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311. The Battle for the Soul of Islam

Author:
James M Dorsey
Publication Date:
10-2020
Content Type:
Commentary and Analysis
Institution:
Hudson Institute
Abstract:
It is not the caliphate that the world’s Muslim powerhouses are fighting about. Instead, they are engaged in a deepening religious soft power struggle for geopolitical influence and dominance. This battle for the soul of Islam pits rival Middle Eastern and Asian powers against one another: Turkey, seat of the Islamic world’s last true caliphate; Saudi Arabia, home to the faith’s holy cities; the United Arab Emirates, propagator of a militantly statist interpretation of Islam; Qatar with its less strict version of Wahhabism and penchant for political Islam; Indonesia, promoting a humanitarian, pluralistic notion of Islam that reaches out to other faiths as well as non-Muslim centre-right forces across the globe; Morocco which uses religion as a way to position itself as the face of moderate Islam; and Shia Iran with its derailed revolution. In the ultimate analysis, no clear winner may emerge. Yet, the course of the battle could determine the degree to which Islam will be defined by either one or more competing stripes of ultra-conservativism—statist forms of the faith that preach absolute obedience to political rulers and/or reduce religious establishments to pawns of the state.
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, Islam, Politics, and Ideology
Political Geography:
Russia, Iran, Indonesia, Turkey, Middle East, Asia, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Qatar, and United Arab Emirates

312. Russia in Africa: Is Great Power Competition Returning to the Continent?

Author:
Agnieszka Paczyńska
Publication Date:
01-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
German Institute of Development and Sustainability (IDOS)
Abstract:
Since 2014 Russian economic, political and security engagement in Africa has grown significantly. This policy brief analyses the motives and recent changes in Russia's Africa policy, and discusses implications for German and European cooperation with Africa.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, International Cooperation, Power Politics, Investment, and Trade
Political Geography:
Africa, Russia, China, and United States of America

313. Russia's Foreign and Security Policy in the Middle East: Entering the 2020s

Author:
Ekaterina Stepanova
Publication Date:
06-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Istituto Affari Internazionali
Abstract:
As Russia has become a major external player in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region due to its military engagement in Syria since 2015, it has acted as a balancer and mediator in several regional controversies and has continued to serve as a security guarantor for the Syrian state. This course has brought Moscow some practical dividends, such as growing economic and military-technical cooperation with select MENA countries, and has spurred its broader international profile. However, entering the 2020s, the risks of more active engagement in the Middle East have also mounted, making Russia’s balancing act more difficult. In three cases where Russia’s involvement has been visible (Syria, Libya and the Israeli-Palestinian problem), evolving developments challenge Moscow’s acquired influence and multi-vector approach, but also create new opportunities for its engagement and mediation. Above all, the 2020 US–Iran crisis catalysed the urgent need for structured regional dialogue, especially across the Persian Gulf. While this requires direct interaction between the region’s main antagonists, the initial impulse to unlock the trans-Gulf impasse might need to come from the outside. A process-oriented blueprint for inclusive multilateral security in the Gulf proposed by Russia in 2019 is a step in the right direction, but to be activated it may need to come as part of some broader international initiative.
Topic:
Security, Foreign Policy, and Geopolitics
Political Geography:
Russia, Eurasia, Middle East, Israel, Libya, Palestine, North Africa, and Syria

314. Understanding Russia’s Interest in Conflict Zones

Author:
Paul M. Carter Jr.
Publication Date:
07-2020
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
United States Institute of Peace
Abstract:
Under Vladimir Putin, Russia’s global ambitions have steadily increased, including in unstable areas of the Middle East, Africa, and the Western Hemisphere. For the most part, Moscow’s activities in these and other areas run counter to Western interests and undermine efforts to mitigate conflict through broad-based, transparent processes. This report outlines the factors that appear to be motivating the Kremlin’s conflict-zone interventions and places them within the larger context of Russian foreign policy interests.
Topic:
Conflict Prevention, Foreign Policy, and Conflict
Political Geography:
Africa, Russia, Eurasia, Middle East, and Syria

315. The Middle East in an Era of Great Power Competition

Author:
Stephen Walt, Bilal Y. Saab, and Barry R. Posen
Publication Date:
04-2020
Content Type:
Video
Institution:
Middle East Institute (MEI)
Abstract:
Of all the internal obstacles and external challenges the United States is likely to face in its pursuit of its new foreign policy priority of great power competition, the Middle East might prove to be the biggest. If the region continues to command U.S. attention and resources, Washington will struggle in its efforts to effectively pivot and counter Chinese and Russian ambitions in Asia and Europe, respectively. How does or should the Middle East fit in America’s new grand strategy? Does the great power competition necessitate an entirely new U.S. approach toward the Middle East? Which U.S. approach best serves Washington’s new global plans? To answer these questions and many others, the Middle East Institute (MEI) is honored to host a conversation with Professor Barry Posen from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Professor Stephen Walt from Harvard University.
Topic:
International Relations, Foreign Policy, Grand Strategy, and Strategic Competition
Political Geography:
Russia, China, Europe, Middle East, Asia, and United States of America

316. A U.S. Strategy to Engage and Contain Putin's Russia

Author:
Michael McFaul
Publication Date:
09-2020
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
The Ambassadors Review
Institution:
Council of American Ambassadors
Abstract:
President-elect Joseph R. Biden has an opportunity to forge a bipartisan, sustained grand U.S. strategy for Russia. With decades of experience in foreign affairs, especially transatlantic relations, he knows Russia, he knows Vladimir Putin and, equally important, he knows the region. When I worked at the National Security Council during the Barack Obama administration, I traveled with then-Vice President Biden to Georgia, Ukraine, Moldova and Russia. Unlike his immediate predecessor, President Biden rightfully will not try to befriend Putin. He and his expert team of foreign policy advisors understand that the central objective in U.S. policy towards Russia today is to contain Putin’s belligerent behavior abroad. At the same time, the incoming Biden administration offers the U.S. a chance to develop a more predictable pattern of bilateral relations with the Russian government and Russian people, supported by Republicans and Democrats alike. After relations with China, competing with Russia is the second-greatest foreign policy challenge of our time, complicated by the fact that China and Russia today are closer to each other now than they were during the Cold War. To successfully achieve American objectives will require the implementation of a comprehensive, sophisticated and nuanced strategy for containing Putin’s belligerent actions abroad and simultaneously cooperating with Moscow on a small set of issues of mutual benefit.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, Conflict, and Transatlantic Relations
Political Geography:
Russia, Europe, North America, and United States of America

317. Defeating Threat Air Defences: the Return of the DEAD

Author:
International Institute for Strategic Studies
Publication Date:
12-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
International Institute for Strategic Studies
Abstract:
For the past two decades the US and its allies have faced a very limited surface-to-air threat in wars in which they have engaged. This is now changing as the worsening security environment and the emergence of near-peer rivals once again raises the spectre of a strongly contested air domain. A central element of the renewed challenge is the surface-to-air missile (SAM) system. China and Russia have fielded and continue to develop SAM systems across all range categories – and to offer many of these for export – that pose a credible threat to air operations. The US, and to an even greater extent the Europeans, have reduced emphasis and expenditure on what is known as the suppression of enemy air defence (SEAD) role. Counter-insurgency rather than counter-integrated air-defence operations have been the priority since the turn of the century. There is now, however, the renewed challenge of being able to carry out air operations in airspace defended by the latest generations of point-, short-, medium- and long-range SAM systems. Low-observable aircraft only offer a partial solution, particularly as the US and its allies will operate mixed fleets of stealthy and non-stealthy combat aircraft at least until around the middle of the century. The latter types of aircraft remain at greater risk from SAM threats than low-observable aircraft, and their operational utility will depend partly on the wider capacity to counter surface-based threat missile systems. SEAD is an asset-intensive capability, particularly in the early days of a conflict, and has traditionally involved dedicated platforms as well as fighter ground-attack aircraft. In SEAD operations in the 1990s, such as Operation Allied Force during the 1999 Kosovo conflict, up to one-third of strike missions were tasked against ground-based air defences. While the force mix will change as uninhabited systems are increasingly adopted in the inventory, a variety of crewed and uninhabited aircraft and associated weaponry will still be required for the task, and will be required in numbers greater than are available in current inventories if faced by a peer or near-peer threat. Collating what is known as an electronic order of battle against peer and near-peer rivals should once again become a priority, as should the capacity to counter, disable or destroy surface-to-air threat systems.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Defense Policy, Military Strategy, and Missile Defense
Political Geography:
Russia, China, Europe, Asia, North America, and United States of America

318. “The Political Striptease Show Amid the Coronavirus Pandemic Is Unattractive, Off-Putting”

Author:
Sergey Ryabkov
Publication Date:
01-2020
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
International Affairs: A Russian Journal of World Politics, Diplomacy and International Relations
Institution:
East View Information Services
Abstract:
Interview with Sergey Ryabkov, Deputy Foreign Minister of the Russian Federation
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, World Health Organization, Public Health, Pandemic, and COVID-19
Political Geography:
Russia and Europe

319. Russia Strives for an Oil and Gas Resurgence

Author:
Pavel K. Baev
Publication Date:
12-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Jamestown Foundation
Abstract:
As the global economy—animated by the arrival of multiple COVID-19 vaccines—hopes for the first signs of recovery, expectations also rise in Russia for an accompanying surge in demand for oil and natural gas and renewed prominence of energy geopolitics in foreign policy-making. President Vladimir Putin is a firm believer in hydrocarbons as the world’s main energy source and a sceptic of “green agendas,” even if Chinese President Xi Jinping has subscribed to the pledge to curtail emissions (TASS, September 30). Russia’s Energy Strategy 2035, approved in June 2020, sets ambitious goals for expanding oil and gas extraction and defines the shifts in the world markets toward carbon-neutral energy production as a major challenge (Vedomosti, May 19; see EDM, June 2). Mainstream Russian experts dismiss the European Union’s post-crisis recovery plans that include new incentives for developing zero-carbon-emission energy sources; defiantly, they project that Russian energy exports to the European market will continue to expand (Kommersant, December 3).
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Energy Policy, Oil, Natural Resources, Gas, and Economy
Political Geography:
Russia and Eurasia

320. Russia and Iraq Deepen Energy, Military Ties

Author:
John C. K. Daly
Publication Date:
12-2020
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Jamestown Foundation
Abstract:
As the United States hastens its drawdown of troops in Iraq before the January 20 inauguration of President-elect Joseph Biden, Russia is seeking to fill the developing geopolitical vacuum there. On November 25, following discussions in Moscow with Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein, Russia’s top diplomat, Sergei Lavrov, remarked that Russian energy firms have invested billions of dollars in the Iraqi oil industry. “When it comes to energy, the largest Russian companies are working in Iraq together with their partners. These are Lukoil, Rosneft, Gazprom-Neft and Bashneft. All four have invested more than $13 billion in the Iraqi economy,” Lavrov told journalists (Interfax, November 25). He added that Moscow was also prepared to increase arms deliveries to Baghdad, stating, “We are ready to meet any Iraqi needs for Russian-made military products. Our country has traditionally played and continues to play a very important and significant role in ensuring Iraq’s defense capability and equipping its army and security forces, including in the context of continuing terrorist threats” (Mid.ru, November 25).
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Energy Policy, Bilateral Relations, and Military Affairs
Political Geography:
Russia, Iraq, Eurasia, and Middle East