Month: September 2022
Stevenson’s army, September 16
– The question of “dues” to campaign committees came up in class. Punchbowl News has a story.-
– Biden signed an executive order on Chinese investments. NYT has more.
-House GOP announces its agenda.
– FT reports pressure on Turkey.
– FP says Iraq is on verge of shiite civil war.
-At Harvard they can’t read cursive.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, September 15
– SFRC reports Taiwan bill. More from The Hill.
– Senators push terrorism designation on Russia.
– Members criticize new Egypt aid.
– Administration set up Afghan aid bypassing Taliban.
– Uncertain schedule for NDAA.
Charlie wrote later:
[I have grandparent duty most Fridays, so let me upload some extra items now]
– WaPo report on Xi & Putin comments.
– More Senate staff will get top clearances.
– Biden’s Asia trade program IPEF gets some movement. Here’s CRS background.
– In addition to Taiwan bill [text here], SFRC yesterday reported what it calls a State Dept Authorization bill. Since it’s 68 pages long and covers a lot of territory, it could be the first significant such measure in 20 years [though flimsy bills with that title have been enacted since.]
– Beware: there is a faction among GOP candidates who have a scary view of civilian control of the military. For example.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Domestic political chaos is not the only thing happening in Iraq
Manara Magazine published my (somewhat more optimistic than the usual) piece on Iraq yesterday. This was my first exposure to Manara, published by the Cambridge Middle East and North Africa Forum–check it out!
It appears that calm has returned to Iraq after the reported intervention of Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the country’s chief and widely respected Shia cleric. In recent weeks, violence had occurred in and near parliament, which has been unable to implement last October’s election results. The clashes involved demonstrators and armed forces loyal to Moqtada al-Sadr, the leading candidate in the elections, and militias loyal to a loose array of rival Shia political parties calling themselves the Coordination Framework.
Al-Sadr withdrew his members from parliament in June and has announced his own retirement from politics (not for the first time). He wants new elections, which he thinks he will win. The Coordination Framework, whose leadership includes al-Sadr’s archrival, former Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, has occupied more than half of Sadr’s seats based on the election results and has proposed a new prime minister. Maliki doesn’t want new elections.
Violence is a staple of Iraqi politics, but it is often intra-sectarian rather than inter-sectarian violence. Shia, Kurds, and Sunnis have all suffered bouts of intra-sectarian political rivalry settled in part through force of arms. The main stakes are power and money. There is often little religious or ideological difference, though al-Sadr claims a more Iraqi nationalist stance while al-Maliki and a number of his Coordination Framework allies are viewed as more pro-Iranian. The Americans are a distant factor, important for the training of the most professional Iraqi security forces but no longer as strongly engaged in Iraqi politics as once they were. Anxious to avoid state collapse in Iraq, they are now reduced to calling for dialogue. Neither al-Sadr, whose forces resisted the Americans for years, nor al-Maliki, who had crucial American support for his second term as prime minister, has much good to say about the Americans.
How this latest deadly violence will play out is not yet clear. New elections are unlikely in the near term, if only because last October’s elections were held early in response to widespread demonstrations and solved nothing. In the past, the winning formula has been a broad coalition, leaving few if any politicians to oppose it. But that is precisely what al-Sadr does not want. He tried but failed to form a “majoritarian” government with Sunni and Kurdish parties, which would have left the Coordination Framework in opposition. The situation could still worsen, with new violence erupting among the competing political factions.
Meanwhile, Iraq muddles on. In June, oil production reached more than 4.5 million barrels per day[i]—near 2016’s record high of 4.83 million barrels per day. At about $90 per barrel, this level of production more than meets the government’s financial obligations and provides ample opportunity not only for investment but also for patronage and corruption. The Federal Supreme Court has decided that Baghdad, not Erbil, should control oil and gas production in Iraqi Kurdistan, causing the exit of international companies that had been active there.[ii] The country’s credit ratings are low but stable. ISIS is mainly defeated and holds no territory, but thousands of its fighters are still at large and hundreds of their families are still returning from Syria. More than one million people displaced by the war against ISIS and earlier conflicts still need support as well as resettlement or reintegration. Government services, which include water, electricity, and healthcare, are notoriously inadequate and inefficient.
Internationally, Iraq has been playing an important role in mediating between Saudi Arabia and Iran, which broke diplomatic ties in 2016. Baghdad has hosted five rounds of talks between Saudi and Iranian intelligence and security officials in the past year and a half.[iii] A meeting of the Saudi and Iranian foreign ministers has been announced, but the meeting itself has been delayed, apparently due to Iraq’s political turmoil. Since it won’t do to have rioting during a key diplomatic event, both the Saudis and the Iranians may want to wait for the formation of a new Iraqi government or meet elsewhere.
Iraq faces other problems with its neighbors. Turkey has thousands of troops inside Iraq and bombards Kurdish forces that it considers terrorists in Iraqi Kurdistan. Fighting inside Syria continues to incentivize the smuggling of arms, drugs, fighters, and civilians to and from Iraq. While Iraq controls the vast majority of its own territory, its borders are still porous and its capacity to control them is limited. That is true also for Iraq’s long borders with Iran and Saudi Arabia.
Taking the long view, Iraq is still far better off than it has been for much of the past twenty years. People can go about their daily lives with far fewer impediments than in the days of blast walls around neighborhoods and checkpoints every few hundred meters. Many Iraqis have been sweltering this summer, but electricity supplies have held up better than usual. Multiple political parties compete for votes, even if the media environment is not really free because of political party domination and intimidation. Iraq is back as a player in the region, albeit still a relatively weak one.
While they are unusual in Middle Eastern autocracies, political fights over government formation are the rule in parliamentary systems, not the exception. Iraqis are contending with the difficulty of finding sustainable compromises and the propensity to use organized political violence to achieve desired ends. The divisibility of the financial spoils should make compromise possible, but profound fractiousness and intense rivalry render it difficult.
[i] “Iraq’s oil production will hit 4.580 million bpd as of July, ministry spokesperson says,” Reuters, June 3, 2022. https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/iraqs-oil-production-will-hit-4580-mln-bpd-july-ministry-spokesperson-2022-06-03/.
[ii] Edwards, Rowena, and Moataz Mohamed, “U.S. oilfield services trio to exit Kurdistan region, Iraqi ministry says,” Reuters, July 4, 2022. https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/schlumberger-baker-hughes-halliburton-will-not-apply-new-kurdistan-projects-2022-07-04/.
[iii] Motamedi, Maziar, “Iran, Saudi Arabia hold fifth round of talks in Baghdad,” Al Jazeera, April 23, 2022. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/4/23/iran-and-saudi-arabia-hold-stalled-5th-round-of-talks-in-baghdad.
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Stevenson’s army, September 14
– Reuters says Putin rejected a pre-invasion deal to keep Ukraine out of NATO.
-US says Russia gave at least $300million to foreign political parties.
– Feaver & Fluornoy stress civil-military norms.
– UVa prof questions value of CFIUS investigations.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Stevenson’s army, September 13
Busy week, sorry about the delays.
– NYT has background on the Ukraine offensive.
– Pro war Russians are angry, as reported by WaPo, and Daily Beast, and FP.
– WSJ says Ukraine wants more weapons.
– Some conservative groups oppose more aid.
– RAND analysts urge US restraint.
– NYT suggests Members do insider trading.
– Staffers comment on working for old members.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I republish here. To get Stevenson’s army by email, send a blank email (no subject or text in the body) to stevensons-army+subscribe@googlegroups.com. You’ll get an email confirming your join request. Click “Join This Group” and follow the instructions to join. Once you have joined, you can adjust your email delivery preferences (if you want every email or a digest of the emails).
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Embellishing reality isn’t helpful
Genc Pollo, former minister and member of parliament in Albania, reacts to this “debrief” with US Ambassador to Belgrade Chris Hill:
“War is too important to be left to the generals” is a bon mot attributed to Georges Clemenceau. As French Prime Minister, he oversaw the victory of his country and the Entente Alliance in the First World War.
I would hesitate a lot to apply his wisdom to diplomats dealing with the Balkans, especially with former Yugoslavia problems. Diplomats here means primarily European and US officials trying to find solutions to challenges ranging from bloody conflicts to dangerous political impasses.
We ought to be thankful for their well-meaning efforts and should celebrate the ones with successful outcomes.
Still listening to this interview of Christopher Hill, the US Ambassador to Serbia, with the Atlantic Council I was a bit perplexed. Disclosure: he’s a good friend of mine from the early 90s when he was a cooperative a helpful Deputy Head of Mission in Tirana. Chris Hill is connoisseur of the region with a lot of experience in difficult situations. He is right in most of what he says. But some of his assertions could be problematic. Let us take these issues one by one.
Issue 1: “There is a criticism that you sometimes hear in the Balkans that somehow this is some effort by Serbia which is so big to dominate the others. That’s the kind of criticism you might have heard in the European Union decades ago about Germany….I’m not sure it’s that valid a criticism.”
Germany is big for sure, but in the initial EEC of six and the actual EU of 27 member states, she finds herself in a balanced structure in terms of political power, economic weight, and population. Berlin carries much weight but can’t and doesn’t rule single-handedly. Look at the European Central Bank.
Besides post-war Germany is a friendly democracy.
By contrast, within the Open Balkans trio (Serbia, Albania, and North Macedonia) Serbia would rule unchallenged.
Issue 2: “[Open Balkans] does support EU standards, in terms of the rule of law, in terms of regulations.”
It remains a mystery to many why supporters of Open Balkans are silent about the Common Regional Market of the Berlin Process. Or trash it along with defunct initiatives. The Berlin Process has all the pretended virtues of Open Balkans and none of its serious downsides. Simple question: would you trust the observance of EU standards in a Western Balkans initiative where the EU is institutionally involved rather than in a local get-together hosted by two corrupt autocrats? Lobbyists might paint a Potemkin village, but Serbia and Albania are well advanced in their latest trajectory towards one-person rule.
Issue 3: “I would say that the Serbian relationship with Albania is as good as it’s probably ever been in history.”
The relationship between Albania and Serbia has generally been always excellent or normal, Including during the rule of Enver Hoxha and Josip Broz Tito. It went awry when things in Kosovo turned terrible. The current rapprochement between Prime Minister Rama and President Vučić is solves a problem that doesn’t exist. It hasn’t contributed in any meaningful way to “normalization” between Kosovo and Serbia, let alone mutual recognition, which is the crux of the matter!
Issue 4: “But I think, if you look at the broad sweep of this issue and the broad arc of where Serbia is going, it’s heading West. You point out the opinion surveys that suggest that Serbia that many Serbs have sympathies that lie further east. …if you look at where Serbian young people are going for their education for jobs, for their training and what type of model they see themselves focusing on, it’s very much toward the West.”
Past are the days when people in the West should believe globalization and economic engagement wwill tame China and Russia, nudging them towards becoming responsible actors in the rules-based world order. We’ve seen Chinese and Russians, including the nomenclatura’s offspring, enjoying life or studying in the West only to return home to embrace autocracy and imperial revisionism.
This to some reasonable extent applies to Serbia. Because the nature of the Serbian regime has not changed much, and its propaganda has worsened.
If the model of post-Milosević Serbia applied to post-war Germany, it would mean having Joseph Goebbels as West Germany’s chancellor in the 60s. He would have refused to adopt Western policies toward the Soviets.
This is reality, and embellishing it isn’t helpful.
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