By Nazarul Islam | USA

I have studied, taught, and written about events in life that changed our world. Some of these, seemed insignificant yet proved to be catastrophic and left indelible mark on culture and history. I have remained a keen student my whole life, trying to piece together the causes, effects and consequences of little things that enriched my perspectives. I had just left my High School when, seemingly out of nowhere, the Cold War in Europe ended. In less than a decade, the Soviet Union collapsed. Apartheid fell in South Africa. Democracy and openness spread like wildfire around the world. A decade later, while in Florida, USA I was a new, untenured when I witnessed the tragedy of the falling Twin Towers in New York. Al Qaeda attacked the United States and the Twin Towers collapsed. I was in Washington DC in a seminar in January 2017– the same month Donald Trump was inaugurated as President of the United States for his first term.

Throughout all this change and tumult, three interconnected questions have fired my curiosity. What is the state of world politics and the international system? What has been and should be America’s role in the global order? And what is the most effective way to evaluate and generate insight for the first two questions? The last question – how best to study these consequential issues – led me to reflect repeatedly on how the past shapes both our present and future. Indeed, the overarching question tying my writing, is as simple as it is difficult to answer: how can history be applied to our current moment, and what is the promise and peril of pursuing something that is called contemporary history

When I was younger, I had pursued these questions in the way most beginners do. As a student, I was trained to put forward arguments in a structured, analytical, and confident manner. My insights, like those of other experts, would only be credible and persuasive if I removed myself from the evaluation, if I separated the object of my study from my own views or background. This valuable – and often essential – approach mirrors the best qualities of fields ranging from history to the natural and physical sciences. But was such a dry, didactic style the only way to approach such complex, contested issues? As I reflected upon the state of the world, America’s role in it, and my own career as a school teacher who cares about policy, I wondered if the traditional third-person Archimedean approach was the only way to wrestle with these consequential, hard-to-answer questions.

I still pursue serious subjects, but as I get older, I recognize I know less, not more. Answers that once seemed sure and certain now seem elusive. I am less interested in winning academic arguments than having a conversation.

The truth is, disciplining my mind can be stern, definitive, didactic, and intimidating, unwilling to countenance uncertainty. The best conversations, on the other hand, are interactive, occasionally mischievous, adventurous and bold, especially when the conversationalists are humble, inclusive, and open to change and persuasion. I am no longer uncomfortable, as I once was, offering arguments that are at times in tension with each other, and I confess that I have been wrong in the past and will be again in the future. I remind people I meet, that everyone interested in international affairs and foreign policy, even experts, will at one time or another be mistaken about how the world works and why. Honesty and humility combined with unceasing questioning and updating of assumptions, and vigorous, respectful conversation, is to be nurtured and treasured.

This does not mean we should forgo sharp, even controversial views. The grave challenges of our time demand that we ruthlessly challenge stylized narratives and conventional wisdom about the ivory tower, grand strategy and world order, the nature of power, and the role of the United States. It is still the role of the scholars (myself excluded) to rile people up, to get them to rethink and challenge their core assumptions. The process, I believe should fully aim to generate debate and discussion while discovering avenues to make sense of an often confusing, dangerous, but also promising world.

This change in my approach was animated by the presence, sometimes explicit, but more often implicit, of two enormously consequential figures who entered my life late, all of them I’ve observed at a distance – Henry Kissinger and Donald Trump

Many years ago, Henry Kissinger’s writings impressed me because he had made his admirers generous to think about and understand his views on the three questions animating my academic career: the state of the world, the role of the United States, and how to study and explore these issues. Over time, the answers I developed had been sharply at odds with Kissinger’s worldview.

The second person haunting the late years of my life is Donald Trump. My earliest impressions about Trump had first emerged as the highly unlikely candidate for the Republican nomination for the presidency of the United States. A decade later, we find ourselves in his turbulent and, for many, unexpected return to the White House. Trying to understand how and why Trump was elected, twice, to lead the world’s most powerful nation, and what that means for the United States and global order, is a vexing and challenging one, forcing me to constantly reassess my own analysis and instincts for politics and policy. What is clear is that Trump is as much a consequence of as a cause for the uncertain times we live in.

How should we think about international relations and the forces that shape it? I have reflected on this question since my early writings on the subject for nearly four decades. The traditional, conventional view sees world politics through the lens of geopolitics: the timeless struggle between great powers driven by a competition for land and resources, which is largely determined by the military balance of power. I used to see the world that way.

Over time, however, my views have changed. I’ve developed a different, and indeed controversial, view, steeped in a historical perspective that argues the global system has transformed in profound ways that are rarely accounted for in our standard analysis. Many of our theories of international relations – and the conventional view that suggests we are in a new age of geopolitics and great power competition – are based on an understanding of the tumultuous and often catastrophic events of the late 19th through the mid-20th centuries, a world marked by imperial conquest and industrialized, mass-mobilized war, violent revolution, and genocide.

What this article fails to recognize is that the conditions and circumstances that shaped that dark, tumultuous world of the past have changed dramatically. Life expectancy has more than doubled while profligacy has shrunk, governance at all levels has improved immeasurably, once lethal diseases are contained, unimaginable amounts of wealth and knowledge have been created, while resource, security, and information scarcities that plagued the world for millennia have been largely tamed.

To me, Land is a far less important source of power, much of the world is urbanized and literate, and conquest and formal empire make little sense, even if there weren’t thermonuclear weapons inhibiting large-scale invasions. Much of what counted for state power and success in 1900 translates poorly to the world of 2025 and beyond.

This does not, however, mean I hold a simple, idealistic view or version of history. Indeed, I believe that we are threatened by new, seemingly intractable, and potentially existential planetary challenges, what I label the problems of plenty. Through most of recorded history, humanity was threatened by scarcity – too little food, knowledge, medicine and technology, security. Today it is plagued by the challenges generated by our abundance and excess. The earth’s worsening climate, the dizzying array of emerging technologies, increasing inequality and migration, political polarization and despair, punctuated by a global public health crisis – the COVID-19 pandemic, which killed more than 20 million people – are problems of plenty that reveal stark challenges we are manifestly unprepared for.

International politics are also driven as much by powerful, non-material influences such as honor, fear, vengeance, humiliation, and identity as by interest. These forces evade easy definition, to say nothing of precise measurement.

This brings me to the question of world order – an issue of increasing interest to students, scholars, and policymakers. Kissinger has discussed this subject frequently in his book. He was worried that scholars and policymakers were not thinking deeply enough about the dangers that existing global institutions and arrangements were not up to the task. The vexing questions surrounding the rise of China, the profound consequences of emerging technology, America’s erratic behavior, the uncertain ‘holiday from history’ status of Europe – all worried him greatly.

Learning from published papers, I developed an eclectic views. Orders have been created and implemented by states to restrain the most dangerous parts of the international system and channel powerful global and national forces in productive, just ways. History reveals, however, that such orders are often contested. Many contemporary analysts bemoan the weakening and even disappearance of the so-called liberal international order that emerged from the ashes of the Second World War. The question remains, how well do we understand what this order consisted of, how and why it was created and maintained, what parts succeeded, and which aspects were less impressive? I have come to realize that there were many different postwar orders, and that some, like the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty order, worked extraordinarily well, whereas others, such as the United Nations system, failed to fully meet their creators’ aspirations.

There was not one international economic order after 1945, but several. Most importantly, this postwar order was created to deal with the grave challenges that shaped the first part of the 20th century – imperialism and decolonization, revolution, great power war, and the Great Depression. Whatever order emerges in the future must continue to minimize these familiar challenges, while also meeting a whole new array of planetary threats for which our current institutional architecture and conceptual frameworks are woefully ill-suited.

These future orders must also possess legitimacy, a quality rarely discussed among foreign policy and international affairs experts. Kissinger often made the point that stable orders only emerged when the major players recognized and accepted that other great powers might have different perspectives of the world, including different goals and values, and even contrasting concepts of how history unfolds. That insight remains important. Today, however, we face a different crisis of legitimacy, between governments and the governed.

Many governments around the world, even – or perhaps especially – those that are democratically elected, are failing to assuage the worries and concerns of their citizens and are unable to meet their demands and expectations, creating a deepening loss of faith in state capacity and governance. Into that vacuum, populists of all sorts, raging against elites and legacy institutions, have acquired unsettling momentum, with uncertain consequences for world politics.

Which brings us to the second question that keeps reminding me— America and its engagement with the world. Perhaps the most important variable for the future of the global order is the position, policies, and health of the most consequential actor in the international system, the United States. Again, one can identify both promising and discouraging signs. The nature of America’s grand strategies are often inconsistent and unreliable, with its history of trying to both dominate and escape from the outside world, sometimes at the same time.

As a country, it invests far too little on policy as a craft, displays a tendency for violence, both internally and externally, while too often pursuing unwise policies in places as far-flung as Vietnam and the Middle East. On a range of pressing issues, from China to nuclear weapons, the United States desperately needs to interrogate its assumptions and update its grand strategies. It is also hard for many, especially those living outside of the US, to understand and trust a nation where a majority of the voting public expresses a faith, even an affection, for a leader possessing such a challenging character and offering such questionable judgment as President Donald Trump.

As a student of contemporary history however, I try to broaden the aperture on how to think about America’s characteristics, history, and relationship with the world around it. While Trump may be sui generis, America has elected more mediocrities like James Buchanan and Warren Harding than visionaries such as Franklin Roosevelt. Indeed, peer closely and the historian can identify a few unsettling similarities between FDR and Trump, including an economic policy that put America first at the expense of the world economy, his efforts to pack the Supreme Court, and Roosevelt’s norm-busting decision to run for four presidential terms, the last when he was gravely ill.

If America is exceptional, it may be less because of the political leaders it has produced over two centuries and more. Its greatness, such as it is, largely lies elsewhere. For example, the United States has remained the world’s largest, arguably most dynamic, economy since the late 19th century, despite profound changes in how wealth is created and distributed, all while competitors looking up from second place – Great Britain and Germany during the first half of the 20th century, the Soviet Union after the Second World War, Japan, the European Union, and more recently China in the post-Cold War world – have, at least in comparison, eventually stalled and even faded.

When we analyze and assess categories of power that may matter most in the 21st century – the global reach of a nation’s culture, the power of its technological innovation, its energy production, the central role of its currency and financial institutions, even its ability to be its own worst critic and find ways to improve – the story of America is perhaps not so dark. To put it another way, relying on the kind of counterfactual reasoning that should characterize how we evaluate the world: America is often the worst great power in the world, except for all the others.

How should we think about, study, and teach these important questions? American institutions have and will no doubt continue to play a central role. As a student I feel like I have access to information. I still can’t believe I get paid (so little) to write about the world while having the privilege to learn from the discourses of smart, inquisitive young people. It is no secret, however, that higher education, especially in the United States, is facing challenges and even crisis.

Some of these problems are baked into the design and structure of the academy. Clark Kerr, who was the chancellor of the University of California at Berkeley in the 1960s, has suggested that: ‘The University is a series of individual entrepreneurs held together by a common grievance about parking.’ People possessing certain traits often ‘self-select’ into the academy. Often, professors can demonstrate brilliance while also combining what would seem to be mutually exclusive traits such as insecurity and arrogance. Universities, by setting themselves apart from other elements of society and generating controversial, even unsettling ideas and technologies, have historically attracted negative political attention.

Today, however, the challenges facing higher education appear steeper than in the past. Universities are overly bureaucratized and increasingly obsessed with virtue-signaling. The stranglehold maintained and pathologies demonstrated by the academic disciplines that define research and teaching are an especially vexing problem for the study of diplomacy, statecraft, grand strategy, and international relations. While these problems mark many of the disciplines in the social sciences and humanities, it is especially disconcerting within the two fields I know best – history and political science.

Again, to be clear, scholarly disciplines serve useful purposes, by defining the outlines of fields of inquiry while organizing and regularizing how to design and pursue research, generate knowledge, validate findings, and accumulate knowledge. These noteworthy benefits come at a cost, however, especially in the disciplines most concerned with strategy and world politics. Political science is often taken by ‘physics envy’, or even worse, given its recent poor track record, economics envy, obsessed with a sort of false scientism based upon an over-reliance on theory and quantification. History is little better.

As a discipline, it too rarely encourages scholarship on critical issues and concerns that matter to large portions of the public, such as questions of war, peace, and statecraft. While political scientists can be obsessed with methods and research design, historians are often unwilling to explicitly surface their underlying assumptions and their thoughts on causality and agency. Worse, they frequently assume their normative preferences are universal and widely shared. In both fields, the research questions can appear narrow and obscure, and advancing the discipline is rewarded more than engaging real world problems. Political science and history often fail to reveal much sympathy or understanding of the world of policy and statecraft, unable to acknowledge the profound difficulty of making hard choices when faced with complexity and radical uncertainty about the future.

All is not lost, however, and the optimist in me wants to believe that we live in an ideal time to study the world. Owing to the efforts of many innovative projects and initiatives, the divide between the world of ideas and practice, the academy and policy, has narrowed. Schools of public policy and international affairs offer an opportunity to exploit the best of academic disciplines without being overly constrained by their limits. The virtues of applying history to understanding our contemporary world are being rediscovered and bigger, broader thinking encouraged. Most importantly, students are smarter, more curious, more engaged, not simply in the United States but around the world.

The task we face is by no means easy. I am especially enthusiastic about the increased interest in both applied and contemporary history, which appear similar but are not quite the same thing. Applied history involves examining examples from the past to shed light on our present and future challenges. Sometimes it demands calling upon the deep history of an issue – say, for instance, various efforts in the past to construct an international order. Knowing deep history should provide greater insight, and, hopefully, better decisions. Our current debates over the origins of great-power wars, the challenges to democracy, and world order are much better when we apply history. There are better and worse ways to do so, and we should encourage a vigorous debate and discussion of best practices.

Contemporary history, on the other hand, employs the skills of a historian in our current circumstances to provide a better understanding of where are today. In other words, it is a history of our current times. Undertaking contemporary history is a fraught exercise, however.

‘Normal’ history is difficult enough – historians vehemently argue about the past; what happened, why, and what it means. They continually revise our understanding of what came before. These disagreements persist despite the advantages that come from analyzing what has already taken place as opposed to making sense of the present and future. ‘Normal’ history, the passage of time, and the distance it creates from the events and personalities under study, should generate greater insight and understanding. It may also drain the kind of emotions and passion that too often cloud our understanding and cool-headed assessment of the current predicament.

There are lower personal stakes when the argument involves issues that shaped the world decades or centuries ago, as opposed to people and events that may have real consequences on our present circumstances. It can be hard to strive for objectivity when viewing a matter – or an American president – that impinges upon our own interests, identity, or strongly held values and beliefs. Most importantly, histories of the past are written largely knowing how the story ends.

A contemporary history of Europe since the Congress of Vienna, completed on 27 June 1914, may offer students a cautiously optimistic tone, celebrating a century of relative peace, political development, and extraordinary economic growth. Indeed, in the days and weeks after Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated, many people believed a war could be averted, and if it came, it would be localized – a third Balkan War, limited in scope like the conflicts in 1912 and 1913. It was only years, even decades, after that fateful day that its full impact was recognized and comprehended.

Which generates a difficult question: Where are we in the story today? If we view our current times through a historical lens, are we at the beginning, the middle, or the end of the story? And what even is the story we are recounting?

Scholars I have known today are to put it mildly, freaking out. In contrast I often write wrote it with both my three children and their friends in mind, trying to make sense of a turbulent nation and often upsetting world. While acknowledging deep concerns with the president and his actions, I have noted that the United States and the world had gone through far more serious challenges in the past and had emerged better off. Playing off one of my favorite movies – the romantic musical La La Land – I continue to argue that America’s greatness came less from who occupied the White House and more from its economy, its culture, its people, and, most of all, its propensity for hope, innovation, and reinvention. In my writings, I have learned more on wonder than worry.

Many years later I am not convinced my balance was right. In the time since, the world has been roiled by danger: China’s suppression of Hong Kong and increasing belligerence in East Asia, deadly conflicts in the Sahel and Middle East, and Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine stand out among myriad tragedies that haunt our world. New challenges, from the climate crisis to emerging technologies, loom larger than ever, and as the world’s failed response to the COVID-19 pandemic revealed, we have few if any solutions to the planetary problems of plenty. In the United States, politics has become even more polarized, more bitter, angrier, and the ability to develop a national consensus on how to move forward, let alone agree on effective policies, is more elusive than ever.

From my vantage point, President Trump and the people around him seem no wiser, no more inclusive, and no more visionary than during the disruptive first term. Despite my views, however, almost 12 million more Americans voted for him in 2024 than in 2016. If I am being honest, I now lean far more on worry than wonder.

Yet our current chaotic period remains a puzzle. I often tell my well-wishers to imagine an alien who is tasked with visiting earth every 50 years and sending a progress report back to her bosses. When she compares the 2025 statistics to 1975, she notes that by every meaningful metric – life expectancy, literacy, knowledge about the world, health and nutrition, violence of all kinds, security, human tolerance and opportunity – life is measurably better than a half-century before.

And 1975, which would be bleak to us today, was much better than 50 years before that – 1925 – and so on. It is true that we live in a time of great worries, an era of palpable rage and resentment and seemingly insurmountable challenges. But we also live in a time of great wonders, where the problems that plagued humanity since the beginning of recorded time – scarcity in food and other resources such as health, information and knowledge, energy, security – have been, if not fully solved, unimaginably improved.

Concurrently, a rights revolution has dramatically increased human tolerance and opportunity, while demonstrably reducing formal and normative prejudices based on gender, race, religion, and sexual orientation in much of the world. If you were to tell someone in 1975 that all the world’s information was available, almost free, to anyone on the planet, simply by possessing a small hand-held device, they would have said you must live in an age of miracles and joy. Few of us feel that way, of course, even as we struggle to make sense of why.

Which gets to the challenge of contemporary history, or the question: where are we in the story – the beginning, middle, or end? And what precisely is the story? Is it 27 June 1914? When my close friend Humayun visited the US in 1975 America had appeared in decline, marred by deep division, drugs, crime, stagflation, and political corruption. The international system was defined by an ideological and geopolitical struggle – the Cold War – framed by the threat of thermonuclear catastrophe. The future appeared bleak. By the 1990s that world was transformed, mostly for the better.

Read: Can America afford Mass Deportation?

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The Bengal-born writer Nazarul Islam is a senior educationist based in USA. He writes for Sindh Courier and the newspapers of Bangladesh, India and America. He is author of a recently published book ‘Chasing Hope’ – a compilation of his articles.

The post Observations: Echoes from My Past first appeared on Sindh Courier.

They will thus be concerned about what this most mercurial of presidents will do if his tariffs are blocked by the Supreme Court.

By Tom Arms | London

Trump is right. Ending tariffs would be an economic disaster, at least for him. Any damage to America would be his own fault.

It would not, as Trump claims, turn America into a third world country. That is a typical Trumpian hyperbole.

But the sudden and dramatic end of tariffs would definitely damage Trump’s vision of the future American economy. And that in turn will hurt Trump politically. Whether it would also be bad for the rest of the world… well, we’ll have to wait and see.

The prospect of the sudden end of tariffs was raised by the decision of the Appellate Court last Friday to support a lower court’s judgement that the tariffs were unconstitutional.

The Appellate Court, however, has given Trump a possible out—The Supreme Court. The Administration has until October 18 to appeal to the ultimate judicial authority and, of course, the court is packed with conservatives,

But that may not be enough. Trump imposed the tariffs under the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA). The IEEPA gives the president sweeping powers to declare an emergency and to use economic actions to deal with it.

These include such measures as sanctions and freezing assets. However, nowhere in the Act does – ruled the Appellate Court by 7 to 4—is the president given the power to impose tariffs. That is “a core Congressional power. “This means, according to two levels of the judiciary, that the tariffs are unconstitutional and should be reversed.

So far Trump’s tariffs have raised more than $210 billion dollars. By time the Supreme Court rules on their legality the figure will be around $300 billion.

If the tariffs are illegal than those who paid them can sue the government—plus interest and possible damage to business—for the money that they lost.

But that is not all. Tariffs are at the heart of Trump’s long-term economic policy and linked to his Big Beautiful Bill (BBB). According to some estimates, the sweeping tax cuts in the BBB could increase the federal deficit by $5.2 trillion over the next ten years. Tariff revenues are meant to more than offset those losses.

In fact, according to Trump, his plan is to eliminate income tax completely and replace it with revenues from tariffs.

Now, here is the rub. The BBB is completely and totally ironclad legal because it was passed by Congress as stipulated in the constitution. Unlike the tariffs, it cannot be reversed. The tax cuts which are at the heart of the BBB are permanent.

This means that Trump has constructed a perpetual economic edifice on foundations which may be declared illegal. If tariffs are declared unconstitutional, the only way he will be able to pay the $800 billion a year allocated immigration control and the $150 billion extra a year for defense is by borrowing money. Republicans—and many Democrats—think the federal deficit is already too high at $1.9 trillion.

There is, of course, the possibility that Congress would vote to give the president the power to impose tariffs. This is unlikely even with a Republican-controlled House of Representatives because the lower house of Congress jealously guards its control of the nation’s finances.

Losing the tariffs war would have other effects. In addition to paying tariffs, many countries have agreed to invest trillions of dollars in US industries and many American companies have promised to return factories to US soil. Japan and the EU have between them agreed to invest $1.1 trillion in the US. Scores of companies have concluded that it is financially—and politically–advantageous to move production to America.

With the end of tariffs Trump is less of a political threat and it is cheaper to keep production outside high labor-cost America. In short, investment promises are tied to tariffs.

Politically, of course, the end of tariffs would make Trump look foolish. But then, that is exactly what he is. Donald Trump has built an economic policy predicated on powers which it very much looks as if he may not have. He has also failed to think through the consequences of an action—one the first principles of leadership.

But what impact will this have on Trump politically. As far as his base is concerned—not much. MAGA has no alternative to Trump. It will hurt him with swing voters, especially those in the low-income Hispanic and Black communities who are already being hit by his economic policies. This could mean a boost for the Democrats in the mid-terms which would curtail Trump’s power in the second half of his administration.

As for the rest of the world, most international leaders already regard Trump as a fool. Many of them will heave a sigh of relief that the tariffs are blocked. But they also know that Trump hates being thwarted. They will thus be concerned about what this most mercurial of presidents will do if his tariffs are blocked by the Supreme Court.

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Tom Arms is foreign editor of Liberal Democrat Voice. He is also a regular contributor to “The New World,” lectures on world affairs and is the author of “The Encyclopedia of the Cold War” and “America Made in Britain.”

Read: Observations of an Expat: The Vote

The post Observations of an Expat: End of Tariffs? first appeared on Sindh Courier.

• Autocrats are more likely to enjoy short-term success, especially for themselves as individuals. But by undercutting the law they create instability which spells long-term disaster for the rest of us

By Tom Arms

Trump’s bombing of Iran and the NATO summit mark the beginning of a new era in international relations.

They were both a ‘political success ‘for the American president.

They were also both a disaster for international law and the rules-based order that has underpinned the longest period of peace and prosperity in world history.

We have now entered an age of strong man politics where laws and political outcomes are determined not by legal precedence and a sense of equality and justice, but by the strength of the political leader and the country they lead. In short, might is right.

Many argue that it has always been thus. To a large degree they are right. But since the end of World War Two the establishment of international structures, law, alliances, global trade and treaties have acted as a brake on unfettered power. Trump has dismantled—or is in the process of dismantling—the post-war world order and removing the brake.

Let’s start with the bombing of Iran. Depriving Iran of the ability to have a nuclear bomb is a good thing. Iran is a dangerous ideologically-driven rogue state. However, the way in which the bombing was organized was another nail in the coffin of international law.

Read: The Uncertainty in the Aftermath of the U.S. Bombing in Iran

There was no attempt to secure international backing for the attack. There was no attempt to even secure domestic or congressional or bipartisan backing for the attack.

Donald Trump did not try for a UN Security Council resolution. He did not consult with his NATO allies. It is debatable whether or not he should have sought a declaration of war from Congress as the constitution stipulates. But he should have at least conferred with the senior members of both parties in the House of Representatives and Senate. He didn’t.

He did not do any of the above. Trump supporters will argue that timing and the need for secrecy dictated otherwise. They are wrong. The threatened action was well-known and the president had given himself a two-week window of action. The fact is, Trump is a unilateralist who acts when and how he wants to without regard to the law or convention.

The NATO summit was a different example of the tectonic shift in international relations. Europe has always looked to the United States for leadership. The US has the economic power, political clout and nuclear arsenal. But successive presidents have endeavoured to insure that alliance decisions were reached collectively. This is because positions with the widest possible agreement have the greatest chance of success.

The European members of NATO need to increase their defense spending. A resurgent Russia is again threatening. China is rising. The Old World has been riding on American military coattails for too long. But that did not mean that the alliance needed to abandon its collective decision-making. NATO’s decision this week to increase defense spending to five percent of GDP by 2035 was not the result of a careful consideration and debate. It was the result of being bullied by Donald Trump.

European (and Canadian) NATO has agreed to the spending increase because Donald Trump threatened to pull out of the Alliance if they didn’t. And if Trump withdrew America from NATO, Europe would lose the protection of 100,000 US troops and the American nuclear umbrella.

What was particularly sad was the way European NATO bent the knee to the American president. Trump’s 24-hour attendance bore no resemblance to a visit by a military partner. It was more like a Roman emperor collecting tribute from conquered people.

Europe and Canada have ten years to reach the five percent target. That should be enough time. When they do, they will have the defensive capacity to dispense with the US. This will not be in America’s interest as its leadership of NATO has been a major weapon in its diplomatic arsenal.

NATO and Iran are only two examples of Donald Trump’s disregard bordering on contempt for the law. Other prominent examples are his refusal to accept the 2020 presidential election. This badly undermined faith in the American electoral process. Then there is the pardoning of the January 6 Capitol Hill rioters. Add to that, his attempts to avoid justice by constantly delaying attempts to bring him to trial for various offenses. Don’t forget Trump’s 34 felony convictions. Finally, there is his disregard for Congress in issuing executive orders which dismantled the US Agency for International Development and other congressionally-mandated government debates.

Donald Trump is an autocrat. And each of his political successes—Iran, NATO DOGE, immigration…undermines the rule of law and encourages other political leaders to follow his autocratic example.

Autocrats are more likely to enjoy short-term success, especially for themselves as individuals. But by undercutting the law they create instability which spells long-term disaster for the rest of us.

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Tom Arms is foreign editor of Liberal Democrat Voice. He is also a regular contributor to The New World (formerly The New European) and the author of “The Encyclopedia of the Cold War” and “America Made in Britain.”

Read: Observations of an Expat: End of Empire

The post Observations of an Expat: A New Era first appeared on Sindh Courier.

By Alireza Bahrami

Correspondent for AsiaN

TEHRAN: Today I walked for four hours in the streets of Tehran. I chose my route to pass in front of the large army barracks near our house. Israel attacked these barracks in the first days of the invasion of Iran. The presence of police officers and guards was evident around the barracks.

Shortly after, about 500 meters away from home, on a side street, the presence of several secret police officers caught my attention. I looked into the side street. A 4-storey building had collapsed in the Israeli attack. I was still stunned to see the same scene repeated on the next side street. On this street, one of the guards had an automatic weapon hanging from his neck. Now I realized where the third series of explosions that terrified my family a few days ago were.

War has shown its terrifying face to my city, to my home and my family. I was thinking about this when I reached the large park near my house.

I saw first a young girl sitting on a park bench, listening to a podcast and drawing. On the bench next to her, a cat was lying down. A little further up, two old men trying to hang two pieces of cloth caught my attention. I sat down on a bench to see what they were going to do. When it was ready, they started playing pin-prick.

The streets of Tehran do not feel like you are in the middle of an apocalyptic movie, nor do they resemble the Tehran that was always bustling and noisy.

But the remarkable thing is that life in the city still goes on. Many people have left Tehran. Many others have stayed home. But some people in Tehran do not seem to have taken the shadow of war seriously at all. At a stall on the side of the street, I saw two women standing while a florist prepared their bouquets. A man had opened his paint shop, waiting for a customer. A woman was carefully cleaning the windows of her house.

Tehran spent the seventh day of the war relatively calmly. Perhaps because of Iran’s attack on Israel on Thursday morning. The news reported that Iran had used highly destructive, undetectable missiles in the attack. Foreign and domestic sources put the number of injured in the attack at more than 200. Or perhaps this calm and quiet in Tehran was due to the words of the foreign minister. He had told the European parties for Friday’s talks that diplomatic talks were meaningless until the Israeli attacks stopped.

Of course, the night before, some areas in a city near Tehran had been targeted by Israel. It was also announced that an attack would be carried out near a village in northern Iran on the morning of the eighth day. However, the air defenses in Tehran spent the seventh day doing little. Perhaps there was another reason.

The internet has not been international in Iran for the past 48 hours. It only works for Iranian sites and applications. The government announced that the numerous drones that were used to attack Iranian infrastructure in the past days were guided via the internet with SIM cards. So, with the internet cut off, these drones are useless. In the past days, many of the air defense shots were to counter these drones.

The news on the seventh day of the war was influenced by the forthcoming Friday’s talks between Iran and the European troika, in consultation with the United States. Another important piece of news was the message from the Iraqi Shiite leader.

The previous day, US President Donald Trump, in a strange (diplomatically) speech, raised the possibility of assassinating the Iranian leader. This was echoed by the Israeli defense minister.

Following these remarks, the Iraqi Shiite leader warned that continued Israeli aggression against Iran and the assassination of the Iranian leader would create a fire that would plunge the region into chaos.

The Iraqi Shiite leader was born in Iran, but has been living in Iraq for decades. He never interferes or speaks out on issues related to Iran. Only when the top Iranian general (Soleimani) decided to defeat Daesh in Iraq did he support his action by issuing a religious declaration. In the end, the Iranian general defeated Daesh, but President Trump (in his previous term) ordered the assassination of the Iranian general. He was killed at the airport in Baghdad, the capital of Iraq. Everyone I spoke to in Tehran on Thursday asked two questions. One was how long this situation would last and what would happen in the end? The second was whether the talks on Friday.

Read: Iran between war and peace

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Courtesy: The AsiaN, Seoul, South Korea (Posted on June 20, 2025)

The post Observations: War and Life in Tehran first appeared on Sindh Courier.

By Tom Arms

Signalgate–as it is now called—will almost certainly be the first of many security breaches by this second Trump Administration.

There are several reasons for this: Trump’s own cavalier attitude towards secret information; the president’s extreme distaste of government employees (the “deep state”); Elon Musk’s purge of the civil service and the low caliber and inexperience of the people he has appointed to high office.

No one expects political appointments to know all the dos and don’ts of the security business less than two months into the job. They shouldn’t even necessarily know that it is highly dangerous to discuss an attack plan in a glorified WhatApp group call.

That is why there are paid officials who have been doing the job for years. One of the main purposes of a civil servant is to handle the mechanics of a meeting. It is the officials’ job to make certain that the right people are invited at the right time and, if classified material is being discussed, to a secure location and that the discussion is conducted so that it is leak-proof. It is important job. Lives depend on it.

I once attended a press conference on weapons procurement at the British Ministry of Defense. Journalize after journalist asked the minister about performance details of various weapons. The minister repeatedly turned to his accompanying civil servant and asked: “May I answer that?” The civil servant politely replied: “No, minister.” He did his job.

The problem is that Elon Musk has fired many of the people who did that sort of job. Or they have resigned in disgust. Or they are too frightened to speak up for fear of losing their job.

It is noteworthy that absent from discussion of the attack was America’s top military man—the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. That’s because he has not been confirmed in office. The former chairman, General Charles Q Brown Jr. was sacked for being Black—a victim of Trump’s war on Diversity, Equality and Inclusion (DEI).

Trump’s personal disdain for secrets was evident in his first term. He regularly ignored security protocols. The most blatant was in May 2017 when at a meeting with Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov he provided information about an ISIS terrorist plot that had been given the CIA by Israel’s Mossad. The information was so secret that it had not even been shared with British intelligence or the other members of the Five Eyes Group.

Then, of course, there were boxes of classified information stacked in a Mar-a-lago bathroom. The information they contained included nuclear secrets. If Trump had not been re-elected he would be on trial for illegally moving the boxes to his country club estate.

Finally, there are the qualifications and character of the people President Trump has appointed. With a few exceptions, they have not been chosen for their knowledge, expertise or experience. They have been chosen for their loyalty. They have been chosen because they will do what he tells them to do. And they will do what he tells them because they are totally dependent on Donald Trump for their position.

A prime example is Steve Witkoff, the man Trump has tasked with negotiating peace in the Middle East and Ukraine. Witkoff’s long career has been as a New York property lawyer and investor. He has no diplomatic experience. In fact, he is very little experience outside the US. His main qualification for the job is that he is one of Trump’s regular golfing partners.

The Republican Party has become the Trump Party. But despite that, few of its senior members are prepared to publicly swear the loyalty that Trump demands. This means that the pool from which he can appoint people is small. This limits his choices. It also means that those who are in power now are likely to stay there—despite their shortcomings.

As with an increasing number of administration’s actions, Signal-gate is headed for the courts. This is because under US law, conversations such as the one involving the attack on Yemen have to be lodged with the National Archives. Apparently, one of the reasons that the administration used Signal was because it erased the contents four weeks after the call.

According to American Oversight, a non-profit focusing on government transparency, the participants in the call violated the Federal Records Act. On Tuesday night they filed a law suit in the DC District Court. The federal judges drew straws on who would hear the case and the winner was—James Boasberg, the same judge who has clashed with the administration over the deportation of suspected Venezuelan gang members to El Salvador.

World Review

There is a major contradiction at the core of the tariffs that Donald Trump announced this week.

Trump says that the tariffs have the dual purpose of revitalizing American industry—especially the car industry—and raising billions in tax revenues which will allow him to cut other taxes.

The problem is that one will cancel out the other. If, as hoped, Americans eschew foreign cars to buy American, then other countries will stop exporting their cars (and car components) to the US. Thus the revenue from tariffs will substantially decline.

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If Europe wanted more reasons to re-evaluate its relationship with the US, Signalgate has provided them.

Trump has imposed tariffs. Vice President Vance used the Munich Security Conference to attack European values. But that was in public. Sometimes what is said behind closed doors—among like-minded friends—is more revealing.

Vance expressed some blunt opinions on America’s European allies. He said any airstrikes would benefit Europe more than America. He that three percent of US cargo passed through the Suez Canal compared to 40 percent of European goods.

“I just hate bailing Europe out again,” said the Vice President. “Let’s just make sure our messaging is right here.”

Hegseth also was not a European fan. “I fully share your loathing of European free-loading,” he said. It’s PATHETIC. But Mike is correct, we are the only ones on the planet (on our side of the ledger) who can do this. Nobody else even close.”

The two men went on to agree that they should find a way to force the Europeans to pay for the attack on Yemen.

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Turkish PhD Student Rumeysa Ozturk was on her way to dinner at a Boston restaurant when six people with their faces covered by scarves, hoodies and large dark sunglasses surrounded her.

“We are police, and you are under arrest,” they told the 30-year-old Tufts University student. They failed to show any identification, quickly cuffed Ms Ozturk and bundled her into an SUV. The incident was captured on a surveillance camera.

Ms. Ozturk is the latest foreign student to be arrested for protesting against Israel’s war in Gaza. Her specific crime appears to have been writing an op-ed for the student newspaper supporting calls for Tufts University to divest from companies with ties to Israel.

Within hours, a Boston judge, issued an order prohibiting her removal from Massachusetts. Sorry, came back the reply from the Department of Homeland Security, she is already in a Louisiana detention centre. Oh, and by the way, her, student visa has been revoked.

The same fate has befallen two other foreign students—Mahmoud Khalil from Columbia University and Bada Khan Suri from Georgetown University. Each of them exercised their right of free speech under the US constitution’s First Amendment and were arrested for doing so. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said this week that there “at least” another 300 foreign students whose visas have been revoked for “anti-Semitic behaviour.”

Foreign visitors—including students—have to abide by American laws. But they are also protected by American law. This includes the right of free speech, legal representation and a fair hearing. But without a student visa they cannot stay in the country defend themselves.

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The Trump Administration is talking to the Taliban. That is the only conclusion that can be drawn from the release last week of US citizen George Glezman.

Especially as it followed the visit to Kabul of US ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad with the specific brief of springing Glezman from the Afghan gaol in which he has been languishing for the past two years.

Khalilzad’s trip was the first to Afghanistan by an American official for four years and included the additional instructions to establish a communication channel. To facilitate his mission Washington lifted the bounties on three senior Taliban leaders.

Qatar has represented US interests in Afghanistan since the shambolic American evacuation, will continue in this role for the foreseeable future and was involved in the negotiations to release Glezmann.

But the Trump Administration wants more. Specifically, the release of remaining US citizens still held; the return of US weapons left behind in the rushed departure and counter-terrorism measures against the Afghan-based Jihadist group Islamic State-Khorasan (IS-K).

They are likely to achieve some cooperation on confronting IS-K. The terrorist group poses a bigger threat to the Taliban than to American interests. Weapons, not so likely, as they are useful source of income on the international arms market as well as helping to arm Taliban militia.

The release of more American citizens is likely to be done on a straight transactional basis; possibly related to the release of Taliban members held at Guantanamo and/or the return of Afghan funds in Western banks in return for the release of American prisoners. Either course should appeal to transactionally-minded Trump.

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He is the “Tropical Trump.” At least that is how the US president has described Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro.

There is no doubt that the two men are ideological bedfellows. They both cast themselves as political victims and champions against the liberal elite. They oppose climate change. They hate the “deep state”, universities, students, journalists and the courts.

But there is a big difference. Trump is in the White House. Bolsonaro this week appeared in court charged with the “violent abolition of the democratic rule of law” along with a slew of other charges including conspiracy to commit murder.

According to the prosecution—who have supporting testimony from one of Bolsonaro’s senior aides—the ex-Brazilian president “knew, handled and discussed” plans for a coup to overthrow President Lula da Silva and replace him with a military government headed by Bolsonaro. They also planned to poison da Silva and other leading figures including Justice Andre de Moraes, who is currently overseeing the five-person judicial panel presiding in the Bolsonaro trial.

The coup attempt started with a claim that the vote was rigged, because there was no way that Bolsonaro could have lost a fair election (sound familiar?). Right-wing protesters camped out in front of the military barracks demanding that the army move to overthrow the result and, after Lula was inaugurated, stormed the Brazilian capital in a clear echo of America’s January 6 riots.

And like the American attack, the Brazilian rioters failed in their mission. The duly-elected Lula da Silva stayed in power. But unlike the US, the Brazilian courts moved quickly against Bolsonaro and he was barred from running for office until 2030. This cleared the way for his trial which could—if Bolsonaro is convicted—lead to his being permanently barred and imprisoned for 12 to 40 years.

So far the Trump response to his Brazilian soulmate’s problems has been relatively muted. His media company, Trump Media, has attacked Justice Moraes for “illegally censoring right wing voices in social media”. The Supreme Court Justice has blocked both Elon Musk’s X platform and another platform called Rumble for allowing hate speech.

At the moment Bolsonaro is not being held in prison and his son has said the former Brazilian president may flee to America to seek political asylum from his friend in the White House. Justice Moraes has said that if Bolsonaro is at any time considered a flight risk he will be locked up.

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Tom Arms is foreign editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and the author of “The Encyclopedia of the Cold War” and “America Made in Britain.”

Read: Observations of an Expat: First Shots Fired

The post Observations of an Expat: Signalgate first appeared on Sindh Courier.

By Tom Arms

Too often the political choice is not between good and bad or moral and immoral. It is between bad and worse.

Ukraine’s President Vlodomyr Zelensky is facing just such a choice. And he must decide soon or sooner.

Eastern Europe’s bitter winter is coming to a close. The spring thaw and rains are turning the wheat fields into mudflats. But summer is coming and the ground will be hard, flat and ready for tanks.

It is strategic decision time. Does Zelensky abandon the counter-offensive hopes of last summer, withdraw to defensible positions and start digging trenches, laying minefields and constructing tank traps? If he does he will be building a man-made hard border that separates the Donetsk Region from the rest of Ukraine with physical obstacles and increases the possibility of the permanent loss of Eastern Ukraine to Russia.

If the Ukrainian leader does concentrate on strengthening his defences by summer, then he runs the risk of the Russian steamroller breaking through all the way to Kyiv.

His decision-making window is small and closing. By May the ground should be suitable for a tank attack. Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu is reported to have 350-500,000 fresh troops ready to move into the front line. And Putin is expected to use his recent electoral victory to justify another mobilization.

Zelensky made the decision to make a stand at the factory town of Avdiika. He lost. It cost the Russians an estimated 17,000 lives, but they have eliminated a Ukrainian foothold in the Donetsk Region and improved their position for a spring offensive. Ukraine’s battle for Avdiika was at the expense of building defensive fortifications elsewhere along the 600-mile front line.

Key elements throughout the Ukraine War have been artillery, drones and air defences. Russian armaments factories are now churning out three million shells a year and Putin has secured a regular additional flow from North Korea and Iran. Putin’s artillery and now firing five shells for every Ukrainian one.  He clearly has been mobilizing and planning for war for years—and his planning is paying dividends.

The EU promised a million-plus artillery shells by the beginning of this year. It came up with just half that amount and will only be up to 1.4 million by the end of this year.  The Czechs, Danes, Poles, Germans, Canadians and Dutch have clubbed together to buy shells on the world market and are said to have found 800,000 which have given the Ukrainians “breathing space” until more weaponry can be bought and rushed to the front.

As important are drones and drone interceptors. The Ukrainians are running out of both. The interceptors are especially important because they were protection against Russian missiles knocking out key infrastructure targets. The drones have, to a certain extent, compensated for the shortfall in artillery. But drone stocks are now running low as well.

Of course, Ukraine’s problems would be eased considerably if America’s Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mike Johnson, would allow a vote on the $61 billion military aid package for Ukraine. History will not be kind to the Republican Christian nationalist. The House of Representatives has now gone into its Easter recess and won’t return to Washington until 22 April.

It would also help if German Chancellor Olof Scholz gave the Ukrainians the German Taurus missile which would enable the Ukrainians to hit more targets inside Russia. The British and French have sent similar long-range Scalp and Storm Shadow missiles, but those stocks are starting to run low.  Scholz refuses to send the German-Swedish weapons for fear that it would lead to an escalation in the fighting. Scholz, however, is facing growing opposition to his stand from both the CDU opposition and from within his governing coalition.

Another problem is the size and age of the Ukrainian army and Ukraine’s conscription laws. The average of a Ukrainian soldier is 43. This is because the minimum conscription age is 27. Legislation is currently working its way through the Ukrainian parliament to lower the conscription age—to 25. But the legislation is being held up with a staggering 1,000 amendments.

The one bit of good news is on the high seas.  Ukrainian drones and ships have are winning the naval war in the Black Sea. They have opened up the routes in and out of the Odessa, blown up key Russian ships and naval installations, and kept the Russian navy largely bottled up in its Sevastopol base.

Don’t give up on the Ukrainians. The odds are that eventually the US military aid will be released. Scholz will probably send the Taurus missiles and more artillery shells will be found for Ukrainian howitzers. It is just a matter of time. In the meantime the Ukrainians must concentrate on a defensive strategy. The generally accepted defensive military equation is one defensive unit can hold off up to ten attacking units.  But that involves a hard, in depth defensive line which would create the politically unacceptable border hiving off Eastern Ukraine.

World Review

The Baltimore Bridge disaster was more than a fatal human tragedy. It was a commercial and trading disaster which starts in Baltimore and ripples well beyond American shores.

But let’s start with Baltimore and its immediate environs. When the Singapore-flagged container ship Dali crashed into the Francis Scott Key Bridge it closed a major land and sea route in and out of a city which is one of America’s most important as well as one of its most socially-deprived.

The 1.6 mile long bridge crossed the Patapsco River which is the major sea channel in an out of the Port of Baltimore which in turn is a major exit and entry point for America’s vital car trade. That sea channel is now blocked. In 2023 the port handled 52.3 million tons worth $80 billion. It directly employed 15,000 people and indirectly supported another 139,000 jobs. This is in a city known as the heroin drug capital of America and where residents have a one and 20 chance of falling victim to violent crime. Powder keg Baltimore does not need thousands to be suddenly laid off work.

The bridge carried a major highway—Interstate 695—as well as well as spanning the entrance to the port. I-295 is a major arterial road connecting New York, Washington DC, Baltimore and Philadelphia. Last year it carried nearly 12 million vehicles. As the Easter weekend descends on one of the most congested areas of America, hundreds of thousands of cars and trucks will be forced to travel hundreds of additional miles on roads ill-suited to carry the extra traffic.

The impact of the bridge disaster will be felt well beyond Baltimore. Eighty percent of the world’s trade moves by ship. It is called the “global supply chain” and when a link in that chain is broken it affects shipping movements across the world. And a major factor in the price of goods is the cost of transporting them.

In recent years the biggest impact on the global supply chain was caused by the covid pandemic. But other factors have been a drought which this month disrupted the Panama Canal; the six-day blockage in 2021 of the Suez Canal by the giant container ship Ever Given; naval battles in the Black Sea as a result of the Ukraine War and attacks by pro-Palestinian Houthis in the Red Sea.

The collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge is one of a growing number of breaks in the increasingly fragile global supply chain which pushes up prices for us all.

Tajiks have lots of reason to hate Putin’s Russia. Tajiks attached to Islamic State-Khorashan even more so. They don’t need the Ukrainians, the CIA or MI6 to egg them on.

That is why there is universal skepticism towards Vladimir Putin’s allegation that the four Tajik terrorists who gunned down 130 people in Moscow’s Crocus City Hall theatre were acting in league with Ukrainian, British and American intelligence. The assertion is made more ludicrous by IS-K’s instant claim of responsibility.

It is unclear whether the terrorists were drawn from the estimated two million Tajiks living in Russia or if they come from Tajikistan or if they originated from Afghanistan where the Persian-speaking Tajiks make up 25 percent of the population. It is known that they are Muslims and that would be enough to turn them against Vladimir Putin.

Putin climbed to power on the back of genocidal war against the Muslims of Chechnya. It made him popular with ethnic Russians but a hate figure for the Central Asian Muslims who were once part of the Soviet empire and the Tsarist Russian Empire before that.

Islamic State-Khorasan (IS-K) is the radical successor to the Islamic State which attempted to establish a caliphate in Iraq and Syria. It is even more fundamentalist then the Taliban in Afghanistan which it has criticized for accepting aid from NGOs.  IS-K is fighting almost everyone. It is opposed to the Taliban, the government of Tajikistan, the Chinese because of their treatment of the Uighurs, Pakistan for its support of the Taliban, the Russians and America and all of Europe. It claimed responsibility for a foiled New Year’s Eve attack on Cologne Cathedral.

Both British and American intelligence fear that there is a real danger of a major IS-K attack on a Western target. The battle against IS-K is one of the few areas of common cause between Russia and the West, at least the West sees it that way.  That is why the CIA warned Putin of a likely attack. But the Russian leader is blind to all threats except those from Ukraine. He ignored the warnings. He paid the price.

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Israel has always been able to count on American support at the UN—until this week. A resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza War was tabled at the UN Security Council and the US abstained. The resolution was passed.

The absence of the American veto was the surest sign yet of President Joe Biden’s frustration with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. But will the American abstention have the desired diplomatic effect? Will Netanyahu allow life-saving aid to flow into Gaza? Will he halt the illegal West Bank settlements? Will he stop the ground offensive against Rafah? Will he abide by the Security Council Resolution? Will he discuss the two-state solution?

Read: Observations of an Expat: US Senator Schumer suggests ousting of Netanyahu

The answer is almost certainly no. In fact, Netanyahu’s two-fold response to the abstention was to double-down. He immediately withdrew from talks in Qatar for a six week ceasefire in return for hostages. He also cancelled a trip to Washington to discuss military tactics. He must reckon that if America won’t support him then he must plan and act alone.

The abstention also appears to have strengthened the position of the Ultra-Orthodox hawks in the Netanyahu government. National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich had been focusing on pushing Palestinians off the West Bank and the destruction of Hamas.  Now they are being outspoken about moving Israeli settlers into the Gaza Strip.  One radical settler organization—Nachala—has parceled out 500 beachfront properties to Orthodox Jews prepared to move as soon as the war is ended.

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Tom Arms is foreign editor of Liberal Democrat Voice. He is also author of “The Encyclopaedia of the Cold War” and “America Made in Britain” and co-host of “TransAtlantic Riff”

Read: Observations of an Expat: US Support for Israel Cracks

The post Observations of an Expat: Ukraine: Bad or Worse first appeared on Sindh Courier.

By Tom Arms

One of the rock solid, unwavering givens in the world’s diplomatic playbook has cracked—the 76-year-old bipartisan US support for Israel.

There will be repercussions for Israel, the United States, the Palestinians, Europe and the Middle East.

Since before 1948, support or opposition to Israel has been one of the world’s key political fault lines. Which side a government chose played a major role in determining their position on a host of other issues.

At the fulcrum of this fault line was support for successive Israeli governments from Republican and Democratic American administrations. More than $4 billion a year in military aid flows from Washington to Israel, and that is only the money that is known. Whenever Israel faced UN condemnation it could count on the American veto. And if it was attacked, America, supplied the latest weaponry. Israel was America’s only certain and democratic ally in the Middle East and Israel could not exist without America.

The public appearance of the crack was the Senate speech last week by Majority Leader Chuck Schumer. He called on Israelis to vote Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu out of office. And he implicitly warned that if the voters did not remove “Bibi” then American aid and political support was in jeopardy.

President Biden gave the Schumer speech the presidential seal of approval. It was, he said, “a good speech.” Republicans disagreed and the battle lines were drawn. Senate Minority leader accused Schumer of interfering in the democratic processes of a close ally. Donald Trump said that Jews who voted Democrat “hated Israel” and “hated their own religion.” Speaker of the House Mike Johnson said he would be inviting Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress. This event is unlikely to happen because it requires the support of Chuck Schumer.

In a post-speech interview with the New York Times, Senator Schumer, said his disillusionment did not start with the war on Gaza. The impetus for him was the bromance between Trump and Bibi and the Trump-organized Abraham Accords which established diplomatic relations between Israel and several Arab countries without any consideration for the Palestinians. Netanyahu, said Schumer, made the crack inevitable when he decided that his interests lay with Trump and the Republican Party at the expense of the Democrats.

The Biden Administration had hoped that Republicans and Democrats and other governments could rally around an American resolution which it put to the UN Security Council on Friday morning. It was much stronger than a previous un-submitted draft and called for “an immediate ceasefire” and the “release of all hostages.” The proposal secured the support of the EU which, up to this week, had been divided over the issue. But it was vetoed by Russia and China who see the Gaza War as a useful diplomatic tool for driving a wedge between America and the Global South.

Canada, however, has taken the dramatic step of stopping weapons sales to Israel because of the rising death toll in Gaza. Palestinian supporters in the Canadian House of Commons introduced the necessary legislation through a long-standing Canadian law that prohibits the sale of arms to countries that “violate human rights” or “harm women and children.” Canada’s Palestinian Solidarity Movement was pushing for the ban. However, it failed to persuade the government to issue more visas to Gazans fleeing the violence; impose sanctions against Israeli government leaders; recognize a Palestinian state and suspend all military and technology trade with Israel.

While the Biden Administration’s Security Council resolution was being vetoed.  Secretary of State Anthony Blinken arrived in Israel for talks with Netanyahu.  As his plane landed, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich announced that Israel was declaring another 1,977 acres of the West Bank Israeli “state land”—a clear signal that Israel was determined to take a strong and independent anti-Palestinian line regardless of American opposition.

In Qatar, ceasefire talks are deadlocked. Hamas refuses to release any hostages unless Netanyahu agrees an end to the war. Netanyahu has agreed to a six-week ceasefire and the increased flow of humanitarian aid in return for 40 hostages out an estimated 130 remaining. But, says Netanyahu, the war resumes after six weeks.

President Biden said an attack on Rafah is a “red line” without saying what happens if the line crossed. Netanyahu says he will attack regardless of Biden’s warning, but he will send a delegation to Washington to explain how the attack will be conducted “humanely.”

World Review

The Ukraine aid bill is starting to inch its way through the American House of Representatives. Up until this week the $60 billion much-needed package has been blocked by Speaker Mike Johnson’s refusal to allow Congress a vote on the issue.

He also tied the aid bill (which also includes money for Israel and Taiwan) to tougher laws on immigration.

This has clearly been done in collusion with Donald Trump who opposes aid to Ukraine and wants to delay any agreement on immigration so that he can make it his key election issue.

Senate Republicans have already passed the Ukraine aid bill and have been piling the pressure on Speaker Johnson to allow a vote. This week he agreed. But with several huge caveats. For a start, aid to Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan will be voted on separately. Next, he wants to change the wording of the legislation from “aid” to “loan” or possibly “lend-lease.”

Johnson also wants to explore the possibility of applying the profits from $300 billion of frozen Russian assets to the aid that Ukraine needs. This would involve something called the REPO Act or, The Rebuilding Economic Prosperity and Opportunity for Ukraine Act which authorizes the President to seize Russian assets.

The problem with the REPO Act is that it specifies that the seized assets should be used for reconstruction. Ukraine needs money to fight. Reconstruction comes after the fighting.

There are other problems with Johnson’s apparent change of heart. To start with, separating out the different clauses and turning aid into a loan will seriously delay the bill. Next, because it is substantially changed the bill will have to go back to the Senate and, finally, both houses of Congress are about to start their 22-day Easter recess.

Mike Johnson’s change of heart may actually be a change of delaying tactics.

Meanwhile the Europeans are trying to fill the gap and smooth over their differences over Ukraine. The last few weeks have seen French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olof Scholz sniping at each other over who is more generous to the brave Ukrainians.

Macron talked about the possibility of sending troops to Ukraine and urged Scholz to provide Volodomyr Zelensky with long-range Taurus missiles. The more cautious Scholz delivered a firm “nein” to sending troops and ruled out the despatch of Taurus because German soldiers would be needed to operate the system. Scholz also pointed out that Germany was providing a lot more money than France and that if the French leader wanted to help Ukraine he should put his money where his mouth is.

Enter Donald Tusk, former European Commission president and current prime minister of Poland. He called a meeting of the leaders of the EU’s two biggest countries to smooth out difficulties that were threatening to derail EU support for Ukraine.

The biggest and most immediate problem facing Ukraine is the lack of artillery shells. Russia is being well-supplied by North Korea and its own factories. Ukraine relies on the West. American aid is held up by Speaker Mike Johnson. Europe is willing but unable to fill the shortfall because its post-Cold War defense industries have been neglected.

The EU, however, does have the money. But, as Mr Tusk said: “Ukraine needs ammo, not money.” So the Tusk-Macron-Scholz meeting came up with a possible solution: Buy the necessary weaponry on the global markets. They should have no problem finding arms merchants prepared to sell them shells or almost anything else.

EU heads of government are meeting this weekend to discuss how much to pledge from both national and EU coffers to what is being called a “capacity coalition” to arm Ukraine. As well as buying shells on the global market, the Europeans will be discussing using the profits from frozen Russian assets, ramping up defence production and improving military cooperation between EU members.

Meanwhile it is worth noting that there was no press conference following the Tusk-Scholz-Macron summit. Differences remain and could easily surface again.

Democracy works in Russia, according to re-elected President Vladimir Putin. Yes, it does. It works for Putin. He managed to gather 87.23 percent of the vote. Such a margin has not been achieved since the days of one-party communist rule.

Congratulations were definitely required. And they came in from all the usual suspects: China, Venezuela, Cuba, Saudi Arabia, North Korea, United Arab Emirates and Iran. Hungary’s Viktor Orban broke ranks with his EU colleagues to join the list of dictators and autocrats. India’s Narendra Modi, leader of the world’s alleged largest democracy, also cabled a “well done Vladimir.” He can be excused because of India’s foreign policy of piggy-in-the-middle playing Russia and China off against each other.

Virtually all of the rest of the world dismissed the elections as a pointless sham.

Sham is right. Pointless is wrong. The elections provided Putin with a platform to enunciate his policies and plans for the Ukraine War (oops, I mean “Special Military Operation). It also allows the Russian leader to claim electoral legitimacy—even if it is based on a false premise. This legitimacy in turn allows Putin to step up his war in Ukraine and against the West in general.

Putin will undoubtedly soon organize another round of conscriptions. He has to in order to replace the estimated 350-500,000 casualties that Russia has so far suffered in the Ukraine War. Russian overseas opponents should also be watching their backs as he will claim that the start of his fourth presidential term justifies a fresh round of assassinations.

Militarily, the focus will continue to be on Ukraine but Moldova and Georgia are worried.  Putin could also stir up trouble between Serbia and Kosovo and Armenia and Azerbaijan. The Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania are already voicing their concern, but they have the NATO shield. So does new Alliance member Finland whose 830-mile border with Russia now has fresh troops on the Russian side.

Also expect an increase in disinformation and cyber wars, especially in the November presidential elections in the US and the European Parliament elections in June. Ukraine will be target number one for the Russian hackers. Last year they launched 2,554 cyber-attacks Ukrainian targets.

Hong Kong needs foreign investment. China needs Hong Kong, especially now that a combination of tariffs, de-risking policies and sanctions has led to a flight of foreign capital from Mainland China on top of faltering growth and the collapse of the property sector.

Which is why it is difficult to understand why Hong Kong’s Legislative Council has shot itself in the economic foot with a fresh round of anti-dissent regulations.

This Tuesday the one-party unicameral legislature passed Article 23 which lists new and tougher laws related to treason, espionage, theft of state secrets, sedition and foreign interference. New restrictions are placed on all foreign entities—government, non-government, media and businesses—and all Hong Kong residents who interact with them.

Foreign correspondents are already packing their bags. Hong Kong has long been a popular base for journalists covering China and elsewhere in the region. Now they are moving to Singapore, Taiwan or Japan.

The media helped to attract businessmen who needed to be close to their information sources. But more importantly, the businesses need to be free to speak to each other and government officials without fear of ending up in a Chinese court.

Xi jingping says he wants foreign businesses to invest in Hong Kong and that Article 23 is designed to create “a secure and stable environment.” Hong Kong officials add that to attract foreign businesses, the legislative council has reduced property taxes and hosted an increasing number of well-attended trade fairs. True, but most of the participants are from Mainland China.

___________________

Tom Arms is foreign editor of Liberal Democratic Voice and the author of “America Made in Britain” and “The Encyclopaedia of the Cold War.” He also co-hosts the world affairs podcast TransAtlantic Riff 

https://open.spotify.com/show/3ntjretAKNLZNFpA5ZEGDG?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

The post Observations of an Expat: US Support for Israel Cracks first appeared on Sindh Courier.

By Tom Arms

The European Union is preparing for what was unthinkable—American withdrawal from NATO.

They have been spurred into action not just by Donald Trump’s offer to Vladimir Putin to “do what you want” with any NATO member who fails to devote two percent of their GDP to defence.

No, Europeans detect 1—a growing undercurrent of isolationism; 2- an American perception that the biggest threat to their national interests lie in Asia; 3- that Americans feel that Europeans have taken advantage of American military largesse for too long and 4- Even the greatest military power in the history of the world can’t fight a two-front war in Asia and Europe.

Read: Trump will pull US out of NATO if he wins election, ex-adviser warns

None of the above concerns take into account the many benefits America derives from membership of NATO.  And the fact is, that Americans, especially MAGA Republicans, are in no mood to listen.

That is why this week the EU launched its European Defense Industry Strategy. At the moment the US supplies about half of the armaments required by its European allies. If Europe is to stand alone then it needs an armaments industry to supplies its troops.

Read: Trump didn’t quit NATO, but a potential second term alarms allies

Launching the EDI Strategy, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen called on EU members to spend at least half of their defense procurement budgets on European-produced weaponry.

To encourage national defense ministries to “buy European,” the commission is dangling a few carrots. For a start, they are offering to exempt ministries from paying VAT on EU-made guns and bullets.

They are also establishing a “High Level Defense Industry Group” to help coordinate procurement programs and an organization to sell the increased defense production to third countries.

Read: Congress approves bill barring any president from unilaterally withdrawing from NATO

And finally, to further encourage the growth of an EU defense industry, the commission plans to partly finance this growth in advance by pre-sales to non-EU armies, air forces and navies.

But there are problems with this plan. For a start most defence planners agree that if America withdrew from NATO that the Europeans—and possibly Canadians as well– best course of action would be to simply move into the NATO positions formerly held by the Americans.

This is because of the past 75 years NATO has developed elaborate and successful command and control systems and lines of communication. Why re-invent the wheel. And, it is all well and good to have more weapons, but Europe also needs tried and test systems to deploy them effectively.

The next problem is that not all members of the EU are members of NATO. Austria, Cyprus, Ireland, and Malta are EU members but not in NATO. Iceland, Norway, Britain, Canada, Albania, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Turkey are members of the NATO alliance but not in the EU.

Ukraine, is included in the planned European Defense Industry Strategy but is neither a member of the EU or NATO.

Read: What if America leaves NATO?

Britain is, of course, one of the most important components in any European-only defense system who is not a member of the EU. The Royal Navy would almost certainly have to assume most of the responsibility for guarding the North Sea, Greenland-Iceland-UK Gap, the English Channel and the approaches to the Channel. Britain also has the second largest defense budget within NATO.

Most important of all, if Europe is to have any kind of nuclear umbrella it needs Britain. The UK has an estimated 250 nuclear warheads, most of them situated at the tips of Trident II missiles which can be launched from its four Vanguard-class submarines.

The French have another 250. And since 2010 Britain and France have been cooperating in the development and production of nuclear warheads. Of course, 500 warheads is less than a tenth of the size of the Russian arsenal. But it is conceivable that Europe can develop a minimum deterrence policy. After all, at the height of the Sino-Soviet split, the Chinese held off Moscow with only 300 warheads.

What is inconceivable, is a European defense system without Britain.

World Review

Keep your eye on Israeli politician Benny Gantz. He is currently the bookies’ favorite to be Israel’s next Prime Minister.

More importantly, he has hinted at a willingness to discuss the two-state solution.

This has put him in direct conflict with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the far-right coalition members of his government. They are totally opposed to the two-state solution which is being pushed by the US, Europe, the Arab world and virtually everyone except Netanyahu and Co.

Gantz’s political flexibility earned him an invitation to visit Washington where this week he met with Vice President Kamala Harris and Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

The visit was not cleared with Netanyahu who ordered Michael Herzog, Israel’s ambassador in Washington, to do everything possible to sabotage the Gantz visit.

And when the minister-without-portfolio returned he was told by Netanyahu that “Israel has only one prime minister.” That prime minister, it must be said, has yet to receive an invitation to visit the Biden White House.

Gantz is leader of the National Unity Party. Like so many Israeli politicians he came through the ranks of the military, eventually becoming army chief of staff in 2012. Then in 2018 he decided to turn his hand to politics and very quickly emerged as the main opposition figure to Netanyahu.

After the October 7 attack by Hamas, Netanyahu invited Gantz to join a national unity war cabinet, along with three other members of his party

Gantz accepted and is in full agreement with Netanyahu on the need for total victory over Hamas. But the two men part company over what happens next.

Netanyahu is adamant in his refusal to discuss a two-state solution or anything even remotely resembling a two=state solution.

But in 2020, Gantz told the Munich Security Conference: “Eventually we will find ourselves a two-entity solution in which we respect Palestinian sovereignty and governance but we will be respected for our security needs.”

Despite repeated questioning by journalists and others, Gantz refused to define “entity.” But position was clear enough to prompt far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich to describe Benny Gantz as the “weak link” in Israel’s war cabinet. This week Smotrich stood up in the Knesset and demanded that Gantz declare his opposition to the two-state solution. Gantz’s reply was a deafening silence.

Meanwhile the minister-without-portfolio continues to rise in the opinion polls and Netanyahu continues to fall. According to a poll this week by Israel’s Channel 10, voters believe that Netanyahu is prolonging the war for his own political ends. According to the poll, voters think that the prime minister knows that when the war ends he will unceremoniously be voted out of office and – without immunity from prosecution–face a series of long-standing corruption charges.

***

The Sudanese Civil War is a forgotten war. It shouldn’t be.

Not only is Sudan a major humanitarian crisis with upwards of ten million displaced people, but it is turning into a geopolitical battleground pulling in many of the world’s major powers.

At its core, the war is a power struggle between two men: the leader of the Sudanese army General Abdul Fattah al-Burhan and the head of Sudan’s feared paramilitary forces General Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo who goes by the nom de guerre of Hemedti.

Hemedti has one big advantage—he controls the country’s gold producing regions. Sudan is the third largest gold producer in Africa after Ghana and South Africa. It produces about $1.3 billion worth of gold a year.

Usually this money goes straight into government coffers. But at the moment it is going to pay for Putin’s war machine via the Wagner Group who is supplying weapons and men in return for illegal gold mining rights.

This has drawn Ukraine into the Sudanese civil war. They recently dispatched war-hardened commandos to the aid of General Burhan because they want to stop the flow of gold to Russia.

The United Arab Emirates have also become involved because they have a stake as middle men in the sale of the gold. They back Hemedti.

The US and Britain are being drawn in because they are concerned about Putin using the Wagner Group to establish a base on the Red Sea. Sudan borders both the Red Sea, the Sahel region and the Horn of Africa.

It also has the Nile running through it. This makes it of interest to Egypt, which is also supporting General Burhan. Ethiopia, who is in the middle of a dispute with Egypt over the Nile water rights, supports Hemedti.

Possibly because it doesn’t want be left out, Saudi Arabia is also involved. But it is hedging its bets by talking with both sides. In the meantime the ten million remain homeless.

***

Economists reckon that the Chinese economy needs to grow by eight percent a year. Less than that and the Chinese Communist Party will have difficulty in providing the social services needed to stave off political unrest.

Last year it grew at five percent. Next year, according to a speech this week by Premier Li Qiang to the rubber stamp National People’s Congress, the economy will grow another five percent.

In fact, most Western economists doubt even the five percent figure. But they can’t provide an accurate statistic because of lack of transparency on the part of the Chinese Communist Party.

There are lots of reasons for the Chinese slowdown. The sanctions and “de-risking” policies of the West are having an effect, especially as the Chinese economy requires large injections of foreign capital. The global cost-of-living crisis caused primarily by the Ukraine War, is also impacting on Chinese exports. Western households just don’t have the money to buy Chinese goods.

Then there is the property market. Seventy percent of Chinese household wealth is tied up in real estate and the real estate sector is crashing.

Related to property is government investment in infrastructure which has been paid for by borrowings. The Chinese government borrowings have increased six-fold since 2000 to 335 percent of the Chinese GDP.

The easy answer to the problems of the Chinese economy is to mobilize their 1.41 billion citizens to spend more. The CCP was hoping for just that when the covid emergency stopped. It didn’t happen. And the reason it didn’t happen is because the Chinese people are saving for what they fear will be a very rainy day.

***

Excitement in the South China Sea this week. The Philippines Coast Guard and their Chinese equivalent clashed with a couple of rammings and damage to a Filipino vessel by a Chinese water cannon.

The government of Bongbong Marcos is currently in the frontline opposing Chinese sovereignty claims over the South China Sea. His hand is strengthened by the recent return of US troops to the Philippines and the country’s long-standing Mutual Defense Treaty with America.

The Philippines is only one of several countries that dispute Beijing’s claim to all of the South China Sea. But it is the only one that has staked out a physical presence.

That presence is a rusty rat-infested World War Two ship the Sierra Madre. The Philippines ran the ship aground on the Second Thomas Shoal in the Spratly Islands. The government then based a small rotating detachment of marines on the ship.

This week’s clash came about because a small flotilla of Philippines Coast Guard vessels was attempting to re-supply the marines. They were blocked by up to 25 Chinese ships. One Filipino ship was rammed and another had its windows broken by a water cannon. CNN cameras caught the action.

One of the Philippines Coast Guard vessels managed to break through the blockade to bring food and fresh water to the Sierra Madre. It will be another 90 days before another supply attempt is made.

The Philippines are particularly concerned about the effect that the Chinese claim has on their fishing industry which employs 1.6 million people. The South China Sea is one of the world’s richest fishing grounds. Its 3,365 known species are estimated to represent 12 percent of the world’s fish.

The 1.3 million square miles of the South China is also the world’s busiest shipping lane. $3.4 trillion worth of trade passes through it every year. And underneath the seabed is reckoned to be 11 billion barrels of oil and 190 trillion cubic feet of natural gas.

The Philippines, Brunei, Vietnam, Taiwan and Malaysia all claim economic rights to a portion of the South China Sea. Each country’s slice is based on the UN-recognized 200-mile limit or median line. China claims it all. Its claim has been rejected by the International Court of Justice, but has the support of 66 other countries.

Read: Observations of an Expat: Space Wars

____________________

Tom Arms is foreign editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and the author of “The Encyclopedia of the Cold War.” He is also co-host of the world affairs podcast “TransAtlantic Riff” which can be heard by clicking here.

https://open.spotify.com/show/3ntjretAKNLZNFpA5ZEGDG?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

The post Observations of an Expat: Unthinkable first appeared on Sindh Courier.

By Tom Arms

Towards the end of last year a group of far-right German political leaders gathered in a country hotel on the outskirts of Potsdam.

They included key members of Germany’s Alternative fur Deutschland (AfD) party including the personal aide to the party leader Alice Weidel.

The AfD is currently riding high in German opinion polls. It is number one in Germany’s five eastern Lander (states) and placing second or third in several Lander in the Western half.

The meeting was organized to hear a proposal from Austrian Martin Sellner, former leader of the Identitarian Movement. Sellner has been banned from Britain and the US. His Identitarian Movement is a proscribed organization in Germany.

But the AfD politicians still wanted to hear his ideas, especially Sellner’s proposed “remigration” program. The plan was simple: Should the AfD come to power it would forcibly deport to an unnamed North African country millions of “non-assimilated peoples” and asylum seekers, even if they had German citizenship or permanent residence visas. Sellner also suggested that people who campaigned against the measure could also be deported.

The plan was simple: Should the AfD come to power it would forcibly deport to an unnamed North African country millions of “non-assimilated peoples” and asylum seekers

This is not the first time in German history that such a measure has been proposed. In June 1940 Adolf Eichmann persuaded Hitler that the SS should take over the French colony of Madagascar, turn into an SS-run police state, and deport Europe’s Jews to the island. The plan failed because of the wartime British naval blockade.

When details of the Potsdam meeting were published in the investigative journal Correctiv anti-AfD demonstrations broke out in Hamburg, Cologne, Berlin and Dusseldorf. The demonstrators demanded that the AfD be banned.

This is legally quite possible. The German constitution says that political parties “that seek to undermine or abolish the free democratic order should be deemed unconstitutional.” Advocating the forcible deportation of German citizens could be construed as undermining the democratic order.

And there is precedent for German courts banning parties. Just this week they banned the neo-Nazi party Die Heimat (The Homeland). The Identitarian Movement is also banned. It asserts the superior rights of European ethnic groups and White people in general in the territories claimed exclusively by them.

The Identiarian Movement, with which Martin Sellner is connected, also pushes the “Great Replacement” conspiracy theory. This argues that liberal elites are working towards replacing White Europeans and European culture with non-Europeans.

Another organization that has been linked with the AfD is PEGIDA (Pan Europeans against the Islamisation of the West). This organization is supported by White supremacists in America and Europe.

The AfD, Identitarian Movement and PEGIDA are all carefully monitored by Germany’s Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution. But the AfD’s popularity, especially in the eastern half of the country makes it almost impossible to ban the party no matter how outrageous its pronouncements and policies become.

Another organization is PEGIDA (Pan Europeans against the Islamisation of the West). This organization is supported by White supremacists in America and Europe

The party was founded in 2013 and in its first federal elections failed to reach the five percent threshold required for Bundestag representation. But they quickly improved. After the 2017 elections they held 93 seats in the Bundestag and had secured representation in 14 out of the 16 Lander.

The AfD is particularly strong in East Germany. They have formed the governments in Saxony and Thuringia. Their strong showing in the territories of the former German Democratic Republic has been attributed to East Germany’s history of autocratic politics and the fact that the region continues to lag behind the rest of the country in economic terms.

The party dropped into fifth place nationally after the latest federal elections. But since then Germany has suffered a series of economic setbacks, the repercussions of the Ukraine War and a rather lack-luster Chancellor in the form of Olof Scholz. The result is that the party is now in second place in the opinion polls, ahead of the SPD and just behind the CDU-CSU.

The respected German Institute for Human Rights said the AfD was implementing “racist and right-wing extremist goals” and “shifting the limits of what can be said so that people can get used to their ethno-nationalist positions.” The Institute concluded that the AfD had reached a “degree of dangerousness” that it should be banned.

Not surprisingly, the leadership of the SPD agrees. The CDU/CSU is more circumspect. Banning established parties, they argue, is difficult. The voting public is split. 47 percent of Germans say ban them and 47 percent say don’t.

World Review

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi has kicked off his election campaign with a prayer. And it was a prayer in the most controversial ethno-religious setting that he could find, thus further strengthening his ethno-religious claim to be the standard bearer of Hindu Nationalism.

The setting was the consecration of a partially-constructed Hindu temple in the town of Ayodha. It was controversial because the temple is being built on the site of a 16th century Muslim mosque which was torn down by Hindu nationalist rioters in 1992.

Related news: Ayodhya Ram Mandir: India PM Modi inaugurates Hindu temple on razed Babri mosque site

The destruction of the mosque led to nationwide religious riots which left 2,000 dead, most of them Muslims.

The Hindus tore down the mosque because they believed that it was built on the birthplace of Lord Ram, the chief deity in the Hindu pantheon of gods.

Modi made it one of his key election pledges that a Hindu temple dedicated to Lord Ram would be built on the site of the former mosque.

And to insure the maximum political return, Modi pulled out all the stops for the consecration of the temple and placed himself at center stage. For a start, the Indian Prime Minister dressed in the saffron robes of a Hindu monk and publicly fasted for five days before the consecration.

Then he invited every possible Bollywood star, businessman and politician–except Muslims and the opposition Congress I Party—to the consecration.

A military helicopter was ordered to fly overheard during the consecration ceremony showering flower petals on the crowd. Modi, of course, led the prayers.

Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first prime minister, was immensely proud of the fact that the Indian constitution declared India a secular nation. Modi is doing his best to reverse that.

***

NATO this week launched its biggest European military manoeuvres since the end of the Cold War.

Codenamed Exercise Steadfast Defender it involves 91,000 service personnel from 31 NATO countries and Sweden. It is the first time Finland will be participating as a full member of the Alliance.

Sweden’s NATO membership was finally approved by Turkey this week and is expected to get the final nod from the Hungarian parliament next month.

Steadfast Defender is meant to demonstrate NATO—and especially American—commitment to the defense of Europe. It involves all three branches of the military—army, navy and air force—and will focus on moving troops as fast as possible into the new frontline states of Finland, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Bulgaria, Greece, Poland and Slovakia.

The Russians have lodged the usual protests, but more importantly they have used their bases in Kaliningrad to jam military GPS devices in the Baltic Region.

***

Trump has won in New Hampshire. He was won in Iowa. He is expected to win in Nikki Haley’s home state of South Carolina.

The agenda for the Republican primaries is looking more and more like a rolling Trump coronation. But the pundits may be looking at the wrong agenda. They might need to spend more time examining the court calendars.

One of the several polls that was conducted during the Iowa caucus was whether the voter would vote for Donald Trump if he was convicted of a serious felony. A third of Iowans who caucused for Trump said a Trump conviction would make him unfit to be president.

If this figure were to be extrapolated nationwide then Trump would fail dismally.

There are four big cases which could result in a major felony conviction. But the odds are that for various reasons, three of them are unlikely to be heard before November. But the fourth case is the biggest and most damaging—the case brought by the Department of Justice and Special Prosecutor Jack Smith for attempted subversion of the 2020 presidential elections.

Trump’s lawyers are employing every legal trick in and out of the books to delay, delay, delay until after November when—if Trump wins—he can pardon himself.

The legal team is currently concentrating on arguing that the former president has absolute immunity for anything involving his election lie and the January 6 riots. The argument will almost certainly go all the way to the US Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court Justices could hear arguments next, month or March, unless the conservative Trump-appointed Justices seek to delay. This is unlikely given the precarious reputation of the court at the moment.

If Trump’s immunity claims are heard by March then the Supreme Court should issue its ruling by late June or early July. This gives the DC court and Judge Tanya Chutkan four months in which to schedule a trial date. Jack Smith reckons that the trial will last four to six weeks. It would be tight.  Trump’s lawyers will continue to delay, delay, delay. But Donald Trump could be found guilty (or not guilty) before the Americans troop to the polls in November.

Read previous blog: Observations of an Expat: Famine

________________

Tom Arms is foreign editor of Liberal Democrat Voice. His book “America Made in Britain” is out in paperback next month and his podcast TransAtlantic Riff may be heard by clicking here:  https://open.spotify.com/show/3ntjretAKNLZNFpA5ZEGDG

The post Observations of an Expat: In a Potsdam Hotel first appeared on Sindh Courier.

By Tom Arms

The world is suffering one of its worst post-war food crises.

Before the Hamas attack on October 7, some 333 million people in the 78 countries covered by the World Food Program were suffering what food gurus call “acute levels of food insecurity.”

The WFP’s latest figures do not cover the 26 million North Koreans, half of whom are said to be suffering from malnutrition.

Neither do they include Gaza where 2.2 million people are literally starving to death. Another 129,000 are facing a thin coffin in an early grave in Mali, Burkina Faso, Somalia, and Sudan.

Feeding these people. Providing them with the means to feed themselves, is not just the right moral thing to do. It is in the interests of the developed world.

The starving millions are driven by the survival instinct to walk, fly, or even sail across the sea in rubber dinghies to countries that don’t want them but can feed them.

The problem is that the situation is likely to become much, much worse, and there is little prospect of getting any better.

Also read: Hundreds of thousands are starving in Gaza as famine arrives at ‘incredible speed,’ UN aid chief warns

The rising food prices which have struck the developed world’s households are also hitting aid agencies budgets, and low growth in the developed world means lower tax revenues and less money for food aid.

The WFP budget last year was $14.1 billion. They will be lucky to raise the same amount this year, and the WFP has several million more mouths to feed.

The problems are further compounded by a shortage of fertilizer caused by the Ukraine War. Three of the biggest fertilizer-producing countries are Russia, Ukraine and Belarus. The cost of agricultural fertilizer has rocketed to a ten-year high.

In the first 18 months or so of the Ukraine War the drop in fertilizer volumes had little effect on crop yields because of the time lag caused by the growing season and fertilizer storage capacity.

But the impact will be felt this spring as farmers are unable to spread adequate muck on hungry crops such as soya, rice, maize, soybeans and wheat—the major foodstuffs.

War is the biggest driver of famine. When the fighting starts the farming stops. The ground is churned by tank treads and exploding landmines rather than productively ploughed for arable crops.

There is no end in sight to the fighting in Ukraine. Or for that matter Gaza, Somalia, Mali, Sudan, Burkina Faso…. All those places are guaranteed to continue to generate empty stomachs and desperate immigrants.

World Review

Surprise, Surprise, Benjamin Netanyahu is opposed to the two-state solution.

The Israeli Prime Minister has never made any secret that he believes that the only guarantee of Israeli security is Israeli control of Palestinian security. On Thursday he reiterated his position.

Any Palestinian state, Netanyahu argues, would be dedicated to the overthrow of the Israeli state. And even if they publicly committed themselves to peace, Netanyahu wouldn’t believe them.

The primary responsibility of every country is defense.  Ipso facto, there can be no Palestinian state—according to Netanyahu.

Most of the rest of the world believes that there are basically three possible outcomes to the Arab-Israeli Crisis: The Israelis wipe out the Palestinians. The Palestinians wipe out the Israelis. Or the two sides somehow work out a modus operandi that allows the two groups to live side by side in peace.

The Biden Administration was hopeful that the experience of Gaza would show that the only long-term opportunity for peace is a political solution which involves a Palestinian state.

But Netanyahu appears unfazed by Gaza. He told a press conference this week that Israel must have security control over all land west of the River Jordan, which would include the territory of any future Palestinian state.

“This is a necessary condition, and it conflicts with the idea of (Palestinian) sovereignty. What to do? I tell this truth to our American friends, and I also told them to stop the attempt to impose a reality on us that would harm Israel’s security.”

John Kirby, the US National Security Adviser, replied: “Israel and the US see things differently.”

Donald Trump, on the other hand, sees the Middle East very much through Bibi eyes. His Abraham Accords were designed to circumvent the Palestinians and the two-state solution. Netanyahu’s continued intransigence could—at least in part—reflect his hope for a Trump victory in the November presidential elections.

Iowa was a Trump landslide. Or was it? Only 15 percent of the state’s 718,000 registered Republicans voted—the lowest turnout in years.

Why? There is no certain answer but here are a few possibles, starting with the MAGA camp: The weather was atrocious. Nobody in their right mind would risk leaving home to caucus in the sub-Arctic temperatures.

Also, the media named Trump the big margin winner before the caucusing started. Why bother risking frostbite to vote for one of the losers or even for the winner? Best stay warm.

Now, for the non-MAGA Republican perspective: We don’t want Trump, but none of the others can win, so why risk hypothermia for a wasted vote?

Everyone is an individual, even in Iowa. So chances are that there are 69,000 reasons why 85 percent of the state’s Republicans failed to caucus. But if that figure is extrapolated across America—then Trump is in trouble come the general election.

As any seasoned campaigner will tell you. The key to winning elections is to persuade as many as possible of your registered voters to get out and vote. Apathy can result in political disaster.

***

Conspicuous by its near silence in the aftermath of the Taiwanese elections is the voice of Chinese President Xi-jingping.

To briefly re-cap, the Chinese leader was loud in his election support for the Kuomintang but and condemnation for the incumbent Democratic People’s Party. This is because the KMT favored closer relations with Mainland China based on the 1992 “one country two systems” concept. The DPP, on the other hand, is moving Taiwan closer to a quasi-sovereign independent state.

The DPP’s William Lai won the presidency, although the party has lost its majority in the Chinese parliament.

The US is in two-minds about the result. They want Taiwan in the democratic capitalist camp. But not necessarily as a sovereign Taiwan. This could provoke Beijing into a military solution which would drag in America’s Pacific-based Seventh Fleet.

So the State Department issued a rather anodyne statement which welcomed the fact that Taiwan held democratic elections, without focusing on the possible repercussions. Statements from Japan, the EU and NATO countries followed suit.

Beijing was, if anything, more anodyne, it has said virtually nothing about the election result itself. Instead it focused on the statements from the Western countries and basically said they had no right to make any comment because Taiwan is part of China. The diplomatic conversation then ended.

There could be lots of reasons for the Chinese not to take the argument further. There is no point. Xi is busy purging his military and party structures. The Chinese economy is sluggish. Or, he could be waiting for a Trump victory in November.

***

Is honor now satisfied in the Iran-Pakistan tit for that missile exchanges?

The first blow was delivered by Iran against an Iranian terrorist group near Panjgur Baluchostan called Jaish-al-Adl. Two children and a number others were seriously injured. Pakistan’s ambassador to Iran was recalled and the Iranian ambassador, who was visiting Tehran, was told not to return.

A few days later Pakistan retaliated with a strike against an anti-Pakistan terrorist group which they called Sarmachas.  Nine people died. The Pakistanis claimed that the attack was designed to deter “a large-scale terrorist attack” from Iran.

Also read: Pakistan conducts ‘precision military strikes’ in Iran

There is a long 565-mile border between the two countries. Some of the inhospitable terrain on other side is used as bases for attacks both countries. The difficulties involved in policing the region provides a reasonably safe haven for terrorist groups.

Iranian-Pakistan relations have see-sawed over the years, but the biggest bones of contention have been attitudes towards Afghanistan and religious divisions. Pakistan has supported the Sunni Taliban while Iran backs Afghanistan’s Shia tribes.

The situation is complicated by a Balochistan Liberation Army which wants to hive off bits of Iran, Pakistan and southern Afghanistan to form their own state. They end up fighting everyone, including Jaish al-Adi.

Also read: Pakistan recalls its ambassador from Iran after airstrikes

There is the additional problem that both Iran and Pakistan have enough security problems elsewhere. Pakistan has tricky situations in Afghanistan, Kashmir, and of course in its relations with India. Iran is deeply embroiled in the wider Middle East problems with its support for the Houthis, Hamas and Hezbollah. Neither needs another security headache.

Which could explain why Pakistan followed its missile attack with an olive branch. The foreign ministry said: “Pakistan fully respects the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Iran. The sole objective of today’s act was in pursuit of Pakistan’s own security and national interest which is paramount and cannot be compromised.”

In the meantime, China, the only country which has close relations with both Iran and Pakistan has offered to mediate, thus giving Beijing an opportunity to widen its Middle East footprint.

***

Individual European countries refuse to give up on Ukraine. American Republicans are holding up $61 billion in aid and Hungary’s Viktor Orban is blocking European Commission help worth $76 billion.

But Orban’s veto does not stop individual European countries from acting independently.

The Baltic States are in the frontline both literally and financially. Tiny Estonia has just pledged $1.3 billion in aid and increased its defense budget to three percent of GDP.

Britain’s Rishi Sunak recently flew into Kyiv to pledge another $3.2 billion and to offer help in beefing up Ukraine’s drone production industry.

French President Emmanuel Macron is expected to visit Ukraine month with a pledge to provide long-range French SCALP missiles.  Germany is doubling its aid to $9 billion.

In the meantime, the situation on the ground is stalemate. Russia appears to have replaced the soldiers it lost last year with 426,000 fresh conscripts. But there is no sign that either the Russians or Ukrainians are making a serious dent into the complex network of defences that separate the Russian-held Donbass Region from the rest of Ukraine.

Both sides appear to preparing for the long-term, and so is Europe. Thierry Breton, said this week that he would in February propose a $100 billion defense investment program. The aim would be to expand European defense industries to enable them to produce the weapons that Ukraine needs.

_________________________

Tom Arms is Foreign Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice. He is currently updating his “Encyclopaedia of the Cold War” and is the author of “America Made in Britain” which is available in paperback next month. Tom Arms also co-hosts the podcast “TransAtlantic Riff”

https://open.spotify.com/show/3ntjretAKNLZNFpA5ZEGDG

The post Observations of an Expat: Famine first appeared on Sindh Courier.