Comments on: Authoritarian States Are Failing–They Have Us Right Where They Want Us!

By: polistra

polistra — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 23:12:17 +0000

A rare and valid piece of logic.

The last time anyone used similar logic with respect to Russia was Bob Taft in 1951, as I detailed here:

http://polistrasmill.blogspot.com/2008/09/both-sides-no.html

If we had listened to Taft then, our history would have been
quite different. If we listen to Larison now, we could also
avoid a lot of heartache.

By: Daniel Larison

Daniel Larison — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 21:31:49 +0000

Thanks for the comment. Certainly, there are cases where politically failing regimes can lash out (almost always unsuccessfully, as your examples remind us) as a way of shoring up support. This is one reason why I have never understood the impulse to confront rickety dictatorships by bombing and sanctioning them, since this does push the population into the embrace of the dictator and perpetuates the rule of the people our government wishes to end. I can imagine scenarios where economic crisis could empower a militaristic faction that later on starts a conflict, but on the whole states that are coping with weakening or collapsing economies are in no position to launch foreign adventures and take on additional costs and risk. Besides, the Russians are getting more out of their bailout loan to Iceland in terms of influence overseas than they would get from launching an invasion of one of their neighbors.

As we know, foreign wars are enormously expensive, and the more technologically advanced a military is the more expensive its wars tend to be. For most states wars are difficult to finance for prolonged periods of time without adverse economic consequences at home. Russia was able to afford a short, sharp war with a tiny neighbor, but I seriously doubt that it has the desire for a prolonged conflict in Ukraine even if Moscow wanted to control that territory directly, and aside from the hard-line nationalist fraction of the population I doubt this is a real objective of the Kremlin.

By: jonfried

jonfried — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 21:13:59 +0000

Crumbling regimes have caused wars in the past- Argentina’s military junta (Falklands) and the Papadopolous regime in Greece (Cyprus) come to mind. Nothing gets people to rally around a regime like a stoking nationalism through war. Still, I agree with the premise of your argument- these states weren’t dangerous to US security before and aren’t dangerous now.

By: Michael D.

Michael D. — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 20:33:03 +0000

Speaking of fearmongering, if not outright fantasy (a lot of new agencies are on the way that I hadn’t heard about to listen to Mr. Newman!), check out this gem on the WSJ opinion page today:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122523927108878301.html

By: Daniel Larison

Daniel Larison — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 19:38:26 +0000

Well, we have always had to worry about the Icelandic regime–they’re socialists, you know.

One thing I don’t understand about people who still want to launch strikes on Iran (and Peters has actually been more level-headed about the extraordinary difficulties involved when it comes to doing this in recent months) is this: why would you want to create a situation in which the main supports for the Iranian regime’s strength and stability (i.e., the prices of oil and gas) are increased dramatically?

By: Adam01

Adam01 — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 19:29:22 +0000

If anything, Peters has understated the case: he completely fails to consider that the recent banking/currency collapse in Iceland make that country the most dangerous regime on the planet today, if not in the Entire History of Human Civilization.
I doubt we’ll make it to the New Year without hordes of neo-Vikings pouring out of Reykjavik on a blood-thirsty campaign of world conquest and terror. After all, Prime Minister Haarde has to do something to distract the locals from the ongoing economic crisis…

“Russia starts going broke, and so has no incentive not to start invading other countries. No incentive, that is, except for the possibility of foreign investment and aid to shore up its slumping economy.”

Indeed, that has already happened.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/09/19/opinion/main4460640.shtml?source=RSSattr=Opinion_4460640

Apparently, Western bankers didn’t get the joke, because in August alone, over $20 billion of foreign investment made for the hills, $7 billion of it in the first two days of the war alone. Scared to do business with such a reckless, unpredictable partner, investors had been closing ranks all summer, and Georgia only locked up their formation. The risk premium has spiked to nine percent, foreign banks stopped lending money to Russian companies–suddenly in dire need of it because all that foreign capital had fled–and foreign issuance dropped by over 85 percent since June.

Venezuala and Iran are in even more dire straights: their sulfur-laden oil is difficult and expensive to extract and refine, and, as you mentioned, Both Chavez & Ahmadinejad have based their leadership on heavily funding social programs that were premised on expensive oil that looks unlikely in the short to medium term.