US drones and Pakistan

S P SETH

Is US policy on the use of drones changing? President Obama’s recent speech at the US National Defence University would seem to suggest rather more a rethink than a change. He would like it to be based on firmer legal ground but he didn’t unveil any course of action to achieve it. His speech was a mishmash of wanting to follow a moral and legal code but unable to do so, as has been the case with Obama on most things. For a President who claims moral high ground, the revelations by the New York Times some time ago about drone targeting didn’t quite match up to this. Indeed, they were quite the opposite.

The Times reported that the Obama Administration held “Terror Tuesdays” meetings in which the President and his national security advisers discussed, which suspected terrorists should be assassinated by drones. And in about a third of these cases, Obama alone took responsibility for naming the targets. This was quite a shocking revelation about the President of the world’s most powerful country making decisions about whether or not someone will live sitting thousands of miles away from the targeted individual(s) and groups.

While the drone strikes started under the Bush presidency, their numbers exploded from about 50 (under Bush) to over 300 hundred under Obama. While these did kill some targeted terrorists, the resultant “collateral” damage in terms of civilian casualties, including women and children, was much greater, though there is no reliable tally. Amazing how we all have got used to the detestable description of civilian deaths as collateral damage! According to the New Yorker, after 2008, the CIA won approval for a category of drone attacks known as “signature strikes” in which, even without a specific target, an attack is justified by a pattern of behaviour, like young men test-firing their weapons or, perhaps, even celebratory firing at a community gathering.

Obama’s speech, though, seemed to suggest some softening of the drones’ policy. Before one is carried away, it is necessary to point out that droning as a policy instrument to hunt out suspected terrorists would continue. The recent drone killing of the Pakistani Taliban’s second-ranking leader, Waliur Rahman, is a case in point, so soon after Obama’s speech. At this point it is important to stress that Pakistan’s political/military establishment has been, over a period, complicit in the US policy of droning terror suspects in the borderlands between Pakistan and Afghanistan, even as it conveniently blamed the US for these strikes.

It is only after the Raymond Davis affair when the US secret agent killed two Pakistanis early in 2011 that US-Pakistan relations became testy.  And they got worse after the US commandos killed Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad. However, despite all the acrimony, the US satellite intelligence has most likely been useful to the Pakistani army in the Swat valley where the Pakistani Taliban almost succeeded in creating a secure foothold to expand their territorial control. But they were halted and even pushed out, though the situation remains unstable. In this situation, some of the high level drone killings, including that of Waliur Rahman, might not be unwelcome; though in today’s politically charged environment nobody in Pakistan’s establishment will admit to it.

The recent elections in Pakistan further raised the temperature on US drone killings. Two major political parties, led respectively by Nawaz Sharif and Imran Khan, cited this as a major complication in US-Pakistan relations. And they both committed themselves to dealing with this issue, and the Taliban question, first, by seeking to stop the use of drones over Pakistan and, second, by starting a political dialogue with the Pakistani Taliban. On both these counts, Waliur Rahman’s death is likely to create fresh complications. Besides, a number of deaths and injuries from blowing up of a university bus in Quetta and attacks on a nearby hospital will make the government’s task of a dialogue with the militants quite difficult. As for drone strikes, even though President Obama made some encouraging gesture in his congratulatory message to Nawaz Sharif (now Prime Minister) on his election victory, the latter would need to tread cautiously in his opening moves that would be watched carefully by many people in Pakistan. Sharif wouldn’t like to be seen as caving in to the US pressure.

The problem in US-Pakistan relations is not just between the governments in the two countries, which in itself is quite formidable. At a more fundamental level, a vast majority of people in Pakistan disapproves of the United States and its policies. And the drone strikes have come to symbolize the low level of their relationship. Therefore, any turnaround would require an important shift in the US policy on drone killings. The US, on the other hand, would like Pakistan to be able to exercise control over terrorists in the tribal areas along the Pakistan-Afghan border. Which is easier said than done. It has the look sometimes of an untamed wild frontier with no government control on both sides. That makes it a haven for terrorists, extremists and al Qaeda elements. In this situation, the US authorities have taken on themselves the role of judge, jury and executioner in another country infringing its national sovereignty.

Pakistan, of course, has been complicit at times and, at other times, unwilling or unable to take a determined stand.  The US has argued that the drone strikes are precise in hitting the targets and the resultant collateral damage is minimal compared to comparable action on the ground by troops. The US certainly has been able to eliminate some high value targets but at what cost?  The cost of turning almost an entire country into hating the United States is pretty high, by any reckoning. At the same time, this has the potential of turning many Pakistanis into sympathizers and/or even recruits of the Taliban cause. This is certainly something the US should ponder about, and initiate some concrete action to halt drone strikes. This will be helped considerably if the new government in Pakistan were to succeed in asserting control over the Pakistan-Afghan tribal belt to deny terrorists the safe haven they have come to exploit to Pakistan’s own great detriment.

However, any effective and lasting solution might have to await the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan by end-2014. In the meantime, some political fence-mending with Pakistan’s new government  is all that one can hope for.

Japan’s WW11 dilemma

S P SETH

Toru Hashimoto, the populist mayor of Osaka, Japan’s third largest city, made an outrageous statement recently justifying the systemic prostitution of Asian women by Japanese soldiers in WWII. He said, “ When [Japanese] soldiers are risking their lives by running through storms of bullets and you want to give these emotionally charged soldiers a rest somewhere, it’s clear that you need a comfort-women system.” Hashimoto is a prominent politician and a leader of the Japan Restoration Association with 57 legislators in parliament; and is considered a potential prime minister. He has since qualified his remarks but it doesn’t make things any better. He is not the only Japanese politician seeking to justify and/or whitewash Japan’s terrible wartime record. Indeed, there is a whole crop of them, particularly among the ultra-right, who believe that Japan was not the perpetrator of the war in Asia-Pacific but rather its victim.

Which is not to say that Japan didn’t suffer when Tokyo was virtually destroyed with the US dropping incendiary bombs on the city towards the close of WW11. Worse still, Japan was the first and the only casualty so far of the US atomic bombing of its two cities, Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Despite all the lame justifications by the US government for such bombing, like it was meant to bring the war to an end and save American lives, it seemed more like punishing Japan and in the process to test the new weapon live. Japan was already on its knees when it was hit with atomic bombs.

But there is no argument that Japan was the aggressor from the time when it started to invade and occupy Chinese territory in the 1930s; and that was before the attack on Pearl Harbour in December 1941that brought the US into the Pacific theatre of WW11. China was the early victim of Japanese aggression, followed by almost all countries of Southeast Asia. The argument sometimes proffered that Japan’s occupation of Asian countries was designed to liberate them from colonial rule or helped them in that direction, is absurd and insulting.

To this day, many Japanese are unhappy that Japan was branded an aggressor in WW11 with a long list of wartime crimes. Even present Prime Minister Shinzo Abe seems to question Japan’s description as an aggressor in WW11, maintaining that the definition of “invasion” was relative--- relative to what is not quite clear. Though the Japanese government was made to apologize under international pressure for systemic prostitution of Asian women by Japanese soldiers (in 1993) and in 1995 to nations that suffered under Japanese wartime aggression, it somehow seemed to lack conviction; considering that it took Japan so long, after the conclusion of the war in 1945, to reach that point.

As against this, successive governments in Germany were much more forthcoming to apologize about its Nazi past, particularly the Holocaust of Jews. Which would explain, partially at least, why its political and economic rehabilitation as a normal state happened so fast. And now it is the virtual leader of the European Union, while Japan is still involved in the semantics of its relative role as a perpetrator or a victim.

Even today, Japan’s ultra-nationalists are unhappy with their government’s apologies, back in the nineties, for war crimes. So much so that Prime Minister Abe’s recent comments about the relative nature of “invasion” has led some to fear that his government might seek to modify or repudiate the earlier apology that Japan proffered. It probably wouldn’t happen for fear of creating a political storm in the region. But this sort of revisionist Japanese politics, even if not affecting all of Japan’s political spectrum, remains a problem in Japan’s relations with its neighbors, particularly with China and South Korea, the first where Japanese army committed some of the most horrific wartime crimes dating back to the 1930s, and the second where Japan’s colonial record got even worse during WW11.

With both these countries, Japan is involved in maritime disputes. At a time when Japan’s maritime dispute with China in the East China Sea, simultaneously with Beijing’s disputes in South China Sea with its Southeast Asia neighbours, was creating a certain empathy between Japan and its Asian neighbours; Osaka mayor Hashimoto’s remarks justifying systemic prostitution of Asian women during WW11, and Prime Minister Abe’s equivocation over the his country’s apology for its wartime aggression, is likely to further tar Japan’s image.

It is difficult to comprehend that even after several decades of  wartime atrocities, some quite responsible Japanese politicians, and others not so responsible, keep insisting that Japan was somehow wronged or misunderstood about its role in WW11. Japan has also been involved in an ongoing acrimonious argument/dispute with its Asian neighbours over the revision of history textbooks, taught in Japanese schools, that tend to whitewash its dark role in WW11.

In the same way, visits by Japanese political leaders to the Yasukini shrine that houses the graves of Japan’s war dead, including those convicted of war crimes in WW11, tend to rile and provoke some of its Asian neighbours. Indeed, during his recent US visit Prime Minister Abe sought to justify such visits as a normal activity, like in other countries, to pay respect to their fallen soldiers. The difference, though, is that Japan’s cemetery also includes the graves of top Japanese generals convicted of WW11 war crimes. In other words, during their visits to the Yasukini shrine to pay homage, Japan’s political leaders are also venerating the convicted “heroes” who were responsible for Japan’s role in WW11. An apparent solution might have been to bury them elsewhere than in the national cemetery for all the war dead of all times. But this is not the case and it continues to be a provocative issue for some Asian countries.

As long as Japan with an important political constituency that seeks to sanitize Japan’s wartime role or even repudiate it,  it will continue to create problems in Japan’s relations with its Asian neighbours from time to time. And Japan will have no one else to blame for this than the inability of its over-charged politicians, like mayor Hashimoto, who continue to deny that Japan did anything wrong in WW11.

Europe’s long night of uncertainty

S P SETH

There is not a day when you don’t hear or read about how bad things are in Europe. For instance, the unemployment rate in Spain and Greece is 27 per cent while the youth unemployment rate is inching close to 60 per cent. The overall unemployment rate in Europe is around 12 per cent. Even its healthy economies, like Germany, are close to recession. France is now in recession, with a negative growth rate. So much was written recently about the economic disaster overtaking Cyprus, an otherwise idyllic Mediterranean island with a population of just over 1 million people. Quite a few of the euro zone countries are in intensive care, barely surviving on bailouts by the troika of European Commission, European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Even Italy, Europe’s fourth biggest economy, is doddering, not knowing what tomorrow will bring. To continue receiving bailout funds, these countries have to undertake specified austerity packages to cut their budget deficits, necessitating drastic reduction in employment, pension entitlements, health, social welfare and so on.

It is, therefore, not surprising that these countries, like Greece, Spain, Portugal and Cyprus (Ireland seems to be managing a bit better), are going through social and political turmoil. Worse still, the new rescue package, starting with Cyprus, is a mix of bail out and bail in to deal with its economic crisis. What it means is that to receive external emergency funds, Cyprus is required to raise significant amount of funds internally. That will involve raiding depositors’ savings in the country’s banks. Which is quite scary if it becomes the norm for future bailouts in euro zone. Apart from the usual package of austerity measures, harsh as they are, people might not always be sure that they have their savings to bank on.

Even as Europe keeps drifting further into a crisis mode, notwithstanding hopeful sounding notes at times, the debate continues about how best to deal with the situation. The prevailing wisdom is that the European Union, particularly its 17 members euro zone, must put its financial house in order by significantly reducing their respective budget deficit and debt. This, hopefully, will generate a process of sustainable growth for European economies. David Stockman has argued in his best-seller, The Great Deformation, that when an economy hits hard times, the government should let the economic crisis play itself out rather than use fiscal and monetary instruments to prop up. In his view, attempting to resuscitate a really sick economy with injections of more money leads to cycles of booms and busts. As he puts it, without periodic “purges of excess and error”, artificial stimulation will only lead to greater economic disaster.  

This is broadly the approach that Germany, the leading economy of the euro zone, is advancing by way of austerity packages to bring debt and deficit under control. Lately, though, there seems to be some softening of this position but austerity still remains the goal.

Another approach is the Keynisian model of lifting a recessionary or depressed economy through more public spending, even if it initially leads to increased debt and deficit.  The United States government has been experimenting with a mix of increased public spending and targeted spending cuts, the result of a tug-of-war between the Congress and the White House. While President Obama would like to further stimulate the economy, the Republican-dominated Congress (in the House of Representatives) would rather cut public spending drastically to reduce debt and deficit--- something along the lines of Europe’s austerity package.

The argument against austerity is that it is self-defeating and counter-productive, as it will further depress an already ailing economy. A revived economy through greater public spending will start generating more revenue, helping to repay debts incurred during recession. There will be more employment, greater investment, more consumer spending, creating a virtuous cycle of general economic prosperity. This is the theory. It is quite possible, though, that more debt and deficit to stimulate the economy of a country might worsen the economy through a spiral of deficit and debt.  In other words, the Keynisian solution of greater public spending to lift an economy out of recession or depression is not a panacea.

There are structural problems too. Today’s recession is largely caused by a financial industry gone berserk with dodgy financial products and lending practices. The banks, insurance companies and the likes went on a lending spree that was supposed to take care of itself. The subprime housing crisis in the United States was a classical example of it. The European banks also bought into those shoddy securities bunching together all sorts of financial products of dubious value.

 Besides, in Europe, some of the euro zone countries found easy access to cheap and plentiful credits after they joined the monetary union and ran heavy debts as proportions of their GDPs.  It was all supposedly self-sustaining as long as the credit chain was kept going. But, as it happened, the chain broke off at places when some creditors wanted to cash in their chips creating a ripple-like effect. The euro zone is trying to deal with this through a major spring-cleaning operation of indebted member countries through austerity packages. Even if it works, it will take a long time and much more misery before any real recovery.

In the meantime, the added economic misery of people from austerity regimes is creating problems of legitimacy for the liberal capitalist system. Ever since the collapse of the Soviet Union in the nineties, western system of democracy and its concomitant free market capitalism has been hailed as the ultimate answer to the world’s problems. Indeed, Francis  Fukuyama, an American political philosopher, wrote a book titled, The End of History and the Last Man. Which broadly argued that the successful liberal western capitalist system was the culmination of human striving for a perfect system that has finally arrived. As for the erratic nature of capitalism, there was no need to worry as markets tended to be self-correcting. The ongoing global economic malaise has put paid to the so-called self-correcting mechanism of global markets, hence requiring economic bailouts and regulations.

The austerity regimes in Europe are causing tremendous social unrest in some countries. Which, in turn, is creating problems of political legitimacy of the system. The elections held in some of the affected European countries to break the political logjam has tended to put together coalitions that lack popular support. This has happened in Greece, Italy and is likely to become the norm wherever and whenever elections are held in other European   countries. There is thus an emerging crisis of governance in Europe, as well as in the United States where Congress and President are at odds over questions of debt and deficit.  

And if the economic situation doesn’t improve, this crisis of governance is likely to deepen social unrest, possibly leading to violence. In other words, the European Union is in for a long night of uncertainty.

Note: This article was first published in the Daily Times.

Contact: sushilpseth@yahoo.com.au