Week in Review Part III: Foreign Affairs

Iran: James Blitz / Financial Times: “How close is the west getting to all-out conflict with Iran? As 2012 gets underway, the question is right at the top of the international security agenda. Hardly a day goes by without some striking news from the region – be it Iran’s decision to enrich uranium at a new underground site; or the unexplained killing of another Iranian nuclear scientist; or Iran’s threat to close the Strait of Hormuz.”

The one issue fanning the flames these days is the imposition of sanctions banning oil imports from Iran (and to a lesser extent the new restrictions on Iran’s financial institutions).

The danger, especially with Iran’s Revolutionary Guard conducting naval exercises over the coming weeks in the area of the Strait of Hormuz, is an accident, a miscalculation, even by a rogue element in the Guard. They love to show off their speed boats and pretend they are about to ram a U.S. or allied naval vessel, only to turn off at the last minute. But now, with the new threat level, how can U.S. naval commanders risk that these same boats aren’t on a suicide mission?

And as I keep saying, going back months, nothing we heard this week on the nuclear weapons front should give the White House or Israel reason to believe Iran is still years away from having the bomb; therefore, my timetable of the administration taking direct action against Iran’s suspected sites remains…by May. [Or Israel will act alone beforehand.] Killing scientists, as was the case again this week for a fourth time, or sabotaging the program through computer worms such as Stuxnet, cannot do the job alone of taking down Iran’s capabilities.

But to clean up the facts of the past seven days:

U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner went to Asia to convince China, Japan and South Korea to limit or outright ban Iranian oil imports. Only Japan agreed to pull back in terms of new purchases (though long-term contracts will be honored), while South Korea said it will, eventually, once it figures out alternative ways to replace the Iranian crude. China, though, said ‘forget about it.’

And on this front, the European Union, which was expected to ban Iranian imports, is now looking to wait up to six months before doing so owing to the importance of the supply to the likes of Spain, Italy and Greece. They, like South Korea, first need to find alternatives, let alone the fact their economies can’t afford an oil shock these days.

[Iran exports 2.3 million barrels per day, the world’s third-largest exporter. The EU receives somewhere between 400,000 and 450,000 bd. China takes in about 500,000 barrels. Japan 400,000; South Korea 300,000; India 500,000. The Saudis have vowed to make up any difference, and despite some reports you may have seen, have oil comparable to Iran’s quality level.]

Meanwhile, Iran announced it has begun enriching uranium to 20% at a second site, the underground facility known as Fordo, near the holy city of Qom, thus further outraging the likes of the United States and France, as well as even Russia to a lesser extent.

Understand that getting to 20% is the hard part. Going to the bomb-making level of 90% is then relatively easy. When you hear how the West is concerned about a “break out,” if we are so lucky to know when this is occurring, it refers to Iran’s suddenly going for 90%, meaning it would be mere months before they could have the bomb capability. [Delivery mechanisms are a separate issue.] For all we know, Iran could have broken out on a small scale already. If the West and Israel were convinced Iran was indeed doing so, a strike on the plants is a certainty, and of course this would entail blowback on Western and Israeli interests around the world. This is why stories on Hizbullah and the Revolutionary Guard’s presence in Latin America are so important because there are lots of soft targets in the region and would be easy missions to carry out quickly, one can only assume.

The International Atomic Energy Agency and Iran are to meet on Jan. 28 but details on just what inspectors would be able to see are unclear.

Indeed, the Iranian regime is under siege. A further sign of this is the imposition of a death sentence on 28-year-old Amir Hekmati, an Arizona-born Iranian-American and former U.S. Marine that Iran has accused of spying for the CIA. The U.S. government categorically denies this. He was arrested in Iran last August while visiting his grandmothers for the first time.

Iran continues to threaten to close the Strait of Hormuz, a transit point for 20% of the world’s crude. The U.S. considers this a “red line” and warns Iranian action would merit a response.

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, speaking of the pressures, said on Monday, “The Islamic establishment…knows firmly what it is doing and has chosen its path and will stay the course.”

Meanwhile, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was gallivanting about in Latin America, spending time with his “dear brother” Hugo Chavez in Venezuela, vowing to work with Chavez to fight imperialism and poverty. Chavez pledged to work with Ahmadinejad to stop the “imperial insanity” of the United States, which he described as a “threat for the world.” [CNN]

Syria: President Bashar Assad showed up in public for the first time in six months, telling his supporters “We are going to win.” Earlier he said in a speech to parliament that Syria would vanquish the “foreign conspirators with an iron fist.”

Assad’s pronouncements were overwhelmingly condemned in the West and in much of the Arab World. A monitor for the Arab League said Syria didn’t carry out any of its commitments previously made to the group and that he had seen “children murdered,” extensive examples of torture, and “skinned bodies.” It was utter carnage. And this week the first foreign reporter, a Frenchman, was killed. Over 400 have died since the Arab League mission of monitors went in.

Israel: Defense officials here stated the obvious, that Iran and Hizbullah were arming the Assad regime, while going back to Iran and the nuclear crisis, a London Sunday Times piece suggested that perhaps the best way to tell action against the mullahs is imminent would be if you knew Israel’s nuclear reactor at Dimona had been shut down.

The Israelis now know that Dimona is vulnerable to Iranian intermediate- and long-range missiles, especially those fired from Lebanon or Syria. “Deactivating the reactor in the southern Negev desert would minimize the dangers of nuclear fallout in the area.”

An official told the paper that the shutdown would begin before the launch of any Israeli or U.S. assault on Iran’s facilities, but that “It takes a long time, many weeks, to cool down a nuclear reactor and lower the level of radioactivity,” as one of the founders of Israel’s nuclear program put it.

I didn’t realize that, separately, Dimona is the second oldest active reactor in the world and is deemed “dangerous” by many experts. One said it “should have been closed a long time ago.”

On a different topic, an Israeli group, Peace Now, which is opposed to settlement construction, said construction on more than 1,850 West Bank units was started in 2011, up 20% from 2010’s 1,550. Needless to say the Palestinians voiced outrage.

And in a late development, a Foreign Policy expose published at week’s end claims Mossad officers have been posing as CIA officers to recruit operatives against Iran’s nuclear program. This has infuriated the U.S. The Mossad officers are equipped with U.S. passports and dollars, and recruited “under the nose of U.S. intelligence officers,” including in London. In response, the U.S. has scaled back joint U.S.-Israeli intelligence operations. The timing is poor. [Jerusalem Post]

Pakistan: As one of my predictions for 2012, I said a coup here was a “layup.” Heck, by the time you read this something could have happened. President Zardari flew to Dubai for a check-up on his health issue, as some felt this was a sign a coup was in the works. The military does not seek a coup. They don’t want to have to deal with the domestic issues that would come with power, at least at this moment. But in many respects it is being forced on them. Prime Minister Gilani sacked the defense secretary this week for “gross misconduct and illegal action” in an attempt to reassert authority, though at the same time, Gilani has said he would step down if that would diffuse tension. However, the leading opposition figure, Nawiz Sharif, is not favored by the military either. Thus far, General Kayani, the overall military chief who was once a friend to the United States, has held off on making a move but the military did warn of “grievous consequences” for Gilani’s action to sack the defense chief.

Meanwhile, the Army has its hands full with the Taliban, with 25 members of the army or paramilitary police units being killed in separate attacks. The Taliban has killed 9,000 civilian or security personnel in Pakistan since 2009. Separately, a bomb blast at a bus terminal along the Afghan border killed 29.

Lastly, former Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has vowed to return between Jan. 27 and 30 and run for office, even though the current government said he would be arrested in connection with the 2007 assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto. Musharraf’s return will not be helpful.

Afghanistan: I have nothing to say on the actions of the four Marines who desecrated some Taliban bodies, other than that the four deserve to be punished according to the rules of the military.

Kuwait: In case you were wondering, the United States now has 15,000 soldiers here, including two brigade combat teams and a combat aviation brigade, according to Defense News, so there is a fairly adequate presence in the region if needed; one larger than was normal since the first Gulf War. In the event of conflict with Iran, the first mission is to protect these troops from retaliatory strikes.

China/Taiwan: By the time the vast majority of you read this, the presidential election results on Taiwan will be known (they are supposed to come out 4-5 hours after I post). Disturbingly, President Ma had only a slim lead over Tsai Ing-wen, your editor having a big financial stake in stability and further economic progress between the mainland and Taiwan and a Ma loss would be disastrous. Tsai is attempting to become the island’s first female president, but the fear is her party, the DPP, is historically independence-minded and you know what that would mean to Beijing.

To give you an idea of how things have changed, 180,000 Taiwanese businesspeople were expected to fly back home to cast their votes because the election is so close. Washington, by the way, agrees with Beijing on this one. They too want a Ma victory. Taiwanese investment in China rose to $12.2 billion in 2010.

On two other topics, similar to the story above on Hong Kong, pollution levels in Beijing are as bad as they were prior to the Olympics. The smog has been so thick many days this winter that road travel, let alone the air variety, has been severely disrupted. In an unusual move, though, the Municipal Bureau of Environmental Protection admitted that the U.S. Embassy’s pollution readings were more accurate than theirs and they have begun sharing data.

And in a story from the South China Morning Post we learn, “Almost 80 percent of women interviewed said they would not consider a man who earned less than $600 a month,” or as the reporter Stephen Chen put it, “Women marry for money and houses, while men wed for passion and looks,” according to a nationwide survey. Now discuss amongst yourselves.

North Korea: Kim Jong Un celebrated a birthday on Sunday. No doubt it isn’t really his, but it fit the calendar and ongoing plan to burnish the kid’s credentials. A documentary of the “military genius” aired the same day, one showing him driving a tank (where he looked like Michael Dukakis), sitting in the cockpit of a plane and interacting with soldiers.

Reuters did report that Pyongyang was holding talks with Japan, though these were taking place in Beijing, this as nuclear negotiators from China and South Korea were meeting to discuss the impasse over the North’s weapons program. A separate report said the North would be willing to halt its uranium enrichment operation if the United States would increase its food assistance. We could probably just ship them excess Hostess products that have aged appropriately.

Myanmar: China can’t like what it sees going on here. The government, nominally under civilian control with the military calling the shots, released dozens of high-profile political prisoners on Friday, including a former head of intelligence, journalists and monks, as the rulers seem committed to democratic reform. The release of the detainees is an important condition set forth by the European Union and the U.S. in order for sanctions against the regime to be lifted.  Secretary of State Hillary Clinton immediately responded in kind by announcing the two nations will exchange ambassadors, though it’s a lengthy process and the U.S. is not lifting sanctions without further confidence building measures. Washington hasn’t had an ambassador in Burma since 1990. An April 1 election for 48 parliamentary seats is to take place with opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi on the ballot. This could be one of the surprise success stories of 2012.

As for Beijing, the rulers obviously don’t want their own people getting too many ideas.

Russia: With less than two months to go before the March 4 presidential election, it still seems likely Vladimir Putin, despite all the protests, will capture more than 50% of the vote and avoid a run-off. Granted, the actual vote tally may be 35% but through the magic of the Sorcerer…

Many say this wouldn’t be too smart, such outright manipulation after last December’s fraudulent Duma vote.

Separately, the director of Russia’s space agency suggested in an interview that the disabled Russian spacecraft that is headed back to Earth this weekend (wear a helmet) failed because it was struck by some kind of anti-satellite weapon.

What was to have been a 2 ½-year mission to explore a moon of Mars failed shortly after takeoff.   Back then, as reported by the New York Times’ Andrew E. Kramer, “A retired commander of Russia’s missile warning system had speculated that strong radar signals from installations in Alaska might have damaged the spacecraft.” The space agency director, however, did appear to choose his words carefully and wasn’t blaming the United States directly while conceding the spacecraft’s equipment “may have broken down while the vehicle was stored on the ground,” waiting for the right time for the Earth and Mars to line up before proceeding with the mission.

Nigeria: There were further killings of Christians, including an attack on a bar that killed at least 8. Remind me not to travel to Nigeria for a beer.

So the Christians, tired of being killed for holding their beliefs, stormed a mosque in southern Nigeria and killed five. Since Christmas Day, at least 85 deaths have been recorded in the sectarian violence.

Meanwhile, the nation ground to a halt due to a general strike over the elimination of a fuel subsidy, which led to a doubling in fuel prices. President Goodluck Jonathan said the subsidy was economically unsustainable. Protests were suspended a few days to allow for talks with officials. The strikes could resume.