Foreign Policy Update – USA Gov Policy

IRAN

Iran continues its abnormal state behavior. Earlier this week it seized a United Arab Emirates (UAE) tanker ship and is continuing with a series of escalating actions leading up to the US destroying an Iranian drone threatening the USS Boxer and its crew. On July 19, an Iranian drone refused to comply with instructions was shot down as it approached within 1,000 yards of the ship traveling in international waters in the Strait of Hormuz.

Referring to the seizure of the UAE vessel, Secretary of State Michael Pompeo said Washington is “following very closely what’s taking place more broadly even than just this tanker in the Strait of Hormuz. The President’s made pretty clear that this is an international obligation to keep these waterways open, and we’re working diligently to build out a maritime security initiative – a broad range of countries participating in that. The Iranians’ effort to deny transit for commercial vessels, crude oil vessels, and other vessels is something that – frankly, it’s consistent with 40 years of their history and it’s something that the United States is prepared to do our part to make sure that those waterways remain open.”

The Secretary added that no one should underestimate the broad range of responses available to the US and that Iran, in particular, should not misunderstand American efforts. He said: “The best solution here is for the Iranians to decide that the diplomatic path forward is the best one for the people inside of Iran, and we try to talk to them because the Iranian regime has clearly done things that are inconsistent with what the Iranian people want.” The Trump Administration continues to seek a diplomatic path forward which will deny Iran both a path to a nuclear weapon and the ability to build out its missile program through proliferation.

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Leaders from 114 nations gathered in Washington for a three-day Ministerial Conference to Advance Religious Freedom. Over 80% of the world lives in nations that restrict religion, according to Pompeo. When asked about talks with China concerning the abuse of the Uighur minority and other issues surrounding the persecution of Christians in China, the Secretary pointed out that religious freedom is a stabilizing force in nations where citizens are permitted to practice their faith. Pompeo added: “It doesn’t create risk, which is what I think some of the countries like China are concerned with when they exercise political repression against various religious faiths. That makes their country weaker. And we’ve made this argument, and we will continue to build that argument out and try and convince every country including China that it’s in their best interest to increase the religious freedom in their country.”

BURMA

The US Government remains deeply concerned about the persecution of the Rohingya people and other human rights atrocities being carried out by the Burmese government and its security forces. According to a senior State Department official in Washington, the Burmese military has made “no progress on holding accountable those responsible for the ethnic cleansing of Rohingya Muslims.”

The official added that to date, “the US has taken a number of actions to promote accountability for these atrocities, including the sanctioning of five Burmese generals and two military units for serious human rights abuses in Rakhine, Kachin, and Shan states.”

This week Secretary Pompeo announced publicly that the commander-in-chief of the Burmese military, Min Aung Hlaing; the deputy commander-in-chief, Soe Win; and commanders of the 33rd and 99th Light Infantry Divisions, Than Oo and Aung Aung, and their immediate family members have been designated under Section 7031(c) of the Department of State Foreign Operations and Related Programs Appropriations Act of 2019 for their involvement in gross violations of human rights, including extrajudicial killings, against Rohingya, particularly from August through September 2017.” Unfortunately, to date, sanctions have done little to change the behavior of the government.

Daria Novak served in the U.S. State Department during the Reagan Administration.

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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