SRI LANKA: No Calm After the Storm

Global Intelligence News / IPS

IPS Correspondents

COLOMBO, Dec 5 (IPS) – The only good thing about tropical storm ‘Nisha’, that lashed northern Sri Lanka in the last week of November, was that it brought a lull to the fierce fighting between Tamil separatist rebels and the Sri Lankan army.

According to the Disaster Management Centre, over 370,000 persons were affected by gale force winds and rains, and more than 50,000 houses were damaged — 11,000 of them completely destroyed — in nine districts in the country between Nov. 22 – 30 when Nisha struck. Eleven persons were known to have died.

The worst damage was recorded in the northern Jaffna peninsula where 330,000 people were affected and nine killed. The peninsula at the northern edge of the island has been besieged by renewed fighting between government forces and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) since August 2006.
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Will Israel attack Iran?

Global Intelligence News
This article was originally published on opendemocracy.net under a Creative Commons license. Read the article in its original form.

Paul Rogers

The eight-week window before the new United States president takes office is causing high nervousness among those wondering about Tel Aviv’s intentions vis-à-vis Tehran, says Paul Rogers

27 – 11 – 2008

The discussion in the last few years about a possible United States assault on Iran’s nuclear facilities has often been accompanied by the coda that if Washington refrained from targeting this member of the “axis of evil” proclaimed by George W Bush in January 2002, then Israel might – with or without American collusion or forewarning – act on its own account. Several columns in this series have examined the possible circumstances and consequences of an Israeli attack, including the likelihood of involvement of the US itself after expected Iranian retaliation (see, for example, “Israel, the United States and Iran: the tipping-point” [13 March 2008] and “Iran, Israel, and the risk of war” [24 July 2008]).

Now, the interregnum in Washington before the inauguration of Barack Obama on 20 January 2009 is coinciding with a fresh round of nervous speculation about Israeli plans and intentions. Two recent reports widely circulated in the Israeli press serve as a reminder of the continuing risk of a conflict involving Iran. The first was that Iran had on 12 November conducted another test of a medium-range ballistic missile capable of hitting targets right across the region (see “Amid nuclear tensions, Iran says it successfully launched rocket“, Ha’aretz 26 November 2008); the second was that Iran claimed on 26 November now to have installed 5,000 uranium-enrichment centrifuges. 

Much is being made of Iran’s new missiles, both in Israel and the United States. Uzi Rubin – the founder of the Israel Missile Defense Association (Imda) – argues in a leading US defence journal that the new Iranian Sajeel/Ashura missile is far more advanced than any previous type (see Uzi Rubin, “Iran’s Game-changer“, Defense News, 24 November 2008). Most Iranian surface-to-surface missiles have been based on North Korean technology, especially the No Dong series of missiles, which themselves use technology based on the Soviet Scud missiles of the 1950s.  

Rubin, however, claims that the Sajeel/Ashura “is a brand-new missile, an original design more advanced than anything available to the North Koreans themselves.”  This may be rather over the top, but it does appear that the new missile is a relatively advanced two-stage solid-fuel system, which would certainly be a generation ahead of the liquid-fuelled No Dong (see Lauren Gelfand & Alon Ben-David, “New missile marks ’significant leap’ for Iran capabilities“, Jane’s Information Group, 14 November 2008).

To add to the sense of unease in Israel, the Israeli defence minister Ehud Barak told the Knesset on 24 November that Hizbollah now has 42,000 missiles, three times the total available at the time of the July-August 2006 war. Most of these are short-range unguided Katyusha-type rockets; but others have a range sufficient to reach all the significant populated centres in Israel as far south as Beersheba in the Negev desert (see “Hezbollah missile stock ‘tripled’“, BBC News, 24 November 2008).

A time of choice

None of this, of itself, means that Israel is preparing for a military attack on Iran. But there are dangers and these need to be put in context. The overwhelming view in security circles in Israel is that a nuclear-armed Iran is completely unacceptable, either now or in the long term (see “Israel won’t allow a nuclear Iran“, Jerusalem Post, 29 August 2008). In this perspective, Israel’s regional nuclear dominance is essential for its security for as long into the future as can be foreseen. A nuclear-armed Iran is out of the question in its own terms, but also because it might also set in motion a regional proliferation of nuclear capabilities involving Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Egypt and ultimately even Syria.  This might be over a twenty-to-thirty-year timescale but that is not long in terms of Israeli security thinking.

Furthermore, for the more immediate future, Israeli military planners can point to the potential for a rapid Iranian “break-out” from its current civil nuclear-power ambitions. There are a number of western analysts – usually but not always of a hawkish disposition – who claim that Iran will shortly have enough low-enriched uranium to be able to run it through the centrifuge cascades. They would further enrich it to the point where there might be enough weapons-grade material for a single crude “gun-type” uranium-based bomb (see William J Broad & David E Sanger, “Iran Said to Have Nuclear Fuel for One Weapon“, New York Times, 19 November 2008).   

Whether Iran has the technology to actually produce such a device is unclear, and there have been reports that Iran’s supplies of uranium ore are so contaminated with heavy metals that the resultant bomb would not work. No one can really be sure; in any case, producing a nuclear arsenal that could serve any kind of military purpose could still take years and there is no indication that Iran intends to take this path. From the Israeli perspective, though, the possession by Iran of even one “inefficient” device would be an act of huge political symbolism, both in terms of domestic Israeli concern and its perception of its military status across the region.   

In one sense, none of these short-term developments matter as much as the real concerns among Israeli military strategists. This is that the Iranians do not seek to develop nuclear weapons in the coming years. Instead they work hard to develop their civil nuclear infrastructure – building more nuclear power stations (six more are planned after Bushehr), as well as research reactors and enrichment plants (see “Russia and Iran: crisis of the west, rise of the rest“, 21 August 2008). All the time, they would be acquiring comprehensive nuclear expertise that could allow them to develop nuclear weapons at any time of their choosing over the next decade.

An Israeli nightmare

There is a further political context for this kind of worst-case scenario, one that combines developments in Iran and the United States (see Trita Parsi, “The Iran-Israel cold war“, 28 October 2005). Over the past couple of years, power has become more and more concentrated in Tehran in the hands of the elderly supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. For all his populist anti-Zionist rhetoric, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is little more than a puppet, but he is presiding over a deteriorating economy that combines 30+% inflation with a budgetary crisis, the latter worsened by the recent halving of oil prices to around $50 per barrel (”The party’s over”, Economist, 20 November 2008). He faces an election in June 2009 and it is by no means certain that Khamenei will back him; Khamenei might prefer another “principalist” who would help distance the supreme leader from the current problems.

This is becoming more and more necessary since, as one current analysis puts it: “the Islamic Republic is facing an urban, educated, healthy and informed population, but has yet to deliver political liberalisation to accommodate prevailing societal realities, while economic difficulties threaten living standards” (see “Republic Enemy: US policy and Iranian elections”, Jane’s Intelligence Review, 13 November 2008 [subscription only])

If Ahmadinejad is dumped and if a Barack Obama administration is willing to engage with Khamenei, then many things become possible (see Mehdi Khalaji, “Problem with Engaging Iran’s Supreme Leader“, RealClearPolitics, 13 November 2008). They could include a continuation of nuclear developments under really strict International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) supervision; serious diplomatic talks; and an easing of sanctions leading in turn to the ability to import badly needed oil technologies (see Jan De Pauw, “Iran, the United States and Europe: the nuclear complex“, 5 December 2007). The result could be something of an economic turnaround that would preserve the religious principalists under Khamenei and reduce the threat of a reformist comeback (see Nasrin Alavi, “Iranians’ interrupted freedom“, 8 October 2008).

For Israel’s strategists this is getting close to a nightmare scenario: a rearmed Hizbollah and an easing of US-Iranian relations while all along (at any time between around 2014 and 2040) the Iranians increase their ability to “go nuclear” at short notice.

A crucial timescale

This, again, does not make an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities imminent, but two further things have to be factored in. The first is that the Israeli Defence Forces, with all their supposed power, were efffectively humbled by Hizbollah in southern Lebanon in mid-2006 (see “Lebanon: the war after the war“, 11 October 2006). There is, as a consequence, a deep-seated desire to regain their status, both within Israel and across the region. An attack on Iran coupled with an overwhelming response to any Hizbollah action would do just that.

The second aspect is that an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities would not be comprehensive in its impact since Israel simply does not have sufficient air power. The intention, instead, would be to incite an Iranian military reaction directed not just at Israel but at US forces in the region, especially in Iraq. That would bring the United States into the war, which really would result in serious damage to Iran’s military capabilities, including its nuclear programme.

This is where the Barack Obama changeover is so significant. The George W Bush-Dick Cheney axis would be well-nigh certain to order just such a massive air power response. An Obama administration, on the other hand, might be just too canny to fall into the trap (see Karim Sadjadpour, “U.S. Engagement with Iran: A How To Guide“, Middle East Progress, 25 November 2008). It would recognise that US forces are so stretched in the region that a massive military response to Iranian attacks will pull the United States into a third war in the region.

This is why the current timescale is so crucial, specifically the next eight weeks through to Barack Obama’s inauguration. It also explains the deep unease in the upper echelons of several western European governments, amid a sincere hope that those eight weeks pass without incident.

This article is published by Paul Rogers, Global Intelligence News, and openDemocracy.net under a Creative Commons licence. You may republish it free of charge with attribution for non-commercial purposes following these guidelines.

About the author:

 In addition to his weekly openDemocracy column, Paul Rogers writes an international security monthly briefing for the Oxford Research Group; for details, click here

Paul Rogers’s most recent book is Why We’re Losing the War on Terror (Polity, 2007) – an analysis of the strategic misjudgments of the post-9/11 era and why a new security paradigm is needed

Image of the Natanz nuclear facility in Iran
Author: Hamed Saber
Wikimedia Commons.
Image of Ahmadiejad
Wikimedia Commons – Public Domain Image

 

Popularity: 35% [?]

DR CONGO: Peace in a Discriminatory State?

Global Intel Net / IPS

Terna Gyuse interviews ERNEST WAMBA DIA WAMBA, academic and senator

CAPE TOWN, Nov 28 (IPS) – War broke out in the eastern part of DRC again in August since which time 250,000 people have been displaced.

The CNDP headed by Laurent Nkunda has seized large parts of the province of North Kivu, threatening the provincial capital Goma.

In an email interview with IPS, Ernest Wamba dia Wamba — an academic and political theorist with perhaps unique insight and experience into the conflict in Congo as both the former leader of the Rally for Congolese Democracy during the Second Congo War (1998-2003) and as senator in the DRC’s parliament — examines the forces at work in the current crisis.

IPS: Ethnicity is often put forward as the key factor in the conflict in this region. You have a different view: what is the conflict really about?
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Popularity: 21% [?]

POLITICS-US: JFK Episode Suggests Obama’s Iraq Plan at Risk

Global Intelligence News / IPS

Analysis by Gareth Porter*

WASHINGTON, Nov 27 (IPS) – The decision by President-elect Barack Obama to keep Robert M. Gates on as defence secretary has touched off a debate over whether Obama can pursue his commitment to rapid withdrawal from Iraq even though Gates has defended George W. Bush’s surge policy and opposed Obama’s 16-month timetable for withdrawal.

Obama did not explicitly address Iraq at a press conference Wednesday, saying only that he would ”provide a vision” on foreign policy and ”make sure that my team is implementing” it. The appointments, which will be formally announced Monday, are expected to include Gates and Gen. James Jones as national security advisor, who has also been critical of Obama’s withdrawal timetable.

But the one historical precedent of a president seeking to get an unwilling military to go along with a presidential troop withdrawal plan suggests that Obama will be unable to implement his plan for Iraq without the defence secretary and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff fully on board.
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Popularity: 20% [?]

POLITICS-DR CONGO: The Devil You See…

Global Intelligence News / IPS

Analyis by Charles-M. Mushizi

KINSHASA, Nov 26 (IPS) – Few Congolese believe Laurent Nkunda is the man with whom to negotiate peace in North Kivu. The crux of the matter is economics and geopolitics — both greatly influenced by Western interests.

And yet because of the security issues in North Kivu, there seems no way around Nkunda, leader of National Congress for the People’s Defense (CNPD), if peace is to return to the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

Ahead of a cabinet reshuffle in Kinshasa last month, then-Minister of National Defense Tshikez Diemu dismissed Nkunda’s declaration of a unilateral ceasefire and call for political negotiations as ”childish babbling”. Tshikez did not make it into the new government.

Since then the CNPD has advanced steadily in North Kivu, displacing tens of thousands more civilians.
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Popularity: 16% [?]

RIGHTS-COLOMBIA: When Terror Wears a Uniform

Global Intelligence News / IPS

Constanza Vieira

SOACHA, Colombia, Nov 21 (IPS) – Herminia Lizarazo did not know what to respond when her seven-year-old grandson told her ”Grandma, I want to know what the army is for.” The boy, whose two uncles belong to the army in Colombia, wanted to wear a military costume for Halloween.

”My uncles dress like that, and they look really good,” he commented to her, arguing in favour of the costume he had chosen for the Oct. 31 holiday, which originated in the United States and has spread to many Latin American countries.

Lizarazo gave a brief personal account of her life, which she called ”a mother’s story,” at a special hearing on human rights in Ciudad Bolívar, Altos de Cazucá and Soacha — vast slum neighbourhoods that line the hills on the southern edge of Bogotá — held Thursday by the Senate Human Rights Commission.

In 1984, she fled the southern department (province) of Huila because of the leftist guerrillas. ”I had four little ones, and we came to Bogotá to try our luck,” she said. ”But four months later, my husband died, and I became a widow.”
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Popularity: 24% [?]

POLITICS: U.N. Seeks Large Military Force to Restrain Congo

Global Geopolitics Net Sites / IPS

Thalif Deen

UNITED NATIONS, Nov 20 (IPS) – The 15-member Security Council decided Thursday to bolster the 17,000-strong U.N. Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC) with an additional 3,000 troops, strengthening further its claim as the largest single peacekeeping force deployed by the United Nations.

But peace activists and human rights organisations remain sceptical whether a larger peacekeeping force is the answer to the crisis in turmoil-stricken African nation.

”The issue here is not the military strength of a peacekeeping force needed in eastern Congo,” the Rev. Gabriel Odima, president of the U.S.-based Africa Centre for Peace & Democracy, told IPS.

”The more relevant issue is why the international community is not addressing the root causes of the conflict in the region,” he said.
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Popularity: 18% [?]

SRI LANKA: Gov’t Celebrates Battle Gains in Tamil Areas

Global Intelligecnce News / IPS

IPS Correspondents

COLOMBO, Nov 19 (IPS) – Sri Lankan national flags hoisted at important locations and posters depicting army offensives against the Tamil rebels are part of week-long celebrations ordered by the government of President Mahinda Rajapakse to mark its latest battlefield victories in the north of the island.

”The nation salutes our brave soldiers who once again linked north and south by their victory at Pooneryn,” one such poster, with silhouetted images of soldiers, read.

”We join all peace-loving people of this country in saluting the security forces and the police for the brave and patriotic roles they have played in regaining the strategically and political important Pooneryn,” the ‘Daily Mirror’ said in a Nov. 17 editorial titled ‘Heroic Achievement’.

”The political leadership led by President Mahinda Rajapakse that pursued the aim of ridding the country of the curse of terrorism undoubtedly deserves the people’s encomiums,” the editorial said.
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Popularity: 17% [?]

POLITICS-DR CONGO: What Future For MONUC?

Global Geopolitics Net Sites / IPS

Stephanie Kale

KIGALI, Nov 19 (IPS) – Nigerian ex-president Olusegun Obasanjo, newly-appointed U.N. envoy in the Great Lakes Region, has visited both Congolese president Joseph Kabila and CNDP rebel leader General Laurent Nkunda, attempting to chisel the outlines of a new peace in the region.

Only hours after diplomats graciously hosted one another, fresh fighting between rebel and government forces erupted in Riwindi, a town 125 kilometres north of Goma, while peacekeepers in the area from UN mission in Congo, MONUC, retreated into their compound.

”We couldn’t go out or else we would get caught in the crossfire,” said Jean Paul Dietrich, the military spokesman for MONUC.

Many think that getting caught in the crossfire is MONUC’s duty, but although its mandate states that troops are to protect civilians, it also says they should not engage in fighting.

The familiar tension between MONUC’s mandate and its inability to use force against either rebel groups or government soldiers — who have been known to loot, pillage and rape in villages they retreat from — leads many Congolese civilians to criticize the effectiveness of MONUC.
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Popularity: 14% [?]

POLITICS-EAST AFRICA: Love Thy Neighbour

Global Geopolitics Net Sites / IPS

Charles Wachira

NAIROBI, Nov 18 (IPS) – Khartoum has long maintained a studious silence over its suspicions that the Kenyan government was assisting the Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA), which governs the semi-autonomous south of Sudan to replenish its armament.

But when pirates hijacked a Ukrainian cargo vessel loaded with arms off the coast of Somalia at the end of September, the National Congress Party (NCP) seized the opportunity to apply the screws.

A memorandum of understanding guaranteeing Kenya a monthly minimum of 500,000 barrels of cheap crude oil, signed between the two governments in late September 2008, became the first casualty, despite official claims by the Kenyan government that the controversial cargo belonged to ”the Kenyan people.”

Myriad reports from independent sources — most notably the East African Seafarers Association and the U.S. Government — suggest President Kibaki’s Government of National Unity (GNU) has been economical with the truth.
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Popularity: 13% [?]

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