Philippa Kaur

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    Making Sense of the Tigray War in Ethiopia

    FO° Insights is a new feature where our contributors make sense of issues in the news.

    Even as the focus has been on Ukraine, a bloody and brutal conflict has raged in Tigray for 17 months but hardly attracted global attention. On March 25, rebel Tigrayan forces declared that they would respect a ceasefire proposed by Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed as long as sufficient aid was delivered to their war-scarred northern region “within reasonable time.”

    Martin Plaut on the Tigray War, Ethiopia and More

    In this episode, we have the former BBC World Service Africa Editor explain what is going on in the Tigray War in Ethiopia and you can read what he has to say below.

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    How significant is the humanitarian ceasefire in Ethiopia’s Tigray region?

    This is the first real breakthrough in the negotiating process that we’ve had since the war began in November 2020. There have been terrible bitter months in which there has been a huge loss of life. As per estimates, up to 500,000 people have died either from the conflict or from starvation in Tigray. The whole of Tigray is surrounded by enemies with the Eritreans to the north and the Ethiopians to the south, the east and the west.

    To avoid starvation, it is vital that supplies get through. The Tigrayans need something like a hundred (100) trucks a day. They’ve had 100 trucks in the last, I don’t know, six weeks. There’s starvation in Tigray and humanitarian assistance is desperately needed.

    Why has the ceasefire taken so long?

    Essentially the Ethiopians and the Eritreans who are prosecuting this war have used starvation as a weapon of war. They are trying to crush the Tigrayan population whom they loathe by any means possible. They attempted to invade the country in November 2020 but that didn’t work. The Tigrayans had to flee their capital but, after a few months, they reorganized and they pushed the Eritreans and the Ethiopians right out of most of Tigray.

    There are only some areas on the west and in the far north of Tigray which are still occupied. So the Ethiopians and the Eritreans have basically used starvation as a weapon of war. They’ve cut all communications links, they’ve prevented medical supplies from coming in and they prevented the trucks from rolling in either through the east or through the south. The people are starving.

    Unique Insights from 2,500+ Contributors in 90+ Countries

    How serious is the humanitarian situation?

    The situation is terrible. As always, it is always the very young and the very old who die first. The problem is that we have no absolute certainty about what is going on because the government of Ethiopia and of Eritrea have refused to allow any journalists to the frontlines even on the Ethiopian and Eritrean sides, let alone into Tigray itself. All communications are cut to Tigray, banking services are cut, there’s no way of paying for anything, all fuel supplies going in have been prevented. So Tigray is almost like a sealed-off area and nobody knows really what is going on but we do get to know some things from whispers, and the whispers are terrible.

    Why has this war attracted less attention than Russia’s invasion of Ukraine?

    If you prevent all international journalists from going in, there’s a news vacuum. How do you cover a story when nobody is allowed to be on the ground? Then, you can’t actually get the shots, film the mother with the dying baby or the grandparents unable to feed themselves or look after themselves. You do not get this information we’re getting now, day in, day out, from Ukraine.

    You’re getting nothing from Mekelle, the capital of Tigray, let alone the rest of the area, some of which is very remote. Most monasteries have been looted, women have been routinely raped, I mean literally routinely raped. Some of the testimony was so brutal it is truly some of the worst I have ever seen in my life.

    What is at the stake for Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa?

    Essentially, there are two views of Ethiopia. As per one view, Ethiopia is an imperial country, a single unitary country that was developed in the 19th century and should really essentially return to that. The Tigrayan have another view. They say that we are all ethnic groups, we must all have a federated system in which real power reverts to all of the ethnic areas. That is what the Tigrayans tried to do until 2018 when they lost power. They tried to create this federation sometimes successfully, sometimes unsuccessfully.

    Essentially, those are the two views of how Ethiopia should be run and it’s equally the way in which the whole Horn of Africa should be governed.

    Unique Insights from 2,500+ Contributors in 90+ Countries

    How can Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed resolve this war?

    My view is if he doesn’t really allow an alternative view of the way Ethiopia is run then it is unlikely that we will have a resolution of this conflict. That will mean that we’ll go back to war. We’ve already seen somewhere between 200,000 and 500,000 people killed and that’s before you take in the deaths of the Somalis who fought in this war, of the Eritreans, tens of thousands of whom have been thrown into the frontline, so I mean the death toll could be immense.

    And we don’t want to see any more of this suffering so we really do need some kind of resolution that addresses the political as well as the humanitarian issues.

    This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.

    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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    Will the Pakistani Prime Minister’s Campaign Slogan Be “Yes, We Khan”?

    Nikkei Asiadescribes Prime Minister Imran Khan’s initiative that will send voters to the polls as “paving the way for [the] South Asian nation’s first ‘foreign policy election.’” As everything having to do with politics in Pakistan is complex, though perhaps never as complex as it has become today, untangling the threads of this constitutional crisis will not be easy. Nikkei’s characterization of what is likely to follow as a “foreign policy election” is accurate, though whether there will be an election depends on a decision of the Supreme Court.

    Pakistan has perhaps the most complex history of any Asian nation. At this moment of global repositioning accelerated by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, things have become more complicated than ever. This is due to the fact that Pakistan has been part of a geopolitical game involving India, China and Russia while sharing a traditionally porous border with Afghanistan. At the same, this young Muslim nation has the reputation of being consistently aligned with the United States since its creation in 1947. The US was persistently and largely embarrassingly involved in Afghanistan for four decades until President Joe Biden decided to pull out of a two-decade military occupation last summer.

    When the political crisis reached its peak on Sunday and Khan succeeded in avoiding a non-confidence vote, perhaps the most astonishing comment came from Major General Babar Iftikhar, the head of the military’s public relations wing, whodeclared that the “Army has nothing to do with the political process.” This might surprise attentive observers of Pakistani politics who have long understood that the military has always been the force controlling all the nation’s political processes.

    Khan has succeeded thanks to what some call a ruse. He has defined the crux of the current crisis to be Pakistan’s relationship with the United States. It has never been a secret that the nation’s military, as Chief of the Army Staff General Kamar Bajwaexplained last week, shares “a long and excellent strategic relationship with the US which remains our largest export market.”

    Today’s Weekly Devil’s Dictionary definition:

    Strategic relationship:

    A term to describe the level of cooperation, collaboration and respect that exists between two nations, the quality of which can range from a bond of mutually acknowledged equality to the exploitation of a lord over a vassal.

    Contextual note

    Before the actual move to dissolve parliament on Sunday, the BBCprovided its description of the state of political play. “Imran Khan, elected in July 2018 vowing to tackle corruption and fix the economy, remains popular with some voters, even though a lot of his public support has been lost as a result of rocketing inflation and ballooning foreign debt.” Khan was clearly aware of the public’s dissatisfaction with economic trends and may have reasons to fear the results of a general election. But, to his credit, Khan has been more active than previous prime ministers in reining in corruption.

    However, Pakistanis are so inured to corruption, they don’t necessarily see it as a disqualifying criterion. In an earlier article, the BBCquoted a disappointed citizen encountered in a barber shop who had voted for Khan in 2018 but appears ready to favor Khan’s opponents. They are allied with the Bhuttos and Sharifs, two families that have previously dominated Pakistani politics and are reputed to be notoriously corrupt. The BBC interlocutor did not seem to care much about that and said, “They might be corrupt but at least they help poor people.”

    Still, the political stakes may not be just “the economy, stupid.” The BBC cites another customer of the same barber shop. “We have to endure this hard time,” he stoically proclaims. “Imran Khan has taken a stance and we should stand with him.” What may not have been quite as clear at the time of the BBC’s survey of barber shop opinion is that Khan was ready turn the debate into exactly what Nikkei Asia described: “the nation’s first ‘foreign policy election.’”

    If that is the case, it will be interesting to see how Pakistan’s military seeks to influence the outcome of the crisis. The new formulation of the army’s neutrality concerning political processes seems even more surprising when taking into account a defiant remark General Bajwa made in March, when he attempted to push Khan to resign. He justified his activism with these words: “Allah didn’t allow us to be neutral as only animals are neutral.”

    Although Bajwa insisted on the longstanding alliance with the US — highlighting the American market’s importance for the economy as a destination for Pakistani exports —  anotherremark he made helps to explain how Pakistan’s geopolitical positioning may be shifting. “I believe,” he declared, that “the world today is built by those who believe in cooperation, respect and equality, instead of division, war-mongering and dominance.” This raises the interesting question of whom the Pakistanis see as nations focused on “cooperation, respect and equality” and whom they identify as warmongers. Bajwa squarely identified Russia’s incursion into Ukraine as putting it on the evil side of the balance, which contrasts with Khan’s insistence on not taking sides on the Russia-Ukraine conflict.

    Khan has focused on the perception of the US, which he sees as promoting the very “division, war-mongering and dominance” General Bajwa vilifies. The prime minister has made two claims: that he has evidence of a US plot to overthrow his regime and that the Pakistani military has sent him “written threats to step down.”

    Historical note

    Stepping back to situate these events in a broader historical context can help to clarify the issues. Recently talk of a “new world order” has made its way into the headlines. This idea has come from two opposite directions: Xi Jinping’s China and Joe Biden’s America. Xi’s version of a new world order is explicitly multipolar. “The rules set by one or several countries,” Xiproclaimed last year, “should not be imposed on others, and the unilateralism of individual countries should not give the whole world a rhythm.”

    Biden’sversion sounds not only different from Xi’s, as we might expect, but is paradoxically identical with what most people recognize as the old world order. “Now is a time when things are shifting,” Biden declared a week ago. “We’re going to – there’s going to be a new world order out there, and we’ve got to lead it. And we’ve got to unite the rest of the free world in doing it.” Anyone with a sense of historical reality may find it difficult to see any deep semantic difference between Xi’s evocation of imposing rules on others and Biden’s idea that “we’ve got to lead it.” The “unilateralism” Xi disparages appears to be precisely what Biden’s champions by insisting that “we’ve got to lead it.”

    In January, The Financial Times summed up theconclusion reached by Xi and Putin in the definition of their newly solidified partnership, noting that “the Russian and Chinese leaders are united by a belief that the US is plotting to undermine and overthrow their governments.” That is the message Khan has put forward and which will likely dominate the eventual election campaign that will follow the dissolution of parliament. More significantly, the increasingly obvious US strategy that consists of avoiding or undermining peace talks between Ukraine and Russia makes it look as if the US is focused on two basic objectives: undermining every government in the world that doesn’t fall into line and turning NATO into the superstructure of a unilateral empire controlled financially and militarily from Washington.

    Instead of a new world order, if that is the strategy of the US, it is little more than a reinforced version of the old world order, more military than ever. The major obstacle, however, is that a traditional ally such as Pakistan or a more recent one like India, who though opposed amongst themselves, can no longer be counted on to toe the line.

    Khan is probably right about a US-led effort at regime change. That seems to be the first reflex of any US president’s foreign policy. It has rarely, if ever worked, but at the core of US culture is the resolution to always “try again.” A lot of ordinary people around the world have become aware of the futility of that pattern. The political elites are only just beginning to feel the pressure to change this worn out pattern.

    What that means is that we are witnessing essentially a new world disorder. What follows is anyone’s guess.

    *[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 Fair Observer Devil’s Dictionary.]

    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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    Punjab Elections Mark a Watershed for Indian Democracy

    India, the world’s largest democracy has held elections since 1951 and largely changed both the national and state governments peacefully. Recently, five of India’s 28 states went to the polls. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won reelection in four out of the five states. The opposition Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) won in the northwest border state of Punjab, beating the historic Congress Party.

    What Is Remarkable About AAP’s Victory?

    The AAP is a relatively new party. Founded in 2012, it is led by Arvind Kejriwal who is the chief minister of Delhi, India’s national capital. Unlike Punjab, Delhi is not a state. It is one India’s eight union territories, some of which are administered directly while others have their own legislatures. A 1991 act of parliament gave the national capital its own legislature and the first election to the Delhi Legislative Assembly was held in 1993.

    The Delhi government does not have the same powers as that of states such as Punjab, West Bengal or Tamil Nadu. The union cabinet that operates out of the British-built New Delhi, a part of Delhi, retains control over law, public order and the police. Both the AAP and the BJP operate out of Delhi and are political rivals with a history of troubled relations.

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    The AAP’s victory in Punjab is a historic moment in Indian democracy. It has defeated the Congress Party, the grand old party of the nation that ruled Punjab for the last five years, as well as the Akali Dal, the regional powerhouse. The AAP has expanded from the national capital to a nearby state. In the eyes of many, the AAP is the new face of the opposition that could replace the sclerotic Congress Party and mount a challenge to the BJP.

    The AAP’s victory in Punjab is significant. Punjab may be one of India’s smaller states but it is a strategic one for the country. With a population estimated to be over 30 million people, it borders Pakistan. Punjab is the home of Sikhs, a five-century old religious and philosophical tradition started by Guru Nanak with followers around the world. During the bloody partition of British India into India and Pakistan, Punjab was partitioned too. Ishtiaq Ahmed has chronicled the tragedy of Punjab in consummate detail and that trauma lives on to this day.

    Pakistan worries about Punjab as a springboard for a tank-led offensive to Lahore that lies 24 kilometers from the border. India worries about a threat to Amritsar, home to the Golden Temple — the holiest Sikh shrine. In the 1980s, Pakistan supported a Sikh insurgency against India and the army had to storm the Golden Temple itself in 1984. Some diehard Sikh extremists still want an independent Sikh state of Khalistan. A new untested party in the strategic state of Punjab is a dramatic new development for Indian democracy.

    Can the AAP Replicate Its Delhi Model in Punjab?

    Many argue that the AAP has done a good job in Delhi. Newspapers like The Hindu and The Print have published editorials about the success of the AAP’s education reforms in Delhi. It has also won kudos for its welfare measures such as distributing free electricity and water as well as improving healthcare. While many contest the extent of change, it is clear that voters in Punjab have bought into the Delhi model. As a strategic state of the union, Punjab presents both new opportunities and challenges for the AAP.

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    For a start, the AAP will now control law, public order and the police. This is a big responsibility in a border state with a history of insurgency. In recent years, drug abuse has haunted Punjab as have allegations of political and bureaucratic corruption. The AAP will have to provide funding for the police in Punjab, something it has not had to do in Delhi, where the law gives the union government control over the police as well the responsibility for its funding.

    To put the matter in perspective, it is instructive to take a look at the numbers. In India’s financial year, beginning April 1 and ending March 31, of 2020-21, the budget for the Delhi Police exceeded $1 billion (over 80 billion rupees). In the 2021-22 financial year, this expenditure is estimated to rise to over $1.4 billion (over 110 billion rupees). Police funding from the union government has given the AAP leeway to fund welfare measures for its voters.

    Besides, Delhi has a much larger economy than Punjab. The 2019-20 gross state domestic product (GSDP) of Delhi was estimated to be over $110 billion (over 8.5 trillion rupees) while that of Punjab was about $75 billion (nearly 5.8 trillion rupees). Delhi’s population is only marginally higher than Punjab and is nearing 31 million people. This makes the GDP per capita differential higher, making Punjab a much poorer place to run for the AAP.

    Punjab once led the nation in prosperity. Till the pre-insurgency years, Punjab had the highest per capita GDP in the country thanks to India’s green revolution that high-yielding seeds, fertilizers and irrigation enabled. This revolution led to other problems that Atul Singh and Manu Sharma chronicled in their 2021 analysis of farm reforms. Yet despite these problems, Punjab ranked third in per capita GDP in the country till 2000-01. Today it has slipped to the 16th position in the country. Furthermore, statistics from the Reserve Bank of India reveal that Punjab’s growth rate has been one of the slowest in the country.

    Punjab’s smaller GSDP and lower growth rates present a big challenge to the state’s public finances. While Delhi’s goods and sales tax (GST) revenue for December 2021 was a little over $493 million (37.54 billion rupees), Punjab’s GST revenue was nearly $207 million (15.73 billion rupees). Punjab has lower revenue and higher expenditure than Delhi. Its fiscal liabilities have risen from nearly $14.8  billion (more than 1.12 trillion rupees) on March 31, 2015 to more than $27.8 billion (nearly 2.12 trillion rupees) on March 31, 2019. While Delhi is nearly debt-free, Punjab runs large deficits and is highly indebted.

    Furthermore, Punjab’s budget is burdened by many rigid spending items like interest payments, salaries, pensions and power subsidies. It has benefited from farm subsidies that India’s XV Finance Commission has declared unsustainable. Punjab’s agriculture has sucked its groundwater, consumed electricity inefficiently, increased pollution dramatically, caused health problems and run out of steam. Neither industry nor services have stepped in to fill the void.

    The AAP has won 92 out of 117 seats in Punjab. It has promised “employment, education, health, free electricity, freedom from drug menace and agricultural reforms.” Given Punjab’s perilous fiscal condition, the AAP will find it much harder to fulfill its promises in this border state than in Delhi, making it very difficult to mount a national challenge to the BJP. More

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    Philosophers Weigh in on the Use and Abuse of Power

    Wars are nasty affairs that destroy people, property and, so long as they last, any hope of perceiving even minimal truth in the news. That is why, after an urgent appeal initiated by the United Nations following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, a group of philosophers from the world’s most prestigious universities came together last week to pool their thoughts on how political power might be redesigned to carry out policies aimed at improving rather than degrading the world. They also addressed the essential question of whom the people should entrust with political power in democracies where they have the right to do so.

    One participant referred to the conference as the “Davos of Metaphysicians.” More than 40 philosophers hailing from top universities such as Harvard, Oxford, Cambridge, Princeton, Columbia, Sciences Po, Australian National University, Delhi University, Peking University,  the Universities of Bologna, Salamanca and Mexico City, agreed to meet after receiving strict instructions not to let the media even suspect the existence of the event before the publication of the final report. Moreover, to ensure a minimum of contamination, the organizers excluded from the debate any philosopher who had even dabbled in political thought or geopolitical matters in any publication at any point in their career. It was feared that anyone with such a profile might be compromised and be tempted to avert the press.

    Philosophers Refute Plato

    After four days of deliberations, which some privately called excruciatingly frustrating and unproductive, the council of philosophers emerged from a state of secrecy worthy of a papal conclave to issue a statement that began by countering Plato’s ancient recommendation that a good republic should be governed by philosophers. The council had the humility to cite its own chaotic deliberations as an illustration of why philosophers could not be trusted to govern effectively or even run any significant political entity.

    The council then began by listing other profiles that should equally be excluded from any role in governing. Inspired by the ancient Athenian example, a significant majority agreed that it would always be dangerous to attribute power to any professional politician, a status they defined as anyone who has served in an office of public service for more than a fixed number of months or years. The council failed to agree on a specific number but settled on an outside limit of not more than three years.

    The most radical philosophers proposed a term of three months for any political office. Their proposal is worth citing because it stipulated that after three months of service, the outgoing political representatives would assist and advise their incoming counterparts with full decision making authority to ensure continuity in government. This innovative idea was rejected by the majority of philosophers.

    Philosophers found it hard to reach agreement on numerous other issues. In their defense, they had only four days of deliberations. One of them complained afterwards that they failed to agree upon the mode of selection of public officials. Some wanted a lottery à la ancient Athens. Others wanted a good old fashioned election. Yet others such as the Indians and the Chinese suggested tough entrance examinations. A few wanted a combination of all three models. This matter could not be resolved for lack of time.

    The Smoke Signal

    On the afternoon of the fourth day, the council of philosophers broke its seal of secrecy and notified what they considered the most reputable media organization in the Western world to unveil the outcome of their deliberations. Fair Observer has seen the final report and finds the council’s work insightful. Other media organizations do not share this sentiment. They complained that the philosophers had failed to notify the media in advance. Besides, with Ukraine going on, who had time to pay attention to egg-headed philosophers?

    With few exceptions, the media appeared to refuse to publish the results of the conference or even acknowledge its existence. The philosophers took umbrage and declared that philosophers should not be the only group not allowed to govern. Anyone who had ever worked with the media in any capacity should be excluded from governing. They also made a unanimous recommendation that anyone trusted with governing should be prohibited from accepting any remunerated activity with the media after stepping down from office.

    The council of philosophers also excluded several  other professions from governing, including lawyers, financial professionals, C-level executives, military officers, entertainment and sports professionals. The council could come to no definitive agreement about shopkeepers and published an inconclusive statement about them. The council nearly degenerated into a riot when the question of teachers came up. The debate was so acrimonious that at one point the chairman of the session, a distinguished female philosopher at Cambridge, barely escaped injury from a cell phone tossed at her head. Numerous chairs and tables were damaged, some beyond repair.

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    Because of deep disagreement on the question of trusting teachers to govern, the philosophers decided that a new conference would be required in 2023 just to deal with that issue. One anonymous philosopher remarked that this was largely because nearly every philosopher is either currently teaching or has done so in the past. Several participants mentioned that the one thing the majority of philosophers could agree on is that self-interest is a significant variable capable of perverting any governance decision, whatever the form of government. The full report of the council is available at this link, which we urge all readers to consult.

    Most commentators in the media deny that such a conference of philosophers even took place. Assuming that no such conference assembled, a reasonable case can still be made that, given the flagrant failure of our political institutions to avoid not just war, but also the destruction of the environment, pandemics, imminent famine in many parts of the world and ever-growing economic injustice, the insight of a council of philosophers sincerely attempting to answer the question of how political power is structured and what it accomplishes could be deemed desirable.

    But the philosophers cited above, whether or not they actually exist, were probably right. The philosophers themselves cannot be counted on to lead, and those who hold power cannot be counted on to follow whatever authentic wisdom philosophers might produce.

    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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    Radicalization and the Role of Video Games

    The audience for video games is massive. According to Nielsen, 82% of global consumers either played video games or watched content related to them in 2020 — a trend accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic.

    The Fusion of Polish Nationalist Groups and Roman Catholicism

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    In 2019, the anti-hate organization ADL published survey data of US gamers, revealing that 23% of respondents had been exposed to white supremacist ideology in online games. Given recent surges in right-wing extremism and violence, including concerning trends in youth radicalization, understanding the extent to which this hugely popular medium offers a potential vector for radicalization is important.

    Gaming and Right-Wing Extremism

    There is a growing corpus of literature exploring the intersection between gaming and right-wing extremism. This includes work that focuses on the cultural overlap between online extremism and gaming communities; potential vulnerabilities that might mean gamers are more susceptible to radicalization; the gamification of extremist activity; and discussion of the “gamergate” controversy that saw a number of gamers involved in coordinated online trolling help drive online extremism.

    However, there is a limited body of work exploring the use of gaming platforms for recruitment by extremists, with much of the content exploring this phenomenon being largely anecdotal, such as a report in November 2020 by Sky News on the radicalization of a 14-year-old boy in the United Kingdom which suggested that the boy had been shown “extreme neo-Nazi video games” by his older brother.

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    Understanding whether there are concerted radicalization efforts that seek to leverage online gaming to reach new audiences has implications for regulatory discussions, interventions and prevention efforts.

    Our Findings

    To help fill this dearth in knowledge, the digital analysis unit at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD) engaged in a piece of scoping research across four platforms associated with online gaming. This included two live-streaming services — Twitch and DLive, which both host individuals who broadcast online gaming to digital audiences, and which have both been used to stream extremist activity.

    Additionally, we explored Steam, the PC game digital distribution service that also provides a platform for gamers to build community groups, and Discord, a chat application originally designed for gamers that has been notably used by right-wing extremists.

    To better understand the potential for overlap between extremism and gaming, we used digital ethnography to scope these platforms, searching for users and communities promoting extremist content. In total, we identified 45 public groups associated with the extreme right on Steam, 24 extreme right chat servers on Discord, 100 extreme right channels on DLive and 91 channels on Twitch.

    These communities and individuals commonly promoted racist, exclusionary and supremacist material associated with the extreme right, including the sharing of material from proscribed terrorist organizations on Discord.

    We then qualitatively analyzed the content shared by these extremist channels and publicly accessible discussion threads to explore the extent that gaming was being used to radicalize or recruit individuals.

    Here we identified several ways in which extremists use gaming. In some instances, extremists would use politically aligned games, such as “Feminazi: The Triggering” as a means to signify their ideology to their peers. Additionally, we found evidence that extremists used historical strategy games to role-play extremist fantasies, such as winning the Second World War for Nazi Germany or killing Muslims in the Crusades. However, although we found ample evidence that extremists are using gaming platforms, we found limited evidence to suggest they are using them to radicalize or recruit new members.

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    Instead, extremists primarily seemed to use gaming as a means of building bonds and community with their peers, as well as more broadly to blow off steam. Whilst there has been a focus in preexisting literature on extremist-created games, we found that a majority of extremist gamers preferred popular mainstream titles such as “Call of Duty” or “Counter-Strike.” Additionally, although anecdotal evidence suggests that young people are being groomed over online games, we didn’t find content that corroborated this.

    Future Research

    Although there were gaps in our methodology — in particular, we didn’t seek to play online games with extremists — these preliminary findings suggest that gamers seem to primarily use gaming in the same way that non-extremists do: as a hobby and past time. These findings have implications for policy responses to online radicalization as well as for future research. In particular, they highlight how extremist users have been able to find a home on gaming platforms online.

    Our project was designed as scoping research to pick up on key trends and didn’t attempt to gauge the scale and reach of these communities, but it is important that future digital research tracks the size of extremist communities so that proportional policy responses can be proposed.

    *[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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    What Is Vladimir Putin’s Endgame?

    After a series of horrific events, I am sat wearing four layers of clothing while penning this piece. Other than at the time I was writing the article, “Is Moscow Turning Off the Gas Tap?” — when the heating was coincidently not working at my office — I decided to turn off my radiator on purpose.

    Ending the War in Ukraine

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    Ridiculous as it might sound, it is my tiny attempt to act against Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, to somehow fight this sense of helplessness, being forced to watch the events unfold, without being able to do much.

    Building Up to War in Ukraine

    It all started a couple of days before February 24, which is when Russia invaded Ukraine. I was preparing for a trip to Kyiv to check on my friends in the Ukrainian capital. Following the latest developments, I tried to find any information that would confirm what the Russian ambassador to the EU had stated on February 16. Vladimir Chizhov said there would “be no escalation in the coming week, or in the week after that, or in the coming month.” Saying one thing and doing another has long been part of the Russian political playbook. Yet the cynicism in saying that wars in Europe “rarely start on a Wednesday” — in reference to US intelligence reports — just to actually invade eight days later is unacceptable.

    On Sunday, February 20 at around 10 pm, I ultimately decided not to set the alarm for later that night in order to arrive at the airport on time. I went to bed with a heavy heart and a sense of cowardice: I decided not to travel to Kyiv. I felt as if I had betrayed the Ukrainian people, especially my friend, who assured me that everything was fine and everyone was calm. Over the next few days, I tried to drown out the voice in the back of my head saying, “You should have gone” by repeating this mantra to myself: If you bring an umbrella, it will not rain.

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    And then we all heard the news. I can only imagine how it must have felt to be actually woken up by air raid sirens — it’s unfathomable. I saw a map of Ukraine showing where the Russian bombs hit. I reached out to friends and colleagues in these places. So far, they are fortunately all fine. I admire their strength and bravery for remaining in Ukraine.

    Back in the office in Vienna, I sat with my colleagues. While we tried to at least grasp what this meant for all of us, we began to realize that this was not just another crisis; this was a decisive development in history. This is war in Europe. It is not the first conflict in Europe since the end of World War II. It is not even the first in Ukraine; the country has been at war since 2014. Back then, during the Revolution of Dignity, the Euromaidan, Ukrainians gave their lives for democracy, our democracy.

    That is precisely why it is only logical for Ukraine to apply for membership in the European Union. Although there is no shortcut to joining the EU, under certain circumstances, it can become possible. Membership in the union should not only remain symbolic. I have written more about this here. In fact, I have been arguing with colleagues about granting such rights to all eastern partnership target countries since 2009. This would, of course, not have prevented anything today. Other actions might have, such as reducing the import dependency on natural resources after the Russia–Ukraine gas crisis of the same year.

    But there is no use in dwelling on the past. Instead, I want to think about the future. Therefore, I have compiled five different scenarios about how the situation in Ukraine could develop. None of them must become a reality, and some of them, hopefully, will not.

    1: All-out (Nuclear) War

    Nuclear war is certainly the worst-case scenario for all sides. An increasingly frustrated and isolated Vladimir Putin, the president of Russia, decides to use tactical nuclear weapons to submerge the Ukrainian resistance. Even if it will “only” involve non-nuclear attacks continuing the obliteration of whole cities and committing war crimes, the democratic international community seriously asks themselves if they can allow this to happen.

    Even if they do, the probability that Putin will stop at the border with Poland, Hungary, Slovakia, the Baltics or Finland is delusional. Consequently, NATO, sooner or later, has to get involved, resulting in World War III.

    I believe that we are actually already at war since February 24 but haven’t realized it yet. It might also continue as a war of attrition and continue indefinitely.

    2: Novorossiya

    This second scenario refers to what Putin himself mentioned in one of his infamous television Q&As in 2014. It has been used in various contexts, with reference to Alexander Dugin, but also as an idea raised by the so-called People’s Republics in Donetsk and Luhansk of the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine. The planned confederation was ultimately not implemented.

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    The reference dates back to a more or less geographically same area referred to as “New Russia” during the Soviet era until the turn of the century. In any case, Putin mentioned the cities of Kharkiv, Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson, Mykolaiv and Odessa — essentially the whole Black Sea coast of Ukraine, linking up the Russian Federation with Transnistria. Since the Transnistria War in 1992, Russian troops have been stationed in the breakaway territory, which is officially part of Moldova.

    This scenario involves the creation of many more “people’s republics,” which are under the influence — politically and economically — of the Kremlin and dependent on it. Recognition of such republics by Moscow or even integration into the Russian Federation is also a possibility.

    Further separatist regions beyond Ukraine are also declared, expanding Russian influence even more. This takes place mostly in the Caucasus, but also in the direction of the former spheres of influence of the Soviet Union.

    3: Fragmentation

    In a more hopeful scenario, Putin’s aggression leads to destabilization within the Russian Federation. While having to devote a majority of the country’s military capacities but also attention and political capital toward Ukraine, old separatist attempts resurface.

    The control over Chechnya is substantially weakened due to the de-facto defeat of Ramzan Kadyrov’s forces. But also further disintegration occurs. Not necessarily violently, but more economic-based toward dependence of Siberia on China or Vladivostok on Japan. The resulting fragmentation and volatility have major consequences for the whole neighborhood but also geopolitically.

    4: Coup d’état

    There have been (too optimistic) rumors about a possible coup being planned by the Federal Security Service (FSB) of Russia. Leaks from the “Wind of Change” lead to an ousting of Putin and his closest circle.

    While it cannot be ruled out, there should not be any false hope. If the security forces and/or the military carry out a coup d’état, we will not see any democratic regime change.

    Most likely, the people belonging to the closest circle of power are replaced, but the mafia system continues with a new godfather who ends the war but distributes the spoils. It is also possible that we will see a military hard-liner taking charge, which could then end in scenario one.

    5: Democratic Revolution

    The most optimistic, but unfortunately most unlikely, scenario would foresee the sanctions against Russia and the isolation of the federation as leading to the people bringing regime change and possibly democratization.

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    In a Maidan-style occupation of the Red Square, Putin is unable to suppress the opposition any longer. It takes a lot of time to account for past actions, reconciliation and anti-corruption measures, but the missed opportunity of the 1990s is finally taken up. Coupled with the enlarged EU economic and security cooperation, there is now a counterpart to the geopolitical volatility caused by China’s ambitions and the political instability of the United States.

    The Outlook

    Regardless of which direction the situation takes (although I most certainly have a preference), it is necessary to be prepared for all eventualities. It is a good sign that there has been enough awareness for Ukraine as well as the necessity to think about the economic requirements to rebuild after the war.

    Nevertheless, it is possible to achieve peace, especially with regard to the importing of oil and gas from Russia. Far too often, we are focused on the immediate costs and do not look at the possibilities. A transition to renewable energy is more necessary than ever, but the hesitancy has kept us dependent on Moscow. Just imagine what the situation would have looked like if a transition had been sped up in 2009.

    Hopefully, we have finally learned the lesson. After all, the price we pay is just money. Ukraine is paying with its life, its infrastructure and, ultimately, its future.

    *[Fair Observer is a media partner of the Institute for the Danube Region and Central Europe.]

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    When Will We Know the Bleeding Truth?

    In an article for Bloomberg, British historian Niall Ferguson expresses his strategic insight into the real motives of the Biden administration concerning the course of the war in Ukraine. Officially, the US claims to be acting in the interest of Ukraine’s defense in an effort to support democracy and reaffirm the principle of sovereignty that permits any country to join an antiquated military alliance directed by the United States, on the other side of a distant ocean.

    Less officially, President Joe Biden has been emphasizing the emotional side of US motivation when he wants to turn Russia into a “pariah,” while branding its president as a “war criminal” and a “murderer.” Biden’s rhetoric indicates clearly that whatever purely legal and moral point the United States cites to justify its massive financial engagement in the war, its true motivation reflects a vigilante mindset focused on regime change.

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    The administration denies it has regime change on its mind. But Ferguson cites a senior administration official who privately confided that Biden’s “end game now … is the end of Putin regime.” The historian concludes that rather than seek a negotiated end to the war, the US “intends to keep this war going.”

    As usual in foreign policy matters, Ferguson notes a certain convergence of viewpoint from his own government. He quotes an anonymous source affirming that the United Kingdom’s “No. 1 option is for the conflict to be extended and thereby bleed Putin.” A little later in the article, Ferguson qualifies as “archetypal Realpolitik” the American intent “to allow the carnage in Ukraine to continue; to sit back and watch the heroic Ukrainians ‘bleed Russia dry.’”

    Today’s Weekly Devil’s Dictionary definition:

    Bleed (a country):

    To encourage and prolong an unnecessary and unjustified conflict in the interest of sucking the life out of the political establishment of a declared enemy, a process that usually automatically implies sucking the life out of at least one other country, including eventually one’s own

    Contextual Note

    Ferguson dares to question the dominant belief in the US that bleeding Russia is a recipe for success. “Prolonging the war runs the risk not just of leaving tens of thousands of Ukrainians dead and millions homeless, but also of handing Putin something that he can plausibly present at home as victory,” he writes.

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    When the focus is both on bleeding and prolonging the combat, there is a strong likelihood that the bleeding will be shared. If a boxer sees a cut over his opponent’s eye, he may strategically focus all his punches on the opponent’s face hoping for a technical knockout. But, by focusing on the loss of blood, he may drop his guard with the risk of getting knocked out or opening his own bleeding wound.

    “I fail to see in current Western strategizing any real recognition of how badly this war could go for Ukraine in the coming weeks,” Ferguson observes. The reason may simply be that the hyperreal moment the Western world is now living through is proving too enjoyable to critique, at least for the media. The more horror stories of assaults on innocent civilians make their way into the headlines, the more the media can play the morally satisfying game of: here’s one more reason to hate Vladimir Putin.

    If the White House is focused, as it now appears, not on saving Ukrainian democracy but on bleeding Russia, all the stories of Russian abuse of brave civilians are designed with the purpose of prolonging the war, in the hope that, discredited by Putin’s failure to break Ukraine’s resistance, Russians will revolt and depose the evil dictator. In the meantime, those Ukrainians who manage to survive are being asked to play the supporting role of watching their country reduced to ruins.

    Ferguson speculates that US strategists have come to “think of the conflict as a mere sub-plot in Cold War II, a struggle in which China is our real opponent.” That would be an ambitious plan, riddled with complexity. But the Biden administration has demonstrated its incapacity to deal effectively even with straightforward issues, from passing the Build Back Better framework in the US to managing a pandemic.

    The Ukraine situation involves geopolitics, the global economy and, even more profoundly, the changing image of US power felt by populations and governments across the globe. At the end of his article, the historian describes this as an example of dangerous overreach, claiming that “the Biden administration is making a colossal mistake in thinking that it can protract the war in Ukraine, bleed Russia dry, topple Putin and signal to China to keep its hands off Taiwan.”

    Historical Note

    One salient truth about Americans’ perception of the Ukraine War should be evident to everyone. Today’s media thoroughly understands the American public’s insatiable appetite for the right kind of misinformation. Niall Ferguson makes the point that the US government may nevertheless be inept in providing it. The history of misinformation in times of war over the past century should provide some clues.

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    In 1935, Major General Smedley Butler wrote a book describing the logic behind his own service on several continents. Its title was “War Is a Racket.” He described the American vision of war as a quest for corporate profit. He tried to warn the nation of the inhumanity of such an approach to the use of military force. He manifestly failed because he was late to the game. Back in 1917, Edward Bernays, the “father of Public Relations,” seduced the American public into believing that the only motive for the nation’s invasions and wars is the spreading of democracy. It was Bernays who provided Woodrow Wilson with the slogan “make the world safe for democracy.”

    For the rest of his life, Bernays not only helped private companies boost their brands, he also consulted on foreign policy to justify regime change when it threatened a customer’s racket. In 1953, working for United Fruit, he collaborated with President Dwight Eisenhower’s secretary of state, John Foster Dulles, and his brother, CIA Director Allen Dulles, to overthrow Jacobo Arbenz, the elected president of Guatemala. Arbenz had a plan to redistribute to the country’s impoverished peasants “unused land” monopolized by United Fruit. In a 2007 article for the Financial Times, Peter Chapman recounted that both Dulles brothers were “legal advisers” to United Fruit. Chapman notes that the company was also involved in the 1961 CIA-led Bay of Pigs invasion.

    In other words, concerning their impact on the American psyche, Bernays the PR man defeated Butler, celebrated at the time as America’s greatest living war hero. His fame was such that a group of powerful fascist-leaning businessmen tried to recruit him to overthrow President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the infamous 1933 “Business Plot.”

    Americans continue to rally around Bernays’ genius for reducing a suspect ideology to a catchy slogan. American interventions abroad are framed as noble efforts to support democracy and promote American business (Butler called them rackets). It’s a population of avid consumers of the media’s plentiful supply of misinformation.

    There are nevertheless odd moments when real information breaks through, though it rarely leaves much lasting impact. Last week, the Pentagon leaked news contradicting the narrative the State Department, the intelligence community and US media have unanimously adopted and promoted. In the Defense Department’s view, Russia’s invasion is not an example of unrestrained sadism toward the Ukrainian people. “As destructive as the Ukraine war is,” Newsweek reports, “Russia is causing less damage and killing fewer civilians than it could, U.S. intelligence experts say.”

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    The US military establishment calls it the “Russian leader’s strategic balancing act,” observing that Russia has acted with restraint. It realistically assesses that, far from seeking to subdue and conquer Ukraine, Putin’s “goal is to take enough territory on the ground to have something to negotiate with, while putting the government of Ukraine in a position where they have to negotiate.”

    Ferguson has gleaned his own evidence concerning US and UK strategy that “helps explain, among other things, the lack of any diplomatic effort by the U.S. to secure a cease-fire. It also explains the readiness of President Joe Biden to call Putin a war criminal.” Peace is no objective. Punishment is. This is a case where the Pentagon has received the message of Smedley Butler and dares to contradict an administration guided by the logic of Edward Bernays.

    *[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 Fair Observer Devil’s Dictionary.]

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    The Prospects of Peace in Afghanistan

    The Doha Agreement signed between the United States and the Taliban on February 29, 2020, not only set a date for the withdrawal of American forces from Afghanistan, but it also included certain obligations for the Taliban.

    Under this agreement, the Taliban are obligated to take measures to prevent terrorist groups from threatening the security of the US and its allies and to engage in a comprehensive intra-Afghan dialogue that would produce a political settlement. The hasty US troop withdrawal in August 2021 emboldened the Taliban to disregard their obligations under the deal and encouraged them to prioritize political takeover instead of a sustainable peace mechanism for Afghanistan.

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    The Doha Agreement and its contents undermined the sovereign government of Afghanistan at the time and provided an upper hand to the Taliban in both war and peace. Certain assurances in the deal enabled the Taliban to become stronger in both battlefield action and narrative propagation.

    These include the agreement’s references to a “new post-settlement Afghan Islamic government”; clauses on the release of Taliban combatants referred to as “political prisoners”; indirect legitimization of the Taliban shadow government by virtue of stipulations such as “the Taliban will not provide visas, passports, travel permits, or other legal documents”; and a complete lack of any mention of human rights protections in Afghanistan.

    Another Case of Failed Peacemaking

    The agreement is not the only pact that was expected to bring a peaceful end to the conflict in the country. In 1988, the Geneva Accords concluded under the auspices of the UN between Afghanistan and Pakistan, with the US and the Soviet Union serving as state guarantors, provided an overall framework for the settlement of the Afghan conflict and the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan. Likewise, the Bonn Agreement in 2001 — irrespective of whether it is categorized as a peace deal —established a process to manage the political transition in the post-Taliban Afghanistan. It briefly outlined steps from the formation of an interim administration to the development of a new constitution and holding elections.

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    However, neither the Geneva Accords nor the Bonn Agreement were successful and ultimately failed to foster conditions necessary for enabling a comprehensive settlement to Afghanistan’s complicated problem. More recently, the Taliban’s abject disregard for their commitments under the Doha Agreement, combined with the United States’ rushed exit, sped up the Taliban’s reemergence, once again closing an already narrow window of opportunity for achieving a durable political solution to the protracted conflict in Afghanistan.

    There is indeed a qualitative difference between the Geneva Accords, the Bonn Agreement and the Doha Agreement. However, one of the key reasons for their failure, among other factors, is that they are silent on the main cause of the conflict in Afghanistan — i.e., ethnic conflict.

    Afghanistan is a multiethnic country where the various ethnic groups are also geographically fragmented. Historically, divisions over who should lead the country and how have been among the core contentious issues in Afghanistan. Disagreements on this matter have manifested in violent ways in the 1990s and non-violent ways in the outcome of four presidential elections held based on the 2004 constitution. Overlooking of the main cause of the conflict and an absence of a viable mechanism for power redistribution among ethnic groups is a common thread that connects each of the three agreements that failed and continued to fuel instability.

    The Current Situation

    Less than two years since the Doha Agreement was signed, in August 2021, Kabul, the Afghan capital, fell to the Taliban. In the aftermath of this development, residences of several former government officials, particularly those from the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces (ANDSF), were raided and these personnel members were either killed or imprisoned. A UN report found that over 100 personnel from the Afghan security forces and others associated with the former Afghan government have been killed in the country, despite the Taliban announcing a general amnesty. 

    Moreover, despite the demands from the international community for the formation of an inclusive government, respect for human rights and counterterrorism assurances, the Taliban have refused to make any concessions. They have brazenly continued suppressing all dissenting voices, severely limiting women’s rights and persecuting civil society members and journalists.

    Peace in Afghanistan?

    It was apparent from day one that the prospects of the post-July 2018 efforts for a political settlement in Afghanistan were uncertain at best. The Doha Agreement simply laid out a possible schedule for the US withdrawal instead of guarantee or measures enabling a durable political settlement or peace process. The Taliban too negotiated the deal with the US with the aim of winning the war rather than seeking a peace deal or political settlement with their opponents.

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    The chaotic withdrawal of American forces and the mayhem at Kabul airport — which was reminiscent of the US pullout from Vietnam — has not only damaged the image of a powerful country like the US around the world, but has also established its reputation as an unreliable ally in times of difficulty. Given historical patterns and the Taliban’s track record, in the absence of any qualitative change of circumstances on the ground, the international community’s positive overtures to the Taliban might be yet another folly.

    As it stands, the prospects for peace in Afghanistan will remain distant for as long as the Taliban own the entire political apparatus rather than participate as a party in an inclusive and representative government and respect dissenting voices. In the meantime, the international community should use sanctions mechanisms and official recognition as the few remaining tools of leverage to hold the Taliban accountable to their commitments and to international legal standards.

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