Friday, June 13, 2025
  • Login
198 Japan News
No Result
View All Result
  • HOME
  • BUSINESS NEWS
  • VIDEO NEWS
  • FEATURED NEWS
    • JAPAN US TRADE NEWS
    • JAPAN EU NEWS
    • JAPAN UK NEWS
    • JAPAN INDIA NEWS
    • JAPAN RUSSIA NEWS
    • JAPAN GULF NATIONS NEWS
    • JAPAN AFRICA NEWS
    • JAPAN EGYPT NEWS
    • JAPAN NIGERIA NEWS
    • JAPAN MEXICO NEWS
    • JAPAN BRAZIL NEWS
    • JAPAN THAILAND NEWS
    • JAPAN INDONESIA NEWS
  • CRYPTO
  • POLITICAL
  • TECHNOLOGY
  • JAPAN AGRICULTURE NEWS
    • JAPAN MANUFACTURE NEWS
    • JAPAN AGRICULTURE NEWS
    • JAPAN IMMIGRATION NEWS
    • JAPAN UNIVERSITY NEWS
    • JAPAN EDUCATION NEWS
    • JAPAN VENTURE CAPITAL NEWS
    • JAPAN JOINT VENTURE NEWS
    • JAPAN BUSINESS HELP
    • JAPAN PARTNESHIPS
  • ASK IKE LEMUWA
  • CONTACT
198 Japan News
  • HOME
  • BUSINESS NEWS
  • VIDEO NEWS
  • FEATURED NEWS
    • JAPAN US TRADE NEWS
    • JAPAN EU NEWS
    • JAPAN UK NEWS
    • JAPAN INDIA NEWS
    • JAPAN RUSSIA NEWS
    • JAPAN GULF NATIONS NEWS
    • JAPAN AFRICA NEWS
    • JAPAN EGYPT NEWS
    • JAPAN NIGERIA NEWS
    • JAPAN MEXICO NEWS
    • JAPAN BRAZIL NEWS
    • JAPAN THAILAND NEWS
    • JAPAN INDONESIA NEWS
  • CRYPTO
  • POLITICAL
  • TECHNOLOGY
  • JAPAN AGRICULTURE NEWS
    • JAPAN MANUFACTURE NEWS
    • JAPAN AGRICULTURE NEWS
    • JAPAN IMMIGRATION NEWS
    • JAPAN UNIVERSITY NEWS
    • JAPAN EDUCATION NEWS
    • JAPAN VENTURE CAPITAL NEWS
    • JAPAN JOINT VENTURE NEWS
    • JAPAN BUSINESS HELP
    • JAPAN PARTNESHIPS
  • ASK IKE LEMUWA
  • CONTACT
No Result
View All Result
198 Japan News
No Result
View All Result
Home JAPAN IMMIGRATION NEWS

In an ‘age of unpeace,’ civilians become new pawns of war

by 198 Japan News
December 30, 2021
in JAPAN IMMIGRATION NEWS
Reading Time: 4 mins read
A A
0
In an ‘age of unpeace,’ civilians become new pawns of war
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

[ad_1]

BERLIN – Many observers have long assumed that the future of geopolitics will be decided in a sea battle over the Taiwan Strait or some rocky outcropping or atoll in the South China Sea. Yet we could probably learn more by examining the treatment of a few thousand desperate refugees in the 21st century’s geopolitical backwaters.

Start with the English Channel. Once the site of some of the most dramatic confrontations in history — from the Spanish Armada and the Napoleonic Wars to the Normandy Landings — it is no longer a theater for great-power politics. Instead, the recent deaths of 27 civilians whose inflatable boat capsized after leaving the French coast has turned the channel into a site of humanitarian tragedy.

Rather than working together in solidarity with France to root out the migrant smugglers responsible for the deaths, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson immediately sought to play to a domestic political audience by blaming the French in an open letter published on Twitter. Far from just another juvenile political stunt, Johnson’s dereliction of leadership will most likely have dreadful and far-reaching consequences.

Facing re-election next spring, in a campaign where migration will be a sensitive issue, French President Emmanuel Macron pushed back against Johnson’s boorishness and disinvited the British home secretary from a gathering of European interior ministers in Calais. Owing to a lack of trust on both sides of the channel, each government believes that the other is using the conflict as part of a bigger power play that extends to trade, defense and foreign policy.

While migration has become a political football in Western Europe, it has been fully weaponized in an obscure strip of land between Belarus and Poland. Hardly a popular destination for travelers from the Middle East, Belarus has been flying in migrants from Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria, and then funneling them to the border with the promise of entry into the European Union. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko’s motive is clear: to pressure European governments to relax the sanctions imposed on his regime following last year’s fraudulent presidential election and tightened after he forced down a commercial airliner to arrest one of its passengers.

Lukashenko is under no illusion that a few thousand migrants would be enough to overwhelm Poland, or even Lithuania. Rather, he understands that the most important battleground nowadays is people’s minds, not territory. Aiming to re-create the images from the EU’s 2015 migration crisis, his use of migrants is ultimately an act of information warfare.

Political scientist Kelly M. Greenhill has shown that Lukashenko is far from the first to turn migrants into a tool of government policy. She documents more than 75 occasions when governments — including those of Morocco, Russia, Libya and Turkey — forced civilians from their homes (or encouraged them to flee) in order to achieve some political, military, or economic objective. The weaponization of migration has become a frequent complement to other forms of pressure such as sanctions, information and cyber warfare and trade and infrastructure policies.

In this context, both the Belarusian campaign and the tussle over the English Channel are symptomatic of a changing foreign-policy environment in which wars are being replaced by new forms of aggression. The connections between people and countries are the new preferred currencies of power.

The military theorist Carl von Clausewitz famously described war as the continuation of politics by other means. But in a nuclear age, war is often an unfathomable option, so global politics had to be continued by still other means — what I call “connectivity conflicts.” Governments are manipulating the very things that link countries together: supply chains, financial flows, the movement of people, pandemics, climate change, and, above all, the internet.

While the coronavirus pandemic pits all of humanity against a single contagious disease, another pandemic is being fueled deliberately from the shadows. Toxic behaviors are becoming contagious as national leaders respond to the weaponization of connectivity by reciprocating it.

The resulting downward spiral will be difficult to reverse, because connectivity conflicts tend to play out under a cloud of hypocrisy and plausible deniability. Lukashenko can argue, however unpersuasively, that migrants from the Middle East traveled to Belarus of their own accord. Similarly, the EU can claim that its decision to suspend the certification of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline linking Germany directly to Russian gas supplies was made on procedural grounds that have nothing to do with politics.

The informal nature of such conflicts makes it difficult to work out why certain decisions were made. Governments and companies have yet to find the right frameworks for evaluating even their own choices. For example, when it comes to decisions about migration, how should a government prioritize international law, human safety and its own influence? Are trade policies meant to increase profit or national power? Should their goal be to minimize the cost to the consumer in the short-term, or to protect local producers from unfair competition (thereby giving consumers a greater choice over the long term)?

Rather than eliminating tensions between countries, connectivity offers new means of competing and engaging in conflict. No wonder the line between war and peace has become increasingly blurred. Gone is Tolstoy’s world, where alternating periods of open conflict and harmony were clearly delineated. We have entered an era of perpetual conflict, in which most of the combatants and almost all of the victims will be civilians. In what I call “the age of unpeace,” the wretched of the Earth have become unwitting ordnance.

Mark Leonard is director of the European Council on Foreign Relations and the author of “The Age of Unpeace: How Connectivity Causes Conflict” (Bantam Press, 2021). © Project Syndicate, 2021

In a time of both misinformation and too much information, quality journalism is more crucial than ever.
By subscribing, you can help us get the story right.

SUBSCRIBE NOW

You might also like

Charges against Japan immigration authorities over death of Sri Lankan dropped

Japan has opened the door to Ukrainians. Its tech sector may get a boost in return.

From Dhaka to Freetown, climate migration puts cities on alert

PHOTO GALLERY (CLICK TO ENLARGE)

  • The government of Alexander Lukashenko’s has been flying in migrants from the Middle East and other countries into Belarus, and funneling them across the border into the European Union in an attempt to gets sanctions lifted. | REUTERS

[ad_2]

Source link

Tags: agecivilianspawnsunpeacewar
Share30Tweet19

Recommended For You

Charges against Japan immigration authorities over death of Sri Lankan dropped

by 198 Japan News
June 17, 2022
0
Charges against Japan immigration authorities over death of Sri Lankan dropped

Japanese authorities will not be held responsible for the death of a Sri Lankan woman who died while in custody at an immigration center in Nagoya last March,...

Read moreDetails

Japan has opened the door to Ukrainians. Its tech sector may get a boost in return.

by 198 Japan News
June 13, 2022
0
Japan has opened the door to Ukrainians. Its tech sector may get a boost in return.

Prior to the Russian invasion of Ukraine on Feb. 24, Japanese national Izumi Chvykov and her Ukrainian husband, Konstantin, lived in the city of Kharkiv. Not far from...

Read moreDetails

From Dhaka to Freetown, climate migration puts cities on alert

by 198 Japan News
June 10, 2022
0
From Dhaka to Freetown, climate migration puts cities on alert

BEIRA, Mozambique/WASHINGTON – When Mozambican fishmonger Manuel Machava hears that the fishermen have landed a bumper catch of mackerel, crabs or shrimp, he has mixed feelings — pleased...

Read moreDetails

Family of dead Sri Lankan detainee demands apology from Japan government

by 198 Japan News
June 8, 2022
0
Family of dead Sri Lankan detainee demands apology from Japan government

Nagoya – The family of a Sri Lankan woman who died while in custody at an immigration center in central Japan last year demanded an apology from the...

Read moreDetails

Japan allows visits by extended family, fiances and common-law partners

by 198 Japan News
June 3, 2022
0
Japan allows visits by extended family, fiances and common-law partners

Along with Japan’s daily arrival cap having been raised to 20,000, foreign nationals wishing to visit relatives who live in the country are now allowed in, along with...

Read moreDetails
Next Post
RCEP free trade deal to take effect Saturday

RCEP free trade deal to take effect Saturday

Women force change at Indian iPhone plant after enduring bad food and crowded dorms

Women force change at Indian iPhone plant after enduring bad food and crowded dorms

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

  • Trending
  • Comments
  • Latest
Good News stories of 2021: Pandemic heroes, tales of survival, and the legacy of the Tragically Hip

Good News stories of 2021: Pandemic heroes, tales of survival, and the legacy of the Tragically Hip

December 26, 2021
Japanese Wine and Food Pairing in Yoichi, Hokkaido

Japanese Wine and Food Pairing in Yoichi, Hokkaido

January 16, 2022
Russia Seizes Control of Partly Foreign-Owned Energy Project

Russia Seizes Control of Partly Foreign-Owned Energy Project

July 1, 2022
Exotic Markets Launches Dual Currency Note on Solana Blockchain

Exotic Markets Launches Dual Currency Note on Solana Blockchain

May 25, 2022
Global tax reform deal to require U.S. participation to be effective

Global tax reform deal to require U.S. participation to be effective

January 8, 2022
Tensions at an all-time high between Russia, Ukraine | English News | World News | WION

Tensions at an all-time high between Russia, Ukraine | English News | World News | WION

January 29, 2022
FTX to Help Voyager Customers, CEO Says Firm Willing to Deploy ‘Hundreds of Millions’ to Help Crypto Industry – Bitcoin News

FTX to Help Voyager Customers, CEO Says Firm Willing to Deploy ‘Hundreds of Millions’ to Help Crypto Industry – Bitcoin News

0
California governor declares emergency over wildfire near Yosemite

California governor declares emergency over wildfire near Yosemite

0
China accuses Japan of interfering in its internal affairs on Taiwan question

China accuses Japan of interfering in its internal affairs on Taiwan question

0
Kyodo News Digest: July 24, 2022

Kyodo News Digest: July 24, 2022

0
Neymar declares wish to stay at Paris Saint Germain

Neymar declares wish to stay at Paris Saint Germain

0
With an eye on China, Seoul seeks to prevent tech leaks

With an eye on China, Seoul seeks to prevent tech leaks

0
FTX to Help Voyager Customers, CEO Says Firm Willing to Deploy ‘Hundreds of Millions’ to Help Crypto Industry – Bitcoin News

FTX to Help Voyager Customers, CEO Says Firm Willing to Deploy ‘Hundreds of Millions’ to Help Crypto Industry – Bitcoin News

July 24, 2022
California governor declares emergency over wildfire near Yosemite

California governor declares emergency over wildfire near Yosemite

July 24, 2022
China accuses Japan of interfering in its internal affairs on Taiwan question

China accuses Japan of interfering in its internal affairs on Taiwan question

April 8, 2025
Kyodo News Digest: July 24, 2022

Kyodo News Digest: July 24, 2022

July 24, 2022
With an eye on China, Seoul seeks to prevent tech leaks

With an eye on China, Seoul seeks to prevent tech leaks

July 23, 2022
Brands of Baseball Gloves

Brands of Baseball Gloves

July 23, 2022
  • Browse the latest updates from Japan
  • Contact us
  • Cookie Privacy Policy
  • Disclaimer
  • DMCA
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms and Conditions

Copyright © 2025 198 Japan News.

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password?

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
No Result
View All Result
  • Browse the latest updates from Japan
  • Landing Page
  • Buy JNews
  • Support Forum
  • Contact Us

Copyright © 2025 198 Japan News.