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| Sapa in North Vietnam Picture by John Stapleton |
"Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze for long into an abyss, the abyss also gazes into you." Nietszchke.
A chorus of dismay, but this time the anger was directed at themselves, not him. "There's nothing wrong with what he's written,"a voice said; while a soldier poured scorn anyway: "Fuck him." Of course a bullet would be cheaper, but he wasn't going to help them solve the problems of their own making. Every day, as if marching towards an apocalypse, the world became more disturbed. Even in this faroff outpost, Sydney, Australia, there was a mounting sense of unease and discontent. The security forces were alarmed and did not know which way to turn. Platitudinous, reassuring statements from the nation's politicians did not reflect the reality on the ground. No one knew which way to turn.
The Clarion Cow, one particularly unpleasant woman in a massive bureaucratic chain, held up progress, raproachement, for months on end. They thought, she thought, he might not be all that politically correct, did not automatically fall into the group think caste of the self-titled progressives, could be easily dismissed. Those who did not fit their world view were always dismissed. It was no wonder they were losing the war. All you had to do to see their serenity come unstuck was to disagree with them, a meltdown on the spot.
These people had spent their entire careers protecting their own turf, encased in hierarchies, unable to see over the ledge, much less jump off, no parachute swinging over the steep ravines of the valley, and their dank, one-dimensional views cast a deadly pall over any hint of creativity, stifled the bureaucracies in which they ruled and ultimately betrayed the taxpayer who was paying for the mess. Paying, essentially, for nothing. Australia had become stultified with self-defeating bureaucracies, grand schemes which more often than not made the country worse, as the state took over more and more of the responsibilities and life challenges which had once been the province of families and churches and charities and yes, that much misused word, communities.
The night was grey and there was treachery afoot. "Nobody believes either of them anymore," a dismissive voice said loudly in the neighbouring park, where locals gathered and drank and argued and passed away the time. "Enough, enough," a raised arm. "We surrender." "We apologise." But he just pretended to not hear whatever was the murmur in the wind of the day; "better to be undetectable" he said to noone in particular. "The gifts come and go. Better to be invisble. Safer." For his kind had always been hunted; not just here on this planet, but across galaxies, across time; for there was nothing more uncomfortable than a truthsayer.
Yes, imagine a world where it was impossible to lie.
THE BIGGER STORY:
War footing: 2016 hot spots from the Middle East to Asia
- THE AUSTRALIAN
- SAVE
Only three weeks in and 2016 is already shaping up as a dynamic year, with conflict and instability in many regions. Here’s an overview of nine international hot spots, focusing on what we’re likely to see in the next 12 months.
1. Iraq: slow progress under dire circumstances
Iraqi forces, supported by the US-led coalition, are making real but slow progress against Islamic State. Kurdish troops recaptured Sinjar in November, cutting the highway from Syria to Mosul — Iraq’s second city, enemy-held since June 2014. In December, government forces recaptured Ramadi, capital of Anbar Province, from Islamic State fighters who had occupied it since May.
The city suffered massive damage, and Islamic State combat groups remain active around it, but the seizure of a significant urban area highlights the progress coalition trainers have made in rebuilding Iraq’s army and police from the low point of mid-2014. Coalition leaders hope more airstrikes — directed, in part, by a 200-strong US “specialised expeditionary targeting force” authorised to accompany combat troops and conduct its own raids — will help to hold the newly won ground. We can expect patchy progress through the year, possibly leading to a resumption of the long-postponed Mosul offensive later in 2016.
But the situation is still dire. Iranian-backed militias are challenging government authority and violently oppose increased coalition involvement. Their abuses have triggered shootouts with Kurdish and Sunni communities and in mid-January Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi had to deploy troops to the Shia stronghold of Basra amid a spike in tribal violence, street protests, and militia activity.
Islamic State still controls Mosul, Fallujah and other cities, is on the offensive around Saddam Hussein’s home town of Tikrit, and is far from defeated.
The politics are even more problematic. The Kurdish region in Iraq is a de facto state with its own internal power struggles and regional entanglements that complicate its relations with Iran, Syria and Turkey. Shia areas are slipping beyond Baghdad’s control, and Sunni-majority provinces such as Anbar are bloodily contested or controlled outright by Islamic State. It will take more than military progress (though that’s an essential first step) to re-establish Iraq as a viable state, let alone turn it into a functioning democracy — which is why nobody (least of all Iraqis) expects that to happen anytime soon.
2. Syria: peace talks falter as Russian-Iranian efforts slow
In Syria, Russian strikes have relieved pressure on Bashar al-Assad’s regime and enabled offensives in the northern provinces of Aleppo and Idlib since October. But the advance is bogging down, with many civilians killed and severe damage to Syria’s already devastated cities. Islamic State has avoided the brunt of Russian airstrikes, which mostly target secular nationalist rebels, giving Islamic State fighters space to mount an offensive against Deir ez-Zor, one of only two surviving regime outposts in northeastern Syria. This month they captured large areas of the city, massacring hundreds of civilians and regime loyalists.
Assad’s military successes, limited as they are, make a peace settlement this year more unlikely. Rebel groups (excluding Islamic State and al-Qa’ida affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra) met in December to co-ordinate demands ahead of talks scheduled for Monday.
In last year’s crisis atmosphere, it seemed possible the regime might agree to a general ceasefire, followed by a transitional government, with Assad’s status to be decided later. Now that he feels more secure, Assad is less likely to countenance such a deal. Likewise, Russia has driven the rebels back from its bases at Tartus and Latakia, securing its key strategic goal and making Moscow less likely to push Assad towards peace, even though Russia’s armed forces are in no shape for a protracted foreign operation. So, absent a significant battlefield game-changer, 2016 will likely see inconclusive peace talks amid a stalemated (but increasingly bloody) conflict.3. Middle East: a worsening Saudi-Iranian conflict
Another factor hampering Syrian peace talks is the deepening proxy conflict between Iran and Saudi Arabia, epitomised by the Saudi execution this month of Shia cleric Nimr al-Nimr. Tehran and Riyadh are competing for regional dominance: sponsoring opposite sides in Syria, fighting a bloody proxy war in Yemen, rallying regional allies and jockeying for influence across the Middle East, Central Asia and parts of Africa. Now that sanctions are being lifted, as Tehran complies with last year’s nuclear deal, Iran will gain access to $US100 billion in frozen assets, travel and trade bans will be relaxed, and the country will again begin to export oil.
This will only exacerbate a global oil glut that has already driven crude prices to a 13-year low, creating turmoil in global markets and sparking fears of instability in oil-producing nations, notably Saudi Arabia, but also Venezuela and Russia.
The Obama administration is touting the nuclear deal as its key foreign policy accomplishment, and if properly enforced it may (possibly) succeed in limiting Iranian nuclear capability for the next 15 years. But Iran maintains its nuclear ambitions and continues to deny the military nature of its program, and this is far from a reset in US-Iranian relations.
Throughout this year Tehran will likely seek to test US resolve on enforcing the agreement, and we can expect tension, conflict and controversy over Iran’s expansionist influence — as well as increasingly violent pushback from the Saudis.
4. Libya: Islamic State growing amid a low-grade civil war
Both Iran and the Sunni states of the Gulf have meddled in Libya, which has suffered severe instability since 2011, and whose government collapsed in 2014. The country is now split between two rival governments, each with its own parliament and executive, and a string of heavily gunned-up tribal and regional militias are competing for control and engaging in serious (albeit episodic) conflict that has killed many civilians, damaged Libya’s cities and prompted many Libyans to flee the country. Last year things got even worse: Islamic State established wilayats — provinces — in each of Libya’s three regions, created a base in Muammar Gaddafi’s home town of Sirte, and fought (with mixed success) to maintain its influence in Benghazi and Derna, a historic centre of extremism and the source of most Libyan recruits to terrorist groups in Syria and Iraq.
Though the UN managed to broker an agreement last month between Libya’s rival parliaments with the goal of establishing a national unity government, the conflict — which amounts to a medium-intensity civil war — continues, and Islamic State is unlikely to lose its foothold anytime soon. We can expect the organisation — along with al-Qa’ida, which retains deep ties in the country’s eastern region — to cement its control through the year, continue exporting terrorist violence and ideology throughout North Africa and the Sahara, and seek to undermine any fragile moves toward peace and stability within Libya.
5. Africa: increased terror risk
The export of extremism from Libya is only one factor driving increased terrorism risks in Africa. Another is the outflow of weapons and fighters that followed the fall of Gaddafi’s regime in 2011 and triggered conflicts in Mali, Sudan, the Central African Republic and elsewhere. Al-Qa’ida remains highly active in Africa, with groups ranging from Somalia’s al-Shabab — which is increasingly carrying out regional attacks, launching assaults in Somali cities, and overran an African Union base in the country’s south this month — to Algerian terrorist Mokhtar Belmokhtar’s al-Mourabitoun, an al-Qa’ida-linked group responsible for several highly lethal attacks on hotels in Mali and Burkina Faso over recent months. But al-Qa’ida is increasingly competing with Islamic State, which now claims the allegiance of Boko Haram, the West African group that is, by far, Africa’s deadliest terrorist group — and has carried out attacks in Tunisia and elsewhere. Islamic State is encroaching on al-Qa’ida’s turf as well, with reports from Botswana last month suggesting a faction of 200 fighters had split off from al-Shabab to form the first formally organised Islamic State brigade in East Africa.
6. Afghanistan: an impending crisis
Another place where Islamic State has made inroads over the past year is Afghanistan. Expanding from a base in Pakistan, the group began infiltrating Afghanistan’s south and east in late 2014, before mounting major attacks — on both the Taliban and the government — in September last year. In direct competition, al-Qa’ida has also increased its activity in the same regions, driving a spike in violence in urban and rural areas.
But the biggest surge is that of the Taliban, still recovering from last year’s announcement of the death of Mullah Omar, its founder and leader until his demise in 2013. Omar’s successor, Mullah Akhtar Mansour, has cemented his leadership of the movement and is running a two-track strategy — on the one hand negotiating with Kabul, and simultaneously pressuring the Afghan military and police in a ramped-up campaign that directly targets Afghanistan’s cities.
Taliban forces seized the northern provincial capital of Kunduz for two weeks last October — the first time in the entire war they’ve succeeded in seizing a major city. Ordinary Afghans were deeply spooked by this, along with Taliban expansion into their old stomping grounds of Oruzgan, Helmand, Kunar and Nuristan (places that coalition forces, including Australians, fought hard to stabilise over the past decade). In the last few weeks the Taliban has also launched an unprecedented string of terrorist attacks on Kabul and other cities.
In the year ahead, Afghan forces will struggle to contain a Taliban spring offensive come April, alongside increased activity from Islamic State, al-Qa’ida and the Pakistan-backed Haqqani network.
We can expect the Afghan police and military to fight hard and achieve some local successes, but the overall prognosis is not good — indeed, there’s a real risk that, without additional international support for the Afghan government, we may see the same kind of Islamic State breakout and blitzkrieg in Afghanistan in 2016 as happened in Iraq in 2014.
7. Europe: a deepening migration crisis
Afghans — with Syrians, Iraqis, Libyans and Eritreans — made up the majority of the more than 1.1 million refugees and asylum-seekers flooding into Europe last year. Thousands died trying to reach the EU, and many more were marooned in transit and processing camps on the European periphery.
Amid an ongoing eurozone financial crisis, frontline border security forces in Greece, Italy, Spain and the Republic of Macedonia simply lack the resources to secure their borders or process the stream of asylum-seekers flocking on to and through their territory.
Most migrants are heading for Sweden and Germany, countries that are rapidly being overwhelmed by the challenge of caring for refugees, screening them for potential terrorists (a reasonable concern given how many originate from war zones, especially after November’s horrific terror attacks in Paris) and dealing with an increasing public backlash against them.
That backlash will only increase this year, especially after widespread incidents of sexual assault and molestation committed by immigrants against women in six German cities on New Year’s Eve prompted public outrage in several European countries.
This year’s refugee flow will be at least as large as last year — already in mid-January illegal immigrants entering Europe via Greece exceeded the monthly total for January 2014 by almost 2000 per cent.
This poses four risks for Europe this year: the risk of violent crime or terrorism perpetrated by asylum-seekers or those hiding within the mass migration stream; the risk of right-wing violence (or, indeed, mainstream public unrest) targeting immigrants; the risk of a breakdown in European border security, with knock-on effects for Europeans travelling to countries with stricter border controls such as Australia or the US, and the risk that Europe’s welfare state will simply be unable to cope with the short-term burden on an already stressed public housing, unemployment and health system.
8. Ukraine: frozen conflict
Russia’s intervention in Syria coincided with a spike of refugees from that country into Europe. Moscow’s intervention was designed in part to shore up Assad, partly to protect Tartus (Russia’s only Mediterranean base and one of the few warm-water ports available to its navy worldwide), and partly to change the subject — a necessary endeavour, after Russia’s 2014 annexation of Crimea and its sponsorship of separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine brought widespread international condemnation and damaging sanctions. Combined with the drop in global oil prices and the stream of body bags containing Russian “volunteers” killed in Ukraine and Syria, this is hurting Russian President Vladimir Putin. It has prompted tough talk from the Kremlin (including a new and aggressive national military strategy signed by Putin on New Year’s Eve) designed to mask an attempt to regain international credibility by taking on Islamic State, while dialling back Moscow’s support for Ukrainian separatists.
This year we can expect the Ukrainian conflict to congeal along the front lines established in 2015, though there’s a risk of intense localised offensives around contested towns such as Mariupol on the Sea of Azov in southern Ukraine’s Donetsk region.
Russian-backed separatists will likely focus on consolidating their hold on the country’s east, peace talks will continue, Ukraine’s legitimate government in Kiev will continue to lack the resources and international support needed to defeat the rebels, and the war will become one of several “frozen conflicts” that punctuate Russia’s near abroad.9. Increasing terrorism risk in Southeast Asia
Closer to home, Southeast Asia is also likely to see an uptick in terrorist activity.
This is partly driven by the spreading influence of Islamic State, which established awilayat in the southern Philippines at the end of last year, sent militants into Thailand last October to attack foreign tourists, and claimed last week’s attack in downtown Jakarta. But older separatist and jihadist groups are also still active in the region and, as in other parts of the world, the emergence of Islamic State has created a competitive dynamic, with each group seeking to outdo the others, raising the general terror threat from a range of Islamist groups.
Thai, Malaysian, Bangladeshi and Indonesian officials have also expressed concerns about the potential for foreign fighters in Iraq and Syria returning home. All this is likely to generate a higher background threat level for many countries in Southeast Asia, including Australia.
This, of course, is only a very selective survey of the international security environment over the next 12 months.
There are many other potential sources of conflict, from tensions on the Korean Peninsula to maritime stand-offs in the South China Sea, domestic terrorism in Australia, potential state-on-state conflicts in the north Pacific, last year’s massive spike in Colombian cocaine production amid ongoing peace negotiations to end the world’s longest insurgency, and increased unrest in Venezuela and Brazil.
Likewise, issues such as low global oil prices, China’s economic slowdown, drought, disease and natural disasters could have impacts at least as severe as many of the conflicts. And there’s unfortunately no doubt that 2016 will bring conflicts that are impossible to predict. But as of now, the nine hot spots listed are a good initial selection of places to watch.
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Perhaps the single most successful book of 2015, “a soaring triumph” as the critics have described it, H is for Hawke is an absolute must read. Every now and then something breaks through the zeitgeist. Author Helen MacDonald wrote in one of the opening riffs: “Forty-five minutes north-east of Cambridge is a landscape I’ve come to love very much indeed. It’s where wet fen gives way to parched sand. It’s a land of twisted pine trees, burnt-out cars, shotgun-peppered road signs and US Air Force bases.
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