imp papers

ORF-Heritage Report

Indo-US Cooperation on Internet Governance and Cyber Security

http://cyfy.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Cyber_Complete-Heritage.pdf

West Asia Monitor

http://www.orfonline.org/cms/export/orfonline/modules/westasia/attachments/wam1_1414834190402.pdf

South China Sea Monitor

http://www.orfonline.org/cms/sites/orfonline/modules/southchina/SouthChinaDetail.html?cmaid=74314&mmacmaid=74315&volumeno=III&issueno=11

Cyber Monitor

http://www.orfonline.org/cms/export/orfonline/html/cyber/Cyber_Monitor11.pdf

Energy News Monitor

http://www.orfonline.org/cms/sites/orfonline/modules/newsbrief/NewsBriefDetail.html?cmaid=74972&mmacmaid=74973&volumeno=XI&issueno=22

Africa Weekly

http://www.orfonline.org/cms/sites/orfonline/modules/africaweekly/AfricaWeeklyDetail.html?cmaid=74652&mmacmaid=74653&volumeno=IV&issueno=26

South Asia Weekly Report

http://www.orfonline.org/cms/sites/orfonline/modules/weeklyassessment/WeeklyAssessmentDetail.html?cmaid=74974&mmacmaid=74975&volumeno=VII&issueno=46

China Weekly

http://www.orfonline.org/cms/sites/orfonline/modules/chinaweekly/ChinaWeeklyDetail.html?cmaid=74618&mmacmaid=74619&volumeno=IV&issueno=35

Issue Brief s

Army Aviation: Does the Army Need its own Air Force?

Pranay S. Ahluwalia

http://www.orfonline.org/cms/export/orfonline/modules/issuebrief/attachments/ib_81_1416045901759.pdf

India and Saudi Arabia: The Scope for Greater Security Cooperation

Kanchi Gupta

http://www.orfonline.org/cms/export/orfonline/modules/issuebrief/attachments/issue_brief_80_1415250580351.pdf

Seminar Series

Rivers of Conflict or Rivers of Peace : Water Sharing between India and China

Prof Pranab Kumar Ray

http://www.orfonline.org/cms/export/orfonline/modules/orfseminarseries/attachments/Seminar-Series_1416034918447.pdf

A Peek Inside a Secret USAF Intel Fusion Center at Langley AFB, Virginia

Marcus Weisgerber

November 18, 2014

A Look Inside a Secret US Air Force Intelligence Center

LANGLEY AIR FORCE BASE, Va. – While there might not be any American combat boots on the ground in Syria, dozens of manned and unmanned aircraft dot the skies above gathering video and other types of intelligence about the movement of Islamic State militants. The images collected by those aircraft are streamed by satellites in near real-time thousands of miles away to Langley Air Force Base in southern Virginia. 

Here in a dimly lit room about the half the size of a football field, airmen — some not even old enough to legally drink alcohol — stare at computer screens interpreting people’s movements and producing intelligence reports that could ultimately be read by President Barack Obama. And without those soldiers on the ground in Syria and Iraq providing context, it’s largely up to these intelligence analysts to distinguish the good guys from the bad guys.

“If you’re looking at the ground and you’re watching folks moving on the ground, to tell a Shia from a Sunni is pretty hard to do,” Gen. Hawk Carlisle, the head of Air Combat Command, said Monday. “Unless ISIS is actually flying a flag that says ‘ISIS’ across the top of it, then it’s sometimes more difficult to tell … where those folks fit on whether they’re combatants or not.”

With no ground forces to identify targets for air strikes, the airmen here at the 480th Intelligence Surveillance and Reconnaissance Wing headquarters, have to process information quickly and accurately, said Col. Timothy Haugh, the unit’s commander. In Afghanistan, for example, a ground commander brings context to pictures gathered from the sky. So if an intel analyst has a question, he or she could give a call to a colleague on the ground for clarification.

“Without a commander on the ground, that puts that responsibility on us to be able to take every piece of data and make it make sense to the supporting commander,” Haugh said. “That is a harder challenge to do certain targets in that environment.”

The Growing Reach of ISIS in North Africa

Der Spiegel

November 18, 2014

The ‘Caliphate’s’ Colonies: Islamic State’s Gradual Expansion into North Africa

The caliphate has a beach. It is located on the Mediterranean Sea around 300 kilometers (186 miles) south of Crete in Darna. The eastern Libya city has a population of around 80,000, a beautiful old town and an 18th century mosque, from which the black flag of the Islamic State flies. The port city is equipped with Sharia courts and an “Islamic Police” force which patrols the streets in all-terrain vehicles. A wall has been built in the university to separate female students from their male counterparts and the disciplines of law, natural sciences and languages have all been abolished. Those who would question the city’s new societal order risk death.

Darna has become a colony of terror, and it is the first Islamic State enclave in North Africa. The conditions in Libya are perfect for the radical Islamists: a disintegrating state, a location that is strategically well situated and home to the largest oil reserves on the continent. Should Islamic State (IS) manage to establish control over a significant portion of Libya, it could trigger the destabilization of the entire Arab world.

The IS puts down roots wherever chaos reigns, where governments are weakest and where disillusionment over the Arab Spring is deepest. In recent weeks, terror groups that had thus far operated locally have quickly begun siding with the extremists from IS.

In September, it was the Algerian group Soldiers of the Caliphate that threw in its lot with Islamic State. As though following a script, the group immediately beheaded a French mountaineer and uploaded the video to the Internet. In October, the “caliphate” was proclaimed in Darna. And last week, the strongest Egyptian terrorist group likewise announced its affiliation with IS.

The Latest Label of Horror

THE LESSONS OF THE DEAD IN HELMAND

George Vlachonikolis

November 19, 2014

Before reading this review, there are two things you should know about Dead Men Risen.

While new to the American market, the book has been around for a while. Dead Men Risen was first published in March 2011. It was received with much critical acclaim, became a Sunday Times bestseller and won the 2012 Orwell Prize for books. An American edition has just been published by Regenry.

Dead Men Risen is banned in Estonia. The author, Toby Harnden, cites “unlawful processing of sensitive personal data” as the reason he was given for its suppression. This isn’t the first time, however, that the book has caused controversy. Prior to its March 2011 release, the Ministry of Defence bought the entire first print-run batch of 24,000 copies and immediately pulped them. They argued that issues concerning national security had come to light after an official review and subsequently requested that various sections be censored. These sections now appear “blacked out” in the actual book.

First and foremost, Dead Men Risen is the story of 1st Battalion Welsh Guards (1WG) and their deployment to Afghanistan in summer 2009. It succeeds at more than that though. In the early stages, it offers the reader a more complete view of the battalion in terms of its recent history – such as the sinking of the Sir Galahad in the Falklands – and also details backgrounds of many of the men that have filled its ranks. Once in Helmand, however, descriptions of combat operations take center stage. In 2009, the British campaign was reaching a crisis point; they went on to suffer 106 fatalities that year (16 of which were Welsh Guardsmen) and a further 103 the next. Dead Men Risen succeeds in both clearing a path through that intensely chaotic and violent period and also in pausing at each terrible moment to reflect on its likely causes and devastating consequences. It offers the reader a full 360 degree view by discussing various people’s viewpoints (sometimes contradictory) and following through with the impact on both the deployed men and their families back home. As a veteran of Helmand myself, I endured a number of strong emotions in reading Dead Men Risen but my overriding feeling after putting the book down was one of closure – like the author had answered all my questions. And thus, as the story of 1WG’s deployment, it is a complete package.

Achieving Disaster Resilience in U.S. Communities

By Stephanie Sanok Kostro, Garrett Riba 

NOV 17, 2014 

http://csis.org/publication/achieving-disaster-resilience-us-communities

Executive Branch, Congressional, and Private-Sector Efforts 

This report examines the disaster resilience efforts of the executive and legislative branches of government and public-private partnerships. Its recommendations are the product of a series of dialogues hosted by the CSIS Homeland Security and Counterterrorism Program and the Irene W. and C.B. Pennington Foundation. Reflecting thoughts, findings, and viewpoints gleaned from the series, the authors provide guidance for officials who want to make progress in bolstering planning, partnerships, and capabilities to address the real, localized, and oftentimes devastating effects of natural disasters. 

Publisher CSIS/Rowman & Littlefield 

ISBN 978-1-4422-4037-7 (pb); 978-1-4422-4038-4 (eBook) 

Purchase

Download PDF file of "Achieving Disaster Resilience in U.S. Communities"

THE BACK FOOT IN UKRAINE - A new third phase of the crisis

Krishnan Srinivasan 

November 18, 2014 

Pro-Russian separatists with a picture of Stalin in Donetsk, 

Ukraine has slipped from the Indian headlines, but it is still the prime security concern in Europe. With Nato engaging in more frequent and bigger military exercises, and Russia responding with aggressive patrolling by sea and air, there have been 11 dangerously close encounters this year, three of which were considered ‘high risk’. In Ukraine itself, following the separatist elections in Donetsk and Lugansk on November 2 and the Russian ‘acceptance’ of the result — acceptance, not approval, the Russian spokesman was quick to clarify — the crisis in Ukraine has moved into a new third phase.

The first phase had ended with the re-unification of Crimea with Russia, the Ukraine government’s signing of the association agreement with the European Union and the first round of Western sanctions against Russia. The last two events represented the Euro-American challenge to Russian authority in Ukraine in the backdrop of the exchange of accusations that were shot through with the rhetoric of a new Cold War.

The second phase of the Ukraine crisis closed shortly after the Ukrainian parliamentary elections in October, when President Poroshenko’s party emerged as the largest in the Rada, and culminated in the wholesale collapse of Western initiatives to build on the first phase, initiatives that were designed to lead to a consolidation of authority by Kiev over the whole of Ukraine and abject submission by Russia. The Western retreat was occasioned by the EU’s desperation that the escalating situation would jeopardize Europe’s gas supplies (30 per cent of requirements) from Russia during the approaching winter, and the conviction that an association agreement with a country where the economy was so unstable would be of little help to an EU itself faced with several economic and financial difficulties.

Russia and China Leading Culprits in Riusing Number of Cyber Attacks on German Computers, German Intel Chief

November 19, 2014

Top German spy says Berlin under cyber attack from other states

The president of the German Federal Office For Protection Of The Constitution (Bundesamt fuer Verfassungsschutz) Hans-Georg Maassen attends a ceremony marking the 10th anniversary of the Joint Counter-Terrorism Centre (Gemeinsames Terrorismusabwehrzentrum, GTAZ) in Berlin October 28, 2014.

(Reuters) - German government and business computers are coming under increasing cyber attack every day from other states’ spy agencies, especially those of Russia and China, Germany’s domestic intelligence (BfV) chief said on Tuesday.

Addressing a cybersecurity conference in Berlin, Hans Georg Maassen said that of an estimated 3,000 daily attacks by hackers or criminals on German government systems, around five were the handiwork of intelligence services. The latter are so sophisticated that they can easily be overlooked, he added.

"We have seen that there are ever more frequent attacks by foreign intelligence agencies on the German government IT infrastructure," he said.

These occur most frequently, Maasen said, before major international meetings such as a G20 conference, where government advisers might receive a virus email purporting to be from another country’s negotiators.

Autumn 2014 Issue of Parameters Now Online

by SWJ Editors

November 17, 2014 

Autumn 2014, Vol. 44 No. 3

Special Commentary

Renewing the Motivational Power of the Army's Professional Ethic

by Don M. Snider

Confronting the "Islamic State"

Understanding the Strengths and Vulnerabilites of ISIS

by W. Andrew Terrill

Priming Strategic Communications: COuntering the Appeal of ISIS

by David S. Sorenson

Towards a Regional Strategy Contra ISIS

by Ross Harrison

We Love the Pentagon’s ‘Encyclopedia of Ethical Failure’

Source Link

It’s a hilarious—and infuriating—database of the government’s ethical shortcomings

Ethically, it’s been a rough couple of years for the military.

In July 2013, an Air Force major general went on an epic five-day benderwhile on a diplomatic mission in Russia. That November, Navy officialslaunched an investigation into misconduct involving top officers and a Malaysian contractor named Fat Leonard.

The Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction has releasedreport after report detailing corruption and waste by contractors and military officials.

Individually, the cases are all bad news. The good news is that authorities often catch and punish government cheats, thieves and frauds. Penalties for ripping off the American taxpayer range from huge fines to hard time in prison.

And when the trial ends and punishment begins, many military ethics cases wind up in the Pentagon’s Encyclopedia of Ethical Failure.

That’s right, the military maintains a database of the federal government’s worst ethics violators. Unlike many government documents, the encyclopedia is clear, easy to read … and actually quite funny. Many of the stories are as amusing as they are aggravating.

It might be the most light-hearted official report anyone’s ever written about criminals.

“Imaginary Ball and Chain Drags Staff Sergeants Down” is one highlight. The Army pays its soldiers a monthly housing allowance. Married soldiers get more cash than singles do.

To game the system, one sergeant convinced his girlfriend to pretend to be his wife. He even forged a marriage license to substantiate the union. He took taxpayers for almost $30,000 in healthcare and housing.

“The relationship must have gone sour, though,” the report reads. “She ended up turning him in to military investigators. After such a betrayal, one can only assume he will now be filing for a fake divorce.”

This kind of amusing commentary is the norm in the encyclopedia. “We try to keep it more entertaining than a U.S. attorney prosecution news release,” an official at the Department of Defense’s Standards of Conduct Office told War Is Boring.

The Standards of Conduct Office handles these kinds of cases for the Pentagon. “We are the principal ethics adviser for the secretary of defense and those serving in his office,” the official said.

The office is also responsible for updating The Encyclopedia of Ethical Failures.

A little friendly instruction at the Edwards Air Force Base golf course. Air Force photo

Global Nuclear Disarmament: The Humanitarian Consequences Route

Manpreet Sethi

ICSSR Senior Fellow affiliated with the Centre for Air Power Studies (CAPS)

17 November 2014

The tenacity of nuclear weapons to continue to exist is evident. At the end of the Cold War, many wrote obituaries claiming that these weapons would soon be the “detritus of the Cold War.” Nothing however, could have been further from the truth. Half a century later, the weapons are still around in large enough numbers to pose dangerous risks to humanity. 

It is in this context that it is interesting to examine a two-year old development that has taken a new approach to the challenge of ridding the world of nuclear weapons. This is the initiative that was primarily spearheaded by Norway, Mexico, Austria, Ireland, Switzerland and New Zealand. It hit headlines in March 2013 when the first conference on humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons was held in Oslo. It focused on the impact of nuclear weapons on human life. Based on testimonies of the hibakushas (survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki), and presentations from factual studies on effects of nuclear explosions, 128 countries reached the conclusion that effects of the use of nuclear weapons were not constrained by borders and that no single nation or international body had the resources or the capability to deal with the consequences. Interestingly, India and Pakistan were the only nuclear-armed states that chose to participate in the conference. The five NPT nuclear weapon states, and Israel and North Korea, ignored the congregation.

Eleven months later, in March 2014, an even larger number of nations, 146 this time (though still not the NWS) came together in Mexico to further highlight the humanitarian challenges of nuclear weapon explosions. More and detailed studies were presented on the long term socio-economic impact of use of nuclear weapons. It was established that reconstruction of infrastructure and regeneration of the socio-economic parameters on which we today measure quality of life would take decades to rebuild if the world were to witness a nuclear exchange. However, the only possessors in the Conference were from India and Pakistan. Seven other nuclear-armed states, two of which own more than 90 per cent of the global nuclear stockpile, evinced no interest in the subject!

Ten months from then, on 8-9 December this year, a third Conference on the subject is being hosted by the government of Austria in Vienna. It proposes to specifically focus on the impact of nuclear explosions on human health, climate, food security and infrastructure. Also included are sessions on inadvertent nuclear use as a result of human and technical factors such as error, negligence, miscalculations, miscommunications, cyber interference, technical faults etc. 

Obama’s revival in foreign policy

By Nicholas Burns

NOVEMBER 19, 2014

EPA

President Obama and Myanmar opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi held a joint press conference at her residence in Yangon last week.

THIS WEEK’S international headlines look awfully daunting to Americans. Tuesday’s vicious Palestinian terrorist attack in Jerusalem reminds us anew of the raw presence of hatred and violence that rules the streets of the modern Middle East. The Ebola outbreak continues to plague three poor countries in West Africa. Russia continues its merciless assault on eastern Ukraine. No wonder then that President Obama is looking toward Asia as the region where he has long wanted to pivot and where there are positive, even historic, opportunities for US foreign policy.

In fact, Obama’s trip last week to China, Myanmar, and Australia was one of the most successful of his presidency. The key stop was Beijing, where Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping announced a bilateral climate change agreement in which they committed to major reductions in carbon emissions and effectively challenged the rest of the world to reach a global agreement in 2015. Obama and Xi also agreed on badly needed transparency measures between Chinese and American armed forces in Asia and on important trade and visa arrangements.

What is most encouraging about the climate deal is that the United States and China are learning to meet global challenges together. And it validates Obama’s determination, starting at the 2013 Sunnylands Summit in California, to build a strong working relationship with Xi, China’s most powerful and self-confident leader since Deng Xiaoping.

Obama can also take indirect credit for last week’s first-ever meeting between Asia’s dueling rivals — Xi and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. Their desultory photo op told a thousand words — these two nationalist leaders don’t like each other very much but have pulled back from their showdown over the Senkaku islands in the East China Sea. By making clear last spring that the United States would honor its defense obligations to Japan in the event of a conflict there, Obama sent an important signal to China to defuse the crisis.

The Geography of Terrorism

KATHY GILSINAN

NOV 18 2014

Source Link

More than 80 percent of last year's terrorism fatalities occurred in just five countries.

Institute for Economics and Peace

Of the 17,958 people who died in terrorist attacks in 2013, 82 percent were in one of five countries: Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Nigeria, and Syria. That's one finding from this year's Global Terrorism Index report, published by the Institute for Economics and Peace. The report is based on data from the University of Maryland's Global Terrorism Database, which has information on more than 125,000 terrorist attacks between 1970 and 2013.

The report found a 61-percent jump in terrorism fatalities between 2012 and 2013. "Over the same period," the authors wrote, "the number of countries that experienced more than 50 [terrorism-related] deaths rose from 15 to 24"—an indication that the problem of terrorism was getting both more fatal and more widespread a year before ISIS declared a new caliphate.

But it's also striking where terrorism didn't occur. Much of the increase in terrorism-related fatalities in 2013 took place in Iraq, where terrorists claimed nearly 4,000 lives—a 168-percent increase over 2012. Worldwide, Iraq was the worst-affected country, accounting for 34 percent of terrorism-related fatalities in 2013, with Afghanistan ranked next with 17.3 percent. Meanwhile, between 2000 and 2013, the report found, around 5 percent of terrorism-related fatalities occurred in the 34 wealthy countries of the OECD. In 2013 specifically, there were 113 terrorism-related deaths in OECD countries—0.6 percent of the worldwide total. Six of these took place in the United States.

Deaths From Terrorism, 2000-2013

Global Terrorism Database/Institute for Economics and Peace

Odierno: Changing World Requires New Look at Army’s Size

By Jim Garamone,DoD News, Defense Media Activity

November 19, 2014 

Source Link

WASHINGTON, Nov. 19, 2014 – The Army is going to shrink, the service’s chief of staff said here today, but leaders must be careful that cuts aren’t draconian.

Speaking to NPR’s Tom Bowman at the Defense One Summit, Gen. Ray Odierno said events around the world have added their own pressure as leaders debate what ultimately will be the size of the force.

Next year, the Army’s active force will drop to 490,000 soldiers. Given budget realities, leaders have said the service likely will drop to 440,000 to 450,000 in the future, with some estimates putting the number at 420,000 if sequestration spending cuts resume in fiscal 2016.

Odierno has warned repeatedly that dropping the size of the force too low increases military risk.

“When we developed the new defense strategy in 2012, we all agreed that 490,000 was the right strength to execute the strategy,” the general said. “Then what happened on top of that was sequestration, which has caused the Defense Department to make more difficult decisions.”

Force Cuts Mean Increased Risk Level

Reviews after sequestration spending cuts kicked in said the Army still could execute its assigned missions, he added, but would increase the level of risk.

But the world has a say. When leaders made those assessments, Russia hadn’t annexed Crimea and threatened the rest of Ukraine. The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant hadn’t invaded northern and western Iraq. Ebola hadn’t metastasized in West Africa.

Today, the United States has an Army brigade from Fort Hood, Texas, in Europe to demonstrate U.S. resolve to defend the region.

The Warrior Ethos at Risk: H.R. McMaster’s Remarkable Veterans Day Speech

by Janine Davidson

November 18, 2014

Source Link

Lieutenant General H.R. McMaster, director of the Army Capabilities an Integration Center and deputy commanding general of futures for the U.S. Army Training Doctrine Command, speaks at Georgetown University's Veterans Day ceremony. (Georgetown University Office of Communications) 

On November 11, Lieutenant General H.R. McMaster, Director of the Army Capabilities Integration Center (ARCIC) of U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command, gave the keynote address at Georgetown University’s Veterans Day ceremony. His message was simple and powerful: the study of war should not be confused with its advocacy; today’s stakes are higher than ever; the warrior ethos is threatened by both tech evangelists (who believe all conflict might be resolved at a safe distance) and a growing gap between the U.S. military and civil society. It’s a remarkably lucid speech by one of the Army’s most energetic leaders. You can read the whole text below: 

Dr. Degioia, faculty, administrators, students, guests—and especially veterans. 

Good afternoon. It is a great honor for me to participate in this celebration. My thanks to Georgetown University and the Student Veterans Association and the Hoya ROTC battalion. It is a particular privilege to celebrate Veterans Day at an elite university that has both educated and been shaped by our nation’s veterans. I would like to begin by thanking, on behalf of all veterans, the university leadership for making Georgetown the top-rated college for veterans. 

Tools of the Trade A Lieutenant’s Life Lessons in Leadership, Part II

https://medium.com/@Doctrine_Man/tools-of-the-trade-d766e0a3207c

“There I was, no shit… “

There’s an old adage that all good war stories begin with those five words. This story is no different. It begins on a summer day in 1989, in a maintenance shop on the far side of Fort Campbell, Kentucky, where I was busy combing through a deadline report when a line of warrant officers filed by the shop counter, bound for the exit.

“Where are you guys headed?” I asked.

“WOLT,” the CW4 leading the group responded, moving on by as if this was an everyday occurrence.

As they passed through the exit and down the stairs into the hot morning sun, I looked over to my maintenance control sergeant, a newly-promoted master sergeant who until recently had been my platoon sergeant.

“WOLT?” I asked. “What the hell is ‘WOLT’?”

“Warrant Officer Lunch Time,” he replied flatly.

“It’s only 1100,” I answered. “Isn't that a little early?”

“They're warrant officers, L-T, what do you expect?” Good point.

In the months that followed, I learned about WOLT – and its nefarious cousin, EWOLT (Early Warrant Officer Lunch Time) – as I matured into my job and grew closer to the maintenance technicians in my charge. Long before books like Coffee Lunch Coffee became popular and social media was the norm, WOLT and EWOLT were the networking tools of choice. During lengthy lunches of ice tea and jaeger schnitzel at the old Rod and Gun Club, we devised detailed maintenance plans, strategized with Logistics Assistance Representatives, and synchronized a steady flow of repair parts that secured readiness across much of the division. For a young lieutenant, however, the education extended beyond the “shop talk” that dominated our meals.

Irascible on the surface, underneath the gruff exterior was a seasoned mentor with a lifetime of lessons to impart on those willing to listen.

Left over on the table

Written by Ajay Jakhar

November 20, 2014 

We should implement subsidies that are inversely proportional to land operating sizes.

Indiaseemsrelieved,having convinced the United States to advocate on its behalf at the WTO regarding the issues arising from its food security programmes, while food-exporting nations are rejoicing at New Delhi signing on the dotted line without insisting on a reduction of farm support in developed countries. As we defend public procurement and stock holding, they will be looking at opportunities to export to India high-value produce like fruit, vegetables, milk, poultry and pulses.

Food prices have been rising for the past many years; more so since 2007. As a result, food-importing countries, usually developing nations, are not overly interested in subsidy reduction in developed countries, because this would increase the cost of their food imports.

Now that the trade facilitation agreement is inevitable, the government must insist on the removal of the many unresolved anomalies and ambiguities in the international trade architecture before a final agreement is inked. Farm support that increases production and skews the market price is considered trade distorting. At the WTO, the market price prevailing in 1986-88 is the “reference price” used for calculating subsidies. Had this reference price been updated — say it was the average price of the preceding three years — we would not be in any danger of breaching the WTO subsidy limit of 10 per cent. Logically, it shouldn’t bother anyone if our support price is less than the prevailing international price. Yet, other rice-exporting nations complain about our rice subsidies.

We could also evoke the WTO Agreement on Agriculture, where “due consideration is given to the influence of excessive rates of inflation on the ability of any member to abide by its domestic support commitments”. Inflation over the past 25 years (about 600 per cent) warrants our not being able to abide by domestic support commitments.

A Modi doctrine?

Written by Christophe Jaffrelot

November 20, 2014 

When he received Xi in Gujarat, Modi announced that China was prepared to invest massively in India.

Many commentators have (often pleasantly) been surprised by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s considerable investment in foreign policy, borne out by his incessant trips to various countries. Yet this is what one should expect from nationalist leaders. Was it not the trademark of Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who demonstrated it in an even more dramatic manner by testing India’s nuclear devices immediately after taking power in 1998?

But foreign policy is not composed only of assertions of power or the tamasha (spectacle) of occasions such as the G-20 meet. It must pursue coherent goals and result in achievements that may or may not appeal to the public, such as the Indo-US nuclear deal. Modi’s foreign policy seems to highlight two priorities: India’s economic interests (something Manmohan Singh also emphasised, occasionally confusing pragmatism with opportunism) and its immediate neighbourhood (for security reasons, among other things).

The economic dimension of Modi’s diplomacy was evident in early September, when he went to Japan, his first trip out of South Asia. During his visit there, Modi declared, “Mere blood mein money hai (Money is in my blood)” — reportedly, he often makes it a point to speak in Hindi with foreigners. Modi’s meeting with Japan’s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe resulted in Japanese assurances of cooperation on a Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train link and on upgrading the ship-breaking yard at Alang. Collaboration between India and Japan will probably be bolstered by the strong personal equation between Modi and Abe, which flows partly from their ideological affinities. But Japan’s economic dynamism today is not what it was after Abe administered shock therapy in the first year of his tenure. This month, the country even slipped into recession.

NEHRU’S PACIFISM HAD NEARLY COST US TAWANG

Claude Arpi 

20 November 2014 

It is entirely due to Major Bob Khathing's courage and swift action, backed by the Assam Governor, that Tawang is part of India. Had Jawaharlal Nehru had his way, it would have been Chinese territory today

While the legacy of Jawaharlal Nehru is being discussed by ‘eminent’ personalities at the Nehru International Conference, organised by the Indian National Congress to commemorate Nehru’s 125th birth anniversary, it is perhaps time to stop using the usual clichés about the first Prime Minister’s 17 years at India’s helm. By the way, I seriously doubt if many of the invitees of the conference have read any of the 58 volumes of Nehru’s Selected Works.

During the recent months, many have questioned the audacity to compare Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel to Nehru, but it is obvious that the Sardar would have been a far more decisive Prime Minister than the Pandit. Remember Kashmir.

In a rare interview, Field Marshal Sam Manekshaw, who was Director of Military Operations at the time of independence, recounted a historic meeting presided over by Lord Mountbatten held at the end of October 1947: “There was Jawaharlal Nehru, there was Sardar Patel, there was Sardar Baldev Singh… I knew Sardar Patel, because Patel would insist that VP Menon [Secretary in the Ministry of States] take me with him to the various states.”

The young Brigadier continues his narration: “At the morning meeting [Mountbatten] handed over the [Kashmir’s Instrument of Accession] thing. Mountbatten turned around and said, ‘Come on Manekji (he called me Manekji instead of Manekshaw), what is the military situation?’ I gave him the military situation, and told him that unless we flew in troops immediately, we would have lost Srinagar, because going by road would take days, and once the tribesmen got to the airport and Srinagar, we couldn’t fly troops in. Everything was ready at the airport.”

The future hero of the Bangladesh War then recalls: “As usual Nehru talked about the United Nations, Russia, Africa, God almighty, everybody, until Sardar Patel lost his temper. He said, ‘Jawaharlal, do you want Kashmir, or do you want to give it away?’ Nehru said, ‘Of course, I want Kashmir. Then [Patel] said, ‘Please give your orders’. And before he could say anything Sardar Patel turned to me and said, ‘You have got your orders’.” Without the Sardar, Kashmir would be Pakistani today.

India Should Look East, to Northeast India

By Mukesh Rawat

November 19, 2014

It is time for New Delhi to recognize the ideological changes taking place in India’s Northeast, and reciprocate. 

Ever since the days of Jawaharlal Nehru, representation has been among the gravest and most persistent issues confronting India’s Northeast. It is a tragedy that this part of the country – a land of mesmerizing beauty, a rich cultural legacy, and the diversity that India so loves – has not been able to win sympathy among the ruling elites in New Delhi in the six decades since Independence. Instead, the people of Northeast India have largely been seen as separatists. Even today, the perception remains that the region is somehow antithetical to Indian democracy, a perception that has often been exploited for political purposes.

True, secession was a serious issue in the early days following Independence, giving rising to scores of outfits such as the National Socialist Council of Nagaland (NSCN) and United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA). But while insurgency activity remains, times have changed, and the changes need to be recognized by both the Indian government and the public. There has been a noticeable shift in the way the people of Northeast India view their relations with the rest of the country. Rather than secessionism, the demand now is largely for regional autonomy and affirmative action.

Indeed, talk to the new generation in Northeast India today and you may hear of dissatisfaction with poor infrastructure and mounting unemployment, but you will struggle to find talk of separatism, at least among the general public. Visit Maniput and you may find protest against the “draconian” Armed Forces Special Power Act or demands for a Greater Nagaland; in Meghalaya, you might hear criticism of the proposed railway line, which locals fear will lead to an influx of non-tribals; go to Tripura and Bodoland and the talk may be of illegal immigrants. Yet it is very unlikely that you will hear the anti-India slogans that once were so common.

Today, the people of Northeast India realize that their aspirations can be accommodated within the Indian constitution, as has exemplified by the example of Mizoram. From a state once known for its famine, compounded by rampant poverty, illiteracy, and insurgency, Mizoram is now a model for development. This occurred only when the insurgents (led by the legendary Laldenga) realized that the Indian constitution was flexible enough to accommodate them.

The insurgents who remain in Northeast India are those who are deprived of education and employment. They join these groups not because they associate themselves with the “separatist ideology” but because of their helplessness in the wake of rampant poverty and underdevelopment. Yes, they do have ideological conflicts with the government (largely on inter-community relations and territorial claims). But these differences don’t mean they are necessarily anti-India.

Can the Afghan Military Hold Against the Taliban? Lots of Question Marks…

Maggie Ybarra

Washington Times, November 18, 2014

Doubts about Afghan forces rise after attack in capital

A Taliban attack in Afghanistan’s fortified capital Tuesday triggered fresh concerns about the ability of U.S.-trained Afghan security forces to secure Kabul as international combat troops withdraw from the war-torn nation.

A small truck laden with explosives rammed the gate of a compound housing foreigners on Kabul’s eastern outskirts, Afghan officials said. Two gunmen then tried to enter the breached gate. Four people, including two Afghan security guards, were killed in the attack, and no NATO forces were slain or wounded.

The assault was the latest in stepped-up bombings in the capital. Over the past week, suicide bombers have targeted the chief of police and a female lawmaker, both of whom survived.

Before Tuesday’s attack, analysts had suggested that the Taliban is set to exploit weaknesses in Afghanistan’s security forces as U.S. and NATO troops dwindle to about 12,000 over the next two years.

Thomas Joscelyn, a security analyst with the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said the Taliban is “actually in pretty good shape to make a stunning comeback after the West leaves,” despite more than a decade of U.S.-led warfare.

U.S. intelligence officials have long warned of senior al Qaeda operatives fleeing into Afghanistan to avoid U.S. drone strikes on hideouts in Pakistan.

But analysts say a more disturbing development centers on behind-the-scenes assistance the Taliban has received from Pakistan — as well as from the Haqqani network, whose terrorists move easily across the Afghanistan-Pakistan border.

"They’ve already been providing broad support for the Taliban, even with the U.S. there," said Mr. Joscelyn, senior editor of the Long War Journal."With the U.S. drawing out of the region, that’s only going to increase."

Pentagon Continues to Give Short Shrift to Al Qaeda Presence in Afghanistan

Bill Roggio

US military continues to claim al Qaeda is ‘restricted’ to ‘isolated areas of northeastern Afghanistan’

The Long War Journal, November 19, 2014

A recently issued report on the status of Afghanistan by the US Department of Defense has described al Qaeda as being primarily confined to “isolated areas of northeastern Afghanistan.” But information on Afghan military and intelligence operations against the global jihadist group contradicts the US military’s assessment.

The Defense Department released its "Report on Progress Toward Security and Stability in Afghanistan" in October. The report, which “covers progress in Afghanistan from April 1 to September 30, 2014,” contains only nine mentions of al Qaeda. Five of those mentions simply reference the mission to conduct “counterterrorism operations against remnants of core al Qaeda and its affiliates.”

The US military’s report states that “[s]ustained ISAF [International Security Assistance Force] and ANSF [Afghan National Security Forces] counterterrorism operations prevented al Qaeda’s use of Afghanistan as a platform from which to launch transnational terrorist attacks during this reporting period.”

Then the report goes on to describe al Qaeda as “isolated” in the northeastern part of the country, a reference to the remote mountainous provinces of Kunar and Nuristan.

"Counterterrorism operations restricted al Qaeda’s presence to isolated areas of northeastern Afghanistan and limited access to other parts of the country," the report continues. "These efforts forced al Qaeda in Afghanistan to focus on survival, rather than on operations against the West. Al Qaeda’s relationship with local Afghan Taliban organizations remains intact and is an area of concern."

Al Qaeda’s operations contradict US military claims

For years, the US military has claimed that al Qaeda is constrained to operating in northeastern Afghanistan, but ISAF’s own data on raids against the terrorist group and its allies has indicated otherwise. According to ISAF press releases announcing operations between early 2007 and June 2013, al Qaeda and its allies were targeted 338 different times, in 25 of 34 of Afghanistan’s provinces. Those raids took place in 110 of Afghanistan’s nearly 400 districts. [See LWJreport, ISAF raids against al Qaeda and allies in Afghanistan 2007-2013.]

Pentagon IG Investigating Why US Spent $700 Million on Economic Development in Afghanistan and Accomplished Nothing

SIGAR: Pentagon’s Economic Development in Afghanistan ‘Accomplished Nothing’

Joe Gould

Defense News, November 18, 2014

WASHINGTON — The US Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) says he is investigating the Pentagon’s efforts to spark that country’s economic development, which cost between $700 million and $800 million and “accomplished nothing.”

SIGAR’s chief, John Sopko, told reporters Tuesday, that the agency has opened an “in-depth review” into the Task Force for Business and Stability Operations (TFBSO), a Defense Department unit aimed at developing war zone mining, industrial development and fostering private investments.

“We have gotten serious allegations about the management and mismanagement of that agency, as well as a policy question about what they were doing and whether they should have existed,” Sopko said.

More broadly, Sopko faulted the US government’s economic development efforts in Afghanistan as “an abysmal failure,” saying it lacked a single leader, a clear strategy or accountability. An avenue of inquiry for SIGAR’s investigation into TFBSO could be Afghanistan’s underdeveloped mining industry.

“We have seen hit-and-miss efforts to develop the [Afghan] economy,” Sopko said of the US. “You, the development experts, should have had a plan to develop the economy and you haven’t, so now we’re stuck.”

Untapped mineral wealth in Afghanistan is estimated at $1 trillion, but Sopko noted that Afghanistan has only recently passed mineral laws and legal gaps make investment unattractive. Critics say the law lacks transparency regarding contracts and ownership, and strong rules for open and fair bidding.

The task force did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The Drone War in Pakistan

Steve Coll

November 18, 2014

The Unblinking Stare

At the Pearl Continental Hotel, in Peshawar, a concrete tower enveloped by flowering gardens, the management has adopted security precautions that have become common in Pakistan’s upscale hospitality industry: razor wire, vehicle barricades, and police crouching in bunkers, fingering machine guns. In June, on a hot weekday morning, Noor Behram arrived at the gate carrying a white plastic shopping bag full of photographs. He had a four-inch black beard and wore a blue shalwar kameez and a flat Chitrali hat. He met me in the lobby. We sat down, and Behram spilled his photos onto a table. Some of the prints were curled and faded. For the past seven years, he said, he has driven around North Waziristan on a small red Honda motorcycle, visiting the sites of American drone missile strikes as soon after an attack as possible.

Behram is a journalist from North Waziristan, in northwestern Pakistan, and also works as a private investigator. He has been documenting the drone attacks for the Foundation for Fundamental Rights, a Pakistani nonprofit that is seeking redress for civilian casualties. In the beginning, he said, he had no training and only a cheap camera. I picked up a photo that showed Behram outdoors, in a mountainous area, holding up a shredded piece of women’s underwear. He said it was taken during his first investigation, in June, 2007, after an aerial attack on a training camp. American and Pakistani newspapers reported at the time that drone missiles had killed Al Qaeda-linked militants. There were women nearby as well. Although he was unable to photograph the victims’ bodies, he said, “I found charred, torn women’s clothing—that was the evidence.”

Since then, he went on, he has photographed about a hundred other sites in North Waziristan, creating a partial record of the dead, the wounded, and their detritus. Many of the faces before us were young. Behram said he learned from conversations with editors and other journalists that if a drone missile killed an innocent adult male civilian, such as a vegetable vender or a fruit seller, the victim’s long hair and beard would be enough to stereotype him as a militant. So he decided to focus on children.

Many of the prints had dates scrawled on the back. I looked at one from September 10, 2010. It showed a bandaged boy weeping; he appeared to be about seven years old. There was a photo of a girl with a badly broken arm, and one of another boy, also in tears, apparently sitting in a hospital. A print from August 23, 2010, showed a dead boy of perhaps ten, the son of an Afghan refugee named Bismillah Khan, who lived near a compound associated with the Taliban fighting group known as the Haqqani network. The boy’s skull had been bashed in.

China’s New Silk Road must steer clear of terror haven Pakistan

CLAUDE ARPI

NOV 17, 2014

Source Link

Can China isolate itself from developments happening on the soil of its ‘all weather friend’ Pakistan? Will not the New Silk Road, which will allow free circulation of goods and people, be the perfect vector for further spreading terrorism?

This week witnessed the frostiest Handshake of the Year.

On the side of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit in Beijing, Chinese President Xi Jinping met the Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and after years of tension in the East China Sea, they shook hands. BBC World Service said:

“The most awkward handshake ever? The body language between China’s president and Japan’s prime minister looked decidedly frosty.”

Twenty seconds worth watching (especially, the faces of the 2 leaders)! But that was a thaw, a small beginning!

Also, US President Barack Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin ‘circling each other warily at a global summit in China’ as Associated Press put it: “On the surface, were all niceties — a pat on the back here, a pleasantry there,” but tough goings during three separate encounters.

And the most awkward — in a chilly night of Beijing, a chivalrous Vladimir Putin’s wrapped a shawl around the shoulders of Peng Liyuan, Xi Jinping’s wife. That is just not done in today’s China.

The South China Morning Post said that the incident was soon “scrubbed clean from the Chinese internet, reflecting the intense control authorities exert over any material about top leaders.”

It was probably better for Narendra Modi to have skipped altogether the mega event. His presence could have hardly helped advance India’s interests.