Momina Khan

Bagram Airbase, the once US stronghold and epicenter of American presence in Afghanistan has once again gained prominence after President Trump publicly demanded the return of the base from the Taliban regime. The Bagram Airbase, located in the Parwan province was initially built by the Russians in the 1950’s and was later on run by Washington during its war in Afghanistan. The base was eventually vacated in 2021 as a part of the US withdrawal strategy. This abandoned military airbase, which was home to approximately thousands of soldiers alongside being the largest American base in Afghanistan features well preserved concrete runways, hangars, control tower and a hospital. President Trump now seems to be interested in retaking control of the well-equipped airbase, where millions of dollars were spent on advanced infrastructure and logistical capabilities.

During a joint conference with the British Premier, President Trump reiterated his call of reestablishing US presence at the strategically significant Bagram airbase by stating, “That could be a little breaking news. We’re trying to get it back because they need things from us. We want the base back.”

President Trump had suspended the funding for humanitarian assistance in Afghanistan back in January 2025 which has negatively impacted the lives of millions of vulnerable Afghans across the country. The Taliban regime has been appealing for economic and diplomatic normalization and might be looking for a breakthrough, which President Trump has hinted in his statement.

Bagram Airbase, a stark reminder of US power is far too significant to be abandoned. Located in the Parwan province, it is well connected to key cities and has been of vital strategic importance throughout history. Modern day Bagram was initially conquered by the Persian Empire and later on Alexander the Great ended up settling there while looking for a strong base at the foothills of the Hindu Kush.

During Alexander’s time, the city was named after him and was called “Alexandria of the Caucasus”.Bagram also served as the summer capital of the Kushan dynasty, thus promoting elaborate interaction of art and religion. Hence, since ancient times Bagram’s control was considered crucial for commercial and military dominance in the region.

The 2021 chaotic American withdrawal from Afghanistan is the repetition of a tactical miscalculation leading to strategic and economic vacuum in Afghanistan, thus replaying discordant notes of the past. The previous US disengagement from Afghanistan after the Soviets left had led to an internal civil war amongst various Mujahideen groups. The Taliban later on emerged from these groups and seized control of the country eventually supplying a training base for Osama bin Laden.

In 2021 President Trump voiced his worry on China’s increasing engagement in Afghanistan during an interview with Fox News. He registered his concerns by stating that China would “take over Bagram.”After the recent Taliban takeover, Beijing has formed a multi-pronged policy with the Afghan government, prioritizing its security interests and has obtained security guarantees from the Taliban regime. While the American withdrawal was in process in 2021, a Taliban delegation met the Chinese foreign minister in Tianjin where, “the delegation assured China that they will not allow anyone to use Afghan soil against China.”

One of China’s primary security concerns tends to be from East Turkmenistan Islamic movement whose main is to liberate the Xinjiang province from the Chinese. Furthermore China is interested in a relatively stable Afghanistan which would thus enable the protection of its economic interests. At the same time China also hopes to work with international and regional powers to ensure peace and stability across the region. With respect to the American decision to reestablish the US presence at the Bagram Airbase, the Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Lin Jian responded by saying that, “The future of Afghanistan should be in the hands of Afghan people.” He further stressed that, “stirring up tension and confrontation in the region will not be supported.”

America’s recent domineering strategy with regards to reclaiming Bagram can visibly disrupt regional stability alongside dragging Pakistan into another regional quagmire. Mired in turmoil and political strife, Pakistan is already grappling with security challenges related to insurgency movements and terrorism. Frequent disputes at Pak Afghan border along with domestic terrorist acts by Tehrik-e-Taliban and Baluch insurgents are obvious obstacles to Pakistan’s security. While dealing with these security threats, mere implementation of military strategies have not yet yielded desired results and amidst this instability, any foreign intervention in Afghanistan could create further complications for the Pakistani state. Being already riddled with security threats, Pakistan has limited capacity to handle additional geopolitical dilemmas and any misadventure across Afghan border could deteriorate its precarious security scenario.

Read: Ripple effect of Israeli attack on Doha

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The writer is a freelance journalist focusing on politics, international relations and tourism.

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By Tom Arms

G7 in Cornwall, NATO heads of government in Brussels and finally a Putin-Biden face-to-face on the shores of Lake Geneva in Switzerland. It is President Joe Biden’s first foreign trip and designed to show, in his words, that “America is back.”

Not with the unilateralist, like it or lump it foreign policy of the Trump years, but with a return to across the board multilateralist-driven leadership. One of the keys to this new policy will be US-Russian relations. And a big part of the meetings in Cornwall and Brussels is finalizing tactics for the summit in Geneva.

The US president has a long list of grievances to present to Vladimir Putin: Belarus, Crimea, Ukraine, Syria, election meddling, cyber-attacks, intermediate nuclear weapons, human rights, corruption and sanctuary for ransomware criminals….

He will deliver the list and then move on. Biden did not ask for the summit to list grievances. He asked for it to forge a new and more pragmatic relationship with Moscow as a counter to the real threat—China. During the Cold War years, the US successfully played Beijing off against the Russians. Now it is time to play the reverse side of the diplomatic coin: Russia against China.

But to judge the success of such a strategy you have to first understand the Russian leader’s position. And to do that you have to start from the premise that Russia is a failing state. However, it is also an ambitious failing state with the world’s largest nuclear arsenal—6,257 warheads. Putin inherited an economy that was tanking. He stopped the precipitous decline by selling out to oligarchs and has ended up a prisoner of the corrupt system he created.

Russian billionaires swan about the world in their private jets and super yachts while the Russian masses are possibly economically worse off than they were under Soviet rule. To divert the hoi polloi from their problems Putin sets out to discredit the West—especially America—so that his own “illiberal democracy” makes Russians feel good about themselves in comparison. As with most foreign policies, start with the domestic concerns.

But there are other traditional historic concerns. The Russians have been obsessed with invasion from the West since the failed march on Moscow by Napoleon’s Grand Army. Hitler’s Operation Barbarossa and the Great Patriotic War is still an everyday political fact of Russian life. Soviet control of Eastern Europe and the division of Germany is hailed as a Russian diplomatic triumph which many would like to see emulated.

The reason is that Moscow sits on the Eastern edge of the North European plain which stretches all the way to the North Sea and performs the role of two-way invasion route for opposing tank-based armies. Putin’s aim—probably the aim of any Russian leader—is to push the Russian sphere of influence and control as far to the West of Moscow as is possible. That is why he supports the unedifying and brutal dictatorship of Alexander Lukashenko in Belarus. It is why he has annexed Crimea and dispatched “volunteers” to fight for a breakaway state in Ukraine. It explains the heavily-armed Russian enclave of Kaliningrad on the Baltic and warnings about the West providing support to Ukraine.

It also explains why Putin is dragging his feet over re-negotiating a deal limiting intermediate range nuclear weapon—the INF Treaty. These weapons are targeted almost exclusively on NATO forces in Western Europe. Strategic weapons are covered by the US-Russian Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty which has successfully reduced the intercontinental ballistic missiles that each country has aimed at the other.

The START Treaty has recently been renewed (February 2021) and will now run until February 2026. The renewal of START and the foot-dragging over INF is a prime example of what nuclear strategists refer to as Russian attempts at de-coupling the United States from the defence of Western Europe. Russia makes concessions on nuclear weapons aimed at the US to make Washington feel good while increasing the pressure on its European backyard, thus raising the question in America of the benefit of protecting Europe.

Biden will come under pressure at the NATO heads of government meeting in Brussels to push for a renewed and—hopefully tougher—INF Treaty. The problem is that saving START at the expense of INF may be one of the few negotiating tactics available to the US president. And at the moment he has few weapons in his negotiating armoury. As long as Putin is meddling in elections, Ukraine and Belarus the US-led West will impose sanctions. They are highly unlikely to be lifted in Geneva or at any time soon. So INF could be kicked into the long grass in order to win concessions over Russian positions on China.

At the moment Beijing and Moscow appear to be marching in lock-step towards an anti-Western future. But history has taught us that this is unlikely to last. Not only do we have the experience of the Sino-Soviet split of the Cold War years, but the Russians have long and vivid memories of the 240-year reign of the Golden Horde which swept out of the East in 1240 and left Moscow and Kiev smouldering wrecks. The invasion routes come from the East as well as the West, which could explain why Putin works hard to maintain influence in the former Soviet states in Central Asia.

Finally, while the White House and State Department regard Russia as a failed state, they also fear that its failure increases the threat from Moscow. Russia is no longer able to compete for hearts and minds in the developing world and it has been forced to dramatically reduce its conventional forces. This means that it will increasingly opt for the greater bang for the rouble offered by cyber warfare and nuclear weapons. A cornered and isolated enemy, it is argued by many, is far more dangerous and unpredictable than the old Soviet Union.

World Review

• There has been an acute outbreak of bipartisanship on Capitol Hill. It has been brought about by an even more acute outbreak of Sinophobia. It appears that the one—and possibly only—thing that upon which Democrats and Republicans can agree is their common fear of the rise of China. But most of all, they worry about they worry about defeat in the technology race which provides the essential tools for all the above. That is why the Senate this week voted by an overwhelming majority of 68 to 32 to pump $250 billion over five years into and development in America’s high-tech industries. It needs it. They worry about losing the values debate, the economic competition and the military debate. At the core of the technology business is semi-conductors and America’s global share of production of semi-conductors has dropped from 37 percent in 1990 to 12 percent in 2021. Meanwhile, China, this year surpassed America’s spending (private and public) on R and D spending in high-tech. Xi Jinping has said that he aims to have China self-sufficient in the production of semi-conductors and other high-tech products and services by 2025. It is a short jump from self-sufficiency to global dominance. US and Chinese competition in this field should be great news for the rest of the world because the likely result is more and better technology services for the rest of us. It should also spur other countries to follow suit for fear of falling behind. Israel and South Korea already invest more of their GDP’s on research and development than anyone else—4.6 percent according to the latest available figures. Britain has recently announced that its R and D investment will rise to more than $250 million a year to turn the country into a “science super power.”
• One of the pillars of a democratic system is free and fair elections in which the largest possible number of people vote. The numbers are needed to give credibility to the result. That is why Australia introduced compulsory voting in 1924 after a poor turnout in the 1922 election. It is also why in Belgium, a non-voter finds it difficult to obtain a job in the public sector; and why ancient Athenians ostracized citizens who failed to turn up to cast their ballots. In short, the more who vote the easier it is for the elected government to do its job. Big turnout equals credibility. Which begs the question: Why is the US Republican Party so intent on making it more difficult to vote? Well, the short answer is Trump’s claims of election fraud. It is also the wrong answer. The fact is that there is very, very little voter fraud in American elections. The right-wing Heritage Foundation reported that they could find only 1,296 cases of proven voter fraud between 1992 and 2020. That is out of billions of votes cast in that 28-year period in federal, state and local elections. So why are the Republicans so keen on making it more difficult to vote? Because more voters usually lead to the election of more progressive or, if you prefer, left-wing politicians. This has certainly been the result of research in Swiss cantons which require compulsory voting. And American psephologists concur that compulsory voting favours the Democratic Party. So, the answer is that the Republican Party is not interested in widespread support to bolster its credibility at home and abroad, democracy or the US constitution. It is interested in power at the expense of democratic values.
• One of the generally accepted and slightly derogatory definitions of a diplomat is “an honest man (or woman) sent abroad to lie on behalf of their country.” Certainly, the main purpose of any country’s foreign policy is to protect that country’s national interests. That is why diplomats will try to avoid outright lies, but will stretch the truth, prevaricate, equivocate and dissimulate in pursuit of their clearly-stated and known goals. And their counterparts know this, respect it and make allowances for it. This is especially true when it comes to negotiating things such as trade agreements which then become international law. But when the negotiations are over, the dust has settled and agreements signed the lying stops. Interpretations of what was agreed continue ad nauseum, but downright lying and law-breaking stops. If it doesn’t, the country that continues obfuscating will not be trusted in negotiations elsewhere and its conduct of foreign policy and protection of national interests will suffer accordingly. This is a major reason it is important that Britain respect the terms of the Northern Ireland Protocol. Accusing Brussels of “legal purism” or now claiming that the “fantastic” deal that it signed in December was done so “under duress” is counter-productive and damaging to Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s “Global Britain” policy. It has already annoyed proud Irish-American President Joe Biden who has warned Boris Johnson of repercussions if the protocol is not respected and damages the Good Friday Agreement. EU negotiator Marcos Sefcovic said after deadlocked talks in London this week that Brussels’ patience is “wearing thin.” And Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said that the protocol was “the only solution and must be implemented completely.” But it is not only the row over Northern Ireland which is creating distrust problems. This week British Health Secretary Matt Hancock told the House of Commons Health and Science Select Committee that Dominic Cummings, the former chief adviser to the Prime Minister, lied when he told the same committee that Hancock lied to the prime minister about his handling of the coronavirus pandemic. Well one of them lied. Or both. But the point is that lying has become the preferred coinage of political debate in a country which once prided itself on its word being its bond.

Tom Arms

Tom Arms is foreign affairs editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and is based in London. He has nearly half a century’s experience of world affairs, and has written and broadcast for American, British and Commonwealth outlets. He is the author of “The Encyclopedia of the Cold War,” “The Falklands Crisis” and “World Elections on File.” His new book “America: Made in Britain” is due to be published in October.

(The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Sindh Courier)

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Big changes are coming up in America’s Middle East policy. The Biden Administration will not have the same relationship with Israel. American aid to the Palestinians is also being restored

By Tom Arms

Big changes coming up in America’s Middle East policy and that won’t all be universally applauded. Saudi Arabia, Iran, Syria, Iraq and Israel are already feeling the difference.

This week’s American attack on Syrian-based and Iranian-backed militias may on the surface seem like a continuation of the Trump Era’s unilateralist shoot-from-the-hip America first and only policy. But an examination of the press statement that followed the retaliatory action indicates otherwise.

The Pentagon went out of its way to thank the Iraqi government for its intelligence input and stressed the strike was only conducted after “full consultations” with its “partners and allies.”

On top of that, the Biden Administration has sought the help of the EU in brokering a deal to revive the Iran Nuclear Accord and, of course, the deal itself is a multinational package to deal with the threat of a nuclear-armed Iran.

However, Washington’s two closest regional allies—Israel and Saudi Arabia—will be none too pleased with Biden’s plans to start talking again with Tehran. They both took the lead in pressuring the Trump Administration to walk out of the nuclear accord and stiffen economic sanctions against Iran.

Saudi-Iranian rivalry for control of the Persian Gulf is ages old. It has been exacerbated in recent years by Iranian-backing for anti-Saud Houthi rebels in Yemen. And then, of course, the two countries are respective leaders of the rival Sunni and Shia factions of Islam.

Iran is also the biggest threat to Israel. And for the Trump Administration unquestioning support for Israel was a cornerstone of its foreign policy. Donald Trump moved the US embassy to Jerusalem, recognized Israeli control of the Golan Heights, cut off aid to the Palestinians, abandoned the two-state solution and supported Israeli settlements on the West Bank.

The Biden Administration will not have the same relationship with Israel. The new president demonstrated it by taking 27 days to make a courtesy call to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. In the call, Biden made some unpalatable facts known. For a start, American aid to the Palestinians is being restored. Next, that the two-state solution is back on the table and Biden wants a resumption of talks between the Palestinians and Israel. Third, Israeli settlements and proposed annexation of The West Bank are—despite what ex-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said—contrary to international law.

Finally, Joe Biden stressed that he would not countenance Israeli interference in American domestic politics. Benjamin Netanyahu has made no secret of his love for Donald Trump, and has appeared on public platforms in the US to support him and other leading Republicans. This is now a no-no.

Telephone diplomacy was also employed by Biden for a “recalibration” in relations with Saudi Arabia. In this instance he pointedly went over the head of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS) to deal directly with 85-year-old King Salman. This is a major blow to the prestige of MBS who enjoyed a close relationship with Donald Trump and his son-in-law Jared Kushner. It was a two-way street. The Saudis provided quiet diplomatic support to Trump’s Arab-Israeli peace plan and spent billions on American weapons. The Trump Administration turned a blind eye to MBS’s appalling human rights record and supported his genocidal war in Yemen.

Biden basically told King Salman that his crown prince was a murderer. That the CIA had proof that MBS had ordered the assassination and dismemberment of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi in October 2018. Furthermore, that The US would no longer support Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen and wanted to see the release from prison of hundreds of dissenting Saudi royals, clerics, journalists, rights activists and businessmen.

Little, if any, of the above will be welcomed by American conservatives. Unquestioning support for Israel is a sacred cow. Palestinians want land claimed by Israel and so Trump’s marginalization of the Palestinians was applauded. Iran threatens Israel and so Trump’s hard line towards Tehran was enthusiastically backed. Saudi Arabia was a traditional foe of Iran so support for Riyadh was nourished.

World Review

• President Joe Biden must have mixed feelings about the public’s continued fascination with the Donald Trump story. On the one hand it is a distraction from his own agenda and on the other, it allows him to move forward quickly and efficiently while attention is largely engaged elsewhere. He is doing the latter. This weekend Biden will celebrate 50 million covid-19 vaccinations, putting his administration well ahead of the target 100 million jabs in 100 days. He is also expected to shortly push through Congress a third major pandemic spending package. This one is worth $1.9 trillion and will focus on the poor minorities and women. The only part of the deal which has won Republican approval is $110 billion for business support. Meanwhile, Trump’s problems continue to make headlines. The biggest is that the US Supreme Court has refused the ex-president’s appeal to block a subpoena to obtain Trump’s tax records for the past ten years. Cyrus Vance Jr., the South Manhattan District Attorney leading the charge, believes that the records will reveal massive fraud involving taxes, bank dealings and insurance. Trump has denounced the investigation as part of the continuing “deep state” “witch hunt” and is keeping the Republican spotlight shining on him with a keynote speech this Sunday at a meeting of the Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC) In Orlando, Florida. His strongest Senate supporter, Lindsey Graham, said Trump “is going to dominate the Republican Party for years to come.”
• Prime Minister Boris Johnson must have mixed feelings about the coronavirus pandemic. More than 100,000 deaths, a locked-down economy and a crippling debt is bad news. But at least it is deflecting public attention away from his disastrous Brexit deal. The biggest problems this week have been predicted and predictable—fishing and Northern Ireland. The EU’s Common Fisheries Policy which made British waters part of a larger European lake open to all EU fishermen was one of the main reasons for Brexit. The problem is that the deal Boris Johnson has struck with Brussels has possibly worsened the plight of the British fishermen. At the root of the issue is the fact that the fish that are caught in British waters appeal to European palates and those netted in European seas appeal to hungry Brits. And because of various quota and hygiene regulations now in place it is becoming difficult to impossible to land fish in each other’s ports. Then there is Northern Ireland with the new trading border in the Irish Sea. This is to keep open the border between the northern and southern halves of the island of Ireland and, hopefully, avoid a return to “The Troubles” of the last quarter of the 20th century. But this means import and export controls between Northern Ireland and the rest of Great Britain. The British government has responded by proposing that the uncontrolled period of trade between Northern Ireland and mainland Britain be extended to 2023. That is unacceptable to Dublin and Brussels. Any restrictions in trade links between Northern Ireland and the British mainland are unacceptable to the protestant Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) who want the current Northern Ireland Protocol jettisoned and a hard border drawn between Eire and Northern Ireland. This, of course, would torpedo the Good Friday Agreement and re-open the prospect of a return to intercommunal fighting.
• China is in a quandary over Myanmar. It wants stability on its border with the Chinese province of Yunnan. It is also wants to protect its multi-billion dollar investment in the deep-water port of Kyaukpyu. There is also the issue of safeguarding the interests of 1.6 million Chinese living in Myanmar and at the same time appear consistent in its policy of non-interference in the domestic affairs of other countries. Basically, Beijing and Xi Jinping don’t care who is in power in Myanmar as long as they don’t threaten Chinese economic and geopolitical interests and their rule keeps angry crowds off the streets. The problem is that the military is failing in the latter task. Thousands continue to demonstrate in protest against the 1 February military coup which overthrew 75-year-old de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi. Most of the international community has called for UN sanctions against the new regime, but these have been blocked by China. Not because the Chinese government loves generals, but because it doesn’t want to rock the Burmese boat. Beijing has invested heavily in the port and special economic zone of Kyaukpyu which is a key link in its “string of pearls” which performs the dual role of a seaborne economic link to the Middle East and Africa and the geostrategic task of encircling regional rival India. But perhaps more important is adherence in Beijing’s strict policy of non-interference in the domestic affairs of third countries.  This is an essential element of Chinese foreign policy as it helps China to fend off criticisms of its own human rights abuses.
• The German conviction this week of Syrian torturer Eyad al Gharib highlights the determination of German prosecutors to employ the little-used legal principle of “Universal Jurisdiction.” This judicial tool dates back to a 1949 Geneva Convention which says that States have the right—nay, the obligation—to prosecute people on their territory who have committed unspeakable acts in other countries such as torture and crimes against humanity. Eyad al-Gharib was a small cog in the Syrian torture machine known as General Intelligence Directorate (GID). That is why his prison sentence is only four and a half years. Another reason is that he is giving evidence against 58-year-old Anwar Raslan, a former mainspring in the GID who is alleged to have tortured, murdered, raped or sexually assaulted 4,000 victims. He is facing life imprisonment. Although al-Gharib was a relative small-fry, his trial stretched to several weeks to allow dozens of witnesses to give hundreds of hours of testimony. Their evidence will be used to convict Raslan and be made available to state prosecution services in other countries so that they can bring actions against any other Syrians who have committed state-sponsored crimes and then sought refuge in their jurisdiction. The Germans are, of course, taking the lead on the issue of universal jurisdiction as partial atonement for their own sad history.
• A victory for Chinese feminists this week. A Beijing divorce court ruled that a husband had to pay his ex-wife for her duties as a housewife. Mr. Chen was told to cough up $7,700 as a one-off payment for Ms. Wang’s five years of housework, childcare and looking after elderly parents. He also has to pay her $300 a month in maintenance. This is a landmark ruling in China because the Chinese—to put it bluntly—are one of the world’s most patriarchal societies. Their emphasis on the male sex is based on the need for strong men to produce food in agricultural work and has been reinforced over the years by the tenets of Confucianism and Taoism. The Chinese Communist Party also played its role in stiffening Chinese society’s patriarchal leanings with its one child policy from the late 1970s to 2016. It provided extra compensation for families with one daughter and in rural areas it allowed families to have a second child if their first was a baby girl. The legacy is a demographic male-female imbalance with roughly 119 boys to every 100 girls. Ms. Wang, it seems, will have little trouble finding a new husband.

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About the Author

Tom Arms is the London-based American foreign affairs journalist. He has nearly half a century’s experience of world affairs, and has written and broadcast for American, British and Commonwealth outlets. Positions he held included foreign correspondent, diplomatic correspondent, foreign editor, editor and founding CEO of an international diary news service. He is the author of “The Encyclopedia of the Cold War,” “The Falklands Crisis” and “World Elections on File.” His new book “America: Made in Britain” is expected this year.

{The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Sindh Courier}

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