Interpreting Russian foreign Policy and Islam

http://studies.aljazeera.net/en/reports/2014/09/2014928101146511560.htm

Karina Fayzullina

Last Updated: : Sunday 28 September 2014 13:35 Mecca

Abstract

The perceived growth of political Islam and Islamist extremism throughout the world has recently led to a rethinking of foreign policy in many Western countries. Intensifying upheaval caused by terrorism from Nigeria to Yemen, and from Afghanistan to Iraq, has placed Muslims, Islam and political Islam in the political spotlight. This is a rising trend everywhere; Russia is no exception. Like elsewhere else in the world, Islam is at the forefront of thinking prevalent in Russian foreign policy-making. There is one difference, however. Negative stereotypes of Islam found in Europe and the US are less visible in both politics and the media. As argued here, Islam is integrated as part of national identity in Russian politics. How does the practice of foreign policy reflect this standard?

Introduction

The image of Russia in the world is rarely associated with Islam and Islamic identity, in general. While Orthodox Christianity is the country’s predominant confession, not many know that Russia is home to as many as 14 million Muslims of various ethnic backgrounds. However, there is no recent census to verify this figure.

Historically, Islam has not been instituted in Russia in a deliberate fashion as a conceptual part of national identity until the breakup of the USSR more than two decades ago. Stark secularism of the former Soviets prevented any religion from evolving either within or without the official political framework. Thus the role of traditional creeds of the diverse ethnicities and peoples included in the former Soviet Union remained understated for decades. It is only recently that Islam in Russia has found itself less ‘chained’ by the restrictions that had previously shackled it for centuries, before and during the founding of the former Soviet Union.

This government policy trend has turned out to be really encouraging. Russian leaders and politicians repeatedly stress the significance of Islam as integral to the political fabric of statehood, historically and in the contemporary era.

For instance, President Putin generally does not shy away from expression of religious sentiment and support, in general, and is forthright in his respect for Islam. He states the following:

‘…Islam is rightly claimed an inalienable part of today’s religious, social and cultural life of Russia. Its traditions are based on eternal values of goodness, mercy and justice…’(1)

The policy of the 2000s along with the government policy to improve Russia’s image in the Muslim world, seems to have yielded encouraging results in terms of Russia’s overall standing. In terms of mass consciousness, Russia is seeking to present itself in the image of a friendly country to Islam and Muslims. That is, it is cultivating the image of an alternative to the belligerence of the US Neoconservative voices (‘Neocons’), who constantly set themselves against the Muslim world with persistent yet fruitless attempts to spread Western political values such as through democracy promotion. Russia does not have a similar policy, and does not follow in the footsteps of the former Soviet Union in terms of seeking to spread communism.

HOLDING ISIS TO ACCOUNT – ANALYSIS

OCTOBER 19, 2014 

http://www.eurasiareview.com/19102014-holding-isis-account-analysis/ 

The international outcry to the openly advertised atrocities committed in Iraq by the jihadist group calling itself Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS or ISIL) has led to calls for investigations and punishment, with US President Barak Obama saying “justice will be done” after the killing of journalist James Foley.

This has provoked a direct reaction in terms of air strikes by the US, and the assembling of an international coalition to fight the group. But beyond this rough military “justice”, what mechanisms exist to turn investigations into court cases that formally bring IS leaders to account? What exact crimes are IS fighters committing, and perhaps more crucially, what chance is there that the group’s fighters will be held to account?

Who is carrying out investigations?

Several teams of investigators are reportedly looking into evidence of atrocities, including the International Commission of Inquiry for Syria, a UK government-supported investigation team (covering Syria), and proposals are being considered in Washington and London for an Erbil-based IS investigation team.

Separately, on 1 September, the UN Human Rights Council agreed to send an 11-member investigations team to Iraq, a decision that came just days after it published a report (27 August 2014) linking ISIS members to mass atrocities and acts “amounting to crimes against humanity” in Syria in the first half of the year.

Other efforts to investigate recent atrocities in Syria and Iraq include the Syrian Commission for Justice and Accountability (SCJA), the Syrian Justice and Accountability Centre (SJAC), and the Commission for International Justice and Accountability, headed by Canadian investigator William Wiley.

What crimes are we talking about?

IS critics accuse the group of a long list of crimes including public executions, beheadings, kidnappings, torture, forced conversions, sexual abuse, killing captured soldiers and putting communities under siege.

Many of these atrocities – openly advertised by the group on the Internet – would be against the Iraqi legal code, which continues to be served by functional criminal courts (in government-controlled areas). Though IS may claim otherwise, most would accept that the alleged crimes are taking place on Iraqi territory normally under the jurisdiction of Iraqi law.

However, with IS controlling around a third of the country, national investigations or prosecutions are not realistic for the moment. And, with Iraq currently in a state of armed conflict, certain violent acts that are forbidden during peacetime become permitted under international law, so IS lawyers could claim that peacetime rules no longer apply.

What about war crimes?

It has become increasingly commonplace to accuse IS of war crimes: global crimes which are technically defined as serious violations of International Humanitarian Law (IHL) – sometimes known as the law of armed conflict. As an example, on 2 September, Amnesty International published a briefing paper entitled Ethnic Cleansing on a Historic Scale, accusing the group of war crimes as well as other atrocities.

The rules of war are set out in instruments such as the four Geneva Conventions (1949) and the two Additional Protocols (1977), and in customary practice.

For IHL to apply, the violence needs to be legally considered as either an international or non-international armed conflict, technical categories that assessments by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) go a long way to establish.

According to ICRC, there is a current non-international armed conflict in Syria (in laymen’s terms, a civil war), which means a range of violent acts in the country, even away from the frontlines, may be counted as war crimes.

The laws apply to the conduct of IS forces, and provide for protection to civilians under their care, whether IS accept the rules or not. Without this legal recognition of the armed conflict (as opposed to other types of violence), war crimes prosecutions would not be possible.

In neighbouring Syria where IS also operates, ICRC made public for the first time in July 2012 that it judged the situation an internal armed conflict, meaning IHL applied to regime forces and IS activities there.

Such judgments are based on two criteria – the intensity of the fighting and also whether the parties to the conflict are organized groups.

The last 12 months have seen IS evolving from a loosely organized military group, to a would-be state-builder. This has lifted IS above the sort of lower level terrorist activity elsewhere in the world.

Of course, if the armed conflict was legally categorized as an international armed conflict, a greater range of war rules would apply (although in recent years differences between the two categories have lessened), including formal protection for prisoners of war. International armed conflicts require two different states to be involved. IS see themselves as a state (in their terms “Caliphate”). However, the lack of any international recognition undermines their claims for the moment.

There is an undoubted (and growing) international element to the fighting. IS territory straddles significant parts of both Iraq and Syria, where it is fighting against both governments, as well as more recently, an international US-led coalition involving more than 50 countries. However, at least in ICRC terms, despite being internationalized, the conflict would not be considered international until it involved recognized states on both sides.

Why the Putin Peace Plan Is Working

http://nationalinterest.org/feature/why-the-putin-peace-plan-working-11519?page=show

"If the current peace process has shown anything, it is that Russia remains Ukraine’s only indispensable partner for stability and prosperity."

Nicolai N. Petro

October 22, 2014

Despite extraordinary obstacles, the Minsk accords, more appropriately known as the Putin peace plan, are actually working. Just when it seemed that continuing violations might lead Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko to abandon the ceasefire, as he had once before, he doubled down with a slew of laws and personnel changes that indicate just how seriously he is now committed to negotiating a resolution to the conflict in eastern Ukraine.

It was not always so. Poroshenko ran for office in May on a platform of negotiated peace, but once in office, he found little support for negotiations among his key supporters. The head of parliament, the prime minister, the minister of interior, even his own national-security team all favored expanding the “anti-terrorist operation” begun by his predecessor in April. With U.S. backing and military advisors, Poroshenko quickly became convinced that military victory could be attained in a matter of “hours.”

Initially, the operation to pacify eastern Ukraine was marred by troop defections, lack of equipment and poor coordination. By the middle of the summer, however, Ukrainian forces seemed to have turned the corner and were pushing the rebels back on all fronts. Then, in late August, the unthinkable happened—Ukrainian troops suffered a disastrous defeat in the town of Ilovaisk. 

The exact details of what went wrong have not been made public. According to Semen Semenchenko—the commander of the volunteer “Donbas” battalion that led the assault on Ilovaisk—after having taken the city center, Ukrainian forces were surrounded by the rebels and totally cut off. Russian media sources suggest that as many as 7,000 Ukrainian soldiers were trapped, along with several hundreds of military vehicles.

Semenchenko claims that the Ukrainian military lost over 1,000 men in that battle, a claim disputed by Ukrainian defense minister Valeriy Heletey, who says that only 107 Ukrainian soldiers died. Ukraine’s General Prosecutor, by contrast, says that “no fewer” than two hundred soldiers lost their lives, and several Ukrainian newspapers reported that fatalities numbered in the hundreds. Only a personal plea by President Putin to allow the besieged Ukrainian soldiers a “humanitarian corridor” to leave prevented even more casualties. Both Heletey and the head of the General Staff were forced to resign.

Iraq's Third-Largest Military Base Is In Danger Of Falling To ISIS

JEREMY BENDER0

OCT 17, 2014

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From a photo collection released by ISIS, showing the group's presence in Ramadi, the provincial capital of Anbar.

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ISIS is laying siege to Iraq's third-largest military installation, where Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) warn that they are ravaged psychologically and on the brink of being overrun, Susannah George reports for McClatchy DC.

The Ain Asad Air Base, located within Iraq's western Anbar Province, is under attack from ISIS and will likely fall if the ISF forces defending it outside don't receive some kind of outside help.

Soldiers report that they are running low on supplies and that morale has collapsed as the US and coalition troops are providing essentially no support to the installation.

"It's not possible to get in any supplies by land," an unidentified ISF soldier toldMcClatchy. "Forces in the base are almost collapsed psychologically and scared. I cannot say for how long we can hold the base."

The Big Cost of Success: The Rise and Ultimate Fall of ISIS

Sean Mirski

October 18, 2014 

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"The strategy that once propelled ISIS to the heights of success will become the source of its downfall."

In the last year, ISIS has expanded its influence in Syria and Iraq with shocking ferocity and speed. In its rampage, the organization has wrested town after town from a seemingly paralyzed Iraqi military. Worse, ISIS has coupled its military successes with remarkably adept propaganda. It has pumped its extremist ideology into the dark corners of the Internet, even as it broadcasts calculated brutality in order to strike fear into the hearts of its enemies. And in late June, it declared the establishment of a new caliphate and installed ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi as its caliph. In just one short year, the Islamic State has become a jihadist colossus.

But this colossus has clay feet. From the start, the Islamic State’s strategy has contained the seeds of its own undoing. ISIS was able to leverage the scale of its ambition—its goal of establishing a caliphate—into publicity, financing and recruits. Although it achieved stunning military victories with these resources,it has now provoked American intervention. ISIS will no longer be able to seize new cities or, indeed, continue holding much of the territory it currently controls in the face of American airpower backed up by local partners. And absent the ability to expand or even retain its territory, ISIS will lose one of the primary engines of its rise: its ambition to statehood.

In short, the Islamic State has painted itself into a corner. The strategy that once propelled ISIS to the heights of success will become the source of its downfall.

The Cost of Statehood

In many respects, the Islamic State differs from traditional extremist groups. It aspires to be more than just a shadowy jihadist network—it wants to rule. In large part, it has succeeded. Depending on the metric used, it now reigns over millions of people and controls tens of thousands of square miles (some say more than the entire United Kingdom). This success has resulted in part from its statehood-oriented strategy. The Islamic State sent shockwaves throughout the jihadist community when it declared its caliphate. Since then, its profile has skyrocketed, opening the door to additional fighters and financing.

But statehood comes at a price. By creating a caliphate, ISIS has also created a new vulnerability for itself: it has become governor of a territory encompassing millions. Its statehood has brought it fame, funding and foreign fighters, but it has also established fixed assets that the United States and its allies can easily hold at risk. It is hard for the United States to pin down shifting and elusive people-based networks like Al Qaeda; it is much easier to target the infrastructure and operations of a territorial government. More importantly, ISIS has tied its internal legitimacy to territory. Without a state, the Islamic State is nothing—or at least nothing that would separate it from the run-of-the-mill jihadist groups and entitle it to greater publicity and resources. In order for the Islamic State to remain influential, then, it must retain its control over vast tracts of Syria and Iraq.

This objective is becoming increasingly difficult in the face of the coalition’s campaign. The American strategy is premised on loosening ISIS’s grip on its territorial conquests, so it is aimed at striking the State’s Achilles’ heel. As ISIS hemorrhages territory, it will lose far more than its access to resources—it will lose the legitimacy that supported its rise in the first place. And as its caliphate shrinks, its fighters will be increasingly disillusioned and incentivized to desert, rather than find themselves exposed to advancing forces without any territory on which to fall back.

As a result, the Islamic State is far more fragile than many commentators believe. It is a dangerous opponent, but it has built its power base on pillars of sand.

American Airpower and the End of ISIS’ Conquests

The Islamic State has expanded its territorial control through the jihadist equivalent of blitzkrieg: its fighters raced from one town to the next, catching Iraqi unit after Iraqi unit off-balance as ISIS continued to carve out ever-greater swaths of the country for its new caliphate. This strategy has served ISIS well, but only because the Islamic State has faced little opposition to its rapid advances across the desert.

The introduction of American airpower inverts ISIS’ odds, however, because the United States will be able to easily destroy any ISIS forces caught out in the open. Unlike, say, the jungles of Vietnam, the deserts of the Middle East leave mechanized forces totally exposed to aerial bombardment. Indeed, the Iraqi Army found itself caught in an analogous position during the First Gulf War. The result was a military catastrophe that culminated in the notorious “Highway of Death” when American forces decimated Saddam Hussein’s retreating ranks as they drove north out of Kuwait. Likewise, ISIS will face considerable—if not insurmountable—difficulties in any attempt to conquer new territory through the use of conventional mechanized forces.

To be sure, American airpower does not work in a vacuum: it requires reliable intelligence about the location of potential targets. The United States can gather some of this information remotely, but in order to launch a truly devastating aerial campaign, it also needs direct, on-the-ground sources.

Pentagon Doubts Veracity of Reports That ISIS Training Pilots on Captured MiG Fighters

Dave Majumdar

USNI News

October 17, 2014

U.S. Central Command Casts Doubts On Claims ISIS Operating Captured MiGs

U.S. Central Command Commander General Lloyd J. Austin III on Oct. 17, 2014. Defense Department Photo

The U.S. Central Command has seen no evidence that the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS or ISIL) terrorist group is operating its own warplanes.

“We don’t have any operational reporting of ISIL flying jets in support of ISIL’s activity on the ground. And so I cannot confirm that,” U.S. Army Gen. Lloyd Austin told reporters during a Friday briefing at the Pentagon.

“And to the degree that pilots may have defected and joined the ranks of ISIL, I don’t have any information on that either.”

The Syrian Observatory on Human Rights (SOHR), which has been tracking the conflict in Syria, has claimed that ISIS has gained access to three Soviet-built fighters including Mikoyan MiG-21 Fishbed and MiG-23 Flogger aircraft. If ISIS were operating its own fleet of fighters, it would be an unprecedented feat for such a group.

According to the SOHR, the fighters are crewed by defectors from the Iraq or possibly by newly trained ISIS terrorists.

“Officers from the Iraqi dissolved army, who are also members in the Islamic State Organization, have overseen the training of some militants in order to be able to lead these aircrafts,” reads a SOHR report.

“The training courses are given in the airbase of al Jarrah known by Kshish airbase too. This airbase located in the eastern countryside of Aleppo and considered the most important camp for IS [Islamic State] in Syria.”

An undated photo of a Soviet era MiG-23 Flogger K via Wikipedia

The Collapse of the Iraqi Army in July and How Mosul Fell to ISIS

Reuters

October 14, 2014

Special report - How Mosul fell: An Iraqi general disputes Baghdad’s story

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Lieutenant General Mahdi Gharawi knew an attack was coming.

In late May, Iraqi security forces arrested seven members of militant group Islamic State in Mosul and learned the group planned an offensive on the city in early June. Gharawi, the operational commander of Nineveh province, of which Mosul is the capital, asked Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki’s most trusted commanders for reinforcements.

With Iraq’s military overstretched, the senior officers scoffed at the request. Diplomats in Baghdad also passed along intelligence of an attack, only to be told that Iraqi Special Forces were in Mosul and could handle any scenario.

On June 4, federal police in Mosul under Gharawi’s command cornered Islamic State’s military leader in Iraq, who blew himself up rather than surrendering. Gharawi hoped the death might avert an attack. He was wrong.

At 2:30 a.m. on June 6, Gharawi and his men returned to their operations room after an inspection of checkpoints in the city of two million. At that moment, convoys of pickup trucks were advancing from the west, driving across the desert that straddles Iraq’s border with Syria. Each vehicle held up to four IS fighters. The convoys shot their way through the two-man checkpoints into the city.

By 3:30 a.m., the militants were fighting inside Mosul. Within three days the Iraqi army would abandon the country’s second-biggest city to its attackers. The loss triggered a series of events that continues to reshape Iraq months later.

It unleashed a two-day charge by IS to within 95 miles (153 km) of Baghdad that caused the collapse of four Iraqi divisions and the capture or deaths of thousands of soldiers. It helped drive Maliki from office. And it pushed Western powers and Gulf Arab nations into launching air strikes on the Islamist militants in both Iraq and Syria.

But how Mosul was lost, and who gave the order to abandon the fight, have, until now, been unclear. There has been no official version: only soldiers’ stories of mass desertions and claims by infantry troops that they followed orders to flee.

In June, Maliki accused unnamed regional countries, commanders and rival politicians of plotting the fall of Mosul, but has since remained quiet.

Nevertheless, Baghdad has pinned the blame on Gharawi. In late August, he was charged by the defence ministry with dereliction of duty. He is now awaiting the findings of an investigative panel and then a military trial. If found guilty, he could be sentenced to death. (Four federal police officers who served under Gharawi are also in custody awaiting trial, and could not be reached.) Parliament also plans to hold hearings into the loss of Mosul.

An investigation by Reuters shows that higher-level military officials and Maliki himself share at least some of the blame. Several of Iraq’s senior-most commanders and officials have detailed for the first time how troop shortages and infighting among top officers and Iraqi political leaders played into Islamic State’s hands and fuelled panic that led to the city’s abandonment. Maliki and his defence minister made an early critical mistake, they say, by turning down repeated offers of help from the Kurdish fighting force known as the peshmerga.

Gharawi’s role in the debacle is a matter of debate. A member of the country’s dominant Shi’ite sect, he alienated Mosul’s Sunni majority before the battle, according to the provincial governor and many citizens. That helped give rise to IS sleeper cells inside Mosul. One Iraqi officer under his command faulted Gharawi for not rallying the troops for a final stand.

For his part, Gharawi says he stood firm, and did not give the final order to abandon the city. Others involved in the battle endorse that claim and say Gharawi fought until the city was overrun. It was only then that he fled.

Gharawi says three people could have given the final order: Aboud Qanbar, at the time the defence ministry’s deputy chief of staff; Ali Ghaidan, then commander of the ground forces; or Maliki himself, who personally directed his most senior officers from Baghdad. The secret of who decided to abandon Mosul, Gharawi says, lies with these three men. Gharawi says a decision by Ghaidan and Qanbar to leave Mosul’s western bank sparked mass desertions as soldiers assumed their commanders had fled. A senior Iraqi military official backs that assertion.

None of the three men have commented publicly on their decisions in Mosul. Maliki has declined Reuters requests for an interview for this article. Qanbar has not responded, while Ghaidan could not be reached.

Lieutenant General Qassim Atta, a military spokesman with close ties to Maliki, told Reuters last week that Gharawi “above all others … failed in his role as commander.” The rest, he said, “will be revealed before the judiciary.” 

In many ways, Gharawi’s story is a window into Iraq. The Shi’ite general has been a key figure since 2003, when the Shi’ites began gaining power after the United States toppled Saddam Hussein and his Sunni-dominated Baath Party. Shi’ite leaders once saluted Gharawi as a hero, while Sunnis see him as a murderer who used Iraq’s war on extremism as a cover for extorting money from businesses and menacing innocent people with arrests and killings.

Gharawi rose through a military riven by sectarian splits, corruption and politics. He is now trapped by those same forces. The decision to punish him and ignore the role of higher-level figures shows not just that rebuilding the military will be difficult, but also why the country risks breakup. As Mosul proved, the Iraqi army is a failed institution at the heart of a failing state.

Kobani: A Metaphor For the Contradictions Facing The West

George PetrolekasHoward Coombs

October 16, 2014

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Nestled on the Turkish border in northern Syria is the city of Kobani, once inhabited by some 50,000 Kurds. Its Syrian name Ayn al-Arab reflects the stateless nature of the Kurds in Assad’s Syria, where they are denied citizenship and any social rights. For the Kurds of Kobani are trapped in Syria, hemmed in by Turkey and under attack by the Islamic State.

Questioned as to why the IS assault was not being stopped, Admiral John Kirby responded, “Airstrikes alone, are not going to . . . to save the town of Kobani.” However, the bravery and tenacity of its Kurdish fighters, combined with airstrikes have permitted it to hang on. It also proves that the IS is not omnipotent in the face of spirited resistance. Quite the contrary.

The Kurds will fight to the end--the examples of IS making prisoners dig their own graves give no reason for them to think that surrender is an option. The old, infirm or the young are left behind, unable to run; their fates predictable if the city falls.

The UN Special Envoy to Syria Staffan de Mistura has warned of an impending massacre. So desperate is the projected scenario for Kobani that Mistura has even asked Turkey to permit volunteers to cross the border to fight the IS and failing that, to assist the US-led coalition "through whatever means from their own territory".

Turkey however won’t act alone, and if it does it is only in the context of defeating Assad – an invitation for mission creep. Our goals are fundamentally different. Instead, thousands gather on hills on the Turkish side of the border, spectators to the carnage unfolding below.

The Obama plan, for which airstrikes are only the opening act, is seemingly unable to find regional actors to provide the ground forces on which the very success of his plan to degrade and destroy the IS rests. If Turkey with a 400 kilometer long border--now occupied by the IS--will not act, despite the recommendations of its own high command, there is little likelihood that other, smaller regional Arab nations will.

Whether Kobani falls or not it presents a series of contradictions for everyone--whichever camp they belong to.

Days of airstrikes have blunted the IS advance, thanks to Kurdish resistance, but the aerial campaign is under-resourced. It can degrade the IS, but it cannot provide for the persistent air coverage necessary to do more alone. Already choices are being made whether to direct resources towards Kobani, or to the ISIS danger around Bagdhad. Desert Storm was far better resourced.

Of all the nations contributing to the coalition, most will not fly over Syria; the niceties of international law rooted in the Westphalian notion of states’ rights standing in the way of any responsibility to protect (R2P). Under international law, Syria has not explicitly granted permission for coalition airstrikes against the IS but to seek that authority, would politically for some nations, be seen as siding with or abetting that regime. It is difficult to see how saving Kobani from falling and avoiding yet more thousands of refugees could in any way be argued as helping Assad. On the contrary, allowing the IS to destroy the Kurds physically, only does what Assad’s regime was doing materially.

The same Westphalian niceties prevent the direct arming of the Kurds with more sophisticated weaponry, instead directing arms to the so far invisible Iraqi Army.

Pentagon preparing for long war in Iraq, Syria

By Robert Burns and Lolita C. Baldor 

The Associated Press

October 18, 2014

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U.S. Central Command commander Gen. Lloyd J. Austin III talks about the command's role in defeating the Islamic State militants during a media briefing at the Pentagon in Washington D.C., on Friday, Oct. 17, 2014. 

Aided by U.S. airstrikes, Kurds defending the Syrian town of Kobani recaptured more territory in what has turned into the biggest battle so far between the U.S.-led coalition and the extremist Islamic State. 

The U.S. cannot afford to lose Kobani to Islamic State fighters, said Robert Ford, the former U.S. ambassador to Syria. 

Syrian activists say the Islamic State militant group has captured some MiG fighter jets and is test-flying the warplanes in Syria with the help of former Iraqi air force pilots. 

One of the top U.S. Army leaders in Europe says he’s concerned that intensified efforts by the Islamic State to recruit more Europeans could pose a threat to Americans living overseas. 

WASHINGTON — Ten weeks into its war against Islamic State extremists, the Pentagon is settling in for the long haul, short on big early successes but still banking on enlisting Syrians and Iraqis to fight the ground war so that U.S. troops won't have to.

The U.S. general overseeing the campaign on Friday predicted that the jihadists will be "much degraded" by airstrikes a year from now, in part because he is focusing attacks on those resources that enable IS to sustain itself and resupply its fighters.

On Friday, for example, the U.S. military said one of its six airstrikes overnight in Syria hit several IS petroleum storage tanks and a pumping station — sites that are central to the militants' ability to resupply their forces and generate revenue. Likewise, it said two coalition airstrikes in Iraq damaged or destroyed IS military targets near the contested town of Beiji, home of Iraq's largest oil refinery.

In his first public overview of the campaign he leads from the Florida headquarters of U.S. Central Command, Army Gen. Lloyd Austin cautioned against expecting quick progress. He said he cannot predict how long it will take to right a wobbly Iraqi army and build a viable opposition ground force in Syria.

"The campaign to destroy ISIL will take time, and there will be occasional setbacks along the way," Austin told a Pentagon news conference, "particularly in these early stages of the campaign as we coach and mentor a force (in Iraq) that is actively working to regenerate capability after years of neglect and poor leadership."

While hammering the jihadists daily from the air, the U.S. military is talking of a years-long effort — one that will require more than aerial bombardment, will show results only gradually and may eventually call for a more aggressive use of U.S. military advisers in Iraq.

"This isn't going to get solved through 18 airstrikes around a particular town in a particular place in Syria. It's going to take a long time," the Pentagon press secretary, Rear Adm. John Kirby, said Thursday, referring to a recent concentration of American airstrikes on the Syrian city of Kobani, near the Turkish border.

That is one reason why the Pentagon is preparing to set up a more formally organized command structure, known in military parlance as a joint task force, to lead and coordinate the campaign from a forward headquarters, perhaps in Kuwait. On Wednesday it formally named the campaign "Operation Inherent Resolve."

As of Thursday the U.S. had launched nearly 300 airstrikes in Iraq and nearly 200 in Syria, and allies had tallied fewer than 100, according to Central Command. Those figures don't capture the full scope of the effort because many airstrikes launch multiple bombs on multiple targets. Central Command said that as of Wednesday, U.S. and partner-nation air forces had dropped nearly 1,400 munitions.

There’s Only One Way to Beat ISIS: Work with Assad and Iran

Leslie H. Gelb

10.18.14 

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The Obama administration has pulled together a coalition as ineffectual as it is unwilling. It's time to join up with the forces, however unsavory, that can do the job. 

Earlier this week, outside Washington, the Obama team hosted senior military leaders from nations pledged to help fight the so-called Islamic State, in a mission the Pentagon is now calling “Operation Inherent Resolve.” Representatives from 21 of the 60-odd countries appeared. Everyone, of course, was too polite to inquire about the embarrassing number of absentees. Nor did they comment on how little these partners have contributed to the war effort thus far, or on the fact that no new serious help has been promised. Least surprising of all was the absence of the only two nations that could help fight the jihadis now and in a tangible form. 

In the short term the only way to check ISIS, as the self-declared caliphate is widely known, is for the United States to work with Bashar Assad’s Syria, and with Iran. It is a tricky and perilous path, but there are no realistic alternatives. 

In short, here’s why: First, air power alone can’t stop, let alone, defeat ISIS. Even those who now demand an escalation of the overly restrained U.S. air campaign don’t argue that it is a solution. Second, neither Iraq nor American-backed Syrian rebels can field viable ground forces, at least for some time. Just look at their performance to date and see if the U.S. can afford to pretend otherwise. 

White House officials won’t publicly discuss the limited effectiveness of their air campaign because it’s the only action the U.S. and its partners can now agree to take. Privately, however, they understand well that missiles, drones and bombs can help Kurdish forces near Kurdistan, damage some jihadi-controlled oil refineries, and keep the militants from massing forces and armor. But that’s about it. 

The White House, however, does not grapple with the essentiality of good ground forces now. Instead, it resorts to its usual wishful thinking. The Iraqi army, the Obama team says, wouldn’t fight for Prime Minister Nuri al Maliki, but it will fight for a more responsive government. The solution was to depose Maliki, the sectarian Shiite prime minster, and to replace him with a more flexible Shiite who might accommodate the unhappy Sunnis and Kurds. 

No such luck. The newly installed regime shows little sign of being able to cure Iraq’s political ills, and Iraqi troops have become no more effective. It is not even certain that they can or will defend Baghdad or the oil facilities to the south. 

Neither can the Obama team shake its years-long rhetoric about salvation resting with equipping an army of Syrian democrats, the so-called moderate rebels. These rebels have formidable advocates in Washington, from Republicans like Senator John McCain to the likes of Hillary Clinton and Leon Panetta, but these devotees are overlooking basic facts. 

Factions within the Syrian National Coalition, the supposed overall leadership body for the rebels, haven’t been able to agree among themselves and exercise little oversight over rebel troops in the field. The rebels inside Syria, those whom Americans truly would like to help, are almost totally disorganized themselves. Their politics run from democratic to Islamic fundamentalist, and many have simply sold to the jihadis the very arms given to them by the U.S. 

Washington should, in fact, undertake a careful long-term program to arm and train these rebels so that over time they will be strong enough to fight and/or bargain with the Alawite Shiites in Damascus. It makes no sense, however, for Mr. Obama to continue promising urgent delivery of hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of arms to groups that could not possibly absorb them. 

Now is not the time for false virtue or moral absolutism. The working principle now has to be first threats first. 

The West Should Not Reject Russia’s Assistance in Afghanistan

by: PETR TOPYCHKANOV

OCTOBER 14, 2014

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Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai officially became the president of Afghanistan on September 29. The Security and Defense Cooperation Agreement, which will go into effect on January 1, 2015, was signed the next day. The agreement permits a limited U.S. troop presence on Afghan territory over a period of ten years. Kabul has promised to provide the troops with access to military facilities in Kabul, Bagram, Mazar-i-Sharif, Herat, Kandahar, Helmand, Gardez, Jalalabad, and Shindand. A similar agreement between NATO and Afghanistan was signed the same day.

The transfer of power in Kabul and the signing of the agreements with the United States and NATO again raise the question of security cooperation between Russia, Afghanistan, and its Western partners. Alexander Grushko, Russia’s permanent representative to NATO, said in an August interview that Russia remains interested in bilateral assistance to Afghanistan. However, Russia’s cooperation with the U.S. and NATO on Afghanistan was effectively frozen by the West in April. Expressing the official position of the Russian Federation, Ambassador Grushko called this decision counterproductive.

It is difficult to disagree with this assessment. Such a method of punishing Russia for the annexation of Crimea deprives the United States and NATO of the opportunity to more effectively strengthen Afghanistan’s defense capabilities and counteract the threats of terrorism and drug trafficking. Refusing Russia’s assistance in Afghanistan looks incredibly wasteful given the withdrawal of coalition troops from the country as well as the need to commit substantial resources to combatting the threat of ISIS in the Middle East and stemming the spread of the Ebola virus in Africa.

Russia’s cooperation with the West is crucial in securing Afghanistan’s peaceful future. Russia supplies the Afghan air force with helicopters, provides for their maintenance, and trains the country’s technical specialists. It also participates in counteracting drug production and trafficking and ensures the transit of U.S. and NATO military and civilian cargo through Russian territory. In September 2013, Russia and Afghanistan launched a joint initiative on border security.

The Ukrainian crisis will not be resolved in the foreseeable future, and Moscow is certainly not planning to reconsider its decision to annex Crimea. Therefore, the United States and NATO must revisit their decision to curtail cooperation with Russia, including on Afghanistan. Afghanistan should not be made into a hostage of the situation in Eastern Europe.

At this time, Washington and Brussels are confident that they can manage without Russia’s participation in solving Afghanistan’s security problems. Ahmadzai’s coming to power and the signing of the cooperation agreements only boosted their confidence; the West has ostensibly created favorable conditions for itself in Afghanistan, obviating the need to consider other external powers.

Many in Russia, Afghanistan, and other countries in the region do not share this view. First, despite the resolution of the political standoff between the two presidential candidates, the political situation in Afghanistan remains volatile. To ensure the regime’s survival, Ashraf Ghani Ahmadzai will have to balance between the interests of various forces inside the country, including the anti-Western factions, and external forces—Russia, China, Pakistan, Iran, India, and the Central Asian republics.

Second, whether the West likes it or not, Russia has long participated in multilateral and bilateral assistance projects in Afghanistan. The most promising recent example is the negotiations between Russia, Afghanistan, and India, and the resulting agreement on the India-sponsored export of Russian weapons to Afghanistan.

LAVROV: RUSSIA CANNOT LOSE UKRAINE

October 19, 2014 

Maxim Nikitin

http://fortunascorner.com/2014/10/19/lavrov-russia-cannot-lose-ukraine/

He said that Russia would support all efforts designed to implement the agreements, including those reached in Minsk that are already being implemented

MOSCOW, October 19 /TASS/. Ukraine is the closest fraternal nation for Russia with which it has “common historical, cultural and civilization roots, the same world outlook as well as language and literature, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in an interview with Russia’s NTV television channel.

Lavrov: gap in international relations is fraught with expansion of crisis zones

“We cannot lose Ukraine because it is not confined to a group of persons who committed a state coup and seized power; it is not confined to the Nazis who continue marching in Kiev and other big cities committing acts of vandalism, destroying monuments and glorifying Hitler’s accomplices,” Lavrov said.

“What’s happening in relations between our presidents proves that we are going to find the way out of the crisis anyway and will help the Ukrainian brothers to agree on how they should build and develop their country,” the Russian foreign minister told NTV.

He said that Russia would support all efforts designed to implement the agreements, including those reached in Minsk that are already being implemented, and those that were reached with participation of Russia, the United States and the European Union in Geneva this year.

In Geneva, the Ukrainians undertook a commitment to immediately start an open comprehensive and accountable national dialogue on the constitutional reform that was supposed to involve representatives of all regions and political forces in Ukraine, the Russian foreign minister said adding that “for some reasons unknown to us, this commitment has never been implemented.”

Is the oil crash a secret US war on Russia?

By Anthony ZurcherEditor, Echo Chambers

16 October 2014 

Lower oil prices, reflected in falling petrol prices at the pump, have been a boon for Western consumers. Are they also a potent US weapon against Russia and Iran?

That's the conclusion drawn by New York Times columnist Thomas L Friedman, who says the US and Saudi Arabia, whether by accident or design, could be pumping Russia and Iran to brink of economic collapse.

Despite turmoil in many of the world's oil-producing countries - Libya, Iraq, Nigeria and Syria - prices are hitting lows not seen in years, Friedman writes.

This is business, but it also has the feel of war by other means: oil”

Thomas FriedmanNew York Times

Analysts identify a number of possible reasons for the steep drop - increased US production, slowing economies in Europe and China and steady production from the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec).

Rather than look at the causes, however, Friedman says to look at the result - budget shortfalls in Russia and Iran - and what it means.

Who benefits? He asks. The US wants its Ukraine-related sanctions against Russia to have more bite. Both the Saudis and the US are fighting a proxy war against Iran in Syria.

"This is business, but it also has the feel of war by other means: oil," he writes.

Paul Richter of the Los Angeles Times agrees that both Russia and Iran are starting to feel the squeeze of lower prices, although he doesn't go as far as Friedman in speculating about a secret war.

New York Times columnist Tom Friedman says it's tough going for petro-dictators

"The economic pressure isn't expected to change Putin's aggressive efforts to retain strong influence over Ukraine, which he considers non-negotiable," Richter writes. "But they are causing strains in his relations with the Russian elite and business establishment, two pillars of his political support."

For Russia, Asia Is No Substitute for the West

by: AKIO KAWATO

OCTOBER 16, 2014

Facing Western sanctions, some Russian pundits are rushing to find an easy way out through increased cooperation with Asia. But their expectations are built on an illusion.

Firstly, neither China nor Japan possesses the technology needed for exploitation of non-conventional oil and natural gas. Japan has a monopoly on gas liquefaction technology, but that is another matter, because, if new sources of natural gas are not developed, liquefaction plants will be of no use. China may be able to provide huge advance payments for oil and gas from Siberia, but Russia will not be able to find any other suppliers of long-term credit in Asia.

Secondly, Siberia and the Russian Far East are too economically feeble to become a dynamic member of the East Asian economy. Industrial products made in European Russia face high transportation costs en route to Asia, and the natural resource wealth to the east of the Urals needs money and time to be further developed.

Tensions with the United States have led Russia to look inwards and eastwards, imperiling its own position in the global economy. Contrary to Russian conventional wisdom, the United States does not always “impose its terms” on other countries; many countries benefit politically, economically, and militarily from their relations with Washington. The U.S. dollar remains the international reserve currency because it is the most reliable, universal, and convenient currency for business. The global free market that arose after World War II has given countries like Japan the opportunity to achieve rapid growth. Negotiations over the TPP (Transpacific Partnership) and the TTIP (Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership) are stalled for now, but not because Japan and Europe have chosen to stand up to U.S. pressure; Japan, for example, is simply unsure whether the agreements will be ratified by the U.S. Congress without amendments. Otherwise, the industrially developed countries see serious advantages to promote free trade.

The ruble and the renminbi are used in international transactions, but only on a limited scale as mere accounting units in bilateral payments. In this way, they remind us of the “transferable ruble” used by the socialist “COMECON” countries during the Cold War; the currency existed on paper but did not contribute to an expansion of trade.

Some Russian pundits lay vain hope on the “increasingly independent” policies of Germany and Japan in relation to the United States. However, this independence has its own limits. Neither country intends to discard its cozy “dependence” on U.S. military might.

Understanding Turkey’s Take on the Islamic State

by: MARC PIERINI

OCTOBER 17, 2014

In a week when Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan made a surprise anti-Western statement while generals from the anti–Islamic State coalition countries (including Turkey) met in the United States, many are puzzled by Turkey’s attitude in the fight against the terrorist group.

Officially, Turkey is ready to take its “full share” in the coalition, subject to two conditions, which Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu reiterated in the country’s parliament on October 14. First, the coalition must agree on a plan for removing the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad; and second, allies must put in place a no-fly zone over Syria’s northern borders and a safe zone on the ground.

Removing the Assad regime is not currently a Western priority. The Syrian president still enjoys the full support of Moscow and Tehran, which would make an agreement at the UN Security Council impossible. This raises the question of how Ankara could possibly promote an action bound to be immediately opposed by Russia and Iran, which incidentally provide 76 percent of Turkey’s gas needs.

In addition, the notion that atrocities committed by the Islamic State are “conveniently” hiding those perpetrated by the Assad regime, as underlined by an adviser to the Turkish president, can hardly justify Western inaction toward the jihadists. The Islamic State is directly threatening hundreds of thousands of Syrian Kurds as well as Turkey and its Western European allies.

Turkey’s second demand, a no-fly zone, is considered by Western military experts as yesterday’s good idea. It could have been a useful device in 2011 or 2012, when the Assad regime unleashed attacks on civilians in northern Syria, but it was not implemented. Meanwhile, as a result of the Assad regime’s atrocities and the recent Islamic State offensive, over 1.5 million Syrians have sought refuge in Turkey, according to government figures.

By now, the Islamic State controls about 250 kilometers (155 miles) of Syria’s border with the Turkish provinces of Kilis, Gaziantep, and Şanlıurfa, while other terrorist organizations control a stretch of the frontier with the Turkish province of Hatay. This leaves two areas in great danger of facing an Islamic State ethnic-cleansing offensive, namely Syria’s predominantly Kurdish districts of Afrin and Qamishli. In the latter, the main city is disputed between the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) and regime forces.

In Syria, it is primarily the Kurdish districts that are in need of protection.

A safe zone on the ground in northern Syria would protect civilian populations in these two districts and avoid widespread massacres. But the idea would be meaningless in Islamic State–controlled territory unless the coalition launched an all-out ground offensive against the jihadists.

This raises questions of consistency for Turkey: Is Ankara ready to protect Syrian Kurds across its border while at the same time claiming that the Syrian Kurds’ PYD is affiliated to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which Turkey brands a terrorist organization comparable with the Islamic State? And would a no-fly zone over parts of Syria not invite air strikes from the Assad regime?

New sick man of Europe?

by Radha Kapoor Sharma 

October 22, 2014 

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The recent pronouncement by the managing director of John Lewis, that France is “finished”, that it is a “sclerotic, hopeless and downbeat” country where “nothing works and, worse, nobody cares about it”, provoked a floodtide of ripostes and aggrieved accusations of “French bashing” from across the channel. Though he later apologised, his comments had touched a raw nerve. The French are battling a severe case of collective despondency about the future. This famous French malaise has percolated through all layers of society, dissipating any lingering illusions of grandeur.

The political landscape never looked bleaker. Distant seem the days of leaders with vision and grand ambition, like Charles de Gaulle and even Francois Mitterrand. Instead, France has to make do with uncharismatic President Francois Hollande (the most unpopular president in modern French history, with a popularity rating that touched 13 per cent), who, unsurprisingly, has a reputation for perpetually having one eye on the opinion polls. Hollande’s efforts to project himself as a statesman of international stature and as the US’s principal ally in the fight against terrorism in the Middle East are somewhat undermined by his inability to control his own fractious Socialist Party and rebellious members of government. His image took a further beating because of former companion Valérie Trierweiler’s tell-all memoir, which shows him in poor light.

The main opposition party, the UMP, in severe in-fighting mode, appeared to be on the verge of a split when, like a knight in shining armour, Nicolas Sarkozy rode into the political breach. The announcement of his return to politics brought temporary respite and the party appeared to be rallying around him. But old ambitions die hard and bitter rivalries have resurfaced. In the meantime, Marine Le Pen’s radical, far-right National Front has been making inexorable inroads into both left and right vote banks, wresting two senate seats for the very first time in the latest elections. In an unprecedented development, opinion polls show that each party enjoys the support of approximately 30 per cent of the voters and suggest a repeat of the 2002 presidential election: a second-round runoff between the UMP and National Front candidates. That the far-right is forging ahead is unsurprising, given the economic doldrums France finds itself in.

Labelled by some as the new “sick man of Europe”, France’s economy is certainly ailing. The country’s rate of growth is close to zero (0.3 per cent), unemployment is over 10 per cent, public debt is around 95.1 per cent of the GDP, and the deficit is 4.3 per cent. Disposable income has shrunk and the spectre of joblessness haunts the young, while for the old, the prospect of diminished pensions seems all too real. Strikes seem the order of the day, as one after the other, various groups — air-traffic controllers, notaries, Air France pilots, pharmacists — make desperate attempts to safeguard their benefits. Hollande’s new measures to spur growth are met, for the most part, with the dismissive Gallic shrug and indifference, indicative of his lack of credibility in the eyes of the population.

This economic quagmire has engendered social tensions. In some dreary, high-rise suburbs, unemployment is as high as 40 per cent for the under-25s, who feel marginalised and discriminated against because of their immigrant origins. All it takes is a minor incident for the feeling of despair that prevails in these neighbourhoods to be ignited into violence. In recent months, the spark was provided by the Gaza conflict, exploited by radical groups to fan violence and anti-Semitism. France, home to Europe’s largest populations of both Jews and Muslims, has, of-late, witnessed the rise of both anti-Semitism and Islamophobia.