Atlantic alliance shattered, Pacific next stop
Having trashed the G7 summit in Quebec, President Trump is now getting ready to meet with North Korea’s Kim Jong-un on Tuesday. Last week President Trump said
I don’t think I have to prepare very much. It’s about attitude.
He might be right, because he has defined down the goals of the summit:
I think it’s going to be a process. But the relationships are building, and that’s a very positive thing…a beginning and a getting-to-know-you meeting-plus.
While Secretary of Defense Mattis is still declaring the American goal to be “compete, verifiable and irreversible denuclearization” (CVID in the trade), the President has retreated from achieving that. Under cover of the furor caused by his temporary cancellation of the meeting, he has lowered the bar. Now he is even saying he’ll know within a minute whether the summit will be successful.
CVID is not going to happen. Kim Jong-un is not giving up his nukes or his missiles, though he may limit the number of the former and the range of the latter. He’ll want in return not just relief from sanctions but also withdrawal of at least some American forces from South Korea. There is simply no better guarantee of his regime than holding on to a limited number of nukes and missiles, which ensure no invasion and no US effort at regime change.
The question is whether those possible limits can simultaneously satisfy the US, South Korea, and Japan. It doesn’t look likely. South Korea and Japan aren’t interested in limiting the range of the missiles, since that decouples their security from the US: the US will feel safe but they won’t. Nor will they be interested in US withdrawal from South Korea, since the American forces there provide a vital tripwire to ensure that the US is prepared to intervene with force if the South is invaded.
There is no way such difficult issues can or should be resolved in a meeting where Seoul and Tokyo are absent. The best Trump can do is to initiate a negotiation that will likely take years to complete. The outcome cannot be nearly as satisfactory as the Iran nuclear deal, which set back Tehran from nuclear weapons and included a permanent commitment to the international safeguards required to prevent any future nuclear weapons program. North Korea is going to remain a nuclear power with significant missile capabilities.
The worst Trump can do is sell out our South Korean and Japanese allies by agreeing to withdraw US troops from Korea and accept Pyongyang’s nuclear status. This cannot be entirely ruled out. The man is desperate for a win and cares not a whit about allies. He admires dictators and likes to break crockery. Kim Jong-un has so far played him like a fiddle. Trump might well be vulnerable to flattery and the prospect of the Nobel Prize the Norwegians will never give him. They are not as dumb as he is.
Trump did serious damage to the Atlantic alliance in the past couple of days. Let’s hope he doesn’t repeat the disaster in the Pacific.
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The 7 – 1 reality sitcom
That’s what is meeting in Quebec today. The odd one out at the G7 is the United States, which has managed to unite Canada, the UK, Germany, France, Italy and Japan in a display of pique against President Trump’s trade policy. That’s what you get for using spurious national security arguments to raise tariffs on steel and aluminum rather than pursuing your complaints through the World Trade Organization (WTO) and withdrawing from a nuclear deal with Iran that the other 6 view as vital to their security.
The vodka will be flowing in Moscow, which will be delighted to hear its Shanghai Cooperation Organization (that’s China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan) compared favorably with the more venerable, more powerful, and in the past more effective G7. President Putin is getting his money’s worth: Trump is dismantling Washington’s relationship with its friends and allies in both the Atlantic and the Pacific, dramatically weakening the West and providing openings for Moscow and Beijing to fill the vacuums. Trump has even called for Russia to be invited back into the G7 (which for a time was the G8). If you find that hard to believe, watch it:
Trump is also claiming this morning that Iran has moderated its behavior due to his withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal:
They’re no longer looking so much to what’s going on in Syria, what’s going on in Yemen and lots of other places. They’re a much different country over the last three months.
This is completely untrue. Iran has done nothing to withdraw or lessen its involvement in Syria, Yemen, and other places. It is not only the same country over the last three months, it is getting ready to start up a plant to produce advanced centrifuges for uranium enrichment.
And the President is vaunting his meeting next week with Kim Jong-un:
Obama, Schumer and Pelosi did NOTHING about North Korea, and now weak on Crime, High Tax Schumer is telling me what to do at the Summit the Dems could never set up. Schumer failed with North Korea and Iran, we don’t need his advice!
No Democratic president ever wanted to concede a summit with the North Korean dictator without getting something in return up front. Trump has done so, to no noticeable benefit to the US so far. Nor is there any sign he will get anything tangible in Singapore, though you can bet on his vaunting a fantastic triumph.
The simple fact is that Trump is finding it a lot easier to offend America’s friends and allies than to get anything from our adversaries, who recognize that he is a bullshitter who flogs flim-flam. It would all be laughable–a kind of reality sit-com–if it weren’t real. The G7-1 is however unified and represents an economy larger than that of the US. Trump may prefer a light-on-substance summit with Kim Jong-un, and he may want to falsely claim that Iran has moderated its behavior, but neither our friends nor our adversaries will be fooled. The only fool in this reality sit-com resides in the White House.
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Shaping a New Middle East Balance of Power
The Conflict Management Program and the Aljazeera Centre for Studies
are pleased to invite you to
Shaping a New Balance of Power in the Middle East:
Regional Actors, Global Powers, and Middle East Strategy
Tuesday June 12, 2018 9:00 AM – 3:00 PM
1740 Massachusetts Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20036
Kenney Auditorium
Register
The Gulf and the Middle East are suffering a paroxysm of conflict involving virtually all the regional states as well as the US and Russia and many different non-state actors. What dynamics are driving this chaos? What can be done to contain or reverse the damage? How might a new balance of power emerge?
9-9:30: Registration
9:30-9:45: Opening Remarks
Ø Ezzedine Abdelmoula, Manager of Research, Aljazeera Centre for Studies, Aljazeera Media Network
9:30-11:00: Dynamics of Political Geography in the Middle East
Ø Chair: Daniel Serwer, Director, SAIS Conflict Management Program
Ø Ross Harrison, Non-resident Senior Fellow Middle East Institute
Ø Kadir Ustun, Executive Director, SETA Foundation
Ø Khalid al Jaber, Gulf International Forum
Ø Suzanne Maloney, Deputy Director, Foreign Policy Program and Senior Fellow, Center for Middle East Policy and Energy Security and Climate Initiative, Brookings Institution
11:00-11:15: Coffee Break
11:15-12:45: Non-State Actors and Shadow Politics
Ø Chair: Paul Salem, Senior Vice President for Policy Research & Programs, Middle East Institute
Ø Randa Slim, Director of Conflict Resolution and Track II Dialogues Program, Middle East Institute; Fellow, SAIS Foreign Policy Institute
Ø Fatima Abo Alasrar, Senior Analyst, Arabia Foundation
Ø Crispin Smith, Harvard Law School
Ø Anouar Boukhars, Non-Resident Scholar, Middle East Program, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and Associate Professor of International Relations, McDaniel College
12:45-1:30: Lunch
1:30-3:00: New Balance of Power
Ø Chair: Mohammed Cherkaoui, Aljazeera Centre for Studies, and George Mason University
Ø Jamal Khashoggi, independent writer
Ø P. Terrence Hopmann, Professor of International Relations, SAIS, Conflict Management Program
Ø Camille Pecastaing, SAIS, Middle East Studies
Ø Hussein Ibish, Senior Resident Scholar, Arab Gulf States Institution in Washington
Tuesday June 12, 2018 9:00 AM – 3:00 PM
1740 Massachusetts Ave., NW
Washington, DC 20036
Kenney Auditorium
photo ID will be checked at the door
For disability accommodations, please contact saisevents@jhu.edu or 202-999-3332 at least one week prior to the event.
Have questions about Shaping a New Balance of Power in the Middle East: Regional Actors, Global Powers, and Middle East Strategy? Contact SAIS Conflict Management Program
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Tea leaves won’t say who won
In a post last month, I attempted to forecast the outcome of Iraq’s May 12 parliamentary elections. With the final count in, what do the results reveal?
- Will Abadi win a majority?
No – Far from first place, Abadi’s coalition landed in an embarrassing third, beaten both by populist cleric Moqtada al-Sadr and militia leader Hadi al-Ameri. This puts Abadi’s future as prime minister in question, but it doesn’t necessarily mean he’s done for. Abadi can count himself lucky, in fact, that electoral victory went to the only coalition without an obvious pick for prime minister. Abadi’s likely path forward will be to ally with Sadr and parlay his international reputation to win a high position, possibly the prime ministry, in a Sadrist-aligned government.
- Will Maliki be eclipsed by Ameri?
Yes – With Ameri winning nearly twice the number of seats, Maliki comes out of this election greatly diminished. Much like Abadi, Maliki’s political future depends on his ability to build alliances with stronger figures in order to remain relevant, although Maliki’s divisive reputation gives him far fewer avenues to explore.
- Will Hakim and Sadr’s rebranding pay dividends?
Emphatically yes – Sadr’s victory, however narrow, also means a victory for his strategy of cross-sectarian anti-corruption populism. While Hakim’s seventh-place showing hasn’t won him the same attention as Sadr, his new party can claim a small victory in winning more seats (19) than Hakim’s former associates in ISCI and Badr combined.
- Is this the debut of a Kurdish opposition?
No, with qualifications – With a paltry 9 seats between them, this election marks a massively disappointing debut for the upstart Nishtiman alliance. So disappointing, in fact, that multiple Kurdish parties have called the results of the election into question. While tangible evidence is scarce, six out of seven major Kurdish parties (all but for the PUK) have called for a recount of votes in Kurdish-majority areas, particularly those controlled by the PUK.
- Is the PUK done for?
No, with qualifications – With a loss of only 3 seats since previous elections, the PUK appears to have emerged unscathed from its recent crisis. This steady appearance is undermined, however, by allegations of vote rigging targeting the PUK strongholds in particular. While these allegations have been mostly vague on specific claims, charges have been widespread enough that the they may force the PUK to respond. Much depends on the next few weeks, but it appears for now that the PUK remains strong.
- Will small parties earn enough to gain influence?
Unclear – While Sadr’s coalition has achieved an undisputed victory, it is far from overwhelming. Sadr’s low numbers (54 of a total 329 seats) mean he could still be outmaneuvered by his rivals in negotiations to form a government. See Ameri and Maliki’s meeting with delegates from the KDP and PUK – an alliance between these four groups would corral an impressive 162 seats (only 3 seats short of an absolute majority). Smaller parties – that is, those with fewer than 10 seats – make up 19.5% of parliament. Their support may become valuable but it hardly seems decisive at this point.
- Was turnout down?
Emphatically yes – With a measured turnout of 44.5%, this election had the lowest turnout of any Iraq has seen. Anecdotal evidence suggests that voters stayed home not due to lack of interest, but due to skepticism that voting will bring change. Notably, this depressed turnout is clearest in Shiite-majority regions – the voting rate in the capital in particular dropping by over 30%. More than sectarian discontent, disenchantment with politics seems to have spread across Iraqi society.
- Was violence down?
Emphatically yes – The near-complete absence of violence around May 12’s vote may be the most important underreported fact around Iraq’s elections. It’s even telling how unsurprising this fact is. While many voters stayed home, it was not fear that kept them away from the ballot box. Whatever Abadi’s political future, history will mark the successful handling of these elections as another point to his legacy.
- Will there be accusations of fraud?
Yes, with qualifications – As mentioned above, fraud allegations have spread among Kurdish parties. While Iraq’s High Elections Commission has responded to various reports of electoral violations across the country, it has expressed confidence in the general results. Though parliament has been discussing the matter, the IHEC’s statements suggest they believe the impact of fraud was minor. Whether this will settle distrust in the Kurdistan region, which is due for regional elections this September, we can only wait to see.
With elections now over, the real trial begins. Iraq’s newly-elected parliament now begins the arduous process of government formation, where party leaders jostle for influence in the new body. How long until a government emerges is anyone’s guess – much like the May’s elections, the sensible approach is to expect the unexpected.
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Things aren’t getting better
I’m back from 10 days in Piedmont (that’s Italy, not Virginia), where the inhabitants are far better at ignoring their politics than most of us in DC. I didn’t have a single serious conversation about the government crisis there, which after weeks of uncertainty has produced a coalition that is almost as weird as the Freedom Caucus combining with the Green Party in the US. My Italian friends don’t like it, but they know their governments are highly constrained by the European Union, market forces, and a tradition of compromise. So let’s have lunch.
Here things are less felicitous. The food isn’t as good and the politics are less constrained. Here’s a quick summary of some changes while we were away:
- The Dotard/Rocket Man Summit is back on for June 12, but with an important difference: the President says it is the beginning of a process, not the precedent-shattering agreement on denuclearization he advertised once upon a time.
- The US is levying tariffs on European steel and aluminum and threatening them on luxury cars. These will all eventually be found to violate our obligations to the World Trade Organization, but the current Administration doesn’t care about that.
- The Europeans are trying to figure out how to ensure Iran continues in the nuclear deal by allowing it to reap economic advantages, which will require them to block US “secondary” sanctions.
- President Trump has declared himself above the law, not only on Twitter but in a letter sent by his lawyers in January to the Special Counsel claiming he can end the investigation or pardon himself. The last president to make such a bold claim was Richard Nixon. We know how that ended.
- Trump has also issued pardons clearly intended to signal to his former minions (Michael Cohen, Paul Manafort) that he has their back if they keep silent.
- Just yesterday, the Special Counsel accused Manafort of witness tampering in a case pending against him for lobbying for a foreign entity (namely the Russia-backed president of Ukraine) without proper registration. The evidence includes wire taps.
Senate Democrats are warning that they won’t lift sanctions for a quicky nuclear deal with North Korea, but there is precious little they can do on the other issues. The Republicans are remaining united in backing Trump in both the House and the Senate. If Trump fires Mueller or pardons his minions, all indications are nothing will be done about it in Congress, but it is becoming harder to see how the judicial investigations can be entirely shut down.
In other news, the President canceled a meeting at the White House with the Superbowl champion Philadelphia Eagles because some of them want to continue their kneeling protest during the national anthem.* This from a president who himself had to be reminded by his immigrant wife to put his hand on his heart during the national anthem:
*PS: I was wrong about this. It turns out the Eagles had never knelt, but quite a few of them refused the invitation to the White House. Trump canceled the event in order to avoid being embarrassed, then scheduled another event at which he demonstrated he does not know the words to either the national anthem or “America the Beautiful.” Impossible to make this stuff up,
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Peace picks, June 4 – 10
- U.S. – North Korean Summit: Cancelled or Postponed? Tuesday, June 5 | 1:30 pm – 4:30 pm | The Heritage Foundation | Register Here
What are the ramifications of the sudden termination of the planned meeting between President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un? What factors led to the cancellation and has the door been permanently closed on a diplomatic solution to the North Korean nuclear problem? Will North Korea abandon its moratorium and resume nuclear and missile tests and escalate tension on the Korean Peninsula. Will there be a resumption of advocacy for a U.S. preventive military attack on North Korea? As Pyongyang, Seoul, Beijing, and Washington engaged in summit diplomacy, Japan had been the neglected partner. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe had established the closest relationship with President Trump of any world leader but then seemed ignored during the summit mania. Does the U.S.-North Korea summit cancellation vindicate Abe’s firm approach to Pyongyang or has there been lasting impact on his political strength as well as Japan’s relationship with the United States?
Join us as two panels of distinguished experts discuss these and other topics as well as make recommendations for U.S. policy in the uncertain time ahead. Speakers include Duyeon Kim (Visiting Senior Research Fellow, Korean Peninsula Future Forum), Dr. Lee Sung-Yoon (Kim Koo-Korea Foundation Professor in Korean Studies and Assistant Professor, The Fletcher School, Tufts University), Dr. Sue Mi Terry (Senior Fellow, Korea Chair, Center for Strategic and International Studies), Dr. Jeffrey W. Hornung (Political Scientist, The RAND Corporation), James Schoff (Senior Fellow, Asia Program, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace) and Yuki Tatsumi (Co-Director of the East Asia Program and Director of the Japan Program, The Stimson Center).
- The Long Search for Peace in Afghanistan | Thursday, June 7 | 1:30 pm – 4:30 pm | US Institute of Peace | Register Here
Please join the U.S. Institute of Peace on Thursday, June 7 for a multi-panel discussion on practical steps for the search for peace in Afghanistan. This effort has moved to center stage in recent months following President Ashraf Ghani’s late February peace offer to the Taliban, a series of major international conferences that consolidated support for a peace deal, and a wave of pro-peace demonstrations across Afghanistan. Crucial questions nonetheless remain: What it will take to get the Taliban to join peace talks in earnest? What will a prospective peace agreement look like? How does the peace process affect the Afghan and international military campaign?
The event will examine the issue from two crucial perspectives: the top-down effort to reach a political settlement involving the Taliban, and the bottom-up effort to forge peace in local communities. We will feature a distinguished and diverse range of American, Afghan, and other experts who have directly worked on this issue in government, the United Nations, academia, and civil society. They will provide a comprehensive look at an effort that is vital to Afghanistan’s future, but often poorly understood outside a small community of experts. Speakers include Steve Brooking (Deputy Special Representative of the UN Secretary General for Afghanistan), Laurel Miller (Former State Department Acting Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan), Barnett Rubin (Senior Fellow and Associate Director of the Center for International Cooperation, New York University), Michael Semple (Visiting Professor, Institute for the Study of Conflict Transformation and Social Justice, Queen’s University, Belfast), Kate Clark (Director, Afghan Analysts Network) and Erica Gaston (Non-Resident Fellow, Global Public Policy Institute). Moderated by Johnny Walsh (Senior Expert on Afghanistan, US Institute of Peace).
- Colombia’s Choice: Analyzing the First Round of the Presidential Election | Thursday, June 7 | 3:00 pm – 4:30 pm | Inter-American Dialogue | Register Here
On Sunday, May 27, Colombians head to the polls for the first round of a critically important presidential election, the first since a peace accord was signed with the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in late 2016. Polls show Iván Duque of the Democratic Center Party with the lead, followed by Gustavo Petro, who heads a leftist coalition. The country remains highly polarized around the terms and implementation of the peace agreement. Combating corruption and curbing drug cultivation and trafficking are key challenges, as responding to the exploding migration crisis in Venezuela. The next government will also have to deal with a tough fiscal situation as it seeks to improve education, health and infrastructure.
The Dialogue is pleased to host a discussion after the first round of the presidential race, to interpret the results and explore what we can expect, should there be a second round on June 17. What is the outlook moving forward? What are the implications of the vote for addressing the country’s wide-ranging and complex peace/security, political, economic and social agendas? Speakers include Catalina Botero (Dean of the Law School at Universidad de los Andes), Juan Carlos Iragorri (Director, Club de Prensa, NTN24) and Peter Schechter (Political commentator and co-host of the Altamar Podcast). Moderated by Michael Shifter (President, Inter-American Dialogue).
- U. S. – Indonesia Relations and the Rise of China | Friday, June 8 | 10:00 am – 11:30 am | The Heritage Foundation | Register Here
The Rise of China is a reality. Its influence – and the opportunity it represents – is being felt from the Pacific to the Atlantic. Southeast Asia, however, is a neighbor. Indonesia, in fact, given Indonesian maritime claims, is right next door. Indonesia has a centuries-long history of dealing with China’s power. How should its government today see the balance between threat and opportunity represented in its rise? How should it make the most of China’s economic contributions to the region’s development? How should it push back on unwelcome initiatives, particularly around issues of maritime security? Where are the intersecting areas of interest with the United States and how should it view a U.S.-China rivalry? What is ASEAN’s role? These are just a few of the questions on the table for this event. Please join us we explore them and many more with our distinguished guests. Speakers include Hon. Rizal Ramli (Former Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs and former Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs, Republic of Indonesia), Cameron Hume (Chairman, American Indonesian Chamber of Commerce, and former U.S. Ambassador to Indonesia) and Brian Harding (Deputy Director and Fellow, Southeast Asia Program, Center for Strategic and International Studies). Hosted by Walter Lohman (Director, Asian Studies Center).
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