LV 232 : Reinventing the maritime security model | Multiple standards | Lorgnette : Dual Kissinger

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Letter from La Vigie dated 27 December 2023

Reinventing the maritime security model

Recent actions at sea against economic assets, in both the Black and Red Seas, have prompted us to reflect on maritime security. For a long time a subordinate issue of naval strategy, the concept deserves to be reviewed in depth, at a time when the multiplication of activities and critical infrastructures at sea are multiplying, suggesting new risks.

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Multiple standards

In recent weeks, some have criticised the West for adopting a “double standard”, proclaiming virtues that are applied differently depending on the circumstances. Without pointing to the incoherence of other players, it is worth noting that this doubt, taken to extremes, betrays first and foremost the loss of influence of a West that is unravelling and weakening by dint of doubt.

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Lorgnette: Dual Kissinger

The death of Henry Kissinger has prompted us to revisit this astonishing figure. The story of this young man who fled Nazi Germany to become a professor at Harvard and then an active adviser to American presidents remains an extraordinary one. He fascinates because he is one of the rare examples to have been, at the highest level, both a geopolitician and a geopolitologist, both a practitioner and a theoretician. It’s not just a question of giving advice and appraisals to those who govern us from time to time: every geopolitologist does it, at a lesser level. Dear Henry Kissinger was in charge of affairs and, in the conditions of his time, he pushed ahead with the rapprochement with China, which at first appeared to be an attempt to bypass the Soviet Union, but with long-term consequences that can still be seen today.

Kissinger was above all a theoretician, notably through two books: Diplomacy (1994), a brilliant realist overview of international relations over the past two centuries. World Order (2016) attempts to explain that there has never been a world order and that we need not worry about the disorder of the 21st century. Two fascinating books.

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LV 229: The United States and the new world | Strategic issues for the seabed | Lorgnette: Spanish turmoil

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Letter from La Vigie, dated 15 November 2023

 

The United States and the new world

Faced with the upheavals underway, America is redefining its priorities. Despite its domestic political difficulties, and backed by a buoyant economy, it is returning to the Middle East, closing the Ukrainian question and renewing its ties with China. This pragmatism should come as no surprise, but we need to draw the consequences.

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Strategic issues for the seabed

The seabed, whose relatively long-standing exploitation has been facilitated by the implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, is becoming a major strategic territory. With the growth in economic activity and the energy and digital transitions underway, they are home to critical infrastructures that need to be able to monitor them and intervene if necessary.

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Lorgnette: Spanish turmoil

Spanish politics never ceases to surprise us. After a party of vacuums (LV 180), the Catalan question is back (LV 94). Last May, the Left in power (LV 117) suffered a debacle in the local elections. P. Sánchez decided to dissolve the assembly and won his gamble in the July elections, where his party held its own. But to stay in power, he needed to secure a majority, which he could only find among the independentists, particularly the Catalans. This agreement was reached on 9 November in exchange for a highly controversial amnesty law, which allows Catalan leader C. Puigdemont, who has been in exile (on the run) in Brussels since 2017, to return to the country. In 2017, the country experienced one of the worst political crises in its modern history (LV 80).

However, Mr Sánchez did not come out on top, and if he is able to reach this agreement, it is because the right-wing leader, A. Feijóo, was unable to build a coalition. So here we have the PSOE, a weakened party, which only manages to find a coalition in a minority situation by reviving the question of independence.

Unsurprisingly, demonstrations organised by the right have multiplied since the announcement of the agreement. Spain is set for another troubled period.

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LV 147 : Media country, real country | To the south | Lorgnette: Ministry of the Sea

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Letter from La Vigie dated 22 July 2020

Media country, real country

Contemporary media are disappointing, caught in the vise of immediacy, emotion and moral indignation. They therefore contribute greatly to the era of “post-truth” and now constitute a disconnected and subjugated class. Worse, they distance political leaders from their long-term mission and reinforce the drift towards polarization, at the risk of radicalization and therefore division. The strategist cannot remain indifferent to this deleterious development.

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To the south

A strategic vacuum has set in in the Mediterranean, which Turkey and Russia have taken advantage of by arbitrating the inextricable Libyan question in their own way. The time has come for the southern Europeans to take the lead and to conduct with their vis-a-vis a truly trans-Mediterranean strategy to preserve their interests and contribute to the development and security of a Southern flank that is carrying risks that are drawing closer together.

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Lorgnette: Ministry of the Sea

After two unsuccessful attempts (81/83 and 88/91), the recent creation of a Ministry of the Sea is raising hopes for a dynamic sector at the service of an overall maritime strategy. France’s maritime assets are well known (LV 145), as are the pitfalls on which the previous ministries ran aground.

The great complexity and cross-cutting nature of maritime issues requires a strong ministerial and political role, building on the achievements, while the stakes and opportunities offered by the oceans are considerable:

  • a common good to be protected, studied and exploited sustainably;
  • economic prosperity and development of our society drawn from our EEZs by an eco-responsible commitment;
  • integration of our maritime sectors, to lead the world in the wake of our blue growth, by building an innovative economic and ecological force (fishing, food, construction, transport, propulsion, marine energies, ports, river sector);
  • guarantee the safety and security of our activities and maritime spaces with regard to international law.

These objectives, taken from the PR’s speech (Montpellier, 3/12/19), are reflected in the remit of the new ministry (15/7/20). May it become, with everyone’s help, the sought-after strategic accelerator.

JOCV

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LV 145 : Japan and France: maritime strategies | Army’s strategic vision | Lorgnette: Sino-Indian tensions

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Letter from La Vigie Nr 145, dated 24th June 2020

Japan and France: maritime strategies

France and Japan, comparable G7 countries, linked by an exceptional partnership, are similarly confronted with the economic consequences of the coronavirus crisis. In search of new levers to revive their economies, they are among the world’s leading oceanic powers and can count on their national maritime strategies to make the most of their assets. The global, bilateral and inter-ministerial maritime dialogue, which opened in Noumea in September 2019, is a pioneering tool enabling them to launch open projects at the scale of the maritime spaces of Europe and the Indo-Pacific, in the service of the reasoned development and preservation of the world ocean.

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Army’s Strategic Vision

The central argument of this reflection is the return to high intensity. It goes without saying that after thirty years of land-based operations of all kinds (peacekeeping, counter-insurgency, etc.) we are seeing a hardening of land-based armed conflicts outside. In order to cope with this, the army will have to be toughened up. It should be noted that this global vision does not cover the national territory.

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Lorgnette: Sino-Indian tensions

China and India clashed on 15 June in a high valley in Ladakh, on the Himalayan borders of the two countries, on the shores of Kashmir, itself the object of friction between India and Pakistan (LV 113). In a valley at more than 4000 m., unarmed border guards clashed with stones and sticks, causing the deaths of about twenty Indians and perhaps forty Chinese. It is believed that the Chinese set up tents in a disputed area. Both countries have since increased their appeasement measures.

Yet the affair is worrying: firstly, because Kashmir is the other explosive region in Central Asia (apart from Afghanistan) that involves three nuclear powers, in a context of state claims (which we note in this issue). But also because China seems to want to apply on the banks of the Galwan River the fait accompli policy it has practised in the South China Sea. The only difference is that here it is challenging not middle powers but India, itself a nationalist, which can use this as a pretext to make up for poor economic results.

This is worrying.

JOCV

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La Vigie Nr 137 : Persistence of Boko Haram | PANG : Oceanic manoeuvre | Lorgnette : Munich security conference

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Letter from La Vigie of 4 March 2020

Persistence of Boko Haram

The (low) French attention for Africa is concentrated on the Sahel-Saharan strip because of Operation Barkhane. However, another jihadist insurrection persists around Lake Chad: Boko Haram remains and has mutated profoundly. Faced with this, the countries in the area have taken vigorous initiatives over the past five years that have made it possible to confine the crisis centre. Why not looking at this example rather than persisting in a Sahelian strategy that has no end in sight?

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PANG: Oceanic Manoeuvre

The project for a new-generation aircraft carrier outlined by the Ministry of the Armed Forces to replace the Charles de Gaulle in 2038 is still only an industrial and technological dossier. It will soon be clarified. But it remains to give it a real strategic dimension as the military pivot of a global oceanic maneuvering and action capability by 2060 capable of protecting France’s interests in the world at that time.

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Lorgnette: Munich Conference 2020

The theme of the latest Munich Security Conference was the Weakening of the West or Westlessness (14-16 Feb.). It confirmed the western anomie.

After the interview with The Economist (Transatlantic Relations, LV 129) and the speech of the Military Academy (Deterrence, LV 136), it completed the President’s strategic vision of an unstable world that is changing dangerously. It had reaffirmed the need for an expanded European strategy and sovereignty that went beyond military issues to encompass standards, technology, infrastructure, communications, AI or neighbourhoods. He noted America’s remoteness, Germany’s rejection of power and the divergences between Europeans while the EU is invisible in the management of crises that affect its security and its values. Among the issues debated in Munich, Syria was not on the agenda, while the humanitarian crisis crystallised differences in priorities and competition between powers, recourse to the economy or migrants as political weapons. Let us hope that the emergency meeting of EU EA ministers will be a salutary awakening.

JOCV

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La Vigie Nr 126 : Take stock of the situation | Arabian peninsula | Lorgnette : PANG

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La Vigie Nr 126 : 2 october 2016

Take stock of the situation

Taking stock of France’s strategic perspectives is a periodic necessity, especially when the scene is lively as it is now. To do this, it is necessary to step back and cross-reference the main lines of force that can be observed. We have identified six of them, which, overlapping each other, provide the framework within which France can act. But is it prepared and willing to do so?

Arabian Peninsula

Saudi Arabia is a new country that has long sought to control its neighbourhood, including the Arabian Peninsula. This purpose has been reinforced by the question of political Islam, which has been structural since the founding of the kingdom. A final factor, oil, is added to these determinants. This results in an attitude that is difficult to follow in a highly troubled region.

Lorgnette: PANG

Behind this acronym in the name of petroleum is a formidable mobile war machine capable of influencing the planet’s strategic balances and controlling vast strategic areas to defend our interests and ensure that our views prevail. The PANG is the new generation aircraft carrier. It will enter service in 2040 for 40 years and will serve what is called France’s power projection in the last quarter of the 21st century.

Anticipating the renewal of the CDG AP means both measuring its contribution to the country’s current external action and projecting itself into 2060 to imagine the conflict of the time and face it. Vast challenge, necessary and realistic. No one doubts the strategic centrality of the Indian Ocean, the Mediterranean of tomorrow, and the Asia-Pacific region; economic activity will be decisive there and France and its European neighbours will be increasingly concerned. There is no doubt either that we will have to regulate this key maritime space for the development of the planet, we will have to move quickly in combat gear and be able to arbitrate tensions there. Who in Europe will be able to do it? France with its PANG! (To be continued)

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JDOK

La Vigie Nr 120 : Maritime Asset | Belgium : how many divisions ? | Lorgnette : Ormuz, June 2019

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Maritime asset

Maritime news commands and shows that the maritime fact is an important part of the equation of the strategy of a globalized economy. It is a major asset for those who know how to develop it and a lucrative predation area for those who want to criminalize it. It also carries a cooperative logic that weighs on global governance. France, although well placed, is slow to take the true measure of it.

Belgium : how many divisions ?

On 26 May last, not only European elections were held in Belgium, but also parliamentary elections. By dint of talking about Brussels to designate Europe, we forget that it has been the capital of an independent kingdom since 1830. However, these elections are worrying because they confirm that the country’s agony process is continuing, without anyone paying any attention to it. This is another symptom of the serious European political epidemic.

Lorgnette : Ormuz, June 2019

Holes in the hull, tankers on fire. The artery through which one-third of the world’s hydrocarbons and one-third of China’s oil supply exits the Arabian Gulf is threatened. Where did the blow come from? Who benefits from the case? Is it a game, a bluff? Is it serious? The equation is complex. Initially, the 2015 JCPoA agreement signed by President Obama with Iran and honestly denounced by President Trump. To negotiate better, he exerts maximum pressure on this country, which neither the Americans nor the Saudis like. Behind the curtain, Israel and its desperate Prime Minister want to create a diversion. In trading rooms, oil prices, shale gas producers.

And then there are the boutefeux, the American duettists Pompeo and Bolton who will do anything to make Iran bend and block its nuclear route, as in North Korea. boutefeux also among the Pasdarans who are losing patience. We’re shooting but blank. The amazed Europeans watch as a blockade, a real act of war, takes hold. Chinese, Japanese, Turks and Russians count the blows and rodomontades and think of a world without Americans. France is on the picket line in Abu Dhabi, powerless.

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