Dmitry Medvedev Reaffirms Soviet Recognition of Palestinian State, Moscow Airport Bombed, Coordinated Campaign Against the Ruling Elite in Russsia, Austrian Soldier on Trial in Germany on Charges of Spying for Russia, Moscow Says Foreign Power May Have Caused Spy Satellite Loss, French Police Seize Fugitive Tycoon’s Yachts on Russia’s Behest, U.S. Vetoes UN Resolution on Israeli Settlements
Russian President Bypasses Israel, Reaffirms Soviet Recognition of Palestinian State
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Austrian on Trial in Germany on Charges of Spying for Russia
An Austrian soldier went on trial in Germany on Monday, accused of spying for the Russian secret service and passing on sensitive information about European helicopter prototypes.
Prosecutors at the Munich court allege that the 54-year-old Austrian army mechanic, spied for Russia’s foreign intelligence service (SVR) from 1997 to 2002.
Continue Reading >> Monsters and Critics | February 14, 2011
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Russia Says Foreign Power May Have Caused Spy Satellite Loss
The Russian space agency suggested Monday that a foreign power may have been behind the space accident that disabled one of the country’s most modern military satellites earlier this month.
Russia on February 1 launched a high-tech Geo-IK-2 craft to help the military draw a three-dimensional map of the Earth and locate the precise positions of various targets.
News reports said the satellite was a vital part of Russia’s effort to match the United States and NATO’s ability to target its missiles from space.
But the craft briefly went missing after its launch only to re-emerge in a wrong orbit that left the craft unable to complete its assigned task.
[...] The official did not identify the country he suspected of trying to derail the Russian military mission. But Moscow frequently accuses Washington of attempting to “militarise” space.
The space official conceded that there may have been other reasons for the launch failure. These included the wrong operations being programmed into the guidance system and other software mistakes.
But the Russian source stressed that the accident occurred between the first and second burns of the Briz-KM upper-stage booster rocket — an area in which the craft makes no contact with ground control.
The official suggested that the electromagnetic pulse may have been aimed at the Russian craft “from a land, sea, air or space vehicle.”
Continue Reading >> AFP | February 15, 2011
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French Police Seize Berezovsky’s Yachts on Russia’s Behest
The Russian Prosecutor General’s Office has confirmed that two yachts and other valuable possessions belonging to the fugitive Russian tycoon have been seized in southern France.
“Our French colleagues have managed to seize [Berezovsky's] yachts in the Juan Bay in southern France, not far from Berezovsky’s estate on Cape Antibes, which was earlier arrested at the request of the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office,” Marina Gridneva, spokeswoman for the Prosecutor General’s Office told Interfax.
[...] French police seized other Berezovsky-owned valuables, including paintings, in the presence of a Russian investigator, the spokeswoman said.
The French judiciary made the decision to confiscate Berezovsky’s property following an official request issued by the Office of the Prosecutor General in Moscow, Itar-Tass reported.
[...] Boris Berezovsky, who has been sentenced to prison in absentia in Russia on charges of embezzlement, fraud and money laundering, has been living in self-imposed exile in the United Kingdom since 2001.
Despite arrest warrants being issued to Interpol by Russian and Brazilian authorities, repeated extradition requests from Russia to UK authorities have produced no results.
Continue Reading >> Russia Today | February 18, 2011
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U.S. Blocks U.N. Resolution Calling Israeli Settlements “Illegal”
The U.S. today vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution that would have condemned Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem as “illegal” and ordered all construction operations there to stop.
The U.S. was the sole no vote on the 15-member Security Council, which had broadly supported the Palestinian-sponsored resolution.
Continue Reading >> ABC News | February 18, 2011
The History of Military Rule in Egypt
Gilbert Achcar: Military rule in Egypt began with Nasser’s overthrow of King Farouk and increasing independence from the U.S.
The Real News | February 13, 2011
Webster Tarpley On The Moscow Airport Bombing
Recent causes of US-UK animus towards Russia include the Khodorkhovsky verdict (the US position being that a finance oligarch that rich should of course be above the law), the inability of NATO to foment a gas crisis this winter, President Medvedev’s endorsement of a Palestinian state (re-affirming the 1988 decision by the USSR), and Afghan President Karzai’s visit to Moscow, where he created the premises for a long-term post-NATO strategic relationship with Russia including the Salang tunnel, hydroelectric plants, and a Turkmenistan-India gas pipeline the US has been seeking to block. Also worth noting is that, in a recent Wikileaks document dump, the impotent gaggle of marginal Russia opposition figures assembled by Obama’s lightweight NSC Russia director Michael McFaul demonstrated a special desire to oust Chechen President Razman Kadyrov, a Putin ally. Are their alleged human rights concerns only a cover story for their fear that Kadyrov is actually suppressing NATO-backed terrorism in Chechnya?
Tarpley | January 25, 2011
Russian President Bypasses Israel, Reaffirms Soviet Recognition of Palestinian State
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said on Tuesday Moscow had recognized an independent Palestinian state in 1988 and was not changing that position adopted by the former Soviet Union in his first visit to the Israeli-occupied West Bank as Russian head of state.
The remark comes after in the past two months a string of recognitions by Latin American states including Brazil and Argentina as Palestinians demand full United Nations membership.
World Bulletin | January 18, 2011
George Friedman : The Republic and The Empire
Stratfor founder George Friedman discusses the theme of his forthcoming book, “The Next Decade,” and explains why the United States has to change the way it deals with today’s world.
Stratfor | January 7, 2011
Russia plans more foreign naval bases
President Dmitry Medvedev said Thursday that Russia intends to expand the number of its foreign naval bases as it tries to catch up with the military capabilities of the West.
Medvedev conceded at a meeting with Russia’s top brass that the country is losing some of its Soviet-era allies and now more than ever needs to negotiate a series of new foreign base agreements with new partner states.
“Unfortunately, the reality is that a number of our previous opportunities have disappeared,” Medvedev said in televised remarks.
Medvedev said that he now had “certain ideas” about how these could be replaced.
“But for obvious reasons, I will not say them out loud,” he added.
Russia has in the past decade lost several of its most important Soviet-era bases, including in Cuba and Vietnam.
These and other losses have left Russia unable to support major naval exercises, leaving the once-mighty force largely confined to the European seas and Russia’s Pacific coast.
Medvedev admitted that this has left Russia at tremendous disadvantage to Western powers, which have supported and built new bases since the Soviet Union’s collapse.
“In this sense, our current partners have much better conditions because they have put up bases the world over. And they enter them and refuel.”
Russia, meanwhile, has to support all its major sea operations with a fleet of refuelling ships, “which is very expensive and completely inefficient,” Medvedev said.
“All in all, this is a subject demanding careful government involvement,” Medvedev said.
AFP | November 25, 2010
China’s Rise in the Middle East
Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu was in China this month touting the “new cooperation paradigm” between Ankara and Beijing. Just a week earlier, a top political advisor to Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao spent five days in Syria signing deals and planting olive trees in the Golan Heights. The Middle Kingdom, it seems, is planting deep roots in the Middle East these days.
The reach of the People’s Republic is far and wide, extending from the Far East to Africa to Latin America, and its interest in the Middle East is neither new nor surprising: China gets more than a quarter of its oil imports from the Persian Gulf and has billions invested in Iran’s oil sector. Recently, though, Beijing appears to be making greater headway, a development fueled by Washington’s creeping withdrawal from the region.
The Washington Institute for Near East Policy | November 16, 2010
Russia Considers Biggest Population Redistribution since Stalin
The Kremlin is considering pushing ahead with the biggest geographical redistribution of its population since Josef Stalin’s forced deportations of entire nationalities in the 1940s.
Under the plans, which were leaked to the daily Vedomosti newspaper, the majority of Russia’s 141 million-strong population would be concentrated in just twenty urban centres rather than sparsely spread out over one fifth of the earth’s surface as is now the case.
At the moment, ninety per cent of Russia’s towns are relatively small with a population of 100,000 people or less, many of them in remote locations. The leaked plan said such places had “no future” and were not worth developing.
Instead, it proposed relocating people to twenty giant agglomerations where Russia’s main natural resources such as oil and gas were located.
Unlike in Stalin’s day, when people were forced to move at gunpoint on the often spurious grounds that they were ‘enemies of the people’ or Nazi collaborators, relocating would be optional and encouraged on economic grounds alone.
Much of rural Russia is dying as young people move to towns and cities anyway and entire Soviet-era settlements which were built around just one or two factories are no longer economically viable.
“There is no need to fight against the current and we need to develop big cities and urban centres,” the plan said according to the newspaper.
Saddled by an obsession for central planning, the Soviets decreed that many towns and settlements be built in areas where the climate was too harsh and where the expense of providing basic utilities was unjustifiably expensive.
Analysts said the plan, which would roll back the Soviet idea of urbanising the entire country, is likely to be heavily touted by President Dmitry Medvedev as part of his agenda to modernise Russia.
“Changing the map of the country is a necessary but not simple task which needs to be done very carefully as any overreaction could lead to a fight for urban resources,” a government official was quoted as saying.
With speculation mounting about whether Mr Medvedev or Vladimir Putin, the prime minister, will run for the Russian presidency in 2012, the plan could be a useful electoral tool for Mr Medvedev according to analysts.
The Daily Telegraph | November 16, 2010
Iran, Russia and US Relations
The Iranian government doubts that the United States will venture to go to war but it is convinced that America will do its best to create tension in the region.
One indication that the US is actively working on it, according to the Iranian Foreign Ministry, is the fact that Russia has joined the sanctions and refused to supply Iran with S-300 systems, cancelling the contract it signed a year earlier.
Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister and Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast says Iran is disappointed with the shift in Russia’s policy. He does not think the sanctions required Russia to cancel the deliveries of defensive S-300 systems.
Also, he believes the Russian leadership does not fully realize how much the decision to cancel the contract will damage Russia’s reputation. Nevertheless, Iran still hopes that eventually the two countries will resume strategic partnership, no matter what the United States promises Russia for abandoning this partnership.
Russia Today | November 18, 2010
US to boost military presence in Yemen
The Obama administration has laid a military plan in the Middle East with “mobilizing military and intelligence resources” to Yemen to allegedly fight terrorism.
According to a report published in the Wall Street Journal on Tuesday, Washington has stepped up pressure on Yemen for what it calls al-Qaeda’s use of Yemeni soil as a safe haven for terrorist operations against the US.
A senior Obama administration official claimed that limited US intelligence experience in Yemen has created “a window of vulnerability” that the US government is “working fast to address.”
Last week, The Washington Post cited top US officials that the US deployed unmanned Predator drones in Yemen to allegedly eradicate al-Qaeda militants.
The drones have been patrolling the Yemeni skies for several months in search of al-Qaeda leaders and operatives allegedly hiding in the country, according to the report.
This is while Yemeni Prime Minister Ali Mujawar has repeatedly criticized the West for linking al-Qaeda to his country.
“Al-Qaeda is mainly a Western-made group,” Mujawar said. The militant group “was not created in Yemen at all as it is being alleged by those who propagate this perception internationally about Yemen.”
His comments hinted at America’s funding of fighters in Afghanistan who were resisting the Soviet occupation back in the 1980s.
Following the September 11, 2001 attacks in New York, the US invaded Afghanistan in order to eradicate al-Qaeda and Taliban militants — whom Washington accused of being behind the attacks.
However, as the war entered its tenth year, the US has failed to present sufficient evidence proving that the al-Qaeda was behind the incident.
Another exampled of Washington military adventurism is the invasion of Iraq.
When the Afghan war was in its second year, the administration of George W. Bush invaded Iraq under the pretext that former Iraqi dictator was hiding weapons of mass destruction, but such weapons were never found.
Moreover, recently released documents by the UK’s Iraq war inquiry suggest that the American and British leaders knew that Iraq was not in possession of such weapons prior to the invasion.
The US now claims that it is planning to begin a new front in Yemen in order to deploy troops to search for al-Qaeda leaders.
Press TV | November 16, 2010
Russia Building 5000 Bomb Shelters in Moscow
Russia Today just put out a video and news report that Russia is building 5000 more bomb shelters in Moscow.
Russia Today | November 10, 2010
No explanation for apparent missile launch near Los Angeles
The lack of any official explanation for the apparent launch of a missile off the coast of Los Angeles Monday evening is both troubling and suspicious. The claim that no military or civilian authority was able to determine what the object was—more than 24 hours after it was videotaped ascending in a westerly direction some 35 miles from the second largest US city—strains credulity.
The non-explanation, combined with the virtual silence of the national media for most of Tuesday, suggests that the incident is far more serious than its treatment by both the government and the media would suggest.
On Monday at 5:30 p.m. local time, a Los Angeles news helicopter crew filmed what appeared to be a large missile rising into the sky, with a billowing vapor trail in its wake.
More than 24 hours later, no explanation had been given by any government agency, civilian or military.
The media on Tuesday cited unnamed Pentagon sources as saying they had “no clue” about the “bizarre” and “unexplained” sighting. A Navy spokesman had earlier ruled out that his branch of the military had any role in the object videotaped, and a local Air Force base said it had not launched any missiles since November 5, when a rocket carried an Italian satellite into space.
The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) claimed they had detected no missile or any other large and fast-moving object in the area.
There was no comment from the White House. The unexplained event came with President Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Secretary of Defense Robert Gates all out of the country.
Even as it denied having any information on the unidentified object, the military asserted that it posed no threat to the US population. NORAD issued a joint statement with the US Northern Command (NORTHCOM) confirming that the “contrail”—the object’s vapor trail—was not the result of a foreign military having launched a missile. “We can confirm that there is no threat to our nation, and from all indications this was not a launch by a foreign military,” the statement said.
No explanation was given as to how the military could assert something was not a threat while claiming it had no idea what it was.
Until Tuesday evening, the national media largely ignored the event. Notably, the New York Times produced nothing on the sighting until the late afternoon on Tuesday, when it reposted an article from the Associated Press on its web site.
The lack of any official explanation and the downplaying of the issue by the media suggest the possibility that the government or elements within the military/intelligence apparatus were, with the collaboration of major media outlets, buying time to come up with a credible story for public consumption.
Robert Ellsworth, former US Ambassador to NATO in the Nixon administration and deputy secretary of defense in the Ford administration, on Tuesday morning speculated that the object was indeed a missile fired by the US military to coincide with President Obama’s Asia trip.
“It could be a test firing of an Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) from a submarine, underwater submarine, to demonstrate, mainly to Asia, that we can do that,” Ellsworth said, adding that similar firings had taken place over the Atlantic during the Cold War with the Soviet Union, but never previously over the Pacific.
A retired Russian rocket scientist who looked at the video told the World Socialist Web Site that the object could only have been a ballistic missile or a rocket destined for outer space.
Later in the day, reports circulated that the object was an optical illusion, created by the particular vantage point of the helicopter in relationship to an airplane flying directly toward it in the evening sky.
However, the intelligence web site Stratfor quickly challenged such explanations, noting that “the video footage available on open source appears to capture a flame emanating from the contrail’s source,” making such theories “unlikely.”
If the video indicated the normal route of a jet airplane, moreover, it should have been easy for the FAA to settle the matter. But both the FAA and NORAD had earlier claimed that there was no evidence of an airplane in the area.
Stratfor went on to question the credibility of official claims that neither the military nor civilian authorities had detected the object and that they had been unable to determine what it was. “The US operates constellations of satellites dedicated to detecting the slightest heat signature to be aware of any missile launch that may be happening that could affect the United States,” Stratfor noted. “It is thus odd that no one from the Navy or Defense Department has chosen to share more details to prevent a host of conspiracy theories and fear-mongering such an incident could spark.”
The web site continued: “Given US surveillance capabilities, it would seem that not only would the US military know that there was a launch, it would know what it was, where it came from and whether it posed a threat.”
Another possibility broached by Pentagon spokesman Col. Dave Lapani is unlikely. He speculated that if there was an object launched, it might have been done by a private entity.
“The launch of a rocket that size doesn’t belong to any commercial entity without them issuing a press release,” said Marco Caceres, an analyst with Teal Group Corp., a Fairfax, Virginia-based aerospace research firm. “It can’t belong to anyone but the military.”
Moreover, this would raise the question of how the largest military and intelligence apparatus in the world could have no knowledge of the assembly and firing of a large object off the coast of a major American city. Among the agencies that would be expected to have knowledge of such an event are the Navy, the Air Force, the Coast Guard, NORAD, NORTHCOM, the FAA, the Department of Homeland Security, and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
There is another possibility that must certainly be drawing the scrutiny of intelligence agencies around the world: that elements in the military acted alone in firing a missile, doing so either without permission or by accident.
A further question is raised: Was the sighting on Monday part of a crisis event that is still in progress?
International intelligence and military officials are likely asking two further questions: Is the US military in control of its nuclear forces? Is the Obama administration in control of the military?
As Statfor concluded, “Working with the knowledge we currently have, including the fact that the US military conducts missile tests in this area on a regular basis, everything points to a missile launched by the United States. Still, why deny knowledge of something that appears to be a rather routine launch at a time when the president is out of the country?”
The apparent missile launch on Monday is the latest in a series of high-profile but unexplained events involving the US military. In 2006, US nuclear missile parts were sent to Taiwan, supposedly by accident. In September 2007, it was learned that a nuclear-armed B-52 bomber flew over the US without authorization. And in 2008, a US military report was leaked in the European media noting that over 1,000 nuclear missile parts had gone missing.
Last year there was the fighter jet-escorted flight of Air Force One, a Boeing 747 used exclusively for the travel of the US president, at a low altitude over Manhattan. President Obama claimed to have no knowledge of the flight, which was explained as a secret “photo op” to obtain pictures of the president’s plane flying near the Statue of Liberty.
Tom Eley
The World Socialist Web Site | November 10, 2010
India, Saudi Arabia to Hold Military Exercises
It is reported that the Indian Army is expected to hold joint military exercises in Saudi Arabia with the Royal Saudi Land Force in March 2011. India will also construct a mountain warfare training school to help Riyadh improve their offensive and defensive capabilities.
In recent years India and Saudi Arabia have deepened their relationship with bilateral high-level visits, intelligence sharing and counter-terror efforts. Saudi Arabia’s Prince Turki bin Faisal Al Saud is expected to visit India in March 2011 and interact with the Indian leadership. Prince Turki, nephew of King Abdullah who heads an influential think tank in Riyadh, is regarded as one of the architects behind the Afghan resistance against Soviet occupation in the late 1980s.
Growing India-Saudi Arabia ties are said to be a result of behind-the-scenes manoeuvring by the United States.
India Defence | November 9, 2010
Unidentified Missile Launched Off California Coast
A mysterious missile launch off the southern California coast was caught by CBS affiliate KCBS’s cameras Monday night, and officials are staying tight-lipped over the nature of the projectile.
CBS station KFMB put in calls to the Navy and Air Force Monday night about the striking launch off the coast of Los Angeles, which was easily visible from the coast, but the military has said nothing about the launch.
KFMB showed video of the apparent missile to former U.S. Ambassador to NATO Robert Ellsworth, who is also a former Deputy Secretary of Defense, to get his thoughts.
“It’s spectacular… It takes people’s breath away,” said Ellsworth, calling the projectile, “a big missile”.
Magnificent images were captured by the KCBS news helicopter in L.A. around sunset Monday evening. The location of the missile was about 35 miles out to sea, west of L.A. and north of Catalina Island.
A Navy spokesperson told KFMB it wasn’t their missile. He said there was no Navy activity reported in the area Monday evening.
On Friday night, Vandenberg Air Force Base, in California, launched a Delta II rocket, carrying an Italian satellite into orbit, but a sergeant at the base told KFMB there had been no launches since then.
Ellsworth urged American to wait for definitive answers to come from the military.
When asked, however, what he thought it might be, the former ambassador said it could possibly have been a missile test timed as a demonstration of American military might as President Obama tours Asia.
“It could be a test-firing of an intercontinental ballistic missile from a submarine … to demonstrate, mainly to Asia, that we can do that,” speculated Ellsworth.
Ellsworth said such tests were carried out in the Atlantic to demonstrate America’s power to the Soviets, when there was a Soviet Union, but he doesn’t believe an ICBM has previously been tested by the U.S. over the Pacific.
Officially, at least, the projectile remains a mystery missile.
CBS News | November 9, 2010
U.S. Support of Japanese Sovereignty over the Kuril Islands
Analyst Matt Gertken discusses U.S. support for Japanese sovereignty over the Russian-held Kuril Islands and looks at the pressure confronting Japan in the foreign policy realm as Washington becomes more involved in the region.
Statfor | November 3, 2010
India’s Strategic Future
Why India needs to move from “strategic autonomy” to strategic cooperation with the United States.
Unlike in Washington, where governments are noisy in articulating their worldviews, for the permanent bureaucracy that runs New Delhi’s foreign policy, silence is golden. But Delhi’s reluctance to articulate a grand strategy does not necessarily mean it does not have one. Since India embraced globalization at the turn of the 1990s, many of its traditional strategic objectives have evolved, and the pace of that evolution has gathered momentum as India’s economic growth has accelerated in recent years.
Yet the United States remains unclear about its potential ally’s goals and objectives. Despite significant advances in Indo-U.S. relations during George W. Bush’s presidency and bipartisan agreement in Washington to support India’s rise, Barack Obama’s administration has found it hard to make big strategic advances. U.S. officials dealing with Afghanistan and Pakistan seem to find India — and particularly its reluctance to offer concessions on Kashmir that might presumably encourage Pakistan to cooperate more thoroughly in Afghanistan — part of the problem. American negotiators on climate change and trade find the notorious prickliness of the old non aligned India alive and well. And the Pentagon is frustrated in its efforts to build a partnership with a New Delhi that resists cooperation on U.S. terms. But American strategists should take heart: If Washington can be patient, endure an extended courtship, and above all take a longer-term view of the relationship with Delhi, it will find much to like about India’s foreign policy.
The problem for India’s top strategists is not that they don’t seek a grand bargain with the United States. It is about negotiating equitable terms. It is also about bringing along a political elite and bureaucracy that are adapting too slowly to the new imperatives of a stronger partnership with Washington. But make no mistake: Engagement with the United States has been the Indian establishment’s highest foreign-policy priority over the last decade and a half.
India’s grand strategy has four broad objectives. In all four areas, strategic cooperation with the United States is critical.
India’s first objective is to pacify the northwestern part of the subcontinent, or the AfPak region, as it is known in Washington. All of India’s great empire-states throughout the last 2,500 years, from the Mauryans to the British Raj, have had trouble controlling these turbulent lands across the Indus River that frame the subcontinent’s western frontier.
Indeed, ever since Alexander the Great and his army first arrived on the banks of the Indus, most foreign forces and alien ideologies have come to what is now India through the northwestern route. In the past, India managed to absorb the invaders and modify their ideologies. All it needed was sufficient time. But weakened by the subcontinent’s partition in 1947 and faced with U.S. and Chinese support for Pakistan during the Cold War, India has had little time and space to manage the conflict with its troublesome sibling to the northwest.
American commentators often discount the threat that Pakistan’s military poses to India. Indian strategists don’t have that luxury. Armed with nuclear weapons and allied with radical Islam, the Pakistani Army remains extremely dangerous — a situation compounded by America’s current dependence on Islamabad to pursue its objectives in Afghanistan and in the tribal areas across the border.
The challenge for India is not just about managing its differences with U.S. policies in Afghanistan and Pakistan. New Delhi has no choice but to work with Washington to stabilize its northwest. That in turn involves encouraging the United States to think very differently about Pakistan and its relations with Afghanistan and India. And that demands getting the United States to pressure the Pakistani Army to end its promotion of extremism in Afghanistan and India.
Both New Delhi and Washington want to move the AfPak region toward political moderation, economic modernization, and regional integration. Neither can achieve these objectives on their own. But they have so far failed to have an honest discussion about how to move forward together, let alone begin coordinating their policies.
India’s second objective is to become an indispensable power in the littorals of the Indian Ocean and southwestern Pacific. For nearly two centuries until partition, the British Raj was the source of stability and the main provider of security in these regions. But after independence in 1947, India chose an inward economic orientation and focused on the global mobilization of the Third World during the Cold War. Not surprisingly, India resented the dominance of the Anglo-American powers in its strategic backyard.
As the power of a rising China today radiates across the subcontinent, the Indian Ocean, and the western Pacific, balancing Beijing has become an urgent matter — especially given the relative decline of the United States. In the past, India balanced Beijing through a de facto alliance with the Soviet Union. Today, it needs a strategic partnership with the United States to ensure that China’s rise will continue to be peaceful. With Washington yet to make up its mind on how best to deal with Beijing, India has no option but to hedge against growing Chinese power as well as the dangers of a potential Sino-American condominium. This necessarily involves nuanced bilateral economic and political engagement with China, albeit with eyes wide open.
Meanwhile, New Delhi’s focus is on China’s neighbors. India is holding on to its old partnership with Moscow, stepping up its economic and security cooperation with Japan, South Korea, and Mongolia, and raising its economic and strategic profile in Southeast Asia and Australasia.
India’s third objective is to increase its weight in global governance and eventually emerge as a “rule-maker” in the international system. In that sense, India’s civil nuclear initiative with the Bush administration was as much about producing electric power as it was about redefining India’s position in the global nonproliferation regime. But U.S. support for India’s bid to become a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council has been elusive. The United States, instead, wants to test whether India is a “responsible stakeholder” in the negotiations on issues ranging from climate change to international trade. From India’s perspective, these American benchmarks have tended to be self-serving and defined by the latest intellectual fashion in Washington. India is prepared to engage on these issues and participate more fully in global decision-making bodies on the basis of its own enlightened self-interest, but is not prepared to take tests from anyone.
India’s fourth objective is to strengthen the factors that are critical for becoming a credible power on the regional and global stages. This involves sustaining its current high economic growth rate, consolidating its advantages in knowledge industries, providing education and skills to its younger population, and modernizing its armed forces and security agencies. On all these fronts, India needs deeper and more open cooperation with the United States through the integration of their advanced technology sectors, trade liberalization, opening the Indian education system to American universities and community colleges, U.S. investments in the Indian defense industry, and American expertise to upgrade Indian intelligence gathering and processing. New Delhi is already engaged with Washington on all these fronts, but the results remain way below potential.
Most of all, the United States needs to recognize that it is dealing with a new India. For too long, India saw itself as a weak, developing country unwilling to unlearn its anti-colonial grievances. Only in recent years has India begun to inch away from its previous focus on the chimera of “strategic autonomy” to emphasize its own role in shaping the regional and global environments.
In the past, India’s internal identity as a liberal democracy was in tension with its external image as the leader of the global south against the West. A rising India — with its robust democracy, thriving entrepreneurial capitalism, and expanding global interests — is bound to acquire a new identity as a champion of liberal international order.
What remains to be seen is whether the Obama administration can seize this moment. Obama has certainly talked the talk, but it is not clear whether his administration is ready to walk the walk to accommodate India’s rise. That might require a leap into the unknown — a historic revision of the international hierarchy of power — that so far, the United States has been unwilling or unable to take.
C. Raja Mohan
Foreign Policy | November 4, 2010
Turkey may train the crew of Ukraine’s only sub
Turkey says it’s ready to help Ukraine in training the crew of the only Ukraine’s submarine Zaporizhzhia, reported Ukrainian defense minister Mikhail Yezhel.
According to the minister, he will meet with Turkish counterpart during the visit to Albania.
“We’re going to discuss issues of air information exchange and military technical cooperation with Turkish defense minister. I think we should also deliberate the possibility of training of our submarine’s crew. By the way, that was Turkey who agreed to help us in this matter”, underlined the minister.
Ukrainian defense minister Mikhail Yezhel visits Tirana (Albania) and attends annual session of the Southeast Europe Defense Ministerial.
Previously, Mr. Yezhel had spoken for an idea to revive Ukrainian submarine fleet and in this context to commission submarine Zaporizhzhia after overhaul.
Zaporizhzhia is former Soviet Project 641 diesel electric submarine built in Leningrad, and launched on May 29, 1970. The sub had been in service in Soviet Navy. Since partition of Soviet Black Sea Fleet in 1997, Zaporizhzhia is the only Ukraine’s submarine. The sub is under patronage of Zaporozhye region, Ukraine. As of 2010, Zaporizhzhia is under repairs.
Rusnavy | October 28, 2010
Vietnam to reopen Cam Ranh Bay to foreign fleets
Vietnam plans to reopen to foreign navies the Cam Ranh Bay port facility formerly used by both the US and Russia, the prime minister said Saturday after a summit dominated by China’s territorial disputes.
“In the centre of the Cam Ranh port complex Vietnam will stand ready to provide services to the naval ships from all countries including submarines when they need our services,” Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung said in response to a reporter’s question, at the close of the East Asia Summit.
Countries will pay for services at the facility which will be developed with Russian assistance, Dung said.
The base in southern Vietnam was used by the United States navy during the Vietnam War, which ended in 1975. The Soviet Union and then Russia later used the facility, until Russia withdrew several years ago.
Vietnam and the US, which restored diplomatic ties 15 years ago, are both concerned about China’s growing military might and assertiveness in the South China Sea.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said in Vietnam Saturday that Hanoi and Washington are “broadening our security exchanges”.
On Saturday the US and Russia were formally invited as members of the East Asia Summit in what analysts say is a blow to Chinese attempts to diminish US influence in the region.
With its core the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean), EAS also includes Australia, China, India, Japan, South Korea and New Zealand.
Bangkok Post | October 31, 2010
Russian military’s joint strategic command: A taste of things to come
Russia’s defense minister, Anatoly Serdyukov, announced that the four new military districts and joint strategic commands, which are to replace six pre-existing military districts, have been established ahead of schedule.
The creation of these four new districts is not news, nor is the fact that they are to be headquartered in St. Petersburg, Rostov-on-Don, Yekaterinburg and Khabarovsk.
These changes go further: permanent strategic commands will control these new districts’ forces, resources and all troop branches.
Strategic nuclear forces and forces currently subordinate to the center, for example, the Airborne Force and the Space Force, will remain as they are.
In the past, only ground forces came under direct control of military district commanders, with joint commands only established in wartime.
A presidential decree, signed in July, gave a deadline of December 1, 2010 for a complete overhaul of the command chain. By September 1, the Western military district had been set up, with the West joint strategic command establishing control over the district’s ground forces, air-force and air-defense units, as well as over those of the Baltic and Northern Fleets.
All joint strategic commands have now been established and are becoming operational, say top Defense Ministry officials.
Turning these commands into fully-fledged entities will take some considerable time. Russia’s officer corps also needs to be overhauled.
Dr. Alexander Sharavin, director of the Institute for Political and Military Analysis, said it will take years before these joint strategic commands are fully operational.
“Any command center has to tackle an extremely broad range of issues. This requires skilled personnel. Russia virtually lacks the experienced specialists needed to run such multi-profile entities,” Sharavin said.
“Accumulating the required experience will take years. A new generation of officers used to working in this new system, who work together intuitively, has yet to emerge,” Sharavin added.
This new format also requires a new approach to training officers for the headquarters and General Staff.
Under the traditional officer-training program, the only serious insight into the workings of other services or branches was provided by the General Staff Academy, which turned out military leaders and top-level staff officers.
Today, there is an increasing need to coordinate the operations of diversified groupings at much lower levels than the General Staff.
Moreover, senior officers, due to serve with these new entities, should have an idea of civilian dimensions to managing the armed forces and foreign policy.
This presupposes military personnel taking on an enhanced role in the work of parliamentary committees and the Foreign Ministry. This is already the case in the West, where generals and admirals commonly have the opportunity to gain diplomatic experience and work in close cooperation with civilian authorities, in both its legislative and executive branches.
This practice was not widespread in either the Soviet or the Russian armed forces. If they are to create truly modern armed forces, the country’s leaders and senior defense officials need to overhaul the entire system of military education and military service.
The rather painful problem of providing joint strategic commands with new equipment deserves particular attention. If these diversified, inter-branch troop groupings are to be properly managed, they need to be entirely re-equipped.
This involves the delivery of up-to-date systems, including advanced operational and strategic automated control systems, telecommunications networks, radio-electronic reconnaissance aircraft, Airborne Warning and Control System (AWACS)-type planes, communications satellites and unmanned aerial vehicles capable of relaying multi-channel online data.
A number of other systems, from platoon- to top-level ones, to assess the combat theater are required, but these are currently in short supply.
These systems are under development, and the roll-out of “smart” advanced and present-generation weapons across the forces is a government rearmament priority. There are also plans to acquire an entire range of state-of-the-art automated control systems for the available stock of military equipment across all units.
This will all take a lot of time to accomplish. Therefore, the question of whether these new operational command units are in place and functioning within the Russian army can be answered in the affirmative. They are up and running.
But it will be at least a decade before they can attain their full potential, and then only if they make steady progress in this direction.
RIA Novosti | October 26, 2010
India Countering China’s strategic encirclement
The Defence Minister and Army Chief have voiced concern over China’s increasing assertiveness on the political, diplomatic and military fronts. Though there is no cause yet to sound an alarm, the Indian establishment should be prepared to checkmate the Dragon’s moves
Look at some of the past and recent developments and then perceive the scenario of a Sino-Indian thaw. The occupation of Aksai Chin by China since 1962, construction of the Karakoram Highway connecting Pakistan, supporting insurgency in India’s North East since 1965 and claiming areas like Sikkim and Arunachal Pradesh have been some of the direct interferences of China in Indian affairs.
A few recent developments, however, are more disturbing then the earlier ones. These include :
A proposed rail link, via Myanmar, to Chittagong port in Bangladesh
Construction of Sona deep sea port at Cox Bazaar in Bangladesh
Construction of Hambantola port in Sri Lanka
A full facility at Gawadar port, west of Karachi, in Pakistan
Occupation of northern areas of Gilgit by regular Chinese troops
Interference in internal politics of Nepal
Intruding in various places along the borders in the guise of herd-grazers
Construction of nuclear power plants in Pakistan
Sino-Indian relations started on a warm note after independence. Both countries were in search of their place in the new World Order and trying to find bread for their people. All this changed in the aftermath of the 1962 Sino-Indian war, which has left China and India in state of flux that continues till today. China started its economic development in late 80′s and became a popular investment destination for Americans and Europeans.
Today China is poised to become an economic superpower and is in close competition with the US and Japan, leaving India far behind. China knows it well that after Japan and United Korea, no other country can compete. With India waking up very late to the new realities of economic developments, China now perceives India as a potential competitor in Asia and Afro-Asian regions. China has become the largest user of oil in the world overtaking USA. The Chinese growing economy has also become the third largest economy in the world, China is a fully developed nuclear state with the largest Army in the world.
It is reported that China consumed 2,200 million tons of oil in 2009. Its consumption of energy in the future is well perceived, and in order to maintain future import requirements, China definitely requires a supply chain management system from the Gulf countries. Gawadar-Xinjang highway, gas pipeline from Myanmar and intermediate refueling facility at the port of Hambantola in Sri Lanka may be its genuine requirements.
These facilities may legitimatize as geo-economic necessities for the future. But the Chinese regular troops occupying Gilgit region in POK, direct support to the Maoist party in Nepal and openly declaring Kashmir as a disputed area prove its hidden intentions of deploying itself in the geo-strategic encirclement of India.
Recent developments in the Indo-US relationship paradigm may have also irked Beijing. US civilian nuclear deal with India, enhanced mutual trust between the two democracies, Obama’s forthcoming visit to India, purchase of defense hardware by India from the US and Obama’s clear indications of upgrading mutual relations with India could be seen as unwelcome developments by China.
China follows well-practiced strategies with its neighbors, like “teaching them a lesson”, as it did with Vietnam in 1978. China also follows a strategy of “tactical arrogance”, with India, Nepal and Bhutan over and again during the livestock-grazing season. China also believes in the strategy of “bullying”‘ neighbors by actions more than words. China, recently denied a visa to one of our Army Commanders posted in Kashmir.
These postures and actions prove yet another point that China has grown so powerful that it does not bother about anyone, including Uncle Sam. China believes in having its cake and eating it too.
One of the biggest and saddest events that have gone in favor of China is the downfall of the erstwhile USSR. The present Russian federation cannot engage China due to its internal problems and weak economy. So, what does it boil down to? What should India do to engage its bullying neighbor meaningfully?
One of the options available to India, as our economist Prime Minister stated, is that our engagement with ASEAN countries is a key element of India’s vision of an Asian economic community. If we can meaningfully engage ASEAN countries in economic ties, then these countries will definitely look up to New Delhi in a supportive and friendly gesture. These countries will definitely upgrade India in their priorities over China. India should also keep close watch on SAARC countries and help them in their genuine economic development. This would remove their fear of India’s big brother attitude and bring about an economic change in the region. We, therefore, must agree upon an economic development program for SAARC countries to enhance their confidence in India and not leave them to any vulnerable threat from outside.
China knows it well that India today is not what it was in 1962. With a credible nuclear deterrence, a fairly well trained and well deployed army, India cannot be bullied or treated with arrogance. India could do well by organizing some sort of offensive capabilities along the north-eastern borders. Indian defensive capabilities are fairly well developed and it is capable of countering any limited misadventure by China. A large-scale Chinese offensive, of course, would dictate different options for India.
In all fairness, China is definitely not an irresponsible state and recognizes India’s regional and international aspirations. If New Delhi and Beijing can settle their long-standing border disputes and engage in economic development as well as ASEAN and SAARC countries, then the 21st century definitely belongs to these Asian giants. After all, Panchsheel, the basic document guiding India’s foreign policy, was first signed by these two countries.
The Tribune | October 21, 2010
Half Of Indian Air Force Equipment is Obsolete
India has the third largest Army, the fourth largest Air force and the seventh largest Navy in the world. Although it may take pride in these statistics however the fact is even after 61 years of Independence, India continues to be dependent on foreign countries for its weapon systems and technology.
From combat aircrafts to state-of-the-art weapon systems and high-end technology equipments for the Indian Air force, the lists of imports is endless and the costs run upto billions of dollars.This over dependence on foreign countries for Air force inventory is certainly hampering India’s quest to become self dependent and become a global player in the world which demands supreme military power.
Since most of the Air force inventory is imported from foreign countries, for any maintenance issues we need to rely on them.The Indian Air force has become vulnerable to the whims and vagaries of foreign suppliers that range from sudden foreign policy shifts, price hikes and glitches in technology.
The Indian Air force (IAF) comprises of 1,322 aircrafts that include 680 combat aircrafts and 305 helicopters, presently operating in a total of 34 squadrons.
Most of the IAF’s 797 fighter jets are of Soviet/Russian origin. These include the Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-21, Mikoyan MiG-27, Mikoyan MiG-29 as well as the Sukhoi Su-30MKI. The IAF also has the Anglo-French SEPECAT Jaguar and French Mirage 2000 aircraft, produced under license.
The MiG-21 around 200 of them, forms the backbone of the IAF however these aircrafts were acquired in the late 1960s and early 70s and they have been aging and almost become obsolete. The Mig-21′s also have a poor safety record and hence the need for replacement is necessary.There is an estimate that in the nine years from 1993 to 2002, IAF lost over 100 pilots in 283 accidents and around 50 pilots have been lost in MiG-21s alone.
Russia decided to ground a substantial number of its MiG-29 aircrafts owing to structural defects. The news sparked off immediate concern for both the Indian Air Force (IAF), which flies three squadrons of this ‘air superiority’ aircraft that played a role during the Kargil war, and for also the Indian Navy which will begin taking delivery of the first four of a total 45 of this aircraft’s naval variant, the MiG-29K, later this year.
The IAF is looking for advance jet trainers (AJT) other than the British-supplied Hawk aircraft to train its pilots. This is because the IAF is facing considerable problems relating to product-support for the 66 Hawks bought only a few years ago. The AJT will play a vital role in training rookie pilots to transition from subsonic trainer aircraft to ‘high-performance’ supersonic fighters.
In 2008, the Russian company Rosoboroexport had suddenly hiked the price of 80 Mi-17-IV transport helicopters from $650 million to $ 1 billion after the deal had been finalized.
The MMRCA tender in which the Indian Air force is looking to replace its aging fleet would include the procurement of 126 multi-role combat aircraft valued at $10.4 billion.
So the conclusion is that India has been over-dependent on foreign countries for its Air force inventory instead of being self-reliant and most of its Aircrafts or Aircraft inventory either have structural defects or are aging which is a major concern.
Defence Aviation | October 14, 2010
China Driving India, Russia Together
At the end of the Cold War, India had a choice either to remain isolated and strengthen the nonalignment movement or join hands with the United States to ultimately balance the growing influence of China. India opted for the latter in light of its own geopolitics.
As part of its strategy to keep South Asia clear of Chinese interference and extend its own influence into the greater part of the Asia-Pacific region, India began courting allies in Southeast Asia with a “Look East” policy. Now, if India has to be reckoned as a great power, it needs to look westward. It needs to spread its influence into Central Asia.
If that’s to happen, India has to find a stable and reliable partner to the north. Russia, an old friend of India’s from the days of the Cold War, will welcome India’s presence in Central Asia to counter China’s ambitions in the region. India’s booming economy moreover can act as a major attraction to Russian industry. Defense contracts serve India’s ambition to continue and improve relations with the Russian Bear.
For quite some time, India and Russia have been moving in that direction. For instance, the two powers have been conducting annual discussions on defense cooperation. This year’s talks centered on Russia’s fifth generation fighter aircraft, a deal worth some $25 billion, and the leasing of the Akula submarine. India plans to get 250 of the fighter jets for its air force while the nuclear submarine will be leased by the Indian Navy for ten years to train personnel before the INS Arihant, the first submarine developed and built in India, joins the fleet. India and Russia have already had developed the BrahMos supersonic cruise missile together.
There has been something of a seesaw in the relation recently, at least when it comes to the procurement of arms with India actively turning to Uncle Sam for weapons. India’s defense spending is set to mount considerably over the next twenty to twenty-five years as the Indian military is modernizing its systems. New Delhi expects to spend nearly $120 billion over a period of five years starting in 2012. This represents a golden opportunity for Russia’s weakened economy to recover.
India would curse itself for allowing a golden opportunity to be missed. China has previously taken advantage of Russian experience and expertise when it recruited former Soviet defense specialist after the Wall came down. India has to make up for this Chinese advantage and speed up the process of cooperating with the Russians.
There are also important geostrategic reasons for improving relations with Russia from the Indian perspective. With the United States preparing to pull out of Afghanistan, there is already talk in Moscow of expanding Russia’s role in Afghanistan. It’s likely that India will also get on board. India and Iran used to be the main supporters of Afghanistan’s Northern Alliance against the largely Sunni and Pashtun Taliban before the American led coalition toppled the regime in 2001.
Russia, which last year allowed the US to ship weapons across its territory to Afghanistan, has been wary of the Taliban insurgency destabilizing Central Asian republics and spilling over into its Caucasus region. At the same time, Russia doesn’t believe in the doctrine of former foreign minister Yevgeny Maksimovich Primakov anymore who once championed the forging of a strategic partnership among Beijing, Moscow and New Delhi to counter Washington’s presence in Eurasia. Instead, Moscow and Delhi are more likely to team up with the Americans to try to counter the extension of the Chinese sphere of interest.
It is against this background that Russian President Dmitry Medvedev is expected visit New Delhi in December for the annual India-Russia summit. Russia shares India’s concern over China’s rise. The last thing it wants is to have a Chinese hegemony spread around the Caucasus and Central Asia once American troops are out. Medvedev’s visit to New Delhi will be preceded by President Barack Obama’s own trip to India in November and there is no prize for guessing that there could be a revision of Primakov’s doctrine aimed at Beijing.
In conclusion, the wheel has come full circle from the time when India in its infancy as a nation newly independent after 1947 used to court the Soviet Union by following a socialist economy with national planning very much in line with the Stalinist model to Russia courting India for economic purposes today and in order to regain international influence and prestige.
Balaji Chandramoha is a member of the Institute of Defense and Strategic Analysis in New Delhi, India, a correspondent of World News Forecast and Editor Asia with World Security Network. For the Atlantic Sentinel he covers South Asia and related greater power politics.
Atlantic Sentinel | October 12, 2010
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