Item 1: "Australia's Liberals Need Foreign Policy Lesson" by Greg Sheridan
- How foreign affairs can be politically decisive:
i. opposition has to show it can be trusted with economic management and national security
ii. governments do sometimes make serious mistakes and an opposition can make them pay
iii. engages basic human and political values
Item 2: "Under the Influence: Finding a Voice for Foreign Aid" by Andrew Bast
- "Foreign aid is probably the most flexible tool -- it can act as both a carrot and a stick, and is a means of influencing events, solving specific problems, and projecting U.S. values."
- U.S. has a $30 billion foreign aid budget for 154 countries
- less than 6 percent of foreign aid is delivered to multilateral development projects, which include programs like the U.N. Development Program and UNICEF, the children's fund
- military aid, which has largely decreased since its peak in 1984 - power balances now tip due to much more than just increasing standing armies, weapons stockpiles, and the confidence of military capability
31 August 2009
30 August 2009
Thirtieth August Two Thousand Nine
Item 1: "The Picture Awaits: The Birth of Modern Counterinsurgency" by Ann Marlowe
- Larrabee reserved the “Recommended” designation for the highly specialized 1956 volume Guerrilla Communism in Malaya, by Lucian Pye, a prolific Sinologist and advisor to President Kennedy.
- “We faced not a real army, but the population itself.” - Alexis de Tocqueville
- “The pirate is a plant which grows only on certain grounds. The most efficient method is to render the ground unsuitable to him. . . . There are no pirates in completely organized countries.” - General Francois-Jacques-Andres
- "Many people think it impossible for guerrillas to exist for long in the enemy’s rear. Such a belief reveals lack of comprehension of the relationship that should exist between the people and the troops. The former may be likened to water the latter to the fish who inhabit it." - Mao Zedong
- Why did these wise men not apply its tenets in the war that was soon to engulf them? At the simplest level, the explanation is fairly straightforward: they chose not to.
- "One thing about which fish know exactly nothing is water, since they have no anti-environment which would enable them to perceive the environment they live in . . . What fish are able to see bears a close analogy to that degree of awareness which all people have in relation to any new environment created by a new technology—just about zero." - McLuhan
Item 2: "Think Again: Realism" by Paul Wolfowitz
- In the words of one leading realist, the principal purpose of U.S. foreign policy should be "to manage relations between states" rather than "alter the nature of states."
- Whether the Iraq war was right or wrong, it was not about imposing democracy, and the decision to establish a representative government afterward was the most realistic option, compared with the alternatives of installing another dictator or prolonging the U.S. occupation
- Critics of realism, like myself, do not think that a businesslike management of the "relations between states" should lead us to neglect issues regarding the "nature of states."
- n the 1970s, the great controversy was over the policy of détente, which called for ignoring the inherent brutality of the Soviet regime in an effort to reach accommodation with it.
- Critics of détente, such as President Ronald Reagan and Sen. Henry Jackson, did not oppose negotiations with the Soviets. But they argued that negotiations needed to be on much stiffer terms and accompanied by pressure for internal change.
- Hans Morgenthau was among the first to put realism -- a philosophy that puts national interests ahead of moral concerns --at the heart of U.S. foreign policy
Item 3: "Just Because He Walks Like a Realist" by Stephen M. Walt
- Realists:
i. see international politics as an inherently competitive realm where states compete for advantage and where security is sometimes precarious - keep a keen eye on the balance of power
ii. other states will defend their interests vigorously, that successful diplomacy requires give-and-take, and that advancing U.S. interests sometimes requires us to do business with regimes whose values we find objectionable - nationalism is a powerful force and that most societies bristle, and ultimately rebel, when outsiders try to tell them how to run their own affairs
iii. not indifferent to moral concerns, including the virtues of democratic government and the value of basic human rights
- Larrabee reserved the “Recommended” designation for the highly specialized 1956 volume Guerrilla Communism in Malaya, by Lucian Pye, a prolific Sinologist and advisor to President Kennedy.
- “We faced not a real army, but the population itself.” - Alexis de Tocqueville
- “The pirate is a plant which grows only on certain grounds. The most efficient method is to render the ground unsuitable to him. . . . There are no pirates in completely organized countries.” - General Francois-Jacques-Andres
- "Many people think it impossible for guerrillas to exist for long in the enemy’s rear. Such a belief reveals lack of comprehension of the relationship that should exist between the people and the troops. The former may be likened to water the latter to the fish who inhabit it." - Mao Zedong
- Why did these wise men not apply its tenets in the war that was soon to engulf them? At the simplest level, the explanation is fairly straightforward: they chose not to.
- "One thing about which fish know exactly nothing is water, since they have no anti-environment which would enable them to perceive the environment they live in . . . What fish are able to see bears a close analogy to that degree of awareness which all people have in relation to any new environment created by a new technology—just about zero." - McLuhan
Item 2: "Think Again: Realism" by Paul Wolfowitz
- In the words of one leading realist, the principal purpose of U.S. foreign policy should be "to manage relations between states" rather than "alter the nature of states."
- Whether the Iraq war was right or wrong, it was not about imposing democracy, and the decision to establish a representative government afterward was the most realistic option, compared with the alternatives of installing another dictator or prolonging the U.S. occupation
- Critics of realism, like myself, do not think that a businesslike management of the "relations between states" should lead us to neglect issues regarding the "nature of states."
- n the 1970s, the great controversy was over the policy of détente, which called for ignoring the inherent brutality of the Soviet regime in an effort to reach accommodation with it.
- Critics of détente, such as President Ronald Reagan and Sen. Henry Jackson, did not oppose negotiations with the Soviets. But they argued that negotiations needed to be on much stiffer terms and accompanied by pressure for internal change.
- Hans Morgenthau was among the first to put realism -- a philosophy that puts national interests ahead of moral concerns --at the heart of U.S. foreign policy
Item 3: "Just Because He Walks Like a Realist" by Stephen M. Walt
- Realists:
i. see international politics as an inherently competitive realm where states compete for advantage and where security is sometimes precarious - keep a keen eye on the balance of power
ii. other states will defend their interests vigorously, that successful diplomacy requires give-and-take, and that advancing U.S. interests sometimes requires us to do business with regimes whose values we find objectionable - nationalism is a powerful force and that most societies bristle, and ultimately rebel, when outsiders try to tell them how to run their own affairs
iii. not indifferent to moral concerns, including the virtues of democratic government and the value of basic human rights
27 August 2009
Twenty Seventh August Two Thousand Nine
Item 1: "DNA Swap Could Cure Inherited Diseases" by Mark Henderson
- DNA can be transplanted safely from one egg to another to correct genetic defects that damage health
- Such children would be the first produced by germline genetic engineering, in which genes introduced by artificial means would be passed to successive generations
- DNA can be transplanted safely from one egg to another to correct genetic defects that damage health
- Such children would be the first produced by germline genetic engineering, in which genes introduced by artificial means would be passed to successive generations
22 August 2009
Twenty Second August Two Thousand Nine
Item 1: "Time to Boycott Israel" by Neve Gordon
- The most accurate way to describe Israel today is as an apartheid state
- Israel - 6 million Jews and close to 5 million Palestinians reside
- Two moral ways of abolishing an arpatheid state:
i. One-state solution - offering citizenship to all Palestinians and thus establishing a binational democracy within the entire area controlled by Israel - demise of Israel as a Jewish state
ii. Two-state solution - which entails Israel's withdrawal to the pre-1967 borders, division of Jerusalem and a recognition of the Palestinian right of return
- the only way to counter the apartheid trend in Israel is through massive international pressure
Item 2: "Still Going Nowhere Man" by Jacob Heilburn
- Deputy U.N. Ambassador Mona Juul called Ban -- the South Korean foreign minister elected secretary-general in 2007 -- "spineless," "charmless," and, most importantly, "incapable" of setting an agenda
- visited Sri Lanka - failed to secure any relief for the Tamil refugees who the government had herded into camps by waging an indiscriminate bombing campaign
- in Burma - offered the ruling military junta political cover by meeting with it - failing to win any concessions on human rights generally or in the case of Aung San Suu Kyi in particular
Item 3: "OPEC's Greed will Herald the End of the Oil Age" by Bill Emmott
- The world is not running out of oil - What it is short of has been investment in oilfields and production - the reason for that can be found in a different four-letter word: Opec
- oil producers’ cartel has deliberately cut production by nearly five million barrels a day - more than the drop in global demand, to keep prices high
- Opec members account for only about 35 per cent of world supply, but Russia, a non-member, accounts for a further 11.5 per cent and is co-operating with their efforts
- US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, swallowed her human rights scruples and paid homage to the Angolans on her tour of Africa, lest they become overly friendly with China instead
Item 4: "The Default Power" by Josef Joffe
- China is a place where the rest of the world essentially rents workers and workspace at deflated prices
- Chinese economy is extremely dependent on exports — they amount to around two-fifths of G.D.P.
- What puts America in a league of its own?:
i. world’s most sophisticated military panoply
ii. U.S. economy to be worth $14.3 trillion, three times as much as the second-biggest economy, Japan’s
iii. per capita income - $47,000 per inhabitant
iv. unmatched research and higher-education establishment
- United States is the default power because there is nobody else with the requisite power and purpose - does what others cannot or will not do
Item 5: "NATO and World Security" by Zbigniew Brzezinski
- NATO has institutionalized three monumental transformations in world affairs:
i. end of the centuries-long “civil war” within the West for trans-oceanic and European supremacy
ii. United States’s post–World War II commitment to the defense of Europe against Soviet domination
iii. eaceful termination of the Cold War, which created the preconditions for a larger democratic European Union
- alliance also needs to define for itself a geopolitically relevant long-term strategic goal for its relationship with the Russian Federation
- global NATO would dilute the centrality of the U.S.-European connection, and none of the rising powers would be likely to accept membership in a globally expanded NATO
- ideologically defined global alliance of democracies would face serious difficulties in determining whom to exclude and in striking a reasonable balance between its doctrinal and strategic purposes
- The most accurate way to describe Israel today is as an apartheid state
- Israel - 6 million Jews and close to 5 million Palestinians reside
- Two moral ways of abolishing an arpatheid state:
i. One-state solution - offering citizenship to all Palestinians and thus establishing a binational democracy within the entire area controlled by Israel - demise of Israel as a Jewish state
ii. Two-state solution - which entails Israel's withdrawal to the pre-1967 borders, division of Jerusalem and a recognition of the Palestinian right of return
- the only way to counter the apartheid trend in Israel is through massive international pressure
Item 2: "Still Going Nowhere Man" by Jacob Heilburn
- Deputy U.N. Ambassador Mona Juul called Ban -- the South Korean foreign minister elected secretary-general in 2007 -- "spineless," "charmless," and, most importantly, "incapable" of setting an agenda
- visited Sri Lanka - failed to secure any relief for the Tamil refugees who the government had herded into camps by waging an indiscriminate bombing campaign
- in Burma - offered the ruling military junta political cover by meeting with it - failing to win any concessions on human rights generally or in the case of Aung San Suu Kyi in particular
Item 3: "OPEC's Greed will Herald the End of the Oil Age" by Bill Emmott
- The world is not running out of oil - What it is short of has been investment in oilfields and production - the reason for that can be found in a different four-letter word: Opec
- oil producers’ cartel has deliberately cut production by nearly five million barrels a day - more than the drop in global demand, to keep prices high
- Opec members account for only about 35 per cent of world supply, but Russia, a non-member, accounts for a further 11.5 per cent and is co-operating with their efforts
- US Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, swallowed her human rights scruples and paid homage to the Angolans on her tour of Africa, lest they become overly friendly with China instead
Item 4: "The Default Power" by Josef Joffe
- China is a place where the rest of the world essentially rents workers and workspace at deflated prices
- Chinese economy is extremely dependent on exports — they amount to around two-fifths of G.D.P.
- What puts America in a league of its own?:
i. world’s most sophisticated military panoply
ii. U.S. economy to be worth $14.3 trillion, three times as much as the second-biggest economy, Japan’s
iii. per capita income - $47,000 per inhabitant
iv. unmatched research and higher-education establishment
- United States is the default power because there is nobody else with the requisite power and purpose - does what others cannot or will not do
Item 5: "NATO and World Security" by Zbigniew Brzezinski
- NATO has institutionalized three monumental transformations in world affairs:
i. end of the centuries-long “civil war” within the West for trans-oceanic and European supremacy
ii. United States’s post–World War II commitment to the defense of Europe against Soviet domination
iii. eaceful termination of the Cold War, which created the preconditions for a larger democratic European Union
- alliance also needs to define for itself a geopolitically relevant long-term strategic goal for its relationship with the Russian Federation
- global NATO would dilute the centrality of the U.S.-European connection, and none of the rising powers would be likely to accept membership in a globally expanded NATO
- ideologically defined global alliance of democracies would face serious difficulties in determining whom to exclude and in striking a reasonable balance between its doctrinal and strategic purposes
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