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in title, tags, annotations or urlABC talks to Bush's Neocon Spokesman for Illegal US Occupation of Iraq Slams Russia for Crimea | Informed Comment - 0 views
Pro-Russian and Pro-Kiev Camps Dig In Amid Uneasy Calm in Eastern Ukraine - NYTimes.com - 0 views
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While the bloody events and clashes that left more than a hundred dead in Kiev a month ago have not been repeated in eastern cities like Kharkiv and Donetsk, occasional violence and a powerful propaganda war have created entrenched pro-Russian and pro-Western camps that scarcely existed before.
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For the fledgling pro-Western central government in Kiev, which is warily keeping one eye toward a possible invasion from Russia, the growing rift among ordinary Ukrainians and among political elites has laid bare the difficulties of establishing political order even if the unsteady peace lasts.
Obama to Putin: Do as I Say Not as I Do by Ralph Nader | Dandelion Salad - 0 views
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As you ponder your potential moves regarding President Vladimir V. Putin’s annexation of Crimea (a large majority of its 2 million people are ethnic Russians), it is important to remember that whatever moral leverage you may have had in the court of world opinion has been sacrificed by the precedents set by previous American presidents who did not do what you say Mr. Putin should do – obey international law.
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Compare, by the way, the United States’ seizure of Guantanamo from Cuba initially after the Spanish-American War, which was then retained after Cuba became independent over a century ago.
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Russia is tightly intertwined with the European Union, as a seller and buyer of goods, services and assets, and to a lesser but significant degree with the United States government and its giant corporations such as oil and technology companies. Sanctions can boomerang, which would be far worse than just being completely ineffective in reversing the Russian annexation of Crimea.
Pro-Russian and Pro-Kiev Camps Dig In Amid Uneasy Calm in Eastern Ukraine - NYTimes.com - 0 views
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“As far as I believe, nobody is going to protect us except for Russia,” Mr. Sopin said. “Do you think that he would have died if they were here?”
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The instability set off by the revolution in Kiev last month and a wave of pro-Russian demonstrations in eastern cities has produced a split among local politicians and businessmen, including fabulously wealthy oligarchs like Rinat Akhmetov, Ukraine’s richest man, who warily supports the government in Kiev.One of those rich men is Gennady A. Kernes, the eccentric mayor of Kharkiv, who has publicly opposed talk of separatism here, theoretically allying himself with Kiev.
The United States, Russia, and the 2016 Election - Lawyers, Guns & Money : Lawyers, Guns & Money - 0 views
Club Med: Israel, Egypt, and Others Form New Natural Gas Group - Foreign Policy - 0 views
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a forum joining Israel, Egypt, Cyprus, and other neighbors to develop their new natural gas discoveries. The Eastern Mediterranean Gas Forum, announced Monday in Cairo, formalizes growing energy ties among recent rivals and could spur much-needed development of energy infrastructure required to tap the region’s potential as a source of energy for Europe and beyond. The forum in particular cements the growing commercial links between Israel and Egypt; Israel expects to start shipping natural gas to Egypt in the next few months as part of a landmark, $15 billion deal between the two countries.
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a few notable absences, including Syria and Lebanon—both of which are trying to develop potential offshore gas fields—and especially Turkey
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The new body will promote “discussions among countries that already have cooperation with each other,” said Brenda Shaffer, an energy expert at Georgetown University. “Hopefully, in the next round of the forum, Turkey will be involved, and that would make it much more significant and not just include the happy campers.”
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State Dept. Was Granted $120 Million to Fight Russian Meddling. It Has Spent $0. - The New York Times - 0 views
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James K. Glassman, the under secretary for public diplomacy during the George W. Bush administration, said the center’s uncertain funding and temporary leadership reflected the administration’s lack of interest in countering either jihadist or Russian propaganda.“They’ve got the vehicle to do this work in the center,” Mr. Glassman said. “What they don’t have is a secretary of state or a president who’s interested in doing this work.”
The military's cult of readiness is sabotaging its efforts to slow the spread of COVID-19 | Task & Purpose - 0 views
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To most people in the universe, “readiness” is a non-word. But for the military, “readiness” encapsulates an obsession with finding new ways to make service member’s lives suck at all times – because somehow, this will make them prepared to fight China and Russia.
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In the minds of many officers and senior enlisted leaders, there is no way they can cancel training exercises to stop troops from getting sick or forgo work parties to make sure empty military installations have their garbage cans emptied and their lawns cut. And God help Pvt. Schmuckatelli, who believes the fact that all barber shops are closed means his command is not going to worry if his hair is a little longer than usual.
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the cult of readiness demands that commanders and senior noncommissioned officers laugh in the face of the greatest public health crisis since the 1918 flu pandemic. Damn it, if troops cannot do a simple 30-mile ruck march in arctic conditions and then pass a snap inspection conducted by an anal retentive first sergeant, how the hell are they going to survive the coming Russo-Chinese invasion of the homeland?
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10 Conflicts to Watch in 2020 - 0 views
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Only time will tell how much of the United States’ transactional unilateralism, contempt for traditional allies, and dalliance with traditional rivals will endure—and how much will vanish with Donald Trump’s presidency. Still, it would be hard to deny that something is afoot. The understandings and balance of power on which the global order had once been predicated—imperfect, unfair, and problematic as they were—are no longer operative. Washington is both eager to retain the benefits of its leadership and unwilling to shoulder the burdens of carrying it. As a consequence, it is guilty of the cardinal sin of any great power: allowing the gap between ends and means to grow. These days, neither friend nor foe knows quite where America stands
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Moscow’s policy abroad is opportunistic—seeking to turn crises to its advantage—though today that is perhaps as much strategy as it needs
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Exaggerated faith in outside assistance can distort local actors’ calculations, pushing them toward uncompromising positions and encouraging them to court dangers against which they believe they are immune. In Libya, a crisis risks dangerous metastasis as Russia intervenes on behalf of a rebel general marching on the capital, the United States sends muddled messages, Turkey threatens to come to the government’s rescue, and Europe—a stone’s throw away—displays impotence amid internal rifts. In Venezuela, the government’s obstinacy, fueled by faith that Russia and China will cushion its economic downfall, clashes with the opposition’s lack of realism, powered by U.S. suggestions it will oust President Nicolás Maduro.
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Donald Trump's Year of Living Dangerously - POLITICO Magazine - 0 views
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One year in, Trump’s much-vaunted national security team has not managed to tame the president or bring him around to their view of America’s leadership role in the world. Instead, it’s a group plagued by insecurity and infighting, publicly undercut by the president and privately often overruled by him. Tillerson, the former CEO of ExxonMobil, is regularly reported by White House sources to be on his way out, with his demoralized, depleted State Department in outright rebellion. Meanwhile, the brawny military troika of White House chief of staff John Kelly, a retired four-star Marine general; Defense Secretary James Mattis, another retired four-star Marine general; and national security adviser H.R. McMaster, a serving Army three-star general, has managed to stop the chaos of the administration’s early days while crafting a national security policy that gets more or less solid marks from establishment types in both parties. The problem is, no one’s sure Trump agrees with it.
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sanctions remain in place despite, not because of, the White House, and sources tell me Trump personally is not on board with many of the more hawkish measures his team proposes to counter Putin, a fact underscored by his eyebrow-raising signing statement in December objecting to several tough-on-Russia provisions in a defense bill
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The language of "principled realism" put forward by McMaster is so un-Trumpian that a top adviser who received a copy told a reporter it was simply “divorced from the reality” of the Trump presidency. “It’s the first time, maybe in history, key advisers have gone into the administration to stop the president, not to enable him,” says Thomas Wright, a Brookings scholar who has emerged as one of the most insightful analysts of Trump’s foreign policy
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The U.S. Air Force Just Admitted The F-35 Stealth Fighter Has Failed - 0 views
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we’re talking about the F-35. The 25-ton stealth warplane has become the very problem it was supposed to solve. And now America needs a new fighter to solve that F-35 problem, officials said.
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With a sticker price of around $100 million per plane, including the engine, the F-35 is expensive. While stealthy and brimming with high-tech sensors, it’s also maintenance-intensive, buggy and unreliable. “The F-35 is not a low-cost, lightweight fighter,”
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the F-35 has failed
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The Company You Keep: Yevgeny Prigozhin's Influence Operations in Africa | Free Russia Foundation - 0 views
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Yevgeny Prigozhin, or “Putin’s chef,” as he’s called in the press, is notorious for two things: dispatching Russian mercenaries into war zones and running a troll farm accused of interfering in democratic elections. This report by Michael Weiss and Pierre Vaux features new insights, including leaked materials from within Prigozhin’s own organization, into how his operation in Africa has evolved into the realm of political consultancy and “election monitoring” using a network of European far-right extremists.
The ISIS Beat - The Drift - 0 views
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even as the new Biden Administration announced the withdrawal of troops from Afghanistan, to “end” the twenty-year war, it will continue airstrikes and raids to tackle the ever-looming threat of terrorism.
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As the persistence of far-right nationalism suggests, ideologies cannot so easily be destroyed — even those we thought we had bombed out of existence seventy years ago. Yet, the world refracted through this war (the “only one” of the 21st century, Bush hoped) has left us not just morally inept, but also woefully misguided about what is to come next
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ISIS has taken control over parts of regime territory in the deserts of central Syria, and slices of S.D.F.-controlled Deir ez-Zor province are witnessing a full-blown ISIS insurgency, underscoring just how central the question of governance is to the group’s appeal. But the U.S. and its allies’ focus on ideology risks ignoring why ISIS gained support in the first place. Raids and detentions, torture and execution, and governance that politically marginalizes certain groups and offers few options for justice or accountability will only build anger. It is these layers of political and social contexts that are lost in most coverage, even if they will shape Iraq and Syria for a long time to come.
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Human rights groups turn their sights on Trump's America - POLITICO - 0 views
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international activists, groups and institutions are increasingly focusing on the United States as a villain, not a hero, on the subject of human rights. While the U.S. has never fully escaped such scrutiny — consider the post-9/11 fury over torture, Guantanamo Bay and drone strikes — former officials and activists say that, under President Donald Trump, American domestic strife is raising an unusual level of alarm alongside U.S. actions on the global stage. Some groups also flag what they say is an erosion of democracy in a country that has long styled itself as a beacon of freedom.
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Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has created a commission tasked with rethinking the U.S. approach to human rights. Pompeo argues there’s been a questionable proliferation of what counts as human rights. Critics fear the commission, whose report is due this summer, will undercut the rights of women, LGBTQ people and others
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“The Trump factor is huge, if not the determinative factor” in the battered U.S. reputation, said David Kramer, a former assistant secretary of State for human rights in the George W. Bush administration. “People advocating and fighting for democracy, human rights and freedom around the world are disillusioned by the U.S. government and don’t view the current administration as a true partner.”
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How the coup in Niger could expand the reach of Islamic extremism, and Wagner, in West Africa | AP News - 0 views
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Niger, which until Wednesday’s coup by mutinous soldiers had avoided the military takeovers that destabilized West African neighbors in recent years.
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a Francophone region where anti-French sentiment had opened the way for the Russian private military group Wagner.
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Signaling Niger’s importance in the region where Wagner also operates, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visited in March to strengthen ties and announce $150 million in direct assistance, calling the country “a model of democracy.”Now a critical question is whether Niger might pivot and engage Wagner as a counterterrorism partner like its neighbors Mali and Burkina Faso, which have kicked out French forces. France shifted more than 1,000 personnel to Niger after pulling out of Mali last year.
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Tom Stevenson · Empires in Disguise · LRB 4 May 2023 - 0 views
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The great powers of the present were the great continental empires of the 18th and 19th centuries. The borders of Russia today are similar to those of the Russian empire in the 1750s. The territory of modern China largely resembles that of the Qing empire in 1760, the main difference being the loss of Mongolia. The United States approached its current mainland form in the 1880s. This may be an age of states, but some of them are so big that global politics is for the most part still a game for subcontinental powers.
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After 2800 bcE there was never again a time without an empire of some sort, and after 600 bcE one or more of them always controlled an area of at least 2.5 million square kilometres. After 1600 CE the figure increased to at least ten million square kilometres: about the size of the US or China today.
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In 19th-century Europe the ratio between the population of the greater and lesser states was about ten to one. Today the ratio between the population of India or China and the average small member of the United Nations is closer to forty or fifty to one.
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