Global storm warning
Hurricane force geopolitical winds are in the
forecast for the rest of the year -- and beyond.
Israel's permanent borders are now quite clear. Some smaller
Jewish
settlements in the West Bank are to be resettled, not in Israel,
but by
enlarging the larger settlements, now all protected by the
420-mile,
$2.2 billion ditch-cum-wall. East Jerusalem is off the
negotiating table;
entirely cut off from the West Bank, it can never be
a Palestinian capital,
administrative or otherwise. Israel is also carving out a security
zone along the Jordan
River border with Jordan. Down this road, even
moderate Palestinians
say this would reduce them to "Bantustans"
on the West Bank.
By Arnaud de Borchgrave
Published April 17, 2006
Afghanistan
is "on life support" with woefully inadequate funding to make a dent on
the world's largest crop of opium poppies, insufficient troops to
counter a resurgent Taliban, and a potential for disaster. So spoke the
Council on Foreign Relations.
Time and again, official spokespeople have claimed the Taliban
was in its last throes, much the way the Iraqi insurgency was
inaccurately described as terminal. NATO is doubling its 10,000-strong
force by November. But Taliban's spring offensive has already killed 14
U.S. soldiers. And coalition forces responded with 2,500-strong
Operation Mountain Lion in Kunar Province, whose mountain peaks soar to
15,000 feet. Heavy air support was supplied by B-52 bombers, F-15
fighter-bombers, A-10 Thunderbolts and British GR-7 Harriers. Taliban
was anything but a spent force. Suicide bombings are now commonplace in
widely scattered parts of Afghanistan.
Far removed from the Pakistani border, in the northern Afghan
provinces, NATO-led forces uncovered huge Taliban arms caches -- e.g.,
15,000 anti-personnel mines, 10,000 anti-tank mines, and 80 tons of
TNT, all "Soviet"-made. The fact some 2 million pounds of supplies were
air-dropped last year to U.S. troops chasing Taliban guerrillas up and
down mountains indicates (1) a gradual increase of infiltration from
Pakistan's tribal areas and (2) the new Afghan army is not ready to
take over. In fact, the Afghan military are still an estimated four
years away from being able to fight on their own. Meanwhile, donor
fatigue borders on donor exhaustion.
In nearby Kyrgyzstan, mafia chief Rysbek Akmatbayev, who is
linked to Afghanistan's multibillion-dollar heroin trade, and is
protected by top government officials, sauntered into parliament with
79 percent of the votes on April 9. His close connections with the
judiciary paid off handsomely; he was acquitted on triple homicide
charges in January. Next, in one of the new democracies nurtured by the
U.S., Mr. Akmatbayev is expected to become chairman of the
parliamentary committee on security, rule of law and information
policy.
A law enforcement delegation from Tajikistan now touring the
U.S. under State Department auspices made clear to this writer that the
Bush administration cannot expect democracy to take root in tribal
societies that lived under Soviet rule for 70 years. Nor should the
U.S. assume, they added, the communist legacy was all bad. As if to
prove the point, Russia and Tajikistan are expanding their security
cooperation by conducting an antiterrorist exercise on the border with
Afghanistan.
While Russian tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, gunships and
fighter-bombers strutted their stuff, three Tajik border guards were
wounded in a firefight with Afghan drug dealers on the Tajik-Afghan
border. The nexus between transnational terrorism and transnational
crime is increasingly evident on all Afghan borders -- Turkmenistan,
Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Pakistan and Iran.
The U.S. democratic crusade has lost its head of steam from
the "Stans" to the Middle East. With gold at $600 an ounce and oil at
almost $70 a barrel, fears of worse to come in Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran
and on the Israeli-Palestinian front are now widespread. Iran says it
has crossed one of President Bush's red lines and started to enrich
uranium -- clinging to the peaceful research canard. And the Bush
administration juggles military options as it runs out of self-imposed
limitations on its diplomatic options. America's European allies
believe this is a propitious time to send a prominent personality on a
secret mission to Iran to explore with Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the
supreme religious leader, the outlines of a geopolitical modus vivendi.
For Mr. Bush, this is heresy; there can be no compromise with the "axis
of evil."
A prominent, U.S.-educated Gulf personality, who keeps a home
in Washington, confided, not for attribution, "those Gulf countries,
including Saudi Arabia, that have benefited from U.S. protection now
fear that same protection endangers their regimes." In Kuwait, he said,
the government is "deeply concerned" that when the U.S. pulls out of
Iraq it will leave a residual, standby force in Kuwait that will then
become the target of a terrorist campaign.
Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah, in the same vein, has been
multiplying the kingdom's relations with the world's new giants --
India and China. His travels are designed to show Saudis the country no
longer depends on U.S. protection. In Egypt, President Hosni Mubarak
maneuvers to pre-empt the fundamentalist, anti-American Muslim
Brotherhood's recent election gains by moving up the timetable for his
son Gamal to replace him.
The perennial Israeli-Palestinian crisis is now heading into
Intifada III. Israel severed security ties to the Palestinian
government, which Hamas called a "declaration of war." Israeli
artillery barrages and air strikes against Palestinian "Qassam" rocket
squads operating from populated areas of the Gaza Strip quickly became
routine.
More than 1,000 Israeli artillery shells and 16 air strikes
were the response to 32 rockets. Innocent civilians, like an 8-year-old
Palestinian girl, are getting killed -- on both sides. Hamas -- a
militant group for the Arab world and a terrorist group for Israel and
the U.S. -- has now taken over the reins of government. But its leaders
are flat broke. And 78,000 armed Palestinian security personnel and
62,000 civilian government employees are without paychecks to feed
their families. And Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert warns he is not
ruling out a ground assault into Gaza: "done it before and can do it
again."
Israel says the solution is relatively simple. Hamas must
recognize Israel, abandon any idea of eradicating the Jewish state, and
then a two-state solution might become possible. Unfortunately, a
"viable, contiguous" Palestinian state, as pledged by former Prime
Minister Ariel Sharon and President Bush, has been pre-empted by the
"creation of new facts" on the ground.
Israel's permanent borders are now quite clear. Some smaller
Jewish settlements in the West Bank are to be resettled, not in Israel,
but by enlarging the larger settlements, now all protected by the
420-mile, $2.2 billion ditch-cum-wall. East Jerusalem is off the
negotiating table; entirely cut off from the West Bank, it can never be
a Palestinian capital, administrative or otherwise.
Israel is also carving out a security zone along the Jordan
River border with Jordan. Down this road, even moderate Palestinians
say this would reduce them to "Bantustans" on the West Bank, the black
settlements once envisaged by apartheid South Africa. Hamas, meanwhile,
is seeking funds from Iran and Venezuela. Other Arab governments are
pledging but so far not giving. Demonstrations are planned in Arab and
other Muslim capitals to pressure governments to give Hamas the
wherewithal for survival.
Hurricane force geopolitical winds are in the forecast for the rest of the year -- and beyond.
* Arnaud de Borchgrave is editor at large of The Washington Times and of United Press International. http://www.washingtontimes.com/commentary/20060416-103032-8779r.htm