Etiket arşivi: China

Strategic or Suicidal Global Competition?

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June 20, 2022

On June 15, the New York Times reported that heat waves are becoming more frequent, hotter, and longer-lasting than in previous decades, according to scientists. The US National Climate Assessment noted in 2018 that the frequency of heat waves had jumped from an average of two per year in the 1960s to six per year by the 2010s. The heat-wave season in the United States has stretched to 45 days longer than it was in the 1960s, according to the report. Carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas concentrations are increasing, temperatures are warming, sea levels are rising, and ice extent and glacier mass are decreasing.[i]

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Moving Toward “No Peace No War” in Ukraine

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May 31, 2022

On May 19, in a government statement in the German Bundestag, Chancellor Scholz said, “We all share the same goal: Russia must not win this war. Ukraine must survive.” Putin first has to realize that he cannot break Ukraine’s defense before he would be willing to negotiate seriously about peace, he continued.  “Emmanuel Macron is right to point out that the entry process is not a question of a few months or even years,” the Federal Chancellor added.

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Confronting China

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May 26, 2022

On March 26, in Poland, President Biden referring to President Putin said, “For God’s sake, this man cannot remain in power.” Administration officials immediately scrambled to clarify that what he meant was not regime change. “That’s not for Biden to decide,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Reuters. “The president of Russia is elected by Russians.” Two days later, Mr. Biden said that his comment was an expression of his outrage and not a change in American policy.

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The War in Ukraine and West’s Summit Meetings

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March 27, 2022

The following was my summing-up of the Ukraine conflict seven years ago:

“News from Ukraine and Ukraine-related developments are not encouraging. The Minsk cease-fire remains fragile. Political and economic difficulties facing Ukraine show no sign of abating. The Government does not appear strong and determined enough. There has been no progress on the level of autonomy to be recognized to the separatist regions. The conflict between “federalization” and “decentralization” continues. Ukraine troops are now being trained by American officers. Russia’s naval deployments and air activity are becoming increasingly reminiscent of the Cold War. NATO is holding joint exercises in Poland, Lithuania, the US in Georgia. The Treaty on Alliance and Integration between Russia and South Ossetia has been submitted to the State Duma for ratification. The flow of immigrants and asylum seekers from Ukraine into EU countries is on the rise… The West continues to see Mr. Putin as an unpredictable leader determined not to allow Ukraine to chart its future. He says that he wants as close interaction as possible with the US, based on equal rights and mutual respect of interests and positions of each other. Both the West and Russia seemingly desire to put the Ukraine conflict behind and move forward but words and deeds do not match.” [i]

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Ukraine Crisis: A Reminder from the Middle East

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February 7, 2022

The Russia-West standoff over Ukraine continues. The US and its European allies are warning of a serious risk of a Russian offensive against Ukraine. Moscow is claiming that the US is trying to pull Russia into an armed conflict over Ukraine that Russia does not want. The US is sending troops to Germany, Poland, and Romania. The West is waiting for the Russian response to its written proposals which Moscow says focus only on secondary issues. Lines of argument and underlying rationale are getting increasingly blurred and confusing.

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US/NATO Talks with Russia, Episode 2 Begins

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January 31, 2022

On January 26, the US and NATO delivered their written responses to Russia’s security demands in Eurasia. A day later, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told the media that the responses offer grounds for serious talks only on matters of secondary importance; that there is no positive response to the main issue which is continued NATO enlargement towards the east and the deployment of strike weapons that can pose a threat to Russian territory.

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The Year 2021 in Retrospect

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December 22, 2021

The top foreign and security policy item of 2021 was the strategic competition between major powers. Its subtitles were “China’s ascendancy”, “Russia’s resurgence” the “waning of American power”. The rise of authoritarianism, democracy’s decline, the failure of multilateralism, and climate change remained subjects of philosophical debate. Needless to say, Covid-19 is still the common enemy but the world failed to close ranks against it.

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The World Needs a Broad Coalition Against Terrorism

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October 12, 2021

On July 8, 2021, in remarks on the drawdown of US forces in Afghanistan President Biden said:

“We went for two reasons: one, to bring Osama bin Laden to the gates of hell, as I said at the time. The second reason was to eliminate al Qaeda’s capacity to deal with more attacks on the United States from that territory. We accomplished both of those objectives — period.”

On August 16, in the middle of a chaotic withdrawal he said:

“Today, the terrorist threat has metastasized well beyond Afghanistan: al Shabaab in Somalia, al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, al-Nusra in Syria, ISIS attempting to create a caliphate in Syria and Iraq and establishing affiliates in multiple countries in Africa and Asia. These threats warrant our attention and our resources.

“We’ve developed counterterrorism over-the-horizon capability that will allow us to keep our eyes firmly fixed on any direct threats to the United States in the region and to act quickly and decisively if needed.”

Finally on August 26, upon the terror attack at Hamid Karzai International Airport he declared:

“To those who carried out this attack, as well as anyone who wishes America harm, know this: We will not forgive. We will not forget. We will hunt you down and make you pay…”

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How Long the “Wait and See” to Judge the Taliban

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September 20, 2021

The world is waiting to see whether the Taliban has changed or not, if so to what extent. Countries involved in Afghan affairs know that they would not witness  fundamental change but hope for a move towards minimum moderation. The question is for how long they would wait and see.

Last week, in remarks to the High-level Ministerial Meeting on the Humanitarian Situation in Afghanistan, UN Secretary General Guterres said:

“Even before the dramatic events of the last weeks, Afghans were experiencing one of the worst humanitarian crises in the world.”

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The Rules-based International Order

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May 10, 2021

The “rules-based international order” is now a recurrent theme in policy statements by senior officials of the Biden administration.

Secretary Blinken, meeting with his Chinese counterparts in Anchorage on March 18, 2021, started the talks by saying that the rules-based international order is not an abstraction; that it helps countries resolve differences peacefully, coordinate multilateral efforts effectively, and participate in global commerce with the assurance that everyone is following the same rules; that the alternative to a rules-based order would be a far more violent and unstable world for everyone.

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