Foreign Policy Update – USA Gov Policy

IRAN

The United States Government is intensifying its maximum pressure campaign against the Islamic Republic of Iran, according to the State Department. This week under its “Awards for Justice” program it announced a reward of “up to $15 million” for any person who helps disrupt the financial operations of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps and Qods Force.

This program gives individuals an incentive to work with the United States to bring terrorists to justice and to prevent acts of terrorism globally, according to Brian Hook, the Special Representative for Iran and Senior Advisor to the Secretary of State.

It marks the first time that the United States has offered a reward for information that disrupts a government entity’s financial operations. The IRGC and the Qods Force were designated as a foreign terrorist organization in April

Hook said the “IRGC trains, funds, and equips proxy organizations across the Middle East. Iran wants these groups to extend the borders of the regime’s revolution and sow chaos and sectarian violence. We are using every available diplomatic and economic tool to disrupt these operations.”

The United States also is also taking sweeping action against an IRGC/QF oil-for-terror network as it has moved hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of illicit oil which is then used to fund terrorism.

VENEZUELAN REGIONAL CRISIS

The United States Announced additional humanitarian assistance in response to the Venezuelan regional crisis. Deputy Secretary John Sullivan and United States Agency for International Development Administrator Mark Green announced September 4 more than $120 million in additional U.S. humanitarian assistance to address the largest external displacement of persons in the Hemisphere’s history.

According to the State Department, Maduro’s rampant corruption, brutal repression, and vast social and economic mismanagement has forced more than 4.3 million Venezuelans to flee the country. Its socialist policies have wreaked havoc on the once prosperous nation and created an environment in which there was a 65% increase in maternal mortality in a single year and in 2018 saw 94% of households living in poverty.

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The aid includes emergency food and health assistance, to vulnerable Venezuelans in Colombia, Ecuador, Brazil, and throughout the region. To date the US has contributed over $376 million in aid since FY2017. In 2019 ninety percent of hospitals reporting shortages of medicine and critical supplies, along with severe shortages of electricity.

CHINA

The United States’ Treasury Secretary Munchin, USTR Lighthizer and China’s Vice Premier Liu He have agreed to ministerial-level discussions on the ongoing trade dispute in Washington in early October. Chinese and US trade officials spoke via telephone over the last few weeks to resolve issues to enable to talks to move forward toward resolution of the trade dispute between the two countries.

This will be the first face-to-face meeting since the recent escalation and is expected to include deputy-level official meetings this month in preparation for the October talks. President Trump announced additional tariffs last month that are scheduled to take effect in October on $250 billion of Chinese goods.

While some analysts report that the Administration is restricted in its future options, the upcoming talks offer an opportunity to make “meaningful progress,” according to a US trade official. Resolution of the dispute remains a distant goal, although both sides remain committed to ending the dispute.

DARIA NOVAK served in the United States State Department during the Reagan Administration, and currently is on the Board of the American Analysis of News and Media Inc., which publishes usagovpolicy.com and the New York Analysis of Policy and Government. Each Saturday, she presents key updates on U.S. foreign policy from the State Department.

Illustration: Pixabay

Quick Analysis

Putin’s Saber Rattling

Earlier this week, President Biden reversed his 2022 decision, authorizing the provision of antipersonnel land mines to the Ukrainian government. It follows an earlier Administration authorization to allow the use of an advanced American missile system capable of striking as deep as 100 miles inside Russian territory. The US election season may be ending, but both Russia and the West show no indication of stepping down the conflict. Russian propaganda continues to swell as the Kremlin increases its threats to use nuclear weapons against the West. Last week Andrey Sushentsov, program director of the pro-Kremlin think tank Valdai Discussion Club (VDC), published an article on growing nuclear tensions in the region. Official Russian language in the last few years has been threatening. Since the US election, rhetoric like that in the Sushentsov article, has approached the level of nuclear blackmail. The VDC article’s main theme centers on Russia’s intent to directly confront the West militarily if the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) becomes involved in Russia’s conflict with Ukraine. “On the one hand, these threats are intended to frighten the West, but on the other, Russian propagandists themselves are starting to believe in the inevitability of escalation,” according to Ksenia Kirillova of the Jamestown Foundation. On November 11, Sushentsov wrote that “The conflict will reach a completely new level, with unpredictable consequences for Europe and the entire world.” Kirillova points out that Putin’s distorted image of the world is divorced from reality and is causing the Kremlin to issue demands that are impossible to fulfill. Financial and other Russian resources needed to support Putin’s war are growing scarcer at the same time. This week the Kremlin announced a reduction of payments to its soldiers. Recently North Korea acknowledged it was sending soldiers to fight in Ukraine as Putin is running out of bodies to use as cannon fire. The war is not going well for Russia. One question floating around the Washington intelligence community is whether Putin will act out of desperation before President-elect Trump assumes office. In recent months the Russian propaganda machine is spewing out materials from fairly reputable analytical platforms inside the country. Kirillova says that “Kremlin ‘experts’ do not conceal that such threats are only intended to break the West psychologically, as they themselves are not prepared for full-scale nuclear war.” Despite Russia’s lack of preparation for an all-out war with the West, the expanding nuclear rhetoric carries with it an increase in the threat of a full-scale war in multiple theaters of operation. In June 2023 a founder of the Russian Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, Sergey Karaganov, called for “delivering a pre-emptive strike of retaliation” on Poland to force the West to surrender. In the previous month, Dmitry Suslov, a direct of research programs at the policy center proposed organizing “a demonstration nuclear explosion” aimed at intimidating the West. In September, President Putin announced a reappraisal of Russian nuclear doctrine after speaking earlier in the year at the plenary session of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum and jokingly calling Suslov a “scary person.” Pavel Baev, writing in the European Daily Monitor, says “Putin intends his announcement to mark an escalation of nuclear brinkmanship and influence the proceedings of future Ukrainian peace efforts.” Putin is expanding the list of environmental conditions that are acceptable for using a nuclear weapon and incorporating it into Russian military doctrine. Baev adds that “The ups and downs of Russian brinkmanship are disconnected from the kinetic battles of the war, correlating instead with Ukrainian peace offensives, such as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s first peace summit in Bürgenstock, Switzerland.” Despite the increase in vitriolic language, in a You Tube video published a week before the US presidential election, Karaganov openly assured the West the primary goal of the escalation is to break the American spirit and that of the West, not outright nuclear war. By Election Day in the US, with political prognosticators predicting a win for former president Trump, Karaganov changed his tune and called for an increased role in nuclear deterrence. Kirillova points out that Western concessions to Russia are unlikely to reduce the risk of nuclear escalation. The distorted reality inside the Kremlin continues to push that President-elect Trump is an adherent of “world government,” that Ukraine will create a nuclear weapon, and Russia must prepare for a nuclear conflagration to achieve its ambitions for a new world order. President-elect Trump has indicated he will not agree to concessions that destabilize Europe, the Middle East or other regions. Going forward a strong US foreign policy may be the most stabilizing course the West can count on to restrain Putin and his intent to rebuild the Russian empire. Daria Novak served in the U.S. State Dept. Illustration: Pixabay

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