World War Trump

by Hall Gardner

  Nevertheless, as soon as is politically possible, in addition to the need for further discussions on reductions of long-range ballistic missiles going beyond New START (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty), which was implemented in 2011 and which is hoped to last at least until 2021, there should be full-fledged discussions to reduce, if not eliminate, all tactical nuclear weaponry as soon as politically possible. These arms reduction/elimination talks could take place in the aftermath of a US-Russia summit.

  On the one hand, Moscow has been enhancing its A2/AD (Anti-Access/Area Denial) tactics in Kaliningrad by deploying S-400 air defense missiles and tactical, nuclear-capable, Iskander surface-to-surface missiles, plus shore-based cruise missiles, so as to block NATO from potentially resupplying the Baltic states in case of war. Russia has developed a new Satan missile, while Washington has accused Moscow of violating the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty) by testing a new intermediate-range missile, which, if true, could set US/NATO-Russian relations back to the 1980s, when NATO opted to counter Soviet intermediate-range SS-20s with the deployment of cruise and Pershing missiles before the 1987 INF accord was signed.

  For its part, the Pentagon has been modernizing the B61-12 tactical nuclear weapon and extending its rage, even when the utility of such weaponry has been questioned, and when its deployment could be considered in violation of nuclear non-proliferation treaty.2 The United States has also been modernizing its launch capabilities for missiles with both conventional and nuclear warheads, such as the Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent and the Long-Range Standoff Cruise Missile. In addition to deployments in Guam, the United Arab Emirates, Turkey, and South Korea, and possibly Japan, the Pentagon has been considering deploying THAAD missile defense systems and penetrating radar in Europe and Saudi Arabia.

  A first step would be to take the roughly two thousand US and Russian warheads off “high-alert” status. Both Moscow and Beijing, in a sign of strategic-nuclear insecurity, have put a large number of their nuclear missiles on hair-trigger alert in order to maintain the survivability of their nuclear weapons against superior US delivery nuclear systems.3 So as to reduce tensions, Washington and Moscow could furthermore agree to a mutual “no-first-use” of nuclear weapons. These steps could be strengthened if Washington considers eliminating land-based elements of the nuclear triad so as to reduce some pressure on Moscow to feel that it must launch its missiles “on warning.” This approach needs to be taken, but without undermining a strong US air- and sea-based deterrent that should remain in the background. Similar confidence measures will prove necessary with Beijing, which opposes the deployment of THAAD defense systems in South Korea and potentially Japan. Both China and Russia fear that the United States can use its missile defense (MD) systems and advanced missiles to launch a preemptive strike.

  A thorough US-Russian discussion of tactical and intercontinental nuclear systems could be accompanied by potential compromises on the deployment of US missile defense systems in Europe. The United States could agree to removing all provocative forward-deployed tactical nuclear weapons from Europe, such as the B61-12, in exchange for significant reductions in Russian nuclear weaponry, while also reducing conventional capabilities on both sides. This approach would likewise mean bargaining within NATO—as NATO's consensus-based decision-making process means that small powers most interested in keeping nuclear weapons in Europe, such as the Baltic states, can oppose a decision to remove those weapons.4

  With respect to MD, the fact that Washington had initially justified MD deployments in eastern Europe based on the fear that Iran would eventually obtain a nuclear weapons and long-range missile capability should open the door to discussions in the aftermath of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) nuclear deal with Iran. (See chapters 8 and 9.) To reach a compromise, the United States and Russia should revisit some of the previous proposals for joint missile defense systems that were proposed before UN-backed Contact Group negotiations pressed Iran to give up on its nuclear program.5

  There has been almost no strategic nuclear confidence between Washington and Moscow since the United States unilaterally dropped out of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty (ABM Treaty) in 2002 without seeking a substitute treaty on missile defenses with Moscow. Here, the Bush Jr. administration argued that the spread of nuclear missiles made the treaty obsolete but did not discuss the matter with Moscow to see if the treaty could be revised in a new format. This is the major strategic issue that helped set off the new arms race, and it will still take some time to build up trust. And Moscow will not give up unilaterally or even compromise without very tough power-based bargaining. Nevertheless, these proposals are not impossible to implement.

  FULLY ABIDING BY THE NUCLEAR NON-PROLIFERATION TREATY

  Gorbachev's point that Presidents Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump need to take the first steps toward banning nuclear warfare is well taken, but neither Trump nor Putin appear ready to move in this direction, given mutual imprecations between the United States and Russia, American accusations of Russian meddling and use of cyber-espionage in the US election process, and Russian counteraccusations of US meddling in Russian affairs, among the many other reasons discussed in this book. (See chapters 3 and 9.) The dilemma is that US-Russian mutual imprecations only serve to enhance the power and influence of the US military-industrial-congressional complex and its Russian equivalent, Siloviki—Putin's prime supporters—as they both seek to build more and more powerful weapons in a very unbalanced game of terror.

  Nevertheless, this fact should not prevent the world's populations and legislatures from pressing Washington, Moscow, Beijing, France, and the United Kingdom, among the other declared and non-declared nuclear powers, to work toward the reduction, if not the elimination, of nuclear weaponry—as is, in fact, demanded of nuclear-weapons states by Article VI of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).6 And if the nuclear arms races continues unabated, then Congress should pass an act that would require a congressional declaration of war for the president to authorize a nuclear first strike or else declare that the United States will never use nuclear weapons first.7 If domestic pressures on governments can achieve global peace, then such steps could ultimately lead to the reconversion of the military-industrial complexes of all countries toward the development of alternative technologies for peaceful social and ecological purposes.

  TOWARD DUAL SOVEREIGNTY ARRANGEMENTS

  But the problem here is that even if state legislatures and populations do insist that their leaderships take the concrete steps to end the nuclear arms race and to settle international disputes, the devil is still in the details. A general political settlement with Russia, China, Iran, and other states will not be achieved by slogans calling for INSTANT PEACE, but only by a concerted US-European-Japanese strategy that possesses concrete proposals as to how negotiate arms reductions and eliminations—and that, in turn, could result in the withering away of the military-industrial complexes of the United States, Russia, China, and Europe. These proposals need to be coupled with complex negotiations in multilateral Contact Groups that deal with territorial and political-economic disputes as well. Given China's rejection of the Permanent Court of Arbitration ruling in favor of the Philippines in July 2016 (see chapter 7) over island disputes in the South China Sea, Beijing's promise in November 2017 to abide by the nonbinding 2002 Code of Conduct that seeks to peacefully regulate island disputes and prevent conflict represents a tiny step forward toward the possibility of peace in the region.8

  One concrete proposal to augment the possibility of peace would be to implement an international legal agreement that would work to settle a number of territorial disputes. In some cases, this could be accomplished by either finding ways to establish zones that would be governed by an international administration or through a resurrection of the United Nations’ trusteeship administration. Or states could find ways to implement systems of joint sovereignty and power-sharing or free-trade accords that provide certain re
gions greater autonomy, combined with agreements involving the mutual renunciation of the use of force. What is needed is an international legal agreement that would either establish internationally administered zones or else joint sovereignty agreements over specific territories.9

  Some of these proposed accords could use a potential Cypriot settlement brokered by the United Nations as a model, in addition to the power-sharing accords that were reached in the 1998 Belfast agreement of Northern Ireland, for example. The approach could seek out free-trade accords or even joint sovereignty and power-sharing agreements, combined with the agreements involving the mutual renunciation of the use of force, for Crimea between Ukraine and Russia; Kaliningrad between Germany and Russia; the Kurile Islands/Northern Territories between Japan and Russia; Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands between China, Taiwan, and Japan; the differing islands in the South China Sea; the islands Abu Musa, Greater Tunb, and Lesser Tunb between the United Arab Emirates and Iran; Gibraltar between Spain and the United Kingdom; and the Falklands Islands between Argentina and the United Kingdom. Such power-sharing accords could also apply to India and Pakistan over Kashmir. These accords could also apply to islands in the French empire or those in the American empire, including Guam, Diego Garcia, American Samoa, and other islands in the western Pacific, along with Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands in the Caribbean, plus Guantánamo Bay.

  In some cases, such accords could also serve to crack down on the island tax havens of the super-wealthy, as was revealed in the Paradise Papers in November 2017,10 at the same time that a global Tobin tax could be implemented on international financial transactions, among other possible items. In the United States, such a tax could possibly generate as much as $190 billion a year (or 1 percent of GDP). A Tobin tax could additionally help stabilize global financial transactions, but it needs to be accepted by a vast majority of countries, which will then need to close financial paradises.

  The funds raised from a global tax base would be invested with strict international regulations and controls as to how and where such funds are to be distributed, with priorities given to assist the development of the poorest regions of the planet. On average—and taking into account population size—income inequality increased by 11 percent in developing countries between 1990 and 2010. A significant majority of households in developing countries—more than 75 percent of the population—are living today in societies where income is more unequally distributed than it was in the 1990s.11

  The Tobin tax, which had been proposed as a means to assist the underdeveloped world, had been rejected at the 2011 G20 summit. One of the reasons for its rejection was due to already-high taxation in a number of countries. So, to be made more politically acceptable, such a Tobin tax proposal would need to be accompanied by reductions in national taxation, so that international taxation would be given priority in the new era of globalization.12 The concept of an international Tobin tax should not entirely be an anathema to Trump. One pro-Trump proposal is a tax based on profits made by US overseas corporations as a means to support infrastructure development in the United States itself.13 Other options could include higher personal income taxes for CEOs—but Trump would dubiously support such an option. Nevertheless, if it can be shown that certain regions and urban areas in the United States are highly impoverished, there is no reason why a percentage of international tax revenues for regional development and infrastructure could not go to the United States or to other developed countries as well. The political question, of course, is precisely what kind of development and infrastructure assistance would prove most beneficial. (See discussion, this chapter.)

  CONTACT GROUP DIPLOMACY

  As argued in chapter 9, a grand compromise between the United States, Europeans, and Russia that would seek to draw Russia into a new relationship with NATO and the European Union—by means of establishing a regional system of peace and development for the entire Black Sea and Caucasus region—should be in the interests of all parties. But such a proposal, to be implemented under the auspices of the OSCE (Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe) or the United Nations, will work only if it is given a real testing by truly engaged diplomacy in which US, EU, Russian, and Ukrainian vital interests are eventually redefined and reconciled.

  This is an argument not for global government, but for interacting global, regional, national, and local governance. It is an argument for greater multilateral cooperation within and among states through multilateral accords and through differing international organizations. During his election campaign, Trump stopped short of threatening to leave the United Nations, but he nevertheless denounced the international regime as “just a club for people to get together, talk and have a good time.”14 He asserted that it was an organization that possessed “enormous potential” but did not always live up to its potential, thus wasting time and money. In Trump's view, the United Nations did not always solve problems, but “caused them.”

  The Trump-Pence administration will probably not leave the United Nations altogether, but it has already begun to seek ways to cut US funding for a number UN programs, and it has dropped out of UNESCO, which oversees World Heritage Sites, in October 2017 due to mounting arrears and a purportedly “anti-Israeli bias.”15 While international organizations such as the United Nations and the OSCE are far from perfect, they nevertheless provide a forum for dialogue between the United States, Europeans, Russia, China, other states, and non-state actors, when relations between states and peoples are strained. And it is clear that the United Nations is caught up in concepts of bureaucratic hierarchy and cannot implement a new UN Security Council that takes into account the rise of new powers such as India, Brazil, South Africa, and Japan since the end of World War II. The United Nations generally works only when the UN Security Council wants it to work. And UN operations and peacekeeping, for example, can be very complicated if officers on the ground are not given strong political support and assistance for what is needed to accomplish their task.

  Nevertheless, UN or OSCE backing for more flexible multilateral Contact Groups can effectively deal with many key issues. One major example is the group of states that negotiated the Iran Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) nuclear accord that was negotiated by the five UN Security Council members, plus Germany and later the EU. Another is the six-party talks dealing with North Korea's nuclear program, which are negotiated by the United States, China, Russia, Japan, and North and South Korea. Another is the Minsk accords, negotiated by Germany, France, Ukraine, and Russia; but that will eventually need US and Turkish participation, as argued in chapter 9.

  The Contact Group formula has proved to be a very effective way to get around UN bureaucratic hierarchy and engage the key state actors involved in the pursuit of peace. The process, even if it may take years to reach a solid accord, helps create international legitimacy for the decisions reached, which should make those accords easier to implement—even if this is not proving the case with Trump's critique of the JCPOA Iran nuclear accord.

  TRUMP'S POLICIES TOWARD PEACEKEEPING AND CLIMATE CHANGE

  Of concern are Trump's negative attitudes toward UN Peacekeeping and climate change. The United Nations and the OSCE are absolutely essential in order to engage in peacekeeping operations. The deployment of peacekeepers for the protection of refugees and immigrants under UN or OSCE mandates or other international organizations may soon be needed in Syria, eastern Ukraine, the Caucasus, and between Israel and a new Palestine, as well as in other regions, such as the Sudan, the Congo, and possibly North Korea, among many others. This will prove a major endeavor, but it can be compared to the expansion of UN (and NATO) peacekeeping missions at the end of the Cold War.

  The Trump-Pence administration plans to cut costs or limit the role of the UN peacekeeping operations represents a major error on the part of the new administration. These proposed cuts (in which the Trump administration was able to cut $500 million, but not $1 billion as it intended, for 2017) are not necessarily in US inte
rests, as UN operations can serve US interests by providing a political buffer between US policy and the differing political and social interests that are in dispute. In short, these international regimes help provide legitimacy for multilateral actions to achieve peace and development. This helps the United States and other countries not to get dragged unilaterally into intractable conflicts. And the burden can be shared to a larger extent.

  THE UNITED NATIONS AND PEACEKEEPING

  According to the United Nations, the approved budget for UN Peacekeeping operations for the fiscal year July 1, 2016–June 30, 2017, is $7.87 billion. This amount finances fourteen of the sixteen United Nations Peacekeeping missions.16 By way of comparison, the UN Peacekeeping budget is way below the nominal US defense budget of $639 billion (which, in reality, is probably double that amount—see chapter 2). The United States pays almost three times more than the amount China now pays for UN Peacekeeping operations. It is true that these relative dues could perhaps be better assessed given China's significant sovereign funds. Nevertheless, investing in UN and OSCE peacekeeping could save billions in defense expenditure—if accompanied by effective multinational diplomacy intended to bring lasting resolutions to conflict, or at least working to better manage those conflicts.

  For example, UN Peacekeeping proved absolutely necessary for the Democratic Republic of Congo, which became for the focal point for war between major and regional powers in the period between 1994 and 2003.17 What was once called World War III in Africa, and which resulted in the loss of some five million lives, was sparked, in part, by the genocide that took place in Rwanda, when some two million Hutus fled into the Democratic Republic of Congo. The horrific conflict that ensued eventually drew the Congo, Rwanda, Zimbabwe, Namibia, and Angola into a proxy war.