Reckless or feckless in Syria

The US is determined to punish the Assad regime for using chemical weapons and violating ‘red lines’ through a military intervention. Inadvisable as this may be, even a narrow targeted attack might be effective if well-planned. However, this does not seem to be the case

The debate on foreign military intervention in Syria is as complicated as the situation in Syria is itself, and it is difficult to do justice to the whole horde of issues — political, ideological, economic and strategic — that shape the conversation in this regard. So, let’s strip the discourse to its bare essentials and focus on two key issues here: First, why does President Barack Obama want to intervene in Syria? And second, what exactly does he plan to do?

The Assad regime has been at war with its own people since 2011 when it first used brutal police force to crackdown on peaceful protestors. Since then, President Bashar al-Assad has slowly but steadily intensified his campaign, using artillery fire and scud missiles even, and each time the West has responded with nothing more than a bland condemnatory statement. What changed in recent weeks is the alleged use of chemical weapons by the Assad regime — President Obama had designated this as a ‘red line’ — that reportedly killed  almost 1,500 people on August 21.

This flagrant breach of what the White House now likes to believe was an ‘international red line’ has to be punished, the Obama Administration has decided. The problem is that there is still no concrete proof that it was, in fact, the Assad regime that ordered the CW attack. The US intelligence assessment in this regard is flimsy; the UN is still investigating the attack; the French are the only ones with a detailed analysis of Mr Assad’s CW stockpile but still cannot pin the blame firmly on Damascus.

Also, the French and American estimates for the number of dead — 400 and 1,400+ respectively — do not match. The British peg the figure even lower at around 300. This is an important distinction because there were chemical attacks prior to August 21 but none elicited such a response, presumably because the body count was low. This brings us to the fallacy of using chemical weapons attacks as a ‘red line’ in the first place.

First, there is no evidence to suggest that chemical weapons kill more people than conventional weapons. In fact, the exact opposite is true. Second, there is an underlying assumption that there is something especially horrific about using a chemical agent as opposed to a conventional weapon. That does not make much sense. As the chemist James Conant, involved in the United States’ chemical weapons programme, wrote: “I did not see in 1917…  why tearing a man’s guts out by high explosive shell is to be preferred to maiming him by attacking his lungs.” In fact, some scholars have even argued that chemical weapons are more humane than conventional weapons but that is beside the point. The crux of the matter is that the international brouhaha over a CW attack is largely misplaced.

But still, let’s go with the flow and assume that President Assad who has been on a murderous spree for two years has now committed an exceptionally terrible crime by gassing his people, and therefore, deserves to be punished by the US (and the international community) or else it will be setting a dangerous precedent for other despots around the world. This brings us to the second aspect of how exactly President Obama intends to hand out this punishment — and it is here that the situation gets really murky. 

President Obama has proposed targeted, signature strikes — America fires a few missiles and bombs key military assets, thereby, weakening the regime and possibly forcing President Assad’s regime to the negotiating table. On the face of it, this seems like a quick, clean, surgical operation but dig below the surface and there lies a can of worms. First, what do these strikes hope to achieve? Is the US looking only to ‘deter’ further CW attacks or is it looking to significantly ‘degrade’ President Assad’s military capabilities?

If the elimination of chemical weapons-related targets is the only aim of US intervention, this is not a practical option. As military experts Chandler P Atwood and Michael Knights point out, the Assad regime is likely to be taking ‘defensive measures’ such as moving the stockpiles around, making it extremely difficult to target them unless the US can respond with persistent intelligence collection for which it will have to establish full control over Syrian airspace. Also, even after these stockpiles have been discovered, the US cannot bomb the chemical weapons. Boots on the ground will be needed. The US can choose to focus on CW delivery systems but even that will require rocket launchers, missiles and aircraft — in other words, a major military operation.

The other option, as Messers Atwood and Knight note, is to hit President Assad’s military assets such as the Damascus-based Fourth Armoured Division which was supposedly responsible for August 21 attack and the lethal 155th Brigade, led by the President’s brother. The US could also attack symbolic targets such as the Air Force intelligence headquarters and military bases in Dumair, Saiqal, Tiyas and Hama and ‘People’s Army’ units that are financed by Iran and trained by its militant Shia proxy Hezbollah. 

In fact, single targeted strikes can actually be quite effective, as Brigadier General Michael Herzog points out. For instance, this year Israel attacked two weapons shipments intended for Hezbollah and also the Scientific Studies and Research Centre in Damascus that was reportedly involved in the development of biological and chemical weapons. All three were targeted strikes (of the kind that Mr Obama fancies) and they were all successful in achieving Israel’s narrow goal of preventing Hezbollah from receiving weapons. But, the key to that success was careful planning and the element of surprise.

Unfortunately, President Obama does not seem to have planned targets and he has already frittered away the surprise advantage. In fact, he if really wanted to launch targeted strikes, he should have done it months ago when Mr Assad was losing ground and the rebels were advancing. A military intervention at that time could have actually tipped the balance in the Opposition’s favour (although, this is not to say that Syria’s Islamist infested, fractured rebel groups are a welcome alternative to the Assad regime). But the calculus has since changed, especially after Hezbollah threw in its weight in favour of the regime. Today, the Assad regime is in a stronger position and there is no reason for the President to willingly give up power.

There is also the matter of civilian casualties which cannot be ruled out, no matter how surgically precise the strikes, as most military experts acknowledge. Even Secretary of State John Kerry said on Tuesday that while the US can restrain its own actions, there are no guarantees for how the Assad regime (and its allies in the region) will retaliate.

(This article was published in the op-ed section of The Pioneer on September 15, 2013)

Building an equal partnership

US must take India’s concerns into account if it wants the latter to be a security anchor against China

That there is a nice ring to lofty statements about the shared ideals and values between the world’s largest democracy and the world’s most powerful democracy is without a doubt, much like all the talk about deepening ties between these two countries allows for some solid diplomatic bonhomie. But rhetoric, no matter how pleasant and passionate, does not necessarily convert into good policy. It is against this backdrop that the Third India-US Strategic Dialogue that Union Minister for External Affairs SM Krishna co-chaired with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Washington, DC on June 13 must be viewed.

The high-level, capstone dialogue between the two countries was instituted in 2010 to promote greater cooperation between the two countries and broaden the scope of bilateral relations. In other words, it is here that the basic framework of India-US relations is defined and demarcated, and then re-defined. The current round of talks, however, has come at a particularly interesting time in the history of the India-US relations.

After a lukewarm start in the late 1990s, ties between India and the US were only strengthened in this past decade. Throughout the mid-2000s, the Bush Administration freely courted New Delhi — their alliance culminating in the groundbreaking India-US civil nuclear energy agreement — but by the time the Obama Administration came to power in 2008, the honeymoon was decidedly over. Washington’s continued pandering to Islamabad, for one, was beginning to take a toll on its relations with New Delhi.

Since then, however, the situation has changed significantly with the US now making it amply clear that it wishes for India to take on a greater role as an ‘ally’.  For instance, during his recent visit to India last week, US Secretary of Defence Leon Panetta talked at length about India’s importance in the reconstruction of post-war Afghanistan. More importantly, he also described India as the “linchpin” of the US’s new foreign strategy which envisions a “pivot to Asia”. Introduced earlier this year, the strategy is essentially America’s response to a changing world order — notably to China’s alarming growth as an economic and military powerhouse that has come at a time when its own influence is waning. Today, as Washington attempts to re-calibrate its relations with Beijing, it has decided to hedge its bet with New Delhi.

Now, the ball is in India’s court. If New Delhi indeed wishes to be part of this new gameplan, the chatter coming out of Washington’s power corridoors is that the former must do more to show greater commitment — it must prove that it is indeed willing to be US’s partner. India’s response in this situation is a definite policy challenge, and how exactly Mr Krishna and his delegation rise to the occasion is to be seen. Still, the team will do well to lay down some ground rules that delineate what exactly it is that New Delhi wants from the US.

Here are the top five non-negotiables that must feature on Mr Krishna’s agenda.

First: Don’t ask us to fight your war with China.

Although Washington will never say it in as many words, what it essentially wants from India is a positive affirmation that in case of a US-China military stand-off (or an outright war, which is of course quite unlikely), New Delhi will stand by its side. That is the crux of the whole “linchpin” narrative. But India has its own issues with China that range from long-festering border disputes to disagreements over sovereign rights in the South China Sea. These again have to be balanced with the fact that today China is India’s biggest trading partner — bigger than the US even. Plus, China is in India’s immediate neighbourhood and, simply put, New Delhi cannot afford to have a confrontational relationship with Beijing for it will be at the cost of our national interest. Washington must understand and acknowledge that.

Second: Stop bullying us over Iran

New Delhi is already doing as much as it possibly can in this situation — it has cut down on its Iranian oil imports as desired by Washington so as to squeeze Tehran over its controversial nuclear programme — but India has its limits too. We don’t like the idea of a bomb in the hands of the Ayatollah anymore than the Americans do, but the fact of the matter is that India needs Iran to meet its rapidly growing energy demands. As an emerging market economy, it is simply not possible for India to completely give up on cheap Iranian oil. Further, Tehran also provides New Delhi key access to the rest of Central Asia and finally, there is no denying that the two share a cultural relationship that goes back centuries. If Washington expects New Delhi to publicly censure Tehran, especially at a time when there is little proof that the former’s own policy of sanctions is working, it really is asking for too much.

Third: Please turn off the Pakistani aid tap, for a change.

If anything , the events of this past year — from the Raymond Davis episode and the unilateral raid that killed Osama bin Laden to the attack on Western targets in Afghanistan by Pakistani militants and the shutting of Nato supply routes — have made it crystal clear that billions of dollars in American aid have bought Washington absolutely no leverage, either in Islamabad or in Rawalpindi. Since the money is literally going down the drain to ultimately fund terror activities that hurt both US and Indian interests, New Delhi must insist that Washington turn off the aid tap. And that should serve as the first step in a long process of holding Pakistan accountable for its many crimes.

Fourth: Clean up the mess in Afghanistan before you leave from there.

There is also no denying that the locals are far from ready to protect their country from the Taliban. And it is not just the security forces but even Afghanistan’s political class is unprepared to resist a Taliban takeover that is sure to happen once Nato troops leave that country in 2014. Hence, it is imperative that India impress upon the US that a rushed exit from Afghanistan will only undo hard-earned gains in the region. If New Delhi fails to do, it will be the one left holding the can afterwards.

Fifth: Give us space and time.

Just like in a successful marriage both partners need adequate personal space and enough time to grow and eventually find their place in the relationship, the same rules apply here too. India has shown that it is committed to building a strong alliance with the US but it must be allowed to do so on its own terms. New Delhi must be an equal partner in its ties with Washington — and not a subordinate member of a group led by the US, Cold War-style.

Ultimately, the US must acknowledge that only an independent and empowered India can make for an effective partner.

(This article was published in the op-ed section of The Pioneer on June 14.)

America reinvents policies to meet new challenges

By scripting the most dramatic shift in its foreign and defence policies since the end of the Cold War, the US prepares to confront a new world order 

When US  President Barack Obama said in a recent interview that, “I made a commitment to change the trajectory of American foreign policy …and I think we have accomplished those principal goals,” his statement was lot more true than popularly acknowledged. Indeed, the new set of ‘defence strategies’ unveiled by his Administration earlier this month marks the most significant shift in US foreign policy since the end of the Cold War.

In the two decades since, Washing-ton, DC has actively played the role of a global hegemon that has maintained an absolute military superiority over the rest of the world, further strengthened by its economic prowess. Indeed, even after the threat of a communist take-over had been effectively eliminated by the late eighties, the US military was only nominally downsized from its War time proportions.

In the first half of the post-Cold War era, the continued maintenance of such a mammoth defence structure was justified by military engagements in Europe (think of the ‘humanitarian intervention’ of the US-led Nato forces in the Balkan Wars) and in West Asia (a successful Gulf War saw the containment of a belligerent Saddam Hussein). Then, in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of 9/11, there emerged a new enemy in the form of Al Qaeda and its network ofjihadi groups. It was, and still is, a stateless, shadowy entity that has nevertheless been portrayed as an evil superpower, somehow akin to communist Russia or Nazi Germany, to once again rationalise the presence of a vast American military. Indeed, as the first US troops landed in Afghanistan, neo-conservatives even declared that this would be the fourth World War (the third being the Cold War), or the ‘Long War’.

A decade later, Mr Obama has now declared that war to be over. Osama bin Laden is dead (although the threat of global jihadists remains, but that is another story), US engagement in Afghanistan is winding down, and for all practical purposes, there are no longer any American boots in Iraq.

But that is not all — the past 10 years have also witnessed the sagging of America’s economic strength. Weighed down by a mounting national debt, the US economy which is yet to fully recover from the global financial meltdown of 2007-2008, can no longer afford a gigantic military — and definitely not one that had supposedly been prepped to fight two wars at the same time. Besides, the possibility of a traditional land war is almost obsolete in a nuclear and globalised 21st century.

It is against this backdrop that the new policy, which seeks to trim the US military and renounce the bipartisan consensus achieved post-1989, must be understood. From performing the traditional role of a hegemon fighting ‘nation-building wars’, Mr Obama’s new doctrine focuses America’s attention on balancing power equations among emerging nations such as India and China in the Asia-Pacific region.

This will be done through a network of regional allies on the front-stage, in diplomatic terms, and through sophisticated secret surveillance, un-manned drones and CIA-style special operations in the back-stage, in military terms. A preview of this kind of warfare is already available in the manner in which the US is carrying out counter-insurgency operations in the AfPak region.

Also, compare this to the far more boots (and weapons) intensive approach of traditional warfare and it naturally explains the smaller, leaner, more agile but technologically advanced military that Defense Secretary Leon Panetta talked about at the release of this strategic document at the Pentagon. Finally, the new strategy also fits in with the narrative of fiscal discipline and domestic cost-cutting that has become an American imperative since the economic downturn.

Grounded in realism, the new policy is a classic example of realpolitik and marks a definite break from the quest for imperial hegemony of the neo-conservative years of former President George Bush and his deputy Dick Cheney who foolishly led US troops into an expensive and ineffective ground battle in Afghanistan and Iraq.

But the new policy is not without flaws. For instance, if the Obama Administration hopes to contain China’s imperialist tendencies — and make no mistake that that is exactly what the new strategy is all about — then simply positioning ships across the Asia-Pacific from Japan to South Korea and even in far away Australia will not serve any purpose. If anything, this unnecessarily aggressive posturing of the US can only serve to provoke an already jittery China.

Ultimately, Mr Obama’s policy is a reflection of his people’s mood. Americans are tired of foreign wars and now simply want their boys to come back home and not in a body casket, please. There may have been a time when a John F Kennedy could have captured the nation’s imagination by promising that his country would “pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.” But those days of a zealous commitment to Americana or the rhetoric of freedom and liberty that surrounds it are long gone. Think of how quickly popular support waned for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, even though far more American soldiers died in the Vietnam and Korea. No one really bought the fourth World War logic, and they are no less glad that it is now over.

(This article was published in the op-ed section of The Pioneer on January 26, 2012).