International Affairs: December 2011 Archives
North Korean dictator Kim Jong-il is dead. Pray that the inevitable instability creates an opportunity for North Koreans to claim their God-given freedom and throw off the horrible tyranny that has been strangling them for so many decades.
It would be great for us to stop the violence in Syria, but America needs big vision humanitarianism.
The most moral foreign policy is the one that is grounded in a serious, long-term strategic view of where the world is headed, what the principal dangers are, and how the United States can preserve and develop its own strength and prosperity so as to do what needs to be done on the international scene.In Syria that means helping grease the skids for Assad, more because it weakens and isolates Iran and undermines Hezbollah than because Butcher Assad is a vicious and bloodthirsty tyrant. A moment could come in which military intervention with the right partners and under the right circumstances would make sense, but it looks as if Assad's growing weakness will spare us from having to make that decision. Preventing a US-Iranian war is a humane and appropriate goal for our foreign policy, and driving the mullahs away from the Mediterranean could help get that done.
In other places a humane and moral foreign policy means doing different things. It means maintaining civil and open relationships with governments in China and Saudi Arabia, for example, despite our instinctive moral distaste for much that those governments do. The moral vigilantes call this hypocrisy, but this kind of behavior is a necessary part of making life better for people all over the world, including Americans.
The best-looking option right now doesn't always produce the best long-term results. This is painful to acknowledge when thousands of innocent people are being slaughtered by vicious murderers.
The Chinese village of Wukan is in open rebellion against the Communist government.
For the first time on record, the Chinese Communist party has lost all control, with the population of 20,000 in this southern fishing village now in open revolt.The last of Wukan's dozen party officials fled on Monday after thousands of people blocked armed police from retaking the village, standing firm against tear gas and water cannons.
Since then, the police have retreated to a roadblock, some three miles away, in order to prevent food and water from entering, and villagers from leaving. Wukan's fishing fleet, its main source of income, has also been stopped from leaving harbour.
The plan appears to be to lay siege to Wukan and choke a rebellion which began three months ago when an angry mob, incensed at having the village's land sold off, rampaged through the streets and overturned cars.
It sounds like the government has blockaded the village. Cutting off food and water from civilians is an atrocity that the international community should condemn.
Could this rebellion spread, or have the Communists contained it? Now that the news is on the internet, it's hard to see how the government can prevent the spread of the news to the rest of China. Revolt by the rural masses is the most direct and imminent threat to China's economic growth, and I don't expect the government to handle it with a light touch.
OilPrice has an insightful look into the logistics of supplying the American forces in Afghanistan with fuel and the effects of the recent friendly-fire incident on the AfPak border.
On 27 November Interior Minister Rehman Malik, addressing journalists at the Ministry of the Interior's National Crisis Management Cell, after strongly condemning the NATO attack on Pakistani forces, stated that the resupply routes for NATO via Pakistan have been stopped "permanently," adding that the decisions of the Defense Cabinet Committee (DCC) on the NATO forces attack inside Pakistan would be implemented in letter and spirit, stressing that "The decisions of the DCC are final and would be implemented."The major issue at stake here for ISAF and U.S. forces is fuel, all of which must be brought in from abroad at high cost. In October 2009 Pentagon officials testified before the House Appropriations Defense Subcommittee that the "Fully Burdened Cost of Fuel" (FBCF) translates to about $400 per gallon by the time it arrives at a remote Forward Operating Base (FOB) in Afghanistan. Last year, the FBCF reached $800 in some FOBs following supply route bombings in Pakistan, while others have claimed the FBCF may be as high as $1,000 per gallon in some remote locations. For many remote locations, fuel supplies can only be provided by air - one of the most expensive ways being in helicopter fuel bladders.
We can't operate in Afghanistan without cooperation from Pakistan. Once we're done in Afghanistan we won't need to be so nice to our "friends" in Pakistan. Not that I blame them for being angry at about the 24 Pakistani border guards we killed with an airstrike.
