| | | | The Kurds Had to Make a Choice | | Writing in Foreign Policy on Sunday, Syrian Democratic Forces commander-in-chief Mazloum Abdi warned that the US had left him with no good options: Though the SDF had held northeastern Syria despite pressure from all sides, the US withdrawal might force him to strike a deal with Russia and Syria.
"We know that we would have to make painful compromises with Moscow and [Syrian President] Bashar al-Assad if we go down the road of working with them," he wrote. "But if we have to choose between compromises and the genocide of our people, we will surely choose life for our people." Such a deal with Assad has indeed been made, signifying a shift in the power balance of Syria's war as Assad's troops have moved into SDF-held territory, CNN's Helen Regan and Eliza Mackintosh report. (The US may have put the SDF in this position, but it's not the first time America has abandoned Kurdish allies, Steven A. Cook writes, also in Foreign Policy: Henry Kissinger in the 1970s and President George H.W. Bush in the 1990s each encouraged Iraqi Kurds to rise up against Saddam Hussein, only to back away later.)
With ISIS fighters now escaping from SDF-run detention camps, The Atlantic's Graeme Wood calls the situation unnecessary and eminently predictable. And serious doubts remain over whether there's any plan to secure ISIS detainees and transfer them to Turkish custody, as advertised: "Turkey may have bitten off more than they can chew" in assuming that responsibility, the Middle East Institute's Elizabeth Dent said in a recent episode of the group's Middle East Focus podcast, noting along with former US Ambassador to Turkey W. Robert Pearson that Turkey's military may not have the capacity to even reach the detention camps where former ISIS fighters and their families are held. | | The Good News on Trade: Trump Is Thinking Small | | President Trump's trade "deal" with China, reached Friday, wasn't too substantive, analysts agree. It's more of a temporary "truce" than anything, The Wall Street Journal writes in an editorial, with China buying more agricultural products and the US not imposing its next tariff hike; the agreement will encourage markets, and might help Trump in farm states in 2020, but it won't do much more than that.
But the good news is that it might signify a shift in Trump's thinking, John Edwards of the Lowy Institute writes at the group's Interpreter blog. Trump has wanted to conclude a sweeping, grandiose trade deal that would address major concerns like intellectual property, market access, and technology transfers. It's good that Trump is calling this agreement "phase one," Edwards writes, as he now seems to be thinking more incrementally.
Less encouragingly, William Pesek writes in the Nikkei Asian Review that Trump has a new trade-war tactic: Blacklisting more Chinese firms at the cutting edge of technology development, as the administration has banned US companies from doing business with some Chinese developers of AI and surveillance technology. These are among the unicorns that might allow President Xi Jinping to revitalize China's economy, Pesek writes, so the move is provocative—but it's unclear what Trump hopes to get out of it, or how it helps. | | Ecuador's Lesson on Energy Populism | | | The protests that have convulsed Ecuador this month are on hold, after President Lenín Moreno called off his rollback of fuel subsidies, but they offer a lesson on fuel politics, writes Bloomberg's Mac Margolis. Moreno had announced he would cut the oil-rich country's fuel subsidies in order to comply with the terms of a $4.2 billion IMF loan—the right move, Margolis writes, as fuel subsidies mostly benefit the rich, and as Ecuador needs to reshape its economy.
But Moreno rolled out his policy ham-handedly: He announced it abruptly and planned compensating measures, like a $15-a-month family benefit and a government housing program, to follow the subsidy cuts instead of offering benefits first to soften the blow, Margolis notes. As protests forced a change of course, Ecuador's crisis serves as a reminder that no matter who benefits from fuel subsidies, they're a noticeable and tangible benefit disadvantaged citizens can see, Margolis writes—the type of government assistance that lends itself to populist support, regardless of whether it's good policy. | | Trump's Diplomatic McCarthyism | | The saga of Marie Yovanovitch, the former US ambassador to Ukraine who told Congress she was pushed out due to pressure from President Trump, prompts former longtime diplomat William Burns to declare Trump's presidency the worst assault on US diplomacy he's seen. In a Foreign Affairs essay, Burns likens Trump's alleged conduct to Sen. Joseph McCarthy's anti-Communist campaign that drove 81 employees from the State Department in the 1950s. (And McCarthy's chief counsel, Roy Cohn, later became Trump's lawyer and mentor, he points out.)
On top of the State Dept.'s demoralization under Trump (Foreign Service applications have hit a two-decade low, Burns notes), Trump's self-dealing and personal vendettas have undercut official US diplomacy across the board, Burns argues: "If a US ambassador doesn't speak for the president, and the embassy is seen as an enemy of the White House, why would the local government take seriously its diplomatic messages? Why use official channels, rather than speak directly to the president's personal lawyer and his grifting confidants?" | | | | | | |
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