims.

There is one reference in the entire five-page document concerning the supply of the illicit heroin and fentanyl, overwhelmingly produced in Mexico, crossing the border and distributed by gangs linked to the criminal cartels.

The sole reference is: “Since 2007, through the Merida Initiative, the Department of State has been working with the Government of Mexico to help build the capacity of Mexico’s law enforcement and justice sector institutions…” That is the work for decades, not an urgent mobilization. No mention of eradication, or border interdiction, or dismantling cartel finances, to name only a few needed actions.

Instead, Obama will expand physician education and monitoring programs, focus on overdose reversal through Naloxone (Narcan), fund needle distribution for drug injectors, and finally, provide opiate substitution drugs as treatment.

But even the increased funding for treatment is more political optics than genuine programs. During the time that the epidemic has surged (most steeply since 2010), the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Administration (SAMHSA) has operated with a yearly budget of $3.7 billion dollars.

Further, SAMHSA funds were in addition to the anticipated, though unrealized, programs of the Affordable Care Act, which was supposed to solve treatment deficiencies. Instead, SAMHSA tells us, “significant gaps in [insurance] coverage” remain, which results in “approximately 3.7 million Americans with behavioral health conditions without health insurance.”

Of treatment expenditures, SAMHSA already expends $1.8 billion in Prevention and Treatment Block Grants to the states. Yet this has not sufficed to prevent the epidemic. Surprisingly, the treatment appropriation request for 2016 has a $41 million decrease from the 2015 enacted budget.

In fact, a program specifically designed to address the gap in treatment need, known as Access To Recovery (ATR) and begun in the Bush Administration, supported expanded provider networks for treatment and recovery support services.

Since 2004 it has served 650,000 clients. As recently as 2012, ATR received $98 million; but the budget request for 2016 eliminates it. That is, the President’s own budget request is at cross-purposes with the sudden increases announced to the press. Moreover, why would the Administration eliminate more than $130 million in existing treatment programs, only to backfill that money on February 2nd?

The key to understanding the new plan is its intended effect on the operation of state substance abuse treatment programs. Eligibility for funding is contingent. And it is here that the Administration most reveals itself. They seek to jaw-bone states by requiring adoption of the Administration’s preferred form of treatment – the so-called Medication-Assisted Therapy (MAT), whereby those suffering from opiate addiction are offered substitute, synthetic opiates such as methadone or buprenorphine as their form of treatment. The measure of treatment success is no longer abstinence, but rather continued maintenance on opiate substitution as shown by “treatment retention.”

Traditional programs (such those that are 12-step or faith-based) that do not accept these terms will not receive the monies. Surely this is a political gift to the credentialed treatment providers, who are guaranteed clients without the burden of moving them to abstinent recovery as a measure of performance.

Previous funding was not conditioned on MAT forms of treatment. This is a serious policy change—cutting treatment programs only to replace them with government maintained addiction.

Properly used, there is an important place for MAT programs; they are valuable tools in stabilizing an opiate addict, linked to the important variables of retention in treatment, stable employment and secure housing during recovery. But such programs are best used to “bridge” those in treatment to full recovery, the goal of abstinence from further opiate use.

Instead, operating under the Obama Administration philosophy that addiction (or “drug use disorder” as they term it) is a “chronic, relapsing disease” from which one should not expect an abstinent recovery as the measure of treatment “success,” the MATs become ends in themselves, and the state of continued opiate substitution itself becomes the objective.

Hence, we see the complete Obama policy. Narcan, needles, and methadone (or buprenorphine) MAT; these are the means to maintain the dependent opiate user, serviced only through authorized providers, and their use constitutes “recovery.”

Instead of a fresh start and freedom, these programs serve up a dependent, even subjugated, client, attached in near perpetuity, receiving authorized opiates as continuous treatment, becoming thereby eligible for “recovery services” benefits. This portrait is not a measure of liberation from addiction, but rather constitutes an expanded sense of dependency.

And still the heroin and the fentanyl are produced and cross the border and are distributed by criminals for injection, whereby yet more are trapped. In response, we are offered “Naloxone tool kits for military bases.” This policy is not intended to stop the opiate epidemic and it will only destroy more American lives.

About the author:
*David W. Murray is a Senior Fellow at Hudson Institute where he co-directs the Center for Substance Abuse Policy Research.

Source:
This article was published by FPRI.

United Nations peacekeepers in the Central African Republic raped or sexually exploited at least eight women and girls between October and December 2015. Among the survivors are a 14-year-old girl and an 18-year-old woman who said peacekeepers gang-raped them near Bambari airport in the center of the country.

“In a country where armed groups routinely prey on civilians, peacekeepers should be protectors, not predators,” said Hillary Margolis, women’s rights researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Sending peacekeepers back home is not enough. The UN needs to insist that troops’ home countries bring rapist and other abusers to justice, and that survivors get the support they need.”

Human Rights Watch documented the eight cases of sexual exploitation and abuse by UN peacekeepers, known as MINUSCA, during research in Bambari between January 16 and 30, 2016. Only one of the survivors had received any medical or psychosocial care, available at the Bambari hospital and through non-governmental organizations, before speaking to Human Rights Watch.

All eight said that they believed the peacekeepers responsible were from the Republic of Congo or the Democratic Republic of Congo. A battalion of approximately 800 soldiers from the Democratic Republic of Congo is deployed to Bambari and other towns in Ouaka province. Between mid-September and mid-December, a small contingent of peacekeepers from the Republic of Congo were also temporarily deployed to protect Bambari’s airport. The deployment of Republic of Congo peacekeepers corresponds with the sexual exploitation and abuse allegations Human Rights Watch documented, most of which occurred at or near the airport.

An 18-year-old woman said that when she visited the Republic of Congo troop base near the airport in late 2015 seeking food or money, armed peacekeepers forced her into the bush and gang-raped her. “I didn’t want to have sex with them, but when I went to visit their base they took me into the bush,” she said. “There were three of them on me. They were armed. They said if I resisted they would kill me. They took me one by one.”

A 14-year-old girl said that in November, two peacekeepers attacked her as she walked by the MINUSCA base at the airport. “The men were dressed in their military uniforms and had their guns,” she said. “I walked by and suddenly one of them grabbed me by my arms and the other one ripped off my clothes. They pulled me into the tall grass and one held my arms while the other one pinned down my legs and raped me. The soldier holding my arms tried to hold my mouth, but I was still able to scream. Because of that they had to run away before the second soldier could rape me.”

In all of the sexual exploitation and abuse cases Human Rights Watch documented, the survivors were living at camps for internally displaced people in Bambari when the abuses took place. Several told Human Rights Watch they had sex with peacekeepers in exchange for food or money as ongoing conflict had left them desperate. UN policy on peacekeepers’ conduct prohibits engaging in any sexual relations with members of the local community.

Human Rights Watch reported the cases to UN officials in Bambari and Bangui within days of receiving the information. The MINUSCA leadership, which has made a commitment to actively prevent and address sexual exploitation and abuse, took immediate measures to respond to the allegations and senior UN officials opened investigations. Human Rights Watch later learned that one case had previously been reported to the UN and an investigation opened.

Under the agreement signed between the UN and countries that contribute troops to UN peacekeeping missions, the relevant troop-contributing country is responsible for carrying out judicial proceedings against soldiers who commit sexual exploitation and abuse. The UN can send troops home and prohibit them from participating in future UN missions, but has no independent capacity to prosecute them.

In a new video report at Fox News, former New Jersey Judge Andrew Napolitano predicts that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) will “very soon” recommend the prosecution of Hillary Clinton for espionage based on her alleged reckless handling of US government secrets while she was Secretary of State. That indictment recommendation, Napolitano explains, will bring the matter into the “political sphere” in which President Barack Obama will have the power either to allow or prevent a prosecution.

Napolitano states:

The evidence of her failure to care for national security secrets is now well documented, overwhelming, publicly known, and publicly understood. We can expect very soon that the FBI will recommend an indictment.

Napolitano proceeds to explain that such a recommendation is not enough to ensure that a prosecution occurs. The FBI’s recommendation, says Napolitano, will just move the matter “into the political sphere.” There, he declares, the big question is “What will the president do about it?”

Watch Napolitano’s report here:

Napolitano is an Advisory Board member for the Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity.

This article was published by the RonPaul Institute.