After Crimea, It’s (Still) Good to Talk

8 April 2014

Heather Williams 

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(Editor’s note: This is a guest post by Heather Williams, a War Studies PhD candidate. Header image is copyright Maksymenko Oleksandr issued under a creative commons attribution license) 

Oscar Jonsson’s post posed the question, what would be the benefit for the West of a negotiated solution with Russia? At first I thought this was either rhetorical or designed to stir the pot. Seeing that it was not the former, I will assume it was the latter and provide the spoon for said pot stirring. 

First, why is the West in talks with Russia over Ukraine? Jonsson notes that the West ‘came running’ to negotiate with Putin and it’s ‘in the bone marrow.’ To quote the second most cliché of security studies phrases (Clausewitz obviously gets the first), ‘it is better to jaw jaw than to war war.’ Now before you cry out ‘Sudetanland’ or fall victim to the Godwin’s law, let’s not discard the notion of negotiation altogether. Generally speaking, the goal of negotiation is to communicate interest, identify areas of discord, and, hopefully, settle on areas of agreement. Negotiations also offer an opportunity for building personal contacts, relaying concerns in a private setting, and building trust, however limited that might be. Negotiations entail risk, to be sure, and there comes a time when it is best to walk away from the negotiating table. Has the West really reached that point with Russia, though? 

This doesn’t mean the West and Russia will be braiding each other’s hair on the weekends whilst watching Hunt for Red October. But any alternatives to dialogue point in the direction of misperception, miscommunication, and potential escalation. Taking a closer look at Western interests in negotiations reveal why this isn’t a massive waste of time. 

Stop Russian advances. In the midst of our ongoing analyses, we often forget the impact of these events on the ground, on people and families living with the stress of corrupt leaders, a collapsed government, and, now, a decapitated state. Keeping this in mind, the first priority must be to promote security within Ukraine, which means stopping Russian advances and facilitating a stable environment in which the Ukrainian people can rebuild. With that said, talking to the Russians is a much more desirable option than remaining silent or military escalation. Negotiation does not mean the West will concede to Russian positions, however. For example, the West will not recognize Crimea as part of Russia. As Jonsson points out, this would undermine the post-WWII system. But why should the West or Russia insist on this point in practice? Any negotiations towards federalization would have to be put to the Ukrainian people for a vote. Given all the fuss the West raised about the illegality of the referendum in Crimea, it would be blatantly hypocritical to then apply the same principles to the rest of Ukraine and undercut its attempts to rebuild a government. This is not Iraq circa 2003. 

Al Qaeda Reorganizes Itself for Syria

Published on The National Interest (http://nationalinterest.org)

Source URL (retrieved on Apr 9, 2014): http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/al-qaeda-reorganizes-itself-syria-10214

April 9, 2014 

Charles E. Berger

According to testimony by CIA director John Brennan before a House panel last week, Al Qaeda recently deployed [3] mid-level planners from Pakistan to Syria. Intelligence officials fear these planners would be used to recruit some of the estimated 1,200 fighters from the United States and European and redirect them to attack the West. In addition to portending a higher likelihood of attacks on the West emanating from Syria, this development may represent efforts by Al Qaeda to shift its organization away from its current networked organization back to the more lethal structure it had before September 11, 2001. 

If Al Qaeda is already well established in Syria, as reported in the media, why would it send planners from Pakistan? Core Al Qaeda, the organization of Ayman al-Zawahri and the late Osama Bin Laden, is not the same organization as the jihadis currently fighting the Assad regime. As of about a month ago, there were two “Al Qaeda affiliates” in Syria. However, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) was officially disenfranchised by Al Qaeda leadership. ISIS is now in open warfare with both the Assad regime and al Nusra Front, Al Qaeda’s remaining affiliate in Syria. As I described in an earlier article [4], what some call the “Al Qaeda network” is not a unified organization, but actually a loose confederation of separate groups using the Al Qaeda brand. 

Why We Can Play the Long Game on Russia

Published on The National Interest (http://nationalinterest.org)

Source URL (retrieved on Apr 9, 2014): http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/why-we-can-play-the-long-game-russia-10213

April 9, 2014 

James Clad [2], Robert A. Manning [3] 

With the benefit of hindsight, the Russian annexation of Crimea shouldn’t have been a great surprise: it has been obvious to those who chose to look that for most of the last twenty years, that Russian president Vladimir Putin never fully accepted the USSR’s demise. Now, as the West agonizes over another possible irredentist feint—possibly in Ukraine proper or in Transnistria—the United States and its allies need to take a deep breath and consider the long game. 

By the end of March, some accouterments of post-Soviet sovereignty had changed. The peninsula in dispute switched flags and currencies. But despite epochal foreboding, few lives had been lost; with Russian pride assuaged, the remainder of Ukraine was lurching into the European Union’s embrace—barring a Putin effort to destabilize it. The issue kicking off the crisis in the first place—Ukraine’s edging towards the EU—had now given Eurasia another tilt towards Mother Europe. 

Is it possible that over the long run, much of this might come out better than feared? Putin’s Ukraine gambit may yet prove a tactical success, but a strategic failure. Even there, if Putin seeks to dismantle Ukraine, he may yet face a Ukrainian military response. The shock annexation of Crimea, itself a product of a 1954 intra-Soviet land transfer, has had another salutary effect—jolting us into reluctant awareness of the downside cost of our intrusions into the Russian periphery over two decades. 

Israel and Palestine: There's Still Room at the Inn

Published on The National Interest (http://nationalinterest.org)

Source URL (retrieved on Apr 9, 2014): http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/israel-palestine-theres-still-room-the-inn-10212

April 9, 2014 

Amitai Etzioni

Simon Schama’s new TV series and book The Story of the Jews [3] is particularly timely, although he’s covering well-ploughed ground. Schama shows, in fine detail, the ways the Jews tried, in any way they knew how and inventing new ones, to become accepted by societies in which they found themselves over the 1900 years that passed since they were exiled after the destruction of the first state of Israel. They tried to “assimilate” by praying on Sunday instead of on the Sabbath, by using the local language instead of Hebrew, by playing an organ instead of the shofar—and so on. They zealously served the rulers of their host countries and contributed richly to their cultures and commerce. However, as Schama shows, again and again and one more time Jews were (a) never fully accepted and (b) sooner or later kicked out in the most violent ways. They found new host countries, only to have their bitter fate repeated. 

After one of these rounds, when a young reporter witnessed the degradation of a Jewish French officer, Alfred Dreyfus, the reporter wrote a book that argued that the Jews had no choice but form their own homeland if they ever wanted to be safe. And Zion was the place to go. His name was Theodor Herzl—the father of Zionism. 

Critics of Zionism do not necessarily agree with this narrative. They tend to hold—as does Ari Shavit’s recent popular book My Promised Land: The Triumph and Tragedy of Israel—that Zionism made a critical mistake when it chose Palestine as the place to erect this Jewish homeland. The reason, as has been observed scores of times to the point it has become a cliché, is that Zionists thought that the Jews were a people without a land, and that Palestine was a land without people, and hence it was a match made in heaven. “They did not see the Arabs”, as Shavit puts it. This argument makes it sound that if the Zionist Jews knew that there were Arabs in Palestine, they would have looked for another parking place, one not taken. After all, if what they were mainly after was to find an empty land, they could have pitched their tents, say, somewhere between Kenya and Uganda, or in Argentina, as some suggested. (Never mind that none of these places were empty either.) The main Zionist thesis, though—the one its critics are seeking to ignore or debunk—was and is that Palestine was the place for the Jewish homeland, because this is where Jewish identity had been developed, because it is the place an Israeli state had existed before it was destroyed, because Jews yearned to return to it through their history. From their viewpoint, Palestine was a place they never really left. (Critics argue that much of this national narrative is constructed; but so is the Palestinian one. Until at least 1918 they all were merely Arabs, citizens of the Ottoman Empire.) 

Moreover, as I recently pointed out [4] in the Jerusalem Post, critics of Zionism make it sound like Palestine was a small home that was taken. Hence the way to build the state of Israel entailed driving out the Arabs. True, some Arabs were driven out—just as a similar number of Jews were driven out of Arab lands. And too many died at each other’s hands. However, data show, beyond doubt, that there was enough room for both people. At the end of 1946, just before the United Nations declaration that led to foundation of Israel, there were 1,267,037 Arabs and 543,000 Jews in Palestine. By the end of 2012 there were 1,647,200 Arabs in Israel (and nearly six million Jews). That is, since 1946 many more Jews and Arabs have found a home in this blessed land. 

How to Calm Asia's History Wars

Published on The National Interest (http://nationalinterest.org)

Source URL (retrieved on Apr 9, 2014): http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/how-calm-asias-history-wars-10216

April 9, 2014 

Mike Mochizuki, Michael O'Hanlon

As President Obama prepares for his trip to Asia in two weeks, tensions are remarkably high in a part of the world that was supposed to be smart enough to focus on getting rich even as the Middle East remained bogged down in conflict. Although much of the problem originates in China, American allies sometimes play a role too—including the government of Shinzo Abe in Japan. His visits to the Yasukuni Shrine in Tokyo are one big reason. Mr. Obama, like other American officials, will probably ask him to desist from future visits when the two heads of government meet in Tokyo. But in fact, Obama should concentrate on a more realistic agenda—asking Abe to redefine and transform the shrine, rather than stop visiting it. 

The wounds of history are profound in East Asia. Simple repetition of the official Japanese apology first articulated [4] by Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama in August 1995 will not suffice to promote historical reconciliation. And as Abe demonstrated by his visit to Yasukuni in December 2013, Japanese political leaders like their counterparts in other countries naturally feel compelled to honor their country’s war dead. The Yasukuni Shrine memorializes millions of rank-and-file Japanese soldiers who died for their country, not just the fourteen Japanese leaders who were convicted [5] of “Class A” war crimes. 

If Prime Minister Abe or his successors want to visit Yasukuni in the future, it should be a transformed shrine. The Yasukuni grounds currently contain a military museum that downplays Japanese aggression and ignores Japan’s war responsibility. An exhibition with such a distorted view of Japan’s past does not belong at a solemn shrine that should be primarily about remembering the sacrifice of ordinary Japanese soldiers. In addition to closing down this military museum, the Yasukuni Shrine should find a creative way to remove the names of the Class A war criminals from among the millions who are memorialized. This option was indeed proposed by a leading political patron of Yasukuni in 2007 and even by then prime minister Yasuhiro Nakasone after his controversial visit to the shrine in 1985. When Emperor Hirohito learned of the enshrinement of the Class-A war criminals in 1978, he was reportedly so angry that he refused to visit Yasukuni again. If Japanese patriots want to honor their war dead, the best way to do so is to transform Yasukuni so that the Japanese emperor can once again visit the shrine, as was frequently done before 1978, without stirring international controversy. 

As contentious as Yasukuni is, this shrine is far from the only issue preventing the healing of historical wounds. Many matters require attention, from the issue of “comfort women,” to the name of the Sea of Japan (which Korean Americans in Virginia are now contesting), to the way Chinese and Koreans teach their own people about the Japanese (verging at times on demonization, despite Japan's peaceful foreign policy after World War II and its efforts to atone for its militarist past). 

America also a winner in Afghan elections

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By Amir Taheri

April 7, 2014

Modal Trigger

It will be weeks before the final results of Afghanistan’s presidential election, held Saturday, are announced. And the winner won’t take office until June. Nevertheless, the voting, the third of its kind since the fall of the Taliban in 2001, has already provided a new and exciting political snapshot of a country emerging from four decades of turmoil. 

The first feature of this snapshot is that a majority of Afghans have adopted elections as the best means of choosing and changing governments. On Saturday, more than 7 million went to the polls — almost 60 percent of registered voters — a turnout about twice the level of four years ago. 

Second, the appeal of elections cuts across ethnic, regional, sectarian and gender boundaries. Turnout was heavier in the six provinces where ethnic Uzbeks, Tajiks and Hazara form a majority — but it was also high in provinces where the majority is Pushtun, the country’s largest ethnic group. In some towns and villages, Pushtuns went to the polls for the first time ever. Even in areas partly under Taliban influence, the number of voters was up at least 30 percent. 

Women’s turnout was also impressive, registering a 40 percent gain over the last time. (And the number of female election monitors was up 70 percent.) 

Book Review: Secrets and Leaks: The Dilemma of State Secrecy by Rahul Sagar

Published by Princeton University Press (2013) 

Reviewed by Steven Aftergood 

Thursday, April 3, 2014

Leaks of classified information have probably never been as prominent and as influential in public discourse as they are today. So Rahul Sagar’s book Secrets and Leaks is exquisitely timed to help readers to think through the conundrums of government secrecy in a democracy and to consider the role of unauthorized disclosures.

This is of course not a new topic. The literature on government secrecy, and even the subset on leaks, is quite voluminous and is perennially renewed. Much of it, truth be told, is tendentious and predictable.

But Sagar makes a fresh, original and provocative contribution to the field. Our problems with secrecy, he says, are not simply attributable to official venality or mismanagement (or to the Espionage Act or the Manhattan Project) but instead are rooted in our constitutional structure. And leaks of classified information are not necessarily a lamentable deviation from good government but are — within certain limits — an essential safeguard that should be defended and encouraged.

There are important “silences” in the Constitution, Sagar says, about the authority of the executive branch to withhold secret information, and about the conditions under which Congress and the public may gain access to such information.

The Framers authorized the president to employ secrecy in the public interest, but did not fully explain how citizens and lawmakers could know whether the president is in fact exercising this power responsibly.

By withholding guidance on how to resolve conflicts over the proper boundaries of official secrecy, these constitutional silences generated growing tensions that by the twentieth century demanded some type of solution. But, Sagar says, none of the resulting solutions — involving various forms of congressional or judicial oversight — have provided a fully satisfactory solution to the challenges of executive branch secrecy.

Contemporary efforts have arrived at an impasse. The regulatory mechanisms that have been championed in recent decades — the Freedom of Information Act and the establishment of congressional oversight committees in particular — have proven ineffective at exposing wrongdoing.

Only leaks, he argues, have the potential to overcome the otherwise unresolved tensions over disclosure of national security information that are the legacy of our constitutional design.

This is not an obvious conclusion. Even some confirmed critics of government secrecy have resisted it. Senator Daniel P. Moynihan, for example, said “There must be zero tolerance for permitting such information to be released through unauthorized channels.”

Senior officers who send troops to their deaths using faulty kit will be jailed:

Soldiers' families praise new rules as top brass warn of being 'hung out to dry'

Duty Holder Concept rules now cover all conflicts involving British forces
Senior officers will face courts-martial if safety warnings are ignored
But former colonel warns new rules will increase burdens on commanders

By MARK NICOL

PUBLISHED: 22:36 GMT, 5 April 2014 |

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2597881/Senior-officers-send-troops-deaths-using-faulty-kit-jailed-Soldiers-families-praise-new-rules-brass-warn-hung-dry.html

Senior Army officers, including generals, will be court-martialled and jailed if they send troops into battle with inadequate equipment, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.

Rules introduced last week mean that – for the first time in Army history – commanders will be held legally responsible for deaths in a war zone caused by faulty kit.

Last night, as troops’ families welcomed the move, top brass warned that combat operations could grind to a halt as officers fear being singled out for blame.

New rules: Royal Marines from Fire Support Troop, Charlie Company, 40 Commando, fire a Javelin missile as they attack a Taliban position on the frontline near Kajaki in Afghanistan's Helmand province

The Duty Holder Concept (DHC) regulations will cover all remaining British military operations in Afghanistan, which are scheduled to end in December, and any future conflicts involving UK Forces.


Their introduction follows huge public outcry over the hundreds of deaths linked to the use of shoddy equipment in Iraq and Afghanistan, including faulty radios and vehicles lacking armoured protection.

The move also comes after the UK Supreme Court ruled that the Government owes a duty of care to soldiers and that their families can sue the Ministry of Defence if equipment failures lead to deaths.

Under DHC, senior officers will face charges if safety warnings are ignored – without an operational imperative to do so.

The rules may also cover high-tech pieces of equipment, such as computers intended to protect helicopters from surface-to-air missiles, or if officers are found to have dismissed concerns raised by an armoured vehicle crew that – due to a mechanical fault – it was likely to tip over, trapping personnel inside.

The rules are being introduced to prevent senior officers escaping justice if they are considered to be responsible for soldiers’ deaths.


New era of accountability: Rules introduced last week mean that - for the first time in Army history - commanders will be held legally responsible for deaths in a war zone caused by faulty kit

The Emerging Arctic

A CFR InfoGuide Presentation

The northern reaches of the planet are melting at a pace few nations can afford to ignore, yielding potentially lucrative returns in energy, minerals, and shipping. But debate is mounting over whether the Arctic can be developed sustainably and peaceably.

The remote latitudes of the Arctic have long been a province of natural beauty, high adventure, and untold riches. For centuries, mariners risked their lives plying the frigid waters and frozen expanses in search of new territory, trade routes, and treasure for king and country. Where a few, like Norwegian polar explorer Roald Amundsen, triumphed over uncommon challenges, many others, like British rear admiral Sir John Franklin, suffered tragedy and defeat. With rare exception, much of the promise of the Arctic remained out of reach, encrusted in the polar ice.

In the twenty-first century, many experts believe that climate change, technological advances, and rising global demand for resources may at last unlock the considerable economic potential of the Circumpolar North. The melting of Arctic sea ice to record lows in recent years has prompted many nations, principally those with Arctic Ocean coastlines—the United States, Canada, Russia, Norway, and Denmark (Greenland)—to reassess their commitments and interests in the icy reaches atop the globe.

Many forecast Arctic summers will be free of ice in a matter of decades, potentially opening the region up to hundreds of billions of dollars in investment, including energy production, shipping, and fishing. The thaw will also pose new security demands as greater human activity induces states to increase their military and constabulary presence. While most experts dismiss the prospects for armed aggression in the Arctic, some defense analysts and academics assert that territorial disputes and a competition for resources have primed the Arctic for a new Cold War.

WHAT BRIEFING CHINESE OFFICIALS ON CYBER REALLY ACCOMPLISHES

April 8, 2014

What Briefing Chinese Officials on Cyber Really Accomplishes

by Adam Segal

http://blogs.cfr.org/asia/ 2014/04/07/what-briefing- chinese-officials-on-cyber- really-accomplishes/

U.S. President Barack Obama, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and China’s President Xi Jinping talk during a family photo at the Nuclear Security Summit in The Hague March 25, 2014. (Doug Mills/Courtesy Reuters)

U.S. President Barack Obama, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and China’s President Xi Jinping talk during a family photo at the Nuclear Security Summit in The Hague March 25, 2014. (Doug Mills/Courtesy Reuters)

David Sanger wrote an interesting article in the New York Times about Washington’s efforts to prevent escalating cyber attacks with Beijing. According to Sanger, U.S. officials have tried to allay the concerns of their Chinese counterparts about the buildup of Pentagon capabilities through greater transparency. They have briefed them on the “emerging doctrine for defending against cyber attacks against the United States-and for using its cyber technology against adversaries, including the Chinese.” We should, however, be clear about their real purpose. These briefings have more to do with deterring China than assuring it.

The ideas on assurance found in the Sanger article build on comments made about ten days ago by Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel at the retirement ceremony for General Keith Alexander, director of the NSA and commander of U.S. Cyber Command. Hagel tried to reassure other countries that despite the build up of personnel at Cyber Command and rising funding for cyber capabilities, “the United States does not seek to militarize cyberspace,” and, “DOD will maintain an approach of restraint to any cyber operations outside the U.S. government networks.” There is little reason to believe that these public statements will have any effect on Beijing or anyone else. The Snowden revelations have made it significantly more difficult for the United States to lecture others about cyberattacks. In addition, as Sanger points out, the distinction the United States makes between the operations it conducts for national security reasons and those China is said to support for economic motivations is not meaningful to Chinese officials.

WHEN THE RIGHT STARS TAKE TOO LONG TO SHINE

The extended time for which the Indian navy is continuing with an acting chief is not doing its morale any good, writes Abhijit Bhattacharyya

Indian navy personnel aboard INS Betwa By the time this piece sees the light of the day, one sincerely hopes and prays that the Indian navy will get its new ‘regular’ four-star admiral, instead of the present three star vice-admiral acting as the chief. In fact, this has never happened before for any of the three wings of India’s defence forces — as it has happened for the navy that continues to be headless for more than six weeks now. Why? All because of a perceived confusion and chaos being woven around the Indian governance system in recent times. And nothing seems to have been worse hit than the Indian armed forces, both in terms of man-management and material ‘mismanagement’. And this, too, happens at a time when Indians are crying themselves hoarse over the Chinese policy of ‘string of pearls’ being set up all around the coastline of India’s neighbourhood; from the Bay of Bengal shoreline of Myanmar to the north-west tip of the Arabian Sea port of Gwadar in Pakistan. In the history of independent India’s 67 years, this long vacancy at the top has never happened before. There was the packing off of top generals in the aftermath of the disastrous Sino-Indian war, there were the deaths of incumbent chiefs in office, of superseding of the seniormost officer and the resignations in consequence, there was the unceremonious sacking of a chief by the defence minister without any coherent or logical reason, but never was the post of the top office of the armed forces kept under an acting chief for an agonizingly long period of more than three weeks, except once, for 23 days, in 1960. It would, therefore, be in order today to look into the genesis and tradition of an issue where a sudden and unexpected development like death or sacking results in such a vacancy, although the present case could be likened more to a ‘vacuum’ than to a vacancy. A vacancy is filled up fast. A vacuum is perceived to be of a longer duration, that is, a version of a vacancy that has all the potential to demoralize and depress the soldiers, thereby giving a morale-booster to the adversary. In a way it can be said to be linked to the psychology of the ‘politics of the higher command appointment’ of the Indian armed forces. It somehow had begun with the post-1947 era perception of the inherent Nehruvian distrust of the Sandhurst-trained Anglicized officer corps of the British Indian army. It, however, seldom struck the mind of the wise of the time that if an Anglicized civilian, Nehru, could be fit to rule the country without any question, why would an Anglicized military top brass be perceived as a potential persona non grata so far as state machinery and the administration thereof were concerned? Be that as it may, a crisis-like situation occurred with the unexpected demise of the then incumbent (first Indian) air force chief of India, Air Marshal Subroto Mukherjee, in Tokyo, on November 8, 1960. It took the then Indian government 23 days to appoint Aspy Engineer as the successor air chief to Subroto Mukherjee, on December 1, 1960.

Political consensus on foreign policy This is despite passions being inflamed in Tamil Nadu

G Parthasarathy


A placard carrying a picture of Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapaksa. An AFP file photo

IN April 1977, just after the Janata Party government assumed office, the eminent Soviet Foreign Minister, Andrei Gromyko, arrived in Delhi, looking visibly nervous. Having backed Mrs. Gandhi’s Emergency rule, Gromyko expected a cold reception in South Block. His counterpart, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, smilingly put him at ease, saying that he had no hard feelings, asserting that “Indo-Soviet relations are strong and do not depend on the political fortunes of any individual or political party”. Happily, that type of statesmanship was retained amidst the heated rhetoric of the current election campaign. Both major national parties have not bickered about the approach to two major foreign policy issues.

As tensions escalated in Ukraine, the UPA government took the position that while we would like issues to be resolved peacefully between the parties concerned, the legitimate interests of Russia cannot be overlooked. This was followed by the courageous decision for India to abstain in a US-sponsored resolution in the UN Human Rights Council, seeking an international inquiry into the civilian casualties in the last days of the ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka. This was a sensitive issue in which passions were competitively inflamed by political parties in Tamil Nadu, some of whom are allied to the NDA. Despite the surcharged atmosphere in Tamil Nadu, the BJP did not oppose the government action and, in fact, let it be known what it felt about India's larger national interests.

The UNHRC resolution passed this year, unlike in the past, included the constitution of an open-ended international investigation into developments in a sovereign member State. This goes well beyond the current understanding and basic operative principles of the UNHRC. Moreover, unlike resolutions of the UN Security Council, resolutions of the Human Rights Council are not enforceable by international sanctions. Not surprisingly, this resolution did not secure the support of the majority of members on the Council. Only 23 of the Council's 47 members supported the resolution, with the majority either abstaining or voting against. Apart from South Korea, other members in India's Asian and Indian Ocean neighbourhood either abstained or voted against the resolution. These included China, Indonesia, Japan, Kuwait, the Maldives, Pakistan, the Philippines, South Africa and the United Arab Emirates. Despite their reputed global influence, the US and its allies could pick up support only from a few Latin American and African countries,

MYTH THAT MUST BE BUSTED AT EARLIEST

http://www.dailypioneer.com/columnists/edit/myth-that-must-be-busted-at-earliest.html

Thursday, 10 April 2014 | Claude Arpi |

Neville Maxwell, who recently ‘released’ the Henderson-Brooks-Bhagat Report on the 1962 conflict, claims that Nehru forced the war on Mao. This is a dangerously inaccurate interpretation of history and must be debunked

It is necessary to come back to the Henderson-Brooks-Bhagat Report and the role played by Neville Maxwell. The Australian journalist, who recently ‘released’ the famous report by posting it on his website, has been propagating a wrong interpretation of history, that India attacked China in 1962. Even presuming that Indian troops may have crossed what the Chinese perceived as the international border, many other factors have to be taken into consideration.

At age 87, why Maxwell remains a great advocate of China’s theory that India was the aggressor, is a mystery to me. It is not that I have any doubt that Nehru committed blunder after blunder, but Maxwell’s version is truly a biased over-simplification of the facts.

In an interview with The South China Morning Post, when asked by the Hong Kong newspaper: “What do you hope to achieve with this disclosure?” Maxwell answered: “What I have been trying to do for nearly 50 years! To rid Indian opinion of the induced delusion that, in 1962, India was the victim of an unprovoked surprise Chinese aggression, to make people in India see that the truth was that it was mistakes by the Indian Government, specifically Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, that forced the war on China.”

Reading the HBBR does not show that India forced a war on China, it just proves that India was not prepared to successfully defend some new forward positions ordered by Krishna Menon (and Nehru) in North-East Frontier Agency and Ladakh. It is undoubtedly a Himalayan blunder in itself; it demonstrates the foolishness of the Prime Minister (and his arrogant Defence Minister), but it was certainly not the root-cause of the War. The ‘forward policy’ was, however, the ideal pretext for Mao Tse-tung to show that India could not go unpunished for insulting China by giving refuge to the Dalai Lama and his followers.

Article 370: The untold story

By Maj Gen Sheru Thapliyal 

Issue Vol 26.1 Jan-Mar 2011 | Date : 07 Apr , 2014

Troops patrol in Kashmir

It is often not realized that among the causes of Kashmir problem – inclusion of plebiscite in the Instrument of Accession, reference of Kashmir to UN, halting Indian offensive when it was poised to drive out the invaders from Kashmir, Article 370 has played no less a part in preventing J&K from becoming an integral part of the Indian Union. Not many people are aware as how and why this Article was formulated and included in the Indian Constitution despite grave misgivings of Sardar Patel and indeed a large number of the members of Congress Working Committee and Constituent Assembly.

Article 370 was worked out in late 1947 between Sheikh Abdullah, who had by then been appointed Prime Minister of J&K by the Maharaja and Nehru, who kept the Kashmir portfolio with himself and kept Sardar Patel, the home minister, away from his legitimate function. Hence Nehru is answerable to all acts of commission and omission, consequences of which we are suffering till date as far as J&K is concerned.

“Why should a state of the Indian Union have a special status? It conveys a wrong signal not only to Kashmiris but also to the separatists, Pakistan and indeed the international community that J&K is still to become integral part of India, the sooner Article 370 is done away is better.”

While it was Mountbatten who persuaded Nehru to take the J&K issue to the UN, it was Sheikh Abdullah, who, driven by his ambition to be ruler of an independent Kashmir and his hatred for the Maharaja, persuaded Nehru to give special status to J&K. Among his reasons were – occupation of one third of J&K by Pakistan, reference to the UN and plebiscite. The most sinister aspect of proposed Article 370 was the provision that any changes could be brought about in it only by the concurrence of J&K assembly. Nehru’s promise that Article 370 was a temporary provision and will get eroded over a period of time has turned out to be a chimera. The first thing that Sheikh Abdullah got done was to abolish hereditary monarchy and redesignate him as Sadar-e-Riyasat who was to be elected by the Assembly. The accession of J&K State into Indian Union was approved by J&K Assembly only in 1956.

India Adrift

BY KREPON | 10 MARCH 2014 

Source Link

US-India relations are not in great shape. One indicator: India’s National Security Adviser, Shivshankar Menon, reacted to the arrest and strip search of an Indian diplomat for visa fraud and disregarding US labor laws as “despicable and barbaric.” In contrast, Menon had difficulty finding his voice when a battalion of PLA soldiers camped out for three weeks nine miles inside India’s disputed border with China. Granted, the strip search was extremely worthy of outrage. But still, the differential in official Indian indignation was telling.

Another indicator: India’s liability laws have so far prevented US corporations from constructing nuclear powers plants on Indian soil. The George W. Bush administration and its backers worked very hard to secure a special exemption for India from the international guidelines of nuclear commerce, hoping to build up India as a counterweight to China. So far, they have little to show for their efforts. Bilateral ties will continue to improve, as evidenced by India becoming the number one recipient of US arms sales. But hiccups are the rule, rather than the exception when two democratically unruly, independent-minded, and exceptional states try to work together.

The malaise in bilateral relations reflects a deeper malaise within India itself. How can a country with so much potential, entrepreneurship, and vitality become so torpid? For a start: tired leadership with an absence of ambition, endemic corruption, and an inability to tackle longstanding, structural pathologies, including those relating to national security.

The Kargil Review Commission, led by K. Subrahmanyam, clarified a laundry list of failings after dissecting India’s intelligence and military deficiencies associated with Pakistan’s surprise initiative along the Kashmir divide in 1999. Failure at the macro level, Subrahmanyam wrote, was one of stasis:

There has been very little change over the past 52 years despite the 1962 debacle, the 1965 stalemate, and the 1971 victory, the growing nuclear threat, end of the cold war, continuance of proxy war in Kashmir for over a decade and the revolution in military affairs.

Fifteen years later, very little has been done to follow up on the Kargil Commission’s recommendations, prompting a spate of new reports and critiques. Here’s a sampler:.

“[S]tagnation of thought hardly serves the national interests.” – “India’s Nuclear Doctrine: An Alternative Blueprint,” Task Force Report convened by P.R. Chari of the Institute of Peace and Conflict Studies, 2012

“Dealing with the challenges presented by Pakistan and China requires several crucial changes to our defence and security structures. First, we should establish a Maritime Commission that will guide the development of India’s maritime capabilities… Second, we need to increase functional efficiency and improve civil-military relations, and this will require the establishment of an integrated Ministry of Defence by populating the ministry with civilian and armed forces personnel… A Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff should head the existing Integrated Defence Staff, which should become the Military Department of the Ministry of Defence. Third, we should establish integrated commands—which will be both regional and functional that includes Special Forces, Air Defence and Logistics. Fourth, the regional commanders should report to a Chairman Joint Chiefs of Staff…” — “Nonalignment 2.0: A Foreign and Strategic Policy for India in the Twenty-First Century,” Sunil Khilnani et. al., 2012.

Massive Retaliation

BY KREPON | 1 APRIL 2014 | 19 COMMENTS

Massive retaliation is a siren song that appeals to states that cannot afford a nuclear competition but can afford to let an adversary cross the nuclear threshold first. It’s a money-saver, and it sounds persuasive, until the threat of massive retaliation is actually tested — when a nation’s nuclear bluff is called. What national leader would actually respond to the use of a single nuclear weapon, or just a few, with massive retaliation?

Of course, a single thermonuclear weapon targeted on a major city might be considered massive retaliation when compared to the use of a low-yield, tactical nuclear weapon. Great Britain and France are postured to do far worse – one of the consequences of relying on MIRVed missiles aboard submarines — but it’s hard to imagine their bluff being called, because plausible tripwires are so remote.

No nuclear doctrine can be persuasive when the use of nuclear weapons seems incomprehensible. States possessing nuclear weapons are therefore obliged to suspend disbelief and draw up plans for the unthinkable. Planning occurs in a vacuum until another mushroom cloud appears on a battlefield, whether by accident, inadvertence, or design. Only then will doctrine and declaratory policy be tested. But no possible test can be aced by the option of massive retaliation. Massive retaliation is the antithesis of nuclear planning. Yes, I remember that Lawrence Freedman defined all nuclear strategy as an oxymoron, but massive retaliation makes other nuclear employment options seem downright thoughtful.

The best-laid plans tend to go awry in conventional warfare, and we can only imagine how badly the execution of nuclear planning could go awry. Flexible response and graduated nuclear punishment were conceptualized to make greater sense of weapons in bloated arsenals. The problem was that no one could make a convincing case of escalation control in the smoking, irradiated ruin of a nuclear battlefield. The more rungs of graduated response that Herman Kahn conceptualized, the more he became an object of ridicule.

India election: country awaits a demographic dividend or disaster

A generational shift is under way in India with half of the population under 24. How the 150m first-time voters cast their ballot will dictate the future

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/apr/07/india-election-demographic-dividend-disaster 

Jason Burke in Delhi 

theguardian.com, Monday 7 April 2014 

Vijay Kumar is preparing for his India civil service exam, alongside 500,000 other hopefuls. Photograph: Sami Siva for the Guardian

There is not much of a view from Vijay Kumar's home near Shadipur depot, west Delhi. He lives in one of the most deprived slums in the Indian capital, in a square mile of narrow lanes, teetering brick tenement homes and open sewers shared by 15,000 people. Yet Kumar's ambitions have never been restricted by his circumstances.

Kumar, 22, is studying for exams for entry to the prestigious Indian Administrative Service – at least when there is power to run a light in the two rooms he shares with his parents and siblings. There are only 4,500 of these elite bureaucrats, and just a hundred or so new recruits each year. Kumar will be among up to 500,000 candidates.

"I want to be in the system and from within do something for my community and for my country," he says. "To change things you need power. I am not interested in money but in doing something for India. This is the responsibility of my generation."

Over the next six weeks more than half a billion Indians will go to 930,000 polling stations in the 16th general election since the country won independence from Britain in 1947. The exact impact of the 120 million first-time voters expected to cast their ballots is hotly debated. What is undisputed is that Kumar's generation will decide their nation's future.

Pakistan/US: Ties that Chafe and Bind

BY KREPON | 19 MARCH 2014 | 7 COMMENTS

Husain Haqqani has many detractors in Pakistan due to his shifting political allegiances and book publications. The thesis of Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military (2005) is about a longstanding alliance of convenience between the Army and Pakistan’s religious parties “to seek strategic depth in Afghanistan and to put pressure on India,” which cemented the Army’s domestic dominance and policies with dire consequences. Husain treads lightly on the failings of Pakistan’s political class, which bid for the Army’s favors while accumulating wealth. Washington comes in for heavy criticism for backing military strongmen and for not making assistance conditional on behavioral change. Pakistan comes across as a “rentier state” – one that “lives off the rents of its strategic location” — yet another reason why this book did not receive rave reviews in Rawalpindi.

Payback came when Husain was forced out of his post as President Asif Zadari’s emissary to Washington. After the US raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound, an orchestrated media campaign charged him of conspiring with a Pakistani-American living in Monaco to seek the Obama administration’s help to prevent an imaginary military coup attempt. Pakistan’s judicial system, which has difficulty prosecuting the perpetrators of mass-casualty attacks, quickly found sufficient evidence to launch judicial proceedings of treasonous behavior.

Husain is now back in the United States writing books. His latest, Magnificent Delusions: Pakistan, the United States, and an Epic History of Misunderstanding, will add Pakistan’s diplomatic corps to his list of detractors. He has burned another bridge, this time with a historical narrative of Pakistan’s play book to secure US economic and military assistance. “Since 1947,” he argues, “dependence, deception, and defiance have characterized US-Pakistan relations. We sought US aid in return for promises we did not keep.” His sources – US archival material providing direct quotes and summaries of high-level exchanges, as well as personal recollections – are too detailed to be dismissed as anti-Pakistan propaganda.

Husain’s bottom line: “Pakistan and the United States have few shared interests and very different political needs… If $40 billion in US aid has not won Pakistani hearts and minds, billions more will not do the trick… The US-Pakistan alliance is only a mirage.” Not exactly your standard, dispassionate diplomatic history.

Taken to the cleaners: U.S. picks up coalition’s $700 million laundry, food, base support tab

Military failed to pass along bills to other countries in Afghanistan

By Jim McElhatton

The Washington Times

Monday, April 7, 2014

In a staggering loss of money even by Pentagon standards, the U.S. military and two contractors left American taxpayers on the hook for more than $700 million in food, laundry and other services that should have been billed to countries that sent troops to Afghanistan.

Coalition countries tacitly agreed to reimburse the Army, but U.S. regional commands in Afghanistan frequently failed to pass along the charges, according to audit records obtained by The Washington Times through the Freedom of Information Act.

The failures, which spanned a 27-month period from 2010 to 2012, included contractors, who didn't report the costs of services to coalition forces, and poorly trained military overseers who neglected to enforce key contract terms with the two companies, identified as DynCorp and Fluor.

What's more, the lapses occurred just as sequestration loomed and Pentagon leaders scrambled to slash spending. Indeed, by one measure, the cost of Afghanistan-based billing failures represents nearly 60 percent of the $1.2 billion that the Pentagon saved by furloughing 640,450 civilian employees.

The billing problems, detailed in an internal Army Audit Agency report sent to U.S. commanders in Afghanistan last summer, also raise questions about oversight of the Army's Logistics Civil Augmentation Program, a multibillion-dollar outsourcing program that uses contractors to support deployed troops.

"The mismanagement of $700 million in reimbursements is mind-blowing, and we need to hold all parties involved accountable," said Scott Amey, general counsel of the Project on Government Oversight. "Contractors need to estimate coalition partner costs, and the Army must get bills out the door and push to recoup every penny that is owed."

Charles Tiefer, a professor at the University of Baltimore law school who served on the U.S. Wartime Contracting Commission, said the report showed that contractors were "making their lives easier, treating Uncle Sam as their personal piggy bank."

Intelligence: Pakistan Tries A DNI

http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htintel/articles/20140408.aspx

April 8, 2014: Pakistan recently decided to form the NID (National Intelligence Directorate) in order to pool intelligence gathered by over 30 Pakistani agencies. Even many Pakistani intelligence officials are not sure how many government and military intelligence collecting organizations there are in Pakistan. An effort is under way to compile a definitive list. The NID was created because of the growing number of instances in which counter-terrorism efforts failed because vital information existed but was not known or available to the army or police. Not unusual, but there have been a growing number of cases in which vital information was available within the intelligence community but there was no easy way to connect the agency with the information with the army or police units tasked with actually doing something about the problem. The NID is supposed to solve the problem but many inside Pakistan and in intelligence agencies worldwide doubt it. 

Much of this doubt comes from a failed American effort to do what NID is attempting. Back in 2004 the United States decided, for the same reasons, to create a similar agency called the DNI (Director of National Intelligence). The DNI was to control all intelligence. This promptly ran into resistance from the CIA which had, for a long time, filled the role as the "Central" Intelligence Agency. The DNI got things rolling quickly by proposing that the chief intelligence officer (the CIA "station chief") at each U.S. embassy be someone other than a CIA officer. The main alternatives proposed were someone from the DIA (the Department of Defense intelligence agency) or the NSA. The problem, as the CIA saw it was that if the intelligence station chief is from NSA or DIA, the senior CIA guy there would have another layer of bureaucracy to go through, and this would slow things down. Although the DNI, technically, has the power to order this change, the CIA unofficially threatened to use its considerable influence (in Congress, the media and elsewhere) to oppose the move. 

This proposal actually makes some sense. For example, there are a lot of talented espionage operatives in NSA and DIA who would make good station chiefs. Moreover, in many small countries, the DIA has more agents and intelligence operations than the CIA. Same deal with the NSA whose electronic eavesdropping is often the primary source of intel on some nations. But the CIA countered by pointing out that the CIA has been handling the station chief duties competently for decades, so why change something it is working well. 

China: The Pundits Of War Are Unleashed

http://www.strategypage.com/qnd/china/articles/20140408.aspx

April 8, 2014: China watched, and supported the recent Russian operation to take the Crimean Peninsula from Ukraine with great interest. The land grab had a bracing effect on the other countries that, until 1991, were part of the ancient Russian Empire. The Crimean operation was the second such land grab Russia has undertaken in the last five years. The first was against tiny Georgia in 2008. Many of these former Russian subjects feel that the Russians are trying to get their empire back. Ask many Russians that question and most agree that it would be a nice thing. Some Russians are more outspoken and bluntly call for the empire to be reassembled no matter what. Poland and the Baltic States managed to join NATO after the Cold War ended and are hoping that the mutual defense terms of the NATO alliance will dissuade Russia. Nevertheless all four, plus Finland, have increased their military readiness this year and are seeking assurances from the West that they will have help against Russia. Many Finns have called for Finland to join NATO, but a large minority has opposed this because of the fear it would anger the Russians. There was a similar division in Ukraine but now more Finns are thinking that NATO membership is preferable to trusting Russia to always behave. Even Sweden, never part of the Russian empire and successfully neutral since the early 19th century is thinking about joining NATO for protection from an increasingly aggressive Russia. 

China sees an opportunity here. That’s because the former Soviet stans of Central Asia (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan) have another option; China. The stans have been very receptive to Chinese diplomatic and economic cooperation. This bothers Russia, but not to the extent that threats are being made, as was the case with the former imperial provinces to the west. The stans also have a problem with never having been democracies. When the Russians conquered them in the 19th century the local governments were monarchies or tribes. When the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, locals who were former Soviet officials held elections and manipulated the vote to get themselves elected "president for life." But many people in the Stans want clean government and democracy, as well as continued independence from Russia. China is no help with that because the Chinese prefer dictators. But China does offer more economic opportunities and protection from what happened ti Ukraine and Georgia. 

Another reason for China to back Russia is the fact that China is also an empire trying to reclaim lost territories. That some of those territories are currently Russia’s Far East (areas bordering the Pacific) is not officially discussed in Russia or China but is no secret to many Russians and Chinese. That is a problem for another day as currently Russia and China support each other’s imperial ambitions (as in Ukraine and the South China Sea) and help each other out to deal with any associated problems, especially the UN or economic sanctions. China is also helping by putting economic pressure on Ukraine by suing Ukraine to cancel a $3 billion loan. 

U.S. and China Discuss Disputes Over Disputed Islands and Airspace Restrictions

April 8, 2014

Hagel, Chang air differences over disputed islands

Associated Press

BEIJING (AP) — The defense chiefs of China and the U.S. are facing off over Beijing’s escalating territorial disputes in the region, with Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel wagging his finger and telling China it doesn’t have the right to unilaterally establish an air defense zone over disputed islands with no consultation.

And he said on Tuesday America will protect Japan in a dispute with China, as laid out in U.S. treaty obligations.

Chinese Defense Minister Chang Wanquan said his country will not take the initiative to stir up troubles with Japan, but Beijing is ready to use its military if needed to safeguard its territory. And he warned that the U.S. must “stay vigilant” against Japan’s actions and “not be permissive and supportive” of Tokyo.

The U.S. has criticized Beijing’s recent declaration of an air defense zone over a large swath of the East China Sea, including disputed islands controlled by Japan.

In their remarks, the two men aired their countries’ well-known positions about the territorial disputes, although doing it for the first time in China, shoulder to shoulder after nearly two hours of meetings here.

"Every nation has a right to establish an air defense zone, but not a right to do it unilaterally with no collaboration, no consultation. That adds to tensions, misunderstandings, and could eventually add to, and eventually get to dangerous conflict," said Hagel, poking his figure toward the television cameras and photographers at the back of the room, as shutters clicked.

For his part, Chang said China stands ready to resolve the disputes diplomatically. But he made it clear that China is always ready to respond to threats.

On the issue of territorial sovereignty, Chang said, “we will make no compromise, no concession, no trading, not even a tiny … violation is allowed.”

On a broader scale, the meeting focused on how the U.S. and China can build stronger ties, in the wake of years of frosty relations over Beijing’s military buildup, persistent cyberattacks against U.S. government agencies and private industry, and aggressive Chinese territorial claims in the East China Sea.

CRIMEA CRISIS MAY SWAY CHINA GAS DEAL – ANALYSIS

APRIL 8, 2014 RFA 

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By RFA

By Michael Lelyveld

Western pressure on Russia over its annexation of Crimea has raised expectations that it will offer China better terms on a long-delayed gas deal in time for President Vladimir Putin’s planned visit in May.

The takeover of the region from Ukraine has heightened the risk that European countries will reduce their reliance on Russia for energy, increasing the importance of exporting its resources to China instead.

The threat of European sanctions is seen as driving Russia’s Gazprom to reach an agreement in its decade-old talks with China National Petroleum Corp. (CNPC) for Siberian gas supplies by offering lower prices.

“With Western sanctions, the atmosphere could change quickly in favor of China,” said Brian Zimbler, managing partner in the Moscow office of Morgan Lewis, an international law firm, in comments cited by Reuters.

Western nations have made clear that they are considering energy penalties as a next step.

At a press conference in The Hague on March 25, President Barack Obama warned that Washington could join Brussels in imposing sanctions to “include areas potentially like energy, or finance, or arms sales, or trade that exists between Europe and the United States and Russia.”

The energy option would strike at the heart of a critical source of Russian income, as well as European interests.

Last year, Europe imported 167.2 billion cubic meters (5.9 trillion cubic feet) of gas from Russia, valued at some U.S. $57 billion, Platts energy news service reported.

Russia supplied one-third of Europe’s gas demand and 36 percent of its crude oil imports, Platts said.

But Europe may now be seeking ways to ease its dependence, giving it a freer hand in responding to Russian expansion moves.

Energy leverage