Monday, November 27, 2023

 

"There are no Armenians left in NK, though Russians have taken to defending them". Opinion about reasons




Russia’s role in the Armenian exodus

“Russia’s role in ethnic cleansing in Nagorno-Karabakh indicates a weakening of its influence in the region,” says Rasmus Kanback, a Swedish anthropologist and expert on the Karabakh conflict. His article on Russia’s role in the exodus of almost the entire Armenian population from Nagorno-Karabakh was published by Insider.

We publish the expert’s opinion on Russia’s role, its position in the region in recent years and the resulting situation – with slight cuts.

The story of a betrayal: Why Russia acquiesced in the ethnic cleansing in Nagorno-Karabakh

The images of Russian military vehicles being transported by train from Azerbaijan are circulating on social media. Formally, the Russian military states that the vehicles are to be repaired in Russia. In practice, most observers of the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh understand that these vehicles are not needed there.

Russia’s presence in Nagorno-Karabakh, or in Azerbaijan for that matter, was shorter-lived than anyone could have anticipated when a trilateral ceasefire agreement was signed between Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Russia three years ago. On paper, Russia was to have a five-year mandate with a clause for extension, deploying 1,960 troops to Nagorno-Karabakh.

The mission was intended to monitor the ceasefire, guarantee the safety of the local population, and ensure passage between the Armenian-populated Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia.

Three years later, none of the hundreds of thousands of Armenians that the Russians were supposed to protect remain in Nagorno-Karabakh. It took less than a week for the entire population to flee in horror of Azerbaijani oppression while Russian troops stood quietly on the sidelines.

Azerbaijani authorities say that Armenians voluntarily left their homes in NK. The Armenian government calls the exodus of compatriots “forced resettlement” and believes that Baku has brought its policy of ethnic cleansing to its conclusion. Yerevan says that the safety of Karabakh Armenians’ residence in their homeland could not be guaranteed.

Assessment of the situation by Armenian experts

A recurring theory in Armenian discourse is that the war between Armenia and Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh in 2020 was allowed by Russia. One argument maintains that Armenia, being in several formal alliances with Russia, approached the West, and Russia directly or indirectly lost interest in maintaining the prevailing security balance in the Southern Caucasus.

Another argument holds that Russia, through military presence in Nagorno-Karabakh, advanced its geopolitical ambitions, also against Azerbaijan. As much as the peacekeeping forces were seen as a security function for the Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh, they also served as a tool of power against both Baku and Yerevan.

With the ethnic cleansing of Nagorno-Karabakh and the withdrawal of the Russian peacekeeping force, a vital part of Moscow’s leverage has disappeared. Russia’s position as a geopolitical actor in the region is weaker today than it was before the 2020 war.

Azerbaijan fills the vacuum after Armenia

But let’s rewind before the question of Russia’s role in the ethnic cleansing is fully answered. As the Armenian relationship, at least diplomatically, deteriorated with Russia, it steadily improved for Azerbaijan. Likelythe country’s president, Ilham Aliyev, quickly understood that the security vacuum left by Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan in recent years could be filled by Azerbaijan.

Just prior to Russia’s major invasion of Ukraine, Vladimir Putin and Ilham Aliyev met in Moscow to sign a new alliance agreement consisting of 43 points. Particularly interesting for this article are the points on deepened military cooperation and cooperation in the energy sector.

At a meeting in early summer 2022, the leaders of the countries once again emphasized the validity of the agreement. A year later, in May 2023, Ilham Aliyev strengthened the rhetoric, calling Russia not only an informal ally but also one “de jure” – an ally in a legal sense. Note that this happened just a couple of months before Azerbaijan, on September 19–20, launched the final offensive against Nagorno-Karabakh.

The fact that Vladimir Putin and Ilham Aliyev are authoritarian leaders who, to some extent, understand each other in a way that Nikol Pashinyan does not, adds to the course of events.

The weeks before the offensive

The weeks before the ethnic cleansing happened, the Armenian-Russian relationship deteriorated rapidly. The Russian side likely claims that it is due to Armenia’s actions. There are three significant events.

The first was when Armenia sent humanitarian aid to Ukraine on September 7. It was the first time it happened. Additionally, Russia was further irritated when Nikol Pashinyan’s wife, Anna Hakobyan, made a formal state visit to Kyiv. In Moscow, the Armenian ambassador to the Kremlin was summoned not only to present a protest but a sharp warning.

The second event is when Armenia held a ten-day joint military exercise with the United States on September 11. While it wasn’t the first military exercise Armenia conducted with the U.S. or NATO, the Armenian government made a big deal of conveying the exercise to the world. Once again, the Armenian ambassador was called for talks in Moscow, and this time the rhetoric escalated further.

The third event took place on September 13 when Nikol Pashinyan, in a lengthy address to the nation, declared that Armenia can no longer rely on Russia as a security guarantor. He referred to Russia’s war in Ukraine, stating that its presence in the Caucasus has proven unreliable.

As this happened, images and videos of Azerbaijani troop movements were published on pro-Azerbaijani social media channels.

“It’s all Armenia’s fault”

The air raid sirens in the capital of Nagorno-Karabakh, Stepanakert, began sounding around 1:00 PM local time on September 19. 

While EU representatives, lacking physical presence in Nagorno-Karabakh, took a critical stance on what was happening, Russia assumed a considerably more passive position.

In the days before the offensive, Vladimir Putin stated that Armenia had itself to blame for “recognizing” Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity. “If Armenia itself recognized Karabakh as part of Azerbaijan, what do we have to do with it?”

When the offensive began, the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs released a statement in a similar vein. Armenia was accused of not only recognizing Azerbaijan’s territory but also of moving closer to Europe rather than maintaining loyalty to Moscow.

According to leaked documents to the Russian news outlet Meduza, the message in Kremlin’s instructions to Russian media is reflected. Russian regime-friendly media were instructed by the Russian leadership to emphasize that it is Armenia’s fault that Azerbaijan has been given the opportunity to attack Nagorno-Karabakh.

This narrative should be seen as an attempt by Vladimir Putin to legitimize an upcoming change in course rather than a truth.

Civil population without Russian protection

Now we’ve come to Russia’s practical part of the ethnic cleansing. On the ground in Nagorno-Karabakh, events unfolded rapidly. After almost ten months of blockade, the Armenian population had run out of almost all necessities. In the weeks before the offensive, there were talks that if nothing changed, the population was heading towards a famine.

Multiple independent testimonies from border villages suggest that the Russian troops, in connection with the Azerbaijani attacks, began to withdraw or stayed quietly on the sidelines.

One of them, a Karabakh-Armenian soldier who fought in the city of Martuni, claimed that the Russian troops had already withdrawn from the frontlines in the morning. If true, this adds to the evidence that the Russian peacekeeping forces were aware of what was about to happen.

In cities and villages at the front, the civilian population tried to seek safety, mostly on foot or with animal transports as fuel had run out during the blockade. Thousands of people flocked to the airport outside Stepanakert, controlled by Russia since November 2020. The Russian troops are said to have urged the fleeing population to leave, causing them to gather in terrible conditions in Stepanakert.

During the critical days before the escape began, the blockade to the west towards Armenia was still active, and Azerbaijani armed forces were approaching from the east.

It was not until Nagorno-Karabakh’s leadership, under Russian surveillance, signed an agreement to dissolve the army two days later, on September 23, that the blockade was lifted.

More than 100,000 Armenians fled the region within a week. Not to forget, already as many as 50,000 Armenians had already been displaced from the war in 2020.

Armenia’s relations with Russia expand in trade sphere

Russia’s role in the South Caucasus is undergoing a shift after the ethnic cleansing. The Russian relevance for the region can be seen through two different filters: one from a military perspective and the other from trade in the region.

The hasty withdrawal of most Russian troops from Nagorno-Karabakh, announced just weeks after the ethnic cleansing, shows how Russia is reducing its physical presence. In contrast to the diplomatic disputes between Armenia and Russia, trade continues to increase between the two countries.

Due to sanctions against Russia, Armenia has become an intermediary for high-tech equipment that Russia lacks. In 2022, Armenia imported 515 percent more circuit chips from the US and the EU than the previous year. Most of these were later exported to Russia. Additionally, trade from Armenia to Russia continues to increase rapidly, despite the political rhetoric.

Azerbaijan’s gas cooperation with Russia grows stronger

A similar trend has been noted from Azerbaijan to Russia, where trade, according to dubious Russian and Azerbaijani sources, is increasing more than in many years, although not as dramatically as in the Armenian case.

What is more interesting is trade from Russia to Europe. Just as the Caucasian states are used to circumvent sanctions against Russia, the detour is also allowed by Europe to circumvent its own sanctions.

The need for gas is so great that the EU overlooks Azerbaijan’s diluting its gas exports with shares of Russian gas and that Russia benefits from the gas trade with Azerbaijan.

In 2015, the same year the European Commission made the final decision to fund a new gas pipeline from Azerbaijan to Europe, Russian Lukoil invested in long-term contracts in Azerbaijan’s gas fields. Today, Lukoil owns 20 percent of Shah Deniz, the largest gas field.

Furthermore, Russia and Azerbaijan signed new short-term gas agreements in the fall of 2022. Formally, they were supposed to expire in the spring, but EU diplomats lack transparent answers about how much of the Azerbaijani gas is actually Russian, which the European Parliament has reacted to.

Russia’s role in the ethnic cleansing

In the end, it is difficult to see what Russia has gained geopolitically from the ethnic cleansing of Nagorno-Karabakh. What can be observed is that while the diplomatic relationship between Azerbaijan and Russia is in better shape today than two months ago, it is significantly worse between Armenia and Russia. However, Russia’s leverage has decreased with both countries.

Azerbaijan has proven to be a more reliable partner for Russia than Armenia, despite public opinion in Azerbaijan being against Russia. The peacekeeping forces that entered Nagorno-Karabakh from Armenia are now leaving the region through Azerbaijan. Appropriately, it symbolizes the shift in relations that has occurred in the last three years.

In practice, it can be argued that if Russia had fulfilled the ceasefire agreement from November 2020, the ethnic cleansing would not have taken place in September. Even though Vladimir Putin tries to blame the Armenian leadership for the humanitarian catastrophe, it was, in fact, the Russian troops that were both present in Nagorno-Karabakh and responsible for safety — not Armenian.

The decision to let the Russian troops passively watch as Azerbaijan, an authoritarian state, displaced over a hundred thousand people in flight was made by no one else but Moscow.

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AUSTRALIA
More than 100 arrested as climate protest shuts down world’s largest coal port


Over 3,000 protesters assemble at Newcastle to demonstrate against ‘government inaction’ ahead of COP28

Maroosha Muzaffar


People take to the water as they continue blockade the access to the coal port in protest for climate action at Horseshoe Beach on 26 November 2023 in Newcastle, Australia
(Getty Images)


More than 100 people were arrested as climate protesters refused to leave after a 30-hour blockade of one of the world’s largest coal ports in Australia.

Over 3,000 protesters assembled at the Port of Newcastle on Sunday to demonstrate against the government’s alleged inaction on climate change ahead of the COP28 summit.

The protesters had permission to hold the climate rally for 30 hours, but thousands of climate demonstrators refused to leave the port after the permitted time was up.

At about 4pm local time on Sunday, police swooped in and arrested 109 people, including 49 men and 60 women. Five of them were under 18 years of age, according to Australia’s Nine News. The minors were later released.

Of those arrested, 18 were taken to Newcastle, Waratah, and Toronto police stations and 86 people were taken to a nearby port facility.

Hundreds of activists took to the waters, either swimming or using kayaks, to stage a demonstration in the shipping lane of the Newcastle port in Australia in one of the country’s biggest climate protests.

Organisers Rising Tide Australia claimed that the protest halted the export of more than half a million tonnes of coal from the country.

The organisers also stated that after initially continuing to kayak in formation in the channel, the demonstrators eventually complied with law enforcement and boarded police boats.

Rising Tide called on prime minister Anthony Albanese to block new coal projects and tax coal exports at 75 per cent in an attempt to move away from fossil fuels.

“I am doing this for my grandchildren and future generations,” Alan Stuart, 97, said in a statement before his arrest. Mr Stuart, who is also a reverend at the Uniting Church, said: “I am so sorry that they will have to suffer the consequences of our inaction. So, I think it is my duty to do what I can and to stand up for what I know is right.”

His 20-year-old granddaughter and Rising Tide organiser Alexa Stuart said: “I just think of the young people growing up that I knew.

“What sort of world are they going to be in? It’s going to be a much less, what should I say, attractive, than I, than we know.

“People are going to be, they’re going to find it difficult to cope in many, many, many situations and I think the final result in all of this is death.”

The protest was labelled the “biggest act of civil disobedience in Australia’s history” by organisers who aim to send a serious message to the government over its inaction.

Adam Bandt, the leader of the Greens, participated in kayaking along with Cate Faehrmann, a Greens MP from New South Wales.

“I’ve lived in Newcastle my whole life and at first I never thought much about the coal ships I was used to seeing every day on the horizon,” Alex Goodsir, a 17-year-old local from Newcastle told the Guardian. “As a member of this community, I need to be lending my voice to the movement to stop this.”

Mr Albanese last year said Labor would not support a moratorium on fossil fuel projects because it would have a “devastating impact on the Australian economy”.

“If Australia today said we are not going to export any more coal, what you’d see is a lot of jobs lost, you would see a significant loss to our economy, significantly less taxation, revenue for education, health and other services, and that coal wouldn’t lead to a reduction in global emissions, what you would see is a replacement with coal from other countries that’s likely to produce higher emissions … because of the quality of the product,” he had said.

In April, several people associated with Rising Tide were arrested after they climbed aboard a train for the Port of Newcastle, where they proceeded to remove coal from its freight cars.

“This is not the end, this is just a stepping stone. Next year we plan on blockading the coal port for at least twice as long,” Zack Schofield, who helped organise the event said.
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Madagascar's record-breaking heatwaves caused by humans, study finds

For the first time, scientists have conducted a study linking human-induced climate change to prolonged heat waves in sub-Saharan Africa. They studied the exceptionally high temperature recorded in Madagascar in October.

RFI
Issued on: 24/11/2023 - 
Men dig for water in the dry Mandrare river bed, in southern Madagascar, following three straight years of drought, 9 November 2020. 
© AP/Laetitia Bezain

By: Zeenat Hansrod


“I was born here in Antsirabe and it’s the first time I am experiencing such abnormally sweltering heat,” 33-year old Tsiry told RFI.

“The temperature is around 30°C and this has never happened before, even if it is summer in this part of the world.”

The town of Antsirabe is located at an altitude of about 1,500 metres, in the central highlands of Madagascar island. It is known for its cool climate in summer, as opposed to the other cities closer to the coast. It’s also the coldest town in the country.

November is when the rainy season should have hit the Indian Ocean island but there has not been a drop for the past week, added Tsiry.

The scale of the heatwave that hit Madagascar in October is the worst the island has seen since 1950.

It is a consequence of climate change caused by human activity, according to a scientific study published, on 23 November, by the World Weather Attribution (WWA), a global network of scientists that analyses extreme weather events in real-time.


The study, conducted by 19 scientists from Madagascar, South Africa, Denmark, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, said "climate change caused by human activity has raised temperatures by 1 to 2 degrees".

But "a rise of even half a degree can push thousands of people to their physiological limits" and cause deaths, points out Sanyati Sengupta, technical adviser at the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre.

“I have the feeling that the sun is pounding on my head,” Tsiry confided from Antsirabe.

Heat peaks are very rarely recorded in Africa, which makes it difficult to accurately study their impact in Madagascar, adds the WWA.Despite climate stress, Africa is in 'unique' position to fight global warming

The 19 scientists collaborated to assess to what extent human-induced climate change altered the likelihood and intensity of hot Octobers in Madagascar.

A high degree of informal settlements and unplanned urbanisation have resulted in large parts of the population becoming particularly vulnerable to heat exposure.

“Most of our houses have roofs made of corrugated metal sheets. It is a nightmare inside,” said Tsiry.

In Madagascar, less than half of the population has access to electricity and clean water, making common coping strategies in extreme heat inaccessible to a large part of the population.
Workers resting in the streets of Antsirabe, a hub for Madagascar's agriculture and industry (illustration)
 © Pauline Le Troquier / RFI

Brickmaker myth

Elevated temperatures in Madagascar have lead to a decline in labor productivity.

“I am lucky to work in a relatively large office where air circulates but I cannot begin to imagine how people in small spaces are coping,” Tsiry said.

According to the report, Madagascar is ill-equipped to face heat waves, “there are no heat action plans, early actions protocols, or comprehensive early warning systems”.

The scientists recommend investments in extreme heat forecasting, warning, and response capabilities. “They are the most urgent requirements for Madagascar to better adapt to a warming world.”Melting African glaciers an early casualty of global warming, say experts

Tsiry added that there is common belief in Antsirabe that the artisanal mud brickmakers are responsible for the lack of rain.

“Some people blame the brickmakers when there is no rain. They stack piles and piles mud bricks to dry out in the sun. So, the rain is no good to them.”

Brick kilns burn for days, adding to the pollution.

“Unless the world rapidly stops burning fossil fuels, these events [exceptionally high and low temperatures] will become more common in the future,” the scientists warn.
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Andry Rajoelina re-elected Madagascar president: poll body

Madagascar President Andry Rajoelina has won re-election in the first round of a ballot boycotted by nearly all opposition candidates, the electoral commission announced on Saturday.


RFI
Issued on: 25/11/2023 -
Madagascar's President and presidential candidate Andry Rajoelina cast his ballot at a polling station in Ambatobe, Antananarivo, Madagascar, on 16 November 2023. 

Andry Rajoelina, 49, won 58.95 percent of the vote in the first round of balloting on 16 November, it said.

Such a margin of victory would eliminate the need for a runoff election and give him a third term as leader of the Indian Ocean island of 28 million.


The turnout was fairly low after 10 of 12 opposition candidates called for a boycott complaining of an "institutional coup" in favour of the incumbent.

Rajoelina, a former DJ and mayor of the capital, Antananarivo, was president of a post-coup provisional government in 2009-2014.


He was elected president in 2019 and gained a degree of notoriety during the coronavirus pandemic by promoting a herbal drink as a cure for COVID-19.

The lead up to the 16 November election was marked by protests against Rajoelina led by opposition candidates.Madagascar goes to polls with opposition calling for boycott

Security forces fired tear gas grenades at demonstrators, and two opposition candidates sustained minor injuries.

Some polling stations were torched ahead of the election, which was delayed for a week because of the trouble.

'Worrying anomalies'

"What results? What election?" was the joint opposition response to a request for comment on Rajeolina's victory.

"We will not recognise the results of this illegitimate election, riddled with irregularities, and we decline all responsibility for the political and social instability that could ensue", the opponents warned.

One of the two opponents who formally remained in the race, Siteny Randrianasoloniaiko, also denounced "worrying anomalies" which he said "raise legitimate questions about the validity of the results".
The opposition has not yet indicated if it will formally contest the result and has not called for more street demonstrations.

In the weeks leading up to the vote, the opposition -- including two former presidents -- led near-daily, largely unauthorised protests that were regularly dispersed by police using tear gas.

Madagascar has been in turmoil since media reports in June revealed Rajoelina had acquired French nationality in 2014.

Under local law, the president should have lost his Madagascan nationality, and with it, the ability to lead the country, his opponents said.

Opposition candidates complained of an "institutional coup" in favour of the incumbent, accusing government of working to reappoint Rajoelina.

They called for the electoral process to be suspended and for the international community to intervene.

Eight countries and organisations including the European Union and the United States expressed concern about the "disproportionate use of force" to disperse opposition demonstrations.

The results still have to be validated by the High Constitutional Court, the country's highest court, within nine days, during which appeals in the event of a challenge can be lodged.

(with newswires)

Rajoelina, a former DJ

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Albert Londres, unflinching reporter who inspired France's top journalism prize

This year’s Prix Albert Londres, France’s equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize, will be awarded on 27 November. It bears the name of a legendary French journalist who travelled the world reporting – and both fascinated and appalled readers with what he described.

RFI
Issued on: 26/11/2023
The Prix Albert Londres award for journalism, pictured in Paris on 29 October 2019. © AFP / DOMINIQUE FAGET

By: Jessica Phelan

“We stopped counting the blows. They were falling relentlessly. We left the porch and went across the street, a hundred metres away.

“We looked up at the cathedral. Ten minutes later, we saw the first stone fall. It was 19 September 1914, at 7.25 in the morning.”

In fact, by the time the French public was reading those lines, it was two days later.

The great cathedral of Reims was in ruins, and Albert Londres had his first big splash in morning paper Le Matin.

It was a time when newspapers were still the primary form of mass media, and a dispatch was still worth reading even days after the event.

Londres’ first-person account of the bombing of Reims cathedral by German troops early into World War I would establish him as one of France’s most compelling correspondents.

It launched a career that took him across four continents, brought distant lands and unknown people onto French front pages, changed public policy, and set a new standard for deeply reported, deeply felt journalism that continues to inspire today.

His writing prioritised “the human side of stories”, says Claire Meynial, a correspondent for French magazine Le Point who was drawn to journalism thanks thanks in part to reading Londres as a teenager.

The profession looks very different today, she says. “But I still think there is value in descriptions and humanising stories – I still believe in this.”

From poetry to papers

Londres was six weeks shy of his 30th birthday when he wrote the story about Reims. Born in November 1884 to a middle-class family in Vichy, after high school he moved to the closest big city, Lyon, and started off as an accountant.

But his leanings were more literary and after a couple of years he left for Paris, where he began publishing poetry.

Around the same time, he had a daughter. Her mother died less than a year later.

Perhaps by vocation, perhaps to pay the bills, he began picking up work for as a Paris correspondent for papers in Lyon, before becoming Le Matin’s parliamentary reporter.

Eight years later, a war broke out unlike any before it, and gave Londres his first taste of the field.
Observing the world

It was the right place for him. From Reims he travelled to frontlines throughout Europe, sending back dispatches from Belgium, Serbia, Greece, Turkey, Albania.

Readers were quickly drawn to his immediate, illustrative style: packed with anecdotes and observations, crafted without sounding pompous.

His editors didn’t always agree. One of his bosses at Le Matin told him his articles had introduced “the germ of literature”; it wasn’t a compliment. The paper soon sacked him.
Albert Londres circa 1923. © Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

Londres found work elsewhere throughout World War I and after it, roving southern Europe and the Middle East.

He became one of the few outside journalists to report from the newly formed Soviet Union, sketching the gulf between Bolshevik ideals and realities in columns that were quoted by The New York Times.

He travelled to Japan and described the disorientating experience of finding himself a clumsy stranger there. From India, he observed the swelling movement for independence, and in China he met warlords, pirates, traffickers and spies.

But he wasn’t interested in simply painting exotic portraits for his readers back in France.

“I’m going to go and observe, write about everything I see,” Londres would write to his daughter. “There are too many misfortunes in this vast world for us to be content with sitting still.”

Devil’s Island

In 1923 he found a profusion of them on Devil’s Island, a penal colony in French Guiana, on the northern coast of South America.

Conditions in the bagne, as the remote prison was known, shocked even worldly Londres. His indignation blazes through his lengthy reportage, which was published first in a Parisian paper and quickly turned into a book.

“More than 9,000 Frenchmen have washed up on these shores and fallen into the circle of hell. A thousand knew how to crawl and settled on the banks, where it is less hot; the others swarm like beasts at the bottom, with one word left on their lips: misfortune; a single idea: freedom.”

It ends with an open letter to France’s minister of the colonies, calling for urgent reforms.

“I have finished. Now it is the government’s turn to start,” Londres wrote. The colonial minister promptly formed a commission and temporarily halted convicts being shipped to French Guiana.

Londres had gone from reporting the news to making it happen.
A voice for the voiceless

He wrote a flurry of exposés in the years that followed: on other penal colonies in French Algeria, on abusive psychiatric asylums, on trafficked sex workers in Argentina, on an escapee from Devil’s Island who he tracked down in Brazil and helped return to France a pardoned man.

Albert Londres on his investigation into sex trafficking in Argentina, 1927


“I wanted to go down into the pits, where society dumps what threatens it or what it cannot nurture. To look at what no one wants to look at any longer. I thought it would be laudable to give a voice to those who no longer had the right to speak. Did I manage to make them heard?”

In 1928 he spent four months travelling from Senegal to the Congo, where he uncovered grievous and often fatal abuses of African labourers forced to build the Congo-Ocean railway for French colonisers.

The resulting book, Terre d’ébène (“Land of Ebony”), is a haunting work, says Meynial, who has herself reported extensively from West Africa.

“It really stuck with me,” she tells RFI. “When you ride that train, you can see how difficult the terrain is – the trees, the forest, the mud everywhere. And he describes how ‘slaves’ [as Londres referred to them] were working with their bare hands, being beaten by the white colonial bosses.

“And I remember thinking how much time you needed to report correctly on this. Albert Londres’ whole work reflects a bygone era, when it was OK to take time to do good journalism.”
Out of time

Months-long reporting trips – Londres would sometimes go weeks without filing, simply getting a feel for his subject – seem like a dream today.

But even he felt rushed. “Up to the age of 45, I wrote fast, too fast; you had to, that was the job,” he wrote in the early 1930s. “From now on, I want to write like an author: am I up to it?”
Undated portrait of Albert Londres in middle age. © AFP

He would never find out. In 1932 he set out to report on China, where imperial Japanese troops had just invaded Manchuria.

He sent back a few dispatches, but informed his editors he was working on a longer investigation. It promised to be “dynamite”, he’s said to have told them.

On 16 May that year, he was sailing back to France when an electrical fault on the liner caused a catastrophic fire. Londres was one of 49 people killed.

People have speculated ever since about the subject of his final story. When two friends with whom he’d discussed his investigation, who managed to escape the burning ship, died in a plane crash a few days later, it only stoked the conspiracy theories.

No record remains. Instead Londres left a different legacy: a prize in his name, awarded each year to a French journalist under 40.

His daughter, Florise, created it months after his death and the first one was announced in 1933. This year will be the 90th time it has been awarded.
Empathy

Meynial won it in 2016 for her reporting on West Africa. The jury told her they appreciated her empathy with the people she interviewed, something she says she took from Londres’ work.

Claire Meynial (right) accepting the Prix Albert Londres on 27 May 2016, alongside fellow winners Sophie Nivelle-Cardinale and Etienne Huver. © AFP / LEON NEAL

“Nothing can ever replace travelling somewhere and talking to people and understanding whether they’re hungry, disappointed, sad, angry,” she says.

“And that’s probably the way I feel close to him: just listening to people, trying to put yourself in their shoes.”

Listen to more on this story on the Spotlight on France podcast, episode 103.

Listen to Claire Meynial on the Spotlight on France podcast:

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PARIS 2024 OLYMPICS

Tahiti village, surfers oppose plans for tower to judge Olympic surf event

Residents and surfers of one of the world's most famous surfing waves, Teahupo’o, in Tahiti, which will host the 2024 Olympic surfing competition, remain opposed to plans to build a judging tower, even after organisers scaled back plans. Opponents say construction will damage coral and put the health of the lagoon at risk.

RFI
Issued on: 27/11/2023 - 
France's Vahine Fierro surfs the Teahupo'o wave in French Polynesia during the World Surfing League's Championship Tour on 19 August 2022. 
© Jerome Brouillet/AFP

Residents, surfers and local environmental groups have been protesting against plans by the Paris 2024 Olympic Games organisers to build a giant aluminium tower in the water for up to 40 people to watch, film and judge the surfing competition in the French overseas territory.

Teahupo’o has long hosted some of the best events of the professional World Surf League's championship tour, with judges on a modest wooden tower on the reef that is dismantled every year.

Last week the president of French Polynesia, Moetai Brotherson, said the surfing events could be moved to Taharuu, on Tahiti's West coast, but organisers said they would keep the event in Teahupo’o, and instead build a "less imposing" tower that would minimise the impact on the environment.

But opponents say the proposal does not adequately address their concerns, as the new tower will need new foundations.

True value of surfing

"For me, it seems impossible to build 12 new foundations without destroying the reef," famed local surfer Matahi Drollet said in a video on social media, asking organisers for evidence existing foundations were not up to code.Tahiti given green light to host 2024 Olympic surfing events

"We are just trying to spread the message that no contest in this world is worth the destruction of nature," Drollet said. "That goes against the true value of surfing and sport in general."

Organisers also said they would work with local experts to reduce the risk to sea life, and even move some corals for their protection during construction.

(with Reuters)
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French Labour Minister on trial for favouritism

French Labour Minister Olivier Dussopt becomes the second sitting minister to go on trial on Monday at the Paris criminal court. He is accused of favouritism when awarding a public contract when he was the mayor of a small town in 2009.

RFI
Issued on: 27/11/2023 
French Labor Minister Olivier Dussopt. © Thibault Camus/AP

Dussopt is accused of having passed on privileged information to the Saur water company bidding for a €5.6 million contract in 2009, when he was mayor of Annonay, in the Ardeche, in southeast of France.

He also allegedly modified the evaluation criteria to favour the company, which had been managing the town's water since 1994, but whose proposal was more expensive than other companies.

Dussopt has denied any wrongdoing, and is going to court “to prove I acted in good faith", he told France 3 public television earlier this month in a rare declaration about the trial, which he has tried to avoid addressing publicly.

The financial crimes prosecutor opened an investigation in 2020, after the investigative website Mediapart looked into links between Dussopt and a local manager of the Saur company during a renegotiation of the contract in 2017.

Appointed labor minister in 2022, Dussopt presented and defended the controversial pension reform that sparked nationwide protests earlier this year.

He and the Saur group’s former director general, Olivier Brousse, will be on trial through Thursday. If convicted, each faces up to two years in prison and a €30,000 fine.

The trial comes as a special court is due to rule on whether Justice Minister Eric Dupont-Moretti used his position to settle personal scores.

His trial before the Court of Justice of the Republic, which tries wrongdoing by members of the government, ended on 17 November.

Dussopt is not facing that court because the alleged favouritism occurred when he was mayor, and not a government minister.

(with newswires)
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Full potential of India-US civil nuclear deal remains untapped: Expert

'While New Delhi is yet to remove obstacles that prevent its purchase of nuclear reactors from the United States, Washington has not been able to match the policy with vision'

PTI 
Washington 
Published 27.11.23


Representational image.

More than 18 years after India and the US signed a civil nuclear deal, its full potential and promise along with the larger bilateral partnership is yet to be realised, according to a top American expert.

While New Delhi is yet to remove obstacles that prevent its purchase of nuclear reactors from the United States, Washington has not been able to match the policy with vision, Ashley J Tellis, the Tata Chair for Strategic Affairs and a senior fellow at the prestigious Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said.

US President Joe Biden's ambition to finally fructify the 2005 civil nuclear agreement cannot end with the sale of US nuclear reactors to India. Rather, it must extend to revising long-standing US policies that continue to make the existence of India's nuclear weapons programme an insuperable obstacle to deepened technological cooperation, he asserted in an opinion piece published by Carnegie Endowment for International Peace on Monday.


"Where India is concerned, New Delhi is long overdue in removing the obstacles that prevent its purchase of nuclear reactors from the United States, consistent with the written commitments it made during the implementation of the nuclear deal. Where the United States is concerned, a different challenge persists that is no less urgent: matching policy with vision," he added.

Tellis noted that after Biden's visit to India in September, the joint statement declared that the two leaders "welcomed intensified consultations between the relevant entities on both sides to expand opportunities for facilitating India-US collaboration in nuclear energy, including in development of next-generation small modular reactor technologies in a collaborative mode".

Realising this promise, however, will require solutions that have eluded the two sides thus far, said the Indian-American expert.

Westinghouse, the supplier of high-output nuclear power plants, remains skittish about sales to India with the absence of a durable assurance of limited liability in the event of an accident.

At least one other American company, Holtec International, which supplies small modular reactors (SMRs), already operates a components factory in India and is eager to explore SMR sales in the country and across West Asia but these discussions are still in the early stages.

Given the Biden administration's interest in consummating the civil nuclear agreement, as well as India's interest in expanding foreign participation in its nuclear energy programme, it is past time for the Modi government to rectify the nuclear liability problems that it has inherited ironically due to the obstructiveness of Modi's own party, albeit long before he led it, Tellis wrote.

The cleanest solution to the current predicament would be to amend India's Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Act (CLNDA) to bring it in line with the Convention on Supplementary Compensation for Nuclear Damage (CSC) by channelling all liability in case of a nuclear accident solely to the operator of a nuclear plant, with the operator in turn protecting its interests by relying on an insurance pool for financial safety. India has already moved to create such an insurance pool pursuant to the CLNDA but it has not been fully funded yet, he wrote.

According to Tellis, even as India looks for ways to realise the commercial promise of the civil nuclear agreement -- an objective that the Biden administration must be congratulated for making its own -- the administration still has another bigger and more consequential task arising out of this accord: addressing the issue of India's nuclear weapons programme in the US grand strategy.

Tellis said the inherited nonproliferation rules and how they are implemented not only prevent India from enjoying the full benefits of the agreement but even more importantly, subvert the overarching objective that drove its negotiation -- assisting India's ascendancy to create the Asian multipolarity that balances China's rise.

"On this count, both the administration and the US Congress are of one mind. Consequently, it is now time for the executive branch to bring its application of the nonproliferation rules in accord with its core strategic goal of building Indian capabilities to effectively resist expanding Chinese power," he asserted.

Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by The Telegraph Online staff and has been published from a syndicated feed.

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How the US made Israel the military it is today

Washington has provided over $130 Billion in unrestricted aid and weapons to Tel Aviv, more than any other country, ever.



THALIF DEEN
NOV 27, 2023

As one of America’s closest allies, Israel has remained heavily dependent on the US —politically, economically, and militarily—since its creation in 1948.

US arms supplies, mostly provided gratis, are channeled via US Foreign Military Financing (FMF), Military Assistance Program (MAP) and Excess Defense Articles (EDA).

According to the Congressional Research Service (CRS), the US has provided more foreign assistance to Israel since World War II than to any other country.

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) documented that the United States supplied 79 percent of all weapons transferred to Israel from 2018-2022.

No one else was even close – the next closest suppliers were Germany with 20 percent and Italy with just 0.2 percent.

A Fact Sheet released October 2023, by the US State Department’s Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, provides a detailed official breakdown on the unrestrained American security assistance to Israel.

Steadfast support for Israel’s security has been a cornerstone of American foreign policy for every U.S. Administration since the presidency of Harry S. Truman.

Since Israel’s founding in 1948, the State Department said, the United States has provided Israel with over $130 billion in bilateral assistance focused on addressing new and complex security threats, bridging Israel’s capability gaps through security assistance and cooperation, increasing interoperability through joint exercises, and helping Israel maintain its Qualitative Military Edge (QME).

This assistance, says the State Department, has helped transform the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) into “one of the world’s most capable, effective militaries and turned the Israeli military industry and technology sector into one of the largest exporters of military capabilities worldwide.”

In the current war, Israel’s overwhelming fire power has resulted in the killings of thousands of Palestinian civilians in Gaza and the destruction of entire cities—mostly with US supplied weapons.

Dr. Natalie J. Goldring, a Visiting Professor of the Practice in the Sanford School of Public Policy at Duke University, told IPS the October 7 Hamas attacks were horrendous acts and should be condemned as such.

“Even so, the Israeli responses to those attacks have been indiscriminate – intentionally so,” she said.

Two days after the Hamas attacks, Israeli defense minister Yoav Gallant declared that Israel would carry out a “complete siege” of Gaza, including blocking the supply of water, food, and fuel, while also stopping the supply of electricity. And Israeli forces have done so, she pointed out.

“The US government bears a special responsibility for the continuing Israeli attacks. It has supplied Israel with massive quantities of military aid and weaponry, and Israel has ignored US restrictions on the use of those weapons”.

This supply of weapons and ammunition allows the Israeli military to continue its indiscriminate attacks in Gaza,” said Dr Goldring, who also represents the Acronym Institute at the United Nations, on conventional weapons and arms trade issues.

“A key first step in reducing the human cost of this war is for the US government to call for an immediate ceasefire. The US government should also halt supplies of weapons and ammunition to Israel, whether from the US itself or from prepositioned stocks elsewhere.”

Since 1983, the United States and Israel have met regularly via the Joint Political-Military Group (JPMG) to promote shared policies, address common threats and concerns, and identify new areas for security cooperation.

According to the State Department, Israel is the leading global recipient of Title 22 U.S. security assistance under the Foreign Military Financing (FMF) program. This has been formalized by a 10-year (2019-2028) Memorandum of Understanding (MOU).

Consistent with the MOU, the United States annually provides $3.3 billion in FMF and $500 million for cooperative programs for missile defense. Since FY 2009, the United States has provided Israel with $3.4 billion in funding for missile defense, including $1.3 billion for Iron Dome support starting in FY 2011.

Through FMF, the United States provides Israel with access to some of the most advanced military equipment in the world, including the F-35 Stealth fighter aircraft.

Israel is eligible for Cash Flow Financing and is authorized to use its annual FMF allocation to procure defense articles, services, and training through the Foreign Military Sales (FMS) system, Direct Commercial Contract agreements – which are FMF-funded Direct Commercial Sales procurements – and through Off Shore Procurement (OSP).

Via OSP the current MOU allows Israel to spend a portion of its FMF on Israeli-origin rather than U.S.-origin defense articles. This was 25 percent in FY 2019 but is set to phase-out and decrease to zero in FY 2028.

Elaborating further Dr Goldring said: “Unfortunately, the situation in Gaza bears similarities to the documented uses of US weapons by the Saudi-led coalition in attacks on civilians in Yemen”

She said: “Our response should be the same in both cases. These countries have failed to honor the conditions of US weapons transfers, and should be ineligible for further transfers until they are in compliance.”

“US arms transfer decision-making gives too much weight to the judgment of government officials and politicians who frequently fail to consider the full human costs of these transfers,” she argued.

“Earlier this year, the Biden Administration released a new Conventional Arms Transfer policy. They claimed that arms transfers would not be approved when their analysis concluded that “it is more likely than not” that the arms transferred would be used to commit or facilitate the commission of serious violations of international humanitarian or human rights law.”

The actions of the Israeli and Saudi militaries are examples of ways in which this standard is not being met, declared Dr Goldring.

As of October 2023, the United States has 599 active Foreign Military Sales (FMS) cases, valued at $23.8 billion, with Israel. FMS cases notified to Congress are listed here; priority initiatives include: F-35 Joint Strike Fighter Aircraft; CH-53K Heavy Lift Helicopters; KC-46A Aerial Refueling Tankers; and precision-guided munitions.

From FY 2018 through FY 2022, the U.S. has also authorized the permanent export of over $5.7billion in defense articles to Israel via the Direct Commercial Sales (DCS) process.

The top categories of DCS to Israel were XIX-Toxicological Agents, including Chemical Agents, Biological Agents, and Associated Equipment (this includes detection equipment ((f)), vaccines ((g)-(h)) and modeling software ((i)); IV- Launch Vehicles, Guided Missiles, Ballistic Missiles, Rockets, Torpedoes, Bombs, and Mines; and VII- Aircraft.

Since 1992, the United States has provided Israel with $6.6 billion worth of equipment under the Excess Defense Articles program, including weapons, spare parts, weapons, and simulators.

U.S. European Command also maintains in Israel the U.S. War Reserve Stockpile, which can be used to boost Israeli defenses in the case of a significant military emergency.

In addition to security assistance and arms sales, the United States participates in a variety of exchanges with Israel, including military exercises like Juniper Oak and Juniper Falcon, as well as joint research, and weapons development.

The United States and Israel have signed multiple bilateral defense cooperation agreements, to include: a Mutual Defense Assistance Agreement (1952); a General Security of Information Agreement (1982); a Mutual Logistics Support Agreement (1991); and a Status of Forces Agreement (1994), according to the State Department.

Since 2011, the United States has also invested more than $8 million in Conventional Weapons Destruction programs in the West Bank to improve regional and human security through the survey and clearance of undisputed minefields.

Following years of negotiations with the Palestinians and Israelis, humanitarian mine action activities began in April 2014 – this represents the first humanitarian clearance of landmine contamination in nearly five decades.

Israel has also been designated as a U.S. Major Non-NATO Ally under U.S. law. This status provides foreign partners with certain benefits in the areas of defense trade and security cooperation and is a powerful symbol of their close relationship with the United States.

This piece has been republished with permission from Inter Press Service.

Thalif Deen

An Israeli Air Force F-35I Lightning II “Adir” approaches a U.S. Air Force 908th Expeditionary Refueling Squadron KC-10 Extender to refuel during “Enduring Lightning II” exercise over southern Israel Aug. 2, 2020. While forging a resolute partnership, the allies train to maintain a ready posture to deter against regional aggressors. (U.S. Air Force photo by Master Sgt. Patrick OReilly)
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Small ‘Hot’ Wars Will Define Cold War II

The US and Soviet Union never came to direct blows but fought for decades through proxies and interventions. Today Ukraine, Syria and Gaza are local conflicts with global implications.

Opinion
Hal Brands, Columnist
BLOOMBERG
November 26, 2023 

The conflict between Israel and Hamas is the most recent round in the long-running struggle between the Jewish state and its enemies. It is a fight to determine whether Iran’s “axis of resistance,” or a loose coalition led by the US, has the edge in a vital region. But this conflict also has a larger global salience: It is one of a series of hot wars at the center of the new cold war playing out around the world.

Cold wars are never as cold — never as peaceful — as their name implies. The US-Soviet struggle from 1947 to 1991 featured dozens of civil wars, proxy wars, and even serious conventional conflicts in places from the Korean Peninsula to Central America. These wars roiled entire regions; in a few cases, they threatened to engulf the globe. Today, a new cold war pits the US and its allies against an axis of Eurasian autocracies. That struggle, too, features some very violent clashes, of which the Israel-Hamas war is the latest, but surely not the last.

In prolonged global contests, these “small wars” can have outsized consequences. They reshape the geopolitical chessboard; they help determine which side will be best prepared if the larger cold war turns hot. They can be sources of strategic advantage, or strategic misery, for the great powers that get involved.

Such conflicts profoundly influenced the course and eventual conclusion of the US-Soviet Cold War. Prevailing in today’s cold war will require navigating the myriad hot wars the US and its friends are likely to encounter along the way.

Only in Europe was the original Cold War truly a “long peace.” Almost everywhere else, it was a cauldron of violence. Civil wars and insurgencies convulsed the Global South. Major conventional wars remade places such as Korea, Vietnam and the Middle East. Superpower involvement in these conflicts — with arms, money or military forces — was omnipresent, even though Moscow and Washington never quite came to blows. The US ultimately lost roughly 100,000 military personnel in the Cold War’s hot wars; all told, the conflicts of the era claimed 20 million lives.

The body counts were ghastly, but unsurprising. Nuclear stalemate fostered stability in superpower relations by giving both sides good reason to avoid all-out war. The division of Europe into coherent, clearly organized blocs meant that red lines in that theater were, eventually, well-understood.

But in a zero-sum contest for geopolitical and ideological mastery, the superpowers — especially the Soviets — simply looked elsewhere for advantage. And the instability that afflicted the developing regions, due primarily to de-colonization and the ideological radicalism of the post-1945 period, created a mass of kindling that Cold War frictions helped ignite.

Significant Hot Conflicts of Cold War I

The Soviet Union and US battled behind the scenes for four decades

Sometimes, Moscow played provocateur in regional conflicts, in hopes of expanding where US red lines were poorly drawn. Joseph Stalin approved North Korea’s invasion of South Korea in 1950, after US officials had left that country outside Washington’s defense perimeter. His successors sought to outflank strong Western positions in Europe and East Asia by supporting insurgents and revolutionaries from Cuba to Vietnam.

In many cases, however, the US ended up resisting, not least because it believed these brushfire wars were tests of strategic commitment. If Washington couldn’t check communist coercion or subversion on the global periphery, why would allies in Europe and East Asia entrust their security to the US?

Hot wars were thus the cut and thrust of the larger superpower competition. They offered opportunities to bleed the enemy, as the Soviet Union did by giving North Vietnam anti-aircraft missiles that devastated American planes and pilots. They were viewed, globally, as tests of capability as well as commitment: If Egypt and Syria defeated Israel in the October War of 1973, Richard Nixon worried, the outcome would be seen as a triumph of Soviet arms over American arms.

Small wars were also laboratories for ideas and weapons that might figure in larger wars. The lessons the Pentagon drew from the October War, about the lethality of modern air defenses and the potential of precision-guided munitions, led to investments in stealth technology, long-range strike weapons and other revolutionary capabilities that would transform the Cold War military balance in America’s favor.

From start to finish, in fact, peripheral conflicts shaped the superpower struggle. The Korean War helped forge the free world: Fears that the North Korean invasion presaged a larger communist assault led Washington to build or fortify a network of alliances around the globe. Two decades later, America’s costly defeat in Vietnam nearly ruptured the free world, while convincing Moscow and its allies that they had the global initiative. There followed communist interventions in Angola, the Horn of Africa, Central America and Afghanistan, which destroyed the superpower détente of the 1970s — and invited a decisive US counteroffensive.

During the 1980s, President Ronald Reagan’s administration punished an overextended Soviet Union by supporting anticommunist insurgents battling Kremlin troops or proxies. The most crucial theater was Afghanistan, where US-backed fighters battered and ultimately banished the Red Army. When Moscow withdrew from that country in 1989, it prefaced the larger geopolitical surrender that brought the Cold War to its end.

Of course, the superpowers weren’t always in control: The proxies they armed, financed and supported had agendas of their own. And if the Cold War’s small wars eventually broke the Soviet Union, they often threatened to escalate disastrously as well.

The Korean War nearly turned into a third world war after a US attempt to reunify the entire peninsula invited Communist China to intervene. The October War eventually produced threats of Soviet military intervention to save Syria and Egypt from defeat — and then a US nuclear alert to call the Kremlin’s bluff. In a tense, bipolar environment, a fire in some obscure location could cause a global conflagration.

In some ways, today’s world looks little like the Cold War. Complex interdependence binds the US and China in an awkward embrace. America’s rivals are not part of a single ideological movement like communism. There is no contemporary equivalent to de-colonization, which wrought such chaos because it gave birth to so many countries in so little time. But cold wars — long, high-stakes struggles in the murky area between war and peace — take many forms.

A cohort of Eurasian autocracies — China, Russia, Iran, North Korea — is cohering around shared opposition to the present international system. These countries have all long contested an American-supported status quo in their respective regions; they seek a future in which US power is blunted and democratic values are further weakened. Now, they are developing stronger connections — military, economic, technological, diplomatic — to one another.

A US-led community of democracies — along with some more-or-less friendly dictators — is facing off against a new revisionist coalition, while non- or multi-aligned states try to avoid committing either way. And as international tensions intensify, wars in sensitive places serve as tests of strength between the two sides.

President Joe Biden has said ongoing conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East are part of a larger struggle between democracies and enemies that want to “completely annihilate” them. Russian President Vladimir Putin, for his part, avows that Hamas terrorists battling Israel, and Russian soldiers pillaging Ukraine, are fighting the same American “root of evil,” and the outcomes “will decide the fate of Russia, and of the entire world.” Indeed, hot wars have been shaping this emerging cold war for some time.

Consider the Syrian civil war, the bloodiest and most consequential conflict of the 2010s. That clash was a proxy war in which a regime backed militarily by Russia and Iran, and diplomatically by China, bested a revolt supported by several Middle Eastern governments and, reportedly, the US. It remade the Middle East, mostly to America’s disadvantage.

Iran used the conflict to flood Syria with fighters, deepen its partnership with the Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah, and strengthen its position along Israel’s northern frontier.

Russia re-established itself as a Middle Eastern power by showing that it would intervene decisively on behalf of its friends. Moscow had broken the “chain of color revolutions” in places such as Georgia and Ukraine, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu declared: No longer could America and its friends topple governments they disliked.

The Syrian conflict overlapped with another geopolitically salient civil war, in Yemen. The collapse of that country’s government in 2014, and the growing reach of a Houthi movement with ties to Iran, triggered military intervention by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Washington was never enthusiastic about that endeavor — then-deputy crown prince Mohammed bin Salman’s “stupid f-ing ground war,” as one US official termed it ­—­ but for lack of better options, it supported its Gulf partners with weapons and intelligence.

This conflict, too, went badly for Washington: The Houthis still control a sizable swath of Yemen, along with Iranian-provided drones and missiles that they have used against their enemies — and Tehran’s. When a US warship shot down Houthi drones and missiles headed for Israel in October 2023, the incident showed how intertwined events in Yemen have become with the region’s larger contest for power. So did the Houthis’ seizure on Nov. 20 of a British-owned cargo ship they claimed has ties to Israel.

Or consider the war in Ukraine, which began in 2014 and escalated in 2022, when Putin sought to conquer the whole country. Had that attack succeeded, it would have endangered Eastern Europe and restored Russian supremacy in most of the former Soviet Union. It also would have trampled the post-1945 norm against territorial conquest and annexation, creating a precedent other revisionists might exploit. Putin’s war in Ukraine was no local matter: It was meant to upend the larger order, in Europe and globally, that the US anchors.

Yet the invasion failed, in part because Washington and its allies understood these stakes all too well. So they turned Ukraine into Afghanistan-on-steroids, giving Kyiv the money, weapons and intelligence it used to kill vast numbers of Russian troops. The goal, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin candidly explained, was to see Russia “weakened.” Meanwhile, the war was consolidating ties among both advanced democracies on one side and Eurasian autocracies on the other — a reminder of how hot wars can serve as the crucibles in which competing coalitions are forged.

The Israel-Hamas war is part of this pattern. It started 50 years nearly to the day after the October War, and its implications could be just as far-reaching.

Prior to this war, Iran had been trying to surround Israel with well-armed proxy forces. Washington had been trying to assemble a coalition, featuring Israel and Saudi Arabia, to balance Tehran and its allies — an effort Hamas sought to spoil by sparking a bloody war that would polarize the region along Arab-Israeli lines.

The international dimensions of the war have only become more pronounced since Oct. 7. The US has supported Israel with weapons, intelligence and military advice. It has also sought to deter intervention by Iran or Hezbollah, even sending two carrier strike groups to the Eastern Mediterranean, and thereby help Israel destroy Hamas one-on-one.

Yet Hamas’s partners aren’t simply standing by. Tehran has encouraged other proxies to launch violent strikes against US forces in the region. Hezbollah is engaged in a violent tit-for-tat with Israel in the north. Russia has hosted Hamas leaders and amplified the group’s propaganda. Both Moscow and, more subtly, Beijing, are trying to exploit international anger over Israeli tactics in Gaza to make Washington pay a diplomatic price with the Global South. They understand that a war in a tiny strip of territory has much larger significance.

There’s no guarantee that such conflicts will stay contained. In 2018, US forces slaughtered perhaps 200 Russian mercenaries who got too close to an American base in Syria. In Ukraine, there have also been close calls: At one point, a Russian pilot tried, and narrowly failed, to shoot down a British plane over the Black Sea. Iran and its allies are presently working very hard to kill US soldiers; in some cases, they haven’t missed by much. When small wars take on bigger consequences, the potential for escalation is very real.

If history is any guide, the Israel-Hamas is a portent: A volatile, divided world offers too many possibilities for repetition. America can prepare for the challenges such conflicts pose by keeping six lessons in mind.

First, hot wars set the tone for cold wars. They shape alignments in key regions; they reveal the larger military balance; they determine whether aggression will be rewarded or punished. So even localized wars can have a long afterlife. For example, Soviet leaders came away from the Korean War believing their support for a brazen land-grab had backfired, which was why Moscow was subsequently more reticent about trying something like that again.

Ukraine, then, is hardly a sideshow. That war’s outcome will affect how countries around the world assess the balance between the US and its enemies — and how Putin and Chinese leader Xi Jinping view the prospects for violent revisionism in the future.

Second, use small wars to prepare for — and deter — bigger ones. The lessons America learned from the October War informed concepts and capabilities that transformed the US-Soviet military balance a decade later. Right now, wars in the Middle East and Ukraine are teaching us about the uses of drones and artificial intelligence, the shifting balance between offense and defense, and the possibilities and limits of maneuver warfare in a world of ubiquitous surveillance. No two wars are exactly alike. But the more America mines today’s conflicts for insights, the better it will fare in tomorrow’s trials.

Third, look for opportunities to strengthen coalitions and weaken enemies. Acts of aggression, by rival great powers or their proxies, can deliver the shock that forces defenders of the status quo to lock arms. And when an adversary overextends itself, a shrewd competitor will look for opportunities to intensify the pain. Today, the vindication of Ukrainian sovereignty is surely a prize worth seeking. In a protracted competition with Moscow and its partners, inflicting catastrophic damage on Russia’s army, suppressing its economy and expanding and energizing the Western coalition are prizes greater still.

Supporting local allies relates to a fourth lesson, however, which is that proxies have minds and methods of their own. Intervention by proxy can be a cost-effective way of imposing costs on an enemy, or of simply managing a situation when direct intervention is too dangerous. But proxies find ways of making their patrons sweat. During the 1970s, it was Cuba that often forced the pace of Eastern Bloc intervention in Africa, with results that were ultimately disastrous for the Soviet Union itself. The US, for its part, supported right-wing rulers who battled communism with vicious brutality in Latin America and elsewhere. In a long, draining contest for supremacy, Washington will have good reasons to outsource interventions. But doing so heightens dependence on actors who may not fully share one’s morality — or one’s interests.

Fifth, keeping small wars contained — while exploiting the opportunities they present — requires artful escalation control. Any involvement in localized wars is fraught because it brings the risk of spreading regionally and beyond. On the other hand, restraint may not be the best guarantee of peace, if it persuades the adversary to keep pushing: Witness the limited impact the Pentagon’s occasional pinprick strikes have had recently in stemming Tehran’s bid for American blood. Shaping smaller wars involves successfully coercing one’s adversaries — which requires running risks and threatening serious consequences no less than it requires wise restraint.

That restraint is important, though, because a final lesson is, don’t overcommit. The US did best during the Cold War when it exploited a rival’s excesses. It did worst when its own interventions became all-consuming. Vietnam, where over 58,000 US military personnel were eventually killed, was the tragic exemplar: That conflict weakened free-world positions almost everywhere and ruptured the Cold War consensus it was meant to serve.

There is no mathematical formula for determining how much is too much. If there were, Washington would never get such decisions wrong. But no matter the stakes of a small war, there is always a point at which greater involvement can become destructive to the global ends Washington must keep in sight. In dealing with the hot wars in this new cold war, America’s foremost challenge will be knowing when to get involved — and just as important, when to stop.



By Hal Brands is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist and the Henry Kissinger Distinguished Professor at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies.
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