Confidence-building Measures Research Articles

Transparency and confidence-building measures for space security

Transparency and confidence-building measures (TCBMs) are a set of tools designed to display, predict and discipline states' behaviour with respect to maintaining the security of space. With intentional and unintentional threats to the peaceful use of space on the rise, there is a growing international consensus on the need for greater transparency in space-related activities as well as confidence-building measures to reduce the prospects of disruption to the ever-expanding role of space in our day-to-day lives. Terrestrial TCBMs can serve as a guide to understanding what political arrangements are possible in space, including certain precedents in the areas of arms control, non-proliferation and disarmament. At the same time, current and emerging challenges in space - including orbital space debris, risk of collisions, growing saturation of the radiofrequency spectrum, the crowding of satellites in geostationary (GEO) orbit and threat of purposeful disruption - need to be evaluated in the context of unilateral, bilateral, multilateral and private initiatives to increase space situational awareness and security. This paper describes and evaluates various prospective TCBMs alongside current proposals to advance safety and security in space, including the EU Draft Code of Conduct for Outer Space Activities. It offers specific recommendations, arguing that Europe is uniquely qualified to negotiate a 21st century TCBM architecture thanks to its history of diplomacy and ability to identify common ground among disparate parties. This will only happen, however, with a more defined institutional design and the EU's emergence as a global civilian leader.

Dark forces awaken: the prospects for cooperative space security

ABSTRACTInternational cooperation on outer-space security has fluctuated over the past decades, marked by periods of common endeavor and relative stability as well as times of destabilizing developments and rising tensions. A high-water mark of space-security diplomacy was the 2013 UN Group of Governmental Experts consensus report on “Transparency and Confidence-Building Measures in Outer Space Activities,” which set out a rich menu of measures and promised new levels of cooperative security among states. Regrettably, the report was followed by a series of negative developments that threaten to reverse the cooperative trend it espoused. These developments include the introduction (by Russia and China) and rejection (by the United States) of a revised draft treaty on the Prevention of Placement of Weapons in Outer Space (PPWT); the adoption by the UN General Assembly of a divisive resolution on “no first placement” of space weapons; the failure of the European Union to gain support for its proposed Code of Conduct, as well as escalating strategic tensions. This viewpoint analyzes the re-emergence of these “dark forces” and their implications for multilateral diplomacy and makes suggestions for remedial action to preserve outer-space security.

United Nations Resolution 69/32 on the ‘No first placement of weapons in space’: A step forward in the prevention of an arms race in outer space?

On 2 December 2014, the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) adopted with a vote of 126 in favor, 4 against and 46 abstentions, Resolution 69/32 entitled ‘No first placement of weapons in space. Despite the limited attention received in academic circles, the adoption of Resolution 69/32 represents an important development in the area of space security. First, it indicates the growing recognition of the positive role that transparency and confidence-building measures (TCBMs) play in preventing an arms race in space (PAROS), even from the perspective of those States that has suggested the adoption of a treaty on PAROS, namely China and Russia. Second, it shows the willingness of a crescent number of members of the United Nations General Assembly to engage in initiatives aimed at promoting a more secure space environment. Third, its controversial reception proves that a universal solution to the issue of space security still lays far ahead.In the light of these elements the purpose of the present viewpoint is to analyze Resolution 69/32, evaluate its positive and negative features, and assess its chances to provide a meaningful contribution to a more secure outer space.

The role and place of international organizations in the settlement of armed conflicts in the southeast of Ukraine (legal aspects)

Problem setting. Armed conflict in the Donetsk and Lugansk regions led to significant losses as personnel of military units and special law enforcement agencies of Ukraine and civilian casualties Ukraine. Under these conditions, according to most politicians and political scientists to modern standards of international law crisis management in Ukraine is possible only through the mediation of international organizations. International organizations have a tool for early detection, warning and conflict prevention and crisis management and post-conflict rehabilitation, they are engaged in a wide range of security issues, including arms control, preventive diplomacy, confidence-building measures, human rights, monitoring elections, economic and environmental security and so on. Recent research and publications analysis. In the literature of recent years certain issues affecting the regulatory and legal framework of international organizations in the field of security. However, scientific research towards the place and role of international organizations in resolving the internal armed conflict in research paid insufficient attention. Paper objective. The article is to examine the nature of international security organizations, evaluating the effectiveness of their work to resolve the situation in the Donetsk and Lugansk regions and providing relevant proposals. Paper main body. The primary place in the order of settlement of the armed conflict in the South East Ukraine has a key intergovernmental international organizations dealing with peace and security in the world – the United Nations (UN) and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). The new National Security Strategy of Ukraine of 05.06.2015 p. Indicated that the aggression of Russia against Ukraine increased the urgency of reforming the Security Council. As part of the UN General Assembly will focus the government of Ukraine will support such initiatives to reform the UN Security Council, which will provide an adequate response to its violations of international law, even if the offender is a permanent member of this body. The main role in resolving the armed conflict currently owned OSCE. The feature is the presence of its field operations acting directly in some participating States, upon request and provide necessary assistance. Decisions in the OSCE adopt by consensus. Currently, there is a problem in meeting the personal safety of observers. The forces of law and order are the following main objectives: personal safety SMM OSCE during their surveillance in the territory controlled by Ukraine; support the SMM OSCE in the demilitarized zone with the ability to provide shelter in special equipment and engineering facilities in the alleged attacks; property protection equipment and CMM OSCE in their locations of the territory controlled by Ukraine. Conclusions of the research. The only security support among international organizations in the settlement of the armed conflict in the South East of Ukraine (except for economic sanctions against the aggressor country) is an unarmed civilian OSCE SMM. OSCE needs serious reform, the creation of a new model of its operation, which takes into account the new situation in Europe, the dramatic changes the security environment, the emergence of new challenges and threats. Areas for further scientific studies will be used to research legal and organizational-tactical bases of improvement of international organizations in resolving the armed conflict.

Iran and multinational enrichment in the Middle East

ABSTRACTAs implementation of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal begins, five other states in the Middle East are moving forward with civilian nuclear power programs. While most of these programs involve contracts with foreign vendors to provide reactors and the low-enriched uranium to fuel them, some states may want to follow Iran’s example and develop their own uranium enrichment programs, giving them a potential nuclear weapons capability. The authors assess the uranium enrichment capacity needed to fuel planned nuclear programs in the Middle East and support the idea of using the next decade to convert Iran’s Natanz national enrichment plant to a multinational one – in partnership with one or more of the international parties to the Iran nuclear deal and some of Iran’s neighbors. Such an arrangement could help maintain the transparency of Iran’s program after restrictions on it expire, thereby easing tensions between Iran and other regional powers. This confidence-building measure could create a political context within which other Middle Eastern states forgo acquiring their own national enrichment programs and begin a worldwide movement away from such programs in favor of more proliferation-resistant multinational arrangements.

Prospects for an Arms Control Regime in South Asia

There have been several confidence-building measures (CBMs) between India and Pakistan in both the pre- and post-nuclear periods. There was even a proposal to create a strategic restraint regime, w...

Indo–Pak relations and Media rapprochement process for South Asian peacenik under the umbrella of regional and global politics

Ponte Academic JournalApr 2016, Volume 72, Issue 4 Indo–Pak relations and Media rapprochement process for South Asian peacenik under the umbrella of regional and global politicsAuthor(s): Irfan Ahmad Tahir ,Manzoor Khan AfridiJ. Ponte - Apr 2016 - Volume 72 - Issue 4 doi: 10.21506/j.ponte.2016.4.21 Abstract:South Asian region is housing two nuclear neighbors that are carrying along traditional hostility and rivalry to offset each others in the arena of regional politics. Instead of solving their issues like modern developed world, their relationships are becoming sour and complex. Both are ambitious enough in winning the Arms Race to ensure State and hyper Security interests instead of promoting the Human interests. It is an unbending fact that use of power can quench lust for land acquisition and prolong forced occupation but it cannot win the hearts and minds of the people. No headway can be achieved without justice, integrity and fair play. Indians vying for a military hegemonic designs and obsession to become a policeman of South Asia and Pakistan desire to balance the power symmetry forced Pakistan to make alliances for ensuring its sovereignty and to safeguard its security parameters. It was not the hostility but security concern of Pakistan that drove Pakistan to develop a close alliance with the Americans even at the cost of relations with other brotherly Islamic nations such as Egypt, Iraq and Syria. It was necessity of State of Pakistan that sought Pakistan to establish a friendly relationship with a God-less Communist China even while claiming to be at the vanguard of Islam and targeting to assume the mantle of Muslim Ummah (community) leadership after holding Muslim leaders summit at Lahore, Pakistan. Pakistan military and economic power patrons like US and China also helped in diffusing the crises prone tensions with India. India alleges Pakistan used mujahedeen left over from 1979 Afghan war to feed strife in Indian held Kashmir and border towns like Pathankot while Pakistan complains that India is sponsoring terrorism in its cities like Karachi, Lahore and Peshawar and patronizing the separatist groups doing subversion in Baluchistan. After the nuclearization of South Asia (SA), many a times the relations come to the brink of nuclear flash point, thereby appealing and forcing the peace lovers to build an atmosphere of trust, peaceful co-existence, thereby; making the region free from violence and avoiding of reaching to the explosive situations. Global power like US seeks from both countries to adopt risk reduction and restraint policies to avoid wars. US president, Obama during the fourth and final Nuclear Security Summit at Washington urged both India and Pakistan to reduce nuclear threat, not to move in a wrong direction and follow US and Russia, the two largest possessors of nuke arsenals, which are prepared to lead the way and follow the clear position on the issue. Similarly, US administration also showed willingness to assist both India and Pakistan to take Confidence Building Measures (CBMs) to reduce the terrorism threat especially in the wake of nuclear arsenals. More-so, Non State Actors (NSA) like civil society and Media are urging from both States to expedite Peace promotion programs in line with the World changing paradigms. The 21st century will remain elusive if the essential conditions for Peace are not fulfilled. Media voluntarily participation in bringing rapprochement is a positive development, albeit of its multifarious role, whether it will be a useful effort or futile is a multi- million question? It also raises the question that how these two warring nations engaged in less proxy more active war-non kinetic to some but going towards kinetic ends in its ultimate objectives come to positive ends, talk about cooperative arrangements and more productive and fruitful arrangements. Why global powers and international community are not paying heed to solve this existing imbroglio? It is high time know that both India and Pakistan recess from rivalry stance. They need to cooperate and accommodate each others before the future of next generations become gloom and doom. Download full text:Check if you have access through your login credentials or your institution Username Password

A Russian Perspective on the Relevance and Challenges of the ADMM-Plus

The main strength of the ASEAN Defence Ministers' Meeting-Plus (ADMM-Plus) is basically the same as that of other ASEAN-centered multilateral dialogue platforms: inclusiveness. In other words, the forum is characterized by a principled openness to countries big and small that belong to the East Asian region geographically, historically, economically, and politically. Each state pursues its own external interests but at the same time accepts ASEAN's coordinating role in promoting mutual cooperation for the sake of greater stability and security at national, regional, and global levels.The first section of this essay examines the strengths of the ADMM-Plus relative to other ASEAN-centered forums. The essay then discusses Russia's participation in the ADMM-Plus, as well as in other regional groupings, and considers the potential pitfalls that could limit the effectiveness of this dialogue platform.The Strengths of the ADMM-PlusAs the youngest member in the family of ASEAN-centered institutions, the ADMM-Plus still does not suffer from some of the weaknesses developed by the older and respected relatives, the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) and the East Asia Summit (EAS). At the risk of sounding too critical, I would dare say that for quite a while the ARF has been a hostage of its own official agenda, which obliges it to proceed in a disciplined way from confidence-building measures to preventive diplomacy and then to conflict resolution-as if conflicts and their resolution can patiently wait until the two previous stages are properly completed. As far as the EAS is concerned, it is tempting to ask whether any of its ten meetings-which, after all, have brought together a whole number of powerful regional and global leaders-has produced memorable results (not to mention historic decisions). What we habitually remember about these summits are clashes between certain states, in particular over the territorial disputes in the South China Sea ever since it was decided in 2010 that the EAS would discuss regional security matters.True, during its last meeting in 2015 the ADMM-Plus also failed to work out a common approach to the situation in the South China Sea. But even so, its agenda and activities do not leave one with an impression of irrelevance. On the contrary, the overall feeling is that this forum is pragmatically and pointedly dealing with real issues such as humanitarian assistance and disaster relief, military medicine, maritime security, counterterrorism, peacekeeping, and humanitarian de-mining actions. While cooperation in some of these priority areas (in the form of field training, meetings, workshops, and exercises) may be developed easier than in others, on the whole this set of objectives reflects some of the serious changes that started to unfold in the world precisely around 2010-the same year that saw the launching of the ADMM-Plus. Specifically, I am talking about the fact that the global transition from unipolarity to multipolarity, which has been evolving since the late 20th and early 21st centuries, has recently acquired a more dramatic, destabilizing, and conflict-generating character. The polarizing effect of this character shift is already felt in East Asia. If this process continues and deepens, then the loss of economic dynamism in this exceptionally dynamic region may just be a matter of time.For Russia-just like for many other, if not all, regional actors-this would be a highly unwanted turn of events. Russia's own modernization plans envisage progressively greater trade and investment cooperation with East Asia's economic miracles. Stronger interactions and links in the military-political field are viewed in this context as having the potential to arrest the further growth of strategic uncertainty, if not fully then at least partially. …

The United States and the osce after the Ukraine Crisis

Ever since negotiations on the Helsinki Final Act opened in Helsinki in 1973, the United States has regarded the Conference (later Organization) on Security and Co-operation in Europe with some ambivalence. The role of the Helsinki Final Act in establishing a normative regime that contributed significantly to undermining the authoritarian regimes in the former Warsaw Pact countries, eventually bringing an end to the Cold War, is widely recognized and appreciated in the United States. However, the expanded post-Cold War role of the osce has received less attention in us foreign policy and, with respect to issues of European security, has clearly been assigned a secondary role in that policy behind the nato Alliance. Those knowledgeable about the osce in the United States widely regard its role in positive terms on issues such as human rights, rights of persons belonging to minorities, rule of law, election monitoring and other “soft” security issues. However, the osce role in “hard” security issues has been given little attention and receives only limited support, due largely to its inability to achieve consensus on most serious security problems and its lack of resources to effectively implement those decisions that it takes. Nevertheless, the recent crisis in Ukraine has awakened us interest in the osce as the institutional framework best able to manage that crisis. The challenge for the German Chairmanship in 2016 will be to build upon this renewed us attention to the osce’s role in “hard” security issues, in promoting negotiated resolutions to this and other stalemated conflicts, in rebuilding the badly damaged regime of confidence-building measures and conventional arms control, as well as responding, within the multilateral osce framework, to new security threats, such as cyber warfare and countering violent extremism.

On the Possibility of “Confidence-Building Measures” Implementation with Regard to China and Taiwan

The article describes the process which took place before establishment of Shanghai Cooperation Оrganization. Under analysis are negotiations between USSR and China on the issue of border delimitation which resulted in strengthening of mutual trust and creation of control mechanism in the sphere of armaments. The said cooperation in the sphere of regional security can be considered as a model for establishment of the similar mechanism of mutual trust between two shores of Taiwan strait. SCO is a proper model because China is a side of bilateral talks and takes real part in working out confidence-building measures as a foundation of security cooperation. The usage of these measures in the relations between Taiwan and China could become a model for development of intraregional cooperation in the East Asia (Asia-Pacific region)

Enhancing International Cyber Security

Cyber aggression is an increasing threat to international security and stability. While national policies intended to deter cyber aggression may offer some solution in the short term, their effects in the long term are doubtful. National cyber-deterrence policies entail the risk of an on-going cyber arms race and a cycle of escalation between potential cyber opponents. Diplomacy may offer fewer results in the short term, but it is more promising in the long term. Confidence-building measures and international norms and values may not be easy to reach, but in the end they could be more effective (and cheaper) than a single focus on national cyber-deterrence strategies. In the long term, cooperation between states to establish confidence and commonly accepted norms of behaviour in cyber space are the most promising ways available to achieve enduring cyber security and stability. Enhancing interstate co-operation, transparency and predictability of behaviour in cyberspace will reduce the risks of misperception, escalation and conflict.

Redefining East Asian Regional Security Dynamics: Establishing Multilateral Transparency and Confidence Building Measures in the Pursuit of Strategic Stability

Redefining East Asian Regional Security Dynamics: Establishing Multilateral Transparency and Confidence Building Measures in the Pursuit of Strategic Stability

China's Assertiveness in the South China Sea: Have ASEAN's Endeavors in Establishing Regional Order Truly Failed

The territorial disputes in the South China Sea have become the major flashpoints of both potential and existing conflicts in Asia. With claimant states from both China and member states of ASEAN, the aggressive military gestures of the claimant states have led to a myriad number of confrontations throughout the years. The inevitability of ASEAN being in the center of the disputes, have led many critics towards the regional organization on its capacity to establish any significant changes towards the dynamics of the South China Sea disputes. This research argues the opposite of the existing academic literatures, which views ASEAN as not an ideal actor in facing the fast paced dynamics of the South China Sea conflicts. It argues of ASEAN’s ability and capacity to persuade China into some forms of compromises into its policy, reflected through its defined position of a conflict management institution throughout the South China Sea crisis. The research thus argues how there is an existing misperception of ASEAN’s conflict management endeavors with the occurrence of China’s recent assertive gestures, ASEAN’s ability in instilling cooperative values and confidence building measures among conflicted states, and relevance of ASEAN’s multilateralism measures despite of China’s historical stance of bilateral means of conflict resolution in regards to the South China Sea conflict.

China’s Assertiveness in the South China Sea: Have ASEAN’s Endeavors in Establishing Regional Order Truly Failed?

<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;"><span style="font-size: 10.0pt; font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; mso-fareast-font-family: 宋体; mso-font-kerning: 1.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: ZH-CN; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;" lang="EN-US">The territorial disputes in the South China Sea have become the major flashpoints of both potential and existing conflicts in Asia. With claimant states from both China and member states of ASEAN, the aggressive military gestures of the claimant states have led to a myriad number of confrontations throughout the years. The inevitability of ASEAN being in the center of the disputes, have led many critics towards the regional organization on its capacity to establish any significant changes towards the dynamics of the South China Sea disputes. This research argues the opposite of the existing academic literatures, which views ASEAN as not an ideal actor in facing the fast paced dynamics of the South China Sea conflicts. It argues of ASEAN’s ability and capacity to persuade China into some forms of compromises into its policy, reflected through its defined position of a conflict management institution throughout the South China Sea crisis. The research thus argues how there is an existing misperception of ASEAN’s conflict management endeavors with the occurrence of China’s recent assertive gestures, ASEAN’s ability in instilling cooperative values and confidence building measures among conflicted states, and relevance of ASEAN’s multilateralism measures despite of China’s historical stance of bilateral means of conflict resolution in regards to the South China Sea conflict.</span></p><div id="_mcePaste" class="mcePaste" style="position: absolute; left: -10000px; top: 0px; width: 1px; height: 1px; overflow: hidden;"><!--EndFragment--></div>

Prospects and Paths of CICA's Transformation

The Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA) is at a critical juncture of development and transformation. In the past two decades, CICA has developed itself into the most representative and inclusive pan-Asian forum on regional security and cooperation, making steady progress on confidence building and regional cooperation, as well as promoting ideas of comprehensive, common, cooperative, and sustainable security. CICA has played a unique role in gradually raising Asia's self-awareness on a regional security agenda and regional architecture building. Nevertheless, CICA's overall influence on Asia's security agenda is still limited, its potential is far from being fully realized, let alone its long-term goal of upgrading into an organization of security and cooperation in asia (OSCA). In the context of changing dynamics in the regional security landscape, there are both great opportunities and huge challenges for CICA's further development and transformation. China, as the chairing country of CICA in the next few years, should show its stewardship to strategically prioritize CICA's road map for its transformation, by enhancing CICA's capacity and institutional building, improving the efficacy of CBMs for regional security, and helping build CICA's capability of delivering more regional security public goods. For the purpose of realizing these agendas of CICA, China should not only work more closely with the core members of CICA, but also engage well with extra-regional powers, particularly the United States, in the area of regional security architecture building.

Sensitising the Disadvantaged Groups through Participatory Approaches: IGNOU’s Experiences in Madhya Pradesh (India)

Madhya Pradesh is home to sizeable proportion of Socio Economically Disadvantaged population of India. Human Development Index of the state is 0.375 which depicts poor socioeconomic conditions. Infant Mortality Rates in some of the areas of the state have been compared to the Sub-Saharan countries as per the World Bank Report titled “India: Achievement and Challenges in Reducing Poverty” It depicts a challenging situation and calls for massive Educational Upliftment of the people working in rural and tribal areas. Government of India has sincerely prioritized these issues through successive five year plans, however the situation on the ground leaves a lot to be desired. Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) have placed renewed emphasis on the capacity building of these communities. India Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU) which is the biggest role player of Open and Distance Learning (ODL) in India has a mandate to bring such disadvantaged groups in to fold of Higher Education. However it has been a challenging job from several points of views as most of the target groups requiring immediate attention are too vulnerable, poorly capacitated to adopt new practices and nearly cut off from the urban centred educational facilities. The areas inhabiting such communities have low penetration of Newspapers, TV or Radios and ODL systems with their paradigmatically different ways of teaching learning are yet to take roots in these areas. It has been a big challenge for IGNOU to reach out to such Disadvantaged Communities, sensitize them through suitable Confidence Building Measures and involve them in the ODL Programmes to strengthen their livelihoods. Despite various initiatives taken up by ministry and other institutions, there is a vacuum of information among the disadvantaged communities. It is now well realised and understood that capacity building systems for such target groups need to be radically different from “Business as Usual Approach”. Authors of this paper have the experience of working for the Promotion, Monitoring and Supervision of ODL programmes in these areas. During 2012-13 a series of “Out of Box Approaches” were initiated by the authors for sensitising these communities. Results have been overwhelming with sizeable participation of people from disadvantaged communities. This paper highlights such new participatory approaches to sensitise the communities and results of such interventions. The paper has been divided in to Four Parts. Part-I describes the socio economic conditions of these areas and the constraints by the people in accessing information. Part-II describes the Confidence Building Measures like “Khula Manch” [Open Interactive Sessions with Community] initiated by the IGNOU Regional Centre Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh) and the response of the communities for such interventions. Part-III describes the initiatives taken by the Regional Centre to sensitise Slum Dwellers in Bhopal. This section also highlights Academic Support Services extended to Slum Dwellers in Slum Areas and the results of such interventions. Part –IV describes the experiences of joint initiatives with “Village Panchayats” in rural areas of District –Khandwa in Madhya Pradesh and lastly Part-V describes overall Conclusions and Recommendations. DOI: 10.5901/mjss.2015.v6n5p538

Carbon sequestration potential in agroforestry system in India: an analysis for carbon project

India is a large developing country with more than seventy per cent population earning their livelihood from diverse land use activities. Changing climate is a worry for the nation but the country cannot afford to slow down the developing/developmental activities. Landuse activities in irrigated agro-ecosystems have started shifting from traditional agriculture to smart agriculture to meet the country’s food requirements and secure livelihood security. But this shift has been achieved at the cost of natural resources and degradation of environment. Realizing the benefits of climate smart agriculture in the changing scenario, farmers are adapting slowly to it but appropriate details of climate vulnerability and package of climate smart agriculture including tree-crop interaction are very limited for adoption. It is important to assess the strengths and weaknesses of carbon sequestration (CS) projects with respect to their practical potential rather than biophysical potential for registration under clean development mechanism for additional income. There is a need to address the technical, economic, legal and social issues of the adopters because they have to lock their land for long time for CS projects, therefore confidence building measures are essentially required to make them aware/motivate for adoption of trees on their farms for mitigation of greenhouse gases (GHGs) and adaptation against changing climate. However, the potential of agroforestry (AF) systems has not been reflected in registration of CS projects due to lack of best practices in AF, procedures and methodologies for carbon accounting, etc., which requires thorough review to develop appropriate models for payments of environmental benefits. Poplar based AF has been considered here as an example to understand the process of accounting CS and its practical applicability for environmental payments.

Security in space: Issues at stake

When discussing international texts and measures for improving security in space, one has to use precise terminology in order for any negotiating party to be clear with definitions. In the context of space security, several texts are being prepared to deal with this issue with different perspectives. Beyond the sole diplomatic aspect of these different proposals, it is important to make sure that they can be efficient in practice. In this respect, the Eu initiated project of an international code of conduct may prove to be a first important so called “transparency and confidence building measure” in space.

WHEN IMPORTERS TURN TO EXPORTING OIL AND GAS — THE SHALE GAS HYPE AND CERTAIN GEOPOLITICAL CHANGES LIE AHEAD IN THE EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN

The Middle East, the world’s only major source of low-cost oil, will remain at the core of the long-term prospects of the world oil market. The IEA went too far referring to the “shale hydrocarbon revolution born in the USA”. For the time being, the global energy landscape has not been turned upside down. It is China’s soaring energy consumption rather than the US’ rising production that will fundamentally shift the world energy order. Some analysts claim that the Sino-Russian relationship will truly shift global energy boundaries: pipelines are turning east. Global oil prices may fall if and when significant volumes of additional Iranian oil return to the market. A new petroleum frontier in the Eastern Mediterranean complicates the manifold conflicts, but opens up new chances for cooperation. There are huge opportunities created by the discovery of gas in the Eastern Mediterranean — not least for countries that are short of both money and energy. Developing these opportunities will require cooperation, and could be both a lucrative and politically rewarding confidence-building measure.

Eisenhower and the Cold War Arms Race: “Open Skies” and the Military-Industrial Complex

Some people have all the luck. The late President Dwight D. Eisenhower was one of them. His running mate and vice president, Richard M. Nixon, ended up tarred with the Vietnam War and accused of suborning democracy with Watergate. Plenty of similar things happened on Eisenhower's watch. He almost got the country into the same Vietnam War at the time of Dien Bien Phu. He undertook to overthrow legitimate governments through covert operations of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) across the globe. Eisenhower engaged in so many crises that his secretary of state, John Foster Dulles, coined the term “brinkmanship” to denote the art of getting into a crisis but then out of it. Eisenhower pre-delegated authority to military commanders to use nuclear weapons. On his watch the United States innovated the thermonuclear bomb and began a nuclear buildup that ended with thousands of delivery vehicles and tens of thousands of warheads and bombs.Eisenhower's reputation by the end of his presidency was not high, but in retrospect historians have often reevaluated him favorably. Despite his brinkmanship, one school of thought considers him a peacemaker. Several of President Eisenhower's speeches or diplomatic maneuvers have served his reputation well over the years. His 1961 farewell speech warning about the military-industrial complex is by far the greatest, but he also gets good press for his “atoms for peace” speech of 1953 and—the subject of this book—his “Open Skies” initiative of 1955.In Eisenhower and the Cold War Arms Race, Helen Bury provides us with the latest examination of Open Skies, a diplomatic maneuver at the 1955 Geneva summit whereby Eisenhower sought to convince the Soviet Union to adopt, as a major confidence-building measure, a scheme that would permit both sides to conduct legal aerial photography of the other for intelligence purposes. Clear intelligence on the Soviet Union would have enabled Eisenhower to calibrate U.S. military budgets finely and might have avoided some of the crises that later arose. Nikita Khrushchev, afraid the CIA might discover how weak the Soviet Union actually was, rejected the proposal.That much is familiar. What is extraordinary in Bury's work is her argument that Eisenhower the peacemaker kept on the case. That is, she argues that the president made repeated attempts to induce Soviet leaders to accept what they had spurned. This is an intriguing proposition, and I would like to believe it. But I fall short of doing so for two reasons.First, the Open Skies Eisenhower exists in tandem with the brinkmanship president. On nuclear issues, his proposal for a nuclear test ban as well as one for General and Complete Disarmament foundered on the issue of inspections (i.e., verification). By no means was the Soviet Union the only rejectionist. Eisenhower would have been no more successful in selling limited on-site inspections to John McCone at the Atomic Energy Commission or to Curtis LeMay at the Strategic Air Command than he was to the Soviet government.Bury seems to treat Open Skies as if it existed by itself. But Eisenhower launched a massive nuclear buildup in response to each of the successive intelligence gaps—on missiles and bombers. He predelegated authority to employ nuclear weapons, creating a “Strangelovian” dilemma. He cooperated in giving the U.S. Navy a bigger share of the nuclear pie in the form not only of ballistic-missile submarines but also of nuclear-armed aircraft carriers. He integrated and coordinated all the targeting plans for those forces in the Single Integrated Operations Plan (SIOP). For Bury to be convincing in her depiction of an Open Skies Eisenhower, she would have to show that these military programs did not conflict with Eisenhower's arms control efforts. That argument is absent here.The second count is evidence. Bury marshals and carefully deploys the evidence on the Geneva summit proposal for Open Skies. I kept waiting for the material that would show Eisenhower bringing up his proposal time after time until Khrushchev was sick of hearing about it. Instead I got sick of waiting. Beyond the rhetoric in some letters exchanged between U.S. and Soviet leaders in late 1957 and 1958, only vague and circumstantial allusions to late-term Eisenhower moves are to be found here. Missing is the record of staff work that might show the letters to be deliberate attempts to revive Open Skies, as well as evidence that the assertions in Eisenhower's letters were not simply debating points offered in the long struggle to define a framework for on-site inspection acceptable to both sides. More work needs to be done on the subject. For the meantime, Bury has given us a very good account of Open Skies in 1955.