LV 225: Ambiant disaster | If there’s only one left, it’s IndoPac | From Korea to Armenia

Letter from La Vigie, dated 20 Sept. 2023

Ambient disaster

The ideologies of the twentieth century, communism and liberalism, have lost their hold on society. For twenty years, the world has witnessed the return of religion as a geopolitical factor, but two catastrophisms – ecological and demographic – have now become replacement ideologies. We need to move beyond them.

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If there’s only one left, it’s IndoPac

For several months, if not years, France’s foreign policy has suffered from a notable lack of clarity in its latest qualification as a “trusted partner power”. Its long-standing partners are taking advantage of this to bully Paris and subject it to historic affronts. Because we have to exist on the international stage, the only thing left is the Indo-Pacific, which we are boosting in the hope that our new partners will have confidence in us.

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Lorgnette: from Korea to Armenia

President Putin welcomed Kim Jong Un, the President of North Korea, with great pomp and ceremony. Kim Jong Un is not accustomed to being received in this way, as his country has opted for long-term strategic isolation. The Korean peninsula is not at peace, since only an armistice was signed in 1953, and since then Pyongyang has maintained a considerable military effort, to the point of developing nuclear weapons, ballistic missiles and possibly a missile-launching submarine. The advantage of military dictatorships is that they have stockpiles. Korea is said to be supplying Russia with 10 million shells to maintain its RAPFEU in Ukraine. You have the allies you can get.

That’s what Armenia told itself when, in 2020, it was unable to resist the Azerbaijani offensive. Russia did just enough to prevent things going too far (LV 151, 154 and 184) and moved on. So its troops went to Ukraine and are still there. From then on, the CSTO, which organised the “near abroad”, lost its strength and Armenia announced that it was organising military exercises with the United States. Moscow is no longer able to guarantee wider security and is losing its most traditional supporters. Azerbaijan is taking advantage. Russia is letting it happen…

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JONVP

La Vigie n° 97 (20 June 2018) : Kim-Trump : Two winners ? – Governance : towards syncretism – Seen from la Lorgnette : Aquarius

Letter n° 97,  La Vigie, 20th  June 2018 (to read this issue in French, clic here)

Kim-Trump : Two winners ?

The recent Singapore summit between Presidents Kim and Trump resulted in a rather flat and uncompromising statement: yet both protagonists were very satisfied. However, this is not a “win-win” agreement, since basically everyone thinks they have deceived each other. In fact, beyond the nuclear issue (yet nothing less than anodyne), the most interesting lies in the ulterior motives of the two leaders. They did not say a word and no commentator has deciphered their real calculations. They are much more subtle than we think.

Governance : towards syncretism

To save the idea of a minimal governance of the planet, we will have to introduce a dose of diversity in the principles and values that administer it, especially at the regional level because the universal always has a local color. To preserve the gains of the old multilateral structures that are going down (UN, NATO, EU), it will be necessary to focus on identifying the factors of peace and development that they carry. To contribute, France must be out of alignment.

La Lorgnette : Aquarius

 

JDOK