Talking Geopolitics

Historically, nations did not conduct themselves without aligning with or getting their bearings in relation to a power system that drove the world; an anchor. This was the case, for example, in the world wars of the last century, and the Cold War. But as Chairman George Friedman explained in our recent ClubGPF live discussion, things have changed, and various nations are testing each other.

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Jacob Shapiro and Kamran Bokhari discuss the geopolitical importance of the 1967 Arab-Israeli War, and whether the realities it created will define the future. Sign up for free updates on topics like this! Go here: hubs.ly/H06mXwR0

TRANSCRIPT:

JS: Hello everyone and welcome to another Geopolitical Futures podcast. My name is Jacob Shapiro, I am the director of analysis for Geopolitical Futures and I am joined again this week by Kamran Bokhari, who is our senior analyst, welcome Kamran.

KB: Thanks for having me, Jacob.

JS: I just want to apologize to our listeners, I know that we didn’t manage to get a podcast out last week, so we’re going to try and get two out this week. In general, we are going to try to stick to one a week, so we appreciate you guys bearing with us as we go along.

Last time we talked, Kamran, we talked about the Islamic State and we talked about the Islamic State’s origins and its futures. And one of the things I think is interesting right now is that the Middle East is really in a state of flux. The balance of power in the Middle East is changing. We can see it changing all the time. One of the things we are chronicling in our writing is how the balance of power in the Middle East is changing all the time. You brought up to us when we were thinking about what to talk about today, that we’re coming up on the 50th anniversary of the 1967 war between Israel and Egypt, Syria, Jordan, and also Lebanon and Iraq had some token forces in there, but really it was between Israel and Jordan, Syria and Egypt. The 50th anniversary is coming up in June. How about you lay out for our readers why you think this is such an important anniversary to note?

KB: I think 50 years is a good point in time to go back and review and measure just how things have unfolded in the region. And 1967 is particularly important because it really shaped the way the region has unfolded. It was a pivotal moment. Israel, as a result of that war, its massive victory over three Arab states, really established it as a military power in the region. And it was only 19 years old, Israel was only 19 years old when that war happened. And at the time, no one could’ve foreseen that Israel would be able to defend itself against three major Arab powers, at least they were perceived as major Arab powers. And the whole perception of Arab strength was essentially laid bare. The image of the Arabs was tarnished. I mean the fact that in the collective Arab memory, June 5, 1967, is seen as Yawm al-Naksa, which is loosely defined or translated as the day of setback, although ‘naksa’ in Arabic is far more, if you will, stronger than just the word ‘setback’ as we know it in English, but nonetheless, it left a deep imprint on the Arab world and established that the Arab world was very much hollow and it could not impose a military solution on Israel.

JS: Kamran, I think this was one of the things you brought up last week that was interesting, which was when we were talking about the Islamic State and we were talking about the rise of radical jihadist Islam as a major ideology in the region, you pointed towards this moment as the moment at which the political ideology of the time, which was secular nationalism, Arab nationalism – in 1967 Egypt was still known as the United Arab Republic technically, right, which is an ode to the short-lived entity that existed when Egypt and Syria were part of the same republic from 1958 to 1961. So you sort of pointed out last week just how important this moment was in history and how it really defined how the Arab world was going to move forward. It amounted to the failure of Nasserism and in some ways, it was the moment that Egypt abdicated leadership in the Arab world, wouldn’t you say?

KB: Absolutely, and I think that it was forced to do that. I think that nobody could argue and nobody could sustain the image of this leadership role that Egypt had projected, that it was the leader of Arab nationalism, the Arab soul, the Arab world. When the Egyptian Air Force was destroyed in a matter of hours on the fifth of June, you couldn’t make that argument anymore. And it was essentially the beginning of the end of the Nasser regime, at least Nasserite Egypt – though some would argue that we are still living in the legacy of Nasserite Egypt – but Nasser himself didn’t live too long after that. He died in 1970, and that really closed that chapter of Arab nationalism, but it also demonstrated that the Arab states, and here we are talking about Egypt, I mean Egypt is the heart of the Arab world given it is the largest Arab state by population, any type of cultural renaissance, new ideologies that take shape in Egypt, in Cairo particularly, and then disseminate to the rest of the Arab world. So that was the status of Egypt. ...

What are the geopolitical impacts of natural disasters? On this free preview of our ClubGPF podcast+, Dir. of Analysis Allison Fedirka and COO Antonia Colibasanu join host Christian Smith to discuss the recent earthquakes in Turkey and Syria, last year’s flooding in Pakistan, and the ongoing drought in Argentina. Go to www.geopoliticalfutures.com to join ClubGPF for more exclusive podcast episodes like this one.

Allison Fedirka and Xander Snyder discuss Venezuela’s political and economic crisis, its broader impacts and why it can't go on forever. Sign up for free updates on topics like this! Go here: hubs.ly/H06mXwR0

TRANSCRIPT:

Xander Snyder: Hi and welcome to the Geopolitical Futures podcast, my name is Xander Snyder and I am an analyst here at Geopolitical Futures and joining me today is Allison Fedirka, a senior analyst also at Geopolitical Futures. And we are going to be talking to you today about what is going on in Venezuela. How are you doing today Allison?

Allison Fedirka: I am doing pretty good Xander, how are you?

XS: I’m great. So people have probably heard about Venezuela in terms of there’s some sort of crisis going on. The Maduro government has been cracking down on protestors and things probably seem pretty chaotic. Where does this situation stand right now Allison?

AF: So people have probably been hearing about Venezuela being in crisis, I would wager since 2012-2013. So in order to understand where we’re at now, it’s important to appreciate from where the country has come over the past five years or so. There are multiple problems making today’s situation more complex and straining and volatile than it was five years ago. The government was always based on a populist policy and as long as the government had money that they could spend on the population, it had support, it would do just fine. They also had a charismatic leader back then which was Chávez.

In 2013, we started seeing financial strain in the country in terms of spending more than it was receiving, declining oil production and capabilities, infrastructure problems and basically seeing the populist government catching up with the Venezuelan government. We also saw Hugo Chávez and die and have his predecessor take his place, which is Nicolás Maduro. He was never popular as Chávez.

So fast forward to 2014, we have the drop in oil prices. Venezuela depends heavily on oil. Ninety-six percent of its U.S. dollars comes from oil sales. So it basically has a decreased source of foreign currency, which was vital for importing food. Everybody needs to eat, and Venezuela does not produce nearly enough food on its own to feed its population. And you continue with the situation of low oil prices, cutting imports, dwindling food supplies and you get to where we are today. So the crisis were seeing did not happen overnight. And what we’re seeing is a long time coming. It’s not necessarily thinking of it as a spark but just something that has been fostered for years and years and years and this was inevitable.

XS: Now Geopolitical Futures’ forecast on Venezuela, if you go on our website you can check out our full year forecast for this year, we say that the Maduro government in its present form won’t survive 2017. So we’ve talked a little bit about how the situation has developed post-Chávez under Maduro over the last several years. What’s going to change this year that’s gonna force Venezuela over the tipping point? Are there alternatives or is there just going to be anarchy for a while?

AF: So the forecast was carefully worded because it is difficult to be precise with exactly how we foresee the government changing. At the beginning of the year and December when we wrote this forecast, there was several possible routes that this could take. One was a very last minute decision to hold a referendum that would trigger new elections. One was dialogue between the parties, one was military coup, one was outside intervention, one was popular uprising.

Since the beginning of the year, several things have occurred in terms of breakdown of institutions and political processes such that a referendum with elections are no longer a viable option. Dialogue seems pretty much impossible, we haven’t seen any moves for foreign intervention. We’ve seen some divide among the military.

Right now, what we’re seeing on the ground is anarchy and that seems to be the dominant force for change in the government right now. Whether or not the opposition can sustain that and also to an extent increases that, because right now it’s becoming the status quo, they need to push it a little bit further in order to get the change that they’re looking for because they’ve been doing that for a month now and so far the government has been able to resist. So that’s where we’re at. The people’s force seems to be the leading cause right now and it will most likely be a combination of those factors of either outside pressure joining the opposition leaders or perhaps factions of the military or dialogue under extreme duress that will take the Maduro government out.

But the point is, we always talk about constraints and imperatives. And we don’t see an out for Venezuel...

Kamran Bokhari and Jacob L. Shapiro discuss where IS came from, the history and politics of radical Islam, and what happens if IS is defeated in Raqqa. Sign up for free updates on topics like this! Go here: hubs.ly/H06mXwR0

TRANSCRIPT:

JS: Hello, my name is Jacob Shapiro, I’m broadcasting today from Avignon, in the south of France. I’m joined by Kamran Bokhari, who I believe is in Washington, D.C. Is that right Kamran?

KB: Yes I am.

JS: I’m joined by Kamran Bokhari who is our senior analyst and who focuses on the Middle East, and we’re going to be talking a little bit about ISIS. Thanks for joining us Kamran.

KB: Pleasure to be here.

JS: So, Kamran, I thought instead of talking about every single battle and every single report that seems to indicate ISIS is imminently falling, we might take a broader look at the subject for our listeners. So, how about we just start with a rather broad question – tell me about how ISIS started. How did ISIS come to be in the middle of Syria and Iraq?

KB: Well if you recall, Jacob, this happened in the wake of regime change, or regime collapse, in Iraq, when the United States invaded Iraq in 2003, toppled the Saddam government and has since been unable to form a viable state. And it was not just the lack of a state, but it also brought to the fore forces that were until then very much contained under the autocratic leadership of the Baathist regime.

And so what we had was the disenfranchisement of the Sunnis, the rise of the Shiites and of course the rise of the Kurds, in the form of regional autonomy. ISIS did not exist, in fact, there were hardly any Islamist groups of any shade in Iraq, but in war, especially when you have the sectarian problem in the Middle East where the Sunnis and the Shia are struggling with one another – yes, the Sunni government came down, but it’s not like the Shiites were able to establish their own government.

There was a window of opportunity in which the founders of ISIS, particularly Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who founded what used to be called al-Qaida in Iraq, laid the foundation for ISIS. And as the years rolled on, ISIS continued to gain strength from the conflict that was brewing. It was a complex conflict. There were Shiites fighting Shiites, Shiites fighting Sunnis, Sunnis fighting Kurds and Sunnis fighting the United States. So in that complex warlike scenario, that’s where we find the birth of ISIS.

JS: Yes, well, as usual in the Middle East, everybody is fighting everybody and it’s all complicated. But so there’s a lot there to unpack. So how about we start with this: You mentioned that the original name of ISIS was al-Qaida in Iraq and you also said that ISIS began, or really, its generation point came in 2003 after the U.S. invasion of Iraq. How about we go back a little step further, and can you talk about the relationship between al-Qaida and between ISIS and what the relationship was and how it’s developed?

KB: If we go back to the aftermath of 9/11 and after the United States invaded Afghanistan and destroyed the infrastructure of al-Qaida, disrupted its operations, forcing al-Qaida, the original organization, to disperse and relocate largely in northwestern Pakistan. Al-Qaida had basically very little power projection capability at that point. I’m talking between 2001 and 2003. And at that point in time, it seemed like al-Qaida’s purpose for staging the 9/11 attacks, which was to bait the United States into militarily acting in a very large way in the Middle East, in the heart of the Muslim world, that didn’t succeed.

The United States sent in a small force, largely special operations forces and intelligence operatives and later NATO forces came in, but originally it was Afghan forces on the ground who toppled the Taliban regime. That didn’t produce the kind of effect that al-Qaida was hoping for. But then when the United States invaded Iraq, that was an opportunity. But al-Qaida didn’t have any horses in this race. Al-Qaida could not reach Iraq. But Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who ran his own jihadist training camp in Afghanistan pre-9/11, was able to make his way from Afghanistan between 2001, and by the time the United States invaded Iraq in the spring of 2003, he had set up his shop in the Sunni areas in northern Iraq. And he was able to take advantage of that vacuum that was created with the fall of the Saddam regime and he began an insurgency.

But at that point in time his group used to be called something like Jama’at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad and it wasn’t even called al-Qaida. But this individual and this outfit were on the ground, al-Qaida was at a distance. Both needed each other.

Zarqawi’s outfit was not getting the kind of coverage or the kind of support, financially or otherwise, because i...