One World, Many Peaces

Westerners Seek Terrorism Training in Defection as US-UK Retreat in Face of Al Qaeda Offensive in Yemen: Losing the 'War on Terror', Well

How is the 'war on terror' President Obama disavowed in name shaping early 2010? For starters, we are painfully learning the lesson that being bold with cash in counter-terrorism is counterproductive compared to being effective on the ground. As the Anglo-American retreat from their embassies in Yemen makes clear, they are barely able to do the former in their current financial condition, and totally unable to do the latter in key battleground areas. In case there is any doubt about whether or not the closing of the Yemen embassies constitutes a retreat, consider the definition of the word in its military sense: "the forced or strategic withdrawal before an enemy, or a withdrawal from action; the act of withdrawing, as into safety."

 

"We're not going to take any chances" was the euphemism used by White House counterterrorism chief John Brennan. We applaud his apparent concern for the embassy workers, but deplore his cowardice. The fact of the matter is that Al Qaeda has been on the offensive in Yemen for over a year, with the ineffective government acting as a welcoming open door. Over the weekend, General David Petraeus overstepped his military jurisdiction over Iraq and Afghanistan to announce the U.S. will more than double its $67 million counterterrorism 2009 aid to Yemen in 2010. This is called "upselling" in business, and terrorist-- whom we agree must to be brought to justice and incapacitated as such-- are doing an exceptional job at helping the US and UK in this regards, with the retreat as a sure sign. Journalists ought to stop covering Al Qaeda like ideological puppets and start covering the organization as the major force with the upper hand in a global war with fronts everywhere.

 

Meanwhile, The Washington Post reports that "Pakistani police say they plan to ask a court to charge five Americans arrested in early December with terrorism, and will seek life imprisonment sentences against them. The young Muslim men, who are from the Washington, D.C., area, were captured in the eastern Pakistani city of Sargodha. The case spurred fears that Westerners are traveling to Pakistan to join militant groups." Again, in case there is any doubt as to whether this constitutes defection, consider its military sense as "to desert a cause, country, etc., especially in order to adopt another." If global counterterrorism efforts are doing one thing well, it's losing.

 

The problem losing the 'war on terror' in these two ways (retreating and defecting) raises, beyond the news-reported obvious, is that no one is winning, not even the terrorists and especially not counterterrorism supporters. Unless, of course, the US is purposefully trying to destabilize the two strategically located countries in order to control them afterwards, a risky 20th century move with few 21st century rewards if so. In any case, retreating from two key terrorist targets, the Yemen embassies, will only encourage them to attack domestic and/or civilian ones. Losing the 'war on terror' by defection and retreat thus creates a snowball effect that will roll the world into avalanches as an avoidable current event creating a detestable future.

Hot Off the Press-- 2009: The Year in Review from One World, Many Peaces with Antony Adolf

 

 

What was 2009 all about — or was but you didn’t hear about it? How will 2010 and beyond take shape? 2009: The Year in Review is One World, Many Peaces’ answer. Antony Adolf, author of Peace: A World History, shares the stories he covered throughout the year as “Current Events Creating the Future” — Ours.

Includes three new essays by Antony Adolf published together for the first time:

•Buyers and Buy-Nots: The New Economics of Poverty and Affluence
•Post-Islamophobia: How Cultural Integration Can Prevent Terrorism and Build Peace
•A Missile Shield by Any Other Name: Is Obama's Global Military Strategy Taking Shape in Eastern Europe?

One World, Many Peaces: The Blog and Podcast will start anew on January 5. Thank you for a great year and have a safe and happy New Year!

 

The Future of International Relations and Global Negotiations: Lessons from Copenhagen

What was at stake in Copenhagen was not only the ecological future of our planet, but in many ways the future of how nation-states will and will not find ways to meet their needs, seek compromise and achieve common goals. The contentious round of climate change negotiations at Copenhagen, which have resulted in a "better than nothing" treaty, are a strong indication of how topic-based negotiations on a global level may take place in the 21st century. For better and worse. Is this one step away or closer to a world government?

Even though the conference took place under the auspices of the UNFCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change), hardly anyone-- participants or media pundits-- have mentioned the United Nations in its regards. Whether or not this more than hints that the U.N. may be very close to expiration date, as a standing-forum the U.N. shares many of the shortcomings of its League of Nations predecessor. Task-focused, results- oriented meetings like Copenhagen may be new wave of international relations, making it a laboratory for how unequal participants can (or cannot) reach a multilateral agreement instead of the bilateral agreements that have dominated world affairs since the 1990s. Ironically, the conference's sponsors include BMW and Honda.

Imagine if, after working out the major procedural kinks and staying vigilant to other ones, the Copenhagen process was used to address issues like world hunger, the global economy, disarmament, regional security and so on. Such ad-hoc, topical conventions could be compared to the Hague Conferences of the early 20th century, which were at least partially effective. They would not by definition constitute a world government, but if doing so is more effective, does it really matter? Perhaps the Copenhagen paradigm is the future and we are the current events creating it.

 

For more on the Copenhagen conference, visit their official site.

For more on the UNFCC, visit their official site.

Beware the Rise of Regionalism: The Decade in Review, Part Two

The past ten years have seen a staggering rise in what is now being called, rather benignly, regionalism: groups of geographically proximate countries that unite in an organization or agreement to pursue common goals. Sounds nice, doesn’t it? It is in one way, but in another regionalism is exactly what George Orwell warns us of in 1984. He turned out to be quite accurate in his depiction of totalitarian communism, how feasible is it for his nightmare to come true in our waking dreams?

 

 
Much more so than not, I would argue. Just weeks ago Asian nations agreed to extend the existing ASEAN organization (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) of ten nations into a much larger powerhouse including China. They are self-consciously taking as their model the European Union (EU) which has been operating on ever larger scales for decades. What these two organizations have in common is that their most basic goals are economic, with foreign policy and internal governance important too, but secondary. Of course, security trumps all at least in name.

 

 

In South America, the Organization of American States (OAS) of 35 chartered member-states has as its slogan "democracy for peace, security and development," more than hinting at its origins as a U.S.-instigated group aimed at stemming communist influence in the region during the Cold War. I guess the OAS won, except for Venezuela. Two regional organizations that have not fared so well in being ineffective are the African Union (AU) and the Arab League. The AU, unlike the EU and ASEAN, set out to be a political organization first and an economic and security one second. It hasn't worked. The Arab League's sole purpose was to destroy Israel, and that hasn’t worked either.

 

The only comparable arrangement in North America is the North American Free Trade Agreement between the U.S., Canada and Mexico, which does form the economic kernel that has lead to success in other cases of regionalism. So far, all these organizations (except the Arab League at first) have been too preoccupied with internal squabbles to think of actively targeting their rivals. As current events, these regional bodies which have taken an ever larger part of the world stage may in the future take it over, and run alongside rather than against the multipolar paradigm we encountered last Thursday.

 

This decade's closing in three short weeks gives occaision to reflect upon it as well that which is about to open. In honor of this arbitrariness, One World, Many Peaces will run a four-part weekly series on Thursdays, "The Decade in Review," to offer provocative closing and opening. thoughts

Why Obama's Got it Right (and so Wrong) on Afghanistan Troop Levels

Ninety two days-- that's how long it took Obama to make his mind up (on international television nonetheless) about his next move in Afghanistan. That's not only bad peace-seeking, that's bad warfare.

 

Let's put this into perspective: if Eisenhower had taken ninety two days to decide where and how many troops would land on D-Day, the opportunity to turn the tables on the Nazis would have passed the Allies by. So what has the waiting game led to now? NOTHING. Obama is doing exactly what he said he would do during the campaign, except the delay. The question then becomes is this the right or wrong move?

I was there when he gave his famous Senatorial speech in Chicago after returning from Iraq, in which he claimed that the Iraq war was "unnecessary" and the Afghan one a "necessary evil" (his gist, my words). I agreed with him them, and I agree with him now. There are terrorists in the region who are a threat not only to America, but to the world at large, and they must be brought to justice before they attack again, or worse yet continue multiplying.

 

Since they do not seem to want to negotiate for safe passage and fair trial (not that it's been pushed hard), the only other option to keep the world safe is to capture them. I do not go as far as to say kill because everyone, especially enemies, are more valuable alive than dead. And since what decrepit NATO is doing is making things worse not better, a full-force assault seems the quickest and least pain-inducing way to proceed to a swift and victorious ending.

That said, any Commander-in-Chief who publicly pontificates upon his options as if they were a public relations ploy loses more than a little respect in the eyes of his soldiers and voters. If he needed the time, so be it, lots is done in secret by government; but every day he waited, soldiers and civilians have died. Playing out major war decisions  like a soap opera while he globetrots to woo China, tries to pass healthcare bill and attempts to reverse the course of this depression-in-denial is wrong, no matter how right his course of action is.

With the rise in U.S. troop levels, the Afghan war has become no less of a U.S. war that is Iraq, despite the internationalist pretences in either case. What Obama should spend the next ninety-two days doing is figuring out how to turn the failing current event that is NATO into the future armed forces of the United Nations, as previously suggested on One World, Many Peaces.