Raising Water Levels on London and China’s Drought/Grain Problem

As we close 2006 and look to 2007, two global warming major reports – one from Finland and other from China – presents the increasingly dire environmental situation we are facing globally.

And whether or not one believes climate change is chiefly man-made or not, we are both under prepared for the coming climate change and making only small progress in curtailing the pollution contributing to global warming.

The two separate reports suggests that:

• London will be partially submerged: “A sea level rise of a metre or more would be “very bad news” for major coastal cities, greatly increasing the risk of devastating storm surges. Particularly at risk are cities on or close to North Atlantic shores, such as London, according to his study in the journal Science.” (Telegraph, 12/18/2006)
• China will face drought and challenges feeding its growing population: “The official [government, SU's note] assessment concludes that hotter weather and increased evaporation will outweigh greater rain and snowfall. In the country’s south, heavier rainfalls could trigger more landslides and mudslides, it also warns. Luo indicated that by 2030-2050, China’s potential grain output could fall by 10 percent, unless crop varieties and practices adapt to the increasingly turbulent climate.” (Reuters, 12/27/2006)

What will the US Preparedness Plan and Response Be? Will it be Regional or Global?

Some examples of government response to pollution and climate change:

• China has been increasingly placing focus on environmental issues, as both as a way to undercut protests regarding deteriorating environment in parts of China and ensure the overall sustainability and stability of China.
• The UK has the Thames Estuary 2100 Project, which seeks to help protect London from a raising Thames through 2100.

With the considerable number of US cities on coastal areas – San Francisco, New York, Seattle, Miami etc – when should we expect a co-ordinate state and federal level of long term 20,50,100 years ahead study on risks of the US coastlines?

What studies and plans does the US have to protect the agricultural lands? Investments in agricultural technology? 10, 20, 50 outline of possible changes in fertileness of the land and how it will effect the US internally to feed itself and externally where it sells its food globally and as a diplomatic tool (giving grain as aid, etc).
Will the US take lead regional, globally in preparing and planning? Or at least focusing on specific areas where disruption of usual weather patterns can spark massive drought and with it conflict and war?

This is far too ambitious thinking for the Bush Administration, as it faces issues in Iraq and of a sitting-duck Presidency, but what will the next administration due?

Many should know by the the issue involving White House censorship of the Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann’s New York Times Op-Ed (see image on left).

I have no issue regarding the prepublication review by the CIA’s Publication Review Board to ensure to classified information are directly or indirectly disclosed, but both Leverett and Mann claims that this was not the case.

While many bloggers have covered this issue, there appears to be a lack of discussion on what Leverett and Mann’s recommendation on Iran actual is and also a lack of this discussion from more right-moderate to conservative blogs, which I feel that StrategyUnit (at least in this current political climate) appears to be in. So here’s StrategyUnit’s attempt to address this deficiency…

Comparing Leverett-Mann’s Op-Ed with Abraham D. Sofaer’s WSJ Article

Regardless if the White House needlessly censored the Leverett-Mann Op-Ed or not, the contents of its thought and position on US foreign policy vis-a-vis Iran make for an interesting comparison to Abraham Sofaer’s WSJ article: “A Reagan Strategy: The right way to negotiate with Syria and Iran.” Sofaer is the former legal adviser to the George Shultz under Reagan.

Abraham Sofaer’s Guide on Engaging Iran/Syria based on Soviet Union

• Regime acceptance. No talk of regime change.
• Limited linkage. Minimal linkage on issues of human rights, regional issues etc “enabling negotiations to proceed while the U.S. responded firmly through deeds”
• Rhetorical restraint. To help allow the Soviety “avoid being seen as capitulating to U.S. demands.”
• Self-interest. negotiating based on “convincing the Soviets to act in their own best interests”

Leverett-Mann’s New York Times Op-Ed on Iran

Iran will only cooperate with the United States, whether in Iraq or on the nuclear issue, as part of a broader rapprochement addressing its core security concerns.
…
This requires extension of a United States security guarantee — effectively, an American commitment not to use force to change the borders or form of government of the Islamic Republic — bolstered by the prospect of lifting United States unilateral sanctions and normalizing bilateral relations.

While Abarham Sofaer focuses more on Syria than Iran, both Leverett-Mann’s and Sofaer make the simple point:

Diplomacy and negotiations can potentially work when both parties can compromise and address each other’s security needs and mutually convince and demonstrate the benefit of cooperation. The United States – as far as we know publicly – has not done that with either Iran or Syria.

Another question to consider is, even if the Bush Administration takes head to Sofaer, Leverett and Mann’s recommendations, does the Bush Administration have the mandate in Washington and the Middle East to do so? Or is this a sitting-duck presidency until 2008?

Introduction
A few months back, I wrote in “India, the US and the Anglosphere“, that India should be positioned by the US as the next global leader “just as Great Britain gracefully passed its world power status to the United States, the United States must look to do them same with India or else face decline in the face of a raising China”.

The New York Times op-ed, “The Myth of the New India” placed forward many criticism of such a promise for India, such as stating “Recent accounts of the alleged rise of India barely mention the fact that the country’s $728 per capita gross domestic product is just slightly higher than that of sub-Saharan Africa”. Indeed, the July 11th’s Mumbai bombings is a tragic reminder of the instability and security risks facing India.

Admitedly, India is not as glowing as some articles on the July/August edition of Foreign Affairs claim (indeed, some of the articles read like well crafted press releases). And while it does face many challenges in poverty and socio-economic issues, the much talked about “The Myth of the New India” NYT articles ignores three main points: 1) the large progress India has made thus far; 2) how much potential it has already shown; 3) and how much India’s political weight is growing – all this despite the economic underdevelopment that persist through most of India.

India: Not Quite Half Empty

Pankaj Mishra, who wrote “The Myth of the New India”, astutely points to several critical areas that has still dodge India despite its high-tech boom:

• Wealth Distribution – especially in Urban versus Rural (70% of India) populations
• Extensive and Deep Poverty – “nearly 380 million Indians still live on less than a dollar a day”
• Political Instability – Kashmir Issue, Religious Militants and a growing Communist Insurgency

Mishra is correct that these issues are a tremendous obstacle to the great power ambitions many increasingly confident Indians are voicing. There are other issues too, like India’s inefficient bureaucracy and its social economic system, which is considered unfriendly towards the type of more open market that is thought needed for high sustained growth.

Yet somewhere between the hope and ambition for India to become a great power and Mishra’s dire warnings, lies progress and great hope for India. Indeed, we should keep in mind that the progress it has made, in the high-tech and financial industry, despite such underdevelopment is impressive and no small feat.

Keeping Things Within Balance

While socio-economic development should ideally be uniform throughout a nation, it is often not. Issues like Rural v. Urban populations and continuing dire poverty in the face of a small, but growing, wealthy elite are real, but common problems faced buy many developing nations and characterize the struggles of many now developed Western nations.

For example, China is facing similar issues, especially as life-time employment at public factories makes way for layoffs and semi-private ownership. And the Urban versus Rural gap is evident in China, as it is in Paris compared to the surrounding banlieue and America’s urban centers in the coasts with the rural areas in the South.

Geopolitical Considerations

Mishra contends that India will not be considered a loyal ally that the United States hopes for as long as it continues making pragmatic deals with China and Iran. This maybe true, but to take this situation on a different view: Perhaps, India will show that constructive engagement between India and countries like Iran and like China are possible. To be sure, Containment is a valid strategy, but the US needs to be reminded that so is Engagement.

Myth and Promise

The essence of Mishra’s article is this: “Many serious problems confront India. They are unlikely to be solved as long as the wealthy, both inside and outside the country, choose to believe their own complacent myths.”

This is no doubt true. India’s growing elite must be confident, but never arrogant nor ignorant of the tremendous challenges that are clearly ahead of it.

India’s growing high-tech industry demonstrating that India is capable in developing their vast potential, not that they have already acheived it. Indeed, being part of one of the world’s oldest civilizations, Indians should know that the IT boom of the past 20 or so years, is not even a flicker in time.

But while Mishra’s article acts as a warning to those that forget the challenge, we should also take note of the following:

If a government like China’s, an oppressive authoritarian government, is beginning to address environmental concerns and wealth distribution with some postive action (see “China – Environmentalism as a National Security Issue”) – we should hope India, the world’s largest democracy, can do even better.

The recent arrests in Toronto, aborting a potential attacking, and a recent article by Michael Scheuer (author of Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War), reinforce the position that Islamic Terrorism is an organic, decentralized beast. Its bigger than Al-Qaida, bigger than Bin Laden and bigger than the now deceased al-Zarqawi. Al-Qaida does have an important role, but as the instigator, the proclaimed vanguard, of a wider Islamist social movement.

Indeed, as StrategyUnit has noted: “As this war is more of cross between an insurgency and a social movement, there maybe no clean cessation of violence in the near or distant future. And in this conflict, there will be no battlefields, but rather our adversaries will be attached as a Global Swarm as Global Guerillas.”

The Toronto 17
The 17 potential terrorists arrested in Tortonto has direct connections to Al-Qaida and were, like the July 7 Londong bombers, homegrown groups. While the details are coming out, the Internet played a major role in communication, indoctrination (recruitment) and training (bombing making).

The suspected terrorists were, luckily for us, inept. A group of “foreign looking” men doing weapons training in the open and later buying three tons of fertilizers (not a fact easy to hide) are not the hallmarks of terrorist masterminds.

Bin Laden – Status: Success or Failure

Michael Scheuer, author of Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War, notes that many experts have written off Bin Laden as a failure:

Over the past two years, U.S. and Western commentators have concluded that Osama bin Laden is largely irrelevant as the leader of the worldwide Sunni insurgency. Newsweek’s Fareed Zakaria, for example, has said that “by now it is surely clear that al-Qaeda can produce videotapes but not terrorism…And the bad guys are losing” (Newsweek, March 15, 2004). James S. Dobbins at the National Review added that bin Laden “made many threats of course, but was never able to back them up, creating an unbridgeable credibility gap” (National Review Online, September 28, 2005). The new CIA chief, General Michael Hayden, has described bin Laden’s recent audiotapes as a public relations campaign to prove he is still alive. “These attempts,” Hayden said, “may be an attempt on their part [bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri] to kind of re-establish authenticity with their followers” (AP, February 5). Finally, from Sarah Lawrence College, Fawaz Gerges all but dismisses bin Laden’s relevance, arguing that “we are in the throes of the beginning of a new wave [in the Muslim world]–the freedom generation–in which civil society is asserting itself” (Christian Science Monitor, February 4, 2004). In short, these arguments assert that the situation has improved.

But indeed, this is not the case. Scheuer correctly points out that Bin Laden, sees himself and Al-Qaida as the final means, but the “match” to light the Ummah (Islamic World) on fire, motivating it against the West:

“[Bin Laden] has never claimed that al-Qaeda could achieve this goal by itself. Quite the contrary, he has consistently maintained that al-Qaeda is only the vanguard of the large-scale movement that is needed to achieve this goal.”

The recruitment of Europeans to fight in Iraq, the Madrid and London Bombings, the abortive attempt in Toronto, the recent alliance of “”Islamist leaders in Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, Egypt, Jordan and Jerusalem” all point to the face that the “flame” is alive and thriving.

Conclusion
The recent Toronto arrests shows that the threat is still very real and is far more diverse than a threat “from over there”, but it is a threat that can be as homegrown as meatloaf and apple pie (for you American readers).

Noah Schachtman of DefenseTech is always a persistent source of great information regarding the technology and equipment that is used in today’s battlefields. (Via Op-For) In PopularSciences, Schachtman and David Axe write on “Winning—and Losing—the First Wired War“: “U.S. forces in Iraq are waging a pivotal campaign in modern warfare—combat on the first “networked” battlefield. One problem: the enemy has a few networks of its own ”

Schachtman and David Axe go to the heart of the issue in Iraq:

“But now, more than three years into sectarian conflict and a violent insurgency that has cost nearly 2,400 American lives, an investigation of the current state of network-centric warfare reveals that frontline troops have a critical need for networked gear—gear that hasn’t come yet. “There is a connectivity gap,” states a recent Army War College report. “Information is not reaching the lowest levels.”

This is a dangerous problem, because the insurgents are stitching together their own communications network. Using cellphones and e-mail accounts, these guerrillas rely on a loose web of connections rather than a top-down command structure. And they don’t fight in large groups that can be easily tracked by high-tech command posts. They have to be hunted down in dark neighborhoods, amid thousands of civilians, and taken out one by one.”

Net-centric Warfare v. Global Guerillas
Net-centric Warfare defined in a monograph at DODCCRP (same folks who published “Shock and Awe”):

“We define NCW as an information superiority-enabled concept of operations that generates increased combat power by networking sensors, decision makers, and shooters to achieve shared awareness, increased speed of command, higher tempo of operations, greater lethality, increased survivability, and a degree of self- synchronization. In essence, NCW translates information superiority into combat power by effectively linking knowledgeable entities in the battlespace”

As Schachtman and Axe noted, NCW is layman’s term the “Walmart-ification” of warfare. (Indeed the monograph of the excerpt above, goes into great detail analyzing the logistical success of Wal-Mart and Dell and other corporations.) But what does NCW look like on the battlefield, Schachtman and Rose describes the following:

“The air-ground collaboration is one of dozens of different ways that network-centric tools are slowly starting to rejigger the military’s hidebound hierarchies. In the Gulf War, the various armed services didn’t talk to one another much, except at the highest levels. That’s partly why there was a six-week air campaign and then a ground attack. During the 2003 invasion, the air and ground assaults struck at once.”

But one of the most powerful tools in battalion command posts like these, notes Garstka, the network-centric theorist, may be one of the simplest: a Web browser, so junior officers can log into secure online forums. There captains and lieutenants can swap tactics, well before they appear in printed field manuals. This is critical in a place like Iraq, where insurgents’ strategies change almost daily. ”

With exception of advance weapon systems and resource intensive efforts like building a Carrier battle group, it is John Robb’s “Global Guerillas” which are best suited to adopting and adapting to technology. For more information on “Global Guerillas”, I strongly suggest reading John Robb’s “THE Bazaar of Violence in Iraq” and “THE Bazaar’s Open Source Platform “. It is required reading in my book.

The US Military and Global Guerillas are both fighting as net-centric agents, but the US Military is after all a hierarchal system, a tool of the nation-state and thus structurally it is slower to adapt. Meanwhile as decentralized and organic entities, “Global Guerillas” naturally evolve into ever more sophistication: the weaker insurgent groups get killed and captured, while the more successful groups sharing and help others replicate their success.

The advantage of the US military (or conventional militaries in general) is its ability to focus its resources into a certain direction in a more coordinated fashion, while the “Global Guerillas” can afford to use a slower trial-and-error method – attrition is not as much as a concern for them.

John Robb’s “Global Guerillas” will always be more nimble and faster that traditional nation-state militaries. The state and its military are by definition more slowly moving, more hierachial and more bound by policies and laws – then numble, adapting, loosely networked, nimble and Global Guerillas. Its not so much that the Global Guerillas are networking better than the US Military, its that the Global Guerillas can afford to adapt more quickly.

Net-Centric Warfare – Myopic Pipedreams
Setting aside the “Global Guerilla” issue, NCW has great limitations. When reading defense experts and their whitepapers/monographs on “Net-Centric Warfare” and “Effects-Based Operation”, we see terms phrases like “information dominance” and “complete situational awareness” and the like.

But the case-studies such war studies experts like to review – Amazon.com, Wal-Mart and Dell – are a world aware from an actual, fluid and “fog” ridden battlefield. There are collecting and analyzing information from a relatively static “battle space” so to speak.

Planning, preparing, executing and adjusting to the changing and fluid battle-space of fourth generation warfare is utterly different than keeping an excellent inventory over your retail logistics network – basically what the Wal-Mart, Dell and Amazon.com case studies are all about. It’s a joke to assume that future soldiers will be equipped with electronic devices to depend on a full host of communication and information share – where will the electricity come from? Are these devices anti-virus proof or even from protected from rough use?

The “Fog of War” will always be a factor that will be foolish to underestimate. Thus, the premise of complete “information dominance” and complete “situational awareness” is a false hope. Net-Centric Warfare is one of the new components of warfare, but it won’t be the last nor the only.

“The release of the data-mining story to USA Today obviously was intended as a means of shooting down his nomination — which it might. But what is important here is not the fate of Hayden, but the fact that the Bush administration clearly has lost all control of the intelligence community — extended to include congressional oversight processes. That is not a trivial point.
…
Leaks of information about secret projects to a newspaper is a symptom of the disease: a complete collapse of any consensus as to what this war is, what it means, what it risks, what it will cost and what price Americans are not willing to pay for it. A covert war cannot be won without disciplined covert operations. That is no longer possible in this environment. A serious consensus on the rules is now a national security requirement.” (Emphasis Mine)

Last week on Thomas Barnett’s blog:

“Putin’s backtalking, along with Ahmadinejad’s and all the rest around the world, just signals the growing awareness internationally that the Bush Administration is a spent force. This crew is not inclined to change their spots now, and the world knows it.

So, quite frankly, our debates should focus most on who and what comes next for America. The conversation is basically over with the Bush Administration. So it’s time to focus on the new ideas, the new leaders, and the lifers within the bureaucracy who will both rule–for all practical purposes–in the meantime and be there when the new crew arrives.”(Emphasis Mine)

Comment
At a moment the US is facing many critical issues domestically (immigration to domestic intelligence) to challenging foreign policy issues (Iran, Iraq, to Latin America) and overarching issues regarding energy and the environment, the United States is quickly finding itself in a rut with a sitting-duck presidency. Unfortunately, the Bush Administration has lost control of any stern party leadership, control over its own agencies and department and directions on policies.

While the “sitting-duck presidency” is a sickness befalling just about every president on his/her last term, its only May, 2006. What happens six-months from now?

Bottom Line:
Will the security environment deteriorate vis-à-vis the US? What power plays will foreign adversaries, competitors and even some allies pursue against the US while we are in this state of flux?

In the coming months, we should expect to see interesting maneuverings from China, Russia, Venezuela, Iran – among others.

Italy: Prime Silvio Minsiter Berlusconi’s lost in April’s elections has paved the way for Romano Prodi to take lead as the succeeding Prime Minister. Prodi has discussed pulling out the 2,700 Italian troops (3rd largest contingent in Iraq). The latest targeting against Italian troops in Iraq will expedite such moves; indeed, CounterTerrorBlog discusses that Al-Qaida hopes to bully Italy to withdraawing, doing what it did against Spain with.

US: Mid-term elections are coming around very soon for the US, leaving many Republican nervous. With President Bush hitting every lower and lower approval ratings and increased Republican-infighting, we should expect Democrats to make gains against the Republicans. If they will recapture Congress is not known, but things can only get worse for the Republicans – and so the support for the Iraq War will suffer.

The Consequences
The fourth largest contingent of forces, from South Korea, are already beginning their partial pullout, paring down “1,000 of its 3,200 soldiers remaining in the country” by the end of this year. Italy, with the coming establishing of Prodi’s government, will most likely pull out its forces out of Iraq perhaps by the end of the year. The UK, American’s venerable ally, could be next when Prime Minister Tony Blair steps down. A very scary situation for supporters of the Iraq War.

With the “Coalition of the Willing” already mocked for its lack of many major powers, the list of nations (listed by the Coalition’s web site) will look even thinner.

Shakeup in the CIA, raising oil prices and the Iran Crisis are putting President Bush in an ever weaker position in the mainstream press and the masses (as the polls show). As more announcements on withdrawals will be announced, support of the war will fall into an ever deeper lull.

Still, the StrategyPage still looks pretty optimistic over the conditions in Iraq:

“[Violence] keeps the foreign journalists happy, but the local reporters are more concerned with the street crime and corrupt government officials…Most of the patrols and raids are now conducted by Iraqi troops, who are well aware of the fact that they are still fighting Saddam.”

But the overall feeling Americans and the world will have is “if the US is wining the war in Iraq, why is everyone pulling out? Abandoning the US?” The counterpoint that the more successful Iraqi government troops continue to be the more the Coalition Forces can step down will sound too convenient of an answer.

While the US has been and needs to slowly withdrawing some troops from Iraq as Iraqi Government forces standup, US withdrawal under media and public calls for an immediate pullout may only embolden and encourage the insurgents and US enemies.

While not perfect analogies, British troops remained in Malaysia for over 10 years to quell the Communist rebellion and similar numbers of years were spent by US forces in the 1899–1913 Philippine Insurrection (though with a high cost of civilian life). A better analogy is that Japan did not receive its sovereignty from the Allies until 1952.

We are only in Year 3 of the Post-Saddam Iraq Era. While the world and even the US public will increase pressure on withdrawing US forces, we need to remember that the Iraq Project is a long term project – longer than a single election cycle – and will have a profound effect on the Middle East, the World and most importantly the Iraqi People for generations to come. It is sad irony that elections in the democracies of the UK, Italy et al may imperil democracy in Iraq.

For a view supporting “Cut and Run” from Iraq, see Lt. Gen. William E. Odom’s article “ Cut and Run? You Bet” in Foreign Policy, May/June 2006.

Summary
In a move echoing Nixon’s trip to China, India and the US have announced a groundbreaking nuclear deal, which many have warned as “Nuclear Madness” helping to accelerate dangerous nuclear proliferation. “Unsettling” this thought is, the reality is that nuclear proliferation cannot be stopped, so the US must well to play the nuclear card when it can. The hope is that this deal is the beginning of growing closer ties between the two world’s leading and largest democracies, which includes the recognition of a new Core power into the fold of the Core states.

The great challenge is for the Post-Bush Administration to carry on with increasing US ties with India for the Bush Administration and the one after to resist temptations to make India a bulwark against China. India is too confident, important and practical to be a pawn for the US; hopefully, the US will not only recognize that, but can see India as a way for bringing more stability to the South Asia and its neighboring region and expanding the Core. India should not play any role in competing against China, but rather help bring China in to the Core as a responsible and productive partner.

Click here for further analysis including sections on:
- Nuclear Fears
- Risking Nuclear Issues for New Realities
- India and the Anglosphere? And What about China?

Related Past Postings:

1. Needed in Asia: Security and Energy Cooperation”
2. Year of Chinese-Indian Friendship…on Oil?
3. Getting India Right : Recreating the Anglosphere

Nuclear Fears
The grand deal between India and the US on India’s nuclear program was seen as a major concession by the US to India (at what many say, a high cost), as the Economist (March 02) reports:

Details of the final separation plan have yet to be made public. It is understood to list as civilian 14 out of 22 reactors, accounting for some 65% of india’s nuclear-power capacity. India will have the right to choose how to classify any future reactors. In return for assurances about the supply of nuclear fuel, it has accepted that once it has put a nuclear facility under international safeguards, it will not be able to withdraw it. These arrangements—giving India far more leeway than America had been demanding—may not be enough to enable Mr Bush to fulfil his offer to amend American laws and persuade other countries to change international rules which prevent nuclear trade with states that do not accept full safeguards.

Many fear that the weakening of the NPT and nuclear proliferation will be the prime consequence of the nuclear deal, especially considering questions on India’s nuclear weapons ambitions. The Economist notes that India has arguing against any agreement that would cap their ability to rapidly produce plutonium (fast-breeder reactor), raising fear of India’s nuclear ambitions especially when it initially stated that it would produce only enough to deter as a defensive weapon. Bob Herbert of NY Time, expresses such fears, when he calls the US-India nuclear deal “Nuclear Madness”

Additionally, there’s the question of the difference between India and Iran (despite that fact has signed the NPT, and India has not signed the NPT). Indeed, this Monday, the US Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Nicholas Burns stated that “while Tehran was trying to extricate itself from the obligations to the IAEA, India was moving towards it. ‘India is the responsible one, Iran is the irresponsible one,’ he said.”

Risking Nuclear Issues for New Realities
While everyone has been concentrating on the nuclear consequences, especially on nuclear proliferation vis-à-vis Iran and North Korea, a wider dimension is required than the limited view of nuclear weapons.

As William Langewiesche of the Atlantic has pointed out proliferation is at the “Point of No Return”, so any analysis on the Indian nuclear deal must understand that the risk of proliferation is not as great when measured against getting building a relationship with a major New Core power.

The Economist does rightfully warns that are “there are plenty of opportunities for the world’s richest democracy and its largest to cement their friendship. Helping India to hone its nuclear skills is hardly a good place to start.” However, its misses the point that China, Russia and Japan can also offer India business deals and even coordination on hydrocarbon energy policy, but blessings on a nuclear program is something only the United States can do at this time.

If the US can reach out to India by addressing its security needs – especially difficult considering India’s energy dealing and stance on Iran and on US relationship with Pakistan – the US can then take the next steps of furthering and sealing economic ties, helping solidify India’s place in the Core and in the Anglosphere. Indeed, beyond helping India both modernize and normalize its nuclear energy program, what else does the US offer that China, Japan and Russia cannot readily offer as well?

Security has to be the foundation of a US-India and eventually an Anglosphere alliance, economics and energy will help solidify it.

India and the Anglosphere, but what about China?
Stephen Green of VodkaPundit is a little too eager when he announces “Welcome to the Anglosphere, India” last Thursday, a single deal wont make an Anglosphere with India a fait compli. But, its a great step indeed.

A number of pundits have commented on India as a potential counterweight against China. This is seen not only by folks in the US but Australia, Indonesia, Japan and others. But this is a false a dangerous hope.

Firstly, China is not a threat as long as it can become ever more integrated with the Old and New Core in the economics. An embraced China is less of a threat than an encircled stubborn China.

Secondly, India (like China) are too much of pragmatist and confident to acquiesce itself as a pawn in Washington’s game. India is recognizing its place in the world as a major partner and will pursue its interests as it sees fit, even if it means friction with the US.

The Bush Administration risked nuclear proliferation and the NPT to bring closer ties with India, recognizing that a new world paradigm is shaping up. Hopefully, the Bush Administration and one after take the next step to not only strengthen ties with India but also reach out to China.

The European Union may try to draw up a media code of conduct to avoid a repeat of the furor caused by the publication across Europe of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad, an EU commissioner said on Thursday.

In an interview with Britain’s Daily Telegraph, EU Justice and Security Commissioner Franco Frattini said the charter would encourage the media to show “prudence” when covering religion.

“The press will give the Muslim world the message: We are aware of the consequences of exercising the right of free expression,” he told the newspaper. “We can and we are ready to self-regulate that right.” (Empahsis Mine)

In StrategyUnit’s commentary on the Jyllands-Posten Muhammed Cartoons, I stated:

The gulf and difference in values, assumptions and perception between millions of Muslims and what the West (esp. the sacredness of the freedom of speech) is not to be underestimated. This is a real division that exists between the cultures and a wedge that fundamentalist at both sides can drive and finally nail down to make the “Clash of Civlizations” a defacto truth.

Sadly, StrategyUnit has miscalculated the sense “sacredness” over free speech that EU officials are willing to state publicly. Eugene Volokh sums it up well, here:

When you say something like that against a backdrop of thugs burning embassies and killing people in reaction to your citizens’ speech, appeasement and surrender are exactly what’s going on, “voluntary” rules or not. Millions of Europeans should feel humiliated that one of their super-government’s officials is even proposing this.

The StrategyUnit has recently posted several articles relating to India, with the strongest being “Getting India Right : Recreating the Anglosphere“, where it is declared:

“There has been discussion that just as Great Britain gracefully passed its world power status to the United States, the United States must look to do the same with India or else face decline in the face of a raising China.”

Now the Economist (Feb 25), ahead of Bush’s March visit to India, leads with two articles highlighting the Bush Administration’s approach with India. The second article, “The Great India Hope Trick“, goes through the three major topics: 1) the difficulty surrounding the Bush Administration’s nuclear technology deal with India; and 2) the American temptation to see India as part of an anti-China axis partner; 3) while India needs and wants to be seen as an equal in any partnership with the US.

The article also touches moves by the US to offer technology to assist with India’s energy security needs, while it faces the difficulty dealing with India’s relationship with Iran, Syria and China on energy projects.

As mentioned earlier on StrategyUnit, India’s geostrategic location near the Middle East, Asia and Central Asia make it an essential ally and a practical ally with its shared Anglo history, language and democractic institutions. While somewhat differing from StrategyUnit, the Economist ends the article highlighting the attractiveness of India highlighting its “Stabiliy, Democracy, and Demography”:

Nevertheless, in the long term, India has two great attractions. One is stability. India has proven mechanisms for the peaceful transfer of power and the ability to withstand terrible internal conflicts—in Kashmir and the north-east, for example—without danger to its integrity. China’s eventual transition to democracy could be traumatic. Another attraction is demography. China’s one-child policy ensures that it will grow old before it gets rich: a generation of only children may suddenly find themselves struggling to support the parents who once pampered them. India will remain younger and more dynamic well into the middle of the 21st century.

For many reasons, a close partnership between India and America seems both desirable and inevitable. The fraught negotiation over the nuclear issue, however, has revealed how difficult it will be to achieve. To America, and to many Indians, it must seem inconceivable that India—still so poor, and so desperately in need of just the sort of help America is offering—should not jump at the chance of a special relationship. How on earth, for example, could the idea of siding with Iran instead be seriously debated? But for many in India, “non-alignment” is a synonym for independence, and should not be sacrificed, however enticing the prize. Moreover, so confident is India’s mood at the moment, that many seriously believe America needs it more than the other way round. Tomorrow belongs to Asia.

Other articles by StrategyUnit for 2006 on India:
1. “Needed in Asia: Security and Energy Cooperation”
2. “Year of Chinese-Indian Friendship…on Oil?“