Popularity: 15% [?]

Under the Bush Administration, this country has pissed away all of its moral integrity and respect around the world. Thus any calls by Bush for restraint from Russia as it pummels the former Soviet province of Georgia ring rightfully hollow. As likely heirs to this smoldering empire, we in Obama’s new liberal base have an opportunity to show that we are not pragmatic usurpers capitalizing on the failure of George W Bush, but rather a base of clear moral leaders on the full spectrum of American policy. So far, this opportunity has been mostly squandered.

Iraq and a Hard Place

A lot of the conversation on the left regarding Georgia centers on the US invasion of Iraq. When Bush and McCain take the press conference stage and bitterly scold Russia for invading a sovereign country, the left sneers and, quite correctly, lambastes them for hypocrisy. What they fail to do is then pivot. First, go to one of the original and core messages of the new liberal base, that the Iraq war was a terrible mistake and should never have been attempted. Second, explain Iraq’s precise relevance to Georgia in that when we blow our military wad on ideological pipe dreams like Iraq, the US ties down one of its main tools of leverage against real threats to democracy, namely Putin’s Russia, among others. Along with the numbing loss of over 4,000 American lives and the catastrophic damage to our economy, the savage mishandling of our great military force should stand as the foundation of our opposition to the Bush and McCain policy of Middle East war mongering. Georgia is the perfect illustration of what happens when the most powerful democracy in the world misuses its military: Other democracies die. As liberals, we would never allow the US to become so distracted and negligent. This is how we must connect Georgia to Iraq.

Know Your Enemy

We all know the pitfalls of traditional media: bloviating opinionators, bite-sized information, the pervasiveness of corporate infotainment. Sometimes however, during extreme situations, such as the Burmese cyclone, election crises in Zimbabwe, we on the left forget our normal media inhibitions and go off furiously googling for any tiny source of information. The conflict in Georgia is no different. As soon as Russian tanks rolled into South Ossetia, CNN instantly becomes again a credible source of news. The on-air employees with their laser-precise hair-dos and augmented breasts heaving stutter out breathless headlines about Russian aggression and almost seem to sexualize horrifying and disturbing images of burning and bloodied Georgian corpses. We liberals seem to forget that this is the same CNN that refused to show images of our soldiers in Iraq because they were “tasteless.” Next in our frantic googling we come across things like Russia Today. We echo endlessly their gracious YouTube contributions across our blogosphere, not understanding that this is the same Russian media that can be brutally gunned down in the street for daring to criticize the state. They report whatever Moscow tells them like a Russian FOX News and some on the left are completely oblivious, refusing to connect the dots. And this isn’t to say that even the media themselves are oblivious to misinformation. I saw ABC employees openly asking on the internet for any articles “around 1000 words” so they could quickly catch up on the Russia-Georgia conflict they were about to cover. This is a war between a nuclear superpower and a tiny western democracy and the good folks at ABC didn’t even know where to begin. Also you had infotainment demigod Larry King interviewing former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. As Larry flung softballs like “are you optimistic,” Gorbachev went down the line one by one listing the exact same talking points as Putin’s foreign minister. The soldiers are Russian Peacekeepers (wtf?), Georgia attacked Russia first, Georgia was involved in ethnic cleansing, and CNN ate it all up and shat it back out as “Breaking News.” This is unacceptable. Quality information and a clear understanding of the facts on the ground are absolutely crucial to making our arguments against conservatives regarding Georgia.

It’s Not All Groovy, Baby

Before President Clinton demolished the liberal base in the 1990’s, liberals were often smeared as new age hippy leftovers from the 60’s love generation. They’d say liberals have no limits, they’re for whatever feels good, man. Worse than that, they’d be painted as “Anti-War,” weaklings, afraid to use violence for fear of upsetting someone. Given that one of our core issues is opposition to the war in Iraq, and that we generally refer to any Iraq war opposition activities as “Anti-War,” we in the new liberal base are in very clear danger of falling prey to the very same political smears. The conflict in Georgia is the perfect opportunity for us to make crystal clear exactly what are limits are. We stand in opposition to distractions like Iraq, but we draw the line in the sand at dictatorships invading democracies, especially European ones. Even dense and backward newcomer democracies in the backwaters of the EU deserve the full and complete protection of the US military. While we liberals can indeed be quite open minded about things, Russians invading Europe is absolutely out of the question. This is our opportunity to make that explicitly clear.

So, what do you think? How can liberals best make their case vis a vis Russia and Georgia?

Popularity: 14% [?]

From Global Security via RFE/RL:

The foreign minister-in-exile of the separatist Chechen government, Akhmed Zakayev, has submitted his resignation.

Zakayev made the announcement amid a growing rift between the parliament-in-exile of the self-declared Chechen Republic Ichkeria (ChRI) and the separatist president and resistance commander, Doku Umarov.

In a video statement received by RFE/RL last month, Umarov declared the existence of a “North Caucasus emirate” and proclaimed himself the emir. That declaration prompted the ChRI parliament to state that Umarov had effectively relinquished his presidential powers, which now devolve to the parliament.

Zakayev told RFE/RL by phone from London today that until the parliament makes a decision on forming a new cabinet and appointing a new prime minister, he is not able to continue as foreign minister. “I think that everything that is happening in the state should have a legitimate foundation; everything should be done in compliance with the law, and in this case, I think that until the parliament forms a new cabinet of ministers, neither I nor the other members of the cabinet can fulfill their duties and professional obligations,” he said.

Zakayev said his resignation should not be viewed “as a departure from the fight for our independence, our freedom, and for the recognition of our state. By no means.”

“Chechnya at present is occupied, but it is not conquered,” he continued. “That’s why people today are waiting for an opportunity, but they haven’t accepted this situation by any means. I am absolutely confident that the Chechen people have good reason to think that soon in the future they will gain independence and live in a free, democratic country.”

It sounds like Zakayev is taking the only reasonable option and folding on his ministerial powers when there’s no constitutional authority. But Zakayev is referring to a separatist constitution - in exile, no less. His actions don’t strengthen the constitution, they effectively help dissolve it. As foreign minister for Chechen separatists, one could presume that Zakayev is neither foolish nor naive. It’s therefore reasonable to presume that Zakayev understands exactly what he’s doing.

The situation in Chechnya has been improving over the last few years, with Grozny airport officially taking flights in late 2006. But even saying that Chechnya is “improving” is a bit like saying Baghdad is better than Mogadishu. You’re dealing with extreme relativities. Make no mistake, Chechnya is still very much a war zone, much to the chagrin of Moscow. However, Zakayev’s resignation gives two major benefits to Moscow’s Chechen file.

First, the split in the separatist government is between secular nationalists and radical islamists. As long as the secular nationalist faction is folding up shop, it frees up Moscow to pursue the remaining Chechen rebels with the kind of brutal vigor only the Kremlin can muster. Russia has found that, post 9/11, the international community tolerates brutal crackdowns on islamist extremists more than it tolerates the same crackdowns on secular nationalists. Incidentally, China is closely emulating this very same technique in East Turkestan, cracking down on the Uieghur minority there.

Second, it very explicitly extends that wait-and-see message to other Chechen separatists. This message is based on the idea that if the separatists simply step back and allow Russia to defeat the muslim extremists, it will bow out quietly and gladly let the Chechens resume their march to independence. Of course, Moscow has no intention of abandoning Chechnya anytime soon, but this paradigm has been extremely effective in pacifying the nationalists. Zakayev’s comments, with his prestige, only strengthens this idea.

The more the US continues its drive towards Russia and Central Asia, the more Chechnya will become important. It’s unfortunate that US assets are so tied up elsewhere, as Chechnya would be an ideal theater for observing Russia’s counter-insurgency tactics and strategies, valuable intelligence for when the US and Russia’s interest in energy reserves inevitably overlap in Central Asia.

Popularity: 2% [?]

From Intellibriefs via Indo-Asian News Service (subscription):

India appears to have failed in persuading principal military ally Russia to stop China from supplying RD-93 aircraft engines to Pakistan for their Joint Fighter-17 (JF-17) Thunder programme, a report in Jane’s Defence Weekly says…

Earlier this year, China handed over two JF-17 fighters to Pakistan with the RD-93 engines under the equal partnership agreement between the Chengdu Aircraft Industry Corporation and the Pakistan Aeronautical Complex. Pakistan plans an initial production schedule of 16 JF-17s.

Russia had contracted to supply China 100 RD-93 engines with an option of providing 400 more that, it now appears, are definitely being transferred to Pakistan as part of Moscow’s overall pressure tactics to keep India within its armaments fold.

What does this have to do with Biden’s Pakistan policy? Watch this video from JoeBiden.com and, at about 2 minutes in, Biden explains his views on US military aid to Pakistan vis a vis India

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xRfAjxivRgM]

In other words, China and Russia have seen to it that even if Biden is successful in cutting off strategic aid to Pakistan, it will not have the desired effect of damaging Musharraf’s credibility in the Pakistani military. If the US cuts off strategic aid to Pakistan, the military will still be well supplied with Strategic fighter, bomber, and support aircraft.

The current political situation in Pakistan has revealed that the Pakistani military is actually quite satisfied with Musharraf. If not, they would never have allowed their assets to be used in Musharraf’s coup/crackdown against the media, parliament, and judiciary. With the exception of an increasingly aggressive Benazir Bhutto, Musharraf has relatively few worries about revolution. Even the pro-Taliban elements in the tribal regions have been relatively appeased. As the Pakistani Army has diverted its resources to the crackdown, the Taliban has conquered a lot of new territory.

I personally respect Senator Biden for being the only candidate to take a realistic, nuanced perspective on Pakistan, as opposed to the seemingly hardline wait-and-see attitude of the other Democratic candidates or the Regime-centric policies favored by the current US Administration. This move by China and Russia leaves Biden a little more cornered on Pakistan policy. Does he ignore it, hope the story doesn’t make it into the mainstream press, and continue with his current policy? Does he propose other aid be cut off from Pakistan, aid not used strategically to counter India? Or, and this is the most difficult option, does he decide to take a much harder, and more public, stance against China, Russia, and their enabling of dictators?

For more on Gen. Musharraf: Official website - Wikipedia
For more on Pakistan’s Emergency Rule: BBC - Wikipedia - The Real News
For more on the Pakistan-India Security Strategy: Council on Foreign Relations - Foreign Policy In Focus - Danger Room

Popularity: 3% [?]