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anonymous

Obama's Pending Foreign Policy Agenda - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/..._pending_foreign_policy_agenda

foreignpolicy politics

shared by anonymous on 24 Mar 10 - Cached
  • As this major domestic issue moves out of the spotlight, it will free up some time for Obama to address other items, such as foreign policy. Several issues will require his presidential attention
  • The United States sees a glaring trade imbalance with the Chinese as the biggest roadblock standing in the way of more rapid economic growth, while Beijing views Obama’s new export initiative with caution.
  • Iran: The country that had the most potential to draw the United States into yet another Middle East war during Obama’s first year in office is happy to watch from the sidelines as Israel struggles on the Iranian and Palestinian fronts vis-a-vis the United States.
  • ...6 more annotations...
  • Israel: The Tuesday meeting scheduled to take place in Washington between Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will occur when American-Israeli relations are at one of the lowest points they have been in years, perhaps decades.
  • Russia: One country that has been delighted to read about the United States’ problems with China and Iran is Russia. It has seized the opportunity to operate in its near abroad and continue upon its mission of resurging into the former Soviet periphery.
  • Russia knows that U.S. commitments in the Middle East will not last much longer, and with the possibility of a more foreign policy-focused American president who can more actively resist Russian advances now on the table, Russia may see a need to speed up the course of events.
  • Possibly seeking to exploit the growing rift between the United States and Israel are the Palestinians, Iranians and Hezbollah.
  • It is with these reports in the backdrop that Netanyahu will go to the White House on Tuesday. Normally, meetings by visiting heads of state are accompanied by photo-ops and press conferences designed to put a happy face forward for the cameras and the world. Tuesday’s meeting will reportedly lack such trappings. This indicates that Obama wants to carefully control the image of this first battery of talks as he emerges from the sphere of domestic politics to face a list of pending foreign policy issues.
  • China: The recent tensions between the United States and China could possibly flare into a full-blown trade war in the coming months.
anonymous

The Netanyahu-Obama Showdown - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...100323_netanyahuobama_showdown

foreignpolicy politics

shared by anonymous on 25 Mar 10 - Cached
  • As a symbol of how bad relations are between the two men, there was no final joint statement, no meeting with reporters and no pictures.
  • Obama wants to make it appear that the problem is with Netanyahu’s unwillingness to forego 1,600 apartments at a time when the United States needs an Israeli-Palestinian peace process in place to decrease anti-American sentiment in Iraq and particularly Afghanistan where fighting is raging. Netanyahu regards Obama’s wishes as intruding on Israeli national sovereignty, core interests and, ultimately, irrelevant to either Iraq or Afghanistan. Obama is trying to frame the matter as Netanyahu deliberately trying to scuttle a process Obama badly wants to happen.
  • The fact that the housing is located in Jerusalem is itself an important point to many Israelis. It is not one that most Americans care about.
  • ...2 more annotations...
  • And this is where a personal confrontation that has turned into political manipulation can turn into a geopolitical rift. The matter has become a core personal issue with Obama and Netanyahu, and the citizens of each country are not inclined to restrain them. Genuinely fundamental issues do not appear to be at stake for either country, and therefore the risks of not yielding seem lower than the benefits of yielding.
  • In the end, of course, there is no question as to which country is more at risk. Israel is important to the United States, but it is not indispensable. The United States, on the other hand, is indispensable to Israel.
anonymous

Iridium - the satellite phone always rings twice - 0 views

www.wiredreread.com/...ellite-phone-always-rings.html

wired reread iridium technology

shared by anonymous on 23 Mar 10 - No Cached
  • In the nineties, Iridium spent $5 billion of Motorolas and other investors money on developing and deploying a revolutionary satellite phone system: 72 satellites were put into Low Earth Orbit through 15 flawless rocket launches in a time-span of a little over a year in 1997-1998. The system was brilliant and worked exactly as designed. The only problem was that the design hadn’t taken into account the realities of Planet Earth below.
  • Iridium became one of the most spectacular business failures ever seen. The bankruptcy hit in 1999, just a few months after this ad ran, and there was even crazy talk about sending the satellites head first into the atmosphere where they would burn up. In the end it was decided not to do that, and instead sell the assets to a group of investors for a mere $25 million. Compare that to the $5 billion invested.
  • In the years since the restructure of Iridium, the new owners have focused on the part of the business that actually made sense: Providing sat-phone coverage not to consumers, but to rescue-workers, humanitarian organizations, military, security, shipping-companies etc. And now, they’ve launched a bold new plan: Iridium NEXT.
  • anonymous on 23 Mar 10
     
    A great look at the Iridium company, who ran ads in Wired Magazine back in the day. From Wired Re-Read (focused on Wired 07.03 in March 1999).
anonymous

Drop down contents hides behind picture on page and can't add second menu - 0 views

pixopoint.com/...index.php

problems

shared by anonymous on 25 Mar 10 - Cached
  • anonymous on 25 Mar 10
     
    My support query about PixoPoint and the Arras theme.
anonymous

Study: Today's youth aren't ego-driven slackers after all - 0 views

www.labspaces.net/..._ego_driven_slackers_after_all

shared by anonymous on 15 Mar 10 - Cached
  • Today's youth are generally not the self-centered, antisocial slackers that previous research has made them out to be, according to a provocative new study co-authored by a Michigan State University psychologist.
  • -Today's youth are more cynical and less trusting of institutions than previous generations. But Donnellan said this is generally true of the broader population. -The current generation is less fearful of social problems such as race relations, hunger, poverty and energy shortages. -Today's youth have higher educational expectations.
  • "Kids today are like they were 30 years ago – they're trying to find their place in the world, they're trying to carve out an identity, and it can be difficult," Donnellan said. "But lots of research shows that the stereotypes of all groups are much more overdrawn than the reality."
anonymous

Exclusive Excerpt: Hack the Planet - 0 views

www.wired.com/wiredscience/2010/03/hack-the-planet-excerpt/#more-19685#ixzz0j6SX7uuR

hack climate

shared by anonymous on 24 Mar 10 - Cached
  • Extending this common trope of American environmentalism to the question of climate engineering would be writer and climate activist Bill McKibben, who views geoengineering as the “junkie logic” of a culture addicted to technological solutions.
  • In The Whole Earth Catalog, first published in 1968, Brand wrote of humanity’s responsibility as Earth’s gardeners and caretakers, “We are as gods, and might as well get good at it.” Recently he updated his thinking. “Those were innocent times. New situation, new motto: ‘ We are as gods and have to get good at it.’”
  • Perhaps climate stewardship simply won’t work, and tinkering with the atmosphere won’t be available. Or it will — and we’ll kill one another over the thermostat. Now we contemplate wielding global powers previously imagined only in science fiction. Maybe the biggest question we’ll face may be how changing the planet will change ourselves….
  • ...3 more annotations...
  • Advanced societies control the weather as a matter of course in the worlds of Star Trek and Dune. When it comes to our air and rain, our control fantasies are strong.
  • We may have to try, but attempting to dictate how much solar energy strikes the planet is a dangerous endeavor, perhaps involving just as much chance as our current course.
  • Succumbing to the illusion of control would mean replacing one burden — navigating the dangers of today’s climate crisis, and overhauling the world’s energy system — with the much more risky burden of revolutionizing our relationship with the sky itself. The illusion of control — “Everthing’s okay, the scientists have fixed the problem” — could engender apathy at a time when we desperately need to stop pouring carbon dioxide into the sky. It could drive nations apart during a planetary emergency, when they most require unity. It might work in unexpected ways or not at all.
  • anonymous on 24 Mar 10
     
    This is an exclusive excerpt from "Hack the Planet" by Eli Kintisch. It's featured at Wired Magazine.
anonymous

Germany: Mitteleuropa Redux - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...315_germany_mitteleuropa_redux

shared by anonymous on 16 Mar 10 - Cached
  • The global system is undergoing profound change. Three powers — Germany, Iran and China — face challenges forcing them to refashion the way they interact with their regions and the world. We will explore each of these three states in detail in our next three geopolitical weeklies, highlighting how STRATFOR’s assessments of these states are evolving.
  • German strategy in 1871, 1914 and 1939 called for pre-emptive strikes on France to prevent a two-front war.
  • They harnessed German capital and economic dynamism, submerged Germany into a larger economic entity, gave the Germans what they needed economically so they didn’t have to seek it militarily, and ensured that the Germans had no reason — or ability — to strike out on their own.
  • ...7 more annotations...
  • STRATFOR has always doubted the euro would last. Having the same currency and monetary policy for rich, technocratic, capital-intensive economies like Germany as for poor, agrarian/manufacturing economies like Spain always seemed like asking for problems.
  • The resulting government debt load in Greece — which now exceeds annual Greek gross domestic product — will probably result in either a default (triggered by efforts to maintain such programs) or a social revolution (triggered by an effort to cut such programs). It is entirely possible that both will happen.
  • German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schauble on March 13 in which he essentially said that if Greece, or any other eurozone member, could not right their finances, they should be ejected from the eurozone. This really got our attention.
  • Back-of-the-envelope math indicates that in the past decade, Germany has gained roughly a 25 percent cost advantage over Club Med.
  • The implications of this are difficult to overstate. If the euro is essentially gutting the European — and again to a greater extent the Club Med — economic base, then Germany is achieving by stealth what it failed to achieve in the past thousand years of intra-European struggles.
  • It is not so much that STRATFOR now sees the euro as workable in the long run — we still don’t — it’s more that our assessment of the euro is shifting from the belief that it was a straightjacket for Germany to the belief that it is Germany’s springboard.
  • But this was not the “union” the rest of Europe signed up for — it is the Mitteleuropa that the rest of Europe will remember well.
anonymous

The Perils Of Polarization - 0 views

www.tnr.com/...the-perils-polarization

generations

shared by anonymous on 05 Apr 10 - Cached
  • American politics now seems condemned to an extended period of intense polarization, with an expanding army of aroused conservatives fighting to halt and reverse what it sees as the deplorable Europeanization of our economy and society. I doubt that a politics so configured will be able to address our long-term economic problems—until a crisis forces us to. I hope I’m wrong.
  • It remains the case that Washington is more polarized than the nation as a whole. The most recent analysis using the standard political science scoring system  found zero ideological overlap between Democrats and Republicans in either chamber of Congress. Which means that in both the House and the Senate, the most conservative Democrat is more liberal than is the most liberal Republican. In the electorate, Democrats who consider themselves moderate or conservative still overlap with similar Republican identifiers. But as Republicans have shed liberals and moderates over the past generation, the overlap has diminished.
  • anonymous on 05 Apr 10
     
    From The New Republic on April 5, 2010. By William Galston.
anonymous

The coming melt-down in higher education (as seen by a marketer) - 0 views

sethgodin.typepad.com/...ion-as-seen-by-a-marketer.html

education

shared by anonymous on 29 Apr 10 - Cached
  • 1. Most colleges are organized to give an average education to average students.
  • 2. College has gotten expensive far faster than wages have gone up.
  • 3. The definition of 'best' is under siege.
  • ...8 more annotations...
  • 4. The correlation between a typical college degree and success is suspect.
  • 5. Accreditation isn't the solution, it's the problem.
  • Back before the digital revolution, access to information was an issue. The size of the library mattered. One reason to go to college was to get access.
  • By emphasizing mass and sameness and rankings, colleges have changed their mission.
  • The more applicants they reject, the higher they rank in US News and other rankings. And thus the rush to game the rankings continues, which is a sign that the marketers in question (the colleges) are getting desperate for more than their fair share.
  • The data I'm seeing shows that a degree (from one of those famous schools, with or without a football team) doesn't translate into significantly better career opportunities
  • The only people who haven't gotten the memo are anxious helicopter parents, mass marketing colleges and traditional employers. And all three are waking up and facing new circumstances.
  • The solutions are obvious... there are tons of ways to get a cheap, liberal education, one that exposes you to the world, permits you to have significant interactions with people who matter and to learn to make a difference (start here). Most of these ways, though, aren't heavily marketed nor do they involve going to a tradition-steeped two-hundred-year old institution with a wrestling team. Things like gap years, research internships and entrepreneurial or social ventures after high school are opening doors for students who are eager to discover the new.
  • anonymous on 29 Apr 10
     
    By Seth Godin on April 29, 2010.
anonymous

Oh Well - 0 views

www.slate.com/2251130

criticalthinking

shared by anonymous on 04 May 10 - Cached
  • But the real lesson of the oil spill may be how bad we are at dealing with unlikely but disastrous events. "We deal with them by ignoring them until they happen, and then overreacting," says John Harrald, a professor at George Washington University's Institute for Crisis, Disaster, and Risk Management.
    • anonymous
      anonymous on 04 May 10
       
      This is like the "big number" problem, where humans have hard time thinking of big numbers, because they're so abstract. For the same reason, we can't figure odds and don't understand sudden systemic changes.
  • anonymous on 04 May 10
     
    Why we're so bad at dealing with unlikely disasters like the Louisiana oil spill. - By Christopher Beam - Slate Magazine on May 3, 2010.
anonymous

Attention Whole Foods Shoppers - 0 views

www.foreignpolicy.com/...attention_whole_foods_shoppers

sustai sustainability contrarian longnow

shared by anonymous on 29 Apr 10 - Cached
  • Food has become an elite preoccupation in the West, ironically, just as the most effective ways to address hunger in poor countries have fallen out of fashion.
  • Yet 850 million people in poor countries were chronically undernourished before the 2008 price spike, and the number is even larger now, thanks in part to last year's global recession. This is the real food crisis we face.
  • Poverty -- caused by the low income productivity of farmers' labor -- is the primary source of hunger in Africa, and the problem is only getting worse. The number of "food insecure" people in Africa (those consuming less than 2,100 calories a day) will increase 30 percent over the next decade without significant reforms, to 645 million, the U.S. Agriculture Department projects.
  • ...9 more annotations...
  • Influential food writers, advocates, and celebrity restaurant owners are repeating the mantra that "sustainable food" in the future must be organic, local, and slow. But guess what: Rural Africa already has such a system, and it doesn't work. Few smallholder farmers in Africa use any synthetic chemicals, so their food is de facto organic. High transportation costs force them to purchase and sell almost all of their food locally. And food preparation is painfully slow. The result is nothing to celebrate: average income levels of only $1 a day and a one-in-three chance of being malnourished.
  • we need to de-romanticize our view of preindustrial food and farming. And that means learning to appreciate the modern, science-intensive, and highly capitalized agricultural system we've developed in the West.
  • It's true that the story of the Green Revolution is not everywhere a happy one. When powerful new farming technologies are introduced into deeply unjust rural social systems, the poor tend to lose out.
  • Traditional food systems lacking in reliable refrigeration and sanitary packaging are dangerous vectors for diseases. Surveys over the past several decades by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have found that the U.S. food supply became steadily safer over time, thanks in part to the introduction of industrial-scale technical improvements.
  • The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition last year published a study of 162 scientific papers from the past 50 years on the health benefits of organically grown foods and found no nutritional advantage over conventionally grown foods. According to the Mayo Clinic, "No conclusive evidence shows that organic food is more nutritious than is conventionally grown food."
  • Less than 1 percent of American cropland is under certified organic production. If the other 99 percent were to switch to organic and had to fertilize crops without any synthetic nitrogen fertilizer, that would require a lot more composted animal manure. To supply enough organic fertilizer, the U.S. cattle population would have to increase roughly fivefold. And because those animals would have to be raised organically on forage crops, much of the land in the lower 48 states would need to be converted to pasture. Organic field crops also have lower yields per hectare. If Europe tried to feed itself organically, it would need an additional 28 million hectares of cropland, equal to all of the remaining forest cover in France, Germany, Britain, and Denmark combined.
  • between 1990 and 2004, food production in these countries continued to increase (by 5 percent in volume), yet adverse environmental impacts were reduced in every category. The land area taken up by farming declined 4 percent, soil erosion from both wind and water fell, gross greenhouse gas emissions from farming declined 3 percent, and excessive nitrogen fertilizer use fell 17 percent. Biodiversity also improved, as increased numbers of crop varieties and livestock breeds came into use.
  • Foreign assistance to support agricultural improvements has a strong record of success, when undertaken with purpose. In the 1960s, international assistance from the Rockefeller Foundation, the Ford Foundation, and donor governments led by the United States made Asia's original Green Revolution possible.
  • Development skeptics and farm modernization critics keep pushing us toward this unappealing second path. It's time for leaders with vision and political courage to push back.
  • anonymous on 29 Apr 10
     
    By Robert Paarlberg at Foreign Policy on May/June 2010. Hat tip from Modeled Behavior (http://modeledbehavior.com/2010/04/28/in-defense-of-the-industrial-farm-and-against-local-sustainable-and-organic/) - Printable, full version
anonymous

U.S.: The Ramifications of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...ns_deepwater_horizon_oil_spill

shared by anonymous on 06 May 10 - Cached
  • BP executives reportedly told the U.S. Congress on May 4 that while the oil is officially estimated to be gushing out at 5,000 barrels per day (bpd) the rate could be as high as 60,000 bpd. In other words, the problem could be far greater and more pressing than previously thought.
  • Offshore oil production accounts for about one third of global oil production, and the demand for it will not disappear. However, the United States already strictly regulates offshore drilling, and regulations will increase as a result of the Deepwater Horizon incident.
  • anonymous on 06 May 10
     
    By StratFor on May 6, 2010.
anonymous

Germany as Eurozone Leader - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...100513_germany_eurozone_leader

shared by anonymous on 14 May 10 - Cached
  • And that project will have to deal with a number of other geopolitical trends unraveling around it. These trends include the Russian resurgence in Central and Eastern Europe, NATO’s increasing tensions, the United States’ eventual move to counter Russia’s resurgence, Central European security fears of a resurgent Russia, a French realization that Paris is no longer equal to Berlin, and Europe’s underlying demographic and debt problems.
  • Germany now senses the opportunity to reform the eurozone so that similar crises do not happen again.
  • anonymous on 14 May 10
     
    May 14, 2010
anonymous

Eurozone Running Out of Peripheral Countries to Bail Out - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...t-peripheral-countries-bailout

geopolitics

shared by anonymous on 11 Jan 11 - Cached
  • Despite denials to the contrary from Schaeuble and from the Portuguese government, nobody is buying the rhetoric that Lisbon will survive long without a bailout. Investors are certainly not buying it and neither are Portugal’s fellow eurozone members.
  • Portugal is on its way to a bailout and Europeans — bankers, investors and politicians — seem relatively resigned to it.
  • The more fundamental problem for Europe is that it is running out of highly indebted, small, peripheral countries on the edge of the eurozone map to rescue. Yes, enacting the bailouts is now an orderly, German-led process, but what happens when the bailouts are no longer of peripheral economies that are one-fifteenth the size of Germany?
  • anonymous on 11 Jan 11
     
    "German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble said Monday that Germany was not pressuring the Portuguese government to seek financial assistance from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund. The statement followed a Der Spiegel report that Germany and France were trying to force the Portuguese leadership to request aid. The denial from Schaeuble came as financial media reported that bond traders claimed the European Central Bank was intervening Monday to buy Portuguese debt in secondary markets. The Portuguese yield rose to more than 7 percent before settling at 6.93 percent. Greece asked for its bailout in March 2010 as yields went above 8 percent."
anonymous

Middle school is when the right friends may matter most - 1 views

www.labspaces.net/..._right_friends_may_matter_most

shared by anonymous on 13 Jan 11 - Cached
  • Having pro-social friends and staying away from deviant peers proved more effective for academic payoffs than simply being friends with high-achieving peers.
    • anonymous
      anonymous on 13 Jan 11
       
      Duh? Certainly with regard to academics, there are no surprises here, but it's interesting that improvement is correlated with avoidance-of problem kids not hanging-with high achievers.
  • This new study -- conducted by Marie-Helene Veronneau and Thomas J. Dishion of the UO Child and Family Center -- focused solely on the role played by friendship on academic achievement.
    • anonymous
      anonymous on 13 Jan 11
       
      And, like every damned study, take this with a giant grain of salt. Maybe, snowball sized.
  • A surprise discovery was that girls who already were struggling academically in sixth grade actually suffered later when their chosen friends were already those making the highest grades, Veronneau said. "We don't know the mechanisms on why it is this way for girls, but we can speculate that girls compare themselves to their friends and then decide they are not doing very well. Perhaps this affects their self-efficacy and belief in their own abilities."
  • ...4 more annotations...
  • For girls already doing well in sixth grade, however, there was an opposite influence. "It could be for these girls, having friends who also are getting good grades, school is challenging and stimulating, and they end up doing better than expected," she said.
    • anonymous
      anonymous on 13 Jan 11
       
      These two examples strike me as a kind of slope. Whichever side of the slope you find yourself on sort of reinforces itself.
  • "Puberty is taking place. The brain is changing rapidly. Kids' brains are almost wired to be reading the social world to see how they fit in, and the school is the arena for it."
  • In a previous longitudinal study, he said, he and colleagues looked at the impacts of peer relationships of young people at ages 13, 15 and 17 to look for predictive indicators of life adjustments at age 24. Those influences at age 13 -- going back to middle school -- were the most influential, he noted. While instruction is school is vitally important, he said, it may be that more eyes should be looking at shifting peer relationships.
  • "Parents should pay attention to what their kids are doing and with whom they hang out," Veronneau said. "If parents notice that there is a shift in a child's friendship network, they should try to get to know those kids, talk with teachers and communicate naturally with their own child about where they are going and when they will be coming home."
    • anonymous
      anonymous on 13 Jan 11
       
      This is a classic difference of broad generational differences in how children are raised. It's helicopter-ish, but I sure get it.
  • anonymous on 13 Jan 11
     
    "As adolescents move from elementary school into their middle or junior-high years, changes in friendships may signal potential academic success or troubles down the road, say University of Oregon researchers."
anonymous

Europe: The New Plan - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...20101220-europe-new-plan

europe geopolitics euro

shared by anonymous on 21 Dec 10 - Cached
  • the euro, has suffered from two core problems
  • the lack of a parallel political union
  • the issue of debt
  • ...20 more annotations...
  • Taxation and appropriation — who pays how much to whom — are essentially political acts. One cannot have a centralized fiscal authority without first having a centralized political/military authority capable of imposing and enforcing its will.
  • the checkbook is not the ultimate power in the galaxy. The ultimate power comes from the law backed by a gun.
  • Americans fought the bloodiest war in their history from 1861 to 1865 over the issue of central power versus local power.
  • Northern Europe is composed of advanced technocratic economies, made possible by the capital-generating capacity of the well-watered North European Plain and its many navigable rivers
  • a people that identifies with its brethren throughout the river valleys and in other areas linked by what is typically omnipresent infrastructure. This crafts a firm identity at the national level rather than local level and assists with mass-mobilization strategies.
  • Southern Europe, in comparison, suffers from an arid, rugged topography and lack of navigable rivers.
  • identity is more localized; southern Europeans tend to be more concerned with family and town than nation, since they do not benefit from easy transport options or the regular contact that northern Europeans take for granted.
  • southern European economies are highly dependent upon a weak currency
  • While states of this grouping often plan together for EU summits, in reality the only thing they have in common is a half-century of lost ground to recover, and they need as much capital as can be made available.
  • European Union is now made up of 27 different nationalities
  • With Europe having such varied geographies, economies and political systems, any political and fiscal union would be fraught with complications and policy mis-prescriptions from the start. In short, this is a defect of the euro that is not going to be corrected, and to be blunt, it isn’t one that the Europeans are trying to fix right now.
  • The ECB’s primary (and only partially stated) mission is to foster long-term stable growth in the eurozone’s largest economy — Germany — working from the theory that what is good for the continent’s economic engine is good for Europe.
  • Smaller, poorer economies are more volatile, since even tiny changes in the international environment can send them through either the floor or the roof.
  • The question is not “whither the euro” but how to provide a safety net for the euro’s less desirable, debt-related aftereffects.
  • When the not-so-desperate eurozone states step in with a few billion euros — 223 billion euros so far, to be exact — they want not only their money back but also some assurance that such overindulgences will not happen again.
  • The second is that the Dec. 16 agreement is only an agreement in principle.
  • Three complications exist,
  • First, when a bailout is required, it is clearly because something has gone terribly wrong.
  • The third complication is that the bailout mechanism is actually only half the plan. The other half is to allow states to at least partially default on their debt
  • tates that just squeaked by in 2010 must run a more difficult gauntlet in 2011 — particularly if they depend heavily on foreign investors for funding their budget deficits.
  • anonymous on 21 Dec 10
     
    "Europe is on the cusp of change. An EU heads-of-state summit Dec. 16 launched a process aimed to save the common European currency. If successful, this process would be the most significant step toward creating a singular European power since the creation of the European Union itself in 1992 - that is, if it doesn't destroy the euro first."
anonymous

China and India: Dragon vs. Elephant - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...a-and-india-dragon-vs-elephant

geopolitics china india

shared by anonymous on 16 Dec 10 - Cached
  • Two major incidents in particular have aggravated sore spots in the relationship.
  • Riots in Lhasa, Tibet, in 2008
  • Pakistan’s continued support of various militant proxies
  • ...6 more annotations...
  • Beijing’s growing economic clout has led it to expand infrastructure and military installations across its western regions in an attempt to bolster its territorial claims
  • India, with no shortage of issues to keep itself occupied at home, is now finding that it is years behind China in countries that New Delhi would like to believe sit firmly within its sphere of influence.
  • China has made considerable progress in building up the necessary political, economic and military linkages into Tibet to deny the Indians opportunities to needle Beijing in critical buffer territory.
  • Beijing’s increasing boldness has become one of the chief talking points in foreign policy circles, extending beyond international hard bargaining over resources and into China’s conduct around its entire periphery and in international organizations.
  • The problem for Beijing is that it is ultimately outnumbered, and overpowered, but its attempts to prepare against threats make it appear more threatening.
  • while India senses Chinese encirclement in South Asia, Beijing senses American encirclement, of which India is only one part.
  • anonymous on 16 Dec 10
     
    "Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, a massive diplomatic entourage and a business delegation representing 100 firms arrived in India on Wednesday for a three-day visit. Wen began the visit by addressing concerns over the growing Sino-Indian rivalry, proclaiming that there need be no essential conflict between the Dragon and the Elephant and that Asia has room enough for both of them. After meeting with Indian Premier Manmohan Singh, Wen will travel to Pakistan, a staunch Chinese ally and Indian arch-foe, to emphasize where his deepest commitments lie. "
anonymous

Egypt, Israel and a Strategic Reconsideration - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...-and-strategic-reconsideration

geopolitics egypt

shared by anonymous on 08 Feb 11 - No Cached
  • without the foreign military forces along the frontiers, the Palestinians could trouble but not destroy Israel. Israel’s existence was not at stake, nor was it an issue for 33 years.
  • The danger that the Egyptian army posed was that it could close with the Israelis and engage in extended, high-intensity combat that would break the back of Israel Defense Forces by imposing a rate of attrition that Israel could not sustain.
  • It was to the great benefit of Israel that Egyptian forces were generally poorly commanded and trained and that Egyptian war-fighting doctrine, derived from Britain and the Soviet Union, was not suited to the battle problem Israel posed.
  • ...19 more annotations...
  • One of Israel’s fundamental assumptions was that Israeli intelligence would provide ample warning of an attack. And one of the fundamental assumptions of Israeli intelligence was that Egypt could not mount an attack while Israel maintained air superiority. Both assumptions were wrong.
  • Egypt had a greater interest in breaking its dependency on the Soviets than in defeating Israel. It could do the former more readily than the latter.
  • in the years after the treaty achieved two things.
  • First, they ended Egypt’s dependency on the Soviets. Second, they further guaranteed Israel’s security by creating an Egyptian army dependent on a steady flow of spare parts and contractors from the United States. Cut the flow and the Egyptian army would be crippled.
  • What is now regarded as corruption was then regarded as just rewards for bleeding in four wars against the Israelis.
  • But now is 33 years later, and the world has changed.
  • For this younger generation, the idea of Gamal Mubarak being allowed to take over the presidency was the last straw. They wanted the elder Mubarak to leave not only because he had ambitions for his son but also because he didn’t want to leave after more than a quarter century of pressure. Mubarak wanted guarantees that, if he left, his possessions, in addition to his honor, would remain intact. If Gamal could not be president, then no one’s promise had value. So Mubarak locked himself into position.
  • The cameras love demonstrations, but they are frequently not the real story.
  • The demonstrators who wanted democracy are a real faction, but they don’t speak for the shopkeepers and peasants more interested in prosperity than wealth.
  • I have laid out the reasons why the 1978 treaty is in Egypt’s national interest. I have left out two pieces.
  • The first is ideology. The ideological tenor of the Middle East prior to 1978 was secular and socialist. Today it is increasingly Islamist.
  • Second, military technology, skills and terrain have made Egypt a defensive power for the past 33 years. But military technology and skills can change, on both sides.
  • As new generations of officers arise, who have heard of war only from their grandfathers, the fear of war declines and the desire for glory grows.
  • Two things from this should strike the Israelis.
  • The first is how badly they need peace with Egypt.
  • The second lesson is that Israel should do everything possible to make certain that the transfer of power in Egypt is from Mubarak to the next generation of military officers and that these officers maintain their credibility in Egypt.
  • Given the strategic and ideological crosscurrents in Egypt, it is in Israel’s national interest to minimize the intensity of the ideological and make certain that Israel is not perceived as a threat.
  • The future of Gaza or the precise borders of a Palestinian state are trivial compared to preserving the treaty with Egypt.
  • There are those in Israel who would argue that any release in pressure on the Palestinians will be met with rejection. If that is true, then, in my view, that is catastrophic news for Israel. In due course, ideological shifts and recalculations of Israeli intentions will cause a change in Egyptian policy.
  • anonymous on 08 Feb 11
     
    "The events in Egypt have sent shock waves through Israel. The 1978 Camp David Accords between Egypt and Israel have been the bedrock of Israeli national security. In three of the four wars Israel fought before the accords, a catastrophic outcome for Israel was conceivable. In 1948, 1967 and 1973, credible scenarios existed in which the Israelis were defeated and the state of Israel ceased to exist. In 1973, it appeared for several days that one of those scenarios was unfolding."
anonymous

The Simmering Strategic Clash of U.S.-China Relations - 0 views

www.stratfor.com/...tegic-clash-us-china-relations

shared by anonymous on 20 Jan 11 - Cached
  • Obama stressed that U.S. forward deployment of troops in the Asia-Pacific region brought the stability that was necessary to enable China’s economic rise over the past 30 years — a thinly veiled warning to China against acting as if the United States were an intruder.
  • Obama emphasized, as his generals have, that the United States has a fundamental interest in free and secure passage in international waters in the region, a push against China’s growing military clout in its peripheral seas.
  • Strategic disagreements were not allowed to interfere with the pageantry.
  • ...3 more annotations...
  • Beijing and Washington have good reason to avoid confrontation. Both are overburdened with problems entirely separate from each other.
  • despite nationalist factions at home, Washington and Beijing continue to court stability and functionality.
  • But the strategic distrust is sharpening inevitably as China grows into its own. Beijing is compelled by its economic development to seek military tools to secure its vital supply lines and defend its coasts, the historic weak point where foreign states have invaded.
  • anonymous on 20 Jan 11
     
    "Chinese President Hu Jintao met with U.S. President Barack Obama on Wednesday for the long-awaited bilateral summit and grand state dinner. The night before, Hu met with Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and National Security Adviser Tom Donilon to discuss strategic issues. "
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