New Core power Russia to help U.S. in Iraq?
"Russia: Putin Considers Sending Troops to Iraq," www.stratfor.com, 16 July. - Thomas Barnett blog
Many said I was nuts when I proposed in the Washington Post Outlook section in April that the U.S. should seek peacekeeping troops from Russia, India (whom they asked previously) and China. When I was on NPR last month, the Atlantic Monthly's Jack Beatty described that notion as "politically impossible."
I got this reference from Capt. Ryan Boyle (a regular weblog reader) at USMC headquarters in Washington, so my thanks to him.
The gist of the article is that Moscow is seriously considering a request by the Bush Administration to send Russian troops to Iraq or Afghanistan (can you believe it?) this fall, just before the election.
Yes, much will depend on Putin's calculations of Bush's likelihood of victory, but the real point here is that it is: 1) not inconceivable that Russia would say yes and 2) the Bush Administration buys into the logic that New Core powers need to be represented in this Global War on Terrorism.
How many are we talking about? Maybe 40,000. What would that do to the Islamic notion of a "clash of civilizations" with the West? It would blow that myth out of the water. Risky for Putin? You bet, but so is sitting on the sidelines.
For me personally? This article is yet another example of why I have a very thick skin about people telling me—throughout my career—that my strategic forecasting was pie-in-the-sky nonsense. The reason why so many experts and journalists see PNM as a guide book to this administration is not because I have inside dope, it's because I've simply cracked the strategic code under which this administration—and all that follow for decades—will invariably find themselves dealing with, day-in and day-out.
Here's hoping this thing actually pans out, but either way, the logic of cooperation now seems a whole lot more plausible, despite the constant whining of nay-sayers like Beatty.
What goes around, comes around on terror
"Saudis Facing Return of Radicals: Young Iraq Veterans Join Underground," by Craig Whitlock, Washington Post, 11 July, p. A1.
"President Says U.S. to Examine Iran-Qaeda Tie: Sept. 11 Terrorists May Have Been Given Aid," by Philip Shenon, New York Times, 20 July, p. A1.
More and more evidence that the young men prone to terrorism that Saudi Arabia has been exporting all these years are increasingly returning to the kingdom with violent designs on the House of Saud.
Saudi Arabia is in a tough spot, which is exactly where they should be in a long-term strategy to transform the Middle East political scene. If Iraq continues to boil, all it does is generate more opportunities for Saudis to go there and cut their teeth as terrorists. And when it settles, guess who's coming for dinner?
Like their compatriots in Iraq, cells operating in Saudi Arabia have repeatedly stated that their primary aim is to drive out all "infidels," including more than 100,000 Western expatriates who help run the country's oil industry and whose military and technical support is crucial to the Saudi government.
If the House of Saud is set to get its just desserts, then Iran is also likely to come under increasing fire—from the U.S. With Iraq out of the way, the biggest security issues in the Gulf are: 1) Iran's rather open support for terrorist networks in the region; and 2) their push for nukes. Expect to see the Bush Administration begin seeding the long-term narrative on that confrontation. If Iran pushes hard enough on the WMD and doesn't come clean enough on its long-term support for terrorists, it could easily rise to the top of the heap of either a re-elected Bush Administration or a new Kerry one, giving Kim Jong Il just that much more time for mischief as he awaits his inevitable turn.
Posted by Thomas P.M. Barnett at 03:36 PM
Good rules in India, bad ones in the Philippines
“In Wake of Fire, Indian State Bans Thatched Roofs on Schools,” by David Rohde, New York Times, 19 July, p. A7.
“Curbing Foreign Investment: Philippine Constitution Derails Development of Certain Sectors,” by James Hookway, Wall Street Journal, 19 July, p. A9.
India suffers a Station Nightclub-like fire in a private school and the country is aghast. With the country’s booming economy, more and more families are dishing out the rupees to put their kids in expensive private schools, which, even though they are often overcrowded, “offer a prized English education that parents believe can give their children an advantage.” Right on, say I, as ESL (English as a Second Language) is one of globalization’s great connecting tissues.
So the fire happens and the affected Indian state does exactly what little Rhode Island did after the Station Nightclub fire, it starts pushing all sorts of new fire code regulations and immediately closes all schools that have the offending thatched roofs until they’re replaced by something safer.
That is a rule-set reset of the good sort.
Here’s the bad one: after dictator Ferdinand Marcos was ousted in 1987, his opponents wrote a badly nationalistic constitution that forbade foreign direct investment in certain sectors. The result is not surprising: a serious lack of development in those sectors because foreign money cannot be tapped and the Philippines economy itself can only self-finance so much. Guess some would rather be a proud-but-poor Filipino.
So there has been no foreign-funded mining operations in the Philippines since 1968. That is why the Philippines are in the Gap, while ESL-crazed India moves into the Core: the former wants connectivity, but still too much on its own terms, while the latter accepts the notion that connectivity requires the synchronization of internal code with that of the outside world.
Posted by Thomas P.M. Barnett at 07:27 AM
Buy you Chinese! Buy! As if our economic lives depended on it!
“Beijing Is Able to Slow Economic Growth: Next Test for China Will Be How Easily It Can Absorb Possible Oversupply of Goods,” by Matt Pottinger, Wall Street Journal, 19 July, p. A9.
More and more indications that China has generated the much-desired “soft landing” for its economy if . . . and here’s the kicker for the formerly centrally-planned economy . . . if the Chinese consumer base can absorb all the goods that will be generated by the investment boom of the past few years.
Already, China is moving into the rarefied territory that defines the United States’ real economic power: the power of its consumption as much or more than its production. More and more we’ll see the global economic health defined not just in terms of what America is willing to buy, but what China is willing to buy.
China will be a near-peer in diplomacy faster than we think, and a near-peer in economic faster than we think. The one thing it won’t be any time soon is our military near-peer. Thinking of China’s “threat” solely within the context of war is a mistake, because its real source of competition with the United States will come in the everything else.
Posted by Thomas P.M. Barnett at 07:24 AM |
