Foreign Affairs

Inside the Attempt to Cancel NatCon Brussels

Conservatives are apparently no longer welcome in Europe. What’s next?

(Saurabh Sharma/Twitter)

Chaos erupted at the National Conservatism conference (“NatCon”) in Brussels today when police ordered the event to be shut down for causing a “public disturbance.”

Hundreds of attendees gathered in the EU capital to hear speeches by Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban, the Brexit Party founder Nigel Farage, the UK’s former Home Secretary Suella Braverman, and more right-wing figures and politicians.

Back on April 13, the organizers of NatCon shared that the conference would be moving to a different location after their host caved to political pressure from politicians such as Brussels’s Mayor Phillipe Close.

Even after finding a last minute replacement venue, NatCon shared that they were still facing pressure to cancel the event altogether, just hours leading up to its start.

As the conference opened, Yoram Hazony, chairman of the Edmund Burke Foundation, which hosts NatCon, said to the crowd, “This is now the third event space where we have attempted to host a National Conservative Conference in Brussels. This is an age in which we can’t expect basic decency or grace from those who are our political opponents.”

The conference proceeded over the next few hours, with a slew of speakers having their chance to address the audience. When Nigel Farage took to the stage, he and his audience did not know what was about to happen. His words were ironically foreshadowing: “If anyone said to me that Brexit wasn’t the right thing to do—leaving this place, recognizing you can’t be a democratic, sovereign nation state and be a member of this monstrous union—they would now tell me: WE WERE RIGHT TO LEAVE!”

However, just minutes into his speech, the Brussels police arrived at the scene, citing “public disturbance” as the reason for shutting the event down.

Police blockaded the venue, telling attendees that if they left, they would not be allowed back in. According to NatCon, “Delegates have limited access to food and water, which are being prevented from delivery. Is this what city mayor Emir Kir is aiming for?”

Saurabh Sharma, president of American Moment and executive director of the Edmund Burke Foundation, who had chaired a panel discussion at the event, shared an image of the chaos on X:

Gladden Pappin, President of the Hungarian Institute of International Affairs, told The American Conservative,

Brussels has been hounding Hungary for supposed rule of law violations for years. But today in the heart of the European Union, the mayor of Brussels forced the National Conservatism conference out of two venues and is trying to expel it from a third, against the will of the owner. Brussels police have barricaded the doors of the conference location, citing the mayor’s criticism of the ideas being discussed and claiming that the conference is under antifa threat. Conference attendees can leave but not return. This is the reality of liberalism: while draping itself in “norms” and the “rule of law,” it has become an aggressive ideology bent on excluding conservative viewpoints. Unfortunately for them, the truth can’t be excluded.

Hazony also spoke to TAC, saying, “We decided to hold NatCon Brussels 2 because Europe is facing a choice between preserving independent nations or descending into totalitarian liberal tyranny. This ridiculous suppression of political speech only underlines this truth. Make no mistake, this is the entrenched political cartel in Brussels doing everything in and out of their power to stop any challenge to their rule.”

Rod Dreher, resident of Hungary, speaker at NatCon, and TAC contributing editor, told TAC via email, “The Islamo-left municipal government, collaborating with Antifa, are showing the world the kind of Europe they will impose if they aren’t stopped. I never imagined I would live to see something like this in the free and democratic West. Yet here we are. Nothing anybody will have said from the NatCon stage will speak as powerfully about the dark realities of the moment as what the Brussels authorities have done.”

While stuck inside the venue, the speakers are carrying on with the event. The question remains: Is free speech still a reality in the European Union? And when will this dark force of suppression make its way across the Atlantic?

The post Inside the Attempt to Cancel NatCon Brussels appeared first on The American Conservative.

Foreign Affairs

Would Israel Go Nuclear Against Iran?

And will the U.S. be dragged along for the ride?

In August 1961, during a period when tensions between Washington and Moscow were at a high point, Admiral Konstantin I. Derevyanko penned a letter to Premier Krushchev. His purpose was to alert Krushchev to what the Admiral called the “nuclear romanticism” of the Soviet General Staff. The Admiral’s words still carry the force of logic and common sense and are still worthy of our attention today:

Which planet do these people [the Soviet General Staff] intend to live on in the future, and to which Earth do they plan to send their troops to conquer territories?… By this indiscriminately massive use of nuclear weapons on a small and narrow area like Western Europe, we would not only be accepting millions of radioactively contaminated civilians, but, because of the prevailing westerly winds, would also be radioactively contaminating millions of our own people for decades—our armed forces and the populations of the socialist countries, including our own country as far as the Urals.

According to an unnamed official of the U.S. Government, President Joe Biden has told Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that the United States will not participate in a counterstrike against Iran. This is gratifying news.

Israel does not contemplate operations against Iran or any other state that challenges Israel’s bid for strategic dominance in exclusively conventional military terms. In other words, for Israel’s national leadership, the use of a nuclear weapon is always on the table. Israel’s fundamental deterrence is still asymmetric nuclear capability.

Until now, Washington’s unconditional support for any action Netanyahu wants to take has made Washington an accomplice in Israel’s deliberate slaughter and starvation of Gaza’s Arab population and in the Israeli attack on the Iranian consulate in Syria, a violation of international law. This collaborative support erodes the power and authority of the American People.

It’s time to ask whether American national interest and common sense are finally intruding in the formulation and conduct of U.S. foreign policy. No one in the United States, Europe, or Asia benefits economically, politically, or financially from a regional war in the Middle East that closes the Straits of Hormuz and potentially invites direct Russian military intervention on Iran’s side. Is it also possible that Biden might object to the destruction of life in Gaza?

In this connection, the revelation that Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin allegedly asked Minister Yoav Gallant, his Israeli counterpart, to inform the United States in advance of any possible counterattack by Israel is small comfort. Americans should not forget that Netanyahu wields considerable influence on the Hill, and in the mainstream media. Already legislators are falling all over themselves to send additional billions to Israel while U.S. borders remain open, Americans die of fentanyl poisoning, criminality rises, and children are being trafficked.

It may be too soon to answer the question of whether U.S. foreign policy is changing. Why? Because Israeli Media reports that there were intense debates during the last two meetings of the Israeli war Cabinet on whether to launch a large-scale strike against Iran. Such an attack would likely target Iranian command-and-control, potential long-range missile sites, airbases, naval bases, and oil infrastructure. On the other hand, there was reportedly a discussion about an Israeli response that might be more “measured” to prevent a wider regional conflict.

What Americans know is that Iran targeted Israeli military installations, not Israel’s population. And Iran used a small fraction of its arsenal and very few of their newest weapons. Hezbollah effectively sat out the event. Though it is speculated that two Israeli airfields and possibly an intelligence station on the Golan Heights sustained some damage, the entire Iranian operation had a theatrical air about it.

No one was surprised. Certainly not the Israeli air forces or their colleagues in the U.S. and British air forces. As noted above, with few exceptions, most of the 300-plus drones and missiles were intercepted and shot down.

Nevertheless, Iran understood what was required to overwhelm Israeli and allied air defenses. We may infer that there was also a desire in Tehran to avoid escalating the conflict. Consider what would happen if Iran launched 1500 drones and 800 ballistic missiles over several hours, or even days. Iran made its point. It’s simple: Iran can destroy Israel. Tehran created new conditions of deterrence that favor Iran.

Iran announced through their UN mission that they consider the issue of the Israeli strikes on their consular offices in Syria closed. But nothing is solved. Little has changed. A million are starving in Gaza, and Americans should expect the Israeli campaign of murder and expulsion in Gaza to resume shortly.

As a result, Netanyahu will demand the subjugation or destruction of Iran or any Muslim entity that challenges Israeli strategic dominance. For Netanyahu it’s a matter of existential importance to Israel. Yet the U.S. did not commit to attacking Iran. This is unacceptable to Netanyahu, and he will work to alter Washington’s position.

Under the circumstances, Washington should expect Israel to employ whatever military power is at its disposal, including nuclear weapons, to destroy Iran’s strategic power. Destroying Iran’s underground nuclear facilities has been a goal for a very long time.

Moscow, however, will not tolerate a devastating attack on Iran. The question is whether Biden will tolerate such an attack and continue to indulge Israeli operations in Gaza. Perhaps Biden should pause to read Admiral Derevyanko’s 1961 advice to Krushchev before he answers.

The post Would Israel Go Nuclear Against Iran? appeared first on The American Conservative.

The last time Persians attacked the Holy Land, they had the Jewish forces on their side. According to Antiochus, the Sasanian capture of Jerusalem resulted in the death of around 60,000 Byzantine Christians. Nearly 1,400 years later, retaliatory Iranian missiles struck Israel in a conflict where the Persians and Jews are on the opposing sides and the world’s still predominantly Christian hegemon is just on the margins as a helpless bystander. I guess that is something of an improvement, although not by much.

It is too fluid a situation to comment in detail, but, for what it’s worth, it appears that the Iranians wanted to keep the attack within that goldilocks threshold with ample warnings ahead. They had backchannels open with the U.S. They informed Iraq about the flight path and trajectory of their missiles. The choice of weaponry—no one intent on waging war uses subsonic drones that take hours to reach the airspace of the enemy to start an air attack followed by a few ballistic missiles, thereby letting enemy air defenses go fully active—was another signal that Iranian actions were predicated on reestablishing deterrence, and not escalation.

Iran’s official statement was measured, and targeted towards signaling the U.S. that Tehran wants to avoid a full-scale war.

“Conducted on the strength of Article 51 of the UN Charter pertaining to legitimate defense, Iran’s military action was in response to the Zionist regime’s aggression against our diplomatic premises in Damascus. The matter can be deemed concluded. However, should the Israeli regime make another mistake, Iran’s response will be considerably more severe. It is a conflict between Iran and the rogue Israeli regime, from which the U.S. MUST STAY AWAY!”

An almost Trumpian ending to a cautiously worded statement that attests three points: the conflict in Iran’s eyes is over, Iran will have to respond to further Israeli action, and the U.S. and Iran are not enemies—this is not between us.

The American response was equally measured. A DoD source stated, “Our forces remain postured to provide additional defensive support and to protect U.S. forces operating in the region.” Note the emphasis here on defensive actions.

Nevertheless, war has a momentum of its own. For all the Iranian calculations, neither the U.S. nor Iran controls how Israel will react.

Ultimately, however, America is facing the same problem as any hegemonic empire faces, the lack of control over its protectorates and peripheries and contradictory lobbying forces within the core. President Biden cannot control the Muslims chanting “death to America” in Minnesota and Michigan, a core constituency of the Democratic party who refuse to assimilate to the American mainstream. He also is unable to control Benjamin Netanyahu—and Biden is also determined to “stand by” Israel whatever be the cost. There’s of course no incentive for Israel to be minimalist in war aims, just as there is no incentive for Ukraine to listen to Washington, given that they have both been assured of unlimited American support.

The Jewish revolt against the Byzantines that invited the Persian conquest started when rabid Christians banned Jews from Jerusalem (despite opposition from a relatively more liberal Empress Eudocia). The Byzantine behemoth was unable to control ethnic rivalry within the empire and was therefore helpless in matters of foreign affairs. Perhaps there is a hidden lesson somewhere, about detachment abroad and assimilation within.

The post The Clear Case for Staying Out of the Brewing Iran War appeared first on The American Conservative.

Foreign Affairs

Benjamin Netanyahu Is Trying to Drag the U.S. Into War With Iran

And it looks as if Biden might let him.

There is a line from the immortal anti-war poem i sing of Olaf glad and big, in which the protagonist, Olaf, a World War I–era conscientious objector who eventually dies in prison at the hands of the state, declares, “There is some sh*t I will not eat.”

The basic problem we confront in the Middle East today is that when it comes from Benjamin Netanyahu, there is nothing Joe Biden will not eat.

Biden has been the object of Bibi’s bullying for years. Netanyahu delighted in humiliating then–Vice President Biden on the latter’s trip to Israel in 2010, announcing on the day of his arrival a massive expansion of “settlements” in east Jerusalem. At some point, one would think, it would become a question of self-respect, of manhood—for Biden to stand up to Netanyahu.

But no.

Yet Biden is hardly alone among the American political and media class who assume the prone position when the Israeli Duce saunters into the room. Of course, there was a time when American officials like Secretary of State James A. Baker were comfortable telling Bibi where to go. Even Bill Clinton, who slobbered over the Israel lobby, found Netanyahu so obnoxious that he reportedly snapped, “Who’s the f*cking superpower here?”

But that is long in the past. Both the lobby and the Israeli government have long known that ol’ Joe marches in time to the tune they call. At a fundraiser at a D.C. hotel in December, Biden told his donors, “We’re not going to do a damn thing other than protect Israel in the process. Not a single thing.”

He’s been as good as his word. Biden’s response to Netanyahu’s savagery has been to grant Israel carte blanche—in addition to what has been described as “ unprecedented” intelligence sharing and diplomatic cover, Biden has approved more than 100 arms sales to the Israeli regime since October 7th, including, according to a report in the Times of Israel, “thousands of precision-guided munitions, small-diameter bombs and other weapons.” Last month, the administration shipped over 1,800 2,000-pound MK84 bombs and 500 500-pound MK82 bombs to the Israelis. The former have, according to a Washington Post report, “been linked to previous mass-casualty events throughout Israel’s military campaign in Gaza.” To give a sense of proportionality, consider that the US dropped a total of one 2,000 pound bomb during its campaign against ISIS. Israel has dropped hundreds on Gaza. Meanwhile, Biden is currently lobbying Congress for an $18 billion arms transfer that would send dozens of F-15 fighter jets to Israel.

Having destroyed the open-air prison that was Gaza (though without, it should be pointed out, doing much in the way of degrading Hamas) Netanyahu has set his sights on bigger things. What Bibi now wants is to provoke a wider war in order to bring the U.S. in and place American power in the service of his long-held dream of striking Iran.

On April 1st, he took steps to make the dream a reality when Israel bombed an Iranian embassy compound in Damascus that killed two Iranian generals and five officers. Former CIA analyst Paul Pillar has written that “hitting the embassy compound constituted a direct attack on Iran.”

An unprovoked attack on a diplomatic compound is a flagrant violation of international laws and norms, but when has that ever counted for anything among the Israeli (and American) governing elite?

That attack was understandably overshadowed here by the senseless, obscene slaughter of seven aid workers from World Central Kitchen that very same day. But of the two, it was the attack on the Iranian diplomatic compound that may have the more serious strategic ramifications—depending on whether Iran responds in kind, and how.

The Syrian compound strike was clearly carried out with the goal of dragging Washington into a war the IDF could never hope to win on its own, barring the use of nuclear weapons—of which Israel has hundreds thanks to its spies pilfering the technology from the U.S.

The state of play then: Biden’s own USAID administrator, Samantha Power, just admitted that famine has broken out in Gaza. The IDF has slaughtered over 33,000 thousand civilians, including over 25,000 women and children, while barely making a dent against Hamas. But the last point matters little because the war was always about ethnically cleansing the Gaza Strip. And once that goal is in the rearview, Bibi’s war aims will transform and become about Iran and its proxy, Hezbollah. As it happens, this is a war that Netanyahu and his neoconservative supporters have been thirsting over for many years.

In response to yesterday’s largely symbolic Iranian drone attack, Biden reiterated his pledge of “ironclad” support for Israel. And overall, the president’s reaction to the Iranian counter-attack was in keeping with his history of subservience to Israel, cutting short a weekend in Delaware to scurry back to the White House in order to speak with his actual boss, the Prime Minister, and meet with members of the National Security Council.

So far, Iran seems to be trying to “thread the needle”—by responding in such a way that satisfies their population’s (understandable) demands for revenge while stopping short of triggering World War III. The big question is whether the Iranian attack will prompt Netanyahu and his American enabler-in-chief to do just that.

This article has been updated.

The post Benjamin Netanyahu Is Trying to Drag the U.S. Into War With Iran appeared first on The American Conservative.

Foreign Affairs

The 2024 Turkish Elections Were a Warning for the Global Right

Turkish conservatives must adapt in the face of voter dissatisfaction.

In 1977, Israel witnessed what was termed the “mahapach,” a Hebrew word for upheaval or revolution, as the right-liberal Likud party ended 28 years of left-center governance. A similar seismic shift seems to be unfolding in Turkey, echoing through the corridors of power in Ankara to the streets of Istanbul and beyond. The 2024 local elections in Turkey have emerged as a watershed moment for the nation’s conservative and nationalist factions, indicating a tectonic shift in the political landscape that may have profound implications for the country’s future.

On March 31, 2024, Turkey’s local elections set a different tone from past polls. The People’s Alliance, a coalition composed of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), experienced a notable setback, losing control over several key municipalities. This marked a departure from the fervor that characterized the May 2023 General Elections, with the repercussions of this electoral outcome poised to significantly influence the role of political actors in Turkish society.

The Republican People’s Party (CHP) emerged as the primary victor, relegating the AKP to second place—a development viewed as a severe blow by Turkish conservatives and right-wingers. Various factions within these groups have speculated on the reasons behind their defeat; a prevalent theory suggests that the electorate aimed to send a stern message to the ruling elite due to the country’s economic downturn. This perspective finds resonance within the context of Turkish right-wing politics, where the relationship between conservative social groups and their political representatives is not based on mutual exchange.

A deep-rooted trust in strong leadership, coupled with an unwavering belief in the leader’s infallibility, fosters an organic bond between the leader and his party, rendering internal reforms challenging. Additionally, the mystical reverence for the state held by Turkish conservatives discourages public dissent. In this vein, the local elections presented an unprecedented opportunity for Turkish conservatives to voice their political discontent in a dramatic fashion, relegating the ruling party to the opposition benches at a local level.

Moreover, the 2024 local elections signify a setback for the Turkish right at large, with the exception of the New Welfare Party (YRP), led by Fatih Erbakan, which seemed to defy the trend by embracing the political legacy and rhetoric of his father, Necmettin Erbakan. The YRP’s platform, focusing on anti-vaccination, nationalist-Islamist themes, and a number of other distinct policy propositions, unexpectedly attracted up to 7 percent of the vote. Disenchanted AKP supporters found refuge in the YRP, buoyed by the belief that such a shift would not undermine the AKP’s standing. Post-election analyses, however, indicate that the People’s Alliance’s vote share hovered around 49 percent, with the anti-Erdogan coalition slightly leading at 50.2 percent. Despite the contraction of mainstream right-wing parties, this does not necessarily denote a paradigm shift among the right-wing electorate.

The relegation of AKP to second place has ignited fervent debate among Turkey’s right-wing circles. While some attribute this decline to economic malaise and poor candidate selection, a broader analysis reveals macro-scale factors at play. The genesis of AKP can be traced back to societal divisions between the periphery and the center, propelled by the capitalist transformation of the Turkish economy and the centralization of state bureaucracy. As the political voice of the marginalized, AKP initially rose to prominence. Over time, however, the party’s pivot towards conservative and nationalist rhetoric led to the alienation of its pragmatic and liberal elements, culminating in the creation of a new “other.”

The “iron law of oligarchy,” by which decisions by a select party elite began facing rejection at the grassroots level, and an identity crisis within conservatism underscore a complex milieu. The conservatives’ prolonged tenure in power, coupled with an increasingly intimate relationship with the state apparatus, has engendered a new political orthodoxy, sidelining dissenters as security threats. Moreover, the inability of the conservative ideology to adapt to changing circumstances, gravitating towards a geopolitical revisionist stance, has surfaced as a salient challenge.

The central dilemma for advancing a conservative agenda in Turkey revolves around the political and geopolitical ramifications of Islam. AKP’s challenge in crafting a comprehensive conservative doctrine is compounded by transnational religious affiliations, notably the concept of the ummah. This global Islamic solidarity occasionally hampers the full realization of a national identity, as demonstrated in debates over Turkey’s trade relations with Israel. AKP’s foreign policy rhetoric since the Arab Spring, aimed at addressing the ummah’s issues under Turkey’s stewardship, has witnessed a recalibration post-2020, yet its societal echoes persist.

Looking ahead, the ramifications of the 2024 elections for Turkey are poised to be far-reaching, particularly in shaping Turkey’s engagement with global powers like the U.S. ahead of the 2028 elections. Turkey’s economic reliance on external financing underscores the necessity of strengthening partnerships with the EU and the U.S. A potential alignment between Erdogan and a Trump-led U.S. could foster cooperation on regional and global fronts, sharing a mutual understanding. This could, consequently, bolster Erdogan’s influence within the realm of domestic politics.

Nevertheless, a glaring deficiency within Turkish conservatism is the lack of engagement with conservative factions beyond its borders, contributing to the stagnation of its domestic agenda. Fostering ties with American conservatism could serve as a pivotal step in rejuvenating Turkey’s conservative movement.

While the local election results in Turkey spell a significant setback for the conservative-nationalist bloc, it is imperative not to overlook the nearly 49 percent vote share secured by the right. This percentage embodies the most significant political capital for the right wing as it gears up for the 2028 elections, signaling that the conservative base, although shaken, remains a formidable force in Turkish politics.

The post The 2024 Turkish Elections Were a Warning for the Global Right appeared first on The American Conservative.

Foreign Affairs

EXCLUSIVE: The Biden Administration Just Admitted It Has Massively Undercounted Ukraine Aid

The new data, given to Sen. Vance and other conservatives in Congress, reveals previous OMB valuations of Ukraine aid were at least $14 billion short.

One of the worst kept secrets in Washington is no one actually knows just how much money the United States has spent in support of Ukraine. Over the past year, however, conservatives in Congress have been pushing President Joe Biden and his administration for the real number, and they’re finally getting some answers.

In a letter sent to Office of Management and Budget Director Shalanda Young on Tuesday, Senator J.D. Vance of Ohio and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, along with Sens. Roger Marshall, Rand Paul, Mike Lee, and twelve other members of Congress, chronicled the immense difficulty Congress has had in getting what should be readily available information from the Biden administration.

When Vance and other conservatives in Congress started pressing the Biden administration to provide the real cost of the Ukraine war in January 2023, the lawmakers estimated the U.S. had spent “a minimum of $114 billion.” Now, with added information from the OMB, Vance and company estimate the current total of aid to Ukraine amounts to at least $125 billion—$14 billion over what the OMB had previously claimed.

That’s not all. Conservatives believe the Biden administration could give Ukraine around another $4 billion in the form of weapons transfers from U.S. stockpiles under the presidential drawdown authority. This would bring the total amount the U.S. could give to Ukraine to $129 billion.

When OMB got to responding to lawmakers’ January 2023 letter almost eight months later, the OMB claimed, through an opaque and admittedly incomplete data sheet, that Ukraine aid totaled $111 billion.

“The deficiencies in OMB’s response were numerous,” the Tuesday letter to Young said of the OMB’s September 2023 response. “It did not account for hundreds of millions of dollars in base appropriations for the Ukraine Security Assistance Initiative. It omitted the administration’s ‘$6.2 billion in ‘freed-up’ authority’ to send weapons to Ukraine, which meant that ‘certain numbers in OMB’s spreadsheet, as well as dollar figures the administration provided for at least some previous Ukraine-related drawdowns, are outdated.’ It did not allow us to determine ‘what obligations, apportionments, and outlays the administration has undertaken for other countries in response to the Ukraine conflict.’”

Vance and company concluded OMB’s September 2023 response was “nonresponsive to our inquiry,” and in a follow-up letter sent September 28, 2023, added that “If OMB’s spreadsheet is to be relied on to produce such a figure—and we believe it cannot be—it is around $111 billion. It would appear likely that the data you have yet to provide would raise this figure by an indeterminate magnitude.”

“Every one of these assertions has been validated,” the Tuesday letter claims. On March 8, 2024, “nearly six months after we again requested a full accounting of Ukraine spending, more than a year after our original request, and one business day before the OMB director was scheduled to testify before the Senate Budget Committee,” the letter notes, OMB finally decided to hand over “another tranche of information.” What it included was shocking.

The latest OMB data dump to Congress revealed, according to the lawmakers’ letter, that the administration had failed to report at least another $684 million in appropriated Ukraine spending, left out another $900 million in DOD assistance connected to the Ukraine war, and a number of other pitfalls that has undercounted the total amount of Ukraine aid by a magnitude of billions.

There could be more, too, as lawmakers included a list of 14 probing questions and information requests in their latest correspondence with the OMB director. No surprise—it’s not Shalanda Young or Joe Biden’s money at stake, just the American people’s.

The post EXCLUSIVE: The Biden Administration Just Admitted It Has Massively Undercounted Ukraine Aid appeared first on The American Conservative.

Foreign Affairs

Leading Armenia Down the Primrose Path

The Armenian prime minister may not know it, but he is playing a dangerous game.

Last week in Brussels, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan announced what has been described as a “landmark plan to help pull Armenia out of Russia’s orbit.”

The plan calls for the EU to allocate €270 million to support the Armenian economy as part of what von der Leyen calls “a new and ambitious partnership agenda.”

This news comes amidst renewed tensions between Armenia and Azerbaijan. A major firefight broke out after Azerbaijan forces opened fire on Armenian defensive positions on the night of April 6.

But not all experts are impressed by the newly announced deal. According to Pietro Shakarian, a postdoctoral Fellow at the National Research University–Higher School of Economics in St. Petersburg who recently taught at the American University of Armenia, “The popular view on the Armenian street is that those 270 million euros look a lot like Judas Iscariot’s thirty pieces of silver. This was the price Pashinyan paid for betraying Armenia, abandoning Artsakh, and exposing the country to severe security threats from Azerbaijan and Turkey. On the part of the U.S. and the EU, it’s a very obvious attempt to push Russia out of the Caucasus once and for all.”

Pashinyan should be forewarned that this is a path that is well-trodden and extremely dangerous for those who have set out upon it. The University of Chicago’s John Mearsheimer has famously described what the Victoria Nuland–led State Department did, by condoning the Maidan coup and supporting Kiev’s NATO ambitions, as “leading Ukraine down the primrose path.” Armenia might usefully learn from the experiences of Ukraine and, closer home to Yerevan, Georgia. Both nations believed the fulsome promises of Western integration, including NATO accession, from their Western patrons in Brussels and Washington.

What reaction can we expect from Moscow? Artin DerSimonian, a junior research fellow in the Eurasia Program at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, tells The American Conservative that, “at a time of serious West-Russia conflict this is naturally perceived in Moscow as an affront. At the Armenia-Azerbaijan border, the situation remains very tense and the potential for further or significant escalation persists. How Russia would respond to this—given the above context—doesn’t inspire confidence. Yerevan appears more determined for a strong foreign and security policy ‘pivot’ rather than merely seeking to ‘diversify’ its security relations.”

As is by now clear, the U.S. national security bureaucracy only knows how to play a zero-sum game, and they and their political patrons seem both unable and unwilling to envision a world in which Iran and Russia are not the apex-villains.

As we can see with the recent Moscow terror attack and the ongoing atrocities in Gaza, that vision of the world stands at stark odds with reality. And the fact is, stark and unpleasant as it might be to the Washington establishment, that the best guarantors of Armenian security are Russia and Iran.

As Shakarian reminds us, “A weakened Armenia has negative security implications not only for Russia, but also Iran. It is not without reason that Tehran has drawn a bright red line against any Azerbaijani or Turkish attack on Armenia’s southern Syunik province, as well as any effort to cut off Syunik from the rest of Armenia. Such actions would sever Iran’s only overland link to the Moscow-led Eurasian Union.”

“Pashinyan’s giveaway of Artsakh and the subsequent ethnic cleansing there,” says Shakarian, “not only shocked Russian society, but also confirmed the view of Russian intelligence that Pashinyan is indeed acting on behalf of external interests, and not the interests of the Armenian state or people. His willingness to give away strategic territories in his own native province, Tavush, are viewed in both Russia and Armenia as further evidence of this.”

Washington may not like it, but if Armenia has any chance at a happy future—and a magnificent, ancient Christian civilization like Armenia certainly deserves one—we need to stop meddling in the Caucasus and limit the damage we have already done in the post-Soviet space.

The post Leading Armenia Down the Primrose Path appeared first on The American Conservative.

Foreign Affairs

Will Israel’s War Expand?

And will Netanyahu bring the U.S. along for the ride?

In the history of U.S. foreign and defense strategy, no presidential administration ever cultivated the rise of new, powerful groupings of nation states that oppose the United States in every sphere of meaningful human endeavor on the scale of the Biden administration. In a world of competing blocs, much of Asia, Africa, Latin America, and several European states are now united by events in Ukraine and the Middle East to overturn America’s global dominance.

Seventy-four years ago, General of the Army Dwight D. Eisenhower expressed the hope that access to more accurate information would prevent future generations of Americans from stumbling into war “at the whim of the man who happens to be president.” Eisenhower was referring to the provocative policies of President Franklin Roosevelt that pushed a recalcitrant American public into a two-front war in Asia and Europe when the U.S. Armed Forces were not capable of decisive operations in just one theater of war.

Thanks to America’s insular position between two great oceans and the enormous sacrifices of British and Soviet forces, the U.S. Armed Forces were given the time to build up to fight in the Second World War. Unfortunately, no such strategic advantages accrue to contemporary Washington. It’s 2024, not 1941.

Still, President Biden appears to be following the FDR pattern. The influence of FDR’s high-stakes strategic gamble in the dangerous runup to the Second World War has been repeated and is now on display in Ukraine and the Middle East and in Washington’s determination to back Israel’s ruthless war to kill or expel the Arab population from Gaza.

Washington’s strategic failure in Ukraine has already tilted Europe’s strategic equilibrium sharply in Russia’s favor. The persistent tendency in the White House and Congress to grossly underestimate Russian technology (particularly hypersonic missiles), manufacturing power, and operational art was fatal error. Washington’s refusal to negotiate with Moscow is consigning the Ukrainian Nation to extinction. This mentality means more Ukrainian soldiers will die pointlessly when a powerful Russian summer offensive will finally end the war on Moscow’s terms.

Tragically, Washington’s European military dependencies followed Washington down its path to ruin. It is not only Great Britain that failed to maintain capable fighting forces. Neither the Europeans nor the United States possess the ground force to fight Russian military power. The combination of Washington’s hallucinations about NATO ground forces with foolish demands for Moscow’s capitulation to Washington’s demands, its overreliance on weak, incapable NATO Forces and Europe’s suicidal economic policies reduced Washington’s NATO Allies to the role of bystanders at their own diplomatic, economic, and political funerals.

Washington knows that Israel’s war in Gaza is not about Israeli national security or even the elimination of Hamas. It is what Muslims think it is: a war for Jewish regional supremacy with the expansion of Israeli power from the Mediterranean to the Jordan River. Prime Minister Netanyahu’s public warmongering is simply the verbal expression of that vision.

Despite Israel’s ongoing attempt to widen the war to Iran by striking Iran’s consulate in Syria, the ruling elites in the Arab world still want a ceasefire and normalization because they are invested in the regional status quo. Nevertheless, Islam’s non-state resistance mounted by Houthis, Hezbollah, and other regional militias are demonstrating that the U.S. and Israel are not nearly so strong as many ruling elites previously thought. This development dramatically increases the pressure on Arab political elites in Cairo, Amman, and other Arab capitals to undertake substantive military action against Israel.

In sum, there is likely little doubt in Netanyahu’s mind that if American air, missile, and naval power intervene to support Israel’s current war, the Israelis will prevail. With each passing day, the U.S. Presidential election moves closer and Netanyahu knows there is a closing window of time within which he must widen the war to entangle American Military Power or risk the redirection of American attention to pressing internal matters.

In contrast to Eisenhower, Biden, like FDR, is inviting war, only without the strategic advantages that made FDR’s gamble possible. Moreover, Biden’s rationale for provocative action against Russia in Ukraine and is characterized by a “we must not fail” urgency that is utterly unnecessary.

Like the Arab elites, Moscow together with its strategic partner in Beijing want the Strait of Hormuz to remain open and the oil and gas to flow. The urgency is unnecessary because Russia does not want a war with the United States and NATO. Russia also will not abandon Iran to American air, missile, and naval assault, but unless Washington foolishly strikes Iran, Russia will not engage.

How did Washington’s ruling political class convince itself that America’s national power could be employed anywhere at will to induce compliance with Washington’s interests? In the decades after the Second World War, Washington embraced Raymond Aron’s doctrine that “Great powers do what they want, and weak powers do what they must.” The fact that Americans have never demanded a national debate to determine the potential cost in American lives, economic burdens, or the long-term effects on America’s international position by such operations enables this behavior.

The end of Ramadan will put an end to the delusive pause in fighting that settled over the Middle East in late March. Iran’s response to Israel’s air strikes will be hugely important to whether the war expands or not.

Just how Tehran will respond to Israel’s recent air strikes on the Iranian Consulate is unclear, but the method and destructiveness of the counterattack are important. To be taken seriously, Iranian action must unambiguously harm Israel on a strategic level. Iran’s counterattack must be a demonstration of Iranian power, but not severe enough to justify U.S. Military Intervention on Israel’s side. Threading this needle may be impossible.

Of course, Iran is not the only regional power. Turkey sits on the periphery of the war but is disinclined to intervene unless Israeli and American military power threatens Turkish security interests in Syria and Iraq. Yet, it would be a mistake to view Turkish inaction to this point as a permanent condition.

Meanwhile, invasion from Mexico, rising criminal violence, drug, and human trafficking, are imposing enormous costs on American society. The resources and funds committed to law enforcement, public education, health care and housing are stretched to the breaking point. The chaos on America’s borders alone threatens to extinguish the freedoms and national identity that generations of Americans took for granted.

George Washington warned that a system of political parties would encourage the “unjust dominion of unprincipled men” in the U.S. government. It has happened. Will Americans finally impose accountability this fall?

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Foreign Affairs

Taiwan’s Earthquake Response Showcases Its Competence

Time and again, the Republic of China has shown a capacity to adapt in the face of fresh challenges.

The earthquake that rattled Taiwan on Wednesday has had its share of viral moments, with buildings tipping over, freeways shaking, and water being violently shaken out of swimming pools. With such jarring scenes, it’s probably no surprise that lives were lost and significant damage done.

But in noting the 13 deaths (so far), 1,100 injured, and tens of millions of dollars in damage, we should recognize that it could have been much worse. Taiwan has a history of earthquakes—more than 100 with a magnitude of 5.5 or greater since 1980, in fact—although this was the worst since 1999, when the 7.7 Jiji earthquake killed more than 2,000 people. Just since that cataclysm they have adapted, with a comprehensive update to their building codes, and with emergency response teams well-prepared to respond to quakes in an urban setting. Thus, even though hundreds remain trapped or stranded as of this writing, the death toll will be considerably smaller than 1999’s despite its similar strength, 7.5.

Resilience is the story of Taiwan’s people since the end of the Second World War, adapting to the threat of invasion from Communist China at the end of the Chinese Civil War via an industrial policy that secured rapid growth rates; to the loss of diplomatic recognition from much of the world through increased openness—including to a then-reforming PRC—and to an increasingly connected world, reliant on distance-spanning technology, by making itself indispensable in one especially crucial sector: semiconductors.

Through careful advanced planning, technological expertise, and the dedication of their technicians, Taiwan has since the dawn of the millennium emerged as the location where much of the world’s semiconductors are fabricated; it accounts for nearly half of total global foundry capacity as of 2023, and much of that comes just from the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC). Now, however, much of the rest of the world is starting to look at this dependence and ask whether it can be sustained.

For, while the PRC has its reasons why it has not launched an invasion of Taiwan to reclaim the “rogue province” that has been governing itself since the end of the Chinese Civil War, most defense analysts do not believe disruption of the semiconductor supply chain would be one of them. Rather, it would be the inherent riskiness of the operation, the condemnation of much of the world, and the belief that, as a civilization spanning millennia, time is on China’s side.

Should those views change, and a mission launched to retake the island, Beijing would consider the disruption of the semiconductor supply chain an acceptable development.

That’s one reason why there has been increased interest in much of the world in diversifying the supply chain outside of Taiwan, including the U.S. states of Arizona and Texas. As I and my co-author, Akhil Ramesh, noted in our series on supply chain security published last year, friend-shoring is an increasingly hot topic largely because policymakers are waking up to the reality that China has seized a foothold in many crucial industries while the rest of the world’s attention was elsewhere—or had convinced itself that the PRC having such advantages would not be an issue.

Sadly, many countries in the past decade-plus have discovered that China has not only built up such advantages, but in bilateral disputes is not shy about using them.

The only sector in our four-part series where China does not hold such advantages is, in fact, semiconductors, and this is largely because of Taiwan’s successes (and, to a lesser extent, South Korea’s) but also China’s failures at getting its own industrial policy off the ground in this field. However, given the Taiwan Strait’s status as a potential flashpoint, diversification has been touted by those who need Taiwan’s semiconductors. Even within Taiwan, President-elect William Lai Ching-te has embraced the idea of TSMC growing outside the island—including to the U.S.

During the rollout of the paper series Ramesh and I authored, we did receive one unexpected piece of pushback: That we should not encourage industry to leave Taiwan. In the face of growing PRC assertiveness in the region, from building new bases abroad, installing suspicious development projects in other countries, and turning territorial disagreements into violent ones, Taiwan’s refusal to be cowed in the face of China’s threats, they argue, is of symbolic importance, as well as strategic: Were China to retake Taiwan successfully, or to browbeat it into submission by strangling its trade and international diplomatic recognition, its ambitions would likely not stop there.

All of which could be true, and still not a decisive refutation of the need for greater diversification of the semiconductor supply chain. During the global pandemic disruptions hit the global supply chain; this earthquake may as well, even if it turns out to be smaller: More than $60 million in damage was reported to TSMC facilities on the island, even though they were back at near 80% capacity within a day.

Encouraging diversification away from Taiwan need not be a death knell for the island’s economy: The Taiwanese have proven their resiliency before and can do so again if they know their economy is not going to be responsible for the majority of the world’s fabrication. In fact, there have been calls for years for them to do just that.

But resilience is not just for Taiwan: Bringing more production of semiconductors (and other hi-tech) to America’s shores is the next step in proofing them against geopolitical concerns—and minimizing future shocks to the US economy.

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Foreign Affairs

Mexico’s Presidential Election Will Not End the Nation’s Ongoing Crisis

On June 2, Mexico will elect a new president.

The era of Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (AMLO) is coming to an end. Most Americans, particularly those following the disastrous events at the southern border, are likely to say good riddance to the cantankerous AMLO, who is completing a six-year term and legally prohibited from running again.

The Mexican leader has been the hemisphere’s loudest voice in promoting a universal “ right to migrate,” sometimes colluding with President Joe Biden to help migrants illegally enter the United States, and sometimes masterfully manipulating him.

Although he will leave office by October 1, AMLO will almost assuredly be succeeded by Claudia Sheinbaum, his protege candidate who is fully expected to continue his administration’s policies.

For months, Sheinbaum has held a commanding lead in Mexico’s national polling, and most experts predict she will easily win the June voting. She is campaigning cautiously, confident that AMLO’s endorsement and popularity—he has almost 60 percent approval levels—will carry her to victory.

Sheinbaum is an experienced politician, who proved her leadership mettle, and won AMLO’s support, by previously serving as mayor (governor in function) of the greater Mexico City capital region (population 22 million).

Sheinbaum’s personality is cut from a different cloth than AMLO’s. She has an academic background, holding a hard-science Ph.D., and tends toward a less combative approach than the outspoken AMLO. However, she very much shares his leftist vision: critical of so-called “neoliberal” economics, while advocating the radical-chic woke agenda that is everywhere in leftist politics. Predictably, she ordered a statue of Christopher Columbus to be taken down in the capital.

If Sheinbaum is elected, the identity-politics-driven international media story will headline her status as Mexico’s first Jewish-heritage woman president. The gushing reporting about her identity will help sweep AMLO off Mexico’s national stage, but Sheinbaum’s expected electoral victory, unfortunately, will certainly further entrench his political agenda.

Sheinbaum has embraced AMLO’s views on immigration: borders should be porous and the priority is addressing “root causes.” When it comes to handling Washington, Sheinbaum is more analytical, but her first instinct is an AMLO-like defense of Mexican sovereignty. She may have some differences on environmental policies with the Mexican president; AMLO is fine burning fossil fuels, while Sheinbaum, the green physicist, is deeper into climate change orthodoxy.

While there are several candidates running, Scheinbaum’s main opponent is Xochitl Galvez, a tech-industry businesswoman and former senator who heads a coalition put together by Mexico’s two main opposition political parties, the PRI (Partido Revolucionario Institucional) and the PAN (Partido Accion Nacional). Galvez is seeking to restore something of the pre-AMLO dynamic in Mexican politics; although she brings a new twist as an indigenous-heritage woman, that era is not likely coming back.

For decades, the PRI and PAN dominated Mexican politics in an establishment manner similar to our own Democrats and Republicans. It was in 2018 that AMLO finally overturned their dominance when his insurgent party, known as Morena (Movimiento de Regeneracion Nacional), took him to the presidency in a landslide victory.

AMLO discredited both the PRI (the old statist, establishment left) and the PAN (conservative and business-oriented) as Mexico’s corrupt ruling class. The fact that the two previously dominant parties, once bitter rivals, have come together, somewhat desperately, to nominate Galvez says volumes about how much AMLO has remade Mexican politics.

One key element of the AMLO realignment was his large expansion of federal welfare and pension plans. In modern Dickensian Mexico, some 20 million workers are in the informal economy that creates 30 percent of national income. AMLO has brought this significant and neglected segment of society into the welfare state for the first time, an effort that doubtless undergirds his popularity.

The left praises AMLO’s welfare policies for “institutionalizing” Mexican support programs, like FDR’s in the 1930s. The country’s conservatives and the old establishment liberal-left, on the other hand, condemn his policies as populist vote-buying, a disreputable political tactic nevertheless regularly used to win Mexican elections.

All of this contributes to why Galvez has a hard path to victory. She has already gone to Washington to suggest that the Organization of American States (OAS) send election observers to Mexico.

Galvez would be marginally preferable to Sheinbaum when it comes to U.S.-Mexican security cooperation. Galvez does talk about collaboration on the common frontier, and she might, at least rhetorically, open up to a better law-enforcement partnership. But her security vision has little in common with securing the border in an American sense.

While Galvez denounces the unprecedented human trafficking that is taking place in both countries, her immigration “solution” is more visas and legal work opportunities for foreigners, particularly Mexicans, in the United States. This is not surprising, since Mexicans living in el Norte can still vote in Mexico’s elections.

Mexico’s endemic corruption is another major campaign issue that directly impacts the U.S. national interest, because our large southern neighbor is both our greatest commercial trading partner and source of migrants. Both candidates, of course, denounce corruption, but neither proposes viable solutions because everybody is out of ideas.

Sheinbaum is almost philosophical, rejecting the notion that Mexican corruption is a “ matter of culture”; she improbably calls for “ peace dialogues” among governors, judges, and police to address “impunity.” Sheinbaum claims, dubiously, that fundamental change is already under way as AMLO’s administration is not only setting a new tone, but has begun to historically remake the country—AMLO pompously calls it the “Fourth Transformation”—by overturning corrupt privileges deeply embedded in Mexican society.

Galvez of course rejects Sheinbaum’s positive spin and has made credible charges that AMLO is no different than past presidents, specifically accusing his adult sons of illicitly profiting from the government-led, massive construction effort of the Maya train line in southern Mexico. This train line is AMLO’s signature infrastructure project, and its costs have ballooned from about $8 to $28 billion as contractors wheel and deal.

Galvez’s criticism is certainly more valid than Sheinbaum’s optimism. Mexican society, by measures like Transparency International’s annual rating, is still hopelessly sunk in widespread corrupt practices. These continue despite Mexico’s success in attracting significant new foreign investment and trade, which comes to the country mainly because of its nearness to the U.S. market. Outsiders who seek to do business with Mexico—and increasingly Chinese businessmen are first in line—simply navigate around corrupt practices or participate in them.

Where AMLO has succeeded on the corruption issue, however, is in fiercely defending his own, highly valuable, personal reputation as being incorruptible. For millions of Mexicans, accustomed to watching their politicians become vastly wealthy (sadly, not unlike in the U.S.), AMLO’s clean record, if it is indeed true, is something remarkable. It certainly helps Sheinbaum’s campaign as she, too, is substantially free from charges of illicitly using politics to become wealthy.

In this context, AMLO has been a grandmaster of symbolic acts that his grassroots supporters never forget. For example, he canceled Mexico City’s massively over-budget new airport project (thought to benefit the corrupt rich); he refused to use and sold off the president’s luxury jet, a Boeing 787 “Dreamliner”; and he never took occupation of the chief executive’s elaborate living quarters known as “Los Pinos.”

While this was brilliant political theater, no president’s policies can remake a country as vast and complex as Mexico, particularly on corruption, in a handful of years. There is a case to be made, perhaps, that the long road of reversing Mexico’s ingrained corruption must start by examples from the top. Certainly, nothing else is working. Sadly, however, when it comes to daily governance issues, such as overhauling the country’s dysfunctional criminal court system, AMLO’s gameplan is as empty as those of Mexico’s previous presidents.

Perhaps there is no higher U.S. national interest than curbing transnational organized crime from using Mexico to strike into our country. Mexican politicians, of course, approach their widespread criminality crisis differently, but they acknowledge that “ insecurity” is the main concern this election cycle, which includes campaigning for Congress, state, and local offices, too.

Mexico’s 2024 election kickoff was accompanied by the murders of two local candidates, tragically symbolizing how violence infects all aspects of Mexican national life. Understandably appalled and frightened, most Mexicans are resigned to their fate that, no matter who is elected president, the country is likely to continue to just muddle through in dealing with a gigantic national crisis.

Both candidates have called for a larger National Guard, since Mexican state and local police are unreliable or even part of organized crime. Galvez is recommending doubling the number to 300,000 guardsmen, but the record of the National Guard, first created by AMLO to replace the corrupted Federal Police, has been unimpressive. AMLO basically backed away from his own National Guard strategy, gradually moving towards putting more and more authority in the Mexican military to deal with crime (and many other issues).

The national armed forces should not be in the forefront in the fight against organized criminals, but Mexico’s disastrous law-enforcement performance—corrupted police forces, dysfunctional courts—reflects a vicious societal struggle that more resembles guerrilla war than a crime wave. No state security institutions except the army and marines seem capable of keeping things from getting even worse. It is certain that la Presidenta Sheinbaum will have nothing behind the curtain to deal with this national catastrophe.

When Mexico’s voting is over, and elected candidates take office, there will be little hope, unfortunately, that U.S.–Mexican bilateral relations will get a meaningful new start. More than a new president in Mexico, what is needed is a new chief executive in the White House. We need an American president who will reverse the Biden administration’s calamitous open-borderism and use forceful U.S. diplomatic leverage to focus Mexico’s political leadership, whoever it is, on our mutual security problems.

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