Tag: Israel/Palestine
Follow the money
The real difference between the candidates on foreign policy issues is not what they say they would do but what they want to fund, which ultimately affects what whoever is elected can do. The Ryan budget proposal, which Romney has said he backs, cuts international affairs spending by almost 10% in 2013 and close to a quarter by 2016 while funding a giant military buildup (on top of the buildup that has occurred since 9/11). Obama does not propose cuts to military spending, but he is trying to keep it below previously projected levels. His “international affairs” budget proposal for 2013 would keep that category more or less at current levels, taking inflation into account.
The consequences of this difference between the candidates for American foreign policy are dramatic. We are already overusing our highly competent, effective and expensive military forces. In Iraq and Afghanistan, they often substituted for far cheaper, but unavailable, civilians: the military provided not only humanitarian aid, which it is required to do in “non-permissive” environments, but also development and state-building assistance. I won’t be surprised if the U.S. military (along with the paramilitary parts of CIA) now has more foreign assistance money available than USAID. The Ryan budget proposal, if adopted, would dramatically increase reliance on the U.S. military for non-military aid, statebuilding, international law enforcement and other fundamentally civilian tasks.
This is not smart. At well over $1 million per deployed soldier (counting support and infrastructure costs), the U.S. military is a fabulously expensive way of getting things done. Relying on it for civilian tasks is the international equivalent of relying on emergency rooms for routine medical care. You may get it done, but only at a far higher price than providing the same care in doctors’ offices or community clinics.
The supposedly business-savvy Governor Romney is suggesting both health care in emergency rooms and use of our armed forces when civilians might suffice. Moreover, experience indicates that the existence of a strong military instrument without equally strong civilian instruments will get us into wars that we might otherwise avoid: need I mention Iraq? If anyone doubts whether our military has been thinking ahead to Iran, this map should be instructive:
I do not mean to suggest, as many of those publishing this map do, that we would be better off without these military installations. Clearly they lend credibility to the threat of force that will be essential if ever there is a diplomatic solution to the Iranian nuclear problem. And if diplomacy fails, the military option needs to be on the table.
But it is hard for me to imagine that we spend more 1 one-thousandth of the cost of these bases on the diplomatic effort with Iran. We may in fact spend significantly less. That means that a 1 one-thousandth chance of a diplomatic solution is worth pursuing. I would put the real odds of diplomatic success at more like 50/50 or maybe 25/75. Someone on the right might say the odds are 1/10. But what Ryan and Romney are proposing is that we cut the diplomatic effort and increase the military push. Does that make financial sense?
I hasten to note that Romney has also made some sensible proposals to use American foreign assistance money more effectively by focusing on rule of law and establishing conditions for successful private initiative. The trouble is there won’t be any money in the government kitty to do those things if he is elected and the Ryan budget adopted.
Iran is the odd problem these days. It may require a military solution, but that is unusual. China as a currency manipulator does not. Even Russia as a geopolitical threat, if you think it one, requires diplomacy more than military mobilization. George W. Bush, no retiring violet, did not try to respond militarily to Russia when it went to war with Georgia, a country he wanted to get into NATO. The list of problems not amenable to military solution is long: Pakistan’s drift toward extremism, Afghanistan’s corrupt government, the stalled Middle East peace process. It is striking that the international community is busy mobilizing an exclusively military response to Islamist extremism in Mali, where a more balanced approach that emphasizes local community economic development would be far more likely to succeed.
I know it won’t happen, but this is what the two candidates should be asked at the debate: given the strains on the U.S. military, what would you do to strengthen America’s civilian instruments of foreign policy and how are those priorities reflected in your budget proposals?
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
A few questions for tonight
It’s a high campaign week. I don’t expect tonight’s town hall debate to focus much foreign policy. Apart from budget, about which I’ll write during the next week, the main difference on international affairs is one of tone, not substance: Romney accuses Obama of projecting weakness, not strength. On Iraq and Afghanistan in particular Romney has criticized the Administration’s past performance but offered little or no idea how he would handle things differently in the future. Obama has so far mostly vaunted the withdrawals from Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as the killing of Osama bin Laden, and mocked Romney’s lack of distinctive policy proposals.
But there are several areas of real difference: China, Israel/Palestine and Iran are the important ones. A few sharp questions are in order.
China: Romney says he would label China a currency manipulator on his first day in office. Someone tonight should ask what difference that would make.
It could form the basis of a complaint to the World Trade Organization (WTO), but there is no guarantee that the complaint would be found justified or that the WTO could provide a remedy. In fact, the Chinese currency (renminbi, whose primary unit is the yuan) has already been revalued by more or less the percentage it was once regarded as undervalued. This was currency manipulation the U.S., including Mr. Romney, should welcome. Chinese retaliation for an American president who declared Beijing a currency manipulator could include not buying U.S. government bonds and maybe even manipulating the renminbi back down, which would help revive the slowing Chinese economy. In short, the U.S. has as much to lose from this macho first-day-in-office declaration as the very uncertain gains.
The Obama administration deserves at least some of the credit for the revaluation of the renminbi. It has also filed trade complaints focused on auto parts with the WTO, but so far as I can tell none of those have been decided yet. It takes years. Using the WTO to bring specific cases has clear advantages over the blanket “currency manipulator” approach: the Chinese have agreed to WTO rules and retaliation is far less likely if a specific case is won there.
Israel/Palestine: Romney now says he favors the two-state solution that has been the U.S. goal for a long time, putting him in tune with the rest of the world. But that’s not what he said on the 47% video, when he proposed just kicking the can down the road and hoping for something good to happen. He gets substantial funding from Sheldon Adelson and others who actively oppose the two-state solution and want Israel to hold on to “Judea and Samaria,” aka the West Bank. You can choose to believe that Romney would buck his moneyed supporters, but I doubt it.
The Obama Administration has failed to deliver a two-state solution, like the administrations that preceded it. You can blame it all on Prime Minister Netanyahu and his right-wing government if you like, but the fact remains: little or nothing has been accomplished between Israel and Palestine, which however has begun to build a more credible state apparatus than existed in the past. Little credit to be gained on this issue, except that the relative peace has held, including with Hamas-controlled Gaza.
The question to be asked is this: what specifically would you do to bring about a two-state solution for Israel and Palestine?
Iran: The difference here is certainly in part one of tone. Those who have spoken with Romney advisor John Bolton come away with the impression that he would relish war with Iran, which other advisors have advocated. Obama administration insiders want a deal and see a credible threat of force as a tool in getting one.
But there is also the “red line” issue. The President has refused to specify his red line, essentially reserving to himself the decision on when Iran has gone so far that he needs to use force. Romney wants to prevent Iran from getting the “capacity” to produce nuclear weapons. This is in some ways just as vague a concept, but it implies willingness to draw the line, for example, at accumulation of only as much 20% enriched uranium as would be required to make less than one nuclear weapon. Romney also wants to reach an explicit agreement on the red line with Israel, so that there is “no daylight” between us on this issues.
Personally, I prefer an American president who decides whether to go to war based on American interests and does not outsource the decision to a foreign leader. But however you feel about it, someone should ask tonight how each candidate would decide whether or not to go to war with Iran.
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Why riot?
You don’t have to be a foreign affairs expert to see that there are political reasons for the Innocence of Muslims-inspired protests around the Muslim world in what has been termed “the video incident.” America’s recent wars in predominantly Muslim countries have heightened tensions. U.S. support for Israel also contributes.
But this can’t be just about politics. The video offended Muslim sentiments. If these protests were really about politics, why were they not more widespread and why did they not take on a more explicitly political guise?
Americans find it difficult to understand the religious justification for these protests. Either they are reduced to cultural relativism (“things are different in the Muslim world”) 0r they wonder if Muslims are so weak in their faith that any offense to their prophet pushes them to mass violence. Neither produces interesting answers.
What Westerners fail to appreciate is the cultural milieu in which Islam originated and propagated. Islam emerged from a pre-existing oral tradition of poetry. The influence is apparent in the Holy Qur’an, which often reads like poetry:
Say, “I seek refuge in the Lord of mankind,
The Sovereign of mankind,
The God of mankind,
From the evil of the retreating whisperer –
Who whispers [evil] into the breasts of mankind –
From among the jinn [spirits] and mankind.” (Surat an-Nas 114)
Recitation of the Qur’an is art, and those with the Qur’an memorized are respected. In early Islam, that was the only way to experience the Qur’an. It is believed Muhammad was illiterate, so when he received the Qur’an from the Angel Gabriel he memorized it and taught it to his followers. The sunnah, or the large body that encompasses the words and actions of the Prophet and some of his close followers, was also initially memorized and passed along orally.
Memorization and oral transmission were the privileged modes of gaining and disseminating knowledge. How was it to be determined whose oral transmission was legitimate? What would be done if two people remembered something differently? In the case of the sunnah an incredibly complex system developed for evaluating the legitimacy of different ahadith (pieces of the sunnah, particular stories about things the Prophet said or did). Was it possible that a certain transmitter could have had contact with another in order to pass along a hadith? Did both transmitters live in the same era and were they known to have traveled in the same region?
The issue of legitimacy also brought into question each transmitter’s character. Ignoring other variables, one might trust what one transmitter said the Prophet did over another if the first had a reputation for honesty while the second was known to lie. The legitimacy of the information a transmitter passed along was intimately connected to the transmitter’s reputation: how honest he was, how often he prayed, whether his teachings were consistent. Character is vital to legitimacy in the Islamic tradition.
The connection between the legitimacy of the content and the character of the content’s originator or transmitter implies that criticism of the latter calls the former into question. If a transmitter is not of high moral standing, there are implications for whether the ahadith he transmitted are considered legitimate. Insulting the Prophet, the original transmitter, calls into question his message, or all of Islam.
In the Shi’i tradition a religious leader’s character is very important, especially in a Muslim’s choice of Ayatollah. Because of the occultation of the last imam, Ayatollahs are selected to demonstrate how a Muslim should live her life until the last imam returns. The importance of an Ayatollah modeling good character is captured in the title given to a well-respected Ayatollah, marja-e-taqlid, which translates as “source of emulation.”
This is strange from the Judeo-Christian perspective, which privileges text. Jews are exigent about error-free copying of the Torah. Western culture worries about plagiarism. Improperly expropriating text undermines an author’s credibility and may call into question everything she has written. We have little need to worry about an author’s character to decide whether a text is valid or not.
It is therefore not surprising that the Judeo-Christian tradition includes insulting, teasing, or at least recognizing the faults of religious leaders without it negatively reflecting on their mission. In the Jewish tradition, many of the prophets are far from moral perfection, but their character flaws do not affect the sanctity of their purpose. Most Christians had a good laugh at the late-night TV jokes about Jesus’ possible wife. The ancient Greeks often mocked the gods.
There is of course no justification for the killings associated with the recent demonstrations. But the importance of transmitters in preserving the Islamic tradition provides some insight into the anger a number of Muslims are feeling around the world, an anger that so many in the West cannot begin to understand.
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
George W. Bush’s playbook
I can do no better in summing up Mitt Romney’s foreign policy speech today than he does himself in the penultimate sentence:
The 21st century can and must be an American century. It began with terror, war, and economic calamity. It is our duty to steer it onto the path of freedom, peace, and prosperity.
Here’s the problem: the terror, war and economic calamity Romney refers to occurred not on Barack Obama’s watch, but on George W. Bush’s. And Governor Romney’s foreign policy prescriptions, like many of his domestic policy prescriptions, are drawn from George W. Bush’s playbook.
The few innovations in Romney’s speech at Virginia Military Institute today are hardly worth mentioning. He wants to see the Syrian revolutionaries get more arms, in particular anti-aircraft and anti-tank weapons, but he fails to say how he will prevent these from being used against us, except to say that those who receive them will have to share our values. That should fix everything in the arms bazaars of the Middle East.
He says he will support a two-state solution for peace between Palestine and Israel. Nice to see him return to the mainstream from the extremist wings of Israeli and American politics, which is where he was during the “47%” fund-raising dinner in Florida when he suggested we would kick the can down the road and maybe skip the two-state solution altogether. Trouble is, the people he pitched that line to are supporting his campaign with fat checks. He says there will be no daylight between America and Israel, which is code for saying that the Jewish settlements will continue to expand, since that is what Netanyahu’s Israel wants. I fail to understand an American presidential candidate who outsources U.S. policy on the Palestinians to Israel.
In Libya he’ll track down the killers of our personnel, which is exactly what Obama promises to do. I’d just be curious how those 15 Navy ships he plans to build each year will help in the effort.
He pledges to condition aid to Egypt but makes the conditions both vague and easy to meet: build democratic institutions and maintain the peace treaty with Israel. There are lots of problems with President Morsy’s Egypt, but you won’t be able to hang him for either of those offenses, yet.
In Afghanistan, he calls the withdrawal the president has pledged a retreat but makes it clear he is not proposing anything very different.
Then there is this on foreign assistance:
I will make further reforms to our foreign assistance to create incentives for good governance, free enterprise, and greater trade, in the Middle East and beyond. I will organize all assistance efforts in the greater Middle East under one official with responsibility and accountability to prioritize efforts and produce results. I will rally our friends and allies to match our generosity with theirs.
The trouble here is that the Ryan budget guts the foreign affairs budget, including foreign assistance. There won’t be any American generosity to be matched with theirs if Romney is elected. This is where Romney departs definitively from Obama and shows his reliance on George W.’s playbook.
I hasten to add that I’d be all for organizing our assistance efforts in the greater Middle East under one official. That would be a good idea.
One last issue: with all this overload of American values as the basis for our foreign policy, I’m curious what Romney plans to do about Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE, Kuwait, Jordan, Morocco and other less than fully democratic friends in the region? They get no mention in this speech, but of course they really can’t be mentioned in a speech that gives unequivocal backing to both our friends and our values. What would Romney do when there is a choice between the two? Keep silent would be a good guess.
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Facilitating dialogue in conflict zones
I’ve got a book out co-edited with David Smock on Facilitating Dialogue: USIP’s Work in Conflict Zones. For an easy intro, you can try my recent appearance on Voice of America.
This is no coffee-table crusher but rather a slim 170-page compilation of case studies from the last 13 years or so. It includes two chapters on dialogues in Iraq (Mahmoudiya and Diyala) and one each on Kosovo, inter- and intra-faith dialogue in the Middle East and Colombia, civil society dialogues in Colombia, Nigeria (Niger Delta in particular) and justice and security in Nepal. David wrote the introduction and we collaborated on the conclusion. The book grew out of a series of internal meetings at USIP that I convened starting in 2009, if I remember correctly, to compare notes on our various dialogue efforts.
The approach in the book is practical. We were not trying to theorize, as others have, but to demonstrate in practice why dialogue is important, what it involves, the many factors that determine success and failure, and best practices that can increase the odds for success.
All but one of the dialogues described were conducted as United States Institute of Peace projects, with vital contributions by contractors, some of whom had been trained by USIP. The exception was a USIP grant-supported project in the Niger Delta conducted by Acadmic Associates PeaceWorks. All were efforts that were at the heart of USIP’s push to go abroad to demonstrate in practice what we thought we had learned in the previous decade or so of peace research, in which the Institute had played a seminal role, mainly through its publications.
When I arrived at USIP in 1998 it was a think tank with training and grant programs. When I left in 2010 it was also a “do” tank, with a much-expanded training program and grants more focused on peace-building in conflict zones. This transformation depended on the ingenuity, courage and commitment of the people who contributed to the projects described in Facilitating Dialogue. These were not efforts for the squeamish, the faint of heart or those who don’t want to risk program failure.
We’ll be launching this book at USIP 10:30-noon on October 17 with a few presentations of the cases (I’ll do Kosovo, Rusty Barber Iraq, Colette Rausch Nepal) and some more general remarks by David Smock. This will be my first presentation at USIP since I left almost two years ago. Please join us for the occasion, which I expect will be a stimulating one.
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
What is happening today besides the debate
This is not a day for foreign policy. We are all too busy getting ready for the first presidential debate tonight. The right is preparing by reminding us all that President Obama is black. That’s useful to shore up white male support in western Pennsylvania and Ohio. Obama and his supporters are more anxious to suggest he is not so good at this debating stuff. Romney is good he says.
The world has more interesting things going on. If you are curious, try these:
1. Georgian President Saakashvili has admitted electoral defeat and will accept, contrary to expectations, seeing his party go into opposition.
2. Iranians have held a massive demonstration protesting the devaluation of the rial and calling on the Islamic Republic to forget about Syria and take care of its own citizens.
3. The independent Serbian broadcaster B92 is airing a series dubbed “Patriotic Pillage” documenting abuses, smuggling and other offences in northern Kosovo.
4. The Syrian opposition is trying to liberate Aleppo, the country’s largest city, resorting to bomb attacks that are unfortunately fulfilling the regime’s claim of terrorism.
5. The Americans are said to be giving up on negotiations with the Taliban, which appear never to have really gotten off the ground.
6. People have started noticing that most of Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu’s campaign financing come from wealthy Americans, some of whom also back Mitt Romney.
These are all more interesting in my view than the debate is likely to be, but you know I’ll be watching anyway!
PS: I should have included in this list Bashar al Assad’s need to send troops to his Lattakia, reportedly to quell fighting between pro- and anti-regime Alawite militias. Not clear whether it is true, but if it is it could be important. You know you are in trouble when…
RSS - Posts
