Relations between countries, no one is a friend.

Tags

Africa, China, Colonies, diplomacy, Foreign Relations, France, Iran, Jordan, La Sublime Porte, Lebanon, London, Paris, Saudi Arabia, Spain, Syria, Turkey

Recently the King of Saudi Arabia died and he was replaced within a few hours by Prince Salman. In the wake of his death, commentators wrote about the relationship of  the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the rest of the Western World. On the chat lines many people questioned why we had relations with that country and presenting their views, mostly and largely uninformed. I do not know why politicians love to use the term our good friends in country X or the expression we are shoulder to shoulder with this country, blah blah. It is simply a false statement, a delusion, it is true that Statesman can see eye to eye on a specific point of mutual benefit and interest but that is usually limited in time and focused on a specific topic.

What most people do not seem to know or take into consideration is the fact that all relations between nations is dominated by self-interest, fierce competition, one upmanship and little else. It is true that in the last 70 years countries like Canada have enjoyed peaceful political relations with many other countries, some relations are old and well established, there are many common interest but at the same time elements that devise and irritate the other party. This is true of our relations with the USA, the UK, France, which historically have been mixed at many levels. Our first Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald knew this and he always kept a weary eye on both London and Washington.

Somerset House Conference 1604, Peace between Britain and Spain.

To return to the events of last week, in the case of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia we have to think of the geopolitics of the region and its long and old history. How the Arab Monarchies of the Arab Peninsula dislike Iran and fear its influence. Currently Iran is negotiating with the USA on nuclear matters and preventing Iran from developing Nuclear weapons. Saudi Arabia is fearful of a deal or arrangement which would leave them out. Iran is a regional power and has been influential in the region for a very long time, centuries in fact. Iran supports military groups in Lebanon and Syria. It enjoyed good relations with the Assad regime, father and son. It plays a role in Iraqi politics and supports Shia politicians and their armed groups. This to the great displeasure of Saudi Arabia who is a new regional power, new in the sense of since 1973 when the oil prices jumped and created new wealth for the Saudis.

Canada has relations with Saudi Arabia, again relatively new relations, we are newcomers to this region compared to Britain. Our relationship is also very different in historical terms. We have more than 500 post-graduate students in Canada and this alone brings in millions of dollars to our Universities, cities and in taxes not counting also consumer goods they buy. This is a wealthy group of students who often drive luxury cars and live in tony neighbourhoods. Many Canadian companies do very profitable business with the Kingdom, Canadians profit economically in many various ways. Our politicians need to consider this carefully when making decisions on Foreign Policy matters.

It seems that for the average person issues like women having to wear a veil or not being able to drive or having their civic rights curtailed by tradition and culture. Every one has a horror story they read in the newspapers about Saudi Arabia. A country were the death penalty is still applied with a high number of executions per year. Such items in the news always disturbs Canadian sensibilities and that would be enough reasons to cut off diplomatic relations for most people. Luckily such decisions are not in the hands of public opinion. Breaking diplomatic relations would be very shortsighted, it would go against our self-interests.

The same reasons could apply to many countries, according to that train of thought we should simply walk away from such countries, because they are corrupt or have a justice system different from ours or their culture and history is offensive to us. Public opinion says shame them for behaving contrary to our norms and beliefs. Such reactions are emotional or based on ignorance. Diplomatic relations are far more complicated than that, because you must never forget that if you break relations with one country, it will be very difficult to re-establish them later and many years may pass before being able to negotiate a new understanding on mutual relations, concessions may be asked which may not be to our liking and then what about Consular relations and the protection of your own citizens who visit countries with whom you have no relations. Currently Canada has broken off relations with Iran and Syria. Other countries may seek to exploit the vacuum for political and commercial reasons. They will step in to take your place economically and politically, those same countries may be a NATO ally or a country with whom you have long peaceful relations. They will profit at your expense and you will lose because you want to stand on principle. Principles are fine but in the end such a narrow position would not be sustainable economically nor politically. Careful analysis must be made of every situation and disagreement before taking action you may later regret.

The ambassador of Siam at the Court of the Sun King presenting gifts.

Diplomacy and Foreign Relations is not about morals or ethics, Diplomacy is an amoral business. You have to be a hard nose realist and pragmatic in any relations you conduct, emotions and feelings have no place in Foreign Relations. Our Prime Minister likes to say that we conduct a moral or ethical Foreign Policy, that for domestic consumption is great speechifying and the common person may rejoice that our PM will tell those people what is what. Think again, it does not work that way at all and Harper found out the hard way with China. He snubbed China for three years and made hostile and intemperate statements at home to please his local base of right wingers. When he finally went to China, the Chinese made him apologise and publicly rebuked him. Harper understood that commercially the Chinese were far more important than he had ever imagined or understood.

China is pursuing an aggressive Foreign Policy, they have the population and economic might to regain the old glory of Imperial days and despite the fact that they may say that they are bridging the gap, resolving differences through mutual understanding, all that is again words for the naive. In any negotiations the Chinese are very tough and unyielding, they know their weight and know that Western consumers want cheap products, Western governments cannot refuse to satisfy the demands of shoppers back home. At the same time the Chinese understand the limits of aggressive behaviour in Asia against neighbours with whom they have irritants with Vietnam, Japan, India to name a few countries. The Chinese are also careful not to get involved in International crisis by taking sides, Crimea, Syria, North Korea, ISIS or ISIL terrorism etc.. they always say that they do not want to get involved in what they consider internal crisis. Their interest is to protect their markets and economic development. At home the Chinese Communist government can only survive if they give the population more wealth and if the country prosper.

China has routinely blocked with its Veto any economic sanction measures at the UN all the while negotiating that Veto vote with the countries most concerned by proposed sanctions. China is only doing what is good for China and its people. Though some have suggested that with its increased International profile China will have to get more involved in crisis around the world that is unlikely to happen.

European Embassy being presented to the Ottoman Sultan, La Sublime Porte

Relations between Canada and China are interesting, China sees us as a supplier of raw resources and nothing else. We do not matter much to Chinese geopolitical way of thinking. On the other hand our politicians believe that because we have a large Chinese population made up mostly by Cantonese speaking Southern Chinese (AKA Hong Kong and Guandong Province) we must matter to China, you know we had this Canadian Norman Bethune who helped Mao in the late 1930’s and we supplied wheat to China during the great famine of the late 1950’s that must mean something. Wrong, it means little though the Chinese are very clever at playing this up knowing we think it is important. When Canadian politicians travel to China be it a Provincial Premier or a Mayor of some metropolitan area, said Canadian politicians fully expect to be received at the highest level of the Chinese Government, i.e. the President or the Prime Minister of China. Wrong again, usually Provincial premiers will be lucky to meet with a member of the Politburo the Chinese judge to be of an equal level as the Canadian provincial premier. As for Canadian Mayors usually the calculation is based on the population size of the City in Canada compared to a neighbourhood in Beijing. A deputy Mayor for that area of the Chinese Capital will meet with the Canadian Mayor. Many Canadian politicians have been dismayed at the polite, courteous but junior level reception they got. So our Canadian politician must make a big deal of any trip to China and show results at home but it is usually pocket change investments for the Chinese.

The Chinese are experts at assessing the opposite side and responding at the level they judge proper in relation to their own view of the world and their place in it. Can we call China our great friend? No not at all, we have correct business like relations which are often difficult and that is it.

Another area where interest matter is commercial contracts. Trade as always been since time immemorial the driver of much of the diplomatic ties between Kings and Princes and today between States.  The power and wealth of Nations depends on trade, not just military strength. Venice is a prime example as a City State, the Hansa of Northern European Cities is another, Spain and Seville after 1492 and under Charles V was the wealthiest of Empire due to the riches from the Americas and the trade in goods that were then sold to other European States, Britain and its Empire, German industrial might and its merchant navy, etc.

Trade disputes often lead to war with devastating effect. Then you have the case of France, it had many African colonies and it decolonized in the late 1950’s early 1960’s but to this day France keeps a tight watch on so many of its former colonies for commercial reasons which favour French Companies. The diplomatic relationship in this case is incestuous, patronizing and the success or downfall of any French speaking ex colony depends very much on how much the President for Life of country X is willing to play ball with the Elysée Palace in Paris. France will not hesitate to send troops to any of its ex-colonies to protect commercial interests disregarding National Sovereignty of those countries, i.e. Côte d’Ivoire, Mali, etc.

Interestingly the Middle-East is another region where France played a role prior to the Second World War, a secret Treaty Sykes-Picot of 1916 created Lebanon to protect the Arab Christian population with allegiance to France. Was the population consulted, of course not, one could argue cynically this was done for their own good. Same for much of the Middle-East, Syria, Iraq, Jordan created by Britain out of a promise made to Sheik Hussain of Mecca with the help of T.E.Lawrence who was the British Liaison Officer in the great Arab Revolt against Ottoman rule.

France today would like to play a greater role in the Middle-East but would have to be let in by the USA. France did not participate in the Wars involving Iraq and various coalitions since the invasion of Kuwait by Iraq in 1990-1991. France was suspicious and angry that US oil companies in the event of victory and an overthrow of the Saddam Hussein Regime would lose oil contracts it had negotiated for TOTAL the French oil company. TOTAL did lose its contracts in Iraq.

Here in Canada the Harper Government has badly played its hand in its diplomatic relations with the White House and the Obama Administration. It is obvious that our Prime Minister is much more philosophically in tune with the GOP and the Tea Party in Congress and in the Senate. He does not hide his preference and that is bad politics and diplomacy. President Obama does not like him much and is tired of being hectored by the likes of the now ex-Foreign Minister John Baird, who according  to former Canadian diplomats, the worst Foreign Minister we’ve ever had in Canada. However Baird was a faithful servant of his master Stephen Harper. This in itself is the job of any diplomat to carry the message of your master no matter how distasteful it may be to you personally, you must defend the message and endorse it that is what a diplomat does. So no Canada does not have friendly relations with the USA and the USA is not our friend. We have a complex relationship based on commercial interests, supply of energy products and military dependency for our National Defence.  People can be friendly towards each other and this is very often the case but not Governments, simply because they have other objectives and interests.

King Louis XV

In closing a bit of music by Jean-Philippe Rameau composed to celebrate a diplomatic & military victory of France with the successful conclusion to the War of the Austrian Succession during the reign of Louis XV.

We can live in Peace

Tags

Arabs, Canada., criminals, Europe, France, islam, media, Muslims, Paris, Peace, politicians, Prophet, terror

After the events of last week in Europe, France, Belgium and Germany involving what I call criminal elements bent on terrorizing society to advance their personal point of view, we heard politicians and experts speak but not convincingly.

Politicians and their experts like to use words like Islamists, Djihadists, terrorists and so on, this is done to give the public an easy target. The politician can then propose more security measures, convincing you that you should allow for less freedoms so they can enforce more and more draconian laws. The so-called experts, nowadays are a dime a dozen, simply repeat the same nonsense, much of it third person anecdotes or use the air time to push the book they just wrote. What really upsets me is how much erroneous information is out there, much of what we hear falls in the category of old wives tales or historical stereotypes. In the old Roman Republic 2700 years ago, there were threats to the survival of Rome and politicians constantly asked for more power and money to solve the problem. The enemy was as exterior force bent on destroying Roman Republican values. Julius Caesar asked for dictatorial powers to solve the problems brought on by the Civil War he had engineered, some people thought it a good idea, though a party in the Senate did not and we know what happened on the Ides of March. Closer to us in the 19th century and 20th century many Nationalistic groups carried out attacks against governments and heads of State.

In 1917 in Russia, the terrorists were called Bolcheviks, in Germany at the same time you had the Spartakist, in 1924 in Croatia there was the Oustachis. in the early 70’s Black September did some spectacular attacks, Germany and Italy had the Red Brigades terror groups. All this to say that various groups at times of troubles will push an agenda based on terror of the masses, the political class always answers in the same way, first minimizing the events and then asking to be given more power for security reasons. After September 2001 the media claimed loudly that the world had changed forever, really, forever? Airports now have so much ”theatre of security” that flying anywhere is unpleasant, each passenger being treated as a potential terrorist, including the 8 month old baby who just pooped in his diaper.

Now we are told by our politicians and the media, the new terrorists are home-grown, it could be your neighbours kids, according to a recent article in the Ottawa Citizen. The kid next door is probably an Islamists or Djihadists, better keep an eye on those pesky neighbours. It would appear that logic has deserted us all together.

The parallel with the books of George Orwell are there for all to see, we are told by the powers that be who is the enemy. In Ottawa and in Montreal we had 2 incidents in October where members of the Armed Forces were killed by so-called Muslim extremists, home grown radicalized youths. I do not buy it, in both cases, they were young men with mental health issues, drug and alcohol abuse issues and apparently recent converts to Islam, whose lives where spinning out of control. One was convinced the Devil was going to kill him and heard voices, the other had a life of failures and rejection, no work and estranged from his family, parents divorced and absent from their lives for many years. Both were killed in action and no one claimed them as being part of a greater conspiracy. Though our Prime Minister immediately proposed more powers for himself for the sake of security.

With the events in Paris and the 17 people killed by 3 criminal youth, the media and the politicians again united to vent on the current and present danger these ”Radicalized Islamists” quite the mouthful when you think of it, are out to get us.

What I profoundly find irritating is the fact that most journalists and their friends the experts and police spokespersons know next to nothing of Islam, use non stop clichés and easy images, claim that what is going on in Nigeria or Syria could very well happen here or be exported to our shores. This is truly grasping at straws since none of them wish to appear as not knowing what they are talking about. Ignorance and misunderstanding is spread around and no one bothers to examine more closely the situation or facts or more interestingly the total failure of our Intelligence Services who have ballooning budgets.

In my experience living and traveling in the Middle-East for many years, I never encountered angry Muslims or radicalized or fanatical Islamists whatever you may wish to call them. My work did take me in the field and out of cities, I met rich and poor, young and old, men and women. I also realize that hostility often comes from perceptions, I remember Western women being enraged because they could not enter a Mosque wearing tank tops and hot pants. Same women would have said nothing when refused entrance in a Christian Church for being inappropriately dressed. I heard often in conversations Westerners mocking Arabs, the phrase was ”If they worked as hard as they pray their countries would not be a hellhole”. However I never heard similar statements from Muslims about Westerners, despite the irritating and condescending attitudes they encountered.

As for Europe, the negative attitudes and the marginalization of segments of the immigrant population by natives is nothing new. In many European countries with a long Colonial past, discrimination and racism is part for the course even towards those who were born and bred in Europe. Attitudes are somewhat better in Canada but again we must beware of myths on multiculturalism and diversity which often hide deeper sociological problems.

All this to say that the Muslim population is very diverse and spread around the world in many countries and continents. I know a lot of Muslims, some religious others not. They are funny, generous, kind, respectful, adaptable and do not try to impose their values on others. They too are appalled by acts of terror and afraid of these radicals just as much as anyone else. They also rightly point out that you can call yourself a Muslim or anything else for that matter, but it is wrong to hijack a religion to commit crimes against people.

I know from my reading of the Koran and the Hadith (sayings) of the Prophet that violence is not the way of Islam and the message is one of peace, charity, faith, generosity towards others and good deeds. I am also reminded that Islam comes from Judaism and Christianity, we share all the same prophets, Jesus included and Mary is venerated as the mother of Jesus. This is why when I hear or read stories where Islam is painted as the religion of terrorists, I find this totally wrong and frankly ignorant of established facts. I also do not accept as anti-Muslim arguments selective choosing of some passages of the Koran to attack Islam as a Faith. You can do the same thing with the Bible if you choose certain passages to denigrate Christians.

As for those who commit acts of terror, to me they are criminals pure and simple. They can claim all they want to be acting on behalf of Islam, God or the Prophet, any reasonable person will see that as a bold face lie. Politicians would do well not to give these criminals importance with titles or attributes.

Muslims live in Western democracy and have done so for a very long time and have integrated themselves very well into society, in Canada they represent about 1.5% of the total population. Yes, images of the Prophet are blasphemy and disturbing, but I too am disturbed when Christian religious images are used to mock in making an ideological point or insult a group in our society. Maybe people doing this should think of other ways to express their point of view within our established concept of Freedom of Expression as understood in Western Democracies. Insults are never good arguments and will not win you friends. Only through knowledge of the other can we dismiss arrogant youths and their ignorant beliefs or any other violent criminal groups like ISIS or ISIL or Boko Aram. As for a solution to the problem of violence inflicted on innocent people, vigilance can help and it is up to us denounce such acts as criminal doings and not accept the facile explanation of the Media or grasping politicians.

After the sad events of today in Paris #Je suis Charlie

Tags

charlie hebdo, France, immigration, integration, islam, ismalists, massacre, Muslisms, Paris, terror, terrorists, values

Like many people I was shocked to hear of the criminal and barbaric act committed at Charlie Hebdo, a satirical newspaper which is part of a long tradition in France. The four cartoonists who were assassinated, were not young men, many had long careers behind them. Charlie Hebdo is an old newspaper and it is one where humanist values where upheld. They made fun at the absurdities of life and in the case of religion, attacked the narrow minded. The 3 men who committed this crime, in my mind, are not Muslims, they may want to wrap themselves in the cloak of Islam but I am not buying it.

The comment below will appear tomorrow as an Editorial in the London Times (08-01-2015) I think it is about time our politicians face reality and start thinking about what immigration of masses of people with whom we share little in common really means and their lack of integration into our Society means in everyday life for all of us.

Living in a Western Society is a social contract, this is how our society is built.

David Aaronovitch wrote:

“The problem is, you may think, that even though the vast majority of Muslims would no more kill a cartoonist than a Methodist would, they still don’t quite get our commitment to freedom of speech. When they complain about insults and say they’re angry about this or that being published and want it banned, then they create the permissive fluid in which the violent zealot swims.
So we need to be clear, for everyone’s sake, and at the moment we are anything but. This is the deal for living together. The same tolerance that allows Muslims or Methodists freedom to practise and espouse their religion is the same tolerance that allows their religion or any aspect of it to be depicted, criticised or even ridiculed. Take away one part of the deal and the other part falls too. You live here, that’s what you agree to. You don’t like it, go somewhere else.”