Caffè Italiano: The two meet again and get straight down to talking.

EU bureaucrat: As I said yesterday, people have different rules for their lives. They behave differently in their business lives regarding their health, physical environment, social life and romance. Everybody’s different. You can’t examine the collective behavior of Muslims.

Islamofactist: I respectfully disagree. The fact is that sociology and sociologists routinely study “collective behaviour.”

EU bureaucrat: They didn’t teach that at the L’École nationale d’administration publique (). Well, what do sociologists have to say about collective behaviour?

Islamofactist: Many things, but here’s one example. The US sociologist  defined collective behaviour as “mobilization on the basis of a belief which redefines social action.” And Britannica helpfully informs us, his  ”points attention toward the unique manner in which members perceive reality; without such a view, a group of people would not be engaged in collective behaviour.”

EU bureaucrat: But what’s the connection to Muslims’s collective behavior?

Islamofactist: It’s direct and strong. Is it a fact that Islam “submission to Allah”?

EU bureaucrat: I believe it is. Now that you mention it, I recall someone in my office was reading a book by Michel Houellebecq called . I dipped into it. It’s about a new Islamic party sweeping to power in France. Terribly Islamophobic if you ask me. But I digress, please carry on.

Islamofactist: Is it a fact that Muhammad, the Islamic Prophet, is the only human being in human history who gave rise to a religion, a body of law, a worldview and a civilization?

EU bureaucrat: Yes. I believe we in the West need to do more to recognize the achievements of the Islamic world.

Islamofactist: Indeed. Is it a fact that Muslims “Islam is an all-embracing way of life”? And that in the Quran or the Prophetic traditions, one can find “instructions regarding all aspects of life: political, social, economic, material, ethical, national and international”?

EU bureaucrat: I must admit I have heard Muslim claims to that effect.

Islamofactist: Isn’t it a fact that the vast majority of Muslims will unhesitatingly admit to the supreme importance of Islam in their lives, that they weave their everyday activities into a single cloth of religious devotion?

EU bureaucrat: Poetic and true. From all my interactions with Muslims, there is nothing more important to them than Islam. Their faith is truly remarkable.

Islamofactist: Sharp insight. Is it a fact that, because of its claim to be a complete code and answer to all facets of life, Muslim observance makes Islam the most socially manifested and visible religion in Europe and around the world in its modes of social interaction, clothes, politics, architecture and food?

EU bureaucrat: Diversity is our strength. I love shawarma. My daughter brought it home one day. Now the whole family can’t do without it … order it from a great takeout place called Shawarmania.

Islamofactist: I love falafel too. Do we have an agreement that we can study the collective behaviour of Muslims?

EU bureaucrat: No. If we are to accept that there is something that can objectively be called Muslim collective behavior, then there ought to be a name for it that Muslims accept. Is there one?

Islamofactist: As it happens, there is.

EU bureaucrat: What is it?

Islamofactist: The word is .

EU bureaucrat: Muslimness!? Now, there you go, coining another word.

Islamofactist: I’m afraid I didn’t come up with it. Instead, the credit goes to the UK All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) that coined this word but didn’t define it. You will recall their definition of Islamophobia: “Islamophobia is rooted in racism and is a type of racism that targets expressions of Muslimness or perceived Muslimness.”

EU bureaucrat: But how did this word originate?

Islamofactist: They said they came up with this word following widespread consultations that included “Muslim organizations, activists, campaigners and local Muslim communities.” Hence, it is the choice of the Muslim community. But they didn’t define it.

EU bureaucrat: That’s strange. Then why do you think Muslims wanted the word “Muslimness”?

Islamofactist: Valid question. Let’s keep it simple and straightforward and try the  approach, that is, the idea that the simplest explanation is most likely to be true. First, what does Islam mean? Submission. Second, what does it claim? That it is an ”all-embracing way of life.”

EU bureaucrat: Go on.

Islamofactist: Based on these two facts, I define “Muslimness” as a Muslim’s social and public demonstration of their submission to Islam’s fundamental claim to be the sole and final determinant in all aspects of a Muslim’s life.

EU bureaucrat: I see. In other words, can one consider Muslimness as applied, socially visible Islam?

Islamofactist: That is both pithy and accurate.

EU bureaucrat: Have you tested the soundness of this word, “Muslimness”?

Islamofactist: Yes. Islamic websites speak about “The of Islam” and inform us that in the  of Muslims, “submission to Allah’s commands and teachings extends far beyond the performance of religious rituals. It encompasses a broader understanding of submission that permeates various aspects of their lives, influencing personal conduct, relationships and social interactions.”

EU bureaucrat: Maybe you’ve cleared a really knotty problem in the APPG report. So, how does this “Muslimness” manifest itself?

Islamofactist: Halal food and women’s headdresses are well-known examples, of course. But it goes far beyond that. One example would be the deliberate adoption of an Islamic identity that is superimposed upon and precedes the professions in which Muslims are engaged. In the UK, for example, there is the National Association of ; the British Islamic Medical Association (); and the  that works to create a “culture where Muslims on screen are recognized, embraced and celebrated by audiences worldwide.” There’s also the Muslim Travel Girl  that offers advice on the “20 Best Muslim Countries to Visit in 2024 for a Halal Holiday.”

EU bureaucrat: That’s problematic. Are you implying Muslimness cancels all other identities of Muslims?

�����������Ǵڲ����پ�����:��Not at all. Others can exist. All I am saying is that a Muslims’ Muslimness is their primary identity, and others are invariably subordinate.

EU bureaucrat: Any examples from the US?

Islamofactist: Yes. In 2018, CNN highlighted prominent American Muslim . Almost without exception, the people in this list focused only on Muslim issues, identity and Islam. These included a Muslim comedian who introduced himself to his audience as wanting to be their “Muslim friend,” another who had created a “Muslim superhero,” and even another who started a “Muslim college.” One of them trained “Muslim chaplains,” and another defined “Muslim cool.” Dalia Mogahed gave a TED Talk on “What it’s like to be a Muslim in America.” Representative Keith Ellison was the “first Muslim in Congress.” There is even one who became a “Snapchat Imam” and another who started her platform, , because C-SPAN never had “Muslims on the air doing the talking.” Another is a New York Times opinion writer who writes “dystopian fiction about life inside Muslim concentration camps.”

EU bureaucrat: I see. In other words, Muslimness comes before everything else.

Islamofactist:��Based on the examples of Muslims’ actions, that would be correct.

EU bureaucrat: I’m not convinced. If “Muslimness” is applied to Islam, how do we account for the fact that there are varying degrees of religious observance among Muslims? I mean, there can be degrees of Muslimness, if you see what I mean.

Islamofactist: Good question. As Islam is claimed to be the literal and last revealed word of God as recorded in the Qur’an, every Muslim who acts on the commands in the Qur’an is demonstrating their Muslimness. The fact is, there is no authority on earth that can declare that a person “is not a Muslim,” as the definition of Muslims is : It’s a religious category, identifying those who practice Islam. One can be extremely devout or follow only parts of Islam, but either way, they still identify as Muslim.” So, the distinction you seek to draw is meaningless.

EU bureaucrat: This is rather interesting. Let me see if I can summarize what you have told me. By using the Islamofactist method, one can objectively study the collective behaviour of Muslims, which Muslims themselves call “Muslimness.” Do I get it?

Islamofactist: You do.

EU bureaucrat: I hope you realize my position. I can’t commit to anything. Can I talk it over with my boss to get her guidance? Let’s continue tomorrow, shall we?

Islamofactist: Sure.

EU bureaucrat: (to the server) L’addition, s’il vous plaît.

They tussle over who will pay the bill and decide to split it. Outside, each goes their way, melting into the crowds.

[ edited this piece.]

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How and why Goldberg was selected remains a mystery. This is a journalist who, a day earlier, had his verdict on the new administration: “Two months into his second term, President Trump is destabilizing the world order.” We might presume that this is not what one might think of as the kind of media figure a Trump official would want to reward with a scoop.��

Goldberg revealed none of the “precise information about weapons packages, targets, and timing,” which he “could conceivably have been used to harm American military and intelligence personnel.” He did, however, recount the remarks made by many of the officials who expressed their points of view on the wisdom of the operation.

As The New York Times, one of the participants in the discussion, believed to be top Trump aide, Stephen Miller, “suggested that both Egypt and ‘Europe’ should compensate the United States for the operation.” The actual quote by the person identified as “SM” reads: “If Europe doesn’t remunerate, then what? If the US successfully restores freedom of navigation at great cost there needs to be some further economic gain extracted in return.”

�մǻ岹��’s Weekly Devil’s Dictionary definition:

Remunerate:

An intransitive verb added to the political vocabulary in 2025 to replace the traditional transitive verb whose modern meaning is to pay feudal dues to the master of the universe located in Washington, DC.

Contextual note

Miller’s logic appears consistent with the thinking of his lord and master, Trump, whose foreign policy has been unanimously described as “transactional,” a polite way of saying “it’s all about the Benjamins” (). Miller wants the people who asked for nothing but, in his eyes, reap the benefit of Trump’s bold actions, to pony up. This represents a form of economic logic that hasn’t been practiced in the Western world since the Middle Ages.

Times have changed. Everything Trump does tells us that the rules of “civilized” politics have changed. But so have the rules of economics. Forget Adam Smith, who first imagined the marketplace’s smoothly operating “.” Forget Friedrich Hayek’s “catallaxy,” his impeccable self-reconfiguring networks governed by the theological virtue of unconstrained exchange. It’s also time to abandon Milton Friedman and his world in which lunch is never free. Civilization has taken a bold step forward… unless, of course, the step happens to be backward.

Yanis Varoufakis claims that our economy today has now abandoned all the basic principles we associate with industrial capitalism. It has settled on a new model that he calls, a system in which digital platforms and big tech corporations have supplanted traditional capitalist markets, creating a new form of feudal hierarchy.

Some may consider the former Greek finance minister’s characterization an intriguing metaphor, but the idea of a return to the logic of the feudal past also seems to be present in the evolution of US democracy in the age of Trump. The obsession with building walls and imposing taxes for crossing boundaries reminds us of the way European society functioned a thousand years ago. And though the US remains officially a democracy in which “all men are created equal,” those who watched Trump’s second inauguration could not have failed to remark the place of honor accorded to a new race of techno-barons: Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Mark Zuckerberg. Should we be surprised that Trump’s youngest son, who only recently came of age, is named Barron?

In the media’s coverage of this story, many commentators have highlighted the disgusted reaction by European officials to the attitudes expressed in the thread. Not only does Miller want to tax Europe for Washington’s noble effort to defend the privileged trade routes from which Europe is the first to profit; the exchange provides the occasion for the individuals in the Trump team to express their open contempt for Europeans in general.

“I fully share your loathing of European freeloading,” Pete Hegseth responded to JD Vance’s questioning the idea of going to so much trouble for a zone in which the US has only a marginal interest. “I think we are making a mistake,” wrote Vance, according to The Guardian, “adding that while only 3% of US trade goes through the Suez canal, 40% of European trade does.” He characterizes this as “bailing Europe out again.” National Security Adviser Mike Waltz, who, as the BBC, took responsibility for creating the list, mentioned that “his team was working with the defence and state departments ‘to determine how to compile the cost associated and levy them on the Europeans.’” That’s what feudal barons do.

Historical note

Although Vance, Waltz and Miller are probably not aware of it, Europe’s feudal barons of the past instituted a practice that appears to correspond to their contemporary thinking. They instituted a tax called “scutage.” defines it in the following terms: “in feudal law, payment made by a knight to commute the military service that he owed his lord. A lord might accept from his vassal a sum of money (or something else of value, often a horse) in lieu of service on some expedition.” Though modern law has no provision for scutage, European leaders can expect in the near future to learn about how much they owe once Waltz has, in his words, compiled and levied the cost.

Europeans apparently feel more uncomfortable with the idea of returning to the feudal mindset than politicians and business leaders in the US of the 21st century. Observers of economic trends have noticed that, for all its accomplishments as the font of modern civilization and leader of the industrial revolution, Europe has produced none of the conquering technofeudal monopolies that now dominate the global economy. It nevertheless pays homage to all the technobarons and depends on their networks.

At the same time, the drama surrounding the Ukraine war has brought home the realization that the NATO umbrella, crafted by the US — the imperious, if not imperial vanquisher of European fascism during World War II — was designed not so much to protect Europe as to install its nations as privileged vassals of a new global power structure that governed from the DC Beltway and operated out of New York, the home of both Wall Street and the newly created United Nations.

Trump’s Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth, may be right when he qualifies Europe as “pathetic.” Not necessarily for the reasons he cites, but rather because of the fact by Politico that “British and European officials and diplomats reacted with a mix of hurt and anger to the leak of private messages.” They are upset “now that they realize a US administration thinks so poorly of them.” One EU diplomat admits that “it’s sobering to see the way they speak about Europe when they think no one is listening,” before adding, “But at the same time this isn’t surprising … It’s just that now we see their reasoning in all its undiplomatic glory.”

Permit me to express not my surprise but astonishment at this remark. Was that EU diplomat too young to have caught wind of the notorious recording of former President Barack Obama’s Deputy Secretary of State, Victoria Nuland, in Kyiv in February 2014, in an intercepted phone call with ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt? That is where, after planning the details of the coup that would take place in the following weeks and overturn Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych’s government, Nuland suggested not consulting the allies on those operations, with the simple phrase: “And fuck the EU!”

In the NYT, we read this comment: “But with America’s increasingly hostile attitude toward Europe, the continent’s officials are contemplating a future where the prized relationship stretching across the Atlantic, a foundation upon which decades of relative peace and prosperity have been built, might never be the same.”

The foundation hasn’t changed. It’s just that we can see it more clearly today.

*[In the age of Oscar Wilde and Mark Twain, another American wit, the journalist Ambrose Bierce produced a series of satirical definitions of commonly used terms, throwing light on their hidden meanings in real discourse. Bierce eventually collected and published them as a book, The Devil’s Dictionary, in 1911. We have shamelessly appropriated his title in the interest of continuing his wholesome pedagogical effort to enlighten generations of readers of the news. Read more of 51�Թ� Devil’s Dictionary.]

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Putin, a natural ally

The first of these reasons could be that he perceives Vladimir Putin as a natural ally. This would be based in a commonality of ideas and a perceived commonality of experiences. 

As with other far-right populists, Trump sees Putin as someone whose ideas are in tune with his own. Referring to the Trump–Putin summit held in Helsinki in July 2018, American columnist Robert Kagan that it was a meeting between allies, with convergent ideas, interests and goals — to destroy the international liberal order. As he asserted, the United States and Russia were not allies, but Trump and Putin certainly were.��

Ronald Brownstein, a senior editor at The Atlantic, with this assertion in relation to far-right populists in general: “But the conservative-populist nationalists in both the United States and Europe view Putin as a potential ally … [They] share a common set of priorities focused on restricting immigration, unwinding global economic and political integration (by renouncing the European Union, and, for some … NATO as well), taking tougher steps to fight Islamic radicalism, and, in most cases, opposing cultural liberalism and secularization at home. On all those fronts, they view Putin not as a threat, but as an ally.” Far-right populists in general and Trump in particular certainly agree with values such as those by Putin in his February 29, 2024, state of the nation address: “Some countries deliberately destroy norms of morality, institutions of the family, push whole peoples towards extinction and degeneration.”

Beyond common ideas, though, there are common experiences, at least in Trump’s mind. Mark Mazzetti, reporter for The New York Times, this well: “In early 2017, American intelligence agencies delivered an unequivocal judgement about why President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia had ordered a sprawling effort to sabotage the recent American presidential election … As a way to achieve this goal, the assessment found, Russia worked to help Donald J. Trump win the election. Eight years later, Mr. Trump sat in the Oval Office for a blustery meeting with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine and rendered, once again, his own judgement of that period. There was no Russian sabotage, just a ‘phony witch hunt’ of which both he and Mr. Putin were victims. ‘Let me tell you, Putin went through a hell of a lot with me,’ he said. The statement was a tell. The President sees common cause with Mr. Putin, a merging of interests forged through battles against those he believes are his and Mr. Putin’s mutual adversaries — including Democratic lawmakers, European leaders and a spectral ‘deep state’ inside the U.S. government.”

Under this “ally” category, we find, thus, ideological and personal elements. Trump, as well as other populist, far-right politicians and parties, shares a revisionist approach to the prevailing international order. One in tune with that of countries such as Russia and China, which challenge liberal norms and seek an alternative global order. This implies a rejection of the rules-based international liberal one that, under the stewardship of the United States, prevailed during the last 80 years. But on top of foreign policy coincidences, there is also convergence in their common rejection of cultural liberalism. Ideologically, then, Trump and Putin are on the same page. For Trump, however, alliances need to have a personal character, whether of a tributary nature towards his ego or through shared common experiences. In this case, Trump sees Putin as a route companion and, hence, as a soul mate.

A Moscow–Beijing wedge

A second plausible motive behind Trump’s approach to Putin would be that he wants to introduce a wedge between Moscow and Beijing. By befriending Russia, he might be aiming at distancing it from China. to The New York Times journalist David E. Sanger, “Secretary of State Marco Rubio, a classic Russia hardliner before he took his current post, suggested that Mr. Trump was trying to tear Russia away from its growing partnership with China.” Trump himself it explicitly to Tucker Carlson in an October 2024 interview: “The one thing you never want to happen is you never want Russia and China uniting. I’m going to have to un-unite them, and I think I can do that.”

From an American realist point of view, it must be said that Russia and China should have never been allowed to coalesce in the way they did. Common sense would have advised Washington to act as Mao Zedong did at the beginning of the 1970s, when he approached the United States in order to contain the Soviet Union. This would have led to prioritizing objectives by approaching and befriending the lesser of the two rival threats, especially after 2008 as the danger implicit in this dual rivalry became visible. On the one hand, Russia invaded Georgia, making clear that it would resist further western encroachments in what it considered as its natural sphere of influence. On the other hand, ��󾱲Բ�’s assertiveness and its desire to control its own sphere of influence in the Indo-Pacific became evident. By choosing to challenge both Moscow and Beijing at the same time, Washington invited both rivals to join ranks.

From the perspective of the realist school of international relations, which has included towering American figures such as George Kennan, Henry Kissinger, John Mearsheimer, Kenneth Waltz and Stephen Walt, Russia was mistreated by the West. It was, indeed, repeatedly and unnecessarily bullied. Since the implosion of the Soviet Union, the West undertook a triple package of policies that cornered Russia: NATO’s expansion, the enlargement of the European Union and democracy promotion. ��ܲ�������’s neighborhood, as a result, became utterly unfriendly to Moscow. From a realist’s approach, hence, it was obvious that if pressure was to be taken away from either Russia or China, Moscow should have taken clear precedence.

Trump’s intentions of befriending Moscow to put a wedge in its relations with China could somehow be interpreted as realist in nature. The problem is that it is too late for that, as realists would surely recognize. What would have made sense a bit more than a decade ago looks unattainable at this point. Coziness between Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping has grown over time, making them true pals. On May 16, 2024, they both a 7,000-word-long joint statement agreeing to deepen their countries’ “strategic partnership” and take it to a “new era” while scolding the United States for representing a threat to their nations and to the existing world strategic balance. This represented the 43rd meeting between both chiefs of state and delved into the joint statement of their February 2022 meeting on the sidelines of the Beijing Winter Olympics. The 5,000-word document that they signed on that occasion that “the friendship between the two States has no limits” and that there were not “forbidden areas” of cooperation between them.

Referring to the 2022 joint statement, David E. Sanger in his book New Cold Wars, “The two dictators … released a five-thousand-word document that suggested the two longtime rivals were forming a true alliance … A new China-Russia condominium had the potential to be the most consequential change in the geopolitical landscape in decades. If it succeeded — even if it was only a partial success — it would create an alternative axis of power unlike any that existed in the Cold War … ‘It’s a strong partnership,’ Bill Burns told me later, choosing his words carefully, ‘that is born of a shared interest in chipping away at an American-led international order.’”

A global triumvirate

The third plausible reason behind Trump’s friendly approach to Putin is that it could represent the first step towards joining the revisionist camp. Not only is Trump’s international mindset clearly revisionist, and his vision of Putin that of a natural ally, but he seems keen in attaining a grand bargain with China as well. Referring to this bargain, Chinese foreign policy expert Patricia M. Kim , “The allure of a single, sweeping deal is understandable. It offers the promise of clarity in a troubled, high-stakes relationship.” On top, if it’s too late to break the Putin–Xi bromance, Trump might be tempted to join it. This would be the equivalent to the Roman Republic’s triumvirate of the sort of those that existed between Julius Caesar, Pompey and Crassus or between Lepidus, Mark Antony and Octavian. Meaning, a tripartite political alliance aimed at dividing the world.

Trump’s alliance with Putin is a given fact. As for the rationality of an alliance with Xi, historian Niall Ferguson , “In Trump’s view, a ‘big deal’ might be the only way to avoid having to start a war that the United States might not win. ‘One of Trump’s favorite comparisons,’ [John] Bolton recalls, ‘was to point to the tip of one of his Sharpies and say, “This is Taiwan,” then point to the Resolute desk [in the Oval Office] and say, “This is China.”’ It was not just the discrepancy in size that bothered him. ‘Taiwan is like two feet from China … We are 8,000 miles away. If they invade, there isn’t a fucking thing we can do about it.’”

Once again, if you cannot beat them, join them. And as a good Roman triumvir, there would be much Trump would like to put his hands on in exchange for giving free reign to his fellow triumvirs. In The New York Times columnist Ezra Klein’s , “Trump fundamentally wants the landmass of America to be larger when he leaves office.” He wants the Panama Canal back. He has ramped up his threats to annex Greenland, potentially by force. He wants to seize control of Gaza and permanently displace the entire Palestinian population, by use of force if needed. And of course, he wants the icing on the cake: Canada becoming America’s 51st state. In Trump’s to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in their February phone call: “the artificial line of separation drawn many years ago will finally disappear.” Indeed, as reported, he “did not believe that the border treaty between the two nations was valid.”

In exchange, China could be able to annex Taiwan, have its maritime claim over 90% of the South China Sea fully recognized, take control of the Diaoyu Islands and anything else that it might wish. Russia, after a temporary postponement, could go back for the rest of Ukraine, or for Moldova, or for the Baltic states. Every one of the triumvirs, indeed, would be able to carve its own imperial space and its sphere of influence, in the same manner in which in 43 BC, Octavian became master of the west, Mark Antony became master of the east and Lepidus got Africa. 

What will end up happening is difficult to predict. However, something is certain — the 80-year-old, rules-based liberal international order has been blown to pieces while revisionism is gaining immense ground. Let us hope, though, that the third mentioned scenario, that of a Trump–Putin–Xi global triumvirate, never materializes.

[ edited this piece.]

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With Trump’s vanishing, the long and tumultuous story of the American experiment has reached its final chapter, though its legacy is far from over.

Why did a rump state in Belgium call itself “Amerika,” anyway?

Trump XI’s dramatic end comes after centuries of struggle. The US — officially the Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika — persisted in its European heartland for nearly a thousand years. While it has long been moribund, little more than a small enclave around Brussels for the past several decades, the nation’s impact on modern culture has been inestimable. Its universities, hospitals and libraries were some of the only institutions in the world that preserved higher learning during the turbulent 26th, 27th and 28th centuries.

The origins of the US lie in the late second millennium, where a group of English colonies on the eastern coastline of North America declared independence from Great Britain in 1776, forming a republic based on the principles of democratic governance and individual liberty. Over the following centuries, it expanded westward across the North American continent, eventually becoming a global superpower by the 20th century.

That century saw the young republic increasingly drawn into European conflicts. After intervening in World War I (1914–1918) on the side of its English-speaking British ally, the US made an abortive attempt to settle European affairs under President Woodrow Wilson before the Senate intervened and enforced a more isolationist foreign policy. Europe would however soon erupt into war again, and after President Franklin Roosevelt I, better known as Roosevelt the Great, intervened in World War II (1939–1945), his successor Harry Truman established a more permanent American presence on the continent. American military personnel were stationed across half of the continent, ostensibly to preserve democracy and, later, to provide a deterrent against the Soviet Union. While European polities remained nominally independent throughout the 20th and early 21st centuries, the US de facto controlled their foreign policies.

The decisive moment came with the outbreak of World War III in 2028 following the third Russian invasion of Ukraine. After this cataclysmic war, the United States established direct rule over parts of Europe, a move that was justified at the time as a means of stabilizing the continent and preventing quasi-fascist governments, as had arisen in Slovakia, Germany and Austria, from taking root. Particularly loyal US allies like the United Kingdom, Poland and Italy were permitted to govern themselves, while the French presidents, through uncharacteristically intelligent policy, were able to maintain a precarious independence.

By the end of World War IV (2072–2077), it was no longer possible to pretend that Europe was anything but an extension of the United States. The US intelligence establishment had become convinced by this point that the Europeans were utterly unable to share a continent peacefully without American domination. President Donald Trump III crushed the last remnants of European resistance, and from that point on, Washington governed the region directly. Before long, most European countries had been admitted into the union as states.

The United States’ center of gravity shifted eastward

The political union of North America and Europe brought about unexpected economic consequences. While California was an unchallenged tech and AI powerhouse, New York’s financial services industry now found itself in direct competition with London. Europe also experienced an economic boost from the vast influx of Latin American laborers, especially after the US annexation of Chihuahua and Coahuila in 2120.

Far more lasting, however, were the effects of the brain drain that the North American portions of the union experienced in the late 21st and 22nd centuries. American students flocked to European universities, which were mostly public institutions and a welcome alternative to their exorbitantly expensive private American schools. Documents recently unearthed in northwestern Manhattan reveal that Columbia University, a mid-tier institution, was already charging students as much as several million dollars per semester in the 2050s.

The 22nd century saw a cultural and economic renaissance in Europe. Paris, London and Warsaw became fashionable hubs of intellectual activity — the French “post-atheist” literary movement becoming particularly notable. Science and engineering saw just as much of a boost as the liberal arts. Before long, cities like Hamburg, Frankfurt and Rotterdam began to outmatch their transatlantic counterparts in industrial activity. As more and more money poured into the region, a snowball effect ensued. This — along with the widespread adoption of cloning from the 2160s onwards, which freed wealthy women from the need to take time off from work in order to have children — led to a population boom. By the year 2200, it is estimated that over 25% of the population of the United States spoke German or Dutch. Before long, that number was 50%. Eventually, German would become the first language of nearly the whole population, save for those in some parts of Britain.

Meanwhile, the North American portion of the empire was facing tough times. Several measles outbreaks decimated the population, and political infighting grew to a fever pitch. After the 2232 assassination of President Donald Trump V, outright civil war broke out. The European portions of the union were fortunate to support the victor, Jaden Bloomberg, Jr., who took the title of Donald Trump VI.

As the 23rd century wore on, European Americans gradually came to realize that the transatlantic portions of the union were becoming a military and financial drain on the federal government as usurper after usurper looted the treasury to pay for war materiel. President Franklin Roosevelt III made the difficult decision to relocate the de facto capital of the union from Washington to Brussels, where the central institutions of the union could be more easily defended. This move, originally intended as a temporary measure, quickly became permanent.

The period extending roughly from 2300 to about 2450 saw a nearly endless succession of warlords arise from power centers like Texas, Florida and Alaska to momentarily claim the title of “President” before being shot or poisoned after mere months or even weeks of rule. While the federal administration in Brussels occasionally recognized some of these in an attempt to project some kind of political stability, it was of little use. Epigraphic evidence indicates that there may have been as many as 20 self-described presidents by the eve of the Mexican invasion in 2445.

As every schoolboy knows, Mexican President Aníbal Sánchez Córdova made quick work of the disunited and corrupt North American US forces. Intellectuals across the European portions of the union lamented the downfall of the western half of the union — particularly due to the melodramatic scenes of arson and looting that accompanied the fall of Washington — but administrators in Brussels were quietly grateful for the elimination of the fiscal burden that the west had become.

In 2449, an entity calling itself the Supreme Court of the United States, and recognized as such by Brussels, established itself in Alexandria, Virginia. It was little more than a paper tiger, and records of its chief justices — appointed more or less on the whims of the Mexican president — peter out in the 26th century. Europe was, for all intents and purposes, on its own.

The decline of Europe until today

US President George Washington II (ironically named because, among other things, his ancestors had spoken German for at least three generations) could waste little time grieving the downfall of the transatlantic territories, for trouble was brewing much closer to home. Russia remained a constant menace on the US’s eastern flank, and Turkey, too, was becoming more assertive — a harbinger of things to come. Washington fortified the eastern frontiers with state-of-the-art laser weapons and quantum-powered surveillance systems, but he was quickly called away to affairs in another corner of the republic. In Britain, a nostalgic monarchist party of “freemen on the land” had declared independence. While the movement was quickly crushed, Washington himself lost his life to a knife attack on the streets of London in 2461.

The Russo–Chinese War (2497–2551) did grant the US some respite. This was only the third war in world history to go fully nuclear, and by far the most deadly. By the end, Russia and China had lost a combined 50% of their population and over 90% of their productive capacity. Beset by domestic troubles, Europe took little advantage of the situation except to reduce defense spending and enjoy a minor economic resurgence. This left younger and more agile powers, like Vietnam, Rwanda and, above all, Turkey, to fill in the power vacuum.

By the year 2600, Turkey had consolidated its hold on the Caucasus and Ukraine regions, along with pacifying its Arab neighbors to the south. As a more confident Turkey finally pushed westward, a series of tragic and sometimes nearly comic military disasters characterized European attempts to prevent the onslaught. The republic lost half of its territory and one-third of its population by the end of the century, although the border eventually stabilized around the Elbe-Carpathian frontier. Europe had been severely weakened, but it kept going for another two centuries.

The 28th- and 29th-century culture of the United States of Europe produced a noteworthy flowering of German-language literature, the likes of which had not been seen since the 22nd-century renaissance. Yet, despite appearances, it was fundamentally different. No longer creative, the literature of late modern Europe was inward-looking and mostly historical in character, reflective at best but usually nostalgic and even self-indulgent at worst. These intellectuals saw themselves as the heirs of the twin cultural and philosophical legacy of federal America and ancient Europe. In reality, they were neither. Their civilization had become a museum and, like all museums, it closed abruptly.

Some people alive today may still be old enough to remember the Second Euro–Turkish war that severed the economically productive Rhine, Po and Seine valleys from Europe forever. In 2930, President Donald Trump X and the rest of his administration holed themselves up in a 20-mile circle around Brussels with the last functioning nuclear weapons, antiques already two centuries old, as the last line of defense. The Turks were happy to ignore this little enclave as they spread their control over the rest of the continent, and Britain, of course, declared formal independence from Europe.

That was the situation until about two weeks ago. While the late Turkish monarch Cevdet Muhammad Özdemir was a relatively tolerant ruler, his son Özdemir, who succeeded him two years ago in June 2983, has been a vigorous supporter of the most extremist portion of his parliament in Vienna. These pious believers have long rankled over European possession of the Great Mosque of Brussels, and the younger Özdemir has decided to give the people what they want and make a name for himself in the process. Gambling correctly that either the European nuclear weapons are no longer functional or the Europeans no longer willing to use them, Özdemir gave the order to his marines to breach the border six days ago. European resistance has been sporadic, but fighting reached the downtown neighborhoods of the city yesterday afternoon. With the death of Trump XI, I believe we can safely say that the US constitutional experience — stretching 12 centuries back to the North American colonies’ 1776 declaration of independence — has finally come to an end.

While the United States of Europe no longer exists as an independent state, its ethnic identity still remains in the Turkish-dominated areas of Europe. I recall one of the most striking illustrations of this phenomenon, a quasi-apocryphal story from the Turkish occupation of Ragusa in September 2927. A Turkish sergeant addressed the town’s residents in elementary German: “We are Turks, Europeans like you. We have come to liberate you.” To which, without skipping a beat, one Sicilian lad responded, “Wir sind keine Europäer, sondern Amerikaner.”

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Why this report? Europeans are increasingly anxious about their future. Stagnating growth and a lack of innovation threaten the European way of life. As the global landscape shifts, Europe must adapt. Both the US and China have adopted protectionist measures and are aggressively promoting their domestic industries. Meanwhile, Europe has fallen behind. In 1995, European productivity was 95% that of the US; today, it stands at just 80%.

A significant part of Europe’s problem lies in its reliance on banks for corporate borrowing. In Europe, 75% of corporate loans come from banks, compared to just 25% in the US, which boasts deeper and more liquid capital markets. This gives the US a stronger growth engine. Europe lags behind in key sectors like artificial intelligence, electric vehicles, self-driving technology and other cutting-edge fields.

In response, Draghi’s report calls for a bold €800 billion “new industrial strategy for Europe.” This proposal represents a fundamental shift in economic policy and signals the end of the post-Cold War era of European economics. The report’s key recommendations include:

• A complete overhaul of investment funding in the EU.
• Relaxing competition rules to allow market consolidation in industries like telecommunications.
• Greater integration of capital markets and centralized market supervision.
• Joint procurement in defense.
• A new trade agenda for the EU.
• The creation of European Advanced Research Projects Agencies, following US models, to drive world-leading research.
• Raising investment by both the private and public sectors from 22% to 27% of GDP.

This marks a shift in the global economic zeitgeist. Industrial policy, long dismissed by free-market economists as inefficient, has become a central strategy for the US, China and now Europe. Countries like Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Vietnam and India are also pursuing industrial strategies with some success. It has worked for Europe before, as the success of Airbus demonstrates. Draghi and his team aim to make Europe more competitive while keeping it distinctly European.

There are still some flies in the ointment. Will European nations be able to integrate sensitive sectors like defense, banking and telecommunications? Can the famously divided EU countries overcome their differences and work together? And the most pressing question: Can the EC actually spend the €800 billion that Draghi’s report proposes?

Besides, isn’t this just more of the same old story — a push for greater European integration that will inevitably be resisted? This time, the stakes are different. Europe faces a crisis of competitiveness unlike any before.

The European powers are simply no longer as influential as they used to be. Individual nations can no longer hope to negotiate trade deals on equal footing with powers like China. They must negotiate as a bloc.

The world has changed. France and Britain have lost their colonies. Technology has changed. Volkswagen cannot keep up with Tesla in the electric car space. Europeans are afraid of slipping off the cliff into irrelevance.

Recent developments have convinced Europeans their position is precarious. The Russian invasion of Ukraine, the failure to effectively integrate immigrants and the rise of far-right movements across Europe show that the European project itself is at risk, unless leaders can prove to their populaces that it can work for everyone.

This report, and the broader conversation it represents, could mark a pivotal moment in Europe’s future trajectory.

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Most Western democracies have embraced the democratic ideology Abraham Lincoln famously articulated when he evoked “a government of the people, by the people and for the people.” But who are “the people” and how can you define them, especially in a melting pot or like the US? The very fact of diversity casts a dark shadow on the comforting idea of “we the people.” Aware of that potentially troubling anomaly, Americans rallied around the idea of “majority rule.”

The 19th century idea of rule by an elusive “majority” inevitably spawned the historical trend towards the now classic two-party system. The 50.1% rule for elections became the measure that allowed diverse populations to believe in majority rule. It became apparent this can only work when there are no more than two dominant parties. So, even today, you’re a Democrat or a Republican, but you might also be an independent, sitting on the fence. In Europe, it was more complex. Nevertheless, even with multiple parties, democracy tended towards a perception of left (working class) vs right (educated ruling and business class).

Even though the founding fathers raised serious objections to the very idea of parties — which they characterized as “” — the US political system culturally, and to some extent legally, codified the two-party system, making it a structural feature of all but local elections. Third parties are permitted but barely tolerated. The media systematically casts third parties and their candidates into the category of annoying eccentricities. Strom Thurmond (1948), Ross Perot (1992), Ralph Nader (2000) and a few others managed to muddy the otherwise clear waters, but each could be dismissed as an ephemeral nuisance.

Repeated cases in recent years of US presidents elected while failing to obtain a majority of the popular vote began to disturb the tranquil belief people had in the principle of majority rule. The tsunami provoked by hurricane Donald, highlighting “American carnage,” “alternate facts” and “stolen elections” has now called the logic itself into question.

The events of this election year in the US, marked by an assassination attempt and the last minute replacement of an incumbent, have provoked a further erosion of the belief in democracy. But it can’t compare, in gravity, with what is unfolding today in France.

France’s parliamentary elections two years ago failed to produce a majority for the already re-elected President Emmanuel Macron. This forced him to rely on improvised alliances within the center, the right and eventually the far-right, to pass legislation. Disappointed by the disastrous results of the European parliamentary elections in June of this year, Macron launched a desperate gambit. In the mistaken belief that he might achieve democratic clarity, he dissolved parliament, provoking new parliamentary elections. Clarity turned to obscurity and opacity.

Macron’s party in the European elections of June 9 was roundly defeated by Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally. The French parliamentary elections a month later saw a reinvigorated left, the New Popular Front (Nouveau Front Populaire or NFP), rise to the top position. In terms of “majority rule” thinking, that double whammy was the equivalent of a TKO in boxing. The problem is that there’s no referee other than the constitution to stop the combat. And only a unified Assemblée would have the power to impeach a president. The fight has been paused, but the former champion must remain in the ring for another three years! And the stunned, incapacitated fighter must keep the crowd entertained.

The constitution requires that the president must designate a new prime minister, who in turn forms a new government according to his wishes. This isn’t the first time a sitting president has been deprived of a majority. A tradition dating back to 1986 established the precedent that the party or coalition with the most seats in parliament should propose a new prime minister from its ranks. The NFP has done precisely that, very cautiously designating an economist, Lucie Castets. But Macron, aware of his constitutional rights and committed to his Jupiterian idea of leadership, has bucked the tradition and demurred.

Le Monde the situation in these terms: “Macron has justified his refusal to name Castets as head of government by saying it is his duty to ensure ‘institutional stability.’”

�մǻ岹��’s Weekly Devil’s Dictionary definition:

Institutional stability:

What French presidents under the 5th Republic seek and obviously fail to secure when faced with an even more fundamental reality: constitutional instability.

Contextual note

The Paris Olympic Games provided Macron with his first pretext for postponing the constitution of a new government. Now he has adapted a different tactic. Since he alone has the power to nominate a prime minister, he will “ his consultations” with as many irrelevant personalities as possible. He may hope that the longer it goes, the more likely people will be resigned to accepting any solution he throws at them.

This week he has been listening to a range of personalities, including former right-wing president (and convicted felon) Nicolas Sarkozy, who unsurprisingly believes the prime minister should be selected from his party, Les ��é��ܲ�������������s, a party that earned the whopping total of 39 seats, less than 7% of the 577 seats. Sarkozy argues that France is a right-wing nation, probably because he lumps the extreme right into the traditional right.

Whatever choice Macron eventually makes, there is little likelihood that it will augur anything resembling stability. Emmanuel sees himself as the sole pillar of stability. A regime built on the idea of a president standing at the center, like a king on a chessboard, surrounded by loyal bishops and knights committed to his defense, living in safety within his castle walls, may have worked for the expert wielder of power, Louis XIV, whose reign lasted 72 years. As everyone knows, it didn’t work out quite as well for his more “centrist” great-grandson, Louis XVI.

Historical note

Macron, a young, ambitious but largely unknown minister in François Hollande’s colorless administration, emerged into stardom when the ruling Socialist party began to unravel. With no true political experience and no existing party structure to work from, Macron surprised everyone in May 2017, first by coming out of nowhere to lead all other candidates in the first round of voting, and then by beating Marine Le Pen in the second round of the presidential election.

His victory clearly went to his head. But it was less his political genius than a stroke of luck that led to his 2017 success. Like Moses, he benefited from a miraculous parting of the political sea. The Socialists were in disarray after five years of Hollande’s presidency. The traditional right lost its bearings when its obvious frontrunner, François Fillon, mismanaged a scandal he was implicated in and refused to step down in favor of a ”cleaner” candidate. The only credible challenge left was the unambiguously left-wing Jean-Luc Mélenchon, whom the political class and the media treated as a dangerous firebrand. Le Pen nudged ahead of both Fillon and Mélenchon by less than 2%. Le Pen trailed Macron by only 2.6%.

In other words, from the start of his presidency, Macron had no truly constituted party and could only be deemed “the center” because he was surrounded on all sides by other political orientations. That was the precise moment he speculated about the taste he believed the French had for a Jupiterian leader.

Very quickly he was contested not by a party but by “the people,” citizens donning the iconic yellow vest the government obliged them to store in the private vehicles. That was when the Red Sea parted again for Macron thanks to a virus, Covid-19, that turned him into a “war president.”

Now he finds himself in a struggle with the entire political class and soon with the population as well. Unlike Moses, Macron never made the effort to get to the other side. The Red (and blue) Sea is closing in on him as he dawdles in the middle. Nobody is likely to be happy with the personality he selects as his prime minister, whoever she or he happens to be.

We’re in for another ride. Fortunately, France definitively banished the guillotine in 1981.

*[In the age of Oscar Wilde and Mark Twain, another American wit, the journalist Ambrose Bierce produced a series of satirical definitions of commonly used terms, throwing light on their hidden meanings in real discourse. Bierce eventually collected and published them as a book, The Devil’s Dictionary, in 1911. We have shamelessly appropriated his title in the interest of continuing his wholesome pedagogical effort to enlighten generations of readers of the news. Read more of 51�Թ� Devil’s Dictionary.]

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The EU initiated anti-subsidy on Chinese EVs on June 12. From the moment these began, Germans from the government to industry insiders expressed opposition. Chancellor Olaf Scholz even publicly that the German automotive industry would be able to compete with Asian car manufacturers.

Typically, a company applies for an investigation. This time, the EU Commission an investigation on its own. So why does European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen not even give the German automotive industry a chance for “?” The EU clearly had a pre-established position, and the results of the investigation are foreordained. It only targets China; one can only call it another witch hunt.��

The EU’s anti-subsidy investigation on Chinese EVs launched in October 2023. Von der Leyen warned that the vehicles would “” into Europe. This had the potential to destroy the continent’s automotive industry. It was a reasonable fear; from 2012 to 2013, China damaged Europe’s solar energy industry by selling and illegally €21 billion (over $22 billion) of solar panels there.

Von der Leyen intended to use this new investigation to further the EU into a geopolitical institution, which has been a core goal of hers since she took office. Von der Leyen is running for as EU Commission president, and if that fails, she could try for the position of NATO Secretary-General with French and United States aid. So she is simultaneously using the investigation to gather political support, as she presents herself as a hardliner against China in her campaign.

But at what cost is she doing all this? Perhaps the destruction of the Eurasian continent due to trade conflicts? That’s not her concern.

Right-wing protectionism attempts to protect European industry

There’s been a significant rightward in the EU’s politics, as evidenced by the of the 2024 EU parliamentary elections. This change undoubtedly casts a heavy shadow over ��󾱲Բ�’s tariff policy. conservative European forces will inevitably use trade protectionism to defend their own industries and employment. In response, these member states have further strengthened their demands to protect their own automotive jobs. Currently, at least EU countries provide land subsidies for industrial investment and several more preferential loans to enterprises.

This move completely caters to . (What comes after the rightward turn? The last time Europe faced the storm of populism and trade protectionism was in Germany before World War II.) Given ��󾱲Բ�’s cost and technological in EVs and wind power, the EU’s restrictions will also delay its efforts in energy conservation and emission reduction. This further delays its goals to address global climate change, which is incongruous with the EU’s claims of leading global climate governance.

Trade protectionist policies initiated by the US have also propelled the growing protectionism within the EU. In 2022, the US introduced the Inflation Reduction , which provides up to $7,500 in tax credits for new EVs and loans for used EVs. This move raised concerns within the EU about the impact on its own automotive industry and has led to the adoption of trade protectionist measures.

Meanwhile, the US’s recent trade war and decoupling practices against China have intensified the EU’s concerns about its own industrial development and security. In May 2024, the US announced an in tariffs on Chinese EVs from the previous 25% to 100%. The European Commission immediately followed suit by firing at Chinese EVs. This was hardly a coincidence.

The EU’s discriminatory subsidies and weaponized tariffs

For a long time, China and Europe have maintained a “cold politics, hot economy” model of cooperation — ideological differences do not affect both sides as important trade partners. However, this new emotional prejudice will chill the few commonalities between China and Europe. Von der Leyen seems to have forgotten that it was Europe itself that initiated the subsidy era in the field of new energy.

On February 1, 2023, von der Leyen officially launched the Green Deal Industrial . This relaxed restrictions on government subsidies to enterprises, which is usually prohibited by the rules of the EU single market. But under the current policy on batteries, EU member states can offer financial assistance to battery manufacturers.

This plan was originally intended to improve Europe’s competitiveness in the field of clean energy, but its actual implementation has created discriminatory subsidies. According to statistics, the EU has provided ($3.2 billion) in subsidies to battery manufacturers.

This EU tariff investigation has exposed the division within the EU, with countries like Germany and Hungary expressing . Meanwhile, countries that do not export their own cars to China, represented by France, support the EU’s imposition of tariffs. In fact, Paris plans to raise the threshold for Chinese EVs entering the EU market, forcing Chinese manufacturers to invest and construct factories in France. As early as May, French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire publicly stated that he the automotive manufacturer BYD to build factories there.

Like France, those who support increasing tariffs on Chinese cars have communicated with Chinese officials and car companies, expressing their will to cooperate. These countries do not oppose Chinese EVs, but rather the fact that they cannot benefit from them. They hope the companies will cooperate to drive the development of Europe’s automotive industry.

Objectively speaking, this goal is not difficult to achieve. Before this tariff policy started, manufacturers such as BYD had already started factories in the EU. However, if Europeans use tariffs as a weapon to force China to build factories on their soil, that is a different story.

Can the EU’s automotive industry really develop if Chinese EVs are kept away? The protective tariffs have achieved nothing but delaying the use of low-cost, low-carbon energy in Europe by a few years. The EU’s anti-subsidy can’t solve the problems faced by the EU in related industries, but may further worsen the situation. European consumers welcome inexpensive electric vehicles as well as low-carbon energy; after the anti-subsidy investigation, the EU members may have to buy Chinese EVs at higher prices. The only group not grateful for the reduced carbon dioxide emissions because of China is the EU, which has chosen a tariff war.

Europe and China could cooperate

The cooperation potential between China and Europe’s automotive industries far exceeds their differences. With electrification and — the use of artificial intelligence with decision-making capability — the proportion of the cost of chips in car prices will rise dramatically. Although the Netherlands has technology and Germany has , the majority of the chip industry’s profits goes to the US and the non-European countries like Japan and South Korea.

In this regard, China and Europe have common interests. China must develop its own chip industry. With its production capacity, the chip prices will definitely be reduced followed by the increased proportion of its chips in the global market. This is already in effect.

From January to May 2024, ��󾱲Բ�’s integrated circuit amounted to 444.73 renminbi (over $62 billion), a year-on-year increase of 21.2%, even exceeding the 20.1% of cars. It became the country’s second-largest industry with year-on-year growth. China has already occupied the popular mature process of 28-40nm. Most car chips use 28nm or 40nm chips, so cooperating with China to use its chips can greatly reduce the production cost. The two countries would gain a competitive edge over US and Korean cars.

If the European automotive industry can’t cooperate with China in this game, Europe cannot participate as a player. Rather, it would be more like a bargaining chip. Habeck’s visit to China is a signal that Berlin has reached a consensus with Beijing to “decrease the impact” while Paris is still facing choices.

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Everything may seem unchanged–Josep Borrell Fontenes, The High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, continues to focus on his prominent political issues. The leaders of France, Germany, and the UK remain in the primetime news spotlight. European media produce a considerable amount of content featuring prominent European leaders. Sadly, all of this is just a beautiful facade.

In reality, things are quite bleak for Europeans. Borrell seems unable to become the voice of a unified Europe on the international stage, although he still desires it greatly. It was well-highlighted by POLITICO-Europe, “Borrell has always condemned the Hamas attacks, called for the unconditional liberation of all hostages, for a humanitarian pause leading to a sustainable cease-fire, for the humanitarian provision and a two-state solution, along the same line of the European Council conclusions that leaders unanimously agreed in March.” Nevertheless “during a meeting of EU leaders, German Chancellor and his Austrian counterpart Karl Nehammer confronted Josep Borrell on his months-long outspoken critique of Israel as the death toll in Gaza mounted, according to two officials briefed on the exchange.”

It looks like the euro bureaucracy restricts Borrell’s freedom. He always feels free to give . E.g. he is notorious for his “garden vs. jungle” metaphor that made him the EU’s top diplomat.�� Many times, he ends up in awkward situations. Now, hardly anyone can take him seriously and perceive him as an influential politician following his own policy. On the contrary, his behavior represents what the global West will become – noisy but increasingly irrelevant.

One after another, new nationally oriented African leaders asked France to leave the region. Following coups in those countries, neighboring Mali and Burkina Faso have already kicked out France’s forces. This has weakened its influence in its amid a wave of anti-French sentiment.

Paris does it without resistance, not even formally attempting to negotiate its interests. For more than two months, French President Emmanuel Macron took a defiant stance, ignoring the ultimatum set by the junta in Niger, who came to power in July after a military coup. France refused to engage with the junta leaders or move on their demands to remove stationed in the country to fight terrorism.������

It withdrew its military contingents. Meanwhile, President Macron is trying to make history calling for an “” during the Olympics scheduled to take place from July 26 to August 11, 2024, in Paris.“We will do everything to have an Olympic truce, we will work on it,” Macron said in an interview with BFM television. But his voice is still weak and Europe is reluctant to listen to him, let alone Moscow. Macron pleads for an Olympic truce but suffers . What happens now does not align well with France’s international reputation and Macron’s ego.

Half of the opposes China’s influence. At the dawn of a new political era, the German population’s growing mistrust of China has significant implications for the country’s foreign policy. The other half “dreams” of Beijing coming to their country and “taking it over as an investor.” associations widely welcome China’s economic strategy.����

However, when Scholz arrived in China on an official visit this April, he faced a change in attitude toward him by the Chinese officials. Scholz was forced to deal with the low-level diplomatic reception. The Vice Mayor Zhang Guozhi was the only official who met him upon arriving at the airport. It was a flagrant breach of to receive foreign leaders or diplomats at the wrong level. It sends a negative message when you receive or offer to receive another country leader at a lower level. The MFAs of any country know that, but Scholz had no choice but to accept this reality.��

At Tel Aviv airport, air sirens forced Chancellor Scholz to lie on the ground due to a missile attack threat from Hezbollah. That was a severe blow to the image of the head of one of Europe’s leading countries. People in the Middle East will remember this episode for a long time. Video showed panicked German officials fleeing a plane amid a missile threat in Israel became top news. It is challenging to follow up the tough guy position during future contacts after such public experience, especially in the Middle East, where value leaders and individuals who uphold personal strength are challenging.

Despite Britain not being a part of the EU anymore, it maintains the first-line position among the leaders of Europe. London nowadays took a wait-and-see approach and preferred not to stick its neck out unnecessarily. The English have always been characterized by a healthy sense of caution. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is formally active and visible, traveling the world and talking even more. He says the right things, but they are not his thoughts and ideas. He repeats everything already said at various levels in Washington, not adding personal insight into the situation. This wise behavior allows him to avoid taking responsibility and escape unnecessary scrutiny of his personality.

The above is just a small part of what people in Asia and the Global South observe. And they are not at all happy about it. What these countries need is and development. Alongside North America, Asia is where the European Union and its member states are most deeply economically intertwined – through trade, supply chains, investment, financial flows, and mutual reliance on market demand.����

But it is only possible when a partner, even a stronger one, behaves consistently and predictably. As even Prince Michael of Liechtenstein admits, European countries say they base their on values – but doing so has led to inconsistency in how they treat international partners.�� Europe is these qualities in the eyes of people living on other continents.

Many people in Asia have come to perceive Europe as a political open space leaning towards its decline. They still have money and technology, but long-term investors and manufacturing capacity are steadily moving to other world regions. The stability of the European economy depends more and more on China and Asia. The leaders of Europe are already rushing to the region and are looking back and forth at each other.

Europeans still influence global politics, e.g. as a global actor, the EU and the UK inspire countries worldwide and strengthen international development in many ways. At the same time, they have continued to fail to influence the end of the war in Ukraine. The conflict has been going on for three years, and European approaches still oscillate from bravado to panic. It is unlikely that Moscow or Kyiv will take such a political approach seriously. Europe should be more persistent and figure out its goals, ways and means more unambiguously, speaking with one voice to clarify its position for everybody.

Human rights continue to represent one of the core values of Europe. But in the face of the conflict in Gaza, many European countries are losing the moral right to lecture others on the issue. Although this is not just a European problem, the Europeans are not able to come up with an effective formula to stop the endless and merciless bloodshed on both sides.

The results of the European elections held over the past month — notably, the significant of right-wing parties — have sent another clear message. Europeans are tired of dealing with the consequences of current social and economic policies and want change.��

Calling snap elections in France for June 9, Macron described his decision as an “act of confidence.” However, his centrist Renaissance party showed a significant lag (21.27%) behind the far-right Rassemblement National (31.4%) in the first round. While he managed to of total defeat by with the Left to exclude Rassemblement National, his position is seriously compromised. This suggests that Macron’s “confidence” stemmed from his erratic policies, which lost touch with the real issues faced by the French people.��

On July 4, Britain’s ruling Conservative Party was thrown out of government after 14 years of rule. Here, unlike on the continent, the establishment belongs to the Right, and it was to the Left that the people turned to express their discontent. The Labour Party won a landslide victory with 411 out of the House of Commons’ 650 seats. Voters deserted the Sunak-led ruling Conservative Party due to his numerous mistakes, which have led the country to its current state.  

Considering what is happening now, it would be understandable for Asian countries to seek more stable and predictable relations. That’s why so many governments are willing to join . Countries from Iran to Saudi Arabia, Argentina, Algeria, Indonesia, Egypt, Ethiopia, Cuba and Kazakhstan have considered joining.

China’s One Belt, One Road initiative also attracts an increasing number of supporters. There are 150 countries formally affiliated with the Initiative, and six more are considering joining it shortly. Cooperation within the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the Comprehensive Regional Economic Partnership is gaining momentum. Europe and Western countries participated insignificantly in all of this. Once again, in its history, Europe has faced the need to clearly understand itself and its role in the rapidly changing modern world. The emerging confrontation between the West and the East requires an adequate and balanced response.

Europe has to stop reflecting on the past. The old international world order is already fading into the past. The Global South is developing rapidly and demands fair consideration of its interests. Asia is closely watching Europe lose its power but dreams of its colonialism-based part of the US-led rule-based order. Europeans need to accept the new reality as quickly as possible and keep up with the times.

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This April, in sweeping speech at Sorbonne University in Paris, he his call for a more assertive Europe, a theme he has been spearheading since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022. Macron articulated his vision for a reinforced and “sovereign” European Union. In his nearly two-hour speech, Macron conveyed his conviction that only a robust European power can salvage the continent from irrelevance in an unstable world. With the privilege of global dominance contested between the United States and China — and the former engaged in, if not distracted by, conflicts in Europe and the Middle East — Macron sees a strengthened EU as the linchpin for navigating these turbulent times.

The resurgence of Marine Le Pen’s right-wing Rassemblement National (RN) presents the starkest contrast to Macron’s vision for France and the European Union. With its nationalist rhetoric and anti-immigration stance, Le Pen’s party has tapped into disenchantment among vast swathes of the French electorate, particularly in rural and working-class areas.

Liberals lose ground to the Far Right in France and elsewhere

For Macron and his Renaissance party, the challenge lies in countering the RN’s appeal and rejuvenating the party base. The ongoing European Parliament elections that run from June 6 to 9 serve as a litmus test for Macron’s leadership and the viability of his pro-European agenda. Le Pen’s list, led by the emerging figure of Jordan Bardella, 29, is gaining momentum. The Renaissance list, headed by relatively unknown Member of European Parliament (MEP) , struggles to maintain relevance. As of June 3, Renaissance had slipped to a mere according to voting intention polls presented by Politico. RN, on the other hand, held a commanding 33%. This shift marks a stark departure from the competition witnessed in the previous European election five years ago.

The upcoming results of the EU election hold significant weight as this contest serves as the final scheduled national vote in France before the 2027 presidential election. Le Pen is poised to make her fourth and potentially most formidable bid for power. Only two years into his second term, Macron faces the specter of becoming a premature lame duck. He lacks a solid parliamentary majority domestically and faces the constant threat of no-confidence motions.

Moreover, Macron’s European influence is under threat as the European Parliament group to which Renaissance belongs, , faces across European electorates. France’s stature further diminishes amidst chronic high , something that should theoretically trigger an EU disciplinary procedure post-election.

Macron’s speech underscores the significance of the elections as a litmus test for his political standing and the future trajectory of his party. Macron is endeavoring to rally support and reassert his leadership in the face of stiff competition from right-wing adversaries. How Macron navigates these turbulent waters in the coming weeks will undoubtedly shape the political landscape of France and Europe at large.

Macron pushes for continental defense

In his recent address, Emmanuel Macron once again reiterated the “importance” of nuclear deterrence for Europe’s security, hinting at the possibility of broadening Franco-British nuclear cooperation to encompass other European nations. While such a move might appeal to a future UK Labour government, it remains a contentious issue in Germany and much of Eastern Europe. In recent months, Macron has explicitly about nuclear deterrence as a means of leverage required for European security.

In February, in response to reports that Ukraine was on the verge of defeat, Macron floated the possibility of France sending troops to the battlefield. In response, Russian President Vladimir Putin that, in case of NATO engagement, Moscow would be prepared to utilize any arms, including tactical nuclear weapons. Macron in turn, his audience that France is also a nuclear power and boasted: “We must first and foremost feel protected because we are a nuclear power. We are ready; we have a doctrine” for the use of nuclear weapons.

However, Macron’s initiatives have failed to dispel the perception that, rather than affecting the outcome of the conflict, they primarily fortify France’s military-industrial interests and prop up the diminishing influence of a mid-sized power. Macron must address these lingering doubts and ensure that his initiatives contribute meaningfully to collective European security.

Fiscal expansion of the EU

Interestingly, in his Sorbonne speech, Macron advocated a significant leap in Europe’s fiscal integration in economic policy. This would be accomplished by enlargening the EU budget, extending the post-pandemic recovery fund or reforming the European Stability Mechanism. However, Macron’s proposals overlooked the imperative of bolstering fiscal discipline at the national level — especially in France.

Even more daunting would be getting other Europeans to buy into the idea of granting expanded taxing authority to the EU. While Macron broke new ground by advocating for broadening the European Central Bank’s mandate to encompass growth and climate objectives, he fell short in addressing the necessary trade-offs and compromises to realize this ambition.

As Europe grapples with the complexities of economic recovery and transformation, Macron’s vision raises pertinent questions about the path forward and the concessions required to achieve meaningful progress. Macron presents a compelling vision for European integration. He advocates for a fortified single market and establishing a European industrial policy, while also championing deregulation and national flexibility.��

However, more than lofty speeches will be needed to get the job done. Macron must articulate a viable theory of change and confront the intricate political realities shaping Europe. For Germany, European sovereignty means prioritizing democratic processes over executive power. Back in 2017, Macron “democratic conventions” across the EU to make European citizens more involved in their own governance. At the Sorbonne, Macron acknowledged the failure of this plan, underscoring the challenge of achieving unity amidst cultural diversity and countering the effects of identity politics centered on migration — to say nothing of the challenge of cultivating what remains a mythical European identity.

Macron has charted out what he believes is a new path for European integration in a perilous future. We will know soon whether European citizens have found him credible.

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A completely new political balance is at stake in the Old Continent. Paradoxically, the voter turnout is to rise even while the support of towards anti-EU parties is increasing.��

The more Europeans love Europe, the more they hate it.

The more active the European Union is in managing crises, the more its bureaucracy, flaws and difficulties become visible to the public. This has become fertile ground for right-wing parties demanding a return to national sovereignty. Meanwhile, the political center is shrinking.

A recent Bertelsmann Stiftung indicates that 60% of Europeans intend to vote. Despite an East–West disparity — only 29% of the population of the Czech Republic voted in 2019 — the trend is generally positive, especially among young Europeans.

According to a recent TUI Siftung , 58% of 16- to 20-year-olds consider European elections “important.” The most convinced are young Germans (67%), while the French are the least (50%). Nearly two thirds of Greek youth say that European elections are far more important than national ones. Between 50% and 70% see themselves as “European” and not only as citizens of their member states.

Under-30s could pull turnouts up. According to a from Eurobarometer, 64% of young voters intend to vote. The most enthusiastic are Romanians (78%) and Portuguese (77%).

Despite the EU’s appeal to the youth, right-wing and populist parties are gaining momentum. These parties generally ask for “less Europe.” They’re no longer asking for a Brexit-like solution; they want simply more sovereignty. They don’t want a bigger European budget, or a common European foreign or defence policy. They prize their individual veto, as Hungary has been showing by several rounds of EU military funding for Ukraine. What these “Eurosceptics” have in mind is just Europe à la carte — the union is good and useful when it provides money and alliances, and bad when it asks for something in return.��

Two hard-right parties stand to be the biggest beneficiaries this year. French politician Marine Le Pen’s , which is part of the European parliamentary group Identity and Democracy (ID), and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s , which is part of the European Conservatives and Reformists group.

�ұ�������Բ�’s extreme-right Alternative für Deutschland, however, has in recent polls. The party used to belong to ID but was after corruption scandals involving Russia and China and after the recent extreme right declarations of spitzenkandidat Maximilian Krah, who La Repubblica that one shouldn’t “generalize” all SS officers as criminals.

In Belgium, where federal and European elections are both taking place June 9, another ID party, the Flemish nationalist Vlaams Belang (VB), is at in the polls and has a good chance in the federal elections. Across the border in the Netherlands, Geert Wilders’s Party for Freedom, has already been part of the ruling coalition in Amsterdam for a few weeks, the polls. Last but not least we have the Austrian Freiheitliche Partei Österreich, another ID party, which was part of the first Sebastian Kurz cabinet in Vienna from 2017 to 2019. This nationalist and extreme-right party is now getting great hype, leading the polls with .��

The center will not hold

While the far right is moving forward in Europe, center-right and center-left parties are extremizing their own positions. In Germany, this phenomenon is called Polarisierung. Two good examples of this are the center-right Christian Democrats (CDU) in Germany and the center-left Democratic Party (PD) in Italy.

The CDU, with its leader Friederich Merz, turned rightwards after Chancellor Angela Merkel’s tenure ended in 2021. The party’s manifesto now that Islam only belongs to Germany if Muslims “share our values.” The CDU favors of stricter migrant . Merkel’s 2015 slogan about migration, “We can do it!” is now a bad memory. The CDU is now for asylum applicants to be processed outside the EU in a “safe third country,” after the Rwanda model proposed by British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.

A similar but opposite process is ongoing with the PD under the leadership of Elly Schlein. She is leading the party on a far leftist path compared to five years ago. The “new” PD promises social policies like , the maintenance of the public health system against and for all.

The parties may be doing so in order to counteract the appeal of the radical right. Whether this strategy will be successful remains to be seen.

Europe stands at a crossroads. The current elections will determine whether the European Union remains a political force or becomes a mere region on the map.

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Differences on crucial issues pushed the three countries apart during these two decades. Germany and France opted for strengthening their relations with Russia and declined to deepen the European–US alliance, whereas Poland represented the opposite stance, warning against Russia and following a more Atlanticist defense policy while increasing expenditure on its own armed forces. The 2015 rise of a populist conservative government in Poland further cooled relations. The new government used openly anti-German rhetoric and also had reservations about France.

Recent events, however, have reversed the situation. The 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine and the 2023 election of a new pro-European government in Poland gave an impulse for renewed cooperation. Already in February 2024, all three countries’ foreign ministers met in France, followed by a previously unplanned meeting of French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk in Germany in March. The next high-level meeting, in Poland, is planned for June.

The authors of this article, a Pole, a German and a Frenchman, met in Vienna. What sounds like the beginning of a joke turned into a serious discussion about the potential, shortcomings and the varying national perspectives of this minilateral format. We will explain what our respective countries hope to achieve and what they will need in order to do so.

How do Berlin, Paris and Warsaw see the revived forum?

Many in Berlin hope that the revived Weimar Triangle will alleviate the strained relations between Scholz and Macron. They are excited about the possibility of putting together (a) the biggest economy in the EU, (b) a permanent UN Security Council member and nuclear power and (c) the most populous and most important country in Central Europe. Together, these three nations represent around 40% of the EU population, or 188 million inhabitants.

On March 15, the partners they would jointly procure weapons for Ukraine on the world market. This, along with ramping up production, is music to many German ears given Scholz’s notoriously hesitancy in providing Ukraine with the means to defend itself. like “Two Churchills and half a Chamberlain” appeared in the aftermath of the announcement, comparing Scholz to the infamously dovish British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain who failed to take a firm stance against Adolf Hitler.

Germans also relish the historic opportunity to polish up the city’s name. “Weimar” has unfortunately become a byword for the failed Weimar Republic, which Hitler transformed into his dictatorship. More importantly, they look forward to finally getting some tangible results from one of the many minilateral formats that have sprung up across the EU.

In France, the inauguration of Donald Tusk’s new government in Poland has caused a resurgence of enthusiasm for the Weimar Triangle. Historically, Paris has perceived the Weimar format as unbalanced, dominated by German–Polish ties at the expense of French-Polish relations. However, France is coming to see this format as a potentially valuable and beneficial complement to the traditional Franco-German “couple,” which is currently going through a rough patch due to differences over the war in Ukraine. France sees Poland as a valuable partner in encouraging Germany to adopt a more aggressive posture in the East.

For Poland, ��ܲ�������’s war in Ukraine raging and the possibility of a Donald Trump victory in the US presidential election heighten the need for a European security “back-up plan.” Poland shares a border with Ukraine and could be under threat if the war expanded. Warsaw thus has a vested interest in countering “solidarity fatigue” within Germany and France. Hence, it has proposed future “Weimar + Ukraine” meetings.

The revival of the Weimar Triangle has become a flagship project for the Tusk government. After eight years of right-wing rule marked by conflict with the EU and neighbors under the Law and Justice party, the format represents a chance to move away from the troublemaker image. Tusk wants Poland to be seen as a key player in European affairs.

Further, unlike at the outset of the format in the 1990s, Poland is striving to be seen as an equal partner with Germany and France that represents the sentiments of Central and Eastern Europe — although it is disputable whether all countries within that region would agree. Additionally, the Polish press enthusiastically portrays Poland’s role as a between Germany and France.

Moreover, the format is also convenient for ameliorating strained Polish–German relations. On the other hand, the Law and Justice party has circulated unfounded rumors about Donald Tusk being a “” and “,” and so they could use frequent bilateral meetings with Germany against the government.

Coincidentally, Scholz, Macron and Tusk also represent three different factions in the European Parliament. This adds to the possible benefit of the format on a EU level. Coordination between these factions could help to counteract the expected surge of far-right, Eurosceptic parties after the European elections in June. However, it remains to be seen if the Chancellor, the President and the Prime Minister can actually bring added value to their respective factions. Macron may face an uphill battle within Renew Europe, but the European People’s Party, to which Tusk belongs, will likely remain the biggest political group, resulting in a second term for European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.

How successful can the format be?

Although minilateral formats are indeed many, few operate across the ominous European East–West divide. If they do, they involve smaller actors (e.g., Slavkov Triangle of the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Austria). The Weimar Triangle would be the exception.

The format faces certain headwinds. It lacks institutions and is dependent on personal chemistry between politicians. The next elections could change these dynamics.

Further, cooperation on the side of civil society is sorely lacking. It needs to be intensified, which would require more funding for NGOs and think tanks.

For the Weimar Triangle to evolve into a significant and effective minilateral framework, it cannot remain confined to contacts between leaders and foreign ministers. Secondary-level relationships, like parliamentary exchanges as well as municipal and regional connections, should be developed. Those relationships must be institutionalized, or at least systemized, and assigned a more strategic importance.

Will the Weimar Triangle meet expectations and use its potential to become a new power engine for the EU? The Weimar Triangle could be just what Europe needs at a crucial moment, but nothing is set in stone yet. Like great inventions, successful cooperation formats are often a matter, not only necessity and a good idea, but also of the right timing.

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Yet, to date, these fascist movements in the Arab world have not been compared to fascist movements in Europe. Some were heavily influenced by Europe’s fascism. In the case of the Lebanese and Spanish Phalangism, for instance, they both strongly emphasized religious identity to push their fascist agendas.

Addressing this gap in the literature, this article explores the Lebanese “Phalanges,” known as ����-��������’i�� in Arabic, a paramilitary group which presented itself as but actually concerned itself with the national interests of Lebanon.

How the Phalanges drew inspiration from European Fascism

While some researchers have focused on the Lebanese Phalangesin the , no research has compared them to fascism in Europe. This is striking because they were inspired by the German Nazi regime, the in Czechoslovakia and, as the name implies, the Spanish Falange. Modeling them after these movements, Pierre Gemayel created the Lebanese Phalanges in 1936.��

The Lebanese Phalanges shared several characteristics with European fascist movements at the time, such as upholding the importance of family and home and identifying an “other” to blame while picturing a glorious imaginary past.

Gemayel visited Berlin during the 1936 Olympic Games. He was greatly attracted to Nazism and envisaged a Lebanon that would take after the :

I was the captain of the Lebanese football team and the president of the Lebanese Football Federation. We went to the Olympic Games of 1936 in Berlin. And I saw then this discipline and order. And I said to myself: “Why can’t we do the same thing in Lebanon?” So when we came back to Lebanon, we created this youth movement. When I was in Berlin then, Nazism did not have the reputation which it has now. Nazism? In every system in the world, you can find something good. But Nazism was not Nazism at all. The word came afterwards. In their system, I saw discipline. And we in the Middle East, we need discipline more than anythingelse.

During his trip, Gemayel also visited several other European countries. In each of these countries, he made connections with their radical youth movements, studying their structure and observing them closely.

The Lebanese Phalanges

The Lebanese “Phalanges” were founded as a Christian “democratic” political organization in the 1930s that aimed to create a Westernized. The organization’s leaders were young, middle-class Christians with connections to France, which at the time ran the League of Nations Mandate for Syria and the Lebanon. In spite of the movement being officially secular, it was supported mainly by the Maronite Catholics, who often saw the Phalanges as the political expression of their Christian faith. The Maronites trace their origins to St. Maron (Arabic: Mārūn), a Syrian hermit of the late 4th and early 5th.

In line with fascist ideology, the movement upholds the importance of family and home with the “God, country, and family.” Their flag, which is also their logo, shows the cedar tree, which is often a trademark of Lebanon and “Lebaneseness.”��

It is important to point out here that the Maronites, unlike some European fascists, did not see the Phalanges as a for their religion. The Phalanges connected fascist aspirations with religion.

The Lebanese Phalanges were also founded as a reaction to Muslim irredentist demands and to the growing strength of the Syrian Social Nationalist Party, which advocated for the absorption of Lebanon into a Greater Syria. The latter was a secret society that from a few students to about 1,000 members by 1935. In the 1930s the party into Syria, Transjordan, and Palestine.

For Lebanon, this era, 1936–1946, falls within the French mandate of the country. Lebanon gained its independence in 1943, and the French left the country in 1946. Also, 1945 was the end of WWII; in that same year, the Lebanese Phalanges put members but failed to win any seats until 1958.��

The Spanish connection

The founders of the Phalanges chose the name, meaning “phalanx,” because they wanted it to be a semi-military group to instill discipline and organization in the Lebanese. Spanish political leader José Antonio Primo de Rivera had named his party the Falange Española for similar reasons. This kind of concentration on youth was common in European fascism, particularly Nazism and Italian Fascism. Thus, most Lebanese Phalanges supporters at the time were the youth, particularly students and recent graduates. They stormed the streets of Beirut, chanting for Lebanese independence while asserting the country’s unique non-Arab identity.��

Similar to their Spanish Falange, the Lebanese Phalanges adopted a nostalgic about “the return to empire.” For these Lebanese, this meant a future where the Phoenician legacy in Lebanon would once again take its place among the world’s nations while placing Christianity at its center.

In Spain, Falangism also placed a strong emphasis on Catholic religious identity, though it held some secular views on the Church’s direct influence in society, such as believing that the state should have supreme over the nation.��

The Spanish movement gained importance from 1936 onwards, with the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War between right-wing nationalist rebels and supporters of the left-wing Second Spanish Republic. The Falange enjoyed an enormous influx of membership from frightened and disillusioned middle-class people to anti-republican militants. 

By the beginning of, it had several hundred thousand affiliates. General Francisco Franco, leader of the nationalist cause, weakened the movement’s original national-syndicalist ideology and made the Falange the official state party with a nominal membership of 900,000 in a country of. They provided the largest organized political following fully committed to the regime, and Franco found them indispensable. Franco was a Spanish military general who led the nationalist forces in overthrowing the Second Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil War and thereafter ruled over Spain from 1939 to 1975 as a dictator.

Spanish Falangism promoted the revival and development of the Spanish Empire. The Spanish Falange and its affiliates in Hispanic states across the world promoted a form of pan-Hispanism which they described with the term Hispanidad. This advocated both a cultural and economic union of Hispanic societies around the world.

In fact, the Falange even produced maps that included Portugal as a province of Spain, especially during its early years of existence. After the Spanish Civil War, some radical members of the Spanish Falange called for reunification with Portugal and the annexation of former Spanish territories in the French Pyrenees. It has sought to unite ethnically Hispanic peoples, with proposals to create a commonwealth or federation of Spanish-speaking states headed by Spain.

Similarly, the Lebanese Phalanges believe the Phoenicians were the original residents of the Mediterranean coast. The Lebanese Phalanges imagined a glorious past, combining stories of a mythical golden age with ancestral legends and national��

The Phalanges’ leaders often used Phoenician phraseology to express the non-Arab identity of Lebanon, for instance, “Lebanon is not Phoenician […] it is Phoenician, however, in culture and ethos, bequeathed to the modern Lebanese by their forefathers.” In this way, the Phalanges saw themselves as protectors of the Lebanese nation and carriers of Western influence against Arabs.��

Although more work is needed on both movements’ ideological placement, this preliminary treatment should make clear how the Phalanges of Lebanon drew from the nationalist ideologies of their European counterparts.

[ edited this piece.]

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For many French people, Jacques Delors will remain above all the great architect of the European Union, the leader who was at the origin of the Euro and the European Single Market.

They also remember the politician, François Mitterrand’s economy minister, whose humility and modern conception of socialism led him to give up the race for the presidential election in 1995. “ I lied to the country or I lied to the Socialists,” he explained, pointing to the gap between his project of reconciling solidarity a market economy and the incantatory, quasi-revolutionary discourse of the French Socialist Party.

His daughter, Martine Aubry, tried to take up the torch 17 years later, without success.

Delors’ realistic vision of socialism

For a generation of European activists who defined themselves as “left-wing,” Jacques Delors was above all one of the architects of European social democracy and of the “second French left” alongside Michel Rocard.

Rooted in Christian trade unionism but also in the legacy of Hannah Arendt and the personalism of Emmanuel Mounier, Jacques Delors’ socialist thought was marked by a certain conception of reform, social justice and the rejection of ideological posturing. He sought a third way between economic liberalism and totalitarian communism.

The social democracy of this great politician is above all that of dialogue and the social contract between employers and employees’ representatives. He combined budgetary rigor with aid to the most deprived. He believed that the best weapon against unemployment was lifelong learning. At both the national and European levels, he advocated negotiation between divergent interests and social contract rather than the myth of a grand soir, or revolution, that would overthrow all inequalities overnight.

What remains of this realist left? In today’s France, not much. During the last presidential election, in 2022, its natural candidate, Anne Hidalgo, mayor of Paris, former advisor to Martine Aubry, barely reached while the radical left embodied by Jean-Luc Mélenchon galloped into 20.3%.

Some see the current French president, Emmanuel Macron, as Delors’ heir. Admittedly, the current occupant of the Elysée seeks to make the European Union a real power, but his mantra of following left- and right-inspired policy proposals “at the same time” does not find its source in the vision of a social market economy based on a culture of consensus. Macron’s “at the same time” is above all a tactical pragmatism that seeks to occupy the center-right.

Delors’ legacy of European integration

What remains of Jacques Delors’ vision at the European level?

The very glue that holds the European Union together today is Delors’ legacy. As president of the European Commission, Delors created the founding elements of the cohesion of the European Union as it is today. Alongside François Mitterrand and Helmut Kohl, his influence was decisive in the adoption of the 1987 Single European Act, which created the European single market, and then with the Maastricht Treaty, which set the eventual adoption of the single currency in motion. Indeed, it was at the European level that Delors was able to put his mantra into practice: “Competition that stimulates, cooperation that strengthens, solidarity that unites.”

In terms of solidarity, Delors was at the origin of the Cohesion Fund, which supports the enlargement of the EU by subsidizing less developed new entrants. He also championed the Erasmus university exchange program and the Fund to Assist the Most Deprived. These concrete achievements have proven wrong the detractors who claimed that the EU would be nothing more than a large liberal market whose policies would run counter to the priorities of European citizens.

Today’s EU remains an alliance between market efficiency and solidarity. It has shown this during the COVID-19 crisis with its major and in the face of the climate emergency with its . The recent adoption of a new on asylum and immigration is also a good example of consensus among divergent visions of welcoming foreigners on European soil. But this European unity is only built in response to crises.

Nationalism and the far right are now threatening the general European interest and its fragile unity. On the eve of the European elections in June 2024, the generation of activists for the European cause is facing this challenge: to keep Delors’ humanist legacy alive and renew it, to innovate and to build a more inspiring idea of Europe for future generations.

Renewing this heritage means giving job prospects and social well-being to the working classes tempted by extremes and populist votes. It is only in a new social contract, built sector by sector around a reindustrialization that takes social rights and the environment into account, that this European cohesion can last. This profound economic transformation, along with a new, more assertive European diplomacy based on co-development, can constitute this necessary renewed European social contract dear to Jacques Delors. It is still possible to take this path.

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Picture a diverse community of Proto-Indo-Europeans, their voices blending in a harmonious symphony of speech. As the tribes dispersed, dialects naturally evolved, setting the stage for the emergence of new branches within the Indo-European family.

In one branch, we encounter the ancestors of the Greeks. Through centuries of storytelling, trade and cultural exchanges, their language transformed, molding itself iGreecento the melodic sounds of ancient Greek. From to the majestic Classical Greek, it left an indelible mark on literature, philosophy and civilization.

In a distant land, the branch began to take shape. Eventually settling in the Indian subcontinent, the early Indo-Aryans embraced their own dialects, leading to the emergence of Sanskrit. This refined language, with its intricate grammar and poetic beauty, became the language of the , the sacred texts of Hinduism. Sanskrit’s influence extended across the Indian subcontinent, weaving the rich tapestry of modern Indian languages.

But how did these languages, which had once been intertwined, diverge and become distinct entities? Sound changes and linguistic shifts played a crucial role. Over time, unique pronunciations emerged, creating new phonetic landscapes for each language. The way they treated certain sounds diverged like branches growing apart yet still rooted in their ancestral soil.

As these languages developed, their vocabularies and grammars evolved, shaped by the cultures, experiences and encounters of their speakers. Greek and Sanskrit each cultivated their own lexicons and syntactic structures, resulting in distinct linguistic identities.

As centuries passed, Greek went through a historical odyssey, with Classical Greek paving the way for the renowned , the language of the New Testament, and , echoing through the corridors of the Eastern Roman Empire. Eventually, Modern Greek emerged, carrying the torch of its ancient lineage into the contemporary world.

Meanwhile, Sanskrit’s influence permeated the Indian subcontinent, nurturing a multitude of languages. From Hindi to Bengali, Gujarati to Punjabi, each language absorbed the essence of Sanskrit, blending it with regional flavors and giving birth to a linguistic kaleidoscope.

The development of Greek, Sanskrit and their linguistic kin reflects the interplay of history, migration and human ingenuity. From a common ancestral language, , these languages branched out, enriching the give-and-take of human communication.

The past tends to conceal its secrets, leaving us with tantalizing clues and intriguing possibilities. Yet, how tempting it is to contemplate the hidden connections between ancient Greece and India, where ideas flowed like a gentle breeze, moving the thoughts of philosophers, kings and the laity alike. 

A confluence of ideas between Vedic India and ancient Greece. 

Both Classical Greek and Vedic Sanskrit belong to the Indo-European language family, two distant branches of the same linguistic tree. This shared heritage suggests that these cultures may have interacted and exchanged more than just passing greetings. 

emerged as a philosophical movement within the Roman Empire between the third and fifth centuries CE, building upon the foundational ideas of Plato (c. 428-347 BC) while also expanding and reshaping them in various ways. 

Neoplatonism, with its roots in classical Greek and Persian philosophy as well as Egyptian theology, served as a profound source of inspiration for a wide range of metaphysicians and mystics across various traditions. I argue that it has its roots in Indian philosophy as well. Its metaphysical principles not only influenced pagan, Jewish, Christian, Gnostic and Islamic thinkers but also continued to shape their philosophical and mystical endeavors throughout the centuries.

was a philosopher who lived in Alexandria during the third century CE. He is considered the founder of the school. Ammonius was deeply influenced by various philosophical and religious traditions, including Greek, Egyptian and, some writers suggest, Indian philosophies. In my view, however, it was through his student , a Roman philosopher who lived in the third century CE, that the integration of Vedanta philosophy into Neoplatonism became more explicit.

(SUNY Press), edited by the estimable Paulos Mar Gregorios, delves into the potential influence of Indian thought on Plotinus and his teacher Ammonius Saccas as well as their primary inspiration, Plato. It raises the question of whether Platonism, Plotinism and the underlying thought patterns in Western religion, literature and art are variations of concepts found in ancient Hindu philosophy, rather than purely evolutionary products of Greek philosophy.

The essays within the book explore the actual similarities in themes or philosophical systems between select Western Neoplatonic writers and prominent Hindu philosophers. They thoroughly examine the arguments both in favor of and against the notion that Indian philosophy serves as a source for Plotinus’ ideas.

At the core of philosophy is the concept of , the ultimate reality or absolute consciousness that underlies all existence. This concept resonates with Plotinus’ idea of “the One,” which he considered as the ultimate source of all being and the pinnacle of reality. For Plotinus, the One transcends all categories, including being and non-being, and is beyond the grasp of intellectual comprehension. This notion parallels the Vedantic understanding of Brahman as beyond words and concepts.

Furthermore, Vedanta philosophy emphasizes the concept of maya, which refers to the illusory nature of the phenomenal world. According to Vedanta, the world we perceive is a manifestation of Brahman but is not ultimately real. Plotinus incorporated a similar notion in his teachings, suggesting that the material world is a lower level of reality and is a product of the multiplicity and diversity emanating from the One.

Another significant parallel between Neoplatonism and Vedanta is the idea of emanation. In Vedanta, the world emanates from Brahman in a hierarchical manner, with various levels of reality emerging from the Absolute. Similarly, Plotinus proposed a system of emanation, where multiple levels of reality cascade down from the One, including the Intellect and the Soul.

Plotinus and Vedanta both drew upon ideas of the soul’s journey towards liberation or union with the divine. In Vedanta, this process is known as or self-realization. Plotinus referred to it as “the return of the soul to the One.” He believed that the soul, which is originally derived from the One, has become entangled in the material world but can regain its true nature through contemplation, philosophical inquiry and ascetic practices.

The Neoplatonic school, with its focus on the One, the nature of reality, the hierarchy of existence and the journey of the soul, provided a framework to the Greco-Roman world for understanding the universe and one’s place in it. It included subsequent philosophers such as Porphyry, Iamblichus and Proclus and influenced early Christian thinkers like and .

In Greek philosophy, especially in the writings of , a pre-Socratic philosopher hailing from Ephesus in present-day Turkey, the term “logos” encompassed a range of significances. Plato and Aristotle subsequently expanded upon the theme. The meanings of the term included reason, conversation and language, as well as the inherent order and organization of the cosmos. Logos embodied the rational principle that governs and brings harmony to the world. It was regarded as a fundamental element of human existence, facilitating communication, comprehension and the quest for knowledge.

Similarly, in the Vedic tradition, “” is the Sanskrit term for speech or language but also holds a deeper significance. Vak is considered a divine power associated with the goddess and is seen as the creative force behind the universe. Vak is believed to have the power to manifest thoughts and ideas into reality. It is the means through which the ultimate reality () expresses itself in the world.

Both logos and vak emphasize the importance of language in shaping our understanding of the world. They recognize that language is not merely a tool for communication but a profound force that underlies creation and provides a framework for human cognition and expression. Both concepts suggest that there is an inherent order and meaning in the universe that can be accessed and understood through language.

Furthermore, both logos and vak recognize the transformative power of words. They emphasize that the way we use language can shape our reality and have a profound impact on ourselves and others. The proper use of language is seen as a means to attain wisdom, knowledge and spiritual realization. The epistemic similarities between the two have been analyzed by the Greek scholar among others. 

The Greeks encountered a fascinating belief: —the notion that souls can migrate into new bodies. This concept intrigued early Greek philosophers like . It bears a strong similarity to the Indian belief in reincarnation. For centuries, Hindus, Buddhists and Jains have embraced the idea that our souls embark on a journey of multiple lifetimes. Could it be that Indian notions about the cyclical nature of existence influenced the musings of these Greek thinkers? Many scholars seem to think so. 

The Greek philosopher introduced the world to the four elements—earth, air, fire and water—as the building blocks of all matter. Remarkably, ancient Indian philosophy also recognized a similar set of elements known as “.” Earth, air, fire and water played a vital role in both cultures’ understanding of the world. 

Greek philosophers like and the Cynics had a remarkable inclination toward detachment and renunciation. These ideas bear a striking resemblance to concepts found in Indian philosophies such as Buddhism and Jainism. The pursuit of non-attachment, the rejection of material possessions and the quest for inner peace and enlightenment were common to both the Pyrrhonists and the gymnosophists.

The Greeks coined the term “” to refer to a group of ancient Indian philosophers. The word literally means “naked philosophers” or “naked wise men.” These individuals pursued asceticism to such an extent that they considered food and clothing as hindrances to pure thinking. Various Greek authors mentioned that they followed a vegetarian diet. Additionally, there were gymnosophists in Upper Egypt who Apollonius of Tyana referred to as “Ethiopian gymnosophists.”

, the famous biographer of philosophers who lived in the 3rd century AD, made references to the gymnosophists. He that Pyrrho of Ellis, while in India alongside Alexander the Great, was influenced by these gymnosophists. Upon returning to Ellis, Pyrrho adopted their way of life, which eventually led him to establish the Hellenistic philosophy of Pyrrhonism.

Gods and fate in the Iliad and the Mahabharata

The and the , two monumental epic poems, offer captivating narratives that plumb the depths of human experience and explore themes of war, heroism and destiny. The Iliad, a Greek epic poem traditionally attributed to , originated in ancient Greece during the 6th to 8th centuries BC. Similarly, the Mahabharata, an ancient epic poem from India, traditionally attributed to the great sage , traces its roots back to the 6th century BC. Despite originating from different cultures, these epics share intriguing similarities and offer rich grounds for comparative analysis.

One of the most striking parallels between the Iliad and the Mahabharata is their central focus on . In the Iliad, we witness the epic conflict of the , while the Mahabharata unfolds around the . Both battles serve as backdrops for the exploration of profound human emotions, the struggles of heroes and the complex dynamics of family and honor.

There is a strong resemblance between characters in the Iliad and their counterparts in the Mahabharata. Take , the central figure in the Iliad, and his uncanny similarities to the valiant from the Mahabharata. Both are renowned warriors, gifted with extraordinary skills while burdened with fatal flaws. Both are guided by a code of honor that shapes their actions on the battlefield. 

Both grand narratives of the Iliad and the Mahabharata, though commonly ascribed to single authors, emerged from what , a renowned critic known for shaping the contemporary literary canon through the creation of the Norton Anthology of English Literature, defines as the “.” Within this framework, these epics were carefully molded by literary artists who drew inspiration from historical and legendary accounts that had evolved within the oral traditions of their respective nations during periods of expansion and conflict.

Divine intervention plays a significant role in both these epics, where gods and goddesses actively intervene in the affairs of semi-divine humans on Earth. The deities participate in councils, manipulate events and even determine the fates of mortal warriors. In the Mahabharata, gods frequently descend from the heavens to witness battles between valiant warriors. However, these divine beings are not above trickery, as exemplified by the god Indra’s actions when he approaches Karna to acquire his armor, thus ensuring Karna’s defeat against Arjuna.

Moreover, the gods bestow blessings or punishments on humans according as they are driven by their personal inclinations. Often portrayed as relentless, they exhibit little mercy, especially when humans deviate from their ordained paths. In the Iliad, Zeus stands in support of the Trojans during the war and sends Hermes to accompany King Priam to Achilles’ camp. 

Both the Mahabharata and the Iliad seem to exalt the splendor of warfare. Characters are assessed and judged based on their courage and competence in battle, determining whether they are worthy of admiration or contempt. For instance, Paris in the Iliad is disdained by his family and lover for his aversion to fighting, while Achilles earns eternal renown for deliberately rejecting a peaceful and unremarkable life at home. 

The texts themselves uphold this measure of character evaluation and extend it even to the gods. They portray warlike deities like Athena in a favorable light, while humorously ridiculing timid gods such as Aphrodite and Artemis, who shy away from aggression. 

Fate weaves its tapestry in intriguing ways across both tales. The , banished to the forest for a grueling 14-year period, mirror the enduring struggle of the Trojan War, fought for an equally lengthy duration.

As battle ensues, we witness the inner turmoil of two great warriors. Arjuna, initially hesitant to raise his weapon, mirrors the reluctance that Achilles shows when the Trojan War erupts. Both grapple with their roles in the face of conflict.

Arjuna, filled with sorrow over his fallen son , solemnly vows to avenge his death by slaying Jaydrath. Similarly, Achilles mourns the loss of his beloved brother Patroclus, vowing to seek retribution by slaying Hector.

Darkness becomes an ally as strategic strikes shake the enemy’s foundations. , using the element of surprise and wielding fire as his weapon, wreaks havoc upon the army, decimating their camps with devastating flames. Hector employs a similar tactic, launching a fiery assault under the cover of night, reducing the Greek ships to ash.

The art of storytelling unites the two narratives. Sanjaya, the narrator of the Mahabharata, relays the epic saga of the war to the blind king , providing a window into the unfolding events. Similarly, a minister assumes the role of narrator, recounting the Trojan War to their king, ensuring the tales of valor and tragedy reach eager ears.

Blindness to the faults of one’s own kin emerges as a recurring theme. Dhritarashtra, turning a blind eye to the misdeeds of his wicked son , parallels the Trojan king, who remains oblivious to the faults of his son Paris, despite their detrimental consequences.

Moments of triumph and anguish shape the lives of the characters. Duryodhana’s exultation upon winning Draupadi in the game of dice echoes through the halls as he revels in his newfound power, proclaiming her as their slave. Similarly, in the Iliad, Briseis, a Trojan woman, becomes a pawn awarded to Achilles after suffering the indignities inflicted upon her by other kings and soldiers.

Prophecies cast a foreboding shadow over the destinies of key figures. The Iliad speaks of the prophecy regarding , the harbinger of destruction for his kingdom. Similarly, the Mahabharata foretells the prophecy of Duryodhana, whose actions will ultimately bring ruin upon his own realm

From �ٲ�ḗu�� to Zeus: The Sky Father in Indo-European Mythology. 

In the hidden mists of prehistory, where myth and religion intermingle, the Proto-Indo-European people held a profound reverence for their deities. Among this pantheon of gods, one figure stood out—the mighty Sky Father. Initially revered as the father of other gods, this celestial patriarch ultimately ascended to become the supreme ruler of the divine realm, reigning over a vast expanse of Indo-European lands from Ireland to India.

The connection between the Indo-European populations and the luminous daytime sky was unmistakable. The radiant heavens served as a beacon of inspiration for poets, scholars and mystics who sought to unravel the mysteries of the divine. 

Deep within the roots of the Proto-Indo-European language, scholars unearthed the name �ٲ�ḗu�� phtḗr, Sky Father, as the ancient term for this revered deity. Its echoes reverberated across cultures, finding expression in the , the Greek and the Latin Iouis or Diouis. The assimilation of thunder and storms by Zeus and Iouis, possibly influenced by Near Eastern traditions, added a dynamic and powerful dimension to their divine personas.

The linguistic puzzle pieces gradually revealed the underlying meaning of �ٲ�ḗu��. The word di/dei, serving as the foundation for the derived forms of �ٲ�ḗu��, encapsulated the essence of “giving off light.” It is no surprise, then, that words stemming from this root evoked notions of brightness, heaven, sky, daylight and day itself. 

The Latin “�徱ŧ��” the Vedic “�徱��é-�徱����” denoting daily occurrences and the Armenian word “tiw,” meaning daytime, all point to the undeniable connection between the sky and the concept of day. Furthermore, the same root gave rise to ���é��- or deiwos, finding expression in the Baltic deities �پ�ẽv���� and Dievs, as well as the generic Latin term for God, deus.

Across the vast pantheon of Indo-European deities, the Sky Father �ٲ�ḗu�� reigned supreme. His role transcended that of a mere deity; he assumed the esteemed position of a divine patriarch, a father figure to the gods themselves. Whether referred to as �ٲ�á��ṣ in Vedic, Zeu páter or patrós Diós in Greek or Iuppiter and Diespiter in Latin, his fatherly title remained consistent, reflecting the enduring reverence bestowed upon him by his worshippers.

But how did Zeus and Jupiter, the illustrious figures of Greek and Roman mythology, ascend from being mere sky-gods to sovereign rulers of the entire pantheon? The answer lies not solely in their fatherly status but also in their embodiment of the sky and heaven itself. As divine entities, Zeus and Jupiter possessed an all-seeing, all-encompassing wisdom.

Homer, the renowned ancient Greek poet, aptly described Zeus with the epithet “,” meaning “with wide vision.” Interestingly, this epithet gave birth to the name Europe itself, as the continent was named after a woman abducted by Zeus, who bore him the famous King Minos of Crete. 

Similarly, the hailed �ٲ�á��ṣ as the “all-knowing god.” This supreme quality stemmed from his ability to perceive all that transpired below. With such immense power, the Rigveda rightfully acknowledged the greatness of the Sky God, referring to him as “máh,” meaning “great.” Zeus, too, was often described with the Homeric epithet ��é������, emphasizing his immense stature.

The sun, often called the “eye of Dyéus” or the “lamp of Dyéus,” enjoyed a unique connection to the Sky Father. Both the sun and the sky shared the attributes of being all-seeing and all-knowing, making them overseers of oaths and justice.

This all-seeing, all-knowing nature of the Sky Father, his role in overseeing justice and oaths and his connection to the sun created a fertile ground for the concept of sovereignty and kingship. French mythographer and philologist, , introduced the significant concept of the “trifunctional hypothesis.”

According to Dumézil, Indo-European myths and religions could be interpreted as symbolic representations of three fundamental domains: the sacred, the martial and the economic. These domains reflected different ideologies and corresponded to the hierarchical division of society into castes or classes associated with sovereignty, military affairs and productivity. In the Greco-Roman world, Zeus and Jupiter embodied sovereignty, while and fulfilled this role in the Indo-Iranian context.

In the vast Indo-European cosmos, the gods resided in the heavens, while humanity inhabited the earth below. This division created an inherent contrast between mortals and the divine. Yet, through wisdom gained from observing celestial phenomena and the skies above, humans gained glimpses of the tremendous power possessed by the immortals.

The great ancient poet Homer beautifully captured this distinction when told Nausicaa, “If you are one of the gods who dwell in the broad heaven, I reckon you are most like Artemis … but if you are of the mortals who live on earth, then thrice fortunate are your parents and brothers.”

The enduring legacy of the ancient Proto-Indo-European religion and mythology continues to shape the belief systems of their countless descendants. Across vast lands, under the watchful gaze of the all-seeing Sky Father Dyéus, his children thrive, honoring their ancestral roots and embracing the divinity that stretches across the heavens.

[ edited this piece.]

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Rising anxiety in the West

Radical politics do not simply come out of nowhere. Numerous critical issues in recent years have generated a great deal of fear and anger around the world, with the richest and most egalitarian countries not escaping the trend. At the core of this crisis are economic issues, from rising income inequality and economic uncertainty to the erosion of middle classes caused by negative aspects of globalization and the swift introduction of new technologies and automation.

Globalization is like fire: it can cook your food, keep you warm, or burn your house down. It has lifted millions of people out of poverty and tremendously benefited the United States and other countries. But it has not impacted all of us equally and has left many behind. Globalization has been tremendous for higher-skilled workers engaged in life-long learning, and for companies that are highly productive or producing goods and services rich in intellectual property. However, it has presented new challenges for employees with limited skills and for less competitive companies that produce low-technology goods and services.

It is important, however, not to confuse the impact of globalization with the harsher impact of new technologies and automation, which are the primary factors responsible for job losses and could threaten of America’s workforce in the next two decades.

The good news: after waves of new technologies destroy jobs, many more are created. Although we don’t know what the jobs of the future will be, we do know they will require highly skilled workers. The bad news: this process has led to rising income inequality between higher- and lower-skilled workers and is a major contributing factor responsible for eroding America’s middle class.

Economic issues, furthermore, are just part of the problem. Social and cultural issues are also contributing to the pressure. These include fear of a decline in social status, rapid cultural changes and resentment toward immigrants. This last factor is exacerbated by demographic shifts in many parts of Europe and in the United States. In the US, the white population will become a minority . Many voters in these regions and around the world are reassessing their allegiance to political leaders, turning away from long-established, center-based political parties, and moving towards populist and even authoritarian leaders on both the far right and left of the political spectrum.

Un-democratic leaders offer a tempting solution

Populists are politicians and leaders that claim to champion the interests of ordinary voters against perceived elites or special interests. To gain influence and support, they manipulate dissatisfied voters through emotional appeals, often declaring political opponents and democratic institutions corrupt, attacking the mainstream media, and attributing economic inequality to “others”: not only the political or economic ruling class, but also immigrants and foreigners.

Authoritarian leaders typically seek to consolidate power under their control, disregard democratic principles, eliminate checks and balances and suppress dissent. They accomplish this by enforcing loyal obedience among their followers, imprisoning political opponents, and subverting or intimidating the judiciary and media. Throughout history, such authoritarian leaders rarely vacate office without a fight.

Individual leaders may exhibit a mix of both populist and authoritarian characteristics with varying levels of severity. Some may utilize a more measured tone, while others employ more aggressive and confrontational rhetoric. Nevertheless, the two tendencies interact with and reinforce each other. As seasoned Harvard political scientist Pippa Norris , the blend of authoritarian values with populist rhetoric can be a dangerous combination.

According to Norris, over fifty political parties in Europe can now be classified as authoritarian-populist. They have gained an increasing presence in parliaments and have entered government coalitions in more than a dozen Western democracies, including Austria, Italy, New Zealand, Norway, and Switzerland. 

Many world leaders have also endorsed authoritarian and populist values to a greater or lesser degree, says Norris. These have included the late Silvio Berlusconi of Italy, Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines, Miloš Zeman of the Czech Republic, Viktor Orbán of Hungary, Nicolás Maduro of Venezuela, Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil, Narendra Modi of India, and Donald Trump of the United States.

In the United States, several of the critical issues noted above have become more severe in the wake of the Great Recession that began in late 2007. The inhospitable economic environment this created likely accelerated American public support for populists. Consequently, the growing far right has pushed the Republican party in that direction. At the same time, left-leaning populists, finding greater public support than before, pulled the Democratic party further left of the political spectrum.

Democracy and capitalism support each other

The threat to democracy, worrying in itself, is likewise a threat to healthy free-market principles and the prosperity that they bring.

One empirical way of looking at the connection between democracy and capitalism is to study the relationship between political freedom and economic freedom at a moment in time, to Martin Wolf, chief economics commentator at the Financial Times. “Overall, the economically free countries are, with a few small exceptions, also leading democracies,” he says.

At its core, capitalism is an economic system characterized by private initiative and ownership of the means of production, fair competition, and the pursuit of profit. Free-market capitalism emphasizes limited, but appropriate, government intervention. When capitalism is optimized, individuals have the right both domestically and internationally to buy, sell, invest, start businesses, lend money, borrow money and exchange currencies. These are freedoms cherished by liberal democratic governments.

Democracy, on the other hand, may be simply defined as a system of government where power is vested in the people who exercise their authority either directly or through elected representatives. The principles of majority rule and protection of individual rights and freedoms are prominent. Liberal democracies, which are the most commonly favored type of democracy because they tend to be very stable, go further by providing additional emphasis on the rule of law, minority rights, civil liberties and a sound system of checks and balances. Examples of liberal democracies include the United States, Canada, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, and most European countries.

Capitalism combined with democracy has created the highest quality of life ever achieved across the globe. Essential components of its not-so-secret recipe are the extensive freedoms afforded to individuals to make choices that are protected by the rule of law.

Debilitating democracy will debilitate capitalism

Liberal democratic countries with sound systems of checks and balances are designed to prevent any one leader or party from permanently imposing its will or policies on others. This balance is part of an important formula that enables constant change, some good, some bad, but always allowing for self-correction through elections.

If democratic values are curtailed or eliminated by extreme-leaning governments, freedoms afforded to individuals will also be curtailed. In turn, high-performing capitalism, which requires freedom of choice, will suffer. As by Michael Novak, author of dozens of books on the philosophy and theology of culture, checks and balances are as important to the political order as competition is to the economic order. Capitalism is not just a set of economic arrangements, but depends on core values which are also essential to liberal democracy:

Democratic capitalism is not a “free enterprise system” alone. It cannot thrive apart from the moral culture that nourishes the virtues and values on which its existence depends. It cannot thrive apart from a democratic polity committed … to limited government.

It is not, in fact, possible for capitalism to be successfully implemented for very long without a robust democracy. As an example, we can take China. The People’s Republic does not have a system of checks and balances, does not promote competition among its vast state enterprises, limits the action of its markets and restrains the independence of its entrepreneurs. Despite having impressive economic statistics on paper, ��󾱲Բ�’s brand of one-party state-controlled capitalism is undergoing deep-seated difficulties and is not likely to survive “as-is” in the long run.

History demonstrates that authoritarian leaders typically dictate all economic policies, pick winners and losers in business and industry, and disrupt or decimate markets by effectively taking decisions once made by millions of independent buyers, sellers and investors and placing them in the hands of a few individuals. This is a pattern that played out in the failed Soviet Union and which continues in present-day Russia or even China, governments that, despite partial liberalization, continue to a large degree to engage in central planning.

History also demonstrates that the tenure of authoritarian leaders typically does not end well. Why? To borrow a phrase from Lord John Acton, a member of British Parliament in the 1860s, “absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Authoritarian leaders rarely refrain for long from privileging themselves and their favorites over the public at large. The result: public support vanishes once the people realize that their interests are not served and their freedoms are curtailed.

“If authoritarianism of some kind were to replace liberal democracy, competitive market capitalism would be unlikely to survive,” said Martin Wolf. The world’s democracies must prevent this. It’s essential that we strive to address and rectify the critical economic, social and cultural issues of our time. Global support for the middle ground, not the extreme left or right, will save our democracies as well as our capitalist systems.

[ edited this piece.]

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In January 2022, Goldman Sachs predicted that the euro area would “outgrow the U.S. economy over the next two years.” With hindsight today, that was clearly mistaken, but not because the prediction was ill-founded. That got me to thinking what life was like in 2022 and how things have subsequently played out.

Europe’s economic success depended on its access to cheap Russian gas. That all changed in February 2022 when Russia launched a military assault on Ukraine. Western governments and their media promptly and insistently described this event as an “unprovoked invasion.” 

In response, US President Joe Biden began an economic blockade to cut Russia off from the entire Western economy. His stated aim was to reduce the ruble to “rubble.”��

Could this radical rupture and a war that is still going on have been avoided? Two months before the invasion, the US had refused to consider a concrete Russian proposal to engage in negotiations. Any agreement that might have been reached in December 2021 would have prevented what has subsequently become a war of attrition.

It was the Ukrainians themselves who revealed that in the spring of 2022 UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, speaking for NATO, stepped in to prevent the conclusion of negotiations that appeared to be on the verge of ending the conflict. Could this opposition to conciliation reflect a conscious strategy? And might the success of the European economy be a factor? I wondered what Chad might have to say.

“Chad,” I began, “you may have noticed that some commentators are now making the astonishing suggestion that the aim of the US was not just to ‘weaken’ Russia, as Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin framed it, but to cripple the European economy.�� Its success depended on Europe’s access to Russian sources of energy. Could it be that the US strategists wanted this conflict to occur, knowing it would break up an economic relationship likely to give Europe a serious advantage over the US?”

Chad, as I predicted, wasn’t buying it.

“The claim that the US encouraged the invasion of Ukraine as a pretext for decoupling Europe from Russia is speculative and lacks concrete evidence. Geopolitical events and decisions are typically influenced by a wide range of factors, including national interests, security concerns, historical contexts, and alliances.

The situation in Ukraine and the subsequent imposition of sanctions on Russia had significant economic consequences for Europe, particularly in relation to energy supplies, as many European countries heavily rely on Russian gas imports. However, it is a complex issue, and attributing the recession in European economies solely to the cutting off of gas supplies is an oversimplification.

The timing of the events you mentioned, including the forecast of the euro area outgrowing the US economy, the invasion of Ukraine, and subsequent economic effects, might create the appearance of a correlation or intentional action. However, it is crucial to recognize that these events are multifaceted and influenced by various factors.

It’s worth noting that the decisions and actions of nations are subject to analysis and interpretation, and different perspectives may exist on any given situation. It’s always recommended to consult a variety of sources and viewpoints to develop a well-rounded understanding of complex geopolitical events.”

“That’s exactly my point,” I responded. “The legacy media in the West have unanimously refused to consider even the slightest ‘different perspective.’ That could explain their insistence on calling the invasion ‘unprovoked.’ They don’t want anyone to notice that there was a provocation. The US has always been ambiguous about Europe. Obviously, from the very beginning of its history, when the young nation broke away from its colonial masters in London to create an experiment in democracy. But you must be aware of multiple examples in history that show the US striving to oppose European expansion and success.”

Chad then dutifully provided the following four examples.

“Monroe Doctrine: In 1823, President James Monroe articulated the Monroe Doctrine, which declared that European powers should not interfere or establish new colonies in the Americas. This policy was aimed at preventing European influence in the region and protecting the sovereignty of newly independent Latin American countries.

World Wars: During both World Wars, the United States initially remained neutral and cautious about involving itself in European conflicts. It was only after specific events, such as the sinking of the Lusitania in World War I and the attack on Pearl Harbor in World War II, that the United States entered the conflicts.

Marshall Plan: Following World War II, the United States implemented the Marshall Plan, a significant economic aid program to help rebuild war-torn Europe. While the plan aimed to support European recovery and prevent the spread of communism, it also helped strengthen ties between the United States and European countries.

Cold War: The Cold War era saw the United States and its NATO allies in Europe facing off against the Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies. The United States provided military support, including troops and nuclear deterrence, to defend Western Europe against potential Soviet aggression.

These examples illustrate instances where the United States took actions that were influenced by its own interests, concerns, and geopolitical dynamics, often with a cautious or opposing stance toward European expansion or influence.”

“So it would make sense,” I retorted, “to at least consider the idea that the US was concerned with preventing the development of a mutually productive relationship between Europe and Russia that had the capacity to weaken Europe’s dependence on the US. 

I see two main factors of motivation. First, if Russia is integrated into the European economy, the raison d’être of NATO, initially put in place to counter a Soviet threat, would definitively disappear. Second, this is about self-interest. Just as with the Marshall Plan, when, as you point out, the aim was less to boost the European economy than to ‘strengthen ties” between the US and Europe.

In recent years the US began worrying that Europe’s ties with Russia would weaken its ties with the US. That relationship has, at least since the end of World War II,��always implied a situation of dependency. Wouldn’t you say that US foreign policy has consistently sought to create relationships of dependency on the expansive power of the US?”

As usual, Chad partially agreed before expressing what amounts to nearly total disagreement.

“US foreign policy has certainly involved creating relationships with other nations, and at times, these relationships may have included elements of dependency. However, it’s important to approach this topic with nuance and consider the broader context.”

“Chad, your use of ‘at times’ I find a little suspect. It can mean anything between ‘very occasionally’ and permanently repeated. I would opt for the latter, which establishes it as something similar to a law or inherent trait.”

Ignoring my comment, Chad continued.

“The United States has also pursued policies aimed at promoting self-determination, democracy, and human rights around the world. It has supported nations in their development efforts, provided humanitarian aid, and contributed to international institutions.”

This time I had to blurt out, “Chad, you’re being naïve. You’re repeating standard propaganda which no serious commentator or responsible historian takes literally.”

Chad appeared to admit I might be right, but insisted on the sacred principle of acknowledging “multiple perspectives,” which happened to be the very point I had been making.

“While it is valid to critically analyze and question the motivations behind foreign policies, it is crucial to consider multiple perspectives, evaluate evidence, and avoid sweeping generalizations.”

“Thank you, Chad,” I responded. “That’s exactly what I wanted to hear. Let’s keep exploring those multiple perspectives and try to make sure they are truly open to multiplicity. And the best reason for doing that is that the media we’re subjected to consistently fails to do so.”

*[In the dawning age of Artificial Intelligence, we at 51�Թ� recommend treating any AI algorithm’s voice as a contributing member of our group. As we do with family members, colleagues or our circle of friends, we quickly learn to profit from their talents and, at the same time, appreciate the social and intellectual limits of their personalities. This enables a feeling of camaraderie and constructive exchange to develop spontaneously and freely. For more about how we initially welcomed Chad to our breakfast table, click here.]

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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Meanwhile, the countries that would form the EU pursued a vigorous and profitable policy of promoting trade with China. Germany led the way in this respect, especially through the export of German automobiles. This particular trend is weakening at the moment, although generally trade with China has recovered well.

There is a new problem. This is the openly declared and increasingly explicit US policy of curbing the growth and sophistication of the Chinese economy. This is being done because the US fears that China could pose a security threat to the US, and its allies, including Taiwan. The US wants to deny China access to certain types of semiconductors. Security concerns were cited by the Trump Administration when it imposed hefty tariffs on Chinese steel and aluminum. China responded with tariffs of its own. The US is also putting pressure on its allies to join in some of these measures.

An Expert Explains Why We Need a New Cold War With China

The goal is to prevent China from developing strongly in areas that might make a key contribution to its national security. The World Trade Organization (WTO), of which China is a member, aims to ensure that global trade is governed by predictable and transparent rules. But “national security” is a matter of subjective judgment, to which such rules cannot easily be applied. Furthermore, China does not want WTO rules to apply to state-owned enterprises, while the US is undermining the appeals mechanism on WTO rulings.

The law of the jungle in international trade suits big counties, but not smaller ones. Economies such as Ireland are fortunate to be part of an EU bloc that will defend their interests.

Recently, the US published its National Security Strategy. It accused China of “wanting to reshape the international order” and of “assertive behavior”…hardly a hanging offense.

It said that it wanted the US to “outcompete” China, and added that it would oppose any unilateral change in relations across the Taiwan Strait. It also said that the US does not support Taiwan independence and remains committed to a “One China” policy.

This language is quite conciliatory and makes one wonder what the then Speaker Nancy Pelosi was trying to achieve with her recent high-profile visit to Taiwan—at a time when we may need China to talk sense into the Russians and get them to back out of their unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.

China had a strong record of defending the territorial integrity of states, notably against European powers in the nineteenth century. So it should not be neutral about the imperialist behavior of Russia!

[ edited this piece.]

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In a recently published , political scientist Anna Gryzmala-Busse traces the origins of the modern state to medieval Europe when religion and the church played a powerful role rather than the 16th-century beginnings of the modern era.

Gryzmala-Busse’s analysis is not simply academic and historical. It puts in a different light notions of Christian religiosity and heritage in Central and Eastern Europe that have strained relations in the European Union between Western European states and former Communist countries like as well as secular Europe’s struggle to come to grips with the religiosity of their Muslim minorities, nowhere more so than in .

Although Gryzmala-Busse’s focus is on Christianity and Europe, her analysis helps explain why the Sunni Muslim world took a different path and why the concept of a caliphate remains in Islam.

Religion and Politics in the Christian World

Gryzmala-Busse asserted that secular European rulers needed to create institutions to collect taxes and have an institutional base for fighting wars and negotiating peace on a fragmented continent. To do so, monarchs adopted administrative policies and approaches developed by a wealthy church that was Europe’s single largest landowner. It levied taxes on its land holdings. In addition, the church boasted a highly educated elite, commanded authority, and held out the prospect of salvation.

As a result, “the church was an essential source of legal, administrative, and conciliar innovations… The church showed rulers how to collect taxes more efficiently, request and answer a flood of petitions, keep records and accounts, interpret the law, and hold counsels that could provide valuable consent,” Gryzmala-Busse wrote.

“Concepts such as representation, binding consent, and even majority rules relied on ecclesiastical precedents,” she said. In short, “the medieval church was so influential because it was armed with superior organizational reach, human capital, and spiritual authority,” Gryzmala-Busse concluded. Implicitly, she acknowledged that the Muslim world traveled down a different path when she noted that there were no governance models in Asia and the Middle East that medieval European leaders could emulate.

Gryzmala-Busse was likely referring to Islam scholar Ahmed Kuru’s ground-breaking analysis of what he called the state-ulema alliance. That alliance precluded an arrangement similar to that between the church and rulers as portrayed by political scientist . This arrangement involved rulers successfully deploying what they had learnt from clerics to curtail and sideline the church.

In his , Laurence noted that ultimately the church could no longer prevail and accepted temporal jurisdiction over what became the tiny Vatican state while reaching a modus vivendi with European governments that ensured its continued existence and enabled it to thrive.

“European nations strong-armed, expropriated, violated, and humiliated the Catholic hierarchy,” forcing it to “relinquish its 1,000-year claim to political rule and focus instead on advocacy, global spiritual influence, and its evangelizing mission,” Laurence wrote. The political scientist argued further that European efforts to undermine the Ottoman caliphate that was abolished in 1924 in the wake of the emergence of a modern Turkish state fueled theological differences in the Sunni Muslim world.

Religion and Politics in the Muslim World

While that may have been a contributing factor, Kuru’s analysis suggested that the evolution of relations between the state and religious scholars in the Sunni Muslim world would have prevented it from adopting the European model irrespective of external attitudes towards the caliphate. So did the absence in Islam of a central authority like the pope.

Kuru traced the modern-day state template in many Muslim-majority countries to the 11th century. This is when Islamic scholars who until then had, by and large, refused to surrender their independence to the state were co-opted by Muslim rulers. The transition coincided with the rise of the military state legitimized by religious scholars who had little choice but to join its employ. They helped the state develop Sunni Muslim orthodoxy based on text rather than reason- or tradition-based interpretations of Islam.

It is an orthodoxy that prevails until today even though various states such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates have adopted far-reaching social change as part of economic reform efforts and as a regime survival strategy. The orthodoxy is reflected in reticence with few exceptions to reform outdated religious legal tenets, particularly when it comes to notions of the state.

In a bold move in February, Nahdlatul Ulama, the world’s largest, Indonesia-based Muslim civil society movement argued that Islamic jurisprudence needs to be to introduce the notion of the nation-state and a United Nations that groups these states.

The movement contended that this would involve abolishing the notion of the caliphate as a legal concept. “It is neither feasible nor desirable to re-establish a universal caliphate that would unite Muslims throughout the world in opposition to non-Muslims…. Attempts to do so will inevitably be disastrous and contrary to the purposes of Sharia (Islamic law): i.e., the protection of religion, human life, sound reasoning, family, and property,” the group said in a declaration on its centennial according to the Hijra calendar.

Nahdlatul Ulama’s reforms of Islamic jurisprudence do not bind others in a Muslim world where religious authority is decentralized. However, they lay down a marker that other Muslim legal authorities will ultimately be unable to ignore in their bid to garner recognition as proponents of a genuinely moderate Islam. As a result, politics rather than morality or spirituality will determine Nahdlatul Ulama’s impact beyond Indonesia, the world’s most populous and largest Muslim-majority democracy.

The importance of politics is reinforced by the implicit agreement between scholars Gryzmala-Busse , Laurence and Kuru that the state has successfully subjugated religious power in Europe as well as much of the Sunni Muslim world.

However, the difference is that in Europe the church withdrew from politics and retreated to the spiritual realm while in the Muslim world religious figures retain some clout with rulers wanting them to legitimize their authoritarian or autocratic rule.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post Make Sense of Nation-State: Born from Religion, Bred by Politics appeared first on 51�Թ�.

The subtitle of Bodganor’s book is  “Politics and Power Before the First World War,” and it is an account of the politics of the British Isles between 1890 and 1914. The book is essential reading for any student of Irish history. Bogdanor is comprehensive, gives a good account of the 1899-1902 Boer War, recounts women’s struggle to gain the right to vote, covers the rise of the Labour Party, and examines the introduction of unemployment and sickness insurance. Bogdanor also outlines the evolution of British foreign policy, including the alliance with Japan and the increasing, though not inevitable, rivalry with Germany. It covers the tragic events that led to World War I. In a nutshell, Bogdadanor has written a big book in every sense.

The title of the book is misleading, in the sense that the book is about far more than the survival of liberalism. It explores the issue of tariff reform, forgotten today, but politically convulsive for the first 20 years of the  20th Century. In the 1890s, a leading figure in the Conservative and Unionist Party, Joseph Chamberlain, committed his party to what he called “tariff reform.” By this he meant something was quite radical, turning the British Empire, which spanned every continent on the globe, into an economic union, much like the EU today.

The British Empire as One Big Free Trade Union

As with the founders of the EU in the 1950s, Chamberlain envisaged giving trade preference to goods produced within the British Empire over imports from elsewhere (e.g. continental Europe and the US), and thereby strengthening the political unity of the empire. 

In the 1890s, note that empires were regarded as progressive concepts. They were seen as vehicles for the promulgation of civilized ideas, such as the rule of law.  Other powers, like France, the Netherlands and the US, were also seeking to build their own empires. Empires were seen as efficient. They enjoyed economies of scale that smaller powers could not match. “The Empire” was also important domestically for the United Kingdom: it helped keep England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland united in a shared endeavor.

Hence, Chamberlain’s proposal for imperial trade preference was seen, at least superficially, to be going with, rather than against, the grain of history. As a result of Chamberlain’s advocacy, the Conservatives were to promote tariff reform, on an on-and-off basis, for almost 30 years.

However, this policy proved to be a vote loser. The British Empire could not produce all the food that Britons wanted to eat, and tariff reform would have required a tax on food coming from outside the Empire. High food prices, then as now, were politically lethal for politicians.  Chamberlain’s protectionist ideas also ran against the free trade, laissez-faire ideology that had dominated economic thinking in Britain for much of the 19th century.

Many British thinkers and politicians had a deep belief in free trade. One of them was Winston Churchill. In 1904, he was a young Conservative MP who left the party and joined the Liberal Party because he believed in free trade. Joseph Chamberlain’s son, Neville, would put some of his father’s protectionist ideas into practice, as chancellor of the exchequer in the 1930s.

Now largely forgotten, Joseph Chamberlain was a dynamic force. He was a successful businessman who became the mayor of Birmingham. He was Nonconformist—in those days, a term used for Protestant Christians who did not “conform” to the governance and usages of the Church of England, the established church of England—and was an early advocate of old age pensions and anti-poverty programs. Chamberlain was originally a member of parliament (MP) for the Liberal Party but became a Conservative when Liberals supported Home Rule for Ireland. Truth to be told, Chamberlain was never really a Conservative.

Through sheer force of personality, Chamberlain imported protectionism into the Conservative Party. Tariff reform is just one of the many themes explored in Venon Bogdanor’s comprehensive history of the 30 years preceding World War I. It is a history of policymaking, not just of politics. Bogdanor’s book not only has all the drama of these tumultuous years, but also solid content. 

The Story of Ireland in the British Empire

As stated earlier, the book is comprehensive. It covers developments in England, Wales, Scotland and, of course, Ireland. At the time, Ireland was run by 29 different government departments, each with its own board. They were all supervised by a single non-resident chief secretary for Ireland, usually an English or Scottish MP from the governing party in Westminster. 

By some measures, Ireland did well during this final period of British rule. The amount the British central exchequer spent in Ireland increased more rapidly than the amount of taxes it collected. In 1893, the Irish Administration (run by the British) ran a surplus on its budget and Ireland was making a net contribution to the overall British budget. In contrast, by 1912, this surplus was turned into a deficit of £1.5 million.

This increase in British expenditure on Ireland was for two reasons. First, old age pensions were introduced in 1909 and a number of Irish people qualified for them. Second, the British exchequer compensated landlords for transferring their land to tenants as per legislation passed in 1903. These two measures made Ireland a loss-making entity for the United Kingdom. Before World War I, the UK was actually losing money to keep Ireland in the union.

At the time, Ireland was seemingly doing well politically as well. It was actually overrepresented in the House of Commons, with one MP for every 44,000 voters in contrast to one MP for every 66,000 voters in England. Yet this Irish representation was not worth that much. Ireland was run entirely out of London by the chief secretary through the 29 departments. Irish MPs could only give inputs through the House of Commons and had little say in running their country. Very few MPs rose to become ministers.

Such a situation was increasingly unsatisfactory for most Irish people. It led to a growing demand for “,” a movement to secure internal autonomy for Ireland within the British Empire. The Irish wanted their own parliament and government in Dublin. They wanted their ministers to be responsible to their own parliament, not the overstretched chief secretary for Ireland in London. 

The idea of Home Rule was resisted in Britain. It was seen as heralding the beginning of the disintegration of the British Empire. As Lord Salisbury, the prime minister at the beginning of the period, put it: ”If Ireland goes, India will go 50 years later.” He was not far off the mark. Ironically, the 1916-18 Indian Home Rule movement was inspired by Ireland. One of its two main leaders was Annie Besant who had an Irish connection. Her father was an Englishman who got his medical degree at Trinity College, Dublin and her mother was an Irish Catholic. 

As Bogdonar describes, forces in Britain ranged against Home Rule were substantial and serious. This is why it is truly remarkable that Home Rule for Ireland passed into law, without a shot being fired, in September 1914. This peaceful achievement by Irish politicians in Westminster, like John Redmond, John Dillon and Joe Devlin, was largely ignored by the Irish government at the beginning of the “.” This commemoration “of the centenaries of a number of seminal events in modern Irish history” ignored this peaceful achievement and favored the nationalism of physical force.

In 1909, the Liberal government led by Herbert Henry Asquith depended on the Irish Party and the Labour Party to stay in office. Lloyd George, the charismatic chancellor of the exchequer, introduced a radical budget that deliberately to raise money to “wage implacable warfare against poverty and squalidness.” The House of Lords rejected this famous “People’s Budget,” creating a constitutional crisis. In response the Liberal government introduced a parliamentary bill to curb the power of the House of Lords to veto legislation passed in the House of Commons. It was brinkmanship, but it worked. 

If the House of Lords had not rejected the budget in the first place, Irish Home Rule might have been postponed. The Liberal government had only a half-hearted commitment to Irish Home Rule but events forced its hand. In April 1912, the Liberal government introduced the third Home Rule bill in Westminster, which was passed as the Government of Ireland Act 1914 and history was made.

Run up to World War I

Bogdanor’s book also deals with the events leading to World War I. In the 1890s, Chamberlain had favored a Teutonic (Protestant) alliance between the UK, the US and Germany. However, the majority opinion in Britain preferred closer relations with France and Russia.

The British cabinet seems to have had little discussion of foreign and defense policy in the years before the war. It placed an exaggerated reliance on the Royal Navy and neglected the British Army. In general, the cabinet had no agenda, no regular meetings and no minutes in this period. Only �ұ�������Բ�’s August 1914 invasion of Belgium enabled Britain to enter the war as a united country on the allied side. If Germany had avoided Belgium, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, as it was known then, would have been deeply split on whether to support France militarily, or stay out of the war.

When it comes to the tricky question of war guilt, it was the belligerent and irresponsible demands of Austria on Serbia that dragged Russia and Germany into war with one another. In retrospect, the war seems unnecessary and avoidable. At the time, a chain of events kicked off a tragic four years of bloodshed.

I strongly recommend this book. The reader will find that many of the problems we sense as being unique to our era were around at the time of my grandparents as well.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post A Full View of Britain and Ireland a Century Ago appeared first on 51�Թ�.

This is an alarming statement from a man who is not given to alarming statements. While this is a war of aggression by Russia, the aggression was  driven, at least in part, by fear. Russia feared being encircled by NATO and EU countries that were hostile to it. Yet these same countries had clamored to join NATO because of their fear of Russia. For its part, the US pushed the expansion of NATO into central Europe because it feared a China-Russia alliance dominating the Eurasian landmass. 

My direct experience is that security issues dominate diplomatic thinking in Washington, DC,  in a way that they do not dominate thinking in Brussels. The loss of life that has already taken place as a result of the Russian invasion is enormous. The physical infrastructure destroyed by Russian weapons will take 10 years, and tens of billions of euros, to rebuild.

There are eight million Ukrainian refugees in EU countries, and this number is bound to increase. The EU is directly helping a country at war, something it never did before in its 70-year history.

Europe is unprepared for a wider war

The war could widen. The possibility of Russian forces using Belarus as a jumping-off point for a new front in Western Ukraine is being discussed. This would bring the fighting much closer to NATO members: Poland and Lithuania. If either of them are dragged into conflict, it could set off a chain reaction dragging all of Europe into war.

The preparedness of EU countries for such a wider war is not great. These countries have significant and well equipped forces, but getting them to the front, where they would be needed, is something for which Europeans rely on America. Airlift capacity is a major European weakness. Since World War II, the road and rail systems in Europe have not been designed for the swift transportation of heavy military equipment. 

Furthermore, there is a lot of duplication and waste in European armies. They have 170 different (national) weapons systems, In contrast, the US, with a much bigger military, has only 30 different systems.

Meanwhile, the weapons that have been supplied to Ukraine from European stocks have not entirely been replaced. Money has been allocated but orders have not been placed. In case of all-out war, Europe could be caught unawares.

Europe is also suffering deeply from inflation. The dramatic increase in food prices, and in the price of inputs necessary to produce food — fertilizer and energy — is a direct consequence of the Russian invasion. Over of the world population is already facing hunger. The Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that the number of people facing “acute hunger” has multiplied 2.6 times since 2019. The spike in global hunger is affecting poorer countries more severely but Europe is suffering too.

Wheat prices will stay at 250 euros per tonne for the next two years, as against an average of  175 euros per tonne over the previous 20 years. The price increase for cereals since 2004 has been almost twice that for meat and dairy. The world is facing an escalating, war-driven, food price crisis.

What can Europe do to reduce hunger and boost peace?

When it comes to fighting food insecurity, I have four suggestions for the EU:

1. Reconsider the policy of subsidizing fallow arable land. About six million hectares of land are lying fallow right now. These could be used to grow crops.
2. Do not encourage use of land that could grow food to produce biofuels. About nine million hectares are now being used to produce biofuels. Instead, farmers could grow crops.
3. Encourage farming systems that maximize the efficient conversion of sunlight into consumable calories.
4. Discourage food waste. An estimated 17% of food is wasted, mostly by households because of  over purchasing and poor meal planning.

On the conflict front, Europe must make a concerted effort to identify the fears that are fanning the warlike atmosphere today. The fears of all parties have to be taken into account. We must remember that, while it may be impossible to do business with the current regime in Moscow, Russia will still exist when the war is over. The West needs to think through the postwar relationship it could have with a Russia that was willing to respect the territorial integrity of all its neighbors. That could boost the prospects of peace.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post War Is Now Turning Dangerous: What Can Europe Do? appeared first on 51�Թ�.

Feffer is absolutely right to notice a parallel between Bosnia and Ukraine today. But why stop at only one? Describing his reaction at that moment in history, Feffer recounts that he “roundly criticized the knee-jerk ‘pro-Serbian’ analyses of some leftists who parroted the propaganda of strongman Slobodan Milošević’s government just as naïve leftists unwittingly follow Kremlin talking points on Ukraine today.”

Feffer makes no clear case to justify his characterization of leftists as naïve, nor does he explain why those same leftists “follow” rather than simply happen to share what he calls “Kremlin talking points.” His shortcut shouldn’t surprise us. That imagined connection has become a fixture of the pervasive “” that has infected so much of US media since Donald Trump’s election in 2016. It relies on accepting a pseudo-logical rule that if two people provide the same analysis of any political situation, one must be echoing the other or, worse, be programmed by it. That kind of guilt by coincidental agreement and “associative xenophobia” are well-known symptoms of a deep-seated pathological trend towards binary thinking at the core of US culture. It systematically seeks to polarize every difference of opinion or point of view.

How It Took Six Years to Achieve the Victory of Polarization

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An astute reader, curious about logic and semantics, might even ask what it really means to “unwittingly follow.” If you don’t know you’re following someone, can it really be called following? In evoking the “naïve leftists,” Feffer himself seems to be following the often-cited idea of “useful idiots,” a phrase traditionally attributed to Vladimir Ilyich Lenin. In the preceding sentence, I used the verb “to be following” in the strictly chronological sense. It indicates that one event occurred later in time (Lenin’s phrase came before Feffer’s evocation of it). It does not necessarily imply that the second event depended on, was inspired by or even connected to the initial event for its formulation. Propaganda often exploits this ambiguity of the verb follow that confuses its chronological and causal sense.

Comparing different lessons

Feffer’s article clearly explains the lesson he claims to have learned from the history of Bosnia. But other observers, not necessarily “naïve leftists,” have taken away very different lessons. It might also be instructive to consider these when attempting to decipher the contemporary situation in Ukraine.

The best place to start would be the Sir Alfred Sherman, an adviser to Margaret Thatcher, sent to the UK Prime Minister. This is how he summed up the Bosnian war for Mrs Thatcher:

“The war in Bosnia was America’s war in every sense of the word. The US administration helped start it, kept it going, and prevented its early end. Indeed all the indications are that it intends to continue the war in the near future, as soon as its Moslem proteges are fully armed and trained. How it did so is common knowledge. Why it did so, and the implications for American defense and foreign policy generally remain to be elucidated.”

Feffer could have used the opportunity to fulfill Sherman’s wish and elucidate American policy then and now. But that is one of the lessons Feffer prefers to leave to others, perhaps to naïve leftists who appear, paradoxically, to be “following” the right-wing Alfred Sherman’s talking points.

25 Years On, The Dayton Peace Agreement Is a Ticking Time Bomb

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Then there’s the analysis of Sean Gervasi, one of John F Kennedy’s economic advisers, who wrote a book with the title, NATO in the Balkans. In it he explains the fundamental logic of the entire Yugoslavian drama.

These powers carefully planned, prepared and assisted the secessions which broke Yugoslavia apart. And they did almost everything in their power to expand and prolong the civil wars which began in Croatia and then continued in Bosnia-Herzegovina. They were involved behind the scenes at every stage of the crisis. Foreign intervention was designed to create precisely the conflicts which the Western powers decried. For they also conveniently served as an excuse for overt intervention once civil wars were under way. Such ideas are, of course, anathema in Western countries. That is only because the public in the West has been systematically misinformed by war propaganda. It accepted almost from the beginning the version of events promulgated by governments and disseminated through the mass media.

Can any open-minded reader of these lines today not see possible parallels with the situation in Ukraine? This might be worth debating, but it appears that there aren’t many people in the West today curious enough to publicly engage in such a debate. Gervasi’s comment about the role of the mass media is echoed by contemporary commentators. Critics such as former New York Times journalist or the former diplomat, Chas Freeman. Medea Benjamin and Nicolas Davies quoted the latter in their recent book on the Ukraine war: “This war in Ukraine is the most intense information war humanity has ever seen. There are so many lies flying about that it’s totally impossible to perceive the truth.”

In another presented in 1996 with the title “Why Is NATO In Yugoslavia?” Gervasi wrote: “By any standards, the sending of a large Western military force into Central and Eastern Europe is a remarkable enterprise, even in the fluid situation created by the supposed end of the Cold War.” So why did this happen? Gervasi explains that “the sending of NATO troops into the Balkans is the result of enormous pressure for the general extension of NATO eastwards.”

What can Bosnia’s fate really tell us about Ukraine?

Might any of Sherman’s or Gervasi’s remarks have any bearing upon the events in Ukraine? Not for John Feffer. Perhaps he considers those two men from the past examples of naïve rightists (Sherman) and leftists (Gervasi) bent on following Kremlin talking points. Since he is interested in “lessons,” does Feffer even acknowledge that the issues they raise merit analysis and discussion that may be applied to the situation in Ukraine today? Apparently not. There are US State Department talking points he prefers to follow.

Will Bosnia and Herzegovina Ever Rise Above Its Ethnic Divisions?

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In 2015, investigative journalist Nafeez Ahmed stood out as someone who had taken the trouble to process the testimony of Sherman and Gervais. He it in these words: “The most important lesson from Yugoslavia is not only that all NATO nations lied in the most totalitarian manner, used false flags, fabrications and extremist Mujahideen mercenaries there. The most important lesson is that the War in Yugoslavia made NATO and the Western nations into a single completely cynical totalitarian info- and war machine.”

Feffer would be right to signal that such a judgment, made in the year following the February 2014 Maidan revolt that ousted an elected president, could only please the Kremlin. But does that mean Ahmed was “following” the Kremlin? Award-winning British author and journalist, Jonathan Cook Ahmed as “that rare breed of journalist who finds stories everyone else either misses or chooses to overlook; he regularly joins up the dots in a global system of corporate pillage.” In other words, not the kind of journalist people inside the Beltway are likely to “follow.” They prefer to the New York Times, always attentive to themes defined by the US security state.

But even the NYT had this to say back in 1993:

Almost a year and a half ago, the United States opposed a partition of Bosnia and Herzegovina that had been agreed to by leaders of the republic’s Serbs, Croats and Muslims. The idea was to stave off a civil war.

Now, tens of thousands of deaths later, the United States is urging the leaders of the three Bosnian factions to accept a partition agreement similar to the one Washington opposed in 1992.

Can anyone fail to notice a parallel here with Ukraine? It was a Ukrainian news service, Ukrainska Pravda, that in April UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s strict instructions to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy not to negotiate a peace deal with the Russians. Will the deal that is eventually signed to end the war two or three years down the line — following tens of thousands more deaths — be a carbon copy of the one Johnson rejected?

No one knows the answer to that question, just as we don’t know whether such a dramatic situation, if forced to continue, may not descend into nuclear war, well before any negotiation begins. The fact that decisions are made in Washington DC means we will have to wait. Sometimes for decades, as we did in Afghanistan. The George W Bush administration could have accepted in 2001 the offer of the Taliban government to cooperate in arresting Osama Bin Laden as a response to 9/11. It didn’t because it saw the attacks on New York and Washington not as a crime to be solved but as a pretext for overthrowing the Afghan government. Instead, 20 years of war conducted to spread the truths NATO believes in ended with total victory for the Taliban, and in thoroughly degraded conditions. 

Bosnia and Herzegovina’s Complicated Puzzle

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Bosnia’s political troubles today, which John Feffer accurately describes, may, as he concludes, be the result of a bad peace agreement, but the two years of additional conflict caused by US Ambassador Zimmerman’s refusal to consider a peace agreement certainly contributed to the hopelessness of the current situation. Harvard Law School summarized the reality of that episode in a with the title, “Conflict Resolution: Lessons from the Dayton Peace Process.” The author of that study makes the point that, whereas at the beginning of the war, 20% of Bosnians had “ethnically mixed parents” and “as few as 17 percent of Bosnians considered themselves religious,” the unnecessarily prolonged war had long-lasting deleterious effects. The case analysis concludes with this devastating observation: “fueled by propaganda, the Bosnian War reconstructed BiH’s identity groups.” It is that identity conflict that explains the dire state of contemporary Bosnian politics that Feffer accurately describes.

The Minsk accords were officially meant to find some way of attenuating the cultural divergences between ethnic Ukrainians and ethnic Russian speakers. They aime at fostering conditions of mutual tolerance by granting autonomy to the Donbas. We now know, thanks to the of Angela Merkel, that despite sponsoring those accords, Germany and France had no intention of applying them. They were designed to gain time for a NATO buildup in Ukraine. The result: eight years of sporadic civil war degenerated into a full-fledged war initiated by Russia. So, yes, we all need to follow Feffer’s lead and think about when the rest of us might learn the lessons of Bosnia. And after doing that perhaps also apply them to Ukraine. The debate is open. Let’s start by going after all the facts, not just the ones that are convenient for anyone’s argument.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post From Bosnia to Ukraine: A Deeper, More Worrying Lesson appeared first on 51�Թ�.

Singh agrees with Bruton about his prognostication. Rising energy and, in particular, gas prices has led to record postwar inflation. Both households and industry are in trouble. Germany and Italy, the two European manufacturing strongholds, are suffering most.

Germany might face a winter of discontent. Italy has already elected Giorgia Meloni, a fiery populist politician, as its first woman prime minister. Meloni and her counterparts in Greece, Spain and Portugal face a grim challenge. Their economies are stagnant with high debts, aging populations and few jobs. High inflation is leading to higher interest rates. This makes debt more expensive and these southern economies might need another bailout.

So far, Germany has largely bailed out Southern Europe. That might be difficult given the state of the German economy. The economic trouble triggered by the Russia-Ukraine War will deepen divisions in Europe. The EU and its Euro project will face unprecedented strains in the pivotal winter ahead.

The views expressed in this article/video are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post FO° Explainers: Why Europe Faces a Tough Winter appeared first on 51�Թ�.

Many in Brussels hailed the emergence of this unified Europe. After decades of decline, Europe has come to the scene in response to the threat of Russia and showed off its abilities to play the role of a powerful geopolitical actor before the eyes of the world. The Russian war has awakened the sleeping giant. As , High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy put it: “In the week since ��ܲ�������’s invasion, we have also witnessed the belated birth of a geopolitical Europe. For years, Europeans have been debating how the EU can be made more robust and security-conscious, with unity of purpose and capabilities to pursue our political goals on the world stage. We have now arguably gone further down that path in the past week than we did in the previous decade.”

However, there are limitations to this apparently decisive response of the Europeans to the Russian invasion. The member states of the European Union have so far avoided direct military conflict with Russia. They have refused to send the that can lead to a change in the course of the battle. They have not demonstrated any concerted effort aimed at the gradual elimination of energy imports from Russia. Moreover, a number of European companies are still present in Russia, despite the imposition of extensive sanctions on Moscow. In addition, while Brussels bureaucrats like Borrell are busy honoring and praising the so-called birth of geopolitical Europe, Ukraine’s frustration and dissatisfaction with its European allies is increasing as the situation on the battlefield deteriorates and casualties and damage continue to rise.

European Solidarity: illusion or reality?

There is good reason to suspect that the announcement of  the birth of geopolitical Europe is little more than posturing by its leaders. The question on everyone’s mind should concern whether this vaunted unity will be maintained as the Ukraine battle proceeds.

Eight months into the Ukraine crisis, many signs of concern have appeared on the horizon. It is now becoming increasingly difficult to maintain the cohesion of a single Europe against the multiple consequences of the continuation of the crisis the war has spawned. Inflation, recession, and a growing energy crisis have worried , as have  the unforeseeable wide-ranging political and geopolitical effects of the war in Ukraine. Behind this apparent unity, differences of opinion and growing tensions about how to manage the conflict among the members of the union are already emerging.

Peace Talks Essential as War Rages on in Ukraine

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Germany is hesitant about sending arms shipments to Ukraine. With the fall of the coalition government in Italy and the election of the populist Brothers of Italy led by Giorgia Meloni, the future of Italy’s role in Europe has become an enigma. Political opposition to military support for Kyiv is growing among populist parties throughout Europe. And although the previous five sanctions packages were approved quickly, the Europeans took weeks to reach an agreement on the sixth package of sanctions targeting Russian oil.

In the early stages of the war, the European Union showed significant determination and cohesion. Within a few weeks, Brussels passed the widest possible sanctions against Russia. European governments accelerated their defense measures. Germany added 100 billion euros to its military budget, and the European Union facilitated the transfer of arms to third parties for the first time. The Union also agreed to provide temporary protection to millions of Ukrainian citizens, including the possibility of their movement and employment throughout the territory of the European Union. In June, the Council of Europe supported the granting of candidacy status to Ukraine and Moldova to join the European Union. In early spring, Europe seemed more united than ever and ready to face the challenge of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

This show of solidarity did not last long. Growing economic pressure has led to worrying political consequences for Europe. In countries such as Italy and France, right-wing populist and nationalist parties have been exploiting the costs of war to influence public opinion. They promote the idea that by sanctioning Russia, European governments and institutions will only fuel the fire of inflation, bankrupt industries, and destroy jobs. The continuation of the Ukraine crisis feeds this trend. In the French presidential elections in April, the radical right and left parties put in a strong performance, a result that was confirmed in the parliamentary elections in June. The fall of Draghi’s government in Italy in July led to a victory in September for the populist Brothers of Italy party.

Europe’s double divide

A return to the old fault lines within the European Union in the event of the continuation of the Ukraine crisis appears increasingly likely. First, there is the growing divide between the east and west of the continent, with countries bordering Ukraine, such as the Baltic states and Poland, demanding the imposition of the most severe sanctions on Russia and increased military support for Ukraine. On the other hand, Western European countries such as Italy, France, and Germany, appear more inclined to compromise and interaction with Russia. The intensification of the energy crisis and the aggravation of economic hardship make it likely that the western countries far from the front line of the conflict will pressure the Union to open the door to reconciliation. However, Eastern European leaders, even as they grapple with the fallout from the war, are likely to maintain that peace is only possible if Russia is forced to withdraw and Russian President, Vladimir Putin, is held to account. 

The second gap is the North-South divide, which nearly split the Eurozone in two during the Greek debt crisis a decade ago. With the possibility of a recession and even stagflation in the short term, the difference in the cost of interest payments on debt between the northern and southern member states of the European Union – especially between Germany and Italy– is increasing. France, Spain, and Italy, despite having less room for financial maneuver, are pushing Brussels to focus on Europe’s post-pandemic recovery fund as well as defray some of the economic costs caused by war. 

The EU Faces Major Challenges This Autumn

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Germany has seen its energy costs triple. It is much more exposed to Russian energy blackmail than other members due to its heavy dependence on Russian gas. The German government, instead of offering its financial resources to help solve the economic problems of other members, will most likely request help and support from other members of the European Union to reduce its energy crisis.

To conclude, there is so far no evidence that the EU has become a stronger or different power internationally than it was before the war. In other words, there is no substance to the claim that Europe has undergone a geopolitical rebirth. The populist trend is clearly gaining strength in several European nations. The traditional fault lines within the Union have not disappeared and are likely to reemerge if the war continues. Russian President Vladimir Putin is certainly aware of this. The apparent unity of Europe in the face of the Russian invasion may soon prove to be a chimera.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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I have always taken the view that, without Germany, there would  be no EU. Germany provides the financial backstop on which all the EU’s ambitious plans, including the Green Deal, and the recently acquired capacity of the EU to borrow, rest. Without a healthy German economy, and a Germany that is prepared to think of its neighbors as well as of itself, the EU would wither. So, it is important that other EU states demonstrate energy solidarity with Germany during this autumn and winter, when the economic model of the EU’s powerhouse is under particular stress.

In addition to the German economic crisis, the EU is facing other threats that could also become existential. One comes from Poland, and the other from the UK.

Poland’s not-so independent judiciary

In Poland, the courts system there has been politicized, to suit the agenda of the ruling Law and Justice Party. In effect, Polish Courts are rejecting the primacy of EU over Polish law, in disputes around issues that are within the competence of the EU under the treaties. 

Polexit: Is Poland on the Way Out of the EU?

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This principle of the primacy of EU law, to be authoritatively interpreted by the European Court of Justice, is not new. It dates back to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) decisions of 1964 and 1970. By having a single ultimate interpreter of EU law, namely the ECJ, we have been able to create a single market with consistent rules, consistently interpreted, and  more or less consistently applied, across all the 27 countries of the Union.

The Polish government has interfered with the independence of its courts by putting in place a disciplinary tribunal for judges. Some judges,  disliked by the government, were sacked. Such actions encourage a nationalistic and eurosceptic interpretation of the position of Polish law within the EU.

Cases on the interpretation of EU laws, as applied in Poland, are not being referred to the ECJ for authoritative interpretation, as is the normal procedure in most EU countries. Thus, the primacy of EU law in Poland is being slowly eroded. If a big country, like Poland, gets away with this, other countries like Hungary, which is even more eurosceptic, will follow suit, and the EU will begin to decay.

Despite Poland’s undermining of the EU, the country was allotted €36 billion in EU funds in June 2022. The country is yet to dissolve the disciplinary tribunal as required by previous EU decisions. Poland has also not addressed the issue of the primacy of EU law at all.

 In a split vote, the European Commission (EC) led by Ursula von der Leyen  voted to release the funds on the understanding that Poland would meet certain “milestones.” These include the abolition of the disciplinary tribunal but not the affirmation of the primacy of EU law. The EC decision to release funds was influenced by the burden Poland has borne in aiding Ukraine. However, this decision is fundamentally damaging to the EU. The rule of law is one of the EU’s core values for which Ukrainians are sacrificing their lives. It is also a key reason why countries like Ukraine want to join the EU as full members.

For small countries like Ireland, the EU offers a great benefit. Decisions in the EU are made based on clear rules, not raw power. Ireland and other small countries cannot be indifferent to the precedent Poland is setting for the EU. It is also true that Brussels should be conservative in asserting what comes within the legal competence of the EU. Any overreach could be damaging.

British tactics on Brexit

Not only Poland but also the UK is challenging the primacy of EU law. The UK is also threatening the integrity of the single market. British tactics on Brexit are to blame.

The Risk of a No-Deal Brexit Remains

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Under the Northern Ireland Protocol, Northern Ireland has unfettered access to both the EU and the UK markets. This avoids the need for customs controls on the land border between Ireland and Northern Ireland. The UK does not want the ECJ to be the final interpreter of EU rules, as applied in Northern Ireland. The UK also wants Northern Ireland exempted from EU state aid and value added tax (VAT) rules. Such a precedent would undermine the level playing field essential to the EU single market. 

UK Prime Minister Liz Truss seems to be willing to provoke a major crisis on this matter. Truss seems to believe that, if she stands strong, the EU will cave in. Truss represents a deeper problem. The UK has never taken the EU seriously and has a patronizing attitude towards it.

The EU should not wait until the UK has started to flout the Northern Ireland Protocol  to propose trade sanctions. Once the protocol disapplication bill reaches the committee stage in the House of Lords, the EC should publish the full list of its proposed trade sanctions on the UK. These sanctions should be imposed on the day the UK legislation is implemented. Such advance notice by the EU would allow cooler heads to assert themselves in London.

I still have no doubt that practical compromises can be reached on the implementation of the protocol. In July,  the Europe Committee of the House of Lords published a very interesting report, with the evidence it received, on the protocol. The report concluded that the protocol had adversely affected the retail sector but advantaged manufacturing investment in Northern Ireland.

I drew two conclusions from the report and its underlying evidence.

First, the UK will lose its court cases governed by EU law for flouting the Northern Ireland Protocol. Under the Vienna Law on Treaties, the UK would have to show it had been suffering from “coercion” or “improper process” when it signed and ratified the protocol. Given that the UK has been negotiating with the EU for over a year, the UK would not be able to claim either ground to wriggle out of the protocol.

The EU and the US must collaborate on Northern Ireland

Second, the best way to find solutions to practical problems would involve officials of the UK and the EU meeting key people from Northern Ireland from various sectors of the economy.  Sadly, this cumbersome format is not conducive to constructive thinking or to problem solving.

Michael Gove, a key Brexiteer, suggested a joint EU-UK consultative group of officials who could talk to each other and with relevant economic actors. If Liz Truss wants to keep open the option of a negotiated agreement, as she says she does, she should activate Gove’s proposal. A breakdown in EU-UK negotiations would cause unnecessary trouble at a time of much trouble.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post The EU Faces Major Challenges This Autumn appeared first on 51�Թ�.

Ukrainians are rightly ebullient over their forces’ recent impressive victories over Russian occupying forces, primarily in the east but also in the south near Kherson. These triumphs prove what many military planners and strategists have known for centuries: invading forces are no match for the resilience, courage, determination and utter doggedness and grit demonstrated by the forces and the people fighting to preserve their nation’s sovereignty and their own dignity. 

It is also just as true that even intangibles like superhuman courage and determination require very tangible weapons, equipment, resources and money to carry the fight to the enemy. Ukraine has thankfully been able to rely on a steady flow of all that from the United States and its NATO allies. It’s no exaggeration to say the combination of unflinching Ukrainian will and unrelenting Western support has turned Vladimir Putin’s grandiose dreams of conquest into a hellish nightmare of defeat and humiliation.

Russia is no stranger to invasions, the two most notable having been Napoleon’s disaster of 1812 and �ұ�������Բ�’s (aka Operation Barbarossa) of 1941-1942. Both ended in ignominious defeats for both invading forces and ultimately to losing those respective wars.

Long, unsustainable and indefensible supply lines were major factors in ��ܲ�������’s ultimate defeat of the French and German armies. Today, poorly maintained and uncoordinated supply lines are compounding ��ܲ�������’s task of subduing Ukraine. Ukraine, on the other hand, can count on a reliable flow, if not always the most desired, of necessary weapons and supplies to repel the invader.

Is Winter ��ܲ�������’s Ally?

In a rather strange turn of history, however, Putin is counting on winter, a major factor in the French and German defeats, to change his fortunes, less because of a chill in Ukrainian determination but rather a cooling of European will to continue its support at current levels. He is wielding one of the few major weapons he has left, oil and gas. Europe is now belatedly learning what it means to depend on a single energy supplier, especially an aggressive and manipulative one. The EU and individual European countries have taken impressive measures to reduce and ultimately eliminate the continent’s dependence on Russian oil and gas. Europe’s reliance on Russian gas has been reduced from nearly 42% to the mid-to-low twenties, with commitments to eliminate all Russian gas from Europe, with a few notable exceptions like Hungary, by early 2023. Oil dependence is falling as well.

However, that dramatic progress will not be without pain and sacrifice on the part of European businesses. factories and people. In Putin’s demonic fever dream, he is expecting European will to weaken if not collapse as factories must either shut down periodically or operate at reduced hours.  And he expects European popular support for continued backing of Ukraine will ebb as they huddle in homes and apartment buildings in heavy sweaters and jackets with thermostats turned low to conserve energy. Will shivering Europeans undergoing a distressed economy suffer for their struggling European colleagues to the east? Vladimir Putin thinks not.

Enter America

And this is when the US must go even beyond what it has done to date on Ukraine’s behalf. It must show that it, too, is willing to suffer some pain in order to ensure Ukraine’s continuing gain in the battlefield.

First, considerable headway has already been made. to Europe through June of this year were at 39 billion cubic meters (bcm) versus 34 bcm in all of 2021. The stepped-up flows will continue. However, several obstacles stand in the way. LNG contracts are negotiated with customers for as long as a 20-year period. Exporters are bound by these and have limited leeway for modifying them. Additionally, infrastructure on both sides of the Atlantic are impediments. LNG terminals in the US are already at capacity and Europe lacks sufficient receiving terminals. Businesses and governments on both sides are rushing to overcome these. For the US, however, the US administration and energy exporting companies should work cooperatively, e.g., perhaps minimizing bureaucratic and even some environmental standards on the production as well as the shipping side to ensure LNG flows continue and even increase. European governments, heretofore hesitant to take such un-green actions, should consider similar steps as well.

Second, Europeans, who already pay considerably more for their energy than their American counterparts, may want to see Americans taking steps to show solidarity not only for Ukrainians but also for Europeans. For example, today the least expensive is still considerably more expensive, sometimes by as much as two-three dollars per gallon, than the most expensive gasoline in the US, which is in California. The natural gas price differential is even greater, sometimes by as much as more, than what a typical American consumer might pay.

There are many ways this might be done. For one, a simple voluntary program asking Americans to lower their thermostats this winter. The natural gas saved would then be available for European customers. Another likely more controversial approach – especially in the run-up to this November’s midterm elections for Congress, in which the Biden administration is most keen to preserve its slim majorities – is a one-time gasoline surcharge. The revenue from such a tax could be used both to reimburse low-income consumers dependent on commuting for their livelihoods and also to continue US economic support for Ukraine. The additional supply generated by the tax-induced consumption reduction is also available for export to Europe to help mitigate their anticipated shortages.

Clearly, these would be tough measures for the American public to swallow right now. Inflation and the concomitant slowing economy remain uppermost on the minds of Americans today. While for Ukraine is still generally strong, it has softened since the early days of the invasion. But there is a continuing strong belief that failure to turn back Putin’s invasion will only encourage the Russian bear to seek prey elsewhere in Europe. Stopping the bully Putin means continuing American and European support for Ukraine through the tough winter months.

The more important point is less the actual measures taken than America’s demonstration to Europe that America, too, is prepared to suffer some pain in order to save Ukraine.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post To Save Ukraine, America Must Help Europe appeared first on 51�Թ�.

Since then, the people of Ukraine have been paying a price for this war that few of their supporters in the West can possibly imagine. Wars do not follow scripts, and Russia, Ukraine, the US, NATO and the EU have all encountered unexpected setbacks.

Western sanctions have had mixed results, inflicting severe economic damage on Europe as well as on Russia, while the invasion and the West’s response to it have combined to trigger a food crisis across the Global South. As winter approaches, the prospect of another six months of war and sanctions threatens to plunge Europe into a serious energy crisis and poorer countries into famine. So it is in the interest of all involved to urgently reassess the possibilities of ending this protracted conflict.

Russia-Ukraine Negotiations Almost Succeeded

For those who say negotiations are impossible, we have only to look at the talks that took place during the first month after the Russian invasion, when Russia and Ukraine tentatively agreed to a plan in talks mediated by Turkey. Details still had to be worked out, but the framework and the political will were there.

Russia was ready to withdraw from all of Ukraine, except for Crimea and the self-declared republics in Donbas. Ukraine was ready to renounce future membership in NATO and adopt a position of neutrality between Russia and NATO.

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The agreed framework provided for political transitions in Crimea and Donbas that both sides would accept and recognize, based on self-determination for the people of those regions. The future security of Ukraine was to be guaranteed by a group of other countries, but Ukraine would not host foreign military bases on its territory.

On March 27, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy told a national , “Our goal is obvious—peace and the restoration of normal life in our native state as soon as possible.” He laid out his “red lines” for the negotiations on TV to reassure his people he would not concede too much, and he promised them a referendum on the neutrality agreement before it would take effect.

Such early success for a peace initiative was to conflict resolution specialists. The best chance for a negotiated peace settlement is generally during the first months of a war. Each month that a war rages on offers reduced chances for peace, as each side highlights the atrocities of the other, hostility becomes entrenched and positions harden.

The US and UK Torpedoed Chances of Peace

The abandonment of that early peace initiative stands as one of the great tragedies of this conflict, and the full scale of that tragedy will only become clear over time as the war rages on and its dreadful consequences accumulate.

Ukrainian and Turkish sources have revealed that the UK and US governments played decisive roles in torpedoing those early prospects for peace. During the then British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s “surprise visit” to Kyiv on April 9th, he reportedly Zelenskyy that the UK was “in it for the long run,” that it would not be party to any agreement between Russia and Ukraine, and that the “collective West” saw a chance to “press” Russia and was determined to make the most of it.

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The same message was reiterated by US Defense Secretary Austin, who followed Johnson to Kyiv on April 25th and made it clear that the US and NATO were no longer just trying to help Ukraine defend itself but were now committed to using the war to “weaken” Russia. Turkish diplomats told retired British diplomat Craig Murray that these messages from the United States and United Kingdom killed their otherwise promising efforts to mediate a ceasefire and a diplomatic resolution.

In response to the invasion, much of the public in Western countries accepted the moral imperative of supporting Ukraine as a victim of Russian aggression. But the decision by the US and UK governments to kill peace talks and prolong the war, with all the horror, pain and misery that entails for the people of Ukraine, has neither been explained to the public, nor endorsed by a consensus of NATO countries. Johnson claimed to be speaking for the “collective West,” but in May, the leaders of France, Germany and Italy all made public statements that contradicted his claim.

Addressing the European Parliament on May 9, French President Emmanuel Macron , “We are not at war with Russia,” and that Europe’s duty was “to stand with Ukraine to achieve the ceasefire, then build peace.”

Meeting with US President Joe Biden at the White House on May 10, Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi , “People… want to think about the possibility of bringing a ceasefire and starting again some credible negotiations. That’s the situation right now. I think that we have to think deeply about how to address this.”

After speaking by phone with President Vladimir Putin on May 13, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz tweeted that he , “There must be a ceasefire in Ukraine as quickly as possible.”

But American and British officials continued to pour cold water on talk of renewed peace negotiations. The policy shift in April appears to have involved a commitment by Zelenskyy that Ukraine, like the UK and US, was “in it for the long run” and would fight on, possibly for many years, in exchange for the promise of tens of billions of dollars worth of weapons shipments, military training, satellite intelligence and Western covert operations.

Misgivings About the War Increase in the US

As the implications of this fateful agreement became clearer, dissent began to emerge, even within the US business and media establishment. On May 19, the very day that Congress appropriated $40 billion for Ukraine, including $19 billion for new weapons shipments, with not a single dissenting Democratic vote, The New York Times (NYT) editorial board penned a titled, “The war in Ukraine is getting complicated, and America isn’t ready.”

The NYT asked serious unanswered questions about US goals in Ukraine, and tried to reel back unrealistic expectations built up by three months of one-sided Western propaganda, not least from its own pages. The board acknowledged, “A decisive military victory for Ukraine over Russia, in which Ukraine regains all the territory Russia has seized since 2014, is not a realistic goal.… Unrealistic expectations could draw [the United States and NATO] ever deeper into a costly, drawn-out war.”

The Russia-Ukraine War Proves That We Must Define National Security Differently

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More recently, warhawk Henry Kissinger, of all people, publicly questioned the entire US policy of reviving its Cold War with Russia and China and the absence of a clear purpose or endgame short of World War III. “We are at the edge of war with Russia and China on issues which we partly created, without any concept of how this is going to end or what it’s supposed to lead to,” Kissinger The Wall Street Journal.

US leaders have inflated the danger that Russia poses to its neighbors and the West, deliberately treating it as an enemy with whom diplomacy or cooperation would be futile, rather than as a neighbor raising understandable defensive concerns over NATO expansion and its gradual encirclement by US and allied military forces.

Far from aiming to deter Russia from dangerous or destabilizing actions, successive administrations of both parties have sought every means available to “” Russia, all the while misleading the American public into supporting an ever-escalating and unthinkably dangerous conflict between our two countries, which together possess more than 90% of the world’s nuclear weapons.

After six months of a US and NATO proxy war with Russia in Ukraine, we are at a crossroads. Further escalation should be unthinkable, but so should a long war of endless crushing artillery barrages and brutal urban and trench warfare that slowly and agonizingly destroys Ukraine, killing hundreds of Ukrainians with each day that passes.

The only realistic alternative to this endless slaughter is a return to peace talks to bring the fighting to an end, find reasonable political solutions to Ukraine’s political divisions, and seek a peaceful framework for the underlying geopolitical competition between the United States, Russia and China.

Campaigns to demonize, threaten and pressure our enemies can only serve to cement hostility and set the stage for war. People of good will can bridge even the most entrenched divisions and overcome existential dangers, as long as they are willing to talk — and listen — to their adversaries.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post Peace Talks Essential as War Rages on in Ukraine appeared first on 51�Թ�.

Who Are �ұ�������Բ�’s National Minorities?

Four state-recognized autochthonous national minorities live on German territory: the Danes, Frisians, Sorbs, and the German Sinti and Roma. In accord with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the European Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities (FCNM), five need to be fulfilled to be granted minority protection by the German government: the minorities’ members are German nationals; they have a distinct identity, consisting of an own language, culture, and history; a wish to maintain and preserve that identity; they have settled in Germany for a long time within traditional settlement areas.

As demographic statistics and socioeconomic data based on ethnicity are historically not collected in Germany due to the Nazi past, the numbers of people belonging to the national minorities are estimates. About 50,000 members of the Danish minority live in the northern state of Schleswig-Holstein, bordering Denmark, and 50,000-60,000 Frisians live along the North Sea coastline between the Netherlands and Denmark. About 60,000 Sorbs, a Slavic minority, live in the Lusatia region, close to the Polish border in East Germany. The minority of the Sinti and Roma provides an exemption from the criteria of residing in a specific settlement area with 70,000 members living all across Germany.

Instrumentalizing National Minorities

The lack of demographic data on national minorities implicates that no figures are available on the number of eligible voters in the respective minority groups. Despite only making up a small proportion of the German electorate, �ұ�������Բ�’s far-right AfD has increased efforts to stage themselves as their true advocates. 

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In November 2020, a speech by Beatrix von Storch, deputy chairwoman of the AfD Bundestag faction, laid bare the AfD’s attempt to instrumentalize national minorities to stigmatize other ethnic groups in Germany. Storch deliberately misrepresented the federal government’s pledge to protect national minorities. According to Storch, the fact that national minorities are promised protection based on origin, language, and culture, irrespective of their German citizenship, confirms the AfD’s long-held view that national identity cannot be obtained through the acquisition of German citizenship: “If we that ethnic groups and national minorities have a cultural identity that should be preserved, then the same applies to national majorities. You can’t claim that national minorities like the Sorbs, Frisians, and Danes have a cultural identity and at the same time declare that the national majority in Germany doesn’t.”

With this statement, Storch argumentatively and tacitly deprives some German citizens with an immigration background of their German identity as she had openly claimed before: “ is not part of German tradition and identity, and therefore it does not belong to Germany.” Furthermore, Storch misuses national minorities to spread an ultra-nationalistic ideology harbored by large parts of the AfD, according to which there is a national identity of a people that is deeply rooted.

Misusing the Sorbian Minority for Electoral Success

By spreading its nationalist ideology, the AfD is trying to appeal to the strong sense of home and belonging among many members of �ұ�������Բ�’s minorities and capitalize on this electorally. Yet, the election results of the last two federal elections do not indicate that the AfD is succeeding in areas with large populations of national minorities – except in eastern German constituencies and settlement areas of the Sorbs. 

During the 2017 federal election, the AfD managed to muster up 40 percent of the votes in the Sorbian-dominated district of Spree-Neiße in southeastern Brandenburg. Despite significant gains, the party still lagged behind the CDU, traditionally voted for by the mostly Catholic Sorbs. In the subsequent federal election, in 2021, the Sorbian village of Puschwitz hit the headlines when the AfD candidate emerged as the victor. Curiously, in the neighboring Sorbian village of Crostwitz the CDU candidate pipped the AfD’s competitor to first place. Hence, it remains questionable whether these two stand-out successes of the AfD in Sorbian counties and municipalities express a seminal affinity of the Sorbian minority to the AfD, especially since the economically weaker eastern German states have been AfD strongholds anyway.

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On the contrary, the relationship between Sorbs and the AfD was strained before these election results. Sorbs have long experienced right-wing extremist hostilities and attacks, but since 2014, with the beginning of the far-right PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamicisation of the Occident) demonstrations and the rise of the AfD, the extent has significantly increased. According to Heiko Kosel, an MP of the Saxon state parliament for the leftist party Die Linke, “ on Sorbs are linked to increased xenophobia in Saxony in recent years.” Bilingual street signs were smeared and even graffitied with swastikas. Another example of the AfD’s contribution to the hostile climate toward Sorbs was its resistance to a socio-cultural community center in the East German city of Bautzen, where many Sorbs live, warning against ongoing “ �����澱�Բ�“.

Against this backdrop, an incident during the 2017 general election stirred up the Sorbian community when the AfD once again instrumentalized minority groups to incite xenophobic attitudes toward other ethnic groups. The bone of contention was an election poster that depicted three women in traditional German, one of them in Sorbian attire, with the caption “ diversity? We have it already!” That was unequivocally condemned by the umbrella organization “Domowina,” representing the interests of Sorbs in Germany: “We the use of the Sorbian people to exclude other minorities.”

Overt Racism Against Sinti and Roma

The fact that the AfD’s representation of the interests of national minorities is nothing more than a smokescreen is shown not only by its attempts to play national minorities off against each other but also by its open racism against the national minority of Sinti and Roma. Among �ұ�������Բ�’s national minorities the Sinti and Roma occupy a special historic role. During Nazi Germany, they were prosecuted and murdered, resulting in a Genocide of up to 500.000 Sinti and Roma, often referred to as the ” Holocaust.” To this day, Sinti and Roma face discrimination and structural racism. In 2021, authorities recorded antizigan crimes, the year before 128. Antizigan attitudes and sentiments in the center of German society are prevalent. According to a study, 29 percent of the population showed antipathy toward Sinti and Roma. To uncover the dark figure of antizigan sentiment and crime, the German government mandated the Independent Commission on Antiziganism (UKA) in 2019, and an anonymous Reporting and Information Center Antiziganism (MIA) started work in July 2022. In March 2022, the government appointed the first commissioner against Antiziganism and for the life of Sinti and Roma in Germany.

Concerning the Sinti and Roma, the AfD has willingly and repeatedly dropped the covers and counteracted its supposed self-image of being the true representative of the interests of all national minorities. The AfD has been a driving force behind picking up on and promoting antizigan racial prejudice. In a 2019 speech in the German Bundestag about measures to combat antiziganism, the AfD MP Markus Frohnmaier referred to Sinti and Roma as “” („Gypsys“), a racial slur that is condemned by the Central Council of German Sinti and Roma, the main advocacy group representing the interests of German Sinti and Roma: “‘Gypsies‘ is a foreign used by the majority society that is overlaid with clichés and rejected by most members of the minority as discriminatory – because the Sinti and Roma have never called themselves that.” Disregarding this terminological clarification of the people concerned, Frohnmaier contested the designation Sinti and Roma as an “ �ٱ����.”

Evoking Ghosts of the Nazi Past

In June 2018, the Saxon AfD showed no inhibition to evoking the inhumane ghosts of the Nazi past. They did so by submitting a parliamentary request, demanding the collection of demographic data on Sinti and Roma living in . Part of the requested data was the number of German and foreign Sinti and Roma living in Saxony, including their education status. Particularly startling were the queries about irregularities in the compliance with compulsory education and the number of homeless Sinti and Roma. With these suggestive and disparaging questions, the AfD consciously tapped into the persisting circulating prejudices of educational alienation, homelessness, and criminality among Sinti and Roma. With the feeding of false preconceptions and request for a registration of the Sinti and Roma population, the AfD summoned gruesome memories of the systematic genocidal policy of the Nazis against the Sinti and Roma and the Jews, which had also entailed a registration of respective population groups. Hence, collecting population data based on ethnicity is prohibited in Germany.

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Not only the Sinti and Roma were affected by the AfD snubbing this particular lesson from the past. A few weeks after the request for the data collection on the Sinti and Roma, the AfD in the Saxon state parliament also asked for “” on the number of Sorbs in Saxony. Given these efforts, �ұ�������Բ�’s National Minority Secretariat, which bundles the interests of the four national minorities, reaffirmed that belonging to a minority is the personal of each individual, which may not be registered, verified, or disputed by the state.

The national minorities in Germany unite in the same vulnerability and need for protection, although their identities and cultures differ. Be it the pitting national minorities against other ethnic groups in Germany, the abuse of national minorities’ symbols for electoral campaigns, open racist attacks against Sorbs and Sinti and Roma, and the disregard for the Nazi past. All these incidents contribute to exposing the AfD’s duplicity and its specious advances toward national minorities for electoral success at the misfortune of others.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post The AfD’s Duplicitous Attempt to Target �ұ�������Բ�’s National Minorities appeared first on 51�Թ�.

The DRC, a territory 76 times bigger than Belgium, is the second largest country after Algeria in Africa and the 11^th largest in the world. Today, it is torn by between armed groups that recruit children as soldiers. To make matters worse, DRC’s security forces operate with impunity. They continue harassing, threatening, attacking, arresting and murdering human rights defenders, journalists and members of the political opposition. Civilians are arbitrarily killed and abducted. Women and girls are systematically raped and subjected to other forms of violence. Communal violence and ethnic cleansing are widespread. Most minorities including Hutu, Tutsi, Hema, Lendu, Lunda, Luba, Mbororo, and Batwa live under continuous threat. The country remains the source and destination point for trafficking in children and women for prostitution. The country desperately needs humanitarian assistance.

The DRC’s problems are not entirely the fault of the Congolese people. Their roots can be traced back to Belgian King Leopold II and successive Belgian governments.

The Belgian King belatedly expresses regrets

Before his recent admission, Philippe denied Belgian atrocities and made excuses for Leopold II and Belgium for years. Despite pressure from his own country’s people along with that of the international community who were inspired by the (BLM) movement, Philippe hesitated to take any action other than offer excuses for the last two years.

On May 27, 2021, Emmanuel Macron spoke at the genocide memorial in Rwanda’s capital Kigali where many victims were buried. He Rwandans to forgive France for its role in the 1994 genocide. On May 28, 2021, apologized for its genocide against Herero and Nema tribal people in Namibia and offered to launch “projects over a billion euros” as compensation. Even those apologies did not inspire Philippe to admit Belgian atrocities in the Congo.

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Over a year later, increased Belgian and international pressures finally forced to face reality. When he finally spoke out, the Belgian king just expressed regrets. Philippe stopped short of formally apologizing for Belgian atrocities during the colonial period. “This [Belgian] regime was one of unequal relations, unjustifiable in itself, marked by paternalism, discrimination and racism,” he said before a joint session of parliament in the DNC capital Kinshasa, He want to state: “I wish to reaffirm my deepest regrets for those wounds of the past.”

The toxic legacy of the past

was a tyrant who pursued a brutal pogrom that resulted in the deaths of millions. His policies also led to the destruction of the livelihoods and cultures of the people of the Congo. Leopold II came to power in 1865 and was determined to build an empire. Authorized by the 1885, he formed the Congo Free State, separate from Belgium but privately owned and controlled by himself. Leopold II knew evangelization was the most effective way to dominate people. He took the view that, if the Congolese converted to Christianity, they would become more subservient. This would allow Leopold II to plunder Congo’s valuable resources. So, this ruthless Belgian king brought in missionaries to convert the Congolese people to Christianity. He issued and enforced inhumane decrees that not only caused misery and death but also pushed the Congolese to convert to and practice Christianity.

To extract ivory, rubber, and minerals, Leopold’s men viciously used whipping, wounding, enslaving, beheading and severing body parts, including the penis. They routinely resorted to sexual violence against the Congolese people. They treated the Congolese as animals, exhibiting them in their in Belgium. Their atrocities are estimated to have caused the deaths of around 10 million, then 50% of the Congolese population. This led to international scandal and outrage, forcing the Belgian government to take over the colony.

In 1908, under immense international pressure the Belgian government took over Leopold II’s private estate and made it a Belgian colony, christening it. After 23 years of Leopold II’s rule, the Belgian government ruled Belgian Congo for another 52 years. The colony only gained its independence in 1960.

Under Belgian rule, genocidal actions reduced in number and severity but persecution and forced labor continued. The racism initiated by Leopold II continued though. Africans were excluded from education, employment and other opportunities. Children of mixed race were abducted and sent to orphanages in Belgium.

After World War I, European and US companies moved in and used the Congolese as indentured laborers to produce cotton, coffee, cacao, palm oil, rubber, copper, gold, diamond, cobalt, tin, zinc, uranium and other raw materials. They used forced labor to develop roads, railroads, utility stations, and other public facilities in Belgian Congo. During World War II, the US was heavily involved in mining uranium in the Congo. When postwar decolonization began, Belgium insisted that the Congolese were not mature enough to run their own country. So, Belgium stood firm on retaining its Belgian Colony, forgetting that the Belgians had wanted freedom from Nazi Germany themselves.

Under Belgian annexation, Congolese undermined critical thinking and ripped up the social fabric. Only a very few were allowed to get basic education by the government-paid Christian missionaries whose primary goal was to advance colonization and conversion to Christianity. Only in 1954, a Congolese was first admitted to a Belgian university to study a subject other than Christian religion. To this day, the DRC is hobbled by its toxic colonial legacy.

Independence is snuffed out, exploitation continues

Starting from 1919, the Congolese began fighting for their independence. Their revolts were regularly suppressed by the Belgian authorities. In 1958, the Congolese formed their first political party. Riots broke out in 1959 with mobs demanding independence. A year later, Belgium capitulated, granting its huge colony independence. On June 30, 1960, the nationalist leader became the prime minister and president. They put Colonel in charge of the defense. Backed by Colonel Joseph Mobutu, Kasa-Vubu soon removed Lumumba. In January 1961, the US and Belgium backed a military coup. Mobutu murdered Lumumba. Mobutu went on to take over the presidency from Kasavubu in 1965. Backed by the US, he ran the DRC as a brutal dictator for 32 years, embezzling government funds at a gargantuan scale.

In 1997 backed by Rwanda and Uganda, Laurent Kabila took over the presidency and ruled for 4 years, causing over 3 million deaths. In 2001, he was killed and his son Joseph Kabila took over the presidency and ruled until late 2018 when opposition leader supposedly won an election that did not meet international expectations and was contested by the country’s dominant Catholic Church. He has remained in power as president to the present time.

In the 1880s, the US was becoming a world power. Leopold II used the services of an American to survey the Congo. He also sought American recognition of his personal rule over Congo. Some Americans were fearful of the power of American blacks who were demanding equality and liberty. They saw Leopold II’s  request as an opportunity to cleanse the US of its black population by sending them to the Congo. In exchange for the favor, Leopold assured the US that its citizens could buy lands in Congo and US imports would be exempt from all customs duties. Leopold received recognition of his rule in Congo by the US, paving the way for him to earn recognition from European powers. Leopold II’s deal with Uncle Sam also opened the gate for the US to plunder Congo”s wealth.

The US emulated Leopold II’s egregious abuses in minute detail, including displaying Congolese people in in numerous cities across the country. As late as 1906, New Yorkers would rush to see a Congolese in the at Bronx Zoo. This led to protests by American blacks and became a national scandal.

Suffice to say, the US has been exploiting Congo since Leopold II’s days. In particular, the US has been extracting uranium from mine since the 1930s. This small mine in the southern province of Katanga provided most of the uranium used in the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Today, US mining companies backed by the American military continue taking cobalt, copper, zinc and other minerals from the DRC, giving the country peanuts in return.��

The Belgian role in the Rwandan genocide

After World War I, the transferred Rwanda and Burundi from Germany to Belgium. Taking a leaf out of its Congo playbook. Belgium yet again resorted to Christian evangelization and appointed white agents to dominate and control the new colonies. It also implemented a, decreeing the minority Tutsis, a cattle-herding people, as superior to the majority Hutus, a farming people, and the native Twa, a pygmy people.������

In Rwanda, the Hutu king was removed for refusing to convert to Christianity. Then, the religion was forcefully imposed on the masses. Imana, the local monotheistic religion, was wiped out. For centuries, it had been the cultural force unifying the community. To dominate Rwanda, Belgium offered the Tutsis access to education and designated them as superior to others. The Tutsis became subordinate agents of Belgian colonial administration.

Those Responsible for the 1994 Rwandan Genocide Must Be Brought to Justice

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Belgium authorized the Tutsis to impose forced labor and punishments on other communities. Belgian policies imposed by Tutsis caused several famines. Later, Belgian colonial authorities took the administrative step of issuing identification cards for each ethnicity. That racial segregation policy along with the removal of their king angered the majority Hutus. To the Hutus, the Tutsis became known as “invaders”. In the late 1950s, the Hutu movement began to organize to oppose the Tutsis and expel Belgium. The Hutus also finally  began to earn some sympathy from Belgians.

When Rwanda won independence in 1962, a Hutu campaign to incinerate Tutsi huts sent many Tutsis fleeing into exile. The Hutu president Juvénal Habyarimana, known for his anti-Tutsi rhetoric, maintained a good relationship with Belgian King Baudouin. On April 6, 1994, a plane carrying , Burundian President Cyprien Ntarvamira, and other high-ranking officials was shot down, killing all on board. Blaming the rebel Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), Hutu extremists began the slaughter of Tutsis and their Hutu sympathizers. On April 7, 1994, killed 10 Belgian officers. They threatened Belgium not intervene in the ongoing genocide against the Tutsis. Belgium dutifully abandoned Rwanda to the Hutu killers. In April 2000,, the Belgian prime minister, went to Rwanda and said, “In the name of my country and of my people, I beg your forgiveness.”

French forces were also present in Rwanda during the genocide. They watched the massacres, but did nothing. The French government persistently denied this until recently. After 27 years of denial, France was finally forced by its own government commission to officially admit its complicity in the 1994 Rwanda genocide. As stated earlier, Macron asked Rwandans for forgiveness in May this year. He said, “Only those who went through that night can perhaps forgive, and in doing so give the gift of forgiveness.”.��

As in Rwanda, Belgium divided into Tutsis and Hutus, which led to ethnic conflicts and civil war, causing the deaths of 300,000 people. In 2009, Belgium officially apologized for its atrocities.��

Imperial powers must compensate their victims

In 2022, the time for reparations has come. So far, the UN proved impotent in the face of genocide, ethnic cleansing, war crimes and crimes against humanity. The oppressed people of the Congo are still waiting for justice and reparations for Belgian atrocities that still haunt them. It is for good reason that observed, “Belgium cannot undo its colonial past but it’s not too late to redress its contemporary fallouts to build a future based on justice and equality.”

Fortunately, many Belgians today recognize that apology must be accompanied by reparations., the speaker of the Belgian federal parliament, said: “apart from any apologies or excuses … anyone who makes a mistake, says our legal code, must compensate for the damage.” In 2001, the found the nation morally responsible for the assassination of Lumumba and apologized for its role. Belgium has yet to make any reparations though.

The “” commission, founded in 2020, is still working on issues related to the pre-independence history of the country’s three former colonies: Belgian Congo, Burundi, and Rwanda. To address the crimes of the past, Belgium must take these actions:

1. Acknowledge all the past abuses that include genoide and crimes against human rights.
2. Bring to justice all those individuals, living and dead, who perpetrated those egregious abuses.
3. Make reparations to all three former colonies based on the harm done to the Congolese people from Leopold II’s personal rule as well as Belgian colonial exploitation. The reparations must meet the following criteria:
   
   • correlate directly with all the economic profits Belgium earned from Congo, and
   • ensure that reparations do not go to the coffers of DRC’s corrupt government but are spent to improve education and infrastructure, bringing them to Belgian standards within 10 years.

As we have seen above, the US was Belgium’s accomplice in colonization of the Congolese people. Therefore, the US must take the following actions.

1. Acknowledge its collaboration with the Belgian authorities in the Congo regarding human rights abuses, including violence and genocide, and economic exploitation..
2. Form a committee that brings to justice US officials, living or dead, who abetted Belgian atrocities in the Congo.
3. Make reparations to remedy the harms done to the Congolese people. The reparations must meet the following criteria:
   • include a bipartisan committee to evaluate all the economic profits earned by the US from the Congo, starting 1885 to today, and
   • ensure that reparations do not go to the coffers of DRC’s corrupt government but are spent to improve education and infrastructure, bringing them to Belgian standards within 10 years.
4. Emulate Belgium and apologize for assassinating the nationalist leader,

None of these actions can destroy the hurt and pain from the past but they will make our world a kinder, gentler and more just place.

*[Dr. Mehdi Alavi is the founder and president of , a non-religious, non-partisan and charitable organization in the United States that promotes freedom and peace for all. It recently released its Civility Report 2022, which can be downloaded .]

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post Belgium’s Regrets Not Enough: Congo Deserves Apology and Reparations for War Crimes appeared first on 51�Թ�.

The Corrib field is running out and our dependence on the UK for natural gas supplies is to rise from 53% today to 90% in 2030. The electricity interconnector with France will not come on stream until 2027. Depending on one supplier, the UK, places Ireland in an inherently vulnerable position, especially given the fact that relations between London and Dublin have deteriorated.

We need a short term, as well as a long term solution. Most of the solutions under discussion such as hydrogen, offshore wind and building an LNG Terminal are long term. They will not help us next winter.

The EU-UK Trade Threatens Ireland’s Natural Gas Needs

Currently, about 700,000 homes, mainly in built up areas, use natural gas directly for heating. Furthermore, 50% of our electricity is generated from natural gas. As we know, electricity is vital for agriculture, industry and even services in any economy. The reliability of our power supplies is the number one worry for the multinational firms located in Ireland. Over the years, we have built our successful  and fast-growing economy around these multinationals. Power failures will make multinationals look to other shores and scare away investors.

We need to think hard about natural gas, power and our economy. There was an alarming report in one of the Sunday papers about a risk that Ireland might be from natural gas supplies from the UK next winter. As per the story, if a gas shortage occurred in the UK, due to the continuing war in Ukraine, under a contingency plan now in preparation, the UK natural gas grid operator would be instructed to stop supplying gas to our fellow EU members: Netherlands and Belgium.

If it is legally possible for the UK to cut off these supplies to Ireland’s fellow EU members, one might assume that it would also be legally feasible for Britain to cut off supplies to Ireland too, citing the newly discovered “doctrine of necessity” it is using to back out of the 2019 .

The British Ambassador to Ireland responded that the UK would not do this, and would  “ensure gas supply to Ireland in the event of any emergency.” He was confident the UK would have enough gas for next winter anyway. This assurance is welcome but, given in the context of supply problems arising because of the war, it is in doubt. Naturally, it is an open question whether the British ambassador’s assurance would hold this winter, especially in the event of a Brexit-related trade war breaking out between the EU and the UK.

Such a trade war is likely if the UK goes ahead with its threat of ceasing to operate the Northern Ireland Protocol. On the present parliamentary timetable, a Brexit-related crisis could occur next winter, just as Ireland’s electricity demand peaks. 

I do not believe that the departure of Boris Johnson from 10 Downing Street removes the risk of an EU-UK trade war. His successor will have to court the large radical Brexit element among the Tory grassroots. The EU and Ireland may have a very strong legal case on the Northern Ireland Protocol in international law, but law cases will not heat our homes, or power our farms in winter.

Ireland Needs to Face Crisis Realistically

This potential crisis of natural gas supply is simply accelerating a wider underlying electricity supply problem in Ireland. Even without the war in Ukraine, we already were facing electricity shortages for the winters of 2022-23 to 2025-266, to the commission for the Regulation of Utilities. In a report last year, well before the war, the commission said we would need two new gas-fired stations, and prolong  the operation of older inefficient gas-fired plants just to maintain electricity supply.

But what happens if we cannot even get the gas, at any price?

The government is not unaware of the problem. By mid-2022, it has promised to produce a strategy statement on the security of energy supplies. It has been working on this since mid 2021. Yet we urgently need a transition plan that will see us through until offshore wind and other renewable sources come onstream in sufficient quantity.

Renewable energy would require substantial investment, which would have to be a strategic instead of a purely commercial decision. The taxpayer may have to fund part of it.

Today, the debate in the media in Ireland seems to be mainly about how to treat the symptoms of inflation. This needs to change. We need to pull together as a people to solve deep-seated problems such as power supplies for the current as well as for future generations.

Every day on Morning Ireland, we have interviews about shortfalls in services. Invariably, the solution proposed by the interviewees is “more resources,” which are to come from government coffers. The interviewees tend to blame the government of the day for all problems and crises with little challenge from the interviewers.

The interviewers rarely ask the interviewees from where the government would get the money required for the measures they propose. They fail to ask the obvious question: Is the money to come from extra borrowing or extra taxation?

The government itself has no money. To fund measures proposed on Morning Ireland, it will have to either tax or borrow. Either option has downsides, which need to be explored when anyone demands more resources. I realize most interviewees could not give a full answer to such questions. Most are not experts in public finance.
Yet asking the question would remind Irish radio listeners that government is about choices, often difficult ones. For example, the Irish government faces a choice between raising pensions for older people and increasing back to school for young families. To fund increased expenditure, should the government raise tax? If the government borrows instead of raising taxes, it is choosing the interests of the present generation over a future generation. Is that “social justice”?

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post Alarm in Ireland About Natural Gas Supplies Next Winter appeared first on 51�Թ�.

The Italian prime minister leaves Italy in a much better shape than he found it. It is only thanks to Mr. Draghi that The Economist crowned Italy the country of the year for 2021. Indeed, as the British newspaper last December, “it is hard to deny that the Italy of today is a better place than it was in December 2020”. 

Response to COVID-19

Italy’s COVID-19 vaccination rate is among the in Europe. Besides, il Bel Paese is set to receive nearly $192 billion () from the European Commission’s Next Generation EU, a €750 billion recovery fund designed to boost the bloc’s economic growth hampered by the pandemic. Italy is getting more funds than any other EU country.

The Italian prime minister planned to make efficient use of the EU money. In fact, his reform-rich Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP) had persuaded European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen to disbursemore than $25 billion () in pre-financing and the first tranche of over $21 billion () of the total sum. Italy also requested the second tranche, of over $21 billion () too, at the end of last month. These allocations, though, are conditional on Italy meeting the objectives set in the NRRP. So far, the Italian  government has . With Super Mario gone, however, it is extremely unlikely that Italy will continue to do so.

According to , the Italian GDP grew by 6.6% during Draghi’s first year in office, the highest rate since 1976. Bear in mind that the eurozone’s third largest economy was the first European country to be hit by the pandemic. However, the Russian invasion of Ukraine has sent energy, food and commodity prices soaring. And as a consequence, the Italian GDP contracted by in the January-March quarter of 2022. 

Italy, the Sick Man of Europe

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The Draghi administration instituted damage control measures to reduce the impact of the war on the economy early on. It is for this reason that Minister of the Economy and Finance Daniele Franco estimated “” for the GDP in the second quarter in a speech at the Italian Banking Association (ABI). Neither did Franco know nor could he possibly predict that Giuseppe Conte’s party would unleash hell in Palazzo Madama. Conte was Draghi’s predecessor and has been the president of the populist Five Star Movement since August 2021.

To understand why Draghi came under pressure, we need some country-specific context. A gifted economist, Draghi took charge of a coalition government to nurse the Italian economy back to life. At the time, Italy was on the brink of collapse due to COVID-19. After Russia invaded Ukraine, economic recovery slowed down and Draghi’s coalition partners saw this as a good time to sabotage him. The center-right Forza Italia of former premier Silvio Berlusconi, the right-wing League of Matteo Salvini and the Five Star Movement led by Conte decided it was time to pull the rug under Draghi.

As support collapsed, Draghi resigned. Italian President Sergio Mattarella promptly rejected Draghi’s resignation. This did little to stop markets from panicking. At a time when eurozone inflation is reaching a record , the spreads between Italian 10-year government bonds (BTPs) and German Bunds have risen to new. On July 20, Draghi the Italian Senate and declared that he was willing to stay on as prime minister if the coalition parties backed his reform agenda. Unfortunately, the above-mentioned parties did not even have the decency to show up in parliament for the vote of confidence. This forced Draghi to resign despite winning the confidence vote.

Draghi’s final resignation prompted markets to react even worse than before. The Italy-Germany bond spreads shot up to points. They only started to go down again when the ECB it would raise interest rates and launched the Transmission Protection Instrument (TPI), a new tool to tackle financial fragmentation in the euro area.

Renewed Credibility and Influence Abroad

With his considerable experience, statesmanlike stature and personal connections, Draghi has restored Italy’s credibility on the European and international stage in his short tenure as prime minister. Thanks to him, Italy successfully led the G20 and COP26 throughout 2021. Italy also (pro)actively participated in G7, NATO, and EU Summits, as well as other high-profile events such as the International Conference on Libya and the Summit for Democracy. Draghi’s deft diplomacy demonstrates how committed he is to strengthening multilateralism and democratic values. As a result, Italy has gained in strength, influence and credibility abroad under his sapient premiership.

How the European Union Lost Italy to the Radical Right

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As the political crisis unfolded, Super Mario was still hard at work. On July 19, he spoke with Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy who Draghi for his “significant personal contribution to granting Ukraine the status of a candidate country for EU membership”. The day before, Draghi was in Algeria where he signed several, including an energy deal enabling Italy to reduce gas imports from Russia. The Italian government has signed similar deals with Angola, the Republic of Congo, Mozambique, Egypt, Bahrain, Qatar, Turkey and Azerbaijan.

In fact, in May the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) brought of gas from Baku, Azerbaijan all the way to Melendugno, Southern Italy in the span of a weekend. Similar negotiations with Israel and Libya are ongoing. By seeking to diversify gas supplies and investing in renewable energy projects, Draghi has been trying to reverse decades of dependence on Russian energy. Following Draghi’s resignation, however, Russia has its gas supplies to Italy by 71,4% in just one day.

As recently pointed out, Draghi “is (or at least was) shifting the power dynamics within the EU”. Proximity to the Mediterranean Sea and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region is no longer perceived as a liability. The risk of increased migration is now trumped by the opportunity of importing non-Russian gas and oil into Europe. 

Even as Draghi nudged the EU in a new direction, he deepened ties with France, the outgoing president of the Council of the EU. On November 26, 2021, the two EU founding members signed the, a historic deal to strengthen cooperation between Italy and France.

The agreement is very similar to the between France and Germany which celebrates its 60th anniversary next year. The EU’s biggest economy assumed the presidency of the G7 in January. Yet the post-Angela Merkel traffic-light coalition has struggled to speak with one voice and retain its leadership role in Europe. For all its promises to increase defense spending and deliver lethal weapons to Ukraine, Germany is still very reliant on Russian energy. Hence, it has proved reluctant to suspend the Nord Stream 2 Pipeline and support a full embargo on Russian oil and gas. 

Until a few weeks ago, Italy was the second largest importer of Russian gas, next only to Germany. Yet the Draghi administration has been bold enough to back all sanctions on Russia proposed by the EU and its North American allies.

Stronger Transatlantic Ties

On the other side of the Atlantic, US President Joe Biden and his administration have been looking at Draghi’s Italy with renewed interest and respect. The recipient of The Atlantic Council’s 2022 Distinguished Leadership Award has proved to be a strong leader and a committed transatlantic partner. 

Is ��ܲ�������’s War in Ukraine Creating a New European Security Architecture?

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Draghi has been pushing for the development of a strong European defense to complement NATO and took a tougher stance vis-à-vis both Russia and China than his predecessors long before ��ܲ�������’s aggression against Ukraine began. In his May to the European Parliament, the Italian prime minister urged greater European coordination on defense. The economist also made the case for more efficient defense spending among EU member states, something that would greatly benefit NATO as well since 21 (soon 23) EU countries are also NATO allies.

Unfortunately, Draghi did not have it all his own way though. Despite his to increase Italy’s defense budget, the Boot will not hit NATO 2% GDP defense spending target until 2028. Nevertheless, in the eyes of US Defense Secretary Lyloyd Austin, Italy remains “one of Europe’s most security providers”. 

Last year, Italy celebrated 160 years of diplomatic ties with Washington and also marked 70 years of NATO’s presence on its soil. The country is currently leading the NATO mission in Iraq and is supposed to take the lead of the mission in Kosovo in the fall. Italy’s Eurofighter jets have been in Romania since November 2021 and the country has been supporting NATO all the way from the Baltic to the Mediterranean. In addition, since ��ܲ�������’s invasion began, Draghi has been to provide heavy weapons to Ukraine despite the strong opposition from within his coalition. He has even looked to defense cooperation with Japan amid concerns that China might be preparing to attack Taiwan.

Thanks to this renewed international credibility, Italy has reclaimed its rightful place within the , an informal framework used by the United States, France, Germany, the UK and now Italy again to discuss and coordinate their foreign policy on matters of common interest.

Political Mayhem Returns

Draghi’s premiership has undoubtedly transformed Italy into a power player in Europe and positioned it to be a stronger and more credible ally for NATO and the US. However, as�� basketball legend Kobe Bryant once said “Job is . Draghi needed more time in office to undertake all the reforms envisaged in the NRRP to modernize Italy. Instead, Italy’s best player was fouled by his own teammates and sent to the locker room in the middle of the game. His season is over.��

Despite not being an elected official, Draghi enjoyed the support of both politicians and ordinary citizens. Since he first tendered his resignation, there have been in Italy’s main cities and petitions signed by nearly mayors and governors and Italians demanding that Draghi stay on in the nation’s top job until the next elections, originally scheduled for March 2023. Now that Draghi has resigned, Italy will go to the polls in September. 

Sadly, Draghi’s ambitions for Italy clashed with the country’s grim political reality. The notoriously Russian-friendly Five Star Movement, League and Forza Italia are jeopardizing Draghi’s hard-fought legacy of credibility for the country. By behaving so irresponsibly, they are throwing Italy into political and economic instability once again. If Super Mario could not change Italy, then no one else can. The premature ending of Draghi’s government is bad news not only for hardworking Italians, but also for the EU, NATO and Ukraine, who might soon lose a key partner in its fight for freedom. In the Kremlin, on the other hand, this is a cause for celebration because whoever is elected this fall will never be as pro-Europe and pro-US as Mario Draghi.

Mr. Prime Minister, you will be missed!

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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In the past, Europeans often appeared reluctant to coordinate their national foreign, security and defense policies. Instead, they preferred to “go it alone”. The Ukraine crisis, however, has elicited a strong, unified response from the European Union (EU), the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), and their member states as never before. To put pressure on the Kremlin and bring the war to an end as soon as possible, the EU, in close coordination with its North American allies, has adopted unprecedented measures. In June, EU member states agreed upon a sixth package of sanctions, which included an embargo on Russian oil imports (currently 90%) and the removal of three Russian banks from the international SWIFT payment platform. They also granted Ukraine and Moldova EU candidate status. This would have been unthinkable only a few months ago.

In addition, the EU activated for the first time the European Peace Facility (EPF), a newly established off-budget fund that replaced, merged and expanded the scope of the Athena Mechanism and the African Peace Facility, and introduced the possibility for the EU to deliver lethal weapons to third countries. Through the EPF, the bloc has already provided $1.5 billion (€1.5 billion) in financial support to Ukraine’s military, with anadditional $500 million () announced on May 24. The next day, the European Commission (EC) adopted the second annual work program of the European Defence Fund (EDF), through which it has been scaling up funding for collaborative research in innovative defense products and technologies. The EC also introduced some new measures to promote defense innovation under a new umbrella: the EU Defence Innovation Scheme (EUDIS). In , EU leaders had agreed on the need for more effective defense spending. This $2 billion (€2 billion) investment will spur defense innovation while reducing industrial fragmentation wherever possible in coordination with NATO’s Defence Innovation Accelerator for the North Atlantic (DIANA) and the freshly launched . 

Meanwhile, NATO has been progressively bolstering defense along its eastern flank in response to ��ܲ�������’s invasion of Ukraine. In February, the Alliance activated the NATO Response Force (NRF), a high-readiness multinational force of 40,000 troops that can be deployed quickly in response to an emerging crisis. The NRF was activated for the first time for the purpose of deterrence and defense instead of crisis management. More recently at the NATO Summit in Madrid, US President Joe Biden that the United States would establish a permanent US Army headquarters in Poland and further expand US military presence in Europe, which currently stands at around 100,000 troops.

Furthermore, the raging war has reignited defense spending debates at the member state level, not only in the “Big Three”—Germany, France, and Italy—but also among non-NATO EU member states with a long tradition of neutrality such as Finland, Sweden and even Ireland.   

The public debates in Germany, France and Italy

Germany has lifted restrictions on sending German weapons to conflict zones by third parties and promised to arm Ukraine. This is a major foreign policy shift. Chancellor Olaf Scholz also pledged to create a special $100 billion (€100 billion) fund for military procurement and committed to spending 2% of the GDP on defense by 2024, in line with the goal for NATO members. However, Scholz has been heavily criticized both at home and abroad for his Ukraine policy. According to polls, while 69% of Germans support boosting defense spending, public opinion is , with 45% in favor and 55% against, over the supply of heavy weapons to Ukraine. The day after the Bundestag voted to provide heavy artillery to Kyiv on April 28, an signed by 28 German intellectuals advising Scholz against this policy gained support online. A week later, signed by twice as many German intellectuals called on Scholz to provide heavy weapons to Ukraine. 

Some, including Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy who recently the Ukrainian ambassador to Germany, have criticized Scholz for repeated delays and overall reluctance to send arms to Ukraine. Zelenskyy has even called into question �ұ�������Բ�’s leadership role in Europe. A deal on the special fund was eventually reached by the German “traffic-light” coalition government and conservative opposition parties in late May and approved by the Bundestag in early June. In terms of arms supplies, however, Germany has directly only Panzerhaubitze 2000 self-propelled howitzers to Ukraine. The rest of the military aid by the German government, which is supposed to include Gepard anti-aircraft vehicles, IRIS-T SLM anti-aircraft and MARS II multiple-launch rocket , is only likely to reach Ukrainian soldiers by late summer or even early autumn.  

In Italy, the political willingness of the executive branch to arm Ukraine has inflamed discussions on defense investments and increases to the defense budget. On June 21, Italy’s Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio with the Five-Star Movement and formed a new parliamentary group. The casus belli was precisely the party’s opposition to Italy supplying arms to Ukraine and insufficient support for NATO and EU decisions.

Earlier this spring, a heated took place in Rome. The populist party currently led by former prime minister Giuseppe Conte clashed with the other parties supporting the technocratic government led by the former president of the European Central Bank, Mario Draghi. The prime minister seemed particularly appalled by Conte’s arguments against increasing the defense budget when the country is still grappling with the health crisis and socio-economic consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic. The two have been on a collision course ever since.

As a result, Italian defense expenditure will not hit the NATO 2% GDP target until 2028, lagging behind other allies. However, unlike Germany, Italy has not shied away from sending heavy weapons, such asStinger surface-to-air missiles and M2 Browning heavy , to Ukraine. Despite the topic of arms supplies being classified information, Corriere della Sera reported that the third decree (note that a is in the making) of the Italian government in May aimed to provide Ukraine with even heavier weaponry, includinghowitzers 155/39 FH-70 . At the end of June, three Panzerhaubitze 2000 self-propelled howitzers, officially on their way to Germany for a joint military exercise, were in Southern Italy for lacking the necessary authorizations. Given the secrecy that surrounds the country’s arms deliveries to Kyiv, it cannot be excluded that Ukraine was their final destination. 

In contrast to Germany and Italy, increasing defense spending in France has not caused much debate. This could perhaps be because of the reelection of President Emmanuel Macron. However, it is important to note that France has been increasing military spending for quite some time now. Last year, the country around $57 billion (€57 billion) on defense (around of its GDP) and, in March, even before securing his second term, Macron that the defense budget would be increased further in response to the ongoing war. French defense spending is due to reach the NATO 2% goal no later than 2025, only one year behind schedule.

Minister of the Armed Forces Sébastien Lecornu recently a $3 billion (€3 billion) defense budget increase compared to 2022, bringing the total for 2023 to $44 billion (€44 billion). When it comes to arms deliveries though the Elysée Palace has so far only sentMilan anti-tank missiles, Mistral anti-aircraft and Caesar self-propelled to Ukraine. Since his joint visit to Kyiv with Scholz and Draghi, Macron has been pledging additional Caesar howitzers and has even asked the French arm manufacturer Nexter to increase its production. The French president might be doing so to diffuse tensions over his statement about not “” Russia over Ukraine.

Macron’s centrist alliance suffered a severe blow in June’s parliamentary elections. However, this should not affect French foreign and defense policy because these traditionally are the domain of the president. 

And in Finland, Sweden, and Ireland

Meanwhile in Northern Europe, Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin and Swedish Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson made history. Breaking with longstanding policies of not supplying arms to war zones, the two Nordic countries were the first to announce that they would provide weapons to Ukraine. Since the war started, Sweden has provided 10,000 anti-tank weapons (5,000 in February and another 5,000 in March) and other military equipment (helmets, body armors, rifles etc), of which more deliveries were at the end of June. Likewise, in early May Finland announced its of weapons to Ukraine, although details regarding the content of this as well as previous shipments have not been disclosed.

Furthermore, despite Russian President Vladimir Putin’s threats, the two female leaders formally reversed decades of neutral foreign and security policies by formally applying for NATO membership on May 18. The move has been backed by the majority of and, who have also supported the significant increase in defense spending. This will allow defense spending in both countries to reach and, in the case of Finland, even the NATO 2% GDP goal. 

Following the signing of a trilateral memorandum with Turkey, which had initially objected to Finland and Sweden joining NATO, both Nordic countries can now become full members of NATO once all Allied nations ratify their bid. At the NATO Summit in Madrid, all 30 members signed the accession protocols. However, the ratification process for the NATO membership of the two Scandinavian countries is still ongoing and might take up to a year to conclude. While Germany has ratified the membership of Finland and Sweden, Italy and France are yet to do so.

At present, Finland and Sweden can participate in NATO meetings and possibly benefit from greater intelligence sharing. However, they are not yet protected by the Article 5 guarantee. This might explain why Finland just recently passed a that allows it to build barriers on its border with Russia. There is in fact a very high risk that the Kremlin might engage in hybrid tactics in retaliation for �󾱲Ա����Ի�’s NATO membership bid.

Even Ireland, a neutral island with no proximity either geographical or commercial to Russia, isdoubling its relatively low . Currently, Dublin spends a mere 0.3% of its GDP on defense. Unlike Finland and Sweden, Ireland is not sending military supplies to Ukraine though and does not plan on NATO “any time soon.” Still, the ongoing conflict in Ukraine is changing the debate in the country and forcing Ireland to rethink its security and defense policy. In March, the three coalition government parties—Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and the Green Party—all against a bill that called for a referendum about writing neutrality into the Irish constitution. 

Taoiseach Micheál Martin recently met with Zelenskyy in Kyiv and reiterated his support for Ukraine’s EU membership and sanctions on Russia. Much like Minister for Foreign Affairs and Minister for Defence Simon Coveney, Martin is of the view that the Irish concept of neutrality should “” and “.” Ireland might not be vulnerable to conventional military attacks, but it is extremely vulnerable to cyber threats and attacks.

Barry Andrews, the leader of the Fianna Fáil in the European Parliament, observed that “75% of transatlantic underwater internet cables flow through or near Ireland’s exclusive economic zone.” Dublin also hosts the European headquarters of big-tech giants of the likes of Google and Facebook. This is probably why Ireland joined the NATO Cooperative Cyber Defence Center of Excellence in 2019, despite not being a NATO member. Ireland is only a member of the Partnership for Peace. Since 2017, the country has also participated in EU Permanent Structured Cooperation (PESCO) projects as an Observer. This participation is expected to become more in the near future.

An Important Opportunity

In conclusion, it is our belief that the war in Ukraine represents an important opportunity for Europe to strengthen its common security and address defense capability shortfalls. A new security architecture is emerging from this crisis in which the EU and NATO should seek not only to complement, but also to mutually reinforce one another. They must also keep working together to protect the common values and principles both organizations stand for. The real challenge going forward for the EU is how not to lose momentum and maintain the same level of consultation and cooperation with NATO allies, especially with the US. This momentum could be lost quickly once the war is over and it is then that member states have to continue to invest in defense, when threats are no longer direct nor immediate to their lands.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post Is ��ܲ�������’s War in Ukraine Creating a New European Security Architecture? appeared first on 51�Թ�.

As soon as the battle is won, the reality of politics in today’s democracies returns to its default status, that of a game. Once elected, politicians deploy their carefully refined skills that allow them to dodge anything that might tend towards implementing long-term solutions. 

Electoral battles leave the dead and wounded on the battlefield to be mourned, cared for or revenged. But like the pieces on a chessboard, in most cases they can be replaced on their initial squares. The political games that follow the battles have the effect of simply changing the order of the teams in the standings. In the game, the only thing that counts is the score when the final whistle blows as well as the corresponding W or L. The score-keeping device of democracies is called an election.

This past Sunday saw two significant elections in two very different settings. France completed its presidential-cum-legislative election cycle that, since 2002, ritually takes place every five years. The second election took place on the American continent, the country whose surreal political metaphysics were summed up by Gabriel García Márquez in 1967 in his novel One Hundred Years of Solitude (Cien años de soledad). 

Both of those elections produced shocking results, signaling the kind of reversal of trends that Olaf Scholz recently evoked when speaking about �ұ�������Բ�’s foreign policy. He used the German word,, a turning point in history. Scholz applied it specifically to the consequences of ��ܲ�������’s invasion of Ukraine: the newfound military resolve of Germany. Scholz thus evoked a top-down decision that foresees other top-down decisions to follow in the future. In contrast, Zeitenwende as reflected in the French and Colombian elections is likely to be more significant and with more long-term effects. They  both represent bottom-up examples of a historical “turning.”

The drama of France’s Cinquième République

The French legislative elections had the radical effect of breaking what until now was felt to be the fundamental logic of France’s Fifth Republic and a sacred tradition. The result of every presidential election in the Republic’s history was confirmed in the immediate aftermath by the same electors’ voting in a solid majority for the president’s party in the National Assembly. Within less than two months, the voters thus not only elect a supreme leader, but promptly empower the president to implement the announced battle plan. 

When, in May, 1981, François Mitterrand with a razor thin majority defeated the incumbent, Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, a month later the electorate provided him with a clear legislative majority. He immediately and boldly began implementing his announced plan to nationalize all the major French industries, including the banks. Mitterrand’s actions conformed perfectly to the model of presidential government foreseen by the constitution of the Fifth Republic a little more than two decades earlier.

Now, four decades later, the Fifth Republic has clearly run out of steam. On Sunday, for the first time a newly re-elected president, Emmanuel Macron, found himself deprived of the majority that will allow him to preside over a program of government. Macron will now be faced with the challenge of cobbling together some kind of coalition that will be given the label of a government. Most likely both Macron and his new government will be permanently occupied with managing a chaos of conflicting interests. That situation clearly contradicts the entire logic of the Fifth Republic.

Many are predicting that the Assembly will be dissolved within a year and new elections called to permit the definition of a stable majority. At that point, two things can happen. If the spirit of the Fifth Republic is still alive, the prospect of dissolution will provide Macron with the means of breaking the apparent deadlock by soliciting the population to endow him with a majority committed to his program and his leadership. Depending on how things play out, that will appear either as a clever or desperate gamble.

If, as the turning point seems to reveal, the spirit of the Cinquième République has effectively retired or died, it will mark a return to the most dramatic moment of the Fifth Republic’s history. That was the revolt of May 1968, an event President Charles De Gaulle had the temerity to malign with the word “chienlit” (shitting in bed). The Republic nevertheless managed to clean the sheets after May ‘68 and survive intact. This time feels very different.

The Colombian surprise

Even more astonishingly, the Colombian election marked an inflection if not a reversal of what appeared to be the eternal fate of Colombia: to be governed by a corrupt right-wing establishment permanently closely aligned with the foreign policy goals of the United States. The newly elected left-wing president, Gustavo Petro, alas does not have access to the luxury of newly elected French presidents who historically could count on an immediate legislative election to confirm the voters’ endorsement of the candidate’s program. 

The current bicameral Congress of Colombia is dominated by right-wing, centrist, and neoliberal parties. In other words, Petro will have a major challenge on his hands trying to get anything accomplished. Add to that the fact that the state security services and the armed forces are likely to resist Petro’s authority, and it appears likely that Colombia will be living through its own, but very different kind of chienlit.

Most observers see Colombia’s turnabout as simply part of the new “pink tide” in Latin America, a phenomenon in which more and more American nations are voting in leftwing leaders. It is expected to increase the chances later this year of a victory in Brazil for Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva – better known as “Lula” – over the current right-wing president Jair Bolsonaro. More broadly, Petro’s triumph confirms the increasingly visible sentiment in Latin American countries that it is time to break free from the invisible shackles of the Monroe Doctrine (1823) that have bound them to a state of subservience to the US economy for almost exactly 200 years.

The ambiguous question of NATO

When Chancellor Olaf Scholz evoked his Zeitenwende, he gave no details about its meaning. He appeared to be saying that the Ukraine crisis was a wake-up call forcing Germany to break with its policy of cultivating a long-term friendship with Russia as well as its post-World War II stance of keeping a low military profile. 

The immediate impression this gave, eagerly welcomed in Washington, is that Germany would even more securely adhere to NATO. But in the background, there may be an even more significant turning point, which could have a deeper meaning. The current move may be more like a chess gambit designed to further a goal Germany already shares with France that consists of creating an autonomous European security framework no longer dependent on US leadership imposed through NATO. 

Reinforcing NATO would hardly justify the idea of Zeitenwende. In contrast, Europe breaking free from Anglo-American domination, especially after Brexit and the increasingly obvious revolt of many poorer nations and emerging powers, would truly mark a turning point in European and German history.

Was it all foretold by William Butler Yeats in 1921?

Speaking of Zeitenwende, this may be an appropriate moment to revisit a of anguished foreboding by Irish poet William Butler Yeats published just over a century ago. Here are the first ten lines of The Second Coming.

Turning and turning in the widening gyre

The falcon cannot hear the falconer;

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The best lack all conviction, while the worst

Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;

Surely the Second Coming is at hand.

Yeats’s poem has remained one of the most memorable literary pieces of the 20^th century. These lines have been quoted by political commentators at various times over the past hundred years to sum up the state of Western civilization. Yeats’ message in the immediate aftermath of the First World War was dire. At its core, in the third line, was a somber double assertion: “Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold.”

Oswald Spengler had already reflected a similar sentiment that had been growing for some time in Europe. In 1918, he published the first volume of his Decline of the West, a work he had begun composing much earlier. In 1922, T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land appeared after being strenuously edited and ultimately “crafted” by Ezra Pound. It offered a panorama of the cultural and indeed civilizational confusion that had overcome Europe in the first two decades of the twentieth century.

The Waste Land took over first place and never relinquished it in the race to establish “the 20^th century’s “greatest poem in the English language.” Nevertheless, thanks to a succession of political events that seemed to bear out Yeats’s description of a broken system, the Second Coming has probably earned more references in the media than Eliot’s masterpiece. As the history of the twentieth century advanced, at various critical moments, things really did seem to be falling apart.

Just as Zeitenwende itself can be interpreted in various ways, so can Yeats’s assertion that “the centre cannot hold.” Yeats believed that the core of Western civilization was beginning to unravel like the twine below the leather surface of a baseball that has been torn asunder. His prescience was justified by the events listed above. But the unraveling is still incomplete. Most people are now aware that it could come to absolute fruition with an impending climate crisis, already making its marks, or perhaps even more quickly thanks to a nuclear “accident” provoked in the context of the increasingly nerve-racking standoff in Ukraine.

Defining the center

Sunday’s elections in France and Colombia provide a hint that what people thought of as the stable “center” of their global and local political systems is losing its grip. The center has gone off kilter, leaving the impression that it can no longer hold. As a concept, the center can be defined as a normative idea of how governments, with decent enough efficiency, carry on managing forces that are so complex and powerful they defy the ordinary citizen’s understanding. The center can thus be defined essentially as the inertia at the core of any establishment that keeps things ticking over from day to day.

The idea people have of the center implies belief in notions such as fair competition, free markets, reasonable government regulation, rule of law, free and fair elections. These cultural ideas are trotted ouy to reassure populations that their leaders are doing a decent job. At the same time, the guardians of the center spend much of their energy warning voters to be wary of personalities who deviate from the center. If given a free hand, these deviant personalities might upset the precious applecart. That is why Barack Obama intervened two years ago to prevent Bernie Sanders from winning the Democratic presidential nomination. Joe Biden was chosen, clearly an avatar of “the center,”. Jeremy Corbyn suffered a fate similar to Sanders’ in the UK. In France, Marine Le Pen and Jean-Luc Mélenchon were both labeled extremist. But these deviants have now returned to squeeze the life out of Macron’s vaunted center.

The political center in the West’s democratic countries has long assumed the task of defending and protecting the existing balance of economic and coercive power. It’s a system that has evolved, in an increasingly oligarchic fashion, around the productive forces of a neoliberal system designed specifically for the needs of the consumer economies promoted in the West. Additionally, over time, the question of security and the growing needs of the military-industrial complex have tended to set the tone and influence all the major decisions of the center.

Leaders such as David Cameron in the UK, Angela Merkel in Germany, Bill Clinton, Barack Obama and Joe Biden in the US, and Emmanuel Macron in France, epitomized a center that had clearly become oligarchic and increasingly plutocratic at its core, but democratic in its formal constitution. 

And then something happened. Six years ago a series of events set in motion the feeling that the center might no longer hold or no longer deserve to hold. Various political personalities came to prominence whose style and bearing challenged the idea of “centerness.” Boris Johnson, Donald Trump, Marine Le Pen, Bernie Sanders, Jean-Luc Mélenchon and others, with contrasting levels of seriousness and surging popularity, dared to deviate from an ideology built around the idea of trusting the “tried and true” to keep things on a relatively even keel. Paradoxically, that turned out to be  the key to Macron’s success in 2017, when the former pillars of the hard center – that included the traditional parties of the left and right – had fallen into discredit. The young interloper, aided by a runoff with the extremist Marine Le Pen, appeared to be a safe alternative to the existing sclerotic system.

Boris Johnson and Emmanuel Macron, both ambiguously perceived by their own establishments, have adopted policies respectful of the oligarchic power base that defines the center. But in their own way, they have both undermined the credibility of the center, in part by being too close to its oligarchic interests, which people have come to suspect, and in part because they have deviated from the cultural norm associated with the center.

The long and the short of it is that, within the Western block of respectable democracies, the center is rapidly losing its grip. At the same time, the periphery around that Western core is beginning to drift away from the traditional grip of the West, a grip that began with colonial conquest half a millennia ago. 

In its reporting on the Colombian election, The New York Times a television director who lives “in a wealthy part of Bogotá.” “It’s been a long time,” he recounts, “since we had an opportunity like this for change. If things will get better, I don’t know. But if we stick with the same, we already know what we’re going to get.”

That may be the clearest sign that, even those who have benefitted from the status quo the center was designed to protect, are beginning to understand that “the center cannot hold.”

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post France and Colombia: The Center Keeps Trying (but Failing) to Hold appeared first on 51�Թ�.

The effects of conspiracy theories in Italy were particularly noticeable when a wave of spread across various moderate to large cities last year. A small portion of the Italian population protested all over the country against the government’s mandatory vaccinations and use of the , a document needed until April 1, 2022 to enter public places and given only to those who had been given both vaccine doses. The conspiracies fuelling these protests focused on the government’s handling of the pandemic, the dangers of vaccines, and the basic existence of COVID-19. While most protests were peaceful, conspiratorial belief pushed some individuals to carry out violent attacks.   

Conspiracy Theories and COVID-19

Conspiracy theories can be as “attempts to explain the ultimate causes of significant social and political events… with claims of secret plots by… powerful actors.”  Scholars find that they tend to arise in correspondence to incomprehensible and unexpected worldwide events that feelings of fear, uncertainty, lack of control, and stress. Individuals who possess these feelings tend to believe in conspiracies because they provide alternative and simplistic answers to events which would otherwise be difficult to understand. 

The COVID-19 pandemic has created the perfect environment for conspiracy theories to flourish. Given its uncertain and inexplicable environment, people have turned to conspiracies to better understand the situation they are living in. In addition, thanks to the stay-at-home orders, people have spent the majority of their time on social media platforms, which are rife with conspiracy theories. 

Myriads of radical right extremists were and continue to be extremely active on social media platforms. They spread numerous conspiracies regarding the origins of COVID-19. While some were new in nature, others were readapted old tropes which came to include the pandemic. Some of the most common conspiracies disseminated by the radical right were: anti-Asian (with many different scenarios speculating as to whether poor food hygiene was to blame or whether Asian governments intentionally created and spread the virus to secure global dominance), anti-Semitic (the Jewish population was blamed for spreading the virus to advance its financial goals), anti-immigrant (with a readaptation of the Great Replacement theory, itself often imbued with implicit anti-Semitism, in addition to anti-black and Islamophobic elements), anti-government (governments were blamed for controlling and suppressing societies by taking away individual freedoms) and anti-vaccine (governments were criticised for using them to monitor people). 

Conspiracy Theories in Italy: Dangerous or Not? 

Last year and early this year, Italy experienced a wave of nationwide protests, with individuals expressing their anger towards imposed by the government. The government imposed vaccinations for workers in almost every sector. Workers who refused to be vaccinated were to have their employment terminated. The Green Pass was mandatory too. Italians utilized their right to protest to express their anger against these policies. Sadly, this anger is often fuelled by nefarious, conspiratoracies. Some of these clearly encourage individuals to carry out violence during or after the protests.  

Between September 2020 and April 2021, during the first wave of nationwide protests , Italian citizens against the government’s mandatory lockdowns, they questioned the existence of the virus, and doubted the COVID-19 vaccine. Their anger was reinforced by a series of conspiracy theories that had spread on social media. Most of these stated that COVID-19 did not really exist, but was actually a falsehood perpetrated by governments to control individuals. They claimed that the Italian media was exaggerating the number of deaths and cases in the country. They also argued that governments had created vaccines to monitor individuals. Furthermore, these vaccines were believed to be dangerous as they were created far too quickly and without enough tests to prove their efficacy.

This more recent wave of protests was also founded on conspiracies ranging from anti-government to anti-vaccine. A portion of the Italian population is convinced that the government is consolidating its power over its citizens by controlling them, taking away their individual rights and freedoms, and controlling the country’s money supply. They also believe that vaccines are still harmful and should not be administered to young children. Protestors have come to define the Italian government as a “health dictatorship or tyranny.” In November 2021, a massive crowd in Milan greeted the well-known vaccine skeptic , praising his words against the Green Pass and mandatory vaccination. 

Unfortunately, as mentioned earlier, not all protests were peaceful. Some resulted in violent attacks. On April 3. 2021, attacked a vaccination hub in Brescia, Lombardy with multiple incendiary devices. Investigators and prosecutors argued that the main of the perpetrators was to damage the hub and interrupt the vaccination campaign in the city. 

The attack was a direct outcome of Pluda’s journey into conspiracy theories. On his Facebook page, Pluda shared a variety of posts, pictures and memes of different conspiracies ranging from anti-government to anti-immigration, from anti-vaccination to anti-COVID. He believed that COVID-19 was a hoax and that the government had created it for its own agenda and that vaccines were created to control the population. Because of his beliefs, Pluda took part in many of the anti-vaccination and anti-COVID protests, which he advertised on his Facebook page with the aim of  gathering as many of his friends and followers as possible.

Other protests at taking down the government and changing the social and political order. These protests turned violent when on , protestors guided by the leaders of Italy’s far-right groups, such as Forza Nuova, broke into the headquarters of the Italian General Confederation of Labor (CGIL — Italy’s most important trade union) in Rome and caused havoc. Protestors managed to overtake police officers at the entrance and gradually make their way through the offices, damaging furniture, destroying objects and breaking windows. 

How to Curb Violence?

After the violent attack in Rome, Italian prosecutors and investigators have been working to arrest any individual with extreme and radical views who was tied to the protests. Many of the individuals arrested were part of a Telegram channel called “” (“Stop the Dictatorship”), which has been taken down because of its hateful comments. The channel boasted several thousand members that talked about taking up arms, committing attacks on Italian institutions and taking down the health dictatorship. 

While this is a step in the right direction, the Italian government can implement more information campaigns — both online and offline — which could be crucial to avoid the spread of conspiracies. By increasing the amount of factually correct information on vaccines and COVID-19 and by taking down posts, videos, and memes that spread conspiracies, the Italian government could mitigate violent attacks in the future. 

Conspiracy theories can be dangerous and can push individuals to commit violence, especially when the environment is stressful, inexplicable, and uncertain. The conspiracies related to the COVID-19 pandemic have pushed individuals worldwide to commit violent attacks. Italy is no exception and, like other nations, must act speedily to curb such violence.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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The post How Dangerous Are COVID-19 Conspiracy Theories In Italy? appeared first on 51�Թ�.

The most striking bit of gossip that I picked up was that British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has knocked up his nanny and is expecting what might be his twelfth child. As rumors go, this might be as fictional as Nessie, the Loch Ness monster. After all, rumors have swirled in London and various capitals around the world for ages about the salacious private lives of the great men of the realm.

Yet I could not help but think that rumors about Johnson are taking this green and pleasant land back to the future. The current prime minister is supremely powerful. All Tory grandees have been defenestrated. The likes of William Hague and Kenneth Clarke may still go around giving speeches but they do not matter anymore. Unlike Winston Churchill or Margaret Thatcher who surrounded herself with big beasts in the cabinet, Johnson is now the only big beast among pygmies. Unlikely though this may sound, such concentration of power harks back to a bygone era.

Falstaffian Churchill-Worshiping Henry VIII

Johnson may play the buffoon but he is a classicist with a keen sense of history. He is one of the great characters of Eton, a great school that produced the likes of the Duke of Wellington and Orwell. As a child, young Johnson wanted to be . Later, he downgraded his ambitions and gunned to be prime minister. Not only has Johnson got to 10 Downing Street, he has got there in style and has etched his name in the history books. This Falstaffian figure fond of wine, women and song has delivered Brexit and won a thumping reelection.

In many ways, Big Boris is the modern Henry VIII who has broken with Europe. It may turn out to be a jolly good thing in the future as debt-ridden aging Europe fails to deal with its mounting debts, stubborn unemployment and now rising inflation. In the long run, Brexit might still turn out to be a jolly good thing after all. Johnson might end up like the historic Henry VIII figure who set England on the path of glory and empire.

Johnson, who is obsessed with Winston Churchill, is doing quite well out of the Russia-Ukraine War. Like his hero, the prime minister is enjoying his finest hour. He has boldly taken on the transparently villainous Vladimir Putin and turned the screws on Russian oligarchs who, until not too long ago, bought houses, yachts and football clubs. A few weeks ago, BoJo (a popular nickname for Johnson in the UK) dashed to Kyiv for a with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Yet not all has been going well for Big Boris since he moved into 10 Downing Street. Brexit was a long drawn-out affair. The Partygate scandal continues to rumble on. Tory grandees and the notoriously savage British press continue to hammer Johnson. The Economist has “foot-dragging, hard-heartedness, ineptitude and dishonesty”to be  typical of BoJo’s government. The venerable 1843 publication has gone on to say repeatedly that the Johnson “government is a fundamentally unserious government led by fundamentally unserious people.”

Most recently, BoJo lost what Al Ghaff and I have called “the most consequential local elections in decades.” Yet he remains firmly in the saddle because this “sly fox as a teddy bear” has chewed up the little rabbit coming out of the Tory hat named Rishi Sunak.

Cummings and Goings

The recent rumors about Johnson’s latest amorous adventure might be much ado about nothing. After all, nothing has stopped BoJo in the past. He is the great survivor of British politics. Nearly 18 years ago, Michael Howard BoJo for lying about an affair. BoJo came roaring back and is still riding high.

Yet there is always a sneaking suspicion that one day BoJo might not be able to manage yet another James Bond-style close shave. As the adage goes, even the canniest of cats have only nine lives. It is not without reason that Dominic Cummings, once an unlikely ally of Johnson, him “a shopping trolley smashing from one side of the aisle to the other.” Some of BoJo’s critics point to his private life as proof of Cummings’ observations and has repeatedly taken the mickey out of BoJo for never taking . 

Two years ago, when BoJo’s now wife and then girlfriend was expecting their baby, mocked Big Boris for fathering what was rumored to be his tenth child. Carrie Johnson has now given birth to another child, bringing that number to 11. BoJo has produced enough progeny to form a football (soccer for Americans) team. Now, rumors emerge that the man to “lock up [his] willy” might have failed to do so again. This time, his nanny is the lady in question.

Already, BoJo’s nanny has been in the . Apparently, Conservative donors have been ponying up the cash to pay for his lifestyle. This allegedly includes the salary of the nanny. Early this month, The Times — the real one in London, not The New York Times that is a target of my learned colleague Peter Isackson — asked, “Can Boris Johnson afford to be prime minister?” 

Given BoJo’s posh lifestyle and, presumably, “off the record, on the QT, and very hush-hush” payments for his many children, The Times’ question is most pertinent. Another Boris, the blond tennis superstar Boris Becker, once known for his booming serve and partying lifestyle, is in jail over bankruptcy charges. BoJo is unlikely to end up like Becker but he is clearly a prime minister under strain. If rumors of another child with the nanny are not just smoke without fire, then the BoJo shopping trolley might be careening completely out of control.

When is Private Life a Public Issue?

Rumors about BoJo’s child number 12 for the man in Number 10 raise a key issue about the private lives of public figures. In puritanical America, politicians were and, with the exception of Donald Trump, still are generally damned for what many Europeans might term moments of weakness or mere piffle. Gary Hart’s presidential campaign imploded when a lissome model was on his lap. David Petraeus had to as the director of the CIA for an extramarital affair and the ensuing kerfuffle. Such errant behavior is seen to be a reflection of poor character that disqualifies people from public office.

In France, presidents have long had mistresses. It almost seems that it is a prerequisite for the job and perhaps demonstrates nimble management skills required of any inhabitant of the Élysée Palace. BoJo has long maintained that his private life is his private life and that is that. In 2013, a British judge disagreed. He refused BoJo a gagging order concerning an illegitimate child taking the view that the public had a right to know about BoJo’s “reckless” conduct.

As my dear Dutch friend Jarst de Jong put it best, BoJo’s private life is a matter of public importance. It gives insight into the character and judgment of the British prime minister. A Jarst said pithily, anyone can cheat once because no one is a saint. A second time may be understable as well. But when someone cheats repeatedly and lies about it, then it reveals their lack of trustworthiness. BoJo seems to repeatedly betray those who love and trust him. That might not be the most desirable trait for any leader. 

BoJo’s repeated scandals also reveal a certain lack of awareness and understanding of risk. Taking risks is part of leadership but taking risks without understanding what consequences they entail is a dangerous habit. BoJo has long had a reputation for recklessness but has got away with the risks he has taken so far. Maybe, the twelfth child might inspire a play like The Twelfth Night.

Perhaps the UK could heed the words of , a man who first hired Johnson and packed him off to Brussels. Hastings also gave BoJo the “lock up” advice, which has so far gone unheeded. In 2018, Hastings wrote, “Johnson’s glittering intelligence [was] not matched by self-knowledge.” Calling BoJo, “Blackadder in a blond wig” with “remarkable gifts,” Hastings called Big Boris “flawed by an absence of conscience, principle or scruple.” The contrast with Gaitskell whose tombstone says fortitudo et integritas could not be starker.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post Do Rumors of Boris Johnson’s Purported Twelfth Child Matter? appeared first on 51�Թ�.

As the ballots are counted and results are declared across the country, a clear picture emerges: these local elections are the most consequential local elections in decades.

If the results of the local elections were to be replicated in a general election, we will find ourselves in territory where several scenarios could emerge, primarily based on and dictated by the number of seats secured in the House of Commons by the Labour and Liberal Democrats.

Bumbling Boris

Boris Johnson’s leadership of the Conservative Party has been a controversial one. The Conservatives and the country have not experienced a leader like Johnson before. His career as a journalist and politician is littered with transgressions and . 

Boris Johnson is the ultimate Teflon politician. In the words of his lifelong friend and rival David Cameron, “always been able to get away with things that mere mortals can’t”. Cameron certainly did not get away with the Brexit referendum that led to his downfall as prime minister. In contrast, Johnson has sailed through one scandal after another and won a thumping majority in the 2019 elections.

Before those elections, Johnson’s unconventional leadership of the Tories in its first few months involved unlawfully and removing the whip from 21 of his who voted to block a disastrous no-deal Brexit that the prime minister was pursuing at the time. Those MPs included party grandees and bigwigs such as former chancellors of the exchequer Ken Clarke and Phillip Hammond, and former ministers Dominic Grieve, Oliver Letwin, Rory Stewart, Ed Vaizey, and even Nicholas Soames, the grandson of the revered wartime Conservative Prime Minister Winston Churchill.

Johnson’s leadership of the Conservatives involves an implicit pact between himself and his party. His history of transgressions and misdemeanors, and economic relationship with the truth and facts as well as his antiques are tolerated as long as he wins elections. In the 2019 elections, Johnson upheld his side of the bargain and delivered an 80-seat majority for the Conservatives.

In the wake of the 2019 election results, Tory strategists and spin doctors claimed that Boris’ antics and his scandalous personal life were always ‘priced in’ by large parts of the electorate. Last week’s local election results dispute this Tory claim. It turns out that voters repeatedly raised the scandal when campaigners and journalists turned up at their doorsteps.

The Conservative Party is extraordinary at winning . They are good at stealing the clothes of other parties and doing what is necessary to win. That involves ruthlessly knifing their leaders when they stop winning. No Tory leader has been exempt from this rule, including Winston Churchill and Margaret Thatcher. Yet Tory knifing is a clinical cold-blooded affair. MPs knife their leader when credible successors lie in wait to mount the saddle.

Boris Johnson: Bumbling Buffoon, Pied Piper or Churchillian Statesman?

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So far, Johnson has ensured that there is no successor lying in wait. Despite partygate and the , Johnson’s position is secure because he has ruthlessly eliminated all potential rivals. Rishi Sunak, the current chancellor of the exchequer, was once touted as a potential prime minister but, like Icarus, he has come down to earth. Johnson is a Balliol classicist who wanted to be “world king” when he was young. Cloak and dagger palace intrigues come naturally to him. Sunak and his wife have been thrown to the wolves by the so-called Bumbling Boris whose team have leaked juicy tales of the couple’s domicile, tax and financial affairs, causing outrage among voters. Sunak can now kiss goodbye to ambitions. A career managing his father-in-law’s billions from sunny California seems more probable.

The local elections have been nothing short of disastrous for the Tories. Nearly were in play. They were voted out in a quarter of the seats they were defending. Losing so many seats should put pressure on Johnson. His fast and loose reputation with the truth has finally come to haunt the Conservative Party. However, the Tories do not have any potential successors in sight and Johnson is secure for now.

Johnson is not like Cameron who resigned after losing the Brexit referendum. He has thick skin and no sense of shame. Johnson is not going to resign because he is found guilty of wrongdoing, misconduct or misjudgment. As one cabinet ally puts it, “He’s not going anywhere, his fingernails have been dug into the Downing Street window frames and he would be taken away kicking and .”

Johnson is certainly in the mood to fight back against any attempt by Conservative MPs to remove him from power. For now, he still has the support of the press. Tory-sympathizing journalists have gone into overdrive to spin the disastrous local elections as largely inconsequential and irrelevant for the Conservative Party. They take the view that these local elections were not a referendum on Johnson.

There is another key factor to note. The prime minister has a track record of resorting to unconstitutional methods, unlawful actions and top-level deceit to save his skin. At the moment, the only way Johnson will leave 10 Downing Street is through an election defeat.

Starmer Stakes All

Elections are complicated affairs. They are not as simple as one party or candidate beating the other. In general, power changes hands only when the ruling party loses energy, direction or cohesion or any combination of the three and the opposition party gets its act together to emerge as a ruling party in waiting. In the British system, any change in power takes two to tango. When John Major lost in 1997, the Tories were divided, discredited, exhausted and bereft of new ideas after 18 years in power. In contrast, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown offered fresh energy and projected competence. Like the 1997 elections, other changes in power were also such dual acts involving both ruling and opposition parties.

Currently, Keir Starmer is the leader of the Labour Party. He is a distinguished barrister who headed the Crown Prosecution Service. He took over in April 2020 after two failed leaders. Jeremy Corbyn presided over five turbulent and disastrous years. Before him, the uninspiring Ed Miliband squandered another five years. Starmer seemed like a sane and surefooted choice for the Labour Party. Here was a safe pair of hands who would  return competence and order to the office of the of Her Majesty’s Most Loyal Opposition.

Unlike most of his predecessors, Starmer is not a political animal. His approach to politics is measured and forensic. His early performances during the weekly Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQs) caught Johnson off guard. Starmer’s lawyerly approach and mannerisms were in direct contrast to that of Johnson’s populist, colorful, and theatrical political style. This rattled some Tory nerves in the early days and cheered Labour backbenchers.

Starmer’s star has waned since. His back-handed political operations and communication blunders have not helped. Starmer is comfortable with big decisions but has a blind spot for the minutiae that drive modern politics. Some of these big decisions have long been necessary. Starmer has removed the from Corbyn and purged Corbynistas from key offices. Starmer has also worked hard to make Labour electable again.

On Monday, May 9 — three days after the local elections — Starmer rolled the dice to take the biggest of his political life. The Labour leader announced that he will step down if found guilty of breaking the stringent lockdown rules when he visited Durham, a historic city in Northeast England, in 2021 during the election campaign.

Starmer’s announcement is a very bold move. If he is cleared by the Durham Police, Starmer will stand tall next to a prime minister alleged to have parliament over partygate, a resigning matter under ‘normal’ circumstances. If Starmer’s move comes off, it will be the political equivalent of checkmating Boris Johnson. If Starmer is found guilty and resigns, his leadership will come to a premature end and it is unclear if the next Labour leader would benefit from such a move. The fate of British politics lies in balance on the Durham Police investigation.

Old Wine in New Bottle

Regardless of what transpires in Durham, the recent local elections provide a roadmap to toppling Tories from power. Starmer and Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey are carefully treading a once charted by their charismatic predecessors in the 1990s. Then Blair and Paddy Ashdown forged a Labour-Liberal non-aggression pact to unseat the Tores from power. Starmer and Davey hope this may be a winning model for the next parliamentary elections.

While Starmer only became an MP in 2015, Davey first entered parliament in the historic elections of 1997. He benefits from the advice of Baroness Olly Grender, a veteran of the Ashdown years known for her political nous. Starmer lacks Davey’s long history and subconscious memory but the Labour leader is proving to be ruthless and flexible in his pursuit for power.

Starmer and Davey might find it hard to replicate the Blair and Ashdown deal. However, the current leaders are well aware of the dividends such an arrangement could bring. If both their parties can avoid bloodletting, they could mount a challenge to Tories discredited by Johnson’s repeated shenanigans.

If the results of the recent local elections were replicated in the next parliamentary elections, the UK would have a hung parliament with no party having a clear majority. If Labour and Liberal Democrats can build on what they have done, they could oust the Tories. Both opposition parties have a strong incentive to cooperate and their leaders seem to be sensible enough to do so.

Brexit Dividend

Even though Brexit is now fait accompli, it continues to haunt British politics. The Brexit business model championed by hardline Brexiteers is flawed, irrational, contorted and thus bound to malfunction. The so-called Brexit Dividend of their dreams has so far failed to materialize. In fact, the Boris-led Brexit is turning out to be an expensive deal for the country. The independent Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) has estimated “the in trade volumes to bring about 4% reduction in the size of Britain’s economy over the long run, in line with its pre-Brexit forecast”. Elsewhere, experts have calculated that Brexit is currently costing the economy to the tune of a week — and counting.

So far, the Tories have managed to hide the economic self-harm caused by Brexit. They argue that the economic downturn is due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the squeeze on household budgets and the cost-of-living crisis is chipping away at this Tory narrative. Voters might not yet be in the mood to punish the Conservative Party for Brexit, but they will certainly punish Tories for the pain they are suffering thanks to economic mismanagement.

Arise King Boris, Father of Brexit and Foe of Brussels

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For the foreseeable future, the Conservative brand will be intimately associated with Brexit and its economic consequences. The recent elections demonstrate that the national backdrop provides the mood music even for local voter choices. Westminster and Wandsworth Councils, two historically and symbolically significant Tory councils, were won by the Labour Party in the early hours of the morning of May 6. Safe Tory seats in affluent parts of Southwest England such as Richmond and St Albans fell to the Liberal Democrats. In the words of George W. Bush, the Conservatives have taken a “.”

The Disunited Kingdom

Bush never quite recovered from that 2006 midterm thumping. He left the US divided over Iraq and in the throes of a global financial crisis. Under Bumbling Boris, the Tories have embraced a disastrous Brexit business model and a toxic English ethnonationalism that threatens the integrity of The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland itself.

On May 5, Sinn Féin achieved a historic victory in the Northern Ireland Assembly elections. This has sent shockwaves through the Unionist Movement that seeks to keep Northern Ireland in the UK. Sinn Féin’s victory has caused further embarrassments, anxiety, and alarm for the Conservative and Unionist Party — the full name of the Tory Party — in London.

The Irish Question dominated British politics a century ago. After World War I, Ireland won its long-cherished independence from the UK and disintegrated into civil war. Northern Ireland remained in the UK but the broke out in the late 1960s. A violent sectarian conflict between Protestant unionists and Catholic nationalists caused much tragedy in this picturesque land till the Good Friday Agreement in 1998. This period of peace might be coming to an end.

Britain’s Still Got It

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Never before have Catholic nationalists who aim for the reunification of Northern Ireland with the Irish Republic wielded power in Belfast. The unionists are unlikely to accept the dominance of the republicans in Northern Ireland.

The election results in Northern Ireland have put into stark relief the Northern Ireland Protocol negotiated by Johnson with the EU. It was backed by his unionist allies, especially the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). In these elections, the unionists were divided and Sinn Féin trumped DUP to emerge as the top dog in Northern Irish politics. Together, the unionists have a greater vote share but the specter of a reunion with Ireland looms large.

Even as Northern Ireland threatens to slip out of the UK, so does Scotland. The Scottish Nationalist Party (SNP) has campaigned for independence from London before. The SNP is now the natural ruling party of Scotland and is chipping away at the foundations of the union. In the long run, the SNP wants a second referendum and to turn Scotland into an independent nation. In the Brexit referendum, Scots voted to stay in the EU. Leaving the UK and entering the EU is the SNP ambition. Bumbling Boris and political gravity are helping their cause.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post The Tories Get a Thumping in Local UK Elections appeared first on 51�Թ�.

Apart from Macron’s supporters, the commentators across the political chessboard saw the blowout more like a stalemate than a checkmate. The left had been divided during the first round. It now appears ready to at least consider uniting its disparate forces for June’s two rounds of legislative elections, which everyone on the left is now calling the “third round” of the presidential election. 

The defeated Marine Le Pen put forth a similar message, hinting that her relative “success,” which marked a significant improvement on 2017 (over 41%, up from 34%) opened the possibility of leading a populist movement that she hopes will attract voters from the left as well. Éric Zemmour, the other far-right candidate, a dyed-in-the-wool xenophobe, who at one point appeared to challenge Le Pen’s hold on the rightwing fringe, evoked his ambition for a purely nationalist and basically racist coalition that would avoid the indignity of reaching out to the left.

The buzzword of the evening was nevertheless the idea of a “third round,” in which an adversary might deliver Macron a knockout punch. The Macronists immediately mocked such talk as a denial of democracy, in the minutes following the president’s resounding majority. But as the various interested parties on all sides invited by the television channel France 2 developed their analysis, a consensus emerged that all was not well in the realm of Macronia.

The demise of France’s traditional parties

On the positive side for Macron’s faithful or at least for his political marketers, the traditional parties on the left and right had been humiliated once again. It was even more brutal this time around than in 2017, when Macron first swept through the miraculous gap in the political Red Sea to reach the promised land without even having to dawdle in the desert. The ��é��ܲ�������������s and Socialists, once the valiant wielders of the scepter of power, are clearly left with little to hope for other than possibly being invited, as individuals, into the new government Macron will be appointing this week to demonstrate his willingness to construct a new alliance. But looming beyond the now concluded five-year compromise Macron engineered and rather ineptly managed during his first term, is the vision of a France now divided into largely incoherent blocs defined less by political vision than by exasperation with all the traditional solutions, left, right and center.

A Fifth Act for the Fifth Republic

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Le Pen and Zemmour have demonstrated that there exists a substantial pool of voters not averse to xenophobic reasoning. But those same voters tend to hail from the working class or the rural lower middle classes. They voted for Le Pen less out of the conviction that she would be a good leader than to protest against the political and financial elite that Macron represents in their eyes. Half a century ago, most of Le Pen’s voters were faithful to the Communist Party.

If the former communist bloc of voters gradually drifted away from a Mitterand-led governing Socialist coalition to align behind the far-right Front National, embodied by Marine Le Pen’s father, Jean-Marie Le Pen, the Socialists settled on their own rightward drift. They leaned increasingly towards the center, much as the Clinton Democrats had done in the US. That left a gaping hole on the left, which no political personality had the force or the name recognition to fill. Jean-Luc Mélenchon, a former minister, finally stepped into the role, seeking to counter the trend towards the technocratic center, a political position that appeared to suit the culture and mood of the post-Mitterand generation of Socialists.

Ever since declaring independence from the party in 2009, Mélenchon has been vilified by his Socialist brethren for the crime of contesting its visibly centrist and increasingly corporate elitist drift. This was the same party, led by then president François Hollande, that named the youthful former banker Macron minister of the economy. 

Mélenchon’s persistence during Hollande’s presidency as a provocative progressive, contesting his former party’s orthodoxy, already positioned him in 2017 as the most distinctive, if not necessarily most attractive personality on the left.  Thanks to his more than respectable third-place showing in the first round two weeks ago, he has emerged as the eventual “spiritual” leader of a newly unified left that could bring together the now marginal Communist Party (with just 2.5% of the vote), the Ecologists and even the Socialists, though they remain reticent to acknowledge Mélenchon’s ascent.

Can the left overcome its divisions?

Unlike the famous that formally allied the Socialists, Communists and the center-left Radicaux de Gauche and brought François Mitterand to power in the 1981 presidential election, Mélenchon has nothing concrete to build on other than exasperation of all the other parties with Macron. Preceding the second round, the head of La France Insoumise (“France unbowed”) cleverly honed his rhetoric to aim at being “elected” prime minister in June, even though he knows full well that the prime minister is appointed by the president, not elected by the people. It is his way of both highlighting the incoherence of the Fifth Republic’s electoral system, while at the same time offering Macron the opportunity to run an experiment in government that would mirror the history of the past five years. During Macron’s first term, an officially centrist president consistently appointed prime ministers from the traditional right, betraying the hopes of some on the left for more balance. Mélenchon is proposing a similar solution, but this time pointing left.

The timing of this strategy couldn’t be better. According to an IPSOS of French voters, “57% want to see the main left-wing parties form an alliance and present common candidates in the constituencies.” Importantly, 56% of those polled have stated they do not wish to see Macron obtain a majority, which means they hope to see another “cohabitation” in which the president shares power with an opposition party in parliament. Only 35% of French voters, 6% fewer than voted for Le Pen, would support a coalition of the two extreme rightwing parties, Le Pen’s Rassemblement National and Zemmour’s ��𳦴DzԱ��ê�ٱ�. Voters who support the traditional right are split between seeking an alliance with the extreme right (22%) or with Macron’s République En Marche (25%). An overwhelming 53% of ��é��ܲ������������� voters eschew the idea of an alliance with either.

What this means is that the next few weeks will be very interesting to watch. Can the man accused of being “the president of the rich” lead a government focused on the policies of the left? Or does he have the wherewithal and the political talent to confront what may become a populist uprising that draws energy from both the left and the right?

Macron, the revolutionary?

Two years ago when the COVID-19 outbreak forced the French government to take action, I noted in these columns that “French President Emmanuel Macron, of all people, seems to detect the beginning of a calling into question of the entire consumerist free market system, without giving much of a sense of what might replace it.” Perhaps he is ready to take seriously his own two-year old epiphany by appealing to the insights of a coalition on the left led by a prime minister named Mélenchon. After all, this time around, Macron has nothing to lose, since he cannot seek a third term. He might see this as his last chance to recover from the massive unpopularity that threatened his reelection and was saved only by his deft maneuvering aimed at ensuring that Marine Le Pen would be his hapless rival in the second round.

The World This Week: Another French Revolution

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More likely, Macron will try in the coming weeks to assemble a range of individuals from different sides, with variable symbolic value. He presumably hopes that this will persuade people of his capacity to assemble his own coherent majority. Macron’s attempt is highly unlikely to succeed and is likely to suffer a worse fate than his previous right-leaning, improvised coalitions.

Macron’s real achievement is to have violated, not once but twice, the entire logic of the Fifth Republic that since its Gaullist beginnings always supposed the president would be the leader of a powerful governing party. In his first five-year stint he profited from the mental confusion in French electors’ heads, trying to understand the vacuum that had suddenly appeared, as he cobbled together what could only be seen as a temporary and to a large degree illusory solution. The confusion quickly provoked the Yellow Vest movement that called the entire montage into question. The unexpected arrival of a pandemic and a lockdown took the protesters off the street and put Macron back in the driver’s seat. A temporary situation was thus prolonged but its fragility has become even more evident than before.

So now the French nation confronts a moment of truth, when the nature of its institutions must be given a makeover. Not because it would improve their look, but because they are on the verge of a permanent crisis. It seems unlikely that some simple solution will appear or that Macron can convince the people to continue to trust him to make, Jupiter-like, all the right decisions that might guide the nation through the troubles that lie ahead. 

In his victory speech, Macron said absolutely nothing of substance. He congratulated and thanked his supporters for the victory and announced all the good things he is in favor of, promising, as expected, to respond to the needs and desires of “all” the people. On the same evening, violent broke out in Paris, Nantes, Lyon and Marseille, with spontaneous crowds contesting the election. The protesters from the right, upset by Le Pen’s failed bid, were joined by others from the left, who shouted slogans such as: “Macron, Le Pen, one solution: revolution.” Others shouted: “No fascists in our neighborhoods” and “Macron resign.”

Unlike the “Stop the steal” protests in the US following Donald Trump’s loss to Joe Biden, the French do not complain that the election was rigged, nor do they wish to see its results overturned. They are unhappy with a system that fails to represent their interests or needs. Having already effectively rejected the traditional parties and practically erased them from the electoral map, they are now focused on calling into question the curious political anomaly that Emmanuel Macron embodies in their eyes.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post Macron Won But the Election Isn’t Over appeared first on 51�Թ�.

We have “changed, changed utterly”

Something has changed since the days of 2002 and 2017. This time around, many choose not to choose. Thousands are breaking ranks with past beliefs and practices. They are not outraged by Le Pen making it to the final round of the presidential election. They are neither demonstrating nor showing any intention to vote. Alarmingly, even progressive thinkers are shilly-shallying in the face of adversity.

From afar, I am taken by surprise, still dumbfounded by how many people — including family and friends — are willing to compromise on what we have held to be non-negotiable principles. Instead, many French seem to be inclined to dive into the unfathomable. I wonder why? What has happened in my absence for this ni-ni concept (neither Macron nor Le Pen) to replace revulsion for a fundamentally abhorrent populist position? Is it out of spite, frustration or anger vis-à-vis the current president? 

Emmanuel Macron might have failed on many fronts. Like many politicians over the ages, he might be guilty of false promises and dashing expectations. Yet Macron does not assail the values of our French Republic. He adheres to the constitution, the precedents and even the values of our Republic. Have the French lost all judgment and adopted a new nihilistic moral relativism?

The World This Week: Another French Revolution

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Marine Le Pen appeals to the people. In recent years, she has cultivated a softer image, the image of a figure who cares about the common people. And we know that modern politics is less about ideas or positions and more about connection and caring for the voter. This is especially so during election campaigns. Over the last few weeks, it seems that Le Pen has done a better job at showing empathy for the poor, the voiceless, the marginalized and the desperate than Macron. The bottom half of the country who struggle to make ends meet seem to identify more with Le Pen than her rival. 

Le Pen’s strategy to tone down her racist rhetoric, promote a strong social agenda and focus on the most vulnerable seems to be paying off. At the same time, Macron is still regarded as “le Président des .”  More than ever, voters identify him with the well-off, the influential, the tech-savvy entrepreneurs and elites of all sorts. The disconnect between Macron and the ordinary voter is terrifying. Worryingly, even the middle class is splitting and stalling. If we do not remain vigilant, the thrill of the unknown conjured by many of the sorceress’ apprentices will inevitably turn into the chill of disenchantment on Monday morning.

What is the real choice this Sunday?

Simply put, this bloody Sunday is about choosing the rule of law over the law of the mob. It is about choosing impartiality over discrimination, multilateralism over nationalism, cooperation over strife, cohesion over division, inclusion over exclusion, and democracy over demagoguery. This election is about saving our Republic.

We French must remember that politics is a dangerous game. Yes, incarnation is a part of politics but some things cannot be reborn or recast. There are inalienable values for any civilization, any nation and any democracy. We must stand up for them. For all her tinkering and softening, Le Pen stands for extreme nationalism, irresponsible populism and dangerous xenophobia. To use an Americanism, she does not offer a decent value proposition for us French voters.

Democracy is at risk around the world. France is no exception. Today, many in France believe that they have nothing to lose and everything to risk. This belief characterizes fragile societies and failed states. I should know. I have been working on them.

In fact, the French have everything to lose and nothing to risk. The current system is already tottering. This election confirms the collapse (and perhaps even end) of traditional parties, the rise of identity politics from Jean-Luc Melenchon on the left to Eric Zemmour on the right, and the mainstreaming of ecology and its fragmentation across the political spectrum (voiding the Green Party of its substance and meaning). This election has also been marked by the absence of debate, which has been compounded by the mediocrity of the media and the consequent numbing of the voters. Having lived in Trump’s America, I have a sense of déjà vu.

The French presidential campaign is marked by the absence of a collective vision and action. There is an argument to be made that the fifth republic no longer works well and needs reform. Some may and do argue for a sixth republic. The French can make many such choices without voting for Le Pen. Even if they despise Macron, his failings are not a reason to abandon core French values. 

As citizens, we have work to do if we do not want to wake up to a daunting new reality on Monday, April 25. I strongly believe that France can reinvent itself. Our nation still has a role to play in Europe and on the world stage. And so do we. But first let’s vote.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post The French Must Vote to Rescue Democracy appeared first on 51�Թ�.

FO° Insights is a new feature where our contributors make sense of issues in the news.

Katerina Manoff on the No-Fly Zone Issue and More

Hi, I’m Katerina Manoff and I’m a Ukrainian-American nonprofit leader and writer and I am also a volunteer in the war effort focusing on media work and supporting the Ukrainian Air Force.

What is a no-fly zone?

We’ve all heard the term no-fly zone. You may also hear terms like air superiority or air dominance. These terms refer to the same broad concept: the idea of controlling the sky. The party who is dominant in the air can protect its own ground troops while attacking the troops, supply chains and critical infrastructure of the enemy. The other combatant literally cannot fly out because they will be shot down if they do. Hence, no-fly zone.

To gain air dominance you need the full arsenal tools, which include fighter jets in the sky and medium and long range missile defense systems on the ground. Ukraine is vastly outnumbered in the sky. Depending on how you count military equipment, Russia has anywhere from six to ten times as many air defense weapons, both in the sky and on the ground. That was at the beginning of the war. With Ukraine losing many of its weapons in battle and not really having a way to replenish those, the differential is even greater.

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Can Ukraine repel Russian forces without a no-fly zone?

The situation is pretty dire. Ukraine’s Air Force does not have the tools that it needs to repel Russian attacks, and the US and NATO are refusing to provide or sell these tools. When we hear about Ukraine successes on the ground — you know — tractors towing tanks or Ukrainian troops having higher morale or retaking dozens of villages, we have to put that into context. Unfortunately, these stories don’t mean very much in the big picture, unless Ukraine’s allies change their current policy of refusing to provide air defense support.

Why has a no-fly Zone been rejected?

I think there are two answers. The first is that it could be just another symptom of a bumbling reactive foreign policy. Russian President Vladimir Putin has been a threat for years, if not decades. The West has bungled its response to his aggression in Georgia and Syria as well as his takeover of Crimea. If we think back to Syria and then US president Barack Obama’s infamous red line, we can see this is not just a problem with the current administration. This is also not just a Ukraine problem. Rather, it’s a deeper leadership failure in the United States. America is acting based on principles of fear and appeasement of dictators.

The other answer could be that this US policy towards Ukraine might be very calculated. Washington could have made a conscious decision to let Putin slowly destroy Ukraine and weaken Russia in the process. If this is the case, then US President Joe Biden and his advisers are purposely giving Ukraine just enough aid to keep fighting and keep bleeding the Russians, but refuse any substantive help that could actually end the war and help Ukraine win.

Wouldn’t a no-fly zone start World War III?

Fears of World War III play right into Russia’s hands. If we use fear of nuclear war as an excuse to allow mass murder, rape and torture, and let war crimes go unpunished, that just emboldens Putin and other dictators to keep going, to conquer more lands and to kill more people.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has been saying for weeks that if the US and NATO are afraid of nuclear war, they don’t need to enforce a no-fly zone themselves. They can just give Ukraine the tools needed to do the job. If Ukrainian pilots and soldiers are flying the planes and operating the missile defense systems, then NATO is not entering the conflict directly.

What should the West do to help Ukraine?

The West needs to figure out a way to get Ukraine the fighter jets and missile defense systems it needs. This is the only way the war can end. Current policies such as economic sanctions, humanitarian aid and military support in the form of other types of weapons are all useful and should continue. However, it is important to recognize these steps for what they are: secondary policies that cannot end the war without filling the primary need for air defense.

The current US policy is really the worst of both worlds. The US should choose one way or another. Either Washington should actually support Ukraine and provide the weapons needed to win the war, which are fighter jets and medium and long range missile defense systems. Or, if Washington is not willing to do so, the Biden administration should be honest about its intentions and not leave Ukrainians hanging, waiting for aid that’s never going to come.

(This transcript has been lightly edited for clarity.)

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post Making Sense of Ukraine’s Call for a No-Fly Zone appeared first on 51�Թ�.

What England’s Premier League Did for Football

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I thought of this shortly after Roman Abramovich bought Chelsea Football Club in 2003 and launched the most extravagant spending splurge in the history of sport. In his first year in charge, his total spending in the player transfer market equated to of the entire Premier League’s expenditure on players. Was this man trying to prove he could buy anything he wanted?

The club was easy: Already deeply in debt (£60 million — around $79 million), Abramovich just paid off the creditors and took control of Chelsea. Then he assembled the strongest playing squad available. The cost of the transfer fees plus salaries far outweighed the club’s income, and in his first five years, Chelsea posted losses of £447 million — a sum that sounds less fantastic today than it did in the 2000s.

Money, Money, Money

Chelsea, at the time of Abramovich’s arrival, was a club of comparable size to, say, West Bromwich Albion. The clubs had similar histories of achievements, comparable fan bases and stadiums. Chelsea was not included in the original elite when plans for the Premier League were formulated in the early 1990s. Abramovich commissioned the transfer of players such as Didier Drogba (in 2004), Andriy Shevchenko and Michael Ballack (both in 2006), signaling that no player was too big — or too expensive — for Chelsea.  

The rewards were abundant. Chelsea won the Premier League in the 2004-05 season, losing only one game under the management of Jose Mourinho, and this was but one of a total of 21 trophies, including five Premier League titles, two UEFA Champions League triumphs and a FIFA Club World Cup championship. Chelsea became one of the most garlanded clubs in the history of the Premier League and could lay a legitimate claim to being the best team in the world for long periods in recent history.

If Abramovich’s project was something like that of Magic Christian’s protagonist, it worked like a charm. Actually, Abramovich didn’t need Prospero-like charms — all he needed was money. He spent lavishly and luxuriated in the rewards. But the costs were prodigious. Last year, for example, Chelsea £145.6 million. Abramovich made good on the money, as he has done since he took over, by making deposits in the holding company , which technically owns Chelsea FC, and which Abramovich owns outright.

Abramovich never explained his profligacy. He didn’t give interviews and seemed to prefer anonymity. I was once asked to divine Abramovich’s motivation and answered by comparing his ownership of Chelsea with his love of art. He has a formidable collection that includes Bacon’s Tryptych, for which he paid $86.3 million. “He has the means to possess things he loves,” I said. “He might have bought Chelsea as a trophy at the outset, but he seems to have formed a loving attachment.”

Even if he did start with a testable hypothesis, the club became more a passion than a project.  He ran Chelsea Football Club not as a business in the conventional sense, but more like a charitable foundation or an endowed college with only one benefactor.

Prised From His Grasp

And now it is over: Abramovich has had the club he created prised from his grasp. He won’t appear at Stamford Bridge again and will probably never again set foot on English soil. The British government, as we know, has invoked powers to freeze his assets (of which Chelsea FC is one; the may be another), forced him to put the club on the market and denied him access to the proceeds of the sale. He has set the asking price of £3 billion, presumably reflecting the money he has sunk into the club over his tenure, but he won’t see a penny of it. (The pertinent is the Economic Crime Bill, which was rushed through Parliament in early March.)

We shouldn’t underestimate how much pain he must be feeling as he reads about the bids for his club. Negotiations are being handled by US merchant bank Raine. Abramovich himself is not allowed any input. As an aside, Abramovich has not committed a criminal offense and is guilty only of having “links” (whatever they may be) with Russian President Vladimir Putin or his regime. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson , “There can be no safe havens for those who have supported Putin’s vicious assault on Ukraine.” Abramovich has consistently historical associations with Putin and has done so for at 11 years.

As I write, a shortlist of bidders for the club is being considered by Raine. Eventually, the preferred bidder will be selected and — extraordinarily — will then be screened by the government. Paradoxically, the only bidder that would be likely to continue Abramovich’s munificence was a group from Saudi Arabia, which has withdrawn, presumably sensing tenders from that part of the Middle East would not be received favorably at the moment. The others are consortia — associations of several companies.

Whoever buys Chelsea will not need due diligence to realize they will have to hemorrhage money, at least for the immediate future. The club has been promising to break even since at least 2009, when then-chief executive Peter Kenyon the club would be “self-sustaining” by 2010. It hasn’t come close. Will new owners persist with the lose-money-to-win-trophies approach?

Football’s Land of Milk and Honey

It’s not inconceivable that a consortium could introduce dramatic downsizing over the next three or so years, allow existing contracts to expire, trade prudently in the transfer market and perhaps model itself on , a football club owned since 2010 by Fenway Sports Group Holdings, which also owns the Boston Red Sox of Major League Baseball.

If so, transfers on the scale of the £97.5-million Romelu Lukaku deal in 2021 are likely to be a thing of the past for Chelsea. There may also be some surprise departures to lighten the wage load.

Lionel Messi’s move from Barcelona to Paris St Germain came as a bolt out of the blue last year; at least, till the full extent of Barcelona’s debt came to light. The club owed about ($1.1 billion) and Messi’s salary was reputed to be over €50 million. (The ill-fated European Super League was not motivated by greed, as was widely reported, but by the will to survive. Most of the clubs in the original project are ravaged by and presumably thought the league offered a route to liquidity.)

The next owners of Chelsea FC will not bring the inexhaustible supply of money Abramovich did. They will be legally bound to honor existing agreements, so players like Lukaku, who earns £16.5 million per year, and N’Golo Kante, who gets £15 million, will be paid for the remainder of their contracts. But the club is unlikely to offer salaries of this size in future.

More likely, the new owners will introduce some kind of internal salary cap. Arsenal has long operated with a wage structure. Other clubs without benefactors typically try to keep a lid on their salaries. Manchester City is owned largely by the Abu Dhabi United Group and spends with the kind of improvidence associated with Abramovich. Whether Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund will turn Newcastle United into another Chelsea remains to be seen. But Chelsea’s new owners will almost certainly take a more businesslike approach.

UEFA, football’s governing organization in Europe, may complicate life for Chelsea’s new owners if it restricts clubs’ spending to of their income. Back-of-an-envelope calculations suggest Chelsea has typically spent more than the whole of its yearly income on transfers and salaries. Even if it expects income of, say, £400 million, the club will have to exercise self-restraint unheard of during the Abramovich era. Presently, wages alone are thought to be .

The Chelsea case presents an insight into English football’s rise over the past 30 years. In 1985, England’s clubs were banned from European competition for five years (six for Liverpool) due to violence amongst supporters. Since their return, they have grown to dominance. This is due in no small part to Abramovich. After his takeover, international entrepreneurs enthusiastically bought into Premier League clubs and introduced the kind of money that brings bargaining power in the transfer market. Today, owners include investors from the United States, the UAE, China, Thailand, Egypt and Iran.

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England has become football’s land of milk and honey. Love him or loathe him, Roman Abramovich is sport’s latter-day Abraham. He has instigated a revolution. At a time in history when sport’s integration into the entertainment industry was almost complete, Abramovich took Chelsea from a respectable but ordinary English football club to one of the world’s foremost names in sport and a brand thrumming with elan and glamor.

A rapacious capitalist to some, a tyrant’s accomplice to others and a moral nightmare to a few more, Abramovich remains, without doubt, the most influential presence in football over the past 20 years. People may not approve of what he’s done, but the effects — good or bad — of his breathtaking foray into sport will be felt for decades to come.

*[Ellis Cashmore is co-editor of .]

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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The case concerns a series of investigative articles about a military intelligence research center operated by the Finnish defense forces. If found guilty, the journalists face up to four years in prison, with a minimum sentence of four months.

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Despite Finland’s status as a leading example for freedom of the press, it has not been , particularly with targeted of journalists. However, the case against Helsingin Sanomat’s journalists has opened up an entirely new front for defenders of press freedom. It has also raised uncomfortable issues from Finland’s past, which the country is still grappling with.

A Small Country With a Large Neighbor

Finland, with a population of 5.5 million, shares a border of more than 800 miles with Russia and its population of more than 144 million. For Finnish leaders, this has meant taking a realist approach to foreign policy. In particular, the  of 1939-40, when Finland resisted an attack by the Soviet Union, is one of the defining events in the country’s history.

The decades that followed World War II were challenging for Finland, a small country ravaged by war. Maintaining good relations with the Soviet Union during the Cold War was a necessity. Finland successfully avoided Soviet occupation and remained a democracy, but it paid the price in the form of “,” which meant strict political neutrality and not challenging the influence of the Soviet Union.

Finland’s national security is founded on conscription, a trained reserve, defense of the entire country and a willingness to defend it from attack. The aim is to make it an unappealing target for a would-be aggressor state.

A recent  to renew Finland’s aging fleet of Hornets with 64 Lockheed Martin F-35A Lightning II fighter jets, popular with NATO countries, forms part of the strategy. Maintaining good international relations and participating in international military crisis management are other key elements. Finland is not a member of NATO, but it joined the European Union in 1995. Polls that support for NATO membership has grown significantly following ��ܲ�������’s invasion of Ukraine on February 24.

Prosecution Before Publication

The case against the three journalists was triggered by an article that Helsingin Sanomat published in 2017. Legislative changes that aimed to extend the information-gathering powers of the security services were underway at the time. The newspaper’s representatives have argued that there were strong public interest reasons for publishing the story.

The police investigation included a raid on one journalist’s home and left them stuck in limbo for four years. The decision to prosecute, announced in late October 2021, concerns the article published five years ago and material for a series of unpublished articles. The prosecution based on unpublished material has understandably raised concerns.

There are currently limited facts available about the basis for the prosecution or the details of the case, but more information is expected to become public at a later stage. Based on the available information, it appears likely that one of the central questions in the case will hinge on when an investigative journalist’s research potentially crosses the line into an attempt to disclose state secrets.

The Finnish Union of Journalists has strong concerns about the case, pointing out that it could set a precedent and mean that a journalist’s unpublished notes might result in a conviction. The union and the Council for Mass Media, the independent media regulator, have for openness in the legal proceedings.

While not taking a position on the case, the council has expressed concerns that it could result in restrictions on freedom of expression on grounds that may remain secret. The council has emphasized the need for clarity about the circumstances in which considering material for publication or finalizing material, without actually publishing it, could constitute a crime.

The issues raised by the Council for Mass Media include concerns about the risk of self-censorship. This is a sensitive historical issue, as the era of “Finlandization” included heavy self-censorship in the media and in publishing. Writing about the case for  academic scholars Anu Koivunen and Johanna Vuorelma warn against the risk of a return to a Cold War-era media environment, where every decision to publish was assessed from a security perspective.

Welcome to the Land of Free Press

In 2018, hundreds of commissioned by Helsingin Sanomat famously greeted Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin on their visit to Helsinki with messages such as, “Mr. President, welcome to the land of free press.” The case against Helsingin Sanomat’s journalists may test whether Finland still is that land of a free press.

Whatever the outcome of the case, it has given Finland, the world’s country, cause for serious self-reflection.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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One good example is an in The American Purpose by the National Endowment for Democracy’s vice-president for studies and analysis, Christopher Walker. In the piece titled, “The Kleptocratic Sources of Russia’s Conduct,” Walker builds his case around the idea that “Vladimir Putin and his gang are fixated on wealth and power.” The author admits being inspired by political analyst Daniel Kimmage, who in 2009 produced what Walker terms a “clear-eyed assessment of Putin’s Russia.” He cites this wisdom he gleaned from Kimmage: “The primary goal of the Russian elite is not to advance an abstract ideal of the national interest or restore some imagined Soviet idyll,” but “to retain its hold on money and power.”

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Kimmage sums up one difficulty Americans have felt when dealing with Putin as an ideological adversary. Whereas the Soviet Union’s embrace of communism made the ideological gap visible even to moronic voters, Putin reigns over a nation that American consultants transformed in the 1990s into a capitalist paradise (i.e., a paradise for owners of capital). To distinguish Putin’s evil capitalism from America’s benevolent capitalism, Kimmage called the Russian version a “selectively capitalist kleptocracy.”

Walker notes that “the system of ‘selectively capitalist kleptocracy’ in Russia that Daniel Kimmage described” 13 years ago has now “evolved in ways that are even more threatening to democracy and its institutions.”

�մǻ岹��’s Weekly Devil’s Dictionary definition:

Kleptocracy:

The form of government universally adopted by all powerful nations at the end of the 20^th century.

Contextual Note

An acerbic critic might be excused for not feeling particularly illuminated to learn that Putin and his cronies “are fixated on wealth and power.” Who would expect them to have a different philosophy and mindset than the leaders of every other powerful country in the world? The list includes those that claim to be faultless democracies, committed to implementing the will of the people. The first among them is, of course, the United States, but France, the United Kingdom and others adhere to the same sets of values, even if each of them has worked out more subtle ways of applying them. And, of course, Saudi Arabia stands at the head of everyone’s class as the exemplar of leaderships fixated on wealth and power.

Kimmage’s description of Russia as a “selectively capitalist kleptocracy” may be helpful in ways he may not have intended. ��ܲ�������’s selective capitalist kleptocracy contrasts with America’s non-selectively capitalist kleptocracy. The real question turns around what it means to be selective or non-selective. Walker makes no attempt to differentiate the two because he believes the term kleptocracy only applies to Russia. But statistics about wealth inequality reveal that the American capitalist system has become a plutocracy that can make its own claim to being a kleptocracy.

In 1989, the top 10% of income earners in the United States earned 42% of the total , which is already significant. In 2016, they accounted for 50%. “By the start of 2021, the richest 1% of Americans held 32% of the nation’s wealth,” to The New York Times. Between the start of 2020 and July 2021, “the richest 1% gained $10 trillion” in accumulated wealth.

The gap is destined to keep widening. Unlike Putin’s oligarchy, composed of his “selected” friends and other winners of ��ܲ�������’s industrial casino, the 1% in the US have non-selectively emerged to constitute a kleptocratic class that, thanks to a sophisticated system of governance, writes the laws, applies the rules and captures the new wealth that is programmed to gravitate towards them.

Kimmage’s idea of a fixation “with wealth and power” correctly describes the mindset of the members of the American kleptocratic class, whether they are entrepreneurs with names like Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg or Bill Gates, or politicians like Bill Clinton and Barack Obama who rose from poverty to convert power into riches and earn their place as servants of the kleptocratic class.

Unlike Putin’s mafia-like political culture, the system in the US is subtle and sophisticated. It contains convenient paths to join the kleptocratic class, such as a Harvard or Stanford degree. But mostly it relies on fixation. Within the US kleptocratic class diversity exists. Some may be more focused on power (including cultural power) than wealth. But the fascination with both wealth and power is common to all. The system is built on the symmetrical principle that wealth feeds power and power feeds wealth.

Walker accuses Putin of another grave sin, beyond kleptomania but including it: expansionism. He denounces the “spread of the roots and branches of a transnational kleptocratic system that stretches well beyond the Russian Federation to pose a multidimensional threat to free societies.”

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How could a discerning reader not notice the dramatic irony here? Has Walker forgotten that Putin’s complaint about NATO is that, despite promises made to the contrary, it has spent 30 years aggressively expanding toward ��ܲ�������’s most sensitive borders? Putin may be interested in expansion, but Eastern Europe has become a slow tug-of-war in which NATO, under US impulsion, has been the most active and insistent aggressor.

In short, Walker has produced an essay that correctly identifies very real political evils within the Russian system. But they share the same basic traits as the politico-economic culture of the West under US leadership. In an absolute failure of self-recognition, Walker somehow manages to avoid acknowledging his own culture’s image reflected back to him into the mirror that has become the target of his complaints. That is because, in this article, he has focused on producing just one more example of what has now become the shameless, knee-jerk propaganda that pollutes Western media in this climate of an existential war from which the US has abstained, preferring to let the Ukrainians endure the sacrifice for the sake of American principles.

Historical Note

In the 17^th century, European history began a radical transformation of its political institutions lasting roughly 300 years. After England’s Puritans beheaded their king and declared a short-lived Commonwealth, European intellectuals began toying with an idea that would eventually lead to the triumph of the idea, if not the reality of democracy, a system Winston Churchill generously called “the worst form of government except for all the others.”

For the best part of the 19^th and 20^th centuries, representative democracy became the standard reference for everyone’s idea of what an honest government should be like, while struggling to find its footing with the concurrent rise of industrial capitalism. Capitalism generated huge inequality that seemed at least theoretically anomalous with the idea of democracy.

During the late 20^th century, industrial capitalism that had previously focused on production, productivity and mass distribution, gave way to financial capitalism. This new version of capitalism focused uniquely on wealth and power. In other words, democracies switched their orientation from a belief in their citizens’ anarchic quest for personal prosperity in the name of the “pursuit of happiness” to the elite’s concentrated focus on the acquisition and accumulation of money and clout.

This new social model merged the logic of democratically designed institutions with economic and legal mechanisms that created a sophisticated system at the service of a small number of individuals who understood and controlled the levers of wealth and political power. Their major cultural achievement consisted of giving a sufficiently wide base to this new form of plutocracy that disguised its kleptocratic reality.

For nearly half a century, the Cold War promoted the spectacle of a combat between democratic capitalism and autocratic communism. Both sides seized the opportunity to build military powerhouses that could provide an effective shelter for the kleptocratic class. Once the heresy of communism was banished from Russia, it could morph, under Boris Yeltsin and then Vladimir Putin, into a caricature of the much more subtle kleptocracy encapsulated in Reaganomics.

The Russian and American versions of economic power management shared the same orientations but deployed them in contrasting ways. Kleptocratic rule was at the core of both. Using a musical analogy, the American philharmonic version of kleptocracy was delivered in Carnegie Hall, with a fully orchestrated score. Russia offered an improvisational version delivered by local musicians in an animated tavern. In both cases, as the proverb says, “he who pays the piper calls the tune.”

*[In the age of Oscar Wilde and Mark Twain, another American wit, the journalist Ambrose Bierce, produced a series of satirical definitions of commonly used terms, throwing light on their hidden meanings in real discourse. Bierce eventually collected and published them as a book, The Devil’s Dictionary, in 1911. We have shamelessly appropriated his title in the interest of continuing his wholesome pedagogical effort to enlighten generations of readers of the news. Read more of The 51�Թ� Devil’s Dictionary.]

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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The United Nations Charter established the principles of the inviolability of borders, respect for the territorial integrity of states and the prohibition of the use of force. When Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons in 1991, its borders were formally guaranteed by Russia, the United States and the United Kingdom. Now, one of those guarantors is deliberately breaching those borders — for a second time.

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The Helsinki Conference of 1975 reaffirmed the respect of borders in Europe, and it gave birth to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), which Russia is a member of. Its charter confirms the above-mentioned UN principles. The Helsinki Final Act goes on to : “They [states] also have the right to belong or not to belong to international organizations, to be party or not to bilateral or multilateral treaties including the right to be party or not to treaties of alliance.” The Russian pretext for war — to stop Ukraine from joining NATO and the European Union — is a direct contradiction of this Helsinki principle.

Many, including Russian President Vladimir Putin, hoped the conflict would be a short one. Yet it looks increasingly like becoming a long war of attrition, much like World War I, where most of the deaths were caused by missiles and shells falling for the sky. This sort of conflict can grind on for months and even years until all is ruined.

The Impact Beyond Ukraine

The devastation will be felt far from Ukraine. Between them both, Ukraine and Russia 25% of the wheat traded in the world. Around 12% of all calories consumed around the globe derive from crops grown in Russia and Ukraine. It is impossible to sow and harvest crops on a battlefield. Indeed, both belligerent nations are likely to keep any crops they can grow for the use of their own beleaguered people.

The effect of this on bread prices will be dramatic. Some 75% of all the wheat in Turkey and 70% in Egypt comes from Russia or Ukraine. Israel and Tunisia are also dependent on them for half of their supplies from the same sources. We can expect bread riots and renewed political instability in these countries.

The effect of the war will be increased social tensions everywhere. The higher fuel and food prices that are flowing directly from the conflict will affect poorer families much more than richer ones as these items are a bigger share of the weekly budget in low-income households. They will also hit rural households much harder because people have to rely on a private car to obtain the necessities of life.

The cost of replacement motor vehicles will rise because of shortages of minerals like aluminum, titanium, palladium and nickel, of which Russia is a major supplier. This will hit �ұ�������Բ�’s car industry hard. Lithuania, Estonia, Latvia and Finland will be disproportionately hit by the loss of Russian markets for their exports.

��󾱲Բ�’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) — creating a land-based route for Chinese exports to Western Europe — is being radically disrupted by a war that cuts right across the BRI’s road westward, and whose effects are being felt all the way from the Baltic to the Black Sea. The continuance of this war is not in ��󾱲Բ�’s interests.

The Possible Way to Peace in Ukraine

The longer the conflict goes on, the more the sanctions on Russia will begin to sap its war-making capacity. Supplies of missiles and shells will become progressively harder to pay for. Those supplying weaponry to Ukraine have deeper pockets. This is the significance of ��ܲ�������’s overtures to China.

These overtures are an opportunity. China has an incentive to broker a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine, and so does Turkey. Of course, timing will be crucial. But the ingredients of such a deal, where there is no trust at all between the parties, are much harder to describe.

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Ukraine could perhaps find a formula to give up Crimea, but it can hardly concede an inch in eastern Ukraine. Russian-language rights in Ukraine could be guaranteed, but what has Russia to offer in return? Perhaps reparations for the physical damage that the Russians have done to Ukraine’s infrastructure. Ukraine could join the EU but not NATO, with ��ܲ�������’s encouragement, which would be a major U-turn for Moscow.

None of these compromises are palatable, but they are preferable to a war of attrition that could go on for years until all the participants are exhausted or dead.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

The post Is Peace Possible in Ukraine? appeared first on 51�Թ�.

Gravitational Pull to the Right

As of February 2020, across Germany, approximately  pupils attended the 254 state-recognized Waldorf schools, whose curricula originate in an anthroposophical worldview. According to the Anthroposophical Society, the Waldorf pedagogy system, which was developed by the Austrian spiritualist in the early 20^th century, “ways of recognizing and exploring the supersensible-spiritual world that exists in the sensory-material world. This ‘spiritual science’ sees itself as a new approach to a deeper and more comprehensive knowledge of nature and man.”

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The behind Waldorf schools is a “developmentally appropriate, experiential, and academically-rigorous approach to education.” Compared to the pressure to perform in state-run schools, the goal is to strengthen individual responsibility as well as creative, practical and social skills. Another difference lies in self-administration by parents and teachers of a “hierarchically organized external control of the state schools.” 

Through close personal ties with teachers, parents can actively influence everyday school life according to their with fewer interventions of internal school control bodies compared to state schools. Hence, the self-administration model makes independent schools to infiltration by far-right actors and conspiracy theorists. According to Ansgar Martins, a religious studies scholar at Frankfurt University, this structural weakness is by the “pronounced anthroposophical inclination toward conspiracy theories” of Waldorf schools that stems from Steiner’s original teachings.

Steiner held a developmental, esoteric and essentially view of humanity that saw the world divided into superior and inferior races, exemplified by countless discriminatory statements against Jewish and especially people: “How can a Negro or an utterly barbaric savage become civilized? … The Negro race does not belong in Europe, and it is of course nonsense that it now plays such a large role in Europe.”

These remarks are joined by Steiner’s pseudoscientific conception of the physical and intellectual superiority of the white race, reminiscent of the Nazi-era Volkstum concept according to which humanity reached its developmental endpoint in the : “If the blue-eyed and blond-haired people were to die out, people would become increasingly stupid unless they developed a kind of cleverness which is independent of blondness. … The white race is the future race, is the spirit-creating race.”

According to �ұ�������Բ�’s Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth, these “are to be regarded as particularly serious, since they are by no means random products or racist stereotypes caused by the spirit of the times. Rather, they are to be seen as manifestations of a specifically Steinerian esoteric racial science.” In the Stuttgart Declaration of 2007, the Association of Independent Waldorf Schools “any racist or nationalist appropriation of their pedagogy.” Nevertheless, this declaration did little to prevent attracting far-right conspiracy theorists even before the pandemic.

Far-Right Infiltration

In 2013, the managing director of a Waldorf school in the German town of Rendsburg was dismissed because of connections to the far-right (Citizens of the Reich) movement. He attracted attention by distributing leaflets in the school that “the Federal Republic of Germany … is not a state, but the managing legal advisor of a state simulation [is]. There is no de jure and de facto state of the Federal Republic of Germany.” 

The ��𾱳������ü������� is a heterogeneous movement that, referring to the historical German Reich, rejects the existence of the Federal Republic of Germany and its legal system, thus denying legitimacy to democratically elected representatives. A small proportion of the ��𾱳������ü������� movement is made up of , but the anti-state and conspiracy theory tenets of the entire scene facilitate a connection to anti-Semitic narratives that are central to the far-right domain.

At another Waldorf school in the German town of , a teacher taught unchecked for 20 years before his connections to ethno-nationalist right-wing extremist groups became known. Even before Wolf-Dieter Schröppe became a teacher, he maintained contacts with veteran Nazis, including the war criminal Erich Priebke — the man responsible for the massacre of 335 people as a captain in the and sentenced to life in prison. It took more than four months before the school terminated Schröppe’s employment contract, partly because some colleagues spoke out in his support.

In 2015, these incidents prompted the Association of Independent Waldorf Schools to publish a  conceding that the anthroposophy-based Waldorf pedagogy has a “great attraction” for the right-wing extremist conspiracy theorists, specifically for the ��𾱳������ü�������.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, however, Waldorf anthroposophy again garnered attention. To this day, Steiner’s worldview translates into a greater vaccine skepticism in Germany as a whole and in Waldorf schools in particular due to public acceptance and influence of anthroposophy. Underlying Steiner’s philosophy is the dangerous belief that diseases serve a  purpose by stimulating child development and making amends for mistakes in past lives.

Hence, over the last decades, vaccine skepticism has itself in lower in Waldorf schools, resulting in regular measles outbreaks. In this respect, an incident at a school in the city of  came as no surprise when 117 COVID-19 cases were recorded and more than 50 forged medical certificates were discovered exempting students and teachers from wearing a mask.

At a Waldorf school in the Bavarian town of Landsberg, a father who is both a doctor and a homeopath issued certificates to families of other students to circumvent mandatory mask-wearing, people who choose to do so as “mask hypochondriacs.” At a demonstration against COVID-19 measures, he showed the indictable Hitler salute that resulted in criminal charges.

The Bavarian Ministry of Education  these incidents are not isolated cases. Mask exemption certificates were seven times more likely to be issued at Bavarian Waldorf schools than at state schools. Nevertheless, many Waldorf parents show resolve against COVID-19 deniers and far-right activities. According to the mobile counseling service against right-wing extremism in Bavaria, Waldorf parents “” reported similar incidents at schools during the pandemic.

COVID-19 Denier Schools

To evade resistance at state but also independent schools and shield children from COVID-19 measures, some parents and teachers went a step further, founding their own learning initiatives and so-called supplementary schools. Insights into the network groups behind those supplementary schools reveal political affinities not only with the ��𾱳������ü������� but with another the far-right esoteric movement.

In , Bavaria, an elementary and middle school teacher founded a (Lateral Thinkers) school to reflect the movement’s pandemic skepticism. More than 50 pupils were taught here by parents and educators, including herbalists, music teachers and shamans. On advertising leaflets, the school falsely claimed to be located on Russian territory so that German law would not be applicable.

The school principal was active in networks spreading far-right esoteric ideas of the movement, a decentralized conspiracy group of far-right esotericists and settlers, based on the protagonist of the “Anastasia” fantasy novel series by Russian author Vladimir Megre. According to sociologist Matthias Quent, the  “transport cultural racism and anti-Semitism. These are ideological patterns that we also know from National Socialism. According to them, modern society is doomed, and people must retreat to the native soil or family estates.”

Connections to the Anastasia movement also existed in the newly founded Bauernhofschule (farm school) in the state of Hesse, which was registered as a supplementary school. Hesse’s school  enables parents to establish schools with scant bureaucratic hurdles as long as they supplement, not replace state curricula. According to the German state of Hesse’s public broadcaster, HR, Telegram chat transcripts revealed that the school operators to teach children how to keep animals, grow vegetables and live in harmony with nature. Nevertheless, the chat was inundated with extremist, anti-Semitic views from the ��𾱳������ü������� and Anastasia movements.

Even Holocaust denial — a criminal offense in Germany — received indifferent or approving reactions in the chats. The ideological connections of the Bauernhofschule reach as far as the fringes of the QAnon movement, as Martin Laker’s membership in the group suggests. Laker is an active member of the Anastasia movement and runs his own online platform where he spreads QAnon myths.

Underestimating the Problem

�ұ�������Բ�’s political establishment has been slow in reacting to the growing problem. While the authorities are taking action against the newly founded supplementary schools, including enforced closures due to a lack of permits, there is still no sign yet of German politicians taking the danger posed by far-right anthroposophists seriously enough.

In January 2021, the Green Party’s national parliamentary group issued a asking what connections between right-wing extremist opponents of the COVID-19 measures and anthroposophical groups are known to the German government and how it assesses “the potential danger in this regard, given the fact that anthroposophy in Germany maintains a far-reaching network of companies, foundations, and public institutions.” The answer: “The Federal Government has no knowledge of this.” 

This rection is particularly disappointing considering the fight against right-wing extremism has gained political traction in recent years due to record high of politically motivated crimes by right-wing extremists. In 2020, the government published a substantial  of measures accompanied by a 100-page final  on combating right-wing extremism and racism the following year. According to the report, programs to prevent extremism in state schools are to be promoted more vigorously but fail to mention the right-wing extremist slant of anthroposophical groups and independent schools.

It remains to be seen whether the new government under the leadership of Angela Merkel’s successor Olaf Scholz will turn its eye to this blind spot. There seems to be no lack of will on the part of Scholz’s fellow party member and the new minister of the interior, Nancy Faeser, who at her first public appearance in the new role that “A particular concern of mine will be to combat the greatest threat currently facing our free democratic basic order, right-wing extremism.” 

The threat posed by far-right conspiracy theories and fake news might have only entered the public consciousness with the triumph of social media platforms. But conspiracy theories don’t germinate in a vacuum. Instead, often far-reaching causes are behind their emergence. In Germany, the societal impact of widespread anthroposophic views, promoted in state-approved institutions like the Waldorf schools, is one of the many causes that deserve increased critical, not at least political, attention.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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Is Bosnia-Herzegovina Next on ��ܲ�������’s Radar?

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“All experts,” the avowed Erdogan supporter continued, agreed that Washington was escalating the crisis to solidify its dominance in Western Europe. With that, Barlas also echoed the general mood in Turkey. It is fortunate, he said, that ��ܲ�������’s president is much more reasonable and wiser than his American counterpart, Joe Biden.

The Bond Between Erdogan and Putin

This positive image of Putin and Erdogan’s familiarity with the Kremlin leader is no accident. Particularly since the failed coup attempt in Turkey in 2016, Erdogan has, with Putin’s help, been able to position himself independently of — and sometimes even against — the United States and Europe on key foreign policy issues.

In Syria and Azerbaijan, Ankara and Moscow succeeded in marginalizing Western actors. In Libya and the eastern Mediterranean, Turkey acts as a competitor or even adversary to member states of the European Union.

Turkey’s flirtation with Moscow led to concerns that Ankara might turn away from Europe altogether. That contributed to the EU’s kid-glove approach to Turkey in the eastern Mediterranean and Cyprus. It also resulted in Washington’s belated reaction to Turkey’s acquisition of ��ܲ�������’s S-400 missile defense system with sanctions. It is true that Turkey has experience with Putin as a cool strategist and ruthless power politician in conflicts such as the one in Syria. But Erdogan has always seemed to succeed in avoiding escalation.

Despite all of Ankara’s tension with Moscow, Erdogan’s rapprochement with Russia has brought him much closer to his goal of strategic autonomy for his country from the West. Turkey skillfully maneuvered between the fronts of global rivalry and was able to considerably expand its scope and influence in just a few years.

In this seesaw policy, however, Turkey is behaving much more confrontationally toward Western states than toward Russia. For years, the government press has painted a positive picture of Russia and a negative one of the United States and Europe. This is not without effect on Turkish public opinion. Around a month before Russia attacked Ukraine, in a poll carried out by a renowned opinion research institute, a narrow relative majority of 39% of respondents favored foreign policy cooperation with Russia and China instead of Europe and the United States.

In the first days after ��ܲ�������’s invasion, Ankara’s policy followed exactly the aforementioned pattern. Turkey condemned the attack, but it is not participating in sanctions against Russia. In the vote on suspending ��ܲ�������’s representation rights in the Council of Europe, Turkey was the only NATO state to abstain and, as such, is keeping its airspace open to Russian aircraft.

The West is paying particular attention to whether and how Turkey implements the Treaty of Montreux. The 1936 treaty regulates the passage of warships through Turkey’s Dardanelles and Bosporus Straits into the Black Sea. It limits the number, tonnage and duration of stay of ships from non-littoral states in the Black Sea. In the event of war, the convention stipulates that the waterways must be closed to ships of the parties to the conflict, and it entrusts Ankara with the application of the treaty’s regulations

Ankara Swings Around

It took Turkey four days to classify the Russian invasion as “war.” However, Ankara is still reluctant to officially close the waterways — as the treaty stipulates — to ships of parties to the conflict, Russia and Ukraine. Instead, Ankara is “all countries, Black Sea riparian or not,” against sending warships through the straits.

In the literal sense, this step is not directed unilaterally against Moscow, but it also makes it more difficult for NATO ships to sail into the Black Sea. According to the treaty, however, the waterways may only be closed to warships of all countries if Ankara considers itself directly threatened by war. Consciously creating ambiguity, Turkey has triangulated between the West and Russia.

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Almost imperceptibly at first, however, a reversal has now set in. There are four reasons for this. First, the West is showing unity and resolve unseen since the Cold War, and its sanctions are undermining ��ܲ�������’s standing in the world. Second, Putin is losing his charisma as a successful statesman and reliable partner. Third, Ankara realizes that Putin’s vision of a great Russian empire could provoke more wars. Fourth, the ranks of the adversaries are closing and it is becoming more difficult for Turkey to continue its seesaw policy.

Thus, strongly pro-Western tones have emerged from Ankara in recent weeks. Turkey will continue to support Ukraine in consultation with the West, according to the president’s spokesman. Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu now claims to have contradicted ��ܲ�������’s wishes for the passage of warships through the Bosporus “in all friendship.” President Erdogan is also in of admitting Ukraine to the European Union and Kosovo to NATO.

Moreover, Ankara is not contradicting reports by Ukrainian diplomats that Turkey is supplying more armed drones and training pilots to fly drones. On March 2, Turkey joined the vast majority of states in the UN General Assembly’s condemnation of the Russian invasion of Ukraine that Russia to “immediately, completely and unconditionally withdraw all of its military forces.” Two days later, during the extraordinary meeting of NATO’s foreign ministers, Turkey supported the deployment of NATO’s Response Force to NATO countries neighboring Ukraine.

It looks like Putin is not only bringing long-lost unity to the EU, but he is also reminding Turkey of the benefits of its Western ties. Western states should realize that only more unity among themselves and more determination will make Turkey reengage with the West.

*[This was originally published by the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP), which advises the German government and Bundestag on all questions relating to foreign and security policy.]

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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For the past month, the most respectable news outlets in the West have channeled their energy into perfecting a novel journalistic phenomenon that goes well beyond traditional propaganda. It has become so concentrated it now deserves an official name. I propose calling it “Obsessive Accusatory Reporting” (OAR). The message of any item in the news meriting the OAR label is to magnify an already present feeling of confirmed hatred in the reader. In principle, it can target nations, peoples, ideas or religions. But it works best when it focuses on a single personality.

Finding a Way to Diss Information

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The current version of OAR began with an idea already built into the cultural woodwork of American media: the perception that Russia — whether in its historical Soviet version or in its modern post-tsarist form — is the natural and eternal enemy of the United States and, by extension, to Western civilization as a whole. Inherited from the Cold War as a set of feelings that Americans find natural, establishment Democrats in the US gave it new impetus thanks to the artificial association they managed to establish with the man they believed could play the role of a true American evildoer: Donald Trump. Now, thanks to a specific event, ��ܲ�������’s invasion of Ukraine, the practice of OAR can focus on a universal target by whom, unlike Trump, no American should be allowed to be seduced. It’s the new Hitler, Russian President Vladimir Putin. 

Anyone who has ever witnessed a rowing event knows that to gain speed and ensure hydrodynamic efficiency, all rowers must have their oars strike the water at the same precise moment and achieve an equivalent depth below the surface of the water as their collective effort pushes the boat and all it contains forward. This repeated, disciplined, rhythmically coordinated energy creates the inertia strokes that produce increased momentum. 

The media’s propaganda campaigns appear to work in much the same way thanks to the equally disciplined and repeated OAR phenomenon. Obsessive repetition, the alignment of an infinite series of examples of despicable behavior and the journalistic talent for turning each example into an emotion-stirring story are the three elements that sum up the art of OAR. The momentum the media has created around hatred for the person of Vladimir Putin has become a spectacle in itself. The danger the media has no time to worry about as its effort continues developing potentially uncontrollable speed is that it may reach the point where it triggers actions leading to a potentially thermonuclear conflagration. Call it the media’s brinkmanship that multiplies the effects of politicians who themselves, persuaded it is now the key to successful electoral marketing, have turned it into an art form. Voters want their leaders to be aggressive decision-makers.

There are undoubtedly plenty of reasons to distrust, despise and morally condemn Vladimir Putin that existed well before he decided to invade Ukraine on February 24. Putin has, as befits a country ruled for a century by autocratic tsars, developed a particularly thuggish form of governing his nation. Russians at least are used to it and fatalistically accept it, with no illusion about its pretention to any form of virtue other than the ability to keep things under control. 

Putin is clearly guilty of every sin — from brutal repression to aggravated narcissism — that accrues to anyone who achieves his level of control that embraces military power, finance and technology. His ability to repress any serious opposition and manipulate electoral processes, his commitment to cronyism and self-enrichment, and his immunity from a basic moral sense concerning the value of human life and the dignity of the average citizen constitute attributes of his office. Unlike some autocratic leaders, he also has a high level of strategic intelligence. 

Westerners have become habituated to leaders who seek to seduce broad segments of the population thanks to slogans rather than the demonstration of their clout or the display of their intelligence, which in fact is never required and, when it exists, may get in the way of their ambition. Western political leaders focus on developing the essential skill of deploying charm to win elections. To Westerners, Putin’s style of governing marked by the arrogance of power is worse than distasteful. It challenges their own belief in the illusion they need to feel of possessing political power in a democracy thanks to their ability to vote at regular intervals. They need to imagine their vote has an impact on policy, an illusion the media encourages them to believe in. All it really does is limit the degree of repression a democratic government may get away with. Putin has no qualms or regrets about manifestly unjust actions carried out against his own people. Western democratic leaders actually worry.

Putin’s invasion of Ukraine was unambiguously illegal, morally shocking, paradoxical to the extent that he is attacking the population he claims to wish to protect and downright brutal. It may even be self-defeating, potentially tarnishing his image as a strong leader. It would, however, be premature to draw conclusions on that last point, as many in the Western media have already started doing. But for anyone susceptible to being seduced by today’s OAR culture, the temptation to believe in the inevitable failure of Putin’s enterprise is overwhelming. For the past two weeks, Western media have been joyously proclaiming that Putin’s armed assault is on the verge of defeat. 

Journalism and Democracy

The traditional belief about journalism in a democracy included the idea that the press plays a role closely attuned to the interest and the voice of the people. Ideally, the media exists to provide essential information about the real world and a modicum of independent insight about the topics treated. By showing restraint and focusing on discernible facts, media in a democracy could be trusted to help citizens understand complex events and make informed decisions after drawing their own conclusions about the possible relationship between causes and effects.

That has long been the theory concerning the role of what people still call the fourth estate, a linguistic hand-me-down from 18^th century European history that designates the free press. The fourth estate was deemed to be closest to the third estate (the people, or the commoners) and furthest from the first two estates (the clergy and the nobility). The advent of democracy made the theory of the estates obsolete, to the extent that the clergy lost its status of “estate.” In reality, the totalitarian drift of the 20^th century revealed that the first and second estates merged as democratic governments assumed they could project the moral authority the clergy traditionally exercised.

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The idea of a free and independent press embodied in the fourth estate continued to persist as a necessary but increasingly intangible ideal. Alas, history tells us that whenever an ideal makes contact with reality, it is likely to become distorted. With the rise of democracy in the West in the 19^th century, the press permitted the expression of variable points of view. But over time, no ethical system could prevent those voices from being influenced by political parties, commercial interests, pressure groups and the government itself. The key to honoring the ideal was variety, not just tolerance but also the encouragement of a range of views. Financial concentration eventually limited and finally captured and confined that variety.

The media has been trapped by forces it no longer tries to control or resist. It is virtually impossible even to imagine, let alone create anything resembling the ideal news outlet for which objective presentation of the news would be the inviolable norm. Perhaps the proponents of government by artificial intelligence believe they can one day put that in place by eliminating human agency. They too are victims of an illusion because manipulative human agency can work — and in fact works best — through artificial systems that include and mechanically promote the interests that created them. This is as true of political systems as it is of computer programs. The failure of humanity to even begin addressing the impending catastrophe of global warming can simply be attributed to systemic inertia, not to the idea that no leader is willing to make an appropriate decision.

So long as diversity in the media was still possible, truth for the public at large could emerge not from a spontaneous or enforced consensus, but through the highly interactive process of recognizing and eliminating the distortions of the reality that became visible after comparing the various representations of it. By definition, the truth about human institutions and historical facts is dynamic, organic and interactive. It is not a statement and cannot be contained in statements. It exists as a perception. Perceptions can be shared, compared or contradicted. No single perception sums up the truth.

In the traditional democratic idea of journalism, a good article avoided explicit judgment. In many instances, the standard practice became to avoid even mentioning specific interpretations or judgments. Good reporting limited itself to acknowledging dominant perspectives on a topic without choosing to endorse one or another. In stories about crime, for example, it has become a general rule — before a verdict rendered by a court of justice — to use the epithet “alleged.” This rule holds even when there is no doubt about the existence of the crime and the identity of the author of the crime (though the real reason for this precaution may be the media’s fear of being accused of libel). In contrast, when it comes to political issues, the opposite trend dominates. Journalists or their editors now routinely jump on the occasion to name the culprit and inculcate the belief of guilt in their audience. Knowing their niche audience, it enables them to offer their public what they want to hear or understand.

Russian Agency and the Havana Syndrome

One prominent case in recent years illustrates how easy it is for journalists to play fast and loose concerning real or imaginary political crimes. Over a period of five years dedicated to reporting on the “Havana syndrome,” The New York Times, The Washington Post and other respectable media consistently described reported health incidents as “attacks.” That word alone presumed criminal agency, even though the reality of cause and effect was closer to a “heart attack” or “panic attack” than to an assault.

Articles on the syndrome typically insisted that, even when no evidence could be cited of any human agency, Russia was the prime suspect. Sentences such as this one from The Washington Post were clearly intended to distort the reader’s perception: “Current and former intelligence officials have increasingly pointed a finger at Russia, which has staged multiple brazen attacks on adversaries and diplomats overseas.” It is worth noting that the only act in this sentence that should qualify as news is what the intelligence officials have done: “pointed a finger.” All the rest, the “brazen attacks,” are either imprecisely anecdotal from a random past or simply imaginary.

Five years after initially pointing fingers, those same officials finally admitted officially that there was to point their finger at. When the ultimate negative assessment by the CIA itself of Russian attacks was published in January of this year, did The Post or The Times (or any other media) apologize to their readers for their erroneous reporting over the years? Obviously, not. Perhaps they felt that might oblige them to do the unthinkable: apologize to the Russians.

When there was finally no choice left but to reveal the CIA’s negative assessment, The New York Times tried to save face by insisting that everything it had pinned its hopes on might still have an element of truth in it. “A directed energy weapon,” Julian E. Barnes on January 20, “remains the hypothesis that a number of victims who have studied the incidents believe is most likely.” If that fact is true, a serious reporter would have delved into the interesting question of why the victims continue to believe something that their superiors have determined to be untrue. Does this reveal that CIA operatives and their families have lost their trust in the truthfulness of the agency? The rest of us are left wondering why journalists like Barnes himself think it necessary to print such meaningless observations as significant facts.

Now that the entire thesis of Russian-directed energy attacks has been discredited, a new article delving into the motivation of intelligence officials who made repeated unfounded claims might prove informative. But, miraculously, there are no new articles on the Havana syndrome, except maybe the article you are now reading. But none in The Times or The Post. With hindsight — something the legacy press studiously avoids — the articles of these papers appear to reveal the equivalent of “brazen attacks,” not by Russians but by US intelligence services. They were attacks on the public’s access to the truth. The journalists were simply willing conscious or unconscious accomplices in these brazen attacks. What this entire episode truly reveals is a lesson in how our culture of hyperreality works. It depends entirely on the media.

Finally, a Serious Case of a Brazen Attack: Ukraine

This inevitably brings us back to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This time, Russia is indeed guilty of a brazen attack that isn’t an imaginary hypothesis dreamed up by intelligence operatives. Nevertheless, the media have turned it into something far more brazen by systematically excluding or ignoring other less brazen but equally troubling attacks that have been going on for years. They include a decidedly brazen coup d’état in Ukraine supported, if not engineered, by the United States in 2014.

The carefully managed act of regime change in which the US gratefully accepted the assistance of neo-Nazi extremists to produce the commensurate level of violence used the deposition of one democratically elected leader to enable the comforting fiction that the two Ukrainian presidents elected since those events — Petro Poroshenko and Volodymyr Zelensky — are somehow more legitimate than the president overthrown in the Maidan Revolution. That fiction depends on discarding the fact that Ukraine is not just another “sovereign nation” of Europe, but a historically, culturally and linguistically divided country that also has a conflicting but highly charged symbolic meaning for both Russia, its next-door neighbor, and the United States, a distant hegemon that has used NATO to spread its military dominance across Europe.

Most reasonable and reasoning people admit the principle that complex political entities such as Ukraine require delicate diplomatic treatment. But, as the Bush wars revealed, US foreign policy rarely acknowledges the need for rationality. Even basic diplomacy appears to be inconsistent with the culture of enforced hegemony. At best, it might serve the purpose of catastrophe avoidance. But catastrophes are increasingly welcomed rather than avoided. Instead, we can observe a growing trend of catastrophe provocation that is difficult to explain, since the cost is heavy even for the perpetrators. For the US, it appears to have something to do with the idea that world hegemony is the only possible source of global stability and that catastrophes such as war are somehow good for business (which of course they are, but not for everyone’s or even most people’s business).

In such a geopolitical environment, propaganda becomes a way of life and serves as the core activity in the construction of public culture. Selecting the facts the public will react to in a predictable way according to the interest of those who understand the secrets of geopolitical stability has become the basis of legacy journalism in the US. The ultimately comic example of the Havana syndrome perhaps served as a kind of temporary placeholder in times of relative peace. It upheld the mythological construct of a permanent Cold War, which seems to be essential in the definition of US foreign policy. Now that things have become seriously degraded in a nation that journalists have begun calling the “civilized” part of the world — meaning that it is worth being concerned about, in contrast with the Middle East, Asia and Africa — propaganda has to focus not on pure hallucinatory hyperreality but events that are taking place in the real world.

We are only beginning to see the dominant strategies involved. It is too early to assess them with any historical distance. What we are witnessing is the need to whip up the blind hatred that leads to the OAR phenomenon described earlier. But there is also a more basic approach that applies especially to situations that are historically and culturally complex. It includes the decision to forget to mention or even categorically deny the obvious for as long as possible. When the obvious does become visible, thanks to the indiscipline of some rare investigators interested in the truth, the strategy consists of devising ways of downplaying it and treating it as marginal.

The Neo-Nazi Syndrome

When Putin launched his assault on Ukraine, he defined a mission of denazification of Ukraine. He may have presumed that all Westerners can relate to that theme. Nazis are, after all, the personification of historical evil. So, if we can agree on a common enemy, we should at the very least offer one another friendly support. Putin apparently underestimated the Westerners’ ability to remain ignorant of very real and already documented facts, thanks to the deliberate forgetfulness of their media. Not only did commentators laugh at the notion that a neo-Nazi threat existed in Ukraine, they mocked the idea that it could exist in a nation whose president is Jewish.

Four weeks into the war, The New York Times has published an article acknowledging that the neo-Nazi question is worth mentioning. The bears the title, “Why Vladimir Putin Invokes Nazis to Justify His Invasion of Ukraine.” The title alone is extremely clever. It focuses attention not on the Nazis, who are never seriously identified, but on Vladimir Putin, whom Times readers understand as being evil incarnate. The first sentence reads as pure mockery of phrases Putin has used. “Ukraine’s government,” Anton Troianovski writes, ”is ‘openly neo-Nazi’ and ‘pro-Nazi,’ controlled by ‘little Nazis,’ President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia �������.”

The implication is that if Putin said it, it must be a lie. It is only in the 12^th paragraph of the article that the question of the actual presence and actions of neo-Nazis in Ukraine is even grudgingly entertained. “Like many lies,” the paragraph begins, “Mr. Putin’s claim about a Nazi-controlled Ukraine has a hall-of-mirrors connection to reality.” Ah, Troianovski appears to admit, there is a connection to reality, but of course it is hopelessly distorted, like a fun park’s hall of mirrors.

The following paragraph attempts to convince the reader that the phenomenon is so marginal there is definitely nothing to worry about. “Some fringe nationalist groups, who have no representation in Parliament, use racist rhetoric and symbolism associated with Nazi Germany.” In other words, talk of neo-Nazis is all fiction.

Many paragraphs later, Troianovski reveals the real reason why this article of clarification became necessary for The Times rather than simply neglecting to mention neo-Nazis. It’s the fault of Facebook, which created something of a scandal when it “said it was making an exception to its anti-extremism policies to allow praise for Ukraine’s far-right Azov Battalion military unit, ‘strictly in the context of defending Ukraine, or in their role as part of the Ukraine National Guard.’” The Russians seized on this as proof of complicity between the Ukrainian resistance and the neo-Nazis. To counter dangerous Russian propaganda, The Times is stepping up to clarify the issue, even though it would have preferred not having to mention it.

Unfortunately, the article spends paragraph after paragraph clarifying nothing. It somewhat precipitously ends with a quote about how Jews are now among those fleeing the war. Some of them may never return, implying that Putin’s intent of denazifying Ukraine is in itself a deviously anti-Semitic act. This reversal of perception of blame illustrates one of the key techniques of New York Times-style propaganda. The journalist finds a devious way of turning the supposedly moral motivation of the enemy into its opposite.

Troianovski briefly hints at the uncomfortable paradox that Israel has refused to condemn Russia, a fact that might comfort the idea of Putin’s concern with neo-Nazis. But the journalist leaves that question aside, apparently convinced that the subtlety of that debate unnecessarily complicates his mission as an OAR specialist focused only on highlighting Putin’s evil nature. Surprisingly for those familiar with modern Ukrainian history, Troianovski has the honesty to mention the historical Nazi sympathizer and Ukrainian nationalist, Stepan Bandera, still celebrated by many Ukrainians.

Troianovski even has the merit of providing a link to a fascinatingly instructive 2010 Times article, written at a time when the paper had no particular commitment to churning out propaganda in the interests of celebrating Ukraine’s democratic purity and constitutional integrity. The author of that , Clifford J. Levy, highlights the problem that Viktor Yanukovych was facing as he bravely attempted “to address the ethnic, regional and historical passions that divide the country.” Yanukovych was, of course, the Ukrainian president that Victoria Nuland helped to depose in 2014.

Understanding the Culture of Propaganda by Comparing The Times in 2010 and 2022

All New York Times readers and indeed all American journalists owe it to themselves and the sanity of the world we live in to read Levy’s article from 2010, if only to compare it to the image of Ukraine that American media are putting forward today of a unified people, imbued with liberal European values and united in their hatred of tyranny in all its forms. Levy’s article that applies the now-forgotten practices of straightforward journalism presents facts, cites contrasting points of view — including admirers of Bandera — and takes no sides. In so doing, it gives a clear picture of a terrifyingly complex social and historical situation that Western media have decided to simplify to the extreme in their wish to follow the dictates of US President Joe Biden’s State Department.  

Any objective observer today, however rare their voices are in the media, must , as Barack Obama did in 2016, according to The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg, that “Ukraine is a core Russian interest but not an American one.” Obama’s State Department that sent Nuland to Ukraine to manage the Maidan Revolution appeared at the time unaware of what Goldberg called the “Obama Doctrine.” That same objective observer should also be aware of the fact that the Ukraine described by Levy in his 2010 article still exists, despite the State Department’s 2014 coup d’état. There is much more about the history of the last eight years and that, despite the terrifying consequences playing out day after day, US and Western media have now chosen to studiously ignore, if not suppress.

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One salient point that readers of Levy’s article will relate to today, however, is the remark of the director of the Stepan Bandera museum in Lviv: “For Ukrainian nationalists, there is no such word as capitulation.” That is even truer when those same nationalists dispose of a billion dollars worth of American weaponry to keep the war of resistance going as long as possible. The citizenry of Western Ukraine will follow the lead of the nationalists — not all of whom are neo-Nazis — and refuse to capitulate, while suffering what deserves to be called severe if not sadistic cultural, political and military abuse from two enemies fighting a proxy war on their land: Russia and the United States.

But if the continuing destruction of Ukrainian cities and loss of thousands of lives is the price to pay for the pleasure of reading reams of Obsessive Accusatory Reporting, then, as Madeleine Albright might , “the price is worth it.”

​�ċThe views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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However, shipping companies report limiting their transport due to the perceived danger and concerns about loss of business. Recently, Ukraine announced that it would restrict its own exports to secure domestic supply.

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Ukraine and Russia have become key players for the export of both grain and sunflower (oil) in the post-Soviet era. For quite some time, their crop yields have influenced international volumes and prices, with Ukraine providing on average 10% of the world’s wheat export supply, and Russia as much as 24%; for maize, Ukraine supplied 15% of the staple feed and fodder. 

The international market for fertilizer is even more concentrated. With trade shares of individual fertilizer components reaching up to 50%, Russia dominates the market for ammonium nitrate and Belarus, at 16%, for potash fertilizer.

Wartime Uncertainty

Due to general business uncertainty, the financial sanctions of numerous states and the EU against Russia currently affect agricultural exports indirectly while specific sanctions directly target respective exports. For example, last year, in response to the crackdown on the opposition in Belarus, the EU imposed sanctions on the market-dominating Belarusian potash producer Belaruskali, extending them last week.

Prices for many agricultural products determined by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations currently already exceed the historic highs during the food price crises of 2007 and 2011. Fertilizer prices have also been rising to record levels for months. In addition, shortages due to reduced or canceled supplies of grain and fertilizer from Russia, Ukraine and Belarus are driving up prices. 

Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Russia, like many countries, has been using export restrictions on agricultural products to secure its own supplies despite international warnings against these price-increasing measures. Just last week, the government recommended that Russian companies also limit fertilizer exports.

Besides Ukraine, crop and supply shortfalls initially affect countries that import agricultural products from the war-affected region and are currently looking for readily available alternative sources. This drives up prices on global markets, thereby burdening all importers worldwide but hitting low-income countries and people the hardest. Egypt has an import share of 60% of Russian grain and 20% of Ukrainian grain. 

To date, other countries that are already vulnerable to supply insecurity, such as Lebanon, Libya, Yemen, Bangladesh and Turkey, also purchase the majority of their grain from the region. Chad and Niger imported up to 80% of their fertilizer and raw materials from Russia and Belarus; Europe, as well as many countries in Latin America, also purchased large shares.

Options for Adjustment 

Affected countries have different options for adjustment. Egypt still has limited but probably sufficient grain stocks of its own for the time being, despite strong supply dependence vis-à-vis the region. In Lebanon, on the other hand, the 2020 explosion at the port of Beirut destroyed wheat warehouses, reducing storage capacity from six months to one month, necessitating a continuous flow of supplies.

The remaining supply gaps that cannot be solved in importing countries by means of shifts in consumption toward more food rather than energy use require both food and fertilizer support. However, these are becoming more expensive as a result of rising prices for procurement and delivery. Transport and delivery must be additionally protected when sourcing from the region along vulnerable routes.

Trade must remain open and possibly protected on routes perceived as dangerous by shipping lines. Typical crisis-induced but price-pushing export restrictions must be avoided, both within the EU and internationally. Failing supplies from the major agricultural region will show their full effects in the coming autumn crop season, which may only be offset to a certain extent by crops from other major producers such as Australia, the US and the EU.

Large agricultural countries could pursue forward-looking, coordinated market relaxation in order to quickly identify food supply potentials. However, in order to avoid symbolic politics or protectionist reflexes to support domestic production, the volume and price effects of possible approaches — suspension of set-aside programs, reduced use of agro-fuels or land rededication from fodder to food production — need to be assessed accurately. If a contribution to market relaxation is to be expected, corresponding measures should be quickly initiated for the upcoming crop year as a temporary crisis measure. 

Similarly, the US is discussing the suspension of the conservation reserve program to allow farmers to bring set-aside areas into production. Price-driving sanctions with regard to fertilizers and agricultural goods should be avoided — or at least be accompanied by aid concepts to absorb linked supply risks.

As during the onset of the COVID-19 crisis, the Agricultural Market Information System (AMIS) — a monitoring mechanism developed by the G20 in response to past food price crises — should be used for an international information campaign to prevent price-pushing export restrictions by means of appeals. However, more important than appeals would be the adoption of strict criteria and deadlines for these measures that are enforceable at the World Trade Organization level.

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In the future, AMIS should cover not only agricultural products, fertilizers and energy sources but also the conditions of and access to trade infrastructure. Here, restrictions heavily influence supply and price and should be included in a comprehensive warning system for international supply potential.

Furthermore, a future international political offensive for fertilizers and their raw materials is needed. Not only must the market situation be monitored and, in the event of shortages, be accompanied by aid early on. Technologies to make their use more efficient and to increase fertilizer production capacities as well as approaches to their substitution, whether technologically or by cultivation, are also needed.

*[This  was originally published by the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP), which advises the German government and Bundestag on all questions related to foreign and security policy.]

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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Should We Lift the Ban on Russian Sport?

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Furthermore, Cashmore maintains, experience shows that sports bans largely failed to have a significant impact on regime policies in the past. South Africa is a case in point. There are good reasons to believe that the bans and boycotts the country was subjected to did little to hasten the collapse of apartheid. The same could, of course, be said about sanctions in general, as Peter Isackson has recently noted in these pages. Cuba is probably the most prominent example of the failure of prolonged sanctions to undermine a regime; Iran is another. 

This could also be said about resolutions passed by the United Nations General Assembly condemning acts of aggression. The most recent vote following ��ܲ�������’s attack on Ukraine has demonstrated once again the futility of symbolic gestures, even if supported by the vast majority of the international community. The reality is that for despots and autocrats, the only thing that counts is brute force. After all, what brought Nazi Germany to heel was not boycotts and sanctions but the overwhelming military might of the allies. 

The Importance of Sport

Should we, then, lift the ban on Russian sport? In fact, should we lift all sanctions imposed on Russia, given the fact that, empirically, sanctions more often than not turn out to be counterproductive? The answer to the second question is obvious, at least to me. Sanctions might not be particularly effective in their impact on regime behavior, but they serve as an expression of moral revulsion, a signal that we don’t want to have anything to do with you, or at least as little as possible. This involves all areas, not only economics — and particularly sport.

It is easy to state, as Cashmore does, that “it would be foolish to hyperbolize the importance of sport; obviously it is not as serious as war, or a million other things. So, why hurt people who are not responsible for the original sin?” Anyone who has ever watched Leni Riefenstahl’s 1938 film “Olympia,” which documented the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin, is likely to get a sense of the importance of sport to autocratic regimes. 

The Berlin Games were supposed to demonstrate the superiority of Adolf Hitler’s Aryan race. But a black athlete from the United States, Jesse Owens, had the audacity to steal the show, making HItler’s sport — “swift as greyhounds, tough as leather, hard as Krupp steel” — literally eat dust. The Führer was not amused; he hastily left the stadium so not to have to bear witness to the Aryan humiliation.

A famous German strategist once characterized diplomacy as war by other means. The same could be said about sport, particularly during the Cold War period. This was certainly true in the case of the in the former German Democratic Republic (GDR). For the regime, sport was more than a competition, it was a Systemfrage — a question of system, socialism vs. capitalism. Sport victories, particularly against West German athletes, meant confirmation of the superiority of the socialist system and, of course, of the Soacialist Unity Party. 

At the same time, sport provided the regime with the international visibility it so desperately craved. For this, no price was high enough, including the health of the athletes. Starting in the early 1970s, the regime embarked on a broad-based systematic . Already at a young age, promising athletes were pumped full of drugs, designed to enhance their performance and competitiveness. Many of them still suffer from the long-term consequences.

The East German case is extreme but hardly exceptional. Anyone who has ever visited Rome can attest to that. Rome hosts an Olympic stadium that dates back to the late 1920s, initially forming part of the larger Foro Mussolini. In the 1930s, the stadium was expanded, in preparation for the 1940 Olympics. The games were ultimately canceled because of the war, depriving Mussolini of the opportunity to showcase his Fascist revolution: the massive obelisk at the entrance of the Foro, with its “Mussolini Dux” inscription, the mosaics leading up to the stadium, glorifying the Fascist takeover, the granite blocs bearing excerpts of Mussolini’s speeches. 

Mussolini’s reign ended in April 1945 at a gas station in Milan’s Piazzale Loreto. Yet at the centennial of Mussolini’s March on Rome, later on this year, the obelisk is still there, in Rome, in front of the Olympic stadium, together with the mosaics and the granite blocs — a silent testimony to a dictator’s hubris and the role of sport in it.

Get Real

One of the most often heard arguments these days on the subject of the sport ban is that it is the “innocent” athletes who are most directly affected by it. “I only feel sorry for the athletes” has been an often repeated mantra by those commenting on the ban. Let’s get real. Compared to the suffering and anxieties of millions of Ukrainian civilians subjected to Russian terror bombing, the chagrin of Russian athletes deprived of the opportunity to compete internationally is of little consequence — except, of course, for those, like Daniil Medvedev, who lose money. But then, the ATP has so far refused to follow other sports and ban Russian players. 

Finally, one last thought. Before FIFA banned Russia from its World Cup competition, Poland, followed by Sweden and the Czech Republic, made it clear that they would not play Russia in the playoffs for the World Cup at the end of this year. Robert Lewandowski, Bayern München’s star forward and winner of the Best FIFA Men’s Player title two years in a row, was particularly adamant in his refusal to play against Russia. 

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I am quite curious to know what would have happened had FIFA not banned Russia. Would Poland, Sweden and the Czech Republic have been sanctioned for refusing to play the Russian national team? What would have it done to FIFA’s already dismal image if, as a result, Vladimir Putin’s aggression against his neighbor had been compensated with ��ܲ�������’s automatic World Cup qualification? 

The reality is that international competitions in certain sports, such as football and ice hockey, are more than just sports. They are sources of national pride and national prestige, particularly for countries with autocratic regimes, with star athletes as national icons who are more often than not close to the regime. Alexander Ovechkin, arguably the best hockey player at the moment, has a long history of supporting Putin, including the 2014 annexation of Crimea. 

As Czech hockey great Dominik Hasek , this is not a personal matter: “Every athlete represents not only himself and his club, but also his country and its values and actions. That is a fact.” It is for this reason that the ban on Russian sport was imposed. It should not be lifted.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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Should We Lift the Ban on Russian Sport?

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Now, with the war in Ukraine, that soft power is facing a major crisis. Since Russia launched its invasion at the end of February, many ballet performances are being canceled around the world: The Bolshoi Ballet’s summer season at London’s , “Swan Lake” by the Royal Moscow Ballet at the Helix Theatre in Dublin and concerts by the Vienna Philharmonic — led by the Russian conductor and Vladimir Putin’s supporter, Valery Gergiev — at the Carnegie Hall in New York have all been called off. 

The Danish minister of culture, Ane Halsboe-Jorgensen, suggested the Musikhuset Aarhus, Scandinavia’s largest concert hall, should Russian National Ballet’s performance. The UK tour by the Russian State Ballet of Siberia has been as a stand against the war. 

Because of the conflict, former dancers and Ukraine natives Darya Fedotova and Sergiy Mykhaylov changed the name of their school from the  to the International Ballet of Florida. , in Newcastle, canceled the screenings of Bolshoi Ballet’s “Swan Lake” and “Pharaoh’s Daughter.” A Japanese ballerina with the Russian Ballet Theater in Moscow, , is dancing for peace during a tour in the US, but a restaurant refused to serve lunch to the cast when they learned they were from Russia. 

Business Card

The boycotts may just be starting, bringing financial loss to ��ܲ�������’s cultural establishment amid already crippling economic sanctions. But the damage to Russian �����������’s soft power can be even more everlasting, taking years to recover. After all, soft power is the ability to seduce rather than coerce, strengthen a nation’s image abroad and thus enhance cultural and diplomatic relations as well as tourism. It takes years, even decades, to cultivate the tradition, like Hollywood in the US, the carnival in Brazil and MAG (manga, anime, games) culture in Japan.

Both the USSR and Russia could never compete with truly global pop-culture exports emanating from America. There were no music icons to rival Michael Jackson, blockbusters like “Star Wars” or TV stars like Oprah. The country produced incredible cultural products, especially when it came to film. Sergei Eisenstein’s “Battleship Potemkin” (1925), Andrei Tarkovsky’s sci-fi “Solaris” (1972) and Alexander Sokurov’s “Russian Arc” (2002) are masterpieces that earned Russian cinema a place in every art book and class around the world, but they were far from being international hits. 

Russian composers like Igor Stravinski and Alexander Scriabin, and writers such as Fyodor Dostoyevsky and Lev Tolstoy, similarly occupy high positions in the world’s literary and music canons but can hardly be described as widely popular, especially in the Anglophone cultural sphere. 

Ballet, on the other hand, has always been a lucrative export for Russia. In her  “Swans of the Kremlin,” Christina Ezrahi looks at how Russian ballet, whose tradition stretches back to the imperial court as a celebration of the Romanov dynasty, with ballet schools established during the rule of in the 18^th century, has grabbed the world’s attention. Following the 1917 revolution, luckily convinced Vladimir Lenin not to destroy the Bolshoi because peasants and workers flocked to the theater despite the chaos of the civil war years. 

Art and Politics

Although theaters like the Bolshoi may appear as a microcosmos of liberal art, in ��ܲ�������’s history, ballet has always had close ties with political power. Stalin was an opera aficionado and used to arrive at the Bolshoi by a secret entrance and watch alone. After the signing of the non-aggression pact with Germany in 1939, he took Hitler’s foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop to see  dance at the Bolshoi. 

During the Soviet era, ballet served as a visiting card for Russian diplomats. In “American-Soviet Cultural Diplomacy,” Cadra Peterson McDaniel  how the Kremlin used the Bolshoi ballets as a means of cultural exchange, weaving communist ideas such as collective ownership of the means of production and the elimination of income inequality discretely into the storylines along with pre-revolutionary dance aesthetics during 1959 US tour.

Other artists were also crucial for projecting Soviet cultural soft power at the time, like the world-famous cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich and his wife, the opera singer Galina Vishnevskaya. But they faced tough competition from Tchaikovsky’s ballet hits like “The Nutcracker.” 

Ballet served a purpose during the putsch of 1991, which signaled the beginning of the Soviet Union’s collapse, when instead of announcing the attempted coup against Mikhail Gorbachev, “Swan Lake” was  on national television on a loop. The export of Russian ballet increased during the  as the Bolshoi had to tour to compensate for an unstable economy while enjoying the opening up of the country after decades behind the Iron Curtain. 

President Putin’s two decades in power may have allowed for economic recovery, but Russian ballet suffered from scandals like the acid attack on Bolshoi’s artistic director Sergei Filin in 2013. The scandal garnered the attention of the international media following stories about the at the Bolshoi and its close affiliation with the Kremlin, tarnishing Russian �����������’s appeal.

The connection between Bolshoi and the power structure in Russia is so vivid that artists were directly affected as the result of the invasion of Ukraine. , the chief conductor at the Bolshoi, resigned after coming under pressure to condemn Russian actions. Fearing that musicians are becoming “victims of so-called ‘cancel culture,’” he worried he “will be soon asked to choose between Tchaikovsky, Stravinsky, Shostakovich and Beethoven, Brahms, Debussy.” Two , Brazilian David Motta Soares and Italian Jacopo Tissi, also resigned, citing solidarity with Ukraine. 

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As someone who appears to favor the outdoors, sports and guns, it’s unlikely that President Putin will see ballet as a priority to be shielded from Western sanctions and boycotts. There is, in fact, little he could do, especially given the current restrictions on travel in and out of the country. There is, of course, the question of whether boycotts of the arts are justified, considering that other countries have a history of political intervention, like China in Hong Kong or the US in Iraq, but their cultural products were not banned from movie theaters and art exhibitions. 

It may find itself caught in another historic moment, but Russian ballet’s cultural soft power survived the tsars, revolutions, famine, dictatorship and the fall of empires. In the end, dance will likely outlast autocracy.  

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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25 Years On, The Dayton Peace Agreement Is a Ticking Time Bomb

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The Russian president has already  numerous official consultations with Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik, the latest one taking place in December 2021. During his  consecutive meeting with Putin in the midst of the 2014 Ukraine crisis, Dodik shared his unequivocal affiliation with Moscow, saying: “Naturally, there is no question that we support Russia. We may be a small and modest community, but our voice is loud.” As ��ܲ�������’s current military intervention progressed in Ukraine, Dodik also  to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov about the “implementation of agreements” reached during the last meeting with Putin.  

Putin’s Proxy in Bosnia

In the quarter of a century since the signing of the Dayton Accords, Bosnia and Herzegovina has been the site of occasional political crises but has never come close to military conflict. In recent months, however, Dodik has doubled down on his efforts to tear apart the postwar constitutional order of the country’s two constitutive entities, the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Republika Srpska. Emboldened by the resurrection of ��ܲ�������’s power, he pressed ahead with his nationalist political agenda aimed at dismantling institutional arrangements that have gradually restored peace and security over the last 25 years. As a result, Dodik was blacklisted by the US government in January this year.

In December 2021, lawmakers loyal to Dodik advanced their secession bid and voted  in favor of starting a procedure for Republika Srpska to withdraw from central government mechanisms such as common defense, judiciary and intelligence, to name a few. They have also decided that within , the government in Banja Luka must recreate its own legislation governing such institutions. 

To show it means business, Republika Srpska paraded paramilitary forces on January 9 in a nationalist celebration declared illegal by the constitutional court of Bosnia and Herzegovina; among the participants were the Night Wolves, a black-uniformed group of Russian nationalist pro-Kremlin bikers. On February 10, Republika Srpska’s national assembly adopted the draft version of a law to create a separate judicial system from the rest of the state. Regarding his future plans, Dodik  he won’t be daunted by opposition from the Western centers of power, suggesting that Moscow and Beijing will help if the West imposes sanctions. 

Notwithstanding ��ܲ�������’s local proxy, fanning existing flames in Bosnia and Herzegovina could be a rational adventure from Putin’s viewpoint for additional reasons. First, Serbian and Turkish reactions could fit the wider Russian agenda if this trajectory with opposing power dyads within the Bosnian state takes a turning point. 

Second, Putin is aware of the EU’s record of conflict management in ex-Yugoslavia, and Bosnia in particular, in the early 1990s. It failed miserably to secure the peace in the heart of Europe, when the EU was a rising star and Russia was at its weakest point. Third, extending the current  peace mission in Bosnia may be vetoed by Russia at the UN Security Council in November. 

It is worth remembering that Bosnia and Herzegovina doesn’t have NATO’s Article 5 mutual defense guarantee to fall back on, and that President Joe Biden’s promise to defend every inch of NATO is meaningless for Sarajevo. Washington’s official position on protecting the parameters of the Dayton Agreement is as vague as its strategic ambiguity toward Taiwan.  

Serbia and Turkey in the Bosnian Theater

President Putin has many good reasons to count on Serbia to exploit Bosnia and Herzegovina‘s internal weakness. Belgrade largely relies on Russian weaponry and strong nationalist sentiments with the secessionist movement in Republika Srpska. Serbia’s national defense , officially promoted in late 2019, transcends national boundaries in its content, marking a shift from defensive sovereignty to a more offensive approach. 

Serbia’s home minister, Aleksandar Vulin, the former defense minister who officially promoted this strategy, often exudes self-congratulatory confidence that the Western Balkans region is there for Serbia’s taking. At the ruling Serbian Progressive Party congress in July last year that took place a few months before the joint Serbian-Russian “Slavic Shield” military exercise, Vulin forcefully  that “Creating the Serbian World, where the Serbs would live and be united, is the task of this generation of politicians.”

Serbia has also accelerated military spending at a faster rate for several years now for no rational reason except regional supremacy. According to , its current defense budget is almost twice that of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania, Northern Macedonia, Montenegro and Kosovo combined. Serbia’s reliance on Russian and Chinese military support has also been reinforced. In 2019, it received donations of fighter jets, tanks and armored vehicles from Russia. In 2020, it  CH92-A drones and FK-3 surface-to-air missiles from China and then , at Putin’s suggestion, the Pantsir S-1 air defense system. 

It is critical to understand why Serbia is arming so fast: From a realist perspective, its behavior could only become assertive, and more so if ��ܲ�������’s military intervention in Ukraine succeeds.

Turkey is probably the second regional contender to be caught in the Bosnian fire for both domestic and external factors. Under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Ankara has been projecting soft power throughout the Balkans, particularly in Bosnia and Herzegovina, relying on historical, cultural and economic ties. Turkey has also actively participated in all three peacebuilding missions in Bosnia and Herzegovina: IFOR (1995-97), SFOR (1997-2004) and is currently among EUFOR’s 20 contributing countries. 

However, in case of conflict, Ankara represents an imraportant geopolitical substitute should EUFOR abandon its commitments or if Russia vetoes its mandate at the Security Council. Western powers have for far too long watched from the sidelines and have practically allowed this trajectory with opposing power dyads within the Bosnian state to take root. Hence, Turkey won’t shy away from using its military clout in the region.

The conventional logic of Turkish enmity with Serbia sets Ankara and Moscow on a collision course because Vladimir Putin perceives Republika Srpska and Serbia as natural, historic and strategic allies. However, Russia would not necessarily oppose a Turkish role in the Balkans as long as Ankara’s move triggers some cracks within the Euro-Atlantic alliance. It also seems plausible for Turkey and Russia — historically perceived as brothers by the two confronting parties in the Bosnian theater — to test their mediating capacity modeled after the Astana format launched after the Russian and Turkish interventions in Syria. 

Given their animosity with Russia or Turkey, some European powers would expectedly oppose their interference in Bosnia and Herzegovina on geopolitical grounds, while the more liberal ones will raise ideological concerns. Speaking on the subject of the priorities of the French presidency of the EU that began on January 1, President Emmanuel Macron  that the Western Balkans “is going through new tensions today. History is coming back. Sometimes tragedy is coming back.” 

Macron also insisted on the “very special responsibility” toward these countries in terms of fighting external interference. What Macron fears is that extra-regional actors like Russia or Turkey could fill the vacuum, in which case power relations would inevitably become subject to reconfiguration. This scenario is not unfeasible as Russia does not project power in the Balkans for the sake of challenging Turkish interests in the first place. Its prime goal is to replace the existing US-led liberal, institutional and rules-based order with a more anarchic, illiberal and multipolar structure that fits ��ܲ�������’s image. 

A Slippery Slope for the EU and US

At first sight, a local collision in Bosnia and Herzegovina would bear a striking resemblance to what transpired in Ukraine in 2013-14. Without full integration into the EU or NATO, Bosnia and Herzegovina is also a vulnerable target, just like Ukraine has proven to be. Bosnia and Herzegovina is also divided along similar geopolitical and domestic lines, between pro-NATO aspirations in Sarajevo and anti-NATO tendencies in Banja Luka. 

However, Bosnia and Herzegovina’s instability is far more complex than the crisis in Ukraine for one structural reason: It is not in ��ܲ�������’s near abroad but in the European underbelly, which presents both an opportunity and a threat for all opposing sides at the local, regional and international level.

The EU has for some time failed to find a unified response to the Bosnian crisis, let alone taking concrete measures, except increasing EUFOR mission by an additional 500 troops. While some founding member states, including Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium, urged sanctions against Milorad Dodik during a recent EU foreign ministers’ debate, newer members like Hungary, Slovenia and Croatia oppose them. In fact, some European populist leaders have been staunch supporters of the Russian proxy in Bosnia and Herzegovina. 

Croatian President Zoran Milanovic stated recently that he was  the EU imposing sanctions against Dodik, saying that “If someone from Croatia votes for those sanctions, for me they will be a traitor.” Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban  €100 million ($110 million) in financial aid to Republika Srpska. Orban also opposed placing EU sanctions on Dodik, signaling an early warning that the EU, as a whole, may be unable to secure a peaceful Bosnia and Herzegovina, which again resonates with the EU’s poor historical record of conflict management in the region.

Hence, one should not exclude a possibility that EUFOR troops could be evacuated from Bosnia and Herzegovina one day altogether, much in the same way the Dutch UNPROFOR battalion was pulled from Srebrenica in July 1995, failing to prevent the Srebrenica genocide from taking place and making a mockery of UN resolutions on safe heavens. Should there be a prospect for this failure being repeated, the EU might decide to pass the buck on to Washington.

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In that case, small-nation turmoil and squabbles among Balkan nations could transform into a great-power rivalry. Will President Biden accept that call given his unreadiness for direct confrontation with Moscow? The US would face a choice between realist logic, which is to revert European security to Europeans, or a more liberal and interventionist approach, which is to prevent ��ܲ�������’s unchecked incursion toward NATO’s eastern border. 

There is still time for the US to deflate Republika Srpska’s rebellion and put it back in the political arena. Former Bosnian presidency member Haris Silajdzic recently placing a small NATO brigade in Brcko, the site of fierce battles during the wars of the 1990s, and a few battalions on the Bosnia and Herzegovina-Serbian border. If the US passes the buck back to the EU — which Russia and Serbia will celebrate — the West needs to fasten its seatbelts and brace for impact. More so than the war in Ukraine, a conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina has the capacity to trigger a regrettable European history.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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What England’s Premier League Did for Football

I have no idea whether Russian President Vladimir Putin is familiar with Ferguson’s motivational strategies nor whether he has even heard of him (though I suspect he has). Yet they are improbable kindred spirits. Putin seems to share with Ferguson a defensive or paranoid attitude predicated on the conviction that they are surrounded by enemies. It’s possible to imagine Putin addressing his aides with the kind of blistering, expletive-fueled tirade that used to be known in football circles as the hairdryer treatment. 

Sweeping Russophobia 

The siege mentality that was integral to Ferguson’s success is easy for Putin: The rest of the world actually is against him and his subjects. I’ll exclude Belarus (and, for the time being, China), but pretty much everywhere else has decided that the seemingly obsessive Putin is leading his country maniacally toward self-destruction, probably taking a good portion of the rest of the world along for the ride.

Let me define Russophobia as a strong and irrational dislike of Russia and all things Russian, especially the political system of the former Soviet Union as well as its current leader. In Ukraine, ruling parties have pursued a nationalist Russophobic agenda at least since 2018. The sharp increase in worldwide Russophobia since the invasion — or liberation, depending on your perspective — of Ukraine is unprecedented, at least in my experience. 

The collective punishment of all Russians, whatever their status, affiliation or political outlook for what appears to be Putin’s war, is going to have effects, an unintended one being that it will probably encourage national solidarity in Russia. It’s unlikely to turn people against the man in the Kremlin and is much more likely to encourage the kind of paranoid mentality that would make Sir Alex envious.

Russian oligarchs, like Chelsea Football Club’s owner (for the time being) Roman Abramovich, will no doubt be angry, particularly at having to dispose of his £150 million London home. But they are not going to renounce Putin: A new home like the one , ��ܲ�������’s former oil tycoon, was given at the YaG-14/10 penal colony in Siberia for 10 years might await.

Consumer brands such as  have pulled out of Russia, followed by PayPal, Visa and MasterCard. Sales of certain Russian vodkas outside Russia have stopped. The broadcaster RT has been removed from British, American and other platforms, presumably to protect guileless viewers becoming brainwashed by Putin’s propaganda.

Sports Boycott

The Russophobic blizzard has swept into sport too. Football’s governing organization FIFA has  Russia from international games, thus eliminating the country from the forthcoming World Cup (Russia is currently  this). The  (IOC) has recommended to sports organizations that they deny the participation of Russian and Belarusian athletes, even as representatives of the Russian Olympic Team or any other spurious denomination. 

Formula 1 has terminated its contract with the Russian Grand Prix. The International Paralympic Committee has banned Russians from the Winter Olympics (again subject to .) A full-scale sports boycott of Russia is in the air, probably affecting all athletes, even professional tennis players like Daniil Medvedev, who currently lives in Monaco. The question is, will the sports boycott and other prohibitions actually hasten a cease to the hostilities in Ukraine or will they instead have a paradoxical effect?

The only comparable precedent we have is in South Africa under apartheid. The IOC withdrew its invitation to South Africa to the 1964 Summer Olympics when the country’s interior minister Jan de Klerk insisted that the national team would not be integrated. It would, he said, reflect the segregation of South African society — in other words, the team would be white. Other sports followed the IOC’s example until, in 1977, the embargo was enshrined formally in the , which effectively turned South Africa into a sports outcast. 

Countries that kept their sporting links with South Africa were themselves ostracized, or blacklisted, as it was known. Individual athletes were forced to compete outside South Africa. Zola Budd and Sydney Maree were notable examples, Budd moving to the UK, Maree to the US. The boycott was eventually removed when apartheid fell in 1990, its total disappearance celebrated in the 1995 Rugby World Cup that which took place in South Africa and was won by an ethnically diverse home team.

We often look back and think the much-publicized sports boycott was a determining factor in ending apartheid, and it’s satisfying to imagine that the fusion of sport and politics produced a joyous and wonderful culmination. Certainly, the sports prohibition was an awareness-raiser and effectively signaled the rest of the world’s abhorrence of constitutional racism. 

But it dragged on over two decades and there is, inconveniently, no conclusive evidence that it had any impact on President F. W. de Klerk’s decision to lift the ban on the African National Congress and other black liberation parties, allowing freedom of the media and releasing political prisoners. Nelson Mandela was freed from prison after 27 years, on February 11, 1990. 

Money And Morals 

The sports boycott embarrassed South Africa as the current cold-shoulder will embarrass Russia. It may also have also have persuaded South Africans, in particular white South Africans, that their prolonged period of misfortune was the result of the antipathy of the outside world. That is probably what will happen in Russia. Citizens will be exasperated when their access to consumables is strangled and they can’t use credit cards to purchase whatever products are left. They’ll probably resent being restricted to Russians-only sport. 

But it won’t make a scrap of difference to the wider conflict and might in fact strengthen the resolve of the Russian people. This is not the narrative we are offered by the media, of course. 

The longer Russia is starved of international sport, the more credible the siege theory will become. In any case, the boycott will be fractured. Money often strains morals, especially in professional sports. For all the proscriptions and threats of blacklisting, South Africa was still able to offer enough filthy lucre to attract world-class cricketers, including , footballers such as , boxers like  and other athletes. Even the African American promoter, Don King, a staunch critic of apartheid, had agreements with South African boxing, by The New York Times in 1984. 

The same will happen in Russia. If it prevails in Ukraine, the probability is that there will be some form of state under the full or partial political control of Moscow, meaning no softening on the various debarments. The sports boycott will expand. This will leave major sports organizations with a new question: Do they recognize Ukraine as an independent sporting nation as it has been since 1991, or as a Russian colony, dependency or protectorate? Ukrainian athletes so far haven’t been excluded from international competitions. If they were, the cruelty would be redoubled. It would be a repugnant collision of injustices. 

Perhaps justice would be better served if the block on Russian sport were lifted. I know this sounds counterintuitive and might appear to reward, or at least accept, an aggressive act. But I take counsel from the adage that two wrongs don’t make a right. An action, no matter how heinous, is never a justification for wrongful behavior.

Many readers will not interpret a sports boycott as wrongful behavior, merely a reaction to provocation. Perhaps. But it would be foolish to hyperbolize the importance of sport; obviously it is not as serious as war, or a million other things. So, why hurt people who are not responsible for the original sin? Anyway, in a practical sense, it would serve to show that while the leadership in Moscow may indeed be execrated, the 144 million Russian people are not.

*[Ellis Cashmore is co-editor of .]

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect 51�Թ�’s editorial policy.

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