Is a bad response better than no response?

The Times is reporting that a torpedo or mine attack was almost certainly the cause of the sinking of the South Korean warship Cheonan last month. Seoul has thus far gone out of its way to avoid blaming North Korea for the incident, and will find themselves in a very awkward position should unequivocal proof emerge that Pyongyang is responsible. In fact, at the moment we seem to be in a bizarre twilight zone where South Korea is doing everything it can to avoid blaming North Korea for the sinking.  

From Seoul it probably seems that suffering occasional provocations (and doing some provoking of its own every so often) is a fair price to pay for peace. The South knows there is no chance it could be invaded again and it quite happy with its place in the world at present. Though the threat from the North is real, it isn’t existential and after more than 50 years of tense peace on the peninsula Seoul has learned to live with it.

The status quo has been good for South Korea since the end of quasi-fascist rule in the 80s, partly because sabre-rattling from the North has been ignored and nationalistic impulses within the South have been kept in check. Doing nothing is an option which has been taken for a long time now, to the benefit of Seoul.

However, just because something works once, twice, or dozens of times does not mean it will always work. The structure and decision-making processes of the North Korean leadership is opaque, so no one can be sure exactly who might have taken the decision to attack the Cheonan. The reasons for the attack are also unclear but if no retaliation is forthcoming, the lesson Pyongyang will learn is that the South has no stomach for a fight. In the short term that may not have any serious repercussions, but if the North begins to  seriously believe that the South won’t respond to any aggression, then there would be a serious risk of a miscalculation which could lead to war. For all his despotism, Kim Jong ill is fairly rational and very much interested in his own survival as leader, but frankly, any leader who can get away with sinking foreign ships to no consequence could be forgiven for believing they can get away with anything. Deterrence only works if it is credible, and it would be very, very dangerous to let North Korea believe it can torpedo the South’s navy when it feels like it.

On the other hand, retaliating in kind could lead to war too, for obvious reasons. If the Southern response made the North Korea's leadership believes it was under general attack, it really has only one tool with which to hit back: an enormous artillery range trained on Seoul which could inflict absolutely catastrophic damage on the city within the first few hours of a war. This trump card would have to be played very early on as it would be vulnerable to being overrun by American and Southern forces once they cross the border. If the North was to hesitate to react  to a general attack, it would be already have lost the war, so there would be no time to negotiate a climb-down or ceasefire. If war starts, it will start in earnest and won’t end until one side is totally defeated.Such a war would be the biggest war the planet has seen in a long time, not a quick and easy victory like Iraq or Georgia, and would cause hundreds of thousands if not millions of civilian and military deaths, and fundamentally change the security mechanisms of East Asia.

So Seoul’s dithering is understandable. There is no easy decision to make here, and no good decision either. At this very moment, the South Korean government will be hoping that they can be saved from responding by a convenient finding that North Korea wasn’t behind the attack. Without  government interference into the investigation that’s a pretty long shot, and if no such convenient finding is forthcoming, a difficult choice will have to be made.

New poll, same old

A new BBC poll shows that public opinion of the United States is beginning to improve after years of decline during the presidency of George W. Bush. Some of this can be attributed to the ‘Obama Effect’, but other factors are at play here and say more about the media than the changing face of the balance of power across the globe today. Results concerning other countries are unsurprising and reflect not their behaviour, but rather their ability to control their public image.

First though, it’s important to examine some of the methodology used in the annual survey. 30,000 people in 33 countries were asked to rate various countries as having either a positive or negative influence on the world (how they rate their own country isn’t factored in). Different countries are selected every year (though some have been included every year), however this year has thrown up some geographical anomalies.

Every single country in North America was polled (including all six Central American nations), but only Brazil and Chile from South America. Almost every Western European nation’s opinions were included, but from Eastern Europe and the Balkans only Russia was consulted. Not one Middle Eastern or Central Asian nation was polled and only three Sub Saharan African nations made the cut. One needs to consider this when analysing these results.

Germany is the most positively-rated country in the survey. Not hugely surprising, as Berlin rarely offends anyone, is generous with aid and an incident in Afghanistan last year where its forces called in an air strike that killed around 100 civilians went largely unreported. It’s one of the great ironies of geopolitics that Germany has finally managed to dominate Europe and simultaneously become perhaps more popular than it ever has been.

Brazil is rated positively by 41% of respondents and negatively by 23%. One struggles to imagine what people imagine Brazil’s negative effects on the world to be, perhaps the inability of the state to fully protect the Amazon is a factor, but more likely is the fact that as Brazil becomes a bigger player on the world stage, it simply attracts more attention and thus more criticism.

This effect could also explain why positive views of China have dropped from 49% in 2005 to 34% today. Western media relentlessly portrays China in a negative light, but China still rates reasonably well. Unsurprisingly, African countries which have been large recipients of Chinese investment hold overwhelmingly positive (c. 70%) view of the People’s Republic. Oddly, no country has a poor a view of China as Italy does. Maybe Italians find Chinese politicians’ dull manner a poor contrast to their own Prime Minister’s behaviour.

Russia ranks poorly, as it has done since these polls were first taken.  Especially loathed in America, Mexico, the EU, South Korea and Japan, Moscow can at least be consoled by the fact that 55% of Chinese deem their giant northern neighbour to be a force for good. In the long run, this may be the most important statistic for Moscow. While Russia is viewed badly by the German and French publics, it has enough economic clout to ensure those countries’ governments seek warm relations with the Bear.

Predictably, Israel, Pakistan, North Korea and Iran are more-or-less universally despised. That won’t change in the foreseeable future and to be fair, none of those countries are trying to be loved. That western, democratic Israel is lumped in with a collapsing state, a dictatorship and a theocracy says a lot. Americans only just about see Israel positively overall, but this won’t worry the Israeli government as it knows its patron will always turn a blind eye to its treatment of Palestinians.

Which makes one wonder why so many people have a positive view of America.  Though Russia, Mexico, Germany, Turkey, China and Pakistan retain negative views of the US, its image has improved quite a bit in the last three years. Overall, 34% of respondents consider the US to have a negative influence on the world. 40% view America in a positive light, up from 27% in 2007. Could that be because the US has finally pulled out of Iraq as it promised to do? Maybe because Guantanamo Bay has been shut down? Perhaps the fact that civilians are no longer being killed in Afghanistan has something to do with it? Dramatic action on climate change? Proper dialogue with Iran instead of threats?

No, more than likely this can be explained by how little attention most people actually pay to international politics. Whatever your opinion on the US is, nothing has substantially changed about its foreign policies in the last three years apart from the manner in which the White House conducts itself. Despite having more control over media than any other country on Earth, America is still not a particularly popular country, but as long as almost no one is paying any attention, that doesn’t really matter.

Counter-counter revolution in Kyrgyzstan

 

Most people outside Central Asia have no idea how to pronounce the name 'Kyrgyzstan', couldn't find it on a map and know nothing of its history, so it may seem somewhat surprising that its internal politics provided the biggest news story of last week.

One might be even more surprised to discover that the three biggest players in world politics, the US, China and Russia expend considerable diplomatic energy trying to keep the former SSR within their spheres of influence, or at least out of eachother's.  On the face of it, Kyrgyzstan doesn't seem very important in the greater scheme of things. It has virtually no oil or gas, it's economy is a basket case and it's military is pitiful, composed almost entirely of decrepit Soviet weapony.

As with all geopolitical topics though, Kyrgyzstan's geography must be considered. It is situated in an extraordinarily stratregically important location.
To the East is China's troublesome Xinjiang province. Like Xinjiang, Kyrgyzstan is mostly Muslim, mostly Turkic and mostly poor. China has a big interest in ensuring that it's tiny neighbour doesn't become a base for seperatists or Islamicists. Beijing uses soft power, mostly trade, to maintain good terms with Bishkek. In future, maybe it can become a satellite state. For now, stability is the goal.

The US also has quite a big strategic interest in Kyrgyzstan. Manas Air Base, in the north of the country, is used to transport a huge amount of American soldiers to Afghanistan. in 2009, when Russia bribed the previous Kyrgyz government to close the base, Washington quickly agreed to triple the amount of rent it paid to keep the base open. Given how unreliable overland supply routes to Afghanistan are, America's reaction was a measure of just how important Manas is.

But going back on the deal with the Kremlin was a huge strategic error by the now-deposed government. The 'aid package' Russia gave was never explicitly tied to the eviction of the USAF, but both were announced on the same day in a manner that left it clear to everyone in no doubt that Moscow have been the driving force between the closure. Once the former President Kurmanbek Bakiyev had a change of heart and allowed the US to continue use of the base, things turned sour. How he could not have foreseen last week's event is anyone's guess, but soon enough Russian energy supplies became a lot more expensive, Russian-owned media turned hostile to the government, and the Kremlin recognised the new government almost before it had taken power.

Russia has numerous controls mechanisms over Bishkek, like the Shanghai Co-operation Organisation, The Collective Security Treaty Organisation and the Eurasian Economic Community customs union. Membership of all these organisations is genuinely voluntary, and beneficial for all states concerned. But Moscow still considers itself to have a sphere of influence in Central Asia, and has no intention of allowing either China or America chip away at it, however slowly. So from the Kremlin's point of view, something had to be done.

Here's what will happen. The new Kyrgyz government, led by Roza Otunbayeva will not evict the US. However, it will make it clear that the decision is not entirely theirs to make, and that were Russia to lean heavily on them, they could be left with no choice. Nikita Khruschev once said Berlin was '...the testicles of the west. When I want them to scream, I just squeeze Berlin'. On a much smaller scale, that is the principle behind Russia's interest in Kyrgyzstan. Now wouldn't be a good time to damage relations with Washingon, but it's nice to know it can be done if needs be.

There is also another benefit for Putin and Medvedev. Like almost all of Russia's 'near abroad', Kyrgyzstan likes to try and balance Russian influence by maintaing decent relations with other great powers. However, Moscow appears to be tiring of what it sees as its disloyal neighbours playing this game. Belarus aggravates The Kremlin by using the EU as leverage against Moscow, but Alexander Lukashenko will take a clear message from the events of the last week: You can only push it so far. If we can make this happen in Bishkek, we can do the same in Minsk. Like all the big players in world politics, Russia has bullying tendencies and likes to make examples. What better example than a President fleeing for his life thorugh the mountains of Central Asia?