Philippa Kaur

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    The American Century Ends Early

    Like Gregor Samsa, the never-to-be-forgotten character in Franz Kafka’s story “The Metamorphosis,” we awoke on January 7 to discover that we, too, were “a giant insect” with “a domelike brown belly divided into stiff arched segments” and numerous “pitifully thin” legs that “waved helplessly” before our eyes. If you prefer, though, you can just say it: We opened our eyes and found that, somehow, we had become a giant roach of a country.

    Yes, I know, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris are now in charge of the US and waving their own little limbs wildly, trying to do some of what needs to be done for this sad land of the disturbed, over-armed, sick and dying. But anyone who watched the scenes of Floridians celebrating a Super Bowl victory, largely unmasked and cheering, shoulder to shoulder in the streets of Tampa, can’t help but realize that we are now indeed a roach nation, the still-wealthiest, most pandemically unmasked one on planet Earth.

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    But don’t just blame Donald Trump. Admittedly, we’ve just passed through the Senate trial and acquittal of the largest political cockroach around. I’m talking about the president who, upon discovering that his vice president was in danger of being “executed” (“Hang Mike Pence!”) and was being rushed out of the Senate as a mob bore down on him, promptly tweeted: “Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution.”

    Just imagine. The veep who had — if you don’t mind my mixing my creature metaphors here — toadied up to the president for four endless years was then given a functional death sentence by that same man. You can’t fall much deeper into personal roachdom than that. My point here, though, is that our all-American version of roacherie was a long time in coming.

    Or put another way: unimaginable as The Donald might have seemed when he descended that Trump Tower escalator in June 2015 to hail his future “great, great wall,” denounce Mexican “rapists” and bid to make a whole country into his apprentices, he didn’t end up in the Oval Office for no reason. He was the symptom, not the disease, though what a symptom he would prove to be — and when it came to diseases, what a nightmare beyond all imagining.

    Let’s face it, whether we fully grasp the fact or not, we now live in a system, as well as a country, that’s visibly in an early stage of disintegration. And there lies a remarkable tale of history happening at warp speed, of how, in not quite three decades, the USS Enterprise of imperial powers was transformed into the USS Roach.

    Once Upon a Time on Earth…

    Return for a moment to 1991, almost two years after the Berlin Wall fell, when the Soviet Union finally imploded and the Cold War officially ended. Imagine that you had been able to show Americans then — especially the political class in Washington — that 13-minute video of Trump statements and tweets interlarded with mob actions in the Capitol that the Democratic House impeachment managers used in their opening salvo against the former president. Americans — just about any of us — would have thought we were watching the most absurd science fiction or perhaps the single least reality-based bit of black comedy imaginable.

    In the thoroughly self-satisfied (if somewhat surprised) Washington of 1991, the triumphalist capital of “the last superpower,” that video would have portrayed a president, an insurrectionary mob and an endangered Congress no one could have imagined possible — not in another nearly 30 years, not in a century, not in any American future. Then again, if in 1991 you had tried to convince anyone in this country that a walking Ponzi scheme(r) like Donald Trump could become president, no less be impeached twice, you would have been laughed out of the room.

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    After all, the US had just become the ultimate superpower in history, the last one ever. Left alone on this planet, it had a military beyond compare and an economy that was the heartland of a globalized system and the envy of the world. The Earth was — or at least to the political class of that moment seemed to be — ours for the taking, but certainly not for the losing, not in any imaginable future. The question then wasn’t keeping them out but keeping us in. No “big, fat, beautiful walls” were needed. After all, Russia was a wreck. China was still emerging economically from the hell of the Maoist years. Europe was dependent on the US and, when it came to the rest of world, what else need be said? This was an American planet, pure and simple.

    In retrospect, consider the irony. There had been talk then about a post-Cold War “peace dividend.” Who would have guessed, though, that dividends of any sort would increasingly go to the top 1% and that almost 30 years later, the US would functionally be a plutocracy overseen until a month ago by a self-professed multibillionaire? Who would have imagined that the American version of a peace dividend would have been siphoned off by more billionaires than anyplace else on Earth and that, in those same years, inequality would reach historic heights, while poverty and hunger only grew? Who woulda guessed that whatever peace dividend didn’t go to the ultra-wealthy would go to an ever-larger national security state and the industrial complex of weapons makers that surrounded it? Who woulda guessed that, in official post-Cold War Washington, peace would turn out to be the last thing on anyone’s mind, even though this country seemed almost disarmingly enemy-less? (Remember when the worst imaginable combination of enemies, a dreaded “axis of evil,” would prove to be Iraq, Iran and North Korea, all embattled, distinctly tertiary powers?)

    Who woulda guessed that a military considered beyond compare (and funded to this day like no other) would proceed to fight war after war, literally decades of conflict, and yet — except for the quasi-triumph of the first Gulf War against Saddam Hussein’s Iraq — achieve victory in none of them? Staggering trillions of taxpayer dollars would be spent on them, while those billionaires were given untold tax breaks. Honestly, who would have guessed then that, on a planet lacking significant enemies, Washington, even six presidents later, would prove incapable of stopping fighting?

    Who woulda guessed that, in September 2001, not Russia or communist China, but a tiny group of Islamic militants led by a rich Saudi extremist the US had once backed would send 19 (mostly Saudi) hijackers to directly attack the United States? They would, of course, cause death and mayhem, allowing President George W. Bush to launch an almost 20-year “global war on terror,” which still shows no sign of ending. Who woulda guessed that, in the wake of those 9/11 terror attacks, the son of the man who had presided over the first Gulf War (but stopped short of felling Iraqi autocrat Saddam Hussein) and the top officials of his administration would come to believe that the world was his oyster and that the US should dominate the greater Middle East and possibly the planet in a way previously unimaginable? Who would have imagined that he would invade Iraq (having done the same in Afghanistan a year and a half earlier), effectively helping to spread Islamic extremism far and wide, while creating a never-ending disaster for this country?

    Who woulda guessed that, in 2009, in the wake of a Great Recession at home, the next president, Barack Obama, would order a massive “surge” of forces into Afghanistan, a war already eight years old? Tens of thousands of new troops, not to speak of contractors, CIA operatives and others would be sent there without faintly settling things.

    By November 2016, when an antiquated electoral system gave the popular vote to Hillary Clinton but put Donald Trump, a man who promised to end this country’s “endless wars” (he didn’t) in the Oval Office, it should have been obvious that something was awry on the yellow brick road to imperial glory. By then, in fact, for a surprising number of Americans, this had become a land of grotesque inequality and lack of opportunity. And many of them would prove ready indeed to use their votes to send a message to the country about their desire to Trump that very reality.

    From there, of course, with no Wizard of Oz in sight, it would be anything but a yellow brick road to January 6, 2021, when, the president having rejected the results of the 2020 election, a mob would storm the Capitol. All of it and the impeachment fiasco to follow would reveal the functional definition of a failing democracy, one in which the old rules no longer held.

    Exiting the Superpower Stage of History

    And, of course, I have yet to even mention the obvious — the still-unending nightmare that engulfed the country early in 2020 and that, I suspect, will someday be seen as the true ending point for a strikingly foreshortened American century. I’m thinking, of course, of COVID-19, the pandemic disease that swept the country, infecting tens of millions of Americans and killing hundreds of thousands in a fashion unmatched anywhere else on the planet. It would even for a time fell a president, while creating mayhem and ever more fierce division in unmasked parts of the country filled with civilians armed to the teeth, swept up in conspiracy theories and at the edge of who knew what.

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    Call it a sign from the gods or anything you want, but call it startling. Imagine a disease that the last superpower handled so much more poorly than countries with remarkably fewer resources. Think of it as a kind of judgment, if not epitaph, on that very superpower.

    Or put another way: Not quite 30 years after the Soviet Union exited the stage of history, we’re living in a land that was itself strangely intent on heading for that same exit — a crippled country led by a 78-year-old president, its system under startling pressure and evidently beginning to come apart at the seams. One of its political parties is unrecognizable; its presidency has been stripped of a fully functioning Congress and is increasingly imperial in nature; its economic system plutocratic; its military still struggling across significant parts of the planet, while a possible new cold war with a rising China is evidently on the horizon; and all of this on a planet that itself, even putting aside that global pandemic, is visibly in the deepest of trouble.

    At the end of Franz Kafka’s classic tale, Gregor Samsa, now a giant insect with a rotting apple embedded in its back, dies in roach hell, even if also in his very own room with his parents and sisters nearby. Is the same fate in store, after a fashion, for the American superpower?

    In some sense, in the Trump and COVID-19 years, the United States has indeed been unmasked as a roach superpower on a planet going to — again, excuse the mixed animal metaphors — the dogs. The expected all-American age of power and glory hasn’t been faintly what was imagined in 1991, not in a country that has shown remarkably few signs of coming to grips with what these years have truly meant.

    Centuries after the modern imperial age began, it’s evidently coming to an end in a hell that Joe Biden and crew won’t be able to stop, even if, unlike the previous president, they’re anything but intent on thoroughly despoiling this land. Still, Trump or Biden, at this point it couldn’t be clearer that we need some new way of thinking about and being on this increasingly roach-infested planet of ours.

    *[This article was originally published by TomDispatch.]

    The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

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    What’s Behind Chile’s Vaccination Success?

    The deadly impact of COVID-19 has been felt in every corner of the globe. On February 22, the United States reached a tragic landmark of 500,000 deaths. Across the Atlantic, nine of the top 10 nations in deaths per million are in Europe, with tiny enclaves of Gibraltar and San Marino topping the tables. The list of countries that have dealt with the pandemic relatively well is much shorter. Almost a year ago, I wrote about how leaders in Brazil and Mexico were slow in taking tougher action to prevent the spread of the virus. I falsely predicted that Latin America is unlikely to witness the death rates seen in Europe. Unfortunately, the effects of the pandemic were equally devastating in the region, if not worse.

    Images of mass graves in the Amazonian town of Manaus and the dead bodies left in coffins in the streets of Guayaquil, Ecuador, have spread worldwide. More than 260,000 Brazilians and nearly 190,000 Mexicans died because of the virus, placing the two countries second and third in absolute numbers of fatalities. Peru registered 1,421 deaths per million and Panama 1,352 on March 4 — numbers that show the devastation caused by the virus in the region so far. Chile has also experienced a significant death rate of 1,084 per million.

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    The big difference in Chile was that authorities mobilized in advance to secure vaccines, hedging bets on various suppliers in different stages of development. In September last year, President Sebastian Pinera announced the purchase of 10 million doses of Pfizer-BioNtech vaccine. Deliveries commenced on December 24, making Chile the first Latin American nation to start its vaccination program. The country has ordered some 90 million doses, more than enough to immunize its 19 million citizens. By March 4, more than 20% of its population received at least one shot, placing Chile fifth in the world when it comes to vaccination rates, just behind Israel, United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom and the United States.

    Political Conflict

    On December 29, Argentinians started to receive the Russian Sputnik V vaccine. The pace of immunization in Argentina has been much slower than expected, with several complaints of those not in priority groups receiving the jab before health workers and the elderly. The “VIP vaccination” scandal has caused the resignation of the health minister, drawing protesters onto the streets and generating criticism against President Alberto Fernandez. So far, Argentina has vaccinated only 2.61% of its 45 million citizens. The slower pace seems to be standard in the region, with most nations unable to vaccinate even 1% of their citizens. The cause is not only the shortage of vaccines but lack of planning and, more significantly, internal political conflict. 

    In Brazil, president Jair Bolsonaro has made several statements that undermined efforts to slow the pandemic. In a national broadcast on March 24, 2020, he criticized the restrictive measures adopted by governors and mayors, urging people to return to work and referring to COVID-19 as a “little flu.” The president also highly publicized the unproven anti-malarian drug chloroquine as being effective against the virus, ordering the Ministry of Health to produce four million doses. His insistence on the use of the drug caused the loss of two health ministers, Dr. Henrique Mandetta, fired by Bolsonaro last April, and Dr. Nelson Teich, who resigned less than a month after taking over. Since then, the position has been filled by an army general specializing in logistics, with neither medical education nor experience.

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    Over the course of the pandemic, Bolsonaro has been exchanging public barbs with the state governments, such as over lockdown measures adopted by individual governors last month. On March 1, 16 of the country’s 26 governors, including three Bolsonaro allies, signed a letter criticizing the government and accusing the president of misleading the public about federal pandemic relief funds. Sao Paulo’s governor, Joao Doria, a former ally in the 2018 elections and a potential competitor in 2022, has been the president’s most vociferous antagonist over the handling of the pandemic.

    At the center of the dispute is the Butantan Institute, one of the most prestigious health centers in Latin America, situated in the state of Sao Paolo. Back in June, Butantan signed a partnership with the Chinese laboratory Sinovac Biotech to produce the CoronaVac vaccine. Initially, Bolsonaro has signaled that Brazil would not purchase the Chinese vaccine, questioning its efficiency, but in January, the Ministry of Health added the vaccine to the national immunization plan following approval by the health regulator, Anvisa. Last month, Doria announced a deal for a further 20 million doses of CoronaVac to complement the 100 million already secured by Butantan.

    Last August, Pfizer said it offered 70 million batches of its vaccine to Brazil, with a delivery scheduled for December. However, with Brazil dissatisfied with the terms of the contract, the deal is still being negotiated. Health Minister Eduardo Pazuello hopes to secure 100 million doses from Pfizer and 38 million from a pharmaceutical subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson, Janssen, to start deliveries in May and August respectively. Due to this lack of urgency and an absence of a unified policy between the federal and state governments, Brazil has so far vaccinated just 3,67% of its population.

    Crisis Management

    Chile has also faced political unrest. Since 2019, the country experienced several mass protests calling for education and pension reforms. In a televised address, President Pinera declared a state of emergency, granting powers to restrain freedom of movement and assembly. The measure resulted in violence that cost 18 lives in five days, leading the UN to examine possible human rights abuses. As a result, Pinera’s approval rating fell to just 7%. In 2020, amid the ongoing political crisis, COVID-19 hit the country hard, provoking the resignation of the health minister, Jaime Manalich.

    However, Pinera managed to turn the situation around. With a degree in commercial engineering from the Catholic University of Chile and a PhD in economics from Harvard, the president is a billionaire businessman, with an estimated net worth of $2,9 billion. He has already led the country once, between 2010 and 2014, earning crucial government nous. Pinera made several concessions to the protesters and supported the calls for a new constitution in an attempt to turn down the political temperature.  

    A referendum on October 25 saw 78% of the population approve a new constitution that will substitute the current one created in 1980 under General Augusto Pinochet. The new Magna Carta will be written by a 155-strong body also elected through a popular vote and with an equal number of men and women. The document will then be confirmed by a popular vote before being implemented.

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    To assuage popular discontent caused by the initial handling of the pandemic in combination with other historical grievances relating to health care, education and pensions, Pinera focused his negotiation abilities to mediate the purchase of million doses of vaccine from different laboratories and suppliers. While most developing nations have been struggling with a lack of supplies, Chile is among the top three countries, along with Canada and the UK, when it comes to the number of doses ordered per capita. Back in September, just before the peak of protests, Pinera announced partnerships on the development and clinical trials between the Catholic University of Chile and Sinovac; the University of Chile, Janssen/Johnson & Johnson and AstraZeneca; as well as the University of Frontera and another Chinese laboratory, CanSino Biologics. More than that, purchases were agreed with Pfizer, Covax, Sinovac and AstraZeneca.

    But despite perceived goodwill from an unpopular right-wing government, the president still faces an uphill climb when it comes to popularity. By March 1, 83% of the Chileans deemed the massive vaccination as good or very good, 58% asses the general management of the pandemic as positive, but Pinera’s personal approval is still only at 24%.

    The successful vaccination has already yielded positive outcomes. According to Chile’s Health Ministry, the number of new COVID-19 cases has decreased in six of the country’s 16 regions in the last seven days and in eight the last 14 days. Chile hopes to vaccinate at least 15 million people in the first semester, which would allow the country to immunize its entire population by the end of June. These numbers would put Chile way ahead in the vaccination game not only in Latin America but worldwide, suggesting that resolute leadership is as important for the nation’s well-being as a robust medical system.

    The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

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    The Talented Mr. Bin Salman

    Mohammed bin Salman is a charming fellow. The tall, dark and handsome Saudi prince known as MBS has seduced world leaders and eager pundits left and right. To his supporters, MBS became first in line to the Saudi throne by championing reform in a deeply conservative Gulf kingdom, taking on corruption, confronting religious extremists and promising to modernize the economy. “Someone had to do this job — wrench Saudi Arabia into the 21st century — and MBS stepped up,” wrote Thomas Friedman in an oft-cited column from November 2017. “I, for one, am rooting for him to succeed in his reform efforts.”

    Not only impressionable opinion-makers have fallen for the prince’s charm. In 2017, MBS won the reader poll for Time’s person of the year with an astonishing 24% of the vote. Second place, at 6%, went to the magazine’s eventual pick for its cover, the #MeToo movement, while Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau garnered a mere 4%, Pope Francis 3% and then-US President Donald Trump 2%.

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    Of course, not everyone has been enthusiastic about the talented Mr. bin Salman. In 2015, three months into his new position as defense minister, MBS launched an air war in neighboring Yemen. Tens of thousands of Yemeni civilians have died, and the country has been plunged into a humanitarian nightmare. The war, which has become a quagmire for the Saudi-led coalition, has not exactly made a lot of friends for MBS.

    Two years later, shortly before he mesmerized Friedman in Riyadh, Mohammed bin Salman detained a number of his wealthiest rivals in a set of rooms at the Ritz-Carlton in the Saudi capital. There he subjected the sheikhs and businessmen to interrogations and torture that resulted in one death and the hospitalization of 17 others. The Saudi leadership called the extortion of billions of dollars from the rich prisoners an anti-corruption campaign, but it was really a way for MBS to consolidate his power through brute force.

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    “He is a psycho,” a relative of one of the detainees said of MBS. “He has spite. He wants to break people. He doesn’t want anyone to have an honorable name but him. He is a devil, and the devil is learning from him.”

    Shortly before the Ritz-Carlton “sheikhdown,” Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi fled the country for the United States. As a Washington Post columnist, he then took aim at the policies of the Saudi government and those of MBS in particular. While the Saudi prince “is right to free Saudi Arabia from ultra-conservative religious forces, he is wrong to advance a new radicalism that, while seemingly more liberal and appealing to the West, is just as intolerant of dissent,” Khashoggi wrote in a column from April 2018.

    That intolerance for dissent was on full and tragic display a few months later when Khashoggi walked into the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul to get papers to marry his Turkish fiancée and never came out. A government-dispatched death squad strangled the journalist and dismembered his body.

    The Saudi government initially denied that Khashoggi had been killed. Then it claimed that the killers were rogue elements. The kingdom eventually put 11 unnamed individuals on trial for the crime, charged eight of them and handed down five death sentences that it subsequently commuted to 20 years in prison.

    After Khashoggi’s murder, the Trump administration imposed sanctions on 17 Saudi officials. But even though a UN report implicated MBS in the assassination, he didn’t face any consequences. Indeed, Trump continued to praise the Saudi prince as if nothing had happened.

    “It’s an honor to be with the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, a friend of mine, a man who has really done things in the last five years in terms of opening up Saudi Arabia,” Trump said at a June 2019 breakfast with MBS at the G20 meeting in Tokyo. “I want to just thank you on behalf of a lot of people, and I want to congratulate you. You’ve done, really, a spectacular job.”

    This week, the Biden administration released an earlier US intelligence report on the assassination of Khashoggi that concluded that Mohammed bin Salman approved the killing. The administration added some new sanctions against certain Saudi officials and instituted a “Khashoggi ban” against 76 unnamed individuals associated with the killing. That ban can also be applied to any foreign officials who harass or harm journalists or activists.

    Still, the Biden administration has declined to sanction MBS himself. Like Tom Ripley in the novels of Patricia Highsmith, Mohammed bin Salman is a confidence man, a possible serial killer and an all-around psychopath with a taste for the high life. Highsmith described the protagonist of “The Talented Mr. Ripley” and four other novels as “suave, agreeable, and utterly amoral.” Although he often comes close to getting caught, in the end, Tom Ripley gets away with murder every time. Will that be the fate of the talented Mr. bin Salman as well?

    The US-Saudi Relationship

    The alliance between the United States and Saudi Arabia initially made sense, at least at a basic economic level. In February 1945, when Franklin D. Roosevelt met secretly with King Abdul Aziz ibn Saud on a Navy destroyer in the Suez Canal, the US president wanted to secure a homeland for Jewish refugees in Palestine. Although the Saudi king was not enthusiastic, he was willing to forge a partnership around oil. Saudi Arabia had recently discovered what promised to be very lucrative fields, and the US needed a reliable oil supply to finish off World War II and begin a post-war recovery.

    Saudi Arabia still has a lot of oil, but the US doesn’t need it anymore. From a high of two million barrels of crude a day in May 2003, US imports dropped to a mere 100,000 last December. For a period of time in January, for the first time in 35 years, the United States didn’t import any Saudi oil at all. Because of its own fossil fuel production, increased imports from countries like Canada, and greater reliance on renewables, the US is simply no longer dependent on the Saudis.

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    Take oil out of the equation and the alliance becomes untenable. Saudi Arabia is a dictatorship with fewer political and religious freedoms than, say, Iran, which the US routinely castigates for its human rights violations. The kingdom has been a destabilizing influence in the region, for instance through its war in Yemen and its earlier embargo of Qatar. Moreover, Saudi Arabia promotes a conservative version of Islam, Wahhabism, that has squeezed out more liberal variants of the religion all around the world. The country has also generated even more extremist ideologies, like the jihadism of Osama bin Laden and his followers.

    In an investigation of the links between the Saudi government and the 9/11 hijackers, the FBI found some evidence of collaboration, through the Saudi Embassy in Washington, but the agency has been divided on whether that evidence is conclusive. The name of the relevant embassy contact, Mussaed Ahmed al-Jarrah, was even inadvertently revealed last May, but it’s not likely that the Saudi government will allow him to be deposed as part of the lawsuit mounted by families of the 9/11 victims.

    It’s not the only case in which the Saudi government has been implicated. A lawsuit in Florida alleges that the kingdom could have prevented an attack by a Saudi air force officer in 2019 at a naval air station in Pensacola that left three US sailors dead.

    The US government has generally looked the other way when it comes to these obvious disqualifications for a strategic partnership. It’s not just oil. The Saudis have proved to be useful partners in various causes over the years. They provided financial support for the anti-Soviet mujahideen in Afghanistan. They’ve been a bulwark behind conservative regimes in the Middle East, such as Egypt, which the United States has misinterpreted as a stabilizing influence.

    And then there’s Iran, with which Saudi Arabia has long battled for influence in the greater Middle East. Part of the rivalry is confessional — Iran is predominantly Shia, while Saudi Arabia is predominantly Sunni. The tensions are also political since the Saudis tend to prefer conservative, pro-Western regimes, while Iran favors governments and movements that are at least skeptical of the West if not outright hostile. But the competition often boils down to geopolitics, with the two countries trying to influence countries and leaders regardless of their religion or political leanings.

    Because the United States decided 40 years ago, with a big assist from Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, to do everything it could to constrain the new Islamic Republic of Iran, Saudi Arabia became an essential partner. In 2015, the Obama administration challenged the cornerstone of this partnership with the Iran nuclear deal. Trump swung in the opposite direction to make the kingdom the fulcrum of a region-wide peace plan.

    President Joe Biden is now trying to “recalibrate” the relationship. It has ended “all American support for offensive operations in the war in Yemen, including relevant arms sales,” but that leaves open the possibility of supporting defensive operations, whatever those might be. It has put a hold on half a billion dollars in military assistance but is now evaluating which deals can go through under the category of “defensive” weapons, like missile defense systems.

    In his initial discussions with the kingdom, Biden also raised issues of human rights and the assassination of Khashoggi. At the same time, however, the administration has tried to preserve the overall relationship by effectively pardoning MBS. King Salman is 85 years old, and he’s not in good health. With MBS set to take over, the United States doesn’t want to alienate a powerful future monarch. Mohammed bin Salman is aware of his leverage. He will act accordingly.

    Dealing with Ruling Assassins

    The Biden administration this week announced sanctions against senior Russian officials over the poisoning of dissident Alexei Navalny. In 2019, the European Union imposed sanctions on Iran for its involvement in the assassination of two Iranians in the Netherlands. After the 2017 assassination at the Kuala Lumpur airport of Kim Jong Nam, who was North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s half-brother, Malaysia closed its embassy in Pyongyang and imposed a travel ban on the country.

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    None of these moves has doomed bilateral relations. The US still engages with the Kremlin, most recently by extending New START. The EU is pushing hard for a resumption of the Iran nuclear deal. Malaysia reopened its embassy in Pyongyang last year.

    Part of the reason why such extrajudicial murders generate sanctions but not a full quarantine of the perpetrating countries is the widespread nature of these offenses. Among its many “targeted killings” by drones, the United States assassinated the head of Iran’s Quds Force, Qasem Soleimani, outside the Baghdad airport at the beginning of 2020. Israel has routinely killed its opponents all over the world, including a Libyan embassy employee in Rome, an Egyptian nuclear scientist in Paris, a Brazilian colonel in Sao Paolo and a Canadian engineer in Brussels. Syria might or might not have been behind several assassinations in Lebanon, including leftist leader Kamal Jumblatt and former Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. None of these countries has suffered geopolitically for these acts.

    The talented Mr. bin Salman, in other words, killed his most prominent critic because he knew he would get away with it. Even if the Biden administration decides for entirely pragmatic reasons not to sanction the Saudi prince, it should definitively stop all military support to Riyadh, even weapons considered “defensive.” After all, if Saudi Arabia feels more secure behind a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system, it will be more likely to direct aerial attacks against its opponents.

    It’s the nature of geopolitics that a few psychopaths are going to become the leaders of their countries. But that’s no reason for the United States to give these “talented” men the weapons to consolidate their power.

    *[This article was originally published by FPIF.]

    The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

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    Is Dutch Exceptionalism Equipped to Cope With the Pandemic?

    In late January, protests and riots against COVID-19 lockdown measures in the Netherlands drew attention from international audiences, taking many by surprise. Described by the Dutch police as the “worst rioting in 40 years,” it was a response to the first curfew the country has seen since the Second World War. Now, more violence and what appears to be a deliberate attack on a coronavirus testing center have caused further shock. The Netherlands is well established at the heart of orderly Northern Europe, bound by welfare-state solidarity and reserved, measured behavior. However, its populist subculture is news to no one. Radical and conservative elements, as well as a culture of Dutch exceptionalism, existed well before the COVID-19 pandemic, which has undoubtedly stirred social tensions in an unprecedented fashion.

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    As the curfew remains in place, most activities are restricted, including the shuttering of non-essential businesses and shops (closed since December), restaurants (closed since November) and gyms. Schools are only recently back in session after being closed in December, and only as of Wednesday, March 3, have contact professions been allowed to open on a limited basis, with stores also taking appointments for shopping trips.

    After suffering some of the worst rates of COVID-19 infections in the second European wave at the end of 2020, the Netherlands is watching numbers rise again. However, a poll in the third week of February indicated that 45% of Dutch citizens believe lockdown measures would be relaxed. How the government responds to this pandemic is most likely being swayed by the fact that national elections are coming up in less than two weeks.

    Intelligent Lockdown

    The unique social dynamics of the Netherlands are important for understanding the social sentiment surrounding the COVID-19 crisis. Firstly, it should be noted that the Netherlands took a different approach to many European counterparts at the start of the pandemic. Referred to as laissez-faire by some, there was never a total lockdown experienced by Spain or Italy. Of course, when the first round of lockdown measures hit Europe, schools, restaurants and businesses were closed. However, while citizens were encouraged to respect social distancing and limit gatherings, as well as to stay home as much as possible, there were neither explicit measures, such as how many times a day one could go outdoors, nor any regulation of them. Prime Minister Mark Rutte called this “an intelligent lockdown.” The Netherlands was one of the last countries in Europe to make masks obligatory, as late as December last year. 

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    This is perhaps due to the culture of Dutch exceptionalism or tolerance: no need to enforce or dictate rules to independent citizens so long as everyone peacefully goes about their business. As Sarah Bracke explains, Dutch exceptionalism can be understood as pertaining to “a notion of toleration, which is historically linked to its particular arrangement of secularization and later on, throughout the second half of the twentieth century, gained a strong resonance in relation to sexual politics.”

    The Netherlands has been known for its “coffee shop” culture where recreational use of soft drugs is openly tolerated, and it has legalized prostitution, euthanasia and gay marriage far in advance of many other countries. Such a culture, which is often criticized as being overly idealized, can prove resistant to what could be viewed as over-regulation of the private sphere through constrictive measures necessitated by the global pandemic.

    Systemic Tensions

    What is perhaps less directly related to but is more illustrative of the social tensions exacerbated by the pandemic is the history of radical-right and conservative presence in the country. Throughout the world, it seems that populist movements against COVID-19 measures and conspiracy theories relating to the pandemic are often led by right-wing factions or adherents. Populist anti-Islam or immigrant politicians or parties have proliferated in the Netherlands in the past decades. Geert Wilders, who founded the nationalist, far-right populist Freedom Party in 2006, is one of the best-known faces in Dutch politics.

    In fact, Dutch politicians often reference immigrants and minority ethnic groups in their rhetoric. While Dutch culture and identity are purportedly tolerant, there has been a constant and evidenced critique from academia and civil society that institutions and society remain exclusionary toward those who fall within the category of “allochtoon” (not from here) versus “autochtoon” (from here). Neoliberal and nationalist-populist parties reflect and mutually reinforce these alleged biases.

    A peek into the perspective of those who attest to discrimination on a daily basis is interesting and illuminative, even if it may not be statistically representative of Dutch culture or even an entirely objective account. The Amsterdam Confessions of a Shallow Man website, for instance, is authored by an expat living in Amsterdam who presents a bemused apparisal of Dutch life and moderates a large Facebook group where members joke, critique or celebrate Dutch culture. With over 8,000 members, it often serves as an outlet for those who feel discriminated against.

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    For example, members share when they have been told to “go back to their country” alongside news and experiences of racists attacks or rental ads that are exclusive to Dutch nationals. In particular, when someone experiences racism or discrimination, other members of the group offer support and advice on how to file a complaint. A common topic of discussion includes a Dutch Christmas character, Zwarte Piet — Black Pete — who takes his name from traditional blackface.

    There seems to be a frustration with proclaimed liberal Dutch tolerance vis-à-vis the experience of everyday life, especially among people of color. This explains the possibility of polarization and right-wing extremism or populism taking firmer root in Dutch society. However, simmering unrest intertwined with racial inequality is not exclusive to the Netherlands: The United States and its Black Lives Matter mobilization provides an example of a nation coming to terms with these same issues that have been exacerbated by the pandemic.

    Typical Problems

    Problematizing extreme reactions to government-imposed COVID-19 response measures can be conducted from several angles. One could cite the culture of Dutch exceptionalism and resistance to intrusive regulation, or point to an increasing trajectory of populism. There are, however, many more factors at play, and the social implications of the pandemic will probably continue to be revealed in varying stages for years to come.

    For example, when explosives and fireworks were set off during riots, which were made up of mostly young people in their teens and twenties, earlier this year, it caused understandable alarm. However, these fireworks could be seen as an extension of Dutch youth culture and a popular, even if a dangerous, tradition. Each season, New Year’s fireworks result in injuries and property damage in otherwise peaceful Dutch towns and cities. These explosives seem to be a traditional manner of expression — both for festive and restive moods.

    By contrast, the recent, uncharacteristically intense February storm Darcy brought sub-zero temperatures, snow and iced-over canals that drew many happy faces. Locals enjoyed another cherished tradition: skating on nature’s ice rinks (at a respectable distance). The Dutch rank favorably on many indexes thanks to a comparatively rich, educated and open society, rooted in a specific set of customs, traditions and culture that requires a unique approach to a global emergency.

    The number of those who participated in the violence is low in comparison to the wider population, although it does suggest that there is understandable dissatisfaction with current COVID-19 response policies and management. Indeed, much like the rest of the world, the Dutch government and society face challenges in addressing the multilayered issues inherent in this unprecedented crisis.

    The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

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    The Complex Role of Racism Within the Radical Right

    Several political parties and governments around the world have centered their commitment to countering the radical right on tackling hate and racism. The most recent example was the announcement by the German cabinet in late 2020 to spend €1 billion ($1.2 billion) for a four-year program on combating “right-wing extremism, racism and antisemitism.”       

    There is no doubt that such political agendas are well intended, and most citizens would agree that racism is not consistent with their society’s democratic values. As US President Joe Biden put it in his inaugural speech, two weeks after the deadly storming of the US Capitol Building on January 6: “Our history has been a constant struggle between the American ideal that we are all created equal and the harsh, ugly reality that racism, nativism, fear, and demonization have long torn us apart. The battle is perennial.”

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    Tackling racism deserves firm political commitment in its own right, and it certainly has a place within a multi-pronged strategy to countering violent extremism (CVE) on the radical right. But is there a tendency to overestimate the efficacy of anti-racism initiatives at the expense of other prevention and intervention measures within the CVE space?  

    Related to this, what role does racism play within the radical right? While it is widely acknowledged that there is no unanimously agreed definition of right-wing extremism or radicalism, most experts in the field consider racism to be a very common feature or, at the very least, one of the “accompanying characteristics” of right-wing extremism. This centrality of racism seems to have led many into thinking that tackling racist hate is a particularly effective way of countering right-wing extremism.

    What Kind of Racism?

    Decades of extensive scholarship — and the lived experiences of those affected — have emphasized that racism is systemic and interpersonal; it is attitudinal, behavioral and structural; and it can draw on biological social constructs and on cultural or religious markers, actual or perceived. At least one (or many) manifestation of racism is present across all radical–right groups. But what kind of racism?

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    The diversity of radical–right movements and groups is well understood in academia, and there have been numerous attempts to develop typologies that capture divergent groups under the umbrella of right-wing extremism. Exclusivist and anti-egalitarian beliefs are a common denominator, but articulations of racism differ across various radical right groups, movements and ideologies. These nuances are important but often overlooked in public and political debates.

    Some elements of the radical right, for example, mobilize in particular against Islam, expressing primarily anti-Muslim racism. This applies to what is often referred to as “counter-jihad” movements (a self-attributed and ideologized misnomer in many ways) and the anti-Islam protests that swept across Europe and Australia in the second half of 2010s. Non-white people are usually welcome there as long as they share anti-Islam sentiments. For example, in Australia, where most of my research has taken place, it was also not uncommon to see radical-right protesters at these rallies displaying Aboriginal flags and insisting they were reclaiming Australia from Islam also on behalf of indigenous Australians.

    These anti-Islam groups and movements differ from white supremacy organizations. For example, one Australian white supremacy group expressed its disagreement with those prominent anti-Islam movements as thus: “We do not believe in multiculturalism minus Islam.” Of course, these boundaries are blurry. There have been personal overlaps, and some radical–right groups with explicitly neo-Nazi convictions have strategically used the anti-Muslim movements to recruit more people to their white supremacy and antisemitic agenda.

    Another example that illustrates the complex, fluid and sometimes contested role that different forms of racism play within the radical right are the Proud Boys in the United States. Founded as a self-described Western chauvinistic boys club by Gavin McInnes in 2016 with an explicit, culturally racist and misogynistic profile, the group quickly adopted the markers of a white supremacist network, despite its chairman, Enrique Tarrio, being himself of Afro-Cuban descent. Infighting between Tarrio and another openly antisemitic and white supremacist leading figure (who reportedly referred to Tarrio as a “token negro”) in late 2020 revealed the internal fractions — all racist, yes, but racist in different ways.

    Racism as an Indicator of Radical-Right Ideology

    While people associated with or sympathetic to radical–right movements generally seem to hold racist views, the majority of those with such exclusionary or prejudiced attitudes toward certain ethnic, racial, cultural or religious minorities are not affiliated with right-wing extremism or radicalism. Attitude surveys across the Western world — from North America, the UK and Europe to Australia — have shown high rates of anti-Muslim sentiments and prejudice, expressed sometimes (depending on the country and the nature of the survey questions) by a majority of the surveyed population. Some surveys revealed that a substantial proportion of respondents also express biological racist views. According to the results of the European Social Survey a few years ago, 18% in the British sample agreed that “some races or ethnic groups are born less intelligent.” Considering the possibility of social desirability effects, we can only speculate as to whether this figure underestimates the true prevalence of biological racism.

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    It is impossible to determine how many of those who hold anti-Muslim or other racist views are affiliated or identify with the radical right — certainly not all of them and probably only a small portion. This is not to disregard the higher susceptibility among these segments of society to mobilization and recruitment efforts of radical–right groups. The path into the radical right is slippery. A former radical–right activist, Ivan Humble, recalled how he became a member of the English Defence League: “I didn’t identify as racist at the time, but I began to zero in on Muslim people in the belief that they were attacking the country I lived in, and that our society was being torn apart as a result. In hindsight, this was such a blinkered view but I couldn’t see it.”

    In our recent research in Australia, we identified several factors that may help analyze the questions as to where and when racism becomes an indicator for radical–right ideologies. We conducted in-depth interviews with people who were invited to speak with us about the concerns they had about diversity and immigration in Australia. We found that most of those we interviewed expressed anti-Muslim racism and other forms of cultural racism, but our analysis concluded that only some of them were affiliated with the radical right. In what way did their articulation of racism differ?

    1. Racism as Part of a Larger Meta-Narrative

    Our analysis suggests that it is important to understand if, and how, racism is functionally embedded in a larger meta-narrative. Among those on the radical right, racism was not “only” an exclusivist personal attitude but part of an ideological system, built on conspiratorial thinking about a secretive global elite seeking to destroy Australian society and culture. They agitated against ethnic or religious minorities, but they often did so with a bigger enemy in mind, which they accused of pushing immigration and multiculturalism to pursue an evil agenda.

    This is also illustrated in a speech by a central figure of Australia’s radical right addressing a public demonstration in early 2019, where he insisted that immigrants and blacks were not the main problem. The real enemies were, according to him, “those who bring these people into our country.”

    Another soon-to-be-published CRIS study by Victoria University and the Institute for Strategic Dialogue found that the radical right in Australia extensively used the Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests for their online mobilization, but, notwithstanding prevalent expressions of racism, a salient argument was that black BLM activists both in the US and Australia were only “useful idiots,” controlled by an alleged communist or Jewish (or both) cabal for their sinister goals.  

    2. Racism and Political Activism

    The second factor that can help identify how racism spills over into radical–right ideologies is related to individuals’ willingness to act upon their attitudes. This addresses important aspects of the behavioral dimension of racism (and of radical–right movements).

    Some in our fieldwork who have displayed racist attitudes expressed no desire to make these feelings public or try to convince others. Rather the opposite was the case: They deliberately avoid conversations about these issues — at least with those they expect may disagree with — and they explicitly denied being politically active. In contrast, those we considered to be associated with the radical right stated they were on a mission to “educate” others — for example, on social media — and they had been actively involved in a range of public rallies. They proudly accepted the label of being a “political activist.” 

    3. Language and “Collective Identity”

    The third factor that may help assess to what extent someone’s racist expressions may be an indicator for a radical–right affiliation relates to the language and symbols used. Certain expressions such as “race traitor” or “white genocide,” and symbols such as 1488 or the use of (((triple brackets))) to indicate alleged Jewishness, are popular within segments of far-right discourses and point to what researchers Pete Simi and Steven Windisch call “identity talk”: “a discursive practice to demonstrate that an individual’s identity is consistent with the perceived collective identity of the movement.”

    The meaning and political message of symbols and terms can change over time: On the one hand, previously neutral symbols are coopted by parts of the radical right (e.g., Pepe the Frog or the “OK” hand signal reappropriated to represent white power), and on the other hand, terms that used to be characteristic for the radical right (e.g., New World Order, Social Justice Warrior) have become mainstream and lost their distinctiveness.

    Countering the Radical Right by Tackling Racism

    What does all this mean for countering the radical right? As mentioned above, measures aimed at tackling racism are important tools for promoting community cohesion, belonging and safety, and they can also play a role in reducing the pool of people who may be more susceptible to far-right mobilization. As such, anti-racism strategies form a vital part of what has come to be known as preventing violent extremism (PVE).

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    As an intervention tool within countering violent extremism (CVE) strategies, however, the potential efficacy of anti-racism approaches seems overrated. Racism may be a salient or “accompanying characteristic” of radical–right movements. While it may contribute to someone’s pathway toward becoming actively involved in the radical–right milieu, the relationship between racism and engagement with the radical right is often better described in terms of correlation than causation.

    If CVE programs intend to address the root causes of why people sympathize and engage with the radical right, they need to look further and beyond racism. Primarily focusing on ideological factors and trying to convince people that racism is “bad” is insufficient, even if complemented by legislative, security and law enforcement intervention. This is because such “corrections” can often lead to further negative backfire effects.

    It is therefore widely acknowledged among CVE scholars and practitioners that countering the radical right requires multifaceted and targeted programs tackling psychological, social and, ultimately, societal questions around personal grievances and people’s desire for purpose, respect and connectedness. When designing CVE interventions with the radical right in mind, it often requires holding back with moral judgments and showing empathy to those who have dehumanized others in order to further stem the harms posed by such activism. 

    *[Fair Observer is a media partner of the Centre for Analysis of the Radical Right.]

    The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

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    Macron Enriches French Vocabulary and Impoverishes Political Thought

    France appears to be living through a strange transitional period that could be described as the waning of the Fifth Republic. It contains no sense of what a sixth republic might look like or why it might even be necessary. But today’s republic, with its unique electoral system, has achieved a summit of incoherence. The current president, Emmanuel Macron, has only one thing in mind: getting reelected in 2022 and maintaining the shaky status quo. 

    The Fifth Republic had a few moments of glory marked by at least three somewhat illustrious personalities who became president. The actions of these three men left a mark on the memory of the French. Their names? Charles de Gaulle, Francois Mitterrand and Jacques Chirac. The only recent president to make a valiant but ultimately futile attempt to achieve their stature, Nicolas Sarkozy, was just this week convicted of corruption and sentenced to three years in prison.

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    Macron hoped to surpass them all but has clearly failed. Instead of playing by the consecrated rules of the Fifth Republic dominated by powerful parties, he profited from a sudden and unexpected vacuum within both the traditional right and the traditional left to sneak through the cracks and create the illusion that a system permanently dominated by the “alternance” of right and left could be run from the center. 

    It was quite an achievement, but Macron failed to understand that modern French political thinking is not about vague ideas or even attractive personalities. It remains based on the notion of “engagement” (commitment) in favor of one or another strong position. The center Macron so proudly claimed to represent has always been seen as spineless and fundamentally unexciting. At best it reflects a commitment to bureaucracy, which the French have no respect for but cannot live without.

    In 2017, it looked like a free ride for Macron that would last five years thanks to a guaranteed majority in parliament, no viable opposition and a public initially willing to entertain the centrist experiment. But it has become a living hell. Macron never managed to build his own party into something that could represent a political force, despite his massive majority elected to parliament on the coattails of his 2017 electoral victory.

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    Now, Macron finds himself embroiled in a controversy of his own creation. Its focus has been defining Islam as the enemy and intellectuals sympathizing with Muslims as the enemy within. In November 2020, The Atlantic reported that “Education Minister Jean-Michel Blanquer has bemoaned the influence of American critical race theory on the French social sciences, blaming them for undermining France’s race- and ethnicity-blind universalism, and for giving comfort to ‘islamo-gauchisme,’ or ‘Islamo-leftism.’” Then, just two weeks ago, France’s higher education minister, Frederique Vidal, set off an uproar in the media and in academe itself when she demanded an “investigation” be carried out into “Islamo-leftist” influence within the universities and research community.

    This spectacular initiative has ended up having a closer resemblance to QAnon than to traditional French intellectual creativity and freedom. Vidal now wants the French to believe that universities and research institutes are harboring a cabal that englobes the French left (irresponsible intellectuals with ideas no sane Frenchmen would endorse) and Islamist extremists (murderous jihadist activists) in an unholy alliance that is threatening the security of the Republic.

    Why? Because a number of serious thinkers have dared to detect a link between the history of European colonialism, including the extension of some its practices into the present, and the rise of violent revolt by Islamic extremists against a system they believe to be oppressive of their people and their people’s well-being. Detecting historical links — or at least certain specific links — has become a crime that can no longer be tolerated.

    Today’s Daily Devil’s Dictionary definition:

    Islamo-gauchiste:

    A faux portmanteau word invented by Emmanuel Macron’s government to create the belief that two segments of French society, each with its own tradition of respectability — leftist thinkers and the Muslims who were part of the booty of the former French empire — are plotting to overthrow the modern mainstream, neoliberal, corporatist and implicitly racist consensus that Macron’s party believes to be the main voting bloc in French society today

    Contextual Note

    Macron’s desire to profit from the fear of Muslims that has attracted voters to his main rival, Marine Le Pen, is understandable, though risky since its anti-intellectual belligerence alienates many to the left of center. More surprising is one of its oddest features, that its promoters have coupled it with an appeal to a long-standing trend among the French of anti-Americanism. It claims to be anti-Islamic, anti-intellectual and anti-American, all at the same time.

    It isn’t enough to attack French researchers who propose readings of history that make French colonial incursions into Muslim lands look inglorious. The Macronists are now affirming that this acknowledgment of France’s historical injustice toward its minorities is an example of slavish emulation of American “critical race theory” that has now infected the minds of a generation of French academics. It’s all the fault of American “wokism,” which has no place in French culture.

    Le Monde has long been the serious newspaper of the intellectual rather than the activist left. Since the end of the Second World War, it has stood as the alternative to the other “serious” newspaper, Le Figaro, which reflected the positions of the establishment right and more specifically the Gaullists. De Gaulle, after all, was the founder of the Fifth Republic.

    Macron claims to be neither right nor left, but his electoral strategy has clearly pushed him to commit to policies agreeable to the right. Responding to the proposal of an investigation into academic Islamo-gauchisme, Le Monde immediately published the appeal launched by 600 academics condemning Vidal’s obscurantist effort. The signatories included the immensely successful Thomas Piketty, highly respected on the left. No one would think of branding Piketty as an Islamo-gauchiste.

    Historical Note

    For nearly a century, the French have complained about the attack on the noble purity of the language of Racine and Voltaire by the importation of English words. In the past, governments have legislated to prevent modern French vocabulary from being overwhelmed by trendy American coinages. That hasn’t prevented French people, and especially professionals, from using the very “anglicisms” they are expected to patriotically deplore. “Low-cost” could simply be called “pas cher” but not by people in business, who prefer the English term. Buzz, open space, leader, flop, play-list, best-of and the verb “booster” (to boost) are commonly spoken. Many deem these words illegal occupiers, on a par with the postcolonial invasion of North African immigrants. Neither of them has any business being here and sapping French culture.

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    Interviewed by the magazine L’Obs, political analyst Olivier Roy provides an acute analysis of the French president’s absurd and futile attempt to strategize his reelection: “Emmanuel Macron believes he is playing a grand strategic game by aiming to reach the second round of the next presidential elections in a face-off against Marine Le Pen.” Macron’s ministers are no longer working for the French republic. They are working for Macron’s reelection in 2022. 

    Recent polls show Le Pen within two points of Macron. For Jean-Michel Blanquer and Frederique Vidal, to steal votes from Le Pen’s white working-class constituency, intellectuals on the left must be branded as traitors to the white European republic. They may be unhappy, but just as US President Joe Biden did with progressive Democrats, the Macronists count on the vast majority on the left to vote against Le Pen.

    What Macron fails to realize is that his quandary is closer to the Democratic Party’s failure in the 2016 US presidential election than its success in 2020. Like Hillary Clinton in 2016, people now see him as a shabby, ineffective pillar of a discredited establishment. Nobody likes Macron enough to want to see him hanging around for another five years. As Roy points out, the strategy he has devised is absurd. He cannot win over Le Pen voters. His commitment to Europe has made him their enemy. And now polls show that many on the left will no longer be intimidated to vote for someone so committed to betraying them and their intellectual culture.

    After two years of the COVID-19 pandemic, 2022 promises to be the year of political pandemonium.

    *[In the age of Oscar Wilde and Mark Twain, another American wit, the journalist Ambrose Bierce, produced a series of satirical definitions of commonly used terms, throwing light on their hidden meanings in real discourse. Bierce eventually collected and published them as a book, The Devil’s Dictionary, in 1911. We have shamelessly appropriated his title in the interest of continuing his wholesome pedagogical effort to enlighten generations of readers of the news. Read more of The Daily Devil’s Dictionary on Fair Observer.]

    The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

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    in World Politics

    Can the British Army Modernize Under Pressure?

    Over the past three decades, the British Army has faced numerous challenges. British soldiers have been putting their lives on the line in several intense multilateral deployments, including the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. These operations have enhanced the mechanical wear and tear, necessitating an early replacement of vehicles that were already due to be replaced by newer generations.

    As bad luck would have it, the need for expensive new equipment comes at a time when budgets are scarce. In the wake of the disintegration of the Soviet Union, UK defense budget allocations were systematically slashed by governments that considered the expense no longer indispensable. This has led many observers to describe the modern British Army as a shadow of its former self. The entire British Armed Forces shrank by more than 50% percent over the past three decades, dropping from 311,000 to 145,000 personnel.

    The Far Right Has a History of Infiltrating the British Army

    READ MORE

    While the overall budget has increased from £38 billion ($53 billion) to £48 billion, the figure is misleading as it does not take into account rising costs of development or inflation. A more telling indicator is the percentage of GDP dedicated to defense, which dropped from 3.5% to 1.7% between 1990 and 2020. The rhythm of deployments, however, has not slowed, with the UK taking an active part in virtually every NATO operation in the past decades.

    But things may be changing. As defense expert Andrew Chuter writes: “The British government has approved the largest rise in its defense budget since the end of the Cold War, with £16.5 billion (U.S. $21.9 billion) in additional funding made available for spending on shipbuilding, space, cyber, research and other sectors over a four-year period.” This is welcome news for an institution that can no longer count on European military assistance as it could before Brexit.

    Retiring the Heavy Cavalry

    In the coming decade, Britain will be waving its Challenger 2 tanks goodbye. Put in service at the end of the 20th century, the Challenger has served proudly in Iraq, Kosovo and Bosnia. The 2003 invasion of Iraq was simultaneously its finest hour and the beginning of the end for the heavy tank. During combat, Challengers were repeatedly struck with rocket-propelled grenades and proved exceptionally robust. Throughout the invasion, the tank remained operational despite extreme conditions and performed admirably.

    Embed from Getty Images

    However, it became apparent that the Challenger could only be deployed in certain environments. Challengers were never used in Afghanistan because they could hardly have operated in the mountainous terrain and because this battlefield was landlocked — two factors that threaten the tanks’ very existence. Heavy armor can be moved easily by sea, with difficulty over land and never by air.

    The heavy tanks are, therefore, proving increasingly irrelevant as Britain strives to maintain its global presence and capacity. From a strategic setting that pitched two massive conventional military blocs against each other in the plains of Central Europe, the West discovered a post-Cold-War era in which it needed to be able to deploy rapidly to every corner of the world. Heavy weaponry is considerably less relevant today. This type of firepower is not needed in skirmishes and territory control, and its low deployability presents a problem for many operations.

    As the UK Ministry of Defense struggles to reorganize budgets, it surprises no one that heavy armor would be the first on the list for the difficult cuts ahead. After several drops in numbers, Harry Lye reports that “The British Army’s fleet of Challenger 2 main battle tanks (MBTs) and Warrior Armoured Fighting Vehicles (AFVs) could be cut under plans reportedly being drawn up by military chiefs.” What will replace British armor if it is effectively mothballed is anyone’s guess.

    The Artillery

    Britain’s AS-90s are also getting close to retirement and, for once, this may be good news. The AS-90 is the UK’s standard self-propelled artillery — effectively a tank, mounted with an artillery howitzer instead of a direct-fire barrel. Artillery regiments have also seen their fleets diminished, for the same budget reasons, and they are also plagued with the same logistical difficulties as their colleagues in the heavy-armor divisions. While not quite as heavy, AS-90 howitzers are immensely cumbersome due to their armor coating, are nearly impossible to move quickly and will easily be evaded by today’s nimble insurgencies.

    But Britain is in luck: There is a new type of howitzer on the market that may fix all of the army’s problems at once. New truck-mounted howitzers, such as the French Caesar cannon, swap armor for mobility. Their simpler design makes them easily transportable by air and considerably less expensive than their predecessors. The Caesar howitzer is the first of its kind to have successfully passed the test by fire in operational deployments. Magzter reports that “Using the truck’s ability to move offers the benefit of being able to have a much lower total system weight particularly if armour protection is either limited to the driver/crew cab area or even eliminated altogether.”

    China, France, Japan, Sweden and many others all have turned to this design, which has demonstrated good operational results. The Caesar cannon is also one of the few artillery types that are air-transportable. Should Britain acquire such howitzers, it could simultaneously maintain its current stock numbers and reduce its military expenditure — a rare opportunity in military affairs.

    The Caesar artillery unit also represents a diplomatic opportunity. The UK was hoping that Brexit would naturally lead to closer ties with the US. This has not transpired — and seems unlikely in the future. Plans for an integrated EU army and low financial contributions from Western European countries have led to American exasperation with its Eastern allies, meaning that US strategies have become, in reaction, increasingly self-sustained and self-centered over the years. Building reinforced interoperability with the French and enhancing the capacity among European nations for rapid deployment is a practical and achievable way to rebuild international ties.

    The Boxer Gamble

    And then, of course, there was the Boxer, the now-infamous infantry fighting vehicle which, despite its critical role on the battlefield, was purchased under the worst possible conditions. While the protection of infantry soldiers receives priority, now that new threats are about, it is unclear why London would allow fair competition for the tender to be scrapped.

    Soldiers commonly need to take the threat of improvised explosive devices or drones into account — something that hardly existed in the 20th century. But, given how drastically the battlefield has changed in the past few decades, defense analysts were astounded that the British Army would throw as fundamental a quality prerequisite as a tender out of the window. By a simple decision, the UK bought the Boxer off the shelf, hoping that it would somehow be adapted to modern threats. Andrew Chuter covered the matter, indicating that 500 Boxers would be ordered — without competition — from the defense contractor Artec at a cost of £4.4 billion, to be delivered in 2023.

    The price tag includes 10 years of technical support. This entails that in case the Boxer reveals itself ill-suited to current-day operations, the UK troops will be stuck with it for at least a decade. Hasty and unverified spending is certainly unwelcome in times of financial strain. But what is done is done. The British Army will presumably not be overturning this decision, and we can hope the Boxer performs well.

    Some of the choices facing the British Army will not make commanders’ hair turn gray beyond reason. If new cannons come at a lower cost, the army can stay within its budgetary envelope and maintain, or even increase, its fleet. Other choices, such as deciding whether to shelve the cavalry, will be more of a strategic gamble. Indeed, Britain may have little need for heavy tanks now, but who knows if it will need them again? One thing is sure, however: Buying the Boxer blindfolded was a huge, almost irresponsible risk in a time of budgetary constraints. Let’s hope future choices will be made with more discernment.

    The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Fair Observer’s editorial policy. More

  • 163 Shares159 Views

    in US Politics

    Most US states don't have a filibuster – nor do many democratic countries

    As the U.S. Senate proceeds with its business, split 50-50 between Republicans on one side and Democrats and independents on the other, lawmakers and the public at large are concerned about the future of the filibuster.
    Under the rules of the U.S. Senate, if just one lawmaker doesn’t want a bill to progress, they can attempt to delay its passage indefinitely by giving a principled speech, or even just reading “Green Eggs and Ham,” as Ted Cruz did in 2013. A supermajority of three-fifths of the senators, or 60 of the 100, is required to stop the filibuster – or signal that one would not succeed – and proceed to a vote.
    As a result of the current Senate split, the majority party – the 48 Democrats and two independents who generally caucus with them, plus Vice President Kamala Harris – cannot unilaterally decide to block filibusters and end debate on a bill. This effectively prevents most bills from ever being voted on without a sizable number of Republicans also agreeing to end debate.
    Many critics have called for the filibuster’s elimination. Its continued use was briefly in question during negotiations between the parties over how to run an evenly split Senate. But the filibuster has survived, and it will likely continue to be a major obstacle to passing legislation.

    As a comparative politics scholar, I have come to the conclusion that because many democratic constitutions already include so many other checks and balances, giving the minority party veto power over widely supported legislation is unnecessary, which is why most U.S. states and most democratic countries do not allow their legislators to filibuster.
    In June 2013, Texas State Sen. Wendy Davis filibustered an anti-abortion bill. While a version of the bill was eventually enacted, in 2016, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the abortion restrictions as unconstitutional. AP Photo/Eric Gay
    Plenty of checks and balances
    According to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, the filibuster ensures “that slim majorities can’t ram through half-baked ideas.” But even without the filibuster, it’s actually quite hard to pass legislation in the U.S., thanks to the Constitution’s robust separation of powers.
    Bills need to pass both chambers of Congress with majority support, which can be a huge hurdle. Founder James Madison argued that having two chambers was beneficial, as it prevents the passage of “improper acts of legislation.” Not every government has two legislative chambers, however. There is only one chamber in Nebraska’s legislature – just like the national legislatures of Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Luxembourg, New Zealand and Norway.
    Even if the bill has the support of the majority in both the Senate and the House, it still faces a potential presidential veto, which can be overridden only by a two-thirds supermajority in both congressional chambers. Yet, at the state level, many legislatures can override vetoes by their governor with a simple majority, which is the same threshold needed to override presidential vetoes in Estonia, France and Italy. Other democracies, such as Austria and Germany, don’t even have a presidential veto.
    If a bill somehow gets passed by Congress and is signed by the president, the Supreme Court can still declare it unconstitutional and strike the law off the books. Not all democracies give their highest court this power: The Constitution of the Netherlands, for instance, explicitly prohibits this. In Switzerland, the highest court can strike down laws passed by the cantons, which are similar to U.S. states, but cannot overturn federal legislation.
    In August 1957, Sen. Strom Thurmond, then a South Carolina Democrat, attempted to prevent the passage of the Civil Rights Act by filibustering for a record 24 hours and 18 minutes. Bettman via Getty Images
    The creation and weakening of the filibuster
    McConnell argues that the filibuster plays a crucial role in our constitutional order. Yet, it’s important to point out that the founders did not include the filibuster in the U.S. Constitution, and the filibuster became part of the Senate’s rules only by mistake when then-Vice President Aaron Burr recommended that the Senate clean up its rulebook by removing redundant language.
    One of the rules that was axed in 1806 at Burr’s behest empowered a simple majority to cut off debate. Eventually, this mistake was realized and exploited when the Senate endured its first filibuster in 1837.
    Since that time, there have been many efforts to restrict the use of the filibuster. A frustrated Woodrow Wilson – the only U.S. president to have earned a Ph.D. in political science – once noted that the “Senate of the United States is the only legislative body in the world which cannot act when its majority is ready for action.” In 1917, he successfully curbed the use of the filibuster by pressuring the Senate to adopt a rule that allowed for a two-thirds supermajority to end debate.
    In 1974, the Senate further limited the use of the filibuster by agreeing that when using a process called “reconciliation” to pass a budget-related bill, debate in the Senate is limited to 20 hours. Effectively this means that reconciliation bills cannot be filibustered, as debate cannot continue in perpetuity.
    After the maximum allotted time for debate has elapsed, reconciliation bills require only the approval of a simple majority. This process was used in 2017 to pass Donald Trump’s tax cuts with only 51 votes. This same process is being used to try and pass President Joe Biden’s coronavirus relief package.
    In 1975, senators reduced the two-thirds supermajority required to end debate to the present three-fifths, thereby creating the current 60-vote threshold.
    In 2013, the filibuster was again weakened when Democrats, then in the majority, eliminated its use on all presidential nominees except those to the Supreme Court, in response to the repeated Republican obstruction of Barack Obama’s nominees.
    In 2017, Republicans, having retaken the Senate, went one step farther by eliminating the use of the filibuster on Supreme Court nominees. All three of Trump’s nominees to the nation’s highest court – Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett – were confirmed with fewer than 60 votes.
    After senators changed the rules in 2017 to prevent the filibustering of Supreme Court nominations, three justices, including Amy Coney Barrett in 2020, were confirmed to the court with fewer than 60 votes. Senate Television via AP
    The obstruction of progress
    In recent years, the filibuster has not hurt Republicans as much as Democrats because the GOP has focused on cutting taxes and confirming judges, both of which can now bypass the filibuster thanks to Senate rule modifications.
    Democrats, on the other hand, are going to have a hard time making major health care changes or enacting immigration reform, as both would be vulnerable to a Republican filibuster.
    [Deep knowledge, daily. Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter.]
    The U.S. system has been designed with more checks and balances than many other successful democracies. Eliminating the filibuster would bring the federal government in line with the majority of U.S. states and democratic countries around the world. More