Chirol was highly critical of the US and international response in providing aid for the Haiti earthquake victims, which set off a comment thread with overwhelming criticism of Chirol’s premise that realistically, Haiti has always always been a disaster and we should not commit resources into black hole because of media and popular excitement. Although I didn’t comment, I basically agreed with most readers who spoke out that Chirol’s stated position was isolationist, especially considering that the country was so close and the problems so manageable with basics not available in Haiti. (Other criticisms—that he was being cruel or callous—didn’t really register with me because appearing cruel is part of the very nature of stone cold realism.) But there are careful realist calculations behind the motives of the three most active participants in Haiti—the US, China and Taiwan.

As it happens, today the Japanese Mainichi Shinbun has an article (Japanese only, sorry) with this title: “Haiti Earthquake: Aid to Victims Displays ‘Diplomatic War’; US, China, Others” summarizes the key player’s (realist) goals. Taking that article and some other articles, the interests of the major countries providing aid are:

• The US, by dispatching one nuclear aircraft carrier and two former presidents, has created the most obvious presence in Haiti and is looking to flex its muscle in the region and show off its power, yet in a peaceful way that is aimed at bettering relations with Central and South American countries. The primary diplomatic targets are Cuba and Venezuela, who could easily win friends and show off their influence if they were seen as being active in the region. I think this also gets to the Monroe Doctrine, where the US long held, from the turn of the 19th century until the end of the Cold War, that no other power could interfere in the Western Hemisphere. That policy was basically abandoned under Bill Clinton during the first Haiti intervention, but I believe it should be vigorously maintained to make sure that all foreign policy fronts are

• China has been ramping up its activity in Central and South America and has tried to become an alternative to US-sourced credit and business, and in cutting off Taiwan from its global friends in the region. China has long been active in Haiti and had 148 peacekeepers in Haiti, of whom 8 were killed in the earthquake—read one of the very first ever ComingAnarchy posts on that topic here. It has dispatched an additional 50 aid workers and donated about a million dollars in aid.

• Taiwan initially offered $500,000 in aid, but when China announced that it would double that, it quickly announced it would provide $5 million in aid, most likely to preserve and protect its status as the legitimate Chinese government as recognized by the Haiti government. Of the 23 countries that have formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan, 12 are in Central and South America. This is despite the fact that, under the current Taiwanese government, Beijing and Taipei have called a “ceasefire” in their war for recognition, but the events in Haiti show that this war is still being waged, albeit more quietly.

Even with that, the position of Australia on the list of countries providing aid surprised me—but keep in mind this list incorporates donations by regional governments, but not those by individuals and NGOs.

• US: $100 million (disaster teams, aircraft carrier, hospital ships, soldiers)
• Australia: $9 million (including donations by regional governments)
• China: $5.4 million (including aid workers)
• Taiwan: $5 million
• Japan: $5.3 million
• Norway: $5 million
• England: $1.4 million
• World Bank: $1 million

Extrajudicial murder has occurred in multiple countries across the globe in the past few weeks. In Nigeria, the leader of a regional Islamic insurgent group was killed by armed forces in their custody after his followers rought violent havoc across several states in the northern part of the country. In India, a photojournalist snapped armed police murdering a man believed to be a member of an insurgent group, bringing attention to what some consider a long history of illegal killing in the chaotic fringes of the country. In Pakistan, the armed forces have done the same to captured Taliban fighters. In Russia, I wrote recently about the murder of human rights lawyer Natalya Estemirova. There are reports also of recent killings in Sri Lanka, Kenya, and Colombia. Assasination of dissidents and insurgents it not an extinct relic of the Cold War—it remains a regular tool of law enforcement by states in the undeveloped world.

In a modern and developed society, extra-judicial killings are abhorrent and unacceptable. Such acts are an abuse of the state’s monopoly on force. And a government that cannot act in accordance with the law loses its moral foundation against those who oppose its rule and doubt its legitimacy. From a practical perspective, there is also the issue that practical problems will arise with the implemntation. There are inherent risks in this approach in that it risks encouraging more insurgents, loses support among those who witness and learn of the attrocity, international condemnation and further scrutiny. Consider America’s own experience in the last decade—the accidental killing of the Davidian fanatics in Waco, Texas in 1993 brought widespread fear of the federal government from many in the American continental interior, and indirectly resulted in the Oklahoma City terrorist bombing in 1995. That’s the type of blowback that can result from extrajudicial killings.

But is there a point where extra-judicial murder is acceptable? Readers won’t be surprised to hear that my view is nuanced. In the anarchic fringes of the globe, the government has to play by different rules to stay in power and in control. In some instances, a government who’s legitimacy and authority is in doubt must show that it is determined and ready to be ruthless when required. In the case of the Taliban in Pakistan or the insurgents in Nigeria, the enemies of the state have claimed for themselves the right to disrupt civil order, kill civilians and soldiers, and conquer vulnerable territory. There are real risk in putting to trial and imprisoning a popular insurgent leader. Had Hitler been shot by a zealous police officer during his imprisonment, instead of being jailed for a year and writing Mein Kampf, Germany might have gone on to be a normal European country.

Consider this quote from Robert D. Kaplan taken from an interview from ten years ago and before 9/11:

Increasingly we have non-state adversaries who want to kill us, terrorist groups for instance, who are not part of any bureaucratic mechanism of the state. They don’t own territory, they do not have an address. So, for instance, when the U.S. government… announced that it had destroyed the infrastructure of Osama Bin Laden terrorist network, some of the hardware and infrastructure, what did that mean? It meant that they had destroyed a bunch of blow-up tents in the dessert of Afghanistan that you and I could put back together in about two hours. So increasingly these people don’t have an infrastructure that is destroyable. They only way to get them is to kill them. So I think the more unconventional the threat, the more assassinations will come back.

Had the US more aggressively sought to capture or assasinate Bin Laden in 1998 after the US embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania (extra-judicial methods), instead of having a grand jury indict him for the murders (judicial methods), the World Trade Center in Manhattan might still be standing. And if we accept that point, I think we have to have a lot more sympathy for the government of Nigeria as they try to keep the peace by executing their own David Koresh.

From June 26-30, Turkish President Abdullah Gul visited China, visiting the capital of Beijing, the cultural city of Xi’an, and the heart of Turkic China, Urumqi. His visit brough the signing of major bilateral business cooperation pacts worth more than a billion US dollars, involving infrastructure, power, mining, agricultural, and trade. And in Urumqi, Gul told press he was deeply impressed by the development of the region and the large-scale construction. Gul also said, “Uyghurs act like a bridge of friendship between Turkey and China. Such role will contribute to the further improvement of our relations.”

What Gul did not know at the time was that ethnic riots had broken out in southern China between Turkic Uyghur migrant workers and Han locals which would spark ethnic riots on the streets of Urumqi just days later, resulting in the death of at least 180 people.

Left: Gul in Urumqi. Right: Victims of the riot.

Those riots resulted in an immediate about-face stance from Turkey with regard to China relations. The political leaders have since called for discussing the Xinjiang riots in the UN Security Council. Prime Minister Erdogan also said that Turkey would grant a visa to Rebiya Kadeer, the Uighur political activist who China blames for the unrest, were she to travel to Turkey. (The day before she said that her visa to visit Turkey in 2006 and 2007 had been denied.) And Turkey then went on to call China’s acts in Xinjiang “genocide.” (On an interesting sidenote to this, you can read this article on China’s longstanding sympathy for the Kurds here, which may partially explain why Turkey’s leaders are taking the opportunity to stick it to Beijing.)

The only other fierce call was from Al Qaeda in Algeria, an independent branch that remains probably the most active cell of the network, has issued threats at Chinese interests. (While that might not sound like a big deal coming from a provincial terrorist organization, consider that there are 50,000 Chinese working in construction and energy projects in Algeria, and hundreds of thousands more across the Middle East and North Africa.)

However, the response from political leaders and media outlets in the Middle East was muted. Arab newspapers made gestures of sympathy in news reports, but none called for condemnations of China from their governments. There were no loud calls for boycotts. And the issue has since fallen off the pages of the newspapers as the event is quietly forgotten. No one in the Arab Middle East appears to want to make China out to be the new Israel.

So why is Turkey so excited? Turkey has long occupied both a cultural and geographic pivot, positioned between three key areas—Europe, the Middle East, and Central Asia. 21st century geopolitical thinkers such as Zbigniew Brzezinski and Samuel Huntington have written of Turkey’s unique position and how Ankara has the most choices of any other state in its weight class as it moves into the future. Does it look west and try to become part of Europe? Does it look south and try to lead and ally with other Sunni Muslim states? Or does it look east towards its Turkic breathren, recently freed from Russian imperial power?

Through the 1990s, it looked as if Turkey wanted to join with Europe and become a member state of the EU. The Middle East was an afterthought—Turkey has acted as a slight counterweight to Saudi Arabia, financing more moderate Turkish Cultural Centers in various parts of the globe. And in Central Asia, Turkey has financed the construction of mosques in the wake of the Soviet collapse, but otherwise has not been proactively involved in the culture or politics of the Turkic states to the east. Does Turkey’s position in Ankara signal a change? It will be interesting to see if this is just a temporary barrier to good relations, or a sign of things to come.

More and more people in the U.S. are becoming less and less shy regarding the possibilities of how the U.S. will act in Afghanistan:

U.S. mulling expanded covert war in Pakistan: report

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama and his national security advisers are considering expanding the covert U.S. war in Pakistan far beyond the tribal areas near the border with Afghanistan, the New York Times reported on Tuesday.

Two high-level reports on Pakistan and Afghanistan that have been forwarded to the White House in recent weeks have called for broadening the target area to reach the Taliban and other insurgent groups to a major sanctuary in and around the city of Quetta, the newspaper said on its website, citing senior administration officials.

Missile strikes by Central Intelligence Agency-operated drones have until now been limited to the tribal areas, and never been extended into Baluchistan, a sprawling province under the authority of Pakistan’s central government, and which is next to parts of Afghanistan where recent fighting has been fiercest, the newspaper website said.

Some American officials say the missile strikes in the tribal areas have forced some leaders of the Taliban and al Qaeda to flee toward Quetta, making them more vulnerable, the Times said. Pakistan has complained that the missile strikes violate its sovereignty.

Many of Obama’s advisers are also urging him to sustain orders issued last summer by former President George W. Bush to continue Predator drone attacks against a wider range of targets in the tribal areas, and to conduct cross-border ground actions, using CIA and Special Operations commandos.

The Times said a spokesman for the National Security Council had declined to provide details, saying only “We’re still working hard to finalize the review on Afghanistan and Pakistan that the president requested.”

No other official would talk on the record on the issue, citing the administration’s deliberations and the politically volatile nature of strikes into Pakistan’s territory, the report said.