Putin’s Petard
I participated last night in SAIS’s Central Asia-Caucasus Forum, which convened a panel on “Putin’s Kosovo Card: its Meaning to Eastern Europe, Caucasus, and Central Asia” that included Kurt Volker and Mamuka Tsereteli with the skillful moderation of Fred Starr. These are my speaking notes:
• Vladimir Putin has persistently and insistently claimed that what the US did in Kosovo sets a precedent for what Russia has done in Ukraine.
• He has conveniently forgotten that Russia argued in 1999 that only the UN Security Council could authorize bombing of Yugoslavia, so if Kosovo is a precedent it is one Russia should not be following in Ukraine without UN approval.
• Putin has also conveniently forgotten that Russia played a critical role in urging Slobodan Milosevic to yield control of Kosovo to NATO.
• I have no doubt that in his mind what he is doing in Ukraine is in part retaliation for what the US did in Kosovo, over Russian objections. But that is quite different from claiming Kosovo constitutes a precedent.
• The claim it is a precedent is based on a bizarre and false analogy with no serious validity. Let me count the things that are wrong with it:
1. NATO intervened against Serbia to protect Kosovo Albanians from a concerted campaign of ethnic cleansing, war crimes, and crimes against humanity by the Serbian government. There have been human rights violations, but no comparable campaign of mass atrocity and expulsion by the Ukrainian government against Russian-speaking Ukrainians either in Crimea or in Donbas.
2. Russia intervened overtly in Crimea, taking territory by military force and annexing it. The US never sought to annex Kosovo’s territory, or to attach it to any other country, something its internationally imposed constitution now prohibits.
3. The UNSC voted an end to the Kosovo war in June 1999 with resolution 1244, which confirmed the outcome and made the issue of its legality moot. There is no such resolution for Crimea or eastern Ukraine. I hope there will never be one unless Russia agrees to withdraw and yield sovereignty back to Ukraine.
4. The UN established a protectorate in Kosovo and governed it until 2008, ensuring that it transitioned to democracy and implemented all the requirements of the UN-sponsored Ahtisaari plan, including in particular protection for the Serb population in Kosovo. Russia has blocked any international engagement in Crimea to protect non-Russians. There is no sign that Crimea or any Russian-controlled part of Ukraine is headed for democracy, and ethnic cleansing of both Ukrainians and Tatars is ongoing.
5. Kosovo is now recognized de jure as sovereign by more than 100 other states and accepted de facto by many more. The Russian annexation of Crimea and the supposed independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia have obtained few international acknowledgements.
6. Russia has also intervened covertly in eastern Ukraine, constantly denying its official presence and prevaricating about its military aid to the Russia-sponsored insurgents. It is currently launching an offensive against Mariupol, which has a large Russian-speaking population (44.4% in 2002, 48.7% Ukrainian). There was no such covert intervention in Kosovo, where the NATO air campaign, its preparations for a ground offensive and even its support for the Kosovo Liberation Army were well-known at the time.
• If there is a Kosovo precedent for what Russia is doing in Ukraine, it is not NATO’s protection of the Albanians but rather Russia’s own attempt to grab the Pristina airport by force in June 1999 as prelude to the arrival of Russian forces by air and occupation of northern Kosovo.
• An even more significant precedent is Slobodan Milosevic in the early 1990s, who claimed to be protecting his co-national Serbs from mistreatment while expelling Croats and Bosniaks from territory the Yugoslav National Army seized in Croatia and Bosnia.
• The pattern is a familiar one: exaggerated reports of mistreatment, organization of militias to protect against largely fictional mistreatment, provocation by those militias against legitimate state forces, then intervention to protect co-nationals from any efforts to restore law and order.
• Russia has repeatedly engaged in this pattern of creating problems in order to control territory with Russian-speaking majorities in the former Soviet space: Transnistria, South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Transnistria, it should be noted, pre-dates Kosovo.
• Moscow has gotten away with it before, so it will try again. Maybe in Kazakhstan. And it will encourage copy-cat efforts in Bosnia’s Republika Srpska and Nagorno-Karabakh, trying to ensure that the sovereign states in which those entities are located cannot exert effective control.
• This is a strategy of destabilization and control by military and paramilitary means.
• One more thing: if Putin seriously thought Kosovo was a precedent for Ukraine that he is justified in following, Moscow would accept the results of the NATO intervention and recognize Pristina. Fat chance of that.
• So as the Russian army attacks Mariupol, let’s call it what it is: naked aggression on neighboring state with the aim of grabbing territory populated in part by Russian speakers.
The discussion revolved in part around criteria for statehood and sovereignty as well as partition questions. Putin’s card is a petard, which is a small explosive device with a tendency to explode in ways that “hoist” the owner. The Russian Federation may well eventually face internal problems inspired in part by Putin’s own behavior in Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova, not to mention Syria.
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Can the Libyans find peace in Geneva?
After the first round of talks earlier this month left observers cautiously optimistic, key Libyan stakeholders were back in Geneva today to continue to negotiate a peaceful resolution to the bloody conflict in the country.
The main objective of the Geneva talks is creation of a national unity government, as well as solidification of the ceasefire declared by a number of armed groups following the first session on January 14-15. A boycott of the negotiations by the Tripoli-based General National Congress (GNC) and sporadic outbreak of violence in Eastern and Southern parts of the country has perturbed the meager successes of the first round of negotiations, but the majority of delegates are now back at the talks.
The UN-sponsored mediation track still faces a number of difficulties. The most serious is the failure to bring all the relevant actors to the table. The GNC boycott means that only one of the two main political parties to the conflict, the Tobruk-based government, is fully represented. Tripoli is indirectly represented through a number of boycotting members of the Tobruk-based House of Representatives and other civil society members (including Nihad Maiteeq , the sister of former prime minister Ahmad Maiteeq). There have also been consultations between UN envoy Bernardino Leon and the GNC leadership. Nonetheless, the lack of formal participation by the GNC arguably harms the legitimacy of any agreement in Geneva – particularly any agreement about a national unity government.
A related problem is the perceived preference by the international community for the Tobruk-based government. The basis for this preference is an election in which fewer than 20% of Libyans participated, the results of which were voided by the Libyan Supreme Court. That government’s close relationship with general Khalifa Haftar, whose military campaign against the entire spectrum of Libyan Islamists has greatly contributed to the polarization of Libyan politics, makes this one-sided recognition difficult to defend.
Jason Pack, a Cambridge University researcher and analyst of Libyan political affairs, points to the problems of this one-sided approach in a recent New York Times Op-Ed:
Western governments are reluctant to acknowledge the implications of the Supreme Court ruling because many of them are secretly cheering for the Tobruk faction to either reconquer the country or dominate a national unity government. After all, the Tobruk government claims to be fighting Ansar al-Sharia in Benghazi — the very same group that killed the American ambassador, Christopher Stevens, in 2012. Perversely, the West’s ability to act as a neutral party and promote compromise is hindered by the fact that it has already recognized Tobruk as Libya’s sole sovereign.
Western backing of the Tobruk regime also seems to rest on a simplistic narrative of the Libyan conflict as a clash between republican secularists and radical Islamists. This binary perspective fails to identify the multiple forces that operate and gain from the conflict and, as one analyst has pointed out, empowers the hardliners on either side that have most to lose from a negotiated settlement.
Even more problematic than Western one-sidedness, however, is the strong support afforded to the local adversaries by regional allies. The Egyptians and Emiratis support Khalifa Haftar’s anti-Islamist campaign. Qatar and Turkey support the Islamists in Tripoli. This has aggravated the conflict, fueling a destructive polarization of Libyan politics. Instead of bringing the parties to the table, the foreign support has emboldened these forces, while simultaneously eroding the legitimacy of both parties in the eyes of ordinary Libyans. Further military support is likely to aggravate the situation further. The dangers of a longer term proxy war in Libya should not be taken lightly.
In spite of the monumental difficulties that the UN mediation efforts are facing, some indicators point in the right direction. Bernardino Leon and his team at the UN Support Mission to Libya (UNSMIL) seem to have made up for the GNC’s non-participation with the engagement of a wide spectrum of political actors and civil society representatives. Following the current round, representatives of Libyan municipal councils will meet on Wednesday to discuss confidence building measures at the community level. Although no date has been provided, it is hoped that this will be followed by discussions between key militia leaders. This multi-track approach may help the UN instigate results that can be implemented on the ground.
The political and economic situation should provide a sense of urgency that may help ripen the conflict for a negotiated settlement. The bloody fighting that characterized much of the second half of 2014 has now turned into a stalemate, with no one side appearing to have a decisive advantage. Tripoli and Tobruk are rapidly running out of money. In both cities the politicians know that Libyan state revenue is the glue that holds their militias together. Once these revenues disappear, many militias might find it more advantageous to pursue their own agendas, further fragmenting the Libyan political landscape.
The great challenges of the current Libyan conflict cannot be resolved in a few days in Geneva. But progress in the talks could stop the situation from deteriorating.
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Syrian opposition getting their act together
The Syrian Coalition of Revolutionary and Opposition Forces informs me that members of various factions of the Syrian opposition met in Cairo over the past few days and agreed yesterday on the attached Cairo Declaration. They also agreed to hold a national conference for all Syrian opposition factions in the coming months.
Attendees and signers included members of a broad spectrum of opposition groups, as well as national figures from various segments of Syrian society, including: Aref Dalilah, Hussein Awdat, Haitham Manaa, Ahmad Jarba, Nibras Fadel, Jamal Suleiman, Riad Naasan Agha, Saleh Muslem, Jihad Makdesi, and Samir Seifan.
I am told the signatories include a significant slice of opposition from inside Syria as well as a higher proportion of Alawites and Christians than in the Syrian Coalition itself. The Muslim Brotherhood was not present (after all, the meeting was in Cairo) but the door remains open to its participation in the spring conference.
This looks to me like the latest in a long series of efforts to unify the opposition. This time the platform is nationalist, non-sectarian, civil, and democratic, including explicit reference to gender equality. It pays due deference to decentralization but also foresees a unified Syria and withdrawal of all foreign forces. I think it doesn’t explicitly address the upcoming intra-Syrian dialogue Moscow is sponsoring, but it is possible some of the signatories may be planning to attend that meeting starting Sunday.
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Peace picks January 26-30
- Expanding Counterterrorism Partnerships: US Efforts to Tackle the Evolving Terrorist Threat | Monday January 26 | 12:00-14:00 | REGISTER TO ATTEND | Washington Institute for Near East Policy | The attacks in Paris were a stark illustration of the serious terrorist threat confronting the United States and its allies, not only in the Middle East, South Asia, and North Africa, but far closer to home as well. In his May 2014 West Point address, President Obama emphasized that a successful long-term counterterrorism approach will revolve around strong partnerships with key actors overseas. What steps is the United States taking to bolster its counterterrorism partnerships with other governments and with nongovernmental actors? How should the U.S. strategy evolve in light of the Paris attacks and the continuing challenge posed by foreign terrorist fighters and the conflict in Syria and Iraq? What is the role of the State Department in this effort? To address these timely issues, The Washington Institute is pleased to host a Policy Forum with Ambassador Tina Kaidanow. Tina Kaidanow is the ambassador-at-large and coordinator for counterterrorism at the State Department. She has also served in high-ranking positions in Afghanistan, Kosovo, and Bosnia and Herzegovina. Note that this event will be off the record.
- Where is Turkey Headed? Culture Battles in Turkey | Monday January 26 | 12:00-13:30 | Rumi Forum | REGISTER TO ATTEND | Turkey is a pivotal country: It is one of the few countries with a functioning democracy, it links the West with the turbulent Middle East, and it has been a reliable partner in NATO in difficult times. But Turkey is also a pivotal country in crisis: Under President Tayyip Erdogan it is drifting towards authoritarian rule, being neither a good partner for the West nor having leverage in the Middle East. Inside it becomes less democratic, internationally it becomes more isolated. Rainer Hermann, an international expert on the Middle East and long time correspondent for Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, will present his analysis of the current affairs in Turkey with prospects for change and the challenges before the West. He has recently published a new book, Where is Turkey Headed, Blue Dome Press: New York, 2014, which is a comprehensive examination of the changes the last decades of Turkish politics have witnessed. He will be available to sign books at the end of the event.
- The Awakening of Muslim Democracy | Tuesday January 27 | 12:00-14:00 | George Washington University | REGISTER TO ATTEND | Jocelyne Cesari is a senior fellow at the Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs and visiting associate professor in the department of government at Georgetown University. She will discuss her recent release, The Awakening of Muslim Democracy: Religion, Modernity, and the State (Cambridge University Press, 2014). The discussion also features Nathan Brown, Professor of Political Science and International Affairs, George Washington University and Marc Lynch, Professor of Political Science and International Affairs, George Washington University.
- US Foreign Policy Towards the Middle East: Priorities and Problems | Tuesday January 27 | 13:00 | School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) | REGISTER TO ATTEND | SAIS’ Foreign Policy Institute invites to a discussion with Ambassador Anne Patterson, Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs on the priorities and problems of U.S. Middle East policy. The discussion is moderated by Ambassador Shirin Tahir-Kheli, Senior Fellow, Foreign Policy Institute. This event is off the record. No audio, video, transcription or digital recording is allowed.
- Armenians and Turks in the Shadow of Genocide | Wednesday January 28 | 12:15-14:00 | Carnegie Endowment for International Peace | REGISTER TO ATTEND | The destruction of the Armenians of the Ottoman Empire in 1915–1916 was the greatest atrocity of World War I. Around one million Armenians were killed and survivors were scattered across the world. Although the issue of what most of the world calls the Armenian Genocide of 1915 is now a century old, it is still a live and divisive issue that mobilizes Armenians across the world, shapes the identity and politics of modern Turkey, and has consumed the attention of U.S. politicians for years. In Great Catastrophe, the eminent scholar and reporter Thomas de Waal, senior associate in the Russia and Eurasia Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, looks at the aftermath and politics of the Armenian Genocide and tells the story of recent efforts by courageous Armenians, Kurds, and Turks to come to terms with disaster as Turkey enters a new post-Kemalist era. Please join us for a conversation with the book’s author, moderated by Charles King. Great Catastrophe will be available to purchase, and the event will conclude with a book signing. De Waal will be joined by Jessica T. Mathews, president of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and Charles King, professor of international affairs and government at Georgetown University. Lunch will be served.
- Ethnic “Homelands”: Imagining a New Middle East, 1919 – 1948 | Wednesday January 28 | 15:30 | George Washington University | REGISTER TO ATTEND | After 1919, as much of the Middle East was absorbed into the beleaguered but still powerful European empires, a new ideology took hold in the region: the concept of physical separation as a “solution” to a newly identified “problem” of ethnic and religious pluralism. Across Europe and the United States, Armenian, Assyrian, and Jewish diaspora groups proved anxious to demonstrate their belonging in the ingathering of civilized nation-states by supporting the project of a homogenous national “homeland,” however remote it might be from their actual lived experiences. Diaspora lobbying, fundraising, and vocal support for creating ethnically based political entities through strategies of transfer and partition also found a reflection in some Arab discourse, as Palestinian, Syrian, and Iraqi Arab nationalists sought to make claims to independent statehood within a global framework that demanded national homogeneity as a corollary to sovereignty. This talk will explore how diaspora communities shaped the emerging political landscape of the modern Middle East as they declared that the only path to legitimate, recognized political status in the new global order was through identification, however distant, with an ethnic “homeland.” Laura Robson is a historian of the modern Middle East. Her current research and teaching focus on the history of religious and ethnic minorities in the twentieth century Arab world. She received her PhD from Yale University in 2009 and is now Associate Professor of Modern Middle Eastern History at Portland State University in Portland, Oregon.
- Global Security and Gender – A Forum with Sweden’s Foreign Minister Margot Wallström | Wednesday January 28 | 16:00-17:15 | United States Institute of Peace | REGISTER TO ATTEND | The new Swedish government has pledged to increase its focus on global women’s issues with what it describes as a feminist foreign policy. The U.S. Institute of Peace, in collaboration with the Embassy of Sweden, will host a forum with new Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallström on diplomacy and gender equality in a challenging global security environment. Following her remarks, Minister Wallström will be joined by former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Africa Ambassador Johnnie Carson, a USIP senior advisor, who will moderate a discussion with the Minister, as well as U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women’s Issues Catherine Russell, and U.S. Ambassador Donald Steinberg (retired), a former deputy administrator at the U.S. Agency for International Development who now serves as President and CEO of World Learning.
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Fox bites Bibi and Boehner
You won’t find a lot of Fox News clips on peacefare.net, but I am posting this one purely on the merits. Until the last couple of minutes of filler (did someone intervene to stop the badmouthing?), Chris Wallace and Shepard Smith plow into both Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and House Speaker Boehner for the invitation to address Congress shortly before Israel’s March 17 parliamentary election:
In my corner of the Jewish liberal establishment, sentiment is running high against Netanyahu, but it is a bit surprising to find the same is true on Fox News.
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Anbar first
The Middle East Institute published this piece of mine last night, under the heading “The Case for Aiding Anbar”:
I ran into some Anbaris in Washington this week. All of them have lost friends or relatives in the fight against Islamist extremism in one form or another. They had interesting things to say.
Anbar is the virtually 100 percent Sunni Arab province of Iraq that resisted the American invasion in 2003-2004, gave birth to the Awakening movement that fought with the Americans against al-Qa‘ida in Iraq in 2006-2007, wanted American bases to remain in Iraq, hosted peaceful mass protests against Nuri al-Maliki’s government in 2013, and largely fell to the Islamic State (ISIS) and its Ba‘thist allies starting in 2014. The provincial leadership is now trying to convince the United States to provide weapons, training, and coordinated air attacks to those willing to fight to take back the province. Déjà vu all over again.
The Anbaris think that ISIS is weak in their province, which they say nevertheless hosts ISIS headquarters. But the ISIS leadership consists of foreigners, who have a tense relationship even with local supporters. ISIS initially appealed to some Anbaris not only because it promised an Islamic caliphate, but also because of the existing corruption and Shi‘i hegemony in Baghdad. But now ISIS is abusing the local population with a severe application of Shariah law, which only a fraction of Anbaris support, and mass executions. It is killing Sunnis and destroying homes and hospitals. It is insisting on “repentance” from tribal leaders who opposed it. Many of those who supposedly repent also leave.
Those Anbari leaders who have left are getting signals from people still in Anbar that they are prepared to fight ISIS if provided with adequate resources and support from outside the province. The liberation should start from those parts of Anbar like Hit that ISIS has not been able to control. Anbar police would form the core of the force opposing ISIS.
The Anbaris avow a good relationship with the government of Haider al-Abadi in Baghdad. He says the right things and has managed to marginalize Maliki. More broadly, relations with the Shi‘a and Kurds have improved. But the new prime minister has not been able to deliver much in concrete terms so far. American arms for Baghdad will only start arriving in March. Abadi is under enormous Iranian pressure, with Iranian Revolutionary Guard commander Qassim Suleimani everywhere. The National Guard law, which the Anbaris support because it would set up provincially-based units to fight ISIS, is stalled in parliament. Only strong international influence will get it passed. Even then, it will take four years before the National Guard units are ready to fight. It will take three years to retrain and re-equip the Iraqi Army.
The Anbaris want to move faster with direct support from the Americans. What they need are weapons, ammunition, training, and coordination with coalition air attacks. National reconciliation, which the Anbaris say they welcome, is important, but military support is urgent. The American-led coalition against ISIS should not focus exclusively on Nineveh and Mosul. It should give priority to Anbar.
Air attacks will not suffice. The coalition needs boots on the ground to assist Anbaris who want to liberate their province. And it needs to move quickly, before ISIS is able to consolidate control and recruit more young Iraqis to its ranks. ISIS pays well, arms its cadres well, and provides “slave brides.”
Anbar wants more than military means. It also wants American investment. The Koreans and Turks are economically active in Anbar, but there is no U.S. commercial presence. Nor is much left of the previous American efforts at reconstruction. The American embassy staff is confined to its fortress while Iranians travel freely. Anbar needs an internationally sponsored reconstruction fund.
The Anbari pitch is strong, well-coordinated, and thoughtful. They know what the Americans want, and what they want to hear. But Washington today seems loath to do anything that might undermine Abadi. And the Americans believe that the Kurdish peshmerga, who are available for a counteroffensive in Nineveh Province, are vital to military success against ISIS. Anbar may have to wait longer than it wants for vital international assistance.
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