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Own goals

The Trump Administration has had a busy few days committing what look to me like “own” goals, that is goals scored against the interests of the United States and its citizens. Let me list them:

1. Renunciation of the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP): this will please no country more than China, which correctly saw TPP as an effort to ensure American influence in Asia and limit Beijing’s sway with its neighbors. If you believe that Beijing aims at regional political and economic as well as military hegemony, the path is far more open today than it was last week.
2. An executive order instructing government agencies to act to the maximum extent permitted by law to undo the Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare: before issuing this order, the Republicans had some chance of convincing people that Obamacare was collapsing under its own weight, but now the administration has taken on responsibility for destabilizing the system Obama established. A replacement is nowhere in sight, so 20 million people will likely have Trump to blame for getting nervous about losing their health insurance (and maybe eventually losing it).
3. The pledge to prevent China from “taking over” international territories in the South China Sea: It is difficult to imagine how this would be implemented in practice if not by war, but just as important is that several other countries friendly to the US have also built islands in the South China Sea, well before China embarked on that enterprise. Even to pretend to be consistent, we would need to block take overs by at least Vietnam, the Philippines, and Malaysia, which wouldn’t get us far in enlisting their help against the Chinese.
4. A rambling and partly incoherent speech at the CIA that disrespected the intelligence community with which he was trying to repair relations: If I hadn’t been told he was a teetotaler, I’d have thought him tipsy. He brought a claque to applaud and managed to say little (some would say nothing) to suggest that he appreciated or understood the sacrifices our intelligence operatives and analysts have to make.
5. Continued insistence on obvious lies: These include gross overstatements of the crowds at Friday’s inauguration as well as the number of people who voted illegally. The media is now getting used to calling out these falsehoods bluntly. Republican members of Congress, who are the only hope for upending this administration, should be chagrined. Trumpkins will continue to believe the lies, but there is no evidence that the majority of Americans are Trumpkins.
   

The nationwide demonstrations Saturday suggested the opposite: the reservoir of people concerned with protecting Obama’s achievements is large and activated. Trump wisely avoided denouncing the demonstrations, which suggests someone in the new administration understands the risks involved in alienating women, the men who support their rights, and perhaps even minorities, who turned out in force. Few previous administrations have excited such opposition so early, none on the scale of last weekend.

More own goals await. With Israel expanding settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, a move of the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem is likely to arouse a strong Arab reaction, one that could damage warming Sunni relations with Israel and handicap the administration’s intended hostility towards Iran. Ditto any move to ban Muslims from entering the US. The hostility to Iran, if realized, could hurt prospects for cooperation with Russia, which is allied with Iran in supporting Bashar al Assad in Syria. Trump has promised to “eradicate” violent Islamic extremism. That would require a far greater presence abroad of American troops and civilians than the administration has indicated it wants. Trump’s reference to a possible future opportunity to “take Iraq’s oil,” which is an obvious war crime, will have generated resentment in the Arab world and should generate concern in America about the possibility of massive new intervention abroad.

The Trump administration is rife with contradictions. The more it attempts to realize its radical changes in American foreign and domestic policy, the more apparent those contradictions will become. Admittedly, I don’t wish Trump well. But if the last few days are any indication, the administration will fail on its own way before its opponents have gotten organized to make it do so.

PS: For those in need of comic relief:

PPS: And this, from the Dutch:

Managing South China Sea conflicts

I enjoyed some time with some smart colleagues yesterday discussing the South China Sea conflicts, unfortunately under Chatham House rules. Below are my own notes for the occasion. 

Two points stand out in my memory of what others said: 

1. Oil and gas resources in the South China Sea are not promising and fish stocks are declining; 
2. The Chinese might well challenge the next president, or undisciplined pilots or naval captains might do so. 

There were lots of other excellent points made, but I’ll have to hope that one of the students present might offer up their notes. I find it difficult to take notes while participating on a panel. 

1. I’m truly honored to sit on a panel with distinguished colleagues. My advice to the students in the room is to listen carefully to them, as they know a lot about the South China Sea disputes and the legal background.
2. I don’t, but I was asked to talk about the conflict management implications of the recent arbitration and the outlook for resolving future maritime disputes in the region, including alternative methods of dispute settlement that China Studies and Conflict Management students will be exploring this fall and during a study trip to Beijing in January.
3. Let me begin with the bad news: if in order to ensure peace we need to settle the various claims of sovereignty in the South China Sea, I think there is very little chance of success.
4. Sovereignty claims are all too often resolved by force.
5. China has the advantage there. For the foreseeable future Beijing will be able to deploy force superior to any of the other individual claimants. Without US assistance, none of the South China Sea claimants would win a naval clash with China.
6. With US assistance, they might win, but only after causing incalculable damage to world order, the world’s economy, and international relations throughout the Pacific.
7. War would be a really bad way to resolve any of the South China Sea disputes.
8. Fortunately, other means are available. Arbitration is one.
9. But arbitration is a method that decides who is right and who is wrong. If it goes in favor of the less powerful state, the more powerful state is unlikely to accept the outcome. That is pretty much what we’ve seen in response to last summer’s arbitration decision.
10. But we’ve also seen another classic conflict management response: China is trying to buy off the Philippines, with at least initial indications of some success.
11. Billions are unlikely to make Manila cede completely, but it may render the arbitration decision ineffective, postponing rather than resolving the issue.
12. There are ample precedents for simply letting sovereignty claims slide. There are still more than five outstanding maritime boundary disputes between the US and Canada. They are mostly ignored in practice, even if neither country is willing to concede legally.
13. There are also ample precedents for cooperative regimes that do not necessarily decide the sovereignty question, or decide it without prejudicing economic interests, thus enabling disputants to gain at least some of the benefits that they think are rightfully theirs.
14. Bahrain and Saudi Arabia share production from a once-disputed oil field; Iran and Qatar share production from a disputed gas field.
15. Such cooperative arrangements are relatively easy where resources are concerned but particularly difficult where security issues are involved, since security is often regarded as a zero sum game.
16. China’s militarization of various non-islands in the South China Sea is perceived in Washington as a threat to US freedom of navigation there. So we send ships and aircraft to traverse locations that we believe are permitted, even if the Chinese think not.
17. In particular, the Chinese think military vessels and planes conducting espionage are not entitled to passage even in its Exclusive Economic Zone, so they may respond by declaring an Air Defense Identification Zone, or by challenging US naval ships or military aircraft. Read more