Tell Me Something I Don’t Know

Russia is corrupt, Silvio Berlusconi’s late-night amusements do not consist of hot-chocolate and Jane Austen novels and Kazakhstani officials are big fans of Elton John. Granted, the last point came as something of a shock, but the general consensus on the “unprecedented insight into US Government foreign activities” is that Wikileaks has not given us all that much of an insight.

One of the surprising claims made by Wikileaks is that America is proving its own guilt and moral baseness – and the onus for Wikileaks is decidedly on America’s activities in the world – by informing foreign governments on what they are likely to read in The New York Times, The Guardian, Le Monde, Der Spiegel and El Pais.

The American government is hardly acting hypocritically here – most of us would make a full disclosure if we knew we were about to be shopped by some holder of privileged information. And neither is America the only concerned country. Governments around the world are afraid that they may be implicated in discussions that look like conspiracies, that they might lose face, or that they might be shown to be acting irrationally. Some will be tempted to gloat at America’s misfortune, and foolishness, but they most likely do so out of concern for their own embarrassment.

Successful diplomacy relies to a considerable extent on discretion. Governments share intelligence and sometimes gossip, criticise each other and make entreaties. The anger that most will feel is that less of what Wikileaks reveals is done in public, such as Canada’s foreign minister pointing out that despite attempted interventions by the US government, the President of Afghanistan, Hamid Karzai, acts with relative impunity in releasing prisoners wanted for supplying drugs.

Yet what Wikileaks does not try to do is show the arch of American diplomacy. It is like a thousand close-up photographs of a shape that cannot be assembled by the human eye. Criticism of Turkey’s Prime Minister, Recep Erdogan, obscures the fact that the United States has pushed hard for EU accession. It also obscures the chain of command, meaning that an indiscreet comment by diplomatic staff is taken to mean as much as a major speech by a Secretary of State.

An Uncertain World

On the other hand, the careful editorialising of newspapers and other media has given the material some sort of shape – not the moral one that Wikileaks intended – but a more realistic one. Despite being a superpower, and an idealistic one at that, America is quite simply faced with a forbidding and chaotic world. What is most impressive is that it takes its duties as a global policeman so seriously.

There was outcry when Wikileaks published its document troves on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The US Army was implicated in torture, the negligent killing of civilians and incompetence. How Iran and China gloated and France and Germany puffed themselves up at the inadequacy of decisions made in the fog of war; all connected, they assumed, to the one big mistake that was the decision to go to war in the first place.

The embassy files show a much less belligerent America than has been imagined, even under George Bush. Several files show a considerable amount of collusion between China and Iran over the latter’s nuclear programme. Yet the American attitude to Iran has been patient in the extreme. The history of US-Iran relations has been gloriously indiscreet, but America has been aware that Iran is not only seeking to destabilise the Middle East, but has had evidence of weapons programmes since September 2001 and has not acted unilaterally. Indeed, when in 2004 photographs of an Iranian weapons facility were made public, the US and its allies (if they could be called that) entered into the most intensive trade and incentive talks. From 2006, Iran armed Shia militias in Iraq to cause wanton destruction. Iran then rejected offers to assist the enrichment of uranium for peaceful purposes in 2007 and in January of this year, and yet, we are on the threshold of a new deal being offered to an unelected and incorrigible regime.

Wikileaks has not yet uncovered American double-standards on Iran because on the contrary, the rest of the Middle East is much more concerned about a nuclear power intent on destroying its Jewish and Sunni enemies. What is also interesting is that Israel has expressed satisfaction in its portrayal through the Wikileaks documents, citing the unwillingness of Egypt to intervene to stabilise Gaza, the unreliability of Fatah and the menace of Iran as justification of its foreign policy.

Much of what Wikileaks has revealed thus far is what we already know, largely because the same sentiments are openly held at the highest levels. As this perceptive commentary has it, the only arena that has had no light shed on it is the Palestinian Question. This is fortunate, not because the US is likely to be behaving in a particularly underhand or despicable manner – the frustrations and limits of American power are pretty plain to see – but because there are so many interested parties in the region, all cynically trying to establish the best means of gaining American support and protection while buying off potentially disruptive domestic or cross-border forces.

Another Shake of the Kaleidoscope?

Julian Assange, who founded Wikileaks, is thin-skinned, prone to interpret everything in an anti-American light and not averse to making deals that would potentially make Wikileaks at least rich. None of these are cardinal sins, and there is a very great virtue in that Wikileaks does not appear to have editorialised by doctoring the documents, only by releasing them in tranches. He says he is releasing these documents in the name of peace, but they may very well mean more war and instability.

One thing that Wikileaks has revealed that could be of some importance is that China might back a united Korea in the interests of securing its border. The latest North Korean crisis has thankfully passed, it seems. But come a time when the dictatorship of the Kim family becomes unsustainable, this intelligence will be difficult for Beijing to row-back on. The other piece of intelligence about China that is new is that America offered to set up an agreement with Saudi Arabia to compensate China for any loss of supply from Iran in order to apply more punitive sanctions. That China refused speaks volumes for the mercantile character of the supposedly communist regime there. It seeks stability above all, but will chip away at American economic hegemony by increment if at all possible.

Iran, Pakistan (hardly covered here) and North Korea form an arc of uncertainty that upholds most of the geopolitical injustices in the world at present. An aggressive Iran menaces Israel directly and indirectly, forcing them to abandon the prospect of engagement with Hamas on behalf of the Palestinians, funds and supplies Hezbollah in Syria and threatens the nascent democracy in Iraq. Pakistan borders on complete failure as a state with attendant dangers in terms of its nuclear programme and the opportunity this would afford to al-Quaeda, whilst threatening the nascent state (I won’t say democracy, although it is more so than Iran) of Afghanistan. North Korean simply plays on uncertainty and fear in order to create differences between the US and China.

Iran is undoubtedly the key to the jigsaw, but a solution to the problem that North Korea poses could be the first step to engaging China more seriously in the world. Barack Obama may be right to spurn a resumption of the Six-Party Talks as North Korea hardly deserve more attention, but he should be discussing the possible reunification of Korea with China as such events rarely happen with much forewarning. The Chinese, however, will not be candid unless they can be quite sure that America’s diplomatic channels are confidential.

An excellent history of diplomatic indiscretion

In Place of Strife – Nation Building in Afghanistan

Thoughts on a panel discussion on Future Options in Afghanistan at the LSE. The podcast will be well worth a listen.

According to insurgency expert, David Kilcullen, insurgencies are by far the most common type of conflict that the world has seen since the end of the Second World War (about 80%). The good news is that they typically fail against better-resourced governments. Afghanistan is a finely balanced case, however. While foreign governments are currently investing in the government heavily both economically and militarily, there is an implicit and borderline explicit deadline. Futhermore, the government has not solidly establised its legitimacy, limping through the last set of elections and failing to deliver in so many areas.

The Conflict Between Idealism and Reality

According to Michael Semple – an expert on the so-called AfPak area – the problem is that there is a gap between the ideals and the reality of the regime. Instead of being a common currency, democracy has divided Afghans into disparate interest groups and local strongmen.

Unlike Iraq, where oil receipts are the incentive for Sunni and Shia to participate in the regime, Afghanistan has no source of wealth to hold it together. Instead it has the Bonn Process, which offered a constitution. The London Conference in January this year has begun the process of the handover. If it succeeds it will strengthen the regime, but the Karzai government is still unquestionably weak and with expectations heightened, demonstrable movement needs to happen within eighteen months for Afghans to buy into it.

A similarly realist view is offered by Tom Tugendhat of the British Army. He believes that security is what will deter Afghans from rejecting the regime, and to that extent the improvement of the police force and national army will be the measure by which the Afghanistan government will sink or swim.

Impunity and Justice

The view of the Afghans on the panel was significantly different to those of the Westerners. Wazhma Frogh and Horiah Mosadiq – both human rights campaigners – are sceptical about reconciliation and feel that justice has clearly not been done. ‘Warlords’ have been enriched and empowered, corruption is rampant and the security forces are not trustworthy. This, as Ms Mosadiq says, is without even beginning to talk about women’s rights, so far from the agenda are they.

To these Afghans at least, the coalition forces give off mixed messages about how committed they are to the long term prospects of Afghanistan, to removing human rights abusers from government and to tackling corruption. Strategies are seemingly written in English and discussed only on international channels (which may not be true but is a powerful presumtion). Little money goes through the Afghan government (and what does does not necessarily end up going to the Afghan people. And the prospect of the Taliban returning to exercise even a modicum of power is repellent to the sorts of educated people who suffered under them in the first place.

So you have a government that is widely perceived to have failed in its basic functions, but a future awful to imagine for all concerned. Is that all holding Afghanistan together?

Well, regional power politics may play a positive role in stabilising Afghanistan. As a country with six immediate neighbours and three interested Great Powers in the region (India, China and Russia), Afghanistan’s loss could be anyone else’s gain. That recommends neutralising the country as much as possible – hence the framework of the UN commitment to its territorial integrity. No-one wants to get sucked into Afghanistan, but neither can they quite leave it alone.

In Place of Strife

The outstanding question is what to leave in place of a longstanding military and financial commitment. In absence of wealth or reconciliation, do human rights offer the future for Afghan unity or do strong institutions and security?

Either way, a bleak and largely unfulfilled future is unfortunately quite likely. Suicide bombings will continue even if the security forces improve rapidly, and human rights will not immediately trump stability or political considerations. Abuses will always happen. And yet, all panelists agree that impunity is not an option

The West and the Afghan government must work quickly to redress grievances and offer an even faintly-credible future. Their hope is that the Taliban turn out to be nationalists above all else.

Obama’s Surge – A Tidy Campaign?

Barack Obama came to office convinced that the war in Afghanistan was a right one, never mind that it was a useful juxtaposition against Iraq and charges of being labelled a woolly liberal. Eleven months into his term, the situation is much the same, demanding a major re-evaluation. An article in this Saturday’s New York Times gives an insightful overview into the process by which Obama has come to make his vaunted statement on Afghan policy.

Obama has rightly decided that the time has come to start swimming, but the tide is very much against him. A difficult election returned President Karzai to power but his image has been tarnished by fraud and authoritarianism. The Taliban has regained a foothold – leading officials to fear for the sovereignty of Karzai’s government. Pakistan has apparently become less secure – evoking a long-running fear of a failed, nuclear state.

Winning the Battle for Public Opinion

On 2 December, Obama made his speech on Afghanistan at West Point Military Academy. The Economist in particular, was disappointed, stating in an editorial that;

this speech—perhaps the worst “big” one of his presidency—failed to present a persuasive case to America’s foes that he has the stamina to tackle them and, in his deceptively simple-sounding little phrase, to “finish the job”.

Read back, the speech is still the masterpiece of clarity and suasion that you would expect from Obama. America’s strategy was elucidated in three main points – a surge in troops starting in the middle of next year, a greater civilian effort, and new efforts to synthesise their approach to Afghanistan and Pakistan.

None of these are particularly new. In March Obama ordered more troops to the country, which the military failed to carry out conclusively. Civilian projects have long been debated, and will be fuelled by Hilary Clinton’s ambition for the State Department. And the Obama administration gave a clear sign of intent when it appointed Richard Holbrooke the Ambassador for AfPak.

More to the point, no details of the policies formed part of Barack Obama’s speech. What Obama does have on his side, is political goodwill. First, NATO has acceded to Obama’s request for support with a healthy supply of reinforcements.

Second, the Republican Party has coalesced around this ‘surge’, partly as a matter of principle, and partly as a reflection of Bush’s surge in Iraq (though Lord knows, they owe Obama nothing for his opposition to a policy which has made his gradual withdrawal from that theatre relatively painless).

Thirdly, the balance inside the administration is in favour of putting more troops in. Clinton, Robert Gates, and most of the Generals have come onside, though Joe Biden has been campaigning fanatically against the surge and Nancy Pelosi is known to be unimpressed.

Perhaps this is a reflection of Obama’s style of government. He has allowed the debate to go on for three months, never obviously siding with a position, except to exclude an immediate and unilateral withdrawal. Everyone has had their say, and ultimately, has been brought on board.

Winning the War – What Next for the Jihadi’s?

A political victory will be temporary, however, if the situation does not improve in the coming months. The great concern is Obama’s commitment. He used his speech to talk about values, but also America’s economy. When first presented with the plans for a surge (Obama has used the words in private, apparently) by General McCrystal, his response was that they needed to get troops in sooner, and out sooner still – before the next US Presidential elections, effectively.

The weight that has been put on Karzai has been focussed on getting a schedule for Afghan troops to take over security. Quite unlike Iraq, which now has a thriving party system, Afghanistan has a very limited political culture. Furthermore, it is unclear where the Taliban will fit into any future political system. The surge is not meant to smash them once and for all, but weaken them for a time. Perhaps it will be long enough to get some kind of system in place to isolate Al-Qaeda, but the question is how?

Without some sort of devolution agenda that can legitimise the warlord system, the prospects for the rule of law in Afghanistan look slim. The alternative is almost certainly a far more involved war, although not necessarily one that America will be involved in. Notice, also, how little has been said about Pakistan. If there is a strategy for the region, it is still vague.

Obama will have many things on his mind this Christmas. The economy, health care, the environment and Iran will all rank above Afghanistan, at least in terms of immediacy. The President may have hoped to buy some breathing space from his surge, but he has front-loaded his dice. America and Afghanistan will both suffer if this policy does not allow something to flourish in the AfPak Winter.

The Nobel Peace Prize

The Norwegian committee that decided to award this year’s Nobel Peace Prize to Barack Obama may have thought they were making a populist choice.  They were wrong.  Howls of derision are ringing out.  This is the first time since 1976 that the award has so flagrantly ignored results and so deliberately sought to encourage nascent progress. 

Indeed, it is hard to ignore the fact that Obama was nominated – as a matter of necessity – less than a month into his presidency.  That Obama’s election was a triumph for the progress of race relations in the United States is not in question, everyone agrees.  However, this award is in danger of making him a token, and further enraging the conservative elements in American politics that resent his neat public image and alleged discreet socialism.

And yet, it is doubtful that the Nobel Committee were so naïve.  It is just about possible to construct an argument for Obama, although it is a blatantly political and in some ways logically dubious one.  The argument, I think, runs something like this.

“The Committee has attached special importance to Obama’s vision of and work for a world without nuclear weapons.”

It is easy to forget the role that nuclear weapons still play in our society.  Since the fall of the Soviet Union, they have been almost entirely irrelevant to the public consciousness.  But it would be as foolish to write the history of our times without reference to the bomb as it would to ignore its central role in the Cold War. 

The Iraq war was based on the premise that Saddam Hussein had Weapons of Mass Destruction.  The pretext was Saddam’s refusal to allow UN inspectors full access to his country, and admittedly faulty evidence that Saddam was interested in plutonium from Niger.  That has since been obscured by six-years of conventional warfare, and accusations of duplicity.  Tony Blair was, I think, fundamentally honest when he described what he foresaw as the defining issue of  21st Century international relations;

“The threat is chaos. And there are two begetters of chaos. Tyrannical regimes with WMD and extreme terrorist groups who profess a perverted and false view of Islam.”

The latter of those two has come to be seen as more dominant, and it is the reason that Obama will almost certainly seek, through force, a conclusion to the war in Afghanistan.  But surveying the world in 2009, nuclear weapons, or weapons of mass destruction are of pressing concern.  North Korea has tested nuclear weapons, and Obama’s decision to reveal secret intelligence about Iran’s nuclear programme put President Ahmadinejad on the back foot.  The prospect of either of these nations achieving nuclear capability would undoubtedly create a new proliferation crisis, as neighbours rushed to arm themselves in defence.  The danger of so many contradictory policies of deterrent is grave.

That is why President Obama has sought a UN Resolution on non-proliferation, while stressing that the target was a world without nuclear weapons.  The document itself resolves virtually nothing, except to remain alert to these concerns.  It reaffirms a good deal, particularly the Non-Proliferation and Comprehensive Test Ban Treaties, but is essentially a statement, devoid of a decisive context.  In short, it achieves little.

“Obama has as president created a new climate in international politics.”

Thus, it is necessary to look elsewhere for progress.  The Nobel Committee implicitly argues in favour of two of Obama’s foreign policy instruments – his use of diplomacy, and the store he sets in multilateral institutions.  There is meat on the former, but whether the latter bears fruit remains to be seen.

Relations with Russia are a particular positive for Obama.  Since ‘pressing the reset button,’ negotiations have begun on reducing nuclear arms in the two countries (not a very significant gain in terms of non-proliferation because the threat is limited and Russian stocks are deteriorating, but superficially and financially helpful nonetheless) and, most importantly, Russia has begun to show signs that it will abide by sanctions on Iran.  That raises the prospect of greater collaboration, that the dilemma of 2003 can be avoided, but it does not guarantee it.

This year has been a multilateral year in many ways.  The meetings of the G20, in the shadow of the recession, have set a precedent in two respects.  Firstly, it has confirmed the expansion of the ‘club’, which decides on the world economy from the seven largest economies plus Russia, to a group that includes the most important developing nations.  Secondly, the collective response to the recession was choreographed, and significantly included more money and a greater respectability for the IMF, another multilateral body. 

If there is a serious headline achievement at Copenhagen on Climate Change, Obama will be able to refer to his grand speech at the UN, where he declared that “We have reached a pivotal moment”, where

“the United States stands ready to begin a new chapter of international co-operation – one that recognises the rights and responsibilities of all nations” and cite a response. 

“Only very rarely has a person to the same extent as Obama captured the world’s attention and given its people hope for a better future.”

Obama’s foreign policy team believe in something called ‘quantity theory’.  Essentially, small but high profile successes culminate into influence, meaning the quantity of power steadily increases.  The presidency began with the (wholly symbolic) closure of Guantanamo Bay and the (slightly more consequential) ban on torture in the US army.  Then came the well-received Cairo speech, and in August there was progress as Benjamin Netanyahu accepted a two-state solution and negotiations began on the settlements, although there was no Peace Plan to be unveiled at the UN.

Most recently came Obama’s UN speech itself, which was underrated, or at least crowded out by other news.  While he did not make it obvious how he was going to deal with every issue, Obama said several important things.  He pointed to four pillars, which were

“fundamental to the future we would like for our children; non-proliferation and disarmament; the promotion of peace and security; the preservation of our planet; and a global economy that advances opportunity for all people.“ 

He also spoke of the importance of human rights, and addressed head-on the concern that while

“the United Nations does extraordinary good around the world feeding the hungry, caring for the sick, mending places that have been broken… it also struggles to enforce its will, and to live up to the ideals of its founding.”

In part, there was little need to descriptive plans or schedules.  The point was to highlight areas for action, and open them up to collective action.  That may not be successful in the long run, but unwillingness to collaborate with America proved to be an obstacle during the Bush years. 

Should the reaction to it hold positive, the Nobel award adds prestige to Obama’s new strategy for engagement with the world.  It is to be hoped that it will reduce the regional sway of men like Ahmadeinejad and Chavez and commit the rest of the world, rather than just America to a particular course. 

Challenges are inevitable.  The disastrous demonstration against the Iranian election was dispiriting, there is every chance that Russia will remain as belligerent in its near-abroad, and China, Burma and Zimbabwe may continue to repress the human rights of their own citizens.  But should Obama’s strategy produce results, they will trump many of the individual contributions that have been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize before.