Category Archives: Opinion

Opinion

Harder the Brexit, Harder the Resolution of Irish Border Problem

The proposals the United Kingdom government is making for its future relationship with the European Union will run into a number of obstacles in coming days.

[John Bruton | Oped Column Syndication]

The harder the Brexit, the harder will be the resolution of the Irish border problem.

In a Joint Report of 8 December 2017, the United Kingdom (UK) agreed to respect Ireland’s place in the EU and that there would be no hard border in Ireland. This was to apply “in all circumstances, irrespective of any future agreement between the European Union (EU) and the UK”.

The further the UK negotiating demand goes from continued membership of the EU, the harder it will be for it to fulfill the commitments it has given on the Irish border in the Joint Report.

If the UK government had decided to leave the EU, but to stay in the Customs Union, the Irish border questions would have been minimized.  But the government decided to reject that, because it hoped to be able to make better trade deals with non EU countries, than the ones it has as an EU member.

If the UK government had decided to leave the EU, but  to join the European Economic Area (the Norway option),this would also have minimized the Irish border problems. The government rejected that because it would have meant continued free movement of people from the EU into the UK .

In each decision, maintaining its relations with Ireland was given a lower priority than the supposed benefits of trade agreements with faraway places, and being able to curb EU immigration.

The government got its priorities wrong.

Future trade agreements that may be made with countries outside the EU will be neither as immediate, nor as beneficial to the UK, as maintaining peace and good relations in the island of Ireland. The most they will do is replace the 70 or more trade agreements  with non EU countries that the UK already has as an EU member and will lose when it leaves.

EU immigration to the UK, if it ever was a problem, is a purely temporary and finite one.

Already the economies of central European EU countries are picking up, and, as time goes by, there will be fewer and fewer people from those countries wanting to emigrate to the UK(or anywhere else) to find work.  These countries have low birth rates and ageing populations, and thus a diminishing pool of potential emigrants.

Solving the supposed EU immigration “problem” is less important to the UK, in the long run, than peace and good relations in, and with, Ireland.

If, as is now suggested, the UK looks for a Canada or Ukraine style deal, the Irish border problem will be even worse. Mrs May has recognized this and this is why she rejects a Canada style deal..

A Canada style deal would mean the collection of heavy tariffs on food products, either on the Irish Sea, or on the Irish border. Collecting them on the long land border would be physically impracticable, so the only option would be to do it on the Irish Sea.

The all Ireland economy, to which the UK committed itself in the Joint Report, would be irrevocably damaged. The economic foundation of the Belfast Agreement would be destroyed.

It is time for the Conservative Party to return to being conservative, and conserve the peace it helped build in Ireland on the twin foundations of the Belfast Agreement and the EU Treaties.  Conservative Party members might remember that, without John Major’s negotiation of the Downing Street Declaration in 1993, there would have been no Belfast Agreement in 1998.

The proposals the UK government is making for its future relationship with the EU will run into a number of obstacles in coming days.

The first will be that of persuading the EU that the UK will stick to any deal it makes.

Two collectively responsible members of the UK Cabinet, Michael Gove and Liam Fox, have both suggested that the UK might agree to a Withdrawal Treaty on the basis of the Chequers formula, but later, once out to the EU, abandon it, and do whatever it liked. This would be negotiating with the EU in bad faith. Why should the EU make a permanent concession to the UK, if UK Cabinet members intend to treat the deal as temporary?

The second problem relates to the substance of the UK proposals.

They would require the EU to give control of its trade borders, and subcontract control to a non member, the UK. While the UK proposals envisage a common EU/UK rule book for the quality of goods circulating, via the UK, into the EU Single Market, the UK Parliament would still retain the option of not passing some of the relevant legislation to give effect to it. The UK would not be bound to accept the ECJ’s interpretation of what the common rules meant. Common interpretation of a common set of rules is what makes a common market, common.

Mrs May is not the only Prime Minister with domestic constraints.  Creating a precedent of allowing the UK to opt into some bits of the EU Single Market, but not all, would create immediate demands for exceptions from other EU members, and from Switzerland and Norway (who pay large annual fees for entry to the EU Single market). It would play straight into the hands of populists in the European Parliament elections, which take place just two months after the date the UK itself chose as the end of its Article 50 negotiation period.

It does not require much political imagination to see that aspects of the UK proposal, if incorporated in a final UK/EU trade deal in a few years time, would be a hard sell in the parliaments of some of the 27 countries. We must remember that all that would be needed for the deal to fail, would be for just one of them to say NO.

Remember how difficult it was to get the Canada and Ukraine deals through.

Article Source: Oped Column Syndication.

John Bruton is the former Prime Minister of the Republic of Ireland  (1994-97) and the former European Union Ambassador to the United States (2004-09). He has held several important offices in Irish government, including Minister for Finance, Minister for Industry & Energy, and Minister for Trade, Commerce & Tourism.

 

Opinion

Inside Putin’s Head

Vladimir Putin tries to legitimize his disregard of the ‘rule of law’ by claiming that all former territories dating back to the Byzantine Era and native Russian speakers must be protected by “Mother Russia”. However, the reality is: these territories give Russia access to warm water ports necessary to ship its oil and weapons.

[Cynthia M. Lardner | Oped Column Syndication]

Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin’s approach to foreign relations and military engagement is opportunistic, aggressive and expansionist. These traits – the anti-thesis of multilateralism and cooperation – are driven by Putin’s mental schema that he has been called upon to defend everyone of Russian descent.

Putin’s actions over the last decade, especially in Ukraine, the Crimean Peninsula, Georgia, South Ossetia and Abkhazia, have cost him his G8 seat and open dialogue with NATO and other foreign powers, to the point where many consider this a resurgence of the Cold War. Since 2015 Russia has been slapped with an increasing number of Western sanctions. The Russian plutocracy remains largely unscathed due to their inter-relationship with the Russian government. Then there is Russia’s vast oil reserves upon which the European Union and other countries are heavily dependent.

Furthermore, more than $250 billion in goods and services exchanged annually between Russia and its largest trading partner, i.e. Western Europe. Russia is also non-discriminatory in its sale of weapons and military technology to foreign powers, including Iran and North Korea. It’s the Russian people, living under Putin’s authoritarian rule, who have, undoubtedly, been forced to endure the adverse economic impact caused by the rapid decline of the ruble.

Russia is one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council, and each of these members has veto power, extending to the enforcement of all international tribunal decisions and, if necessary to dispatch peacekeeping missions. Thus, the Russian Federation is protected from international judicial civil accountability in the International Court of Justice or the Permanent Court of Arbitration, which hears cases between United Nations member nations.

As Russia is not a party to the Rome Statue, it is not subject to criminal liability before the International Criminal Court. By way of example, assuming, arguendo, that there was a viable enforcement mechanism, Russia could have been held responsible for the illegal annexation of Crimea under the Minsk II Agreement, and for its actions in Syria. In sum, Putin rules the Russia with impunity and without accountability.

Gorbachev and Kissinger Speak Out

Mikhail Gorbachev, the last General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), received a Nobel Peace Prize in 1990 for summits held with Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush resulting in the 1987 Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty. The summits were instrumental in bringing the post-World War II Cold War to its conclusion.

The goodwill generated by Gorbachev and his successor Boris Yeltsin, the first president of the newly created Russian Federation, dissipated when Yeltsin resigned as president, appointing Vladimir Putin the acting president until official elections were held in early 2000. He has been re-elected three consecutive times. Based on his interference with any contender posing an actual threat, Putin could hold the presidency indefinitely.

When the Cold War ended Russia expected to be accepted by the West. This never fully materialized. Putin views that Russia has been left disconnected from post-World War II Europe and threatened by the continuation of NATO.

Dialogue between the West and Russia has deteriorated to the point where it is once again in Cold War mode. Many, including NATO Secretary General, Jens Stoltenberg, and Gorbachev have warned that the continued isolation of Russia could lead to armed conflict on European soil.

Gorbachev warned:

“The situation hasn’t been this bad in a long time, and I am very disappointed in how world leaders are behaving themselves. We see evidence of an inability to use diplomatic mechanisms. International politics has turned into exchanges of accusations, sanctions, and even military strikes… I am sure no one wants war, but in the current febrile atmosphere could lead to great trouble, and ordinary people are not yet aware of the threat hanging over them…”

Legendary former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, who has been in contact with both US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, and Gorbachev agree that, minimally, a détente [easing of hostility] is needed to ease the tensions between the two countries, which would simultaneously ease tensions around the world.

A logical starting place for dialogue would have been to discuss the mutual charges of violations have placed the INF Treaty in jeopardy and the renewal of the 2010 New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty put bounds on the US-Russian nuclear competition, is due to expire in less than three years. These treaties provide desirable Mutual Assured Stability between the two countries. But the vision most of the world was left with was Putin tossing a soccer ball to Trump.

After the July Helsinki summit between Putin and Trump, Kissinger sadly concluded, “I think we are in a very, very grave period for the world.”

Chicken or the Egg: The Sanctions Conundrum

Since assuming power, Putin has proven himself to be an antagonist. There are several factors driving Putin’s aggressive, opportunistic and expansionist tactics.

Putin believes himself to be irrevocably tied to Europe dating all the way back to the Byzantine Era. Putin has justified his actions by repeatedly stating that it is his duty to protect all the people of Russian descent even if they reside outside of Russia.

While Russia was sanctioned for the Russo-Georgian War, those sanctions do not compare to the sanctions imposed innumerable times by the EU and the US since 2015. The first set of these sanctions were imposed for the 2014 illegal annexation of the Crimean Peninsula for Ukraine. Russia then lost its seat on the G8. It was the illegal annexation and continued occupation of Crimea that initially left Russia diplomatically out in the cold. While the Minsk Protocols were violated, the reality is that Russia is going to continue occupying Crimea in order to access the warm water port [in Sevastopol] in order to transport its oil [through Black Sea]. This creates a diplomatic conundrum for those wise enough to advocate that the current Cold War be transformed into a détente.

More recently, Russia has been sanctioned for tampering with the 2016 US Presidential election and for being found culpable for a chemical weapons attack in Great Britain on a former KGB agent and his daughter. In the eighteen months, Russia has seen diplomats expelled from several countries – most recently in Greece – for a variety of reasons.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has alleged that Russia – despite the sanctions – has increased its economic and military capacities. The value of the ruble, however, tells a different story. After years of sanctions, the ruble has only slightly recovered.

Sanctions have not proven effective. In the case of the Crimean Peninsula, the sanctions will continue indefinitely despite their ineffectiveness in achieving anything other than increasing Russian ire [anger].

Crisis Group’s senior analyst for Russia, Anna Arutunyan, advocates for a more common sense approach to the imposition of future sanctions:

“Rather than creating incentives for changes in Russian policy or behaviour, such sanctions instead serve to reinforce the Kremlin’s narrative that the West will besiege Russia whatever it does. To work more effectively, any fresh Western sanctions should target specific actions – if necessary piece by piece – rather than conflating all of the Kremlin’s aggressive activities abroad. Western powers should lay out clearly what would need to happen for those sanctions to be lifted.”

Weakening Democratic Nations

Putin wants to see Western democratic nations weakened. Due to historical ties, that desire to disrupt is greater where the European Union is concerned.

The July summit with Trump made an international mockery of democracy and the ‘rule of law’, and further damaged the US’s relationships with traditional allies. The preceding G7 and NATO summits and meeting with British Prime Minister Theresa May were coups for Putin as they evidenced a weakening amongst Western allies.

A weakening of the ties between democratic nations generates confusion and diminishes the power of the strongest leaders, such as German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron. Insecurity is increased by the inconsistencies between Trump and senior US military officials.

What’s more, the threat perceived by the Baltics, the Scandinavia, the Balkans, Poland, Ukraine and Georgia has reached an unacceptable level.

Ukraine and Georgia

Along with the well-known ongoing armed conflict in Ukraine’s Donbas region (where Russian troops and mercenaries push for control of even more landmass), there was and is a similar – but lesser known – scenario playing itself out in Georgia.

The trigger was the 2008 NATO Summit, where Georgia and Ukraine were given a commitment that at a future date they would accede to the NATO member-state status. Putin is speculated to believe that his engaging aggressive and expansionist tactics in both Georgia and Ukraine would slow down or even halt the accession process.

Georgia, once a part of the USSR, is wedged between the Middle East, Russia, Iran and Turkey and is an important corridor for oil pumped from the Caspian Sea. This month is the 10th anniversary of the start of the Russo-Georgian War in which Russia drove Georgian troops out of two breakaway provinces, South Ossetia and Abkhazia. To date, the Kremlin continues to illegally occupy these territories going so far as so construct nineteen military bases in South Ossetia alone.

Georgia is still being attacked by militants using covert tactics that, until recently, were ignored by the media. Pro-Russian militants are taking back Georgia hectare by hectare under cover of darkness, saving Russia from the burden of engaging in an all-out [direct] armed conflict with Georgia. There are times when Georgian farmers wake up only to discover warning signs, barbed wire and even surveillance cameras on what was only the day before part of their farms.

Based on his ill-conceived belief predating the USSR, Putin tries to legitimize his disregard of the ‘rule of law’ by claiming that all former territories dating back to the Byzantine Era and native Russian speakers must be protected by “Mother Russia”, including Georgia, especially South Ossetia, and the Crimean Peninsula. However, the reality is: these territories give Russia access to warm water ports necessary to ship its oil and, no doubt, weapons.

Admiral James Foggo, Commander of US Naval Forces Europe and Africa, stated that Russia is deploying more submarines to the Mediterranean, Black Sea and North Atlantic at the highest rate since the end Cold War.

At the 2018 NATO Summit, the alliance’s member-states reaffirmed their commitment to Georgia that it will accede to NATO member-state status. Putin responded with the expected threat that if NATO added Georgia on Russia’s southern flank, it would “respond appropriately to such aggressive steps which pose a direct threat to Russia.”

The Baltics, Poland and Scandinavia

Then there’s the threat to the EU’s north — specifically Poland, Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania.

The Soviet Union seized Lithuania in 1939. On March 11, 1990, Lithuania declared that it was an independent state, the first of the Soviet republics to do so. While Poland was not a Soviet satellite state, it was under Soviet and, then, Russian control until 1989.

At present, [Russia’s] neighboring countries, Finland and, to a lesser degree, Sweden and Norway have a heightened sense of fear of Putin’s tactics. The Lithuanian and Swedish governments have gone so far as to disseminate materials to their citizens about how to spot a Kremlin agent and what to do in the event of an attack.

Finland was under Russian control until 1917 and the two countries share an 833 mile border. For over 100 years, Finland has tread a fine between Europe and Russia. An EU member since 1995, Finland is not a NATO member. However, Finland participates in nearly all sub-areas of the Partnership for Peace programme and has provided peacekeeping forces to the NATO missions in Afghanistan and Kosovo.

But, it is Poland and Lithuania that face the biggest threat due to the strategic location of the Suwalki Gap, a narrow 64 mile piece of land connecting NATO member-states Poland and Lithuania. Occupation of the Suwalki Gap or bordering Lithuanian territory by Russia would cut off the three Baltic States from other NATO countries. The US Army Europe commander Lieutenant General Ben Hodges stated that the Suwalki Gap is a high potential Russian military target.

Analysts have compared Suwalki Gap to the Cold War era’s German Fulda Gap, where NATO planned and prepared for hypothetical USSR attacks.

NATO has enhanced its forward military presence in more than five regions.

NATO has also created new five cyber warfare centers in Finland, Estonia, Poland, Germany and France.

At a time when NATO needs to rely on Poland, it has boldly challenged adherence to the ‘rule of law’. In January, Poland passed a bill criminalizing any suggestion Poland was complicit in the Holocaust, resulting in sharp criticism by the EU and the US. In July, Poland pulled away from the EU when it changed its judicial system in violation of the rules set by the EU. These are odd tactics for a country that is fearful of Russia. It is questionable what impact Russian operatives supporting far-right nationalists have had on recent events in Poland.

There’s [Russian] Western Military Command for countering NATO. Headquartered in St. Petersburg, the Western Military Command covers 26 federal subjects (including Moscow and Kaliningrad), bordering Poland, the Baltic States, Finland and Norway. A May 2018 Rand Corp report described it as “Russia’s most-capable ground and air forces”.

“Strengthening Russia as an independent international player does not give rest to our NATO colleagues. They are trying in every possible way to prevent Russia from becoming a geopolitical competitor, all the more having allies,” stated Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu.

“Not only have Russia’s actions and capabilities increased in alarming and confrontational ways, its national-security policy is aimed at challenging the US and its NATO allies and partners,” said Admiral Foggo.

Putin has heightened the threat level by engaging leaders from those European states which are either not part of the EU or were former USSR satellite states, and also by engaging voters who feel disenfranchised from the EU or the US. Additionally, Putin controls a vast propaganda machine and a host of cyber-warfare tactics that has interfered with numerous elections, most notably in the US, France, Austria and Germany, as well as inciting anti-democratic and even white supremacist protests.

Russia has used soft power to deter former Soviet republics and states to Russia’s west and south from joining NATO and the EU. Putin’s authoritarian leadership is admired by Czech Republic President Miloš Zeman, Hungary Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and Serbian Prime Minister Alexander Vucic.

Cynthia M. Lardner is an American journalist residing in the Netherlands and is a contributing editor to Tuck Magazine and the International Policy Digest. Ms. Lardner holds degrees in journalism, law, and counseling psychology.

Opinion

Russia is America’s Friend

“Russia is our friend.” It’s a case that could fill volumes. I don’t make this case suffering under some delusion of the perfect saintliness of the Russian government, neither now nor at any time in history.

[David Swanson | Oped Column Magazine]

Last May I was in Russia when fascists held a rally in my hometown of Charlottesville, not to be confused with their larger rally which followed in August. At the May rally, people shouted “Russia is our friend.” I was on a Russian TV show called Crosstalk the next day and discussed this. I also discussed it with other Russians, actual friends in the human sense. Some of them were completely bewildered, arguing that Russia never had slavery and couldn’t be the friend of Confederate-flag-waving people whom they saw as advocates for slavery. (Anti-Russian Ukrainians have also waved Confederate flags.)

I don’t think slavery or serfdom was on the minds of the people shouting “Russia is our friend.” Rather they believed the Democratic/Liberal accusation that the Russian government had tried to help make Donald Trump President, and they approved. They may also have thought of Russia as a “white” ally in their cause of white supremacy.

I think there is a case to make that, in fact, in a very different sense, “Russia is our friend.” It’s a case that could fill volumes. I don’t make this case suffering under some delusion of the perfect saintliness of the Russian government, neither now nor at any time in history. In 2015, the Russian military approached me and asked if I would publish their propaganda under my own name. I told them to go to hell publicly. I’ve had Russian media censor my criticisms of Russia and highlight my criticisms of the US (yet they allow more criticism of Russia than big US media allows criticism of US foreign policy).

I make the following case because I think it is overwhelming yet fervently ignored. I’ll just note a few highlights.

While the US and Russia were war allies during World War I, the US, in 1917, sent funding to one side, the anti-revolutionary side of a Russian civil war, worked to blockade the Soviet Union, and, in 1918, sent US troops to Murmansk, Archangel, and Vladivostok in an attempt to overthrow the new Russian government. They abandoned the effort and withdrew in April, 1920. Most people in the US do not know this, but many more Russians do.

The threat of the communists, as an example, albeit a deeply flawed one, of taking wealth away from oligarchs was a driving force in US foreign affairs from 1920 up to, all during, and long after World War II. Senator and future president Harry Truman was far from alone in wishing to help the Russians if the Germans were winning, but the Germans if the Russians were winning, so that more of both would die. Senator Robert Taft proclaimed an elite view, shared by some West Point generals, that a victory for fascism would be better than a victory for communism. Wall Street had helped to build up Nazi Germany. Without the help of IBM, General Motors, Ford, Standard Oil, and other US businesses right through the war, the Nazis could not have done what they did. The US government was complicit in these acts of treason, avoiding bombing US factories in Germany, and even compensating US businesses for damage when hit.

The Russians had turned the tied [tide] against the Nazis outside Moscow and begun pushing the Germans back before the US ever entered World War II. The Soviets implored the US to attack Germany from the west from that moment until the summer of 1944 — that is to say, for two-and-a-half years. Wanting the Russians to do most of the killing and dying — which they did — the US and Britain also did not want the Soviet Union making a new deal with or taking sole control of Germany. The allies agreed that any defeated nation would have to surrender to all of them and completely. The Russians went along with this.

Yet in Italy, Greece, France, etc., the US and Britain cut Russia out almost completely, banned communists, shut out leftist resisters to the Nazis, and re-imposed rightwing governments that the Italians called “fascism without Mussolini.” The US would “leave behind” spies and terrorists and saboteurs in various European countries to fend off any communist influence.

Originally scheduled for the first day of Roosevelt’s and Churchill’s meeting with Stalin in Yalta, the US and British bombed the city of Dresden flat, destroying its buildings and its artwork and its civilian population, apparently as a means of threatening Russia. The US then developed and used on Japanese cities nuclear bombs, a decision driven largely by the desire to see Japan surrender to the US alone, without the Soviet Union, and by the desire to threaten the Soviet Union.

Immediately upon German surrender, Winston Churchill proposed using Nazi troops together with allied troops to attack the Soviet Union, the nation that had just done the bulk of the work of defeating the Nazis. This was not an off-the-cuff proposal. The US and British had sought and achieved partial German surrenders, had kept German troops armed and ready, and had debriefed German commanders on lessons learned from their failure against the Russians. Attacking the Russians sooner rather than later was a view advocated by General George Patton, and by Hitler’s replacement Admiral Karl Donitz, not to mention Allen Dulles and the OSS. Dulles made a separate peace with Germany in Italy to cut out the Russians, and began sabotaging democracy in Europe immediately and empowering former Nazis in Germany, as well as importing them into the US military to focus on war against Russia.

The war launched was a cold one. The US. worked to make sure that West German companies would rebuild quickly but not pay war reparations owed to the Soviet Union. While the Soviets were willing to withdraw from countries like Finland, their demand for a buffer between Russia and Europe hardened as the US-led Cold War grew, in particular the oxymoronic “nuclear diplomacy.”

Lies about Soviet threats and missile gaps and Russian tanks in Korea and global communist conspiracies became the biggest profit makers for US weapons companies, not to mention Hollywood movie studios, in history, as well as the biggest threat to peace in various corners of the globe. The US drew Russia into a war in Afghanistan and armed its opponents. Efforts at nuclear disarmament and diplomacy, which more often than not came from the Soviet side, were routinely thwarted by Americans. When Eisenhower and Khrushchev seemed likely to talk peace, a US spy plane was shot down, just after an American who’d been involved with those planes defected to Russia. When Kennedy seemed interested in peace, he was killed, purportedly by that very same American.

When Germany reunited, the US and allies lied to the Russians that NATO would not expand. Then NATO quickly began expanding eastward. Meanwhile the US openly bragged about imposing Boris Yeltsin and corrupt crony capitalism on Russia by interfering in a Russian election in collusion with Yeltsin. NATO developed into an aggressive global war maker and expanded right up to Russia’s borders, where the US began installing missiles. Russian requests to join NATO or Europe were dismissed out of hand. Russia was to remain a designated enemy, even without the communism, and even without constituting any threat or engaging in any hostility.

When Russia gave the US a memorial in sorrow for the victims of 9/11, the US practically hid it, and reported on it so little that most people don’t know it exists or believe it’s a false story.

When Russia has proposed to make treaties on weapons in space or cyber war or nuclear missiles, the US has regularly rejected such moves. Russia’s advocacy for the Iran agreement meant nothing. Obama and Trump have expelled Russian diplomats. Obama helped facilitate a coup in Ukraine. Trump has begun weapons shipments to the coup government, which includes Nazis. Obama tried to facilitate an overthrow in Syria. Trump escalated the bombings, even hitting Russian troops. Trump accuses Russia — the one allied power not still occupying Germany — of dominating Germany, while trying to prevent Russia from selling its fossil fuels.

Russia is accused, and found guilty prior to convincing evidence, of shooting down an airplane, of “aggressively” flying near US planes on Russia’s borders, of “conquering” Crimea through a popular vote, of poisoning people in England, of torturing and murdering a man in prison, and of course of “hacking” an election — an accusation which, if evidence is ever produced for it, will amount to far less than Israel does in the US or than the US does in many countries. Through all of these accusations it is not uncommon for the Russians to be referred to as “the commies,” despite the demise of communism.

What, you may ask, does any of this have to do with Russia being a friend? Simply this: nobody other than a friend would put up with this shit.

David Swanson is an author, activist, journalist, and radio host. He is the director of World Beyond War, a global nonviolent movement to end war and establish a just and sustainable peace. David is campaign coordinator for Roots Action.

Opinion

Anarcho-Populism, A New Ideology?

Failure to understand the new ideological framework will be the cause of the collapse of many political parties and coalitions that exist today.

[Fotini Mastroianni | Oped Column Syndication ]

According to researchers, the ideology born in 2011 is a mix of cyber-anarchism, anti-globalization and populism like the one emerged in Russia and the US in the late 19th century.

We all know the Anonymous mask, a symbol of the new type of revolution (anarcho-populism), a symbol that we have seen in the streets of Cairo and elsewhere. The new ideology that has emerged is grounded in the anti-globalization movements that emerged in the 1990s and in 2000. Movements that rejected the power of the media and promoted the idea of ​​collectiveness through popular assemblies in each neighborhood. There is, however, a significant difference between the anti-globalization movements and the movements of the squares, such as those who have been resurrected in Greece, etc.

The anti-globalization movement was, of course, against global neo-liberalism and its main exponents, such as the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organization, etc., while the square movements, as we experienced with the Aganaktismenoi in Greece, were directed mainly against the domestic oligarchy of the political system. Ideological purity, simply, did not exist. Common people were involved in the movements of the squares, where they discussed publicly and shared their thoughts with others, and their goal was more justice and transparency from the political system.

The “contract” between rulers and the people has been broken due to the economic crisis. The creation of artificial economic crises by the neo-liberal elites, the so-called rescue programs that do not eventually save anyone, have led millions of people to poverty and impoverishment (Greece is a living example). Governments no longer guarantee prosperity, not even the viability of their citizens, and freedom is limited.

The new movements and the new ideology mainly use social media to spread messages to mobilize furious citizens and protect them from austerity measures (see anti-auction movement in Greece). The communication campaigns of these movements reveal the political and economic scandals, the middle-class poverty and the oppression of the government.

A two-pole system is created – common people against the elites. Common people who seek democracy and battle totalitarianism. The relationship with the Left is now competitive, therefore the Left fights these movements.

In the economy, the main axes are to provide social services and guarantee a minimum wage, while, contrary to the globalization movements that await the end of capitalism, the new ideology emphasizes the end of inequalities, mainly at national/local level.

The existing political system cannot match this new ideology and, in my opinion, it is wrong to consider this new ideology as populist in the sense of chauvinistic nationalism.

Failure to understand this new ideological framework will also be the cause of the collapse of many political parties and coalitions that exist today. In Greece, this collapse is seen through mass contestation and the creation of many small parties, which, however, do not quite understand these changes, but think in an old-fashioned political way.

World changes, a change so radical that causes unrest. The new reality has not yet been shaped, but it will, perhaps after very painful processes, be created hoping for better living terms for people.

Fotini Mastroianni is an economist, MBA lecturer, writer, blogger from Athens, Greece. She had taught, among others, at the University of Wales & University of Glyndwr.

Opinion

Time to Re-Examine the Atlantic Alliance

It’s time the NATO went the way of the Warsaw Pact and recognize that the old ways of thinking are not only outdated but also dangerous.

[Conn M. Hallinan | Oped Column Magazine]

The outcome of the July11-12 NATO meeting in Brussels got lost amid the media’s obsession with President Donald Trump’s bombast, but the “Summit Declaration” makes for sober reading. The media reported that the 28-page document “upgraded military readiness,” and was “harshly critical of Russia,” but there was not much detail beyond that.

But details matter, because that is where the Devil hides.

One such detail is NATO’s “Readiness Initiative” that will beef up naval, air and ground forces in “the eastern portion of the Alliance.” NATO is moving to base troops in Latvia, Estonia Lithuania, the Czech Republic and Poland. Since Georgia and Ukraine have been invited to join the Alliance, some of those forces could end up deployed on Moscow’s western and southern borders.

And that should give us pause.

A recent European Leadership’s Network’s (ELN) study titled “Envisioning a Russia-NATO Conflict” concludes, “The current Russia-NATO deterrence relationship is unstable and dangerously so.” The ELN is an independent think tank of military, diplomatic and political leaders that fosters “collaborative” solutions to defense and security issues.

High on the study’s list of dangers is “inadvertent conflict,” which ELN concludes “may be the most likely scenario for a breakout” of hostilities. “The close proximity of Russian and NATO forces” is a major concern, argues the study, “but also the fact that Russia and NATO have been adapting their military postures towards early reaction, thus making rapid escalation more likely to happen.”

With armed forces nose-to-nose, “a passage from crisis to conflict might be sparked by the actions of regional commanders or military commanders at local levels or come as a consequence of an unexpected incident or accident.” According to the European Leadership Council, there have been more than 60 such incidents in the last year.

The NATO document is, indeed, hard on Russia, which it blasts for the “illegal and illegitimate annexation of Crimea,” its “provocative military activities, including near NATO borders,” and its “significant investments in the modernization of its strategic (nuclear) forces.”

Unpacking all that requires a little history, not the media’s strong suit.

The story goes back more than three decades to the fall of the Berlin Wall and eventual re-unification of Germany. At the time, the Soviet Union had some 380,000 troops in what was then the German Democratic Republic [East Germany]. Those forces were there as part of the treaty ending World War II, and the Soviets were concerned that removing them could end up threatening the USSR’s borders. The Russians have been invaded — at terrible cost — three times in a little more than a century.

So West German Chancellor Helmet Kohl, U.S. Secretary of State James Baker, and Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev cut a deal. The Soviets agreed to withdraw troops from Eastern Europe as long as NATO did not fill the vacuum, or recruit members of the Soviet-dominated Warsaw Pact. Baker promised Gorbachev that NATO would not move “one inch east.”

The agreement was never written down, but it was followed in practice. NATO stayed west of the Oder and Neisse rivers, and Soviet troops returned to Russia. The Warsaw Pact was dissolved in 1991.

But President Bill Clinton blew that all up in 1999 when the US and NATO intervened in the civil war between Serbs and Albanians over the Serbian province of Kosovo. Behind the new US doctrine of “responsibility to protect,” the NATO opened a massive 11-week bombing campaign against Serbia.

From Moscow’s point of view the war was unnecessary. The Serbs were willing to withdraw their troops and restore Kosovo’s autonomous status. But NATO demanded a large force that would be immune from Serbian law, something the nationalist-minded Serbs would never agree to. It was virtually the same provocative language the Austrian-Hungarian Empire had presented to the Serbs in 1914, language that set off World War I.

In the end, NATO lopped off part of Serbia to create Kosovo and re-drew the post World War II map of Europe, exactly what the Alliance charges that Russia has done with its seizure of the Crimea.

But NATO did not stop there. In 1999 the Alliance recruited former Warsaw Pact members Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic, adding Bulgaria and Romania four years later. By the end of 2004, Moscow was confronted with NATO in Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia to the north, Poland to the west, and Bulgaria and Turkey to the south. Since then, the Alliance has added Slovakia, Slovenia, Albania, Croatia, and Montenegro. It has invited Georgia, Ukraine, Macedonia and Bosnia and Herzegovina to apply as well.

When the NATO document chastises Russia for “provocative” military activities near the NATO border, it is referring to maneuvers within its own border or one of its few allies, Belarus.

As author and foreign policy analyst Anatol Lieven points out, “Even a child” can look at a 1988 map of Europe and see “which side has advanced in which direction.”

NATO also accuses Russia of “continuing a military buildup in Crimea,” without a hint that those actions might be in response to what the Alliance document calls its “substantial increase in NATO’s presence and maritime activity in the Black Sea.” Russia’s largest naval port on the Black Sea is Sevastopol in the Crimea.

One does not expect even-handedness in such a document, but there are disconnects in this one that are worrisome.

Yes, the Russians are modernizing their nuclear forces, but the Obama administration was first out of that gate in 2009 with its $1.5 trillion program to upgrade the US’s nuclear weapons systems. Both programs are a bad idea.

Some of the document’s language about Russia is aimed at loosening purse strings at home. The NATO members agreed to cough up more money, but that decision preceded Trump’s Brussels tantrum on spending.

There is some wishful thinking on Afghanistan — “Our Resolute Support Mission is achieving success” — when in fact things have seldom been worse. There are vague references to the Middle East and North Africa, nothing specific, but a reminder that NATO is no longer confining its mission to what it was supposedly set up to do: Keep the US in, Russia out and Germany down.

The US is still in — one should take Trump’s threat of withdrawal with a boulder size piece of salt — there is no serious evidence the Russians ever planned to come in, and the Germans have been up since they joined the NATO in 1955. Indeed, it was the addition of Germany that sparked the formation of the Warsaw Pact.

While Moscow is depicted as an aggressive adversary, the NATO surrounds Russia on three sides, deployed anti-missile systems in Poland, Romania, Spain, Turkey, and the Black Sea, and has a 12 to 1 advantage in military spending. With opposing forces now toe-to-toe, it would not take much to set off a chain reaction that could end in a nuclear exchange.

Yet instead of inviting a dialogue, the document boasts that the Alliance has “suspended all practical civilian and military cooperation between NATO and Russia.”

The solution seems obvious. First, a return to the 1998 military deployment. While it is unlikely that former members of the Warsaw Pact would drop their NATO membership, a withdrawal of non-national troops from NATO members that border Russia would cool things off. Second, the removal of anti-missile systems that should never have been deployed in the first place. In turn, Russia could remove the middle range Iskander missiles the NATO is complaining about and [Russia] agree to talks aimed at reducing nuclear stockpiles.

But long range, it is finally time to re-think alliances. The NATO was a child of the Cold War, when the West believed that the Soviets were a threat. But Russia today is not the Soviet Union, and there is no way Moscow would be stupid enough to attack a superior military force. It is time the NATO went the way of the Warsaw Pact and recognize that the old ways of thinking are not only outdated but also dangerous.

Conn M. Hallinan is a California-based independent journalist. He is a regular columnist for the think tank Foreign Policy In Focus and holds a PhD in Anthropology from the University of California, Berkeley.

Opinion

The Necessity of Multilateralism

It is not just multilateral relations between countries that are suffering, it is also the institutions created through multilateral treaties, especially those tied to the Rome Statue, that are failing their essential purpose. Even the stability of the EU has been threatened by nationalism, including Brexit.

[Cynthia M. Lardner| Oped Column Syndication]

Global stability and security depends upon multilateral relationships among countries and multinational entities. Multilaterism broadly encompasses agreements, treaties, trade agreements, security and intelligence sharing, etc. among three or more countries with one another or as members of multinational entities, such as the United Nations, the International Criminal Court, the G7, NATO, and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE).

The focus is on cooperation that is based on adherence to norms and the rule of law. In many respects multilateralism is the exercise of soft power by its members as it opens the door for leverage should other issues falling outside the defined relationship develop. Multilaterism is waxing and waning depending upon what country or entity one scrutinizes.

“What is new today is that the United States in particular, but also the UK, Russia, and others, often contrary to their own interests, are trying to go it alone more often—whether by pulling out of international agreements, leaving international organizations, or annexing territory in violation of international law. It is too early to say, however, that multilateralism is on the wane: that depends on how the rest of world responds to these moves,” said Ian Bond, Director of Foreign Policy at the Centre for European Reform.

Multilaterism at Work: The OSCE’s Asian Partners for Co-operation and NATO

There are a few excellent examples of multilateralism, including the OSCE’s Asian Partners for Co-operation and NATO. I had the privilege to speaking with Ambassador Clemens Koja, the Permanent Representative of Austria to the OSCE, which is based in Vienna, Austria and to Eirini Lemos from NATO’s Political Affairs and Security Policy Division in Vienna, which maintains a relationship with the OSCE’s Asian Partners for Co-operation.

Excellency, you recently spoke at the Austrian Embassy in The Hague about the OSCE Asian Partners for Co-Operation, along with the Ambassadors from four or the five participating Asian countries – Afghanistan, Thailand, South Korea and Australia. Why is the Asian Partners for Co-Operation an important outreach endeavour for the OSCE?

Ambassador Koja: In an increasingly interconnected world it is clear that security does not end or begin at Europe’s borders: issues such as cyber security, migration, human trafficking or non-proliferation to name but a few are transregional or global in their nature.

For that reason the partnership between the OSCE and a number of Asian countries helps both sides to advance on security matters. On the partner side the OSCE is often seen as an important contributor to peace and stability and sometimes also as a model for deepening regional cooperation. Partners also take great interest in resolving conflicts in the OSCE area, in particular in the crisis in and around Ukraine, and contribute substantially to the OSCE’s activities there.

What do see as the greatest challenge facing the Asian Partners for Co-Operation?

Ambassador Koja: However, it is undeniable that Partners are by their nature diverse: Afghanistan shares a long border with the OSCE and for this reason takes a natural interest in the numerous OSCE projects in Central Asia. Other more remote partners place their focus more on the common security issues and lessons learned from the OSCE as the world’s largest regional security organization.

Does the Asian Partners for Co-Operation discuss the issue of free trade and, conversely, trade wars?

Ambassador Koja: The OSCE increasingly discusses issues such as trade and environment, however does not duplicate EU or WTO activities. It therefore concentrates on the concept of economic connectivity as a means of enhancing trust and co-operation between partners and increasing political stability by increasing living standards.

Are there issues that fall outside of the ambit of the Asian Partners for Co-Operation?

Ambassador Koja: Obviously, the discussions with partners cover only issues within the OSCE’s ambit, i.e. the very wide and comprehensive security approach the OSCE stands for with its three dimensions.

Do you consider multilateral alliances and partnerships essential to creating a more peaceful and just world?

Ambassador Koja: In our perspective, it has become clear that the complexity of today’s challenges in several fields calls for multilateral approaches – at least for those aspiring to sustainable answers and solutions. More multilateralism also means more credibility and a stronger acceptance by the people.

The OSCE, as largest regional organization under Chapter VIII of the United Nations Charter, has always relied on the concept of comprehensive, indivisible security based on a cooperative method. In that vein, Austria has always advocated the promotion of effective multilateralism in order to ensure political stability, overall security, socio-economic progress as well as ecological sustainability.

The OSCE is comprised of 57 member nations. Has there been any objection by any OSCE member nation to the OSCE Asian Partners for Co-Operation or any other OSCE operation?

Ambassador Koja: With its 57 participating States, ranging from Vancouver to Vladivostok, the OSCE provides a vital platform for dialogue and and the sharing of norms, commitments and expertise. Yet, an outreach to our immediate neighbors is valuable, indeed indispensable, as our security is inseparably linked to theirs. This concerns both our partners in the Mediterranean and in Asia.

Nor is this approach questioned by the OSCE States. On the contrary, we are happy when third countries express their interest in the organization and seek an exchange. But it is clear that according to the basic principle of our organization – the consensus – all participating States must agree to a formalization of such a co-operation. As far as I am informed, China never applied for an official partner’s statute. However they were involved in the discussions on enhancing connectivity in the Eurasian area initiated by Germany’s OSCE Chairmanship 2016.

The OSCE’s Asian Partners for Co-Operation is supported by NATO. Ms. Lemos shed some light on the critical support NATO renders.

NATO established an office in Vienna for liaising with the OSCE Asian Partners for Co-operation. Why has NATO made this a priority?

Ms. Lemos: NATO has opened the liaison to the OSCE and other Vienna based organization, following a Warsaw decision to enhance the practical and political co-operation with the OSCE.  This reflects the long standing relationship, which dates back many years. As such the office doesn’t have any geographical focus, and is not specifically mandated to liaise with the OSCE Asian Partners for Co-operation.

The OSCE is an important organization for NATO (reflected very well at the Warsaw Summit declaration), not least for its role as a custodian of the rules based order and important European security agreement and CSBMs.

NATO is an excellent example of a working multilateral institution. Does NATO consider multilateral alliances and partnerships essential to creating a more peaceful and just world?

Ms. Lemos: NATO attributed great importance to multilateralism and relations with external partners and international organizations. This was very much enshrined also in our comprehensive approach policy, already in 2008, where we endeavored to include NATO’s efforts as part of an international strategies for sustainable piece efforts. Our experience in Afghanistan and in the Balkans demonstrated the need that security and development go hand in glove. Multilateralism complements bilateral relations, and allows a more comprehensive perspective of addressing challenges.

As you know, in the same spirit in 2010 we opened an office to UN.

So NATO’s outreach to its associated partners, be it in the MD or Asia will be through regular OSCE events and activities, whenever we are involved.

How is NATO working with the OSCE and its Asian Partners for Co-operation on the five established areas: new security threats and a new security paradigm; search for conflict prevention in the new security circumstances; confidence- and security-building measures in Northeast Asia; comprehensive security in Central Asia, the human dimension of security, and human trafficking? Is the relationship “generic” or of a general consultative nature?

Ms. Lemos: NATO has developed its own partnership agreements with a number of countries in the Asia-Pacific region, namely Japan, the Republic of Korea, Australia and New Zealand. These are not related to NATO’s cooperation with the OSCE. You can find more on these partnerships on the NATO website.

Failed Multilaterism

It is not just multilateral relations between countries that are suffering, it is also the institutions created through multilateral treaties, especially those tied to the Rome Statue, that are failing their essential purpose, such as the United Nations Security Council, and the International Criminal Court, which has lost members in the last two years. Even the stability of the European Union has been threatened by nationalism, including Brexit, which can be roughly translated into a fear of the influx of refugees.

The Trump Administration

Sadly multilateralism is on the decline, in part, due to the Trump Administration’s isolationist and bilateral policies, Brexit, and to China’s expansionist and bilateral foreign policies. The United States (U.S.) is losing allies as fast as China is gaining partners.

It started immediately after Donald Trump’s inauguration when he abandoned the Transpacific Trade Partnership, and has continued with the Trump Administration backing out of the Paris Climate Agreement, the Iran nuclear deal, the threats to abandon NAFTA, combined with threats to impose stiff tariffs on imported steel and aluminum on the European Union, China and Canada, and the obscene failure of President Trump to work with the U.S. key allies at the G7 Summit or, as some are calling it, the G6 + 1.

Currently, the U.S. currently has 20 bilateral trade relationships, which came under harsh criticism by Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, who stated that because the U.S. is “…bigger than any other partner that comes along… many partners will [not] be keen to deal with you bilaterally.”

Meanwhile China has been scooping up countries left standing out in the cold by the White House creating innumerable partnerships with America’s former allies. At the 2018 World Economic Forum President Xi Jinping commented that, “The global market system is the ocean we all swim in and cannot escape from. Any attempt to… channel the waters in the ocean back into isolated lakes and creeks is simply not possible.”

An excellent case in point in Japan as explained in a December article that appeared in The Diplomat:

[In November 2017] Japan finalized a free-trade agreement (FTA) with the European Union (EU) that will encompass some 600 million people and roughly 30 percent of gross world product: it creates what the Financial Times calls “the world’s largest open economic zone.” When Washington withdrew from negotiations over the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) at the beginning of last year, the 11 remaining countries that had been participating in deliberations pressed forward, with Tokyo taking the lead. They agreed on the core elements of a revised deal this past November — the so-called Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) — and are hoping to ratify it early this year. Japan is simultaneously contending with China to shape the contours of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, an FTA that covers approximately half of the world’s population and a third of its output and, notably, excludes the U.S. Most recently, Tokyo has agreed to help finance Beijing’s ambitious Belt and Road Initiative.

The United Nations Security Council

The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) is comprised of five permanent member nations, and ten rotating member nations elected by the five permanent members to staggered two-year terms. At the time of its creation, the world’s five greatest superpowers were afforded the privilege of serving as permanent UNSC members: the U.S., the United Kingdom, France, the Russia and China (P5). There is no provision in the U.N. Charter requiring that designation as a UNSC permanent member ever be reviewed or revisited.

The P5 have de facto control over the UNSC by virtue of their exclusive veto power over exercised when any permanent member casts a “negative” vote on not only “substantive” draft resolutions but as to what constitutes a substantive issue. The most recent abuse of the veto power was by the U.S. in resolution as to its highly inflammatory decision to move the Israeli Embassy to Jerusalem, which it singularly recognized as the capital of Israel. China did not even participate in the Permanent Court of Arbitration’s case concerning its violating the Exclusive Economic Zone in the South China Sea as it knew it could veto any UNSC action to enforce the adverse decision. For the same reason Russia fears no UNSC action as to the illegal annexation of Crimea. There will never be a resolution as to Syria as Russia and likely China would cast their veto.

The P5 has been criticized for failing to deliver justice, provide security, and adhere to Rule of Law, including its responsibility to protect (R2P) by former statespersons, such as Kofi Annan, the seventh U.N. Secretary-General and Nobel Laureate, former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, and former Canadian Foreign Minister Dr. Lloyd Axworthy, calling into question whether the U.N. Charter needs to be amended. Very few statespersons still in office are willing to criticize the P5 fearing retribution with two exceptions being New Zealand’s Prime Minister Helen Clark and Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan have boldly joined the chorus.

A portion of this article first appeared in the Security and Human Rights Monitor.

Cynthia M. Lardner is an American journalist residing in the Netherlands and is a contributing editor to Tuck Magazine and the International Policy Digest. Ms. Lardner holds degrees in journalism, law, and counseling psychology.

Opinion

The Spanish Labyrinth

Newly minted Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez faces at least two daunting tasks: cleaning up the wreckage wrought by enforced austerity and resolving the Catalan crisis after last fall’s independence referendum.

[Conn M. Hallinan | Oped Column Magazine]

As the socialist-led government takes over in Spain, newly minted Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez faces at least two daunting tasks: cleaning up the wreckage wrought by years of European Union (EU) enforced austerity and resolving the Catalan crisis exacerbated by Madrid’s violent reaction to last fall’s independence referendum. Unfortunately, his Party’s track record is not exactly sterling on either issue.

Sanchez, leader of the Socialist Workers Party (PSOE), patched together parties in Catalonia and the Basque region, plus the leftist Podemos Party, to oust long-time Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy of the People’s Party (PP). But is the telegenic former economics professor up to the job, and will his Party challenge the economic program of the EU’s powerful “troika”—the International Monetary Fund, the European Central Bank and the European Commission?

The answers to those questions are hardly clear, and in many ways the cross currents and rip tides of Spanish politics still resemble Gerald Brenan’s classic study of the Civil War, The Spanish Labyrinth.

While the issue that brought Rajoy down was corruption—a massive kickback scheme that enriched scores of high-ranking PP members— his Party was already weakened by the 2015 election, and he has been forced to rely on the conservative Ciudadanos Party based in Catalonia to stay in power. In short, it was only a matter of time before he fell.

Sanchez promises to address the “pressing social needs” of Spaniards, although he has been vague about what that actually means. But Spain is hurting. While economic growth returned in 2013, unemployment is still at 16.1, and youth joblessness is 35 percent. Rajoy took credit for the economy’s rebound from the massive financial meltdown in 2008, but there is little evidence that budget cuts and austerity did the trick. The two main engines for growth were cheap oil and a weak currency.

The job growth has mainly been in short-term and temporary jobs, with lower pay and fewer benefits. That is not specific to Spain, however. Of the 5.2 million jobs created in the EU between 2013 and 2016, some 2.1 million of them have been short term, “mini” jobs that have been particularly hard on young people. Many continue to live at home with their aging parents, and 400,000 have emigrated to other European countries.

Education, health care, and infrastructure have all deteriorated under a blizzard of budget cuts, and Sanchez will have to address those problems. His party’s record on the economy, however, has been more centrist than social democratic, and the PSOE basically accepts the neo-liberal mantra of tax cuts, deregulation and privatization. It was PSOE Prime Minister Jose Zapatero who sliced more than $17 billion from the budget in 2010, froze pensions, cut child care funds and home care for the elderly, and passed legislation making it easier to lay off workers.

It was anger at the Socialists over rising unemployment that swept Rajoy and the PP into power in 2011. The PSOE has never recovered from that debacle, dropping from 44 percent of the vote to 24.9 percent today. It has only 84 deputies in the Parliament, just 14 more than Podemos.

When Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias proposed forming a government of the left. Sanchez rejected it and instead appointed all PSOE people to the cabinet. However, he will have to rely on support from the left to stay in power, and there is no guarantee that it will be there unless the Socialists step away from their centrism and begin rolling back the austerity measures.

Sanchez has a mixed record on leftism vs. centrism. He was ousted from the Party’s leadership last year by the PSOE’s rightwing when he considered forming a united front of the left. It was the Party’s rank and file, angered at the rightwing Socialists that allowed Rajoy to form a minority government that put him back in power. So far, Sanchez has been unwilling to consider the kind of alliance of left parties that has been so successful in Portugal.

The new government will also need the support of the two Catalan parties, and that will likely be an uphill slog. The Catalans just elected a government that supports independence, although its President, Quim Torra has called for “talks.”

The current Catalonia crisis was ignited when Rajoy torpedoed a 2006 agreement between the Spanish government and the Catalan government that would have given the province greater local control over its finances and recognized the Catalan’s unique culture. Under the prodding of the PP, the Constitutional Court overturned the agreement and shifted the dispute from the political realm to a legal issue.

At the time, the idea of independence was marginal in Catalonia, but the refusal of Rajoy to even discuss the issue shifted it to the mainstream. “Independentism, which until 2010 was a decidedly minority option in Catalonia, has grown immensely,” according to Thomas Harrington, a Professor of Hispanic Studies at Trinity College, CT.

The Catalans began pressing for a referendum on independence—nearly 80 percent supported holding one—although it was initially seen as non-binding. Even though Podemos did not support the idea of independence, it backed the basic democratic right of the Catalans to vote on the issue. The PSOE, however, was as hard-nosed on the issue as Rajoy and the PP. Not only did the Socialists not support the right of the Catalans to vote, they backed Rajoy’s crackdown on the province, although they decried the violence unleashed on citizens trying to vote during last October’s referendum.

Some 2.3 million Catalans out of the 5.3 million registered voters went to the polls and overwhelmingly endorsed independence in spite of the fact that Rajoy sent some 10,000 National Police and Guardia Civil into the province to seize ballot, beat voters and injure more than 850 people. Legal procedures have been filed against over 700 mayors and elected officials, and the Catalan leadership is either in jail or on the run. While Sanchez said the crackdown was “a sad day for our democracy,” he will have a lot of explaining to do to the Catalan government.

Unlike Rajoy, Sanchez says he wants a dialogue with the Catalans, although he also says he intends to uphold the Spanish constitution, which does not permit secession.

Catalan society is deeply split. The big cities tend to be opposed to independence, as are many trade unions. The left is divided on the issue, but many young people support it. As the Financial Times’ Tobias Buck points out, “The younger generation, who have been schooled in Catalan and have less contact with the rest of Spain than their parents, are among the most enthusiastic backers of independence.”

It is also clear that the brutality of Rajoy’s assault has moved people in that direction, although polls show independence still does not have a majority. But in a sense, that is irrelevant. When almost half the population wants something that “something” has to be addressed, and if Buck is right about the demographics, time is running out for Madrid.

There are other serious constitutional issues that need to be addressed as well. Rural areas are greatly favored over cities. While it takes 125,000 voters in Madrid to elect a representative, in some rural areas it takes as few as 38,000. There is also a need to address Rajoy’s draconian laws against free speech and assembly.

Just how stable Sanchez’s government will be is unclear. He must keep the Basques and the Catalans on board and do enough on the economy to maintain the support of Podemos.

The PP is badly wounded, and the rightwing Ciudadanos Party—the only one that voted against the no confidence resolution—will be looking to fill that vacuum. Ciudadanos calls itself the “center,” but its economic policies are the same as those of the PP, and it is rabidly opposed to separatism. It performed poorly in the last election and in regional elections in Galicia and the Basque region. It did well in the recent Catalan elections, but that is because the Popular Party collapsed and its voters shifted to Ciudadanos.

Sanchez must recognize that the Catalan issue is political, not legal, and that force is not an option. As Napoleon Bonaparte’s Foreign Minister Talleyrand once remarked, “You can do anything you like with bayonets, except sit on them,” summing up the truism that repression does not work in the long run.

Conn M. Hallinan is a California-based independent journalist. He is a regular columnist for the think tank Foreign Policy In Focus and holds a PhD in Anthropology from the University of California, Berkeley.

Opinion

Turkey’s President: Short Term Victory, Long Term Trouble

The election will be held essentially under martial law, and Erdogan has loaded all the dice, marked every card, and rigged every roulette wheel. 

[Conn M. Hallinan | Oped Column Magazine]

When Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called for a presidential and parliamentary election June 24—jumping the gun by more than a year—the outcome seemed foreordained: the country is under a state of emergency, Erdogan has imprisoned more than 50,000 of his opponents, dismissed 140,000 from their jobs, jailed a presidential candidate, and launched an attack on Syria’s Kurds, that is popular with most Turks.

But Erdogan’s seemingly overwhelming strength is not as solid as it appears, and the moves the President is making to insure a victory next month may come back to haunt him in the long run.

There is a great deal at stake in the June vote. Based on the outcome of a referendum last year, Turkey will move from a parliamentary system to one based on a powerful executive presidency. But the referendum vote was very close, and there is widespread suspicion that Erdogan’s narrow victory was fraudulent.

This time around Turkey’s President is taking no chances. The electoral law has been taken out of the hands of the independent electoral commission and turned over to civil servants, whose employment is dependent on the government. The state of emergency will make campaigning by anything but Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) and its ally, the National Action Party (MHP), problematical.

But Erdogan called for early elections not because he is strong, but because he is nervous about the AKP’s strong suit, the economy. While growth is solid, unemployment is 11 percent (21 percent for youth), debts are piling up and inflation—12 percent in 2017—is eating away at standards of living.

The AKP’s 16-year run in power is based on raising income for most Turks, but wages fell 2 percent over the past year, and the lira plunged 7.5 percent in the last quarter, driving up the price of imported goods. Standard & Poor’s recently downgraded Turkish bonds to junk status.

Up until now, the government has managed to keep people happy by handing out low interest loans, pumping up the economy with subsidies and giving bonuses to pensioners. But the debt keeps rising, and investment—particularly the foreign variety— is lagging. The Turkish economy appears headed for a fall, and Erdogan wants to secure the presidency before that happens.

To avoid a runoff, Erdogan needs to win 50 percent of the vote, and most polls show him falling short, partly due to voter exhaustion with the endless state of emergency. But this also reflects fallout from the President’s war on the Kurds, domestic and foreign.

The AKP came to power in 2002 with a plan to end the long-running war with Turkey’s Kurdish minority. The government dampened its suppression of Kurdish language and culture, and called a truce in the military campaign against the Kurdish Workers Party.

But the leftist Kurdish-based People’s Democratic Party (HDP) broke through the 10 percent threshold in 2015 to put deputies in the Parliament, denying the AKP a majority. Erdogan promptly declared war on the Kurds. Kurdish deputies were imprisoned, Kurdish mayors were dismissed, Kurdish language signs were removed, and the Turkish Army demolished the centers of several majority Kurdish cities.

Erdogan also forced a new election—widely seen as fraudulent—and re-claimed the AKP’s majority.

Ankara also turned a blind eye to tens of thousands of Islamic State and Al-Qaeda fighters who crossed the Turkish border to attack the government of Bashar al-Assad and Syria’s Kurdish population. The move backfired badly. The Kurds—backed by American air power—defeated the Islamic State and Al-Qaeda, and the Russians turned the tide in Assad’s favor.

Turkey’s invasion of Syria—operations Olive Branch and Euphrates Shield— is aimed at the Syrian Kurds and is supported by most Turks. But, no surprise, it has alienated the Kurds, who make up between 18 and 20 percent of Turkey’s population.

The AKP has traditionally garnered a substantial number of Kurdish voters, in particular rural, conservative ones. But pollster Kadir Atalay says many Kurdish AKP supporters felt “deceived and abandoned” when Erdogan went after their communities following the 2015 election. Kurds have also been alienated by Erdogan’s alliance with the extreme rightwing nationalist MHP, which is violently anti-Kurdish.

According to Atalay, alienating the Kurds has cost the AKP about 4 percent of the voters. Considering that the AKP won 49.5 percent of the vote in the last national election, that figure is not insignificant.

The progressive HDP is trying hard to win over those Kurds. “The Kurds—even those who are not HDP supporters, will respond to the Afrin operation [invasion of Syria], the removal of Kurdish language signs, and the imprisonment of [Kurdish] lawmaker,” HDP’s parliamentary whip Meral Danis Bestas told Al Monitor.

The HDP, whose imprisoned leader, Selahatt Demirtas, is running for president, calls for a “united stance” that poses “left-wing democracy” against “fascism.” The danger is that if the HDP fails to get at least 10 percent of the vote, its current seats will taken over by the AKP.

Erdogan has also alienated Turkey’s neighbors. He is in a tense standoff with Greece over some tiny islands in the Aegean Sea. He is at loggerheads with a number of European countries that have banned him from electioneering their Turkish populations for the June 24 vote. And he is railing against NATO for insulting Turkey. He does have a point—a recent NATO exercise designated Turkey “the enemy.

However, Erdogan’s attacks on NATO and Europe are mostly posturing. He knows Turkish nationalists love to bash the European Union and NATO, and Erdogan needs those votes to go to him, not the newly formed Good Party—a split from the rightwing MHP—or the Islamist Felicity Party.

No one expects the opposition to pull off an upset, although the centrist and secular Republican People’s Party (CHP) has recently formed an alliance with the Good Party, Felicity, and the Democratic Party to insure that all pass the 10 percent threshold for putting deputies in parliament.

That electoral alliance excludes the leftist HDP, although it is doubtful the Kurdish-based party would find common ground with parties that supported the jailing of its lawmakers. Of the Party’s 59 deputies, nine are in jail and 11 have been stripped of their seats.

There is an outside chance that Erdogan could win the presidency but lose his majority in Parliament. If the opposition does win, it has pledged to dump the new presidential system and return power to parliament.

The election will be held essentially under martial law, and Erdogan has loaded all the dice, marked every card, and rigged every roulette wheel.

There is virtually no independent media left in the country, and there are rumors that the AKP and the MHP have recruited and armed “supporters” to intimidate the opposition. A disturbing number of guns have gone missing since the failed 2016 coup.

However, as Max Hoffman of the Center for American Progress notes, the election might not be a “slam dunk.” A run-off would weaken Erdogan just when he is preparing to take on a number of major problems other than the economy:

  • Turkey’s war with the Kurds has now spread into Syria and Iraq.
  • In Syria, Assad is likely to survive and Turkey will find it difficult—and expensive—to permanently occupy eastern Syria. Erdogan will also to have to deal with the thousands of Islamic State and al-Qaeda fighters now in southern Turkey.
  • Growing tensions with Egypt over the Red Sea, and Ankara’s new alliance with Sudan, which is at odds with Cairo over Nile River water rights.
  • The strong possibility of a U.S confrontation with Iran, a nominal ally and important trading partner for Turkey.
  • The possibility—remote but not impossible—that Turkey will get into a dustup with Greece.
  • And last, the rising price of oil—now over $70 a barrel—and the stress that will put on the already indebted Turkish economy.

The Turkish president may get his win next month, but when trouble comes, he won’t be able to foist it off on anyone. He will own it.

Conn M. Hallinan is a California-based independent journalist. He is a regular columnist for the think tank Foreign Policy In Focus and holds a PhD in Anthropology from the University of California, Berkeley.