Category: Daniel Serwer
Stevenson’s army, January 5
– Cook Political Report says redistricting is a wash.
– Defense appropriations heading to higher figure.
– Austin & Blinken together testify on Afghanistan before SFRC next week, in closed session.
– DefenseOne criticizes US hypersonic missile program.
– Vox sees flaws in legal opinion on SEAL refusal to vaccinate.
Charlie also published this yesterday:
I’m always looking for good cases to illustrate the policy process. For diplomatic and military policies, the supply is vast. For foreign economic policy, however, I haven’t found many. Until this week, when I finally had a chance to read Edward S. Miller’s 2007 book for the Naval Institute Press, Bankrupting the Enemy: The U.S. Financial Siege of Japan before Pearl Harbor.
Miller also has a revealing summary of U.S. economic sanctions policies starting with World War I, showing how reluctant U.S. officials were to use sanctions for foreign policy purposes. The key law empowering the president for almost any economic sanctions, the International Emergency Economic Powers Act [IEEPA] of 1977, is actually based on a section of the 1917 Trading with the Enemy Act. That law resulted from a bureaucratic fight between the Commerce Department, which historically ran export controls, and Treasury, which claimed jurisdiction over financial transactions laws. Treasury won that fight, not least because the assertive secretary was also President Wilson’s son in law.
A similar bureaucratic struggle occurred in 1940-41 over Japan.Secretary of State Cordell Hull, the key interlocutor with the Japanese, resisted harsh sanctions because he considered them too provocative. Treasury Secretary Henry Morgenthau, however, favored pressure but had only an advisory role on sanctions. In key meetings with FDR in July, 1941, the president decided on freezing Japanese assets in the United States and restricting exports of various commodities but not a full embargo. Roosevelt and his cabinet officers even expected to sell oil to Japan, but only after some delay and on a case-by-case basis.
At the sub-cabinet level, however, Dean Acheson dominated the interagency committee that wrote the rules implementing FDR’s executive order and did so to prevent any oil shipments to Japan, a red line that many historians argue made war inevitable. Hull was upset to learn of the impact of the rules when he returned from medical leave, but was reluctant to force a change that might be viewed as favorable to the Japanese. FDR himself was preoccupied with his meeting with Churchill in August and the growing naval conflict with Germany and did not force a change back to his original policy.
Miller cites a 1976 paper by a researcher at the National Archives which has even more details of the hawkish cabal in the bureaucracy on the broad range of export restrictions on Japan, including redefining “aviation gas” so as to prevent any oil exports.
The key lesson for me is the power of the sub-cabinet bureaucracy to shape policy by implementation rules, regardless of presidential-level decisions. It happens all the time. The formal policy was to deter Japan from greater conquest by limited but significant export restrictions, not a full embargo. The actual policy Japan faced was an existential threat.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I plan to 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).
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Stevenson’s army, January 4
In the good old 20th century, when a heavy snowstorm hit, the federal government announced a “liberal leave” policy. Now they call it “unscheduled leave.” As I interpreted the old language, only liberals could stay home. Everybody else had to work.
Nearly 94 years ago, most nations agreed to the Kellogg-Briand pact, outlawing war as an instrument of national policy. Notwithstanding the [in]effectiveness of that agreement, five major nuclear powers this week declared that nuclear wars can never be won and should not be fought. Good luck.
The newly empowered National Cyber Director is hiring 75 staff.
WSJ reports Russia & China are cooperating militarily.
Defense contractors are bankrolling lawmakers who opposed certifying Biden’s victory.
So, yes, it’s time for another piece surveying research on collapsing democracies.
My SAIS colleague Charlie Stevenson distributes this almost daily news digest of foreign/defense/national security policy to “Stevenson’s army” via Googlegroups. I plan to 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).
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Focus on what matters
In addition to the previous, I did this interview with Besnik Velija of Kosovo’s Gazeta Express on New Year’s eve (it was published in Albanian this morning):
Q: I am writing about the US involvement in Western Balkans developments. Mr. Jeffrey Hovenier now is officially the new US Ambassador at Kosovo, Mr. Christopher Hill at Serbia. We have also Mr. Escobar as Special Representative for the Western Balkans.
With the completion of this mosaic of important people in the Western Balkans, do you expect an offensive by Joe Biden in 2022?
A: I expect this new crew to want to accomplish something in the Western Balkans, starting in 2022. Their focus initially will likely be on preventing disaster in Bosnia and Herzegovina, but they will also want to achieve something with Kosovo and Serbia.
Q: Do you expect concrete developments in the Kosovo-Serbia dialogue?
A: Yes. I certainly hope to see progress on missing people and on financial issues. I would also like to see adoption in the Western Balkans, including by Pristina and Belgrade, of principles that govern correct behavior towards neighbors, along with implementation plans.
Q: Do you find the EU negotiation model profitable, and do you think that the US should take over the entire Kosovo-Serbia dialogue process, in order to end the protracted negotiations?
A: I think the EU process is still the best forum available, but it requires more support and commitment from the US, including monitoring implementation of agreements reached. I doubt the US will take it over, as the destiny of the Western Balkans is in Europe.
Q: What do you think about a meeting at the White House, led by Biden, that would not end without the parties reaching a final agreement?
A: Such spectaculars happen only when carefully prepared. I see no prospect that either Belgrade or Pristina will be ready for it before the Serbian presidential election next year, and perhaps not after that either.
Q: If a final agreement is not reached with these people and with Joe Biden at the helm of the US, what do you foresee for the Western Balkans and specifically for Kosovo and Serbia?
A: Whether a “final” agreement is reached or not, what I hope is the Western Balkans will focus on what matters: preparation for EU accession and, for those who want it, NATO membership. The benefits of both come mainly from those preparations. Once qualified, potential EU member states will need to wait for the political window to open, likely not much before the end of this decade. The road is long. Slow but steady will win this race.
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Long live the dialogue, even if it is stalled!
Two interviews I gave last month were published in Kosovo, in Serbian and Albanian respectively, over the weekend.
Veljko Nestorovic of Kosovo Online did this one:
Q: Was 2021 an unsuccessful year when it comes to the dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina?
A: Yes the dialogue is stalled and will continue to be stalled at least until after the Serbian elections in 2022.
Q: With the appointment of the UK Special Envoy, as well as two US Envoys for the Western Balkans, will the US and the UK take the lead in dialogue?
A: The US continues to want the EU to lead, but I think both the UK and US will be more prepared to work in tandem with the EU than was at times true in the past.
Q: How do you view US sanctions. Are you expecting new names on the US list?
A: Yes, I imagine there will be more people named.
Q: Prime Minister Kurti has repeatedly stated that the issue of the missing must be resolved. At the moment, about 1,600 people are listed as missing, but in addition to Belgrade, given that one-third of the missing are non-Albanians, most Serbs, does Pristina have a responsibility in the search for those missing?
A: Yes of course. Pristina should be accounting for any missing on which it has information. That should include any victims of the KLA or of other Albanian armed groups.
Q: Is there a possibility for an agreement and a new meeting between Kurti and Vučić during 2022?
A: There is always a possibility, but I doubt it before the Serbian elections.
Q: Do you expect visa liberalization for Kosovo in 2022?
A: I’d be foolish to expect it, but I do hope it will happen in 2022. The French and Dutch need to tell Pristina why they have hesitated and give Pristina an opportunity to satisfy them.
Q: Do you expect a greater role of the USA in the Western Balkans during 2022 when it comes to dialogue, but also BiH [Bosnia]?
A: The US is already more focused on BiH than it has been in the past and will likely continue its diplomatic efforts there in 2022. But let me be clear: the right direction for the US should be more respect for individual rights in BiH. Nothing the US does should strengthen the stranglehold of ethnic nationalist political parties on power. They are the problem, not the solution. A more civic state would be a more functional state in BiH.
Besnik Gashi of Lajmi.net did this one:
Q: The first issue that I would like to discuss is the steps that Kosovo has taken in recent years in the framework of the dialogue with Serbia. I would like to ask what do you consider to be the most progressive and regressive agreements since the beginning of the technical dialogue between the two countries, where they were mediated by Brussels?
A: I’m not going to answer your question, for a good reason. There is no definitive evaluation of the agreements and their impact, despite the laudable efforts of civil society organizations in both Kosovo and Serbia.
This is not good. I believe the US and EU should regularly issue progress reports on implementation, obstacles to implementation, and impact. These should be based on close cooperation with civil society and government organizations in both countries.
Speaking more broadly, I think the dialogue has had a positive impact on Kosovo’s international standing by putting it on an equal and symmetrical basis with Serbia in the EU context, even though it has had a negative impact by allowing Serbia to encourage countries to delay recognition while the dialogue proceeds.
Q: Since we are talking about Brussels, it should be noted the achievement of the Agreement on the formation of the Association of Municipalities by Kosovo is facing full opposition from the Prime Minister of Kosovo, Albin Kurti. According to him, the agreement has been achieved by previous governments and is endangering the “Bosnianization” of Kosovo, in the sense of building a new Republika Srpska.
What is your opinion about the Association and the opposition that is being made to it by the Prime Minister?
A: The Prime Minister is doing something I think is a good negotiating tactic: holding back on Serbia’s top priority because Serbia is holding back on Kosovo’s top priorities, namely recognition and UN membership. The Association issue would look very different if Serbia were prepared to recognize Kosovo and tell Moscow and Beijing to allow Pristina into the UN.
Q: On the other hand, the US has issued a sort of ultimatum to Kosovo to reach a comprehensive agreement with Serbia during the term of the current Kosovo government, which culminates in mutual recognition of the two countries. What do you think, can the mentioned agreement be finalized within 3 or 4 years?
A: It can be finalized in 3 or 4 months once there is the political will on both sides to make the necessary compromises. But there is no sign at all of that from Serbia, and little of it from Kosovo.
Q: There has also been rumours of active US involvement in the dialogue, or even direct, in order to speed up a final agreement. Do you think such a thing should happen?
A: It can happen, but if it triggers Russian involvement it would not be a good thing.
Q: The US, namely the U.S Department of the Treasury, has recently targeted smuggling and criminal groups in Kosovo, some of them politicians. Do you think that there is a example of similar actions that the US has implemented in other countries and will follow them in the case of Kosovo, as well as whether the politicians of the countries in the region can be spared?
A: My understanding is that the US sanctions for corruption are and will continue to be global, not just the Balkans. No one guilty should be spared.
Q: In an interview last year, you told that Grenell is not a friend of Kosovars. Does this opinion still stand, given that Grenell during this year, following the diplomacy in the shadow of Kosovo, came to visit and said that he would take care of the Kosovo-Serbia dialogue and the implementation of the Washington Agreement?
A: Grenell should be avoided by anyone in either Serbia or Kosovo who wishes the dialogue well. He is a grifter, not a diplomat. The Washington Agreement isn’t worth much more than the two separate pieces of paper it was typed on.
Q: We are nearly in the end of this year and next year is expected to be more promising for Kosovars when it comes to visa liberalization. Hope has been raised with the arrival of a new chancellery in Germany, which in their political program for the Western Balkans also envisage visa liberalization for Kosovo. Do you think that Germany will be active enough to convince the skeptical countries of the EU Council?
A: I certainly hope so. Kosovo merits the visa waiver. Germany is the de facto leader of the EU in the Balkans. Berlin needs to make its weight felt.
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Want to make an impression? Send the airborne
Last month’s threat by Serb political boss Milorad Dodik is fading into the holiday mist. No one who watches Bosnian poitics should relax. He has made it clear his goal is de facto secession of Republika Srpska. This regional entity’s authority extends to 49% of Bosnia and Herzegovina’s territory.
Dodik is moving small step by small step. Each time he slices the salami to get closer to what he wants. Last month the RS National Assembly convened to begin planning for withdrawal starting in six months from Bosnia’s security, justice, and taxation institutions. These were all established in the aftermath of the 1992-95 war that ended in the Dayton peace agreements. American efforts “to walk Bosnia back from the cliff” at least made Dodik stop at the edge.
The plan is to eviscerate the minimal Bosnian state
He is unlikely to step much farther back or to declare independence. Dodik’s plan is to eviscerate the Bosnian state, minimal though it is. He wants the RS to withdraw from Sarajevo’s vital institutions under a veil of legislative approval. He would then be all-powerful and unaccountable in his own fief. Failing that, he wants his threat of secession to prevent any further strengthening of Sarajevo governance.
Russia will support Dodik’s moves and try to protect him. Moscow is already denying the authority of the High Representative in Bosnia, who is responsible for civilian implementation of the Dayton agreements. Serbian President Vucic will be more circumspect, as he fears EU and US disapproval. But his minions, including Interior Minister Vulin, cheer more openly. The RS is an important component of what they call the “Serbian world.” That would be a Greater Serbian state incorporating neighboring Serb populations.
The ethnic authoritarian paladin
Dodik is the embodiment of the ethnic authoritarian ideal. He started political life as a relative moderate in the Bosnian context. But he has become a denier of crimes (including genocide) the RS committed during the 1990s war. He is now a champion of Serb exceptionalism, a subservient puppet of Moscow, and a deeply corrupted pocketer of ill-gotten gains. The Dayton agreements divide the Bosnian pie along ethnic lines. That reduces political competition and incentivizes predatory behavior. Most people in Washington and Brussels understand that Dodik is irredeemable. So their diplomats work hard instead to get Serbian President Vucic to restrain him, offering mostly carrots and few sticks.
That is no longer working as well as once it did. Like his genocidaire predecesssor Radovan Karadzic, Dodik regards himself as a political competitor to Vucic in Belgrade, not just a provincial party chief in Banja Luka. The time is coming for a showdown between these Serb paladins.
Vucic is unquestionably more powerful, but Dodik is more useful to the Russians. They would regard de facto RS secession as a useful precedent and bargaining chip for breakaway provinces in Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia. Moscow would also enjoy derailing a Western triumph of the 1990s unipolar moment: the negotiated end of the Bosnian war.
What is to be done?
Dodik is making it impossible for the US and EU to continue ignoring his moves towards de facto independence. The question is: what can they do about it? Next time he slices the salami, how should they react?
First, the EU and US need to nullify any decisions in the RS Assembly that contradict the Dayton accords and subsequent decisions of the High Representative. This the HiRep can do with the stroke of a pen. But then what? How do his decisions get enforced?
Once upon a time, the HiRep would not have hesitated to remove Dodik from office. But is that any longer feasible? Another possibility is his arrest for insurrection against the Bosnian state, of which he is blatantly guilty. But Bosnia’s prosecutors seem unwilling and likely incapable of doing that.
The US and EU will need to act
If nothing can be done inside Bosnia, then the burden falls to Washington, Brussels, and European capitals (if the EU fails to act jointly). They will need to levy punishing sanctions on Dodik personally, all members of the RS Assembly who vote for withdrawal from Bosnian institutions, and the RS institutionally, including an end to all World Bank and IMF as well as bilateral assistance and access to international financial markets. If the RS has de facto seceded from Bosnia, it shoud not benefit from grants or loans available to its sovereign. It would be rank hypocrisy to allow any international financiing or official development assistance to reach the RS.
There are other possible moves. Brussels and Washington could shut down RS representational offices. The international military presence, EUFOR, could move troops to the vital northeast town of Brcko while the UK and US deploy NATO troops there, to prevent any effort by either Sarajevo or Banja Luka to seize it. Want to make an impression? The British and Americans could arrive in the hundreds by parachute outside Banja Luka, in a NATO training exercise.
Dodik and any other politicians supporting de facto secession could be barred from Sarajevo and any requirements for Serb approval of Bosnian government actions there could be abrogated. Any funding for the RS from Sarajevo could stop. Bosnia could revert to its pre-war constitution, or devise a new one that erases the RS as well as the Federation and its cantons, relying on municipalities for local governance.
Dodik should not be ignored
This is an illustrative, not an exhaustive, list of options, not recommendations. The main point is that Brussels and Washington should no longer downplay or ignore Dodik’s moves. If they do, patriotic Bosnians, who were the main victims of the 1992-95 war, will take matters into their own hands, seizing Brcko before Dodik does.
That too, would mark a failure of Dayton, but one that would preserve the country’s sovereignty and territorial integrity as well as its multi-ethnicity. For anyone thinking democracy is a preferable system of government, it would be better than secession by genocide-denying political and ideological successors to Radovan Karadzic, bent on ethnic authoritarian rule with Moscow’s support and on creation of Milosevic’s Greater Serbia.
Share this, I'll really appreciate it:
Stevenson’s army, January 2
– The Great Resignation has hit Hill staffers because of the January 6 attacks.
– 1/3 of Americans [including 40% of Republicans] tell pollsters violence against the government is sometimes justified. The figure was 18% in 2010.
– WSJ says China fell short of trade commitments to US.
– FP lists conflicts to watch in 2022.
Charlie also wrote this yesterday:
I followed the career of Peter Navarro in recent years with great interest. He was an outspoken China hawk who advised the Trump campaign and then was an early appointee to work in the White House. Candidate Trump had promised to create a National Trade Council to take on China and otherwise promote an America First economic policy, but he never did. As a student of the presidency, I was not surprised that other officials blocked that action in order to preserve the established system that tilted toward mainstream policies. Instead, Navarro was named head of an Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy that had no clear authority, not even an executive order creating it, but gave Navarro a handful of aides.
Despite his weak bureaucratic position, Navarro was a hustler and he knew the president agreed with him on trade. So he wrote memos and showed up at meetings and got into fights with the more powerful figures like the secretary of the treasury and the head of the national economic council. He also maneuvered to see the president without an appointment and to ride on Air Force One, sitting in the conference room.
Navarro produced major documents criticizing China’s trade policy and pushed for even tougher measures. But he repeatedly lost fights with the treasury secretary and the trade adviser, who ultimately persuaded President Trump against extreme measures.
Navarro also did valuable public service pushing the administration to recognize the danger of the coronavirus when most senior officials, including the president, were downplaying the threat. And with no clear lines of authority within the White House, Navarro wound up as the action officer for government officials and company leaders searching for protective gear and medical supplies. As he reports in his new memoir, In Trump Time, he succeeded time and time again with quick results, though he complains of many times he was thwarted by existing laws and administrative requirements.
There’s a valuable case study in that memoir, though it’s told in a rambling, incomplete way. Navarro tells how, in the summer of 2020, he dreamed up the idea of a special commission to investigate the causes of the pandemic and to report before election day of the human and economic costs. He believes that the virus originated in a Chinese lab and wanted to call the group the CCP Virus Commission. He wrote a draft executive order, but then ran into resistance from several senior officials. He still can’t believe that the president wouldn’t agree to his brilliant election ploy.
Navarro is using his book to settle scores — against all of Trump’s national security advisers except Robert O’Brien; against Treasury Secretary Mnuchin; against Jared Kushner; against Anthony Fauci; and even against Mike Pompeo and Vice President Pence. He disparages them all in intemperate language and then describes how he thinks the Democrats stole the 2020 election and what he did to help Trump prevent a Biden inauguration.
Navarro could have told a story of a lonely fighter for policy change. He has some victories to brag about after all. But his anger and his Trump loyalty outweigh that story.
RSS - Posts
