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Entry
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1AC
Tournament: Golden Desert | Round: 1 | Opponent: Kent Denver | Judge: Arhem 1AC
Contention 1 is Relations Plan solves relations 2 ways- expands credibility and soft power in the region Hinderdael 11 M.A. candidate at SAIS Bologna Center, concentrating in American Foreign Policy and Energy, Resources, and Environment Klaas Hinderdael, Breaking the Logjam: Obama's Cuba Policy and a Guideline for Improved Leadership, by http://bcjournal.org/volume-14/breaking-the-logjam.html?printerFriendly=true
Conclusion The two countries’ histories have long been intertwined, particularly after the Monroe Doctrine of 1823 gave rise to the American belief that it would become the hemisphere’s protector. Until the immediate aftermath of Fidel Castro’s revolution, Cuba provided a testing ground for the promotion of American ideals, social beliefs, and foreign policies. In the context of Raúl shifting course in Cuba, the Obama administration has the opportunity to highlight the benefits of both the use of soft power and a foreign policy of engagement. As evidence mounts that the United States is ready to engage countries that enact domestic reforms, its legitimacy and influence will grow. Perhaps future political leaders, in Iran or North Korea for example, will be more willing to make concessions knowing that the United States will return in kind. The United States should not wait for extensive democratization before further engaging Cuba, however. One legacy of the Cold War is that Communism has succeeded only where it grew out of its own, often nationalistic, revolutions. As it has with China and Vietnam, the United States should look closely at the high payoffs stemming from engagement. By improving relations, America can enhance its own influence on the island’s political structure and human rights policies. At home, with the trade deficit and national debt rising, the economic costs of the embargo are amplified. Recent studies estimate that the US economy foregoes up to $4.84 billion a year and the Cuban economy up to $685 million a year.50 While US-Cuban economic interests align, political considerations inside America have shifted, as “commerce seems to be trumping anti-Communism and Florida ideologues.”51 Clearly, public opinion also favors a new Cuba policy, with 65 percent of Americans now ready for a shift in the country’s approach to its neighboring island.52 At this particular moment in the history of US-Cuban relations, there is tremendous promise for a breakthrough in relations. In a post-Cold War world, Cuba no longer presents a security threat to the united States, but instead provides it with economic potential. American leaders cannot forget the fact that an economic embargo, combined with diplomatic isolation, has failed to bring democracy to Cuba for over 50 years. American policymakers should see Cuba as an opportunity to reap the political, economic, and strategic rewards of shifting its own policies toward engagement. By ending the economic embargo and normalizing diplomatic relations with the island, President Obama would indicate that he is truly willing to extend his hand once America’s traditional adversaries unclench their fists.
Cuba is key to US-Latin American Relations – specifically spills over to global cooperation on nuclear material transfers and warming Shifter ‘12 (Michael is an Adjunct Professor of Latin American Studies at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and writes for the Council's journal Foreign Affairs. He serves as the President of Inter-American Dialogue. “Remaking the Relationship: The United States and Latin America,” April, IAD Policy Report, http://www.thedialogue.org/PublicationFiles/IAD2012PolicyReportFINAL.pdf)
Cuba, too, poses a significant challenge for relations between the United States and Latin America. The 50-year-old US embargo against Cuba is rightly criticized throughout the hemisphere as a failed and punitive instrument. It has long been a strain on US-Latin American relations. Although the United States has recently moved in the right direction and taken steps to relax restrictions on travel to Cuba, Washington needs to do far more to dismantle its severe, outdated constraints on normalized relations with Cuba. Cuba is one of the residual issues that most obstructs more effective US-Latin American engagement. At the same time, Cuba’s authoritarian regime should be of utmost concern to all countries in the Americas. At present, it is the only country without free, multi-party elections, and its government fully controls the press. Latin American and Caribbean nations could be instrumental in supporting Cuba’s eventual transition to democratic rule. An end to the US policy of isolating Cuba, without setting aside US concern about human rights violations, would be an important first step. Many of the issues on the hemispheric agenda carry critical global dimensions. Because of this, the United States should seek greater cooperation and consultation with Brazil, Mexico, and other countries of the region in world forums addressing shared interests. Brazil has the broadest international presence and influence of any Latin American nation. In recent years it has become far more active on global issues of concern to the United States. The United States and Brazil have clashed over such issues as Iran’s nuclear program, non-proliferation, and the Middle East uprisings, but they have cooperated when their interests converged, such as in the World Trade Organization and the G-20 (Mexico, Argentina, and Canada also participate in the G-20), and in efforts to rebuild and provide security for Haiti. Washington has worked with Brazil and other Latin American countries to raise the profile of emerging economies in various international financial agencies, including the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. In addition to economic and financial matters, Brazil and other Latin American nations are assuming enhanced roles on an array of global political, environmental, and security issues. Several for which US and Latin American cooperation could become increasingly important include: As the world’s lone nuclear-weapons-free region, Latin America has the opportunity to participate more actively in non-proliferation efforts. Although US and Latin American interests do not always converge on non-proliferation questions, they align on some related goals. For example, the main proliferation challenges today are found in developing and unstable parts of the world, as well as in the leakage—or transfer of nuclear materials—to terrorists. In that context, south-south connections are crucial. Brazil could play a pivotal role. Many countries in the region give priority to climate change challenges. This may position them as a voice in international debates on this topic. The importance of the Amazon basin to worldwide climate concerns gives Brazil and five other South American nations a special role to play. Mexico already has assumed a prominent position on climate change and is active in global policy debates. Brazil organized the first-ever global environmental meeting in 1992 and, this year, will host Rio+20. Mexico hosted the second international meeting on climate change in Cancún in 2010. The United States is handicapped by its inability to devise a climate change policy. Still, it should support coordination on the presumption of shared interests on a critical policy challenge. Latin Americans are taking more active leadership on drug policy in the hemisphere and could become increasingly influential in global discussions of drug strategies. Although the United States and Latin America are often at odds on drug policy, they have mutual interests and goals that should allow consultation and collaboration on a new, more effective approach to the problem.
It’s not irreversible – we’re at the tipping point now – every reduction key Nuccitelli 12 Dana, is an environmental scientist at a private environmental consulting firm in the Sacramento, California area. He has a Bachelor's Degree in astrophysics from the University of California at Berkeley, and a Master's Degree in physics from the University of California at Davis. He has been researching climate science, economics, and solutions as a hobby since 2006, and has contributed to Skeptical Science since September, 2010, http://www.skepticalscience.com/realistically-what-might-future-climate-look-like.html, HM We're not yet committed to surpassing 2°C global warming, but as Watson noted, we are quickly running out of time to realistically give ourselves a chance to stay below that 'danger limit'. However, 2°C is not a do-or-die threshold. Every bit of CO2 emissions we can reduce means that much avoided future warming, which means that much avoided climate change impacts. As Lonnie Thompson noted, the more global warming we manage to mitigate, the less adaption and suffering we will be forced to cope with in the future. Realistically, based on the current political climate (which we will explore in another post next week), limiting global warming to 2°C is probably the best we can do. However, there is a big difference between 2°C and 3°C, between 3°C and 4°C, and anything greater than 4°C can probably accurately be described as catastrophic, since various tipping points are expected to be triggered at this level. Right now, we are on track for the catastrophic consequences (widespread coral mortality, mass extinctions, hundreds of millions of people adversely impacted by droughts, floods, heat waves, etc.). But we're not stuck on that track just yet, and we need to move ourselves as far off of it as possible by reducing our greenhouse gas emissions as soon and as much as possible. There are of course many people who believe that the planet will not warm as much, or that the impacts of the associated climate change will be as bad as the body of scientific evidence suggests. That is certainly a possiblity, and we very much hope that their optimistic view is correct. However, what we have presented here is the best summary of scientific evidence available, and it paints a very bleak picture if we fail to rapidly reduce our greenhouse gas emissions. If we continue forward on our current path, catastrophe is not just a possible outcome, it is the most probable outcome. And an intelligent risk management approach would involve taking steps to prevent a catastrophic scenario if it were a mere possibility, let alone the most probable outcome. This is especially true since the most important component of the solution - carbon pricing - can be implemented at a relatively low cost, and a far lower cost than trying to adapt to the climate change consequences we have discussed here (Figure 4).
It’s real and is anthropogenic---reject negative evidence Prothero 12 Donald R. Prothero, Professor of Geology at Occidental College and Lecturer in Geobiology at the California Institute of Technology, 3-1-2012, "How We Know Global Warming is Real and Human Caused," Skeptic, 17.2, EBSCO How do we know that global warming is real and primarily human caused? There are numerous lines of evidence that converge toward this conclusion. 1. Carbon Dioxide Increase Carbon dioxide in our atmosphere has increased at an unprecedented rate in the past 200 years. Not one data set collected over a long enough span of time shows otherwise. Mann et al. (1999) compiled the past 900 years' worth of temperature data from tree rings, ice cores, corals, and direct measurements in the past few centuries, and the sudden increase of temperature of the past century stands out like a sore thumb. This famous graph is now known as the "hockey stick" because it is long and straight through most of its length, then bends sharply upward at the end like the blade of a hockey stick. Other graphs show that climate was very stable within a narrow range of variation through the past 1000, 2000, or even 10,000 years since the end of the last Ice Age. There were minor warming events during the Climatic Optimum about 7000 years ago, the Medieval Warm Period, and the slight cooling of the Litde Ice Age in the 1700s and 1800s. But the magnitude and rapidity of the warming represented by the last 200 years is simply unmatched in all of human history. More revealing, the timing of this warming coincides with the Industrial Revolution, when humans first began massive deforestation and released carbon dioxide into the atmosphere by burning an unprecedented amount of coal, gas, and oil. 2. Melting Polar Ice Caps The polar icecaps are thinning and breaking up at an alarming rate. In 2000, my former graduate advisor Malcolm McKenna was one of the first humans to fly over the North Pole in summer time and see no ice, just open water. The Arctic ice cap has been frozen solid for at least the past 3 million years (and maybe longer), 4 but now the entire ice sheet is breaking up so fast that by 2030 (and possibly sooner) less than half of the Arctic will be ice covered in the summer. 5 As one can see from watching the news, this is an ecological disaster for everything that lives up there, from the polar bears to the seals and walruses to the animals they feed upon, to the 4 million people whose world is melting beneath their feet. The Antarctic is thawing even faster. In February-March 2002, the Larsen B ice shelf -- over 3000 square km (the size of Rhode Island) and 220 m (700 feet) thick -- broke up in just a few months, a story -typical of nearly all the ice shelves in Antarctica. The Larsen B shelf had survived all the previous ice ages and interglacial warming episodes over the past 3 million years, and even the warmest periods of the last 10,000 years -- yet it and nearly all the other thick ice sheets on the Arctic, Greenland, and Antarctic are vanishing at a rate never before seen in geologic history. 3. Melting Glaciers Glaciers are all retreating at the highest rates ever documented. Many of those glaciers, along with snow melt, especially in the Himalayas, Andes, Alps, and Sierras, provide most of the freshwater that the populations below the mountains depend upon -- yet this fresh water supply is vanishing. Just think about the percentage of world's population in southern Asia (especially India) that depend on Himalayan snowmelt for their fresh water. The implications are staggering. The permafrost that once remained solidly frozen even in the summer has now thawed, damaging the Inuit villages on the Arctic coast and threatening all our pipelines to the North Slope of Alaska. This is catastrophic not only for life on the permafrost, but as it thaws, the permafrost releases huge amounts of greenhouse gases which are one of the major contributors to global warming. Not only is the ice vanishing, but we have seen record heat waves over and over again, killing thousands of people, as each year joins the list of the hottest years on record. (2010 just topped that list as the hottest year, surpassing the previous record in 2009, and we shall know about 2011 soon enough). Natural animal and plant populations are being devastated all over the globe as their environments change. 6 Many animals respond by moving their ranges to formerly cold climates, so now places that once did not have to worry about disease-bearing mosquitoes are infested as the climate warms and allows them to breed further north. 4. Sea Level Rise All that melted ice eventually ends up in the ocean, causing sea levels to rise, as it has many times in the geologic past. At present, the sea level is rising about 3-4 mm per year, more than ten times the rate of 0.1-0.2 mm/year that has occurred over the past 3000 years. Geological data show that the sea level was virtually unchanged over the past 10,000 years since the present interglacial began. A few mm here or there doesn't impress people, until you consider that the rate is accelerating and that most scientists predict sea levels will rise 80-130 cm in just the next century. A sea level rise of 1.3 m (almost 4 feet) would drown many of the world's low-elevation cities, such as Venice and New Orleans, and low-lying countries such as the Netherlands or Bangladesh. A number of tiny island nations such as Vanuatu and the Maldives, which barely poke out above the ocean now, are already vanishing beneath the waves. Eventually their entire population will have to move someplace else. 7 Even a small sea level rise might not drown all these areas, but they are much more vulnerable to the large waves of a storm surge (as happened with Hurricane Katrina), which could do much more damage than sea level rise alone. If sea level rose by 6 m (20 feet), most of the world's coastal plains and low-lying areas (such as the Louisiana bayous, Florida, and most of the world's river deltas) would be drowned. Most of the world's population lives in low-elevation coastal cities such as New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, D.C., Miami, and Shanghai. All of those cities would be partially or completely under water with such a sea level rise. If all the glacial ice caps melted completely (as they have several times before during past greenhouse episodes in the geologic past), sea level would rise by 65 m (215 feet)! The entire Mississippi Valley would flood, so you could dock an ocean liner in Cairo, Illinois. Such a sea level rise would drown nearly every coastal region under hundreds of feet of water, and inundate New York City, London and Paris. All that would remain would be the tall landmarks such as the Empire State Building, Big Ben, and the Eiffel Tower. You could tie your boats to these pinnacles, but the rest of these drowned cities would lie deep underwater. Climate Change Critic's Arguments and Scientists' Rebuttals Despite the overwhelming evidence there are many people who remain skeptical. One reason is that they have been fed distortions and misstatements by the global warming denialists who cloud or confuse the issue. Let's examine some of these claims in detail: * "It's just natural climatic variability." No, it is not. As I detailed in my 2009 book, Greenhouse of the Dinosaurs, geologists and paleoclimatologists know a lot about past greenhouse worlds, and the icehouse planet that has existed for the past 33 million years. We have a good understanding of how and why the Antarctic ice sheet first appeared at that time, and how the Arctic froze over about 3.5 million years ago, beginning the 24 glacial and interglacial episodes of the "Ice Ages" that have occurred since then. We know how variations in the earth's orbit (the Milankovitch cycles) controls the amount of solar radiation the earth receives, triggering the shifts between glacial and interglacial periods. Our current warm interglacial has already lasted 10,000 years, the duration of most previous interglacials, so if it were not for global warming, we would be headed into the next glacial in the next 1000 years or so. Instead, our pumping greenhouse gases into our atmosphere after they were long trapped in the earth's crust has pushed the planet into a "super-interglacial," already warmer than any previous warming period. We can see the "big picture" of climate variability most clearly in ice cores from the EPICA (European Project for Ice Coring in Antarctica), which show the details of the last 650,000 years of glacial-inters glacial cycles (Fig. 2). At no time during any previous interglacial did the carbon dioxide levels exceed 300 ppm, even at their very warmest. Our atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are already close to 400 ppm today. The atmosphere is headed to 600 ppm within a few decades, even if we stopped releasing greenhouse gases immediately. This is decidedly not within the normal range of "climatic variability," but clearly unprecedented in human history. Anyone who says this is "normal variability" has never seen the huge amount of paleoclimatic data that show otherwise. * "It's just another warming episode, like the Medieval Warm Period, or the Holocene Climatic Optimum or the end of the Little Ice Age." Untrue. There were numerous small fluctuations of warming and cooling over the last 10,000 years of the Holocene. But in the case of the Medieval Warm Period (about 950-1250 A.D.), the temperatures increased only 1°C, much less than we have seen in the current episode of global warming (Fig. 1). This episode was also only a local warming in the North Atlantic and northern Europe. Global temperatures over this interval did not warm at all, and actually cooled by more than 1°C. Likewise, the warmest period of the last 10,000 years was the Holocene Climatic Optimum ( 5,000-9,000 B.C.E.) when warmer and wetter conditions in Eurasia contributed to the rise of the first great civilizations in Egypt, Mesopotamia, the Indus Valley, and China. This was largely a Northern Hemisphere-Eurasian phenomenon, with 2-3°C warming in the Arctic and northern Europe. But there was almost no warming in the tropics, and cooling or no change in the Southern Hemisphere. 8 From a Eurocentric viewpoint, these warming events seemed important, but on a global scale the effect was negligible. In addition, neither of these warming episodes is related to increasing greenhouse gases. The Holocene Climatic Optimum, in fact, is predicted by the Milankovitch cycles, since at that time the axial tilt of the earth was 24°, its steepest value, meaning the Northern Hemisphere got more solar radiation than normal -- but the Southern Hemisphere less, so the two balanced. By contrast, not only is the warming observed in the last 200 years much greater than during these previous episodes, but it is also global and bipolar, so it is not a purely local effect. The warming that ended the Little Ice Age (from the mid-1700s to the late 1800s) was due to increased solar radiation prior to 1940. Since 1940, however, the amount of solar radiation has been dropping, so the only candidate remaining for the post-1940 warming is carbon dioxide. 9 "It's just the sun, or cosmic rays, or volcanic activity or methane." Nope, sorry. The amount of heat that the sun provides has been decreasing since 1940, 10 just the opposite of the critics' claims (Fig. 3). There is no evidence of an increase in cosmic ray particles during the past century. 11 Nor is there any clear evidence that large-scale volcanic events (such as the 1815 eruption of Tambora in Indonesia, which changed global climate for about a year) have any long-term effects that would explain 200 years of warming and carbon dioxide increase. Volcanoes erupt only 0.3 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide each year, but humans emit over 29 billion tonnes a year, 12 roughly 100 times as much. Clearly, we have a bigger effect. Methane is a more powerful greenhouse gas, but there is 200 times more carbon dioxide than methane, so carbon dioxide is still the most important agent. 13 Every other alternative has been looked at and can be ruled out. The only clear-cut relationship is between human-caused carbon dioxide increase and global warming. * "The climate records since 1995 (or 1998) show cooling." That's simply untrue. The only way to support this argument is to cherry-pick the data. 14 Over the short term, there was a slight cooling trend from 1998-2000, but only because 1998 was a record-breaking El Nino year, so the next few years look cooler by comparison (Fig. 4). But since 2002, the overall long-term trend of warming is unequivocal. All of the 16 hottest years ever recorded on a global scale have occurred in the last 20 years. They are (in order of hottest first): 2010, 2009, 1998, 2005, 2003, 2002, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2001, 1997, 2008, 1995, 1999, 1990, and 2000. 15 In other words, every year since 2000 has been on the Top Ten hottest years list. The rest of the top 16 include 1995, 1997, 1998, 1999, and 2000. Only 1996 failed to make the list (because of the short-term cooling mentioned already). * "We had record snows in the winter of 2009-2010, and also in 2010-2011." So what? This is nothing more than the difference between weather (short-term seasonal changes) and climate (the long-term average of weather over decades and centuries and longer). Our local weather tells us nothing about another continent, or the global average; it is only a local effect, determined by short-term atmospheric and oceano-graphic conditions. 16 In fact, warmer global temperatures mean more moisture in the atmosphere, which increases the intensity of normal winter snowstorms. In this particular case, the climate change critics forget that the early winter of November-December 2009 was actually very mild and warm, and then only later in January and February did it get cold and snow heavily. That warm spell in early winter helped bring more moisture into the system, so that when cold weather occurred, the snows were worse. In addition, the snows were unusually heavy only in North America; the rest of the world had different weather, and the global climate was warmer than average. Also, the summer of 2010 was the hottest on record, breaking the previous record set in 2009. * "Carbon dioxide is good for plants, so the world will be better off." Who do they think they're kidding? The Competitive Enterprise Institute (funded by oil and coal companies and conservative foundations 17) has run a series of shockingly stupid ads concluding with the tag line "Carbon dioxide: they call it pollution, we call it life." Anyone who knows the basic science of earth's atmosphere can spot the gross inaccuracies in this ad. 18 True, plants take in carbon dioxide that animals exhale, as they have for millions of years. But the whole point of the global warming evidence (as shown from ice cores) is that the delicate natural balance of carbon dioxide has been thrown off balance by our production of too much of it, way in excess of what plants or the oceans can handle. As a consequence, the oceans are warming 19, 20 and absorbing excess carbon dioxide making them more acidic. Already we are seeing a shocking decline in coral reefs ("bleaching") and extinctions in many marine ecosystems that can't handle too much of a good thing. Meanwhile, humans are busy cutting down huge areas of temperate and tropical forests, which not only means there are fewer plants to absorb the gas, but the slash and burn practices are releasing more carbon dioxide than plants can keep up with. There is much debate as to whether increased carbon dioxide might help agriculture in some parts of the world, but that has to be measured against the fact that other traditional "breadbasket" regions (such as the American Great Plains) are expected to get too hot to be as productive as they are today. The latest research 21 actually shows that increased carbon dioxide inhibits the absorption of nitrogen into plants, so plants (at least those that we depend upon today) are not going to flourish in a greenhouse world. It is difficult to know if those who tell the public otherwise are ignorant of basic atmospheric science and global geochemistry, or if they are being cynically disingenuous. * "I agree that climate is changing, but I'm skeptical that humans are the main cause, so we shouldn't do anything." This is just fence sitting. A lot of reasonable skeptics deplore the right wing's rejection of the reality of climate change, but still want to be skeptical about the cause. If they want proof, they can examine the huge array of data that points directly to human caused global warming. 22 We can directly measure the amount of carbon dioxide humans are producing, and it tracks exactly with the amount of increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide. Through carbon isotope analysis, we can show that this carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is coming directly from our burning of fossil fuels, not from natural sources. We can also measure the drop in oxygen as it combines with the increased carbon levels to produce carbon dioxide. We have satellites in space that are measuring the heat released from the planet and can actually see the atmosphere getting warmer. The most crucial evidence emerged only within the past few years: climate models of the greenhouse effect predict that there should be cooling in the stratosphere (the upper layer of the atmosphere above 10 km or 6 miles in elevation), but warming in the troposphere (the bottom layer below 10 km or 6 miles), and that's exactly what our space probes have measured. Finally, we can rule out any other suspects (see above): solar heat is decreasing since 1940, not increasing, and there are no measurable increases in cosmic rays, methane, volcanic gases, or any other potential cause. Face it -- it's our problem. Why Do People Continue to Question the Reality of Climate Change? Thanks to all the noise and confusion over climate change, the general public has only a vague idea of what the debate is really about, and only about half of Americans think global warming is real or that we are to blame. 23 As in the evolution/creationism debate, the scientific community is virtually unanimous on what the data demonstrate about anthropogenic global warming. This has been true for over a decade. When science historian Naomi Oreskes 24 surveyed all peer-reviewed papers on climate change published between 1993 and 2003 in the world's leading scientific journal, Science, she found that there were 980 supporting the idea of human-induced global warming and none opposing it. In 2009, Doran and Kendall Zimmerman 25 surveyed all the climate scientists who were familiar with the data. They found that 95-99 agreed that global warming is real and human caused. In 2010, the prestigious Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences published a study that showed that 98 of the scientists who actually do research in climate change are in agreement over anthropogenic global warming. 26 Every major scientific organization in the world has endorsed the conclusion of anthropogenic climate change as well. This is a rare degree of agreement within such an independent and cantankerous group as the world's top scientists. This is the same degree of scientific consensus that scientists have achieved over most major ideas, including gravity, evolution, and relativity. These and only a few other topics in science can claim this degree of agreement among nearly all the world's leading scientists, especially among everyone who is close to the scientific data and knows the problem intimately. If it were not such a controversial topic politically, there would be almost no interest in debating it since the evidence is so clear-cut. If the climate science community speaks with one voice (as in the 2007 IPCC report, and every report since then), why is there still any debate at all? The answer has been revealed by a number of investigations by diligent reporters who got past the PR machinery denying global warming, and uncovered the money trail. Originally, there were no real "dissenters" to the idea of global warming by scientists who are actually involved with climate research. Instead, the forces with vested interests in denying global climate change (the energy companies, and the "free-market" advocates) followed the strategy of tobacco companies: create a smokescreen of confusion and prevent the American public from recognizing scientific consensus. As the famous memo 27 from the tobacco lobbyists said "Doubt is our product." The denialists generated an anti-science movement entirely out of thin air and PR. The evidence for this PR conspiracy has been well documented in numerous sources. For example, Oreskes and Conway revealed from memos leaked to the press that in April 1998 the right-wing Marshall Institute, SEPP (Fred Seitz's lobby that aids tobacco companies and polluters), and ExxonMobil, met in secret at the American Petroleum Institute's headquarters in Washington, D.C. There they planned a $20 million campaign to get "respected scientists" to cast doubt on climate change, get major PR efforts going, and lobby Congress that global warming isn't real and is not a threat. The right-wing institutes and the energy lobby beat the bushes to find scientists -- any scientists -- who might disagree with the scientific consensus. As investigative journalists and scientists have documented over and over again, 28 the denialist conspiracy essentially paid for the testimony of anyone who could be useful to them. The day that the 2007 IPCC report was released (Feb. 2, 2007), the British newspaper The Guardian reported that the conservative American Enterprise Institute (funded largely by oil companies and conservative think tanks) had offered $10,000 plus travel expenses to scientists who would write negatively about the IPCC report. 29 In February 2012, leaks of documents from the denialist Heartland Institute revealed that they were trying to influence science education, suppress the work of scientists, and had paid off many prominent climate deniers, such as Anthony Watts, all in an effort to circumvent the scientific consensus by doing an "end run" of PR and political pressure. Other leaks have shown 9 out of 10 major climate deniers are paid by ExxonMobil. 30 We are accustomed to hired-gun "experts" paid by lawyers to muddy up the evidence in the case they are fighting, but this is extraordinary -- buying scientists outright to act as shills for organizations trying to deny scientific reality. With this kind of money, however, you can always find a fringe scientist or crank or someone with no relevant credentials who will do what they're paid to do. Fishing around to find anyone with some science background who will agree with you and dispute a scientific consensus is a tactic employed by the creationists to sound "scientific". The NCSE created a satirical "Project Steve," 31 which demonstrated that there were more scientists who accept evolution named "Steve" than the total number of "scientists who dispute evolution". It may generate lots of PR and a smokescreen to confuse the public, but it doesn't change the fact that scientists who actually do research in climate change are unanimous in their insistence that anthropogenic global warming is a real threat. Most scientists I know and respect work very hard for little pay, yet they still cannot be paid to endorse some scientific idea they know to be false. The climate deniers have a lot of other things in common with creationists and other anti-science movements. They too like to quote someone out of context ("quote mining"), finding a short phrase in the work of legitimate scientists that seems to support their position. But when you read the full quote in context, it is obvious that they have used the quote inappropriately. The original author meant something that does not support their goals. The "Climategate scandal" is a classic case of this. It started with a few stolen emails from the Climate Research Unit of the University of East Anglia. If you read the complete text of the actual emails 32 and comprehend the scientific shorthand of climate scientists who are talking casually to each other, it is clear that there was no great "conspiracy" or that they were faking data. All six subsequent investigations have cleared Philip Jones and the other scientists of the University of East Anglia of any wrongdoing or conspiracy. 33 Even if there had been some conspiracy on the part of these few scientists, there is no reason to believe that the entire climate science community is secretly working together to generate false information and mislead the public. If there's one thing that is clear about science, it's about competition and criticism, not conspiracy and collusion. Most labs are competing with each other, not conspiring together. If one lab publishes a result that is not clearly defensible, other labs will quickly correct it. As James Lawrence Powell wrote: Scientists…show no evidence of being more interested in politics or ideology than the average American. Does it make sense to believe that tens of thousands of scientists would be so deeply and secretly committed to bringing down capitalism and the American way of life that they would spend years beyond their undergraduate degrees working to receive master's and Ph.D. degrees, then go to work in a government laboratory or university, plying the deep oceans, forbidding deserts, icy poles, and torrid jungles, all for far less money than they could have made in industry, all the while biding their time like a Russian sleeper agent in an old spy novel? Scientists tend to be independent and resist authority. That is why you are apt to find them in the laboratory or in the field, as far as possible from the prying eyes of a supervisor. Anyone who believes he could organize thousands of scientists into a conspiracy has never attended a single faculty meeting. 34 There are many more traits that the climate deniers share with the creationists and Holocaust deniers and others who distort the truth. They pick on small disagreements between different labs as if scientists can't get their story straight, when in reality there is always a fair amount of give and take between competing labs as they try to get the answer right before the other lab can do so. The key point here is that when all these competing labs around the world have reached a consensus and get the same answer, there is no longer any reason to doubt their common conclusion. The anti-scientists of climate denialism will also point to small errors by individuals in an effort to argue that the entire enterprise cannot be trusted. It is true that scientists are human, and do make mistakes, but the great power of the scientific method is that peer review weeds these out, so that when scientists speak with consensus, there is no doubt that their data are checked carefully Finally, a powerful line of evidence that this is a purely political controversy, rather than a scientific debate, is that the membership lists of the creationists and the climate deniers are highly overlapping. Both anti-scientific dogmas are fed to their overlapping audiences through right-wing media such as Fox News, Glenn Beck, and Rush Limbaugh. Just take a look at the "intelligent-design" cre-ationism website for the Discovery Institute. Most of the daily news items lately have nothing to do with creationism at all, but are focused on climate denial and other right-wing causes. 35 If the data about global climate change are indeed valid and robust, any qualified scientist should be able to look at them and see if the prevailing scientific interpretation holds up. Indeed, such a test took place. Starting in 2010, a group led by U.C. Berkeley physicist Richard Muller re-examined all the temperature data from the NOAA, East Anglia Hadley Climate Research Unit, and the Goddard Institute of Space Science sources. Even though Muller started out as a skeptic of the temperature data, and was funded by the Koch brothers and other oil company sources, he carefully checked and re-checked the research himself. When the GOP leaders called him to testify before the House Science and Technology Committee in spring 2011, they were expecting him to discredit the temperature data. Instead, Muller shocked his GOP sponsors by demonstrating his scientific integrity and telling the truth: the temperature increase is real, and the scientists who have demonstrated that the climate is changing are right (Fig. 5). In the fall of 2011, his study was published, and the conclusions were clear: global warming is real, even to a right-wing skeptical scientist. Unlike the hired-gun scientists who play political games, Muller did what a true scientist should do: if the data go against your biases and preconceptions, then do the right thing and admit it -- even if you've been paid by sponsors who want to discredit global warming. Muller is a shining example of a scientist whose integrity and honesty came first, and did not sell out to the highest bidder. 36 * Science and Anti-Science The conclusion is clear: there's science, and then there's the anti-science of global warming denial. As we have seen, there is a nearly unanimous consensus among climate scientists that anthropogenic global warming is real and that we must do something about it. Yet the smokescreen, bluster and lies of the deniers has created enough doubt so that only half of the American public is convinced the problem requires action. Ironically, the U.S. is almost alone in questioning its scientific reality. International polls taken of 33,000 people in 33 nations in 2006 and 2007 show that 90 of their citizens regard climate change as a serious problem 37 and 80 realize that humans are the cause of it. 38 Just as in the case of creationism, the U.S. is out of step with much of the rest of the world in accepting scientific reality. It is not just the liberals and environmentalists who are taking climate change seriously. Historically conservative institutions (big corporations such as General Electric and many others such as insurance companies and the military) are already planning on how to deal with global warming. Many of my friends high in the oil companies tell me of the efforts by those companies to get into other forms of energy, because they know that cheap oil will be running out soon and that the effects of burning oil will make their business less popular. BP officially stands for "British Petroleum," but in one of their ad campaigns about 5 years ago, it stood for "Beyond Petroleum." 39 Although they still spend relatively little of their total budgets on alternative forms of energy, the oil companies still see the handwriting on the wall about the eventual exhaustion of oil -- and they are acting like any company that wants to survive by getting into a new business when the old one is dying. The Pentagon (normally not a left-wing institution) is also making contingency plans for how to fight wars in an era of global climate change, and analyzing what kinds of strategic threats might occur when climate change alters the kinds of enemies we might be fighting, and water becomes a scarce commodity. The New York Times reported 40 that in December 2008, the National Defense University outlined plans for military strategy in a greenhouse world. To the Pentagon, the big issue is global chaos and the potential of even nuclear conflict. The world must "prepare for the inevitable effects of abrupt climate change -- which will likely come the only question is when regardless of human activity." Insurance companies have no political axe to grind. If anything, they tend to be on the conservative side. They are simply in the business of assessing risk in a realistic fashion so they can accurately gauge their future insurance policies and what to charge for them. Yet they are all investing heavily in research on the disasters and risks posed by climatic change. In 2005, a study commissioned by the re-insurer Swiss Re said, "Climate change will significantly affect the health of humans and ecosystems and these impacts will have economic consequences." 41 Some people may still try to deny scientific reality, but big businesses like oil and insurance and conservative institutions like the military cannot afford to be blinded or deluded by ideology. They must plan for the real world that we will be seeing in the next few decades. They do not want to be caught unprepared and harmed by global climatic change when it threatens their survival. Neither can we as a society. Extinction Brandenberg 99 (John and Monica Paxson, Visiting Prof. Researcher @ Florida Space Institute, Physicist Ph.D., Science Writer, Dead Mars Dying Earth, Pg 232-233) The ozone hole expands, driven by a monstrous synergy with global warming that puts more catalytic ice crystals into the stratosphere, but this affects the far north and south and not the major nations’ heartlands. The seas rise, the tropics roast but the media networks no longer cover it. The Amazon rainforest becomes the Amazon desert. Oxygen levels fall, but profits rise for those who can provide it in bottles. An equatorial high-pressure zone forms, forcing drought in central Africa and Brazil, the Nile dries up and the monsoons fail. Then inevitably, at some unlucky point in time, a major unexpected event occurs—a major volcanic eruption, a sudden and dramatic shift in ocean circulation or a large asteroid impact (those who think freakish accidents do not occur have paid little attention to life or Mars), or a nuclear war that starts between Pakistan and India and escalates to involve China and Russia . . . Suddenly the gradual climb in global temperatures goes on a mad excursion as the oceans warm and release large amounts of dissolved carbon dioxide from their lower depths into the atmosphere. Oxygen levels go down precipitously as oxygen replaces lost oceanic carbon dioxide. Asthma cases double and then double again. Now a third of the world fears breathing. As the oceans dump carbon dioxide, the greenhouse effect increases, which further warms the oceans, causing them to dump even more carbon. Because of the heat, plants die and burn in enormous fires, which release more carbon dioxide, and the oceans evaporate, adding more water vapor to the greenhouse. Soon, we are in what is termed a runaway greenhouse effect, as happened to Venus eons ago. The last two surviving scientists inevitably argue, one telling the other, “See! I told you the missing sink was in the ocean!” Earth, as we know it, dies. After this Venusian excursion in temperatures, the oxygen disappears into the soil, the oceans evaporate and are lost and the dead Earth loses its ozone layer completely. Earth is too far from the Sun for it to be the second Venus for long. Its atmosphere is slowly lost—as is its water—because of ultraviolet bombardment breaking up all the molecules apart from carbon dioxide. As the atmosphere becomes thin, the Earth becomes colder. For a short while temperatures are nearly normal, but the ultraviolet sears any life that tries to make a comeback. The carbon dioxide thins out to form a thin veneer with a few wispy clouds and dust devils. Earth becomes the second Mars—red, desolate, with perhaps a few hardy microbes surviving.
Second, Nuclear terrorism escalates to major nuclear war. Global coop on material transfers is key. *a. escalates to inter-state conflict – nations assume fissile material comes from the stocks of other countries – that forces retaliation b. Terrorists can acquire weapons – states can sponsor terrorism and terrorists can independently develop weapons c. Plan solves – cooperation on fissile material transfers is key because it prevents terrorists from acquiring dangerous weapons Ayson’10 Robert – Professor of Strategic Studies and Director of the Centre for Strategic Studies: New Zealand at the Victoria University of Wellington – “After a Terrorist Nuclear Attack: Envisaging Catalytic Effects,” Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, Volume 33, Issue 7, July, obtained via InformaWorld
A terrorist nuclear attack, and even the use of nuclear weapons in response by the country attacked in the first place, would not necessarily represent the worst of the nuclear worlds imaginable. Indeed, there are reasons to wonder whether nuclear terrorism should ever be regarded as belonging in the category of truly existential threats. A contrast can be drawn here with the global catastrophe that would come from a massive nuclear exchange between two or more of the sovereign states that possess these weapons in significant numbers. Even the worst terrorism that the twenty-first century might bring would fade into insignificance alongside considerations of what a general nuclear war would have wrought in the Cold War period. And it must be admitted that as long as the major nuclear weapons states have hundreds and even thousands of nuclear weapons at their disposal, there is always the possibility of a truly awful nuclear exchange taking place precipitated entirely by state possessors themselves. But these two nuclear worlds—a non-state actor nuclear attack and a catastrophic interstate nuclear exchange—are not necessarily separable. It is just possible that some sort of terrorist attack, and especially an act of nuclear terrorism, could precipitate a chain of events leading to a massive exchange of nuclear weapons between two or more of the states that possess them. In this context, today’s and tomorrow’s terrorist groups might assume the place allotted during the early Cold War years to new state possessors of small nuclear arsenals who were seen as raising the risks of a catalytic nuclear war between the superpowers started by third parties. These risks were considered in the late 1950s and early 1960s as concerns grew about nuclear proliferation, the so-called n+1 problem. It may require a considerable amount of imagination to depict an especially plausible situation where an act of nuclear terrorism could lead to such a massive inter-state nuclear war. For example, in the event of a terrorist nuclear attack on the United States, it might well be wondered just how Russia and/or China could plausibly be brought into the picture, not least because they seem unlikely to be fingered as the most obvious state sponsors or encouragers of terrorist groups. They would seem far too responsible to be involved in supporting that sort of terrorist behavior that could just as easily threaten them as well. Some possibilities, however remote, do suggest themselves. For example, how might the United States react if it was thought or discovered that the fissile material used in the act of nuclear terrorism had come from Russian stocks, and if for some reason Moscow denied any responsibility for nuclear laxity? The correct attribution of that nuclear material to a particular country might not be a case of science fiction given the observation by Michael May et al. that while the debris resulting from a nuclear explosion would be “spread over a wide area in tiny fragments, its radioactivity makes it detectable, identifiable and collectable, and a wealth of information can be obtained from its analysis: the efficiency of the explosion, the materials used and, most important … some indication of where the nuclear material came from.”41 Alternatively, if the act of nuclear terrorism came as a complete surprise, and American officials refused to believe that a terrorist group was fully responsible (or responsible at all) suspicion would shift immediately to state possessors. Ruling out Western ally countries like the United Kingdom and France, and probably Israel and India as well, authorities in Washington would be left with a very short list consisting of North Korea, perhaps Iran if its program continues, and possibly Pakistan. But at what stage would Russia and China be definitely ruled out in this high stakes game of nuclear Cluedo? In particular, if the act of nuclear terrorism occurred against a backdrop of existing tension in Washington’s relations with Russia and/or China, and at a time when threats had already been traded between these major powers, would officials and political leaders not be tempted to assume the worst? Of course, the chances of this occurring would only seem to increase if the United States was already involved in some sort of limited armed conflict with Russia and/or China, or if they were confronting each other from a distance in a proxy war, as unlikely as these developments may seem at the present time. The reverse might well apply too: should a nuclear terrorist attack occur in Russia or China during a period of heightened tension or even limited conflict with the United States, could Moscow and Beijing resist the pressures that might rise domestically to consider the United States as a possible perpetrator or encourager of the attack? Washington’s early response to a terrorist nuclear attack on its own soil might also raise the possibility of an unwanted (and nuclear aided) confrontation with Russia and/or China. For example, in the noise and confusion during the immediate aftermath of the terrorist nuclear attack, the U.S. president might be expected to place the country’s armed forces, including its nuclear arsenal, on a higher stage of alert. In such a tense environment, when careful planning runs up against the friction of reality, it is just possible that Moscow and/or China might mistakenly read this as a sign of U.S. intentions to use force (and possibly nuclear force) against them. In that situation, the temptations to preempt such actions might grow, although it must be admitted that any preemption would probably still meet with a devastating response. As part of its initial response to the act of nuclear terrorism (as discussed earlier) Washington might decide to order a significant conventional (or nuclear) retaliatory or disarming attack against the leadership of the terrorist group and/or states seen to support that group. Depending on the identity and especially the location of these targets, Russia and/or China might interpret such action as being far too close for their comfort, and potentially as an infringement on their spheres of influence and even on their sovereignty. One far-fetched but perhaps not impossible scenario might stem from a judgment in Washington that some of the main aiders and abetters of the terrorist action resided somewhere such as Chechnya, perhaps in connection with what Allison claims is the “Chechen insurgents’ … long-standing interest in all things nuclear.”42 American pressure on that part of the world would almost certainly raise alarms in Moscow that might require a degree of advanced consultation from Washington that the latter found itself unable or unwilling to provide.There is also the question of how other nuclear-armed states respond to the act of nuclear terrorism on another member of that special club. It could reasonably be expected that following a nuclear terrorist attack on the United States, both Russia and China would extend immediate sympathy and support to Washington and would work alongside the United States in the Security Council. But there is just a chance, albeit a slim one, where the support of Russia and/or China is less automatic in some cases than in others. For example, what would happen if the United States wished to discuss its right to retaliate against groups based in their territory? If, for some reason, Washington found the responses of Russia and China deeply underwhelming, (neither “for us or against us”) might it also suspect that they secretly were in cahoots with the group, increasing (again perhaps ever so slightly) the chances of a major exchange. If the terrorist group had some connections to groups in Russia and China, or existed in areas of the world over which Russia and China held sway, and if Washington felt that Moscow or Beijing were placing a curiously modest level of pressure on them, what conclusions might it then draw about their culpability? If Washington decided to use, or decided to threaten the use of, nuclear weapons, the responses of Russia and China would be crucial to the chances of avoiding a more serious nuclear exchange. They might surmise, for example, that while the act of nuclear terrorism was especially heinous and demanded a strong response, the response simply had to remain below the nuclear threshold. It would be one thing for a non-state actor to have broken the nuclear use taboo, but an entirely different thing for a state actor, and indeed the leading state in the international system, to do so. If Russia and China felt sufficiently strongly about that prospect, there is then the question of what options would lie open to them to dissuade the United States from such action: and as has been seen over the last several decades, the central dissuader of the use of nuclear weapons by states has been the threat of nuclear retaliation. If some readers find this simply too fanciful, and perhaps even offensive to contemplate, it may be informative to reverse the tables. Russia, which possesses an arsenal of thousands of nuclear warheads and that has been one of the two most important trustees of the non-use taboo, is subjected to an attack of nuclear terrorism. In response, Moscow places its nuclear forces very visibly on a higher state of alert and declares that it is considering the use of nuclear retaliation against the group and any of its state supporters. How would Washington view such a possibility? Would it really be keen to support Russia’s use of nuclear weapons, including outside Russia’s traditional sphere of influence? And if not, which seems quite plausible, what options would Washington have to communicate that displeasure? If China had been the victim of the nuclear terrorism and seemed likely to retaliate in kind, would the United States and Russia be happy to sit back and let this occur? In the charged atmosphere immediately after a nuclear terrorist attack, how would the attacked country respond to pressure from other major nuclear powers not to respond in kind? The phrase “how dare they tell us what to do” immediately springs to mind. Some might even go so far as to interpret this concern as a tacit form of sympathy or support for the terrorists. This might not help the chances of nuclear restraint. One way of reducing, but probably not eliminating, such a prospect, is further international cooperation on the control of existing fissile material holdings.
Third, lifting the embargo is a pre-requisite to meaningful scientific cooperation with Cuba – it would establish a framework for open engagement Pastrana et al., Sergio Jorge Pastrana is the Foreign Secretary of the Academia de Ciencias de Cuba, Michael T. Clegg is the Foreign Secretary of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and Donald Bren Professor of Biological Sciences, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the School of Biological Sciences, University of California, Irvine. 08 (Sergio Jorge, Michael T. Clegg, Science AAAS October 2008, “U.S. – Cuban Scientific Relations,” Vol. 322 no. 5900 p. 345, ACCESSED June 30, 2013, RJ) In a few years, the two oldest national academies of science in the world outside of Europe—those of the United States and Cuba—will celebrate their 150th anniversaries. Yet despite the proximity of both nations and many common scientific interests, the U.S. embargo on exchanges with Cuba, which began in 1961 and is now based on the 1996 U.S. Helms-Burton Act and subsequent regulations, has largely blocked scientific exchange. It's time to establish a new scientific relationship, not only to address shared challenges in health, climate, agriculture, and energy, but also to start building a framework for expanded cooperation. Restrictions on U.S.-Cuba scientific cooperation deprive both research communities of opportunities that could benefit our societies, as well as others in the hemisphere, particularly in the Caribbean. Cuba is scientifically proficient in disaster management and mitigation, vaccine production, and epidemiology. Cuban scientists could benefit from access to research facilities that are beyond the capabilities of any developing country, and the U.S. scientific community could benefit from high-quality science being done in Cuba. For example, Cuba typically sits in the path of hurricanes bound for the U.S. mainland that create great destruction, as was the case with Hurricane Katrina and again last month with Hurricane Ike. Cuban scientists and engineers have learned how to protect threatened populations and minimize damage. Despite the category 3 rating of Hurricane Ike when it struck Cuba, there was less loss of life after a 3-day pounding than that which occurred when it later struck Texas as a category 2 hurricane. Sharing knowledge in this area would benefit everybody. Another major example where scientific cooperation could save lives is Cuba's extensive research on tropical diseases, such as dengue fever. This viral disease is epidemic throughout the tropics, notably in the Americas, and one of the first recorded outbreaks occurred in Philadelphia in the 18th century. Today, one of the world's most outstanding research centers dedicated to dengue fever is in Cuba, and although it actively cooperates with Latin America and Africa, there is almost no interaction with U.S. scientists. Dengue fever presents a threat to the U.S. mainland, and sharing knowledge resources to counter outbreaks of the disease would be an investment in the health security of both peoples. Cuba has also made important strides in biotechnology, including the production of several important vaccines and monoclonal antibodies, and its research interests continue to expand in diverse fields, ranging from drug addiction treatment to the preservation of biodiversity. Cuban scientists are engaged in research cooperation with many countries, including the United Kingdom, Brazil, Mexico, China, and India. Yet there is no program of cooperation with any U.S. research institution. The value system of science—openness, shared communication, integrity, and a respect for evidence—provides a framework for open engagement and could encourage evidence-based approaches that cross from science into the social, economic, and political arenas. Beyond allowing for the mutual leveraging of knowledge and resources, scientific contacts could build important cultural and social links among peoples. A recent Council on Foreign Relations report argues that the United States needs to revamp its engagement with Latin America because it is no longer the only significant force in this hemisphere. U.S. policies that are seen as unfairly penalizing Cuba, including the imposition of trade limitations that extend into scientific relations, continue to undermine U.S. standing in the entire region, especially because neither Cuba nor any other Latin American country imposes such restrictions. As a start, we urge that the present license that permits restricted travel to Cuba by scientists, as dictated by the U.S. Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control, be expanded so as to allow direct cooperation in research. At the same time, Cuba should favor increased scientific exchanges. Allowing scientists to fully engage will not only support progress in science, it may well favor positive interactions elsewhere to promote human well-being. The U.S. embargo on Cuba has hindered exchanges for the past 50 years. Let us celebrate our mutual anniversaries by starting a new era of scientific cooperation.
Solves Laundry List Fedoroff 8 – subcommittee on research and science education, committee on science and technology, House of Representatives, 110 Congress, administrator of USAID, science and technology advisor to the Secretary of State and US Department of State (Nina, “International Science and Technology Cooperation,” Government Printing Office, 4/2/2008, http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-110hhrg41470/html/CHRG-110hhrg41470.htm)//RH Chairman Baird, Ranking Member Ehlers, and distinguished members of the Subcommittee, thank you for this opportunity to discuss science diplomacy at the U.S. Department of State. The U.S. is recognized globally for its leadership in science and technology. Our scientific strength is both a tool of “soft power” – part of our strategic diplomatic arsenal – and a basis for creating partnerships with countries as they move beyond basic economic and social development. Science diplomacy is a central element of the Secretary’s transformational diplomacy initiative, because science and technology are essential to achieving stability and strengthening failed and fragile states. SandT advances have immediate and enormous influence on national and global economies, and thus on the international relations between societies. Nation states, nongovernmental organizations, and multinational corporations are largely shaped by their expertise in and access to intellectual and physical capital in science, technology, and engineering. Even as SandT advances of our modern era provide opportunities for economic prosperity, some also challenge the relative position of countries in the world order, and influence our social institutions and principles. America must remain at the forefront of this new world by maintaining its technological edge, and leading the way internationally through science diplomacy and engagement. The Public Diplomacy Role of Science Science by its nature facilitates diplomacy because it strengthens political relationships, embodies powerful ideals, and creates opportunities for all. The global scientific community embraces principles Americans cherish: transparency, meritocracy, accountability, the objective evaluation of evidence, and broad and frequently democratic participation. Science is inherently democratic, respecting evidence and truth above all. Science is also a common global language, able to bridge deep political and religious divides. Scientists share a common language. Scientific interactions serve to keep open lines of communication and cultural understanding. As scientists everywhere have a common evidentiary external reference system, members of ideologically divergent societies can use the common language of science to cooperatively address both domestic and the increasingly trans-national and global problems confronting humanity in the 21st century. There is a growing recognition that science and technology will increasingly drive the successful economies of the 21st century. Science and technology provide an immeasurable benefit to the U.S. by bringing scientists and students here, especially from developing countries, where they see democracy in action, make friends in the international scientific community, become familiar with American technology, and contribute to the U.S. and global economy. For example, in 2005, over 50 of physical science and engineering graduate students and postdoctoral researchers trained in the U.S. have been foreign nationals. Moreover, many foreign-born scientists who were educated and have worked in the U.S. eventually progress in their careers to hold influential positions in ministries and institutions both in this country and in their home countries. They also contribute to U.S. scientific and technologic development: According to the National Science Board’s 2008 Science and Engineering Indicators, 47 of full-time doctoral science and engineering faculty in U.S. research institutions were foreign-born. Finally, some types of science – particularly those that address the grand challenges in science and technology – are inherently international in scope and collaborative by necessity. The ITER Project, an international fusion research and development collaboration, is a product of the thaw in superpower relations between Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev and U.S. President Ronald Reagan. This reactor will harness the power of nuclear fusion as a possible new and viable energy source by bringing a star to earth. ITER serves as a symbol of international scientific cooperation among key scientific leaders in the developed and developing world – Japan, Korea, China, E.U., India, Russia, and United States – representing 70 of the world’s current population. The recent elimination of funding for FY08 U.S. contributions to the ITER project comes at an inopportune time as the Agreement on the Establishment of the ITER International Fusion Energy Organization for the Joint Implementation of the ITER Project had entered into force only on October 2007. The elimination of the promised U.S. contribution drew our allies to question our commitment and credibility in international cooperative ventures. More problematically, it jeopardizes a platform for reaffirming U.S. relations with key states. It should be noted that even at the height of the cold war, the United States used science diplomacy as a means to maintain communications and avoid misunderstanding between the world’s two nuclear powers – the Soviet Union and the United States. In a complex multi-polar world, relations are more challenging, the threats perhaps greater, and the need for engagement more paramount. Using Science Diplomacy to Achieve National Security Objectives The welfare and stability of countries and regions in many parts of the globe require a concerted effort by the developed world to address the causal factors that render countries fragile and cause states to fail. Countries that are unable to defend their people against starvation, or fail to provide economic opportunity, are susceptible to extremist ideologies, autocratic rule, and abuses of human rights. As well, the world faces common threats, among them climate change, energy and water shortages, public health emergencies, environmental degradation, poverty, food insecurity, and religious extremism. These threats can undermine the national security of the United States, both directly and indirectly. Many are blind to political boundaries, becoming regional or global threats. The United States has no monopoly on knowledge in a globalizing world and the scientific challenges facing humankind are enormous. Addressing these common challenges demands common solutions and necessitates scientific cooperation, common standards, and common goals. We must increasingly harness the power of American ingenuity in science and technology through strong partnerships with the science community in both academia and the private sector, in the U.S. and abroad among our allies, to advance U.S. interests in foreign policy. There are also important challenges to the ability of states to supply their populations with sufficient food. The still-growing human population, rising affluence in emerging economies, and other factors have combined to create unprecedented pressures on global prices of staples such as edible oils and grains. Encouraging and promoting the use of contemporary molecular techniques in crop improvement is an essential goal for US science diplomacy. An essential part of the war on terrorism is a war of ideas. The creation of economic opportunity can do much more to combat the rise of fanaticism than can any weapon. The war of ideas is a war about rationalism as opposed to irrationalism. Science and technology put us firmly on the side of rationalism by providing ideas and opportunities that improve people’s lives. We may use the recognition and the goodwill that science still generates for the United States to achieve our diplomatic and developmental goals. Additionally, the Department continues to use science as a means to reduce the proliferation of the weapons’ of mass destruction and prevent what has been dubbed ‘brain drain’. Through cooperative threat reduction activities, former weapons scientists redirect their skills to participate in peaceful, collaborative international research in a large variety of scientific fields. In addition, new global efforts focus on improving biological, chemical, and nuclear security by promoting and implementing best scientific practices as a means to enhance security, increase global partnerships, and create sustainability.
Contention 2 is Multilat Anti-Americanism and unilateralism kill U.S. legitimacy – that causes interventions and escalation *unilateralism fails – a. power dilution – arms trade has fallen to NGOs, international organizations are too cumbersome and beaten by small regional alliances, GONGOs are resulting in proxy soft-power competition b. small state backlash – international norms created by unipolarity cause diffusion of power to smaller states with vetoes that they can use to control us in international institutions c. economic multipolarity – strong economic globalization means other countries have enough influence to American goals *unilateralism causes great power wars via aggressive intervention – military power creates the temptation of policymakers to use it—hegemons are inevitably more aggressive and that leads to adventurism – policymakers have incentives to engage in threat construction and greatly exaggerate threats that allow intervention – Iraq proves Kupchan 12 – Ph.D. in international relations from Oxford, Associate Professor of International Relations @gtown, Senior Fellow and Director of Europe Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations (Charles Kupchan, “Sorry, Mitt: It Won't Be an American Century”, FEBRUARY 6, 2012, http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2012/02/06/it_won_t_be_an_american_century?page=0,2) In an election season, such talk rolls easily off the tongue. But Romney's hackneyed rhetoric is woefully out of step -- both with an American electorate hungry for a less costly brand of foreign policy and with a world in the midst of tectonic change. A sharp economic downturn and expensive, inconclusive conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan have left Americans ready for a focus on the home front. Abroad, the charge for the next U.S. president can hardly be to stick his head in the sand and deny that the global distribution of power is fast changing. On the contrary, it is to react soberly and steadily to the implications of such change and ensure that the United States remains secure and prosperous even as economic and military strength spreads to new quarters. President Barack Obama is on the correct path. Leaving Iraq and overseeing a paced withdrawal from Afghanistan will bring U.S. commitments back into line with U.S. interests. Special operations and drone strikes have proved far more effective in fighting al Qaeda than has occupying countries in the Middle East and South Asia, and an offshore posture in the Persian Gulf is the best way to deal with Iran. Amid China's rise and the economic dynamism building in its neighborhood, Obama is right to downsize the U.S. presence in Europe and orchestrate a strategic "pivot" to East Asia. The move constitutes a necessary hedge against Chinese ambition and ensures that American workers will benefit from expanding markets in the Pacific Rim. These policies will enable the United States to simultaneously adjust to a shifting global landscape, husband its resources, and grow its economy -- facilitating the president's pledge to focus on "nation-building here at home." Romney has already denigrated Obama's pragmatism, charging that "our president thinks America is in decline." Obama shot back in his State of the Union address on Jan. 24 that "anyone who tells you that America is in decline … doesn't know what they're talking about." Obama decidedly has the upper hand in this back-and-forth. He recognizes that, the country's strengths notwithstanding, U.S. strategy must adjust to a world in which power will be more broadly distributed. And his focus on rebuilding the American economy speaks directly to an electorate yearning for more equity and prosperity at home. According to a recent Pew Research Center survey, 46 percent of Americans want the United States to "mind its own business," and 76 percent think the country should "concentrate more on our own national problems" than on foreign challenges. These are high numbers by historical standards -- a clear indication that the electorate is hurting economically and wary of strategic overreach. Romney should take note. His chest-thumping talk of a new American century still plays well in some quarters. But Obama's commitment to nation-building at home will play even better. Even if Romney's rhetoric were to get more domestic traction, it would still bear no resemblance to the new global landscape that is fast emerging. The United States is indeed an exceptional nation -- in its prized geographic location, commitment to freedom and democracy, and brand of international leadership. But the country's exceptionalism should not be used as an excuse to hide from global realities. China's GDP will catch up with America's over the course of the next decade. The World Bank predicts that the dollar, euro, and China's renminbi will become co-equals in a "multi-currency" monetary system by 2025. Goldman Sachs expects the collective GDP of the top four developing countries -- Brazil, China, India, and Russia -- to match that of the G-7 countries by 2032. The United States will no doubt exit the current slump and bounce back economically in the years ahead. Nonetheless, a more level global playing field is inevitable. To be sure, America's military superiority will remain second to none for decades to come. As the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have made amply clear, though, military primacy hardly ensures effective influence. And with the U.S. defense budget poised to shrink in the service of restoring the country's fiscal health, the United States will have to pick its fights carefully. Shrewd and judicious statecraft will be at least as important as raw power in ensuring the country's security. To acknowledge the need for the United States to adjust to prospective shifts in the global distribution of power is not, as Duke University professor Bruce Jentleson recently pointed out in Democracy, to be a declinist or a pessimist. It is to be a realist. And safely guiding the United States through this coming transition requires seeing the world as it is rather than retreating toward the illusory comfort of denial. Adjusting to the rise of the rest requires, for starters, making more room at the table for newcomers. That process is already well under way. The G-20 has supplanted the G-8, widening the circle for global consultations. In the aftermath of reforms adopted in 2010, developing countries now have enhanced weight at the World Bank and IMF. The enlargement of the U.N. Security Council, though currently bogged down in wrangling, is also in the offing. But making international institutions more representative is the easy part. More challenging will be managing the ideological diversity that will accompany the coming realignment in global power. Precisely because the United States is an exceptional nation, its version of liberal democracy may well prove to be the exception, not the rule. In China, Russia, and the sheikhdoms of the Persian Gulf, state-led brands of capitalism are holding their own -- and may well do so for the foreseeable future. The Arab Spring could finally bring democratic rule to at least some countries in the Middle East, but it is also breeding political Islam; democratization should not be mistaken for Westernization. Even emerging powers that are already democracies, such as India, Brazil, and Turkey, are charting their own paths. They regularly break with the United States and Europe on trade, Middle East diplomacy, military intervention, the environment, and other issues, preferring to side with other ascending states, whether democratic or not. Romney's paeans to American power are no excuse for his silence on how he plans to manage these complexities. Promoting international stability will grow more demanding as rising powers bring to the table their differing conceptions of order and governance. The United States has a key role to play in managing such diversity and channeling it toward cooperative ends. Overheated proclamations of American preeminence, however, will do more harm than good. If a new, consensual international order is to emerge, rising powers must be treated as stakeholders in that order, not merely as objects of American power. Shepherding the transition to this more pluralistic world is arguably the defining challenge facing U.S. statecraft in the years ahead. Romney appears ready to pave over this challenge by denying that such change is afoot and attempting to portray Obama's policies as "an eloquently justified surrender of world leadership." Obama should welcome this debate and refuse to let his opponents hide behind the veil of American exceptionalism. Democrats no longer need to feel vulnerable on national security; Obama has demonstrated smarts and strength on many issues, including the degradation of al Qaeda, the pivot to Asia, and the isolation of Iran. He understands that agile, firm diplomacy backed by American power will do much more for the United States than congratulatory talk of American primacy. A smarter, more selective, and less costly U.S. role in the world would not only help the United States get its own house in order, but also give rising powers the wider berth they seek. And good policy would also be good politics; Americans are keen to share with others the burdens and responsibilities of international engagement. The world desperately needs a brand of U.S. leadership that focuses not on ruling the roost, but on guiding a more diverse and unwieldy globe to consensus and cooperation. Multilat is the alternative – it leads to global coop and power sharing—it creates shared framework of interaction changes the way states interpret global politics *multilateralism solves global problems – a. fosters great power sharing – increased multilateral dialogue devises similar analytics lenses that make policies more readily adopted on a large scale b. increases international cooperation – lends legitimacy to policies by virtue of debate and increases efficient implementation of joint programs because actors feel invested in solutions – creates a self-reinforcing dynamic which creates new focal points for strategic interaction Pouliot, 11 — Professor of Political Science at McGill University (Vincent, “Multilateralism as an End in Itself”, International Studies Perspectives (2011) 12, 18–26) NG Because it rests on open, nondiscriminatory debate, and the routine exchange of viewpoints, the multilateral procedure introduces three key advantages that are gained, regardless of the specific policies adopted, and tend to diffuse across all participants. Contrary to the standard viewpoint, according to which a rational preference or functional imperative lead to multilateral cooperation, here it is the systematic practice of multilateralism that creates the drive to cooperate. At the theoretical level, the premise is that it is not only what people think that explains what they do, but also what they do that determines what they think (Pouliot 2010). Everyday multilateralism is a self-fulfilling practice for at least three reasons. First, the joint practice of multilateralism creates mutually recognizable and patterns of action among global actors. This process owes to the fact that practices structure social interaction (Adler and Pouliot forthcoming).2 Because they are meaningful, organized, and repeated, practices generally convey a degree of mutual intelligibility that allows people to develop social relations over time. In the field of international security, for example, the practice of deterrence is premised on a limited number of gestures, signals, and linguistic devices that are meant, as Schelling (1966:113) put it, to ‘‘getting the right signal across.’’ The same goes with the practice of multilateralism, which rests on a set of political and social patterns that establish the boundaries of action in a mutually intelligible fashion. These structuring effects, in turn, allow for the development of common frameworks for appraising global events. Multilateral dialog serves not only to find joint solutions; it also makes it possible for various actors to zoom in on the definition of the issue at hand—a particularly important step on the global stage. The point is certainly not that the multilateral procedure leads everybody to agree on everything—that would be as impossible as counterproductive. Theoretically speaking, there is room for skepticism that multilateralism may ever allow communicative rationality at the global level (see Risse 2000; Diez and Steans 2005). With such a diverse and uneven playing field, one can doubt that discursive engagement, in and of itself, can lead to common lifeworlds. Instead, what the practice of multilateralism fosters is the emergence of a shared framework of interaction—for example, a common linguistic repertoire—that allows global actors to make sense of world politics in mutually recognizable ways. Of course, they may not agree on the specific actions to be taken, but at least they can build on an established pattern of political interaction to deal with the problem at hand—sometimes even before it emerges in acute form. In today’s pluralistic world, that would already be a considerable achievement. In that sense, multilateralism may well be a constitutive practice of what Lu (2009) calls ‘‘political friendship among peoples.’’ The axiomatic practice of principled and inclusive dialog is quite apparent in the way she describes this social structure: ‘‘While conflicts, especially over the distribution of goods and burdens, will inevitably arise, under conditions of political friendship among peoples, they will be negotiated within a global background context of norms and institutions based on mutual recognition, equity in the distribution of burdens and benefits of global cooperation, and power-sharing in the institutions of global governance rather than domination by any group’’ (2009:54–55). In a world where multilateralism becomes an end in itself, this ideal pattern emerges out of the structuring effects of axiomatic practice: take the case of NATO, for instance, which has recently had to manage, through the multilateral practice, fairly strong internal dissent (Pouliot 2006). While clashing views and interests will never go away in our particularly diverse world, as pessimists are quick to emphasize (for example, Dahl 1999), the management of discord is certainly made easier by shared patterns of dialog based on mutually recognizable frameworks. Second, the multilateral procedure typically ensures a remarkable level of moderation in the global policies adopted. In fact, a quick historical tour d’horizon suggests that actors engaged in multilateralism tend to avoid radical solutions in their joint decision making. Of course, the very process of uniting disparate voices helps explain why multilateralism tends to produce median consensus. This is not to say that the multilateral practice inevitably leads to lowest common denominators. To repeat, because it entails complex and often painstaking debate before any actions are taken, the multilateral procedure forces involved actors to devise and potentially share similar analytical lenses that, in hindsight, make the policies adopted seem inherently, and seemingly ‘‘naturally,’’ moderate. This is because the debate about what a given policy means takes place before its implementation, which makes for a much smoother ride when decisions hit the ground. This joint interpretive work, which constitutes a crucial aspect of multilateralism, creates outcomes that are generally perceived as inherently reasonable. Participation brings inherent benefits to politics, as Bachrach (1975) argued in the context of democratic theory. Going after the conventional liberal view according to which actors enter politics with an already fixed set of preferences, Bachrach observes that most of the time people define their interests in the very process of participation. The argument is not that interests formed in the course of social interaction are in any sense more altruistic. It rather is that the nature and process of political practices, in this case multilateralism, matter a great deal in shaping participants’ preferences (Wendt 1999). In this sense, not only does the multilateral practice have structuring effects on global governance, but it is also constitutive of what actors say, want, and do (Adler and Pouliot forthcoming). Third and related, multilateralism lends legitimacy to the policies that it generates by virtue of the debate that the process necessarily entails. There is no need here to explain at length how deliberative processes that are inclusive of all stakeholders tend to produce outcomes that are generally considered more socially and politically acceptable. In the long run, the large ownership also leads to more efficient implementation, because actors feel invested in the enactment of solutions on the ground. Even episodes of political failure, such as the lack of UN reaction to the Rwandan genocide, can generate useful lessons when re-appropriated multilaterally—think of the Responsibility to Protect, for instance.3 From this outlook, there is no contradiction between efficiency and the axiomatic practice of multilateralism, quite the contrary. The more multilateralism becomes the normal or self-evident practice of global governance, the more benefits it yields for the many stakeholders of global governance. In fact, multilateralism as an end in and of itself could generate even more diffuse reciprocity than Ruggie had originally envisioned. Not only do its distributional consequences tend to even out, multilateralism as a global governance routine also creates self-reinforcing dynamics and new focal points for strategic interaction. The axiomatic practice of multilateralism helps define problems in commensurable ways and craft moderate solutions with wide-ranging ownership—three processual benefits that further strengthen the impetus for multilateral dialog. Pg. 21-23 Multilat promotes band-wagoning and international coalitions among allies, strengthening the US-led system *only multilateralism solves global problems, unilateralism fails for several reasons – a. technology – the internet and instant communications makes small states and non-state actors immune to hard power – even rogue states can shape public opinion against America through state-run news agencies b. threats – terrorism, disease and the private arms trade cannot be addressed via unilateralism – they are global problems that demand local solutions which only multilateralism resolves c. facilitates state-sponsored backlash – creates bloated international institutions that delay successful solutions – the failures of Kyoto, Copenhagen and every global trade treaty for the past 20 years prove that hard power doesn’t result in global cooperation – multilateralism results in joint-info sharing that solves Ikenberry and Kupchan 04 – (John Ikenberry and Charles Kupchan, “Liberal Realism: The Foundations of a Democratic Foreign Policy,” National Interest (Fall 2004)) It is misguided, however, to assume that America's preponderant power, when combined with an assertive unilateralism, promotes stability as a matter of course. As the record of the past four years makes clear, the unfettered exercise of U.S. primacy has not led to deference and bandwagoning, but to resentment and incipient balancing. The problem is not unipolarity per se, but changes in the exercise of U.S. power that have in turn changed foreign perceptions of U.S. intentions and how the United States will use its preponderant strength. A dominant America that reassures others and deploys its power to secure public goods induces systemic stability; unfettered primacy deployed in the exclusive pursuit of national self-interest does the opposite.¶ The Bush Administration's grand strategy rests on a second geopolitical misconception: that U.S. primacy is durable. To be sure, America's economic and military might ensures that it will remain the world's leading nation for decades to come. But current power asymmetries will inevitably diminish in the years ahead. The European Union's wealth already rivals that of the United States, and it may well forge a more independent and unified security policy as this decade proceeds. Over the course of the next decade, Japan may tire of always following America's lead, China will emerge as a major power, and Russia, India and Brazil are poised to become stronger and more assertive players. It will be impossible for the United States to sustain current power, asymmetries. Indeed, if America seeks to preserve unipolarity and its attendant sway over global affairs, it will only ensure that other centers of power, as they rise, array their strength against the United States.¶ Finally, the Bush Administration has overestimated the advantages of military superiority and mistaken brute strength for influence, producing adverse consequences on a number of fronts. In Iraq, Washington was correct that Saddam Hussein's regime would crumble under the U.S. onslaught, but it failed to appreciate that the invasion would spawn a dangerous mix of nationalism and religious extremism, leaving the United States struggling against a guerrilla insurgency that effectively neutralized America's military might. In similar fashion, the Bush Administration is aware that its unilateralist bent has provoked anti-American sentiment in many quarters, but it has discounted the discontent because countries opposed to U.S. policy do not have the military wherewithal to stand in America's way.¶ Although it is correct that other countries are not forming alliances against the United States, Washington is overlooking the more subtle forms of balancing that are occurring--with potent geopolitical consequence. The broad coalition that blocked UN authorization of the Iraq War denied the United States the legitimacy of international approval, substantially raising the economic and political costs of the war. Allies bore 90 percent of the costs of the Gulf War, but the American taxpayer has financed most of the current operation, and Washington has been unable to convince key allies to send troops to Iraq. If the United States continues on its current course, it will enjoy military supremacy, but little else.¶ FROM THE perspective of liberal realism, management of the global balance of power would be based on three propositions. First, the United States must wield its superior strength in concert with others to ensure that it forestalls rather than invites balancing behavior. Re-establishing America's bona tides as a benign hegemon necessitates resuscitating the alliances, institutions and consultations that have eroded under Bush's watch. The United States should of course reserve the fight to act alone as a last resort, hut Washington must rediscover that the costs of unilateral action usually far exceed the costs of seeking consensus.¶ Second, liberal realism entails moving with--rather than against--the secular diffusion of global power. The scope of American primacy will wane as this century progresses; the ultimate objective should be to channel rising centers of strength into cooperative partnerships with the United States. Furthermore, strength elsewhere, even if it comes at the expense of America's relative power, need not come at the expense of its influence and security. If rising centers of power are integrated into a rule-based order, they promise to be net contributors to international stability. Americans would benefit substantially from a Europe that is capable of projecting power outside its neighborhood and sharing risks and responsibilities with the United States. China is emerging as one of Asia's dominant states; what is in question is not whether its power will rise, but the ends to which it will use its growing strength.¶ Third, liberal realism rests on a multidimensional understanding of power, sensitive to the fact that America's military supremacy, although a vital element of national strength, is not sufficient to safeguard American security. The United States should continue to invest in its armed forces and maintain its pronounced military advantage, but absent respect for U.S. leadership abroad, U.S. primacy does more to divide the world than to unite it. Washington needs to renew the non-military dimensions of its global influence, working to reclaim its moral authority abroad and to make disaffected allies again feel like stakeholders in the international system. The plan solves– First, repeal would represent a commitment to multilat and human rights – motivates other countries to rally behind the U.S. *plan spreads multilateralism – only the removal of the embargo carries the symbolic weight of revoking previous unilateral efforts to backlash against other countries in votes during conferences in the UN *overwhelms alternative causes – removing the embargo signifies an endorsement of international law that overwhelms human rights violations in Guantanamo and Iraq – prefer comparative evidence Burgsdorff 09 – Ph. D in Political Science from Freiburg University, EU Fellow at the University of Miami (Sven Kühn von, “Problems and Opportunities for the Incoming Obama Administration”, http://aei.pitt.edu.proxy.lib.umich.edu/11047/1/vonBurgsdorfUSvsCubalong09edi.pdf)//NG In addition, the US needs to improve its international human rights reputation which was severely damaged by US engagements in Iraq and the treatment of prisoners in Guantanamo. The perception that the US does not do its utmost to fully respect international law is an issue that renders difficult joint efforts to make the UN a meaningful instrument for acting decisively against human rights violations.2 If the US wants to act more effectively in multilateral forums in general on human rights matters, Washington, as a matter of priority, needs to restore US credibility, thus making human rights a more defendable key priority in international relations. Together, the EU and US stand a far better chance of furthering democratic change and sustainable improvement of the living conditions in Cuba. It is also then that other foreign partners, notably from Latin America, could be more easily approached to engage on Cuba along commonly agreed upon agendas. A realistic scenario, however, has to consider that political change in Cuba will probably take longer and most likely be preceded by economic reform measures coming from the regime itself. Foreign actors wishing to assist in this process in a meaningful manner, are well advised to pursue a long term, incentives-based approach to both the Cuban authorities and Cuba’s emerging civil society, including the human rights defenders. Outlook: Will President Obama radically change US policy towards Cuba? An answer to that question requires reviewing three important factors: first, constraints and opportunities in the political environment in the US, i.e. power constellations in the Congress and in Florida; second, interests in Cuba, i.e. Cuba’s elite and the domestic opposition; and third, likely reactions in the international community, i.e. within the Latin American and Caribbean region; in Europe; with respect to Cuba’s allies; and last but not least, at multilateral level. 6.1 What are the key considerations in today’s political environment in the US? During the electoral campaign Obama promised to undo the restrictions on travel and remittances imposed by the first Bush administration. He called the embargo a “complete fiasco” but shied away from suggesting the lifting of the economic sanctions or revoking Helms-Burton, saying that he would maintain the embargo as long as no substantial political reform and release of political prisoners would take place on the island. In essence, Obama’s proposed measures would correspond to a policy similar to the one enacted during the second term of President Clinton. This was during the campaign. Is it reasonable to assume that Obama’s resounding victory nation-wide and in Florida provide a more conducive domestic platform for overhauling for good the failed and discredited embargo policy? Most observers would give a negative answer, at least during President Obama’s first two years in office, and this for the following reasons: First, Cuba and Latin America are not among the top foreign policy concerns at this juncture. Second, while US business is clearly interested in strengthening trade and developing investment ties with Cuba strong pressure, so far, has only come from the agribusiness sector which succeeded in exporting US goods despite the embargo since 2002. Moreover, Cuban demand is still crippled by rather modest purchasing power and the overall business and regulatory environment is certainly not conducive to foreign investment. Third, despite a change in the electoral map overall and a slow generational change within the Cuban-American community, a clear majority of registered Cuban-American voters actually participating in elections leans towards the Republican party and can still be mobilized around the single issue of taking a principled stance against the Castro regime (e.g. all three Republican incumbents in Miami Dade county have re-won their seats; moreover, in 2010 Senator Mel Martinez’ seat comes up for election – if the Democrats were to take his seat they could come close to gaining a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate). Few commentators, on the other hand, think that the new president should and could lift the embargo during his first year in office, arguing that he enjoys at present and for a limited period only, a unique window of opportunity because of the high rate of approval at home and abroad (including in Cuba among the Afro-Cuban community). Lifting the embargo unconditionally would be widely heralded as the dawning of a new era in the Western Hemisphere and beyond, with immediate positive repercussions on bilateral relations with all major Latin American and Caribbean countries. Pressure to lift the embargo, or parts of it, may also come from the powerful US oil lobby if commercially viable finds are discovered in Cuba’s exclusive economic zone, with Cuba actively courting US investments in the remaining off-shore blocks. It would make little sense for the US to prohibit off-shore oil exploration in Florida’s continental shelf when a few miles further down South numerous international companies exploit Cuba’s oil and gas reserves. Moreover, the argument goes, President Obama does not need to ‘pander’ to the conservative Cuban-American vote in South Florida (i.e. those 65 having voted for McCain) because this part of the electorate will remain an anti-Obama constituency no matter what he does. As a matter of fact, the democrats could actually loose Latino votes in Florida in the next elections among the nonCuban Latino community and among those 35 of Cuban-Americans having supported Obama in 2008 (according to exit polls 75 of whom are reported to be against the embargo) if his Cuba policy changes remain largely symbolic, i.e. simply undoing what has been established under President Bush, while maintaining the embargo. As far as the 2010 Florida senate seat is concerned seasoned political analysts recall that, traditionally, any incumbent president’s party tends to loose seats in mid-term elections, thus making the prospect of getting closer to the 60 seat majority a rather difficult task (especially if former governor Jeb Bush were to run for the vacant post). 6.2 How about the political environment in Cuba? Since coming to power in August 2006 Raul Castro has reiterated on several occasions that Cuba is willing to discuss with the US ways and means to improve bilateral relations and bring an end to the policy of confrontation. The only requisite would be to conduct these talks on the basis of equality and without any political pre-conditions. These statements did not contain much of a political risk for Havana since they were unlikely to be heeded by the Bush administration. If, however, the Obama administration were to take them at face value, it is fair to say that Cuba’s government appears to be ill-prepared for commencing meaningful discussions with the US. For the past 50 years the official dogma was based on the premise that US policy is hostile, interventionist and imperialist. A fundamental overhaul of the US approach towards Havana would make it difficult for the Cuban government to continue propagating the David-versus-Goliath myth, considering that the new US president, as an Afro-American, shares with two-thirds of Cubans a similar ethnic background. Obama may indeed be perceived by many in Cuba as the personification of a different, less fearful and certainly better America. In this context it is interesting to note that Armando Hart, former Minister of Culture and one of the chief ideologues of the Communist party, published an article in Granma in October 2008 where he underlined the need for defending the Cuban Revolution against the erosive power of a non-embargo centered, i.e. open door US policy towards Cuba. Havana might, indeed, not be ready yet to engage with Washington under a non-embargo scenario. The present situation, with the embargo being nominally in place (yet discredited internationally and in Cuba, in addition to being undermined in its impact because of direct commercial links with US business and the massive flow of remittances without the ‘danger’ of millions of visiting Americans pouring into the island), seems to be the best of both worlds for Cuba: while Havana can blame US hostility for domestic development problems, which serves the regime well politically both abroad and at home, the embargo does not do any major economic and financial damage that would jeopardize the survival of the regime. Furthermore, Cuba’s illegal political opposition strongly disagrees with the embargo because the continuation of a coercive policy framework is used by the authorities as a pretext to discredit those opposing the regime as ‘puppets’ and ‘counterrevolutionary agents’ at the service of the US. The Cuban opposition would clearly prefer Washington to conduct an open door policy addressing all sectors of the Cuban society, including, of course, concrete measures supporting directly the emerging dissident movement and providing high-profile visibility to human rights defenders. 6.3 How would the international community react? At international level all major actors would clearly welcome an end to the embargo. While the sanctions policy allowed European, Canadian and, more recently, Venezuelan, Chinese, Brazilian and Russian to become more involved with Cuba in the absence of competitors from the US (with the exception of agriculture produce), most of the foreign powers, and in particular the EU and Latin American countries, would clearly support a definite lifting of the coercive measures. Ending the embargo would be perceived as a decision carrying a momentum of powerful symbolism since it would signal a newly found willingness in Washington to reconsider the usefulness of acting unilaterally and outside the international legal framework. As a matter of fact, together with other measures such as closing Guantanamo, signing up to the Kyoto Protocol and putting into practice the succeeding agreement under the Bali conference, and possibly, joining the International Criminal Court as well as ratifying further international human rights treaties such as the 1990 Convention on the Rights of the Child, it would be interpreted by the international community as steps towards effective multilateralism. Second, the plan fosters a credible conflict resolution model which prevents conflict including the Middle East – status quo policies risk disengagement *plan fosters a credible conflict resolution model – increases diplomatic negotiations with Cuba which even if they fail garner international support for America in multilateral negotiations – also increase Cuban relations which spreads democratic efforts worldwide giving the US a hedge in multilateral institutions *solves Kashmir conflict – plan fosters international momentum and credibility to leverage international dialogue in resolving human rights abuses, military buildup and Indo-Pakistan tensions in the region – solves the root cause of the problem *solves Middle East conflict – increased credibility allows Obama to leverage his international reputation with rogue nations like Iran to control fissile material and international leverage allows us to de-escalate Middle East tensions Dickerson 10 – Lieutenant Colonel, US Army, paper submitted in fulfillment of a Master of Strategic Studies Degree at the US Army War College (Sergio M, “UNITED STATES SECURITY STRATEGY TOWARDS CUBA,” 1/14/10, http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a518053.pdf) NG At the international political level, President Obama sees resuming relations with Cuba as a real step towards multilateralism and leadership. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon made the following statement about then President-elect Barrack Obama’s national election. “He spoke about a “new era of global partnership…I am confident that we can look forward to an era of renewed partnership and a new multilateralism." To highlight this point further, U.N. nations have voted overwhelmingly since 1992 to overturn the Cuban Embargo. In 2007, 184 nations voted against the embargo5 - a powerful statement about U.S. unilateralism with regards to Cuba. The argument can also be made that the U.S. has foreign relations with China, Saudi Arabia and other non-democratic governments while applying a different standard towardsCuba. With growing perception that Cuba no longer poses a credible threat to the U.S., it appears that U.S. policy has changed from coercive to punitive following the end of the Cold War. With a renewed focus on multilateralism, President Obama could go a long way to break this image by spreading the seeds of a “new beginning” in U.S.-Cuba relations. While dismissing Cuba’s immediate security threat to the U.S., we cannot ignore their 90-mile proximity to the U.S. shore. As we struggle to contain the illegal Mexican exodus into the U.S. and all the security concerns it poses, we neglect to see the historical similarities in past encounters with the Cuban government that led to similar incursions. So if we critically reexamine the current U.S. – Cuba embargo, why does the U.S. believe it will only lead to Cuban democratization? What about government collapse? A Cuban government collapse akin to Somalia could create a significant refugee situation not to mention an implied U.S. responsibility to provide humanitarian and even stability operations in Cuba. If catastrophe does occur, a search for causes would certainly lead back to our punitive approaches to U.S. diplomacy towards Cuba. On the other hand, consider that foreign diplomacy achieves a breakthrough under Raul’s Cuba. It could certainly hedge our influence in Latin America. According to Dr. DeShazo, “close bilateral relationships with Venezuela is a product of Fidel Castro-Hugo Chavez friendship and does not enjoy much popular support in Cuba-nor with Raul.” If true, perhaps having a U.S. - Cuba option can become an alternative to that relationship post Fidel Castro. Loosening or lifting the embargo could also be mutually beneficial. Cuba’s need and America’s surplus capability could be mutually beneficial - and eventually addictive to Cuba. Under these conditions, diplomacy has a better chance to flourish. If negotiations break down and a decision to continue the embargo is reached, international support would be easier to garner. Almost 21 years since the wall fell in Berlin, it is time to chip away at the diplomatic wall that still remains between U.S. and Cuba. This paper will further define our interests in Cuba and why President Obama should continue his quest for renewed diplomatic relations with Cuba. It will discuss potential risks associated with retaining the current 50-year diplomatic policy and give some broad suggestions regarding a new U.S. – Cuba foreign policy. Policy and National Interest Present U.S. policy towards Cuba is economic isolation imposed via embargo to coerce Cuba into establishing a representative government. While the basic policy remains unchanged, the same is not true about U.S. interests in Cuba. During the Cold War, stated U.S. interest was to contain Communism, the leading edge of which was Cuba. More than anything the U.S. wanted Castro’s demise but international support hinged on preventing the spread of communism. After 1989, communism was under siege and capitalism was on the rise. U.S. interests now shifted towards peace and regional stability. Of course, removing the Castro regime was still the preferred method, but without Soviet collusion Castro’s Cuba was no longer a credible threat to the U.S. Not surprisingly, international support quickly dwindled leaving the U.S. as the unilateral enforcer. In hindsight many argued it was the right time to loosen the embargo and seek better relations with Cuba. Instead, a renewed passion to topple Castro and establish democracy fractured any hopes to rekindle relations. In retrospect, Kennedy could not have foreseen a 50-year embargo that survives the Soviet Union’s demise but fails to remove Castro. The same cannot be said about the Obama Administration today. This section will analyze U.S. – Cuba policy, past opportunities and ultimate failure over the past 50 years. From 1959 to1964, beginning with President Eisenhower but shaped primarily by the Kennedy Administration, U.S. policy was to remove Fidel Castro and establish Democracy in Cuba.6 It can be argued that this policy resonates today but during the early period the U.S. actively pursued removal as the decisive action that would lead to Democracy in Cuba. Political and military efforts to remove Castro in 1961 were reinforced by the initial embargo implementation and tightening that was most effective. Between1965 and 1970, U.S. attempts to maintain a multilateral embargo failed and its effectiveness withered as western governments refused to acquiesce to U.S. - led sanctions. By the time the OAS officially lifted the embargo, Cuba had successfully diversified its trade portfolio and by 1974, 45 of Cuba’s exports came from western governments.7 The period 1965-1972, although officially endorsing the previous administration’s tough stance, largely ignored its neighbor while it dealt with the more pressing conflict in Viet Nam. Containment and a period of Presidential ambivalence towards Cuba allowed tensions to cool between nations. This coupled with a growing fatigue with the Viet Nam War resulted in a renewed engagement to normalize relations with Cuba. A policy of “rapprochement” or normalization began with the Nixon Administration and received promising traction under the Carter Administration in 1977. The rapprochement period, 1973 – 1980, was President Carter’s attempt to curtail communism in Africa and Latin America. By normalizing relations with Cuba, President Carter could leverage this good will to reverse Cuban presence in Ethiopia, Angola and Zaire. Several overt measures were taken to reduce embargo restrictions and in February, 1977 State Department spokesmen Fred Brown “publically acknowledged and accepted a Cuban proposal to begin bilateral talks on maritime boundaries and fishing rights.”8 In June, U.S. National Security Council decided to end the practice of blacklisting foreign ships that called on Cuban ports. Perhaps the most notable improvement that year was to allow foreign diplomats to occupy each other’s embassies. This allowed direct communication between countries; the previous practice had been to use Swiss and Czech proxies.9 Several incidents including the “Soviet Brigade” and the “Mariel Boatlift” in 1980 intensified this opposition and quickly derailed Carter’s initiatives in Congress. As President Reagan took office in 1980, U.S. – Cuba relations had already soured. The Reagan Administration would reinforce the weakened embargo and a return to a containment strategy under the auspices that Cuba was “promoting terrorism and subversion in virtually every Latin American country”. But strong Congressional opposition against normalizing relations took center stage during the 1980 presidential elections. Several incidents including the “Soviet Brigade” and the “Mariel Boatlift” in 1980 intensified this opposition and quickly derailed Carter’s initiatives in Congress. 10 The White House policy was to “disrupt and destabilize the island’s economy, terminate the Cuban-Soviet alliance, end Cuba’s internationalism, and finally reinsert Cuba within the capitalist politicaleconomic orbit.”11 President Reagan made every attempt to return to an “airtight” embargo but Cuba’s persistent trade with the west subverted the effort. In fact, British and Canadian companies could conduct trade in “America’s back garden without having to compete with U.S. companies.”12 Reagan did however, exact a toll on Cuba’s economy by preventing other nations from allowing Cuba to reschedule its debt: “a process of negotiating new loans to replace existing obligations, either by lengthening maturities, deferring of loan principal payment.”13 This action compelled Cuba to make its most overt concessions towards normalizing U.S. - Cuban relations. Castro removed troops from Africa and reclaimed 2,700 Cuban refugees that had departed to America during the 1980 Mariel Boatlift. Castro even allowed a U.S. Human Rights delegation to visit prisoners in Cuba. In return, the Reagan and Bush Administrations made no significant concessions to Cuba and status quo between countries remained. The last meaningful opportunity for change occurred after the fall of the Berlin Wall and particularly the window it presented the U.S. following the collapse in Soviet – Cuba relations. During the period 1990 – 1993, internal and economic turmoil following the Soviet Union’s break-up led to a drastic cut in Soviet subsidies and trade relations with Cuba. This action compelled Cuba to make its most overt concessions towards normalizing U.S. - Cuban relations. Castro removed troops from Africa and reclaimed 2,700 Cuban refugees that had departed to America during the 1980 Mariel Boatlift. Castro even allowed a U.S. Human Rights delegation to visit prisoners in Cuba. In return, the Reagan and Bush Administrations made no significant concessions to Cuba and status quo between countries remained. 14 This led to a 34 drop in Cuban economy forcing Castro to renew western trade options and relook his own draconian business and commercial practices. The first Bush Administration passed on this precious opportunity, ignoring Cuba’s overt concessions late in the previous administration and choosing instead to enact the 1992 Cuban Democracy Act reversing Carter’s amendment to allow third country U.S. companies from trading with Cuba.15 By the time President Clinton came to office, momentum had already shifted in Cuba’s favor. Cuba’s economy began to rise in 1994 reaching its apex in 1996 with a 41 increase thanks to foreign investments in tourism. The introduction of the HelmsBurton legislation in 1996 gained Congressional traction after the Cuban Air force shot down two, anti-Castro “Brothers in Rescue,” planes over Cuba. The Helms-Burton Act created unrealistic expectations for the Cuban government before U.S. would loosen restrictions with Cuba. A total of eight requirements had to be met and the most controversial of these included; a transitional government in place unlike the Castro regime; the dissolution of the Department of State; Cuba must hold free and fair elections and a controversial property law that allowed property owners that left Cuba as early as 1959, to make claims in U.S. Courts on that property. With Cuba’s economy on the rise, this new measure to tighten the noose failed terribly and only succeeded in further alienating both governments. The second Bush Administration did little to engage Cuba and after September 11, 2001, was completely engrossed in the War on Terror. U.S. policy towards Cuba has changed little in 50 years. Although the embargo continues to fail despite our best efforts to tighten it, our policy has remained steadfast and the U.S. is no closer to normalizing relations with Cuba. A History of Anger and Distrust After 50 years, deep-seated distrust and anger exists between the U.S. and Cuba. Perhaps an obvious assessment, but one that if ignored could undermine attempts to repair diplomatic relations between countries. Several diplomatic pitfalls developed over the years could hinder any attempt to reestablish relations. They could spell disaster and set an already tenuous relationship back decades. These triggers are subtle but recognizable over a long and tumultuous period in U.S. – Cuba relations. A historical account will help identify these political impasses and create favorable conditions for diplomatic success in future U.S. – Cuba relations. Experts argue over who’s started the dispute between nations: was it the Cuban Agrarian Reform Act in 1959 that nationalized agrarian land in Cuba to include U.S. owned lands? Could it have been Cuba’s decision to resume trade with the Soviet 9Union that led to a U.S. imposed embargo on Cuba in 1960? Perhaps the bigger issue was how diplomatic, economic and military efforts by both countries continued to aggravate already strained relations.16 In 1961, Cuban exiles supported by the Central Intelligence Agency failed to topple the Castro government. The Bay of Pigs fiasco sent Cuba a clear signal that the U.S. was not interested in negotiation. Castro answered immediately by allowing Soviets to position nuclear missiles in Cuba, threatening U.S. vital security and leading to the Cuban Missile Crises. These intentions have survived to the present undermining any attempt to pursue common interest and reduce tensions. The underlying fear that U.S. remains committed to toppling the Cuban government constitutes the first diplomatic pitfall in U.S. – Cuban relations. For this very reason, democratic reform will not succeed as a diplomatic bargaining tool with Cuba. Suspicions run deep among Cuban leaders and any inferences to government reform, albeit noble, will impede meaningful relations. Human rights advocacy, free trade and limited business opportunities in Cuba may be more plausible and could eventually encourage the long-term changes U.S. wants in Cuba. The embargo itself remains a perpetual albatross that continues to undermine any real diplomatic progress between nations. A series of coercive measures designed to topple the Castro regime began with U.S. – led efforts to expel Cuba from the Organization of American States (OAS) in January 1962 followed by trade prohibitions on imports and exports to Cuba by the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC). 17 This was achieved by leveraging an existing 1954 OAS Caracas Resolution designed to prevent trade with communist countries called Trading with the Enemy.18 After bilateral sanctions are established, U.S. pursued broader international support by 10enacting the October 1962 Battle Act prohibiting U.S. assistance to any country that traded with Cuba. An early attempt to persuade the North American Treaty Organization (NATO) nations to comply with the embargo yielded limited success.19 However, a new perceived security threat brought on by the Cuban Missile Crises in late 1962 gave U.S. the leverage it needed in February 1964 to convince NATO nations to effectively cease trade with Cuba. In July 1964, OAS followed NATO’s lead; U.S. had succeeded in isolating Cuba from its western traders.20 Tightening the noose placed extraordinary economic pressure on Cuba considering U.S. multilateral efforts reduced western trade by 73 in 1964. Cuba was obliged to subsidize this deficit with the Soviet Union and China between1961 – 1973. This trend continued by enticing Latin American and other western countries like Canada and England in the 1980s and following the Soviet fall in the 1990s.21Commensurately, Presidential administrations have loosened and tightened the embargo repeatedly as the climate between nations improved or deteriorated. The Cuban Defense Act in 1992 and the Helms Burton Act in 1996 tightened embargo restrictions signaling continued U.S. intentions to remove the Castro regime. But the U.S. - led embargo played right into Castro’s hand. Castro accused the U.S. calling it “another economic aggression” and stating that Cubans would have to undergo “long years of sacrifice.”22 By demonizing U.S. policy, he was able to galvanize Cuban support during the toughest times. The embargo helped create the American enemy, removing any popular support for rebellion and elevating Castro’s struggle to a legitimate Cuban struggle.11Castro was also complicit in the failure to mend U.S. – Cuba relations. Hiscontinued attempts to export communism began in Africa with a total 55,000 troops in Angola and Ethiopia by 1978. He focused efforts closer to Latin America by supporting Puerto Rican independence movement in 1975, the Sandinistas overthrow in Nicaragua in 1979 and the Farabundo Marti National Liberation (FMLN) in El Salvador. Cuba’s support to Columbia’s M19 (Columbian Election Day April 19, 1970) guerilla movement labeled Cuba a “state sponsor of terrorism” in 1982.23 Castro’s expansion efforts fueled U.S. security paranoia and prevented several overt efforts by the Carter Administration to improve relations with Cuba. In April 1980, an incident at the U.S. Mission in Havana led 120,000 Cubans to depart Mariel Port by boat to the U.S.24 The incident better known as the “Mariel Boatlift” became the tipping point that inhibited further relations with Cuba. Despite the growing tensions between the U.S. and Cuba, trade between the west and Cuba increased. NATO compliance with U.S. - brokered trade restrictions broke down after 1966 in particular due to British and Canadian opposition. U.S. efforts to use the OAS embargo to influence the United Nations also failed. In 1974, Latin American leaders pushed to end the OAS embargo. In 1975 the OAS lifted the embargo with Cuba and the embargo returned to a bilateral embargo now condemnedby most western countries.25 In 1982, Cuba’s failing economy led Castro to pursue western trade with a renewed vigor. By “1987, more than 370 firms from twenty-three European, Latin American, and Asian countries participated in Cuba’s largest ever annual trade fair.”26 Castro’s interest in improving U.S. - Cuba relations was perhaps the greatest from 1982-1988. Castro made statements in 1982 to resume talks with the U.S.; he took back more than 1000 Mariel Boatlift criminals that came to the U.S. in 1987 and pulled troops out of Angola in 1988 to mention a few. These rare moments and apparent seams in Castro’s armor were left unanswered by the Reagan and Bush Administrations. Instead renewed efforts to continue ratcheting a now largely ineffective bilateral embargo served only to increase animosity between both countries. It is difficult to quantify, but essential to note, that U.S. action over the years seems to support a hatred for Fidel Castro that interferes with any attempt to established diplomatic relations with Cuba. If true, to neglect this assumption could undermine any efforts to reverse our seemingly punitive approach. Perhaps it can be traced to his support for a Soviet-style communism. After all, few things in 1960 America were feared and despised more than communism. Any country affiliated with the communist movement became an affront to the American way of life. Furthermore, Americans shed blood in Cuba during the 1898 Spanish American War leading to Cuban Independence in 1902.27 Fidel Castro became evil’s face in Cuba and any attempt to partner with Castro seemed equally tainted. Fast forwarding to the present, with communism no longer a threat, perhaps it’s time to let the anger fade and deal with Cuba for its’ diplomatic merit not past indiscretions. The question remains whether clear objectiveness leads U.S. diplomatic efforts with Cuba? It is important to note that what’s at stake here is U.S. national interests and not the legacy of Fidel Castro. Another important pitfall is to exploit democracy as a precondition for diplomacy and economic engagement in Cuba. If democracy is virtuous, then why must we exploit it? It casts a negative shadow on a positive change in government. There is a common perception that U.S. policy with regards to security and stability can only exist under the precondition of a “Democratic Cuba”. It has prevented any real progress in U.S. – Cuba relations because of well placed fears that we mean to subvert the Cuban government. A popular Cuban American lobby group, The Cuban American National Foundation summarizes traditional U.S. beliefs towards Cuba. They suggest, “U.S. – Cuba policy should focus on (1) advancing U.S. interests and security in the region and (2) empowering Cuban people in their quest for democracy and prosperity…that these are “intertwined and one cannot be individually accomplished without the other.”28 The recommendation then focuses largely on steps to pursue a democratic Cuba. To separate security and stability from democratic pursuits in Cuba could benefit both causes. Focusing on better diplomatic relations could further democracy as a byproduct of increased exposure to open markets, businesses and globalization. China is a good example. The U.S. has diffused tensions with China by exposing them to open markets. Although they continue to embrace communism, their version of communism has been somewhat diluted as they modified their business practices, trade and other aspects to compete in the global marketplace. If you take into account that Cuba’s Growth National Product (GDP) decreased by 4 since 2006 while their debt grew by 16 to almost $20B in 2008, Cuba certainly has incentive to do the same.29 By imposing democracy we jeopardize diplomatic avenues to our principal security and stability pursuits. To assuage the Cuban America position on this issue may be simpler today than 10 years ago. Today’s younger Cuban-American generation is more amenable to closer relations with Cuba. The anger carried by their immigrant forefathers14after 50 years may be passing and perhaps the time is right to leverage this new Cuban American generation to open dialogue with Cuba without the democratic preconditions tied to negotiations. As we pursue diplomatic relations with Cuba we should not expect full disclosure, immediate results and a Cuban government anxious to please the U.S. We should expect a cautious and limited first engagement that appears noticeably weighted in U.S. effort. Let us assume the U.S. makes significant diplomatic and economic concessions but Cuba is less willing to provide some reciprocal offering. U.S. policy could conclude that Cuba has no genuine desire to consummate new diplomatic relations and diplomacy could fail. It is imperative to understand that the U.S. has done most of the “taking” and hence will, at least for the near future, do most of the “giving”. A steady, patient and continued engagement is needed until Cuba has the confidence to commit to further diplomatic relations. Current U.S.-Cuba Policy Analysis Understanding the deep-seated animosity and distrust that continues to fuel U.S. - Cuba tensions will aid us in properly analyzing the feasibility, acceptability and suitability (FAS) of current and future U.S. policy with Cuba. Identifying FAS applications to diplomacy, information, military, economic, finance, intelligence and law enforcement (DIME-FIL) will highlight weaknesses in current U.S. – Cuba relations that can be modified for future improvement. The logical question with regards to current U.S. – Cuba policy is whether it’s feasible to continue the current policy. At least for the foreseeable future, the answer is yes. It equates to doing nothing diplomatically, militarily and economically. Perhaps this 15option is appealing given a robust domestic agenda and U.S. involvement in two wars. According to Professor Schwab and other experts however, the U.S. has lost the information campaign targeted at the Cuban people. It has only, “buttressed Fidel’s popularity in Cuba and elsewhere, which eviscerates the very purposes the embargo was set up for.”30 It’s like the classic biblical story of David triumphing over Goliath – the bigger the oppressor the greater the victory. True or not, Fidel has made the case successfully to the Cuban people. While it’s feasible for the U.S. to pursue the current course there is no evidence it will succeed. How acceptable is it to U.S. foreign policy? There are three elements of national power that highlight our current policy: diplomacy, economy and law enforcement. It is subjective to evaluate acceptability strictly in terms of current national power invested and subsequent pay offs in foreign policy. U.S. needs international cooperation to achieve the coercive effects that only complete economic strangulation can accomplish. This is tough to do and North Korea and Iran bear this true. If we look at it from a broader international and economic perspective we can begin to see why it’s not acceptable. Take a UN General Assembly vote renouncing the U.S.-led embargo on Cuba for instance; since1992 there has been overwhelming vote to end the embargo.31 In essence, it has garnered sympathy for Castro and encouraged western nations like Canada and Spain to continue open relations with Cuba. Even if the embargo could work, U.S. diplomacy has failed to yield the international tourniquet needed to bring change in Cuba. Applying economic force without first garnering the necessary diplomatic support failed to achieve intended changes succeeding instead in hurting the Cuban people it hoped to protect. Whether or not an embargo can work in Cuba is suspect but succeeding without international support is impossible. Since the embargo hinges on a larger multinational participation, international and not just U.S. acceptability is necessary to achieve U.S. ends in Cuba. Several embargo refinements over the years like the Libertad Act have further tightened restrictions on Cuba. These restrictions have placed a heavy burden on the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) particularly in Miami. A 2007 GAO report highlights these burdens and how they impede other more important Law Enforcement activities in defense of the homeland.32 GAO findings suggest there’s a real need to balance U.S. paranoia for “everything Cuba.” This rebalancing purports an unacceptable cost-benefit to the current law enforcement aspect of the embargo. It diminishes our greater need to defend against terrorist, criminals and other real threats to our national security. In essence, our efforts to impose embargo restrictions are unacceptable tradeoffs for homeland security. In the final analysis, U.S. – Cuba policy is not sustainable because it has failed to meet desired national ends: Cuban democracy and human rights. Prior to 1989, the U.S. could make the argument that the embargo contained communism and generally marginalized the Castro government. It failed however, to depose Fidel Castro and democratize the Cuban government. A post Cold War Cuba no longer poses a threat to the U.S. - communism is contained and Cuba is still under embargo. Despite a 50-year failure to affect change in Castro’s government, our policy with regards to Cuba remains unchanged. We have foregone diplomatic engagement and chosen coercive economic power as our only political tool. Does Cuba Pose A Security Threat to the U.S.? Let’s begin by asking this question: can we afford to escort commerce through Caribbean waters from Cuban pirates? This sounds as farfetched as an attack from an Afghan-based Al-Qaida using commercial airliners to destroy the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. This scenario while unexpected is completely contrary to our policy objectives in Cuba. The greater possibility that “something” unfavorable happens in Cuba that threatens U.S. national interests is certainly more relevant. Although Cuba poses no traditional threats to the U.S., geographically, their 90-mile proximity should concern us. Our proximity to Cuba assures U.S. involvement, be it voluntary or involuntary, in a major crisis. Consider a disease outbreak that begins in Cuba over a break down in hygiene, government pollution or other misfortune attributable to economic strife. The disease has no boundaries and quickly reaches the Florida shores via travelling Cuban American citizens. This scenario could be mitigated or even preventable under the auspices of better relations. Aside from the obvious medical benefits a partnership provides, established communications with Cuba would likely prevent an uncontrolled spread in the U.S. There are definite advantages to having healthy regional partnerships to deal with regional problems. While economic pressure has failed to bring about government change, it could trigger a government collapse. If Cuba becomes a “failing” or “failed state” we could see a huge refugee flood into the U.S., increased crime and drug trafficking across U.S. borders, and renewed security and stability issue in the region. In 1980, 120,000 Cuban refugees fled Mariel and 20,000 more in 1994 after Cuba declared an open immigration policy.33 From 2004 – 2007, 131,000 Cubans have made residence in the U.S. Almost 38,000 settled in Florida alone in 2006. Although it’s mere speculation to presume Cuba will fail, if it did, there is no question where Cubans would seek refuge. A failed state could eventually draw U.S. involvement into nation building in Cuba taking a greater toll on our national resources. This scenario, while unexpected, is completely contrary to our policy objectives in Cuba. Current U.S. policy is no longer a sustainable option to achieving our national interests in Cuba. Until realignment can bring national policy back in line with national interests, conditions will not exist for real change in U.S. – Cuba relations. Proposed U.S.-Cuba Policy Analysis If today marks President Obama’s “new strategy” towards Cuba we must begin with U.S. National interests in the broader Latin American context. Over the past 50 years our approach has been germane to Cuba and not the larger Latin American construct. In so doing we have isolated Cuba from Latin America for coercive reasons yes, but also for the very democratic principles we hoped Cuba would follow. The State Department’s Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs (covers Canada and Cuba) has set the following goals for the region: “Economic partners that are democratic, stable, and prosperous; Friendly neighbors that help secure our region against terrorism and illegal drugs; Nations that work together in the world to advance shared political and economic values.”34 To simplify these goals, let us just say stability, economic prosperity and democracy. Using these as a benchmark, I propose our new diplomatic strategy towards Cuba must be similar - achieve economic stability, security and a representative government as the “end state” goal and not the prerequisite for engagement. President Obama can implement this policy by first building American and Congressional support for engagement. He should establish a formal infrastructure that communicates to Cuba and the International Community at large that we’re serious about diplomatic engagement with Cuba. Finally, we must loosen embargo restrictions and expose Cubans to U.S. open markets, business opportunities and 21st Century living. This combination will improve relations with Cuba by regaining their trust, improving their living conditions and exposing them to the democratic enticements we hope they will emulate. Achieving Congressional approval will be difficult although not impossible in the present economic recession. The economic benefits associated with new business opportunities in Cuba can encourage skeptics in Congress to mobilize. As a counterargument to a continued embargo, the President can point to the dangers associated with failed states like Somalia inadvertently caused by the very environment sanctions create. A strong communication strategy to gain American support coupled with a softening Cuban American stance, shrouded in economic opportunity, could encourage Congressional dialogue and resolution. President Obama can succeed if he sets realistic goals and expresses these to the American public before the media or his opposition defines these. We’ve established that coercive means have failed to achieve democracy and economic stability in Cuba. I’m suggesting there is another mutually beneficial alternative. Using China as an example, their exposure and need to compete in free global markets broadened their horizons and shifted their hard line communist approach to international diplomacy. This was a feat that coercive diplomacy has not accomplished in Cuba. Yet we still have civil disagreements with China on human rights issues, Taiwan’s right to independence and other contentious issues without resorting to coercive measures. Why should Cuba receive different treatment? The confusion lies with our tendency to impose democracy as a precondition for diplomatic relations. How can Cuba subscribe to small business practices, a free economy building block, if business opportunities are not available? Diplomatic engagement and economic encouragement has a better chance. Cuba’s economic condition incentivizes their willingness to begin diplomatic negotiations. The U.S. should begin by focusing efforts to establish diplomatic relations through incentives rather than coercion. We must also set the democratic precondition aside to pursue when the relationship matures and trust is reestablished. Exposing them to new opportunities will eventually, through their own discovery and U.S. shepherding, lead them to a more representative government. If we accept that reestablishing relations with Cuba is the first real step to a democratic end-state then the first action must be to appoint an Ambassador to Cuba. This diplomatic gesture signals that U.S. is serious about foreign relations. The Ambassador’s first actions must include setting the conditions with Cuba to allow a loosening of embargo restrictions. President Obama, in the spirit of multilateralism, should pursue international solidarity since some countries enjoying exclusive trade with Cuba would certainly protest the immediate competition. Choosing a time-phased removal would protect U.S. assets and interests in the remote possibility that Cuba fails to comply with the agreed bi-national or international terms. It might also sooth domestic and partisan anxiety regarding open trade with Cuba. President Obama must accomplish this early in his first term to allow time to reap success or mitigate failure before the next elections. The U.S. cannot afford to miss another opportunity to normalize relations with Cuba. A Cuba without Fidel is an opportunity – whether it is Raul or his replacement in 2013. The U.S. must lay the foundation today for renewed U.S. Cuba relations. Delaying could also signal the contrary to Raul Castro suspiciously awaiting the true purpose of recent U.S. concessions. While a long term goal may be to influence change in government, it cannot be the basis for initial success and continued diplomacy. With diplomatic patience and a prosperous Cuba, we have reason to believe, like China and Russia that capitalism will prevail over communism. But new politicians and a younger generation of Americans who measure success between terms and administrations will not understand if results aren’t immediate or commensurate to U.S. efforts. Instead, the strategy pursued must occur with a measured diplomatic optimism that insures immediate setbacks don’t derail the restoration of trust that must occur before complete reciprocation can be expected. Conclusion Today, 20 years have passed since the fall of the Berlin Wall – it’s time to chip away at the diplomatic wall that still remains between U.S. and Cuba. As we seek a new foreign policy with Cuba it is imperative that we take into consideration that distrust will characterize negotiations with the Cuban government. On the other hand, consider that loosening or lifting the embargo could also be mutually beneficial. Cuba’s need and America’s surplus capability to provide goods and services could be profitable and eventually addictive to Cuba. Under these conditions, diplomacy has a better chance to flourish. If the Cuban model succeeds President Obama will be seen as a true leader for multilateralism. Success in Cuba could afford the international momentum and credibility to solve other seemingly “wicked problems” like the Middle East and Kashmir. President Obama could leverage this international reputation with other rogue nations like Iran and North Korea who might associate their plight with Cuba.35 The U.S. could begin to lead again and reverse its perceived decline in the greater global order bringing true peace for years to come. Middle East war causes World War 3 The Earl of Stirling 11, hereditary Governor and Lord Lieutenant of Canada, Lord High Admiral of Nova Scotia, and B.Sc. in Pol. Sc. and History; M.A. in European Studies, “General Middle East War Nears - Syrian events more dangerous than even nuclear nightmare in Japan”, http://europebusines.blogspot.com/2011/03/general-middle-east-war-nears-syrian.html Any Third Lebanon War/General Middle East War is apt to involve WMD on both side quickly as both sides know the stakes and that the Israelis are determined to end, once and for all, any Iranian opposition to a 'Greater Israel' domination of the entire Middle East. It will be a case of 'use your WMD or lose them' to enemy strikes. Any massive WMD usage against Israel will result in the usage of Israeli thermonuclear warheads against Arab and Persian populations centers in large parts of the Middle East, with the resulting spread of radioactive fallout over large parts of the Northern Hemisphere. However, the first use of nukes is apt to be lower yield warheads directed against Iranian underground facilities including both nuclear sites and governmental command and control and leadership bunkers, with some limited strikes also likely early-on in Syrian territory.¶ The Iranians are well prepared to launch a global Advanced Biological Warfare terrorism based strike against not only Israel and American and allied forces in the Middle East but also against the American, Canadian, British, French, German, Italian, etc., homelands. This will utilize DNA recombination based genetically engineered 'super killer viruses' that are designed to spread themselves throughout the world using humans as vectors. There are very few defenses against such warfare, other than total quarantine of the population until all of the different man-made viruses (and there could be dozens or even over a hundred different viruses released at the same time) have 'burned themselves out'. This could kill a third of the world's total population.¶ Such a result from an Israeli triggered war would almost certainly cause a Russian-Chinese response that would eventually finish off what is left of Israel and begin a truly global war/WWIII with multiple war theaters around the world. It is highly unlikely that a Third World War, fought with 21st Century weaponry will be anything but the Biblical Armageddon. That is the most probable scenario for extinction – nuclear arms race, regional war, and preemption. Allison 6 – Graham Tillett Allison Jr., Graham Allison is an American political scientist and professor at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard. (“The Will to Prevent,” Harvard International Law Review, Fall 2006, page lexis) Meanwhile, Iran is testing the line in the Middle East. On its current trajectory, the Islamic Republic will become a nuclear weapons state before the end of the decade. According to the leadership in Tehran, Iran is exercising its “inalienable right” to build Iranian enrichment plants and make fuel for its peaceful civilian nuclear power generators. These same facilities, however, can continue enriching uranium to 90 percent U-235, which is the ideal core of a nuclear bomb. No one in the international community doubts that Iran’s hidden objective in building enrichment facilities is to build nuclear bombs. If Iran crosses its nuclear finish line, a Middle Eastern cascade of new nuclear weapons states could trigger the first multi-party nuclear arms race, far more volatile than the Cold War competition between the United States and the Soviet Union. Given Egypt’s historic role as the leader of the Arab Middle East, the prospects of it living unarmed alongside a nuclear Persia are very low. The IAEA’s reports of clandestine nuclear experiments hint that Cairo may have considered this possibility. Were Saudi Arabia to buy a dozen nuclear warheads that could be mated to the Chinese medium-range ballistic missiles it purchased secretly in the 1980s, few in the US intelligence community would be surprised. Given Saudi Arabia’s role as the major financier of Pakistan’s clandestine nuclear program in the 1980s, it is not out of the question that Riyadh and Islamabad have made secret arrangements for this contingency. Such a multi-party nuclear arms race in the Middle East would be like playing Russian roulette—dramatically increasing the likelihood of a regional nuclear war. Other nightmare scenarios for the region include an accidental or unauthorized nuclear launch from Iran, theft of nuclear warheads from an unstable regime in Tehran, and possible Israeli preemption against Iran’s nuclear facilities, which Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has implied, threatening, “Under no circumstances, and at no point, can Israel allow anyone with these kinds of malicious designs against us to have control of weapons of destruction that can threaten our existence.” It causes the U.S. lash out, precipitating global war *state-sponsored terrorism in the US creates a torrential flood of public fear which creates coalitions in the public demanding retaliation – the effect of which is US-led nuclear lashout drawing in greater powers Schwartz-Morgan ‘1 – Nicole, Assistant Professor of Politics and Economics at Royal Military College of Canada, 10/10/2001, “Wild Globalization and Terrorism,” http://www.wfs.org/mmmorgan.htm The terrorist act can reactivate atavistic defense mechanisms which drive us to gather around clan chieftans. Nationalistic sentiment re-awakens, setting up an implacable frontier which divides "us" from "them," each group solidifying its cohesion in a rising hate/fear of the other group. (Remember Yugoslavia?) To be sure, the allies are trying for the moment to avoid the language of polarization, insisting that "this is not a war," that it is "not against Islam," "civilians will not be targeted." But the word "war" was pronounced, a word heavy with significance which forces the issue of partisanship. And it must be understood that the sentiment of partisanship, of belonging to the group, is one of the strongest of human emotions. Because the enemy has been named in the media (Islam), the situation has become emotionally volatile. Another spectacular attack, coming on top of an economic recession could easily radicalize the latent attitudes of the United States, and also of Europe, where racial prejudices are especially close to the surface and ask no more than a pretext to burst out. This is the Sarajevo syndrome: an isolated act of madness becomes the pretext for a war that is just as mad, made of ancestral rancor, measureless ambitions, and armies in search of a war. We should not be fooled by our expressions of good will and charity toward the innocent victims of this or other distant wars. It is our own comfortable circumstances which permit us these benevolent sentiments. If conditions change so that poverty and famine put the fear of starvation in our guts, the human beast will reappear. And if epidemic becomes a clear and present danger, fear will unleash hatred in the land of the free, flinging missiles indiscriminately toward any supposed havens of the unseen enemy. And on the other side, no matter how profoundly complex and differentiated Islamic nations and tribes may be, they will be forced to behave as one clan by those who see advantage in radicalizing the conflict, whether they be themselves merchants or terrorists.
Third, the plan sends a clear signal of cooperation to Latin America, creating new partnerships and bolstering relations *plan sends a signal of Latin American cooperation to reinvigorate the OAS – even though Cuba’s suspension was revoked in 2009, there exists a disconnect between their reenlistment and the continuation of the embargo – corrupts the OAS agenda by delegitimizing US credibility *solves Latin American relations – choice statements from leaders of the Bolivarian Alliance prove Cuba is the nexus point of increased relations which solves multilateralism by enlisting support of developing countries who bandwagon with Latin America White 13 – Senior fellow at the Center for International Policy and former U.S. ambassador to Paraguay and El Salvador (Robert, “After Chávez, a Chance to Rethink Relations With Cuba”, New York Times, 3/7/13, http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/08/opinion/after-chavez-hope-for-good-neighbors-in-latin-america.html?pagewanted=all)//TL FOR most of our history, the United States assumed that its security was inextricably linked to a partnership with Latin America. This legacy dates from the Monroe Doctrine, articulated in 1823, through the Rio pact, the postwar treaty that pledged the United States to come to the defense of its allies in Central and South America.¶ Yet for a half-century, our policies toward our southern neighbors have alternated between intervention and neglect, inappropriate meddling and missed opportunities. The death this week of President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela — who along with Fidel Castro of Cuba was perhaps the most vociferous critic of the United States among the political leaders of the Western Hemisphere in recent decades — offers an opportunity to restore bonds with potential allies who share the American goal of prosperity.¶ Throughout his career, the autocratic Mr. Chávez used our embargo as a wedge with which to antagonize the United States and alienate its supporters. His fuel helped prop up the rule of Mr. Castro and his brother Raúl, Cuba’s current president. The embargo no longer serves any useful purpose (if it ever did at all); President Obama should end it, though it would mean overcoming powerful opposition from Cuban-American lawmakers in Congress.¶ An end to the Cuba embargo would send a powerful signal to all of Latin America that the United States wants a new, warmer relationship with democratic forces seeking social change throughout the Americas.¶ I joined the State Department as a Foreign Service officer in the 1950s and chose to serve in Latin America in the 1960s. I was inspired by President John F. Kennedy’s creative response to the revolutionary fervor then sweeping Latin America. The 1959 Cuban revolution, led by the charismatic Fidel Castro, had inspired revolts against the cruel dictatorships and corrupt pseudodemocracies that had dominated the region since the end of Spanish and Portuguese rule in the 19th century.¶ Kennedy had a charisma of his own, and it captured the imaginations of leaders who wanted democratic change, not violent revolution. Kennedy reacted to the threat of continental insurrection by creating the Alliance for Progress, a kind of Marshall Plan for the hemisphere that was calculated to achieve the same kind of results that saved Western Europe from Communism. He pledged billions of dollars to this effort. In hindsight, it may have been overly ambitious, even naïve, but Kennedy’s focus on Latin America rekindled the promise of the Good Neighbor Policy of Franklin D. Roosevelt and transformed the whole concept of inter-American relations.¶ Tragically, after Kennedy’s assassination in 1963, the ideal of the Alliance for Progress crumbled and “la noche mas larga” — “the longest night” — began for the proponents of Latin American democracy. Military regimes flourished, democratic governments withered, moderate political and civil leaders were labeled Communists, rights of free speech and assembly were curtailed and human dignity crushed, largely because the United States abandoned all standards save that of anti-Communism.¶ During my Foreign Service career, I did what I could to oppose policies that supported dictators and closed off democratic alternatives. In 1981, as the ambassador to El Salvador, I refused a demand by the secretary of state, Alexander M. Haig Jr., that I use official channels to cover up the Salvadoran military’s responsibility for the murders of four American churchwomen. I was fired and forced out of the Foreign Service.¶ The Reagan administration, under the illusion that Cuba was the power driving the Salvadoran revolution, turned its policy over to the Pentagon and C.I.A., with predictable results. During the 1980s the United States helped expand the Salvadoran military, which was dominated by uniformed assassins. We armed them, trained them and covered up their crimes.¶ After our counterrevolutionary efforts failed to end the Salvadoran conflict, the Defense Department asked its research institute, the RAND Corporation, what had gone wrong. RAND analysts found that United States policy makers had refused to accept the obvious truth that the insurgents were rebelling against social injustice and state terror. As a result, “we pursued a policy unsettling to ourselves, for ends humiliating to the Salvadorans and at a cost disproportionate to any conventional conception of the national interest.”¶ Over the subsequent quarter-century, a series of profound political, social and economic changes have undermined the traditional power bases in Latin America and, with them, longstanding regional institutions like the Organization of American States. The organization, which is headquartered in Washington and which excluded Cuba in 1962, was seen as irrelevant by Mr. Chávez. He promoted the creation of the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States — which excludes the United States and Canada — as an alternative.¶ At a regional meeting that included Cuba and excluded the United States, Mr. Chávez said that “the most positive thing for the independence of our continent is that we meet alone without the hegemony of empire.”¶ Mr. Chávez was masterful at manipulating America’s antagonism toward Fidel Castro as a rhetorical stick with which to attack the United States as an imperialist aggressor, an enemy of progressive change, interested mainly in treating Latin America as a vassal continent, a source of cheap commodities and labor.¶ Like its predecessors, the Obama administration has given few signs that it has grasped the magnitude of these changes or cares about their consequences. After President Obama took office in 2009, Latin America’s leading statesman at the time, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, then the president of Brazil, urged Mr. Obama to normalize relations with Cuba.¶ Lula, as he is universally known, correctly identified our Cuba policy as the chief stumbling block to renewed ties with Latin America, as it had been since the very early years of the Castro regime.¶ After the failure of the 1961 Bay of Pigs invasion, Washington set out to accomplish by stealth and economic strangulation what it had failed to do by frontal attack. But the clumsy mix of covert action and porous boycott succeeded primarily in bringing shame on the United States and turning Mr. Castro into a folk hero.¶ And even now, despite the relaxing of travel restrictions and Raúl Castro’s announcement that he will retire in 2018, the implacable hatred of many within the Cuban exile community continues. The fact that two of the three Cuban-American members of the Senate — Marco Rubio of Florida and Ted Cruz of Texas — are rising stars in the Republican Party complicates further the potential for a recalibration of Cuban-American relations. (The third member, Senator Robert Menendez, Democrat of New Jersey, is the new chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, but his power has been weakened by a continuing ethics controversy.)¶ Are there any other examples in the history of diplomacy where the leaders of a small, weak nation can prevent a great power from acting in its own best interest merely by staying alive?¶ The re-election of President Obama, and the death of Mr. Chávez, give America a chance to reassess the irrational hold on our imaginations that Fidel Castro has exerted for five decades. The president and his new secretary of state, John Kerry, should quietly reach out to Latin American leaders like President Juan Manuel Santos of Colombia and José Miguel Insulza, secretary general of the Organization of American States. The message should be simple: The president is prepared to show some flexibility on Cuba and asks your help.¶ Such a simple request could transform the Cuban issue from a bilateral problem into a multilateral challenge. It would then be up to Latin Americans to devise a policy that would help Cuba achieve a sufficient measure of democratic change to justify its reintegration into a hemisphere composed entirely of elected governments.¶ If, however, our present policy paralysis continues, we will soon see the emergence of two rival camps, the United States versus Latin America. While Washington would continue to enjoy friendly relations with individual countries like Brazil, Mexico and Colombia, the vision of Roosevelt and Kennedy of a hemisphere of partners cooperating in matters of common concern would be reduced to a historical footnote. Plan Text: The United States federal government should substantially lift its economic sanctions towards the Republic of Cuba.
Contention 3 is Framing
And, the embargo is an act of genocide – it disproportionately affects the Cuban population and is maintained only to destroy socialism Malott 7 (Curry, From New Mexico State University in Las Cruces, NM, Currie Stephenson Malott received a Master's Degree in Sociology in 1998 and a PhD in Curriculum and Instruction in 2004. Before coming to West Chester University, Dr. Malott published and taught in the foundations of education and social studies at Brooklyn College/CUNY, D'Youville College in Buffalo, NY, and Queens College/CUNY. During this time, Dr. Malott has been interested primarily in advancing theoretical and practical application of critical pedagogy through the foundations of education and beyond. Dr. Malott is also the founder and series editor of Critical Constructions: Studies on Education and Society (Information Age Publishing). “Cuban Education in Neo-liberal Times: Socialist Revolutionaries and State Capitalism”, Journal for Critical Education Policy Studies, v5 n1 May 2007 pg. 245)moxley The US has not been trying to influence the revolution but to destroy it. Just as in Hannibal’s times when the Senate in ancient Rome proclaimed the destruction of Carthage, the obsessively pursued motto of U.S. administrations has been: Cuba must be destroyed. (Fidel Castro, 2002. p. 6) After the overthrow of the Batista dictatorship it did not take long for Washington to respond to Castro and his revolution. For example, in Killing Hope (1995) William Blum argues that, “bombing and strafing attacks of Cuba by planes based in the United States began in October 1959, if not before. In early 1960, there were several fire-bomb air raids on Cuban cane fields and sugar mills, in which American pilots also took part ... ” (Blum, 1995. p. 186). In 1961 the United States, relying on the support of the Cuba people, which they never got, orchestrated an unsuccessful, fullon invasion of Cuba, the “Bay of Pigs,” instigating the nearly catastrophic “Cuban Missile Crisis.” Embarrassed from the dismal failure of the “Bay of Pigs,” the Kennedy administration almost immediately initiated “... a campaign of smaller-scale attacks upon Cuba ...” (Blum, 1995. p. 186), despite how dangerously close to a nuclear war the US had just come. Describing Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) extra-law behavior toward Cuba throughout the 1960s, William Blum (1995) notes how the US repeatedly subjected the island to: Countless sea and air commando raids by exiles, at times accompanied by their CIA supervisors, inflicting damage upon oil refiners, chemical plants and railroad bridges, cane fields, sugar mills, and sugar warehouses; infiltrating spies, saboteurs and assassins ... anything to damage the Cuban economy, promote disaffection, or make the revolution look bad ... taking the lives of Cuban militia members and others in the process ... pirate attacks on Cuban fishing boats and merchant ships, bombardments of Soviet vessels docked in Cuba ... (p. 187) The United States government has also been implicated in using chemical and biological warfare directly against the Cuban civilian population by introducing poisons and diseases into the environment via avenues such as food supplies. Other chemical warfare tactics employed against the Cuban economy have included poisoning their number one export, sugar. The primary theory behind these attacks intended to topple the revolution is that if life is made so unbearable for the population, the people will eventually turn against those leading the struggle for social change, i.e. Fidel Castro. In other words the goal is to turn the people against their government by making them suffer and struggle, and instilling fear and terror into them. This twisted anti-democratic logic has not only informed and continues to inform the physical assaults against Cuba, but the trade embargo as well (Blum, 1995; Chomsky, 1999), which the Cuban government, drawing on the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948, has consistently reminded the world that an embargo is an act of economic war and can therefore only be internationally recognized as legal between countries at war with each other. According to international law, only one conclusion can be drawn: the US embargo against Cuba is an act of US terrorism. Not only is the embargo internationally illegal, it has been revised throughout the course of ten US presidential administrations, consistently intensifying its levels of brutality. For example, in 1992 the US passed the Torricelli Act, after Cuba lost 85 of its foreign trade after the fall of the USSR, which further restricted Cuba’s ability to purchase food and medicine from US subsidiaries in third countries, which, at the time, amounted to 718 million US dollars. Then, in 1996, the Helms-Burton Act intensified the persecution of and sanctions against those investing in Cuba, both currently and potentially, in addition to authorizing funding for aggressive acts against the Island. However, while Cuba has been granted special permission, as of 2001, to make a limited number of purchases in the US, although with extremely tight restrictions, making many transactions, especially those in the areas of medicine, virtually impossible, the administration of President George W. Bush, in 2004, approved a report: For new actions and measures intended to intensify the blockade by stepping up actions aimed at discouraging tourism and investment in Cuba, by restricting financial flow and visits to the island and by placing even more restrictions on family remittances and exchanges in various spheres, the aim being to bring about conditions which would allow the US to intervene in Cuba, thus permitting them to impose the “regime change” to which the US president made reference on 20 May of that year 2004. (Granma, 2005. p. 6) When the words “regime change” are uttered from the mouth of a US president, catastrophe usually ensues. While it would not be the first time the US attempted to institute a “regime change” in post-1959 Cuba, the phrase “regime change in Cuba,” coming from US President Bush II is nevertheless cause for alarm, as should the embargo in general be a source of indignation for all US citizens (for an increasing number it is) for its illegality is carried out in their name. The illegal US trade embargo against Cuba has, without a doubt, been the most publicized counter-revolutionary tactic both within and outside of Cuba, which, for the past 15 years, the UN General Assembly has passed a resolution calling for the US to end (Amnesty International, 2003). Summarizing the United States’ Trade Embargo against the nation they have been sworn to serve and protect, quoting a secret State Department report by I.D. Mallory (Department of State: Foreign Relations of the United States, volume VI, 1991), declassified in 1991, the editors of the Cuban government’s publication, Granma (2005), note: The economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed by the United States against Cuba is the longest-lasting and cruelest of its kind known to human history and is an essential element in the United States’ hostile and aggressive policies regarding the Cuban people. Its aim, made explicit on 6 April 1960 is the destruction of the Cuban Revolution: “( ... ) through frustration and discouragement based on dissatisfaction and economic difficulties ( ... ) to withhold funds and supplies to Cuba in order to cut real income thereby causing starvation, desperation and the overthrow of the government (...)” (p. 3) The effect of the embargo on the Cuban people has been severe. For example, in a groundbreaking analysis of Cuba’s resistance to the pressure to privatize from neoliberal global capital Báez (2004) notes that the US$41 billion Cuba lost between 1962 and 1996 has had a real impact on the Cuban people’s standard of living. Báez (2004) notes that “the written object of the law was to punish any businesses that were investing in Cuba, in addition to prohibiting the IMF and World Bank from facilitating business transactions on the Island” (p. 111). In the aforementioned Cuban report published in Granma (2005) the devastating manifestations of the consistently intensifying US embargo, supported and added to by Democratic and Republican presidential administrations alike, are laid out in detail highlighting the implications on Cuba’s “food sector,” “health sector,” “education sector,” “tourism sector,” “finances,” transportation sector,” “civil aviation,” “oil,” among other areas such as the “sports sector.” The Cuban report pulls no punches concerning the seriousness of the embargo and its combined effect on the various sectors of Cuban economic and social life: This policy ... amounts to an act of genocide under the provisions of paragraph (c) of article II of the Geneva Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide of 9 December 1948 and therefore constitutes a violation of International Law. This Convention defines this as ‘( ... ) acts perpetrated with the intention to totally or partially destroy a national, ethnic, racial or religious group’, and in these cases provides for ‘the intentional subjugation of the group to conditions that result in their total or partial physical destruction’. (Pp. 3-4) Again, the Cuban government, noting that the US embargo has in fact been designed to “totally ... destroy” their nation constituting an act of genocide, has repeatedly garnered the overwhelming support of the international community in their call for its immediate termination. By not only ignoring the collective voice of the United Nations to end the embargo, but by intensifying it as well, the US has consistently shown a blatant disregard for international legitimacy. Despite the real devastation the embargo and other forms of US terrorism have had on Cubans, Báez (2004) argues that they cannot alone explain all of Cuba’s problems. Báez (2004) points to the fall of the Soviet Union has having perhaps the most (or equal) dire effects on Cuba paving the way for the opening up of certain areas of the “Cuban Market” to foreign investors, as Castro struggles to generate value/hard currency/US dollars to fund the Revolution’s social programs and feed his people, 70 of whom have lived their entire lives under the embargo (Granma, 2005).
Prioritize environmental existence over framing and ontology. Paul WAPNER Prf. And Director of the Global Environmental Policy Program @ American ‘3 “Leftist Criticism of ‘Nature’” Dissent Winter p. 74-75
The third response to eco-criticism would require critics to acknowledge the ways in which they themselves silence nature and then to respect the sheer otherness of the nonhuman world. Postmodernism prides itself on criticizing the urge toward mastery that characterizes modernity. But isn’t mastery exactly what postmodernism is exerting as it captures the nonhuman world within its own conceptual domain? Doesn’t postmodern cultural criticism deepen the modernist urge toward mastery by eliminating the ontological weight of the nonhuman world? What else could it mean to assert that there is no such thing as nature? I have already suggested the postmodernist response: yes, recognizing the social construction of “nature” does deny the self-expression of the nonhuman world, but how would we know what such self-expression means? Indeed, nature doesn’t speak; rather, some person always speaks on nature’s behalf, and whatever that person says is, as we all know, a social construction. All attempts to listen to nature are social constructions—except one. Even the most radical postmodernist must acknowledge the distinction between physical existence and nonexistence. As I have said, postmodernists accept that there is a physical substratum to the phenomenal world even if they argue about the different meanings we ascribe to it. This acknowledgment of physical existence is crucial. We can’t ascribe meaning to that which doesn’t appear. What doesn’t exist can manifest no character. Put differently, yes, the postmodernist should rightly worry about interpreting nature’s expressions. And all of us should be wary of those who claim to speak on nature’s behalf (including environmentalists who do that). But we need not doubt the simple idea that a prerequisite of expression is existence. This in turn suggests that preserving the nonhuman world—in all its diverse embodiments—must be seen by eco-critics as a fundamental good. Eco-critics must be supporters, in some fashion, of environmental preservation. Postmodernists reject the idea of a universal good. They rightly acknowledge the difficulty of identifying a common value given the multiple contexts of our value-producing activity. In fact, if there is one thing they vehemently scorn, it is the idea that there can be a value that stands above the individual contexts of human experience. Such a value would present itself as a metanarrative and, as Jean- François Lyotard has explained, postmodernism is characterized fundamentally by its “incredulity toward meta-narratives.” Nonetheless, I can’t see how postmodern critics can do otherwise than accept the value of preserving the nonhuman world. The nonhuman is the extreme “other”; it stands in contradistinction to humans as a species. In understanding the constructed quality of human experience and the dangers of reification, postmodernism inherently advances an ethic of respecting the “other.” At the very least, respect must involve ensuring that the “other” actually continues to exist. In our day and age, this requires us to take responsibility for protecting the actuality of the nonhuman. Instead, however, we are running roughshod over the earth’s diversity of plants, animals, and ecosystems. Postmodern critics should find this particularly disturbing. If they don’t, they deny their own intellectual insights and compromise their fundamental moral commitment. Now, what does this mean for politics and policy, and the future of the environmental movement? Society is constantly being asked to address questions of environmental quality for which there are no easy answers. As we wrestle with challenges of global climate change, ozone depletion, loss of biological diversity, and so forth, we need to consider the economic, political, cultural, and aesthetic values at stake. These considerations have traditionally marked the politics of environmental protection. A sensitivity to eco-criticism requires that we go further and include an ethic of otherness in our deliberations. That is, we need to be moved by our concern to make room for the “other” and hence fold a commitment to the nonhuman world into our policy discussions. I don’t mean that this argument should drive all our actions or that respect for the “other” should always carry the day. But it must be a central part of our reflections and calculations. For example, as we estimate the number of people that a certain area can sustain, consider what to do about climate change, debate restrictions on ocean fishing, or otherwise assess the effects of a particular course of action, we must think about the lives of other creatures on the earth—and also the continued existence of the nonliving physical world. We must do so not because we wish to maintain what is “natural” but because we wish to act in a morally respectable manner. I have been using postmodern cultural criticism against itself. Yes, the postmodernists are right: we can do what we want with the nonhuman world. There is nothing essential about the realm of rocks, trees, fish, and climate that calls for a certain type of action. But postmodernists are also right that the only ethical way to act in a world that is socially constructed is to respect the voices of the others— of those with whom we share the planet but with whom we may not share a common language or outlook. There is, in other words, a limit or guiding principle to our actions. As political theorist Leslie Thiele puts it, “One can’t argue for the diversity of views of ‘nature’ without taking a stand for the diversity of nature.”
No prior questions to the 1AC David Owen, Reader of Political Theory at the Univ. of Southampton, Millennium Vol 31 No 3 2002 p. 655- Commenting on the ‘philosophical turn’ in IR, Wæver remarks that ‘a frenzy for words like “epistemology” and “ontology” often signals this philosophical turn’, although he goes on to comment that these terms are often used loosely.4 However, loosely deployed or not, it is clear that debates concerning ontology and epistemology play a central role in the contemporary IR theory wars. In one respect, this is unsurprising since it is a characteristic feature of the social sciences that periods of disciplinary disorientation involve recourse to reflection on the philosophical commitments of different theoretical approaches, and there is no doubt that such reflection can play a valuable role in making explicit the commitments that characterise (and help individuate) diverse theoretical positions. Yet, such a philosophical turn is not without its dangers and I will briefly mention three before turning to consider a confusion that has, I will suggest, helped to promote the IR theory wars by motivating this philosophical turn. The first danger with the philosophical turn is that it has an inbuilt tendency to prioritise issues of ontology and epistemology over explanatory and/or interpretive power as if the latter two were merely a simple function of the former. But while the explanatory and/or interpretive power of a theoretical account is not wholly independent of its ontological and/or epistemological commitments (otherwise criticism of these features would not be a criticism that had any value), it is by no means clear that it is, in contrast, wholly dependent on these philosophical commitments. Thus, for example, one need not be sympathetic to rational choice theory to recognise that it can provide powerful accounts of certain kinds of problems, such as the tragedy of the commons in which dilemmas of collective action are foregrounded. It may, of course, be the case that the advocates of rational choice theory cannot give a good account of why this type of theory is powerful in accounting for this class of problems (i.e., how it is that the relevant actors come to exhibit features in these circumstances that approximate the assumptions of rational choice theory) and, if this is the case, it is a philosophical weakness—but this does not undermine the point that, for a certain class of problems, rational choice theory may provide the best account available to us. In other words, while the critical judgement of theoretical accounts in terms of their ontological and/or epistemological sophistication is one kind of critical judgement, it is not the only or even necessarily the most important kind. The second danger run by the philosophical turn is that because prioritisation of ontology and epistemology promotes theory-construction from philosophical first principles, it cultivates a theory-driven rather than problem-driven approach to IR. Paraphrasing Ian Shapiro, the point can be put like this: since it is the case that there is always a plurality of possible true descriptions of a given action, event or phenomenon, the challenge is to decide which is the most apt in terms of getting a perspicuous grip on the action, event or phenomenon in question given the purposes of the inquiry; yet, from this standpoint, ‘theory-driven work is part of a reductionist program’ in that it ‘dictates always opting for the description that calls for the explanation that flows from the preferred model or theory’.5 The justification offered for this strategy rests on the mistaken belief that it is necessary for social science because general explanations are required to characterise the classes of phenomena studied in similar terms. However, as Shapiro points out, this is to misunderstand the enterprise of science since ‘whether there are general explanations for classes of phenomena is a question for social-scientific inquiry, not to be prejudged before conducting that inquiry’.6 Moreover, this strategy easily slips into the promotion of the pursuit of generality over that of empirical validity. The third danger is that the preceding two combine to encourage the formation of a particular image of disciplinary debate in IR—what might be called (only slightly tongue in cheek) ‘the Highlander view’—namely, an image of warring theoretical approaches with each, despite occasional temporary tactical alliances, dedicated to the strategic achievement of sovereignty over the disciplinary field. It encourages this view because the turn to, and prioritisation of, ontology and epistemology stimulates the idea that there can only be one theoretical approach which gets things right, namely, the theoretical approach that gets its ontology and epistemology right. This image feeds back into IR exacerbating the first and second dangers, and so a potentially vicious circle arises.
Evaluate consequences Weiss, Prof Poli Sci – CUNY Grad Center, ‘99 (Thomas G, “Principles, Politics, and Humanitarian Action,” Ethics and International Affairs 13.1) Scholars and practitioners frequently employ the term “dilemma” to describe painful decision making but “quandary” would be more apt.27A dilemma involves two or more alternative courses of action with unintended but unavoidable and equally undesirable consequences. If consequences are equally unpalatable, then remaining inactive on the sidelines is an option rather than entering the serum on the field. A quandary, on the other hand, entails tough choices among unattractive options with better or worse possible outcomes. While humanitarians are perplexed, they are not and should not be immobilized. The solution is not indifference or withdrawal but rather appropriate engagement. The key lies in making a good faith effort to analyze the advantages and disadvantages of different alloys of politics and humanitarianism, and then to choose what often amounts to the lesser of evils. Thoughtful humanitarianism is more appropriate than rigid ideological responses, for four reasons: goals of humanitarian action often conflict, good intentions can have catastrophic consequences; there are alternative ways to achieve ends; and even if none of the choices is ideal, victims still require decisions about outside help. What Myron Wiener has called “instrumental humanitarianism” would resemble just war doctrine because contextual analyses and not formulas are required. Rather than resorting to knee-jerk reactions to help, it is necessary to weigh options and make decisions about choices that are far from optimal. Many humanitarian decisions in northern Iraq, Somalia, Bosnia, and Rwanda—and especially those involving economic or military sanctions— required selecting least-bad options. Thomas Nagle advises that “given the limitations on human action, it is naive to suppose that there is a solution to every moral problem. “29 Action-oriented institutions and staff are required in order to contextualized their work rather than apply preconceived notions of what is right or wrong. Nonetheless, classicists continue to insist on Pictet’s “indivisible whole” because humanitarian principles “are interlocking, overlapping and mutually supportive. . . . It is hard to accept the logic of one without also accepting the others. “30 The process of making decisions in war zones could be compared to that pursued by “clinical ethical review teams” whose members are on call to make painful decisions about life-and-death matters in hospitals.sl The sanctity of life is complicated by new technologies, but urgent decisions cannot be finessed. It is impermissible to long for another era or to pretend that the bases for decisions are unchanged. However emotionally wrenching, finding solutions is an operational imperative that is challenging but intellectually doable. Humanitarians who cannot stand the heat generated by situational ethics should stay out of the post-Cold War humanitarian kitchen. Principles in an Unprincipled World Why are humanitarians in such a state of moral and operational disrepair? In many ways Western liberal values over the last few centuries have been moving toward interpreting moral obligations as going beyond a family and intimate networks, beyond a tribe, and beyond a nation. The impalpable moral ideal is concern about the fate of other people, no matter how far away.szThe evaporation of distance with advances in technology and media coverage, along with a willingness to intervene in a variety of post–Cold War crises, however, has produced situations in which humanitarians are damned if they do and if they don’t. Engagement by outsiders does not necessarily make things better, and it may even create a “moral hazard by altering the payoffs to combatants in such a way as to encourage more intensive fighting.“33 This new terrain requires analysts and practitioners to admit ignorance and question orthodoxies. There is no comfortable theoretical framework or world vision to function as a compass to steer between integration and fragmentation, globalization and insularity. Michael Ignatieff observes, “The world is not becoming more chaotic or violent, although our failure to understand and act makes it seem so. “34Gwyn Prins has pointed to the “scary humility of admitting one’s ignorance” because “the new vogue for ‘complex emergencies’ is too often a means of concealing from oneself that one does not know what is going on. “3sTo make matters more frustrating, never before has there been such a bombardment of data and instant analysis; the challenge of distilling such jumbled and seemingly contradictory information adds to the frustration of trying to do something appropriate fast. International discourse is not condemned to follow North American fashions and adapt sound bites and slogans. It is essential to struggle with and even embrace the ambiguities that permeate international responses to wars, but without the illusion of a one-size-fits-all solution. The trick is to grapple with complexities, to tease out the general without ignoring the particular, and still to be inspired enough to engage actively in trying to make a difference. Because more and more staff of aid agencies, their governing boards, and their financial backers have come to value reflection, an earlier policy prescription by Larry Minear and me no longer appears bizarre: “Don’t just do something, stand there! “3sThis advice represented our conviction about the payoffs from thoughtful analyses and our growing distaste for the stereotypical, yet often accurate, image of a bevy of humanitarian actors flitting from one emergency to the next.
Only full removal of the economic embargo solves Gorrell 05 Lieutenant Colonel, U.S. Army War College Lieutenant Colonel Tim Gorrell, Cuba: The Next Unanticipated Anticipated Strategic Crisis?, Strategy Research Project, 18 March 2005, U.S. Army War College, http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA433074 RETAIN SANCTIONS AGAINST CUBA, BUT ENFORCE THEM IN VARYING DEGREES DEPENDING ON THE POLITICAL CLIMATE AND THE CUBAN REGIME’S CONDUCT IN REGARD TO AMERICAN INTERESTS Throughout the past 15 years, the U.S. has experimented with a variable enforcement option. During the Clinton administration, restrictions were occasionally eased. For example, in March 1998, President Clinton announced: 1) the resumption of licensing for direct humanitarian charter flights to Cuba; 2) the resumption of cash remittances up to $300 per quarter for the support of close relatives in Cuba; 3) the development of licensing procedures to streamline and expedite licenses for the commercial sale of medicines and medical supplies and equipment; and 4) a decision to work on a bipartisan basis with Congress on the transfer of food to the Cuban people.33 In January 1999, President Clinton ordered additional measures to assist the Cuban people, which included further easement of cash remittances, expansion of direct passenger charter flights to Cuba, reestablishment of direct mail service, authorization for the commercial sale of food to independent entities in Cuba, and an expansion of people-to-people exchanges (i.e. scientist, students, athletes, etc.)34 This policy ended when the new administration failed to see any reciprocal progress from Castro. Fragmenting the policy process may do more harm than good. It does too little too late and causes hard feelings among Cubans and American businesses. The carrot-stick diplomatic approach will not make Castro yield. Such policy breeds inconsistency as it can vary from administration to administration, as it has between the Clinton and Bush administrations. The rules constantly change and thus have a ripple effect on American businesses and the quality of life of Americans, Cuban-Americans and native Cubans. Cuban trade has already declined to a trickle since the Bush administration sought to further squeeze the Castro government. Prior to the Bush administration’s trade crack down, 2004 was emerging as a record year for U.S. imports to Cuba. By the end of December 2004 U.S. suppliers and shippers were projected to have earned some $450 million, a 20 increase over 2003 sales.35 Imposing restrictions, as the Bush administration did in June 2004, perplexed American businesses with unpredicted problems. These businesses make adjustments, as do Cuban- American citizens, then must abruptly alter their business strategies because of a Congressional vote or an Executive order. This political tug-of-war does not move the U.S. any closer to realizing its security objectives. On the Cuban American front there is eroding support for this U.S. policy position. In the 2000 presidential election, President Bush won 81 of south Florida’s Cuban-American vote. A recent poll by the William C. Veleasquez Institute-Mirram Global indicates that his support today has fallen to 66.36 This decline signals a negative response to policy that limits travel, restricts the amount of goods people can bring to their relatives, and places limitations on sending money to family in Cuba. Cuban-Americans believe that this only hurts their poor relatives in Cuba. According to Jose Basulto, head of Brothers to the Rescue, and Ramon Raul Sanchez, head of the anti-Castro Democracy Movement, the U.S. government is using the Cuban people to harass Castro.37 Applying policy in a give-and-take manner, accomplishes little to facilitate the fall of Castro. The Cuban people enjoy brief periods of limited benefits, only to have these benefits withdrawn should the President or members of Congress wish to take another jab at Castro. American civilian businesses are also negatively affected. LIFT ALL SANCTIONS AND PURSUE NORMAL DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS WITH CUBA Normalcy is the only policy that the U.S. has not attempted. The present policy misses the security implications, alienates allies and others worldwide, harms U.S. businesses, and is losing support domestically. First, the U.S. must reassess the threat posed by Cuba. There is, in fact, virtually no security threat. Further, policies that were applicable in the past, when there was a threat, should not be applied to the current environment. The U.S. Cuban policy is perplexing because it appears to conflict with the ends, ways and means that the National Security Strategy is applied in other regions of the world. The U.S. has normalized relations with Vietnam and Libya and has certainly opted for an open dialogue with Communist China. Likewise, there is abundant evidence that a new policy toward Cuba could very well achieve the ends that 43 years of embargo have failed to accomplish. Secondly, Cuba currently trades and has diplomatic ties with much of the world. The goal of U.S. sanctions is to isolate the Cuban regime; however, they have only slowed, not deterred economic growth. On 4 November 2003 the United Nations voted, for the 12th straight year, 173 to 3 (with 4 abstentions) against the four-decade U.S. embargo against Cuba.38 Voting with the U.S. were Israel and the Marshall Islands. The U.S.’ staunchest allies, the 15 members of the European Union, along with Japan, Australia and New Zealand, all object to the “extra-territorial” effect of U.S. legislation that they feel violates their sovereignty. 39 There are two schools of thought regarding trade and democracy. The first is that economic growth will promote democracy. The other questions this notion and argues that democracy must come first.40 There is strong opinion, however, that in Cuba’s case economic engagement will bring about the desired results. Certainly many Cuban-Americans and perhaps some others in the world would not agree with this course of action. However, there is evidence that a significant number of people both within the U.S. and abroad favor a policy change. In 1992 a pastoral letter from Cuba’s Bishops stated that the US embargo “directly affects the people who suffer the consequences in hunger and illness. If what is intended by this approach is to destabilize the government by using hunger and want to pressure civic society to revolt, then the strategy is also cruel.“41 The third consideration is U.S. business. Under the current rules, U.S. businesses are permitted to sell agricultural produce to Cuba.42 Today 27 firms from 12 U.S. states are doing business with Cuba, making Cuba 22nd among U.S. agricultural markets.43 These business activities are greatly influenced by Cuban-Americans and members of Congress. The economic power of the U.S. can be our most powerful weapon. The possibilities of economic engagement offer a myriad of branches and sequels that could promote a rapport between the American people and the Cubans. The aggressive pursuit of these endeavors would go far in ensuring an orderly transition to a post-Castro Cuba. It is an erroneous assumption to believe that Castro’s demise will miraculously trigger reform and all the problems of the last 40 years will vanish. A visionary policy, albeit constrained within the parameters of the Castro regime, will go far in setting agreeable social-economic conditions in Cuba both now and in the future. Finally, public opinion in the U.S. favors a new policy direction. A 1997 Miami Herald poll found that a majority of Cubans under the age of 45 supported “establishing a national dialogue with Cuba,” whereas for the most part their elders opposed such dialogue.44 Former President Jimmy Carter, writing in the Washington Post after his May 2002 visit to Cuba, reported that he found an unexpected degree of economic freedom. Carter went on to say that if Americans could have maximum contact with Cuban, then Cubans would clearly see the advantages of a truly democratic society and thus be encouraged to bring about orderly changes in their society. 45 Castro himself appears willing to consider greater reform. In 1998 he permitted Pope John Paul II to visit Cuba; Cubans are permitted to own property; he has opened trade; and in 2002 he broadcast former President Jimmy Carter’s address at the University of Havana.46 Additionally, he indicated that the Cuban government would return any of the Guantanamo detainees in the unlikely event that they would escape.47 CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION U.S. policy makers need to confront the real Cuba of today in order to build a “free” Cuba of tomorrow that is capable of taking its place in the world community as a responsible, democratic nation. Given the history of the past 100 years, and particularly our Castro centric policy, the U.S. needs to make a bold change toward Cuba. The U.S. has pursued a hard-line approach toward the Castro regime for over 40 years. While this policy was easily justified during the Cold War era and, to a certain degree, during the 1990s, it fails to address the present U.S. national security concerns. The globalization trends of the 21st century are irreversible, Fidel Castro is in the twilight of his life, and a new generation of Cuban-Americans is supportive of new strategies that will ease the transition to a post-Castro Cuba while buttressing economic and social opportunities in the near term. Furthermore, there is a new dimension that U.S. policy strategists must take into account in deciding the course of U.S.- Cuba relations – the GWOT. World-wide asymmetrical threats to U.S. interests, coupled with the Iraqi occupation and the potential for any one of the present hot spots (i.e. Iran, North Korea, Taiwan, etc.) to ignite, should prompt strategic leaders to work harder to mitigate a potential Caribbean crises. The prudent action would then be to develop strategies that can defuse or neutralize these situations before they require the U.S. to divert resources from protecting its interests in the GWOT. Therefore, the U.S. can best serve its security, the Cuban people, and the Western Hemisphere by abandoning the present draconian policy toward Cuba. The U.S. should implement a new policy designed to achieve its goals through lifting all sanctions and pursuing normalized diplomatic relations; encouraging people-to-people dialogue and trade. The policy should continue to pursue human rights, democracy, and free market ends. However, the ways to realize these objectives should be grounded in full economic engagement, an approach that has not been fully attempted. The present U.S. policy has failed miserably. What does the most powerful nation on earth have to lose by attempting a bold shift in its policy toward Cuba?
Contention 1 is Relations Plan solves relations 2 ways- expands credibility and soft power in the region Hinderdael 11 M.A. candidate at SAIS Bologna Center, concentrating in American Foreign Policy and Energy, Resources, and Environment Klaas Hinderdael, Breaking the Logjam: Obama's Cuba Policy and a Guideline for Improved Leadership, by http://bcjournal.org/volume-14/breaking-the-logjam.html?printerFriendly=true
Conclusion The two countries’ histories have long been intertwined, particularly after the Monroe Doctrine of 1823 gave rise to the American belief that it would become the hemisphere’s protector. Until the immediate aftermath of Fidel Castro’s revolution, Cuba provided a testing ground for the promotion of American ideals, social beliefs, and foreign policies. In the context of Raúl shifting course in Cuba, the Obama administration has the opportunity to highlight the benefits of both the use of soft power and a foreign policy of engagement. As evidence mounts that the United States is ready to engage countries that enact domestic reforms, its legitimacy and influence will grow. Perhaps future political leaders, in Iran or North Korea for example, will be more willing to make concessions knowing that the United States will return in kind. The United States should not wait for extensive democratization before further engaging Cuba, however. One legacy of the Cold War is that Communism has succeeded only where it grew out of its own, often nationalistic, revolutions. As it has with China and Vietnam, the United States should look closely at the high payoffs stemming from engagement. By improving relations, America can enhance its own influence on the island’s political structure and human rights policies. At home, with the trade deficit and national debt rising, the economic costs of the embargo are amplified. Recent studies estimate that the US economy foregoes up to $4.84 billion a year and the Cuban economy up to $685 million a year.50 While US-Cuban economic interests align, political considerations inside America have shifted, as “commerce seems to be trumping anti-Communism and Florida ideologues.”51 Clearly, public opinion also favors a new Cuba policy, with 65 percent of Americans now ready for a shift in the country’s approach to its neighboring island.52 At this particular moment in the history of US-Cuban relations, there is tremendous promise for a breakthrough in relations. In a post-Cold War world, Cuba no longer presents a security threat to the united States, but instead provides it with economic potential. American leaders cannot forget the fact that an economic embargo, combined with diplomatic isolation, has failed to bring democracy to Cuba for over 50 years. American policymakers should see Cuba as an opportunity to reap the political, economic, and strategic rewards of shifting its own policies toward engagement. By ending the economic embargo and normalizing diplomatic relations with the island, President Obama would indicate that he is truly willing to extend his hand once America’s traditional adversaries unclench their fists.
Cuba is key to US-Latin American Relations – specifically spills over to global cooperation on nuclear material transfers and warming Shifter ‘12 (Michael is an Adjunct Professor of Latin American Studies at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and writes for the Council's journal Foreign Affairs. He serves as the President of Inter-American Dialogue. “Remaking the Relationship: The United States and Latin America,” April, IAD Policy Report, http://www.thedialogue.org/PublicationFiles/IAD2012PolicyReportFINAL.pdf)
Cuba, too, poses a significant challenge for relations between the United States and Latin America. The 50-year-old US embargo against Cuba is rightly criticized throughout the hemisphere as a failed and punitive instrument. It has long been a strain on US-Latin American relations. Although the United States has recently moved in the right direction and taken steps to relax restrictions on travel to Cuba, Washington needs to do far more to dismantle its severe, outdated constraints on normalized relations with Cuba. Cuba is one of the residual issues that most obstructs more effective US-Latin American engagement. At the same time, Cuba’s authoritarian regime should be of utmost concern to all countries in the Americas. At present, it is the only country without free, multi-party elections, and its government fully controls the press. Latin American and Caribbean nations could be instrumental in supporting Cuba’s eventual transition to democratic rule. An end to the US policy of isolating Cuba, without setting aside US concern about human rights violations, would be an important first step. Many of the issues on the hemispheric agenda carry critical global dimensions. Because of this, the United States should seek greater cooperation and consultation with Brazil, Mexico, and other countries of the region in world forums addressing shared interests. Brazil has the broadest international presence and influence of any Latin American nation. In recent years it has become far more active on global issues of concern to the United States. The United States and Brazil have clashed over such issues as Iran’s nuclear program, non-proliferation, and the Middle East uprisings, but they have cooperated when their interests converged, such as in the World Trade Organization and the G-20 (Mexico, Argentina, and Canada also participate in the G-20), and in efforts to rebuild and provide security for Haiti. Washington has worked with Brazil and other Latin American countries to raise the profile of emerging economies in various international financial agencies, including the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. In addition to economic and financial matters, Brazil and other Latin American nations are assuming enhanced roles on an array of global political, environmental, and security issues. Several for which US and Latin American cooperation could become increasingly important include: As the world’s lone nuclear-weapons-free region, Latin America has the opportunity to participate more actively in non-proliferation efforts. Although US and Latin American interests do not always converge on non-proliferation questions, they align on some related goals. For example, the main proliferation challenges today are found in developing and unstable parts of the world, as well as in the leakage—or transfer of nuclear materials—to terrorists. In that context, south-south connections are crucial. Brazil could play a pivotal role. Many countries in the region give priority to climate change challenges. This may position them as a voice in international debates on this topic. The importance of the Amazon basin to worldwide climate concerns gives Brazil and five other South American nations a special role to play. Mexico already has assumed a prominent position on climate change and is active in global policy debates. Brazil organized the first-ever global environmental meeting in 1992 and, this year, will host Rio+20. Mexico hosted the second international meeting on climate change in Cancún in 2010. The United States is handicapped by its inability to devise a climate change policy. Still, it should support coordination on the presumption of shared interests on a critical policy challenge. Latin Americans are taking more active leadership on drug policy in the hemisphere and could become increasingly influential in global discussions of drug strategies. Although the United States and Latin America are often at odds on drug policy, they have mutual interests and goals that should allow consultation and collaboration on a new, more effective approach to the problem.
It’s not irreversible – we’re at the tipping point now – every reduction key Nuccitelli 12 Dana, is an environmental scientist at a private environmental consulting firm in the Sacramento, California area. He has a Bachelor's Degree in astrophysics from the University of California at Berkeley, and a Master's Degree in physics from the University of California at Davis. He has been researching climate science, economics, and solutions as a hobby since 2006, and has contributed to Skeptical Science since September, 2010, http://www.skepticalscience.com/realistically-what-might-future-climate-look-like.html, HM We're not yet committed to surpassing 2°C global warming, but as Watson noted, we are quickly running out of time to realistically give ourselves a chance to stay below that 'danger limit'. However, 2°C is not a do-or-die threshold. Every bit of CO2 emissions we can reduce means that much avoided future warming, which means that much avoided climate change impacts. As Lonnie Thompson noted, the more global warming we manage to mitigate, the less adaption and suffering we will be forced to cope with in the future. Realistically, based on the current political climate (which we will explore in another post next week), limiting global warming to 2°C is probably the best we can do. However, there is a big difference between 2°C and 3°C, between 3°C and 4°C, and anything greater than 4°C can probably accurately be described as catastrophic, since various tipping points are expected to be triggered at this level. Right now, we are on track for the catastrophic consequences (widespread coral mortality, mass extinctions, hundreds of millions of people adversely impacted by droughts, floods, heat waves, etc.). But we're not stuck on that track just yet, and we need to move ourselves as far off of it as possible by reducing our greenhouse gas emissions as soon and as much as possible. There are of course many people who believe that the planet will not warm as much, or that the impacts of the associated climate change will be as bad as the body of scientific evidence suggests. That is certainly a possiblity, and we very much hope that their optimistic view is correct. However, what we have presented here is the best summary of scientific evidence available, and it paints a very bleak picture if we fail to rapidly reduce our greenhouse gas emissions. If we continue forward on our current path, catastrophe is not just a possible outcome, it is the most probable outcome. And an intelligent risk management approach would involve taking steps to prevent a catastrophic scenario if it were a mere possibility, let alone the most probable outcome. This is especially true since the most important component of the solution - carbon pricing - can be implemented at a relatively low cost, and a far lower cost than trying to adapt to the climate change consequences we have discussed here (Figure 4).
It’s real and is anthropogenic---reject negative evidence Prothero 12 Donald R. Prothero, Professor of Geology at Occidental College and Lecturer in Geobiology at the California Institute of Technology, 3-1-2012, "How We Know Global Warming is Real and Human Caused," Skeptic, 17.2, EBSCO How do we know that global warming is real and primarily human caused? There are numerous lines of evidence that converge toward this conclusion. 1. Carbon Dioxide Increase Carbon dioxide in our atmosphere has increased at an unprecedented rate in the past 200 years. Not one data set collected over a long enough span of time shows otherwise. Mann et al. (1999) compiled the past 900 years' worth of temperature data from tree rings, ice cores, corals, and direct measurements in the past few centuries, and the sudden increase of temperature of the past century stands out like a sore thumb. This famous graph is now known as the "hockey stick" because it is long and straight through most of its length, then bends sharply upward at the end like the blade of a hockey stick. Other graphs show that climate was very stable within a narrow range of variation through the past 1000, 2000, or even 10,000 years since the end of the last Ice Age. There were minor warming events during the Climatic Optimum about 7000 years ago, the Medieval Warm Period, and the slight cooling of the Litde Ice Age in the 1700s and 1800s. But the magnitude and rapidity of the warming represented by the last 200 years is simply unmatched in all of human history. More revealing, the timing of this warming coincides with the Industrial Revolution, when humans first began massive deforestation and released carbon dioxide into the atmosphere by burning an unprecedented amount of coal, gas, and oil. 2. Melting Polar Ice Caps The polar icecaps are thinning and breaking up at an alarming rate. In 2000, my former graduate advisor Malcolm McKenna was one of the first humans to fly over the North Pole in summer time and see no ice, just open water. The Arctic ice cap has been frozen solid for at least the past 3 million years (and maybe longer), 4 but now the entire ice sheet is breaking up so fast that by 2030 (and possibly sooner) less than half of the Arctic will be ice covered in the summer. 5 As one can see from watching the news, this is an ecological disaster for everything that lives up there, from the polar bears to the seals and walruses to the animals they feed upon, to the 4 million people whose world is melting beneath their feet. The Antarctic is thawing even faster. In February-March 2002, the Larsen B ice shelf -- over 3000 square km (the size of Rhode Island) and 220 m (700 feet) thick -- broke up in just a few months, a story -typical of nearly all the ice shelves in Antarctica. The Larsen B shelf had survived all the previous ice ages and interglacial warming episodes over the past 3 million years, and even the warmest periods of the last 10,000 years -- yet it and nearly all the other thick ice sheets on the Arctic, Greenland, and Antarctic are vanishing at a rate never before seen in geologic history. 3. Melting Glaciers Glaciers are all retreating at the highest rates ever documented. Many of those glaciers, along with snow melt, especially in the Himalayas, Andes, Alps, and Sierras, provide most of the freshwater that the populations below the mountains depend upon -- yet this fresh water supply is vanishing. Just think about the percentage of world's population in southern Asia (especially India) that depend on Himalayan snowmelt for their fresh water. The implications are staggering. The permafrost that once remained solidly frozen even in the summer has now thawed, damaging the Inuit villages on the Arctic coast and threatening all our pipelines to the North Slope of Alaska. This is catastrophic not only for life on the permafrost, but as it thaws, the permafrost releases huge amounts of greenhouse gases which are one of the major contributors to global warming. Not only is the ice vanishing, but we have seen record heat waves over and over again, killing thousands of people, as each year joins the list of the hottest years on record. (2010 just topped that list as the hottest year, surpassing the previous record in 2009, and we shall know about 2011 soon enough). Natural animal and plant populations are being devastated all over the globe as their environments change. 6 Many animals respond by moving their ranges to formerly cold climates, so now places that once did not have to worry about disease-bearing mosquitoes are infested as the climate warms and allows them to breed further north. 4. Sea Level Rise All that melted ice eventually ends up in the ocean, causing sea levels to rise, as it has many times in the geologic past. At present, the sea level is rising about 3-4 mm per year, more than ten times the rate of 0.1-0.2 mm/year that has occurred over the past 3000 years. Geological data show that the sea level was virtually unchanged over the past 10,000 years since the present interglacial began. A few mm here or there doesn't impress people, until you consider that the rate is accelerating and that most scientists predict sea levels will rise 80-130 cm in just the next century. A sea level rise of 1.3 m (almost 4 feet) would drown many of the world's low-elevation cities, such as Venice and New Orleans, and low-lying countries such as the Netherlands or Bangladesh. A number of tiny island nations such as Vanuatu and the Maldives, which barely poke out above the ocean now, are already vanishing beneath the waves. Eventually their entire population will have to move someplace else. 7 Even a small sea level rise might not drown all these areas, but they are much more vulnerable to the large waves of a storm surge (as happened with Hurricane Katrina), which could do much more damage than sea level rise alone. If sea level rose by 6 m (20 feet), most of the world's coastal plains and low-lying areas (such as the Louisiana bayous, Florida, and most of the world's river deltas) would be drowned. Most of the world's population lives in low-elevation coastal cities such as New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, D.C., Miami, and Shanghai. All of those cities would be partially or completely under water with such a sea level rise. If all the glacial ice caps melted completely (as they have several times before during past greenhouse episodes in the geologic past), sea level would rise by 65 m (215 feet)! The entire Mississippi Valley would flood, so you could dock an ocean liner in Cairo, Illinois. Such a sea level rise would drown nearly every coastal region under hundreds of feet of water, and inundate New York City, London and Paris. All that would remain would be the tall landmarks such as the Empire State Building, Big Ben, and the Eiffel Tower. You could tie your boats to these pinnacles, but the rest of these drowned cities would lie deep underwater. Climate Change Critic's Arguments and Scientists' Rebuttals Despite the overwhelming evidence there are many people who remain skeptical. One reason is that they have been fed distortions and misstatements by the global warming denialists who cloud or confuse the issue. Let's examine some of these claims in detail: * "It's just natural climatic variability." No, it is not. As I detailed in my 2009 book, Greenhouse of the Dinosaurs, geologists and paleoclimatologists know a lot about past greenhouse worlds, and the icehouse planet that has existed for the past 33 million years. We have a good understanding of how and why the Antarctic ice sheet first appeared at that time, and how the Arctic froze over about 3.5 million years ago, beginning the 24 glacial and interglacial episodes of the "Ice Ages" that have occurred since then. We know how variations in the earth's orbit (the Milankovitch cycles) controls the amount of solar radiation the earth receives, triggering the shifts between glacial and interglacial periods. Our current warm interglacial has already lasted 10,000 years, the duration of most previous interglacials, so if it were not for global warming, we would be headed into the next glacial in the next 1000 years or so. Instead, our pumping greenhouse gases into our atmosphere after they were long trapped in the earth's crust has pushed the planet into a "super-interglacial," already warmer than any previous warming period. We can see the "big picture" of climate variability most clearly in ice cores from the EPICA (European Project for Ice Coring in Antarctica), which show the details of the last 650,000 years of glacial-inters glacial cycles (Fig. 2). At no time during any previous interglacial did the carbon dioxide levels exceed 300 ppm, even at their very warmest. Our atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are already close to 400 ppm today. The atmosphere is headed to 600 ppm within a few decades, even if we stopped releasing greenhouse gases immediately. This is decidedly not within the normal range of "climatic variability," but clearly unprecedented in human history. Anyone who says this is "normal variability" has never seen the huge amount of paleoclimatic data that show otherwise. * "It's just another warming episode, like the Medieval Warm Period, or the Holocene Climatic Optimum or the end of the Little Ice Age." Untrue. There were numerous small fluctuations of warming and cooling over the last 10,000 years of the Holocene. But in the case of the Medieval Warm Period (about 950-1250 A.D.), the temperatures increased only 1°C, much less than we have seen in the current episode of global warming (Fig. 1). This episode was also only a local warming in the North Atlantic and northern Europe. Global temperatures over this interval did not warm at all, and actually cooled by more than 1°C. Likewise, the warmest period of the last 10,000 years was the Holocene Climatic Optimum ( 5,000-9,000 B.C.E.) when warmer and wetter conditions in Eurasia contributed to the rise of the first great civilizations in Egypt, Mesopotamia, the Indus Valley, and China. This was largely a Northern Hemisphere-Eurasian phenomenon, with 2-3°C warming in the Arctic and northern Europe. But there was almost no warming in the tropics, and cooling or no change in the Southern Hemisphere. 8 From a Eurocentric viewpoint, these warming events seemed important, but on a global scale the effect was negligible. In addition, neither of these warming episodes is related to increasing greenhouse gases. The Holocene Climatic Optimum, in fact, is predicted by the Milankovitch cycles, since at that time the axial tilt of the earth was 24°, its steepest value, meaning the Northern Hemisphere got more solar radiation than normal -- but the Southern Hemisphere less, so the two balanced. By contrast, not only is the warming observed in the last 200 years much greater than during these previous episodes, but it is also global and bipolar, so it is not a purely local effect. The warming that ended the Little Ice Age (from the mid-1700s to the late 1800s) was due to increased solar radiation prior to 1940. Since 1940, however, the amount of solar radiation has been dropping, so the only candidate remaining for the post-1940 warming is carbon dioxide. 9 "It's just the sun, or cosmic rays, or volcanic activity or methane." Nope, sorry. The amount of heat that the sun provides has been decreasing since 1940, 10 just the opposite of the critics' claims (Fig. 3). There is no evidence of an increase in cosmic ray particles during the past century. 11 Nor is there any clear evidence that large-scale volcanic events (such as the 1815 eruption of Tambora in Indonesia, which changed global climate for about a year) have any long-term effects that would explain 200 years of warming and carbon dioxide increase. Volcanoes erupt only 0.3 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide each year, but humans emit over 29 billion tonnes a year, 12 roughly 100 times as much. Clearly, we have a bigger effect. Methane is a more powerful greenhouse gas, but there is 200 times more carbon dioxide than methane, so carbon dioxide is still the most important agent. 13 Every other alternative has been looked at and can be ruled out. The only clear-cut relationship is between human-caused carbon dioxide increase and global warming. * "The climate records since 1995 (or 1998) show cooling." That's simply untrue. The only way to support this argument is to cherry-pick the data. 14 Over the short term, there was a slight cooling trend from 1998-2000, but only because 1998 was a record-breaking El Nino year, so the next few years look cooler by comparison (Fig. 4). But since 2002, the overall long-term trend of warming is unequivocal. All of the 16 hottest years ever recorded on a global scale have occurred in the last 20 years. They are (in order of hottest first): 2010, 2009, 1998, 2005, 2003, 2002, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2001, 1997, 2008, 1995, 1999, 1990, and 2000. 15 In other words, every year since 2000 has been on the Top Ten hottest years list. The rest of the top 16 include 1995, 1997, 1998, 1999, and 2000. Only 1996 failed to make the list (because of the short-term cooling mentioned already). * "We had record snows in the winter of 2009-2010, and also in 2010-2011." So what? This is nothing more than the difference between weather (short-term seasonal changes) and climate (the long-term average of weather over decades and centuries and longer). Our local weather tells us nothing about another continent, or the global average; it is only a local effect, determined by short-term atmospheric and oceano-graphic conditions. 16 In fact, warmer global temperatures mean more moisture in the atmosphere, which increases the intensity of normal winter snowstorms. In this particular case, the climate change critics forget that the early winter of November-December 2009 was actually very mild and warm, and then only later in January and February did it get cold and snow heavily. That warm spell in early winter helped bring more moisture into the system, so that when cold weather occurred, the snows were worse. In addition, the snows were unusually heavy only in North America; the rest of the world had different weather, and the global climate was warmer than average. Also, the summer of 2010 was the hottest on record, breaking the previous record set in 2009. * "Carbon dioxide is good for plants, so the world will be better off." Who do they think they're kidding? The Competitive Enterprise Institute (funded by oil and coal companies and conservative foundations 17) has run a series of shockingly stupid ads concluding with the tag line "Carbon dioxide: they call it pollution, we call it life." Anyone who knows the basic science of earth's atmosphere can spot the gross inaccuracies in this ad. 18 True, plants take in carbon dioxide that animals exhale, as they have for millions of years. But the whole point of the global warming evidence (as shown from ice cores) is that the delicate natural balance of carbon dioxide has been thrown off balance by our production of too much of it, way in excess of what plants or the oceans can handle. As a consequence, the oceans are warming 19, 20 and absorbing excess carbon dioxide making them more acidic. Already we are seeing a shocking decline in coral reefs ("bleaching") and extinctions in many marine ecosystems that can't handle too much of a good thing. Meanwhile, humans are busy cutting down huge areas of temperate and tropical forests, which not only means there are fewer plants to absorb the gas, but the slash and burn practices are releasing more carbon dioxide than plants can keep up with. There is much debate as to whether increased carbon dioxide might help agriculture in some parts of the world, but that has to be measured against the fact that other traditional "breadbasket" regions (such as the American Great Plains) are expected to get too hot to be as productive as they are today. The latest research 21 actually shows that increased carbon dioxide inhibits the absorption of nitrogen into plants, so plants (at least those that we depend upon today) are not going to flourish in a greenhouse world. It is difficult to know if those who tell the public otherwise are ignorant of basic atmospheric science and global geochemistry, or if they are being cynically disingenuous. * "I agree that climate is changing, but I'm skeptical that humans are the main cause, so we shouldn't do anything." This is just fence sitting. A lot of reasonable skeptics deplore the right wing's rejection of the reality of climate change, but still want to be skeptical about the cause. If they want proof, they can examine the huge array of data that points directly to human caused global warming. 22 We can directly measure the amount of carbon dioxide humans are producing, and it tracks exactly with the amount of increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide. Through carbon isotope analysis, we can show that this carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is coming directly from our burning of fossil fuels, not from natural sources. We can also measure the drop in oxygen as it combines with the increased carbon levels to produce carbon dioxide. We have satellites in space that are measuring the heat released from the planet and can actually see the atmosphere getting warmer. The most crucial evidence emerged only within the past few years: climate models of the greenhouse effect predict that there should be cooling in the stratosphere (the upper layer of the atmosphere above 10 km or 6 miles in elevation), but warming in the troposphere (the bottom layer below 10 km or 6 miles), and that's exactly what our space probes have measured. Finally, we can rule out any other suspects (see above): solar heat is decreasing since 1940, not increasing, and there are no measurable increases in cosmic rays, methane, volcanic gases, or any other potential cause. Face it -- it's our problem. Why Do People Continue to Question the Reality of Climate Change? Thanks to all the noise and confusion over climate change, the general public has only a vague idea of what the debate is really about, and only about half of Americans think global warming is real or that we are to blame. 23 As in the evolution/creationism debate, the scientific community is virtually unanimous on what the data demonstrate about anthropogenic global warming. This has been true for over a decade. When science historian Naomi Oreskes 24 surveyed all peer-reviewed papers on climate change published between 1993 and 2003 in the world's leading scientific journal, Science, she found that there were 980 supporting the idea of human-induced global warming and none opposing it. In 2009, Doran and Kendall Zimmerman 25 surveyed all the climate scientists who were familiar with the data. They found that 95-99 agreed that global warming is real and human caused. In 2010, the prestigious Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences published a study that showed that 98 of the scientists who actually do research in climate change are in agreement over anthropogenic global warming. 26 Every major scientific organization in the world has endorsed the conclusion of anthropogenic climate change as well. This is a rare degree of agreement within such an independent and cantankerous group as the world's top scientists. This is the same degree of scientific consensus that scientists have achieved over most major ideas, including gravity, evolution, and relativity. These and only a few other topics in science can claim this degree of agreement among nearly all the world's leading scientists, especially among everyone who is close to the scientific data and knows the problem intimately. If it were not such a controversial topic politically, there would be almost no interest in debating it since the evidence is so clear-cut. If the climate science community speaks with one voice (as in the 2007 IPCC report, and every report since then), why is there still any debate at all? The answer has been revealed by a number of investigations by diligent reporters who got past the PR machinery denying global warming, and uncovered the money trail. Originally, there were no real "dissenters" to the idea of global warming by scientists who are actually involved with climate research. Instead, the forces with vested interests in denying global climate change (the energy companies, and the "free-market" advocates) followed the strategy of tobacco companies: create a smokescreen of confusion and prevent the American public from recognizing scientific consensus. As the famous memo 27 from the tobacco lobbyists said "Doubt is our product." The denialists generated an anti-science movement entirely out of thin air and PR. The evidence for this PR conspiracy has been well documented in numerous sources. For example, Oreskes and Conway revealed from memos leaked to the press that in April 1998 the right-wing Marshall Institute, SEPP (Fred Seitz's lobby that aids tobacco companies and polluters), and ExxonMobil, met in secret at the American Petroleum Institute's headquarters in Washington, D.C. There they planned a $20 million campaign to get "respected scientists" to cast doubt on climate change, get major PR efforts going, and lobby Congress that global warming isn't real and is not a threat. The right-wing institutes and the energy lobby beat the bushes to find scientists -- any scientists -- who might disagree with the scientific consensus. As investigative journalists and scientists have documented over and over again, 28 the denialist conspiracy essentially paid for the testimony of anyone who could be useful to them. The day that the 2007 IPCC report was released (Feb. 2, 2007), the British newspaper The Guardian reported that the conservative American Enterprise Institute (funded largely by oil companies and conservative think tanks) had offered $10,000 plus travel expenses to scientists who would write negatively about the IPCC report. 29 In February 2012, leaks of documents from the denialist Heartland Institute revealed that they were trying to influence science education, suppress the work of scientists, and had paid off many prominent climate deniers, such as Anthony Watts, all in an effort to circumvent the scientific consensus by doing an "end run" of PR and political pressure. Other leaks have shown 9 out of 10 major climate deniers are paid by ExxonMobil. 30 We are accustomed to hired-gun "experts" paid by lawyers to muddy up the evidence in the case they are fighting, but this is extraordinary -- buying scientists outright to act as shills for organizations trying to deny scientific reality. With this kind of money, however, you can always find a fringe scientist or crank or someone with no relevant credentials who will do what they're paid to do. Fishing around to find anyone with some science background who will agree with you and dispute a scientific consensus is a tactic employed by the creationists to sound "scientific". The NCSE created a satirical "Project Steve," 31 which demonstrated that there were more scientists who accept evolution named "Steve" than the total number of "scientists who dispute evolution". It may generate lots of PR and a smokescreen to confuse the public, but it doesn't change the fact that scientists who actually do research in climate change are unanimous in their insistence that anthropogenic global warming is a real threat. Most scientists I know and respect work very hard for little pay, yet they still cannot be paid to endorse some scientific idea they know to be false. The climate deniers have a lot of other things in common with creationists and other anti-science movements. They too like to quote someone out of context ("quote mining"), finding a short phrase in the work of legitimate scientists that seems to support their position. But when you read the full quote in context, it is obvious that they have used the quote inappropriately. The original author meant something that does not support their goals. The "Climategate scandal" is a classic case of this. It started with a few stolen emails from the Climate Research Unit of the University of East Anglia. If you read the complete text of the actual emails 32 and comprehend the scientific shorthand of climate scientists who are talking casually to each other, it is clear that there was no great "conspiracy" or that they were faking data. All six subsequent investigations have cleared Philip Jones and the other scientists of the University of East Anglia of any wrongdoing or conspiracy. 33 Even if there had been some conspiracy on the part of these few scientists, there is no reason to believe that the entire climate science community is secretly working together to generate false information and mislead the public. If there's one thing that is clear about science, it's about competition and criticism, not conspiracy and collusion. Most labs are competing with each other, not conspiring together. If one lab publishes a result that is not clearly defensible, other labs will quickly correct it. As James Lawrence Powell wrote: Scientists…show no evidence of being more interested in politics or ideology than the average American. Does it make sense to believe that tens of thousands of scientists would be so deeply and secretly committed to bringing down capitalism and the American way of life that they would spend years beyond their undergraduate degrees working to receive master's and Ph.D. degrees, then go to work in a government laboratory or university, plying the deep oceans, forbidding deserts, icy poles, and torrid jungles, all for far less money than they could have made in industry, all the while biding their time like a Russian sleeper agent in an old spy novel? Scientists tend to be independent and resist authority. That is why you are apt to find them in the laboratory or in the field, as far as possible from the prying eyes of a supervisor. Anyone who believes he could organize thousands of scientists into a conspiracy has never attended a single faculty meeting. 34 There are many more traits that the climate deniers share with the creationists and Holocaust deniers and others who distort the truth. They pick on small disagreements between different labs as if scientists can't get their story straight, when in reality there is always a fair amount of give and take between competing labs as they try to get the answer right before the other lab can do so. The key point here is that when all these competing labs around the world have reached a consensus and get the same answer, there is no longer any reason to doubt their common conclusion. The anti-scientists of climate denialism will also point to small errors by individuals in an effort to argue that the entire enterprise cannot be trusted. It is true that scientists are human, and do make mistakes, but the great power of the scientific method is that peer review weeds these out, so that when scientists speak with consensus, there is no doubt that their data are checked carefully Finally, a powerful line of evidence that this is a purely political controversy, rather than a scientific debate, is that the membership lists of the creationists and the climate deniers are highly overlapping. Both anti-scientific dogmas are fed to their overlapping audiences through right-wing media such as Fox News, Glenn Beck, and Rush Limbaugh. Just take a look at the "intelligent-design" cre-ationism website for the Discovery Institute. Most of the daily news items lately have nothing to do with creationism at all, but are focused on climate denial and other right-wing causes. 35 If the data about global climate change are indeed valid and robust, any qualified scientist should be able to look at them and see if the prevailing scientific interpretation holds up. Indeed, such a test took place. Starting in 2010, a group led by U.C. Berkeley physicist Richard Muller re-examined all the temperature data from the NOAA, East Anglia Hadley Climate Research Unit, and the Goddard Institute of Space Science sources. Even though Muller started out as a skeptic of the temperature data, and was funded by the Koch brothers and other oil company sources, he carefully checked and re-checked the research himself. When the GOP leaders called him to testify before the House Science and Technology Committee in spring 2011, they were expecting him to discredit the temperature data. Instead, Muller shocked his GOP sponsors by demonstrating his scientific integrity and telling the truth: the temperature increase is real, and the scientists who have demonstrated that the climate is changing are right (Fig. 5). In the fall of 2011, his study was published, and the conclusions were clear: global warming is real, even to a right-wing skeptical scientist. Unlike the hired-gun scientists who play political games, Muller did what a true scientist should do: if the data go against your biases and preconceptions, then do the right thing and admit it -- even if you've been paid by sponsors who want to discredit global warming. Muller is a shining example of a scientist whose integrity and honesty came first, and did not sell out to the highest bidder. 36 * Science and Anti-Science The conclusion is clear: there's science, and then there's the anti-science of global warming denial. As we have seen, there is a nearly unanimous consensus among climate scientists that anthropogenic global warming is real and that we must do something about it. Yet the smokescreen, bluster and lies of the deniers has created enough doubt so that only half of the American public is convinced the problem requires action. Ironically, the U.S. is almost alone in questioning its scientific reality. International polls taken of 33,000 people in 33 nations in 2006 and 2007 show that 90 of their citizens regard climate change as a serious problem 37 and 80 realize that humans are the cause of it. 38 Just as in the case of creationism, the U.S. is out of step with much of the rest of the world in accepting scientific reality. It is not just the liberals and environmentalists who are taking climate change seriously. Historically conservative institutions (big corporations such as General Electric and many others such as insurance companies and the military) are already planning on how to deal with global warming. Many of my friends high in the oil companies tell me of the efforts by those companies to get into other forms of energy, because they know that cheap oil will be running out soon and that the effects of burning oil will make their business less popular. BP officially stands for "British Petroleum," but in one of their ad campaigns about 5 years ago, it stood for "Beyond Petroleum." 39 Although they still spend relatively little of their total budgets on alternative forms of energy, the oil companies still see the handwriting on the wall about the eventual exhaustion of oil -- and they are acting like any company that wants to survive by getting into a new business when the old one is dying. The Pentagon (normally not a left-wing institution) is also making contingency plans for how to fight wars in an era of global climate change, and analyzing what kinds of strategic threats might occur when climate change alters the kinds of enemies we might be fighting, and water becomes a scarce commodity. The New York Times reported 40 that in December 2008, the National Defense University outlined plans for military strategy in a greenhouse world. To the Pentagon, the big issue is global chaos and the potential of even nuclear conflict. The world must "prepare for the inevitable effects of abrupt climate change -- which will likely come the only question is when regardless of human activity." Insurance companies have no political axe to grind. If anything, they tend to be on the conservative side. They are simply in the business of assessing risk in a realistic fashion so they can accurately gauge their future insurance policies and what to charge for them. Yet they are all investing heavily in research on the disasters and risks posed by climatic change. In 2005, a study commissioned by the re-insurer Swiss Re said, "Climate change will significantly affect the health of humans and ecosystems and these impacts will have economic consequences." 41 Some people may still try to deny scientific reality, but big businesses like oil and insurance and conservative institutions like the military cannot afford to be blinded or deluded by ideology. They must plan for the real world that we will be seeing in the next few decades. They do not want to be caught unprepared and harmed by global climatic change when it threatens their survival. Neither can we as a society. Extinction Brandenberg 99 (John and Monica Paxson, Visiting Prof. Researcher @ Florida Space Institute, Physicist Ph.D., Science Writer, Dead Mars Dying Earth, Pg 232-233) The ozone hole expands, driven by a monstrous synergy with global warming that puts more catalytic ice crystals into the stratosphere, but this affects the far north and south and not the major nations’ heartlands. The seas rise, the tropics roast but the media networks no longer cover it. The Amazon rainforest becomes the Amazon desert. Oxygen levels fall, but profits rise for those who can provide it in bottles. An equatorial high-pressure zone forms, forcing drought in central Africa and Brazil, the Nile dries up and the monsoons fail. Then inevitably, at some unlucky point in time, a major unexpected event occurs—a major volcanic eruption, a sudden and dramatic shift in ocean circulation or a large asteroid impact (those who think freakish accidents do not occur have paid little attention to life or Mars), or a nuclear war that starts between Pakistan and India and escalates to involve China and Russia . . . Suddenly the gradual climb in global temperatures goes on a mad excursion as the oceans warm and release large amounts of dissolved carbon dioxide from their lower depths into the atmosphere. Oxygen levels go down precipitously as oxygen replaces lost oceanic carbon dioxide. Asthma cases double and then double again. Now a third of the world fears breathing. As the oceans dump carbon dioxide, the greenhouse effect increases, which further warms the oceans, causing them to dump even more carbon. Because of the heat, plants die and burn in enormous fires, which release more carbon dioxide, and the oceans evaporate, adding more water vapor to the greenhouse. Soon, we are in what is termed a runaway greenhouse effect, as happened to Venus eons ago. The last two surviving scientists inevitably argue, one telling the other, “See! I told you the missing sink was in the ocean!” Earth, as we know it, dies. After this Venusian excursion in temperatures, the oxygen disappears into the soil, the oceans evaporate and are lost and the dead Earth loses its ozone layer completely. Earth is too far from the Sun for it to be the second Venus for long. Its atmosphere is slowly lost—as is its water—because of ultraviolet bombardment breaking up all the molecules apart from carbon dioxide. As the atmosphere becomes thin, the Earth becomes colder. For a short while temperatures are nearly normal, but the ultraviolet sears any life that tries to make a comeback. The carbon dioxide thins out to form a thin veneer with a few wispy clouds and dust devils. Earth becomes the second Mars—red, desolate, with perhaps a few hardy microbes surviving. It magnifies all impacts and makes global conflicts inevitable Ginsborg et al. 12 – Mikkel Funder, Signe Marie Cold-Ravnkilde and Ida Peters Ginsborg - in collaboration with Nanna Callisen Bang, Denmark Institute for International Studies, 2012, "ADDRESSING CLIMATE CHANGE AND CONFLICT IN DEVELOPMENT COOPERATION EXPERIENCES FROM NATURAL RESOURCE MANAGEMENT" www.diis.dk/graphics/Publications/Reports2012/RP2012-04-Addressing-climate-change_web.jpg.pdf 2.2 Climate change as a con?ict multiplier¶ Climate change is therefore best seen as a con?ict multiplier, rather than as a major direct cause of con?ict in itself. Climate change may aggravate and extend the scope of existing con?icts, or trigger underlying and latent con?icts to break out into the open. ¶ Previous studies have identi?ed a number of areas in which climate change may contribute to a worsening of con?icts (Brown and Crawford 2009). These include:¶ • Land and water access. Access and use rights to land are a key feature in most situations where climate change has contributed to natural resource con?icts so far. Climate change can intensify existing con?icts over land, as land becomes less fertile or is ?ooded, or if existing resource sharing arrangements between di?erent users and land use practices are disrupted. In some parts of Africa, climate change may lead to a decline in available water resources of some 10–20 by the end of the century (op cit.). This may intensify existing competition for access to water at intra-state and/or subnational levels. ¶ • Food security. Reduced rainfall and rising sea levels may lead to a decline in agricultural production and a substantial loss of arable land in some parts of Africa. Reduced yields for own consumption and increasing domestic food prices may in some cases lead to civil unrest, and competition over access to land may intensify.¶ • Migration and displacement. In some cases, increased scarcity of and competition over access to water and arable land may contribute to internal or regional migration, and disasters such as ?oods may lead to temporary or long-term local displacement. This may in turn strengthen con?icts between host societies/communities and migrants looking for access to new land and resources. ¶ • Increasing inequality and injustice. Through processes such as the above, some population groups may be particularly hard hit, leading to increased inequality and a sense of injustice. This may intensify existing grievances and disputes between natural resource users and/or between resource users and outside actors such as governments – thereby increasing the risk and intensity of con?ict.
Second, Nuclear terrorism escalates to major nuclear war. Global coop on material transfers is key. *a. escalates to inter-state conflict – nations assume fissile material comes from the stocks of other countries – that forces retaliation b. Terrorists can acquire weapons – states can sponsor terrorism and terrorists can independently develop weapons c. Plan solves – cooperation on fissile material transfers is key because it prevents terrorists from acquiring dangerous weapons Ayson’10 Robert – Professor of Strategic Studies and Director of the Centre for Strategic Studies: New Zealand at the Victoria University of Wellington – “After a Terrorist Nuclear Attack: Envisaging Catalytic Effects,” Studies in Conflict and Terrorism, Volume 33, Issue 7, July, obtained via InformaWorld
A terrorist nuclear attack, and even the use of nuclear weapons in response by the country attacked in the first place, would not necessarily represent the worst of the nuclear worlds imaginable. Indeed, there are reasons to wonder whether nuclear terrorism should ever be regarded as belonging in the category of truly existential threats. A contrast can be drawn here with the global catastrophe that would come from a massive nuclear exchange between two or more of the sovereign states that possess these weapons in significant numbers. Even the worst terrorism that the twenty-first century might bring would fade into insignificance alongside considerations of what a general nuclear war would have wrought in the Cold War period. And it must be admitted that as long as the major nuclear weapons states have hundreds and even thousands of nuclear weapons at their disposal, there is always the possibility of a truly awful nuclear exchange taking place precipitated entirely by state possessors themselves. But these two nuclear worlds—a non-state actor nuclear attack and a catastrophic interstate nuclear exchange—are not necessarily separable. It is just possible that some sort of terrorist attack, and especially an act of nuclear terrorism, could precipitate a chain of events leading to a massive exchange of nuclear weapons between two or more of the states that possess them. In this context, today’s and tomorrow’s terrorist groups might assume the place allotted during the early Cold War years to new state possessors of small nuclear arsenals who were seen as raising the risks of a catalytic nuclear war between the superpowers started by third parties. These risks were considered in the late 1950s and early 1960s as concerns grew about nuclear proliferation, the so-called n+1 problem. It may require a considerable amount of imagination to depict an especially plausible situation where an act of nuclear terrorism could lead to such a massive inter-state nuclear war. For example, in the event of a terrorist nuclear attack on the United States, it might well be wondered just how Russia and/or China could plausibly be brought into the picture, not least because they seem unlikely to be fingered as the most obvious state sponsors or encouragers of terrorist groups. They would seem far too responsible to be involved in supporting that sort of terrorist behavior that could just as easily threaten them as well. Some possibilities, however remote, do suggest themselves. For example, how might the United States react if it was thought or discovered that the fissile material used in the act of nuclear terrorism had come from Russian stocks, and if for some reason Moscow denied any responsibility for nuclear laxity? The correct attribution of that nuclear material to a particular country might not be a case of science fiction given the observation by Michael May et al. that while the debris resulting from a nuclear explosion would be “spread over a wide area in tiny fragments, its radioactivity makes it detectable, identifiable and collectable, and a wealth of information can be obtained from its analysis: the efficiency of the explosion, the materials used and, most important … some indication of where the nuclear material came from.”41 Alternatively, if the act of nuclear terrorism came as a complete surprise, and American officials refused to believe that a terrorist group was fully responsible (or responsible at all) suspicion would shift immediately to state possessors. Ruling out Western ally countries like the United Kingdom and France, and probably Israel and India as well, authorities in Washington would be left with a very short list consisting of North Korea, perhaps Iran if its program continues, and possibly Pakistan. But at what stage would Russia and China be definitely ruled out in this high stakes game of nuclear Cluedo? In particular, if the act of nuclear terrorism occurred against a backdrop of existing tension in Washington’s relations with Russia and/or China, and at a time when threats had already been traded between these major powers, would officials and political leaders not be tempted to assume the worst? Of course, the chances of this occurring would only seem to increase if the United States was already involved in some sort of limited armed conflict with Russia and/or China, or if they were confronting each other from a distance in a proxy war, as unlikely as these developments may seem at the present time. The reverse might well apply too: should a nuclear terrorist attack occur in Russia or China during a period of heightened tension or even limited conflict with the United States, could Moscow and Beijing resist the pressures that might rise domestically to consider the United States as a possible perpetrator or encourager of the attack? Washington’s early response to a terrorist nuclear attack on its own soil might also raise the possibility of an unwanted (and nuclear aided) confrontation with Russia and/or China. For example, in the noise and confusion during the immediate aftermath of the terrorist nuclear attack, the U.S. president might be expected to place the country’s armed forces, including its nuclear arsenal, on a higher stage of alert. In such a tense environment, when careful planning runs up against the friction of reality, it is just possible that Moscow and/or China might mistakenly read this as a sign of U.S. intentions to use force (and possibly nuclear force) against them. In that situation, the temptations to preempt such actions might grow, although it must be admitted that any preemption would probably still meet with a devastating response. As part of its initial response to the act of nuclear terrorism (as discussed earlier) Washington might decide to order a significant conventional (or nuclear) retaliatory or disarming attack against the leadership of the terrorist group and/or states seen to support that group. Depending on the identity and especially the location of these targets, Russia and/or China might interpret such action as being far too close for their comfort, and potentially as an infringement on their spheres of influence and even on their sovereignty. One far-fetched but perhaps not impossible scenario might stem from a judgment in Washington that some of the main aiders and abetters of the terrorist action resided somewhere such as Chechnya, perhaps in connection with what Allison claims is the “Chechen insurgents’ … long-standing interest in all things nuclear.”42 American pressure on that part of the world would almost certainly raise alarms in Moscow that might require a degree of advanced consultation from Washington that the latter found itself unable or unwilling to provide.There is also the question of how other nuclear-armed states respond to the act of nuclear terrorism on another member of that special club. It could reasonably be expected that following a nuclear terrorist attack on the United States, both Russia and China would extend immediate sympathy and support to Washington and would work alongside the United States in the Security Council. But there is just a chance, albeit a slim one, where the support of Russia and/or China is less automatic in some cases than in others. For example, what would happen if the United States wished to discuss its right to retaliate against groups based in their territory? If, for some reason, Washington found the responses of Russia and China deeply underwhelming, (neither “for us or against us”) might it also suspect that they secretly were in cahoots with the group, increasing (again perhaps ever so slightly) the chances of a major exchange. If the terrorist group had some connections to groups in Russia and China, or existed in areas of the world over which Russia and China held sway, and if Washington felt that Moscow or Beijing were placing a curiously modest level of pressure on them, what conclusions might it then draw about their culpability? If Washington decided to use, or decided to threaten the use of, nuclear weapons, the responses of Russia and China would be crucial to the chances of avoiding a more serious nuclear exchange. They might surmise, for example, that while the act of nuclear terrorism was especially heinous and demanded a strong response, the response simply had to remain below the nuclear threshold. It would be one thing for a non-state actor to have broken the nuclear use taboo, but an entirely different thing for a state actor, and indeed the leading state in the international system, to do so. If Russia and China felt sufficiently strongly about that prospect, there is then the question of what options would lie open to them to dissuade the United States from such action: and as has been seen over the last several decades, the central dissuader of the use of nuclear weapons by states has been the threat of nuclear retaliation. If some readers find this simply too fanciful, and perhaps even offensive to contemplate, it may be informative to reverse the tables. Russia, which possesses an arsenal of thousands of nuclear warheads and that has been one of the two most important trustees of the non-use taboo, is subjected to an attack of nuclear terrorism. In response, Moscow places its nuclear forces very visibly on a higher state of alert and declares that it is considering the use of nuclear retaliation against the group and any of its state supporters. How would Washington view such a possibility? Would it really be keen to support Russia’s use of nuclear weapons, including outside Russia’s traditional sphere of influence? And if not, which seems quite plausible, what options would Washington have to communicate that displeasure? If China had been the victim of the nuclear terrorism and seemed likely to retaliate in kind, would the United States and Russia be happy to sit back and let this occur? In the charged atmosphere immediately after a nuclear terrorist attack, how would the attacked country respond to pressure from other major nuclear powers not to respond in kind? The phrase “how dare they tell us what to do” immediately springs to mind. Some might even go so far as to interpret this concern as a tacit form of sympathy or support for the terrorists. This might not help the chances of nuclear restraint. One way of reducing, but probably not eliminating, such a prospect, is further international cooperation on the control of existing fissile material holdings.
Third, lifting the embargo is a pre-requisite to meaningful scientific cooperation with Cuba – it would establish a framework for open engagement Pastrana et al., Sergio Jorge Pastrana is the Foreign Secretary of the Academia de Ciencias de Cuba, Michael T. Clegg is the Foreign Secretary of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and Donald Bren Professor of Biological Sciences, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the School of Biological Sciences, University of California, Irvine. 08 (Sergio Jorge, Michael T. Clegg, Science AAAS October 2008, “U.S. – Cuban Scientific Relations,” Vol. 322 no. 5900 p. 345, ACCESSED June 30, 2013, RJ) In a few years, the two oldest national academies of science in the world outside of Europe—those of the United States and Cuba—will celebrate their 150th anniversaries. Yet despite the proximity of both nations and many common scientific interests, the U.S. embargo on exchanges with Cuba, which began in 1961 and is now based on the 1996 U.S. Helms-Burton Act and subsequent regulations, has largely blocked scientific exchange. It's time to establish a new scientific relationship, not only to address shared challenges in health, climate, agriculture, and energy, but also to start building a framework for expanded cooperation. Restrictions on U.S.-Cuba scientific cooperation deprive both research communities of opportunities that could benefit our societies, as well as others in the hemisphere, particularly in the Caribbean. Cuba is scientifically proficient in disaster management and mitigation, vaccine production, and epidemiology. Cuban scientists could benefit from access to research facilities that are beyond the capabilities of any developing country, and the U.S. scientific community could benefit from high-quality science being done in Cuba. For example, Cuba typically sits in the path of hurricanes bound for the U.S. mainland that create great destruction, as was the case with Hurricane Katrina and again last month with Hurricane Ike. Cuban scientists and engineers have learned how to protect threatened populations and minimize damage. Despite the category 3 rating of Hurricane Ike when it struck Cuba, there was less loss of life after a 3-day pounding than that which occurred when it later struck Texas as a category 2 hurricane. Sharing knowledge in this area would benefit everybody. Another major example where scientific cooperation could save lives is Cuba's extensive research on tropical diseases, such as dengue fever. This viral disease is epidemic throughout the tropics, notably in the Americas, and one of the first recorded outbreaks occurred in Philadelphia in the 18th century. Today, one of the world's most outstanding research centers dedicated to dengue fever is in Cuba, and although it actively cooperates with Latin America and Africa, there is almost no interaction with U.S. scientists. Dengue fever presents a threat to the U.S. mainland, and sharing knowledge resources to counter outbreaks of the disease would be an investment in the health security of both peoples. Cuba has also made important strides in biotechnology, including the production of several important vaccines and monoclonal antibodies, and its research interests continue to expand in diverse fields, ranging from drug addiction treatment to the preservation of biodiversity. Cuban scientists are engaged in research cooperation with many countries, including the United Kingdom, Brazil, Mexico, China, and India. Yet there is no program of cooperation with any U.S. research institution. The value system of science—openness, shared communication, integrity, and a respect for evidence—provides a framework for open engagement and could encourage evidence-based approaches that cross from science into the social, economic, and political arenas. Beyond allowing for the mutual leveraging of knowledge and resources, scientific contacts could build important cultural and social links among peoples. A recent Council on Foreign Relations report argues that the United States needs to revamp its engagement with Latin America because it is no longer the only significant force in this hemisphere. U.S. policies that are seen as unfairly penalizing Cuba, including the imposition of trade limitations that extend into scientific relations, continue to undermine U.S. standing in the entire region, especially because neither Cuba nor any other Latin American country imposes such restrictions. As a start, we urge that the present license that permits restricted travel to Cuba by scientists, as dictated by the U.S. Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control, be expanded so as to allow direct cooperation in research. At the same time, Cuba should favor increased scientific exchanges. Allowing scientists to fully engage will not only support progress in science, it may well favor positive interactions elsewhere to promote human well-being. The U.S. embargo on Cuba has hindered exchanges for the past 50 years. Let us celebrate our mutual anniversaries by starting a new era of scientific cooperation.
Solves Laundry List Fedoroff 8 – subcommittee on research and science education, committee on science and technology, House of Representatives, 110 Congress, administrator of USAID, science and technology advisor to the Secretary of State and US Department of State (Nina, “International Science and Technology Cooperation,” Government Printing Office, 4/2/2008, http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-110hhrg41470/html/CHRG-110hhrg41470.htm)//RH Chairman Baird, Ranking Member Ehlers, and distinguished members of the Subcommittee, thank you for this opportunity to discuss science diplomacy at the U.S. Department of State. The U.S. is recognized globally for its leadership in science and technology. Our scientific strength is both a tool of “soft power” – part of our strategic diplomatic arsenal – and a basis for creating partnerships with countries as they move beyond basic economic and social development. Science diplomacy is a central element of the Secretary’s transformational diplomacy initiative, because science and technology are essential to achieving stability and strengthening failed and fragile states. SandT advances have immediate and enormous influence on national and global economies, and thus on the international relations between societies. Nation states, nongovernmental organizations, and multinational corporations are largely shaped by their expertise in and access to intellectual and physical capital in science, technology, and engineering. Even as SandT advances of our modern era provide opportunities for economic prosperity, some also challenge the relative position of countries in the world order, and influence our social institutions and principles. America must remain at the forefront of this new world by maintaining its technological edge, and leading the way internationally through science diplomacy and engagement. The Public Diplomacy Role of Science Science by its nature facilitates diplomacy because it strengthens political relationships, embodies powerful ideals, and creates opportunities for all. The global scientific community embraces principles Americans cherish: transparency, meritocracy, accountability, the objective evaluation of evidence, and broad and frequently democratic participation. Science is inherently democratic, respecting evidence and truth above all. Science is also a common global language, able to bridge deep political and religious divides. Scientists share a common language. Scientific interactions serve to keep open lines of communication and cultural understanding. As scientists everywhere have a common evidentiary external reference system, members of ideologically divergent societies can use the common language of science to cooperatively address both domestic and the increasingly trans-national and global problems confronting humanity in the 21st century. There is a growing recognition that science and technology will increasingly drive the successful economies of the 21st century. Science and technology provide an immeasurable benefit to the U.S. by bringing scientists and students here, especially from developing countries, where they see democracy in action, make friends in the international scientific community, become familiar with American technology, and contribute to the U.S. and global economy. For example, in 2005, over 50 of physical science and engineering graduate students and postdoctoral researchers trained in the U.S. have been foreign nationals. Moreover, many foreign-born scientists who were educated and have worked in the U.S. eventually progress in their careers to hold influential positions in ministries and institutions both in this country and in their home countries. They also contribute to U.S. scientific and technologic development: According to the National Science Board’s 2008 Science and Engineering Indicators, 47 of full-time doctoral science and engineering faculty in U.S. research institutions were foreign-born. Finally, some types of science – particularly those that address the grand challenges in science and technology – are inherently international in scope and collaborative by necessity. The ITER Project, an international fusion research and development collaboration, is a product of the thaw in superpower relations between Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev and U.S. President Ronald Reagan. This reactor will harness the power of nuclear fusion as a possible new and viable energy source by bringing a star to earth. ITER serves as a symbol of international scientific cooperation among key scientific leaders in the developed and developing world – Japan, Korea, China, E.U., India, Russia, and United States – representing 70 of the world’s current population. The recent elimination of funding for FY08 U.S. contributions to the ITER project comes at an inopportune time as the Agreement on the Establishment of the ITER International Fusion Energy Organization for the Joint Implementation of the ITER Project had entered into force only on October 2007. The elimination of the promised U.S. contribution drew our allies to question our commitment and credibility in international cooperative ventures. More problematically, it jeopardizes a platform for reaffirming U.S. relations with key states. It should be noted that even at the height of the cold war, the United States used science diplomacy as a means to maintain communications and avoid misunderstanding between the world’s two nuclear powers – the Soviet Union and the United States. In a complex multi-polar world, relations are more challenging, the threats perhaps greater, and the need for engagement more paramount. Using Science Diplomacy to Achieve National Security Objectives The welfare and stability of countries and regions in many parts of the globe require a concerted effort by the developed world to address the causal factors that render countries fragile and cause states to fail. Countries that are unable to defend their people against starvation, or fail to provide economic opportunity, are susceptible to extremist ideologies, autocratic rule, and abuses of human rights. As well, the world faces common threats, among them climate change, energy and water shortages, public health emergencies, environmental degradation, poverty, food insecurity, and religious extremism. These threats can undermine the national security of the United States, both directly and indirectly. Many are blind to political boundaries, becoming regional or global threats. The United States has no monopoly on knowledge in a globalizing world and the scientific challenges facing humankind are enormous. Addressing these common challenges demands common solutions and necessitates scientific cooperation, common standards, and common goals. We must increasingly harness the power of American ingenuity in science and technology through strong partnerships with the science community in both academia and the private sector, in the U.S. and abroad among our allies, to advance U.S. interests in foreign policy. There are also important challenges to the ability of states to supply their populations with sufficient food. The still-growing human population, rising affluence in emerging economies, and other factors have combined to create unprecedented pressures on global prices of staples such as edible oils and grains. Encouraging and promoting the use of contemporary molecular techniques in crop improvement is an essential goal for US science diplomacy. An essential part of the war on terrorism is a war of ideas. The creation of economic opportunity can do much more to combat the rise of fanaticism than can any weapon. The war of ideas is a war about rationalism as opposed to irrationalism. Science and technology put us firmly on the side of rationalism by providing ideas and opportunities that improve people’s lives. We may use the recognition and the goodwill that science still generates for the United States to achieve our diplomatic and developmental goals. Additionally, the Department continues to use science as a means to reduce the proliferation of the weapons’ of mass destruction and prevent what has been dubbed ‘brain drain’. Through cooperative threat reduction activities, former weapons scientists redirect their skills to participate in peaceful, collaborative international research in a large variety of scientific fields. In addition, new global efforts focus on improving biological, chemical, and nuclear security by promoting and implementing best scientific practices as a means to enhance security, increase global partnerships, and create sustainability.
Contention 2 is Steel Economy low now – 3.6 growth rate is deceiving; actual growth is down AP 12/05/2013 Associated Press; December 5, 2013; US economy expands at 3.6 percent rate in Q3 but business stockpiles drive half of the growth; http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/12/05/us-economy-expands-at-36-percent-rate-in-q3-but-business-stockpiles-drive-half/; Gundaria WASHINGTON – The U.S. economy grew at a 3.6 percent annual rate from July through September, the fastest since early 2012. But nearly half the growth came from a buildup in business stockpiles, a trend that could reverse in the current quarter and hold back growth.¶ The Commerce Department's second estimate of third-quarter growth was much higher than the initial 2.8 percent rate reported last month. And it was well above the 2.5 percent growth rate for the April-June quarter.¶ But almost the entire third-quarter revision came from a big jump in stockpiles. Consumer spending, the lifeblood of the economy, was the weakest in nearly four years.¶ When excluding inventories, the economy grew at a 1.9 percent rate in the third quarter, down from 2.1 percent in the spring.
In written testimony during a House Ways and Means Committee hearing Thursday, a U.S. steel trade group denounced Chinese steel imports containing Cuban nickel, the Export Law Blog first reported. At the same time, the group said the embargo puts U.S. stainless steel companies at a “competitive disadvantage.”¶ China is the largest consumer of Cuban nickel. Nickel is a crucial ingredient in stainless steel. ¶ Specialty Steel Industry of North America (SSINA) “encouraged stricter enforcement of the U.S. regulations on trade with Cuba, particularly with respect to China,” the Washington-based group said in a press release. However, written testimony by the SSINA chairman also says that the embargo hurts U.S. stainless steel companies.¶ The U.S. embargo “places the domestic specialty metals industry at a distinct competitive disadvantage by allowing one of its biggest foreign competitors an opportunity to avail itself of Cuba's nickel reserves, while simultaneously denying the U.S. industry the same access,” said SSINA Chairman Sunil Widge in his testimony. ”As long as the embargo remains U.S. law, it must be enforced, otherwise U.S. stainless steel producers and producers of other nickel-bearing metals will remain disadvantaged by the failure to apply the embargo.” ¶ Citing section 515.204 of the Cuban assets control regulations, the group argues that the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) can force importers to certify their stainless steel products don’t include Cuban nickel. ¶ Three years ago, the Bush Administration announced efforts to crack down on imports of stainless steel products containing Cuban nickel. However, the only publicized recent nickel-related enforcement case involved the U.S. subsidiary of a Chinese company that directly trades nickel. In 2008, OFAC fined Minxia Non-Ferrous Metals. The latest instance in which Japanese and European exporters agreed to being screened for Cuban nickel by the United States was in the early 1980s, according to Export Law Blog author Clif Burns.¶ Even if they were willing to cooperate, Chinese manufacturers would have a hard time truly certifying their products don’t include any Cuban nickel, Burns argues.¶ “Notwithstanding SSINA’s huffing and puffing about the moral imperative behind the Cuba embargo, the trade group’s real interest has little to do with U.S. foreign policy and everything to do with Chinese competition,” Burns writes in his blog. “After all, the alleged competitive disadvantage of U.S. producers who can’t buy Cuban nickel could be solved tomorrow by lifting the embargo, something SSINA’s doesn’t even whisper as a possible solution to its issues.” Demand goes to China and hurts the US steel industry- cheaper steel and efficient production makes China the preferred source ASTC 6/20/13 (Alliance Steel Trading Corporation, a full service steel trading firm supplying steel mills, fabricators and end users, “U.S. Icons Now Made of Chinese Steel Imports Surge While U.S. Mills Idle; Lacking Bridge Expertise at Home”, http://alliancesteeltrading.com/?p=1451) (JN)
This is the second Major bridge in USA that is using Chinese steel instead of product from USA.¶ The bridges in this country were built by many companies, but one of the largest builder was Bethlehem Steel, who slowly closed their plants, merged, sold off and have faded from the list of steel producers and bridge builders. It may be time for Nucor, Steel Dynamics and others to step up and reclaim this sector of the steel market. It appears we as a country are overdue to rebuild, repair or replace a great many bridges in the next 25 years.¶ Here is the WSJ article.¶ “The Verrazano-Narrows Bridge was a feat of American engineering when it was built across New York’s harbor in the 1960s. Now, it’s being repaired with steel made in China.¶ Chinese steel imports have surged so far this year, even as U.S. producers are awash with excess domestic capacity. Chinese steel was also recently used in the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge.¶ The reason is partly because Chinese-made steel is cheaper. In fact, U.S. steel companies argue its price is unfairly subsidized, and want the U.S. government to restrict imports as much as possible. China claims it is simply a more efficient producer.¶ Also at play, however, is the relative scarcity of American contractors with expertise in specialized projects like bridges.¶ Together, these two factors show why the U.S. is unlikely to completely swear off Chinese steel.¶ Last year, New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority awarded a $235.7 million contract to a California contractor to repair the Verrazano-Narrows, a towering suspension bridge that is still the longest in the U.S.¶ The contractor, Tutor Perini Corp., TPC -3.21 subcontracted the fabrication of steel decks for the bridge to China Railway Shanhaiguan Bridge Group, which the MTA says is using 15,000 tons of steel plate made by China’s Anshan Iron and Steel Group. The decks will replace the two-level bridge’s concrete upper roadway.¶ The MTA said it tried to find a contractor whose bid for the project included American steel, but there was only one such bidder, Structal-Bridges, and its bid was twice as high as Tutor Perini’s, said MTA spokeswoman Judie Glave.¶ MTA officials said price wasn’t their only consideration, noting that Chinese companies have become specialists in making parts for bridges across the U.S.¶ The bridge work is one of the reasons Chinese steel shipments to the U.S. have been surging. In the first four months of 2013 they jumped 33 from a year earlier to 480,095 tons. The increase is particularly striking because total U.S. steel imports for the period fell 17 to 10.6 million tons.¶ The China Iron and Steel Association said the growth is based on supply and demand, and suggested Chinese steel exports have been rising because they are more competitive. “Why is it that we can export more? It’s because of competitiveness on price and service,” said Li Xinchuang, the trade group’s deputy secretary-general.¶ U.S. steel mills, meanwhile, have been increasingly inactive. As of June 15, their production had fallen to 76.7 of their capacity from 78.8 a year earlier. The U.S. produced 88.6 million tons in 2012, 5.7 of the world’s total.¶ Most of the steel from China now goes into building projects like bridges and buildings, sweet spots for Nucor Corp., NUE +0.45 the No. 3 U.S. steelmaker, which makes half of its steel for the construction industry.¶ “Construction is essential to our business,” said Dan DiMicco, Nucor’s chairman and former chief executive. Though construction steel commands less of a premium than automotive steel, it is one of the biggest steel markets in volume terms.¶ It is also one that domestic steelmakers are looking to for growth in the wake of several high-profile bridge collapses and calls to boost infrastructure spending, and in anticipation of a rebound in construction of large, nonresidential buildings such as—office complexes, malls and hospitals, which consume 70 of the steel used in construction. The surge in Chinese imports is threatening those hopes.¶ “There’s usually a year-or-more lag,” said Daniel Meckstroth, chief economist of the Manufacturers Alliance for Productivity and Innovation, a manufacturing industry-funded research group based in Arlington, Va. Consumption of non-residential construction steel — for projects like ranging from bridges and highways to schools and hospitals — is expected to increase 1 this year and 6 in 2014, according to MAPI. New housing developments also need “more roads, highways and bridges,” he said, although that can take “several years.”¶ Bill McEleney of the National Steel Bridge Alliance, whose members make bridges and bridge parts, said many U.S. companies can build bridges, but not many are experienced with the flat-deck design being used these days to build or renovate heavily trafficked bridges.¶ In rapidly urbanizing China, such construction is booming. “The Chinese are building many more of these kinds of bridges, so they have more fabricators,” Mr. McEleney said.¶ Structal, a Chicago-based division of Canada’s Canam Group Inc., said it is the only U.S. company that makes decks for those type of bridges. Sales manager Tony Matutis said the company uses only American steel and can’t compete on price with China’s government-backed steelmakers.¶ Leo Gerard, president of the United Steelworkers union, said Chinese steel’s “supposed cost savings do not take into account the environmental price of shipping steel from hundreds of thousands of miles versus 100 miles, nor the cost to our fragile economic recovery and the loss of American jobs.”¶ The MTA said its bridge and tunnel repairs are funded by bonds backed by toll collections, and receive no state or federal funding. Therefore, they don’t fall under the Buy American Act, which requires government projects to use American-made products when possible.¶ Still, Ms. Glave said the “MTA wants to continue working with the domestic steel industry to develop American-made solutions for bridge renovations.”¶ Anshan Iron and Steel confirmed it and the China Railway Shanhaiguan Bridge Group were cooperating on the Verazzano-Narrows Bridge project. The companies also worked together on Alaska’s Tanana River Bridge, which the steelmaker described as China Railway Shanhaiguan’s first bridge project in the U.S.¶ Anshan described the New York project as a test of whether its steel bridges “can go out into the world.” Shanhaiguan couldn’t be reached for comment.¶ “Where there is construction activity occurring in the United States, domestic steel is often not being used,” said Alan Price, a trade attorney for Nucor. “Many construction projects are sourcing steel from overseas, including from state-owned enterprises in China.”¶ Wilson Huang, a manager with Shanghai-based steel-trading firm Falcon Resources isn’t surprised American companies are using Chinese steel. “U.S. production costs are high, and Chinese steel costs a lot less, so it’s natural that the U.S. is buying more,” he said.¶ Consultant John Packard, publisher of the Steel Market Update newsletter, recently surveyed American buyers of steel used in construction and found that prices for Chinese-made steel were 25 lower.¶ The U.S. government currently collects duties on Chinese steel products, including steel bars, plats and pipes, all used in construction. Last week mainly imposed during the Bush administration, currently the U.S. renewed tariffs on bars for five more years.¶ Earlier this month, the American Iron and Steel Institute, which represents U.S. steelmakers, called on President Barack Obama to extend the tariffs on other steel products.¶ Beijing has warned in the past that any U.S. effort to roll back Chinese steel exports would hurt broader bilateral economic ties with Washington. 2 Scenarios Steel is the lynchpin of the US economy – allows post-recession resurgence, creates a multiplier effect, and creates jobs IT ’13 (Industry Today, Volume 15, Issue 2, “AMERICAN STEEL INDUSTRY: Strength for our Future”, http://industrytoday.com/article_view.asp?ArticleID=F378) (JN)
A manufacturing backbone, the steel industry is a strategic, essential element of America’s economic growth, stability and national security. The nation’s energy supply, transportation system, urban centers, clean water and safe food supply all depend on steel. Innovation and technology transformed America’s 21st century steel industry into a world leader in quality, performance and sustainability. America faced challenges in recovering from the global recession. The steel industry played a significant role in leading U.S. manufacturing’s post-recession resurgence, primarily because it is highly interrelated with many other economic sectors. Timothy J. Considine, professor of energy economics at the University of Wyoming, described the ripple effect on employment. In his analysis (“Economic Impacts of the American Steel Industry”), he found that every one job in the U.S. steel industry supports seven jobs in the U.S. economy. For 2011, his report states, the American steel industry directly employed 150,700 and – given the multiplier effect – supported more than 1million,022,009 jobs elsewhere. In addition, the industry contributed more than $101 billion in value added and $246 billion in gross output. Based on tax multipliers utilized in the analysis, during 2011 the steel sector generated nearly $23 billion in local, state and federal taxes. The industry’s significant economic impact is based on the fact that steel is the most prevalent material in the economy, and the industry purchases a wide variety of inputs from other industries, creating the favorable ripple effect. This is one reason why so many countries welcome investments that establish steel mills. Mills stimulate industrial supply chains. Considine writes that indirect impacts support jobs in industries supplying the steel industry with inputs of energy, materials and services. Economic impacts also arises from the stimulus that additional labor and capital income provides for households to spend on goods and services, he adds.
Economic lows increase the likelihood for global war Royal 10 (Jedediah, Director of Cooperative Threat Reduction – U.S. Department of Defense, “Economic Integration, Economic Signaling and the Problem of Economic Crises”, Economics of War and Peace: Economic, Legal and Political Perspectives, Ed. Goldsmith and Brauer, p. 213-215)
Less intuitive is how periods of economic decline may increase the likelihood of external conflict. Political science literature has contributed a moderate degree of attention to the impact of economic decline and the security and defence behaviour of interdependent states. Research in this vein has been considered at systemic, dyadic and national levels. Several notable contributions follow. First, on the systemic level, Pollins (2008) advances Modelski and Thompson's (1996) work on leadership cycle theory, finding that rhythms in the global economy are associated with the rise and fall of a pre-eminent power and the often bloody transition from one pre-eminent leader to the next. As such, exogenous shocks such as economic crises could usher in a redistribution of relative power (see also Gilpin. 1981) that leads to uncertainty about power balances, increasing the risk of miscalculation (Feaver, 1995). Alternatively, even a relatively certain redistribution of power could lead to a permissive environment for conflict as a rising power may seek to challenge a declining power (Werner. 1999). Separately, Pollins (1996) also shows that global economic cycles combined with parallel leadership cycles impact the likelihood of conflict among major, medium and small powers, although he suggests that the causes and connections between global economic conditions and security conditions remain unknown. Second, on a dyadic level, Copeland's (1996, 2000) theory of trade expectations suggests that 'future expectation of trade' is a significant variable in understanding economic conditions and security behaviour of states. He argues that interdependent states are likely to gain pacific benefits from trade so long as they have an optimistic view of future trade relations. However, if the expectations of future trade decline, particularly for difficult to replace items such as energy resources, the likelihood for conflict increases, as states will be inclined to use force to gain access to those resources. Crises could potentially be the trigger for decreased trade expectations either on its own or because it triggers protectionist moves by interdependent states.4 Third, others have considered the link between economic decline and external armed conflict at a national level. Blomberg and Hess (2002) find a strong correlation between internal conflict and external conflict, particularly during periods of economic downturn. They write: The linkages between internal and external conflict and prosperity are strong and mutually reinforcing. Economic conflict tends to spawn internal conflict, which in turn returns the favour. Moreover, the presence of a recession tends to amplify the extent to which international and external conflicts self-reinforce each other. (Blomberg and Hess, 2002. p. 89) Economic decline has also been linked with an increase in the likelihood of terrorism (Blomberg, Hess, and Weerapana, 2004), which has the capacity to spill across borders and lead to external tensions. Furthermore, crises generally reduce the popularity of a sitting government. "Diversionary theory" suggests that, when facing unpopularity arising from economic decline, sitting governments have increased incentives to fabricate external military conflicts to create a 'rally around the flag' effect. Wang (1996), DeRouen (1995). and Blomberg, Hess, and Thacker (2006) find supporting evidence showing that economic decline and use of force are at least indirectly correlated. Gelpi (1997), Miller (1999), and Kisangani and Pickering (2009) suggest that the tendency towards diversionary tactics are greater for democratic states than autocratic states, due to the fact that democratic leaders are generally more susceptible to being removed from office due to lack of domestic support. DeRouen (2000) has provided evidence showing that periods of weak economic performance in the United States, and thus weak Presidential popularity, are statistically linked to an increase in the use of force. In summary, recent economic scholarship positively correlates economic integration with an increase in the frequency of economic crises, whereas political science scholarship links economic decline with external conflict at systemic, dyadic and national levels.5 This implied connection between integration, crises and armed conflict has not featured prominently in the economic-security debate and deserves more attention.
U.S key to the global economy inclusive to China
Caploe ‘9 (David Caploe is CEO of the Singapore-incorporated American Centre for Applied Liberal Arts and Humanities in Asia., “Focus still on America to lead global recovery”, April 7, The Strait Times, lexis) IN THE aftermath of the G-20 summit, most observers seem to have missed perhaps the most crucial statement of the entire event, made by United States President Barack Obama at his pre-conference meeting with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown: 'The world has become accustomed to the US being a voracious consumer market, the engine that drives a lot of economic growth worldwide,' he said. 'If there is going to be renewed growth, it just can't be the US as the engine.' While superficially sensible, this view is deeply problematic. To begin with, it ignores the fact that the global economy has in fact been 'America-centred' for more than 60 years. Countries - China, Japan, Canada, Brazil, Korea, Mexico and so on - either sell to the US or they sell to countries that sell to the US. This system has generally been advantageous for all concerned. America gained certain historically unprecedented benefits, but the system also enabled participating countries - first in Western Europe and Japan, and later, many in the Third World - to achieve undreamt-of prosperity. At the same time, this deep inter-connection between the US and the rest of the world also explains how the collapse of a relatively small sector of the US economy - 'sub-prime' housing, logarithmically exponentialised by Wall Street's ingenious chicanery - has cascaded into the worst global economic crisis since the Great Depression. To put it simply, Mr Obama doesn't seem to understand that there is no other engine for the world economy - and hasn't been for the last six decades. If the US does not drive global economic growth, growth is not going to happen. Thus, US policies to deal with the current crisis are critical not just domestically, but also to the entire world. Consequently, it is a matter of global concern that the Obama administration seems to be following Japan's 'model' from the 1990s: allowing major banks to avoid declaring massive losses openly and transparently, and so perpetuating 'zombie' banks - technically alive but in reality dead. As analysts like Nobel laureates Joseph Stiglitz and Paul Krugman have pointed out, the administration's unwillingness to confront US banks is the main reason why they are continuing their increasingly inexplicable credit freeze, thus ravaging the American and global economies. Team Obama seems reluctant to acknowledge the extent to which its policies at home are failing not just there but around the world as well. Which raises the question: If the US can't or won't or doesn't want to be the global economic engine, which country will? The obvious answer is China. But that is unrealistic for three reasons. First, China's economic health is more tied to America's than practically any other country in the world. Indeed, the reason China has so many dollars to invest everywhere - whether in US Treasury bonds or in Africa - is precisely that it has structured its own economy to complement America's. The only way China can serve as the engine of the global economy is if the US starts pulling it first. Second, the US-centred system began at a time when its domestic demand far outstripped that of the rest of the world. The fundamental source of its economic power is its ability to act as the global consumer of last resort. China, however, is a poor country, with low per capita income, even though it will soon pass Japan as the world's second largest economy. There are real possibilities for growth in China's domestic demand. But given its structure as an export-oriented economy, it is doubtful if even a successful Chinese stimulus plan can pull the rest of the world along unless and until China can start selling again to the US on a massive scale. Finally, the key 'system' issue for China - or for the European Union - in thinking about becoming the engine of the world economy - is monetary: What are the implications of having your domestic currency become the global reserve currency? This is an extremely complex issue that the US has struggled with, not always successfully, from 1959 to the present. Without going into detail, it can safely be said that though having the US dollar as the world's medium of exchange has given the US some tremendous advantages, it has also created huge problems, both for America and the global economic system. The Chinese leadership is certainly familiar with this history. It will try to avoid the yuan becoming an international medium of exchange until it feels much more confident in its ability to handle the manifold currency problems that the US has grappled with for decades. Given all this, the US will remain the engine of global economic recovery for the foreseeable future, even though other countries must certainly help. This crisis began in the US - and it is going to have to be solved there Chinese steel dependence threatens national security Kellen 6/09/13 (Patrick Kellen, “The Death of the American Steel Industry is a Bigger Problem Than Just Job Losses”, http://economyincrisis.org/content/the-death-of-the-american-steel-industry-is-a-bigger-problem-than-just-job-losses) (JN)
Any time an American company is forced to compete against a low-wage company from another country, or compete against a company receiving government subsidies and grants, the American firm will be at a severe disadvantage. Full, open exposure to this sort of unfair competition can decimate entire industries, and indeed we are seeing this very thing right now. When the decimated industry is vital to national security, like the steel industry is, the problem is even graver. The Anshan Iron and Steel Group, from China, is an excellent and sobering illustration of the risks that threaten us.¶ AISG was founded by the merger of two groups established in 1916 under Japanese rule. It has gone on to merge with the Benxi Iron and Steel Group and has become the second largest steel maker in Mainland China. Like most steel producers in China, it is a state-owned enterprise, and this means trouble for the United States.¶ As explained in an Industry Today article, an SOE is run to further government interests and does not operate by market forces. AISG can obtain cash grants and subsidized financing even during economic recessions. They therefore have no reason to worry about the bottom line when making their business decisions. It is for this very reason that the Chinese steel industry has exploded over the last dozen years, and when we let them enter our market uncontested, they put American steel makers out of business.¶ This leaves us in a dependent state, dependent on China for our steel needs. It would be bad enough if it were potato chips, but the fact that it is steel makes it downright perilous. Steel is a vital resource for our national security, and yet we turn more and more to China to meet our needs. What would happen if relations with China soured, and suddenly the Chinese government decided to cut us off?¶ There is yet another concern with Anshan besides the economic devastation and potential abuse by the Chinese government. Anshan has also sought, in recent years, to aggressively invest in U.S. steel producers. The problem is that steel producers work closely with the American government on many fronts, and at some levels aren’t necessarily privy to sensitive information. If our steel producers are controlled by AISG, and AISG is controlled by the Chinese government, then we are creating a pipeline of state secrets, a pipeline which leads directly to the Chinese government.¶ Our long-time friendly neighbor Canada is not privileged with that sort of access. How much less can we afford to expose ourselves to China?¶ Fortunately, there is a ray of hope. In 2010, at the behest of several Congressmen and women, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States was moved to intervene and force Anshan to rethink its designs on American firms and eventually put those plans on hold. This shows that, if we have the will, there is a way to protect our security concerns. A VAT tax would also go a long ways towards addressing the economic concerns raised by Chinese steel.¶ Our predicament is real and not to be trivialized, but we are not defenseless. We have shown that we can look out for our own interests when we want to. Our leaders simply need the political will to do something. A little prodding from their constituents would go a long way towards instilling that will. Hegemony solves nuke war and extinction Barnett 11 (Thomas P.M, Former Senior Strategic Researcher and Professor in the Warfare Analysis and Research Department, Center for Naval Warfare Studies, U.S. Naval War College American military geostrategist and Chief Analyst at Wikistrat., worked as the Assistant for Strategic Futures in the Office of Force Transformation in the Department of Defense, “The New Rules: Leadership Fatigue Puts U.S., and Globalization, at Crossroads,” March 7 http://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/8099/the-new-rules-leadership-fatigue-puts-u-s-and-globalization-at-crossroads It is worth first examining the larger picture: We live in a time of arguably the greatest structural change in the global order yet endured, with this historical moment's most amazing feature being its relative and absolute lack of mass violence. That is something to consider when Americans contemplate military intervention in Libya, because if we do take the step to prevent larger-scale killing by engaging in some killing of our own, we will not be adding to some fantastically imagined global death count stemming from the ongoing "megalomania" and "evil" of American "empire." We'll be engaging in the same sort of system-administering activity that has marked our stunningly successful stewardship of global order since World War II. Let me be more blunt: As the guardian of globalization, the U.S. military has been the greatest force for peace the world has ever known. Had America been removed from the global dynamics that governed the 20th century, the mass murder never would have ended. Indeed, it's entirely conceivable there would now be no identifiable human civilization left, once nuclear weapons entered the killing equation. But the world did not keep sliding down that path of perpetual war. Instead, America stepped up and changed everything by ushering in our now-perpetual great-power peace. We introduced the international liberal trade order known as globalization and played loyal Leviathan over its spread. What resulted was the collapse of empires, an explosion of democracy, the persistent spread of human rights, the liberation of women, the doubling of life expectancy, a roughly 10-fold increase in adjusted global GDP and a profound and persistent reduction in battle deaths from state-based conflicts. That is what American "hubris" actually delivered. Please remember that the next time some TV pundit sells you the image of "unbridled" American military power as the cause of global disorder instead of its cure. With self-deprecation bordering on self-loathing, we now imagine a post-American world that is anything but. Just watch who scatters and who steps up as the Facebook revolutions erupt across the Arab world. While we might imagine ourselves the status quo power, we remain the world's most vigorously revisionist force. As for the sheer "evil" that is our military-industrial complex, again, let's examine what the world looked like before that establishment reared its ugly head. The last great period of global structural change was the first half of the 20th century, a period that saw a death toll of about 100 million across two world wars. That comes to an average of 2 million deaths a year in a world of approximately 2 billion souls. Today, with far more comprehensive worldwide reporting, researchers report an average of less than 100,000 battle deaths annually in a world fast approaching 7 billion people. Though admittedly crude, these calculations suggest a 90 percent absolute drop and a 99 percent relative drop in deaths due to war. We are clearly headed for a world order characterized by multipolarity, something the American-birthed system was designed to both encourage and accommodate. But given how things turned out the last time we collectively faced such a fluid structure, we would do well to keep U.S. power, in all of its forms, deeply embedded in the geometry to come. To continue the historical survey, after salvaging Western Europe from its half-century of civil war, the U.S. emerged as the progenitor of a new, far more just form of globalization -- one based on actual free trade rather than colonialism. America then successfully replicated globalization further in East Asia over the second half of the 20th century, setting the stage for the Pacific Century now unfolding. The transition away from heg independently causes extinction Brzezinski 12(Zbigniew, Prof of US Foreign Policy at School of Advanced International Studies – Johns Hopkins University, Counselor – CSIS and Trustee and Co-Chair – CSIS Advisory Board, Former National Security Advisor – Carter, “After America”, Foreign Policy, January / February, http://www.foreignpolicy.com/artic les/2012/01/03/after_america?page=full) For if America falters, the world is unlikely to be dominated by a single preeminent successor-- not even China. International uncertainty, increased tension among global competitors, and even outright chaos would be far more likely outcomes.While a sudden, massive crisis of the American system-- for instance, another financial crisis –would produce a fast-moving chain reaction leading to global political and economic disorder, a steady drift by America into increasingly pervasive decay or endlessly widening warfare with Islam would be unlikely to produce, even by 2025, an effective global successor. No single power will be ready by then to exercise the role that the world, upon the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, expected the United States to play: the leader of a new, globally cooperative world order. More probable would be a protracted phase of rather inconclusive realignments of both global and regional power, with no grand winners and many more losers, in a setting of international uncertaintyand even of potentially fatal risks to global well-being. Rather than a world where dreams of democracy flourish, a Hobbesian world ofenhanced national security based on varying fusions of authoritarianism, nationalism, and religion could ensue. The leaders of the world's second-rank powers, among them India, Japan, Russia, and some European countries, are already assessing the potential impact of U.S. decline on their respective national interests.The Japanese, fearful of an assertive China dominating the Asian mainland, may be thinking of closer links with Europe. Leaders in India and Japan may be considering closer political and even military cooperation in case America falters and China rises. Russia, while perhaps engaging in wishful thinking (even schadenfreude) about America's uncertain prospects, will almost certainly have its eye on the independent states of the former Soviet Union.Europe, not yet cohesive, would likely be pulled in several directions: Germany and Italy toward Russia because of commercial interests, France and insecure Central Europe in favor of a politically tighter European Union, and Britain toward manipulating a balance within the EU while preserving its special relationship with a declining United States. Others may move more rapidly to carve out their own regional spheres: Turkey in the area of the old Ottoman Empire, Brazil in the Southern Hemisphere, and so forth. None of these countries, however, will have the requisite combination of economic, financial, technological, and military power even to consider inheriting America's leading role.China, invariably mentioned as America's prospective successor, has an impressive imperial lineage and a strategic tradition of carefully calibrated patience, both of which have been critical to its overwhelmingly successful, several-thousand-year-long history. China thus prudently accepts the existing international system, even if it does not view the prevailing hierarchy as permanent. It recognizes that success depends not on the system's dramatic collapse but on its evolution toward a gradual redistribution of power. Moreover, the basic reality is that China is not yet ready to assume in full America's role in the world. Beijing's leaders themselves have repeatedly emphasized that on every important measure of development, wealth, and power, China will still be a modernizing and developing state several decades from now, significantly behind not only the United States but also Europe and Japan in the major per capita indices of modernity and national power. Accordingly, Chinese leaders have been restrained in laying any overt claims to global leadership. At some stage, however, a more assertive Chinese nationalism could arise and damage China's international interests. A swaggering, nationalistic Beijing would unintentionally mobilize a powerful regional coalition against itself. None of China's key neighbors -- India, Japan, and Russia -- is ready to acknowledge China's entitlement to America's place on the global totem pole. They might even seek support from a waning America to offset an overly assertive China. The resulting regional scramble could become intense, especially given the similar nationalistic tendencies among China's neighbors. A phase of acute international tension in Asia could ensue. Asia of the 21st century could then begin to resemble Europe of the 20th century -- violent and blood thirsty.At the same time, the security of a number of weaker states located geographically next to major regional powers also depends on the international status quo reinforced by America's global preeminence -- and would be made significantly more vulnerable in proportion to America's decline. The states in that exposed position-- including Georgia, Taiwan, South Korea, Belarus, Ukraine, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Israel, and the greater Middle East --are today's geopolitical equivalents of nature's most endangered species. Their fates are closely tied to the nature of the international environment left behind by a waning America, be it ordered and restrained or, much more likely, self-serving and expansionist.A faltering United States could also find its strategic partnership with Mexico in jeopardy. America's economic resilience and political stability have so far mitigated many of the challenges posed by such sensitive neighborhood issues as economic dependence, immigration, and the narcotics trade. A decline in American power, however, would likely undermine the health and good judgment of the U.S. economic and political systems. A waning United States would likely be more nationalistic, more defensive about its national identity, more paranoid about its homeland security, and less willing to sacrifice resources for the sake of others' development. The worsening of relations between a declining America and an internally troubled Mexico could even give rise to a particularly ominous phenomenon: the emergence, as a major issue in nationalistically aroused Mexican politics, of territorial claims justified by history and ignited by cross-border incidents.Another consequence of American decline could be a corrosion of the generally cooperative management of the global commons -- shared interests such as sea lanes, space, cyberspace, and the environment, whose protection is imperative to the long-term growth of the global economy and the continuation of basic geopolitical stability. In almost every case, the potential absence of a constructive and influential U.S. role would fatally undermine the essential communality of the global commons because the superiority and ubiquity of American power creates order where there would normally be conflict.None of this will necessarily come to pass. Nor is the concern that America's decline would generate global insecurity, endanger some vulnerable states, and produce a more troubled North American neighborhood an argument for U.S. global supremacy. In fact, the strategic complexities of the world in the 21st century make such supremacy unattainable. But those dreaming today of America's collapse would probably come to regret it. And as the world after America would be increasingly complicated and chaotic, it is imperative that the United States pursue a new, timely strategic vision for its foreign policy -- or start bracing itself for a dangerous slide into global turmoil.
Plan Text: The United States federal government should substantially lift its economic sanctions towards the Republic of Cuba. Contention 3 is Solvency Only full removal of the economic embargo solves Gorrell 05 Lieutenant Colonel, U.S. Army War College Lieutenant Colonel Tim Gorrell, Cuba: The Next Unanticipated Anticipated Strategic Crisis?, Strategy Research Project, 18 March 2005, U.S. Army War College, http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA433074 RETAIN SANCTIONS AGAINST CUBA, BUT ENFORCE THEM IN VARYING DEGREES DEPENDING ON THE POLITICAL CLIMATE AND THE CUBAN REGIME’S CONDUCT IN REGARD TO AMERICAN INTERESTS Throughout the past 15 years, the U.S. has experimented with a variable enforcement option. During the Clinton administration, restrictions were occasionally eased. For example, in March 1998, President Clinton announced: 1) the resumption of licensing for direct humanitarian charter flights to Cuba; 2) the resumption of cash remittances up to $300 per quarter for the support of close relatives in Cuba; 3) the development of licensing procedures to streamline and expedite licenses for the commercial sale of medicines and medical supplies and equipment; and 4) a decision to work on a bipartisan basis with Congress on the transfer of food to the Cuban people.33 In January 1999, President Clinton ordered additional measures to assist the Cuban people, which included further easement of cash remittances, expansion of direct passenger charter flights to Cuba, reestablishment of direct mail service, authorization for the commercial sale of food to independent entities in Cuba, and an expansion of people-to-people exchanges (i.e. scientist, students, athletes, etc.)34 This policy ended when the new administration failed to see any reciprocal progress from Castro. Fragmenting the policy process may do more harm than good. It does too little too late and causes hard feelings among Cubans and American businesses. The carrot-stick diplomatic approach will not make Castro yield. Such policy breeds inconsistency as it can vary from administration to administration, as it has between the Clinton and Bush administrations. The rules constantly change and thus have a ripple effect on American businesses and the quality of life of Americans, Cuban-Americans and native Cubans. Cuban trade has already declined to a trickle since the Bush administration sought to further squeeze the Castro government. Prior to the Bush administration’s trade crack down, 2004 was emerging as a record year for U.S. imports to Cuba. By the end of December 2004 U.S. suppliers and shippers were projected to have earned some $450 million, a 20 increase over 2003 sales.35 Imposing restrictions, as the Bush administration did in June 2004, perplexed American businesses with unpredicted problems. These businesses make adjustments, as do Cuban- American citizens, then must abruptly alter their business strategies because of a Congressional vote or an Executive order. This political tug-of-war does not move the U.S. any closer to realizing its security objectives. On the Cuban American front there is eroding support for this U.S. policy position. In the 2000 presidential election, President Bush won 81 of south Florida’s Cuban-American vote. A recent poll by the William C. Veleasquez Institute-Mirram Global indicates that his support today has fallen to 66.36 This decline signals a negative response to policy that limits travel, restricts the amount of goods people can bring to their relatives, and places limitations on sending money to family in Cuba. Cuban-Americans believe that this only hurts their poor relatives in Cuba. According to Jose Basulto, head of Brothers to the Rescue, and Ramon Raul Sanchez, head of the anti-Castro Democracy Movement, the U.S. government is using the Cuban people to harass Castro.37 Applying policy in a give-and-take manner, accomplishes little to facilitate the fall of Castro. The Cuban people enjoy brief periods of limited benefits, only to have these benefits withdrawn should the President or members of Congress wish to take another jab at Castro. American civilian businesses are also negatively affected. LIFT ALL SANCTIONS AND PURSUE NORMAL DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS WITH CUBA Normalcy is the only policy that the U.S. has not attempted. The present policy misses the security implications, alienates allies and others worldwide, harms U.S. businesses, and is losing support domestically. First, the U.S. must reassess the threat posed by Cuba. There is, in fact, virtually no security threat. Further, policies that were applicable in the past, when there was a threat, should not be applied to the current environment. The U.S. Cuban policy is perplexing because it appears to conflict with the ends, ways and means that the National Security Strategy is applied in other regions of the world. The U.S. has normalized relations with Vietnam and Libya and has certainly opted for an open dialogue with Communist China. Likewise, there is abundant evidence that a new policy toward Cuba could very well achieve the ends that 43 years of embargo have failed to accomplish. Secondly, Cuba currently trades and has diplomatic ties with much of the world. The goal of U.S. sanctions is to isolate the Cuban regime; however, they have only slowed, not deterred economic growth. On 4 November 2003 the United Nations voted, for the 12th straight year, 173 to 3 (with 4 abstentions) against the four-decade U.S. embargo against Cuba.38 Voting with the U.S. were Israel and the Marshall Islands. The U.S.’ staunchest allies, the 15 members of the European Union, along with Japan, Australia and New Zealand, all object to the “extra-territorial” effect of U.S. legislation that they feel violates their sovereignty. 39 There are two schools of thought regarding trade and democracy. The first is that economic growth will promote democracy. The other questions this notion and argues that democracy must come first.40 There is strong opinion, however, that in Cuba’s case economic engagement will bring about the desired results. Certainly many Cuban-Americans and perhaps some others in the world would not agree with this course of action. However, there is evidence that a significant number of people both within the U.S. and abroad favor a policy change. In 1992 a pastoral letter from Cuba’s Bishops stated that the US embargo “directly affects the people who suffer the consequences in hunger and illness. If what is intended by this approach is to destabilize the government by using hunger and want to pressure civic society to revolt, then the strategy is also cruel.“41 The third consideration is U.S. business. Under the current rules, U.S. businesses are permitted to sell agricultural produce to Cuba.42 Today 27 firms from 12 U.S. states are doing business with Cuba, making Cuba 22nd among U.S. agricultural markets.43 These business activities are greatly influenced by Cuban-Americans and members of Congress. The economic power of the U.S. can be our most powerful weapon. The possibilities of economic engagement offer a myriad of branches and sequels that could promote a rapport between the American people and the Cubans. The aggressive pursuit of these endeavors would go far in ensuring an orderly transition to a post-Castro Cuba. It is an erroneous assumption to believe that Castro’s demise will miraculously trigger reform and all the problems of the last 40 years will vanish. A visionary policy, albeit constrained within the parameters of the Castro regime, will go far in setting agreeable social-economic conditions in Cuba both now and in the future. Finally, public opinion in the U.S. favors a new policy direction. A 1997 Miami Herald poll found that a majority of Cubans under the age of 45 supported “establishing a national dialogue with Cuba,” whereas for the most part their elders opposed such dialogue.44 Former President Jimmy Carter, writing in the Washington Post after his May 2002 visit to Cuba, reported that he found an unexpected degree of economic freedom. Carter went on to say that if Americans could have maximum contact with Cuban, then Cubans would clearly see the advantages of a truly democratic society and thus be encouraged to bring about orderly changes in their society. 45 Castro himself appears willing to consider greater reform. In 1998 he permitted Pope John Paul II to visit Cuba; Cubans are permitted to own property; he has opened trade; and in 2002 he broadcast former President Jimmy Carter’s address at the University of Havana.46 Additionally, he indicated that the Cuban government would return any of the Guantanamo detainees in the unlikely event that they would escape.47 CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION U.S. policy makers need to confront the real Cuba of today in order to build a “free” Cuba of tomorrow that is capable of taking its place in the world community as a responsible, democratic nation. Given the history of the past 100 years, and particularly our Castro centric policy, the U.S. needs to make a bold change toward Cuba. The U.S. has pursued a hard-line approach toward the Castro regime for over 40 years. While this policy was easily justified during the Cold War era and, to a certain degree, during the 1990s, it fails to address the present U.S. national security concerns. The globalization trends of the 21st century are irreversible, Fidel Castro is in the twilight of his life, and a new generation of Cuban-Americans is supportive of new strategies that will ease the transition to a post-Castro Cuba while buttressing economic and social opportunities in the near term. Furthermore, there is a new dimension that U.S. policy strategists must take into account in deciding the course of U.S.- Cuba relations – the GWOT. World-wide asymmetrical threats to U.S. interests, coupled with the Iraqi occupation and the potential for any one of the present hot spots (i.e. Iran, North Korea, Taiwan, etc.) to ignite, should prompt strategic leaders to work harder to mitigate a potential Caribbean crises. The prudent action would then be to develop strategies that can defuse or neutralize these situations before they require the U.S. to divert resources from protecting its interests in the GWOT. Therefore, the U.S. can best serve its security, the Cuban people, and the Western Hemisphere by abandoning the present draconian policy toward Cuba. The U.S. should implement a new policy designed to achieve its goals through lifting all sanctions and pursuing normalized diplomatic relations; encouraging people-to-people dialogue and trade. The policy should continue to pursue human rights, democracy, and free market ends. However, the ways to realize these objectives should be grounded in full economic engagement, an approach that has not been fully attempted. The present U.S. policy has failed miserably. What does the most powerful nation on earth have to lose by attempting a bold shift in its policy toward Cuba? And, the embargo is an act of genocide – it disproportionately affects the Cuban population and is maintained only to destroy socialism Malott 7 (Curry, From New Mexico State University in Las Cruces, NM, Currie Stephenson Malott received a Master's Degree in Sociology in 1998 and a PhD in Curriculum and Instruction in 2004. Before coming to West Chester University, Dr. Malott published and taught in the foundations of education and social studies at Brooklyn College/CUNY, D'Youville College in Buffalo, NY, and Queens College/CUNY. During this time, Dr. Malott has been interested primarily in advancing theoretical and practical application of critical pedagogy through the foundations of education and beyond. Dr. Malott is also the founder and series editor of Critical Constructions: Studies on Education and Society (Information Age Publishing). “Cuban Education in Neo-liberal Times: Socialist Revolutionaries and State Capitalism”, Journal for Critical Education Policy Studies, v5 n1 May 2007 pg. 245)moxley The US has not been trying to influence the revolution but to destroy it. Just as in Hannibal’s times when the Senate in ancient Rome proclaimed the destruction of Carthage, the obsessively pursued motto of U.S. administrations has been: Cuba must be destroyed. (Fidel Castro, 2002. p. 6) After the overthrow of the Batista dictatorship it did not take long for Washington to respond to Castro and his revolution. For example, in Killing Hope (1995) William Blum argues that, “bombing and strafing attacks of Cuba by planes based in the United States began in October 1959, if not before. In early 1960, there were several fire-bomb air raids on Cuban cane fields and sugar mills, in which American pilots also took part ... ” (Blum, 1995. p. 186). In 1961 the United States, relying on the support of the Cuba people, which they never got, orchestrated an unsuccessful, fullon invasion of Cuba, the “Bay of Pigs,” instigating the nearly catastrophic “Cuban Missile Crisis.” Embarrassed from the dismal failure of the “Bay of Pigs,” the Kennedy administration almost immediately initiated “... a campaign of smaller-scale attacks upon Cuba ...” (Blum, 1995. p. 186), despite how dangerously close to a nuclear war the US had just come. Describing Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) extra-law behavior toward Cuba throughout the 1960s, William Blum (1995) notes how the US repeatedly subjected the island to: Countless sea and air commando raids by exiles, at times accompanied by their CIA supervisors, inflicting damage upon oil refiners, chemical plants and railroad bridges, cane fields, sugar mills, and sugar warehouses; infiltrating spies, saboteurs and assassins ... anything to damage the Cuban economy, promote disaffection, or make the revolution look bad ... taking the lives of Cuban militia members and others in the process ... pirate attacks on Cuban fishing boats and merchant ships, bombardments of Soviet vessels docked in Cuba ... (p. 187) The United States government has also been implicated in using chemical and biological warfare directly against the Cuban civilian population by introducing poisons and diseases into the environment via avenues such as food supplies. Other chemical warfare tactics employed against the Cuban economy have included poisoning their number one export, sugar. The primary theory behind these attacks intended to topple the revolution is that if life is made so unbearable for the population, the people will eventually turn against those leading the struggle for social change, i.e. Fidel Castro. In other words the goal is to turn the people against their government by making them suffer and struggle, and instilling fear and terror into them. This twisted anti-democratic logic has not only informed and continues to inform the physical assaults against Cuba, but the trade embargo as well (Blum, 1995; Chomsky, 1999), which the Cuban government, drawing on the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948, has consistently reminded the world that an embargo is an act of economic war and can therefore only be internationally recognized as legal between countries at war with each other. According to international law, only one conclusion can be drawn: the US embargo against Cuba is an act of US terrorism. Not only is the embargo internationally illegal, it has been revised throughout the course of ten US presidential administrations, consistently intensifying its levels of brutality. For example, in 1992 the US passed the Torricelli Act, after Cuba lost 85 of its foreign trade after the fall of the USSR, which further restricted Cuba’s ability to purchase food and medicine from US subsidiaries in third countries, which, at the time, amounted to 718 million US dollars. Then, in 1996, the Helms-Burton Act intensified the persecution of and sanctions against those investing in Cuba, both currently and potentially, in addition to authorizing funding for aggressive acts against the Island. However, while Cuba has been granted special permission, as of 2001, to make a limited number of purchases in the US, although with extremely tight restrictions, making many transactions, especially those in the areas of medicine, virtually impossible, the administration of President George W. Bush, in 2004, approved a report: For new actions and measures intended to intensify the blockade by stepping up actions aimed at discouraging tourism and investment in Cuba, by restricting financial flow and visits to the island and by placing even more restrictions on family remittances and exchanges in various spheres, the aim being to bring about conditions which would allow the US to intervene in Cuba, thus permitting them to impose the “regime change” to which the US president made reference on 20 May of that year 2004. (Granma, 2005. p. 6) When the words “regime change” are uttered from the mouth of a US president, catastrophe usually ensues. While it would not be the first time the US attempted to institute a “regime change” in post-1959 Cuba, the phrase “regime change in Cuba,” coming from US President Bush II is nevertheless cause for alarm, as should the embargo in general be a source of indignation for all US citizens (for an increasing number it is) for its illegality is carried out in their name. The illegal US trade embargo against Cuba has, without a doubt, been the most publicized counter-revolutionary tactic both within and outside of Cuba, which, for the past 15 years, the UN General Assembly has passed a resolution calling for the US to end (Amnesty International, 2003). Summarizing the United States’ Trade Embargo against the nation they have been sworn to serve and protect, quoting a secret State Department report by I.D. Mallory (Department of State: Foreign Relations of the United States, volume VI, 1991), declassified in 1991, the editors of the Cuban government’s publication, Granma (2005), note: The economic, commercial and financial blockade imposed by the United States against Cuba is the longest-lasting and cruelest of its kind known to human history and is an essential element in the United States’ hostile and aggressive policies regarding the Cuban people. Its aim, made explicit on 6 April 1960 is the destruction of the Cuban Revolution: “( ... ) through frustration and discouragement based on dissatisfaction and economic difficulties ( ... ) to withhold funds and supplies to Cuba in order to cut real income thereby causing starvation, desperation and the overthrow of the government (...)” (p. 3) The effect of the embargo on the Cuban people has been severe. For example, in a groundbreaking analysis of Cuba’s resistance to the pressure to privatize from neoliberal global capital Báez (2004) notes that the US$41 billion Cuba lost between 1962 and 1996 has had a real impact on the Cuban people’s standard of living. Báez (2004) notes that “the written object of the law was to punish any businesses that were investing in Cuba, in addition to prohibiting the IMF and World Bank from facilitating business transactions on the Island” (p. 111). In the aforementioned Cuban report published in Granma (2005) the devastating manifestations of the consistently intensifying US embargo, supported and added to by Democratic and Republican presidential administrations alike, are laid out in detail highlighting the implications on Cuba’s “food sector,” “health sector,” “education sector,” “tourism sector,” “finances,” transportation sector,” “civil aviation,” “oil,” among other areas such as the “sports sector.” The Cuban report pulls no punches concerning the seriousness of the embargo and its combined effect on the various sectors of Cuban economic and social life: This policy ... amounts to an act of genocide under the provisions of paragraph (c) of article II of the Geneva Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide of 9 December 1948 and therefore constitutes a violation of International Law. This Convention defines this as ‘( ... ) acts perpetrated with the intention to totally or partially destroy a national, ethnic, racial or religious group’, and in these cases provides for ‘the intentional subjugation of the group to conditions that result in their total or partial physical destruction’. (Pp. 3-4) Again, the Cuban government, noting that the US embargo has in fact been designed to “totally ... destroy” their nation constituting an act of genocide, has repeatedly garnered the overwhelming support of the international community in their call for its immediate termination. By not only ignoring the collective voice of the United Nations to end the embargo, but by intensifying it as well, the US has consistently shown a blatant disregard for international legitimacy. Despite the real devastation the embargo and other forms of US terrorism have had on Cubans, Báez (2004) argues that they cannot alone explain all of Cuba’s problems. Báez (2004) points to the fall of the Soviet Union has having perhaps the most (or equal) dire effects on Cuba paving the way for the opening up of certain areas of the “Cuban Market” to foreign investors, as Castro struggles to generate value/hard currency/US dollars to fund the Revolution’s social programs and feed his people, 70 of whom have lived their entire lives under the embargo (Granma, 2005).
No prior questions to the 1AC David Owen, Reader of Political Theory at the Univ. of Southampton, Millennium Vol 31 No 3 2002 p. 655- Commenting on the ‘philosophical turn’ in IR, Wæver remarks that ‘a frenzy for words like “epistemology” and “ontology” often signals this philosophical turn’, although he goes on to comment that these terms are often used loosely.4 However, loosely deployed or not, it is clear that debates concerning ontology and epistemology play a central role in the contemporary IR theory wars. In one respect, this is unsurprising since it is a characteristic feature of the social sciences that periods of disciplinary disorientation involve recourse to reflection on the philosophical commitments of different theoretical approaches, and there is no doubt that such reflection can play a valuable role in making explicit the commitments that characterise (and help individuate) diverse theoretical positions. Yet, such a philosophical turn is not without its dangers and I will briefly mention three before turning to consider a confusion that has, I will suggest, helped to promote the IR theory wars by motivating this philosophical turn. The first danger with the philosophical turn is that it has an inbuilt tendency to prioritise issues of ontology and epistemology over explanatory and/or interpretive power as if the latter two were merely a simple function of the former. But while the explanatory and/or interpretive power of a theoretical account is not wholly independent of its ontological and/or epistemological commitments (otherwise criticism of these features would not be a criticism that had any value), it is by no means clear that it is, in contrast, wholly dependent on these philosophical commitments. Thus, for example, one need not be sympathetic to rational choice theory to recognise that it can provide powerful accounts of certain kinds of problems, such as the tragedy of the commons in which dilemmas of collective action are foregrounded. It may, of course, be the case that the advocates of rational choice theory cannot give a good account of why this type of theory is powerful in accounting for this class of problems (i.e., how it is that the relevant actors come to exhibit features in these circumstances that approximate the assumptions of rational choice theory) and, if this is the case, it is a philosophical weakness—but this does not undermine the point that, for a certain class of problems, rational choice theory may provide the best account available to us. In other words, while the critical judgement of theoretical accounts in terms of their ontological and/or epistemological sophistication is one kind of critical judgement, it is not the only or even necessarily the most important kind. The second danger run by the philosophical turn is that because prioritisation of ontology and epistemology promotes theory-construction from philosophical first principles, it cultivates a theory-driven rather than problem-driven approach to IR. Paraphrasing Ian Shapiro, the point can be put like this: since it is the case that there is always a plurality of possible true descriptions of a given action, event or phenomenon, the challenge is to decide which is the most apt in terms of getting a perspicuous grip on the action, event or phenomenon in question given the purposes of the inquiry; yet, from this standpoint, ‘theory-driven work is part of a reductionist program’ in that it ‘dictates always opting for the description that calls for the explanation that flows from the preferred model or theory’.5 The justification offered for this strategy rests on the mistaken belief that it is necessary for social science because general explanations are required to characterise the classes of phenomena studied in similar terms. However, as Shapiro points out, this is to misunderstand the enterprise of science since ‘whether there are general explanations for classes of phenomena is a question for social-scientific inquiry, not to be prejudged before conducting that inquiry’.6 Moreover, this strategy easily slips into the promotion of the pursuit of generality over that of empirical validity. The third danger is that the preceding two combine to encourage the formation of a particular image of disciplinary debate in IR—what might be called (only slightly tongue in cheek) ‘the Highlander view’—namely, an image of warring theoretical approaches with each, despite occasional temporary tactical alliances, dedicated to the strategic achievement of sovereignty over the disciplinary field. It encourages this view because the turn to, and prioritisation of, ontology and epistemology stimulates the idea that there can only be one theoretical approach which gets things right, namely, the theoretical approach that gets its ontology and epistemology right. This image feeds back into IR exacerbating the first and second dangers, and so a potentially vicious circle arises. US-Cuba talks are happening now but are at a critical junction – lack of commitment derails the process Galeono 6/22/13 (Javier, Associated Press, “Analysis: Cuba, U.S. Take Steps Toward Rapprochement but Complicated Road Lies Ahead”, June 22nd, 2013, http://cubaconfidential.wordpress.com/tag/john-kerry/)//moxley HAVANA, Cuba — They’ve hardly become allies, but Cuba and the U.S. have taken some baby steps toward rapprochement in recent weeks that have people on this island and in Washington wondering if a breakthrough in relations could be just over the horizon. Skeptics caution the Cold War enemies have been here many times before, only to fall back into old recriminations but there are signs that views might be shifting on both sides of the Florida Straits.¶ The countries have held talks in the past week on resuming direct mail service, and announced a July 17 meeting on migration issues. A U.S. federal judge in May allowed a convicted Cuban intelligence agent to return to the island. Cuba informed the family of jailed U.S. government subcontractor Alan Gross this month it would let an American doctor examine him, although the visit has apparently not yet happened. Cuban President Raul Castro has also ushered in a series of economic and social changes, including making it easier for Cubans to travel off the island.¶ Under the radar, diplomats on both sides describe a sea change in the tone of their dealings. Only last year, Cuban state television was broadcasting grainy footage of American diplomats meeting with dissidents on Havana streets and publicly accusing them of being CIA frontmen. Today, U.S. diplomats in Havana and Cuban Foreign Ministry officials have easy contact, even sharing home phone numbers.¶ Josefina Vidal, Cuba’s top diplomat for North American affairs, recently travelled to Washington and met twice with State Department officials, a visit that came right before the announcements of resumptions in the two sets of bilateral talks that had been suspended for more than two years. Washington has also granted visas to prominent Cuban officials, including the daughter of Cuba’s president.¶ “These recent steps indicate a desire on both sides to try to move forward, but also a recognition on both sides of just how difficult it is to make real progress,” said Robert Pastor, a professor of international relations at American University and former national security adviser on Latin America during the Carter administration. “These are tiny, incremental gains, and the prospects of going backwards are equally high.”
1/2/14
1ac embargo
Tournament: Wake | Round: 1 | Opponent: round 1 wake | Judge: Stacy Sharp 1AC
Contention 1 is OFAC OFAC is overstretched—the plan is key to effective sanctions Johnson, Spector and Lilac 10 - Andy Johnson, Director, National Security Program, Kyle Spector, Policy Advisor, National Security Program, Kristina Lilac, National Security Program, Senior Fellows of The Third Way Institute, (“End the Embargo of Cuba”, Article for The Third Way Institute, 9/16/10, http://content.thirdway.org/publications/326/Third_Way_Memo_-_End_the_Embargo_of_Cuba.pdf, Accessed 7/02/13, AW)
Keeping the embargo in place requires that the US government devote time and resources to AND resources to respond to the current threats posed by rogue states and terrorist networks That revamps sanctions on Iran – previous lack of focus and disorganization Maberry and Jensen 13 – J. Scott Maberry, J.D, Georgetown University Law Center, International Trade partner in the Government Contracts, Investigations and International Trade Practice Group, Mark L. Jensen, J.D, Harvard Law School, International Trade associate in the Government Contracts, Investigations and International Trade Practice Group, (“OFAC gets hot, bothered on Iran and Cuba: how economic sanctions work today”, Report for Sheppard Mullin Richter and Hampton LLP, 5/7/13, http://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=8657e6ce-454a-4eaf-ba8b-d225ea59ecdd, Accessed 7/9/13, AW)
People who practice U.S. economic sanctions law like to talk about how AND and economy further, it seems likely that additional sanctions will be applied.
Main barrier to successful Iran sanctions is resources, OFAC’s key. Jurdi 13 (Ramsey B. Jurdi, Associate at Chadbourne and Parke LLP, whose practice focuses on international dispute resolution, commercial litigation, and compliance matters. He regularly appears in arbitration proceedings conducted by the Dubai International Arbitration Centre (DIAC) and counsels companies on commercial disputes and construction contracts throughout the Middle East, maintains an active practice counseling U.S. and international companies on compliance with U.S. laws, particularly export control laws, defending white-collar criminal inquiries, and conducting special investigations. In this role, Mr. Jurdi has been involved in a variety of matters relating to the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), U.S. Military contracting, and economic sanctions administered by the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), American University of Beirut, B.A., with honors, 2001, The George Washington University Law School, J.D., with honors, 2005, April, “Iran Sanctions Enforcement Not Keeping Pace With Rhetoric”, http://www.chadbourne.com/files/Publication/1d463291-a830-4cda-900b-8ac1e4e5eaf0/Presentation/PublicationAttachment/973e17dd-d8d4-4d63-bc77-91a51c069072/IranSanctionsEnforcement_Apr13.pdf, TL)
A critical look at the US record of enforcement of sanctions against Iran reveals that AND were against Belarusneft, Petróleos de Venezuela, Sytrol and Zhuhai Zhenrong Company. OFAC effectively targets Iranian businesses supporting proliferation Fitzpatrick 1/16 --- Mark Fitzpatrick directs the IISS Non-Proliferation and Disarmament Programme, International Institute for Strategic Studies (“US sanctions on Iran“, January 16, 2013, IISS, www.iiss.org//media/Documents/.../US20sanctions20on20Iran.pdf, accessed July 10, 2013, MY) Financial institutions that provide financial support for the sensitive nuclear and missile programs are also AND and China, have been so designated for helping Iranian banks evade sanctions. Sanctions solve Iran prolif – multilateral coalitions – international position of strength DeLeon et al 12 - Rudy deLeon, National and International Security, John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, Recipient of The Defense Civilian Distinguished Service Award in 1994, 1995, and 2001, National Intelligence Distinguished Service Medal in 2001, Former US Senior Department of Defense Official, Senior Vice President of National Security and International Policy at American Progress, with Brian Katulis, Peter Juul, Matt Duss and Ken Sofer, (“Strengthening America’s Options on Iran”, Report for The Center for American Progress, April 2012, http://www.americanprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/issues/2012/04/pdf/iran_10questions_INTRO.pdf, Accessed 7/10/13, AW) *NOTE: P5+1 is comprised of: United States, Russia, China, United Kingdom, France and Germany*
Indeed, amid an array of political transitions and military conflicts around the globe, AND notions and make decisions based on facts while preparing fully for all contingencies.
showing a test facility south of February’s blast.
Iran prolif leads to nuclear war- 3 ways- arms race, miscalc, and Israeli Preemption Allison 6 – Graham Tillett Allison Jr., Graham Allison is an American political scientist and professor at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard. (“The Will to Prevent,” Harvard International Law Review, Fall 2006, page lexis) Meanwhile, Iran is testing the line in the Middle East. On its current AND us to have control of weapons of destruction that can threaten our existence.” Contention 2 is Relations
Scenario 1 is Warming Ending the embargo would expand credibility, US soft power, and improve US-Cuban relations. Hinderdael 11 M.A. candidate at SAIS Bologna Center, concentrating in American Foreign Policy and Energy, Resources, and Environment Klaas Hinderdael, Breaking the Logjam: Obama's Cuba Policy and a Guideline for Improved Leadership, by http://bcjournal.org/volume-14/breaking-the-logjam.html?printerFriendly=true
Conclusion The two countries’ histories have long been intertwined, particularly after the Monroe Doctrine of 1823 gave rise to the American belief that it would become the hemisphere’s protector. Until the immediate aftermath of Fidel Castro’s revolution, Cuba provided a testing ground for the promotion of American ideals, social beliefs, and foreign policies. In the context of Raúl shifting course in Cuba, the Obama administration has the AND At home, with the trade deficit and national debt rising, the economic costs
Cuba is the lynchpin to Latin American relations, goodwill, solving anti-americanism and successful soft power Perez 10 J.D. Yale Law School. Working with Koh former Dean of Yale Law and Legal Advisor to the State Department David A. Perez, America's Cuba Policy: The Way Forward: A Policy Recommendation for the U.S. State Department, Spring, 2010, Harvard Latino Law Review, 13 Harv. Latino L. Rev. 187
Anti-Americanism has become the political chant de jour for leaders seeking long- AND
throughout Latin America, and would go a long way toward creating goodwill.
From an image stand point repealing the sanctions and removing the embargo is symbolic. AND that the administration is taking steps to ensure that sovereignty is actually respected. Repealing the Helms-Burton Law will certainly stimulate foreign investment in Cuba as well AND , the two benefits that stand out the most are trade and fuel.
Latin American relations are vital to the US. Needed to combat global problems like proliferation, climate change, and insure economic growth. Only engagement solves Zedillo et al 08 Commission Co-Chair for the Brookings Institute Report on the Partnership for the Americas and former President of Mexico Ernesto Zedillo, Thomas R. Pickering, etc, Rethinking U.S.–Latin American Relations A Hemispheric Partnership for a Turbulent World. Report of the Partnership for the Americas Commission, The Brookings Institution, November 2008, http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/Research/Files/Reports/2008/11/2420latin20america20partnership/1124_latin_america_partnership.PDF
The Need for a Hemispheric Partnership Historically, the United States and Latin America have rarely developed a genuine and sustained AND ran out of steam, became mired in confrontation, or remained underresourced. If a hemispheric partnership remains elusive, the costs to the United States and its AND to tap new markets, make new investments, and access valuable resources. It is important to note at the outset that the term “partnership” as AND responsibilities according to its own economic and political capacities to generate shared benefits. Today, four changes in the region have made a hemispheric partnership both possible and AND with a shared sense of responsibility and a common stake in the future. For example, drug trafficking and its associated criminal networks have now spread so widely AND adapting to ecological shocks—all require sustained cooperation among the hemisphere’s countries. The second change is that the LAC countries are diversifying their international economic relations. AND expensive manufactured imports, living standards in the LAC region have improved significantly. At the same time, many LAC countries have moved beyond their traditional reliance on AND Integration, have also reduced the region’s dependence on traditional sources of capital. Some Latin American countries are investing abroad on an unprecedented scale. In 2006, AND relationships in the hemisphere will continue to diversify as the world economy recovers. The third change is that the LAC countries are diversifying their political and diplomatic relations AND new confidence in their capacity to chart their own course in the world. Their enhanced confidence and autonomy will make many LAC countries much less responsive to U AND Washington should play a more limited role in their part of the world. The fourth change is that, today, the LAC countries are better positioned to act as reliable partners. Despite remaining governance challenges, the vast majority of these countries are stable democracies for which competitive elections and peaceful transitions of power are the norm, not the exception. Throughout these countries, civil society groups now participate extensively in the policymaking process, and there is much less tolerance of violence as a means of political expression. Economic progress has also made the LAC countries more reliable partners. Leaders, including some on the left, are committed to fiscal responsibility. Most central banks are now independent bodies focused on inflation control. Exchange rates largely reflect market forces. As a result, many LAC countries can now look beyond their borders and commit to sustained partnerships and responsibilities on regional and global issues. In sum, the countries of the LAC region have made significant strides in economic and social development and will continue to prosper even if U.S. leaders remain disengaged. Washington must decide whether it wants to actively reengage and benefit from the region’s dynamism and resources or be sidelined as other economic and political actors fill the void left by its absence.
Warming manmade- prefer scientist Pittock 10—led the Climate Impact Group in CSIRO until his retirement in 1999. He contributed to or was the lead author of all four major reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. He was awarded a Public Service Medal in 1999 and is CSIRO Honorary Fellow. (Barrie, Climate Change: The Science, Impacts, and Solutions, 2010, pg. 240)
Is the science credible? As noted in Chapters 4 and 5, there are many uncertainties in relation to AND to slow and eventually reverse the increase in greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. These conclusions are hotly contested by a relatively small number of contrarians, discussed in AND . Too often contrarians repeat old arguments that have already been thoroughly discredited.
We need to get prepared for four degrees of global warming, Bob Watson told AND warming caused by human emissions could propel us towards a similar hothouse Earth.
Scenario 2 is Science Diplomacy Lifting the embargo is a pre-requisite to meaningful scientific cooperation with Cuba – it would establish a framework for open engagement Pastrana et al., Sergio Jorge Pastrana is the Foreign Secretary of the Academia de Ciencias de Cuba, Michael T. Clegg is the Foreign Secretary of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and Donald Bren Professor of Biological Sciences, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the School of Biological Sciences, University of California, Irvine. 08 (Sergio Jorge, Michael T. Clegg, Science AAAS October 2008, “U.S. – Cuban Scientific Relations,” Vol. 322 no. 5900 p. 345, ACCESSED June 30, 2013, RJ) In a few years, the two oldest national academies of science in the world AND us celebrate our mutual anniversaries by starting a new era of scientific cooperation.
This degree of scientific cooperation makes all of their impacts less likely due to scientific integration and a laundry list of impacts Fedoroff 8 – subcommittee on research and science education, committee on science and technology, House of Representatives, 110 Congress, administrator of USAID, science and technology advisor to the Secretary of State and US Department of State (Nina, “International Science and Technology Cooperation,” Government Printing Office, 4/2/2008, http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/CHRG-110hhrg41470/html/CHRG-110hhrg41470.htm)//RH Chairman Baird, Ranking Member Ehlers, and distinguished members of the Subcommittee, thank AND a means to enhance security, increase global partnerships, and create sustainability.
Plan Text: The United States federal government should lift its economic sanctions towards the Republic of Cuba. Contention 3 is Solvency Only full removal of the embargo solves – the current policy is causing anti-americanism, terrorism, and risks a crisis – partial or conditioned removal is worse than the status quo. Gorrell 05 Lieutenant Colonel, U.S. Army War College Lieutenant Colonel Tim Gorrell, Cuba: The Next Unanticipated Anticipated Strategic Crisis?, Strategy Research Project, 18 March 2005, U.S. Army War College, http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA433074 RETAIN SANCTIONS AGAINST CUBA, BUT ENFORCE THEM IN VARYING DEGREES DEPENDING ON THE POLITICAL AND have to lose by attempting a bold shift in its policy toward Cuba?