The Bigger Picture in Thailand's Protests

Sample Article: The Bigger Picture in Thailand's Protests

The Bigger Picture in Thailand's Protests

December 2, 2013 | 1735 GMT

Summary

(LAM YIK FE/Getty Images)
Anti-government protesters remove a barricade in Bangkok on Dec. 2.

The rapid escalation of anti-government protests in Thailand is a reminder of the many fault lines beneath the country's deeply polarized political landscape. Even if the unrest manages to unseat Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra's popular government, the same political and economic problems that have repeatedly troubled the country could return under the next government. At a time when Thailand is attempting to change its regional role, its fragile political situation continues to threaten its relevance in the increasingly important region of Southeast Asia.

Analysis

The massive, weekslong protests in Thailand quickly descended from relatively peaceful to violent over the weekend. After protesters had occupied several state ministries and key business districts for four days, violence erupted in the suburbs of Bangkok on the evening of Nov. 30 between protesters and the Red Shirts -- supporters of the prime minister and her brother, ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra -- who had mobilized outside of Bangkok to protect the government. Fighting intensified after anti-government protesters damaged vehicles believed to contain the Red Shirts as they streamed into Bangkok.
Later that night there was more bloodshed in the Ramkhamhaeng area when gunfire from an unknown gunman incited clashes between some 70,000 Red Shirts who were holding a pro-government rally inside Rajamangala Stadium and Ramkhamhaeng University students who had gathered nearby in opposition to the government. Four people were killed and at least 57 were injured in the fighting.
Violence continued Dec. 1 despite the withdrawal of the Red Shirt protesters. Some 30,000 anti-government protesters remained in the streets, forcing their way into more government buildings, including TV stations, the prime minister's office and the police headquarters. Termed a "people's coup," the movement fell short of its objective after police stepped up their efforts, using tear gas and water cannons, leaving dozens more injured, and imposing a seven-hour curfew throughout the capital city and outlying regions. The protesters vowed to continue their march into the metropolitan police bureau on Dec. 3.
Smaller numbers of anti-government protesters similarly tried to besiege the provincial halls in other provinces. Notably, the protests have shown signs of spreading into a few southern provinces that are traditional opposition strongholds, including Krabi, Nakhon Si Thammarat, Chumphon and Yala. They have also spread into other provinces that generally support the Pheu Thai party, including Samut Prakan and the northernmost Chiang Rai.
The strengthening momentum of the protests convinced protest leader Suthep Thaugsuban, a resigned lawmaker from the Democrat Party, to issue a two-day ultimatum (set to expire late Dec. 3) for Yingluck to resign. But instead of demanding the dissolution of parliament or early elections in which the ruling Pheu Thai party's popularity could work against the opposition, Suthep called for the creation of an unelected People's Council. So far, Yingluck has been defiant, but Suthep's campaign also created uneasiness among many, including the opposition camp. However, the escalating pressure combined with the strengthening street protests could mean that a new political crisis, which has from time to time resulted in military coups, may not be far off.

The Root of the Protests

The foundation for the ongoing protests was laid after the Pheu Thai party's repeated attempts to push forward several constitutional amendments, including the recent one that would make the Senate a fully elected body in order to push forward Pheu Thai's political agenda and a controversial amnesty bill. A key component of the government's proposal for what it claimed to be a national reconciliation, the amnesty bill is widely said to be an effort to bring Thaksin back into the country from exile and to strengthen Pheu Thai's hold on power. Thousands of protesters took to the streets when the bill passed the lower house in late October, leading the ruling party to withdraw the bill. Meanwhile, the Constitutional Court rejected the constitutional amendment in mid-November.
Instead of quelling what were relatively limited protests, the opposition decided to capitalize on the reaction against the government and fomented massive demonstrations. The focus of the protests shifted from blocking the bills to ending "Thaksin's regime."
Although the protests have momentum, the opposition's immediate goal of bringing down the government will face two major challenges in the next couple of days. First, it is important for the opposition to bring the military on board if it is to oust the sitting government. Protests and violence have been a centerpiece of the country's political dynamic since the 2006 coup against the Thaksin-led government, and the judiciary, military and monarchy have repeatedly intervened. An open military intervention would be the last resort if violence reaches an extreme, particularly considering the ruling party's widespread popularity and moderate progress in a rapprochement with the royalist-allied military. Despite its past interventions, the military may be more willing to tolerate a range of political reversals without directly jeopardizing its own power and prestige.
In the meantime, the opposition's second challenge will be trying to keep the protests strong. The king's birthday weekend from Dec. 5 to Dec. 8 -- traditionally a time for celebration and a time when political moves are seen as disrespectful -- is expected to dampen the enthusiasm for protests. Â
Even before the current crisis, Thai politics have been deeply polarized. The geographic, social and economic problems that have repeatedly brought the country to an impasse have not gone away, and the issue of royal succession always simmers beneath the surface.
What formed the backbone of Thailand's contemporary political history -- the antagonistic regional divisions between Bangkok and the northern regions -- was manifested by the rise of the populist Thaksin in the late 1990s. Thaksin's massive popularity among the rural poor -- especially those in the north and northeast, which together make up more than half the country's population -- and his attempts to manipulate political institutions in his favor were seen as a direct threat to the traditional political establishment in Bangkok, whose power rests on the military, civil bureaucracy and the royal families.
Thai politics since the 2006 coup have repeatedly been consumed by the struggles between Thaksin's proxy parties and anti-Thaksin forces. These struggles have directly led to several rounds of political crisis and the end of three successive governments. The popularity of Thaksin's sister, Yingluck, and her campaign for national reconciliation had brought relative stability to the country for the past two years. However, facing the threat of lost influence, the traditional establishment has not wasted time in bringing pressure against Yingluck's government.
Beneath the political roots, there has been a growing economic challenge during Yingluck's two years in office. Thailand has made remarkable progress with sustained economic development, but economic growth and public services have been largely concentrated in the central region and Bangkok, while the vast majority of the population working in agriculture and informal sectors has little access to social welfare. Such inequality has exacerbated social tensions and increased the public demand for inefficient populist policies.Â
Moreover, with Thailand's exports, which accounted for 60 percent of the country's economy, faltering amid the global recession and China's slower growth, the need to harness the rural population grew. Lower exports also were an opportunity for the opposition to point to Yingluck's many inefficient populist policies and her controversial political agenda. Falling exports have strained the state budget, which was already beset by a failing rice subsidy and massive infrastructure investment. Now the country is facing a growing credit bubble and long-lasting economic slowdown, which will only worsen with the political crisis.

Struggling for Relevance

As an important security ally of the United States, Thailand was likely to play a major leadership role in the region at a time of renewed U.S. engagement in Asia. However, Bangkok's political uncertainties and concerns about the civilian-military balance appear to have hampered the U.S.-Thai relationship and have forced Washington to look for other partners, such as the Philippines, Indonesia and Singapore, and to develop better relations with less traditional partners such as Vietnam.
With the United States now placing less emphasis on its relationship with Thailand, the country is accelerating its pursuit of more vibrant ties with China, which perceives Bangkok as a strategic pillar in its expanded outreach in Southeast Asia and as a potential corridor as it builds up its maritime sphere. Under Yingluck's government, China has discussed building a high-speed rail line from Bangkok to Nong Khai as well as various investment pacts. But the latest disruption also reminded Beijing that its strategy could again be threatened if the current government cannot retain power.
While all this is going on, Thailand is faced with the strategic opening of Myanmar, Thailand's historical rival to the west, and growing competition with Cambodia in the east. With the rest of the region prepared to capture the benefits of its newfound significance, Thailand may find itself being left behind.

For my birthday, Slavoj Žižek spoke on Love as a Political Category

We lived in a golden age, did we but know it

Bob Doyle

 
1916-2009 Born on North King Street & fought against fascism in the Spanish civil war

"The fight today is as vital as it was in Spain, but remember we are fighting for an idea and though we must at times defend ourselves guns ca

nnot impose an idea; the four weapons of victory are - education, organisation, civil disobedience & unity.

From my lifetime of struggles these are the lessons I've learned - take up the fight and let us fight together for the liberation of mankind."

LA LUCHA CONTINUA

EVIDENTLY CHICKEN TOWN

the fucking cops are fucking keen 
to fucking keep it fucking clean
the fucking chief's a fucking swine
who fucking draws a fucking line
at fucking fun and fucking games
the fucking kids he fucking blames
are nowehere to be fucking found
anywhere in chicken town

the fucking scene is fucking sad
the fucking news is fucking bad
the fucking weed is fucking turf
the fucking speed is fucking surf
the fucking folks are fucking daft
don't make me fucking laugh
it fucking hurts to look around
everywhere in chicken town

the fucking train is fucking late
you fucking wait you fucking wait
you're fucking lost and fucking found
stuck in fucking chicken town

the fucking view is fucking vile
for fucking miles and fucking miles
the fucking babies fucking cry
the fucking flowers fucking die
the fucking food is fucking muck
the fucking drains are fucking fucked
the colour scheme is fucking brown
everywhere in chicken town

the fucking pubs are fucking dull
the fucking clubs are fucking full
of fucking girls and fucking guys
with fucking murder in their eyes
a fucking bloke is fucking stabbed
waiting for a fucking cab
you fucking stay at fucking home
the fucking neighbors fucking moan
keep the fucking racket down
this is fucking chicken town

the fucking train is fucking late
you fucking wait you fucking wait
you're fucking lost and fucking found
stuck in fucking chicken town

the fucking pies are fucking old
the fucking chips are fucking cold
the fucking beer is fucking flat
the fucking flats have fucking rats
the fucking clocks are fucking wrong
the fucking days are fucking long
it fucking gets you fucking down
evidently chicken town

JOHN COOPER CLARKE

Prometheus

Millburn: Okay, so uh...do you have anything to back that up? I mean, look, if you're willing to discount three centuries of Darwinism, that's...wooh! But how do you know? Mm?
Elizabeth Shaw: I don't. But it's what I choose to believe.

Boots of Spanish Leather

|--------|--------|--------|--------|--------|
|--0----1|--1----0|--0----1|--1----0|--0----0|
|-----0--|-----0--|-----0--|-----0--|-----0--|
|--0---0-|--2---2-|--0---0-|--2---2-|--0---0-|
|--------|--------|--------|--------|--------|
|3---3---|3---3---|3---3---|3---3---|3---3---|


 |--------|--------|--------|--------|--------|--------|
 |--0-----|--3----3|---0-0-0|---01---|--0----1|--1----0|
*|-----0-0|-----0--|--------|-2---2--|-----0--|-----0--|
*|--0---0-|--2---2-|--2---2-|--0---0-|--0---0-|--2---2-|
 |--------|--------|--------|--------|--------|--------|
 |3---3---|0---0---|0---0---|2---2---|3---3---|3---3---|

  Well I'm sailin' away my   own true love             

|--------|--------|--------|--------|--------|
|--0-----|--3----3|---01---|--0----1|--1----0|
|-----0-0|-----0--|-2---2--|-----0--|-----0--|
|--0---0-|--2---2-|--0---0-|--0---0-|--2---2-|
|--------|--------|--------|--------|--------|
|3---3---|0---0---|2---2---|3---3---|3---3---|

      I'm sailin' away   ^  mornin'            
               in the

|--------|--------|--------|--------|--------|--------|
|--0-----|--3----3|--3-----|-1------|--0----1|--1----0|
|-----0-0|-----0--|-----0--|---0-2-2|-----0--|-----0--|
|--0---0-|--2---2-|--2---2-|--2---0-|--0---0-|--2---2-|
|--------|--------|--------|3-------|--------|--------|
|3---3---|0---0---|0---0---|----2---|3---3---|3---3---|

     Is ^ somethin^send ^ across the sea    
       there     I can   you from

|--------|--------|--------|--------|---01---|--------|
|--0-----|--3----3|---01---|--0-----|-----3--|--0-----|
|-----0-0|-----0--|-2---2--|-----0-0|-2-----2|-----0-0|*
|--0---0-|--2---2-|--0---0-|--0---0-|--0---0-|--0---0-|*
|--------|--------|--------|--------|--------|--------|
|3---3---|0---0---|2---2---|3---3---|2---2---|3---3---|

 From the place ^  I'll be  landing?
           where

    Well I'm sailin away my own true love.
    I'm sailin' away in the mornin'
    Is there something I can bsend you from across the sea,
    From the place where I'll be landin'?

No, there's nothing you can bring me my own true love.
There's nothing I wish to be ownin'.
Just carry yourself back to me unspoiled
from across that lonesome ocean.

    Well I just though you might want something fine
    made of silver or of golden
    either from the mountains of Madrid
    or the coast of Barcelona.

If I had the stars from the darkest night
and the diamonds from the deepest ocean,
I'd foresake them all for your sweet kiss,
for that's all I'm wishin' to be ownin'

    That I might be gone a long old time,
    and it's only that I'm askin'.
    Is there something I can give you to remember me by,
    To make your time more easy passin'?

Oh how can, how can you ask me again?
It only brings me sorrow.
For the same thing that I want from you today
I would want again tomorrow.

Well I got a letter on a lonesome day.
It was from her ship a'sailin'.
Sayin' "I don't know when I'll be comin' back again.
It depends on how I'm feelin'."

Well if you my love must think that a'way
I'm sure your mind is a'roamin'.
I'm sure your heart is not with me
but with the country where you're goin'.

So take heed, take heed of the Western wind.
Take heed of the stormy weather.
And yes, there's something you can send back to me;
SPANISH BOOTS OF SPANISH LEATHER.

In mystery the soul abides

Michael D. Higgins final Dáil speech

World IPv6 Day

Ireland's future depends on breaking free from bailout

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2011/0507/1224296372123.html?via=mr

ECB-IMF deal is a noose that will strangle economic recovery

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2011/0409/1224294304548.html

You should care about Eircom — our economic wellbeing depends on it

http://www.irishexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/matt-cooper/you-should-care-about-eircom-our-economic-wellbeing-depends-on-it-147769.html

When Irish Eyes Are Crying

http://www.vanityfair.com/business/features/2011/03/michael-lewis-ireland-201103?currentPage=all

If you thought the bank bailout was bad, wait until the mortgage defaults hit home

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2010/1108http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif/1224282865400.html

The Clutter From The Gutter (Anhrefn & Margi Clarke)

Clutter From The Gutter

Carl Sagan - 'A Glorious Dawn' ft Stephen Hawking

Robyn - Konichiwa Bitches

Three good reasons to spurn Lisbon once again

http://www.thepost.ie/commentandanalysis/three-good-reasons-to-spurn-lisbon-once-again-44120.html

Dublin Alphabet Pub Crawl

http://dublinalphabetpubcrawl.blogspot.com

The Quiet Coup

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200905/imf-advice

The Lisbon Treaty No Vote - A Defeat for Imperialism

http://www.pana.ie/idn/20081129.html

Two little boys

"Exterminate all the Brutes": Gaza 2009

http://www.chomsky.info/articles/20090119.htm

Israel: Boycott, Divest, Sanction

http://www.naomiklein.org/articles/2009/01/israel-boycott-divest-sanction

The Strategic Game To Undermine The Irish Vote On Lisbon

http://www.swp.ie/component/content/article/8-news/54-the-strategic-game-to-undermine-the-irish-vote-on-lisbon

Johnny Ryan's Short History of America

EU plans to force second Lisbon vote

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/ireland/article4969353.ece

Reversal of Fortune

http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2008/11/stiglitz200811?printable=true&currentPage=all

Noam Chomsky: The Financial Crisis of 2008

http://www.zcommunications.org/znet/viewArticle/19111

Rise Up With Fists - Jenny Lewis and The Watson Twins

Loose Lips - Kimya Dawson

The Real World Order

By George Friedman

On Sept. 11, 1990, U.S. President George H. W. Bush addressed Congress. He spoke in the wake of the end of Communism in Eastern Europe, the weakening of the Soviet Union, and the invasion of Kuwait by Saddam Hussein. He argued that a New World Order was emerging: “A hundred generations have searched for this elusive path to peace, while a thousand wars raged across the span of human endeavor, and today that new world is struggling to be born. A world quite different from the one we’ve known. A world where the rule of law supplants the rule of the jungle. A world in which nations recognize the shared responsibility for freedom and justice. A world where the strong respect the rights of the weak.”

After every major, systemic war, there is the hope that this will be the war to end all wars. The idea driving it is simple. Wars are usually won by grand coalitions. The idea is that the coalition that won the war by working together will continue to work together to make the peace. Indeed, the idea is that the defeated will join the coalition and work with them to ensure the peace. This was the dream behind the Congress of Vienna, the League of Nations, the United Nations and, after the Cold War, NATO. The idea was that there would be no major issues that couldn’t be handled by the victors, now joined with the defeated. That was the idea that drove George H. W. Bush as the Cold War was coming to its end.

Those with the dream are always disappointed. The victorious coalition breaks apart. The defeated refuse to play the role assigned to them. New powers emerge that were not part of the coalition. Anyone may have ideals and visions. The reality of the world order is that there are profound divergences of interest in a world where distrust is a natural and reasonable response to reality. In the end, ideals and visions vanish in a new round of geopolitical conflict.

The post-Cold War world, the New World Order, ended with authority on Aug. 8, 2008, when Russia and Georgia went to war. Certainly, this war was not in itself of major significance, and a very good case can be made that the New World Order actually started coming apart on Sept. 11, 2001. But it was on Aug. 8 that a nation-state, Russia, attacked another nation-state, Georgia, out of fear of the intentions of a third nation-state, the United States. This causes us to begin thinking about the Real World Order.

The global system is suffering from two imbalances. First, one nation-state, the United States, remains overwhelmingly powerful, and no combination of powers are in a position to control its behavior. We are aware of all the economic problems besetting the United States, but the reality is that the American economy is larger than the next three economies combined (Japan, Germany and China). The U.S. military controls all the world’s oceans and effectively dominates space. Because of these factors, the United States remains politically powerful — not liked and perhaps not admired, but enormously powerful.

The second imbalance is within the United States itself. Its ground forces and the bulk of its logistical capability are committed to the Middle East, particularly Iraq and Afghanistan. The United States also is threatening on occasion to go to war with Iran, which would tie down most of its air power, and it is facing a destabilizing Pakistan. Therefore, there is this paradox: The United States is so powerful that, in the long run, it has created an imbalance in the global system. In the short run, however, it is so off balance that it has few, if any, military resources to deal with challenges elsewhere. That means that the United States remains the dominant power in the long run but it cannot exercise that power in the short run. This creates a window of opportunity for other countries to act.

The outcome of the Iraq war can be seen emerging. The United States has succeeded in creating the foundations for a political settlement among the main Iraqi factions that will create a relatively stable government. In that sense, U.S. policy has succeeded. But the problem the United States has is the length of time it took to achieve this success. Had it occurred in 2003, the United States would not suffer its current imbalance. But this is 2008, more than five years after the invasion. The United States never expected a war of this duration, nor did it plan for it. In order to fight the war, it had to inject a major portion of its ground fighting capability into it. The length of the war was the problem. U.S. ground forces are either in Iraq, recovering from a tour or preparing for a deployment. What strategic reserves are available are tasked into Afghanistan. Little is left over.

As Iraq pulled in the bulk of available forces, the United States did not shift its foreign policy elsewhere. For example, it remained committed to the expansion of democracy in the former Soviet Union and the expansion of NATO, to include Ukraine and Georgia. From the fall of the former Soviet Union, the United States saw itself as having a dominant role in reshaping post-Soviet social and political orders, including influencing the emergence of democratic institutions and free markets. The United States saw this almost in the same light as it saw the democratization of Germany and Japan after World War II. Having defeated the Soviet Union, it now fell to the United States to reshape the societies of the successor states.

Through the 1990s, the successor states, particularly Russia, were inert. Undergoing painful internal upheaval — which foreigners saw as reform but which many Russians viewed as a foreign-inspired national catastrophe — Russia could not resist American and European involvement in regional and internal affairs. From the American point of view, the reshaping of the region — from the Kosovo war to the expansion of NATO to the deployment of U.S. Air Force bases to Central Asia — was simply a logical expansion of the collapse of the Soviet Union. It was a benign attempt to stabilize the region, enhance its prosperity and security and integrate it into the global system.

As Russia regained its balance from the chaos of the 1990s, it began to see the American and European presence in a less benign light. It was not clear to the Russians that the United States was trying to stabilize the region. Rather, it appeared to the Russians that the United States was trying to take advantage of Russian weakness to impose a new politico-military reality in which Russia was to be surrounded with nations controlled by the United States and its military system, NATO. In spite of the promise made by Bill Clinton that NATO would not expand into the former Soviet Union, the three Baltic states were admitted. The promise was not addressed. NATO was expanded because it could and Russia could do nothing about it.

From the Russian point of view, the strategic break point was Ukraine. When the Orange Revolution came to Ukraine, the American and European impression was that this was a spontaneous democratic rising. The Russian perception was that it was a well-financed CIA operation to foment an anti-Russian and pro-American uprising in Ukraine. When the United States quickly began discussing the inclusion of Ukraine in NATO, the Russians came to the conclusion that the United States intended to surround and crush the Russian Federation. In their view, if NATO expanded into Ukraine, the Western military alliance would place Russia in a strategically untenable position. Russia would be indefensible. The American response was that it had no intention of threatening Russia. The Russian question was returned: Then why are you trying to take control of Ukraine? What other purpose would you have? The United States dismissed these Russian concerns as absurd. The Russians, not regarding them as absurd at all, began planning on the assumption of a hostile United States.

If the United States had intended to break the Russian Federation once and for all, the time for that was in the 1990s, before Yeltsin was replaced by Putin and before 9/11. There was, however, no clear policy on this, because the United States felt it had all the time in the world. Superficially this was true, but only superficially. First, the United States did not understand that the Yeltsin years were a temporary aberration and that a new government intending to stabilize Russia was inevitable. If not Putin, it would have been someone else. Second, the United States did not appreciate that it did not control the international agenda. Sept. 11, 2001, took away American options in the former Soviet Union. No only did it need Russian help in Afghanistan, but it was going to spend the next decade tied up in the Middle East. The United States had lost its room for maneuver and therefore had run out of time.

And now we come to the key point. In spite of diminishing military options outside of the Middle East, the United States did not modify its policy in the former Soviet Union. It continued to aggressively attempt to influence countries in the region, and it became particularly committed to integrating Ukraine and Georgia into NATO, in spite of the fact that both were of overwhelming strategic interest to the Russians. Ukraine dominated Russia’s southwestern flank, without any natural boundaries protecting them. Georgia was seen as a constant irritant in Chechnya as well as a barrier to Russian interests in the Caucasus.

Moving rapidly to consolidate U.S. control over these and other countries in the former Soviet Union made strategic sense. Russia was weak, divided and poorly governed. It could make no response. Continuing this policy in the 2000s, when the Russians were getting stronger, more united and better governed and while U.S. forces were no longer available, made much less sense. The United States continued to irritate the Russians without having, in the short run, the forces needed to act decisively.

The American calculation was that the Russian government would not confront American interests in the region. The Russian calculation was that it could not wait to confront these interests because the United States was concluding the Iraq war and would return to its pre-eminent position in a few short years. Therefore, it made no sense for Russia to wait and it made every sense for Russia to act as quickly as possible.

The Russians were partly influenced in their timing by the success of the American surge in Iraq. If the United States continued its policy and had force to back it up, the Russians would lose their window of opportunity. Moreover, the Russians had an additional lever for use on the Americans: Iran.

The United States had been playing a complex game with Iran for years, threatening to attack while trying to negotiate. The Americans needed the Russians. Sanctions against Iran would have no meaning if the Russians did not participate, and the United States did not want Russia selling advance air defense systems to Iran. (Such systems, which American analysts had warned were quite capable, were not present in Syria on Sept. 6, 2007, when the Israelis struck a nuclear facility there.) As the United States re-evaluates the Russian military, it does not want to be surprised by Russian technology. Therefore, the more aggressive the United States becomes toward Russia, the greater the difficulties it will have in Iran. This further encouraged the Russians to act sooner rather than later.

The Russians have now proven two things. First, contrary to the reality of the 1990s, they can execute a competent military operation. Second, contrary to regional perception, the United States cannot intervene. The Russian message was directed against Ukraine most of all, but the Baltics, Central Asia and Belarus are all listening. The Russians will not act precipitously. They expect all of these countries to adjust their foreign policies away from the United States and toward Russia. They are looking to see if the lesson is absorbed. At first, there will be mighty speeches and resistance. But the reality on the ground is the reality on the ground.

We would expect the Russians to get traction. But if they don’t, the Russians are aware that they are, in the long run, much weaker than the Americans, and that they will retain their regional position of strength only while the United States is off balance in Iraq. If the lesson isn’t absorbed, the Russians are capable of more direct action, and they will not let this chance slip away. This is their chance to redefine their sphere of influence. They will not get another.

The other country that is watching and thinking is Iran. Iran had accepted the idea that it had lost the chance to dominate Iraq. It had also accepted the idea that it would have to bargain away its nuclear capability or lose it. The Iranians are now wondering if this is still true and are undoubtedly pinging the Russians about the situation. Meanwhile, the Russians are waiting for the Americans to calm down and get serious. If the Americans plan to take meaningful action against them, they will respond in Iran. But the Americans have no meaningful actions they can take; they need to get out of Iraq and they need help against Iran. The quid pro quo here is obvious. The United States acquiesces to Russian actions (which it can’t do anything about), while the Russians cooperate with the Unit ed States against Iran getting nuclear weapons (something Russia does not want to see).

One of the interesting concepts of the New World Order was that all serious countries would want to participate in it and that the only threat would come from rogue states and nonstate actors such as North Korea and al Qaeda. Serious analysts argued that conflict between nation-states would not be important in the 21st century. There will certainly be rogue states and nonstate actors, but the 21st century will be no different than any other century. On Aug. 8, the Russians invited us all to the Real World Order.

www.stratfor.com

The US missile defence system is the magic pudding that will never run out

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/aug/19/usforeignpolicy.russia

The 5.6.7.8's - I'm Blue

The $1.4 Trillion Question

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200801/fallows-chinese-dollars

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Harvard Address. 1978

http://www.columbia.edu/cu/augustine/arch/solzhenitsyn/harvard1978.html

Britain seen from above

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7539529.stm

Lucky Cat

Economic troubles mark the end of Ireland’s “Celtic Tiger”

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/jul2008/irel-j14.shtml

Two Seconds - Laura Cantrell

Spoiling Sarko's Euro-Show

http://www.counterpunch.org/marliere06242008.html

EU to keep pushing for dead parrot treaty

http://www.sbpost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=TOM+MCGURK-qqqs=commentandanalysis-qqqid=33872-qqqx=1.asp

Nothing has changed in Europe, so stop panicking

http://archives.tcm.ie/businesspost/2008/06/22/story33846.asp

Irish 'love EU the most'

http://ukpress.google.com/article/ALeqM5jErgIWvVf-eEIDjZHU8kWKgiqlKQ

Brace yourself for bullying and threats

http://www.independent.ie/opinion/columnists/gene-kerrigan/brace-yourself-for-bullying-and-threats-1418328.html

Bertolt Brecht

"The people have lost the confidence of the government; the government has decided to dissolve the people, and to appoint another one."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bertolt_Brecht

The Problem With Europe

By George Friedman

The creation of a European state was severely wounded if not killed last week. The Irish voted against a proposed European Union treaty that included creation of a full-time president, increased power to pursue a European foreign policy and increased power for Europe’s parliament. Since the European constitutional process depends on unanimous consent by all 27 members, the Irish vote effectively sinks this version of the new constitution, much as Dutch and French voters sank the previous version in 2005.

The Irish vote was not a landslide. Only 54 percent of the voters cast their ballots against the constitution. But that misses the point. Whether it had been 54 percent for or against the constitution, the point was that the Irish were deeply divided. In every country, there is at least a substantial minority that opposes the constitution. Given that all 27 EU countries must approve the constitution, the odds against some country not sinking it are pretty long. The Europeans are not going to get a strengthened constitution this way.

But the deeper point is that you can’t create a constitution without a deep consensus about needing it. Even when there is — as the United States showed during its Civil War — critical details not settled by consensus can lead to conflict. In the case of the United States, the issues of the relative power of states and the federal government, along with the question of slavery, ripped the country apart. They could only be settled by war and a series of amendments to the U.S. Constitution forced through by the winning side after the war.

The Constitutional Challenge
Creating a constitution is not like passing a law — and this treaty was, in all practical terms, a constitution. Constitutions do not represent public policy, but a shared vision of the regime and the purpose of the nation. The U.S. Constitution was born in battle. It emerged from a long war of independence and from the lessons learned in that war about the need for a strong executive to wage war, a strong congress to allocate funds and raise revenue, and a judiciary to interpret the constitution. War, along with the teachings of John Locke, framed the discussions in Philadelphia, because the founders’ experience in a war where there was only a congress and no president convinced them of the need for a strong executive. And even that was not enough to prevent civil war over the issue of state sovereignty versus federal sovereignty. Making a constitution is hard.

The European constitution was also born in battle, but in a different way. For centuries, the Europeans had engaged in increasingly savage wars. The question they wanted to address was how to banish war from Europe. In truth, that decision was not in their hands, but in the hands of Americans and Soviets. But the core issue remained: how to restrain European savagery. The core idea was relatively simple. European wars arose from European divisions; and, for centuries, those divisions ran along national lines. If a United States of Europe could be created on the order of the United States of America, then the endless battling of France, Germany and England would be eliminated.

In the exhaustion of the postwar world — really lasting through the lives of the generation that endured World War II — the concept was deeply seductive. Europe after World War II was exhausted in every sense. It allowed its empires to slip away with a combination of indifference and relief. What Europeans wanted postwar was to make a living and be left alone by ideology and nationalism; they had experienced quite enough of those two. Even France under the influence of Charles de Gaulle, the champion of the idea of the nation-state and its interests, could not arouse a spirit of nationalism anywhere close to what had been.

There is a saying that some people are exhausted and confuse their state with virtue. If that is true, then it is surely true of Europe in the last couple of generations. The European Union reflected these origins. It began as a pact — the European Community — of nations looking to reduce tariff barriers. It evolved into a nearly Europe-wide grouping of countries bound together in a trade bloc, with many of those countries sharing a common currency. Its goal was not the creation of a more perfect union, or, as the Americans put it, a “novus ordo seclorum.” It was not to be the city on the hill. Its commitment was to a more prosperous life, without genocide. Though not exactly inspiring, given the brutality of European history, it was not a trivial goal.

The problem was that when push came to shove, the European Community evolved into the European Union, which consisted of four things:

1. A free trade zone with somewhat synchronized economic polices, not infrequently overridden by the sovereign power of member states.
2. A complex bureaucracy designed to oversee the harmonization of European economies. This was seen as impenetrable and engaged in intensive and intrusive work from the trivial to the extremely significant, charged with defining everything from when a salami may be called a salami and whether Microsoft was a monopoly.
3. A single currency and central bank to which 15 of the 27 EU members subscribed.
4. Had Ireland voted differently, a set of proto-institutions would have been created — complete with a presidency and foreign policy chief — which would have given the European Union the trappings of statehood. The president, who would rotate out of office after a short time, would have been the head of one of the EU member states.

Rejecting a European Regime
The Irish referendum was all about transforming the fourth category into a regime. The Irish rejected it not because they objected to the first three sets of solutions — they have become the second-wealthiest country in Europe per capita under their aegis. They objected to it because they did not want to create a European regime. As French and Dutch voters have said before, the Irish said they want a free trade zone. They will put up with the Brussels bureaucracy even though its intrusiveness and lack of accountability troubles them. They can live with a single currency so long as it does not simply become a prisoner of German and French economic policy. But they do not want to create a European state.

The French and German governments do want to create such a state. As with the creation of the United States, the reasons have to do with war, past and future. Franco-German animosity helped created the two world wars of the 20th century. Those two powers now want a framework for preventing war within Europe. They also — particularly the French — want a vehicle for influencing the course of world events. In their view, the European Union, as a whole, has a gross domestic product comparable to that of the United States. It should be the equal of the United States in shaping the world. This isn’t simply a moral position, but a practical one. The United States throws its weight around because it can, frequently harming Europe’s interests. The French and Germans want to control the United States.

To do this, they need to move beyond having an economic union. They need to have a European foreign and defense policy. But before they can have that, they need a European government that can carry out this policy. And before they can have a European government they must have a European regime, before which they must have a European constitution that enumerates the powers of the European president, parliament and courts. They also need to specify how these officials will be chosen.

The French and Germans would welcome all this if they could get it. They know, given population, economic power and so on, that they would dominate the foreign policy created by a European state. Not so the Irish and Danes; they understand they would have little influence on the course of European foreign policy. They already feel the pain of having little influence on European economic policy, particularly the policies of the European Central Bank (ECB). Even the French public has expressed itself in the 2006 election about fears of Brussels and the ECB. But for countries like Ireland and Denmark, each of which fought very hard to create and retain their national sovereignty, merging into a Europe in which they would lose their veto power to a European parliamentary and presidential system is an appalling prospect.

Economists always have trouble understanding nationalism. To an economist, all human beings are concerned with maximizing their own private wealth. Economists can never deal with the empirical fact that this simply isn’t true. Many Irish fought against being cogs in a multinational British Empire. The Danes fought against being absorbed by Germany. The prospect of abandoning the struggle for national sovereignty to Europe is not particularly pleasing, even if it means economic advantage.

Europe is not going to become a nation-state in the way the United States is. It is increasingly clear that Europeans are not going to reach a consensus on a European constitution. They are not in agreement on what European institutions should look like, how elections should be held and, above all, about the relation between individual nations and a central government. The Europeans have achieved all they are going to achieve. They have achieved a free trade zone with a regulatory body managing it. They have created a currency that is optional to EU members, and from which we expect some members to withdraw from at times while others join in. There will be no collective European foreign or defense policy simply because the Europeans do not have a common interest in foreign and defense policy.

Paris Reads the Writing on the Wall
The French have realized this most clearly. Once the strongest advocates of a federated Europe, the French under President Nicolas Sarkozy have started moving toward new strategies. Certainly, they remain committed to the European Union in its current structure, but they no longer expect it to have a single integrated foreign and defense policy. Instead, the French are pursuing initiatives by themselves. One aspect of this involves drawing closer to the United States on some foreign policy issues. Rather than trying to construct a single Europe that might resist the United States — former President Jacques Chirac’s vision — the French are moving to align themselves to some degree with American policies. Iran is an example.

The most intriguing initiative from France is the idea of a Mediterranean union drawing together the countries of the Mediterranean basin, from Algeria to Israel to Turkey. Apart from whether these nations could coexist in such a union, the idea raises the question of whether France (or Italy or Greece) can simultaneously belong to the European Union and another economic union. While questions — such as whether North African access to the French market would provide access to the rest of the European Union — remain to be answered, the Germans have strongly rejected this French vision.

The vision derives directly from French geopolitical reality. To this point, the French focus has been on France as a European country whose primary commitment is to Europe. But France also is a Mediterranean country, with historical ties and interests in the Mediterranean basin. France’s geographical position gives it options, and it has begun examining those options independent of its European partners.

The single most important consequence of the Irish vote is that it makes clear that European political union is not likely to happen. It therefore forces EU members to consider their own foreign and defense policies — and, therefore, their own geopolitical positions. Whether an economic union can survive in a region of political diversity really depends on whether the diversity evolves into rivalry. While that has been European history, it is not clear that Europe has the inclination to resurrect national rivalries.

At the same time, if France does pursue interests independent of the Germans, the question will be this: Will the mutual interest in economic unity override the tendency toward political conflict? The idea was that Europe would moot the question by creating a federation. That isn’t going to happen, so the question is on the table. And that question can be framed simply: When speaking of political and military matters, is it reasonable any longer to use the term Europe to denote a single entity? Europe, as it once was envisioned, appears to have disappeared in Ireland.

Stratfor

Look what we have done for ordinary Europeans

http://www.davidmcwilliams.ie/2008/06/18/look-what-we-have-done-for-ordinary-europeans

Ireland Punishes the EU for Constitution Trick

http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,559741,00.html

European powers to continue with Lisbon Treaty despite Ireland “No” vote

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/jun2008/irel-j16.shtml

Andreas Whittam Smith: Irish voters have stated the truth for all of us

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/andreas-whittam-smith/andreas-whittam-smith-irish-voters-have-stated-the-truth-for-all-of-us-847897.html

Mikhail Gorbachev

"The most puzzling development in politics during the last decade is the apparent determination of Western European leaders to re-create the Soviet Union in Western Europe"

Only Ireland Can Vote on EU's Future

http://www.counterpunch.org/browne05172008.html