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161. Justifying sacrifice: Barack Obama and the selling and ending of the war in Afghanistan

Author:
Trevor Mccrisken
Publication Date:
09-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Chatham House
Abstract:
Just a month after entering office, US President Barack Obama spoke at the US Marine Corps base at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina. His remarks focused on his plans to 'responsibly' end the war in Iraq and to deepen the commitment of the United States to the fight against Al-Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan. One of the key motifs that Obama used in his speech was that of 'sacrifice'—the need for all Americans to continue the age-old tradition of paying a price for the freedoms they enjoy. As he told the audience of US Marines: 'The consequences of war are dire, the sacrifices immeasurable. You know because you have seen those sacrifices. You have lived them. And we all honor them.' He then characterized this notion of sacrifice for one's country as being part of a long tradition that was responsible for the very existence of the United States and an essential guarantor of its domestic freedom:
Political Geography:
Afghanistan, United States, Iraq, Taliban, and North Carolina

162. Escaping from American intelligence: culture, ethnocentrism and the Anglosphere

Author:
Richard J. Aldrich and John Kasuku
Publication Date:
09-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Chatham House
Abstract:
American intelligence continues to privilege strategic analysis for policy-makers. The core of the American intelligence system remains the National Intelligence Estimate process, the legacy of Sherman Kent, the 'Founding Father' of the analytical profession. In support of this process, vast technical resources are deployed in collecting secret material that is not available from open sources or from diplomatic reporting, and then subjecting it to elaborate analysis. The priority accorded to this activity is symbolized by the veneration of the President's Daily Brief, a top-level intelligence summary that is described by Bob Woodward as 'the most restricted document in Washington', and by the White House itself as 'the most highly sensitized classified document in the government'. George Tenet, one of the longest-serving directors of Central Intelligence, has insisted that President's Daily Briefs from his period of office were so important that none would ever be declassified and released for public inspection.
Topic:
Intelligence
Political Geography:
America and Washington

163. The UN Arms Trade Treaty: arms export controls, the human security agenda and the lessons of history

Author:
Mark Bromley, Paul Holtom, and Neil Cooper
Publication Date:
09-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Chatham House
Abstract:
The UN-led process aimed at negotiating an arms trade treaty (ATT), formally launched in 2006, reached the end of its mandate on 27 July 2012 after a four-week negotiating conference. The conference had been tasked with reaching consensus on an international treaty to establish the 'highest possible common international standards for the transfer of conventional arms'. Such a task was always going to be hard to achieve, but it was widely assumed that there was broad acceptance of a draft treaty text that was circulated on the penultimate day of the conference. However, on the final day the United States declared that the text needed further work and they proposed convening another conference to conclude negotiations. Russia, North Korea, Cuba and Venezuela supported the US position. At the time of writing it is unclear whether the next stage in the ATT process will be a vote on the adoption of the draft treaty text in the General Assembly in December 2012, an additional round of UN negotiations or something else entirely.
Political Geography:
Russia, North Korea, Cuba, and Venezuela

164. Climate security, risk assessment and military planning

Author:
Chad Michael Briggs
Publication Date:
09-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Chatham House
Abstract:
The effort to tie together environment and security is not a new endeavour. The Epic of Gilgamesh spoke of floods, possibly referring to actual changes in the Euphrates and Tigris rivers, resulting in clashes over water access and land use. Stories from the Third Punic War (albeit of disputed veracity) spoke of the Romans sowing the fields of Carthaginians with salt in order to prevent the communities from rebuilding. Environmental factors have been crucial in warfare throughout history, from storms warding off the Spanish Armada in Elizabethan times to the decimation of European troops by disease during the Crusades. Later colonial powers, recognizing that the conquest of land overseas required also the conquest of nature, established schools of tropical hygiene and medicine to provide adaptation strategies for new environmental conditions.
Topic:
Security
Political Geography:
United Kingdom and Europe

165. Resource wars: searching for a new definition

Author:
Jasper Humphreys
Publication Date:
09-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Chatham House
Abstract:
It is a sad and startling fact that the second highest segment of global illicit commerce is in wildlife, dead or alive; in May 2012 the average price for rhino horn was higher than that of either gold or cocaine at US$60,000 per kilo.
Topic:
War
Political Geography:
Afghanistan

166. Mainstreaming the environment into postwar recovery: the case for 'ecological development'

Author:
Richard Milburn
Publication Date:
09-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Chatham House
Abstract:
In the past decade there has been an increased realization of the shared geography between biodiversity and conflict, with recent research finding that over 80 per cent of major armed conflicts between 1950 and 2000 occurred within biodiversity hotspots, and 90 per cent of conflicts occurred in countries containing biodiversity hotspots. This finding is accompanied by an expanding body of literature detailing the effects of armed conflict and the post-conflict development process on biodiversity, leading to the observation that 'while war is bad for biodiversity, peace is often worse'.
Political Geography:
Afghanistan

167. Book Reviews: International Relations theory

Author:
Patrick Chabal
Publication Date:
09-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Chatham House
Abstract:
An ever more pressing issue in the social sciences today is the question of standpoint. From where do social scientists identify and analyse the problems they wish to understand and explain? Which theories do they deploy and why? And what concepts do they use to achieve enlightening results? This question is more often than not elided, both because we feel secure in the use of the standard theories we employ, and because we are not accustomed to think critically about the matter of standpoint, or perspective. Having acquired the theoretical tools of our discipline, we are not tempted to re-examine their merit whenever we embark on our analytical journeys. However, there are now voices calling into question this unthinking use of social, political and economic theories. Two critiques are particularly significant. The first is that which challenges social theory on the grounds that it is the theoretical tool of the West, or North, which is blind to the fact that, in the words of Edward Saïd, it is 'Orientalist'. The second is that which disputes the 'scientific' nature of the so-called social sciences.
Topic:
International Relations
Political Geography:
Asia

168. Introduction

Author:
Julie Smith
Publication Date:
11-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Chatham House
Abstract:
Many people believed that Great Britain was not and did not wish to become European, and that Britain wanted to enter the Community only so as to destroy it or divert it from its objectives. Many people also thought that France was ready to use every pretext to place in the end a fresh veto on Britain's entry. Well, ladies and gentlemen, you see before you tonight two men who are convinced of the contrary.
Topic:
War
Political Geography:
United States, Europe, and Germany

169. Britain and Europe

Author:
Robert Cooper
Publication Date:
11-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Chatham House
Abstract:
Forty years after Britain joined Europe both have changed, mostly for the better. This story does not, however, begin in 1972 when the negotiations finished and were ratified by parliament, nor in 1973 when the UK took its place at the Council table as a full member, but ten years before with the first British application and the veto by General de Gaulle. Sometimes, going further back still, it is suggested that if Ernest Bevin's ideas for West European cooperation had been pursued, or if Britain had decided to join talks on the Schuman Plan, or to take the Spaak Committee seriously, things might have been different. But the truth is there was no Robert Schuman or Jean Monnet in Britain, and no readiness to think in radically new terms. Had the UK been present at the negotiations that led to the European Coal and Steel Community, the outcome for Britain would probably still have been the same, precisely because the vision was lacking. The decision on the Schuman Plan was a close-run thing—the idea of planning for heavy industry being in accordance with the ideas of the Labour government. But British ideas were very different from those of the French or the Americans, who were thinking in terms of supranational bodies—indeed, for Monnet this was a cardinal point. His approach was supported by the Benelux countries, which were already setting up their own customs union. Bevin had an ambition to lead Europe, but it is not clear where he wanted to take it. British policy was sensible and pragmatic but it offered no vision and few resources, and still gave as much priority to the empire as to Europe. Most probably, participation in those early talks would only have postponed a decision not to join the new enterprise. It was only when that enterprise looked successful and likely to last that Britain began to take it seriously and to think of membership.
Political Geography:
America, Europe, and France

170. Interview with Hans-Dietrich Genscher

Author:
Quentin Peel and Michael Stürmer
Publication Date:
11-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Institution:
Chatham House
Abstract:
Michael Stürmer: Occasionally, and very pointedly, you have described yourself as 'the man from Halle'. What does Halle stand for in your life? Hans-Dietrich Genscher: It is the city that has moulded me. It is a very defiant, revolutionary city, with a great tradition in the Enlightenment, in the Reformation, but also in the labour movement. So it is no surprise that on 17 June 1953, the centre of the uprising, outside Berlin, was in Halle. But also in the Third Reich there was strong resistance in this region.
Topic:
War
Political Geography:
Europe and England