Diplomacy & Crisis News

Aux yeux de beaucoup de Brésiliens, la multinationale Odebrecht incarne les dérives d'un capitalisme de connivence. / Afrique, Amérique latine, Brésil, Capitalisme, Commerce international, Développement, Économie, Énergie, Entreprise, État, Mondialisation, Multinationales, Parti politique, (...) / Afrique, Amérique latine, Brésil, Capitalisme, Commerce international, Développement, Économie, Énergie, Entreprise, État, Mondialisation, Multinationales, Parti politique, Protectionnisme, Diplomatie - 2013/10

Doug Bandow

Security, Asia

Pyongyang will attempt to communicate with America through a parade. It won’t be a message Washington wants to hear. But that is the price of the Trump administration failing to effectively follow up on the president’s diplomatic breakthrough.

North Korea’s Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un may show his hand for future dealings with America on October 10. The anniversary of the founding of the Korean Workers’ Party (KWP) is always an important occasion, but 2020 is the seventy-fifth anniversary of the formation of what passes for a communist party.

Although he caucused with communist states, Kim Il-sung, originally appointed by Moscow as its occupation frontman, never admitted being beholden to anyone. Alone among communist states, the North displayed not one image of Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin, Mao, or any other communist notable. After all, what would juche represent if the nation’s founding ideals were based on the ramblings of a couple of long-dead Germans?

However, the claim of North Korean exclusivity means the KWP celebration is likely to be substantial despite the country’s economic troubles and the world’s coronavirus pandemic. Most everyone in Pyongyang, at least, will be watching. Foreign analysts and journalists will study the parade closely. Which makes it a perfect opportunity for the Kim regime to showcase a new weapon capable of striking the United States.

President Donald Trump’s dramatic opening to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea effectively ended a year after it started, in February 2019 at the failed Hanoi summit. The administration’s continued demand for full denuclearization before the DPRK received any meaningful concessions doomed additional talks. So Pyongyang largely disengaged from diplomacy with the United States and around the globe. Even unofficial contacts withered.

Yet Kim did not return to the North’s traditional policy of brinkmanship. Most notably, he did not restart nuclear and long-range missile testing. Nor did he launch another invective assault, highlighted by insults directed at the president—such as famously calling Trump a “deranged U.S. dotard.” Last December Pyongyang threatened to resume verbal combat if the president renewed hostilities, but there have been few rhetorical contretemps since.

The North more directly and roughly rejected Seoul’s attempts at conversation, likely because the former sees little positive to be gained so long as the Moon government refuses to challenge U.S. sanctions policy. However, the recent killing of a South Korean official in unclear circumstances prompted an apology of sorts from Kim, which might presage a softening attitude. Or perhaps Kim is veering toward conciliation with the South to prepare for an increasingly likely Biden administration, which seems unlikely to resume Trump-style summitry.

The parade provides an excellent opportunity to make implicit threats and increase tensions without testing American red lines. Resuming ICBM and/or nuclear testing would break a commitment, ostentatiously accelerate military developments, and increase threats to the U.S. homeland. The consequences would be unpredictable, but possibly dangerous.

For instance, Trump, especially if looking for a miracle deus ex machina to win reelection, might restart his “fire and fury” policy. Although a President Joe Biden likely would be more measured, his first reaction would not be to ease sanctions and attend summits. Indeed, with Iran likely much higher on an incoming Biden administration’s agenda, he might decide on a tougher response to North Korea to gain leverage in reinstating and/or renegotiating the nuclear deal with Tehran.

In contrast, a parade exhibition is less provocative. It is as likely to showcase possibilities, desires, wishes, dreams, and bluffs as realities. The threats are more theatrical and look more theoretical, offering more opportunity to dissuade Pyongyang from moving forward without considering military options.

Nevertheless, the DPRK could put on quite a show. A 38 North analysis of satellite data indicates that the North Koreans have built temporary shelters large enough to hold missiles and transport vehicles. The Carnegie Endowment’s Ankit Panda predicted: “The North Koreans are going to come out with potentially scores of solid propellants, medium range missiles.”

Although even mid-range missiles are nuclear-capable and able to strike U.S. bases in the region, their limited range makes them less fearsome for Americans and American policymakers. So something more is likely. The regime hasn’t showcased an ICBM since early 2018, when the Kim-Trump show debuted. As 2020 dawned Kim promised a “new strategic weapon,” which remains as yet unseen. It most likely is one or more long-range missiles.

An apparent transporter-erector-launcher (TEL) was spotted at the capital’s parade ground, which could be significant. Chad O’Carroll of NKNews noted that “North Korea suffers from a historic inability to develop its own heavy launcher vehicles, so the country has only shown small numbers of medium and long-range missiles at military parades. Therefore, if many heavy launcher vehicles are shown transporting an expanded missile arsenal at the parade in October, it would mean the country has markedly improved its capabilities.”

Such a missile display—even if mock-ups were used—would provide a powerful reminder to Washington on why negotiations are in America’s as well as North Korea’s interest. Moreover, the North might emphasize numbers by parading several ICBMs. Some analysts believe that the number of storage units suggest deployment of as many as a dozen. The larger the number, the more difficult for the United States to either preempt or defeat an attack. However, displaying what might merely be a model is not likely to panic America and drive a president or president-elect to act precipitously.

Another possibility would be to highlight development of an SLBM, or submarine-launched ballistic missile. However, the smaller weapons would look less formidable on parade. The threat also would be less. Although submarine-launched missiles have a formidable reputation, the North is far from having a workable fleet capable of carrying SLBMs and the United States has long invested heavily in anti-submarine technology to counter the Soviet Union and now China. Pyongyang could more cheaply and effectively increase the number of mobile land-based missiles.

North Korea also likely aspires to develop multiple independent re-entry vehicles, which allow one missile to carry several warheads. There are no reports that Kim’s engineers have produced such a device, which also would not be much of a parade prop. Some conventional weapons look impressive, but the regime has been devoting its limited resources elsewhere for years. Which is another reason the North is likely to emphasize its missiles in the parade: in this field Pyongyang’s progress has been significant, including the development of ICBMs and solid fuels.

Whatever occurs at the parade likely will constitute the North’s full “provocation” ahead of the Nov. 3 election. Pyongyang would prefer a Trump victory, but any dramatic threats would undermine the president and/or might trigger a violent reaction.

However, additional provocations are probable after the election. The DPRK might seek to encourage another presidential foray into dealmaking if Trump wins; reminding him of the North’s capabilities would encourage him to be more flexible and offer smaller deals involving at least some sanctions relief.

If Biden is victorious, the North probably will raise tensions to increase its leverage with the new administration. Creating a sense of crisis might be the only way to force Korea onto the Biden agenda. And to encourage a more active stance and willingness to negotiate than was evident in the Obama administration.

As in the past, Pyongyang will attempt to communicate with America through a parade. It won’t be a message Washington wants to hear. But that is the price of the Trump administration failing to effectively follow up on the president’s diplomatic breakthrough. The next administration should recognize that the North doesn’t plan to abandon its nukes and shape policy accordingly.

Doug Bandow is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute. A former special assistant to President Ronald Reagan, he is author of Tripwire: Korea and U.S. Foreign Policy in a Changed World and co-author of The Korean Conundrum: America’s Troubled Relations with North and South Korea.

Image: Reuters.

The need for the World Food Programme, the recipient of the 2020 Nobel Peace Prize, to exist is starker than ever. From conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo, to flooding in South Sudan, and the civil war in Yemen, man-made and natural disasters are leaving tens of millions of people unsure if they will have enough food for themselves and their families to survive on.

Desmond Lachman

economy, Americas

A delay in a second stimulus package while the coronavirus is wreaking havoc across the country would increase the odds that the U.S. economy will experience a double-dip economic recession.

History will judge the American political class harshly if Congress and the White House prove themselves unable to compromise on a fiscal stimulus package before the November election. 

A delay in a second stimulus package would increase the odds that the U.S. economy will experience a double-dip economic recession. Additionally, it would make it all the more difficult for the United States to extricate itself from its worst economic recession in the past ninety years. It would do so as an increasing number of households and companies would be forced into bankruptcy and debt default.

That the U.S. economy now needs another sizable fiscal stimulus package would seem to be beyond question. As Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell keeps noting, the high-frequency data, including the recent disappointing employment numbers, strongly suggest that the U.S. economic recovery is already stalling and in need of more policy support. Worse yet, it is doing so at a time that the economy has regained only around half of the twenty-two million jobs that it lost in the pandemic’s wake.

Heightening the urgency of the need for an early fiscal boost are growing indications that the US economy could soon be hit by economic shocks coming from at home and abroad. 

At home, the health experts are warning of the real risk of a damaging second wave of the pandemic as the fall and winter months approach. Were that to happen, it could result in at least the partial rolling back of the lockdown’s easing that would be a drag on the economy. As to the potential shocks that could emanate from abroad, both the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank are now warning of a very much less favorable international economic environment in general and the risk of a record wave of emerging market debt defaults in particular.

Further heightening the need for an additional fiscal stimulus package is the desperate economic straits in which many households and small businesses now find themselves. The supplemental unemployment insurance benefits for those losing their jobs as a result of the pandemic ran out at the end of July. Meanwhile, the generous Paycheck Protection Program that helped small businesses keep open and stave off bankruptcy ran out in August. Without additional early support, all too many of these businesses will permanently go under.

Making the lack of a compromise between Congress and the White House all the more difficult to understand is that both sides acknowledge that the economy is in urgent need of major budget support. While Congress thinks that a package of some $2.4 trillion, or over 10 percent of GDP, is needed, even the White House is suggesting that a fiscal boost on the order of $1.5 trillion, or around 7 percent of GDP, would be appropriate.

Beyond the dollar amount of any new package, what further separates the two sides is the composition of any such package. Both sides agree that there should be another round of checks sent out to lower-income households and that additional support should be provided to small businesses and to the airline industry. However, the White House disagrees with Congress’s idea that the $600 a week supplemental insurance benefit should be reinstated or that generous aid should be provided to troubled state and local governments.

In today’s charged political climate, it would seem to be all the more urgent to have Congress and the White House reach a compromise on a fiscal boost before the November election. With the economic recovery already stalling and with unemployment still very high, the economy can ill-afford another few months of policy inaction. Yet that is what is all too likely to happen in the event that an agreement is not reached before the election especially were the election results to be challenged or were there to be a change in administration.

Earlier this year in the depth of the recession, in the country’s best interest, parties from both sides of the aisle put aside their differences to enact the CARES Act—the largest peacetime fiscal stimulus on record. With the U.S. economy still so fragile and so vulnerable to another leg down, one would hope that bipartisan agreement can once again be reached to address the current difficult economic situation. Unfortunately, however, all the clues seem to suggest little likelihood of that happening anytime soon.

Desmond Lachman is a resident fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. He was formerly a deputy director in the International Monetary Fund's Policy Development and Review Department and the chief emerging market economic strategist at Salomon Smith Barney.

Image: Reuters

Mark Episkopos

Security, Asia

Be on the lookout for a new ICBM or SLBM.

The Kim Jong-un regime is preparing to mark the 75th anniversary of the founding of the ruling North Korean Workers’ Party with a major military parade, where North Korea is poised to unveil several of its latest missile systems.

On October 10th, thousands of troops and masses of vehicle columns will line the streets of Pyongyang with all of the pomp and tightly rehearsed choreography befitting a major North Korean holiday. The last North Korean military parade was held in September 2018, following the Singapore summit between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim earlier that summer. In keeping with the spirit of then-ongoing denuclearization talks, North Korea opted not to display either of its new strategic weapons or its older stock of nuclear weapons delivery systems, at that celebration.

But a constellation of recent military and technical circumstances suggests that Pyongyang aims to use the 2020 parade as a high-profile venue to flaunt a slew of nuclear-capable missile systems. Late last month, reports emerged of a spike in activity at North Korea’s Sinpo Shipyard. The Sinpo Shipyard is the primary construction site for North Korea’s upcoming Sinpo-C ballistic missile submarine, the presumed successor to North Korea’s Soviet-derived Sinpo-B submarine line. North Korea has likewise made strides in developing and testing a nuclear-capable submarine-launched missile (SLBM) that can be deployed outside of Washington’s land-based THAAD network of missile defenses in East Asia, potentially posing an existential threat to critical South Korean infrastructure. Given the recent strides made in both of these projects, there is good reason to expect a Pukguksong-3 SLBM launch during the upcoming parade. This was already done last year, but likely from a submersible barge—demonstrating a Pukguksong-3 launch from a fully operational submarine, perhaps even a Sinpo-C prototype, would be a compelling testament to North Korean naval modernization.

The 75th-anniversary celebration could also become a showcase for North Korean intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) technology. Late last year, Kim announced at a Workers’ Party meeting that “the world will witness a new strategic weapon to be possessed by North Korea in the near future.” This could mean several different things in the context of the upcoming parade. South Korean news agency Yonhap, citing South Korea officials, posits that North Korea could be preparing to unveil a new long-range ballistic missile. This may be the solid fuel, nuclear-capable ICBM that a growing number of Korea experts believe is currently being developed by Pyongyang.

Another, somewhat more tame possibility is a parade demonstration of North Korea’s reported capacity to indigenously produce transporter erector launchers (TEL’s) for ICBM’s, which previously had to be imported and converted. A vehicle strongly resembling a TEL was recently spotted at the Mirim Parade Training Ground in the vicinity of Pyongyang, suggesting that TEL’s will take part in the parade. A larger supply of functioning TEL’s allows North Korea’s nuclear arsenal to be more widely deployed, enhancing both its first and second-strike capabilities.

For North Korea’s leadership, the 75th-anniversary parade raises issues of political timing. On the one hand, Pyongyang has recurrently threatened to destabilize U.S. politics ahead of the upcoming presidential election; to this end, a North Korean ICBM demonstration could burden the embattled Trump administration with a fresh foreign policy controversy a mere three weeks from election night. On the other hand, North Korea tends to save its major military provocations until shortly after new U.S. presidents are sworn in. If Pyongyang plays its nuclear hand now and Donald Trump goes on to lose the election, North Korea risks diluting what could later be a source of diplomatic leverage against a prospective Joe Biden administration.

Mark Episkopos is a frequent contributor to The National Interest and a PhD student in History at American University.

Image: Reuters.

Amid escalating hostilities in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights appealed on Friday for an urgent ceasefire and for greater protection to be given to those caught up in the violence. 

Warfare History Network

History, Asia

Despite its shortcomings, the Grumman fighter more than held its own against Japan's Zero fighter at Coral Sea, Midway, and in the battles over Guadalcanal.

Key Point: Although the Wildcat was not as graceful as its opponent, American pilots exploited the plane’s weight to negate the Zero’s agility.

The Grumman F4F Wildcat is usually described as chunky, “square,” squat, or stubby—not exactly adjectives that suggest grace or elegance. The Wildcat is also frequently criticized for being slow, heavy, and lacking in maneuverability, especially in comparison with its main adversary, the famous Japanese Zero fighter. Despite its shortcomings, the Grumman fighter more than held its own against the Zero at Coral Sea, Midway, and in the battles over Guadalcanal.

Designers at Grumman intended the Wildcat to be rugged and heavily armed, a fighter that could absorb punishment as well as attack with six .50-caliber machine guns. The Zero, on the other hand, was built to be light and maneuverable at the cost of strength and toughness. It was certainly graceful and nimble, but it did not have the armor or the self-sealing fuel tanks that would have made it better protected but less agile.

The Wildcat in Combat

In performance, the Zero greatly outclassed the Wildcat, but because of their plane’s rugged design and construction, Wildcat pilots were able to survive attacks by Zeros that would have killed their Japanese opponents.

Japanese ace Saburo Sakai was greatly impressed by the Wildcat’s ability to withstand damage. “For some strange reason, even after I had poured about five or six hundred rounds of ammunition directly into the Grumman, the airplane did not fall but kept on flying,” Sakai wrote after a fight with a Wildcat. “I thought this very odd—it had never happened before— and closed the distance between the two airplanes until I could almost reach out and touch the Grumman. To my surprise, the Grumman’s rudder and tail were torn to shreds, looking like an old torn piece of rag.”

Sakai concluded with a note of amazement, “A Zero which had taken that many bullets would have been a ball of fire by now.”

Lieutenant Commander James Flatley, who commanded USS Yorktown’s fighter group at Midway, discovered that the best way to fight the Zero was to use the Wildcat’s weight and speed to advantage—gain altitude and dive at full throttle no matter what the enemy did. This tactic allowed Wildcat pilots to zoom through any screening Zeros and attack enemy bombers.

“Sooner or later they had to take you on on your terms,” Flatley explained. “If you should be jumped from behind, they had difficulty following, particularly when you rolled at high speed.”

These tactics produced results. During the Guadalcanal campaign, Wildcat pilots decimated Sakai’s fighter wing, which was stationed at Rabaul and made up entirely of Zeros. Although the Wildcat was not as graceful as its opponent, American pilots exploited the plane’s weight to negate the Zero’s agility.

This article first appeared on the Warfare History Network.

Image: Wikimedia Commons

Cover of the June 30, 2016 issue of ‘Excelsior’ carried an illustration of a Russian soldier on horseback with a refugee child in his arms. The picture was captioned, ‘The Symbol of Protection of the Armenians by Russians.’

Whether it be the conflict in Syria, skirmishes in Crimea, Ukraine and Chechnya or the recent outbreak of conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia, the old disputes that were never fully resolved have often broken out into armed conflict since the end of the Soviet Union. While the Soviet regime often created some detente between conflicting regions by applying overwhelming security in those regions, at times silently quashing conflicts behind the Iron Curtain, the modern iteration of those conflicts now are armed with weaponry that was once used by the Soviet Army themselves. These weapons were designed to fight a large scale Cold War with the US and NATO, and while being very advance for the era of the late 1970s into the 1980s, they were not designed to do anything but completely destroy their targets, along with the regions where the conflicts would take place.

Much of the modernisation of 1980s era Soviet weapons came from experiences in the field in Afghanistan along with anti-air systems used in Vietnam against the US Air Force. The defense of the Soviet Union from Germany in the Second World War created a focus on air defence and long range missile defence in order to deter an attack on the Soviet Union from the other end of Europe or the globe. With many of these systems now reaching the farthest parts of the world, a new and expansive military threat looms whenever a conflict erupts between regional rivals. With the old disputes in the region of Nagorno-Karabakh echoing conflict between Turkish backed forces and Russian backed forces during the First World War, the ability for Armenia or Azerbaijan to use a conventional ballistic missile to target the larger powers if they support the opposing side is a very real threat to the region. Soviet designed systems were very good for their day, and still are very effective on older aircraft that make up the bulk of systems in the region. An Iskander missile landing on Azeri troops in Turkey or an anti-aircraft missile shooting down a Russian transport plane is likely to escalate conflict between both powers in the region.

The use of conventional modern weapons in the field also is designed to completely destroy communities caught in the conflict. Later Soviet era equipment was very effective, and the costs to the lives of young solders escalates rapidly when used in urban combat. Experiences in Syria, and previously in the many conflicts in Chechnya showed the toll those ex-Soviet weapons could have, even on the modernised Russian Army. Weapons designed to quash rebellions in Prague and Warsaw, and to roll into the rest of Europe are devastating in regional conflicts. For the most part, both sides in those regions have equivalent systems, and both sides fight until everything is destroyed. With the traditional politics still lingering in the region and the proximity to one of the world’s largest oil reserves, the world community should quell any further conflict immediately, before it becomes worse…and in our generation’s disputes it has always become as bad as it can get.

Kris Osborn

Security,

It would be a great boon, but there may not be enough of the planes to go around.

Should an entire U.S. Navy Carrier Strike Group finds itself in a great power war on the open ocean, it seems possible that surface ships might struggle to defend against attacks from enemy fifth-generation stealth fighters. Unless, that is, large numbers of carrier-launched F-35Cs were operational and able to engage in air-to-air combat against approaching enemy aircraft. 

But how about F-22 stealth fighter jets? During the U.S. Navy’s Valiant Shield exercise in the Pacific in September, the service began to explore the idea of having F-22 Raptors defend surface ships such as destroyers, amphibious assault ships and carriers. 

Perhaps the stealth fighter, believed by many to be the most dominant and advanced air-superiority platform in existence, could defend carriers? Why not? 

Speaking of carriers, Retired Lt. Gen. David Deptula, Dean of the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, makes the point that damage to surface ships such as carriers in open-ocean warfare can bring catastrophic effects. 

“You can’t sink land-bases. They can be rapidly reconstituted. Carriers present a huge footprint that is potentially more vulnerable...but is that the best use of an F-22?” Deptula said. 

Given that the F-22 program was, in the minds of many, prematurely truncated years ago, there may not be sufficient numbers of available F-22s for a mission of this kind. More importantly, would they have the reach and staying power to preserve vulnerable air space above surface ships? It seems availability, and the number of nearby F-35Cs, might also be pertinent factors. 

For the first time, the joint Valiant Shield exercise included an Army unit focused on Multi-Domain Operations and the event tested air-ground-sea networking technologies merging Navy ships, Poseidon spy planes and even mine warfare capable B-52s to conduct integrated operations. 

Broadly speaking, a Navy report referred to the mission scope as “maritime security operations, anti-submarine and air-defense exercises, amphibious operations, and other elements of complex warfighting.” 

Carrier strike groups are of course known for their many defenses such as air-and-missile defense interceptors, long-range guns and close-in-defenses such as Phalanx guns or anti-torpedo technologies. Could ship self-defense systems, which increasingly include weapons such as lasers and electronic warfare systems, be better served by having F-22s operate overhead? 

Such a prospect presents interesting options, should an F-22 be able to reach the right ranges and be sufficient to conduct missions overhead. Refueling an F-22 with the Navy’s emerging MQ-25 Stingray carrier-launched drone refueler, however, might extend dwell time and mission scope in a significant fashion. Existing ship defenses may be well equipped to defend against anti-ship missiles, enemy boats and even ballistic missiles, yet it does seem apparent that they could be vulnerable to fifth-generation enemy aircraft. Clearly these threat circumstances are why the Pentagon developed the F-35, yet they also raise the question as to whether an air-to-air dominant fighter like an F-22 might also be well suited to preserve air security in ocean warfare. 

Certainly the advent of Russian and Chinese fifth-generation stealth aircraft changed the threat equation in a substantial way, regarding the kinds of attacks possibly faced by surface ships. China, for instance, is fast-tracking a carrier-launched variant of its J-31 to rival the F-35B. 

“F-18s are not going to bring much utility in a high-end fight,” Deptula said. 

Kris Osborn is the defense editor for the National Interest. Osborn previously served at the Pentagon as a Highly Qualified Expert with the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Army—Acquisition, Logistics & Technology. Osborn has also worked as an anchor and on-air military specialist at national TV networks. He has appeared as a guest military expert on Fox News, MSNBC, The Military Channel, and The History Channel. He also has a Masters Degree in Comparative Literature from Columbia University. This first appeared earlier and is being reposted due to reader interest.

Image: Reuters

Bill Bradley

Politics, Americas

As we disregarded Russian fears and ignored the chance for a true partnership, Steve worried about the resumption of hostile relations between our two countries and possibly a new Cold War.

I knew Steve Cohen for over fifty years from my time with the New York Knicks (he loved basketball) to the U.S. Senate (he loved politics) to business (it couldn’t hold his attention). He was a public intellectual with core convictions informed by history. His magisterial biography of Nikolai Bukharin established his academic reputation. When I read it in the 1970s, it changed the way I thought about the origins of the Soviet Union. For Steve, ideas lived and language made a difference. He often marshaled his great clarity to challenge the status quo. Whether he was smuggling Solzhenitsyn novels into the Soviet Union in the 1970s, advising CBS News during the Gorbachev years, pleading with everyone to avoid a second Cold War or lecturing to a rapt class, he always expressed what he saw as the truth. Above all, he felt the Russian spirit, the pain of Russian history, and the irrepressible humanity of the Russian people.

As a U.S. senator, I traveled often to Russia during the 1980s when Mikhail Gorbachev was in power. Steve saw Gorbachev as having potentially a seminal role in the history of the world and he made no bones about it. With literally hundreds of Russian friends in the arts, journalism, academia, and government, Steve encouraged me to get to know the Russian people and the Russian land. So for six years between 1985 and 1992, I would travel the country from Moscow/St. Petersburg to Irkutsk with just one staff member and a friend of Steve’s who worked for the U.S. Information Agency and was a Ph.D. in Russian culture and language. We would often have meetings with Soviet officials in their offices and then we would go out and meet people in the streets or subways, at literary societies, and around Russian kitchen tables. On one of these trips, I asked a woman exiting the Tashkent subway what Perestroika and Glasnost meant to her. She paused before replying, “A new life for my children.”

When I came back from those trips, I would have lunch with Secretary of State George Shultz and tell him what I had seen, heard, and felt, which he said was much different from those things that the CIA was telling him. Through many sources, Shultz recognized that Gorbachev was a special leader, convinced Reagan of it and the Cold War ended.

When Boris Yeltsin succeeded Gorbachev and the economy went into a free fall with inflation at 1000 percent and a poverty rate of over 30 percent, Steve would say that Russia needed an FDR and instead got a Milton Friedman, leading to the rise of a kleptocracy.

Any good politician knows that when someone is down you call them up and tell them you’re with them and that you know they’ll get through the difficult times. The United States didn’t do that with Russia. We sent free-market ideologues without any understanding of Russian history and with little appreciation for the emotional trauma and wounded pride that the end of the Soviet Union brought to Russia. When the Russian intelligentsia offered advice on how we could work together in the world we just kept on doing what Russians felt was contrary to their interests—NATO expansion, missile defense, Iraq, Kosovo, and Libya.

As we disregarded Russian fears and ignored the chance for a true partnership, Steve worried about the resumption of hostile relations between our two countries and possibly a new Cold War. He held out hope that America would come to its senses. That view increasingly was not popular among the American foreign policy establishment and the media. In fact, in Steve’s last seven years, the New York Times rejected every op-ed he submitted. Some people even labeled him “Putin’s apologist.” Those comments hurt Steve deeply because he was first and always an American but one who could appreciate the legacy of Russian history and the opportunity that existed when tectonic plates shifted. Above all, he knew that it took courage and real leadership at the highest levels to create something new.

The relation between Steve and Gorbachev extended to their families. Gorbachev once told Steve that Steve’s relationship with his wife Katrina reminded Gorbachev of the one he had had with his wife Raisa, who was his inseparable soul mate until she died in 1999. And when Steve’s number two daughter, Nika, developed a consuming interest in both basketball and Russia, she honored her father’s roots in Kentucky and his contribution to the world.

For those of us who knew and cared for him, we will carry with us the memory of a good man who tried to make a difference on a very large stage and who never let the slings and arrows of criticism slow him from calling it as he saw it.

Bill Bradley is a former member of the New York Knicks, a former U.S. Senator, and a presidential candidate in 2000.

Image: Reuters.

Pandemics are not always transformative events. While some worrying preexisting trends could accelerate, it’s incorrect to assume that the coronavirus will end globalization, kill liberal democracy, or enhance China’s soft power.

The UN World Food Programme (WFP), which provides lifesaving food assistance to millions across the world – often in extremely dangerous and hard-to-access conditions – has been awarded the 2020 Nobel Peace Prize. 

Accéder à l’article d’Arnaud Odier, « Le secteur financier face au choc du COVID-19 » ici.

Retrouvez le sommaire complet du numéro 3/2020 de Politique étrangère ici.

Mali’s transitional President has appointed a new Prime Minister, the UN’s top official in the West African country told the UN Security Council on Thursday, detailing the significant events which has ushered in a new political era, since the 18 August coup d’état.

The COVID-19 pandemic has shown that “our health systems are inadequate”, the UN chief told a ministerial meeting on Thursday, citing weak structures and unequal access to healthcare as “major reasons” why the coronavirus has killed one million people and infected more than 30 times that, globally.

Armed conflict has a disproportionate impact on women and girls – a key reason why women’s “full, equal and meaningful participation” in UN peacekeeping is such a priority, the Secretary-General said on Thursday. 

The COVID-19 pandemic has forever changed the way consumers shop online, the UN trade and development body, UNCTAD, said on Thursday, announcing results of a survey of some 3,700 consumers across nine countries. 

Two books by scholars of the women’s rights movement explore the history of the ratification of the U.S. Constitution’s 19th Amendment.

L'absence d'ambitions de la gauche, ou son incapacité à les réaliser, encourage l'extrême droite à la détrousser de ses idées les plus porteuses. Dans ce registre, Alain Soral est devenu une vedette du Net. / Crise des valeurs, Extrême droite, Idées, Idéologie, Internet, Jeunes, Médias, Mondialisation, (...) / Crise des valeurs, Extrême droite, Idées, Idéologie, Internet, Jeunes, Médias, Mondialisation, Nationalisme, Politique, Racisme, Travail, Marxisme, Fascisme, Néolibéralisme - 2013/10

As we speak, the world is plagued by the coronavirus, which has claimed more than one million lives worldwide.  While many commentators have noted that the pandemic has created the greatest economic crisis since the Great Depression, horrific mental health problems among a great segment of the population and great social unrest, not enough people have noticed that the pandemic has also led to the strengthening of Islamist extremism across the globe.  

According to the Palestinian Center for Policy and Research, a recent poll found that if elections were held today between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority, Hamas would win: “The overwhelming majority of the Palestinians views the decision of the UAE to normalize relations with Israel as a betrayal or abandonment of the Palestinian cause, one that serves only the interests of Israel. A similar majority thinks that Saudi Arabia and Egypt, by endorsing that normalization, have in effect abandoned the Palestinian leadership.   But most Palestinians also place the blame on themselves because they are divided and have normalized relations with Israel long before others.”

If Hamas were to take over the West Bank, a Palestinian source, who spoke on condition of anonymity, noted that this would be detrimental for women. The Hamas daily Falistin encourages gender apartheid in the Gaza Strip by calling for limiting women’s participation in public life for they are the “fastest transmitters of epidemics.”  From age 9 onwards, all schools are gender segregated in Gaza by law, even if the schools are privately owned, Christian or run by the UN.  Furthermore, male teachers in Gaza are forbidden from having female students. Women in Gaza are also barred from riding motorcycles, smoking in public, learning to drive in the presence of a man, using a male hairdresser and even submitting complaints of incest.  On top of that, Gazan women are forbidden from going to the beach or a restaurant unless they are accompanied by a male chaperon.  In fact, even mannequins in women’s clothing stores are required to be dressed modestly.  The Hamas Morality Police are known to frequently harass women who do not wear the hijab or conduct themselves in accordance with their ideology.  All of this occurred way before the pandemic reached the coastal strip.   

The Palestinian source added that minorities fare no better under Hamas rule as well.  The Al-Nasser Salah al-Deen Brigades, the military wing of the Popular Resistance Committees in Gaza, warned people against celebrating Christmas a couple of years ago in a flier, claiming one should “not to go the way of the Jews and the Christians, indeed God is not for the evil people.”  According to the Hamas authorities, the flier was aimed not only at Muslims but also Christians in the coastal strip.  It is apparent that if Hamas takes over the West Bank, such radical Islamist extremism would reign supreme there too.   

Further to the West, Turkey has been inciting against Israel and India at the UN.  Recently, Erdogan stated that the “filthy hands” of Israelis are “increasing their audacity at Jerusalem’s holy sites,” a remark which has an uncanny resemblance to Mahmoud Abbas’s anti-Semitic “dirty feet” speech.  He also took a jab at India’s Kashmir policy.  Shipan Kumer Basu, who heads the World Hindu Struggle Committee, called Erdogan’s remark about Kashmir and Israel at the UN “highly reprehensible.” 

Erdogan also has been threatening the UAE and other countries who seek to reconcile with the Jewish state.  This came after they transformed the Hagia Sophia into a mosque and submerged a UNESCO world heritage site under water, both acts that showed that religious extremism is dominating Turkish politics these days.  They also have been taking advantage of the pandemic to try and deport Iranian refugees.   Not too long ago, it was reported that Turkey tried to deport Iranian women’s rights activist Maryam Shariatmadari back to the Islamic Republic.  Although she was spared in the end, the Turkish authorities have now eyed the deportation of another refugee from Iran. 

Sirwan Mansouri, a Kurdish political and human rights activist, was captured and tortured several times in Iran before he was finally forced to flee to Turkey: “I was recognized as a refugee 5 years ago by UNHCR and I was interviewed for resettlement in 2016, but my case went on hold till 2019 for unknown reasons. Again in 2019 my wife and I were interviewed for resettlement in Ankara, but no result again and every time I contacted them, they told me I should be awaited.  I am a refugee rights activist and manage a refugee website named: HANARefugees.”

“I publish the latest news on websites for refugees.  I also have done a lot of talks and interviews about refugees in Kurdish, Persian and English languages,” he added.  “I wrote some articles about their terrible condition and the rights they are entitled to in Turkey. Two years ago we wrote a letter in a type of petition with more than 5400 signatures to UNHCR headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland and complained about the process, but received no response. Again, this year, we wrote another letter to ECHR (European Court For Human Rights) and complained about both the UNHCR and immigration office of Turkey.”

“I am Kurdish and due to my race, bear more discrimination in comparison with other refugees. Besides all I am a journalist and work on the human rights and refugees rights field and because of my activities in social media, the Turkey government put more pressure on me directly and indirectly. In their recent act, they took my Identity card without any reason and  are trying to deport me and have wanted me to leave the Turkish territory, while I am a refugee and based on Geneva convention no one has the right to deport a refugee to his/her country of origin.  I know Turkey responsible for holding my case in the resettlement section for 5 years without any reason, while according to UNHCR staff, I am eligible to resettle in a third safe country.  Furthermore, I am sick and have some different diseases such as diabetes type 2 and have polyps in my intestines suspicious of cancer and have all medical documents.” 

And according to Mansouri, he is not the only one: “In late 2018, the UNHCR formally handed over the review of refugees’ cases to the Turkish Immigration Office. Since then, the Immigration Office has rejected most of the cases on an unprecedented scale, given many refugees expulsion notices for leaving Turkish territory, and in some cases has deported refugees. And this process is continuing. All this is happening while according to the Geneva Conventions, none of the refugees who have been accepted by the UNHCR and are under international protection should under any circumstances be returned to their countries of origin.”

This fact was confirmed by Mendi Safadi, who heads the Safadi Center for International Diplomacy, Research, Public Relations and Human Rights: “Turkey was a refuge for opponents of the Iranian regime and many Iranian opposition figures saw Turkey as a safe haven, but now Turkey has turned into a great danger for them, given that the Turkish government is cooperating with their Iranian counterparts.  Said Tamjadi and Muhammed Rajabbi were sentenced to death in Iran after they were betrayed by Turkey.  Other Iranian refugees who fled Turkey are awaiting deportation back to Iran, like Mansouri.   The Safadi Center operates in the international arena to prevent such deportations from happening, for Turkey is violating international law.”

However, the Palestinian Authority and Turkey are not the only ones that turned more Islamist since the pandemic erupted.   Basu claims that radical Islam has also only got stronger in Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Pakistan since the pandemic erupted, and that it poses a threat to the continued existence of Hindus in these three countries: “A Hindu school girl was hacked to death for refusing to marry a Muslim in Bangladesh.  In that same country, a Hindu girl was raped inside a police station.  A Hindu family in in Eidalpur village was recently assaulted.  A 14-year-old Hindu girl was forcefully converted to Islam in Pakistan.  In the same country, a Hindu doctor had his throat slit and a Hindu temple was destroyed during the coronavirus lockdown.  And these types of incidents just keep getting worse.”  

“Due to the silence of humanity, the simple-minded Hindus of Bangladesh, Afghanistan and Pakistan are gradually disappearing,” he added.  “Environmental activists always played an effective role in protecting endangered species in various countries.   But no one has stood up to help the oppressed Hindus of these three countries.  This is very tragic.  I think that humanity should wake up from its slumber or else Hindus will cease to exist in these countries.  And given their radical Islamist ideology, they will not even establish museums to preserve the vanquished Hindu culture in their nations.   I urge humanity to step up to the plate before it is too late.”

The existence of this global pandemic is causing many people to turn to religion as a remedy for their sorrows.   However, Islamist extremists are taking advantage of this normal human reaction in order to push forward their extremist agendas that oppress women and minorities, and one day, this will once again threaten the West, after the borders open up again.   After all, an increase in the number of people adhering to extremist ideology leads to more terror attacks and rogue regimes.  Therefore, it is of utmost importance for Western policy makers to formulate a strategy for dealing with Islamist extremism, so that we will be prepared for what happens the day there is a vaccine.