Caucasus – La Vigie

La Vigie Nr 186 : African coups | Torn Georgia | Lorgnette : Indonesian opening

Posted on 16 February 2022 by La Vigie

African coups

The recent coups in Mali and Burkina Faso show the disappointment of African elites and populations towards France. This can be explained by a major strategic error, a mixture of good conscience, overuse of the military tool, inappropriate governance manoeuvres and, finally, misunderstood and therefore misimplemented interests. France has disappointed and it is to blame. It must draw the consequences.

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Georgia torn

Georgia is the only country in the Transcaucasus that is open to the West, to the Black Sea, to Europe. The country is haunted by the demons of conflict with separatist provinces and its complicated relationship with Russia. Its attempt at rapprochement with the United States ended in failure, especially militarily, but Georgia has since embarked on a new path towards the European Union. Perhaps this is not a bad idea!

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Lorgnette: Indonesian opening

The recent sale of 42 Rafale fighters to Indonesia is welcome, for obvious industrial reasons. If it is not sure that it favours French defence, it constitutes on the other hand an asset in our foreign policy, in particular in South-East Asia, a more accurate term here than Indo-Pacific. It should also be noted that this sale is accompanied by that of two Scorpene submarines. The AUKUS affront has been repaired (LV 176).

Paradoxically, it may have served its purpose. Indeed, like many countries in the region, Indonesia is careful to maintain a policy of balance between China and the United States, ensuring that it is not too dependent on either. It had been following our strategic and industrial partnership with India with interest, which prompted it to consider our offer carefully. But it is very likely that the Australians’ unilateral decision played a role: by considering that France was not secure enough, Australia proved that, on the contrary, France had a balanced position in the region. This was probably the decisive argument for Jakarta. Thus, in addition to India and Singapore, France obtains a third partner in this South and South-East Asia. Let’s hope it won’t be the last.

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JOCVP

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La Vigie Nr 184 : Bruised Armenia | Russian-US negotiations | Lorgnette : Deterrence and espionage on the small screen

Posted on 19 January 2022 by La Vigie

Letter from La Vigie dated 19 Jan 2022

Bruised Armenia

While Turkey has just begun negotiations to try to normalise its relations with its neighbour Armenia – having agreed not to mention the “Armenian genocide” for the time being – it is time for us to continue our trans-Caucasian tour of horizon by looking at Armenia. What place does it occupy in the regional balance?

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Russian-US negotiations

European observers have been very alarmed by the risk of war on the borders of Ukraine. What if it was all a bluff, with Putin playing poker this time and cashing in on the bilateral negotiations with the US? Killing any hope of an autonomous European defence.

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Lorgnette : Deterrence and espionage on the small screen

A television co-production between Arte and the BBC, entitled “VIGIL” and currently on air, stands out. It is a short six-part series.

It begins with an investigation into the suspicious death of a sailor aboard a British SSBN in Scottish territorial waters. While the aerial images are of the actual base at Faslane, the SNLE base is renamed ‘Dunloch’.

Sadly, sacrificing to current conventions regarding the heroine’s moods and omitting a few implausibilities, certainly accepted for dramatic reasons, the series’ interest lies in the way it revisits the underwater film ‘genre’, which can quickly prove tiresome. It is not the ground investigation that offers it, but the way in which the nuclear deterrent is approached. Indeed, the huis clos is an SNLE (sous-marin nucléaire lanceur d’engins) and it soon becomes apparent that the very principle of the deterrent posture is at the heart of a scheme.

It is rare enough to bring these serious issues to such an audience (so within the series there are also all sorts of pacifists): this is the great merit of the series.

JOCV

Photo credit : The White House

La Vigie Nr 181 : On civil war | Azerbaijan in turmoil | Lorgnette : pre-2022 strategic debate

Posted on 9 December 2021 by La Vigie

Letter from La Vigie, December 8, 2021

On civil war

Civil war is a conflict between parties in a constituted political unit. Its causes have varied throughout history, but like external warfare, it contributes powerfully to the constitution of the state (or to its dissolution). Today, it seems much more frequent than external war, even if it seems unlikely in France.

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Azerbaijan in turmoil

One year after the end of the second Nagorno-Karabakh war, sporadic clashes have resumed. Let us begin a cycle of in-depth analysis of the Transcaucasus and start with Azerbaijan, reviewing its delicate game of alliances and its place in the regional balance.

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Lorgnette : pre-2022 strategic debate

The preparation of the 2022 electoral scene continues with new candidates. Preliminary debates focus on issues of purchasing power, immigration and internal security (see above). They address the domestic issues that are crucial in a presidential election. Yet the prospect of the upcoming French presidency of the European Union opens the door to debates on the posture of the European Union and its strategic autonomy in the current world disorder. French arms export successes underline the rearmament of Middle Eastern countries, the volatility of power relations in West Asia (see above) and the ongoing technological competition. The Sino-American rivalry is more about Taiwan than the New Caledonia referendum and France’s interests in the Asia-Pacific.

The debate of the electoral campaign should, however, seriously address the strategic questions of the ambient conflict, France’s military commitments, France’s place in Europe and Europe’s place in the world, and the means to be devoted to the country’s security.

LV is preparing to contribute to this.

JOCV

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LV 159 : On democracy in America | Grozny the new | Lorgnette : Closed sky

Posted on 19 January 2021 by La Vigie

Letter from La Vigie Nr 159, dated 20 January 2021

Democracy in America

The events of 6 January in Washington mark a popular emotion, undeniably seditious even if it cannot be described as a coup d’état. It confirms the deep American division between radicals on both sides. It is also the occasion for censorship by the major social networks which questions their place in the democratic system. A heavy task awaits Joe Biden.

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Grozny the new

Chechnya hasn’t been in the headlines for the last 15 years or so, yet what happened to Chechens fighting Chechens in Syria, some alongside Russians, others in the EI? Today, however, let us note the Russian control that has regained control of it ciscaucasian space.

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Lorgnette : Closed sky

Russia declared on 15 January that it was withdrawing from the Open Skies Treaty, signed in 2002, which allowed the right to conduct and the obligation to accept observation flights over [the] other party’s territory to verify military activities and installations. Trump’s United States unilaterally withdrew last November (LV 143) to the chagrin of its European allies, who refused to accede to Moscow’s request not to transfer their observations to Washington. The United States had already withdrawn unilaterally from the INF Treaty (LV 112).

Open Skies marked the end of the era of Confidence and Stability Building Measures (CSBMs) that had irrigated international dialogue since the 1970s. The whole system of arms control and monitoring disappears: all that remains is the New Start Treaty (nuclear arsenal control), which expires on 5 February next.

The timetable is important: while Joe Biden will take command of the White House on 20 January, the Russian announcement constitutes diplomatic pressure to prolong New Start while affirming its resolution in the negotiations to come.

JOCV

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LV 154 : Tumultuous elections | (De)frozen conflitcts | Lorgnette : Secularims misunderstood

Posted on 11 November 2020 by La Vigie

Letter from La Vigie n° 154 ; 11 November 2020

Tumultuous elections

The US presidential election has kept the world’s media on tenterhooks. Many on that occasion decried American democracy. However, other recent elections (Belarus, Côte d’Ivoire) have shown unconvincing processes. On closer inspection, the American election shows a great democratic vitality, even if politically (but that is another matter) the transition crisis is likely to continue.

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(De)frozen conflicts)

Frozen conflicts were an unwelcome legacy of the Cold War. Nevertheless, they are warming dangerously, one after the other, and the case of Nagorno-Karabakh is fuelling strategic thinking around hypotheses of symmetrical high-intensity conflicts.

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Lorgnette: Secularism misunderstood

It must be said that following the Islamist attacks of the last few weeks, secularism has been much talked about, rarely understood. First of all in France, where some people who take advantage of it understand it only as a kind of State atheism, which it is obviously not. But above all, the notion seems to some people to be the symbol of a “French universalism”: it must be said that this universalism is indeed French and very poorly understood outside.

This is true among our European and American friends. One only has to look at the journalistic treatment of the “big” American media, it is true that it is strongly influenced by the post-colonial, woke and communitarian ideology. Even Le Monde implies that this is excessive (here). But this famous “French model” is not understood by Muslim countries either, and the French reaction has been seen (and instrumentalized by some, notably R. Erdogan) as an official persecution of Muslims. Let us recall that French Muslims are those in Europe who feel best integrated into their country. And let us deplore the fact that our secularism is so badly assimilated, first of all by us, unable to explain it simply.

JOCV

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LV 151 : Behind the wall | What does America tell us ? | Lorgnette : High-Karabakh

Posted on 29 September 202029 September 2020 by La Vigie

Letter from La Vigie n° 151 of September 30, 2020

Withdrawal behind the wall

The construction of walls is accelerating in this world. However, this tactical mode of action has never been able to contribute structurally to sustainable strategic action. Similarly, it reflects a withdrawal into oneself and a fear of the other when we need dialectics.

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What does America tell us?

The American election campaign is particularly abnormal: not only because of Covid, but also because it demonstrates the confrontation, block by block, of two irreconcilable Americas ready to fight, refusing in advance the victory of the other side. Beyond the disappearance of the WASP cement, it is a conception of modernity that is moving away. Finally, this issue of La Vigie looks at the consequences of the victory of D. Trump or that of J. Biden: in both cases, the prospects are not great.

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Lorgnette : Nagorno-Karabakh

Should we be surprised at the resumption of fighting in Nagorno-Karabakh, the Armenian enclave in Azerbaijan? No. First of all, because the dispute is ancestral and we see no negotiated solution to this conflict. Moreover, the outbursts of recent days seem to have been orchestrated more for internal reasons on the Baku side than by the desire to regain military control of this territory. The fact remains that the cannons have spoken and that some are alarmed.

Let us recall here that a frozen conflict does not mean an extinguished conflict: the freezing only means that it does not degenerate, but that it is maintained, on the other hand, by more or less noisy or deadly skirmishes. By this yardstick, the battle of the last few days would be normal.

For all that, it is at odds with Azerbaijan’s skillful policy (LV 134). The two great godfathers of the region, Russia and Iran, should quickly signal the end of the episode in Baku. But this is counting without the Turkish activism, about which one wonders here what he is pursuing: in the complicated multi-band game of the East, this is probably not about the Transcaucasus but more likely a message to Moscow and Tehran.

JOCV

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LV 134 : New military strategies | Clever Azerbaijan | Sahel, no Pau

Posted on 22 January 2020 by La Vigie

Lettre from La Vigie, dated 22 JAN 2020

New military strategies

Military strategy must articulate both nuclear strategy and the response to asymmetric adversaries. Without dwelling on fashionable concepts (Hybrid Warfare, A2/AD), let us note the return to concerns of high-intensity warfare, which had been forgotten. Opposition between peers or quasi-peers is back on the agenda, without overshadowing other priorities. 2020 is an opportunity to think calmly before the turmoil of the next presidential campaign and the subsequent LPM.

Clever Azerbaijan

Azerbaijan is thus on the borders of Europe and Asia, the Russian world and the Middle East, and is of interest to both China and the United States. As a Muslim, Shiite and secular country, it has just presided over the Non-Aligned Movement. Rich in abundant oil, it does not waste this income and succeeds, thanks to skilful diplomacy, in asserting its interests despite the persistent dispute with neighbouring Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh. These are all exceptions which would almost be worthy of a model and in any case arouse interest.

Lorgnette: Sahel, no Pau

France convened the leaders of the five G5 Sahel countries at a summit in Pau last week. It asked them, as it were, to confirm their desire to see France intervene in the region, in particular through Operation Barkhane. It was a question of finding political support at a time when the French presence is routinely decried in regional public opinion. In short, to force the said governments to come out of their duplicity. In exchange, France announced the dispatch of 220 additional troops and the refocusing of the operation on the Tri-border region.

220 troops is a 5% reinforcement: no one will believe that this can change the balance of power. As for the concentration on the three borders, it is a change that is at best operative, it certainly has no strategic significance. As for the rest, nothing changes and the stalemate will continue. For the old moons that have been proper and ineffective for decades will continue without changing the political behaviour of the region’s rulers: what if we put them face to face with their responsibilities?

JOCV

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