Category: Authoritarianism

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A turn to the Big Stick.

This is from the 36th Parallel social media account (as brief food for thought).

We know that Trump is ahistorical at best but he seems to think that he is Teddy Roosevelt and can use the threat of invoking the Monroe Doctrine and “Big Stick” gunboat diplomacy against Panama and Greenland to leverage concessions from them. But he is no Teddy Roosevelt and this is not the early 20th century. Trump may find that abrogating Treaties and engaging in coercive diplomacy may suit Putin but may not be the useful tools that he thinks they are when dealing with two friendly democracies/military partners (Rio Treaty/NATO) in today’s world. Who is advising him on this?

Because it smacks of mobster thuggery mixed in with gross ignorance.

Trump’s reasoning appears to be rooted in his fear of Chinese influence in both countries. Chinese firms have invested in Greenland’s strategic minerals sector for over a decade while US and other Western firms have not. Trump and his advisors see this as a threat now that the Arctic Passage is opening thanks to global warming (that Trump refuses to acknowledge much less address), but neither the autonomous Greenland government or the Danish government that oversees it (the relationship between the two is akin to that of NZ and the Cook Islands) seem particularly bothered by their presence and welcome the investment. Even if it stationed military personnel there in WW2 and has mounted Arctic expeditions using military personnel stationed at a Greenland base, the US has no claim to Greenland whatsoever. It is Danish territory with a local independence movement (something that Trump may attempt to exploit), which means that he is eying the internationally recognised territory of a NATO partner for annexation or acquisition.

Since 1996 Hong Kong based maritime transport firms (COSCO in particular) have managed the container terminals at both ends of the canal. The locks are manned by a mixture of Panamanian, US and other nationalities, so the Chinese do not “control” it. Contrary to Trump’s lies, there are no PRC “soldiers” in the Canal Zone and the management of the canal, including passage fees and related levies, are not discriminatory against US-bound, US-originated or US-flagged vessels. Under the terms of the 1977 Panama Canal Treaty that replaced the original Treaty signed in 1903 (in which the US paid Panama a flat sum and yearly rents for a ten-mile swathe of land on either side of the canal), no military personnel other than those of the US and Panama can be stationed in the Canal Zone, and foreign military forces must ask for permission to transit the waterway. The result is that the Canal Zone is sovereign Panamanian territory whose security is partially guaranteed by the US rather than be threatened by it.

As for the invocation of the 1823 Monroe Doctrine as a reason to intervene in Panama, beyond the imperialistic motivations behind it, the reality then and now is that the Doctrine is just a proclamation by one US president backed by military force. Its original focus was on deterring European powers (and Russia) from establishing footholds in the Western Hemisphere but over time it became an umbrella excuse for US interventionism even if it was not particularly effective in preventing the establishment of a Soviet naval base in Cienfuegos, Cuba, or Marxist/Maoist inspired and backed guerrilla revolutionary movements from cropping up throughout the region in the post-WW2 Cold War era.

Most importantly, the Monroe Doctrine has no basis in international or US law. It is not a Treaty (unlike the Panama Canal Treaty) that has been ratified by the US Congress, and therefore has no legal standing. It just survives as a historical relic propped up by notions of customary usage as a general justification for US interventionism in the Western Hemisphere. I had to deal with it when I was the Western Hemisphere Regional Policy Analyst in the Office of the US Secretary of Defense, and let’s just say that US security hawks like it because they believe that it gives them unilateral carte blanche to meddle in Latin American and Caribbean affairs. They now have a chance to test that belief.

For some background on the Panama Canal see these US briefs on how the Panama Canal Treaties came into effect.

https://history.state.gov/milestones/1899-1913/panama-canal#:~:text=In%20his%20new%20role%2C%20Bunau,guarantee%20the%20independence%20of%20Panama.

https://history.state.gov/milestones/1977-1980/panama-canal

The text of the 1977 Treaty restoring Panamanian control over the canal can be found here: https://pancanal.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/neutrality-treaty.pdf

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About Syria.

I have been thinking about Syria and coverage of the fall of the Assad regime, and to be honest I believe that there is something missing from the picture being painted, at least in NZ. Although I am no expert on Syria or the Middle East, I do have some experience working with irregular and unconventional fighting groups as well as writing about authoritarian regime demise and the modalities by which that occurs. I will therefore take a moment to reflect on what I think is missing.

Media reporting has it that the attack on Aleppo and rapid, two-week drive through Hama and Homs to Damascus was a surprise. That may be true for the media, many non-Syrian laypeople and perhaps the Russians and pro-Assad Syrians themselves, but otherwise I beg to differ. The reason is because the training and massing of rebel fighters in Northern and Central Syria would have taken time (some believe the uprising has been 5-10 years in the making), and would have therefore been detected by Western and regional intelligence services some time ago. If we think about satellite and aerial imagery, signals intercepts, ground based thermal and other technical acquisition capabilities as well as human intelligence on the ground, then consider that Syria and its armed factions are in the middle of a larger geopolitical conflict in the Levant and wider Middle East, and then think about who has a direct vested interest in Syria’s fate (as well as their partners and patrons), it is probably safe to assume that intelligence agencies grouped in the 5 Eyes, Jordan, Turkey, Israel, Egypt, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, France and/or Germany were monitoring at one level or another developments in rebel-held areas long before the assault on Aleppo was launched.

And then there is the pro-Assad intelligence community.

Perhaps distracted by events elsewhere, the Russians appear to have been genuinely caught off-guard, although it has been reported that they started pulling out personnel from Syria weeks before the attacks began (which would suggest they knew something was about to happen). Likewise, perhaps distracted by their own concerns regarding Israel, Hamas and Hezbollah, the Iranians eventually airlifted key personnel out of Damascus shortly after Aleppo fell, so even if they were blind to the preparations for the uprising, they clearly believed, correctly, that momentum was with the rebels once the assault was launched. More tellingly, weeks ago there were credible claims that the Syrian State had been “hollowed out” by senior officials (i.e. state coffers were raided, corruption and drug-dealing was endemic and public service provision halted), who then fled the country. Make of that what you will.

All of this would have given some clear indications that the Syrian status quo was about to change and Assad and the rest of his henchmen were soon to exit one way or another. What is telling is that the intelligence agencies that would have known about the rebel’s preparations (including NZ via its connections to 5 Eyes and other Western intelligence agencies including Mossad), maintained excellent operational security and did not let it be known, either by leaks or mistakes, that a major coordinated assault by the rebels was in the making. This was done not so much to spite the mainstream corporate media, which clearly had zero boots on the ground in rebel-held areas prior to the assault, but to prevent the Syrians, Iranians, Hezbollah, Hamas and Russians from learning about the uprising before it was underway. By the time the “axis of resistance” realised what was happening, it was too late to do anything but wait, watch and if need be, flee.

Whether the Russian, Syrian and Iranian intelligence failures were caused by them being stretched too thin on the ground, distracted with external events and/or incompetence, there are lessons to be learned learned from their lack of forewarning.

Israel’s successful (at least for now), multi-front campaign against Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran and the Houthis, with some sidebar strikes on Syria thrown in for good measure, degraded the axis of resistance’s capabilities to detect and prevent the uprising. Now it appears that Israel is opening another front in Syria with an eye to significantly changing the geopolitical landscape in the region. Hamas and Hezbollah have been decimated as military forces. Iran has been intimidated into passivity. The Houthis have gone largely silent. This, thanks to Israel’s scorched earth, targeted assassination and long-range missile strike operations against all of them. Now Israel has launched a two-pronged offensive in Syria, conducting a bombing campaign against weapons storage facilities (some containing chemical weapons stockpiles) while simultaneous targeting command and control facilities as well as the entirety of the Syrian Navy (which shares major port facilities with the Russian Mediterranean fleet at the city of Tartus, which in turn raises the question of what will become of the Russian presence there and at a nearby airfield once the rebels seize control of them).

The IDF has also sent ground forces into and beyond the UN-monitored buffer zone separating Syrian control from Israel within and beyond the Golan Heights. Much like in Southern Lebanon, Gaza and the West Bank, Israel has seized the opportunity provided by neighborly discord in order to expand its presence in its neighbours’ territory, perhaps with an eye to redrawing their common borders. Since there is no foreign power capable of stopping Israel or willing to do so, it looks like the Israeli gambit will pay off. But that may depend on what the rebel-led government in Syria does next.

If foreign powers were aware in advance of the rebel’s plans, it is also very likely that they conducted more than passive observation and information-sharing amongst themselves. The US has 900 troops in Syria, most of them US Army Special Forces (Green Berets), Green Berets’ main mission is to train, advise and assist local forces in any given conflict, so it is possible that they had working ties to the rebel groups in advance of the assault on Aleppo. The US also has combat troops stationed in Jordan, Israel and Iraq and a variety of military assets in Turkey, effectively surrounding Syria’s land borders. Likewise, in part because of the lingering presence of ISIS in central and eastern Syria, a number of other countries–NATO members most likely–have special operators and/or military intelligence assets “in theatre.” Turkey acknowledges its military working relationship with one of the rebel groups, the Syrian National Army (SNA) in Northern Syria. The US has close ties to Kurdish insurgents in Northwest Syria and Northwest Iraq. The Jordanians are said to have operatives in Southern Syria and one can assume that, if not an surreptitious military presence, Israel has its covert hand in the pie as well.

What this means is that it is quite possible that foreign forces provided training, advising and intelligence and logistical support in the years, months, weeks and days leading up to and through the assault on Aleppo. If so, it should not be surprising that he rebels maintained an unusual amount of discipline previously unseen in their ranks, and that the various armed factions worked well together, sometimes in coordinated fashion. Even some of their combat fatigues and weapons look new and Western in origin!

So who are these rebels? Basically they are Hayat Tahrir al Sham (HTS), who are the remnants of a group formerly known as Jabbat al-Nusra (Nusra Front), an al-Qaeda and ISIS-connected Islamicist group; the Free Syrian Army (an anti-Assad “secular” group backed by the West); and the afore-mentioned, Turkish-backed SNA. There are also Kurdish PKK/YPG/SDF militias in the mix who control approximately one quarter of Syrian territory east of the Euphrates River (and major oil fields), although these divide their time between mopping up Syrian Army troops in Northeastern Syria and fighting ISIS militants, the SNA, the Turkish military and pro-Turkish militias.

The rebel coalition has formed a tactical alliance against its common enemy. None of the constituent parts are particularly democratic in orientation, and in spite of HST’s claims that it has served all ties with ISIS and does not espouse (Sunni) Islamicist beliefs such as Salafism or Wahhabism, such statements must be taken with a grain of salt. There are numerous reports of lethal attacks on Christians and Alawites (which is a Shiite sect) by rebel forces in Aleppo and Hama, so the proof of the rebel’s good intentions remains to be seen, especially if military discipline has broken down amid the quest for collective revenge.

The sectarian nature of the rebel coalition is worth noting because the Assad regime was Alawite, which is a mostly coastal minority community in an otherwise Sunni-dominated country. Assad reserved many of his governments’ top positions to co-religionists in the Syrian Baath Party (originally related to the Iraqi Baathists led by Saddam Hussein), so retribution and revenge against those who formed the support base and bureaucratic staff of the Assad regime can be expected, HST assurances to the contrary notwithstanding. What is promising is that HST has agreed to form an interim (not yet transitional) government with various sects represented and some carry-overs from the Assad regime appointed in order to restore and/or maintain continuity in public services.

The HST-led government is now focused on rooting out Assad loyalists, imposing social order, securing military and police facilities (including notorious prisons), and bringing public services back to life where possible. But reconstruction of battle-damaged areas will be lengthy and difficult process given that Syria’s treasury has been emptied, many public offices looted and/or damaged, and corruption is rampant within and between various sectarian groups. The international community will be asked to foot the bill and provide the human, material and financial capital required to return the country to some semblance of normalcy. This is complicated but the fact that the HST and PKK/YPGSDF have been designated as terrorist entities by the UN and a number of countries (although for different reasons, with HST designated because of its ties to ISIS and the PKK/YPG/SDF designated at Turkey’s insistence because of their irredentist activities in pursuit of an independent Kurdistan in territory now controlled by Syria, Iraq and Turkey). Before international relief can be offered, the terrorist designations will have to be lifted, something that will not please many interested parties for a variety of reasons.

More broadly, the fall of the Assad regime is one variant of what is known as “bottom-up transitions,” where before the regime is prepared to exit it is forced to do so by public pressure and mass collective action. Bottom-up transitions can stem from revolts, rebellions, general strikes, mass protests and the ultimate sub-type, revolutions (which, unlike the others, involve parametric change in the economy, social order and political society). These are not to be confused with top-down transitions, in which the outgoing regime frames the conditions by which it relinquishes power. This can be done peacefully or by a coup d’état, which is essentially an armed quarrel amongst elites in which the military acts as the arbiter of who wins and loses in the power struggle by siding with those that favour an exit strategy and transition to a different regime type. Examples of peaceful top-down transitions were seen in Brazil in the 1980s and Chile in the 1990s, where power was devolved from military control and handed over to elected civilian rule rather than be overthrown by force.

In Syria as has happened elsewhere, there will be major tensions between so-called “moderates” and “militants” (soft-liners and hard-liners) in the HST-led coalition. Hardliners and militants tend to come from fighting backgrounds. They tend not to seek compromise and conciliation because they have succeeded in imposing their will by force of arms. They are reluctant to forgive their defeated adversaries and many are sworn to avenge the affronts committed against their families, friends and communities (and in Syria, the affronts included atrocities and other forms of barbarism committed by Assad’s forces against the civilian population). Moderates, on the other hand, tend to come from the non-fighting political opposition, religious, business and community leaders and foreign interlocutors. These seek to draw a line behind them when it comes to dealing with the past in order to facilitate the reconstruction of society and promote national reconciliation.

The key to keeping the post-Assad transition relatively peaceful is for the moderates and softliners to gain the upper hand in negotiations to form the new government. For that to happen, inducements and constraints (think carrots and sticks) must be offered to and placed on the militant hardliners. Inducements can include open trials for those accused of heinous crimes committed on Assad’s behalf, placement of senior rebel commanders in leadership roles the Syrian security apparatus, establishment of Truth and Reconciliation Tribunals that address past sins committed on all sides, and even material rewards for those who refrain from continuing to use violence as a means to an end. Constraints could include weapons impoundments, criminal prosecutions, and other legal and material disincentives that discourage continuation of hardline or militant behaviour.

None of this will be easy but it is necessary is stability is to return to Syria. It is possible that the armed factions and their political and social supporters can use the common ground forged fighting the common enemy to expand the basis for commonality into other aspects of Syrian life. It could start with something as simple as national sports or cultural traditions and then move to the more thorny issues of governance, economic accumulation and distribution, religious and secular civil rights, and so forth.

What is clear is that, for the short term at least, the big losers in Syria are Alawites, Iranian and Russians. Assad is gone and his minions routed. Iran has lost its major overland transit route connecting it to Lebanon (Hezbollah) and Palestine (Hamas) as well as the intelligence, forward basing and logistical support of the Assad regime. Russia has lost it foremost ally in the Middle East as well as the intelligence and military assets that it had stationed in Syria prior to Assad’s fall (assuming that the new regime will confiscate the Russian facilities at Tartus and Khmeimim Air Base near Latakia city). Reputationally, both Iran and Russia have taken a major hit with their weaknesses as a security partner now exposed.

Israel appears to be the primary short-term beneficiary of Assad’s overthrow. To a lesser but significant extent, so are Western and Middle Eastern powers with a stake in the Levant. But a longer-term prognosis is more difficult to ascertain because the direction of the HST-led government has yet to be determined, and the post-Assad settling of scores has yet to be decided. Whether or not this involves a return of Islamicists with or without the ISIS brand is foremost among the concerns of many security agencies.

In any event the best we can do is embrace the uncertainties inherent in the moment, attempt where possible to bolster the moderate/softliner positions within the new government and offer concrete steps based on the experience of others as part of the path towards national recovery. History will be the ultimate judge of the process but for the moment all we can say is that we live in interesting times.

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Not all authoritarians are fascists.

A few days ago I responded to a post about Trump being a fascist on one of my friend’s social media page, then made a few comments on the consultancy social media page by way of follow up. Given the subsequent back and forth (including with regular KP reader Diane under her other social media moniker) I figured I might as well share my thoughts here. I realise that it may seem pedantic (it is) and inconsequential (it is not), but the misuse of value added terms is a trigger for me. So, with my political science/comparative politics hat on, let me offer some thoughts on the matter.

First, by way of prelude and backdrop to why I have decided to opine about this particular subject, let me explain something about analytic precision, specifically the notion of conceptual integrity. Conceptual transfer is an analytic tool where a concept is taken out of its original context in order to explain a different phenomenon that replicates the original meaning intact. The integrity of the original meaning is upheld in spite of the transfer. Say, a wheel back when is a wheel today even if its specific features are different. Conversely, conceptual stretching is a situation when a concept is stretched beyond its original meaning in order to describe a different, usually related but not the same, phenomenon. It loses explanatory and analytic integrity as it is stretched to explain something different. For example, when a hawk is called an eagle or an orca is called a killer whale. As an analytic tool the former is methodologically sound and intellectually honest. The latter is not. Conceptual integrity and precision is particularly important when using loaded or charged words, especially in contentious areas like politics.

There are plenty of authoritarians but only few were fascists or neo-fascists. There are Sultanistic regimes like those of the Arab oligarchies. There are theocracies like Iran (which used elections as a legitimating device). There one party regimes like the Belarus, PRC, DPRK, Syria and Cuba, one party dominant/limited contestation regimes like Algeria,Egypt, several of the K-stans, Hungary, Russia, Singapore, Tunisia, Turkey, Nicaragua and Venezuela and Egypt, military-bureaucratic regimes like those of the Sahel, and a variety of personalist and oligarchical leaders and regimes elsewhere. The way in which leadership is contested/selected and exercised, the balance between repression and ideological appeals in regime governing approaches, the mixture of inducements (carrots) and constraints (sticks) when it comes to specific key policy areas (say, in labor, tax, sexual preference and reproductive rights laws). There are many manifestations of the authoritarian phenomenon, so mislabeling some types as others compounds the practical and conceptual problems associated with the conceptual imprecision and confusion.

That is why it is unfortunate that Trump is being labeled a “fascist.” He clearly is a dictator wanna-be but fascism was a political movement specific to 20th century interwar Europe that combined charismatic leaders at the head of a mass mobilisational one party regimes with specific economic projects (state capitalist heavy industrialisation in the case of Nazi Germany) and state-controlled forms of interest group representation (state corporatism, to be specific). Fascist gain power via elections, then end them. Trump may lead the MAGA movement but he has no ideological project other than protectionist economics, diplomatic and military isolationism and nativist prejudice against assorted “others.” He prefers to manipulate rather than eliminate elections as a legitimating device. Barring an outright military takeover at this command, he will not be able to control the three branches of government even if he wants and tries to. He cannot control how interest groups are organised and represented unless he changes US laws governing interest representation and intermediation. Most fundamentally, he is just about himself, using tried and true scapegoating and fear-mongering in an opportunistic push to gain power. It worked once in 2016, so he is at it again, this time with a “better” (Project 2025) plan. That is scary but not fascist per se.

The closest he gets to a proper political category is national populist. As seen in the likes of Juan Peron in Argentina, Getulio Vargas in Brazil and Lazaro Cardenas in Mexico, these were charismatic leaders of mass mobilised movements as well, but who had different economic projects, different social bases (e.g. German Nazism and Franco’s fascist regime in Spain were middle class-based whereas Italian fascism and Argentine Peronism was urban working class-based and Mexican populism under Cardenas was peasantry-based), and who did not use warmongering to restore their nations to a position of global dominance (as did the European fascists). Trump’s base is low education working and lower middle class rubes encouraged by opportunistic business elites who self-interestedly see short-term benefit from supporting him. In other words, his supporters are the greedy leading the stupid.

It appears that respected people like Generals Milley and Kelly, who served in the Trump administration, are mistaken when they ever to him as a fascist. What they are describing is no more than garden party electoral authoritarians such as that of Viktor Urban or Recep Erdogan. Trump may admire despots like Putin, Kim and Xi, but he is a long way from being able to copy them, and none of them is a fascist in any event. Dictatorial ambition and authoritarian approaches come in many guises beyond the often misused term fascism. In fact, superstructural affinities like rhetorical style, corruption and bullying tendencies aside, Trump is less a fascist than he is a lesser moon in the authoritarian universe.

If I had to label him, I would say that Trump is a populist demagogue who has strong authoritarian ambitions such as purging the federal government of non-loyalists and persecuting his political opponents. Perhaps he will graduate into becoming a full-blown dictator. But what he is not is a fascist, at least not in the proper sense of the word. He is too ignorant to implement a modern variant of fascism in a place like the US, and there are too many institutional and social counters in the US to any move he may make in that direction. What I will admit is that he has neo-Nazis in his inner circle (Stephen Miller) and evil Machiavellians as his consiglieri (Steve Bannon, soon to be released from jail for contempt of Congress). Along with assorted lesser ogres equipped with the Project 2025 playbook, it is possible that they could turn the US political system into something resembling a modern variant of a national populist regime. But there is a ways to go before that happens.

I therefore feel that it is unfortunate and counterproductive to call him a fascist. It is like how he and his minions call Kamala Harris a “communist” or “socialist.” The labels are absurd and betray a profound ignorance of what those terms mean (and the differences between them), but they make for good red meat rallying points for a MAGA base that lacks the education or common sense to see the smear for what it is or the reality that communists and socialists do not get to hold the positions of California Attorney General, US Senator and Vice President (the closest they have come in recent times is Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, and he is no communist).

If the good generals and Vice President Harris decided to take a page out of his fear-mongering smear playbook by calling him a fascist, that may be understandable given the danger he poses for US democracy. But it is also dishonest (given Milley and Kelly’s educations, I find hard to believe that they do not know what fascism is and is not, but then again, many general grade officers major in military history, international relations and/or security studies rather than comparative political science and so may not be familiar with the proper definitions of the term. As for Harris, she is trained as a lawyer. Enough said).

Anyway, the point of this undoubtably boring exegesis is to get a pet peeve off of my chest, which is the resort to conceptual stretching in order to negatively frame narratives about political phenomena.

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Media Link: “AVFA” on the politics of desperation.

In this podcast Selwyn Manning and I talk about what appears to be a particular type of end-game in the long transition to systemic realignment in international affairs, in which the move to a new multipolar order with different characteristics than the previous one is marked by conflict, the inevitable friction that ensures from unregulated competition absent universal norms and boundaries of behaviour, and the unfortunate yet predictable turn to politics of desperation by actors who are personally or politically invested into status quos under siege. The consequences of this turn of events is both uncertain and yet likely negative in the end. We use Trump, Netanyahu, Zelensky, Putin, Maduro and Ortega as examples of desperate leadership, although the trend can be extended to other cases as well.

The bottom line is that little if any good can come from the politics of desperation.

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Choosing the lesser evil.

(With Kate Nicholls)

Presidential elections were held in Venezuela on July 28th, delivering an apparent victory for the Opposition headed by Edmundo Gonzalez of the Unitary Democratic Platform (PUD) but a declared victory for incumbent Nicolás Maduro of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV). Gonzales was the hand-picked successor to businesswoman Maria Corina Machado, who was banned from running for president in the build-up to the election and who remains the power behind the PUD throne. Nicolas Maduro is the heir of Hugo Chavez’s “Bolivarian” legacy, something that sparked a resurgence amongst Latin American leftist movements at the turn of the 21st century but which has lost its promise and backtracked into decline and decay in the decades since then.

The election was held in the context of widespread claims and considerable evidence of electoral intimidation and fraud, against a backdrop of various restrictions on civil and political liberties, so the legitimacy of the declared outcome has been questioned from within Venezuela as well as abroad. In fact, wide-spread violent protests have broken out since the results were announced, and the possibility of civil war cannot be discounted as more evidence emerges that the election may have in fact been stolen by Maduro and his supporters. It remains to be seen whether he will remain power or face a coup, a domestic civil uprising, an escalation in regional or foreign intervention, or some combination thereof.

As even a causal observer will note, Venezuelan society has become especially polarized since the rise of former coup-monger Hugo Chávez to power in the 1990s (Chavez led two attempted coups before finally gaining power via electoral means). This polarization is not limited to Venezuelan partisan politics. Its echoes are heard as far away as New Zealand and elsewhere. Progressive left voices in particular, on social media and the blogosphere, are supportive of Maduro’s win, reject claims of electoral intimidation and fraud as right-wing disinformation, and highlight the potential for United States involvement should any coup eventuate. This championing of the Chávez-Maduro Bolivarian regime by the left is not new: Chávez’s brand of nationalist-Indigenous populism (cast as indigenous socialism) and its resistance to United States influence in Latin America gained much international attention in the early 2000s and continues to be supported today. For much of the Left in NZ and elsewhere, then and now, the historical sins of the US far outweigh the current crimes of contemporary Left authoritarians, Maduro included. For their part, Western media outlets see Maduro as a tin-pot dictator hell-bent on holding power at all costs, continuing in a long line of bad Leftist henchmen that extends back to Castro, Lenin, Mao and Stalin.

This framing poses a dilemma for political scientists. The discipline tends to prioritise regime type over left-right politics. That is to say, the discipline’s ideological preference is for democracy over dictatorship rather than the policy content of either type of regime. This is an obvious normative bias, one that is readily defended due to the fact that, despite all its limitations and contemporary flaws, empirically democracy does a better job at protecting basic human rights than any other regime type. The balance on how this is achieved (say, between individual and collective rights and responsibilities and between economic freedom, opportunity and equality) then becomes the stuff of quantitative and qualitative positive (objective) micro-analytic analyses rather than normative macro-analytic preferences. That allows political scientists to distinguish between specific types of dictatorship and democracy based on organisational features, public policies and socio-economic outcomes, including variants such as military-bureaucratic versus populist authoritarianism or social versus liberal democracy (which is also why political scientists can get very pedantic when words like “fascist” and “communist” are thrown around as epithets by mindless pundits).

The current situation in Venezuela underscores this dilemma all too well: from a democratic standpoint there is no comfortable way to back a winner given the nature of both sides, and the true loser in the game is likely democracy as an regime type and an ideal. Let’s examine why.

First, the Bolivarian regime. What began as a model for the “Pink Tide” of electoral socialism in Latin America in the late 1990s has devolved into a left-leaning nationalist populist authoritarian kleptocracy characterised by nepotism, corruption and incompetence. An increasingly shaky cadre of state managers, military leaders and Nicolas Maduro loyalists have stripped the country’s coffers nearly bare while allowing critical infrastructure to decay, including in the all-important oil sector. As a result, health, education and welfare indicators (including basics such as provision of transportation and potable water)  have dropped precipitously while poverty, unemployment and crime rates have spiked (a general assessment is provided here). Inflation is running at 130,000 percent per year, rendering the Venezuelan Bolivar worthless as a token of financial exchange. 8 million Venezuelans have migrated abroad, and the Venezuelan State has been hollowed out by bureaucratic parasitism and partisan agency take-overs and patronage. The result is country that has seen its GDP drop a staggering 80 percent in the decade since Maduro succeeded Chavez, even with considerable financial and material support from sympathetic foreign partners such as Cuba, Iran, the PRC and Russia. Truth be told, the country is ruled by thieves posing as anti-imperialist revolutionaries. In this they resemble Daniel Ortega’s Nicaragua or Putin’s Russia more than post-Castro Cuba or Xi Jin-ping’s PRC. In short, the situation is dire. Under Maduro Venezuela has become a failed State.

The curse of Venezuela is that the PUD-led opposition is not a choirboy’s convention either. Besides the failed 2002 coup against Chavez and the 2018 drone attack against Maduro during a parade and its member’s history of dubious commitment to democratic practice (Gonzalez’s admirable personal traits as an academic and diplomat as well as his middle class roots notwithstanding), the current opposition has significant ties to Venezuelan ex-pats linked to rightwing Cuban and Nicaraguan exiles, who in turn have attracted the support of conservative groups in the US and other Latin American countries (some of which have connections to the military and oligarchical dictatorships of the 1980s and 1990s as well as contemporary political figures like Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil and Javier Millei in Argentina). Machado has been courted by and has extensive links to very conservative foreign actors, especially those in the US, for two decades. She also has direct social links to the pre-Boliviarian oligarchical past, as her parents were wealthy members of the old elite. For all of their talk of “democracy” and “freedom” and the gloss of respectability offered by Gonzalez, the unifying feature of the Venezuelan opposition led from behind by Machado is more about retribution and roll-back wrapped in a nostalgic vision of the pre-Boliviarian past and a desire to return the country to the old, albeit re-branded status quo. For all the public discontent about Maduro’s government, that is a non-starter.

For the PUD-led opposition the trouble is that, much like Cuba after the revolution, Venezuela is different for having undergone the Bolivarian experiment, especially when it comes to socio-economic and racial hierarchies. It therefore will not easily return to a past that was not always good for everyone. It is no longer the country of plastic surgery beauty queens, cheap petrol and affordable Scotch whisky for those who lived in the affluent Eastern Caracas foothill suburbs because if nothing else, economic and social decline and outward migration have made for a great leveller in Venezuelan society. In other words, the opposition yearns for a return to a political, social and economic status quo that no longer exists and which will be impossible to return to even if Maduro is forced from power. More importantly, a return to the pre-Bolivarian past is not only unrealistic, it is undesirable.

That is because Venezuela was no shining example of liberal democracy before the rise of Chávez. It is true, underpinned partly by the benefits of oil wealth, that it was one of the most stable polities in Latin America for much of the late twentieth century. The country did not experience the same pattern of populist authoritarianism and military rule that occurred in countries such as Chile, Brazil, or Argentina, or the kind of guerilla and para-military led violence that occurred in neighbouring Colombia or in Central America. Instead, the election-based two party-dominant regime that ruled Venezuela from 1958 until the late 1990s was what comparative politics specialists refer to as a limited, oligarchical or restricted democracy. The spoils of oil wealth and benefits of close ties with the United States were shared between two elite-backed political parties that allowed for relatively free elections, rotation in government office and key interest group cooptation via material incentives for favoured organisations. But that arrangement purposely left little room for truly leftist or authentic working class representation, thereby overseeing and perpetuating deep-seated socio-economic inequalities. Cheap fuel and commodity imports subsidized by taxes on primary (mostly petroleum) exports served as the opiate of the masses that maintained social peace. But as years passed after the 1958 tripartite agreement that founded the modern Venezuelan Republic (the Pact de Punto Fijo), the elite compact eventually turned into an increasingly distant and corrupt political duopoly unresponsive to popular demands for change, leading to outbreaks of protest and even episodic guerrilla violence.

Attuned to this discontent, Army officer Hugo Chavez led abortive “colonel’s coups” in the 1990s that paved the way for his eventually successful run for the presidency in 1999. His campaign was staunchly anti-elitist, anti-imperialist and redistributionist, with major state agencies expanded or granted control over previously private agencies. That contributed to the rise of the indigenous-socialist movement that came to be known as Bolivarianism and which continued after the eventual transfer of power from Chavez to Maduro (Chavez’s vice-president and former union leader) upon the former’s death in 2014. The trouble is that Chavez and his Bolivarian cohorts’ managerial skills did not match their ideological ambitions, and after much public spending at home and abroad–something that did lift basic domestic socioeconomic indicators and forged international solidarity links with foreign anti-Western regimes for the first ten years of the Bolivarian experiment–the wheels began to come off the Venezuelan cart. Graft crept into the public sector while investment declined and public spending continued unchecked even as it was increasingly untethered from hard currency earnings. The Boliviarians began to emulate their predecessors when it came to bourgeois lifestyles, the main difference being that they preferred to wear khakis and red berets rather than Liki likis, guayaberas and flowered polleras.

Occasional observers of Latin American politics tend to blame much of the region’s history of political instability, especially when it comes to worldwide attention-grabbing events such as military coups or foreign interference, especially on the part of the United States. While it is historically undeniable that the United States has supported various dictators in their rise to power, and withdrawn support when this no longer seems of benefit or, in true neo-colonial fashion, opposed revolutionary movements wherever they arose, other factors including political polarisation, democratic backsliding, bureaucratic corruption and military intervention cannot solely be explained by external factors. Domestic forces of one kind or another always play a role: from the problems of policy deadlock associated with forms of government that combine presidentialism with multi-party legislatures, to the failure to instil cultures of accountability and transparency in private and public institutions, to deeply ingrained social and racial hierarchies underpinned by institutional legacies, to historical patterns of land ownership and other forms of commercial exchange, and more. 

That said, foreign involvement, if not outright intervention, is already an element in the politics surrounding the Venezuelan presidential election. Cuba has sent para-military advisors to bolster the Maduro regime by helping organise the violent “colectivos” of armed young men intimidating election workers and demonstrators.These are modelled on the Cuban “turbas divinas” mobs that emerge as counters to episodic protests on the island. Hezbollah (and Iran) has had a decades-long presence in Bolivarian Venezuela, providing a criminal-ideological nexus that triangulates weapons, drugs and money smuggling activities that extend from the Levant to the Tri-border region of Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay and which launder criminal as well as ideological assets under the protection of the Bolivarian State. More recently, Wagner Group mercenaries have appeared as part of Maduro’s personal guard, essentially playing the role of foreign praetorians for the besieged leader. It is a sign of his insecurity and lack of trust in his own forces that he now depends on the protection of these Russian proxies.

But the Opposition is in no real position to remove Maduro on is own even if it has the material, political and logistical support of foreign agencies. Hence, given the disarray in post-election civilian politics, and the inability of the PUD to dislodge the Maduro regime by weight of popular sentiment (and votes), it will be left to the Venezuelan military to ultimately determine the outcome of the current crisis. However, the Venezuelan military is not monolithic and is rendered by cronyism and corruption. Guarantees will have to be made and assurances given if military support for regime change is to occur (which will likely involve immunity from prosecution for graft and other acts of official malfeasance). Otherwise, the default option is to repress, which remains as a default because it is highly unlikely that any external forces (including the US) will overtly intervene in the event Maduro’s forces dig in and crack down on dissent. That sets the stage for more covert forms of subterfuge and grey area machinations, which will only prolong the impasse even if in somewhat sublimated fashion. And we can rest assured that these covert options are already being explored by various interested parties.

Whatever the eventual outcome, it will involve foreign actors supporting each side as well as soft-and hardliners in the PUD and PSUV ranks. In that light Maduro is at best just one rock in the road to a peaceful transition. At worst, he is now a pawn in a larger game that is beyond his control. In that light it is others with skin in the game that now matter most, and that includes the armed forces and foreign actors aligned on opposing sides of the Venezuelan political divide.

In terms of potential transition scenarios, the best that can be hoped for is the formation of a unity government made up of moderate elements of the outgoing regime and Opposition who commit to a military or perhaps internationally-overseen transition project leading to “restorative” elections down the road. The transition would focus on erecting an acceptable framework for political contestation while revitalising critical infrastructure, attracting investment and cushioning the dislocating effects of the economic crisis via promulgation of foreign aid-supported safety net programs for the most disadvantaged. All of that means that a variety of foreign interlocutors will need to be engaged on multiple policy fronts, starting with the political negotiations over procedures and paths forward and then moving onto substantive discussions about economic and social recovery planning. The Organisation of American States (OAS) may prove helpful in this regard even if its criticism of the Maduro regime has seen its representation at the election curtailed and stonewalled.

Returning to the political science angle, one way to envision the process is as a type of stylised multi-actor “game” in which the objective is to restore an open democracy to Venezuela. Any peaceful transition scenario to this end assumes that longer-sighted moderates will dominate negotiations on both sides of the domestic crisis and that their respective foreign backers will support such moderation over hard-line entrenchment and ongoing confrontation. That is a very big ask given the deep animosities extant between the adversaries. Again, the Venezuelan military will become a major focus of pressure from all sides, and it will ultimately be them who give the nod one way or the other. That is because the Venezuelan armed forces have one thing that no other stakeholder has: veto power over what is agreed to.

In a sense, the Venezuelan transition “game” boils down to a choice of lesser evil. That is true for Venezuelan society as a whole but especially true for the military as veto welders over the entire post-election process. Does the military choose the evil that it knows and which feeds it while continuing as the defenders of a failed State propped by like-minded foreign authoritarians, or does it take a step into the unknown and go with a side that has very patchy democratic credentials, very dubious foreign rightwing connections, but which is popular and represents the possibility of national recovery and renewal? Is continuity or change the better option, both for the military as an institution and for the nation as a whole?

Which is to say that there is much yet to happen before the Venezuelan crisis is resolved, peacefully or not. Or in antiseptic political science terms, the transitional “game” has moved from iterative (outcomes do not change with each successive play) to extensive-form in nature (outcomes change with each play), with the ultimate “foundational” conclusion leading to the next Venezuelan regime being uncertain and not necessarily Pareto (both sides advance their interests without hurting the other, leading to mutual second-best outcomes), much less Nash-optimal (both sides achieve preferred goals) for all concerned. That is to say, negotiations between and within the competing political blocs are not so much about immediate choices and outcomes but about setting the terms and conditions for an eventual resolution to the political impasse on terms that may not be the preferred result for anyone but which are mutually acceptable given the circumstances. It could even be a Pacto de Punto Fijo 2.0 moment, one that could be considered as a historical referent for current negotiations. It may seem like over-intellectualised gibberish to phrase things this way, but there is a core truth in this parsing of words that the principals involved may want to heed.

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Differentiating between democracy and republic.

Although NZ readers may not be that interested in the subject and in lieu of US Fathers Day missives (not celebrated in NZ), I thought I would lay out some brief thoughts on a political subject being debated in the US. It seems crazy but there seems to be some confusion on what a the terms “democracy” and “republic” mean.

There are (MAGA) right-wingers and conservative media commentators who claim that the US is a Republic, not a Democracy. They are either cynical or ignorant. The two are not antithetical. Democracy is a means of giving political voice, selecting political representatives and granting social (and often economic) equality. It comes from the Latin word “demos,” or polity.

Republics (from the Latin res publica) are a type of political governance where, unlike monarchies or other forms of oligarchical rule, leadership purportedly derives from or is delegated by the sovereign will of the people (which may/may not be voiced democratically). There are democratic republics and there are authoritarian republics, so the two terms–democracy and republic–while having different specific meanings, may or may not be overlapped when it comes to a given political framework.

In fact, as the old saying goes, any country with “democratic” in its name is likely not regardless of whether it has “Republic” in its title. For example, the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea (DPRK) is anything but. The Peoples Republic of China (PRC) holds elections (in the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)), but is certainly not democratic in the liberal (universal, free, fair and transparent elections) sense of the term. Argentina under its dictatorships remained a “Republica Federal.” In fact, Republics can be federal in nature, where political administration is decentralized and broken into constituent parts such as US or Brazilian states, or unitary in nature, where the central government has administrative jurisdiction over the entire country (as in NZ). In neither case does this necessarily involve democracy as a concept or practice. It is simply a type of governmental administration within given territorial limits, to which different types of political voice, representation and accountability are attached.

Again, democracy is about political expression and social equality; republic is about political organisation. The US was founded and has been broadened via much struggle and conflict as a democratic republic (first for some, eventually for all). The process involved two parallel processes that were not always congruent or synchronised, which consequently has led to repeated conflict (think Civil War and the Civil Rights movement). In fact, the broadening of “democratic” rights within the US over the years has produced backlash from small and large-R “republicans” who believe that the awarding of rights to previously marginalised groups and non-citizens somehow infringes on their existing rights (which assumes that “rights” are an indivisible pie where awarding some to one group means that other groups will lose their fair or previously allotted share). This has extended into discussions of “states rights” versus those accorded by US federal law, where advocates of the Republic versus Democracy designation argue against democracy because it interferes with State’s autonomy over their internal (political, economic and social) affairs. In this view, a US Republic leaves the issue of individual and collective rights to be decided by States under their own self-made laws. Democracy removes that prerogative by federal fiat, subjugating states to the dictates of a federal overseers (who in turn are seen as pawns or tools of nefarious elites). This view is deeply flawed, if not dishonest.

The “states versus feds” debate has been rehashed endlessly and largely settled as a matter of US constitutional law. Despite ongoing efforts by groups like the Federalist Society to redefine the relationship between the central government and states, it has never really been framed as a “Republic versus Democracy” issue. But in the hands of malevolent or ignorant actors, this adversarial distinction contributes to the false dichotomy between and binary juxtaposition of the two different but often compatible terms.

It would be a pity if the narrative that democracy is antithetical to being a republic begins to take larger hold in the US in the lead-up to the November elections. Perhaps some of those who espouse such a view really would prefer that the US become an authoritarian republic. But what the very presence of such views does show is that when it comes to fundamental concepts underpinning the US political order, there sure are a lot of misinformed if not downright stupid people out there–and plenty of others who wish to exploit their ignorance for myopic partisan gain.

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Media Link: AVFA on post-colonial blowback.

Selwyn Manning and I discuss varieties of post colonial blowback and the implications its has for the rise of the Global South. Counties discussed include Palestine/Israel, France/New Caledonia, England/India, apartheid/post-apartheid South Africa and post-colonial New Zealand. It is a bit of a ramble but it raises some infrequently discussed points. You can find the episode here.

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Setting things straight.

Seeing that, in order to discredit the figures and achieve moral superiority while attempting to deflect attention away from the military assault on Rafa, Israel supporters in NZ have seized on reports that casualty numbers in Gaza may be inflated by Hamas (even if corroborated by international agencies), I thought I would recap the truth behind this spin game.

On October 7 Hamas fighters attacked Southern Israel from the Gaza Strip. They were initially said to have killed more than 1500 people (mostly civilians), but after scrutiny that figure was reduced to below 1200 (including military personnel). At least some of the deaths attributed to Hamas were later found to be the result of friendly fire from responding Israeli (IDF) forces. Israeli sources claimed that babies were cooked in microwaves, women were sexually tortured and mutilated and that mass rapes were carried out, but that has not been independently substantiated. Scores of hostages (closest reliable count is 250) were supposedly taken back into Gaza, presumably to serve as human leverage in subsequent negotiations with Israel. A few have been released but many of those have died, not just at Hamas’s hands but as a result of IDF assaults on the places that they were being held captive.

Here are some facts. The killing of IDF soldiers by Hamas is not a crime, as it can be classified as the product of clashes between an armed resistance to an illegal occupying force on Palestinian land (one look at the 1947, 1967, 1973 and recent maps of Palestine/Israel demonstrates the steady annexation of Palestinian land regardless of the formal agreements in place). In other. words, as ugly as that sounds, in a fight with an armed opponent IDF soldiers were fair game.

What is a war crime is if Hamas tortured, raped or murdered soldiers after they surrendered. But in order to prosecute the Hamas individuals or units involved would require international recognition of Hamas as a legitimate fighting force acting on behalf of a recognised State or political community. Although Hamas has a political wing that is related to but separate from the armed wing and has been the de facto government of Gaza since its victory in the 2006 Palestinian elections, leading to the 2007 Hamas-Fatah war that resulted in Hamas gaining control of Gaza while Fatah and other Palestinian Authority factions retreated to the West Bank, the International community (read: the West) does not recognise it as a State or government and instead has designated it a terrorist entity because of the irregular warfare operations, including terrorist attacks, conducted by its armed wing. That may be convenient for Israel and its Western supporters, but it makes it more difficult to hold Hamas accountable for the actions of its members, armed and unarmed (because not all Palestinians, or Hamas supporters for that matter, are fighters). So, in spite of the obvious fact that Hamas was a governing entity in Gaza at the time the war started, charging Hamas fighters with war crimes is difficult because they are not seen as representative of any duly constituted political organisation. They are just terrorists, and if one is to believe the Israel apologists, so are the people they are ostensibly fighting for.

Here I must pause for a brief aside about non-recognition. There is irony in non-recognition of Hamas as a legitimate representative of at least some Palestine people. Hamas exists as a political movement with an ideology (nationalist-religious in this case), as well as a physical presence that extends beyond its armed wing. It will not go away just because it is not recognised abroad, is not liked by many, or if its armed cadres are decimated. And it holds equal if not more legitimacy than the Palestinian Authority of which Fatah is part, which is a corrupt gerontocracy that serves as a laptop of the Israelis in the West Bank. Moreover, Israel itself is not like in many quarters and is not recognised by a number of Muslim-majority States, but it certainly exists and is not going anywhere no matter what other’s may wish or think. In addition, the State of Israel was created in part due to the “terrorist” operations of the likes of the Irgun (which was designated as a terrorist organization by the British), so not recognising Hamas because of its irregular warfare activities in the contemporary era is a hypocritical specious reasoning.

The bottom line is this. Non-recognition may be an attempt at de-legitimation and ostracism, but it is more akin to closing ones eyes and putting fingers in one’s ears while shouting “you are not there” to someone you dislike. The reality says otherwise, and in the international arena non-recognition only serves to absolve political actors from assuming full legal responsibility for their actions. Not recognising Hamas as having a legitimate claim when it comes to representing Palestinians is therefore an own-goal (remember, Hamas won the largest plurality in the parliamentary elections of 2006 and would have been required to form a coalition government before Israel, the US and other Western states backed Fatah’s rejection of the results and subsequent armed assault on Hamas in Gaza. This only played into the hands of the hardline Hamas cadres and strengthened their resolve to prevail in the fight against Fatah, which they did. That set up the subsequent chain of events that has led to the current disaster).

In any event, killing, raping and abducting civilians are crimes against humanity even if the actions of the Hamas fighters are not technically classified as war crimes when it comes to their treatment of IDF soldiers. Remember that it is not the method or instrument of violence that defines a war crime or a crime against humanity. Nor is it the number of victims. Instead, it is who commits atrocities (war crimes are committed by military forces) and who is targeted. Regardless of who the material authors may be, for there to be war crimes or crimes against humanity, the victims must be defenceless. In the case of Israelis attacked by Hamas on October 7, most but not all of them were, so the scale of the atrocities was significant and cannot be downplayed.

In response, Israel unleashed a scorched earth collective punishment approach to the residents of Gaza, and has meted out come collateral punishment to Palestinians in the West Bank as well. Some see the IDF military campaign in Gaza as genocidal in intent–and it may well be–but at a minimum it is ethnic cleansing in effect: entire swathes of Gaza have been cleansed of their inhabitants. The NZ apologists for the IDF approach want to make it seem that 15,000 or 20,000 Palestinian dead is significantly different than 30,000 or 40,000 dead claimed by Hamas (never mind the wounded and maimed or those now enduring mass starvation due to Israeli (including Jewish settlers!)) interference with aid convoys. But at the same time they use the malleable 1200+/- Israeli body count to argue that the IDF response is proportionate to the October 7 attacks. They also clamour for the release of the Israeli hostages but are silent about the thousands of Palestinians detained by Israel since October 7. It seems that Israel also understands the hostage-taking-as-leverage game. Perversely, for the Israel supporters scale and scope of dehumanisation only matters when the numbers favour a particular victimisation narrative. In other words, 1200 Israeli dead is comparable with 20,00 rather than 40,000 Palestinian dead, so moral equivalence applies. That is not a winning argument.

That is in large part due to the fact that collective punishment is illegal under international law and classified as a war crime, most specifically Convention 4, Article 33 of the Geneva Convention. The same convention, article 34, notes that the taking of hostages is prohibited, even if it does not specify the means by which hostages are taken by belligerents (presumably the 3,000 or so Palestinians held in “administrative detention” without charge by the Israelis since October 7 would fit into this category regardless of the institutional/legal facade used to cloak their real status). So although only Israel is guilty of violating the convention when it comes to collective punishment, both sides are in violation of the Geneva Conventions when it comes to hostage taking.

That brings up the truth of the matter. Both Hamas and the IDF have committed war crimes and/or crimes against humanity. Both have committed serious breaches of international law. Fiddling with and sniping about numbers do not alter this fact. Moral relativism does not alter this fact. Trying to comparatively scale and scope the atrocities does not alter this fact. No amount of spin alters this fact.

Most of all, both Israel and Hamas apologists cannot escape this fact.

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Another Brief on Intelligence Matters.

Although my son is still in hospital he is recovering well and should be sent home soon. We dodged a bullet thanks to the Starship medical staff.

While at the hospital a reporter from one of Argentina’s oldest and most influential papers got in touch with me to discuss the case of the Russian double agent (for the UK) Sergei Skripal and his daughter, who were poisoned some years ago by Russian agents but survived and then disappeared. Some time ago they were reported to be hiding in NZ and I was asked about that by various media, and the Argentine reporter had seen some of the news coverage that mentioned me. He was most focused on the details of the case and whether the the Skripals could still be in NZ if they ever were. But before that he wanted a primer on intelligence operations. Here is the Q&A in English.

Why do countries spy and why do they react negatively to being spied upon? What is intelligence collection and what type of people are selected to become intelligence agents?

Espionage and intelligence-gathering is rooted in human nature. Humans fear uncertainty, and a way to diminish uncertainty is to gather information about uncertain subjects, be they economic, military, natural, political or social. It helps determine intentions as well as capabilities or other factors otherwise unknown. From that intelligence-gathering, knowledge is achieved and uncertainty is diminished. And if it is true that knowledge is power, then power is enhanced by intelligence-gathering.

Intelligence collection and analysis comes in three forms: human intelligence, signals/technical intelligence and open-source intelligence. Human intelligence refers to human collectors, i.e. intelligence agents of the State and non-State actors (say, private security firms or investigators) who collect information from personal observation, interactions and exchanges with people in a designated functional areas, regions or countries. State intelligence agents work in two ways. One is under the protection of a diplomatic passport. Known as “official cover” agents, this includes military attaches as well as other diplomatic personnel whose activities are recognised by host countries but which often extend beyond the official remit outlined in their credentials. If caught and accused of espionage, official cover agents are detained and deported as per diplomatic protocol (that is, they received diplomatic immunity).

Non-official cover (NOC) agents are what are traditionally known as spies. They are the stuff of cloak and dagger stories but the reality is a bit more mundane in most instances. They work under the cover of assumed names, aliases and occupations, for example as businesspeople, academics or developmental aid workers, among many other “covers.” If caught, they are subject to the full penalties of the jurisdiction in which their offenses were committed and where they are charged (including being subject to the death penalty in many countries). They receive no diplomatic immunity. The outed US spy Valeri Plane (outed in 2003 by the W. Bush administration as revenge for husband refusing to go along with their lies about Iraq having nuclear weapon precursor yellowcake stockpiles), who used a job as a petroleum executive as cover for her espionage activities in the Middle East, is an example of such a so-called “NOC.”

NOCs tend to work in a highly compartmentalised or “siloed” manner, dealing with one agency liaison up the collection chain and putting degrees of separation between the down-chain primary source contacts (informants who may be conscious or unconsciously helping the NOC and be paid or unpaid depending on who they are) in order to maintain tight operational security. The means of feeding intelligence up the chain are many, involving technical tools as well as personal interactions.

There is a sub-set of human intelligence agents that might be called “hunter-killers.” While all human intelligence agents will be trained in things like surreptitious entry, lock-breaking, concealed observation (static and in motion), eavesdropping and other such tradecraft, the hunter-killer sub-set includes assassination in their repertoire. The lethal means can include a range of tools, to include poison, blades, firearms, explosives or armed unmanned vehicles (for example, the CIA has its own UAV fleet, as does Mossad, among others). The individuals who engage in this type of activity are, at least when tasked to do such things, not true spies in the proper sense of the term since their focus is not on obtaining information but on acting on information previously obtained, although they may work in partnership with official or non-official cover agents because their priority focus is on tracking and eliminating targets. They are essentially assassins, although they may even engage in broader combat activities depending on circumstance. Intelligence agencies maintain paramilitary units for such purposes, and they can be embedded in or along with military forces. Given the threat environment in which a State operates and the nature of the adversaries being confronted, the number of hunter-killer agents, units or teams may be large or small. Israel has a large number of such people. The US has a fair number. New Zealand has none, as far as is known or admitted. In general and as can be expected given the nature of their rule, authoritarian regimes use hunter-killers more than democracies.

The ideal human intelligence agent must have a calm and even temperament, be able to display coolness under pressure, be resourceful, have a keen sense of curiosity and ingenuity when problem-solving, have the ability to think laterally and “out of the box,” and have a capacity to “silo” or compartmentalize their work so that their real work life as intelligence collectors is undetectable in their personal, public and private lives. They must be able to ward off being compromised, be it sexually, financially or socially. They must be able to keep a secret and rationalize their personal morals and ethics with their professional ethos and obligations. They must have a deep sense of and commitment to public service (service to the State on behalf of the Nation).

Selection to become a human intelligence agent varies from country to country. Along with the traits mentioned below, in authoritarian regimes party and personal loyalties to political elites are a significant factor in recruitment and selection. In democracies, they are not. Modern intelligence agencies in democracies maintain professional standards for recruitment and promotion that are neutral when it comes to partisan and personal politics. They use advanced psychological testing to determine a candidate’s fitness to serve. These include cognitive, physical and intellectual testing, often involving real-case scenarios in which a candidate is placed in a pressure situation in order to evaluate their decision-making capabilities. Once a candidate has been accepted into service and learned the tools of the trade (“spycraft”), they are matched with a suitable cover profile and trained in how to maintain that profile in the field (be it as a diplomat, military officer or undercover agent). There are variations to this scenario but the overall thrust is very similar in most developed States, and in fact in some instances (5 Eyes) intelligence agencies have exchange programs for officers from allied States in order to improve professional standards amongst them.

Question Two: It is said that Russia prefers human intelligence collection whereas the US and UK prefer technological means. Is this true and if so, why?

During the Cold War and the first 20 years of the post-Cold War environment, the US had a great advantage in signals and technical intelligence (SIGINT/TECHINT), moving far beyond the early 20th century techniques of eavesdropping on phones and/or in public and private places or using radar, sonar or advanced photographic techniques. It expanded the SIGINT/TECHINT collection domain to include space and submarine collection capabilities as well as sophisticated electronic and technical collection platforms using infrared, acoustic signature detection, computer intercepts and then cyber-hacking. As a result, it placed less emphasis on human intelligence collection, in part because it is a US cultural trait to believe in the superior benefits of advance technologies in everything from kitchens, cars and television to warfare. As a result, as of the 1970s the US diverted intelligence resources and focus towards signals and technical intelligence collection to the detriment of human intelligence collection. Also remember that CIA activities in Chile, Indonesia, and many other places had placed a stain on the reputations of field agents and undercover officers involved in those activities, so the move away from human intelligence collection was an expedient way of getting out of the unwanted limelight.

As a result, human intelligence collection (HUMINT) was maintained  but in diminished numbers. Given the changing priorities of the post-Cold War geopolitical environment, it left an unbalanced focus on post-Soviet dynamics without a shift to emerging threats such as ideologically motivated non-State actors like al-Qaeda.  For that HUMINT work the US increasingly relied on Israel and other allied countries. The emphasis on SIGINT/TECHINT was reproduced and compounded by the 5 Eyes network, which created economies of scale in that form of intelligence gathering that began to dominate the overall information acquisition process in their respective communities even if human intelligence agents were tasked with following up on information obtained and gleaned by SIGINT/TECHINT means by any of the partners.

The problem with over-emphasising signals and technical intelligence collection is that it often cannot discern real intent by separating bluster and idle talk from a commitment to action. Operational security counter-measures can also thwart effective SIGINT/TECHINT collection. In addition, the trouble with relying on partners for human intelligence collection and analysis is that the intelligence comes “filtered” by the interests of the sharing State, not all of which are exactly coterminous or identical to those of the US (and vice versa for its partners). In recent years the US has revived its human intelligence programs, but they are playing catch up when it comes to recruiting people with the appropriate language, social, cultural and personal skills to operate under deep cover (or even officio cover) in foreign environments. People with backgrounds in anthropology and sociology are high value recruits, but the number of them are small when compared to the amounts of subjects/targets that need covering.

As an example, when 9/11 happened the US military intelligence is reported to only have 3 Arabic speaking linguists in their ranks. NZ human intelligence (the SIS) had none, and even with the recruitment of Muslim, Chinese and Polynesian New Zealanders in recent years, it lags far behind when it comes to people with the requisite skills to undertake both official cover and NOC work given the threat environment in which NZ now operates.

As for the Russians, the situation was different. Because the Soviet Union/Russia and the PRC were considerably behind the US when it came to signals and technical intelligence well into the 1990s, they both emphasized and put resources into human intelligence collection. For decades even that form of intelligence collection was limited to internal intelligence and counter-intelligence (for example, against counter-revolutionaries, some of whom had foreign backing) and in their near abroad or against strategic adversaries (the US and its major allies). Over time the human intelligence capabilities of the USSR and later Russia expanded to have a global reach, something that China has emulated today. Other countries such as Israel have developed similar capabilities, using Jews in the diaspora as collection agents (known as “sayanim”). 

However, in the 21st century both Russia and China have put much effort and resources into developing state of the art signals and technical intelligence collection capabilities Although they do not have the economies of scale available to the 5 Eyes Anglophone signals intelligence network, they have developed sophisticated capabilities of their own. The advent of social media has facilitated and accelerated this effort, something seen in the disinformation and misinformation campaigns undertaken by the Russian signals intelligence agency, the GRU, against Western democracies via the work of dedicated units such as the Fancy Bear cyber-hacking group that interfered with and continues to interfere in US and other democratic elections while promoting socio-political discord and right-wing conspiracy theories (including in NZ).

Hence, while it is true that Russia has traditionally favored human intelligence collection methods, to include hunter-killer activities, that is no longer the absolute case. Both it and the PRC have a very expansive and sophisticated signals and technical intelligence capabilities, including in space, in the atmosphere, on land and under the sea.

Examples of technical and signals intelligence collection include photographic and thermal imagery from space, submarine interceptions (“tapping”) of undersea communications cables (such as by the PRISM system used by 5 Eyes), airborne photography, jamming and early-warning detection, metadata targeted and bulk collection of internet communications, and acoustic “reading” of vibrations from interior conversations on exterior surfaces such as windows. Plus all of the old fashioned techniques such as telephone wiretapping, coding and decoding, encryption and decryption, etc. Artificial Intelligence has been used for some years now even if the commercial applications have only become operational in recent times, and is set to become a dominant means of extracting actionable intelligence from vast quantities of data as well as more rapidly recognising, analysing and filtering threat assessments and other intelligence priorities.

Questions 3 and 4: How does UK intelligence operate and why does it treat intelligence gathering differently from espionage?

Before delving into the specifics of the question, allow me to note that oversight and regulation of intelligence operations and agencies differs greatly between democracies and authoritarian regimes. Authoritarian regimes use intelligence agencies for domestic espionage, paralleling or supplementing the work of police intelligence units that are focused on crime-fighting. In such cases the focus of intelligence agencies is on domestic political dissent, subversion, foreign agents (counter-espionage), and a number of other targets such as environmental activists and other non-conformists who the regime deems to be enemies of the State. Intelligence units are bound by their own internal rules and procedures, which usually are much looser than those in democracies. They also have para-military units of the “hunter-killer” type that are tasked with hunting down and eliminating opponents at home and abroad. The Skripal case is an example, as was the Operacion Condor network operated by the Southern Cone dictatorships in the 1970s. Authoritarian intelligence agencies and agents are not bound by the rule of law but by the boundaries set by the political (often military) leadership of the regime.

In contrast, intelligence agencies in democratic regimes operate according to the rule of law and constitutional principles. They are more restricted in their freedom or latitude of action. They tend to limit their domestic activities to counter-espionage and transnational crime with State or ideological connections, such as when monitoring and countering Hezbollah activities in the Tri-Corner region of Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay (where drugs, weapons an extremists congregate for mutually beneficial purposes). In general, however, domestic intelligence collection is a responsibility of the police or gendarmes, not intelligence agencies, who only work with the domestic intelligence units of the police and gendarmes when specifically tasked to do so and within defined legal authority.

Because of that intelligence agencies in democracies have a primary focus on foreign and transnational intelligence gathering and threat identification and analysis as well as counter-espionage. They are bound by numerous legislative and legal restraints on their activities and a system of checks via courts and other oversight mechanisms. Unless the circumstances are exceptional (say, a bomb about to go off in a crowded train station), they must adhere to civil liberties and other democratic rights accorded to the population. And even then they often need the authorization of a special court or judge in order to legally infringe on individual and collective rights and constitutional norms.

To be clear, these norms have been violated in many instances by spy agencies in liberal democracies, including in the US, UK and NZ, but if discovered they are liable under the law and can be held accountable by oversight agencies as well as legislatures (if the Executive will not act against them in such instances). Intelligence agencies do not operate according to the whims of the political leadership, but in accordance with and under penalty of law.

In terms of how the UK approaches intelligence matters, it conforms with the democratic model outlined above. It uses legal frameworks to determine the distinction between intelligence gathering by the British State, its allies and partners and even private parties like corporations, versus espionage by foreign States or British nationals working for foreign states or front entities (such as by and for Chinese firms and “friendship societies” connected to PRC military intelligence via “United Front” entities). Having a legal framework delimiting what is and is not permissible when it comes to intelligence collection and the means used to that end gives the British State (and other States in their own ways), legal cover and authority to disrupt and prosecute (often clandestine) intelligence-gathering activities deemed unlawful and illegal.

Put simply, in the UK and other democracies intelligence collection done under official cover is considered permissible up to a point. Intelligence collection done under non-official cover is considered espionage and punishable by law. If an official cover intelligence officer from a foreign embassy goes beyond his recognized intelligence gathering duties (say, by trying to poison a dissident in England), that person will be charged and a warrant issued for their arrest even if they are deported under rules of diplomatic immunity. If a Russian NOC attempts to poison someone and is caught, s/he is out of luck.

Espionage is what the bad guys do; intelligence collection is what the good guys do, and the legal distinction is there to preserve that fiction.

Question Five: Where are the Skripals?

The Skripal’s are likely in a 5 Eyes country. They need to be in a place where they can go relatively unnoticed, where security can be provided for them and where there are not many other Russians around unless those Russians are sympathetic to the Skripals and have been security vetted. They will be provided with fake identities and documentation and take language lessons to disguise their thick English/Russian accents. They will be coached on how to act under their assumed identities, for example, as a retired Bulgarian businessman and his middle-aged daughter who cares for him as per traditional custom. They could be located in a city without many Russians where they can disappear in the crowds or, contrastingly, in a rural area far from prying eyes. That depends on their personal characteristics. If they are urbanites then they would stick out in a rural setting and probably have difficulties coping, much less assimilating. Many factors will determine where exactly they are re-located and hidden from Russian intelligence.

Of course, they may be relocated to a non-5 Eyes country such as Argentina or South Africa. But Skirpal’s spying was done for the UK and 5 Eyes, not other States, so other States would be reluctant to incur Russia’s wrath in the event they are discovered. Plus, other States may be more susceptible to corruption, leaking and not be able to provide adequate levels of discrete but effective security for them. So it seems to that a 5 Eyes country is the most likely place where they have been relocated.

That could be Australia, which has few Russians, lots of anti-Russian sentiment and both large cities and remote rural areas. Likewise, Canada. Even Wales or Scotland might serve the purpose. New Zealand is too small, in my opinion, and the US, although immense, has large Russian expat communities that are not all opponents of the Putin regime and is over-run with Russian spies in any event. So my guess is that they will be in a medium sized town or city in a rural area of a large or relatively unpopulated country or area of a country with few Russians present. But there are people who are experts in this so I can only speculate as to their exact location.

One final observation. The Skripals were poisoned, like other Russian double agents. Russia reserves poisoning for traitors of some importance, not just anyone. People of lesser status fall out of windows, get run over or die in a variety of crashes and explosions, depending on opportunity (remember the Wagner Group boss Prigozhin’s plane crash last year). Lesser rivals such as journalists and whistleblowers get shot. It will therefore be interesting to find out what killed the dissident and opposition politician Alexei Navalny, who supposedly died of “natural causes” in a Siberian prison camp at age 47. My hunch is that he may have received the ultimate (ironic) honour in the way in which his demise came about.

Or to draw the analogy this way: my Italian grandmother was once discussing with my parents the death of a cousin of hers who had mob ties in New York City. My parents asked her about how he died and she said “from a heart attack.” When challenged because the press had covered the story of a low level mobster getting “hit” in some criminal feud, she replied “yes, he died of a heart attack when a piece of hot lead went through it.”

In Russia the heart attack is induced by poison, but only for the special few.