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Tom Barnett : Seven Reasons Why Obama’s Nuke-Free Utopia Won’t Work

mano — Fri, 22 May 2009 03:27:41 +0000

May 14, 2009, 12:58 PM

Seven Reasons Why Obama’s Nuke-Free Utopia Won’t Work

The president wants to rid the world of nuclear weapons. Sounds like he’s fighting the good fight, but Esquire.com’s global-strategy expert argues that it’s absolutely the wrong one — a fight that might open globalization’s door to World War III.

By Thomas P.M. Barnett

Last month in Prague, President Obama declared his country’s “moral responsibility to act” in transforming our planet into one free of nuclear weapons. He called for a global summit and a treaty to end nuke development, then signaled his seriousness back home by axing the Pentagon’s much-needed Reliable Replacement Warhead program. Speaking before tens of thousands of Czechs on the day North Korea tested a long-range missile, Obama may have sounded like Martin Luther King (“This goal will not be reached quickly — perhaps not in my lifetime”), but his concept of a nuclear-proof world is patently unattainable, potentially dangerous, and inherently wrong. “I’m not naïve,” the president said. “But we go forward with no illusions.” But he is, and he has.

George W. Bush had his “axis of evil,” while Obama seems to find nuclear weapons to represent a kind of natural evil unto themselves — no matter who possesses them. Now the twentysomethings in Prague may have cheered his invocations of “hope” and “change,” and others may bejumping on board, but I’ve discovered something in my years of global-strategy analysis, and it’s not the deadly fatalism Obama describes — it’s the modern realism he ignores: Nuclear weapons are the single best thing that has ever happened in mankind’s long history of war.

Globalization existed prior to World War One, but then nukes arrived with their own “crystal-ball effect,” previewing the suicidal destruction of modern war between great powers. And if globalization’s economic interdependence was a “great illusion” back then, it’s become a rock-solid strategic reality in recent decades — and our recent global financial contagion has only made that more indisputably clear. Meanwhile, the world’s great powers have come to understand that nuclear weapons are for having, not using. And that is why no nuclear power has ever directly gone to war against another.

If Obama simply wants to reengage Russia on further warhead reductions, fine. But it seems to me that his nuclear utopianism is not so much an extension of his youthful optimism as a vestige of the generational guilt promoted by Cold Warriors like Henry Kissinger — “wise men” who seek to end America’s hypocrisy in preaching non-proliferation while relying on nuclear weapons as strategic back-stop. This vision isn’t just a backwards one; it’s a dangerously destabilizing policy agenda that makes conventional great-power war conceivable once again. Here’s why Obama’s nuclear ideals put World War III back on the table:

1. The “increasing speed” of proliferation is a myth.

As far as a world filled with nuclear powers is concerned, we’re just reaching double digits (as in, ten!) with North Korea and Iran. Meanwhile, roughly three-dozen additional states have achieved nuclear power while eschewing weaponization.

Ah, but we are told that when “irrational” regimes reach for the Bomb, likeTehran’s mullahs or Pyongyang’s whacked-out Kims, we enter into a new, far more threatening era. And yet history remains clear on this subject: When nuclear monopolies are ended and existing rivalries are nuclearized, stability tends to break out — time and again.

So, yeah, let’s manage Iran’s ascension to the great-power club (and Israel’s temptation to wipe it off the map preemptively) and encourage Beijing to rid the world of Kim’s war-crime-worthy regime (lest South Korea and Japan go nuclear, too), but let’s not pretend that a nuclear-free world facilitates either evolution.

2. One nuke in a nuke-free world is more usable.

If nuclear weapons are suddenly in short supply by the destabilized great powers, any regime that rapidly fields them would become, overnight, the strategic equivalent of the one-eyed man in the land of the blind.

As much as some experts hype the dangers associated with Iran and North Korea, the fact that Israel possesses hundreds of nuclear warheads, while Pyongyang’s potential opponents own them in the thousands, keeps these threats reasonably deterred (Ahmadinejad being no more rhetorically aggressive than Mao was in his nuclear debut).

3. An America with fewer nukes breeds a new class of military powers.

By reducing “barriers to entry” to the marketplace called great-power war, I believe we would actually encourage the proliferation of nuclear weaponry. If Obama and his successors were to withdraw America’s virtually global nuclear umbrella, numerous middle powers would become highly incentivized to fill that security gap.

Of course, the dream would be to include all such states in a global rejection of nuclear weaponry, but that’s not likely if the system’s clear Leviathan (the United States) demotes itself to the status of a de-nuclearized great power. That scenario (Obama’s scenario) instantly elevates a slew of suddenly “near-peer” military powers in a manner that smaller states will likely find strategically unpalatable. As in, they could be blown into oblivion — strategic or literal — at any moment.

4. A new class of military powers breeds a new round of local wars.

The fallout from the collapse of our nuclear umbrella would be as frightening as it would be immediate: the resumption of great-power rivalries and proxy wars in regions once again subject to profound spheres of influence. That would further complicate the strategic landscape and undo so much of the Obama administration’s diplomatic success between now and then.

5. An America without nuclear retaliation doesn’t keep enemies scared.

It’s not that fear-mongering accomplishes much, really. But a superpower needs an outwardly fearless image beyond this one that Obama offered in Prague: “As long as these weapons exist, the United States will maintain a safe, secure and effective arsenal to deter any adversary, and guarantee that defense to our allies.”

Even if the capability remains, Obama’s words eliminate the existential threat of massive American retaliation to disabling strikes, be they directly mounted by nation-states or indirectly by their proxies. And without the threat of our “unhinged” or “angry” response, the U.S. arguably encourages further asymmetrical responses from likely opponents, cyberwarfare being preeminent among them.

6. Getting rid of old-school nukes won’t stop the rise of new-school biological weapons.

This century’s scientific advances in warfare will certainly be centered in biology — not in physics, which defined that great twentieth-century advance known as the atom bomb. These new advances will lead to weapons likely destined to the same fate as chemical weaponry: unusable in any deterrent sense because of their uncontrollability (once unleashed, who knows where they spread?).

So if the only players crazy enough to use warfare’s new scientific weaponry are nihilistic terror groups — groups that don’t care where the blowback hits because their aim is widespread instability and fear — undoing nuclear capabilities won’t diminish that danger whatsoever.

7. The threat of “loose nukes” is for Jack Bauer to worry about, not Barack Obama.

In his speech, Obama described a scenario in which a nuclear weapon falls into the hands of terrorists “the most immediate and extreme threat to global security.” But the historical record here is equally clear: Recognized nuclear powers do not share technology indiscriminately, while unrecognized ones (e.g., North Korea, Pakistan) are tempted to cash in.

Recognized nuclear states don’t just pass bombs to terrorists, because that would negate the primary reason for having them: keeping the state safe from any attacks by fellow nuclear powers (in Iran’s case, from the U.S. and Israel).

The Obama administration wants to separate itself from the Bush-Cheney legacy of rejecting nuclear arms control while, at the same time, obsessing over the dangers of nuclear terrorism. I understand this. But there are better ways to bridge those two dangers than seeking to turn back the clock on nuclear weapons, which — counter-intuitive as it may seem — have actually kept us free of great-power war for well over six decades and counting.

Don’t underestimate the power of America’s large nuclear arsenal; it constitutes a very big stick that allows our leadership to speak softly as the world’s sole military superpower. For a president of Obama’s temperament and ambition, this is a match made in heaven. Now all he has to do is appreciate it, because with enough on his plate to consume five or six terms, Obama needs to husband his political capital at home and his diplomatic capital abroad to focus more on pressing matters and immediate threats.

I mean, this man is attempting to unwind America’s two military quagmires while finessing Iran and North Korea. As Obama makes Afghanistan-Pakistan his war, he disappoints the Left. As he’s forced to engage Iran more equally, he angers the Right. And promising a “nuclear-free world” preemptively apologizes in both directions. Instead, America should remain committed to the strategic concepts of nuclear deterrence and continue our decades-long policy of being openly ambiguous about the conditions that will trigger our use of such weapons. Because if the threat is out there, America — and Obama — has to remain in control of it.

Esquire contributing editor Thomas P.M. Barnett is the author of Great Powers: America and the World After Bush.

George Friedman : Obama Enters the Great Game

mano — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 12:26:16 +0000

Obama Enters the Great Game

January 19, 2009

By George Friedman

U.S. President-elect Barack Obama will be sworn in on Tuesday as president of the United States. Candidate Obama said much about what he would do as president; now we will see what President Obama actually does. The most important issue Obama will face will be the economy, something he did not anticipate through most of his campaign. The first hundred days of his presidency thus will revolve around getting a stimulus package passed. But Obama also is now in the great game of global competition — and in that game, presidents rarely get to set the agenda.
The major challenge he faces is not Gaza; the Israeli-Palestinian dispute is not one any U.S. president intervenes in unless he wants to experience pain. As we have explained, that is an intractable conflict to which there is no real solution. Certainly, Obama will fight being drawn into mediating the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict during his first hundred days in office. He undoubtedly will send the obligatory Middle East envoy, who will spend time with all the parties, make suitable speeches and extract meaningless concessions from all sides. This envoy will establish some sort of process to which everyone will cynically commit, knowing it will go nowhere. Such a mission is not involvement — it is the alternative to involvement, and the reason presidents appoint Middle East envoys. Obama can avoid the Gaza crisis, and he will do so.

Obama’s Two Unavoidable Crises
The two crises that cannot be avoided are Afghanistan and Russia. First, the situation in Afghanistan is tenuous for a number of reasons, and it is not a crisis that Obama can avoid decisions on. Obama has said publicly that he will decrease his commitments in Iraq and increase them in Afghanistan. He thus will have more troops fighting in Afghanistan. The second crisis emerged from a decision by Russia to cut off natural gas to Ukraine, and the resulting decline in natural gas deliveries to Europe. This one obviously does not affect the United States directly, but even after flows are restored, it affects the Europeans greatly. Obama therefo re comes into office with three interlocking issues: Afghanistan, Russia and

Europe. In one sense, this is a single issue — and it is not one that will wait.

Obama clearly intends to follow Gen. David Petraeus’ lead in Afghanistan. The intention is to increase the number of troops in Afghanistan, thereby intensifying pressure on the Taliban and opening the door for negotiations with the militant group or one of its factions. Ultimately, this would see the inclusion of the Taliban or Taliban elements in a coalition government. Petraeus pursued this strategy in Iraq with Sunni insurgents, and it is the likely strategy in Afghanistan.

But the situation in Afghanistan has been complicated by the situation in Pakistan. Roughly three-quarters of U.S. and NATO supplies bound for Afghanistan are delivered to the Pakistani port of Karachi and trucked over the border to Afghanistan. Most fuel used by Western forces in Afghanistan is refined in Pakistan and delivered via the same route. There are two crossing points, one near Afghanistan’s Kandahar province at Chaman, Pakistan, and the other through the Khyber Pass. The Taliban have attacked Western supply depots and convoys, and Pakistan itself closed the routes for several days, citing government operations a gainst radical Islamist forces.
Meanwhile, the situation in Pakistan has been complicated by tensions with India. The Indians have said that the individuals who carried out the Nov.

26 Mumbai attack were Pakistanis supported by elements in the Pakistani government. After Mumbai, India made demands of the Pakistanis. While the situation appears to have calmed, the future of Indo-Pakistani relations remains far from clear; anything from a change of policy in New Delhi to new terrorist attacks could see the situation escalate. The Pakistanis have made it clear that a heightened threat from India requires them to shift troops away from the Afghan border and toward the east; a small number of troops already has been shifted.

Apart from the direct impact this kind of Pakistani troop withdrawal would have on cross-border operations by the Taliban, such a move also would dramatically increase the vulnerability of NATO supply lines through Pakistan. Some supplies could be shipped in by aircraft, but the vast bulk of supplies — petroleum, ammunition, etc. — must come in via surface transit, either by truck, rail or ship. Western operations in Afghanistan simply cannot be supplied from the air alone. A cutoff of the supply lines across Pakistan would thus leave U.S. troops in Afghanistan in crisis. Because Washington can’t predict or control the future actions of Pakistan, of India or of terrorists, the United States must find an alternative to the routes through Pakistan.

When we look at a map, the two routes through Pakistan from Karachi are clearly the most logical to use. If those were closed — or even meaningfully degraded — the only other viable routes would be through the former Soviet Union.

One route, along which a light load of fuel is currently transported, crosses the Caspian Sea. Fuel refined in Armenia is ferried across the Caspian to Turkmenistan (where a small amount of fuel is also refined), then shipped across Turkmenistan directly to Afghanistan and through a small spit of land in Uzbekistan. This route could be expanded to reach either the Black Sea through Georgia or the Mediterranean through Georgia and Turkey (though the additional use of Turkey would require a rail gauge switch). It is also not clear that transports native to the Caspian have sufficient capacity for this.
Another route sidesteps the issues of both transport across the Caspian and the sensitivity of Georgia by crossing Russian territory above the

Caspian. Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan (and likely at least a small corner of Turkmenistan) would connect the route to Afghanistan. There are options of connecting to the Black Sea or transiting to Europe through either Ukraine or Belarus.

Iran could provide a potential alternative, but relations between Tehran and Washington would have to improve dramatically before such discussions could even begin — and time is short.

Many of the details still need to be worked out. But they are largely variations on the two main themes of either crossing the Caspian or transiting Russian territory above it.

Though the first route is already partially established for fuel, it is not clear how much additional capacity exists. To complicate matters further, Turkmen acquiescence is unlikely without Russian authorization, and Armenia remains strongly loyal to Moscow as well. While the current Georgian government might leap at the chance, the issue is obviously an extremely sensitive one for Moscow. (And with Russian forces positioned in Azerbaijan and the Georgian breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, Moscow has troops looming over both sides of the vulnerable route across Georgia.) The second option would require crossing Russian territory itself, with a number of options — from connecting to the Black Sea to transiting either Ukraine or Belarus to Europe, or connecting to the Baltic states.

(click image to enlarge)

Both routes involve countries of importance to Russia where Moscow has influence, regardless of whether those countries are friendly to it. This would give Russia ample opportunity to scuttle any such supply line at multiple points for reasons wholly unrelated to Afghanistan.

If the West were to opt for the first route, the Russians almost certainly would pressure Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan not to cooperate, and Turkey would find itself in a position it doesn’t want to be in — namely, caught between the United States and Russia. The diplomatic complexities of developing these routes not only involve the individual countries included, they also inevitably lead to the question of U.S.-Russian relations.

Even without crossing Russia, both of these two main options require Russian cooperation. The United States must develop the option of an alternative supply route to Pakistan, and in doing so, it must define its relationship with Russia. Seeking to work without Russian approval of a route crossing its “near abroad” will represent a challenge to Russia. But getting Russian approval will require a U.S. accommodation with the country.
The Russian Natural Gas Connection

One of Obama’s core arguments against the Bush administration was that it acted unilaterally rather than with allies. Specifically, Obama meant that the Bush administration alienated the Europeans, therefore failing to build a sustainable coalition for the war. By this logic, it follows that one of Obama’s first steps should be to reach out to Europe to help influence or pressure the Russians, given that NATO has troops in Afghanistan and Obama has said he intends to ask the Europeans for more help there.

The problem with this is that the Europeans are passing through a serious crisis with Russia, and that Germany in particular is involved in trying to manage that crisis. This problem relates to natural gas. Ukraine is dependent on Russia for about two-thirds of the natural gas it uses. The Russians traditionally have provided natural gas at a deep discount to former Soviet republics, primarily those countries Russia sees as allies, such as Belarus or Armenia. Ukraine had received discounted natural gas, too, until the 2004 Orange Revolution, when a pro-Western government came to power in Kiev. At that point, the Russians began demanding full payment. Given the subsequent rises in global energy prices, that left Ukraine in a terrible situation — which of course is exactly where Moscow wanted it.

The Russians cut off natural gas to Ukraine for a short period in January 2006, and for three weeks in 2009. Apart from leaving Ukraine desperate, the cutoff immediately affected the rest of Europe, because the natural gas that goes to Europe flows through Ukraine. This put the rest of Europe in a dangerous position, particularly in the face of bitterly cold weather in 2008-2009.

The Russians achieved several goals with this. First, they pressured Ukraine directly. Second, they forced many European states to deal with Moscow directly rather than through the European Union. Third, they created a situation in which European countries had to choose between supporting Ukraine and heating their own homes. And last, they drew Berlin in particular — since Germany is the most dependent of the major European states on Russian natural gas — into the position of working with the Russians to get Ukraine to agree to their terms. (Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin visited Germany last week to discuss this directly with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.)

The Germans already have made clear their opposition to expanding NATO to Ukraine and Georgia. Given their dependency on the Russians, the Germans are not going to be supporting the United States if Washington decides to challenge Russia over the supply route issue. In fact, the Germans — and many of the Europeans — are in no position to challenge Russia on anything, least of all on Afghanistan. Overall, the Europeans see themselves as having limited interests in the Afghan war, and many already are planning to reduce or withdraw troops for budgetary reasons.

It is therefore very difficult to see Obama recruiting the Europeans in any useful manner for a confrontation with Russia over access for American supplies to Afghanistan. Yet this is an issue he will have to address immediately.

The Price of Russian Cooperation

The Russians are prepared to help the Americans, however — and it is clear what they will want in return.

At minimum, Moscow will want a declaration that Washington will not press for the expansion of NATO to Georgia or Ukraine, or for the deployment of military forces in non-NATO states on the Russian periphery — specifically, Ukraine and Georgia. At this point, such a declaration would be symbolic, since Germany and other European countries would block expansion anyway.

The Russians might also demand some sort of guarantee that NATO and the United States not place any large military formations or build any major military facilities in the former Soviet republics (now NATO member states) of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. (A small rotating squadron of NATO fighters already patrols the skies over the Baltic states.) Given that there were intense anti-government riots in Latvia and Lithuania last week, the stability of these countries is in question. The Russians would certainly want to topple the pro-Western Baltic governments. And anything approaching a formal agreement between Russia and the United States on the matter could quickly destabilize the Baltics, in addition to very much weakening the NATO alliance.

Another demand the Russians probably will make — because they have in the past — is that the United States guarantee eventual withdrawal from any bases in Central Asia in return for Russian support for using those bases for the current Afghan campaign. (At present, the United States runs air logistics operations out of Manas Air Base in Kyrgyzstan.) The Russians do not want to see Central Asia become a U.S. sphere of influence as the result of an American military presence.
Other demands might relate to the proposed U.S. ballistic missile defense installations in the Czech Republic and Poland.

We expect the Russians to make variations on all these demands in exchange for cooperation in creating a supply line to Afghanistan. Simply put, the Russians will demand that the United States acknowledge a Russian sphere of influence in the former Soviet Union. The Americans will not want to concede this — or at least will want to make it implicit rather than explicit. But the Russians will want this explicit, because an explicit guarantee will create a crisis of confidence over U.S. guarantees in the countries that emerged from the Soviet Union, serving as a lever to draw these countries into the Russian orbit. U.S. acquiescence on the point potentially would have ripple effects in the rest of Europe, too.

Therefore, regardless of the global financial crisis, Obama has an immediate problem on his hands in Afghanistan. He has troops fighting there, and they must be supplied. The Pakistani supply line is no longer a sure thing. The only other options either directly challenge Russia (and ineffectively at that) or require Russian help. Russia’s price will be high, particularly because Washington’s European allies will not back a challenge to Russia in Georgia, and all options require Russian cooperation anyway. Obama’s plan to recruit the Europeans on behalf of American initiatives won’t work in this case. Obama does not want to start his administration with making a massive concession to Russia, but he cannot afford to leave U.S. forces in Afghanistan without supplies. He can hope that nothing happens in Pakistan, but that is up to the Taliban and other Islamist groups more than anyone else — and betting on their goodwill is not a good idea.
Whatever Obama is planning to do, he will have to deal with this problem fast, before Afghanistan becomes a crisis. And there are no good solutions.

But unlike with the Israelis and Palestinians, Obama can’t solve this by sending a special envoy who appears to be doing something. He will have to make a very tough decision. Between the economy and this crisis, we will find out what kind of president Obama is.
And we will find out very soon.