Anything but soft power
If China is intent on using soft power to expand its influence, Iran wants to use hard power. At least some of the leadership does. And some does not.
Senior military official says Revolutionary Guards will not stay within Iran’s borders
Although President Hassan Rouhani said few days ago while marking Iran’s Army Day that Iran wants brotherly and strong relations with neighboring countries and rejects interfering in other countries’ internal affairs and noted that “dialogue is the only means towards peace in the region,” the Iranian Revolutionary Guards has contradicted him by stating that it will not commit to staying within Iran’s borders.
… Rear Admiral Ali Fadavi, the commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps Navy, said the Revolutionary Guards’ activities “are not limited to Iran,” noting that the guards’ forces are currently fighting thousands of kilometers away from Iranian borders.
Fadavi added that this military apparatus’ actual name is the “Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps” refusing the appendage “Iranian.”
Commenting on why the Revolutionary Guards’ forces are present in other countries specifically in Syria and Iraq, Fadavi said: “Guarding the Islamic revolution does not only mean guarding one country and one government…
Fadavi commended the presence of Iranian forces in Syria and Iraq and Tehran’s support of militias in Yemen and Lebanon and said this is “necessary” to defend the Islamic revolution…
On April 18 while marking Army’s Day, Rouhani commended the army for not interfering in political affairs. Commentators said Rouhani was thus indirectly criticizing the Revolutionary Guards for interfering in the country’s domestic and foreign political affairs.
“Although the army understands politics well, it was not dragged into the political game and it remained committed to the imam’s will. We do not see the name of any army commander in corruption cases, and this confirms the purity of the Islamic Republic’s army,” Rouhani said. The Revolutionary Guards responded to Rouhani and said his remarks “destroyed unity, (incited) divisions and conveyed ingratitude.”
Fadavi concluded his interview by saying: “During the sacred (Iranian-Iraqi) war, we were fighting the enemy in the city of Khorramshahr and in the midst of our homes but today we are fighting the enemy thousands of kilometers away from our borders.”
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Labels: ForeignPolicy, Iran, politics, soft power
English retreat
Wayne Berbert, who teaches at
Syosset High School in New York, pointed out this article from
Foreign Affairs about the new debate about England's role in the world. Is it like the 1930s?
Littler England: The United Kingdom's Retreat From Global Leadership
In the last year, some 39,000 migrants… tried to make their way to the United Kingdom from the French port of Calais by boarding trucks and trains crossing the English Channel. In response, the British government attempted to secure the entrance to the tunnel in Calais, dispatching two and a half miles of security fencing that had been used for the 2012 Olympics and the 2014 NATO summit.
The United Kingdom’s improvised response to the migrant crisis, with recycled fences substituting for a coherent immigration policy, is emblematic of its increasingly parochial approach to the world beyond its shores. The Conservative government of Prime Minister David Cameron appears to lack a clear vision of the country’s place on the global stage. The United Kingdom, a nuclear power and permanent member of the UN Security Council, now seems intent not on engaging with the outside world but on insulating itself from it…
Historically, the United Kingdom has been an active player in world politics… the country was a founding and engaged member of the institutions of the postwar Western order… And the United Kingdom’s relationship with the United States has been a great asset to both sides since World War II.
Recently, however, factors including fatigue following the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, a recession, and a prime minister with little apparent interest in foreign affairs have conspired to render the British increasingly insular. The British diplomatic corps and military have seen their capabilities slashed amid harsh austerity measures…
With a national referendum on the United Kingdom’s EU membership likely to be held in 2016, debates about the country’s place in the world will come into sharper focus…
Budget cuts are the most visible sign of the United Kingdom’s retreat. The budget of the Foreign Office has been cut by 20 percent since 2010… The armed forces have also been downsized, with the army alone expected to shrink from 102,000 soldiers in 2010 to 82,000 by 2020…
The penchant for disengagement has not been confined to the executive branch. In 2013, the British Parliament voted against intervention in Syria, presaging a more cautious approach to military intervention in general. Public opinion seems equally allergic to foreign entanglements…
As British policymakers have lost interest in engaging with the outside world, they have embraced a shortsighted conception of economic interests…
Such mercantilist priorities are also shaping British foreign policy in the Persian Gulf, where, for instance, the pursuit of lucrative arms contracts with Bahrain has come to supersede strategic considerations of regional stability or the promotion of democracy. A similar myopia defines the British response to Russia…
What is so confounding about London’s narrow mercantilism is that even if economic prosperity were the chief objective of foreign policy, the current approach would still be shortsighted. Profitable trade depends on the preservation of a stable and rule-bound international system, which both the Islamic State and Putin seek to revise. China may be a large and enticing market, but geopolitical rivalry in Asia represents a real threat to global prosperity. An emphasis on trade policy alone will do nothing to address major challenges to the international order, including piracy off the coast of Africa, the Islamic State’s attempts to throw the economies of the Middle East and North Africa into turmoil, and the massive flow of migrants across the Mediterranean. No European state—indeed, no state at all—can hope to confront these challenges alone. For a country with limited means, dealing with problems of this scale requires collective action.
Yet precisely when international cooperation is needed most, a new political argument threatens to weaken the United Kingdom’s ability to collaborate: the debate over whether the country should leave the EU…
Buried within some of the Euroskeptics’ criticisms of EU membership lies a paradox about British power. On the one hand, advocates of Brexit [British exit from the EU] argue that London is too weak to wield sufficient influence in Brussels… On the other hand, the skeptics maintain that the United Kingdom is so inherently powerful that free from the shackles of the EU, it would suddenly enjoy enough global heft to negotiate trade deals effectively with the likes of China…
The United Kingdom cannot defend its interests alone. Many proponents of Brexit argue that international collaboration should occur with the United States rather than through the EU. Yet it’s not clear that U.S. policymakers are interested in working with an insular United Kingdom adrift from the EU…
These days, Washington is longing for its allies to take on a greater share of the burden of maintaining security in their own backyards. Moreover, and in stark contrast to earlier periods, Washington has increasingly come to believe that for the Europeans to be able to maintain security, they will need to work together within the EU…
The upcoming referendum will determine whether the country’s retreat will continue unchecked. Yet whether it wishes to or not, the United Kingdom cannot detach itself entirely from events in eastern Europe, the Middle East, or Asia. Collective European action, of precisely the kind the EU was designed to foster, represents the only viable alternative.
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Labels: ForeignPolicy, politics, UK
Perspectives differ
Is the Nigerian military incapable of acting? Some officials from the US think so. Some Nigerians say they aren't getting enough help.
With Schoolgirls Taken by Boko Haram Still Missing, U.S.-Nigeria Ties Falter
Soon after the Islamist group Boko Haram kidnapped nearly 300 teenage girls in Nigeria in April, the United States sent surveillance drones and about 30 intelligence and security experts to help the Nigerian military try to rescue them. Gen. David M. Rodriguez, the top general for American missions in Africa, rushed from his headquarters here to help the commanders in the crisis.
Seven months later, the drone flights have dwindled, many of the advisers have gone home and not one of the kidnapped girls has been found…
Nigeria’s ambassador to the United States has accused the Obama administration of failing to support the fight against Boko Haram, prompting the State Department to fire back with condemnations of the Nigerian military’s dismal human rights record…
[I]n Stuttgart, officials at the headquarters of United States Africa Command offered their own bleak assessment of a corruption-plagued, poorly equipped Nigerian military that is “in tatters” as it confronts an enemy that now controls about 20 percent of the country.
“Ounce for ounce, Boko Haram is equal to if not better than the Nigerian military,” said one American official here, who spoke on condition of anonymity…
The United States has flown several hundred surveillance drone flights over the vast, densely forested regions in the northeast where the girls were seized…
When the Pentagon did come up with what it calls “actionable intelligence” from the drone flights — for example, information that might have indicated the location of some of the girls — and turned it over to the Nigerian commanders to pursue, they did nothing with the information, Africa Command officials said.
In addition, United States security assistance to Nigeria has been sharply limited by American legal prohibitions against close dealings with foreign militaries that have engaged in human rights abuses…
Those restrictions have drawn sharp criticism from Nigerian officials... Nigeria’s ambassador to the United States… said his government was dissatisfied with the “scope, nature and content” of American support in the fight against Boko Haram. He also disputed allegations of human rights violations committed by Nigerian soldiers…
Groups like Human Rights Watch say the Nigerian military has at times burned hundreds of homes and committed other abuses as it battled Boko Haram and its presumed supporters…
Testifying before House and Senate hearings, administration officials in May offered an unusually candid criticism of the Nigerian military. “We’re now looking at a military force that’s, quite frankly, becoming afraid to even engage,” said Alice Friend, the Pentagon’s principal director for African affairs at the time.
Sarah Sewall, the undersecretary of state for civilian security, democracy and human rights, said at a separate hearing that despite Nigeria’s $5.8 billion security budget for 2014, “corruption prevents supplies as basic as bullets and transport vehicles from reaching the front lines of the struggle against Boko Haram.”
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Labels: corruption, ForeignPolicy, military, Nigeria, state capacity
Take that Obama!
Iran welcomes the opportunity to host the leaders of countries ostensibly aligned with the US to bolster its own international influence and the legitimacy of the regime (and Ahmadinejad?). Can it overcome its reputation as a promoter of Shiite interests?
Thanks to Blanca Facundo for pointing out the
Asia Times article about the meeting (even though it over-explains things).
Tehran to host weekend conference on terrorismTehran will host a two-day international conference on terrorism this weekend, Iran's foreign minister said Wednesday…
According to local reports, officials from 80 countries as well as experts from regional and international organizations will take part in the conference. No further details were given.
The presidents of Afghanistan, Pakistan and Sudan reportedly already confirmed their attendance.
Iran has on several occasions criticized the United States and its Western allies for having deteriorated security in both Afghanistan and Iraq by their military presence.
Tehran says the most effective option to fight terrorism is to allow regional countries to take care of security and force foreign troops to leave the region.
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Labels: ForeignPolicy, Iran
