La Vigie 89 (28 FEB 2018) : De-escalation as a grand strategy – Syrian escalation – A French narrative

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Escalade et désescalade ...

 

De-escalation as a grand strategy 

The time has come for France to adopt a grand strategy that characterizes it for the beginning of the twenty-first century. At a time when a Cold War episode is looming and the Euro-Atlantic world seems to be losing its composure and cohesion, France could promote widespread de-escalation and a return to the security fundamentals of the European continent. To regain the advantageous position of equilibrium power between America, Europe, Africa and Asia, it will have to some extent to misalign and detox from militant support to the structures and practices of the world of yesterday.

Syrian escalation

In Syria, the civil war has always seen outsiders intervene. As the IS vanished, we are now witnessing a rise in auctions that sees two axes confront almost directly: the United States, Israel and Arabia on one side; Syria, Russia, Iran and Turkey on the other. If all the leaders had shown stability in the past, it would not worry too much. Unfortunately, it is not the case. The risk of escalation is worrying.

La Lorgnette : A French narrative

JDOK

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N° 88 : Citizens mobilization | Economic reason, political reason | Nuclear posture review

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La vigie, 14th Feb 2018.

To access the issue (in French), click here 

Citizens mobilization

the SNU, universal national service under examination is a short citizen conscription that closes the civic training process provided by the National Education. Breaking with the outmoded practice of military service, the unequalitarianism of the national service, it will have to preserve however the variety of civic sectors preparing for civic responsibility. To strengthen the cohesion of the country and mobilize youth on the same republican project, it is desirable to favor citizen conscription for all in the year of 18.

 

Economic reason, political reason

Since the 1980s, we have been living under the economic reason that undeniably dominates political reason. Globalization has initially reinforced this trend, but we have been witnessing, for the last ten years or so, a slow shift towards the return of political reason. Here is the real contemporary cleavage, more than the one between openness or closure, liberties or populism, conservatives or progressists.

Lorgnette : Nuclear posture review

JDOK

Crédit photo :  Eric Constantineau – www.ericconstantineau.com on Visualhunt /CC BY-NC

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N° 87 : On secrecy and intelligence – Trompe l’oeil – Lorgnette : From NPT to NWPT

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About secrecy and intelligence

The debate on false news generally focuses on the relevance of the media and the inexorable popularity of social networks: the quantity would surpass the quality. However, it is not just about over-media that alternately reveals secrets (Wikileaks and whistleblowers) or protects them (hacks and plots). The hidden truth raises the question of secrecy in our societies. Is it a coincidence that the unbridled development of the media has gone hand in hand with the growing role of the intelligence services, but also of the attention paid by governments to these “secrets”, all the more tasty as they were more rare?

Trompe l’œil

By reviewing the recent declarations on our foreign policy and the prospects for the armed forces, we can see that the real effort to reniew France’s strategic posture is first and foremost about the method and not about the options taken earlier. Whether our interventions abroad, our European perspective or the expeditionary dialectic and its domestic benefits. Beyond the imperative of budgetary responsibility, we will seek the foundations of our defense policy. We will be worried about not having learned all the lessons from our strategic commitments since the end of the cold war.

Lorgnette : From NPT to NWPT

N° 86 : Strategic dead angles and French vulnerabilities – Revolts: season 2? – Lorgnette: Missile manouver

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Strategic dead angles and French vulnerabilities

What are the blind spots of our national defense and our national security? Certainly, our defense of the national territory, although imperfect, is always up to France. But our position of internal security remains weakened by the conceptual deficiencies of a national strategy whose coherence is insufficient. It is necessary to put in capacity not only social, political and judicial but also military to ensure the necessary public order guarantee of the rule of law.

Revolts: season 2?

In early 2018, two popular movements affect Iran and Tunisia. If they refer apparently to the previous troubles (respectively in 2009 and 2011), they are distinguished by their mainly social nature. Above all, this means that if political systems are not challenged, internal balances are a problem, whether complicated alliances in Tehran or the coalition in place in Tunis. The hypothesis of a regime change is unlikely, but the absence of an internal political alternative is likely to provoke other similar crises.

Lorgnette: Missile manouver

N°85 : Greetings for France 2018 – Cleavages that evolve

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To read the French version of issue n° 85, click here

Greetings for France 2018 : What can France wish for its security in 2018? That the glimpse of reprieve spreads and that it can be sheltered from the destabilizing effects of the active scars of the empires of yesterday in Europe (Ukraine), the Levant (Arabo-Persian Gulf), in North Africa (Egypt, Libya, Sahel) but also technological and financial raids, all belligerents. Let it avoid the multiple strategic poachings that currently divide the planet and prohibit any form of global regulation. Let her remember by celebrating the bad peaces of 1918, to support a more pragmatic strategic way towards European integration and global governance.

Cleavages that evolve : The world faces a deep contradiction between its accelerated motion, for economic and technological reasons, and a deep desire for stability from the people across the world. This new division is altering and complicating the old political cleavage between right and left, which has long served to explain the course of the world. The clash between internal dynamics and external upheavals will explain many future events

Lorgnette : La Vigie is renewed

Photo crédit : Min Api Emke dessin

We wwish you a merry Christmas

JD and OK

N° 84 bis (free reading) : The world has changed – Table of contents 2017 –

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The world has changed.

The world has changed. It needs a sustainable strategic grammar that is only the management as rational as possible of a structural and fluid chaos. Here is the return of the circumstances of the world, in the words of De Gaulle.

Index 2017

In 2017, La Vigie published 91 articles that are listed in this index. […]

Happy new year

JDOK

 

N° 84 : Entering a wasteland – Strategic Capacity and sterility –

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Entering a wasteland : Returning to the year 2017 to characterize it strategically, is to observe that it has in fact led to a space cluttered by obsolete objects inherited from the cold war and those of an illusory global governance. It is also to observe that everywhere the peoples have sought to obtain from their elites that they give them top priority and defend their interests first. Finally, it is to point out that France without leaving its state of general precariousness has strengthened and regained confidence in it. The twenty-first century will open in 2017 on a strategic wasteland.

Strategic Capacity and sterility : The strategic review of the year 2017 can not be summarized in the review of the only weapons programs, in the enumeration of some theoretical debates, in the analysis of the different kinds of conflicts that took place. A central problem seems to be to examine the preponderance of technology in the definition of strategic postures. Is the only strategy of the means sufficient in view of the diversity of the current by-passes? Probably not, which reveals the need for a new strategic imagination.

Merry Christmas

JDOK

N° 83 : Neo-Caledonian stake | Digital strategy | Lorgnette : Diplomacy and strategy

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Neo-Caledonian stake : In a year, New Caledonia, French Asiatic territory, will have redefined the terms of reference of its sovereignty as provided by the Nouméa agreements (1998). It is possible that this political TRendez-vous will lead to an original form of independence delegating in return to France a part of its strategic responsibilities. This formula could serve as a basis for other statutory developments of the French overseas and to draw a new personality of a plural France on a world scale

Digital strategy : Far from the public fantasies around Artificial Intelligence, the armed forces are facing the fourth computer revolution, after that of the personal computer, its networking and social networks. The digital transformation is thus a new challenge that will be added to those of C4 and cyber. From the Internet of Things to Cloud Infrastructure, from Augmented Reality to Artificial Intelligence, here are so many strategic challenges that need to be tackled, from the technical, tactical, strategic or skills point of view: a new field of reflection opens up to us.

Lorgnette: Diplomacy and strategy

JDOK

Photo crédit :  Roger Le Guen on Visual hunt / CC BY-NC-SA

New Silk Roads and Central Asia : Shanghai Cooperation Organisation ( SCO) on the frontline… (E.Dupuy)

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The convening of the 17th Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO founded 15th January 2001) summit , on the 7th and 8th June 2017, in Astana,  Kazakhstan, was an opportunity to highlight the specificity of the only intergovernmental organisation bringing together 5 of the 6 Central Asian States – ex-soviet republics, (with the exception of Turkmenistan)  and the only one created and de facto “influenced” by Beijing.

Source

(article en français)

Beyond that, it is now the geo-economic interactions and geopolitical convergences between the SCO and China’s “New Silk Roads” (One Belt, One Road, OBOR) project that have to be taken into account to realise how this new “Great Game” will deeply unsettle international relations. Continue reading “New Silk Roads and Central Asia : Shanghai Cooperation Organisation ( SCO) on the frontline… (E.Dupuy)” →

N° 82 : Non-aligned Europe | Strategic depth of the overseas | Germany in breakdown

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Abstracts

Non-aligned Europe


Globalization is primarily economic and has allowed emerging countries to catch up with growth, without political convergence. Europe, built on free competition, is disarmed in the face of this new environment. However, it continues to take up the old institutional recipes (as evidenced by the recent PESCO) while NATO is hypnotized against the East. This strategic shift creates a non-aligned Europe. […]


Strategic Depth of Overseas

The French overseas territories are a heterogeneous inheritance whose valorization remains to be done in a strategic framework to reinforce the global vocation of France and to constitute a true necklace of ultramarine pearls allowing each one of them to be inserted more directly in the development of the new spaces of globalization. […]Link to the n° 82

Lorgnette : Germany in breakdown

JDOK

credit : dalbera on Visualhunt / CC BY

The Islamic State, anatomy of the new califate (Th. Flichy de La Neuville)

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We are pleased to welcome Thomas Flichy de La Neuville, professor at Saint-Cyr, who reviews the ISlamic State :

Credit

Is the advent of the Islamic state a surprise? What is the nature of the Islamic state? What are the foundations of the Islamic State? What are the energy challenges of the conflict? What are the differences between ISIS and Al Qaeda? What are the historical roots of the Islamic State? Who is Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, leader of the movement? A 2.0 jihadism ?  Is ISIS a fanatical organization? What is the attitude of the population towards the Islamic state? How many fighters? What weapons? What financial sustainability for the Islamic state? Can the coalition defeat the Islamic state ? JDOK

Continue reading “The Islamic State, anatomy of the new califate (Th. Flichy de La Neuville)” →

N° 81 (free) – 8 November 2017 : A French strategic review | Iraq : and now? | A light in Gaza

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Abstracts

A French strategic review

In 2017 no white paper but a strategic review, dense, sober and quickly conducted in the continuity of the strategic work and assessment of 2013. We note its realism and the lucid report that it makes the strategic precariousness of France. One wonders about its European commitment and the desire to increase again the power of defense to preserve a strategic autonomy celebrated. It is to be regretted that the decisive choices regarding the armed forces model are returned to the work of the next procurement programming law next year.

Iraq : and now ?

After the defeat of the IS, what will become of Iraq? there are two options: to take advantage of the victory in this civil war to rebuild a state that includes the Kurds (which explains the recent steadfastness towards them in the city of Kirkuk), or to let go of the ethnic game and let the power to the Shiite majority, even to reproduce the Maliki government’s mistakes from 2011 to 2014 and to open the door to the break-up of the country. Baghdad must solve both the external equation and an internal crisis.
Lorgnette : A light in Gaza
JDOK