By Ranjit Gupta*

Not only is Donald Trump the least-prepared president-elect in US history, but he compounds this handicap by showing little interest in preparing for perhaps the most important position in the world. He has been brazenly blasé about avoiding intelligence briefings, saying, “I don’t have to be told, you know, I’m, like, a smart person.”

Donald Trump, the first billionaire US president, has appointed to his cabinet or cabinet-level positions people having a combined net worth of about US$5.6 billion, the highest in US history. Success in deals and money-making seems to be a premium criterion for Trump’s evaluation of people, an unusual approach for successful governance. Having 4 former generals in his team is also unprecedented. Less than half of the appointees have government experience. Those who will have his ear on a daily basis are his cronies – his chief strategist, Steve Bannon, is an unabashed White-supremacist demagogue having headed right-wing news site Breitbart News, before chairing the president-elect’s campaign; Reince Priebus, Trump’s chief-of-staff, was chair of the Republican National Committee; Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, has emerged as a key power centre. None of them had worked in government. His daughter, Ivanka, has been sitting in Trump’s meetings with foreign dignitaries. His national security advisor, Gen Michael Flynn, is unabashedly racist and an Islamophobe; he was sacked as head of the Defence Intelligence Agency. He has a long record of being unable to work harmoniously with colleagues.

Trump’s foreign policy-related comments during the campaign were like throwaway remarks – seemingly consciously designed keeping in mind the next day’s news headlines – conspicuously exhibiting a complete lack of serious thinking through on many critical issues. He has a dim view of long time US security alliances and of allies being freeloaders. Even after being elected he has continued to be off-handed. In a particularly conspicuous and potentially extremely dangerous break with the past, Trump took a congratulatory call from the president of Taiwan and later strongly defended his doing so against both domestic criticism and China’s continuing strong warnings. The Sino-US relationship is the most critical relationship in global geopolitics and must be treated with great sensitivity.

All this cannot but be a matter of considerable concern since the US is the world’s most powerful country and has been the linchpin of the global security architecture.

Trump has appointed Rex Tillerman, the CEO of ExxonMobil, as secretary of state, and South Carolina Governor Nicky Haley to be ambassador to the UN. Neither has any foreign policy experience. However, Tillerman has shepherded ExxonMobil’s work in over 50 countries remarkably successfully. Trump sees him as a pragmatist and a savvy dealmaker, viewing his strong personal ties with Putin and business relationship with Russia – including opposition to sanctions on Russia – favourably. This resonates well with his own personal warm feelings towards Putin as someone able to cut deals with strongmen, many of whom have traditionally been opposed to the US: “Rex is friendly with many of the leaders in the world that we don’t get along with…I like what this is all about.” All this said, Tillerman may prove to be an inspired choice.

Retired marine Gen James Mattis’ nomination as secretary of defence has been the most popular appointment. He is particularly well regarded in the US military and enjoys bipartisan political support.

It is to be hoped that both Tillerman and Mattis will bring a certain degree of sobriety and gravitas in the consideration of important foreign policy issues.

Currently, the most dangerous flashpoints in the world are in West Asia, which has been in flames for almost six years now, and there are few signs of the situation improving meaningfully any time soon. Issues in this region are likely to be amongst the earliest foreign policy decisions of the Trump administration. Each decision will have consequences that would adversely impinge upon Trump’s other regional priorities, and so it will not be easy to pursue many mutually contradictory components of his West Asian policy agenda.

Trump’s campaign remarks suggest that he attaches the highest priority to defeating the Islamic State (IS) through proactive cooperation with Russia, and that he wishes to establish a close personal working relationship with Putin. Particularly after Russia’s successful military intervention in Syria, such a partnership will inevitably ensure a fresh lease of life for Assad’s continuing in power until his patrons, Russia and Iran, decide otherwise. It will also further empower Iran in the region and enable Russia to consolidate its growing physical military presence and political influence in West Asia in the long-term.

On the other hand, Trump has repeatedly said that it would be his “number-one priority to dismantle the disastrous (nuclear) deal with Iran.” Vice-President Pence, NSA Flynn, CIA Director Pompeo, Chief of Staff Priebus and indeed even Defence Secretary Mattis are also hawks on Iran, but to his credit, Mattis has publicly suggested that the US must not unilaterally scrap the nuclear deal. Abrogating it will create complications with all other co-signatories, particularly Russia, apart from potentially causing Iran to take counter-actions with potentially highly destabilising consequences.

Trump has promised to shift the US embassy in Israel from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Announcing the appointment of a long time lobbyist for Israel, David Friedman, as the new US ambassador to Israel, Trump said, “the bond between Israel and the United States runs deep..I will ensure there is no daylight between us….He [Friedman] has been a long time friend and trusted advisor to me.” Accepting the offer, Friedman inter alia said, “I intend to work tirelessly to strengthen the unbreakable bond between our two countries and…. I look forward to doing this from the US Embassy in Israel’s eternal capital Jerusalem.” Long-term senior aide to Trump, Kellyanne Conway, later said, “this is a very big priority for the President-elect and I have heard him repeat it several times privately if not publicly” after being elected. Doing this will create a huge uproar all over the Muslim world, greatly complicating the new administration’s relations with Muslim countries. This move will almost certainly provide a huge boost to greater radicalisation of increasingly larger numbers of Muslims and terrorism.

Trump has spoken highly of Erdogan and both Pence and Flynn have dropped hints that Gulen could be extradited to Turkey. This would greatly encourage Erdogan to become even more authoritarian. Given his visceral hatred of the Kurds and proclivity towards policy flip flops, this will serve to greatly enhance uncertainties in West Asia. At the same time, Trump has expressed great admiration and friendship for the Kurds of both Syria and Iraq. There is no clarity how this conundrum can be resolved.

If these campaign promises are carried out, it will almost certainly further inflame and destabilise the situation in West Asia. It would be in the interest of the region, the world, and indeed of the US itself to postpone decisions relating to the nuclear deal, shifting the embassy, and decision regarding Gulen for 6 months or so to enable a thorough evaluation of their inevitably serious consequences.

Finally, it merits mention that the implementation of these promises will create huge dilemmas for India because it cannot sit silently on the fence as it has done advantageously in the past. India will perforce have to take stands, inevitably offending one or the other side, and each one of India’s relationships in West Asia are very valuable for India.

* Ranjit Gupta
Distinguished Fellow and Columnist, IPCS, & former Indian Ambassador to Yemen and Oman

Scientists from Queen Mary University of London (QMUL) have discovered the secret behind the toughness of deer antlers and how they can resist breaking during fights.

The team looked at the antler structure at the ‘nano-level’, which is incredibly small, almost one thousandth of the thickness of a hair strand, and were able to identify the mechanisms at work, using state-of-the-art computer modelling and x-ray techniques.

First author Paolino De Falco from QMUL’s School of Engineering and Materials Science said: “The fibrils that make up the antler are staggered rather than in line with each other. This allows them to absorb the energy from the impact of a clash during a fight.”

The research, published today in the journal ACS Biomaterials Science & Engineering, provides new insights and fills a previous gap in the area of structural modelling of bone. It also opens up possibilities for the creation of a new generation of materials that can resist damage.

Co-author Dr Ettore Barbieri, also from QMUL’s School of Engineering and Materials Science, said: “Our next step is to create a 3D printed model with fibres arranged in staggered configuration and linked by an elastic interface.

The aim is to prove that additive manufacturing – where a prototype can be created a layer at a time – can be used to create damage resistant composite material.”

A new study finds local weather may play an important role in Americans’ belief in climate change. The study, published on Monday, found that Americans’ belief that the earth is warming is related to the frequency of weather-related events they experience, suggesting that local changes in their climate influence their acceptance of this worldwide phenomenon.

“One of the greatest challenges to communicating scientific findings about climate change is the cognitive disconnect between local and global events,” said Michael Mann, associate professor of geography at George Washington University and co-author of the paper. “It is easy to assume that what you experience at home must be happening elsewhere.”

The researchers found that Americans who experience more record highs than lows in temperature are more likely to believe the earth is warming. Conversely, Americans who live in areas that have experienced record low temperatures, such as southern portions of Ohio and the Mississippi River basins, are more skeptical that the earth is warming.

The study notes that part of this dichotomy may be because of the early terminology used to describe climate change that suggested the earth was simply warming – not changing in innumerable but measurable ways. This might have led residents living in areas that experienced an unusually cold winter to doubt that climate change is occurring.

“Who do Americans trust about climate change; scientists or themselves?” said Robert Kaufmann, professor in the department of geography and the Center for Energy & Environmental Studies at Boston University and lead author of the paper. “For many Americans, the answer seems to be themselves.”

The researchers also found that a recent period of lower-than-average temperatures offset the effect of a long warming period, further supporting their findings that people’s belief in climate change is local and experiential.

The scientists note the importance of differentiating between weather, the temperatures of a relatively short period of time such as a season, and climate, the average temperatures over a period of 25 or 30 years. Emphasizing the difference between weather and climate may help scientists more effectively communicate about climate change.

The paper, “The Spatial Heterogeneity of Climate Change: An Experiential Basis for Skepticism,” was published in Proceedings National Academy of Sciences.

By Adam Garfinkle*

(FPRI) — It is an honor to have been invited to present the twentieth Templeton Lecture on Religion and World Affairs, and that is for two reasons: to stand with the list of luminaries who have preceded me and to have the opportunity to participate in one man’s visionary generosity. The late John Templeton has managed to do through this lecture series what few ever achieve: a way to continue to make the world a better place even after we have left it.

That said, the title handed over to me is a daunting one because it pulls in its train an array of aspects that even taken separately, let alone together, are complex, capacious, and highly charged emotionally. The typical corrosive effects of emotion on analytical precision inclines to conflation, to the shoving together of subjects better understood through distinctions. And that is indeed the problem we face this evening.

In these days and in this country, when most people hear the phrase “sources of religious violence,” they tend to conflate religious violence with terrorism, tend to assume that the principal source of that violence is “religious” in nature, and tend to focus their attention on violence perpetrated in the name of Islam. These conflations are unfortunate.

Terrorism is but one form of religious violence; sectarian conflict between subsets or sects of a religion, which usually account for the majority of the corpses, is religious violence, but it is not necessarily or usually limited by way of tactics to terrorism.

And not all political violence and terrorism has been or is today motivated by religion. It is no simple matter to distinguish the religious sources of political violence (and terrorism) from a range of other plausible sources: ideology (similar in some ways to religion but not the same); ethno-nationalism; perceived threats to corporate social identity; mass social-psychological dislocation; or, typically, some hard-to-unscramble combination of these and other motivational ingredients. Just because perpetrators themselves or victims, let alone remote bystanders, assert that religion is the source of an act of violence does not make it so.

Most putatively religious violence today is said to come from self-avowed Muslims, and that is empirically true; but it has not been true in even the relatively recent past as historians reckon it, and it need not be true in the future. Islam has no monopoly among religious institutions on the violence franchise.

So from all three assumed directions, the conflation implied to many by this lecture’s title melts away—as well it should for it is the cause of much confusion and no little policy malpractice. In its place, we need some serviceable distinctions, and we may come by them in the usual way—via some useful definitions. As the anthropologist Clifford Geertz once noted:

Although it is notorious that definitions establish nothing, in themselves they do, if they are carefully enough constructed, provide a useful orientation, or reorientation of thought, such that an extended unpacking of them can be an effective way of developing and controlling a novel line of inquiry.

Geertz’s description of what definitions can achieve is well taken. They can be, when properly constructed and unpacked, a superb antidote to misleading conflations even if not always to intellectual novelty. For our needs this evening, we do not require novelty, only that we recall Orwell from 1939: “We have now sunk to such a depth at which the restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men.”

Terrorism Defined

We need two definitions in particular: one of “terrorism,” briefly and one of “religious” at somewhat greater length. Let us take them in that order.

We have had for some time now a perfectly good—logical, sharp, and objective—definition of terrorism. Both the State Department and the United Nations share it with most other governments and with the vast majority of academic specialists who troll the topic. To paraphrase, it is this: The use of deadly violence by non-state actors against random civilians in order instill fear in a population for the purpose of seizing media attention and provoking government authorities to react in ways counterproductive to their own values.[1]

Observers may quibble over the relative weight given in any particular incident to the operative parts of this definition, and some observers argue, too, that states as well as non-state actors may also perpetrate terrorism against their own (see Syria) and other people. Some states have and still do such things, true, but it constitutes a separate phenomenon since no state authority deliberately acts to undermine its own interests and values. So the basic definition stands, which is why when Americans describe the attack on the USS Cole in Aden Harbor in 2000, or before that on the U.S. Marine and French Marine barracks near the airport in Lebanon in October 1983, as acts of terrorism—which they are wont to do—they are way off the mark. Attacks against uniformed soldiers on foreign territory in no way conform to the standard and widely accepted definition of terrorism.

It doesn’t mean these were innocent, justified, or nice sorts of behavior; guerrilla war tactics, which is what they both were, can be gruesome and loathsome in the extreme. But they are not acts of terrorism, and the lazy conflation which holds that they are is not harmless. When some apologist for terrorism tells us with an upward flip of the wrist that “one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter,” we want to be able to refute that form of permissive relativism. But if we allow the definition of terrorism, as we use it, to become so elastic that it can mean almost anything, we thus provide a license for such nefarious relativism to come at us from directions we do not appreciate. If we want to promote the norm that terrorism is never a justified means of pursuing political objectives, as well we should, then we must exercise strict discipline over the language we use to describe it.

What is Religious Violence?

As for a definition of what is religious, that is a taller order. Just what is “religious violence”? Or, put a bit more usefully, what is it about a given act of violence, or class of violent acts, that makes it “religious”? Put still more usefully, perhaps, how do we distinguish the motivational sources of individual behavior, when that behavior occurs in a group context, when some of those sources may be socially embedded in a religious context but others not?

This latter question is of course generally relevant to all facets of social psychology, not just to violent or terroristic behavior. The professional and academic literature on this general subject is vast, running all the way from Solomon Asch’s famous conformity experiments of the 1950s through Irving Janis’s equally famous analysis of “groupthink” in the 1970s, and well beyond to other famous and not-so-famous research efforts up until the present time. What all of the literature either stresses or takes for granted (depending mainly on when it was written) is that individual motives are indeed socially embedded. In other words, neither an individual’s thoughts nor the acts that flow from thoughts exist in a solipsistic vacuum. They are entwined in a matrix of experience and expectations with other people, and that is true even for “lone wolf” incidents of terrorism in which the relevant social matrix may be remote, via the internet, as was the case with the Pakistani-born couple who perpetrated the San Bernardino shootings.

What this means is that individuals who commit acts of political violence (and terrorism) may do so as representatives of religious groups committed to violence, such as al-Qaeda, Daesh, Jemmah al-Islamiyah, and others, yet whose own private motives—the conscious ones as well as the substrata of other murkier motives—may be all over the proverbial block. Extremists often do what they do out of group solidarity, in a quest to be a part of something larger than themselves—and it doesn’t matter what glue makes the group cohere. The same went for the Baader-Meinhof group as goes now for al-Qaeda cells. The only relevant general difference, perhaps, is that in the Middle East the dominance of individual agency is generally far weaker than it is in Western societies, so such groups may form more easily.

In the Middle East, too, this yearning often has to do with the pull of a specific social structure. It is no coincidence that in the sectarian strife currently ripping apart several Arab societies, groups of fighters tend to be related—siblings, cousins, and so on, connected closely or less closely to each other through the segmentary lineages of their tribes. Tribal ties can and often do trump sectarian ties. Indeed, it is very difficult in many Middle Eastern contexts to separate the social structure of tribalism, which predates Islam, from the religious legitimation of tribal forms that came afterwards. So some people who claim to be fighting for religious reasons may instead be fighting in the social matrix of collective guilt and collective responsibility central to tribal identity and order, and some who claim to be fighting for their tribe may instead be inspired by religious metaphors, if not actual religious law. If they are not sure, how can we be?

Some do what they do so that their families will be honored to have given birth to a martyr, an understanding nested in a religious narrative but that is not a positive obligation of Islamic law, as the vast majority of authorities understand it.[2] But they do it, often enough, so that surviving family members will be paid money or otherwise be materially supported as a result of the martyr’s deed. This has been common among Palestinian radicalism directed against Israelis and Jews for decades. How can one reliably tell after the fact which motive is dominant? One cannot; the nest of interlocking motives in an extended family is inscrutable from the outside, and often enough even from the inside. In other words, “martyrs” may blow themselves up in the hope of murdering innocent bystanders for any number of reasons that have nothing do to with their following a religious injunction, and yet because the organization to which they belong is a “religious” one—Hizbollah or Hamas, say—many observers assume that this in and of itself makes the violence “religious.” It doesn’t.

What about when the perpetrators of violence themselves claim, in the thrall of the violent act itself, that they are religiously in motivation? They might be, but then again how do we know—because how do they know—that they are not really motivated instead by the aforementioned ethno-nationalism, which in many cultures is hard to separate from the religious civilization that abides beneath it? That is a relevant question, for example, about Hamas members. They claim to be religiously motivated, but unlike radical organizations like al-Qaeda that reject nationalism in principle, Hamas is an explicitly Palestinian organization. Any Muslim might join al-Qaeda or Daesh, but no non-Palestinian is likely to join Hamas. So who can really say what the balance is in given individuals between ethno-nationalist and strictly religious motives?

Can Ritually Irreligious People Perpetrate Religious Violence?

In truth, the matter is even more convoluted than that. As we will discuss in a moment, a goodly number of those whom we call religious extremists think they are defending “Islam” from a conspiracy mounted in the West—with either a little or a lot of help and direction from Zionists, depending on the variety of the conspiracy theory d’jour—to destroy Islam. But what exactly do they mean by Islam? Do they mean a religion as we understand it?  That’s unlikely since there is no word in Arabic that precisely means “religion” as we understand it in the West. The word din is sometimes translated as religion, but it actually means law and can mean faith or even truth, depending on context. Do they mean an ecclesiastical hierarchy, which is to say an institution? Sunni Islam lacks ecclesiastical hierarchies comparable to those in Western Christian history. Do they mean a theology, a set of ideas about God? Or do they mean a corporate identity expressed in the mode of a religious civilization that subsumes a mash-up of pretty much all of the above? Hint: the latter is the correct answer most of the time.

That helps to explain why, as it turns out, very few homicide/suicide bombers write notes or express last wishes that refer explicitly to religious texts or religious law. Very few of them have madrassa level educations, and very few know much about Islamic law or the origins and deeper meaning of Islamic customs. Some, especially those living outside Muslim-majority societies, do not lead remotely pious lives. The perpetrators of the Paris bombings of November 13, 2015, residents of the Molenbeek section of Brussels, were known to have hung out in bars, hired prostitutes, and used drugs. Can ritually irreligious people like that perpetrate what it is reasonable to call “religious” violence? If religion is defined very broadly to encompass a civilizational identity, then “yes.” But that broad a definition loses in explanatory precision what it may gain in inclusivity.

Clearly, then, defining “religious violence” is no simple matter. Human behavior is motivated by various layers of need and purposefulness, some rational by general measure and some perhaps not, some conscious and many clearly not. Even getting someone on the couch does not guarantee that a trained psychologist or psychiatrist can get to the bottom of the motivational reservoir beneath any given act of violence, and, in the case of “martyrs,” putting a bloody corpse on a couch will accomplish nothing, except to render the couch unfit for future use.

Short of using couches, there is an enormous professional and academic literature on why some people but not others, in some situations but not others, decide to kill innocent people en masse. Some of this literature comes from the precincts of psychology and psychiatry, some from sociology and anthropology, some from criminology, legal studies, political science, philosophy, and from brave historians willing to tilt their knowledge forward. Some even comes from theology and religious studies.[3]

To simplify a fair bit, all of this literature aims basically to get answers to four questions. First, under what socio-economic conditions do people tend to join terrorist groups, religious or otherwise? Second, does the profile of extremists reflect any sort of group self-selection, or does it drive recruitment strategies? Third, does ideology (not theology) matter in sorting which groups particular individuals join? And fourth, is there a mindset or personality type susceptible to extremist thinking, and presumably acting?

Amid this vast literature, some of it based on impressive empirical analysis, answers to these questions vary. But it is fair to say that once various forms of social embeddedness are taken into account, the percentage of the variance in explaining political violence that can be laid at the feet of specifically religious motivation articulated by the perpetrator is low. Some of the finest work taking this view includes Scott Atran’s theory of “the devoted actor,” the basic approach of Marc Sageman—a psychiatrist turned terrorism analyst of the highest caliber—and several others of note.[4]

Now, this may be all wrong, for the simple reason that most of the Western researchers interested in this topic are not themselves traditionally religious people, and so may be expected to discount religious motivations in others.[5] The scientific method notwithstanding, this happens a lot. Then again, looking at the evidence in as objective a way as possible, an inarguably religious motivation for the perpetration of violent acts against innocents appears to be present only in a minority of cases.

On the Other Hand . . .

That said, some of those minority cases have been of extreme importance. Indeed, whatever the numbers—and if ever numbers were soft and slippery these are—religion matters critically in the perpetration of political violence in Muslim-majority societies today in two ways. But these are two ways neither of which aligns with the common understandings that most Americans seem to have about this subject.

One has to do with the global historical phenomenon of chiliastic religious violence, and the other has to do with what I will call the primordial human intuition of guilt. The two, very different as they are, rather often come together in what we call lazily “religious violence.” Again, let’s take them in this order.

After the attacks of September 11, 2001, the American political class split into its usual schizophrenic Left-Right orientation in trying to explain what had just happened. To make a long story shorter, both sides reverted to their stock explanations from Cold War vintage, merely superimposing them from Communism onto Islamism. So liberals blamed poverty and social inequities and proposed a “Marshall Plan” for the Middle East, demonstrating that they had little idea of what the Marshall Plan actually was or why it worked. Conservatives blamed the absence of freedom and democracy, and so we got the counterproductive calamity of the George W. Bush administration’s “forward strategy for freedom.” Both of these explanations succeeded in identifying minor to mid-level accelerants or enablers of terrorism, and both failed miserably in identifying the actual motivations behind al-Qaeda’s attack.[6]

They failed because the stock of relevant historical knowledge on which they could draw went back at most fifty years. The American political class today is the most historically ignorant political class in the history of great powers since the Treaty of Westphalia. Its members’ educations are strikingly poorer in history from those of European power elites of earlier times, and even from their worthy American elders—the likes of Henry Kissinger, Zbigniew Brzezinski, and Brent Scowcroft.

The simple and well-recorded truth is that religious violence erupting from premillennarian movements has struck nearly in every century in recorded history and in every habitable continent. A short list of “greatest hits” would include: the Jewish zealots fighting the Roman Empire, all the way to Masada, in the 2^nd century CE; the Crusaders sacking Jerusalem in 1099[7]; the White Lotus/Maitreya cult movement against the Manchu Qing dynasty, which first coalesced in the 14^th century; the Peasants’ Revolt of Thomas Müntzer in 16^th century Germany; the Taiping Rebellion of 19^th-century China; the Spirit or “Ghost” Dances of the American Indians that ended with the massacre at Wounded Knee in 1890[8]; and on a smaller scale the Mau-Mau uprising in Kenya in the 1950s.

All of these episodes, and hundreds of lesser-known ones strewn through history as well, display a similar basic structure. A traditional culture finds itself the prey of a more powerful external force and breaks into essentially three schools of thought in how to deal with the challenge: give in and be like the wealthier and more powerful adversary; take the techniques but not the culture of the adversary; and reject everything about the adversary as a threat to the corporate identity of the people. The three groups—assimilators, reformers, and nativists—vie with each other and the latter group invariably mobilizes religious symbols around a charismatic leader to both win the civil dispute within the society and to fight against the challenging power from without.

Al-Qaeda’s actions in September 2001 constituted a textbook case of chiliastic religious violence. In this case, its charismatic leader, Osama bin-Ladin, decided to wage the civil battle inside Islam by attacking the preeminent symbol of the adversarial culture bearing down on Islam—the United States—what he called the “far enemy.” The West and the United States were really just props in what was essentially an internal struggle within Islamic societies over how to deal with the crisis of modernity bearing down on it with ever greater ferocity since the 1798-99 French invasion of Egypt.[9] If one can understand Islam as a religious civilization instead of a religion/theology, as it is narrowly defined in Western terms, then yes, this was religious violence on a massive and history-changing scale.

Again, it had happened many times before, even, as noted, on American soil when Wovoka (Anglicized name, Jack Wilson) first led the Paiute tribe, and then others, in a series of mystical dances to put an end to the expansion of white people into Indian lands. Wovoka preached to Indians that they needed to remain apart from the whites, needed to live a clean life and avoid boozing, lying, stealing, and causing or contributing to any divisions among the Indians themselves. Revolutionary demands for asceticism, cultural integrity, and unity…..sound familiar? In this case, one element in the traditional pattern of premillennarian movements does not conform: For the most part, the Indians did not initiate the suicidal violence common to the other cases. They might well have done so in time and some were experimenting with the notion on a small scale, but the white folks beat them to the bloodletting—at Wounded Knee.

It was obviously too much to expect the senior members of the Bush administration, or the Democrats in opposition, to have known much about any of these foreign historical cases and to have understood them in such a way as to apply them to what happened on September 11, 2001. But the Ghost Dances, on our own soil? Not to have even thought about the Ghost Dances in context? We all learned something about this in high school, right? Right?….

The Role of Guilt

Human beings are social animals, and all human beings are socialized by their parents and/or other close family members to replicate the language skills, body-communication gestures, touch skills, cosmological understandings, and moral values of the group. Every culture—and this is true to some degree even among primates—devises means of disciplining and redirecting individuals who deviate from the rules that ensure that the socialization process is successfully completed, at least to the point where minimal social coherence can be maintained. One of the functions of religion—which every culture has and about which more below—is to sacralize critical elements of the culture into which people are socialized, people who in turn socialize succeeding generations.

Now, one of the key issues every culture must deal with concerns sexuality. Every culture known to history has devised certain sexual taboos, and every religion has codified and enforced those taboos. We need not dwell here on the reasons for this, whether its origins lie in concerns about incest, or whether it has to do with the need to cooperate so that human beings do not replicate the extreme violence of many alpha males elsewhere in the animal kingdom, which would jeopardize the survival of the species. What matters for our purposes is that controlling sexuality is a key challenge for any society, and religion always plays a role in that function.

Now let’s apply this observation to the case before us. Boys who grow up in a traditional environment—and this goes for Orthodox Jews and Victorian-era Anglicans as well as traditional Muslims—are taught certain sexual taboos, and depending on the culture, these may be taught by the mother rather than the father. In traditional Islamic societies, the mother usually tells her son at a certain suitable age that he mustn’t masturbate; it’s a sin. You stain yourself spiritually as well as literally when you do that, she says, for you are wasting the seed of life that is a gift of God. You mustn’t touch any woman who might be menstruating, because during her period, she is ritually unclean; and since you can’t ask a woman, even a female cousin, if she is menstruating because it is unseemly, you simply avoid touching women other than your own mother until you are married. That means no pre-marital sex at all, not even consensual adolescent fondling. It also means not looking at licentious photos or videos, because these stir up carnal urges that might lead one to become impure.

These are shameful things to do, the mother asserts—a word chosen very carefully. The stress on impurity and stain is not incidental; it is the metaphorical hinge on which the entire socialization effort depends. There is a consequent need, should one become impure, to atone for one’s behavior in order to excise the stain, which in less concrete terms is shame if it becomes known to others and guilt if it does not. This metaphor is taken very concretely in many traditional societies. You can see this entire conceptual system open to view in the Torah, especially in Leviticus, and especially in the liturgy of the Jewish High Holy days; Islamic sensibilities are not appreciably different in this regard.

Now, the boys in Molenbeek, as already noted, were known to be carousers, drinkers, and drug users before they carried out their murderous sprees in Paris and Brussels. In their case, socially networked personal commitments solidified their behavior. And though more of a loner, Omar Mateen of Orlando fame used to go out and have a good time as well. He is described as having oscillated between being occasionally very religious and being “normal” and fun-loving most of the time. This calls attention to a pattern that, if you understand what it’s like to be raised in a traditional environment with regard to sexual behavior only to be subsequently drowned in temptation, is not hard to discern. It goes something like this, and let’s use Omar Mateen as our hypothetical case.

Omar knows he’s not supposed to lust after women out of marriage, and certainly not after men. But even when married (twice, apparently), he is exposed to sexual cues and opportunities all the time in south Florida, and he is weak: maybe he watches porn and masturbates, or maybe he hires a hooker from time to time.

He remembers well his mother insisting that all this is sinful, so he feels remorse. He becomes temporarily pious so that he can remove the stain he has caused. He resolves not to sin again, but his determination lapses. He does it again, and he feels intense guilt, leading to frantic renewed efforts at atonement and stain removal. He falls into a cycle of sin and remorse until he concludes that he can never escape; he has sinned too much to be forgiven. This depresses him and renders him prone to explosions of anger and violence, such as beating his wives. There is only one way out now: having dishonored and shamed his family, especially his own mother, because of his wanton behavior, he has to redeem the family through his own martyrdom.

This psychological-behavioral complex explains certainly not all but a fair number of Islamist suicide terrorism cases. It is hard to prove, because what goes on in someone’s head is impervious to sure knowledge and, as already noted, what goes on inside someone’s head can never be divorced from the social frameworks in which thinking is ever embedded.

Now, is this a description of a religious motivation? At the level of standard theology, no—but theology and the community that embodies it can set parameters on extreme behavior. If a person so afflicted with guilt over sexual improprieties is not bound by such community-buttressed norms—a Mohammed Atta in Hamburg, the rowdies in Brussels, Omar Mateen in South Florida—what he might do is less constrained. So most suicide terrorism is probably deeply religious in a generic sense, but it is not particular to Islam and the basic structure of motivation here is pre-Islamic—indeed, it is pre-Abrahamic altogether, right down to primal. Mass murder driven by rage, guilt, or a collapse of self-worth—sometimes suicidal and sometimes not—has happened in many places (Tasmania, Norway, Columbine, Sandy Hook, South Carolina) where the mass murderers were not Muslims. It can exist amid any way of thinking in which sin and shame and ritual impurity have a place.

Why don’t most Western analysts of terrorism make this observation? Because, again, most are themselves so far from traditional ways of thinking and living that they but rarely sense the power of pre-intellectualized religious beliefs. They therefore tend not to credit them as possible sources of behavior. The combination of chiliastic religious violence operating on the macro-level, so to speak, and the guilt/stain removal behavior operating on the micro-level, offers a way to get arms around the data before us. And this is a possibly useful way to conceptualize the problem even if most of the motivation for political violence within and emanating from the Muslim world today is not properly described as conventionally “religious.”

Misreading Islamist Terrorism: Why It Matters

So, in sum, what do we tend to misunderstand about the sources of religious violence? Just about everything. We usually fail to distinguish between political violence and terrorism; we fail to look closely enough at the socially embedded motives of individual extremists that we lazily label “religious,” as if that is tantamount to understanding them; and some of us at least fail to avoid breathless and false essentialist accusations about the supposedly inherent character of some religions altogether.

Let me close with two brief, related points about this latter failure. The President-elect goes George W. Bush a long step further in his avowed theory of Islamist terrorism, assuming for a moment that he may be taken at his word. Whereas Bush identified a democracy deficit as the problem, Trump insists that Islam itself is terroristic. Not only is this an absurd fact-free proposition, it is exceedingly counterproductive to give voice to it. Muslim Arabs are not stupid. They are more than capable of reasoning that if Westerners think that Islam itself is their mortal enemy, then the only way for the West to finally solve its terrorism problem is to convert or kill pretty much every Muslim adult on the planet. And that just reinforces the propaganda line of the radical political entrepreneurs who claim that the West is engaged in a conspiracy to destroy Islam. Making such statements helps the worst actors in the region, and that is hardly in the U.S. or Western interest even if the statements were true.

For years now, many conservatives have raised pulses—their own and others’—by criticizing the Obama administration for refusing to name the enemy, instead limiting its language to references to “violent extremists.” Everyone knows that these violent extremists are Muslims acting in the name of Islam, and to avoid calling a spade a spade is just a pusillanimous example of political correctness run completely amok. It’s a great applause line—just like other, similarly glib arguments that sound right until you actually think about them. But it misapprehends the motives not only of the Obama administration, but also of the Bush administration before it, whose language usage on this point was not much different.

The Bush administration’s initial reluctance to explicitly define the problem in religious terms turned on its concerns about what became known as Islamophobia. It wanted to avoid giving any pretext for domestic violence against Muslim residents and citizens of the United States. But it soon came also to understand that to deal effectively with the problem over time required Muslim allies, and those allies (in other governments and in civil society) by and large pleaded with the U.S. government privately not to speak in ways that would further polarize internal divisions in the Muslim world over religion. That, they explained, risked validating the propaganda line that the West was at war not with Islamism but with Islam, and that would make it harder for them to be the effective allies we needed them to be.

Bush administration principals understood this and acted accordingly for the most part, as did the Obama administration after it. How a Trump administration will  behave in this regard is, as of this writing, anyone’s guess.

About the author:
* Adam Garfinkle is a Robert A. Fox Fellow in the Foreign Policy Research Institute’s Program on the Middle East. He is founding editor of The American Interest.

Source:
This article was published by FPRI.

Notes:
[1] The classic exemplar of this definition is David Fromkin’s still-excellent Foreign Affairs essay from Spring 1975, entitled “The Strategy of Terrorism.”

[2] No Islamic school of jurisprudence condones either suicide or the murder of innocents, and all uphold the inadmissibility of coercion in religion. Even within the ISIS caliphate there is at least a pretense of law most of the time before gruesome things are done to innocent people.

[3] An excellent example is Jonathan Sacks, Not in God’s Name: Confronting Religious Violence (Schocken, 2015).

[4] See Atran, “The Devoted Actor: Unconditional Commitment and Intractable Conflict Across Cultures,” Current Anthropology, Volume 57, Supplement 13 (June 2016); and Marc Sageman, Misunderstanding Terrorism (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2017). For a typical focused example of the contemporary approach to research, see Kunaal Sharma, “What Causes Extremist Attitudes Among Sunni and Shia Youth? Evidence from Northern India,” GW Program on Extremism (November 2016). One interesting recent effort that tries to correlate engineering educations with a propensity toward terrorism is Diego Gambetta and Steffen Hertog, Engineers of Jihad: The Curious Connection Between Violent Extremism and Education (Princeton University Press, 2016).

[5] It requires a huge dose of historical amnesia to pull this particular form of obliviousness off. Here we are, citizens of a great power, trying to parse the meaning and strategic implications of a sectarian struggle within Islam that from time to time spills out of the region and scatters blood on us and our Western friends, apparently without realizing that about four, four and half centuries ago there was a great Muslim power trying to parse the meaning and strategic implications of a great sectarian struggle within Christendom. And the leaders of that power concluded that, as sincere as the religious disputations in Europe were, it did not stop a Catholic power (France) from allying with the Ottoman Empire against another Catholic power (Hapsburg Austria). So it has always been more complicated than it may seem.

[6] I have written on this before. See, for example, “Comte’s Caveat: How We Misunderstand Terrorism,” Orbis (Summer 2008).

[7] This is specifically where the term chiliastic came from, referring to the Christian belief that Jesus would return at the millennium and rule visibly over mankind for a thousand years.

[8] The other well-known, if poorly understood, American example—peculiar and short-lived though it was—was John Brown’s essentially suicidal-terrorist raid on Harper’s Ferry in October 1859.

[9] See Michael S. Doran, “Somebody Else’s Civil War,” Foreign Affairs, January-February 2002.

After the thunderbolt of Brexit, the world was again taken by surprise on  November 8, 2016 when America astonished the world by choosing the billionaire, Donald Trump as their president.

In Pakistan the overall perspective was that Hillary would win the election leaving Trump empty handed. Pakistanis, along with the rest of the world, were stunned to learn about Trump’s victory. Following his victory speech, the billion dollar question in Pakistan was “How will Trump’s policies affect Pakistan?”

Republican’s history with Pakistan has not been constant. Traditionally there have been many ups and down. President Nixon supported Pakistan over India in the 1971 War because it needed Pakistan as back channel for Nixon’s trip to China. In 1990 during the tenure of George H.W. Bush, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif visited the US, but was given a cold shoulder and was asked to halt the uranium enrichment program.

Two years later, American diplomat Nicholas Platt advised Pakistani leaders that if Pakistan continued to support terrorists in India, “the Secretary of State may find himself required by law to place Pakistan on the state sponsors of terrorism list”.

When it comes to South Asia, Trump’s policies are very ambiguous, but it appears he is very anti-Pakistan and Pro-India. Following the shooting in San Bernardino in California in December 2015, Trump said that he wanted to ban all foreign Muslims from entering the US. He also seems to have a concern for Pakistan’s nuclear program, and has termed Pakistan as a “vital problem” for US, “because they have a thing called nuclear weapons.” He added, “They have to get a better hold of the situation”.

In 2011, NDTV reported that Trump wanted an immediate pull back on aid to Pakistan, unless it did away with nuclear weapons .“They are not friend of ours. (There are) plenty of other terrorists in Pakistan, we know that,” he is reported to have said.

On the other hand, Trump seems to have a very soft corner for India and has repeatedly said that he loves India. “I am a big fan of Hindu and I am a big fan of India ,big, big fan,” said Trump. Moreover Trump praised Indian Prime Minister Narender Modi as a great man, and said he looks forward to deepening diplomatic and military ties with India. Trump wishes to promote trade with India and strengthen the relationships even further by providing them with jobs, scholarships, etc. He intends to make the Indian-American politician Nikki Haley the ambassador of United Nations.

Trump has showed his willingness to mediate the Kashmir issue between India and Pakistan. The adviser to Prime Minister on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz said, “Trump deserves a Nobel Prize if he resolves the Kashmir dispute”, but his tilt towards India might be an obstacle for the process.

His policies will also be affected by the cabinet he selects, which until now seems to be very hawkish. He is choosing millionaires who have funded his campaign and who were previously loyal to him. He intends to include James Mattis (Mad Dog) as Secretary of Defense who expressed very harsh comments during the Afghan war. “It is quite fun to shoot them, you know. It is hell of a hoot. It is fun to shoot some people,” Mattis is reported to have said.

In view of all the above, considering his love for India and his cabinet picks Pakistan may have to see some tough times in near the future, but Trump cannot do away with Pakistan as Pakistan shares a border with Afghanistan where the US maintains forces. So whether Trump likes it or not the strategic position of Pakistan does not favor Trump. Islamabad reports that in 2013-16 relations have improved between United States and Pakistan, if the same continues or not will largely be determined by Trump’s new policies.

By Bawa Singh*

Historically, Afghanistan and Sikhs have been enjoying religious and geo-cultural relations since the inception of Sikhism (1469). But lately, due to the ongoing civil war and terrorism in Afghanistan, an existential threat has been haunting the Afghan Sikhs.

Recently, the Sixth Heart of Asia-Istanbul Process (HoA-IP) conference took place in Amritsar (Punjab-India) on December 3-4, 2016 where the Amritsar Declaration was issued. Regrettably, the issue of Afghan Sikh victims could not find place in the Amritsar Declaration despite it being issued from the place of their origin.

Afghanistan has been highly ravaged due to the ongoing civil war and terrorism. The root cause of civil war and terrorism in Afghanistan are poverty, inequality, underdevelopment, ethnic discontent, the ethnic composition and, partly, the regional geopolitcs.

Terrorist organisations such as the Taliban, Hizb-e-Islami, Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), Lashkar-i-Janghvi and the Haqqani Network have been operating with impunity in Afghanistan. And not only the Afghan people but the Indian Afghan communities have also been suffering on account of these terrorists.

Several efforts have been made to bring the terrorists into the mainstream. Through the Geneva Accord (1988) and the National Consultative Peace Jirga (NCPJ), efforts have been made to convince the Taliban to become part of the mainstream for peace and prosperity in the country.

In due course of time, other steps like the Heart of Asia-Istanbul Process (2011) and the Quadrilateral Coordination Group (QCG) have been taking place for rebuilding, reconstruction and peace-making in Afghanistan. Despite these mechanisms, however, peace and prosperity have remained a distant dream for Afghanistan.

The Heart of Asia-Istanbul Process (HoA-IP) was launched in 2011 to seek regional cooperation to establish peace and stability in Afghanistan. The five HoAs which had already taken place focussed on the issues of peace, prosperity, unity, integrity and sovereignty, curbing of terrorism and reconstruction and rebuilding of Afghanistan.

The Sixth HoA was jointly inaugurated by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani on December 3, 2016. About 40 countries in various capacities participated in the Sixth HoA at Amritsar. The central theme of the meeting was ‘Addressing Challenges, Achieving Prosperity’. The two major outputs of the conference were the Amritsar Declaration and the Regional Counter-Terrorism Framework.

After two days of deliberations and debate on Afghanistan, social, economic, political and security challenges have been given important place in the Amritsar Declaration. The underpinnings of the declaration are the promotion of stability, peace and prosperity and resolute action against terrorism, violent extremism, radicalisation, separatism, and sectarianism in Afghanistan.

However, while all major challenges facing Afghanistan have been discussed and deliberated, the problems of Indian Afghan minorities such as the Sikhs and Hindus — on whose land the Sixth HoA took place — have not been made part of the diplomatic discussion.

It is said that during the late 1950s, about 50,000 Sikh and Hindu families were living in Afghanistan. But following atrocities by the erstwhile Taliban regime (1996-2001), their total population has come down to 8,000 only.

The recent incident of Afghan Sikhs who had left Afghanistan due to threats from the Taliban and were rescued from a shipping container at a UK port highlighted once again the plight of the Sikhs in Afghanistan.

These people have not been enjoying religious freedom. They have always remained under the apprehension of proselytisation. Several historic Gurdwaras have already been destroyed by the Taliban. Long hair is a symbol of Sikh’s religious identity but often they have been forced to cut their hair.

Sikh children have been deprived of education as they are not being allowed to go to schools. In case anybody dares to challenge the Taliban diktats, they are being bullied, beaten up or given severe punishment.

The Sikh women have been the most vulnerable. In case they want to go out of their homes, they have to think twice as they are insulted and made fun of.

The rich Sikh community has been turned into labourers due to the prohibition of doing business and buying lands. These people have even not been allowed to perform the last rites of their dead as per their religious beliefs.

Against this backdrop, the HoA 2016 (Amritsar) provided a very significant opportunity for India to familiarise the Afghanistan government in this regard. At the same time, it was also a golden opportunity for the Punjab government — being part of the diplomatic process — wherein they could have made the Afghan-Indian minorities’ status and sorrows as the key issue of the deliberation and diplomatic process.

It seems that both India and Punjab missed a diplomatic opportunity in this regard.

The heart cry of the Afghan-Indian minorities has not been heard. If the Amritsar Declaration could cover the many challenges being faced by the Heart of Asia region, including Afghanistan, then why could not the issues of Indian Afghan minorities, such as Sikhs and Hindus, become part of the same diplomatic process?

These minorities have been living lives bereft of socio-economic and religious freedoms. They have been dying daily under lot of psychological stress. It is hard to divorce the diaspora and diplomacy in the context of host and affected country.

Diplomacy is the only channel by which various problems being faced by the diaspora could be sorted out. The Sixth Heart of Asia 2016 provided an important diplomatic opportunity to take up the case of Indian minorities in Afghanistan.

Sadly, not a single word was mentioned in the Amritsar Declaration in this regard. The heart and voice of the affected Afghan Indian ethnics has remained unheard and unrepresented.

It is recommended that the Indian and Punjab governments should take cognizance of the existential threat to the Indian-Afghan diaspora. The Punjab government, especially, should urge the Indian government to use its diplomacy to protect the Afghan Sikhs and Hindu diaspora in Afghanistan, so that they could become a part of Afghanistan mainstream and enjoy a dignified life.

*Dr. Bawa Singh is teaching at the Centre for South and Central Asian Studies, School of Global Relations, Central University of Punjab, Bathinda, India. Comments and suggestions on this article can be sent on: editor@spsindia.in

By Shabir Choudhry*

Pakistan faces many serious problems — and among them is the status and invulnerability of holy cows, and people who are above Pakistani laws. The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) is not a living being, yet it has also gained the status of being a holy cow — and people are warned of serious consequences if they dare to oppose or criticise this new holy cow.

People are accused of being ‘anti-Pakistan’ and ‘agent’ of foreign powers because they dared to criticise holy cows — and some are facing sedition charges for attacking CPEC and demanding a share in the accruing benefits.

I am also among the ‘bad guys’ who are perceived as ‘disrespectful’ and critics of this holy cow and who demand a fair share in the benefits because it runs without permission through our land, Gilgit-Baltistan, which is part of the former princely state of Jammu and Kashmir.

Pakistani officials, some Pakistani people and Kashmiri foot soldiers of Pakistan may not like what I write or say. Their dislike and even hatred does not deter me from speaking out to protect and promote interests of people of Jammu and Kashmir state.

In my opinion, CPEC could have the following negative effects on Gilgit-Baltistan:
· Status of Jammu and Kashmir dispute and Gilgit-Baltistan can change because of CPEC;
· A serious danger in the demographic changes; already hundreds of thousands of non-local people reside there and control local economy and politics;
· Exploitation of our resources will increase;
· Growing influence and power of secret agencies of Pakistan and competing interests of secret agencies of other countries;
· Stationing of foreign troops to protect the CEPC route;
· Possible stationing of non-state actors of countries or groups who want to sabotage the project; and
· A serious danger that Gilgit-Baltistan could become a battleground for competing interests of countries and their proxies.

CPEC could be a holy cow to some Pakistanis but to China it is an economic project with strategic and military significance. Chinese are very cruel businessmen — they will fully exploit Pakistan just like Pakistan is exploiting resources of Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan. What one fears is that despite much hype and attraction, CPEC will prove to be a white elephant for Pakistan and it could prove to be Pakistan’s Waterloo.

Because of poor economic performance and rampant corruption, Pakistan has difficulty in paying back loans obtained at very low interest rates. One wonders how Pakistan is going to pay back the loan incurred on CPEC with very high interest rates. People need to be told that more than $35 billion has been taken as loan at very high interest rate for this ambitious project.

Anyone who criticises the CPEC or demands a rightful share is portrayed as an ‘agent of enemy’ and ‘anti-Pakistan’ and that forces thinking people to remain quiet on the topic. However, some genuinely believe that this economic project could be a ‘game-changer’ — but they are not sure in whose favour it may change the game.

May be keeping the above in mind, Mirwaiz Umer Farooq, a Kashmiri religious and political leader, while speaking on the CPEC said: “It is an opportunity for J&K also to be part of the old Silk Route, once again. We can be part of the CPEC, even before the resolution of Kashmir issue and become part of the Central Asian discourse rather than a South Asian discourse. Kashmir can become a gateway for India as well”.

He further said “I am sure India will also want to be part of CPEC” but did not explain the reasons for his feeling so.

The people of Jammu and Kashmir want peace and harmony and not a war of attrition. They want to live in peace and economic stability, which can only come if there is peace in the region, hence they support economic projects. But at the same time, they don’t want plundering of their natural resources by those who occupy this beautiful and resource-rich land.

Resentment, anger and rebellious attitude against the system is created when he/she is a victim of inequality; and is systematically exploited and oppressed. The system, instead of analysing the causes of resentment and rebellious trends or rectifying its own shortcomings, accuses the victim, which aggravate the situation even more.

For example, when East Pakistan was part of Pakistan, the ruling Punjabi elite of West Pakistan said distribution of wealth or resources should be based on the area and not population (because East Pakistan had more population). When East Pakistan became Bangladesh, the same elite changed its stance and said distribution of resources should be based on the population (because now Punjab had the largest population), hence deprivation of other provinces of the remaining Pakistan.

People may remain quiet but they are not fools that they don’t understand who is doing what. If CPEC is being called ‘China Punjab Economic Corridor’, it is because of the feeling of exploitation and unfair treatment.

According to a report in Pamir Times, people of Gilgit-Baltistan have been denied compensation for land acquired for the CPEC. In frustration, people of Gojal Valley protested and demanded payment, and action against NHA officials. “It is pertinent to note that, so far, not a single penny has been paid to the land owners in Gojal Valley.”

It is also pertinent to mention that the Pakistan government plans to establish 29 special economic zones along the CPEC route and, according to Sultan Rais, Chairman Awami Action Committee of Gilgit-Baltistan: “CPEC will pass through 600 km area of Gilgit-Baltistan but it is unfortunate that they are not getting even a single industrial zone or any development project.”

Apart from economic aspects, the Gwadar port also has a great strategic and military significance. Astonishingly, not much attention is given to this and even not much has been said about the deal under which eight submarines are to be supplied by China to Pakistan, which will surely elevate Pakistan’s naval military strength. Chinese military ships and submarines have already taken position in and around Gwadar.

Panos Mourdoukoutas writes in Forbes that “China desperately needs the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). It’s part of that nation’s vision to write the rules of the next stage of globalisation and help its export and investment engines grow for years to come… China has to either appease India or ‘forget’ about the CPEC project”.

The article further suggests that “if pro-Indian forces in Pakistan sabotage China’s CPEC route”, China should expect an open confrontation against India, because that raises the possibility of an open confrontation between China and Pakistan on the one side, and India and its allies on the other.

It is claimed that the key to success of CPEC is stability in Balochistan; and to some extent peace and stability in Gilgit-Baltistan. Can there be peace when people are denied their fundamental rights, their natural resources are systematically plundered and, in some areas, F16, Cobra helicopters and guns are in action?

Whether one likes it or not, the fact is that there is a credible presence of tens of thousands of Chinese military personnel on Pakistani soil and on Jammu and Kashmir territory controlled by Pakistan. Also the Chinese navy is playing an active part in and around Gwadar. Doesn’t that undermine sovereignty of Pakistan? Or is it acceptable because the Chinese are paying a good price for that?

Apart from proxies of other countries. the role of banned terrorist organisations, including Taliban and Daesh, will also be essential because some of them are extremely angry with Pakistan, and may create problems for CPEC-related projects to settle scores with the Pakistani state.

To understand the real situation of Balochistan and possible threats to the CPEC, we cannot ignore sentiments of the local people. Balochistan Home Minister Mir Sarfraz Bugti said on Saturday, December 10, 2016, that 13,575 terrorists were arrested while 337 were killed in around 2,825 operations in the province during 2015-16. Of course, the figures provided by the rebels are much higher and help us to understand the gravity of the situation.

Bramdagh Bugti, grandson of Baloch nationalist leader Akbar Bugti, not only thanked Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi for his open support to the people of Balochistan, but also hoped that he would raise this issue at international forums. He maintained: “It is too late; we can’t remain with Pakistan any longer as it has deprived us of basic rights.”

Mama Qadeer, another renegade Baloch leader, told the German Radio: “India supports our cause and the Baloch people appreciate it. Islamabad takes it as Indian interference. They blamed India’s RAW for the Quetta attack. They like to blame everything on RAW. The authorities even call me a RAW agent.”

No matter how rosy a picture Pakistan presents of Gwadar, the bitter fact is that there are severe problems which need to be resolved before smooth sailing of the CPEC. There is even no drinking water and people are facing enormous problems in the province.

Gwadar is now presented as a lifeline of Pakistan, but not many people know that Gwadar was not part of Pakistan until December 8, 1958. Legally, this territory was part of the Sultanate of Muscat and Oman and Pakistani Prime Minister Feroz Khan Noon bought it for 3 million dollars.

CPEC also provides China great military and strategic advantage as it will enable China to monitor Indian and American activities from Gilgit-Baltistan and Balochistan, especially from Gwadar. Gwadar can in future develop into a well-equipped military naval base, which would provide China an enormous strategic advantage in the region. This will result in increased rivalry in the Arabian Sea and the Indian Ocean between India, China and other interested parties.

Pakistan will once again be in the eye of the storm and Pakistan may not be able to deal effectively with the challenges and the mounting debts, especially with high interest rates of the CPEC loan. Perhaps to settle certain issues or for the safety and security of Pakistan, they may compromise on Gwadar or some other national strategic assets, even on nuclear-related issues.

One fears that there is danger that after some time Gwadar may not be in control of Pakistan, as China will have complete control of the sea port. The Chinese will decide what to do and who should benefit from the facilities available at the Chinese-built port.

*Shabir Choudhry is a political analyst, TV anchor and author based in London. Comments and suggestions on this article can be sent to editor@spsindia.in

By Nishant Rajeev*

The September 18, 2016 Uri terror attack has possibly changed the course of India-Pakistan relations for years to come. It was the single largest loss of life suffered by the Indian Army since the Kargil war. But the events that followed Uri were of greater significance.

The Indian Army crossed the LoC to strike terror “launch pads of terrorists” and even gave a public statement to that effect. It’s not as though the army had never crossed the LoC before, but rather the direct targeting of terror launch pads and the public disclosure is something that no government had dared to do in the past. The Indian media hailed this as a historic feat and said that it was no longer ‘business as usual’. The status quo had changed and the Indian state had the resolve to strike back at Pakistan for conducting terror attacks in India.

Looking beyond all the rhetoric, it must be said that the “surgical strikes” were truly an impressive operation. The ability to conduct such strikes coupled with a robust counter-insurgency grid can adversely affect the operations of insurgents in the Kashmir Valley, not to mention the psychological impact it will have on terror groups across the border.

However, the government’s strategy on cross-border terrorism and Kashmir shouldn’t revolve around the use of the military alone. India’s strategic planners will face new challenges in employing this tactic (surgical strikes) as both countries move forward. The loss of the element of surprise will be of major consequence while planning future operations. The Pakistan army will increase vigil across the border making penetration harder. They will also increase security around these camps and move them further away from the LoC.

Even a single failure with large casualties on the Indian side, can make for very bad headlines and lead to an embarrassment on the global stage. It would be prudent to say that such tactics can’t be used with high frequency and will be reserved for special circumstances only. One must remember that military force has its own limitations and can’t address all the causes of the insurgency.

The problems in Kashmir stem from various avenues starting with a lack of economic development to the psychological and historical aspects of the problem. The people of Kashmir have a deep mistrust for the Indian state and the security agencies in particular. As a recent report by a delegation to Kashmir led by former union minister Yashwant Sinha noted, Kashmiris detest the view of the government that everything that happens in the Valley is a Pakistani ploy and the real crux of the matter isn’t political.

The economic landscape of J&K doesn’t fare too well either as highlighted in an economic survey by the J&K government in 2014-15. Unemployment in the Jammu & Kashmir state is at 4.9 per cent compared to the all-India figure of 2.9 per cent. The report also noted that work opportunities have not kept pace with the increasing population. The problem of unemployment gains more importance because of higher incidence of unemployment among the educated section of youth of the state.

The share of industry in GSDP is around 20-25 per cent and the growth of the industry has decelerated by about 4 per cent from 2007-08 to 2014-15. The state also faces challenges when it comes to physical infrastructure as well as power supply. These socio-economic factors will have only complex solutions. Different people will want different things from the government and it will be a monumental task to accommodate them all. But to get some concrete results, these are the aspects that will matter the most.

The army has always played a major role in Kashmir ever since the insurgency began. Most governments have heavily relied on the army to maintain law and order ever since the insurgency began. Although the army has done a commendable job in quelling the insurgency since the 1990s, the Indian government’s policy needs to have more depth than blaming Pakistan and deploying the army.

Any future policy needs to incorporate not only the use of military force but also diplomacy, dialogue and development. The government must work towards regaining the trust of the people by bringing economic progress and opening avenues of dialogue with the relevant stakeholders.

There must be a willingness on the part of the central government to talk to the local population and address their grievances. Also, the recent moves by the Indian government to diplomatically isolate Pakistan has been a significant step in the right direction, as we saw in the aftermath of the surgical strikes when even Pakistan’s loyal allies remained silent on the issue and the boycott of the SAARC meet.

The real challenge and focus should be to break the Pakistan-China nexus. Such a move will affect investments, development and will have a direct bearing on the civilian population and the voter base. Only if the government comes out with such a multi-pronged strategy can it expect some tangible results.

The current government and many previous governments have relied on the army far too much when it comes to Kashmir. They must all remember that the army can never be the solution to the Kashmir problem. The army’s deployment must be viewed as a short-term strategy to give the government some breathing room to implement a long-term plan.

Without a coherent long-term solution, which most governments don’t seem to have up till now, we can never hope to see a stable Kashmir.

*Nishant Rajeev is a GCPP course student at the Bangalore-based Takshashila Institution, a public charitable trust engaged in public policy research & education. Comments and suggestions on this article can be sent to editor@spsindia.in

Many Russian commentators, observing the ongoing populist wave in various Western countries, have been suggesting that this trend will fundamentally change the West and ultimately spread to Russia as well. But Znak commentator Gleb Kuznetsov argues that there is no basis for either conclusion.

He he points out that “the main problem of populism is that it doesn’t change anything. It only says that it is necessary to change everything,” but no populist movement or leader has “a well-defined image of the future” or plans for implementing it (znak.com/2016-12-19/politiki_populisty_poluchayut_podderzhku_v_evrope_i_ssha_zhdet_li_eto_rossiyu).

And he observes that there are two compelling reasons to think that populism won’t spread to Russia. On the one hand, anyone who tried to promote such ideas independently of the regime would soon be jailed or worse. And on the other, the Kremlin is quite ready to coopt populist slogans precisely because it sees that they can prevent change rather than promote it.

Kuznetsov takes up the problem of populism in the West. According to him, “the anti-elite and anti-bureaucratic voting in Great Britain – Brexit – has led only to the appearance of work for several hundred bureaucrats who have begun with high salaries to develop the procedure for an exit.”

And in the US, “Trump, who achieved his victory under slogans calling for a struggle against family dealings, clans, and lobbyism has brought to the White House his own children, the wife of the leader of the Republican leader of the Senate, as well as numerous relatives, friends and business partners.”

The incoming president “promised to put all lobbyists up against the wall and ‘drain the Washington swamp,’ but already now lobbyists are enjoying a level of power in the US which they never had earlier.” Trump’s nominee for defense secretary was pushed by the lobbying of former Vice President Dick Cheney and former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.

And Trump’s telephone call with the president of Taiwan, something that infuriated Beijing, was pushed by the lobbying efforts of former Republican presidential candidate and influential senator, Bob Dole. In short and with remarkable speed, the “populist” Trump has expanded the very forces he won the election by saying he’d defeat.

Populists in the US and elsewhere can only expect two things in the future: “total disappointment” when they realize that those they voted for aren’t going to do what they promised and the increasing use of populist rhetoric by “’systemic politicians’” who will use it and discard it just as quickly.

As far as Russia is concerned, Kuznetsov says, “both Trump and the Brexit activists and many other Western populists would set in a Russian prison about a week after the start of their election campaign.” The Kremlin has both the laws in place to do just that and has demonstrated its willingness to use them for its own purposes.

And at the same time, the Znak commentator points out, Putin and his regime have shown themselves willing to use populist rhetoric even though they have no plans to implement their promises either. Consequently, the spread of a real populist challenge to Russia is unlikely and “most probably impossible.”

Nutritional guidelines restricting sugar intake are not based on reliable science, suggests a review published in Annals of Internal Medicine. The quality of available evidence to link sugar with health outcomes is generally rated as low to very low. Public health officials and consumers should be aware of these limitations when considering recommendations on dietary sugar.

The relationship between sugar intake and health is complex and is influenced by many variables. Based on available evidence, several authoritative health organizations, including the World Health Organization, have issued differing public health guidelines on sugar consumption. When respected organizations issue conflicting recommendations, it can result in confusion and raises concern about the quality of the guidelines and underlying evidence.

Researchers conducted a systematic review of nine authoritative guidelines on sugar intake to determine the consistency of recommendations, methodological quality of guidelines, and the quality of evidence supporting each recommendation. Guideline quality was rated using the Appraisal of Guidelines for Research and Evaluation 2nd edition (AGREE II) instrument.

To assess evidence quality, articles supporting recommendations were independently reviewed and rated using Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation (GRADE) methods. The researchers concluded that guidelines on dietary sugar are based on low-quality evidence and, therefore, do not meet criteria for trustworthy recommendations. These findings suggest that the development of trustworthy guidelines on dietary sugar requires improvement.

The authors of an accompanying editorial suggest that the public consider the funding source and methods of the review before accepting the authors’ conclusions. They note that the review was funded by the North American branch of the International Life Sciences Institute, a trade group representing several big companies in the food and beverage industry, including The Coca-Cola Company, The Hershey Company, and Mars, Inc..

Most salamanders are homebodies when it comes to mating. But some of the beasts hit the road, traversing miles of rugged terrain unfit for an amphibian in pursuit of a partner from a far-away wetland.

And when those adventurers leave home, they travel an average of six miles – and as far as almost nine miles – to new breeding sites, a new study has found.

That’s a long haul on four squatty legs.

The scientists who unlocked this evolutionarily important information got there by cross-referencing genetic details from salamanders in various Ohio wetlands with the distance the animals would walk on a treadmill before tiring out.

The research, published online this month in the journal Functional Ecology, is the work of scientists at The Ohio State University who want to better understand how and where salamanders procreate and how that fits into work to preserve the animals, including land conservation efforts.

It is a mystery what prompts a salamander to cross rocks, fields, streams and roads to mate and, in the process, mix up the genetics of another salamander outpost far from home, said lead author Robert Denton.

“It has to be incredibly intimidating for these tiny salamanders. They could get eaten by a crow or a raccoon. They could dry out,” said Denton, a presidential research fellow in Ohio State’s Department of Evolution, Ecology and Organismal Biology.

“This is the first study to connect physiological factors – particularly how fast they get tired of walking – with genetics showing animal movement in the field.”

Understanding these connections is critical to predicting how environmental and other changes can harm species, Denton said. Dispersal – leaving the birthplace for a new habitat – is a key element of keeping a species genetically healthy, he said.

Animal travel for breeding is a complex area of research, he said. There are a lot of factors to consider, including how they decide to move, why only certain animals hit the road and how they actually complete the journey – in a series of shorter trips or all at once, for instance.

And when it comes to salamanders, things get particularly tricky.

“They live these really mysterious lives – we only see them out for a couple days in the spring. They spend most of their time just hiding,” Denton said.

Furthermore, they have fragile skin that prevents insertion of any kind of tracking device.

To shed light on the mystery, the researchers looked at genetic diversity and endurance in two types of mole salamanders (part of the Ambystoma genus.) One type is all-female and reproduces by cloning and sometimes borrowing sperm that males leave behind on twigs and leaves. The other type mates in a more traditional manner.

The “sexual” salamanders walked on the treadmill an average of four times longer before reaching fatigue than their all-female counterparts. Denton and his colleagues measured fatigue as the point where the salamander didn’t “right” itself within a few seconds when removed from the treadmill and placed on its back.

Prompting a salamander to walk on a miniature treadmill isn’t much of a challenge, Denton said. A small pinch of the tail or poke in the behind, and they’re off at a slow, steady pace. The treadmill – borrowed from another research team – is outfitted with plastic walls that ensure the animals don’t take a spill off the side, as they tend to not walk a straight line.

“They’re like endurance athletes. Some of them could walk for two-plus hours straight without tiring themselves,” Denton said.

“That’s like a person lightly jogging for 75 miles before wearing out.”

Genetic information collected in the wetlands lined up with the treadmill tests. Sexual salamanders were found approximately twice as far from their birthplace as the all-female cloning animals. The DNA analysis included testing of tissue samples from all known breeding wetlands in a salamander-rich area of rural Ohio. The researchers collected samples from the tail tips of 445 salamanders.

Differences between the all-female and sexual salamanders could have multiple explanations, Denton said.

“Maybe the best explanation for why sexual salamanders travel so far is because they have to: On a large landscape with few places to breed, the animals that can cross that distance are the ones that survive and reproduce,” he said.

“Perhaps the more interesting question is why the all-female salamanders don’t go very far, and we think that has to do with the physiological costs of not having sex. Essentially, not mixing up your genomic material often enough likely causes some problems for genes that you need to make energy.”

In a given wetland mating area, most of the DNA samples looked alike. But there were outliers.

“We looked for the ones that stood out like sore thumbs,” Denton said.

About 4 percent of salamanders were out of sync genetically, and could be linked to other wetlands where they were born, Denton said. That information allowed him and his colleagues to map the distances some of the animals traveled to mate.

“It was surprising to us that they go really long distances – four, five, six miles – from home,” Denton said.

The ring-tailed lemur, an iconic primate that is emblematic of the wild and wonderful creatures inhabiting the tropical island of Madagascar, is in big trouble.

According to a new study by the University of Victoria in British Columbia and the University of Colorado Boulder, the number of ring-tailed lemurs among known populations is thought to have plummeted to less than 2,500 in Madagascar, the only place where they exist. The decline is primarily a result of habitat destruction, bushmeat hunting and illegal capture for the pet trade, said CU Boulder Professor Michelle Sauther, co-author of study.

The study, led by Professor Lisa Gould of the University of Victoria, indicated only three sites in Madagascar are known to contain more than 200 of the primates. In addition, 12 sites now have populations of 30 or less, and there are 15 sites where ring-tailed lemurs have either become locally extinct (extirpated) or they have a high probability of disappearing in the near future.

“This is very troubling,” said Sauther, who has been studying ring-tailed lemurs in Madagascar for 30 years. “They are disappearing right under our noses.”

A paper on the subject by Gould and Sauther was published online in the journal Primate Conservation.

Sauther said the fact that ring-tailed lemurs are ecologically adaptable and capable of surviving and thriving in harsh habitats is an indication that many other lemur species in Madagascar — as many as three-quarters of the roughly 100 species that reside there — are in dire straits.

“Ring-tailed lemurs are like the canary in a coal mine,” said Sauther, who co-directs the Beza Mahafaly Lemur Biology Project in southwestern Madagascar. “If they are going down the drain, what will happen to the other lemur species on the island that have more specific habitat and diet requirements?”

Habitat destruction has hit Madagascar particularly hard in recent years, said Sauther. One of the biggest threats today are the open-pit sapphire mines that entice thousands of people from the island and outside of it to dig up the ground in search of their fortunes, resulting in quick and massive forest destruction.

An island nation off the southeast coast of Africa that is larger than California, Madagascar hosts more than 22 million people, roughly 90 percent of whom live on less than $2 a day. “I think it’s important to keep in mind that what is driving habitat loss and ring-tailed lemur declines is human poverty,” said Sauther.

“It’s likely that the ring-tailed lemur population will eventually collapse,” Sauther said. “We are getting an early warning that if we don’t do something very quickly, the species is going to become extinct. And this is the one primate species in Madagascar we never thought this would happen to.”

Gould said many areas that once contained larger populations of ring-tailed lemurs are now devoid of them. From 2009 to 2013 she conducted surveys of ring-tailed lemurs in a number of small forest fragments in south-central Madagascar, and has been updating information on ring-tailed lemurs throughout their geographic range since 2012.

“It was important to try and document as many populations of ring-tailed lemurs in as many regions as possible,” said Gould. “While I was discovering previously unknown lemur populations, many of them are likely to be extirpated in the near future.”

You might have heard of Phil Mulryne, a Manchester United footballer who’s shared the field with David Beckham and brought fame to Ireland with 27 caps – international appearances – in his athletic career.

But now, Mulryne is setting aside his jersey to pursue the vocation of a Catholic Dominican priest.

“This for me was one of the major reasons that attracted me to the religious life,” Mulryne said in a video interview posted by the Daily Mail.

“To give oneself completely to God through the profession of the evangelical councils, to take him as our example and despite our weakness and our defects, trust in Him that he will transform us by his grace, and thus being transformed, communicate the joy in knowing him to everyone we meet – this for me is the ideal of Dominican life and one of the major reasons of what attracted me to the order.”

Mulryne, a 38-year old Irishman, began his career in football as a kid in 1994 when he attended the Manchester United youth academy, and eventually joined the Norwich league in 1999.

His teammates were among the many of his surprised acquaintances to find out that he gave up his global fame and £500,000 in career earnings to pursue the vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience as a Catholic priest.

“It was a complete shock that he felt this was his calling,” fellow footballer Paul McVeigh said, according to the Daily News.

After a series of major injuries at the end of his career in 2008, Mulryne was faced with the future: how would he spend his post-footballing days?

According to McVeigh, Mulryne began turning “his life around and was doing a lot of charitable work and helping the homeless on a weekly basis.” The Catholic Herald reported that Bishop Noel Treanor of Down and Connor became an influential figure during Mulryne’s conversion, eventually inviting him to enter the seminary.

“I know for a fact that this is not something he took lightly as the training to be ordained as a Catholic priest consists of a two-year philosophy degree, followed by a four-year theology degree and only after that will he finally be qualified as a priest,” McVeigh said.

In 2009, the Irish native entered the Irish Pontifical College in Rome, where he has been pursuing the priesthood through studies in philosophy and theology.

This fall, on Oct. 30, he was ordained a deacon in Belfast by Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin, and is set for priestly ordination in 2017.

Rag pickers in a central Indian city will be safer as they collect street waste thanks to the efforts of a church group who assisted them to acquire official identification.

For 15 years, church group Jan Vikas (People’s Development) Society, has been advocating the need for rag pickers in the city of Indore to have official identification to help ensure their safety.

Malini Gaur, the mayor of the city, distributed identity cards to 250 rag pickers in a recent public function.

“We are grateful to the Indore Municipal Corporation for accepting our long standing demand and issuing identity cards to rag pickers,” says Father Roy Thomas, director of Jan Vikas (people’s development) Society.

Father Thomas said that the card gives allows them to pick up trash — such as plastic and metal waste — from public places and homes.

Without such cards they are often suspected as criminals and thieves and shooed away disturbing their dignity as human beings, the Divine Word priest said.

The identity cards will help them collect waste without fear of harassment from local police and people. “It will also add to their self esteem,” he told ucanews.com.

Divine Word missionary Father George Payattikattu started the Jan Vikas Society in 2001 to serve the poor in city, which is the commercial capital of Madhya Pradesh state.

During President-elect Donald J. Trump’s campaign against his Democratic opponent, Hillary Clinton, one of his key talking points that resonated with millions of Americans was his promise to “drain the swamp” in the nation’s capital. While few doubt his sincerity, the denizens of the D.C. swamp will not drain easily.

In their search to blame others for the dramatic loss by the Democratic Party’s beloved presidential nominee, the Democrats have been blaming the Russian government for hacking into the computer system of the Democratic Party’s headquarters and releasing documents that hurt the Clinton campaign.

Armed with intelligence reports and the results of an FBI investigation, Democratic lawmakers — and even some Republicans such as Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham — are claiming Vladimir Putin, Russia’s toughguy president, is ultimately responsible for Hillary Clinton’s loss and Donald Trump’s win. However, several past incidents of intelligence report “re-editing” coupled with FBI and Justice Department politicizing of their probes leave few people believing anything being reported by the Obama administration.

Scoffing at the claims regarding Russian hacking, Wikileaks web site creator and journalist Julian Assange implied during a TV interview that a Democratic National Committee staffer, Seth Conrad Rich, who met a violent death was the source of a trove of damaging emails. The rogue web site began posting thousands of documents just days before the Democratic National Convention and continued releasing the damning documents faster than the news media could handle them in the run up to the November 8 election.

Speaking to Dutch television program Nieuswsuur after he announced a $20,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of Seth Rich’s killer, Assange said the July 11 murder of Rich in Washington, D.C., was an example of the risk leakers undertake and the danger of retaliation.

Rich was a 27-year-old man director with the Democratic National Committee (DNC) who was shot and killed as he walked home in the Bloomingdale neighborhood of Northwest Washington, D.C., police and his family said.

Seth Conrad Rich died after he was shot multiple times three blocks east of Howard University Hospital, said members of the Metropolitan Police Department on Sunday, July 11. The victim’s mother, Mary Rich, said police told her family her son may have been the victim of an attempted robbery.

Meanwhile, Jack Burkman, a talk radio host and a professional lobbyist with numerous Washington, DC, contacts told the media he will continue to call on the public to come forward with any information about the case. Seth Rich held a managerial position at the DNC and part of his job was investigating fraud and other misconduct in the election process for the Democrats. Yet, his murder received minimal news coverage and a tepid police investigation that attributed Rich’s death to a robbery gone wrong.

Burkman is also offering a $100,000 dollar reward out of his own pocket for any information that leads to the apprehension of the killers. His reward is in addition to those already being offered by Washington DC’s Metropolitan Police Department ($25,000) and by Wikileaks ($20,000). Wikileaks founder and director Julian Assange has embraced several conspiracy theories surrounding Rich’s murder. Assange believes, based on reading thousands of pages of Hillary Clinton’s and the DNC’s emails, that Rich wasn’t killed in a random robbery.

“I agree. There were reports that Seth Rich had been investigating complaints of impropriety at the DNC and that he was in the midst of his probe when he was suddenly discovered dead on the streets of the nation’s capital by police,” said former homicide detective Benjamin Figueroa. “The robbery itself sounds suspicious based on what was printed in the newspapers.”

DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz issued a statement mourning the death of Rich, who worked as voter expansion data director: “Our hearts are broken with the loss of one of our DNC family members over the weekend. Seth Rich was a dedicated, selfless public servant who worked tirelessly to protect the most sacred right we share as Americans – the right to vote,” she said.

US president-elect Donald Trump’s environmental commitments appear elusive. His remarks on climate change and his recent nominees for cabinet members have stirred domestic concerns surrounding climate-related issues. Would Southeast Asia need to be concerned too?

By Margareth Sembiring*

US President-Elect Donald Trump, during his election campaign, announced his plan to withdraw the United States from the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. The landmark Agreement that entered into force on 4 November 2016 is a product of two decades of negotiations and in which 197 countries pledge to keep global warming to well below 2 degree Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

The US’ ratification of the Paris Agreement was greeted with much enthusiasm particularly since the US opted out of the preceding 1997 Kyoto Protocol. As a party to the Agreement, the US aims to bring down greenhouse gas emission by 26 to 28 percent from 2005 levels by the year 2025. It reportedly means a potential reduction of 1.6 Gigatons of CO2 equivalent from a Business as Usual scenario. Being the world’s second biggest carbon emitter after China, such reduction will contribute greatly to the fight against climate change. Anxieties over Trump’s threat to walk out of the Agreement are therefore not completely baseless.

Cause for Concern in Southeast Asia?

Subsequently Trump’s recent choices of Scott Pruit to head the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Cathy McMorris Rodgers as the Secretary of the Interior Department have raised further alarm. Both are reportedly known to be closely allied to the oil industry. With such an outlook, the Trump administration is feared to likely reverse the US’ climate-friendly policies including Obama’s Clean Power Plan. There are also worries that Trump may put a curb on the EPA’s budget and frustrate other environment initiatives at federal level.

While much of the distressed murmur is currently happening within the US’ domestic sphere, the Southeast Asia region may also need to brace for potential fallouts from Trump’s possible anti-climate policies. As all ASEAN member states are listed under the Non-Annex I Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), or the ‘developing countries’ category, the region is admittedly in need of assistance in implementing its climate-related initiatives.

The Paris Agreement urges developed countries to mobilise US$100 billion per year by 2020 for climate financing. The US has promised to contribute $3 billion to the Green Climate Fund, making it the top donor of a total of close to $10 billion pledged as of early December 2016. Should the US pull out from the Paris Agreement, as Trump proposed, its involvements in the Fund would likely be affected.

The long history of various environment-related collaborations in the Southeast Asian region may experience drawbacks as well. Back in 1992 during the Bush presidency, the US-Asia Environmental Partnership (AEP) was established with the aim of facilitating sustainable development in Asia. Additionally, the ASEAN-US Technical Assistance and Training Facility (ASEAN-US TATF) Phase II between 2007 and 2013 has assisted various ASEAN initiatives, including in developing ASEAN cities’ capacity to measure and monitor carbon emissions using more advanced technologies.

The US was also involved in bringing together climate specialists from the US and ASEAN to exchange technical information pertaining to climate change adaptation at local level in the CityLinks Pilot Partnership.

Whither ASEAN-US Climate Change Cooperation?

In 2014, ASEAN and the US formally inked their commitments to address the changing climate in a Joint Statement on Climate Change. In the follow up to the Joint Statement, the USAID plans to disburse over $60 million in support of environment-related programmes in the region. More recently in September 2016, the USAID Clean Power Asia was launched to encourage the development of renewable energy in Lower Mekong states and other ASEAN member states. The initiative, expected to cost a minimum of $750 million in the course of five years, is projected to reduce at least three million metric tonnes of greenhouse gas emission.

The USAID, in particular its Regional Development Mission for Asia (RDMA), indeed plays a central role in executing the US global environmental agenda. The investments on forest management and clean power development were reported to amount to $5 million and $275 million respectively. Specifically on the forestry front, realising the high carbon emissions emanating from massive deforestation activities in the region, the RDMA rolled out the million-dollar USAID Lowering Emissions in Asia’s Forests (USAID LEAF) programme.

To support the operations of the US Department of State and the USAID, a budget request of $50 billion was made early this year. With Trump picking Rex Tillerson, the CEO of oil corporation ExxonMobil, as the Secretary of State, the US’ future financial commitments for the USAID and especially its environmental programmes have become less certain now.

Needed: US’ Involvement in Global Environmental Agenda

While countries in Southeast Asia have developed their own policies, mechanisms and institutions to address climate-related issues, financial and technical assistance to operationalise them remain a necessity. Indonesia, for example, was the world’s fourth largest carbon emitter in 2015 due largely to its burning forests.

As part of its efforts to stop annual forest fire issues and curb attendant carbon emissions, Indonesia launched a plan to restore two million hectares of its degraded peatlands early this year. To materialise such ambition, Indonesia is in need of sustainable financing.

Between 1990 and 2010, Southeast Asia experienced the fastest growth of carbon dioxide emissions from the use of fossil fuels. Looking at the contributions that the US could make in assisting climate initiatives in the region, its commitments to global environmental agenda are therefore critical. In the event the Trump administration decides to turn away from climate change, US involvement in Southeast Asia may get affected; countries in the region may potentially take longer to achieve their Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs) pledged in the Paris Agreement.

The slowing down of climate-related progress due to a change of leadership in the US would augur ill not only for the Southeast Asian region but also for the world. While none of these worries have been proven, the consequences of a waning commitment from the US could already be foretold. And it will mean bad news for the green earth.

*Margareth Sembiring is a Senior Analyst at the Centre for Non-Traditional Security Studies, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.

By Arthur Herman*

In 2014 the Japanese government promulgated a new defense export policy, lifting bans that had been in place for nearly thirty years. As inaugurated by the Abe administration, Japan’s new defense export policy offers huge opportunities for US-Japan defense industrial cooperation.¹

These are opportunities Japan can exploit as it moves from having almost no presence in a rapidly expanding, increasingly globalized, and highly lucrative defense trade market into potentially being one of the market’s most important global players. This would be much like what it managed to do in the 1970s and 1980s when it became a dominant and innovative presence in the global automotive industry.

The United States can also take full advantage of these opportunities to increase its own defense exports and imports, including in some surprising areas. These include technologies and systems that until recently lay outside the conventional defense sector, but which now overlap with the Pentagon’s new third offset strategy for developing and fielding future military systems, in many cases by tailoring commercial high-tech technologies to fit defense needs (see chapter 5).²

At the same time, there are important risks that accompany this new defense export policy. These include:

• political risks, particularly with Japanese public opinion at home, as well as public opinion abroad;
• geopolitical risks, including Japan’s bilateral relations with Asian neighbors, particularly China;
• technological risks, particularly in the area of technology transfers and intellectual property (IP);
• economic risks for Japanese companies that venture into the new defense export arena without adequate preparation or adequate support from their government, which are vividly illustrated in Japan’s recent major effort to sell its Soryu-class submarines to Australia (see chapter 4).

Any new national policy, especially in the defense arena, comes with an inevitable learning curve. The highly competitive arms market today makes that curve especially steep for Japan. But when—not if—Japan masters that curve and becomes both an important defense exporter and innovator, much as it did in the automotive industry in the 1970s and 1980s, it can and will emerge as a formidable partner of the United States, or possibly even a competitor, in equipping its allies with defense technologies to make the world safer and more secure.

Chapter 1: Japan’s New Defense Export Policy

Nearly forty years after banning all defense and defense-related exports, in 2014 the Japanese government promulgated “three principles on transfer of defense equipment and technology,” which set the terms for transfer of military technologies by Japan’s government and defense industry to other countries, including the United States.³

Although often portrayed as an unprecedented “easing” or “lifting” of Japan’s four- decade-old defense export ban, the three principles themselves were actually far from unprecedented, nor were they the first three principles articulated to define Japan’s defense export policy. The first three principles were instituted in 1967 when the Sato administration blocked all defense exports to 1) Communist bloc countries; 2) countries subject to arms embargoes under the United Nations Security Council; and 3) countries involved in, or likely to be involved in, international conflicts. At the time, this would have included Israel as well as Arab countries such as Egypt and Syria.

Then, in 1976, the Liberal Democratic government of Prime Minister Takeo Miki extended the prohibition to all areas not included in the three principles, in effect shutting down any and all defense exports from Japan.

Beginning in the 1980s, however, it became clear that this policy was far too broad and sweeping, and successive governments granted exemptions to the defense export ban. In 1983, for example, Prime Minister Nakasone exempted the transfer of military technology to the United States,⁵ and in 1997, assistance was allowed for activities relating to removal of anti-personnel mines.⁶ Finally, in 1999, the government allowed cooperative research on ballistic missiles and missile defense.⁷

Other exemptions followed:

• 2006: Agreement for transfer of patrol vessels to Indonesia⁸
• 2013: Agreement for transfer of armored construction equipment to Haiti⁹
• 2013: Japan-Philippines exchange of notes for delivery of patrol vessels to the Philippines¹⁰
• 2013: Formal signing of the Japan-UK Arms and Military Technologies Transfer Agreement¹¹

These last three were in accordance with the Guidelines for Overseas Transfer of Defense Equipment promulgated by the chief cabinet secretary two years earlier, in 2011, which eased the transfer of certain types of Japanese defense equipment and technologies in specific cases.¹²

All the same, there had been no effort to substantially revise, let alone replace, the three principles as a matter of policy until Prime Minister Shinzo Abe took office in 2012. Abe’s decision to invoke an entirely new approach to defense exports by permitting entire categories of defense transfers for the first time was a reflection of certain new geopolitical realities.¹³

These included a rapidly changing regional security environment, especially with China’s rise as an aggressive military power. There was also a changing global security environment, as Japan’s traditional reliance on the United States as its primary defender in the event of a major conflict seemed less and less certain—and seemed an artificial and outdated limitation on Japan’s ability to chart its own independent foreign policy course.

Therefore, at almost the same time that US-Japan defense security guidelines were being revised to make Japan a more active partner in operations for its own defense, and Article 9 of the Japanese constitution¹⁴ was being reinterpreted to permit a more proactive defense posture and “collective self-defense,” the Abe cabinet instituted a major reform in the defense export field, collectively known as “the new three principles.”¹⁵

Far from “lifting” or “ending” Japanese defense export controls, as some critics (and supporters) claimed, these three principles merely clarified when transfers of defense equipment from Japan to other countries will be prohibited or permitted. Under the three original headings, they can be summarized as follows:¹⁶

1) Transfers of defense equipment are prohibited when:
a) they violate obligations under treaties and other international agreements of which Japan is a signatory, e.g., the Chemical Weapons Convention; the Convention on Cluster Munitions; the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production, and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines and on their Destruction, known as the Ottawa Treaty; and provisions of the UN’s Arms Trade Treaty, among others;
b) they violate obligations under UN Security Council resolutions, including those preventing arms transfers to sanctioned countries such as North Korea and Iran;
c) they are destined for a country that is party to a conflict regarding which the UN Security Council is taking measures to maintain or restore international peace and security.

2) Transfers are permitted when they contribute to “the active promotion of peace” and international cooperation, or when they contribute to Japan’s own security, by
a) enabling it to implement international joint development and production projects with its allies and partners;
b) enhancing security and defense cooperation with its allies and partners; or
c) supporting Japan Self-Defense Forces (JSDF) activities, including maintenance of equipment that enhances the safety of Japanese nationals.

3) Finally, transfers are permitted when there are appropriate formal guarantees regarding extra-purpose use and third-party transfers, which the recipient government must provide to the Japanese government prior to transfer, and to which the government of Japan must give its consent.

In addition, in the interest of both transparency and accountability, Japan’s National Security Council is also supposed to receive an annual report concerning the overseas transfer of defense equipment issued by the Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry (METI), the government agency that has statutory authority over all defense exports.¹⁷

Chapter 2: The Role of Japanese Government Agencies and Trade Associations

Just as defense export policy and process in the United States is divided among several government agencies—the Departments of Defense, State, and Commerce—so too does Japan involve multiple agencies, including the Ministry of Defense. In Japan’s case, however, final authority is firmly anchored only in one agency, namely the Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry. This has powerful implications for the scope and direction of future defense trade, since commercial and defense export strategies will be more co-mingled than in the United States. It also makes for more unified control over the export process, providing an opportunity for a more coherent and coordinated defense export strategy than currently exists in the US government.

Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry
Under Japan’s Foreign Exchange and Foreign Trade Act, only the Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry can issue export licenses, including in the defense sector. Roughly ninety METI employees handle export controls in the defense and security field as part of the Security Export Control Division (figure 1). Those employees are mandated to manage export control regulations in accordance with the three principles from 2014. They also analyze all data relating to export control while joining discussions with other government agencies in export-control-related areas, including the Japan Ministry of Defense (JMOD).¹⁸

Figure 1. Organization for Security Export Control in METI

Source: http://supportoffice.jp/outreach/2014/asian_ec/pdf/day1/1345_Mr.JunKaeki.pdf

In the Foreign Exchange and Foreign Trade Act, Articles 48 and 25 specify certain goods and technologies¹⁹ that are controlled in defense transfers. These include items with both civilian and military applications (dual-use items); items that can be used for the manufacture of weapons of mass destruction (WMDs); and items with specific military end-use activities.²⁰ The articles also designate which countries are permitted to be partners in defense export, the so-called “white countries,” which include the United States (box 1).²¹

There is, however, another player in the defense export policy: JMOD.

JMOD and Defense Exports

In June 2014, JMOD issued a landmark paper, “Strategy on Defense Production and Technological Bases.”²² That document, which followed the release of the three principles of defense exports, acknowledged that these principles would significantly change the direction and force of JMOD’s own long-term goal to revivify Japan’s defense industrial and technological base.

For example, the strategy paper noted that “Japan’s defense industries must strengthen their international competitiveness to respond to changes” in the international defense market, which is changing rapidly. It also pointed to the importance of building strong relationships regarding defense equipment and technology cooperation with other countries, noting that Japan had concluded broad agreements on these issues with Great Britain in July 2013, France in January 2014, and Australia in June 2014. Such cooperation, of course, presupposes defense transfers from Japan.

For that reason, the paper stated, “MOD will formulate a framework which will enable the transfer of defense equipment, with nations that are likely to become partners in international joint development and production.” In addition, “MOD will study the postures and systems for smoothly promoting cooperation under government commitment and oversight throughout the life-cycle of transferred defense equipment.” This clearly points the way to creating a regular government-to-government and/or a foreign military sales program to oversee transfers of Japanese equipment and technologies, i.e., defense exports.

Thus, when JMOD’s new Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics Agency (ATLA) was established (figure 2), one of its important functions was to encourage and supervise defense equipment cooperation with other countries.

Figure 2. ATLA Organization Chart

Source: http://www.mod.go.jp/atla/en/soshiki.html

Although JMOD has conceded that final authority over defense exports and technology transfers belongs to METI, it nonetheless sees an important role for itself in promoting these transfers, both as a matter of overall defense strategy and to strengthen Japan’s defense industrial base. For that reason, several former METI officials were transferred to ATLA to shore up its experience base in dealing with export and transfer issues, including the need for future export controls.

Keidanren and Defense Export Policy
Finally, the role of Keidanren (the Japanese Business Federation) in export policy needs to be considered. In July 2012, the Federation’s Defense Production Committee and the Aerospace and Defense Committee of the American Chamber of Commerce in Japan put out a “Joint Statement on Defense Industry Cooperation between Japan and the United States.” It described four models for cooperation, ranging from formal government-to-government programs like the US/Japan BMD/SM-3 missile program (see chapter 4), to cases where a licensee company unilaterally “supplies defense equipment in response to a request by the licensor’s country.”²³

Although Keidanren was clearly in favor of a major reform of Japan’s defense export policy, there is every indication that the three principles exceeded its members’ expectations, especially those companies with high-tech product lines that are best positioned to take advantage of the new export regime.²⁴

The real question is whether they and the rest of the Japanese defense industry are prepared to handle the challenges that this new export policy will present.

Chapter 3: Japan and the International Defense Market

The international defense trade market is an arena that Japanese companies, with their impressive marketing skills and sophisticated product development savvy, would seem destined to dominate. Global arms sales are slated to rise dramatically in the next decade, especially in Asia. Many countries are looking for systems that are the same as or similar to the ones Japan’s defense companies have been supplying to the JSDF and Japan Maritime Self-Defense Forces (JMSDF) for years (table 1).

Japan’s defense companies have developed and produced a range of military hardware for export that would be attractive to many overseas customers. This includes the Type 90 tank (Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, or MHI), OH-1 helicopter (Kawasaki Aerospace), and Komatsu Light Armored Vehicle (LAV), as well as Hayabusa-class patrol boats (MHI and Shimonoseki), Atago-class Aegis destroyers (MHI), Osumi-class tank landing ships (Mitsui), and Izumo-class helicopter-equipped destroyers (Japan Marine Ltd.). All are manufactured in Japan and almost certainly find customers, particularly in Asia. Indeed, the promise of Japan’s positioning for arms exports sales has been known for some time. In 1988 a secret memo circulated among Japanese defense executives that even predicted that if Japan were allowed to sell its defense articles abroad, the country could capture 45 percent of the world tank market, 40 percent of military electronic sales, and 60 percent of naval ship construction.²⁵

Table 1. Twenty Largest Japan Ministry of Defense Contractors in FY2015 (as of March 31), by Monetary Value of Contract

Whether that prediction was accurate or not in 1988, the sober truth is that today Japan’s defense industry also faces severe obstacles in creating its fledgling defense export market, some of which are of Japan’s own making.

The first is that they are latecomers to the game compared to the United States, Russia, China, or even South Korea. The rules of the international defense market, where every country has its own esoteric import-export restrictions and licensing requirements, are staggeringly complex. Much depends on relationships of trust developed over years and a proven track record. Foreign customers may like the sophisticated features of Japan’s Type 90 battle tank or its OH-1 observation helicopter, but they also like a tank or helicopter that’s been tested on the battlefield, as Russian and US export products have.

Another obstacle is that defense is a small share of overall business even for Japan’s biggest defense contractors—barely 4 percent of sales on average, according to Japan’s Ministry of Defense. Even MHI, Japan’s biggest defense contractor (ranking twenty-fifth in terms of world arms producers), does only 5.6 percent of its overall business in the defense market.²⁶ This means that the sale of military systems abroad may not draw the kind of managerial attention and focus Japanese companies will need to penetrate those overseas markets, at least at first.

At the same time, in a country that is still largely pacifist, company executives will not like to be branded as “merchants of death” because of their burgeoning defense sales.²⁷ Since Article 9 of the Japanese constitution in effect bans the use of military force,²⁸ a strong culture of anti-militarism and pacifism has been reinforced by decades of quietism in the conduct of foreign policy. Of course, since 1954, Japan has made an exception for the defense of the home islands, and its defense budget remains impressively large for a primarily pacifist-minded country.²⁹ Prime Minister Abe’s reinterpretation of Article 9, and defense spending that is rising to the highest level since World War II, represent important steps. But sales of defense articles abroad that could be characterized as “arms trafficking” are bound to have a negative impact on Japanese companies’ reputation at home, and consequently, there is reluctance at both the corporate and governmental level to tempt bad publicity.

Finally, Japan’s defense companies have grown up in a largely anti-competitive domestic environment, in which they have been accustomed for years to catering to the needs of a single customer, the Ministry of Defense and the JSDF. That has been a customer that knows what it wants and knows what companies can make it. In addition, the government has been inclined to make Solomon-like decisions on which companies make which defense systems to ensure that Japan’s defense industrial base is as widely distributed as possible and that everyone has a share in the action (as JMOD has done with sharing the contract for Soryu-class submarines with both MHI and Kawasaki).³⁰

Japanese companies accustomed to an anti-competitive corporate culture will face a major challenge when operating in an international defense market that is intensely competitive, with multiple players with multiple skills and capabilities. These include not just the United States, Russia, and China, but Japan’s neighbor South Korea as well as Canada and Turkey. To qualify for the list of the largest arms exporters, Japan will have to double sales every year for a decade (table 2).

Table 2. TIVS of Arms Exports from Twenty-Five Largest Exporters, 2015

At the same time, Japan is slated to become a major importer of US arms, with its agreement to buy forty-two F-35 joint strike fighters, even though in terms of volume of American arms purchases, it still lags far behind Saudi Arabia and even India. Yet American defense companies know Japan is one of their most lucrative markets. Already American aerospace firms are lining up for the chance to replace Japan’s aging fleet of F-2 fighters with their own designs, and Japan will be hard pressed to summon up the resources to replace the F-2 with indigenous design and production.³¹ Furthermore, many of the technologies Japanese companies have employed to create defense systems for the JSDF are actually licensed from the United States, reducing the likelihood that foreign countries will buy Japanese when they can acquire the same technologies directly from the United States, probably at reduced cost.

In short, Japan faces many challenges as it tries to find its proper niche in today’s global defense market—just how challenging, two recent examples have revealed.

Chapter 4: Three Case Studies

Even before the declaration of the three principles, Japan began pursuing important defense sales to two Asian countries: Australia and India. Neither went according to plan, yet both offer important lessons for future export opportunities. The most important lessons of all may date back even earlier to Japan’s cooperation with the United States in joint development of a defense export product.

Australia and the Soryu-class Submarine

In July 2014, on a visit to Canberra, Prime Minister Abe and Australian prime minister Tony Abbott signed an historic agreement to jointly develop submarine technologies. This was intended to be the first step in an Australian purchase of Japan’s Soryu-class submarines to replace the aging Collins-class submarines the Royal Australian Navy (RAN) had relied on since the 1990s.³² The deal was the first important test of the Abe government’s new defense export policy and a potential $20 billion sales boost for the Soryu‘s two principal builders, Kawasaki Heavy Industries and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries.³³ It was also supposed to be an important step in developing the increasingly close alliance between the two former World War II enemies, Japan and Australia.

The Soryu-class boat is the world’s largest conventionally powered submarine and reputedly the world’s best non-nuclear-powered submarine. Using a Sony-designed hydrodynamic system and equipped with special steel and noise-reduction features developed independently by Japan, it is fitted with an advanced Swedish-designed air independent propulsion system that allows it to remain submerged for extended periods—an important advantage in the wide reaches of the Pacific Ocean.³⁴

At the time, it was understood that Australia would approach other countries, such as the United States, Germany, France, and Sweden, as part of its search to replace the Collins-class boat. It was also understood, especially in Japan, that this search would be largely pro forma and that purchase of at least ten Soryu-class submarines would soon be in the offing.³⁵

Then, however, things began to slow down and go wrong.

First, in November, Prime Minister Abbott came under pressure to open the tender to replace the RAN’s submarines to international competition, including the German company HDW, which was building similar boats for Singapore, and the Swedish firm Saab.³⁶ Miffed at this unexpected turn, Japan made noises indicating that it might choose not to resubmit its bid.³⁷

Second, in September 2015, Prime Minister Abbott, a strong and committed proponent of closer defense ties with Japan,³⁸ was replaced by Malcolm Turnbull,³⁹ whose commitment to the Japan alliance was less certain and who made it clear that domestic considerations would also enter into any final decision.⁴⁰

Those considerations included Australia’s trade unions, which began a campaign against the Japanese submarine deal. They pointed out that the new submarines would be largely built in Japan and not in Australian shipyards, while the other foreign competitors emphasized that it was important for Australia to participate in the boats’ construction.⁴¹

Critics pointed out that the Soryu class has half the range of the Collins class and does not carry any additional torpedoes or missiles. They also noted that the $38.5 billion price tag seemed too much when Canberra could buy off-the-shelf boats from HDW or Saab for far less.⁴²

Proponents of the Japan deal replied by pointing out that the Australians would not only be getting access to sophisticated Japanese-designed systems but would also gain the advantage of interoperability with American submarine and anti-submarine warfare systems—something the Collins-class boats lacked. In addition, the Soryu-class submarine is outfitted to take on the most advanced US weapons and combat system programs and components, which were part of a separate contract with a US defense firm. Submarines built by other foreign countries would have no such capability.

Australia, by seamlessly integrating its submarine fleet with the US and Japanese fleets, went the argument, would gain an important strategic as well as technological advantage, especially in dealing with a major undersea maritime power such as China.

As time went on, however, these arguments lost their force, especially when the non-Japanese competitors proved to be more effective than was previously thought. According to a confidential source, the main Japanese bidder, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, was forced to restrict access to information about key features of its Soryu-class design due to the JMSDF’s fears that important made-in-Japan technologies might leak out.

The turning point came in the spring of 2016, when a commission consisting of retired naval officers and officials drew up its recommendations on the tender. To the shock and surprise of the Japanese government, the MHI bid came in last, behind the bids of French company DCNS and German sub maker HDW.

The failure to seal the Australian submarine deal proved politically controversial. An article in Japan Times on June 23, 2016, was highly critical of Abe’s “obsession with exporting submarines to Australia, far removed from strategic diplomatic thinking” and also faulted “the attitudes of government agencies and private enterprises characterized by their blindly following Abe’s single-minded pursuit”⁴³ of an Australian deal. Those government agencies included JMOD and ATLA.

Nonetheless, the criticism heaped on Abe, JMOD, and MHI in particular misses several marks. This was Japan’s first serious entry into the defense export arena, with a deal involving a highly complex and expensive weapons system with many moving parts and almost as many political actors.

In addition, the navy’s objections to selling Australia the same submarine technologies that Japan had spent decades developing, and on which the JMSDF depends and will depend for at least another decade, may have seriously weakened MHI’s case. Confidential sources have suggested that the failure to take the time to develop an export-version Soryu-class boat that overcame JMSDF’s objections meant that MHI was compelled to be vague about certain onboard capabilities in its presentations.

Neither the Germans nor the French felt any such compunctions. Indeed, Japan’s French competition, DCNS, proved masterly in its presentations. First, it focused on how a contract with DCNS would provide work and jobs for Australian workers and shipyards. Since the bidding rules that made building the boats in Australia only one of the three options for the contract, Japan failed to emphasize that possibility, while DCNS, and also Germany’s HDW, quickly committed to building in Australian yards. DCNS also arranged an off-site demonstration of those of its submarine’s capabilities in which it knew the RAN to be specifically interested. The French firm also hired a former chief of staff of the Australian Defense Ministry to advise it on the bid, and he in turn put together a list of a dozen requirements that DCNS needed to meet to win the contract. These included wooing the American defense contractors who would eventually be installing the boats’ all-important combat systems. In contrast, neither JMOD nor MHI hired any former Australian defense officials or RAN officers to help them in the tender process.⁴⁴

According to sources, the off-site demonstration of submarine capabilities not only influenced the commission’s view of the French versus the Japanese tender bid; it also forced MHI to try a similar selling tactic in the final days of the competition.

In September 2015, MHI opened a unit in Australia (astonishingly, no such office had been set up in the fourteen months since the initial deal had been announced). The Abe government began talking about direct investment in Australia in areas besides defense, including creating a lithium-ion battery plant.

Then in April 2016, Japan sent one of its Soryu-class boats on a goodwill visit to Sydney. Its captain and crew learned on their way home that the contract had been awarded to DCNS.

The bottom line is that Japan found itself outmaneuvered and outsold by countries and firms that had far more experience in the international arms market. If the Abe administration is to be faulted anywhere, it is in its failure to allow more time to prepare for a serious, no-holds-barred competition with some of the most aggressive and accomplished arms dealers in the world. Until the government, JMOD, and Japan’s defense companies manage to conquer the arms sales learning curve, they will probably face more disappointments, particularly in the market for large complex systems.

India and the US-2 Seaplane

In January 2014, Japan and India announced that they were close to a deal in which Japan would sell India twelve US-2 seaplanes manufactured by ShinMaywa Industries and worth $1.65 billion.⁴⁵ Although negotiations for this deal began in 2011,⁴⁶ as of this writing (September 2016), it remains unsigned, and there is considerable speculation that it will never materialize.

The problems arising from this defense export, unlike those with the Australian submarine deal, do not spring from foreign competitors or failure to communicate the US-2’s key military capabilities. Indeed, India made it clear from the beginning that it was purchasing the planes for non-military use, such as air-sea rescue and maritime surveillance.

Likewise, there was no confusion about whether the aircraft would be built in Japan or India. Indian defense officials have stated that the deal was set to be signed in the first quarter of this year, with the first two seaplanes delivered off-the-shelf and the remaining ten to be built under license in India.

There were, however, serious questions raised on the Japanese side during negotiations over the types of surveillance technology transfers that would be allowed under the final deal. Fears arose that such transfers could be seen as arms transfers that would have an adverse impact at home politically. Indian navy officials in turn argued that the price tag per plane ($115 million) was too high if those planes failed to “come with other state-of-the-art surveillance technology which could enable the aircraft to be used for multiple purposes,” including presumably, military surveillance.⁴⁷

Soon, there were other disagreements regarding India’s Defense Ministry offset policy, which requires 30 percent domestic production for procurements from foreign sources. A joint statement by then-Japanese Defense Minister Gen Nakatani and Indian Defense Minister Manohar Parrikar in July 2016 commended the effort made by both countries to come to an agreement on the US-2, but failed to make any further announcements of a pending deal. Some sources say both countries would prefer to let the deal wither away; others say the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi is still hopeful that some final arrangement can be made.

Nonetheless, according to Abhijit Singh, former naval officer and head of the Maritime Policy Initiative at the Observer Research Foundation in New Delhi, “the Japanese, due to their history, are also not fully conversant with global norms on how defense deal negotiations are conducted.” This includes being adept at negotiating the labyrinthine rules and regulations of foreign bureaucracies, which can be particularly tricky in India—but which is a skill essential to doing defense business with New Delhi.

As with the Australian submarine deal, a lack of understanding of how defense export markets work has proved a major setback for Prime Minister Abe’s long-range plan for increased defense cooperation with both Australia and India—“including through two-way collaboration and technology, co-development and co-production,” as Abe and Modi announced in a joint statement in December 2015.⁴⁸

But another danger also lurks in both the Australian and Indian cases. Export missteps will complicate or even upset closer alliance relationships. A Japan-Australia-India trilateral alliance has the potential to be a game changer in the Pacific and Indian Ocean security environment. Equally potentially, the loss of interoperability, especially with US systems; failure to achieve announced arms trade negotiations; and misunderstandings and unanticipated complications that breed a sense of frustration and even mistrust could work to the disadvantage of secure relationships with Japan’s allies, even undermining them.

Fortunately, this has not been the case with the United States. In contrast to the Soryu-class submarine deal with Australia and the US-2 seaplane deal with India, the Japanese-US joint development of the SM-3 anti-ballistic missile has largely been a success. It contains important lessons for Japan’s future defense exports, but also points to the road ahead on cooperation with the United States.

The United States and SM-3

On December 8, 2015, the US Missile Defense Agency, JMOD, and ATLA, in cooperation with the US Navy, announced “the successful completion of a Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) Block IIA flight test from the Point Mugu Sea Range, San Nicolas Island, California.” According to the announcement, “This test, designated SM-3 Block IIA Cooperative Development Controlled Test Vehicle-02, was a live fire of the SM-3 Block IIA. The missile successfully demonstrated flyout through kinetic warhead ejection. No intercept was planned, and no target missile was launched.”⁴⁹

This test was the result of the SM-3 Cooperative Development Project, a long-term joint US-Japan development of a twenty-one-inch diameter SM-3 variant, designated Block IIA, to defeat medium- and intermediate-range ballistic missiles. Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) is the naval component of the US Ballistic Missile Defense System (BMDS). The Missile Defense Agency (MDA) of the US Department of Defense (DoD) and the US Navy cooperatively manage the Aegis BMD program.

Back in December 2007, Japan conducted a successful test of an SM-3 Block IA against a ballistic missile aboard JDS Kongō. This was the first time a Japanese ship was employed to launch the interceptor missile during a test of the Aegis BMD system. In previous tests, the JMSDF had provided tracking and communications only.⁵⁰

In 2008, Japan began codevelopment of the SM-3 Block IIA with the United States. The twenty-one-foot SM-3 missile, designated RIM-161A in the United States, is a major part of the US Navy’s Aegis BMD system and is a complement to the shorter-range Patriot missile. The intercept velocity of the latest SM-3 is around 6,000 mph, with a ceiling of 100 miles and a range of 270 nautical miles.

The missile’s kinetic warhead is a Lightweight Exo-Atmospheric Projectile, a non-explosive hit-to-kill device. According to non-classified sources, Japan is overseeing development of the nose cone, which protects an infrared ray sensor from heat generated by air friction, as well as the second- and third-stage rocket motors and the staging assembly and steering control section for the missile.⁵¹ As for the rest of the missile, the booster is the United Technologies MK 72 solid-fuel rocket, and the sustainer is the Atlantic Research Corp. MK 104 dual-thrust solid-fuel rocket. The third stage is the Alliant Techsystems MK 136 solid-fuel rocket.

Cooperation on the Block IIA proceeded smoothly, but when the United States was set to export it to other countries, including Qatar, Japan’s Foreign Ministry noted that this would be a technical violation of the long-standing ban on defense exports. After considerable discussion and considerable prompting from the US Department of Defense, then-prime minister Yoshihiko Noda decided to make an exception for weapons systems produced as part of bilateral defense agreements. Indeed, it was this decision that opened the door to other bilateral defense agreements and to the Abe government’s revising the entire export policy, leading ultimately to the three principles promulgated in 2014.⁵²

The reasons why the SM-3 Block IIA has been a relative success for Japan’s new export policy compared to submarines and seaplanes—indeed, has heralded the new export policy itself—are many.

First, instead of trying to export an entire Japanese-made system, Japan conducted this venture in complete cooperation with the US government and US defense companies, which not only served as technical partners, but because they were more experienced in the vicissitudes of the international defense trade, were able to arrange for sale to Qatar.

Second, Japan was working in cooperation with the United States in ballistic missile defense, an area in which it faces few clear competitors, and indeed, an area in which the opportunities for more cooperation and codevelopment are relatively expansive. These include, for example, airborne boost-phase intercept ballistic missile defense. The United States already had a laser airborne system, which it is currently working to upgrade using unmanned platforms. However, there is currently a proposal involving two Japanese companies and a US technology firm for developing an unmanned boost phase interceptor using a conventional anti-missile missile. This could target and destroy missiles fired from North Korea while they are still in their boost phase, whereas land-based systems such as THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) and Aegis Ashore do so only in the terminal phase.

If Japan moved ahead with this boost-phase interceptor, or BPI project, it would actually enjoy an advantage over the Pentagon and its usual US defense contractors. This is because development and deployment of BPI will be relatively inexpensive (less than $10 million by recent estimates), and if existing technologies are used, relatively near term. Indeed, it could become an export package system that other countries threatened by rogue nations’ ballistic missiles will want to purchase, and thus lead to a made-in-Japan ballistic missile defense system.⁵³

Third, the SM-3 joint development project was underpinned by very clear formal agreements between the two countries. The first was in August 1999, when the Japanese government agreed to conduct cooperative research on four components of the interceptor missile being developed for the US Navy Theater-Wide (NTW) anti-missile system, for use against short- and medium-range missiles up to 3,500 kilometers.⁵⁴ In 2007 came the signing of the General Security of Military Information Agreement, or GSOMIA, between Japan and the United States, followed (after considerable delay) by a formal Reciprocal Defense Procurement Memorandum of Understanding, or RDPMOU, in 2016. The United States has similar RDPMOUs with twenty-two other nations, but this was the first such agreement signed with Japan, and it points the way to further defense industrial cooperation down the road.

Fourth, the SM-3 project was undergirded by an American desire to encourage Japan’s more proactive defense and defense-trade posture to benefit the United States as well as Japan. Then-secretary of defense Robert Gates was a prime mover in getting the joint development of SM-3 underway and promoting its export sales as an important adjunct to US-Japanese strategic cooperation at the broadest level.

But another, even wider field of opportunity looms for Japan-US technology cooperation—and for possible Japanese defense exports.

Chapter 5: Japan and the Third Offset Strategy

Announced in 2014, the Pentagon’s so-called “third offset strategy” aims “to sustain and advance America’s military dominance for the 21st century” by developing key technologies that will underpin our defense systems of the future.⁵⁵ These include unmanned systems, robotics, miniaturization, artificial intelligence (AI), and big data, as well as advanced weapons systems such as high-energy lasers, hypersonic missiles, and electromagnetic railguns.

As in the case of the first offset (the development of nuclear and ballistic missile technology in the fifties) and the second offset (the introduction of precision-guided munitions, stealth technologies, and digitized advanced intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance in the seventies and eighties), the plan is to leverage US technological advantages in the defense sector as a means of maintaining our country’s military edge.

Yet the technologies involved in the third offset are also rapidly emerging as exponential growth technologies. Exponential growth technologies can be illustrated by a simple example: while thirty linear steps roughly equal 30 yards, thirty exponential steps (i.e. that double the distance at each iteration) would equal one billion meters, or twenty-times around the earth. This will mean a dramatic change in both the per-cost basis and technological applications of future defense systems in ways that will mirror Moore’s Law.⁵⁶

In announcing his “Defense Innovation Initiative” in 2014, then-secretary of defense Chuck Hagel specifically stated that since most innovation tends to come from outside “traditional defense contractors,” his department would “actively seek proposals from the private sector, including from firms and academic institutions outside DoD’s traditional orbit.”⁵⁷ This would include a long-range research and development planning program to find, develop, and then field important technologies in space, undersea, air dominance and strike, and air and missile defense. The program would seek information from industry, academia, and federal research labs, as well as from foreign countries.⁵⁸

In addition, as these advanced technologies approach “singularity,” opportunities to develop them further in conjunction with advanced countries such as Japan will increase, as will the possibility of deploying them across the US alliance system to dramatically upgrade leading allies’ military capabilities at much lower cost than conventional force-building. For Japan, this could represent a major breakthrough both in its own self-defense and in boosting collaborative security in the Pacific region.

Japan and Lasers

One such area is lasers and laser research. For example, in a 2012 paper published in Plasma Physics and Controlled Fusion, a team of researchers and engineers at Japan’s Osaka University described a laser they were developing and how it works. In July 2015, they reported successfully firing the Laser for Fast Ignition Experiments (LFEX) for a short pulse. The LFEX can credibly be called the world’s most powerful laser, and though the pulse was barely a trillionth of a second, it emitted two petawatts of power, or two quadrillion watts, roughly one thousand times the world’s total electricity consumption.⁵⁹

A laser that could quickly shoot down or disable a cruise or ballistic missile would certainly be a huge tactical achievement. However, a laser such as the LFEX is too large and is not directly suited to military purposes. According to Michael Donovan, associate director of the Texas Petawatt Laser program, “If one wanted to destroy a satellite, the Japanese LFEX laser would not be the answer, as it would not propagate far through the atmosphere—even if it could be pointed toward the satellite.” Donovan adds that “the higher you get, the thinner the atmosphere. So a laser launched in space could propagate, but a petawatt laser is too large to economically launch into space.”⁶⁰

However, as the MDA works on airborne laser projects as part of an integrated ballistic missile defense system, including boost-phase intercept of missiles using lasers and unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), much of the current Japanese research would seem to have important relevance to developing key components of military laser systems.

At the same time, the Technical Research and Design Institute of the Japanese Defense Ministry has designed a modified Aegis laser system for Japan’s latest 27DD destroyers to engage cruise and anti-ship missiles and other high-precision weapons. (One 27DD Atago-class destroyer is expected to be launched in 2020 and another in 2021.⁶¹)

Advanced Sensors

Another promising area is sensors. The Japan Times reported in July 2014 that Japanese companies had supplied sensors to the United States for the Patriot Advanced Capability (PAC-3) interceptor and transferred sensor-related technology to the UK.⁶² An example is Sony, which has a major plant for complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS) sensors in the Kumamoto Technology Center in Kyushu Region.⁶³ These sensors are not only cheaper to manufacture than standard CCD (charged-couple device) sensors, even though both are essentially silicon chips that convert light into images; they also consume less power and offer a wider dynamic range. The CMOS sensor business is expected to grow from $10 billion in 2014 to more than $16 billion by 2020, and the range of military as well as commercial applications will grow with the size and flexibility of CMOS technology.⁶⁴

In addition, Hitachi High Technologies has developed a range of ultra-thin wearable sensors, including one that detects the wearer’s emotional states.⁶⁵ Many of these sensors are for medical uses or for semiconductor manufacturing that requires very high levels of precision. But the versatility and advantages of such sensors for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance at a very granular level, including monitoring the physical state and stress of warfighters, seem obvious.

Composite Materials
Military-grade composite materials are highly useful for their low weight, durability, and ability to protect soldiers from injury. Today UAVs, unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs), armored fighting vehicles, submarines, other naval vessels, and body armor all involve the use of composite materials, including advanced carbon laminates and so-called carbon “sandwich” products.

Composite material consumption has increased significantly in the commercial aerospace sector, from 5 to 6 percent in the 1990s to more than 50 percent in today’s advanced aircraft programs, such as the Boeing 787 and Airbus 350.⁶⁶

As it happens, Japan has been a pioneer in development and manufacture of certain composite materials since the 1960s, and along with the United States, India, Brazil, and China, it is a leader in composite material research. The Japan Carbon Fiber Manufacturers Association includes Toray Industries, Mitsubishi Rayon Company, Kureha Corporation, Nippon Graphite Fiber Corporation, and other leading chemical, oil, and natural gas companies.

The Japan Society for Composite Materials, founded in 1975, recently organized its seventeenth US-Japan Conference on Composite Materials at Hokkaido University. Furthermore, Hokuriku Fiber Glass, a manufacturer of glass-fiber products in Komatsu, has developed a fiber-reinforced plastic using traditional Japanese weaving and braiding techniques, resulting in a three-dimensional carbon-weave heat-resistant material able to withstand temperatures as high as 3,000 degrees Celsius (5,432 degrees Fahrenheit).⁶⁷ This material will be used by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency to protect unmanned spacecraft and probes, and its uses for other commercial or military satellite launches or for space reentry vehicles again seem obvious.

Indeed, a number of companies in the United States have begun using composite materials for lightweight launch rockets for small “cube” satellites. These materials not only make the rocket lighter but also easier to manufacture, and they can dramatically reduce the cost of a launch. The possibilities of partnering with Japanese companies such as Hokuriku Fiber Glass, which offers the added advantage of composite materials with ultra-high levels of heat resistance, appear promising.

In sum, the market for Japan’s defense exports includes many products whose military applications are not immediately obvious but which are both desirable and necessary as part of a US shift to a third offset overmatch of possible future adversaries and are fruitful avenues for US-Japan joint research and development.
The most important area, however, may be robotics.

Robotics

Japan has more than a quarter million industrial robot workers, and the robotics industry there is more important than in any other country in the world. According to Japanese estimates, in the next fifteen years, the number will jump to over one million, and expected revenue for robotics by 2025 is nearly $70 billion.⁶⁸

Indeed, Japanese economic planners see robotics doing for Japan’s export economy what automobiles did in the 1970s and 1980s. Certainly something analogous may lie ahead in the area of defense-related robotics, which have assumed a new urgency within the third offset strategy model and where the Japanese enjoy several key comparative advantages.

Of course, major Japanese companies such as Honda, Toyota, Hitachi, and Fujitsu have dominated the field of industrial and/or assembly-line robots for years—so much so that very few non-Japanese robotics firms have been able to survive, let alone thrive, in this highly competitive global market. Combined with additive, or 3-D printing manufacturing techniques, advanced industrial robotics can bring dramatically improved production precision and performance to the US defense industrial sector, from conventional arms systems to more high-tech systems such as electromagnetic rail guns and directed-energy weaponry.

Beyond that market, however, Japan has also surged ahead in Android robotics, including robots that mimic human actions such as walking, talking, and smiling. A recently created robot, Child-robot with Biomimetic Body (CB²), can follow moving objects with its eyes. There is even a robot, HRP-4C, that can mimic fashion models walking the catwalk, and Kirobo, the first robot astronaut, traveled to the International Space Station in August 2010.⁶⁹

For Japan, the advantages of relying on robots and robotic technology are obvious. In a country with a declining birth rate, robots represent a major “force multiplier,” in terms of both work and quality of life, for an aging population.

Yet the same analogy applies to Japan’s military and Self-Defense Forces, where a quality-over-quantity advantage over a possible antagonist such as China makes eminent good sense. It applies similarly to the US military and its third offset strategy, where robotics is not only one of the targeted technologies, but also has enormous applications across the entire field of advanced systems that make up the third offset arsenal, from advanced manufacturing processes to autonomous subsystems of larger networks.

For example, while Japan has not directly entered the arena of unmanned aerial and sea vehicles, Japanese robotics companies would clearly offer a range of applications and products that would be extremely useful in further developments in these platforms and their accompanying capabilities. This is particularly true in the defense technology sector, where China has become increasingly active and competitive.

Among these applications and products are swarm technologies. While swarm robots have only recently emerged from various robotics labs, Tokyo-based components maker Murata Manufacturing has unveiled the Murata Cheerleading robots, ten doll-like robots that are controlled by a wireless network and perform precisely synchronized dance routines, moving in unison to form shapes such as a circle or a heart, while spinning on their balls.⁷⁰

“We designed the cheerleader robots to cheer people up and make them smile,” Murata spokesman Koichi Yoshikawa told Computer World in September 2014. “Their features can be summed up as ‘3S’: stability, synchronization and sensing and communication.”⁷¹ Those are precisely the characteristics needed for effective swarm systems in the military arena as well, on land, in the air, or at sea.

Finally, Japan’s preeminence in robotics will strongly complement the work the United States is doing in AI, in which it has been heavily invested for a decade or more. From Silicon Valley companies like Google and Facebook, to IBM and its mascot AI computer Watson, the private sector has been a leader in the Internet of Things (IoT), big data, and AI expertise.

Japan’s work in AI, by contrast, has been hardware oriented and seen as an adjunct to robotics research and development. Japanese AI scientists have spent considerable time, for example, doing research “that help robots learn and predictively determine what and how humans want them to act through experience-based inferences,” Mazakazu Hirokawa of Tsukuba University has been quoted as saying.⁷²

Yet these developments of “human-friendly” robotic capability could complement AI developments in the United States, which emphasize independent creative thinking and “deep learning,” and could even dispel some of the suspicions about autonomous defense systems and “rise-of-the-machines” scenarios.

Above all, Japanese expertise in highly sophisticated robotics could provide ideal platforms for AI developments in the future defense sector. Whether the United States recognizes these opportunities for leveraging Japan’s lead in third offset technology is difficult to say and depends on many factors. One of them without a doubt is how well Japan does the job of “selling” its advanced technologies as complementing or supporting similar developments in the US defense sector, and how skillfully it cultivates this potentially huge customer for its high-tech talents.

Chapter 6: Risks of the New Export Policy

No discussion of Japan’s new defense export policy would be complete without considering the potential risks. While not exactly unprecedented, the new policy certainly represents a major change in Japan’s relationship with other countries, both friendly and unfriendly; with Japanese public opinion regarding weapons and arms; and with Japan’s own defense industry.

These risks can be divided into four groupings: political, geopolitical, economic, and technological.

Political Risks

In a country that is still largely pacifist, there could be a backlash against the government and the companies involved, which could be portrayed as forming a malign military-industrial complex that profits from conflicts, war, and the global arms trade. This possibility is hardly remote. The campaign to revise Article 9 toward a more proactive defense posture proved highly controversial, sparking a massive media campaign in opposition to the Abe policy, raucous demonstrations across Japan, including in the capital, and even fistfights inside the Diet itself.⁷³ The initial lifting of the export ban did not provoke similar protests, in part because it was overshadowed by the controversy regarding Article 9, but also because defense exports do not have a notorious historical legacy linked to Japan’s imperialist past. In addition, because defense trade has hitherto played so insignificant a part in Japan’s commercial and geopolitical relations with other countries, a merchants-of-death narrative has not gained much purchase for Japan’s biggest defense contractors—at least for now.

However, if Japan does become a rising defense exporter, those narratives could be easily attached to the process, especially if Japanese technology is used in a conflict involving the loss of human life. If the Abe government were to fall, such narratives could even inspire a successor administration to push to reimpose the export ban—especially if Japan’s defense export industry is still in a fledgling state, so that halting exports has only a limited or highly marginal economic impact.

Even if no such restoration does take place, fear of it could act as a restraint on Japanese companies, preventing them from taking advantage of opportunities that could benefit both their bottom line and Japan’s security. In the worst-case scenario, this self-restraint could become a vicious cycle: reluctance to step forward into the export market narrows the range of options for defense trade in other countries, which means that Japan falls further behind in the global defense market, which in turn limits options for doing business. The result would be that Japan’s defense industry and defense-related companies wind up imposing their de facto ban on exports, to the detriment of Japan and its allies.

Geopolitical Risks

Some of Japan’s Asian neighbors have expressed worries that Japan’s new proactive defense policies mark a recrudescence of its role as an aggressive military power, as in the 1930s.⁷⁴ Some of that concern is genuine (even some liberal Japanese have the same fears); some of it is disingenuous and politically motivated. Nonetheless, there is a risk that a Japanese entry into the global defense market that is seen as overly aggressive or aimed at a particular country, namely China, could fuel those fears.⁷⁵

China sees Japan not only as an economic rival and an obstacle to China’s rise to regional and world hegemony, but also as a potential competitor in the world defense and arms market, one with important comparative advantages in quality and reliability, as well as in advanced high-tech areas.⁷⁶ Beijing would not at all be displeased to see Tokyo’s new export policy fail.

The risk that Japanese defense exports could trigger a Chinese backlash would operate in two ways. First, it would discourage Japanese companies with extensive business ties with China from entering the export market. Second, it would discourage customers in Asia and elsewhere from “buying Japanese” for fear of offending China.⁷⁷

Yet these fears may be overstated. Many of Japan’s potential customers, such as the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, and India, have already seen their relations with China deteriorate over border disputes (India) or China’s claims to sovereignty in the South China Sea (Philippines, Malaysia, and Vietnam).⁷⁸ Those that would be keener to maintain good relations with China, such as South Korea and Singapore, would be less likely to buy Japanese in any case. In addition, Japan has been dramatically scaling back its business investments in China over the last decade. This means that while many Japanese companies, like Sony and Toshiba, do have extensive business relations with China, the threat of a Chinese economic boycott or embargo is considerably less than it would have been in 2001 or 2005.⁷⁹

In the final analysis, by far the greatest threat to good Sino-Japanese relations has been China’s ongoing aggressive military posture, especially in the East China Sea and the South China Sea, as well as its failure to rein in the ballistic missile and nuclear threat posed by its client state North Korea. The friction a growing Japanese defense export industry would generate between the two countries pales by comparison. Indeed, a very strong argument can be made that failure to build a strong and effective export strategy, including industrial and technological cooperation with the United States and other allies, will pose more risks than such a policy’s success by diminishing Japan’s capacity to restrain and deter present and future threats from its larger, more aggressive neighbor.

Technological Risks

These risks come primarily in two forms. The first is the risk of technology transfers, i.e., that Japanese defense technologies will be used for purposes contrary to Japanese national interests. These would include transfers to countries or groups that are committing violence, terrorism, or aggressive actions proscribed by the United Nations Security Council or other multilateral international bodies and/or treaties of which Japan is a member or a signatory.

Such transfers are, of course, specifically banned under the terms of the three principles.⁸⁰ It is assumed that Japanese companies would take the necessary steps to make sure the law is observed and that the Japanese government would ensure that any company or country buying or receiving Japanese defense equipment adheres to the requirements of the three principles regarding third-party transfers (see chapter 1). In addition, a robust industrial-security regime can help to eliminate unwanted technology transfers that are due to industrial espionage or cyberespionage (see below).

Nonetheless, there is always some residual risk that Japanese technologies might fall into the wrong hands or be used for purposes that violate international law and offend Japanese public opinion. Therefore, it will be important for JMOD, METI, and other government bodies overseeing the export process to make sure the Japanese public knows that all possible steps are being taken to avoid these risks, and that Japan’s defense export trade is geared to strengthening its allies and the bonds of international peace and stability, as well as its own national security.

The second, more complicated, form of technology transfer risk is associated with IP issues and joint research and development with foreign governments and companies, particularly the United States. Many Japanese companies worry that they will lose their IP rights if they engage in joint development or joint venture projects with US companies and the US government, especially since the DoD has a policy that IP or patents created as a result of research and development it funded belong to it and the US government.⁸¹ At a February 2015 meeting in Washington, DC, organized jointly by the National Defense Industrial Association (NDIA) and the Society of Japanese Aerospace Companies (SJAC), several Japanese industry representatives expressed this concern, along with fears that even IP developed by their commercial divisions that is used in a system developed or produced jointly with a US defense contractor may be lost.

The Americans present (including myself) worked to reassure them that these IP and patent issues can be resolved through negotiation of individual contracts and should not be a barrier to US-Japan defense industrial cooperation. Those worries remain, however, and if they are not addressed in a more systematic way, Japanese companies may be reluctant to enter into joint projects with US defense contractors, even though these may be one of their most lucrative options.

Economic Risks

One type of economic risk is faced by companies that venture into the defense export arena without adequate preparation or adequate support from the government of Japan. This is vividly illustrated by the Australian submarine deal (see chapter 4),which may have inflicted lasting damage on the reputation of Soryu-class makers Kawasaki and MHI as reliable suppliers of advanced defense systems.

There is also the risk that if the US Congress perceives Japanese imports—including a growing volume of defense imports—as a challenge to American industry and jobs, as in the 1980s, this might lead to protectionist legislation that could hamper or even injure Japan-US trade relations. This has historical precedent: Professor Heigo Sato has pointed out that “as the United States began to focus on the issue of defense technology diversion and competition with Japan’s rising economy in the late 1980s, providing defense production licenses to an economic competitor was not seen as viable, even with security considerations in mind.”⁸²

This led to one of the most notorious episodes in US-Japan defense industrial cooperation. In 1985, JMOD’s predecessor, the Japan Defense Agency (JDA), began looking for a successor to the F-1 ground support fighter. Two years later, JDA and the Pentagon signed a coproduction agreement involving the F-16 Fighting Falcon, to produce a plane for the Japan Air Self-Defense Forces (JASDF) dubbed the FSX.

The agreement, however, came under heavy fire from the US Congress, which complained that the FSX involved too little production for US defense firms and too much technology transfer to Japan—including technologies that Japan could commercialize at US expense. As a result, the agreements were rewritten, with severe restrictions placed on technology transfer and a mandate that US firms would get 40 percent of the production work. The JDA complied, and production of the Mitsubishi F-2 fighter began in 1996. But the clash left considerable bitterness on both sides, particularly in Japan, since the Japanese were convinced the original agreement already leaned too heavily toward the United States. In a Japanese corporate culture where memories are long and the sense of shame and humiliation runs deep, the FSX “debacle” still rankles—and has left residual fears that deeper defense industrial cooperation with the United States could lead to similar confrontations.

Again, those fears may be misplaced. The US defense market was very different in 1989, when US companies enjoyed a commanding position thanks to the heavy demands of the Cold War–era Pentagon for weapons and other equipment. With today’s more austere Pentagon budgets, all recognize that foreign sales, and cooperation with foreign defense firms, will be the key to sustaining growth. That necessarily includes Japan, and it is difficult to find any American defense industry official—or indeed any defense official—who is not eager to engage in defense technology and trade cooperation with Japan. In addition, given Japan’s very fledgling position in the defense export market and the fact that so many of its own defense technologies are US-derived, it is unlikely that firms like Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, or L3 Communications will perceive MHI or Mitsubishi Electric as dangerous rivals any time soon.

Chapter 7: Managing the Risks of a Defense Export Policy

Taken as a whole, development of a strong defense export policy for Japan involves multiple risks and challenges, which can make the policy itself seem daunting.

On the other hand, many of these risks can be managed and offset if the new export policy is combined with other changes in Japan’s overall defense trade strategy. These include four significant steps, the first of which is developing a robust industrial-security regime.

Exports and Industrial Security

A modern defense industry cannot thrive in the absence of effective industrial security and cybersecurity. Nevertheless, thus far Japan’s defense sector has managed to function, even prosper, without a formal industrial security apparatus. This is because the unique bonds of trust and honor between the Japanese government and its corporate partners have enabled them to work together successfully even without such an apparatus.

For decades, Japan’s defense industrial sector has been focused on indigenous products for the JSDF and licensed production of US systems. As Japan becomes both an innovator in defense products and services and an exporter, however, the lack of a robust industrial security and cybersecurity regime will create strict limits on customer confidence in the integrity of Japanese products and diminish the readiness of sophisticated users to procure defense equipment from Japan.

This will have to change as Japan enters the swirling waters of the international defense systems market. It will need a modern industrial security and cybersecurity program to match the present and future capabilities of its growing defense industrial sector.

What does a modern industrial security regime do?

A robust industrial security regime protects both national and intellectual property and will help Japan work more closely with other allied nations in developing and producing advanced defense systems.

First, it contributes to national security by serving as a continuous interface between the government and cleared industrial corporations.

Second, it administers and implements laws and regulations relating to a national industrial security program.

Third, trained industrial security personnel provide oversight and assistance to cleared contractor facilities and assist management security officers in ensuring the protection of Japanese and foreign classified information.

Finally, industrial security personnel facilitate the exchange of classified shipments between the United States and foreign countries and oversee foreign ownership, control, and influence countermeasures in the defense sector.

Eventually, industrial security program officers can also provide training and security awareness to ATLA and JMOD personnel, JMOD contractors, employees of other Japanese government agencies, and even foreign governments with which Japan is working on military-industrial and technical projects.

Japan has already taken some important steps in the industrial security arena. The most important was to sign the General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA) with the US government in 2007.⁸³ In addition, the Japanese government has passed a state secrets law that protects classified information and imposes penalties on those who violate its provisions.⁸⁴ The recent decision to intensify DoD-JMOD cooperation on cybersecurity is also an important move forward and a significant improvement over earlier US-Japan cyberdialogues.⁸⁵

All the same, Japan has lagged in implementing an effective industrial security program as provided for in the GSOMIA. This increases the risk of insider threats as well as the possibility that hostile foreign intelligence services will penetrate Japan’s scientific and industrial institutions.

Incidents involving either of these would significantly injure Japan’s own national security and deter foreign countries and corporations from conducting further defense business with it, whether joint ventures/codevelopment or importing of Japanese defense articles. Hence, industrial security is one of the issues that must be addressed in order for a strong export strategy to take root.

The second step would be to develop an effective Foreign Military Sales (FMS) system under JMOD/ATLA supervision.

Exports and Foreign Military Sales

Defense export trade can take several forms: government-to-government sales, licensing of commercial sales through vendors, or a combination of both.

However, the complexity of modern defense systems (such as the Soryu-class submarine) has reduced the relative importance of commercial sales, particularly in developing major systems.

For one thing, very few major systems involve a single contractor or even a single “systems integrator” type of defense industrial firm anymore. The majority require careful government coordination and planning in order to assemble the myriad of firms and technologies needed to develop and produce the finished system and then to constantly maintain and upgrade that system in the field, particularly in a foreign country. Hence, export sales place demands that few companies, even the largest, can meet without the help of their own government from the very start.

In addition, users want to have guaranteed life-cycle support, training, performance, and product improvement and upgrades that only a government-to-government sale can offer.

Therefore, a strong, effective FMS program will become vitally important to building and extending Japan’s defense trade opportunities and will help to prevent failures like the Australian submarine deal.

Again, how would such a system work?

First, the US experience has demonstrated that no large bureaucratic infrastructure is needed to carry out an FMS program. Instead, JMOD/ATLA would establish representatives in targeted customer countries, such as Australia, India, the Philippines, and the United States. The Japanese government would also want to establish a secure financing and payments program so that the Japanese companies it has approached as part of FMS procurement will know that they will be compensated through the entire life cycle of the program. In a complementary fashion, the government of Japan would also guarantee that customers for Japanese-made systems will have support through the same life cycle, including eventual upgrading and replacement.

Finally, an effective FMS system would have an established program of offsets. One purpose would be to encourage customer satisfaction through joint production and development (something lacking in the Australian submarine negotiations⁸⁶ and not handled satisfactorily in the Indian US-2 negotiations⁸⁷). Another would be to broaden Japan’s access to foreign markets in both the commercial and defense sectors.

This, indeed, points to the third element in export-risk management: defense investment abroad.

Exports and Direct Foreign Investment

Under GSOMIA, Japanese investors are able to participate in the US defense market through joint ventures with US companies or as wholly owned subsidiaries, under three forms of security agreements.

The first is a special security agreement (such as the one made by British-owned BAE Systems with the US government⁸⁸); the second is a proxy (used by Italian-owned Leonardo/Finmeccanica to penetrate the US market⁸⁹); and the third is a security control agreement (used by French-owned Thales in its joint venture with Raytheon⁹⁰).

All three offer Japan unprecedented opportunities for access to the US market, including the FMS system and military aid markets, which in 2015 totaled $46 billion and $10 billion in sales, respectively.⁹¹

The existence of Japanese-owned but US-based subsidiaries would also help reduce the perception that the Japanese defense industry is a competitive enterprise that hurts American jobs. Just as Nissan and Toyota have used the opening of auto plants in the United States as a way to promote their image as good corporate stewards, companies like MHI, Fujitsu, and IHI would be able to position themselves as job creators and technology incubators on American soil.

In short, moving to joint ventures and/or wholly owned subsidiaries in the United States could help Japan to become a global player and could serve as a powerful platform for speeding technology transfers for Japanese companies.

The most effective way to achieve the latter end, however, would be to streamline the entire defense trade process through a Defense Trade Cooperation Treaty (DTCT).

Exports and Defense Trade Cooperation Treaties

The goal of a formal DTCT is to allow license-free defense trade between the United States and key allies.⁹² There are rules restricting the use or sale without an export license of almost every component or material used in modern defense systems. The process of approving such licenses can be time-consuming and onerous, particularly under the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) in the United States. A DTCT would provide a range of specific exemptions for companies doing defense trade in both Japan and the United States. These exemptions would:

• speed up the transfer of existing defense technologies in order “to achieve fully inoperable forces” and to do so by lowering existing arms control barriers between the two countries, including requirements for individual export licenses for defense articles;
• leverage the strengths of both countries’ defense industries and create a permanent new avenue for facilitating defense industrial cooperation between the United States and Japan, including codevelopment of new technologies and systems;
• foster an atmosphere of mutual trust and information sharing on defense systems between two long-standing allies.

In 2007, British prime minister Tony Blair proposed to President George W. Bush a formal DTCT between the United States and the UK.⁹³ The two leaders signed the treaty in June of that year, and this was followed in September by a similar treaty signed between President Bush and Australian prime minister John Howard.⁹⁴

The benefits of a similar DTCT with Japan seems obvious. Indeed, such a bilateral treaty makes sense on many levels. The State Department’s Directorate of Defense Trade Controls authorized over $7 billion worth of US-origin direct commercial sales of defense articles to Japan in FY2014, almost twice the value of such sales to the UK and approximately four times the value of such sales to Australia.⁹⁵ With such an important ally and with trade volumes at this level, it makes good sense to enhance bilateral security by streamlining the bureaucratic process.

The benefit of a DTCT goes well beyond direct commercial sales of defense articles, however. It will directly foster deeper integration between the industrial capabilities of the two nations to dramatically increase the quality and capabilities of the technologies available to both partners. Bolstering defense trade between the world’s two most advanced high-tech industries would go far in developing key sixth-generation systems of the future. It would also go far in meeting the Pentagon’s own objectives for a third offset strategy in the areas of unmanned aerial and undersea vehicles; advanced sea mines; high-speed strike weapons; advanced aeronautics, from new engines to new and different prototypes; electromagnetic rail guns; high-energy lasers; and missile defense and cyber capabilities.

Finally, the terms of DTCT trade with other DTCT countries create, in effect, a Defense Common Market or community of DTCT companies, with the United States, Australia, the UK, and Canada all participating in defense trade more or less as licensing equals. It is even possible to envision other potential DTCT signatories joining the same Defense Common Market, including India.

Such a possibility does lie farther in the future. For now, however, an effective DTCT could be a vital cornerstone of a highly successful Japanese defense export strategy—one that matches the promise of Japan’s new defense export policy with the real need for more US-Japan defense industrial and defense cooperation, to the benefit of both countries and other allies.

Conclusion

Will Japan be an “awakening giant” in the field of defense exports in the future? What happens will depend on many factors. One of the most important, however, will be targeting the right markets for entry. While Japanese defense officials currently like to think of themselves as exporters and codevelopers with countries like Australia, the UK, France, and India, Japan’s new defense export policy’s biggest opportunity may well be here in the United States.

Significant barriers remain. Many would be eliminated through a DTCT that lifts restrictions based on ITAR, which would dramatically increase exports to the United States and open new vistas for US-Japan defense industrial cooperation.

After the failures with the Australian submarine deal in particular, the Japanese government is acutely aware that the defense export status quo is not sustainable. One solution reportedly under consideration is to gather all the separate defense divisions of Japanese companies into a single public-private corporation, which would then enter the defense export market as a single entity.

Such a solution has a certain bureaucratic elegance, along the lines of the merger of the separate defense equipment agencies into a single agency, ATLA. At the same time, however, such an approach has its own risks. One would be detaching IP rights and patents from the parent company belonging to each defense division. Another is that smaller defense units, such as Fujitsu Defense Systems or Hitachi Defense Systems, would be permanently eclipsed by larger and traditionally better capitalized players—leading to missed opportunities for independent innovation or even for disruptive breakthroughs such as a unit on its own might achieve.

Even more important, such an approach would have difficulties separating out dual-use technologies that belong to the mother company. How would Mitsubishi Electric, for example, decide which parts of its electronic component business belonged to its defense division and which to its various commercial activities? Barring Solomon-like infallible judgment, the administrative headaches that would ensue could overshadow whatever advantages come from welding all of Japan’s defense industries into a single defense contracting corporation.

On the other hand, models such as the Israeli defense industry could offer valuable lessons on how public corporations can operate effectively in an export environment while still retaining powerful innovative and entrepreneurial instincts.⁹⁶

What other concrete steps should the current Japanese administration consider taking?

One would be to modify or clarify the requirement in the second principle that limits sale and/or transfer of defense equipment to “the active promotion of peace” and international cooperation, or requires that it contribute to Japan’s own security. In a number of important cases, this would limit opportunities for defense trade with countries with which it would be beneficial for Japan to increase military and strategic cooperation but with which it has very limited formal defense ties. Examples would be India and the sale of advanced fighter aircraft or Taiwan and the sale of Soryu-class submarines.

Still another step would be establishing a division within ATLA that is entirely focused on export policy and staffed with METI officials, who could work to identify key technologies for defense export and issue appropriate licenses to Japanese companies, while also establishing branch offices in countries that will be important to Japan’s future defense trade, including the United States, India, and Taiwan.

A third important step would be to encourage Japanese companies to explore opportunities for direct foreign investment in the defense sector, especially in the United States. Fujitsu’s acquisition of Texas-based GlobeRanger in 2014 was a groundbreaking start, but a more ambitious and more systematic approach is needed if Japan’s comparative advantages in the global export market, especially in the United States, are to be fully exploited.⁹⁷

Above all, however, what Japan’s new defense export policy requires to take root and grow is the political will to make it happen. The same political will to lift the export restrictions and to reorient Japan’s entire defense posture, must now enter into the arena of bilateral US-Japan defense technological and defense trade cooperation.

About the author:
*Arthur Herman, Senior Fellow at the Hudson Institute

Source:
This article was published at the Hudson Institute.

List of Names and Acronyms
Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics Agency
ATLA
artificial intelligence
AI
Ballistic Missile Defense
BMD
Ballistic Missile Defense System
BMDS
boost-phase interceptor
BPI
charged-couple device
CCD
complementary metal-oxide semiconductor
CMOS
Defense Trade Cooperation Treaty
DTCT
Department of Defense
DoD
foreign military financing
FMF
foreign military sales
FMS
General Security of Military Information Agreement
GSOMIA
Intellectual property
IP
International Traffic in Arms Regulations
ITAR
Internet of Things
IoT
Japan Air Self-Defense Forces
JASDF
Japan Defense Agency
JDA
Japan Maritime Self-Defense Forces
JMSDF
Japan Ministry of Defense
JMOD
Japan Self-Defense Forces
JSDF
Komatsu Light Armored Vehicle
LAV
Laser for Fast Ignition Experiments
LFEX
Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry
METI
Missile Defense Agency
MDA
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries
MHI
Patriot Advanced Capability
PAC-3
Reciprocal Defense Procurement Memorandum of Understanding
RDPMOU
Royal Australian Navy
RAN
Terminal High Altitude Area Defense
THAAD
unmanned aerial vehicles
UAVs
unmanned underwater vehicles
UUVs
US Navy Theater-Wide
NTW
weapons of mass destruction
WMDs

By Hani Hazaimeh

Four Jordanian policemen were killed in clashes with radical militants during a raid on a village near the southern Jordanian city of Karak on Tuesday, said Mohammad Momani, minister of state for media affairs and government spokesman.

The violence occurred just two days after a shootout between police and gunmen, holed up in the Crusader castle near Karak, 130 km south of Amman, left 14 people dead — 10 civilians including a Canadian tourist and four terrorists.

Daesh claimed responsibility for the strike.

Momani said the security agencies arrested a suspect related to the terrorists involved in Sunday’s attack, who confessed to hiding weapons in his apartment.

“The police escorted him to his house; he ran inside and started shooting at the police personnel killing one of them. Reinforcements were deployed to the scene. The suspect was joined by other attackers hiding in the house,” Momani said.

Police are conducting raids based on the information gathered from arrested suspects, according to Momani.

Warning messages were relayed through mosque loudspeakers to civilians telling them to stay away from the clash site, eyewitnesses said.

Momani said the authorities sent text messages to the residents in the area urging them not to come near the site of the security operation.

Security forces have been carrying out raids throughout the kingdom, especially in Karak, following Sunday’s incident.

On Tuesday, security officers detained a number of radicals including Qatada Omar Mahmoud, son of the Salafi movement leader Abu Qatada Al-Falasteeni, following raids in Amman, Zarqa and Al-Baqa’a.

Sources said the detainees include Mustafa Al-Issa, Abu Qatada’s son-in-law and a leader in the movement, and Rashad Shtiwi from Baqa’a. Other young men in Amman and Zarqa were arrested over the past two days.

Daesh on Tuesday said the attack was carried out by four “soldiers of the caliphate” in revenge for US-led coalition airstrikes targeting terrorists in Syria and Iraq.

Mohammad Abu Rumman, researcher at the Center for Strategic Studies at the University of Jordan, told Arab News on Tuesday that a worrying change is occurring in the Daesh group, which has become significantly dissociated from mainstream jihadists and their leaders such as Al-Maqdasi and Abu Qatadah.

The change among sympathizers is represented in the shift from ideological support and sympathy for Daesh to adopting its ideology and carrying out its plans through groups and cells in a manner that will serve the agenda of the group directly, especially under the current circumstances when Daesh is waging a decisive war in Iraq and Syria.

“This is not the first time that terror groups and sleeper cells are carrying out operations against Jordan. Since the 1990s, Jordan has been involved in an open fight against such groups,” said Abu Rumman, who is also an expert on Islamic groups.

“However, the point here is that parts of the groups that are supportive of and sympathizing with Daesh ideologically and intellectually have shifted to terrorist operations without receiving direct orders from the group’s leadership.”

He added that the terrorists have now resorted to a direct confrontation with the local authorities.

“In the past those groups surrendered whenever their plans were foiled by the local security agencies. Now, they are engaging in a direct armed confrontation with security personnel, opting to die rather than turn themselves in, based on a fatwa (edict) issued a few years ago by some terrorist leaders urging their followers to resist arrest and fight to death.”

Abu Rumman said that followers of such terror groups consider any individual working in any military or security apparatus a legitimate target or enemy, as is the case with Western tourists, in line with the group’s agenda, which is a dangerous development.

It was destined to be an iconic image: a small girl holding a teddy bear in a white dress marked by blood splotches with the ruins of Aleppo behind her. But according to authorities, it was also a set-up, shot hundreds of miles away in a different country, with help of a posing child and some paint.

Egypt’s Interior Ministry has revealed on its Facebook page that it arrested a group of five people caught in the act of producing images purportedly depicting scenes of suffering in Aleppo that they had planned to pass off as real pictures from Syria.

The ministry said that the residents of Port Said, a city on the Suez Canal, were caught in the middle of their shoot as the 12-year-old star, Ragd, was posing for 21-year-old Mustafa, who told the authorities that he “normally photographed weddings and ceremonies, but had an idea for something else.”

“In a conversation with them, the suspects revealed that they had shot a series of scenes to be spread on social media, as actual pictures from Aleppo,” said the ministry, which posted a video of the arrest, and interviews with the suspects online.

The stand-in for Aleppo was “the ruins of a house that had been slated for demolition by the authorities some time earlier.” The blood was obtained from a “tin of red paint” that was liberally smeared on the girl, her fake bandages, and her stuffed animal.

The girl herself was known to the photographer beforehand, and came to the session with her mother, the photographer, and three other local men.

Mustafa is being detained in jail for an initial four days, while the others have been set free, and Ragd has been returned to her guardian.

While it is unknown whether Mustafa’s staged photo would have gained social media traction, vivid photographs – some of them fake – have been powerful tools in shaping public opinion since Aleppo was re-captured by Syrian government forces earlier this month.

The most notorious hoax picture, which has been shared thousands of times on Twitter and Facebook, features a girl running through a debris-filled street. The caption reads “Girl running to survive, all her family have been killed. It’s not in Hollywood. This real in Syria.” In fact, the image was cut from a 2014 Lebanese pop video.

Another video, called “Executions have begun in the middle of the street in Aleppo,” which has also been widely shared, depicts supposed government forces allegedly taking out retribution on civilians. In reality, the video dates back from 2012, and contains unverified images.

Diseases from farm production have caused great damage to ASEAN and show signs of worsening in the future. To address this, can Singapore aspire to align farm production practices with established international standards when it serves as ASEAN chair in 2018?

By Luis P. Montesclaros*

Singapore will be chairing ASEAN in 2018. During the recent Commonwealth Agricultural Conference which Singapore hosted, Dr Paul Chiew, Programme Chief (Food Safety) of its Agri-Food & Veterinary Authority, was asked about the country’s plans for its chairmanship, from a food safety perspective.

Dr Chiew responded briefly that harmonising standards could be among Singapore’s priorities. This might be just what the region needs given the looming threat of diseases from substandard food production. In the long-run, if this gets worse, it can eventually affect food security for Singapore and for the larger Southeast Asian region.

Reducing Risks of Animal-borne Diseases

Over the past 15 years, ASEAN states have been struck by animal-borne diseases, which infect people through physical contact. The avian influenza affected farms in majority of ASEAN states. Indonesia has suffered the most deaths in the region, of 167 people out of 199 infected (a kill-rate of 84%). The swine flu is estimated to have killed a quarter of a million worldwide, more than half of which were from Asia and Africa.

The presence of these diseases is crucial not only for consumer health, but also for job creation and economic growth. A majority of ASEAN’s rural populations depend on agriculture for their livelihood. When a farm is struck by a disease, it will need to cull its animals, and smallholder farmers may not be able to bear these financial losses. Countries affected by diseases lose their overseas buyers, leading to a drain in the country’s exports, a reduction in GDP, and further job loss in the long-term.

For example, Thailand used to be the world’s fifth largest poultry exporter, with US$638 million worth of total exports in 2003, but exports plunged to just US$47 million in the year following the avian influenza outbreak. This loss of US$591 million is relevant, as it equates to wages of as many as 350,000 Thai workers, based on wages in this period. Yet by 2015, Thailand had still not recovered to 2003 levels.

Substandard rearing, feed, storage, and transport practices contribute to animal-borne diseases, according to the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). Waterfowls originally carried their own viruses, but these were not lethal to people until they mutated. Contact between chickens and waterfowl birds (e.g. ducks) as well as rearing of chickens in close contact with one another, contributed to these mutations. The CDC also posits the swine flu virus likely originated from contact between North American and Eurasian pigs in the process of trade/transport, which caused similar mutations.

Risks of animal-borne diseases could have been mitigated if farms abided by international standards set by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation, namely, the Codex Alimentarius, as well as guidelines by the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE). Biosecurity measures include separating batches of growing animals (e.g. chicks/hens) in different growing areas/pens, limiting contact between animals of different types, and use of proper protective equipment to limit human-animal contact.

Looming Challenge of Antibiotic Resistance

Food-borne diseases, acquired through consumption, also present major challenges to the region. Singapore had 1,042 cases of Salmonella infections this year (as of June 2016) based on Ministry of Health Statistics. While not as lethal as swine or avian influenza, it still leads to vomiting, fever, diarrhoea and abdominal cramps. Other countries have also faced this problem, although Singapore is ahead in terms of reporting disease incidence.

While antibiotics have been developed to prevent food- and animal- borne diseases, farmers have a tendency to over-use them. Antibiotics have properties which allow for faster animal growth and increased protein content in meat. At a recent TED Talk, Professor Jorgen Schlundt, head of NTU’s newly established Centre for Food Technology, emphasised that over-use of antibiotics can lead to antibiotic resistance, wherein diseases develop immunity to antibiotics. The WHO notes that today this is a challenge all countries face.

The WHO recommends increased vigilance ‘from farm to the table’, including the production phase. Denmark is a global exemplar for this, as it banned antibiotic growth promoters (AGP), and advocated better management practices that allowed for comparable growth performance. However AGPs continue to be used in ASEAN, and their implications a looming future challenge.

Who Will Pay for Safer Food?

Whether it be segregation of livestock, reducing the use of antibiotics, or other practices, upgrading food production standards implies costs to businesses. Singapore can serve as an example for ASEAN in this regard, as it has supported the use of technologies towards safer food production practices.

Thanks partly to government’s co-investment, and a sincere desire to protect consumers from harm on the firm’s side, N&N Agriculture Pte Ltd is pasteurising its eggs to reduce the risk of Salmonella infections. During pasteurisation, eggs are put under extreme heat to kill bacteria, while preserving the eggs’ freshness and preventing them from getting cooked.

However, states and farms are not sufficient to sustain production transformations. Mr. Ma Chin Chew, N&N’s CEO, shared that locals do not necessarily prefer pasteurised eggs over non-pasteurised eggs, and may not be willing to pay a premium for them. In this regard, it is uncertain how the company will be able to finance costs for energy, water, and staffing for this process upgrade in the future.

As such, efforts by farms and the state will only lead to safer outcomes in the future if consumers play their role in supporting farms that produce safer food. This applies to any firm upgrading to provide safer products to consumers.

Singapore’s hindsight and practical experience in upgrading food production standards makes it good reference for other ASEAN countries. This hindsight will give it credibility to generate cooperation as the region faces a new reality of increased risk from animal- and food-borne diseases.

*Luis P. Montesclaros is an Associate Research Fellow with the Centre for Non-Traditional Security (NTS) Studies, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.