Month: December 2018
Another red line erased
President Trump has apparently decided to withdraw US troops within 30 days from the one-third of the country they control with the help of allied Kurdish-led but partly Arab-staffed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), in anticipation of a Turkish attack on the Kurds. This contradicts official statements of US policy, which claimed the troops would remain until Iranian forces were withdrawn. Pentagon and other officials are said to still be arguing against the decision to erase this red line.
If implemented, this withdrawal will leave a vacuum in northeastern Syria that the Turks, Syrian government with its Iranian allies, and various extremist factions will try to fill, while the SDF tries to hold the territory. A great deal will depend on which of these forces the Americans favor. If they plan to leave via Turkey, that will favor Ankara. I’d bet on that, because the Patriot sale approved less than 24 hours ago suggests a broader rapprochement with the Turks. If they go out by air or through Iraq, they might be able to help the SDF retain control. It is said the SDF are expected to continue to target extremists for American attack.
The outcome of this free-for-all is difficult to predict, though more than likely it will boil down to a fight between Turkey and the Syrian regime. That might end in a pact, with the Turks withdrawing in exchange for commitment from Damascus to crack down on the SDF, especially its Kurdish leadership. Alternatively, the extremists–ISIS or Al Qaeda–may end up with a de facto safe haven, only nominally controlled by the regime or Turkey. The SDF is unlikely to be able to hold its dominance for long without on-the-ground US support, even though they include some ferocious fighters.
Trump’s decision, assuming it holds, would be consistent with both his and President Obama’s assessment that Syria is not worth fighting for. But unlike Obama, Trump claims a firmly anti-Iranian stance. It is hard to square withdrawal from Syria with wanting to back Iran out of its regional efforts at power projection, unless the withdrawal is prelude to all-out war against Iran. Americans are not ready for that, but a president in domestic difficulty, including manifold legal troubles, might try it as a grand distraction. Woe if that is what is happening.
American withdrawal will deprive Washington of any diplomatic leverage in the chimerical Geneva talks on a political solution in Syria. But even with a US presence they weren’t going anywhere. The withdrawal will also limit US capabilities against extremists, especially once the SDF succumbs to Turkish and/or Syrian attacks.
Is this the right decision or the wrong one? Let’s put it this way: if the US was not going to commit itself to a serious rebuilding effort in eastern Syria, one that would provide a model of well-functioning governance for the rest of Syria, staying had little point. That project would have been a difficult and expensive one. Trump, like all his predecessors since 1989, has no stomach for “nation-building.” But if you want to avoid the resurgence of extremists, statebuilding is what is needed. Now it will be up to the Russians, Iranians, and Turks. Let’s see how well they do.
One consequence is apparent: Trump has demonstrated repeatedly that he takes strong positions and backs down from them quickly. Witness his almost simultaneous backdown on the closure of the US government due to the budget fight. Trump bluffs and caves. Those who thought Obama made a big mistake not enforcing the “red line” on chemical weapons in Syria should be screaming foul. But many of them won’t, because they are predominantly Republican. Another red line is being erased.
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Between past and future
I spoke yesterday in Belgrade at a conference organized by the Forum on Ethnic Relations and the Open Society Foundation on “Serbia and Kosovo Between Past and Future.” It was run under Chatham House rules, but I regard my own remarks as suitable for public consumption:
- First a word of thanks to the Forum on Ethnic Relations and the Open Society Foundation as well as the Helsinki Committee for providing this opportunity, at a particularly fraught time, for this discussion of relations between Serbia and Kosovo.
- First, on their relations right now: we are going through a difficult period, largely caused I think by exaggerated expectations.
- I don’t know who told President Thaci that he could get what he wants in southern Serbia without giving up vital interests in northern Kosovo. I also don’t know who told President Vucic that he could get what he wants in northern Kosovo without giving up vital interests in southern Serbia. Each was willing to take, but not to give.
- I’m fine with that, because however apparently rational to two ethnic nationalist presidents, the exchange of territories based on the ethnic affiliation of their populations is a bad idea.
- It would be an admission by both that neither can offer equal protection of the law to all his citizens. That is the essence of what they need to do to become EU, and if they want, NATO members.
- It would also destabilize Macedonia and Bosnia, and strengthen Vladimir Putin both there and in Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine.
- It was foolhardy for both the EU and the US to entertain the proposition of land and people swaps, which are antithetical not only to EU and NATO membership but also to the Badinter principles laid down in the early 1990s that govern the dissolution of former Yugoslavia.
- Now we need to deal with the consequences of the failed swap proposition. These include Pristina’s imposition of tariffs and its decision to convert its security forces to an army, as well as Belgrade’s opposition to Kosovo’s entry into Interpol and other international organizations.
- In my view, the tariffs are a CEFTA question and need to be dealt with there. I hope its mechanisms will be sufficient both to eliminate them and fix any legitimate problems Pristina has with treatment of its exports to Serbia.
- As for the army, I find it hard to imagine how anyone thought the Kosovo Albanians would do without one after what they suffered. KFOR will not stay in Kosovo forever. Pristina needs the means to defend itself at least for a week or 10 days, so long as Serbia presents a threat.
- That it does: its prime minister has made it crystal clear that an intervention into Kosovo under the guise of protecting the Serbs there is an option. Serbia’s concerted efforts to prevent Kosovo membership in international organizations and bilateral recognitions are also hostile acts.
- NATO needs to make it clear to Belgrade that such a move would lead to a military response. At the same time, Pristina needs to make it clear that Serbs in Kosovo are not threatened. Prime Minister Haradinaj has been trying to do just that.
- But managing the immediate threat doesn’t solve the longer-term problem.
- What is needed is normalization, so that Serbia doesn’t represent a threat to Kosovo and Kosovo does not represent a threat to the Serbs who live there.
- That will require much more extensive cross-border relations than exist today, including but by no means limited to diplomatic recognition and exchange of ambassadorial-level representatives.
- But, some say, what does Serbia get? How can you expect Belgrade to accept Kosovo’s sovereignty and independence without a quid pro quo?
- If Serbia is seriously concerned with the Kosovo army, it might get some concessions on its size and capabilities.
- It will get nothing if it waits to just before accession to recognize Kosovo, since then all the leverage will be with the EU members.
- Let me remind you of a page from US history: our most threatening enemy for about 100 years after independence was Great Britain, whose Canadian territory had the longest border of any country with the US.
- Today, both Canada and Great Britain are two of America’s key allies.
- But 100 years is too long to wait in the 21st century. The time to end the enmity between Kosovo and Serbia, to the advantage of both, is now. It can be done, but only on the basis of mutual recognition and respect.
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From war to peace
I spoke at the Media Centre in Belgrade yesterday about my recently published Palgrave MacMillan book, From War to Peace in the Balkans, the Middle East and Ukraine. Here are my speaking notes for the occasion:
- It is a pleasure to be back in Belgrade, and a particular pleasure to give my first talk about this book here in a Media Center that witnessed so many of the pivotal events of the 1990s wars in the Balkans. Many thanks to Dusan Janjic for providing the opportunity!
- Many of you will remember that period: the US and Europe fumbling for years in search of peaceful solutions in Croatia, Bosnia, and Kosovo only to find themselves conducting two air wars against Serb forces, first in Bosnia and later in Kosovo.
- But Americans have mostly forgotten this history. Europeans too often believe there were no positive results. Here in the Balkans, many are convinced things were better under Tito.
- I beg to differ: the successes and failures of international intervention in the Balkans should not be forgotten or go unappreciated.
- That’s why I wrote my short book, which treats the origins, consequences, and aftermath of the 1995, 1999 and 2001 interventions that led to the end of the most recent Balkan wars.
- In my view, conflict prevention and state-building efforts thereafter have been partly successful, though challenging problems remain in Bosnia, Macedonia, Kosovo, and Serbia.
- The book examines each of these on its own merits, as well as their prospects for entry into NATO and the EU, whose doors are in theory open to all the Balkan states.
- Bottom line: I believe all states that emerged from Yugoslavia as well as Albania are closer to fulfilling their Euroatlantic ambitions than they are to the wars and collapse of the 1990s.
- They were making decent progress when the financial crisis struck in 2007/8. The decade since then has been disappointing in many different respects:
- Growth slowed and even halted in some places.
- The Greek financial crisis cast a storm cloud over the EU.
- The flow of refugees, partly through the Balkans, from the Syrian and Afghanistan wars as well as from Africa soured the mood further.
- Brexit, a symptom of the rise of mostly right-wing, anti-European populism, has made enlargement extraordinarily difficult.
- The repercussions in the Balkans have been dire:
- Bosnia’s progress halted as it slid back into ethnic nationalist infighting.
- Macedonia’s reformist prime minister became a defiant would-be autocrat.
- Kosovo and Serbia are stalled in the normalization process.
- Russia has taken advantage of the situation to slow progress towards NATO and the EU.
- Now the question is whether the West, demoralized and divided by Donald Trump and right-wing populists, can still muster the courage to resolve the remaining problems in the Balkans and complete the process of EU and, for those who want it, NATO accession.
- I think Plan A is still viable. I also don’t see a Plan B that comes even close to the benefits of completing Plan A. Only three big obstacles remain.
- First is ending the Macedonia “name” issue. Skopje and Athens are on the verge of doing just that. New leadership was required to make it happen.
- For those who claim the West is prepared to tolerate corruption and state capture, I suggest a chat with Nikola Gruevski. If there is a viable liberal democratic option, the West will support it.
- Second is normalization between Belgrade and Pristina, the subject of the conference that will open within the hour.
- I’ll have more to say then, but let me say here that Serbia has already abandoned its claim to sovereignty over all of Kosovo, both in the April 2013 Brussels agreement and in opening the question of partition along ethnic lines.
- I think that is a terrible idea, for many reasons I will outline later, but it confirms that Belgrade has no intention of ever again governing the Kosovo Albanians.
- The third issue that needs to be resolved in the Balkans is the dysfunctional state structure that the Americans imposed on Bosnia and Herzegovina at Dayton.
- It has kept the peace for close to 25 years, but it needs reconfiguration to enable the Sarajevo government to negotiate and implement the acquis communautaire.
- These three are serious problems, but not insoluble ones. The road ahead is shorter than the road already traveled. Doubling back is a bad idea.
- My book proceeds after the Balkans to apply lessons learned to the Middle East and Ukraine, which also face identity-based conflicts challenging sovereignty and territorial integrity, lie close to the Balkans, and share more Ottoman history than is generally acknowledged.
- The lessons are these: leadership is key to starting, preventing, and ending wars; early prevention can work, with adequate resources; ethnic partition will not; international contributions can be vital; neighborhood counts; power sharing and decentralization can help.
- This accessible treatment of what makes war and how to make peace will appeal to both scholarly and lay readers interested in how violent international conflicts can be managed. It is available free, worldwide, courtesy of my generous employer, the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. To get it, click on the book cover at www.peacefare.net
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Lost, but not paradise
The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace hosted a discussion Wednesday with Daniel Seidemann, founder and director of Terrestrial Jerusalem. He was joined by Zaha Hassan, a human rights lawyer and visiting fellow at the Carnegie Middle East program. They reviewed recent events in Israel and Jerusalem and discussed the implications for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the near future.
Seidemann’s portrayal of the political future in Israel was bleak. The move by the Trump administration to relocate the American embassy to Jerusalem was the death knell for American leadership in the crisis. Worse, there is no other state willing and able to fill America’s role as neutral arbiter in the conflict. Seidemann warned that hopelessness, which he called “the great destabilizer”, now reigned in East Jerusalem. He expressed no confidence in the ability of the current administration to approach Jerusalem with the seriousness that it deserves, or even recognize what he characterized as the basic fact of occupation in East Jerusalem, Gaza, and the West Bank. Instead he characterized the American policy as “buy them and break them” hoping to stifle dissent with budgetary crumbs, combined with a bleak situation intended to break Palestinian political will.
Seidemann also warned that Israel, along with most of the West, is in danger of sliding into authoritarianism. Institutions are under attack all across Israel. Netanyahu will be attending the inauguration of Jair Bolsonaro, Brazil’s new President-elect who more than toyed with fascism while on the campaign trail. Netanyahu’s move towards authoritarianism is largely due to the noose around his neck: he faces the specter of imminent indictment on corruption charges, which he hopes to ride out and remain in office.
Domestic pressure may play a part in pushing Netanyahu towards construction of two “doomsday” settlements: the E1 settlement in East Jerusalem which would create a bottleneck in the West Bank, and another settlement which would sit between East Jerusalem and Bethlehem. Both settlements would create a serious barrier to the realization of a continuous Palestinian state, as well as displace Palestinians from their homes in numbers unseen since 1997. Though this plan has been paused in the past due to international pressure, it is conceivable given the vacuum of American leadership that Netanyahu may move to strengthen his base in Israel.
Zaha offered an overview of Palestinian strategy in the wake of American withdrawal as an effective mediator. Palestinians have engaged in a flurry of international engagement, hoping to advocate for themselves on the world stage. They filed a complaint to the UN Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, the first ever state-to-state complaint handled by the UN. The committee, consisting of experts on racial discrimination, will tackle among other issues the accusation of apartheid in Israel.
Another complaint has been lodged with the International Criminal Court, and deals with human rights violations committed on Palestinian territory. Since many of the allegations have taken place in East Jerusalem the case will necessarily involve a ruling on whether East Jerusalem is part of the territory of the Palestinian State.
A case in the International Court of Justice questions whether the US can legally relocate its embassy to Jerusalem given the city’s special status. While the US under Trump will likely ignore an unfavorable ruling, the decision will have repercussions for states who are considering an embassy move but seek to abide by international law.
The situation in Israel underlines the need for a renewed American policy in the Middle East. Seidemann urged that it is not too soon to begin considering what American policy in Israel should be after Trump, but he warned against viewing previous American policy as paradise lost, saying “it is lost, but it’s not paradise.” Instead America needs a new plan for thoughtful leadership in the Middle East, free of gimmicks and mindful that the world is no longer unipolar. The silver lining to America’s withdrawal under Trump is an opportunity to reconstitute US foreign policy.
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The Middle East wants reform
On Tuesday the Middle East Institute (MEI) hosted the presentation of the latest Middle East Public Opinion poll by James Zogby. Polling was conducted in 10 countries: Tunisia, Egypt, Lebanon, Palestine, Jordan, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Turkey and Iran. Zogby, Co-founder and President of the Arab American Institute and Director of Zogby Research Services, presented a summary of the data and key points before a panel discussion that featured Paul Salem, President of MEI, Kate Seelye, Vice President of MEI, Alex Vatanka, an MEI Senior Fellow, and Steven Cook, Eni Enrico Mattei Senior Fellow for Middle East and Africa Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. Throughout the Middle East citizens expressed discontent with the policies of their governments. Only in the UAE did a majority of respondents indicate that their country was on the right track. This discontent spanned the rough divide opened by the Arab spring. Egypt and Tunisia both followed the “democratic track” after successful revolutions in 2011, but a majority of respondents there believe their countries to be on the wrong track, joining Iraq and Palestine as states with majority disapproval. In Egypt the drop included the military, whose confidence levels have fallen 50 points since 2013. Government reform was ranked 3rd overall in the list of political priorities, topping extremism, foreign enemies, health care, and personal rights. This contradicts a common narrative, which justified the failure of the Arab Spring by claiming that the people desired only improved economic and security conditions and cared little for political reform as long as those conditions were met. Downplaying the desire for reform may have been simply wishful thinking by authoritarian leaders in the region. The survey conveyed a sense of foreign policy pragmatism. Regarding Syria there was growing support for a national unity government with participation of Bashar al Assad. Regarding Iran, while majorities supported the Trump administration’s move to pull out of the nuclear deal, in every country except Tunisia and Egypt the majority believe that peace between Iran and the Arab world is “very possible” or “somewhat possible.” Eight out of ten countries, including Iran, held the majority view that it is important to bring Iran into a regional security arrangement with the Arab countries to help bring peace to the region. One exception to this pragmatism is the the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. A growing majority in 5 out of 7 Arab states were opposed to a partnership with Israel, even if Israel returns occupied Palestinian lands and fulfills the terms of the Arab Peace Initiative. Palestinians themselves remained overwhelmingly prepared for peace with Israel if the refugee issue is solved and Israel returns to its pre-1967 borders, but a growing number believe the Israelis would never agree to those terms. Given the growing struggle between Saudi Arabia and Turkey for regional influence, the polling reflected just how close the competition is. Turkey surpasses the Saudis for favorability in Tunisia, Lebanon, Palestine, Jordan and Iraq, and tightened the gap in Egypt. A majority of Arab countries view Turkey as playing a more positive role than Saudi Arabia in both Iraq and Syria. Public opinion of America has fallen in the region. The EU, Russia and China all fared better than America. The panel believed that this drop in opinion was largely due to the perception of the American government as inept. The polling indicates a continued sense of unrest in the region. With little faith in their own institutions, the people of the Middle East remain largely uninspired by the jingoistic foreign policies of their governments and continue to seek an end to costly civil wars, in order to focus on domestic reforms and economic improvement.Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Not just lame but pathetic
This is remarkable: the President Tuesday owning a government shutdown over his border wall, bragging about winning Senate contests in two states that should never have been in doubt, and mansplaining her powers to the soon-to-be Speaker of the House. He did this intentionally in front of television cameras.
He thinks a border wall he promised Mexico would pay for is more important than meeting the US Government’s sovereign financial obligations, that Senate victories in solid red states give him bragging rights, and male chauvinism is appealing to his misogynistic supporters. This is not just lame, it’s pathetic.
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