Introduction

On the surface, the US has been saying it wants Russia's cooperation on Iran's nuclear program in the Security Council this week. So praktike wonders what to make of the timing of Cheney's anti-Russia speech in Lithuania, in which he accused the Russia government of using oil and natural gas as "tools for intimidation and blackmail," "unfairly and improperly restrict[ing] the rights of her people," and taking "actions that undermine the territorial integrity of a neighbor, or interfere with democratic movements."

After that bit of raw chutzpah, Cheney proceeded, in the words of the NYT, to wade into the energy battles in Kazakhstan while embracing Nazerbayev with smiling praise for Kazakhstan's "political development." Cheney finished his tour in Dubrovnik with the endorsement of NATO membership for an unlikely trio of candidates, Croatia, Albania and Macedonia.

Altogether, the trip was a tour de force -- a nicely judged combination of high-minded Cold War-style ideological conflict with cynical Great Game competition, carefully tailored at each stop to play to the specific anti-Russian (and pro-US) interests of key local players.

Strategic linkages

I don't think there can be any question that the Bush Admin has been making a number of anti-Russian moves in recent weeks and that Cheney's trip was deliberately designed to be provocative. It appears to me that the Russophobe hardliners within the Bush Admin, led by Cheney, have won the internal debates about how to deal with Russia leading up to next month's G-8 summit in St Petersburg.

As important, I also think the provocations directed toward Russia are part of a parallel program to delegitimize the UN process for dealing with Iran, where the US is transparently engaged in faux diplomacy.

In my view, recent moves by the Bush Admin are comprehensible only when they are seen as linked -- part of a broader "forward-leaning" effort to aggressively reassert US hegemony. My fear is that the tactics the US is using in playing the "diplomatic route" re Iran may not only be extremely dangerous as a way of dealing with Iran itself. Those tactics are likely to have far broader and more profound long-term effects on the structure of the international system.

Where are US foreign policy elites?

Why so little reaction to the Bush Admin's tougher line on Russia by American foreign policy elites ("realists" and "liberal internationalists") who aren't the natural allies ("neocons" and "national greatness" conservatives) of the Bush Admin? Perhaps it's because most foreign policy elites tend to be experts in one area or another with limited overlap -- e.g. nuclear proliferation, Middle East, former Soviet Union, China, Latin America, defense, etc. Or perhaps it's because they've lost the old Cold War habits of seeing linkages across diplomatic and security issues and across regions.

I also think, in part, it's because almost all "schools" of American foreign policy share unquestioningly the assumption that being the sole superpower is in the natural order of things. American hegemony is, at least in principle, assumed to be necessary and/or benign, and its maintenance and assertion is a good thing. What the various schools quarrel about is how best to maintain and assert American power (soft and hard) and "leadership." When liberal internationalists like John Ikenberry and Anne Marie Slaughter question whether maintenance of a unipolar system is actually in American interests, note how gingerly they approach the issue in order to avoid being treated as anti-American heretics.

"Realists" and "liberal internationalists" may tut at Cheney's confrontational style, and some may question his blatant hypocrisy on the subject of democracy. But I'm rarely seeing any challenge to the basic narrative that Russia deserves a smack-down from the US. First, it's become conventional wisdom (albeit of the ahistorical variety) that Russia is rolling back democracy and increasingly flirting with dictatorship at home [ed. - without really explaining why, it seems to be assumed that Putin's "soft authoritarianism" at home should automatically have a negative impact on US-Russia relations on everything from terrorism to trade]. Second, there's a general feeling that Russia has been getting a bit uppity abroad [ed. - Russia is seen as somehow "meddling" where it doesn't belong, even where some American elites actually agree more with Russia's position than that of the Bush Admin -- e.g. issues such as Iran or the Palestinians]

So maybe it's not surprising that it takes a rabid anti-imperialist who doesn't belong to any of the mainstream foreign policy schools, Justin Raimondo, to produce the first article I've read that condemns Cheney's anti-Russia attacks as something more than just undiplomatic and hypocritical. Even Raimondo, however, doesn't fully link Cheney's moves with the diplomatic games vis a vis Iran.

A five-pronged strategic offensive?

To see how recent Bush Admin policy moves are part of a broader strategy of reasserting hegemony, I find especially helpful the following observation by DrLeoStrauss (Stop the Spirit of Zossen).

The U.S. is currently conducting five separate strategic grand offensives:

(a) the roll back of the old Soviet imperial periphery across Eastern Europe, down through the Russian 'Near Abroad' of Ukraine and Georgia and Central Asia;

(b) the on again off again stuttering efforts to isolate China as the new 'Peer Competitor' across both the Asian Pacific rim and also in Central Asia [ed. - and in recent months, competition in Africa has been added to the list];

(c) conduct an international war on 'terrorism' (such as it is);

(d) lead new international cooperation regarding nuclear and WMD proliferation [ed. - "lead" is a charitably neutral way of describing the Bush Admin goals of (i) leaving to the US the determination of which countries are worthy of obtaining nuclear technology and weapons and (ii) ensuring that no unfriendly state can achieve deterrence against the US use of force]; and

(e) bootstrap the Middle East into modernity through unilateral American force of arms.

(Sprinkle 'democracy' on all of the above).

What's remarkable is that Iran intersects with all five "grand strategic offensives" plus "democracy." That helps explain how and why the Bush Admin has turned the nuclear dispute with Iran into a "crisis" (with considerable help from the Iranians themselves, of course). The Iranian situation offers the Bush Admin an opportunity to make "progress" on a number of its strategic offensives simultaneously -- not just with Iran or with the nuclear proliferation regime but with China and Russia as well.

The UN process is set up for "failure" in the sense that the Bush Admin is not going to obtain the sort of robust steps against Iran that it has sought. Either the Security Council negotiations will produce some sort of deadlock over the statement or, as Bolton has suggested this weekend, the US intends to proceed without Chinese and Russian support. Either outcome would give the US the excuse to ignore the Security Council going forward -- Rice has already been claiming that the Security Council would suffer a fatal "loss of credibility" if it fails to take action on Iran. Next stop, as again Rice has already suggested, is "coalitions of the wiling."

The Bush Admin will likely pin the blame for failure on the "ineffectiveness" of the UN (and international institutions), in general, and on China and Russia, in particular. We should expect the bill of particulars against China and Russia to be three-fold:

• they are authoritarian regimes that cozy up to tyrants for their own narrow economic and geopolitical purposes
• they threaten global energy security (in their roles as major consumer and major producer, respectively), and
• they are potential threats to their neighbors.

Marketing the program

This three-pronged attack draws on several different policy rationales or motives, each with a different way of defining "threats" to American interests:

• Cold War-style: ideologically-defined enemies, based on the "nature of the regime";
• Great Game-style: challenges to US influence/control of global energy;
• US "global leadership"-style: threats to US predominance in any region.

As DrLeoStrauss suggests, even if the Bush Admin's strategic goals were commendable (which I dispute), the simultaneous pursuit of such an ambitious collection of strategic objectives is likely to produce considerable incoherence in execution. Furthermore, as Cheney's trip illustrated, that incoherence will be compounded by relying on such a mix of "styles." It's difficult to reconcile the Cold War-style (e.g. Cheney's ideological assault on Putin's supposed lack of democracy) with the Great Game-style (e.g. fishing for gas deals with Nazerbayev while praising his fifteen-year contribution to Kazakhstan's "political development").

The advantage of this mixed bag of rationales, however, is the same the Bush Admin enjoyed in assembling support for the Iraq war: a bit of something for everyone -- liberal hawks, ideological warriors, "national greatness" conservatives, and old-fashioned military hawks. The fact that no one can explain the "real reason" the US went to war in Iraq isn't a bug, it's a feature.

Of course, such an ambitious program can't be left entirely to the Bush Admin. They need help from pundits and politicians to frame, legitimize and sell the program. Not surprisingly, we've already begun to hear from the usual suspects. A mere four days before Cheney's appearance in Lithuania, Robert Kagan warned in the op-ed pages of the WashPost of a global threat to liberalism potentially greater than Al Qaeda: a "League of Dictators" (read China and Russia) that will use their positions at the UN to undermine the promise of a new international order. Although Kagan's essay is primarily an example of the Cold War-style, he deftly weaves in the "energy security" card by showing how China's ideological and strategic interests (i.e., access to energy) are likely to coincide in places like Africa or Venezuela.

Max Boot has similarly been busy on the op-ed pages. The day before Cheney began his trip in Vilnius, Boot was lamenting the "dictatorship dividend" -- the windfall from rising oil prices enjoyed by "noxious dictators" like Putin and Chavez. Boot hit the trifecta -- the challenge to global "energy security," an ideological conflict, and the threat of "regional contagion."

Vladimir Putin and Hugo Chavez can buy off their publics with generous subsidies and ignore Western pressure while sabotaging democratic developments from Central America to Central Asia.

Since in this article Boot is concerned with nefarious energy suppliers, his list of villains doesn't include China, with which he is willing for the US to make common cause, at least as fellow energy consumers. In a longer piece, I'm confident he'd be able to find a way to lodge China in the enemy camp a la Kagan. As Matt Yglesias notes, Francis Fukuyama reminds us that the PNAC folks always need an enemy, and China was their pre-9/11 favorite. So they may just be reverting to form.

If John McCain's speech at the Brussels Forum on transatlantic relations a week ago is any indication, the "national greatness" conservatives are on the same page as the neocons and, according to Dan Drezner, the "muscular liberals" in the person of Richard Holbrooke are in full agreement with McCain. And of course the human rights folks and democracy true believers have long had China in their sights and are delighted to hear Cheney take on the Russians.

Reporting on his attendance at the Brussels Forum, Drezner notes:

The general tenor of the conference so far has been to focus less on transatlantic frictions and more on the geopolitical and geoeconomic difficulties that Russia and China are posing to the West as a whole. More later, but a question to readers -- will the realpolitik of a rising China and a renegade Russia... be the ultimate driver for a closer transatlantic partnership? And should that be the main driver?

Snark aside, Kagan and Boot give us a taste of the sort of arguments, from the same unholy alliance that brought us Iraq, that I expect to hear against Russia and China as the Bush Admin seeks to reassert American hegemony.

This post certainly requires quite a bit more fleshing out, so let's call it an "Intro." As and if I develop some of these thoughts further, I'll update with links to future posts.

cross-posted at American Footprints

UPDATED below on 8-29-05 for new coverage from the Economist

---

This is an update to the positioning and posturing over the draft UN Summit document I discussed in my earlier defense of John Bolton.

The Guardian's diplomatic editor is reporting that the Foreign Office is supporting the original draft -- and speaks for the EU as well, since the UK holds the Presidency these days. The headline and lede are couched in terms of Bolton and the US dynamiting "UN reform," but most of the complaints noted in the article focus on the Millennium Development Goals and the poverty/development agenda I discussed in the earlier post. The MDGs are just just one piece of a complex agenda proposed by Kofi Annan, but they can generate a lot of quotes from high-profile NGOs, especially in the wake of the Make Poverty History and Live-8 events in July, which received such visible support from Tony Blair.

The Guardian adopts a breathless US-against-the-world frame for the story, with the UK leading the fight against the Bush/Bolton forces of evil.

Britain will join an international alliance to confront George Bush and salvage as much as possible of an ambitious plan to reshape the United Nations and tackle world poverty next week .

The head-to-head in New York on Monday comes after the revelation that the US administration is proposing wholesale changes to crucial parts of the biggest overhaul of the UN since it was founded more than 50 years ago.
[...]
A wide range of organisations, from aid groups to the anti-arms lobby, voiced dismay about Mr Bolton's objections yesterday and expressed concern that the summit may end in failure.

The Make Poverty History campaign said there was a danger that the millennium development goals, the original reason for holding the summit, would be reduced to a footnote.

A source close to the UN secretary-general, Kofi Annan said it was too early to declare the UN plan dead. "Bolton wants to knock down the plan and start from scratch," the source said. "He will find that his opinions are not shared by most of the rest of the world."

The president of the UN general assembly, Jean Ping from the Gambia, has been working on the draft, covering issues of poverty, climate change, genocide, small arms, the creation of a permanent UN peacekeeping capability and reform of the UN management structure, for the past year.

A Foreign Office spokesman said yesterday that the UK and the European Union, of which Britain holds the presidency, "are broadly content with the summit draft. It reflects the ambitious agenda thrown up by Kofi Annan".

The spokesman said it was "important that we do not row back from previous high-level summits", such as the G8 meeting at Gleneagles in July and the UN millennium summit in 2000.

He stressed that a lot of negotiation on the draft still lay ahead. "There is a long way to go before leaders meet in September." [emph supplied]

I certainly agree that it would be bad form for the UN Summit to "row back from" prior international resolutions, especially at the instigation of the US. But the draft looks to me like another attempt to go over a great deal of old ground where the Bush Administration has refused to budge in the past, including as recently as July. Blair and Gordon Brown did their best in the runup to Gleneagles to armtwist the Bushies on a host of items near and dear to their heart, such as Brown's debt relief mechanism. And the whole world watched the cliffhanger negotiations on the infamous climate change language. I certainly don't agree with the Bush Administration's positions on many of those topics, but it's a bit disingenuous to claim that the US is backtracking.

So what are the Brits up to? After their experience trying to get agreement from the Americans on the Gleneagles agenda, it would seem unlikely that they actually expect the US to change its position on a host of items in the context of the UN Summit. So perhaps a bigger game's afoot.

Tony Blair and Condi Rice both have explicitly embraced a two-pronged global strategy for dealing with the Global Struggle Against Violent Extremism: unapologetically going after the "bad guys" while offering a longer-term vision of a hopeful future to the less-developed parts of the world. But where the Bush Administration focuses almost exclusively on political freedoms and "democracy" as the cure for a troubled world, Blair has a much fuller vision of what is required for dealing with global issues and the challenges of interconnectedness. Hence the two centerpieces of his EU Presidency: his major Africa initiative and a commitment to getting a deal on global climate change that goes beyond the Kyoto paralysis. But whereas the Bush approach is determinedly a set of US-led or managed initiatives, Blair has been reemphasizing the importance of multilateral institutions and networks of relationships. Without setting himself up as in opposition to (or as Chirac would have it, balancing) the US' hegemonic ambitions, Blair has been demonstrating an alternative model of global leadership which is more attractive to many countries as well as to interest and advocacy groups which are often vocal opponents of US policies. In this context, helping the US to isolate itself in another high-profile context may suit Blair's agenda.

Annan's original proposal for the UN Summit was to try to strike a "grand bargain" that (1) met the concerns other countries have about US policy (most notably but not exclusively in the security domain), (2) produced concrete reforms in areas where the US, along with many other countries, believes the UN needs a major overhaul, such as the human rights commission and the bureaucracy in New York, (3) gave a more formal leadership role to countries that are major powers and more voice to the South more generally, and (4) provided an impetus for initiatives where there is a general willingness for the UN to take a greater role, such as in peace-building.

The prospects for such a bargain were never very good, if only because the bargain over Security Council membership has become so contentious. And it is unlikely that a grand bargain would be achieved without that issue being resolved. But even on other issues, the shape of any such bargain had been lost in the blizzard of detail in the draft UN Summit document as it stood before Bolton's red pen.

If the approach to negotiating the draft is to continue to bargain over details in a massive document, there are two possible outcomes, which really depend on the other countries, especially the Brits: either the well-known US objections will be accommodated without too much fuss, or the US will be isolated but the actual reasons will be lost in minutiae. In the first case, the summit will be declared a "success" by the politicians (and the NGOs will moan and wring their hands), and in the second, it will be declared a failure. In neither case is it remotely probable that the UK will get the US to sign off on anything close to the current draft. And in neither case are we likely to see anything approaching Kofi's "grand bargain" of reform.

Bolton has proposed scrapping the massive detailed document and going to a short-and-sweet set of principles which could in fact resuscitate the "grand bargain" approach. This would be high-risk because it would highlight potential disagreements that would be hard to paper over with pages on pages of obfuscatory prose. But the US could also be betting that such an approach might keep the US from being isolated because it would highlight potential faultlines among those who are currently signing on to the massive draft -- since the current draft is as much a comprehensive wish list as a set of actions and would not involve significant adjustments to their own policies nearly to the same degree as it would impact US policies.

So what are some of the possible outcomes? Here are the four that seem to me most likely. "Success" that produces a document that doesn't mean much or change much of anything. "Failure" of a mishmash of topics, with the US isolated and blamed for the "failure" on process grounds (i.e. Bolton intransigence). "Failure" of a "grand bargain," with the US isolated and blamed for the "failure." "Failure" of a "grand bargain" but in its place an agreed "agenda for the future" -- with the US not isolated and nobody taking "blame" -- just a consensus that Kofi's ambitions for achieving a "grand bargain" were premature, and by the way, his term is just about completed anyway and he's damaged goods because of oil-for-food, etc etc.

It seems to me that Bolton would like to achieve the fourth outcome, or if that's not doable, the first. What I'm wondering is, which outcome would Tony Blair prefer?

UPDATE And here's the FT's leader on Saturday. The FT passes along the (UK) version of the story I questioned in my earlier post -- that to everyone's surprise and consternation, Bolton threw a fit about the lengthy document upon his arrival in New York. But the FT does acknowledge that US positions on a number of items aren't exactly news, and that it's a bit more complex than strictly the US-against-the-world. The piece is worth reading as a pretty good summary of what some of the fusses are about and what the US would like to see as "UN reform."

Eventually, warned that this would let other states off the hook of the many US-inspired commitments that they dislike, Mr Bolton sat down yesterday with his UN colleagues to haggle over hundreds of US amendments.

They mostly focus on measures and institutions the US has consistently opposed elsewhere, such as the International Criminal Court and the nuclear test ban treaty which the US has either refused or failed to ratify. The US is also opposed to the pledge for rich countries to spend 0.7 per cent of their national wealth on aid; most Americans believe US aid is far higher than this, and the Bush administration does not want to remind them it is actually far lower.

In the same vein the US apparently wants to delete reference to the UN's Millennium Development Goals set in 2000, when the original aim of next month's summit was to review progress towards them. [As I discussed earlier, I have considerable sympathy with the US position now that the MDGs have morphed into a sort of Trojan horse for development initiatives I personally would not support] Astonishingly, given the loud US allegations of recent genocide in Darfur, Washington is fretting at language that would urge permanent Security Council members not to use their vetoes to block action to halt genocide and other war crimes.

On this, however, China is as opposed as the US. Earlier this summer, Beijing joined Washington to thwart more states joining them permanently on the Security Council. Other recent developments also augur ill. The failure of last May's Non-Proliferation Treaty review conference has cast gloom on any further initiatives next month to check the spread of nuclear weapons. By contrast, the Group of Eight summit's relative success at Gleneagles on debt forgiveness has created the equally erroneous opposite impression on aid: that little more needs to be done. [And indeed, further discussion of debt relief, as well as the contentious debate with the US on the impact of debt relief on the balance sheets of the IFIs, is undoubtedly part of the agenda for the IMF/World Bank annual meetings just after the UN Summit, so its reappearance on the UN agenda, other than to indicate that further work is being undertaken, is somewhat mystifying.]

Still on the agenda for the UN summit are many US priorities that deserve support and success. They include reforms to give Kofi Annan's UN secretariat more management responsibility but also to make it more accountable, the creation of a Peacebuilding Commission, reform of the UN's human rights machinery and an international convention to define and outlaw terrorism. But to have a chance of securing these goals, the US and Mr Bolton need to take account of others' concerns. In all negotiations, taking requires some give.

Still, I'm curious whether Blair really expects Bush to "give" something new, and if so, what.

FURTHER UPDATE: The Economist offers the most balanced view I've seen so far. Describing the US reasoning for deleting explicit references to the Millennium Development Goals and how that fits within the "grand bargain":

September’s summit, billed by the UN as the biggest gathering of world leaders in history, was originally to be a five-year review of the 2000 Millennium Summit, the most notable product of which was the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). These include worthy aims such as halving abject poverty and achieving universal primary education by 2015. As desirable as these goals are, there seems little hope of achieving the panoply of policy objectives embedded in the MDGs; the UN itself is already complaining about the lack of progress.

The proposed American edits to the document remove nearly all references to the MDGs, referring instead to more vaguely-worded “internationally agreed development goals”. In place of the MDGs, America wants to put more emphasis on the “Monterrey Consensus”, the result of a 2002 summit in Mexico that concluded that developing countries need to take more responsibility for their own growth by fighting corruption, improving the investment climates and otherwise making their countries more hospitable to economic activity.

Such market-friendly ideas have become the vogue not only in America but among the non-governmental organisations fighting desperate poverty around the world. They have belatedly recognised that tens of billions of dollars in aid over the past decades have utterly failed to curb extreme poverty in much of the world, especially Africa. Those countries that have made the greatest strides against poverty, most notably India and China, but also countries like South Korea and Taiwan, have done so largely by making their own economies suitable for investment and growth.

But developing countries, many at the UN and many rich-world governments too believe that substantial aid is required as well. For reasons of geography and history, they argue, Africa is in a “poverty trap” that no amount of internal reforms will solve without aid. Thus the draft summit document included a call for rich countries to aim to give 0.7% of their GDP in assistance.

It is this kind of language that America wants removed. In a slightly defensive letter to other ambassadors sent on Friday, Mr Bolton said that despite its deletion of every reference to the MDGs, America did in fact support them, so long as these were taken to mean outcomes (e.g. halving poverty) and not inputs (such as the aid target, which America never agreed to). The blizzard of negative publicity last week may have put some pressure even on America’s fierce ambassador.

The diplomatic problem is that the countries of the developing world—represented by the “G77” group—see a strong focus on aid and the MDGs as their price for agreeing to the rich world’s—especially America’s—agenda. These priorities include an overhaul of management and oversight within the UN’s own house, to prevent, for example, fraud like the recent and humiliating oil-for-food scandal. The developing countries may only agree to proposed American reforms like this if tempted by a promise of significant and predictable aid flows. If the Americans are going to propose 750 amendments, the G77 might respond in kind.

This explanation -- that the US opposes the implied "inputs" that have become attached to the MDGs, not the goals themselves -- is consistent with my previous analysis. In its explanation of the inputs vs outputs argument, the Economist points solely to the "percentage of GDP" commitment for aid flows, which the US has long rejected. But getting rid of the GDP commitment would be an easy change to make -- simply strike the provision containing the commitment -- and would not require removing references to the MDGs themselves. By contrast, the far more elaborate set of proposals embodied in the Sachs report are tied directly to the MDGs, so I still think those are some of the main "inputs" the US is trying to kill.

cross-posted at Liberals Against Terrorism

Well, not exactly. I am not a John Bolton fan, to put it mildly. But I actually think Bolton's getting a bum rap over the the recently leaked "mark-up" containing the extensive US comments on the draft declaration for the UN Summit.

Given Bolton's record, it's not surprising that the US mark-up is being characterized as a Bolton special:

• John Bolton is doing exactly what his critics expected of him. He is sticking it to the world. . .hard and nasty. (Steve Clemons sitting in for Josh Marshall at TPM)


• John Bolton is the perfect messenger for the blunt challenge Washington has thrown down to the international consensus. (Guardian)


• America's controversial new ambassador to the United Nations is seeking to shred an agreement on strengthening the world body and fighting poverty intended to be the highlight of a 60th anniversary summit next month. In the extraordinary intervention, John Bolton has sought to roll back proposed UN commitments on aid to developing countries, combating global warming and nuclear disarmament. (The Independent)


• While Bolton ludicrously talks about seeking a "strong consensus," the objective is rather obvious: strong dissensus all around. [Hence, talking about the merits of this or that proposal totally misses the point. The proposed changes are tactical fig leaves fog sabotage.] (Stygius)

The extensive scope and degree of detail of the mark-up (some 750 comments, hardly a paragraph in 32 pages left untouched) -- especially in areas that appear non-controversial (at least by comparison with Kyoto or the ICC) -- have given rise to speculation that Bolton is off the (Condi) reservation again. Clemons, citing a briefing for NGOs held by Nicholas Burns and Philo Dibble, reports that Burns and Dibble were vague and seemingly unforthcoming in explaining why the Millennium Development Goals had disappeared from the US' preferred language. Clemons speculates that the civil wars within the State Department have begun, reasoning that Burns and Dibble couldn't shoot down Bolton in public, but they didn't support him either. Similarly, Stygius notes a NYT article at the time of the Bolton recess appointment, citing State Dept insiders' claims that the UN reform agenda had been proceeding well in the absence of a permanent ambassador. Based on Bolton's patterns of past behavior, Stygius understandably draws the following conclusion:

John Bolton wants to escape the cage that's been built around him. Thus we see him emphatically trying to inject himself into a reform process that is already well underway, one controlled by those within a Bush Administration that have deliberately (and pragmatically) excluded him in the interests of UN reform.

I've taken a quick scan through the mark-up (pdf) provided via Steve Clemons. And I've looked with somewhat greater care at the development sections that seem to have provoked quite a bit of comment, especially the deletion of language regarding the Millennium Development Goals. I have quite a different take on the draft and the US position.

I was indeed shocked and dismayed, but not by the majority of US comments. Rather, I was flabbergasted that whoever has been shepherding the document through the bureaucratic process had thought that a draft at this late date, which had so many items that directly contradicted long-standing US positions -- including on topics that had just received world-wide attention at the Gleneagles G-8 summit -- had the remotest chance of survival.

Let's focus first on process. The Guardian offers two possible explanations for this state of affairs.

The US delegation says it was raising its objections informally at meetings to discuss the draft, and was forced to circulate its blunt list of deletions and additions only after those objections were ignored.

The account provided by European officials at the UN explains the late timing of this intervention by turmoil inside the US foreign policy establishment. For the first seven months of this year, as the draft was being hammered out, the US had no full permanent representative at the UN. John Danforth retired in January, and the White House's attention was focused on persuading the Senate to confirm John Bolton. A career diplomat, Anne Patterson, led the delegation in the interim, but reportedly received little political guidance from Washington.

When Mr Bolton arrived this month, finally forced in by the president with a temporary executive appointment, the change was dramatic. The leadership shifted from a non-political diplomat to one of the most ideological and partisan US permanent representatives in recent history.

Let's be clear, folks. A large number of the proposed changes would require no, I repeat, no political guidance from Washington. They are no-brainers, pure and simple, for anyone representing the US in international fora. Many are on points where representatives from other countries familiar with the issues would know good and well that the draft language was a non-starter for the US. Not just for the Bush Administration, but for prior administrations or for a considerable majority of the US Congress.

The explanation offered by the US delegation, as reported by the Guardian, is plausible. The account provided to the Guardian by "European officials at the UN" is not. Unless, that is, what the officials meant when they said "little political guidance" was that State told Anne Patterson not to throw a public tizzy-fit until Bolton arrived on the scene.

Now for some substantive comments. Let's leave to one side the absolutely clear-cut non-negotiable US positions on hot-button issues -- such as Kyoto and the ICC -- where the positions in the draft were not couched in terms that could conceivably obtain US endorsement. Let's just focus on the development and poverty agenda, where it's already clear from the press comments that the proposed US changes will be viewed by some (especially NGOs and undoubtedly many developing countries) as backtracking on some sort of grand global consensus.

Some of the proposed additions or deletions are undeniably chippy -- the US substituting its preferred formulation that publicizes its own programs or philosophies rather than use more generic language that would incorporate a wider variety of approaches that have broad support in the development community. A wordsmith would have few difficulties coming up with language that is widely acceptable to both the US and the original drafters in many of those cases. Some of the changes are stylistic -- toning down the sweeping generalities and grandiose sentiments but more accurately reflecting the reality of what the document represents and is likely to achieve in practical terms (e.g., "all" is invariably struck; "recognize" and "resolve" are often substituted for "agree" and "commit"). Even after the US' proposed amendments, however, it's a pretty ambitious laundry list of hopes and dreams.

But if we take a large step back from the specific clauses and look at the overall thrust of the draft, it's easy to see why the US viewed it as troubling, to say the least. The draft is a major attempt to shift responsibility for defining and overseeing the development/poverty agenda, and controlling the resources for that agenda, from the current system of bilateral aid politics and multilateral institutions (especially the IMF and the World Bank) to New York. The alleged "backtracking" by Bolton on the MDGs should be seen in this context.

The draft for the UN Summit, before the US started whacking away with a red pen, covered a whole host of topics that are currently being debated within the IMF, the World Bank and the WTO (and occasionally the G-8, G-22 etc) -- such as debt relief and what it will mean for the capital structure of the lending institutions, changes in the architecture of the international financial system, coordination of national development and poverty reduction strategies with bilateral and multilateral assistance, improving the mechanics of aid delivery, the big Doha Round agenda. No one who included these issues in the draft for the UN Summit could have expected that these complex topics -- which have been discussed non-stop for years, with progress made incrementally, and which will be discussed for years to come -- could be brought profitably into the UN Summit process.

The proposed draft can only be fully understood if you've got a feel for the sort of debates represented by Jeffrey Sachs' gargantuan scheme to "end poverty in our lifetime." The scheme was set forth in a special report overseen by Sachs for Kofi Annan earlier this year that's an "action plan" for the MDGs. I am extremely uncomfortable with the entire Sachs approach, which is far too top-down (in the sense of planning, not necessarily implementation, and rapid scalability), too focused on box-car dollars, and much too heavy on actions directed at eliminating "poverty" rather than integrating more of the poor into a long-term positive-feedback process that promotes sustainable economic development. Caveat -- Sachs does have lots of interesting diagnoses of problems and specific ideas for ways to make drastic improvements in peoples' lives, his recent book is worth a quick read, and some of the specific chapters and Task Force reports that are components in the grand UN scheme are full of good insights.

It is my personal opinion -- and apparently the position of the US government -- that the world doesn't need more grandiose schemes. But it is not simply a matter of opinion that there is a complete absence of a "global consensus" on development and poverty reduction which the US (or Bolton) is purportedly opposing. In fact, it's an absolute canard to suggest that such a consensus exists. Surely the recent debates spawned by the attention to assistance in Africa at the recent G-8 summit should have made that clear to one and all. Reasonable people who are passionately committed to development and poverty reduction have major differences about what sorts of assistance or actions by developed countries are effective and desirable.

But in addition to my allergy to a development philosophy that's excessively "planned," overly concerned with fund-raising, and focused heavily on "poverty" per se, the biggest problem I have with Sachs' proposals is that it would put the UN in the driver's seat. As most fights over institutional arrangements, the Sachs proposal isn't framed as New York-centric in so many words. But the reality of the institutional agenda is plain to discern for anyone with experience in institutional battles when (1) the driving goals/metrics are "owned" by the UN (the MDGs), (2) the "coordinating" mechanisms are ten-year national development plans tied to the achievement of the UN-owned goals, (3) UN Country Teams are responsible for ensuring "coordination" of both bilateral and multilateral assistance, and (4) the Bretton Woods institutions (IMF, World Bank) and regional development banks are supposed to derive much of their agendas from the MDGs. The Sachs' report's ten recommendations for transforming aid -- although accurately identifying several legitimate issues -- together if adopted would produce a major institutional power shift under the technocratic guise of clearer objectives and better coordination. The indicative, not mandatory, aspirational benchmarks that were the MDGs have become the vehicle for a nice little power struggle.

A shift in center of gravity from the specialized international financial institutions (IFIs) towards the UN in New York may appear to be attractive for a lot of NGOs, who think they'll be able to more readily influence the agenda and ensure "accountability" of the development institutions. It's also superficially attractive to developing countries that have less voice within the board rooms of the IFIs, where the donor countries have the greatest power, and the particular developmental flavor-of-the-year in the donor capitals will often have more influence on the type and timing of assistance than needs as perceived by recipients of that assistance. Indeed, the entire issue of inadequate voice of less-developed countries within international organizations, and the erosion of legitimacy of those organizations due to inadequate voice, is a very real concern.

Robert Keohane addresses the issue of "accountability" of the IFIs in a provocative article in the most recent issue of the Harvard International Review (Kennedy School) that focuses on "defining power" in international relations. Keohane's topic is "Abuse of Power: Assessing Accountability in World Politics." Unfortunately, the issue is not yet online. Here's some of the bit on multilateral organizations, which are the frequent object of wrath and scorn as "unaccountable," especially by NGOs.

Consider the entities conventionally held accountable on a transnational basis. The most prominent, judging from demonstrations, press coverage, and even scholarly articles are major inter-governmental organizations concerned with economic globalization: the European Union, World Bank IMF, and WTO. Champions of "more accountability" make these organizations major targets, which certainly have deficiencies in accountability and certainly do not meet the standards of accountability for the best-functioning democracies of our era. But ironically, these entities seem to be relatively accountable compared with other key global actors.

These economic institutions are internally accountable to states on the basis of authorization and support. States must create them and continue to fund them. Externally significant accountability gaps exist. Indeed, many poor people affected by the policies of the IMF, World Bank, and WTO lack any ability to hold the organizations accountable. Nevertheless, there is a vaguely held notion that these people should have some say in what the organizations do -- that the "voice of the poor," in the World Bank's words, should be heard. Many feel, then that these organizations should be externally as well as internally accountable.

Various NGOs purporting to speak for and promote principles that help affected people gain legitimacy on the basis of this widespread belief. One result of the endeavors is that the decision-making process of many multilateral organizations have become remarkably transparent. Indeed, in transparency they now compare well to the decision-making processes of most governments, even some democratic ones. When their process are not transparent, the chief source of non-transparency is governmental pressure for confidentiality.

But the decentralization and discord characteristic of world politics mean that these organizations cannot keep secrets very well. ... Leaders then spend much of their time answering charges that are made against their organizations, and seeking to persuade constituencies that the organizations are actually constructive, responsive, and legitimate.

These organizations are therefore anything but "out-of-control bureaucracies" accountable to no one. Indeed the real problem appears quite different. A large number of would-be principals, led by a variety of NGOs, demand accountability. But the NGOs are weak compared with governments, to which these organizations are chiefly accountable. When they lose the battle due to their institutionally weak positions, NGOs condemn the organizations as "unaccountable." [emph supplied]

Keohane doesn't directly raise the other accountability question at the heart of many debates over the roles of NGOs and the newly-fashionable "civil society" organizations -- who elected them? This is a critical issue, because advocacy groups by their very nature are not effective vehicles for accommodating conflicting interests. The "accountability" problem presented by NGOs themselves may be equally applicable to governments of developing countries in which the interests of substantial portions of a country's population may be poorly represented in the political system. But that particular accountability challenge is not central to those who would hope to use the UN to shift the power equation within the world of development assistance, since state sovereignty is a core principle of the UN system.

The "accountability" wars are not some minor skirmish. Sebastian Mallaby, in a September 2004 Foreign Policy article (sub req'd) took on the potential negative effects of NGOs on the developmental effectiveness of the multilateral institutions. This was a major theme in Mallaby's recent biography of James D Wolfensohn, in which a recurring critique of Wolfensohn's tenure as President of the World Bank was that he tried too hard to meet the insatiable agendas of NGOs. I would agree, while noting that in the process, Wolfensohn did help institutionalize a far more transparent process of considering a range of impacts of the Bank's projects on interests -- whether poor or indigenous peoples, minorities, or the environment -- that are often poorly represented in the political systems of developing countries. Listening to the "voices of the poor" and focusing on "pro-poor" ways of implementing reforms or building new projects has been "mainstreamed" in World Bank practice. Wolfensohn's emphasis on meaningful local partnerships was also a useful corrective for an institution renown for its arrogance. A similar sensitivity to a broader agenda of interests is belatedly beginning to be felt at the IMF, in part a recognition of the excessively narrow approach to macroeconomic adjustment that the Fund pursued in the Asia crisis, as critiqued most famously by Joseph Stiglitz. Heterodox policy approaches are also finding far more congenial homes within both institutions over the past decade. So these institutions can and do reform and reinvent themselves as they learn from experience and as the world changes around them.

Shifting the development agenda from the IFIs in Washington to the to-be-created UN development apparatus in New York is the last thing that should be embraced if aid effectiveness is a priority. Although considerable progress has been made in making UNDP a more dynamic and efficient UN agency, no one would confuse its experience, expertise, or intellectual leadership with the IFIs. There may indeed be a need for expanding the UN's own development capacity within Country Teams that deal with a host of closely intertwined development issues in the political, social and economic areas. There is certainly a need to reduce the number of separate aid organizations that governments in developing countries must deal with. And coordination to avoid overlapping and conflicting projects is always an objective. But assigning a coordinating role, and having the MDGs drive the development agendas, is a recipe for a bureaucratic nightmare. The objective of UN reform is to get the UN to focus on the things it does well, or that no one else can do, and reorganize its bureaucracy to address those tasks. Not to add on new tasks that are already in the reasonably capable hand of other institutions.

Setting to one side whether a shift in apparent power and influence over the development agenda would benefit the poor in developing countries, such a shift would be a Pyrrhic victory. Keohane's conclusion applies equally to NGOs and developing countries who demand more "accountability" from the multilateral institutions:

Certainly some real benefits could result from making the WTO and the IMF more accountable to a wider range of interests and values. However, we should be alert to the prospect that the political result of such a shift would be a reduction of states' interests in such organizations. If states get less benefit from international institutions, they will be less willing to provide resources and to accept demands on them., through these institutions, for accountability. The ultimate result of such well-meaning moves, therefore, could be a weakening of the accountability, limited as it is, that multilateralism imposes on powerful states. Those who believe in accountability as a way of limiting abuses of power should work to build support within powerful, rich countries for acceptance of more effective and legitimate multilateral governance to achieve human purposes, and for the increased external accountability that is likely to follow.

Agreeing with US criticisms of the UN draft on development doesn't mean that I support the Bush Administration's approach to foreign assistance (or the Bush Administration's policy on many of the other controversial items in the UN draft such as arms control). There are a host of changes I would like to see in US policy toward foreign assistance writ large, especially but not exclusively as pursued by the Bush Administration. Among a long list of things I'd like to see changed by the Bush Administration (recognizing that these are not necessarily unique to either the Bush Administration or to Republicans) -- an insistence on an extremely limited set of tools that fit their ideological biases; a defense in every possible circumstance of intellectual property concerns of US multinationals; a predeliction for bilateral over multilateral approaches (and the leverage/blackmail that often entails); the habit of setting priorities or attaching conditions to aid that please narrow vocal domestic constituencies (especially ethnic diasporas and religious groups); the inability to build lasting coalitions in Congress for long-term programs and international organizations; and their trumpeting of grand "innovative" schemes that promise billions and deliver nada. Unfortunately, not only is the Bush Administration unlikely to change its approach to foreign assistance significantly, even if it were willing to adopt the changes outlined in the draft UN Summit document, those changes wouldn't be for the better.

Unfortunately for the US' diplomatic position, Ambassador Bolton is the wrong person to be making the case for how and why the UN Summit draft needs to be changed. Stygius makes an excellent point -- the draft UN document as it currently stands is exactly the wrong sort of document for a major summit.

From the sound of it, a 39-page declaration of resolutions strikes me as utterly insane, drowning all of the urgent priorities in a sea of diplomatic ejaculation; but the immediate point is that waiting until just before a conference starts before deluging everyone else with proposed changes is a tactical maneuver to castrate the entire project before it even starts.

And that's the problem the US now has with Bolton in this position, because everyone assumes that he's simply engaging in obstructionist tactics. His reputation is such that he has little credibility presenting the American criticisms of what is claimed to represent a broad international consensus, even though such a consensus is bogus.

It is far too easy for those who would like to see the US squirm to make the US look bad via Bolton. I won't go so far as to say that those managing the drafting process at the UN set him (and the US) up with malice aforethought, but the more paranoid could make a case for that, since the inevitable result is going to be a great deal of finger-pointing and blame-casting. And who do you think the rest of the world is going to believe -- John Bolton and George Bush? Riiiiight...

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A follow-up post on this story, how it's being played out in the press, and speculation about the role of the UK, here.

cross-posted at Liberals Against Terrorism

Susan Rice, writing in the Sunday Washington Post on "Why Darfur Can't Be Left to Africa," makes the following claim:

[W]e should not lose sight of the fact that conflict and genocide are fundamentally different phenomena, even though they may occur in tandem as in Darfur and Rwanda. Genocide, as distinct from conflict, is a crime against all humanity regardless of race, religion or region, and it is the obligation of the entire world to stop it.

Well, yes, the deliberate mass killing of innocents certainly has a large moral claim on our attention and available resources. From a moral standpoint, I would agree that genocide has an even stronger claim on all of us than the slaughter of innocents as collateral damage in a civil war (although the distinction between "genocide" and conflict can often be difficult to draw where there are long-standing conflicts and grievances). I agree that we should not distinguish between genocide that occurs in Africa and elsewhere, as though Africans are less valuable or worthy of protection (although Rice's analogy for intervention in Darfur -- the Balkans -- had a geopolitical dimension for NATO regardless of whether "genocide" was involved). Most importantly, putting a halt to massacres of civilians provides the strongest legal justification for other countries to ignore the sovereignty of a government, because it is either engaged in genocide or too feeble to stop one.

But the fact that intervening to halt genocide is easier to justify than interventions in other violent conflicts doesn't make it a "fundamentally different phenomenon" for other purposes. Putting a halt to the killing is only the beginning, not the end, of any intervention. Whether a conflict involves genocide or just terrible violence does not change the fact that those who intervene should have a pretty clear idea of what the desirable "end game" will be for neutralizing, if not permanently resolving, the conflict. There also must be a consensus on how to get to the "end game," the military and non-military resources required, and what impact the desired outcome would likely have on neighboring countries. Regardless of whether the methods used by one of the sides in a violent internal conflict is "genocide," those who intervene will have taken upon themselves the long-term responsibility for overseeing the hard political and practical challenges of peace-keeping and peace-making, reconstruction, and -- depending on the political outcomes -- reconciliation or separation of the conflicting groups.

I will grant that, if labeling a conflict a "genocide" makes it easier for a larger part of the international community to share long-term responsibility, then "genocide" is different from other conflicts. It becomes easier to mobilize an intervention to halt the violence, makes it more likely that international political support for long-term post-conflict stabilization and reconstruction can be maintained, and improves the odds that there will be widespread support for those countries who undertake to act as "guarantors" of the outcome. The fact that a conflict involves "genocide" does not, however, absolve proponents of intervention from sketching at least the broad outlines of what should come after the killing is halted and emergency relief is provided.

I agree with much of Rice's discussion of the limited capacity -- both politically and militarily -- of the nascent African Union. It would be a mistake for the US or NATO to rely on the AU as an effective response to the government of Sudan. Even handling the immediate humanitarian crisis requires a great deal more of both external pressure on and support for the AU. But Rice's analysis and recommendations are missing a few crucial elements about what comes after the escalated response she advocates. Simply claiming that "genocide is different" isn't a good enough excuse for that glaring omission.

I have yet to hear from proponents of expanded US, NATO or UN intervention in Darfur just what they are proposing for a long-term resolution of the conflict, how to reach and sustain that resolution, as well as the likely impact of such a resolution not only within Sudan but for neighboring countries. The feebleness of the African Union's responses has reflected, in part, a number of legitimate concerns throughout the region about what comes next if monitoring becomes a more assertive type of intervention.

Regarding the crisis in Darfur, surely the past two decades of war and fitful attempts at peace in southern Sudan have taught us that the Sudanese political, ethnic and sectarian conflicts are not only remarkably complex, nearly intractable, and remarkably impervious to outside influence but also that the political cultures and institutions in the region are extremely fragile. Regarding intervention more generally, surely the past three years in Iraq and Afghanistan have taught us all something about going into a country without a plan or thought of unintended consequences or with starry-eyed notions that getting rid of tyrants is a final solution.

So no, genocide and other conflicts are not "fundamentally different phenomena," because moral outrage, good intentions and wishful thinking do not a plan make.

Via the blog of the UN Foundation, UN Dispatch, quoting an AP story:

Secretary-General Kofi Annan has announced the creation of a fund to promote democratic institutions and practices around the world - an idea first proposed by the United States.

President Bush suggested the creation of a fund in a speech to the U.N. General Assembly in September. He said it would help countries lay the foundations of democracy by instituting the rule of law, independent courts, a free press, political parties and trade unions.

Somewhat ironically, given the recent run of rather depressing news about the state of democracy in Africa, it was at the African Union summit earlier this week that Annan announced the initiative (pdf). It's also not entirely clear whether Africa is all that high a geopolitical priority for the Bush Administration in proposing the fund, given its strategic emphasis on promoting democracy in other regions. But Kofi, ever the diplomat, made the most of his announcement.

more below the fold   more »

With all the ink split and airwaves filled about John Bolton and UN reform, very little in the way of "what exactly do we mean by reform" has been discussed by either proponents or opponents of Bolton's nomination. I admit to a certain sympathy for Tom Friedman's recent takedown of the GOP cries for "UN reform."

"Reforming the U.N." is without question one of the most tired, vacuous conservative mantras ever invented. It is right up there with squeezing "waste, fraud and abuse" out of the Pentagon's budget.

Still, I think Suzanne Nossel does us all a terrific service at Democracy Arsenal in explaining where UN reform really does matter. She outlines a number of key issues, as well as the stands being taken by different players.

Suzanne presents her piece as "on the margin of the Bolton debate." If, however, as has been speculated, the White House is considering pushing Bolton to the Senate floor even if the Committee sends his nomination with a negative recommendation, the sole reason -- other than an assertion of presidential power -- will be to tar the Democrats as "UN-huggers" who don't want an "effective UN." Such a circus will do neither the Democrats nor US foreign policy any good.

For that reason, I think it's extremely healthy for the policy blogs like Democracy Arsenal to expand beyond Bolton himself to the specifics of UN reform. The point is not that the Bush position on reform (at least as it's likely to be pursued by Rice) is either necessarily disingenuous or bad per se. Nor is it that the Bolton opponents are opposing Bolton as a way of undermining Bush's position on the UN. Rather, it's that Bolton is the wrong guy to pursue a reform agenda that is broadly shared on both sides of the aisle.

To make that case effectively requires Bolton's opponents to do more than simply saying "me too." It's not enough to say vaguely that the UN needs reform. That isn't very persuasive, and it has the added negative effect of being just general UN-bashing, rather than focusing on expanding on what the UN does well and changing it where it needs to change.

Suzanne also makes the point that it's important to identify where specific reform priorities overlap with Kofi Annan's proposals, and where the sticking points are. As she illustrates, a lot of those sticking points will be found in disagreements between the US and either Annan or other groups of countries, NOT between a majority of Republicans and Democrats.

Suzanne points us to a recent speech at the UN by Shirin Tahir-Kheli, the person Condi Rice has put in charge of the reform effort and the response to Annan's proposals. There are lots of tricky issues that are finessed in the speech. But I think most of us will find there's much to like in the Rice agenda so far. Which just makes the Bolton appointment all the more maddening and inexplicable!

{cross-posted at Liberals Against Terrorism}

This is one of those inside-baseball posts, but it's very good news for the development community.

The nominee for the new head of the United Nations Development Program -- replacing Mark Malloch Brown who has moved to Kofi Annan's chief of staff -- is Kemal Dervis from Turkey. For those of you who have read Sebastian Mallaby's book on Jim Wolfensohn's stint at the World Bank, you'll remember Kemal as one of the most colorful characters in one of Mallaby's most riveting tales. Kemal was the World Bank manager under whom the extraordinarily difficult and innovative Bosnia emergency assistance package was put together in 1994 -- which was crucial to the success of bringing Dayton to a conclusion. And as Mallaby notes [p. 121]:

a few years later, when he returned to Turkey to take up an appointment as his country's finance minister, the stock market jumped as his plane landed in Ankara and he was greeted as a savior.

I'm not going so far as to hail Kemal Dervis as UNDP's "savior," although given UNDP's leading role regarding the Millennium Development Goals and an uncertain mandate with respect to crisis prevention and recovery, this is one challenging job. It's great to see someone who is both a fine mind and a risk-taker in a major leadership role in the international civil service. Kudos to Kofi for selecting him from among 100 candidates.

Here's a snip from the UN press release today:

UNDP is the largest of the independently funded UN agencies and, under its special General Assembly mandate, leads the UN's work on eradicating extreme poverty and promoting good governance in the developing world. Its staff is active in 166 countries.

Mr. Dervis' current activities, such as participation in the Global Progressive Forum and the Progressive Governance Network, have been aimed at "finding ways to make globalization into a more stable and inclusive process and to further international cooperation," UNDP said.

He is the author of a book published last month called "For Better Globalization," speaks fluent English, French and German, besides Turkish, and holds a doctorate in economics from Princeton University and Master's and Bachelor's degrees from the London School of Economics (LSE).

{cross-posted at Liberals Against Terrorism}

[UPDATE 1-14-05 1:0AM EST] by nadezhda

Seems Kofi got the message after all. Courtesy Outside the Beltway, this item in the FT:

The United Nations is looking for a well-connected Washington figure to head its information office there, as part of a wide-ranging image makeover to improve relations with Congress.

The move, revealed to the Financial Times on Thursday, is touted as part of a public information revolution within the UN, which began with the recent appointment of Mark Malloch Brown, a former strategic communications professional, as chief of staff to Kofi Annan, UN secretary-general. According to one UN insider, the idea is to appoint an influential advocate with Capitol Hill experience who “understands how Washington works, can make calls, and get those calls answered”.

As Joyner, oops Robert Tagorda remarks:

It's astonishing that a global institution wouldn't have such a lobbyist in the first place. Isn't the US the most powerful country? Isn't it, at the most basic level, a permanent member of the security council? Why wouldn't you have a full-fledged operation whose sole purpose is to monitor beltway politics, especially since one major party tends to take a skeptical view of your very existence?

Can't imagine who "revealed" it to that London rag the FT. Mightn't it be some Brit who's moving into the office next to Kofi's?

In any event, this UN move shouldn't come as any surprise to readers of chez Nadezhda, huh? See comment thread below the fold.

[Further UPDATE} For those without FT access, here's a good profile in Guardian Online of Mark Malloch Brown, via Normblog. You don't imagine somebody's got a image-remake campaign started with the press, now do you? And BTW, MMB is old friends with PW and EJ. But then it's a small, small world.

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Originally posted 1-3-05 by praktike

Now somebody decided to leak the fact that a super-secret intervention meeting with the embattled Kofi Annan took place recently at Richard Holbrooke's pad:

The crisis meeting of veteran foreign policy experts in a Manhattan apartment one recent Sunday was held in agreed-upon secrecy.

The high profile guest of honor came unaccompanied by his usual retinue of aides and without the knowledge of most of his closest advisers. The mission, in the words of one participant, was clear - "to save Kofi and rescue the UN."
   more »

When the first news of the tsunami crossed the wires, reports were of deaths in the 20s and 50s. But the wires also reported the magnitude of the earthquake and geographic reach -- to southeastern India and beyond -- as well as walls of water two stories high. This clearly meant we would be looking at deaths in the tens of thousands at best. And indeed, each hour the toll keeps marching upwards, and we are still in the midst of the initial chaos, when the numbers of missing and presumed dead cannot be accounted for with any accuracy.

Yet the score-keeping of numbers of victims only tells part of the tale. The scale of the geophysical event is mind-boggling, and will be the stuff of both science and legends for decades to come. So far, Wikipedia is proving to be a remarkable, dynamic resource for understanding what has happened.

Wikipedia also provides an extremely useful compendium of constantly updated information on the current struggles to deal with the most urgent threats as well as the broader tasks of addressing the longer-term consequences of the catastrophe in each country affected. In addition, a truly international collection of sites and programs soliciting assistance -- in kind and cash -- can be found there. A special section is devoted to indepth coverage of the disaster as it has affected India. Reuters' AlertNet, its humanitarian crisis and disaster service, is a good place to track news on UN, aid agency and NGO responses going forward.

The blogosphere has of course not disappointed. Folks have ramped up a variety of resposnes in short order. Via The Acorn, here's a just-launched site devoted to both information and organizing assistance: SEA-EAT blog (The South-East Asia Earthquake and Tsunami). Here's their RSS feed as well.

SEA-EAT blog has just set up a very useful donation page that directs you to organizations accepting donations online as well as those taking other forms of donations. Check out if there are comments on the SEA-EAT blog regarding some of the organizations soliciting assistance -- and you can also post questions about an organization if you want to know more about them.

In the blog's list of "how you can help," they add:

If you're a blogger, and would like to help us out by taking up posting duties, the same post has email addresses of the current contributors who can send you a blogger invitation. It would be nice having people around the world taking this up in shifts.

The SEA-EAT blog has a number of links to info, satellite photos, etc. on the topographical impact of the earthquake and tsunami that's beyond my ability to imagine.

The press item that perhaps caught my overall disbelief best was this bit of black humor, from a Korean site, titled "Sumatra, We Have a Problem":

The devastating earthquake that sent tidal waves flooding across land masses in the Indian Ocean has wrought significant changes in the topography of the region - even dislocating Sumatra by 36 meters. This caused aeronautical problems as the instruments of aircraft delivering relief supplies from all over the world failed to detect the new location of Sumatra Airport.

[UPDATE] The shifting Sumatra and neighboring islands is raising additional concerns about getting aid to affected people in those areas. According to Reuters:

The [US Geological Survey] team in Pasadena, California, also was studying more detailed satellite images on Tuesday to determine if the scraping of one plate over another plowed up enough debris on the ocean floor to block the port of Banda Aceh in Sumatra where international aid was headed.

Large earthquakes in the last decade in Kobe, Japan, and Golcuk, Turkey, deformed the coastlines and rendered their ports inoperable after the crises, Hudnut said.

The scientists have asked for cooperation from operators of commercial satellites that can provide high-resolution images to show the extent of damage to coastlines, he said.

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We'll continue to post additional sources of information or organizations that might be of interest as we learn about them.

Network for Good is an online network that links people who want to donate funds or volunteer with projects of interest. They also help people find ways to give in response to disasters, such as the Caribbean and Florida hurricaines earlier this year. Their page on assistance for victims of the Asian tsunami can be found here.

Again, the Wall Street Journal editorial page condemns Kofi Annan, via a piece by Kenneth L. Cain, a former U.N. human-rights officer. This time, it's not about oil-for-food but rather for Annan's shameful failure, as head of the UN peacekeeping mission in Rwanda, to to stop the genocide there. In general, I think that member nations bear the greatest responsibility for the UN's failings, but I think that Rwanda/Srebenica is far stronger than the OFF case against Annan. In the latter instance, it was the Sanctions Committee (essentially the Security Council) that was responsible for oversight. But I didn't post this to defend Annan.

Setting the question of Annan's tenure aside, I have to admit that I'm a little mystified as to why the Wall Street Journal is so deeply hostile to international institutions; it seems that the editorial page will eagerly print anything that denounces or shames them, whether it is the World Bank or the UN or NATO. But Wall Street itself benefits enormously from these institutions, in the form of greater global connectivity and a stable international system under (as much as possible) the rule of law, among other things. The Breton Woods institutions set the rules of global commerce very much in the United States' and therefore Wall Street's favor. And--this may sound cold--but it really doesn't matter from the international financial community's perspectivte whether a few hundred thousand people die in disconnected regions of the world. So why the animus? Why the disconnect?

(By the way, these guys are hiring)