In Geopolitics This Week
Parallel Leadership Bid Splinters Libyan Politics, Compellence and Deterrence at Play in the Ukraine Crisis, Viable Alternatives to the Strait of Malacca for China, and other stories.
Parallel Leadership Bid Splinters Libyan Politics
Libya's internal divisions are poised to deepen as the Libyan House of Representatives named a new prime minister. Following the collapse of planned elections late last year, the Government of National Accord (GNA) wants to take control of Libya's political future after Abdulhamid al-Dbeibah’s UN-backed interim Government of National Unity (GNU) failed to bring stability to the country, and has outright refused to step down. Fathi Bashagha has been sworn in as the new Prime Minister, assuming leadership in a parallel administration.
The move threatens to once again split Libyan politics between two warring factions with separate administrations, each claiming to speak for the Libyan people. Dbeibah was installed in 2021 as head of the GNU, a body put in place through a UN-backed process to oversee the run-up to elections in December that never took place. Reports indicate that Dbeibah has rejected the GNA parliament's moves, saying he will only relinquish power after a national election. As another schism develops in Libyan politics, the actions of foreign states may once again prove the deciding factor with international players still actively contesting the political climate in Libya for their own ends. Russia, Egypt, France and the United Arab Emirates — among others — have backed Khalifa Haftar's Libyan National Army while Turkey, the US, and some European countries have supported the UN-backed Tripoli government.
Foreign powers have already voiced their support for Bashagha’s candidacy. In Cairo, Egyptian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ahmed Hafez expressed the country’s support for the legitimacy of the Libyan House of Representatives, urging Bashagha to assume his new responsibilities by enacting laws and granting legitimacy to the executive authority of the new prime minster. In a similar vein, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova chose to recognize the vote held by the Libyan House of Representatives as one that “should be respected.” The Russian position remains consistent with its years-long involvement in Libya (along with Egypt and the UAE) in support of the military leader Khalifa Hifter, who was one of the members participating in the process of nominating and approving the candidacy of Bashagha.
Compellence and Deterrence at Play in the Ukraine Crisis
Regardless of the values or political system which define a country’s position in the international system, every country in the world seeks in some way to deter or compel other countries in order to ensure their own survival and achieve their strategic goals. Countries seek to deter others from taking actions perceived as harmful to their national interests, while at the same time strive to obtain leverage that can be used to compel others to be receptive to their wants and requests.
Not all countries are bestowed with equal capabilities to do this, as some possess natural advantages such as mountainous terrain or strategic depth through vast territories that enhance their position, while others are utterly exposed. Some countries are able to generate adequate deterrent and compellent power by simply harnessing their own resources, while others must seek protective alliances with a stronger partner. Both concepts — deterrence and compellence — are necessary to understand the tensions currently simmering between Russia, Ukraine, the United States and NATO, because the crisis is the result of interlocking, multi-faceted and dynamic factors years in the making.
In the Russian view, the collapse of the Soviet Union led to a drastic fall in Moscow’s freedom of action in its near-abroad, as former Eastern Bloc states increased their ability to push back against Russian power by joining alliances and coalitions with more powerful actors. In 2008 and 2014, however, Russia signaled that it would no longer idly accept the growing influence of the EU and NATO in its geographic periphery by using limited military engagements as a form of compellence against Georgia and Ukraine in order to raise the costs of any form of integration into the Euro-Atlantic bloc.
On the other hand, Ukraine — spurred on by financial, political, and military support from EU and NATO member states — has sought closer alignment with the Euro-Atlantic bloc as a form of deterrence in order to offset Russia’s regional military advantages. Moreover, Kiev has prioritized deterrence against Russia in order to preserve its importance as a transit country for Russian natural gas flowing to European markets. Russian energy exports to European customers forms an important source of income for the Russian state, meaning that Ukraine’s energy infrastructure acts as a deterrent against Russia because preserving that revenue stream is in the interests of Moscow. Even Russia’s limited military interventions in Ukraine since 2014 have taken place at a distance from the energy transit infrastructure that connects Russia to Europe, and these energy supplies have continued to flow largely without interruptions even as relations between Moscow and Kiev break down.
Viable Alternatives to the Strait of Malacca for China
The current state of affairs in the Strait of Malacca affords an element of enhanced protection to trade routes used by the United States and its allies, a significant part of which includes trade with China. Yet over the past two decades, Chinese influence in the area has steadily increased, leading US strategists to pay more attention to the Strait as they look to challenge Beijing’s growing power across all domains. In the unlikely event of a major war between the US and China, the Strait would become a critical zone of control which both powers would seek to dominate by all the means at their disposal.
If the US was able to maintain undisputed dominance of the Strait during an armed conflict, it could pose a crippling threat to China’s economic activity. For this reason, China has incentives to drastically expand its naval capabilities generally, and intensify naval operations around the Strait specifically. Moreover, China’s development is at the mercy fuel supplies as the country’s economic growth is dependent on an ever-increasing need for oil, the vast majority of which passes through the Strait as it is imported from Saudi Arabia and other countries in the Gulf. This reliance on the Strait for development needs has been recognized by Beijing, which is why its leadership seeks to facilitate the opening of alternative maritime trade routes, — such as the Thai Canal — bypassing the Strait of Malacca and, by extension, US leverage over China’s economic development.
A more feasible approach than militarily dominating the Strait for Beijing would be the construction of an oil pipeline in Thailand which would transport the resource quicker and easier to China. Alternatively, a rail link currently being constructed across the Malay Peninsula, which is expected to be completed in the near future as part of China’s Belt and Road Initiative, may also offer Beijing a means to bypass concentrated US military power at the Strait. This network promises to not only transport freight, but passengers as well, which would work to further integrate Malaysia’s domestic economy with that of China’s. For China, a number of geopolitical alternatives to the Strait may be found in Southeast Asia, and could promise ways to secure continued development while diminishing US leverage over China’s ambitions.