Month: October 2021

Facing unrest in the Central Asian states and food shortages at home, Russian President Vladimir Putin is having a rough time this year controlling social unrest in the former Soviet states. During the last few years, rising food prices have caused the population to search for less expensive alternatives which tend to be high in calories. The result has been an overall weigh gain in the Russian population due to unhealthy food products and declining health conditions throughout most of the country. Policymakers in Moscow now are pushing for the government to intervene before social unrest spreads due in large part to drought in Western agricultural areas and floods in the East, that have killed off crops in agricultural areas across the country.

According to Society, a Russian publication, “In February 2021, consumers reduced spending on the purchase of vegetables and fruits by 30-60%, beef by 25%, pork by 13%, and bakery products by 40%. At the same time, spending on sugar increased by 18%.” Government attempts to rein in prices have failed, creating a domestic political issue that Putin must deal with before the shelves become empty as in the waning days of the Soviet Union and earlier, during the February 1917 revolution. 

“A combination of two larger factors makes it likely that some shelves will, indeed, be bare in the coming months. First, as a result of climate change, Russian farmers have faced flooding in some food-growing regions and drought in others, sending the production of bread and potatoes down. Second, authorities face difficulties in restraining price increases or purchasing additional supplies abroad because of the large number of players in the food chain, declining production in many countries and the weakness of the ruble,” according to Paul Goble of the Jamestown Foundation. 

The state Duma, Russia’s rough equivalent to the US Congress, is expected to introduce a bill for low-income citizens to receive additional food certificates. Yaroslov Nilov, chair of the Duma State Committee on Labor, Social Policy and Veteran Affairs said: “Today, unfortunately, due to the high cost of medicines, those who do not have sufficient funds, they are not entitled to free medicines due to illness.” To many families in Russia, it appears to be a return to the extreme challenges they faced before the fall of the Soviet Union. That puts Putin’s agenda as risk and his time in office in question if he can’t fulfill the basic demands of the population for food.

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President Vladimir Putin in his last legislative address remarked that “we remember what happened in the Soviet Union at the end of the 1980s” and how “empty shelves” affected people. He added that “the main thing is to ensure the growth of real incomes” to enable Russians to purchase food and other goods. Russian food prices far exceed incomes which have flatlined. The government is unsure how to address the issue as grain production is down 30% this year. Political commentators in Moscow noted that even the potatoes, a Russian staple, will be physically “smaller in size” and will go up in price by more than 10 times their current inflated value this fall. While it is possible for Putin to spin the issue and blame climate change as an external factor not related to his domestic policies, the Russian people have strong negative memories of what occurred after the fall of the Soviet Union. The President is faced with feeding his people at a large political cost to him if he has to admit there are large numbers of poor in the country that he hopes to recreate as a modern Russian empire with superpower status.

Konstantin Ordov, head of the Department of Corporate Finance and Corporate Governance of the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation, called food an “expensive pleasure,” and a burden on the national budget. He added that Moscow is not ready to add a few trillion rubles to solve the problem. Now there is talk in Moscow of reimposing plan and price controls. So far, Putin is not prioritizing the food or poverty problem saying that the country will resolve the issue by 2030. Last year potatoes cost 11.2 rubles per kilogram, this year they rose above 80 rubles. It caused one reporter to try questioning Putin about “why potatoes now cost more than bananas.” The only response the people of Russia are receiving from Putin this fall is that they will have to “tighten their belts.” With the fall of Afghanistan, the destabilization of the Central Asian states, and troubles in the Caucuses, Putin’s small potato problem may loom larger than predicted on the domestic political scene this coming winter.

DARIA NOVAK served in the United States State Department during the Reagan Administration, and currently is on the Board of the American Analysis of News and Media Inc., which publishes usagovpolicy.com and the New York Analysis of Policy and Government.  Each Thursday, she presents key updates on Russia

Illustration: Pixabay

Once again, Biden has engaged in an action that has benefited China at American expense.

Biden’s ill-advised closing of Bagram Air Force Base led to the demoralization and collapse of the Afghanistan military and government. The U.S. withdrawal from that nation was inevitable, but abandoning Bagram prevented any power sharing with the pro-U.S. (now former) Afghanistan government from occurring, and eliminated any western access to Afghanistan’s strategically vital assets.

China will now have complete access to Afghanistan’s vitally needed Rare Earth Elements (REE.)  Canada’s Fraser Institute notes that “a classified Pentagon memo called Afghanistan the Saudi Arabia of lithium…The importance of REE’s to the global economy cannot be overstated. They are essential to the manufacture of a host of modern technologies, including cell phones, televisions, hybrid engines, computer components, lasers, batteries, fiber optics, and superconductors. Congressional findings have called rare earth elements critical to national security,and understandably so. REEs are key to the production of tank navigation systems, missile guidance systems, fighter jet engines, missile defense components, satellites, and military grade communications gear.”

It follows a career-long pattern of moves by Joe Biden.

The most recent example has been his refusal to put the blame on the Covid pandemic where it squarely belongs, on the Beijing regime, despite the evidence. As the New York Post recently reported, “Even the leader of the World Health Organization’s pathetic “investigation” in China, where WHO played along with Beijing’s coverup, now says it’s “probable” COVID leaked from the Wuhan lab.”

In another recent move, Reuters reports that the Biden Administration has “granted licenses authorizing suppliers to sell chips to China’s blacklisted telecom company Huawei for its growing auto component business.”

U.S. Representative Mike Rogers (R-AL), Lead Republican on the House Armed Services Committee, released a statement on concerning reports that the Biden administration authorized the sale of microchips to Huawei. “Reports that the Biden administration has approved the sale of microchips, worth hundreds of millions of dollars, to an espionage appendage of the Chinese Communist Party are alarming yet unsurprising…I urge the administration to immediately reverse this decision before further harm is done to U.S. national security.”

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This follows another action, also reported by Reuters, that Biden withdrew a series of Trump-era executive orders that sought to ban new downloads of China-owned apps WeChat and TikTok.

Critics of Biden’s stance on China include Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX), who has has called the Biden administration “weak” on China. Similarly, reports Politico, former Vice President Pence accuses Biden of “rolling over” to China.

There is some debate on how soft the Biden Administration is on China, and indeed, there are some areas, such as an assortment of sanctions, where the White House has acted responsibly. However, as Joseph Bosco noted in a Hill article    “…there is one important area where Biden administration backsliding has undeniably occurred: enforcement of Trump’s crackdown on U.S. investment in Chinese technology companies that support the People’s Liberation Army. … Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin removed Chinese technology giant Xiaomi from a blacklist of such companies considered security risks pursuant to an executive order Trump signed last November.”

None of these moves are unexpected. Biden has a career-long history of kowtowing to Beijing.

One of the most dramatic, and devastating events in U.S.-China relations was the granting of “permanent normal trading status,” which occurred near the end of 2000. The move was signed by President Clinton, but Biden was the driving force in the legislative branch. You can draw a direct line from that move to the wholescale move of American manufacturing, and the related jobs, to China.

Photo: Pixabay

The Centers for Disease Control has recommended reimposing some COVID restrictions, even as the Biden Administration wholly ignores a key reason why the China-originated pandemic is having a mild resurgence.

Taken as a whole throughout the nation, COVID is not appearing to be returning to the danger it previously presented, thanks largely to the Trump Administration’s vaccine development efforts. However, the impact of the White House ignoring the impact of dramatic numbers of unvaccinated illegal immigrants storming across the southern border is facilitating an uptick in cases. The policy of quietly spreading those people throughout the nation is worrisome.

Contagious disease problems from illegal immigration is not a new phenomena. The Southern Medical Association  previously warned that illegal immigration may expose Americans to diseases that have been virtually eradicated, but are highly contagious.

The Center for Immigration Studies has emphasized the work of  Peter Edelstein, M.D., who writing in Psychology Today in January 2017, warned that “In the end, it is hard to completely ignore the health risks posed by those whose entry into the country avoids medical examination and treatment. Whether you sit on the ‘build a wall’ end of the spectrum or the ‘they’re just seeking a better life’ end, accepting that treatable major health risks are freely entering into our general population is an unwise strategy, regardless of your political leaning…”

That caution has been echoed by the Federation for American immigration Reform, which has argued that illegal immigrants, unlike those who are legally admitted, undergo no medical screening to assure that they are not bearing contagious diseases. They are setting a resurgence of contagious diseases that had been totally or nearly eradicated by the U.S. public health system.

Published reports indicate that 30 percent of illegal immigrants in border facilities refused to take the COVID vaccine. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency has reported, notes Axios, that 20,000 illegals have been found to have the disease in their facility.  

Details from Immigration and Customs Reform (ICE) facilities   scattered throughout the nation are worrisome. A few examples: The Stewart Detention Center found 871 confirmed COVID cases; 563 at the Bluebonnet center, 404 at the Aurora Contact Facility, 609 in the El Paso Service Processing Center, 423 in the OteroCounty Processing Center, 460 in the Houston Contract Facility,  471 in the Montgomery Processing Center, 763 in a New Orleans facility, 493 in Louisiana’s Richwood center, 1,634 in La Palma Correctional facility, 886 in Karnes, 535 in El Valle, 1,011 in Port Isabel, 1,169 at the South Texas Family Residential Facility, 871 in the South Texas Center, and 471 in San Diego’s Otay facility.

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On July 26, The Border Report noted that “671 newCOVID-19 cases were reported Monday in Hidalgo County on South Texas border.”

Republicans Senators are calling on the President to address the humanitarian, national security, and most recently, public health crisis on the southern border. As rates of COVID-19 rise in Texas communities, that’s state’s Sen. Ted Cruz urged the Biden administration to preserve Title 42 prompt expulsions of illegal immigrants to protect the health and safety of Americans.  

Cruz noted that “The Biden border crisis is getting worse…We are on pace for over 2 million people to cross illegally into this country. We have the highest level of illegal immigration in over 20 years. Last year, we had the lowest rate of illegal immigration in 45 years.”

Cruz particularly criticized the Biden Administration for seeking to end Title 42 restrictions, the Sanitation and Quarantine measure affecting entry into the United States of those with contagious diseases. He states that “…Joe Biden is now talking about ending title 42. Title 42 is the tool that has allowed us to prevent people with COVID from being released into this country.”

Taking the opposite tact, Cruz has introduced the SHIELD Act, which would prevent the release of illegals with contagious diseases into the general population.

Illustration: Pixabay

On repeated occasions, Joe Biden has intentionally used incendiary language to oppose legislative measures that deter cheating on elections. He has similarly used inflammatory phrases in response to those urging him to address the growing crisis on the Southern border.

 “The 21st-century Jim Crow assault is real…We’re facing the most significant test of our democracy since the Civil War—that’s not hyperbole.” The President has also stated that America is “backsliding into the days of Jim Crow.” 

None of the measures Biden used this language for is, in any manner, discriminatory or racist. Requiring proper identification to vote, and mandating that a clear chain of custody and transparent vote counting is common sense, and common decency. Securing a border against illegal entry is a fundamental responsibility of the national government.

That reality has not stopped the White House from making its bizarre and dangerous comments.

In addition, Biden has employed deliberately insulting phrases to characterize his political opponents, calling them Neanderthals, racists, and similar phrases.

While statutes exist establishing penalties for “inciting to riot,” (example: “Code of the District of Columbia § 22–1322. Rioting or inciting to riot. Whoever willfully incites or urges other persons to engage in a riot shall be punished by imprisonment for not more than 180 days or a fine of not more than the amount set forth in § 22-3571.01, or both,” The protections of the First Amendment limit the application of the concept. That’s fortunate for Democrats in general and Biden in particular.

Writing in the New York Times in 2018, Gerard Alexander, a professor of political science at the University of Virginia, noted: “Liberals often don’t realize how provocative or inflammatory they can be. In exercising their power, they regularly not only persuade and attract but also annoy and repel…Racist is pretty much the most damning label that can be slapped on anyone in America today…Yet some people have cavalierly leveled the charge against huge numbers of Americans.”

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Why has Biden, who campaigned on a pledge to unite the nation, adopted such harsh rhetoric?

Today’s Democrat Party is dominated by its hard-left wing, which is banking on extreme claims to distract the public from its growing failures in deterring crime, restoring the economy, and establishing a foreign policy that addresses Chinese and Russian aggression.

Clearly, Democrat Progressives seek to dramatically alter the United States, but lack the public mandate to do so. They must find support by creating the impression that the nation is racist, economically unbalanced, and generally unfair.

However, the public, at school board meetings and other forums, is expressing resentment over Progressive allegations about America being inherently racist. Further, leftist emphasis on woke issues, (which pronoun to use, socialism, defunding the police and military, canceling of contrary views, etc.) are not finding receptive ears with voters.

The Democrats’ woes are getting worse.  foreign affairs, which had been on the backburner of political debate, are moving steadily to the forefront. The Wuhan-originated pandemic substantiated Trump’s claim that China was a malevolent presence, a reality made even more obvious by Beijing’s establishment of concentration camps to oppress religious and ethnic minorities within its borders. The dramatic arms buildup by both Russia and China has been all but ignored by Biden and his party.

Recently, the Cuban peoples’ quest for personal freedom, and the startling failure of key Democrats to sympathize with them, has exposed the Progressives’ affinity for both communist policies and authoritarianism in general.

Rather than engage in a long-delayed and urgently required period of self-examination about their policy failures and growing distance from the general public, Democrats, lead by Biden, are doubling down on inflammatory comments and outrageous charges about their opponents. Inevitably, this will both further divide the nation and lead to an electoral debacle for the Left in the next election.

CHINA

October 1 marks the anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China. The State Department issued a statement congratulating the Chinese people and vaguely mentioned the challenges in the relationship. It did not ask for the return of all American being illegally detained in Chinese prisons or mention other human rights issues. President Xi Jinping this year began a crackdown on private enterprises. According to the Jamestown Foundation, “pragmatist elements have expressed growing unease with recent developments and have stressed the salience of private enterprise and innovation to China’s growth.” The coming year looks like China will continue to experience crackdowns on private enterprises and freedom of speech and assembly. When asked about US-China relations during a Thursday TV interview in Pittsburgh, Secretary of State Tony Blinken said “One of the things we’ve learned, including from the COVID-19 crisis, is we have to build more diversified and more resilient supply chains, including bringing some of that manufacturing and supply back here to the United States, especially when it comes to critical products and critical technologies, where we can’t afford to be dependent on anyone else, or we can’t afford to have a shortage and a crunch.” He opted not to directly mention China as the source of the problem.

“PRESIDENT TRUMP”

During remarks to the press after Blinken’s meetings with America’s European partners at a Trade and Technology Council conference, the Secretary was asked if “the G20 in Rome be an opportunity for President Trump to discuss this issue and particularly to discuss with China the issue of the non-market economy? And what kind of answer would you like to receive from China?” Blinken did not note that Joe Biden was President, not Donald Trump. He went on to say that “we know there are ongoing commitments that China made, including in the Phase One trade deal negotiated by the previous administration in terms of commitments to purchase certain things that we believe China should be held to. But the bottom line is there is an important agenda – trade, investment with China for all of us is important and something that we want to sustain.” It appears the Secretary was uncertain who is the boss in the White House.

IRAN

After six to seven rounds of indirect talks, the Iranians continue to refuse to speak with US officials regarding their nuclear development program. According to Blinken, “They’ve been away from the talks now for three months… had an election, a new government was formed, but they’ve not re-engaged with the talks. So the jury is out on that and the ball remains in their court, but not for long. Because the problem that we face now…, is that because of the work that Iran is doing on its nuclear program in violation of the JCPOA – spinning more sophisticated centrifuges, building up stockpiles of uranium enriched to 20 percent or even 60 percent – simply getting back to the terms of the JCPOA at some point will not be sufficient to recapture the benefits of the agreement because of the progress Iran has made.” He added that the US is prevailing upon its partner countries to get Iran back into the JCPOA.

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NORTH KOREA

During September North Korea test-fired its third hyper-sonic missile in violation of UN Security Council resolutions. Blinken said the US is “evaluating and assessing the launches” and that Washington takes it “very seriously.” When questioned by a reporter about specific actions the US is taking, Blinken did not offer any explicit actions beyond saying that “ Our envoy for North Korea is now actually talking to the South Koreans and the Japanese.”

AFGHANISTAN

When questioned about General Milley’s blaming the State Department for taking a long time on decisions regarding the withdrawal from Afghanistan, Blinken defended his Department in perfect Washington fashion saying “The President made the right decision to end America’s longest war… As the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs General Milley said himself, no one anticipated that the security forces of Afghanistan as well as the government would collapse in the short period of time they did. And I don’t think anyone can say that we took any of the decisions that we took alone, one agency making the decision. Everything we did, we did collectively as a team through a process, and every voice was heard and listened to in that process. And we did it together.”

DARIA NOVAK served in the United States State Department during the Reagan Administration, and currently is on the Board of the American Analysis of News and Media Inc., which publishes usagovpolicy.com and the New York Analysis of Policy and Government.  Each Saturday, she presents key updates on U.S. foreign policy from the State Department.

Illustration: Pixabay

When viewing national boundaries on a Russian map the phrase “near abroad” comes to mind. It describes the area just outside the country’s official political boundaries but still inside Moscow’s sphere of influence. It includes places like the Ukraine, Belarus, and other more fully independent East European nations. Russia’s concept of its “near abroad” is expanding in the years since Vladimir Putin assumed power. We witnessed this in his 2014 annexation of the Crimean region of Ukraine and more recently in Russia’s building of additional military and air bases above the Arctic Circle. While China, which is 900 miles to the south of the Arctic, calls itself a “near Arctic nation,” Russian territory legally extends above the Arctic Circle. Russia’s “near abroad” encompasses not only the physical Arctic lands to Russia’s north, but under Putin his country also is becoming more politically and militarily active in the entire region. Give the potential economic benefits and natural resources that should give the West cause for concern.

Earlier this year Russia, represented by Nikolay V. Korchunov, assumed chairmanship of the Arctic Council which governs the eight Arctic states’ interests in the region. Putin’s desire for a more prestigious and influential global role is seen not only in the chambers of the Arctic council itself, but it also is evidenced by Moscow’s advanced military buildup in the High North. Putin has upgraded its military bases and airfields left abandoned during the Cold War period and added new ones. CNN reported earlier this year that satellite images indicate two Russian radar stations are now operating in Provideniya and Wrangel Island across from Alaska, and a new quick-reaction alert force has been  organized in the Far East port town of Anadyr. Russia also constructed an airstrip on Kotelny Island in northeastern Siberia. In the northwestern region Putin added an airfield on the country’s northernmost military base of Nagurskoye. This includes a storage facility being built for the unmanned underwater nuclear-powered Poseidon drone. 

While Putin may be talking in the Arctic Council about “sustaining the Arctic environment” his actions betray a different course. The Pentagon is monitoring the building up closely to determine the extent of the potential threat to US national security interests in the region. Earlier this year Russia conducted massive Arctic maneuvers this year that included over 40 drills. The “Foreign Policy Concept of the Russian Federation, which was approved by Putin on November 30, 2016, covers Russian geographic priorities and mentions objectives on all continents, according to a recent RAND report. “As climate change in the Arctic opens new viable transit lanes and competing continental shelf sovereignty claims, strategic competition in the area is likely to increase,” it says. 

Russian military policy prioritizes access to the Arctic to maintain its nuclear deterrence capability which is the first element of Russia’s defense strategy. From a Russian perspective it is evidence to confirm for the world that Russia is again a great power. More than two-thirds of Russia’s nuclear warheads are located in the High North. That provides Russia with excellent access to the Atlantic Ocean and its strategic bombers basing for direct flight paths to the US mainland. With increased access to the Arctic, Putin also seeks to increase his protection of Russian lands on the country’s northern flank. 

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There also are vast amounts of natural resources under the Northern Sea Route (NSR), from the Barents Sea to the Bering Strait. “NSR is in Russian territorial waters [and] ships transiting the NSR need the permission of Russian authorities and must pay transit fees,” according to the RAND study. Putin is quite aware of the potential economic windfall of the NSR. A ship transiting from South Korea to Germany through the Suez Canal takes 34 days to make the journey; using the NSR would be reduced to 23. Financially, Russia also benefits from its own vast reserves of oil and gas in the Arctic. Russia may have as much as 48 billion barrels of oil and 43 trillion cubic meters of natural gas, according to Putin. He publicly stated he intends for Russia to produce a full 30% of all hydrocarbons in the Arctic by 2050. For the Russian leader that justifies building and expanding bases, resuming a warship presence in the Arctic and flying strategic bombers in the Arctic. The question is how far will Putin go to protect his country’s perceived national interests? 

DARIA NOVAK served in the United States State Department during the Reagan Administration, and currently is on the Board of the American Analysis of News and Media Inc., which publishes usagovpolicy.com and the New York Analysis of Policy and Government. 

Illustration: Pixabay