Month: December 2010
Why won’t China rein in North Korea?
That’s the question on my mind, even if much of what I read addresses the less interesting question of why we know better and the Chinese are making a mistake. The explanations for Beijing’s behavior are many and varied. From people who live closer than we do:
1. The South Asia Analysis Group (Subhash Kapila) suggests Pyonyang’s behavior “arises from a calibrated strategy operated in tandem with China’s increasing aggressiveness in East Asia”:
- China exploits North Korea as a strategic proxy against the U.S.;
- Washington responds timidly for fear of alienating China, hoping it may still emerge as a partner, even an ally;
- China is part of the problem, not part of the solution.
2. An Australian offers less dramatic explanations:
- Pyonyang has Beijing in a bind: “North Korea may be a bad friend, but it would be a worse enemy”;
- Beijing doesn’t want the international community to get into the habit of asking it to rein in pariahs;
- China thinks its coaxing will work better in the long term than a more rigorous approach.
Beijing’s main concern is generally thought to be stability. But why don’t they see North Korean behavior as threatening to stability? Are they happy to see the Americans, Japanese and South Koreans discomforted? Are they thinking that recent events will serve them well by hindering any moves towards reunification?
PS: As luck would have it, Victor Cha Sunday morning (I posted on Saturday) has
But because they are the only ones helping the North, China’s leaders are afraid that such a move [cutting off oil supplies to North Korea] would collapse the regime and send millions of starving refugees flooding over its border. The Chinese have no easy way of determining how much pressure they should use, so they remain paralyzed, making ineffectual gestures
Paralysis may not last forever.
PPS: Ed Joseph points out that this question was discussed Sunday on Fareed Zakharia’s GPS: “China experts provided insights on just that question. Most intriguing theory: China fears a precedent and a non-Communist, unified Korea on its border, according to the expert.” You can watch the discussion, which starts just before minute 33, here.
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Too early to declare a South Sudan success
Rift Valley Institute (Aly Verjee) updates a previous paper on just-in-time preparations for referenda in Southern Sudan (January 9) and in the border area Abyei, where no progress has been made and the referendum there will clearly be postponed.
While I share Michael Gerson’s enthusiasm for the American officials working on getting Sudan right, it is clearly too early to declare an Obama foreign policy win in South Sudan, as his headline writer did (reflecting accurately the contents of the op/ed). There is a long and difficult road ahead that could be upset by violence, political games, logistical difficulties, technical incompetence, interference from neighbors and miscalculation by Khartoum or Juba. The American officials of course know that better than I do.
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Kosovo elections preview: opportunity knocks
Kosovo national elections will take place tomorrow, the first parliamentary poll since independence. Unlike Egypt, Haiti and Ivory Coast, the Kosovo government seems likely to gain in legitimacy and authority from a relatively well-organized and executed effort, one in which substantial numbers of Albanians, Serbs and other minorities are expected to choose among a wide array of political options.
By all reports, the campaign and the election-day organization have been good, maybe even very good. Planning has included 23,000 certified election observers. Polling places are expected to be available in Serb enclaves; Serbs are guaranteed 10 seats in a 120-seat Parliament but can win more. Other minorities also get 10. The system is “open list” with the opportunity to select five candidates. Women make up one-third of the lists and one-third of the unicameral legislature.
The campaign has been vigorous but peaceful, with eight Serb parties among the 29 contesting the elections. Two new Albanian parties—the more radical Self Determination and the activist but more centrist New Spirit—joined the competition with more established political forces and their offshoots. The press in Kosovo is ranked “partly free” by Freedom House, due in large part to weaknesses in the legal environment. But there do not appear to have been any special restrictions associated with the elections.
The main issues of concern to voters, according to the National Democratic Institute’s pre-election polling, are the economy/jobs and corruption, which are also the two areas in which the most dissatisfaction was expressed. “Political stability,” whatever that means, is a fairly distant third. Health and education are viewed as improving. The only institutions scoring at all well were civil society organizations, though the parliament, government and political parties did better than the new municipalities and the ministry of community and returns.
Participation is expected to be strong in most communities, with the possible and important exception of the Serbs who live in the North, where Belgrade’s influence is most strongly felt. If tomorrow is peaceful and participation is strong, it will be an excellent sign of interest and even confidence in the political process.
These elections are an opportunity. If they come off well, they will be an important step in validating Kosovo’s institutions as representative and democratic in advance of upcoming negotiations with Belgrade and give Pristina an important claim to international recognition, regardless of who wins or loses.
Why should Americans care about elections in such a small and out of the way place? With U.S. leadership, NATO went to war over Kosovo in 1999, and we thereafter spent billions to station forces there and help build the Kosovo state. As we consider what to do in Afghanistan (as well as Iraq), it is at least modestly gratifying to hear that such efforts sometimes succeed, at least in part.
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Election purgatory, on the way to hell
Elections: for Americans the ultimate source of legitimacy and state authority, but just for that reason problematic in authoritarian societies and fragile states. We are watching elections create problems in three markedly different societies these days:
- Results of Haiti’s first-round presidential poll have generated violent protests by those who believe they were falsified to favor incumbent President Rene’ Preval’s preferred candidate, leading to a review (maybe recount?) by the electoral commission that ran the effort in the first place.
Elections are one of the few things the international community can organize (relatively) quickly and effectively, even under trying circumstances. Authoritarian and (sometimes) weak states can also manage the task. What they find much harder is accepting the results. Elections distribute power; from power flow money, resources and sometimes life and death. No one should expect elections to be peaceful unless everyone in the game (and out of it) is prepared to play by fair rules and to accept the results.
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Diplomatic ballet with Iran
While Tehran is touting its “superior” position in talks with the P5+1 Monday and Tuesday in Geneva and asserting that the nuclear issue is settled, reality looks different from Washington. While no one seems to think the Geneva meeting made any substantive progress, insiders think sanctions are biting, due to an unusual degree of US/EU common resolve as well as tacit cooperation from money centers in the Middle East. The recent seizure of Iranian ships in Singapore is possibly related to sanctions.
Lady Ashton at least thought the Iranians agreed to meet again (in January in Istanbul) to discuss nuclear questions, but the Iranians denied it. If the Iranians refuse to meet again, or continue to claim that nuclear issues can’t be discussed, Washington and Brussels will need to consider ratcheting up the sanctions, which are said to have already denied Tehran the overt use of dollars, euros and pounds in international transactions.
Tightened sanctions could however have unintended consequences: they need to be targeted on the leadership and avoid hurting ordinary Iranians and strengthening the hand of the Iranian government against its opponents, at least some of whom might want Tehran to adopt a more flexible approach on the nuclear issue.
Diplomats generally call this walking a tight rope. I prefer the ballet analogy. Or is it all really just a soap opera?
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
A diplomat’s guide to reading wikileaks
I wrote thousands of diplomatic cables during 21 years in the U.S. Foreign Service, and I dread calculating how many I’ve read. Here is an insider’s view of how to read them.
Don’t believe everything they say (and don’t say). A good diplomat will of course report what foreigners say as accurately as possible, but even when she does there are still several sources of uncertainty. Most important is language.
I have top scores in both Portuguese and Italian, but I did not always understand every word an interlocutor (that’s diplomatese for “person,” implicitly someone worth talking to) said to me in Brazil and Italy. Many conversations occur in non-ideal conditions (noisy restaurants, standing up at cocktail parties, in crowded hallways, over unreliable cell phones, at opposite ends of a long conference table). If the foreigners are speaking to you in English, they may not always understand the subtleties of our complex language and may say things that require interpretation. If the conversation is conducted through an interpreter, a great deal may be lost in translation.
In addition to language, there are omissions. Diplomats don’t usually report a lot on what they themselves say, though there are exceptions to the rule. If there is a need to prove that you carried out your instructions, you may reproduce the instructions in the cable almost to the letter, even if you didn’t really say all that stuff.
What is missing is more important than what is there. The cables being published are not the most sensitive ones. Those are usually “captioned” with markings that limit their distribution (limdis, exdis and nodis are the most common captions, but there are others for special topics). Captioned cables are not routinely shared interagency, so the low-level Defense Department type who leaked these did not have access to the more restricted material. There is of course Top Secret material as well that is not included in the wikileaks. But “Top Secret” is not used as much as people imagine for normal diplomatic discourse. Wikileaks has provided the iceberg, but the tip of limited distribution materials is missing. That is often the most interesting material.
The people who write the cables are not always the ones speaking in them or signing them. It is common for ambassadors and other high-level officials to go to meetings with “principals” (big shots) accompanied by a note-taker. They are lower-ranking Foreign Service officers who know that their job is in part to make the principals look good in the cable that inevitably they have to draft. Being a note-taker is a privilege, a greater one the higher ranking the principal. You want to be asked to do it again.
Note-takers draft, circulate the draft for clearance, and get a higher-up to sign off. All diplomatic cables leaving an American embassy are sent in the name of the Ambassador or Charge’ (the person he leaves in charge when out of the country, usually the “Deputy Chief of Mission” aka Minister for most non-American embassies). This does not mean that the Ambassador necessarily read or signed the cable—there will be others in the Embassy authorized to “sign out”—though if an ambassador was involved in the discussion reported she normally would want to read it before it goes to Washington.
The cables you are reading are on the whole well done, and you can read millions more if you want. The general reaction around the world in diplomatic circles is horror at the release of these documents, but admiration and even acclaim for their quality.
There are many more available for the asking: under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), the National Security Archive at George Washington University has acquired many more than wikileaks is publishing. Those obtained under FOIA are scrubbed to make sure no risks to the national security will arise; they are generally older than some of those being published now and of less obvious journalistic interest.
You can even ask for cables yourself: submit a request on the State Department website and ask for whatever you want. They won’t come right away, but they do eventually come (you may have to pay reproduction costs). I’ve collected many more over the years than I’ll ever be able to read and make sense of!
RSS - Posts
