Q & A Archive

Leaders from Egypt, Iran, Bangladesh, Nigeria, Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, and Turkey attended a Developing 8 summit in Abuja, Nigeria in July. In an e-mail interview, Gareth Jenkins, Istanbul-based analyst and author of “Political Islam in Turkey: Running West, Heading East?“, explains the background and current state of the D-8. WPR: What is the historic background and focus of the Developing 8, and how is it evolving? Gareth Jenkins: The Developing 8 (D-8) was founded on June 15, 1997, in Istanbul. It was the brainchild of Necmettin Erbakan, modern Turkey’s first Islamist prime minister, who wanted to create a Muslim alternative […]

Bad day for the French defense industry: Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said that the final decision on a fighter jet purchase will be made after the upcoming Brazilian presidential elections on Oct. 3, but before he leaves office on Jan. 1, 2011. The contract, expected to be worth upwards of $3 billion, was all but awarded to the French Rafale earlier this year, before the Brazilian Defense Ministry objected to a decision being made before its tender and performance evaluation had been completed. Meanwhile, Russia opened its search for amphibious command vessels to an international tender, after […]

A few more eyebrow-raisers in terms of France’s defense purchases: The head of France’s procurement agency traveled to Washington over the summer to discuss the purchase of Reaper UAV drones, and the French military is anxiously awaiting delivery of a batch of already purchased Javelin missiles for use in Afghanistan. The Javelins are a minor purchase, and needed to fill an urgent operational gap. But they come on the heels of similar gaps in light-armor vehicles being filled with second-hand U.S. equipment last year. The drone purchase, on the other hand, marks a pretty significant strategic choice hanging in the […]

There’s an easy punchline in the fact that despite its “zero problems with neighbors” policy increasingly bearing fruit, Turkey’s defense spending continues to climb. But the truth is, if the U.S. is able to live with the instability that could result from “turning the page” on Iraq, that’s because it will remain distant. Turkey and Iraq’s other neighbors, however, once again have a very unpredictable near- and medium-term forecast on their borders. Add to that the inherent volatility of the current standoff over Iran’s nuclear program and the nature of the Middle East, and the fact that Turkey is hedging […]

Addressing the possibility that the U.S. and Europe will shy away from military interventions post-Iraq/post-Afghanistan, Richard Gowan suggests that emerging countries — Brazil, China and India, in particular — could very well step in to fill the gap in the context of U.N. state-building operations. It tracks well with what Matt Armstrong wrote in his WPR feature article, U.N. Peacekeeping as Public Diplomacy. (Gowan’s article in that issue, The Tragedy of 21st Century U.N. Peacekeeping, makes for good reading, too, as a cautionary note.) In this case, emerging countries’ interest in burnishing their global bona fides would overlap with U.S. […]

A propos my post of the other day, here’s more along the same lines from Carlyle Thayer writing at East Asia Forum, who frames it as China’s soft power vs. U.S. smart power. And once again, U.S. smart power seems to have made a significant comeback. Significantly, as Thayer puts it, “The timing is bad for China as the regional security architecture looks set to gain a new lease on life and expand into new areas of cooperation.” Add to that the fact that the soon-to-include-the-U.S. grouping, EAS, is apparently gaining an edge over the sans-U.S. ASEAN+3 grouping favored by […]

In the midst of a post on Turkey-India relations, and how they are limited by each seeing the other through the prism of Cyprus and Pakistan respectively, Mehmet Ozkan makes a good point about Turkey’s lack of membership in any of the emerging power forums, like BRIC or IBSA. He argues that such an involvement would help India and Turkey develop institutional ties that they currently lack. But it occurred to me that it would also be a solid credential ratifying Turkey’s status as not just just a regional power, but as a global middle power. I’m surprised that hasn’t […]

A good rundown from Ajai Shukla of India’s, and China’s, ambitious targets and mediocre results. The great Indian Ocean Panic of 2009 could still very well turn out to be a dud.