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      Working Together Toward Peace in Yemen

      by

      Nothing in recent memory could have possibly done more damage to America’s relations with the Yemeni people and to its image in the region than Washington’s support for the Saudi-led military intervention in Yemen. The conflict produced the worst manmade catastrophe — one that never had to happen. As US President Joe Biden embarks on that treacherous mission to end his country’s involvement and, consequently, end the war itself, the extent to which regional crises are not just difficult to resolve, but intertwined, will become his most formidable adversary. But as the Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu said a long time ago, a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

      First, let us understand how we got here why Yemenis have become so very disappointed with and feel betrayed by the United States. Understanding that is critical to any future US efforts vis-à-vis Yemen.

      Cautiously Optimistic: The Biden Administration’s Options in Yemen

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      When in March 2015 the Saudi regime announced, from Washington, the commencement of the military intervention in Yemen, the Obama administration had already given its green light to the regime presided over by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. In fact, President Barak Obama went ahead to provide the Saudis with weapons and logistics support, including target-selection advisers and refueling of coalition fighter jets on their bombing raids. Obama’s decision effectively made the US a direct member of the Saudi-led coalition in both name and in fact, waging an undeclared war on a nation that never fired a single bullet against the United States.

      It’s Going to Be Quick

      It was going to be quick: a two-week expedition and it’s done, with minimum casualties — or so they thought. Granted, we can safely speculate that, despite Saudi Arabia’s well-known military incompetence, seen during the First Gulf War, and its total disregard for human life, Obama still could not have guessed how callous and, therefore, catastrophic the Saudi campaign would become. We can also grant that no one in Obama’s administration knew that Yemenis are not a people who can be subdued in two weeks or two years or even, as US ally Britain ultimately learned, in 128 years.

      No one, it seems, told Obama how crazy the idea was to intervene in a country dubbed the graveyard of foreign invaders nor, it seems, reminded Obama of previous US estimates of quick wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and how those turned out to be. Obama was a man in a hurry, and people in a hurry act fast. Consultations and critical thinking take time.

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      But why did Obama make this horrible decision that his successor, Joe Biden, is now trying hard to put right? Obama, in 2015, nearing the end of his presidency, was single-mindedly focused on leaving behind a glorious legacy of having achieved a breakthrough with Iran by signing the nuclear agreement, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which was going to be a crowning achievement of his foreign policy. It was also a deal that Washington’s regional ally, Saudi Arabia, together with Israel and the UAE, were vehemently opposed to, and still oppose.

      Obama’s decision to support Saudi war efforts was the appeasement gift that he gave the Saudis to quieten their protests in return for signing the JCPOA. For Yemen, the ink that Obama used to sign the JCPOA agreement was made from the blood of its people. Yemenis have been made to sacrifice their lives and livelihoods on the altar of the Iran nuclear deal and the regional and international political expediency and horse-trading that went with it. They have proven to be the most expendable people, both for their own tyrants and their regional and international counterparts.

      How Hillary Clinton, had she succeeded Obama, would have dealt with evidence of Saudi-led callousness, or whether she would have taken the decision to end the support for the coalition that Biden announced last week, is useless speculation after the fact. She was not elected. Instead, we had to contend with a disastrous presidency of Donald Trump, whose first order of regional business was to sign a $110-billion arms deal with Riyadh, progressively building to $380 billion, and continue to support and arm to the teeth the Saudi war on Yemen.

      You Break It, You Own It

      After Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria and Yemen, do we still need proof that military interventions, no matter how well-intended the protagonists claim them to be, do not solve but worsen crises? We should be excused for being scared when we hear President Biden promising to spread democracy worldwide, that “America is back.” We saw what happened when democracy became the calling card that substituted the weapons of mass destruction. Biden would be well advised to keep those good intentions on the back burner for the time being and instead focus on solving the destructive consequences of earlier good intentions. As history has repeatedly shown, the road to hell is indeed paved with them. 

      This will probably go down as Biden’s era. He better make it work. His first days in office have been loud and clear. And the sounds were, with some exceptions, mostly good. After earlier skepticism, this author is now becoming cautiously optimistic that Biden is determined to move in the right direction. At his age and time in his career, he has nothing to lose and everything to gain by doing the right thing for America — and eventually, hopefully, become convinced to leave Yemen alone to try to do the right thing on its own. Going forward, the best help the Biden administration can and must provide is not to do too much. Less is definitely more. But for now, the US must be held firmly accountable, applying the Pottery Barn rule: You break it, you own it.

      The United States must review its priorities. This brings us to Biden’s recent decision to stop arms supplies to the Saudi intervention in Yemen and revoking the Trump administration’s labeling of Ansar Allah (as the Houthis are officially known) as a terrorist organization. Biden’s administration understands that former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s decision was not aimed at Ansar Allah but was, in fact, one of the last minute mischievous moves that the Trump administration left behind to entrap Biden and tie his hands in a fait accompli. This was a trap that Biden is clearly not willing to fall into. Good for Biden. Good for Yemen. Good for peace.

      Away from Trump’s and Pompeo’s political mischief that has impressed only the gullible, Biden’s decision to suspend operational support and intelligence sharing, despite being symbolic in immediate military terms, is nevertheless very serious. Although the Saudi regime — the world’s leading arms importer accounting for 12% of the world’s arms trade — is able to continue the war from its large stockpiles (the UAE’s F35 fighter planes were not intended for delivery until 2027), Biden’s decision strongly indicates a very important change of priorities in the region.

      Embed from Getty Images

      Biden doesn’t view Iran as the bogeyman used by the Trump administration as an excuse to terminate the JCPOA while continuing arms sales and saber-rattling that created one of the most dangerous periods of continuous regional instability. For the Biden administration, that era has ended. It is now the era of diplomacy and finding solutions to problems, without kicking down doors. But let’s not get carried away with euphoria — it won’t be easy. Biden has the experience and resources to understand the challenges. That is why he is offering assurances.

      But even as Biden is moving toward the realignment of US priorities, with the aim of easing regional tensions, he must also be wary of Benjamin Netanyahu’s moves in the Persian Gulf. When it comes to Biden’s policies, Israel sees a window of opportunity to muscle in, hoping to replace what Netanyahu predicts to be America’s waning regional influence. Netanyahu is regionally encouraged in this mischief-making. Israel and its regional allies on the Arab side of the Persian Gulf are no friends of the JCPOA, which is a lynchpin in the Biden administration realignment. To succeed with the JCPOA partners, Biden will eventually have to confront all of Washington’s regional allies.

      It will be dangerous for Biden to ignore the threats. Equally dangerous will be any temptation to use Israeli mischief as leverage against Iran. Worse has been tried by the Trump administration; it didn’t work. The who-will-blink-first gambit between Tehran and Washington must stop. Perhaps, instead, walking the walk simultaneously could symbolize that unity of purpose that has been missing for four long and traumatic years. With that unity of purpose, the United States and Iran can also work toward finding a solution to the war in Yemen and stopping the misery of a nation that has paid a heavy price for the JCPOA. America and Iran owe it to the Yemenis. Biden has already made the opening moves, both by stopping the arms supplies and by assuring Riyadh that Washington has their back if Yemenis attack.

      Decision Time

      Yemenis must welcome this Biden assurance. It is not just offered as protection for Saudi Arabia, but useful for Yemen because it is a positive step towards peace. Yemen never had the intention or a plan to attack Saudi Arabia. But it was Saudi Arabia and UAE that sent the first missiles into Yemen’s capital city on that infamous night in March 2015. The coalition continued the air strikes relentlessly, despite mounting evidence of high civilian casualties. Yemeni retaliation became necessary to make the coalition slow down its attack — to try to make the pain mutual. The strategy largely worked.

      If Biden now wants to assure the Saudis and simultaneously ensure that they suspend the airstrikes, Yemenis must welcome that. It is up to Riyadh and Washington to determine how that protection would look. In any event, American protection for the Saudis is not new. But Yemen must insist that any future resumption of arms supplies to Saudi Arabia or the UAE must be accompanied by US assurances that the weapons will not be used against Yemen, with a reliable verification mechanism in place. For now, Yemenis must focus their energy on securing peace, taking advantage of the opportunity Biden’s policy shift offers. 

      President Biden has made his decision. It is a decision Yemenis have been demanding for a long time. Now it is up to the others involved in this horrendous war to make theirs. This war could not be possible without foreign actors, many of whom are sitting around the JCPOA table, supplying weapons to the regional and domestic parties to this war. The Biden administration should not stop at freezing US arms supplies but should pressure its NATO allies, especially Britain and France, to stop arms sales. Washington should also pressure regional actors to stop their funding and arms supplies to the various domestic forces. This will be an uphill battle, but one that Yemen needs to win.

      Before this war, a common estimate of the number of weapons among the Yemeni population was 50 million — a 2:1 ratio. That figure was more myth than reality. Today, after almost six years of conflict, it will be safe to assume that that figure is no longer mythical and may indeed have increased at the hands of militia groups, whose exact numbers or identities no one knows for sure. All these militias were created, funded and armed by regional actors, who still continue to do so today. The question of how to withdraw these weapons and end the anarchy of lawless militias operating in Yemen will continue to haunt the country for many years to come. The war that was ostensibly intended to restore a legitimate state in Yemen and improve the lives of its people has in reality become a war that has destroyed even a semblance of a state and instead created a humanitarian catastrophe for generations to come.

      Ironically, Ansar Allah, whose defeat was the stated objective of the military intervention, has not only gained greater public support inside and outside Yemen, but has emerged as the strongest and most organized group in the country without which no solution is possible. Like Iran, which has emerged as a regional power despite, or perhaps because, of 40 years of political, economic and even military aggression led by the United States, Ansar Allah has found a raison d’être from the war waged against it. In fact, it is not an exaggeration to suggest that the Saudi-led military intervention has given Ansar Allah a public relevance and strength it never dreamt of having. This is its war dividend. The question is, how much better can the peace dividend be?

      Embed from Getty Images

      Regardless of any dreams of governing Yemen that some within Ansar Allah may or may not have, the leadership has demonstrated itself to be pragmatic enough to acknowledge the limits of any ambitions of forming a central government in a nation as diverse as Yemen. Centralization has failed several times in the past, and it will fail again. A federation of several states (six are currently proposed) has been the major focus of Yemenis’ attention in seeking the creation of a federal state. Strong opposition to the proposed six-state federation might necessitate accepting a union between southern and northern states under a federal or even a confederal system, which will prevent a total collapse of the current union resulting in continuous wars. Yemenis have painfully lived through that before.

      When the war finally comes to an end, finding a working formula acceptable to everyone will be a major challenge. Negotiations leading to successful agreements, by definition, are those that give something — but not everything — to everyone. The alternative to that formula is war. There can be no maximalist or zero-sum solutions that can bring enduring peace to Yemen. The peace dividend for all parties must be found within that formula, led by Yemeni negotiators willing to put everything on the table with no preconditions except ending the war and bringing peace, stability and prosperity to Yemen.

      Peace Dividend

      Contrary to what the group actually believes, nothing can be more burdensome and exert more pressure on Ansar Allah and the other warring factions than a reopening of Yemen’s entry points, especially airports and seaports. People returning to the country seeking opportunities, encouraged to start rebuilding their lives, is a strong fait accompli, requiring those in power to measure up to the challenge. Despite current difficulties, Yemenis have the spirit and mindset to return immediately if routes are opened. It is relatively easy to rule a country at war and under a blockade through oppression. It becomes much harder when the world is paying close attention to the evolution of peace as the nation is rebuilding.

      Like any group or political party, there are various political viewpoints within Ansar Allah, ranging from ideologically unyielding to politically pragmatic. The challenge is to formulate an approach that can navigate a middle ground within the group as a whole. Attempts to use these divergent political viewpoints as fissures to be exploited will be dangerous for the entire effort and delay or, worse, torpedo the peace process. Spoilers are created by such an approach. We have come to this point, partly because of those who think they can cleverly do exactly that.

      Instead of cleverness, what is needed in these times is wisdom, the ability to work patiently across all divides and a commitment to Yemen as a whole and not to partisan politics or gains. Anger and protests are a necessary tool to bring focus to the problem. Yemenis must continue to agitate and make good trouble for the powers at play, to make them pay attention to the problem. However, solving the problem requires cool heads and a different focus.  

      As efforts to bring an end to the war are planned, identifying the moving parts and the various components of the war are a must. As much as Ansar Allah’s strength is derived from the Saudi intervention, it also benefits to a large extent from the disarray among its adversaries, particularly the government of Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, which itself is divided between his supporters and those of his opponents at the Southern Transitional Council (STC), whose agenda is to secede from the union. Refusing to identify themselves as Yemenis, they have nevertheless failed to come up with an alternative identity. So they call themselves “southerners” — a geographical location rather than a national identity.

      Apart from fighting Ansar Allah, the divided Hadi government and the STC are fighting against each other for turf in the south as Ansar Allah quietly watches from the sidelines, probably waiting to pick up the pieces. The coalition, now comprising only of Saudi Arabia and the UAE, is expressively committed to restoring legitimacy (meaning Hadi’s government) and supporting opposing parties in the battles between Hadi’s government (supported by Saudi Arabia) and the STC (supported by the UAE). Effectively, the Saudi-UAE coalition, despite all claims of unity, is in fact locked in a proxy war for influence in south Yemen.

      And if all that is not bizarre enough, there is the Islah Party, Yemen’s Muslim Brothers, declared as a terrorist organization by both Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Despite the designation, the party is a member of the Hadi government, which Saudi Arabia and the UAE are committed to restoring to power after defeating Ansar Allah.

      Embed from Getty Images

      However, domestic factions will not decide the peace in Yemen. They can, to a certain extent, for a certain period, act as spoilers of the peace process, but that’s as far as they can go if their sponsors and external actors decide to end the war. And most of those who can, in fact, those who must decide are sitting around the JCPOA table. That’s where the center of power is for the war in Yemen. Should those trying to move ahead with the JCPOA fail to bring peace to Yemen as a prerequisite of the implementation of the nuclear deal, there are enough possibilities to wreck the JCPOA itself, irreparably. It should be remembered that Israel, Saudi Arabia and the UAE are not friends of the JCPOA. The three are also involved in the war in Yemen. One doesn’t need to be a genius to see how the lines crisscross.

      If Yemen gets help to find postwar peace and stability and is then left alone, the Biden administration and others in the region will find it a better partner to engage with, going forward. Yemen must move on from the era of leadership that continuously seeks external support and interference to compensate for its incompetence, corruption and failures. The country needs young energetic leaders who are invested in its future prosperity. A nation of 30 million with tremendous resources does not need charity. Instead, Yemenis must seek partnerships. Regional players who wasted billions seeking unfair geopolitical advantages through destructive war could have achieved greater benefits through partnerships with Yemen — for much less.

      Yemen’s hope is in its youth, despite, or perhaps because of a painful but educational 6-year war. There is still time to develop that mindset for the future. In as far as regional neighbors (and beyond) are concerned, Yemenis are a forgiving people. Yet lest future generations risk repeating it, we must never allow this Nakba to be forgotten. Yemen can and must forgive, and then move on.  

      Nothing is more sustainable than the need to get things done, no matter how misguided it might be at times. Generosity of the heart is whimsical. It was not generosity that induced President Obama to support Mohammed bin Salman’s war on Yemen. It was political expediency born from a misguided notion of need. Today, it is not the generosity of President Biden’s heart that will stop the war in Yemen but political expediency born from a real need. Both are related to the JCPOA.

      In 2015, for Barack Obama, the horrendous war in Yemen was a vehicle toward the Iran nuclear deal. For Obama’s former right hand, now President Biden, in 2021, there can be no successful implementation of the JCPOA without ending that horrendous war. Call it irony, or call it divine intervention to set the record straight. But now, let’s work together to win the peace.

      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

      How Tough Is Biden Prepared to Look?

      by

      A week after taking office, US President Joe Biden made a point of breaking with the position of his predecessor, Donald Trump, who famously blamed China for deliberately spreading the coronavirus. Trump insisted on calling it the Wuhan flu, Kung flu or any other xenophobic alternative. Coming to the defense of the entire Asian community in the United States, Biden issued a memorandum stating the following: “Inflammatory and xenophobic rhetoric has put Asian-American and Pacific Islander persons, families, communities and businesses at risk.”

      The Iran Deal vs. the Logic of History

      READ MORE

      The World Health Organization (WHO) team conducting an investigation in Wuhan released its preliminary findings this week on the origins of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. It maintained, as Reuters reports, “that the virus likely came from bats and not a laboratory in the Chinese city of Wuhan.” On February 10, an official of the US State Department announced what appeared to be a retreat to the Trump administration’s position: “The United States will not accept World Health Organization … findings coming out of its coronavirus investigation in Wuhan, China without independently verifying the findings using its own intelligence and conferring with allies.”

      One of the WHO inspectors, British zoologist and expert on disease ecology Peter Daszak, reacting to the State Department’s note, addressed this advice to Biden in a tweet: “Well now this👇. @JoeBiden has to look tough on China. Please don’t rely too much on US intel: increasingly disengaged under Trump & frankly wrong on many aspects. Happy to help.”

      Today’s Daily Devil’s Dictionary definition:

      Look tough:

      1. The principal action required to maintain the status of a bully, a person whose demeanor counts more than their substance
      2. The principal action required to maintain the image of the leader of a hegemon, called upon to make a show of being hyper-aggressive toward nations elected by politicians and the media as an existential threat  

      Contextual Note

      While the WHO team offered no definitive explanation of the origin, it focused on different possibilities of animal transmission requiring further investigation. When asked at a press conference on February 10 whether he had “any interest in punishing China for not being truthful about COVID last year,” President Biden cagily replied, “I’m interested in getting all the facts.” That answer leaves him free to look tough on China or, alternatively, to look tough at the intelligence that for the past four years has done what intelligence always does, responded obsequiously to the political solicitations of the administration in place.

      One American who, for the past four years, has made a point of looking tough and has been regularly featured in the media is Mike Pompeo, the final secretary of state under the Trump administration. In a desperate effort to keep the Trump mystique going to maintain its flagging ratings, Fox News brought Pompeo back to defend the Wuhan flu theme Trump consistently exploited for electoral advantage during last year’s presidential election campaign. In the interview, “Pompeo said ‘significant evidence’ remained that the coronavirus originated in a Chinese laboratory, casting doubt Tuesday on the World Health Organization‘s assessment that it likely spread from animals to humans.”

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      Pompeo, a former CIA director, admitted in 2019 that his job at the Central Intelligence Agency consisted of lying, cheating and stealing. He implied that he was now telling the truth, a fact ironically borne out by his honest admission of duplicity while at the CIA. And yet, there may be reason even today to believe that Pompeo has retained something of his talent for lying, which he will be willing to use for what he deems virtuous purposes. 

      The language people like Pompeo use often reveals how they manage to bend the truth when they aren’t simply betraying it. In the Fox interview, Pompeo explains, “I continue to know that there was significant evidence that this may well have come from that laboratory.” What can Pompeo possibly mean when he says, “I continue to know”? Is knowledge for Pompeo something that can appear and disappear? Knowledge is a state of awareness of truth, not an act of will, something one can decide according to the circumstances. 

      And because what someone knows must be a fact, what is the solid fact he says he continues to know? He tells us that it is the idea that the coronavirus “may have come from” the Wuhan laboratory. But something that “may” be true is at best a reasonable hypothesis and at worst a fabricated lie. Something that “may” be true cannot be called knowledge. Any honest speaker would use the verb “suspect.” But, in this age of conspiracy theories, people tend to suspect anything that is merely suspected. And Fox News has always preferred assertions to suspicions.

      In the same interview, Pompeo describes his recommendations for the US policy on China. He says the nation must “continue to make sure that the next century remains one dominated by rule of law, sovereignty and the things that the America first foreign policy put in place.” 

      Besides the fact that Pompeo offers another example of his favorite verb, “continue,” his odd assertion that “the next century” (the 22nd?) must be “dominated by rule of law” offers a curious yoking of two theoretically antinomic ideas: dominance and rule of law. The very idea of “rule of law” posits a relationship of equality between all concerned parties. It opposes the effect of domination. Rule of law is about level playing fields and fair play. Pompeo’s formulation reveals that he thinks of the rule of law as a specific tool of American domination. This is of course consistent with the facts, whatever the administration. The US still steadfastly refuses the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court and Trump’s “America First” policy refused any law other than its own.

      For those wondering why Fox News has taken the trouble to interview the former secretary of state of a president now being tried for sedition, the journalists reveal the interest at the end of the interview. Fox sees Pompeo as a worthy contender for the 2024 presidential campaign. He’s a cleaner version of Trump, but one who will always talk and look tough.

      Historical Note

      After the most contentious presidential election in its history, the US has been preparing to experience the transition from one radical style of hyperreality to another — from Donald Trump’s outlandish display of petulant rhetoric committed to reshaping the world in his image to Joe Biden’s reserved and fundamentally uncommitted avuncular manner. Just as in 2008, when they voted in Barack Obama after eight years of George W. Bush’s chaotic wars and a Wall Street crash, Americans are expecting a change of style and focus from the never-ending drama of the Trump years. 

      But just as the self-proclaimed change candidate Obama, once in office, showed more respect for continuity than commitment to renewal, on the theme of foreign policy, President Biden appears to be following Trump’s lead while simply reducing the tone. This phenomenon reflects a more fundamental reality at the core of today’s pseudo-democratic oligarchy. It is regularly masked by the transition from Republican to Democrat and vice versa. The reigning political hyperreality, despite the contrasting personal styles of successive presidents, will always prevail. Continuity trumps change.

      Embed from Getty Images

      Biden’s future policy on both China and Iran provides two cases in point. The clock is ticking on the need to recalibrate both of these relationships, more particularly on Iran, which has an election coming in just a few months. As the world anxiously awaits the new orientations of the Biden administration, the kind of continuity Pompeo appreciates may prove more dominant than the reversal people have come to expect. After all, Trump set about reversing everything Obama did, so why shouldn’t Biden do the same? The answer may simply be that that’s not what Democrats do.

      The average American has never been seriously interested in foreign policy. That very fact has consistently led to the kind of Manichaean thinking that dominated during the Cold War. In his 2000 election campaign, the inimitable George W. Bush summed up how that Manichaean system works: “When I was coming up, it was a dangerous world, and you knew exactly who they were. It was us versus them, and it was clear who them was. Today, we are not so sure who the they are, but we know they’re there.” As John Keats once wrote, “That is all Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.” 

      *[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

      American Democracy: We Have Misread the Signs of the Coming Storm

      by

      The January 6 storming of the US Capitol by supporters of President Donald Trump in an attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 election has left many of us pondering the future of democracy in the United States. The symbol of American democracy withstood the onslaught this time, but the question remains whether the rule of law, free elections and a free press will prevail, or whether the country will succumb to the whims of mob rule and authoritarianism? The outcome of the second impeachment trial of former President Trump on charges of insurrection will shape the answer to that question.

      We have watched the rise of authoritarianism in Poland, Hungary, Brazil and other former democratic regimes, assuming that our institutions and our Constitution were too strong to be compromised by right-wing populist movements. Looking back over the past five decades, it is clear we missed or misread the signs of the coming storm.

      Will American Democracy Perish Like Rome’s?

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      Beginning with Richard Nixon’s “Southern strategy,” to Ronald Reagan’s “government is the problem,” to the acceleration of neoliberalism and globalization under Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, to the rise of the Tea Party during the Obama administration, the threads of extremism were being woven into the tapestry that Trump donned in 2016. This underlying malaise became the core of the movement that erupted in insurrection on Capitol Hill.

      Knowing the history of its evolution does not explain why the passions associated with each of these threads created a violent revolt. One author who was particularly prescient on this question is Eric Hoffer, sometimes called the working man’s philosopher. Writing not from the ivory tower of an elitist, but from his working-class background, in 1951, he articulated in “The True Believer” what has been described as the best analysis of the origins of fanatical or extremist movements. Two points are particularly salient in understanding Trumpism and today’s political environment.  

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      First, Hoffer writes, “though hatred is a convenient instrument for mobilizing a community for defense, it does not, in the long run, come cheap. We pay for it by losing all or many of the values we have set out.” The language of the extreme right has become more vitriolic as individuals become caught in the information vortex of social media. In the echo chambers on the internet, ideas become overwhelmed by angry rhetoric demonizing those who have legitimate differences on issues.

      The vocabulary of dissent becomes more hateful, a rigid us-versus-them construct is formed, and a collective narcissism fed by a narcissistic leader emerges based on a sense of aggrievement. Differences become reasons for a “war” or a “battle” to reclaim control of the future so that it will resemble the past. The language of war cheapens the values of democracy, which, while encouraging passionate stances on issues, requires resolution through thoughtful and respectful dialogue and the rule of law.

      The language for fomenting an insurrection has been there for all to read prior to the emergence of Trump as president, but as a nation, America ignored the warning signs, content that the future would advance securely without addressing the social fractures of its past. After all, we have been reassured by Francis Fukuyama that we are at the end of history. What we seem to ignore — what Hoffer recognized in 1951 — is that a leader with authoritarian tendencies can give shape to an insurrection movement by stoking the seething discontent and perceived injustices of the past, a leader with clearly definable traits. Hoffer’s enumeration of the required traits of such a leader is chilling for it describes Trump so clearly:

      “Exceptional intelligence, noble character and originality seem neither indispensable nor perhaps desirable. The main requirements seem to be: audacity and a joy in defiance; an iron will; a fanatical conviction that he is in possession of the one and only truth; faith in his destiny and luck; a capacity for passionate hatred; contempt for the present; a cunning estimate of human nature; a delight in symbols (spectacles and ceremonials); unbounded brazenness which finds expression in a disregard of consistency and fairness; a recognition that the innermost craving of a following is for communion and that there can never be too much of it.”

      Given what we know about President Trump’s character and leadership style and compare it to Hoffer’s list, his role in encouraging, throughout his time in office, what finally transpired on January 6 is not surprising — nor should his unprecedented second impeachment be. Now the challenge to secure a resilient democracy is to learn from our recent history. The outcome of the impeachment trial and the Republicans’ subsequent behavior will determine the resolve of our political system to thwart authoritarian passion. Democracy requires a Republican Party grounded in principles and policy rather than one guided by personalities, conspiracies and seditious impulses. 

      More broadly, how do we transform groups with collective narcissistic mentalities into proponents of deliberative democratic action? How do we stay alert to the ascent of autocratic leaders with the character flaws Hoffer has enumerated? If we do not address these two questions, the ashes of the Capitol Holl insurrection will be the foundation for future mass movements of violent political disruption. Maintaining a vibrant democracy in the United States requires vigilance and the recognition that exceptionalism does not make us invulnerable to the autocratic impulses of our past.

      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

      Is China the New Champion of Globalization?

      by

      On January 25, addressing a virtual World Economic Forum, China’s President Xi Jinping not only strongly advocated for a multilateral approach to the COVID-19 pandemic but insisted on the virtues and systemic benefits of free trade and globalization. Jeopardizing those elements may introduce conflict into the international system, Xi warned, clearly referring to, although not mentioning, the United States. This is not the first time Xi has credited himself as the “champion of globalization,” in particular when attending meetings in Davos. In 2017, in the early days of Donald Trump’s presidency, with the long shadow of barriers to trade and isolationist policies just starting to appear on the horizon, China’s president made important remarks encouraging free trade and opening up the markets.

      However, with Trump out and Joe Biden now in the Oval Office, there seems little to suggest any substantial change in US policy, at least in the foreseeable future. If the US isn’t particularly eager to work with China toward free trade and multilateral cooperation, the European Union, and Germany in particular, quickly opted for a completely different approach, signing a key investment deal with Beijing at the end of last year. The Comprehensive Agreement on Investment (CAI) will grant a greater level of market access for investors than ever before, including new important market openings.

      Forecasting the US-China Relationship

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      Washington did not miss the opportunity to express its concerns about a deal that suddenly and unexpectedly sidelined the United States at a moment when, after four years of relative anarchy and opportunism, restarting transatlantic relations should be a priority. Writing in the Financial Times, Gideon Rachman recently pointed out how little sense it makes to rely on a US security guarantee in Europe while undermining its security policy in the Pacific, considering how much Europe has benefitted from the fact that for the past 70 years, the world’s most powerful nation has been a liberal democracy. Germany, in fact, was able over the last decades to exercise a sui generis role of Zivilmacht (civilian power) by framing its national interest in geoeconomic terms, encouraging German exports worldwide while outsourcing its defense to the reassuring presence of US troops.

      To better understand Xi’s quasi-imperial stance at the World Economic Forum, it has to be placed not only against the backdrop of the recent investment deals with the European Union or with the 15 countries of the Asia-Pacific region, but on the big news that China is on course to overtake the US as the world’s biggest economy by 2028, five years ahead of earlier predictions, mainly due to the asymmetric impact of COVID-19. While it is clear that China has successfully contained the Sars-Cov-2 outbreak and the Chinese economy is now recovering at a higher speed than other countries, it is also true that a lack of transparency and delays in sharing information with the international community about the virus have contributed to an acceleration of the pandemic at a global level.

      Embed from Getty Images

      Nonetheless, in the current debate over shaping more efficient emergency policies, China is still emerging as the model to follow and imitate, despite being unpopular. There is little doubt that in the “social imaginary” of liberal societies, as reports from Europe and the US suggest, authoritarian regimes are seen by many as more efficient and better prepared to deal with crises than democracies. Yet we must not forget that this efficiency comes at the inevitable cost of political and civil rights.

      Xi Jinping is well aware that the Biden administration can finally change course for the US and its allies, forging a united and progressive front after years of populist, nativist and authoritarian politics. Perhaps this element can help understand Xi’s assertiveness at the World Economic Forum better than the recent economic successes. After all, political and civil rights are China’s Achilles’ heel. Criticism of the Communist Party, let alone advocating for basic human rights such as freedom of speech or the rule of law, inexorably leads to repression that falls with equal severity on the rich metropolis of Hong Kong and the poor areas of Xinjiang, sweeping up ordinary citizens and billionaires alike, from Joshua Wong to Jack Ma.

      Can China credibly profess the virtues of globalization to achieve harmony and balance in an international system if it doesn’t adhere to international law? Can Beijing speak of cooperation to solve global problems when it has withheld vital information about the threat of the COVID-19 pandemic? As Xi Jinping continues to steer the Middle Kingdom out of its historical isolation, avoiding challenging the United States for the position of world leader will be difficult, given China’s demographics and economic status. Will these two Weltanschauungen, two comprehensively different conceptions of the world, sooner or later present the international community with a choice?

      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

      The Iran Deal vs. the Logic of History

      by

      The Associated Press offers an update on the standoff between the US and Iran over the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), also known as the Iran deal, from which Donald Trump as president spectacularly withdrew the US in 2018.

      Trump committed an act of pure will, with no serious legal argument related to the terms of the agreement. In the culture of international diplomacy, that usually signifies a betrayal of trust or an act of bad faith. In the democratic and free market tradition, the idea of a contract depends on the recognition of theoretical equality of status between the contracting partners. In real geopolitics, however, the hegemonic position of the United States means that acts of bad faith will always be permitted. It is a privilege of hegemonic power. Such acts will also be resented. 

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      Just as Trump made a point of undoing anything associated with the Obama administration, many people have expected that US President Joe Biden would follow suit, seeking to overturn everything Trump so deliberately sabotaged. The AP article reminds us of Biden’s campaign promise to “seek to revive the deal,” while noting that the new administration insists “that Iran must first reverse its nuclear steps, creating a contest of wills between the nations.”

      Today’s Daily Devil’s Dictionary definition:

      Contest of wills:

      A competition between two parties of approximately equal strength based on their refusal to agree on anything until one subdues the other by imposing a solution designed to narrowly avoid a catastrophe with uncontrollable consequences

      Contextual Note

      Many cultures feature the proverb, “Where there’s a will there’s a way.” A logical corollary of the proverb would be: Where there are two wills there is no obvious way. But as Gary Grappo, in an article on Fair Observer, explained this week, this contest of wills is not limited to Iran and the US. There are a number of other wills involved. And where there are several wills, the way will be extremely obscure. Or, just as likely, there will be no way at all.

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      Grappo, a former US ambassador and the current chairman of Fair Observer, reminds us that there is the will of the other signatories of the original agreement, essentially the permanent members of the UN Security Council and the European Union. In normal circumstances, faced with the prospect evoked by the Iranians of returning to the agreement they signed in 2015, the signatories would simply reaffirm their good faith, which has never wavered. But even if they were to express that intention, for the multiple reasons Grappo lays out in his article, the Biden administration is itself caught in the trap Trump knowingly laid out for future administrations. Because of its status as hegemon — aka the international bully who imposes the rules of the road in the name of democracy and civilized values — the US cannot allow itself to meekly admit that Trump’s obviously failed “maximum pressure” policy on Iran was an irresponsible mistake and a violation of the very idea of the rule of law. It’s a question of pride, but also of pressure from both rational and irrational voices.

      The situation contains two major absurdities, which everyone is aware of but no one dares to speak about. Grappo correctly reports that Secretary of State Antony Blinken and National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan “have promised that the US will consult with … regional allies like Israel and Saudi Arabia before making decisions or taking any action.” This could make sense if “consult with” amounts to nothing more than informing those nations of the state of negotiations. If it implies involving them in the discussion or seeking to accommodate their positions, there are two reasons to see this as wishful thinking, if not dangerous folly.

      The first is that if the debate is truly about Iran’s military nuclear capacity, the insistence that the Israelis have a role in the debate is patently absurd. Israel has accomplished — totally illegally and with the benediction of the Western powers — exactly what the JCPOA is designed to prevent Iran from achieving. Israel is a nuclear power that, at the same time, denies its status as a nuclear power. In a rational world, a renegotiated treaty in which Israel has its say would require the dismantling of Israel’s nuclear capacity. No intelligent and informed diplomat on earth could imagine Israel accepting that condition.

      The second absurdity concerns Saudi Arabia. Grappo evokes the need to address the question of “terrorism, terrorism financing, human rights, religious persecution, etc.” If Saudi Arabia’s interests were taken into account, the logical consequence of this would be to examine and eliminate the kingdom’s obvious practice of all those evils. The Saudis remain the heavyweight champions of Middle East terrorism. It was Saudis, after all (possibly with the complicity of members of the royal family), who engineered and executed 9/11, the only direct attack on the US since Pearl Harbor. For decades, the Saudis have been spreading Wahhabi jihadism globally, contributing to the rise of al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group. And who — other than Trump — can forget that it is Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman who kills journalists working for The Washington Post and is not averse to imprisoning or killing anyone else who too publicly opposes his regime?

      And yet, on the subject of Israel and Saudi Arabia, Grappo tells us that “President Biden and his team will have to find a way to ensure that these governments’ concerns, fears and interests are taken into account.” If this has any meaning, that certainly means that there will be at least two wills too many in the contest

      Historical Note

      A former diplomat, Gary Grappo understands the thinking, positioning and maneuvering that must be going on within the Biden administration. He has presented a true and realistic account of the dilemma it is faced with. But the picture he paints is one of such a confusion of wills that imagining any solution with a reasonable chance of success requires believing in a world of diplomatic hyperreality — the equivalent of a stage play, where wills simply exist as the speeches characters express and never translate into concrete acts with consequences.

      The representation of geopolitics as a spectacle of hyperreality may please the media, who thrive by presenting it in living color. It keeps the pundits who depend on it for their livelihood talking and writing. It may even distract the public’s attention for short periods, as it once did for Roman emperors. But history has its own laws that will consistently undermine even the most solidly constructed examples of hyperreality.

      Embed from Getty Images

      Wills are not the only forces at play here. Underlying the quandary of how the US might return to the JCPOA is the evolution of global power and hegemony over the past three decades. It began with an earthquake: the collapse of the Soviet Union. 

      During the Cold War, the US could do pretty much anything it wanted in the so-called “free world,” knowing it was admired (for its dynamic economy), respected (for its power) and feared (for its might). Recent events have seriously reduced the level of admiration of the US across the globe. The actions of two presidents, George W. Bush and Donald Trump, have seriously diminished respect for American power globally. Waging war on the basis of an obvious lie (Bush) and conducting foreign policy on the basis of whims and threats alone (Trump) have significantly reduced the credibility of any “reasoned position” the US takes to justify any action. Finally, the long series of military fiascos since the Vietnam War, along with two economic fiascos in the past 12 years, have transferred the fear people used to have of US might to a fear of the inadvertent catastrophes its policies provoke.

      Barack Obama’s strategy with the JCPOA made some sense. It consisted of betting on the idea that a loosening of constraints would naturally provoke an evolution within Iranian society toward a less paranoid vision of the West and of America in particular. It would encourage what optimists like to think of as “the better angels” of the Iranian people. It also meant leaving the Middle East quagmire behind, a feature of Obama’s Asia Pivot. The process worked in a unified Vietnam once the US abandoned its mission to save the country from communism. The problem with such a strategy today for some people, including members of Congress, is that it scores no hegemonic points. And that is intolerable.

      *[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

      Trumpism After Trump: The Wrong Person at the Right Time?

      by

      A few days before the Senate was due to vote on whether to proceed with the second impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump on charges of inciting insurrection, an article in The Washington Post’s opinion pages boldly proclaimed that “Trumpism is American fascism.” Equating the Trump phenomenon with fascism is nothing new. The comparison started with his election in 2016, feeding a cottage industry over the next four years. At the time, most academic experts on fascism vehemently disagreed. In August 2020, for instance, a prominent Georgetown University historian raised the rhetorical question, “How fascist is President Trump?” The response followed, stante pede: “Not that much.”

      The arguably most important reason for dismissing the fascist charge was that scholars of fascism did not want to contribute to what Gavriel D. Rosenfeld has called “symbolic inflation” — the fact that invoking Adolf Hitler has led to a process where the “value of ‘Hitler’ as an admonitory signifier has become progressively devalued over time.” Examples abound. Jörg Haider, for instance, the leader of the Austrian Freedom Party (FPÖ) who propelled it to international prominence in the 1990s, was routinely associated with Hitler.

      How Do You Tell an Authoritarian From a Fascist These Days?

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      It was only in the aftermath of the assault on the US Capitol that one of the most eminent contemporary scholars of fascism, Columbia University historian Robert Paxton, came out to state that “Trump’s incitement of the invasion of the Capitol … removes my objection to the fascist label. His open encouragement of civic violence to overturn an election crosses a red line. The label now seems not just acceptable but necessary.”

      A Diagnosis of Decline

      Behind this reassessment of Trump(ism) is the fact that those who invaded the Capitol on January 6 had no qualms about engaging in violent actions. In fact, by now, it has become obvious that many of the insurgents considered violence a perfectly acceptable means to advance their agenda. The Proud Boys — recently labeled a neo-fascist terrorist group by the Canadian government — add a whiff of squadrismo to the mix. The squadristi (this picture is taken at the Foro Italico, a piazza in front of the Olympic stadium in Rome, depicting an armed squad heading out for a punitive expedition) were Benito Mussolini’s armed goons routinely swarming out to the countryside where they terrorized socialists and trade union leaders.

      Squadrismo was informed by a “palingenetic vision of politics” that was also at the heart of Mussolini’s version of totalitarianism. The term was originally coined and developed by Roger Griffin, another leading expert on fascism. Griffin defines fascism as a palingenetic form of populist ultranationalism, where “palingenetic” refers to the myth of rebirth, revival and regeneration provoked by a profound sense of decline, decay and decadence. It follows that fascism is revolutionary and, thus, by definition, the opposite of conservatism. The last thing fascists are interested in is defending and preserving the status quo.

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      From this perspective, there can be no doubt that Trumpism has certain affinities to fascism, to put it cautiously. The very slogan that informed Trump’s 2016 campaign, “Make America Great Again,” reflects the palingenetic spirit of fascism. It serves both as a diagnosis and a promise. A year ago, New York Times columnist Ross Douthat gave a sense of how the diagnosis might go. In his view, the United States, if not the whole Western world, suffers from decadence, manifested by “forms of economic stagnation, institutional sclerosis, and cultural repetition at a high stage of wealth and technological proficiency and civilizational development.”

      There undoubtedly is much truth to this diagnosis. In fact, a Pew survey from early 2019 revealed that a significant majority of the American public shared this view. When asked about their expectations 30 years into the future, a majority thought that the United States would lose importance on the world stage; that the country would be saddled with a huge national debt; and that socioeconomic inequality would be even higher than at the moment. At the same time, the vast majority of respondents had little confidence in the capability of the country’s elected officials to meet these challenges. In fact, more than half of respondents thought that “Washington” had a “negative impact” on finding solutions to the country’s major problems.

      Various studies from 2020 provide further confirmation of the perception of decline. A Brookings Institution preview of the results of the 2020 Census, for instance, painted a picture of stagnation, both in terms of population growth and mobility. A U.S.News analysis of the most recent findings of its annual country rankings found widespread skepticism that more than three years of Trump had made the country “great again.” In fact, compared to the previous year, more Americans thought the US was corrupt: at 31%, a 5% increase on 2019. At the same time, the number of Americans who thought their country was “trustworthy” declined from 61% in 2019 to 55% in 2020.

      Finally, according to a Pew study from early 2020, most American Christians have come to believe that their religion has lost, and continues to lose, influence in American life. Worse still, most also believe that there is a fundamental “tension between their beliefs and the mainstream culture.” This is particularly galling given the fact that at one time in the not-so-distant past, Christian culture was mainstream culture. Not for nothing, in 2016 and 2020, (white) evangelicals voted overwhelmingly for Trump.

      Something Like Fascism

      Diagnosis, however, is relatively easy. Coming up with a genuine remedy is a fundamentally different issue, provided it goes beyond trite platitudes couched in catchy sloganeering epitomized by Trump’s MAGA campaign. “Make America Great Again” is one of these slogans that sound good but are fundamentally meaningless in the true sense of the word. As such, it is part of the new type of “simulative politics” characteristic of contemporary Western-style democracy, a politics staged as an organized spectacle, the “embodiment of a reality style of politics,” as Douthat puts it, by a president who was “performing a drama that doesn’t necessarily have strong correlates in the real world.” All of this makes Trump a “cartoonish imitation of something like fascism,” a “weird, internet-enabled simulacrum of fascism.”

      The carnivalesque mise en scène of the storming of the Capitol — a pastiche of the storming of the Bastille on July 14, 1789, itself a symbolic act given there were only seven prisoners held in the fortress — lends some credence to Douthat’s interpretation. Exemplary here is the “almost-farcical” case of “Elizabeth from Knoxville” who thought she would take part in a revolution only to get Maced (and complain bitterly about it). The farce, of course, goes only so far, given the very real violence resulting in material destruction and the loss of life. It is at this point that the simulacrum turns into reality, exposing the potential of genuine fascism hiding behind the ludicrousness and absurdity of the last days of Trump.

      Embed from Getty Images

      Trumps’ departure has not diminished the potential. Quite the contrary: His ignominious exit has added new fuel to the anger and resentment among many Americans that propelled Trump to the presidency in the first place and has done nothing to assuage diffuse political disenchantment or weaken latent authoritarian inclinations. In fact, an authoritative empirical study from June 2020 found a “substantial minority” of Americans being open to “authoritarian alternatives.” In late 2019, around a quarter of US survey respondents expressed support for a strong leader “who doesn’t have to bother with Congress or elections.” Overall, it concluded that between a “quarter and a third of the American public flirt with the idea that an alternative to democracy would be a good thing.”

      The study does not disaggregate the results along color lines. It stands to reason, however, that a majority of those yearning for a strong leader are white voters, the very same voters who constituted the bulk of Trump’s loyal supporters. White Americans have always considered themselves the only true embodiment of the nation, rooted in a white Anglo-Saxon Protestant heritage, which was only gradually extended to Europeans of other Christian faiths. In fact, for much of the 19th century, Catholic immigrants from Ireland, Germany and Italy were considered less white than Americans of Anglo-Saxon stock and, as a result, subject to discrimination.

      Over the past several years, the universe of white American identity and pride has come crashing down. For one, as numerous projections have pointed out, by 2045, white Americans will have become a minority in what they see as “their own country.” The result has been both growing white “racial anxiety” and the beginnings of a sociocultural and sociopolitical backlash against the rise of visible minorities, reflected in the support and vote for Trump. Secondly, there is the seemingly inexorable decline of Christianity’s influence in American society. Over the past few decades, American Christians, and particularly white American Christians, have progressively lost their “cultural dominance” and, with it, the assumption, as the editor of a prominent Christian news outlet put it, “that people are like us and people understand us, and people accept us.”

      Finally, there is the notion that the United States is the greatest country in the world and, therefore, predestined and entitled to assume the leadership of the Western world. This was certainly true in the postwar period, given the essential threat posed by the Soviet Union. Today, it is a rather iffy proposition, as the skepticism of a majority of the American public about the country’s position in the world clearly shows.

      The Trump years have severely tarnished the American image among the country’s key allies. The trade war with China exposed American weaknesses in the face of a new challenge to its supremacy. The pandemic, and particularly the way it was handled, only made things worse. In late 2020, a mere quarter of the German population and around a third of the French had a favorable view of the United States. In the UK, traditionally America’s closest ally in Europe, only around 40% saw the US in a favorable light.

      Fertile Ground

      If there has ever been fertile ground in the United States for the kind of palingenetic form of populist ultranationalism Griffin has identified as the core of fascism, it is now. Fertile ground, however, is not enough. It takes the right enabler to translate the mixture of anxiety, resentment, political disenchantment, the flirting with authoritarian alternatives and the yearning for revival and the reestablishment of the “natural order” into political action. Trump might have appealed to some of these sentiments. However, in the end, the combination of egocentric narcissism and mental slothfulness assured that he would never amount to more than a cheap pastiche of the likes of Italy’s Silvio Berlusconi.

      Embed from Getty Images

      This is not to say that Trump was nothing but a fleeting moment in contemporary American politics. Quite the opposite. Trump might have been the wrong person at the right time. His impact, however, is enduring. It is reflected most prominently in the direction large parts of the Republican Party have taken. Whereas in the not-so-distant past Republicans championed various culture-war causes, from opposition to abortion and same-sex marriage to the promotion of school prayers, today, a large number of Republican officials on the federal, state and local levels have adopted positions that lean in the direction of Trump-style subversion of the American democratic system. As Chris Hayes has recently put it in the pages of The Atlantic, the fight these days between Democrats and Republicans is less about policy, where under the impact of COVID-19 “the gaps are narrowing. It’s about whether the United States will live up to the promise of democracy — and on that crucial question, we’ve rarely been so divided.”

      Even after the shock of January 6, Republican officials continue to feed into the politics of anger and resentment that was at the heart of the assault on Congress. Yesterday, as the Senate voted to proceed with Trump’s impeachment 56-44, just six Republicans joined their Democratic colleagues in the move to condemn the president’s role in inciting an unprecedented domestic assault on American democracy. With 17 Republican votes needed to impeach Donald Trump, a reckoning is unlikely.

      The temptation to harvest white resentment for individual gain is too strong and, with it, the temptation to follow the lure of some form of post-fascist fascism, American-style. In 1935, Sinclair Lewis published a novel with the provocative title, “It Can’t Happen Here.” Lewis, of course, thought fascism was a possibility, even in the United States. It might be a good idea to give his book a second look.

      *[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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      Russia Joins the Red Sea Scramble

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      Russia has come back to the crowded Red Sea. On November 11, 2020, the Russian government announced its agreement with Sudan to establish a naval base at the city of Port Sudan. While the Russian navy already enjoys access rights to the port, the concession with Khartoum envisages the creation of a Russian logistics center that will host up to 300 personnel and four naval units, including nuclear-powered vessels, for a renewable period of 25 years. In exchange for the concession, the Kremlin will send military advisers to train Sudanese forces and will be allowed to use Sudanese airports and airspace to support its base in Port Sudan.

      Israel’s Comeback in the Horn of Africa

      READ MORE

      On top of that, Moscow will be in charge of security at the base, giving it the chance to install advanced radar and air defense systems. Although it will be much smaller in size compared to the naval base of Tartus in Syria, the facility in Port Sudan will become a pivot of Moscow’s maritime projection spanning from the Mediterranean to the Indian Ocean.

      Red Stars Align

      Russia’s landing in Port Sudan represents the convergence of several strategic goals. Traditionally a land power, Russia is vying to bolster its maritime prowess. The comprehensive program to modernize its fleet brought in 23 new vessels in 2019 and 40 in 2020. Most of them are more modest in size than the Soviet-era battle cruisers being decommissioned as Moscow leans toward a small-ship fleet — one that can hardly keep pace with the US or the Chinese navies, according to analysts.

      Nevertheless, Russia is arming new units with high-tech systems, like the Poseidon marine drones and the new 885M Kazan nuclear-powered submarine, which will reinforce the navy’s capability to operate at regional level in support of ground and air forces. This element suits the Kremlin’s strategy of intervention in crises, from Syria to Venezuela, and might be particularly useful in the Red Sea region.

      But the fleet itself is only half of the picture. Maritime power equally requires a network of naval bases where vessels can safely dock and be supplied. To date, Moscow not only set a firm foothold in the Mediterranean — a longstanding goal of Russia’s foreign policy — but also rose up as the preeminent maritime power in the region thanks to its naval base in Tartus and its military presence in eastern Libya in particular.

      Embed from Getty Images

      Now, as the Mediterranean regains centrality and the Indian Ocean witnesses growing power competition, the Red Sea has become a strategic pivot for countries with global ambitions like Russia. This is the rationale behind the long-sought naval base in Sudan, which will allow Moscow to span its military capabilities — and hence its influence — from the Black Sea, down through the eastern Mediterranean and the Red Sea to the Indian Ocean.

      Finally, the base in Port Sudan is a major achievement of Russia’s Africa policy. During the first Russia-Africa Summit in 2017, President Vladimir Putin pledged $20 billion in investments, skillfully attaching no conditionality to them. More importantly, he harnessed military cooperation as a crucial asset of Russia’s diplomacy in Africa. Building upon its successes in Syria and Libya, the Kremlin began to offer weapons and military services through the semi-private military company, Wagner, replicating a strategy adopted by South Africa and its Executive Outcomes PMC to expand its influence across the continent in the 1980s and 1990s. In exchange, Russia secured access rights to strategic natural resources, mainly uranium, gold and rare earth elements in the Central African Republic and Sudan, 80% of whose arsenals are filled with Russian weapons.

      In Sudan, Moscow struck a deal with former President Omar al-Bashir to provide training to the Sudanese army and support military operations in Darfur, the Blue Nile and South Kordofan; a Russian base on the Red Sea was allegedly part of the accord. Despite the fall of Bashir’s regime following widespread protests in 2019, Moscow navigated Sudanese politics and maintained strong ties with the president of the Sovereign Council, General Burhan, eventually obtaining the base in Port Sudan.

      Regional Power Play

      The Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden have been an arena of intense geopolitical competition among global and regional powers in recent years. Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Turkey have all scrambled to establish military outposts in the Horn of Africa. Russia makes no difference. Its quest for a military presence along the Red Sea led Moscow to enter into negotiations with Eritrea, Djibouti and even Somaliland over the past few years, but without success. Now, the base in Port Sudan has some notable implications for regional security and power competition.

      Russia has managed to stay outside regional disputes. Before Omar al-Bashir was ousted, Turkey and Qatar were about to finalize a concession in Suakin, just 50 kilometers south of Port Sudan. Under Saudi and Emirati pressure, the transitional government put the agreement with Ankara and Doha on hold. With a Russian presence in Port Sudan, Turkey’s chances of obtaining an outpost along the Sudanese coast become even slimmer. Consequently, the competition between Turkey and Russia will likely increase in the Horn of Africa, at least until the two powers will find an understanding as they did in Syria and Libya.

      The UAE and Saudi Arabia have a more nuanced position. The two countries have invested heavily, both economically and militarily, in the Red Sea. The Russian attempt to build a base in Eritrea reportedly went awry after Riyadh and Abu Dhabi stepped in to drag Eritrea from the field of Iranian influence. This suggests that a solid Russian presence in the Red Sea might be seen as an element of disturbance. Yet the UAE has already cooperated with Moscow in eastern Libya, backing General Khalifa Haftar, and has signed a strategic partnership in 2018, which also paved the way for the sale of Russian weapons to Abu Dhabi.

      Saudi Arabia might see Russia’s military engagement in the Red Sea as an opportunity. As the Houthi rebels in Yemen have proved capable of targeting ships and the Saudi oil infrastructure as far as Jeddah, Russia might become a useful ally in enforcing maritime security in the southern Red Sea region.

      Implications for the US

      Despite strong ties with Washington, the Gulf monarchies do not see Russia as a threat. Russia’s policy of non-interference, combined with its political stability, are generally perceived by autocratic regimes in the Middle East and beyond as less intrusive and dangerous. Conversely, the United States and the European powers often attach conditionalities to economic and military cooperation. Such tensions might be on the rise as the Biden administration pledges to keep a keen eye on human rights and democracy when it comes to foreign relations, with Saudi Arabia being already under the spotlight.

      Therefore, the Gulf monarchies and other actors in the region are more likely to cooperate with rather than confront Russia and possibly leverage these ties to water down requests from Washington and the like. This seems to be the case for Sudan as well, which has recently conducted deeply transactional negotiations with Washington around being delisted as a state sponsor of terrorism. The announcement of the Russian base probably accelerated the implementation of the accord too.

      Besides political considerations, the Red Sea is already particularly crowded — the US and China both maintain military bases in Djibouti. Now the US will have to deal with Russia’s accrued military presence in a pivotal region. The main reason of concern is Russia’s increased capability to operate militarily in the proximity of two of the most relevant chokepoints of the world, Suez and Bab el-Mandab. Since 10% of the world’s trade and 9% of oil shipments cross these points every day, controlling them is of crucial importance for global economic stability and security. In the long term, Russia’s footholds in the Mediterranean and the Red Sea will affect the US control over Suez and Bab el-Mandab, bringing an intensification of global power competition and potentially turning these chokepoints into flashpoints.

      *[Fair Observer is a media partner of Gulf State Analytics.]

      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

      Will the US and Iran Meet Jaw to Jaw?

      by

      On February 4, US President Joe Biden visited the US State Department, located down the street from the White House. He went to deliver a foreign policy message much needed by the men and women of that department and the nation. His audience was a receptive one, not surprising given that nearly all of the hundreds in attendance were career diplomats and civil service employees. He delivered exactly what they wanted to hear, affirming that, “You are the center of all that I intend to do … the heart of it.” That message dovetailed with his plans for an expansive reassertion of American diplomacy. It was necessary because American diplomacy had been absent for the last four years under the Trump administration.

      Unchanged or Unchained: What’s in Store for the JCPOA?

      READ MORE

      The foreign policy agenda outlined by Biden variously referred to: fortifying ties with America’s key allies and partners in Europe and Asia; serving notice to Russian President Vladimir Putin that Biden will challenge, “in a manner very different from my predecessor,” Moscow’s cyber threats and authoritarian moves against neighbors; challenging America’s new nemesis, China, on human rights, intellectual property and global governance but also offering cooperation when it serves US interests; calling out Saudi Arabia on Yemen and Myanmar on the recent coup; and recommitting the US to defending democracy and human rights and to upping immigration numbers into the US.

      The one major foreign policy challenge staring President Biden directly in the face but not mentioned was Iran. During his election campaign, he had promised to re-enter the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the nuclear accord with Iran from which then-President Donald Trump had withdrawn the US in May 2018.

      So Many Voices

      Not mentioning the subject in this — Biden’s first major foreign policy address of his brief presidency — may have been a wise course of action. First, his secretary of state, Antony Blinken, and national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, have promised that the US will consult with America’s P5-plus-1 partners — Britain, France and Germany — as well as regional allies like Israel and Saudi Arabia before making decisions or taking any action. Moreover, at this stage, speaking too critically or harshly so soon would only trigger further stubbornness and resistance from an already recalcitrant Iran. And speaking too hopefully would ignite strong pushback from members of Congress resistant to almost anything short of Tehran’s capitulation.

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      Rejoining the JCPOA is replete with challenges that Biden’s former boss, Barack Obama, also faced but badly mishandled. Both Blinken and Sullivan have indicated that simply re-entering the nuclear agreement cannot be this administration’s sole objective. Any agreement with Iran that lasts into and through the next Republican administration must also address Iran’s growing missile arsenal and its meddling behavior in the Middle East, including in Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Lebanon and elsewhere.

      Just getting these issues on the agenda with Tehran would be an achievement, given the Islamic Republic’s oft-stated opposition to such discussions. Nevertheless, Biden knows that to reach a genuinely enduring agreement that survives his presidency, these issues must be on the table. Iran’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, should also understand that for any agreement to offer his country predictability and stability in its international endeavors into the future, these issues are inescapable.

      Iran isn’t the only party with whom the Biden administration will have to negotiate. First, there are America’s allies who are part of the accord and who, for the last four years, have battled to keep the JCPOA on life support. It will be Britain, France and Germany who will run the initial interference for the US before it can meet face to face with the Iranians. Furthermore, the US will have to have their firm support before it can reach out to the other P5-plus-1 members, China and Russia. So, winning their support will be vital to the administration’s success.

      Second, there are America’s regional allies, most especially Israel, Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf states, who have a genuine — they might say existential — interest in the outcome of any future talks. There was considerable dissension among these countries in the run-up to the 2015 accord and in its aftermath. Some, most especially Israel, made their objections known publicly and undiplomatically. Nevertheless, their concerns were valid, and President Biden and his team will have to find a way to ensure that these governments’ concerns, fears and interests are taken into account.

      Moreover, any dialog addressing the regional issues — whether on Iran’s malign activity in the Middle East or perhaps even the presence of US forces in the region — will likely have to include these countries. (How that might happen is a mystery, given that states like Saudi Arabia and Iran don’t yet officially recognize Israel.) What is essential for the Americans, however, is that these governments are somehow a part of the negotiations and that whatever results from the next round of negotiations is acceptable to the nations of the region most impacted. Blinken and Sullivan, chastened by the experience of 2015 and what came after, undoubtedly understand this.

      The Invisible Partner at the Negotiating Table

      Then, there is the final and likely most challenging party to future talks. That is the US Congress. Securing congressional approval for a follow-on agreement(s) and ensuring it endures beyond the Biden presidency will depend on winning that body’s approval. While Biden probably will not submit any new agreement to the Senate for approval, as the Constitution requires for formal treaties, he will nevertheless need to have at least its implicit support.

      Biden cannot afford to make the mistake of Woodrow Wilson in 1918 with the League of Nations and President Obama in 2015 with the JCPOA. He must find a way to bring in key members from both the House and Senate, even if only indirectly, in order to ensure that whatever results reflects their concerns. If Biden and his team can satisfy the concerns of the other two major groups — America’s P5-plus-1 partners and regional allies — then they will likely have addressed many of Congress’ concerns. But he cannot afford either to take their support for granted or to neglect Congress. They will have to be engaged throughout the process.

      Complexity (Times 100): Iran and All the Issues

      Of course, there is also the heart of the issue: the longstanding distrust and animus between the US and Iran. The imperfect deal brokered by Obama and the withdrawal from it by Trump served to exacerbate these feelings among Americans and Iranians, respectively. So, the sides may be starting from a more difficult position than they did in 2012, when they initially began their dialog that culminated with the JCPOA. Hardliners on both sides have further hardened their positions, Republicans (and some Democrats, too) in the US and the all-powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and its leadership in Iran. They’re not just polar opposites — they live at opposite ends of the galaxy.

      Embed from Getty Images

      Furthermore, the issues have been brought into stark relief as a result of the American exit and subsequent imposition of crushing sanctions on Iran, its leadership, banking institutions and the IRGC. The country’s economy is reeling, though it has managed to finally stabilize. But any notion or hope of significant growth that reaches rank-and-file Iranians and businesses is non-existent under US sanctions. In 2021 and beyond, a nation of some 84 million people must be a part of the international community and most especially the global economy. That can’t happen as long as US sanctions hang over Iran’s head. The choice is stark, albeit hard, for Iran’s leadership: continue on the path to nuclear capability or join the rest of the international community.

      Despite Iran’s early declarations, an immediate US return to the JCPOA and suspension of sanctions prior to some of the aforementioned talks are a chimera. The Biden administration hasn’t taken the bait and shouldn’t. With sanctions in place, Biden has an advantage, no matter how much he may have opposed them in 2018.

      The administration should use this advantage. So, at the very least, before rejoining the JCPOA, it should insist on Tehran’s acceptance of follow-on negotiations on: the various time horizons on Iran’s nuclear development with weapons implications; the range and numbers of missiles; more comprehensive inspections, including of military sites; and its involvement in countries of the region and support for various militias and groups almost universally viewed as terrorists. Iran’s hardliners see some of these issues — like missiles and support for militia groups in the Middle East — as necessary and even existential, but there may be no avoiding talking about them.

      Iran doubtlessly has its chronic issues with the Americans, from threats of regime change to menacing military presence throughout the region, including US Navy aircraft carriers off its coast to American Air Force heavy bomber flights near its borders. It will also want some guarantees that whatever is agreed this time has some assurance of continuing. Then there are America’s non-nuclear-related sanctions on Iran, e.g., those relating to terrorism, terrorism financing, human rights, religious persecution, etc. These also are likely to become issues in any future talks.

      The Main Thing

      Hanging over all of this is the justifiably feared nuclearization of the Middle East. There can be no doubt that a nuclear-armed or -capable Iran would inevitably trigger similar strategic moves by Saudi Arabia and perhaps the United Arab Emirates and Egypt. Such a development in the world’s most volatile region is nightmarish.

      Resolving these supremely difficult issues will come down to some hard diplomacy and earnest, patient dialog. There is no military solution. Nuclear weapons can never be one either. And, as the previous administration’s “maximum pressure” approach demonstrated, Iran cannot be sanctioned into capitulating.

      In the words of Winston Churchill, “Meeting jaw to jaw is better than war.” It’s time for both sides to set their jaws to work.

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