Foreign Policy Update – USA Gov Policy

ISRAEL

In a recent interview Secretary Blinken said that “President Biden believes, and that is that the best and ultimately only way forward, really, is through a two states [solution]… first, Israel as a Jewish and democratic state is going to have truly lasting security through two states, and the Palestinians would get the state that they’re entitled to. That also means that any steps that anyone takes – unilateral steps that anyone takes – that make the prospect of two states even more challenging than it already is, we oppose, and we’ve also been very clear about that.”

ARCTIC COUNCIL

Secretary of State Antony Blinken attended the 12th Arctic Council Ministerial meeting in Reykjavik, Iceland, with foreign ministers from all eight Arctic States. All signed onto the 2021 joint declaration reaffirming the Council’s commitment to maintain peace, stability, and constructive cooperation in the Arctic region, emphasizing Arctic States’ unique position to promote responsible governance in the region, and asserting the importance of immediately addressing the climate crisis in the Arctic. Recently, the region has become a focus of potential great power competition as the Northern Passageway presents the potential of creating a shorter maritime passage to Europe from Asia. Advanced technologies now available also make it possible to excavate the region’s vast undersea mineral and energy resources. While there Blinken and Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov discussed Russia’s Arctic Council Chairmanship and the importance of cooperation given the two countries shared stake in the region.

RUSSIA

Secretary Blinken while attending the Arctic Council meetings said that the United States “seeks a predictable, stable relationship with Russia.” According to Blinken, it is good for the US and the Russian people. He added that “It’s also no secret that we have our differences. And when it comes to those differences, as President Biden has also shared with President Putin, if Russia acts aggressively against us, our partners, our allies, we’ll respond. And President Biden has demonstrated that in both word and deed – not for purposes of escalation, not to seek conflict, but to defend our interests.”

Blinken also acknowledged that there are many areas where Washington and Msoscow’s interests intersect and overlap. “Whether it is dealing with COVID-19 and the pandemic, combatting climate change, dealing with the nuclear programs in Iran and North Korea, Afghanistan, there are many areas of intersecting interests,” he said.

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BURMA

On Tuesday, May 18th, in Geneva, the United States announced nearly $155 million in new humanitarian aid for Rohingya refugees and affected host communities in Bangladesh at the launch of the 2021 Joint Response Plan for the Rohingya Humanitarian Crisis. The Deputy Spokesman for the State Department, Jalina Porter, said that of the $155 million more than $138 million is for programs inside Bangladesh. That brings the United States’ total assistance for the crisis response since August 2017 to more than $1.3 billion.

“This funding will sustain the efforts of our partners to provide life-saving assistance to affected communities on both sides of the Burma-Bangladesh border, including the nearly 900,000 Rohingya refugees who have taken refuge in Bangladesh – some 740 million of whom arrived since 2017, when they were forced to flee ethnic cleansing and other horrific atrocities and abuses in Burma’s Rakhine State, according to Porter. The funding also is expected to provide assistance to more than 470,000 Bangladeshi host community members and to others affected by the ongoing violence in Burma.

TURKEY

Ned Price, State Department Spokesman, said the United States “strongly condemns President Erdogan’s recent anti-Semitic comments regarding the Jewish people and finds them reprehensible.” He added that Washington is urging “President Erdogan and other Turkish leaders to refrain from incendiary remarks, which could incite further violence. We call on Turkey to join the United States in working to end the conflict.”

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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