Ukraine Crisis Undermines US Interests Around the World

Sino-U.S. diplomacy hit a bump last week after President Barack Obama met with the Dalai Lama, Tibet’s exiled religious leader. Britain and France both faced significant backlashes from Beijing after similar meetings. Fortunately for Obama, the United States’ close economic relationship with China will likely ensure that fallout will be limited to frosty diplomatic protests that will not result in a prolonged nuclear winter.

Disproportionately repressive force against peaceful protesters, often in the form of organized thuggery, has become a common theme in a number of conflicted cities worldwide, most recently in Venezuela. Demonstrators faced off with violent thugs in last summer’s marches in Istanbul and other Turkish cities. In Iran, they are called the Baij. More recently, Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych tried to use similar groups in an attempt to put down the protests that finally ousted him.

TECHNOLOGY

Consumer interest in privacy has surged with news of retail hacking and broad U.S. government surveillance revealed by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden. Some smartphone apps now claim to provide a thin layer of security, while more savvy users are finding ways to hide their virtual tracks using encrypted social media products and networks.

Contrary to President Barack Obama’s promised reliance on career Foreign Service officers to fill U.S. ambassadorial positions, his administration is nominating a large number of political allies and fundraisers, and many are not qualified for the job. Filling senior overseas posts with men and women with no foreign policy experience is nothing new, but in his second term Obama is opening the floodgates to a group of appointees whose common thread appears to be a wholesale lack of knowledge of the countries where they will live and work.

As first-round talks to curtail Iran’s nuclear weapons program closed last week there was no evidence to suggest that the coming negotiations can succeed. Few observers expect a resolution within the allotted six months; even fewer expect Tehran to agree to the seven key concessions LIGNET has identified to assure that Iran’s nuclear effort is solely for civilian purposes.

Radical Islamists in the unruly Sinai Peninsula appear to be targeting Egypt’s tourism industry, which has suffered from the country’s instability since 2011. The downing last month of an Egyptian air force helicopter with a surface-to-air missile is a serious development, one which could derail peace efforts on the strategically important peninsula.