January 11, 2016
The year 2015 picked up where 2014 had left off: with a myriad of conflicts. The wars in Syria, Iraq, Libya and Ukraine are still in full swing, and the “Islamic State” still controls huge swats of territory in the middle-east. Boko Haram is still murdering thousands of people in the Lake Chad region and terrorist groups remain a powerful threat in Somalia, Kenya or Mali.
Older conflicts also took a new turn. A cease-fire exists on paper in South-Sudan but the situation on the ground tells another story, and the same could be said in the Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo or Libya. The civil war in Yemen has now become a regional war with Gulf states, with Saudi Arabia leading the charge, involved on the side of formally ousted President Saleh against the Houthis insurgency supported by the Shiia community led by Iran. Furthermore, a more aggressive Russia decided to jump into the Syria conflict, muddying the waters even further.
Terrorism also continued its rise in 2015 due not only to the attacks perpetrated by IS or Al Qaeda, but also the clear return of ideological terrorism and increasing number of “lone” or unaffiliated terrorists. No continent has been spared, and despite the minimal technical means, the damage has been severe.
Consequence of all of the above are the largest refugee streams since WWII, which have put western politicians under tremendous amounts of pressure as fear and uncertainty grip large portions of western populations. The refugee crisis is not only causing bureaucratic nightmares or economic concerns – the latter compounding the financial crisis in Europe – but is also accelerating the return of far-right populism and nationalism, which all sides of the political spectrum are trying to benefit from.
In this chaos two things stand out from a terrorism and a political perspective: France’s feet of clay and the return of international diplomacy.
Je suis shattered
Before the first shots were fired in the Charlie Hebdo offices on 7 January, France’s reputation for counter-terrorism was second to none in Europe. A 2008 Foreign Policy article described France as the second worst place to be a terrorist after Jordan, and this reputation was founded. The country had the legislation, the know-how, the structure and above all, the ruthlessness to be highly effective in its fight against terrorism. Being suspected of terrorism in France was a quasi-death sentence as preventive arrests and indefinite detention based on legal loopholes masterfully managed by the six anti-terror judges of the 14e Parquet de Paris limited movement and access of any suspect. Externally, the DGSE’s work in Africa and the middle-east – especially its HUMINT network – allowed them to regularly nip terrorist plots in the bud and connect the dots.
That is not to say France had a perfect record. The 1980s, with the Action Direct and Palestinian terrorism, or the attacks of the Groupe Islamiste Armé (GIA) in 1994-95, showed the flaws. However, its sterling record during Al Qaeda’s golden age (1993-2006), despite being a high risk target, fortified France’s reputation as a dangerous place for terrorists, a reputation that quickly became a myth.
The cracks began to show with Mohamed Merah in 2012. Not only had he managed to hit three targets in a short amount of time, but he also held police and GIGN personnel in check with a lengthy hostage situation. France could be hit, and its security forces stalled long enough for damage to occur. The question was whether or not this was an exception or the sign of real vulnerability. The giant was bleeding. How would its enemies react?
2013 and 2014 saw few and very small attempts, including a short period in the autumn of 2014 where some attacks were carried out using cars and knives. Attacks that are impossible to prevent as Israel is finding out since September 2014. So while some of the conditions were being assembled, it didn’t appear as though the attacks by Merah had emboldened terrorists to act on French territory.
As is now well known, this situation completely changed in 2015 and the feet of clay of France’s counter-terrorism apparatus were made for all to see. First with the attacks on Charlie Hebdo – claimed for Al Qaeda – and the HyperCacher, claimed for the “Islamic State”. With these attacks, the tone was set for a year that saw no less than ten terrorist attacks occur, most of them by lone attackers, as in the case of the Thalys train in August. This annus horribilis for the French counter-terrorism and security forces culminated in the incredibly well-planned and IS supported attacks in Paris on November 13, that left 130 people dead and hundreds more injured.
What could have been an expensive warning for French decision makers and security forces when Charlie Hebdo was attacked – the same could be argued for Merah – actually confirmed their vulnerability. The other attacks chipped away at France’s reputation until it and its surrounding myth were completely shattered. What remains is a country at a loss, confused on how it should proceed in the months and years ahead and forced to make a show of strength, which is often a poor decision. In 2015, the myth of France as the fortress of counter-terrorism was destroyed and this is the terrorists’ greatest victory that year.
The Return of International Diplomacy
“Where, indeed, were those working international conferences so familiar to the diplomats of the past, so different from the brief public-relations and photo-exercise summits which had now taken their place?”
This sentence was written by historian Eric Hobsbawm in 1994 as he looked at the tendencies of international relations and diplomacy. While some summits and meetings have occurred in the 21 years since the question was asked, 2015 certainly provided the world with a return to “old school” diplomacy, and arguably, at the cost of the United Nations.
Considering the number of conflicts and crises around the globe at this point, such a resurgence is not surprising. Close circle diplomacy was used for the Minsk accords affecting the war in Ukraine; idem with the negotiations which led to the accord surrounding Iranian nuclear development and the Geneva meeting trying to solve the Syrian conflict. Saudi Arabia has been very active on its own in this field, organizing two coalitions, one involved in the Yemen civil war and the other in the Syrian conflict; France appealed both to its bilateral relationships and the EU agreement for support in its “war” against the “Islamic State” and the USA is now acting more as a power broker in conflicts, as seen in the above mentioned conflicts as well as in the Turkey/Russia crisis or those involving China and south-east Asian states over the Spratly islands.
While this type of international diplomacy can be lauded, it nonetheless raises serious questions as to the role and importance of the United Nations in international diplomacy. In each case, the UN has either not been involved or merely acted as a rubber stamp on decisions decided outside its arena. In fact, things got so bad for the UN that secretary general Ban-Ki Moon held a press conference in November pleading for a larger UN involvement in diplomatic affairs. It would have been hard to imagine such a situation occurring ten or twenty years ago.
In light of the growing number of conflicts, it is difficult to see this trend reversing in 2016. Yet the last two months of 2015 nonetheless provided some incentive for a return of international organization diplomacy. The COP 21 agreement actually yielded some tangible results while the negotiations surrounding the Syrian conflict and the threat of the “Islamic State” shifted its stage to the UNSC in December. However, the issue of effectiveness will remain: is the likelihood of peace greater if achieved in close quarters, or under the auspices of an international organization? The outcome of the Syrian war will most likely provide the answer.