Security

South Africa and Nuclear Security

April 19, 2015 / Africa, security, Theory / , , , ,
Image of South Africa taken by NASA. Source: CIA World Factbook, South Africa
Image of South Africa taken by NASA. Source: CIA World Factbook, South Africa

Terrified of outside intervention, the South African military created six atomic weapons, which were dismantled after the collapse of apartheid. The nuclear material, however, was preserved, despite requests (by the United States and others) that the South African government convert this material into a less-dangerous form. This material is stored at a site called Pelindaba, which is the country’s main nuclear research center. In 2007 two separate teams attacked the facility, and were defeated by sheer luck. A recent account of this event makes for terrifying reading, less because of how close the attackers came to succeeding than for the lackadaisical response of the South African government. According to this account, recently posted on African Defense magazine, President Obama has twice written private letters to President Jacob Zuma, to ask that South Africa convert the uranium into a form less readily converted into nuclear weapons. The South Africans have failed to respond. This article merits careful reading.

The concept of human security is currently gaining traction in International Relations theory. This paradigm defines security as those issues that threaten not only the state but also the population. This approach has many merits, particularly given the rise of non-state actors as threats, and the impact that climate change may have on entire populations. Advocates of a security paradigm known as realism, however, critique human security as being a “slippery slope.” If you adopt this approach to security, what problems are not security issues? While I believe that human security has many advantages over realism as a means to address global challenges, this particular critique by realists does give me pause. Events such as the attack on Pelindaba are particularly dangerous, in way that seems to merit a clearly defined theoretical approach. One can only hope that behind the scenes South Africa is taking more steps to ensure security at this site than seems to be the case based on this report.

Shawn Smallman, Portland State University

What strange nightmare happened in Coahuila?

March 28, 2019 / Latin America, security / , , , ,
Metropolitan cathedral in Mexico City, from the CIA World Factbook, which states that it is in the public domain
Metropolitan cathedral in Mexico City, from the CIA World Factbook, which states that it is in the public domain

In September 2014 there was a tragic event in Mexico when 43 students in the state of Guerrero, Mexico disappeared. Despite some conspiracy theories, it is now clear that all were murdered by a drug cartel, which worked in collaboration with both the local police and the mayor, as well as the mayor’s wife. Mexicans were shocked by this event, which caused a political crisis for President Enrique Pena Nieto.  The world media gave extensive coverage to events, as people were stunned at the brazenness of the crime. The Iguala murders became a symbol of the horror of the Mexican drug war, and the extent to which it has corrupted not only the police, but also political elites. But what happened in Coahuila, in northeastern Mexico, and why have events there not received similar coverage? …

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Mexican Ambush

April 9, 2015 / Latin America, security / , , ,

Since 2006, when the Mexican drug war began, perhaps 150,000 people have either been killed or disappeared. Very few of these murders have ever been prosecuted. Even the number of dead is controversial, and it is possible that the true figure is much higher. The Mexican government has had significant successes recently, such as the capture on February 25, 2015 of La Tuta, the head of the Knights Templar in the Mexican state of Michoacan. Still, as quickly as one cartel is destroyed, a new one emerges to take its place. In this particular case, the New Generation cartel is quickly filling the space vacated by the Knights Templar. If anything, the level of violence against the state seems to be increasing. …

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Climate Change and War: the origins of the Syrian Conflict

April 17, 2015 / climate change, environment / , , ,

Climatologists and social scientists have been debating whether a severe drought in the MIddle East may have led to the outbreak of war in that country for at least two years. I discussed this topic in a blog post published in 2013. A new study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences is now receiving a lot of attention for its detailed study of the question. So far, the best coverage that I have seen of the topic has been Andrew Freeman’s article, “The Seeds of War,” which combines text with photographs and graphics. I highly recommend this piece. You can also read the abstract for the original article here. Of course,  few questions are trickier than the causation of a war, which are multi-factorial. The anniversary of the outbreak of World War One last year led to a plethora of academic studies about that war’s causation. By its nature, it’s almost impossible to do counter-factual history; that is, to demonstrate what would have happened if something had not taken place. Nonetheless, the causal link in Syria between the collapse of the agricultural economy, the explosive growth of urban populations, and the breaking of social bonds, is a persuasive one. …

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Canada’s Project Habbakuk: the Strangest Military Technology ever

October 12, 2018 / Arctic, security / , ,
"Ice Wall" by CNaene at freedigitalphotos.net
“Ice Wall” by CNaene at freedigitalphotos.net

Military history is filled with strange ideas, which are often created out of extreme necessity. Sometimes they work, such as Hannibal’s ruse of tying torches to the horns of cattle, in order to mislead the Roman army regarding the direction his forces were moving. More often they fail. Still, of all the strange, mad ideas in military history, none was ever so odd as Project Habbakuk. During World War Two, the survival of Britain depended upon victory in the Battle of the Atlantic. An island nation, Britain could not obtain the raw materials and food that it needed to survive if it could not defeat German submarines. As the sea battle moved to a moment of crisis, a strange man of questionable genius named Geoffrey Pyke conceived the idea of building warships out of ice. As bizarre as the idea sounded, a memo on the idea was brought to Churchill in December 1942. He loved the concept and and ordered that research on the project move forward.

It soon became clear that ice was an unsuitable building material. Fortunately, scientists soon learned that by mixing wood pulp with ice an incredibly strong material could be created, which would also resist melting. The plan was to create an immense aircraft carrier, many times larger than any other in existence, out of this new material. According to L.D. Cross (Code Name Habbakuk, p. 52) it would have reached two million tons, and have stretched more than the length of two football fields. Its sheer mass would have helped –at least in theory– to make the ship unsinkable. The work of of designing and building the ship was given to Canada, although Canadian Prime Minister McKenzie King thought, as revealed in his famous diaries, that this was “another of those mad, wild schemes (that started) with a couple of crazy men in England” (L.D. Cross, Code Name Habbakuk, 63). Nonetheless, the government decided to build a small prototype on Patricia Lake in Alberta, Canada. Of course, in practice the idea was impossibly complex, and by 1943 Britain had nearly won the Battle of the Atlantic. The project was finally abandoned in December 1943. …

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Free MOOCs on World War One

October 22, 2014 / academia / ,

Although I teach both hybrid and online classes, I haven’t yet taken a MOOC, which is a free online class made available to a large number of people. Now the BBC has worked with four British universities to make available four MOOCs on World War One, and I’m thinking about joining. Curious too? You can sign up here.

Professor Smallman, Portland State University

Malcolm Fraser’s Dangerous Allies

May 27, 2015 / security / , ,
"Globe Retro" by vectorolie at freedigitalphotos.net
“Globe Retro” by vectorolie at freedigitalphotos.net

Malcolm Fraser was the Prime Minister of Australia from 1975 to 1983. He has recently written Dangerous Allies with Cain Roberts, in which he analyzes Australia’s grand strategy from the 19th century to the present. At its core, his argument is that Australia has always adopted a policy of “strategic dependency,” first with Britain and then with the United States. Given Australia’s economic and military weakness in the nineteenth century, he believes that this was an inevitable choice. At the same time, this approach has consistently led Australia into disaster. Fraser clearly has no love for Churchill. He describes the losses and perils that Australia faced from Gallipoli during World War One, to North Africa in World War Two. By 1941 Australian forces were far from the home front, which was left vulnerable by the British debacle in Singapore. Overall, Fraser’s depiction of Australia’s relationship with Great Britain is one in which the nation made great sacrifices for little reward. …

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Nuclear Sabotage in Europe

April 17, 2015 / energy, security / , , ,
"Nuclear" by luigi diamanti at freedigitalphotos.net
“Nuclear” by luigi diamanti at freedigitalphotos.net

In a previous article, I discussed how the French government has sought to suppress evidence regarding the massive costs that a nuclear accident would entail. But an accident is not the only danger facing nuclear reactors as a recent incident at Belgium’s Doel 4 nuclear reactor makes clear. Some person -most likely an employee at the plant- deliberately damaged an oil drainage system from a turbine, which caused so much damage that the plant will be closed until after the New Year. Now Belgium may face blackouts if winter demand for electricity is particularly high. The Doel 4 incident is particularly worrying because the plant is located in a heavily populated part of Europe.

Remarkably two other reactors are also offline in Belgium, because cracks were found in reactor casings, which means that Belgium has lost more than half of its nuclear capacity. While people often argue that renewable power is too intermittent to be relied upon, events in Belgium again make the point that there are also major risks in relying on nuclear power. In this particular case, we know very little about the sabotage. Was it carried out by an isolated individual? If so, what was their motivation? Clearly threats to to the integrity of nuclear reactors do not always come from outside the plant. Currently the case in Belgium is being investigated by the Belgian police. Do these forces have the expertise to investigate nuclear crimes? The Belgian case also should make security experts and plant owners question their practices. How carefully are plant employees screened, and what monitoring systems are in place? …

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The 2013 French White Paper on Defence and National Security

April 17, 2015 / Europe, security / , ,
Cities of France by David Monniaux, Wikipedia Commons.
Cities of France by David Monniaux, Wikipedia Commons.

National white papers on military strategy are key tools to understand trends in security thought. Last year, the French government issued a White paper on National Defense and security, which has a few interesting points. First, although the document never once uses the term “human security,” this concept has influenced the document: “The term `risk’ refers to any danger that does not include any hostile intent but which might impact on the security of France: they therefore include political events as well as natural, industrial, health and technological risks.” Part of the reason for this shifting emphasis may come from the fact that “France no longer faces any direct, explicit conventional military threat against its territory.” Indeed, Europe’s current security situation, the document suggests, is nearly unique in its history: “… since the end of the Cold War, the European continent has ceased to be the epicenter for global strategic confrontation. This is without precedent in the history of our continent.” …

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Video Review: the Knot: a deliberate human act

June 24, 2017 / Latin America, mystery / , , ,
"Part Of A Globe With Map Of South America" by digidreamgrafix at freedigitalphotos.net
“Part Of A Globe With Map Of South America” by digidreamgrafix at freedigitalphotos.net

In an earlier post, I talked about what appeared to be a case of bioterrorism in Brazil, in which someone deliberately introduced a fungus, called “Witches’ Broom” into the cacao growing region of northeastern Brazil. Dilson Araujo posted a comment, in which he talked about the documentary he had made on the topic, which had kindly posted to Youtube. I’ve watched the video, which seeks to describe the immense impact that this event had, and to explore why there the Brazilian state failed to appropriately investigate the crime. More than just a documentary, this video represents an important historical document, which contains eyewitness evidence about events during that terrible period from 1989 through the early 1990s. The film is sub-titled in English, and makes for gripping viewing, in particular in the final twenty minutes.

One of the common beliefs about Witches’ Broom was that if it had been introduced deliberately, the reason likely was a political one, to undermine the power of the great landowners. This idea seems to concern the film-maker, because the documentary began with a fairy-tale history of witches’ broom, in which a female narrator described how this event freed rural workers from the oppression of the northeastern countryside; at the end of this story, the narrator was revealed to be a witch. Paired with the following scene, in which President Dilma Rousseff announced a Truth Commission in Brazil, I at first feared that the documentary might be a polemic. Instead, the director wanted to make the point that in Brazil there are many truths. Sadly, because of the inequality and rural oppression that did exist in Brazil at the time of the crime, those who were victimized seemed at times almost defensive. One of the points that an interviewee made was that the majority of cacao producers were not people of great wealth, as over 90% had fewer than a 100 hectares. …

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