Geopolitical thread

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 03 Jun 2012 17:03

http://ibnlive.in.com/blogs/atishayabbh ... a-now.html

a interesting article about chinese gambles starting to unravel...

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 04 Jun 2012 00:45

This article says that there is fraud in geo politics

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php? ... a&aid=2095
Eurasia, the "World Island": Geopolitics, and Policymaking in the 21st Century

Geopolitics and Eternal Realities

Geopoliticians, by all uses of that term, seem to claim to understand the eternal and fundamental geographical realities in a way that automatically places their analyses above those of ordinary strategists. Mackinder, Kissinger, Brzezinski, Gray, and the rest all would have us believe that they can see the proper course for policy because they understand the "eternal" realities that the earth provides, despite the fact that their assumptions are often baseless or archaic. Ó Tuathail has described this phenomenon, and his remarks are worth quoting at some length:

To understand the appeal of formal geopolitics to certain intellectuals, institutions, and would-be strategists, one has to appreciate the mythic qualities of geopolitics. Geopolitics is mythic because it promises uncanny clarity and insight in a complex world. It actively closes down an openness to the geographical diversity of the world and represses questioning and difference. The plurality of the world is reduced to certain "transcendent truths" about strategy. Geopolitics is a narrow instrumental form of reason that is also a form of faith, a belief that there is a secret substratum and/or a permanent set of conflicts and interests that accounts for the course of world politics. It is fetishistically concerned with "insight," and "prophecy." Formal geopolitics appeals to those who yearn for the apparent certitude of "timeless truths." Historically, it is produced by and appeals to right-wing countermoderns because it imposes a constructed certitude upon the unruly complexity of world politics, uncovering transcendent struggles between seemingly permanent opposites ("landpower" versus "seapower," "oceanic" versus "continental," "East" versus "West") and folding geographical difference into depluralized geopolitical categories like "heartland," "rimland," "shatterbelt," and the like. Foreign policy complexity becomes simple(minded) strategic gaming. [Ó Tuathail makes reference to Brzezinski here] Such formal geopolitical reasoning is . . . a flawed foundation upon which to construct a foreign policy that needs to be sensitive to the particularity and diversity of the world's states, and to global processes and challenges that transcend state-centric reasoning.[25]

As unsettling as it may be, there are no "timeless truths" in world politics. The international system changes as fast as we can understand its functions, and often much faster. It seems to be natural for the human mind to use analogies and slogans to comprehend situations that are difficult to grasp. If policymakers indeed simplify the world into frameworks to make it comprehensible, then they must beware not to base those frameworks on outdated and intellectually sloppy assumptions of geopolitics.

Analogies and Policy

Policy is driven by analogy, both historical and theoretical. One common, and dangerous, analogy that drives US Eurasian policy is "the game." Brzezinski speaks of chess; Central Asian policy is the "new great game"; Kissinger and Nixon used game analogies throughout their reign and in their writings afterward.[26] Impenetrably complex problems are simplified to games, which was problematic enough during the Cold War but is acutely poisonous today.

Take Brzezinski's chess analogy. Chess has two players, and one opponent; it is zero-sum, and to the finish; there is a winner and a loser, with no middle ground. The opponent of the United States to Brzezinski is, and has always been, Russia. If we approach Eurasia as if it were a chessboard, then we will be met by opponents, and cooperation and mutual benefit would be removed from our calculations. If the leaders of the most powerful nation on earth were to conceptualize foreign policy as a chess game, it would virtually ensure that other nations would as well. A Eurasian alliance to counteract growing US influence would be virtually inevitable.

Mackinder's Heartland theory is a another example of inappropriately applied analogy. Sir Halford took Britain's traditional fear of the dominance of the resources of continental Europe by one power and extended it to encompass the entire world. To many geopoliticians, the United States is an island power, peripheral to the crucial and decisive land of Eurasia. The only way America can be safe is if the continent does not unify against her.

England's fear of a united European continent in the 19th century was understandable, because only a continental power unconcerned with land enemies would be able to concentrate its resources to challenge the Royal Navy. The analogy with the World Island and the United States falls apart, for no nation that dominates that continent would ever be able to threaten our hemisphere. Even if it were conceivable that one power could dominate Eurasia (which of course it is not), such an imbalance would not necessarily threaten American interests, and the dominant power presumably would not be able to project power over the oceans. Any imaginable alliance of Eurasian powers would be too unwieldy and disparate to operate effectively. Some fear that a Eurasian alliance would be capable of shutting off trade with the United States, ruining our economy and standard of living. While this may have had some relevance when there was the potential for the rest of the world to be dominated by the communists, as long as the great powers of the World Island continue to be wedded to the free market (and do not perceive US power to be threatening), then there is little danger of their voluntarily shutting their doors to the American market and investment structure.

Paradoxically, our attempts to prevent a Eurasian anti-American alliance may make that outcome more likely. As Steven Walt has persuasively shown, imbalances of threat, not imbalances of power, drive alliances together.[27] Our attempts to project power into the Heartland, if done clumsily, can heighten threat perceptions in its capitals, making such counterproductive alliances more attractive.

British uneasiness with the European Union is reflective of this fear of continental alliances. But is there really any threat of a state marshaling forces against the British Isles? Analogies, and their accompanying "eternal interests," tend to persist long after their useful life is over. Sometimes we fail to perceive the end of that intellectual shelf life.

When these experts say that India is a geo political island it is actual unrealistic. But it is propogated to isolate India from other region in a malicious way.

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 05 Jun 2012 09:47

The Obama Paradox: A conversation with David Sanger, author of a new book on Obama's secret wars.

Christopher Sidor · Post by **Christopher Sidor** » 05 Jun 2012 23:27

Acharya wrote:This article says that there is fraud in geo politics

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php? ... a&aid=2095
Eurasia, the "World Island": Geopolitics, and Policymaking in the 21st Century

British uneasiness with the European Union is reflective of this fear of continental alliances. But is there really any threat of a state marshaling forces against the British Isles? Analogies, and their accompanying "eternal interests," tend to persist long after their useful life is over. Sometimes we fail to perceive the end of that intellectual shelf life.
When these experts say that India is a geo political island it is actual unrealistic. But it is propogated to isolate India from other region in a malicious way.

How true. Even in India, there are many who cling to beliefs and ideals way after their shelf-life is over.

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 06 Jun 2012 06:56

Your questions for Crumpton -- and his answers about Tora Bora, torture, Cheney, 'Thunderball,' and good books on intel

Bye-Bye OPEC: Ten new global energy powers.

pankajs · Post by **pankajs** » 06 Jun 2012 18:18

You Say Defense, We See Threat

The contradiction between stated policies only serves to increase Russian concerns about the true U.S./NATO agenda behind the BMD deployments in Europe and other parts of the world. There exists an interrelationship between strategic offensive arms and strategic defensive arms, as clearly stated in the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty. The pace and ambition of U.S./NATO plans to strengthen their BMD potential risk undermining the strategic balance.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 07 Jun 2012 21:17

Very interesting
The emotional and fear factor in each country is a good indicator how the world will shape up

http://www.greaterkashmir.com/news/2012 ... 025-12.asp

World @2025
Fear, Humiliation, and Hope are the ingredients of the new global dynamic
BOOK REVIEW
AHMED NAZEER MOTTA
SmallerDefaultLarger

Book: The Geopolitics of Emotion: How Cultures of Fear, Humiliation, and Hope are Reshaping the World,
Author: Dominique Moisi,
Publisher: Doubleday, New York
Year: June 2010
Pages: 176 +xii

‘The Geopolitics of Emotion’ adds a different dimension to the way the world has been divided, and examines political trends through the prism of emotion. Professor Moisi argues that it is the feelings of fear, humiliation, and hope that are reshaping world politics, and it is these sentiments which are just as influential as the cultural, social, and economic factors that breed political conflict. Moisi suggests that the world is divided into three groups of nations: those that are motivated by hope, those that are driven by resentments born of humiliation, and those whose primary attitude is that of fear.
The first emotion studied by Moisi is hope. Hope means confidence. In Moisi’s view, this hope is translated into cultural openness and confidence. China, as a prime example of the culture of hope will lead to the eclipse of the US. Another Asian example of hope comes from India, a dazzling country - from an outsider’s perspective - which faces deep internal contradictions. Even though China and India share many commonalities, the origins of their pride and confidence are different: the imperial past for China and a bright vision of the future for India.
However, it would be fallacious to assume that all Asian countries belong to the culture of hope: the author excludes Japan as being “beyond” the culture of hope and uses Pakistan as an example of a country which has not reached that point yet. When he often talks of “Asia”, he actually means just China and India and not other like Central Asian countries, the Koreas or successor states of the Raj other than India.
The culture of humiliation is exemplified by the Islamic world, later redefined as the Arab-Islamic world. For Moisi, humiliation means impotence, being confined to a future that is in stark contrast to the glorified past.
The Arab-Islamic world is not the only global region facing such a dichotomy. As the author points out, this dichotomy can induce two types of behavior. One possibility is the “I’ll show you I can do it” behavior, found in South-East Asia, which gives birth to powerful competition. The other side is the despair of the “if I can’t reach you, I will drag you down” kind. According to Moisi, it is here that the Arab-Islamic World finds itself.
The French scholar ascribes this despair to the fact that the region is both demographically on the rise and politically humiliated. The region has been plagued with incapable leaders who, instead of taking responsibility, are constantly looking for scapegoats. The main cause of this grave situation is the historical decline of the Arab-Islamic world, a process which started with the failure to capture Vienna, continued with colonization in the region and was ultimately reinforced by the establishment of the State of Israel and by Israel’s treatment of Palestinians. The climax was reached during the Six-Day War, when the Arab states lost all hope.
Moisi reminds us, the sense of humiliation is not only negative; as seen, it can be successfully used as a diplomatic weapon by Arab countries against their former colonizers and by Israel against Europe. Moisi however rejects claims that the problem lies in Islam given that Islam has produced many intellectuals who argued against the feeling of humiliation. He also states that the Arab-Islamic world is culturally declining because of “despots and fundamentalists” sharing interest in curbing the free expression.
In the Arab and Muslim world, he writes how these societies feel trapped in a culture of humiliation, which feeds into Islamic extremism, leading to hatred of the West. Meanwhile, much of Asia has been able to concentrate on building a better future, creating a culture of hope.
The Fear: Finally, the culture of fear pertains to the Western world. The main reason is that, for the first time in the past three centuries, the West is not the trendsetter – globalization no longer belongs to the Western World. It is this fear that unites Europe and the West. Moisi acknowledges that, while fear is indispensable for survival, it can become excessive and incapacitating. The fear did not start with the attacks of September 11, but was rather exacerbated by these events.
The high point of hope in Europe was marked by the fall of the Berlin Wall; the feeling of hope has been deteriorating ever since. The key moment for Europeans to completely change their positions was, according to the author, the breakup of Yugoslavia which brought a war to the backyard of Europe (war that Europeans were not able to cope with). Fear in Europe stems from “the other” and, paradoxically enough, the more we need “the others” – as part of the workforce, for example – the more we reject them emotionally. This fear of “the other” is epitomized by the debate about the accession of Turkey to the European Union.
Russia, Israel, Africa and Latin America: Moisi devotes an entire chapter to hard cases, where all three emotions are entwined. The first examined case is Russia, a country obsessed with its tragic flaws. Humiliated since the fall of the USSR, Russia exhibits the xenophobic fear of “the other” (such as Chechnya) and displays hope in its most material form. For the Russian leadership, democracy, according to Moisi, is a sign of weakness. A parallel between Russia and Iran can be easily drawn. Nevertheless, Iran is on the rise while Russia is facing a rapid decline.
The other analyzed hard case is Israel, a state which shares the vulnerability feature with Russia due to its demographic and regional political realities. In the subchapter on Israel, Moisi makes the most surprising comparison of the whole volume: he states that the source of Israel’s humiliation is Israel’s mistreatment of Palestinians. Apparently, this wrongdoing can be traced back to the mistreatment of Jews in the past in the same way to abused children abusing their own children.
Africa is the third hard case, a world region slowly emerging from the abyss. Contemporary deals are, however, signs of politicians’ efforts to remain in office. Moisi points to South Africa as a success story and again alludes to the maltreatment of Palestinians by the Israel by expressing his desire for the rise of a Palestinian version of Nelson Mandela.
The fourth case is embodied by Latin America, which shows less despair, but also less hope. Brazil, the only shining example, especially from a financial standpoint, is unfortunately plagued with violence.

Possible Scenarios:
In the final chapter, Moisi offers two possible scenarios for the world in 2025. He states that if fear takes over the globe, catastrophic events would ensue: more unrest in the Middle East, use of biological terror, a shutdown of borders, the weakening of neo-protectionist United States, the almost complete dissolution of the European Union, a partial resurge of Russia’s former empire, wars in Asia, nuclear armament of Japan, the fall of Africa, and chaos in Latin America. In a nutshell, life would be like in the Early Middle Ages. On the other hand, if hope prevails, there would be peace in the Middle East, the UN would undergo a significant reform, the United States would become “a senior partner” around the world instead of a policeman, Russia would envision its future in the West, China would be on the path of the rule of law, Africa would develop and MERCOSUR would become a full-fledged entity. Strangely enough, Lebanon would unite with Syria.
At the conclusion of his argument Moisi offers two imaginary scenarios of how the world might look in 2025: one where the culture of fear has been dominant, and one where the culture of hope has held sway. There are no prizes for guessing which is preferable.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 08 Jun 2012 01:53

We should also project our on Indic ideas on such scenarios and explore them in GDF.

What do Indics fear and what do Indics hope for?

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 08 Jun 2012 02:08

That would be giving away information to the adversaries.
India is the only country where they cannot predict the outcome of the future based on fear or emotions

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 09 Jun 2012 06:20

America's Last Prisoner of War

The Netanyahu Paradox

Starting from scratch: Zero-based alliance formation

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 09 Jun 2012 11:31

Vietnam’s Rising Geopolitical Importance

Vietnam’s Rising Geopolitical Importance
Wed Jun 6, 2012 15:51 BST
US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta’s visit to Vietnam earlier this week demonstrates that Washington is continuing to reach out to Hanoi as a new regional partner, as America refocuses on the Asia-Pacific region after a decade of wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. In a special feature on Business Monitor Online, we discuss Vietnam’s significance in South East Asian geopolitics:

Long coastline on the South China Sea: Vietnam has a very long coastline, spanning almost the entire western stretch of the disputed South China Sea. (China regards the entire sea as its own and has become more assertive in its claims since 2010, whereas Vietnam, the Philippines, and several other states claim the sea in part.) This means that Hanoi cannot help but have an interest in the affairs of the South China Sea, whose importance stems from the fact that it is a major shipping route; the significant oil and gas reserves there; and its considerable fish supplies. If Vietnam were to ally with China, then this would significantly enhance Beijing’s control of the South China Sea. As it happens, Vietnam’s suspicion of China means that Beijing has a formidable competitor for control of the Sea. Even if Vietnam does not ally with the US, Hanoi’s stance denies Beijing complete supremacy over the Sea, and this benefits other countries with claims on its waters, most notably the Philippines. Meanwhile, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan also do not wish to see Chinese dominance of the South China Sea, because this could theoretically interfere with their shipping.

Mainland South East Asia influence: Vietnam also has a high degree of political and economic influence in Laos, where it competes with China and Thailand for loyalty and business. Vietnam’s influence in Cambodia is less clear cut, because although the Phnom Penh leadership is on amicable terms with Hanoi, there is widespread distrust of Vietnamese intentions among ordinary Cambodians. Nevertheless, with Vietnam generally warming to the US, Thailand having officially been designated a US ‘Major Non-NATO Ally’ in 2003, and Myanmar moving towards rapprochement with the West, it is evident that mainland South East Asia’s three most populous countries are seeking to counterbalance Chinese influence in the Asia-Pacific region.

Vast economic potential and large population: Vietnam’s geopolitical importance has also been boosted by its rapid economic growth, especially over the past decade, which has made the country a major emerging market and an attractive investment destination. In fact, some Japanese, South Korean, and Western multinationals are said to favour Vietnam as an alternative to China, partly as a hedge against political risk in China (although there is considerable political risk in Vietnam, too), but also because Vietnam offers competitive labour costs. Vietnam’s economic prospects are augmented by its large and youthful population (88mn and still rising), and the country also has the 11th-largest armed forces in the world, with 455,000 personnel. As Vietnam’s economy and population grow, the country has the potential to emerge as a middle-ranked power in its own right, making it all the more attractive as a partner to countries seeking influence in South East Asia (i.e., China, the US, Japan, and India).

The full article, which also discusses the prospects and risks for Vietnam’s geopolitical emergence and ties with the US, is available to subscribers on Business Monitor Online.

shyam · Post by **shyam** » 09 Jun 2012 12:23

Acharya wrote:India is the only country where they cannot predict the outcome of the future based on fear or emotions

In fact Indians are projected as highly emotional people, and despite that their emotional outcome is practically zero. May be they are high on emotion and low on action.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 10 Jun 2012 02:04

shyam wrote:
Acharya wrote:India is the only country where they cannot predict the outcome of the future based on fear or emotions
In fact Indians are projected as highly emotional people, and despite that their emotional outcome is practically zero. May be they are high on emotion and low on action.

Individually they are emotional but dont make the mistake of the nation which looks after itself.
Individual peoples attributes should not be extrapolated to the entire nation.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 10 Jun 2012 11:49

US-Russia Relations Aren’t Going to “Cool Down”

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 10 Jun 2012 12:27

Dealing with the Devil's Excrement

With its rapidly reducing dependence on Middle Eastern oil, the U.S. has little reason to stay on in the region — a looming problem for India

In coming years, India will become evermore dependent on oil from an evermore troubled region.

“Ten years from now”, the man who founded OPEC told a young graduate student during a 1976 interview, “twenty years from now, you will see: oil will bring us ruin”. India's strategic community ought to reflect on those words: little-noticed but seismic shifts in oil geopolitics mean the country is staring at a strategic challenge of a magnitude it is utterly unprepared for.

From a peak of more than five billion barrels in 2005, the United States' crude oil and refined products imports fell to 4.14 billion barrels last year [See Table 1].

THE UNSTABLE PETRO-STATE

OPEC's founder, Juan Peréz Alfonzo, had warned of oil's exceptionally toxic political properties back in 1976: “we are drowning”, he famously said, “in the Devil's Excrement”. The petro-states on which growing economies like India rely to fuel their search for prosperity, he had realised, simply cannot be stable. In the mid-1970s, when Mr. Alfonzo had made his dark prophecy about ruin to scholar Terry Lynn Karl, the corrosive character of the Devil's Excrement was little understood. Instead, it appeared to have made the ruler of every petro-state a Midas. The Shah of Iran promised his people a “great civilisation”; Carlos Andrés Pérez, Venezuela's President, imagined a future where “Americans will be driving cars built by our workers in our modern factories”.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 10 Jun 2012 12:40

1899 EUROPEAN GEOPOLITICS BLOG
http://burak-arikan.com/1899-european-geopolitics
“Angling in Troubled Waters” map by cartographer Fred W. Rose shows the European geopolitical situation in 1899. If you look at the details (see the larger version) you will see some countries such as Russia, UK, and Ottoman Empire are fishing. What do they catch? Blogger Catholicgauze says:
“…their ‘catches’ are in fact colonial possessions.”
This map, found via Boran Güney, is a neat example of the micro macro visualization technique. You can read through human figures and symbols across national borders.

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 10 Jun 2012 14:38

http://europeangeostrategy.ideasoneurop ... -neo-west/

Britain-France: a new agency for the neo-West?

Published on 20 February 2012 by Luis Simón
Last Friday, French President, Nicholas Sarkozy, and British Prime Minister, David Cameron, met in Paris to take stock of the progress made by the military agreements signed by the two countries at Lancaster House in November 2010 and renew their political commitment to the cause. With the caveat of the many hurdles that remain on the way, Friday’s declaration is as systemic as anything we’ve seen militarily in Europe in the past twenty years. It included a range of concrete and far-reaching proposals, namely a commitment to develop jointly a new strike drone with potentially inter-continental reach; an integrated maritime fleet incorporating assets from both countries by the early 2020s; a high level expeditionary exercise in the Mediterranean involving sea, land and air forces, to accelerate the development of the Combined Joint Expeditionary Force by 2016, supported by a Joint Force Headquarters; greater industrial, research, technological and civil and military nuclear collaboration; as well as co-operation in a number of critical capabilities (including submarine technology, strategic airlift, maritime mine countermeasures and satellite communications). The message was loud and clear: notwithstanding their spats over the Euro, France and the United Kingdom are intent on deepening their geopolitical relationship.

Gerard · Post by **Gerard** » 10 Jun 2012 21:30

India is not a global power
Chinmaya R. Gharekhan, former Indian Ambassador to the United Nations, was until recently Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's Special Envoy for West Asia

Singha · Post by **Singha** » 10 Jun 2012 23:13

how does a person end up having both chinmaya and gharekhan in the name?

gakakkad · Post by **gakakkad** » 10 Jun 2012 23:25

useless farticle as usual ...says nothing..usual rant about poverty and imported arms and soft pawar.. bla..bla... I believe a compooter program can be used to write the strat-e-jee farticles..just rearrange pre-written rants depending upon situation..

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 14 Jun 2012 07:10

Letter from Tokyo

nvishal · Post by **nvishal** » 14 Jun 2012 10:31

Gerard wrote:India is not a global power
Chinmaya R. Gharekhan, former Indian Ambassador to the United Nations, was until recently Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's Special Envoy for West Asia

People are confusing themselves and others when they think that india has global ambitions(a sheriff of a sort). First understand the concept of the non-alignment policy.

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 16 Jun 2012 03:26

Acharya wrote:Dealing with the Devil's Excrement
With its rapidly reducing dependence on Middle Eastern oil, the U.S. has little reason to stay on in the region — a looming problem for India

In coming years, India will become evermore dependent on oil from an evermore troubled region.

“Ten years from now”, the man who founded OPEC told a young graduate student during a 1976 interview, “twenty years from now, you will see: oil will bring us ruin”. India's strategic community ought to reflect on those words: little-noticed but seismic shifts in oil geopolitics mean the country is staring at a strategic challenge of a magnitude it is utterly unprepared for.

From a peak of more than five billion barrels in 2005, the United States' crude oil and refined products imports fell to 4.14 billion barrels last year [See Table 1].

THE UNSTABLE PETRO-STATE

OPEC's founder, Juan Peréz Alfonzo, had warned of oil's exceptionally toxic political properties back in 1976: “we are drowning”, he famously said, “in the Devil's Excrement”. The petro-states on which growing economies like India rely to fuel their search for prosperity, he had realised, simply cannot be stable. In the mid-1970s, when Mr. Alfonzo had made his dark prophecy about ruin to scholar Terry Lynn Karl, the corrosive character of the Devil's Excrement was little understood. Instead, it appeared to have made the ruler of every petro-state a Midas. The Shah of Iran promised his people a “great civilisation”; Carlos Andrés Pérez, Venezuela's President, imagined a future where “Americans will be driving cars built by our workers in our modern factories”.

Its amazing how people in India write and advise like they live outside.
Yes the exeunt(plural of exit) of the West from Middle East due to reduced dependence on oil as energy source, will be a "return to old normal" in Kishore Mahabubani's words.

A tie-up of India, Iran, Russia(I^2R) will bring back stability to the region. Arab Shiekhs can return to becoming new Midases and let the others worry about stability. PRC can join or stay aloof.

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 16 Jun 2012 07:54

Our Billionaire Philanthropists

Dreams From Their Fathers: The dads who made the world's leaders who they are

Q&A: Norman Finkelstein: The intellectual pariah, author of two new books, on Noam Chomsky, BDS, the Holocaust, and Whitney Houston

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 17 Jun 2012 19:36

The My Lai Massacre

HOW TO KILL A RATIONAL PEASANT

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 17 Jun 2012 23:38

http://www.euractiv.com/countries/greec ... sis-513255

Greece’s geopolitical orientation should not be taken for granted
-A+A
Published 12 June 2012

Due to its geography and geopolitics, Greece will be in play for years to come, argues Robert D. Kaplan.
Robert D. Kaplan is Chief Geopolitical Analyst for Stratfor, a Texas-based global intelligence company.

"Greece is where the West both begins and ends. The West -- as a humanist ideal -- began in ancient Athens where compassion for the individual began to replace the crushing brutality of the nearby civilizations of Egypt and Mesopotamia. The war that Herodotus chronicles between Greece and Persia in the 5th century B.C. established a contrast between West and East that has persisted for millennia.

Greece is Christian, but it is also Eastern Orthodox, as spiritually close to Russia as it is to the West, and geographically equidistant between Brussels and Moscow. Greece may have invented the West with the democratic innovations of the Age of Pericles, but for more than a thousand years it was a child of Byzantine and Turkish despotism.

And while Greece was the northwestern bastion of the anciently civilised Near East, ever since history moved north into colder climates following the collapse of Rome, the inhabitants of Peninsular Greece have found themselves at the poor, southeastern extremity of Europe.

Modern Greece in particular has struggled against this bifurcated legacy. In an early 20th century replay of the Greco-Persian Wars, Greece's post-World War I military struggle with Turkey led to a signal Greek defeat and as a consequence, more than a million ethnic Greeks from Asia Minor escaped to Greece proper, further impoverishing the country. (This Greek diaspora in Asia Minor was a massive source of revenue until the Greeks were expelled.)

Not only did World War I have a bloody and epic coda in Greece, so did World War II, which was followed by a civil war between rightists and communists. Greece's ultimate escape from the Warsaw Pact was a rather close-run affair: again, the effect of Greece's unstable geographical location between East and West.

Greece struggled on. As recently as the mid-1970s it was governed by a particularly brutal military dictatorship (led by colonels from the backwater of the Peloponnese), which lasted for seven years, and fear of another coup persisted during the initial stage of its reborn democracy.

Even though the Olympic tradition began in Greece in antiquity and the first modern Olympics were held in Greece in 1896, Greece was denied the right to host the centenary modern Olympics in 1996 owing to the country's lack of preparedness in organisation and infrastructure. Greece did host the 2004 Olympics, but the financial strain that the games put on Greece contributed to the country's economic fragility in the run-up to the current debt crisis.

It is not entirely an accident that Greece is the most economically troubled country in the European Union. The fact that it is located at Europe's southeastern back door also has something to do with it. For Greece's economic and political development bear marks of a legacy not wholly in the modern West.

Roughly three-quarters of Greek businesses are family-owned and rely on family labor, making meritocratic promotion difficult for those outside the family. Tax cheating is rampant. The economy suffers from a profound lack of competitiveness, even as Greece is mainly a service economy, relying on tourism, in which manufacturing constitutes a weak sector. Of course, these features have much to do with bad policies enacted over the years and decades, but they are also products of history and culture, which are, in turn, products of geography. Indeed, Greece lacks enough productive land to be an agricultural power.

Then there is political underdevelopment. Long into the 20th century, Greek political parties had a paternalistic, coffeehouse quality, centered on big personalities -- chieftains in all but name -- with little formal organisational support. George Papandreou, the grandfather of the recent prime minister of the same name, actually headed a party called the "George Papandreou Party."

Political parties have been family businesses to a greater extent in Greece than in other Western democracies. The party in power not only dominated the highest echelons of the bureaucracy, as is normal and proper in a democracy, but the middle- and lower-echelons, too. State institutions from top to bottom were often overly politicised.

Moreover, rather than having a moderate left-wing party and a modern conservative one, as is common throughout Western Europe, in Greece through the early 1990s there was a hard-left party, the Pan-Hellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK), which during the Cold War openly sympathized with radical Arab regimes like Hafez al Assad's Syria and Moammar Gadhafi's Libya, and a somewhat reactionary right-wing party, New Democracy. The drift of both those leading parties toward the centre is a relatively recent affair.

And so the creation of late of a hard-left party, SYRIZA, and a hard-right neo-Nazi movement, Golden Dawn (vaguely reminiscent of the military junta that ruled Greece from 1967 to 1974), both harbor distant echoes of Greece's mid-20th century past. Ironically, while Greece's extreme economic crisis created these radical groupings in the first place, if these new parties fare badly in the upcoming poll it might indicate a firm rejection of extremism by Greek voters and a permanent turn toward the center -- toward political modernity, that is.

There is a tendency in all of this to throw one's hands up at the specter of the Greeks and declare them too much trouble than they're worth, at least for Europe. But such an attitude reeks of hypocrisy, even as it denies Western self-interest. When Greece joined the European Union in 1981, its economy was manifestly not ready; Brussels had made a rank political decision, not an economic one -- just as it would in admitting Greece to the eurozone in 2002. In both cases, the ground-level, domestic reality of the Greek economy was swept aside in favor of an abstract quasi-historical vision of Europe stretching from Iberia to the eastern Mediterranean.

Of course, Greece, during the 1980s -- when I lived there for seven years -- might have used the influx of cash from the European Union in order to discipline and reform its economy. Instead, then PASOK Prime Minister Andreas Papandreou used the money to swell the ranks of the bureaucracy. Thus, did Greece remain underdeveloped, and the dream-gamble of Brussels failed. The saddest irony is that the sins of the hard-left Andreas Papandreou were visited upon his well-meaning, center-left son, George, who had his short tenure as prime minister from 2009 to 2011 poisoned by his father's economic legacy.

But Western self-interest now demands that even if Greece leaves the eurozone -- and that is a big "if" -- it nevertheless remains anchored in the European Union and NATO. For whether Greece drops the euro or not, it faces years of severe economic hardship. That means, given its geographic location, Greece's political orientation should never be taken for granted.

For example, the Chinese have invested heavily in developing part of the port of Piraeus, adjacent to Athens, even as Russia's economic and intelligence ties to the Greek area of Cyprus are extremely close. It has been speculated in the media that with Greece short of cash and Russia enjoying a surplus, were the Russians ejected from ports in Syria in the wake of a regime change there, Moscow would find a way to eventually make use of Greek naval facilities. Remember that Greece and Cyprus both have modern European histories mainly because they were claimed by Western powers for strategic reasons.

In other words, from the point of geography and geopolitics, Greece will be in play for years to come."

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 19 Jun 2012 02:53

Battle of the Somme caused one of the biggest takleef to bartannia sarkar.

And Battle of Jutland caused great takeleef to the bartannia navy.

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 19 Jun 2012 09:11

The Final Battles of Pope Benedict XVI

Global Trends 2030: Two page Menu

Catching up on the news

Interview: Hillary Clinton

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 20 Jun 2012 00:28

http://www.alternet.org/world/155919/ho ... ce_?page=3

How the US is Pressuring India to Enlist in its Quest for Global Dominance
The US has sought an alliance with India to pressure China and to isolate Iran.
June 18, 2012 |

A mid-level officer of the Indian Foreign Ministry told me that he was startled by the language used by US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta during his visit to India on June 6. India, Panetta said, is the "lynchpin" in US plans to "rebalance towards the Asia-Pacific region". The officer said that at one point Panetta had said India is the US "doorway into Asia". At least two of the Indian officials in the room later joked that he should have said that India is the US's doormat into Asia.

Panetta had come to Delhi with a brief that was uncomplicated but not conducive to peace. Panetta's objectives, and that of the third India-US Strategic Dialogue (which began on June 13), seem obliged to isolate three major actors in Asia: China, Iran and Pakistan. The "rebalancing" is not intended to bring these crucial countries to the table to discuss areas of common interest, such as the imbroglio in Afghanistan, the question of energy security and the unsettled border and security disputes between these countries.

The US has sought an alliance with India for the past decade with the aim of putting pressure on China, of balancing out its reliance upon Pakistan's geographic location, and of isolating Iran in the forums of the non-aligned world (as well as enhancing access for US firms into the Indian market). These are not pathways to peace. They are precisely the opposite.

Afghanistan

Panetta's short-term objective in Delhi was to bring India more firmly into its Afghan operations. He came to India seeking Indian monetary and military assistance for the Afghan mission of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Indian tanks are not going to be airlifted into Kabul anytime soon, although this remains on the agenda. As a precursor, the Indians were asked to increase their reconstruction commitments.

Whether Panetta's goal is to actually have Indian tanks in Afghanistan seems unclear. What is obvious, however, is that this is an unsubtle way to put pressure on Islamabad to desist from its refusal to allow NATO material to transit from Karachi's port through Torkham into Afghanistan. The US is currently spending upwards of $100 million per day more than beforehand to get its goods into Afghanistan through Central Asia. During Panetta's Delhi visit, the US fired its drones for the ninth time since the Chicago North Atlantic Treaty Organization summit in May, killing three people. The continuation of the drone program has soured the relationship between Islamabad and Washington. Pakistan's Asif Ali Zardari is locked into his presidential residence, afraid of his people and terrified of their reaction if he gives in, once more, to the US.

Rony · Post by **Rony** » 20 Jun 2012 01:06

I would take anything what Vijay Prashad says with a pinch of salt. He is MK Bhadrakumar for export !

JE Menon · Post by **JE Menon** » 20 Jun 2012 02:17

>> At least two of the Indian officials in the room later joked that he should have said that India is the US's doormat into Asia.

I'm curious abt the mechanics of this.. What does he mean by "at least" two? Two that he knows of? If so did both mention it to him? Since he is implying that they made the same joke separately, did both think it worthwhile to tell him so? It's an interesting sentence... Not to mention he is implying more than two officials may well have made the same joke

ramana · Post by **ramana** » 20 Jun 2012 02:29

Are any of you members of India US dialog group in yahoo groups?
They have a variety of high and low brow dialogs going on.

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 20 Jun 2012 10:27

The Coming Oil Crash

10 Reasons Countries Fall Apart

The Pharaoh's Legacy: As Hosni Mubarak lies on his deathbed, he leaves behind a broken Egypt.

Wasteland: the 50-year battle to entomb our toxic nuclear remains

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 26 Jun 2012 08:24

On 'The Crisis of Zionism': Why you should read Peter Beinart

Requiem for a Russian Spy: A CIA veteran remembers his Soviet counterpart.

The Battle for the Soul of Occupy Wall Street

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 30 Jun 2012 12:50

Again, a coming together of the energy producing and energy consuming countries of Asia is the ultimate nightmare scenario for the US, which fears exclusion from the ensuing matrix of regional cooperation involving countries that happen to be spearheading the fastest-growing region in the world economy. The entire US strategy in the post-Soviet era had aimed at forestalling such a catastrophic eventuality that might put paid to the US efforts to get embedded in the "Eurasian heartland", which includes or overlooks some of the major regional powers in the coming decades - Russia, China, Kazakhstan, India, Pakistan and Iran. (Turkey's admission as a "dialogue partner" of the SCO - at China's behest - at the Beijing summit last month further unnerves the US.)

From the Russia thead

svinayak · Post by **svinayak** » 02 Jul 2012 02:13

http://shriramsharma.blogs.it/2011/12/1 ... -12311788/

INDIA: A RISING SUPER POWER (TIME MAGAZINE 3RD APRIL 1989)

In the past few years India has rapidly emerged as such a Super Power that henceforth other Super Powers like Russia, China, USA and France can longer ignore India. India managed to push back Pakistani attack on Siachen Glacier, by entering Sri Lanka it liberated them from terrorism and by douzing the revolution in Maldives it helped reinstate Abdul Gayum government in power. Such leadership acts of Super Power India tell us that no longer can India be ignored by saying it is an underdeveloped backward country. Today on the basis of the capability of its armed forces India is on the 4th spot. First is Russia (5 million), 2nd is China (3.2 million), 3rd is America (2.1 million) troops and 4th is India that possesses highly trained well decorated 1.4 million army men. They say that the main issue is not that based on number might India should be accepted as a Super Power but what is important that in the entire world behind every 6 persons is 1 Indian. India is the world’s largest democracy and in every field be it medical, army, engineering, space travel/technology etc Indians in India or abroad lead due to their brilliant skilful intellect. Despite trying to solve internal problems it has made important progress in the past 2 decades in food grain production, export of materials and self dependence. This is that 1st Super Power who by trying to usher in world peace has obstructed military attacks by other powers that be between themselves.

For more scientific e literature pls visit http://www.shriramsharma.com/ www.awgpestore.com http://www.dsvv.ac.in/ www.akhandjyoti.org and http://www.awgp.org/

In the west India has only one image- full of blind beliefs and traditions, over populated and that India which rolls in problems yet in his cover story Mr. Munro writes: From this India one more Super Power is emerging that sequentially while solving problems with the help of its spiritual heritage and talented intellectual energy lest in future becomes a power that leads the world it should not astonish anyone. This must be called divine consciousness and a flow of Lord Mahakal that is ushering in this Era Transformation and with the help of an organized force after getting liberated from political slavery spanning 2000 years again is reinstating India as a Super Power. In the 21st century it will be the leading power of the world.

America’s defense minister John Tower recently in a speech delivered by him in the presence of the American Senate to Associated Press said that very soon we shall witness India rising as a Super Power. While throwing light on the speed of development within industrialization and artistic skills of 3 eastern countries i.e. India, China and Japan he opines that we must not be surprised at all on noting that in the 21st century these 3 nations commence leading the world and inspire all to execute creative tasks. He said that till yesterday those parts of the earth which were colonized they due to their cultural heritage are emerging as Super Powers and even amongst them India is the crest jewel. He also accepted that the root reason why these countries are fast developing is are Indian and Japanese scientists and industrialists residing in USA with whom western talent cannot compete.

America’s leading economist and one making prophecies based on computerized statistics Linden La Roche opines that India from the standpoint of varied types of means is no doubt wealthy but also because of its intensely talented young intellectual class shall definitely be rendered a Super Power in all fields like cultural, financial and material. By stating this time period as between 1995-2005 in an interview with PTI he said that after a political upheaval for a few years radiant Indians oozing with spiritual energy shall first lead Asia and step by step it shall lead the entire world.

In ‘Newsweek’ magazine dated 12 December 1988 a speech of Henry Kissinger was published wherein he opined that by the end 0f 2000 AD India will emerge as such a Super Power in the international arena wherein it shall shoulder all those world responsibilities that today is being handled by America. Ultimately in entire Middle and East Asia India shall have to be accepted by all as an emerging world leader. He says that in these days despite differences being noted between India and USA yet in the long run these 2 great Super Powers jointly shall carry out creative tasks. Henry Kissinger was a great orator from Harvard University and an ex foreign secretary of America. With reference to international matters he is accepted as a high stature specialist.

http://www.sehgalfamily.com/?p=2846
India super? - Ikram Sehgal

member_23626 · Post by **member_23626** » 02 Jul 2012 09:06

^^^ How successful were we??

D Roy · Post by **D Roy** » 03 Jul 2012 00:29

Just note one thing that will show how successful we have been.

Diana Eck, yes the same person who turned out to be SSwamy's bete noir in Harvard has written a book which fully endorses the sacred geography of bharat varsh that we hold so dear.

It is at odds with the typical Stratfor propaganda.

Of course it could be a ploy to lull us. But I don't think it is.

I think a very big group in America is now committed to building bridges with us.

Now look at where our relations with the Briturds are headed and you will see a clearer picture emerge.

member_23626 · Post by **member_23626** » 03 Jul 2012 06:39

D Roy wrote:Just note one thing that will show how successful we have been.

Diana Eck, yes the same person who turned out to be SSwamy's bete noir in Harvard has written a book which fully endorses the sacred geography of bharat varsh that we hold so dear.

It is at odds with the typical Stratfor propaganda.

Of course it could be a ploy to lull us. But I don't think it is.

I think a very big group in America is now committed to building bridges with us.

Now look at where our relations with the Briturds are headed and you will see a clearer picture emerge.

The only fear I have is that we (our leaders) will take right decisions and will lead and not follow these countries. Anyways, thanks for pointing out where we are

abhishek_sharma · Post by **abhishek_sharma** » 04 Jul 2012 06:20

Pivoting and rebalancing: The good, the bad, and the ugly

New and notable scholarship: the legality of the bin Laden raid