Tag: Israel/Palestine
Trump’s first foreign policy failure
I find it hard to cheer the widening of any war. But President Biden’s decision to allow Ukraine to strike deeper inside Russia is an exception. It has become necessary in response to Moscow’s persistence in pursuing its invasion despite colossal losses.
I am not really cheering the move. It’s more like recognizing its grim necessity.
The gains are small but the losses are big
The Russians have advanced, albeit marginally, over the past year, mainly in Donbas. The gains in 2024 amount to less than 1% of Ukraine’s territory. The advances since 2022 have cost around 700,000 Russians killed and wounded, according to the Ukrainians. Russian military casualties are now estimated at around 40,000 per month. That’s why President Putin doesn’t want to mobilize Russians again. They are souring on his war.
The losses on the Ukrainian side are no doubt large as well, though not the 700,000 or so Moscow claims. Russia is simply mirroring the number projected in the West for its own losses. But Ukraine before the war had a population of about 37 million. Russia’s was almost four times that number. In a war of attrition, Russia has more bodies to throw at Ukraine than Ukraine has to throw at Russia. And more elite political willingness to accept those losses. Putin doesn’t tolerate dissent.
Russia also continues to attack civilians and civilian infrastructure using drones and missiles. To judge by news reports, Ukraine’s attacks on civilians are minor by comparison.
Escalation but will it make a difference?
Biden’s decision apparently applies to MGM-40 Army Tactical Missile System (aka ATACMs) with a range of about 190 miles. It is reportedly limited for now to countering Russian advances in Kursk oblast, which the Ukrainians invaded in August. The decision responds to the deployment there of North Korean troops in support of the Russian army.
Moscow is portraying this deployment as adding fuel to the fire. That is a reasonable assessment, but the fire will not be in Ukraine. Most of the gigantic country remains beyond their range. The ATACMs can however reach a lot of military targets inside Russia. Whether that is a game changer, or they are too little too late, is unclear for now.
What is clear and what isn’t
The Ukrainians and Russians are racing for gains against the January 20 deadline in the US. Both expect President Trump, once inaugurated, to try to force a negotiated settlement to the war. Reports suggest he would require Ukraine to cede, at least temporarily, Russian occupied areas. It would also commit Kyiv to not joining NATO for decades.
That would be a one-sided settlement in favor of Moscow. And it would need the Europeans to deploy peacekeepers to guard a demilitarized zone between the two sides.
None of the parties will find the Trump idea attractive. Putin seems ready to reject it. He wants all of Ukraine permanently within the Russian sphere of influence and outside NATO. The Europeans, who have failed at peacekeeping between Israel and Lebanon, won’t want to do guard a demilitarized zone. Ukrainian President Zelensky doesn’t want to cede territory or be barred from NATO.
That doesn’t mean it won’t happen. Trump will threaten to withhold aid to Ukraine. The Europeans won’t compensate Kyiv and will want to limit the Russian advance. Putin is facing increasing economic and popular pressure at home. Zelensky may get boxed in.
Partition has consequences
The consequences of decades-long partition will be tragic. The Russians will insist on Zelensky’s removal, or defenestrate him at the first opportunity. Western investment in Ukraine will dry up. Its economy will shrivel. People will emigrate. Moscow proxies will take over, as they have in Georgia and Chechnya. Putin will have won.
Partition of Ukraine will echo elsewhere. Serbia will see it as an opportunity to take northern Kosovo. Republika Srpska will try to secede from Bosnia and Herzegovina. Irredentist ambitions worldwide will flower. China will want to assert sovereignty over Taiwan. Israel will annex the West Bank and northern Gaza. Dozens of border disputes in other regions will exacerbate.
Trump’s partition of Ukraine will be his first but not his only foreign policy failure.
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Immigration is clear, national security not
Trump’s appointments so far merit a first look. What do they suggest about the direction of the next Administration?
Deportation is for real
The appointments of Steven Miller as deputy chief of staff, Tom Homan as “border czar” (a White House appointment?), and Kristi Noem as Homeland Security Secretary send a clear message. They suggest that Trump is doubling down on deportation of undocumented immigrants. He proposes to start with those who have criminal convictions, in the US or abroad. But is a small percentage of the targeted population. Any convicted in the US are deported upon release. US Border Patrol has arrested about 17000 “criminal noncitizens” so far this year.
Focus on immigrant criminals was an election-year gimmick. Trump is really after the millions of undocumented immigrants living in the US who are not criminals. He wants to use the US Army to support that effort, which is estimated to cost more than $300 billion. Crime rates in this undocumented immigrant population are lower than among American-born citizens.
The disruption to the US economy, especially in some of the areas that voted most heavily for Trump, is likely. Especially if Homan follows through on threats to conduct workplace raids and deport whole families, massive economic damage will ensue.
Foreign policy is unclear
The signals on foreign policy are less clear. The named National Security Advisor, Michael Waltz, is a former Green Beret and China hawk. He is called a Ukraine skeptic, but that is vague. Would he advise against continued assistance to Ukraine in current circumstances? Or would he want it augmented to ensure a negotiated settlement on Ukraine’s terms?
The nominee for Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, is similarly ambiguous. He favors a negotiated end to the war that maintains Ukrainian sovereignty. It is not clear what that means, though the Kyiv Post assumes it means concession of some territory to Russia in exchange for peace. Rubio is also an Iran hawk who favored the disastrous 2018 withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal. That diplomatic malpractice resulted in Iran becoming a nuclear threshold state today.
The alternatives to Waltz and Rubio, even though both have become Trump sycophants, could have been worse. Former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn is a nut job. Ric Grenell, a former Trump ambassador in Berlin and momentarily Director of National Intelligence, is a grifting dimwit. Grenell may still be in the running for a high position at State or elsewhere, so no one should assume yet that he is out of the running completely. He never had the stature to be Secretary of State, but that would not have prevented Trump from nominating him. He has strong business ties to Jared Kushner. That could be his trump card.
Defense: even more unclear
Trump hasn’t named a Secretary of Defense yet.* If it is to be Iowa Senator Joni Ernst, fans in Kosovo will cheer. The Kosovo Security Force collaboration with the Iowa National Guard has been consistently fruitful. It has also spun off academic, government, and commercial cooperation.
But there are lots of other candidates according to Fox News, including Grenell. Whoever gets the job will face enormous challenges. Defense of US interests abroad requires that Washington remain committed to NATO and other alliances in the Pacific. Trump has continued to be more critical of allies than of Vladimir Putin.
The Kremlin has denied Trump urged the Russian President to show restraint in Ukraine. That could suggest the beginning of some strain between Trump and Putin, but I’ll believe it when I see it.
A bit better than last time around, but not for Gaza and Lebanon
Trump’s appointments so far have all been loyalists, to him personally and to election denial. But they are also people who are arguably more suitable than some of his previous choices. He is getting through the process quickly and cleanly. There are lots of rumors, but little hesitation or confusion. Trump chief of staff Wiles is doing her job well.
In late breaking news, former Arkansas Governor Huckabee will be ambassador to Israel. That confirms what sensible people knew. Trump will back Netanyahu 100%. Not because of the Jews, who voted overwhelmingly for Harris, but because of the Christian Evangelicals. The wars in Gaza and Lebanon will end only when Netanyahu wants them to. Trump will back Netanyahu even more than Biden did.
*After I published this, Trump announced a Fox News talking head, Pete Hegseth, as his pick for Defense. I know nothing about him but what I read on Wikipedia. I respect his military service, but he hardly seems even close to the qualifications required of a Defense Secretary. And lobbying for pardons for convicted war criminals is disqualifying. He is certainly far below Joni Ernst in stature. Trump’s nominee to head the CIA, is John Ratcliffe. He had trouble winning Senate confirmation as Director of National Intelligence in the first Trump administration. Ratcliffe is notable for his lack of professional intelligence qualifications and partisan posturing.
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Wrong and wrong, maybe wrong again?
I could of course be wrong again. But that’s the gloomy picture I am seeing on the day after an election gone wrong.
I was 100% wrong about the outcome of this election. I expected Harris to win the battleground states. She lost them. I expected her to win the popular vote by a wide margin. It’s not yet clear, but it appears she lost it.
I should have known better
I spent the last week in deep red Hall County, Georgia, doing “voter protection” for the Georgia Democratic Party. That entails monitoring paper ballot processing as well as helping adjudicate ambiguously marked ballots. I also duplicated a few dozen so that the scanner can read them. This is done in cooperation with Republicans and County election officials. Yesterday I was a poll watcher in a precinct whose voters include both a retirement community and mostly Mexican immigrants. The electoral mechanism both in the county government center and at the polling place was professional, efficient, and thus boring.
The demographics were more interesting. Hall is a county of more than 42,000 people that depends heavily on two industries. Chickens are first. Medicine is second. Both industries use large numbers of Mexican immigrants. There are not many native-born Americans feeding and slaughtering the chickens or tending the bed pans. Nor I imagine would you get on well doing construction, another thriving sector, if you didn’t speak Spanish.
By the time I got to the polling center yesterday about 11 am the early rush was over. Mid-day belonged mainly to the retirees, many of whom looked like they were patrons of the medical center. The late afternoon saw a rush of mostly younger Mexican Americans. A young US-born Mexican American poll worker provided translation whenever needed. I observed no tension of any sort between the two demographics. The mostly retired poll workers were impeccably correct and helpful to the immigrants, all of whom were US citizens. I hope they all recognized the symbiosis between the two communities.
My precinct voted more than 60% for Trump. Symbiosis doesn’t extend to the ballot box. I have no doubt about where most of the Trump and Harris votes came from.
It’s identity politics
Trump has found a way to make voting for him a question of identity. His racist dog whistles were vital to his first election. His macho man displays are vital to this second, as they shifted male votes in his direction. I find both difficult to understand, as I don’t regard white, male identity as anything more than an arbitrary classification. You could just as well call me short and old, with much more physical evidence to back the claim. I’m not proud of being white, male, short, or old.
I am proud of being an American. To me, that means having lots of individual rights and collective responsibilities. During my lifetime, I have seen the rights expanded. Younger people, Blacks, Latinos, women, and LGBTQ Americans now enjoy far more freedom than they did in my 1950s childhood. It seems to me the responsibility of white males to adjust to those changes. “All men are created equal” is not ambiguous (even if it should now read “all people”). “Make America Great Again” is a slogan that appeals to those who want to return to segregated, male-dominated, heterosexual America. I don’t share that aspiration.
I expect Trump to try to fulfill many of his promises. He made them to cater to interest groups that own him. He will try to deport large numbers of undocumented immigrants and end asylum. As President, Trump will impose more tariffs, raising the cost of living and inducing retaliation by other countries. He will fire large numbers of civil servants. His allies in Congress will try to end abortion country-wide and repeal Obamacare. They will give more tax relief to the rich and burden the middle class. Trump will welcome cryptocurrencies and try to manipulate the Federal Reserve, undermining monetary stability. His Supreme Court nominees will be people prepared to adjust their jurisprudence to his policy preferences.
I could be wrong again
As bad as I think the re-election of Trump is for America, I fear it is worse for the world. Trump will do at least some of what he has promised. We will see an end to American support for Ukraine and surrender of part of it to Putin. That will encourage Russia to try again in Moldova or the Baltics. He will withdraw American troops from South Korea and Japan, encouraging them to get their own nuclear weapons.
The Balkans, which concern many of my readers, will not be top priority. But Trump’s re-election will encourage ethnonationalists throughout the region. If Ukraine is partitioned, why shouldn’t Serbia to try to capture northern Kosovo and Republika Srpska? Why shouldn’t Kosovo join Albania? Washington might even help. War will be a real possibility. Ethnic cleansing and state collapse will follow. All the while, the Trump family will be benefiting financially from Jared Kushner’s Saudi-financed investments in Serbia and Albania.
In the Middle East, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu will get Trump’s full support. The new Trump Administration will not restrain Israel in Gaza, the West Bank, or Lebanon. Trump will likely encourage military confrontation with Iran. That is the only option left to deter Iran from getting nuclear weapons. Trump will try to get the Saudis to recognize Israel. They will string him along. It remains to be seen whether they will accept Netanyahu’s “less than a state” for Palestine. That proposition is essentially the continuation of the status quo: one state with unequal rights. It is what many call “apartheid.”
I could of course be wrong again. But this is the gloomy picture I am seeing on the day after an election gone wrong.
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What happens if Trump wins?
In many parts of the world, the answer is obvious. Trump has said he would strike a deal with Putin on Ukraine. That means surrender of at least Ukrainian territory Russia already controls. In the Middle East, Trump backs Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu 100%. That means Palestinians will be restricted to even smaller areas of the West Bank and Gaza. The prospects for a Palestinian state will be reduced to nil. In Asia, Trump has encouraged Japan and South Korea to get their own nuclear weapons. That, he hopes, will enable US withdrawal. Taiwan will be surrendered, sooner or later, to China.
But what about the Balkans? The region won’t be a priority for either a President Trump or a President Harris. She has said nothing so far as I know about the Balkans. But she is a vigorous rule of law defender of human rights. Trump has also said little about the Balkans, but we know what he did last time. We should expect more of the same.
President Harris: human rights and rule of law
Balkan policy under Harris will hopefully be consistent with her commitment to human rights and rule of law.
That implies keeping NATO and EU membership open, protecting individual rights, and fighting corruption. Consistency would require that American diplomacy return to opposing ethnic nationalism and promoting liberal democracy. Appeasement of President Vucic should decline, as should tolerance for the current Bosnia HiRep. He has backed ethnonationalists and opposed the pending European Court of Human Rights decision that undermines their hold on Bosnia. Interest in extending Kosovo’s sovereignty and countering corruption in Serbia and Albania should increase.
President Trump: partition and profits
In Trump’s first term, his Balkan envoy Ric Grenell favored partition of Kosovo. I am not among those who believe that he can become Secretary of State. But he could take Jim O’Brien’s place as Assistant Secretary for Europe. As soon as the partition option is opened again, it will spread. First to southern Serbia but then to Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia, and southwestern Serbia (Sandjak). Populations will start moving. Violence will result.
Trump/Grenell will also favor the Balkan fortunes of son-in-law Jared Kushner. That means more appeasement of Serbia’s President Vucic and Albania’s Prime Minister Rama. Both of them have sought to line Trump’s pockets with real estate deals. No doubt they stand to gain as well, politically if not financially.
Sooner rather than later
I don’t think any of this will respect the diplomatic clock. If Trump wins, the changes will start quickly. Europeans will assume NATO is dead. Russia will too. In the Balkans, Vucic and Republika Srpska President Dodik will try to produce facts on the ground. They’ll leave the conference rooms for later. With NATO immobilized, Serbia could try to grab northern Kosovo and the RS can secede from Bosnia. This could all happen during the lame duck presidency, before the January 20 inauguration, or very soon thereafter.
The Biden Administration needs to prevent disaster on its own watch, if Trump is elected. The State and Defense Departments should be preparing now and forewarning the Balkanites, even before the election. EUFOR and KFOR should be prepared to counter partition moves in Kosovo and Bosnia. Plans for reinforcement should be ready. Even now, it would be a good idea to move more troops to Brcko, in northeastern Bosnia. Without Brcko, RS secession is improbable.
Later rather than sooner
If Harris wins, all of the above could still happen. But later rather than sooner, if she fails to correct the mistakes of the Biden Administration. A thorough review of Balkans policy is long overdue. It won’t be hard to discern why Biden couldn’t get anything more than ammunition for Ukraine from appeasing Serbia. Vucic is not embracing the West and won’t. Russia has infested his security services. His own ambition for a Serbian world is analogous to Putin’s Russian world.
The harder part will be correcting course. The EU and US need to lower ambitions for the Dialogue between Pristina and Belgrade. They need to raise the pressure on Belgrade and counter Russia’s malign influence there and in Montenegro. And Washington and Brussels need to strengthen the sovereignty and territorial integrity of both Bosnia and Kosovo.
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It will end when Israel wants it to
Israel continues to enjoy military successes in both Gaza and Lebanon, but its adversaries fight on. The death of Yahya Sinwar leaves Hamas without clear leadership. The death of Hassan Nasallah likewise left Hezbollah without clear leadership. But both Islamist movements continue to attack. Their cadres seek “martyrdom.”
The options
Americans, official and unofficial, are urging Israel to take the win and embark on the day after. Israel has done enormous damage to both Hamas and Hezbollah. The Israel Defense Force has decimated, but not eliminated, their underground facilities, drones, rockets, and missiles, leadership, and personnel. Ending the fighting in Gaza as well as Lebanon would open the possibility of a prisoner/hostage swap in Gaza. It would also put pressure on the UN Security Council to move Hezbollah north of the Litani River. UNSC resolution 1701 requires that. It is the declared Israel war objective in Lebanon.
Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu isn’t buying. He wants to go after Iran, which is a state sponsor of both Hamas and Hezbollah. Israeli retaliation for Iran’s massive military attack on October 1, which did little damage, is still pending. His Defense Minister has promised it will be “lethal” and “surprising.” But it has also been delayed. The Americans want the Israelis not to target Iran’s nuclear program or its oil production facilities. The former will trigger an Iranian decision to develop nuclear weapons. The latter would bump up world oil prices.
The politics
The wars in Gaza and Lebanon are not going to end before November 5. That would give Kamala Harris a big boost at the polls. Netanyahu doesn’t want that. He wants Donald Trump back in the White House. President Biden is threatening to withhold military assistance to Israel unless humanitarian assistance starts flowing again to Gaza. Trump would not do that. Judging from past experience, he would not seek to restrain Israel at all.
No matter whom the US elects, Netanyahu has his own political calculus. His only hope for remaining in power is a military victory so overwhelming Israelis will forget his faults. They include his personal malfeasance and his government’s failure on October 7. A dramatic blow to Iran would do the trick.
The civilians
In the meanwhile, civilians are suffering the brunt of war. The situation in Gaza is unprecedented. Virtually its entire population is displaced. Most of its housing stock, its educational and health systems, as well as its economy are destroyed. People are desperate. Some are starving. There is ample evidence the Israeli army has targeted civilians and children.
In Lebanon, the destruction is less extensive so far, but Netanyahu has threatened to make it like Gaza. The Israelis have obliterated some border communities. They have also hit Beirut, including areas that are not Hezbollah strongholds. Many Lebanese are displaced. Several thousand are dead.
How does this end?
Most Israelis want a ceasefire and prisoner/hostage exchange. Most American Jews and Arabs have wanted that too. But Netanyahu wants to continue to fight Hamas and Hezbollah. He would also like to hit Iran hard. President Biden will to try to restrain him. A President Harris would do likewise. Trump would not.
Netanyahu has repeatedly demonstrated that he does what he wants. The Middle East wars won’t end until the Israeli government wants them to. That isn’t going to happen while Netanyahu is in office.
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A true conservative would vote Harris
I don’t have a lot of Republican friends. That’s true. But for those Republicans I know identity is the reason for their attachment to that party. One was born into a family in Arizona in which no one had ever voted for a Democrat. Another, an otherwise first-rate political analyst, simply believes what Republicans say and doubts what Democrats say. He puts the burden of proof on his opponents.
Neither of these colleagues has ever before supported across-the-board tariffs or deportation of immigrants. They both pride themselves on not being racists. Yet they will vote for a candidate who wants to impose broad tariffs and deport millions. Trump is also a confirmed white supremacist and has promised to restrict minorities from moving to the suburbs. Republican identity trumps [pun intended] their policy preferences. It shifts the burden of proof, so here are some proofs.
The domestic issues
To be fair, traditional Republicans are in a difficult spot. The Republican party they knew and loved favored lower taxes and high defense expenditures. It has evaporated. Trump’s Republican party favors lower taxes only for the truly wealthy and abandonment of defense obligations.
Presidents Reagan and George W. Bush welcomed immigrants. Trump blames them for crimes they haven’t committed, as he did for the Central Park five. He wanted them executed, which is what he wants for immigrants who kill “Americans.” The five, all Black, were innocent.
Traditional Republicans do have reason to dislike Kamala Harris’ policy proposals. They fear extra spending for her housing, healthcare, education, and other “social” programs would explode the deficit. But they should be aware that the data is clear. Trump did that, even before the COVID-19 epidemic. Her spending proposals will have to pass in Congress. Trump’s promise of tariffs he can levy without Congressional approval
There is a decades-long history of lower percentage debt increases under Democratic than Republican presidents:
This is at least in part due to Republican control of one or both Houses of Congress. That’s a good reason for a Republican debt hawk to vote for some down-ballot Republicans. But it is not a good reason to vote for Trump.
Foreign policy
On foreign policy, the situation is even clearer. Both Trump and Harris are hawkish on China and protective of Israel. But Trump reached a trade agreement with China that Beijing didn’t implement. He did nothing to respond. The trade agreement also cost the US budget a great deal due to related agricultural subsidies. They continue. Trump would back Israel to the hilt. Harris wants to rein it in, provide humanitarian assistance to Palestinians, and prevent a wider war.
Trump has threatened to abandon allies in Europe and to end support for Ukraine. Harris backs the NATO allies and Kyiv. Most NATO members are now fulfilling their 2024 NATO commitment to spend 2% of GNP on defense. The big jumps came under Biden, after the Russian expansion of the Ukraine invasion. They did not come under Trump. Allied solidarity in supplying Ukraine has helped to counter Russia’s expansionist impulse and reduce the threat to other “frontline” states.
Putin’s Russia is an expansionist, imperial power trying to correct what it regards as history’s mistakes. If Moscow wins in Ukraine, it will try again in Moldova and eventually Poland and other former Soviet satellites. It is not exaggerating to say Ukrainians are dying to prevent Americans and Europeans from fighting.
Trump has encouraged South Korea and Japan to think about getting their own nuclear weapons. That he thinks would reduce US commitments in Asia. It is a truly bad idea, as it would leave Asian security at risk of a nuclear confrontation. The US would not control the outcome.
Trump has signaled he would not help defend Taiwan. China will take advantage of that signal. Biden’s expressed willingness to support Taiwan has arguably forestalled a Chinese effort to take it over.
If you are a true Republican, vote Harris
Half of Trump’s former cabinet secretaries are not supporting his re-election bid. Nor is his Vice President, about whose safety during the January 6 riot Trump was unconcerned. Former Vice President Cheney, a staunch conservative, and his also conservative daughter Liz are voting for Harris. So too is Mark Milley, Trump’s Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, along with hundreds of other retired generals. Milley regards Trump as “fascist to the core.”
Preventing Trump from doing what he has pledged to do should outweigh any remaining identity issues. A true Republican would vote Harris.
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