Falklands - here we go again

"Staggering to war in the Falklands?" asks an article on the US Naval Institute blog.

Argentina has put into place a program of economic sanctions designed to put pressure on the people who live in the Falklands. It has abrogated a 1995 agreement with the Falklands that would have permitted collaboration in the search for oil and natural gas. The same can be said for a 1999 agreement to conserve fishing stocks in the southwest Atlantic.

A ban on charter flights crossing over Argentine airspace to the Falklands has hurt the island’s tourist business. Currently, the only direct flight from Argentina to the Falklands leaves from Rio Gallegos on the second Saturday of the month and returns on the third Saturday. Argentina permits this single monthly exception to policy on behalf of families who wish to visit the Argentine Cemetery north of Darwin, which holds the remains of 237 Argentine combatants from the ’82 war, although other private travelers are allowed to join the flight.

As of February 2010, Argentina’s Decree 256 requires authorization permits for all ships passing through Argentine waters to the Falklands. On 15 July 2010, it was reported that an Argentine navy ship operating in shared Uruguayan-Argentine waters forced a small merchant vessel linked to the Falklands to identify itself and provide all the information related to cargo and destination. Even aside from the intimidation, it remains costly and time-consuming for merchant shipping and cruise lines to obtain proper authorization from the Argentine authorities. Consequently, fewer cruise ships have been stopping in the Falklands.

An Argentine bill about to become law contemplates sanctions against international companies that operate in Argentina and either intend to participate or are involved in oil-related activities in the Falklands. In the meantime, Britain has protested to Argentina and has firmly rejected the legitimacy of Decree 256. Britain considers the decree a violation of international law and, more specifically, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. The Falklands Chamber of Commerce claims that Argentina has imposed a full-fledged sea blockade on the Falklands population.

Since responsibility for the defence of the Falklands has certainly been a major bargaining chip in the current, supposedly Strategic Defence Review, and since the Tory defence review in 1981 was the major proximate cause of the 1982 war - the longer-term one being the FCO's genetic predisposition to appeasement - everything is in place for a repeat performance, only this time without the crucial support of Chile and the USA.

Woodward - kicking The One when he's down

Normally I find it difficult to summon up any sympathy for politicians even if they suffer tragic personal loss. I would not give them my hand if I were drowning, so I sincerely do not care what what happens to them.

But I do feel a bit sorry for The One following the publication of Bob Woodward's Obama's Wars. They are Bush's wars, dammit, made and lost by him before he left office. It was Bush who switched resources from Afghanistan to Iraq, Bush's SecDef Rumsford who decided to use the Iraq invasion to prove that the USA could do more with less, and Bush who committed the USA and its allies to "nation-building".

Comes Woodward's book to reveal in excruciating detail - drawn from his usual wide range of disloyal government officials, many of them bearing classified documents to twist the knife - that The One acceded to his military commanders' urging to repeat in Afghanistan the "surge" that they believe turned the corner for them in Iraq, and responded to his political advisers, the Democratic leadership of Congress and the unease of his NATO allies by announcing a date for beginning to wind down direct involvement in the Afghan war.

Woodward tells us that while Obama was publicly declaring that the pacification of Afghanistan is a “vital national interest”, he was privately demanding an "exit strategy", within a time frame that made a nonsense of the institution-building strategy that Generals McChrystal and Petraeus crafted, and that he himself endorsed. This was because, Obama said, "I can’t lose the whole Democratic party".

Well, he couldn't contemplate that, could he? Not and hope to carry out his domestic agenda.

The One's administration is now in trouble precisely because of that domestic agenda, which is more than fair enough. But to suggest that he - or anyone else - could have found a magic solution to the military/geopolitical mess he inherited is grotesque.

George Friedman: unmitigated bollocks

"Pakistan and the US exit from Afghanistan", George Friedman's latest contribution to the free part of Stratfor on-line, is so breath-takingly bad that it requires no commentary. Well, maybe just the penultimate paragraph:

Pakistan has every reason to [provide the cover for turning a US retreat into a negotiated settlement]. It needs the United States over the long term to balance against India. It must have a stable or relatively stable Afghanistan to secure its western frontier. It needs an end to US forays into Pakistan that are destabilizing the regime. And playing this role would enhance Pakistan’s status in the Islamic world, something the United States could benefit from, too. We suspect that all sides are moving toward this end.

The Taliban hate their old masters in Pakistan's Inter-Service Intelligence (ISI). The ISI hates the Americans. Any helping hand offered to the Americans will be interpreted by the "Islamic world" as further proof that Pakistan is a US proxy. India is going to be a world power eventually, which Pakistan will never be.

Apart from that, it's a great plan. 

Prat's Clegg-fall at the UN

It is hard to select which part of Clegg's address at the UN was more cringe-worthy. It certainly puts him ahead of Jack Straw, who set the previous benchmark for arse-crawling foreign policy statements.

Straw, of course, had the Muslim voters in his Blackburn constituency in mind when, as foreign secretary, he claimed blame on behalf of Britain for the problems of the Middle East and the Indian subcontinent. Nobody in either area even commented on his nostra culpa: unlike the self-abusing Labour pukes, the peoples once part of the British Empire have more important things to do than to wallow in a distant and ambivalent past.

At least Straw's crawl had a strong basis in historical fact. Not so Clegg, who, confronted with the self-imposed mission of crawling up Indian and Muslim arses simultaneously, produced this gem:

Four centuries ago, the great [Islamic] Mughal emperor Akbar was legislating for religious freedom and equality in what is now India [actually conquered northern India, but what the hell], while in parts of Europe heretics were being burned at the stake [there goes the Roman Catholic vote].

Actually, Akbar ruled with much the same indifference to local cults as the British were to do later, although the insensitive British imperialists hanged offenders instead of getting war elephants to step on their heads, and offended against multiculturalism by abolishing suttee and thuggee.

That phrase alone might have won the title for Clegg, but then there was this gem: 

The United Kingdom will also show leadership by example. As fierce advocates of the international rule of law, we will practice what we preach. No nation can insist on the law, and then act as though it is above it.

Nice one. Leadership implies that someone may follow, an optimistic view of Britain's current world status. Plus declaring that Britain acted illegally in joining the Iraq invasion, although consistent with LibDem orthodoxy, is not Coalition policy - the Tories, after all, supported the invasion - and admits a legal liability that the Iraqis, who bear Britain a grudge for surrendering Basra to Shia extremists, may choose to exploit.

And finally there is this POS:

In recent years we have learned – in some cases the hard way – that democracy cannot be created by diktat. Freedom cannot be commanded into existence.

Let's see now: Italy, Germany, Japan are the more screamingly obvious exceptions to Clegg's newly-discovered principle of political science. And what about all those wars of national liberation? Finally, who in his right mind would argue that democracy creates freedom? Unless the rule of the majority is circumscribed by fundamental laws that the majority cannot change - which is not the case in Britain - freedom is an extremely fragile flower that may be trampled at will.

Foreign policy dilemma for The One

Typically well written article by George Friedman in Stratfor on the November congressional elections and their implications for The One's foreign policy choices.

The United States has a president who won a modest victory in the popular vote but whose campaign posture and the reality under which he took office have diverged substantially. He has been drawn, whether by inclination or necessity, to the portion of his presidency where he is [institutionally] weakest [i.e. domestic policy] and most likely to face resistance and defeat. And the weaker he gets politically the less likely he is to get domestic legislation passed, and the defeats will increase his weakness.

Presidents [can] go into opposition when they lose support in Congress. They run campaigns against Congress for blocking their agenda and blame Congress for any failures. Essentially, this was Bill Clinton’s strategy after his reversals in 1994, and it worked in 1996. It is a risky strategy, obviously. The other option is to shift from the weak part of the presidency to the strong part, foreign policy, where a president can generally act decisively without congressional backing. If Congress does resist, it can be painted as playing politics with national security.

Friedman argues that the second option is politically unattractive because the Republicans practically own the national security issue. Yet The One cannot escape it - he has a war going south in Afghanistan, and any prospect of a settlement there, or of a successful legacy in Iraq, involves dealing with the inveterate shit-stirrers in Tehran (my terminology, not Friedman's).

Diplomatic strokes appeal to Obama. They also would appeal to his political base, while any agreement with Iran that would contribute to an American withdrawal from Iraq and perhaps from Afghanistan would appeal to the center. The Republicans would be appalled, but Obama can’t win them over anyway so it doesn’t matter. Indeed, he can use their hostility to strengthen his own base.

What the settlement with Iran might look like is murky at best. Whether Iran has any interest in such a settlement is murkier still. But if Obama gets hammered in the midterms, his domestic agenda will be frozen. He doesn’t have the personal strength and credibility to run against Congress for two years and then get re-elected. He retains his power in foreign affairs but he has not gotten traction on a multilateral reconstruction of America’s global popularity. He has two wars ongoing, plus a major challenge from Iran. Attacking Iran from the air might or might not work, and it could weaken him politically. That leaves him with running against Congress or addressing the Middle East with a diplomatic masterstroke.

I'm not so sure The One can't run against Congress to advantage. The Republican establishment is in a mess of its own making and is facing a full-blown insurgency from the Tea Party phenomenon.

But I am sure that Tehran has no interest in making a deal with the Great Satan. There is no possibility of a deal when the minimum demand on both sides is greater than the maximum concession either can make.

Sound governance in emerging markets

Useful article on comparative fiscal management by Desmond Lachman in The American. The argument is well illustrated by two charts. The first was produced by Bill Gross, head of Pacific Investment Management Co., the world’s largest bond fund, to illustrate that while the public finances of Japan, Greece and Italy are far down the unsustainable path, France, USA, Britain, Ireland and Spain are all heading the same way:

For the "Ring of Fire" economies, lackluster growth is likely in the years ahead because high budget deficit levels will bring higher interest rates, as governments compete with their private sectors for financing. Private sector confidence will be further undermined by the prospect of higher taxes to pay for a public sector that will fiercely resist any change to the status quo. Obviously these considerations are of particular relevance to Britain, which has the highest state sector deficit as a percentage of GDP.

The second chart contrasts the public debt levels of the "Ring of Fire" countries with those of the emerging market economies, which, with the notable exception of India, range between 40 to 50 percent of GDP. Given their relatively small budget deficits, it is likely their public debt levels will remain at healthy levels.

In the years immediately ahead, the article concludes, emerging markets will retain many of the advantages that have favored their rapid growth in the recent past, amplified by their sounder public finances. There is every reason to expect that, as they become even more significant in the global economy, they will become increasingly vocal in pressing their case for their representation in international economic organizations like the International Monetary Fund to reflect their rapidly rising relative importance.

The Caucasus Emirate

The latest bulletin from Stratfor on the Caucasus makes intriguing reading. If the single-source account of the role of the Russian FSB in discrediting Doku Umarov and his dream of a North Caucasian Emirate is true - damn, they're good!

The most serious threat to Russian imperial expansion into the Caucasus was led by Shamil, an ethnic Avar from Dagestan. The so-called Caucasian War was the Russian conquest of the North Caucasian Muslim tribes, including Dagestanis, Chechens, Ingush, Ossetians, Karachay and Circassians.

Shamil became chief among those leading a united resistance in the name of a Caucasian Imamate, and was the third and last Imam from 1834 until captured in 1859. His grandson played a leading role in the short-lived Republic of the Northern Caucasus (1917-20).

One can well understand why the FSB should have been very keen to prevent history repeating itself.

US-Mexican borderlands

The always worthwhile George Friedman has a short article on the US-Mexico borderlands issue in Stratfor.

Three fault lines emerged in United States on the topic [of Mexican immigration]. One was between the business classes, which benefited directly from the flow of immigrants and could shift the cost of immigration to other social sectors, and those who did not enjoy those benefits. The second lay between the federal government, which saw the costs as trivial, and the states, which saw them as intensifying over time. And third, there were tensions between Mexican-American citizens and other American citizens over the question of illegal migrants. This inherently divisive, potentially explosive mix intensified as the process continued.

Migration to the United States is a normal process. Migration into the borderlands from Mexico is not. The land was seized from Mexico by force, territory now experiencing a massive national movement - legal and illegal - changing the cultural character of the region. It should come as no surprise that this is destabilizing the region, as instability naturally flows from such forces.

Those interested in geopolitics would be well advised to register for Stratfor's free intelligence reports. The only (minor) downside is that you will receive frequent emails urging you to upgrade to a paid subscription.

The Caucasus chamber-pot

Article on the Caucasus in Stratfor by George Friedman is well worth book-marking. Ever since I was roped in at short notice to give a cruise ship lecture on the subject as we sailed off the coast of Abkhazia, I have been acutely aware of the massive overhang of ethnic and historical legacy crap poised to hit the geopolitical fan in the Caucasus.

As far as I am concerned, the nearest historical parallel is the Balkans immediately pre-1914.

The new Great Game(s)

Excellent article in the UK Defence Forum on the geopolitics of the current chaos in Kyrgyzstan. Won't attempt to summarize, as it deserves reading in full.

I am particularly struck by the significance of Uzbekistan, much the most powerful of the ex-Soviet Stans, which is not going to sit idly by while fellow Uzbeks are driven out of Kyrgyzstan. It's a can of exceptionally vigorous worms.

This is, of course, the heart of the territory where the 'Great Game' was played out between the British and the Russian Empires in Queen Victoria's reign.

I give a talk on 'The New Great Game', but my focus has been on the ethnic cauldron of the Caucasus. Seems I'll have to crack the books and get deep into Kipling territory.