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http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/ The Interpreter 2014-08-29T05:59:28+00:00 Daily analysis of international events with a focus on Asia. Published by the Lowy Institute for International Policy. Lowy Institute BlogEngine.Net Syndication Generator http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/opml.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd Lowy Institute Daily analysis of international events with a focus on Asia. Published by the Lowy Institute for International Policy. en-AU The Interpreter 0.000000 0.000000 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/29/The-Lebanon-isation-of-the-Middle-East.aspx The Lebanon-isation of the Middle East 2014-08-29T05:57:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
The opening of this essay, about the arbitrariness of the Middle East's national boundaries drawn up nearly a century ago under the Sykes-Picot Agreement, will be familiar to most. But then George Friedman takes things in an interesting direction:

The map may show a nation, but (Lebanon) is really a country of microscopic clans engaged in a microscopic geopolitical struggle for security and power. Lebanon remains a country in which the warlords have become national politicians, but there is little doubt that their power comes from being warlords and that, under pressure, the clans will reassert themselves.

A similar process has taken place in Syria. The arbitrary nation-state has become a region of competing clans. The Alawite clan, led by Bashar al Assad (who has played the roles of warlord and president), had ruled the country. An uprising supported by various countries threw the Alawites into retreat. The insurgents were also divided along multiple lines. Now, Syria resembles Lebanon. There is one large clan, but it cannot destroy the smaller ones, and the smaller ones cannot destroy the large clan. There is a permanent stalemate, and even if the Alawites are destroyed, their enemies are so divided that it is difficult to see how Syria can go back to being a country, except as a historical curiosity. Countries like Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Israel and the United States might support various clans, but in the end, the clans survive.

Something very similar happened in Iraq.

(H/t The Browser.)
 2014-08-29T05:57:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen A new George Friedman essay argues that Middle East governance is reverting to clans. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=8ae2bd3a-7335-4061-bfe9-5815570b2304 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=8ae2bd3a-7335-4061-bfe9-5815570b2304 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/29/The-Lebanon-isation-of-the-Middle-East.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=8ae2bd3a-7335-4061-bfe9-5815570b2304 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/29/Why-Indian-and-Pakistani-sea-based-nukes-are-so-troubling.aspx Why Indian and Pakistani sea-based nukes are so troubling 2014-08-29T04:07:00+00:00 Andrew Winner

The danger of sea-based nuclear weapons in Asia depends on the strategic context of the potential protagonists, along with the particulars of the platforms, delivery system, and doctrines.

Perhaps the least menacing in the short term is the interaction between India and China as each builds its sea-based nuclear capability. There are still years to go before each state has systems coupled with the need to deploy them in locations that could lead to dangerous interactions.

A second dyad, between US sea-based nuclear weapons and the growing Chinese maritime nuclear arsenal, has the potential for misunderstanding, risk-taking, and escalation, but Washington and Beijing are not in a state of on-again, off-again militarised hostilities. This, coupled with the distance from China that US nuclear-armed ballistic missile submarines are likely patrol, limits some potentially dangerous interactions.

The India-Pakistan dyad, however, carries the potential to be the most menacing in the short-to-medium term.

Both India and Pakistan are at the initial stages of deploying nuclear weapons on submarines. Being new to a deployed technology and operational technique does not mean the two governments and their militaries will not be careful or capable. Both states are likely to be highly cautious and professional in their deployment of these capabilities. However, there is always a learning curve with new capabilities and therefore always chances for misperception, miscalculation, and the threat of escalation.

Three additional factors in the South Asian context make this newly emerging set of capabilities particularly troubling.

The first is the very short range of India's first generation submarine-launched ballistic missile (the K-15 has a reported range of 750km) and Pakistan's likely submarine-launched cruise missile (the Babur, with a reported range of 700km). The second is that it appears Pakistan will be deploying its sea-based nuclear capability in a dual-use platform, a diesel-powered attack submarine. Finally, the two states have a history of wars and militarised crises over a range of disputes that will not be resolved anytime soon.

Unlike the deployment of nuclear warheads on land-based missiles or nuclear gravity bombs, sea-basing of nuclear weapons carries a much greater chance of close-up and regular interaction between the forces of two potential protagonists. In peacetime, once India and Pakistan actually have operational platforms deployed, it can be expected that each side will seek to gather intelligence on the acoustic signature of the other side's submarines, along with information about operating patterns and locations. This creates chances for accidents, incidents, or heightened tensions, particularly as the relatively short ranges of the missiles mean that deployment areas may be relatively close to the other's territorial waters.

Yes, such submarine-versus-submarine interactions occur already without any public acknowledgment of increased tensions, but the importance of nuclear weapons may cause both sides to take greater risks both to gather intelligence and to defend a nuclear-armed platform. Similarly, both sides may become more aggressive in patrolling and defending territorial waters, contiguous zones, and even exclusive economic zones if they want to deny the other side from gaining operational familiarity with a particular stretch of water.

If another militarised crisis between India and Pakistan were to occur after the deployment of sea-based nuclear weapons, the chances of inadvertent escalation will be higher than in an environment absent these platforms. In the case of Pakistan's likely nuclear platform – an Agosta-class submarine basically indistinguishable from its conventionally-armed counterpart – Indian naval commanders and their civilian leadership may be faced with a difficult dilemma. Protecting India's surface and submarine fleet from Pakistan's submarines in a crisis or war requires aggressive detection measures and attacking potential contacts. However, India may feel constrained if it does not want to inadvertently escalate a crisis or conflict by destroying the 'secure second-strike' portion of Pakistan's nuclear triad. If India were to destroy a Pakistani submarine carrying nuclear-armed missiles as part of a conventional war, would Pakistan's leadership interpret this action as crossing a nuclear threshold?

Similarly, in a future crisis or conventional war, what would Pakistan do to place itself in a better position to track and, if possible, destroy the INS Arihant or its successors? Pakistan has shown itself both willing and able, as far back as 1971, to undertake long-range, risky submarine operations in an attempt to strike at high-value Indian assets on India's east coast. Would India view such a Pakistani operation in a future crisis as escalatory? What would its response be?
 2014-08-29T04:07:00+00:00 Andrew Winner Three factors in the South Asian context make this newly emerging set of capabilities particularly troubling. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=74955faf-71e8-49a6-ac0b-7d0e60837d52 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=74955faf-71e8-49a6-ac0b-7d0e60837d52 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/29/Why-Indian-and-Pakistani-sea-based-nukes-are-so-troubling.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=74955faf-71e8-49a6-ac0b-7d0e60837d52 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/29/Obama-has-no-strategy-for-ISIS-Do-we.aspx Obama 'doesn't have a strategy yet' for ISIS. Do we? 2014-08-29T01:19:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
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President Obama is already being pilloried for his statement, made in a press conference earlier today, that 'we don't have a strategy yet' for combating ISIS. No strategy? This for a terrorist group that his own Defense Secretary described as 'an imminent threat to every interest we have...Oh, this is beyond anything that we've seen, so we must prepare for everything'.

Still, at least Obama has things in the right order: strategy first, then bombing. William Kristol, on the other hand, would prefer to just get started: 'What's the harm of bombing them at least for a few weeks and seeing what happens? I don't think there's much in the way of unanticipated side effects that are going to be bad there.' Kristol is a neo-conservative and leading foreign policy voice among Republicans.

It's a good thing Australian Defence Minister Senator David Johnston signaled on Wednesday evening that an Australian decision on whether to join US military action was not imminent:

I think the Americans and most of us would want to see a stable government in Baghdad. And that's not going to occur until 10th September when the new Prime Minister takes over. And if he's inclusive, I think that will make things a lot more visible, tangible and concrete going forward. So we're a long way from that.

 As I said on Wednesday, before Australia commits military force, we first need a clear assessment of the threat and a plausible strategy for defeating that threat. Without that, we would essentially just be dropping bombs to 'see what happens'.
 2014-08-29T01:19:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen Before Australia commits military force, we first need a clear assessment of the threat and a plausible strategy for defeating that threat. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=8eca2e30-d5a0-48d7-92fd-b28b880ecc66 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=8eca2e30-d5a0-48d7-92fd-b28b880ecc66 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/29/Obama-has-no-strategy-for-ISIS-Do-we.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=8eca2e30-d5a0-48d7-92fd-b28b880ecc66 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/29/Violence-against-women-in-PNG.aspx Violence against women in PNG: How men are getting away with murder 2014-08-28T23:30:00+00:00 Jo Chandler

All photos by Vlad Sokhin.

In a new Lowy Institute Analysis published today, Jo Chandler presents a devastating picture of the endemic violence against women in Papua New Guinea and the role Australia can play in supporting local initiatives to address the problem. Below, Jo reflects on how remote justice is for many women.

Over the past six years I've made numerous trips to PNG, usually intensive excursions but too quick (as media paradigms tend to dictate) and likely too ambitious, ranging across health and education and into politics, resources development and corruption. Violence was rarely the story I went looking for, but it was inevitably the one I found.

The first instinct of a journalist trying to communicate a crisis is to quantify it — to bundle it up in statistics. But the data on violence in PNG is scarce, and it is inevitably scrubbed clean of identity and humanity. The reality, by contrast, is raw, overwhelming, unfathomable, complex.

So you might describe the scores of walking wounded waiting for triage outside highlands hospitals every morning, oftentimes the bashed and basher sitting together, waiting their turn. Or you might try to capture the vulnerability of girls and women when they venture out of home, and how it shackles their movements and their prospects in city and village alike. Yet these narratives fall short when they depict PNG women as merely helpless and scared. They are also tough, funny, resourceful, cunning, resilient.

But perhaps the trickiest thing to communicate is just how formidable the landscape is for women wanting access to justice. So many obstacles. The remoteness. The poverty of resources, of cash. The lack of roads, personnel, and vehicles to respond to emergencies. The shortcomings of police capacity and culture. The brutality, often inspired by hard-wired notions of payback and supercharged by modern blights of bitterness and booze. The failure of agents of the state to honour their ethics and their obligations, and to uphold the law.

These were issues I was starting to poke around last October when I made the first of a few visits to East Sepik. I stopped over in Wewak on my way to Maprik, in the hinterland, hitching a ride with an Oxfam team visiting their local partner agency. The Nana Kundi Crisis Centre is one of a mere handful of women's refuges sprinkled across the country.

As it happened, the hotel in Wewak was overrun with Papua New Guinean and Australian officials and dignitaries all similarly preoccupied with questions of justice. They were en route to the opening of a community law and justice office in Lumi, West Sepik. Among them was Kerenga Kua, one of PNG's most distinguished lawyers before entering politics and, at that time, serving as Attorney-General and Minister for Justice. (In June this year, he was abruptly sacked by the Prime Minister.)

Kua settled down in the warm evening with myself and photographer Vlad Sokhin (his images above). In Australia, interviewing politicians is an endurance test of spin and obfuscation. In PNG, it is most commonly about Big Man bluster and posturing. In both contexts many words are spoken but little is said. This interview proved to be something else.

What I want to understand, I say, is why terrible crimes continue to be committed with such impunity. 'We have a formidable problem,' says Kua.

We have a very big land area and our population is scattered through remote communities. It would not be a problem if the culture in the community reacts positively to the established legal system. But the culture that prevails at the moment...is to look after your own. So if one of your own offends against the law, you protect him. That is what the community does, they protect perpetrators. So a victim (of violence) is not, in the first case, able to report the matter and mobilise the witnesses and bring the offender to account unless that victim has a stronger network of support (than her attacker). Then that can be used to force the issue to the proper legal system.

Many disputes never get past the informal mechanisms exercised by clans, families, and tribes outside established systems. 'If you hang around Port Moresby on the weekends you will see a lot of gatherings under the rain trees, in the shade,' he explained. 'Those are informal dispute resolution systems in progress. They don't register it in the courthouse.' Violent crimes are dealt with under the trees because people don't trust the government to support both the offender and the victim.

People have set up their own default system, so the government systems have become irrelevant, more or less. You see it at a rural level as well. You might demand that the victim and her witnesses and everybody march to the police station and lay the report and get the offender charged. But in the background the offender and their people are busy attacking the victim and her supporters and witnesses yet again.

Inevitably the winners are those with the biggest gang of wantoks (relatives), and so it will remain, says Kua, until such time as the Government secures trust and authority.

The next step up the legal ladder is the village court, which is recognised as part of the formal sector and empowered to resolve disputes by reference to customary law and practices. Village court magistrates are not supposed to deal with serious criminal matters like rape and assault, but 'of necessity they deal with it, to bring about a resolution, to bring about peace to that particular segment of the community.'

But there is little capacity for deterrence against serious crime within the 'settlements of convenience' delivered at village level. The preferred government strategy, Kua says, is to get the matters to police, charges laid, committal in the district court and, where there is a case, a full trial in the National Court.

Ultimately the solution is to 'send a more powerful message to the men — that you cannot commit, let's say, a violent sexual offence against a woman, and then you bury it at the village level, without allowing it to go through the proper court system.'

That all requires building infrastructure and capacity (courts, skills, systems, personnel) 'and that is what we are doing,' says Kua. But it is a long haul 'and as a nation our issues are many.' Justice competes against a range of other critical priorities, including transport, health, and roads.

Meanwhile his strategy is to signal the seriousness of the issue by imposing the death penalty, which remains on the books in PNG, though it has not been used since 1957. Prime Minister Peter O'Neill moved soon after taking power to reactivate it and Kua has dispatched teams overseas to investigate lethal injection. It is coming, he says.

'For want of a better solution, in desperation, when you have this kind of impunity existing and growing in a society, we are forced to a corner, where we resort to things like the death penalty for rape, for aggravated rape.' In the PNG context 'fire has to be met with fire. You use fire sometimes to kill off bigger fires elsewhere.'

We can't...allow a level of impasse and status quo to continue to permeate to the detriment of our women folk, our young girls, our vulnerable population. We have to do something about it. I hope you don't come and take offence to that. Because the European Union (and the United Nations) are openly coming out to us and saying 'listen you can't have death penalty, you can't have corporal punishment'. And I'm thinking 'where do they come from?...What solutions do they have for our issues?' (We have) no taxpayer base, very limited financial resources, (we're) trying to deal with all the human issues of life and falling short of course, as one would expect.

Kua tells me he is proud to be the Attorney-General who oversaw the enactment of family protection legislation (more than 20 years in the making) which makes it easier for victims to get interim protection orders at the grassroots village level, defines a wider range of offences, and also empowers and directs police action.

'Our heart has always been with our womenfolk, for the majority of us,' Kua says. 'We are committed to doing everything we reasonably can within the confines of the resources available to us. That is the commitment we can give them.'

Today Kerenga Kua is gone from office, another maelstrom consumes the energies of the power players, and it is business as usual in far-flung village courts and under the rain trees of Port Moresby.
 2014-08-28T23:30:00+00:00 Jo Chandler Perhaps the trickiest thing to communicate is just how formidable the landscape is for women wanting access to justice. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=98032a13-6c30-43c8-94de-c641294d1141 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=98032a13-6c30-43c8-94de-c641294d1141 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/29/Violence-against-women-in-PNG.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=98032a13-6c30-43c8-94de-c641294d1141 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/29/India-links-Labour-reform-India-Japan-economic-recovery-RiceBucketChallenge-and-more.aspx India links: Labour reform, India-Japan, economic recovery, #RiceBucketChallenge and more 2014-08-28T22:24:00+00:00 Danielle Rajendram

Is labour market reform really crucial to reviving India's manufacturing sector? Pranab Bardhan doesn't think so.

Shamika Ravi argues that rather than being reinvented or restructured, India's Planning Commission should be replaced with an independent think tank.

Is India's economy starting to recover?

Prime Minister Modi is off to meet Shinzo Abe in Japan next week, marking the occasion by sending a series of tweets in Japanese. Here are seven things to watch out for during his visit.

India has started its own alternative to the ice bucket challenge: the rice bucket challenge.

Why India needs an opposition leader.

In this NBR interview, Nilanthi Samaranayake reflects on the Modi Government's engagement with South Asia.

Raja Mohan and Rory Medcalf argue that the ability to build flexible Asian coalitions should become a critical element of India's strategy.

Check out the trailer for the crowdfunded documentary film Driving with Selvi, which follows the story of South India's first female taxi driver.

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 2014-08-28T22:24:00+00:00 Danielle Rajendram The week's best reading on India. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=57a237a1-20fc-45d6-8cfd-183d4088e001 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=57a237a1-20fc-45d6-8cfd-183d4088e001 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/29/India-links-Labour-reform-India-Japan-economic-recovery-RiceBucketChallenge-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=57a237a1-20fc-45d6-8cfd-183d4088e001 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/28/Indonesia-Australia-Code-of-conduct-is-excellent-news.aspx Indonesia-Australia Code of Conduct is excellent news 2014-08-28T07:32:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
It has an odd name and a confounding operative clause, but the 'Australia-Indonesia Joint Understanding on a Code of Conduct' signed today in Bali by Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop and her Indonesian counterpart Marty Natalegawa is good news.

What's with the name? According to the Associated Press, Julie Bishop 'wanted to call it a "Joint Understanding," while her Indonesian counterpart Marty Natalegawa preferred "Code of Conduct." So they combined the titles.' (And, it might be added, mangled the English language in a way reminiscent of the award Montgomery Burns once conferred on Homer Simpson for 'outstanding achievement in the field of excellence'.)

As for the operative clause, in Julie Bishop's words it 'specifically says that Australia and Indonesia will not use our resources, including our intelligence resources, to harm each other's interests'. The actual text reads:

The Parties will not use any of their intelligence, including surveillance capacities, or other sources, in ways that would harm the interests of the Parties.

There are several ways to parse that statement, and no doubt that is just what was intended. In fact, there is probably no agreed definition behind it, which is just fine for both sides. A deal like this is not enforceable anyway, and is more about finding a face-saving way to resume a relationship which is mutually beneficial.

Mind you, it carries risks. Although we haven't heard from Mr Snowden for some time, were the Guardian to release a new tranche of documents tomorrow exposing more Australian spying activity against Indonesia, the language about not using intelligence assets to harm each other's interests could become a weapon in the hands of angry Indonesian legislators. Then again, if such a possibility actually deters both sides from doing too much spying on the other in future, it's a good thing.

And here's another good thing: according to Bishop, the Code 'lays the groundwork for even greater cooperation in the area of intelligence sharing...including in relation to the issue of foreign fighters.'

That is excellent news. The counter-terrorist cooperation between Australia and Indonesia since the 2002 Bali bombing is something of which both sides can be genuinely proud. It has stopped bombings that could have killed countless more Indonesians and Australians and stalled Indonesia's democratic transition. It has also dealt a severe blow to the feared terrorist group Jemaah Islamiya, and ought to serve as an international model of how the terrorist threat can be contained.

Photo courtesy of @aosny2011.
 2014-08-28T07:32:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen It has an odd name and a confounding operative clause, but it's a good deal. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=8508d3c6-c287-4664-a572-1eeafe877375 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=8508d3c6-c287-4664-a572-1eeafe877375 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/28/Indonesia-Australia-Code-of-conduct-is-excellent-news.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=8508d3c6-c287-4664-a572-1eeafe877375 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/28/Japans-continuing-confidence-in-the-alliance.aspx Japan's continuing confidence in the alliance 2014-08-28T05:36:00+00:00 Yusuke Ishihara
The views expressed here are the author's own, and do not necessarily represent those of National Institute for Defense Studies or the Japanese Ministry of Defense.

I am inspired by the recent debate on The Interpreter about the trajectory of Japan's security strategy. Brad Glosserman's Washington Quarterly article, which prompted the debate, sketches the contemporary discourse in Japan. Many do indeed appear to accept the decline of Japan rather comfortably, which, Glosserman suggests, explains why Japan does not go beyond picking 'low-hanging fruit' in economic and security policy. Although I personally wouldn't use this expression, I agree with Brad's underlying message that the series of recently announced policy initiatives do not constitute a radical change in Japan's strategic posture.

Building on Brad's explanation, which focuses on Japan's domestic discussion, I would add another key factor which accounts for why Japan is not changing as fast or as dramatically as a number of external observers, including Hugh White, anticipate. That is: despite the hot debate about the end of the US unipolar moment, the Japanese Government continues to place a high degree of confidence in the leadership of the US, and indeed in the alliance. In other words, from a Japanese perspective, changes in the external environment have not yet reached the point where Tokyo is forced to fundamentally reconsider its post-war strategy, founded upon its alliance with the US.

The Abe Government's National Security Strategy (NSS) captures this perception: 'though its relative influence in the international community is changing, the US remains the country that has the world's largest power'.

Japan's confidence is also underscored by America's repeated commitment to the alliance, powerfully demonstrated by flying B-52s through China's so-called air defence identification zone in November 2013 and President Obama's affirmation of the US treaty obligation to defend the Senkaku Islands. The Abe Government's confidence is also widely shared by the public. According to a recent poll by the Japan Broadcasting Corporation (NHK), 70% of respondents believe the alliance should be maintained or even further reinforced. I am sure this widely shared confidence in the Japan-US alliance shapes opinions and discourses within Japan and encourages many to feel comfortable with the status quo.

Of course, this does not mean the Japanese Government is blind to some of the challenges facing the US both on its international and domestic fronts.

In order to support the US in this difficult time, Japan's policy aims to strengthen and further support the alliance rather than switching to any alternative strategy. This is, at minimum, a fourfold initiative: (1) reforming Japan's security policy and system by establishing the National Security Council, amending some long-standing self-imposed restraints and building a 'Dynamic Joint Defense Force'; (2) adjusting the alliance infrastructure, including the defence cooperation guidelines, in line with China's 'gray-zone' activities and Japan's constitutional reinterpretation; (3) reaching out to third parties who share Japan's interests and values, including most prominently Australia; and (4) attempting to manage the relationship with China.

As Malcolm Cook rightly argues, Japan's policy moves are largely consistent with what the US is trying to do in Asia. Perhaps the only existing discrepancy between Japan and the US is how successful each has been at engaging China. While the US institutionalises its relations with China through the Strategic and Economic Dialogue and regular summit meetings, so far Japan's engagement vis-à-vis China remains stagnant, despite the Japanese Government's consistent calls for dialogue.

The current status of Japan's engagement with China is a concern for the alliance. It is more difficult for regional partners to cooperate with Japan if Sino-Japanese relations remain strained. It may also slow the US-Japan initiative to work with third countries (eg. a Japan-Australia-US or Japan-Korea-US framework). Furthermore, a functioning and healthy Sino-Japanese relationship is clearly advantageous to the alliance. For example, creating a Sino-Japanese maritime communication mechanism (a key agenda of Japan's China engagement) would help Japan and China avoid accidental or inadvertent escalations and hence prevent the US from having to make a difficult decision about how to respond. This is the key reason why the US vocally supports Japan's China engagement.

The past few weeks have seen some positive signs in the Japan-China relationship. On the sidelines of this year's ASEAN Regional Forum ministerial meeting, the Japanese and Chinese foreign ministers held a dialogue for the first time since the Abe Government came to power. In addition, speaking to a visiting Japanese parliamentary delegation on 18 August, Chinese Vice-Present Li Yuan Chao made some positive remarks about the possibility of an Abe-Xi summit meeting when Prime Minister Abe visits China for APEC in November.

How effectively and quickly Japan's engagement with China is restored is still an open question. But there is no question that any progress in Japan's engagement with China will support the US-Japan alliance and thus further strengthen Japan's confidence in the alliance.

Image courtesy of the White House.
 2014-08-28T05:36:00+00:00 Yusuke Ishihara Despite the hot debate about the end of the US unipolar moment, the Japanese Government continues to place a high degree of confidence in the continuing leadership of America. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=29717e52-8c97-43ec-9dc6-95409941d336 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=29717e52-8c97-43ec-9dc6-95409941d336 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/28/Japans-continuing-confidence-in-the-alliance.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=29717e52-8c97-43ec-9dc6-95409941d336 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/28/Canada-teaches-Russia-geography.aspx Canada teaches Russia geography 2014-08-28T04:35:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
Sure, Canada is famous for its comedians, but who knew they were working at NATO?

 2014-08-28T04:35:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen Canada is famous for its comedians, but who knew they were working at NATO? http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=15348a51-9113-4ea6-89e4-69a55def2735 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=15348a51-9113-4ea6-89e4-69a55def2735 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/28/Canada-teaches-Russia-geography.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=15348a51-9113-4ea6-89e4-69a55def2735 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/28/Pacific-island-links-West-Papua-Fiji-democracy-Melanesia-fisheries-and-more.aspx Pacific island links: West Papua, Fiji democracy, Melanesia, fisheries and more 2014-08-28T03:51:00+00:00 Tess Newton Cain
Keep up with what has been happening in the Pacific island region with our selected links.

As the 17 September election draws closer, political observers and commentators are thinking about what needs to come next to re-establish democracy in Fiji.

Meanwhile, in a recent Interpreter post, Alex Stewart asserts that in diplomatic terms Fiji has outsmarted Australia.

Incoming president of Indonesia Joko Widodo has promised to give more attention to West Papua, but will building a presidential palace there be enough?

On the Devpolicy blog, Jonathan Pryke examines why Melanesians are under-represented in Australian communities of Pacific island descent.

Giff Johnson revisits his concerns about the proliferation of regional meetings and highlights the ongoing tension between regional rhetoric and national service delivery.

Management of the region's fisheries is vital for sustainable development and food security. How does the 'Parties to the Nauru Agreement' grouping influence this?

The forthcoming G20 summit in Brisbane has received no attention in the region. Australia's 'Special Representative' recently visited Suva and Noumea to discuss why this gathering is important for the Pacific.

Next week the international community will gather in Apia, Samoa for the third International Conference on Small Island Developing States:

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 2014-08-28T03:51:00+00:00 Tess Newton Cain Links to this week's best Pacific islands reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=01c53da1-2e71-42f2-9989-429a067eb91c 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=01c53da1-2e71-42f2-9989-429a067eb91c http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/28/Pacific-island-links-West-Papua-Fiji-democracy-Melanesia-fisheries-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=01c53da1-2e71-42f2-9989-429a067eb91c http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/28/Strategic-Stability-and-Chinese-SSBN-The-Need-for-Net-Assessment.aspx Strategic stability and Chinese SSBNs: The need for net assessment 2014-08-28T02:05:00+00:00 Stephan Fruehling

In his introduction to this Interpreter debate, Rory Medcalf raises the important question of how nuclear-armed ballistic-missile submarine (SSBN) programs in Asia influence strategic stability.

Making such an assessment for any one weapons system in isolation is fraught with difficulty, as judgments are inevitably based on assumptions about doctrine, employment, escalation, and strategic concepts. Technical details also matter a lot, as was demonstrated in the late Cold War by the development of the highly precise Trident D5 (which gave the US SSBN fleet the ability to conduct counterforce missions against hardened targets) on the one hand, and the appearance of very quiet Soviet submarines (pictured) on the other. Strategic stability is thus always a question of net assessment.

Viewed in this light, the scale and scope of the programs under development in Asia today seem unlikely to change fundamental power relationships and military balances. India and China have toyed with SSBN technology for decades, and it is difficult to see either action-reaction patterns, or an out-of-character acceleration, that would indicate an incipient SSBN arms race. That said, the fact that SSBNs are now being introduced into the regional mix of capabilities throws a useful spotlight on the influence of geography, and on Chinese views about the vulnerability of their nuclear forces. Both of these factors are of fundamental importance to net-assessment-based judgments of strategic stability in the Western Pacific, and highlight the strengths of the current strategic order that China must still overcome.

The attraction of SSBNs is that they can be difficult to find and destroy, particularly if they are either isolated from adversary ASW forces in a 'bastion' or able to hide in the vast expanses of deep water found in the Pacific, Atlantic, and under the Arctic ice cap. Strategic geography thus favoured the employment of SSBNs by the main nuclear powers of the Cold War (the US, Soviet Union, France and Britain), whose submarine bases had direct access to suitable deployment areas.

Not so in China's case. While the waters of the northern South China Sea are deep, they are also confined.

The need to pass through chokepoints into the Pacific places Chinese submarines at a disadvantage, as it makes it easier to for US and allied ASW forces to detect and track Chinese SSBN patrols passing into the Pacific, or to block them through mining in wartime. Moreover, the South China Sea is ringed by US allies, and any 'bastion' the PLA Navy might attempt to establish could be contested by a range of US and allied systems operating from friendly territory. Those systems would of course themselves be at risk of Chinese attack, but the heart of a conventional battle would not be a good place for an SSBN to be.

'Deploying' the SSBN in the cave complex on Hainan Island might align more closely with the Chinese preference to keep close control of nuclear warheads, but it would significantly limit the strategic benefit of having an SSBN capability: if they remain inside the caves too long, the Chinese SSBN force risks being disabled by a US strike (even if this required nuclear weapons). Should they leave the caves in a crisis, however, China risks sending inadvertent escalatory signals, and the boats would enter waters likely to be teeming with US attack submarines.

All of this raises the question of why China is developing SSBNs in the first place. The reasons are far from clear, and a coherent strategic rationale may not even exist in Chinese minds. SSBN development is consistent with the long-term features of Chinese nuclear strategy and force modernisation, which emphasise survivability through dispersion of its land-based systems. With the DF-31 and DF-31A, China can now retire its only silo-based system, the large DF-5 ICBM, and rely completely on solid-fuel, road mobile nuclear missiles.

And yet the development of an SSBN force indicates that China is not fully confident in the survivability of its land-based nuclear forces, and is at least hedging its bets. This is not fully unjustified, as land-based missiles still have to operate in prepared deployment areas that are vulnerable to the large-scale nuclear suppression campaign, of which the US is still capable. US attempts to build a survivable launcher for its own land-mobile Midgetman missiles during the Cold War are a salutary reminder of the inherent fragility of mobile ICBMs to nuclear blast pressure. Adding SSBNs to the mix would certainly complicate US planning for the unlikely event that it should ever consider a disarming strike on China, but it does not change the basic source of China's vulnerability, which lies in the numerical imbalance of the nuclear forces of both countries.

Investment in SSBNs thus indicates that China remains uncomfortable with the limits imposed by its small nuclear arsenal. But the scale of China's investment doesn't really address the issue. SSBNs put a lot of eggs into one basket and are no panacea for the problem of survivability, especially given China's geographic disadvantage. As such, their appearance in the region is a useful reminder that the broader factors underpinning strategic stability in the region — US military capabilities, including its nuclear arsenal, and the alliances they support in the Asian littoral — have a lot going for them still.
 2014-08-28T02:05:00+00:00 Stephan Fruehling Because of China's geography, its SSBNs are highly vulnerable. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=6d9fcbeb-17bf-4d50-bc57-294c01ecec94 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=6d9fcbeb-17bf-4d50-bc57-294c01ecec94 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/28/Strategic-Stability-and-Chinese-SSBN-The-Need-for-Net-Assessment.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=6d9fcbeb-17bf-4d50-bc57-294c01ecec94 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/28/Pacific-island-leadership-PNG-steps-up.aspx Pacific island leadership: PNG steps up 2014-08-28T00:43:00+00:00 guest blogger – blank
Jenny Hayward-Jones is Director of the Lowy Institute's Melanesia Program and Tess Newton Cain is a Nonresident Fellow at the Lowy Institute.

One of the key announcements at the conclusion of the recent Pacific Islands Forum meeting in Koror, Palau was the appointment of Dame Meg Taylor as the new Secretary-General of the Forum's Secretariat. Much has been made of the fact that she is the first woman to be appointed to that role. But of equal and possibly greater significance is that she is Papua New Guinean.

Though Taylor is not the first Forum Secretary-General from PNG (Noel Levi held the position between 1998 and 2004), given PNG's population (in excess of 7 million), economy (which continues to grow), and its strategic importance, it has for a long time punched below its regional weight.

However, since the 2012 elections which saw Peter O'Neill returned as prime minister, that situation has changed markedly. While PNG has not given up its hopes of joining ASEAN to forge stronger links with its Asian neighbours, the O'Neill Government has become much more present in the Pacific islands region in terms of investment, development assistance and diplomacy.

PNG pension fund NASFUND is a prominent investor in the Pacific and has formed joint ventures with other pension funds and PNG businesses to invest in hotels in Fiji and Solomon Islands. PNG's Bank South Pacific has pursued an expansion strategy in the region, acquiring banks in Fiji, Solomon Islands and Niue to grow its operations. PNG's BeMobile has acquired a telecommunications licence in Solomon Islands.

PNG has also increased its role as a development partner in the region, supporting more activities and devoting more money.

This has prompted some to ask whether this is appropriate, given PNG's domestic development challenges. However, the PNG Government clearly sees the increased funding as a means of improving its standing and influence among its Pacific island neighbours, so we can expect more activity of this type going forward. In addition to numerous bilateral relationships (think scholarships for students from Solomon Islands and assistance with elections for Fiji), a recent development came at the latest meeting of Pacific Island Forum leaders. A regional package of US$122 million was announced to support the development objectives of smaller Pacific island countries.

In the diplomatic sphere, PNG's activities have been numerous, although it is not clear whether there is an overarching strategy at play rather than a more opportunistic approach.

Of particular significance is the role PNG has played in assisting Australia with detention of asylum seekers. O'Neill secured a realignment of Australian aid to bring it into line with his government's objectives (though this was more about rhetoric than practice, as Australia's aid program was largely designed to support PNG's objectives anyway). In addition, he has negotiated what can be described as a preferential diplomatic relationship with Australia, including a prime ministerial dialogue forum. This is a signal that PNG's relationship with Australia is singular and prominent in both Canberra and Port Moresby.

Elsewhere, PNG has taken a greater interest in the workings of the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG), having hosted the most recent Special Leaders' Meeting alongside the 5th Melanesian Festival of Arts and Culture. Within the MSG Secretariat, the recently appointed Deputy Director-General is a PNG citizen, Moelan Kilepak. While the MSG has certainly become more prominent in recent times, high-level and continuing participation by its largest member is key to future growth and influence.

At the 'whole of the Pacific' level, the recent review of the Pacific Plan was led by Mekere Morauta, a former PNG prime minister. More recently, Meg Taylor, a former PNG diplomat, was appointed as Secretary-General of the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat after intense lobbying by the O'Neill Government.

Not only has this latest development added to the list of indicators of increasing assertion of regional leadership emanating from Port Moresby, it has also served to crystalise an attendant risk: that of diplomatic tension between PNG and Fiji.

Fiji's historical role as a regional leader is well recognised. However, PNG looks to be signaling that regardless of the outcome of Fiji's 17 September elections, Suva should not expect that there will be a return to 'business as usual'. Diplomatic tensions between Fiji and PNG are evidenced in disputes over the Fiji National Provident Fund backing out of an investment in PNG, Fiji's rejection of PNG's High Commissioner as dean of the diplomatic corps in Suva, the absence of PNG's Prime Minister and Foreign Minister from some MSG meetings and Fiji's own Pacific Islands Development Forum, the absence of Fiji's Prime Minister from the MSG leaders' meeting in Port Moresby, and disagreements over the Melanesian candidate for the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat's Secretary-General role.

Papua New Guinea is perhaps more ready now than at any time in its past to step up to a regional leadership role. Bolstered by the election of Meg Taylor, PNG will also host the Pacific Islands Forum leaders' meeting in 2015, giving the Government in Port Moresby a rare opportunity to showcase its ambitions. But it will need to battle a resurgent Fiji, which will be using a newly legitimate status after 17 September to reclaim its supremacy among the island states.

Image by Flickr user AK Rockefeller.
 2014-08-28T00:43:00+00:00 guest blogger – blank PNG is taking on a new leadership role among Pacific Island states. Can it compete with an energised Fiji? http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=17f0fde0-8795-4d85-b722-1dff51e82965 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=17f0fde0-8795-4d85-b722-1dff51e82965 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/28/Pacific-island-leadership-PNG-steps-up.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=17f0fde0-8795-4d85-b722-1dff51e82965 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/28/Indo-Pacific-security-links-Nationalist-leaders-hypersonic-weapons-defence-industries-and-more.aspx Indo-Pacific security links: Nationalist leaders, hypersonic weapons, defence industries and more 2014-08-27T23:00:00+00:00 Andrew Kwon
The Indo-Pacific is a strategic system encompassing the Indian and Pacific oceans, reflecting the expanding interests and reach of China and India as well as the enduring role of the US. The Lowy Institute's International Security program presents a weekly selection of links illuminating the changing security picture in this increasingly connected super-region.

Vietnam has sent its first envoy to China since the HYSY981 oil rig crisis.

With the recent election of Narendra Modi in India, speculation is emerging over the role of strong nationalist leaders throughout an already tense Indo-Pacific region.

Despite a recently aborted test, US experimentation with hypersonic weapons highlights an emphasis on investing in new technologies to improve capabilities.

News has emerged that China may be developing a next generation high-speed submarine design which would allow it to move faster by 'flying' through water.

Japan and India continue to express strong interest in improving their respective defence industries.

This convergence has led to expectation that discussion over defence industry cooperation will be high on the agenda during the Modi-Abe Summit in Tokyo.

Closer to home, there is growing concern over Australia's own defence technology edge and the need for serious consideration in the upcoming Defence White Paper.

The Lowy Institute International Security Program's work on Indo-Pacific security is supported by two grants from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.
 2014-08-27T23:00:00+00:00 Andrew Kwon Your weekly dose of the best Indo-Pacific security reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=fde50c92-421b-455a-993c-89de2744a48f 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=fde50c92-421b-455a-993c-89de2744a48f http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/28/Indo-Pacific-security-links-Nationalist-leaders-hypersonic-weapons-defence-industries-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=fde50c92-421b-455a-993c-89de2744a48f http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/27/150-anniversary-Geneva-Convention.aspx After 150 years, time to renew our commitment to the Geneva Conventions 2014-08-27T07:18:00+00:00 Leonard Blazeby

The signing of the first Geneva Convention, by Charles Edouard Armand-Dumaresq. (Wikipedia Commons.)

In a month where the horrific realities of armed conflict have dominated the news headlines, it is poignant to note that 150 years ago the international community first came together to develop rules to limit the barbarity of war.

The result of that August 1864 diplomatic conference, hosted by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), was the first Geneva Convention protecting the sick and wounded on the battlefield. Despite this agreement (and the host of international humanitarian law [IHL] treaties negotiated since then) we continue to witness blatant disregard for the laws of war. Today, more than ever, ICRC is calling for stricter compliance with IHL to preserve life and human dignity around the world.

As Australians this month recall the devastation of the First World War, dozens of countries remain in the theatre of armed conflict. Unlike the wars of recent centuries, however, these modern battles are not characterised by opposing state armies trading fire across the trenches. The majority of contemporary conflicts take the form of civil wars; and it is civilians, not combatants, who are the primary victims of violations of IHL. All too frequently civilians are deliberately targeted and terrorised, used as shields, or their means of survival — water, food and shelter — are destroyed. Women and girls, in particular, are the victims of rape and other forms of sexual violence, in some cases on a massive scale. Forced displacement is unsettling entire communities. In Iraq and Syria alone, we are seeing populations the size of Adelaide uprooted from their homelands, and facing the bleakest of futures in the extreme conditions of temporary desert camps.

The international community has not sat back in the face of these changing realities. States and civil society have successfully negotiated a host of international agreements to protect the most vulnerable from the cruelty of war and ban indiscriminate weapons, from cluster munitions to anti-personnel landmines. As recently as June this year Australia ratified the Arms Trade Treaty, an historic agreement that has put in place global rules to better regulate the trade of conventional weapons, with the express purpose of reducing human suffering.

In spite of this progress, millions of civilians are bearing the brunt of the world's enduring wars.

It is not surprising, then, that we at the ICRC are often asked whether IHL remains relevant in an era of these violent confrontations, when atrocities are reported on an almost daily basis. While it is acknowledged that this body of law faces challenges, we are convinced it remains the best framework for regulating behaviour in war. It is the insufficient respect for applicable rules, rather than a lack of rules, that is the principal cause of suffering during armed conflicts. If IHL were better respected, there would be less death and destruction. At present, however, IHL lacks effective means of identifying, preventing and halting violations while they are occurring. The mechanisms within IHL that do exist are rarely, if ever, used. This impotence has often meant appalling devastation for those affected by war. And a right that is regularly violated without provoking any clear response is likely to lose its validity over time.

Underlying it all is our collective failure. Contracting States to the 1949 Geneva Conventions have undertaken to respect and to ensure respect for these treaties in all circumstances. Thus far, however, they have failed to give themselves the resources required to keep their promises.

In recognition of this, the ICRC, along with the Swiss Government, has been holding talks since 2012 with all states, including Australia, on the best way to improve compliance with IHL. Our work is based on a mandate given by the 31st International Conference of the Red Cross and the Red Crescent. A variety of proposals have emerged from this initiative, such as the formation of a dedicated forum where states can decide jointly on the measures needed to bring better compliance with IHL. This could include regular and systematic discussions on how States Parties are meeting their obligations under the Conventions and addressing associated challenges.

The concept of rules regulating behaviour in conflict is not a new or Western notion. Throughout history and across cultural boundaries, from the tribal wars of the Pacific to the major interstate conflicts in Europe, combatants have created rules to regulate the conduct of hostilities. This universal principle that even wars have limits has seen every state in the world ratify the Geneva Conventions. It is now up to our generation to create a strong institutional framework to ensure that these rules are respected. If it is to be fully effective, the law needs suitable instruments. Today, a solution is within our grasp. It is up to us to seize this opportunity.
 2014-08-27T07:18:00+00:00 Leonard Blazeby International humanitarian law can limit can limit atrocity in wartime, but we need better instruments. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=6d5226a3-6e42-4c9c-9021-33fbe6edecd5 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=6d5226a3-6e42-4c9c-9021-33fbe6edecd5 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/27/150-anniversary-Geneva-Convention.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=6d5226a3-6e42-4c9c-9021-33fbe6edecd5 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/27/Air-power-to-fore-Middle-East.aspx Air power to the fore in the Middle East 2014-08-27T06:39:00+00:00 Rodger Shanahan

As a former Army officer, my service bias has always made me a believer that only events on the ground matter. The air force is a great enabler but rarely the decisive factor. But my experience of the Middle East has also taught me the value that many governments place in air power.

In the Gulf in particular, technically advanced aircraft symbolise modernity and make up for the limited manpower available to staff their militaries. And it is a service that can be both a path to, or symbol of, political authority. Both Syria's Hafiz al Assad and Egypt's Hosni Mubarak were air force pilots (and later commanders), while King Abdullah of Jordan (like his late father King Hussein) and the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi are both qualified military pilots.

But as the region reels from multiple security crises, it is interesting to note the degree to which air power is being used by regional forces for a multiplicity of purposes. A student of air power would do well to focus closely on the Middle East at the moment for the rich field of research it is proving to be.

Libya

Days of unverified reports of an aerial bombing by Egyptian and Emirati aircraft on a Libyan weapons storage area and Tripoli's international airport have now been verified by American officials (the officials claim they were not informed of the strikes beforehand, which is not to say they did not know about them beforehand). If true, the strike says much about UAE and Egyptian concerns regarding the need to contain the influence of the Muslim Brotherhood and its affiliates, as well as to stymie Qatari efforts in Libya to do the opposite. It is also further evidence that the UAE is adopting a more muscular and independent approach to regional security issues.

Gaza

Up until two weeks ago, the Israeli air force had already conducted 4900 sorties against Gaza since the most recent conflict began. And yet, just as was the case in the 2006 Lebanon war, even the Israeli air force admits it cannot completely extinguish the threat of indirect-fire weapons from Gaza.

Iraq

As politicians mull the possibility of air strikes against Islamic State, and the US increases surveillance of possible targets in preparation for future strikes, it is interesting to note that America has already flown 1500 sorties since 8 August (about 600 of these were combat sorties, which included 96 attacks against Islamic State targets). This shows again just how resource-intensive even a 'low intensity' air campaign can be, and why regional states will need plenty of enabling support if they are to take on Islamic State.

Iran

In the east, Iran triumphantly announced the destruction of an Israeli drone spying on its Natanz nuclear facility. The truth is that the drone was more likely flown from Azerbaijan, as this detailed report outlines. Secular Shi'a Azerbaijan and religiously Shi'a Iran have a rather testy relationship and Baku's cosiness with Israel has been an irritant to Tehran for years. Whether the drone was actually shot down near the nuclear facility or somewhere much closer to the Azeri border is perhaps something we'll never know, but it reinforces the type of surveillance technology available to a wide range of states.

Syria

To all of this we could also add the fall of Tabqa airbase, the last military base held by the Syrian Government in Raqqa province, now under the complete control of Islamic State. Syrian Government efforts at targeting the militants from the air ultimately proved futile, again showing that effective aerial campaigns against ground forces require a concentration of effort and duration that few states can manage.

Over the next few weeks it is increasingly likely that air power will be on display in the region in a significant way. For students of air power, the Middle East is certainly the place to watch.

Photo by Flickr user Garry Wilmore.
 2014-08-27T06:39:00+00:00 Rodger Shanahan Recent events in the Middle East show just how resource-intensive air campaigns are. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=57518cf8-51c4-4bfb-9bd4-c048e6f4f8cf 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=57518cf8-51c4-4bfb-9bd4-c048e6f4f8cf http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/27/Air-power-to-fore-Middle-East.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=57518cf8-51c4-4bfb-9bd4-c048e6f4f8cf http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/27/Australia-vs-ISIS-Two-things-we-need-to-hear-from-the-Government.aspx Australia vs ISIS? Two things we need to hear from the Government 2014-08-27T05:16:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
On Monday we read in The Australian that 'The  Abbott government is actively considering an extended military role for Australia in Iraq...The three main military options for Australian involvement are renewed humanitarian air drops, deployment of special forces and ground-attack roles for our aircraft', Greg Sheridan reported.

The New York Times has reinforced this line, reporting that US officials 'said they expected that Britain and Australia would be willing to join the United States in an air campaign' against the extremist group ISIS.

But this morning we read in the Fairfax press that, according to Foreign Minister Julie Bishop, 'Australia had not been asked to provide any military assistance to try and counter Islamic State's advance across Iraq and said the Government was focussed on providing humanitarian support.'

Presumably there is a prime ministerial statement in our near future which will clear this up. When that moment arrives, and if Mr Abbott does announce that Australia is taking a role in military operations, Australians have a right to expect two key things from their 'team captain':

1. A comprehensive statement describing the US strategy for countering ISIS, and Australia's role in it: In this regard, the PM's recent statement that 'There would have to be a clear and achievable overall purpose, a clear and proportionate role for us, a careful assessment of the risks and an overall humanitarian purpose' was reassuring.

But it already looks as if the Americans are defining 'humanitarian purpose' broadly, and if it stretches still further until it becomes indistinguishable from a mission to defeat ISIS (or ISIL), we need to know exactly how this is going to be accomplished. As Brian Fishman just wrote on War on the Rocks, 'No one has offered a plausible strategy to defeat ISIL that does not include a major U.S. commitment on the ground and the renewal of functional governance on both sides of the Iraqi-Syrian border.'

I happen to think a mission like that would be disastrous for the US, and that Australia should dissuade America from carrying it out rather than offering to take part in it. But if the Abbott Government disagrees, it ought to at least do Australians the courtesy of spelling out exactly what the parameters of the mission are and how the goals will be achieved.

2. An assessment of the threat: Attorney-General George Brandis now tells us that the threat of extremists coming back from the Middle East is the 'greatest national security threat that Australia has faced in many years...The escalating terrorist situation in Iraq and Syria poses an increasing threat, unlike any other that this country has experienced, to the security of Australians both at home and overseas.'

That's some strong language, but it sits oddly against the assessments provided to the Government by Australia's intelligence agencies (my emphasis):

Senior intelligence officials told journalists their assessment was that the terrorist threat from global Islamist terrorism would rise, that some of the 60 or so Australians fighting in Syria and Iraq would come home dangerously radicalised, and that the Syrian dispute was also re-radicalising Indonesian extremists. Currently the threat was unchanged.

Sometimes it feels as if the post 9/11 period has never happened, because we keep making the same mistakes: we hype the threat, terrorise ourselves, and over-react in ways that only strengthen those we are fighting. Let's take a deep, deep breath before starting on the same road again.
 2014-08-27T05:16:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen If we're going to get militarily involved, Australians need to get an assessment of the threat and a sense of the mission. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=acbd7ad7-11f5-421d-bb75-5f5bff1e1999 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=acbd7ad7-11f5-421d-bb75-5f5bff1e1999 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/27/Australia-vs-ISIS-Two-things-we-need-to-hear-from-the-Government.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=acbd7ad7-11f5-421d-bb75-5f5bff1e1999 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/27/Sea-based-nukes-A-marginal-effect-on-stability.aspx Sea-based nukes: A marginal effect on stability 2014-08-27T03:47:00+00:00 Thomas Mahnken
There are several sources of instability in the Asia Pacific region today. Some are political, such as China's pursuit of territorial claims at sea and on land at the expense of its neighbours. Others are military, such as those elements of Chinese military modernisation aimed at coercing Beijing's neighbours and countering US extended deterrence guarantees and power projection capabilities. Chinese doctrine also contains features that could be highly destabilising. Finally, there is a considerable potential for misperception among actors in the region.

The deployment of nuclear-armed submarines (SSBNs) is unlikely to contribute greatly to stability, but neither is it likely to create instability where none existed or to magnify existing sources of instability.

Beijing is undertaking a large-scale modernisation of its military, including its nuclear force. According to Department of Defense and press sources, China is fielding the mobile DF-31A intercontinental ballistic missile and is developing the mobile DF-41 with multiple independently-targetable re-entry vehicles. According to press reports, China has also conducted at least two tests of the WU-14 hypersonic boost-glide vehicle. China also fields theatre nuclear strike systems such as the DF-21. And China has invested considerable resources in developing and deploying the Jin-class SSBN and JL-2 submarine launched ballistic missile (pictured).

China's nuclear modernisation is aimed at giving the Chinese leadership a secure second-strike capability. As Tom Christensen has argued, that is in turn likely to embolden China (if it has not already done so) to pursue a more aggressive foreign policy. The deployment of SSBNs is clearly part of that but is far less consequential than other Chinese developments. These include:

The continuing deployment of large numbers of precision conventional ballistic missiles that threaten China's neighbours.

The fact that China apparently to some extent co-mingles the deployment and command and control of its nuclear and conventional forces.

The Chinese Second Artillery Force's doctrine, which discusses missile strikes in close proximity to hostile forces as deterrent actions.

Misperception and miscalculation are always a possibility with the deployment and operation of any new capability, and it would behove the Chinese Government to be transparent in its plans for its SSBN force. That said, the deployment of SSBNs is likely to be far less consequential than other elements of Chinese military modernisation.

Photo courtesy of Sinodefence Forum.
 2014-08-27T03:47:00+00:00 Thomas Mahnken Deployment of SSBNs is unlikely to contribute greatly to stability, but neither is it likely to create instability. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=7cac84a4-4160-45e6-aca8-72d2b37c8619 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=7cac84a4-4160-45e6-aca8-72d2b37c8619 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/27/Sea-based-nukes-A-marginal-effect-on-stability.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=7cac84a4-4160-45e6-aca8-72d2b37c8619 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/27/environment-news-cycle.aspx The environment and the news cycle 2014-08-27T00:49:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen

I loved this bit from US environmental activist Bill McKibben, who is guest blogging on Andrew Sullivan's site:

Every day there's something more immediately important happening in the world: ISIS is seizing an airbase this morning, and California is recovering from an earthquake, and Michael Brown is being buried.

But there's nothing more important that's happening each and every day than the ongoing deterioration of the planet on which we depend. Though on a geological time scale it's proceeding at a hopelessly rapid pace, in terms of the news cycle it happens just slowly enough to be mainly invisible. It's only when a new study emerges, or a shocking new data set, that we pay momentary attention, until the Next New Thing distracts us.

Quite right. The news media focuses on events, and the deterioration of our environment is a process, not an event.

So what's the 'shocking new data set' McKibben is referring to? A new study published in Science claiming that invertebrate numbers have dropped by a staggering 45% over the last 35 years. Good grief.

Photo by Flickr user Dan Foy.
 2014-08-27T00:49:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen A new study published in Science claims invertebrate numbers have dropped by a staggering 45% over the last 35 years. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=4a51acc0-aa29-4c28-8c81-2738f57b2cd7 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=4a51acc0-aa29-4c28-8c81-2738f57b2cd7 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/27/environment-news-cycle.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=4a51acc0-aa29-4c28-8c81-2738f57b2cd7 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/27/China-links-WeChat-Clive-Palmer-South-Korea.aspx China links: WeChat, Clive Palmer, South Korea, pigs, robots, Deng, Mao, Xi and More 2014-08-27T00:16:00+00:00 Dirk van der Kley

The Communist Party of China has opened a WeChat account.

'The majority of the world's feed crops are destined for China's pigs.' So who will feed the pigs?

Fergus Ryan argues that Julie Bishop should not have apologised to the Chinese Embassy over Clive Palmer's anti-China outburst: 'It's the kind of oversensitive micromanaging of the Australia-China relationship that ends up making us look weak.'

Fergus took a screenshot of the top ten most liked comments (Chinese) from a heavily commented Weibo post on the Clive Palmer comments. None criticised Clive's comments. Palmer has since apologised.

An in-depth look at South Korea's China policy under Park Geun-hye.

China's growing grey market for all that's foreign.

Is Xi Jinping the heir to Deng Xiaoping or is he more like Mao? Here's a pithy infographic of Deng's quotes and achievements to celebrate 110 years since his birth. (Thanks Danni.)

China is slowly automating its manufacturing sector but still lags well behind the global average for robots per 10,000 workers.

 2014-08-27T00:16:00+00:00 Dirk van der Kley Links to this week's best China reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=ab39ce28-36dc-4d70-9d94-a9cb851e2b51 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=ab39ce28-36dc-4d70-9d94-a9cb851e2b51 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/27/China-links-WeChat-Clive-Palmer-South-Korea.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=ab39ce28-36dc-4d70-9d94-a9cb851e2b51 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/27/Australians-back-tougher-anti-terror-laws.aspx Australians back tougher anti-terror laws 2014-08-26T23:19:00+00:00 Tim Mayfield
The early numbers are in on the Government's proposed toughening of Australia's anti-terror laws and they make for interesting reading. According to Newspoll, 77% of respondents were in favour of the new law that would require individuals who travel to pre-designated conflict zones to prove they had not been in contact with any terrorist groups.

This result is significant.

It is significant because, when it comes to matters of national security, public opinion really does matter. While on other issues it may be within a government's remit to move ahead of prevailing attitudes, when it comes to our collective safety there should be no such latitude.

This is because measures that are enacted with the aim of preserving the safety of citizens will inevitably impact on our liberty. And though the most basic function of any government is to protect its citizens, history is littered with examples of governments that have used this justification to concentrate their own power and quell opposition.

While a robust and mature democracy like Australia is unlikely to go down such a path, the centrality of individual rights and liberty in our system of governance demands strong public support for any measures that impinges on our freedoms.

So what should we make of the Newspoll results recently published in The Australian?

Given that Newspoll has addressed the most controversial of the proposed enhancements to our current anti-terror laws, it is reasonable to assume that there would be the equivalent or greater support for the other measures, which in the main seek to maintain existing powers of the AFP and ASIO* beyond their current sunset clauses.

Furthermore, the decisive outcome on the specific question of reversing the onus of proof for people traveling to designated conflict zones indicates that Australians are largely comfortable with the proposed recalibration of the liberty/security scale toward ensuring our collective safety.

It should be noted that Newspoll's question does not actually mention anything about reversing the burden of proof, which is the key element of the provision in question. No doubt more cautious wording would have dampened some of the apparent enthusiasm for the proposal.

It is also important to acknowledge that public opinion must not be the sole determinant of the utility of enhanced anti-terror measures. Any broad-based consensus should be combined with targeted consultation, especially with those communities likely to be disproportionately affected by the changes.

We are seeing this process play out in the form of engagement by key actors, including Prime Minister Abbott and ASIO Director-General David Irvine, with representatives of the Islamic community. While these meetings do not appear to have resulted in the consensus that I am sure the Government would have liked, they nonetheless serve an important purpose in providing a platform for alternative views to be expressed by those who feel that they have the most to lose.

Our parliament should also heed expert opinion. This will become especially pertinent when the draft legislation is tabled later this year. Indeed, it will be crucial to determine whether the laws will actually have the desired effect of combating the threat of radicalised fighters returning to Australia to carry out terrorist attacks. This is easier said than done. The concept of reversing the burden of proof will require careful thought and deft drafting in order to achieve the desired effect while not entangling innocent travelers.

If the Government can get the drafting right, it has a sound basis to move forward with this measure along with the other proposed enhancements to Australia's counter-terrorism framework.

Photo by Flickr user Jeff Nelson.

Ed. note: ASIO is a corporate member of the Lowy Institute.
 2014-08-26T23:19:00+00:00 Tim Mayfield When it comes to matters of national security, public opinion really does matter. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=0b3ee9a2-2c2e-447f-b701-b6746f2e3c8f 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=0b3ee9a2-2c2e-447f-b701-b6746f2e3c8f http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/27/Australians-back-tougher-anti-terror-laws.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=0b3ee9a2-2c2e-447f-b701-b6746f2e3c8f http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/27/How-Fiji-outsmarted-Australia.aspx How Fiji outsmarted Australia 2014-08-26T22:15:00+00:00 Alex Stewart

Last Friday Fijian Interim Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama began his first visit to Australia since taking power in 2006. In response to the 2006 coup, Canberra had imposed travel bans for all members of the Fijian government. These were abandoned earlier this year by the Abbott Government.

One would expect such a visit to be about mending fences and shoring up relations. But Rear Admiral Bainimarama was not visiting Canberra to speak with the Abbott Government. His visit was to Sydney, to meet with Fijian overseas voters as part of his campaign for the Fijian elections next month. Bainimarama is more concerned with gaining support for his Fiji First party than securing the goodwill of the ostensible leader of the Pacific Islands region.

This focus on Fijian domestic affairs even when visiting Australia is symptomatic of the confidence with which the Bainimarama Government has approached regional affairs, and of the fact that it does not feel cowed by the largest power in the region.

Given the success of Fijian foreign policy since 2006, this is not surprising.

Despite the fact that Australia provides Fiji with a significant amount of aid, Fiji does not regard itself as dependent on Australia and has been quite prepared to challenge the Australia-dominated regional status quo. Since 2006 the Bainimarama Government has assertively broadened its international relationships, both within the region and further abroad. While a lot of attention has been given to Fiji's relationship with China, Suva has also strengthened relations with the rest of Melanesia and with global players such as India and Brazil. Overall, Fiji's relations with other states are at their healthiest since independence.

The Bainimarama Government has also mounted a strong challenge to the Australian-backed Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) by launching its own rival organisation. The Pacific Islands Development Forum (PIDF) has now held two successful summits that have garnered significant international attention. While it certainly doesn't have the resources of the PIF, the PIDF looks set to stay, and significantly blunts the impact of Fiji's ongoing suspension from the PIF.

This strengthened web of bilateral and multilateral relations has given the Bainimarama Government the maneuvering room it needs to take a confident stance against its Australian critics. When Foreign Minister Julie Bishop visited Suva last February to start on the road towards normalising the relationship, Fijian sources confidently proclaimed that this was Australia's last chance to remain relevant.

The decision by the Abbott Government to lift sanctions in February had raised hopes that there might be a warming of relations between Fiji and Australia. Those hopes were always expressed cautiously, but six months on there has been little sign that the Bainimarama Government has been swayed by Canberra's softened stance. When the campaign trail led Rear Admiral Bainimarama to New Zealand earlier this month, he bluntly said that he doesn't consider Australia a part of the Pacific Islands region. A harsh statement, given that Australia is a founding member of the PIF.

Furthermore, the Bainimarama Government remains determined to hold elections in Fiji in the manner it sees fit, including by passing controversial electoral legislation just over a month before the poll date. Forcing a return to democracy had been a key goal of the Australian sanctions regime, but in that respect appeasement appears to have had as little effect as confrontation. The rhetoric and policies enacted by Suva have not changed since 2006, nor will they unless the Rear Admiral is handed an unlikely defeat on 17 September.

This is not to say that abandoning the sanctions regime was a bad decision. There is nothing to be gained from maintaining an ineffective regime of sanctions that gave the Bainimarama Government rhetorical ammunition in its attempts to reshape the order of the region to its liking. But it is important to point out that lifting them has not healed the rift between Canberra and Suva.

If the Abbott Government wants to reassert the full measure of Australian influence then more work is required not only in Fiji but also in the rest of the Pacific Islands. The fact that the Bainimarama Government weathered Australian sanctions without feeling the need to compromise will have implications that will be felt for some time in what John Howard described as 'our patch'.
 2014-08-26T22:15:00+00:00 Alex Stewart Fiji does not feel cowed by the largest power in the region. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=d5aab4c6-c251-4585-9e64-262ffd8e6fe2 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=d5aab4c6-c251-4585-9e64-262ffd8e6fe2 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/27/How-Fiji-outsmarted-Australia.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=d5aab4c6-c251-4585-9e64-262ffd8e6fe2 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/26/tragedy-European-unemployment.aspx The tragedy of European unemployment 2014-08-26T08:10:00+00:00 Stephen Grenville
The Interpreter hasn't had much to say about European growth for a couple of years, mainly because there hasn't been much of it. European Central Bank President Mario Draghi brought this melancholy story up to date at the central bankers' annual get-together at Jackson Hole, Wyoming, last week, far from the bustle of the financial markets. The bankers have exhausted the usual topics of monetary policy at past meetings; this time their focus was on labour markets.

The graph below shows the starting point of Draghi's narrative. US unemployment rose much more sharply than Europe's in the first phase of the 2008 crisis, but US unemployment came down substantially while European jobless rates continued to rise.

Most of this difference reflects the second wave of the crisis which hit the European peripheral countries (starting with Greece) at the beginning of 2010. But the overall euro-area unemployment rate of nearly 12% is not just a reflection of 25% unemployment in Greece and Spain. With the exception of Germany, none of the core European countries has had any recovery to speak of, with employment lower and unemployment substantially higher than before the crisis. The table below (source) shows the percentage change in GDP, employment and unemployment between the pre-crisis peak and the first quarter of 2014:

What is to be done? Draghi's answer is 'a bit of everything'. He'll keep monetary policy loose (and presumably do 'whatever it takes' if the euro comes under threat). But he is looking for help from fiscal policy and structural reform. A call for structural reform (ie. productivity improvement) is a standard element of just about any macro-economic prescription, but it carries more weight and urgency given the duration and depth of the European recession.

Draghi quotes figures showing that European structural unemployment (the part that can't be fixed just by getting economic activity back to full capacity) as having risen from 8.8% in 2008 to 10.3% in 2013 as a result of the crisis and the lacklustre recovery. This would imply that the usual instruments of counter-cyclical macro-policy can't take the unemployment rate down very far.

He reports that Ireland has done better than Spain in terms of wage flexibility, but Ireland's main method of getting its unemployment rate down has been emigration, not only of disenchanted Irish youth but also the migrants from other parts of Europe who had flocked to Ireland when it was the Celtic Dragon, before the crisis.

Even this dismal litany doesn't complete the list of problems facing Europe. The European banking system is undercapitalised and in no position to support a strong recovery. And the unsustainable debt burdens on the peripheral countries make it most unlikely that a recovery can occur in these countries without a substantial additional debt write-off.

Draghi (and others) are giving more attention to the possibility that Europe may be facing secular stagnation of the sort demonstrated by Japan over recent decades. This is not a novel idea, but its revival is gaining wider attention, including in this comprehensive e-book from Vox-EU.

Just as a postscript on the Draghi speech, his presentation contrasted to the typical central banker's view, which is interested in the labour market only in as far as it affects inflation. Draghi began his speech by sounding, well, human:

No one in society remains untouched by a situation of high unemployment. For the unemployed themselves, it is often a tragedy which has lasting effects on their lifetime income. For those in work, it raises job insecurity and undermines social cohesion. For governments, it weighs on public finances and harms election prospects. And unemployment is at the heart of the macro dynamics that shape short- and medium-term inflation, meaning it also affects central banks. Indeed, even when there are no risks to price stability, but unemployment is high and social cohesion at threat, pressure on the central bank to respond invariably increases.

 2014-08-26T08:10:00+00:00 Stephen Grenville Unemployment figures show that Europe just isn't recovering from the GFC. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=2b0f4c89-b5c2-4d73-ba3f-ac535c73c9b2 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=2b0f4c89-b5c2-4d73-ba3f-ac535c73c9b2 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/26/tragedy-European-unemployment.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=2b0f4c89-b5c2-4d73-ba3f-ac535c73c9b2 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/26/Military-strategy-links-Chinas-tech-counter-productive-sanctions-F-35-hegemony.aspx Military & strategy links: China's tech, counter-productive sanctions, F-35 hegemony and more 2014-08-26T06:03:00+00:00 Matthew Hill

Joshua Foust asks: why are US officials so much more concerned about the threat posed by the Islamic State when violent quasi-state actors of a similar scale are on the rise in their own backyard?

Ely Ratner and Elizabeth Rosenburg argue that the continued escalation of sanctions against Russia will only serve to undermine the capacity of US allies — in Asia, as well as in Europe.

Despite the vast resources thrown at the stealth capabilities of fifth-generation aircraft like the F-35, there are indications that they could soon be outstripped by Russian and Chinese advances in radar technology.

Yet, as Valerie Insinna notes, these potential vulnerabilities are unlikely to derail the unprecedented impact of the F-35 on the global defense industrial base.

After 2018, the F-35 is likely to capture over a 50 percent share of the global fighter jet market, says Richard Aboulafia, aerospace analyst for the Teal Group, in a February report…"There are too many models chasing too few orders," he says. The F-35 is "looking to have a very significant international presence that will probably suck up most of the orders from U.S. allies."

Jeffrey Lin and Peter Singer survey China's pursuit of next generation military technologies.

Should NATO reassess the role of Europe-deployed nuclear weapons in deterring Russia? The Atlantic Council highlights the views of several of its prominent analysts.

TX Hammes argues that states cannot continue to assume technology will provide them with superior tactical options to contain sub-state actors, particularly as autonomous navigation and precision targeting systems diffuse globally.

Finally, War is Boring has posted an ode to the Browning M2, commemorating its astonishingly long service record from 1933 to the present day.

 2014-08-26T06:03:00+00:00 Matthew Hill Links to this week's best military and strategy reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=690579b1-26c9-4d6d-8d41-0cc5bb386909 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=690579b1-26c9-4d6d-8d41-0cc5bb386909 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/26/Military-strategy-links-Chinas-tech-counter-productive-sanctions-F-35-hegemony.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=690579b1-26c9-4d6d-8d41-0cc5bb386909 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/26/Why-do-nations-fight-Prestige-mostly.aspx Why do nations fight? Prestige, mostly 2014-08-26T05:19:00+00:00 Julian Snelder
Nobel laureate economist Paul Krugman has some powerful insights into the economic motivation for war in his recent New York Times op-ed. He worries that some modern wars may be deliberately conceived as a distraction from bad economic conditions; he is referring to Russia, and wondering what China might do one day if its economy falters.

Krugman's angle is an economist's twist on an ancient question: why do we fight?

'Rationalist' theories of war – nations fight when benefits exceed costs – overlook the simple reality that miscalculation is inevitable in warfare. In fact, miscalculation has been said to be the very cause of war. As Krugman observes, wars frequently ruin one, both or even all sides: 'starting a war is a very bad idea. But it keeps happening anyway.'

The economic argument against war was made by the liberal Manchester School in the 1860s, then made again by Norman Angell in The Great Illusion (1909). He has, unfairly, been ridiculed for his poor prediction. Angell wasn't arguing for the impossibility of war but for the stupidity of war. World War I proved him right, not wrong.

A century on, we still ponder Angell's puzzle: surely we are trading too much to contemplate conflict? This is the recurring myth of economic interdependence as a restraint on war. It was proven wrong in 1914, when Britain and Germany were highly entwined, and again today as Vladimir Putin risks Russia's economy for his Novorossia project. Some feel reassured by the massive 'Chimerica' financial condominium binding the US and China together. A US Marine Corp general voiced this confidence at a recent seminar: a conflict in the Pacific is unlikely, because 'we owe so much money.'

But money is seldom at the root of either war or peace among nations (although as Krugman notes resource booty often drives civil conflicts). The causes of inter-state war are famously complicated. It is often joked that more ink has been spilled over war than blood. Of the thousands of books on the subject I will cite a recent one because of its clarity. In Why Nations Fight, Richard Lebow comes to a resounding conclusion about the 94 major international conflicts since 1648. Of our three major motives – appetite (wealth), spirit (honour) and fear (security) – it is the human 'spirit' which incites most wars. A whopping 58% of wars were over standing or prestige. Revenge accounted for 10%. Material aggrandizement, or what Marx called imperialism, accounted for just 7%.

That fact is worth repeating: more than half of major conflicts were over 'who's the boss.'

Lebow's analysis is not simplistic. He doesn't mean that nations don't tussle over territory; they do. But their reason is often tied to historical sovereignty or security or influence, rather than material value. Curiously, he deliberates long over the US entry into World War II: was it caused by Japan's fear or America's revenge? Lebow's analysis challenges the widely held view that rising powers cause war. In fact it is the incumbent great powers who fight wars with the highest frequency (mostly insurgencies), and the declining great powers who act the most aggressively (often against weaker states) and irrationally (they usually lose). In other words, angry nations often miscalculate. He further shows that 'balance of power' arrangements aren't particularly good at preventing wars, tough they do work militarily (small comfort).

It can be said that a balance of power is emerging in Asia, one that partly rests on a 'financial balance of terror'. But the American general reassured by his nation's debt to China may overstate the effect of its deterrence. The trillion dollars or so Washington owes Beijing is a lot of money, but it's worth only one or two months of output of either country. There is a danger that economic interdependence actually heightens the risk of conflict by making nations over-confident in their ability to inflict financial pain.

Great powers usually only act as such 30 years or more after achieving that status. In China's case, Lebow calculates this may have happened as early as 1990. China now is a true superpower. Perhaps what America should worry about most is when 'Chimerica' is no longer so consequential to China, when Beijing becomes so mighty that it has no heed for American opinion. Then its actions may be driven purely by domestic spirits. By Krugman's bleak logic, that is when it may face economic problems at home, and distractions abroad will beckon.
 2014-08-26T05:19:00+00:00 Julian Snelder According to new research, of our three major motives – appetite (wealth), spirit (honour) and fear (security) – it is the human 'spirit' which incites most wars. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=49bbff5c-bf43-471f-928c-d268f088f722 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=49bbff5c-bf43-471f-928c-d268f088f722 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/26/Why-do-nations-fight-Prestige-mostly.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=49bbff5c-bf43-471f-928c-d268f088f722 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/26/Edible-insects-ISIS-in-Southeast-Asia-elephant-dung-coffee-and-more.aspx Southeast Asia links: Edible insects, ISIS in Southeast Asia, elephant dung coffee and more 2014-08-26T01:58:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan

Thailand's 7500 tonnes of edible insects are helping struggling farmers and feeding a growing global market.

Europe could play a bigger part in Freedom of Navigation disputes in the South China Sea, argues RUSI's Edward Schwarck.

Malcolm Cook looks at Southeast Asia's growing divide and its similarities with Northeast Asia.

Malaysia's Minister of Urban Wellbeing, Housing and Local Government on the return of bodies of those who died in the MH17 disaster:

The Washington Post looks at Thailand's despicable trafficking record.

Border tensions remain between Bangladesh and Myanmar, explains IDSA's Gautam Sen. India could play a role in normalisation.

According to Kuala Lumpur police, bomb-making material was purchased by 19 suspected jihadists loyal to ISIS. Their targets in the Malaysian capital included a Carlsberg brewery, pubs and discos.

Over at CSIS, Kriti Sapra looks at the rising spectre of religious extremism in Southeast Asia.

Malaysian PM Najib on which side Malaysia should take in the US-China rivalry: 'It's not as easy as choosing a football team.'

The 2015 roll-out of the ASEAN Economic Community could increase inequalities, writes Sara Schonhardt.

Yangon is planning a subway to free up its congested roads (it seems to get worse by the day). Here's the proposed map, and for train buffs, here's the Project's Facebook page.

An excellent infographic put together by the Sumitro Chair at CSIS explains fishing competition between China and Vietnam in the South China Sea.

'The aroma is floral and chocolate, the taste is chocolate malt with a bit of cherry.' That's the description of the world's most expensive coffee, made in Thailand's Golden Triangle. It's Black Ivory Coffee made from feeding coffee beans to elephants, which are then retrieved from their dung:

[vimeo:80956738]
 2014-08-26T01:58:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan Links to this week's best Southeast Asia reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=741342c3-303b-4d1d-a5ec-201871f76353 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=741342c3-303b-4d1d-a5ec-201871f76353 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/26/Edible-insects-ISIS-in-Southeast-Asia-elephant-dung-coffee-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=741342c3-303b-4d1d-a5ec-201871f76353 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/26/Is-Hilary-Clinton-really-a-foreign-policy-hawk.aspx Is Hillary Clinton really a foreign policy hawk? 2014-08-26T01:24:00+00:00 James Bowen

We are in strange times indeed when a presumptive US Republican presidential candidate can hope to score political points by accusing his likely Democratic rival of being a war hawk, but this is apparently the world we inhabit in 2014.

The accuser in this case was Kentucky Senator and leading light of the libertarian movement, Rand Paul, who was targeting former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in his comments to the Meet the Press program last weekend. Paul called Clinton 'gung-ho' where foreign policy was concerned, and appeared to lay out the welcome mat for disaffected Democrats who were 'tired of war' ahead of the 2016 presidential election.

Paul, it should be said, has done himself no favours in this particular policy arena of late by vacillating in response to the question of whether his support for US non-interventionism extends to cutting off aid to staunch ally Israel (the latest position appears to be a firm 'no').

Nonetheless, he has raised a question worth investigating in light of the multitude of military challenges facing the US in the Middle East and elsewhere, and the strong likelihood that Clinton will occupy the White House fairly soon: is Hillary Clinton a war hawk? And does this count in her favour?

One factor that seems to answer the first question in the affirmative is the sizeable distance she and her camp have recently sought to put between her positions and those of President Barack Obama. In a much-publicised interview with The Atlantic, Clinton called out Obama's failure to offer support to rebels fighting Bashar Al-Assad's regime in Syria as being culpable in the rise of the Islamic State, an organisation most recently in the news for the horrific beheading of US journalist James Foley.

'The failure to help build up a credible fighting force of the people who were the originators of the protests against Assad — there were Islamists, there were secularists, there was everything in the middle — the failure to do that left a big vacuum, which the jihadists have now filled,' she said, adding that great nations needed better organising principles than Obama's favoured 'don't do stupid stuff.'

So far, so hawkish.

Clinton has also departed from Obama on the question of US support for Israel in light of what many consider to be its grossly overzealous response to the threat of Hamas in Gaza. She has shown far less frustration than the President and Secretary of State John Kerry towards Israeli leadership under Benjamin Netanyahu, and proclaimed Israel's right to defend itself in recent speeches and in that same article in The Atlantic, in which she went as far as to figure that anti-Semitism had played some role in the global reaction to Israel's counter-offensive.

Back in 2008, Clinton also said that as president she would be willing to break a near 70-year run in US policy and use nuclear weapons against Iran if it were to launch a nuclear attack on Israel (at this point we should remember that an embrace of the Israeli cause and a general hawkishness have long gone hand-in-hand as far as US foreign policy are concerned).

Then there is Clinton's record of supporting the invasion of Iraq in 2003, for which she has since offered deep regret but which remains evidence of her propensity to be swept up in the sort of militaristic fervour that could again arise should the US come under some sort of attack post-2016. It also points to Clinton's hawkish instincts being far more than a response to Obama's foreign policy, which continues to divide the US public, and more in keeping with that of Bush and her husband.

The logical conclusion is that Obama, and indeed Paul, are the anomalies here and that not being a hawk is very much the exception to the rule for US leaders.

Should Hillary have carried on as Secretary of State through the crises in Ukraine, the Middle East and elsewhere it would have been interesting to watch how she handled the implementation of her boss's increasingly hands-off foreign policy.

The political calculus of all this is in turn quite fascinating, given that polls continue to show most in the US oppose further US interventionism. That includes a huge 70% of the public being against the type of involvement Clinton wants to see in Syria. Owing to one of those rather depressing quirks of US politics, the fact that her more muscular outlook is nevertheless considered politically shrewd can be attributed to the country's elites being decidedly more hawkish than the general public, at least according to one recent argument.

While some have claimed that Clinton's recent accuser Rand Paul will be her only viable Republican challenger, it's difficult to see him avoiding the fate his father and fellow libertarian outlier Ron Paul, who was hugely exciting to a certain segment of the Republican base but too much on the fringe to be considered a viable candidate.

Besides, a contest between a hawkish Democrat and a dove-like Republican will surely be too disorienting for anyone to consider.

Photo by Flickr user kakissel.
 2014-08-26T01:24:00+00:00 James Bowen We live in a strange world when a potential Republican presidential candidate is criticising his Democratic rival for being too hawkish. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=57df7adb-b6c6-4bd0-a320-3ee43fa99d20 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=57df7adb-b6c6-4bd0-a320-3ee43fa99d20 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/26/Is-Hilary-Clinton-really-a-foreign-policy-hawk.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=57df7adb-b6c6-4bd0-a320-3ee43fa99d20 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/26/In-defence-of-my-Unity-Journal-critique.aspx In defence of my Unity Journal critique 2014-08-26T00:25:00+00:00 Rhys Thompson
Ordinarily, I would welcome comments on my work by highly regarded counter-proliferation policy commentators such as Jeffrey Lewis and Catherine Dill, whose work I have read on Arms Control Wonk. Indeed, they have devoted much time to the Unity Journal allegations and I could apologise for not citing their commentaries alongside those by Andrew Selth and John Arterbury.

The authors are usually attentive to the small details, which lends a particular authority to their analyses. It is therefore unfortunate that they appear to have misread and misinterpreted the post they have spent so much effort rebutting. Sadly, this makes their rebuttal misleading and inaccurate.

My initial post focused mostly on the legality of the Unity Journal reporters' actions in the context of media freedom in Myanmar. And their guilt was not really in question: In their own article, they admitted to knowing that they were trespassing on a military site, and their editor later admitted to trespassing in an interview. But the authors are likely aware of this, as they are surely basing their analyses and comments on the original Unity article rather than subsequent second-hand reporting.

Still, I am surprised by the accusation that I supported any of the journalists doing 'hard time', that 'brutal sentences' were justified in cases of poor journalism or even for trespassing, or that 'press protections only apply to good journalism', since I never actually wrote any of this. In fact, I noted that the punishments were severe and not comparable with responses internationally. My follow-up post reiterated and added context to this point.

A careful reading of both of my posts shows this.

As I previously stated, I accept that the claims about the site in question may be true, but maintain the Unity Journal article did nothing to prove this, even if it did draw international attention. And there is also no dispute that the harsh sentences were due to Unity Journal reporting about (and trespassing on) a defence facility, a point I initially noted and which we seem to agree on.

The Lewis-Dill rebuttal seems to give some credibility to the sources used by the Unity Journal reporters, namely the local residents who had their land confiscated. But there is no assessment of whether their bitterness at losing land (again, not in dispute) may have influenced the allegations. Moreover, I'm sure Lewis and Dill would agree that while the locals (much like satellite imagery) can confirm that a building or site exists, this is very different from having first-hand knowledge of what is actually going on inside. If anything, their rebuttal supports my original argument that critical analysis of this article is still needed.

It is disappointing that discussions of important issues relating to Myanmar, especially those involving human rights, quickly fall prey to emotion, and personal criticisms soon take the place of an objective analysis of the facts. Too often, the argument is over what was thought to have been said, rather than what was actually said.

Regrettably, the Lewis-Dill rebuttal is a case of the former, not the latter.
 2014-08-26T00:25:00+00:00 Rhys Thompson Rhys Thompson responds to criticism from Jeffrey Lewis and Catherine Dill. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=23161b9f-13dc-43b2-9b9a-d1abc03bde8b 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=23161b9f-13dc-43b2-9b9a-d1abc03bde8b http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/26/In-defence-of-my-Unity-Journal-critique.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=23161b9f-13dc-43b2-9b9a-d1abc03bde8b http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/25/250000-displaced-Myanmar-humanitarian-crisis.aspx Quarter of a million people displaced in Myanmar's humanitarian crisis 2014-08-25T06:57:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan
Recent headlines on Myanmar have centred on Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and the country's stuttering media reforms, but the much graver reality that has been largely absent from news coverage was outlined earlier this month in a snapshot report published by the UN's Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

Almost a quarter of a million people have been internally displaced in the country's recent conflicts. Heavy fighting between the Kachin Independence Army and the Tatmadaw (the Myanmar military) in Kachin state has displaced 99,000 people. In Rakhine state, troubled by continuing communal violence, 137,000 people have been internally displaced, half of whom don't have secure access to food.

Medicins Sans Frontière was earlier this year banned from working in Rakhine state (it has since been allowed to return). Riots against international aid agencies earlier in the year in the troubled state have also impeded health services and food distribution before the wet season (as explained earlier on these pages). The number of health clinics in the state almost halved between February and July this year (from 1560 to 830). Flooding and heavy rain have also imperilled internally displaced people in already fraught situations.

These reports come as the latest Global Humanitarian Overview puts 2014 as one of the worst years in living memory for humanitarian crises around the world. According to the report, some 102 million people are estimated to be in need of humanitarian assistance, a 20% increase since December 2013.

Graphic courtesy of UN OCHA.
 2014-08-25T06:57:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan Two new reports outline the scale of the crisis, which is all but ignored by the international media. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=dd398a5a-a104-428e-a309-84246745a479 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=dd398a5a-a104-428e-a309-84246745a479 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/25/250000-displaced-Myanmar-humanitarian-crisis.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=dd398a5a-a104-428e-a309-84246745a479 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/25/France-the-sick-man-of-Europe.aspx France, the sick man of Europe? 2014-08-25T06:13:00+00:00 Daniel Woker

France is not doing well.

The crisis is evident from the ubiquitous beggars in the streets of Paris to its bad, and worsening, economic data. President Hollande's wishful notion of a merely temporary French lapse in the economic competition with Germany has ended; defeat has been conceded.

Northern Europe's heavy dose of austerity medicine has been rejected, and France has now joined the southern European chorus on the need for further deficit spending to revive the economy. Does that mean France — the continent's second-biggest and the world's fifth-biggest economy — is tilting towards Europe's informal 'Club Méditerranée', where life is sweet but subsidised by the more industrious north? Yes and no.

Yes, with regard to the outsize role that state intervention has in economic recovery. While it is undisputed internationally that the main fiscal parameters are the state's prerogative, the same is not true for the labour market, where France is hopelessly interventionist, thus stifling enterprise and innovation. This has proven difficult to change, as the key word in labour relations remains 'solidarité', leading to absurd situations where strikes are called not to change a particular group's grievances but rather out of solidarity with an unconnected economic segment. On the other side of the labour market, state incentives for employers are pocketed rather than reinvested to create new employment.

No, in that it does not share the quasi-feudal conditions that can still be found in much of southern Europe, where a few families and clans are spread over considerable parts of the economy of Italy, Spain and especially Greece and Portugal. The recent implosion of the latter's banking and real estate conglomerate Espirito Santo illustrates the ongoing struggle to get rid of these deeply encrusted structures.

France, of course, had its seminal break with feudalism and religion long ago. As the French school books have it, France's Age of Enlightenment, followed by the mother of all social revolutions, catapulted the country to the forefront of humanity's struggle to provide just, decent and equal living conditions for all and every 'citoyen'.

Whatever the historical truth of this narrative, it is a fact that the French 'contrat social', especially its educational side, provides for a basically level playing field. Public schools are just that and, mostly, they are the best. Universities are state institutions too, not private for-profit enterprises. They charge nominal fees and are not burdening the average new labour market entrant with crippling student loans to be paid back before starting professional life.

Certainly these structures have aged badly and are fraying at the edges. The main problem here, as in other sectors, is an unwillingness to innovate as both the composition of society (through immigration, especially from non-European countries) and academic content (globalisation; digitalisation) change beyond recognition. Yet the system is basically sound and can be renovated, as long as the assumption prevails that education is as much a public good, gained by merit and not (daddy's) money, as it is an individual investment in one's own future.

Excellent food is still the delight of anybody living in or visiting France. Yet food (or rather its provider, agriculture) constitutes a major hurdle for economic development in France. What commodities are for Australia, agriculture is for France, yet for far too long, this economic sector has attracted a disproportionate share of capital, labour and subsidies (both nationally and through the EU's Common Agricultural Policy). Due to migration, cheaper imports and technological advances, jobs in French agriculture are today at the bottom rung of the economic scale and vanishing rapidly.

Yet labour and capital, thus freed up, has not been channeled into innovative industrial production, itself hard hit by globalisation with its export of capacities to emerging countries. Thus the schism between a relatively small elite profiting disproportionally from globalisation and the army of globalisation losers is even more pronounced in France than in other Western countries. This in turn is not exactly conducive to labour market reforms.

While the lack of economic reform remains a major drag on the country and on its role in Europe, the opposite is true with regard to two other major elements of potential progress towards the 'great European promise', as symbolised by the EU.

Firstly, Europe will have to develop the means to guarantee order in its 'near abroad' (Mediterranean, Africa) and to take a bigger part of responsibility for a functioning global order. As we all know, the US is unwilling and unable to continue to shoulder the burden on its own. It is fair and necessary that Europe should help, and here France has been a leader, especially with regard to Africa.

The second area where France counts among the leading countries in Europe concerns assimilation of immigrants, especially those with non-European roots. The ugly historical chapters of racism in its colonies and of rampant antisemitism notwithstanding, 'la nation fondatrice des droits de l'homme' nevertheless has a pretty good record over the last 50 years of integrating the huge influx of immigrants from former colonies. The remaining challenge from mainly Muslim 'banlieus' (suburbs) and the present political onslaught from the xenophobic far-right have economic rather than social roots. They can be solved when the aforementioned economic reforms are tackled in earnest.

On a personal level, the French are in general quite tolerant, and this not only with regard to their womanising politicians. France's leading Sunday paper Journal de Dimanche runs a yearly contest to crown the most popular person nationwide. In this country of said politicians, charming crooners, attractive actresses and great chefs, the crown this year did not go to any of these, but rather to singer-songwriter Jean-Jacques Goldman, son of a Polish Jew and a German, followed by two actors, one with African ancestry and the other with Algerian background.

Photo by Flickr user jacsonquerubin.
 2014-08-25T06:13:00+00:00 Daniel Woker President Hollande's wishful notion of a temporary French lapse in competition with Germany has ended; defeat has been conceded. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=82e58375-0d65-41ac-878f-cec2797200ec 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=82e58375-0d65-41ac-878f-cec2797200ec http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/25/France-the-sick-man-of-Europe.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=82e58375-0d65-41ac-878f-cec2797200ec http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/25/Rebuttal-Rhys-Thompson-Unity-Journal-case.aspx Rebuttal to Rhys Thompson: The Unity Journal case 2014-08-25T04:08:00+00:00 guest blogger – blank
Jeffrey Lewis is Director of the East Asia Nonproliferation Program at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies and founder of ArmsControlWonk.com. Catherine Dill is a Research Associate at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies.

We were extremely distressed by the article titled Myanmar: Media Freedom and the Unity Journal Case, written by Rhys Thompson. Worst of all, we feel forced to criticise people and an institution we like and admire. The Lowy Institute has been a wonderful addition to the policy discourse on Asia. We're not sure what happened this time.

Thompson's argument depends entirely on the awful idea that the brutal sentence (ten years of hard labour for the journalists) is justified because the reporting's sourcing is 'hazy and questionable.' A subsequent piece softens the tone, but leaves in place the argument that the Unity journalists remain partly to blame for 'poor' reporting, trespassing and other supposed infractions.

This is appalling.

The notion that press protections only apply to 'good' reporting amounts to having no press protections at all. A free press is an essential element of an open society. It cannot function when reporters must be perfect to avoid being thrown into jail for reporting on the financial dealings of those in power.

The facility near Pauk remains a mystery. Unity claimed the local villagers believed it to be a Chinese chemical weapons facility. Journalist John Arterbury has reported the suspicion of Bertil Lintner that the facility is involved in the North Korean missile trade. We would only note that the 'signatures' of the facility are similar to those at other sites where North Koreans are believed to be operating. The size and layout of the facility, to say nothing of the Government's reaction to its disclosure, should interest any reporter or anyone concerned about Myanmar's transition to an open society.

There are almost certainly errors in the Unity story. Any early story about such a secret site will contain mistakes; that is what happens when reporters try to untangle the lies and obfuscations of governments. Even Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein have noted that their initial stories about Watergate contained inaccuracies as they attempted to understand the scope of the conspiracy. One story incorrectly linked three innocent White House officials to the Nixon Administration's wiretapping conspiracy. Thompson's argument boils down to the claim that the Nixon Administration should have been able to lock up the entire the staff of the Washington Post for 'hazy' reporting, an option Nixon would certainly have enjoyed.

Moreover, Thompson's argument is fundamentally dishonest. Let's say Lintner is right: it's a North Korean missile factory in violation of UN sanctions. Does anyone believe that, had the Unity reporters correctly identified the foreign personnel as North Koreans involved in an illicit arms deal, the sentences would have been lighter? The sentences were harsh not because the story was wrong (if it was wrong) but because Myanmar's Directorate of Defence Industries (DDI) wants to shield its activities from scrutiny.

Finally, who is Rhys Thompson to tell us what the facility is or whether the reporting was good? As evidence that the quality of the reporting was poor, Thompson points the inclusion of 'supposedly irrelevant' details about the water and power supply. As nonproliferation policy experts, this statement is baffling. Details about water and power supply are essential to determining the purpose of the facility. We have been conducting, with a number of colleagues, an examination of the power supply precisely because such details help reveal the purpose of the facility. In substituting his judgment for that of a reader, Thompson illustrates the problem with authoritarianism. The authorities don't know what's best for you, despite their smug assurances.

In fact, the Unity reporters appear to have accurately reported what local villagers believed, whether the villagers were right or wrong. Many of the things the villagers told Unity are consistent with features visible in the satellite images we analysed — details such as the security perimeter, tunnels, helipads for visits by senior leadership figures and housing that looks to be for foreign workers.

Oh, and lest we forget, the villagers were right about one other minor detail as well. Their farms were taken without due process and their village was destroyed. You can see that in the satellite images, too.

That's quite a story, if you ask us. But, by all means, let's focus on any details that might be hazy and sentence five people to ten years hard labour. Let's emphasise that the journalists 'trespassed' at a site they said had no signs prohibiting entry, where no one asked them to leave, and in a manner that might result in a slap on the wrist in the US. Just as long as we don't ask any difficult questions about the process that led to the razing of a village, the construction of a suspicious defence facility with foreign workers, or DDI's continuing relationship with North Korea.
 2014-08-25T04:08:00+00:00 guest blogger – blank A response to Rhys Thompson's piece arguing that Myanmar journalists got important details wrong about an alleged chemical weapons facility. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=47efec21-b2c9-4c38-a0d7-868a35b43f87 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=47efec21-b2c9-4c38-a0d7-868a35b43f87 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/25/Rebuttal-Rhys-Thompson-Unity-Journal-case.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=47efec21-b2c9-4c38-a0d7-868a35b43f87 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/25/Chinas-unsafe-aerial-intercept-What-does-this-mean.aspx China's 'unsafe' aerial intercept: What does this mean? 2014-08-25T02:42:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen

Last Friday we learned that a Chinese fighter pilot had earlier in the week engaged in some Top Gun-style antics with a US surveillance aircraft (see photo):

An armed Chinese fighter jet aggressively confronted a U.S. Navy P-8 Poseidon surveillance aircraft earlier this week over international waters in the South China Sea, mounting a series of "unprofessional and unsafe" maneuvers that included passing within 20 feet of the Navy aircraft's wingtips, a Pentagon official said...

...The Navy P-8 was on a routine mission gathering intelligence in international airspace over the contested South China Sea, about 135 miles east of Hainan Island, China's southernmost point. The incident occurred several days after Army Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, made a historic visit to nearby Vietnam.

On three separate passes, the Chinese J-11B flew directly under and alongside the Navy aircraft, at one point bringing its wingtips within about 20 feet of the P-8's wings before conducting a roll over the top of the U.S. aircraft. The Chinese fighter jet also passed the nose of the P-8 at a 90-degree angle, showing its belly loaded with weaponry to the U.S. Navy pilot, Kirby said.

China has been unrepentant in response to US claims of unsafe pilot conduct, and it looks like the US is trying to de-escalate the situation, with un-named US officials telling the Wall Street Journal that 'the midair encounters may be attributable to a "rogue" pilot or group of pilots in a squadron responsible for intercepts in the South China Sea. These officials also said they don't believe the aggressive flying was directly authorized by the Chinese military.'

In other words, the US is signaling that recent efforts to improve military-to-military relations aren't jeopardised by this single incident.

Clearly the US and China need to improve their mutual understanding of how these intercepts ought to be managed. When there are clear rules and procedures in place, there is less room for rogues on either side to make snap judgments that could be misinterpreted by the other. The problem will only become more acute as China develops its capabilities to fly missions close to US Pacific territories and even the continental US. Not that improving these 'rules of the road' is any guarantee of safety. The US and Soviet Union (then Russia) have decades of experience with these aerial encounters, yet in April a Russian fighter performed almost exactly the same dangerous manoeuvre with a US spy plane.

Speaking of 'rules of the road', the WSJ article points out that:

The U.S. maintains all vessels have a right to freedom of navigation outside another country's territorial waters, which extend 12 nautical miles from the coast under international law. China has at times said that freedom doesn't apply to military surveillance and mapping and has bristled at the presence of U.S. military aircraft and ships coming so close to its shores.

It's true that China has made this distinction, but in June last year it also undercut its own case by admitting that it had conducted incursions into America's exclusive economic zone.

That said, the balance of maritime surveillance and espionage capability massively favours the US at present. China does not even have a long-range maritime patrol aircraft in its inventory or any bases close to US soil from which to operate them. The US, by contrast, has bases in Japan, Guam and Hawaii, and is rebuilding its fleet with the new P-8 Poseidon and the MQ-4C Triton drone. Its ally Japan also has a huge fleet of maritime surveillance aircraft.

If China does develop the capability to conduct regular surveillance missions off US Pacific territories or even the mainland, the US reaction to such flights will be a symbolic indicator of America's willingness to cede China the rights and privileges of a great power. China's conduct in this case may well have been provocative and dangerous, but these surveillance flights do take on a different resonance when they are happening in your own backyard.

Finally, it's worth pausing to think about how technology may change this high-stakes game: as I mentioned, the US is in the process of introducing drones to conduct some of this surveillance work. So what would last week's incident have looked like if the US aircraft had not been carrying a crew? On the one hand, with no lives in danger it would have lowered the stakes for the US. On the other, would the lack of risk to the crew also make US military commanders more willing to take risks with flights close to China's shores?
 2014-08-25T02:42:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen Clearly the US and China need to improve their mutual understanding of how these intercepts ought to be managed. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=8da38f26-b9d6-4ac9-9bbb-44f982d588ad 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=8da38f26-b9d6-4ac9-9bbb-44f982d588ad http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/25/Chinas-unsafe-aerial-intercept-What-does-this-mean.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=8da38f26-b9d6-4ac9-9bbb-44f982d588ad http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/25/Indonesia-Dispelling-the-ghosts-of-98.aspx Indonesia: Dispelling the ghosts of '98 2014-08-25T00:10:00+00:00 Catriona Croft-Cusworth

Police and students during the 1998 Jakarta riots. (Wikipedia.)

Twice in the past two months the spectre of the 1998 riots in Jakarta has been raised, and twice it has been dispelled by the Indonesian capital's refusal to return to a state of fear and violence.

No one seriously expected '98-level disorder at last week's announcement of the Constitutional Court's decision to reject the election appeal of losing presidential candidate Prabowo Subianto, nor at the announcement of president-elect Joko 'Jokowi' Widodo's victory last month. But the memory of the tragedy has hung over the city since election day in July.

The anxiety, hinging mainly on whether Prabowo and his supporters would concede defeat, is reflected in everyday conversation: Chinese-Indonesians who say they have tickets to Singapore on standby; former student protesters predicting public attacks by hired thugs; a motorcycle taxi driver asking why the Australian embassy hasn't arranged a ticket home for me yet. It also shows in the response by police and the armed forces, who brought in thousands of additional personnel from other provinces to secure the city last week.

In anticipation of the Constitutional Court's ruling last Thursday, an estimated 5000 protesters supporting Prabowo brought the city centre to a standstill with demonstrations that were met by authorities with tear gas and a water cannon. The action made for dramatic news footage, but in reality was a contained kind of chaos. Outside the city centre, typically congested main roads were empty of traffic as many commuters opted to stay home and out of the way of any potential trouble. Those who did attend the demonstration appeared to either be members of groups affiliated with Prabowo's coalition or simply rent-a-crowd protesters in it for the Rp50,000 ($5), new T-shirt and a free lunch — said to be the going rate for this odd staple of Indonesian politics.

Some demonstrators would have been truly there for the cause. The spin team behind Prabowo's campaign has been working hard to sow confusion about the status of the election.

Almost a month after Jokowi was declared president-elect, media outlets supporting the Prabowo camp were still introducing him as 'presidential candidate No. 2'. Banners can still be found today in central Jakarta congratulating Prabowo on his presidential 'win'. On Indonesia's Independence Day last weekend, mainstream TV channels broadcast the flag-raising ceremony involving outgoing president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, while over on the Prabowo-affiliated TVOne the main event was a bizarre ceremony at a polo club involving Prabowo and his running mate Hatta Rajasa, who acted as if they had already been made president and vice president.

On Thursday, as the Constitutional Court prepared to read its verdict on Prabowo's claim of 'structured, massive and systematic' electoral fraud by his opponent, Prabowo was nowhere to be seen. Jokowi, meanwhile was carrying out his duties as Jakarta governor, awaiting his inauguration as president in the coming months. His supporters had been asked to stay off the streets and wait for the court to settle the dispute. They were not disappointed. Judges publicly read out an overview of their verdict, addressing each point in Prabowo's lawsuit one by one. Starting at 2pm, the verdict reading lasted several hours, leaving the bored protesters to give up their chants and eventually disperse at sundown. Just before 9pm, the verdict was finally confirmed as a rejection of Prabowo's appeal, leaving Jokowi's claim to the presidency intact. Symbolically, The Jakarta Post reported that the announcement came 16 years to the day since Prabowo was dismissed from the military over alleged human rights abuses during the 1998 riots.

Soon after the verdict was announced, the Prabowo camp released a statement accepting defeat, but still alleging instances of injustice in the conduct of the election.

Nonetheless, there appears to be a general acceptance of the election result and a clear preference for any disputes to be handled via democratic institutions rather than a disturbance of the peace. Thanks to the functioning of institutions such as the General Elections Commission (KPU) and the Constitutional Court, attempts to disrupt the election process via misinformation and the orchestration of public disturbances have not succeeded. Indonesia's democracy may still be a work in progress, but this election showed a population determined to achieve consensus and rule of law rather than return to past tactics of fear and violence.
 2014-08-25T00:10:00+00:00 Catriona Croft-Cusworth Indonesian democracy is a work in progress, but its institutions are holding firm. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=68d57ff8-1e78-4b2c-abfa-cfa0364be8bf 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=68d57ff8-1e78-4b2c-abfa-cfa0364be8bf http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/25/Indonesia-Dispelling-the-ghosts-of-98.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=68d57ff8-1e78-4b2c-abfa-cfa0364be8bf http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/25/renewable-energy-Iraq-remittances-ice-buckets-elephants-and-more.aspx Aid & development links: renewable energy, Iraq, ice buckets, elephants and more 2014-08-24T22:15:00+00:00 Philippa Brant

An innovative agreement on renewable energy technology transfer has been signed between China, Denmark, Ghana, Zambia and UNDP.

UN agencies and NGOs are struggling to respond to the humanitarian crisis in Iraq. Even the $500 million Saudi aid grant, which they wanted spent as fast as possible, has faced logistical problems.

Stop dumping ice on your head. Just give money. Good critique of the #icebucketchallenge on Slate (thanks @bjrigby).

Last year was the most dangerous on record for humanitarian workers, with 155 deaths and 134 kidnappings.

Can China save Africa's elephants?

Lauren Wolfe on why so many women are dying from Ebola.

What happens when we start thinking about remittances as income? Great Lego video depiction of a new paper by Michael Clemens and Timothy Ogden.

[youtube:YlVKAPRjSw0]
 2014-08-24T22:15:00+00:00 Philippa Brant Links to this week's best aid and development reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=79ccdced-9052-4015-ba80-27501c58b4c0 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=79ccdced-9052-4015-ba80-27501c58b4c0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/25/renewable-energy-Iraq-remittances-ice-buckets-elephants-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=79ccdced-9052-4015-ba80-27501c58b4c0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/23/Weekend-catch-up-China-Japan-competition-strategic-stability-climate-change-and-much-more.aspx Weekend catch-up: China-Japan competition, strategic stability, climate change and much more 2014-08-22T22:00:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
Bringing together all the longer Interpreter articles you were too busy to read this week.

We've had some interesting responses to Hugh White's piece from last week on China-Japan competition and what it means for the US-Japan alliance. This is addition to Malcolm Cook's critique last Friday.

First up, Christopher Pokarier argued that a key part of China's foreign policy is an attempt to delegitimise Japan:

Clearly, central to such a strategy is the stigmatisation of Japan, given its locale, continuing economic, technological and cultural clout, and alliance with the US. In recent months, wilful misrepresentation of Japan's contemporary character as a society and a polity under the leadership of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has escalated.

This has been evidenced starkly in Chinese media reaction to Abe's recent visit to Australia and the close and deepening ties affirmed by the Australian and Japanese governments. Shrill criticism from mainland media soon became news in its own right in Australia, and a counterweight to the otherwise upbeat news cycle around Abe's visit.

Next up, Dhruva Jaishankar argued that what China fears most in Asia is some sort of middle-power coalition to balance Beijing's growing power:

A security partnership with India offers Japan at least two other benefits, both of which, if carried through, could undermine Beijing's plans for regional hegemony. Japan's military-to-military contacts with India enable it to prepare for out-of-area contingencies, particularly in the maritime realm, which represents a key step in Japan's path to becoming a normal military power. More significantly, the possibility of joint production of the US-2 aircraft with India, and its potential export to third countries, could mark a major development as part of Japan's reversal of its self-imposed ban on defence exports.

Finally, Brad Glosserman suggested that given Japan's strategic and economic realities, its responses to China's rise are constricted:

Given this context, Japan's choices become:

The status quo, or alliance with the US: this allows Japan to balance psychological and structural constraints and maintain maximum freedom of maneuver. In truth, however, even this could push the Japanese public to the edge of its comfort zone.

A nuclear power, without great power ambitions: this would be a practically impossible choice, given anti-nuclear sentiment in Japan. Pursuit of the nuclear option would isolate Japan and offer little security, which its strategic planners acknowledge. The public would never stomach an offensive posture, so any nuclear stance would be a poison pill, purely defensive in nature. (If I wanted to be as provocative as possible, I'd call this the 'North Korean option.') This undercuts Hugh's thesis of a nuclear-armed Japan striving to become a great power (add the cost of such a policy and the likelihood plunges even further).

A junior partner to China: Japanese may not want to compete with China but they are too proud and too unsettled by China to accept subordinate status either. Even junior partner status within the alliance can be irritating, but the US uses the right language when discussing Japan to relieve that pressure. Japan could only accept a subordinate status to China when China is so transformed that it is no longer a threat to Japan (about the same time that Taiwan would vote to reunite with the mainland) and when Beijing offers a relationship that affords Japan the status it demands.

Hugh responded to his critics, offering this conclusion:

So what can Japan do? I think it faces a binary choice: accept Chinese primacy or try to preserve its full political and strategic independence. Which path Japan takes will depend, inter alia, on what kind of regional hegemon China might become. If it turned out to be as benign as the US has been in the Western Hemisphere, then a future for Japan as Asia's Canada might not be so bad. But how trusting are the Japanese willing to be? And what have the Chinese done to earn Japan's trust?

And the alternative? I may have misled Brad by describing Japan's other option as a return to 'great power' status. I do not mean that Japan would need to compete with China for hegemony in Asia, or assert a sphere of influence of its own to match and balance China's. In the right regional setting Japan could establish itself as a great power on equal terms with China, without seeking hegemony or a sphere of influence. For reasons I set out in The China Choice, that regional setting would need to resemble the nineteenth-century European Concert of Powers: a Concert of Asia. Only as an independent great power in that kind of setting can Japan be secure over coming decades, unless it is willing to accept subordination to China.

Sticking with Northeast Asia, Robert Kelly gave us two posts on whether the US should withdraw its forces from South Korea. In Part 1, he argued in the affirmative:

The US is not an empire. Where it can retrench, it should. Commitments should not last indefinitely.

This is an openly normative argument. If one embraces a full-throated version of US hegemony (militarised, globalised, interventionist) then this will not appeal. But post-Iraq, there is clear public desire to rein in American interventions, so the normative case for restraint, on liberal democratic grounds, is strong.

The costs of hegemony are not just financial. They also include the regular war-making and killing of foreigners; a sprawling, hugely intrusive national security state; domestic nativism; as well as torture, indefinite detention, rendition, and similar penal abuses. All this suggests that retrenchment would be good for American democracy and liberalism. Allies may not like that. They will complain of abandonment. But sacrificing America's liberal ideals at home to promote them abroad is strange brew. It is increasingly obvious that hegemony abroad is deleterious to American liberalism at home. Where allies can stand on their own, as South Korea very obviously can, US retrenchment would be domestically healthy.

In Part 2, Robert gave us four reasons why US forces should remain in South Korea:

South Korea, standing alone, might slide toward a semi-democratic national security state like Pakistan

This cost is almost never reckoned by those advocating withdrawal from Korea. Most advocates of retrenchment from Korea, such as Cato's Doug Bandow, assume Korea to be a stable market democracy that can carry the costs of a head-to-head competition with North Korea. This is so economically, but I am not so sure politically. For thirty years the 'republic' of Korea was more like a Prussianised barracks-state dictatorship than a republic, with one dictator, Park Chung-hee, who genuinely seemed like the Korean version of Mussolini (Park's repression was the big reason President Carter wanted to withdraw from Korea as part of his human rights emphasis in US foreign policy). So thorough-going was the McCarthyite propaganda of dictatorial Korea about the 'reds' to the north that many older Koreans will tell you they actually believed that North Koreans had red skin.

Long, enervating national security competitions, like those between Pakistan and India, or North and South Korea, are corrosive to democratic and liberal institutions. South Korea's dictators used to justify repression and illiberalism on precisely these grounds. It is a huge achievement for South Korea that it managed to create real democratic and liberal institutions. It would have been easy for South Korea to stay a militarised faux-democracy like Egypt today, or Turkey and Indonesia earlier on. A US withdrawal that pushed up South Korean defence spending to 7% of GDP might threaten the South Korean experiment with liberalism and democracy, one of especial importance in the future as an Asian model against the authoritarian 'Beijing consensus.'

 This week Graeme Dobell rounded out his series on great Australian foreign policy speeches. His final pick was Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's speech to Peking University in 2008:

Mark the Peking University speech as a key moment when China's ruling dynasty began to realise that Australia's new prime minister would not be their Manchurian candidate. Instead, his intimate knowledge of China gave Lu Kewen an ability to say dangerous things; that he was saying them in Mandarin doubled the menace.

Rudd was speaking as China prepared for its great international coming-of-age party – hosting the Olympics – and as Beijing cracked down hard on any attempt by Tibet to catch the Olympic limelight. Rudd put his hand right onto that scorching subject.

The Prime Minister recounted his own journey to discover China, the history of Australia's relationship with China, and then started to move on to dangerous ground by talking about the many difficulties facing China – 'problems of poverty, problems of uneven development, problems of pollution, problems of broader human rights' – and the great impact China was having on the rest of the world. And then he started to offer suggestions and criticisms.

While we're talking about China, here's Julian Snelder hosing down suggestions that there might be some sort of climate change policy breakthrough for the world's largest CO2 emitter:

China indeed sees diplomatic and commercial opportunity in the global climate change carnival, but don't it to expect it commit to any hard targets.

Yet this very idea has been tentatively held out, both by a CASS professor suggesting a coal consumption cap at 4.5 billion tonnes in 2025, and by the Advisory Committee on Climate Change dangling a longer-term 11 billion tonne CO2-equivalent limit by 2030 (from 9.5 billion today).

But these were not official statements, and they were quickly disowned as such. Furthermore, there are a number of reasons to be cautious about any future 'breakthrough' on emissions caps.

China already mines 3.8 billion tonnes of coal every year, and Chinese coal alone accounts for 20% of all global CO2 emissions. On present coal use patterns, China is on track to belch almost half of the entire world's recommended maximum 'CO2 budget' of 32 billion tonnes of CO2 by 2030.

It would therefore take a wrenching change in China's economy to suddenly alter its trajectory of rapidly growing coal use.

And Vaughan Winterbottom on rising violence in China's northwest:

So why is violence spiking? I spoke with some of the foremost experts on Xinjiang to find out. Below are highlights.

Henryk Szadziewski, a senior research at the Uyghur Human Rights Project, discussed recent policy and personnel changes:

"It's a good idea to look at the unrest from a broader chronological perspective. Uyghur grievances with the Chinese state stretch further back than the recent uptick in violence. Wang Lequan was known for dealing harshly with Uyghur expression of dissent. Post-2009, the appointment of his successor Zhang Chunxian was supposed to bring a 'softer' approach to governance in Xinjiang.

Given the policies we see in effect today, it's hard to distinguish this 'softer' approach. Xi Jinping's announcement earlier this year that security policies would be emphasized over development was viewed as a palliative to unrest. Although the Second Xinjiang Central Work Forum this year proposed some measurable goals in addressing economic disparity between minorities and Han Chinese, especially in terms of reducing unemployment, the systematic and ingrained social discrimination faced by Uyghurs remains. As with many economic policies in the past, these goals have been imposed from above with little agency in decision making from Xinjiang residents."

On Monday the Lowy Institute hosted the launch of the Australian Government's 'economic diplomacy' policy. Alex Oliver explained the economic diplomacy agenda for Interpreter readers:

In the increasingly globalised international environment Australia now faces, this economic diplomacy agenda will be a complex one to prosecute: it implies a far greater role for non-government entities, particularly the private sector, and means a much greater involvement for the Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade in formulating and facilitating the Australian Government's approach to international trade and foreign investment.

Because economic diplomacy requires domestic policy settings which reduce barriers to trade, economic growth and investment, DFAT, along with its two ministers, will need to lead a whole-of-government, whole-of-society effort to achieve positive economic outcomes through diplomacy. As Ms Bishop described, the strength and uniqueness of this policy is that it aligns all Australia's international efforts – foreign policy, trade, tourism, investment and development – so that they are "pulling in the same direction."

Our debate on sea-based nuclear weapons and strategic stability continues. This week Rod Lyon argued that that sea-based nuclear weapons are indeed a strategic stabiliser:

I think there are important political gains to be derived from sea-based systems, and those might be more important than the strategic and technological ones. First, such systems suggest a commitment to a durable, resilient nuclear force. They suggest that resort to nuclear weapons needn't be — and won't be — a rushed decision. Second, they devalue the benefits to an adversary of a bolt-from-the-blue attack upon the land-based component of the force, usually sited in relatively static target sets. Third, because they make such an attack upon the land-based systems less likely, they help reassure the population of the nuclear weapon state that they aren't mere nuclear cannon fodder, and thus help sustain political support for the arsenal.

Iskander Rehman, conversely, stated that that a 'combination of dual-use platforms and doctrinal opacity could prove highly detrimental for crisis stability':

A common reading of the movement towards sea-based deterrence is that it provides a greater vector for strategic stability, not only by ensuring the relative sanctuarisation of nation's deterrents and thus reducing first-strike incentives on both sides, but also by displacing the locus of nuclear competition from heavily populated state territories to the wide open waters. This optimistic vision does not hold up to scrutiny, however, when applied to regional nuclear dynamics in the Second Nuclear Age. Indeed, in this particular case, one could argue that it is not so much the process of naval nuclearisation itself which is inherently stabilising or destabilising, but rather the manner in which it is being pursued. Pakistan seems to be taking a dangerous path which combines dual-use systems (nuclear-tipped cruise missiles), cultivated doctrinal ambiguity, and a fair degree of maritime brinkmanship.

There are, no doubt, numerous lessons that could be drawn from the Cold War, whose study unfortunately tends to be neglected or oversimplified in South Asia. During the second half of the Cold War, in particular, theorists warned that within a heavily nuclearised environment, and under conditions of strategic uncertainty, offensive submarine operations or deployments could give birth to dangerously escalatory dynamics. And interestingly, much as in contemporary Pakistan, this argument was countered at the time by a constituency that argued that the diversification — and resulting dispersal — of nuclear assets at sea both strengthened their survivability and buttressed overall deterrence.

Since we're on the topic of strategy, Peter Layton questions whether Australia still needs a new Defence White Paper, considering that many of the capability and budgetary decisions have already been made:

The missing element in all this is strategy. A word search for 'strategy' in the public consultation Defence Issues Paper finds the word only four times in the 65-page document.

In simple terms, strategy is the way that the force structure (the means) is used to achieve desired objectives (the ends). But making strategy is intellectually difficult, and not as much fun as buying new jets, ships and tanks! Devising the ends, and the ways to achieve those ends, is not easy. Giving advice to busy, harassed policymakers on how to develop strategy can be contradictory and confusing.

Even so, it is worth the effort. Good strategy can magnify the effectiveness of a nation's military power. Moreover, efficiency processes are best based around a strategy. The Army, for instance, wants to be quickly adaptable to new and emerging circumstances. This objective might be incompatible with the push for a stable, unwavering acquisition plan that industry can 'bank' on for the next two decades or so. In the absence of a strategy, incoherence is a constant danger.

Photo by Flickr user coddogblog.
 2014-08-22T22:00:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen Bringing together all the longer Interpreter articles you were too busy to read this week. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=7265dd82-3630-4c01-b747-9ae8f3ac4d6b 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=7265dd82-3630-4c01-b747-9ae8f3ac4d6b http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/23/Weekend-catch-up-China-Japan-competition-strategic-stability-climate-change-and-much-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=7265dd82-3630-4c01-b747-9ae8f3ac4d6b http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/22/Thailands-coup-is-complete-with-election-of-General-to-PM.aspx Thailand's coup is complete with 'election' of General to PM 2014-08-22T06:07:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan

Three months after Thailand's latest coup took place, it is finally complete. Yesterday General Prayuth Chan-ocha (pictured) was elected as prime minister by the country's National Legislative Assembly (NLA), a body he stuffed full of military colleagues earlier this month.

The 197 NLA members charged with electing him were all appointed by the junta. There were no other nominations for the top post. Under the interim constitution (the junta tore up the last one, which the military wrote in 2006), politicians from the recent governments are ineligible for NLA seats. As a result, of the body that elected Prayuth, over half were military (70 active, 36 retired).

The appointment of General Prayuth comes a few weeks before his mandatory retirement from the military. Other top brass will also reach mandatory retirement age in September and will likely take up civilian roles.

For all Southeast Asia watchers, the similarities between Thailand's new quasi-civilian government and that in Myanmar are striking.

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
 2014-08-22T06:07:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan The similarities between Thailand's new quasi-civilian government and that in Myanmar are striking. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=e7c2ff1e-4708-4610-a436-cac431d21cb2 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=e7c2ff1e-4708-4610-a436-cac431d21cb2 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/22/Thailands-coup-is-complete-with-election-of-General-to-PM.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=e7c2ff1e-4708-4610-a436-cac431d21cb2 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/22/The-Islamic-States-media-logic.aspx The Islamic State's media logic 2014-08-22T05:47:00+00:00 Rodger Shanahan

The horrific images surrounding the gruesome execution of the US journalist Jim Foley are dominating the headlines. The Islamist group had several reasons for doing what they did, and when they did it.

It reinforces the Islamic State's reputation as the baddest Islamists of them all, a useful tool when you're looking to knock off your Islamist competitors in Syria. It also shows the US that there are costs associated with its air campaign, and the warning that there is another hostage at their mercy reinforces that warning; the English language audio track was designed for the target audience.

I don't however necessarily agree that one of the aims is to goad the West into becoming more deeply involved in Iraq. The Islamic State is as aware as anyone that neither the President nor the American people are inclined to do it, and there are many more ways to skin the Islamist cat than simply put combat troops into Iraq.

But these are relatively minor aims given the shock value that the vision was intended to produce.

People already know that the Islamic State is cruel and heartless, and they know the US isn't going to stop their air attacks just because Islamic State kills a hostage. Rather, I think the main point of the exercise was to do with the timing of the release. Islamic State had just suffered a couple of battleground reverses, having been rebuffed from Mount Sinjar and more importantly losing control over Mosul Dam, an important infrastructure prize for a putative caliphate. If you want people to stay with you, join you or submit to you, it's necessary to project an image of control and martial success. Images of destroyed Islamic State vehicles and equipment and triumphant Kurdish and Iraqi soldiers celebrating over ground you've just lost isn't good for business. In the space of a few hours though, this negative imagery was swept away by an execution video; people may have heard about Mosul Dam but they aren't reminded of it because those images are no longer displayed.

The Islamic State is very good at manipulating the social and news media space. And if it takes the beheading of someone to counter images of battlefield setbacks, then so be it. Such is the calculus of Islamic State's media department.

Image courtesy of REUTERS/Ralph Orlowski.
 2014-08-22T05:47:00+00:00 Rodger Shanahan The beheading of James Foley was not about goading America, but it was about media manipulation. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=69164807-1d65-451e-97b6-5f4b56676546 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=69164807-1d65-451e-97b6-5f4b56676546 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/22/The-Islamic-States-media-logic.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=69164807-1d65-451e-97b6-5f4b56676546 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/22/Should-the-US-retrench-from-South-Korea-Part-two-No.aspx Should the US retrench from South Korea? Part 2: No 2014-08-22T02:00:00+00:00 Robert E Kelly

A couple of days ago I laid out the arguments for a US withdrawal from South Korea. Today, I lay out the arguments for staying.

This topic is rarely discussed. In the US, the foreign policy consensus for hegemony, forged between liberal internationalists on the left and interventionist neoconservatives on the right, remains strong. It has only just recently come under sustained criticism, likely due to the messes in Iraq and Afghanistan. That consensus takes the US position in Korea as a given. An American withdrawal has not seriously been mooted since the Carter Administration, when it indeed would have been a large mistake.

So what are the benefits of staying?

1. US Forces Korea (USFK) insures that the US retains a strong regional ally in a region the US now deems central

If the pivot to Asia (or 'rebalance' or whatever we are supposed to call it) is to take off, the US will need regional allies. Japan of course is the central US ally in the region. And others are being pushed toward the US by China's belligerent behaviour in the East and South China Seas. But India and the southeast Asian states are not so much pro-American as anti-Chinese.

By contrast, Korea has been a staunch US ally since the 1950s. It has deep inter-operability with the US military. It has never really wavered from the US camp. It even sent soldiers to fight in Vietnam to demonstrate loyalty. It is not the 'reckless driver' that other allies, most notably Israel, have been. While it spends less than it should on defence, South Korea free-rides far less on US power than Europe or Japan. As a percentage of GDP it spends around double what the average US ally does on defence.

The looming unknown question is whether South Korea would line up with the US in a Sino-US or Sino-US/Japanese war. The primary purpose of the pivot is to militarily hedge China (or openly contain it, if you're Chinese). South Korea is wary of this. China is its largest export market, and both Seoul and Beijing share a disturbingly bitter loathing for Japan. Will that draw Seoul and Beijing together? Probably not.

2. China will claim that the US has 'fled' (or, once the US goes somewhere, it can never leave)

This is the worst possible argument for a US commitment — credibility. Staying some place for no other reason than that staying sends a good 'signal' is not a good rationale.

But it is pretty clear now that the Sino-US relationship is 'sliding from engagement to coercive diplomacy,' as David Lampton puts it. As East Asia enters toward bipolarity, a zero-sum logic will increasingly kick in, in which a US retrenchment will happily be read by China — one can always count on the Global Times — as US capitulation. Whether the US wants to stay in Korea or not, now it can't leave. It's stuck.

Indeed this is one of the great unseen costs of US interventions: once in, America can almost never leave anywhere without provoking a crisis of confidence about its credibility and commitment. In this vein, the time to withdraw from Korea was in the 1990s, at the peak of the unipolar moment, before the Chinese challenge to US power in the western Pacific, and when North Korea was wobbling. That window has probably closed.

3. South Korea, standing alone, might slide toward a semi-democratic national security state like Pakistan

This cost is almost never reckoned by those advocating withdrawal from Korea. Most advocates of retrenchment from Korea, such as Cato's Doug Bandow, assume Korea to be a stable market democracy that can carry the costs of a head-to-head competition with North Korea. This is so economically, but I am not so sure politically. For thirty years the 'republic' of Korea was more like a Prussianised barracks-state dictatorship than a republic, with one dictator, Park Chung-hee, who genuinely seemed like the Korean version of Mussolini (Park's repression was the big reason President Carter wanted to withdraw from Korea as part of his human rights emphasis in US foreign policy). So thorough-going was the McCarthyite propaganda of dictatorial Korea about the 'reds' to the north that many older Koreans will tell you they actually believed that North Koreans had red skin.

Long, enervating national security competitions, like those between Pakistan and India, or North and South Korea, are corrosive to democratic and liberal institutions. South Korea's dictators used to justify repression and illiberalism on precisely these grounds. It is a huge achievement for South Korea that it managed to create real democratic and liberal institutions. It would have been easy for South Korea to stay a militarised faux-democracy like Egypt today, or Turkey and Indonesia earlier on. A US withdrawal that pushed up South Korean defence spending to 7% of GDP might threaten the South Korean experiment with liberalism and democracy, one of especial importance in the future as an Asian model against the authoritarian 'Beijing consensus.'

4. A US withdrawal might in fact encourage the North Koreans to try again

A common assumption, particular on the South Korean left and among more dovish commentators (me included), is that North Korea has no real interest in unification. Unification means the elimination, if not extermination, of the Kimist elite and their privileges. North Korea, we assume, knows it will lose a war. The (North) Korean People's Army (KPA), while very large, is based on Cold War-era technologies. And like many communist militaries, its force structure is based around a repeat of World War II: the KPA has many tanks, armoured personal carriers, and infantry. It could fight and win the 1943 battle of Kursk. It is however unprepared and unequipped for the sort of modern warfare practiced by the US: C4ISR, overwhelming airpower, stand-off strikes facilitated by space power, the rapid destruction of command-and-control, and so on. As such, the KPA would lose a war with combined allied forces. It knows this; hence Pyongyang built nuclear weapons. They are the ultimate deterrent for an otherwise outdated military.

But it is precisely these 'networked battlefield' technologies that the South Korean military lacks. The ROKA (Republic of Korea Army) is still configured around infantry and traditional homeland defence. It lacks many of the high-tech capabilities of the US military, particularly in the air. The US would indeed 'tank-plink' the KPA and rapidly dissociate its units from each other and Pyongyang by destroying command and control. Can the ROKA do this? As the never ending debate over the reversion of OPCON ('operational control') of the ROKA in wartime suggests, most are sceptical. If not, the KPA might actually hold together in the field in a conflict.

The question is tough: if the US left South Korea, would North Korea see an opportunity for victory, to absorb a successful economy and bail-out its own decrepit system?

So what does all this mean? In brief, the debate over US forces in Korea is far less clear than many think. The Cold War is over. North Korea is no threat to the US, and if South Korea ramped up seriously, it could probably win a war without US assistance. On the other hand, US forces are already there. The costs of staying are minimal, and if the pivot is to really define US grand strategy in the coming decades, then South Korea could be a valuable ally if it will tilt against China.

Image courtesy of U.S. Army Korea (Historical Image Archive).
 2014-08-22T02:00:00+00:00 Robert E Kelly Four reasons why the US should keep its troops in South Korea. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=6c06f950-ac76-4c1d-8781-6cd8fca89ce5 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=6c06f950-ac76-4c1d-8781-6cd8fca89ce5 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/22/Should-the-US-retrench-from-South-Korea-Part-two-No.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=6c06f950-ac76-4c1d-8781-6cd8fca89ce5 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/22/China-Japan-relations-Hugh-White-responds.aspx China-Japan competition: Hugh White responds 2014-08-22T00:45:00+00:00 Hugh White

The four excellent responses to my post on China-Japan relations all present important points about Japan's situation and its options in the face of China's growing power. Just to recap, my piece questioned whether Chinese political and military pressure on Japan in the East China Sea is as counter-productive for China's strategic objectives as many people believe.

That depends of course how Japan and the US react to it. I suggested that it would serve China's aim of weakening US leadership in Asia if it undermined Japan's confidence in the US alliance by exposing America's reluctance to support Japan militarily against China. This would be seen as a win in Beijing even if Tokyo responded by building up its own defences, because China would rather face Japan than America as a strategic competitor in Asia.

My old colleague and valued sparring partner Malcolm Cook argues that if Beijing's leaders thinks this way, they are wrong. He says China's pressure on Japan has strengthened the US-Japan alliance, and cites Abe's measures to 'normalise' Japan's military role as evidence.

This is a key issue: if Malcolm is right than the Chinese really are making a big mistake in the East China Sea. That is why it is so important to test our judgments on it quite carefully. I'd offer Malcolm two sets of thoughts about it.

First, how confident is Tokyo that America really would be willing to go to war with China over the Senkakus? This is not at all a hypothetical issue for Japan. Malcolm seems to think Tokyo has complete faith in US military support. I am much less sure. That's partly because of what people in Tokyo say to me. It's partly because of what Americans say, and don't say. The polite word for America's signals over the Senkakus is 'mixed', and they remain so even after Obama's Tokyo statement earlier this year. Above all, it's because of the military realities. When we look at what would happen if the US actually did fight China over the Senkakus, we can see why Japan would be wise to doubt US support.

Second, what is Abe's motive in strengthening Japan's military posture? Malcolm is sure that it is to reinforce the US-Japan alliance, not to replace it. I think it is aiming to do both. Prime Minister Abe no doubt hopes that by doing more to support America in Asia it will strengthen US capacity and resolve to preserve the status quo. But I have argued before that this won't work, and it seems that Abe sees that as a real risk. So his new policies are also intended to lay the foundation for Japan to look after itself if US support should fail.

If these thoughts are right, China would be right to think that its assertiveness will weaken the US-Japan alliance, and leave Japan with only the two choices I mentioned.

However Dhruva Jaishankar's elegant post raises a different possibility.

He suggests that even if Beijing is right to expect a weakening US-Japan alliance, it might be overlooking a third Japanese option. Rather than meekly submitting to Chinese primacy or reconstituting itself as an independent great power confronting China, Japan could join and perhaps lead a coalition of regional powers along the lines recently suggested by Rory Medcalf and C Raja Mohan. This is what Abe himself may well have in mind.

Rory's and Raja's fine paper deserves a post to itself, but let me just say here that I think the possibility that they and Dhruva raise is less threatening to China's ambitions than one might suppose. That is because, whatever might be its diplomatic attractions, the strategic potential of such a grouping against China is very limited. Ultimately, it depends on how willing its members are to go to war on one another's behalf. In Japan's position, of example, the value of a regional coalition would depend on whether India, Australia, Vietnam and others would be willing to go to war with China to support Japan over the Senkakus. I bet they wouldn't, and I think China would bet that way too. So without America, Japan is on its own.

Of course China is keen to make sure it stays that way. That is why, as Christopher Pokarier quite rightly says, China is going out of its way to stigmatise Japan's defence policy changes as 're-militarisation'. Like him I think this is quite unjustified. Japan has a perfect right to defend itself just as any other country does. It has almost 70 years of good international citizenship behind it, from which the historical revisionism of Prime Minister Abe and his circle does not materially detract. And, above all, Japan today lacks the strategic weight to threaten China or any country that Beijing chooses to support. This is why I don't think we should be too worried about Japan reconstituting itself as an independent strategic power in the new order that is emerging in Asia as the old one passes away.

Which brings me finally to Brad Glosserman's piece. Brad is another favourite sparring partner. As always, he goes straight to the core questions. I absolutely agree with him (and with Malcolm) that the best thing for Japan would be to continue to depend on America. But I do not believe that is possible, because the old regional order in which that posture worked so well for Japan has been overturned by China's new power and ambitions.

The impact on Japan's situation is a simple matter of what we might call Newtonian strategy. As China's wealth and power grows, the costs to the US of conflict with China grow, and the threshold for US support to Japan against China goes up accordingly. It has now gone up far enough that America may no longer be willing to support Japan militarily over issues like the Senkakus which Japan rightly regards as vital. I think perhaps many Americans are in denial about this. I don't think many Japanese are. The Chinese understand it very clearly, and that is the message their actions over the Senkakus are trying to convey.

So what can Japan do? I think it faces a binary choice: accept Chinese primacy or try to preserve its full political and strategic independence. Which path Japan takes will depend, inter alia, on what kind of regional hegemon China might become. If it turned out to be as benign as the US has been in the Western Hemisphere, then a future for Japan as Asia's Canada might not be so bad. But how trusting are the Japanese willing to be? And what have the Chinese done to earn Japan's trust?

And the alternative? I may have misled Brad by describing Japan's other option as a return to 'great power' status. I do not mean that Japan would need to compete with China for hegemony in Asia, or assert a sphere of influence of its own to match and balance China's. In the right regional setting Japan could establish itself as a great power on equal terms with China, without seeking hegemony or a sphere of influence. For reasons I set out in The China Choice, that regional setting would need to resemble the nineteenth-century European Concert of Powers: a Concert of Asia. Only as an independent great power in that kind of setting can Japan be secure over coming decades, unless it is willing to accept subordination to China.

Image courtesy of the White House.
 2014-08-22T00:45:00+00:00 Hugh White What will Japan do in response to China's rise? Hugh White responds to those who have critiqued his 'Is China making a big mistake about Japan?' http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=d89ff9df-e64d-40b4-99f8-a3862b76d53a 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=d89ff9df-e64d-40b4-99f8-a3862b76d53a http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/22/China-Japan-relations-Hugh-White-responds.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=d89ff9df-e64d-40b4-99f8-a3862b76d53a http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/22/India-Links-Independence-Day-Pakistan-talks-Central-Asia-GM-crops-Hindutva-and-more.aspx India links: Independence Day, Pakistan talks, Central Asia, GM crops, Hindutva and more 2014-08-21T23:00:00+00:00 Danielle Rajendram

Last week, Prime Minister Modi delivered his first Independence Day address, which was widely well received.

Vivek Dehejia and Rupa Subramanya argue that this speech 'marks the beginning of India's full emergence as a postcolonial nation-state'.

PB Mehta says this is the first Independence Day speech that 'did not lean upon the authority or pedigree of anything else, but the people'.

And Tavleen Singh commends the speech for reminding Indians of the things many would rather not acknowledge.

Manoj Joshi on why India must get serious about Chinese military modernisation.

'That hashtag was my colleague': a powerful first-hand account of the media circus surrounding last year's Mumbai gang-rape, written by a colleague of those attacked.

How can India get its monetary policy back on track?

New Yorker profiles Vandana Shiva, an Indian activist campaigning against genetically modified crops.

Why India should look to build ties with energy-rich Central Asian states.

This week, India cancelled Foreign Secretary-level talks with Pakistan following a meeting between the Pakistani High Commissioner and the leader of a Kashmiri separatist group . Siddharth Varadarajan argues that this decision reveals Modi's lack of experience on foreign policy, but Ashok Malik thinks talks with Pakistan can wait.

Varghese K George argues that Hindutva ideology has now moved from the fringe to the centre of Indian politics.

Is the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty on its last legs?

 2014-08-21T23:00:00+00:00 Danielle Rajendram Links to this week's best India reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=343731be-a90c-42b0-9f5e-629b5f78493d 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=343731be-a90c-42b0-9f5e-629b5f78493d http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/22/India-Links-Independence-Day-Pakistan-talks-Central-Asia-GM-crops-Hindutva-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=343731be-a90c-42b0-9f5e-629b5f78493d http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/22/Nuclear-weapons-and-Pakistans-naval-strategy.aspx Nuclear weapons and Pakistan's naval strategy 2014-08-21T21:43:00+00:00 Iskander Rehman

Since 1998, when India and Pakistan both burst out of the nuclear closet and publicly revealed their formerly recessed nuclear capabilities to the world, scant commentary has been made on the impact that the introduction of sea-based delivery systems would have on the South Asian nuclear equation.

This can be attributed, in part, to the relatively recent nature of naval nuclearisation in South Asia. India launched its first indigenously produced nuclear submarine, the INS Arihant, in 2009, and Pakistan only formalised its ambitions for a functional nuclear triad (via an Inter Services Public press release) in May 2012. However, while public discussions in both countries on complex issues such as nuclear naval strategy still remain somewhat inchoate and have yet to fully mature, India's nuclear submarine program was, in fact, initiated over three decades ago. Furthermore, there are statements by Pakistani leaders and naval commanders referring to the need for Pakistan to acquire a nuclear triad that long precede India's public unveiling of the Arihant.

It is important, first of all, to emphasise that both countries have their own distinct sets of motivations to engage in naval nuclearisation.

All too often outside observers almost mechanically hyphenate the two South Asian nations and reduce the multi-layered complexity of their nuclear interactions to a simple action-reaction dynamic. India, for example, is motivated in part by a desire for prestige and international recognition, but also by a very rational objective to place its nuclear assets at a safer distance from a decapitation strike. This is particularly important in light of China's growing militarisation of the Tibetan plateau and the proliferation of Chinese ballistic-missile silos in strategic high-altitude points along the border. In addition, there are mounting concerns over the reach of Chinese air power, Chinese advances in electronic and cyber warfare, as well as over recent reports that indicate China is developing a navalised variant of its 3000km-range Dong Hai 10 cruise missile.

Pakistan has its own strategic rationale for developing a naval nuclear capability which is at least partly independent of a simple desire to mirror India's advances. But the point that bears most emphasis here is that through its threats to disperse nuclear assets among various components of its fleet, Pakistan can offset India's increasingly overbearing conventional naval advantage in the Indian Ocean. When interviewed, Pakistani commanders mention the precedent set by Israel's alleged decision to place nuclear-tipped cruise missiles aboard conventional submarines and have suggested to me, somewhat provocatively, that Pakistan should follow suit.

Another option, some have argued, would be to station nuclear weaponry aboard surface ships and maritime-patrol aircraft. Not only would this provide the country with greater strategic depth, it would also extend some of the more dysfunctional elements of Indo-Pakistani nuclear interactions from land to sea. By threatening, either directly or indirectly, to employ low-yield nuclear weapons at sea, or against an advancing Indian aircraft carrier strike force, Islamabad can hope to acquire 'escalation dominance' and thus considerably dilute its larger neighbour's coercive naval power, much in the same way that it has managed to dilute India's conventional advantage on land.

In both cases, this has been achieved by a refusal to abide by a No First Use (NFU) policy and, increasingly, through a flirtation with the tactical use of nuclear weapons as warfighting instruments. This has been achieved, in part, through shifting from an earlier generation of enriched uranium nuclear weapons to a newer generation of plutonium weapons, allowing Pakistan to significantly expand its nuclear arsenal (which now appears to have overtaken India's nuclear weapon inventory) and to make progress in the miniaturisation of its nuclear warheads for battlefield use.

To provide a concrete example, most analysts now concur that Pakistan is developing a sea-based version of its Babur missile, a subsonic nuclear-capable missile that bears an uncanny resemblance to the US Tomahawk, albeit with a much shorter range.

The introduction of nuclear weapons will have a major impact on the future of naval warfighting in the Indian Ocean. Fleets caught under a nuclear shadow are compelled to operate under different principles. Most notably, ships must loosen their deployment patterns and adopt more dispersed configurations to better shield themselves from the ripple effects of a nuclear blast. For Pakistani security managers, acquiring nuclear-armed cruise missile submarines could provide an opportunity to skew the existing naval power dynamic, primarily by injecting an even greater degree of uncertainty and ambiguity in India's tactical calculus, but also by preventing the Indian Navy from concentrating the bulk of its power projection platforms in one location.

Such a toxic combination of dual-use platforms and doctrinal opacity could prove highly detrimental for crisis stability. In the event of conflict, there would be no way for India to ascertain whether Pakistani vessels or maritime patrol aircraft are nuclear-armed or not, and a radioactive 'fog of war' would float over combat operations.

A common reading of the movement towards sea-based deterrence is that it provides a greater vector for strategic stability, not only by ensuring the relative sanctuarisation of nation's deterrents and thus reducing first-strike incentives on both sides, but also by displacing the locus of nuclear competition from heavily populated state territories to the wide open waters. This optimistic vision does not hold up to scrutiny, however, when applied to regional nuclear dynamics in the Second Nuclear Age. Indeed, in this particular case, one could argue that it is not so much the process of naval nuclearisation itself which is inherently stabilising or destabilising, but rather the manner in which it is being pursued. Pakistan seems to be taking a dangerous path which combines dual-use systems (nuclear-tipped cruise missiles), cultivated doctrinal ambiguity, and a fair degree of maritime brinkmanship.

There are, no doubt, numerous lessons that could be drawn from the Cold War, whose study unfortunately tends to be neglected or oversimplified in South Asia. During the second half of the Cold War, in particular, theorists warned that within a heavily nuclearised environment, and under conditions of strategic uncertainty, offensive submarine operations or deployments could give birth to dangerously escalatory dynamics. And interestingly, much as in contemporary Pakistan, this argument was countered at the time by a constituency that argued that the diversification — and resulting dispersal — of nuclear assets at sea both strengthened their survivability and buttressed overall deterrence.

For instance, Linton Brooks, who served on the Reagan Administration's National Security Staff, wrote in 1986 that:

Deterrence is enhanced through the deliberate importation of both risk and uncertainty...Sea-based systems, able to attack a wide spectrum of targets from a large number of platforms, over a broad spectrum of attack azimuths, complicate Soviet defense planning immeasurably, thus strengthening deterrence.

Depressingly, however, things may in fact be even more complex and unstable now, in large part because the South Asian maritime environment is so alarmingly unstructured. At least during the second half of the Cold War (from 1972 onwards) the Soviets and Americans enacted the INCSEA, which worked towards limiting critical misinterpretations in times of tension. India and Pakistan have no such regime in place, and Pakistan continues to rely on a policy of maritime brinkmanship to compensate for its conventional inferiority.

There are frequent reports, for instance, of near collisions between Pakistani and Indian surface vessels. And in 1999, a Pakistani maritime patrol aircraft was shot down by an Indian Mig-21 when it strayed into Indian airspace. If Pakistani frigates or maritime patrol aircraft were transporting nuclear weapons and such incidents were to reoccur, the implications could be severe.

The scattering of nuclear assets at sea, particularly aboard surface ships, also heightens the risks of a nuclear weapon being intercepted by a malevolent non-state actor, a perennial concern when discussing Pakistan's growing nuclear arsenal. Another question worth raising is whether the escalation dynamics of nuclear warfare in the maritime theatre are less constrained than those that would attend similar operations on land.

A classic example is the tense situation which unfolded underwater during the Cuban Missile Crisis and which almost led to disaster. We now know that each of the Soviet submarines deployed off Cuba was in fact armed with nuclear-tipped torpedoes, a fact which was not known by the US Navy at the time. In an attempt to force the Soviet submarines to surface, the US fleet dropped depth charges which were not intended to hit the submarines but rather to coerce them into revealing themselves. The Soviet submarine commanders, however, viewed these actions under a different light, and one harried commander even ordered his men to assemble the nuclear torpedo to battle-readiness.

This incident highlights two disturbing dimensions of naval nuclear interactions: the perennial risks linked to misperception and ill-conceived or designed signaling, and the various challenges linked to command and control. When it comes to contemporary South Asia, even though Pakistan has threatened to use tactical nuclear weapons against advancing Indian tank formations on land, one could be forgiven for expressing severe reservations over whether Pakistani commanders would be willing to detonate nuclear weapons on their own soil. Out on the open waters, however, such a question remains uncomfortably open.

Finally, analysts will now need to pay much closer attention to the interaction between conventional and nuclear assets at sea, and how this will impact on each country's strategies, doctrines, and acquisitions. Technology, like geography, can blur the line between defence and offense. For example, whereas previously the question of submarine proliferation in South Asia could be viewed through a purely conventional prism, everything will become a lot more complicated now that nuclear-armed and nuclear-powered assets have been thrown into the mix. Formerly conventional naval warfare capabilities such as anti-ship warfare or anti-submarine warfare can now also be equated with counterforce capabilities, with all the destabilising ramifications such a conceptual shift implies.

The Lowy Institute gratefully acknowledges support from the John D and Catherine T MacArthur Foundation for this Interpreter debate, which is part of a broader research, dialogue and outreach project on strategic stability in Indo-Pacific Asia.

Photo by Flickr user Kashif Mardani.
 2014-08-21T21:43:00+00:00 Iskander Rehman Pakistan is taking a dangerous path which combines nuclear-tipped cruise missiles, doctrinal ambiguity and maritime brinkmanship. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=c215200f-d10c-4319-89cb-9db878f1eeae 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=c215200f-d10c-4319-89cb-9db878f1eeae http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/22/Nuclear-weapons-and-Pakistans-naval-strategy.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=c215200f-d10c-4319-89cb-9db878f1eeae http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/21/Pacific-island-links-Sean-Dorney-Fiji-elections-West-Papua-Gold-Risge-mine-and-more.aspx Pacific island links: Sean Dorney, Fiji elections, West Papua, Gold Ridge mine and more 2014-08-21T06:40:00+00:00 Tess Newton Cain
A selection of news, analysis and commentary from and about the Pacific island region.

Nominations for Fiji's general elections closed on 18 August. Twelve of the received nominations were rejected by the Fiji Electoral Authority, including that of Mahendra Chaudhry, leader of the Fiji Labour Party. Of the 249 accepted nominations, 41 are women. Fiji First was the only party to have all of its nominated candidates accepted; a number of these have since been challenged by the People's Democratic Party (PDP).

The future of the Gold Ridge mine in Solomon Islands looks increasingly uncertain. Further to suspension of operations and a massive reduction in the workforce, a deterioration in law and order in the area has resulted in the evacuation of all non-local staff.

Jope Tarai reflects on incidents of intimidation by Fijian authorities against those who support the cause of West Papuan independence. Meanwhile, in West Papua, the detention by Indonesian authorities of two French journalists is part of a decades-old policy of restricting international coverage of what happens in the province.

The IMF's quarterly 'Asia and Pacific Small States Monitor' is out, with a special focus on the impacts of climate change.

The Micronesia Challenge is a conservation initiative of five Micronesian countries. It has been awarded a Pacific Oceanscape Leadership award in recognition of its innovative and influential approach.

Ben Bohane highlights some key messages arising from a recent workshop that examined regional security issues.

Sean Dorney is leaving the ABC after 40 years of reporting on and from the Pacific. In 2012 he was awarded the inaugural Media Award from the Australian Council for International Development (ACFID) in recognition of his work. This is the speech he gave on receiving that award:

[youtube:CgrkEFxIK1c]
 2014-08-21T06:40:00+00:00 Tess Newton Cain Links to this week's best reading on the Pacific islands region. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=9f4fb39f-3cd2-4ebe-adfb-b4240462ce82 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=9f4fb39f-3cd2-4ebe-adfb-b4240462ce82 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/21/Pacific-island-links-Sean-Dorney-Fiji-elections-West-Papua-Gold-Risge-mine-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=9f4fb39f-3cd2-4ebe-adfb-b4240462ce82 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/21/INS-Arihant-revealed.aspx INS Arihant revealed 2014-08-21T05:55:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen

As we begin the second round of our debate on sea-based nuclear weapons in the Indo-Pacific, here is the first clear image of the INS Arihant, India's first indigenous nuclear-powered submarine, to be armed with either a dozen 750km-range nuclear tipped ballistic missiles or four larger missiles with 3500km range. The image above is a still from a news report by India's NDTV, which broke the story yesterday.

An earlier image gave very little away, whereas in this shot we can clearly see the distinctive 'hump' aft of the sail, where the ballistic missiles will be housed. I'm no naval architect, but the sail looks to be of a rather dated design, reminiscent of the Soviet-era Kilo-class submarines the Indian Navy already operates. That's not too surprising, since Arihant has been in development since 1998. On the other hand, the designers seem to have done a much better job of integrating the missile hump with the hull than has China with its Type 094.

As our debate on sea-based nuclear weapons has already shown, the performance of the submarine is critical for strategic stability in the region. If the ship is noisy and easy to track, it will not give India the guaranteed second-strike capability it wants in order to dissuade an adversary from mounting a surprise attack. And of the ship is armed only with relatively short-range weapons such as the 750km K-15 missile, it would need to operate dangerously close to an adversary's home waters, thus making the ship vulnerable and destabilising. The longer-range K-4 missile has been tested from an undersea platform but is years from being operationally deployed on Arihant and her eventual sister-ships.

The Lowy Institute gratefully acknowledges support from the John D and Catherine T MacArthur Foundation for this Interpreter debate, which is part of a broader research, dialogue and outreach project on strategic stability in Indo-Pacific Asia.

 2014-08-21T05:55:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen The performance of India's first indigenous nuclear submarine will be critical for strategic stability in the region. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=f18d8e3b-4d94-4360-b2d3-e1dbb4f3a98c 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=f18d8e3b-4d94-4360-b2d3-e1dbb4f3a98c http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/21/INS-Arihant-revealed.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=f18d8e3b-4d94-4360-b2d3-e1dbb4f3a98c http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/21/Even-noisy-submarines-can-be-stabilising.aspx Even noisy submarines can be stabilising 2014-08-21T04:36:00+00:00 Rod Lyon

Having read the initial round of contributions to this debate, I must say I'm not a believer in the idea that sea-based nuclear weapons are destabilising. In large part, that's because I'm finding it difficult to construct a scenario in which a senior defence adviser ever uses the sentence, 'Mr President, we have to attack now, they have sea-based nuclear weapons.' True, the future is an unwritten page so it's impossible to say with certainty that such a sentence will never be uttered. But on any rational calculation of probabilities, I know which way I would bet.

Does that mean we can look with equanimity at the forthcoming deployment of nuclear weapons at sea by Asian nuclear powers? Well, not entirely. It's true that some force structures are more destabilising than others. In particular, deployment of vulnerable high-value targets doesn't contribute to good crisis stability. So if Asian powers were to deploy large warhead numbers in vulnerable, noisy SSBNs, they'd have to anticipate losing at least some of those boats early in a conflict. Still, even vulnerable SSBNs might have value if deployed in protected bastions, behind layered defensive screens, exploiting known seabed topographies, confusing the targeteer with diversionary noisemakers, and keeping the warhead loadings low per boat. Quiet SSBNs would have value without that supporting architecture.

Deployment of nuclear weapons at sea doesn't guarantee invulnerability. But the development should typically be seen as positive in relation to Asia's current monopedal force structures. No Asian power has a strong 'air-breathing' strategic leg. They're mainly just land-based forces. Having a sea-based leg is something of a safeguard against technological surprise.

Moreover, I think there are important political gains to be derived from sea-based systems, and those might be more important than the strategic and technological ones. First, such systems suggest a commitment to a durable, resilient nuclear force. They suggest that resort to nuclear weapons needn't be — and won't be — a rushed decision. Second, they devalue the benefits to an adversary of a bolt-from-the-blue attack upon the land-based component of the force, usually sited in relatively static target sets. Third, because they make such an attack upon the land-based systems less likely, they help reassure the population of the nuclear weapon state that they aren't mere nuclear cannon fodder, and thus help sustain political support for the arsenal.

Finally, I'd make one simple observation: if Asia's nuclear-armed countries want to build and deploy sea-based nuclear weapons, who's going to stop them? Nations typically have the right to get their own defence procurement decisions wrong. And in this case it's far from evident that decisions to deploy nuclear weapons at sea would be wrong.

The Lowy Institute gratefully acknowledges support from the John D and Catherine T MacArthur Foundation for this Interpreter debate, which is part of a broader research, dialogue and outreach project on strategic stability in Indo-Pacific Asia.

Photo by Wikipedia.
 2014-08-21T04:36:00+00:00 Rod Lyon If Asia's nuclear-armed countries want to build and deploy sea-based nuclear weapons, who's going to stop them? http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=d9b5ad78-7ec6-40e8-b770-2a6b417588f2 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=d9b5ad78-7ec6-40e8-b770-2a6b417588f2 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/21/Even-noisy-submarines-can-be-stabilising.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=d9b5ad78-7ec6-40e8-b770-2a6b417588f2 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/21/Why-is-violence-spiking-in-Chinas-northwest.aspx Why is violence spiking in China's northwest? 2014-08-21T02:15:00+00:00 Vaughan Winterbottom

Clive Palmer says the Chinese government shoots its own people. If he's talking about Xinjiang, he's right.

Last month saw the deadliest violence in years in the autonomous region, which has a sizeable Uyghur Muslim population. A knife attack in Yarkand on July 28 saw 100 deaths, including a whopping '59 terrorists' shot by security forces. A separate incident near Hotan on August 1 involved 30,000 locals teaming up with security forces to trap and kill nine terrorists, according to state media.

There are reasons to be suspicious of official accounts, but there's no denying the security situation in Xinjiang has deteriorated. On Sunday the People's Daily reported drones were to be deployed in the region.

Some great pieces have been filed from Xinjiang over the past month (here, and here), while Getty photographer Kevin Frayer supplied some stunning photography on a recent Ramadan trip.

A lot of the reporting has highlighted Beijing's oppressive religious and security policies towards Uyghurs. But these have been in place for years, and Beijing is currently engaged in an unprecedented effort to raise living standards ad generate 'social cohesion' in the region. Xinjiang's hard-line Party boss Wang Lequan was kicked out of his post following mass rioting in July 2009, and his successors in regional policy, Zhang Chunxian and Yu Zhengsheng, initially signaled a softer approach.

So why is violence spiking? I spoke with some of the foremost experts on Xinjiang to find out. Below are highlights.

Henryk Szadziewski, a senior research at the Uyghur Human Rights Project, discussed recent policy and personnel changes:

It's a good idea to look at the unrest from a broader chronological perspective. Uyghur grievances with the Chinese state stretch further back than the recent uptick in violence. Wang Lequan was known for dealing harshly with Uyghur expression of dissent. Post-2009, the appointment of his successor Zhang Chunxian was supposed to bring a 'softer' approach to governance in Xinjiang.

Given the policies we see in effect today, it's hard to distinguish this 'softer' approach. Xi Jinping's announcement earlier this year that security policies would be emphasized over development was viewed as a palliative to unrest. Although the Second Xinjiang Central Work Forum this year proposed some measurable goals in addressing economic disparity between minorities and Han Chinese, especially in terms of reducing unemployment, the systematic and ingrained social discrimination faced by Uyghurs remains. As with many economic policies in the past, these goals have been imposed from above with little agency in decision making from Xinjiang residents.

Reza Hasmath, a lecturer in Chinese politics at the University of Oxford, said socioeconomic disparities and lack of institutional access for Uyghurs were at the heart of discontent. He also saw significance in this year's Xinjiang Central Work Forum:

The work forum outlined what I think can be construed as a moderate option to deal with the spread of radical Uyghurs: namely, to boost employment and income levels among Uyghurs. The problem at hand, however, is the manner in which the state actually attempts to do this. The work forum proposed increased fiscal transfers. This does not necessarily increase the odds of Uyghurs obtaining high status/high wage jobs. Moreover, the forum's recommendations to increase urbanization and inter-regional migration, while a good step in principle, often means more Han migration into urban Xinjiang rather than ethnic minority migration.

Finally, the last major recommendation (of the work forum) to 'strengthen state education,' while important, can have a moot effect given that Uyghurs have difficulties obtaining good jobs in spite of having high education. In short, a moderate option does exist for the state. The problem is that it is often not executed in a manner that will yield tangible results.

James Leibold, a Xinjiang expert at Latrobe University currently based in Beijing, says the Government is increasing its micro-management of locals' lives:

Under Xi Jinping, the Chinese Party-state has doubled down on Xinjiang, increasing its penetration into nearly every aspect of Xinjiang society: quadrupling the regional public security budget since 2009; sending thousands of high-level cadres down to live alongside local villagers and community members in small groups; re-doubling efforts to urbanise and industrialise southern Xinjiang; and regulating the daily activities of Xinjiang's Uyghur minorities from the length of their facial hair to what sort of religious activities are 'legal.'

As Li Xiaoxia, deputy director of the Xinjiang Social Science Academy recently wrote, and I quote loosely here: "As the scope of religious extremism expands, the government's management of religious affairs must be further strengthened, become more detailed and penetrate into more areas of Muslim social life, so that it touches on every aspect of daily life, such as clothing, food, housing, marriage and deaths."

Finally, Michael Clarke, a research fellow at Griffith Asia Institute, discussed the issue of radicalisation:

Most of the violence until recently has been the result of the state's heavy-handed approach to Xinjiang and the Uyghurs. However, the violence that we have seen in the past six to 12 months, I think, suggests that there is evidence of some level of radicalisation. The March attack in Kunming, the bombings in Urumqi in April and May, and the latest incident in Yarkand point to a certain level of premeditation and planning that we have generally not seen before.

Chinese claims that groups such as the East Turkestan Islamic Party are to blame for these events are difficult to verify. Overall I think that the strategy or tactics of the more recent attacks in Xinjiang point at least to some Uyghurs looking to the example of regional (ie. Central and South Asian) and global Islamist groups for inspiration. In this context, though, I would argue that state policy has played a facilitating role. Through its systematic repression of Uyghur dissent — including of modern and secular Uyghurs — it seems inevitable that elements within the Uyghur population will turn to violence.

Photo courtesy of REUTERS?David Gray.
 2014-08-21T02:15:00+00:00 Vaughan Winterbottom Clive Palmer says the Chinese government shoots its own people. If he's talking about Xinjiang, he's right. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=ceb24310-01a4-40c9-87f0-38d6d06e6609 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=ceb24310-01a4-40c9-87f0-38d6d06e6609 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/21/Why-is-violence-spiking-in-Chinas-northwest.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=ceb24310-01a4-40c9-87f0-38d6d06e6609 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/21/Do-we-still-need-a-new-Defence-White-Paper2.aspx Do we still need a new Defence White Paper? 2014-08-21T01:30:00+00:00 Peter Layton

The need for a new Defence White Paper is fast diminishing. The Government has been busy making big decisions that will shape Defence and the ADF force structure for decades to come.

The latest budget papers set out the steps by which the 2% of GDP funding target will be met. The Air Force's future force structure has been finalised with decisions on buying lots of Joint Strike Fighters and some P-8 maritime surveillance aircraft and Global Hawk surveillance drones (and perhaps more C-17 cargo planes and KC-30 aerial tankers). The Navy's future fleet seems set with new tankers, new patrol boats, an aviation support ship, a $78 million study that effectively locks in a particular eight-ship future frigate solution and the slipping of the Collins submarine replacement. Meanwhile, Army's flagship project, Land400 (Land Combat Vehicle System), is well advanced with tenders expect to be released before year's end.

With little left to discuss about budgets and force structure, the Defence White Paper process now seems to be moving towards becoming efficiency-focused. The two main areas of interest in this are a long-term set-in-concrete shipbuilding plan and a First Principles Review into how to expedite acquisition and sustainment decisions. The new emphasis on these two important but narrow issues reveals the shift underway from a true Defence White Paper to what is steadily becoming a Defence Efficiency Review.

So a new Defence White Paper now seems redundant, except as a compiled listing of recent announcements. But the missing element in all this is strategy. A word search for 'strategy' in the public consultation Defence Issues Paper finds the word only four times in the 65-page document.

In simple terms, strategy is the way that the force structure (the means) is used to achieve desired objectives (the ends). But making strategy is intellectually difficult, and not as much fun as buying new jets, ships and tanks! Devising the ends, and the ways to achieve those ends, is not easy. Giving advice to busy, harassed policymakers on how to develop strategy can be contradictory and confusing.

Even so, it is worth the effort. Good strategy can magnify the effectiveness of a nation's military power. Moreover, efficiency processes are best based around a strategy. The Army, for instance, wants to be quickly adaptable to new and emerging circumstances. This objective might be incompatible with the push for a stable, unwavering acquisition plan that industry can 'bank' on for the next two decades or so. In the absence of a strategy, incoherence is a constant danger.

A new Defence White Paper may still be useful if it sets out a defence strategy, but if not, it is arguably becoming unnecessary. Without strategy, the new Defence White Paper might be better and more accurately reconceived as a Defence Efficiency Review.

Image courtesy of the Department of Defence.
 2014-08-21T01:30:00+00:00 Peter Layton Most of the big acquisition decisions have been made. There is however one missing element: strategy. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=477a5a09-5b59-4266-90b0-54b489431b04 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=477a5a09-5b59-4266-90b0-54b489431b04 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/21/Do-we-still-need-a-new-Defence-White-Paper2.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=477a5a09-5b59-4266-90b0-54b489431b04 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/21/Hong-Kong-twisted-political-pathology.aspx Hong Kong's twisted political pathology 2014-08-20T23:55:00+00:00 Julian Snelder

Another month, another huge political street protest in Hong Kong. Last Sunday the territory's residents marched again, this time against the planned but so far unscheduled Occupy Central sit-in. Just as July's pro-democracy marchers comprised a broad cross-section of Hong Kong society, so did the counter-demonstration this weekend. The coalition against Occupy Central included members of the business community worried about commercial upheaval (which, presumably, is the whole point of Occupy Central), establishment moderates opposed to civil disobedience, and pro-Beijing patriot groups.

The events have been peaceful, reflecting the restraint of both Hong Kong's citizens and its police force. Yet there is an edgy aspect to this back-and-forth mass mobilisation which is worryingly reminiscent of Thailand.

I disfavour the Occupy Central movement because I believe, as my previous posts make clear, a reasonable nomination and voting process for the position of Hong Kong's Chief Executive is probably the preferred option for the 'silent majority' of Hongkongers. To expect more ignores the reality of the city's constrained political identity. Occupy Central's campaign to threaten deliberate disruption is unduly provocative and self-harming; Sunday's march can be interpreted as a backlash by pragmatists who rationally fear the wrath of both Beijing and financial markets.

There are, however, some really worrying aspects about what happened on Sunday.

For a start, nobody can agree on the number of participants. This might seem unimportant, but it reflects a lack of objectivity, and perhaps of trust, in society. Invariably when a rally occurs, there are wildly differing claims from each side about how much support they have. But even purportedly neutral institutions like the police and University of Hong Kong's respected public opinion program differ. Sure enough, we're 'tangled up in the numbers game' again.

There are strong suspicions of 'rent-a-mob', voiced here, here and here. Mainland tourists were reportedly directed to the event with PRC flags. Chinese state-owned companies ordered local employees to attend. Well organised friendship groups kitted out in smart uniforms helped out with meals and maybe cash. Their placards brandished slogans like 'stability' and 'harmony', terms often used by China's authorities.

The covert marshaling of Beijing-friendly crowds outside China is something foreigners witnessed before the 2008 Olympics. As Andrew Browne notes in his essay this week, the Overseas Affairs Office organising them 'puts established overseas Chinese communities at risk by raising the issue of their national loyalties.' But Hong Kong is within China itself and the Liaison Office has unlimited resources at its disposal here. Its website openly features pictures of 'harmony' protesters and 'anti-suffrage' messages. In the crowd-on-crowd game, Beijing will prevail. The state itself, if necessary, could numerically overwhelm its own citizens for 'popularity.'

Indeed, that is the most troubling prospect. For years Hong Kong's government was goaded by liberal civil movements, but 'since at least 2012, pro-government groups, such as Voice of Loving Hong Kong and Caring Hong Kong Power, have increasingly relied on disruptive protests of their own to neutralise the opposition', as the Oxford sociologist Larry Au writes. Whereas a powerless opposition resorts 'by necessity' to silly stunts, the Government's aim is to wear them down. In Hong Kong's twisted political pathology, people now protest against protest. Those who support a restricted nomination committee rather than free suffrage are, consciously or not, choosing against choice. At its nihilistic extreme, they will be voting against voting.

Even a pro-business conservative like myself can recognise the danger of voluntarily self-restricting political choice. The next thing to go will be the independent media, then the rule of law, and then after that Hong Kong will empty. Meanwhile the street parades go on. As Au puts it, 'unfortunately, countering one protest with another only goes so far. The forces of necessity and fatigue will only perpetuate — if not worsen — the current state of affairs. The only way out of this vicious cycle is to rework the political structures that spawned this insanity.'

Photo by Flickr user pasuay @ incendo.
 2014-08-20T23:55:00+00:00 Julian Snelder Those opposed to free suffrage are, consciously or not, choosing against choice. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=1a4debaa-3229-46ba-932c-6ee667a94b28 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=1a4debaa-3229-46ba-932c-6ee667a94b28 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/21/Hong-Kong-twisted-political-pathology.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=1a4debaa-3229-46ba-932c-6ee667a94b28 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/21/Indo-Pacific-security-links-ASEAN-regional-forum-coast-guards-tourism-in-the-South-China-Sea-collective-self-defence-and-more1.aspx Indo-Pacific security links: ASEAN, coast guards, collective self-defence and more 2014-08-20T22:50:00+00:00 Brendan Thomas-Noone
The Indo-Pacific is a strategic system encompassing the Indian and Pacific oceans, reflecting the expanding interests and reach of China and India as well as the enduring role of the US. The Lowy Institute's International Security program presents a weekly selection of links illuminating the changing security picture in this increasingly connected super-region.

With the 21st ASEAN regional forum wrapped up in Myanmar, the South China Sea is a hot topic this week. Is ASEAN beginning to take a harder line on the issue?

David Brown proposes that the US should organise a multilateral coast-guard force that could be used to confront Chinese vessels in the disputed territory of the South China Sea. Carl Thayer argues that the US ought to leverage its alliances in the region, and not confront China directly.

Meanwhile, the Philippine Navy wants to make the South China Sea a tourist destination.

Following the launch of their joint paper last week, Rory Medcalf and C Raja Mohan argue in The National Interest that middle power coalitions can create stability in Indo-Pacific Asia.

Are relations between New Delhi and Beijing undergoing a reset?

Gareth Evans and Joseph S Nye are debating what Japan's move towards 'collective self-defence' means for the region.

Is a stronger bilateral relationship between the US and India the key to strategic stability in the Indo-Pacific?

The Lowy Institute International Security program's work on Indo-Pacific security is supported by two grants from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.
 2014-08-20T22:50:00+00:00 Brendan Thomas-Noone Your weekly guide to the best Indo-Pacific security reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=b1d36933-a337-4919-9c1a-e87a26804410 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=b1d36933-a337-4919-9c1a-e87a26804410 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/21/Indo-Pacific-security-links-ASEAN-regional-forum-coast-guards-tourism-in-the-South-China-Sea-collective-self-defence-and-more1.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=b1d36933-a337-4919-9c1a-e87a26804410 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/20/What-Julie-Bishop-told-China-about-Clive-Palmer.aspx What Julie Bishop told China about Clive Palmer 2014-08-20T06:29:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
[youtube:OKZoKcFFZxE]

Here's Business Spectator's Fergus Ryan on Clive Palmer's Monday evening TV outburst about China:

It was only after Julie Bishop apologised to the Chinese embassy that the Chinese government put out a statement saying Palmer's attack was "full of ignorance and prejudice", absurd and irresponsible. By getting the Chinese embassy involved over comments made by a member of another party, the government has given more oxygen to Palmer's remarks. It's the kind of oversensitive micromanaging of the Australia-China relationship that ends up making us look weak...

...The Chinese government knows that Australia is a democracy. Apologising to them for what happens in the rough and tumble of Australian democratic discourse encourages the Chinese government to think they can exert pressure on Australia to dampen debate.

To be fair to Bishop, it seems she did not actually 'apologise' to the Chinese Embassy for Palmer's remarks; rather, she contacted them to distance the Government from Palmer. Yet I agree with the broad sentiment here; Australia is a robust democracy, and that's an image we should actively cultivate on the international stage, not shy away from. It is one of our great soft-power strengths.

So while Bishop was telling the Chinese ambassador how disgraceful Palmer's comments were, I hope she also found time to say that this sort of thing is commonplace in a democracy, and that as a nation we not only survive it but are even strengthened by the debate it provokes. China ought to try it sometime.
 2014-08-20T06:29:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen Australia is a robust democracy, and that's an image we should cultivate on the international stage, not shy away from. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=35760cab-2403-4ce5-9fa8-5c662ec1eca6 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=35760cab-2403-4ce5-9fa8-5c662ec1eca6 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/20/What-Julie-Bishop-told-China-about-Clive-Palmer.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=35760cab-2403-4ce5-9fa8-5c662ec1eca6 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/20/China-links-SCO-Muslims-PLA-graft-China-dream-Xinjiang-and-more.aspx China links: SCO, Muslim faith revival, graft, China dream, Taiwan, Xinjiang and more 2014-08-20T03:50:00+00:00 Dirk van der Kley

There are reports that a group of North Korean defectors held by China on the Laos border have been released rather than being repatriated as usual.

Activists in Taiwan and Hong Kong are joining forces, which is not what Beijing wants.

Xi Jinping says China should build a 'new style' of media organisation, which will be 'strong, influential and credible'.

Following the fall of former Central Military Commission member Xu Caihou, the PLA instructs its soldiers not to believe in or spread rumours, and to oppose 'political liberalism'.

Four misconceptions about China's anti-corruption campaign.

Chinese media lights up after a Hong Kong weekly says IS aims to expand into Xinjiang. Simone van Nieuwenhuizen adds that China's Xinjiang policies could undermine Beijing's attempts to be diplomatically proactive in the Middle East.

Staying with The Interpreter, Vaughan Winterbottom writes that there are incentives for both Beijing and Russia to return security to a more prominent place on the Shanghai Cooperation Organization agenda.

China's Hui Muslims are enjoying a faith revival.

Some great interviews in this short film on the 'Chinese dream' from the perspective of three migrants:

[vimeo:103081295]
 2014-08-20T03:50:00+00:00 Dirk van der Kley Your weekly links to the best China reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=73b1ff80-cae4-499d-b1a8-b37289f52691 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=73b1ff80-cae4-499d-b1a8-b37289f52691 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/20/China-links-SCO-Muslims-PLA-graft-China-dream-Xinjiang-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=73b1ff80-cae4-499d-b1a8-b37289f52691 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/20/Australian-jihadists-citizenship-solution.aspx Australian jihadists: Is revoking citizenship the answer? 2014-08-20T03:23:00+00:00 Peter Hughes

One of the policy solutions being considered by the Australian Government to deal with the expected problem of returning Australian jihadists is to preclude their return to Australia, or expel them, by revoking their Australian citizenship.

A recently released report from the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor (INSLM) recommends that the Minister for Immigration and Border Protection be given the power to revoke citizenship on national security grounds.

This is not a new idea. Some years ago there were calls to revoke the Australian citizenship of suspected World War II war criminals in the hope that this would get them out of the country. We 'knew' they were guilty but couldn't actually prove it through a criminal justice process, so it was argued that an administrative decision under the Australian Citizenship Act would function as a work-around. The idea was never adopted, for good reason: there was no guarantee that anyone who lost their Australian citizenship in that way would actually be allowed to return to another country.

It is not clear what the expected outcome would be of the 'citizenship solution'. Revoking the Australian citizenship of someone engaged in jihadist activity would deny further access to Australia but would not stop the person from engaging in political violence elsewhere. Only prosecution, conviction and incarceration, whether overseas or in Australia, would achieve that.

Citizenship solutions are always harder in practice than they look.

The INSLM report suggests that Australia should respect its obligations under the 1961 UN Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness, and that revocation of citizenship should only occur in relation to jihadists who are dual nationals. Unfortunately, there is nothing in the report to tell us whether in fact there is any reason to believe that the suspected jihadists (about which Australia is rightly concerned) actually have a second citizenship, and therefore whether anyone's Australian citizenship could in reality be revoked while adhering to the UN Convention.

Then there is the question of how a decision to take away citizenship would be made. Existing Australian citizenship policy and law set a high bar for revocation. Before it can even be considered, the person must have been convicted of a serious offence (primarily, fraudulent acquisition of citizenship) committed before becoming a citizen. Offences committed after becoming a citizen are a matter for the criminal law and are not a basis for revocation of citizenship.There is no provision for loss of citizenship of an Australian-born citizen, except where the person is a dual citizen who serves in the armed forces of a country at war with Australia. For jihadists, would a conviction for some offence be required, or just suspicion? If suspicion is sufficient to take away a person's citizenship, the status of Australian citizenship would be seriously weakened.

The report moves on from the question of jihadists to make a broader condemnation of dual citizenship. INSLM 'does not see why, as a matter of public policy, an Australian citizen should also be able to be a citizen of another country' and 'by its nature, dual citizenship is deeply problematic'. It goes on to say that the granting of dual citizenship in Australia since 2002 'does not render it anything like traditional' and recommends that 'the 2002 legislated policy in favour of dual citizenship should be reconsidered'.

This analysis would probably come as a surprise to the estimated 4 million Australian citizens who enjoy dual citizenship.

Most Australian dual nationals are people who migrated to Australia and then acquired citizenship. Retention of their first citizenship is, in practice, a matter between them and their country of birth. There is not a lot the Australian Government can do about this, and it has not attempted to do anything since the establishment of Australian citizenship in 1949. The sensible policy priority, as in other migrant-receiving countries such as the US and Canada, has been to integrate migrants through encouraging the taking up of Australian citizenship, rather than to sever past linkages.

The anomaly in Australian citizenship law was that, until April 2002, an adult Australian citizen who was Australian-born lost his or her Australian citizenship if they took out the citizenship of another country. This created the ridiculous situation that an Australian-born person was in a much less favourable position than a migrant Australian citizen.

Implementation of this restrictive policy was in practice arbitrary, as the Australian Government had no way of knowing which Australians had taken out citizenship in another country. The only people that were recorded as losing their Australian citizenship were those who were unlucky enough to reveal their acquisition of foreign citizenship, perhaps while in contact with an Australian mission abroad. For example, an Australian woman seeking to register a child born overseas as an Australian citizen might find that, not only was the child not a citizen, but that her own Australian passport had to be confiscated on the grounds that she had not been an Australian citizen for years, by virtue of acquisition of another citizenship.

This restrictive approach became completely untenable when Australian-born citizens began to live and work abroad in much larger numbers. Many Australians living overseas found that for practical reasons they needed to take out foreign citizenship, but wanted to keep their personal and family links with Australia to allow frequent travel between countries and possible return. The Australian approach to dual citizenship was also increasingly out of step with the US, Canada and the UK, which permitted their nationals to take out another citizenship without loss of their original citizenship.

The Coalition government secured the passage of legislation in 2002 to stop Australians losing their citizenship through acquisition of another. This was on the advice of a report of the Australian Citizenship Council chaired by former Governor General and Justice of the High Court Ninian Stephen. A key justification was that Australia would benefit economically and socially by retaining linkages with its expanding diaspora, even if some of them also became citizens of other countries.

That argument remains valid.

Dual citizenship is not without its problems, including in the consular realm, but the current policy settings remain in the national interest and should be left alone. Tinkering with them is unlikely to have any impact at all on the Australian jihadist problem.

 Photo by Flickr user mechanical turk.
 2014-08-20T03:23:00+00:00 Peter Hughes A new report suggest that one way of preventing jihadists returning to Australia from Iraq and Syria is to revoke their passports. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=116cb212-9214-4936-9926-c1ec49da5f0e 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=116cb212-9214-4936-9926-c1ec49da5f0e http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/20/Australian-jihadists-citizenship-solution.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=116cb212-9214-4936-9926-c1ec49da5f0e http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/20/A-corrective-to-that-robotics-video.aspx A corrective to that robotics video 2014-08-20T01:22:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
Earlier this week I posted a rather terrifying video about the implications of robotics for the global economy and employment. Thanks to Stephen Grenville for pointing me to this critique of the video. The piece has a couple of key arguments, the first refuting the notion that human workers will become redundant in the production process just as horses were once moved aside by the machine age:

...unlike the horses, the humans are also useful as consumers. They are the people who will value the products the robots (and other humans) produce. Think about that for a moment. For each person who is disengaged from society because of a robot, if you cut them off from consumption as well (by say not giving them any money), that is a unit of demand gone. So this pool of unemployed are left outside the system and do not interact in any way with the robot-employed economy.

If that sounds unsustainable, it is. There is a contradiction in the story. You have a person who values the product produced by robots by more than the 'total cost' in terms of resources to supply them with that product. You have to feel pretty ill about the prospects of capitalism to suppose that such an opportunity (certainly at scale) will go unexploited.

Also, we need to think more deeply about who will own the robots:

The presumption is always that the bourgeoisie rather than the proletariat owns the machines. But why should that be the case? The robots we are talking about these days are not industrial scale. Why would it be the case that a pure capital owner will purchase the robot rather than a displaced worker any more than it was the case that those who drove horse drawn wagons where displaced by pure car owners?

 2014-08-20T01:22:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen Will robots displace workers and lead to mass unemployment? Maybe not. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=b9f1d1bf-0f87-4649-a1b4-df9ae0603993 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=b9f1d1bf-0f87-4649-a1b4-df9ae0603993 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/20/A-corrective-to-that-robotics-video.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=b9f1d1bf-0f87-4649-a1b4-df9ae0603993 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/20/Should-the-US-retrench-from-South-Korea-Yes.aspx Should the US retrench from South Korea? Yes 2014-08-19T23:30:00+00:00 Robert E Kelly

Over at War on the Rocks, Christopher Lee (a former officer in the US Forces Korea [USFK]) and Tom Nichols (of the US Naval War College) have gotten into a useful debate on whether US forces should remain in Korea. This issue is not widely discussed, which is surprising given the end of the Cold War and the huge margin of advantage in South Korea's favour.

Although I have taught international relations in South Korea for six years, this idea is almost never mooted in academia or the media here, so I applaud War on the Rocks for broaching it. But I think Lee and Tom (full disclosure: Tom Nichols is a friend) have missed the strongest arguments for a pull-out. Specifically, I think Lee understates his case for withdrawal and Tom will have to work harder to justify his arguments for the US staying. Today, I want to lay out a more robust case for departure. In Part 2 I will outline the counter-argument. In brief, I think that the case for staying just barely clears the bar and that the tide is running against it.

Why could/should the US leave South Korea?

1. South Korea is free riding. It only 'needs' the US because it is doing less than it would otherwise

Free riding is controversial issue, one that has bedeviled all US alliances for decades. An entire literature within international relations is built around the curious dynamics, such as 'buck-passing' or 'reckless driving,' that characterise allies' efforts to shift burdens to other allies, or tie others unwittingly to their own national preferences.

The most acute free-riding problem in the US alliance structure is in Europe. NATO informally benchmarks 2% of GDP as a minimum for members' defence spending. Yet only four NATO states break that marker. This has systematically crippled NATO, forcing the US to take the lead on what ought to be European contingencies such as the Balkans wars, Libya, and the Ukraine. Japan is even worse, spending less than 1% of GDP on defence.

By contrast, South Korea spends 2.6% of GDP on defence. This sounds better, but unfortunately is far from enough given the massive garrison state of North Korea sitting right on top of it. There is no formal spending target (USFK places no such demand on Seoul) but the number I hear widely thrown around is that without the US, South Korea would need to spend two or three times as much as it does on defence now.

Every foreign security analyst I know in Korea thinks the ROK needs to spend a great deal more; South Korea has significantly under-invested in C4ISR, missile defence, and counter-insurgency tactics. It is woefully under-prepared to occupy North Korea. It does not draft women, despite a declining birthrate that is leading to a major shrinkage in the ground force. With a GDP 25 to 30 times that of North Korea and a population more than twice as large, South Korea has the room to make a far greater effort. Where Lee and Nichols spar over the small amount of money the US contributes to Southern defense, the real issue is getting South Korea to take its own defence far more seriously.

2. The US presence in Korea (and Japan) discourages Japan-South Korea rapprochement

I have written about this issue several times. In brief, the US alliance almost certainly inhibits much needed cooperation between Japan and Korea on regional issues, most obviously China and North Korea. Specifically, the US alliance permits 'moral hazard' in both: neither Tokyo nor Seoul suffer any consequences for ridiculous criticisms of the other because the US insures them both against the consequences. Hence Japan and particularly Korea focus far too much attention on each other, and not nearly enough on the real regional threats.

There is a great deal of agonising in the US over how to get these two allies to bury the hatchet and start working together, but no one wants to admit the obvious solution — a genuine threat of abandonment. Hawks will disagree, and there are indeed downsides to abandonment, but let's stop pretending that US regional alliances don't have costs such as this.

3. USFK's presence ideologically props up North Korea

One point that neither Lee or Nichols brought up is the obvious propaganda boon to North Korea of the US peninsular presence. This is not an uncommon omission. Most researchers on the North tend to assume that its ideology is a lot of empty talk, a smokescreen over a degenerate gangster-ocracy whose real 'ideology' is living the high life and hanging onto power by any means necessary.

While the elite's emptiness and cynicism is certainly clear, I think this is too easy. My own sense (perhaps from having visited North Korea and being bombarded relentlessly there with propaganda there) is that ideology is important. North Koreans are expected to attend ideology training 'classes' at least once a week (more often for officials and higher-ups). The official Korean Central News Agency and the three newspapers of Pyongyang exert tremendous 'intellectual' effort on ideological reinforcement. The focus of that ideology, particularly since the end of the Cold War and the collapse of communism, is anti-colonial nationalism, in which the US has taken the place of the Japanese invader and South Korea is the bastardised, globalised 'Yankee Colony.'

An imminent American invasion is the primary explanation the regime offers to its people for their privation and the permanent national security emergency. Take that justification away, and North Korea loses its raison d'etre. If South Korea is no longer 'occupied,' then why does North Korea need to exist at all?

4. USFK's persistence keeps China from cutting North Korea loose, which would accelerate Pyongyang's collapse

In the same way that USFK perversely acts as an ideological crutch for Pyongyang, so does it act as a reason for Beijing to endlessly prevaricate on North Korean bad behaviour and Korean unification. China is formally committed to Korean unification, but in practice this is a lie. Instead, the Chinese openly refer to North Korea as a 'buffer' between them and the robust democracies of South Korea, Japan, and the US.

I detest this logic. It suggests a breath-taking cynicism about the catastrophic human rights condition of North Korea. That China would callously instrumentalise a state that the UN recently likened to Nazi Germany is just appalling (and goes a long way to explaining why so few in Asia trust China). But that is the situation. However, were the US to retrench from South Korea, the Chinese fear of USFK on its doorstep would be alleviated. Indeed, South Korea could swap a USFK exit plus a promise of post-unification neutrality for a Chinese cut-off of aid to North Korea and pressure for unification.

Hawks in the US and South Korea might not like that, but alleviating the extraordinary suffering of the North Koreans should be the primary goal. If a USFK departure, tied to a major Chinese policy shift, could bring that about, it should be considered.

5. The US is not an empire. Where it can retrench, it should. Commitments should not last indefinitely.

This is an openly normative argument. If one embraces a full-throated version of US hegemony (militarised, globalised, interventionist) then this will not appeal. But post-Iraq, there is clear public desire to rein in American interventions, so the normative case for restraint, on liberal democratic grounds, is strong.

The costs of hegemony are not just financial. They also include the regular war-making and killing of foreigners; a sprawling, hugely intrusive national security state; domestic nativism; as well as torture, indefinite detention, rendition, and similar penal abuses. All this suggests that retrenchment would be good for American democracy and liberalism. Allies may not like that. They will complain of abandonment. But sacrificing America's liberal ideals at home to promote them abroad is strange brew. It is increasingly obvious that hegemony abroad is deleterious to American liberalism at home. Where allies can stand on their own, as South Korea very obviously can, US retrenchment would be domestically healthy.

Photo by Flickr user DVIDSHUB.
 2014-08-19T23:30:00+00:00 Robert E Kelly Five strong reasons why the US should remove its forces from South Korea. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=615f2ba1-bd2b-4b0b-b9be-56fec19584b8 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=615f2ba1-bd2b-4b0b-b9be-56fec19584b8 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/20/Should-the-US-retrench-from-South-Korea-Yes.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=615f2ba1-bd2b-4b0b-b9be-56fec19584b8 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/20/Military-and-strategy-links-Scottish-contingencies-naval-survivabilityand-Americas-tech-edge.aspx Military & strategy links: Scottish contingencies, naval survival, America's tech edge and more 2014-08-19T22:19:00+00:00 Matthew Hill

As tensions with Russia continue to rise, the US Marine Corp is once again stockpiling heavy armour in climate-controlled Norwegian caves.

Bill Sweetman argues that things are looking up for the Royal Navy, with new assets and technologies coming on line. But concerns loom regarding the implications of Scotland's independence referendum.

Meanwhile, RUSI has a new paper on contingency options for Britain's nuclear capability should Scotland choose independence.

How can the US respond to the rapid erosion of its military technology edge? Ben Fitzgerald focuses on turning dual-use technologies and globalisation to America's advantage.

Information Dissemination has a fascinating discussion of the evolving understanding of warship survivability over time, and its contemporary ramifications.

Over at Small Wars Journal, Gary Anderson attempts to sketch out ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi's approach to warfare.

Arms Control Wonk has posted a podcast covering anti-satellite weapons, their proliferation, and China's recent hit-to-kill test.

Finally, here's evidence of the the progress being made on integrating piloted and unpiloted systems. In this video, the US Navy's X-47B testbed engages in carrier landing and recovery operations while 'sharing the pattern' with an F/A-18:

[youtube:RqiOzO8yV4A]
 2014-08-19T22:19:00+00:00 Matthew Hill This week's best military and strategy reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=6c08cab1-8a7c-4b44-b766-8fa399557602 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=6c08cab1-8a7c-4b44-b766-8fa399557602 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/20/Military-and-strategy-links-Scottish-contingencies-naval-survivabilityand-Americas-tech-edge.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=6c08cab1-8a7c-4b44-b766-8fa399557602 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/19/Breakthrough-China-climate-change-policy.aspx A breakthrough in Chinese climate policy? Not likely 2014-08-19T06:48:00+00:00 Julian Snelder

I argued back in April that China's 'synthetic natural gas' (syngas or SNG, which is gas made from coal) is 'bad economics, bad science and an environmental catastrophe'. I also said that 'what is striking is the ambition of Chinese plans versus the widespread scepticism of SNG worldwide and inside China itself.' Apparently, some of this scepticism is now being heard.

Datang, a syngas pioneer, has exited the business, selling its operational Keshiketeng project. The company admitted that its entire syngas business proposition was failing technically and financially; relieved investors sent Datang's stock up 23% on the day of the announcement. Meanwhile, Greenpeace published an alarming report claiming that the 50 planned Chinese syngas projects would emit 1.1 billion tonnes of CO2 annually, almost triple America's entire stated CO2 reduction target by 2020. The National Energy Administration (NEA) in Beijing has now announced certain limits on syngas projects, reportedly worried about 'an investment spree regardless of environmental and economic realities.'

But if China does dial back its syngas ambitions, will it be due to financial considerations (as in Datang's case) or because of CO2 emissions (the concerns of Greenpeace)? Syngas is such a monster that the easy answer is 'both' (and in fact a third problem, water, weighs heavily against the technology too). But the fundamental question remains: just how serious is China about climate change, and is it prepared to sacrifice growth to limit its emissions?

The Lowy Institute's Rio Tinto Fellow, Lisa Williams, has highlighted that Beijing has other priorities (diversifying its energy base, leading new technologies, reducing pollution in its cities) which happily align with climate-change objectives. This explains the paradox of a nation admired for its renewable energy commitment while its citizens live in appalling smog.

Karolina Wysoczanska at Nottingham is sceptical: China indeed sees diplomatic and commercial opportunity in the global climate change carnival, but don't it to expect it commit to any hard targets.

Yet this very idea has been tentatively held out, both by a CASS professor suggesting a coal consumption cap at 4.5 billion tonnes in 2025, and by the Advisory Committee on Climate Change dangling a longer-term 11 billion tonne CO2-equivalent limit by 2030 (from 9.5 billion today).

But these were not official statements, and they were quickly disowned as such. Furthermore, there are a number of reasons to be cautious about any future 'breakthrough' on emissions caps.

China already mines 3.8 billion tonnes of coal every year, and Chinese coal alone accounts for 20% of all global CO2 emissions. On present coal use patterns, China is on track to belch almost half of the entire world's recommended maximum 'CO2 budget' of 32 billion tonnes of CO2 by 2030.

It would therefore take a wrenching change in China's economy to suddenly alter its trajectory of rapidly growing coal use. Goldman Sachs estimates that, in addition to the 3.8 billion tonnes mined this year, another 1 billion tonnes of new mine capacity is already under construction. Coal has become so abundant in China that prices are the lowest in six years. UBS sees almost 50GW (to put in context, a really big power station is 1GW) of coal-fired power capacity added each year for the foreseeable future: 'the reality is that no other technology — wind, solar, gas, hydro and nuclear — represent a viable alternative.'

China is struggling to find conventional oil and gas deposits offshore and in shale gas. Renewable energy is attractive from a pollution-control perspective but needs expensive thermal power backup. As syngas illustrates, China will be tempted to use its super-cheap coal to substitute other energy sources where it can.

Most fundamentally, it is unlikely Beijing will act more cooperatively in the diplomatic sphere. China is sincere in perceiving itself as a developing country with a short industrial history. Collective action to protect the global commons is devilishly difficult. The Kyoto Protocol had little impact. Australia repealed a carbon tax as a business burden. The former Soviet Union is emitting well below its 1990 reference level but this is merely because its economy collapsed. America's shale gas revolution occurred not out of environmental concern but because it was profitable.

The Chinese syngas projects have almost certainly been slowed due to unsound economics, not because of concern over CO2. Notably, Beijing's NEA has banned only small 'sub-scale' syngas projects, not large ones. Maybe this is still good news, but it is premature to celebrate a shift in Chinese climate policy.

Photo by Flickr user World Bank Photo Collection.
 2014-08-19T06:48:00+00:00 Julian Snelder 'Syngas' may be out of favour, but it is premature to celebrate a shift in Chinese climate policy. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=20555cdd-1947-4772-89b2-736b504de552 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=20555cdd-1947-4772-89b2-736b504de552 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/19/Breakthrough-China-climate-change-policy.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=20555cdd-1947-4772-89b2-736b504de552 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/19/Iraq-US-humanitarian-mission-now-includes-defending-Mosul-dam.aspx Iraq: US humanitarian mission now includes defending Mosul dam 2014-08-19T06:20:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
CENTCOM released this statement yesterday:

TAMPA, Fla., Aug. 18, 2014 — U.S. military forces continued to attack ISIL terrorists in Iraq Monday, using a mix of fighter, bomber, and remotely piloted aircraft to successfully conduct 15 airstrikes near the Mosul Dam.

The strikes damaged or destroyed nine ISIL fighting positions; an ISIL checkpoint; six ISIL armed vehicles; an ISIL light armored vehicle; an ISIL vehicle-mounted anti-aircraft artillery gun, and an IED emplacement belt. All aircraft exited the strike areas safely.

Since Aug. 8, U.S. Central Command has conducted a total of 68 airstrikes in Iraq. Of those 68 strikes, 35 have been in support of Iraqi forces near the Mosul Dam. These strikes were conducted under authority to support Iraqi security forces and Kurdish defense forces as they work together to combat ISIL, as well as to protect critical infrastructure, U.S. personnel and facilities, and support humanitarian efforts.

If that sounds like 'mission creep' for an operation sold as an effort to protect Iraqi civilians and Americans in Iraq, then consider President Obama's justification:

In a letter released Sunday notifying Congress of the action, Obama said the militants' control of the dam posed a threat to the U.S. Embassy 200 miles away in Baghdad, which could be inundated if the dam were breached. "The failure of the Mosul Dam could threaten the lives of large numbers of civilians, endanger U.S. personnel and facilities, including the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, and prevent the Iraqi government from providing critical services to the Iraqi populace," he wrote.

Obama had signaled in a statement last week that protecting "critical infrastructure" would be part of what officials have described as a limited military intervention.

 2014-08-19T06:20:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen Is this a case of 'mission creep'? http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=dc9864fc-fbb0-4d82-91c0-faff71a7da5c 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=dc9864fc-fbb0-4d82-91c0-faff71a7da5c http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/19/Iraq-US-humanitarian-mission-now-includes-defending-Mosul-dam.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=dc9864fc-fbb0-4d82-91c0-faff71a7da5c http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/19/What-sort-of-power-does-Japan-want-to-be.aspx What sort of power does Japan want to be? 2014-08-19T03:57:00+00:00 Brad Glosserman

Hugh White graciously flags my assessment of Japan as he tries to make sense of Chinese policy toward Tokyo. He is right: my 'analysis does lend support to the idea that Japan would accept a subordinate status in a Chinese-led Asia.'

I wouldn't reach that conclusion, however.

Nor for that matter do I think Japan will rally to any call from Abe to (in Hugh's words) 're-establish itself as a great power in Asia, with nuclear weapons and all.' As I weigh the options, Japan's best bet is the status quo: alliance with the US. A nuclear-armed Japan is possible, but it would be shorn of great power ambitions – and this is a much inferior second-best alternative. Only in the end (and it would not be a choice so much as a fait accompli) would Japan play number two to China, unless China were to radically transform itself.

The rhetoric out of Tokyo in recent years (even before Shinzo Abe returned to the Kantei) has been increasingly hardline toward China. Beijing is seen as a direct threat to Japanese national interests, a destabilising force in regional affairs, and a challenger to the norms and institutions that have underwritten regional order in Asia. The most recent Defense White Paper, issued just last month, was explicit: 'Japan has great concerns over such Chinese military activities, etc, together with the lack of transparency in its military affairs and security issues, and needs to pay utmost attention to them. These activities also raise security concerns for the region and the international community.'

A darkening assessment of Chinese aims and ambitions has driven Japan's defence policy. Focus has shifted from the frigid Northwest to the Southwest Islands, and security planners are shoring up the maritime approaches and sea lines of communication. The Abe Cabinet's reinterpretation of the exercise of the right of collective self-defence is part of this transition, even if this change is far less than meets the eye. Also notable are the creation of a National Security Council, the articulation of a National Security Strategy, the passage of the National Secrets Law, and changes in rules regarding Overseas Development Assistance and export controls.

All of this (and the list is not complete) is also part of an alliance modernisation process that aims to strengthen the US-Japan security partnership to deal with new political, economic and security realities. While Prime Minister Abe may chafe about Japan's place in the post-war order, his rhetoric frames the changes in Japan's security policy as being in service of the alliance. Abe wants to reassert Japan's status as a 'first-tier nation', but this is also so that it can be a better partner to the US.

Here, Hugh and I part ways. Abe may hanker for great-power status, but most Japanese do not. My study of Japan after the triple disaster of 11 March 2011 reveals a country fatigued by such ambitions. Japanese are tired of competing, and see little reward from the struggle to catch up or keep up. Japanese are comfortable with their place in the world and profoundly sceptical about the changes required for them to re-energise their economy, the essential first step in the process of (re)assuming a higher international profile.

These attitudinal constraints to a renewed and re-vitalised Japan are the most compelling and least understood, but they are only part of the problem Abe and fellow internationalists face. Japan's demographic profile and its growing debt also profoundly constrict Japanese choices. Most acutely, an aging population is unlikely to choose to devote increasingly scarce resources to the military, a prerequisite to the claim of 'great power status.'

Given this context, Japan's choices become:

The status quo, or alliance with the US: this allows Japan to balance psychological and structural constraints and maintain maximum freedom of maneuver. In truth, however, even this could push the Japanese public to the edge of its comfort zone.

A nuclear power, without great power ambitions: this would be a practically impossible choice, given anti-nuclear sentiment in Japan. Pursuit of the nuclear option would isolate Japan and offer little security, which its strategic planners acknowledge. The public would never stomach an offensive posture, so any nuclear stance would be a poison pill, purely defensive in nature. (If I wanted to be as provocative as possible, I'd call this the 'North Korean option.') This undercuts Hugh's thesis of a nuclear-armed Japan striving to become a great power (add the cost of such a policy and the likelihood plunges even further).

A junior partner to China: Japanese may not want to compete with China but they are too proud and too unsettled by China to accept subordinate status either. Even junior partner status within the alliance can be irritating, but the US uses the right language when discussing Japan to relieve that pressure. Japan could only accept a subordinate status to China when China is so transformed that it is no longer a threat to Japan (about the same time that Taiwan would vote to reunite with the mainland) and when Beijing offers a relationship that affords Japan the status it demands.

My article argues that Japan could pursue a fourth alternative, one that eschews great power status to become 'a problem solving country.' This is a radical option that I teased out of interviews even though no one I talked to explicitly endorsed it. It is Soeya Yoshihide's 'middle power diplomacy' on steroids, a concept that Lowy has done some fine work on. It would likely exist within the alliance framework, so it could just be a variant on the first choice.

I've got my money on number one, although there are nuances to be teased out. As always, though, we owe Hugh a thanks for forcing us to think hard about these questions.

Photo by Flickr user federica Intorcia.
 2014-08-19T03:57:00+00:00 Brad Glosserman Japanese do not want their country to be a great power, yet nor do they wish to be subordinate to China. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=a98fd173-4955-4293-b246-1514bdb091df 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=a98fd173-4955-4293-b246-1514bdb091df http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/19/What-sort-of-power-does-Japan-want-to-be.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=a98fd173-4955-4293-b246-1514bdb091df http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/19/Chinese-Russian-troops-gather-military-exercises.aspx Chinese, Russian troops gather for military exercises 2014-08-19T01:20:00+00:00 Vaughan Winterbottom
[youtube:3g143C9Um4Y]

Military personnel from China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan are gathering for the fifth Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) 'Peace Mission' drill in North China this week.

Seven thousand personnel (around 5000 are Chinese while Russia is sending the second-biggest cohort of 900) are arriving in Zhurihe, Inner Mongolia, for the 24-29 August drill. Kazakhstan is bringing along transport planes it bought from Airbus, while Kyrgyzstan's soldiers are from special forces units trained by the US.

This year's exercise has added importance, as Russia seeks to boost the standing of the SCO while it sheds friends in the West, and as China wakes up to the threat radical Islam poses to its rule in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. The focus of the exercise is combating terrorism and boosting intelligence sharing, according to Xinhua.

The degree of emphasis the SCO places on security issues is open to debate. Back when the last such drill was held in 2010, the Brookings Institute's Julie Boland wrote: 'Since the SCO was created in 2001, some commentators have assessed that China's primary focus in the SCO is on expanding its economic opportunities in Central Asia, while Russia's is on security-related issues. This is clearly in error.'

But then no drill was held for four years and China proceeded to sign billions of dollars of energy deals with SCO member-states. This year's exercises will be the biggest since 2004; it remains to be seen whether the members will use it to breathe new life into the security aspect of the bloc.

Both Russia and China may see an incentive to do so.

Russian commentators have long touted the SCO as a kind of eastern NATO, though officials have stopped short of committing the SCO to Central Asia's most obvious candidate for future security engagements — Afghanistan. This month, Russian state news outlet Ria Novosti ran a piece calling the SCO 'a new alternative to the West.' The author noted that 'a much more powerful answer (to sanctions) is the formation of a multi-polar world, the foundation of which should be blocs like the BRICS and the SCO.'

Unlike the BRICS, the SCO provides a handy framework for Russia to increase its show of military cooperation with non-Western actors. That's something even its shiny new Eurasian Economic Union doesn't provide for — Kazakhstani representatives at this year's signing ceremony explicitly rejected a military dimension to the union.

Any attempt by Russia to usurp the SCO's security agenda for political point-scoring against the West would likely be met with unease in Beijing. That said, China may not be above expanding cooperation in Central Asia as it comes to terms with the threats posed by jihadist groups to Xinjiang, its northwest autonomous region with a sizeable Uyghur Muslim population.

In mid-August, an article by Hong Kong-based Phoenix Weekly detailed revenge threats made by the Islamic State (IS) against China for 'seizing Muslim rights.' The piece went viral on the mainland. China already has an Islamist network bent on Xinjiang independence on its doorstep in Pakistan. If greater number of jihadists respond to the IS call, the SCO may find itself with a very real military purpose.
 2014-08-19T01:20:00+00:00 Vaughan Winterbottom China may not be above expanding SCO cooperation in Central Asia as it comes to terms with jihadist groups to Xinjiang. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=176a95f1-6bf5-4cf8-9363-3e968c3489b6 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=176a95f1-6bf5-4cf8-9363-3e968c3489b6 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/19/Chinese-Russian-troops-gather-military-exercises.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=176a95f1-6bf5-4cf8-9363-3e968c3489b6 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/19/measuring-international-trade.aspx Are we measuring international trade correctly? 2014-08-18T23:56:00+00:00 Stephen Grenville
Perhaps the most fundamental change in international trade in recent decades has been the development of multinational 'supply chains'. The production process has been 'unbundled', with different stages of production taking place in different countries. An iPad is assembled in China, but only $10 of the total production costs takes place in China; most of the total cost comes from inputs made in other countries, including the intellectual property and design input from Apple in California.

In conventional trade statistics, exports are counted in gross terms, so the cost of the assembled iPad (including those elements imported into China) is counted in China's export figures. Over recent years, the misleading implications of the gross trade figures have been more fully recognised. Since 2012, an alternative value-add data set has been available.

The Reserve Bank of Australia has built on this data to provide new insights into Australia's international trade, particularly on trade-partner shares. The diagram below, from the RBA, illustrates the issue. If Australia exports $100 of iron ore to China, which is then used as the input for products which China exports to the US worth $110, conventional statistics would record this as $100 of Australian exports and $110 of Chinese exports. But China has, in this exaggerated example, only added $10 of value.

Focusing on 'value-add' statistics changes the picture of Australia's export partners.

In this example, the destination of $100 of iron ore exported by Australia is no longer China, but, in final product form, America. Comparing the two measures of Australia's export destinations, we get the following table:

These value-added statistics also provide a very different perspective on the importance of the services sector to Australia's exports. In gross terms, services make up only 22% of exports, but services form an important input into other exports (especially manufactures). Recalculating exports according to value-added model takes the services component to over 40% of Australia's exports (a bit bigger than resources). This different perspective fits Australia's comparative advantage: our export future doesn't lie in manufactures, but in commodities and services.

These value-add statistics don't replace the conventional gross statistics, which are available more quickly and don't rely on so many assumptions. Nor are they the last word in the ongoing process of refining statics to reflect a changing world. But they provide a valuable alternative perspective, sometimes with policy implications. At the very least, they are a reminder of the complexity of international trade: our exports will depend not only on what is happening in China, but on what is happening in China's export destinations as well.
 2014-08-18T23:56:00+00:00 Stephen Grenville 'Unbundled' supply chains make measuring international trade more complex. Is 'value-add' a better measure? http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=862c28a7-4cbe-4c54-8c27-02e09f682d23 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=862c28a7-4cbe-4c54-8c27-02e09f682d23 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/19/measuring-international-trade.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=862c28a7-4cbe-4c54-8c27-02e09f682d23 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/19/Southeast-Asia-Links-Myanmars-Phantom-Spitfires-Kerry-on-Southeast-Asia-Malaysia-mulls-Facebook-ban-Thailands-dancing-army.aspx Southeast Asia links: Myanmar's Spitfires, John Kerry, Malaysia's Facebook ban and more 2014-08-18T22:22:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan

Thailand's National Legislative Assembly accepted (in principle) the 2015 budget bill. The Junta's first budget since coming to power includes spending increases in education and (you guessed it) defence. When quizzed by reporters, the head of the Thai Junta said: 'If we don't increase the budget and purchase new weapons, then nobody will fear us'.

Is Myanmar moving toward a new kind of authoritarianism? An ISEAS paper explores the state of Myanmar's democratic transition.

US Secretary of State Kerry threw his support behind Myanmar's reforms and played down concern of stalled reforms during his visit. He later noted Myanmar's 'extraordinary transformation'. By contrast, he said Washington was 'very disturbed by the setback to democracy' in Thailand. A full transcript of Kerry's address at the East-West Center on the US Vision for Asia-Pacific Engagement can be found here.

Can Indonesia save the Six-Party Talks?

Malaysia looked into banning Facebook this week and then back-pedaled quickly.

Indonesia's draft budget includes a debilitating rise (not the hoped-for eradication) in energy subsidies, and may hamper Jokowi's chance to boost growth.

Progress or despair in new moves to unearth Myanmar's phantom World War II Spitfires?

A long running debate in Myanmar on the adoption of proportional representation hit the streets earlier this month and continues to consume column inches. Those against PR say its being pushed by the ruling USDP party to enhance its election chances ahead of the popular Suu Kyi-led NLD (other views can be found here, here and here).

The NY Times' interesting take on US Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Dempsey's visit to Vietnam (mine here).

If you missed this year's Shangri-La Dialogue, IISS has a great round-up of events in a new publication replete with videos.

The BBC goes to Mong La, a Chinese gambling town in Myanmar:

[youtube:xqbw_7Vo_eA?]

 2014-08-18T22:22:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan Weekly links to the best Southeast Asia reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=abe8d928-50fa-4831-b8e1-1c93391df471 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=abe8d928-50fa-4831-b8e1-1c93391df471 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/19/Southeast-Asia-Links-Myanmars-Phantom-Spitfires-Kerry-on-Southeast-Asia-Malaysia-mulls-Facebook-ban-Thailands-dancing-army.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=abe8d928-50fa-4831-b8e1-1c93391df471 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/18/Great-Australian-foreign-policy-speeches-Rudd-at-Peking-University.aspx Great Australian foreign policy speeches: Rudd at Peking University 2014-08-18T07:33:00+00:00 Graeme Dobell
Michael Fullilove began our series on great speeches about Australia's place in the world with a selection of ten speeches, here and here. Graeme Dobell's first pick in this series was Bob Hawke's APEC speech. His second choice was John Howard's speech on the US alliance and Australia's response to the 9/11 attacks, and his final choice is Kevin Rudd on China.

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Kevin Rudd is a masterly communicator and a superb campaigner with a steely will to power. The controversy and the contest in the Rudd legacy are over his ability to govern and his role within the Labor Party. The commentariat is being elbowed aside by Rudd's former colleagues, eager to offer detailed accounts of his flaws. See the new effort by the former Treasurer, Wayne Swan, on The Kevin's abrasive style, policy gridlock and drift, vindictive and juvenile humiliation of people, unprofessional and unproductive behaviour and...and...and...

Enough! In Canberra, as in any capital, the saints are to be found in church, your dog is your best friend, and to locate the politicians look for the steam from the giant egos and the smoke from the eternal battles to decide and deliver.

Step by that spectacle to this column in praise of Rudd's ability to make a great speech. Note that Rudd is one of those rare Australian politicians who fought his way to two goes at being prime minister. Thus, he stands close to such giants as Deakin and Menzies – and to Billy Hughes, who headed both Labor and non-Labor governments.

Mentioning Hughes is a reminder of the line that with Billy in the party ranks, an MP never had to look to the other side of the House for the most dangerous plots and darkest treachery. Bastardry is no bar to being a top pol; judge 'em by what they deliver and...Enough, I say! On to Rudd's eloquence.

Michael Fullilove rightly lists Rudd's apology to Aborigines and the Stolen Generations in February 2008 as one of Australia's greatest modern speeches. That speech captured the spirit of one of the finest days I've seen in the parliament, expressing the emotion of thousands of people who flocked there to be part of it, in the chamber and the grounds outside.

The Rudd effort nominated as a great foreign policy speech took place only two months later in an address to students at Peking University. Rudd spoke truth to the new great power, and the fine words generated heat as well as light. He delivered it in Mandarin, and both the Mandarin and English versions can be found here.

Mark the Peking University speech as a key moment when China's ruling dynasty began to realise that Australia's new prime minister would not be their Manchurian candidate. Instead, his intimate knowledge of China gave Lu Kewen an ability to say dangerous things; that he was saying them in Mandarin doubled the menace.

Rudd was speaking as China prepared for its great international coming-of-age party – hosting the Olympics – and as Beijing cracked down hard on any attempt by Tibet to catch the Olympic limelight. Rudd put his hand right onto that scorching subject.

The Prime Minister recounted his own journey to discover China, the history of Australia's relationship with China, and then started to move on to dangerous ground by talking about the many difficulties facing China – 'problems of poverty, problems of uneven development, problems of pollution, problems of broader human rights' – and the great impact China was having on the rest of the world. And then he started to offer suggestions and criticisms.

First, on how the students of Peking University and China's coming generation should change their country:

I think that you – the young people of China, the generation that will see China's full integration into global society, the global economy and the overall global order – have an important role to play in the life of the world. The global community looks forward to China fully participating in all the institutions of the global rules-based order, including in security, in the economy, in human rights, in the environment. And we look forward to China making active contributions to the enhancement of that order in the future. It is a necessary task of responsible global citizenship. It is a big responsibility you have. You are the product of China today. And you are the representatives of China's tomorrow. You will be the ones who define how the world sees China. "Harmony" was the dream and hope of that great Chinese thinker and activist Kang Youwei. The Hundred Days reform movement, like Peking University, also marks its 110th anniversary this year. Kang proposed a utopian world free of political boundaries. China has variously articulated its approach to development as one of "peaceful rise", "peaceful development" or more recently that of a "harmonious world". In 2005 the then US Deputy Secretary of State Bob Zoellick spoke for his part of his concept that China would and could become a responsible global stakeholder. As I said last week in a speech to the Brookings Institution in Washington, it is worthwhile thinking about how to encourage a synthesis of these concepts of a "harmonious world" and the "responsible stakeholder". The idea of a "harmonious world" depends on China being a participant in the world order and, along with others, acting in accordance with the rules of that order. Failing this, "harmony" is impossible to achieve. "Responsible stakeholder" contains the same idea at its core – China working to maintain and develop the global and regional rules-based order.

Tibet and the Olympics:

This year, as China hosts the Olympics, the eyes of the world will be on you and the city of Beijing. It will be a chance for China to engage directly with the world, both on the sports field and on the streets of Beijing. Some have called for a boycott of the Beijing Olympics because of recent problems in Tibet. As I said in London on Sunday, I do not agree. I believe the Olympics are important for China's continuing engagement with the world. Australia like most other countries recognises China's sovereignty over Tibet. But we also believe it is necessary to recognise there are significant human rights problem in Tibet. The current situation in Tibet is of concern to Australians. We recognise the need for all parties to avoid violence and find a solution through dialogue. As a long-standing friend of China I intend to have a straightforward discussion with China's leaders on this. We wish to see the year 2008 as one of harmony, and celebration – not one of conflict and contention.

A true friend offers unflinching advice:

A strong relationship, and a true friendship, are built on the ability to engage in direct, frank and ongoing dialogue about our fundamental interests and future vision. In the modern, globalised world, we are all connected; connected not only by politics and economics, but also in the air we breathe. A true friend is one who can be a "zhengyou", that is a partner who sees beyond immediate benefit to the broader and firm basis for continuing, profound and sincere friendship. In other words, a true friendship which "offers unflinching advice and counsels restraint" to engage in principled dialogue about matters of contention. It is the kind of friendship that I know is treasured in China's political tradition. It is the kind of friendship that I also offer China today.

Beijing did not want a Kevin Rudd who offered unflinching advice. China eventually hammered Rudd and Australia to make the true friend shut up and get back in line. China's diplomatic version of the death of a thousand cuts was brought to an end with a 'ceasefire' agreement in October 2009. Here is the text of that deal and the translation I offered at the time.

In all the things that Australia and China will do together in the future, there will be a lot more diplomatic exchanges about respect and mutual interests. Much rarer will be the Australian leader who stands up and speaks as directly as Kevin Rudd did at Peking University. For all the pain it caused, it is a great speech.
 2014-08-18T07:33:00+00:00 Graeme Dobell Rudd offered friendship with unflinching advice. China hammered Australia to make it shut up and get back in line. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=15bf8e62-39db-419d-9ecb-7b6bebd9d7e3 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=15bf8e62-39db-419d-9ecb-7b6bebd9d7e3 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/18/Great-Australian-foreign-policy-speeches-Rudd-at-Peking-University.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=15bf8e62-39db-419d-9ecb-7b6bebd9d7e3 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/18/What-Beijing-fears-most-Intra-Asian-balancing.aspx What Beijing fears most: Intra-Asian balancing 2014-08-18T06:05:00+00:00 Dhruva Jaishankar

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a rising China, in possession of a modernising military, must be in want of a non-militarised Japan. So is Beijing being foolish by acting assertively in the East China Sea, thereby helping to fuel Japan's evolution into a full-fledged military rival?

Perhaps not, says Hugh White. Based on analyses by Amy King and Brad Glosserman, he argues that either China doesn't believe that Japan can become a 'normal' military power (in which case Tokyo would have little choice but to accept a subordinate role to Beijing in Asia), or China calculates that its assertiveness and Japan's militaristic response will drive a permanent wedge in the US-Japan alliance, to China's benefit.

The possibilities Hugh raises are certainly compelling. China's coercive behaviour has so far elicited a relatively ambivalent response from America. Although Washington talks a tough game in Asia, and has continued apace with military exercises with other powers in the region that share its concerns about China's military modernisation, other aspects of its behaviour are cause for concern. Washington still felt the need to send two very different messages about its intentions to audiences in the US and in Asia (a point the Lowy Institute's Michael Fullilove recently raised with US Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel in Singapore). Attempts at emphasising the non-military dimensions of Washington's 'pivot to Asia,' the mixed response to China's extension of an air defence identification zone in the East China Sea, and budgetary considerations all point to waning enthusiasm in Washington for confronting Beijing.

There's also good reason to suspect Japan's long-term political appetite for a strategic rivalry with China.

Prime ministers have short life-spans in Japan (even the charismatic Junichiro Koizumi lasted only five years) and incumbent Shinzo Abe's position on reinterpreting Japan's constitution is not necessarily shared by some within his own party, let alone the wider Japanese political and bureaucratic establishment. The sharp decline in Abe's approval ratings to below 50% raise further questions about his political longevity and, with it, Japan's future as a normal military power.

The ambivalence of America and the possible unsustainability of Japan's response to China's provocations are mirrored in other regional powers. Vietnam is of two minds about confronting China, with the wing of its Communist Party's Politburo that favours accommodating Beijing reportedly ascendant. Even in India, where anti-Chinese sentiment is incredibly high, there's a continuing desire to diversify relations with all major powers, which means deepening ties with China even as it hedges against Chinese assertiveness. This tendency was recently underscored by rumours that India may join the Shanghai Cooperation Organization as a full member later this year.

But while all these developments might suggest that Beijing is playing its cards shrewdly (staking its claims and asserting its dominant regional position without risking a significant backlash), White's argument falls short on a simple but important point. He presents a binary choice for China in the Indo-Pacific: either it will confront the US, supported by a self-constrained, pacified Japan; or it will face a remilitarised Japan that lacks the full backing of the US-Japan alliance.

Yet there's a third possibility that White has overlooked, one that is much more troublesome from Beijing's standpoint. That is the evolution of a strategic, security, and technological compact among resident Asian powers that serves to balance China. Chief among these balancers would be Japan and India, but Vietnam, Australia, and others could all conceivably play crucial roles. Indeed, Rory Medcalf and C Raja Mohan have recently raised this very possibility: the emergence of middle-power coalitions in the Indo-Pacific.

The one that has Beijing most worried, judging by the rushed visit of Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi to New Delhi in June, is the emerging strategic relationship between India and Japan. Security ties between these two countries are, at present, at risk of being both wildly oversold and under-explored. But there is no discounting the potential. As I've written elsewhere, India and Japan share similar concerns about Chinese intentions (both are locked in territorial disputes with China) and have doubts about Washington's commitment to the region. They also have complementary strengths, with Japan's financial resources and technological sophistication a natural foil for India's manpower-heavy and battle-hardened military.

A security partnership with India offers Japan at least two other benefits, both of which, if carried through, could undermine Beijing's plans for regional hegemony. Japan's military-to-military contacts with India enable it to prepare for out-of-area contingencies, particularly in the maritime realm, which represents a key step in Japan's path to becoming a normal military power. More significantly, the possibility of joint production of the US-2 aircraft with India, and its potential export to third countries, could mark a major development as part of Japan's reversal of its self-imposed ban on defence exports.

There is a tendency in some quarters to downplay Beijing's ability to make mistakes. Even its handling of public relations — not exactly China's strong suit — can somehow be re-interpreted as an act of brilliance and sophistication. While White rightly raises two scenarios in which China's assertiveness towards Japan reaps dividends, it's hard to completely discount the possibility that Beijing is being short-sighted. China's leaders might relish the thought of unquestioned Asian dominance or a revanchist campaign against an isolated Japan. But the emergence of a balancing coalition led by Japan and India (and possibly including others) presents a much more daunting prospect.

Photo by Flickr user generalising.
 2014-08-18T06:05:00+00:00 Dhruva Jaishankar An Asian coalition led by Japan and India is a daunting challenge to China. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=f81e03f0-12bb-43ab-b8ff-2fd162fd2056 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=f81e03f0-12bb-43ab-b8ff-2fd162fd2056 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/18/What-Beijing-fears-most-Intra-Asian-balancing.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=f81e03f0-12bb-43ab-b8ff-2fd162fd2056 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/18/Australias-economic-diplomacy-risks-and-opportunities.aspx Australia's economic diplomacy: Enlightened self-interest? 2014-08-18T04:55:00+00:00 Alex Oliver

Almost a year since the Coalition took the reins of government and introduced its policy of 'economic diplomacy', a term which was probably foreign to many Australians at the time, Foreign Minister Julie Bishop and Trade and Investment Minister Andrew Robb launched the Government's Economic Diplomacy policy today at the Lowy Institute. Since the election, it's a term the Foreign Minister has used frequently, along with the 'open for business' mantra and its emphasis on promoting the economic interests of Australia and Australian businesses internationally.

The ministers must have received a considerable amount of feedback about the policy, including questions about what 'economic diplomacy' actually means, because both today went to considerable lengths to explain it. The complexity of the task is illustrated by the length of the ministers' speeches: almost an hour, taken together, and followed by a short Q&A session.

In the Foreign Minister's parlance, 'economic diplomacy' means:

harnessing broader aspects of our international diplomatic work to promote trade, encourage economic growth, attract investment and support business.

To do this, Australia's global network of 95 ambassadors, high commissioners and consuls general, together with 72 trade commissioners, will make economic diplomacy their guiding principle: 'promoting our national reputation as an open export-oriented free market economy (and as a country which is) a great place to invest and with which to do business.' Several times in her speech, Ms Bishop underscored the role of the private sector, particularly small and medium enterprises; she also included players in the broader Australian community: NGOs, think tanks, the arts and sporting people and organisations.

In the increasingly globalised international environment Australia now faces, this economic diplomacy agenda will be a complex one to prosecute: it implies a far greater role for non-government entities, particularly the private sector, and means a much greater involvement for the Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade in formulating and facilitating the Australian Government's approach to international trade and foreign investment.

Because economic diplomacy requires domestic policy settings which reduce barriers to trade, economic growth and investment, DFAT, along with its two ministers, will need to lead a whole-of-government, whole-of-society effort to achieve positive economic outcomes through diplomacy. As Ms Bishop described, the strength and uniqueness of this policy is that it aligns all Australia's international efforts – foreign policy, trade, tourism, investment and development – so that they are 'pulling in the same direction.'

As pointed out by one of the participants in the workshop which followed the Ministers' speeches, this means Australian diplomacy is no longer an 'elite sport' played only by diplomats and government officials. Because it will involve Australians and all kinds of Australian business, economic diplomacy will bring the business of Australia's international engagement much closer to home.

But it also makes Australia's diplomacy much more complex, at a time when DFAT, our principal agency for international engagement, has been resource-strapped for decades. And there are risks in making Australian business and industry the spearheads of our international engagement; the AWB scandal and Indian students' crisis are two examples of aggressive economic 'diplomacy' gone awry. These risks will require careful management by skilled diplomats abroad, and appropriate domestic policy-making and regulation by government at home.

Australia is no outpost in prioritising economic diplomacy: Canada, the UK, and the Netherlands are examples of significant and like-minded nations pursuing similar goals to those outlined today by Bishop and Robb. The key to success will be making sure that the policy doesn't become, in Bishop's words, 'the pursuit of Australia's naked self-interest to the potential detriment of others', but balances Australia's economic ambitions with broader and less self-centred aspirations for prosperity and peace in the region.
 2014-08-18T04:55:00+00:00 Alex Oliver The policy means Australian diplomacy is no longer an 'elite sport' played only by diplomats and government officials. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=579888c8-99f0-47e3-9f4a-405a6310e010 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=579888c8-99f0-47e3-9f4a-405a6310e010 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/18/Australias-economic-diplomacy-risks-and-opportunities.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=579888c8-99f0-47e3-9f4a-405a6310e010 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/18/Humans-need-not-apply-An-economic-horror-movie.aspx Humans need not apply: An economic horror movie 2014-08-18T03:39:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
Holy crap, this video is terrifying. From the narration:

We have been through economic revolutions before, but the robot revolution is different. Horses aren't unemployed now because they got lazy as a species; they're unemployable. There's little work a horse can do that do that pays for its housing and hay. And many bright, perfectly capable humans will find themselves the new horse: unemployable through no fault of their own.

[youtube:7Pq-S557XQU#t]

(H/t Kottke.)
 2014-08-18T03:39:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=8f953a05-a677-40bb-8b0e-a9f4fa9714c9 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=8f953a05-a677-40bb-8b0e-a9f4fa9714c9 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/18/Humans-need-not-apply-An-economic-horror-movie.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=8f953a05-a677-40bb-8b0e-a9f4fa9714c9 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/18/Chinas-strategy-to-sow-distrust-of-Japan.aspx China's strategy to sow distrust of Japan 2014-08-18T01:41:00+00:00 Christopher Pokarier

Promoting mutual distrust in the Asia Pacific now appears central to Chinese strategy. As Hugh White has argued persuasively, China seeks greater influence in Asia through weakening the faith of America's regional allies and partners in US resolve to remain engaged in the region. This will be compounded if US preparedness to work collectively as a hedge against Chinese hegemony is eroded.

Clearly, central to such a strategy is the stigmatisation of Japan, given its locale, continuing economic, technological and cultural clout, and alliance with the US. In recent months, wilful misrepresentation of Japan's contemporary character as a society and a polity under the leadership of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has escalated.

This has been evidenced starkly in Chinese media reaction to Abe's recent visit to Australia and the close and deepening ties affirmed by the Australian and Japanese governments. Shrill criticism from mainland media soon became news in its own right in Australia, and a counterweight to the otherwise upbeat news cycle around Abe's visit.

Overblown Chinese reactions to the Abbott Government's warm embrace of Abe appeared in Australia too.

'Japanese militarism is back' screamed the headline on the front cover of the Australian Chinese Weekly on 19 July. Within the paper was a full-colour glossy feature on Abe's visit to Australia, including a two-page spread repeating the headline overlaid on images of Abe and Abbott speaking together in Canberra and the rising sun emblem. The message was clear: the Australian Government, in welcoming Abe, is aiding and abetting the return of Japanese aggression.

As has recently been discussed on The Interpreter and elsewhere, the local Chinese-language media increasingly mirrors the political intentions of Beijing's leadership. Whatever the motivations for such scaremongering, it is consistent with what appears to be a deliberate strategy from Beijing of delegitimising Japan.

A core narrative is that Japan is guilty of reckless endangerment of regional peace through provocative actions towards China. This centres now on Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, with the nuances of Abe's worldview and statements disregarded as he is branded a dangerous rightist-nationalist-historical-revisionist. Such shorthand has become widespread in Western media reportage, as seen is this sloppy New York Times editorial.

Certainly Abe has given critics material to work with, most recently through his Government's review (though not retraction) of the 1993 Kono Declaration apologising to Korean 'comfort women'. Abe's visit to Yasukuni shrine stands, for critics, as having a totemic association with the glorification of past Japanese militarism despite the explicit disavowals of such a meaning by Abe.

Relations between China and Japan deteriorated markedly prior to Abe's election, primarily but not exclusively around the Senkaku/Diaoyu dispute. A turning point was when Beijing chose to interpret the September 2012 decision by the left-leaning Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ) Government of Yoshihiko Noda to purchase three of the Senkaku islands (from a private Japanese owner) as a major escalation of the dispute. The nationalisation decision was actually a preemptive move to stop moves by right-wing Tokyo Governor Shintaro Ishihara and various other nationalist activists to take control of one or more of the islets. What was widely understood in Japan as a move to defuse the territorial dispute was instead interpreted by China as an act of state aggression.

China blew a rare opportunity to drive a wedge between Japan and the US during the period of DPJ governments of Hatoyama, Kan and Noda by succumbing to hubris and belligerence just when a charm offensive was called for. The only consolation for China is that Abe is an easier target for delegitimating Japan.

Japanese public opinion towards China, for a long time more positive than that felt on the mainland for Japan, has deteriorated dramatically since 2010. Arguably, the resulting political climate helped Abe's return to the Liberal Democratic Party leadership. The more trashy elements of Japan's free media increasingly exploit domestic unease about China for commercial gain, although Japanese political leaders don't appear to be boxed in, policy wise, by public opinion in relation to China. Yet there is widespread acceptance of the need for an effective China hedge through better relations with both the US and other nations of the region. Moreover, Japanese of all political persuasions are tiring of being pressured by Beijing, and by Seoul, to make symbolic concessions just to start talking.

Japan could only consider distancing itself from the US if China seemed completely benign, and such a scenario is currently unthinkable to most Japanese. This is by no means costless to China, in either security or economic terms. Japanese FDI to China is down a third on the previous year. Japanese firms have long hedged against political risk in China by maintaining a strong commitment to investing in Southeast Asia and beyond.

Viewed from China, memories of wartime Japanese aggression, instances of a defiant lack of repentance by some Japanese identities, and conjuring up the spectre of resurgent Japanese militarism would seem the ideal means to stigmatise Japan throughout an Australasia with a shared experience of suffering in the Pacific war. Yet to date, fears of present and near future aggression from China (rather than increasingly distant memories of a past Japan) seem to have greater salience.

Only in South Korea, where collective memories of the trauma of Japanese colonialism has been central to legitimating political ideologies since the Korean war, is a large proportion of both elite and popular opinion critical of Japan. But with South Korea still dependent on US security guarantees, ill will between it and Japan is primarily an issue for America.

Prime Minister Abbott's warm welcoming of Abe infuriated Beijing not just because he was prepared to be magnanimous on matters of history. Rather, by simply stating the fact that Japan has been a model international citizen for nearly seven decades and deserves 'a fair go', Abbott struck a forceful blow against Beijing's strategy of delegitimising Japan and driving an attitudinal wedge between it and its longstanding postwar friends.

Image courtesy of REUTERS/Alex Ellinghausen.
 2014-08-18T01:41:00+00:00 Christopher Pokarier Promoting distrust of Japan in the Asia Pacific now appears central to Chinese strategy. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=017a24e5-83f2-424b-8242-6793e2174949 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=017a24e5-83f2-424b-8242-6793e2174949 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/18/Chinas-strategy-to-sow-distrust-of-Japan.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=017a24e5-83f2-424b-8242-6793e2174949 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/18/Aid-development-links-Aid-scholarships-South-Sudan-Universal-Health-Coverage-and-more.aspx Aid & development links: Aid scholarships, South Sudan, Universal Health Coverage and more 2014-08-17T23:49:00+00:00 Stephanie Dunstan

What's the value of Australian Aid scholarships? ANU's Dev Policy Blog have started a three-part analysis.

With news of airlines cancelling travel from Ebola-effected countries, interesting that the WHO is against the idea.

Australia steps up humanitarian aid to South Sudan, with fears of a worsening food crisis.

Interesting reading on Social Impact Bonds.

Nice interactive over on Devex on the long history of USAID.

Why the Gates Foundation isn't (yet) supporting the drive for Universal Health Coverage.

Listen to the Lowy Institute's Jenny Hayward Jones and Tess Newton Cain discuss the diplomatic wrangle between Fiji and PNG over the appointment of Meg Taylor as Secretary General of the Forum Secretariat.

 2014-08-17T23:49:00+00:00 Stephanie Dunstan Links to the week's best aid and development reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=5a7aa4bc-56b8-495e-9e4d-401a39d6dbf5 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=5a7aa4bc-56b8-495e-9e4d-401a39d6dbf5 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/18/Aid-development-links-Aid-scholarships-South-Sudan-Universal-Health-Coverage-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=5a7aa4bc-56b8-495e-9e4d-401a39d6dbf5 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/18/Jokowi-Indonesias-president-in-waiting.aspx Jokowi, Indonesia's president in waiting 2014-08-17T23:04:00+00:00 Catriona Croft-Cusworth

While Indonesia's losing presidential candidate Prabowo Subianto is still busy challenging last month's election results at the Constitutional Court, president-elect Joko Widodo, better known as Jokowi, has already laid ground rules for how he wishes to arrange his cabinet. The court is due to announce its verdict on the election on Thursday, and it now seems highly unlikely that the result will disrupt Jokowi's plans for the presidency.

More than a month on from the election, Indonesian voters have generally accepted the results announced on 22 July by the General Elections Commission (KPU), which delivered the presidency to Jokowi at a split of 53% of the votes to Prabowo's 47%. Jokowi has returned for now to his position as Jakarta governor, awaiting his inauguration as president in October.

Heavy security was deployed in Jakarta ahead of the KPU's announcement, with some fearing that violence could erupt from either side at news of a defeat. Fortunately, the results were received peaceably, though this was in no way helped by the reaction of Prabowo and his supporters.

After refusing to accept the results of reputable quick counts and claiming victory for himself on election day, Prabowo announced hours before the release of the official count that he would 'withdraw' from the election, an ambiguous statement that left constitutional law experts scratching their heads about whether it would have any bearing on the results. Most concluded that it wouldn't, while some even suggested that Prabowo could face heavy fines or jail time for violating the presidential election law with his withdrawal.

When official results showed that Jokowi and his running mate Jusuf Kalla had won the vote, their supporters were asked in the interests of security to celebrate privately rather than on the streets as they had done on election day. Meanwhile, Prabowo and his running mate Hatta Rajasa urged supporters to publicly 'secure' the vote at the KPU office, and embarked on a campaign to delegitimise the election results. They released a public statement alleging 'structural, massive and systematic' electoral fraud and claimed that their right to a democratic election had been violated.

The case was taken to the Constitutional Court, which after a recent scandal that saw its chief justice jailed on bribery charges, is eager to regain public trust.

From the start, the court described Prabowo and Hatta's lawsuit as unclear, unconvincing and riddled with spelling errors, a clear signal that the court would not easily reject the results of the KPU. Having agreed to hear testimony from 25 of the 52,000 witnesses the Prabowo team claimed to be able to put forward, the court has grown increasingly impatient over the course of the trial as witnesses have failed to provide convincing evidence of cheating. Some have only been able to provide second-hand reports of money politics, while others have been accused of making logical leaps in their testimony, as in the case of one witness who produced a newspaper clipping reporting Surabaya mayor Tri Rismaharini's public congratulation of Jokowi on his victory as evidence of vote-rigging in the East Java capital.

Outside the courtroom, Prabowo's support base is reportedly shrinking. The results of a national survey by the Indonesian Survey Circle (LSI) released last week showed that if another election were to take place today, Jokowi would remain the victor, with an even bigger margin of support at about 57.06% of the vote to 30.39% for Prabowo, and 12.55% retreating to the category of 'undecided'. Crowds have dutifully gathered outside the Constitutional Court in a show of support for Prabowo throughout the trial, though even these supporters were reported to be losing interest when demonstration organisers failed to provide enough of the obligatory rice boxes to go around on Friday afternoon.

It's unclear how Prabowo will react to what now appears will be a certain loss for his appeal at the Constitutional Court. However, with waning support for his failed presidential bid, it's looking unlikely that the announcement could spark any public unrest. As Jokowi makes quiet preparations to take power in the coming months, it appears that Indonesia is ready to accept him as its democratically elected president.

Photo by Flickr user Charles Wiriawan.
 2014-08-17T23:04:00+00:00 Catriona Croft-Cusworth The Constitutional Court is likely to endorse the presidential election result on Thursday. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=7989d4d0-5eec-4db2-a283-a873cede442c 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=7989d4d0-5eec-4db2-a283-a873cede442c http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/18/Jokowi-Indonesias-president-in-waiting.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=7989d4d0-5eec-4db2-a283-a873cede442c http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/16/Weekend-catch-up-Iraq-AUSMIN-Vietnam-US-ties-WTO-troubles-China-Japan-and-more.aspx Weekend catch-up: Iraq, Vietnam-US ties, AUSMIN, WTO, China-Japan and more 2014-08-15T22:00:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
Bringing together all the longer Interpreter articles you were too busy to read this week.

Rodger Shanahan's provocative piece on ISIS's 'strategic gift' to the Obama Administration got a lot of attention early this week:

Iraq clearly needed military assistance but the US needed to offer it in such a way that it wouldn't be seen to profit Maliki politically. What better way to introduce US firepower than in support of a humanitarian cause and in defence of Kurdish-controlled areas? It came with the imprimatur of the Iraqi Government but is not directly in support of it. It is a difficult act to juggle but it gives the US some leverage: if Maliki tries to cling to power, expect a narrow range of US military support. If he leaves and is replaced by a more inclusive government, then air support could be more widely employed.

Anthony Bubalo looked at the domestic angle to the Iraq crisis:

The main reason the Islamic State has made such gains in Iraq is that Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has not ruled for all Iraqis. In particular, by disenfranchising the Sunni minority, he created a fertile field for the Islamic State to plow. There is no way the group's relatively few fighters could have made the gains they did without the implicit and in some cases explicit backing of Sunni communities in Iraq's north.

That backing came not because these communities loved what the Islamic State was offering. Quite the contrary. In fact, the main threat to the Islamic State's gains is not the Iraqi Army (with or without US air cover), but the likelihood that ordinary Sunnis will chafe under the Islamic State's harsh rule. Indeed, it is a significant measure of Sunni discontent with Baghdad that Sunnis are prepared, for the moment at least, to do a deal with this particular devil.

Which brings us to Australia.

We also talked about the annual AUSMIN talks, held in Sydney this week. I warned about the implications of missile-defence cooperation, and here's James Brown:

...the long term issue of most importance to the alliance which needs to be discussed this year is the future force posture of the US Navy in Australia.

At the 2012 AUSMIN in Perth, then Australian Defence Minister Stephen Smith said that the growing strategic importance of the Indian Ocean was leading the US Navy to shift its attention to the waters off Australia's northwest coast. That AUSMIN meeting committed a joint working group of Australian and US officials to investigate options for the additional presence of US Navy vessels on Australia's west coast. A formal study didn't begin until December 2013, and the group will report its finding to the leaders over the next few days with a view to forging a way forward to new naval force posture arrangements.

Stephen Grenville looked at the crisis in multilateral trade negotiations and Mike Callaghan called on the G20 to save the World Trade Organization:

One of the threats to global economic cooperation that the G20 must confront is the impact of India's veto of the Bali WTO trade deal.

The G20 must respond and restore confidence in the multilateral trading system and the WTO. Tom Miles sums up much of the reaction to India's decision when he says that 'India has dealt a potentially fatal blow to the World Trade Organization's hopes of modernising rules of global commerce and remaining the central forum of multilateral trade deals'. Simon Evenett from the Swiss Institute for International Economics said that 'without a serious shake-up, the WTO's future looks like that of the League of Nations.'

The US military did some cozying up to Vietnam this week, reported Elliot Brennan:

Hanoi has long pushed its brand of 'more friends, fewer enemies' foreign policy. Of course, a stronger American partnership now could be a counterweight to Chinese assertiveness and what some might see as a fitting punitive measure. But while this Pentagon visit offers a welcome window for greater cooperation with the US, it should not be overstated. Vietnam's 'orbit' is well populated. Indeed, that has been Vietnam's policy since 1988. For Washington, there is probably also a concern not just about Beijing's recent assertiveness in the South China Sea but also of Russia's increasing ties with Hanoi.

Julian Snelder discussed China's rough treatment of multinationals:

International business people are often told here that 'they are not invited to China to profiteer; they are invited to make the Chinese better'. The guests are held to higher standards than locals, and they should be. Chinese officialdom is making a mighty effort to build future Chinese global champions like Immelt's GE. Knocking foreigners is part of their strategy, forcing them to be more responsive and competitive. Multinational companies are 'making China better', but China is making them better too.

Here's Mathew Sussex on that mysterious Russian aid convoy bound for Ukraine:

The idea that the Russian aid convoy really contains heavily armed soldiers, ready to pour out of their trucks and open fire, is probably better left to Hollywood.

The troops would automatically be discovered at the border and turned back. And if they decided to fight, they would be quickly cut down as they left their vehicles. Either way, it would be a public relations disaster for Moscow, with domestic as well as international consequences. Putin would have been caught out in a barefaced lie about humanitarian relief. And engaging in a shooting match from trucks makes for a senseless and unpopular waste of well-trained personnel.

It is almost definitely the case that the convoy does indeed contain aid, and it will continue to do so as it attempts to cross into Ukraine. The International Committee for the Red Cross was able to confirm, as the convoy moved towards the border, that the trucks were indeed full of relief supplies.

But this raises a couple of scenarios much more likely than the idea of a series of Russian Trojan Horses.

Twitter loved Hugh White's question: Is China making a big mistake about Japan?:

One thing is for sure: China's conduct, especially over the Senkakus, is undermining Japan's post-war strategic posture, a posture which has served both Japan and China so well for so long. The foundation of that posture has of course been Japan's confidence that it can rely on America for its security, which in turn has seemed essential to Japan's unique version of 'national pacifism'.

As I have argued before (Explaining China's behaviour in the East and South China Seas), China's actions over the Senkakus seem deliberately designed to undermine Japan's confidence in American support by showing Japan that on a critical issue America is not willing to risk a clash with China on Japan's behalf. And that seems to be working. Despite President Obama's bold affirmation of US support over the disputed islands in Tokyo in April, Japanese confidence in US support against China does seem to have waned. The clearest signs are of course Mr Abe's steps to embrace collective self-defence and start looking for allies in Asia, including Australia.

These are exactly the kinds of steps towards normalisation that we could expect Beijing to want to avoid. So what is going on? There seem two possible alternatives to the conclusion that Beijing is just making a mistake.

Malcolm Cook disagreed, and there will be more on this debate next week.

Photo by Flickr user Hamster Factor.
 2014-08-15T22:00:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen Bringing together all the longer Interpreter articles you were too busy to read this week. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=52f8fb66-4fdd-4de9-8588-7a578fc5c135 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=52f8fb66-4fdd-4de9-8588-7a578fc5c135 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/16/Weekend-catch-up-Iraq-AUSMIN-Vietnam-US-ties-WTO-troubles-China-Japan-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=52f8fb66-4fdd-4de9-8588-7a578fc5c135 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/15/Chinas-Xinjiang-policy-A-Middle-East-headache.aspx China's Xinjiang policy: A Middle East headache 2014-08-15T05:49:00+00:00 Simone van Nieuwenhuizen

China wants to play an active and constructive role in achieving peace in the Middle East.

That's what Liu Jieyi, China's permanent representative to the UN, recently said when reiterating Foreign Minister Wang Yi's 'Five Point Proposal' promoting an end to violence in Gaza. This was presented as an extension of Xi Jinping's May 2013 'Four Point Proposal' on the Palestine issue.

While China seeks to project a soft-power image with such proposals, China's domestic policy in Xinjiang threatens to undermine its potential to move toward a more active and constructive Middle East policy.

In China, religious activity is strictly monitored and regulated by the Communist Party, which fears any belief system that may undermine its authority. While restrictive policies have been in place for a number of years, in reaction to the spate of attacks and violence in Xinjiang since last year, the Chinese Government has enforced further regulations curbing expressions of Islamic identity in the region. During the month of Ramadan, several government departments required employees to sign pledges to not fast. In universities, Muslim students were forced to eat meals with professors to ensure government orders were being followed. This policy was only applied to Muslims in Xinjiang — other Muslim minorities, such as the Hui, living in other parts of China, were not subject to the same restrictions.

While onlookers in Beijing may interpret these as necessary precautions against the spread of terrorism and extremism, or as evidence of the Government's unwavering authority in Xinjiang, China's restrictive policies are further fueling anti-government sentiment among the Uighur population. On the day before Eid al-Fitr, nearly 100 people were killed in the violence that ensued when government buildings, police stations and vehicles were attacked in the western city of Yarkand. Shortly afterwards, Jume Tahir, the government-appointed Imam of Kashgar's Grand Mosque and vocal advocate of the Party's anti-terror policies, was stabbed to death.

China's Xinjiang policy is counterproductive to its image across the Middle East, as demonstrated by anti-China protests held in Saudi Arabia and Turkey in July.

These events, however, have not led to a change in China's approach. Authorities have now implemented a ban on long beards, headscarves, long dresses, the niqab, as well as star and crescent symbols (the 'five abnormal styles'), in public spaces in the city of Karamay for the duration of a sporting tournament it is hosting from 8-20 August.

By linking Islamic dress, symbols and traditions so closely with the threat of terrorism, China risks alienating not only its domestic Muslim population, but the rest of the Muslim world. Yet as the world's largest net oil importer, China has vital interests in the Middle East. Iraq is now China's fifth-largest source of oil. With four projects in operation, China's CNPC is the largest foreign investor in Iraqi oil.

While the region is preoccupied with the crises in Gaza, Syria and Iraq, China's Xinjiang policy may escape scrutiny. But as China's interests and presence in the Middle East grow, it will need more forward-looking policies. While China frequently regards external criticism of its domestic policies as interference in the country's 'internal affairs', China's policy-makers need to recognise that its Xinjiang policy has serious implications for its engagement with the Middle East.
 2014-08-15T05:49:00+00:00 Simone van Nieuwenhuizen China's treatment of Muslims is being watched in the Middle East. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=86fbcbb6-56ad-4615-b748-d23ff4636803 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=86fbcbb6-56ad-4615-b748-d23ff4636803 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/15/Chinas-Xinjiang-policy-A-Middle-East-headache.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=86fbcbb6-56ad-4615-b748-d23ff4636803 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/15/US-courts-Vietnam-military-chiefs-visit.aspx US courts Vietnam with military chief's visit 2014-08-15T04:50:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan

'The place for you right now is Vietnam.' So President Obama and Defense Secretary Hagel reportedly told the Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Martin Dempsey, and so originated the first visit by a top US military chief to Vietnam since 1971.

That historical event began yesterday when Dempsey met with his Vietnamese counterpart Lt Gen Do Ba Ty in Hanoi. In part, the visit is a piece of protocol, a return visit for one made by General Ty to Washington last year. However, the timing may allow for further cooperation between the erstwhile enemies.

Following an initial closed-door meeting, the Vietnamese Ministry of Defence hinted that closer military cooperation would take place. While relations have been increasingly strong (particularly on the economic front) since the 1995 normalisation of relations, military cooperation has been limited.

Dempsey's four-day visit – which also takes in meetings with the Prime Minister and Defense Minister – comes amid growing tensions in the region. After months of tensions and clashes, in July China's state-controlled oil company CNOOC withdrew its drilling rig from Vietnamese waters (Carl Thayer explained why here). For Beijing, it was a successful foray to test the resolve of the US and ASEAN (both failed to react strongly) and to alter the status quo. By the end of the crisis, the media had stopped reporting that the rig was in what international law considers to be Vietnam's EEZ, instead opting for 'disputed waters'. This irked many in the region and worried Vietnam's leadership.

As a result, there have been calls for Hanoi to distance itself from China's influence. Gary Sands, in a piece for Foreign Policy, argues that now is the time to re-engage Vietnam as it spins 'out of China's orbit'. As he explains, this view has been pushed by many in the Vietnam Communist Party.

But the story is more complex than binary ins-and-outs.

Hanoi has long pushed its brand of 'more friends, fewer enemies' foreign policy. Of course, a stronger American partnership now could be a counterweight to Chinese assertiveness and what some might see as a fitting punitive measure. But while this Pentagon visit offers a welcome window for greater cooperation with the US, it should not be overstated. Vietnam's 'orbit' is well populated. Indeed, that has been Vietnam's policy since 1988.

For Washington, there is probably also a concern not just about Beijing's recent assertiveness in the South China Sea but also of Russia's increasing ties with Hanoi. Moscow is a key ally and primary supplier of military hardware to Vietnam. Hanoi signed 17 separate agreements on military and economic ties with Russia during President Putin's visit in October last year. Hanoi has begun taking delivery of Russian Kilo-class submarines, Gepard class light frigates, and SU-30MK2 aircraft. This new capability may embolden Vietnam to take a more aggressive posture on its borders, a concern for all in the South China Sea.

Hanoi is also a key component of Russia's plans for a strong Eurasian Customs Union, seen by Russia as 'a vehicle to reintegrate the post-Soviet space', according to Chatham House. Vietnam is a key component of that Asia expansion, with eyes also on the South China Sea's best deep-water port of Cam Ranh Bay (Russia previously leased a naval base in the Bay).

It is therefore no surprise that with the door ajar, the US may be keen to strengthen relations with Hanoi. Moreover, in sending a military leader, the US can largely avoid comment about Vietnam's human rights problems, which have created headlines recently.

Photo courtesy of the US Defense Department.
 2014-08-15T04:50:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan Vietnam is putting its 'more friends, fewer enemies' foreign policy to practice. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=def4f36b-0779-4b42-82e8-5789ca3451f4 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=def4f36b-0779-4b42-82e8-5789ca3451f4 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/15/US-courts-Vietnam-military-chiefs-visit.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=def4f36b-0779-4b42-82e8-5789ca3451f4 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/15/AUSMIN-2014-What-are-we-getting-ourselves-into.aspx AUSMIN 2014: What are we getting ourselves into? 2014-08-15T03:59:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen

Here's The Australian's Greg Sheridan on this week's AUSMIN talks:

...the two governments committed to establish a working group on integrating their efforts on ballistic missile defence...In time, the US ideal is to be able to track and follow any hostile missile with seamless allied co-operation, and have the missile interceptor with the best shot, whether ground or sea-based, from whichever allied nation, shoot the missile down. This could even involve US commanders being able to fire, remotely, missiles from Australian ships.

Marc Lippert, US Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel's chief of staff, told me how the US already, at times of heightened missile tension with North Korea, co-ordinates its ship placements with Japan to provide the best possible cover. Australia is a long way from this kind of integration. We don't have air warfare destroyers in service. But that's the road we're on.

Yes it is. Mind you, it's a long road. The AUSMIN communique says only that Australia and the US will establish 'a bilateral working group to examine options for potential Australian contributions to ballistic missile defence in the region'. And as Sheridan says, the Australian ships are not built yet.

Still, given that the lead Air Warfare Destroyer is due to be delivered in 2016 and that North Korea provokes an international crisis approximately once a year, it's not too early to ask why we are on this particular road. The deployment of missile-defence ships has become a standard part of the Japanese and American response to heightened tension with North Korea, so you would think that if this trilateral integration goes ahead, Australia too would deploy a ship in the event of a crisis. It would certainly be diplomatically awkward to develop the joint capability and then refuse to take part.

And yet, Australia has not participated militarily in response to recent crises such as the 2013 nuclear test, the 2012 satellite launch or the 2010 Cheonan sinking. No political leader in Australia pushed for it, and the Japanese, Koreans or Americans did not seem to mind that we stayed out. So why are we contemplating a capability that would make it near impossible for Australia to stay out of regular North Korea crises? It is a particularly pointed question given that, if North Korea one day deployed missiles that could reach Australia (they don't have them yet), the missile-defence system being envisaged in partnership with the US and Japan could NOT protect the Australian continent. Any North Korean missile of that range would fly too high and too fast for the AEGIS-based system to intercept it.

The obvious response to these concerns is that Australia is getting involved in order to be a good ally. But there are may ways we can do that.

Photo courtesy of the Minister for Foreign Affairs.
 2014-08-15T03:59:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen We're proposing to take part in a missile-defence network that could not protect the Australian continent. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=d7f56bed-d95f-4731-8684-f154438b2850 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=d7f56bed-d95f-4731-8684-f154438b2850 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/15/AUSMIN-2014-What-are-we-getting-ourselves-into.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=d7f56bed-d95f-4731-8684-f154438b2850 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/15/Great-Australian-foreign-policy-speeches-Howard-911-US-alliance.aspx Great Australian foreign policy speeches: Howard on 9/11 and the US alliance 2014-08-15T02:10:00+00:00 Graeme Dobell
Michael Fullilove began our series on great speeches about Australia's place in the world with a selection of ten speeches, here and here. Graeme Dobell's first pick in this series was Bob Hawke's APEC creation speech. His second choice is John Howard's speech on the US alliance and Australia's response to the September 11 attacks.

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Australia's House of Representatives convened on 17 September 2001, six days after the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington had set the direction of the first decade of the 21st century.

The Prime Minister, John Howard, who was in Washington on the day of the attack, rose to give one of his finest parliamentary performances, formally invoking the treaty provisions of Australia's alliance with the US. It was a speech from the heart as well as the head. Howard stood with a long line of Australian leaders over the previous century who had built the security relationship with the US. Howard's passion was clear, as were the principles he spoke to – but much that followed was to become a dark time in the alliance.

Howard moved a motion that the House:

expresses its horror at the terrorist attacks which have claimed so many lives in the United States of America;

conveys to the Government and people of the United States of America the deepest sympathy and sense of shared loss felt by the Government and people of Australia;

extends condolences to the families and other loved ones of those Australians killed or missing as a result of the attacks;

declares that such attacks represent an assault, not only on the people and the values of the United States of America, but of free societies everywhere;

praises the courageous efforts of those engaged in the dangerous rescue operation still underway;

believes that the terrorist actions in New York City and Washington DC constitute an attack upon the United States of America within the meaning of Articles IV and V of the ANZUS Treaty;

fully endorses the commitment of the Australian Government to support within Australia's capabilities United States-led action against those responsible for these tragic attacks; and

encourages all Australians in the wake of these appalling events to display those very qualities of tolerance and inclusion which the terrorists themselves have assaulted with such awful consequences.

I've watched many Howard performances in the old and new parliament, and this was one of those rare times when he stepped beyond his role as a political warrior and a great debater. It was the speech of a leader explaining to Australia that 'the world has changed. We are all diminished, we are all changed, and we are all rather struggling with the concept that it will never be quite the same again.'

The speech had three parts: the first focused on what Howard called 'a tragedy and an obscenity of an appalling and repugnant magnitude'; then on the fight ahead and the values involved; and finally ANZUS.

Tragedy:

In the 27 years that I have been privileged to be a member of this parliament, I can think of no more sombre occasion than the circumstances under which this House meets today. We have had tragedies of a national and international kind before. We have been touched by the poignancy of the deaths of people. We have confronted significant moral and national challenges, but none matches in depth, scale and magnitude the consequences of what the world must now do in response to the terrible events in the United States last week. In sheer scale, the death and destruction are almost incomprehensible in a time not regarded as a time of war...It goes beyond the death so cruelly inflicted without warning, without justification and without any skerrick of moral authority on innocent people merely going about their daily lives; its context represents a massive assault on the values not only of the United States of America but also of this country— the values of free men and women and of decent people and decent societies around the world. It is an act of terror. It is an act which is repugnant to all of the things that we as a society believe in. On occasions like this, those things that divide us in this parliament, those things that we might bicker and quarrel over as a people, as we go about our lives, are so suddenly and so quickly put into perspective. I remember the morning in Washington— as the House knows, I had been in the United States. I had been for an early morning walk. It was a beautiful Washington morning— there was just a touch of autumn. I had walked past the Lincoln memorial and many of the other great memorials of that great nation which stood between us and tyranny on one critical occasion in our history. I, like millions of other Australians, was deeply moved and distressed. I felt an enormous sense of empathy towards the American people who had suffered this awful deed.

Values:

There is united, righteous, deep, seething anger around the world at present. But, as the months go by and as perhaps the early dividends of retaliatory action are not ready and not apparent, some of that anger may subside; and some may argue that the extra miles that are required to be travelled are not really worth it. But, if those who died last Tuesday are not, in the judgment of history, to have died in vain, there is an obligation on all of us to persevere, to travel the distance, to persist and to root out the evil that brought about those terrible deeds. But, in the process of responding, we must do so with care as well as with lethal force. We should understand that barbarism has no ethnicity and evil has no religion. Both around the world and within our own society, we should take pause lest we engage in the evil of scapegoating individual groups within our society. I have said on a number of occasions that I know that my fellow Australians of Islamic faith are overwhelmingly as appalled about what happened as I am, as an inadequately practising Christian. This is an assault on values common to all the great religions of the world, and it is also an assault on the values of many people who profess no religion. I say to my fellow Australians of Islamic faith or of Middle Eastern descent that I extend to you the hand of friendship. You are part of our great society; you are part of the fabric of the great, decent, freedom loving, fair minded Australian nation; and you are as entitled to share my outrage, my sorrow, my anger and my sadness as are others within our community—because wouldn't it be a terrible, tragic, obscene irony if in responding, however we do it as individuals or as nations, to these terrible terrorist attacks we forsook the very things that we believed had been assaulted last Tuesday in New York?

Alliance:

In every way, the attack on New York and Washington and the circumstances surrounding it did constitute an attack upon the metropolitan territory of the United States of America within the provisions of articles IV and V of the ANZUS Treaty. If that treaty means anything, if our debt as a nation to the people of the United States in the darkest days of World War II means anything, if the comradeship, the friendship and the common bonds of democracy and a belief in liberty, fraternity and justice mean anything, it means that the ANZUS Treaty applies and that the ANZUS Treaty is properly invoked. As a proud, patriotic Australian, I was literally moved to tears by what occurred in the United States. I was filled with admiration for the spirit of the American people. I can with genuine affection and fondness say that their behaviour in the wake of those events and their determination to respond appropriately, to heal the wounds and to help those who mourn and grieve demonstrates very powerfully that the American people do live, in the words of their wonderful national anthem, 'in the land of the free and the home of the brave'.

Formally invoking the treaty for the first time, Howard marked another moment in an Australian tradition: Deakin inviting the US Great White Fleet; Curtin turning to the US in the Pacific war free of any pangs for the traditional links to Britain; Spender achieving the ANZUS treaty; Menzies committing to Vietnam with the new great and powerful ally; Holt going all the way with LBJ; Whitlam hanging on to the alliance despite Vietnam and the controversy over the US bases in Australia; Hawke incorporating the US bases into the alliance.

The course Howard, set with his speech and parliamentary resolution, took Australia to Afghanistan and Iraq. The commitment Howard made was not just to the alliance but to George W Bush. The Push With Bush was to impose great political costs on Howard and Tony Blair, and significant alliance burdens on their nations. Iraq divided Australian politics while, by contrast, the major parties maintained their consensus on the commitment to Afghanistan over the 12 years of what became Australia's longest war.

Throughout Iraq and Afghanistan, the centrality of the US alliance for Australia endured with barely a wobble, proving the strength of the idea about the US relationship at the heart of Howard's speech.
 2014-08-15T02:10:00+00:00 Graeme Dobell One of those rare times when Howard stepped beyond his role as a political warrior and a great debater. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=5e9cfcdf-a1b7-4e69-bedc-15f2517d01f0 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=5e9cfcdf-a1b7-4e69-bedc-15f2517d01f0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/15/Great-Australian-foreign-policy-speeches-Howard-911-US-alliance.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=5e9cfcdf-a1b7-4e69-bedc-15f2517d01f0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/15/Japan-and-US-unified-not-split.aspx Japan and US unified, not split 2014-08-14T23:38:00+00:00 Malcolm Cook

Hugh White's latest post immediately reminded me of three things: my admiration for Hugh's ability to spark debate; an Interpreter post I wrote on the same topic 18 months ago; and the fact that I frequently agree with Hugh's analysis of the situation and disagree with his conclusions.

Hugh poses the questions of whether China is being 'dumb' by provoking Japan toward a more 'normal' defence policy, and sets up a dichotomy that assumes Chinese provocation of Japan is aimed at undermining Japanese confidence in and commitment to the US-Japan alliance: either China stops trying to undermine the US-Japan alliance, which leaves US strategic weight in Asia largely intact as the principle limit to Chinese ambitions, or it undermines the US-Japan alliance, in which case Japan replaces America as the major balancer of Chinese power in Asia. Which would Beijing rather deal with? I think they'd probably prefer Japan, Hugh says, concluding that therefore China is not being dumb.

Yet the answer to Hugh's question of whether China is being 'dumb' by provoking Japan may very well be 'yes'.

China's provocations in the East China Sea certainly are supporting Japan's less abnormal defence policy. However, Japan's changes are not aimed at replacing the US as a balancer of Chinese power in Asia but rather helping to support America's continued role as the primary balancer. Rather than the White-envisioned US-Japan split in the face of a more aggressive China, there is a growing unity, with Japan stepping up to play a more active alliance-based role. The Abe Administration's reinterpretation of Article 9 to include the limited exercise of the right of collective self-defense is primarily motivated by Japanese alliance responsibilities and the upcoming revisions of this very treaty, as well as Japan's role in the US-led regional ballistic missile defense system.

Likewise, Japan's developing strategic partnerships with Australia, India, the Philippines, Vietnam and others parallel US developments with these countries. In the case of Australia it is being done explicitly to bolster the US-Japan-Australia trilateral relationship. The Abe Administration's loosening of arms export bans will also allow Tokyo to play a more active and central role in US-Japan and US-led multi-partner weapons systems' developments, and will allow Japan to export its indigenously developed arms. Changes to Japan's planned military capabilities, particularly the expansion of its Aegis-capable fleet, also are consistent with Japan seeking greater security through a stronger alliance with the US and not outside it.

Certainly, policy-makers and the wider security community in Japan are worried about the US strategic position in Asia and the rising threat from China (and North Korea). Yet, all the steps taken by Japan so far are either driven by or fully consistent with a stronger US-Japan alliance with Japan playing a more active role.

Photo by Flickr user US Navy.
 2014-08-14T23:38:00+00:00 Malcolm Cook 'Is China being dumb by provoking Japan?' Hugh White answers his own question with a form 'no', but is he right? http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=c58a374e-1f37-4e30-9e40-e185b6e8154c 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=c58a374e-1f37-4e30-9e40-e185b6e8154c http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/15/Japan-and-US-unified-not-split.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=c58a374e-1f37-4e30-9e40-e185b6e8154c http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/15/India-Civil-nuclear-deal-spending-priorities-arms-imports-New-Silk-Road-midday-meal.aspx India links: Civil nuclear deal, spending priorities, arms imports, New Silk Road and more 2014-08-14T22:33:00+00:00 Danielle Rajendram

Is the Modi honeymoon over? Victor Mallet thinks Modi won't fulfil the hopes of his supporters nor fears of his detractors, Livemint asks why Modi has shied away from bold reforms and Ellen Barry argues that voters tended to see in Modi what they wanted to see.

With a third of the world's malnourished children living in India, what's behind India's food security crisis?

On a similar note, Paromita Pain reflects on the lessons learned from India's midday meal scheme.

Indrani Bagchi reports that the Australia-India civil nuclear deal is likely to be finalised during Prime Minister Abbott's upcoming trip to India.

These four charts demonstrate why India must change its spending priorities.

Siddharth Sivaraman and Rajeswari Pillai Rajagopalan make the case for diversifying India's arms imports.

C Raja Mohan argues that India should partner with China on the New Silk Road initiative.

On Modi's silence on communal episodes, Prem Trivedi writes:

He promised during his victory speech in May to be the sort of Prime Minister who would "take everyone along." To do that, he must articulate a more inclusive nationalism that re-brands the BJP as a party that celebrates India's Hindu tradition while recognizing the country's richly plural identity.

 2014-08-14T22:33:00+00:00 Danielle Rajendram Links to this week's best India reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=f33777f9-9e6b-4d6d-aa1f-e73b2198c72d 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=f33777f9-9e6b-4d6d-aa1f-e73b2198c72d http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/15/India-Civil-nuclear-deal-spending-priorities-arms-imports-New-Silk-Road-midday-meal.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=f33777f9-9e6b-4d6d-aa1f-e73b2198c72d http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/14/Ukraine-Aid-convoy-ominous-signal-Moscow.aspx Ukraine: Aid convoy an ominous signal from Moscow 2014-08-14T05:35:00+00:00 Matthew Sussex

The Russian 'aid' convoy, 12 August 2014 (REUTERS/Nikita Paukov)

The mysterious Russian 'aid' convoy — announced with much fanfare by the Kremlin on 11 August — has now reached Voronezh near the Ukrainian border. What happens next has been the subject of intense speculation. But it does seem that Vladimir Putin has made up his mind to intervene directly in eastern Ukraine.

The news that Russia would be contributing its own humanitarian relief to Donetsk and Luhansk sent what one source neatly referred to as the 'geopolitical telephone' into meltdown. Did the 280 identical white trucks really only contain food and medical supplies? Or would the cargo be unloaded and replaced with Russian Special Forces and military equipment en route to Ukraine? Why had Vitaly Churkin, Russia's ambassador to the UN, suddenly changed his tune on the need for humanitarian corridors for Ukraine when he had previously been so vehemently against them for Syria? And why did the relief convoy have stickers marked 'MC' (short for 'Mirotvorcheskiye Sily' or 'peacekeeping'), the exact same ones to be found on vehicles operated by Russian forces in Transnistria, South Ossetia and most recently in Crimea?

In the lead-up to the convoy's departure, the Kremlin engaged in a hefty amount of signaling. Russia moved more troops up to the border with Ukraine, bringing the total from 12,000 to 20,000. Reports increased about heavy weapons (including Grad unguided rocket systems) moving into separatist-held areas. Ukrainian fighter aircraft were shot down by Russian jets. There was even evidence that Ukrainian ground forces were repeatedly coming under artillery fire from within Russian territory.

In addition to its build-up on the border, Russia held a coordinated series of military exercises involving front-line air assets, assault forces and artillery. Partly this was designed to show off new hardware which had become ready for operational deployment following the Kremlin's ambitious 2008 modernisation project. But during an address to his troops, Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu also told Russian forces that they should 'expect the unexpected'. He went on to note that the world had changed, and that peace-keeping units could be called upon without warning.

The idea that the Russian aid convoy really contains heavily armed soldiers, ready to pour out of their trucks and open fire, is probably better left to Hollywood.

The troops would automatically be discovered at the border and turned back. And if they decided to fight, they would be quickly cut down as they left their vehicles. Either way, it would be a public relations disaster for Moscow, with domestic as well as international consequences. Putin would have been caught out in a barefaced lie about humanitarian relief. And engaging in a shooting match from trucks makes for a senseless and unpopular waste of well-trained personnel.

It is almost definitely the case that the convoy does indeed contain aid, and it will continue to do so as it attempts to cross into Ukraine. The International Committee for the Red Cross was able to confirm, as the convoy moved towards the border, that the trucks were indeed full of relief supplies.

But this raises a couple of scenarios much more likely than the idea of a series of Russian Trojan Horses.

The first is that the Russian convoy moves up to the border and the Ukrainians refuse to accept it or guarantee safe passage. That will open up a new window for the Kremlin to accuse Kiev and the West of appalling double standards: that aid from the Europe and the US is acceptable, but Russian aid is not. It will allow the language of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) to be used, showing that there is one set of rules for the West and another for everyone else.

The second scenario is that Ukraine allows the convoy to pass, but along the way it is forced to turn back due to 'provocations', has its cargo stolen, or is even fired upon. That will represent a perfect pretext for Putin to launch a rescue mission using his new military machine.

However contrived, it will nonetheless be defensible on both statist and humanitarian grounds. Putin will be able to claim, with justification, that Kiev has failed in its obligation to protect civilians and those assisting them. He will also be able to point to the targeted use of force by Russian peacekeepers as an entirely reasonable response under the circumstances.

Putin's recent moves, and his likely intentions, have further incensed leaders in the US and the West more broadly. This is mainly because there is little they are prepared to do to stop it. International attention is now much more closely focused on the renewed conflict in Gaza and the American intervention in Iraq. The US population is also worried about the outbreak of Ebola in West Africa.

As a result, the war in eastern Ukraine has been slipping off the radar, and marshaling the domestic and international will for a firm response to any Russian intervention will be difficult. But equally, preventing Putin from achieving his ambitions will take much more than symbolic sanctions, tough talk or 'de-friending' Putin at the upcoming G20 summit in Brisbane.

Given the series of half-measures witnessed so far, one must wonder whether the West has inadvertently sent a signal to Putin. If so, he seems to have received the message, and is acting accordingly.
 2014-08-14T05:35:00+00:00 Matthew Sussex Russia's aid convoy is not a Trojan Horse, but that is little consolation. It seems Putin has made up his mind to intervene. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=76ab3445-05ab-4325-b682-b7ac961ea096 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=76ab3445-05ab-4325-b682-b7ac961ea096 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/14/Ukraine-Aid-convoy-ominous-signal-Moscow.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=76ab3445-05ab-4325-b682-b7ac961ea096 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/14/Pacific-island-links-Fiji-special.aspx Pacific island links: Fiji special 2014-08-14T05:13:00+00:00 Tess Newton Cain
I spent some of this week in Fiji so it is the focus of this week's links:

Australia will co-lead a 14-country international observer mission to Fiji for the elections on 17 September. The Australian delegation will be led by Peter Reith.

Grant Bayldon of Amnesty International (NZ) looks at what is needed to support true democracy over and above holding elections in September.

The Fiji First party has been campaigning in New Zealand where they have had a mixed reception. When asked for assurance that there would be no more coups, Bainimarama's laughing response was 'You vote me into Parliament and there will be no coup'.

The interim prime minister will also visit Australia, where approximately 4000 Fijians have registered to vote in next month's elections. His visit is expected to prompt protests.

Current polling shows that Bainimarama enjoys 60% support as preferred prime minister but this is a 6% drop since May.

Away from politics, Fiji is preparing to welcome home a favoured son, golfer Vijay Singh, along with other big names who will take part in the first international tour event to be held in the country.

This coming weekend will see the celebration of the Hibiscus festival. More than just a beauty pageant, this year's theme is the impact of climate change:

[youtube:TqeW6vhsY4M]
 2014-08-14T05:13:00+00:00 Tess Newton Cain It's election campaign time in Fiji. Catch up on the latest and best reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=ed517f5c-2af1-4a03-8c67-d87579996ddd 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=ed517f5c-2af1-4a03-8c67-d87579996ddd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/14/Pacific-island-links-Fiji-special.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=ed517f5c-2af1-4a03-8c67-d87579996ddd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/14/Great-Australian-foreign-policy-speeches-APECs-creation-by-Bob-Hawke.aspx Great Australian foreign policy speeches: APEC's creation, by Bob Hawke 2014-08-14T02:00:00+00:00 Graeme Dobell

Michael Fullilove began this series on great speeches about Australia's place in the world with two sets of five speeches. Over coming days I'll add three to this list. The first, by Prime Minister Hawke, was delivered on 31 January 1989.

The oration on Asia's future was both cautious and visionary, and it produced one of the great Australian foreign policy achievements. The prose, though, was not great.

Perhaps you can't expect too much polish from a speech on trade policy. Especially when the writing finished at about 4am on the day it was to be delivered to a luncheon of the Korean Business Associations in Seoul.

The last-minute writing effort was because Australia's prime minister thought 'the footsteps of history' sounded ominous, plus he wanted to make a splash on a tour through Asia. As always, political need dances with policy demands. Hawke was going to roll the policy dice to propose the creation of a new Asia Pacific organisation.

The speech was the spark for APEC, Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation, which had its first ministerial meeting in Canberra within the year.

Hawke called for the creation of a government-level edition of the second track vehicle, the Pacific Economic Co-operation Conference, founded by Australian and Japan in 1980. The suggestion (which seems modest enough now) was for an Asia Pacific version of the OECD. Yet at that moment in 1989, APEC was not something Asia could have created for itself — not Japan, South Korea or ASEAN, and certainly not China.

The speech was an expression, in trade-speak, of Hawke's imagining of an Australia deeply 'enmeshed' in Asia's future. APEC could be a regional expression of the unilateral liberalisations that the Hawke Government had made its central domestic agenda.

The idea, as unveiled, was portrayed in defensive and fearful terms, rather than glowing language. The fear was of the cracks appearing in the multilateral system because of the failure of GATT negotiations. Asia needed to respond to the trade blocs being created in Europe and North America. Here is Hawke mapping his aims:

First, effective regional co-operation can greatly improve the chances of success of the Uruguay Round and could thereby give a vital boost to the liberalisation and therefore the preservation of the GATT-based trading system. The GATT system now faces its most crucial test. The Montreal impasse, essentially due to lack of progress on trade liberalisation in agriculture, must be overcome. If the Uruguay round fails, the underlying tensions which will have caused this failure will corrode the essence of the GATT system. We must work together to save the GATT system. The region's role will be critical given its strong growth, reliance on trade and growing world importance and responsibility...

Second, we must be prepared openly to discuss obstacles to trade within our region. From Australia's point of view, the success of the newly industrialising economies is an enormous opportunity, for us and for the whole region. Others see this very success as a threat, and it has led to frictions in trade relations within the region and beyond. There is undoubtedly room for dialogue and cooperation on this issue.

...The third area in which we could benefit from regional cooperation is through identifying the broad economic interests we have in common. We should try to investigate whether through co-ordinated Policy making we might better capitalise on the extraordinary complementarity of the economies in the region...

Before I leave this topic, I must stress that my support for a more formal vehicle for regional co-operation must not be interpreted as suggesting by code words the creation of a Pacific trading bloc. Australia's support for non-discriminatory multilateral trading solutions in the GATT framework is clear, long-standing and unambiguous.

Not a bloc, but certainly something that would be more than the OECD. APEC tapped powerful currents in the Asia Pacific and fundamental Australian interests.

The initiative was launched with scant preparation or consultation with key regional leaders; Hawke was going to ask for forgiveness, not permission. There was no certainty that having floated the idea of a regional ministerial meeting, Australia would be able to make it happen, particularly as the US was initially excluded and the concept cut across ASEAN's view of itself as the paramount regional organisation.

The sketchy details of Hawke's vision had been conjured up by officials on the plane flying with the PM and put into words during the all-night writing effort. In politics, a stuff-up can be as likely as a well-planned plot. Elements of APEC's birth illustrate a third category: fortunate happenstance, when an idea flourishes because of the alchemy of timing, history, luck, and personality, and lots of frantic follow-up pushing. APEC was something Asia needed. The region might not be able to talk openly about its strategic problems, but at least it could discuss trade.

The Hawke speech did not name intended members, but journalists traveling with the Prime Minister were briefed that Australia would consult initially with Japan, South Korea, New Zealand and Southeast Asia. The line on possible US membership was that it was 'not for Australia to decide who is in and who is out.' This approach produced diplomatic fireworks in Washington. Looking back over his time as foreign minister, Gareth Evans said one of the most unnerving moments of the job had been 'having the mark of Zorro laid on me by (US Secretary of State) Jim Baker at our first meeting in 1989 when he was told that Bob Hawke's concept of APEC — as he had outlined it at that stage in his Seoul speech — didn't include the United States.' Baker later said he was incensed that Australia had not consulted the US but he 'accepted at face value their explanation that they were worried that if it included the US that ASEAN would be less likely to sign on.'

The reality was that Japan could never have signed up to a grouping that excluded the US, and Hawke's memoirs are explicit that he always wanted the US in. But the US spat meant the Seoul speech did the first thing a big proposal needs — it got plenty of attention from everyone in the Asia Pacific.

Image by Flickr user thenoodleator.
 2014-08-14T02:00:00+00:00 Graeme Dobell Highlighting the best speeches about Australia's place in the world. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=d3c2f2ac-9f28-4755-a0b1-b205aaa9f487 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=d3c2f2ac-9f28-4755-a0b1-b205aaa9f487 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/14/Great-Australian-foreign-policy-speeches-APECs-creation-by-Bob-Hawke.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=d3c2f2ac-9f28-4755-a0b1-b205aaa9f487 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/14/comments-section-Is-China-making-a-big-mistake-about-Japan.aspx From the comments section: Is China making a big mistake about Japan? 2014-08-14T00:00:00+00:00 guest blogger – blank
Featuring the best Disqus comments by Interpreter readers, as selected by the editors.

Responding to Hugh White's post on whether China is right to dismiss Japan as a future strategic rival, commenter Peter suggests a couple of problems with the premises underlying Hugh's argument:

Just because Japan is seeking to strengthen security ties with Australia and India for instance isn't necessarily a sign of a weakened alliance. First, the US for its part is very happy for Japan to shoulder a greater burden in East Asia. Japan spending more on ships, planes and tanks means that the US can spend less. Second, it is unrealistic to expect a "normal" country to depend solely on a single actor for its security. Australia also effectively enjoys a US security guarantee, but that doesn't stop it from pursuing defence cooperation with other actors in the region.

Additionally, it is not as though this behaviour is new. Japan previously made an attempt (under Shinzo Abe) to pursue new regional security arrangements, such as the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue as far back as 2007. While this may have again been prompted by fears of a rising China, it predates the period of China's "new assertiveness". Since Hugh White was a leading advocate against this dialogue it is puzzling that he doesn't mention it in the context of his argument.

AaronJH argues that China's provocation of Japan is being driven by domestic concerns:

Take a glance at any newspaper from the mainland, or watch Xinwen Lianbo, and you can see how the state controlled media milks any conflict with Japan for all it is worth, driving nationalistic fervour. That nationalism is one of the key techniques used by the Party to deflect attention from its current problems. It's much better to have people rioting in the streets overturning Japanese cars than to be protesting against the corruption of local officials.

It seems every time there are domestic disturbances, the rhetoric against Japan ratchets up dramatically. It was no coincidence that during the controversy around Bo Xilai, Japanese car dealerships had to close their doors, and Japanese restaurants shut down due to the rhetoric reaching fever pitch.

Maybe there is no over-arching strategy. Conflict over the Diaoyu Islands, and conflict with Japan in general plays well at home, and that is enough to justify the assertive tactics.

On the other hand, the conflict over the South China Sea is definitely part of the broader "New Silk Road" strategy of securing critical marine transit routes through the South China Sea, and road transport routes through Central Asia. However, the Diaoyu island dispute seems more geared around domestic concerns. If not primarily, then definitely as a major secondary motivation.

 2014-08-14T00:00:00+00:00 guest blogger – blank Featuring the best comments by Interpreter readers, as selected by the editors. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=5f31bbd4-9162-48b7-84cd-9e4d5aa0b3dd 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=5f31bbd4-9162-48b7-84cd-9e4d5aa0b3dd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/14/comments-section-Is-China-making-a-big-mistake-about-Japan.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=5f31bbd4-9162-48b7-84cd-9e4d5aa0b3dd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/14/China-Economic-war-humbling-multinationals.aspx China: Economic war and the humbling of multinationals 2014-08-13T23:30:00+00:00 Julian Snelder

'I really worry about China. I am not sure that in the end they want any of us to win', confided GE boss Jeff Immelt to a group of fellow multinational business-people dining in Shanghai in 2010.

So far, GE has mostly stayed out of trouble in China. But many other Fortune 500 companies have been whacked by the Chinese authorities: for corruption (GSK), food safety problems (KFC and MacDonalds), security concerns (Cisco, IBM and others), quality problems (Samsung), forced upgrades (Microsoft), monopolistic behaviour (Qualcomm), and 'unparalleled arrogance' (Apple).

Offshore deals have been postponed or even forbidden by Beijing. And recently, foreign carmakers have been hit for excessive pricing on the mainland (more on this later), an accusation which has also been directed at Starbucks, milk suppliers, luxury goods companies and drugs firms. The list is practically endless.

Beijing uses three agencies to prosecute foreign firms, depending on their sin: the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) reviews pricing, the Commerce Ministry approves mergers and acquisitions, and the State Administration for Industry and Commerce (SAIC) probes anti-trust matters. It is a formidable trio, and the Chinese state rarely loses cases on its home turf. Multinationals can also find themselves simultaneously brutalised in the Chinese press; almost all succumb meekly to the charges, correct their mistakes and apologise for hurting the feelings of the people.

To be fair, the Chinese authorities usually do have good grounds for complaint. Foreign companies often behave badly in China. But it seems that successful foreign companies are targeted, as if Beijing deliberately wants them humbled. Immelt appears surprised by this possibility. He shouldn't be.

China is, first and foremost, a state capitalist. Like all nations, it covets the mercantilist objective of commercial success. Countries don't fight economic war like they fight militarily, but sometimes it feels that way. The AFR's Angus Grigg, in an intriguing short piece on the deteriorating business climate for multinationals earlier this week, reported a Chinese official acknowledging this point forthrightly: 'It's an economic war'.

Twenty years ago, John Fialka's superb War by Other Means described in scary detail how nations conduct underground conflict in the commercial realm; Japan then was America's most feared rival, although China was charging up the list. The Japanese, led by the masterly bureaucrats at the Ministry of International Trade and Industry, had achieved global success based on a level of chauvinism in their home market that China has never approached. The Japanese were much too polite to say what the Shanghai official told Grigg, but no doubt embraced 'economic war.'

Unfortunately, this term literally applies to the worsening situation with Russia, which faces sanctions and other forms of 'lawfare'. Both China and Russia are perceived to be at the vanguard of growing anti-Western statism, but China is a more formidable and subtle player than the Soviet Union ever was. 'The Chinese were never as stupid as the Russians, who came to us and said repeatedly "we will bury you"', as Zbigniew Brzezinski splendidly put it last week.

Indeed, China's strategy in the state capitalism game seems beyond such easy explanation. Back to the car market. Chinese consumers have long complained about paying 2-3 times what Americans pay for luxury cars. Most of this gap is explained by formal levies, such as import duties and sales taxes. But not all. The authorities worked backwards through the pricing layers and found three anomalies. First, carmakers have been stiffing local dealers. Second, carmakers overcharge for spare parts. Third and most damning, Beijing has found that premium cars rolling out of German factories are marked up outrageously when heading for China, which may account for one-third of German carmaker profits. Chinese consumers are being gouged and Beijing is angered by this unfairness. Beijing probably also resents the fact that the brands are 'skimming' this money back home rather than sharing the profits with their China joint ventures.

Yet forcing foreigners' prices lower is the very opposite of what other mercantilists do. Japan and Korea are delighted to see foreign cars at huge premiums compared to indigenous alternatives; all the better to encourage buy-local preferences. Nations criticise each other at the WTO for 'dumping' — exporting below cost or home-market prices — yet China's objection is the reverse. Forcing foreign carmakers to lower their prices doesn't help China's national champions either; it hurts them by lowering prices relative to domestic brands. Are Beijing's actions about consumer advocacy, or does it simply want to take away the super-profits of foreign companies who might otherwise further dominate China's booming car market?

The claim of 'monopolistic' behaviour is iffy. Competition in cars is fierce and consumers can choose between many brands. Chinese car buyers act more affluently than Western ones, so it is hard to argue for greater affordability. Western companies in China are doing what all businesses do: charging whatever price the market bears. If Beijing is so concerned about monopolies, it could do much more by investigating its own state-owned enterprises. And perhaps Beijing should consider why domestic agricultural prices are soaring above international levels, a direct result of subsidising farmers at the expense of urban households. In other words, there are plenty of domestic pricing anomalies to investigate.

International business people are often told here that 'they are not invited to China to profiteer; they are invited to make the Chinese better'. The guests are held to higher standards than locals, and they should be. Chinese officialdom is making a mighty effort to build future Chinese global champions like Immelt's GE. Knocking foreigners is part of their strategy, forcing them to be more responsive and competitive. Multinational companies are 'making China better', but China is making them better too.

Photo by Flickr user dcmaster.
 2014-08-13T23:30:00+00:00 Julian Snelder Knocking multinationals is part of China's economic strategy, and it works for both sides. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=b3b53e61-a851-4f15-acf0-b34d55a2302b 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=b3b53e61-a851-4f15-acf0-b34d55a2302b http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/14/China-Economic-war-humbling-multinationals.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=b3b53e61-a851-4f15-acf0-b34d55a2302b http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/14/Indo-Pacific-security-link-Chinas-nukes-Korean-intelligence-middle-power-coalitions-Indias-naval-ambitions-and-more.aspx Indo-Pacific security links: China's nukes, Korean intelligence, middle-power coalitions, India's naval ambitions and more 2014-08-13T22:15:00+00:00 Danielle Rajendram
The Indo-Pacific is a strategic system encompassing the Indian and Pacific oceans, reflecting the expanding interests and reach of China and India as well as the enduring role of the US. The Lowy Institute's International Security program presents a weekly selection of links illuminating the changing security picture in this increasingly connected super-region.

Will India's blue water naval ambitions shake up the balance of power in the Indo-Pacific?

As NATO and other Western powers step back, what are the prospects for China-India cooperation in Afghanistan? (Thanks Dirk.)

Rory Medcalf speaks to the Wall Street Journal on how Indo-Pacific middle powers are responding to rivalry in their region. You can read his joint paper with C Raja Mohan on middle-power coalition building here.

International Crisis Group looks at the risks of possible intelligence failures on the Korean Peninsula.

Austin Ramzy reports from a Vietnamese Coast Guard vessel on China's presence in the South China Sea

Why is Indonesia's new president reaching out to Japan?

Should America fear China's nuclear weapons? This provocative article ties into The Interpreter's own debate on the implications of sea-based nuclear weapons for Indo-Pacific strategic stability.

 The Lowy Institute International Security Program's work on Indo-Pacific security is supported by two grants from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.
 2014-08-13T22:15:00+00:00 Danielle Rajendram A weekly selection of links illuminating the changing security picture in this increasingly connected super-region. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=4c3ade3d-168f-457f-bac7-8c056e38ff15 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=4c3ade3d-168f-457f-bac7-8c056e38ff15 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/14/Indo-Pacific-security-link-Chinas-nukes-Korean-intelligence-middle-power-coalitions-Indias-naval-ambitions-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=4c3ade3d-168f-457f-bac7-8c056e38ff15 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/13/Abbott-military-first-instincts.aspx Does Abbott have a military-first instinct? 2014-08-13T05:46:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen

There's a pretty extraordinary revelation buried in today's Paul Kelly column in The Australian regarding Prime Minister Tony Abbott's response to the MH17 downing:

In the early days of the crisis several weeks ago Abbott wanted to put 1000 Australian troops onto the crash site in conjunction with 1000 Dutch troops. Nothing better testifies to his outrage at the event and his keenness to deploy Australian assets in a cause that affected Australians. This option remained on the table for a few days.

It was never going to be viable. Yet debate around this idea continued before the Prime Minister was talked around and decided it was too dangerous and inappropriate an option. Putting Australian troops into that highly charged situation would have been far too risky.

Yet it offers insights into Abbott's approach to military issues: he is impatient with limitations relating to logistics and deployment. When Australians are involved Abbott wants to make a difference as soon as possible.

Kelly's claim is not sourced but assuming it is true, the idea presumably foundered on the fact that such a deployment could only have happened with Russian acquiescence, which was never likely. Still, the instinct to consider such a large deployment is telling, as is Kelly's broader conclusion about Abbott's impatience with those in uniform who want to put the brakes on such initiatives. I have heard a similar account of Abbott's disposition from another source.

'Abbott's every instinct is to deploy Australian military and police assets and he needs to be persuaded by his advisers from such options', says Kelly. He might have added that, on MH370 and Operation Sovereign Borders as well, Abbott also chose to get the military involved.

But against this we need to weigh the fact that Abbott was wary of America's proposed military intervention in Syria in 2013, which President Obama abandoned at the last moment (Abbott: 'We have to be very careful because if we break something, we own it.'). And although Abbott was a supporter of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, he has since defended it in only the most qualified and diffident ways.

Furthermore, Kelly makes much of Abbott's 'profound moral code' and how it affects his approach to foreign policy. But Kelly's examples draw heavily from the MH17 incident where, as I have argued elsewhere, Australia has no major foreign policy interests in play. It's easier to show moral rectitude when very little is at stake.

I'm not ready to say that Kelly is wrong about Abbott's alleged instinct for morals-driven military activism. I have been following Abbott's foreign policy thinking for some years, but even during the last election campaign, I was torn on this issue, listing five reasons Tony Abbott will be a steady-as-she-goes foreign policy leader and four reasons he won't.

At the core of this debate is the question of Abbott's political identity. Yes, he is a conservative, but this masks the fact that Abbott's worldview draws from two distinct sources which cannot comfortably co-exist: British conservatism (cautious, realist, wary of military adventurism) and American neo-conservatism (Manichean, confrontational, willing to impose democracy by force).

Depending on the quotes you choose, Abbott could belong to either tradition. It is not yet clear that he has made a choice between them.

Photo by Flickr user US Pacific Command.
 2014-08-13T05:46:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen Depending on the quotes you choose, Abbott is either a cautious British-style conservative or a confrontational neo-con. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=08b901cf-a967-49f9-8cb0-62ec79cebc54 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=08b901cf-a967-49f9-8cb0-62ec79cebc54 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/13/Abbott-military-first-instincts.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=08b901cf-a967-49f9-8cb0-62ec79cebc54 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/13/ASEAN-Regional-Forum-Round-Up.aspx ASEAN Foreign Ministers Meeting round-up 2014-08-13T04:03:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan

This has been an important year for ASEAN. The bloc has flourished economically, experiencing strong growth, with future annual GDP growth values projected to average 5.4% to 2018. Yet ASEAN has been tested by significant instability. The most severe of these tests was the CNOOC oil rig in Vietnam's EEZ, which led to a heated dispute. But there has also been a coup in Thailand and political and religiously motivated violence in Myanmar, Cambodia and the Philippines.

Through it all, ASEAN has remained silent, leading many commentators to call it increasingly defunct in the emerging power structure of the wider Indo-Pacific region. Instead, it is more likely an indication of the Asian brand of quiet diplomacy than complete impotence.

Last weekend, foreign ministers from Southeast Asia and the wider region converged on Naypyidaw, Myanmar, for the ASEAN Foreign Ministers Meeting (AMM) and the ASEAN Regional Forum. The AMM is generally a lacklustre affair where ASEAN's policy of non-interference trumps any bold public statements. Instead, it is the closed-door diplomacy (or what Malaysia's Najib calls 'quiet diplomacy') that often resonates loudest. Here are a few of the outcomes:

ASEAN released an insipid joint communiqué. Among other things, it highlighted the goals of reaching two-way ASEAN-China trade volumes of US$500 million by 2015 and US$1 trillion by 2020. Unsurprisingly, and despite calls by Vietnam and the Philippines, the communique did not criticise China's assertive actions in the South China Sea this year. But Vietnam was successful in pushing for the inclusion of the word 'seriously' in the communiqué:
We remained seriously concerned over recent developments which had increased tensions in the South China Sea and reaffirmed the importance of maintaining peace, stability, maritime security as well as freedom of navigation in and over-flight above the South China Sea.

The 'Triple Action Plan' to manage tensions in the South China Sea was introduced by the Philippines. Its content was partly drawn from a US proposal for a moratorium on provocative action in the South China Sea. The Philippines' Foreign Secretary stated later that the TAP had not encountered objections' by ASEAN members. 'The fact that there were no objections, I take that to mean that ASEAN was fully supportive', he said. ASEAN states officially 'noted' its inclusion in the communiqué but didn't press its adoption.

Despite the impact on Malaysia, ASEAN said it would not collectively condemn Russia over the MH17 incident. Many member states (notably Vietnam) have strong ties with Moscow. As Myanmar's newly appointed Minister of Information Ye Htut stated: 'The ASEAN Regional Forum is not to force any other country. It's about mutual respect and dialogue.' In the joint communique there was however condemnation for ISIS, reference to the situations in Syria and Gaza, and praise for elections in Afghanistan.

Meanwhile, at the ASEAN Regional Forum, Australia's Foreign Minister announced further cooperation between Canberra and ASEAN in education. This will be spearheaded by the extension of the New Colombo Plan, a program for student exchanges between ASEAN and Australia, to which the Australian Government is dedicating A$100 million over five years.

Photo by ASEAN.

 2014-08-13T04:03:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan ASEAN countries have had a good year, as the organisation continues its tradition of quiet diplomacy. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=88390f1a-4a1f-40f5-b0cf-7b30b0734522 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=88390f1a-4a1f-40f5-b0cf-7b30b0734522 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/13/ASEAN-Regional-Forum-Round-Up.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=88390f1a-4a1f-40f5-b0cf-7b30b0734522 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/13/Movie-trailer-Camp-X-Ray.aspx Movie trailer: Camp X-Ray 2014-08-13T02:59:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
Synopsis:

A young woman joins the military to be part of something bigger than herself and her small town roots. But she ends up as a new guard at Guantanamo Bay instead, where her mission is far from black and white. Surrounded by hostile jihadists and aggressive squadmates, she strikes up an unusual friendship with one of the detainees.

[youtube:_1MDrwqjeGo]

(H/t Slashfilm.)
 2014-08-13T02:59:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen A young woman joins the military and ends up as a guard at Guantanamo Bay. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=f16fdd6b-6d33-4e7e-90b9-fe040f5adc23 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=f16fdd6b-6d33-4e7e-90b9-fe040f5adc23 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/13/Movie-trailer-Camp-X-Ray.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=f16fdd6b-6d33-4e7e-90b9-fe040f5adc23 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/13/Is-China-making-a-big-mistake-about-Japan.aspx Is China making a big mistake about Japan? 2014-08-13T00:55:00+00:00 Hugh White

It has long been an axiom of Asian strategic analysis that the last thing Beijing wants is a rearmed, strategically independent, 'normal' Japan. And yet it seems obvious that Beijing's highly assertive policies are pushing Tokyo in exactly that direction. To many this provides yet another sign that China does not know what it is doing.

This is reassuring to those who think we do not need to take China's challenge to US regional leadership too seriously. As long as China foolishly stokes anxiety and provokes counter-balancing action among its neighbours, America has little to fear.

Well, maybe. But before we assume that China is being foolish, it is worth looking more closely at alternative explanations of what is going on. There is a chance that Beijing might be making a rather different mistake from the one most of us assume, and there is even a chance that they are not making a mistake at all.

One thing is for sure: China's conduct, especially over the Senkakus, is undermining Japan's post-war strategic posture, a posture which has served both Japan and China so well for so long. The foundation of that posture has of course been Japan's confidence that it can rely on America for its security, which in turn has seemed essential to Japan's unique version of 'national pacifism'.

As I have argued before (Explaining China's behaviour in the East and South China Seas), China's actions over the Senkakus seem deliberately designed to undermine Japan's confidence in American support by showing Japan that on a critical issue America is not willing to risk a clash with China on Japan's behalf. And that seems to be working. Despite President Obama's bold affirmation of US support over the disputed islands in Tokyo in April, Japanese confidence in US support against China does seem to have waned. The clearest signs are of course Mr Abe's steps to embrace collective self-defence and start looking for allies in Asia, including Australia.

These are exactly the kinds of steps towards normalisation that we could expect Beijing to want to avoid. So what is going on? There seem two possible alternatives to the conclusion that Beijing is just making a mistake.

The first and perhaps more probable explanation is that China's leaders believe Japan is incapable of becoming a 'normal' military power again, even if it does lose confidence in US support. Beijing quite possibly assumes that Abe's bid to rebuild Japan as a great power in Asia is doomed to fail. After twenty years of economic stagnation, political drift, demographic decline and natural disasters, Japan is simply too demoralised to remake itself into a serious independent military power again.

My ANU colleague Amy King has recently written an outstanding piece suggesting that this is exactly what Beijing thinks. She shows that Chinese statements and commentaries almost completely omit Japan from discussion of Asia's strategic future. They just don't seem to take Japan seriously as a potential great power. That seems right to me: I've always been struck by how readily Chinese interlocutors dismiss Japan as a possible strategic rival.

This would explain why Beijing doesn't seem to worry about how Japan responds to its assertive tactics in the East China Sea. China's leaders may hope and expect that if their pressure tactics work, Japan will lose confidence in America and yet be unable to reassert an independent role as a great power. In which case, Beijing might think, Japan would have no alternative but to acquiesce in Chinese regional leadership.

But are the Chinese wrong to dismiss Japan as a future strategic rival in this way? I've always tended to believe that they were. Japan has such an intense sense of its own identity, and such an intense fear (thanks in part to China's own conduct) of how it would fare under China's regional leadership.

But many people who know Japan much better than I do say that this may not be right. They argue that Japan might indeed be unable, or at least unwilling, to resist Chinese regional leadership if American leadership falters. Now Brad Glosserman of CSIS has written a fascinating essay in the Summer 2014 issue of Washington Quarterly that sheds a lot of light on Japan's choices at this critical moment. Although Brad does not draw this conclusion specifically, his analysis does lend support to the idea that Japan would accept a subordinate status in a Chinese-led Asia. If that is right, then the current moves to undermine the US-Japan alliance make good strategic sense for Beijing.

The second possibility is that Beijing has got Japan wrong, and instead of sliding gracefully into subordination Japan would respond to any erosion of US leadership by rallying to Abe's call and re-establish itself as a great power in Asia, with nuclear weapons and all. I still think this is a real possibility.

If Beijing sees this as a possibility, or if it comes to see it as such in future, then it will face an interesting choice: would it rather face Japan as a strategic rival in Asia, or America? Either it stops trying to undermine the US-Japan alliance, which leaves US strategic weight in Asia largely intact as the principle limit to Chinese ambitions. Or it undermines the US-Japan alliance, in which case Japan replaces America as the major balancer of Chinese power in Asia. Which would Beijing rather deal with? I think they'd probably prefer Japan.

So either way, China's strategy may not be so dumb after all.

Photo courtesy of Wikipedia.
 2014-08-13T00:55:00+00:00 Hugh White There are two possible alternatives to the conclusion that Beijing is making a mistake in pushing Tokyo towards strategic 'normalisation'. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=91b75f32-f27c-4a75-826e-6c469bccb029 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=91b75f32-f27c-4a75-826e-6c469bccb029 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/13/Is-China-making-a-big-mistake-about-Japan.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=91b75f32-f27c-4a75-826e-6c469bccb029 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/13/Hayden-Cooper-wins-2014-Lowy-Institute-Media-Award.aspx Hayden Cooper wins 2014 Lowy Institute Media Award 2014-08-12T23:36:00+00:00 Stephanie Dunstan
[youtube:jIgsFboTyJE]

Last night the Lowy Institute announced ABC Middle East correspondent Hayden Cooper as the winner of the 2014 Lowy Institute Media Award for his ABC Foreign Correspondent report on journalist Peter Greste. You can watch Hayden's acceptance speech above.

Other finalists selected by the judges were Amanda Hodge (The Australian) for her work on the Indian elections and sexual violence in India, Christopher Joye (Australian Financial Review) for his coverage of intelligence and spying issues, Michael Bachelard (Fairfax Indonesia correspondent) for his reporting on the Indonesian elections, and Michael Edwards (ABC) for his coverage of the polio epidemic in Pakistan.

'Cooper's coverage of the trial, and his compelling interviews with Greste's colleagues and family, exposed the personal risks all foreign correspondents take reporting from countries in turmoil. Cooper's telling of Greste's story is a deserving winner', said Lowy Institute Executive Director Michael Fullilove, who was a member of the Media Award judging panel along with former Australian Senator and diplomat Amanda Vanstone, multi award-winning journalist Chris Masters, former foreign correspondent Jane Hutcheon, and Lowy Institute Board Director Mark Ryan.

 The keynote address at last night's award ceremony was delivered by Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull, who said 'We are often reminded that our freedoms, our way of life are secured because our defence forces are prepared to put their lives on the line. We should not forget that the price of the news we read every day, of the transparency, accountability indeed democracy that only a free press can ensure is all too often paid in lives and liberty put at risk by journalists like Peter Greste.'
 2014-08-12T23:36:00+00:00 Stephanie Dunstan At the awards ceremony, Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull paid tribute to journalists who put their lives on the line. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=688211e8-b71d-4c3d-9a66-da5db51f3eff 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=688211e8-b71d-4c3d-9a66-da5db51f3eff http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/13/Hayden-Cooper-wins-2014-Lowy-Institute-Media-Award.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=688211e8-b71d-4c3d-9a66-da5db51f3eff http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/13/Southeast-Asia-ASEAN-Tropico-5-Gerrymandering-Malaysia-MH17-Khmer-Rouge-sentencing.aspx Southeast Asia links: ASEAN, gerrymandering Malaysia, MH17, Khmer Rouge and more 2014-08-12T21:59:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan

Too close to the bone? Thailand banned a video game where the player engages in a role-play as a dictator to fend off uprisings, and rigs elections in a restive tropical country.

The Thai Junta has reactivated a 2010 'cyber scout' program which will 'observe (online) behavior that is deemed a threat to national security and protect the royal institution.'

US Secretary of State John Kerry thanked ASEAN for its 'committed partnership' as the US pushed for greater US-ASEAN cooperation. On the sidelines of the ASEAN Regional Forum, he was in hot water with his Chinese counter-part after arriving late for a meeting with an unimpressed Wang Yi.

In a week of much international dialogue in Southeast Asia, The Diplomat looks at the battle for ASEAN between the US and China.

 As widely predicted, the Malaysian Government has de-listed its troubled state-run airline after MH17 and MH370 disasters this year.

Battling the Southeast Asian pollution haze, Singapore passes a new law.

'Smaller small Navies' in Southeast Asia are a good thing for regional resilience, argues Koh Swee Lean Collin at RSIS.

The Economist takes an insightful look at gerrymandering in Malaysia and why the main party, United Malays National Organisation, has been in office since 1957.

Puangthong Pawakapan looks at the Thai Junta's Interim Constitution in an ISEAS Perspective Paper.

John Cole and Steve Sciacchitano take an excellent look at 'coup as counter-insurgency in Thailand.'

The struggling Thai economy is putting pressure on the Junta.

Human Rights Watch wrote this open letter to Obama on US policy towards Myanmar.

After his Buddha leg tattoo launched him into Facebook stardom in Myanmar, a Canadian backpacker was forced to leave the country this week.

Former Khmer Rouge leaders Khieu Samphan and Huon Chea were found guilty of crimes against humanity this week and were sentenced to life in prison. Here is the ruling of the Extraordinary Chambers of the Courts of Cambodia.

[youtube:iPXFx0nUEzs]

 2014-08-12T21:59:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan Links to this week's best Southeast Asia reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=5ae8cd66-a240-44fd-83c8-9a0167ada84c 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=5ae8cd66-a240-44fd-83c8-9a0167ada84c http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/13/Southeast-Asia-ASEAN-Tropico-5-Gerrymandering-Malaysia-MH17-Khmer-Rouge-sentencing.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=5ae8cd66-a240-44fd-83c8-9a0167ada84c http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/12/US-arms-transfers-social-media-at-war-and-more.aspx Military & strategy links: US arms transfers, social media at war, and more 2014-08-12T06:08:00+00:00 Matthew Hill

 With France's sale of Mistral-Class amphibious warfare ships set to go ahead despite the collapse in Europe-Russia relations, could NATO serve as an alternate buyer?

Al Jazeera has an impressive infographic showing the evolving framing of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict on social media.

With Washington stepping up its operations against the Islamic State, it's worth exploring the broader economic and consular interests that have further enmeshed the US in Kurdistan.

Max Fisher argues that the US decision to launch strikes against IS following its recent surge towards Kurdistan demonstrates the bankruptcy of a decade's worth of strategy reliant on arms transfers and capacity building.

Meanwhile, with the era of endless domestic largesse behind it, the US defence industry is looking to seriously increase its international sales — with Washington's assistance.

South Korea decision to send a destroyer to evacuate its nationals from Libya provides another data point on Seoul's growing naval power projection capabilities.

Evidence has emerged that the Nigerian army may be involved in the mass killing of suspected members of militant group Boko Haram.

Nick Bisley continues an excellent debate over at The Strategist on China's future relationship to the regional order in Asia. Key quote:

As China grows, and it will for at least another decade, its sense of frustration won't abate and it may grow. Xi Jinping is the strongest and most nationalistic president China has had since Mao. It's inconceivable that during his leadership China will suddenly have a Damascene conversion to the delights of US primacy. As a result China will continue to resent structures it believes are stacked against it, it'll continue to develop alternatives, and it'll continue to test the order in carefully calculated ways.

Finally, War on the Rocks has a great piece on the role of the Royal Navy in shaping modern drinking culture.

 2014-08-12T06:08:00+00:00 Matthew Hill Links to this week's best military and strategic reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=f18dca1c-30ea-4598-ad5a-0c5b222fe371 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=f18dca1c-30ea-4598-ad5a-0c5b222fe371 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/12/US-arms-transfers-social-media-at-war-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=f18dca1c-30ea-4598-ad5a-0c5b222fe371 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/12/what-next-for-multilateral-trade-negotiations.aspx What next for multilateral trade negotiations? 2014-08-12T05:31:00+00:00 Stephen Grenville

The Director-General of the World Trade Organization is sounding despondent after the latest setback to the December 2013 Bali Agreement. Meanwhile, a survey of exporters has given some endorsement for the alternative path of free trade agreements (FTAs). Is there any hope for furthering the multilateral trade agenda?

Mike Callaghan described the Bali Agreement signed last December as a small win for the WTO — the first multilateral trade agreement since the WTO replaced the GATT as the multilateral trade forum in 1995. The main components of the Bali Agreement were trade facilitation (aimed at cutting red tape and corruption in ports, thus encouraging international trade), an agriculture package that allowed governments to run food security programs without breaching WTO commitments, and a reaffirmation of market access for less-developed countries.

While the agreement reached in Bali required subsequent endorsement, this was seen as a mere formality, as the text was signed by all trade ministers and had been painstakingly tailored to India's special sensitivities on food security. Yet India late last month blocked the deal.

The time limit for final endorsement expired at the end of July, with India insisting on re-opening the agricultural issues. The WTO Director-General, reporting to the WTO ambassadors in Geneva on 31 July, had a tone of desperation. This is not 'just another delay which can simply be ignored or accommodated into a new timetable'. Here is the wider context:

I want to stress the importance of each of the three pillars of the WTO: disputes, monitoring and negotiations — not to mention our work on technical assistance and aid-for-trade. We saw the importance of our work during the financial crisis when, unlike with previous crises, there was no surge in protectionism. Having the rules in place and adherence closely monitored — with the dispute settlement mechanism there to back them up — helped to keep protectionism in check during a dangerous period for the global economy. The value of those pillars was plain to see — and they performed very well. But, when I took office last September, I was clear that I had real concerns for the future of the negotiating pillar. Bali was a very important moment in reviving and revitalising the negotiating function. But, just seven months later, once again I am very, very concerned.

The central component of the Bali Agreement (making ports more efficient) is hardly controversial. But why is food security policy such a sticking point? In an imperfect-market world, surely India should be able to offer some subsidies to its own farmers? When, however, the farm price-support programs result in what are effectively export subsidies, it becomes a multilateral concern.

The WTO Director-General expressed some hope that the European summer holiday period might deliver a breakthrough when the ambassadors next meet in September. But if not, the consequences do indeed seem dire for the future of multilateral trade agreements. When a hard-fought negotiation, finally brought to fruition, can be torpedoed in this way, who will bother to try again?

Meanwhile, the rival model for international trade negotiation, FTAs, received some endorsement from a survey by The Economist Intelligence Unit. Senior executives from 800 exporters in Australia, China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam were quizzed on their experience. All these countries have extensive FTA coverage. The survey finds that each FTA signed in Asia is used, on average, by only one in four exporters. But where they are used, the result is positive: more than 85% of respondents report that their exports to the markets concerned have increased either significantly or moderately as a result of FTAs. According to the EIU report:

Critics of FTAs have long warned this would happen. FTAs, they say, replace the relative simplicity of multilateral WTO agreements with a "noodle bowl" of overlapping preferences and rules and regulations that, in practice, often prove more trouble than they are worth for companies to use. But the result is nonetheless surprising, given the benefits in terms of increased exports reported by companies that do use the FTAs.

Of course exporters (the survey respondents) are not in a position to judge the overall national or multilateral benefit of FTAs. The central criticism of FTAs (which should properly be called 'discriminatory preferential trade arrangements') is that they divert a country from buying its imports from the cheapest foreign supplier. FTAs are unambiguously second-best, compared with multilateral agreements. But the current multilateral model seems in need of drastic modification.

Photo by Flickr user Betsy Dorset.
 2014-08-12T05:31:00+00:00 Stephen Grenville Another setback for multilateral trade negotiations as the Bali agreement is on the rocks. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=71c80fc5-1495-4660-85eb-b3f51e2826ab 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=71c80fc5-1495-4660-85eb-b3f51e2826ab http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/12/what-next-for-multilateral-trade-negotiations.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=71c80fc5-1495-4660-85eb-b3f51e2826ab http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/12/Enter-Pyongyang-and-the-ethics-of-tourism-in-North-Korea.aspx 'Enter Pyongyang' and the ethics of tourism in North Korea 2014-08-12T04:18:00+00:00 Marty Harris
[vimeo:102051605]

A rare look inside Pyongyang, thanks to a collaboration between 'branding specialist' JT Singh, filmaker Rob Whitworth, and North Korean tour company Koryo Tours. Apart from being a striking and somewhat surprising portrayal of life in the North Korean capital, it reopens the conversation on the ethics of being a tourist in North Korea and the 'engage or isolate' debate.

Singh has provided some insights on the filming process:

We were closely assisted by two guides from the National Tourism Administration, who helped us gain special access to locations and made sure that we followed all the rules. As is standard for all foreign visitors to the country, we were not allowed to shoot any construction sites, undeveloped locations or military personnel. Other than that we were given relatively free reign.

The average visitor to Pyongyang is likely to be surprised by the scenes they encounter and are especially surprised about how clean and orderly the city actually is. Indeed, people living in Pyongyang and other major cities enjoy a higher quality of life than those in other parts of the county.

 2014-08-12T04:18:00+00:00 Marty Harris A new video offers a rare look inside Pyongyang and reopens the conversation on the ethics of being a tourist in North Korea. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=86b5ec7c-497c-48b1-955e-7d808697a008 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=86b5ec7c-497c-48b1-955e-7d808697a008 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/12/Enter-Pyongyang-and-the-ethics-of-tourism-in-North-Korea.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=86b5ec7c-497c-48b1-955e-7d808697a008 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/12/Foreign-correspondents-more-important-than-ever.aspx Foreign correspondents more important than ever 2014-08-12T02:50:00+00:00 John Garnaut
Some of the world's heaviest hitters are assembling in Sydney ahead of tonight's Lowy Institute Media Award announcement.

Yesterday, US Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel and Australia's Defence Minister David Johnston took the opportunity to gauge the rising global temperature with Lowy Institute stalwarts ahead of today's annual AUSMIN dialogue with Secretary of State John Kerry and Foreign Minister Julie Bishop.

US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel with Lowy Institute Executive Director Michael Fullilove yesterday.

Unfortunately, Kerry and Hagel have a bit too much on their plates to attend tonight's announcement at the Lowy Institute's 19th century headquarters in Bligh St. For the Americans are here at a time when the Middle East is faced with the most dangerous cocktail of militancy and uncertainty anyone can remember, as Hagel told the ABC's 7.30 last night. The band of current and latent disaster stretches through Libya, Egypt, Gaza, Syria, Iraq, the Ukraine, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Xinjiang and into the East and South China Seas.

Senior figures in the capitals of this hemisphere privately complain about a 'weak' White House that has emboldened barbaric extremists (and also Russia's Vladimir Putin and China's Xi Jinping) to push the 'red lines' of American power. President Barack Obama stands accused of neglecting the 'pivot' to Asia that he famously put in motion while standing in Australia's Parliament House back in 2011.

Mr Obama has acknowledged the beginnings of a new and dangerous global disorder. 'I do believe that what we're seeing in the Middle East and parts of North Africa is an order that dates back to World War I starting to buckle,' Obama told New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman on Friday. In that interview and in a previous speech at West Point he forcefully defended the principles of non-action and reminded the world of what it was like, under his predecessor, to be hurled to the opposite extreme.

But it was only in an interview published last week in The Economist that he finally defined his approach to the country that matters most for this hemisphere:

One thing I will say about China, though, is you also have to be pretty firm with them, because they will push as hard as they can until they meet resistance. They're not sentimental, and they are not interested in abstractions. And so simple appeals to international norms are insufficient. There have to be mechanisms both to be tough with them when we think that they're breaching international norms, but also to show them the potential benefits over the long term. And what is true for China then becomes an analogy for many of the other emerging markets.

That, I would submit, is the most clear and clear-eyed formulation of a China policy that we've heard from a world leader in quite some time.

In his interview with Friedman, Obama also reminded us that there is one place – Indonesia, on our doorstep – 'where good news keeps coming'.

It is perhaps only a slight stretch to claim that Obama with his interview, and Kerry and Hagel with their presence in the country, are steering the global conversation towards tonight's event at the Lowy Institute, and towards the foreign correspondents who are brushing aside life-threatening dangers, evaporating budgets and salacious digital demands to show Australians what we need to know about our world.

'In a world where it is harder and harder to support foreign bureaus we are more convinced than ever that we need Australian reporters with Australian eyes and sensibilities looking at Australian interests,' says the Lowy Institute's executive director, Michael Fullilove.

Tonight a jury comprised of Amanda Vanstone, Chris Masters, Jane Hutcheon, Mark Ryan and Fullilove will name the journalist who has done more than any other to deepen the knowledge of international policy issues in Australia. The winner will be proclaimed by the former journalist and Minister for Communications (broadly defined), Malcolm Turnbull.

Some international policy subjects, however, are more difficult to report than others. 'We made a pledge in blood not to reveal the short list,' says Fullilove. 'At least, I probably shouldn't do it on our own Interpreter website.'
 2014-08-12T02:50:00+00:00 John Garnaut We need Australian reporters with Australian eyes and sensibilities looking at Australian interests. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=34b7cd52-dda5-44fd-baf1-3121db597376 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=34b7cd52-dda5-44fd-baf1-3121db597376 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/12/Foreign-correspondents-more-important-than-ever.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=34b7cd52-dda5-44fd-baf1-3121db597376 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/12/China-links-PLA-compounds-shale-gas-PR-blunders-social-media-anti-monopoly-and-more.aspx China links: PLA compounds, shale gas, PR blunders, anti-monopoly and more 2014-08-12T01:30:00+00:00 Dirk van der Kley

Life inside Beijing's secretive PLA compounds.

China's National Energy Administration halves it 2020 shale gas output target.

Chinese social media is helping to improve local governance. At the same time, China is placing greater restrictions on instant messaging apps.

Poor PR for Chinese academia at a recent sinology conference in Portugal. Chinese officials secretly seized and ripped out pages containing information about a Taiwanese academic organisation from conference handbooks.

An account of some of the grassroots restrictions on Muslim practices in Xinjiang. Meanwhile Karamay, a city in Xinjiang, has banned people with large beards or Islamic clothing from traveling on public buses.

Anti-monopoly laws being used to pressure foreign businesses.

John Garnaut writes about Xi Jinping's 'you live, I die' approach to saving the Communist Party from corruption decay. He notes this method faces a major struggle:

 Mr. Xi and his close supporters, who were born into the Communist aristocracy as children of former leaders, have won the first round in their battle to save the revolution that their parents fought for. But there is a long journey ahead not least because, like their forebears, they have invested far more effort defining enemies than objectives.

Also on the topic of corruption, China University of Petroleum not-so-subtly tries to cover the signature of disgraced politician Zhou Yongkang, with a model rocket:

 2014-08-12T01:30:00+00:00 Dirk van der Kley Your weekly links to the best China reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=bf27931c-ff19-48fd-896b-891dd00a9662 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=bf27931c-ff19-48fd-896b-891dd00a9662 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/12/China-links-PLA-compounds-shale-gas-PR-blunders-social-media-anti-monopoly-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=bf27931c-ff19-48fd-896b-891dd00a9662 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/12/SSBNs-destablising-Not-if-command-and-control-is-maintained.aspx SSBNs destablising? Not if command and control is maintained 2014-08-11T23:42:00+00:00 Ravi Ganesh

Ballistic missile submarines (SSBNs) became the seagoing platform of choice for the deployment of strategic nuclear weapons by 1960, with the availability of submarine-launched ballistic missiles. Today there are five countries with operational SSBNs. The US, the UK, France and Russia all have a major part of their deterrent capability deployed on SSBNs, while China has three or four SSBNs, though not all are operationally available.

Before getting into a discussion on how the spread of sea-based nuclear weapons in Asia would affect stability, it is worth revisiting some concepts regarding 'stability'. To clarify, this discussion is about nuclear stability, not about prevention of conventional conflict. In other words, our frame of reference is to examine whether the possession and deployment of nuclear-armed submarines in Asia would provoke, or conversely prevent, escalation of a conflict over the nuclear threshold. With this in mind, the following is a brief review of the existing concepts:

Strategic stability exists when there is mutual acceptance of relative nuclear force levels (which is not the same thing as the forces being equal) and neither side has the intent or desire to alter it. A change in this relativity could induce willingness to strike first, either by the side that perceives itself as weaker (as a pre-emptive defensive measure) or by the side that sees itself as stronger and therefore immune from effective counterstrike.

Crisis stability exists when the nuclear weapons of both sides are not vulnerable to inadvertent or unauthorised launch, when both sides are confident in each other's determination to avoid escalation, and when the command and control (both politico-military as well as technical) is robust and can withstand political crises.

Deterrence stability prevails when each side knows that the nuclear forces of the other will survive an attack and be able to deliver an effective retaliatory strike with consequences that will be unacceptable to it.

The only Asian country that currently has SSBNs in service is China, though their detailed operational status is not clear. India is in the process of operationalising its first SSBN; however it is not clear when a matching submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) will be available. Pakistan does not have any SSBNs and has not declared any intention of building or acquiring any, though there are reports of it considering nuclear warheads for its submarine-launched cruise missiles. The only other nuclear weapons deployed in the Asian maritime region are those on US and Russian submarines. With this background we may consider the question at issue.

Let us for convenience consider the relevant countries in dyads, beginning with the US-China equation. The US has overwhelming nuclear superiority in forces as well as technology, and the SSBNs that China can deploy against it will not seriously affect the balance between them for some time to come. If however China's SSBN program goes smoothly and it has five or six operational units in the next three or four years, that would be a significant challenge which the US would have to address. From a theoretical standpoint it is more destabilising when one nuclear power in a dyad has the overwhelming advantage, and China having a demonstrable ability to retaliate, albeit with a much smaller force, will reduce the possibility of a preemptive strike by an adversary.

A similar situation exists with the India-China dyad. China's nuclear superiority rules out any first strike attempt by India. With a far smaller arsenal than China's, India is vulnerable to a first strike. The deployment of SLBMs will strengthen India's second-strike capability, on which it is largely dependent because of its 'no first use' policy. India is not pursuing parity in nuclear forces with China; if it did that would create arms race instability. The Indian SSBN program will not address the nuclear imbalance with China, but will improve strategic stability by giving India a credible ability to retaliate to a nuclear attack.

The India-Pakistan equation is more fraught. Pakistan's nuclear arsenal is a little larger than India's and growing rapidly, according to the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists. According to reports, Pakistan also has a nuclear submarine building program, and although Pakistan has no known plan to deploy ballistic missiles at sea, there have been reports of plans to miniaturise a warhead for fitment on submarine-launched cruise missiles. Considering India and Pakistan share a long land border, and potential targets on both sides are a few minutes' flying time apart, it is hard to see how the Indian SSBN, when operational, would in any significant way change the nuclear stability equation. On the other hand, just as a destabilising element has been created on land by the introduction of Pakistan's Nasr tactical nuclear missile, if Pakistan does fit submarine-launched cruise missiles with nuclear warheads it would result in the delegation of the control of nuclear weapons to the tactical level and thus dangerously destabilise the situation.

To conclude: the deployment of sea-based nuclear weapons will not destabilise the nuclear balance in the Indo-Pacific provided this is restricted to ballistic weapons with centralised launch authority and the requisite command and control structures. The situation would, however, become extremely unstable by the arming of ships and submarines with nuclear-tipped cruise missiles.

The Lowy Institute gratefully acknowledges support from the John D and Catherine T MacArthur Foundation for this Interpreter debate, which is part of a broader research, dialogue and outreach project on strategic stability in Indo-Pacific Asia.

Photo from Reuters/Kamal Kishore.
 2014-08-11T23:42:00+00:00 Ravi Ganesh Sea-based nuclear weapons will not destabilise the Indo-Pacific provided it is restricted to ballistic weapons with centralised launch authority. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=2c0e0ebb-1330-4215-810b-4f4dc2bb7b90 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=2c0e0ebb-1330-4215-810b-4f4dc2bb7b90 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/12/SSBNs-destablising-Not-if-command-and-control-is-maintained.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=2c0e0ebb-1330-4215-810b-4f4dc2bb7b90 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/12/Documentary-trailer-The-Green-Prince.aspx Documentary trailer: The Green Prince 2014-08-11T22:20:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
This one comes out in selected Australian cinemas next week, and could hardly be more timely. Synopsis:

In the style of a tense psychological thriller, this extraordinary documentary recounts the true story of the son of a Hamas leader who emerged as one of Israel's prized informants, and the Shin Bet agent who risked his career to protect him.

[youtube:ZZOebv85JXI]

(H/t Slashfilm.)
 2014-08-11T22:20:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen The Green Prince tells the true story of the son of a Hamas leader who emerged as one of Israel's prized informants. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=eec4a4b6-2926-4a13-94ef-6f686e51050b 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=eec4a4b6-2926-4a13-94ef-6f686e51050b http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/12/Documentary-trailer-The-Green-Prince.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=eec4a4b6-2926-4a13-94ef-6f686e51050b http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/11/G20-must-save-WTO.aspx G20 must save the WTO, among other things... 2014-08-11T05:46:00+00:00 Mike Callaghan

As John Lennon wrote, 'life is what happens when you are busy making other plans.' How true for Australia's plans for the G20. Life is not being kind in the lead-up to the Brisbane G20 Summit.

The head winds for the summit so far include:

International organisations (the IMF and World Bank) lowering their forecasts for global growth.

Equity markets being hit with concerns of rising geopolitical tensions ( Ukraine, Gaza, Syria, Iraq).

Economic sanctions being imposed by some G20 members (US, EU, Australia, Canada) on another G20 member (Russia) and that member imposing trade sanctions on other G20 members.

A G20 member (Argentina) defaulting on its external debts.

Another G20 member (the US) continuing to block agreed governance reforms of the IMF.

One G20 member (India) vetoing an agreed WTO trade deal, a move which has brought into question the future of the WTO and the multilateral trading system.

To add to the depressing developments, Indian Central Bank Governor Raghuram Rajan (who is famous for forecasting the 2008 financial meltdown) has warned that the world economy is on the brink of another market crash. To top things off, the World Health Organisation has called the Ebola outbreak an international health emergency.

How should the G20 react to these developments? It must confront them; it must deal with reality. If it did not, any collective commitment coming from a G20 meeting to strengthen global growth or do anything else would be hollow.

The G20 — not only at the summit in November but also when G20 finance ministers meet in Cairns in September — must discuss the impact of rising geopolitical tensions on the global economy. It would be surreal if, in the face of the developments listed above, a meeting of world leaders or finance ministers limited their discussions to technical economic and financial issues. As Michael Spence has noted, rising geo-political tensions are a major threat to global co-operation and economic prospects. If the G20 truly is a global economic steering committee, it must adapt to developments and respond to all the challenges and threats to the global economy.

One of the threats to global economic cooperation that the G20 must confront is the impact of India's veto of the Bali WTO trade deal.

The G20 must respond and restore confidence in the multilateral trading system and the WTO. Tom Miles sums up much of the reaction to India's decision when he says that 'India has dealt a potentially fatal blow to the World Trade Organization's hopes of modernising rules of global commerce and remaining the central forum of multilateral trade deals'. Simon Evenett from the Swiss Institute for International Economics said that 'without a serious shake-up, the WTO's future looks like that of the League of Nations.'

The world economy has prospered with a rules-based global trading system administered by the WTO. However, trade liberalisation through the WTO's Doha round has dragged on for over 13 years and in response, countries have sought progress through bilateral or regional trade deals. While this may benefit the countries involved, it has not been a positive for the global trading system and the countries excluded. There is a 'noodle bowl' of trade arrangements, often mutually incompatible, which discriminate against non-members, mainly developing countries. This trend has undermined the WTO, including its vital dispute resolution mechanism.

In the absence of the WTO's mediation of trade disputes and its capacity to deliver binding rulings, the world economy would likely be engulfed in retaliatory trade wars. For example, China recently lost an appeal at the WTO in a case brought by the US, EU and Japan to challenge China's restrictions on exports of rare earths. In the absence of the WTO's dispute resolution mechanism, the US and the other countries would probably have retaliated with their own restrictive measures.

For the sake of the global economy, the G20 must act decisively to restore faith in the global trading system and the future of the WTO.

How? At the Brisbane Summit, G20 members should commit to rolling back protectionist measures introduced since the global financial crisis, including non-tariff measures. The G20 should ask the WTO to monitor, report and make public progress with the rollback. The G20 chair should seek individual commitments from members for the early implementation of the Bali trade facilitation agreement. G20 members should not wait for the formal ratification of the agreement but include in their individual growth strategies the steps they are taking to facilitate trade. If one member does not make such a commitment, it should not stop action by others.

At the Brisbane Summit, G20 leaders should call on WTO trade ministers to conclude the Doha round and leaders should set the strategic direction for the WTO in a post-Doha world. This should be one that does not repeat the ambitious and wide-ranging Doha program with its 'nothing is agreed until everything is agreed' agenda. In future, negotiations should target specific areas and allow for plurilateral agreements, where WTO members may opt in. The discussions over the future of the WTO should be anchored around the governance and implications of global value chains.

As chair of the G20 in 2014, Australia has to ensure that the G20 is nimble, does not become preoccupied with a set agenda, and responds to challenges and risks that arise. One of those challenges is to save the WTO.

Image courtesy of the G20 Australia website.
 2014-08-11T05:46:00+00:00 Mike Callaghan With India's veto of the Bali trade agreement, the issues confronting the G20 Summit in November are mounting. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=d37d8421-d7c5-4d97-bf70-f77c3f423594 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=d37d8421-d7c5-4d97-bf70-f77c3f423594 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/11/G20-must-save-WTO.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=d37d8421-d7c5-4d97-bf70-f77c3f423594 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/11/Fighting-Islamist-terrorism-Communities-the-key.aspx Fighting Islamist terrorism: Communities the key 2014-08-11T04:45:00+00:00 Anthony Bubalo
There is an obvious connection between what is happening in Iraq at the moment and the Abbott Government's announcement last week of new measures to fight terrorism at home.

A significant number of young Australian nationals have traveled to fight in conflicts in Syria and Iraq. Some are fighting with the Islamic State (formerly ISIL/ISIS), whose sweep through northern Iraq has now prompted President Obama to launch limited air strikes against the group. The fear is that these Australians fighting with the Islamic State or other radical groups in Syria and Iraq may return home, having picked up military skills and jihadist connections that might one day be used in terror attacks in Australia.

But there is another connection between what is happening in Iraq and Australia that deserves attention.

The main reason the Islamic State has made such gains in Iraq is that Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has not ruled for all Iraqis. In particular, by disenfranchising the Sunni minority, he created a fertile field for the Islamic State to plow. There is no way the group's relatively few fighters could have made the gains they did without the implicit and in some cases explicit backing of Sunni communities in Iraq's north.

That backing came not because these communities loved what the Islamic State was offering. Quite the contrary. In fact, the main threat to the Islamic State's gains is not the Iraqi Army (with or without US air cover), but the likelihood that ordinary Sunnis will chafe under the Islamic State's harsh rule. Indeed, it is a significant measure of Sunni discontent with Baghdad that Sunnis are prepared, for the moment at least, to do a deal with this particular devil.

Which brings us to Australia. I am not remotely suggesting that Australia faces an insurgency along the lines of what we have seen in Iraq or that Australian Muslims are as disenfranchised as Iraq's Sunnis. But there is a lesson for Australia all the same. And that is, to defeat terrorism you need the support of communities from which the terrorists might come or within which they might seek shelter and support. To get that support, these communities need to feel included, not marginalised.

This should be a matter of principle. Political leaders often riff on the line that terrorists target us because they hate what we represent: tolerance, openness, democracy. But that means we need to do more than just pay lip service to these principles.

It is also a practical matter. For those agencies charged with leading the fight against terrorism, Muslim communities in Australia will be the best source of information and knowledge on those from within their midst who are fighting in Syria and Iraq or who have succumbed to radical and violent ideas.

And should that terrible day come when an act of terrorism is perpetrated in the name of radical Islam in Australia, then strong, open and confident ties with Muslim communities will be essential to ensuring that any such attack does not lead to further outbreaks of violence and retribution of the type that will tear deeply into the fabric of our society – precisely what the extremists want.

The risk of a terrorist attack in Australia is grave. More Australians have chosen to fight in Syria and Iraq than chose to fight in Afghanistan in the days when al Qaeda was being formed there.

More generally, the turmoil in the Middle East is seeing the creation of a new generation of combat-experienced jihadists, including some from our own region. Indonesia and Malaysians are also finding their way to Middle Eastern conflict zones.

However, this is not just a case of radical Islam running amok. It flows from the repressive measures being introduced by revived authoritarian structures after the failure of the Arab uprisings. Iraq is the most obvious example. Egypt deserves attention too, especially given the willingness of public figures like Tony Blair to anoint the country's elected autocrat, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, a moderate. Egypt's history shows us that the kind of immoderate policies being pursued by Sisi will produce many more radicals than it will ever eliminate.

To combat the next-generation terrorist threat in Australia we need a range of tools, including some of those announced by the Government last week. But we will also need Muslim communities that are not on the defensive because they fear the exposure of one bad egg will foul the reputation of their whole community. Defensive communities won't cooperate with police and intelligence agencies. In fact, fearful and defensive communities will provide exactly the kind of environment that extremists like the Islamic State in Iraq love.

To avoid this outcome requires good leadership from Muslim communities but also from federal and state governments. In particular, those politicians and officials leading the fight against terrorism need to consult, listen and explain widely with Muslim communities. The poor reaction of some Muslim community leaders to the measures announced last week is a political failure that needs to be avoided.

This dialogue with Muslim communities won't always be easy and there is room for greater frankness. But frank discussion needs to be productive rather than accusatory. That responsibility extends to the commentariat and the media. References to '100 year wars' are as unhelpful as they are unfounded.

The good news is that we probably have time. I genuinely believe that conditions in the Middle East today are worse in terms of the production of jihadist ideas and activists than anything we saw in the lead-up to 9/11. But it took time for the forces and conditions that created al Qaeda to have their most deadly effect, and we are probably still in the early years of the evolution of this new threat.

Prime Minister Maliki could have averted the arrival of the Islamic State had he acted in a more inclusive fashion towards Iraq's Sunni community. The situation is very different in Australia, but let's learn the lesson about the importance of communities and inclusiveness.

Photo by Flickr user Jane Dalton.
 2014-08-11T04:45:00+00:00 Anthony Bubalo Maliki aided the rise of ISIS by not ruling for all Iraqis. Let's not make the same mistake in Australia. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=e8276aa4-3891-4398-9aa2-72b88aa9b688 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=e8276aa4-3891-4398-9aa2-72b88aa9b688 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/11/Fighting-Islamist-terrorism-Communities-the-key.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=e8276aa4-3891-4398-9aa2-72b88aa9b688 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/11/AUSMIN-2014-naval-force-posture.aspx At AUSMIN 2014, let's talk about naval force posture 2014-08-11T03:09:00+00:00 James Brown

Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel arrives in Sydney, 11 August 2014. (Department of Defence.)

US Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel touched down in Sydney today for the annual AUSMIN meetings between Australian and US foreign policy and defence leaders, which start tomorrow. There will be no shortage of crises for the leaders to discuss, from coup rumours in Baghdad to the ongoing conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine. Leaders will also sign off on existing force posture agreements that permit the rotational presence of US Marines and the US Air Force in northern Australia.

But the long term issue of most importance to the alliance which needs to be discussed this year is the future force posture of the US Navy in Australia.

At the 2012 AUSMIN in Perth, then Australian Defence Minister Stephen Smith said that the growing strategic importance of the Indian Ocean was leading the US Navy to shift its attention to the waters off Australia's northwest coast. That AUSMIN meeting committed a joint working group of Australian and US officials to investigate options for the additional presence of US Navy vessels on Australia's west coast. A formal study didn't begin until December 2013, and the group will report its finding to the leaders over the next few days with a view to forging a way forward to new naval force posture arrangements.

In a sense, the presence of the US Navy in Western Australia is nothing new. US Navy Expeditionary Strike and Carrier Groups have been visiting the port at HMAS Stirling for decades. But the shift in economic power within Asia, the modernisation of the Chinese and Indian militaries, and the growing importance of energy transit routes through the Malacca Straits is leading US strategic planners to think more about the potential for crisis in Southeast Asia.

Two recent studies from the Center for Strategic and International Studies and RAND Corporation, both supporting the ongoing US global force posture review, concern themselves with the need to move large numbers of US Marine Corps troops into Southeast Asia. Both endorse the expansion of the Marine Rotational Force-Darwin into a full-size Marine Air/Ground Task Force and then consider further naval and maritime intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance initiatives which might be appropriate. The CSIS report considers the presence of a US Carrier Group in Western Australia, but dismisses it as too expensive, given the near US$6 billion cost of facilities upgrades.

Both reports mention the possibility of home-porting a US nuclear submarine at HMAS Stirling. This option is attractive, given HMAS Stirling hosts one of the few Mark 48 Torpedo Maintenance Facilities in the southern hemisphere and so can recondition and resupply submarine munitions. The Royal Australian Navy also has readily accessible underwater exercise areas and submarine rescue training facilities at HMAS Stirling.

However, the most likely force posture option under discussion is for the future rotational presence of a US Amphibious Ready Group (ARG) at HMAS Stirling. The Marines based in Darwin will need some kind of sea-lift if they are to operate in Southeast Asia, and it makes more sense to base this in Western Australia than in other nearby locations. The US Chief of Naval Operations last year flagged his intent to raise another ARG in the lower Pacific region. Local political considerations in both the US and Australia would make home-porting the ARG in Perth difficult, but a rotational presence would make sense.

This would require some additional berthing infrastructure at HMAS Stirling, as well as the possible construction of additional ramp space at nearby airfields, but it is far less costly than other options. For the US, this would preposition assets closer to potential trouble spots, diversify basing (particularly outside of the range of potential adversary missile systems), and allow an enhanced and more regular Indian Ocean and Southeast Asian presence, using fewer vessels than if a forward presence wasn't available.

Australian leaders will need to make more of a case for why this option needs to be explored and how the alliance is evolving. Currently, questions regarding force posture are met with relatively simple endorsements of the strength and shared vision of the US alliance. That cedes much of the ground in the discussion to strident critics such as former Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser, who argues that Australia should withdraw from the alliance entirely. At this AUSMIN, it is not only important to work through the options privately, but to discuss how to make a detailed public case for why such steps are beneficial to both countries.
 2014-08-11T03:09:00+00:00 James Brown The most important issue to be discussed at this year's AUSMIN will be the future force posture of the US Navy in Australia. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=b280ff94-d9ff-47ad-964e-01ca1d0e4726 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=b280ff94-d9ff-47ad-964e-01ca1d0e4726 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/11/AUSMIN-2014-naval-force-posture.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=b280ff94-d9ff-47ad-964e-01ca1d0e4726 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/11/Iraq-ISIS-error-Maliki-mismanagement-Obama-opportunity.aspx Iraq: ISIS's error, Maliki's mismanagement, Obama's opportunity 2014-08-11T01:38:00+00:00 Rodger Shanahan

As events unfold in Baghdad, President Obama's decision to unilaterally withdraw US troops from Iraq in the absence of a Status of Forces Agreement appears vindicated. Prime Minister Maliki has exacerbated the sectarian nature of Iraq's politics, bringing the current crisis to a head. The White House must be thanking its lucky stars that it doesn't have troops working for a prime minister who is refusing all entreaties to leave.

Some commentators have opined that ISIS would not have had its successes in Iraq had there been a residual US troop presence. The reality is that ISIS has assiduously courted the Sunni tribes disenfranchised by Maliki's government, and the Iraqi military has become hollow and corrupt. A small residual US force would have been at best spectators to, and at worst complicit in, Maliki's mismanagement of the situation. Greg Sheridan's view in The Australian that 'a residual (US) force would have helped stabilise Iraqi politics and bolster the Iraqi military' is typical of the 'if only' brigade – it ignores the complex reality of Iraq's secular, religious and tribal dynamics.

That is why in some ways ISIS's decision to launch attacks against religious minorities and the Kurdish region has presented President Obama with a strategic gift which he has been quick to act upon. Iraq clearly needed military assistance but the US needed to offer it in such a way that it wouldn't be seen to profit Maliki politically. What better way to introduce US firepower than in support of a humanitarian cause and in defence of Kurdish-controlled areas? It came with the imprimatur of the Iraqi Government but is not directly in support of it. It is a difficult act to juggle but it gives the US some leverage: if Maliki tries to cling to power, expect a narrow range of US military support. If he leaves and is replaced by a more inclusive government, then air support could be more widely employed.

For its part, ISIS is beginning to learn the difficulty of trying to fight a conventional military campaign using captured equipment when your enemy has air supremacy. As far as we know, US airstrikes have only destroyed an artillery piece, a mortar baseplate, some armoured vehicles and a vehicle convoy, but even the rabid ideologues of ISIS will start to sense that trying to manoeuvre in the open plains of northern Iraq is fraught with danger when US strike aircraft lurk overhead. Nor will the demonstration effect of a few 500lb bombs and Hellfire missiles have been lost on the other protagonists. Iraqi and Kurdish forces are likely to fight more vigorously if they know air support is at hand. Moreover, should US air support be broadened in support of a more inclusive Iraqi government, Iraqi tribes now aligned with ISIS may decide that their interests are better served by opting out of the Islamist coalition.

These are all big ifs, and the situation in Baghdad is unfolding hour by hour. But it may well be that ISIS's decision to press ahead with attacks against minorities and the Kurds is a strategic, rather than just tactical, error.

Photo from Flickr user United States Forces Iraq.
 2014-08-11T01:38:00+00:00 Rodger Shanahan ISIS's decision to launch attacks against religious minorities and the Kurdish region has presented President Obama with a strategic gift. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=3cd24c68-5c6f-4643-9dbc-67a5355faa98 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=3cd24c68-5c6f-4643-9dbc-67a5355faa98 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/11/Iraq-ISIS-error-Maliki-mismanagement-Obama-opportunity.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=3cd24c68-5c6f-4643-9dbc-67a5355faa98 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/11/Iraq-links-Coup-rumours-Kurdish-gains-Maliki-oil-and-more.aspx Iraq links: Coup rumours, Kurdish gains, Maliki, oil and more 2014-08-11T01:02:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
Events are moving fast. Here are a few sources to help you make sense of it all:

Baghdad coup rumours are rife on Twitter this morning as troops loyal to PM Maliki are deployed around the city.

Note these are just rumours at present. There is still a lot we don't know.

Yesterday Maliki, in a midnight TV address, said he was taking legal action against President Fouad Massoum for 'violating the constitution.'

A senior State Department official says the US is throwing its weight behind President Masoum.

The first three days of US air strikes have emboldened Kurdish fighters, as they reclaim two towns from ISIS.

Obama cast his air-strike announcement of last Friday in humanitarian terms, but John Judis says it is all about oil.

The consequences of America's previous humanitarian intervention, in Libya.

The NY Review of Books has a quick explainer about the competing political and military forces in Iraq:

The story, which has seemed to be all about religion and military developments, is actually mostly about politics: access to government revenue and services, a say in decision-making, and a modicum of social justice. True, one side is Sunni and the other Shia, but this is not a theological conflict rooted in the seventh century. <acronym>ISIS</acronym> and its allies have triumphed because the Sunni populations of Mosul and Tikrit and Fallujah have welcomed and supported them—not because of <acronym>ISIS</acronym>'s disgusting behavior, but in spite of it. The Sunnis in these towns are more afraid of what their government may do to them than of what the Sunni militia might. They have had enough of years of being marginalized while suffering vicious repression, lawlessness, and rampant corruption at the hands of Iraq's Shia-led government.

 2014-08-11T01:02:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen Events are moving fast. Here are a few sources to help you make sense of it all. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=1c574dbe-1aca-475e-aa28-b47e6592728a 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=1c574dbe-1aca-475e-aa28-b47e6592728a http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/11/Iraq-links-Coup-rumours-Kurdish-gains-Maliki-oil-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=1c574dbe-1aca-475e-aa28-b47e6592728a http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/11/Aid-development-links-Ebola-solar-press-freedom-hunger-Uganda-more.aspx Aid & development links: Ebola, solar, press freedom, hunger, Uganda & more 2014-08-10T23:28:00+00:00 Stephanie Dunstan

Ebola fears undermine regional peacekeeping plans in Africa.

China will install more solar power this year than the US.

The biggest rises and falls in press freedom around the world in 2014? Read the new Reporters without Borders Freedom Index.

842 million people in the world do not have enough to eat. This number has fallen by 17% since 1990 . See more stats from World Food Program on hunger.

A call for papers for the 2014 Australasian Aid Conference , run by ANU's Development Policy Centre.

On the psychological effects of poverty.

The US-Africa Leaders Summit happened last week. The focus was economic.

Does foreign pressure actually make it harder to promote human rights in certain countries? A look at Uganda's anti-gay laws.

 2014-08-10T23:28:00+00:00 Stephanie Dunstan This week's best aid and development reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=3ba0ef6d-62bd-415c-8df1-8c27a9535107 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=3ba0ef6d-62bd-415c-8df1-8c27a9535107 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/11/Aid-development-links-Ebola-solar-press-freedom-hunger-Uganda-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=3ba0ef6d-62bd-415c-8df1-8c27a9535107 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/11/dangers-SSBN-proliferation-Indo-Pacific-Asia.aspx The dangers of SSBN proliferation in Indo-Pacific Asia 2014-08-10T23:11:00+00:00 Peter Dombrowski

It has become commonplace to lament the arms races underway in Indo-Pacific Asia.

China's military modernisation over the last two decades has helped provoke heightened political tensions and growing concern in capitals from Tokyo to New Delhi to Washington and Moscow. North Korea's continued pursuit of nuclear weapons and missile delivery systems keeps tensions in Northeast Asia high. The Indian subcontinent is home to two nuclear powers that have fought four wars over the last 65 years. Many countries in the Asian littoral have undertaken serious rearmament programs, and across the region strategists see a proliferation of missiles of all types — anti-access systems, aerospace capabilities and naval platforms, among others.

Regional nuclear modernisation programs, especially the development of submarines (nuclear powered or conventional) armed with nuclear weapons, are of special concern.

China and India are committed to producing more nuclear-capable delivery systems and weapons with greater range, accuracy and features that make them more lethal and thus more threatening to potential adversaries. Meanwhile Pakistan is pursuing its own program to acquire more capable submarines from China. While no one is arguing, as yet, that Pakistan intends to acquire ballistic missile submarines, some analysts hint that nuclear-tipped cruise missiles are a real possibility. Given Pakistan's record on nuclear proliferation over the past decades, such fears appear real.

With the possible exception of America, powers external to the Indo-Pacific (Russia, for example) are also pursuing strategic modernisation. Russia, lest anyone forget, is an Indo-Pacific nuclear power by virtue of its Pacific Fleet, complete with its latest model SSBNs (in the American lexicon: Ship, Submersible, Ballistic, Nuclear), the Borei class, armed with Bulava missiles. Even the US is investing in the research and development preliminary to building a replacement for the Ohio-class submarines that currently constitute the sea-based leg of the American nuclear triad. American strategic modernisation is not a driver in the region's strategic dynamics, but insofar as the US is executing an Asian 'pivot', American military capabilities, nuclear and conventional, remain important.

The emergence of strategic submarines in the Indo-Pacific is summarised in the following table.

This short post will not attempt a net assessment of regional or bilateral rivalries. A full analysis would need to look more closely at all dimensions of military power as well as the impact of American forces in the region. But a simple scan of the table above allows one small observation for a region that may soon be in the grips of a full-blown nuclear arms race. The prospects for stable, long-term peace (meaning greater strategic stability, the reduction of crisis instability, and fewer opportunities for accidents, chance and misperception to lead to conflict) depend, in part, on taking steps sooner rather than later to rein in potentially destabilising developments. At present, regional SSBN programs are not so advanced, and the numbers of platforms and weapons are not so large, that steps cannot avert a widening arms race.

Growing numbers of submarines with nuclear-armed ballistic missiles may preserve second-strike capabilities for their possessors (and thus, debatably, contribute to strategic stability). But in the increasingly crowded seas of Indo-Pacific Asia, greater numbers also lead to more opportunities for accidents, chance and misperception.

Submarine accidents are not unknown: the national tragedy of a lost boat and its crew might quickly become a regional or even global crisis if reactors or nuclear weapons have problems. Submarine operations in cramped seas also raise the possibility that one side or another will encounter the other in a crisis, with unpredictable results. Slowly maturing command and control (C2 ) and intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) technologies still have a ways to go (look how long it took in US and the Soviet Union to develop their systems).

Furthermore, few speak of the challenge of ensuring the political and professional reliability of crews (while the mature nuclear powers rarely focus today on crew reliability, such concerns were quite real in the not-so-distant past). Nor are SSBNs and ballistic missiles in the Indo-Pacific the only aspect of undersea warfare and nuclear weapons that should trouble us: surface fleets, mine warfare, anti-submarine warfare and so forth increase the danger of incidents at sea, and they could raise the potential for a nuclear crisis. Knowledgeable analysts are concerned that the next stage of the Indo-Pacific naval arms race will involve still more submarines with nuclear sea-launched cruise missiles.

Three 'nots'

If regional actors (not just the states currently pursuing SSBNs but other concerned parties) are to act to avert further arms racing and stabilise the emerging undersea deterrent, they must recognise the situation for what it is. A nuclear arms race at sea is:

Not simply a local or regional issue.

Not simply a military issue.

And not simply a navy or maritime issue.

A nuclear arms race at sea is a global problem with far-reaching implications for proliferation, conventional arms modernisation, and the possibility of arms control. The mere existence of such systems makes it more likely that the so-called nuclear taboo might finally be broken. An undersea nuclear race is deeply political because it affects the geopolitical rivalry among great and regional powers, not to mention alliance structures and patterns of regional governance.

For all regional military forces, such a nuclear arms race at sea is not simply the business of navies: SSBNs affect joint and combined operations in ways big and small, and blur important distinctions between conventional and nuclear systems. It is worrisome that despite some recent developments there has been, in general, asymmetric progress in developing weapons systems versus the C2, ISR, training/readiness, and nuclear doctrine necessary to deploy sea-based deterrent systems safely and reliably.

Although prudence on the part of India, China and other regional powers may alleviate these concerns, it may not be sufficient for those interested in regional stability. In the end, although it is not fashionable to advocate for arms control much less naval arms control, strategists and policy makers should remember the words of Schelling and Halperin: 'the essential feature of arms control is the recognition of the common interest, of the possibility of reciprocation and cooperation even between potential enemies with respect to their militaries.' And, in the words of Robert Jervis, which seem especially prescient with regard to naval nuclear arms racing in the Indo-Pacific, 'because the security dilemma and crisis instability can exacerbate if not create conflicts, potential enemies will have an interest in developing arms control arrangements.'

The Lowy Institute gratefully acknowledges support from the John D and Catherine T MacArthur Foundation for this Interpreter debate, which is part of a broader research, dialogue and outreach project on strategic stability in Indo-Pacific Asia.

Image from Wikipedia.
 2014-08-10T23:11:00+00:00 Peter Dombrowski Greater numbers of SSBNs lead to more opportunities for accidents, chance and misperception. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=7a363d74-db1c-4b80-8f9d-40209c9b4a9a 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=7a363d74-db1c-4b80-8f9d-40209c9b4a9a http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/11/dangers-SSBN-proliferation-Indo-Pacific-Asia.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=7a363d74-db1c-4b80-8f9d-40209c9b4a9a http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/09/Weekend-catch-up-World-War-I-Iraq-nuclear-submarines-and-more.aspx Weekend catch-up: World War I, Iraq, nuclear submarines, Russia sanctions and more 2014-08-08T22:00:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
Bringing together all the longer Interpreter articles you were too busy to read this week.

Although I would hate to distract you from reading our fine long-form content, before highlighting this week's best pieces, I'll mention one other feature from this week, our multi-part series on the best films about World War I, as nominated by you, our readers. Here are part 1, part 2 and part 3, and part 4.

We began the week with qualified good news from the Pacific, thanks to economist Tim Harcourt:

There's been a lot of talk about getting women into top positions in business in Australia, but our friends in the Pacific have been walking the walk. The inaugural Pacific Export Survey 2014 reveals that around 27% of exporting small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the Pacific are run by women, compared to 11% of exporters in Australia according to the DHL Export Barometer. That's almost a 3:1 ratio.

Monday was the 100th anniversary of the start of World War I, and Rory Medcalf took the opportunity to look at parallels with today's security picture:

Improvements in the methods of interstate relations have not kept pace with the speed or complexity of today's international environment. Sure, as Graham Allison suggests, things are better now because 'intelligence systems provide near real-time information' to help make decisions in a crisis. Moreover, leaders 'can talk directly to one another' by phone or videoconference. In 1914, on the other hand, he notes that governments 'sent cables to ambassadors who transmitted messages to foreign offices, increasing the chances of miscommunication'.

The sad secret of 21st century diplomacy, however, is that a lot of the time it still works likes that, even during crises. Consider the lack of operational hotlines between, say, China and Japan or even China and the US; or the potential for mischief or miscommunication. A telephone call can only help avert crisis if both sides are willing at least to talk. And while crisis and disaster can strike suddenly, even the most urgent and accomplished multilateral diplomacy – like the recent UN Security Council resolution on flight MH17 – takes precious days.

Rodger Shanahan argued that there is no hypocrisy in Obama's decision to intervene in Iraq while staying out of Syria:

There will of course be accusations that Obama is a hypocrite for intervening in Iraq but not Syria. That argument is simplistic and wrong. If the US is obliged to intervene militarily everywhere there is a humanitarian need, it would never stop intervening. Obama said as much in his speech. He is one of the few US leaders to understand the limits of American power.

Moreover, the situation in Syria is far more complex. To have assisted one side would have meant breaching a nation's sovereignty (no big deal) and potentially assisting the very Islamist forces that pose a security threat to the region and the West (a very big deal). The intervention in Iraq requires Obama to do neither of those things, so the calculus is completely different.

This week we kicked off a debate thread on sea-based nuclear deterrence in the Indo-Pacific. The entire thread (with much more to come) is here, but it's worth highlighting this piece from Chinese scholar Wu Riquiang:

Chinese and Indian SSBNs are unnecessary because China-India and China-US strategic relations are stable, and will probably remain so in near future. While the Indian nuclear weapons program is driven by China's nuclear capability, it is America that drives China's nuclear development. Neither China nor India has first-strike capability against the other side, and neither side is seeking such capability. Some American nuclear and conventional strategic capabilities, such as missile defences and conventional prompt global strike (CPGS), do pose a big challenge of China's nuclear deterrent, but China can deal with these threats and restore strategic stability with its land-based nuclear missiles, which are relatively cheap and technologically mature compared to sea-based nuclear weapons.

Stephen Grenville said the international ratings agencies were being unfair to Australia:

Remarkably, some of the key actors responsible for the 2008 financial debacle have managed to restore their reputations, and no rehabilitation is more remarkable than that of the Teflon-coated credit rating agencies. Leading up to 2008, they handed out AAA ratings to worthless mortgage securitisations (but of course these were a different sort of AAA rating: the debt issuers simply paid for it). Nor were the country ratings much better: S&P's 'investment-grade' endorsements of bankrupt Greece survived well into 2010. The role of the CRAs was under critical review well before the 2008 crisis but no satisfactory answer has yet been found for their undue influence and they are still accorded a role in the Basel prudential supervision arrangements.

Could it be that S&P is peeved because it recently lost its reputation-damning court case in Australia? It's little wonder that analysis of the sort produced by S&P for Australia evokes a derisive response. Can't they do better?

Here's Hugh Jorgensen on a potentially thorny problem for the G20: America locking French bank BNP Paribas out of USD transactions:

While the French have accepted BNPP's guilt, they have taken issue with what they see as America's exploitation of the central role of the US dollar by blacklisting BNPP's oil-and-gas divisions from USD clearing houses. Of the judgement, Francois Hollande pointedly stated 'I am conscious of the risks of totally disproportionate, unfair sanctions, that could have economic and financial consequences for the whole of the euro zone...there are other banks that could also be targeted, creating a risk and a doubt over the solidity of the European financial system'. Indeed, Societe Generale, Credit Agricole and Deutsche Bank are all believed to be in line for DoJ investigation on similar sanction-breaking grounds.

In essence, the European leaders are concerned about the precedent that might be set by the DoJ's ruling. Global banks rely upon access to USD clearing houses to complete international payments on behalf of their clients. If an Indian importer wants to buy goods from Russia, it is easier for both parties to complete the transaction in US dollars than rupees or rubles. Accordingly, of the US$5 trillion that is traded every day on foreign exchange markets, the US dollar features in 87% of transactions.

One of our most popular posts this week was Vaughan Winterbottom's treatment of the tit-for-tat diplomatic measures taken this week by Russia and Japan:

Japan imposed limited new financial sanctions yesterday on 40 individuals and two groups implicated in Russia's actions in Crimea and Eastern Ukraine. The sanctions attempted to walk a tightrope between appeasing the US and keeping alive hopes of settling a nearly seven decade-old territorial dispute with Russia, but it looks like Moscow has pushed Tokyo off the tightrope.

Julian Snelder asked this week: just how big are CNOOC's oil reserves? Worryingly low, it seems:

Researchers have previously noted the significant long-term decline in CNOOC's domestic offshore oil reserve life. Based on updated information presented in the filing, and assuming CNOOC's forecast production rates, the company may run down its reserve life to barely six years by 2015. This compares to almost 15 years in 2001, and it is well below the 10 years normally considered comfortable for an 'upstream' oil exploration company.

Rhys Thompson surveyed Myanmar's media environment:

Since 2011 there have been many positive changes. The Government abolished pre-publication censorship and issued new 'daily' licences to local publications. It also extended visas for international journalists to three months and passed a new media law in early 2014. However, these changes need to be contrasted with later developments which challenge President Thein Sein's rhetoric and suggest the Government still remains uncomfortable with reducing its control of the media.

Matt Hill looked at the 'salami tactics' practiced by Moscow and Beijing, and how democracies are responding:

So the risk is not that the developed democracies will march into conflict with Russia or China after some predictable accumulation of provocations. Rather, the risk lies in the fact that the complex nature of democratic popular sentiment means we cannot effectively judge the political ramifications of any given security event until we observe the way it merges with or diverts from the strategic narrative.

The MH17 tragedy may or may not galvanize sufficient political will in democratic states to change the political calculus in Europe. But who is to say how government, media, and social perceptions will evolve, and how it will affect calls for action in, say, Britain and the Netherlands, but also attitudes towards Russia in bordering states such as Finland and Sweden which are weighing the prospects of NATO affiliation? Moreover, if Putin continues his efforts to destabilise eastern Ukraine, MH17 is unlikely to be the last tragedy with collateral damage to the West. Another such shock could tip the balance of Atlantic sentiment.

Photo by Flickr user Kevin McShane.
 2014-08-08T22:00:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen Bringing together all the longer Interpreter articles you were too busy to read this week. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=0e2e1c06-6206-4cd1-9427-bf49bc02cb1b 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=0e2e1c06-6206-4cd1-9427-bf49bc02cb1b http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/09/Weekend-catch-up-World-War-I-Iraq-nuclear-submarines-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=0e2e1c06-6206-4cd1-9427-bf49bc02cb1b http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/08/Obama-intervention-Iraq-is-not-Syria.aspx Obama's intervention: Iraq is not Syria 2014-08-08T04:37:00+00:00 Rodger Shanahan

The limited use of military force announced by President Obama earlier today was likely prompted by concern at the success of ISIS's latest offensives across Syria and Iraq. The jihadist group has recently redoubled its efforts in Raqqa, Syria, in an effort to take the remaining pockets of Syrian Government-held territory in the province. At the same time, ISIS's performance against Kurdish forces would have raised concern in Washington and Baghdad, and led to a re-assessment of some overly optimistic judgments about Kurdish capabilities.

The situation facing the Yazidis and the Christians is of grave humanitarian concern. The fact that the refugees are geographically concentrated would have made air support an attractive option for the president. Add to this the fact that the sovereign Iraqi Government invited the intervention, and the stage was set for a dual humanitarian/limited direct military intervention operation to which Obama could agree.

There will of course be accusations that Obama is a hypocrite for intervening in Iraq but not Syria. That argument is simplistic and wrong. If the US is obliged to intervene militarily everywhere there is a humanitarian need, it would never stop intervening. Obama said as much in his speech. He is one of the few US leaders to understand the limits of American power.

Moreover, the situation in Syria is far more complex. To have assisted one side would have meant breaching a nation's sovereignty (no big deal) and potentially assisting the very Islamist forces that pose a security threat to the region and the West (a very big deal). The intervention in Iraq requires Obama to do neither of those things, so the calculus is completely different.

In his speech, Obama was careful to emphasise the need for an Iraqi political solution to the crisis engulfing the country. As long as Maliki remains prime minister, there will be little appetite for substantive US air support. The intriguing question is whether a more politically inclusive Iraqi prime minister might prompt a more robust US response in terms of air support and stand-off weapons.

Photo by Flickr user Marines.
 2014-08-08T04:37:00+00:00 Rodger Shanahan There will be accusations that Obama is a hypocrite for intervening in Iraq but not Syria. That argument is simplistic and wrong. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=51c67477-80fc-4dad-98e9-032ea5283b17 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=51c67477-80fc-4dad-98e9-032ea5283b17 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/08/Obama-intervention-Iraq-is-not-Syria.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=51c67477-80fc-4dad-98e9-032ea5283b17 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/08/Indo-Pacific-rivalry-Australia-India-middle-power-coalitions.aspx New Lowy Institute paper urges Indo-Pacific middle powers to band together 2014-08-08T03:58:00+00:00 Stephanie Dunstan

In a new Lowy Institute Analysis launched today, International Security Program Director Rory Medcalf and Nonresident Fellow C Raja Mohan argue that Indo-Pacific middle powers should look to build security coalitions in response to changing power balances in Asia.

China's increasing assertiveness and doubts about America's role in the Indo-Pacific have resulted in enhanced security cooperation between middle powers in the region. 'With Tony Abbott and Narendra Modi due to meet in the coming months, India and Australia are well placed to form the core of middle power coalition building', says C Raja Mohan in the new paper.

 The Analysis argues that cooperation between Indo-Pacific middle power coalitions would help them deal with the uncertainties surrounding the future of US-China relations while helping to build a more multipolar Indo-Pacific order. 'The next logical step should be the creation of "middle power coalitions". These informal arrangements will allow regional players to cooperate on strategic issues in groups that do not include China or the US', says Rory Medcalf in the paper.

Key findings:

China's assertiveness and uncertainties about America's response are causing middle powers in Indo-Pacific Asia to looking beyond traditional approaches to security.

Cooperation between Indo-Pacific middle power coalitions would build regional resilience against the vagaries of US-China relations.

India and Australia are well placed to form the core of middle-power coalition building.

The Analysis is free to download from the Lowy Institute website.

Image courtesy of Royal Australian Navy.
 2014-08-08T03:58:00+00:00 Stephanie Dunstan China's increasing assertiveness and doubts about America's role in the Indo-Pacific incentivize middle powers to form coalitions. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=2cf124aa-15cf-4a17-a7f9-643b2ef4dcf4 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=2cf124aa-15cf-4a17-a7f9-643b2ef4dcf4 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/08/Indo-Pacific-rivalry-Australia-India-middle-power-coalitions.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=2cf124aa-15cf-4a17-a7f9-643b2ef4dcf4 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/08/Iraq-Obama-reluctantly-opts-for-force.aspx Iraq: Obama reluctantly opts for force 2014-08-08T02:24:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
[youtube:zuaO5EJzLAE]

So, President Obama has announced that the US is delivering air-dropped humanitarian aid to refugees in northern Iraq, and that he has authorised air strikes to prevent a genocide.

As a rule, I tend to side with 'defensive realists' such as Stephen Walt on these issues. As Walt argued yesterday:

Some will argue that we have a moral responsibility to try to end the obvious suffering in different places, and a strategic imperative to eradicate terrorists and prevent the spread of WMD. These are laudable goals, but if the history of the past twenty years teaches us anything, it is that forceful American interference of this sort just makes these problems worse. The Islamic State wouldn't exist if the neocons hadn't led us blindly into Iraq, and Iran would have less reason to contemplate getting nuclear weapons if it hadn't watched the United States throw its weight around in the region and threaten it directly with regime change...

...this argument would not preclude limited U.S. action for purely humanitarian purposes -- such as humanitarian airdrops for the beleaguered religious minorities now threatened with starvation in Iraq. That's not "deep engagement"; that's merely trying to help people threatened with imminent death. But I would not send U.S. forces -- including drones or aircraft -- out to win a battle that the Iraqi government or the Kurds cannot win for themselves. The United States spent the better part of a decade chasing that elusive Grail, and the end result was precisely the sort of chaos and sectarian rivalry that has produced this latest crisis.

Yet if Obama's description of the situation is accurate, the distinction between military and humanitarian action is far from clear cut. Obama opened his statement by saying the refugees stranded on a mountain in northern Iraq faced 'certain death' (he also used the word 'genocide') from ISIS. If it's acceptable to help these people by feeding and sheltering them, I see no obvious moral barrier to using proportionate and discriminating force to protect them too. In fact, if there is a moral imperative to help the refugees with aid, it would be somewhat obtuse to refuse them other kinds of assistance when it is available.

Of course, this moral logic needs to be bounded by practical reasoning. Will force actually work, or will it make things worse? That is Walt's concern, and I share it. The use of force therefore needs to be severely limited, but it should not be ruled out entirely. I think the tone of Obama's statement, and his reluctance to use force in Syria, suggest this is his instinct too.

BTW, if you're looking for background on the Yazidi, the religious group ISIS is evidently trying to exterminate, look here. (H/t Browser.)
 2014-08-08T02:24:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen If there is a moral imperative to help the refugees with aid, how can we refuse them military assistance too? http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=a1261be4-3095-4b6d-99a8-0f1cd237cb37 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=a1261be4-3095-4b6d-99a8-0f1cd237cb37 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/08/Iraq-Obama-reluctantly-opts-for-force.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=a1261be4-3095-4b6d-99a8-0f1cd237cb37 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/08/Russia-amassing-troops-Ukrainian-border.aspx Why is Russia amassing troops on the Ukrainian border? 2014-08-08T00:31:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
Just four days after MH17 was brought down over the Ukraine, Russia scholar Matthew Sussex wrote a scathing assessment of Moscow's early reaction to the incident for The Interpreter. But he closed his piece by arguing that it could have been much worse:

...Putin could have expressed horror at the loss of MH17 and promised to persuade the separatists to stop fighting immediately, regardless of any 'provocations'. He could then have called a Security Council meeting to guide its focus towards accessing the crash site, rather than who was to blame. Finally (and this is the insidious part) he could have declared Eastern Ukraine a dangerous warzone and unilaterally nominated Russia as the regional power with the capacity to secure it. That could have been the pretext to roll 12,000 troops across the border, ostensibly to create a cordon sanitaire to MH17's resting place.

Now NATO is warning that Russia may be contemplating that very strategy:

Russia has amassed around 20,000 combat-ready troops on Ukraine's eastern border and could use the pretext of a humanitarian or peace-keeping mission to invade, NATO said on Wednesday. Stating the conflict in Ukraine was fueled by Russia, NATO said in a statement that the troop build-up had further escalated "a dangerous situation".

"We're not going to guess what's on Russia's mind, but we can see what Russia is doing on the ground – and that is of great concern. Russia has amassed around 20,000 combat-ready troops on Ukraine's eastern border," NATO spokeswoman Oana Lungescu said in an emailed statement. NATO was concerned that Moscow could use "the pretext of a humanitarian or peace-keeping mission as an excuse to send troops into Eastern Ukraine", she said.

A fortnight ago I wrote an op-ed for the Financial Review arguing that, for Australia, the MH17 shootdown was a consular crisis, not a test of foreign policy. My purpose was to warn that Australia ought to be wary of involving itself too closely in the power politics of this crisis. Australia has few interests at stake in the region, and Russia is not a serious threat to Australia's interests.

Further catalysts for closer Australian involvement are now emerging: overnight there was an announcement that Russia is imposing sanctions that will target Australian agribusiness. And now, according to NATO, there is a heightened threat of Russian invasion, which apart from being a crisis for Europe, would be particularly serious for Canberra if Australians working at the crash site were caught up in it.
 2014-08-08T00:31:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen NATO warns that Russia could invade under a humanitarian pretext. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=84e78298-5b89-4bca-bbce-d6051c7d7ab0 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=84e78298-5b89-4bca-bbce-d6051c7d7ab0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/08/Russia-amassing-troops-Ukrainian-border.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=84e78298-5b89-4bca-bbce-d6051c7d7ab0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/08/The-best-world-War-I-movies-(part-4).aspx The best world War I movies (part 4) 2014-08-07T23:37:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
 I thought we had exhausted this topic but the suggestions keep on coming. Here are part 1, part 2 and part 3, and below are three more films.

Up to now I have avoided googling 'best World War I movies' and similar phrases, because I assumed there would be lists out there but I didn't want to spoil the fun. FWIW, here's what looks like a pretty comprehensive list on Wikipedia.

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 2014-08-07T23:37:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen More suggestions from our readers about the greatest films about the great war. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=2499eb20-8454-44f7-88b5-7fce4b65b1e9 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=2499eb20-8454-44f7-88b5-7fce4b65b1e9 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/08/The-best-world-War-I-movies-(part-4).aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=2499eb20-8454-44f7-88b5-7fce4b65b1e9 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/08/India-links-Kerry-visit-WTO-poverty-WW1-Bhutan-ISIS-Ganges.aspx India links: Kerry visit, WTO, poverty, WW1, Bhutan, ISIS, Ganges and more 2014-08-07T22:08:00+00:00 Danielle Rajendram

US Secretary of State John Kerry visited India last week, meeting Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the first time since his election. He penned this op-ed in The Economic Times with Penny Pritzker, the US Secretary of Commerce.

Shashank Joshi looks at the contributions of India and other colonies to the First World War.

Is India getting close to ending extreme poverty?

James Crabtree reviews Getting India Back on Track: An Action Agenda for Reform, and asks whether Modi will follow the authors' advice.

David Brewster argues that this year's Malabar exercise points to deepening relations between India and Japan.

Why are China and India both jostling for influence in tiny Bhutan?

The New York Times reports on the young men who are leaving India to join ISIS.

This beautiful National Geographic feature follows the Ganges from its mountain source to the sea.

Sadanand Dhume on India's position at the WTO this week:

If Narendra Modi deliberately set out to destroy global goodwill for his government among trade negotiators and free-trade supporters, he could scarcely have been more effective.

 2014-08-07T22:08:00+00:00 Danielle Rajendram Links to this week's best India reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=b6ad2ef6-9eb4-4bbe-809c-158df4fa16dc 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=b6ad2ef6-9eb4-4bbe-809c-158df4fa16dc http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/08/India-links-Kerry-visit-WTO-poverty-WW1-Bhutan-ISIS-Ganges.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=b6ad2ef6-9eb4-4bbe-809c-158df4fa16dc http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/07/china-india-Unnecessary-and-destabilising-SSBNs.aspx SSBNs are unnecessary and destabilising 2014-08-07T07:18:00+00:00 Wu Riqiang
 A Chinese Type 094 (Jin-class) SSBN. (Wikipedia.)

Regarding the Chinese and Indian ballistic missile submarine (SSBN) programs and their impact on international security, my arguments are: (1) they are not necessary; (2) noisy SSBNs are destabilising and should not be deployed; and (3) China's SSBNs are still far from being operational.

Chinese and Indian SSBNs are unnecessary because China-India and China-US strategic relations are stable, and will probably remain so in near future. While the Indian nuclear weapons program is driven by China's nuclear capability, it is America that drives China's nuclear development. Neither China nor India has first-strike capability against the other side, and neither side is seeking such capability. Some American nuclear and conventional strategic capabilities, such as missile defences and conventional prompt global strike (CPGS), do pose a big challenge of China's nuclear deterrent, but China can deal with these threats and restore strategic stability with its land-based nuclear missiles, which are relatively cheap and technologically mature compared to sea-based nuclear weapons.

So why are China and India developing SSBNs? The probable answer is that they are doing it for technology demonstration, national prestige, or bureaucratic competition purposes.

It is sometimes argued that SSBNs are a stabilising force, but this is the case only when the SSBN in question is quiet. Quiet SSBNs are difficult to find, giving leaders confidence that they will always have the ability to strike back should they be attacked, whereas noisy SSBNs are easy for an adversary to track, locate and destroy, encouraging a 'use it or lose it' mentality in times of crisis.

A declassified US Office of Naval Intelligence report from 2009 stated that China's Type 094 SSBN is so noisy that it is not survivable. China can use the Type 094 for technology demonstration or training purposes, but should not deploy it. India has yet to commission its Arihant-class SSBN, so we have no idea of its noise level. But if it too proves to be noisy, India should not deploy it either.

Furthermore, given China's lack of experience running an SSBN fleet, it needs to solve several problems in order to operate the Type 094s:

Missile range: the range of the JL-2 sea-launched ballistic missile, which will arm the Type 094, is 7400km, not enough to hold the continental US at risk if launched from China's coastal waters. The Type 094 will have to get through the first island chain to target America, which would be dangerous, given its high noise level.

Alert status: for land-based ballistic missiles, China separates nuclear warheads from their boosters in peacetime. Will China change this practice for SSBNs? Will China maintain a continuous-at-sea deterrent?

Will China deploy a permissive action link (PAL)-like coded arming control device in its SSBNs? The advantage of the PAL-like system is to avoid unauthorised launch; the disadvantage is that the crew might be unable to launch missiles should the national command authority or the communication system be destroyed.

Deployment mode: will China deploy its SSBNs in 'bastions' protected by friendly forces, along China's coastal waters, or in open seas?

In sum, there are many problems for China to solve, all of which are complicated. China is unlikely to solve these problems in 10 to 20 years. I believe the current purpose of China's SSBN fleet is (and should be) to develop submarine-building technology and to train submariners in how to run an SSBN fleet. It is however too early to discuss the security influences of the Type 094.

The Lowy Institute gratefully acknowledges support from the John D and Catherine T MacArthur Foundation for this Interpreter debate, which is part of a broader research, dialogue and outreach project on strategic stability in Indo-Pacific Asia.

 2014-08-07T07:18:00+00:00 Wu Riqiang It is sometimes argued that SSBNs are a stabilising force, but only when the SSBN in question is quiet. That's not true of China's Type 094. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=de2fe25f-a334-46e9-997d-6a71da2a8746 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=de2fe25f-a334-46e9-997d-6a71da2a8746 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/07/china-india-Unnecessary-and-destabilising-SSBNs.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=de2fe25f-a334-46e9-997d-6a71da2a8746 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/07/Pacific-island-links-Fiji-elections-Kerry-visit-Obama-too-Naurus-courts-RAMSI-and-more.aspx Pacific island links: Fiji elections, Kerry visit (Obama too?), Nauru's courts and more 2014-08-07T05:13:00+00:00 Tess Newton Cain
Each week we bring you a round-up of news, analysis & commentary from and about the Pacific island region:

Recent changes to the Electoral Decree in Fiji creating a minimum residency requirement have led to two candidates being disqualified.

New financial products enable more rural businesses in Pacific island countries to gain access to commercial credit.

On Devpolicy, Jon Fraenkel highlights some of the key messages of a review of the Regional Assistance Mission to Solomon Islands that was presented at the Pacific Islands Forum last week, amid heightened tensions following the burning of houses in a squatter settlement. US Secretary of State John Kerry will include Solomon Islands in a six-day Southeast Asia and Pacific tour, and there is talk that the US president will visit the region later in the year.

The government of Nauru has appointed a new chief justice and two other judges, including the first female appointment to the bench. The appointments have been greeted with cautious optimism by the previous chief justice and suspended members of the parliamentary opposition.

Check out this interactive presentation of new policy proposals in Vanuatu, designed to bring budget documents to life and keep citizens informed.

There is a wealth of archeological finds that tell us a lot about early Polynesian settlement of Tonga, but no museum in which it can be displayed.

The Pacific Islands Forum leaders' meeting has concluded in Palau. Jenny Hayward-Jones and Roman Grynberg analyse what was (and was not) achieved.

Fourteen Pacific island countries have been invited to attend the inaugural Thailand-Pacific island Forum; Australia and New Zealand are attending as observers.

Earlier this year, the World Bank Praxis series looked at poverty and hardship in the Pacific island region:

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 2014-08-07T05:13:00+00:00 Tess Newton Cain Each week we bring you a round-up of news, analysis & commentary from and about the Pacific island region http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=a7c112e1-c6ef-4493-bade-afed470c272d 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=a7c112e1-c6ef-4493-bade-afed470c272d http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/07/Pacific-island-links-Fiji-elections-Kerry-visit-Obama-too-Naurus-courts-RAMSI-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=a7c112e1-c6ef-4493-bade-afed470c272d http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/07/Khmer-Rouge-tribunal-convicts-too-little-too-late.aspx Khmer Rouge tribunal convicts, but it's too little, too late 2014-08-07T04:20:00+00:00 Milton Osborne

Today's long-anticipated conviction Nuon Chea, Brother Number Two in the Khmer Rouge regime, and Khieu Samphan, Head of State of Democratic Kampuchea, for crimes against humanity brings to an end their long running trials in the Extraordinary Chambers of the Courts of Cambodia, which was established in 2006. Their trials began in 2011.

Originally there were four defendants on trial, but Ieng Sary, the former foreign minister in the Khmer Rouge regime, died while the trial was under way, and his wife, Khieu Thirith, was judged unfit to stand trial because of mental illness.

Yesterday, the court outlined terms of a new case against both the men convicted today. They are now to be charged with genocide.

The charges relate to the actions of the Khmer Rouge regime which killed many hundreds of thousands of Khmers Islam (or Chams, a substantial Muslim minority in Cambodia), as well as tens of thousands of Vietnamese. Give that both men are in their eighties, it is quite possible they will die in prison before a verdict is reached.

The tribunal has been subject to much criticism, some of which I outlined as long ago as 2007 in my Lowy Perspective paper, The Khmer Rouge Tribunal: An Ambiguous Good News Story. There is no doubt that the tribunal's continuing existence is an annoyance to Prime Minister Hun Sen, who has made clear his reluctance to see it indict new defendants in accordance with his view that his compatriots should 'dig a hole and bury the past'.

Many Cambodians will be glad that a verdict has been reached, but there will be others who feel the whole process has taken too long and has failed to tackle the broader issue of the continuing presence in high places within government of many who previously were closely associated with the Khmer Rouge regime. It is a sentiment reflected in the above CNN video interview with the activist Theary Seng, whose family suffered grievously under the Khmer Rouge. The video is accompanied by a thoughtful commentary from Youk Chhang, the founder of the Cambodian Documentation Centre.
 2014-08-07T04:20:00+00:00 Milton Osborne Hun Sen has made it clear he would prefer that Cambodians to bury the past. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=015123aa-8df4-446c-ac37-9fa24bc521cf 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=015123aa-8df4-446c-ac37-9fa24bc521cf http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/07/Khmer-Rouge-tribunal-convicts-too-little-too-late.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=015123aa-8df4-446c-ac37-9fa24bc521cf http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/07/Myanmar-The-state-of-the-media.aspx Myanmar: The state of the media 2014-08-07T03:25:00+00:00 Rhys Thompson

My previous Interpreter post on media freedom in Myanmar examined the Unity Journal case, focusing on commonly ignored faults in the article and the illegality of the journalists' behaviour. It also noted the severity of the punishment the journalists received.

This piece takes a broader look at Myanmar's media landscape.

Since 2011 there have been many positive changes. The Government abolished pre-publication censorship and issued new 'daily' licences to local publications. It also extended visas for international journalists to three months and passed a new media law in early 2014. However, these changes need to be contrasted with later developments which challenge President Thein Sein's rhetoric and suggest the Government still remains uncomfortable with reducing its control of the media.

For example, the Government later reduced the length of foreign journalist visa stays to one month, which some believe was a response to dissatisfaction with foreign media coverage of violence in Rakhine State, though the Government denied this. Separately, a foreign journalist was deported after being accused of taking part in a demonstrations he was covering.

In 2013, a journalist was arrested and imprisoned for alleged trespassing and then, soon after, a second journalist was arrested and imprisoned for both trespassing and defamation. These and other incidents have resulted in concerns about political interference, especially when journalists have reported on sensitive issues such as corruption.

Some actions have also created concerns about official intimidation.

For example, the Police Special Branch recently conducted 'friendly discussions' with media outlets, seeking information on finances and distribution. There were suggestions this was part of a broader investigation into certain publications, but this was not confirmed. It is unclear whether the aim was intimidation, but since the Ministry of Information is responsible for the media, it would have been a more appropriate for it to have made the enquiries.

Most recently, the Bi Mon Te Ney journal published a story that repeated false claims made by (and attributed to) a local activist group stating that Aung San Suu Kyi and ethnic leaders had been appointed in an interim government that would serve until the next elections. In response, the Government arrested and charged the editors, claiming the article was misleading, defamatory and may undermine the stability of the state.

Taken together, these incidents raise questions about whether the Government knows, or cares, how its actions are perceived. It also raises questions about the Government's motivation: is it concerned with the sensitivity of the journalists' stories, the legality of their behaviour, or is it punishing them to send a message?

These incidents have also led to claims that the Government is deliberately targeting the media, which it denies, instead claiming it has to find a balance between the rights of journalists and reporting that is ethical and professional. It's a fair point, for while some journalists are experienced and properly supervised, many have not received high levels of journalistic training or appropriate supervision. The local media has acknowledged that some journalists do not always act professionally, while others have noted that there is a lot of 'irresponsible journalism' in Myanmar.

The previous military regime is largely responsible for this state of affairs. Myanmar's education system deteriorated under years of military rule, and strict censorship and oppressive tactics ensured the environment was not conducive to properly educating and training journalists.

Moreover, as the Unity Journal case attests, the current government's default response to what it considers poor journalism is prosecution, which has little educational or capacity-building value. Indeed, a continued hard-line approach could drive journalists out of mainstream media and into less regulated social media, with its lower editorial standards and quality control. It could also result in a less critical media, or as with the Unity Journal case, it could even drive publications out of business.

'Tough' responses don't provide any real guidance or assistance to the local media. The Government's new media law allows for mediation in some cases prior to legal action. Although mediation has been employed already, resulting in an out of court resolution and charges being dropped, it is not yet the default option. Infractions do need to be dealt with, especially when journalists break the law. But the Government risks losing international support and alienating the local media if it continues to prioritise harsh punishment over working with the media to resolve issues.

Recent reports suggest the Government is willing to change. In early August, President Thein Sein met with Myanmar's Interim Press Council and acknowledged it should play a larger role in mediating disputes, including prosecutions. The President also apparently instructed ministers to examine mechanisms to allow journalists better access to information, something that has been lacking.

While this appears to be a positive development, it is unclear whether it will work in practice. Until we see how the Government responds to future reports on sensitive topics such as those covered in the Unity Journal article, it will be hard to gauge whether its attitude has changed.

Photo by Flickr user Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.
 2014-08-07T03:25:00+00:00 Rhys Thompson The Myanmar Government's default action in media cases is punishment. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=134e5d09-115f-4049-bc37-43ad7d86ec30 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=134e5d09-115f-4049-bc37-43ad7d86ec30 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/07/Myanmar-The-state-of-the-media.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=134e5d09-115f-4049-bc37-43ad7d86ec30 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/07/The-best-World-War-I-movies-(part-3).aspx The best World War I movies (part 3) 2014-08-07T01:20:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
 Well, this has been quite an education for someone who has seen precisely one world War I movie, and a bad remake at that.

Below, the third bumper compilation of memorable World War I movies, as selected by you via Twitter, Disqus and email. Part 1 here and part 2 here:

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 2014-08-07T01:20:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=d8be29cb-a636-471f-a972-4ab04599f124 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=d8be29cb-a636-471f-a972-4ab04599f124 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/07/The-best-World-War-I-movies-(part-3).aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=d8be29cb-a636-471f-a972-4ab04599f124 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/07/A-note-to-Email-Digest-subscribers.aspx A note to Email Digest subscribers 2014-08-07T00:45:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
There's many a slip 'twixt the cup and the lip. And so it is for IT upgrades, when despite things working fine in testing, they don't work so well in practice.

On Tuesday I mentioned that Interpreter Email Digest subscribers were getting a new service with an upgraded format, but unfortunately we have had some teething problems, so subscribers are still getting the old Feedblitz service. We hope to make the switch early next week.
 2014-08-07T00:45:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen The switch to an upgraded Email Digest service has been delayed. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=d0eb7adc-ffcc-4a04-b94a-c368b699c040 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=d0eb7adc-ffcc-4a04-b94a-c368b699c040 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/07/A-note-to-Email-Digest-subscribers.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=d0eb7adc-ffcc-4a04-b94a-c368b699c040 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/07/Why-sea-based-nuclear-weapons-wont-stabilise-the-Indo-Pacific.aspx Why sea-based nuclear weapons won't stabilise the Indo-Pacific 2014-08-07T00:15:00+00:00 Bruno Tertrias
China, India and possibly Pakistan intend to deploy nuclear weapons at sea. Ultimately, such deployments may well have a stabilising effect — that is, they may reduce the risk of full-scale war and nuclear use. Sea-based nuclear weapons might, for instance, fit well with 'no-first-use' doctrines. They might also encourage reduced investment in more destabilising forces such as weapons fired from fixed sites, which are vulnerable and thus suited to a 'first strike'. And after all, sea-based nuclear weapons were widely seen as stabilising during the Cold War.

However, we should beware of applying simple retrospective visions of the US-Soviet balance to the Asian strategic scene. There are various reasons to doubt that deployment of sea-based nuclear weapons in Indo-Pacific Asia will be stabilising.

First, to state the obvious, there are three independent centres of nuclear power in Asia: China, India and Pakistan. And that is before counting the US and Russia, as well as North Korea, which one day could also want to base some of its weapons at sea. This fundamental element of the Asian nuclear scene will remain regardless of where weapons are based.

Second, although wanting the permanent presence of nuclear weapons at sea as a second-strike capability to guarantee their survival is arguably a stabilising factor, that may not be the driving motivation of all three countries. There seems to be strong interest in China and India, at least, in the symbolic value of strategic submarines, including for parochial or bureaucratic reasons. In addition, these two countries may prefer to avoid deploying nuclear-armed sea-launched ballistic missiles, in order to maximise political control over the weapons. It should also be added, regarding China, that the choice of a secure SSBN base on Hainan island, where berths are largely immune to a first strike, puts less pressure on Beijing to adopt a practice of continuous at-sea deterrence.

Third, deployment of nuclear weapons at sea in Indo-Pacific Asia does not only mean strategic missiles based on submarines.

It may include cruise missiles on vulnerable surface platforms. It will also probably include theatre systems designed to target naval forces, notably by Pakistan. This would not be a stabilising factor if command-and-control dilemmas for such systems are resolved in a way that dilutes the ability of national authorities to maintain the highest degree of political control over the weapons at all times. It should be remembered that probably the closest call for the use of nuclear weapons since 1945 concerned naval theatre weapons: it was in Cuba in October 1962.

Fourth, Indo-Pacific waters lend themselves less easily to the deployment of non-detectable submarines than was the case for the Cold War confrontation, when the Atlantic and the Pacific oceans offered more opportunities. This is especially true since India and Pakistan are likely to field only medium-range systems for some time, forcing their submarines to operate relatively close to the adversary's shores. It is also worth mentioning that unlikely accidents can happen, as was the case in 2009 when British and French SSBNs collided, and it took them a while to realise what had happened.

More generally, the transition period towards the deployment of operational SSBNs by China, India and Pakistan is likely to be long, tortuous and dangerous, for technical and budgetary reasons. What happens if one (or two) of the three countries manages to have a secure sea-based second-strike capability well before the others?

Simply put, it is impossible to argue that the deployment of sea-based nuclear weapons in Indo-Pacific Asia will be inherently stabilising.

The Lowy Institute gratefully acknowledges support from the John D and Catherine T MacArthur Foundation for this Interpreter debate, which is part of a broader research, dialogue and outreach project on strategic stability in Indo-Pacific Asia.

Image from Wikipedia Commons.
 2014-08-07T00:15:00+00:00 Bruno Tertrias We should beware of applying simple retrospective visions of the US-Soviet balance to the Asian strategic scene. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=b43f976a-3a94-4c3e-abe5-eff143935ca3 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=b43f976a-3a94-4c3e-abe5-eff143935ca3 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/07/Why-sea-based-nuclear-weapons-wont-stabilise-the-Indo-Pacific.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=b43f976a-3a94-4c3e-abe5-eff143935ca3 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/07/Indo-Pacific-security-links-ICBMs-charm-offensive-drone-sales-US-India-intelligence-sharing-Russian-subs-and-more.aspx Indo-Pacific security links: ICBMs,drone sales, intelligence sharing, Russian subs and more 2014-08-06T22:15:00+00:00 guest blogger – blank
By David Schaefer, an intern in the Lowy Institute's International Security program.The Indo-Pacific is a strategic system encompassing the Indian and Pacific oceans, reflecting the expanding interests and reach of China and India as well as the enduring role of the US. The Lowy Institute's International Security program presents a weekly selection of links illuminating the changing security picture in this increasingly connected super-region.

Citing surveillance imagery, Clint Richards warns that North Korea may soon be in possession of intercontinental ballistic missiles.

China has recently been conducting 'anti-missile tests', but there is suspicion this is just a cover for more satellite-killing weaponry.

With so much talk of military capabilities and diplomatic friction, have we seen the end of China's 'charm offensive'?

Given the enlarged role for special operations forces in US defence posture, RAND has a video presentation which argues that an American offer to China to jointly train with its special operations units could resonate with the People's Liberation Army.

In Japan, American defence manufacturers increasingly perceive a lucrative market for drone sales.

Following a visit from US Secretary of State John Kerry to India, the Hindustan Times reports that an intelligence sharing pact between the two countries is on the table for discussion.

Bucking the trend towards sanctioning Moscow, the Indian Navy is edging closer to acquiring Russian submarines while New Delhi's ambitious plans for developing more vessels are delayed.

The Lowy Institute International Security Program's work on Indo-Pacific security is supported by two grants from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation
 2014-08-06T22:15:00+00:00 guest blogger – blank The Indo-Pacific is a strategic system encompassing the Indian and Pacific oceans, reflecting the expanding interests and reach of China and India and the enduring US role. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=64450be3-b070-4587-88b1-cdafaa2edb21 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=64450be3-b070-4587-88b1-cdafaa2edb21 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/07/Indo-Pacific-security-links-ICBMs-charm-offensive-drone-sales-US-India-intelligence-sharing-Russian-subs-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=64450be3-b070-4587-88b1-cdafaa2edb21 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/06/How-big-CNOOC-oil-reserves.aspx How big are CNOOC's oil reserves? 2014-08-06T05:24:00+00:00 Julian Snelder

Back in early June, Geoff Miller asked: 'are resource constraints driving China's Asia's policy?' A recent stock exchange filing by China's state-owned oil company CNOOC may illuminate Chinese motivations.

Researchers have previously noted the significant long-term decline in CNOOC's domestic offshore oil reserve life. Based on updated information presented in the filing, and assuming CNOOC's forecast production rates, the company may run down its reserve life to barely six years by 2015*. This compares to almost 15 years in 2001, and it is well below the 10 years normally considered comfortable for an 'upstream' oil exploration company.

CNOOC has traditionally been Beijing's offshore monopoly producer, so the condition of CNOOC is critical to China's future energy strategy. CNOOC is also the owner and operator of the HYSY-981 oil rig which, until recently, was drilling in contested waters in the South China Sea, although CNPC, a less experienced offshore operator, may have usurped CNOOC's leadership of this expedition, possibly for internal political purposes.

To be clear, one data point cannot show a definitive picture of either China's offshore hydrocarbon situation or its foreign policy intent. But it is revealing enough to make a debate worthwhile.

Some caveats: first, estimating oil and gas reserves is a notoriously tricky business, so difficult that most oil companies bring in outside specialists to verify what they are sitting on. In the footnotes of its stock exchange filing, CNOOC states that it is relying more on internal assessments rather than these foreign consultants; this may or may not be significant. Second, the SEC filing method allows only those oil fields planned for production within five years to be counted in reserves. That is conservative, and there are other, more generous, measures used in the industry such as the 3P system. Third, as noted above, because CNOOC intends to accelerate offshore China production by 20% next year, this mathematically reduces apparent reserve life. And fourth, CNOOC is looking further afield and has invested in foreign properties such as Canada's Nexen.

What is beyond dispute is that historically, CNOOC has not replaced its stated reserves sufficiently quickly to offset its production increases. CNOOC has been investing heavily, but its prospects have disappointed. True, there may be more oil and gas that CNOOC is developing and is not yet visible. But even if HYSY-981 strikes oil in the South China Sea, it may take years to turn into a full-fledged production platform. Outsiders have little more than the SEC filing to judge what resource trajectory CNOOC really faces.

And that is the interesting question here. Beijing takes a strategic view of energy security (as it should) and it views oil reserve information as sensitive. Beijing often takes a minimalist approach to disclosure; its tradition is to yield information and concessions reluctantly. Whatever is not deliberately disclosed, such as the SEC filings, will be considered a 'state secret.'

Moreover, whenever possible China's state oil companies keep things internal rather than outsourcing to private and foreign oilfield service firms and international consultants. This is becoming increasingly challenging for the state behemoths because they require ever-growing efficiency and specialisation, but there remains a strong will to develop indigenous and in-house technologies. No multinational contractors are manning the HYSY-981 platform; it is a Chinese-run show. Beijing is wary of privatisation in the upstream oil sector because it fears giving away too much. So while we are witnessing reform of state-owned enterprises such as in Sinopec's downstream division, we won't see a repetition of the dreaded post-Soviet 'reform' experience where carpet-baggers snapped up oilfields on the cheap.

Finally, we know that CNOOC itself may view the South China Sea as a treasure of unimaginable scale, reportedly some 125 billion barrels in potential resources. This assessment may be vastly exaggerated; although the sea is considered to be geologically promising, the contested waters generally are not. As one recent commentary put it, 'it's not about the oil, it really is about the tiny rocks.' But whether the Chinese see this as a matter of sovereignty or resources, they are expanding their offshore fleet.

In summary, we can only glimpse an incomplete picture of China's oil security, but the small window we have shows a rapidly depleting resource base. This must be concerning to policymakers and likely will spur greater efforts in domestic development (such as shale gas and other unconventional sources) as well as offshore prospecting. What we are seeing in the South China Sea may be the early manifestation of what Geoff Miller calls 'a much harsher view' of Beijing's energy security dilemma.

* For interested readers, this figure can be calculated using the 1.69 billion of proven crude and liquid reserves on p.29 of the filing, 2013's daily production rate of 610,000 barrels (p.43), and assuming 20% higher production in 2015 with 100% incremental reserve replacement rate.
 2014-08-06T05:24:00+00:00 Julian Snelder A recent SEC filing provides a glimpse into China's offshore oil reserves. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=bf3f3c63-2d4a-44bb-8e0f-90ce161cf7a6 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=bf3f3c63-2d4a-44bb-8e0f-90ce161cf7a6 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/06/How-big-CNOOC-oil-reserves.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=bf3f3c63-2d4a-44bb-8e0f-90ce161cf7a6 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/06/Obama-talks-to-The-Economist.aspx Obama talks to The Economist 2014-08-06T04:04:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
Some interesting quotes from a wide-ranging interview. On Asia:

Part of what Asia was able to do was not simply open up markets to the West for cheaper goods, it was also able to foster homegrown businesses in Asia with regional markets that gave an opportunity for businesses to get better, to develop better products, to in some ways avoid competition on the global scale right away. Essentially, you can operate off-Broadway before you open the show on Broadway.

Hmmm, is that an accurate portrayal of Asia's economic miracle? I'm not so sure.

On China:

One thing I will say about China, though, is you also have to be pretty firm with them, because they will push as hard as they can until they meet resistance. They're not sentimental, and they are not interested in abstractions. And so simple appeals to international norms are insufficient. There have to be mechanisms both to be tough with them when we think that they're breaching international norms, but also to show them the potential benefits over the long term. And what is true for China then becomes an analogy for many of the other emerging markets.

On Russia:

Russia doesn't make anything. Immigrants aren't rushing to Moscow in search of opportunity. The life expectancy of the Russian male is around 60 years old. The population is shrinking. And so we have to respond with resolve in what are effectively regional challenges that Russia presents. We have to make sure that they don't escalate where suddenly nuclear weapons are back in the discussion of foreign policy. And as long as we do that, then I think history is on our side.

Now this one is definitely not true.
 2014-08-06T04:04:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen Is Obama bending the truth in this interview? http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=9331022d-d1fc-49e6-8b55-efc4dd2040ec 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=9331022d-d1fc-49e6-8b55-efc4dd2040ec http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/06/Obama-talks-to-The-Economist.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=9331022d-d1fc-49e6-8b55-efc4dd2040ec http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/06/The-best-World-War-I-movies-part-2.aspx The best World War I movies (part 2) 2014-08-06T03:06:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
Plenty more ideas have come through since I called for your nominations yesterday.

Here's the first batch, below is part 2, with part 3 still to come. Thanks to all those who have tweeted, disqused and emailed, and keep them coming:

[youtube:R4aZNuCB2c0]

[youtube:zT5GJ0It9X4]

[youtube:8tYFZywQbQw]

[youtube:QhueHIXbTF4]

[youtube:bBPJiukZRMk]

[youtube:B-He8XWlRL8]
 2014-08-06T03:06:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen More reader nominations for the best films about the Great War. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=93791ea3-806d-44c7-b641-e3e713443667 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=93791ea3-806d-44c7-b641-e3e713443667 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/06/The-best-World-War-I-movies-part-2.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=93791ea3-806d-44c7-b641-e3e713443667 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/06/Can-Moscow-drive-a-wedge-between-Tokyo-and-Washington.aspx Can Moscow drive a wedge between Tokyo and Washington? 2014-08-06T01:32:00+00:00 Vaughan Winterbottom

Japan imposed limited new financial sanctions yesterday on 40 individuals and two groups implicated in Russia's actions in Crimea and Eastern Ukraine. The sanctions attempted to walk a tightrope between appeasing the US and keeping alive hopes of settling a nearly seven decade-old territorial dispute with Russia, but it looks like Moscow has pushed Tokyo off the tightrope.

Prior to the Ukraine crisis, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe had struck a conciliatory tone with Vladimir Putin in the hope of boosting ties and winning concessions from the Russian president on the sovereignty of three islands and a group of islets a stone's throw off Japan's north coast. The islands, which Tokyo refers to as the Northern Territories and Russia calls the Kurils, were occupied by the Soviet Union in 1945 and have been in Moscow's hands ever since.

According to Japanese media, Russia's Foreign Ministry announced after Japan's sanctions statement that it was postponing a meeting scheduled for late August between the two countries' deputy foreign ministers, during which the territorial dispute was to be discussed. A visit by Russian President Vladimir Putin to Japan, first proposed by Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at a leader's meet during February's Sochi Olympics, now looks in doubt.

Russia's postponement of the August dialogue shows that it is willing to use the dispute to drive a wedge between Washington and Tokyo.

In some respects, Moscow had already succeeded: Japanese sanctions were less severe than those announced by the US late last month, and analysts pointed to the wording used by Japanese politicians suggesting Tokyo was not overly enthusiastic about imposing them. Russian media came to the same conclusion, with RIA Novosti calling them 'just for show' (Russian).

But should international sanctions continue to be ratcheted up, it looks unlikely that Tokyo will stray too far from the US position as it seeks stronger commitment from its ally in its dispute with China over the Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands. Japan's 2014 Defence White Paper, released yesterday, castigated China for its 'dangerous acts' over the islands, while also using language preferred by the US to describe the dispute.

US support in the war of words against China or the promise of future negotiations with Russia over the Kuril Islands? The choice is an obvious one for Mr Abe, despite the nationalistic pride he may have to swallow in not being the Japanese Prime Minister that finally brought the islands home.

In the meantime, economic ties between Japan and Russia have been improving just fine, despite the territorial dispute. China is again a factor. Russia wants to entice Japanese investment capital and energy technology to develop its Far East and counter China's monopolistic buying position on the region's natural resources. This suits Japan as it seeks out alternative sources of energy in the post-Fukushima era and hedges against geopolitical risk in the Middle East. Joint energy projects are already underway. So far, there's been no talk from Moscow of canceling them. And why would it? Doing so would cut off a valuable future energy export market at a time when Europe is looking to wean itself off Russian pipelines.
 2014-08-06T01:32:00+00:00 Vaughan Winterbottom Moscow is using the Kuril Islands dispute to force Tokyo to soften its position on Ukraine sanctions. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=e1380476-3fb1-47dd-a058-046ad1874269 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=e1380476-3fb1-47dd-a058-046ad1874269 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/06/Can-Moscow-drive-a-wedge-between-Tokyo-and-Washington.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=e1380476-3fb1-47dd-a058-046ad1874269 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/06/Sea-based-nuclear-weapons-in-Asia-Stabiliser-or-menace.aspx Sea-based nuclear weapons in Asia: Stabiliser or menace? 2014-08-05T23:55:00+00:00 Rory Medcalf
On this day in 1945, the first nuclear weapon was used in conflict, with devastating consequences for the people of Hiroshima. In Asia today, nuclear weapons remain part of the strategic reality, for better or worse.

But calculations about nuclear armaments in the region may be changing, notably with the introduction of Chinese and Indian submarine-launched nuclear weapons. This could have profound implications for whether nuclear weapons continue to help keep the peace or become instruments of instability and catastrophic escalation.

Often, strategic analysts and policymakers consider nuclear deterrence as somewhat separate from broader strategic and economic change. This has been all too apparent in the grand maritime region of Indo-Pacific Asia, where economic growth has been accompanied by tensions at sea, military modernisation and growing strategic differences among the powers.

Now, changes in the region are beginning to challenge traditional deterrence dynamics. Throughout the next decade, sea-based nuclear-weapon delivery platforms are set to proliferate in the Indo-Pacific, with China reportedly due to conduct its first at-sea nuclear deterrence patrol sometime this year, India readying for sea-trials of its first nuclear ballistic missile submarine, and even potential Pakistani interest in putting nuclear arms to sea.

Advocates of sea-based nuclear weapons see these fleets as providing stability because of their relative invulnerability to surprise attack. This is meant to provide a secure 'second strike' capability, ensuring that nuclear deterrence is credible and thus successful at preventing war.

But the picture is murky.

The implications of new sea-based nuclear weapons for deterrence, stability or instability will not be determined by those weapons systems alone. Investment in other capabilities like ballistic missile defences, anti-submarine warfare (including nuclear-powered attack submarines) and hypersonic missiles could complicate the picture. And much will depend on doctrines, the professionalism of personnel, and matters of perception and communication.

The nexus between new platforms, the factors driving their introduction and broader strategic realities raises the critical question of strategic stability. Will these new platforms, on balance, add to long-term stability in the region, greatly reducing the incentives for war or escalation, or will they contribute to the risks of crisis, arms races and coercion?

Will the deployment of an assured second-strike capability by India and China in the coming years lead to recognition of mutual vulnerability between them and also between China and the US? Or will sea-based nuclear weapon delivery platforms add to already heightened maritime tensions and risk? How will the shifting dynamics of nuclear deterrence interact with conventional force postures in the region? Are there stability-enhancing lessons to learn from the Cold War experience of the established sea-based nuclear powers?

In the weeks ahead, The Interpreter will host an international online debate to help answer these critically important questions. To open the debate, we have invited contributions from four leading scholars of strategy, maritime security and nuclear deterrence: Bruno Tertrais of the Fondation pour la Recherche Stratégique, Ravi N Ganesh of Asia Centre Bangalore, Wu Riqiang of Renmin University of China and Peter Dombrowski of the US Naval War College.

These initial posts will be followed by contributions from a range of security scholars and practitioners, and there will also be opportunity for the original contributors to reply and expand upon their arguments. Interpreter readers are also invited to join the conversation through the comments section, with the best comments to be featured in special posts. I hope the discussion, like our debate some years ago on extended nuclear deterrence, will prove lively, informative and of genuine value to policymakers.

Most of all, I hope it will help illuminate the way to measures that might minimise the risk that nuclear weapons will ever be used again.

The Lowy Institute gratefully acknowledges support from the John D and Catherine T MacArthur Foundation for this Interpreter debate, which is part of a broader research, dialogue and outreach project on strategic stability in Indo-Pacific Asia.

Image courtesy of Wikipedia.
 2014-08-05T23:55:00+00:00 Rory Medcalf Introducing a new Interpreter debate series on sea-based nuclear deterrence in Asia. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=3f7df0a0-2645-4fe6-bad1-73e2922afa0f 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=3f7df0a0-2645-4fe6-bad1-73e2922afa0f http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/06/Sea-based-nuclear-weapons-in-Asia-Stabiliser-or-menace.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=3f7df0a0-2645-4fe6-bad1-73e2922afa0f http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/06/China-links-Anti-graft-Abe-Xi-patriotism-rule-of-law-Islam-Africa-oil-rigs-fishing-and-more.aspx China links: Anti-graft, Abe-Xi, patriotism, rule of law, Islam, Africa, oil rigs and more 2014-08-05T22:24:00+00:00 Dirk van der Kley

Rumours are flying that former Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda may have met Chinese President Xi Jinping on a secret visit to China. Meanwhile, Japan and China are reportedly seeking to hold an Abe-Xi meeting at APEC in November.

The ministry of education is proposing to remove the clause that students 'should love the Communist Party of China' from its code of conduct, in favour of more historical and cultural forms of patriotism.

China, America and a new Cold War in Africa.

Latest Sinica podcast on the rule of law in China.

China is building more offshore oil rigs.

Reuters on the role of economics and satellites in promoting Chinese fishing in the South China Sea.

The Economist asks is anti-graft anti-growth? This anecdote is too good to leave out:

Not that the anti-graft campaign is necessarily encouraging open and transparent behaviour. In Sihong county in Jiangsu province this month, authorities panicked when they heard that inspectors from the central government were coming. Having illegally converted farmland into highways, the bureaucrats carted in lorryloads of soil overnight to cover them up. Photos of the buried roads, now planted with soyabeans, have since become something of a hit around the country.

Lots of great stuff in the latest China Leadership Monitor.

The top 1% has one-third of China's wealth.

It seems the more the Government tries to curb wearing of the veil in Xinjiang, the more popular it becomes. Jeremy Page argues that this is part of a growing wave of conservative Islam in China's west.

The Chinese Government reported that about 100 people died in violence in Xinjiang this week, including the gunning down of 59 'terrorists'.

Also on Xinjiang, here's a photo of officials handing out some of the 300 million rmb allocated in rewards for tip-offs in Xinjiang (h/t @ChuBailiang):

 2014-08-05T22:24:00+00:00 Dirk van der Kley Links to this week's best China reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=fd957a48-e7c1-488b-b770-93afc2513910 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=fd957a48-e7c1-488b-b770-93afc2513910 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/06/China-links-Anti-graft-Abe-Xi-patriotism-rule-of-law-Islam-Africa-oil-rigs-fishing-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=fd957a48-e7c1-488b-b770-93afc2513910 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/05/best-World-War-I-movies.aspx The best World War I movies 2014-08-05T05:49:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
Below are clips from movies suggested by you in response to my request earlier today for your favourite World War I movies. It's notable that there has not been a huge variety in your responses, and in fact famed director Peter Jackson has said 'It's interesting how few films there have been about World War I'.

[youtube:KRrr-CDXijs]

[youtube:Z0Ankn-AzC4]

[youtube:a3tuBFHuYV4]

[youtube:nmDA60X-f_A]

[youtube:aiObc2XmVqw]

[youtube:oDkbIMuNGV8]

And last, here's Regeneration, from 1997. Not a clip, but the entire movie:

[youtube:zgCyxRs5rvc]

 2014-08-05T05:49:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen Interpreter readers nominate their favourite films about the Great War. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=b032b61b-c156-4162-b6e4-061962691111 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=b032b61b-c156-4162-b6e4-061962691111 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/05/best-World-War-I-movies.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=b032b61b-c156-4162-b6e4-061962691111 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/05/Military-and-strategy-links-Chinas-choices-forecasting-war-and-good-weapons-turned-bad.aspx Military & strategy links: China's choices, forecasting war, good weapons turned bad and more 2014-08-05T03:30:00+00:00 Matthew Hill

Andrew Phillips evaluates China's choices with respect to Asia's regional order: challenge, subvert, or 'go west'?

Nautilus explores the legacy of Lewis Fry Richardson's attempts to forecast conflict — the birth of the quantitative study of conflict.

David Axe talks to David Ward about good weapons programs turned expensive, inefficient, and just plain bad.

Robert Farley questions the extent to which Beijing should focus on reorganising its air power capabilities.

Here's a good summary of what's at stake with respect to increasing US-Africa security cooperation.

Paul Schere ponders how the US might lose its superiority in military robotics.

Arms Control Wonk has an insightful podcast discussing US accusations of Russia's violation of the INF treaty, and the specifics of the weapons and politics involved.

Finally, the Telegraph has a fascinating set of photos of soldiers' kit throughout the ages.

 2014-08-05T03:30:00+00:00 Matthew Hill Links to the week's best military and strategy reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=1461a74c-e755-4d86-90d6-f54d8fc304ca 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=1461a74c-e755-4d86-90d6-f54d8fc304ca http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/05/Military-and-strategy-links-Chinas-choices-forecasting-war-and-good-weapons-turned-bad.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=1461a74c-e755-4d86-90d6-f54d8fc304ca http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/05/BNP-Paribas-fine-is-G20s-dollar-dilemma.aspx BNP Paribas fine is G20's dollar dilemma 2014-08-05T02:05:00+00:00 Hugh Jorgensen
There are many countries which do not much like the central role of the US dollar. But while they generally (and grudgingly) agree that there is not much to be done about it for now, a punishment recently meted out by US financial regulators against BNP Paribas (BNPP) has incensed European leaders into calling for the dollar, and its role in the application of bank fines, to be an item of discussion at the G20 Brisbane Summit. This is a tricky issue, and whether it has enough momentum among the entire G20 to make it to Brisbane is debatable, but if it does, it will be divisive.

The cause of the most recent spat relates to penalties imposed on BNPP, a French multinational and the world's fourth largest bank, with some US$1.8 trillion of assets on its books. At first glance, it is hard to see why the French Government would be interested in coming to the defence of BNPP. In June it became the first ever global bank to submit a guilty plea to the US Department of Justice for engaging in 'large-scale, systematic violations of U.S. economic sanctions'. As the DoJ's press release explains, over a period of eight years, BNPP 'unlawfully open(ed) the doors of the U.S. financial market to...Sudan, Iran, and Cuba...as well as to individuals and groups specifically identified and designated by the U.S. government as being subject to sanctions'.

The DoJ placed the amount of money illegally shifted through the US financial system over a period of eight years at around $8.8 billion. BNPP did not have much of a leg to stand on in its defence either, with the revelation that one senior compliance officer wrote to his colleagues in 2007 that their Sudanese clients 'play a pivotal role in the support of the Sudanese government which...has hosted Osama Bin Laden and refuses the United Nations intervention in Darfur'. And so, BNPP earned itself a US$8.9 billion fine, was forced to fire twelve employees, and has been barred from directly clearing dollar transactions through its oil-and-gas-trade-finance departments based in key financial centres throughout the world.

Although the US$9 billion fine is one of the DoJ's largest ever, it is the last of these three punishments that has particularly raised the ire of not only the French Government but also its German, British and Italian counterparts.

While the French have accepted BNPP's guilt, they have taken issue with what they see as America's exploitation of the central role of the US dollar by blacklisting BNPP's oil-and-gas divisions from USD clearing houses. Of the judgement, Francois Hollande pointedly stated 'I am conscious of the risks of totally disproportionate, unfair sanctions, that could have economic and financial consequences for the whole of the euro zone...there are other banks that could also be targeted, creating a risk and a doubt over the solidity of the European financial system'. Indeed, Societe Generale, Credit Agricole and Deutsche Bank are all believed to be in line for DoJ investigation on similar sanction-breaking grounds.

In essence, the European leaders are concerned about the precedent that might be set by the DoJ's ruling. Global banks rely upon access to USD clearing houses to complete international payments on behalf of their clients. If an Indian importer wants to buy goods from Russia, it is easier for both parties to complete the transaction in US dollars than rupees or rubles. Accordingly, of the US$5 trillion that is traded every day on foreign exchange markets, the US dollar features in 87% of transactions.

While the 'exorbitant privilege' US companies receive from rarely having to engage in foreign exchange swaps is generally exaggerated, this new DoJ ruling has opened up a new can of worms about the US dollar. BNPP broke US law, sure, but it did not break any laws in France or Europe, and the USD transactions it would otherwise now be conducting through its newly black-listed oil and gas divisions no longer involve sanctioned countries or companies (assuming BNPP sticks to its word). Whatever the merits of the scale of the fine (which the French also dispute), it is entirely another to impose penalties that actually impede banks from engaging in market-making activity.

As Michael Spence wrote recently: 'The cross-border flows of goods, information, people, and capital that are (the global economy's) lifeblood rely on a threshold level of safety, stability, and predictability.' Yet any unintended consequences from denying the world's largest banks access to USD clearing houses would constitute a negative spillover, and could run foul of the G20's commitment at Pittsburgh to promote a more integrated global financial system. BNPP is clearly guilty of a crime, but doubts around the nature of the response, and divergence between EU and US financial regulators on how to impose bank fines, means the G20 might now be forced into juggling one more item at Brisbane.
 2014-08-05T02:05:00+00:00 Hugh Jorgensen The US Justice Department's punishment of BNP Paribas has Europe questioning the centrality of the US dollar. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=e12534ae-4810-44f4-b945-c088bc6d7d00 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=e12534ae-4810-44f4-b945-c088bc6d7d00 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/05/BNP-Paribas-fine-is-G20s-dollar-dilemma.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=e12534ae-4810-44f4-b945-c088bc6d7d00 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/05/Film-trailer-Testament-of-Youth.aspx Film trailer: Testament of Youth 2014-08-05T01:15:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
I guess it can't be a coincidence that this trailer is released right on the 100th anniversary of the start of World War I, although the release date for the film is not yet clear.

[youtube:e3e2nNNJ7-4]

This trailer raises a broader question in my mind: what are the great films about World War I?

I was raised on epic World War II movies (off the top of my head: Patton, The Big Red One, Saving Private Ryan, A Bridge Too Far, The Thin Red Line, Bridge over the River Kwai) but the Great War? I sat through All Quiet on the Western Front when I was in high school (the 1979 version with Ernest Borgnine — weird), but I really can't think of any prominent World War I movies, let alone great ones.

Leave your nominations in the comments thread or send them to email@example.com.

UPDATE: See suggestions in the comments thread and on Twitter (including Lawrence of Arabia, which is pretty bleeding obvious, though I guess I was thinking of 'trench' movies).

(H/t Slashfilm.)
 2014-08-05T01:15:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen What are the best films about World War I? We want to hear from you. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=47089df0-2d90-41f7-877b-dc66692e5730 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=47089df0-2d90-41f7-877b-dc66692e5730 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/05/Film-trailer-Testament-of-Youth.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=47089df0-2d90-41f7-877b-dc66692e5730 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/05/Southeast-Asia-Links-Asia-in-the-Arctic-drug-resistant-malaria-ISIS-in-Indonesia-Thailands-military-legislature.aspx Southeast Asia links: Asia in the Arctic, drug-resistant malaria, ISIS in Indonesia and more 2014-08-04T22:45:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan

A new and worrying Thailand-Myanmar axis is emerging between military leaders, says Pavin Chachavalpongpun.

An NBR Asia Policy Roundtable takes a look at Asia in the race for the Arctic, including an interesting essay on Singapore's Arctic pursuits by Ian Storey.

The Thai Junta's new legislature of 200 appointed members is dominated by the military, as explained by Bangkok Pundit. Saksith Saiyasombut took a look through an excellent infograph.

Thailand and China will be linked with two high-speed rail lines by 2021 in a long anticipated US$23 billion deal signed by the Thai junta this week.

Drug-resistant malaria is spreading through Southeast Asia, according to a new paper in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Japan gifted Vietnam six maritime patrol vessels worth US$5million this week.

An insightful paper by Gregory Poling of CSIS looked at recent trends in the South China Sea and US foreign policy and the options for policymakers.

Thanakha, Myanmar's traditional face balm, is under threat from modern cosmetics.

Indonesia debates the merits of stripping ISIS supporters of citizenship after another online recruitment video surfaced.

Here's one of five fascinating short films of an interfaith project in Myanmar. 'Portraits of Diversity' aims to show different aspects of religion and society in the country. Here's a look at the daily life of a Mandalay monk, Venerable Tayzar Dipati:

[vimeo:100879117]
 2014-08-04T22:45:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan Links to this week's best Southeast Asia reading. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=0e94a591-99c2-4b2e-bd32-aad8bbf122fb 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=0e94a591-99c2-4b2e-bd32-aad8bbf122fb http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/05/Southeast-Asia-Links-Asia-in-the-Arctic-drug-resistant-malaria-ISIS-in-Indonesia-Thailands-military-legislature.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=0e94a591-99c2-4b2e-bd32-aad8bbf122fb http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/05/New-format-for-The-Interpreters-email-digest.aspx New format for The Interpreter's email digest 2014-08-04T22:15:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen

About 3000 Interpreter readers receive either a daily or weekly email from us with links to our latest posts. Until yesterday we used Feedblitz for this service, but from today we are doing it ourselves via the Lowy Institute's recently revamped database.

The only difference subscribers will notice is that the email will be formatted slightly differently. You will still get headlines, links and short descriptions of every post from the last 24 hours or seven days in a new, easy-to-scan format, though you will no longer see the full text of the article in the email.

Unfortunately, we're not away to the cleanest of starts. It seems the links are broken in the email sent out to subscribers this morning. A thousand apologies; we are investigating.

If you'd like to subscribe to the email digest service, look at the right-hand column of our page for the 'Keep up to date' box, enter your email address and click on either the 'Daily Digest' or 'Weekly Digest' button.
 2014-08-04T22:15:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen Email digest subscribers will notice a slight change in format. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=176a30aa-1574-438a-a84a-28310d8488f7 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=176a30aa-1574-438a-a84a-28310d8488f7 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/05/New-format-for-The-Interpreters-email-digest.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=176a30aa-1574-438a-a84a-28310d8488f7 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/04/Is-great-power-war-still-possible-Reflections-on-World-War-I.aspx Is great-power war still possible? Reflections on World War I 2014-08-04T11:14:00+00:00 Rory Medcalf

A hundred years since the beginning of World War I, the guns of August 1914 are still echoing. Right now it's useful sport among strategic analysts and historians to pick the similarities and differences between the world today and on the eve of the First World War. The worrying state of global geopolitics is leading many to ponder: could it happen again? Is devastating war between powerful states really a thing of the past?

Here are a few thoughts from my own checklist of what to watch for when we consider the possibility of interstate war in today's world. It's hard to improve on this thoughtful recent piece by Graham Allison, but my assessment differs in a few places, notably on the roles of technology, alliances, diplomacy and sheer folly. On balance, though, I tend to reach the same conclusion: 'just because war is irrational, does not make it unthinkable'.

Interdependence versus mistrust

This issue has been done rather to death, and this essay by Oriana Mastro reminds us why economic and financial enmeshment across today's Indo-Pacific Asia need not mean automatic peace, just as the mutually reinforcing aspects of Anglo-German prosperity failed to stop catastrophe in 1914. The markets did not see that one coming, so why (as Niall Ferguson reminds us) should they be any more enlightened now?

Unintended and unexpected consequences

In 1914, a few supremely unlucky gunshots by a troubled Serbian youth began the cascade to catastrophic war. The much greater interdependence and complexity of today's joined-up world means that a disruptive event – such as an assassination or annexation — could have consequences even harder to predict and manage, no matter how good our real-time information.

Deficient diplomacy

Improvements in the methods of interstate relations have not kept pace with the speed or complexity of today's international environment. Sure, as Graham Allison suggests, things are better now because 'intelligence systems provide near real-time information' to help make decisions in a crisis. Moreover, leaders 'can talk directly to one another' by phone or videoconference. In 1914, on the other hand, he notes that governments 'sent cables to ambassadors who transmitted messages to foreign offices, increasing the chances of miscommunication'.

The sad secret of 21st century diplomacy, however, is that a lot of the time it still works likes that, even during crises. Consider the lack of operational hotlines between, say, China and Japan or even China and the US; or the potential for mischief or miscommunication. A telephone call can only help avert crisis if both sides are willing at least to talk. And while crisis and disaster can strike suddenly, even the most urgent and accomplished multilateral diplomacy – like the recent UN Security Council resolution on flight MH17 – takes precious days.

Alliances

Alliances are easy to blame for the 'chain-gang' effect that drew so many countries into what began as a Balkan war. But a focus on the entangling potential of alliances in 1914 can overlook their stabilising value in 2014. It's hard to see how a Japan allied to the US would be a more volatile actor in the Asian strategic order than one anxiously alone.

Media

Plenty has been made of the role of propaganda in fanning misinformation, hate and nationalism before and during World War I. But it is worth pausing before we assume that rapid access to information is somehow breaking down barriers by raising awareness of how much we all have to lose from conflict. Social media is proving a prime vehicle for dangerous forms of nationalism and confrontation-mongering in Asia, Europe and the Middle East. And if you've seen Moscow's glitzy RT channel lately, you will (hopefully) know that state-sponsored propaganda is proliferating in shameless new forms.

Technology and speed

While diplomacy still often moves at a 20th or even 19th century pace, military technology has streaked ahead, dramatically compressing the time for sensible decision-making during a crisis. An incident at sea or in the air over contested Asian waters would be over in minutes, perhaps seconds. Frontline commanders and political leaders would have scant time to weigh the risks of striking first against those of restraint. By today's measures, the fateful month following the assassination in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914 was a leisurely slide to disaster. In a present-day contingency, the first hours would be crucial, not least for shaping the clash of narratives.

1914 or 1941

A centenary is a neat frame of reference, but an artificial one: there is no intrinsic reason why 1914 should be a better guide to the future of conflict-management than, say, 1939, 1962, or even 1814. In an Asian context, where China's strategic decision-making remains difficult for outsiders to comprehend, perhaps 1941 rather than 1914 may be the historical analogy most worth studying. That was the year that the deeply dysfunctional decision-making of the Japanese military and cabinet led to Japan's attack on the US and the madness of a war that key Japanese players privately believed they could not win.

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
 2014-08-04T11:14:00+00:00 Rory Medcalf A checklist of what to watch for when considering the possibility of interstate war in today's world. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=2e8a476b-3354-48d3-a7d1-c5cfba324235 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=2e8a476b-3354-48d3-a7d1-c5cfba324235 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/04/Is-great-power-war-still-possible-Reflections-on-World-War-I.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=2e8a476b-3354-48d3-a7d1-c5cfba324235 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/04/Russia-China-salami-tactics.aspx Russia, China and the risk of 'salami tactics' 2014-08-04T06:20:00+00:00 Matthew Hill
[youtube:IX_d_vMKswE]

The MH-17 tragedy and Moscow's behaviour in Ukraine underscore the risks of the strategies revisionist powers are deploying to subvert the status quo from Eastern Europe to the South China Sea. While these strategies are diverse in their methods and objectives, they are marked by the same central assumption: so long as the stakes are escalated gradually and without overt use of force by the revanchist state, the leading democratic powers will remain irresolute in defence of distant interests.

This assumption, however, is based on a misreading of how democratic politics interacts with security dynamics, and risks breeding a false confidence among rising powers that ignores the unnerving rapidity with which democracies can shift their security perceptions and strategic direction.

The past year has seen commentators decry the apparent success of revisionist powers in using 'salami tactics' (see Yes, Prime Minister clip above) to challenge the status quo enjoyed by Western democracies. Iterative extensions of territorial claims and increased support for proxy actors to subvert existing authority serve to gradually undercut previously frozen disputes without providing Western states an easy target in response.

Rising powers have come to perceive — correctly, in the short run — that pluralism renders democracies conflict-averse. Citizens tend to be apathetic towards distant events which appear to have little relevance to their lives. For democratic leaders, the political costs of firm action thus tend to stymie firm strategy. Such situations are clearly dangerous for democracies, since they frustrate the ability of political leaders to decisively reorient strategy to deter further aggression from revanchist powers.

Yet the situation is equally dangerous for revisionist states.

Initial successes can encourage revisionist leaders to conflate apathy among democratic publics with an unwillingness to react to perceived security threats. In doing so, they may walk blindly into actions which cross a line. Where is this line? It is difficult to specify because of the subjective nature of threat perceptions and the complex social dynamics of mass politics. Many transgressions may have no political effect, before one event interacts with a society's political imagination to generate a step-change in the collective worldview.

For example, Germany misjudged US isolationist sentiment prior to 1917 as an aversion to war. Similarly, many in Germany were convinced that London lacked the will to follow through on its commitments to Poland in 1939. Four decades on, Argentina assumed that post-imperial Britain lacked the spine to challenge a fait accompli in the Falklands. Then in 1990, Iraq vastly underestimated the will of Washington to defend its interests in the deserts of Kuwait.

So the risk is not that the developed democracies will march into conflict with Russia or China after some predictable accumulation of provocations. Rather, the risk lies in the fact that the complex nature of democratic popular sentiment means we cannot effectively judge the political ramifications of any given security event until we observe the way it merges with or diverts from the strategic narrative.

The MH17 tragedy may or may not galvanize sufficient political will in democratic states to change the political calculus in Europe. But who is to say how government, media, and social perceptions will evolve, and how it will affect calls for action in, say, Britain and the Netherlands, but also attitudes towards Russia in bordering states such as Finland and Sweden which are weighing the prospects of NATO affiliation? Moreover, if Putin continues his efforts to destabilise eastern Ukraine, MH17 is unlikely to be the last tragedy with collateral damage to the West. Another such shock could tip the balance of Atlantic sentiment.

In East Asia, the risks generated by the behaviour of the revisionist power are similar, though you wouldn't think so to read much of the commentary. Concerns are rife regarding Washington's willingness to defend its strategic position in the face of Beijing's creeping territorial aggression. Hindsight bias is strong here: there is a tendency to derive the likelihood of US reaction to the next Chinese action from its past performance. Given Washington's timid response to Chinese coercion towards the Philippines and Vietnam, commentators argue that US defence commitments to the region are in doubt.

But assessments of Washington's resolve cannot be reduced to a sum of its previous actions. Indeed, awareness of this fact is what has thus far constrained Beijing's coercion.

The risk is that out of accident, hubris, or domestic political pressure Beijing continues to escalate confrontation in the region to the point that it results in a sustained exchange of fire and loss of life at sea between China and its neighbours, especially Japan.

Should this occur, the shift in political, economic, and media atmosphere in the US would likely render inaction impossible. The disruption to regional trade driven by skyrocketing insurance rates and fuel costs, the reverberating question of epochal challenge to US global leadership, and nationalist pressures from Congress could produce a shock to the security perceptions of the US public, constraining the president's latitude dramatically. Even if the Administration preferred to stay clear of such a conflict, the democratic context is likely to demand from the White House robust action to constrain Beijing's maritime influence.

That crises have unpredictable effects on public sentiment in democracies isn't a startling revelation. But it is one that revisionist powers need to grasp as they fray the boundaries of the strategic status quo.
 2014-08-04T06:20:00+00:00 Matthew Hill Revisionist powers are underestimating the resolve of democratic states, which tend to stand firm at unpredictable moments. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=8cb3bcba-137b-47ca-b6c1-3fa9bd60f0ae 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=8cb3bcba-137b-47ca-b6c1-3fa9bd60f0ae http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/04/Russia-China-salami-tactics.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=8cb3bcba-137b-47ca-b6c1-3fa9bd60f0ae http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/04/how-expensive-is-renewable-energy.aspx Just how expensive is renewable energy? 2014-08-04T04:10:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen

I raised this topic recently when The Economist pointed to a new Brookings study which argued that the cost of renewables had been severely underestimated. There was some pushback in the comments thread, and now I see that Green Tech Media, an American green energy industry website, has also debated the study and questioned the ethics of The Economist's reporting. Listen to the podcast debate here.

While I'm on the broad topic of climate change, its worth noting some ripples in China's treatment of this issue. China accounts for about 25% of the world's carbon emissions, so along with the US, China needs to be a leader in cutting emissions. But back in early June China signaled that it was not yet prepared to put a cap on its carbon emissions growth:

Any near-term regulation of China's greenhouse gas emissions would likely allow for future emissions growth, a senior government official said on Monday, discounting any suggestion of imminent carbon cuts by the biggest-emitting nation.

Sun Cuihua, deputy director of the climate change office at the National Development and Reform Commission, said it would be a simplification to suggest China would impose an absolute cap on greenhouse gas emissions from 2016.

No decision had yet been taken on a cap and the timing of such a measure was under discussion, she said. Several options were being considered and China would choose policies in accordance with its conditions and stage of development.

"Our understanding of the word 'cap' is different from developed countries," Sun told a conference.

But at a recent conference in Germany, China's chief climate diplomat Xie Zhenhua said:

China might announce a "peaking year" for its carbon emissions in the first half of 2015 when the country would present its contributions to address global climate change, said China's chief climate negotiator on Monday.

Go read the NY Times' coverage for further context on that quote. That piece also offers a link to a fascinating argument by former US senators Timothy Wirth and Tom Daschle, making the case that binding global treaty on emissions is a chimera, and that the aim for the 2015 Paris conference instead ought to be to get nations to commit to binding national cuts to emissions:

A new agreement should recognize that a simple one-formula-fits-all framework is not feasible: We don't know how to allocate emissions among nations, the global economy makes this impossible anyway, and the early differentiation between developed and developing economies is no longer valid. Instead, a new start is needed, based in part on what has been called "pledge and review": Nations will pledge concrete steps to reduce their carbon emissions and periodically submit their progress to the international community for review.

Rather than strive for an elusive, binding global treaty, the idea is to encourage countries to make strong national commitments in their own economic self-interest and then roll those up in the Paris agreement, which would not take the form of a treaty and thus would not need to be ratified. Countries would be motivated to take these actions in response to competition, both economic and political; international peer pressure; and the aspirations of their own people. The overarching goal is to spur national action to bend the carbon curve downward in a meaningful and measurable fashion, giving greater certainty to the private sector to innovate and invest in low-carbon technologies. This is the world's best option for accelerating progress and averting catastrophic climate change.

Photo by Flickr user Iamoix.
 2014-08-04T04:10:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen Debate continues on a controversial Brookings study. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=8ad0429e-3e36-4f6e-a50b-abb4936fe6fc 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=8ad0429e-3e36-4f6e-a50b-abb4936fe6fc http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/04/how-expensive-is-renewable-energy.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=8ad0429e-3e36-4f6e-a50b-abb4936fe6fc http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/04/Credit-rating-agencies-Australia-economy.aspx Credit rating agencies must do better 2014-08-04T02:02:00+00:00 Stephen Grenville

Standard and Poors' credit ratings. (Wikipedia.)

Foreign investors learn about the Australian economy from a variety of sources, but the credit rating agencies (CRAs) have a special place, as many investment managers are committed to following the rating agencies' assessments. As well, the CRA ratings are used in prudential supervision. This gives special importance to Standard and Poors' (S&P) latest pronouncements, reaffirming Australia's AAA rating.

The S&P press release begins by noting 'the country's strong public policy settings, economic resilience, and significant fiscal and monetary policy flexibility' as well as its 'strong ability to absorb large economic and financial shocks, as was demonstrated during the global recession in 2009.'

So far, so good. Then come the caveats:

Australia's high external imbalances, dependence on commodity exports, and high household debt moderate these strengths...In our opinion, while Australia benefits from many fundamental strengths, its key credit weakness is the economy's high level of external liabilities. The banking system in particular has a high degree of external indebtedness and remains highly reliant on the ongoing backing of foreign investors...Meanwhile, Australia continues to run significant current account deficits...

Pressing the panic button? Not really. This is just having 'two bob each way', as S&P goes on to say:

In our opinion, however, the risks associated with Australia's high private-sector external debt are manageable because of the strength of the country's financial system, the high degree of foreign currency debt hedging, and an actively traded currency that historically has allowed external imbalances to adjust. Additionally, Australia's highly credible monetary policy framework remains able to help counter the impact of any economic shocks.

So we're OK after all? Not so fast.

Just in case you're getting lulled into complacency, S&P concludes with some warnings and a line-in-the-sand threat:

We could lower the ratings if external imbalances were to grow significantly more than we currently expect, either because the terms of trade deteriorates quickly and markedly, or the banking sector's cost of external funding increases sharply. Such an external shock could lead to a protracted deterioration in the fiscal balance and the public debt burden. It could also lead us to reassess Australia's contingent fiscal risks from its financial sector. We could also lower the ratings if significantly weaker than expected budget performance leads to net general government debt rising above 30% of GDP.

What would a country have to do to get a clean bill of health? Australia's banks are no longer obtaining new funding flows from overseas, and their outstanding balances are smaller than in 2008 (see graph below). Sure, the AAA government guarantee helped them to come through the crisis smoothly but the same thing could be provided again, if needed. The financial system was given the ultimate stress test in 2008 and came though well, unlike many countries. As for the warning on external imbalances, since 2008 the current account deficit is significantly smaller, as is the external income deficit.

Source: Reserve Bank of Australia.

What about the 'line in the sand' on net government debt? With the current level at just over 20% of GDP, it would indeed be a major slippage if we were to find ourselves over 30%, so for S&P to finish its press release with this hypothetical outlier is drawing a long bow. It's drama-queen stuff, but it has been picked up by the press, always happy to spotlight an impending disaster, no matter how unlikely.

Let's also put the current level (and even the 30% line in the sand) in perspective. Here are the equivalent IMF figures for the G7 countries:

Source: IMF Global Stability Report, Table 22.214.171.124.

Remarkably, some of the key actors responsible for the 2008 financial debacle have managed to restore their reputations, and no rehabilitation is more remarkable than that of the Teflon-coated credit rating agencies. Leading up to 2008, they handed out AAA ratings to worthless mortgage securitisations (but of course these were a different sort of AAA rating: the debt issuers simply paid for it). Nor were the country ratings much better: S&P's 'investment-grade' endorsements of bankrupt Greece survived well into 2010. The role of the CRAs was under critical review well before the 2008 crisis but no satisfactory answer has yet been found for their undue influence and they are still accorded a role in the Basel prudential supervision arrangements.

Could it be that S&P is peeved because it recently lost its reputation-damning court case in Australia? It's little wonder that analysis of the sort produced by S&P for Australia evokes a derisive response. Can't they do better?
 2014-08-04T02:02:00+00:00 Stephen Grenville AAA ratings are great, but we should look closely at Standard and Poors' pronouncements on the Australian economy. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=f944d304-b548-40a9-b34f-44dd3ca0452f 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=f944d304-b548-40a9-b34f-44dd3ca0452f http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/04/Credit-rating-agencies-Australia-economy.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=f944d304-b548-40a9-b34f-44dd3ca0452f http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/04/Pacific-trade-sisters-doing-it-for-themselves.aspx Pacific trade: Sisters doing it for themselves 2014-08-04T00:33:00+00:00 Tim Harcourt

The port of Suva, Fiji. (REUTERS.)

There's been a lot of talk about getting women into top positions in business in Australia, but our friends in the Pacific have been walking the walk. The inaugural Pacific Export Survey 2014 reveals that around 27% of exporting small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the Pacific are run by women, compared to 11% of exporters in Australia according to the DHL Export Barometer. That's almost a 3:1 ratio.

Why is this so?

Part of the reason could be that, historically, women in Pacific island countries have taken on more community leadership positions relative to other cultures (although this has not translated into representation in national decision-making). There may be some modern reasons too, as micro finance programs have mainly been aimed at female entrepreneurs in developing countries, including in the Pacific. The other explanation could be trade and migration ties, which are closely related to family businesses moving between the Pacific and New Zealand and Australia; this is most noticeable in relation to Polynesian countries. The matriarchs in the family often head up small businesses to keep family members in touch when migration occurs, as it inevitably does to Australia and New Zealand.

The survey – commissioned by Pacific Islands Trade & Invest and the Department for Foreign Affairs & Trade and timed for the Pacific Islands Forum leaders' meeting — also uncovered some new details about the exporter community in the Pacific.

First of all, they are keen to export although the small scale of each island country holds them back. Fiji is the biggest exporting nation (25% of Pacific exporters are in Fiji), followed by Samoa, Tonga, Vanuatu, Cook Islands and Solomon Islands. As there is minimal scale in the Pacific, they have to export to larger markets such as Asia, the US, Australia and New Zealand, instead of to their Pacific neighbours. They tend not to sell to each other, although Vanuatu has exported beef to other Pacific Islands and there is some movement of goods between some members of the Melanesian Spearhead Group as a result of the trade agreement. This focus on larger markets increases transport costs, and thus erects a further barrier to export success.

Secondly, exporters in Pacific nations are not after more aid money but do see a need for better access to capital and foreign investment.

This is because the cost of capital is high domestically compared to Australia and New Zealand, with their more mature financial markets and larger customer bases. Most Pacific nations are looking to joint ventures to give them access to infrastructure (which is under-developed in Pacific Islands) or injections of foreign equity to make the investments viable when they set up. Public private sector partnerships (PPPs) also make sense in this space. Progressing aid projects onto a commercial footing with enterprise initiatives – such as is occurring in Vanuatu with tourism and agribusiness supply chain projects — is a good example of aid progressing to trade.

Thirdly, there is a view that a formal trade pact across Pacific nations with Australia and New Zealand will reduce trade costs between countries. The argument goes that this would really help Pacific nations, given the tyranny of distance (meaning high transport costs, small scale and very small consumer markets). But the reality is that there are few tariff barriers left to reduce and for the most part, market access will not benefit Pacific island countries unless more is done to boost their productive capacity.

When it comes to the Pacific, small is still beautiful. Over half the Pacific nation exporters are small, with less than 20 employees and less than AS$1 million revenue per annum. Most are new to the game too. More than a third of them only started exporting in the last three years. Agriculture, tourism, manufactured goods and services (evenly divided) made up the majority of the exports with resources only representing around 5%.

Whilst some Pacific countries have exported their best rugby players to New Zealand and Australia, they are also trying to expand their markets across a range of products and services so they are not just losing (very famous) human capital. Rugby may be a masculine-dominated affair, but when it comes to SME exporting in the Pacific, it is not just a man's game anymore.

Thanks to Tess Newton Cain, Jodie McAlister and Caleb Jarvis for their comments and expert assistance.
 2014-08-04T00:33:00+00:00 Tim Harcourt New survey reveals 27% of exporting small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in the Pacific are run by women. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=ec96200b-7d8a-4636-a7a8-b884b120880a 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=ec96200b-7d8a-4636-a7a8-b884b120880a http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/04/Pacific-trade-sisters-doing-it-for-themselves.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=ec96200b-7d8a-4636-a7a8-b884b120880a http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/04/Aid-development-links-Ebola-Midwives-Indonesia-and-more.aspx Aid & development links: Ebola, midwives, Indonesia and more 2014-08-03T22:14:00+00:00 Stephanie Dunstan

With the UN confirming 1323 cases of the Ebola virus, and 729 dead, why do so many people in West Africa think is it a hoax? Read this Foreign Policy dispatch.

See how African countries are getting wealthier, fast. Infographic charting GDP growth across Africa since 1980.

If you haven't already, read Robin Davies reflections on Australia's new aid paradigm. Part 3, released last week, examines the new opportunities for research and development

Midwives are key to a healthy and safe pregnancy for women. Read this UN State of the World's Midwifery Report, monitoring 73 countries which carry the burden of more than 96% of maternal deaths and 93% of newborn deaths globally.

World Bank briefing on the development challenges facing Indonesia's new President Joko Widodo.

On 25 August, Jenny Hayward-Jones will host a discussion with Australian Ambassador for Women and Girls Natasha Stott Despoja and award-winning journalist Jo Chandler. They will explore the serious problems facing women in Papua New Guinea and the Pacific Islands. Get your ticket now!

 2014-08-03T22:14:00+00:00 Stephanie Dunstan This weeks best reading on aid and development issues. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=c5f847d0-0b6c-4327-8ed6-0b2e245b4fd3 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=c5f847d0-0b6c-4327-8ed6-0b2e245b4fd3 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/04/Aid-development-links-Ebola-Midwives-Indonesia-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=c5f847d0-0b6c-4327-8ed6-0b2e245b4fd3 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/02/Weekend-catch-up-Best-speeches-Zhou-Yongkang-status-quo-in-Northeast-Asia.aspx Weekend catch-up: Best speeches, Zhou Yongkang, status quo in Northeast Asia and much more 2014-08-01T22:00:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen
Bringing together the best longer Interpreter articles you too busy to read this week.

On Monday Lowy Institute Executive Director Michael Fullilove launched the revised second edition of his book of great Australian speeches. For The Interpreter, Michael gave us a two-part post listing his ten favourite speeches about Australia's place in the world. Here's Michael (in Part 1) discussing then Opposition Leader Arthur Calwell's 1965 speech in opposition to the Vietnam war:

In response to Prime Minister Menzies' 1965 announcement that Australia would send an infantry battalion to Vietnam, Opposition Leader Arthur Calwell laid out Labor's opposition to Australia's participation in the war in a finely argued parliamentary statement. The party politics of the Vietnam War were, in fact, strikingly similar to the party politics of the Iraq war nearly forty years later. In both cases a Coalition government sought to shrink the US-Australia alliance to the dimensions of a single conflict, while a Labor opposition argued that the war was inimical to the interests of both countries. Calwell's remarks laid out Labor's case in plain English, argument upon argument. They were anti-war without being anti-American, and were substantially vindicated by history.

Part 2 is here.

Yesterday we featured a Russian view of the MH17 tragedy from Igor Yurgens, Chairman of the Board of the Institute of Contemporary Development:

The consequences for Russia depend on the outcome of the crash investigation. Even if it confirms that Vladimir Putin learned only after the fact about the 'mistake' made by the separatists and that there was no command from Moscow to shoot down the Boeing, this will not change the essence of the situation for the Kremlin. Its only chance for redemption is if somehow the blame for the tragedy is shifted to Kiev and the world community accepts this. But this is a fleeting chance, at best.

However, much time remains before the investigation will conclude, and the dynamics of the Ukrainian crisis and relations with the West are rapidly worsening in the meantime. The EU's adoption of the third and most painful round of sanctions signals that the conflict has already gained substantial momentum.

One particularly critical aspect of this crisis for the Kremlin is the show of solidarity on both sides of the Atlantic. From the early years of Vladimir Putin's leadership, a special emphasis was placed on strategic cooperation with the European Union. Until recently, relations with leading European partners even took precedence over relations with countries of the former Soviet Union. In Moscow there was hope that Brussels would take a much more moderate approach than Washington, and that conflicts of interests between America and many European capitals would have a mitigating effect.

Following the tragedy, Moscow lost much of its room for manoeuvre between European countries and the US. Now the political position of EU leaders has more clearly separated from the interests and pressure of European business. Furthermore, the Kremlin is seeing a new and worrying trend: the attitude toward Russia in the European business community has begun to change. The tough criticism of Russia coming from the leaders of German industrial associations has been particularly painful.

We had some big news from China this week: Zhou Yongkang, a former domestic security chief, is in the words of the Chinese Government 'being investigated' on 'suspicion of grave disciplinary violations.' Vaughan Winterbottom provided the context:

Zhou is the highest-ranking member of the Communist Party to be brought down on corruption charges since 1949.

President Xi has said from the start that no Communist Party cadre is off limits when it comes to corruption investigations. This proves it.

But Zhou's real crimes were likely his association with Bo Xilai and carving out an oil industry and security fiefdom that rivaled the power base built by President Xi on his way up. In this sense, Zhou's downfall is more reminiscent of a Mao-era purge. Many would say it is a purge, the target of which is all and sundry associated with former President Jiang Zemin.

We'll know soon enough. If Xi's anti-graft drive is an honest attempt by a man whoviews himself as cleanto root out the corruption that pervades the Party, we'd expect the intensity of the campaign to continue. If it wanes, then Zhou was likely the top target of a purge from the start.

As always, Robert E Kelly provide first-rate analysis in a two part post on the supposed shift in Northeast Asia security arrangements. His first piece argued that despite what some would have you believe, South Korea is not drifting towards China. Here's an excerpt:

The claim goes that Korea is torn between the US and China. It is dependent on China economically while dependent on the US for security. The Korean Government is divided into sinophile and pro-US factions. Xi's successful recent trip illustrates the 'Sinic temptation' of Korea. Korea will in time 'finlandise' and equivocate on liberalism and market economics.

Once again, there is a grain of truth here, but a lot of exaggeration and little evidence. It is true that Korea is torn between China and the US. But many states in Asia are. The big internal foreign policy debate for all of Asia's medium powers in the coming decades is precisely the same: how to benefit economically from China's explosive growth without getting pulled into its orbit politically. Not just South Korea, but North Korea, Taiwan, Vietnam, Indonesia and Australia all face the same dilemma.

In his second post Robert argued that despite the 'reinterpretation' of its constitution, Japan is not really remilitarising:

Japan too of course had a reasonably effective military in the twentieth century. But World War II was seventy years ago and was followed by a decisive social break against 'bushido', militarism, and so on. Since then the Japanese military has not fought once. No one really knows how well it will fare (a point that applies to all regional militaries, actually). The conventional wisdom seems to be that Japan's navy is the most competent, followed by the air force, then the army, but these are soft qualitative judgements at best. (Here is a good outlet on this issue.)

Finally, it has been widely noted that the Japanese public is either indifferent or opposed to the 're-interpretation'. That should be comforting to those worried about militarisation. Abe may be able to squeeze more resources out of the finance ministry because his parliamentary coalition is unnaturally large due to the quirks of Japanese election law. But without public support (not just tepid uninterest, but genuine support) he will find it hard to build a force capable of much beyond homeland defence. A serious expeditionary or power projection capability — necessary to do anything serious with the Americans in the region — will require public support. At the moment at least, it is not there.

Matthew Sussex wrote on the new set of US/EU sanctions imposed on Russia over its behaviour in Ukraine:

These sanctions won't go anywhere near far enough to deter Putin. At best, they are a small PR victory. At worst, the length of time taken to negotiate them will only reinforce Putin's calculation that Europe is divided.

To begin with, these sanctions don't lock the EU into a long-term course since they are reviewed every three months. Actual energy trading will continue, and the focus on oil exploration leaves Russia's gas sector unmolested. A crucial compromise to win the backing of Paris was that the military embargo could not be retroactive. That gave the green light to a 2011 French deal to sell Russia two Mistral helicopter carriers at a price of €1.2 billion.

The aspects of this package with the most teeth are the EU's financial sanctions. Putin will find it harder to obtain credit, which will drive Moscow closer to Beijing. China is likely to charge a steep price for that credit, as it did during the global financial crisis. Even so, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov's response that Russia would not bother engaging in 'hysterics' with tit-for-tit sanctions was a sure sign that Moscow is confident in Europe's fragility. Just like Kosovo and Chechnya in the 1990s, when the tokenistic suspension of Russia from the Council of Europe and the NATO dialogue process lasted a mere six months, Russia intends to simply wait Europe out.

 Considering the fallout from MH17 (and Syria), should security issues be on the G20 agenda? Mike Callaghan thinks so:

Is the G20 the right forum to deal with security and political matters? The UN Security Council has its role, but it also has its limitations. The strength of the G20 is that it is a leader's level meeting and it is more representative than the G7. Moreover, escalating regional tensions are directly related to the performance of the global economy. As Nobel Laureate in economics Michael Spence has noted, 'at this moment in history, the main threats to prosperity — those that urgently need world leaders' attention and effective international cooperation — are the huge uncontained negative spillover effects of regional tensions, conflict, and competing claims to spheres of influence.'

Australia should be proactive. It should signal now that geo-political tensions will be discussed at the Brisbane Summit. But expectations should be managed. There should be no suggestions in advance that major breakthroughs or landmark agreements will be reached in Brisbane. Rather, it should be presented as an opportunity for some frank exchanges between leaders on issues of global importance. Moulding the G20 summit to cover such matters could be the legacy achievement for Australia's turn as G20 president.

Stephen Grenville looked at the limits of anti-corruption campaigns in Indonesia:

The issue here is whether public servants should face criminal charges (and long jail sentences) when their policy decisions are harshly judged after the event.

One member of the Bank Indonesia board (which made the decision to rescue Bank Century) has just been given a ten-year jail sentence. While his case is complicated by other factors, the KPK (Corruption Eradication Commission) has indicated that it will now turn to the other members of the Bank Indonesia board, including current Vice President Boediono (who was Bank Indonesia Governor in 2008) and one of president-elect Jokowi's suggested names for finance minister.

The KPK has gone so far beyond its proper role here that 35 leading citizens — lawyers, former ministers, politicians — wrote an 'amicus curiae' ('friends of the court') letter to the KPK. Respected senior legal figure Todong Mulya Lubis said that 'If public policy is criminalised, many public officials will be afraid to take decisions'.

Adding to Stephen's argument, Peter McCawley wrote that 'if officials come to live in fear of aggressive anti-corruption campaigns, the bureaucracy will choke up because everybody will avoid taking decisions':

The problem – that the Indonesian bureaucracy will choke up for fear of witch hunts – is s serious. While the aggressive role of the KPK is to be welcomed, if the result is that bureaucrats all over Indonesia run for cover then government across the nation will clog up. If an attempted prosecution of Dr Boediono were to lead to reluctance on the part of the central bank to take difficult decisions in the midst of a financial crisis, then the consequences for economic management in Indonesia would be serious indeed.

Finally, Julian Snelder on why China's Silk Road initiative matters:

China's pivot to Eurasia is smart, necessary and urgent.

The US subtly threatens China's sea routes, whereas the Eurasian 'heartland' is a landlocked space occupied by weak countries. China offers them investment, trade and security assistance, and in return gets a lock on Kazakh oil and Turkmen gas. Beijing cherishes the goal of 'breaking through' to the Indian Ocean, the Persian Gulf and Europe, bypassing its Malacca dilemma. Washington stands by; its own 'New Silk Road' program is flailing and its main focus is to leave Afghanistan. It should welcome Beijing's initiatives. The truth is, China has far more to offer the region than distant America.

China proposes three broad systems as part of its new Silk Road: a northern railway to Europe which eventually converges on the Trans-Siberian, the pipelines to Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan and possibly beyond to Iran, and the southern highway corridors.

Photo by Flickr user barockschloss.
 2014-08-01T22:00:00+00:00 Sam Roggeveen Bringing together the best longer Interpreter articles you too busy to read this week. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=7505405f-edca-4485-a95f-4dc3c4536f06 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=7505405f-edca-4485-a95f-4dc3c4536f06 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/02/Weekend-catch-up-Best-speeches-Zhou-Yongkang-status-quo-in-Northeast-Asia.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=7505405f-edca-4485-a95f-4dc3c4536f06 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/01/MH17-Russia-faces-tough-test.aspx MH17: Russia faces a tough test 2014-08-01T07:04:00+00:00 Igor Yurgens
The aftermath of the tragic crash of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 has generated consensus among the world's leading countries on Russia's role in the Ukrainian crisis. Moreover, this event has caused European leaders to substantially reconsider their attitude on the nature and scope of sanctions against Russia.

But in the absence of evidence pointing directly to the involvement of Ukrainian separatists in the tragedy, Russia still sees opportunities to defend itself against accusations and promote alternative versions of what happened. These versions are not being taken seriously by international media, politicians or the public in many countries.

Russian aviation experts suggest that the information from the aircraft's black boxes can only indirectly confirm the fact of a missile attack on MH17. The full picture of the catastrophe, these experts say, can only be developed based on the retrieval of the aircraft wreckage and a comprehensive assessment of the damage. They note that only through such a procedure was it possible to establish that the Russian Tu-154 passenger plane flying over the Black Sea in 2001 was downed by Ukraine's air defence forces.

Nonetheless, representative of the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine Andrei Lysenko said analysis of the airliner's black boxes had already confirmed the plane had been downed after being struck by shrapnel from a missile that caused a massive, explosive decompression. These comments drew a sharp rebuke from Moscow: official conclusions can only be made upon completion of the investigation.

Representatives of the Russian Government and the state-controlled information space in Russia have put forth a variety of theories, including directly blaming the Ukrainian military for shooting down the plane with a Buk surface-to-air missile or a fighter jet which was supposedly flying in close proximity to the airliner. The Russian media only indirectly and inconspicuously mentions the possibility that the separatists could have launched a rocket from their own Buk system.

Independent experts in Russia believe that the Boeing was downed by a Buk missile fired from territory controlled by the separatists. But such missile complexes must be controlled by professionals, which is why most often the blame is placed on Russian military personnel who could be operating in Ukraine. This version is usually accompanied by an important caveat: the passenger plane was mistaken for another target. For example, the separatists received a false report regarding the flight of a Ukrainian military transport plane and mistook the Boeing for that plane. The intercepted communications between the separatists several minutes after the tragedy occurred seem to support this assertion.

This version is not one that can be swept aside by some massive information campaign engineered by Russian authorities.

Their position is made worse by the dominant viewpoint in many countries, which is that while the separatists are directly to blame for the downing of MH17, the Kremlin is the main culprit in this tragedy. This is the viewpoint projected from Washington, although mainly relying on indirect evidence and without yet providing photos or information from satellites and other means of reconnaissance. The less frequently mentioned scenario, that the missile was launched from Russian territory, changes little: in either case, Russia and specifically the Russian president are the guilty party. This case is already proven for many politicians, experts and a large portion of the population of the world's leading countries.

The consequences for Russia depend on the outcome of the crash investigation. Even if it confirms that Vladimir Putin learned only after the fact about the 'mistake' made by the separatists and that there was no command from Moscow to shoot down the Boeing, this will not change the essence of the situation for the Kremlin. Its only chance for redemption is if somehow the blame for the tragedy is shifted to Kiev and the world community accepts this. But this is a fleeting chance, at best.

However, much time remains before the investigation will conclude, and the dynamics of the Ukrainian crisis and relations with the West are rapidly worsening in the meantime. The EU's adoption of the third and most painful round of sanctions signals that the conflict has already gained substantial momentum.

One particularly critical aspect of this crisis for the Kremlin is the show of solidarity on both sides of the Atlantic. From the early years of Vladimir Putin's leadership, a special emphasis was placed on strategic cooperation with the European Union. Until recently, relations with leading European partners even took precedence over relations with countries of the former Soviet Union. In Moscow there was hope that Brussels would take a much more moderate approach than Washington, and that conflicts of interests between America and many European capitals would have a mitigating effect.

Following the tragedy, Moscow lost much of its room for manoeuvre between European countries and the US. Now the political position of EU leaders has more clearly separated from the interests and pressure of European business. Furthermore, the Kremlin is seeing a new and worrying trend: the attitude toward Russia in the European business community has begun to change. The tough criticism of Russia coming from the leaders of German industrial associations has been particularly painful.

If Moscow and the fighters under its control are truly not responsible for the tragedy, it should do everything possible to help establish the true cause and in doing so at least minimise the collateral damage to its relations with the EU. Otherwise, even while the investigation is in process, the position of those accusing Moscow of all sorts travesties (not only the tragedy of the Malaysian Airlines flight) will only grow stronger.

The question of Russia's responsibility for the Ukrainian crisis is now becoming a separate problem considered outside the scope of the MH17 tragedy. So as Moscow strives to keep the focus on the question of who shot down the aircraft, it should not forget that the answer to this question may not be the deciding factor in whether other countries decide to enact tough containment policies toward Russia.
 2014-08-01T07:04:00+00:00 Igor Yurgens Blame for the MH17 shootdown may not be deciding factor in whether countries decide to enact tough containment policies toward Russia. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=8ced305d-f21d-40d5-83aa-eae019cdf275 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=8ced305d-f21d-40d5-83aa-eae019cdf275 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/01/MH17-Russia-faces-tough-test.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=8ced305d-f21d-40d5-83aa-eae019cdf275 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/01/G20-inclusive-growth-target.aspx G20: The case for an inclusive growth target 2014-08-01T04:32:00+00:00 Amanda Robbins

Earlier this year Treasurer Joe Hockey negotiated a significant commitment among G20 Finance Ministers to aim for an additional 2% of global growth over the next five years. As countries develop their action plans for achieving this goal in the lead-up to the next G20 Finance Ministers' meeting in September, it's worth considering whether this is the right target.

While the 2% target has been highlighted as a major achievement of Australia's chairing of the G20 so far — getting these nations to agree to anything these days is laudable — it is interesting that we have placed GDP growth at the centre of the G20 agenda. This commitment comes at a time when the economic orthodoxy of pursing growth above all else is being challenged.

Whether it is the work of economist Thomas Piketty, the OECD, World Bank, or even the IMF, economists everywhere are talking about the idea of 'inclusive growth'.

Inclusive growth seeks to consider not only the pace of growth but also its distributional impact. The World Bank argues that the 'rapid pace of growth is unquestionably necessary for substantial poverty reduction, but for this growth to be sustainable in the long run, it should be broad-based across sectors, and inclusive of the large part of a country's labour force.'

While the concept of inclusive growth and related ideas of equity economics and social inclusion have been discussed for some time, it really came to the fore in economic theory following the global financial crisis. What has emerged in recent studies is that despite the extraordinary accumulation of wealth and economic growth, inequality has increased, particularly in the US but also in Australia and other countries. This has spurred an urgent debate on broader ideas around growth and its impact.

Of course, growth is a good thing. But what the G20's 2% growth target fails to do is reflect the lessons of recent years that growth alone will not necessarily deliver benefits to everyone. The IMF has argued that tackling inequality is not antithetical to striving for growth. Instead the opposite is true: rising inequality is a drag on growth.

To provide further leadership at the G20, Australia should seek to build on the 2% growth target by adding the additional measure of inclusive growth. One option would be to commit to a 2% improvement in the incomes of the bottom 20% of households over the next five years. This would be simple, measurable, achievable and proportionate. It would incentivise nations to consider the distributional impact of growth and begin to address the inequality that persists in many nations, including our own.

It won't address all issues of measuring inclusiveness, particularly as income is just one measure of the distributional impact of growth, but it would be a start.

Treasurer Hockey has an opportunity to build on his G20 success when he meets finance ministers again in September. By including even one measure that broadens the discussion from growth to inclusive growth, Australia would be leading the effort to finally grapple with inequality within and between our nations. Now that's a goal worth striving for.

 Image courtesy of REUTERS/Jason Reed.
 2014-08-01T04:32:00+00:00 Amanda Robbins The G20 should commit to improving by 2% the household incomes of the bottom 20%. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=717474b2-8bb3-42a3-84a1-0478e31b485f 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=717474b2-8bb3-42a3-84a1-0478e31b485f http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/01/G20-inclusive-growth-target.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=717474b2-8bb3-42a3-84a1-0478e31b485f http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/01/Resignations-of-Myanmar-ministers-part-of-government-reshuffle-amid-criticism.aspx Myanmar cabinet reshuffle: Preparing for elections 2014-08-01T03:35:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan
There has been much talk recently of the slowing of reform in Myanmar. Criticism of Myanmar's government has resurfaced over the refusal to allow constitutional changes that would permit Aung San Suu Kyi to run for president, as well as the high-profile sentencing of journalists and the ongoing communal violence and humanitarian disaster in Rakhine State. Last week the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Myanmar stated that there were indications the country was 'backtracking' in its reforms.

As such, a major government reshuffle perhaps should not come as a surprise.

A little over a year out from Myanmar's much anticipated elections, the resignation of two key ministers on Wednesday — Minister of Information Aung Kyi and Minister of Health Dr Pe Thet Khin — shows the Government's positioning (and perhaps responsiveness) after recent criticism. Previous cabinet resignations were later shown to be forced, creating speculation over this most recent reshuffle. Indeed, presidential spokesperson and likely new Minister of Information Ye Htut noted that the president had found shortcomings in the outgoing ministers' performances.

Moreover, both ministers have been under considerable pressure recently.

The Minister of Health has been criticised for his handling of humanitarian aid groups which are providing medical assistance in troubled Rakhine state, and because of persistent low levels of health care in Myanmar despite significant increases in spending. Similarly, there has been ongoing criticism of media reforms under the Ministry of Information. The jailing of five journalists in July was met with wide censure in international press. In the absence of a functioning independent regulatory body, the Ministry has played the role of arbiter, leading to self-censorship by journalists (such as this internal memo by the Australian editor of the Myanmar Times asking his journalists not to report on the plight of Muslim without his consent).

The cabinet reshuffle elevates (pending parliamentary approval) two deputy ministers to the top posts of Information and Health. They are Deputy Information Minister Ye Htut and Deputy Health Minister Than Aung.

Ye Htut is the high-profile mover in the reshuffle. Known locally as the Minister of Facebook for his prolific use of social media, he was pivotal in laying the beginnings of media reform from 2007 (a wonderful interview with him here). While his strong positions on press freedoms have put many local journalists off-side, he has proven a capable front man for Thein Sein, often stealing the limelight with his good command of English and soundbite media appearances. The former lieutenant colonel is close to the president and will proactively toe the government line.

The reshuffle will mean three ministers have been replaced in the last two months. The Minister of Religious Affairs Hsan Hsint was sacked in June after angering much of the Sangha, the powerful community of 400,000 monks, following a raid on a monastery. As the presidential spokeperson said at the time of his dismissal, he 'acted beyond the president's instructions so we had to take action against him.'

The reshuffle should strengthen the capacity of Thein Sein's government. The new ministers, notably Ye Htut, will be essential in shepherding through the last wave of reforms before the elections. As such their role will be pivotal to the public assessment of the ruling USDP's performance and ultimately its success in the 2015 election.
 2014-08-01T03:35:00+00:00 Elliot Brennan Recent criticisms of reform backtracking might have forced President Thein Sein to act. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=e30e3cbf-8295-4dfb-b649-94f5cccae14c 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=e30e3cbf-8295-4dfb-b649-94f5cccae14c http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/01/Resignations-of-Myanmar-ministers-part-of-government-reshuffle-amid-criticism.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=e30e3cbf-8295-4dfb-b649-94f5cccae14c http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/01/Ten-speeches-on-Australias-place-in-the-world-(part-2).aspx Ten speeches on Australia's place in the world (part 2) 2014-08-01T01:04:00+00:00 Michael Fullilove
Part 1 of this series reviewed great speeches on Australia's place in the world, from Federation to Vietnam. In this post, I look at the period from Vietnam to Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17.

1. Robert Hughes, 'The culture of complaint', New York, 14 January 1992

Bob Hughes was one of our great characters, an erudite commentator on art, history and politics. In 1992 he gave a series of public lectures at the New York Public Library (reproduced in his Culture of Complaint) in which he entered the American culture wars like a whirling dervish, railing against political correctness and euphemism and dispensing blows to both left and right.

Hidden within this polemic was a thoughtful and generous account of multicultural Australia, which he presented as a counterpoint to the more ideological American version:

(Australian) multiculturalism asserts that people with different roots can co-exist, that they can learn to read the image-banks of others, that they can and should look across the frontiers of race, language, gender and age without prejudice or illusion, and learn to think against the background of a hybridised society. It proposes — modestly enough — that some of the most interesting things in history and culture happen at the interface between cultures. It wants to study border situations, not only because they are fascinating in themselves, but because understanding them may bring with it a little hope for the world.

2. Paul Keating, Eulogy for the Unknown Soldier, 11 November 1993

On Remembrance Day 1993, the seventy-fifth anniversary of the 1918 armistice, an unknown Australian soldier, representing all Australians who have been killed in war, was interred in the Hall of Memory of the Australian War Memorial. Prime Minister Keating's eulogy that day is perhaps the finest speech in Australian history. It was composed of good, plain words, elegantly arranged.

The speech began:

We do not know this Australian's name and we never will. We do not know his rank or his battalion. We do not know where he was born, or precisely how and when he died. We do not know where in Australia he had made his home or when he left it for the battlefields of Europe. We do not know his age or his circumstances — whether he was from the city or the bush; what occupation he left to become a soldier; what religion, if he had a religion; if he was married or single. We do not know who loved him or whom he loved. If he had children we do not know who they are. His family is lost to us as he was lost to them. We will never know who this Australian was.

Yet he has always been among those we have honoured. We know that he was one of the forty-five thousand Australians who died on the Western Front. One of the 416,000 Australians who volunteered for service in the First World War. One of the 324,000 Australians who served overseas in that war, and one of the sixty thousand Australians who died on foreign soil. One of the hundred thousand Australians who have died in wars this century.

He is all of them. And he is one of us.

3. Nick Warner, 'We are here as friends', Honiara, Solomon Islands, 24 July 2014

In the early 2000s Solomon Islands was nearly overwhelmed by ethnic violence, corruption, criminality and thuggery. By 2003, the Solomon Islands state was close to failing. In July, the Australian Government decided to accede to a request from Honiara and lead a regional intervention in the country — the Regional Assistance Mission Solomon Islands (RAMSI).

On 24 July the first RAMSI personnel, comprising military, police and civilians including Special Coordinator Nick Warner, were deployed in Honiara as part of Operation Helpem Fren (pidgin for 'helping friends'). Hundreds of Solomon Islands men, women and children pressed against the cyclone fence around the perimeter of Henderson airport to get a look at the force. Most appeared happy and excited. Standing on the tarmac, wearing a red lei around his neck, Warner delivered a message to the people of Solomon Islands.

People everywhere have a right to live their lives peacefully, to go about their daily business without threats or violence or intimidation, to have their children educated in schools, to have illnesses attended to in hospitals and clinics, to have a government that is permitted to govern for the benefit of all people, free from intimidation or coercion by armed thugs.

Solomon Islands used to be such a place.

But for too long this country has suffered at the hands of a small number of militants and criminals who have terrorised Solomon Islands society, brought the country to its knees, and done a disservice to the reputation of Solomon Islanders as a good and generous people.

The men and women from around the Pacific who arrived on your shores today as part of the regional assistance mission come at the invitation of the Solomon Islands government, and as guests of the Solomon Islands people.

We are calling our involvement here Operation Helpem Fren, because that is what we are here to do. We are here as friends, to work in partnership with you, to restore promise to your country, to restore hopes for a better life to you and your children.

4. Owen Harries, 'Saying no can get to be hard', 29 November 2006

One of Australia's most eminent foreign-policy thinkers, Owen Harries is a political conservative but a foreign-policy realist. His opposition to the Iraq war put him at odds with the Howard Government. A few years after the invasion of Iraq, Harries delivered a thoughtful speech to the Lowy Institute on the lessons of the conflict for the US and Australia. He concluded:

I believe that the days when Australian foreign policy was a relatively simple affair are coming to an end. Dealing with an unsettled superpower ally, while simultaneously adjusting to the rising importance of China as a regional power and a trading partner, is going to require skills that Australia has not had much cause to practise until now...

Every alliance requires a degree of trust. It also requires discrimination and balance — and a touch of scepticism. What Australia must learn from the Iraq experience is that it should not commit itself to marching in lock-step with anyone — let alone a superpower which is simultaneously committed to an incredibly ambitious programme of global change, deeply divided domestically, and has the most inept president since Warren G. Harding in its White House.

It must learn to be as good an ally as it can be while maintaining its freedom of choice.

5. Julie Bishop, 'An utterly deplorable act', New York, 22 July 2014

As I have written before, Canberra conducted itself admirably in the days after the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17, an act that caused the greatest single loss of Australian life overseas since the 2002 Bali bombings. Prime Minister Tony Abbott spoke plainly and clearly and helped to stiffen the Western response to this outrage. Foreign Minister Julie Bishop was energetic in her diplomatic efforts. Opposition Leader Bill Shorten was scrupulous in his support for the Government. Australian officials from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade to the Australian Federal Police were highly professional. All in all, there was a sobriety to the response that was a relief after the circus antics of Clive Palmer and Senator Jacqui Lambie. MH17 had had a jolting effect on the Australian body politic.

The Foreign Minister's strong statement following the adoption of Security Council Resolution 2166 makes this list both because of the significance of the moment — this was, after all, a resolution drafted and negotiated successfully by Australia — and because of the righteous anger with which she delivered it.

Mr President, the message from this Council to those who were responsible for this atrocity is definitive — you will be held to account for your actions.

Australia will continue to do everything we can to ensure this barbaric act is thoroughly investigated and the perpetrators are brought to justice.

We have an overriding objective — to ensure dignity, respect and justice for those killed on MH17. We will not rest until this is done. We will not rest until we bring them home.

 2014-08-01T01:04:00+00:00 Michael Fullilove Michael Fullilove highlights his ten favourite speeches on Australia's place in the world (part 2). http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=6a729b74-d2ee-442a-bcf2-75fbbb25be1f 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=6a729b74-d2ee-442a-bcf2-75fbbb25be1f http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/01/Ten-speeches-on-Australias-place-in-the-world-(part-2).aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=6a729b74-d2ee-442a-bcf2-75fbbb25be1f http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/01/India-Links-Human-Development-Index-space-diplomacy-Israel-dilemma-rape-reporting-US-India-and-more.aspx India links: Human Development Index, space diplomacy, Israel dilemma, US-India and more 2014-07-31T23:30:00+00:00 Danielle Rajendram

Rukmini S investigates the numbers and tells the stories of Delhi's reported rape cases as part of a three-part series in the Hindu. Part three is due to be released later today.

Is India's politics becoming less dynastic?

The UN has released its 2014 Human Development Report. Nitin Sethi looks at why India continues to lag behind comparable nations.

This Indian Express dynamic timeline lets you explore Modi's first 100 days in office.

Could space diplomacy help India achieve its foreign policy goals?

Why India is struggling to realise its infrastructure ambitions.

Some amazing photos from the overland journey along the Stilwell Road between Northeast India and China.

Harsh V Pant looks at India's Israel dilemma.

What does India need to do to build a stronger foreign policy?

US Secretary of State John Kerry delivered a speech on his vision for US-India relations before departing to the India-US Strategic Dialogue. Check out the video of his remarks below:

[youtube:20hnnODJkWk#t=270]
 2014-07-31T23:30:00+00:00 Danielle Rajendram http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=492ddb35-2b2d-444a-ad58-a046148a60ca 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=492ddb35-2b2d-444a-ad58-a046148a60ca http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/01/India-Links-Human-Development-Index-space-diplomacy-Israel-dilemma-rape-reporting-US-India-and-more.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=492ddb35-2b2d-444a-ad58-a046148a60ca http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/01/france-counter-terrorism-africa.aspx France's counter-terrorism role in Africa: No more Afghanistans 2014-07-31T22:58:00+00:00 Daniel Woker

As reported in the international media since mid-July, Operation Barkhane is essentially a French anti-terrorist combat force of 3000 men, permanently stationed in the African Sahel. It has a centralised command headquartered in Chad and includes heavy arms, notably about 40 planes for combat and intelligence operations, stationed in various parts of the region.

As of today, Barkhane replaces temporary and country-specific force deployments such as Operation Serval in Mali, where in 2013 French troops and the Malian army drove militant jihadists back from the capital Bamako into their Saharan heartland.

Also formally part of Operation Barkhane are the armed forces of five regional countries: Mauritania, Mali, Chad, Burkina Faso and Niger. All these countries are menaced by absolute poverty and minimal state infrastructure (three of the five are at the very bottom of the recently released Human Development Index) and increasingly since the fall of Qadhafi, by militant Islamists bent on erecting their own Sahel-based caliphate. Connections exist between Barkhane and other deployments in the larger region, notably the Central African Republic (CAR), where a mixed African-French-EU deployment of about 7000 troops is tasked with keeping a bloody civil war between northern Muslims and southern Christians from spilling into genocide (non-French EU soldiers are deployed only in the capital, Bangui).

Another crucial country in the region, Algeria, helps out informally: due to history, French-Algerian relations are never easy, but Algerian intelligence agencies share information on Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM).

The internationally little known DGSE (Direction Generale de Securite Exterieure), roughly the French CIA, is playing a central role in Operation Barkhane. One of DGSE's main functions is to prevent the creation of another Afghanistan, a safe heaven for young French Muslims to be indoctrinated and to gain fighting experience in the field, returning home as potential terrorists. The 500-plus French nationals reported to be fighting with ISIS in Iraq and Syria have understandably set alarm bells ringing in Paris.

The anti-terrorist and peacekeeping forces in the Sahel are a patchwork of national, foreign and multinational units.

Deployments are complicated by the fact that the few functioning local armed forces are often sent into neighboring countries for local reasons. For example, Chadian troops had to be withdrawn from the African-led International Support Mission to the Central African Republic following their 'bad behaviour' (diplomatese for behaving like an occupation force rather than as peacekeepers). French troops serve as as an indispensable combat element but also as arbitrators when local feuds threaten to overshadow the main function of operations — that is, the fight against jihadi terrorism.

France has a long history of 'robust' interference in African affairs to safeguard its interests. When negotiating Operation Barkhane during an extensive visit to the region in mid-July, President Francois Hollande was accompanied not only by Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian but also a sizable delegation of businessmen. The French parastatal Areva, one of the leading global suppliers of nuclear power stations, gets its uranium mainly from Niger. Large French multinationals such as Orange (telecom) and Bouygues (construction and telecoms) dominate the regional market down to Cote d'Ivoire. While in Abidjan, Hollande was warmly welcomed by President Allassane Outtara, whom the French had helped, in 2011, to oust his predecessor Laurent Gbagbo.

Operation Barkhane is one in a long succession of French interventions in post-colonial West Africa, and probably not the last. In Nigeria, geographically situated just below the Sahel zone, another terrorist force threatens the stability of one of Africa's largest and potentially richest countries. Boko Haram might well be the deadliest and most dangerous of all these terror groups, as demonstrated by the brazen and globally highlighted kidnapping of 200 school girls recently in the Muslim north of Nigeria. On 27 July Boko Haram struck for the first time in neighbouring Cameroon when it kidnapped the wife of Amadou Ali, Cameroon's vice-president, in the border town of Kolofata.

The kidnapping and the lack of effective pursuit of Boko Haram by Nigerian authorities has shown their blatant lack of will and capability. Despite its large and supposedly well-trained army, Nigeria will clearly need outside help to cope with homegrown Islamic terrorism. Effectively, this can only mean European military assistance, with some indispensable American support in reconnaissance and logistics.

Considering that Cameroon was a French colony (with a British-dominated north), and Nigeria was held by the British, Boko Haram now challenges both former colonial powers. It is to be hoped that London will recognise finally that due to its colonial history, it carries additional responsibilities in Africa too.

Under the joint leadership of France and the UK, the two most powerful and battle-ready armed forces in Europe, the EU will have to step up and do much more to secure long term stability on a continent whose much predicted bright future will remain elusive if it does not manage to provide basic services for its citizens, and protect them too.

Image courtesy of REUTERS/Luc Gnago.
 2014-07-31T22:58:00+00:00 Daniel Woker European militaries need to step-up if Boko Haram and other terrorist groups are to be stopped. http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=fbe1bbdf-52ae-42ed-9318-462ee34a5f01 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=fbe1bbdf-52ae-42ed-9318-462ee34a5f01 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/08/01/france-counter-terrorism-africa.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=fbe1bbdf-52ae-42ed-9318-462ee34a5f01 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/07/31/Pacific-island-links12.aspx Pacific island links: Pacific Islands Forum, regionalism, PNG aid, climate change and more 2014-07-31T05:09:00+00:00 Tess Newton Cain
This week our links are focused on the Pacific Islands Forum taking place in Koror, Palau.

On the Devpolicy blog, Seini O'Connor asks: what can the people of our region expect of the regionalism project?

Islands Business provides a detailed backgrounder on what Pacific leaders will be addressing at the 45th Pacific Islands Forum meeting.

For the second year running, Australia's prime minister is not attending the Forum. Whilst Tony Abbott's absence may be understandable, it represents a missed opportunity.

In his opening speech, President Tommy Remengesau of Palau stressed the importance of ocean health for Pacific island countries. Further to last year's Forum meeting, which included the adoption of the Majuro Declaration, the impacts of climate change in the region will be a key issue for discussion.

PNG is using the Forum meeting to further establish itself as a regional aid donor. Its delegation has been lobbying hard for the appointment of Dame Meg Taylor as the new Secretary General of the Forum Secretariat. She is one of five candidates; whoever gets the job will have plenty to deal with.

Prime Minister Gordon Darcy Lilo of Solomon Islands will be presenting an independent review of RAMSI to leaders that was commissioned by the Forum and the Government of Solomon Islands.

Prime minister Enele Sopoaga of Tuvalu has used the Forum as a platform to advocate for changes to the 'Least Developed Country' graduation processes, an issue which also affects other Forum members.

There have been calls for Forum leaders to follow the lead of the Melanesian Spearhead Group and discuss West Papua at its meeting, but this will most likely go unheeded.

 2014-07-31T05:09:00+00:00 Tess Newton Cain http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/pingback.axd http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post.aspx?id=e49a2ce7-f32f-4111-b5e3-0f74c2ed5b4e 0 http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/trackback.axd?id=e49a2ce7-f32f-4111-b5e3-0f74c2ed5b4e http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/07/31/Pacific-island-links12.aspx#disqus_thread http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/syndication.axd?post=e49a2ce7-f32f-4111-b5e3-0f74c2ed5b4e http://www.lowyinterpreter.org/post/2014/07/31/Relax-Japan-is-not-remilitarising.aspx Relax, Japan is not remilitarising 2014-07-31T04:38:00+00:00 Robert E Kelly

In my previous post I argued that the last few months have seen a spike in punditry claiming that Northeast Asia's status quo is about to change, and that conflict is more likely. Japan's constitutional revisions have provoked exaggerated responses from South Korea and China, while Chinese President Xi Jinping's recent successful trip to South Korea has been interpreted in Japan in a similarly negative manner.

But much of this is exaggerated nationalism and posturing from regional hawks (and some American think tanks) about a stable, but disliked, status quo. As I argued, South Korea is not in fact 'finlandising' or going over to China. Such talk is more indicative of the Japanese right's glee in snubbing Korea whenever possible.

Not to be outdone, one can always rely on Chosun Daily in Korea or the Global Times in China (here is a link of special interest to Australian readers) to overreact to Japanese military developments.

But most of this is overstated and little of it is helpful.

Northeast Asia is fairly stable. It could certainly be better, but compared to many regions, it is doing rather well. Trade and tourism are robust. The problems of state failure and irregular wars, so common elsewhere, are not apparent. As Dave Kang has noted, much of the maritime tension is being 'fought' by fishermen and coastguards. For all the big talk, there has been no war in the region since the 1950s.

So should you really care that Japan 're-interpreted' its constitution? Not so much, for three reasons:

1. Until Japan actually spends more on defence, the 're-interpretation' makes little difference

Japan spends less than 1% of GDP on defence. This is even lower than the European members of NATO, who are routinely castigated by the US for free-riding (as the Ukraine crisis is demonstrating yet again).

It takes huge amounts of money to field comparatively small military forces. The logistical tail (the number of support staff, technicians, trainers, crew, and so on) behind each actual warfighter or platform is longer today than ever before. Modern militaries — basically since World War I — have also increasingly relied on technology and combined arms tactics whose complexity requires even greater resources (Stephen Biddle explains all this nicely in the opening chapters here). The long, troubled, and hugely expensive history of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter aptly demonstrates the spiraling costs and troubles of modern military platforms.

So sure, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe may want to buy an aircraft carrier, but does a troubled economy have an extra US$5-10 billion for that? Perhaps, but until the budget numbers change, it's all just talk.

2. Unless Japan can actually translate that extra spending into genuine capabilities, that too reduces the importance of the 're-interpretation'

A basic materialist approach to Japanese 're-armament' would simply be to look at GDP percentages. But bigger budgets are not enough either, because money has to be translated into capabilities — the deployment of modern complex platforms by highly skilled technicians in complicated ways (combined arms, the networked battlefield, C4ISR, and so on) to achieve a goal. Very few modern militaries have been able to do that successfully, and most of them in the twentieth century were Western. Just throwing money at the defence ministry is not enough.

Japan too of course had a reasonably effective military in the twentieth century. But World War II was seventy years ago and was followed by a decisive social break against 'bushido', militarism, and so on. Since then the Japanese military has not fought once. No one really knows how well it will fare (a point that applies to all regional militaries, actually). The conventional wisdom seems to be that Japan's navy is the most competent, followed by the air force, then the army, but these are soft qualitative judgements at best. (Here is a good outlet on this issue.)

Finally, it has been widely noted that the Japanese public is either indifferent or opposed to the 're-interpretation'. That should be comforting to those worried about militarisation. Abe may be able to squeeze more resources out of the finance ministry because his parliamentary coalition is unnaturally large due to the quirks of Japanese election law. But without public support (not just tepid uninterest, but genuine support) he will find it hard to build a force capable of much beyond homeland defence. A serious expeditionary or power projection capability — necessary to do anything serious with the Americans in the region — will require public support. At the moment at least, it is not there.

3. Engaging in 'collective self-defence' is a right every other country in the world has. By embracing it, Japan is becoming more, not less, normal, and so more predictable

David Pilling makes the useful point that collective self-defence is the right of every other country, and that Japan moving in that direction is no big deal. Pilling couches the argument in normative language, stating that it is Japan's right to arm itself as it sees fit and align itself with whomever it likes. All that is so, but it is clearly uncomfortable to Seoul and offers fuel for Chinese efforts to isolate Japan in Asia over its alleged militarism.

A better interpretation is that Japan's defence normalisation makes it more like every other country in the world and therefore more predictable. It is Japan's weird post-war state — radically pacifist yet disturbingly unrepentant about the empire, located in Asia but not really a part of the region — that makes it such a hot potato. The more Japan is respo